Element Print

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My element is Tungsten and it’s atomic number is 74. My element was discovered by Irish chemist Peter Woulfe from his analysis of the mineral wolframite. Tungsten was isolated as tungstic oxide (WO3) in Sweden by Carl W. Scheele in 1781. Tungsten is widely used in older style electric bulbs and electronic tubes. It is also used as the filament in halogen tungsten lamp, and it is used in heavy metal alloys due to its hardness.

I decided to draw and grenade because Tungsten is used in bullets, missiles and grenades. As I was looking at images I saw a tattoo of an exploding grenade and I thought it looked nice so I decided to draw it. To make the print I first sketched the grenade a few times and finally once I liked one of them I drew it nicely. Then after the drawing was finished I had to draw it again onto onion paper so that I could trace over it to engrave the styrofoam. Then I covered it with ink and transferred/printed it onto paper.

If I printed again I would spend more time drawing to attempt to make the drawing even better. I also would add more paint so that the entire image was printed evenly. I enjoyed the research the most because I found what I learned interesting and I was learning a lot of different facts. For the research I had to look at all the aspects of my element, what it is used for, where it is found, where, when and who discovered it, where is it mined, and it’s facts such as it atomic mass, atomic number and symbol.

Justin's Matt Print

Matt print
Matt print
 
My element is tin. Tin is a metal, that is often used to coat other metals. This helps to prevent corrosion. The atomic number of tin is 50. Tin has been used since 3000 BCE. It was used to make art, and was one of the most commonly used metals. I chosed to use an altoids container because an altoids container is made of tin. I thought this was an interesting way to portray tin, because not many people would have thought of that. To make the print I had to draw the altoids container backwards so the print would come out correctly. If I were to do this print over again I would spend a lot more time working on the details of the print. I could have made the design a lot more realistic which i think is necessary. I enjoyed thinking creatively to figure out a way to portray my element. It was interesting, I went from drawing the tin man  from the Wizard of Oz to a couple other ideas before this idea had came to me.

Element Print

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Radon was discovered by Friedrich Ernst Dorn a german chemist. Radon was found when chemist realized a gas emitting from other radioactive elements. the residue left from the elements when they breakdown is radon. 86 is the atomic number, 222 is the atomic mass. For this element a lot of images immediately popped into mind with gas masks and explosions but that seemed too easy and unoriginal. I thought of a character named Radioactive Man from the Simpsons and realized that he fit perfectly with the properties of radon. It was a different and fun way to represent Radon.

The first step to make this print was to sketch out my image on a 4x6 rectangle. After we had the perfect sketch we laid tracing paper on top and traced the image onto the tracing paper. That is when we were given our plate to trace the image one last time onto to the plate. We had to make sure that we trcaed the image on the plate backwards so that when would print it, it would be right side up. We had paint on a tray and used the paint roller to evenly spread the paint onto our plate. We printed the image onto a sheet of paper and used a wooden spoon to smooth out the paint and details on the paper. Then we cut out the border and glued the image on.

If i were to make this print a second time I would make a more complex image so that it would be more visually pleasing and have the process be more precise. also i wish i would've had spread the paint evenly so that there wouldn't be all of those white lines. I enjoyed the painting and actual printing the most because it was really fun having our image come to life and printed onto the paper.

Copper

My element was copper. its atomic number is 29 and has a few different uses. it was first discovered on a island as small beads in prehistoric times. Now, it's used as water pipes in houses and was even used to make Lady Liberty and bullet shells, which sparked my imagery. i saw that some bullet shells were made with copper and i found that very interesting because i never knew that. i always thought it was made of another metal. so instead of using a penny or a pipe as my design, i used what i learned and made a bullets because of the copper shells bullets have. when creating my print, i had to first draw it on paper then trace it on tracing paper. i had to put it on tracing paper so that i can flip the image backwards so the words can be read when the print is finished. we then traced our image on a styrofoam plate. this was going to be the stamp. after the image was traced, we then applied paint to the plate and put the image on paper. when the plate was on peper, we had to apply pressure to the plate so that all the ink falls from the plate to the paper. when the ink made its mark, the image was finished. overall, i liked my image, but i feel like i would change some things about it. i wish i applied more pressure to the edges of my project because not all of the paint made a mark on the sides. i thik i would have also gotten rid of all the negative space so the image can pop out more. my favorite part was making the design because i learned a lot about copper and its uses. it was also very relaxing to draw. this project was fun and i like my results.
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Print/Matt

