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Artist’s rendering of NASA’s SLS on the launchpad.  Credit: SpaceNews.com: http://spacenews.com/nasa-sets-december-2019-date-for-first-sls-launch/

“All three engines up and burning.  3, 2, 1, 0, and liftoff! The final liftoff of Atlantis.  On the shoulders of the Space Shuttle, America will continue the dream!”  Since the end of the Space Shuttle program, NASA has aimed for the much more ambitious goal of sending a man to Mars.  Currently, they plan to launch man to Mars by the mid 2030’s In the last blog post, I talked about how NASA’s funding has declined since its apex in the 60’s 70’s and the moon landings.  Since then, the Space Shuttle has expanded knowledge of living within space but it can travel no further than low earth orbit.  To do that, they need to build a new Space Launch System or SLS. However, it is already much more expensive than the proposed BFR from SpaceX who plan to launch more to Mars at just a fraction of the cost.  One possible reason for this is the change of power in the United States meaning change in plans for NASA’s programs, leading to progress taking a long time to be done with constantly changing goals.  

After having collected surveys from students at SLA, I would like to share my results, but before that, I will state the goals of my survey.  My plan for the survey was to ask people how much they believed that NASA receives, along with whether they should receive more or less funding.  As I continued my research, I began to add more questions based on companies like SpaceX competing with NASA. When it came to the answers, the common answer to “how much money do you think NASA receives?” was around the ballpark of 2-5 Billion, with some saying in the range of millions, and one answer saying trillions, but the trend is showing that people think NASA receives less money than they actually do,

which is around 18 Billion.

The majority of people believed that NASA should receive more funding, and they said that the money for that should come from the budget for Government or Military for the reasons of it being important for them to combat global warming and advance technology on earth with endless possibilities.  The people who said that NASA should receive less funding said that it should go to education, citing the reason that our school system is falling apart and would need the funding.

Another question that was added was on the topic of NASA’s manned Mars mission, which to me, would show the people’s faith in NASA to send humans to Mars within a decent time frame.  The majority had faith in NASA to land a man on Mars before their planned date timeframe of the 2030’s

For the next series of questions had to do with NASA versus private companies when it comes to landing a man on Mars first.  NASA plans to use the SLS to launch humans to Mars while a likely rival is SpaceX with their Big Falcon Rocket or BFR, who plans to get to Mars cheaper than NASA, but a timeframe isn’t clear yet.  This question was more split with slightly more than half believing that NASA would send humans to Mars first, citing that these private companies might not be reliable and the rest saying that Private companies will send humans to Mars first, with one reason being as they are cheaper than NASA.  

Annotated Bibliography here.

In the last post, I talked about my You and The World Project and how I picked illegal animal trafficking as my research topic. I learned how the rarer an animal is, the more demand there is going to be for that specific animal or animal product. Also, the reason why there isn’t that much information about the people selling these products is because they are big industries that provide financial support. Furthermore, illegal animal trafficking is also usually done by people who are local and who live in low income neighbourhoods, which is why they end up turning to illegal animal trafficking.

Here’s why colleges are so expensive

Annotated bibliography

In Blog post 1, I talked about why colleges are so expensive. They were expensive because of main reasons like inflation, the need of college, and popularity. Because colleges know you need and want them, they want to make it more because they can. Also, if non-popular colleges raise their prices the more popular and expensive colleges will raise theirs to make it seem like they are better.  These things are the reason colleges are about 33,000 a semester.

Some new information, coming from Quora, gives even more reasons. Another reason that I did not mention the cost of textbooks. Textbooks are extremely expensive not only because of the price but the quantity. A textbook is about $150, but you have to multiply that cost with the amount of classes you have. Another reason is the teachers. They get paid a pretty good amount, which the college has to give so the colleges need more money so they can pay for them. College professors get about 25K per course. Another source says that one of the reasons colleges are so expensive is because the state usually doesn’t give much support to public colleges. Because the State gives more money to private, because they know they will be successful, public gets less support. I interviewed some college students. I asked them these questions. I got many different helpful responses. Here is an example of what one student responded with. These responses gave me many different types of views like, whether college is worth the price. Some said no unless you get a good job out of it. Some said yes, no matter what college is worth it. I personally think after all this research that college is worth the price but the price is a bit extreme. One of the questions I asked was, “What’s the worst thing about college?” I asked that because I was wondering if price was the worst thing about it. I am wondering if people really don’t care about the price, or if they got used to the fact that it is really expensive. These interviews gave me many insights on how college is different for different students in different colleges. It’s also interesting to see the ideas they have to make colleges cheaper. For my final blog post, which is to make a change to the problem,I was thinking of getting money to via donations or fundraiser, and to give it to college student that are having a problem paying.

In my first blog post for the You and The World project, I have completed a lot of research on sleep disorders, specifically in teenagers. I mentioned insomnia, sleep apnea, and other causes of a lack of sleep. I have listed statistics for both disorders, and I have closed out with an original research plan.

Since my first blog post on the topic of sleep disorders, I’ve had a plan for the original research. I’ve researched a lot, and now it’s time go deeper into it.

My first original research plan was to put a survey in an advisory memo (you can take it if you want, it doesn’t matter anymore), or just send it to every freshman if possible. Most of the questions were about normal sleep, and there were some diverse answers from the few people I sent it to.

More Opinions About Pit Bulls

In my previous post, I wrote and researched on how there are many common misconceptions about American Pit Bull Terriers. What I found in my research is that the temperament of a pit bull is almost always reliant on its treatment from humans. If the dogs are handled with respect and their needs are met, there are fewer temperament issues. If any breed of dog, not just pit bulls, are abused or not given the care they need, problems start to occur. Sometimes pit bulls especially may have temperment issues because of post-traumatic stress disorder from previous abuse.

When I continued my research, I focused on statistics with pit bulls. One article by the Huffington Post gathers many statistics on causes of injury or death. For instance, common causes of death are compared to the likelihood of dying from a dog bite. An example from the article states, "Maybe more striking is the fact that you are FAR more likely to die from eating a hot dog (choking from inhalation of food) than from being attacked by an actual dog. Death by a real dog- 1 in 116,448. Death by a hot dog- 1 in 3,375." This reveals that there is always a possibility to die from a dog attack, yet there are many other things that are more likely to occur.

This shows how getting killed by a dog is a very small chance compared to many things

Sara L. Wilson, from the Canine Journal, has a blog post all about pit bull statistics. Similarly to the Huffington Post article, this post has a lot of information which puts pit bull casualties and behavior into perspective. One example is about how American Pit Bull Terriers are technically a “bully breed.” There are many other dogs on the list of over 40 breeds. Some of the other dogs on the list include Pugs and Boston terriers. One point this post makes is about canine behavior. Wilson writes, “What we do know from statistical analysis is that 86.8 percent of American Pit bull terriers have passed their temperament testing according to the American Temperament Test Society, Inc. This is a higher number of American pit bulls to pass their testing than collies, beagles, and even golden retrievers.” I think this quote proves that pit bulls do not have temperament as bad as we think.

Some examples of a bully breed. The quotation marks around “bully” show how those breeds are not necessarily rough.

For my original research on this topic, I created a survey to gather people's opinions on pit bulls. I chose to do this because in order to change people's view on pit bulls, I should know their opinions first. The survey helped me learn the surveyee's experiences with dogs in general, more specifically pit bulls, as well as what they think of pit bulls. Some people have had positive experiences with pit bulls, and some have had less positive interactions. Many of the people who took my survey were very open-minded; some said they had heard bad things about pit bulls, but they were sure pit bulls were friendly and kind dogs. This information lets me know that some people have similar opinions on pit bulls as me, but some people also have more negative views. Generally, more people had a positive outlook on the breed. My goal is to make sure everyone has a positive outlook on pit bulls.

