Interview With a Former Part-Time MBA Student

Marci Reynolds, 42, from Boston, MA, completed her associates, bachelors and masters degrees part-time, while working full-time. She is currently a Vice President for a large, publicly traded corporation in the New England area.  I recently had the opportunity to interview Marci about her experience with part-time degree programs. Heres what she had to say: Q: You earned an associate, bachelors, and masters degree in part-time programs. Did you work full-time throughout all three programs? A: Yes, I worked full-time throughout the entire process. I started working full-time right after I graduated high school, then started taking evening college courses in my 20s. Some years, I took 3-5 classes, other years I took only 1. It would depend on the responsibilities I had to fulfill in my full-time job. Q: Was it difficult to find time for both school and a career? How did you make it work? A: Time management was definitely a challenge! Since I am a morning person, I would often get up extra early, ex. 5 a.m., to write papers or do homework. I studied during my lunch hour at work. And, I would go to the library on weekends to limit distractions and get as much work done as possible in short time increments. There were several occasions I used vacation days to study for major exams or finish large projects. Q: Did your employers help you with your tuition? A:  Yes, I was lucky to have tuition reimbursement from every employer. At the very end of completing my bachelors degree, I was bulking up on classes and had used up the company policy allotment of reimbursement. I appealed to senior management and got additional funding for my last three to four classes which was awesome! Since my masters degree was much more expensive, tuition reimbursement only covered about 50-60% of the costs. Q:  Were there any drawbacks to receiving tuition reimbursement? A:  Other than the small amount of paperwork I needed to submit to human resources, there were no drawbacks. Q:  Like any programs, part-time programs have their pros and cons. What would you consider to be the biggest pro? A:  The biggest pro was I could pick exactly which classes I wanted to take on what nights or weekends with which instructors. I had total control and could best align the schedule with my work and personal life. Q:  How about the most obvious con? A:  In addition to the time management challenges, it took significantly longer to complete my degrees. I also missed out on the full time college experience that many adults talk about for years to come. Q:  Was there any aspect of attending school part-time that you hadnt considered prior to enrolling? In other words, was there anything surprising about your part-time experience? A:  The MBA program in which I enrolled catered to full-time students more than part-time, and the homework requirements were not always realistic. I also did not expect to have full-time students in their early 20s, mixed in with the part-time students, mainly 35, in the evening program. This caused challenges, especially on group projects. Q:  Were there any differences between a part-time undergraduate program and a part-time graduate program? A:  In my experience, yes. The part-time undergraduate program I attended definitely catered more to part-time students, and the attendees were almost all working full-time and going to school at night. The graduate program I attended had many younger students and mixed full-time and part-time students in the same classes. Also, there was significantly more homework and more group projects in my graduate program. Q:  I get a lot of letters from students who are worried that part-time MBA programs will not provide them with the same type of recruiting and networking opportunities that full-time programs can. Did you encounter fewer opportunities in your part-time program or were you satisfied with the level of resources made available to you? A:  Since almost every class I attended had a different mix of students, every class presented new networking opportunities. But, in a part-time program, you need to make more of an effort before class or during breaks. After class, everyone is running to their cars to get home for the evening. I do hear that full-time students have more networking opportunities with their professors. In night school, you dont have that opportunity unless you proactively request one-on-one meeting time. There just isnt time in class. Since I graduated, Ive used Linked In to stay in touch with several students and professors I met in night school. Q:  When you think about your part time MBA experience, what stands out? What were some of the highlights? A:  There were two experiences I want to call out from my MBA program that were particularly rewarding and great learning experiences. The first was a two week trip to Japan. At my university, they offered international travel business electives. For my trip to Japan, we visited about 12 Japanese businesses and learned a lot about their culture. We were graded on several large papers we had to write. I had never been to Japan and it was quite a journey! The second experience was a one-week intensive course I took on World Class Business Operations. I got permission to take five days off from work without using vacation time. The class visited eight New England companies who had won Best Place to Work Awards. We met with senior management, got tours of their operations and learned more about their unique offerings. It was fun and I learned a lot of relevant info I could then apply to my day job. Q:  Overall, are you happy with your decision to earn your degrees through part-time programs? Do you ever wish you would have chosen to attend school full-time instead? A:  No, I have no regrets. Because I went to school part-time, I have a lot more work experience than other working women my age. In this challenging economy, with a lot of competition, I now have both the degrees and the work experience. As someone who has done a lot of interviewing and hiring of employees, I have found that the mix of experience and degrees helps to set an applicant apart from other candidates. Q:  Do you have any additional advice for students who are considering a part-time program? A:  Even taking one class en route to a degree is valuable from a personal development and a resume perspective. Employers like to see that you are striving to complete your education. Also, taking classes that relate to your full-time job will often lead to better job performance. If you dont have any college experience, think about getting a certificate first. Complete that, and then enroll in an Associates program, etc. This is a positive, rewarding path to follow, and when you complete a step, it feels great! Last, if you are getting your MBA, do some additional research to learn more about the ratio of full-time and part-time students in the night classes. I would recommend schools who have fewer full-time students in these classes.

The Night - Original Writing - 1666 Words

She rushed home after work telling Rachael of her dinner plans for the night and she promised she wouldn’t interrupt them. She did however want a full report of the night’s events the following day. Lila had decided to go with something more casual since they weren’t actually going out for dinner this time. She settled for a pair of jeans and soft green sweater. She twirled around a couple of times happy with the way things fit, put on her coat and headed out. As she rode up the elevator to his apartment, she was becoming nervous. She wiped her hands down the front of her jeans silently praying they weren’t going to be sweaty all night. It wasn’t as if this was their first date, it wasn’t. But things seemed be different now. She wasn’t†¦show more content†¦It was her belief one must always wear an apron in the kitchen as to not spoil your clothes.† He placed a glass of water in front of her with a flourish. â€Å"She sounds like a very wise woman your grandmother,† she smiled. â€Å"She was quite the individual,† he said as he finished bringing the rest of the dishes over to the table. Once everything was arranged the way he wanted it, he removed the apron laying it on the counter top before taking his seat. Lila filled her plate. She never was one of those girls who believed in eating like a bird when out on a date. She never understood the mentality behind it. If you were hungry, you ate, simple. She doubted anyone was ever fooled by the three bite girls and claims of being full. Not only was it a waste of a good meal, but they would end up at home stuffing their faces afterwards because they were starving. How they figured they fooled anyone was beyond her. She put a piece of the duck in her mouth and closed her eyes. It positively exploded with flavor in her mouth. Keith sat back and watched. He was happily surprised at her reaction to the food as well as the amount she had on her plate for such a little thing. The look of bliss on her face made it all worthwhile. She had a quirky, adorable demeanor about her and seemed well grounded in addition to being inquisitive so far. The obvious pleasure she was getting from simply eating made her an absolute treasure. He smiled to himself and started to eat his own mealShow MoreRelatedNight Nights - Original Writing845 Words   |  4 Pagesuntil night time. We all would camp out in the living, our parents would tuck us in and then it was off to bed. Sleeping peacefully until one of my cousins woke us all up screaming while she was sleeping. Night after night we had to deal with this. The following year I as well as all of my cousins anticipated the same thing. Peacefully sleeping only to be awaken in the middle of the night by shears of horror. But to all of our surprise my cousin sleep peacefully all the way through the night everyRead MoreThe Night - Original Writing1183 Words   |  5 Pagesfell to the floor convulsing in pain. She was turning and realised that no one could save her. She took her last breath realising she was going to become like him. A vampire. Experiencing the final stages of her turning her back arched. That was the night of her transformation. Read MoreThe Night - Original Writing792 Words   |  4 Pagesenlightning. My parents died. I was six years old. They died, because of me. We got in a reasonable argument about Clifford the Big Red Dog, of all things. I stormed out of the house at 8:00 pm. I remember how glistening the stars were that night, how the colors of purple and dark blue collided in the sky and how the moon was full and shined with what seemed like a never-ending light. I just kept running, laughing like the obnoxious six year I was. They ran after me calling my name, I justRead MoreThe Night - Original Writing1528 Words   |  7 PagesAfter a long restless night, Allie had a servant draw a hot bath for her just after daybreak. She stepped in, sat down, and then let her entire body slip beneath the water. She held her nose as she wet her copper locks and soaped her head. She intended to bring the shine back- she did not like the dull creature that stared back at her from the mirror the night before. The hot water was soothing; it felt good on her tired body. After washing, s he lay there and let the warm water soak the tirednessRead MoreThe Night - Original Writing1580 Words   |  7 PagesEverything was beautiful that night. The sky was as clear as the spring water. The weather was so beautiful that we thought that we were not in the summer. I was sitting outside the house in our garden with my parents. We were having a nice chat after a delicious homemade crispy chicken with fries that my mom usually do. Everything was just perfect until my father received the unexpected call. The call that I wished my father didn’t receive. â€Å"Hello†¦what! What are you saying! Calm down I’m comingRead MoreThe Night - Original Writing906 Words   |  4 PagesEvelyn peeked down the hall from her bedroom making sure the light to her parents’ room was off, indicating that they had gone to sleep. When she saw the darkened hallway she knew that her parents had gone down for the night. Her younger sisters, ages 10 and 8, had been put to sleep a couple hours before. There was no one watching. Evelyn tiptoed down the stairs—thank God they were carpeted, which helped shield the noise of her steps—and she grabbed her mom’s car keys carefully exiting the houseRead MoreThe Night - Original Writing1004 Words   |  5 PagesThe crowd filled out of the arena, the buzz and excitement leaving with them. Dark walls echoed the heavy sounds of the metal equipment as it was scraped across the floor by the road crew. In the absence of the band, the crowd and the music, the atmosphere seemed as ble ak and empty as the crowd floor itself. Suddenly, echoes of past joyous screams were replaced by a single, blood curdling scream coming from the direction of the cloakroom. The sound, filled with fear, tore through the arena and bouncedRead MoreThe Night - Original Writing1332 Words   |  6 Pages Waking up to the smell of strawberry jam and toast coming from the kitchen, Dan looks over at his clock to see that it is 7:30. Forcing himself up, he throws on a set of clothes and tiptoed down the stairs to be sure not to wake up Lisa. When he got to the bottom of the stairs, Dan sees both his parents, father at the kitchen table drinking coffee and reading the newspaper, and mother at the counter spreading the jam on the mountain of toast beside her. The quiet morning is comfortable and pleasantRead MoreThe Night - Original Writing723 Words   |  3 PagesDuring the summer you can find the same scene on any Saturday night. I see an elderly man near the entrance setting behind a table covered with stacks of booklets. I can tell he is employed by the park by the dark green polo shirt and tan ball cap he is wearing. Even from a distance I can hear him shout, â€Å"Programs! Get your programs. Three dollars!† As a middle aged man wearing a dark t-shirt and baggy blue jeans wal ks through the door. It becomes obvious that he is experienced with the process.Read MoreThe Night - Original Writing859 Words   |  4 Pagesfriends ran out to see what all the laughing was about. They watched the video and began cracking up too. After, we all went back inside due to the amount of bugs outside. We spent the rest of the night talking and laughing until we all fell asleep at around two in the morning. This was the last night we all spent together before heading off to college. Even though it was in the middle of the summer, life took over and we were all busy on different days. The one way that we were able to keep in contact

