Sandra Bahena.

(GOING FOR THE LOOK, BUT RISKING DISCRIMINATION BY STEVEN GREENHOUSE. THIS ARTICLE APPEARED IN THE NEW YORK TIMES ON JULY 13, 2007)

 Greenhouse states that companies (such as Abercrombie and Fitch) have been "skirting the edges of anti discrimination laws." "Hiring attractive people is not necessarily illegal, but discriminating on the basis of age, sex, or ethnicity is." (GOING FOR THE LOOK, BUT RISKING DISCRIMINATION BY STEVEN GREENHOUSE.) On one hand, I agree that companies should be allowed to hire whomever they want when they are trying to project a certain image. On the other hand, I don't believe that companies should take such extremes as to discriminate against ethnicity. If I walked in to a Hollister store and tried to get a job, I would completely understand if I was rejected the position because I was dressed in baggy pants and a solid colored tank top. It would be best to walk in the store promoting their "beach look":  beach-wave curls, dressy flip flops, a floral skirt, a skin-tight blouse and a natural smile that screams " Look at me, I look like the model on the big poster you see at the entrance. Welcome to Hollister!" It's stores like Hollister that make it understandable why they would hire such a sleek and slender staff. Their clothes are ridiculously expensive and they will take the extreme of hiring people that are willing to wear and promote their clothes and items. They want people who will look good and hopefully promote confidence in order to get items off their shelves. Is it such a shame?

I've always believed that any person can change their appearance for a certain job if they really wanted it, but I don't believe that they should be turned away because of their skin color or race, those factors should not matter when the image being projected are materialistic items. It's also favorable to the business to have their employees attract customers by wearing what they think will have customers lined up at the cash register. As a customer, I don't really look at who is selling me an item, but I focus on how well the item looks on a person. I understand why a business would have a staff that look similar to one another and like they just hopped out of the store's catalogue. It makes it easier for the consumer to pick out what to buy.

Is it fair to reject a person from a job because of age or sex? Does it matter? Yes, the sad reality is that companies try to hire people that they think will help raise their revenue. It's understandable to turn away a 50 year old male from a job at Victoria's secret, a lingerie store. Truth is, a company would rather hire a young lady in her early 20's because she will help project that "sexy look" that customers would rather see. Not only would having a female staff be beneficial, but more comfortable for clients. Personally, I wouldn't want a male to help me pick out bras and underwear. My conclusion, then, is that companies should be allowed to hire whomever they want but shouldn't reject someone who is applying because of skin color or race. 

Sandra & Erik

In Steven Greenhouse's article, "Going for the Look, but Risking Discrimination" he states that companies are "skirting the edges of anti discrimination laws." The phrase states that companies are on edge of breaking laws, but are not entirely doing so. Businesses find "loop holes" to hire certain people that will help project their company image. In doing so, the company risks law suits and provokes discrimination against age, sex, and race without breaking any laws. 

(GOING FOR THE LOOK, BUT RISKING DISCRIMINATION BY STEVEN GREENHOUSE. THIS ARTICLE APPEARED IN THE NEW YORK TIMES ON JULY 13, 2007)

May 5,2011

Today in class, we revised the paragraphs we wrote yesterday. We learned that it's crucial to spend your words wisely to prevent awkward sentences.

May 4, 2011

"Skirting the edges of Anti Discrimination Laws"

 The phrase "skirting the edges of anti discrimination laws," in the articles context, describes how companies find "loop holes" to hire certain people that will help project their company image. In doing so, the company risks law suits and provokes discrimination against age, sex, and race. In Steven Greenhouse's article, "Going for the Look, but Risking Discrimination", he states that Abercrombie & Fitch hires their employees based on looks. The company isn't doing anything illegal, but what they're doing, can be frowned upon. This motive supports the phrase "skirting the edges of anti discrimination laws".

Abercrombie & Fitches, 

E-Roc & Sandeezy

May 3, 2011

For at least one period in my four years of  high school, I spent it withering away in my third period class; chemistry. To this day, I  feel that sitting through Mrs. Nation's class was a complete waste. Spending forty-five minutes everyday, only to listen to her ramble about her personal life. 


Is it pathetic to say that I know more about her two kids and husband, rather than what makes up an atom? Is it sad to say that sucking up to her only got me away with a C? Yes, I can honestly say that to this day, I can't remember a thing we were taught in chemistry. The only memories that remain, are the  days spent listening to what she had to say about her adorable family.

