Hey everyone, it’s Devia again! If you’ve been keeping up with my blog posts on youth violence, you should know that I’ve been researching on youth violence. For my first blog, I mostly wrote about what my topic was and why it was important to me. Also, it spoke of what caused the majority of youth violence and teenagers’ participation in violent behavior. For my first blog post, click here. My second blog contained information on my piece of original research. For that, I conducted a survey marketed towards teenagers in questions that could help the reader and myself better understand what goes through the average youth’s mind. To access my second blog post, you can click this link.

This blog is the final piece of my English class’ “You and The World” project. To conclude the segment, we had one last mission; become an Agent of Change. To become this ”Agent of Change” it was our sole duty to not only research and write about our important topic, but to help to better our issue. This is just us getting involved in our topic, trying to be of service in any way we can, any way that we can think of. For my Agent of Change part of the project, I chose to spread the word. Even though this blog is helping get the word about youth violence, it still isn’t enough. I needed to do something else, something greater than just this blog to spread the word. Around my neighborhood, I’ve been posting up papers and posters that support anti violence in youth. I’ve also spoke with my peers at my church on this topic.

I know it isn’t much, but it’s more than what somebody else didn’t do. By putting up posters and flyers, the word to help subdue youth violence will disseminate. First, through my neighborhood, then the city and from there, there’s no telling what could happen afterwards. There’s no telling how far my anti violence campaign will go. With that, the additional piece of my Agent of Change work was with my church group, where I briefly spoke on my You and The World project and youth violence itself. I hope that it was good enough to subordinate anyone that I spoke to to partake in youth aggression. Furthermore, I hope that the people I spoke with can follow in my footsteps to help spread an anti violence campaign in youth. I’m fraught with satisfaction based on what I’ve been doing. I feel as though everything that I do is serving a helping hand in detaching violence and aggression from teenagers.    

Other things are also being done to discontinue teenage violence as well. Various organizations and clubs have programs that help prevent youth violence as well. For example, the city of Philadelphia has conducted a project, located as a pdf here, designed to become a bulwark, stopping violent behavior from reaching youth beforehand. The plan is a multiple step project whose focal points are broken down into the categories of Education, Training and Employment, Meaningful Engagement, Health, Detention and Diversion and a Safe Environment. The city’s main idea is that by doing things to prepare them for the future, distract them from violence, and help promote safety, youth would more likely be prone to a nonviolent behavior. Furthermore, there are an array of clubs and programs that teens can join that influence a stray from violent behavior. One of those organizations being PAAN, the Philadelphia Anti-Drug/Anti-Violence Network, which strives to help reduce the violence in youth.

Even though I did a lot of work, I still wish that some things were to be done differently. If I could change anything about my project, I would change how much I worked as an Agent of Change. I think that I could have done more to promote my issue to others. I could have scheduled more opportunities to speak about my topic to others and maybe helped out in an organization as a volunteer. Everything is okay though because I still think that no matter how much I didn’t do, I did enough.

Lastly, I would like to thank everyone who helped me while I was trying to do this project. I would like to thank my teacher, Mrs. Dunn, and my student teacher, Ms. Lucy, for assisting me and answering any questions I had about the project. I would also like to thank my old teacher, Mr. Crain for helping me to get more people interested in my issue. I would also like to thank everyone who’ve read my blogs and been keeping track of my issue.

Thank you!

This blog post is the third part in a 3 part series on our English class' You And The World project, where we each tackle a problem in our society that we want to spread awareness about. Blog #1 is about our initial research on our topic. Blog #2 is about our field research, where we gathered data ourselves based on survey results or observation. I took a survey of everyone in our class on their opinion of littering.

A signed SOSNA trash bag

In my research between now and my Blog #2, I looked into organizations like the South of South Neighborhood Association who hold neighborhood cleanups periodically, where they supply grabbers and garbage bags (pictures below) to small groups of people who help clean up the street. For my Agent of Change assignment, I participated in the first SOSNA spring cleanup of 2014. I put an ad in the school memo for it, but nobody could make it there. Neighborhood clean ups are a great way to get involved in improving the environment and beautifying your city, and other than that, it's great exercise for your back and arms. A few more interesting things were that we filled up around 10-20 trash bags over about 9 blocks and a couple parks, there was a 4 block stretch where there were no trash cans (except for one belonging to a business), and that the quality of the sidewalks and surrounding buildings appeared to be a big factor in the amount of trash in those places.

