Ella Baker Essay

Ella Baker embodies the theme of strength in the face of adversity in Joanne Grant’s novel Ella Baker: Freedom Bound. Ella Baker comes from a long line of strong women who taught her to stand up for what she felt was good and right. As Ella Baker encounters racial discord in the twentieth century, she draws up on the strength of her mother, her grandmother and her aunts. She also remembers the strength that was passed down from her grandfather and uncle. As a result of her great strength she is able to teach others about nurturing equality among all people. Ella Baker spent her adult years organizing people to fight for equality but this fight wasn’t always easy. Ella Baker was a black woman facing all the struggles that black people went through prior to and just after the Civil Rights Movement. She can be compared to Martin Luther King Jr. because of her tenaciousness and unwillingness to give up the fight. However, Baker faced gender discrimination as well which only added to her struggles but also encouraged her to continue to use the strength that her ancestors passed down to her. Ella Baker faced great resistance from the Southern Christian Leadership Conference headed by Martin Luther King Jr. because she was a woman and men didn’t care for taking advice from women. In this way, Ella Baker faced a fight for racial rights as well as gender rights. Ella Baker was responsible for organizing ordinary people to fight for equality. She is credited with the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) which mobilized ordinary people to join the Civil Right fight despite the challenges that they faced. Throughout her activist activities and numerous speeches, she urged ordinary people to find the strength to identify one thing that needed changing and work on it a little at a time. She emphasized to crowds that each person had something to give and these little bits could add up to huge changes. Ella Baker’s most important contribution to the world was her untiring dedication to the Civil Rights movement. Drawing upon the strength that her family members instilled in her gave her the power to continue the fight even when times were tough. She was one of the pioneers of the Civil Rights Movement and Grant’s book details her great contributions. One important characteristic that gave Ella Baker so much of her strength was her ability to work towards equality without calling attention to herself. Baker didn’t focus on the work of individuals. Instead, she focused on the great things that could be accomplished when people worked together to make changes. As a result, Baker was often at odds with other (primarily male) civil rights activists because she was more focused on getting things done than reveling in the glory of accomplishment. Grant’s inclusion of primary and secondary sources only lends to the credibility of strength that she presents in her book. African American people have relied on songs and rhymes throughout history in order to gain strength during struggles. Grant’s inclusion of several of these short songs shows just how important strength was to Ella Baker and the many avenues she used to draw upon the strength of her family members. Grant’s use of personal remembrances of Ella Baker goes further to show her character and depth of her strength in her constant battle to gain equality for all people. If these accounts were not included in the book, the theme of strength wouldn’t be displayed as well as Grant was able to show. The use of primary and secondary sources give further evidence about the person that Ella Baker was and allow readers to gain a true picture of the kind of person that Ella Baker really was. Throughout the book, Ella Baker demonstrated her â€Å"belief in the ability of people to take control of their lives and lead themselves. † Joanne Grant realized the importance of telling the world about Ella Baker. Grant had first hand experience with the work of Ella Baker and the important contributions she made to the Civil Rights Movement. Grant witnessed Baker’s ability to set herself apart in order to build upon inner strength to find one’s path in life. Ella Baker was no stranger to resistance based on both her race and her gender and Grant knew that her story needed to be told so her name could be associated with the great work that was done throughout the Civil Rights Movement. The role of black women is underrepresented in non fiction and Grant took it upon herself to share her opinion of Ella Baker with readers. Ella Baker: Freedom Bound is a book that will open the eyes of readers learning about the Civil Rights. It will show the struggle that African Americans went through to gain equality but also the struggle that women went through. Grant paints a vivid picture of the strength that Ella Baker had despite constant challenges to keep her from reaching her goals. This book emphasizes that strength is necessary when one is fighting such an important battle. Ella Baker becomes the model of persistence through her dedication to equality and her willingness to keep fighting no matter what. She didn’t let men or white people keep her from working towards her vision of equal rights. This book is highly recommended to those who wish to gain a clear but different perspective on what it was like to be an activist during the Civil Rights Movement fighting for both racial and gender equality. Grant, Joanne. â€Å"Ella Baker: Freedom Bound. 1998. 17 Nov 2008 . Hamilton, Grace Towns & Robinson, Ruby Doris Smith. â€Å"Book excerpts: Three women’s voices from the annals of the civil rights struggle. † The New Crisis April: 1. Omatseye, Sam. â€Å"Ella Baker: A Civil Rights Angel. † Urban Spectrum. 2006. 17 Nov 2008 .

