Teachers Discriminate

Hey all,

As always, feel free to comment on the following.

As a senior in high school, I've had my fair share of teachers.  And as all students know, there are some teachers who are good and some who just plain suck.  But have you ever considered why a particular teacher is bad?

Sometimes I hear that it's based on the subject.  Artsy folk may not enjoy science classes.  Likewise, science nerds don't necessarily enjoy English classes.  But there are other people, like me, who like or dislike classes, not subjects.  I have no favorite subject, not in high school anyway.  Every subject is generally the same in value for me.  But what I've realized is that I tend to either really enjoy a class, or loathe it.

The reason is actually pretty simple.  Teachers can greatly influence how students react to a class.  No student enjoys a class where they are hated by the grand authority figure.  This is where some social psychologists may emphasize the self-fulfilling prophecy, where students' attitudes towards teachers affect the way they are treated. I'd go so far as to say this is what the majority of students experience; those who hate particular subjects will show that, and that displacement will cause the teacher to act reciprocally.  However, if you're like me, this reasoning is incorrect.

The way I see it, I don't like some teachers because they flat-out do not like me.  I think our education system is extremely naive.  Whenever we share these thoughts to authority figures, they always brush it off and claim that it's how we act.  Our predisposition of a class makes us think that we are being targeted.  Never have I heard that it's even possible the teacher is discriminatory.

At my particular high school, we have all these rules in place regarding discrimination of gender, sexual orientation, socio-economic status, etc.  It's presented in a way that assumes students don't follow these guides.  However, why is that?  It's obvious many students discriminate one another, but is it really that exclusive?  I dare say teachers are equally obligated to follow these guidelines.  In my opinion, these guidelines are superficial regulations to create the facade of a peaceful learning environment.

So a quick summary.  Why do I not like classes?  Because of bad teachers.  Why are teachers bad?  Because they discriminate.

As a minority, it's difficult for me to make any powerful assertions.  I can claim a teacher to be racist, but no one would believe me.  Why would they?  If the rest of the class is Caucasian, they certainly would not feel the same way.  But that's the beauty of it.  Students never claim of sexist teachers because teachers don't explicitly show that.  If the gender split is even, the teacher would have a hard time discriminating against a large group of students.  On the other hand, when it's duck, duck, grey duck the teacher can be discriminatory.  No, there's no real way to see if a teacher is racist, or sexist, or homophobic without a direct confession, but in my defense, it's equally petty to think all teachers treat all students equally.

Now the clincher.  So what?  To be perfectly honest, I don't give a rat's buttocks about the teacher's personal beliefs.  A teacher is still a person, and he or she is entitled to opinions.  Do I feel targeted at times?  Absolutely.  In fact, there is no doubt that there are teachers who are racist.  Maybe not in my school, but they exist.  The real issue I have with this is about superficiality.  I don't mind if a teacher is discriminatory.  Do they have a moral obligation to be fair?  Yes.  But they don't need to be.  And because of this, the only thing I need from my high school is to recognize that this is a possibility.

The fact of the matter is that the teacher may not even know it.  They might just have a psychological predisposition to dislike certain individuals.  A lot of this is cultural.  Some teachers may not like what students wear, but they don't consciously recognize that.  Essentially, it's not really anyone's fault!  The only error is how schools try to hide the imperfections.

It was cute in 3rd grade to say that we were imagining things.  It's not so cute in high school when you can feel things happening.  It's extremely painful to not be able to talk about this to a teacher, because after all, I'd be complaining about their colleague.  And due to our conditioned responses about confronting a teacher about negative affairs, are we really expected to go and tell them ourselves?  They could just as easily say that I'm just imagining things.

In closing, teachers are just as discriminatory as students.  Schools don't need to fix that.  Fix how it's portrayed.

Thanks for reading,
cyoubx

Rejection From MIT Was a Worthwhile Experience

Hey all,

Ready for a long post?  Me too.

The summer before senior year in high school, I thought about which schools I wanted to apply to for college.  I was interested in schools with a great Biomedical/Bioengineering program, and the top choices were not hard to find.  Naturally, my eyes wandered to MIT, my dream school since I was a youngun.  Yeah, I knew my chances weren't high, but looking at the E.C.s and the classes I took, I thought I had a decent shot.

Over the next few months, I worked incessantly on the application that I thought would determine my future.  I went over the application after I finished, and finally sent it in Early Action.

