Are Leggings a Crime?

During advisory we've been watching a documentary called Missrepresentation. It basically talks about women in the media and how it affects the way girls perceive themselves and all that. It's very interesting, but honestly we've seen it all before. Everywhere we look we have people telling us flat out to not pay attention to the media. But I think that there is more of an issue here. 

I just came across this article talking about how schools want to ban leggings. All of the sudden it occurred to me as I read this specific part of the article: "In fact, one 13-year-old student, Sophie Hasty, put it perfectly over at Slate, saying, 'Not being able to wear leggings because it’s ‘too distracting for boys’ is giving us the impression we should be guilty for what guys do.”' 

This made me really think. We've seen this stuff all before but maybe the people who should be watching these films is the boys. They need to know how it affects girls when they objectify them. When we are told to not act a certain way because of the way a boy will react to it, I think it is completely going against the whole idea of not relying on men for approval. No one wears leggings to get a reaction from boys, we wear them because they are comfortable and it is unfair to be blamed if boys can't handle themselves at the age of 17. 

Have You Heard of the Band "We Don't Exist?"

What is it with this trend of always wanting to know the most obscure bands? It's kind of weird if you think about it. If you want a good laugh, watch this video:

In the video, an interviewer is asking people at Coachella (a music festival) if they've heard of a band that they made up, and all of them answer yes! It got me thinking about why it's cool to know bands that no one else knows. 

To me, this fad is a little ironic. The fact that it's trendy to be doing something that no one else is. I think that the reason why this is cool is because it is so easy to access and discover new music in today's society, it is cool to be original because it shows that you take more time to look for new music. Everyone can go on the iTunes top 10, even my 8 year old cousin, but it takes dedication and a sense of what's cool to go on trendy websites and illegally download mixtapes produced by rappers that no one has ever heard of. With the new technology, apps and social media being introduced to us constantly, its hard to not get bored of everything. This is what sparks the need to constantly be refreshing what we listen to, wear, and talk about.

Everyone wants to be the one that starts the new trend, but how is it a trend if the trend is to not follow the trend...? Something to think about the next time you stop liking a band because they became too "mainstream" or "sold out."

The ACT Prince and the Pauper

In a previous blogpost, I talked about how ACT companies see areas like the NorthShore as a perfect place to market because we're all "crazy" due to the pressure and competition at New Trier. But where does this pressure come from?

These tests make people nervous because there is only one outcome. If your test score are good, you are considered smart. If your test scores are bad...are you really stupid? Or are you just a bad test taker? Could you be having a bad day? Colleges don't care. If you looked at a 22 and a 30 you would be able to tell which is better, but what about if you looked at each kid? Would you be able to really say which one deserves a college education? Probably not, because there are so many other factors.  

When I went to my aunt and uncle's house in Delavan, Wisconsin over Thanksgiving it got me thinking, is this really fair? So many of these scores are achieved with the help of tutors, a service that isn't available to people in lower-income neighborhoods such as Delavan. Only a handful of my cousins have attended college and most of them would be grateful for a 25 on the ACT. This is a score that I would not be satisfied with getting. But with the tutoring sessions that I have, could my cousins get a higher score?

This makes me question whether or not ACT tutors should be allowed. Or, is the ACT even a fair way to assess a student on their abilities? One student in Winnetka is seeing a tutor every Sunday who, for an hour, helps said student review everything that they have learned over the past 3 years, and teaches them tips and tricks that are guaranteed to improve their score. Another student in a lower-income neighborhood has never had access to a tutor and takes the test once, thrilled with a score 4 points lower than something that would be acceptable for the student from Winnetka.

The student from Winnetka gets into a better school than the student from the lower-income neighborhood and ends up with a higher-paying job post college. Is this fair? If the student's preparation for the ACT were switched, would the scores stay the same? I think that a student's resources and abilities based on the amount of money they have affects the way they score on these tests, making it hard to really trust them.

I think this says something about American ideals. We are working so hard to achieve this high test score, for what? How is our success measured? It seems to me that the main goal is money, so keep your eye on the prize and keep spending money and maybe you'll raise kids that have as much determination to earn enough money to spend on their kids to do the same thing. What's the point?

Think Twice Before You Swipe

When is giving your information up dangerous? Apparently when shopping at Target over winter break. Starting on Black Friday and continuing through most of December, Hackers have gained access to millions of people's credit card numbers and information through Target's database. The hackers use this information to create fake credit cards and sell them to people who wipe the bank accounts clean.

This isn't just happening in New York or major cities, it happened to my family and many other families that we know. So the question is; how could Target, a huge corporation let something this tragic happen? What's to blame? According to Jamie Dimon, JPMorgan's CEO, we should blame the fact that these major companies aren't taking responsibility for their technological advancements as far as security goes. 

For more information you can read this article. 

"Dimon expects that cybercrimes such as the Target breach will become more common if retailers and banks do not work on security, he said. 'This story is not over, unfortunately,'" I agree with Dimon. With all of the progress made with technology we need to make sure that all of the information we give is safe. We are trusting technology more and more and putting our personal information in a computer system can seem more secure than it really is.

So what do we do here? Stick to hard copies of all of our information locked away in a safe or do we take the cyber route and trust computers and electronics with all of our information, only to be protected by a 5 number or letter password?