Apple Price Cut Essay

To what extent the iPhone pricing strategy is similar to the iPod pricing strategy? How do you explain that the iPod price cut did not lead to such a level of customers’ protest? Answer: Both iPhone and iPod have experienced a large amount of price cut in their product lifecycle. In this document, we can find that iPod was launched in October 2001. Tough relatively high priced for an MP3 player, it was hugely demanded and remains popular till date though there was a price slash in 2005. Similar to the price cut of the iPod, two months after the launch of the iPhone, Apple lowered the price by 200 USD. However, regarding the price strategy, a big difference between two products is the timing of price cut. iPod adjusted its price after experiencing a 4-year success from its launch in 2001, whereas iPhone drop in price in only 2 month, which is the main explanation of why the iPod price cut did not lead to such a serious level of customers’ protest. Although both price adjustments were designed for the aim to further expand in the mass market and improve the sales, we can find that the main reason for price cut of iPod is to sell more products in its declining period of product lifecycle. By contrast, the objective of price cut of iPhone is to rapidly monopoly the smart phone market in its growing period of product lifecycle, which resulted a part of Apple fans’ profits since they bought the product in a high price. 2. â€Å"Market analysts pointed out that Apple had created a strong brand and customer loyalty which it capitalized on by adopting a skimming strategy in pricing. They also felt that customers accept its highly priced products with equanimity. To go a step further, they consciously expect it to be so.What does this tell you about the value of iPhone own-price elasticity, cross-price elasticity and income elasticity? Answer: The practice of ‘price skimming’ involves charging a relatively high price for a short time where a new, innovative, or much-improved product is launched onto a market. Obviously, due to the reason that Apple had created a strong brand image by its innovation of technology and creativity of design, and loyalty of c ustomers, particularly those Apple crazy fans, the price skimming strategy was able to work extremely well when iPhone was launched onto the market. Meanwhile, Apple’s iPhone entered the highly volatile cell phone market combining telephony, MP3, Web surfing and video watching, which completely revolutionized the tech-savvy market and was most awaited by both the technology enthusiasts and mainstream media. Therefore, the success of this strategy was largely dependent on those first adopters’ inelasticity of demand for the product either by the market as a whole. However, in the cell phone industry, where the product lifecycle is relatively short and the market is highly competitive. Before some other competing products or substitutes emerging on the market, iPhone could enjoy its high price and benefit from its â€Å"monopoly profits† in a short term where demand is relatively inelastic. Whereas in the cell phone industry, the demand from mass market is price elastic, which is the main reason that Apple needs to drop its price to increase its sales according to its mass-market strategy. In terms of cross-price elasticity, we can think about this question from two aspects: complements and substitutes. Firstly, due the reason that the demand of iPhone is price elastic in mass market, price of iPhone decrease, quantity demanded of components increases, which leads Apple to get a lower price of components from its supplier and further guarantee its gross margin of iPhone. In addition, the increase of sales also means the increase number of customer buying and renting apps from Apple’s online store. Secondly, considering substitutes, price of iPhone decrease, and quantity of competing products demanded decrease. Since the demand is price elastic, the lower production cost and increase revenue from Apple softer ware are able to recuperate the loss from cost cut. We can make the conclusion that regarding to the income elasticity, a decrease of price of iPhone has a positive impact on its total revenue. 3. Based on the information provided in the case would you say that the market for smartphone is closer to monopoly or to monopolistic competition? Justify. Answer: Yes, base on the information provided in the case, I regard the smartphone industry as a monopolistic competition. Monopolistic competition  is a form of imperfect competition  where many competing producers sell products that are  differentiated  from one another. Smartphone industry has following characteristics:* There are several producers like Apple, Blackberry, Nokia, Motorola etc. , and many consumers in the market, but no company can total control over the market price. * Consumers perceive that there are non-price differences among the competitors’ products. * There are few barriers to entry and exit.Producers have a degree of control over price. 4. Is the price cut decided by Apple two months after iPhone initial launch consistent with the smartphone market structure described above? Answer: Yes, the performance of iPhone is consistent with the smartphone market structure. Firstly, the MC firms sell products that have real or perceived non-price differences. However, the differences are not so great as to eliminate other goods as substitutes. Technically, the cross price elasticity of demand between goods in such a market is positive. In this case, iPhone perform the same basic functions but have differences in qualities such as design, style, reputation and appearance. Secondly, independent decision-making is another characteristic of monopolistic competition. The firm gives no consideration to what effect its decision may have on competitors. In other words each firm feels free to set prices as if it were a monopoly. Lastly, Apple has some degree of market power. Market power means that the firm has control over the terms and conditions of exchange. An MC firm can raise it prices without losing all its customers. The firm can also lower prices without triggering a potentially ruinous price war with competitors, which is the reason why iPhone was able to largely cut its price in two months. 5. Knowing the price cut affected negatively Apple reputation, do you believe Apple adopted an opportunistic pricing strategy initially selling the iPhone at a high price to take advantage of holiday season high spending habits and then dropping the price to stimulate market growth? Is this consistent with Apple pricing strategy in its other product lines like computers and iPod? Answer: I don’t entirely believe that iPhone lunched at a high price was due to it attempted to take the advantage of â€Å"holiday season high spending habits†. From my point of view, there are two main reasons why iPhone priced high at the beginning: Firstly, the core consumer groups of iPhone are enthusiastic fans of high-tech gadgets; and some of them are loyalty customers of Apple. These parts of people are not sensitive for iPhone’s price. What attract them are its quality, design and innovation. The first adopters’ inelasticity of demand is a good opportunity for using the price skimming strategy. Secondly, high price strategy is an effective method to build a high-end brand image. It’s much easier that a high brand image product cuts its price for promotion than a low brand image one raises it. For the tech-savvy market, the product lifecycle is short. We can often find on the market that a product of Apple or other brands cuts its price when it has been launched for a period of time. But iPhone dropped its price only 2 months after it had been introduced onto the market. This strategy is quite different from other products of Apple. For instance, iPod depreciated 2 years after it came into the market. Seeing the price of iPhone must be in line with iPod Touch, this strategy is â€Å"special† for Apple, comparing with other products. 6. â€Å"According to Apple executives the move had been planned long ago and felt that the pricing strategy was conceived in part to keep the iPhone’s pricing in line with its new iPod touch. † Explain to what extent a high-priced iPhone could be an obstacle to the success of the new iPod Touch. Based on what you know about Apple late development do you find that explanation convincing? Answer: In terms of the features of these two types of products, iPod Touch is like a simplified version of iPhone, without the function of a â€Å"phone†. This determines that the prices of these two types of products must be â€Å"in a line†, which means, for a reasonable consideration, the price of iPod Touch must be lower than iPhone but not too far away. If iPhone had not cut its price, iPod Touch must have had been priced at a higher level than the realistic one. We assume that, if iPhone 4 GB continued being sold at 499USD, iPod Touch may be sold at 400 or 450USD. As an mp3 player, it would be much more expensive than its competing brands. On the contrary, if iPhone had kept a high price level but iPod Touch had been set at a low one, the customers would have had been confused for â€Å"why a simplified version of iPhone is so much ‘cheaper’ than iPhone? † That would have had a negative impacts on the sales of both iPhone and iPod Touch, even would have had impaired Apple’s brand image. Combining with what I know about the late development of these two types of products, I found although the price cutting had a temporary harm on customer’s trust, iPhone and iPod Touch both performed well on the market. It proved the importance of keeping the price of iPhone and iPod Touch in a line. 7. â€Å"But the sharp price cut suggested that even Apple, which has long lived in a pricing bubble insulated from other personal computer makers, is not immune from the brutal pressures of the cellular phone business. † Does this statement mean that the personal computers market is different from the cellular phone business in other words, the cellular phone market is more competitive than the personal computer market? Why? Do you share this view? Justify. Answer: From this statement, I can’t make the conclusion that the cell phone market is more competitive than the personal computer market. Apple is one of the earliest personal computer manufacturers in the world. Its personal computer products are behalf of the most advanced PC technology of the world. Especially its graphics processing technology and operating system have high reputation. Thus, Apple’s PC products long lived in a pricing bubble insulated from other personal computer makers. That means Apple has definitely strong market power on PC market. Its high price doesn’t mean there is less competition. Furthermore, the technical innovation, appearance design, and function combination of cell phone products are updating so fast. So the lifecycle of a handset product is shorter than a computer. The price cutting often occurs when a mobile phone has come onto market for a period of time. The objective usually is for making price room for a new generation of product, which isn’t caused by competing activities. In conclusion, I don’t share this view. 8. â€Å"Keeping in mind Apple’s range of high priced products which gives it an â€Å"aura† of exclusivity, was Jobs decision to reduce the price a right one?†¦ With a 50% gross margin, Apple is setting itself up for aggressive price declines going forward†. Do you believe that Apple move is a sign that it is ready to enter a price war? Would this mean that Apple is leaving the niche market position it held for decades to go after mass market? What would be the pros and cons of that strategy? Do you believe it? Answer: The characteristics of Apple’s products are novel design, fashionable appearance and the combination of music, game, music, web surfing and other functions. It determines the positioning of iPhone must be high, and the main target consumer group is high income, music ; digital amateurs. This segment of consumer has low sensitive for price. Pure price war will not yield more market shares for iPhone. So, the price cutting strategy doesn’t mean Apple is ready for the price war. The product’s features determine Apple’s niche market strategy. But a cell phone product innovates relatively faster than other cargos. When a product successfully attracted some first adopters, how to sell them to more followers should be the core problem. Cutting the price and going in to the mass market is a universal method. Apple also adopted this strategy on iPhone. Pros of going to mass market: * iPhone can attract more followers. Some of them are sensitive to the price, their demands are elastic. Before the price cutting and entry of the mass market, some of the non-owners didn’t buy it just because of the high price. * iPhone can expand its market share quicker, and establish the competitive barriers. Its market power will be stronger. * The expanded customers would have had bought more online products, which would have had a big growth of income.By this strategy, iPhone can consolidate their customer-friendly brand image, and increase the loyalty of the customers. * The cooperation with AT;T can get a synergy between these two brands, and can receive a sum of bonus revenue from the carrier. Cons of going to mass market: * It made the brand image be lower than before. * Decreased the gross margin of iPhone. * Hurt some d ie-hards’ loyalty. * Increased the degree of monopoly, made the competition imperfect, and harmed the balance of the benign competition with its rivals. But a cellular phone product such as iPhone goes into the mass market is usually a temporary strategy when the product comes into the mature or declining period in its lifecycle, or when the company wants to make some price room for a new product. Apple cut iPhone’s price was just for keeping the iPhone’s price being in a line with iPod Touch’s. It didn’t mean Apple changed its main branding strategy to go into the mass market. For that time, I assume that it was a reasonable strategy for Apple to cut iPhone’s price.

