Reggae Music and Its Influences Essay

One of the world’s iconic figures, Reggae musician Bob Marley(1945-1981) stated that, â€Å"People want to listen to a message, word from Jah(God). This could be passed through me or anybody, I am not a leader, messenger. The word of the songs, not the person, is what attracts people.† Reggae music is gifted to people in Jamaica as their own unique identity. Jamaican musicians are well-known for expressing their Rastafarian beliefs through the music, Reggae. Rastafarian reflects ideologies, attitudes, actions of the people for the better society (Spiker,1998). At this point, they became social commentators, prophets, and messengers who heal the wounds of people affected by social and political injustices (Aimers, 2004).This essay illustrates that reggae music has been successful spreading Rastafarian beliefs in politics, social injustices and cultures. Firstly, Jamaican musicians play essential roles to give the political messages to people based on their Rastafarian beliefs. The political messages shared through the Reggae music are those of peace, love, and brotherhood of mankind for forming a unity to fight for the liberty of people in Jamaica. Musicians gave the message by setting several goals based on general popular interest of the population against any oppression and encouraged people to speak-up. For instance, Bob Marley(1945-1981); the predominant singer strived to bring the awareness for not only in the hearts of Jamaicans, but also in those of Africans and the rest of the world (Abram & Ingrid, 2009). One of his popular songs, â€Å"Get up, and Stand up for your rights† not only defended his religious beliefs but also pointed at political oppression and natural rights of people (Lockard, n.d). Following lyrics is from the song by Bob Marley (1973): We sick an’ tired of-a-your ism-skism-game Dying ‘n’ goin’ to heaven in-a Jesus’ name, Lord. We know when we understand: Almighty god is a living man. You can fool some people sometimes, But you can fool all the people all the time. So now we see the light (What you gonna do?) We gonna stand up for our rights! (Bob Marley Lyrics) Thus, one can conclude that reggae and its musicians are influential as a medium for spreading political messages to enlighten the darkness of people’s mind and brain.   Secondly, People all around the world heard the voice of Rastafarian beliefs against social injustices through the reggae music and by its talented musicians. Their songs’ lyrics were mightier than swords to reveal such issues as racism, colonialism, slavery, and exploitation on colored people in Africa. Rastafarians are attached to the ideas of equality, tolerance, justice, and non-violence. In addition, it is a theology of submissiveness and every Rasta has a right to freedom of expression (Abram & Ingrid, 2009). Particularly, slavery had affected most of Africans’ lives badly for being taken away from one own society and family which could have damaged them physically and psychologically by segregations and hard labors (Novick, n.d). For example, Reggae musician, Peter Tosh(1944-1987)’s famous song â€Å"Mama Africa†(1983)indicated the life of an African slave missing home: Mama Africa How are you doing Mama, Mama Africa Long time me no see you Mama They took me away from you Mama Long before I was born They took me away from you Mama Long before I came on in(Peter Tosh Lyrics) Hence, the reggae music and its musicians had not only led people in Jamaica for Rastafarian beliefs and for fighting against the social injustices but also Africans as a whole for the better survival. Lastly, the Rastafari influence also had contributed to the cultural significance of reggae music and culture of people; it was a symbol for both identity and pride among the Jamaicans. It has also created an understanding of lifestyle and culture in Jamaica for the rest of the world (Aimers, 2004). The reggae music and Rastafarian complemented one another to occupy people’s state of mind to think of it as a part of the Jamaican lifestyle, needless to mention that it has become a tradition and culture for them. In spite of all the difficulties and hardships which came upon people in Jamaica, they had been recognized internationally for their predominant reggae music all over the world. The culture of reggae along with Rastafarian symbols was being introduced to many countries. Reggae musicians’ hair-styles, clothing and accessories which mirror the Rastafari are being imitated by some devoted fans. For example, Thailand’s Khao-San road is full of Rastafarian symbols and its trendy musician, Bob Marley printed-items from head to toe. Therefore, Reggae music and its Rastafarian symbols have enormously impacted on cultures of many different countries, originated from Jamaica. In conclusion, there are many studies which has discussed about the importance of reggae music spreading Rastafarian beliefs and symbols throughout the world. Reggae music has been positively influential to the society by means of political, social, and cultural impacts. In addition, it has not only brought the liberty to people in Jamaica but also mother Africa. Therefore, it is remarkable peak in history that peaceful and non-violent music won over the aggressive wars, fights, and any kind of violence. In fact, peaceful as well as meaningful song lyrics are mightier than sharp and shining swords. References; Aimers, J. (2004). â€Å"The Cultural Significance of Reggae.† ATH175 People of the world. Retrieved from; http://www.units.muohio.edu/ath175/student/petersle/culture.html Abram, V. & Ingrid, H. (October, 2009). â€Å"The Rastafarian Movement.† The Observatory for Religious Phenomena (World Religion Watch). Retrieved from http://www.worldreligionwatch.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=281&Itemid=65 Lockard, Craig A. (June, 2010). â€Å"Bob Marley, Victor Jara, Fela Kuti, and Political Popular Music.†University of Illinois. Retrieved from; http://worldhistoryconnected.press.illinois.edu/7.2/lockard.html Novixk, S. (n.d). â€Å"The Effects of Slavery on Reggae Music.† The Dread Library. Retrieved from; http://debate.uvm.edu/dreadlibrary/novick.html Spiker, C. (April 1998). â€Å"Reggae As Social Change:The Spread of Rastafarianism.† The Dread Library. Retrieved from; http://debate.uvm.edu/dreadlibrary/spiker.html

