All my life I have been into fashion and it is a major part of my life. Fashion gives me a creative forum to express my self in ways other forms of art can not. I see what you wear as a mirror of your inner self and and they way you feel. Sitting watching an old Dereck Lam fashion show I was inspired to create a piece of art that represents both of my passions, fashion and art.
For this piece I used recycled coupon newspapers and and glue. It was't easy trying to shape and form the news print paper into the style I wanted so the design changed quite a few times. My end design became a two piece garment, a bandeau top and ruffled bottom. Creating the dress in paper signified the first design and the first idea will last forever but it can always be changed and made better and that goes for things that happens in life.
I am lobbying against the FAA Retirement Age For Commercial Pilots. As of right now there are no groups or organizations who are showing opposition to this law, mainly because the cutoff age was raised from 60 to 65 in 2007.
Certain organizations actually argued against the FAA changing the age from 60 to 65 because they felt that some pilots weren't going to be physically able to fly after the age of 60.
I began to research more organizations run by airline pilots and I was able to find an organization called ALPA (Air Line Pilots Association). This organization has dealt with the FAA before and was also one of the reasons that the FAA retirement age was changed, so if I were to continue on with trying to succeed in this lobbying project, my best bet would be to contact ALPA and see what they could do to help.
As many of you know, school is cancelled tomorrow - the first day of EduCon. EduCon will still be happening, and attendees will begin arriving at school at 10:00 am. We will have activities for the attendees set up at school all day long and the building will be open. In addition, several of tomorrow night's panelists were planning on speaking to SLA kids during the day. Those conversations will still happen for students who wish to attend.
No students are mandated to come to school, but the building will be open for EduCon. We know that many students are very committed to the conference and have been working very hard for tomorrow and the weekend. We are all committed to making sure that it is an incredible event for all.
Students who wish to come in should bring in a note from their parents.
Here is my American Government Benchmark for quarter 2
I chose some of my laws/cases from memory, cases I had heard about before I chose to look into more and elaborate on. There was a point where I didn't know any other cases by memory. Once I got to that point I began to search google for Judical branch cases, Legislative branch cases, and Executive branch cases. The process was easy at first because I researched laws/cases that I already knew, so I got those out of the way quick. The farther along I got the more complicated finding cases/laws it got. I expect my life to get affected more by the government as I get older because depending on the career I choose, different laws and decisions made by the government may effect me in different ways.
When I work with any form of art, I am
reminded that art is not what IthinkI know, but what I know Isee. I begin a
piece by saying to myself ‘you are not an
artist’. By saying this to myself first, no matter what the finish product
maybe, I am content with it because I am
not an artist, therefore it I can be filled with happiness and obtain a
sense of equality when my work is placed side by side with someone who actually
is an artist. Art does not come easy for me. It’s almost as though art should
be classified as an unofficial emotion. This being because art is what you
feel, what you depict when you view a painting, or look at the world; it’s your
spirit. And all these I lack.
In fact, my artwork doesn’t contain any of
the qualities one would qualify as being art. There is no skill, no talent, no
emotion, no feeling yet what it lacks in those departments; it’s generously
made up in effort. I cannot allow
myself to do something I haven’t done in a long time, but I could more than a
courteous amount of effort into trying, and that is what my artwork is a
reflection of: enterprise.
For my quarter two benchmark, I struggled
with what exactly I wanted to accomplish, and what I would be proud to show the
world. Something I could own up to, and put my name on. However, this wasn’t
easy. I started drawing sketches of different objects that would be placed
before at that period of time. This didn’t work. My interpretation of copying
what I thought I saw, was confused with copying what I knew should be there. And
with each attempted trial, I thought I had failed.
Given everything I learned about art thus
far, I figured I needed to start with something more basic. Something that
truly had to do with sight, or something that could replicate my emotions even
if they weren’t truly there; for this would be my artwork. So I picked up 3
colors.
Now, the color wheel is not complex. It’s
simply an organization of color hues around a circle, showing
relationships between colors considered to be primary
colors, secondary colors, complementary colors, etc. The wheel can show more, and more mixtures of colors,
without every truly defining what
color is. This was my artwork.
Knowing that I could replicate something that no one else could define but
myself because it was the way I saw it, made me anxious.
And from this, I created my vision
of what I believed to the color wheel. I mixed colors to create other colors, and mixed those colors to try and create new colors. I knew my piece was finished when I
started to get the sense of frustration. Because I was becoming overwhelmed
with the idea of completing my color wheel, I knew I was beginning to think too
hard. And because I was able to tap into an emotion, I knew I had accomplished
something. When
my work is going well, I am filled with a sense of happiness, and when I try to
go beyond what I believe to be all of my ability, I know it is time to stop. Art
is not my passion, but it is something I am trying to “relearn”. When people
see my work; I'd like them to realize that I am not an artist
Congratulations to SLA Science and History teacher, Mr. Gamal Sherif, for being chosen by the National Science Teachers Assocation to be awarded the 2011 CPO Award for Excellence in Inquiry-based Science Teaching. Mr. Sherif was one of three teachers in the country and the only high school teacher to be chosen this year.
