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School District Budget Cuts: Cutting the Future: Followup

Posted by Michael Roth in English 1 - Dunn on

The total amount of budget cuts over the next two years is proposed to be 400 million dollars, on top of the 40 million for this year. Most recently, full-day kindergarten has been compromised, as have many buses. If Governor Corbett's budget is approves, the district may go from 3.2 billion dollars of operating budget to 2.7 billion by July 1st. What I'm about to write is a lot of statistics, so if you don't want the details you may want to skip this part. 



The proposed budget by Governor Corbett would "shave the district's share of basic education funds ($107 million); eliminate charter-school reimbursements ($110 million); end accountability block grants for full-day kindergarten ($55 million); cut educational assistance funds for after-school tutoring ($19 million); and excise dual-enrollment programs that allow high school students to earn college credit ($1 million)." 3800 jobs are said to be lost, as well. Operating budgets are to be cut by 29%, kindergarten funding by 43%, transportation by 44%, alternative education programs by 50%, extended day programs to be eliminated altogether, vocational education cut by 30%, high-incidence special education staffing by 5% leading to a 77% cut of special education liaison positions. Gifted education will be cut by 50%, english language learner supports by 20%, 50% cuts for central offices which leads to 430 job losses, instrumental music cut by 9%, early childhood programs by 16% resulting in 730 pre-K slots lost by The Bright Futures program and 216 lost by Comprehensive Early Learning Centers.



Arlene Ackerman (pictured below) has said that the District's way of handling these cuts aren't bad. She brought up the point that some are saying, for example, to save art programs while others save literature, and there isn't enough money left after the cuts to save all programs. Part of the issue that Ackerman is dealing with is that if she saves one program, she won't be able to save another, and there isn't a single program that all members of the community don't want to save. Be that as it may, in my opinion, there is still more that she could be doing, maybe even contributing some of her own pay, (possibly $500,000 this coming year,) or managing the money the District will receive more efficiently although, as I've said, she is in a difficult position.


Dr. Arlene Ackerman - Superintendent - School District of Philadelphia


http://www.thenotebook.org/blog/113629/what-gets-cut-what-gets-spared

http://abclocal.go.com/wpvi/story?section=news/local&id=7951825

http://www.philly.com/philly/news/local/121759939.html

http://www.thenotebook.org/blog/113665/ackerman-everybodys-feeling-some-pain

http://www.phila.k12.pa.us/offices/ceo/ackerman/message_from_super_10-08.html

Teen Suicide Numbers can be Shocking

Posted by Morgan Taylor in English 1 - Dunn on

In my resent research I have found some interesting facts. These facts really made me think. I had a few things on my mind while I was looking at this data. The entire time I was thinking to myself  “These adolescent teens are killing themselves while they are still young what would make them want to do that. They think that there is no way out of their horrible lives, instead of getting help the go ahead and end the lives they have not yet lived.

            If you read my last blog you would know that I was talking about what causes a child or teen to kill them selves. A question asked last time was “ What would make a person old or young want to end their lives when they still have more of life to live.” If you haven’t read my last blog please refer back to it if you want to know more or are interested in finding out why teens and people do this to themselves,

In this blog I will be talking about the math of this matter. Yes the statistics of teen suicide. This information is both very socking but absolutely true. These statistics are from 2001, if you think that these numbers are high think of how they changed over 10 years. 400,000 people that year went to the emergency room for hurting themselves. 30,622 deaths occurred that year for teen suicide. Deaths per 100,00 population is 10.8, this means that almost 11 of 100,000 people die for every 100,000 people in a population. Deaths due to firearm are 5.9 people and 6,869 people. Suffocation suicides are 2.2 people and 6,198 deaths. Poisoning are 1.8 people and 5,191 deaths. Although these numbers are not as high as expected this data is from 2001 and the number have and still are going up.

Next time I will be talking about the signs of teen suicide and how to prevent it, until next time readers. If you want to see more graphs go to this link below.


LINK

Another Mass Murderer: Part 2

Posted by Roberto Abazoski in English 1 - Dunn on
Last week, my blog post was about the types of cancers and their causes. This week, I researched the number of people these cancers affected in 2007. Also, I researched the charities that are raising money to fund more research to find a cure.