Impacts of Alcoholism on Family Welfare Essay

Chapter ONE 1. 0 Introduction 1. 1 Introduction This chapter contains the background of the job. statement of the job. intent of the survey. aims of the survey. research inquiries. justification of the survey. restrictions of the survey. the range of the survey and the conceptual model. 1. 2 Background to the Problem Seventy per centum of Kenyan households are affected by alcohol addiction ( Simiyu. 2006 ) . Man has. over clip. so come to admit the fact that alcohol addiction is so destructive to the human race. This explains the ground as to why legion surveies have been conducted and some are still underway in dealingss to assorted countries where alcohol addiction is so a major menace. It is nevertheless of import to observe that most of these surveies are chiefly centered on the alky. Alcoholism is a term that has many and sometimes conflicting definitions. In current and historic use. alcohol addiction refers to a status that consequences from continued ingestion of intoxicant despite the societal and medical impacts that are raised by the frailty. Alcoholism besides referred to. in the 19th century and partially in the 20th century. as alcoholism. may besides mention to pre-occupation with or irresistible impulse towards the ingestion of intoxicant and/or impaired ability to acknowledge the negative impacts of inordinate intoxicant ingestion. The Macmillan lexicon ( 2002 ) defines the word alcohol addiction as a medical status that makes it hard to command the sum of intoxicant you drink. 1. 2. 0 Alcoholism The dictionary definition of alcohol addiction is. a upset characterized by the inordinate ingestion of and dependance on alcoholic drinks taking to physical and physiological injury and impaired societal and vocational functionality. The Mayo Foundation for Medical Education and Research defines alcohol addiction as 1 a layman’s term for intoxicant dependance and maltreatment. The medical encyclopaedia defines alcohol addiction as a popular term for two upsets. intoxicant maltreatment and intoxicant dependant. The definition of alcohol addiction adopted for this survey was a upset that involves long term. repeated. uncontrolled. compulsive and inordinate usage of alcoholic drinks that impairs the drinker’s wellness and societal dealingss. In this survey alcohol addiction was characterized by frequent imbibing. imbibing five or more yearss in a hebdomad. 1. 2. 1 Family Welfare The Macmillan lexicon ( 2002 ) defines a household as a group of people who live together and are all related to one another. normally dwelling of parents and kids. It besides defines public assistance as the wellness and felicity of people. The definition of household public assistance adopted in this survey encompassed physical and psychological wellness. fundss. employment. societal life and relationships Velleman. ( as cited at World Wide Web. alcoholandfamilies. org ) . Family public assistance was characterized by economic system. wellness and safety. legal proceedings. matrimony stableness. duties. and backdown. The Macmillan lexicon ( 2002 ) defines economic system as the careful usage of money. merchandises or clip that really small is wasted. Family economic system in this survey was characterized by the sum of money spent on intoxicant. investing ventures and nest eggs in regard to individual’s income. The dictionary definition of wellness is the status of your organic structure particularly whether or non you are ill. Safety on the other manus refers to the fact that a thing is safe. For intent of this survey wellness and safety was characterized by cases of intoxicant related unwellness or upsets. domestic force both on adult females and kids attributable to alcohol. accidents or any other act done which exposed the person to harm as a consequence of the influence of intoxicant on the individual ( Alcoholic ) or on the household. and psychological province. 2 Responsibility is defined by the Macmillan lexicon ( 2002 ) . as a province of being in charge of person or something and of doing certain that they do or what happens to them is right or satisfactory. In the survey duty was characterized by cases of household functions of persons ( for illustration paying school fees by the parents ) . good physical and psychological handiness for the household. work jobs due to alcohol and its attendant negative impacts ( Alcoholism ) . Marriage stableness is a state of affairs where matrimony can raise up beyond the challenges which can take to its break-up ( Akem. 2009 ) . For intent of this survey matrimony stableness was characterized by cases of divorce. separation. wrangles and dissensions. Withdrawal is to no longer take portion in something or halt person from taking portion ( Macmillan 2002 ) . The definition of backdown adopted for this survey was assisting the individual to acquire rid of his/her organic structure off intoxicant every bit good as the harmful physical effects of intoxicant. Schuckit & A ; Mace. ( as cited at World Wide Web. replies. com ) Withdrawal in this survey was characterized by attempted cases to halt intoxicant ingestion by either the person or 3rd party attempts and the several challenges posed by the same. 1. 2. 2 Alcoholism Unmasked Up-to 50 per centum of slayings involves alcohol. and three or more people die in Britain due to alcohol ( Holden. 1996 ) . Approximately 14 million people in the United States of America are alkies. intoxicant being the 3rd taking slayer in the United States. killing 20 thousand people and wounding 1. 5 million due to imbibe drivers. Drink. ( as cited in Katherine. 2009 ) . Drink besides reported that 65 per centum of the aggressive onslaughts against adult females involve usage of intoxicant by the wrongdoer with more than 60 per centum of the homicides affecting the usage of intoxicant by either the wrongdoer or the victim. Harmonizing to Kenya Medical Research Institute ( KEMRI ) intoxicant maltreatment affects 70 per centum of households in Kenya. 3 In November 2001. over 140 people died and tonss of others lost their sight after devouring an illegal laced drink. In June 2005 illegal brew laced with industrial intoxicant caused the deceases of 49 people and more than 174 people were hospitalized after imbibing the place made Kwona-Mbee. literally ‘see the manner ahead’ . brew incorporating methanol a toxic wood intoxicant added to the mixture to give it more kick ( Simiyu. 2006 ) . Harmonizing to a survey carried out by WHO ( 2004 ) affecting 188 patients evaluated after motor vehicle clangs in all infirmaries located in Eldoret found out that 23. 4 per centum were blood intoxicant concentration ( BAC ) positive and 12. 2 per centum were intoxicated. This research work indicates the impacts of alcohol addiction on wellness and safety of the alcoholic. but they fail to advert the impacts of this upset in the household puting. Holden ( 1996 ) . provinces that intoxicant does no good for the economic system. bing the British industry 1. 7 British billion lbs. There therefore existed demand to set up a clear nexus between household economic system and alcohol addiction. About a 3rd of alkies recover whether they are in intervention plan or non. Vallant. ( as cited in Santrock. 2005 ) . Surveies from the national institute on intoxicant maltreatment and alcohol addiction ( NIAAA ) in United States of America indicate that of all drugs. backdown from intoxicant differs most significantly. This is so because it can be straight fatal. with an alcoholic holding no serious state of affairss holding a important hazard of deceasing from the direct consequence of backdown if non managed decently. This established the demand to look into how backdown as an facet of household public assistance is affected by alcohol addiction. One in three divorces is due to behavioural jobs linked to imbibing ( Holden. 1996 ) . In Kenya. most domestic misinterpretations are attributed to alcohol. ( Simiyu. 2006 ) . The survey. hence sought to happen out the impact of intoxicant on matrimony stableness. 4 1. 3 Statement of the Problem Research has shown that intoxicant so has major impacts on the life of its victims. Indeed no adult male is an island ; hence an alky does non populate in isolation. It is hence expected that whereas intoxicant is non good for the rummy. it is besides non good for the household of the drinker. It robs them the morally unsloped individual that they looked up to. What might be the assorted facets of the household that might be affected by holding an alky in the household? Harmonizing to Cork. ( as cited at World Wide Web. alcoholandfamilies. org ) . research workers have frequently shown much concern for the alcoholic. while overlooking his/her household. There was hence need to find the assorted facets of the household that were affected by holding an alky in the household. 1. 4 Purpose of the Study The intent of the survey was to look into and set up the nature of relationship that existed between alcohol addiction and assorted facets of household public assistance of reforming alkies in Suneka division. utilizing instance survey research design with a position of conveying to the visible radiation the strength of alcohol addiction in our society. Alcoholism was characterised by frequent imbibing. imbibing five or more yearss per hebdomad. Family public assistance was characterised by household wellness and safety. household economic system. duty. matrimony stableness. cases of legal proceedings and backdown. 1. 5 Research Objectives The research sought to set up the impacts of alcohol addiction on household public assistance by specifically happening out: 1. The challenges posed by the negative impacts of alcohol addiction on household economic system. 2. The challenges posed by the negative impacts of alcohol addiction on matrimony stableness. 3. The challenges posed by the negative impacts of alcohol addiction on household wellness and safety. 5 4. Problems associated with backdown from alcohol addiction. 5. The impacts and frequence of alcohol addiction influence on legal proceedings perpetrated against alkies within the household. 6. The nexus between alcohol addiction and disregard of duties. 1. 6 Research Questions In order to set up the sort of relationship that existed between alcohol addiction and household public assistance. the research was guided by the undermentioned research inquiries: 1. What are the challenges posed by the negative impacts of alcohol addiction on household economic system? 2. What are the challenges posed by the negative impacts of alcohol addiction on matrimony stableness? 3. What are the challenges posed by the negative impacts of alcohol addiction on household wellness and safety? 4. What are the jobs associated with backdown from alcohol addiction? 5. What is the impact and frequence of alcohol addiction on legal proceedings perpetrated against alkies within the household? 6. What is the nexus between alcohol addiction and disregard of duties? 1. 7 Significance of the Study The findings of the research sought to assist: 1. Locate out the impact of alcohol addiction in the local context which will move as an oculus opener to the stakeholders concerned for case the Ministry of Health. Human rights militants and the full NGO community to see the demand to assist the affected parties. 2. Juncture. as a consequence. puting up of appropriate plans to assist control the threat caused by alcohol addiction. for case puting up a rehabilitation Centre. 3. Alcoholics see the demand to halt taking intoxicant. holding realized the hurting they inflict on their households. 6 1. 8 Restrictions of the Study The survey was based on a sample size of 30 respondents drawn from an accessible population which consists of persons from Suneka community in Kisii south territory. Owing to scarceness of resources. safeguards should hence be taken while generalising findings of this research to other vicinities. This may be majorly due to environmental and societal factors that may factor in to annul the findings. 1. 9 The Scope of the Study The survey chiefly focused on the impact of alcohol addiction on household public assistance. a instance survey of Suneka division. Kisii south territory. Nyanza state in Kenya. The survey was based on a sample of 30 respondents and was conducted between the months of February and March 2009. 7 1. 10 Conceptual Framework ALCOHOLISM FAMILY WELFARE FAMILY HEALTH AND SAFETY MARRIAGE STABILITY FAMILY ECONOMY ALCOHOLISM RESPONSIBILITY WITHDRAWAL LEGAL IMPLICATIONS Fig. 1. 0 A conceptual model on the relationship between alcohol addiction and household public assistance. The survey sought to happen out the relationship that existed between alcohol addiction and constituents of household public assistance viz. : household wellness and safety. matrimony stableness. household economic system. backdown. and the legal deductions. 8 Chapter TWO 2. 0 Literature Review 2. 1 Introduction This chapter contains past surveies in relation to alcohol and alcohol addiction. It has besides highlighted the historical background. It peculiarly focuses on the impacts of alcohol addiction on the economic system. wellness and safety. legal deductions. matrimony stableness. backdown and duties which were the pillars of this survey right from the planetary. Continental and local point of position. It besides contains the critical reappraisal and the sum-up. 2. 2 Past Studies This subdivision will shadow visible radiation on the historical background of alcohol addiction. researched impacts. and the planetary. Continental and local deductions here in Kenya. 2. 2. 0 Historical Background The word alcohol addiction was foremost introduced by a Swedish doctor Magnus Huss ( 1849 ) to intend toxic condition by intoxicant. It was subsequently mentioned in France by M. Gabriel ( 1866 ) in his medical thesis. This marked the development of the word alcohol addiction ( as cited at World Wide Web. asnwers. com/library/psychoanalysisdictionary ) . The most strict definition of an alcoholic ( a individual enduring from alcohol addiction ) is the one provide by Pierre Fouquet. â€Å"An Alcoholic is any adult male or adult female who has lost the ability to make without intoxicant. † The production of intoxicant day of the months back. to around 1400-1600 BC ( Before Christ ) . in the Munainus part between black and Caspian seas. Commercial production of intoxicant was good underway by 1500 BC. Court Wright. ( as cited at World Wide Web. asnwers. com/library ) . Alcohol is likely the oldest drug known to humanity. It was easy for the crude people to detect that fruits and juices left to stand in warm topographic points easy fermented to organize alcoholic mixtures. Alcohol production is chiefly founded on barm cells. which in presence of heat and 9 H2O continue to turn by utilizing up the sugar until the sugar is finished or alcohol content putting to deaths them. Alcohol is a deathly toxicant and in high adequate measures. it kills all living things including the barm cells that produce it. Weil & A ; Rosen. ( as cited at World Wide Web. alcoholicsanonymous. org ) ! It was ab initio believed ( Sigmund Freud. Karl Abraham. Sandor Ferenczi ) that intoxicant does non make symptoms but merely promotes them. taking suppressions and destructing sublimation ( Descombey. 2002 ) . The theory of alcohol addiction ( 1905d ) is summarized in footings of predomination among work forces. get downing at the oncoming of pubescence. Sigmund. ( as cited at World Wide Web. replies. com/ library ) . Magnus the Swedish professor of medical specialty distinguishes between two types of alcohol addiction that is. Acute alcohol addiction. which is due to impermanent effects of intoxicant taken within a short period of time- inebriation and poisoning ; Chronic alcohol addiction. which is a status caused by accustomed usage of alcoholic drinks in toxicant sums over a long period of clip. Prior to the 19th century. alcohol addiction was seen as a moral failing or condemnable. instead than an unwellness. The new. â€Å"Disease† attack to alcohol addiction was started in America perpetrated by the. â€Å"Alcoholism motion. † It consisted of Alcoholics Anonymous ( A self aid group. apparatus in 1935 ) . National commission for Education on alcohol addiction ( subsequently The National Council on Alcoholism ) and the YALE. Centre for intoxicant surveies. The. â€Å"Alcoholism movement† Quickly spread to Britain and later to the remainder of the universe ( Heather & A ; Robertson. 1997 ) . Harmonizing to WHO ( 2004 ) In Africa. for case. intoxicant related drinks are really prevailing among cultural groups branded in different names passed from one coevals to another. Among the common alcoholic drinks are: Chang’aa-Which is common among Samburu pastoralists populating in northern Kenya and the whole of Kenya at big. In fact the word seems to hold gained a national entreaty in Kenya along with Busaa which are frequently used in Kisii among 10 the Gusii community. Others include: Palm vino ( common along the Kenyan seashore ) . banana beer ( made from a fermented mixture of banana and sorghum flour ) and Muratina ( made from sugar cane and Muratina fruit-a fruit grown in Kenya ) . Among the Gusii community. the common alcoholic drinks used from times immemorial include Chang’aa and Busaa. Chang’aa is a distilled merchandise ensuing from malted millet. maize or sorghum alongside molasses the mixture of which has been fermented for a figure of yearss. for case a hebdomad. The fermented malted millet. maize or sorghum mixture in its petroleum province ( nondistilled ) produces Busaa. 