(Top) Some responses of what people thought about pit bulls

(Bottom) People describing a dog- seen below

The dog that I asked people to describe

My opinion on this matter has changed a little bit. Now that I know some of the behavioral statistics, I have an even greater opinion on the matter. I am interested to see what specific experiences, positive and/or negative, people have endured. I am especially curious to see what the negative experiences have been. There is nothing I have been left wondering.

The final step of the project is called an agent of change. This is where we use all of the research we have made and act upon our community problem. I am not very certain what I will do for my agent of change. I have had a few thoughts. One idea I have is that I will collect some supplies (dog toys, dog food, treats, etc.) and donate them to a dog shelter. A second idea that I have is to put up images in my school of pit bulls and caption it "Does this dog look mean to you?" When I do pursue with my agent of change, I am sure it will be great.

Social Decline Continued

In my previous blog post I gave a brief description of my topic, the negative effects on social media. These effects vary from sleep, depression, and lack of communication skills. We also talked about the percentages of households that contain handheld devices, along with a prediction in the future of what the year 2020 will look like. I will go on into a little more details , listing and informing you, the reader, more negative effects of participating in social media.

So far we have talked about three negative effects caused by social media, Next I have another effect of social media, and it is kind of crazy how many non benefiting affects that I can find form the internet. So, the next one is the addiction aspect, and the time consumption, how it can eat up the time out of your daily life.

Doing some research on the topic I found some repeating patterns. Various ones showed up on different sites, one not loving technology so much, but what they really want to access is done through technology. What is one thing that requires a phone? That thing is communication with friends, and how they need to keep up with the “latest news”. One thing to notice is that with the addiction, it ties into the communication situation we discussed as said in a washington post “teens spend so much interacting with each other on social networks and phones that they are growing less comfortable with in-person interactions and not developing essential social skills.”  and this just proves my previous claims.

Adults are usually on there phones frequently, but they have a farther variety of reasons why to be on their phones as much as they are. Teens however are getting to the point where there phone time consumption is fit for an adult.

In this image they are showing how withing the four year span of 2004-2008 that the time teens are on there phones now imagine 10 years later in 2018 and see who is on their phones more.

The next thing on the list that I am going to mention is something more generally about female teenagers. How social media has a huge influence on their self-image. Girls are constantly are self conscious even if they do not admit, I can say that guys are also affected by it, but I think that girls go to the father extreme of finding the level of satisfaction, or just to satisfy other individuals.

Being a student that attended three different school, each one consisting of both genders. During those years consistently, I’ve observed and would say 75% of the students are drained and focused into there self image, and social media just boost it to another level. A short passage from cnn states… “it's not a law that you have to post a selfie before, during, and after every activity. But for kids, it's pretty much mandatory.  The resulting likes, thumbs-ups, and other ratings all get tallied, both in the stark arithmetic of the Internet and in kids' own minds. For some -- especially girls -- what starts as a fun way to document and share experiences can turn into an obsession about approval that can wreak havoc on self-image.”. Imagine a world without social media? Would you be better and healthier human being? Maybe you would get a more healthy amount of Sleep, are you obsessed? Those questions that I just asked were put to the test.

For the past month I have been thinking about what do do for my original research I figured why don’t ask our generation, the teens. So it started as interviewing teens, in person, for a quick five minutes. The process was smooth but I wasn't getting the information that I needed and I needed some insight where the person answering wasn't feeling invaded and was comfortable answering. So that is when i decided that I was going to conduct a survey. Answers varying from exactly proving my points to not so much. Considering both I cae to a conclusion, but first let's look at the results to  my survey.

Looking at this chart and with the results I can confidently say that the majority of the people who answered to the survey would be a better or a more improved version of themselves without social media. I can not say if they would be happier though.

In the first post we talked about the effects social media has one an individuals and one of those is the mass amounts of sleep lost to social media.

Going into this question I knew that sleep was something that was being taken over by social media or even Netflix( let's not get off topic) but at this point I think you get the point for this one Let us look at one last one.

The last one I will be looking at with you is how much time is put into your social media/cyber life. From how much I participate and noticing with my friends with how much they use it I can say that we are pretty consumed. One answer states ”I've become less attentive. Sometimes I go on it in the middle of class or something” Some though say that social media doesn't really bother them.. Let us take a look.

Some mixed opinions  but, with these varied answers it helps me come to a conclusion.

So my conclusion is a little bit of opinion and facts because I believe a lot of people can, and do experience negative affect, but there are some people who either can ignore the decent amount of bad or they just are lying. Anyways. This is a successful experience and I think myself have learned a lot. I am still curious about why people are so engaged into social media I’m into it a lot but I somewhat still don't have an idea why I am involved with it  so much. After all of the work I have done on this I still am not 100% sure about my Agent of Change but I wanna start small. People need to be aware before anything can be preached.

Anne Otated  and Biblee Ography

This post will continue about the issues with safety among the NFL. If you have not read the first post, please take a few minutes to read and then come back. Click here to read the first post. If you still did not read the first post, I am still going to summarize the first topic. I first started out talking about how many injuries there are per game. There could be 6 major injured each game! That is crazy. I also talked how pre-season is too long and super unnecessary, because they already have to play 16 weeks of football and 4 more games that don’t mean anything is unnecessary. I then started to talk about how CTE affects football players and the effects it will have later on in a football player’s life. I wrapped it by pointing out how high school students are our future and how if they play football at a young age, football could cause some very negative effects in the long run.

After the first post, I wanted to do more research about the different injuries in the NFL. I read more about CTE. There was a study where former NFL player’s brains were donated to see how many of them had CTE. What the study showed was shocking. The study showed that 99% of former player’s brains had CTE. That is a huge number. The sample might have been a bit too small to see if this trend is truly true. There were only 202 brains donated, but that is a decent sample size. That could also mean that some brains were in stage 1 while others were in stage 4, but that is still a huge number.

A medial collateral ligament (MCL) tear is more common among people who play football. You can tear your MCL if you get tackled and land the wrong way, or if you jump and the land the wrong way. MCL injuries are more common than ACL injuries and can be treated in better ways. If the tear is just slightly injured, then you can just wait to let it heal. Surgery is not usually required even for more severe cases. It is only requested if the person wants the MCL to heal faster. Last season, there were 151 MCL tears in the NFL. Even if MCL tears are not the most severe injury, that is too many tears.

For this stage in the project, I had to interview or do a study about an expert on my topic. I tried and tried and tried. I emailed Roger Goodell, the commissioner of the NFL, 3 different times with 3 different emails and I have still gotten nothing from him. I then tried to contact some doctors that know a lot about concussions and injuries in the NFL and same deal; no responses.  I then went to plan B, and I was going to try to call the front offices of different organizations within the NFL, but that also did not work. I was starting to worry that no one cared about me. I then tried to contact local football high schools to ask for an interview with the players, and EVEN them did not respond. I then emailed back all of the people I already emailed, and someone finally responded! I then had my dad’s friend contact some high school football coaches and he helped me get more interviews and some survey responses.

The very first interview that I have was last friday (March 16th). The man that I interviewed was named Dave Kutzler, and he is a youth football coach. The reason why I wanted to interview him is because he would provide an interesting perspective about football. Below are the questions that I asked him and what he responded with. There is also the audio of the interview if you would want hear it that way.

Q: What do you enjoy the most about football?/What made you want to become a youth football coach?

A: “I played from a young age as well. I think I started when I was 8 years old, and I played till I was 16, and I have a lot of fond memories like playing with my teammates and stuff like that, so that is really what wanted me to coach football. When I was playing I always had fun, I never got hurt, never got a concussion. So, yeah that is why I like it.”

Q: How has the greater awareness of player safety changed the game and the way you coach?

