Critical Response Paper to Mike Rose’s I Just Wanna Be Average Essay

In his essay â€Å"I Just Wanna Be Average,† Mike Rose details his school life in South L. A. Now a professor of Education and Information Studies at UCLA, Rose moves through secondary school at Our Lady of Mercy on the Voc. Ed. Track, revealing why the standardized versions of this â€Å"educational system† betray the core values behind liberal, humanistic education as we understand it. As Rose wants to stress the value of all individuals, the discrepancies between their actual intellectual capacities and how the system classified and treated them, he paints his fellow students in Vocational Education in great detail. His title comes from Ken Harvey, who, among the many colorful characters and lively Americans Rose met, dropped the defining one-liner of his entire Voc. Ed. Experience: We were talking about the parable of the talents, about achievement, working hard, doing the best you can do, blah-blah-blah, when the teacher called on the restive Ken Harvey for an opinion. Ken thought about it, but just for a second, and said (with studied, minimal affect), â€Å"I just wanna be average. † That woke me up. Average? Who wants to be average? At the time, I thought Ken’s assertion was stupid, and I wrote him off. But his sentence has stayed with me all these years, and I think I am finally coming to understand it (Rereading America, 186). Rose goes on to attempt to clarify his understanding of this one-liner and how it fits in America’s education system. He reveals how Ken Harvey was trying to protect himself, â€Å"by taking on with a vengeance the identity implied in the vocational track† (187). Rose himself was lucky, switching to College Prep and meeting a belated beatnik intellectual-turned-educator named Jack MacFarland, and a hard-nosed science teacher named Brother Clint. These characters brought a college preparatory curriculum to a place and students who had never seen it before. And Rose reveals how classism and racism most often prevent that from happening, wasting entire American populations in entire communities deliberately, all while demanding higher â€Å"standards† and â€Å"accountability,† when the real efforts are never made, save in name and sprinkled across the land as media headlines. Rose’s essay reveals the multitude of challenges that students face, from struggles with family at ages that leave them ill-prepared to handle the emotional fall-out, to struggles with the emergence into a broader American world, to engaging in their own developing sexuality and its uncertain role in the context of their lives: work, and dreams, and the sense of possibilities of what life can or cannot be. I think Rose does a great job bringing this school in South Los Angeles to life. I can hear Ken Harvey, and see Jack MacFarland. When we hear him diagnose Ken’s problem, and his response to it, he’s very believable. He describes how kids get assigned to Voc. Ed. , being defined as â€Å"slow. † And he reveals the results: â€Å"You’ll have to shut down, have to reject intellectual stimuli or diffuse them with sarcasm, have to cultivate stupidity. † I wonder though, what he thinks the answers are. Is it smaller classes, or teachers that care? Obviously, Brother Clint and Jack MacFarland are teachers that care, and work hard to connect with every student. But not all teachers are like that, right?

Double Standards in Sexuality Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 3750 words

Double Standards in Sexuality - Essay Example Today just like in the past generations, sexual double standards has progressed to a level that it is no longer considered as an issue worth frowning at (Gerodetti, 2004). In this paper, the issue of sexual double standards will be discussed to evaluate the existence of the issue from a historical and contemporary position. The difference in the men and women sexuality as has been perpetuated within the society thus gaining an acceptable status within the communities will also be discussed in the paper. In the Victorian era, the attitude towards sexuality differed and this is believed to have strengthened the double standards issue as we know it today. For example, sexual activities and practices such as masturbation in women and men were viewed from a different angle and this led to varying support to the different genders on the same topic. For example, during this era, it is believed that men were more concentrated on the effects of masturbation to them as compared to having a sexual relationship with men. Masturbation during this period was associated with a wide range of physical and mental disorders and conditions such as syphilis and other venereal conditions were attributed to men who were engaged in the activity. During the Victorian era, it is believed that people were unaware of their sexuality and this gave the aristocrats the leeway to manipulate those they deemed fit. Though there exists the perception that Victorian England was marked by the presence of female distaste and male indulgence, evidence points to a situation where the couples enjoyed mutual sexual pleasure as seen today in the modern society (Alexander & Fisher, 2003). Attitude towards prostitution also changed as the leadership legalized and made the issue of prostitution public as opposed to the venerated act of the 17th century.

