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Adventures In Graduation …. True Tales Of Foolery
I am starting this blog with a big ole phat “Whew!! That’s over!” I have been under the radar the last couple of weeks because I was working on my final project for graduate school and was short on time and patience for internet foolery. Anyway, at my school, there is a window period for when people can take part in commencement, so I was able to walk in the ceremony even though I had one more week of class left and my final project and thesis still due, no pressure, right?
The main campus for my school where the May commencement was held is about 100 miles from where I live, we have a brick and mortar campus here but the big ceremony was held at the main campus. I go up the day before so I didn’t have to get up hella early to be at line up by 11:00 am. So, on my way up on Friday, I stop at Culver’s to grab a bite to eat. They had a 3 piece fish dinner on the menu for like $11.00 and some change. I wasn’t interested in all of the carb laden side dishes that came with the dinner, so I asked the girl at the drive-thru if I can just get a couple of pieces of fish. She said that I could and that I could get just 2 pieces of fish for about $9.00 and change or 3 pieces of fish for about $13.00 and change. I was floored that I could get a whole meal for $11.00 and change but to just get fish was WAY more, so I asked the girl at the window why that was….. her answer? Because they had to ring each piece separately. Seriously? Needless to say (but I’m going to say it anyway), I got a burger and kept it movin.
The rest of Friday came and went without too many more uncontrollable irritations, so I worked on my project, hit the rack and got up the next morning for graduation, Show Time! Now, I have nothing against math majors, however, I think that having the head of the math department give the commencement address is a little odd at best, especially when there may have been one graduate from that department. The head of the department admitted that she had never given a commencement address before and in writing her address, she thought it would be a good idea to speak directly to the graduates versus writing a speech designed to impress her colleagues and her boss. I’m thinking that she should have gone with the speech designed to impress her boss and colleagues instead.
I think that the intent of her speech was to promote financial responsibility and the importance of saving money. She began by letting us know that a lot of little things can add up to big things, duh, I know, right? The way she explained that concept was by saying “I make under 70k per year, but if you add up the total of a few professors that make under 70k per year that eventually, you’ll see that the school pays out more than 100k per year in salaries because it all adds up”. That’s just fan-effin-tastic. She stood in front of hundreds of people who are now probably up to the top of their head in student debt and announced that in the grand scheme of things, she doesn’t make any money. That’s what we wanted to hear, I thank her for that. She did share with us one of her money saving tips, she let us know that she washes out zip-lock bags and sets them atop of the handles of wooden spoons for them to dry so she can reuse them. I thank her for that too.
Just when I was thinking that this address could not be more irrelevant and even less motivational, she goes on to tell us of a trip that she once took with her husband to some island where “The black people were so dark, they were the blackest people in the world and they had never seen white people in person before”. Oh for crying out loud, and since they had never seen white people in person before, she said they were so taken by her straight hair that all the children wanted to do was to play with it. The people of the islands were thankful for the crayons she sent them for the school when she returned home, so I think that the moral of that train wreck was that if you help one person in your life, you’ve made a difference. Now look, I have completed 3 degree programs now and I was much happier that speech was over than I am that school is over for me (for the moment).
After graduation was over, I was pretty sure that I had seen and heard all of the randomness that I could fit into one weekend, until a woman almost took out the front end of my car by barrel assing through the McDonald’s drive-thru when I stopped for iced coffee. What was her hurry? They gave her the wrong .39 cent pie……….. yes, really.
And So… I Have This Disease
Lately I’ve not really felt much like myself. I’ve been lethargic, really unfocused, anxious and agitated. Okay, so maybe I have been feeling like myself other than the lethargy part….lol.
Anyway, I did some digging to see what could be going on with me, and it seems that I’ve been afflicted with something that usually happens to teenagers when they are about 17 or 18 … I found something that sounds almost exactly like me:
A common disease which plagues high school seniors at one point during their last year in high school. Before they graduate, they are overcome with a lazy and indifferent attitude; uncaring of their studies. There are many different causes of the disease, but it can often be contagious between close friends. Often results in a change in personal style; from anything beforehand to sweats and baggy shirts. Hair is barely ever brushed; or for women, is up in a messy bun or ponytail. They might have many absences and a generally dismissive outlook towards any type of school assignments.
