Do Now #74: Earth Day

April 13, 2013, 9:17 am • Posted by Andrea Swensrud
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photo restored by Royce Blair/Flickr

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Do Now

Do you make it a regular practice to care for the environment? If so, what do you do? If not, why?

Introduction

The first Earth Day celebration was held on April 20, 1970. Its founder, Senator Gaylord Nelson, developed the idea over a seven-year period after he realized that political leaders were not making environmental issues a priority. Senator Nelson began a massive grassroots effort among his colleagues and in local communities. Twenty million people participated in the first Earth Day. They became part of a change that continues today.

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Do Now #73: An Acidic Ocean For All?

April 10, 2013, 6:47 am • Posted by Matthew Williams
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California Academy of Sciences

California Academy of Sciences

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Do Now

Why does ocean acidification matter? What role can you play?

Introduction

Over the past one hundred years or so, the ocean has absorbed the carbon dioxide (CO₂) released into the environment from burning fossil fuels. Absorbing these emissions makes our oceans more acidic. This change in the ocean’s pH level is called ocean acidification. As the pH levels change, we face increasing threats to our ocean health, marine life and even our economy (i.e. industries such as fisheries and tourism).

One of the most harmful effects of ocean acidification is a decrease in marine organisms’ ability to grow structures like skeletons and shells. Corals are especially under attack; higher acidity slows their growth and makes their skeletons weaker. Since coral reefs are home to at least a quarter of all marine species, losing such a habitat would have drastic effects for our global food chain.

Though ocean acidification is a relatively new topic of discussion for scientists, it has caught the attention of several groups around the world to speak and act in support of our oceans. In an article in Scientific American, Virginia Gewin writes, “Washington State, a leading U.S. producer of farmed shellfish, has launched a $3.3-million, science-based plan to address this growing problem for the region and the globe.” There are other actions and studies taking place in the scientific community as well. The Science Daily writes that at Stanford University, scientists are seeking the sea urchin's secret to surviving ocean acidification.

How much of a threat does ocean acidification have on our ecosystem and food chain?

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Do Now #72: North Korea's Threat of Attack

April 5, 2013, 6:59 pm • Posted by Matthew Williams
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PBS NewsHour

PBS NewsHour

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Do Now

How do you think the U.S. should respond to North Korea's threat to deploy nuclear weapons on its neighbors and even the United States? Why? Is this a credible threat?

Introduction

In recent years, North Korea has made several threats to develop and deploy nuclear weapons on countries like South Korea, Japan, and even the United States. These type of threats were never met with major concern as it seemed clear that North Korea was not close to building weapons grade nuclear materials nor had the capability to fire long range missiles outside its border. Well, things have changed.

Now, it seems that North Korea is much closer to reaching the capability of deploying such weapons. All of this started when North Korea conducted new nuclear tests in February, which in turn prompted the United Nations Security Council to impose new sanctions on the North. And last week, North Korean leader Kim Jong Un signed a plan to put strategic rockets on standby to be fired at the United States and its bases in the Pacific at any time.

It is unclear at the moment how serious or credible the threat is to the U.S, however, the U.S. government announced last Wednesday that it was deploying an advanced missile defense system to Guam as a precautionary measure against these threats from North Korea. The resource below provides three perspectives on the conflict. What do you think? Does this action seem necessary? Is it too passive or aggressive? How should the United States handle this very delicate situation?

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Do Now #71: Sexual Cyberbullying: The Modern Day Letter A

March 29, 2013, 7:43 pm • Posted by Matthew Williams
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cyberbullying

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Do Now

These days, many teenagers live half their lives on social media sites, and they're writing the rules as they go. One online trend 16-year-old Temitayo Fagbenle finds disturbing is something she calls "slut-shaming," or using photos and videos to turn a girl's private life inside out. How often do you see sexually explicit images of your peers in social media news feeds? What do you think when you see images like this? Do you think sexual cyberbullying is a problem?

Introduction

Temitayo is a youth reporter for Radio Rookies, a New York Public Radio initiative that gives teens the tools and training to tell true stories about issues important to them. She decided to do the story, Sexual Cyberbullying: The Modern Day Letter A, because she noticed that a lot of sexually explicit videos of girls were ending up on Facebook, Twitter and other social media sites. Teenagers often encourage this when it happens by liking, sharing and commenting on the images countless times.

“Slut shaming” isn’t new; it’s been going on for centuries. In her story, Temitayo compares sexual cyberbullying to the book the Scarlett Letter. The main character, Hester Pryne, lives in the 1600s--Puritan times. She cheats on her husband and has to wear a letter A on her chest (A= Adulteress) for the rest of her life.

Similarly, when photos and videos are posted online they can follow you forever. There are countless websites, Facebook pages and Twitter handles that are created to shame girls online, many are literally called "exposing hos." Temitayo tried twice to report a sexually explicit picture she saw of a teenage girl to Facebook, but they didn’t take it down. Do you think Facebook or other social media sites have any responsibility in this?