Historical Perspective Essay Essay

The method that nurses implement nursing care is influenced by research. Nursing theorist has influence to the practice of professional nursing and research. Many of the primitive theorists has help to develop the research from the previous to the current and will continue to the future to integrate research. Research has influence the action nurses consolidate and implement nursing care and process. One of the early primary nursing was Florence Nightingale. Florence Nightingale opened the doors for future researchers and theorist to model professional nursing. Florence Nightingale is the mother of contemporary nursing after coming back from the frontlines of Crimean War in 1856, and she renovated the fatality rate by attending the environment ( George, 2011, chapter 3). During the Crimean War Florence Nightingale offered to help with the nursing task, where she attended and took care of an ailing and injured soldiers. Florence Nightingale would tend to the sick soldiers at all times making sure that they were taken care of getting a clean environment, ventilation, hand washing, lighting and free of noise. Her concept to nursing is the environment. Environment could be modified to progress conditions so that natural ruling could allow healing. An environment model was established to glimpse the control of the physical environment as a major constituent of care ( George, 2011). Nightingale model progress to paradigm in nursing practice and contributes on nursing care and planned rendered to patients. Nurses maintain to practice their profession without attaining that their process and objective are based on Nightingale’s concept. The concept of environmental control serves as a foundation for many research analysis. Nursing theories related to Nightingale’s Environmental Model will continue to guide research and nursing profession. With her theory and concepts the nursing profession has implemented her methods for environmental cleanliness as a guide model in nursing practice to meet the needs of the patients.

Race and Ethics Essay

I think that race could have several meanings depending on the individual. To me, race means â€Å"a group of people that have some same, common physical attributes at one another.† I think that race is society’s way of categorizing certain people into certain groups. Ethnicity is defined as â€Å"The classification of a population that shares common characteristics, such as, religion, traditions, culture, language, and tribal or national origin.† I think that this definition pretty much covers my personal opinion of what ethnicity means. What I didn’t realize is that ethnicity can also cover religion and I never thought religion could fall under ethnicity. I thought that ethnicity only covered skin colour and other physical attributes in people. The concepts are important to United States society in that the U.S. is a melting pot already. It is an equal opportunity country. I think that race and ethnicity are used for several studies to get a good idea of the future of the United States. I think that both of these two concepts are also important to the future of education, policies, laws, opportunities, families, and future views of society. On the other hand, I don’t feel that there is a huge problem at the moment. I think that these concepts are important but I don’t think that the U.S. as a whole looks at race and ethnicity as being a problem. I feel that it’s just the norm when you see other race and ethnicity in the United States.

(writer's choice) Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

(writer's choice) - Essay Example On the whole, it had a relatively simple premise. Gilmore Girls ran for seven seasons from 2000 to 2007 and was primarily known for its fast paced dialogue and pop-culture references. The show focuses on two female characters: Lorelai and her teenage daughter Rory. Lorelai and Rory live in a small town in Connecticut called Stars Hollow and this town is filled with lovable, wacky characters. Lorelai gave birth to Rory as a teenage and it is because of this that they have a very close friendship that differs from Lorelai’s own relationship with her rich parents who she ran away from after having Rory at 16. The difference between these two relationships, particularly between Lorelai and her parents, is often what drives the conflict in an episode. The specific show that I chose to analyze is the fifth episode in the 2nd season entitled â€Å"Nick and Nora/ Sid and Nancy.† Luke, who owns a diner in Stars Hollow and is somewhat of a love interest for Lorelai, brings his troubled nephew, Jess, to live with him. Jess steals from people and is disrespectful which cause Lorelai to give Luke parenting advice. The two characters fight over the situation and eventually make up with Luke realizing that he needs Lorelai’s help occasionally. One important concept in interpersonal communication is biased listening. According to the article entitled â€Å"Types of Listening,† biased listening is defined as â€Å"when the person hears only what they want to hear†¦and misinterprets based on stereotypes and biases†( â€Å"Types of Listening†). In this particular episode of Gilmore Girls, biased listening occurs when Luke and Lorelai have a conversation about Jess when he runs out on a special dinner that Lorelai and her friends cook for him. Lorelai explains how Luke should be going about parenting Jess and Luke decides to only hear the judgment and negativity in what Lorelai says and believes she is unfairly criticizing him. Another important concept in interpersonal

Compare the nazi system of governance with that of the United States Research Paper

Compare the nazi system of governance with that of the United States - Research Paper Example Nazi’s system of governance is Fascist, Totalitarian state type, and United States is a republic federal system (executive in nature) (Avery p.133). The two systems of governance (Nazi and United States) have shared and differing characteristics and this research paper will be a comparison between the two systems of governance. Nazis Totalitarianism and Fascism was a system of governance where dictatorship is dominant, and societal resources are monopolized by the state by using tactics like technology, terror and propaganda. The governance within the state was based on hierarchies that were fully dominated by one political party having one single leader. The one party system does penetrate the entire country using provisional and regional organizations. The leader in this type of system or regime focuses in mobilizing and making use of political participation, groups and communities are lead by local or regional leaders who are charismatic in outlining and championing their l eader’s promises and praises (Mullender pp. 178). The system reflects an aspect of extreme Nationalism which aimed at bringing about uniformity of all the German speaking citizens into one single unitary nation. The economy in Nazis system of governance was based on socialism, a form of corporate type of togetherness. The basis of socialism is that no competition is created and nobody suffers as all the wealth, resources were shared publically together. The Nazism system is based on the use of paramilitary institutions, the institution is created and instituted in order to scare, discourage and subdue opposition parties and maintain party supremacy (Rittberger pp.35). Examples of such paramilitaries include: storm troopers, defense corps, and secret state police. The type of governance system is based on massive use of spies and propaganda, and the philosophy of Elitism is also applied in running the state and other institutions. Elitism involves a process where just few soci al groups or individuals are given the power and authority to lead or rule. In United States, a type of republic government is applied with features of a federal system. The federal system is a system of governance where the state as divided the government into three branches and functions. Each of the branch having its own powers or authorities, but all the branches are been provide with checks and balances that ensures a regulation of reign of superiority with the purpose of legislation, execution and judicial functions. In legislation branch is given the responsibility of making federal laws and consists of senate and house of representations. The executive is given is given the job of enforcing and executing laws of the government. The judicial branch is to apply and interpret laws that are presented to them. The country is a republic because the people have been vested authority democratically to elect and recall back their leaders (Shefter pp.48). The republic or federal syste m is based on popular sovereignty which states that the entire whole power of the government lies on the people. The government needs to address the rights and needs of the people. The power and authority is invested on laws and acts provided by the people of the country and they must be adhered to fully. The basis of checks and balances is helpful in federal system so that one of the three branches of government does not become powerful or misuse any power or authority accorded to them (Shefter

Tax(see attachment) Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 3000 words

Tax(see attachment) - Essay Example Manufacturing parts in UK and then exporting to third world countries is not viable due to various financial factors. Hence the company has decided to set up a manufacturing unit in any of the third world country. This will help the company to maximize its profits, and at the same time give an opportunity to expand and explore new markets. The following report addresses the various issues that have to be considered from international tax perspective while expanding operations offshore. While setting up an overseas operation there are certain very important tax related issues that need to be considered before choosing an appropriate location. The issue might seem to be too complicated initially given the numerous nations and their individual legal and political systems but there appears to be abroad consensus among all the nations of the world regarding tax matters. And, this is surely a matter of utmost relief to companies that intend to operate across political boundaries as tax matters indeed create problems in estimating income earned by a subsidiary, more so what portion of it can be rightly considered as income of the consolidated entity. However, with the phenomenal rise of multinational corporations, the vexatious issue of which state should rightfully tax which portion of the income of a multinational business entity still poses certain questions for which unambiguous answers are hard to come by. Legally speaking, every state has the jurisdiction to impose tax, irrespective of whether the tax is generated within the domestic territory of the state (source country) or it is generated outside the domestic territory but by a legal entity that is normally resident of the state (residence country). In the international taxation regime that is adhered to by almost all the countries of the world, the country where the tax is generated has the first right to tax

