The Social Network Show

Do you ever find yourself exhilarated and exhausted by turns? Or maybe delving into seemingly unrelated areas of interest? Those are signs of your creative mind at work! And you may be surprised to learn of the benefits of your unorthodox approach to learning and career.

Today, you’ll be hearing from a Hall of Fame member. The International Adult and Continuing Education Hall of Fame (located at University of Oklahoma) inducted professor Kathy King in two thousand eleven. Professor of Adult and Higher Education at the University of Central Florida in Orlando, Kathy is an award winning author who has published 30 books. Recent ones include Empowering Women through Literacy and The Professor's Guide to Taming Technology, others focus on workplace training and online learning. She is known for her conference sessions and innovative topics and is a popular international keynote and conference speaker, mentor, and professor.

Kathy's areas of research include instructional technology, faculty development, and mentoring. I met Professor King at the Text and Academic Authors Assoc. conference recently. While listening to her presentation there, I realized it was filled with ideas valuable for you, regardless of occupation.The core of Dr. King’s presentation was developing tools to help us meet our goals, whatever they might be. But in terms of setting those goals she emphasized the need to “be who you are as a result of your whole life experience.” That is especially important in the 21st century when the career a young person prepares for through training or higher education may not even exist four years later! What is essential in candidates for any position in any field is flexibility.

It is hard to get rid of the notion that ideally, one finds her niche early, sticks with it, and becomes a recognized expert, if not guru, of the field. I noticed from Dr. King’s CV that her Bachelor’s degree from Brown University was in Biochemistry, followed by a Master’s in theology and missions, a Master’s in adult education, and a doctorate in higher education from Widener University. So she has a number of strands in her life journey, even just looking at her education. Professor King gave us some examples of how earlier interests have been useful, maybe even essential, to later career opportunities.

She applied her early training in biochemistry to mastering technological tools. This is the type of cross-training that must be spelled out in cover letters and given top-billing in résumés or CVs. After researching the organization you will be interviewing with, you can customize your documents to emphasize the life experience that qualifies you for the position.

Like many of us, Dr. King has a lot of different balls in the air. She described some of the tricks and tools she uses to keep them from falling to the floor and rolling off into oblivion. Google calendar can be useful as it can be customized and used across all your devices. Although project management software might be worth the time to master, she enjoys having Excel serve the same purpose. In the interview Dr. King describes how to set up Excel to keep track of a number of simultaneous projects as you move through the steps to accomplishment.

Getting to know and accept your own individual process of writing, or whatever activity your field involves, will help you be the “master of your own universe.” If the timeline you set out proves unrealistic, you simply revise it. When your life consists of many different strands—interest in a wide range of ideas, projects, and so forth—lists and charts help to avoid feeling overwhelmed and helpless in face of the project viewed as a whole.

Dr. Kathleen King of University of Central Florida concludes with inspiring thoughts about attaining a balance in life between accomplishment, health, and activities that nurture your spirit.

Kathleen P. King, Ed.D.  is a Professor of Adult and Higher Education at the University of Central Florida. She earned her doctorate in higher education from Widener University, Chester, Pennsylvania. She also has a masters in education in adult education from Widener, a masters of arts in theology and missions from Columbia International, Columbia, SC, and a bachelors of arts in Biochemistry  from Brown University, Providence, RI.

International Adult and Continuing Education Hall of Fame (located at University of Oklahoma) recognizes Dr. King's contributions to the fields of adult and higher education with her induction in April 2011.  Because of her compelling presentations and insights on the topics of faculty development, distance learning, transformative learning, diversity, 21st century learning needs, and instructional technology, Dr. King is widely sought after as a keynote speaker nationally and internationally. She presents refereed research and presentations at educational and interdisciplinary academic conferences nationally and internationally.

Research and Publications

Awards, Recognitions and Service

Currently, Dr. King is co-editor, Dr. Gabrielle Stroschen of DePaul University, of the refereed journal International Forum on Teaching and Studies as well as serving on several editorial boards of several other premiere journals.  In addition, Dr. King is editor-in-chief for three Information Age Publishing book series: Higher Education, Adult Education and Emerging Technologies. She is also a member of the executive committee of the Commission of Professors of Adult Education (CPAE) (2002-2004, 2009-2010).