"Once it gets to a social media network it’s over for her life," one of Temitayo's classmates said. She gathered a group of girls from her school to talk about why so many teenagers, especially girls, harass each other online. "Girls do it to themselves," another girl explained, "half the time we can’t even blame guys."

But another young woman pointed out that a lot of girls don't even know they're being recorded. She said, "It’s not fair that a guy can actually hide his phone, have sex with you and record you, and then show it to his friends, like, 'Yo, look, look, look!'"

In the age of social media, schools have had to take on a new role. Some students screenshot the cyberbullying they see online, print it out and bring it to their teachers as evidence. Erica Doyle, the Assistant Principal at Temitayo's school said, "Once we’re dealing with digital media that is sexually explicit that has been captured and shared with the public, that actually now is a criminal matter."

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Do Now #70: Equal Playing Field for Women

March 22, 2013, 7:42 pm • Posted by Maxine Einhorn
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Jupiterimages for photo.com

Jupiterimages for photo.com

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Do Now

Does our culture foster an equal playing field for women? If not, how can the circumstances improve for women? Explain your thoughts.

Introduction

Sheryl Sandberg, Facebook’s Chief Operating Officer, has a lot to say on this. Her new book, Lean In: Women, Work, and the Will to Lead, is all about female ambition, personal and professional ambition, and she tells it like it is. There are barriers to achievement for women, and her view is that women need to “lean in” and go for it, talk about the obstacles to achievement and aim high.

She writes, “The percentage of women at the top of corporate America has barely budged over the past decade.” And the data on women in the workplace supports her arguments. Women hold about 14 percent of executive officer positions, 17 percent of board seats, up from 16 percent in 2007 and 12 percent in 2002 (Spencer Stuart 2012 report). Women account for 18 percent of Congress. For women of color, the situation is worse since they hold only 4 percent of top corporate jobs and 5 percent of the congressional seats. As for pay, The Lowdown looks at earnings equality between men and women:

“……in 2010, female full-time workers made only 77 cents for every dollar earned by men, according to US Census data (and that number drops significantly for black women, and even more for Latinas). Women, on average, earn less than men in almost every occupation for which there is sufficient wage data, according to the Institute for Women’s Policy Research.”

When looking at female aspiration Samberg describes the “leadership ambition gap,” where fewer women than men aspire to senior jobs. “Young women internalize society’s cues about what defines ‘appropriate’ behavior, and, in turn, silence themselves,” writes Sandberg.

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Do Now #69: A New Approach with the New Pope?

March 15, 2013, 11:56 pm • Posted by Maxine Einhorn
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PBS NewsHour

PBS NewsHour

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Do Now

Times are changing with the election of the first South American Pope. What should the role of the pope be in today’s world? Is it time for the church to update its positions on social issues like birth control and gay marriage?

Introduction

The Cardinals are smiling in Rome with the election of a new pope. He is the first pope who is not from Europe, but is South American (where 40% of the world’s Catholics live), from Buenos Aires, Argentina. It is a sign of new times for the 1.2 billion Catholics in his huge world-wide constituency.

Cardinal Jorge Mario Bergoglio has taken the name Francis – drawing on the connection to St Francis of Assisi who saw his calling in working for social justice, working with the poor and living a simple and humble life. As a cardinal, Pope Francis did not live surrounded by luxury, and is expected to continue to take a low profile, traveling by bus rather than chauffeur driven cars, cooking his own meals and visiting slums. In his view, pastoral work rather than doctrinal battles is the work of religion in the modern world.

But is this feasible? Can Pope Francis be a reformer by emphasizing the needs of the poor without taking a clear stance on secular issues e.g. the financial scandals in the Vatican and sex offences by priest? Can the Church separate itself from political or social laws and doctrines? Although seen as a modernizer of Argentina’s Catholic Church, Pope Francis is a Jesuit who is committed to traditional Church beliefs and values. He has spoken clearly against same-sex marriage, gay adoption, abortion and ordaining women as priests.

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Do Now #68: Would Stricter Gun Laws Reduce Gun Violence?

March 8, 2013, 4:38 pm • Posted by Maxine Einhorn
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photo by HeatherHeatherHeather/flickr

photo by HeatherHeatherHeather/flickr

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Do Now

Would stricter gun laws reduce gun-related violence? Why or why not? What is the central issue around this problem?

Introduction

There have been a series of tragic events these past few years that have really brought the issue of gun violence onto the national stage. Most recently, the shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Connecticut has reignited this debate. It was one of the worst mass shootings in American history, 20 of the 27 people killed were small children.

The question that comes up over and over about gun violence is whether we should have stricter gun laws in place. The main issue comes down to two points: maintaining our rights and ensuring our safety. Specifically, the issue is about the balance between Americans' constitutional right to bear arms - as it is written in the Second Amendment - and the desire that almost all of us share to live safely without the threat of being harmed by gun violence.

Senator Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., who has been a leading gun control advocate and authored an assault weapons ban in 1994, which lapsed in 2004, is now expected to offer an updated version of this legislation. "Now is exactly the time," says New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, an advocate for gun restrictions, "Calling for 'meaningful action' is not enough. We need immediate action. We have heard all the rhetoric before." There need to be controls over the sale of weapons and assault weapons do not belong on our streets – this is the clear position of gun control advocates.