Source: Urban Dictionary
It’s official, I have Senioritis!
I am in the final 3 weeks of school before I finish my MSCJ (Master’s of Science Criminal Justice) and I can’t focus. I have two undergrad degrees and neither time did I struggle writing my final papers but my master’s thesis is killing me. Not because it’s hard, and I love school but GOOD LAWD !
I have a great support group and they’ve said “Hang in there, it’s almost over” and “You got this!” …. both of which I know are true but…GOOD LAWD!
I have thought about different ways that I could get through this, I like to think that I have a great set of coping mechanisms. My first thought is that I could drink, I dismissed that because if I start drinking, I am entirely capable of missing the last 3 weeks of school altogether, so that was no good. I have some friends who have successfully completed college high, but knowing me, I would spend the last 3 weeks of school either sleeping or eating foods that would cause my personal trainer to inflict serious bodily harm on me and I refuse to pay him to do that.
Since I couldn’t come up with an alternative method of coping with my senioritis, I thought that a 12 step program for stressed out master’s degree candidates would help me, until I read the steps:
Step 1 – We admitted we were powerless over our senioritis – that our lives had become insane.
Step 2 – Came to believe that only graduation could restore us to sanity
Step 3 – Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of anti-anxiety medications as we understand them.
Step 4 – Made a searching and feverish inventory of all of our research notes.
Step 5 – Admitted to our professors, to ourselves and to another human being the exact nature of our research theories.
Step 6 – We’re entirely ready to have Microsoft Word remove all these defects of spelling and grammar.
Step 7 – Humbly asked APA formatting to remove our shortcomings
Step 8 – Made a list of all persons we had thought of harming, and became willing to make good on those promises if they interrupt our research or the reporting of our findings.
Step 9 – Made direct amends to such people who have previously interrupted our research or the reporting of our finidings…….at some point.
Step 10 – Continued to proofread our work and when we were wrong promptly ignored it
Step 11 – Sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with God as we understood God, praying only for knowledge of God’s will for us and the power to carry that out
Step 12 – Having had a graduation as the result of these steps, we tried to carry this message to other students, and to practice these principles in all our affairs
After reading the steps, I decided that turning over, asking, making amends, removing defects and all of that, in addition to my research and the reporting of my findings in my thesis was just undertaking more than I can deal with at the moment.
So, after all of the research I’ve done on my senioritis and the various ways that it can be managed, I decided that the best treatment for this disorder was to just got off my ass and make it happen……….I got this.
From The Classroom To The Cellblock – The School To Prison Pipeline
With all of the recent publicity surrounding the current state of public schools in major cities, I have been meaning to write this piece for the last few weeks but just keep getting sidetracked. I am not one to jump on just any old bandwagon that passes my door nor am I a devout conspiracy theorist but recently I have heard and read up on some information that is, without a doubt, food for serious thought.
Some countries used to decide what occupation a person would enter by using a standardized test. What you scored on that test would determine what occupation a person was going to do to earn a living. If a person scored high enough, they would be allowed to receive higher education and enter into a professional arena. If they scores were not high enough then the test taker would be remanded to a life of manual labor. I am beginning to think that we are doing something very similar in the U.S. but using a different method.
28 states have passed legislation to allow for the existence of privatized prisons. Those are prisons that are not state owned or state funded per se however they are allowed to bill the state or federal government for the care of the inmates. Many of these corporations are now planning how many more prisons they will need to build based on 3rd and 4th grade reading scores as there has been a direct link established between lack of education and the crime rate. Most inmates do not possess a high school diploma upon their entry into the penal system.
That said, I think that there is a weeding out process taking place in the public school systems in most cities. Classrooms are overcrowded, students are exhibiting negative and sometimes dangerous behaviors and many public schools have cut funding for advanced placement programs to try and meet the educational need. This weeding out process allows for some children to be voluntarily bussed to suburban schools to receive an education. For those children who are not bussed but show some sign of academic promise, there is the opportunity for them to test and then be placed in a lottery system to attend a magnet or charter school. Some of the magnet and charter schools are funded by the public school systems and some are private. Along with the students that are going to the magnet or charter schools, so are some of the best teachers. They are going to the magnet and charter schools because the class sizes are smaller and they are less dangerous. Many of the teachers who have transferred believe that it gives them a better opportunity to educate. Finally there is the option of attending a parochial school, there are scholarships available for those whose families cannot afford tuition.