A: “I have coached for about 10 years. Back when I first started coaching him, he did flag football for his first two years, and then when you are 7 years old, you can convert to playing tackle football. When I first started out coaching, I had to take a bunch courses that were pretty expensive. They are run by USA Football, which is endorsed by the NFL, and they have NFL coaches giving video chats that we would have to watch. The people who pioneered a lot of the ‘Heads Up’ stuff were the Seattle Seahawks. They had a defensive coordinator who taught this different style of tackling, more like rugby style, where it is called ‘Heads Up’ tackling or ‘Seahawks’ tackling where your head is always up, you never dip your head. It does not get rid of the concussion injuries, but it does eliminate neck injuries. What the Seahawks taught was that you wrap around the legs and roll, which is a different style of tackling than I learned early on. From the years that I have coached, I have seen it change. For the first 5 years that I coached, there were no instructions, there were no videos or courses to take. They just trusted that the people teaching the kids understood the game. But in the last five years, they started to teach how to do proper techniques regarding the neck injuries, spine injuries, concussions on how to take that out of the game. So there have been a lot of advancements in the youth coaching within the last  4-5 years. Before that there was almost nothing.”

Q: Do you think that the NFL should be implementing the “Heads Up”/Rugby style of tacking?

A: “They actually do. That is why you are seeing a lot of these dudes roll. Within the last year or two, a lot of the defensive back hits have not been anywhere near the head. I do not think that it is widely broadcasted, but I do think that this ‘Seahawk’ tackling is being used more often than you think. I think that a lot of people are starting to teach it that way, because the NFL changed the rules so much because if they do not, they will be penalized and will hurt the team more. If you do not see it a lot now, you will see it very soon (the “Heads Up” tackling”).”

Q: You said in the email that for the 10 years you have coached, none of your players have received a concussion. What have you done as a coach to make sure of that?

A: “When the kids are young, I would say anywhere between 7 and 10 they truly do not hit hard enough as far as concussions. So that has really never been a concern, and I do not think it should be a concern for any parent or any organization. They just don’t hit hard enough, they are just a bunch of bobbleheads walking around a football field. Now, at about age 10 or 11, you can start to see some of these kids really develop. They are really starting to understand the game, and really starting to understand the hits. That’s really when the teaching and the movement and the pushing towards that ‘Seahawk’ tackling (“Heads Up) football is put into place. We took that as coaches and integrated that. Football starts in August. Your biggest concern in August is heat exhaustion. So they taught us that as well. What to look for as far as heat exhaustion (symptoms, etc.), and the first week is no pads, and just allowing the body to get used to the heat, and the running, and stuff like that. That is week one; no hitting, just heat. The second week is really when you teach the kids basic fundamentals. What I mean by that is doing step by step processes of how to hit, and we do it very slowly. It is really two weeks of getting your body just to the heat and the second week is very step by step no large hitting. Not only that, they teach us that during practices, you should not have the kids tackling more than 3 yards part. In other words, you are not running 20 yards in full steam, bashing each other 20 yards apart. That contact is very close contact, so if the contact is very limited during practice, we do not have large collisions. Within the last 5 years, the NFL has really brought in a lot into the lower levels of football as far as training.”

Q: So, as highers schoolers go to college and might want to be professional football players, and they are not doing the 3-yard tackles, when do they learn that running 20 yards at full speed to tackle someone is not the right idea? When is the learning curve?

A: “What we also teach is this thing called angle tackling, and the ‘Heads Up’ tackling. You always have your head up, and you always have to keep your head out of tackles. When I played, you always had a coach who would say, ‘Put your hat on,’ or ‘Let ‘em up’. Stuff like that. We do not say stuff like that anymore. When you have a tackle, your head has to go across the body, the head is never down. During games, hopefully, that what we have taught in the 3-yard drills, does work. You are going to see concussions in any sport; soccer, cheerleading, gymnastics. The best thing that we can do is to keep emphasizing the ‘Heads Up’ to just keep your head out of the tackle. I do know that they teach the technique at high school level football. That probably is also probably only been out for 4/5 years, because when we (coaches) have to take the courses, there are high school courses. The high school coaches have to take the high school level courses.”

Q: Do you think that enough/too much is being done to prevent concussion in football?

A: “There is never too much. There can always be more, but do I think that they are going in the right direction and heading the right way as far safety? Let's face it: If people do not address this issue, football is not going to existent anymore. About 3 or 4 years ago, I would say that amount kids signing up for football was at an all-time low. But now that people are starting to see what we (the coaches) are doing as far as courses, training, stuff like that, the amount of kids signing up for football is rising again. I have seen within the last 2/3 years, the levels are going back up, but there was a time where some parents were reluctant about putting their kids in. But again, there is never enough training. I think that they are heading in the right direction. It is definitely a lot better than it was.”

Q: Have you received any concerns from parents regarding the safety of their child/children?

A: “I have not. I think they see us (coaches) the way we approach our practices. We have their their best interest at heart as far as safety. Let’s face it; these are kid are anywhere from 10 to 14 years old. Most of the kids who play football have been playing  a few years before that, and also the kids who play football are a different breed. Most of them are very aggressive kids. Most of them are very up-beat kids, very postivekids, not a lot of negativity. And honestly that is another reason why I love coaching football, just kids that can listen to discipline, kids that like discipline, kids that listen, kids who want to get better, kids gernalary a little more athletic. I love teaching kids football. They are a different breed - I can not explain it. Some of the kids that play baseball can play while others are just okay. If you can not play football, you are afraid to hit, stuff like that, you get weed out pretty quick. So you are dealing with a type of child that wants to be there, and wants to get better, and wants to learn teamwork, and wants to learn the game of football. That is another why I really like it (coaching football) as well. I loved dealing with the kind of kid that is really interested in it.”

Q: Any else that you think would help me?

A: “I know that we all want to keep our kids as safe as possible, I mean there are all kinds of sports that can be dangerous. Like I was telling you earlier, cheerleading can be dangerous especially if you are getting through 20 feet into the air. People can get hurt by that. That being said, you can not put your kids in a bubble. We can do all kind of things to keep them as safe as we can. But kids have to be kids and I hear parents say that they will never let their child play football, but if they want to? I do not want to hold my kid back. If he wants to play football, I will ensure that he is getting the best instruction as he can to be safe, but I would let him do it. I hear a lot of the conversation, ‘I will never let me kid play’....why...why? There might be another sport that you could not play because your parents would not allow you, you be upset? That is kind of how I feel about it. The kids are totally into it. Alright lets teach them the proper way to play and go by it that way.

After doing the interview with Dave Kutzler, I learned a lot. I learned that football is changing for the better. Youth coaches are teaching the kids the proper way to play without injuring themselves. I also did not know how much the NFL is helping out. They want the younger generation to be safer so they can play in the NFL as well. They want as many kids to enjoy football. The interview also many me think of my project in a different light. I thought that there was a lot to improve upon within football. You can never help out too much, but the NFL is working on safety issue more than I thought that they were. Dave answered all of my questions wonderfully and I was left with no questions.

The very next day after I had my interview Dave, Will Parks called me. Will Parks is a safety who plays for the Denver Broncos, but he grew up in Philly. My dad’s friend, friend friend, knew Will and set me up with an interview. I do not have the written portion, but I do have the audio that you can listen to.

After doing the interview, I learned a lot. Will Parks was lucky enough to have no major injuries, but has seen injuries. He noted that the last game of the season that he played, he saw one of his own teammate’s break a leg. His response to someone the questions were similar to Dave, in the fact that he said that football is football. There will be injuries either way. He also said that if you want to play harder, you have to more careful and watch out for yourself. Since Will Parks did not have any major injuries, I could not find out some information about players who had to go through the injuries process, but other than that I got all I needed from Will Parks.

For my project, I also did a survey. The survey is supposed to be filled out by high school football players to see how much they know about the risks of football. I have a few responds, but I want to wait a few more days for more responds, so I will post another post about the survey and what it said.