Various supplies provided by SOSNA

This was a fun project, and I’m looking forward to participating in litter cleanups in the future. The project has also taught me alot. Mainly that people don’t litter just because they don’t care. It’s also because they just don’t want to touch those gross garbage can handles when it’s so easy to just toss your stuff on the ground, but I digress.

Even though our city is bad in terms of cleanliness, it's only considered the sixth dirtiest city in America. Others include Atlanta at #5, Los Angeles at #4, Baltimore at #3, New Orleans at #2, and the Big Apple itself, New York, at #1. The cleanest was Cheyenne, Washington. Cheyenne even received the EPA’s Clean Drinking Water award in 2009. According to the website, they use special precautions and techniques to prevent large plants from leaking toxic fluids into the water supply. This may help with problems involving larger structures, but it wouldn’t be as effective here. If we as a whole really want to do better, we can encourage more cleanups and stricter laws in those places.

To conclude this post, thanks to Andy from SOSNA for agreeing to let a group of SLA students join their neighborhood cleanup of this spring. Also, big thanks to the 22 people who took my survey on littering (except for that one guy, you know who you are). And thanks to Ms. Dunn and Ms. Lucy for their continuing influence and support.

Annotated bibliography (Sources for #2 and #1. See hyperlinks for #3.)

Take this survey about littering!

As you probably already know from either common sense or experience, hurricanes and other severe storms are some of the most destructive things nature can throw at us. As you already know if you've been following my blogs, it can be difficult to find out how to prepare for storms beforehand, and a lot more emphasis is placed on storms while they're happening as opposed to during the beginning of the season, when it's relatively easy to prepare.

I recently interviewed Hurricane Sandy victim Mrs. Parks, proud owner of a house in Sea Isle City, New Jersey. Her tales of how “you could see through the house because the walls were gone” provide a caution for how damaging storms can be even with the proper precautions. It's very difficult to rebuild when you have “to gut the entire house,” while “still waiting for our insurance, we haven't gotten a cent yet.”

Of course, hurricanes aren't the only type of storm that can necessitate gutting a house. A recent blizzard caused a pipe to freeze over burst in my family's house, also in Sea Isle. The resulting damage destroyed all of our appliances and flooring, and most of the walls in the front of the house had to be removed.

The interior of the shorehouse on Pleasure Ave. in Sea Isle, NJ

Now that I've personally experienced storm damage, I can see that sometimes it's not possible to take all necessary precautions. However, that only means it's more important to be aware of the threats faced by storms. The fact that storms that may not be considered “natural disasters” can cause catastrophic damage just as easily as those that are only makes it more important to be ready for storms of all kinds at all points in the year.

One of the easiest parts of preparing for storms of all kinds is to have a disaster supplies kit. However, it can be difficult to keep one ready and organized at all times. For my Agent of Change project, I plan to put together basic supply kits to distribute to residents of a shore town in anticipation of the next storm. Wish me luck!

Annotated bibliography

Hello, again! My name is Talya Laver and I am a freshman at Science Leadership Academy.  In my english class, we have been doing more work on our You and The World projects. The topic I have been focusing on is Leukemia. To refresh your memory, Leukemia, as well as Lymphoma, Myeloma and Myelodysplastic Syndromes (MDS), are all blood cancers.  In my first blog post, I explored what Leukemia is, the different types of Leukemia and different organizations that are looking for cures as well as great places to donate. For this blog post, instead of doing a lot of research on the internet, I conducted my own research in the form of a survey.  

The goal of the survey I conducted was to see how well know Leukemia is compared to other types of cancer. I did not know almost anything about Leukemia and had never known anyone personally affected by the cancer before my aunt was diagnosed. Going into the survey, I thought the responses I would get would support my idea that most people do not know anyone affected by the cancer and do not know much about it. I was not completely wrong. I received 47 responses to my survey, the largest percent of responses from people in High School (Grades 9-13), closely followed by people ages 31-45.  