2. 2. 1 Global Impact 2. 2. 1. 0 Health Alcohol has raised major attending on the international land chiefly due to its negative impacts in the society. Exceeding the list is the nexus between intoxicant and its impact on wellness. It is of import to observe that intoxicant on its ain can do a medical upset known as alcohol addiction which was the pillar rock of this survey. Surveies indicate that alcohol addiction can originate in a familial upset which can be transferred to the progeny of the victim merely like any other familial upsets. It is estimated that 60 per centum of those who become alkies are believed to hold a familial sensitivity for it. Vallant. ( as cited in Santrock. 2005 ) . Hamgin and others ( 1999 ) besides reported that there is a high frequence of alkies in first degree relations of alkies. Research has shown that intoxicant amendss assorted variety meats in our organic structures ensuing to chronic diseases. Some of these variety meats include: 1. The Liver: Excessive ingestion of intoxicant consequences to liver cirrhosis and liver hepatitis. Hepatitis is the redness of the liver while liver cirrhosis is a liver complaint that interferes with the liver’s normal construction and map. Both diseases can be fatal 11 2. Blood: Excessive ingestion of intoxicant interferes with both the construction and map of blood. High measures of intoxicant amendss red blood cells doing them to go abnormally big every bit good as the devastation of white blood cells which consequences to low unsusceptibility whereas damaging of ruddy blood cells may take to malignant neoplastic disease in appendages ( NIAAA ) . The NIAAA in the United States of America suggests that a connexion exists between heavy intoxicant ingestion and increased malignant neoplastic disease hazard. In fact 3. 56 per centum malignant neoplastic disease instances all over the universe are related to alcohol imbibing ensuing to 3. 5 per centum of all malignant neoplastic disease deceases. 3. Heart and circulatory system: Alcohol imbibing affects these organic structure systems doing such disease as bosom onslaughts. shot ( which arises when a blood coagulum from the bosom enters the circulatory system into the encephalon barricading blood circulation in the encephalon ) Alcohol is besides non good for pregnant adult females for it can take to assorted birth upsets such as. Fetal Alcohol syndrome ( FAS ) . Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder ( FASD ) . These are lasting birth defects on off-springs of adult females who consume material intoxicant during gestation ( NIAAA ) . Other wellness deductions include Sexual disfunction and epilepsy and in appendages even doing decease straight. Despite the legion researches on the deductions of intoxicant on wellness. non much has been done on the frequence of such wellness deductions on households affected by alcohol addiction. However. for an alcoholic it is of import to observe. possibly non for his/her interest but for the children’s interest. that if they continue the way to alcohol addiction they are seting their kids at the exposure to this upset since comprehensive surveies have shown that kids of alcoholics’ show a three-to-four times hazard of developing the upset. Recent surveies have proved that alcohol addiction is 40 to 60 per centum attributed to cistrons. go forthing 40 to 50 per centum on environmental influences. Schuckit ; Anthenelle Schuckit. ( as cited in Schonbeck. 2004 ) . Alcohol is non besides good for the encephalon doing psychological injury in the long tally with cases such 12 as depression and anxiousness with every bit many as 25 per centum of alkies showing terrible psychiatric perturbations. Alcohol consequence reveals an overall sulky encephalon activity ( Revolution wellness. 2007 ) . 2. 2. 1. 1 Safety Alcoholism has besides raised oculus blows in relation to its influence on safety in the society. Top on this list is route accidents. Indeed in most accidents grossly impaired judgement reduced automatic activity and decreased ocular perceptual experience all play their portion. In the United States 41 per centum of all traffic human deaths are alcohol related. On norm. intoxicant related motor vehicle accidents occur after every 30 proceedingss wounding 500. 000 Americans annually with 30 per centum of all Americans involved in such accidents at one clip during their life clip while 50 per centum of such injury instances end up dead. ( World Wide Web. niaaa. National Institutes of Health. gov ) . Harmonizing to Santrock ( 2005 ) . 60 per centum of homicides involve usage of intoxicant by either the wrongdoer or victim and 20 per centum of suicide instances involve usage of intoxicant by the victim. with 65 per centum of aggressive cases against adult females affecting the usage of intoxicant by the wrongdoer. Santrock besides reports that intoxicant additions cases of aggressiveness ; to be precise alkies are more easy provoked when rummy than when they are sober to unleash rough words. throw a clout or draw a trigger of a gun. Dougherty. Benelt & A ; others ; Fale-Steward. aureate & A ; Schumacher. ( as cited in Santrock. 2005 ) . Harmonizing to Seto & A ; Barbaree ( as cited in Santrock. 2005 ) . it is unfortunate that the people who are already prone to aggression are besides the 1s who are likely to imbibe and so go violent when they become drunk! Peoples under the influence of intoxicant. about commit half of the colzas and other violent offenses. Abbey. Ross & A ; McDuffie ; Abbey & A ; others. ( as cited in Santrock. 2005 ) . All these comprehensive research focuses on the impacts of alcohol addiction on the alcoholic’s safety but fails to shadow visible radiation on the agony which the household has to undergo as 13 a consequence. Equally most of these research findings do non convey out clearly the frequence of such jeopardies among households of alcoholics’ . 2. 2. 1. 2 Marriage Stability It is estimated that more than 40 per centum of separated or divorced adult females were married to or populate with a job drinker with more than three fourths of non-fatal female victims of domestic force holding reported that the attacker had been imbibing ( www. alcohlics-info. com ) . Harmonizing to Holden ( 1996 ) one in every three divorces are attributed to alcohol imbibing. It is clear while intoxicant seems to be a clear menace to stableness in matrimonies it is ill-defined. on where precisely it impairs on matrimony stableness. 2. 2. 1. 3 Duty It is estimated that a majority of 10 per centum work force in the United Kingdom have jobs due to alcohol ( Holden. 1996 ) . Harmonizing to Velleman. intoxicant affects the quality of rearing. although the facets of quality of rearing are non good defined ( as cited at World Wide Web. alcoholandfamilies. org ) . At the prime of alcohol addiction the alcoholic manifests an arrant neglect to everything. including shelter. household. nutrient. and occupation. These occasional flights into limbo are best described. ironically. as. ‘Drinking to acquire off from the problems’ caused by imbibing ( www. alcoholics-info. com ) . These surveies indicate a clear nexus between alcohol addiction and the function it plays in the executing of duties at big but fails to pin-point the peculiar impact of alcohol addiction on household duties and the frequence of the points mentioned above in a household scene. Santrock ( 2005 ) . acknowledges the fact that orgy imbibing. normally associated with high BAC. to be associated with category absences. physical hurts. problem with constabulary and unprotected sex all cases of disregard of duties by kids ( college pupils ) who are a unit of the household. 14 2. 2. 1. 4 Legal Deductions There are at least 50 thousand recognized alkies in Victoria-Australia. with one-hundred thousand rummy and disorderly strong beliefs each twelvemonth ( Wright. 1991 ) . Drinking at inappropriate times can take to legal proceedings such as Drinking and drive. beyond the legal set bounds. or public upset. Harmonizing to NIAAA ( 1997 ) 40 per centum of assaults are alcohol related. About 3/4 of all captives in 1997 were involved in intoxicant or drug maltreatment in some manner taking to their current offense ( United States Department of Justice Statistics. 1997 ) . From research already conducted at that place seems to be a nexus between intoxicant and offense but on the other side no surveies exists on the frequence of legal state of affairss encountered by alkies in a household puting or their households or challenges faced by such households when faced by such happenings. 2. 2. 1. 5 Withdrawal Unlike backdown from other drugs. backdown from intoxicant differs most significantly from other drugs. since it can be straight fatal ( NIAAA. 1997 ) . For illustration it is highly rare for diacetylmorphine or cocaine backdown to be fatal. When people die from diacetylmorphine or cocaine backdown they typically have serious underlying wellness jobs which are made worse by the strain of ague backdown. An alcoholic nevertheless. who has no serious wellness. issues has a important hazard of deceasing from the direct effects of backdown if it is non decently managed. When intoxicant is stopped. particularly suddenly. the person’s nervous system suffers from great encephalon instabilities. This can ensue in symptoms that include anxiousness. life endangering ictuss. craze tremens and hallucinations. shingles and possible bosom failure. During backdown particularly acute backdown symptoms tend to lessen after 1 – 3 hebdomads. Less terrible symptoms ( e. g. insomnia and anxiousness ) may go on as portion of a station backdown syndrome bit by bit bettering with abstention for a twelvemonth or more. Withdrawal symptoms begin to lessen as the organic structure and cardinal nervous system makes versions to change by reversal tolerance and reconstruct 15 maps towards normal organic structure working. It is apparent that from completed research the accustomed user experiences hangover ( a combination of caput aching. sickness. weariness and depression ) a state of affairs which may be really ambitious. Harmonizing to Hamigan & A ; others. ( as cited in Thom. 2009 ) one in nine persons who drink continue the way to alcohol addiction. However. harmonizing to Vallant. ( as cited in Santrock. 2005 ) by the age of 65 a tierce of alkies are dead or in awful form ; a 3rd is still seeking to bear dependence and a 3rd is abstentious or imbibing merely socially. Vallant found the factors taking to successful backdown to be predicted by: 1. Having a strong negative experience with intoxicant. for case serious medical exigency 2. Finding a replacement depends. for case speculation. exercising or gluttony ( which besides has serious medical deductions ) 3. Developing a positive relationship such as a caring employer or a new matrimony 4. Joining a support group such as Alcoholics anon. ( AA ) . Vallant acknowledges that more than 18 million patients presently need intoxicant intervention and merely one 4th of all time get intervention for a figure of grounds such as deficiency of handiness of such installations lack of equal infinite. limited support or because drinkers object to the intervention. These surveies clearly depict the challenges confronting backdown from the medical base point. However. it is of import to observe that non much has been done on the impacts of backdown on the household set-up. 2. 2. 1. 6 Economy Alcohol besides does no good for the economic system. In 1989 it cost British industry 1. 7 billion United Kingdom lbs ( Holden. 1996 ) . Harmonizing to a recent particular study prepared for United States Congress by NIAAA. the impact of intoxicant on society including force. traffic accidents. lost work productiveness and premature deceases. cost America in sum an estimated 188 billion United States dollars 16 yearly. However. non much has been done on the impacts of intoxicant on household economic system and personal fiscal direction and stableness as separate from National or Global economic impacts. 2. 3 Continental Impact The continent Africa is characterized by poorness and unemployment. Extensive research has shown that these factors are a contributory to the start of intoxicant consumption and accordingly alcohol addiction. African states have high reported instances of domestic force which are mostly attributed to ingestion of intoxicant. Since most of the imbibing population is hapless and they can’t afford ‘expensive and classy’ commercial trade names. they have opted for the inexpensive non-hygienical local brews. The imbibing population besides spends most of their fundss on intoxicant go forthing their households financially unstable hence their household economic system is in a awful province. Excessive intoxicant ingestion besides causes serious negative consequence on birthrate in both work forces and adult females: diminishing testicular and ovarian size. interfering with sperm and egg production and viability. interrupting catamenial rhythms. and cut downing libido. When gestation is achieved decreased quality of sperm and egg may significantly and for good impact the quality of life. pre and post-natal. of the kid. A kid born to an intoxicant utilizing adult female has a great hazard of being born with foetal intoxicant syndrome. which causes typical cranial and facial defects. including a smaller caput size. shortening of the palpebras. and a lowered encephalon capableness. Developmental disablements. bosom defects. and behavioural jobs are besides more likely. There has been an call among adult females from Mombasa. a town in the Kenyan seashore. that alcohol consumption among their work forces common people is doing them incapable of executing their connubial responsibilities. Alcohol ingestion has besides caused legion wellness jeopardies within the Continental standing similar to what is being experienced globally. Among such diseases common in Africa include: liver disease. physical hurts due to short 17 term effects of intoxicant leave entirely the psychological complaints that the household of the alky has to travel through ( Asenjo. 2009 ) . It is nevertheless of import to observe that unlike in western states. in Africa intoxicant is more reserved to the male population. Womans who drink are seen as a societal frailty associated with harlotry and immorality therefore. as such intoxicant has gained much prevalence among work forces and as such most alkies are work forces. It is ironical that since times immemorial adult females have ever prepared the brew. but they give it to their male opposite numbers for ingestion. Alcoholism besides increases cases of matrimony break down due to such factors as domestic force. disregard of duty ( a major job ) and the psychological impacts involved largely among the adult females fork and the kids of the alcoholic hubby semen male parent. However. unlike in the developed states where there exists. in copiousness. establishments dedicated to help alkies agitate off their wonts. such installations are really rare in the black continent. These can be attributed to the fact that in most communities. intoxicant ingestion is regarded as a traditional artefact and as the expression goes. â€Å"Mwacha mila Ni mtumwa â€Å" ( A Swahili adage which translates into. â€Å"He who abandons tradition is a foreigner† . Besides this can be cited as a ground chiefly responsible for low cases of backdown in the continent. Withdrawal. if any. is due to 1s own attempts or in some cases force per unit area from a peculiar category in the community for case. church or 1s ain household. It is. nevertheless. of import to observe that despite the ‘naked’ impacts ( negative ) caused by intoxicant all over the continent. non much has been done to better understand the job from a Continental base point and whatever givens that exists about alcohol addiction. are merely mere generalisations. in that instance. of what happens in the West to be applicable in Africa every bit good. which might non ever be the instance owing to the so obvious cultural and societal difference 18 2. 4 Local Impact The annihilating effects of intoxicant and drugs on immature people can be felt au naturel today. Experts have sounded dismaying bells after two surveies revealed that school kids every bit immature as 11 are falling quarry to alcohol. Research at the African Mental Health foundation says that in the last four old ages the usage of intoxicant and other drugs among immature people has increased by a astonishing 71 per centum. In Kenya. live intoxicant ingestion is estimated to be 5. 0 liters of pure intoxicant per capita for population older than 15 old ages for the old ages after 1995. estimated by a group of cardinal intoxicant experts ( WHO. 2004 ) . A 1997 to 1998 study sponsored by the Economic ad Social Research council and The British Institute