Anti Competitive Behaviour

Question: How the Practise of Competition Commission Concludes Retail could have interpreted using an Anti Competitive Behaviour. Answer: Perfect competition, the utopian situation is the only case where anti-competitive behaviour does not takes place. Under perfect competition welfare is maximized as both consumers and producers are able to extract the optimal amount of consumer and producer surplus. On other hand, under the monopoly market welfare loss takes place as consumers are deprived and producers extract the maximum possible producer surplus. As per the report given by the Competition Commission two groups of people have been identified namely the supermarket owners and the property owners or property developer. It has been observed that both the groups have been engage into anti-competitive behaviour either willingly or forcefully. The first group that is the supermarket owners are showing anti-competitiveness practicing oligopolistic nature. Oligopoly is that type of competition where few firms cater to the demand of large number of consumers (Bloch, Eaton and Rothschild 2014). There can be existence of other firms as well but these few firms dominate the entire market and influences in quoting price and making business regulation in the particular segment in which they deal. Under this structure there is existence of market failure where social welfare is lost in the forms of forgone high price. The oligopolistic economy has kinked demand curve. In the given report there is existence of three major supermarkets namely Spar, Pick n Pay and Shoprite dominates the market. They have been strongly engaged in dominating the property owners and thereby showing anti-competitive behaviour. According to the Commissions report, these supermarket giants have forcefully tied up the property owners into such an agreement that they cannot deviate from their state and lease the land to some other retailers. Through this tie-up the landlords are facing hindrance in leasing the land to the competitors of these leading supermarkets even if they are ready to provide a better deed. This has been possible because the supermarket has been operating under oligopoly, which is characterized by highly inter-woven system. A single move by any of the competitors results in consequent movement of the other thereby maintaining the cartel that was previously agreed (Ellickson 2013). On other hand, the behaviour shown by the second group namely the landlords and the property developer are also anti-competitive in nature. The landlords are sometimes forced to show this behaviour by the lease agreement and coercion of the supermarkets. But it has been observed that the property developers give the power to only supermarkets to carry on trade in their property. They have been solely guided by the motive of profit. They are able to charge higher rent from the supermarkets than they would have been able to do for small retailers. Other than the above mentioned lease agreement practices, the buyer power, information exchange and category management also showed anti-competitiveness in the system. The general people are the buyers of the retail and grocery products. With the existence of the supermarkets, the buyers are left with no choice but to purchase their daily requirement from those markets. It has also been seen that to save the time and to get everything at same place, consumers themselves are reluctant to visit these malls and markets. Hereby it can be observed that the competitiveness have been slaughtered by both the buyers power and choice and the big markets in the nation. Information exchange can also lead to anti-competitive behaviour of the market. If the information is not timely spread out or has been misinterpreted, then it may lead to lack of scope for other competitors to evaluate and extend their business in market. In this way, lack of information exchange can lead to collapse of competit iveness of the market and give way to anti-competitiveness. Thus, it can be said that the existing market is far from being perfectly competitive. In reality, each segment of the market shows some degree of imperfection. It has been observed that the greatest level of imperfection lies in the supermarket with oligopolistic market structure. References: Bloch, H., Eaton, B.C. and Rothschild, R., 2014. A Dynamic Model of Oligopolistic Market Structure, Featuring Positioning Investments.International Journal of the Economics of Business,21(3), pp.379-411. Ellickson, P.B., 2013. Supermarkets as a natural oligopoly.Economic Inquiry,51(2), pp.1142-1154.

Western Art Music Secular music of the middle ages Essay Example For Students

Western Art Music Secular music of the middle ages Essay Hundreds of these songs were created and performed and eventually notated by bands of musicians flourishing across Europe during the 12th and 13th centuries, the most famous of which were the French trousers and troubadours. The monophonic melodies of these musicians, to which may have been added improvised accompaniments, were often rhythmically lively. The subject of the overwhelming majority of these songs is love. Most of which are performed by wandering minstrels. Instruments most probably used in secular music during the middle ages may include drums, harps, recorders, and bagpipes were the instruments used in secular music because they were easy for the traveling musicians to tote about. Instruments were taught through oral tradition and provided great dancing music and accompanied the stanzas well. There are many composers which composed secular music. These composers were known as Troubadours and trousers. They are French nobles. Among the best known of these poet-musicians are were the troubadour Gallinule X, duke of Aquatint, from southern France. We will write a custom essay on Western Art Music Secular music of the middle ages specifically for you for only $16.38 $13.9/page Order now As well as trouper, Chasteness De Couch, from rather France. Not all were men, Beatrice De Did was a troubadour who addressed songs to men. Western Art Music Secular music of the middle ages By Tom-Torn 1300 and Died in 1377, he was famous as a musician as well as a poet, An avian garden or Vanguard which means someone who leads to make a development of new ideas. Composer, poet and most known representative of the Ears Nova tradition. He was respected, not only in his native country, but also in Italy, Spain and other parts of Europe. Born in the French province of Champagne. Around 1323, he became secretary and chaplain to John, King of Bohemia, whom he accompanied on trips and military campaigns throughout Europe. Spent most of his years in in Reams, where he served as a church official. Gallinule also wrote sacred and secular polyphonic music. He traveled to many courts and presented copies of his music and poetry to noble patrons. These copies made Gallinule one of the first important composers whose works have survived. Among his works are 42 ballads 23 motets; most known of which is Messes De Monster Dame. Another composer is John Denotable born in England around 1385 died on December 24, 1453 in London He was also known as John Denotable; one of the leading English composers of his time. His works influenced other composers including Gallinule Duffy and Gilles Ponchos. Aside from being a composer, he was also an astronomer and mathematician. He wrote sacred pieces, secular songs and motets. Some of his known works are: 2 complete masses, 3 incomplete masses, and 14 individual mass sections. Geoffrey Chaucer There are many secular compositions during the Middle ages, some of them are

Don Quixote essays

Don Quixote essays Don Quixote filled his imagination with everything that he had read, with enchantments, knightly encounters, battles, challenges, wounds, with tales of love and its torments, and all sorts of impossible things, and as a result had come to believe that all these factitious happenings were true; they were more real to him than anything else in the world. The windmills were in fact real giants to Don Quixote. While on his travels he encountered a windmill that he thought were giants. Since the giants were lawless he had to attack the thirty or more of them. He thereupon commended himself with all his heart to his lady Dulcinea, beseeching her to succor him in this peril. After the battle he did not complain for the knights of the day did not complain about their bodily injuries. He could only imagine these giants in his story books he read, also when he commended himself that was what all the knights of the time did from what he had read. Since windmills were in fact windmills he blamed it on the evil magician Freston. The magician was surly evil although he did not do anything to the windmills. Don Quixote came upon some knightly encounters during his journeys. The first encounter was while he was watching his armor. Two muleteers came by to water their mules. In order to do this the mule driver had to remove the armor. He warned the muleteer, but with no vigilance to Don Quixote. He then exclaimed succor O lady mine, this vassal heart in this my first encounter; let not your favor and protection fail me in the peril in which for the first time now find myself. He then proceeded to strike the muleteer in the head. He had to so to speak devote his first battle to Dulcinea his lady love in which all the knights did. He had read all this in the story books. After this encounter he came upon a farmer whipping a young boy named Andres for the thieving of some sheep. When Don Quixote approached the farmer he...

How Middle Class Families Can Afford Private School

How Middle Class Families Can Afford Private School Private schools can seem out of reach for many families. Middle-class households in many U.S. cities are struggling with the cost of  health care, education and other expenses on the rise. Simply paying for everyday living can be a challenge, and many middle-class families dont even consider the option of applying to private school due to the added cost. But, a private school education may be easier to achieve than they thought. How? Check out these tips. Apply for Financial Aid Families who can not afford the full cost of private school can apply for financial aid.  According to the National Association of Independent Schools (NAIS), for the 2015-2016 year, about 24% of students at private schools received financial assistance. That figure is even higher at boarding schools, with nearly 37% of students receiving financial aid. Nearly every school offers financial aid, and many schools are committed to meeting 100% of a familys demonstrated need. When they apply for aid, families will complete what is known as a Parent Financial Statement (PFS). This is done through the School and Student Services (SSS) by NAIS. The information you provide is then used by SSS to generate a report that estimates the amount you can contribute to school experiences, and that report is what schools use to determine your demonstrated need. Schools vary with regard to how much aid they can provide to help pay private school tuition; some schools with large endowments can provide larger aid packages, and they also consider the other children you have enrolled in private education. While families can not know in advance if the aid package provided by their schools will cover their costs, it never hurts to ask and to apply for financial aid to see what the schools can come up with. Financial aid can make affording private school much more feasible. Some financial aid packages can even assist with travel if youre applying to a boarding school, as well as school supplies and activities. Tuition-Free Schools Full Scholarships Believe it or not, not every private school carries a tuition fee. Thats right, there are some tuition-free schools across the country, as well as schools that offer full scholarships to families whose household income falls below a certain level. Free schools, such as Regis High School, a Jesuit boys school in New York City, and schools that offer full scholarships to qualified families, such as Phillips Exeter, can help attending private school a reality for families who previously never believed such an education would be affordable. Lower-Cost Schools Many private schools have lower tuitions than the average independent school, making affording private school more accessible. For example, the Cristo Rey Network of 24 Catholic schools in 17 states and the District of Columbia offers a college-prep education at a lower cost than that charged by most Catholic schools. Many Catholic and parochial schools have lower tuitions than other private schools. In addition, there are some boarding schools across the country with lower tuition rates. These schools make affording private school, and even boarding school,  easier for middle-class families. Enjoy Employee Benefits A little-known benefit of working at a private school is that faculty and staff usually can send their children to the school for a reduced rate, a service known as tuition remission. At some schools, tuition remission means a portion of the costs are covered, while at others, 100 percent of the costs are covered. Now, naturally, this tactic requires there to be a job opening and for you to be qualified as a top candidate who gets hired, but it is possible. Keep in mind, too, that teaching isnt the only job at private schools. From business office and fundraising roles to admission/recruiting and database management, even marketing and software development, the wide range of positions offered at private schools might surprise you. So, if you know that your skills align with the needs of a private school and that you want to send your children there, you might consider dusting off your resume and applying for a job at a private school.