Response to Survey

On my hypothesis that most people have not personally known someone affected by Leukemia or have been diagnosed with Leukemia, I was not proven wrong. Although over half of the people I surveyed had said they have not know anyone affected by Leukemia or have been affect by Leukemia, it was not exactly the response I had thought I was going to receive. I had thought that there was going to be a much larger difference between the number of people who have been or have known someone affect by Leukemia and people who have not had that experience.  The gap was only three responses.

Response to Survey

That was not the only area where my hypothesis was not proven wrong.  59% of people who responded to the survey said that they were Not Informed or A Little Informed on the topic of Leukemia. Only one person felt they were Fully Informed on the cancer. This does not surprise me, especially due to the responses to another question I asked, “Which type of cancer do you hear the most about?” 89% of people said the type of cancer they hear the most about is Breast Cancer. This question went hand-in-hand with the next question I asked, “Which type of cancer do you know the most about?” The responses to this question were not quite as concentrated as the previous, yet no one said the type of cancer they knew the most about was Leukemia/Blood cancers. 

Response to Survey

In addition to conducting my own research, I have also found some new information published on the topic since my last blog post. On February 11th, it was released that a “Researcher discovers new target for leukemia treatment” for Acute Myeloid Leukemia. The research may have identified a powerful protein in the development of the cancer. This could become immeasurably helpful in finding treatment and cures for Leukemia.

Keep your eyes out for my next, and final, blog post!

To view the work sited, click here.

Hello everybody. This is Devia again with my second blog post about violence in youth. If you weren’t able to read my first blog, you can access it by clicking here. My first blog had a lot of information about what can influence an adolescent’s violent behavior, like peer pressure or a low IQ. Along with that, it gave insight on the rising of teenagers’ participation in violent activities, articles and statistics that support that statement. My first blog also contained information about the increase technology has on a youth’s violence and how much our generation is affected by this.

While researching, I’ve been trying to collect new information to go along with my topic. I’ve also been trying to find more recent statistics as well. One website that I have encountered is one of Drexel University's. Although it may not be much, the website still gives some potential causes of youth violence, which I didn’t realize before.

Another website that I used before can also be used for more information now. The Philadelphia Police Department has a page full of crime maps and statistics. The page, which you can view here, is interactive. Not only can you view up to date statistics on homicides throughout the city, but you can access the amount of assaults, rapes, and/or homicides within a set time period for any specified part of the city. That information can be combined with this. The point that matters most says that juveniles were accounted for 16% of all violent crime arrests and were accounted for 11% of all murder victims. That, together with the Philadelphia Police Department, would make for roughly 5 juvenile homicide victims year to date.

Another part of my research included an original research piece, for which I decided to conduct a survey for. The survey asked a group of 8th graders their opinions and personal experiences with what could be the beginning or youth violence. The survey's results showed that over 80% of the teenagers interviewed had been physically hurt by another youth, which can be used as an example of youth on youth assaults and bullying as well. The results also showed that two-thirds of the adolescents had seen a weapon and half of those who’ve seen a weapon, also held one and/or attempted to use it to hurt someone else. When asked their opinion on youth assaults on peers versus adult attacks on youth, most people responded that the latter was worst because adults should know better or because it is taking advantage of the child’s age and vulnerability. When asked what influenced a person’s violence, the most common responses were that it was technology, their environment, or just their feelings in general. Lastly, when asked who how much of a role a youth’s surroundings and technology played on their violence, majority agreed that it depended on the person.

The original research I conducted gave me an insight on the many different perspectives people the same age can have on the same topics. It also helped me realize that not everyone is the same so therefore, there can be an infinite amount of reasons why a youth has a violent nature and the ones I found online are just the tip of the iceberg. Moreover, the results of my survey made me conclude that there is a lot of work to be done in understanding the ways youth violence is differentiating and whether if youth were to be put into groups based on their age, environment or race, the causes would change. I also wonder why youth violence is not at a steady increase or decrease and is instead, happening at various percentage changes. I also am wondering why it is so hard to find more recent data and statistics on youth crime rates. To help change the issue of youth violence, I am thinking about going back to my old school where I sent my survey to. There, I plan on talking with the older children about youth violence prevention and the consequences and repercussions that come with crime and violent acts. Make sure you tune in for blog post number 3!