After doing all of this, I have learned a lot. Reading a bunch of articles made me think one way, and then doing my interviews makes me think another way. At first, I thought that the NFL was not doing a whole lot, but after doing the interviews, that is false. The NFL is trying to reduced injuries in football. The last thing that I have to do is “change” or fix my issue. I have some general ideas, but they are half-baked. I might try to design a helmet or pads to reduce the number of injuries, or I can make a website or powerpoint to have my reader know about the issue. If you have ideas please comment below.

In my first blog post, I talked about how there is colorism within the Latino community. I talked about how the media only shows a specific “type” of Latino. They show the ones with light skin and straight hair. While they don’t show the ones with dark skin and kinky curly hair. I also talked about the common phrase “mejorar la raza” or “fix the race.” I got most of my information from the internet and from my family’s experiences with discrimination. As I was researching, I wasn’t completely satisfied with the information I got. I knew that there was more to learn and understand. So, I did my own research to get more information on people’s personal experiences.

At first, I wasn’t sure how I was going to do this. I couldn’t exactly interview one specific person about this issue because I wanted multiple experiences that people have dealt with discrimination. I came up with doing an online survey and they would fill out with questions I had for them. I made the survey on google forms so it would be accessible to them. I started brainstorming questions for my survey. I knew I didn’t want them to be yes or no questions. They needed to explain their experiences and make it personal. These are the questions I came up with:

• Have you ever been discriminated against because of how you look by other Latinos? If so, how?

• Have you been discriminated or “made fun of” because of your looks by family members? If so, how? What did they say? What were they talking about?

• Have you ever seen anyone be treated differently because of their skin color/looks? Latino to Latino? What happened, where were you, and how did both parties react or respond? (quick summary).

• Have you ever realized that there was colorism within the community? Do you remember the first time you noticed colorism? Explain your experiences.

• Have you ever heard of the phrase “mejorar la raza” or “fix the race?” If so, by who, where, and why did they say that, and to who did they say that too? Please explain.

Pie chart showing that everyone who took the survey is Latino

I needed to get my survey out to Latinos of all different backgrounds and ages. I sent it out to kids in my school, outside of school, and a few family members. I got 10 responses, which is a good amount considering the specific group of people I needed to send it to (Latinos). When I got my results back, I was expecting for them to understand where I was getting that and know about the Colorism in our community. I was also expecting for them to say that they have been looked down upon for their dark skin. My expectations were based on articles I read. The one article I read was about how the one Latina’s group of friends would treat someone in their own community, who would also be Latina, different because their skin would be darker. I only heard about  discrimination within the community towards the darker skinned Latinos. This one video I watched was about darker skinned people talk about experiences where they have been discriminated against. The one Dominican woman talked about the phrase “mejorando la raza.” Which means to “advance the race” or to marry someone and have kids with someone who is lighter to make the race “better” because they are lighter.  My survey didn’t exactly reflect this.

As I looked over the responses I received, they didn’t align with all the articles I read and the videos I watched. It was the opposite. Someone responded to the question “Have you ever been discriminated against because of how you look by other Latinos? If so, how?” They responded with “Yes, I have been told I was too white.” While another responded with “I'm a pale Puerto Rican. My Latino peers sometimes never take me seriously because of it. Some think I'm lying and others think I'm so out of touch with my culture because I pass as a "gringa.” They were being teased and looked down upon for their lighter skin. With my previous knowledge and research, they only talked about discrimination to darker Latinos. These peoples’ experiences are telling me that they aren’t dark enough or “Latino” enough.

Responses to the first question on the survey

How would I change this issue within the Latino community? What would be my agent of change? I don’t have an answer or a definite way to change this problem but I have been brainstorming. I am going to inform people. We need to right our wrongs. Members of our community must change how we speak and talk about others. We should all embrace one another for our differences. That’s what makes us all special and unique.

Annotated Bibliography

My first post is a long read and if you haven’t gotten a time to read it I will summarize it in this post. If you do want to read the post you can find it here. My original post introduces the idea of racial microaggressions. Racial microaggressions are racist things said or done that are rarely meant to be offensive. After introducing what they are I present and explain statistics showing how they affect individual people. These statistics come from a variety of sources that are all on my annotated bibliography found here.

Since my first post, I have interviewed six individuals and added two new sources to my annotated bibliography. I am going to breakdown the basic information given in each interview.

Horace Ryans is a sophomore and student advocate at Science Leadership Academy in Center City. The interview. The first question is “Have you seen any racial microaggressions in the SLA community?” His response is saying that racial microaggressions happen all the time. His example was normalization of the N-word. This gives insight into racial microaggressions in the SLA community and what students think about them and if they notice them. The next question was have you experienced any microaggressions personally? His example was in freshman year in African American History class people made jokes such as “slavery was not wrong.” The third question was do you think these microaggressions are common? He says that yes they are common in SLA, but only because they are common in the real world. The fourth question was have you reported these aggressions to any form of authority. He says no. The follow up question was does he regret not reporting these. His response is that he is using these experiences to learn and better himself as a person. The next question was what can be done to help stop racial microaggressions and he responded by saying was you always need to educate and advocate. He also said you cannot change someone mentality, but you can always educate them. The next question was how do you think the administration can help stop racial microaggressions in the SLA community. He says SLA is a community where students can take a problem and attempt to fix it themselves without the help of a teacher. He also says that teachers can be there to facilitate a conversation. This interview tells me that Horace has seen and experienced racial microaggressions, but he uses them to improve himself as a person instead of trying to get an adult to punish the student.

Londyn Edwards was the second person I interviewed. The questions and answers were typed out and they can be found here. The questions are the same as before. Londyn describes microaggressions that are much more personal. She describes when a classmate was discussing whether white people or black people get colder faster. When Londyn attempted to share her opinion the classmate responded with, “Well you’re closer to white anyways so your opinion doesn’t count.” This classmate was clearly talking about her lighter skin tone. This situation is a great example of what a racial microaggression is and why they need to be talked about. She has not reported the aggressions to any authority because they all happened with different people. She also says that she often questions the actions of non people of color in SLA. She then says she wants a gathering of the school to educate students on what racial microaggressions are why they are a problem. This is similar to what Horace said in his interview.

The next person I interviewed was Deacon Mackin, found here. Deacon is a student at SLA center city and a freelance artist. He has seen racial microaggressions in the SLA community and the worst has been the use of fake statistics to prove a point. Like one student claimed that mass incarceration is a myth. He says he has not experienced racial microaggressions in the SLA  community because he is white, but he has witnessed a lot of racial microaggressions in the community. His example is one of his black friends were asked what it is like to live without a father even though he has a dad that he lives with. The aggressor then made a fake statistic that most African Americans do not have a father at home. Deacon believes that these aggressions are common in the community. He thinks students can fight against these aggressions and call people out about these aggressions. He thinks that when aggressions are reported that the administration of the school acts well on the problem. So far all my interviews have led to very similar data. They all believe that microaggressions are a problem and that they need to be stopped in some way. Deacon is the only person so far to say fight against the aggressors instead of educate the aggressors.

My fourth interview is with Zoey Tweh, found here. I recommend listening to this interview if you only listen to one. It is the most insightful interview. Zoey is a junior at SLA center city and is also the president of the Black Student Union of SLA center city. Zoey says she has seen microaggressions. She is the first to mention the diversity of SLA and the intentional diversity of the school. She also says that since there is a lot of diversity there is also a lot of diversity in perspectives. She gives an example that some students believe that police brutality is not real. She says that she has not personally been attacked by a racial microaggression, but she has been offended by someone's lack of open mindedness. Zoey says she doesn’t tell teachers or staff about racial microaggressions, but she does ask for these topics to be brought up in class or discussed in class in some way. She says that SLA students often have difficult conversations and talk about problems with race and that's how you can stop racial microaggressions. Zoey also says that if the administration continues to strive towards having discussions about racism in class then they are doing a good job.

