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| Lehman, Casey. "School Lunch." Wikipedia. Wikipedia, 18 Sept. 2008. Web. 19 Mar. 2016. |
Citations
Lehman, Casey. "School Lunch." Wikipedia. Wikipedia, 18 Sept. 2008. Web. 19 Mar. 2016.
Saturday, March 19, 2016
Closed Campus Lunch
This Action Project is the lat project of my Systems & Models course. The purpose of this project is to give the students a voice and let us address a problem that we see with the school and have the opportunity to speak on it. I learned a lot about this school in the past 4 years and I have seen many changes withing the school and I specifically liked this project because it gave me a voice other than the end of term surveys. I am very proud of the way I addressed my topic and I feel that there should be a legit change to the problem I addressed. I was also surprised by how many people actually supported the fact of closed campus lunch. Please read my project below!
Citations
Lehman, Casey. "School Lunch." Wikipedia. Wikipedia, 18 Sept. 2008. Web. 19 Mar. 2016.
"History of I-O Psychology." Cogniphany. Cogniphany. Web. 20 Mar. 2016.
Citations
Lehman, Casey. "School Lunch." Wikipedia. Wikipedia, 18 Sept. 2008. Web. 19 Mar. 2016.
A New Start
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| Lezumbalaberenjena. Andrew Saint-George. 1959. Fidel CASTRO at Palacio Municipal of Santa Clara before March toward Havana 4. 2013. Flickr. Flickr. Web. 19 Mar. 2016. |
In 1959, Fidel Castro and his Communist regime took over Cuba. Most Cubans fled their homes because of the violence, oppression, and upheaval of this political revolution. Since Castro's rule life in Cuba has gotten way worse, specifically economically. Those fleeing Cuba went in search of jobs and a better life, often migrating to the U.S. - away from Communism and toward the promises of democracy. Many people fled the Cuban government because those who spoke out against Castro and his Communist ideas were often jailed or even executed. Because of Castro’s rules, many Cubans have fled to America, mainly for freedom. In the 1980’s, during a massive immigration wave, Castro released a group of Cubans from mental institutions and prisons and put them on a boat along with other migrants who were leaving in search of jobs and a better life. The U.S. media represented this move by the Communist leader in a very negative way, which increased anti-Cuban discrimination (www.energyofanation.org). In October 1962, during the Cuban missile crisis the U.S. and the Soviet Union engaged in a 13-day political and military standoff. The cause of this conflict was due to the installation of nuclear-armed Soviet missiles on Cuba, just 90 miles from U.S. shores. This country engaged in the Cold War against. After taking over the Caribbean Island Nation of Cuba in 1959, Communist leader Fidel Castro allied themselves with the Soviet Union. Cuba became dependent on the soviets for military and economic aid. The fact that the nuclear-armed Cuban missiles were being installed so close to the U.S mainland (90 miles south of Florida) was a very big problem for U.S officials. During this time the U.S and the Soviets were engaged in a cold war (1945-91). The Soviet Union and the U.S were engaged in one of the biggest Cold War confrontations after a spy plane made a high-altitude pass over Cuba and took a picture of a medium-range ballistic missile being assembled for installation. A key factor in the Soviet missile scheme was the hostile relationship between the U.S. and Cuba. Also after the U.S attacked Cuba in the failed Bay of Pigs invasions in 1961. Castro saw the missiles as being a way to prevent further U.S aggression. In more recent news, on April 11 2015, President Barack Obama and Raul Castro shook hands at the Summit of the Americas in Panama, marking the first meeting between a U.S. and Cuban head of state since the two countries severed their ties in 1961. You can hear a personal story of how a woman and her family left Cuba in search of a better life in America
Cuban Immigration to the United States
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When was the largest wave of immigrant from Cuba to the United States?
