Ideas For Final Paper

One of the topics I am interested in writing about is how people view cars in society. I want to see if people view your car and automatically put in in a certain social class or if they view the car as part of your personality. I want to learn if the car is a major part of how people view wealth and to see if people with wealth own nicer cars, as well as if people with less wealth own nice or none nice cars as people view. I want to see if people judge a book by its cover or if they see the person before they judge the class they are in.
http://www.forbes.com/2009/10/06/car-personality-wealth-lifestyle-vehicles-gender-income.html
This website gives all views of this topic and I think it is a great start for me to get started on my paper.
Another topic I am interested in writing about is whether people think wealth is given to you or if you have to work hard for it. There are two different sides to this topic, the one where people grow up in a wealthy family and the second one is where people grow up and earn every bit of wealth they have. I think it would be a great thing to learn that if people that grow up in wealth have to work as hard as people that start out with lesser wealth. This will be interesting because people always view people with wealth as being handed everything, so I am curious if this is really true or if they really work as hard as people do that start with much less than they do.
http://www.economist.com/node/16690659
This website gives the views of every part of the wealth spectrum, so if I do this paper it will be a great place to start.

Compare and Contrast

I want to compare and contrast two pair of shoes made by Jordan. I want to compare and contrast the Jordan Retro 1 and the Jordan 2010.They are a shoe made by the same company but they are about about 10 years apart in design. The color scheme of the shoes a very similar. The both have the red black and white color scheme. They both do not have the Nike sign because Jordan is almost its own brand now and back when his first shoe was released Jordan was sponsored by Nike. They both are made to play basketball in but the 2010 is a more trendy shoe and is more of a pure basketball shoe unlike the retro 1 because it is an old school shoe, even though it was the perfect shoe back in the day. The design of the shoes are very different. The retro 1 is classic shoe that gives us a sense of where the shoe game all started. The 2010 is a new shoe and it brings us to where the shoe game is today in design, how people want more radical shoes and not the same old thing.

Paragraph Revision

With all of the new technology coming out every day it is hard to know whether or not we are going to completely lose face-to-face communication. It will probably never come to something that severe, but we need to make certain it does not have a fighting chance. Technology is a great thing; communicating one on one, however, provides us with the ability to see one’s facial expression. Something you don’t get when sending an email.

Every day in the first sentence can be removed because it is just being repetitive.

There needs to be a comma right after coming out in the first sentence.

Make the last sentence an add on and but a comma in front of it instead of a period.

Change don't to do not.

There needs to be dashes between one-on-one.

Analyzing an Argument

http://www.cio.com/article/29898/The_Importance_of_Face_to_Face_Communication_at_Work

This article disuses how many senior executives think their company would run better if they had more face to face contact rather than people sending emails back and forth. They state that they need to put down there computers blackberries and every other piece of communication so they can go out and talk to each other. Nothing is better than some old fashion face to face communication. They wish people in there line of work would stop using technology so much and go old fashion like people used to. Now do not get more wrong technology is a great thing and it helps make companies run smoothly but I feel that they would run even smoother if they would be willing to back away and go to the lower parts of the corporation and talk to people to see what they think of the company. I am going to use this information in my paper to prove my point. This is an excellent point for me to use. It shows how many important people in companies think the same thing as I do. It helps show how face to face communication is an important thing but we are losing it in the long run.

Argument

http://www.mlive.com/opinion/kalamazoo/index.ssf/2009/10/our_turn_do_colleges_put_too_m.html

This article is about standardize testing to get into college and if they are weighted to much. This articles discuses three different points of view on how standardize testing is weighted to much to get into colleges. Each person has their beliefs on whether or not standardize testing is important to get into college. I think they are an important thing because if colleges did no have these tests they would not know how much the student learned in high school. People argue the fact that they do not show how well a student did in high school, but colleges do look at a students grades and each school teaches things differently so colleges need a way to make all of the students equal in they way the take a test.

http://www.bukisa.com/articles/124318_are-we-too-dependent-on-computers

This article is about how people are becoming to dependent on computers. This article discuses how many people only us computers now and that they cannot do many other things in life. It talks about how younger students are becoming illiterate because they use the computer too much and have lost there reading ability. I think computers are a great thing, they have advanced our society in so many different ways. I do think though that they need to be used less and they need to be used for the right ways. If we continue using computers for pointless things we will lose our ability to communicate between people.

http://management.about.com/cs/generalmanagement/a/CEOsOverpaid.htm

This article is about CEOs being over paid. This article talks about how CEOs are paid 531 times the average hourly paid person and how they do not do that much more work to deserve so much more money. I think being a CEO is an important and a great job to have but I do not think they should get paid the amount of they do. There is no way a person needs to be paid so much than you average worker to have them sit behind a desk and talk about how their company is doing. CEOs are important jobs but they need to be paid less.