Myart
Myart
My element is Arsenic (AS) and its number is 33. My element was said to have been discovered by the Chinese, Greek, and the Egyptians. But, the only person on record is Albertus Magnus. It was said that in 1250 when he heated up soap with orpiment. It was then used mainly for rat poison, pest insecticides, and even cancer treatments. I chose to draw that because it reminds me of a bottle of poison. So, the "A" is the bottle and in the middle there's a skull with a cross to represent it's danger. Then, I added the "S" next to a handle. The bottom part represents a mouse trap, so it's almost like the "S" is getting trapped. After figuring out this image I then had to trace it onto a smaller thin paper. From there I transferred my art onto a plate. This plate was then dipped in ink and stamped onto a paper. Afterwards, I hung up my paint, then when dried, I gave it a border. I would have chosen a drawing with more lines because since I had a lot of negative space, it was hard to see the positive. But, I enjoyed printing my art and turning them into stamps. It was cool to see my art almost come to life and have color in it.

Alexis Sweeney Week 9 - Day 1 & 2 print/matt

My element is Silver (Ag) and has the atomic number of 47. It is one of the first elements discovered by humans and can be used for killing bacteria, soaps, and jewelry. I got the idea for the silver spoons design after doing a google search of "things made from Silver." One of the first things that popped up were were beautiful spoons that I felt the urge to copy down. Of course I didn't get most detail but the general outline is there. To make the print, I first did research about negative space to prep for the art work. Next, I used a thin piece of paper to draw my design, then after, I traced it onto a piece of foam. After that, I rolled on silver colored paint to then transfer it onto a piece of paper. When that was done I cut out a 5x7" piece of construction paper and glued it onto the surface. If done this a second time, I would have waited for the paint to dry a bit longer because it was still tacky when I glued, and I most enjoyed rolling on the silver paint. 
Hhhhhhhhhh
Hhhhhhhhhh

Nickel

My element is Nickel, also knows as Ni, and the atomic number being 58.93. MY element was first found in Sweden by Axel Fredrik Cronstedt in 1751. The nickel it's mostly used to make objects, like keys, zippers, jewelry, pens, coins and many more. I got the idea for this image of drawing the nickel as demon by reading about the origin of the name it was given. Nickel comes from the word kupfernickel which means Devil's Copper and that gave me the idea of drawing this image. I went thru figuring out to make the nickel look evil and how to make it all look like a demon. If I did this again I would've added more detail onto the fire to make it look more like fire. I actually liked learning about the origin of the word "nickel". First I did some research then I was inspired by "Copper Demon" (original name) and decided to draw it and I loved the way the drawing came out because I'm the best artist.
Nickel
Nickel

Print/Matt Elements

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My element is chlorine. Its atomic number is 17. Chlorine is usally used to clean pools and water. Yet in WW2 they were used for toxic gasses. Chlorine was actually made by accident. At first I wanted to make a swimming pool but I thought that was very plain, and I thought about a chlorine bottle. The little bubble at the top is gas. I drew gas there because at room temperature chlorine is gas. One thing I would change would probably be where the number 17 is on the bottle. My favorite part of this project would be putting the color on the paper because we all had different elements and little color choices so not everything could be its own color. 

Printmaking

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​My element is Krypton and the atomic number is 36. My elements symbol is Kr and it was discovered by an english chemist while he was studying liquified air. You can use Krypton in certain light bulbs and in high speed photography. The way I got my idea for this print was that I found out Krypton is a noble gas and when I thought of noble I thought of Kings and queens. If you look closely you can see my letters and numbers form a crown. If I had more time to do this print I would have taken more time to make sure that every part of the print was covered in paint. I enojyed the part of designing and drawing because I could dig deep into the meaning of my element and designing things are fun for me. Overall this project was different then anything we have done and it was very fun. 

Building Park in Communities: Finishing Up

In my last two blog post I talked about how I was interesting in the subject of Building Parks in Communities. In the first blog I went into detail about the statistics about the crime rate and the poverty in certain areas with and without parks and compared them. In my second blog post I explained how I wasn’t able to get my interview because of the lack of response.

Since I wasn’t able to have an interview I decided to continue on to my agent of change. I ultimately decided to do an event in a park. I heard that Jayden Tull’s topic was excercise and they would go hand and hand. So we collabed and came up with the idea to have a workout session at a park. We made sure to text everyone that we knew would be able to come out and waited for their responses.

We got a good amount of responses and went to Penn Park to do our workout session. When we arrived we decided that it would be way more fun to play a game of soccer.
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It would have been pretty boring to just do exercises so we did a game that would have us exercise but we would also have fun doing. That’s why we chose to do soccer. We played for about an hour before we all went our separate ways and went home.