Consumer behaviour Assignment Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2750 words

Consumer behaviour - Assignment Example According to Hoyer and Macinnis (2009, p. 1), consumer culture that explains consumer behavior includes amongst other things consumer diversity, social class and household influences, psychographics entailing lifestyle, personalities, and values as well as social influences. Businesses and organizations should strive to understand consumer’s behavior in order to tap the positive attitudes and change the negative attitudes to suit their products. Bill is a proud owner of a chain of GYM centers meant for enhancing users’ fitness. These chains of gym centers focus on market (Hoyer & Macinnis, 2010, p 10). Bill is interested in building user loyalty hence be sure of their registration annually. In addition, the business the business would wish to apply the created loyalty into initiating customer relationship marketing. What’s more, this chain of gym centers have been experiencing high number of customers that register but fail to come, those that attend irregularly, as well as those that do not renew their registration (Kardes, Cronley & Cline, 2010, p. 15). ... 3) defines consumer behavior as the holistic decisions that consumer makes regarding acquiring, consuming, and disposing of goods, services, time, as well as ideas over a time. Consumer behavior is an important aspect for Bill and his chain of gym centers to understand thereby providing services that conform to users’ needs and wants. Provision of such services is the only secrete of attracting more users as well as reducing defection and irregularity of attendance. Bill needs to understand reasons as to why there is irregularity in attendance, defections, and the fact that most users do not re-register after the expiry of their sessions (Kardes, Cronley & Cline, 2010, p. 15). There is need also to identify various factors that influence such behaviors as well as the changing factors within the society for instance, increase in lifestyle diseases hence the need to regularly engage in exercises to reduce weight and other bodily aspects attributable to such lifestyle diseases. T he following describes how Bill and his chain of gym centers will improve and change users’ attitudes and perceptions through consumer behavior in order to tap more sales and profitability. 2.1 Improving and Change Gym’s Users through Consumer Behavior Improving and changing of gym users is effectively attainable through consumer behavior. One of the ways of improving and changing users’ of the gym through consumer behavior is by creating and developing marketing mix that satisfies users. Bill’s chain of gym centers is market oriented hence the need to have an effective and efficient marketing mix that provides satisfaction to the users. However, it should be noted that developing a marketing mix that fully provides user satisfaction is cumbersome and challenging. Bill should

Macroeconomics Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words - 11

Macroeconomics - Essay Example In 2012, the performance for 2nd quarter was almost 50% lower than that of the first quarter. It appears that the most significant growth takes place in the 4th quarter. That happened in 2009 and 2011, but certainly not in 2012. In 2010, the growth rates were somewhat evenly distributed in each of the four quarters. Because of the recent thrust of the Federal Reserve to provide stimulus funds for the attainment of the ideal of full employment, 2013 should have a much higher growth rate and lower unemployment rate. On a per quarter basis, there is a 50% probability that the growth rate in the 2nd quarter will be higher than the first quarter. Since the 2nd quarter was lowest in 2009 and 2010, lower than the first quarter in 2012, but higher in 2011 than the first quarter, the probability of having a lower GDP growth rate is 75%. The 3rd quarter will be higher than the 2nd quarter and most probably higher than the 1st quarter since this is what happened in the past four years. By the 4th quarter, assuming no major calamities will disturb business operations, USA real GDP should experience the highest growth rate so far since the time of the recession. First, it is because the Fed has been supportive of the need for more money supply. There is a determination to bring down the unemployment rate in the USA. The People have been complaining about the high unemployment rates and performance of the Monetary Board in easing the financial difficulties of the country for several years now. Secondly, the government is more prepared to adjust to unfavorable climate changes. And thirdly, there has been news about improvements in the way the economic problems in Europe are being handled, e.g. the way Greece economic crisis is being resolved. Europe is a major trading partner of the

Low Income Housing Authority Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

Low Income Housing Authority - Essay Example From this study it is clear that  like any other management style, planning is an essential tool. To achieve the best results, managers should make concrete plans to sustain their businesses. Low income housing authority makes planning strategies to accommodate the demands of the low income people. The stakeholders submit their plans to the public housing director providing detailed information of how they intend to serve the locals. â€Å"Planning helps the management to improve their services†.According to the paper  proper planning will ensure proper housing, equal allocation and provision of quality facilities. It helps the housing department to analyze the trends of housing and predict any challenge in future. Essentially, planning helps in creating affordable housing while safeguarding the already existing premises. Nevertheless, planning requires competent planners put in place. For instance, planning to safeguard the suppliers of cheap housing may aim at incrementa l processes of change that may result in reducing the availability of houses of a particular type. â€Å"Mechanisms aimed at protecting low cost stocks are to ensure that the planning tools contain the general objective so as to protect or retain the existing affordable housing sources†.  When the policy makers are involved in creating more affordable housing, more emphasis is given to the duration the affordable house will be retained and by whom. Essentially, â€Å"there is no sole technique of securing affordable housing.

