Response to Sedaris

    

            This is definitely one of the most eccentric, yet interesting essays I have ever read.  I hated getting distracted or interrupted because I didn’t want to put it down; that has rarely ever happened.  It starts out with a boy who performs some odd antics in the classroom, such as leaving his chair 28 times in one day and licking a light switch.  His teacher, Miss Chestnut, takes note of this and tells the boy she wants to visit his mother because she wasn’t sure if his mother saw how he behaved, or if he reserves his eccentricities exclusively for Miss Chestnut and the classroom.  However, even out of both the classroom and home, he would still behave in such a way where people would think that he had “special problems.”  For example, he would pause every couple seconds to lick mailboxes and touch leaves which he presumed that grabbed his attention.  It was strange to read that it failed to amaze him that people didn’t notice these things.  As his mother and Miss Chestnut were discussing his behavior, she tells the teacher that she is not shamed or seriously bothered by and tells her he’ll simply “come out of it.”  Following Miss Chestnut’s visit, his father attempted to cure him with a number of threats.  For instance, his father thoroughly told him to never put his nose on the windshield while they were driving.  And what do yano, he did.  This lead to a bloody nose and he actually said he loved the feeling of that!  His unorthodox ways of behaving accompanied him throughout high school and most of his college life.  However, at the end of his college days, he said that college was the best thing that could’ve ever happened to him.  His habits faded and he soon lost interest in performing those strange antics he displayed in his earlier days of living.

WJ #9- Research Paper Response

            With my topic pertaining to the Patriot Act, the question that I propose to answer for my paper is how the enactment of the Patriot Act has affected U.S. citizens.  That is the question I am working with now but I could tweak it as I continue to write my research paper.  The thesis statement that I came up with is….After the September 11^th, 2001 terrorist attacks, the U.S. government decided to implement the Patriot Act to protect citizens from foreign and domestic threats.  This could change but this is what I developed for my first idea.  I chose this topic because I think the Patriot Act is a controversial, yet interesting issue since it gives the federal government permission to enhance surveillance such as wiretapping cell phones, looking through medical records, and performing unconstitutional searches.  All 3 of these forms of action by the government have caused much discomfort between citizens, pleading that they think it’s an invasion of privacy.  The Patriot Act is actually an acronym that stands for “Uniting and Strengthening America by Providing Appropriate Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism.”  It is an act of Congress that was signed into law by President George W. Bush and is set to expire May of this year after a 90-day extension in February.  This is some of the background information that I have learned about this topic in my Law & Society class.

            One thing I would like to find out about this issue is the impact the Patriot Act has had on our country and its citizens.  I think it would be important to know if law enforcement agencies are accused of terrorist and racial profiling by people deemed suspicious because that can cause much controversy especially if you’re an innocent person.  This can be a major problem in big cities such as New York because of the prevalent number of minorities inhabiting it.  In addition to the impact it has had on Americans, I am also interested in the process the government and law enforcement agencies go through in performing surveillance tactics such as interceptions and wiretapping.  Since it is a controversial issue, many arguments are created.  For instance, the opposition mainly believes it intervenes with privacy and takes away the freedoms of being an American citizen.  Another argument is that the Patriot Act was created during a time of unreasonable decisions.  It’s important to have research to back up what you’re talking about.  So far I have taken the time to read through three scholarly journals that my professor suggested me to look at.  I thank him because I found some interesting and important information while reading articles in the journals, which I can use for my research paper.  Other sources include the magazine article, “The American Chronicle” and two textbooks.  I will continue to research information on this topic in attempt to enhance my knowledge and therefore create an effective research paper.

Response to Trip Gabriel(Plagiarism)

            After reading Trip Gabriel’s article, I think the main idea is that digital technology has caused a bad influence on students to plagiarize.  Having a computer and using the Internet to conduct research makes copying and pasting much easier.  Ms. Brookover, who works at a campus library, quotes “everything can belong to you really easily online rather than walking into a library and physically holding an article.”  I think plagiarism occurs more often nowadays because past generations didn’t have easy access to computers and other sources of technology.  There are also some excuses students make when being accused of plagiarizing.  For example, people don’t think they need to credit a source since the page didn’t include author information.  I personally think this is laziness because even if it didn’t list any author(s), you can put forth a little more effort to find the author, or include other important information in your works cited and list the title of the author as “Anonymous.”  Another excuse is that when students search for information, they can mistake it for common knowledge, thus not crediting the source.  I don’t think there are any excuses in plagiarism because going through middle and high school, we were taught the correct way to write papers and also learned the proper format to create citations and give credit to others.