1959 – 1960 – 250,000 Cuban immigrants arrived
1965-1973 – 300,000 Cuban immigrants arrived
1980 – 125,000 Cuban immigrants arrived
Present Immigration continues at a high rate
http://www.energyofanation.org/Waves_of_Cuban_Immigrants_6_29_06_3_51_PM.html
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| BKJ, Baby Picture (2016) |
I am a Cuban woman who fled to america with my family at a very young age. My story begins in 1961 when I was born, Life was very hard because just 2 years before i was born a Communist leader by the name of Fidel Castro took over Cuba. Living in a Communist country was very bad because almost everything was restricted. I remember having to go to military school because it was mandatory. Even the television was restricted, the government chose what you go to watch and it was almost always about politics and the government in Cuba. The government use to basically put on a mask/disguise for the outsiders and tourists. I remember they used to put empty boxes on display at the grocery stores to make it seem like they had and abundance of food to the tourists passing by. The one thing I cannot forget is how the government kept inventory of everything you had. In Cuba every month someone has to watch the block and report to the government what they see wrong for example if your neighbor give you some meat from his cows it's the watch person's job to report that because that's restricted. They give you a notebook, lets say you have a family of 4 so they give you four pounds of meat, rice, beans etc. enough for the month. To even get any of that stuff they make you wait in a massive line early in the morning and when it is finally your turn you get a list, they bring you all the merchandise and unfortunately sometimes they run out of certain things so you don't get everything you need for that month. Another thing that is really bad about Cuba is that you cannot get milk for your family if you don't have a baby that is under 1 years old. In 1966 my parents applied for a visa and got accepted which gave us the opportunity to come to America. At first they were going to split all of us up to go in groups but my mom said that if we do not go all together than we don't go at all. When we were getting ready to leave the government had to take inventory of our whole house because we were not allowed to take anything but the clothes on our back, “that was Castro's way of saying goodbye.” We got on a plane to Miami, when we landed we stayed there for about 3-6 months and then the Red Cross was going to send us to Colorado but we had an aunt in Chicago so they moved us here instead. When coming to America there were a lot of challenges but one of thee biggest ones was the language barrier. I spoke Spanish at the time and didn't understand English but almost everything was English so that made things very hard. When my family settled down and I got into school another setback was the way the other kids and teachers treated me. I was always treated very bad by other students, they would make fun of me and bully me. They were not the only ones that treated me this way though, teachers also treated me very bad because I didn’t speak English so they would make me sit in the back of the class. Also when we got sick we had to deal with it because it was very hard to ask for medicine in a pharmacy when you don’t speak English. The first years we were here were very odd for us because we have never experienced winter before and in those first years one of the worst winter storms hit (33 in). The bad parts about moving to America for me was the schools. In Cuba they have one of the best school systems in my opinion and here I feel like we are like 3 years behind. Another big difference was the gangs. The gangs in America are taken a lot more serious and the crime rate is a lot higher here than it is in Cuba. Leaving my home country was very scary but we had a lot of help from the Red Cross, they gave us almost everything we need to start a new life in our new home. Sometimes I miss my home country but in the end I do not regret leaving because the U.S gave me a better home and a better place to raise my children.
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| "One Account. All of Google." Google Maps. Web. 19 Mar. 2016. |
Citations
"Cuban Missile Crisis." History.com. A&E Television Networks. Web. 19 Mar. 2016.
Monday, March 14, 2016
Looking Deeper Into Invisible Man
For the first action project in Equality we studied the book Invisible Man written by Ralph Ellison. The purpose of this project was to analyze the book Invisible Man using the ideas of the race theorists such as W.E.B. Du Bois. I really enjoyed the book and it was very surprising to see how similar the story and the theorists ideas were, even how some of the theorists actions in life somehow reflect in the book. I am very proud of my writing because I feel that I covered the topics I chose very well. Please read my analysis of the book below!
Invisible man was written in 1952 by Ralph Ellison which was also around the time that Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat to a white man and move to the back of the bus. This is also around the time that Martin Luther King Jr. lead a boycott of the Montgomery, Alabama, bus system. Ellison is best known for his novel Invisible Man, which won the National Book Award in 1953. In 1992, Ellison was awarded a special achievement award from the Anisfield-Wolf Book Awards; his artistic achievements included work as a sculptor, musician, photographer and college professor as well as his writing. This story is about Invisible Man who never actually states his name. Throughout the story it seems like he is trying to find himself and it seems like he is very confused about his life. He goes through a lot of racist events throughout the book. In order to analyze the text Invisible Man I used the race theories of Booker T. Washington (“Atlanta Compromise Speech”, 1895) and W.E.B. Du Bois (“ The Souls of Black Folk”, 1903). The concepts of double consciousness and lifting yourself up by your bootstraps are useful concepts for analyzing race in the text.