We at SLA are thrilled to see that NSTA has recognized what we have long known - that Mr. Sherif is a master teacher who helps students to inquire deeply about their world and learn powerfully from the questions they ask and the answers they find.
Congratulations Mr. Sherif, and thank you for all you do for SLA!
I am lobbying Global Warming. I want the state of Pennsylvania to do something toward Global Warming. As of right now the state of Pennsylvania have no real big supporters to help stop or slow down the process of Global Warming. Global Warming can possibly cause our children’s children to really be in trouble. Maybe some of the ideas that have already been presented to help Global warming should be put to the test to help out the ozone. I feel as though if the city of Pennsylvania does something, because of its influence on the United States, that other people would follow and we could possible help out our future children. One of our main supporters are the STATOIL company. I've looked up my areas legislators which are Vincent Hughes and Anthony H. Williams and I haven't heard or saw anything recent about them stressing the importants of clean energy or a decrease in burning of fossil fuels. Anthony Williams is apart of the Environmental Resources and Energy Committee but hasn't spoke out about using less factorial methods of creating energy.
Barbara Adams is another Pennsylvania supporter of stopping global warming. She was under the governorship of Ed Rendell.
I think a good place for me right now is to find away to come in contact with some of our representatives and talk to them about how passionate I am about helping the situation. If they can hear a high school kids concern on the situation it might do some good.
I think that Brianna and I
did a pretty good job on every aspect and step of this process besides
communication. I think that if we had had more time we could have gave that
area a little more attention. I felt as though this was an important part of
the process that we didn’t do extremely well. If we were given time to add on,
we would probably go back and maybe contact different offices in different
areas to see if our response would have gotten better or worse. I also think
that showing up to an office in person and being able to speak to someone face
to face would have been more effective. We could have communicated our ideas
better rather than forcing the opinions of the welfare representatives and
perhaps it would have made the conversation a little more easygoing and
comfortable for both of us. We should have communicated our ideas of making the
welfare system more efficient better and in doing so I think we would have
gotten a better outcome
-Finding telephone numbers and addresses for
these representatives.
-Getting them to talk!
(What are some process methods they feel
are flawed?)
(What plans do they have in the future for
the Welfare System.)
(How can they make improve the welfare
system.)
(What suggestions can be made to us as
students in trying to make a difference and have our voices heard?)
WIC South Philadelphia Office
1536 South Broad Street, Philadelphia PA
(215)-463-5571
It was no surprise to my partner and I that the
representatives at the welfare office weren’t much help to us at all. We
contacted them by phone. We spent most of our time on hold or we were given the
run around. We weren’t able to get much information on the subjects of our
questions that we presented to them. I can’t necessarily say they were rude it
just seemed as if they had better things to do. The feedback they did give us
wasn’t at all helpful because they didn’t feel as though their system had many
flaws. Neither do they believe that there are ways around there system, which
was one of our major concerns. I think that maybe if we had shown up in person
that it would have been a lot harder for them to ignore us and easier for them
to understand how serious we were about changes for the best in the welfare
system.
We are going to extend our efforts to the National Youth Rights Association. We also want to have rallies and demonstrations to strengthen our arguement. We created a facebook page, http://www.facebook.com/home.php?sk=group_167273339975033. Our three step process to victory is Step 1: Attempt contact with the National Youth Rights Association Raise awareness with posters detailing what we plan to accomplish as well as a set date for the rally Step 2: Try to either start or join a chapter of the NYRA to support this cause. Once the day is set (for the rally)gather a small film crew and shoot the entire rally from start to finish. Step 3: Release the video showing the support we receive and send it to the proper government officials. In our rally we want to state the message clearly that we want the drinking age lowered. We want to show statistics that support our point of view. Maybe we could have some guest speakers, like the college professors and other distinguished people that support us. We could send a petition around the crowd to be signed in support.
It’s definitely not a “good” year for our issue. The national minimum drinking age isn’t even approaching the table of things to be talked about this year. Robert Donatucci apposes lowering the drinking age, but he is one of the most important players when determining the outcome of lowering the drinking age. He may not be on the same side, but there are over 100 college professors that are. We can try to coordinate with some of the colleges and their professors. The greatest population that we could affect and influence would be the teens. They are the ones that the law effects, and they are also the ones who want to see the law change more than anyone else. The time frame we have is any time before the next legislation meeting. The liquor control board has no current scheduled meetings because of the death of Robert seeing as he was the head chairmen. As soon as they find a replacement, meetings will continue. That will be the best time to try and bring up our points.
There
were many success and failures during this quarter. What this quarter focused
on was life and perspective form of art. From my experience this quarter I
would have to say it was a challenging and difficult process, as I was
introduced to new method of art such as charcoal and real life perspective. Even
though using charcoal was like using a crayon, the difference was its ability
to show the color and shading. While real life perspective, there were many
details in which it was difficult to capture or even show on paper.