2 page biography of Jeremy Bentham and his contribution to the study Essay

2 page biography of Jeremy Bentham and his contribution to the study of Ethics - Essay Example Bentham was a great activist who advocated political and economic freedom. He pioneered various political movements that lobbied for the abolition of slavery, legal use of the death penalty, and physical punishment. Political radical ideas advanced by Bentham lobbied for separation of church systems from the state, freedom of expression for all citizens, divorce rights, gender equity, and animal rights. However, Bentham opposed natural rights and law but favored individual legal rights for all citizens (Becker and Becker 137). Bentham mentored several students during his time as a teacher and researcher. Some of Bentham’s great students included James Mill, James Stuart Mill, James Austin, and Robert Owen. His students also developed into great theorists for instance; Robert Owen become the founder of Utopian socialism while John Austin remained as the famous legal philosopher. Bentham, who attended Westminster school at the tender age of 12 in 1760, existed as a child prodigy. He started studying Latin at the age of three and preferred reading England history books. Bentham, who was the brother to Samuel Bentham, completed his Bachelor’s degree at Queen’s college in 1763. Bentham obtained his master’s degree in 1766 at Queen’s college. He practiced law in college though he never represented persons in courts of law. He reportedly hated English legal code and named it ‘Demon of Chicane’. Bentham loved chemistry and spent most of his time conducting chemical experiments and speculating theories relating to legal abuses. His interest in chemistry angered his father who knew that he would develop into a renowned intelligent lord chancellor amongst English courts of law. Due to great interest in sciences, Jeremy Bentham pursued physical science studies and started research on suppositions that had a relationship with politics and law. Research on suppositions related to law and politics

Concert reflection Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Concert reflection - Essay Example The music texture is a combination of homophony and polyphony. The use of imitation is also dominant in the concert. The organizing principle of the music is based on contrast and variations. It has a clear flow of ternary form. The music has a slow speed with uneven spacing. Its dynamics is characterized with softness with a piano play. The concert has a wide voice range. It has a combination of soprano, alto, and tenor. The musical instrument families associated with the concerts include Keyboard instruments, chordophones, and brass. The type of singing group in the concert is known as choral groups. This is evident in acappella singing that features in the performance when all voices sing at the same time. It has a clear Chamber music ensemble as revealed by the pattern used. The singers occasionally remain silence while a single singer sings in certain parts. This was a duet performance in Philadelphia by a great artist known as Pink. Her music is known to follow the romanesca melodic formula. This performance is done at times while seated or standing and has a number of accompaniments which may be limited to the mood of the song. The mood of the song is determined by the message in the song. The rhythm is slow and organized in the basic meters. In has much syncopation in almost all the lines of the music. The music is based on major scale. â€Å"The melody is derived from the singer’s vocal tone that aligns well with the instrumentalist.†(O’toole 123) The vertical events sound in line with the music providing good harmony. Being a western music in the present generation, it borrows much from the lineage having major scale. The concert had a high central tone that could ignite the audience. The music had a dissonance musical space. The texture of her this concert is known to be monophony. It has some sections that take the imitation texture. The music form of the concert is has basic elements of contrast and repetition. This form of music

Breakfast Club Analysis Essay Example for Free

Breakfast Club Analysis Essay The well-known song â€Å"Don’t You Forget about Me† plays at the end of the movie The Breakfast Club, signaling not only the end of the famous movie, but also the end of the transitory group that had developed in the earlier scenes. Although movie was released over twenty years ago, high school students today can still use the labels that are examined in the movie to identify themselves in the cruel world they call high school. With the final lines â€Å"you see us as you want to see usIn the simplest terms, in the most convenient definitions,† the point of the movie finally becomes apparent; stereotypes are not accurate representations of teenagers, but instead they accurately represent who teenagers think they are. There is no doubt that students all come with labels; it is inevitable. But whether a student is a brain, a jock or a princess, they are all greatly impacted by the stereotypes and boundaries that are a part of each of their social groups. To teenagers, being a part of a social group is huge, as portrayed in The Breakfast Club. As soon as the movie starts, viewers can decipher the cliques that each student is in. When the students are being dropped off, viewers assume which cliques each student is in by their appearances, how they respond to their parents, and how they react to coming to school on a Saturday. The most important identification of each student’s clique is seen by where they sit in the library. Much like the school cafeteria today, the students sat where they felt comfortable. In this case, it was away from everyone else in the room, with the exception of Andrew and Claire who were already in similar social groups and had similar friends. Bender eventually approaches the topic of the students’ separate cliques by asking Andrew, â€Å"Do you think Id speak for you? I dont even know your language.† The students, while all in similar situations have trouble effectively communicating because they do not really know each other. This proves how drastically different teenagers are from those not included in their immediate friend group. Humans in general, especially teenagers, are greatly influenced by their peers and the activities that their peers participate in. This means that they are also largely impacted by the stereotypes that are associated with their cliques and social groups. Stereotypes change who teenagers think they are based upon what others are saying about them. Being forced into a role can completely change who a person is or how someone acts. For example, Andrew felt genuinely bad about taping together Larry Lester’s butt cheeks,  but he was influenced by his friends and by the expectations that he thought his father had for him. These expectations can drastically impact how teenagers treat one another. At the end of the movie, the boundaries outlined earlier in the film are semi-broken. Although, Claire tells Bender that she hates her friends, she remains friends with them because she does not feel like she would belong in another clique. The boundaries that are formed from the very beginning, such as the language each teenager uses or the lunches that they have, are finally broken when Allison takes the varsity letter off of Andrew’s jacket and when Claire gives Bender her earring. Although neither of these actions is huge, and none of the students will leave their prior friend group, they are beginning to break the boundaries that separated them in the first place. And though the breakfast club may never speak to each other again, they have developed a greater sense of understanding for each other and the cliques that they are all in. While Brian, Allison, Bender, Claire, and Andy may never talk to each other again, they may reconsider how they treat someone in a different social group than them or how they perceive someone who is different than them. The cliques are still going to exist, yet the students will be able to see others for who they really are, not for who others think they should be. Whether a student is impacted directly by their friends and peers, or by the boundaries that tie them to a specific group, the fact that there mindset is shifted by these pressures is unavoidable.

Christopher Skase - The Sick Tycoon :: essays research papers

In the early 1980's a young confident man named Christopher Charles Skase became world famous by amassing a list of assets including a multi-million dollar company called Quintex, the channel 7 network, Mirage resorts and a number of extravagant houses across the world. Christopher Skase was born on the 18th of September 1948 in Melbourne, Australia. He grew up in a rich family going to Malvern and Caulfield Grammar Schools. He first started making money as a stockbroker and then as a finance journalist. In 1975 he bought a small Tasmanian based company called Quintex. Borrowing heavily the Company expanded into resort developments including 5 Mirage resorts and the media company, channel 7 network. Buoyed by his success Skase began to represent Australia's entrepreneurs of the 80's. Brash, extravagant and fearless. Who could forget his Christmas parties in Brisbane last decade? The Quintex group of companies collapsed in 1989. By 1991 Skase a seasoned overseas traveller failed to return to Australia. Bankrupt and aloof he stayed far from home and fought attempts to force him to return for trial on the charges brought by the Australian Securities Commission. Whilst a resident of Majorca Skase has developed his business ventures by creating an international company pursuing interests in resorts. It appears that this strategy has been adopted to carry favour with the Spanish Government in relation to investment attraction. Since 1994 in Spanish Courts he has fought extradition proceedings to Australia, claiming that a life threatening lung condition prevented him from travelling. This was challenged in the courts by witnesses to his lifestyle in Majorca where he and his wife Pixie are living together with step-daughter Amanda and her husband Tony Larkin. The Spanish had until recently upheld Skase's testimony. In May 1998, with Senator Amanda Vanstone leading the charge, the Australian Government cancelled Skase's passport. The Spanish courts moved quickly sending notice to Skase to leave Majorca by the 23rd July 1998 due to his lack of citizenship. Of course, there was and continues to be an appeal. Realising that he could be extradited to Australia since being stateless, Skase moved quickly to obtain a passport. In August, 1998 he became a citizen of Dominica and now has a valid Dominican passport.

“Art in Action: Dance Series” Reflection Paper Essay

Last February 16, we were required to watch Art in Action: Dance Series which features the Brazilian School of Capoeira (EBC). The program contains lectures and actual performances by students from the university and guest artists. Some of the lectures given were the following; Introduction to music, benefits of music to the artist and audience, elements of music and intoduction of different filipino ethnic instruments. The program also featured different kinds of dances like ; Philippine Northern Dances, Mindanao Dances, Classical Ballet, Swing, Modern Dances, Streetdance and Capoiera. Even though a lot of types were mentioned, I saw that the program focused mostly on dances from our country. The program still focused on how vibrant our culture is and how it changed over time. Honestly, my perception of philippine dances changed after watching this show because I saw how beautiful and creative those dances were. This program really made me appreciate more our culture. I’m now confident in saying that I learned a lot from this program, not just from our culture but also about dance as general. I learned that dance is really a form of art because it also requires creative skills which are also needed when painting or in arts and crafts. However, the highlight of the show were the featured guests from The Brazilian School of Capoeira (EBC). Members of EBC performed and they surely left the audience in awe. They were kind enough to give a â€Å"free class† when they asked volunteers from the audience to come and join them onstage. All in all, the show was very fun and educational. I learned a lot of things about dance which changed the way I saw dance before. I really recommend that everyone should watch them perform. It’s worth watching and everyone will surely have a good time.

