One Issue Could Make Or Break A Vote

Over the high holidays, many families get together and catch up on their lives. They talk about after school activities, piano recitals, politics, etc. Recently though, politics has been the most pressing issue with most of my above-age-21 family members. They are all deciding on who to vote for! I feel like it would be such a hard choice to choose who to vote for mainly because there are so many issues a candidate must have a strong opinion on. The reason I'm writing this post is to bring up the idea of people voting for a candidate just because of one the candidate's many ideas. Is it fair to like all but one of a candidate's ideas and then vote for the other? I guess it depends how important that ONE issue is to the voter. I know that one family member of mine has a strong opinion about the idea of being pro- choice and of women having abortion rights. President Obama has a clear position that he supports abortion rights, while Romney has a muddled position on if he supports them. He opposes the abortion rights but he previously supported them. In my opinion, this was a sly move on Romney's part, because considering that humans make mistakes and change their minds, this is too big of an issue to change his mind on when millions of people consider that as part of their voting for him / or President Obama. Whether the issue is terrorism, national debt, or even immigration, a voter must be very very knowledgable on who they are voting for and WHY. Each individual has different opinions on what is more important to them and they should be well educated on what stance their candidate has on that issue. This should be an extremely interesting voting year.

Speech codes on Campus: In class activity

When I read the "Jim Crow on Fraternity Row" I was absolutely shocked. Seeing college age kids, who I will be in schools with in one year, acting the way they were in the age we are living in was a terrible thing to see.

I definitely think this behavior should be either outlawed or banned on campus because it is disgusting and immature and racist. It would be a problem though to ban it because it would lead into the question of what kind of themed parties can people have that will not offend others? The black stereotypes they are conveying are extremely harsh and it makes the students themselves look terrible. When I saw pictures on the slideshow of kids with their bodies painted black, smiling, and being hung by a white farmer, I almost threw up. This is no way any person should be allowed to act or reinact and especially on a campus where many races are present, such as Auburn, or Chicago, it is sad to see the way peers are depicting other peers. If the Universities allow this behavior to continue, it will foster a new generation of racist and careless Americans. also, when people are being mocked or threatened, they are not in a safe place. And the goal of campuses is to be a safe place for all the people attending.

I am applying to the University of Illinois as a freshman for their Fall semester in 2013. I looked them up to see their policies on speech codes and learned that they were a red light university which meant that they have one policy that clearly restricts freedom of speech. I read about a professor who taught CAtholic Thought and he was told that he would "not be rehired" because he supposedly sent an email that was hostile to gay people. I think its important that FIRE got involved and tried to preserve the academic values of free and open discourse.  There were a few other policies about harassment and the rights of the students to be free from hate speech on campus because it could turn into more serious incidents. I Sexual harassment is also another one of the policies at U of I. I don't feel impacted by these speech codes as a prospective student because they are rules to keep us (the students) safe and the policies I have seen have been reasonable so far. The only speech code that I see that infringes on any rights to free speech would be the sexual harassment category where you cannot say anything with a derogatory term, insult, dirty jokes, etc. These are all words, yet you can be very very punished for using them.

The University would react in a huge way because one of the biggest policies it has is "Bias and Hate Speech" and these are in the yellow light category. If their students were engaged in this behavior, the University would show them a huge punishment which is also an example for other students who would have acted the same way. U of I has a reputation of being a wonderful school and to lose its reputation because of racist acts like that would be a shame.

FIRE's goal is to "defend and sustain individual rights at America's colleges" and this is something I agree with. FIRE is a smart way for students to get rights from the colleges they are attending who place so many restrictions on behavior now-a-days. Free Speech can be dangerous, but it can also be dangerous if we are not allowed to have it, so the FIRE organization should not be present all the time.

The best ways for people to learn about colleges is seeing how it treats its students and how the rights of the students affect how the students can learn/ grow in a university setting. I liked learning about the speech codes on campus because it showed me a new dimension towards thinking about bad behavior, hate speech and more relevant ideas on college campuses.

Teens acting out Post

For my blog this week, I wanted to write about something relevant that was from another's blog on CNN.com. A teacher named Robyn Barberry wrote a blog post about a school shooting at a nearby high school called Perry Hall in Baltimore, MD. A 15 year old student had brought a gun to school and shot a 17 year old who ended up recovering from the gunshot. The article is not as focused on the shooting as much as how schools handle their students, academically and emotionally.

The blog says, "The American school system has become so focused on attaching numbers and labels to children that we’ve forgotten about individuality. We’ve devalued independent thinking in the world of multiple choices, but one right answer.