Assessing & Analyzing the Impact of the British Petroleum (BP) Essay

Assessing & Analyzing the Impact of the British Petroleum (BP) Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill in the Gulf of Mexico - Essay Example is a petroleum manufacturing company which was founded in the year 1889. It is a London based company and is one of the largest companies in the world. It is engaged in the business of exploration of oil and petroleum and manufacturing of various petroleum products. BP is vertically integrated and is engaged in all allied business activities related to the oil and gas industry (Yahoo Finance, 2012). It is a multinational company and its shares are traded in the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) and London Stock Exchange (LSE) with the ticker symbol â€Å"BP†. BP is associated with a rich history and has achieved numerous landmarks on its way to become a large multinational company as it stands today. BP is committed towards becoming the industry leader and maximising the wealth of its shareholders through energy supply to its customers in a responsible and safe manner. The business segments of BP are primarily two, namely a) the oil exploration and manufacturing unit, and b) the marketing and refining business unit. Recently BP has engaged itself in exploring sources of renewable energies as well. The recent tragic incident involving the Gulf of Mexico oil spill had a significant negative impact on BP and the company has taken several strategic initiatives to restore its reputation in the market. Gulf of Mexico Oil Spill The Gulf of Mexico oil spill incident took place on April 20, 2012. It is regarded as one of the largest disastrous event corresponding to the petroleum industry history. The incident took place at Deepwater Horizon, which is a semi-submersible rig meant for oil drilling and situated offshore in the Gulf of Mexico. An explosion occurred which set the oil rig on fire and 11 crewmen were found dead. Several other workers working there were injured. The explosion took place while the oil drilling was on at a water depth of around 1500 m and BP was the principle operator of this project. The explosion occurred because of the ignition of methane gas in the drilling rig which expanded into the rig due to high pressure exerted by the methane gas. Later on after this mishap, oil leak was found which began to spread at a fast rate. According to the reports of Flow Rate Technical Group, the leak resulted in spilling out of oil amounting to around 4,900,000 barrels of oil. The resulting oil spill quickly spread over a large area of water covering around 1,500 square kilometres. After considerable efforts the wellhead was successfully capped on July 15, 2010. A commission was set up by the US government to investigate on the reasons behind the explosion and oil spill which released its final report on January 5, 2011. According to this report several faults were identified on the part of BP which led to the occurrence of this disastrous event. They were mainly accused of making an attempt to work on the project at cheap rate that resulted in the explosion and oil leakage. One of such fault detected was that BP did not make use of any diagnostic tool which could have the ability to test for the tensile strength of the cement used to build the rig. Another major fault in the part of BP was that it ignored the pressure test which indicated negative results. In addition to this BP did not make any effort to plug the pipe with the help of cement. Hence all these facts suggest that BP was primarily responsible for the oil spill at Deepwater Hori

Promotional campaigns and consumers behavior Essay

Promotional campaigns and consumers behavior - Essay Example Currently,marketing creativity is focused on the study and analysis of consumer’s buying behavior.On the one hand,promotional campaigns that we can see every day may seem to us an ordinary event In reality, there is a need to cover numerous and diverse issues for marketers in order to satisfy the needs of the customers and make them buy a certain product. One may think that it is hardly realistic that a consumer may be influenced by some special strategies and appeal to: psychology of customers (the way they think; the way the customer is influenced by his environment); the behavior of customers in the process of shopping; the value of products and a real value of a certain product for the customers and many other factors (Alba and Hutchinson, 1987). Basically, there is a need for marketers to conduct a study of â€Å"individuals, groups, or organizations and the processes they use to select, secure, use, and dispose of products, services, experiences, or ideas to satisfy nee ds and the impacts that these processes have on the consumer and society" (Mullen and Johnson 1990, p. 18). Theoretical overview Basically, in order to give an exact answer to the question ‘why promotional campaigns should take into account consumer’s behavior’, it is relevant to refer to the theoretical background of consumer’s psychology. Starting from 70s, scientists and researchers have underlined that consumer’s behavior is greatly influenced by their family members.... Moreover, a complicated nature of a comprehensive buyer’s behavior model is often considered to be inefficient in predicting consumer’s behavior in the future do to its complicated nature. There are two main approaches to the study of consumer’s behavior: the Behavioral Decision Theory and Social-Cognition Approaches to Consumer Research. Both these strategies are based on customer’s perception of a product and an intention to buy it in his consciousness (Alba and Hutchinson, 1987). Daniel Kahneman and Amos Tversky are representatives of BDT approach to the study of consumer’s behavior. Consumer’s choice is the main objective of the scientists’ researches. A practical aspect In order to practically implement a theoretical knowledge about a consumer’s choice which is shaped under the influence of his consciousness, the promotional campaigns are developed with regard to the mental and social peculiarities, economical and many othe r factors of the target group (Holbrook, 1999). For example, it is rather hard to promote products of daily consumption. There are a lot of different producers and very often a consumer’s choice can be easily changed. â€Å"A Cup of Instant Culture† is a slogan created by Maxwell Coffee in previous years. In XXI century drinking coffee is an integral part of an individual’s image (Aaker, J.L., 1997). For example, if advertising campaign shows a smiling business woman or business man who drinks coffee, the consumers people in their consciousness would perceive this ad as exemplifying two concepts ‘success’ and ‘coffee’ as interrelated ones (Gerritt, 1999). In the modern world we often see exotic advertising of coffee. Coffee