Reflection of Five Minds for the Future

Reflection of Five Minds for the Future The concepts and arguments about Gardner’s five minds enriched me a lot, and made me think further about the capabilities and skills people should equipped with to handle the new world in the future individually and cooperatively. As a master student, I feel that subjects in commerce will cultivate my cognition and interpersonal skills by developing disciplined, synthesizing, creating, respectful, and ethical minds.In a few years time, when I become a business professional, I think those minds are still important to me in order to make bigger achievements. Disciplined mind Disciplined mind means a continuous process of improving one’s skills. No matter what knowledge I have captured now, there are still many unknown areas for me to explore. However, in retrospect, I always thought what I have been told was exactly what I need to learn. And now I figure out that learning is not merely receiving, but is the continuous process of sel f-education, self-discovery and self-reflection.The subjects in commerce provide opportunities for me to do further research, to find out the solutions to the issues and get feedback from myself and others, which cultivates my habit of investigating the ideas in the long run. Synthesizing mind Gardner (2008, p3) defined that synthesizing mind is a process of collecting, evaluating and combining distinguished information. As a student, during in-class discussions and exams, I have been given many chances to perfect my synthesizing mind.When preparing exams, I will synthesize all the information, ideas, and feelings from separate lectures and combine them to one mind map, demonstrating their inter-relationships. After doing like that, I will have further understandings of the subjects and could put those abstract theories into practice. The group project also encourages me to absorb different views when looking at one problem, and then integrate all together into one idea, which becom e the main research direction. For an informed business professional, a synthesizing mind is necessary for them to make the most appropriate decision.Arming with synthesizing mind, they attempt to consider all the horizontal and vertical information before making final decision. Horizontal information means new ideas from other colleagues and knowledge gain from other domains, and vertical information includes the lessons learnt from their past experiences, knowledge about their current circumstances and also new dilemmas they may meet in the coming situations. Moreover, the capability of generating well-informed strategies will lead business professional to higher level in their career, such as manager or leader level.Creating mind As argued by Gardner (2008, p3), individuals need to think creatively to break new world, or we will be left behind by the overwhelming development of technology. I cannot agree more to his argument because the situations where some people have been â₠¬Å"controlled† by computers and internets have arisen. For example, individuals nowadays become more dependent on the ideas and information provided on the internet, which lead them to think superficially and conservatively.The education method of MCom overcomes the drawbacks of traditional teaching process in terms of encouraging students to think out of the box and to look at one problem from different viewpoints. Creativity is not always welcomed, especially in the domains stated by Gardner (2008, p7), such as accounting, law and engineering. Taking accounting as an example, lots of accounting policies have been used for years and have been a stereotype to all the firms. Major innovation of the accounting policy will rarely happen; however, minor changes will easily occur.It is necessary for them to adapt to the small changes and make suitable decision based on the updated policy rather than follow the old ways blindly. Respectful and ethical mind Living under the multicult ural environment, individuals are supposed to appreciate others’ culture, understand and pardon others’ behavior and build common trust. And we citizens shall do whatever a responsible person will do in our role, standing in our view. As a master student here, I may have some pportunities to work with people from different nations. If I want to be respected by others, I need to welcome and understand them and show my respect sincerely. A respectful mind is vital for a business professional in dealing with relationships between colleagues, customers and friends. When facing a problem, the person who refuses to listen to others’ opinions but insist on his or her own thought will make the problem more complex and finally poison the workplace, and no one are likely to work with this kind of person any more.As the world becoming globalized, people who can appreciate different arguments, cultures and behaviors will adjust themselves well to the new world. In order to enjoy decent life in the new world, businessmen should not act selfishly, rather, they are supposed to have ethical mind, thinking in a way of making win-win decisions to benefit our society as well as their business. Bibliography Gardner, H. 2008, Five Minds for the Future, Harvard Business Press, Boston, Massachusetts