You can check out Dr. Kings books on Amazon and connect with her on LinkedIn.

Diane Graber of Cyberwise: No Grownup Left Behind

There’s some fear of the unknown for parents, because their kids are growing up in a world so different from the one they grew up in. Although that was true for an earlier generation or more, dangers seem to have multiplied. Principles of human behavior, though, Diane emphasizes, haven’t changed although the tools available have. Focus on the behaviors, and you won’t have to keep up with every new tool.

Consideration for others, ethical behavior, good manners, need to be modeled by parents even while children are too young to use the tools the parents are using, because little ones are taking it all in. Research shows adults are prone to share personal information online than kids are!

Three things our guest recommends 1. Remember it’s not about the tools, it’s about using them wisely. 2. Be curious about the world kids are living in, especially when they first start using social media, before the door closes in teen years when they are not so eager to have you enter their world. 3. Try the apps out yourself to see what the buzz all about. Your kids can help you learn how.

In teaching the Cyber Civics™ Privacy unit Ms. Graber has her 7th graders read the Privacy Policy of a tool they are interested in using, providing help with the legal terms. In small group discussion the kids go over the policy and voice their reactions to it. “I can’t believe that! That’s not right!” is a common reaction. Some decide they can live without an app that makes unfair demands.

The 3-year middle school Cyber Civics™ curriculum includes in year one, Digital Citizenship, in year two, Information Literacy (how to retrieve, analyze, and use information), and in year three, Media Literacy (how to analyze media messages).

If you’d like to introduce your child’s middle school to the program, contact Diane at cyberwise.org or go to cybercivics.com for a leaflet or free downloads of the actual lessons for one-hour per week of the school year. Her school found that the students’ school scores have risen because so many subject areas are touched upon in the classes and critical thinking skills are being taught. Success depends upon the three communities (teachers, children, and parents) working together, so workshops for teachers and presentations to parents are available.

Front-running apps at present include Instagram and Snapchat. It is important to remind kids that there are a number of ways that Snapchat’s “disappearing” shots can be recorded by others, contrary to the belief that they cannot form part of their digital footprint that stays online. On the plus side, kids can save their ‘snaps’ throughout the day and combine them to form Snapchat stories to tell others about their day. News bits from CNN and National Geographic are distributed to Snapchat users, increasing its value.

It is very important for parents to support and abide by the age requirements of various tools. If you must be 13 to sign up, stick with that and do not let peer pressure or kid pressure coerce you into allowing your children to use the app if they are underage. They will not be protected by the Children’s Online Protection Act (COPA) if they have lied about their age. Furthermore, developmentally children do not typically have the cognitive ability to think ethically before the age of 13.

Diana Graber has long been a producer and marketer of media — including film, video, television, print, and live sports events. Together with her husband, she co-owns Graber Productions, an Emmy-award winning (8 times!) film and video production company. 

In addition to producing the content for CyberWise, No Grownup Left Behind!, Diana is recognized as an expert in “digital literacy.” As Adjunct Faculty of the Media Psychology M.A. program at the Massachusetts School of Professional Psychology (MSPP), she taught “Media Psychology for the 21st Century.” She also developed and teaches a middle-school media literacy program called Cyber Civics™. A regular contributor to The Huffington Post and many other publications, she is tapped often by the media (TV/radio) to comment on tech topics.

She has a B.A. in Communications Studies from UCLA, an M.A. in Media Psychology & Social Change from Fielding Graduate University/UCLA and was a finalist for the NAMLE Research Emerging Scholar Award for her paper,  New Media Literacy Education. Her Cyber Civics program was recognized as an "Innovation in Education" finalist by Project Tomorrow and the O.C. Tech Alliance. She serves on the boards of the Journey Foundation and Wheels4Life and resides with her husband and two “digital native” daughters in Capistrano Beach, CA.

You can connect with Diana on LinkedIn

Can you remember the first time you heard mention of The Cloud? For me it was a TV ad presenting a woman working on family photos—for some reason The Cloud was the answer to all her problems. Since then, this catchy concept has been wholeheartedly embraced by purveyors of convenience. And today almost all electronic goods and services make mention and use of it. But isn’t it an interesting notion! Clouds are light, filmy, puffy, billowy, they are almost immaterial, further perpetuating the illusion that cyberspace is unworldly, not tangible, vague, just out there somewhere in another dimension.