Assessing what appears to be the use of LAMP in Eduardo Gamarra’s CVA

In January 2003, Eduardo Gamarra and his research team set out to lend their professional and academic expertise in mitigating the probable causes of Bolivian conflicts through the Conflict Vulnerability Assessment or CVA of Bolivia (Gamarra, 2003, p. 1). Assessing the possible causes of conflicts in Bolivia will stop the ongoing threats to countrywide instability.The Bolivian instability may have started and peeked during the 2002 elections where parties started to clamor for position by entering into party coalitions; due to this, the majority vote that should have been echoed as the Bolivian democracy has been counterproductive to insure the satisfaction of party coalition based interests (Gamarra, 2003, p. 4). Through the CVA, Gamarra deems that it is possible to predict possible events that could turn into violent confrontations by taking into account the premises set by the present Bolivian political landscape.In relation to the main objectives of this research paper, Eduardo G amarra’s preemptive and predictive research to address future Bolivian conflicts will be assessed through the methodology that Gamarra employed in his research. As of this point, Gamarra’s CVA appears to employ predictive methodologies in its attempts to prevent the occurrence of violent confrontations in Bolivia. Furthermore, CVA appears to follow conventions of predictive research such as those prescribed in LAMP. As the center of this research paper, Lockwood Analytical Method of Prediction (LAMP) is one of the widely used predictive research methodologies (LAMP, 2010, p.n. pag. ). This methodology offers a new methodological approach from the conventional quantity based projections in predictive researches (LAMP, 2010, p. n. pag. ). LAMP can be assumed as the methodology used by Gamarra in CVA since CVA is also highly predictive in terms of its generalizations. This research paper will assess whether Gamarra’s CVA as a predictive work follows the guidelines set by LAMP. By qualifying the CVA parts and foci with the twelve steps prescribed in LAMP, this paper seeks to fulfill its objective and deems that a definitive conclusion is possible to arrive at. Gamarra as a follower of LAMP as seen in his CVATo conclusively qualify whether Gamarra used the LAMP method in writing the CVA would require the tedious work of identifying whether the part of the LAMP are present in the CVA. This task is impeded by the fact that the final format of the CVA does not have the same labels as the LAMP; at least not as blatant. However, the idea that Gamarra used the LAMP in his CVA can be seen through the parts that his CVA put so much attention on (which follows LAMP prescriptions). These parts appears to have been presented in the CVA; these parts entails almost fifty percent accordance to the prescribe methodology in LAMP.In the whole CVA, the issue that holds the most bearing is the mitigation and prevention of conflicts in Bolivia. Gamarra and his tea m was more than solid in reiterating that the CVA will focus on Bolivia as a conflict prone country. This is the reason why Gamarra and his team spent a lot of time in trying to predict the possibilities of the occurrence of conflicts. Through the extensive research facts presented in the paper, it can even be said that the whole CVA seeks to answer one primary question, â€Å"What are the probable reasons that would cause conflicts to arise in Bolivia?† The CVA tried to find the answer for this question by grouping the conflicts in Bolivia in five major classifications, institutional, economic, land, coca/cocaine, and citizen and public security (Gamarra, 2003, p. 4). In the CVA, Gamarra and his team identified two major actors that can very much affect the outcome of the conflict resolution and mitigation in Bolivia- government and opposition. The MNR or Nationalist Revolutionary Movement represents the government; while the MAS or Movimiento al Socialismo leads the opposit ion. CVA attributed that these parties are the main actors in the Bolivian politics and conflicts.Misunderstandings and apathy between these two parties can easily translate the strong political divide to violent confrontations (Gamarra, 2003, p. 4). However, the CVA did not dismiss the possibility that the 2002 elections can also improve the conflict situation through these parties (Gamarra, 2003, p. 4). The government and the opposition perceive the issues of conflict in terms of their participations on the issues. The government side pride themselves in terms of the international economic and security support it has (Gamarra, 2003, p. 6).On the other hand, the opposition takes pride in the intermediation they are able to contribute to the conflict resolution process (Gamarra, 2003, p. 6). In the CVA Gamarra and his team provided contextualizing facts that would put the MAS led opposition and MNR led government in their places in the conflict situation. This attempt can be seen wi th the graphical representation that Gamarra and his team presented to show the divided opinions of the national actors regarding the appropriate type of government in Bolivia (Gamarra, 2003, p. 14).Gamarra further contextualized the conflicts in terms of the partisan opinion in considering the plausibility of military uprising (coup d’etat) in installing new types of government that parties see as more fitting to Bolivia (Gamarra, 2003, p. 12). Even if Gamarra and his team are loyal to LAMP in these parts of CVA, there are other parts of CVA that show that the CVA was not exclusively written through LAMP. The Contradictions, Shortcomings and Disloyalties of CVA to LAMP As said earlier, the CVA appears to be written through the LAMP; this can hold for the almost fifty percent of the CVA.However, in terms of the data gathering and presentation part of the CVA Gamarra and his team took a different path apart from LAMP. This claim can be supported with the different formulation of the conflict scenarios in the CVA when compared to the LAMP. In LAMP, the permutations of the alternative futures (z) follow a strict formula XY=Z that is determined by the number of actors (x) and the numbers of major scenarios (y) (LAMP, 2010, p. n. pag. ). The formula basis of LAMP insures uniformity in terms of the numbers of scenarios that would be required in predicting through certain national actors.In the CVA there are five major scenarios provided (counter narcotics, political institutions, citizen and public security, economic arena and land ownership). Raising the two identified actors by the five major scenarios will require thirty-two scenarios. On the other hand, the CVA was only able to provide 16 scenarios under the five major scenarios. Another shortcoming of the CVA was its failure to conduct proper pair wise comparison among the scenarios; this resulted to different scenarios provided under the five major scenarios.The scenarios of citizen and public security have four scenarios as compared to the three scenarios of all of the remaining major scenarios (counter- narcotics, political institutions, economic arena and land ownership. Due to the absence of a pair wise comparing mechanism, the CVA also lacks the qualifications of probabilities that are determined through â€Å"votes† from comparing pair wise. These characteristics of the CVA deviated by twenty- five percent from the total twelve steps prescribed in LAMP.On the other hand, CVA delivered the remaining twenty-five percent of LAMP in accordance to the prescriptions of LAMP. Gamarra and his team provided the needed information to establish consequential analysis, which the step 9 of LAMP prescribed. The steps 10, 11 and 12 are also included in the CVA through the imaginative conclusion presented in the CVA. The high dependency rate of the Gamarra and his team’s conclusion with the numbers presented by the graphical representations follow the predictive nature of LAMP . Conclusion and RecommendationsTaking into account all of the investigations presented in this research paper it can be concluded that the Conflict Vulnerability Assessment of Bolivia is a hybrid research in terms of the methodologies it employed. The seventy five percent of the CVA was written in accordance with LAMP, but the twenty five percent of CVA does not coincide with the quantitative requirements of LAMP. The difference between LAMP and the methodology employed in CVA does not imply that the CVA is a failed predictive research. CVA’s use of different methods only show the flexibility that Gamarra and his team sought to establish in the CVA.Given this conclusion, this paper would recommend improvements for the two major aspects of the CVA- structure and methodology. It is recommendable that the CVA would use a paper structure or format that is more accessible in answering specific aspects of predictive research. The current arrangement of the CVA tends to make the is sue of Bolivian conflict too broad to discuss and even solve. The discussions without the recommended segmentation appear not only to be reiterating but also to be too general since the reference focal points overlap each other (as seen in the presentation of the scenarios).On the other hand, the methodology employed with the CVA appears to be improvable in terms of making the quantitative aspect of the methodology isolated and only catered as additional empirical references. A qualitative research method is probably more fitting to the undeniable culture sensitive and politics laden conflicts in Bolivia. Eduardo Gamarra and his team could have broken away from the conventions of quantitative predictive research by providing more vivid narrative accounts of the current and predicted conflict situations instead of standing on the methodological position of LAMP.The quantitative elaborateness in LAMP makes the quantitative shortcomings in CVA either half-truths or irrelevant; both pro babilities could have avoided if the CVA was treated as a qualitative research. Bibliography Gamarra, E. A. (2003). Conflict Vulnerability Assessment Bolivia. Retrieved August 5, 2010, from www. digitalcommons. flu. edu: http://digitalcommons. fiu. edu/cgi/viewcontent. cgi? article=1002&context=laccwps LAMP. (2010). The Application of LAMP. Retrieved August 5, 2010, from www. lamp-method. org: http://www. lamp-method. org/2. html