Pulse Polio

Pulse Polio Pulse Polio is an immunization campaign established by the government of India in 1995-96 to eradicate poliomyelitis (polio) in India by vaccinating all children under the age of five years against polio virus. This project deals with the ways to fight poliomyelitis through a large scale immunization programme, co-operating with various international institutions, state governments and Non Governmental Organizations. In India, vaccination against Polio started in 1978 with Expanded Program in Immunization (EPI). By 1984, it was successful in covering around 40% of all infants, giving 3 doses of OPV to each.In 1985, the Universal Immunization Program (UIP) was launched to cover all the districts of the country. UIP became a part of child safe and survival motherland program (CSSM) in 1992 and Reproductive and Child Health Program (RCH) in 1997. This program led to a significant increase in coverage, up to 95%. The number of reported cases of polio also declined from 28,757 during 1987 to 3,265 in 1995. In 1995, following the Polio Eradication Initiative of World Health Organization (1988), India launched Pulse Polio Immunization Program along with Universal Immunization Program which aimed at 100% coverage.In 2012, India was declared free of polio by WHO. Key objectives The Pulse Polio Initiative (PPI) aims at covering every individual in the country. It aspires to reach even children in remote communities through an improved social mobilization plan. [1] †¢Not a single child should miss the immunization, leaving no chance of polio occurrence. †¢Cases of Acute Flaccid Paralysis (AFP) to be reported in time and stool specimens of them to be collected within 14 days. Outbreak Response Immunization (ORI) to be conducted as early as possible. †¢Maintaining high level of surveillance. Performance of good mop-up operations where polio has disappeared. †¢India to be polio-free by 2005. [1] Steps involved †¢Setting up of booths in al l parts of the country. [1] †¢Initializing walk-in cold rooms, freezer rooms, deep freezers, ice-lined refrigerators and cold boxes for ensuring steady supply of vaccine to booths. †¢Arranging employees, volunteers and vaccines. †¢Ensuring vaccine vial monitor on each vaccine vial. †¢Immunizing children with OPV on National Immunization Days. †¢Identifying missing children from immunization process. †¢Surveillance of efficacy. Study of its success State specific cases-[1]The Gujarat case- In 1998, in Bhavnagar district of Gujarat, immunization officers reported that 98 children out of the total of 2,000 missed the vaccine. Health workers were first prevented from coming to village. Later, when the booths were established and the program did start, lot of parents did not bring their children to the booth. According to them, children from their village developed polio-paralysis even after the immunization. The Bengal Case-[2] Health officers, who visited the village in West Bengal, saw utter discontent amongst the people as they stated that two children contracted the virus after the vaccine.In another instance, parents of a two-and-a-half-year-old child who developed cellulites in the heel were convinced that it had been caused by the vaccine that was given to their child a week before. The doctor who gave the vaccine was forced to pay the entire amount for the child’s treatment. Therefore, the reasons for non-compliance by the people can be anything from lack of attitude to lack of awareness, from vaccinating an ill child to apprehension about the side-effects of polio drops (including fever, loose motion, death, infertility etc. [3] It is found out that poor participation of doctors and nurses, difficulty in maintaining and procuring vaccine, difficulty in procuring vehicles, inadequate support from community members are also reasons why the program has not been completely successful. [4] India free of polio 2012 The last reported case of polio in India was in West Bengal on January 13, 2011. [5] On 25 February, 2012, India was officially struck off the list of polio-endemic countries by the World Health Organization (WHO). [6]

African Politics - Aid Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2000 words

African Politics - Aid - Essay Example Aid was started in Africa in order to facilitate development projects after colonialism. Colonialism had impoverished African countries and the western nations came in with the concept of aid to assist. The intentions were pure and there was initially no agenda behind the money being provided. As Michelle (2013) stipulates in the journal article, there were big development ideas that were to be funded by the aid money but what lacked is the technical expertise. Aid was to be used in various developmental areas such as education, health, infrastructural development among others. Education is the baseline of every country whether developed or developing. It is therefore in the best interest of every nation to have its entire people educated if it is to have developments in the future and use it to enhance their livelihoods. Africa has been left behind for decades on the issue of access to education and this has led to aid being given and debt accrued in the need to educate their public. The dire need to raise the education standards led to need to borrow money from the Bretton Woods institutions such as the World Bank in order to complete the project. The project ended up consuming more and having no much return benefits to the intended public and a debt accrued. Drazen, (2002) explains how debts from the aid continued to increase with no hopes of them being paid back especially with the oil crises which led to an increase in food prices as well as the deplorable conditions in these African nations that have led to an increase in poverty. The Bretton Woods institutions together with the western countries that supplied the money for the aid came up with the concept of structural adjustment programs as the condition for being granted the aid. The African leaders desperate for the money went along with this program that saw massive layoffs and retrenchments taking place in the public sector. The structural programs were

Social Security Programs Research Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Social Security Programs - Research Paper Example This was meant actually to ensure the retirees had some money at their disposal so as to ensure cash flow which would in turn stimulate the economy. In addition he also wanted this program to be an income supplement. This was also supposed to ensure that most people especially the old and disabled were to be entitled to a social security insurance program especially those who were of the aged (Dilnot, 1989). Over the past year there has been much to say about the social security fund though most talks don’t seem to be very appealing. The truth of the matter is the Us government is really having it rough now as far as the social security fund is concerned since the dependants today compared to the time when this project was initiated has rose by millions. In the coming 2-3decades this fund will be practically impossible to run and offer the citizens of US that social security it was intended for (Sacks, 2000). One major blow to the social security fund is the fact that the group of beneficiaries have been increased over time from just the elderly and disable to the spouse or minor children of a retired workers and another benefit was also included for the family of a worker who has dead prematurely. Now if you put together these facts together with the fact that Americans are living longer then this is a big blow to the success of this fund in the coming years (Sacks, 2000). According to the additional views by the Senator Robert J. Dole, the long term deficit that will be in the non-medical social security program translated to 1.8% of the taxable payroll. when one On closely looking at the projections of the actuaries, in the next 75years the benefits of this program shall be very challenging to payroll tax income translating to about $25 billion per year in deficit. This deficit is seen practically a big problem to the success of the social security fund and if not addressed this program has a very terrible