Today you’ll hear about the very physical nature of The Cloud. We will take a journey to the center of the Internet with author Andrew Blum. His writings about architecture, design, technology, urbanism, art, and travel have appeared in numerous publications such as Wired, Vanity Fair, The New Yorker, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Guardian, Popular Science, and Metropolis, where he is a contributing editor. The book you’ll be hearing about on is called Tubes: A Journey to the Center of the Internet, which has been published globally and translated into ten languages. Mr. Blum has degrees in literature from Amherst College and in human geography from the University of Toronto.

What first got Andrew interested enough in this subject to research and write a book about it? He grew increasingly intrigued about what was real in a tangible, physical sense, about the Internet. Maybe it was the squirrel that nibbled through a cable in his Brooklyn backyard, interrupting his service, who started it all. That was certainly a physical aspect to the Internet! Finally, some time later, he learned that from there the cable went underground to a big brown metal box a few neighbors away to join other cables at a junction box, where they were combined into a few strands of glass (fiber optic cable). This process continued toward a “head-end” where resides a cable modem termination system (CMTS), then toward “master head-ends” and the biggest hubs, of which there are only 12 to 13 on earth!

Who maintains these cable gathering stations where different network companies agree to cooperate with others, their competitors, in a process called “peering”? Network engineers who work in the dark, cold, lonely, concrete world of wire cages containing racks of servers with eerily blinking lights. A few times a year they gather together for face-to-face networking and discussion at NANOG (North American Network Operators Group). They not only have to be great trouble-shooters when something in their network of networks goes wrong, they must be diplomats, negotiating sharing agreements between the competing networks they work for.

At the time of recording, it’s been almost two years exactly since Edward Snowden’s revelations about the extent of eavesdropping NSA has been doing. Before that watershed event, Andrew caught a glimpse of the global and physical nature of the phenomenon. At the central Internet hub of Germany, his guide explained to him that national security “siphoned off” 10% of the traffic passing through it. The information kept going, but was copied to be examined. Although the significance of this information escaped him at the time, he now appreciates that eavesdropping on a mammoth scale has been standard operating procedure for years among a variety of governments.

Throughout Tubes: A Journey to the Center of the Internet, Mr. Blum encounters the small world of giant data centers and the humans who run them. Does it resemble a cloud? One of his guides stated, “This has nothing to do with clouds. It has everything to do with being cold!” “The cloud is a building. It works like a factory.” Not to leave us entirely without romance, Blum concludes, “What I understood when I arrived home was that the Internet wasn’t a physical world or a virtual world, but a human world.”

Andrew Blum is the author of Tubes: A Journey to the Center of the Internet, the first book-length look at the physical infrastructure of the global Internet. Blum’s writings about architecture, design, technology, urbanism, art, and travel have appeared in numerous publications, including Metropolis, where he is a contributing editor, Architectural Record, Wired, Vanity Fair, The New Yorker, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Guardian, and Popular Science. Tubes has been published globally and translated into ten languages. Blum has degrees in literature from Amherst College and in human geography from the University of Toronto, and lives in his native New York City with his wife and two children. He is currently writing a new book about the infrastructure of the weather.

You can learn more about Andrew on his website

Spider Graham (co-author of Taking Down Goliath: The Digital Marketing Strategy for Beating Competitors with 100 Times Your Spending Power) talks with Jim Meskauskas, Co-founder and Chief Strategic Officer of Media Darwin. Jim helps clients develop an awesome business communication strategy. He is a medialogist who has spent the last 20 years living, breathing and thinking about how to use media to move people to action. From strategy, planning and buying, to measurement, data tech and operations, he’s got it covered! That’s one of the very cool things we can do here at The Social Network Show—bring you a half hour or so of consultation with national, even worldwide, experts at absolutely no cost to you!!