In the United States, 2007, the cancer prevalence, the number of people living with cancer, came to a total of 11,714,000 people (rounded to the nearest 1000). This includes males, females and all the types of cancer. 5,353,000 males were living with cancer in 2007; this includes all types of cancer. Also, 6,361,000, females were living with cancer in 2007; this also includes all types of cancer. The type of cancer that most people were living with in 2007 is breast cancer; 13,000 males lived with it and 2,592,000 females lived with it. To think if these people didn't die, what good they would do to the world aside from the bad that is already in the world like wars, but that's a whole different blog. One of them could've started something big to help the world get back up from what ever brought it down. I always wondered what life would be like knowing you don't have much time left if your not that old, but these victims have and I hope they used the rest of their time well. Are you really living if you're not making each day different and lively?

The best cancer charities to donate to are the “Breast Cancer Fund”, “Breast Cancer Research Foundation”, “Susan G. Komen for the Cure”, and “St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital”.

I also researched if cancer if curable. The answer to that is yes! 80% of all types of cancer can be cured, but only if treated early. Although, not everyone still survived. A vaccine can’t cure it though because a vaccine can only heal against a disease by a germ and cancer isn’t a germ, therefore a vaccine will never cure cancer.

So what is the cure? Read next week’s blog to read my further research on this “cure”.

 

http://www.cancer.org/cancer/cancerbasics/cancer-prevalence

http://www.charitywatch.org/toprated.html#cancer

http://www.healthoma.com/can-cancer-be-cured-is-cancer-curable/

 

Collectivism- the opposite of Individualism and America

Posted by Kyler Jones in English 1 - Dunn on
Preamble:
It is important to know about collectivism because it is almost the exact opposite of individualism and they are both very strongly opposing philosophies. Having some understanding of collectivism will help you better understand individualism


​Collectivism is the political theory that people should be interdependent on others and all conform to the same ideas and worship the goals of group than that of the individual. It's a broad term that expands to many different topics and politics. Collectivists believe in order to form the more common good that the people should be united as a whole live their lives for the community, nation, or society.

Collectivism stresses the worth of the group instead of that of the individual. Collectivism has been expressed strongly through political philosophies such as socialism, fascism, and communism. Examples of collectivism can be viewed in our society such as things as privately owned media, and corporate America.
Part 2: America, Collectivist or Individualist?

Privately owned media can dictate the things that people watch therefore, they have control over what we view. If everyone views the same things than everyone is united by that. Corporations because they force people to all consume at the same products there for making shopping a common interest.

Those are examples of collectivism in a federal constitution republic, capitalist, democracy with two political parties (republicans and democrats). If you think about it, even though we have a democracy it really is another form of collectivism because only the people who vote, and the majority's opinions rule.
Individualism can play out in America through capitalism, but it's very limited what you can do because of laws, government, coercive institutions such as school, and money. It's a system of working for others all your life and maintaining your lifestyle. Also, it becomes even more collective because you have to conform to others expectations, and if everyone has to meet those expectations than everyone eventually sells themselves to popular opinion, in order to have more freedom.

So freedom is limited, to how much money you have, and how others feel about you.
For example, one trying to enter the workforce knows that she may have to dress a certain way and act very friendly and be basically a yes-man for her boss in order to get the job. She wants the job because she needs the money to support her psuedo-bohemian lifestyle, she can't afford to dine at high end restaurants if she works odd jobs. So conforms herself to a common system of doing things in order to have more freedom and power.
That is an obvious idea of collectivism because she is molding her mind to the beliefs and behaviors of
the majority.

So America is unfortunately more collectivist than it ever will be individualist. Unless you are willing to break all rules than individualist. The moral worth of the individual does not exist in this society, because we are constantly told to fit into other people's molds, the legislative branch places laws that say what we cannot do, class and jobs create a hierarchy that people are defined by, and authority basically strips away the purpose of individualism because you have to be a slave to authority in order to gain some freedom ( which doesn't even exist because of the limitations of rules).

So it's justifiable to say that American is collectivist, in a very divided, organized, and clever way.