Now, lets step back and take a look at this, you start with a school system that has good teachers and educable students, start taking the “best” of the students and the teachers and filter them out, leaving the “rest” in the pubic school system. Many of those who are left eventually drop out and end up where…you guessed it, in prison.
It’s a known fact that slave labor was used in the U.S. because it was inexpensive. When that was no longer legal, many businesses and corporations began using inexpensive immigrant labor or shipping their industrial work to countries where workers get paid pennies on the dollar and the company can still receive tax incentives. Enter the prison systems, public and private. The average inmate makes approximately $15.00 every two weeks working a job at the prison during their incarceration, that’s $30.00 per month to manufacture goods that are then resold by large companies.
Some companies that benefit from the use of prison labor include Chevron, IBM, Victoria’s Secret, Texas Instruments, Honeywell and Motorola. The federal prison system trades under the name Unicor but the private prisons stand to benefit the most from inmate labor because they get first crack at the contracts since they have to raise most of their operating costs on their own.
In my opinion, we have managed to create a new type of “involuntary servitude” or “slavery” if you will. Most of the immigrants and overseas employees are making more than thirty dollars a month so it’s actually less expensive for those companies to contract with prisons to make their goods. I think that the “system” has found a way to isolate those who are the most “at risk”, under-serve them by “educating” them in crowded classes, sub par building conditions with ill equipped teachers with the hopes that the data remains correct, those who do not complete high school are more likely to transition into the prison system.
I completely understand that committing a crime and going to prison is a choice that’s made by a person but face it, many kids are raising themselves, baited by the temptation of “fast money” and in some other cases, trying to help support the family. Those are not always the case with someone who is doing time but the reality still exists big business stands to profit in a big way on the backs of undereducated people, especially minority men.
I can’t say that if was not for inmate labor that those jobs would be available to the American worker because it’s obvious that big business will find cheap labor but I do struggle with the idea that certain groups are singled out to self distruct. It’s almost seems as if a family is not able to get their child into one of the funnels that takes them into an alternative school setting that those children end up in a whole different funnel and that funnel leads to $30.00 per month. Hence all of the lobbying that states and large corporations do to ensure access to privatized prisons.
So, what say you? Do you think that disallowing big business to partake in the benefits of inmate labor further put our “at risk” youth more at risk than they started out or are some of these links sheer coincidence? Second question is, would big businesses be as motivated to USE inmate labor if they had to relinquish a percentage of their profit and donate it to the local public school systems?
If you want to read more about this, I found a really good article on the use of prison labor and the economic impact it has on society. Prison Labor Cheats Society
Originally Posted 9/28/09
Diary of A Mad Black Grad Student – Misadventures In Graduate School
This session, I have to take this “Readings in Criminal Jusitce” class. Basically, we choose 6 books, get them approved by the professor, read one a week and submit a book review.
The criteria for the book review is as follows:
“Book Reviews: For each Book Review, you will read your approved material and complete a critical
analysis report. Book Reviews should include a summary of the book, but must be more than a
simple book report. They must include a critical analysis of the book coupled with how the book may
contribute to the literature of criminal justice. Other observations about the author’s credibility,
sources, methodology, and ability to be up-to-date should also be included to the best of the
student’s ability. Book Reviews should be 3-5 pages written in Word format, and follow APA style.”
So, last week I did my book review on The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness by Michelle Alexander. The book discuses Alexander’s theory that the criminal justice system practices a system of institutionalized racism that attempts to disenfranchise people of color in the same social and economic way as the Jim Crow laws of the south had previously.
As emphasized above, one component of the paper is to discuss the author’s credibility, for which I wrote:
“Michelle Alexander is a litigator and civil rights activist and litigator and recipient of a 2005 Soros Justice Fellowship and holds a joint appointment at the Kirwan Institute for the Study of Race and Ethnicity and the Moritz College of Law at Ohio State University (Alexander, 2010). Alexander previously served as director of the Racial Justice Project at the ACLU of Northern California and later directed the Civil Rights Clinics at Stanford Law School where she served as an Assistant professor (Alexander, 2010).”
