12B – Inquiry Question

Inquiry Question

What traits do employees look for in college graduates who apply for positions in their companies?

Employers want their employees to have the necessary skills and knowledge of the world around them.  This is a skill that a liberal arts education provides.  Students that are really interested in liberal arts should be encouraged to follow their choice successfully.  Employees want their employees to be able to think for themselves and to make intelligent decisions.  Communication skills are at the very top of the list of life skills that employees are looking for.  A liberal arts education will provide these skills to students.  A specific degree will more likely prepare students for a much more specific job.  This may or may not be the job that they end up having for the long term.  It is very hard for all students to know exactly what career they want to pursue when they complete college. Some people know what they want and some are still undecided.  In this case a liberal arts education is a great choice.  This still provides you with a college education, and gives you flexibility with your career choice.

In the United States there is continued pressure to prepare students for the workplace and this can be achieved with a liberal arts education.  Employers want their employees to write better, speak better, and to reason better. 

“A majority of employers want their employees to have more knowledge of global issues, more knowledge of cultural diversity in the U.S. and abroad, and more civic knowledge, among other things. Both the skills and the knowledge for which employers clamor are those provided by the liberal arts.”

Cited from: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/timhall/liberal-arts-and-the-work_b_3055433.html

In the workplace it is necessary for employees to be able to use their skills when writing and communicating and when applying critical thinking to their decisions.  All employers look for these traits in their staff.  The stereotype of a liberal arts college is that they do not always prepare its students for finding a job after graduation.  But, we do know that liberal arts colleges do help teach students to develop all of the qualities that are in demand by employers.  They are taught to be successful in the choice of a career.  

12 A - Liberal Arts Education?

 Liberal Arts Education?

A liberal arts education is focused on the whole person.  This type of education can make a student a more complete person.  A liberal arts education teaches students how to think for themselves.  A student can learn people skills which are very important and essential in the workplace. Students can also learn a trade or a particulate skill which can be changed to accommodate ones needs. T he liberal arts education help students see the whole picture in regards to real life situations.  A liberal arts education helps to prepare students for the future that is not always certain.  A liberal arts education is focused on giving students knowledge to help prepare them for the work force they will enter into upon graduation.  This education helps a student prepare for a competitive work place.  It had been stated that many employers feel that all students should have the knowledge given them by a liberal arts education.  Textbook learning is important but students have to learn to think for themselves and make decisions based on their own knowledge or judgment. There is a big difference between learning something in a book and real life experience.  Both have their differences and can be beneficial. You can never learn too much, whether it is from books or hands on experience. The more you learn and the more experience you have the better off you are.

Students need to understand that their college education can help them to understand and to learn the value of the new situations that they have never seen or experienced.  A liberal arts education gives a student the skills and knowledge to find information they need.  It also gives them the ability to apply their findings to the everyday life.  They learn to evaluate this information and to use it after looking at it with different viewpoints.

“Liberal arts is founded on a whole person, developing a person athletically and academically. Liberal arts is going international. The 21st century is one of entrepreneurship and innovation. There will not be fixed careers. The liberal arts teaches you to think outside the box.”

Cited by:  http://rendezvous.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/01/22/two-views-on-liberal-arts/?_r=0

12 V – Interdisciplinary Perspective

Interdisciplinary Perspective is when you put together different ideas and put them together as one. It is the way you look at ideas to see how they can work together as one whole idea.  One must have knowledge of all the concepts and different ideas that they are trying to incorporate together.

Segments

Segments are the parts into which something is divided. Many different things would be segments and they do not necessarily have to be evenly divided.

Pragmatism

Pragmatism is having a practical approach to a certain thing, or to balance things. If you have a reasonable way to approach or to look at something then you are considered pragmatic.

11 I - LGBT Community

A few weeks ago I attended a talk in Farhnam, which is the dorm that I live in. I am friends with the , Yo-yo, that was giving the talk, so I figured it would be nice to go to it. The talk was on October 29^th at 7:00pm and it was located in the common room of Farhnam.  The speaker was Yo-yo and the topic was about people’s different sexual orientation. A few interesting points she made are that being gay isn’t a choice, and that people are born either liking men or liking woman. Another point she brought up was that there is a difference between gender, and sex gender is who you want to be, and sex is who you physically are. The last point she brought up which I thought was the most impotent one was about the LGBT community. It’s a lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender community.

11B – Peers Blogs

1. What are ways we can promote more creativity, and why are these important looking towards the future?

2.   Why are young people often more innovative then their elders?

3.  Without the invention of computers, do you believe people will be more creative?

I found many questions to be very good and of college level critical thinking.  I chose the third question regarding the invention of computers and peoples creativity.  I am sure there are many different opinions on this matter, however in my opinion, my answer would be no.  I believe that people are and can be very creative.  With the invention of computers, people have more ways to be creative.  They have more tools available to them to assist their creativity.  The tools that the computer and the internet provide us are priceless.  I could not imagine a life without computers. People have been creative long before computers were around.   It was really not that long ago when computers were not around, and now people cannot even imagine their lives without them.  People’s creativity can be increased by the computers in fields such as science, art, and music. There are just so many programs that assist with creativity.  All projects can be made to look better with the use of a computer. I also believe that a person’s age does make a difference in this as well.  Kids are brought up using computers today, and that was not the case in years past.  My grandparents for example learned to use computers and the internet as adults, therefore I believe that it takes longer for them to learn and get used to using computers.

Since creativity is defined in many different ways, it is not possible to know for sure the impact that computers have had on creativity, however I’s sure everyone’s opinion on this will be different. 

11 A – 4 Inquiry Questions

1. How is water/air quality affected by human activities?

2. How do glasses help people see better, and how does laser surgery work to improve vision?

3. How is stopping distance related to the slope of a surface?

4.  What makes sound change?

I chose to answer question 1. Pollution is a large problem on earth today. There are many different opinions on it.  The question is: How is water/air quality affected by human activities?  Human activities effect water and air qualities every day.  Some of the things that affect air quality are pollution, littering, noise pollution, thermal pollution.   We pollute the air by the cars we drive, and the airplanes that fly in the sky every day.  We also pollute the oceans with the boats that use the oceans for transportation.  We dump a lot of trash into the ocean. The worst case of pollution lately was the BP oil spill in the gulf coast.  Two hundred six million gallons of oil poured in the waters of the gulf coast.  It took them over eight-seven days before they were able to stop the oil from leaking into the ocean.  Over four thousand birds died, and over five hundred sea turtles died. Sixteen thousand miles of coast line were affected by this disaster.  This included Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, and Florida.  This also affected people because they were not able to fish any more in this area, which in turn also affected tourism.  Tourism is a big source of revenue for these states.  The people who live there and who own local businesses depend on tourism for their livelihood.  If the beaches are polluted and there is not fish for the local restaurants.  The residents of the states then suffer due to the water quality being polluted by human activities and human error.

11 V – Innovation – What does it mean?

Innovation is when someone comes up with a new idea, or a new way to do something that is an improvement to how it was previously being done. Some innovations can happen rather quickly, while others may evolve over long periods of time.  Some innovations may require a lot of persistence and may suffer failure before it becomes a success.  This all relates to what we have learned so far in class.  Some innovative ideas may even fall into the category of delayed gratification.  This would depend on what the innovation is and how it would benefit whatever the intended field is which it was in.

Synthesize

The meaning of synthesize is to incorporate things together in order to make something new. 

Regurgitate

The meaning of regurgitate is to repeat facts without understanding them.