Sex Slave Trade_Blog #2_Hunt

Posted by Katherine Hunt in English 1 - Dunn on

In my first blog post I talked about the Sex Slave Trade that goes on all throughout the world. Also, in my first blog post I talked about what I was interesting to me and wrote basic information. In my prior blog there was talk about where the Sex Slave Trade. This is my second blog post and I will go into more depth into what is going on with the trade at the moment.

New research that has been selected for this blog is where Sex Slave Trade originated. There is not an exact place that there is said that it originated because slaves come from everyone. Although, many of resources say that is flourished in Islam while others say that it started in Thailand, while others say this started back during the slave trade itself. Disregarding from where this originated that is not the problem. The real problem is the Sex Slave Trade itself.

Currently, the Sex Slave Trade is known to be illegal in most parts of the world. Although, it is illegal the population of this trade is starting to grow as the years pass by us. It is said that in the United States we are the lowest ranked human trafficking country in the world. On the contrary in Thailand, they are the highest ranked country that part-takes in the Sex Slave Trade. Since, the 1900’s there have been approximately 80,000 women and children sold into this market.

Why is sex slave trade being done? In the Islamic culture most of the men find the women to be their property and think that they can do anything they want with them. In most countries especially poorer countries it is done for the money. In Thailand, the trafficking industry is being done because it is an annual 8 billion dollar industry.

Every year there are thousands of people that are human trafficked throughout the world. Even though the Sex Slave Trade is too big for anyone to make a huge impact to stop this there are organizations for this. Organizations are out the search in order to help victims stand up for what is right in hopes that this trade will be abolished. Some organizations to help are “Abolish Slavery” and “Not for Sale”.

 

Bibliography-

1.     http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/1530000/posts

2.   http://www.bbc.co.uk/religion/religions/islam/history/slavery_1.shtml

3.     http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sexual_slavery

4.     http://www.wnd.com/?pageId=12616

5.     http://www.suite101.com/content/the-sex-slave-trade-innocence-lost-a239643

What REALLY has value to it?

Posted by Isabela Supovitz-Aznar in English 1 - Dunn on
Materialism isn’t just trends, and the way you dress and look. If you really think about the main issues with materialism it isn’t just that material things don’t ACTUALLY make you happy, it’s that the advertisement world has created a gimmick of stereotypes for us to follow and look to as “beautiful” or “perfect” or “cool”. Those words define people in great ways, so of course! Why wouldn’t you want to be those things? The truth is, No material object can change who you are. And although it may influence how people see you it will never bring you full happiness if you don’t feel 100% like your self. In fact, these trends, and stereotypes, and things considered “attractive” and “cool” can lead people into depression. If an average sized girl sees her favorite clothes being worn by twig-thin models who skips meals on a daily basis, the chances are this could influence that girl to develop a dangerous habit like throwing up, or starving herself and that could lead to diseases like anorexia and bulimia.

            Another thing that materialism is doing to the world is it’s physically HURTING our planet. Yes materialism has gone on for thousands of years, the wealthy Egyptians had decorative gold jewelry and pyramids sky-high. It’s the same concept through out history. A trend catches on, and consumers begin spending and spending. What this does, is it fills our homes with unnecessary amounts of clothing, or useless gadgets and machines and toys that really aren’t crucial to our lives and our survival. And all of these things we own took resources to make, have you ever thought about where all of these things go when we’re through with them? Landfills, trash, they are put into our earth.  They are put back into our planet as harmful worn out and sometimes toxic material. Just because I would rather have 10 pairs of shoes than 2, my planet is going to suffer.

            Many people turn to materialism as an escape. They see it as their chance at renewal. A new look, a new phone, a new outfit, new make up, new video games. All these things we essentially don’t need, and that make us cooler amongst our groups of friends.  Studies have shown that people when thinking back had happier memories with material experiences (like going golfing, going to see a movie, or going to a concert etc.) than with memories of themselves buying something they really wanted.

             I think that if I were to do something about materialism, it would have to start with the advertisement world. Stereotypes, or one sort of person should not be the only ones advertised. It’s okay to be who you are, and look the way you look and if we had confident people of all different sizes and colors and sexuality looking proud of who they are on billboards, and in commercials, I have a feeling people wouldn’t have the constant urge to make themselves someone else’s idea of perfect through materialism.

            Next time I would like to look more into what people can do about materialism, how to get yourself out of the cycle of constantly spending and buying things you don’t need, and how I can spread the word.