Sitcom morality Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

Sitcom morality - Essay Example A number of cultural trends that are taken for granted today had their genesis in the 1950s. It was a time when large suburban developments took root, education became a national priority and television was introduced to the American public. It was a very â€Å"buttoned down,† conservative era, known for its suppression of social movements, such as the ones fought for civil rights and counter-culture music. Both, however, exploded in the 1960s, becoming the calling cards of that decade. â€Å"Leave It to Beaver† portrayed an iconic family, headed by a typical suburban couple, Ward and June Cleaver. Their two sons were Wally and his younger brother Theodore (Beaver). Presented from a child’s point of view, the show was filled with moral instruction and tips on the â€Å"proper† way to live one’s life. The value of a good education was a constant theme, reflecting the mores of the era. If anything, the family in â€Å"Married With Children† depicted the very opposite of the 1950s view, as the show consistently poked fun at conservative concepts of morality. Headed by Al and Peggy Bundy, with children Kelly and Bud, the sitcom openly mocked mainstream institutions like education, and became the very definition for the perceived immorality of the 1980s. While the dissimilarities between the two sitcoms are legion, they were also alike in a number of ways. Although not nearly as supportive as the Cleavers, the Bundys were known for sticking together to deal with outside threats to the family, despite their incessant internal bickering. Although infidelity is certainly bandied about in â€Å"Married,† neither Al nor Peggy is ever unfaithful, something that would have been all but unthinkable in the iconic â€Å"Beaver† setting. While the concept of the nuclear family was on the upswing in the 1950s, by the ‘80s and ‘90s it was definitely under assault. The proportion of traditional two-parent households declined significantly

Flim Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Flim - Essay Example Wishing we had never existed instead because our life is a total failure in its current form? That is the premise of the movie â€Å"Its a Wonderful Life† by Frank Capra. First released in 1946, this Christmas drama was originally based on the short story â€Å"The Greatest Gift† by Phillip Van Doren. The movie starred James Stewart as George Bailey, a self-sacrificing man who is willing to put his own dreams on hold in order to help those in his town achieve theirs. He inherited a money lending business from his father that, due to the economic depression caused by the war, was on the verge of bankruptcy. In order to prevent a bank run, George tried to commit suicide but is prevented from doing so by his guardian angel Clarence Odbody (Henry Travers). Influenced by A Christmas Carol themes, Clarence sets about saving George by showing him how the town would have turned out much differently if he and his business had never become a part of the lives of the townsfolk. In the end, George realizes that his life has not been a complete failure and that his life is â€Å"wonderful† just as it is, specially with the town residents coming to the aid of his failing bank by contributing more money to save it. The movie in itself is a study of the history of the banking history. With no real banking system existing at the end of the 19th century, small money lenders helped the town business by accepting cash deposits from clients that could then be lent out to business owners. This lending institution known as the savings and loan system would become the bedrock of the great American dream. However, it came at a great price. Remember the term â€Å"Bank Run†? It was first used in this movie to explain how the antagonist, Mr. Potter refused to open up the coffers of the town bank to the people in order to help them survive to their next paycheck by giving them loans or allowing them to withdraw their deposits. He is the representation of everything that is

Positioning Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Positioning - Essay Example Product positioning should be focused not only on the present, but should be adaptable for the product and the marketplace in the long term also. (Hiebing Jr., Roman G.; Cooper, Scott W. 2003 pp.145-146). Product positioning focuses on the attributes of the specific product in a market type. First of all, it is essential to understand how the product outperforms the competitors. Adroitly picking one or two key product attributes which are superior as compared to the competition, is important. Attacking competitors along axes corresponding to these attributes is the next critical step. The axes may be: feature/ technology, price/ performance, and channel/ margin axis. In entering an existing market, product positioning specifically influences the value customers place on its new features. (Blank, Steven G. 2006 p.46). Brand positioning is a process of establishing and managing: the images, perceptions, and associations that the consumer applies to the product, based on the values and beliefs associated with the product. These are managed through application of the brand positioning elements (name and graphic components) consistent with the product’s positioning, in all target market communication relating to the company, product or service. Brand represents the values, the personality and the experience that people associate with the company. A brand provides a point of reference: a reason to choose the company, product or service over the competition. (Hiebing, Jr., Roman G.; Cooper, A product like chewing gum can be positioned by Mapping: mapping out visually what is important to your target market in terms of key product attributes. Most effective when based on quantitative research that is representative of the marketplace. This positioning approach will also help to more clearly evaluate how the product and the key competition are perceived on each attribute. The three steps

Organizational Behavior-Syllabus Essay Example for Free

Organizational Behavior-Syllabus Essay I. Course Information Intelligence and technical knowledge will only take you so far in your work and private lives. My goal is to introduce you to behavior in organization (and of organizations) in a way that stresses you personal behavioral skill development. In other words, the course should help you assess your strengths and weaknesses and will stress how you can enhance and improve your management skills. To that end, the course stresses a mix of assessment tests for each chapter to give you a personal point of departure for learning and skill development, along with basic theory and cases and role plays to examine examples of situations and skills that we are studying. This is a hands-on course. I expect students to come to class prepared to learn and to participate! Course Objectives: 1) To provide students with knowledge and understanding of the basic principles of organizational behavior (i.e. human behavior in organizations). 2) The course includes both theoretical and practical aspects of OB and is designed to offer introductory knowledge, skills, and perspectives in OB that can be useful for students’ professional and academic careers. II. Course Learning Outcomes: On completion of this course, students should be able to: 1ï ¼Å½ Understand the basic principles of organizational behavior (i.e. human behavior in organizations). 2ï ¼Å½ Be equipped with introductory knowledge, skills, and perspectives in OB that can be useful for students’ professional and academic careers. Teaching and Learning Activities: 1. Lecture 2. In class exercises, small group discussion 3. Team Presentations 4. Final Exam III. Assessment In addition to attendance and engagement in classroom discussion, all items discussed in class including all materials assigned as ‘Required’ reading may be used to assess students’ progress in the class. The methods of assessment include the following: Personal Journal A skills-based OB course centers upon assisting you to assess your strengths and weaknesses, developing a learning plan to redress these and regular reflection about how you can apply the skills and concepts learned outside the classroom. Keeping a journal is the best way to facilitate this. To ensure you get off to a timely start, I shall ask for some specific assignments that constitute part of the journal to be handed in for credit. Examples include the self- assessment of strengths and weaknesses based upon the online assessment (class 2), and other individual exercises in the textbook. You can fulfill the first assignment online at http://www.passovoy.com/assessment/sal/quick.html. You are required to complete a minimum of 8 assessments. In some cases, you will be surprised by what you learn about yourself – both positive and negative. Each student is required to write a maximum two-page single-spaced typed write-up regarding what you learned about yourself. Final Exam A written in-class exam will be given on May 14, 2012. The format of the exam is a combination of multiple-choice and/true-false questions, and are based on lecture and text materials. Many questions are applied and require you to analyze and synthesize OB concepts. Please prepare early for the exams and come to class with any questions or concerns you may have prior to the exam date. Do not feel uncomfortable asking questions. Other students will also benefit from the discussion. Top Five Take-Aways This assignment provides a final opportunity for you to synthesize and share your learning with the class. Reflect on your learning in this class and write up a list of your â€Å"Top Five Take-Aways† from the course. Explain why you chose each concept, how you have utilized it in your own life, and how you think it will help you in your future role as a leader. There is no set length of the paper. That depends on your learning. You are required to turn in a hard copy. Single-spacing, please. Obviously you will not be graded on whether your choice of a learning point is valid or not. Your learning is your learning. Your grade will be based on how well you explain that concept’s application to your life. Your presentation in class will be fairly informal. Each member of the class will have about a minute or so to share a point or two about your most important learning from the course. It is simply an opportunity to reflect on your learning with your peers. Sometimes hear ing what is important to other people can also contribute to your own learning. Group Project Learning to work effectively in groups is a critical work skill. On day one, you will be asked to form groups (final membership to be handed into me by the third meeting. With your group, you will have two assignments. The first is to develop a team learning notebook, recording team responses to case discussion questions throughout the semester. The team learning notebook will be collected during the mid-point of the course (6th week), as well as the end of the course (12th week) . The second assignment is to conduct a 20 minutes presentation on a topic of your choice related to the topic on the day selected by your group. Further information will be given in class and sign up is on a first-come first –serve basis. If any group member expresses displeasure with group process and contributions of others shall used a peer evaluation form. Each individuals contribution will be identified on the peer evaluation form I will provide and that will be confidential (i.e., your group members will not see your evaluation of their participation). All group members should participate equally to obtain full credit for the assignment. For example, if the assignment receives a grade of 8.5 out of 10 and your group gives you 100% participation rate, then you will receive the total 8.5 points. If your group gives you less than 100% participation, your grade will be adjusted accordingly. Evaluation of your peers should help you maintain an appropriate level of participation from all of your group members. IV.Course Policies Academic Dishonesty: Assignments found to have been plagiarized or an exam in which cheating is found to have occurred will receive a grade of ‘zero’.