Debate on School Uniform Essay

Today we are seeing that the younger generations are becoming more preoccupied with fitting into the latest fashion trends. School administrations have noticed that dress code violations could be an attribute to the lack of performance in the classrooms. Public schools across America are searching for answers to enhance a better learning environment for the students. Taking all this into consideration, school uniforms would be a great idea to alleviate some of the negativity kids face due to societies apparel obsessions. In addition to what has been mentioned, studies have shown positive results with the use of public school uniforms. If it means that the schoolrooms will be more orderly, more disciplined,† Mr. Clinton said, â€Å"and that our young people will learn to evaluate themselves by what they are on the inside instead of what they’re wearing on the outside, then our public schools should be able to require their students to wear school uniforms (Mitchell, 1996). I believe a requirement of school uniforms should be implemented in all public elementary and middle schools. Read more: Should uniforms be mandatory essay In the name of putting â€Å"discipline and learning back in our schools† President Clinton instructed the Federal Education Department today to distribute manuals to the nation’s sixteen thousand school districts advising them how they can legally enforce a school uniform policy. If it means that the schoolrooms will be more orderly, more disciplined,† Mr. Clinton said, â€Å"and that our young people will learn to evaluate themselves by what they are on the inside instead of what they’re wearing on the outside, then our public schools should be able to require their students to wear school uniforms† (Mitchell, 1996). â€Å"It’s a fashion trend that’s spreading from Los Angeles to Louisiana, from Maryland to Miami, public schools are discussing, and in many cases adopting, the old private school idea. School uniforms are designed to help kids focus on algebra instead of high-tops; to make students compete for grades rather than jackets (www. pbs. org). In 1987, the first public school Cherry Hill Elementary in Baltimore, MD instituted a school uniform policy. Later in 1994, the Long Beach Unified School District in California adopted a mandatory uniform policy in some of its schools, making it the first urban district to do so. Before long there was a considerable increase in the use of uniform. For example, ninety-five percent of New Orleans’ public schools require uniforms, eighty-five percent of Cleveland, eighty percent of Chicago, sixty-five percent of Boston, sixty percent of Miami, and fifty percent of Cincinnati’s public School changed to uniforms (www. education. org). New York City, which is the largest school district in the US, has adopted the school uniform policy. The largest school district in the U. S. has adopted school uniforms. Over a half-million elementary-school students in New York City will have to adhere to a dress code by the fall of 1999. The president of the school board said the policy is â€Å"important to diminish peer pressure and promote school pride,† but that it’s not â€Å"an act of magic to transform schools overnight†¦ It isn’t going to replace a good teaching, good principals, and small classrooms. †(www. pbs. org). The National Association of Elementary School Principals (NAESP) conducted a phone survey of seven hundred and fifty five principals in 2000, which revealed that twenty one percent of all public schools had a uniform policy (www. education. org). Another reason that schools have decided to conform to uniform policy is because some students arrive at school in T-shirts that bear slogans or graphics promoting drugs and alcohol, or that display a variety of messages that conflict with values the schools are trying to promote. Others may swagger around the halls in gang-related garb. Also, others may show up in sexually provocative clothing. These issues, as well as a desire to minimize socioeconomic tensions between the â€Å"haves† and â€Å"have not’s†, have spurred some schools to adopt more stringent dress codes or to require students to wear uniforms. As the Department of Education’s Manual on School Uniform notes, â€Å"Uniforms by themselves cannot solve all of the problems of school discipline, but they can be one positive contributing factor to discipline and safety† (Lumsden, Miller, 2002). Some authors contend that uniforms lessen emphasis on fashion, reduce the financial burden of low-income families, and promote peer acceptance, school pride, and learning. In a ten-state survey of elementary and middle school principals conducted two years ago by the National Association of Elementary School Principals and the clothing company Lands’ End, eleven percent of respondents said that their schools mandate uniforms, and another fifteen percent were considering such a policy. Others recent survey indicated that support for uniforms are growing among parents as well. In one survey, fifty-six percent of parents said they would support a school uniform policy (Lumsden, Miller, 2002). School uniforms also take the pressure off students to pay top dollar for clothes, according to Reginald Wilson, a senior scholar at the American Council on Education in Washington, D. C. â€Å"I think it does lower the cost of clothes, and kids don’t emphasize clothes as much when they’re all wearing the same thing,† Wilson said. â€Å"Certainly the competition to wear the best shoes or the best sweaters and so forth has been prevalent in school ever since I was in school, and the poor kids felt inferior† (www. pbs. org). Deborah L. Elder wrote about an evaluation of school uniform policy at John Adams and Truman Middle Schools for Albuquerque public schools. In the beginning in the fall of 1998 under a policy started by parent’s students at John Adams and Truman Middle Schools in Albuquerque were required to wear tuck-in polo shirts and khaki pants or skirts. Elder reports on an evaluation of this policy that used interviews, focus groups, and surveys, along with data on discipline referrals and numbers of students achieving honor-roll status. During the first semester of the 1998-1999 school year, both schools experienced a clear improvement in student conduct from the previous year. At John Adams Middle School, discipline referrals fell from one thousand five hundred and sixty-five during the first semester of the previous year to four hundred and five. At Truman, referrals dropped from one thousand one hundred and thirty-nine to eight hundred and fifty. Students, teachers, and parents stated in interviews â€Å"uniforms place all students on an equal level,† Elder writes, â€Å"Students who may be immediately labeled by peers and staff no longer stand out. † Survey data showed that seventy-five percent of parents and eighty-nine percent of staff supported uniforms and believed they decreased violence, theft, and gang activity, Although only fifteen percent of students supported uniforms, fifty-nine percent agreed that â€Å"school uniforms help school officials identify trespassers on campus. † Concerns about school violence have led to increased interest in and acceptance of uniform policies. In the wake of school shootings, communities and schools are much more willing to embrace uniforms as well as a number of other strategies to enhance student safety. Curbing gang-related violence was the primary goal of the Long Beach (CA) Unified School District when, in 1994, it began requiring students in all its elementary and middle schools to wear uniforms, In the Dysart Unified School District outside Phoenix, Arizona, eliminating some of the stigma associated with clothes was the main motivation behind the adoption of uniforms. Even before the recent series of school shootings, a survey of principals conducted by the National Association of Secondary School Principals found strong support for uniforms. In addition to having a sense that uniform may aid in violence prevention, many administrators believe that uniforms will reduce discipline referrals, while improving attendance, achievement, self-esteem, and school climate. A study of middle school students in the Charleston (SC) School District fount that school uniforms did appear to alter students’ perceptions of school climate. Students attending district schools that required uniforms viewed their school climates more positively than did students enrolled in schools where uniforms were not mandatory. Additional benefits credited to school uniforms include improved discipline, increased respect for teachers, increased school attendance, fewer distractions, improved academic performance, increased self-esteem and confidence, lower overall clothing costs, promotion of group spirit, reduction in social stratification and fashion statements, improved classroom behavior, lower rates of school crime and violence, and easy identification of nonstudents (Lumsden, 2001). Many opponents believe that dictating what students wear to school violates their constitutional right to freedom of expression (Lumsden,Miller, 2002). People oppose uniforms point to unnecessary violations of students First Amendment rights, authoritarian regimentation, extraordinary expenditures on special clothing, an environmental tone that is harmful to education and learning, and cosmetic solution to deeper societal problems. Students First Amendment right to freedom of expression, and whether it is being abridged, is one of the fundamental issues raised, Several legal challenges have asserted that students freedom to select what to wear to school is a form of self-expression that schools are not entitled to interfere with (Lumsden, 2001). In a recent case, Littlefield v. Forney, parents challenged a school uniform policy adopted by the Forney, Texas school board. The policy required students to wear polo shirts, oxford shirts, or blouses in any of four specified solid colors, with blue or khaki pants, shorts, skirts, or jumpers. Denim, leather, suede, vinyl, and spandex were off-limits, as were baggy clothes and specific types of shoes. The parents claimed that the district’s policy violated â€Å"the right of parents to control the upbringing and education of their own children. † The plaintiff also argued that the policy interfered with students’ freedom of expression and forced them to express ideas with which they might disagree. In addition, they also declared that the procedures for opting out of the policy violated their religious freedom by allowing school officials to assess the sincerity of people’s religious belief. The federal district court dismissed the suit without a trial, but the plaintiffs then appealed to the 5th Circuit Court, where the ruling of the lower court was upheld. In its decision, the 5th Circuit Court indicated that students’ free-speech right to select their own clothes is â€Å"not absolute,† and that this right must be balanced against a school board’s stated interests in adopting a dress code or uniform policy. To decide whether a specific uniform or dress code policy is permissible under the Constitution’s free-speech clause, the court used a four-pronged test it had previously applied in another school uniform case, Canady v. Bossier Parish School Board. The court looked at four criteria: the school board must have the power to make a policy, the policy must promote a substantial interest of the board, the adoption of the policy must not be an attempt to censor student expression, and the policy’s â€Å"incidental† restrictions on student expression must not be greater than necessary to promote the board’s interest. In this case, the 5th Circuit found that all four criteria were satisfied and that the district’s school uniform policy therefore did not violate students’ right to free expression. The court also ruled that parents’ rights to control their children’s upbringing, including their education, cannot override school rules that are considered â€Å"reasonable† to maintain an appropriate educational environment. In this case, the court concluded that the uniform policy was â€Å"rationally related† to the interests of the school board in â€Å"promoting education, improving student safety, increasing attendance, decreasing dropout rates, and reducing socioeconomic tensions among students. † The parents’ argument that the opt-out procedure violated religious freedom because if gave school officials the authority to judge the sincerity and content of families’ religious beliefs was also rejected by the court. Their decision was based on the policy not containing any religious goals; they did not have the effect of advancing or hindering any particular faith over any other; and did not excessively â€Å"entangle† school officials in religious beliefs (Lumsden, and Miller, 2002). Public schools that have already put uniform into place have seen improvement. Kids are less focus on what they are wearing, and more focus on schoolwork. Kids are not focused on what they should wear the next day for school and you won’t have kids up early looking for clothes to wear to school. Elementary and Middle Schools will see significant change once uniforms are put into place. School uniforms are a great way to preserve the level of social equality amongst the students. The thought of knowing the social background is prevented. It makes kids treat each other equally; not judging by what clothes they wear. Students will learn to respect each other on the foundation of how they get along and not how sexy they look. Humiliating or bullying other kids will decrease or stop altogether. The level of distraction is considerably reduced. Since students will be dressing in similar clothing, which will be distinctive to the school, the students will build up a sense of belonging and loyalty to the school. School uniforms will help avoid incidents of complicated situations (inferiority and superiority). Students will not be known by what they wear, but by how they perform. Kids can build team spirit. When you wear specific colors, a sense of unity can be developed. Similar clothing promotes team spirit. School uniforms encourage a sense of ownership and discipline. Therefore, I strongly believe school uniforms should be a requirement for public school students in the elementary and middle schools. Overall, implementing school uniform in elementary and middle public school will be beneficial, as I have mentioned above. Kids may not be happy about it at first, but they will eventually catch on. I personally work with middle school kids who go to public school and wear uniforms. They did not like it at first, but what they all agree on is how they don’t have to decide on what to wear. References Lumsden, Linda and Gabriel Miller. â€Å"Dress Codes and Uniforms. † 2002. National Association of Elementary School Principals, Alexandria, VA. 19 6 2012 . Lumsden, Linda. Uniforms and Dress-Code Policies. Eugene, May 2001. Mitchell, Alison. New York Times: Clinton Will Advise Schools on Uniforms. 25 February 1996. 23 June 2012 . Public School Uniform Statistics. 2012. 19 6 2012 . School Uniforms. 21 6 2012 .