 

Until next time!

 

Isabela.





resources :



http://www.cpyu.org/Page.aspx?id=76937

 

http://www.helium.com/items/386605-problems-of-materialism-and-consumerism-in-historical-perspective

Disaster From Mother Nature

Posted by Eric Loth in English 1 - Dunn on

Hey guys, welcome back to Disaster From Mother Nature. As most of you guys know if you read the last blog, this time I will be talking about the earthquake that had happen to Japan. And a little bit about the tsunami and the nuclear melt down even thought the melt down is off topic, well it goes with the earthquake so why not.

 

A 9.0 magnitude earthquake, this is serious. On Friday March 11,2011 an earthquake has struck Japan. The national police agency announced that around 10,000 people have been killed and a total of 17,000 still missing.  A total off 250,00 people are stay at a safety faculty. Japan has lost a lot of homes and will take a while to rebuild, But from the facts out of my mind I think that the people of Japan has spread around the world to find shelter as fast as they can before there lives get more worse. So if you see a Japanese person looking lost go help them, they came out to everywhere looking for help, for people to support them but I bet half of the people they see just ingnore them and the other half just make an excuse. It’s not that hard to just lend money, just think to your self what if that was you.

 

After the earthquake had occurred a tsunami also hit Japan making it so much worse than what they already got to go through.  The tsunami had wash down all off the houses and buildings broken by then earthquake and also the damage it got by it self. After the tsunami hit that part of Japan was done. It will take a while for them to recover. One thing I don’t get is, why doesn’t America help Japan more or as much as they did to Haiti. From my opinion I think that what had happened to Japan is much more worse then Haiti just thinking of the earthquake, tsunami and the nuclear melt down.

 

Now the nuclear melt down, they had to make sure that everyone in Japan left. After all the natural disaster a nuclear power place got messed up from the earthquake. Its seems that the earthquake was so powerful that it took all the water that cooled down the nuclear power system and made the nuclear power burn. Which leaked out and made the air polluted. So Japan is still working on trying to fix it. I think they are doing a good job. This is one of the biggest reasons why the people of Japan is all around the world.  So give a hand and go help and support the people of Japan

 

As you can see the people of japan still need your help, so go out and donate. On my next blog pose I will be talking about  the Haiti earth quake and how they are doing now.  

 

           

 

Cup.

Posted by Anonymous in Storytelling - Chase on
I ordered a cup that says "Aperture science a trusted friend in science" Zach and Stefen thinks it's a waste of money since i can go make my own but you know it's not the same. the reason i bought a cup is so i could have on when we do story slam and it'll be my own special cup with memories from other people. I also bought it cause of a game franchise that i enjoy. It comes in the mail today. the first thing i'm gonna drink from it is. tea.no wait! coffee...wait we don't have coffee at home. Maybe juice but the cup is too good for juice to be the first drink that it holds. maybe a frap. maybe there is a store that puts fraps in a cup of your choice it's conservative and eco-friendly. they should do that. 

Trust

Posted by Taylor Valentine in Storytelling - Chase on
Let's be honest. I don't really trust him.  I'm only giving him this responsibility because my "babying" makes him angry.  I'm not fully confident that he has any expertise whatsoever in flower picking, or matching, or the organizational skills to even remember everything he needs to.  The worst part is, I feel guilty that I'm not. So here's to trust by means of guilt and to the hope that this trust will manifest into a white corsage next week.  

ADD

Posted by Anonymous in Storytelling - Chase on
I was diagnosed with ADD at the age of four. That's dumb. I was four years old, all four year old act like they have ADD. I don't have ADD. That just bullshit.

ADD

Posted by Anonymous in Storytelling - Chase on
I was diagnosed with ADD at the age of four. That's dumb. I was four years old, all four year old act like they have ADD. I don't have ADD. That just bullshit.

Does your social status effect your college acceptance?