Hello again.  My name is Jason Greene and I am 9th grader at Science Leadership Academy.  In English class we are doing a project called You And The World.  During this project we have to find a issue we are passionate about then go into the world and try to fix it.  My issue is Public Education in the city of Philadelphia.  This is my second blog post.  To read my first blog post click here.  In my first blog post I introduced my issue and how it is one of the biggest problems facing the city today.  I also talked about how there was a lack of funding for public schools.

   

For my original research I decided to do make a online survey.  I wanted to find out if the people taking the survey had special classes while in middle-school.  I also wanted to find out if there were cuts while they were attending the school.  I got lots of good responses back.  Almost all the people who responded said that they went to middle-school in Philadelphia in the past few years.  Most if not all of them said while they were there that the school made cuts that hurt their learning and safety. Some of these positions were Teachers, Counselors, Secretaries and Lunchtime aids.  All of these positions are very important.  If you don't have enough teachers than you have to put more students in each class.  If you don't have any lunchtime aids there will be no one to watch the kids while at lunch.  The results I got really informed me on my issue because now I knew that the budget cuts of the school district just did not affect me but also my friends.

While most of the people who filled out my survey did have special classes like art and music…

Does/Did your middle-school offer...

Art               6  22%

Music/Band  5  19%

Computers   6   22%

Gym            5   19%

Health          5   19%

Over the past few years there have been lots of layoffs.

Over the past few years did your middle-school cut any of these positions?

Guidance counselor	2	15%
Secretary	1	8%
Dean	2	15%
Teachers	5	38%
Lunchtime Aids	3	23%

Now that I got my results I believe even more that this has to change.  The change has to happen now.  It is not fair for kids not to be able to get the best education they can get.  They can not get that without simple things like teachers and counselors.  As I was doing my research I started to wonder how many schools in Philadelphia were shut down and how many students had to be relocated because of that?

The next part of this project is called Agent of Change.  This is when go out into the real world and I go volunteer somewhere and try to have an impact on my issue.  As I said in my last blog post I will be going to my old school, J.S Jenks.  J.S Jenks have been badly hurt by the recent budget cuts.  My sister still goes there and she told me that they don't even have an art teacher anymore, that a dad that used to be an artist now comes in 2 times a week and teacher classes.  When I volunteer at the school I want to help out in a 6th, or 8th grade classroom.  I think I will have a big impact when I come because I the school needs as much as it can get. When I am at the school volunteering I hope to help the teachers in anyway I can if that means making copies or help teach the lesson I will try my best.

     

Seal of J.S Jenks

Stay tuned for part 3!

My bibliography.

In my first blog entry, I talked about how Philadelphia is known as the second dirtiest city in America, and how that has an affect on the air and our marine life. I haven't found much new information in real life, but this week I took a survey of 22 people in Philadelphia, mostly from my school, and the new information I found showed a lot about our city's causes of littering.

Of everyone that took the survey, less than half littered (10/22). And of those, none of them said that they littered often. Of everyone that littered, nearly all of them said it was because they were never near a trash can or didn’t have time to find one (9/10), and that they wouldn’t litter so much if the city installed more. Some even said that the city's trash cans were too hard to use (3/10) because they didn't want to have to touch the lid to open it. Every one of the people surveyed said that they thought littering was wrong.

I agree with the survey results. Sometimes it’s nearly impossible to find a trash can in some areas of Philadelphia. You can carry your trash for blocks and blocks, and even if you do find a trash can it doesn’t always have a recycling bin next to it. I thought it was interesting that so many people didn't litter or littered rarely. I think that if there had been a wider variety of people taking the survey then there would've been different results.

Also, I might soon be collaborating with a local business to organize a neighborhood clean up in Philadelphia. They do clean ups regularly in my neighborhood and even hire 8th graders to help over the Summer in exchange for school supplies. Stay tuned for more information.