Decision Tree Essay

Decision Tree Essay Decision Tree Essay Chapter 9 Structuring System Requirements: Logic Modeling True-False Questions 1. Data flow diagrams are designed to show the detailed logic of processes. Answer: False Difficulty: Med Reference: p. 282 2. Structured English is useful for representing the logic in information system processes. Answer: True Difficulty: Easy Reference: p. 282 3. Structured English represents the three fundamental structured programming statements: choice, repetition, and sequence. Answer: True Difficulty: Med Reference: p. 282 4. Reference, linking, and selection programming statements are represented in Structured English. Answer: False Difficulty: Med Reference: p. 282 5. Decision tables allow you to represent a set of conditions and the actions that follow from them in a tabular format. Answer: True Difficulty: Med Reference: p. 282 6. Data flow diagrams are adequate for modeling all of the complexity of an information system. Answer: False Difficulty: Med Reference: p. 283 7. Data flow diagrams are not adequate for modeling all of the complexity of an information system. Answer: True Difficulty: Med Reference: p. 283 8. Logic modeling represents the internal structure and functionality of the processes represented on data flow diagrams. Answer: True Difficulty: Med Reference: p. 283 9. In the analysis phase, logic modeling reflects the structure or syntax of a particular programming language. Answer: False Difficulty: Hard Reference: p. 283 10. Logic modeling is an activity associated with requirements structuring. Answer: True Difficulty: Easy Reference: p. 283 11. Although logic modeling represents a process’s structure, it cannot represent the temporal dimensions of systems. Answer: False Difficulty: Hard Reference: p. 283 12. In structured analysis, the primary deliverables of logic modeling are structured descriptions and diagrams that outline the logic contained within each DFD process as well as diagrams that show the temporal dimensions of systems. Answer: True Difficulty: Hard Reference: p. 283 13. Logic modeling deliverables may take the form of new entries into the project dictionary. Answer: True Difficulty: Med Reference: p. 283 14. For each primitive process, the analyst should develop Structured English, decision table, and decision tree representations. Answer: False Difficulty: Med Reference: p. 283 15. State transition diagrams, sequence diagrams, and activity diagrams are types of logic models. Answer: True Difficulty: Med Reference: p. 285 16. Structured English is a process modeling technique. Answer: False Difficulty: Easy Reference: p. 285 17. Structured English is a modified form of the English language used to specify the logic of information system processes. Answer: True Difficulty: Med Reference: p. 285 18. The Unified Modeling Language is a modified form of the English language used to specify the logic of information system processes. Answer: False Difficulty: Med Reference: p. 285 19. Structured English relies heavily on adjectives and adverbs. Answer: False Difficulty: Med Reference: p. 285 20. The standard version of Structured English is called the Unified Modeling Language. Answer: False Difficulty: Med Reference: p. 285 21. If and case are two types of conditional statements. Answer: True Difficulty: Easy Reference: p. 285 22. Referencing Structured English, terms that specify logical comparisons are spelled out rather than represented by their arithmetic symbols. Answer: True Difficulty: Med Reference: p. 287 23. When preparing Structured English statements, the analyst includes statements to initialize variables, open and close files, and find related records in separate files. Answer: False Difficulty: Hard Reference: p. 288 24. Structured English resembles a programming language. Answer: False Difficulty: Med Reference: p. 288 25. Structured English is a communication technique used for analysts and

4 Senses Animals Have That Humans Dont

4 Senses Animals Have That Humans Don't Radar guns, magnetic compasses, and infrared detectors are all man-made inventions that enable humans to stretch beyond the five natural senses of sight, taste, smell, feel, and hearing. But  these gadgets are far from original. Evolution equipped some animals with these extra senses millions of years before humans evolved. Echolocation Toothed whales (a family of marine mammals that includes dolphins), bats, and some ground- and tree-dwelling shrews use echolocation to navigate their surroundings. These animals emit  high-frequency sound pulses, either very high-pitched to human ears or completely inaudible, and then detect the echoes produced by those sounds. Special ear and brain adaptations enable these animals to build three-dimensional pictures of their surroundings. Bats, for example, have enlarged ear flaps that gather and direct sound toward their thin, super-sensitive eardrums. Infrared and Ultraviolet Vision Rattlesnakes and other pit vipers use their eyes to see during the day, like most other vertebrate animals. But at night, these reptiles employ infrared sensory organs to detect and hunt warm-blooded prey that would otherwise be completely invisible. These infrared eyes are cup-like structures that form crude images as infrared radiation hits a heat-sensitive retina. Some animals, including eagles, hedgehogs, and shrimp, can also see into the lower reaches of the ultraviolet spectrum. Human beings are unable to see either infrared or ultraviolet light with the naked eye. Electric Sense The omnipresent electric fields produced by some animals function like senses. Electric eels and some species of rays have modified muscle cells that produce electric charges strong enough to shock  and sometimes kill their prey. Other fish (including many sharks) use weaker electric fields to help them navigate murky waters, home in on prey or monitor their surroundings. For instance, bony fish (and some frogs) possess lateral lines on either side of their bodies, a row of sensory pores in the skin that detect electrical currents in the water. Magnetic Sense The flow of molten material in the earths core and the flow of ions in the earths atmosphere generate a magnetic field that surrounds the planet. Just as compasses point humans toward magnetic north, animals possessing a magnetic sense can orient themselves in specific directions and navigate long distances. Behavioral studies have revealed that animals as diverse as honey bees, sharks, sea turtles, rays, homing pigeons, migratory birds, tuna, and salmon all have magnetic senses. Unfortunately, the details about how these animals actually sense the earths magnetic field are not yet known. One clue may be small deposits of magnetite in these animals nervous systems. These magnet-like crystals align themselves with the earths magnetic fields and may act like microscopic compass needles.   Edited by Bob Strauss

A Research of How health and safety affect employees productivity and Essay

A Research of How health and safety affect employees productivity and company profits in Koh Brothers Group - Essay Example Literature Review 4 2.1 Introduction to Literature Review 4 2.2 Importance of Health & Safety at Workplace 5 2.3 Health & Safety at Koh Brothers 6 3. Research Methodology 7 4. Conclusion 10 References 12 1. Introduction 1.1 Background of the Company Koh Brothers is a well established construction, property development and specialist engineering provider in Singapore. The company was started by Mr Koh Tiat Meng in the year 1966. They have various milestone projects under them such as flood alleviation, counting Rochor Canal and Kallang River to name a few. The group has wide-ranging construction services and 40 subsidiaries, joint ventures and associated companies which are spread over Singapore, China, Indonesia, Malaysia and Vietnam. Apart from construction, they have diversified business in building materials, real estate, leisure & hospitality. The company has received A1 grading by Building and Construction Authority (BCA) which enabled them to undertake various civil engineering projects and building projects over the years. Koh Brothers is currently the highest grade for contractor’s registration in this category. 1.2 Research title, Research Question, Research Objectives The report mainly focuses into the health and safety standards maintained by the company and how it can affect an employee’s productivity and company profits. ... Moreover, high number of accidents and employee sickness may result in company’s declining profit. Therefore, health and safety regulations should be improved and well implemented in order to increase company’s profits and employee’s morale in which lead to further productivity. This can increase company profits as it increase company’s reputations in the eyes of investors and stakeholders. 2. Literature Review 2.1 Introduction to Literature Review Our focus of study is to look into the health and safety standards maintained by Koh Brothers and how it has helped them to boost the employee performance and also boost the company profits. According to EANPC â€Å"Productivity is an expression of how efficiently and effectively goods and services (i.e. goods and services which are demanded by users) are being produced. Thus, its key characteristics are that it is expressed in physical or economic units - in quantities or values (money) - based on measurements which are made at different levels: on the level of the economy overall, that of a sector or branch of the economy, that of the enterprise and its individual plants/units and that of individuals† (EANPC, 2005). Being a construction company, Koh Brothers put a lot of stress on Human Resource. They believe that their people are behind the success of their company. Lot of health and safety measures are taken by them to ensure their protection and care. Their staff under-go through consistent upgrading course to make sure that they can develop their new-found skills, determine new efficiencies for their professional development, and achieve better satisfaction in their work. 2.2 Importance of Health & Safety at Workplace Research has shown that satisfied and happy employees

Law of Criminal Evidence Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

Law of Criminal Evidence - Essay Example The prosecution already had evidence of his admission to the theft, which were strong enough to convict him. The evidential burden in this case had been brought forth due to the presence of the admission statements from the police interrogations. However, the prosecution would justify their evidential burden if the prosecutor gave more evidence linking Robert to the theft of the iPods. In Asif and Molly’s cases, the prosecution had the burden of proof. The standard applicable here is the ‘beyond reasonable doubt’ legal standard1. Asif had been accused of stealing iPods and so was Molly. Although the evidential burden was represented by the presentation of witnesses who claimed that they saw Asif stealing the iPods, the evidential burden was yet to be depicted as far as Molly was concerned. There are no witnesses who associated that Molly had taken part in the theft. The prosecutor had the burden of proof beyond reasonable doubt, to present evidence linking Molly t o the theft of the iPods. In the case of Bratty vs. Attorney General of Northern Ireland2, Lord Moris stated that a mouthy excuse should not be concluded as enough evidence to convict the accused. The manager’s allegations depicting that Molly and asif had taken part in the theft was not enough evidence. Robert’s own confession of his participation in the theft plays a major role in the evidence burden3. However, advising him that engaging a solicitor would lengthen the process was a misguidance.... In both cases, he had been deceived into the confession. Although this is a good defense, the prosecution might counteract this by arguing that the defendant did not have to worry about the involvement of the police and the court if he was innocent. The fact that he was afraid of the police and the court meant that there was something he knew about the crime, which he did not want to bring forward. Such claims would act as a disadvantage to Robert’s case. In other words, it would be hard to convince the jury to abandon the confessions made by Robert when he was interrogated by the manager and the police. Legally, the police had a right to advice Robert about his right to remaining silence. However, advising him that engaging a solicitor would lengthen the process was a misguidance. This is because they knew that he would eventually need one since they were sure that they he would be taken to court. On the other hand, the police might claim that they were simply using tactics t o make him tell the truth. The law gives accused individuals a right to silence when interrogated by the police. However, sections 34-39 of the 1994 act imposed limitations on this law. In the case of Rice vs. Connolly, it was held that individuals had no right to answer police questions if they are not arrested4. However, this section gives the jury the right to make adverse inferences as a result of the accused person’s silence. In other words, Molly was expected to mention that he was under duress when he performed the crime. Molly was expected to mention that Asif was mad and that he had threatened to break her legs she failed to carry out the act of crime. She should have further mentioned that the she was sure Asif would go ahead with his