Distinguishing between an Offer and an Invitation to Treat Essay

Distinguishing between an Offer and an Invitation to Treat - Essay Example An invitation to treat comes in when something is displayed in a shop window or a catalogue mentioning prices of goods. Normally this is not an offer; hence it cannot coerce the shopkeeper to sell the items at the stated price. For this case a contract is made when a prospective buyer accepts the price stated in the items and it created when the item is placed over the counter but not when the customer remove the item on the supermarket shelves. There is an acceptance in both offer and invitation to treat. For example in an offer, there must be an offeror and an offeree while on the hand in invitation to treat there must be a place or a shop where goods have been displayed together with their prices and a customer makes an offer when he present them at the cash desk. For the case of an offer, it must be communicated for a contract to arise, therefore the two parties must be of the same mind otherwise it cannot be accepted by a person who has no knowledge that an offer has been made. In invitation to treat, it does not have to be communicated as items are displayed in a supermarket and a person enters and makes an offer when he places it on the counter and not necessary that he should have had knowledge that an offer had had been made. ... took them to the cash desk where they paid for them. It was held that the customer made the offer when he presented them at the cash desk, and not when he removed them from the shelves.3 Similarities between an Offer and an Invitation to Treat There is an acceptance in both offer and invitation to treat. For example in an offer, there must be an offeror and an offeree while on the hand in invitation to treat there must be a place or a shop where goods have been displayed together with their prices and a customer makes an offer when he present them at the cash desk. Both offer and acceptance remain open for duration of time and they can be accepted only before time expires. In both offer and invitation to treat, the offeror is free to attach any condition in the offer or invitation to treat before he communicated to the target group for acceptance. There is an intention to create a legal relation. One cannot bind the other party without his consent in both offer and invitation to treat. Both offer and invitation to a treat can be revoked anytime before an acceptance is made. Both offer and acceptance may be made by a word of mouth, in writing or by conduct. Differences between an Offer and Invitation to a Treat For the case of an offer, it must be communicated for a contract to arise, therefore the two parties must be of the same mind otherwise it cannot be accepted by a person who has no knowledge that an offer has been made. In invitation to treat, it does not have to be communicated as items are displayed in a supermarket and a person enters and makes an offer when he places it on the counter and not necessary that he should have had knowledge that an offer had had been made. The following

Are the Council of Ministers and the European Commission Essay

Are the Council of Ministers and the European Commission interdependent or competing institutions - Essay Example These institutions are responsible for the formation of public policy after series of arguments and discussions among the members and it is true that they consider the interest of the Union rather than that of member states while making important decisions and therefore assumes a higher degree of independence. The unique institutional structure of the European Union sets it apart from other traditional institutions as the entire member states have agreed to focus more on the national interest. Each of these institutions has a unique role to play in the decision making process by complementing each other. This paper is an attempt to analyse the importance and interdependence of the Council of Ministers and the European Commission. The council of ministers The most prominent among all the institutions of European Union is the Council of Ministers which instigated to draw more attention after the integration of European Community. According to Alex Warleigh, â€Å"the council of minist ers is the collective noun for the member state representatives who meet to take final decision on all EU legislative proposals† (Warleigh, p.26). ... On the other hand there are experts who consider the Council as an obstruction to the political incorporation which always hinder the innovative ideas suggested by the Commission and the Parliament. But the true fact is that the Council protects the people of the EU from profligate European proposals and also controls the powerful politicians from the member states and direct their state oriented discussions towards a shared and expanding policy agenda (Warleigh, p.1). The structure The council of ministers which encompasses one minister from each member states of the EU meets frequently in Brussels or in Luxembourg in order to make legislative decisions. EU nations choose the appropriate minister to represent them in the Council according to the subject under consideration. Each member nation holds the presidency for a period of six months which rotates among them. The Committee of Permanent Representatives which is also known as COREPER and the general secretariat prepare most of t he work to be done by the Council. COREPER consists of officials from different governments of the member states. Decisions of the Council are made on the basis of vote and the population of each state is the factor which determines the weight of its vote (Pearson Education, publishing, 2011). It is comparatively an easy task to identify the institutions of a member state where the legislative and executive powers are easily distinguishable. But in the case of European Union such a distinction is hard to make as the executive powers are shared between the Commission and the Council and the legislative powers between the Council and the Parliament and therefore the Council of Ministers possess both the executive and legislative functions.