I thought that would be sufficient but apparently not, my professor had a question which was:
“Why is this author credible? All of her positions have been with ideologically left organizations. Does her book provide a fair and balanced analysis of the laws and the application of these laws to most people? Do you personally view this author to be credible? Why or why not?
This is where your critical thinking skills will come into play. How do we evaluate an author that appears to have an agenda.
I had a student that reported on a book written by David Duke. He claimed Duke was credible because he was an elected official. I would argue that as a member of the KKK, he was not credible. I would personally question anything that he wrote.
Your thoughts…..”
My thoughts?? My thoughts are “Why in all hell are we comparing Michelle Alexander to the card carrying KKK politician David Duke?”
In all of the years that this man has been teaching, the only author of questionable credibility he has encountered has been David Duke?
*No Words*…..*Blank Stare*. I have a bad habit of shooting off my mouth at or around the same time that I am trying to process and get the full gist of a situation. I got the gist of this one rather quickly……he’s comparing an accomplished and educated author against LSU graduate and Ku Klux Klan aficionado David Duke. Makes perfect sense to me…….ok, I’m lyin, makes no damned sense and is slightly offensive.
I finally got around to answering the question wearing by Sunday best, student hat, the one’s like they give out at the “Professionalism School for the Tactfully Challenged”:
“You are correct, most of her positions have been with left organizations, however, the issue of a disproportionately amount of minorities in prison has been a discussion in criminal justice, especially after passage of the truth in sentencing legislation, the war on drugs and mandatory sentencing legislation . However, when she first entered the field of law, she was not focused on race and became focused on race after having a personal encounter regarding race and the criminal justice system. I think that she could qualify in court as an expert witness on the topic of racial disparity in the criminal justice system based on her qualifications.
Her book does not provide a fair and balanced analysis of the laws and application of these laws to most people, it’s not designed to, and her book is designed to highlight what she perceives as institutional racism in the criminal justice system. I think she goes beyond just saying “it’s a racial issue” to outlining why and how she believes the criminal justice system is a system of disenfranchisement for people of color and how it can be compared to other social systems such as the Jim Crow laws of the south. Alexander also references statistics that are accessible by the public and prepared by organizations that are considered non-biased, such as the United States Department of Justice. After looking at David Dukes credentials, I have to say that I agree with you, I think he pales in the credibility comparison to Michelle Alexander.
In the respect that Michelle Alexander’s perspective is plausible and she is, by qualifications a reliable source on racism in the criminal justice system, I would find her to be credible. Although I find her credible does not mean that I agree with every word she says. I think there is a large socio-economic piece that also lends to a higher incarceration rate among minorities but I am hard-pressed to believe that it’s the only component. ”
That made perfect sense to me and he gave me credit for my answer but in reading some of the other input he had to offer, I think that my professor doe not believe race is an issue as far as the criminal justice system is concerned. I don’t know what criminal justice this retired law enforcement professional is looking at but the one here in the U.S. does not afford the same opportunities to minorities or the poor that other’s have.
I am just still all caught up that we even had to discuss David Duke…….and how did we get there, again?
You Down With O.C.D? Yeah You Know Me…..
Okay, so a while back I blogged bout my obsession with school…. I think I did anyway, if I didn’t….if you don’t know, now you know, as Biggie would say.
Anyhew, I tend to set my bar pretty high. I am the chronic overachiever, it’s who I am and I’ve learned to embrace that……..for the most part. This session, I am taking a class in Comparative Criminal Justice. The objective of the class is to study the criminal justice systems of other countries and at some point, in a final research paper, compare one of our choice to the United States criminal justice system.
This week, up for discussion (this class is online), we have a question that reads “Are there any situations in which it might be permissible or even necessary to hold a U. S. citizen in custody without recourse to the judicial system? Provide examples of those situations.”
Now, before I show my O.C.D. (I know you’re dying to see it), this is a graduate school level class, there is supposed to be some form of independent thinking going on here……maybe that’s the overachiever in me, who knows?