If you would like to take the survey, visit http://www.tinyurl.com/SLAtrashsurvey.

My name is Jason Greene and I am a 9th grader going to Science Leadership Academy.  For my You and the World project,  I chose to talk about public education in the great city of Philadelphia.  I chose this issue because this is one of the many issues facing the city today.  Public education has a lack of funding. This is important to me because me and all of my friends are affected by the lack of funding for our school district.  Education is important and we need to find out how to fix this.

This is the headquarters of The School District of Philadelphia in Center City.

When my English teacher gave me and my class this project I started to think about what I wanted to do.  One of my goals in life is to become Mayor of Philadelphia.  Since I want to do that when I grow up I started to think about some issues that face the city today.  I decided to do my YATW project on public education because I feel like it is the most significant.  Most of the money goes to charter schools and not public ones.  Because of this you can get a better education at charter schools.  We should care about this issue because most kids in the city go to public schools and it’s not fair that kids that go charter and private schools get a better education.  Coming from a public middle-school I know how these cuts feel.  At my old school we don’t have a music teacher no more.  I used to play trombone and was part of the all-city middle school band for three years.  Since my old school doesn't have a music teacher anymore there is no more band.  We also do not have an art teacher.  A parent that used to be an artst now comes in twice a week to teach.  Now I go to Science Leadership Academy.  This is my first year here so I don’t know how this school was effected but I am sure that a this school was effected.  I am just lucky that I can go to a school that can give me a great education.

This is the graduation rates of boys and girls who went to public schools from 2002-2011.

This is the graduation rates of boys and girls who went to charter schools from 2008-2012.

In 2012 The School District of Philadelphia had a 304 million dollar budget shortfall.  Because of this they had to close down they had to close down 23 schools and lay off 3700 teacher,nurses,music teacher,art teachers and other workers.  While all of this was happening according to labnotes.com 9 more charter schools opened and their budgets have been increased by 107 million dollars.  Why would they do this?  Instead of increasing the budget for the charter schools and opening new ones why don’t you use that money to fund public schools.  That 107 million dollars could have saved 9 public schools.  Now that makes more sense to me.  Over 10,000 students are at new schools this year because the school that they went to last year is closed now.

This is University City High School.  637 students went here last year.  0 go there now.

Going on with this project there are some things I want to learn.  I am going to go volunteer at my old school John Story Jenks Elementary School in Chestnut Hill.  When I am there I also want to talk to some of my old teachers to see how they are dealing with the budget cuts.  I will also talk to some of the students there to see if they notice anything different from last school year to this school year.  I hope to find out other thing while working on this.

This is J.S Jenks.  This is the school where I will be doing my volunteer work at.

This issue is very important to me.  This is important to me because this is effecting me and my friends.  This is also going to the kids that live in Philadelphia and get a public education in the future. I feel like no one really cares about this or say that this will change soon.  I don’t want soon I want now. We could change this.  If we come together and show that we care about we can change this.  

If you want to see my bibliography click here.

Hello, my name is Talya Laver and I am a freshman at Science Leadership Academy. In our English class we are working on a project entitled You and The World. This project gets us to think about an issue that is meaningful to us and what we could do to fix it. The issue that I chose was Leukemia. Leukemia, as well as Lymphoma, Myeloma and Myelodysplastic Syndromes (MDS), are all blood cancers. I have chosen this topic because my aunt recently passed away after a three year battle with Leukemia. She was one of my inspirations and I was very struck by the way she faced her disease; with constant determination and positivity. I hope to educate people about what blood cancers actually are and help to raise money to find a cure.

Blood cancers are caused by changes in the DNA of one stem cell. That cell then multiplies and accumulates, interfering with the productiveness of the red blood cells, white blood cells and platelets. When your white blood cells are affected, you can no longer fight infection as well. These mutated cells affect bone marrow, blood cells, lymph nodes and other parts of the lymphatic system. Leukemia, specifically, is caused by a change of the DNA in a white blood cell.

