CSC151 2009F, Class 42: Association Lists

Admin:
* Class seems underpopulated today.
* Reading for Tuesday: Design Patterns and Higher-Order Procedures.  
  * Warning: You may find that it repeats some things you learned 
    earlier in this semester.  
  * That's okay, we want you to have the reinforcement.
* Are there questions on the project?
  * Remember: I dropped HW8 so that you'd spend a bit more time on 
    the project proposal for Wednesday
* Friday's S&B article on the campus climate survey reinforced to me 
  that I want to spend a bit more class time on that survey.  
  * http://www.thesandb.com/news/campus-climate-assesment-brings-to-light-the-concerns-of-marginalized-groups.html
  * http://www.grinnell.edu/offices/president/diversity/

Overview:
* Campus Climate
* Association Lists
  * Storing information in tables.
  * Representing table entries as lists.
  * Representing tables as lists.
  * Association lists: Scheme's standard table representation.
  * Implementing key association list procedures.

CAMPUS CLIMATE

Why are we doing this?
  "'How can you actually reach out to the students that weren’t there?' ... To deal with this challenge, Bernal intends to send out campus-wide emails and post information on the Grinnell website regarding suggestions made in response to the results of the assessment." (Quote taken from S&B article.)

Warning: I don't have answers (I wish I did).  But I think talking about the
issues are one way we start to address them.

Basic Questions
* What parts do you find most concerning?
* What can *we* do about it?

Concerning things
* We seem to be doing worse than peer institutions
  * People less comfortable
  * More bias (or experience thereof)

Some things S&B reported as concerning
* "[O]ver 60% of employees and students reported that they were very comfortable and comfortable with the climate at Grinnell College and in their department or work unit."  (Quote taken from executive summary)
  * Issue: There seems to be a discrepancy between what we say ("Grinnell
    is an open and friendly place") and what many of us experience.
    The experience is worse when you're expecting the place to be more
    positive.

Some things that concern Sam
* Report from faculty meeting that a large number of students feel that 
  they are "called out" in class because of their race/gender/etc.
  * Particularly troubling in face of stereotype threat
  * Example from "Predictably Irrational"
* 28 respondents report having been sexually assaulted while at Grinnell 
  College
* "30% (n = 214) of respondents had personally experienced offensive, hostile, exclusionary, or intimidating conduct that interfered unreasonably with their ability to work or learn on campus."

* Sam also worries that the data have been reported inconsistently, 
  but that's a different issue.

Responding:
* Realize that 40% of your peers feel uncomfortable here; even
  acknoledging that can help them
* TAKE THE TIME TO READ THE REPORT (OR AT LEAST THE SUMMARY)
  (OR AT LEAST THE PARTIALLY-ACCURATE S&B ARTICLE)
* Talk to people outside your social group
* Realize that only a single instance of intimidating conduct can make people
  uncomfortable being at the institution

Do the lab