I loved the experience that we had at the session. The energy was awesome and it was obvious that everyone wanted to be at the session. I really enjoyed interacting with the students that came out. Not only were we able to do a part of a project but, we also had fun while doing it. I never thought that I would have this much fun while doing a project.

We made a change at the session. We were able to inform students that you  an excercise and have fun at the same time. This was very important because we were able to make a change in students lives. I am really confident that the students that came to the session will be exercising over the summer.

I really enjoyed this project. As I worked on this project I was happy that I was able to express a topic that I really wanted to invest in for school.


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It gave me a chance to really connect with the topic personally. With the knowledge that I have now it made me focus more on trying to improve communities. Especially my community, and now I have an idea on why the parks are important.

I learned that I really care about my community because of this project. I spent so much time thinking about how to contribute to the cause. I also learned that even though I go through a tough situation, if I persevere through it I can finish strong. Parks are also really important to me which was really a surprise. Check out my Annotated Bibliography for more information.


Building Parks in Communities: Taking the Necessary Steps

In my last blog post I wrote about my topic which was Building Parks in Communities. I went into detail of how I was going to get my information from my interview. I also described how the area I lived in had a high crime and poverty rate. I provided statistics on why the parks were important and gave my personal connection to my topic. Now you will find out how my interview went.

My first choice for my interview was Michael Nutter but, then I started to think about how busy he might have been. So I decided to switch him out for Councilman Kenyatta Johnson. I chose him because he put 3 million dollars into renovating and building parks all over philadelphia. I found out about him by trying to look for important people that would have authority about change in Philadelphia. I saw a couple of councilman but, Councilman Kenyatta stood out to me because of the areas he improved. He focused on low income areas that really need the parks and renovation into the area.

Once I got his contact information I emailed him right away. I waited a couple of week and there was no response.
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Screenshot 2017-06-08 at 5.02.25 PM
I waited a couple of more days because I thought he was just a really busy man but, I still had no response. So I searched online to find out where his office was and it turned out to be at city hall. In that same week I went to his office to see if I would be able to talk to him. Once I got there I found out that he had already left for the day. Since I told them about my project they gave me his schedulers contact information.

So it was the next day and I decided to email her.


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Screenshot 2017-06-08 at 5.19.10 PM
So like I did for Councilman Kenyatta Johnson I waited and just like Kenyatta Johnson there was no reply. I never had the time to go back up to city hall again but, I really tried to get the interview. Next time I am thinking about having an interview I am going to make sure that there is a backup person for me to interview.

After this whole situation I still had to figure what I was going to do for my agent of change. I had a couple of ideas in mind which included me raisng money to help an organization build a park, provide a slide show to my advisory, or have an event at a park. I wrestled with these ideas for weeks. Trying to figure out which idea I would be able to do in the amount of time that I had. I was moved to do a presentation to my advisory because thats what alot of my classmates were doing. I enjoyed all of the research that I have done so far. Styed tuned for my next blog post to find out what I ultimately chose. If you want more information check out my Annotated Bibliography.


Batman: Under The Red Hood (as a western)

We all love superheroes. Whether it be Spiderman or Batman, many people find themselves engaged by these types of stories. Because of this, most people fantasize about what alternate versions of these heroes would look like and how their worlds and narratives change because of this. That is what my project focuses on. My conversion takes the neo-noir superhero story of Batman and puts a western twist on the setting, props, and production. For this project I will be recreating the opening scene, where the Joker is holding Robin (Jason Todd) hostage while trying to draw out Batman to save him

 

I chose to turn this movie scene into a Spaghetti Western type of film because I felt like these universes and the characters that reside within them have a lot more in common than most people think. Batman, in a way, could be considered a very secluded and nomadic figure similar to how someone like Blondie acts in The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly. He has a strict code of justice that he follows and takes along with him throughout his adventures in Gotham City. Robin, specifically Jason Todd who eventually becomes the Red Hood, could be seen as his partner stands as an anti-hero towards Batman himself as there are many things that they are at odds about. It is for this reason that I chose to do this type of conversion for my storyboard, The characters and stories hold a lot of parallels for it to not be able to work. Another things about the genre of spaghetti westerns is the cinematographic choices that directors like Sergio Leone use to give them that gritty feeling of the American West in their films. I noticed that in scenes during different dialogue segments were not interrupted at all by cuts or any other technique that transitions into another shot. I also noticed that there is very little non-diegetic noise which means that there are very little times in which things like the soundtrack or any other noises that only the audience hears are cued to go off. Because the setting would have to take place in the American West, the scene would take place in some sort of old and run-down farmhouse or warehouse. This would add a much older feel to the scene and will make the overall feel of the scene even more raw and intense.