Pneumatic Auto Gear Changer Project

Pneumatic Auto Gear Changer Project (a) Introduction 1.1 This career episode is based on my design and fabrication project carried out during the penultimate year of my bachelors degree in Mechanical Engineering at Rajiv Gandhi College of Engineering (Anna University Affiliated)-Sriperumbudur, Tamil Nadu state, India. Established in 2001, it is a self-financed and one of the best engineering institutes in Tamil Nadu. The project was completed over a period of 3 months from December 2012 to March, 2013. (b) Background 1.2 The project on Pneumatic Auto Gear Changer was carried out in order to understand and implement theories in gear change application. Its purpose was to analyze the various steps involved and to provide recommendations for a real world use of this technology. I carried out this project as a part of a group of four people. In this project, a push button was used to activate/deactivate a solenoid valve and at the time of gear changing, the switch was triggered and the solenoid valve was activated. This in turn causes the compressed air to go through the pneumatic cylinder. The compressed air pushes the pneumatic cylinder as it passes through a tube and henceforth changes the gear from one speed to the other with the help of a gear box arrangement. 1.3 The automatic gear changing structure is relatively useful in low cost automation in all automobiles. Pneumatic systems work at higher speeds and the manpower requirement is reduced due to this project. The design and the implementation of this project in the real world application was made and a detailed report was submitted. This project work was supervised under Mr. Manoj Kumar, the associate professor in the department of mechanical engineering at Rajiv Gandhi College of Engineering. As it was an open ended project, I had to look up through several online journals, document reviews and also took guidance from the head of the department on various projects and ideas. The project time was quite limited and had to be come up with a proper design plan before the actual start of the project. This proved to be quite a challenging task as this was the first real world project in my career. However, I was completely aware of the fact that, these would be the kind of challenges and problems I would face in real life as a professional engineer. Some of the duties I was involved in during the course of this project were as follows: I carried out an extensive study on various materials relating to the pneumatic systems. Since, there was no specific consensus on the selection of compressors, I had to select the one that best suited the requirements of the project while considering all the technical aspects. I also dealt with the equipment suppliers on behalf of my team to purchase the necessary materials needed for the project. I attended meetings with my supervisor to discuss individual observation and the progress of the project. I presented this project to the department faculties and also completed an extensive project report. (c) Personal Engineering Activity As a first step of the project, I explained my thoughts on doing this project to my supervisor. I carried out my research regarding the project and presented him the importance of the project before carrying out the project.ÂÂ   The present scenario gear changer plays a vital role in automobiles.ÂÂ   Manual transmissions have become uncommon in many cases of cars sold across Australia, North America and some parts of Asia. However, they remain dominant in parts of Europe and other developing countries. Hence, I did an analysis on the present day vehicles equipped with automatic transmission option and those that are not and further highlighted the importance of the project in the present and future of automobiles as well as in certain machineries. After deciding on the project, I carried out numerous literature reviews in order to come up with an appropriate design plan and to acquire the necessary equipment needed for the project. However, the articles and writings published on the topic was quite limited and were available for only specific cases.ÂÂ   As my project was regarding the project pneumatic gear changer, I did my extensive research on the pneumatic side of the project. Furthermore, I reviewed the advantages of pneumatic system and discussed with my supervisor for the usability in the project. Pneumatic system and was best considered due to its following reasons: The pneumatic system power output could be easily controlled Over loading does not affect the pneumatic systems The pneumatic system could be used at varying working temperatures Transportation of air through pipelines over long distances can be easily done with pneumatics in place. Pneumatics enables high working speeds It is a system which requires minimal upkeep. In this project, I used a reciprocating compressor as the key component for the supply of compressed air. I selected the appropriate equipment for the project after evaluating the suitability of information acquired from several sources. A compressor is an instrument that sucks in air and gas at an optimum pressure and deliverers the air back at a higher pressure as the output. It was very important for my project to select the appropriate compressor as pneumatic systems operate primarily on the supply of both compressed air and pressure into the system. Moreover, I had to make sure, clean conditions were maintained during the phase of the project as warm and moist air could result in precipitation of condense from the compressed air. The following is the schematic diagram of pneumatic auto gear changer used in this project. Figure 1: Schematic diagram of pneumatic auto gear changer I also considered an important element for this project which was the push button. The push button switch was fixed near the driving seat of the vehicle. Besides this, I had set up an air tank with fully filled compressed air in it. Prior to gear changing, the solenoid valve was activated by triggering the switch. The compressed air streamed from the air tank to the pneumatic cylinder as the solenoid valve was open. Likewise, at the time of compressed air inlet into the cylinder, the pneumatic cylinder moved forward and the gear box liver moved along automatically from one position to the next. The gear box liver was further activated which allowed the vehicle running at different speeds. I have highlighted the advantages of this type to my supervisor and was duly approved and appreciated by him. They are as follows: It required simple maintenance cares A safe system for the automobile. Easy to Handle. Low cost automation project Repairing was easy. Easy replacement. However, some of the disadvantages of this type were as follows: Initial cost was high. The system was a complicated one. During the course of this project, I used a control valve to control the flow direction within the system. I also used a 3/2 single acting solenoid valve, having one inlet, outlet and an exhaust port. The air entered the pneumatic single acting solenoid valve once the push button was activated. Moreover, I introduced a pneumatic shifter to the whole design as it works through compressed air power. So once the gear changing signals were received, the pneumatic shifter opens or closes the magnetic valve assembly. The compressed air flows into the system once these valves are open, or thrusts it out thereby creating the effect of shifting gear mechanism. More compressed air into the system allowed the gear to be shifted up and the gear shifted down as the air was let. Furthermore, I used an on-board tank to get this compressed air to the cylinder even though I knew re-routing the engine exhaust could be a possibility and be economically viable however, it would result in lower performan ce as most of the oxygen present in the exhaust gas would already be burnt. Figure 2: Schematic of a 3/2 single acting solenoid valve After the analysis on various aspects of this project, I discussed my project outcomes and my results.ÂÂ   Putting all the information to use, I wrote the final report titled Pneumatic Auto Gear Changer and presented this to my department professors and to the head of the department. (d) Summary This project presented me with the opportunity to understand the applications of theoretical knowledge that I had acquired in class rooms to implement in a real world project.ÂÂ   Discussions during the project with the supervisor provided great insight to challenges presented throughout the project.ÂÂ   The challenges uncovered were resolved by use of appropriate technical skills. This project also helped me understand the working and execution of any engineering project and served as a stepping stone to the real world. Overall, I am very happy that I could contribute myself effectively to this project at its various stages and also helped to secure the highest possible grade for this project.

