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Looking back at this project I would like to say I am overall pleased with what I accomplished. This was an amazing project to do because I focused on what I was very passionate about. This has helped me think outside of the schools and explore issues that are happening in the world and our society.

For the Research Part, I wish I would have found more statistics, primarily in 2015 instead of 2014. I know it was just a year ago, but so much has happened within 2015 and I wish that I would have been able to capture that data. Some things I want to discover through my project on  gun violence in Philadelphia was to find out more about was how many of the families are dealing with the lost of a loved one because of this brutal action. I think that would have taken my project over the top and made the research very interesting.

The Original Research actually went well. I think I had enough people to take my survey to make a point.  Although I wish I found more information, I think I could have done an interview instead of a survey. It would have been great  to know what  a police officer or a family member who had a loved one shot or die because of gun violence felt, and how they cope with it knowing that this violent act is still taking place in our world.  But overall, I am pleased with my survey and happy that it went the way I wanted it to.

I had the impact that I was hoping for in my Agent of Change piece. A lot of people have been noticing the posters around the school, and I actually seen people taking the time out to read them and that is something I was hoping for. I think that having them around the school is something that can also impact other youth of what is going on in Philadelphia and that we need to support the movement for it to stop.

With closing, I would like to say thank you to Ms. Giknis for having everything planned accordingly and the project flowed with all of the due dates. Also for letting everyone do what they wanted to do and even giving extensions when needed so we can do what we really wanted to, and be passionate about it. I think that this will make me do more outside of this project maybe doing things in my local community to have more people aware of this situation. I may start by reaching out to the families who have suffered from the tragedy that gun violence brings, maybe by giving out care packages so they know I care.  This project was by far the best and I hope throughout my life I will have more opportunities to do things like the You and The World Project.

Glows and Grows

For my You and the World project, I dived into a topic that I wouldn’t have otherwise, which was Women’s Rights in the workforce. It was a topic that I really hadn’t put much thought into before since I didn’t think that it affected me. I knew that my family was made up of strong and independent working women so me joining the workforce was just expected but now I realize what actually takes place behind the scenes and how serious the whole situation really is.

The original research part of the project was probably the most successful, since not only did I collect actual facts and statistics, but also personal opinions and experiences. I learned about how much of a difference gender actually does make when in the workplace which hadn’t occurred to me before. Equal pay, gender stereotypes, low percentages of women, and inadequate benefits are just a few of the issues I touched on and also spread awareness of through numbers and facts, but I mainly got personal accounts from issues such as lack of confidence, lack of self-belief, and also lack of self-application. I think that was another successful part of this project, reaching out to people. I was able to conduct a survey with the help of a senior and her feminist blog, which got twenty-two results, and I also led two interviews with Buzzfeed workers which was a huge accomplishment. Aside from that, I heard numerous personal accounts from people which added greatly to my final product. One thing I would have changed are the types of questions I asked because they seemed a bit redundant and at times a bit irrelevant.

For my agent of change, I created a presentation where I summarized the information I collected and taught my classmates about the injustices that afflict the female working world and also how things are getting better in this day and age. Most of my peers partook of social media trends and school-wide protests but I decided to take a different route, one that I knew couldn’t end women’s issues as a whole but would at least educate my classmates on a topic I’m very passionate about. The result was great and I was successful in bringing this issue through to light, not only through my blog posts but through my Agent of Change. I almost wish I had started a petition or a strike or something a bit bigger that would have a larger impact, but I feel that education is the strongest form of change and taking that information, I went forth and made my presentation. One thing I would change though, is the amount of time I put into the initial rehearsal, since I was pretty much winging the whole thing, which most times I’m good at but this time a bit of practice wouldn’t hurt.