Blah & Blahs

E-Roc & Sandeezy

5/2/11

Alliteration is the occurrence of the same letter or sound at the beginning of adjacent or closely connected words. For example, "Sally sells sea shells by the seashore." Parallelism is a format in which sentences are structured alike and create an interesting flow. For example: Disneyland is the bee's knees. Disneyland is punk-rock. Disneyland is a majestic playground for all ages. Anecdote is a short story. It's a clever way to introduce a topic you want to address and lures the reader.
                                                Bees & Knees,E-Roc & Sandeezy

Anecdotal Opening

For at least one period in my four years of  high school, I spent it withering away in my third period class; chemistry. To this day, I  feel that sitting through Mrs. Nation's class was a complete waste of my time. Spending forty-five minutes everyday, only to listen to her ramble about her personal life. Is it pathetic to say that I know more about her two kids and husband, rather than what makes up an atom?

Anecdotes & Commas,

E-Roc & Sandeezy

April 25, 2011

If a company is trying to project a certain image than they should hire someone that represents their company image 100 %, but if they choose to, they can hire whoever they want. If it is a clothing company, like H&M, they should hire someone that keeps up with the trends and dresses well. It all depends on what the company image is, because who they hire is who will represent them. I think they will only hire people that project their image or else they won't make as much business.

4/18/11

You have decided to invest your hard earned money and some money you have borrowed from your friends to open a clothing store. 

1. What kind of clothes are you going to sell?

Clothes you would normally wear in the summer. Crop tops, band t-shirts, cardigans, cut-offs, skinny jeans, sandals, shorts, ect.

2. When people think of your store, what three words do you want them to think of? 

Unique, comfortable, fresh.

3. What kind of people are you going to hire to work in your store?  

People who fit into our criteria and would normally wear the clothes we sell, or clothes that resembles ours.

April 12, 2011

We agree with the argument presented by Hacsi, in "Stop Waiting for a Savior." It's makes sense to hire a person with experience in education, rather than someone with a political background for a superintendent's position. 

Chucks & top hats,

E-Roc & Sandeezy

April 12, 2011

We agree with the argument presented by Hacsi, in "Stop Waiting for a Savior." It's makes sense to hire a person with experience in education, rather than someone with a political background for a superintendent's position. 

April 7, 2011

Today in class we reviewed written essays. We read them out loud, and discussed ways we could improve them. Mainly, we were taught another important template we are able to work with. 

In Bilger's essay, "The Last Meow," he states -insert statement-.

We learned the differences between the meanings behind the words, "seems" and "states".

Grease and tight jeans,

E-ROC & Sandeezy

P.S. Check out Erik's pomp.

On one hand BLAHBLABLAHBLAHBLAH....

Today in class we reviewed an essay that supports Bilger's argument in his article "The Last Meow". We also went over writing templates that we can use in our essays, that make our statements more concrete.

3/23/2011

Today in class, we learned that every essay should be similar but different. Similar, in the sense that an essay should be sculpted by a template, and different because of the prompt given. All that is needed to be done is plug information into a template,  just like you would plug in numbers into a formula.

Sarcasm & Giggles,

E-Roc & Sandeezy

3/14/11

In todays class discussion, we revised an essay that opposed Bilger's argument that our love affair for pets is out of control. The essay held up its argument by stating their opinion and facts clearly. Compared to our essays, it is very different, because Sandra and I, we agreed with Bilger's arguement.  Perhaps the essay was more well structured than our essays. 

Serenades and lullabies,

E-Roc & Sandeezy

PS we should be acknowledged for our time and wonderful effort we apply to this blog.

March 10, 2011

Today in our class discussion we went over a sample student essay with a score of six.

It was a response to Bilger's argument, she  addressed the topic, considered the opposing viewpoint and had great transitions for the reader to flow through it easily. Her essay is a great example for us to learn from and immensely  provided us with a new template.

I have to go potty,

E-Roc & Sandeezy

3-7-11

1. What are the main points the author is making in his piece(at least two)?

In his piece one of the main points that he wants to get across is that all pets don't have a say in the extremes their owners go for them. Second, the article suggests that a pet is worth almost any effort, any cost for most people.