Invisible Man was asked to give a speech at the main ballroom in a leading hotel. He arrived at the place and was basically forced into a blindfolded boxing match with other black men - Battle royal -. They fought for their lives while the white men just laughed and yelled aggressive comments. After the boxing match they were told to grab money from the rug but when they reached for the money they quickly found out that it was an electric rug and they were still forced to pick up the money. Meanwhile, all the rich white people sat around laughing and encouraging this act. Even after the whole event they found out that the money was fake and it was basically for the white peoples’ entertainment. This is a metaphor for racism because the white people make the oppressed fight for a promise of money or goods but never really intended to give it to them. I see both Booker T. Washington’s theories and W.E.B. Du Bois theories when analyzing this part of the book. When Invisible Man was giving his speech I observed W.E.B. Du Bois’s theory of double consciousness because even though they acknowledged that he was a great speaker by allowing him to speak there they also ignored him because he was a black male. I feel that this moment displays double consciousness because in that moment he has kinda two personalities, one where he is a good speaker and the other as a black man who is seen by the whites as unintelligent. I also see Booker T. Washington's ideas of respecting the white men and taking what they give you rather than fighting for more when he had to keep giving his speech even though nobody was listening. Also when Invisible Man had to change his words when giving the speech because instead of “social responsibility” he said “social equality” and one of the white men angrily asked him to explain himself and he replied that it was a mistake.
Another moment in the book I chose to analyze was when Invisible Man was assigned to give tours of the campus. Invisible man was assigned to give a tour of the campus to Mr. Norton who was a white millionaire founder of the college. As Invisible Man was giving the tour of the college, Mr. Norton, he unwittingly drove Mr. Norton to the cabins which once served as slave quarters. Mr. Norton is very intrigued by the cabins but the narrator does not want to stop because Jim Trueblood lives there and he is depicted as a very sick man because he impregnated his own daughter. Mr. Norton insisted that Invisible Man stop so against his gut feeling to keep going he was compelled to stop because Mr. Norton was a very important person. I see a lot of double consciousness in this chapter. Invisible Man knows what his duty as a tour guide is and he knows that he is not supposed to go to the outskirts of the college (the bad parts) but because Mr. Norton is a rich white man and Invisible Man is taught to obey what Mr. Norton says. This moment was very important because it basically shaped his future.
When Invisible Man and Mr. Norton arrive back at the campus, Norton requests to go back to his room and wants to talk to Dr. Bledsoe. Invisible Man is asked to meet with Norton and Dr. Bledsoe in Norton's room to talk about the whole situation. When Invisible Man arrives at Norton's room he is surprised to see that Dr. Bledsoe is not there. Invisible Man is confused but Norton assures Invisible Man that everything is ok because he told Dr. Bledsoe that Invisible Man was not responsible for the actions that took place on the day of the tour. Later on Dr. Bledsoe talks to Invisible Man and is very angry that he took Norton to all the places he was not supposed to see. Invisible Man then protests that Norton ordered him to take him to those place and he is not to blame. Even though Norton earlier agreed that it was not Invisible Man's fault, Dr. Bledsoe angrily tells Invisible Man that he is a black man from the south and should be able to lie his ways out of situations like that. I also see a ton of W.E.B. Du Bois’s theory of double consciousness. All his life Invisible Man is taught to “undermine the whites with yesses and grins” and is basically taught to tend to what the white man says but in this situation he was expected to lie and disregard the white man's orders. In this situation Invisible Man was torn between two different attitudes/ identities.
Bois, W.E.B. Du. "Chapter 1 Of Our Spiritual Strivings." The Souls Of Black Folk. 1-6. Print.
Washington, Booker T. "Booker T. Washington Delivers the 1895 Atlanta Compromise Speech." Print.
Invisible man was written in 1952 by Ralph Ellison which was also around the time that Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat to a white man and move to the back of the bus. This is also around the time that Martin Luther King Jr. lead a boycott of the Montgomery, Alabama, bus system. Ellison is best known for his novel Invisible Man, which won the National Book Award in 1953. In 1992, Ellison was awarded a special achievement award from the Anisfield-Wolf Book Awards; his artistic achievements included work as a sculptor, musician, photographer and college professor as well as his writing. This story is about Invisible Man who never actually states his name. Throughout the story it seems like he is trying to find himself and it seems like he is very confused about his life. He goes through a lot of racist events throughout the book. In order to analyze the text Invisible Man I used the race theories of Booker T. Washington (“Atlanta Compromise Speech”, 1895) and W.E.B. Du Bois (“ The Souls of Black Folk”, 1903). The concepts of double consciousness and lifting yourself up by your bootstraps are useful concepts for analyzing race in the text.