Link to StoryBoard:
https://docs.google.com/a/scienceleadership.org/document/d/1sZNQ-S8rdm1DtfJqXVTqGi40vAsSov2g-c-Yynk9A6U/edit?usp=sharing

Donald Moses: Palladium

 

 

 

 

My element is Palladium which is referred to as Pd on the periodic table and its atomic number is 46. My element was founded by William Hyde Wollaston in 1803 after melting platinum with acids and found little pieces of palladium. Uses for palladium today include catalytic converters for cars, jewelry, and dentistry tools. One fun fact is that palladium was used for cold fusion research. Well I made the 46th as it was so I had more room for the Pd as I made Pd look like it had pieces of palladium like when Wollaston first discovered palladium. First I drew the template into a 4 x 6” square. Then I drew the image on a small piece of paper that was see through. Then I flipped the traced picture onto a piece of foam then pressed the lines of the drawing so that those parts would be my negative space you could say. Then I took a roller with some paint on it and I tried my best to make 6 good prints. If their was anything I would do differently would be when making the prints I took some paint off the roller as some of my images I could barely see the lines. I would say trying to make the prints with the roller as it was enjoyable to try and was hard to get right.


Post #3 - The Video is Up - Sam Gualtieri

Hi, I’m Sam Gualtieri. For my first blog post, I discussed the concept of the technological singularity and how realistic it was. In my second blog post, I reviewed the interview I had just done and discussed the more realistic dangers of computer technology and what should be done to prevent them, as well as what the majority of people thought about the subject.


My subject is something that’s only beginning to show itself as a problem in our society. Many parents have started to find problems with how the internet interrupts their children's social interactions. This is true for basically all ages, and is far from the only problem that comes with computer technology, but it’s one of the most popular ones to be protested. However, there’s more to this story. Computers are an incredibly powerful tool, and many worry that one day they may become too smart and be beyond our control. However, as Mr. Kamal pointed out to me in my interview, the problem isn’t software (or other things) being too smart, but too stupid.


It’s a powerful tool, and has no foolproof way to stop itself from getting out of the hands of someone with dangerous intent. For my Agent of Change, I created an informational video and put it on youtube. The best way I can describe it is a Vox-style educational video. The video contains 6 recommended guidelines recommending questions to ask yourself before creating a new technology.  The goal is to share this out as far as possible and maybe make those guidelines mainstream. The questions are:



  1. How much will it cost to create and maintain?

    1. Are the materials too expensive for mass productions?

      1. On that note, would it be smart to use this material environmentally?

  2. Could my product be a danger to the user in any situation?

    1. Electric shock? Exploding? Sentiance?

  3. How could my product be used with negative intent and what can I do to  prevent this?

    1. How powerful is my tool?

    2. Could it be used to hurt people? (physically, online)

  4. How easy should my product be to acquire? (commercial or specific market)

    1. Should people be able to order it online, or should there be legal requirements involved?

  5. Would this product replace human jobs? How many?

    1. While maybe it could be convenient for companies, how many working class people would be let go?

  6. What are the benefits of my product? Does it justify these risks?

    1. What does my product do and how beneficial is it to the world?

    2. Have I found many problems looking through these past problems?

    3. Are they worth risking for the sake of the product?

 

Overall, I’m ok with my video. I hate everything I make, as do many content creators of any creative medium. The timing is weird in places, and it can be very dense, but it also looks really nice. Mr. Kamal had a lot of interesting things to say and it was difficult to try to cut it down. In the end I wish I could have made his part shorter, but there was just so much good stuff. I’m passionate about this subject, yet I learned that I don’t know as much as I thought I did, and compiling all that into a video is hard. There are plenty of things about this video that I wish I did differently. The transitions from The Singularity to general safety with technology isn’t really explained outside of Mr. Kamal sort of changing the subject. I still need to post this link on all my social media and try to get people to share it. Otherwise, I’m done.

 

Annotated Bibliography:

 


Negative Space Cut Out

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Negative space is the spaces between and around a drawing or object. This means the outside of an object forms a shape that can either be positive (the white) or the negative (the part that is filled in). Either way you cut it out, you will be left with a silhouette-look to your object.

To find the negative spacing in my picture, I cut out all of the positive or lighter shaded parts of the picture. This includes the windows and grass on the ground.

