Whatever happened to English and Social Studies??

Last night, as I'm sure almost everyone knows, President Obama delivered the annual State of the Union Address. To read the full text of the speech, Click Here.
Throughout the speech, Obama constantly discussed the current issue of education. According to the speech, America has fallen to "ninth in the proportion of young people with a college degree", and the President feels that America must do better than that. I completely agree with what he is saying, the quality of education is a major issue in the country, and it is something that needs to change.
Obama also stressed the importance of teachers, but most notably he talked about teachers of math and science. He stated "we want to prepare 100,000 new teachers in the fields of science and technology and engineering and math. (Applause.)" The question that instantly popped into my mind after he said this was "What about English, or Social Studies, or arts? Why are math and science suddenly the most important subjects?"
I'm personally not a fan of either of the two, so maybe I'm biased, but it seems to me that other subjects taught in school are equally as important. Perhaps many people feel that students taught in the subjects of math and science will somehow be more beneficial to society, that they will be quicker to stop global warming, or save the world. I don't think this is the case, I think students taught in other subjects have just as great of a chance to be beneficial to society, which makes me wonder why the President chose to only reference those two subjects.

Meta-Blog Post

Please Assess Secrets, Secrets are No Fun, Unless They are for Everyone

Last quarter, in my meta-blog post, I mentioned that "Blogging makes me nervous." I guess I could say that in some cases that is still true, but for the most part, I think my blogs have really improved this quarter! In my opinion, over the course of a quarter, I began to write posts that interested me, not just posts that I thought would tie well into class. For example, in my post titled Secrets, Secrets are No Fun, Unless They are for Everyone, I wrote about political issues and wartime, two subjects that rarely catch my interest. It was a big change from my normal blogs about pop culture issues. However, I was so excited to write the post because it was finally a political subject that did interest me, and I was able to make some really cool connections into what we were learning in class. (Not only that, but I got a total of 4 comments on that post...an all time record!!!)
Another way that my blogs have changed from the past quarter was that they became more frequent. Rather than simply blogging once a week, I began blogging more often, on subjects that caught my eye. This really changed my outlook on blogging, because instead of writing because I had too, I blogged because I wanted too. That is a big change from last quarter.
In some cases, blogging still makes me nervous because I never know how my opinions will resonate with other people. But I think for the most part, I am becoming much more confident with my posts, and I hope that will only improve in the quarter to come.

New Huck Finn Controversy!

Today as I was skimming through Perez Hilton.com (possibly my favorite website of all time), I came across something that surprisingly enough was not celebrity related, but was actually about the book The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. As most of you know, we are currently reading the book in class, so I clicked on the article as fast as I could to learn more. As it turns out, a decision was made to edit the 'N Word' out of the entire book, and there has been much controversy about that decision.
Mr. O'Connor mentioned in class that the word is used somewhere around 217(?) times in the book, so clearly, the book would be significantly altered. Alan Gribben, who is in charge of the change, also stated that they will be removing the word 'Injun' from the book. These words will be replaced with the word 'slave'.
Gribben defends his decision by stating that "Race matters in these books. It's a matter of how you express that in the 21st century." In my opinion, the word should not be removed. It is, in a way, altering history by changing the way that the story is told to make it more appealing, or politically correct to others.  However, others completely agree with the decision Gribben has made, and feel that the book should be edited.
To read the full article Click Here

The Age Old Question

Since most of my winter break was spent with me sprawled on the couch watching movies, it was no surprise that I made a connection to one of those movies today in class. Today, we were discussing the controversial subject of when a child officially becomes an adult. It reminded me of a movie I watched one afternoon over break called My One and Only. This movie centers on the life of a recently single mother, struggling to find a new husband that can support her family.
The main plot of the movie is that this newly single mother (Renee Zellweger) feels that she cannot raise her two boys without the help of a husband, so she sets out on a quest to find one. There is a line in the movie that made me think of class today. She is talking to her ex husband, and he asks her if she loves him anymore. She responds by saying "I don't know, but I do know I don't NEED you anymore."
I think at this point in the movie, the mother finally reached adulthood. Though she was much older than eighteen, and would have been considered an adult by many others, she finally realized that she could live her life without relying on someone else to help her, and to me, that made her an adult.
Now, I'm not saying this is the case for everyone. Everyone is different, and everyone reaches adulthood at different times and under different circumstances. Some may argue that adulthood is simply reached when one turns 18, or moves out of the house. I personally feel there is no set date. But it brings up a good question: Is there a certain time when every person reaches adulthood?

High Five Choir

I am a part of the High Five Choir at New Trier, and the choir was recently featured in the Chicago Tribune. If you have time, check it out!

Click Here to watch a video of High Five

Click Here to read the article

Walking in an Airport Wonderland

The Holidays are here, and for many of us, that means travel! After recent talks about airport security in class over the past week, I began to think about how much airport security has evolved since 9/11, and whether some recent security measures are a violation of civil liberties. At the beginning of 2010, the TSA began adding full body scanners into airports as a means of security. Some say that these body scanners are a complete violation of people's right to privacy, but are they? Is the nation justified in doing this, as long as it is for the protection of the people?
This is a commonly brought up question, and I think it can be almost impossible to answer. I completely see both sides of the situation. The country wants to make our lives a little safer, but have they gone too far this time? It's interesting to think about. If you find yourself in an airport over vacation, try to answer the question. Has airport security gone too far?

Secrets secrets are no fun, unless they are for everyone.

After learning about the Vietnam War on Friday in class, I drew a couple of parallels between the Vietnam war and the Iraq war, most notably in what our government told us, or rather didn't tell us, about those wars. During the Vietnam war, President Lyndon B. Johnson declared that reason he went to war with Vietnam was due to the Gulf of Tonkin, and the torpedo of an American ship. However, there is much speculation as to whether or not the torpedo of this ship actually happened.
 But one of the main reasons that we went to war with Vietnam was to stop the spread of communism. This somewhat resembles the current war in Iraq. The commonly known reason for going to war with Iraq was that the American government believed that Saddam Hussein was collecting materials to build weapons of mass destruction, however this too was never proved. Some are saying that the actual reason we went to war with Iraq was so we could gain access to their oil reserves, but once again this is merely speculation, and has not been proved. I thought it was interesting that in both cases our government did not tell us exactly what was happening with the war, or why we went to war in the first place, and it reminds me of what we have been discussing in class. When, if ever, should the government be allowed to hide important pieces of information from citizens of this country? In my opinion, never. Even during perilous times, American citizens have a right to know what is going on in their country, rather than being left in the dark.