Theory of Knowledge for the IB Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words

Theory of Knowledge for the IB - Essay Example The second definition goes beyond the original reason for the invention of machines. Instead of just aiding us in our daily tasks by being "extensions" of our bodies in performing their tasks, machines, especially since the time when a machine called computers are invented, become performers of tasks independently of its user. As long as its actions are programmed in such a way that it can now perform tasks without the presence or the real-time control of humans. They have become very sophisticated that they can surpass what we can do. Mechanical cranes can lift manifold times the maximum weight that the strongest living human can. Assembly line robots can accomplish a task way beyond a team of fastest human workers of that particular job. And, in 1997, a supercomputer named Deep Blue defeated the then world chess champion, Garry Kasparov. The power of machines exponentially increases our capacity to produce goods and services. It is understandable that they can outshine our mechanical abilities. But in terms of our mental faculties, machines such as Deep Blue has been programmed to outsmart our rational faculties. This presents a question that we are to resolve in this paper. Can a machine know Before going further, we must first define what the verb "to know" means. In English this word has several definitions. In the American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (Fourth Edition) " know" has eight definitions: "1. To perceive directly; grasp in the mind with clarity or certainty. 2. To regard as true beyond doubt. 3. To have a practical understanding of, as through experience; be skilled in 4. To have fixed in the mind: 5. To have experience of: 6a. To perceive as familiar; recognize: b. To be acquainted with: 7. To be able to distinguish; recognize as distinct: knows right from wrong. 8. To discern the character or nature of:" The definitions above give us different aspects of the word "know." By these we can say that "knowing" something starts when we perceive a thing by our senses, processing this acquired information to a point that we become acquainted with those things and ends up with the capability of the "knowing" person to distinctly distinguish or recognize that thing from others. The emergence of the Information Age has introduced machines that can "think" independently. They, such as supercomputers, can grasp and process data at astounding speeds. In a fraction of a second, they can perform mathematical operations that a human can do in hours or even years. With this capacity, they can really perform rational activities, at least to a certain extent. But can we say that this supercomputer's ability to process data is already an act of knowing given the definition of "know" above For me, I believe that machines cannot fully know. They may perform mental tasks of humans with rapidity and precision way above that of humans. But still they cannot totally know things as per defined by dictionaries. If we use the definitions above, they fall short of thoroughly knowing something. To prove this, let us consider the first definition "To perceive directly, grasp in the mind with clarity or certainty." Computers are designed to perceive and grasp data to help us in our tasks. Word processing programs, for example, are created for us to write a letters and other documents in a precise and neat manner. It can receive data coming

Consumer Problems Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words

Consumer Problems - Essay Example It is identified that carbon dioxide, carbon monoxide, and extreme heat produced during the disaster amplify the dreadfulness of mattress fires. This paper will explore the lethal effects of mattress fires and will also recommend solutions to the issue. Potential issues of mattress fires As per the report released by CPSC representatives, mattress fire causes 700-1000 deaths annually (Mattress and bedding fires). This huge mattress fires related death rates point out the severity of the issue. According to Mullan (2004), national fire loss estimates assert that mattresses and bedding were the major cause to ignite in 19, 400 residential fire cases attended by fire service during 1995-1999. Although many regulations have been initiated to address the issue, none of them could effectively avoid the mattress fires. The regulations could persuade industries to manufacture fire resistant mattresses. However, even the restructured mattresses are not capable of preventing the spread of fire . The issue has turned to be one of the major social concerns in the United States as technology did not develop an effective method to eliminate this problem. Although cigarette smoking in bed is the main cause of mattress fires, type of suits the individuals wearing, the furniture used, and the room setting also add to the rapid spread of the mattress fires. It is important to note that mattress fires spread very quickly in an uncontrollable manner and hence it increases the chances of fatalities and huge economic loss. According to United States Deputy Fire Administrator Chief Charlie Dickinson (as cited in Morales, 2004), mattress fire doubles itself every minute. From the reported mattress fire cases, it is observed that users of mattresses, their family members, and neighbors in nearby apartment units are at risk of mattress fire. It is assumable that the mattress fire victims would probably be asleep and it adds to the severity of the issue. Similarly, kids and aged persons a re easily affected by mattress fires since they lack sufficient physical fitness to leave the disaster spot instantly. Carbon monoxide is the deadly gas released during mattress fire disasters and it would kill individuals before the flames do. Many consumers are of the belief that previous government regulations have completely eliminated mattress fires; however, these regulations could only reduce the risks associated with mattress disasters. Solutions Obviously, it is difficult to stop the mattress fires completely; therefore, it would be better to explore some remedies that would mitigate the dreadfulness of this issue. Firstly, people must get aware of the dreadfulness of mattress fire and the available disaster response techniques. The adult persons must be careful about removing their children and aged parents from bed at the time of disaster. In addition, one must close the doors to stop fire and call the fire service department. It is advisable for the fire service departme nt to provide awareness programs to the public. Likewise, it is not practical to inhibit people from smoking in bed; hence, it is better to place a protective material layer in between sheets and mattress. In the opinion of Hammack (as cited in Sumi and Williams-Leir, 1969), woolen blankets, cotton cloth treated with a commercial launderable fire retardant, and certain types of plastic sheeting are the effective defensive measures to prevent

Reflective log on the six topics Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2000 words - 1

Reflective log on the six topics - Essay Example In reflecting on the history of crime control, the policies of the government and the calls for reforms from citizens have played a dynamic role in shaping crime control and policing. One issue in attempting to explicate a history of crime control in the United Kingdom is that crime statistics were not kept before 1805 and thus all endeavours to reconstruct the state of crime before then must be gathered from, at times, shady court records (Emsley 204). The genesis of modern crime control is often attributed, by most Whig historians, to the establishment of the Metropolitan Police in 1829 by then Home Secretary Sir Robert Peel (Sharpe 6). The traditional historical account suggests that this was prompted by the rising rates of crime throughout London and other increasingly urbanized areas in the north and midlands, and the perceived outmoded inadequacy of the previous system of parish constables and watchmen, which had shown its impotence in such situations as the Gordon Riots in 1780 (Emsley 211). The elevation of crime control measures from primarily local and discretionary mechanisms to centralized and homogenous is a general trend that is in part due to the g rowth of London and other large cities, and the attendant concerns of urban populism mandated greater national implementation of crime management techniques (Emsley 226). One possible explanation for this is that urban environments present a more complex and interconnected social dynamic, which can more easily breakdown with more disastrous results, than in the more agrarian and rural milieu that dominated Great Britain in centuries prior. Rather than focusing on the dozens of crime control theories that populate handbooks and research journals, some attention should be paid to the nature of crime control theory itself and how it is established. One of the difficulties in generating sound theories of crime control is in

Phizer Marketing and Products Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

Phizer Marketing and Products - Essay Example The ultimate aim of every marketing activities of Pfizer is to maximize sales through increased prescription writing. Pfizer know that majority of the patients all over the world are purchasing medicines based on the prescriptions from their doctors. So, Pfizer’s advertising strategies give number one priority to doctors rather than patients. They know very well that once the doctor prescribes their medicine, most of the patients may purchase it without a second thought. Direct-to-consumer (DTC) advertising of drugs has been legal in the USA since 1985, but only really took off in 1997 when the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) eased up on a rule obliging companies to offer a detailed list of side-effects in their infomercials (Direct-to-consumer advertising under fire, 2009) Targeted ads are possible nowadays because of the rapidly increasing popularity of internet and social media. Sending of customized emails is one of the major marketing strategy implemented by many of th e prominent organizations like Pfizer. Pfizer uses social media like Facebook, Twitter, MySpace etc to reach out individual customers. In short, Direct To Consumer advertising (DTC) is one of the prominent advertising channels in Pfizer’s’ marketing activities. ... â€Å"The New York Times reports that Pfizer is planning to lock up the market for heart treatments by bundling its new drug (toretrapib, which is still in experimental stage of development) to the company's bestselling cholesterol lowering drug, Lipitor† (Pfizer Marketing Scheme Stirs Concern_NYT, 2005). The aim of Pfizer is to have two birds for one shot. In other words, they are trying to exploit the publicity and brand value generated by its new product for selling some of their existing products. Even though the above marketing strategy has raised many criticisms, Pfizer do not bother about such criticisms and they are going ahead with the marketing strategy of forcing the heart patients to purchase more Pfizer products. â€Å"Marketing activities with health care professionals must convey full and substantiated information about the side effects and the safety profile of medicines† (Practicing ethical sales and marketing, 2011). In order to strengthen the bondage between the consumers and the company, Pfizer reveals the side effects associated with each of the drug they sell. The above strategy helped Pfizer to increase the confidence of the people over Pfizer products. It should be noted that most of the other pharmaceutical companies do not have the habit of revealing the side effects of their products in their marketing campaigns because of their concerns about the possible negative impacts. Pfizer always believe in telling the truth to the consumers which helped them to increase the relationships with its customers. Pfizer succeeded in partitioning the entire market based on the differences in the purchasing behaviors of the consumers. â€Å"Segmentation analysis is actually based on the theoretical belief that every

Anishinabe peoples and the clan system Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

Anishinabe peoples and the clan system - Essay Example The institutions of social services, justice, community development, property and civil rights, customs law, educational and health services were among the institutions orderly managed by Anishinabe Clan System (Sitting, 2003). The institutions as they were well managed reflected the original values which promoted the well-being of a common man. The system offered a great law which presented both forms of social and political governance clearly. Therefore, people could not contradict in either social or political ideas. The system presented a way of dealing with social and political differences harmoniously. It was an effective system of administering both structure of governance and social order in the society. Furthermore, its spiritual importance cannot be underestimated. It was a system where spiritual policies could be applied when there is a need to reconcile conflicting parties in the society. Through application of its policies and principles, the system continued to function and support all the people and was important in fulfilling their pursuits and needs. Even though, times changed, the clan system continued being strong and became key to the strength of Ojibway people. People could identify themselves with the clan systems. It defined the people’s unity and identity, and at the same time maintained integ rity, personal identity and dignity of the people. The clan System, apart from providing leadership and governance to Ojibway people, it also gave a chance to the people to actively participate in the governance decisions and the concerns of their needs. The people through the Clan System could also actively compel the policies that could derail their rights and freedoms (James, 2007). The governance was well organized and the hierarchy was well defined. Each clan was given a place and designated a role to play in the society. The clan meets regularly depending on the

MD3 Assignment 1 Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words

MD3 Assignment 1 - Essay Example He is audible and this is proved by the fact that the audience respond to the speech by clapping and cheering when he talks about an important point. He maintains eye contact with the audience during the speech, and pauses he makes while delivering his speech and his vocal expressions are excellent. He makes use of gestures and facial expressions to deliver his message of pain that he feels because of the discrimination directed to the black society. His introduction is excellent as he explains the main points he is going to deliver during the speech, which is discrimination against the black people. His main points are easily identifiable as he raises his tone while delivering the main points of his discussion and pauses to get a reaction of the audience. The speech is properly organized as it starts with the main idea then it is followed by complaints or the current situation and finally ends with what has to be done to ensure that all prejudice against the black people is eliminated in the American society. He uses supportive evidence by naming states where racism has been practiced and concludes that he has a dream that one day everyone will be able to work together as brothers irrespective of skin color. It is evident that the speech is received well by the audience since they respond by cheering and clapping throughout the speech. By doing this exercise I have learnt that a speech has to be arranged chronologically and presented in a way that the audiences are able to digest the message being passed. I have learnt that the speed of delivering a speech needs to be at a rate that the audience will be able to relate and join in so that delivery is