Okay, back to the question, this is a COMPARATIVE class, where we look at criminal justice systems world wide….tonight, I read post, after post, after post, going on and on about how our constitution does not allow anyone (other than the unlawful enemy combatants) to be held without access to the judicial system. Maybe it’s me but I didn’t see anything in that question that says specifically, the U.S. citizen is being held on U.S. soil!! This is a COMPARATIVE…. compare something!!
I know that it sounds really, super simple but I am completely annoyed at the fact that people won’t think or feel the need to take the “easy” way out. Their “easy way” is starting to become an epic waste of my time for the week. This class is not designed to be simple, but it’s not rocket science either.
I really think that at the graduate level, people should be beyond the hand holding thing. I don’t think that we should have to have rudimentary instructions for us to be able to apply the concept of the class to the question being answered. So, I try and hop in and redirect by saying:
“That said, for me, there are two things missing from this question, the first is, where is the U.S. citizen being held, are we purely discussing a citizen held here in America without recourse or are we talking about an American being held abroad? The second thing that was missing for me, was “held for how long?”
I am going to fill in my own blanks, per se and answer the question like this, yes, there are some times when it is permissible to hold a U.S. citizen in custody without recourse to the judicial system.
The text states that Great Britain has the most stringent policy antiterrorism laws among any advanced democracy (Reichel, 2008, p. 95)
Britain’s antiterrorism laws allow Britain to hold suspected terrorists for up to 28 days (maximum), without being charged, pending investigation (Reichel, 2008, p. 96). Opponents to this policy, claim that the detention time is too long, while proponents had, at one time, argued that the time should be extended to 3 months.
So, it goes without saying (but I’m going to say it anyway), that a U.S. citizen, detained in Britain, under suspicion of terrorism, could spend a maximum of 28 days in custody without recourse to the judicial system.”
Now we’re moving forward…….so I thought. The responses I got were “Great way to look at it, thanks for the unique perspective.” Seriously? All I can do is take my O.C.D. and their case of group-think and hope that my O.C.D. doesn’t kick the sh!t out of their one track thinking.
I really do like this class, it’s challenging and what it’s challenging the most, is my patience…….
So, I Gave A Lecture At STLCC Yesterday…..
Well it seems like I recovered from my melt down the other day. Yesterday, I spoke at one of the Community College campus’s to a juvenile justice class. I lectured on the new issues and trends in juvenile justice.
One thing that I got a lot of time to talk about is how the age of technology is making legislators rethink current policies as they relate to the online distribution of child pornography by minors.
The core issue is that prior to the age of camera phone, iPhones, pads, Blackberry’s and so on, the only way to distribute pictures was to have them developed and mailed. Young people were not engaging in that kind of activity, as it took time and money, but now, with the convenience of picture phones and smart phones, anything is a go…..
The gist of my lecture is that many states are just now beginning to introduce legislation to deal with child pornography created by minors, distributed by minors and received by minors. Prior to some of the recent legislation, minors were held under the same child pornography statues as adults. The creation, distribution and receipt of child pornography would, in fact still be a felony for minors and and they would have to place their name on the sex offender registry, just as an adult.
Many states are seeing the felony and the registry component as being too severe for minors, as both of those entities would follow a minor into his or her adult life. so many states have passed laws decreasing the penalties for minors to a misdemeanor and no registry addition. Although, this is a lesser charge, a misdemeanor is still punishable by up to one year in jail and a wide range of fines.
We discussed the issues as to how state, local and federal governments were going to assign jurisdiction over such cases and the whole nine yards.
The reference point for the conversation was an analysis of the topic as brought to light but the video of a 14-year old girl who was recorded performing oral sex on her boyfriend, that recently went viral as well as the concept of “sexting”.
At the beginning, many people were prepared to disengage. Some had their heads on their desks, other people where chillin with their iPods and so on… it wasn’t intimidating as much as I thought it rude. I was able to use humor to redirect that behavior and get everyone focused. Once that happened, the lecture went very well. The class asked great questions and the more we got into the topic, the more they opened up and discussed how they think the law should handle these situations.
Overall it was a great class and my mentor may have an opportunity for me to help write an Introduction To Criminal Justice textbook…that would be AWESOME!!
Is Teen Violence Linked To Heavy Soda Drinking?
One of the people I follow on Twitter sent out a study that claims that there is a correlation between heavy soda drinking and teen violence. I am going to post the findings of the study because I think that it is an interesting read but that’s about it.