Invisible Man was asked to give a speech at the main ballroom in a leading hotel. He arrived at the place and was basically forced into a blindfolded boxing match with other black men - Battle royal -. They fought for their lives while the white men just laughed and yelled aggressive comments. After the boxing match they were told to grab money from the rug but when they reached for the money they quickly found out that it was an electric rug and they were still forced to pick up the money. Meanwhile, all the rich white people sat around laughing and encouraging this act. Even after the whole event they found out that the money was fake and it was basically for the white peoples’ entertainment. This is a metaphor for racism because the white people make the oppressed fight for a promise of money or goods but never really intended to give it to them. I see both Booker T. Washington’s theories and W.E.B. Du Bois theories when analyzing this part of the book. When Invisible Man was giving his speech I observed W.E.B. Du Bois’s theory of double consciousness because even though they acknowledged that he was a great speaker by allowing him to speak there they also ignored him because he was a black male. I feel that this moment displays double consciousness because in that moment he has kinda two personalities, one where he is a good speaker and the other as a black man who is seen by the whites as unintelligent. I also see Booker T. Washington's ideas of respecting the white men and taking what they give you rather than fighting for more when he had to keep giving his speech even though nobody was listening. Also when Invisible Man had to change his words when giving the speech because instead of “social responsibility” he said “social equality” and one of the white men angrily asked him to explain himself and he replied that it was a mistake.
Another moment in the book I chose to analyze was when Invisible Man was assigned to give tours of the campus. Invisible man was assigned to give a tour of the campus to Mr. Norton who was a white millionaire founder of the college. As Invisible Man was giving the tour of the college, Mr. Norton, he unwittingly drove Mr. Norton to the cabins which once served as slave quarters. Mr. Norton is very intrigued by the cabins but the narrator does not want to stop because Jim Trueblood lives there and he is depicted as a very sick man because he impregnated his own daughter. Mr. Norton insisted that Invisible Man stop so against his gut feeling to keep going he was compelled to stop because Mr. Norton was a very important person. I see a lot of double consciousness in this chapter. Invisible Man knows what his duty as a tour guide is and he knows that he is not supposed to go to the outskirts of the college (the bad parts) but because Mr. Norton is a rich white man and Invisible Man is taught to obey what Mr. Norton says. This moment was very important because it basically shaped his future.
When Invisible Man and Mr. Norton arrive back at the campus, Norton requests to go back to his room and wants to talk to Dr. Bledsoe. Invisible Man is asked to meet with Norton and Dr. Bledsoe in Norton's room to talk about the whole situation. When Invisible Man arrives at Norton's room he is surprised to see that Dr. Bledsoe is not there. Invisible Man is confused but Norton assures Invisible Man that everything is ok because he told Dr. Bledsoe that Invisible Man was not responsible for the actions that took place on the day of the tour. Later on Dr. Bledsoe talks to Invisible Man and is very angry that he took Norton to all the places he was not supposed to see. Invisible Man then protests that Norton ordered him to take him to those place and he is not to blame. Even though Norton earlier agreed that it was not Invisible Man's fault, Dr. Bledsoe angrily tells Invisible Man that he is a black man from the south and should be able to lie his ways out of situations like that. I also see a ton of W.E.B. Du Bois’s theory of double consciousness. All his life Invisible Man is taught to “undermine the whites with yesses and grins” and is basically taught to tend to what the white man says but in this situation he was expected to lie and disregard the white man's orders. In this situation Invisible Man was torn between two different attitudes/ identities.
In conclusion, when doing my analysis of Invisible Man I tried to pick the most important parts of the book, parts that changed the life of invisible man. The main idea of my analysis is to show that there is no easy way to live for Invisible Man. He always has two conflicting voices in his ear and even when he tries to do the right thing it always comes off bad to someone in the scene and how even though there is supposed to be equality he still gets treated like there is none. I feel that the connection I made to Invisible Man show that even though Invisible man is a human he is treated as less than that but life is still very hard for Invisible Man because nobody really accepts that there should be equality. After reading the book I still have questions as to what happens to Invisible Man. One of my questions is; what happens to Invisible Man after he goes in the manhole and the people who were chasing him close the manhole? Also was it a setup that he got kicked out because it seemed like a setup because Norton basically forced Invisible Man to take him to the bad parts of the college and somehow Invisible Man still got in trouble? I feel that throughout the book invisible man is basically set up for failure multiple times. I feel that this was probably a normal thing and that is why Invisible Man experienced so much conflict.
Work Cited
Ellison, Ralph. Invisible Man. New York: Random House, 1980. Print.
Work Cited
Ellison, Ralph. Invisible Man. New York: Random House, 1980. Print.
Tuesday, March 1, 2016
Keep Your Eyes on the Road
This project is for my Steam course named Systems & Models. The purpose of this project was to first think of a experiment to do. Next we had actually do the experiment and analyze the data. Then we basically had to write a research paper that talked about the project, what we did and analyze it. I learned a lot about distractions while in a vehicle and how horrible distractions can be. I also learned that cops are not really enforcing the law. I am very proud of my research. Please take a look at my project below.
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