ULACIT NEWSFundated in 1970

Costa Rica, Friday 17th august, 2012

Authors:

Saylin Arguello

Andrey Muñoz

Josselyn Rodríguez

Sandra VillamilEnglish III

Laura Luckner

ULACIT NEWS present:

SAYLIN ARGÜELLO

Healthy Living to Have Longevity

We have to set in the agenda to make it. But, if we maintain a healthy lifestyle, we will feel better. It only takes a little discipline and knows that the quality of life improves. If we want to feel younger, we have to know these five habits for health.

Healthy diet: A healthy lifestyle should start with changing your eating habits. A diet has a fundamental role maintaining good health and prevents diseases. In fact, most of the diseases are caused by lack of nutrients. So you must eat a balanced diet that will provide all necessary nutrients.

Exercise: Exercise is essential to maintain a good quality of life. Inactivity is a major cause of weakness and poor health. This is directly related to with problems such arthritis and rheumatism. In addition, heart problems originate from poor blood circulation (which could be improved through exercise).

Do not smoke or drink alcohol: We know very well that smoking brings a lot of negative consequences in our body. Therefore, if you want to improve your health, the first thing is stop smoking. Also, drinking excessive alcohol also has negative effects on our body.

Do not consume any kind of drugs: Try to reduce to a minimum the amount of pills you take. Do you feel a little pain and then look for any medication? If this is true, you are polluting your body unnecessarily. Aspirin and sleeping pills are some of the substances that you should consume only when necessary.

If we can combine these tips, would be good for us. Remember that you will feel better with a good nutrition; you have to add exercise, good music, a good book, laughter,

entertainment and good times shared with positive people, so we can take longevity without many complications or diseases.

SANDRA VILLAMIL

How to Have a Long Life?

Is our way of life affects aging? I think are many ways to influence how to have a longer life. And probably the most important is, avoiding bad habits, like, smoking, drink a lot of alcohol, staying a lot of time under the sun, eating a lot of carbohydrates, being in constant stress and not make exercise. So in the next paragraphs I will talk about what we need to do in order to have a longer life.

Water is really important if we want a better and longer life because our body has a 70% of water, and we need a balance. And also it is a weapon against toxins, because it flushes out our system. Also because when we drink water we expulses a lot of fat through urine.

Sleep, most people think it is not important, but many investigations discovered that resting is the clue to have long and a healthy life. Our body needs to relax if we do not that, we can feel fatigued, depressed, hostile, sad, we can have hallucinations, or decline the ability to concentrate. A normal person sleeps between 6 and 9 hours a day.

Nutrition, because of the globalization, most of our diet fast food, generally because it is cheap, it is a quick service, and we can eat it very fast. The problem is the food has a lot of carbohydrates, saturated fat, many calories, and all those are really bad for our health. Sometimes the fat is accumulated in the venous tissue, which prevents the passage of blood; also it increases the levels of triglycerides and cholesterol. So we need to avoid those types of foods.

I believe it is important to take care of our body, but we have to avoid excess, because if we do a lot of exercise, drink a lot of water, and just eat vegetables, we will not give all the vitamins, and energy that our body needs. So we should try to have a normal live, without bad habits.

SANDRA VILLAMIL

Social and Physical Obstacles are a Real Problem for Disabled People

Almost always people, who have any disability, do not have the possibility to have education, or a professional career, because society excludes the cultural life with normal social relation. And the families usually put them in institutions, away of the normal life. But in this essay we are going to know the other face of the coin

Many people with physical disabilities not let to have a successful and rich life. Most of those people are an inspiration for our life, because sometimes we do not make the best effort to achieve our goals, or we believe that we cannot do it; but in the moment that we know some story about persons with disabilities with many obstacles, we really think that we can make everything that we want. So, I will show you a story to admire, and probably to learn, because the intention is that you feel the inspiration to overcome the obstacles that stand in your life.

His name is Roger Frank he is a licensed clinical psychologist and college counselor in 1974, he had s spinal cord injury, and he thought that he never return to university, because the limitations with the transport, and because, he could not move easily his fingers but then, he thought about people who have the same conditions and also they overcome the obstacles in this moment, he started to fight for come back to university, but first he had to learn to write. When he could overcome that obstacle, he decided to enter a psychology career.

What is he doing now? After overcoming the obstacles, he has now a job in a private clinic as psychologist, and also works as a college counselor. How did he achieve this goal? He had to make three essential points: work really hard, to had compromise and determination. He said that many people prefer to be relaxed, and for that, they do not take any risk, and if you do not take changes, you never will be successful.

In conclusion, I want you to think about yourself, and want you tell me if you are a disable person, because sometimes we say excuses just for not taking any risk, and probably we are a kind of disabled person, but just because we want it, because we do not face the challenges.

ANDREY MUÑOZ

Why are you sad?