Jim describes large corporate digital advertising as focusing only on data-driven “puzzle problems.” He feels strongly that there is another kind of problem marketing needs to solve: “mystery problems.” By thinking about why media dollars should be apportioned in a particular way, Jim takes a more philosophical approach requiring intelligent interpretation of customers’ motives. He offers the example of working with Dole fresh vegetables. They needed to ask the usual questions: Who are the target audiences? Where do they live? How is it they’re spending their time? But another essential question was, Why is someone going to be interested in this product? The answer may not be rational, as JP Morgan said, people will give two reasons for doing something, “a good reason and the real reason.” Marketers need to reach not for the rational cortex, but for the older part of the brain, the limbic system, if not the old reptilian brain! (In spite of all that, Dole fresh veggies purchasers’ motives came down to health and convenience.)

Spider points out that in contrast to some of the cringe-worthy marketing out there, which forgets that it is addressing human beings, a better approach involves getting people’s attention in such a way as to start a meaningful conversation. Jim emphasizes that better engineering and technology is not the solution to all marketing problems by saying, “All of human behavior can’t be rendered in a machine-readable form….ultimately the reason somebody is doing something [such as marrying for love or for money] is going to matter when you try to persuade them to choose you over someone else.”

Understanding the motives, the reasons why, of those you are hoping to move to a specific action, is crucial in deciding what you will say.

Mr. Meskauskas describes the non-actions of humans, not countable, therefore not data, as marketing or human behavior dark matter. A promising source that can help researchers observe without influencing is the raw social stream. Collecting and filtering social media, although slanted toward positive experiences, tells a more direct story of what is motivating people than traditional means such as diaries or focus groups. The social stream is the biggest of big data.

Jim Meskauskas

WHO AM I? Jim Meskauskas is a co-founder and Chief Strategic Officer of Media Darwin, a consultancy specializing in strategic planning of commercial communicative action. He's a medialogist who has spent the last 20 years living, breathing and thinking about how to use media to move people to action. From strategy, planning and buying, to measurement, data tech and operations.

WHAT I DO. Approach to all problems logically, mixed with a consideration for the fantastical. First, find what kind of problem it is – a puzzle problem, which requires the right kind and amount of data; or a mystery problem, which requires the right interpretive intelligence based on the right experience. Next, subject that conclusion to a zero-based planning process. This avoids the prejudices of the past while accentuating potentialities of the future in a practical framework.

Outside of that, his likes are horror movies, Southeast Asian cuisine, his wife and his cat -- not necessarily in that order. Dislikes are mean people, people whom text while walking in or out of the subway entrances, and the word “incentivize.”

You can connect with Jim on Pinterest.

"The Spider Graham Series" with guest, Jeremy Dalnes of PULSE INSIGHTS

Spider Graham (co-author of Taking Down Goliath, veteran digital media buyer, seller, and producer, and long-time digital advertising, sales, and marketing practitioner) talks with Jeremy Dalnes about the myriad advantages of micro surveys in getting to know the visitors to your website, online shoppers, or listeners to your podcast. Dalnes, who recently launched Pulseinsights.com, explains how one-question surveys serve as a trail head, an entry point to huge amounts of data that can be analyzed according to the respondents’ position in the sales funnel.

The response rate to traditional surveys is a microscopic 0.5%. Pulse Insights has achieved from 4% to 17% response rates to single-question surveys, which are not interruptive or obtrusive, thus keeping the experience positive. The person who sees the survey can respond as easily as he or she can refuse, as both take just one click.

A business can adopt “agile learning” about its user base, to better shape content strategy or acquisition strategy. The results of the micro survey can be presented integrated with Google analytics, making access a breeze.

The most intriguing comments by Jeremy Dalnes deal with the importance of emotion as a driver of action. As an example, he cites a pharmaceutical company that included a question about belief—Do you believe this treatment will work?” Belief does not show up in Google or other analytics (except through Pulse Insights), but with it, strategists can see differences in segments and begin to understand potential customers presently in the upper levels of the sales funnel.

Dr. J asked Mr. Dalnes, a graduate of Oberlin Conservatory of Music, about the influence of music on his work. He speaks about the importance of learning to listen to the other members of your ensemble (team members) who absolutely must be listening to each other on performance night. The conductor is the CEO whose work is primarily pre-performance, shaping the sound. The individuals’ execution depends upon practice, but to nail it on performance night they must be listening to each other.