...The result finally appeared online, and it was not what I hoped for.  I got deferred.  Strangely enough, I catatonic, a psychological isolation.  I became stoic and I wasn't really thinking at all.  When it hit me that I wasn't accepted I treated the deferment as a rejection.  Prior to this, I hadn't really experienced rejection.  I was admitted into the University of Minnesota Talented Youth Mathematics Program (UMTYMP), National Honor Society, American Regions Mathematics League (ARML), etc.  Getting accepted was the only thing I ever really understood.  In retrospect, being deferred didn't mean getting rejected at all, but I had a different mindset back then.  To not get accepted was to get rejected.

So the wait continued.  The regular decision date came pretty quickly and I was hoping for the best.  I clicked on the little button that would determine my future...and poof....nope.  This time I was much less paralyzed.  I was pretty openly upset about this.  Deferred was a new term that didn't know very well; rejection was a term I despised and hoped I would never get.  This is of course all very silly in retrospect, but at the time, I was furious.

After getting the rejection, I cubed (solved Rubik's cubes) for an unhealthy 4 continuous hours to calm myself.  Needless to say, it worked.  However, once I thought about the rejection again, I immediately became frustrated.  Thus, I went into deep introspection about why I did not get accepted.

It's sort of funny how I sought out comfort online by looking at other people's rejections.  It's wee bit sadistic, but it made me feel better about myself.  I also looked at how other people coped, and the supposedly comforting words that kept reappearing were "Getting rejected doesn't mean you weren't good enough."  And to this, I say Bull Feces.  I take on a fairly pessimistic stance.  The sentence just wasn't completed.  It should have ended with "other people were just better."  For anyone who tells yourself this, don't.  It's too quaint.  Ick.  The other way to refudiate (see what I did there?) this statement is to simply say that if you were good enough, you would have gotten accepted.  In the case of MIT, I probably had similar numbers as the next person on file.  The fact that I got rejected was because I wasn't good enough.  I didn't stand out as much, and so I wasn't as selectable.  So in truth, getting rejected does mean I'm not good enough, and I'm okay with that.

For me, this was an eye opener.  I naively thought that I could actually get accepted into one of the most prestigious technical institutions in the world.  I took a look at the people who got accepted, and that's when it hit me that getting rejected was expected.  The people I know who got accepted were some of the most intelligent people I've ever met.  Their drive and academic skills surpassed mine tenfold.  Looking at the small pool of applicants I knew, I understood that I really had no chance.  The fact that I even got deferred was a blessing.  I didn't really deserve to be deferred.  The way I see it, getting deferred meant my numbers were adequate, but that I, as a person, didn't stand out.

So as for my "determined future?"  Well, getting rejected from MIT determined my future alright.  But not in a bad way at all.  Rejection means I won't go there for undergrad, but there's always opportunity after that.  Plus, who can say that MIT was the best fit for me, anyway?  I can't say for certain that I would have flourished in that competitive environment.

In the end, I learned a lot.  Pessimistically, I'm just not as good as I thought I was.  Although that's a depressing statement, it's true.  Since getting rejected, I've considered every action I've taken.  It's a large world after all, and it's competitive.  You may think you're awesome, but there's always at least one person better.

Thanks for reading,
cyoubx

Making Stickers is as Easy as 1,2,3,4,5....An Explanation for Children

Hey all,

I've developed my own method for making vinyl stickers for Rubik's Cubes.  Originally, I used electric tape since it is a sturdy material, relatively cheap, and it comes in a variety of colors.  However, the lifespan was only a couple months.  Over time, electric tape tends to soften and the adhesive on the vinyl bonds better to plastic.  Thus, the stickers started sliding all over the place.  So now...I write up my method for creating your own vinyl stickers.

Supplies - 

1. Word processor/Paint/Gimp (any word processing or image creation program that features an on-screen ruler.)
2. Ruler
3. Regular copy paper and printer
4. Vinyl sheets and/or double sided tape (I got the vinyl in a pack of six at a local arts and crafts store.)
5. Scissors/Exacto Knife

Procedure - 
I.  Preparation (Template)

1. Grab your cube and measure the width of each cubie.  Each sticker should be 1/8 inch shorter.
   Ex:  If a cubie is 3/4 in wide, the sticker should be 5/8 in wide.
   
2. Take this measurement and go to your computer program; I will be using Microsoft Word.  Using the "rectangle" shape tool, draw a square.  Right click to format the shape and set the width and height to the length of the sticker.  I will be using 0.63"
3. After the shape is set, copy the shape and paste it 8 times.  Then set the nine shapes up into an array.  NOTE:  To get to this step, you may also "Insert" a 3x3 table.
4. This is the template for one side.  At this point, either select all nine squares or the table, copy it, and paste it 5 times to result in 6 3x3 arrays.
5. Organize the arrays neatly and print out your templates.