This life is difficult but not impossible we see every day many people suffer diseases and they can smile when they see the moon, hear the ocean and feel the air... so we know that our lives are not complicated because we do not have any problem and I think that we are ungrateful. The problem is our blind society; we do not see is this life and we doing not love this present from the universe.

In our times we have famous people and organizations that help people with disabilities for example “Disability word “in the United States. Also we have famous people for example Stephen Hawking. He is an example of triumph because actually he is chief of the Lucasian Chair of Mathematics at the Cambrige University in the United States.

Between the many honors that have been granted, Hawking has been honored with twelve honorary doctorates and was awarded the OBE in 1982, Prince of Asturias Award for Concord in 1989 and the Medal Copley in 2006. His numerous publications include The Large Scale Structure of Spacetime with GFR Ellis, General Relativity: A review in the Einstein Centennial W.Israel, and 300 Years of Gravity, with W Israel. Stephen Hawking has published three popular books: the bestselling A Brief History of Time, Black Holes and Baby Universes and Other Essays and most recently in 2001, The Universe in a Nutshell, and in 2005, A Brief History of Time, a revised and expanded version of his first bestseller. He is a great. I just think so! When I read about him I feel up and I want to be a different person.

Why are you sad? Is the questions that many people say and I thinking that we do not have reasons? All our goals can be ended, we see examples in the society, persons with disabilities and they can accomplish anything… Well, you only need to feel positive and feel the air waves in your face and smile.

As a conclusion, we are unlimited people we can be happy and achieve anything. When you feel bad, just look around you and feel positive because you have so many reasons. If you want to be a better person in the future just do it. You do not have reasons to be sad, you do not have walls, you only need to stand and learn to live with a smile.

ULACIT NEWS PRESENT:

SANDRA VILLAMIL

Is the Media a Help, or is it an Injury for Us?

It is a reality that every day we see advertisings about the media on TV, internet, newspaper, magazines, and also we listen in to the radio, but we do not make the decision just based on that, we think if the product is accepted by society, or if it is a fashion product. So based on that I made some questions: Do we buy media just because it is important to be part of society

Tecnology

or because we really need them? Is the media a positive or negative influence in our lives? Probably we are going to have the answers, when we finish this essay.

Does TV affect our lives? Probably yes, but I think it influences children and teenagers more, and the effects could be positive or negative, for example, it is positive when some sport become famous, and get a lot of attention, so children want to practice the sport, and it is same when in TV sex images are shown, excessive scenes of violence, or women with a really thin body. At the same time advertisings shows a lot of fast food and all this confuses people, because on one hand it shows thin women with a perfect live, and on the other hand it shows delicious food, so probably you want both at this point we find children with serious eating disorders, which leads to severe health issues and even death.

Nowadays in computer games, video games and some movies, it is common to see a lot of images of violence, where people are hurting other people. This may transmit aggressive information causing people to act in a violent manner. So maybe that increase violence, but we cannot affirm that, because we do not know how the world will be without this violence information.

Is the internet the best tool in the world? If an interview is made, there will be logic results: all people think it is an important tool, and most people will say that it is necessary, but is it really the best? I believe it is like a help in our lives, but it also has many disadvantages, like addictions to some pages, like Facebook, online games, Twitter; you get pornography when you want, you could find wrong information and you could be cheated by this media. I feel the worst thing is when you have to make a work for the university, and you just “copy and paste” the information, because with that you do not learn, so what kind of professionals works for us?

With the essay I do not want to tell people to stop using technology, or the media, I want everyone to think in himself and analyze if he is a victim and whether media dominates his/her life). And if you are influenced you can make a change step by step, and change from being a victim to someone who really uses technology as an efficient tool.

By NICOLE PERLROTH and NICK BILTON

Twitter Changes Lead to Online Protests

Twitter’s new rules for third-party developers have spurred an online uproar.

After the company imposed stricter rules for its application programming interface, or A.P.I., on Thursday, engineers and developers picked up their virtual pitchforks and took to Twitter and blogs to decry what some described as a “bait and switch.”

“Twitter looks a lot like the big star who forgot about all the little guys that helped it get to the top,” Rafe Colburn, an engineer at Etsy, wrote in a blog post.

The influential Instapaper creator Marco Arment was more direct in his criticism: “Twitter has proven to be unstable and unpredictable and any assurances they give about whether something will be permitted in the future have zero credibility. I sure as hell wouldn’t build a business on Twitter.”

Mr. Colburn, Mr. Arment and others took issue with the company’s new user cap, which limits Twitter’s third-party apps from accommodating more than 100,000 users, or growing beyond 200 percent of their current user base. Another point of contention was a rule that forbids third-party apps from weaving chronological tweets with content from other networks — a big headache for apps like Flipboard, which mix tweets with content from Facebook, blogs and publications and other sources.