Do some brief research on the topic of resisting change. What Paper

Do some brief on the topic of resisting change. What determines whether or not people resist change - Research Paper Example Researchers have observed many types of resistance. Employees avoid doing tasks or postponement of tasks, resignation and underproduction are the most common outcomes recognized by researchers. Another study unveils few other indicators that show resistance for change in the organization, which include increased absenteeism, impatience and frustration (Todnem, 2005). These indicators and reactions of employees are reflective of the resistance to change. In order to manage the change effectively and to avoid these negative after effects of change in the organization, mangers must understand the reasons behind the resistance. Employees do resist change and their negative responses are caused by few rational reasons. One reason behind the resistance of change by employees is uncertainty about the effects of change being implemented in the organization. Uncertainty about job performance is another reason that triggers employees to resist change because they are unaware of the tasks, which will be given to them after change and they have fear of not having the required skills. Another reason behind this resistance is no involvement of employee in the change process, which creates the fear of abrupt change in the mind of employees and they think they are not the part of the organization. To cope with these consequences, management must be proactive, enable employee participation, and make them aware of the effects of the change in the organization (Todnem,

Organisation analysis

Organisation analysis INTRODUCTION I personally feel that I already possessed some basic knowledge required in analysing and gathering information about an organisation. In the past while I was preparing myself for the campus recruitment programmes during my bachelors, I did a similar kind of research in order to get an idea beforehand about the companies and their market values that I was applying for. What I liked the most about this module is that in the initial three weeks we were just taught about the various principles and frameworks that underlie in analysing an organisation and its only in the last couple of weeks that we were provided with hands on experience in implementing the learnt techniques. LESSONS LEARNED I really felt it new and great to interact with the employees while conducting the surveys among them. In the later part when we were not granted the permission to conduct the surveys, I founded it pretty difficult but learnt quite a lot about the issues that are faced while conducting them under the shades. Though the questionnaires were straight forward and the employees did not have much difficulty in filling them, the major setback was with the interviews that I had with some of them. I had to reframe almost all of our questions in such a way that it does not eats up much of the employees time and also to make it easy for them to come out with specific answers. STAGES OF ANALYSIS Our group was assigned with the Warwick Food and Drink Department for our analysis. The Food and Drink department was found to be offering many services like the cafes, restaurants, bars and food deliveries across the university. Hence we figured out that we need to put in a lot of effort and time in order to furnish our findings. As instructed by our course coordinator we choose a member of our team as the group representative, who was responsible for interacting with the manager. The very first day we begin our analysis, we decided and made our group representative to mail and book an appointment with the manager of that department. Luckily to our surprise, we got an early appointment for the meeting from the manager. Since time was lacking for us to analyse about each and every service offered by the department, we all brainstormed and decided on some of the major and bigger services to analyse. Initially many of my team members decided to conduct their analyses on services that catered to only to a small amount of people owing to the lack of time, but later I somehow struggled and convinced them to opt in for some of the bigger service areas. I was of the notion that by understanding the work structure in these bigger service areas, we could get a clear view of the organisation as a whole. We then framed the questions that we were to ask the manager during the interview. Many of us came up with different kind of questions and after much aberration we zeroed on some of the basic questions. Again in this phase I faced quite some difficulties in convincing my team members. Though there are many instances one of t hem being the question about the Safety Measures that are being undertaken in the department. Since our analysis was about the Food and Drinks, I felt the need to consider about the safety measures being taken in order to guarantee the quality of food that are served to the customers, whereas my team members felt that it is awkward to shoot this question to the manager of that department. Though many were not happy I somehow convinced my group representative to incorporate it to the list of other questions. But later to everyones surprise, it was for this question that the manager gave utmost importance and also spent quite a lot of time on answering it. Though when compared to the other groups we got an early appointment from the manager and also had an interview with her, we could not extort as much of the needed information from it. But we figured out that motivation was ought to be an important factor that was missing in that department, which in turn led us to understand deeper into the facts that the grading system and feedback from the managers about the performance of their employees were also lacking. Owing to our lack of time, we took motivation as the preceding factor and decided to dig out as much information we could from it. We framed some more questions based on motivation and tried to schedule another interview with the manager, but our appointment was refused. Later we prepared a questionnaire (owing to the fact that their workplaces were busy always) containing questions about the employees motivation, their job satisfaction, etc. and we decided to hand it over to just a minimal number of employees in each of the services on which we were concentrating our analysis. Again when we tried to get permission from the manager to give out these questionnaires, she readily disagreed to it. Hence we almost felt like we were totally lost in the middle of nowhere. Later we decided to conduct the interviews and give out the questionnaires to some of the employees, whom we personally knew. Though what we did was out of the rules since the manager did not wanted and did not knew about this, we had no other options left. Since we were mainly concentrating on the factors like the motivation, grading system, feedback and the performance evaluation, our interviews and the questionnaires were narrowed down onto these fields and I almost succeeded in extracting the required information from the 8 surveys that I conducted. After completing the surveys our entire group sat together and brainstormed about the answers that we obtained. After much aberration we zeroed down on some of the common issues that needed to be taken care of in the department, which we made sure came up in line with those factors that we planned to consider after our initial interview with the manager. Though I planned to address the issues like leadership and teamwork persisting in the department, it could not be done owing to the lack of co-operation from the upper management. THEORIES INVOLVED I made use of the Maslows Hierarchy of Needs in order to depict the various and basic needs of the employees. To my surprise its only the full time employees who were satisfying their whole range of needs whereas the part time employees were concerned only about their basic needs. From my analysis I figured out that it was mainly owing to the current recession that the employees were tending to ignore their higher level needs. We also made use of the Adams Equity Theory and McClellands Acquired Needs Theory in order to understand and relate the issues about the employees workplaces and the relationship among their co-workers, from the data we acquired from them. After disseminating as much of the acquired information among our team members, we headed our way to prepare for the presentation and the final report. Since the report was just a one page document, it is the presentation which made us to put in some extra efforts. We decided to showcase in the presentation, the exact information or to be more specific the exact wordings which we obtained from the employees during our interview with them. AREAS OF IMPROVEMENT If I were to undergo the whole life cycle and come out with a much more efficient analysis strategy, then I would take care of the following issues. Firstly, I would try getting as much information as possible from my initial interview with the manager. Since in the beginning we were of the notion that we would have at least 2-3 meetings with the manager, we shelved some of the questions for our later interviews which owing to our bad luck did not happen. So it is always better to get all the required data at that instant rather than waiting for chances. Secondly, we were almost waiting about a week for a reply from the manager pertaining to our second meeting. Hence the next time instead of just waiting during that period I would straight away start conducting my surveys whenever possible. Since time is an important factor which we need to consider, I would take precise care of it. CONCLUSION The organisation analysis module gave me a wider view of what analysis is all about. I learnt that analysis is just about reporting our findings and not arriving at judgements for the same. It also gave me an edge on how to practically implement the models and frameworks in the real world scenarios. I personally feel that if a person is able to analyse something immense and external to him, would surely be able to analyse and learn about him to a great extent by incorporating the same techniques. Hence this module has not only aided me to grow professionally but also personally. REFERENCES 1. Carrell, M.R., Dittrich, J.E. (1978). Equity Theory: The Recent Literature, Methodological Considerations, and New Directions. 2. Maslow A.H. (1943). A Theory of Human Motivation, Psychological Review 3. McClelland, D. C. (1975). Power: The inner experience, New York: Irvington.

Extreme Roles :: essays research papers

Extreme Roles In every country, city, town and neighborhood in the world, there are stereotypes. We all live in a classified area where you can be regarded as rich, poor or middle class. Within those three types there becomes sub-categories, where ethnicity , gender and sexuality also become a part of the environment. The list goes on and on. In David H. Hwang’s M. Butterfly, the roles of men and women in the Eastern and Western society are extremely limited in that men and women are both expected to act there part. Being a women in Eastern society, means basically, to do whatever possible to please your man. Song, although we come to find is actually a man, played the part of the perfect women. " Gallimard: I have a vision. Of, the Orient. That, deep within its almond eyes, there are still women. Women willing to sacrifice themselves for the love of a man. Even a man whose love is completely without worth."(Act three, scene three, pg.92). Song knew from experience t hat men of the Western world loved submissive women who would do anything to please the man they were with. Femininity is displayed as weak and passive. In order to find a man, a women had to do anything, even accept the fact that there husbands would find a mistress on the side. It was socially acceptable to be intentionally blind to what your husband was doing. The same also seemed to take place in the Western world as well, although not at such extreme cases.. Helga assumed that Gallimard took up a mistress while living in the Orient. Masculinity in this novel seems to be, the more women you have in your lifetime, the more you are considered a man. "Gallimard: (To us): Toulon knows! And he approves! I was learning the benefits of being a man. We form our own clubs, sit behind thick doors, smoke-and celebrate the fact that we’re still boys†¦."(Act two, scene 4, pg. 46). The men in this novel seemed enchanted with the idea of women and the fame they got with f riends when it was found out that they were having extra marital affairs. In the Orient and the Western world as well, masculinity wasn’t defined by hard work and a having and striving toward a perfect marriage and family life, it was defined by sex. Sex with other women than your wife.