Jeremy Dalnes is Co-Founder of Pulse Insights a customer experience optimization platform that leverages voice of customer data combined with deep industry expertise to create an agile learning environment that drives material improvement in the metrics that matter for our clients.

Prior to Pulse Insights, Jeremy served as Worldwide Director of Digital Strategy for Johnson & Johnson Medical Devices where he led global digital strategy to drive customer engagement and loyalty. Previously, Jeremy was VP of E-Business for Panasonic North America, where he was responsible for all online sales and marketing for Consumer Electronics North America. Originally from Chicago, Jeremy has worked in customer acquisition strategy, PR, and online advertising technology both in California and New York for such innovative and entrepreneurial companies such as Home Decor Products, Consumer Health and Wellness Startup, Zeo and Excite.com.

Jeremy is an active conference speaker having participated in numerous industry conferences including Internet Retailer, Shop.org, & Ad:Tech. He received his bachelor's degree in Technology in Music and Related Arts (TIMARA) from the Oberlin Conservatory of Music.

Is the younger generation running digital circles around you? Thanks to our expert guests our listeners are familiar with many guidelines for parents, educators, and adults in general, who are confronting the challenges of the digital age. This episode goes one step farther, because Diana Graber of Cyberwise.org has provided mini courses designed to teach you what research has shown to be the six most important Digital Life Skills.

Ms. Graber earned an M.A. in Media Psychology and Social Change, making her an ideal guest for The Social Network Show. She and Dr. J discuss the importance of getting research findings into the hands of the public. When researchers write primarily for other researchers, too often even the most useful information can become cloaked in jargon with which the general reader is unfamiliar. Diana has translated and organized valuable information in bite-sized chunks as certificate modules available at the very affordable price of $8.99. (cyberwisecert.com) In fact, your first course is completely free.

Schools can subscribe to Cyber Civics™ [http://www.cyberwise.org/#!get-the-cyber-civics-program/c10pf ], years 1 and 2, to provide curriculum in digital literacy training to middle school educators.

Asking children to show you how to use the social apps they are fans of is a great way not only to learn the ropes, but also to establish the custom of being where your kids are, before they reach the teen years when they are may not be so eager to communicate. Diana observes that the frontal lobe, source of judgment, may not completely develop until the age of 25! She notes other developmental milestones that will help you appreciate the opportunity, as well as the challenge, information technology presents.

Diana emphasizes that behavior is far more important that the particular digital tool-du-jour. Although new tools appear almost daily, behavioral principles are evergreen, carrying over from one app to the next!

Diana Graber has long been a producer and marketer of media — including film, video, television, print, and live sports events. Together with her husband, she co-owns Graber Productions, an Emmy-award winning (8 times!) film and video production company. 

In addition to producing the content for CyberWise, No Grownup Left Behind!, Diana is recognized as an expert in “digital literacy.” As Adjunct Faculty of the Media Psychology M.A. program at the Massachusetts School of Professional Psychology (MSPP), she taught “Media Psychology for the 21st Century.” She also developed and teaches a middle-school media literacy program called Cyber Civics™. A regular contributor to The Huffington Post and many other publications, she is tapped often by the media (TV/radio) to comment on tech topics.

She has a B.A. in Communications Studies from UCLA, an M.A. in Media Psychology & Social Change from Fielding Graduate University/UCLA and was a finalist for the NAMLE Research Emerging Scholar Award for her paper,  New Media Literacy Education. Her Cyber Civics program was recognized as an "Innovation in Education" finalist by Project Tomorrow and the O.C. Tech Alliance. She serves on the boards of the Journey Foundation and Wheels4Life and resides with her husband and two “digital native” daughters in Capistrano Beach, CA.

You can connect with Diana on LinkedIn

Jayne (J. A.) Hitchcock is one of many individuals giving their all in the grass-roots, front-line effort to help children and teens cope with cyber abuse. Jayne heads up Working to Halt Online Abuse (haltabuse.org and haltabuseKTD.org) to give not only advice, but hands-on free assistance to adults, as well as kids. Jayne passes on a steady stream of great tips for cyber citizens via Twitter (@Netcrimes) and is joined by her Siberian Husky (@Cybercrimedog) in visits to schools (and on Twitter!).