There are two categories in which a specific type of Leukemia can be sorted into; Acute Leukemia and Chronic Leukemia. Acute Leukemia progresses very quickly and is more common. Chronic Leukemia worsens slowly over time. Within    those two categories there are two different types of Leukemia. The two types of Acute Leukemia are Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia and Acute Myeloid Leukemia. Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia starts in the white blood cells and affects the lymphocytes. Lymphocytes flow in the bloodstream to help fight infection. When they do not mature properly, they can no longer fight infection. Acute Myeloid Leukemia can start in many types of developing blood cells. It affects myeloid stem cells, which later mature into red blood cells, platelets or myeloblasts. Myeloblasts later turn into white blood cells. Acute Myeloid Leukemia prohibits the myeloid cells from maturing the way they should and myeloblasts do not go on to become white blood cells which help fight infection; leaving the carrier susceptible and unable to defend themselves. The two types of chronic leukemia are Chronic Myeloid Leukemia and Chronic Lymphocytic Leukemia. Chronic Myeloid Leukemia is very similar to Acute Myeloid Leukemia with the exception that the disease progress more slowly because in the beginning some of the blood cells mature and work properly. Chronic Lymphocytic Leukemia is identified by the presence of too many abnormal lymphocytes found in the bloodstream. These abnormal cells crowd around the healthy cells prohibiting the production of red blood cells, white blood cells and platelets. All four of these types of leukemia will result in death if the proper treatment is not received. 

                                   This diagram shows the the breakdown of the different types of  

           Leukemia diagnosed in 2013 in both adults and children.

The best course of treatment for Leukemia depends upon many things: the type of Leukemia, the stage at which the cancer is diagnosed, the patients age, and the patients general health. The goal of the treatment is to target the Leukemia cells and kill them, allowing healthy cells to grow in their place. A patient is considered “in remission” when there are no longer any signs of Leukemia cells. Normally the first plan of attack for patients with Acute Leukemia is chemotherapy. Chemotherapy attacks the Leukemia with the use of drugs, which are normally received in stages. In the event that the cancer had spread to the brain or spinal cord, intrathecal chemotherapy attacks the cells in these areas by injecting the drugs directly into the spinal canal. Radiation can also be used to treat acute leukemia. Radiation therapy targets the cancer cells with large amounts of radiation, and can also be used to target Leukemia cells in the spinal cord or brain.  For people that have high-risk Leukemia, doctors may suggest a stem cell transplant. Stem cell transplants destroy all of the cells in the bone marrow, both good and bad, and replaces them with new, healthy cells. Patients with Chronic Lymphocytic Leukemia may choose not to pursue treatment right away because the cancer progresses much slower. When the patient decides to pursue treatment, there are a few different ways to target the cancer and the course of action is decided upon by the patients doctor. Radiation therapy can be used to destroy cancer cells or to shrink swollen lymph nodes or spleen. Chemotherapy can also be pursued should that course of treatment best attack the cancer cells in a patient. The cancer cells can also be targeted with a monoclonal antibody to destroy or stop the growth of the cancer cells. Patients with Chronic Myeloid Leukemia should receive treatment right away because the gene can develop more mutations that make the cancer more resistant to treatment. The first course of treatment is targeted with a tyrosine kinase inhibitor, a drug to help fight the cancer. More treatment options can include chemotherapy and biological therapy. Biological therapy includes medicines given to a patient to help improve their body’s natural defences against the cancer. To learn more about treatment options, please read this overview of Leukemia treatment options.  

Many organizations have been dedicated to helping Leukemia patients and trying to find a cure for Leukemia. One of these organizations is The Leukemia and Lymphoma Society. Their goal is to both find a cure for Leukemia and Lymphoma as well as improve the quality of life for patients and their families. The Leukemia and Lymphoma Society also publishes a lot of information about Leukemia and Lymphoma if you are interested in learning more about either type of cancer. The National Children’s Leukemia Foundation’s main goal is to find a cure for Leukemia that can help everyone regardless of race, religion or ethnicity, with a focus on children. The Moffitt Center, located in Florida, treats cancer patients as well as researches to find cures for different types of cancers. The chart located below shows their success rate as well as the national success rates for patients with all four types of Leukemia. All of these organizations, as well as many others, accept donations to help find a cure.

To view the works cited, click here.