Negative spacing is helpful to artist because it defines the drawing, the negative spacing also brings a balance between outline and fill in. Negative spacing in art gives the piece of artwork a more solid,as well as create more shapes when you take a closer look.

Negative spacing does enhance our drawings far more than we think. It gives us time to focus on one part at a time, if we had everything in one big mass of colors, we would not look as closely. We can also take more time to notice the shapes that positive space makes.

Legal Immigration

I’m Alina and this is my final blog post for You and the World project. In my first blog post I talked about why immigration is illegal and the pros and cons of immigration. Another thing is that I talked about what immigrants are struggling to do just to get in the United States. After that on my second blog post, I interviewed two of my friends who were immigrants. During my second blog post I asked them the same questions and both of them have two different answers as their experience of being an immigrant.If you want to take a look, here is Simon’s interview transcript and here is Sarah’s interview transcript. And now for my final blog post I did a Agent of Change at Science Leadership Academy.

What is an Agent of Change you might ask, well an Agent of Change is when you want to change that situation to a solution that will allow people to participate in. For my Agent of Change, I did a bake sale in school outside of the office. My bake sale was on June 6th during lunch. I did this fundraiser to help The National Immigration Service Directory so they can help immigrant have an affordable job to work at and to help immigrants come to America to have a better life style.

During my bake sale, my goal was to raise $50.00. But while selling doughnuts and cookies, I raised about $55.00. I exceeded my goal which was a good thing because the more the better. With this money, it could help immigrants live a better lifestyle in America then as they did back in their old country. Another thing is that with this money it could help immigrants not get deported back to their country.

Why did I do a bake sale you may ask? Well, a bake sale is easier than spending a lot of money doing a run or hosting an event. Doing a bake sale was really fun because you get to experience handling money and meeting new people.

My experience with the bake sale was very nervous because I was afraid that nobody will buy my baked goods but instead there was a lot of people who came and bought the baked goods. The best thing was that I get to donate the money to the National Immigration Service Directory.

 

Success In the Path of Graffiti

Chandrea Lack

June 9, 2017

Success In the Graffiti Run

In my first blog post, I have talked about the problems that graffiti brought to our community and how it shouldn’t be considered vandalism by the age groups of 12 to 19. They do it to express how they feel in a manner where it is shown to themselves and it brings some of them names and fame, but the fame comes after being heard, you do that big change or that big thing then you get heard. For my second blog post I explained the detailed areas of why graffiti was not considered art from a law’s point of view and it showed that the police were to assume whoever carried a can of spray paint was vandalizing property which I thought was very immature of them to just start assuming. Graffiti is art like any other form of art. It shouldn’t be outlawed because it’s a release of feelings, the rebellious teen spirit. Graffiti has messages in them too they express you.

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My experience doing this event drove me into learning so many things. I learned how to manage my time well and give people time to show up, when to order the food, how long each of the activity we were going to play for and when we were going to leave. I also learned how to create a decent poster people would look at to come to my event. A New Design (6).jpg

The poster was spread all through social media and was known to some students but some could not make it.

 

For my “Agent of Change” it consisted of hosting a “Graffiti Run”. The run was held at a park in South Philly called FDR park (Franklin Delano Roosevelt). The area that we went to was a field beside a skatepark with a ton of graffiti art which stood out while I hosted the activities.  Involved in this run were freshmen from SLA coming out to support my project. Around 20 others showed up to the graffiti run. This event wouldn’t be made possible if I didn’t have my helpers. They didn’t just help support the run but also helped set up a lot of the equipment. During the graffiti run, I gave out food, drinks, and colored powder. The food and drinks were to help the students if they needed a small boost or a little more energy after the running and activities and the colored powder was just to make the theme interesting. Those who came also brought some stuff of their own to support the idea of just having fun and expressing how they felt like how the walls of the skatepark felt with all of the drawings on the walls they were supportive as they brought a football, frisbee, volleyball, basketball, and skateboards. The day overall was very fun to host but also stressful but I was happy to hear back that everyone had a good time and that it was hosted very well.  

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Potassium

My element was Potassium, Atomic number 19. it was discovered by Sir Humphry Davy through the process of electrolysis way back in 1807. it's name was derived from the word English word Potash, which is where it can be found. Potassium is an Alkali metal, which is group 1 of the periodic table. 

Potassium can be found in foods like bananas, avocados, fish, potatoes and more. It is used in fertilizers and also in the making of glass. The idea for my image was based on how potassium is used in fertilizers and can also be found in natural foods. So I drew a vine, in the shape of a K because K is the symbol for that element. (you can see the K better if you turn it to the side or tilt your head). I drew this vine to represent plants and growth. (fertilizers help plants grow, and those potassium rich foods help people grow). 