Disaster recovery team Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Disaster recovery team - Essay Example The business disasters have several causes including human, natural, and mechanical in nature. The committee is in charge of procedures and operations of a discovery exercise. It is the central committee in any business company. For this company, it has twelve members from across all departments operational in the business. The departments are Information technology, management, electrical, finance, human resources, security department, and vendor. The committee must prepare and maintain a discovery plan. It is the first step in the process of planning the recovery. The committee should identify the risks and threats associated with disasters. The committee does this exercise by carrying out risk analysis that includes among others evaluating threats posed to the continuality of the business (Mukhopadhyay, 2005). Other scholars refer to the business risk analysis as the business impact analysis and entails assessing the current environmental and physical control and security structures as well as evaluating their capacity to serve their purposes. Differences in the magnitude of risk depend on location of occurrence, affected asset, as well as time. The committee should classify the risks into various classes while undertaking evaluation. The process helps in arranging on a scale according to priority. The committee can categorize the risks into known categories. External risks refer to those risks that nobody can associate failures of the company with their occurrence (Klein, 2007). Their strengths come from the fact that they are not bound by the company and its management. They fall into four subcategories including natural risks, risks caused by human factors, supplier, as well as civil risks. Completion of evaluation of risks means that the disaster recovery committee should sort and allocate scores to the categories. Determinants could be impact and likelihood. The management can prepare a score sheet to effectively score and

The Coach Essay Example for Free

The Coach Essay As a group coaches are often criticized for their overemphasis on winning and their overly serious attitude toward the league experience. Most studies, however, point out that in general Little League coaches get involved for the love of the game and for the love of their participating child. Coaches that angrily shout criticism from the sidelines are not appreciated or liked as are relaxed, supportive, and knowledgeable coaches who emphasize the improvement and learning of new skills. Coaches that develop close and personal relationships with the child and her/his parents are the most likely to contribute to a positive learning experience. Coaches are first and foremost role models and teachers. Good coaching is not about producing winning teams; its about asking every day before practice or a game: Is what were planning to do today in the best interest of the kids? The best lesson a coach can teach is that playing fairly makes everyone a winner, and that: Developing Coaching Philosophy A casual observer of any little league game site will notice the excessive seriousness and tension exhibited by coaches on the sidelines. Coaches and spectating parents get very involved with their childrens game. Some fail to realize the deleterious effects of their vocal protests regarding game referee decisions or disapproval of their childs performance. Several soccer leagues that I am familiar with have on record a very appropriate league philosophy statement. These statements emphasize learning, fair play, fun, equal opportunity, etc over winning. Ironically, the same leagues use trained referees and linesmen, for example, to officiate a game between two teams comprised of nine-year-old players. Players are often assigned to positions in which they are most productive or least destructive. And, coaches, parents and players exhibit excessive celebration when a goal is scored (even when the goal resulted from a clumsy goalie error) or when a game is won. Overly formal game control, early specialization, and excessive celebrations seem incompatible with a child-centered league philosophy. Should the league experience serve best only the most talented and promising individuals at the expense of the less skilled? A typical league reality of winning first, child second, seems to prevail over the same leagues beautifully crafted philosophy statement. The stress associated with coaching a losing team stems from the distorted view that winning equals good coaching and loosing equals poor coaching. The child that is allowed to play a variety of positions will learn and progress irrespectively of her or his teams winning or loosing record. In the soccer league that I joined as assistant coach during the Fall of 1999, the head coach knew which the two best teams on the league were several weeks before kickoff. Who gets the credit for coaching these kids? Four of the kids on our nine-year-old boys team never played the game. How are they going to learn and improve if we are not going to allow them to make mistakes? Sticking to a child-centered game plan can get very tricky and involve tough decisions. A Coaching Philosophy Some coaches get turned off by the word philosophy. They cannot see how any one philosophy can have an impact on their daily problems and work. Ones teaching or coaching philosophy, however, is actually a very practical matter. An analogy to ones philosophy may be equated to a pair of glasses that filter reality through ones personal experiences, opinions, values and beliefs. It has, therefore a direct influence on how we see and understand the world around us, what actions we take, and why we choose to behave in the ways we do. In fact, every coach, whether aware of it or not, is following certain principles or his philosophy while coaching. It may seem reasonable to assume that the philosophy that directs the coachs everyday life thinking and actions would be also applied by her/him to coaching. Yet, this often seems not to be the case. For example, most coaches would agree that a less skilled child with little or no self-confidence needs special attention and time investment. Yet, who are the kids that usually get the most attention, the most playing time, the most praise? Still, let’s assume, for example, that a businessman discovered that the firm he is negotiating with was dishonest. He decides to do his business with another group despite the fact that he may end up paying more for essentially the same product. This may not sound like good business, yet many a businessman I talked to expressed willingness to stick to their principles even if it meant higher expenses. How many coaches do you know that would stick to principles of sportsmanship or fair play rather than win a game? Obviously, we can readily see a gap between what a coach may think is the right thing to do in every day life situations, and the actions he/she ends up taking on the playing field. Developing an Alternative Coaching Philosophy Dr. Rainer Martens, a world renowned sport psychologist and publisher, explains that the development of a functional coaching philosophy involves two major tasks: †¢ become a student of your own feelings and who you are? †¢ prioritize and delineate your coaching objectives †¢ Developing Self-Awareness Children are great imitators. Therefore, you are more likely to shape them into your own image than into what you would actually like them to become. The coach is a very powerful role model. This is why it is important that the coach be honest as he/she evaluates her/himself and get in touch with here/his own feelings. The coach needs to discover whether he really likes who he/she is. A quick subjective self-awareness test would be to ask oneself When I was a child, would I have liked to have my current self as a parent? As a coach? If the answer is yes, explain to yourself why you think the way you do. What is it that makes you a good parent, teacher, coach? If you realize that you do not like everything about yourself, dont panic, nobodys perfect. The key factor is not for every coach to be a perfect individual. It is crucial, however, that the coach be honest with her/himself, and willing to take the appropriate steps to change for the better. Dr. Martens suggests that one such first step would be to form an open door policy and solicit feed back from the kids, assistant coaches and the parents. This, according to Dr. Martens means that the coach needs to learn to listento be attentive to both overt and covert communication patterns. Good listening skills ensure two way communications and thus decrease the filtering effect that often distorts the true message delivered by the other party. Prioritization and Delineation of Coaching Objectives It is an indisputable fact that children are their parents and nations most precious asset. It may seem natural to assume, therefore, that the majority of adults mean well for the kids. Yet, how often do we wish something for our child, and then step back and take the time to find out whether this is what the child really wants? More often than not, adults feel they know better, and thus, exclude children from the decision making process. Youth sport, unfortunately, is a prime example of this phenomenon. In 1987 the Athletic Footwear Association in America sponsored a study of 10,000 students ages 10-18 regarding their feelings about sport. The students reacted to questions such as why they participate, why they quit, and what changes they would make in order to get involved again in a sport they dropped. The most important finding of the study was that winning, which is the most publicized and pursued goal of sports never ranked higher than seventh even among the most competitive athletes. To have fun and to improve my skills were consistently the first two choices why the students chose to play sports. When asked why they dropped from sports three of the first five reasons were I was not having fun, coach was a poor teacher, and too much pressure. How many coaches you know would have predicted this outcome? (Rainer, 1987, 3-14) Dr. Martha E. Ewing and Dr. Vern Seefeld of the Youth Sports Institute of Michigan State University who conducted the study, and Dr. Steven J. Danish, chairman of the Department of Psychology at Virginia Commonwealth University who added psychological and developmental interpretations proposed the following truths about children and sport: Fun is pivotal; if its not fun, young people wont play a sport (Rainer, 1987, 3-14). Skill development is a crucial aspect of fun; it is more important than winning even among the best athletes. The most rewarding challenges of sports are those that lead to self-knowledge. Intrinsic rewards (self-knowledge that grows out of self-competition) are more important in creating lifetime athletes than are extrinsic rewards (victory or attention from others). The American Youth and Sports Participation study authors proposed the following tips for coaches and parents who are willing to develop an alternative coaching philosophy: For Coaches Become a communicator (a listener and a giver of feedback). Recognize the needs of your kids and balance your needs with theirs. Develop perspective: remember what you were like at their age and what you could do then; dont judge the kids by what you can do now. Remember the truths and plan activities with them in mind. Seek out workshops and educational programs that teach not only sports-related skills but also communication and interpersonal skills that will help you work with parents and get the most out of your kids. Try to work with parents and make them part of the team rather than viewing them as critics to be avoided. Coach Development Education, as pedagogical theory so perceptively points out, is a two-way process, which means that both sides of the process have an opportunity to influence each other. Therefore, the coach can expect to be shaped by his team members’ characters and styles in a way that is no less decisive than his or her influence upon them. Realizing it may prove a challenge to many authoritative coaches, yet this impact is undeniable and should not be underestimated. However, in case of a younger team, the coach’s influence is going to exceed that of the children as they, as mentioned before, are great imitators and need a role model to follow. For this reason among others, the coach has to develop certain moral and professional qualities that will form the basis for practical application of one’s coaching philosophy. The tenets of coaching philosophy determine which exactly qualities one needs in order to develop one’s team and bring them to a victory earned in the spirit of fair play sportsmanship. In the first place, a coach has to be a superb organizer. This is the coach’s primary function in the team: to unite a disparate set of players into a coherent whole. Unity in the contest has to stem from psychological unity of the team, the much talked about team spirit. A coach in one’s philosophy has to define how important a place the team occupies in his/her activities and endeavors and what ways of achieving this unity are legitimate and effective. In team sports specifically, the value of team relationships cannot be overrated, since a victory is only a product of collective efforts and rarely a gift of luck.