The study, conducted in Boston by French researchers, claims that “teen violence IS linked to heavy soda drinking”. The researchers make their claims based on the testing of Boston inner city students ages 14-18. The researchers admit that a bulk of the study was comprised of Black, Latino and bi-racial (black and white) children and contained little to no Asian or White students.
Some of you research and design guru’s out there can correct me, but it seems to me that if Asian and White students are not incorporated into the study, that it would be a bogus to assume that teen violence, as a whole, is linked to heavy soda drinking. Based on how the study was conducted, I would even be hesitant to claim that teen violence in minority youths is linked to heavy soda drinking as there was no control group to support that claim either.
Furthermore, the study was conducted via survey, which, for numerous reasons can be dicy in terms of the results. I think that the study is more of a foundation for more studies to be conducted on the topic.
The study authors concede that sodas are probably not the direct cause of the aggression, which isn’t saying much as this study was not in depth enough to render causation.
Here is the study:
PARIS — Researchers in the United States said on Tuesday they had found a ‘shocking’ association — if only a statistical one — between violence by teenagers and the amount of soda they drank.
High-school students in inner-city Boston who consumed more than five cans of non-diet, fizzy soft drinks every week were between nine and 15-percent likelier to engage in an aggressive act compared with counterparts who drank less.
‘What we found was that there was a strong relationship between how many soft drinks that these inner-city kids consumed and how violent they were, not only in violence against peers but also violence in dating relationships, against siblings,’ said David Hemenway, a professor at the Harvard School of Public Health.
‘It was shocking to us when we saw how clear the relationship was,’ he told AFP in an interview.
But he stressed that only further work would confirm — or disprove — the key question whether higher consumption of sweet sodas caused violent behaviour.
The new study was based on answers to questionnaires filled out by 1,878 public-school students aged 14 to 18 in the inner Boston area, where Hemenway said crime rates were much higher than in the wealthier suburbs.
The overwhelming majority of respondents were Hispanic, African-American or mixed; few were Asian or white.
Among the questions were how much carbonated non-diet soft drink, measured in 12-ounce (355-millilitre) cans, the teens had drunk in the previous seven days.
They were also asked whether they drank alcohol or smoked, carried a weapon or showed violence towards peers, family members and partner.
What emerged, said Hemenway, was evidence of ‘dose response,’ in other words, the more soda was consumed, the likelier the tendency towards violence.
Among those who drank one or no cans of soft drink a week, 23 percent carried a gun or a knife; 15 percent perpetrated violence towards a partner; and 35 percent had been violent towards peers.
At the other end of the scale, among those who drank 14 cans a week, 43 percent carried a gun or a knife; 27 percent had been violent towards a partner; and more than 58 percent had been violent towards peers.
Overall, teens who were heavy consumers of sugary fizz were between nine and 15 percentage points likelier to show aggressive behaviour compared with low consumers, even when ethnicity and other confounding factors were taken into account.
This is a magnitude similar to the link found, in previously researched, with alcohol or tobacco.
Hemenway said the study had included a couple of questions aimed at taking a children’s home background into account, including whether the teen had taken a meal with his family in the previous days.
As it was only intended as a preliminary investigation, the questionnaire did not ask what kind of sodas the teens drank, he said.
‘This is one of the very first studies to examine’ the question, said Hemenway.
‘We don’t know why (there is this strong association). There may be some causal effect but it’s also certainly plausible that this is just a marker for other problems — that kids who are violent for whatever reason, they tend to smoke more, they tend to drink more alcohol and they tend to maybe drink more soft drinks. We just don’t know.
‘We want to look at it more carefully in following studies.’
The study, published in a British journal, Injury Prevention, will revive memories of the ‘Twinkie Defence,’ a US legal landmark in which a killer successfully argued that his behaviour had been swayed by eating junk food.
The defendant in this case, Dan White, had been charged with homicide. His lawyer’s successful pleading led to conviction of a lesser charge, of voluntary manslaughter.
Several studies elsewhere have established a link between very high sugar consumption and lack of social bonding or irritable and anti-social behaviour.
Some diet research has also pointed the finger at the lack of micro-nutrients as a source of aggression, but this work is still in its early stages.
