Life: September 2005 Archives

I received a bit of a jolt the other day, when a form letter e-mailed from Case informed me that one of my freshman year professors, Ignacio Ocasio (better known as Doc Oc), had died. In addition to the e-mail, I found a short two page article in the Summer 2005 Case Magazine about him. Click on his picture below for the full article:

Some additional links are a campus news article, and a blog.

What I remember most about Doc Oc was his passion for teaching. And when I say teaching, I mean actually teaching. The process of taking some new and foreign information, and helping a person to learn it, to the point that they understand it. Chemistry may not have been my thing, but I do appreciate the fact that Doc Oc took the time, effort, and energy to teach it to me.

Finding someone who is a good teacher is very rare in this world -- especially in higher education. That is what made Doc Oc special. And it is why I will always remember him.

-Andy.

Stumbled across an interesting article yesterday, that simultaneously is and is not about hurricane Katrina. In October of last year, National Geographic did an article about Louisiana's Wetlands. The first four paragraphs lay out, in frightening detail, exactly what happened with hurricane Katrina.

It seems like there has been a failure of government, both in the time that preceded Katrina, and with what has occurred since. The optimist in me hopes that the government is held accountable, and grows and evolves to a better place as a result. But the pessimist in me doesn't think that anything is really going to change. :(

-Andy.