Drawing
from real life, was the most challenging process during this whole quarter. As
there were always more then just one layer of shade or the image in which I
could see, the viewpoints and the details of the object. At first drawing from
real life perspective such as my hand was easy but when it came to shading or
transparent objects, I couldn’t seem to capture the exact details of the
object. The clear bottle small project, I believe was the first challenge in
further advancing my real life perspective skills.
My
first clear bottle small drawing was that of a glass jug. The difficult part of
that project would be my ability to capture the glass like texture of the
drawing. Where it looks like the glass was bending and reflects part of the
lights. It wasn’t until I worked on the large clear bottle, when I noticed my
improvements in this type of skill. Using charcoal, I have to say that was the
most successful part of this experience. Mainly because I was able to improve
in art, using two skills I wasn’t familiar with, which in the end I believed it
was a beautiful piece of art. Which that was one of the art piece that I am
proud of and thought was a success.
For
each week there was a new assignment. From real life perspective and charcoal
small to real life perspective and charcoal large. Which every project that was
assigned during that week must be finished in two class periods, mainly because
we only had art twice a week. So most of the projects were to be done on our
own time, during the snow, and even when we don’t have the class. I feel that I
could get the art done easily and well during class, while at home the
motivation for it is not much. Thus, large projects should take a little
longer, while there should be art that could be finished in one class period.
Finally
for the menu project where we had to choose a category, I choose to work on the
genre focus. Where I had to create two inspired piece of art from my genre. I
focused on fantasy art as my genre, as fantasy to me is a colorful and playful
art such as a child’s book. Using origami to express myself, I created two
scenes. One being a vase filled with origami pastel stars as the soil and lots
of origami flowers consisting of a tissue rose and paper lily. The second one
features two-origami crane interacting with each other around a pile of food,
hearts, and stars. Which these are my inspirations from fantasy art, which
combines my imagery of fantasy and my love of origami.
For the Quarter 2 Benchmark I had to search the three branches of the government, Legislative, Executive, and Judicial. For each branch I had to find two positive and two negative examples of the branch's power, and write paragraphs of what they are and how they affect me. I had some serious difficulty with this benchmark. Which is evident from how late I am handing this in. Connecting the laws and court cases and such to myself wasn't that difficult, but finding the examples themselves proved to be difficult and tedious to me. I feel that even though I am late handing this in the quality is well enough to make it worth handing in. I am proud of my work, and proud of myself for getting past my difficulties with the project.
Here is my lobbying assignment. For the final lobbying assignment,I decided to transfer all my information into a newspaper article. I thought this would be a better way to explain my topic and my point of view etc.
For my 2nd quarter project I wanted to show the contrast between color and black and white. At first I wasn't sure how I would show this, but one day when I was really angry I made a splatter painting. I painted the page black and then threw colors onto it. The result was this:
Next I got a white sheet of paper and splattered just black paint on it. The comparison of the two is this:
After, I got another white sheet of paper and splattered colors onto it. The I painted a piece black and splattered white on it. The resulting comparison was this:
From here I wanted to draw actual shapes and things so I started a colorful drawing with flowers and got this:
Instead of finishing my colorful project I moved onto a black and white Mandala drawing on the opposite side of the paper. This took ridiculously long to make, but the result was this:
This was my favorite thing to make, even though it was epically difficult. The comparison between my two final drawings is this:
I had a lot of fun doing every aspect of this project. I just wish I would have done this blog post on time :(
I did a terrible job with these. To me my hands look like clay-mation on paper. So i tried doing them in different ways. Didn't work to my expectations. But draewing me kind of did. So i don't quite get what made my face easier to draw.
This is the link to my Q2 Benchmark for American Government. It covers all three branches of government and the different laws that relate to me within those branches. This is also an example of checks and balances.
This benchmark to start was a difficult one for me especially for certain topics. One being FASFA for alot of people that was a pro but for me it was a con which left it hard for me to find a pro to my executive branch. I did not like this project at all because it different really teach me anything. Although we learned about checks and balances I just think this benchmark wasn't that helpful to me.
I've been working solo this project and trying to get in touch
with Anthony Hardy Williams 8th District Representative, and trying to
get people aware of the situation. As you should know by now I want to get a group together to influence neighborhood cleanups, specifically urban neighborhoods. I wanted to start a group within SLA that expanded to a much larger crown with the help of the senator, It was to be something bigger than your average optional Saturday block sweep. My main concern has been to have our
urban streets clean like we have them clean in Downtown Philadelphia
and Independence Hall. I haven't heard anything back from the senator
but I also know these things take time and he is a very busy person. For this blog post it is really just an update on the current status of things. Basically I am just waiting on a go from the Senator or at least some support on his part. It wouldn't be a problem to start straight out of school, i just want the support of the senator.