Important Attributes Of Body Language Cultural Studies Essay

Important Attributes Of Body Language Cultural Studies Essay An ideal manager avoids adaptors that convey negative meaning e.g. fidgeting or playing with objects to indicate nervousness. Also, an ideal manager effectively utilizes various gestures, which are referred to as kinesics by researchers, to give clues that he / she is actively listening to a conversation or to communicate his / her agreement or disagreement over an argument. Facial expression and eye contact: Facial expressions convey various human emotions and an ideal manager uses facial management techniques to convey right expression at right time. Managers can exhibit confidence and earn credibility by making and maintaining constant eye contact with their audience. Personal space: Although not a direct part of nonverbal communication giving appropriate personal space to a person depending upon his / her preference, liking, gender and age is a key consideration for an ideal manager while trying to project a good image. Touch: At workplace an ideal manager can use touch to communicate nonverbally either in a social context or business context. The professional touch is businesslike and impersonal. The external factors that affect the body language of a manager at work place are: Regional effects: An ideal manager should be aware of the regional interpretations of various body language signals e.g. nodding of head might signal a yes in some regions whereas same gesture may be interpreted as a no in others. Gender effects: The gender of a manager affects the message communicated by his / her body language. Status effects: Body language signals given and interpreted by individuals depend upon the status that the person holds in society or at workplace. Managers at various levels in hierarchy in an organization need to adopt different style of nonverbal communication. Culture effects: The degree and rules of expression of some aspects of nonverbal communication differ across cultures. With increasing globalization a manager should be cognizant of the cultural context of the audience to be able to effectively utilize nonverbal communication. REPORT TEXT TABLE OF CONTENT OVERVIEW Turabian / Chicago style of formatting has been followed while creating this report. Business and managerial communication may be defined as the use of language or graphics in business. While the two important parts of managerial communication viz. written and oral communications take center stage, managers tend to overlook nonverbal communication which forms an equally important aspect of their communication. Nonverbal communication may constitute two-thirds or more of total communication. Since nonverbal signals can be very helpful in responding to others and making stronger connections with clients and colleagues they can be used by managers to create an impression about themselves. Body language plays a very important role in our day-to-day business activities. Since a role of manager demands that he / she achieves the goals with or through other people the need for good interpersonal skills becomes increasingly important. Nonverbal communication forms a very important part of interpersonal communication along with verbal and written communication. Mastering nonverbal communication helps manager decode the silent signals of others and align their body language with the attitude they want to project thus gaining a competitive advantage in business. Excelling in nonverbal communication can help manager excel in following areas: Leadership: To be able to influential as a leader it is important for managers to understand the message that employees want to communicate both verbally and nonverbally and to be able to effectively communicate congruently by aligning spoken words with their body language. Negotiation: Acquiring understanding of body language helps manager correctly read between the lines of what people are saying. This can act as an effective tool along with ability to establish credibility using good body language in process of negotiation. Sales: Ability to convey nonverbal cues effectively helps manager sell their ideas and products. Customer service: Understanding customers needs by their nonverbal signals can go a long way in delivering customer delight. Given the importance that nonverbal communication holds in professional life of a manager it is very important to understand various attributes that are associated with body language of an ideal manager and factors that affect the same. This research has been undertaken to analyze these attributes and their impact on communicating nonverbal cues effectively by a manager. This report outlines the analysis of these attributes and factors and draws some conclusions that will be helpful for managers to understand how they can effectively incorporate nonverbal communication at workplace. PROBLEM STATEMENT AND SCOPE The purpose of this research is to identify and analyze: What are the attributes that affect the body language of a manager? How can a manager effectively incorporate nonverbal cues to align body language with verbal communication? What are the external factors that affect nonverbal communication? The scope of this research is limited to: Nonverbal communication at workplace Nonverbal communication for managers RESEARCH ANALYSIS ESSENTIAL ATTRIBUTES OF BODY LANGUAGE OF AN IDEAL MANAGER In the workplace, people can convey a great deal of information without even speaking; this is called nonverbal communication. Nonverbal communication can convey more than written and verbal communication, and human beings read and react to these nonverbal signals in the workplace. As per the cited study by Prof. Albert Mehrabian of UCLA, words, tone of voice and body language account for 7%, 38% and 55% of personal communication. Body language is kind of nonverbal communication that involves body movement and gestures, which communications researchers call kinesics. There are numbers of possible signs that can be communicated through body movements and gestures. In addition to body movements and gestures, the nonverbal cues can be expressed through facial expressions and eye contact, personal space, and touch, influence individual interactions in the workplace. In present dynamic business scenario, the quality of a good Manager seeks to communicate effectively through Non Verbal cue s i.e. body movements and gestures, facial expression etc. Body movement and gestures: Movement and gestures are key components of body language. Gestures or movements of the head, hands, arms, and legs can be used to convey specific messages that have important linguistic translations.Here are some helping tips to use gestures and movement effectively: How to stand: One should stand with feet shoulder-width apart, knees relaxed. Body weight should be evenly distributed on both feet. Nervous pacing or shifting of one foot to other needs to be avoided. Stand up straight. Ones shoulders should be back and his/her head held high so he/she can make eye contact. This particular posture shows confidence and helps one breathe more fully. What to do with your hands: Hands always need to place in the neutral position, hanging loosely at both sides, so they will be available for natural gestures. Both arms folded across the chest is a universal gesture that signifies defensiveness or negativity. It signals an attempt to hide from an unfavourable situation. It can also signify disagreement, discontentment or discomfort. An ideal Manager should always be aware of these facts. Hands in pockets to be avoided since it can lead to a sloppier posture. Hands should be empty. Hand gesture can be used in conveying many important messages. If one must hold something (notes or the PowerPoint remote), he must be aware of what he is doing. One must not point at the audience. How to Use Gestures: Gestures can help in communicating ones ideas and a little goes a long way. Use of a variety of smooth, deliberate and natural gestures supports and visually illustrates a Managers message very effectively to audiences. A relaxed posture while walking or during a meeting always needs to be maintained. Relaxed posture indicates one is comfortable in his/her surroundings and not under stress. Even if in a stressful work atmosphere, one Managers calmness and relaxed posture help others around to feel more comfortable and to have more faith in his abilities to lead and delegate responsibilities. In workplace, it is often common that we offer handshake when we are introduced to a new individual. Handshake is a gesture of welcome: The interlocking of palms signifies openness and the touching signifies solidarity. The styles of handshakes are generally governed by the attitudes of a person, namely a) Dominance b) Submission c) Equality. For a manager, it is important ge nerally in a workplace, he goes with the equality attitude. Researchers also categorize certain nonverbal behaviours called adaptors, which are typically unconscious behaviours and are used when a person is tense or anxious. Examples of adaptors are adjusting ones clothes, biting ones nails, cracking of knuckles, or fidgeting and toying with an object. These indicate to others that a person is upset or nervous, and such kind of behaviour during a meeting with a co-worker may be interpreted very negatively. A Manager engaged in such behaviour may be seen as preoccupied or anxious. Gestures and movement provide the visuals that accompany your words. Learning to use them effectively helps to convey ones message with confidence and the audience will see the message instead of just hearing it. But use any gesture that is irrelevant to the message is strictly not recommended. Facial expressions and eye contact: Facial expressions and eye contacts are types of nonverbal communication that go very closely with body language and can have an noticeable effect on business relations. Researchers have found that people can identify with great accuracy seven separate human emotions, even after seeing only facial and eye expressions: sadness, happiness, anger, fear, surprise, contempt, and interest. Therefore, without speaking a word, a facial expression can convey a great deal of information to others. The face is the primary source of emotions. Similarly, eye contact or lack of eye contact can also indicate a persons attitudes and emotions. There are hundreds of languages in the world, but a smile speaks them all. A simple smile can make others feel more at ease where a frown can make people see that one is aggressive or unsure of something. We use facial expressions to get our points across in the right context. For example, your message would suffer if you were saying how angry you are with a hu ge smile. Similarly use of positive facial expression with a genteel smile becomes very effective while a Manager tries to convince one of his clients. Eye movement is a key part of facial behaviour because the eyes are invariably involved in facial displays.When someone talks to you, do they look directly at you or look away? Maintaining eye contact when talking (or listening) to someone gives an impression that one is confident and honest. Making little eye contact gives a different kind of impression, like one is nervous or shy. The direct stare of the speaker can show candour or openness. Downward glances are generally associated with modesty; eyes rolled upwards are conveyed as a sign of fatigue. Personal space: Researchers use the term proxemic to describe the way that a person uses space in communication. Each individual has a personal space, which is like an invisible bubble surrounding them. This bubble becomes larger or smaller, depending on the person with whom we interact. We are comfortable standing or sitting closer to someone we like and standing or sitting at a distance with someone we dislike or dont know well. However, the amount of personal space that a person desires depends on many characteristics, including culture, situation, closeness of relationship, gender and age. One can use physical space to communicate many different nonverbal messages, including signals of intimacy, aggression, dominance, or affection. The most important observation one can make about a room full of people is the personal space each person commands. Human nature dictates that people considered more powerful are typically awarded greater personal space by the other people in the room. Research data s hows that, while interacting with friends, relatives, or conducting casual business, most people prefer a distance of one and a half to four feet. When conducting formal or impersonal business, most individuals prefer a personal space of 4 to 8 feet. Therefore, a person is likely to be more comfortable standing closely to a trusted co-worker than to a new customer. A good Manager must be aware of these kinds of behaviours to effectively convey his/her position and authority. Touch: In the workplace, people may use touch to communicate nonverbally. The functional-professional touch is business-like and impersonal. The social-polite touch, such as a handshake, is much more common. This type of touch is used to recognize other individuals. It is an expected touch in many business settings. Finally, the friendship-warmth touch shows how one treats another as a person. A pat on the back or a hug is a friendship-warmth touch. In most workplaces, the social-polite touch is the only necessary touch, and most Managers are encouraged to avoid the friendship-warmth touch in the workplace. Many people see a hand on a shoulder or a pat on the back as a useful touch to convey encouragement or concern for anothers well-being. Finally, personal space and touch are used differently in different nations. Americans tend to prefer larger amounts of personal space than do some Indians, Latin Americans, Italians, and Middle-Easterners. Germans, Chinese, and Japanese prefer larger am ounts of personal space, similar to what Americans prefer. Thus, when conducting business with people from other cultures, it is important to understand and respect their personal space needs. EXTERNAL FACTORS THAT AFFECT NONVERBAL COMMUNICATION Regional effects: Â  People across the world recognize a set of common gestures. For an ideal manager, this is a great boon as there is no huge task of ensuring that his/her non-verbal cues are not misinterpreted. It is however important that the ideal manager is aware of the differences of meaning. For example, research shows that the shoulder shrug is a universal gesture. It means that the person who makes the gesture does not know whatever was asked for him. Gestures like clapping would mean calling somebody or could mean just plain applause. Although greetings change cross different countries, there are number of features which are common: Close Proximity, direct orientation, eyebrow flash, smiling, mutual gaze, body contact, presenting the pal,- either visibly or for shaking. Similarly, gestures that denote emotions are very similar across cultures. Gender effects: The gender also decides the interpretation of gestures. For a male manager if he is in doing a presentation, with his hands in his pockets, it will be seen as gesture which shows his nervousness or insecurity. However the same gesture when a woman does, it is interpreted as aggression. Status effects: Research studies have shown that high-ranking officials resort to fewer gestures than their subordinates. The less educated rely more on gestures than on communication based on words. Culture effects: Different cultures have different interpretations of nonverbal cues. Moreover, an acceptable gesture in one culture might be considered as an offensive one in another culture. Hence, it becomes very important to take into consideration the cultural context of the audience while trying to use nonverbal communication. An ideal manager, equipped with knowledge of culture effects on body language, can effectively use nonverbal cues to communicate with target audience. CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS Body language constitutes 55% of the person communication of a manager. The image projected of an ideal manager is the sum total of various attributes of his non verbal communication; body movement, eye contact, touch and personal space. There are variations in the body language of a manager, depending on the set environment and sex. In spite of these extraneous influences, it is possible to identify some typical behavioral patterns that define his/her personality in positive and negative way. Many researches and observation have provided some standards for the observable attributes of the body language of an ideal manager. Body language of a manager is an integral part of communication across businesses and regional settings. There are some expected/favored attributes that can be developed to project an ideal image of a manager. Though these non-verbal communications are in a way natural reflection of overall social and educational upbringing of a being, these can be developed as well. The study of body language is a developed science and provides sufficient aids to a keen learner. There are some regional, status and gender influences on the body language and these distinctions are imperative to be known to managers communicating with wide range of people across geographies and culture. APPENDIX RESEARCH DATA Sketch of personality of the manager as defined by his / her body language: Nonverbal Message/Body Language Typical Interpretation Making Direct Eye Contact Self-Confident, Assertive, Friendly, Sincere Avoiding Eye Contact Nervous, Evasive, Indifferent, Passive Erect posture (head up, shoulders back) Self-confident, Assertive Smiling Contended, Understanding, Encouraging Clenching hands Nervous, Anxious, Fearful Shaking Head Disagreeing, Shocked, Disbelieving Biting the lip Worried, Anxious Raising eyebrows Disbelieving, Surprising Folding arms Defensive, Disagreeing Open arms Receptive Leaning forward Attentive, Interested Patting on the back Encouraging, Congratulatory, Consoling Fidgeting Impatient, Nervous Chin Stroking Making a decision Slouching in seat Bored, Uninterested Eye roll Dismissive gesture that indicates superiority Tilted to one side Showing interest Scratching the head Bewildered REFERENCES Kurien, Daisy. 2010. Body Language: Silent Communicator at the Workplace. The IUP Journal of Soft Skills, Vol. IV, Nos. 1 and 2: 29-36 Zhou, Hui and Zhang, Tingqin. 2010. Body Language in Business Negotiation. International Journal of Business and Management, Vol. 3, No. 2, http://www.ccsenet.org/journal /index.php/ijbm/article/viewFile/1680/1588 (accessed 18 August 2010): 90-96 Dumbrava, Gabriela and Koronka, Adriana. 2009. Actions Speak Louder Than Words Body Language in Business Communication. Annals of the University of PetroÃ…Å ¸ani, Economics, 9(3): 249-254