But as KQED’s The Lowdown asks, what is it with America’s Love of the Gun? The article points to the figure that “there are 89 guns for every 100 civilians," according to the 2011 Small Arms Survey. That amounts to roughly 270 million guns owned nationwide, far and away the highest gun ownership rate in the world. Mitchell Rycus, a University of Michigan professor emeritus who studies violence and terrorism, agrees: "We've been a gun-toting society for hundreds of years," he said. But the focus on guns is misplaced. “The point," Rycus said in an article in the San Francisco Chronicle entitled Can We Do Anything to Prevent Massacres?, "is that America needs to look harder into the mental instability that often marks a mass killer, and to figure out how to address it.”

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Do Now #67: The Sequester Begins

March 1, 2013, 6:10 pm • Posted by Matthew Green
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www.whitehouse.gov

www.whitehouse.gov

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Do Now

The sequester is now in effect. Some of the key spending cuts will be in areas of air traffic, early childhood education, health, food safety, environmental services, recreation, criminal justice, research, and defense. What area will affect you, your family, community, and/or the country the most and why?

Introduction

Late Friday evening, President Obama signed an order required by law that set in motion the automatic, government-wide spending cuts known as the sequester. While it won’t lead to across the board tax hikes – as the fiscal cliff threatened to do – it will result in sweeping cuts to government services that millions of Americans rely on.

What is going to happen? More than $85 billion in automatic across-the-board spending cuts to military and domestic programs over the next seven months ($42.7 billion from each). Of course, there is some dispute over the extent of the damage, and a number of conservative groups – particularly those advocating for smaller government – argue that the impacts are grossly exaggerated as a political scare tactic. While seemingly large, they say the cuts are still but a tiny percentage of the federal budget – a mere 2.3 percent.

However, a series of independent analyses have made clear that these cuts will exact a pretty large toll throughout the country. An article in the Texas Tribune illustrates the extent of various cuts in each state, as well as the impact per person. Generally speaking, the sequester is expected to stunt America’s already sluggish economic recovery by reducing our growth (in terms of GDP) and killing approximately one million jobs over the next two years, according to estimates by the Bipartisan Policy Center.

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Do Now #66: What Have You Learned from YouTube?

February 28, 2013, 8:39 am • Posted by Kristin Farr
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Awesome Dog Rides Turtle/YouTube

Image from video Awesome Dog Rides Turtle/YouTube

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Do Now

YouTube has plenty of videos of crazy cats and Harlem shakers, but it's also a great place to learn new skills and information. What specific things have you learned from watching YouTube videos?

Introduction

To those who may not know, YouTube is a video-sharing website on which users can upload, view and share videos. Most of the content on YouTube has been uploaded by individuals, although media corporations including PBS, the BBC, CBS, Hulu, and even KQED offer some of their material via the site, as part of the YouTube partnership program. Unregistered users can watch videos, while registered users can upload an unlimited number of videos.

The company is based in San Bruno, California, and uses Adobe Flash Video and HTML5 technology to display a wide variety of user-generated video content. There are movie clips, TV shows, music lessons, make-up application tips, instructions on home repair, and so many more homemade video tutorials on YouTube. Forming a new wave of free educational resources, YouTube even has an education site featuring lectures from professors, educational animations, and more. Sal Khan's revolutionary Khan Academy was launched on YouTube and became an educational sensation.

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Do Now #65: The Bottom Line (A Minimum Wage)

February 22, 2013, 9:11 pm • Posted by Maxine Einhorn
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Spencer Platt/Getty Images

Spencer Platt/Getty Images

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Do Now

Should there be a minimum wage? Is it time to raise the federal minimum wage? How might this be a good or bad thing? For whom?

Introduction

Is it time to raise the federal minimum wage? President Obama endorsed the idea in his State of the Union address. He called for increasing the federal minimum wage in stages from $7.25 to $9 by the end of 2015, and then linking further increases to the rising cost of living. Right now for most workers it is set at $7.25, where it has been since 2009. This adds up to $15,080 per year which is just about equal to the poverty level for a family of two.

According to the San Francisco Chronicle, 19 states and the District of Columbia have a minimum wage above the federal level.

The Lowdown presents the key arguments in favor and against raising the minimum wage.

The arguments in favor:
Since the economy has grown, wealth should be shared…. Full-time workers deserve to earn a living wage and be able to afford basic necessities like food, gas, and health care. It would boost the economy by increasing purchasing power, creating the need for more production and consequently more jobs. This would reduce dependence on social services. It is only fair since corporate profits have grown making the gap between rich and poor wider.

The arguments against:
It would hurt those it intends to help…. Raising the minimum wage would hurt already struggling small businesses by increasing their overall costs. Many American businesses might cut workers’ hours and outsource jobs to countries where labor is significantly cheaper. This would increase the unemployment rate, especially among younger workers.

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