Those conditions were greeted with a contempt typically reserved for investment bankers around bonus season: “Wall Street has a saying that applies to Twitter’s new A.P.I. policy: “Bears make money, bulls make money, but pigs get eaten,” tweeted Joel Spolsky, a co-founder of Fog Creek Software.

“This morning Twitter feels like your favourite band that has sold out to a major record label,” wrote Ewan Spence, a contributor to Forbes.com.

“Twitter, what kind of bird are you becoming? Are you still that cute little bird that everyone loved, or are you becoming a scary bird of prey?” wrote Nova Spivack, the chief executive of the start-up Bottlenose.com, who compelled people to sign his petition, #OccupyTwitter.

Some developers tried to quell outrage pointed toward Twitter. Tapbots, the maker of Tweetbot, a popular Twitter app, said in a company blog post that the response to the A.P.I. changes seemed overblown. “There’s been a lot of fear, uncertainty and doubt generated by Twitter’s latest announcement,” the company wrote. “I wanted to let everyone know that the world isn’t ending.”

Others said such changes were par for the course when working with the data that large social networks provide. Bradford Cross, the co-founder of Prismatic, a social news aggregation Web site, said that while Twitter and other social networks could be hard to work with, “You’re getting the lowest distribution cost in history, lots of great data that you can create value from and you’re getting a more intimate connection to people.”

“It is going to be a Wild West for a while — social network wars, platform dodginess, media business turmoil and back-channel deals,” Mr. Cross added.

Many described Twitter’s changes as inevitable, particularly as the company struggles to find a viable business model. Twitter has experimented with various revenue streams like sponsored tweets and advertising. But its revenue — eMarketer estimates Twitter will make $260

million this year — pales in comparison to that of Facebook, which generated a substantial chunk of its $3.7 billion in revenue last year from its profit-sharing arrangement with third-party apps like Zynga.

But that explanation did not square with Twitter’s most vocal critics, like Mr. Spivack, who outlined alternative ways Twitter could generate revenue by keeping its A.P.I.’s open.

“Various apologists for Twitter attempt to justify it because ‘Twitter needs to be a multibillion-dollar business,’” Mr. Spivack wrote. “These kinds of statements just don’t hold water and are completely misguided.” He added, “The future market cap of the company will ultimately be orders of magnitude greater if they are stewards of the open nervous system of the planet than if they are the next Myspace trying to sell ads on their own page s and apps. It’s really that simple.”

ULACIT NEWS Present:

SAYLIN ARGUELLO

News affects your mood?

You go home from work, you are tired and want to sleep, and you turn on the TV to relax for a while and start to watch the news. And so, being to say the presenters: “More dead people in Iraq... The economy continues to decline… Unemployment crew…

Bridges fall in San Jose… Theft and deaths…” If after that your mood does not collapse, or you get angry, I congratulate you, I’m sure; you are one in a million.

What mood can a person have after hearing so much bad news? And worse, how do you think you will be able to sleep? That mood can have after listening to a group of people told so many lies?

I get angry watching or reading news. When I see bad news, for example that there are more thieves than police in the street, But, that makes us think the news? My mood is impaired and it is something that I have to change. I now! Also about with regard to political opinion programs, I resent the hypocrisy of these people. But we cannot stop watching news because we would be “uninformed”. So, that happens to me.

I learned to not let that happen to me, I need to lower the daily dose of news, not see the three editions of daily news, morning, noon and night. It is a triple dose should kill your mood, what it will take away time and prevent you to concentrate on more in positive things.

Only one newscast a day is more than enough, say too much! Also look for more balanced news, talk right and wrong with the current government and of everything in general, for example. And just limit to see! It is the best, I’m sure. Not watch news before going to sleep: affects your mood and you will not enjoy your sleep. Also before bedtime visual pollution is bad.

I was a fan of the news, if passed 5 editions to date, 5 I saw. Not watching a lot of these programs have improved my mood, I sleep better, do not worry so much and I spend my time and energy on more productive things. And that is something that I think everyone should do. This is my opinion.

“The news always go straight to the sports page, which record human achievement, the first pages contain only failures” Earl Warre.

ANDREY MUÑOZ

Points off for the daily news

We know that in our days we see many media all around us. we can see watch the news everyday on TV, radio, internet, cell phones and others… maybe many people feel like drowning in the news and this overload information, so all this supersaturated day by day causes problems to our society.

The first point off for the daily news is because this modernism affects the mind of people who watch it. They also create habits and addiction to watching those every day. This is one of most important negative points the daily news. This was proven by several studies over the last few years.

Over the last few years our society has been surrounded by many ideas of modernism. These things caused addiction and drowning feelings the daily news. (The daily news causes addiction and feelings of drowning.)