The Native Perspective of Urban Education Essay -- Education

I. Introduction: This essay reports the state of urban and rural educational development in public schools, while also focusing on New Orleans public education system. In the literature, we explore factors both internal and exclusive as well as factors external and inclusive that contribute to the quandaries of K-12 education in America. To be clear public education as a whole is not in crisis. Children in more affluent school districts gain a comparative advantage over their impoverished peers because they have strong investments tied to the communities overall success. In turn, these children are able to go further with more resources readily available to them. However, children in less affluent school districts face serious educational shortcomings due to little investment in the beggared communities surrounding the school. It is more accurate to say that America has two systems of public education. The first system, based principally, but not entirely in the suburbs of America and in wealthier urban districts, is in many respects mediocre, specifically in comparison to international peers in advanced industrial nations. However, the second system, based principally in poorer urban and rural areas, is an absolute failure; in which an exceeding number of students dropout well before high school graduation. An astounding number of students receive high school diplomas that do not certify academic confidence in basic subjects. An outstanding number of students are unprepared for the world of employment. An incredible number of students are unprepared to matriculate to institutions of higher education or advanced training. In this essay, I shall focus on the small yet significant aspect of this educational crisis bey... ...rs—not eliminated in all cases, but closed substantially in many cases. This is in part because a higher percentage of the expenditures in the poorer districts are now being picked up by the states. Likewise, the federal government also picks up expenditures through compensatory education programs. So while money matters, it is not the only thing that matters. School safety and discipline matter significantly. The quality of teachers matters considerably. Support from parents and the surrounding community matters radically. And a culture of learning matters drastically. Hence, all of those things must be attended to; at the same time, we must concentrate on the preexisting and remaining gaps in resources. This study points to the disparities of public education in historically poor minority communities and the steps necessary to address the issues. (Developing)

Essays --

Enviro Geo 1 CP: Take Home Final Exam Unit One Review: Biodiversity A. What is biodiversity? Biodiversity is the variety of life and all natural processes found on Earth. B. Why is global biodiversity decreasing? The main cause of the decrease in global biodiversity is the result of human activity. This means habitat destruction, hunting, invasive species, pollution, and climate change that threaten the extinction of species. C. How can we protect and preserve biodiversity? One way we can preserve and protect biodiversity is through the law. Right now, legal actions are being made to save species from extinction. For example, the Endangered Species Act (ESA) forbids the government and private citizens from harming listed endangered and threatened species or their habitats. Also Species Survival Plans (SSP) are made to manage, protect, and reintroduce threatened and endangered species by putting them into captivity until safe to be released. D. How do energy and nutrients move through ecosystems? a. (reference food webs/food chains/energy pyramids) Energy and nutrients move throughout the ecosystem through the consumption of other creatures. This transfers energy to the next consumer, however it transfers smaller and smaller amounts of energy as the chain of consumers grows larger. E. THE BIG QUESTION: Why is it important to protect biodiversity? Biodiversity increases an ecosystem’s productivity; meaning all species play huge roles in it, especially humans since they have the ability to completely change nature. Humans heavily depend on plants and animals and benefit directly from diverse ecosystems: plants, clean water, oxygen, food, and fertile land all come from healthy bio... ...ding then transforming into Industrial agriculture with the advancements of technology. B. How can we produce enough food for a rapidly growing population while sustaining our ability to produce it? Our world today faces the problem of running out of space. We need not only land to live on, but also land to cultivate crops. Already forty percent of Earth’s land is used for farming purposes, and with a population over seven billion and still rapidly growing, the main problem is, There isn’t enough room. So the price of food is raising. Right now, one billion people are suffering from hunger, they can’t afford the food that is taking up living space, so if we cut down more forests and destroy nature, will the prices go down? The best way to produce enough food for our population as of now is to use our resources more efficiently and reduce our wastes of food. Essays -- Enviro Geo 1 CP: Take Home Final Exam Unit One Review: Biodiversity A. What is biodiversity? Biodiversity is the variety of life and all natural processes found on Earth. B. Why is global biodiversity decreasing? The main cause of the decrease in global biodiversity is the result of human activity. This means habitat destruction, hunting, invasive species, pollution, and climate change that threaten the extinction of species. C. How can we protect and preserve biodiversity? One way we can preserve and protect biodiversity is through the law. Right now, legal actions are being made to save species from extinction. For example, the Endangered Species Act (ESA) forbids the government and private citizens from harming listed endangered and threatened species or their habitats. Also Species Survival Plans (SSP) are made to manage, protect, and reintroduce threatened and endangered species by putting them into captivity until safe to be released. D. How do energy and nutrients move through ecosystems? a. (reference food webs/food chains/energy pyramids) Energy and nutrients move throughout the ecosystem through the consumption of other creatures. This transfers energy to the next consumer, however it transfers smaller and smaller amounts of energy as the chain of consumers grows larger. E. THE BIG QUESTION: Why is it important to protect biodiversity? Biodiversity increases an ecosystem’s productivity; meaning all species play huge roles in it, especially humans since they have the ability to completely change nature. Humans heavily depend on plants and animals and benefit directly from diverse ecosystems: plants, clean water, oxygen, food, and fertile land all come from healthy bio... ...ding then transforming into Industrial agriculture with the advancements of technology. B. How can we produce enough food for a rapidly growing population while sustaining our ability to produce it? Our world today faces the problem of running out of space. We need not only land to live on, but also land to cultivate crops. Already forty percent of Earth’s land is used for farming purposes, and with a population over seven billion and still rapidly growing, the main problem is, There isn’t enough room. So the price of food is raising. Right now, one billion people are suffering from hunger, they can’t afford the food that is taking up living space, so if we cut down more forests and destroy nature, will the prices go down? The best way to produce enough food for our population as of now is to use our resources more efficiently and reduce our wastes of food.

Nursing in Alabama

The focal point of this paper is to look into the aspects of nursing profession in Alabama. Nursing profession in Alabama could be regarded as a profession that is on a high note lately. In 2000 it was reported that there are about 41,500 nurses in Alabama who are legally licensed as RN or registered nurses. It is also reported that at current date there are about 85% of these nurses who are actively on the go with their profession and are employed with different agencies and institutions. This number is about 34,000 as on 2000. One interesting observation about the profession of nursing in Alabama is that the population per 100000 consist 765 registered nurses. This is lower than the national rate as it is 780 per 100000 people. (Sen, 2001) In the same year, 2000, the state of Alabama ranked quite well at 10 under the parameter of employment of vocational or licensed practical nurses among other states.   However, it should also be looked after that out of a population per 100000 individuals the total number of licensed practical nurses was 330. This was much higher than the national rate of licensed practical nurse at it stands at 240 per 100000 individuals. But when it comes to total number of licensed practical nurses Alabama scores average at 19th with the sum total being 15000 workers.   However, it should be mentioned that the number of nurse practitioners in 2000 in the state of Alabama was 1400 which is almost at par with the national index of nurse practitioners. . (Sen, 2001) Though it is true that Nursing salaries, like physician salaries, vary by experience, location and specialization it should be noted that on an average a nurse can earn $10-$20 per hour in Alabama, with an additional housing subsidy and this pay can get even higher in areas of high living like Chicago San Francisco or New York. It has been estimated that this amount can rise for traveling nurses to $24-$35 per hour and is almost double the amount of the average stationary nurse. For records, California offers the most number of jobs for traveling nurses. However, it should also be mentioned that the profession of traveling nurse is short termed and a part time job. Usually sums up to 3-4 months in a year or for 45 days on an average out of a year of 365 days. (Mukherjee, 2004) Education is a vital aspect in the field of nursing. MSN or Master of Science in Nursing Program follows a well formulated Terminal Objectives that is very relevant in both medical and administrative level. In general sense the MSN Terminal Objectives includes a general Administration-MSN Track followed by an Education or MSN Track. The next MSN Terminal Objectives that follow after these are The RN-MSN Degree and The Coordinated MSN or MBA Option followed by a Nursing Education Certificate Program. Next there is the UT Southwester Women’s Health Care Nurse Practitioner MSN Completion and The MSN-NP Degree. Shortly after this there is Admission to UT Tyler MSN, MSN or MBA, MSN or NP Programs. There is also a Policy for Non-Degree Seeking Students Procedure for Course Equivalency Determination. Last phase comes with the inclusion of MSN Progression, Thesis and Thesis or Professional Scholarship. (Roberts, 2005) The current workforce analysis of Nurses in Alabama as on 2005 was around 48,000 and at a national level this figure sums up to 1200000. In the same context it could be mentioned that the average salary of a regular nurse in Alabama is about $2500-$3000 which is practically at par with the national index of salary rate of nurses in the US. However, working conditions vary from state to state and Alabama ranks quite high in this respect positioned only second to California. Alabama provides a 7 hour per day shift with any one day in the week as off day for a nurse with free lodging available. (Anand, 2006) Training and education requirement for a nurse in Alabama include the MSN schedule and is regarded as the most essential aspect for getting a license. For sustaining this license or continuing education requirements are essential and there is always room for updated activity and a 3 week semester is available for the registered nurses per year. This semester in the on an average ranges around 2.5 weeks nationwide. However it should be noted that licenses are issued by the Alabama Authority for Care for nurses residing in Alabama whereas the central board of nursing is in based in New York under the name National Board of Registered Nurses. The licenses issued by NBRS-NY are valid all over the US. (Anand, 2006) In the context of Alabama the supply and demand curve of nurses is extremely favorable. At present there is a shortage of about 15% nurses in Alabama alone in respect to the license issued and active workforce. However, in the national context this data is more marginal as the difference between demand and supply of registered nurses is only 3.43%. (Anand, 2006) It should be remembered that the profession of nursing is a noble profession and to excel in it requires hard works with compassion and a favorable state would help this profession to flourish. The state of Alabama could be regarded as an ideal venue for nursing with its high demands.   (Podolski, 2006) References: Anand, M; (2006); US HealthCare Forum: Current Data & Analysis; IBL & Alliance Ltd. 452-461 Mukherjee, Sachin D; (2004); Thought Strategies; IBL & Alliance Ltd. 327 Podolski, V; (2006); Public Perception of Perceptions: An Approach Towards well being; IBL & Alliance Ltd. 87 Roberts, O M; (2005); Outline of Social care; National Book Trust 43 Sen, S; (2001); USA: Nursing Data; ABP Ltd. 98-101   

