A New Generation John F Kennedy is about President John F Kennedy Essay

The book John F. Kennedy and a New Generation is written by David Burner and published by Little Brown, Boston in 1988. David Burner is a Professor in the Department of History in State University of New York. Professor Burner research interest includes social history of US. He is currently working on a project with patty Limerick about colonialist women. His other publications include â€Å"A History of Democratic Party (1970), A History of Presidential Elections (2002), Reading from Settlement to reconstruction (1998) and Making Peace with the 60s (1997). His book A New Generation John F Kennedy is about President John F Kennedy admiration that can be seen throughout the book. Even though critics have mentioned many shortcomings about Kennedy, Burner instead focuses on Kennedy leadership and his accomplishments throughout his life. Burner mentions that Kennedy appealed to various segment of public for his style, looks and accomplishments that formed the basis of his support. For example he won the support of Jews, Asians and Hispanic and other blue-collar democrats giving them a promise of American dream as he himself had immigrant background. Burner explores the controversies including success and failures of Kennedy life and how it shaped American consciousness. He provides deeper discussion of Kennedy both as an individual and as a leader allowing readers to examine the changes that shaped the American political system during 1950s and 1960s, and how Kennedy created a greater hope for every American. The author mentions several events and incidents from the time and how Kennedy was influential changing the course of history. For example the Cuban missile crisis tested the leadership of president leadership when Kennedy threatened the use of nuclear arms in the wake of Cuban Mission crisis in 1962. The naval blockade ordered by Kennedy proved successful and the negotiation with Russia ended peacefully. Another incident Burner mentions is the turbulent end of state sponsored racial discrimination, which Kennedy brought to an end by supporting racial integration and civil rights movement. Kennedy was also eager to see US leader of the space race. It was JFK speech in Rice University in September 1962 where he mentioned, â€Å"No nation can expect to be the leader of the other nations. We choose to go to the moon in this decade and do other things not because they are easy, but because they are hard†. Kennedy approached Khrushchev for cost sharing the technology. Kennedy approved a huge sum of $22 billion to launch American Space Project and Apollo goal was finally realized when Neil Armstrong became the first American to land on moon. Bruner discuss the charm of Kennedy and his wife who were more popular than pop stars and movie stars. One main reason was their good looks and charm that was often photographed by magazines and set the changing fashion trend. Kennedy’s even changes the White House environment from a bleak house to lively and house of mirth and joy. They believed that White House should be place of American History, arts and culture. They invited various artists, writers, and scientists including noble laureate which made White House a livelier place. Despite all the good points which burner has mentioned, the book ignores the bed sheet and fashion stories were associated with Kennedy. Kennedy is well known for his history of extra marital affairs including involvement with Marilyn Monroe do not suit a sitting president. Burner did not talk about these issues, even though it has no thing to do with his professional life, yet such incidents were part of Kennedy should have been discussed. Burner has mentioned on several occasions the influence of Kennedy in the domestic and international affairs including the civil rights; however the view of Burner is more of only glorification of the Kennedy. Even though Kennedy is the most popular President of the United States; but critics argue that his reputation is overrated. He was young and charming; but he was unable to achieve any thing major in his lifetime. Kennedy popularity is based on optimistic beginnings on various domestic and international issues. Critics mention that the popular Civil Right Act was envisioned by his brother Robert Kennedy and was signed by President Johnson in 1964 that was Kennedy successor. Kennedy did not disclose the severity of his health condition. He was believed to have Addison disease that is tantamount of failure of professional integrity. He is considered to be the unhealthiest man to sit in the oval office. While other the Addison disease he was also suffering from an extreme backache from childhood added with various kinds of infections. There is also criticism about his domestic politics that Burner has ignored in his book. For example Kennedy tried to appease Southern Democrats by stocking the lower federal bench with segregationists who did not live up to the mark he was advocating. It is believed that by making attorney general he tried to form a political dynasty that the Founding Father did not advocate. However Vietnam is considered his greatest mistake, where during his time US intervention in Vietnam increased and Kennedy authorized a coup absent the Diem; while dictator general overtook the power which further aggravated the situation in Vietnam.. Even though it was in fact Johnson who made his own mistakes by over involving and bombing the Vietnamese excessively, but the game was started by Kennedy and it was not easy to backup. The people who supported war become protestor calling the American administration immoral. Even though Kennedy assignation fueled the Vietnam cause as his untimely death became martyrdom, but Vietnam was blunder that cost US a lot in time money and human life. Had Kennedy not intervened in the Vietnam there would have no loss of time, money and American lives in an unethical war that continued for decades without any outcome. In the case of Cuban Missiles Crisis, it is mentioned that Kennedy went too far and the world was standing at the brink of a nuclear war due Kennedy antagonism. Had the Russian not backed off, there was every possibility of end of the world. For his supporters he his aggressiveness increased US role in international affairs, but for his opponents it was not sane for president to resort to Nuclear weapons as a last choice. Kennedy critics often label him as youthful charmer with little substance especially by conservatives. And it is often done to minimize his efforts about Civil Rights and international affairs, but the truth is Kennedy was a man of vision. He initiated many new debates in American Society that was unthinkable in his time. Even though most his policies were achieved by his successors; as he was not able to see his vision fulfilled due to his untimely death, the credit still goes to him. Had he not been able to think ahead of time; many things would have been delayed. For example his plan for landing a man on moon was mega project, which took place ahead of the decade. The landing on moon not only increased US prestige in the world, but it also boosted US military technology and power that continues till today. The Vietnam War was mistake but the same mistake can be seen today in the case of Iraq War. The people who initially supported Iraq War now are chanting against the current administration; there are always opposite views regarding any issue. Kennedy advocated the Civil Right Movement at a time when country was divided; and there was division among his own members, but he took the stance and even called the Martin Luther Jr wife to show his affiliation for a just cause. Though Johnson signed the bill, but it was Kennedy who took a step ahead in a difficult time for which he is worth praise. The book is good for people who have no knowledge of Kennedy as a President; however Burner has not justified his role as writer by discussing his dark side that could have made Kennedy more of a man rather a mythical figure. Reference David Burner, (1988). John F. Kennedy and a new generation. Boston: Little, Brown Robert l Bartley, (February 26, 2001). Coolidge deserves more praise. Retrieved July 8, 2006, Web site: http://www. opinionjournal. com/columnists/rbartley/? id=85000640 SUNY SB Department of History -Faculty Page- David Burner. Retrieved July 8, 2006, Web site: www. sunysb. edu/history/faculty Stephen G. Rabe, (2000). John F. Kennedy and Cuba, November 1962 to November 1963. Presidential Studies Quarterly. 30,