My final interview was with Ella Burrows and Kaamil Jones. Two seniors from SLA center city campus. Kaamil says social media is a major part of racial microaggressions. His example was in freshman year Harriet Tubman was proposed to be on the twenty dollar bill and a student said on social media “Harriet Tubman doesn’t belong on the twenty dollar bill she belongs ironing my clothes.” Ella agrees that social media plays a major part. She adds that outside the classroom racially insensitive comments are made. Kaamil says he has never experienced a racial microaggression in SLA. Ella says she has experienced racial microaggressions at SLA like “it’s cause she’s white.” She says she has never taken offense to the comments. Kaamil says that they are common, but they are rarely meant to be harmful. He says this is because people become too comfortable with what they say. Ella agrees that when people get too comfortable they say things that are not appropriate. Neither of them have reported anything to any administration at the school. Kaamil wants people to have a conversation about race to try to understand other people's perspectives. Ella agrees that conversations have to be had. They both say that many people do not like talking about race and that is a problem. They agree that the SLA administration does a great job with handling these topics by trying to get the students to have these conversations. This interview talks the most about why racial microaggressions occur. This is another interview that I think is great to listen to.

All these interviews have told me that racial microaggressions are common in the SLA community, but most common on social media. Most agree that a conversation is the best way to stop racial microaggressions. They all agree that the school administration does a good job handling race by having conversations.

The final part of this project is to make some change about my topic. Since most of the people I interviewed agree that conversation is the best way to stop racial microaggressions I will attempt to start multiple conversations in the community about race. I will add more to this idea when I get a firmer grasp on my idea.

As you may remember from my last post , elders living in isolation is something that concerns me. Humans often start a new part of their life when they realize that they are getting old and that they are alone. As part of my investigation, I contacted Gail Kass, the President and CEO of NewCourtland Senior Services. Their mission is “providing affordable housing and services for low-income seniors in Philadelphia.” After the interview with Ms. Kass, I learned about the importance of helping others and how wonderful it is to make someone feel like at home.

Ms. Kass said that the first activity that the residents do is start their morning with a warm breakfast in the dining room. Then throughout the day, the residents do activities like play Bingo, got to the nursery room, exercise, work on music and art projects, or stay in their rooms as they wish. The building is divided into two sections with 60 beds in each section. There are double rooms and each room has the capacity of two patients per room, a little setup, beds, bathroom, and a closet Three warm meals are served throughout the day. I asked her: “To what extent did the patients leave the facility ?” She said, “There are three main reasons why the patients would leave our facility and it is to visit their doctors, go on trips, and when the families pick them up.” Ms. Kass said that they often go on trips to the museums, such as, the flower show, restaurants, outdoors, and their favorite place, the dollar store.

This is a picture of how pets can be helpful to seniors who live in isolation.

    In my first blog post I talked about social media and how it can affect what people think about themselves. I also talked about photoshopped pictures and non photoshopped pictures and how people today want to be something else but there not. For my original research I did an interview I interviewed Jenny Mcquaile. She directed and produced the documentary straight/curve redefining body image.  For my research I also watched the documentary.

In the documentary they talked about a lot of things that I mentioned in my last post. The documentary focused on a lot of things like teenagers and body image and there self esteem how it affects them today. It talks about what people are seeing on social media and in magazines and how people remember pictures faster than anything else. How that affects people thought process about how they look. In the documentary they use a diverse number of models to speak and model so people can see that you can look good in anything and it does not matter how much you weigh and how you look.   

I learned a lot from the interview that I did with Jenny Mcquaile. I learned that clothing sites are actually listening and that they pay people to read the comments. In the beginning I was not focused on eating disorders but when I did the interview I learned about eating disorders. Like how people associate that larger people are not healthy when it really is that people need fat to be healthy. Jenny also mentioned in the interview that social media was a cause for this problem but she also said that social media can be used for good. For example she said that social media can be used as a voice and we can know tell people what we want out there on the internet. In my last post I never really said that social media could be used for good but know that I am thinking about this it can be used for good. You can use social media to get your opinion out there and to make sure that people here you.   

The documentary is not focused on one thing it talks about eating disorders, and teens and how self conscious they are. I think the main thing though that they were trying to get across was that beauty can come in all shapes and sizes. To do this they used different models that were different ages and races and they model to show this. The models also got to tell their experiences like what it is like to be a model today. They talked about what the requirements are to be a model today.

After doing all this research I am starting to notice things that are affecting people self esteem and the way they look at themselves. Like on social media or billboards I am also starting to catch myself and notice when I judge myself because of the way I look. I believe that all these things are wrong and if people stop seeing just their body and the way they look then I think people can move on and stop focusing on the way they look. One thing I wish I focused on more is eating disorders. I believe that eating disorder are a major issue with this topic. I wish I looked into this problem more and discussed it more.

For my agent of change I think I might write letters to all the clothing companies that give the image that looking skinny is the right way to look. I believe that the interview I had with Jenny Mcquaile informed me on a lot of things I did not know before. I also believe that it helped me further my research on this topic and expand my thinking.   

A Unique Point of View of Poverty

A young child carrying grass for cattle. These are usually odd jobs any child can do for miniscule amounts of currency.

Image Credits

In my previous post, I introduced you to the topic of poverty in Cambodia. I provided immense research and information of why it's such a prevalent problem in the country today. One such factor was the effects of wartime, and another one is because of the deteriorating quality of education present in the country. After conducting a bit more research, I found out that the rate of poverty fell by almost 30% in recent years. In 2004, it was a high as 50% in the nation, before dropping to an astonishing but still troubling 24% in 2014. If the data was conducted in 2018, I would predict that the poverty rate would be around 13% if the poverty rate fell by 3% each year. As stated in my other post, Cambodia is backed by money from foreign aid. In my new research, I found out that such countries include the United States, and China. It is said though that China only looks at the potential resources and business that the country can offer, rather than pouring money in for the sake of human rights and living conditions. Over 70% of the country with a population of 15 million is under the age of 30, which is staggering for a country infested with poverty.

Houses on stilts that are deployed along the river are common sights to see in these kinds of areas.

Image Credits

Also related to the new information I found while conducting new research, is that while poverty is mostly in the rural areas of Cambodia (such as the countrysides and so), it is also beginning to appear in urban areas as well. Cities like Phnom Penh (the capital of the country), or Siem Riep (home to Angkor Wat), are slowly starting to see poverty rates rise. In my opinion, this is especially alarming because these are big cities and you should see people going to work and having conversations about the weather, not people begging for spare change on the cobbled and musty streets of Phnom Penh. The last piece of information that I found is that more than 25% of all households are led by a single mother, due to the wars and strifes that have occured during the nation’s bloody history. Combined with the existence of poverty, and an high rate of uneducated unemployed women, they often have to turn to the sex industry, which is another yet unofficial source of income for the economy. Due to this, there are a lot of question marks to whether or not the government should do something about this.

This graph shows the comparison between people in poverty and people who’s on borderline poverty. As you can see, the rate of poor people decreased, but the rate of people who are endangered to becoming poor is astonishingly high in 2011.

Image Credits

For my original research, I conducted an interview with my father. I produced a total of 8 questions, all relating to my topic. There was a lot of reasons for interviewing him such as time, accessibility, language barrier, and etc. But the main reason was that he is a person familiar to the country, with him growing up there himself. He to me is considered someone who lived through poverty. From my interview, I learned many things about him that I did not know or I knew but very vaguely. For example, my first question asked about how it was like growing up for him, and he responded by describing the hardships he had to deal with growing up. One such example included him saying that he would have liked to go to school, but instead he had to focus on working in order to provide for his family. A similar pattern I saw in his responses is that he believes no jobs and the government not caring are the main reasons to why poverty is so prevalent in modern day Cambodia. This leads me to believe that in order to extricate the root of the problem, the government must listen to their people more and there needs to be more jobs with higher paying salaries. These are huge additions to the understanding of my issue and I believe that learning from a person who’s gone through the same things as people I’m researching is invaluable to my knowledge. My personal opinion on poverty has not changed due to the interview, but rather it has strengthened. My opinion is that poverty is a major issue, and if it's not fixed soon, then the future of Cambodia as a nation looks grim and bleak. With this interview, this just confirmed my opinion and there is nothing that can even remotely change it.