This quarter in art class I got to use and put into practice things that I have learned throughout the year. I got to put techniques like shading and mediums India ink into practice with my own style. This was very  helpful for me because it let me see how what I have learn will be enmeshed in my art as I go forward. I didn’t have any other theme beside practice and using things learned. I think this quarter was very helpful for me and I got a lot from it.

http://www.humanesociety.org/issues/abuse_neglect/

I am choosing animal abuse because there are a lot of people around the world abusing animals. There are too many people using animals to take advantage of them just because they may make one small mistake. Some people would make up an excuse saying that they would hit their pet just because they were not listening to their owner. Also thousands of animals would be abused each day just because they were with the wrong owner. The most abused animal is the pitbull. This one pitbull, she was a girl and she was homeless until one night a stranger had came up to her in an alleyway and tied a wire very tight around her mouth. Her nose had to be surgically removed. It is really sad that humans would be so cruel to hurt or attack a sensitive animal like this.

Now wouldn't you like to see a dog happy, not sad? Why would anyone want hurt a poor little puppy or kitten?  Some people say that it's hard to train an animal or they don't like how their pets react to certain things. That's why ASPCA would help. Nobody could ever make up an excuse to hurt a dog physically or mentally. The main reason why I chose animal abuse is because too many people think that animals shouldn't be treated as well as humans. Sometimes I really just wonder why humans would take their anger out on poor little animals, and why would they do that?  Why hurt little animals at least you could confront the people that hurt you instead?

You can actually help the fight against animal abuse. You can spot animal abuse by just walking down the street. If an animal has untreated wounds it can get infected.  An owner could be seen giving it's pet dirty water. If you look closely at a dog's neck, there might be a scar on it's neck from the collar being too tight. I think animal abuse should be stopped by arresting the owners that abuse their pets. It is not fair to the animals that have to deal with this in any time in their lives.

Blog Post #2: Original Research

• interview recording

                     Animal Cruelty

What do you think about animals being abused

Have you ever seen animals being abused

Will you ever stop an animal being abused

Tiana's response

1. I think that is very wrong for animals to be abused people should be locked up for that.

2. No

3. Yes I will because it is wrong.

Blog Post #3: Agent of Change

• presentation slides

• recording of presentation

https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1HIP0RA8D0j3So5g1r-j3LElueBfC0Rv72-DSqACLj_4/edit#slide=id.p

My first project was basic shapes and collaging I used the red colors as fire to represent the many forest fires that we're killing our own environment with. This piece involved water coloring and the splatter technique to get the feeling of fire. The glitter might be a little hard to see but it's supposed to show the glow fires have.The second project shows the beauty in our environment, I wanted painting to stick out so I painted them black and added accents of color to give the eye something to look at. It's the good and bad of nature. 

I had so much fun with my first ceiling tile I wanted to do more. I made one big one and two little ones. The first one had a twist on an old 80's comic, I wanted to use bolder colors than the original comic it took a little longer to get the details in the face and the tear drop. I was proud of the way mines came out especially the girls hair. The little ceiling tiles are two of the few places I want to travel to because everyone does a Philly skyline I wanted to leave the borders of America and adventure out. Tokyo and Johannesburg are beautiful places so they were fun to draw and paint.

    Overall I had a lot of fun with my art assignments and look forward to creating a lot more. I couldn't have done it without the help of my lovely art partners in crime who helped cut out the many many pieces of paper for each background. Gave me the motivation to paint and even gave great feedback. I hope you enjoy my four lovely master pieces.

In my first Blog Post, I mentioned Online Predators. In a nutshell Online Predators are people who commit child sexual abuse that begins or takes place on the Internet. This needs to be brought up and have more awareness for many reasons. One; most children are not educated or not educated enough about this topic. If we could teach kids how to be safe Online, there would be a lot less of this crime going on. Two; some parents are not educated enough in this field. If more parents knew the signs of a predator, then more of these instances can be avoided or cut off before it goes out of control. And finally; our society is mostly based off of modern technology. This allows Predators to stalk in the depthness that is the internet and can get away scott-free. If we educate and teach more individuals about this issue, more events like these can be stopped. There has been cases where some police units are trying to bring up awareness, however it is not brought up enough on a global scale. So what are some of the signs of an Online Predator? According to the Washington Police there are several tricks Online Predators use including, but not limiting to; chatting privately, flattery, intimidation, asking for personal information, and sympathy. The main way predators lure in their victims is by ‘grooming’. “Grooming is how online predators manipulate children into meeting in real life with their sole goal of having sex with them. Predators will spend weeks, months, and/or possibly years "grooming" their victims before asking them to meet in real life.”