Dr. J reviews with Jayne her longtime involvement starting with legislation addressing E-mail abuse after being targeted herself, back in 1997. Since then, she has worked continually to help train law enforcement in how to deal effectively and considerately with reports of cybercrime. As J. A. Hitchcock, she has turned her talent as an author to the subject as well. You can read her 2006, second edition, of Net Crimes & Misdemeanors: Outmaneuvering Web Spammers, Stalkers, and Con Artists (with a Foreword by Vint Cerf) and from 2013, True Crime Online: Shocking Stories of Scamming, Stalking, Murder, and Mayhem, which are discussed in our interview.

Ms. Hitchcock explains how Phoebe, "The Cyber Crime Dog", has especially enabled discussion with early elementary school students. Problems online and with smart phones have become more of a problem for that age group in recent years, as online safety training has been aimed at older kids and teens for the most part. But Phoebe had developed cataracts, threatening to limit her participation in cybercrime fighting. Jayne and Dr. J discuss what needed to be done and the help Phoebe’s supporters can offer to offset the high cost of her eye surgery through www.gofundme.com/v5z4sg

Although mass media and social media are great ways to increase awareness and educate the public, one-on-one, face-to-face work such as done by Jayne, and other guests on The Social Network Show, such as Darren and Beth Laur (@crimefighterguy), Rich Guerry (@RichardGuerry) and Carol Todd (@c_todd).

Jayne A. Hitchcock is an author and cyber bullying and cyber crime expert. She volunteers with the U.S. DOJ Office for Victims of Crime, the National Center for Victims of Crime, and law enforcement agencies worldwide. She has worked tirelessly with legislators in the drafting and passing of many of this country's Internet laws.

As president of WHOA (Working to Halt Online Abuse) at haltabuse.org and WHOA-KTD (Kids/Teens Division) at haltabusektd.org, Jayne continues a mission to educate adults and children in online safety.

Jayne conducts law enforcement training for local, county, state, military and federal agencies. Her speaking schedule on cyber crime and cyber bullying includes elementary/middle/high schools, universities and colleges. She also lectures at libraries, conferences, and corporations. She has been featured on Swift Justice, America's Most Wanted, 48 Hours, Good Morning America, Cosmopolitan and TIME magazines, and local, national and international newscasts, and was selected by Lifetime TV as their "Champion For Change."

Jayne's eighth book, Net Crimes & Misdemeanors 2nd edition, covers just about anything that can happen online and how to stay safer (netcrimes.net). Jayne's ninth book, True Crime Online: Shocking Stories of Scamming, Stalking, Murder and Mayhem is now available (truecrime-online.com). She is also on the editorial board of the International Journal of Cyber Crimes and Criminal Justice. She is a member of Operations Security Professionals Society, Sisters In Crime (national and New England), Maine Writers & Publishers Alliance, National Rifle Association (Life Member), The American Legion, and 3rd Marine Division Association (Life Member).

With national concern about the relationship of police and the communities in which they work, The Social Network Show welcomes another episode of the National Crime Prevention Council Series that discusses this issue. Co-host Michelle Boykins, Senior Director of Communications introduces her guest, Sue Rahr, Executive Director of the Washington State Criminal Justice Training Commission and a former Sheriff in King County, Washington.

Sue tells us how important the current national conversation about the relationship of the police and communities, is for the future. She is positive that the new police recruits will change the culture of the police departments because of the current training they are getting and the use of social media to enhance communication about crime. Much of the discussion in today's show was about a report that Sue wrote with a colleague titled, From Warriors to Guardians: Recommitting American Police Culture to Democratic Ideals. The report indicates that law enforcement has drifted off course in building close ties to community members and that the "tough on crime" and "zero tolerance" stance in police departments has had unintended consequences that are not good. Listen to the show to hear about the tough decisions that police officers have to make and what Sue thinks needs to be done to improve community policing.

