Authored by Marissa Heim
While education systems unjustly underserve students of color, tenacious and creative teachers and librarians are working hard to strengthen their school communities. At Brooklyn Center Secondary, one example is a larger-than-life, colorfully connected friendship quilt.
Continue readingAuthored by Melissa Nogues
‘Gigi’ is a great example of how a story can be told in different formats to give the viewers unique experiences. The story of ‘Gigi’ originated as a novel by Collete (Barnes 1973). This was then turned into a play, which Lerner and Loewe originally decided to adapt into a movie musical in 1958 (Encyclopedia of World Biography 2020). From the movie musical, the pair then created the Broadway show with additional songs and flair. The above advertisement highlights these new changes. In this story, the main character Gigi is sent off to be taught how to be an elegant woman, but on the way she falls for a man for which an interesting arrangement is then made (Barnes 1973). The details from the original story might be lost in the musical production, but what is gained is an enchanting viewer experience.
Continue readingAuthored by Darian Donachie
President Lyndon B. Johnson authorized the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA) on October 3, 1965, during the mid-Cold War period (Kennedy 2019). The INA changed America’s formerly biased policy to reunite immigrant families as well as encourage skilled workers from other countries to establish a new life in the United States (History 2019). As a result, immigration to the United States soared throughout the 1960s and 1970s as people sought to start a new life free from “poverty or the hardships of communist regimes in Cuba, Eastern Europe, and elsewhere” (History 2019, under “Immediate Impact”). The number of immigrants from Asian countries to the United States was considerably high on account that they were now allowed to migrate to the United States; moreover, many of these immigrants sought to relocate to the United States from “war-torn Southeast Asia” (History 2019, under “Immediate Impact”).
Continue readingAuthored by Elliot Clement
Coretta Scott King devoted “a lifetime to raising public consciousness around issues related to human rights and social justice,” and although many know her primarily through her husband, Martin Luther King, Jr., she was a powerful force for change in her own right (Crawford 2007, 116). She earned numerous accolades and over sixty honorary doctorates, including one from Marymount Manhattan College, during her lifetime, but her story is still often overshadowed by her husband’s (Suggs 2006). Her own dedication to social justice arose when she was not allowed to student teach in the Ohio public schools, because despite the fact that the students were integrated, the faculty remained all white (Crawford 2007). It was this instance that spurred King into a life dedicated to social justice, both with and without her husband.
Continue readingAuthored by Paula Leahy Welch
Since Carol Dweck first published her research around the concept of growth mindset more than 20 years ago, social scientists, corporations, and educators have been searching for ways to apply the theory to obtain practical benefits. “Numerous studies have found that students fare better if they believe that their intellectual abilities can be developed—a belief called growth mindset—than if they believe that their intellectual abilities are immutable—a belief called fixed mindset” (Claro, Paunesku, and Dweck 2016, 8664).
Continue readingAuthored by Allison Payne
When Jonathan Larson’s musical Rent debuted in the 1990s, the small show quickly grew in popularity. Rent started as seven performances in late 1994 that led to an extended off-Broadway run, all presented by the New York Theatre Workshop (Heredia and Span 1996). It then spent over 5,000 performances between 1996 and 2008 at Broadway’s Nederlander Theater, telling its story of a diverse group of friends trying to live their lives while dealing with the horrors of AIDS (Grode 2015, 253).
Continue readingAuthored by Brittany E. Partinico
On March 13, 1926, the “Great Neck News” editorial first addressed the allegations present in Owen Davis’s playwright depiction of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s “The Great Gatsby,” where critics surmised that the peninsula of Great Neck was loosely based on his fictionalized “West Egg” (Lanigan 1926, 18). Fitzgerald’s literary masterpiece, not only sparked enlightenment in American culture and addressed the “American Dream” regarding cumulative wealth, but also sparked a debate amongst New Yorkers and Long Islanders as to whom was synonymously represented as the infamous “gaudy, West Egg” (Pumphrey 2011, 115-119). The presumptions of critics did not sit well with Great Neck residents, with feelings that the correlation to the novel would evoke preconceptions and undesirable impressions of Great Neck. Great Neck residents felt the “unfair” symposium by critics was presumptuous based on the lack of factual evidence present in the novel as well as the bias being reflected merely on Fitzgerald’s short-lived residency in Great Neck (Lanigan 1926, 18).
Continue readingAuthored by Amy M. Smith
Prior to the invention of the electric refrigerator in 1912, people used an icebox that had to be stocked with ice that had been harvested from frozen bodies of fresh water in the winter and shipped to consumers (Hurt 1986). For most of the 19th century, Sandusky, Ohio was known as the “Ice Capital of the Great Lakes” with ice houses and transportation equipment all along the shores of Lake Erie (Kavanaugh 2003).
Continue readingAuthored by Victoria Crosby-Haslim
Texas is the second-largest state in the United States and is known for its independent status by the single star on its state flag (Migiro 2018). Nevertheless, from personal experience, it proves its dedication to the citizens through the pride it takes in how they support their citizens. Located in the center of Texas, Fort Hood, along with other cavalry units, in tribute to its long-ago history, soldiers can earn “spurs,” through deployments or successfully completed missions and tasks, that attach to their boots and have the option of wearing the “Cav Hat” that is not mandatory, but encouraged if considered a “trooper,” or a soldier in a cavalry unit (1st Cavalry Division Association 2020). Military members in the Army characterize “L-D-R-S-H-I-P, an acronym for the seven Army core values: Loyalty, Duty, Respect, Selfless Service, Honor, Integrity, and Personal Courage” (U.S. Army 2018, under “Lifestyles”). Fort Hood, known for its cavalry, originated for patrol of the Mexican border via horseback and rode into battle yelling “charge!” It “is the only post in the United States currently capable of stationing and training two full armored divisions, first and third, within its campus” (Williams 2017, para 4.1), hence the name, The Great Place.
Continue readingAuthored by Cuyler K. Otsuka
On Sunday, December 7, 1941, shortly before 8:00 a.m., Imperial Japanese airplanes approached the island of Oʻahu and began their surprise attack on Pearl Harbor and Hickam Field, two United States military installations on the island. The alarm sounded at 8:05 a.m., and Engines 4 and 6 were promptly dispatched to Hickam Field to respond to the blazes and medical emergencies caused by gunfire and bombs (Bowen 1979, 126). As part of a “mutual aid pact,” the Honolulu Fire Department, a civilian fire department, assisted the United States military, and vice versa (Bowen 1979, 127).
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