In my second Blog Post, to find out how much our students actually know, I gave out a quick survey regarding Online predators. Most people in fact did not know the first signs which are chatting privately, flattery, intimidation, asking for personal information, and sympathy. Participants stated that the first signs were asking to meet up or pictures. These are when the Predator already has you in their grip. So this means children are being taught what the most noticeable signs are, but not necessarily the first red flags.

For my agent of change I decided to bring my project closer to the SLA community. I wanted to actively show how to stay safe on the internet. I wanted to make a direct impact. My solution to this was to give a presentation about Online Predators and how to stay safe on the internet. So that’s what I did. I created a google presentation and showed some of my classmates and advises what to do Online and what to look out for. The video can be played below.

Doing this project was definitely an adventure. From having no idea what to do, to making a great presentation, to scheduling presentation dates, rescheduling. Overall it was challenging, but still felt like I made a difference, no matter how small. If I could’ve done this again, I would definitely done something a little more big. Maybe a presentation at a middle school or at TFI. If you still want to make a difference, learn the signs, be safe, and tell others. After all one person saved is another gained to spread the word.

Blog Post #1 shared the point of Black Lives Matter, people who stands up for what they believe in. Black Lives Matter stands up for what you believe in, and what I am doing for this Blog Post is exactly what I want to do.

Black Lives Matter, and Trayvon Martin

For me previous work, I’ve found a video that talks about different people who needs to respect the laws, a guy at the time who was 20-30 years old randomly stopped a Police Officer by the Law of Washington State/RCW. The law stated that anyone who has an unmarked vehicle, is hereby banned to drive. The cop had an unregistered unmarked vehicle and he was using it for undercovering. The citizen gave the cop a huge warning to the cop making him to register the vehicle. The citizen stated there is no mark or indication on the car and the Driver/Cop known as Deputy Canfield have been stopping people in the vehicle in an unregistered vehicle. Everyone needs to respect the law, even the people that are under the power as well.

What I pursued and learned more information about is the laws in the states There should be a change in the community we live in, because people are getting disappointed in the way that they’ve been treating and now it leads to chaos more people are following the ways of mankind.

#BLM Survey

This helps me inform the concept I am learning/researching, it gives us a valuable source of what is happening around the world that demonstrates the cause of these things. I believe that everyone who have heard about this topic is furious about this but we all have a same/different theory about this, we agree and disagree on what we are doing and who we are becoming, but if you actually look at the cause and effect of what’s happening from the past to the present, you would see a huge difference then what society had on us then before.  

This help me of my understanding by showing the concept of why we do this, we do this because we want what’s best for the future, we don’t want a cruel world where we look up to people by example and teach all of us from right to wrong, we want to teach one another respect and acknowledge the fact that we need to do the best we can to raise our children. So my understanding would be the leaders stepping up not just for kids, but for all of us around the world.

In the first blog post (which by the way you can check out here) the main things that I went over were things like teenage stress levels by the percentages which shown to be higher than those in adults, a brief summary of why stress really comes in to anyone’s life, and an explanation of what the project for the class was about. These were the main points that I brought up in the blog post #1, if you want to see them more in detail you can always just check it out from the link above.

And in the second blog post I went over just all of my research and findings from my original research that we were required to do. And I was able to pull up and notice a pattern in some of my research that was somewhat significant. If you are interested in reading the whole thing though, you can check it out here.

For my agent of change part of my project I made a bunch of homemade stress balls at my house to give out to the teenagers at my school well to help them relax in the time of need. But is a part of the way that I was able to get the word out let people know about teen stress and how important it was because I gave them out I told people about my project and why it was important to me. And my whole object to raise awareness to teens on some ways that they could reduce how stressed they are.

What I decided to pursue for my agent of change was a way that I could help teenagers be less stressed but have it also be a way that they could do in school. Because based on the research from my last blog post things that a lot of people did when they were stressed you can’t really do in school. So these would be things like: Sleep, get on social media, cry, etc. So an idea that someone gave to me that I decided to follow through with was making stress balls that they could use in school.