Lakota Woman Review

Lakota Woman mary crow dog The book, Lakota Woman, written by Mary Crow Dog, gave the reader a personal view of the feelings shared by most Indians living in the United States during this present day. The book dealt with the time period of Crow Dog’s life along with some references to past events. Crow Dog attempted to explain the hostility felt towards the white men in the United States by the surviving Indian population. She used her own life as an example in many instances to give the reader a personal perspective.The main point in writing this book was to present the reader with the Indian viewpoint on how they were treated and what the effects of that treatment has done to their people over the years. From the beginning of the book it becomes evident that not all Indians are the same. Mary Crow Dogs grandparents grew up during a time when the United States was trying to â€Å"civilize† the Indians by forcing them to abandon their customs in favor of a Christian lif estyle.Most Indians took offence to that proposition, but some did not. Crow Dog’s grandmother was one of the Indians who would have been termed as a successful convert. She adopted the Christian faith and was raising her grandchildren to accept Jesus in their lives. Crow Dog admitted the Jesus part sounded good, it was the beatings at the hands of the nuns and the awful food served to them at the boarding school that tainted their views of Christianity. Indians who accepted the white man’s ways were called half bloods.Crow Dog said, â€Å"The general rule is that whoever thinks, sings, acts, and speaks Indian is a skin, a full-blood, and whoever acts and thinks like a white man is a half-blood or breed, no matter how Indian he looks. † (49) This division among their own people often created hostility and sometimes led to violence. Another problem was the rage felt inside of the warriors who were having their lifestyle taken from them. These were men who were us ed to hunting for their food which in turn gave them a feeling of pride. Being held on a reservation took their spirit and crushed it.It led to heavy drinking among a large amount of the male Indian population which sometimes led to violence against women. Crow Dog suggested that these men were acting out because they could not hunt and perform their duties as Indian males. The book spoke about the different religious ceremonies and the spirituality exemplified by the Indian people. The use of the pipe along with the Willow tree tobacco, the various dances performed, and the infusion of religion in every aspect of the Indians life showed the reader how important religion is to the Indian people.Because of that knowledge, it was appalling to read how Leonard Crow Dog’s religious rights were violated and mocked in prison. The basic right of being able to freely practice a religion was denied to Crow Dog while incarcerated. The AIM, or American Indian Movement, was formed in ord er to bring to light the hardships faced by the Indians living in the United States and took a huge part in the Wounded Knee incident. Crow Dog was a member of that organization and married Leonard who was one of the group’s leaders. Power is a theme that is seen throughout the book in various forms.Crow Dog spoke of the power felt during certain Indian customs such as smoking the peace pipe or performing the Ghost Dance. Another form of power was seen when the doctors at the hospital took Crow Dog’s sisters baby and killed it. As if that was not enough, her sister was sterilized so she could not have any more Indian children. Crow Dog made sure that would not happen to her own child who was born at Wounded Knee. The show of force by the military at Wounded Knee was another example of the power exerted by the white men on the Indians.The fabricated charges brought against Leonard Crow Dog which resulted in his incarceration showed the power the government held and was willing to use against the Indians. The Indian women show their own version of power by making it their duty to procreate in order to replace the population of warriors who were lost defending the cause. Another theme running through the book is anger. Not surprisingly, Crow Dog and a good majority of her people felt that something was taken from them without their permission.Because they harbor those feelings, they believe it is ok to do things like steal from stores owned by white people. They justify their actions because they feel they are getting their revenge against the white people who stole from them. Taking Wounded Knee over and performing the Ghost Dance was a way to show the white man that they were not going to be taken advantage of any longer. They were not going to let the white men stop them from performing their sacred ceremonies and change their way of life.The Indians took their anger against the white man and used it as fuel. Crow Dog spoke of the hardships she h ad to deal with living as Leonard Crow Dogs wife. Initially she was not interested in Leonard Crow Dog, but years later she found herself married to him and acting as his main support line during his incarceration. When Leonard was released from prison she described how they had to become reacquainted with each other. Life was extremely challenging for Mary Crow Dog but she stood by her husband’s side and provided the support he needed.After being released, Mary Crow Dog would follow Leonard to various places around the country where his help was needed to bring recognition to a person or groups issue. Her life was dedicated to Leonard and together they both fought for what they believed in. For Mary Crow Dog, her life as an Indian became complete when she took part in the Ghost Dance ceremony. Crow Dog was pierced in the traditional way and experienced the visions that her ancestors had for hundreds of years. She felt that she was finally a full blooded Indian after the cere mony which symbolized that her transition was complete.The author, Mary Crow Dog, is an Indian who has experienced the hardships of life living as an Indian under the conditions the United States Government has mandated for the Indian people. She gave the account of her life and co-authored the book along with Richard Erdoes. Crow Dog has also written Ohitika Woman, while Erdoes has written several books including Lame Deer, Seeker of Visions, The Sun Dance People, The Rain Dance People, The Pueblo Indians, and Crying for a Dream. Erdoes used Crow Dogs firsthand account as the basis for writing this book.The authors accomplished their goal of bringing the reader into the world of the Indians and presenting the difficulties they faced and had overcome over the years at the hands of the United States Government. I enjoyed the book. I felt that it informed the reader of the various problems the Indians have faced over the years and how some of those problems are still being dealt with. It showed the mistreatment of the Indians by the United States Government. It brought the reader into the world of the Indian and made you understand why their harbor resentment and hostility along with mistrust for white people and the government.I think this book is important for anyone who is looking to get an inside look into the bruised feelings of Indians and the reasons behind those feelings. The book provided an overview of what tribe life is like and did not hide the negatives like the drinking problems and abuse of women. Anybody who is looking for knowledge into the feelings of Indians will benefit greatly from this book. ——————————————– [ 1 ]. Mary Crow Dog and Richard Erdoes, Lakota Woman, (New York, N. Y. , Harper Perennial 1990)

Unleashing India’s Innovation and Entrepreneurship Potential

Unleashing India’s Innovation and Entrepreneurship Potential India has been one of the best performers in the world economy in recent years. Indian economy has been one of the stars of global economics growing 9. 6% in 2006 and 9. 2% in 2007. Growth had been supported by market reforms, capital inflows of FDI, rising foreign exchange reserves, both an IT and real estate boom, and a flourishing capital market. Like rest of the world, however, India is also facing testing economic times (economic recessesion) with inflation running at 11%, the highest level seen in a decade . The Indian stock market has fallen more than 40% in six months from its January 2008 high. $6 billion of foreign funds have flowed out of the country in that period, reacting both to slowdown in economic growth and perceptions that the market was over-valued. It’s high time we recognize the growing significance and visible impact of Entrepreneurship and innovation on wealth-creation and employment-generation in India. INNOVATON: Innovation is a process to achieve measurable value enhancement in any commercial activity, through introduction of new or improved goods, services, operational and organizational processes. It is a significant factor in fostering competitiveness, improvement in market share and quality. It reduces costs . Innovation is a key driver of economic growth. It is both creation, commercialization of new knowledge and diffusion and absorption of existing knowledge in new locations. Growth, accompanied by innovations, has been associated with rising living standards and a reduced number of poor people. India is increasingly becoming a top global innovator for high-tech products and services. Still, the country is under performing compared to its innovation potential which has direct implications for long-term industrial competitiveness and economic growth. About 90 % of Indian workforce is employed in the informal sector. This sector is often characterized by underemployment, low-productivity and low-skill activities. Although India has the benefit of a dynamic young population , with more than half of the country’s population under 25 years old, only 17 percent of people in their id-20s and older have a secondary education. To uphold rapid growth and help alleviate poverty, India needs to aggressively exploit its innovation potential, relying on innovation-led, rapid and inclusive growth to achieve economic & social transformation . According to one of the findings the output of economy could increase more than five folds if each enterprise could absorb knowledge existing in India and achieve the level of productivity of top enterprises in their sector. By applying knowledge in new ways to production processes, better and new products can be produced with the same or fewer inputs to meet the needs of all sections of Indian society. The very popular â€Å"Dabbawala† system is an innovative business process which allows 4,500–5,000 semiliterate Dabbawalas to deliver almost 200,000 lunches to workers every day in Mumbai. The Dabbawalas reportedly make one mistake per 6 million deliveries. So remarkable is this delivery network that international business schools have studied the work flows of the Dabbawala system to understand the key to its stellar performance rating. To unleash its innovation potential, India needs to develop following strategies: > > Increasing level of competition to improve the investment climate, supported by stronger skills, better information infrastructure and more public and private finance. Recommended actions to raise competition include removing regulations which are not essential and applying essential ones more transparently in product, land, labor, capital, and infrastructure services markets—for example, easing limits on small industries, restrictions on foreign direct investment (FDI) etc. Limited skills and training are a major bottleneck. Only 16 percent of Indian manufacturing firms offer in-service training, compared with 92 percent in China . The Indian firms that provide in-service training are 23–28 percent more productive than those that do not. This bottleneck could be overcome (i) by providing public matching funds for firms to invest in training and (ii) increasing the fiscal and managerial autonomy of universities and colleges, and increasing private participation in higher education. Better information flows are needed: high-speed national research and education networks accelerate the pace of new discoveries and the expansion of knowledge. Information-related actions could include expediting the allocation of radio and wireless broadband spectrums, increasing targeted subsidies for rolling out rural mobile and broadband, and agreeing on an organizational structure to deploy and manage a national research and education network. gt;> India can benefi t from supporting efforts to create and commercialize knowledge, help in diffusing existing global and local knowledge and by increasing the capacity of smaller enterprises to engross it. Private enterprises need to increase R&D spending. Between 1998 and 2003, multinational corporations spent $1. 3 billion on R&D in India—showing that its valuable assets could be exploited more effectively. Measures to spur private R&D could include consolidating and expanding early-stage technology development programs as well as developing a policy and action plan to use public procurement to promote innovation. New domestic knowledge needs to be converted to commercial use. Of the top50 applicants for patents in India between 1995 and 2005, 44 were foreign firms. Only six were Indian. Actions to promote commercialization and strengthen links among industry, universities and public laboratories could include providing support to technology transfer offices, creating a patent management corporation, developing technology parks and incubators and improving India’s regime for intellectual property rights. India should also consider enhancing support for higher-risk technology R&D and commercialization by strengthening its New Millennium Indian Technology Leadership Initiative and by opening the program to international collaboration and giving grants to both research institutions and private enterprises, with sharing of any resulting royalties. The Diaspora needs to be tapped more effectively. About 20 million people i. e. 2 percent India’s population earn the equivalent of two-third of India’s GDP. Steps to tap more efficiently tap India’s overseas talent could include supporting a larger Diaspora network, building on existing groups that aggregate this population’s (NRIs’) talent and capital for use in India. >> India would benefit from fostering more inclusive innovation—by promoting more formal R&D efforts for poor people and more creative proletariat efforts by them, by improving the ability of informal enterprises to exploit existing knowledge. Inclusive innovation can play a critical role in lowering the costs of goods and services and in creating income-earning opportunities for poor people. The Council of Scientific and Industrial Research has developed technology applications for rural India, university and formal private initiatives e. g. e-Choupal. To leverage traditional knowledge into revenue, a policy-oriented intellectual property rights think tank could propose how to implement a cheaper intellectual property regime. Finally, successful technology upgrading programs could be extended to help informal and rural enterprises make better use of existing knowledge. ENTREPRENEURSHIP: Entrepreneurship represents a mindset. It is the skill of finding creative, innovative and profitable solutions to problems and to be paradigm pliant. An entrepreneur is someone who assumes the financial risk of the initiation, operation and management of a business. They aren't generally high-risk takers when they can't affect the outcome of the situation. They tend to set realistic and achievable goals, and when they do take risks, they're usually calculated ones based on facts and experience, rather than instincts. Entrepreneurs are participants not observers, players not fans. And to be an entrepreneur is to be an optimist, to believe that with the right amount of time and resources, you can do anything. Why is the US more prosperous than India? Is it because we Indians are less smart than Americans? No, Indians are universally known for their intelligence. Is it because they have greater resources? No, India is as much if not more rich in natural resources. Then, why is the US more prosperous than India? The US is more prosperous simply because they have more entrepreneurs. Entrepreneurs have a big role to play in driving India’s growth. With a slower economy, it is vital that government; academic world and regulatory bodies create a favourable environment for entrepreneurs to flourish. Entrepreneurship is a critical element of a growth economy and India is poised to unlock a Silicon Valley like entrepreneurial boom through the next 10 years. If India needs to eradicate poverty, we have to grow. To grow, we have to employ the unemployed. NASSCOM and CII have estimated that if India wants to be a developed country by 2020, it needs to create 10 million jobs. The million-dollar question is how these jobs are going to be created. Neither the Army nor the police force can soak up such a large number, nor can the Railways or the government. They can only be engrossed by the private sector. The industrial set-up is expanding, but not at the rate that can employ such large numbers. Is there any solution to this grave problem? Fortunately, YES, the answer is entrepreneurship. As per TiE (The IndUS Entrepreneurs- a non-profit organization, promoting entrepreneurship) each entrepreneur creates 30 jobs. An entrepreneur creates jobs, setting stage for a flourishing economy. Over 30% of Microsoft employees are Indians. The NASA relies on Indian brains for its various missions. IIT graduates are considered the worlds brightest. Why do these people flock to the US, simply because the US has more opportunities? What can we do to stop this self-ruining brain drain? The answer lies in promoting entrepreneurship. The beginnings are already in place, steps have been taken in the right direction. There is an overall shortage of start-up entrepreneurs in India compared to the rest of the world. One of the most significant deficiencies an Indian entrepreneur may face revolves around capital. Although there is ample willingness to invest capital in a well-established enterprise, there is little willingness to fund start-ups. The quality and quantity of venture capital in India is low. The benefits of entrepreneurship to the society and the economy as a whole are enormous. Entrepreneurship helps in avoidance of monopolies and cartels and help in checking large corporations and MNCs. Entrepreneurs realize the tremendous demand for goods abroad and help to market the surplus. This will make the Indian market export competitive and at the same time, the MADE IN INIDIA brand more acceptable. The surplus footstock which would have been otherwise rotting in the government storehouse, can be exported, thus earning foreign exchange. The government gets rid of the excess stock while the exporter earns revenue, leading to a win-win situation. An important factor influencing FDI, from developed nations to developing nations is the concentration of entrepreneurship. FDI is directly proportional to entrepreneurship. The highest contributor of FDI is the US. The US readily welcomes Indian exports and also lists Indian companies on American exchanges. No wonder NASDAQ rocks on the beats of Infosys Chairman, NR Narayan Murthy. So, the message is clear; we need more entrepreneurs. It is high time, the government realizes that only and only ntrepreneurship can help it grow at the high rate and rethinks its policies. To unleash its entrepreneurship potential, India needs to develop the following strategies Nurture early stage entrepreneurial ventures based on technology and innovation. Create physical infrastructure and support systems necessary for business incubation activities. Facilitate networking with professional resources that include mentors, experts, consultants and advisors for the incubated companies. Identify technologies/ innovations which have potential for commercial ventures. Promote and foster the spirit of entrepreneurship. Carry out activities that facilitate knowledge creation, innovation and entrepreneurship activities.