The second point is the sedentary in our society because many people forgotten do exercises and have a good nutrition for example in 1999 an adult died because of his sedentary lifestyle and addiction to watch daily news. He was surrounded by many media who make him crazy. He was looking TV so many hours a day.

Also the daily news causes violence in our society. We receive bad news every day in fact those bad news increase violence because they have blood scenes and this message is not positive for us.

I think the problem is how many hours we dedicate to the news and we need to improve our habits. We can do more exercise if we want a better life without media and daily news

ULACIT NEWS PRESENT:

SANDRA VILLAMIL / SAYLIN ARGUELLO

Homework: Is It Really Good?

The schools send children to do homework. It is a routine. We can say this is universal and everyone thinks are a common practice. One of the most popular questions is: why do we have to do homework? And as an answer we have two positions: some people are in favor and others disagree. So, in the next paragraphs, we are going to have different opinions about the topic, where the purpose is that you have your own judgment.

Homework is something positive, because it is a test for us. We can say if we understand the topic or if we need to study more. Others reason is that homework makes us more responsible since we are children, and that is very important because in life we need to do different kind of work where we need to know about responsibility, and autonomy, and that are things that we know when we are doing homework.

Do homework is something negative because most of the time people do “copy paste”, and doing that people do not understand anything, and do not learn, so this is just a waste of time. Others reason are parents who do their children’s homework. Children believe that always will be the same, and when they grow up, they are frustrated by having to make their own task.

When a teacher does not leave homework, usually children rejoice and celebrate the event, what makes us appreciate that these routines are as punishment for children. They want to have free time to devote to the activities they love such as playing or watching TV. Clearly, if you make a votation about homework, winners are going to be the students, because they would say no to it. It is interesting to think whether we should cancel or not homework and respect the preferences of students as well.

In conclusion, homework can be harmful because it can help to kill the child's interests in learning and studying. But if instead, teachers let homework be an exercise of reflection, exploration, find what interests them, then the exercise can be very enriching for the child, depending on the type of education that you want to give to your children.

By JESSICA LAHEY

The Destructive ‘Too Much Homework’ Myth

Across the country, voices are raised in protest over the skyrocketing homework load inflicted on American students. Parents challenge teachers to re-evaluate homework policies. Anti-homework nonprofits circulate no-homework pledges. Writers and filmmakers make careers out of their anti-homework stance. The current generation of schoolchildren, they say, is enslaved by four to five hours of homework a night, toiling into the wee hours of the morning with no time for family or friends, driven to drugs, cheating and mental illness.

This would be a sad state of affairs indeed – if only it were true.

I teach middle school Latin and English, and, as I have stated here on Motherlode, I hate homework. If American students really were laboring under this sort of untenable workload, I would be leading the charge for the emancipation of our children. But when I set out to adjust the amount of homework I assigned in my own classes earlier this year, I started looking at those national averages — and I found that most American kids aren’t overburdened with homework at all.

According to the Brown Center Report on American Education, American students have one of the lightest homework loads in the world, typically less than one hour per day. Fully half of U.S. students are assigned no homework at all, even in middle and high school. Who is doing more homework, according to “The Michigan Study,” research often cited as proof of the aforementioned “skyrocketing?” Twenty years ago, the first and second graders averaged about 8 minutes a day on homework. Now they average about 17 minutes a day.

Even the vocal parents protesting excessive homework loads are the exception rather than the norm. The Brown Center report reveals that most parents – 64 percent to be exact – feel that their children’s homework load is “just about right,” and among the parents who were unsatisfied with their children’s homework load, 5 out of 7 wanted more homework for their children, not less.

When I asked teachers in both public and private schools to explain the divide between the well-publicized homework horror stories and the reality as depicted in the research, their answers pointed in the obvious direction: demographics. Anecdotally, they saw wealthier students enrolled in college preparatory schools doing more homework than students in low-income public schools, and recent research on the experience of those lower-income youth bears them out. “Students overall did not have much assigned homework, and reported little or no consequences if they did not complete their assigned tasks.”

The supposed homework burden? It’s upper middle class parent myopia, a problem whose limits they’re too close to see. Robert Pondiscio, former fifth-grade teacher at P.S. 277 in the South Bronx, agreed, via e-mail:

The battle over homework is one of those things that differentiates education among the privileged and everyone else. At the low end you have abysmal standards of academic

proficiency that create the illusion of achievement where little exists. At the high end, you have earnest parents who worry about uptown problems like overscheduling kids and the hothouse environment of elite schools. They fret about the pressures their kids face while continuing to worship at the altar of getting them into just the right college. Meanwhile inner city teachers work night and day to try to get kids to the point where they can compete for any kind of college opportunity whatsoever.

I am not in favor of an increase in homework load, thank you very much. But when we manage to have a national conversation about education, homework is a red herring. Some otherwise privileged children may have too much, but the real issue lies in places where there is too little. When we do talk about homework, we shouldn’t forget that.