21 Minus

This Saturday, I had the opportunity to go and attend 21 Minus at the Museum of Contemporary Art.  I was really excited because this was a youth event and I was going to be able to see a few of my friends.  The first thing I saw when I walked in was a boy buried in a bed of dirt.  Around him was flowers.  He asked me, " Do you want to plant one?"  Sure enough I did plant one.  It really got me excited for the rest of the event.  I began to talk to this flower man about the Teen Creative Agency (TCA) at the MCA.  It is a group of artists and thinkers under the age of 21 years old who meet weekly at the MCA to discuss, explore, and curate, contemporary art.

At 4:30, I got to watch a performance by Tim Tsang and Qadash Troutman about our relationship to technology.  It was a very interesting dance performance and explored how attached we have become to our technology.  They asked to put our phones away and just watch and experience their message.  I thought this was extremely interesting in contrast to this inquiry strand because it really tackles the question of the other side of technology.  As someone who is a huge advocate for it, it is always interesting to enrich yourself with a diverse opinion.  I really enjoyed 21 Minus, and I really respect how the MCA really let these kids take full creative control.  I loved seeing kids my age leading discussions and performances, it really was inspiring.

What I pulled from this event is the power of community.  It was so amazing to seeing kids that were all ages participating.  I really think that kids are asked to act like an adult, but treated like a kid.  This program really enables kids to pursue their opinions and their free thinking.  I didn't think a performance like this about technology would even be possible until this event.  I hope to be able to attend next year!

Prose

A couple of months ago, I attended a lecture on prose writing  at DePaul.  His name was Dr. T.R. Johnson, and he is a professor at Tulane University.  He was extremely passionate and was an amazing speaker.  He was a total rebel to the standard university education and claimed that universities cradle their students too much.

He began to talk about a consumerist culture that we live in today.  He gave a shocking fact that substance abuse of 18-24 year olds doubled between 2000 and 2010.  This idea of consumerism is parallel to universities not letting their students follow their passions through creativity and innovation.  I was shocked with these statistics and assumptions that I really went into researching prose to see if it really had this power.  The word prose comes from the Latin word meaning straightforward.  Straightforwardness it pretty much what the writing is like.  The structure of it is also the beauty of it.  It often times contains metrical structure of verse, much like poetry.  Prose is extremely famous because of the persuasiveness and beauty of it.  It has the ability to move people and inspire young and old minds alike.

I unfortunately didn't get to spend a lot of time at this event, but from what i learned I really did enjoy it.  I am hoping that I get to expand my writing style into writing prose because it really does seem like an amazing thing.  I hope to one day meet Dr. T.R Johnson and thank him for his words.

Peace on Earth Film Festival

I journey to the Chicago Cultural Center on March 19th to attend the Peace on Earth Film Festival.  When i first arrived, I did not know what to expect.  But as I arrived and walked into the auditorium where it was happening, a sign caught my eye.  It said “ Raising awareness of peace, nonviolence, social justice, and an eco-balanced world.  This really stuck with me throughout the whole movie presentation.  The movie we came to see was called Groundswell Rising.  It was a special screening and a feature Documentary. The lights then went down, and the movie started.  I loved it.  The 70 minutes flew by.  It was about both sides of the political spectrum of the fracking for natural gas.  It also talked about the environmental effects that fracking had.  What I thought was this movie’s strength was that it pulled in all different sorts of people to interview.  It pulled in locals, scientists, politicians, doctors, farmers, and even parents.    The whole movie tracks the grassroots movement that exposes the danger to our clean air, water, and civil rights.  I left the theater amazed and hungry for more knowledge about fracking and what we could do to fight and find alternate forms of energy.

When I got home, I wanted to expand my research and break down fracking a bit more.  Fracking, or Hydraulic Fracturing, is a technical  process of drilling down into the earth because high-pressured water mixture is directed at a rock to real ease gas inside.  Sand, water, and chemicals are injected into the rock at a high pressure which then allows gas to flow out.  Another big reason why fracking is such a bad thing is that  it uses an average of 400 tanker trucks to carry just water to and from the site.  This is water that could be used as drinking water.  Not only that but the water is mixed with sand and chemicals to create 40,000 gallons of chemical laced fracking fluid.  This chemical mixture contains up to 600 chemicals.  What is even worse is that this process contaminates the water with high levels of methane, leaving locals with high percent cases of sensory, respiratory, and neurological damage.  This is a very important topic, and If you would like to learn more about check out this website:

    

http://www.dangersoffracking.com/

Journey to Univision

I had the opportunity to go and visit the Univision station downtown this week.  It was such an amazing experience because I had known about the station ever since I was little.  I had also never been to a television station, so i had no idea what to expect.  When we first arrived, we were greeted by a tour guide.  She started the tour off with meeting in the conference room and talking about what Univision really is.  I had always known it was a spanish news station, but I never knew how much more it really was!  Our tour guide showed us some sample episodes and also began to explain how Univision prides itself on reaching all sorts of demographics. 