2. How effective is his use of pathos?

The authors use of pathos (emotion) is very strong. He uses imagery to illustrate animals in pain that would trigger the readers emotional core. The author also asks rhetorical questions in order to reinforce the article's major points.

3. How effective is his use of logos?

The authors use of logos (logic) he goes into detail about surgical procedures take. Also chronologically plots the history of veterinarians starting the year 1910.

4.Which is stronger? Why?

Both his pathos and logos are strong as one another, his use of pathos supports his logos and vice versa. For example, the author describes a time when pets and owners had no emotional attachment, and kittens were once put in bags and thrown into a river. When read out loud in our class discussion, one could tell it hit everyones emotional buttons.

5. On what points do you agree with the author? On what points do you disagree with the author?

We agree with the authors point that pets do not have a say in what their owners do for them, because suffering pets don't have a say in whether they want to keep suffering or just be put down. The last sentence in the article was very strong because it reinforces the idea, that since the beginning, the pets never had a say.

"The cats as always, didn't say a word."

 Sugars and spices,

E-Roc & Sandeezy

2/22

 Burkhard Bilger is a legitimate source and author, because he has been a contributor  for the New Yorker since 2000 and staff writer since 2001. He has also had work published in the New York Times and has earned two National Magazine Awards and six nominations. Bilger's interviews are also reliable.  For example, Guy Pidgeon was found in the article, "The Last Meow". Pidgeon is found to actually work at the AMC. 

Paws & Whiskers,

E-Roc & Sandeezy

THE AMC.

Fun Fact: Veterinarians are in the hospital 24 hours a day, 7 days a week to provide immediate care.

Today in our class reading of "The Last Meow", we discussed the foundation of a paragraph lays on the topic sentence. As a class, we learned that for future college references, it's a good idea to highlight the topic sentence of each paragraph. Doing so, will make it easier to understand what you read in the article. Also, we briefly hit the topic of parallelism, and we were taught identify the structure. Lastly, we learned to identify the irony in a paragraph.

Eggs & Bacon,

E-Roc & Sandeezy

The Last Meow PART 1 reaction

In a world of destruction and hate, I find it enlightening to see Shawn Levering care for his deathly ill cat, Lady. A blue collared man from a small city in Delaware found himself in the throes of Upper East Side New York, willing to spend over $15,000 for a kidney transplant, in hopes of curing his sick cat.  To see such a love expressed is nice to read about. Although the article expresses that this procedure is only to be done to please Shawn's wife, the owner would still risk all that money out of love for his wife. It almost seems like a dream to read about this, to read about an owner going out of his way for a small helpless creature. I'm trying to compare Lady to my last cat Mini. If I had all the money in the world, I would have personally went out of my way to cure Mini of her allergies and bad liver. We did our part though, as a family we all took our turns giving Mini her monthly shot for allergies in a span of 7 years. Months leading to her death, she lost a drastic amount of weight, stopped eating normally, and she would vomit the food she did eat. My step father spent thousands of money on her shots, vet visits and special diet. It was heartbreaking to see my cat in pain and slowly die, and now reading this article I'm learning that there could have been something more done. Perhaps we could have taken her to a big city where Mini's suffering could have been cured, but due to financial circumstances it was impossible for us to do so,

I find it sad reading this article because it reminds me of something that could have been. 

Cherries & Smiles,

Sandeezy

Picture This! We learned This! 2/10/11

Today in our class discussion, we first learned to used the terms "retrospect" and "borne away" in a correct manner. In addition we learned the proper placement for a semi-colon. Here are some examples of the terms used correctly.

"In retrospect, I noticed that my choice in fashion was quite horrid freshman year."

"Borne away, the sunbus took me to the mall."

"I have several pet-peeves: snoring,nail biting,burping, and spitting."

      

 Following the session, we began to read "The Last Meow". In doing so, we broke down the first three paragraphs in order to analyze what we were reading. The first paragraph was formed to describe the cat with a massive amount of pathos. The pathos used, formed an emotion of glamour and beauty to describe cat in her last days of life. Using pathos was a strong introduction to the following paragraph that contrasts a middle-class man (owner of the cat) from Delaware in Upper East Side, New York City. Using deductive reasoning, the reader can understand that this man wouldn't be such a hectic city if his cat wasn't in dire need of medical attention. Lastly, in the third paragraph we were taught the simplicity of coherency. The first sentence of the second that third paragraph and very much coherent to each other, regardless of the fact that they are not next to each other.  