Research Paper Overview---Justus

Research Paper Overview(Patriot Act)

Hi, I am choosing to do my research on the USA Patriot Act and how it has affected the daily lives of Americans.  PATRIOT is an acronym that stands for Uniting and Strengthening America by Providing Appropriate Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism.  This was signed into law by George W. Bush 6 weeks after the terrorist attacks on 9/11 had occurred.   The Act dramatically reduced restrictions on law the ability of enforcement agencies to search telephone, e-mail communications, medical, financial, and other records.  This in particular has sparked much discomfort among citizens because the government began to wiretap phone calls, which had many people saying it was an invasion of privacy.  In addition, it also gave law enforcement officials broad discretion to search immigrants and other minorities suspected of terrorism-related acts, which lead the discrepancy of racial profiling.  These are a few examples of controversial issues that arose from the Patriot Act because of the infringements of citizens’ civil liberties.  Now there are also advantages of having this enacted such as it allows law enforcement to use surveillance against more crimes of terror.  I personally think the Patriot Act is a good thing because, most importantly, it aids with the protection of US citizens.  I will explain the pros and cons pertaining to the Patriot Act and the controversy that goes along with it.  

1st Annotation- Justus

Hoover, Larry, Hee-Jong Joo, and Hyunseok Jang. "An Evaluation of Compstat’s Effect on Crime: The Fort
     Worth Experience." Police Quarterly. 13.4 (2010): 387-412. Print


     This article deals with the impact Compstat has had on the Forth Worth, Texas Police Department with explaining changes in violent, property, and total index(murder) crimes.  Compstat(Computer Statistics) is the name given to New York City's police department's accountability process and has been replicated in many other departments nationwide.  Its goal is to map crime and identify problems.  The authors gave research to indicate that while some crimes decreased with the use of Compstat, others remained occuring.  I think it comes down to how effective the police are in implementing this strategy.  Reading this article helps me with my own research because it allows me to become more familar with Compstat.  Since i want to be a police officer in the future, i believe its important to see how Compstat is used and to see the effectiveness it has in different areas.

Response to Richtel

The main idea of this story is to show the significance technology’s influence has on behavior and the brain and how it affects people’s daily lives.  It also explains some of the advantages and disadvantages dealing with multi-tasking.  The main character is Kord Campbell  who is constantly juggling between e-mail, instant messages, video games, online chats, and web browsers, while trying to focus on his family.  He loves the stimulation and excitement he gets from these electronic gadgets and forgets things like dinner plans.  It is easy to see that this is Mr. Campbell’s addiction, which is interrupting work and family life.  From my perspective, I multitasked occasionally with chatting on facebook and attempting to finish homework and I had a difficult time maintaining what needed to be done for my class.  While many say multitasking makes them more productive, research has shown otherwise.  For instance, people who commit a great deal of multitasking actually have more trouble focusing and shutting out irrelevant information along with experiencing higher levels of stress.  However, scientists also show that using technology can benefit the brain in some ways.  A prime example is that the brains of Internet users become more efficient at finding information.

Mr. Campbell had an early start with technology when he was in 3^rd grade when his parents bought the video game called Pong.  I believe being acquainted with technology at such a young age may explain why he has become so addicted.  Soon after that, he became familiar with a variety of game consoles and computers, which he learned how to program.  When he was older, he became a successful Internet provider.  Being involved with technology his whole life has really played a toll on him and his family whether it’s from him missing business conferences because of looking at a Twitter post or him always needing to be on his phone during vacation time.  I think he is suffering the major consequences of multitasking and should find some sort of way to fix it.

Introduction

 How's everyone doing today?  Hi my name is Mark Cable and i'm a junior at IUP majoring in Criminology with the goal of becoming a Pennsylvania state police officer.  I'm currently 20 years old and was born in the small town of Connellsville, which is about an hour south of Indiana.  My favorite sports growing up were hockey and baseball which i continue to play today.  Whenever i'm on campus, you can either find me in class, at the library, or at the gym.