Monthly Archives: February 2012

Coasta Concordia Runs Aground

 

Still 15 recorded passengers are missing from the Costa Concordia, the cruise ship that ran aground and capsized off the Tuscan coast of Giglio island on January 13, 2012. The evacuation of the ship took several hours, after hundreds of passengers that had boarded the ship that morning had not yet been told what to do in case of an emergency. Although there were enough lifeboats aboard ship, some people were forced to stay back. The ones that are still said to be missing were probably thrusted to the hull, or part of the ship submerged underwater. There have been numerous claims of the ship’s captain,  Francesco Schettino, pre-maturely abandoning the ship to run and catch a lifeboat. Coast guard crews ordered Schettino to go back aboard ship to help with the evacuation of passengers. He never went back aboard and claimed he fell into the lifeboat.
Captain Schettino, who was jailed after leaving the ship, is under house arrest near Naples. He is currently facing charges of manslaughter and abandoning ship before all passengers had left. Each passenger of the Costa Concordia Cruise trip will be payed $14,500 by Genoa – based Costa Crociere and a full reimburse expense including the coat of the cruise. It may take up to 10 months for the whole ship to be removed from the reef, while 500,000 gallons of fuel are being pumped out of the cruise ship. Dive teams and removal forces have been delayed because of the weird weather this winter. Over time, the ship has shifted over 24 inches and is dangerously close to a 290 ft. sea floor. Passengers and crew members that survived the accident have been called to testify at a hearing on March 3, in Grosseto. I personally am not really scared about traveling by cruise. I just believe that if the captain knew more of what he was doing, the whole situation could have been avoided.

~Gabriella Amodei

Bust Out Gum From Educational Jail!

Gum has always been a controversy in schools ever since it had been invented! But the question is… why is it that gum is not always allowed in schools? It seems as if schools lock it up in some imaginary jail! What’s the big deal?! Well, it can be a bit of a mess when students leave it under the desks and leave the wrappers on the floor. On the other hand, myths of gum pumping the blood through the brain increase work ethic and effects school work. So is that myth real? Does gum enhance work ethic in school? Yes, its true! And surprisingly, the strongest subject it effects is math! The one subject everyone thinks needs a little boost.

Recent studies done by Baylor College took a look at this link between gum chewing and math scores. They had 108 students in Los Angeles from ages 13 to 16 contribute to the experiment. 54 were assigned to chew sugar free gum, and the other 54 did not. While taking math tests, doing math homework, and in math class the students were either chewing gum or not. After 14 weeks of the experiment, and students had to take a math test. After the grades were observed, it was shown that the students who had been chewing gum had better final math grades than the ones who were not. Not only that, but students who chewed gum scored 3% higher on standardized math tests. Teachers had also made observations that students chewing gum were quieter, more focused, and have a longer attention span than the students who did not chew gum.

So it’s true! Gum does help increase work ethic and boosts math grades! Just what we all need! Now, to answer the myth of gum helping the blood flow. Other research was performed to show that gum does stimulate blood flow. But not in the way you would think. FACT: When gum is chewed, it tricks the stomach into thinking food is being chewed and should soon be digested. Because of this, the blood starts to pump faster and produce a hormone called insulin. This increases glucose cells in the stomach, and brain. Blood then flows from the brain to the stomach, increasing oxygen and blood flow. During all this, the brain is energized so it is easier for it to take in information that may be harder to understand such as math. This increases the memory of the student which later comes into play when they’re taking a test. This is why gum helps students! So why ban it from school if it helps students with their education? It just doesn’t make sense to me. Gum should be allowed in every school! If education is so important, give it a little boost! I say, let’s bust gum from behind these confined bars and show  its potential.

~Ariana Pepper

iMustHave

The day to day updates on technology surprises us still. The last few decades have led us to become more and more dependent on electronics. Apple and Android has been one of the major contributors to this revolution. Over 110 million iPhones have been sold over the last 4 years, 300 million iPods sold in the last 8 years, and about 30 million iPads in the last two years. Recently we have even started reading on electronics. HTC, Motorola, Kindle, BlackBerry, Samsung, Pantech, and more have come out with new tablets. The last few years we have become so involved in electronics that I’m even dictating this blog entry on Dragon, a speech to text translation application.