The Interview

Here is the person I interviewed, which is my father who is pictured alongside my mother.

This brings my Original Research post to a close. I hope you find the interview interesting as it takes you to a point of view that is told by a person who experienced poverty first hand. Now for my Agent of Change, I plan to send at least 10-15 care packages filled with various amenities and cash. Said various amenities could include, travel sized bottles of toothpaste, shampoo, or instant foods such as ramen noodles or other various instant foods. Monetary values could range from $10-15 dollars which may not seem like a lot, but one  U.S dollar is worth 4000 Cambodian riel and most items in Cambodia such as clothing and food can be worth from around 2000-300 riel, which is a huge bargain. These will be delivered to my lesser relatives in Cambodia who I hope will appreciate it. This plan is tentative for now, but this is just a general idea of what I am planning to achieve for my Agent of Change. Thanks and remember, you can make a big difference to save Kampuchea ( កម្ពុជា)!

Take a look at my annotated bibliography!

You can check out my first post HERE. In my first post, I talked about the role the price of higher education plays when students are in the application process. In my first post, I also talked hypothetically about how this could go on to affect the individual's life and any future careers. However, since my last post, I have done some further research mostly from interviewing. During the early stages of my original research, I conducted a questionnaire with the MIT admissions office and they provided me some informational and interesting answers to some of my questions. When I was conducting the questionnaire with MIT’s director of admission research and analysis, Rachel E. Kay, she gave me a set of links to various sources with information on my topic. One of the links I ascertained from Rachel led me to a page dedicated to MIT admissions there I learned that students from the class of 2021 who applied for aid in family income that was up to 90,000 dollars annually typically paid nothing when it came to terms of tuition. Rachel’s link also informed me of the percentage of students who graduate debt-free which is 72% of MIT entire student body and 91% of MIT’s student body receives financial aid. Over the course of my research, I learned that MIT participates in a program called questbridge in which the predominant idea is to recruit students who want to pursue higher education, I was also informed about how MIT awarded 97.1 million dollars in scholarships to undergraduates in the previous year alone. I was also provided a demographic of the 2021 class (HERE)  (HERE{for exact numbers}).

This directly relates to the issue I brought up in my previous post about the cost of tuition scaring graduating twelfth graders from applying to certain colleges/universities. MIT tries to challenge this issue by not accepting their applications based on what classes the individual took in high school but rather they accept their students based on what they know. So in my previous post, that student with the straight A’s and 3.9 GPA would be able to go to MIT without having to pay tuition if he gets into MIT. Besides my interview with MIT, I also interviewed my sister who is currently enrolled in a private university. I asked her a various amount of different questions such as did you ever think of studying abroad to if you had the option would you cut military spending to increase the U.S investment in education. Overall one thing that kept reoccuring in both of my interviews was that both the institution and the student believe that there are opportunities for those who cannot afford higher education. These interviews really added to my understanding of my issue because I now know that the issue isn’t there just waiting to be solved but rather it is being recognized and is on the process of being solved by institutions and individuals such as MIT and my sister. After this research, my opinions have differed from my original opinions for I thought that the colleges/universities didn’t really care and the individuals didn’t really either too. However, when you see different institutions going through the process of trying to revamp their tuition to make it more affordable for poorer students. It gives hope when you see major schools such as MIT awarding students with over 97 million dollars in aid so students can further their education without worrying about debt. One question still leaves me wondering and that is when will the U.S department of education effectively try to make the issue of the pricing of higher education a priority or will they ever try to do so? Not only does this question resonate in my head “what can the U.S do?” but also what can I do to change this issue? The answer to this question is fairly simple and that’s why for my agent of change I’m going to be contacting heads of government from Pat Toomey to Donald Trump I will try to solve this issue as best as I can.

Annotated Bibliography

Audio Interview

As you read in my last slate post, I basically summarized why the WNBA should be expanded and why the players are being underpaid. Due to some further research, I’ve found out that it is more complicated and easy achieving this. I am posting again to give further explanation.

According to a recent blog post on Swish Appeal, there are many reasons why expansion could be a good or bad thing. One great outcome from expanding the WNBA is a more expanded viewership. For example, the WNBA partnered with Twitter in 2016 and ever since they joined forces, the WNBA’s views launched up. The more popular the WNBA is the more people will want to partner with them. Another reason why the WNBA should expand is because we are losing WNBA culture. When I say culture I am talking about legacies, talent, and history. For example, when the WNBA was at its peak it had 16 teams. They lost 4 teams because there started to be a lack of interest in the ownerships. These teams had extremely talented individuals and were extremely talent as a team. One of the old teams, the Houston Comets, were the only team to win the WNBA championship four consecutive years! They also were the only WNBA team that was invited to the white house. If we keep these teams alive and expand the franchise the WNBA could be bigger than the NBA one day.

The reasons why the WNBA shouldn’t be expanded are fair but can be solved problems. It’s no surprise that money is an issue. This source says that only half of WNBA teams actually make a profit in any season. These six teams are owned by people who also own a NBA franchise. There is also the wage gap the WNBA has to make up. There are too many underpaid players in the WNBA, expansion will make money tighter. The second problem this source lists is international competition. Players have been forced to go overseas to play for international teams so they can provide better for their families. International teams pay way more than the WNBA does, because they are in a better place financially. For example, Phoenix Mercury guard Diana Taurasi missed the whole 2015 season to play overseas. They paid her $1.5 million.

The Bay Area is trying to make a change for the league. The Bay Area’s NBA team, the Warriors, are currently building a new arena. They are expected to move in this arena in the 2019-2020 season. The co-owner of the Warriors, Joe Lacob wants to make a WNBA team for the Bay area and host their home games at the Warriors current arena. This is great because that will be more people drafted in the WNBA each year and more publicity for the franchise. This is a beginning for the expansion for the WNBA.

My original plan for my Original research was going to be an interview with either the head coach of the New York Liberty’s, Katie Smith or the assistant coach, Herb Williams. I emailed both the Manager of fan development, Brett Tessler and the Director of communications, Vincent Novicki. When they both didn’t get back to me I tried contacting the coach of Imhotep's girls basketball team. Due to the fact that they are preparing for states, he was not able to do the interview. As a late result I decided to interview someone in my community who knows a great deal about the WNBA. I interviewed Diamond Wallace. Diamond gave me a different insight on the topic. She explained more problems that the WNBA faces, which made me realize that it isn’t entirely their fault that the league is so small and there is wage gaps. Diamond said “The only reason why I think they are doing bad is because there is not a lot of entertainment. A lot of people look for 360 dunks and crossovers and the WNBA doesn’t really offer that.”That is something I didn't even think about. I appreciate her cooperation and the knowledge she gave to me about my topic.

This is an image from my interview with Diamond Wallace.

I am not sure what I want to do for my Agent of Change. Diamond gave me the idea of creating a website to explain what I’ve learned and what everyone can do about it. I was also thinking of writing an email to various NBA teams to try to do an act like Joe Lacob is willing to do. I am open to ideas so please comment below if you have any.

For further information, please look at my Annotated Bibliography.