Download this picture for a pre-made template.  (It will be the right size)

II.  Cutting Out Stickers

1. Take your template sheet and cut out all the arrays (to get 6 individual templates)
2. Using double-sided tape, glue the template onto the back of your vinyl sheet (my sheets had paper backings).  NOTE:  Make sure the grid lines on the template face outside so that you can see them...
3. Take your scissors and cut out the template.  Then, cut out the individual squares.
4. Using nail clippers, cut the corner of each square to "round" it off.  (This is obviously optional).
5. Repeat steps 2-4 five times

III.  Application

1. Remove the backing of the vinyl squares.  The vinyl sheets I purchased were "cling-ons" without adhesive on the back.  Rather, they used static to attach to plastic.  If your vinyl sheets are not adhesive, use double-sided tape to apply adhesive.
   NOTE:  This gives the sticker a mosaic feel since the tape cannot be applied perfectly (I like this.)
2. Place the stickers onto your cube.  I used tweezers, but use whatever you need.

Congrats!

End Result

Final Notes - 

1. This was a rather long tutorial, but the actual process should take no longer than an hour for all six sides.
2. This is ideal for people who want to make custom stickers for various puzzles and for people who do not have the means to purchase from Cubesmith or another online store.
3. If you have questions, feel free to ask me :)

Good luck!

Thanks for reading,

cyoubx

He Has Google AdSense Now!!

Hey all,

Quick updates:

3x3 - sub 15

5x5 - sub 2:30

6x6 - sub 6:15

More importantly...you will now begin to see advertisements on my blog.  This is because I now have Google AdSense enabled :)

That's all, folks.

Thanks for reading,

cyoubx

Skyline is the Cheesiest, Most Predictable Movie EVAR!!

Hey all,

I made the poor decision to watch Skyline last night.  There was absolutely nothing special.  From the get-go, I knew the ending.  As the movie progressed, my predictions were confirmed, and the ending came and went seamlessly.

Skyline is a sci-fi thriller taking place in New York City.  One momentous day, an alien infestation storms the city and kidnaps people who, we later find out, fuel the aliens.  Classically, there are 4 survivors, who later meet-up with a couple more people in an apartment.  Following Jurassic Park, they get picked off one by one leaving only the two lovers alive.  It's all very quaint.

I leave out the "twist" at the end, because it's something you should be able to figure out ten minutes into the film. 

I suppose I'll say one good thing before giving out the verdict.  There were actually plenty of cinematic symbols I rather enjoyed.  The following lines may "spoil" the repugnant movie but I'm sure you'll live.  The tentacle-aliens live by feeding off of human brains.  The shape of the head looks suspiciously familiar to female genitalia.  The twist is that the creature lives when a brain is thrust into the structure and dies when organs are pulled out, as is shown in one of the last scenes.

Another profound symbol is that of water.  Most movies use water to show baptism or some type of change.  In this movie, it's surprising to see that the protagonist persistently wants to go to the harbor but never reaches that place (and he eventually gets harvested, oops, spoiler alert).  The aliens, on the other hand, never touch the water and use it only to dispose of carcasses.  It actually goes further.  When the protagonist is harvested, his brain travels through something resembling a water-filled fallopian tube.  Essentially, the protagonist reaches water, and that's where the end scene starts to get "interesting."

The cinematography wasn't anything special, and the sound mixing was decent.

With it's continuity goofs, and various plot flaws, this thriller is possible the most opiate film I've ever seen.  The ending was too story book and took ten minutes to execute when thirty seconds would have been sufficient.  Having a B-grade line of actors and a C-grade plot, I can only give this film a

C+

Thanks for reading,
cyoubx

Hey Oh PB

This is really just for me :)

Average of 5: 14.71
1. 14.69   B2 D B F R' D2 F' D' L2 F
2. (11.32)   D2 L2 B L' B' L R' B2 L' B'
3. (19.37)   D2 B F D2 R B F' R' D' B
4. 14.45   L U' B L' B2 U L' U' R L2
5. 15.01   R U F2 U2 R2 B2 U' B U' D'

This One's for Him

Hey all,

Haven't posted in a while due to school and other things, but I've gotten faster.

I've been getting sub 18 second averages for awhile now, but recently (yesterday and today), I've been getting sub 17 second averages.

Two new PB's today:
16.38 a5
16.84 a12

I've also recently broken my single a couple times.
9.91 lucky
11.73 lucky
12.93 lucky?
13.xx many times non lucky.

I hope to get a sub 15 second average of 5 by the end of the year.

This was more for me, but I thought I'd share with you anyway!

Thanks for reading,
cyoubx