Posted by Jasmin Hussain in English 1 - Dunn on
​For the next couple of weeks I will be doing research to see if social statuses such as family income, neighborhoods, schools ore even social networking profiles effect acceptances into college. I am interested in this topic because I want to make sure that if social statuses do interfere with college acceptances I will have a efficient social status. This research plan can not only help me but also others who want to maintain a good social status for college acceptances. So far in research I learned that many colleges indeed do look into social networking profiles when considering student acceptances. When colleges consider students they not only look for good test scores and teacher recommendations but they also want to know how students are outside of the academic area. Keeping a appropriate social network profile can give a good impression. For my future research I want to look into what a good online profile looks like. What type of comment should you keep off of facebook or twitter or myspace? What is appropriate to be said on your profile???
Links used for research:
http://mshgrant.edublogs.org/2011/04/26/does-facebook-affect-your-college-admission-chances/









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Livin' High off that WIN!

Posted by John DeSalis in Storytelling - Chase on
​The 2011 Rockets Baseball team is coming off a HUGE win over Strawberry Mansion in what would be the Rockets chance to lock-up their spot for the 2011 PIAA AA playoffs which will start on Monday May 16th against teams in the B-Division. The Rockets have also locked the 2nd seed with that win as well. It was a good day for all the senior players on the team, Brandon Williams threw a complete 135-pitch game to give him the W, Andre Serrano was a monster at the plate and also on the base paths, Anthony Seeley found how to get out of his little slump, Marshall Johnston kept his streak alive and was just as equally aggressive at the plate and on the bases as Andre, I myself had a horrible day at the plate, and thought that I got the wrong time to be in a slump with a strikeout and a sacrifice fly in my first two at-bats, soon to find myself to hit 2 singles in my next two at-bats. Overall, we were very happy to have finally done this and to have had the opportunity to represent SLA in the playoffs.

GO ROCKETS!

Some people are trying to stop animal cruelty.

Posted by Jessica Maiorano in English 1 - Dunn on

The research that I focused on is an animal rescue center called the ASPCA. The reason I am writing about this is because it is one of the biggest teams to help fight animal cruelty. In 2005 they started this team when hurricane Katina happened. It is a group of staff that help animals with all different problems that are natural and man made disasters. The team works with other groups to rescue animals and give them the care that they need. You can adopt animals from the ASPCA, learn how to take better care of your pet, donate and learn ways to get involved to stop it.

 

The ASPCA happy tails is when they tell you about stories of animals how they were saved and what happened to them. I have got into that pacifically because I wanted to know what was going on with the animals, I didn’t just want to know that there was animals getting hurt I wanted to everything about the situation.

 

For example there is a dog-named Mercury. His owner was a dog fighter. The ASPCA suspected that he was a dog fighter and the owner kept them in tiny cages in a yard. The man did the only thing he came do at that point was tell him to put his dogs in bigger crates and took photos of the dogs. Mercury caught the mans eyes and knew he would save him one day. The owner winded up putting the animals in a vacant apartment. The men Ruiz got them out right away and bring them to the ASPCA. Now he is healthy and ready to be adopted.

 

You don’t want that happening to other animals and neither do I? I don’t know why people did it in the first place but that’s what I want to know.


http://www.aspca.org/ 

Johniera, Tim, Dre- Gulf Of Mexico Dead Zone

Posted by Andre Reed in American History - Laufenberg on
Reflection: Our group found it really easy to find information on our topic. And found it interesting how this man made disaster occurs mostly during the summer and spring and how long it's been going on. Some of us (Andre) never even heard about this disaster before until we got the assignment. We learned a lot about the Gulf of Mexico.

a. What went well was that we got the work done.
b. Nothing really didn't go well.
c. Something we would do different would be is how we research our topic. And maybe talk about more of the effects.

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Relfexion

Posted by Jaccar Garcia in Spanish Literature - Gierke on
Jaccar Garcia


Quiereme Cinco Minutos

Anai Lopez


En el capitulo que leí hoy la abuela de Elena esta en el hospital por que cayo en una coma. A Elena se le rompe el corazón de ver que la abuela tiene tubos y pinza metía por adentro de ella. Entonce Elena le comienza a hablar porque sabe que dique aunque la abuela esta inconsciente puede oil todo alrededor. Elena le dice gracia por ver tenido a su padre y a su tíos y que vía sido mejor si se vía quedado soltera para que la abuela podia viajar y hacer todo lo deseaba. Luego entra una enfermera y hace que Elena se salga del cuarto, Elena le da un beso a su abuela y sigue pal pasillo donde esta el papa de ella.