But my favorite part was when our tour guide talked about getting involved with the latino community all around the city.  Univision actually does live shows from different parts all over the city every week of the summer!  It is in their mission statement to not just give news, but to bring communities together.  I thought this was apparent in our short time on the tour.  Excitingly enough, at the end of the presentation, I learned that Univision had won five Emmy Awards last year.  It was great to see that this amazing work being praised on a national note. 

After our meeting in the conference room, we were directed to the tech parts of the studio.  This included the editing studio, audio rooms, and the sets of each of the segments.  Being a student in a TV arts class, I was amazed.  After all the work I had done this semester, learning the nitty gritty, I had finally found myself in a real TV studio.  And it was even more interesting to learn about how the studio technicians ran the live editing systems.  After this tour, I am very proud to say that my knowledge and interest in studio technology has increased greatly.  So grateful for the experience!

Here is my friend, Steven, enjoying himself at the Univision Studio.

Data: The Human Story.

I was so blessed to have to opportunity to go see Christian Rudder, the co-founder of OkCupid and the author of Dataclysm: Who We Are When We Think No One's Looking.  He started by breaking down his app and what it means to have vast amounts of data.  Data is very important because It can break down what is important for a business and who your target audience is.  Rudder used the example of his app, OkCupid, to break down his target audiences.  He did an analysis of the ideal ages that men looked for in women and for ages women looked for in men.  His results showed that while women looked for men roughly their age, men looked for women around the age of 20-25.  Even though it was ridiculous, this helped Rudder and his team develop certain marketing techniques to cater to these people.  

The psychology of your audience is everything for a successful business, and using data can give you a strong understanding of it.  You can conclude trends and then set up marketing, advertising, and business strategy.  I decided to continue my research of data analysis and what it means for businesses.   I landed on a website that picks apart how data can aid you.  It is split up by Overview (a view of user metrics), Demographics (the identity of your audience), Behavior (comparisons of new and returning visitors), Technology, Mobile, and Users Flow (aesthetic). This website does a great breakdown of this, so you all should check it out!  

http://www.socialmediaexaminer.com/google-analytics-audience-data/

This event was such an amazing experience and I took what i learned really to heart!

Design Thinking Workshop

I had the opportunity to participate in a library redesign project where students, teachers, and administration got to work together to learn about design thinking and applications of technology into bettering life.  I went into the day not knowing really what to expect and the looks of uncertainty around the room didn’t help very much either.  I sat down next to a 4th grader, Gigi, and was shocked at first that someone so young was participating.  As the project started, we learned about the power of design thinking.  I was very interested in the creation process and result of IKEA’s design team creating a solar-powered refugee shelter.  It caught rain water, used solar power to create electricity, and it was made out of insulated light weight material that kept it warm in the winter and cool during the summer.  But the kick of this shelter was that it could be easily sent to the survivors of disasters all around the world.  I thought this was really cool and innovative.  

We continued the day by analyzing our schools strengths and weaknesses and then applied them to recreating our library based on those principles.  At this point, I realized why the fourth graders were there.  Even though at first glance it seemed shocking and inefficient, I actually did my best work with Gigi and we ended up creating an amazing new plan for a library.  I really felt a sense of community during the project and that made me realize the power of design thinking.  I continued my research into design thinking and found some really interesting information.  I learned that the reason why it is so effective it because it enables our creative, design, and analytical cognitive abilities all at once.  The result is a pure idea in all forms.  So instead of thinking up some idea and then shooting it down due to lack of either confidence or passion, you pursue your ideas in a whole new way.    The steps of design thinking are not linear.  Robert McKim, a known philosopher,  uses a a step series that he summarizes with “ Express-Test-Cycle”.  I am really glad to have had this experience and if you would like to read some of McKim’s journals on design thinking here is the link  : http://www.philosophy.illinois.edu/people/rmckim

Social Science of Louder Then A Bomb

       I had the opportunity to go to Louder Than a Bomb back a couple of months ago.  When I walked into the room with all of the performers, I had no idea what to expect.  I had never been to a slam poetry competition and the only time i had seen slam poetry was at school.  It was a really great experience and it was truly amazing to get to see not only the famous actor Alec Baldwin but Chance the Rapper as well.  It had been a long time since I had really gotten involved with poetry.  It was probably my freshman year where I actually became interested in it.   The poems were beautiful, and I felt everyone together while they slammed.  But it wasn’t the poems that really got me at LTAB, it was the community of people.  Even though LTAB was an amazing arts event, it was amazing to learn about the social science of the event.

          LTAB summed up what coming together as a community really means.  The program itself is amazing because it gathered kids and adults from all over the city and brought them together.  I became interested in the whole idea of what a community can do and social productivity and I found some very interesting things.  I discovered that social science is full of many different ways of analyzation using both quantitative and qualitative techniques.  Sociology is the study of society a human social action.  What sociology does is unify history, psychology, and culture together to create a human community.  I think this is important to know when going to a event like LTAB because you have so many different experiences at this event that fall along the lines of political, historical, and societal themes.  Kids slammed about their family, Rahm Emanuel, Nelson Mandela, and much more. This really made me think about what Civic Engagement really means.  It isn’t always going to be the message of what makes these events powerful, but the people there who come together and support it.  What an amazing thing that we get the opportunity to be part of!

Here is Chance the Rapper!