Kayla Kelly                                                                                                                            3/17/18

English 9

Ms. Giknis

You and the world projet       

  I have an animosity to animal abuse;I am ardent in stopping animal abuse

                           My Dog

Before                                           After

How many animals get abused in the U.S

https://www.petsafe.net/learn/help-prevent-animal-cruelty

The Numbers are high considering the chart, 60% of all abused animal victims and 60% of them are dogs, 83% are cats and dogs, and if you think how many people abuse animal across the united state.The SPCA is is a good choice , because most time they have to euthanize animals if they don’t have enough room, but They said the don’t ethinzia adoptable animals, and they try to save as many animal as much they can which is also why it is also a good choice, and  they are getting less animals in so they don’t have ethinize as much, and maybe more room. And animal abuse is a very serious problem, and SPCA is still good because they try to help as much as they can, it is like me trying to help every homeless person of the street and taking them in to my home I can’t do that to all of them, I don’t have enough room to do that, not to mention I have small house, so I would have to let go of some people like what SPCA does, but now they probably don’t do it as much ( they do not accept birds , dogs, cats, small animals). An the ACCT is a good choice too because like my interviewer said the ACCT  is an open it take shelter,so they will take any animal bird, cats, dogs, etc. So if you know you can’t take care of an animal please take it to ACCT, or any shelter, because if you know you can’t take care of it it is a form of abuse and it is better off in any shelter. She also said that abuse is what they regularly see so don’t be afraid to take the animal in , but if it would be related to the police like your neighbor is the abuser then call the PSPCA.And if you help lessen the number of animal coming in , and to help people take care of animals, and if you don’t know how to take care of an animal but you enough money to take care of one then you can look on web sites and ask for help, don’t be embarrassed, there is more people like that than you think.and my other interviewer said that all my question where more for PSPCA for an iterview, but I was already running out of time for that when I got her response.                                                                My interviewer teeling me that I could hep ACCT with my agent of change

.

the other interview that said PSPCA was a better coice to interview fo r my questions

But Anyway, I have a dog(the first picture above) that is probably been through that, Although we don’t,know her back story besides her being shot 16 times and her being still here, not to mentions she had a couple of disease before the adoption center got her, and usually dog adapt and if she was wild she probably would not have a disease, but who knows she may have escaped, but I mean she is in my family's care for about 2 years in march 12th and she is very happy and she is always wagging her tail, beside when she goes for a car ride, tha vacuum goes on , and if we put on a tv show that has a gun shooting a one point like a mystery show,or if there is a fake gun like a nerf gun near, which would be the trama, but that is kind f why i am doing this.

Rabies: why most people terrorize dogs.

https://www.tes.com/lessons/ZfjkR0gtFqB-jQ/animal-rights

Dog are Abused 20% More Than any Other Animals in the U.S

But  Abuse can’t get unnoticed, and that means we have to start speaking up, I mean the abuser doesn't have to know a thing, most calls are autonomous, and you don’t have to tell the person that you going to tell, like almost every one of my site say to do, because it is important.And what is even more important is that 100% of people who commit  sexual homicide has a history of animal abuse which is kind of bothering that a lot of them do that, and it doesn't mean the other way around so if there is a neighbor who is abusing an animal doesn't mean they will commit sexual homicide so don’t be afraid to do your own actions and report them.Not to mention abusers, abusers don’t give the animals enough room for  them sometime to breathe and grow, or give them too much room, like the whole yard but can’t use all of the yard because they are chained up from the picture in many sites. Which is again terrible, considering the effect, which is physical and mental health issues.Or animal hoarder, I mean they collect animals and are like I can take care of them even though they obviously cannot, but they completely think they can handle everything but they have a lot cats, dog, etc.

And to kind of wrap this up a bit, I read the laws(which I suggest for you if you care for animal, because one of my site suggests it too in one of the steps for reporting animal abuse). first, animal abuse penalty includes the officer to file a felony charge(a felony is a severe crime and is viewed severely by the society, and can include murder, robbery, kidnapping, etc)dog t fighting is already a felony, and breaks down into different grade pentaly’s base on how hard the abuse is. And veterinarians have civil immunity( where you don’t get served the punishment) now I don’t get too much of this but if they actually harm animals I think they will get charged because rules are rules, I think it is only for checking things from the dog and stuff. And a little bit obvious but if they commit animal abuse they will have to give animals. And did you know there is a new law that if someone abuse horse’s they will be charge the same charge as abusing dog and cats.

For my Agent of change I was thinking of having a bake sale and and giving the money to ACCT, and I will be ecpically easy because my interviewer is working in funraising and money depratment. I had limited chocies to do think, because I can’t just walk up to a person like hay your and animal abuser I will call the cops and make sure this animal is safe, and there is volenteer options but that means I might have to do it way more than I thought. I have students run philly style, durring saturdays an hour after school on mondays tuesdays and thursdays, and also have robotics, not to metion I also have green season in running which means I have to practice in the summer, and all of that make My time very limited, and I don’t know what hours they would like me to go in, plus I don’t know how to get there, I haven’t even travel in there over there a thousand time on the train but I haven’y been in there, not to metion it is know where neer the train station and the close septa there is 53 an I don’t even know where I could even catch that,  and I can definatl not get another dog, my dog is j same way about elouse with other dogs and she is a nut case, we can take care of her but with my grandma, my grandma would be going nut, my grandma already freaks out over pretty much any thing we do (my dad, mom, brother, and me ,feel the her, way protective, always want to cleans, too much, but we love her any way). I could sent care packages, but I can’t take car of that, mostly likely my dog will rip up ANYTHING, money is better, she hates money and metal, when I show her money she is nor tempted to eat it.

                                          Annotated bibliography

1. “Animal Cruelty”Learning to give,https://www.learningtogive.org/resources/animal-cruelty

The definition of animal abuse is the acts of violence or negling the animal on purpose or at least mostly on purpose.and it is important to know which ones are which because, police or animal control will know and asses the problem, like if it is dog fighting, and you say i don’t know abusing an animal in a backyard, they might think oh only one and not bring enough equipment, to ring them to a shelter. This abuse can cause physical and emotional pain, considering my dog whenever she hears gunshots(even on TV, plus we live near an country club that has an gun range) she gets scared and when we first got her she was jumpy and whenever and man/boy try to take her collar off she would growl, but when me or my mom took it off she did nothing(she is fine now and is very happy and understands that we will not hurt her and stuff because now my dad and brother can take her collar off) so that memory will live on.

• Animal abuse is very cruel and hurtful to other animals (I do not trust SPCA because if they run out of room for animals, they ethiniza some animals)

• It is very horrible because animal are just like us, they have feeling just like us, so it is very unfair for someone to do that to an animal.

              2.“Animal abuse and Human Abuse: Partners in crime” PETA,https://www.peta.org/issues/companion-animal-issues/companion-animals-factsheets/animal-abuse-human-abuse-partners-crime/

Studies have shown that aggressive animal are likely to be abused because people are afraid and a coward. 100% of sexual homicide  has a history of animal abuse.Albert Desalvo killed 13 women and abused puppies so it can back up my reasoning.

• It is very usual for a sexual homicide person to abuse animals

• And I am not surprised that aggressive animal get abused more,because again people are cowards

3.“Animal Abuse”Amarican Human https://www.americanhumane.org/fact-sheet/animal-abuse/

4.I didn't know that there was steps, I kind of knew some signs but I am not sure whether I will recognize the signs.owners often neglect their pets because they don’t know there pets need, but most of neglect is on purpose.but outrageous because human system can take calls right at that minute, but they get a lot calls so they will not take the call right at the moment.

• We can testify or sign a complaint about the abuse like how you sign a complaint about noise

• Neglect in both children and dogs are horrible  and can result in death

“Reasons for abuse” wildlife rescue and rehabilitation http://wildlife-rescue.org/services/advocacy/animal-abuse/

5.Actions can be active and passive, like hurting the animal and not doing anything for the animal. Like some kid decapitated dog and stuff and setting fire on their tails and butts.Passive actions can cause severe pain to a dog or cat

“ U.S Animal Abuse records deleted-What we stand to lose”National geographics.https://news.nationalgeographic.com/2017/02/wildlife-watch-usda-animal-welfare-trump-records/

The roadside Zoo neglected the animals including premature death. And making the monkey Dehydrated while performing experiment on them that is just rude.and whipping elephants and changing them.