Analysis of three sun articles on the execution of Robert Harris Essay

These three articles printed in the sun newspaper in 1992,approach the execution of Robert Harris in very different ways . The articles have chosen to cover different parts of the Robert Harris case. Article 1 is focused on the way Robert Harris died and the T. V reporter Michael tuck giving a graphic description of the execution and the build up to it . The second article is about he nuns including Mother Teresa who tried to turn the decision around so Harris’s life could be spared. Article three gives a description of where and how the victims were murdered and what how the parents felt and thought of Harris’s execution. The first article explains and describes what happened to Robert Harris. It starts with a detailed description of Harris’s execution. † Gurgled and gasped as cyanide gas choked the life from him†. This has been written as the second sentence to give an immediate impact of disgust and it plays with your emotions and it makes you more interested and you want to read on. Once the writer has got the readers attention, he then goes to the lead up to the execution. The first article is very against the death penalty as when it talks about the execution was reprieved twice before he was finally gassed, the article tries to make you feel sorry for Harris. Michael Tuck describes the execution as â€Å"grisly† â€Å"and† not a humane way to die† and in this he is confirming that he is against the anti-death penalty. Alternatively, article three is not against the anti-death penalty. It starts off with Harris’s victims parents, giving there opinion on Harris’s execution. One of the victims farther said ‘ I have no time for do-gooders who says that he should be spared look what he did to my son’. † Am I supposed to erase the memory, the pain of that†. This is trying to make you feel sorry for the parents of the victims and it is trying to persuade the reader that capital punishment is good. Article two is set out in a bold headline, which reads â€Å"NUN’S MERCY BID† and under the headline is a small paragraph. It mentions Mother Teresa Name to give a sort of good feeling to the article because Mother Teresa well know personality of being warm, nice and a gentle person and it says that she appealed to a California governor Pete Wilson to spare Harris’s life this sort of makes you feel that if Mother Teresa is trying to safe his life then she must be doing the right thing and Harris’s life should be spared. It says in the article that there were loads of anti-death sentence campaigners who urged for the killer not to be killed. This is a fact that many people wanted Harris to live and theres evidence of Mother Teresa point of view. Theres a couple of lines in this article that say that â€Å"Harris had alcoholic parents and he was fifth of nine children terrorised by there farther†. His lawyers said that he may have been brain damaged by a beating at the age of two†. This could make the reader feel sorry for Harris and its not fair for Harris to be killed in this way but there no evidence that the article is true. The visual presentation in the articles plays a very important role. In article one, theres a big picture above the article of two chairs where Harris was probably killed I think that this picture is trying to make you feel sorry for Harris as the picture makes you feel a sort of horrific sense of dying and displays a horrible looking setting in where people are chained to chairs and then are choked with gas and then killed. Beside the picture is â€Å"TV man watches Harris in gas chamber†. This is very emotive language and makes the article more dramatic. In article two there is a photo of a man I think its Harris but it could be a different number of people maybe Michael Tuck watching the execution or is it Harris himself its good as it lets the reader speculate. All three articles are made up of fact an opinion. Article one is mainly made up of opinion it is nearly all Michael Tuck telling the readers what he thought. He said â€Å"But IF you ask me this is not a clean and humane way to die† This is Michael Tuck expressing his opinions on the execution. Article two has got a bit of opinion He said â€Å"he may have been brain damaged by a beating at the age of two† The words â€Å"may have† means that not necessarily true. The only fact in this article is that Mother Teresa fought with other campaigners to spare Harris’s life. Article three appears to be a balance of fact and opinion. The first half of the article is mainly opinion. Theres the victims parents saying what they think about Harris’s execution. â€Å"They were out for a fun day fishing when they were executed by this beast†. It is the parent’s opinion that Harris is a â€Å"Beast†. The second half of the article seems to tell more fact, it says how the victims were killed, for the first time across the three articles. But after telling the story theres still opinions added. † The grinning Harris calmly ate the boys hamburgers†. There is know way that anyone could of none this so this must be opinion. In conclusion all articles have different stories, which all connect together, but as you can see Harris was an evil man as he shot two innocent boys dead for no reason at all. Language used in these articles is effective and ahs been used well to give you a clear picture of how Harris died and how he killed two innocent teenagers. People tried to save him but it didn’t work. When all three articles are read separately they create a biased opinion on Harris execution, but when read together you have a balanced account of Harris case.