This image shown below is showing a student that is reading a book for class which they probably weren’t enjoying, so they whipped out the stress ball to make everything better!

I feel like my agent of change worked for the most part while it lasted there were some times when the stress balls backfired and actually just caused more reasons to stress because some peoples broke and it was just a mess every where. But I think that they generally helped people, even if people weren’t actually using the stress to squeeze to death, but some people were satisfied by just having it because it was cool I guess.

What I did wish that I could’ve done better was been doing all of this stuff earlier and planning it all out better. Because in the end I needed an extension on this project mainly because when I got stuck with my project and needed a bit of guidance, I didn’t really follow up with that and just waited until the last minute. And then even after I got an extension I waited until the day before necessary to get the agent of change ready, staying up until past midnight and what not. And I wish I would have done that earlier so that I could have thought of a way to maybe keep the balloons from popping a notable problem.

Extra pictures from agent of change:

While researching poverty for this project, I encountered many glows and grows. Some glows are my discovery of many organizations that battle poverty. Since poverty is the cause of hunger, many organizations are aware of this issue and are trying to help. Though, for my research, some grows are I wanted to find more about people affected by poverty so that I could involve them in my original research. I believe that if I had added that information, more people will be interested in the topic of poverty. A question that was left unanswered and I am still wondering about is why were parents not as effective as much as children.

Some challenges I experienced during my original research was finding an organization that would allow me to interview them. It was something that I could not do since no one wrote back to me. So I was left to do a survey. I actually found some shocking information. For example, many people knew that poverty is an issue but they didn’t know that poverty affects mostly children. If I can do this over again, I would continue to reach out to organizations and if that is not possible, I could get better questions on my blog post 2 so that it would answer my point.

For my research, I wish I had interviewed Lily Palmer because of her recent experience with Dress Codes. I think her story would have made a great contribution to my project and i'm really upset I didn't have the time to talk to her. I wanted to know how it made her feel, what emotions was she feeling when she was called out for her attire, how she reacted, and how is she going to prevent this from happening again.

My original research went really well. Many people did my survey, so I got a lot of insight on what people think about feminism and how they feel about it. If I could do something differently I would have released my survey sooner, and I would've made my questions mandatory to answer because a lot of people skipped questions on my survey.

My project had a pretty good impact because a lot of people learned about feminism and what it really is. Many girls showed up for my photo shoot, and many people shared a picture with the hash tag #MoreThanADistractionSLA. What really shocked me is most people posted pictures of themselves in black and white with the hash tag which was weird and random, but it was something that made my project stand out. It basically created a trademark for itself.

If I had the chance I would do this project again because it was something I enjoyed. I also liked that I got to do my work based on a topic I am very passionate about because it gave me the chance to reach my full potential and do a good job on it. I really hope that my project has, or will make an impact because feminism is something I strongly believe in, and knowing that I made or can make a difference makes me feel 100% more motivated to fight this issue than before.

I think interviewing Mr. Lehmann was awesome, because I was working to help my cause, (school funding) and at the same time work in my own school, which I think is cool because I can see the change from inside out.  Also, I am glad all of my work got to be internal to the school because it gives me a deeper sense of pride, knowing that I am directly affecting the people around me.  However I hope it can affect the whole school district, and if I continue with this cause throughout my high school career or even further, possibly, I change the way schools are funded completely.  I also am glad that I am now well informed on this topic.  It is a relatable topic amongst all my peers, and I should have understood the problem better, becuase up until now did not know why there was a problem at all.  However, I am able to explain our school funding fairly well now.  

Something I am not happy with is that the organization I tried to work with responded at first, but when I tried to solidify a time to work with them, they were silent.  Also, getting posters printed and put on the walls have been a struggle, and I am just resolving that now.  I wish I had found out more about the politics of how the schools are funded, and what measures can be taken to change the system.  If I had known who to go to or an organization that dealt with that, that would have been nice.

I think my original research went great.  All my interview questions were answered and provided much of the information I wanted to know.  The only thing I can think of for it to have been better, would be to interview more people for a variety of answers and more information.  Putting up posters is something I like to do and hopefully will have some impact, but if I were in a different, more powerful position, I would have liked to make a bigger impact.