• I love elephants so I hate that they would do the elephants

• And I hate that the family zoo would do that and I wonder if they ethinza

Extra websites:

http://placerspca.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/faqs.pdf

http://criminal.findlaw.com/criminal-law-basics/what-distinguishes-a-misdemeanor-from-a-felony.html

http://www.philly.com/philly/news/animal-cruelty-pennsylvania-libres-law-20170628.html

https://www.today.com/pets/aspca-adoption-euthanasia-s-down-animal-shelters-t109029

Throughout life people are asked who they are. This is simple at first with people saying their name, address, and ages. As you get older and gain more responsibility your identity changes to your major in college, current or past jobs, and who you are dating. These changes, while small have a great impact on how people perceive themselves. The changes lead, to the problem that today’s society is having. Today’s society Identifies themselves as being apart of multiple systems where there is no defined stability like in relationship and employment.

When people are in a relationship they are supposed to love each other and they are supposed to date and marry someone that makes them happy. When someone has a relationship based on materialistic goods, instead of feeling, it can cause unhappiness in the relationship, which could cause a divorce. Statistics from Mckinley Irvin Family Law States there are 876,000 divorces a year. The amount of divorce there per year is affecting people psychological identity and sudden failure of the opposite spouses will change the personals ideals and point of view of themselves. The loss of am important relationship like a spouse from a divorce changes the other spouse’s point of view. They question their view of themselves as a graduate student to a husband to I am a graduate student and recently divorced. They question what they did wrong and what they could do differently and what negative effect happen in their relationship with their spouse. The break up causing them to losing their identity. When both spouses agree to the divorced there is still a a identity crisis. Both spouse have emotional damage and Identity damage.

People who are workaholic can lose their identity by fully investing their life into their work. If they fully devote their lives to a particular type of work they are more likely to have no other way to define themselves beside their work. Working hard at your job is not a bad thing. They have a higher chance of a raise, promotion, and the ability to network. It can still cause inner conflict with themselves later on in life. Jobs aren’t forever and when  they retire from their jobs that they dedicated their life, what do they have? So much time of a person’s life is spent working to get a perfect job and once they get the job then the goal is to plan for retirement and to pay off student loans. They have little or no time for personal time and fun until retirement. Working in certain fields like medicine can cause a person to not have a chance to define themselves outside of work with eight to ten years in college and residency, While this could cause them to have a higher quality of life, it could also caused them to have a mental issue during like depression and anxiety with little to no outlet to let off stress. The fact that they don't have an outlet for destressing allow them to mentally have a breakdown more easily and lose themselves and who they are. So when retirement comes around they have no idea how to enjoy life because they don't know what to do because they don't really know themself.

The best way to stop people from losing one’s identity  is to stop following the principles of the previous generation. Throughout history people lived and learned from the beliefs of the past generation. With each new generation there a new set of principles that are commonly shared with everyone in that generation .With having ideas for the previous generation being pushed down to the next generation in concern of relationship and jobs. Past generations has there after college experience be to meet someone and they get married and get a job and a mortgage in there early to mid 20’s. They had to take responsibility much earlier than the newer generation. While the principles changes thought out the generation the ideal stayed the same about wanting to be a good spouse and parent and being a valued member of their respective community. The difference from the two generation is a small change of the newest generation having the choice in there early adulthood. This choice caused them to be able to  expression what they want in life before they have to be fully committed to a job. This is something that older generation like bosses and parents doesn’t really understand about the younger generation. These are not the only factor that caused people to lose their self-identity. In 2008 newly graduated college students found the economy in a recession. Student could not get any jobs during that time and this causing them not to know what to do with their life with no job employment in their field and. This made them not know how to fit into the world but these are factors that are man-made. We can all fix and change how we view society idea of a person self image. There identity, makes the next generation can become successful and healthy by the idea only they define their identity.

The Next Phase

In the beginning of my journey to stop littering, I gave a basic definition and talked about what littering is. I explained the cause of littering, the effects, and a solution that could possibly stop people from littering. I also  gave statistics about littering that happens in our community. To see what the littering situation was like, I went out and observed my neighborhood.

Age Difference

The next task that I fulfilled with my journey, was field observations. What I was observing was the amount of trash on the ground and how frequent people drop their trash on the ground. As I was observing, I noticed that different age groups litter less or more. Then I realized that adults litter more than teenagers and teenagers litter more frequently. I looked up a website where it gives gives statistics on the types of trash on the ground and the different age group that litters the most. This website stated, “Those under 19 are the most frequent culprits, while adults aged 21 to 35 are three times more likely to litter than the 50-and-up crowd.” This information explains about the age difference when it comes to littering, because you would think that teenagers are the ones littering but really it is the adults who is littering the most and that has an effect on the youth. The youth doesn't care as much for their environment because they are focused on other things and they litter because they see other people do it. If adults are littering more than teenagers, it’s not showing teenagers a good example of how the world should always be clean. People should educate each other about the importance of keeping our streets clean.

This picture represents america being dirty because all the litter that is everywhere.

My Observations

For my observations, I wanted to see the amount of trash in my neighborhood. The first thing I did was look at the ground to see how much trash their was. While I was observing, I noticed there was so many cups, bottles, plates, paper and etc. After seeing all the trash on the ground, it was clear to me that my neighborhood is really dirty. Below are pictures that I took of the trash:

From the pictures above, it shows how filthy our neighborhoods look. My neighborhood, in North Philadelphia, isn’t the only dirty area; there are more areas in Philadelphia that are dirty. I was reading this blog post where the author, Julie Hancher, was talking about how dirty Philly is. She said, “Several neighborhoods actually have removed trash cans from their streets because residents will pile bags next to trash cans instead of waiting for their trash cans. Also, lack of trash cans throughout the city tempt people to throw their trash wherever – in a bush, etc.” This is one of the reasons why Philadelphia is filled with trash. From the blog post it says, “A few years ago I was on Filbert Street near Eighth behind our newsroom in the old Strawbridge & Clothier building, and I watched a woman in a parked minivan throw a dirty diaper right out her window onto the street.” Not only people are dropping trash on the ground while walking people are dropping trash on the ground from their cars.” This shows that since people are lazy to throw their trash, in the trash, they decide to throw it on the ground.

My Next Step

After my first post, I’ve been researching a lot about littering more. As I’m researching, I realized that some people do not care about their environment. Some things I was wonder was if people ever think before actually doing something? This is a question that I have in mind, because people don’t seem to care about what they do as long as it is done and out the way. Now that I have done enough researching and observing, it is time to bring this issue into a solution. One of my solutions is to have an impact on other people to show that cleaning up the environment can make a difference to the community.

My first blog post was about the introduction to the bystander effect. My first experience of the bystander effect was when I got jumped in the streets and no one helped. I decided to go deeper about the issue with the bystander effect. I found out that bystander effect is cause by the amount of people present in the situation. The more people at the site of bullying, the more likely they won’t help. With less people in the situation, the most likely they would help. This is because they think another person will step in and help. Also, they don’t feel like it their responsibility to jump in and help. Finally, fear plays on the people because they don’t want to risk their life or be the next victim.  

Some new information I have found since the last post is an experiment that have been done with 5 year old kids about the bystander effect. They are asked to color in a picture while there was an adult in the room painting a cardboard wall. The experiments were set up as the kid was alone with the painting adult, and another one where a couple of other kids painting with them who were confederates of the experimenter but were told not to say anything. In the finally one, they have the confederates kid be block by the cardboard but the non confederate kid can still see them which they call it the bystander unavailable situation. The adult would spill color water and the child would help them bring over paper towels. They found out that kids that were mostly alone help the adult while with other kids, only 50% of them helped. They discover the kids in the bystander unavailable situation still help although there were other kids there. This shows that the role of diffusion of responsibility is the problem and not social referencing