Drugs Are Bad Essay Example for Free

Drugs Are Bad Essay It’s a common known fact that drugs are bad, but yet they are still used recreationally, especially among teenagers and young adults. Some of the most popular drugs used today are marijuana, ecstasy, tobacco, and alcohol. Marijuana has many nicknames. Weed, mary-jane, chronic, hash, etc. It is usually smoked, but can also be made with food or as tea. Scientists have learned a great deal about how THC acts in the brain to produce its many effects. When someone smokes marijuana, THC rapidly passes from the lungs into the bloodstream, which carries the chemical to the brain and other organs throughout the body. THC acts upon specific sites in the brain, called cannabinoid receptors, kicking off a series of cellular reactions that ultimately lead to the high that users experience when they smoke marijuana. Some brain areas have many cannabinoid receptors; others have few or none. The highest density of cannabinoid receptors are found in parts of the brain that influence pleasure, memory, thoughts, concentration, sensory and time perception, and coordinated movement. Users experience slower reaction times, extensive hunger, poor memory, and lack of motivation. In personal experiences, weed has had no worth-while positive outcome on people that I know have used it, especially regularly. Known users have been arrested, expelled from school, suffered with their grades, or made poor decisions. People have told me that the feeling of being high actually does not feel good at all, and that it makes them depressed or that they are being pulled downward. Consistent use of marijuana can lead to addiction, lung cancer, anxiety, depression, and dependence. Ecstasy is a drug that has stimulant and psychodelic properties. It is taken orally as a capsule or tablet. It is also known as X and MDMA. Short-term effects of taking the drug include feelings of mental stimulation, emotional warmth, enhanced sensory perception, and increased physical energy. Adverse health effects can include nausea, chills, sweating, teeth clenching, muscle cramping, and blurred vision. It is a rumor that exercising, or doing any other activity that would cause the body to heat up such as sex, would cause the body to overheat while on ecstasy and thus would result in death. Personally, I have seen some crazy things while people were on ecstasy. I have heard that taking a shower feels really good, but coming down from a high of mass endorphins is especially painful. A girl I know was coming down from the high so fast and so hard that she was banging her head on the cement in the parking lot because she was feeling so terrible. She then destroyed her phone by throwing it against the wall. Alcohol, although legal over a certain age, is still considered a drug. When a person drinks alcohol, the alcohol is absorbed by the stomach, enters the bloodstream, and goes to all the tissues. The effects of alcohol are dependent on a variety of factors, including a persons size, weight, age, and sex, as well as the amount of food consumed before drinking. The disinhibiting effect of alcohol is one of the main reasons it is used in so many social situations. Other effects of moderate alcohol intake include dizziness and talkativeness; the immediate effects of a larger amount of alcohol include slurred speech, disturbed sleep, nausea, and vomiting. Alcohol, even at low doses, significantly impairs the judgment and coordination required to drive a car safely. Low to moderate doses of alcohol can also increase the incidence of a variety of aggressive acts, including domestic violence and child abuse. Hangovers are another possible effect after large amounts of alcohol are consumed; a hangover consists of headache, nausea, thirst, dizziness, and fatigue. Some long term effects of alcohol are liver failure, addiction to alcohol or alcoholism, damage to the brain, damage to the fetus of a pregnant woman, and depression. There are ways to prevent severe hangovers. There is a saying that goes, â€Å"Beer before liquor, never sicker. Liquor before beer, you’re in the clear. † A hangover is a result of dehydration because of the effects of alcohol on a person’s system. Tobacco is another legal substance that is considered a drug. Tobacco is typically smoked but can also be chewed and absorbed by way of the gums. When a person smokes a cigarette, the body responds immediately to the chemical nicotine in the smoke. Nicotine causes a short-term increase in blood pressure, heart rate, and the flow of blood from the heart. It also causes the arteries to narrow. Carbon monoxide reduces the amount of oxygen the blood can carry. This, combined with the effects produced by nicotine, creates an imbalance in the demand for oxygen by the cells and the amount of oxygen the blood is able to supply. This imbalance causes a tobacco high, and most of the times, light headedness. It is now well documented that smoking can cause chronic lung disease, heart disease, and stroke, as well as cancer of the lungs, larynx, esophagus, mouth, and bladder. In addition, smoking is known to contribute to cancer of the cervix, pancreas, and kidneys. Researchers have identified more than 40 chemicals in tobacco smoke that cause cancer in humans and animals, some including things like rat poison. Smokeless tobacco and cigars also have deadly consequences, including lung, larynx, esophagus, and oral cancer. The harmful effects of smoking do not end with the smoker. Women who use tobacco during pregnancy are more likely to have adverse birth outcomes, including babies with low birth weight, which is linked with an increased risk of infant death and with a variety of infant health disorders. The health of nonsmokers is affected by environmental tobacco smoke, or second-hand smoke. Each year, exposure to second-hand smoke causes many people to die of cancer. The temporary feeling that these drugs give the user does not outweigh the consequences that come with the choice to use these things. Although alcohol and tobacco are legal over a certain age, it doesn’t mean that they aren’t harmful. They still do a lot of damage to the user’s body. Marijuana and ecstasy are illegal in the United States and yet are still widely and popularly used. The word drug carries a negative connotation for these reasons.