Success and failure of Mergers, Acquisition and divestiture process

According to the Cambridge’s Internationals Dictionary of English, a Merger is when two or more companies join together, Acquisition is buying of a business by another company and finally divestiture is a process when a company takes back its investment from a less profitable company. Actually MA&D (Merger, Acquisition and divestiture) is a common process these days. The main motive behind is to increase profits and decline losses for the company.Say for instance if a company finds buying another company to be very beneficial in its upgradation process, increasing profitability or declining costs than that company can go for Acquisition or taking over of that company. Similarly due to high competition when some companies of same field, find it difficult to reduce the cost of production, logistics and marketing than few companies can come together in a contract or merge themselves in one big unit. Thus merger helps the companies to reduce their costs and increase the profitabil ity. Divestment is another common process these days.Actually those companies, which are not yielding enough of profits to the Parent Company or may be proving to be a big loss for the parent company, can be divested by the Parent Company. Thus by selling its shares from a weak or loss incurring unit a company can save its money. MA&D process. 2. MA&D process and its success: The present research shows that nearly 65 percent to 85 percent of corporate MA&D process fails. This process results in well short of expectations. The features of MA&D in the present day scenario are as follows. 1. The deals made are getting bigger thus increasing the scale of risk and reward. 2.To attain immediate gains from the big deals made by the companies, the opportunities gets missed that could capitalize on synergies that will deliver sustained, long term financial improvements and stake holders value. 3. The announcement of MA&D results many times in confusion both inside and outside the company, wh en the executives are a unable to institutionalize a governance process that can maintain momentum through integration. 4. Government institutions creates hurdle in the way of those MA&D process which could prove monopoly of a basic need products that could later on effect the price fixation monopoly by that company.Thus, today MA&D process is moving towards higher risks, lower productivity, confusion and government intervention. Success in the MA&D process: MA&D process. 3. The possible methods of getting successful in the MA&D process are suggested below. A. Post merger integration, business re-engineering and post divestiture separation present such an opportunity by which a person can estimate all the fields that could effect the business profitability in future. B. MA&D process needs to be planned and managed as well-structured hierarchical set of activities from beginning to the end. C.System Integration and outsourcing can help in leveraging MA&D activity to deliver results-d riven, sustainable operational transformation. D. Define and deploy a course of action appropriate for the type of MA&D like consolidation, combination, transformation or preservation. E. Plan and implement the transition to an optimized business model and infrastructure. F. Manage, operate and evolve the new applications and infrastructure. G. Identifying potential synergies in terms of people, process and IT and delivers these to plan. H. Ensure seamless separation of systems and data.MA&D process. 4. I. Rationalizes and streamlines infrastructure and processes. Thus from the above the following critical factors for success can be evaluated. 1. Clear intent 2. Perseverance 3. Leadership 4. Accountability 5. Leverage 6. Coordination 7. Experience 8. Focus 9. Decisiveness 10. Communication Present day scenario: The present figures state that nearly 65 percent of the failed in the MA&D process. Reason was overlooking of some features. The success and failure of the MA&D depends on th e following facts that need to be dealt carefully. MA&D process. 5.That is if the following facts are taken into consideration than only the MA&D process can prove to be beneficial for the company. Otherwise MA&D process can prove to be big mistake. 1. IT integration efforts make MA&D difficult: ERP or Enterprise resource planning applications like SAP has become ubiquitous in large organizations today. The promise is business process simplification, enhanced productivity and seamless information transfer. However these applications also require that businesses be wired together, typically through a single, unified database and other infrastructure.This of course, means individual businesses are far more difficult to separate. For instance , when Pfizer divested its Adam and Schick units, significant effort went toward figuring out how to separate data of the entities while blocking access to each other’s information. 2. Support services and facilities are hard to unravel: Ac hieving scale through shared support services and joint facilities is a broad trend in the business community. The more successful a company has been at this the greater difficulty it will face unwinding these collaborations. One big part of this is staff allocation.The trend toward shared support services has extended through general and administrative functions, call centers, account payable and receivable, payroll administration, and compensation and benefits plan management. MA&D process. 6. Carving out pieces of these integrated functions carries real challenges. 3. Outsourcing adds third party issues to MA&D: Not only are organizations centralizing they are outsourcing as well. In some way this may ease the process of separation, as the organization no longer owns the employees, systems and processes. Outsourcing firms are also very good at splitting workflow.If only it were that simple. In addition numerous perhaps hundreds of vendor relationships, outsourcing generally invol ves processes that are critical to a company’s core businesses. Therefore divesting a unit with significant outsourcing substantially increases the need for a rigorous review of services agreements to understand change of control provisions and to assess how service will continue going forward. 4. The divested business may require long term support: Until the divested business is prepared to stand on its own or is fully supported by the buyer it likely will need support from its former parent.Establishing clear service level agreements or SLAs between the buyer and the seller is critical. For highly integrated global businesses this can leas to country by country agreements, each involving dozens of services such as facilities management, back offices support and sales and manufacturing. MA&D process. 7. Conflicting interest can complicate the SLA process. For example depending on the situation the selling organization may have incentive to either prolong or limit the time fr ame on which these services will be provided. 5.Disruption threatens both seller and divested entity: Like a merger in reverse, a MA&D done right requires a plan detailed across every function, carefully monitored and adjusted as execution unfolds. This is a major project. Developing the separation plan often requires three-way collaboration between the seller and its remaining businesses, the divested unit itself, in some cases the buyer. The complexity of managing this separation planning across every function of the business and across the globe can rapidly absorb all attention of the businesses.The real danger here is underestimating just how much effort this will require. 6. The MA&D can impact the seller’s cost structure: Once the seller has carved out the divested business, it may well need to take another look at its own cost structure. In some cases, there can be loss of scale in areas where work was combined with the divested business. In the earlier, Pfizer example , customer service employees who had supported the divested Adams businesses were rationalized because the buyer, Cadbury Schweppes, did not require their services.MA&D process. 8. However this did not fully make up for the loss of scale. It took additional work with the customer service model, automating orders and other improvements to get the cost structure back in line. 7. Regulatory requirements can force your hand: Regulatory requirements on both local and global levels often create additional complexities. For example, MA&D may be required to resolve anti-trust concerns for a merger transaction. In these situations an organization may have to give up capabilities it would otherwise no elect to relinquish.As part of the Linde-Boc merger, regulators required that Northern American business be divested and operate as a stand-alone business, forcing Linde-BOC to part with both capabilities and people it would otherwise want to retain. Similarly in MA&D with European components, n egotiation with world’s councils on a country by country basis can lengthen the MA&D process and create additional constraints. Conclusion: Mergers, acquisitions and divestiture (MA&D) can make or break your business. And more and more organizations are looking to these initiatives to deliver quick and dramatic financial returns. 006 clocked up a staggering $4 trillion worth of deals, representing an average 30% growth, while the average deal size is also rocketing. MA&D process.9. As the merger wave rolls on, it is clear that many companies are taking this opportunity to divest non-core businesses. After all were in an active markets and there’re plenty of buyers- financial and strategic –sitting on hordes of cash and looking for attractive deals. However before moving to cash in on businesses you think will be attractive it is worth taking a hard look at the process of MA&D. Whether its an out fright sale or even a spin off to shareholders.Does all these means MA&D is a bad idea? Of course not . I many cases they are absolutely the right things to do. The trick is to be aware of the seven challenges in advance, and all seven are equally valid for MA&D of every size and use that knowledge when assessing any proposed transaction. There are many assessments to be made. 1. How much of the business to sell? 2. Could a strategic buyer more appropriate than a financial buyer? 3. Which is better an MA&D or a spin off? Truly understanding answers to these questions can help a seller get the very best deal in the broadest sense of the term.

American Indian Stories: Native Americans Essay

In American Indian Stories, University of Nebraska Press Lincoln and London edition, the author, Zitkala-Sa, tries to tell stories that depicted life growing up on a reservation. Her stories showed how Native Americans reacted to the white man’s ways of running the land and changing the life of Indians. â€Å"Zitkala-Sa was one of the early Indian writers to record tribal legends and tales from oral tradition† (back cover) is a great way to show that the author’s stories were based upon actual events in her life as a Dakota Sioux Indian. This essay will describe and analyze Native American life as described by Zitkala-Sa’s American Indian Stories, it will relate to Native Americans and their interactions with American societies, it will discuss the major themes of the book and why the author wrote it, it will describe Native American society, its values and its beliefs and how they changed and it will show how Native Americans views other non-Natives. Before the introduction of the â€Å"pale face† Native Americans lived a calm and serene life. They lived in big communities and help one another in order to survive. They had a form of religion, poly-theistic, that would be their main form of salvation. They had chiefs and warriors. They had teepees that would allow them to quickly pack up and move. The Native Americans were a nomadic, primitive people that did not live up to the whiter man’s view of â€Å"civilization†. However, the white man, pale face, felt the need to change the Native Americans barbaric ways of life. The Americans were smart in their efforts in trying to convert the Indians. They would go after the kids because they were still young and gullible. â€Å"Yes, my child, several others besides Judewin are going away with the palefaces. Your brother said the missionaries had inquired about his little sister†¦ â€Å"Did he tell them to take me, mother† (40). The children were impressionable. In this first story, the daughter gets hooked on going with the missionaries because they said they had apple trees and being that she has never seen an apple tree, she begged her mother to go not knowing that her mother did not want to send her away. Some Indians enjoyed leaving with the Americans; others did not because of what the Americans had done to the Indians. The mother in this story had told her daughter stories of what the paleface had done and how they had killed most of her family. â€Å"There is what the paleface has done! Since then your father too has been buried in a hill nearer the rising sun. We where once very happy. But the paleface has stolen our lands and driven us hither. Having defrauded us of our land, the paleface forced us away† (10). Having knowing this, the little girl still persisted and wanted to go with the paleface. Many of the Indians that left with the missionaries were gone for many years and did not know how much had changed back at home. In the story The Soft-Hearted Sioux a young man comes back home after receiving an education from the missionaries. He had left before he was taught how to survive out in the wild. He came back to dying and starving parents. He was brainwashed by the missionaries because he went against his family’s customs and told the medicine man never to come back and that God will save his father. He started preaching God’s words to his people and they left the community. His father was growing sicker and sicker and he needed food. His son went out everyday trying to get something but had no skills in hunting. His father had told him to go two hills over and he could find meat. With no concept of ownership, the son went and killed a cow that belonged to an American. Upon leaving with the meat he was chased down and attacked by the â€Å"owner† of the cattle. The son accidentally killed the man and fled back to his father’s teepee only to realize that he was too late and that his father had died. He was so conditioned by the white man that he had forgotten his ancestors’ ways of survival. The book suggests that Native Americans were not savages and that they had a normal lifestyle before the Americans came in and changed everything. Their society was based upon helping one another out. It was also based upon mobility. They would have to make homes in such a way that they could just pack up and leave whenever they needed to. The Native Americans had a values based on nature, life and death. The believed that you must respect nature, respect the living and put a special emphasis on the dead. In The Dead Man’s Plum Bush the little girl walked by a plum bush that had just blossomed out beautiful plums. When the girl had reached to grab one of the plums her mother had told her not to and explained that â€Å"the roots are wrapped around an Indian’s skeleton. A brave is buried here. While he lived he was so fond of playing the game of striped plum seeds that, at his death, his set of plum seeds were buried in his hands. From them sprang up this little bush† (32). The fact that the bush was there because of a man’s fascination with plum seeds and that no one can enjoy its fruits shows how much respect for the dead is played through the Native Americans’ beliefs. Zitkala-Sa’s main motives for writing this book was to show â€Å"one of the first attempts by a native American woman to write her own story† (back cover). Another main motive was to inform people of the way that the Americans came and took over the Indians’ land and people; the land was taken by force and the people by bribing little kids. The main theme for the book was to show how the Indians felt about the Americans. Going by the book, there is no set way of showing how many people liked or disliked the Americans. However, it is noticeable that the parents clearly did not like the Americans because they knew what the Americans had done to them in the past and what they are doing to them presently. They knew that the Americans came in and killed their ancestors and forced others to leave their lands. They knew that they were taking their children away and brainwashing them into thinking that their families were savages and that the Americans had more to offer them. They knew that the Americans were making their kids forget about their ways of living and their beliefs. The children, however, saw the Americans invitation as a way to better themselves and their families. The children would happily go away with the American strangers thinking that everything would be better for them. Zitkala-Sa tried to show how her people were treated by Americans in her book American Indian Stories. She showed how the Indians life was before the Americans and how it had changed after the introduction of the Americans. She proved that not all of the Indians liked the white people. She proved that most of the children that left did not remember their family’s way of life. She proved that when the Americans came they not only took the Indians’ land, they also took their people. Works Cited Zitkala-Sa. American Indian Stories. University Of Nebraska Press. Lincoln and Lo.