More and more schools are beginning to integrate these electronics into daily learning. Before we realize it we will have already completely surrounded ourselves with these high-tech tools we use for every day tasks. I believe it is important to realize the significance of the electronics and how far they have come from typewriters and cups on either end of a string. We take for granted the technology that helps us with simple tasks like writing a paper or drawing a flower. The momentum in terms of electronics is building.

~Andrew Mahan

Who’s Gone From the Grammys?

 

At 3:55 on Saturday, pop legend Whitney Houston was pronounced dead at the Beverly Hilton Hotel. She will be greatly missed by her fellow singers and, of course, her crazy music fans like me. The 48-year-old star singer of I Look To You and I Wanna Dance With Somebody died the night before the Grammys and already rumors are circulating.  I, like many other people, am wondering if her death has something to do with The Grammy Awards the next day. Although only a short time has past since her tragic demise, I have heard varying ideas of the cause of death (since it wasn’t disclosed to the public) from she drowned in the bathtub to she overdosed because she was depressed. Even with the short notice, her talent lived on that amazing night, with Jennifer Hudson honoring the six-time Grammy winner at the awards ceremony with a beautiful tribute performance.
Going back in time, most people know that Whitney Houston has struggled with drug problems in the past. There has been gazillions of debates recently about whether her substance abuse started before or after her marriage to bad-boy R&B singer Bobby Brown. Personally, I think that it was her popularity combined with her rocky marriage that sent her looking for the wrong kind of relaxation. Whitney Houston had checked into rehab various times during her life, but in 2005 her mother staged an intervention. She checked into rehab and stayed clean for several years. She even attempted a comeback in 2009 with the album, I Look To You. Fans who followed Whitney Houston and her music would have known that she planned to do a remake of the 1976 drama, “Sparkle” with Jordin Sparks. She was also offered a position as a judge on the amazing show The X Factor. So how did a singer with so much going for her suddenly get yanked from our world? No one knows yet the cause of her death, but one things for sure: her music will live on forever in our hearts.

~CarsonLee Harper

“Linning”: Is it just a Fad or is Jeremy Lin the Answer to the Knicks’ woes?

02/10/12

The sports’ world has had its fair share of sports fad. From Week 7 through the Divisional Playoffs, Tim Tebow was the definition of a fad, tacking on straight six wins at one point, only to be utterly crushed by the Patriots, once in the regular season and then again in the Divisional Playoffs.. But with the Super Bowl gone and the Tebow craze done, the spotlight shines in the Big Apple on the New York Knicks’ new star, Jeremy Lin. With Baron Davis injured, Mike Bibby and Toney Douglas failing, and the rookie Iman Shumpert floundering under the spotlight, the Knicks turned to Lin, the 2nd year man out of Harvard to lead the team. And Jeremy did not disappoint. Lin put up 25 points, handed out 7 assists, and grabbed 5 rebounds, leading the Knicks past the New Jersey Nets. In the next two games, Jeremy Lin continued his dominance, scoring 20+ points against the Jazz and the Wizards. But now, he faces his first true test. Kobe Bryant. Tonight the re-energized Knicks will pit themselves against Kobe and the Lakers at Madison Square Garden. Today, the “Linsanity” proves itself or falls apart.

02/11/12
After watching the Lakers-Knicks game at Madison Square Garden, I’ve gone “Linsane”. Jeremy Lin showed Kobe Bryant up, whom in a previous interview before the game;  said he didn’t really know what Lin did. But now, I’m sure, he knows very well. I’ve been watching basketball for five years now and Jeremy Lin is the best play-making point guard I’ve seen since Rajon Rondo and Steve Nash. Lin displays excellent court vision and he can place a pinpoint pass from 15 feet away. But that is not all. Jeremy Lin can also read defenses, hit jump shots, and drive through traffic in the lane. At the beginning of the game, the Lakers were dropping under the screens to open up Lin. So Jeremy took advantage of this by pulling and hitting four 15+ feet jumpers in the first quarter. But when the Lakers started to go through the screens, Lin beat them to the basket, laying it in six times throughout the game. Already NBA analysts, like Stephen A. Smith, are beginning to compare him to Steve Nash, a player well on his way to the Hall of Fame. Through this game, Lin has proved that he won’t be another Tebow story. He will be much, much better. As far as I’m concerned, I’m “All Lin”.

~ Nazar Chowdhury