To do this project, I had to do research on the element, which luckily was easy enough for me because I already had done a project on this element before. Then i had to think of an image that could represent this element and be 4X6'' (not bananas! That's boring). at first i wanted to draw stained glass because it is used in the making of glass, but I didn't like the way it turned out, so I decided I wanted to do a K in calligraphy. eventually it started to look like a plant so I continued with that idea and drew leaves. After the drawing I traced it onto a piece of parchment paper and turned it so that it was backwards and traced that onto my plate. After that, I rolled paint onto my plate, stamped it onto a piece of white paper, and chose the neatest nicest ones to be matted. 

I then cut my image to the right size, 4X6''. To Matt my images, I chose a piece of construction paper and measured it to be 6X8". finally I glued my cut image down to the middle of the paper so that it has a 1'' boarder. there aren't many things that I would do differently because to be completely honest i loved this final project and i think it turned out well. I think the only thing I would do differently is be more careful with the paint, because I made a few stamps and kept messing them up because I wasn't careful. 

My favorite part of this project was the designing process. I like to draw and even though I was frustrated a lot, the final outcome was amazing in my opinion. I think it was very creative and i thought outside of the box for this one. 

You love marijuana???

English 9

You and the world

 

 

                                                               You love marijuana

Hello, My name is Josiah Mast and I have been doing a you and the world project in my english class on the topic of Marijuana. In my last post (https://scienceleadership.org/people/jmast) I talked about how if marijuana is legalized our city could make a lot of money to fix up rough communities and other places that need to be worked on. I was very excited to get started on this project and went with my head down just thinking about how I could make marijuana legalized. I thought first I could start with a survey(https://docs.google.com/a/scienceleadership.org/forms/d/1QiJSDplCavXZuHSKYoYpedm0p03r1TYhDciHMGe-nmg/edit) and than show the results to the principle and prove that he was not letting people express themselves through things that are not considered to be “promoting something that is not okay in today’s society”. People said things like “Josiah you can’t just walk into the principal's office and change his mind. That’s just not how it works”. In my mind I was saying that they were right and that I should slow the pace down but in my heart though I was just saying things don’t just become legal you have to fight for it. So I than went back to the survey idea and started having people fill it out. I received 81 responses on my survey(all anonymous) and I really felt that I was giving the people of SLA a chance to share their feelings on a topic that has kind of been shunned by the elders of the school.

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                      This photo is from my survey and is answered by people from different grades and schools

 

 

I was very happy with the results I got but I knew that this little survey was not going to change the mind of our principle. I came in luck when Madison siegel approached me to tell me about her aunt who is fighting in the state of Pennsylvania to make marijuana legal. This was just the thing I needed. It was someone I could write letter to or talk to who had an actual say in talking to the state of Pennsylvania on making marijuana legal for medical and recreational uses. This was also happening when I was getting flooded with survey responses. I was saying to myself that I could possibly pull this off. I could possibly walk into SLA with marijuana socks and not be told to take them off. I could do this. I started to exchange letters with Madison’s aunt so that we could talk about what I could do in SLA to try and change what was happening. I than decided to go for help from the people that did my survey. I had done a few written response questions and wanted to see if there was anything helpful in their writings that I could try. Screenshot 2017-06-08 at 10.16.54 PM.png

                                                            Some of the results from my survey

 

That is all of the project that I have done right now but I believe for my slate post 3 I will have everything finished and ready to go so that I can or have made a difference in the community around me. If you would like to do some research on your own here is a link to my bibliography.https://docs.google.com/document/d/1LrJEKPdStKFPDAbwneFWhu-ehf2GsNKtHF3ymUBM-Os/edit

The Big change

The Big Change

 

For the past month, I have been doing research on problematic family homes and as people say you learn more and more each day. In my first blog post, I talked about this problem and how much it meant to me and coming closer to how I can make a change about what’s going on. In my second blog post, I interviewed a friend of mine who goes to my school who had gone through a struggled group home.Knowing that people doesn’t know his background story it’s hard to tell people that this kind of stuff goes on, but I am proud of him for sharing his story with me and getting hard things off his shoulders. This topic has really been important to me because if I was in this position, I wouldn’t know what to do and seeing that children in these homes are sometimes scared and they don’t tell anyone what goes on. So this is where my agent of change come in. To see all my sources you can look at my annotated biography.