Strides in science and math are essential to our country’s future in our global economy, but without humanity and creativity, how can we progress?

It’s time for the pendulum of American educational philosophy to stop swinging and start balancing in a way that accounts for all of our students’ needs. Gladden was described in local media reports as “smart,” but evidently, he was unstable, too. Students like him tend to disappear in a world where good grades and test scores mean everything is OK"

This is all so fascinating to me! I totally agree with everything that Barberry said. I don't think that school anymore care so much about children's creativity and well-being as much as test scores and ability to push themselves to their limits. Now, with all of the modern technology and ways for kids to get a hold of dangerous weapons or drugs, it is even MORE important than before for the schools to be checking in with kids and making sure they are doing okay, on a personal level. 

I don't like how kids are labeled and numbered, instead of nurtured and individualized. I understand that it is an easier way to handle large groups of kids, but when it comes to admissions or evaluations, the scores should not be any deciding factor whatsoever in a decision. Like the boy in the article, a smart kid can still make stupid decisions. When I read this article, I got chills thinking about this ever happening at our own school, and I hope that the school systems change eventually towards more individualistic thinking classes and expectations.  

September 11. 2001 and September 11, 2012

The 11th year commemoration of September 11 was two days ago. I was lucky to be in Issues because I could spend a part of my day at school directly connected to the events that occured on September 11 in New York. We watched a video documentary about firemen and the filmmakers who happened to have their cameras on while the towers were being hit and crumbling down. I think this was a fabulous movie because it was 100% true and there was no recreation of anything, so I could actually feel like I was in it and experiencing the horror along with the people in it. As opposed to a movie where I cannot connect at all because it was a recreation. The firefighters and others who helped save civilians were, in my opinion, the biggest heroes that America has ever seen. They inspire me to do something in my life where I have helped others.

I remember September 11, 2001 like it was yesterday. I was in first grade at Solomon Schechter Day School. We were all lining up to go somewhere, and I look up (because first graders are very short) and see all of my hebrew and religious teachers babbling away in hebrew like something terrible had just happened. I was not fluent enough in hebrew yet so I could not follow their conversation or anything, but I could tell something was not right. At the time, the worst thing that I, a Jewish private school 1st grader, could think of that would have happened was that the Torah dropped. The Torah is one of the most holy parts of Judaism and in my head I formulated a conclusion that the Torah had dropped. I got very sad and didn't really understand why they couldn't just tell us that in English.

When I got home I don't remember hearing about it but I remember that my parents were very worried and stressed out for a while after that. A few years later I learned that my sister, since she was in 3rd grade, was able to watch live footage from the news as it was happening, but since I was in first grade I was too young to watch it. I now understand why I did not see footage of this until middle school probably. It was a huge part of my life while it was happening and I didn't even know it. And now, I have friends who live in New York from my Youth Group. I could never imagine losing any of them. They offered to show me around the new Ground Zero memorial which I heard was beautiful. I heard that it is the most patriotic I will ever feel once I experience this memorial.

I've reflected a lot on how American society has changed since that day in September up until the same day in September but 11 years later. I've changed too; we've all changed.  The thought still haunts me that I was alive during this event and I am thankful for and never take for granted the high level of security we have at airports and concern our parents have for us at all times because really, the world is dangerous and unpredictable.

Connection after Connection after Connection

On Friday in class we watched the movie about Free Speech. One of the very interesting stories was about Debbie Almontaser, the Muslim woman in New York who tried to open a dual language school, and got accused of many things. She eventually was forced to resign and had her life ruined by this situation. She had the best of intents and never did anything wrong. I thought this story was very touching because I can't imagine how hard she must have worked to build up this new school and now all of her efforts were wasted and she got so much criticism for doing something good for the community. I thought about how unfair people can be to one another, and how innocent people get bad reputations so quickly. On another note, I was casually on the phone last night with my friend who goes to Stevenson High School, and we ended up talking about the exact same concept as I had been thinking about: innocent people getting bad reputations quickly. One of the Deans at Stevenson was asked to resign because he had been accused of inappropriate texting to one of the students. I had not heard about this, and it only happened in April of 2012. He had been the Dean there since 2008 and according to my friend, was the nicest man in the world. I heard the real story from my friend, not the ones that are in papers or online, but the true story, and all I could feel was pity for this poor man who just had some bad luck. I think this connection is important for me to make that I cannot believe everything I hear from any source, and accusations like the one made on Debbie Almontaser happen too often and even in my own area. I will be careful next time I judge someone just because of something I read about them or hear about them.