Criteria for an Evaluation

I want to evaluate the new BMW M3. It merits evaluation because it is an extremely popular car and it is a new version of the car. For this evaluation I am going to compare its handling to other cars to see if it is the best handling sports car. I am also going to use horsepower. Horsepower is a great way to evaluate a car because it shows how fast a car can go and it shows how well the car accelerates. Another important part of speed is the weight of the car. I will see if the car is heavy or light to see if the amount of horsepower is the car has is going to give it great speed and acceleration. I want to see if the M3 is more than a sports car as well. I want to see if the M3 can be an everyday car, if it has luxury like all of BMW's, and if it is capable of being called a true sports car. I want to look at ever aspect of the BMW M3. I want to look it over top to bottom, front to back to see if the M3 is really a sports or if it is just another car on the road.

Detailed Outline

1.I am going to start off with a quote that shows what people think of the dean. Then I am going to go into the dean's everyday routine to show how much work he gets in before everyone else day even starts.

2. "You have got to be the coolest dean ever." I think this is a great quote for the first scene because it shows what faculty and other people think of Jim as a person and a dean.

3. I am going to write about how Dean Jim Thomas has been an amazing influence on the Smeal College of Business and Penn State University as a whole. I am writing about this because he is resining as dean after this year. It is an important subject because Dean Thomas has made Smeal into one of the top business schools in the nation and has given Smeal an atmosphere that makes you feel like you are home.

4. This issue started when Dean Thomas decided to step down as dean for issues untold.

5. "Dean Thomas is one of the greatest people I have met at Smeal and talking to him makes you feel like you are at home. It will be a sad day when he finally steps down as dean." This is stated by Freshman Jordan Walls. This is showing what students thing of Dean Thomas and it also shows how Dean Thomas makes Smeal a comfortable atmosphere.

6. "If he is available he will talk to you." This is stated by the deans assistant Lynn Tressler. This is showing how Dean Thomas will go out of his way to help a student. It shows how much he cares about the students of Smeal.

7. "Jim Thomas has been an outstanding dean and will leave very big shoes to fill. He is a real visionary who has been a transformative leader, able to inspire and engage students, faculty, staff, alumni, and friends of the University to reach for even greater achievements." I am going to end my paper with this because it is a great statement by Rob Erickson, executive vice president at Penn State.

8. I am ending my story with the quote above (7). I want people to see how much Jim Thomas has dean for Smeal and the University as a whole. I want people to see the amazing man he is and how much work he has put in to make Smeal and the University an amazing place.

Investigation

A description of something for my investigation would have to be Dean Thomas's office. As you walk up to the second floor you go into a gorgeous office where there are two or three office desks one can see. Then you take the right, right as you walk in. You must walk through the Dean's Assistant office to get to his office. Once you enter his office, one may be amazed at the size of it or maybe how beautiful it looks. If one takes a second to look around they will notice a nice sitting area with large chairs and couches. Then after that he has his own meeting area, with a huge long table and the best technology so everyone can get a good feel for what Smeal has to offer. After one looks around to take in the Dean's entire office one can see pictures of his children scattered around his desk and in the book shelves behind his desk. Then if one sits down to talk to the Dean they will notice on one of his chairs he has jacket laying over it, which gives you the feel of a very down to earth person who is just there to assist you in what you have to ask.

Quotes:

Jordan Walls (student) - "It is going to be hard to see the Dean go. He is a very personable man and he makes the atmosphere amazing around Smeal. He tries to give it the feeling of almost like you are home."

Lynn Tressler (Dean Thomas's Assistant) - "He was a great man that all of the professors like talking to as well as the staff. It is going to be hard to see him go because he was a great man to work for and to watch him leave with all the hard work he has put in to make Smeal an amazing business school."

Facts:

Wall Street Journal - Penn State Smeal College of Business is the number one recruiting school companies to higher from and Penn State's business students start at a higher pay then other students around the country.

Lynn Tressler - Dean Thomas is not completely leaving Smeal, he is staying to teach one or two classes a semester. As well as Jim will be staying the Dean till next Summer just to take make sure everything is still running smoothly.

Two other areas of interest that occurred to me while doing research and interviews is the fact that the Dean is not leaving Smeal but staying around to teach. This interest me because I want to know why he still wants to stay and what he plans on teaching as well. Another area of interest is how are they going to pick the new and if Dean Thomas will have any say in who will be taking his position.