For my agent of change, I choose to raise and donate money to a local organization called “Turning Points for Children.”  I choose this organization because it connects to my topic of this project so well and I was very excited to see they had a donation option. Right away when I looked into the website, I immediately knew that I wanted to raise money for these children. Me personally I love children and seeing all types of children like those  in foster homes, makes me up set due to the fact that some of these children are really young and to see how  they don’t have what I had as a child.

On Thursday June 8, 2017, I sold water ice to students at my school for $1 to raise money to donate to the organization. I had a goal to make $100. I came out a little short but I was still excited to see how many people came out to but the water ice and for me to explain the cost of doing it. As I go home ready to make the donation it makes me so happy to do this. I would probably be shy to do it face to face but i would love to share how much I care about the children in foster homes to see what I don’t have. This wasn’t a big change but it’s a big and great start to it.

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Notice Youth Violence

Hey I’m Ben as you know I’m doing a project for English class called you and the world and I have to find a problem in the world and get it supported, noticed, or solved. I chose to get Youth Violence noticed at Science Leadership Academy and show that even if we go to a school where we have a safe environment people go through a lot of violence that involves the youth community. When I go home on the train everyday there's always students fighting and it makes me unsafe or very discomforting. I would mind my business on the train walk out and the police would block exits because of students a fighting and it just makes public transportation a ugly mess.

 

I did two other posts and they involved some research explaining the violence students have caused in slate post 1 which involved which parts of Philly is safer than others. We found that North and West Philly have caused the most violence. In slate post 2 I discussed some of the results of youth violence which end tragically sometimes. Sometimes people are put in the hospital and the unlucky ones take something precious which hurt families and friends around their neighborhood.

 

I did some research for my agent of change and found that the youth crime rate has dropped and it is still dropping. Crimes such as assault, battery, rape, etc are caused by the youth community. Crimes in these categories have dropped 68% A lot is being done but not a lot of people notice this crisis that's going on in youth crime and violence. People aren’t gonna stop and people still don’t care. If they see something they like they will take it from you and won’t think twice. It’s crazy how cruel people can be to each other. But is there a way to stop violence; no but there’s ways to

get it noticed in our communities.

 


 

My official Agent of change was pretty creative and everyone at SLA has probably seen it once or twice. I made a poster that represents everything I’m against that said STOP THE VIOLENCE. What this poster represented was a small but noticeable voice for every person who doesn’t feel safe in their own community after school. Things are being done like populating all train stations with more police which reduces violence in the area. I decided to create a poster because when you walk by and see the poster it makes you think, does violence happen everywhere because we don’t see it in SLA. It’s good to expose our community to topics like this and get it noticed.

 



While doing my project I felt like the project was impossible and I couldn’t ever complete this with a good grade or at all. But as the project kept going I realized that I accomplished a ton of research and got my agent of agent thought out and finish very swiftly.  Reflecting on the project I felt like I did an awesome job fulfilling my goal in getting youth violence recognized. I feel proud of myself for all the hard work and courage to interview a police officer to get info that even police think youth violence is still a problem.

 

If I could of done this whole project again I would not procrastinate and get things done way earlier than I did. I got everything in on time but I think I should have gotten a peer review for each blog post. Well thanks for reading my last blog post if you want more information look at my annotated bibliography and do some more research.


Me and NotInPhilly

In my previous two blog posts I have told you about Taney and Bainbridge streets’ problem with litter and my own outdoor observations of my streets. In this blogpost I will be telling you about me actually acting on this situation. In my blogpost, ¨Litter Search and Solutions¨, in the end, I mentioned signing up and joining Not In Philly to help make a positive change in myself and my community. Recently, I have created for  myself an account on http://notinphilly.org/ and registered to clean and Taney street. When you register to clean up your street it shows map of Philadelphia with roads for you to choose from and it shows you who else is currently cleaning that street and the streets near by and how many people there are for that street. When I registered for Taney Street it said I was the first person to register for cleaning that street.

The day after I registered, I went out on Taney street in the afternoon and picked up trash and recyclables off the street with a trash grabber and a plastic bag. I picked up the trash with the help of my father. My father helped me take the pictures of the trash with his camera. We also did a little extra cleaning on Bainbridge Street. When I was out on the street seeing all the trash on the street made me feel displeased with some of my neighbors and sad knowing that it was hurtful to the people, plants and animals that live in this  neighborhood. But when I cleaned up the trash and looked back when I was done, I was very satisfied with how clean the streets looked and was happy knowing I had done a good deed.