Service Oriented Architecture (SOA) Design

Service Oriented Architecture (SOA) Design Introduction Objective The goal of a Service Oriented Architecture (SOA) is to achieve reusable assets in an agile manner that is aligned with the business needs of the organization. The SOA Reference Architecture provides guidelines for making architectural and implementation decisions. To that end it serves as a blueprint for creating or evaluating a solution architecture for different groups within the organization. In addition it provides insight and patterns for integrating the different elements of an SOA as illustrated by the different layers of an SOA. An SOA Reference Architecture is designed to answer some of the key questions and issues encountered while developing a solution such as: What are the aspects of an SOA as expressed in terms of layers that need to be considered when designing solutions based on SOA principles? What are the building blocks needed to include in each layer of a solution? What are some of the key architectural decisions that need to be made when designing a a solution that is based on SOA? Which roles in a project would benefit from using these principles and guidelines? To answer these questions this document provides the following: Establishes a common vocabulary and set of definitions for services and SOA. Identifies the different functions of an SOA implementation and define their interactions with each other and with functions outside the scope of the Rufus platform. Provides SOA guiding principles. Defines consistent design and implementation across services. Shows when and where to use SOA technologies. Supports SOA governance. Provides an architectural based design methodology. Overview This document presents the layers, building blocks, architectural and design decisions, patterns, options and the separation of concerns needed to design or evaluate an SOA architecture. The architecture consists of multiple components which are divided into the following categories: Quality of Service (QoS) Security Consumer Business Process Integration Services Information Infrastructure Governance Monitoring Management Center of Excellence (COE) Design Time Elements Component View Design Time Elements Design-Time Activities are the technical activities, guidelines, and deliverables that allow for everyday development within the SOA and Integration Architecture. Including: Service Modeling and Design Canonical Data Modeling Policy Specification Service Assembly Service Testing Service Identification Service Lifecycle Management Service Modeling and Design Services must be modeled and designed to support an extensible plug-and-play model by being: Reusable So that other Services leverage an existing Service. Composable So that a Service can leverage other Services. Interoperable So that Services can work with each other. Discoverable To support location independence. To enable the above qualities, each Service (except for Data and Utility Services) needs to have: A well-defined Service Contract To enable loose couple by hiding low-level implementation details from Service Consumers. SOAP-based Web Services achieve this by specifying a WSDL interface with XML-based document exchange. RESTful Web Services define a contract with HTTP input parameters and JSON/XML-based responses. Coarse-grained So that operations have enough data to carry out all tasks in a stateless manner. Stateless operations Statelessness (i.e., not maintaining state between invocations) enables a Service to be reused in many contexts. A way to handle Exceptions to notify its caller if there are problems carrying out an operation. To ensure that each type of Shared Service is designed and implemented in a uniform manner, a SOA Governance team should create SOA Best Practices documents for: Service Design, Web Service Design, and XML Message Design in Designers Guides (i.e., working agreements). Topics would include: Service Specification and Design Interface (including Canonical Data model for messages see section 3.5.2) Policies (see section 3.5.3) SLAs (Service Level Agreements) A description of what the Service does A description of the Services operations. Best practices for each type of Shared Service (Business, Common, Data, Integration, and Utility). Examples showing the difference between Service-Oriented Design and Object Oriented Design. How to develop a SOAP Web Service (and handle Exceptions). How to develop a RESTful Web Service (and handle Exceptions). Canonical Data Modeling (XML) Many organizations have several autonomous packaged and custom developments that have evolved independently of one another. Many times, each system has become a system with its own implementation methodology, culture, processes, business rules, and vocabulary. Many companies face the problem of using the business data to enable applications to communicate in a distributed systems environment. Organizations design Canonical Data Models (CDM) to help analyze the message exchange within the organization and with their trading partners. Data is embedded in the basic architecture of any organization. To develop the CDM, an organization must inventory business concepts and map the vocabulary into fundamental business concepts. The CDM provides a framework for integrating the disparate terms for each line of business. The CDM is a catalog of neutral terms defined in an XML Schema, including: Entities in the business domain (e.g., Order, Customer, etc.) Agreed-upon data structures so that a domain element has a single, common definition. Formatting rules. A CDM defines an organizations data in motion the XML messages exchanged between: Services within an enterprise. An enterprise and its external trading partners. Many industries have an industry standard (e.g., ACORD, for Insurance, or EDRM for e-Discovery) to define core concepts and define data exchanged between companies. A Canonical Data Model provides the following benefits: An enterprise can easily exchange data with its business partners. An enterprise can adopt a single approach to exchanging data across all services the enterprise. The canonical model helps define the interface for each Service (thus hiding the structure of the physical data in the database). Changes to the canonical data model are required only when an entirely new business concept arises. Policy Specification Policies provide service-level meta-data to Web Services consumers. Specifying these policies is an important step in Web Service design, and this is accomplished by attaching policy expressions to the WSDL. Specifically, these policies include: Security: Transport Protocol Algorithm (RSA, etc.). Messages Authentication/Authorization Level of Service (e.g., Silver, Gold, Platinum, etc.). For example, a Platinum customers requests execute on best-provisioned server for better performance (but also at a higher price). Performance For example, send notifications if performance for a particular service dips below the promised SLA. Auditing For example, begin auditing when a particular service consumer invokes an operation on a Service. Service Assembly A Business Analyst first develops a Business Process Diagram (using BPMN Business Process Modeling Notation) to model a business process at a business/requirements level. Then, designers and developers create a runtime model in either BPEL (Business Process Execution Language) or JBI (Java Business Integration) to: Assemble existing Shared Services into a Business Process Enable a BPMS product and/or ESB can run the business process. Designers use MEPs (Message-Exchange Patterns) to model the runtime characteristics of a business process. Typical MEPs include: Pipes and Filters Content-based Router Recipient List Wire Tap Dynamic Router These patterns are gaining in popularity and many of the newer ESB and BPMS products support executable MEP models. Please see the following for further information: Enterprise Integration Patterns Home Page Enterprise Integration Patterns, Gregor Hohpe, Bobby Woolf, et al. Service Testing Most Shared Services will be implemented as Web Services, and it is important to take a Test-Driven Development (TDD) approach to Web Services development because: Designers and developers need early feedback on the design, functionality, usability, and performance of each Web Service. QA personnel need to be able to test Web Services. Overall quality is very important because each Web Service could be used by multiple consumers. Service Testing includes: Inspecting Web Services: Documentation Generating HTML documentation from the Web Service interface. Debugging Show SOAP/HTTP requests that are sent received over the wire. Invoking Web Services: Generating Web Services requests from WSDL to set the Web Service. Simulating/Mocking Web Services Generating Unit Tests based on the Web Service interface. Functional/Performance Testing Web Services Simulating load conditions. Reporting on performance under load conditions. Commercial products include: Eviware soapUI Pro iTKO LISA Open Source products include: Eviware soapUI Community Edition WebInject PushToTest TestMaker Points to Ponder (for Evaluation) Does the product support both SOAP and RESTful Web Services? How? Does the product enable you to view SOAP/HTTP messages over the wire? Does the product have a good/usable Web UI to make it easy to test? Can a QA/Tester use the product without developer intervention? What level of SOAP, WSDL, and HTTP does the product support? Does the product support an Agile/TDD approach with Unit Tests and Mocking? Does the product generate Unit Tests to support Continuous Integration? Can the product simulate load conditions and report on performance/scalability? How much setup is involved? How does the licensing work? Service Identification Service Identification is one of the key steps in designing a Service-Oriented solution because it defines and identifies high-level Business Services by using the following the following approaches: Top Down: Analyze and model business processes. Design new Services that enable the tasks and activities in the business processes. Bottom Up: Service-enable existing and applications systems. Create business processes from the Services. Middle Out: Analyze and model business processes. Catalog existing applications and services. Determine which can be Service-enabled. Create Service Adapters. Map tasks and activities from the business processes to existing Services. Create new Services to fill in the gaps. A Middle-out approach is recommend because it takes the best parts of the other approaches: The bottom-up approach creates isolated silos that dont align with the business. The top-down approach takes a long time, and the enterprise cant wait for every business process to be defined in order to begin designing and developing Services. A compromise approach takes into account the need for timeliness, but also instills enough discipline to design Business Services that match up with the goals and objectives from the Business Architecture by: Taking a first cut at the Business Services from Marketing materials and meetings with the CMO and other business stakeholders. Starting with only a few Business Processes. Driving toward a thin/vertical slice of functionality based on the business processes. Service Lifecycle Management Service implementations are software like any other software module or application. As such, they go through a similar lifecycle. The service lifecycle is depicted in the following diagram. The lifecycle starts with Service Identification. Services are part of more general business processes. As such, new services are usually identified by the design of a new business process. This is not the only way that new services are identified however. Sometimes services are identified as part of portfolio management. This involves analyzing the requirements for a service across the breadth of the enterprise. The level of analysis required for this type of identification is difficult to gauge and therefore CIBER does not recommend using portfolio management for service discovery at this time. Once a service has been identified, it follows an iterative development process. Iterative processes use the feedback from subsequent phases to make corrections in previous phases based on lesson learned or issues that may crop up. Services are part of a greater distributed system however and any changes made can have an impact on other development efforts. Therefore it is important to be mindful of the effect change can have even during development of a service. The Service Specification and Design phase produces at a minimum the specification for the service interface. This interface specification includes the semantics and data that the service supports. This represents the contract between the service and its consumers. Diligence should be applied to the design of this interface as changes to the interface have the greatest impact to subsequent phases. Changes to the service interface can impact both clients that may be developed in parallel, implementation of the service, as well as test plans that have been implemented to test the service. This does not mean that a service interface must never be changed once it is designed. Designs are not perfect and in todays IT environment it is not always possible to take the time required to produce an interface definition that is ideal. Therefore it is prudent to put processes in place that take into account that service interfaces may change. Whenever implementing a service take into account tha t the interface may change to the extent possible to minimize the impact of that change. This also applies to the implementers of consumers of the service. In some cases, consumers may want to wait until the service has been through some number of rounds of testing before starting their implementation. This allows for some experience to be developed with using the service thereby (hopefully) minimizing the possibility of change to the interface. Once the service has been designed it proceeds to the Service Implementation phase. In this phase the service will be developed based upon architectural standards developed by the university OIT group. Any issues encountered trying to implement the design of the service should be fed back to the designer in order to refine the design if necessary. Finally, service need to be tested before being deployed into production use. Testing of services involves four primary areas of focus: Security testing is essential to assess the risk of a service with regard to vulnerability, data privacy and data integrity. Tests need to be developed to test boundary conditions which can assess the robustness of the service handling inputs outside the range of anticipated values. Tests should also be created that ensure the service performs as expected based on the roles as defined within the system. Type of Testing Description Functional This area of testing focuses on ensuring the service performs its function according to the requirement of the business process it support. Automated test suites should be developed to perform regression testing to quickly verify functionality during the life cycle changes that may occur. Performance This area of testing focuses on performance characteristics of the service including measurement of time to perform the service and load testing of the service. The output from this type of testing forms the basis of understanding how to configure and deploy the service in a production environment. Interoperability This area of testing ensures the service adheres to its service specification. Early identification of interoperability issues is key to integration of the service through exposure to university partners and clients. This type of testing is especially important when the service interacts with multiple data sources and/or systems. Security Security testing is essential to assess the risk of a service with regard to vulnerability, data privacy and data integrity. Tests need to be developed to test boundary conditions which can assess the robustness of the service handling inputs outside the range of anticipated values. Tests should also be created that ensure the service performs as expected based on the roles as defined within the system. Regression One of the more important types of testing related to usage of services is regression testing. The more applications that depend on a given service, the more impact a change to that service can have on the environment. As such, when changes are made to services, regression testing must be undertaken to ensure that the service not only supports new or updated functions but all other functions upon which the service relies. Table 1 Service Testing Types Once the service is ready it is deployed into production use. At this point the service enters the maintenance cycle as opposed to the development cycle. Services in production sometimes require change. The change may be due to a defect in the system or a request to add more functionality to the service. It is important to understand how this change should be handled based on its nature. Defects that are a result of a fault in the underlying implementation of the service and do not change the behavior of the service may be handled by a Defect Remediation process. In this case it is desirable to apply a fix as quickly as possible to the existing service as it may be affecting multiple university processes and causing a disruption to the universities ability to perform its function. Changes that modify the behavior of an existing service or its interface are best handled by identifying a new service or a separate version of the service. In this scenario versions are really new services that are separate from the original. Taking this route minimizes impact on consumers using the original service but can cause a proliferation of services within the enterprise. This may not always be desirable however and some effort should be put into defining conditions under which an existing service in production may be modified (for instance, only one business consumer is affected and the change is well understood). This should be documented so that everyone understands the conditions and ensure that changes are handled in a consistent manner. Service Withdrawal is the final step of the lifecycle. Eventually services will start ballooning (especially when changing production services leads to the creation of new services) and some services will stop being used. Removing service can be problematic as a service may support multiple business process owned by different colleges and departments. A procedure needs to be adopted to define and orderly withdrawal of services from the system. Such a procedure may start with deprecating the service (with a note explaining why and some suggestion as to another service to replace it). Secondly, services can be monitored for use and the consumers identified. Finally, if the service is still being used the consumers should be contacted to discuss a solution. This should result in establishing a schedule for the consumers to switch over to another service so that the service may be withdrawn. Consumers of a deprecated service may not have incentive to change. Making changes requires effort and possibly some risk to the consumer. This needs to be recognized when seeking collaboration from consumers to switch over to another service. In this case it will be necessary to be creative in coming up with a common understanding of the benefit of switching to a newer service so the deprecated one may be withdrawn. Center of Excellence (COE) An online community to: Impart the SOA Vision. Educate IT and business staff on SOA. Communicate SOA best practices. Gain feedback on how to adapt the SOA Governance process and overall SOA program. Provide support advice for new and ongoing SOA implementations. Provide SOA Resources: Books Web Sites Industry Standards Quality of Service Logging Most applications and systems use some form of logging that stores messages to a persistent medium (DBMS, file, etc.). Logging provides the following benefits: Troubleshooting Applications log errors upon failure, and system personnel use this information to repair the problem. Reviewing System personnel examine log messages to check for problems. Auditing Security personnel can review log messages to see what actions a user performed in the system. Debugging Developers generate log messages to debug their programs. Identity Management Identity Management is the ability to identify a requestors (person or system) true identity and relationships between people and organizations (groups). The current policies and level of enforcement are expected to continue into Managed Services by using Microsofts Active Directory as the source for identity management. Confidentiality Confidentiality assures that during transport of the data it was never visible, accessible or viewed other than by authorized recipients. There currently is no Smart Energy or Smart Grid requirement to secure messages for Confidentiality. Authentication Authentication is also done within Microsofts Active Directory and adds authorization policies to the verified identity. Authorization Authorization is currently done at the application level. Within Managed Services (stage MS3) authorization will be performed to determine whether the requestor (person, application, service) is authorized to access the requested service, data and even the Managed Data Repository. Integrity / Non-repudiation Integrity requires that during transport and even as read by the sender there were no unauthorized modifications of the content of the message. Non-repudiation assures the sending service that the receiving service has received the intended message. Current Smart Energy and Smart Grid projected needs do not require message Integrity, but for sensitive messages (time, confidentiality, event, or priority) there is Non-repudiation. Consumers Service Consumers are the end consumer/user of the services provided by an enterprise. The consumer has the flexibility to process and display useful and relevant information provided by Services. Service Consumers access Services through a consistent interface (or contract) exposed by that Service. Service Consumers can be: User Interfaces B2B Applications Business Processes User Interaction Users can access enterprise services through variety of mechanisms, including Portals, web sites, or PDAs. A web site provides a web-based interface to enable users to perform daily, job-related tasks. A web site leverage the services created provided the organization, as a part of SOA implementation, and do not contain any business logic themselves. The site seamlessly integrates with back-end services (using SOAP/WSDL, REST/JSON) and business processes. The site can be secured by global security policies, but also can include role based authentication that limits access to only relevant information making it easier to manage. A Portal is a web site that enables users to access highly personalized information and services. It can increase the productivity and effectiveness of employees within an organization through a consolidated view of available services and information. Typically the site is highly interactive, allowing the user to run a wide variety of tools and functions such as, global search queries, and custom dashboard and advanced business intelligence tools. Portals provide a unified entry point to the organization and provide common look and feel all across applications. Portals form the front end for business processes and custom applications created as composite applications. The site can also be utilized to mash-up other applications or services from 3rd party sites. Wikis, Blogs, RSS feeds, and content can all be made available within the site. A PDA enables mobile users to access enterprise services. Like sites and portals, a PDA has no business logic of its own, but it allows the end user to interact with back-end services by seamlessly accessing the Web Services exposed by an enterprise. However, a PDAs interface and functionality is much more limited than that of a web site because of display and memory constraints. B2B Applications An organization normally collaborates with external business partners such as suppliers and customers to achieve its business objectives. An external partners B2B application (e.g., a web site or portal) will invoke a Web Service exposed by an enterprise, which in turn executes business functionality on behalf of the client. Business Processes A Business Process codifies and streamlines the rules, practices, and business s activities in an enterprise. Business analysts create Business Process Diagrams using the industry-standard Business Process Modeling Notation (BPMN) to document a set of coordinated tasks and activities that lead to an organizational goal. You can think of a business process as a graphical representation of a Use Case (RUP) or User Epic (Agile / Scrum) in that it shows normal and alternate flows along with exceptions encountered during processing. In SOA, a business process coordinates the business services (see section 3.2.1) developed by an enterprise. SOA architects and developers derive business services from the tasks and decision points in a business process diagram. Business logic is used to form business flows as parallel tasks or sequential tasks based on business rules, policies, and other business requirements. Examples of Business Processes include: Purchasing a product Time Entry / Approval Billing Service Provisioning For information on tools and products, please the Workflow / Orchestration section (3.4.5). Collaboration Services Presentation Services Presentation Services define a common set of services to manage interaction with users or trading partners (to the extent this second interaction is needed). Presentation services are provided by: web servers, portal servers, and application servers that provide the capability to quickly create the front end of business processes and composite applications to respond to changes in user needs through channels, portals, rich clients, and other mechanisms. Presentation services integrate with other foundational services, such as security (e.g., single sign-on). Users can access enterprise services through variety of mechanisms, including Portals, web sites, or PDAs. A web site provides a web-based interface to enable users to perform daily, job-related tasks. A web site leverage the services created provided the organization, as a part of SOA implementation, and do not contain any business logic themselves. The site seamlessly integrates with back-end services (using SOAP/WSDL, REST/JSON) and business processes. The site can be secured by global security policies, but also can include role based authentication that limits access to only relevant information making it easier to manage. A Portal is a web site that enables users to access highly personalized information and services. It can increase the productivity and effectiveness of employees within an organization through a consolidated view of available services and information. Typically the site is highly interactive, allowing the user to run a wide variety of tools and functions such as, global search queries, and custom dashboard and advanced business intelligence tools. Portals provide a unified entry point to the organization and provide common look and feel all across applications. Portals form the front end for business processes and custom applications created as composite applications. The site can also be utilized to mash-up other applications or services from 3rd party sites. Wikis, Blogs, RSS feeds, and content can all be made available within the site. A PDA enables mobile users to access enterprise services. Like sites and portals, a PDA has no business logic of its own, but it allows the end user to interact with back-end services by seamlessly accessing the Web Services exposed by an enterprise. However, a PDAs interface and functionality is much more limited than that of a web site because of display and memory constraints. BI / Reporting BI (Business Intelligence) / Reporting provides a high-level view of KPIs (Key Performance Indicators) to business stakeholders to enable them to make decisions and manage the business. Examples of KPIs include: Efficiency of business processes. Job Costing. New customers acquired. Sales information by demographic (age, ethnicity, geographic region, etc.). Churn / turnover of accounts by demographic. A BI product uses the information stored in a Data Warehouse to present it to the user. A BI tool (such as Business Objects) uses Key Performance Indicators (KPIs e.g., sales conversion rate, in-force polices, market penetration, for example) to report on data, identify trends, perform data analysis, etc. to enable business users to make decisions and operate the business as efficiently as possible while advancing a business strategy. BI increases business agility and shortens timeframes for decision-making. It gives companies the ability to identify and anticipate opportunities represented by seemingly unrelated events. It is a key enabler of strategic and tactical decision making. Commercial products include: IBM COGNOS MicroStrategy O