Number One Party School

During this recording American Life investigated Penn State being the number one party school in the nation. They define and make great since of the issue at hand. They go at the issue in many different ways to give the audience different views of the subject. The reasons why the issue needs to be investigated immediately is to prove or disprove weather or not Penn State is really the number one party school in the nation. People were curious weather this poll was true or because Penn State tries to be number one at anything. The facts and details of this issue are put very clearly. American Life goes through many different views to see how this effects different people and how this is a good or a bad thing for the college. They go to different people who have different effects on the issue and people they issue effect differently. They want to investigate every angle of this issue, so they can have a full idea of what is occurring. Since this was a recording every person is quoted. They get peoples views as things are occurring and as people are being effected by the issue. The recording is a great way to see hear everything, so people can hear first hand what is occurring. The conclusion, I feel, American life is trying to get a crossed is that Penn State just wants to be the best at everything they do. No matter what it is Penn State will try to win it. The students want to be able to say they go to the best college in the nation. I think this investigation was a great way to go about this issue. They got everyones point of view. The issue wanted they to investigate was amazingly investigated. They just wanted to see what life was like on Penn State and during that they discovered Penn State was your normal college town when it occurred to drinking, but what Penn State is not, they are not a normal college town. They want to be the best.

The First Draft

From what I understand about what Lamott is saying the first draft is the most important part of the writing process. When she said everyone writes "shitty first drafts", I felt much better about my writing and the paper I just wrote. I had multiple people look over my personal narrative and every person ripped it to shreds. I was a little unhappy with this because I thought the paper was good, but I guess the only way to make it better is to have people look over it and over it so you can make your own writing better. I think writing the first draft to my paper was not good at all, but after looking it over and looking at what people had to say and looking over it more myself I had a lot of mistakes and parts of my paper I could have made much better. I also like what Lamott said about the only way to write something good is to write it terribly the first time. I agree with this because nothing is perfect the first and everything can be made better by working on it, tweaking it, and just redoing it. If everything was done perfect the first time everyone would be great at everything and there is no fun in that because if that were the case this place would be a very boring one. The first draft is more about the process of writing than it is about the product of what is written the first. A lot of time someone's first draft is about getting all of their ideas out. It does not matter what kind of order they are in, but the ability to get everything in one time is great because everything can be fixed to be great. Also if everything was about the product and not the process nothing would be fun in life. When people are doing anything, it does not matter if its writing or any other activity, they tend to like the process and the time it took to get to the product. Most people are like this, as am I, because you have a great time working towards the finally product. People have fun with the things they are doing, they are working with people the want to, and the experience of the process is much more rewarding a lot of time than the final product. The final product of writing is the same way if we never had fun with the process of writing we would not have some of the great writers we have had and no one would like to write. The point of the first draft is to suck, but in the end if you do not have the "shitty first draft" you cannot have the amazing final draft.

It May Take a Few Years, but You Will Figure Out Her Gift Somday

I read "What She Gave Me" by Anne Lamott. This memoir was very touching to me. Anne wrote about how her mother had died four years and how her mother was not a very motherly figure and she was angry her mother never taught her anything. She was always angry at her from a young age because she never taught her how to be a lady and she could never go to her to disuse anything of importance. Anne would always have to go to her father and disuse anything she needed to talk about or anything she just wanted to get off of her chest. What she did not realize until later on in life is her mother taught her a multitude of things but she never realized it until four years after her death. I liked the she disused and represented her mother throughout her writing. She depicted her mother in horrible ways by saying she was a slob and by saying she was a horrible and mean mother, but she wrote it in a way that made it seem from the heart and even though she did all of these horrible things to her, she was her mother and she would always love her. I also like the way she brought her own life with her son into describing her mother. She said how her son reminded her how she acted towards her mother at some points in her life and she also said how her son and mother look alike with their huge eyes. She stated all of this because even though she had shown so much hatred towards her mother early on in her passing that she now wants to reconsider everything and she her love towards her mother and how she will never be able to forget her mother. Anne also used great technique in the way she went about showing her love towards her. I like how she waited till the end of her memoir to state everything her mother taught her because she wanted that to be the last thing everyone read. She wanted to show her mother taught her many things that made her into the women she is today. Even though this memoir was all about Anne's mother, I think her main goal of this memoir was to show people that just because you do not realize what someone has taught you does not mean they did not teach you anything; it only means it may take you a few days, weeks, months, even years in Anne's case, but everyone teaches us something to make us into the person we are today whether we want to believe that or not.