Susan Rahr, Appointee for Member, President’s Task Force on 21st Century Policing

Susan Rahr is Executive Director of the Washington State Criminal Justice Training Commission, a position she has held since 2012.  From 2005 to 2012, she served as the first female Sheriff in King County, Washington.  Ms. Rahr spent over thirty years as a law enforcement officer, beginning as a patrol officer and undercover narcotics officer.  While serving with the King County Sheriff’s Office, she held various positions including serving as the commander of the Internal Investigations and Gang Units, commander of the Special Investigations Section, and Police Chief of Shoreline, Washington.  Ms. Rahr received a B.A. from Washington State University.

Are you concerned about the police involved shootings and the reactions of the communities around the country? Welcome to another episode of the National Crime Prevention Council Series with Co-host Michelle Boykins, Senior Director of Communications and her guest, Chief Gary MacNamara from the Fairfield Connecticut Police Department.

Chief MacNamara addresses this issue and explains the difference between traditional policing and community policing. In this episode, you will hear about how he believes the police departments can rebuild rapport with communities, even those that have had a long standing history of bad relations. Chief MacNamara also shares with us what he learned about community relations after being a first responder to the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting and shares his thoughts on the pros and cons of using body cameras.

Chief Gary MacNamara

B.S. Law Enforcement Science - University of New Haven, Connecticut

Masters Degree in Public Administration - University of New Haven, Connecticut

Chief MacNamara is a 22 year veteran of the Fairfield Connecticut Police Department, starting as a patrol officer in 1988. There he served as a Field Training Officer and was temporarily assigned to an Auto Theft Task Force. He has served the department as a Detective, Detective Sergeant, Lieutenant, and Captain. He has recently been serving the department as Deputy Chief. His duties include overseeing the Field Services Division of the Fairfield Police Department, covering patrol, investigations and Special Services. In the past he has overseen the Emergency Response Team, Hostage Negotiators, Training Unit, Internal Affairs, Accreditation and Public Information.

In 2002, he was the lead negotiator at Fairfield University where he successfully negotiated the release of 27 students and a professor held hostage on the campus, by a subject claiming to possess an explosive device. That same year, 2002, MacNamara was a Fairfield County Hero Award nominee for courage, dedication and commitment to Public service, and Police officer of the year for the Bridgeport Exchange Club.

Chief MacNamara has taught in the area of Critical Incident Response, as well as Interview and Interrogation techniques, auto theft, internet safety for both children and parents as well as in the areas of school violence and hostage negotiations, sharing his experiences during the University incident. MacNamara is a 2004 graduate of the FBI National Academy (219), as well as a 2009 graduate of the FBI LEEDS Session #61. He is also an adjunct professor at POST University.

He was also a former journalist for the Justice Journal where he wrote a monthly column called "What if. ", and has appeared as the co-host, with Lt. Perez, of a local public access television series “Just the facts”. He has also appeared on the NBC Today Show, Geraldo Show, MSNBC Live, Dateline NBC and the Line-up on Fox News.

The Boston Red Sox named clinical and social psychologist Dr. Englander Most Valuable Educator of 2013 because of her work in technological aggression and how it interacts with peer abusiveness in general. She was the Special Editor for the Cyberbullying issue of the Journal of Social Sciences, and has authored about a hundred articles in academic journals and books. She is a frequent guest on The Social Network Show.

For this episode, Dr. J asked Professor Englander to sketch out the important issues parents face with regard to technology as their child grows. Even when your child is still an infant or toddler, it is helpful to think through what your family policy about “screen time” should be. The first thing to consider is one’s own use of screens, be they computers, smart phones, tablets, or even television. Dr. Englander explains why info tech can impact human development, even at or perhaps especially at, a very young age. What exactly are babies and toddlers missing out on if parents are interacting with their devices, rather than with their child?

As children enter school age, parents might ask, “Is there a particular age when I should let my child have a smart phone?” Dr. Englander says there is no other question she is asked as often as that one! She explains the factors to consider, including a surprising one dealing with family economics. And adolescence, of course, raises many info tech issues, and they are also discussed in this episode.

Elizabeth Kandel Englander is a professor of psychology and the founder and director of the Massachusetts Aggression Reduction Center at Bridgewater State University, which delivers anti-violence and anti-bullying programs, resources, and research for the state of Massachusetts. She is the author of the book, Bullying and Cyberbullying: What Every Educator Needs to Know (Harvard Education Press; October 2013).

Learn more about Dr. Englander on her website.