Domestication History of Chickens (Gallus domesticus)

Domestication History of Chickens (Gallus domesticus) The history of chickens (Gallus domesticus) is still a bit of a puzzle. Scholars agree that they were first domesticated from a wild form called red junglefowl (Gallus gallus), a bird that still runs wild in most of southeast Asia, most likely hybridized with the gray junglefowl (G. sonneratii). That occurred probably about 8,000 years ago. Recent research suggests, however, there may have been multiple other domestication events in distinct areas of South and Southeast Asia, southern China, Thailand, Burma, and India. Since the wild progenitor of chickens is still living, several studies have been able to examine the behaviors of wild and domestic animals. Domesticated chickens are less active, have fewer social interactions with other chickens, are less aggressive to would-be predators, are less susceptible to stress, and are less likely to go looking for foreign food sources than their wild counterparts. Domestic chickens have increased adult body weight and simplified plumage; domestic chicken egg production starts earlier, is more frequent, and produces larger eggs. Chicken Dispersals Chickens, Chang Mai, Thailand. David Wilmot The earliest possible domestic chicken remains are from the Cishan site (~5400 BCE) in northern China, but whether they are domesticated is controversial. Firm evidence of domesticated chickens isnt found in China until 3600 BCE. Domesticated chickens appear at Mohenjo-Daro in the Indus Valley by about 2000 BCE and from there the chicken spread into Europe and Africa. Chickens arrived in the Middle East starting with Iran at 3900 BCE, followed by Turkey and Syria (2400–2000 BCE) and into Jordan by 1200 BCE. The earliest firm evidence for chickens in east Africa are illustrations from several sites in New Kingdom Egypt. Chickens were introduced into western Africa multiple times, arriving at Iron Age sites such as Jenne-Jeno in Mali, Kirikongo in Burkina Faso and Daboya in Ghana by the mid-first millennium CE. Chickens arrived in the southern Levant about 2500 BCE and in Iberia about 2000 BCE. Chickens were brought to the Polynesian islands from Southeast Asia by Pacific Ocean sailors during the Lapita expansion, about 3,300 years ago. While it was long assumed that chickens had been brought to the Americas by the Spanish conquistadors, presumably pre-Columbian chickens have been identified at several sites throughout the Americas, most notably at the site of El Arenal-1 in Chile, ca 1350 CE. Chicken Origins: China? Two long-standing debates in chicken history still remain at least partially unresolved. The first is the possible early presence of domesticated chickens in China, prior to dates from southeast Asia; the second is whether or not there are pre-Columbian chickens in the Americas. Genetic studies in the early 21st century first hinted at multiple origins of domestication. The earliest archaeological evidence to date is from China about 5400 BCE, in geographically widespread sites such as  Cishan  (Hebei province, ca 5300 BCE), Beixin  (Shandong province, ca 5000 BCE), and Xian (Shaanxi province, ca 4300 BCE). In 2014, a few studies were published supporting the identification of early chicken domestication in northern and central China (Xiang et al.). However, their results remain controversial. A 2016 study by Chinese bioanthropologist Masaki Eda  and colleagues of 280 bird bones reported as chicken from Neolithic and Bronze age sites in northern and central China found that only a handful could securely be identified as chicken. German archaeologist Joris Peters and colleagues (2016) looked at environmental proxies in addition to other research and concluded that the habitats conducive to jungle fowl were simply not present early enough in China to allow for the domestication practice to have taken place. These researchers suggest that chickens were a rare occurrence in northern and Central China, and thus probably an import from southern China or Southeast Asia where evidence of domestication is stronger.   Based on those findings, and despite the fact that southeast Asian progenitor sites have not as yet been identified, a northern Chinese domestication event separate from that of southern China and Southeast Asia does not seem likely. Pre-Columbian Chickens in America In 2007, American archaeologist Alice Storey and colleagues identified what appeared to be chicken bones at the site of El-Arenal 1 on Chiles coast, in a context dated before the 16th-century medieval Spanish colonization, ca. 1321–1407 cal CE. The discovery is considered evidence of pre-Columbian contact of South America by Polynesian sailors, still a somewhat controversial notion in American archaeology. However, DNA studies have provided genetic support, in that chicken bones from el-Arenal contain a haplogroup which has been identified at Easter Island, which was founded by Polynesians around 1200 CE. The founding mitochondrial DNA cluster identified as Polynesian chickens includes A, B, E, and D. Tracing sub-haplogroups, Portuguese geneticist Agusto Luzuriaga-Neira and colleagues have identified one found only in eastern Asia and one from Easter Island. The presence of the sub-haplotype E1a(b) in both Easter Island and el-Arenal chickens is a key piece of genetic evidence supporting the pre-Columbian presence of Polynesian chickens on the coast of South America. Additional evidence suggesting precolumbian contact between South Americans and Polynesians has been identified, in the form of ancient and modern DNA of human skeletons in both locations. Currently, it seems likely that the chickens at el-Arenal were brought there by Polynesian sailors. Sources Dodson, John, and Guanghui Dong. What Do We Know About Domestication in Eastern Asia? Quaternary International 426 (2016): 2-9. Print.Eda, Masaki, et al. Reevaluation of Early Holocene Chicken Domestication in Northern China. Journal of Archaeological Science 67 (2016): 25-31. Print.Fallahsharoudi, Amir, et al. Genetic and Targeted Eqtl Mapping Reveals Strong Candidate Genes Modulating the Stress Response During Chicken Domestication. G3: Genes|Genomes|Genetics 7.2 (2017): 497-504. Print.Là ¸tvedt, Pia, et al. Chicken Domestication Changes Expression of Stress-Related Genes in Brain, Pituitary . Neurobiology of Stress 7.Supplement C (2017): 113-21. Print.and AdrenalsLuzuriaga-Neira, A., et al. On the Origins and Genetic Diversity of South American Chickens: One Step Closer. Animal Genetics 48.3 (2017): 353-57. Print.Peters, Joris, et al. Holocene Cultural History of Red Jungle Fowl (Gallus Gallus) and Its Domestic Descendant in East Asia. Quaternary Science Reviews 142 (2016): 102-1 9. Print. Pitt, Jacqueline, et al. New Perspectives on the Ecology of Early Domestic Fowl: An Interdisciplinary Approach. Journal of Archaeological Science 74 (2016): 1-10. Print.Zhang, Long, et al. Genetic Evidence from Mitochondrial DNA Corroborates the Origin of Tibetan Chickens. PLOS ONE 12.2 (2017): e0172945. Print.