Apples and pears,

e-roc & sandeezy

PARAGRAPH USING ALL OUR VOCAB.

They called the girl "Ruddy", because she was never seen with a fair complexion, always glowing red on her cheeks. You can always find her on the beach, the sun transforming her light brown hair almost to a dirty blonde shade. There is an exception though, one day the beach missed her because of she got pink eye, an eye doctor prescribed her with some eye drops. Suddenly, she dropped her dreams of studying oncology, the study of tumors, to dig deeper into opthamology, so she can cure everyone's pink eye. She rushed home that day to remind her anemic mother to take her iron pills, and talk to her about her new dream. Her mother praised her for this new found dream, finally her congenitally blind husband can now be studied, and hopefully one day be cured by his own daughter Ruddy! Ruddy laid in bed that night, contemplating whether to pursue this dream, in retrospect, she looked back on her past dreams and realized she could do this! Borne away, she took the SunBus the following day to the Mayo Clinic where she could encounter professionals working.  She strived to do everything her role models where doing. She enjoyed the sight of the utilitarian objects, such as injections being practiced on the eyes of clienteles. With the intent of taking the SunBus home, she was surprised to find the bus had left with out her. The dichotomy of the sky didn't bother her, due to it's radiant pink color for the sun was about to set, and the night sky was about to fall. Dander from the trees was falling in front of the path laid before her, she took a huff from her albuteral inhaler, and thought about the compounded dreams rushing in her head. She hoped that if she did decide to become a opthamologist, her spawn would unequivocally have a bright and wealthy future. She continued to walk on home and she noticed she couldn't be more in love with the sound the leaves were making, anthropomorphized, she spoke to the trees and told them about her future plans. Suddenly, a turtle crossed her path and it seemed to have been struggling to survive. Quickly, she took it to the vet. The veterinarian spoke words that would make anyone unhappy, "The turtles aorta has failed and it's in a coma." Ruddy's heart broke and she felt that not even sutures can repair it. The dire choice of euthanasia or life had been brought upon Ruddy and she chose life. Ruddy stayed at the vet all night, only to watch the life of this orphaned turtle depreciate slowly. Every second spent with the turtle had been appreciated. The Vet came in to the room and gave the turtle a shot. The vet's deductive reasoning had failed on him, because 2 minutes later the turtle passed on. It had been euthanized. Ruddy felt devastated because of the malpractice.  Ruddy returned home, went on with her life and ended up studying oncology. Ironically, due to her over-exposure to the sun as a young child, she developed skin cancer. Fortunately, chemotherapy had made her healthier, and she's now a successful oncologist.

THE END. 

Pins & Needles,

E-roc & Sandeezy

Evaluating an essay.

  Unfortunately, the writer struggled to make his points clear for the reader.  The essay we reviewed, would have been strong if the sentences held more structure and less awkwardness. 

Luckily, the writer addresses  arguments made my Dhrele to help support his topic sentence, with a well-fortified technique, using pathos and ethos. 

Yours truly, 

E-roc & Sandeezy

Purple Thumbs 1/26/11

Voters thumbs were stamped the color purple, as evidence that they had casted their vote in Iraq. Now a symbol of democracy, Iraqi men and women show off their purple thumbs to prove they casted their vote. 

Bricks and Walls,

E-Roc & Sandeezy

Productivity is the best activity, Creativity is an even better activity!

XoxO,

E-Roc & Sandeezy

January 25th, 2011

"On Facebook, more than 85,000 people have pledged to attend a nationwide antigovernment protest planned for Tuesday, Jan. 25, in Egypt."

The sentence shown above is the topic sentence from a article in Time Magazine, "Is Egypt About to Have a Facebook Revolution?". Found in the third paragraph, the sentence directly states what the reader is about to read. The rest of the paragraph, supports this topic sentence entirely, listing facts and informing the reader about the attempted online revolution in Egypt.

Yours Truly,

E-Roc & Sandeezy.

1/24 Erik Ramirez

Today in class we went over what our final and we discussed how to improve our writing skills. I learned that there you should be only one topic for every paragraph and to do this you must state the topic sentence and the rest of the paragraph should support it. We also discussed where a sentence should begin and end.

Hearts & Rockets,

E-roc