Let me tell you about my experience with the Not In Philly registration. There I made myself a new account. Signing up was easy: on their website they gave me a form where I just had to give my name, my phone number, my address, my email address, and make up a password. After that they gave me an email telling me to go to their website and choose a block/street to clean, I choose a block on Taney Street because it was next to my house. I trust this website because it is not a big faceless corporation or a money hungry business. It is a nonprofit organization that seeks to make a good difference and it is currently happening everywhere around the city unlike the Philadelphia Streets Litter Cabinet which I have never seen in action. I also trust this organization because it was created by a well known family friend who is kind and looks towards improving the city and solving its problems, like the litter on the streets.

A website that I found that focuses on reducing litter is called the Litter Less campaign. This campaign not only encourages people to pick up trash but it also aims for changing the minds of children about the problem of littering and what they can do to make a difference, ¨It aims to engage and educate children and young people on the issue of litter, and encourage them to make positive choices.¨(http://www.ecoschools.global/about-the-campaign). The organization is involved in 35 schools around the world and they educate children on cleaning up litter.  I like how this focuses on younger generations, teaching them not to litter.  If we can teach each generation not to litter, pretty soon young people and adults all over the world might stop littering and be more concerned about keeping the environment clean.

Overall, I feel that I have made a change with myself and my neighborhood. My change is that I have gone from just being against littering to standing up and physically acting on the problem. I have made a change in my neighborhood by being the newest person to having a habit of cleaning the streets and being a example to keeping the streets healthy and clean to the neighborhood. I feel really proud of myself for developing these new good habits. So far I plan on cleaning the streets one day every week, but I want to expand this by starting clean on two or three days a week. What is left to be done is to get more people in my neighborhood to clean the streets and join Not In Philly. I love making a good difference in my neighborhood and making clean and healthy decisions.

 

"About the Campaign." Eco Schools. Eco Schools, 2014. Web. 08 June 2017.

http://notinphilly.org/

 

https://docs.google.com/a/scienceleadership.org/document/d/1a1IMIcIqSX8D1xx5avGy6a4UGhaZAydxWbygZ_MH0RQ/edit?usp=sharing

 

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My trash grabber with a piece of plastic.

 

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Some trash around a neighbor’s flower pot.

 

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My collected trash in a plastic bag.

Print

Rubidium, the element of Vacuums
Rubidium, the element of Vacuums
My element was Rubidium, it's symbol being Rb. Rubidium has the atomic number 37. The element was discovered in 1861 by Robert Bunsen and Gustav Kirchhoff. The interesting thing about the discovery is it was discovered on Robert Bunsen's invention, The Bunsen Burner. I was inspired to make this design because one of Rubidium's uses is to make fireworks purple. However, I chose the color red for this particular one because it got its name from the color Deep Red, Rubidius, in Latin. To make this print I first decided to make the firework rocket striped and I tried to determine the best way to incorporate the negative and positive space. It was also a bit challenging to incorporate the Symbol and Number in the image while still keeping it creative. The only thing I'd change would be making the lines neater and making sure that the ink doesn't fall in the lower layers. I really enjoyed doing the Ink for this project as well as the research. I feel certain elements aren't very well known and have unique and interesting stories to them, like Rubidium. I really enjoyed learning about these things, and I felt like I was learning how to do something new when actually using the ink rollers.

Mercury Print/Matt Project

My element was Mercury. Its atomic number is 80, and its chemical symbol is Hg. My element has been used for many things in the past, but it turned out to be poisonous and harmful to people. In the 20th century, it was commonly used for thermometers, fluorescent lights and light bulbs,  batteries, tooth fillings, felt production, and much more. It was discovered in Spain and France 30,000 years ago when it used for ancient cave murals and decoration. For my imagery, I originally made designs that incorporated a lot of Mercury's many well-known uses, but I felt like it was not very original. I did research and learned that Mercury is nicknamed "quicksilver" because it is a liquid metal and has a silver metallic look. I decided to use that for my design instead, because I thought it was more creative and less known about Mercury. To make the print, I made many different sketches because I felt that none of them were the design that I wanted. I finally decided on a design that looked like silver droplets around everything, and cleaned it up so the design looked nice. Then, I traced my design onto transfer paper and then onto a styrofoam plate. I went in with a blunted pencil on the styrofoam and pressed down the parts that I wanted to be white in the final product. Finally, I got the ink, covered my print with ink using a paint roller, and put the final product on paper. I matted two of them and left one untouched. If I did the print again, I probably would have made the prints further away from the edge because I struggled to rip the sides in a nice looking way. I also would have added a little more detail, because I thought the negative space wouldn't come out as well as it did in the end. The part I enjoyed the most was doing the printing itself, because I really enjoyed the different colors of ink and it made me feel like all the work that I did paid off.  
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