Juveniles Tried as Adults Essay

In the United States, anyone who is charged for committing a crime before the day of their 18th birthday is considered a juvenile and depending on the severity of the case shall be tried as a juvenile. There are some cases; however, where the juvenile justice system should be harder on the juvenile, but in most cases they should not go to an adult prison. There are most certainly some cases in which the juvenile should face the adult justice system, but for petty instances, a juvenile court will suffice. I find it hard to agree that a juvenile convicted for crimes dealing with drugs, alcohol, traffic violations, etc. should be tried in an adult court to receive punishment; however, I do believe that someone who commits rape, murder, kidnapping, or any other major crimes of the sort should be taken to an adult court. â€Å"Old enough to do the crime, old enough to do the time,† is a quote I remember hearing as I was growing up, but I was not taught that it applied to small or m inor crimes, but often serious ones involving the harming of another individual. Placing juveniles in adult prisons can cause them to be put in danger, when in reality many of them can be â€Å"fixed† through the juvenile justice system. Juvenile offenders sometimes commit crimes that are equal to or of higher quality than those of adults; however, punishing them as adults in adult prisons will do no justice; they are less competent to stand trial, adult prisons can harm them mentally, physically, and emotionally, and they more often than not choose the actions they do because of someone who is of influence to them. Juvenile offenders are often less competent than adults to stand trial making it ineffective to sentence them as if they were adults. Juvenile offenders are classified as â€Å"childish, infantile, and young,† according to dictionary.com. â€Å"Some studies have examined the understanding that youths’ have on trial procedures and the overall basic knowledge of trials† (Grisso et al). During these studies they found that there was no compassion to the basic knowledge of trials and trial procedures to that of adults. One study conducted showed that 55% of the juveniles they interviewed could not accurately describe what the Miranda laws meant when read to them except the section that says, â€Å"you have the right to remain silent,† according to the National Center of Juvenile Justice. The National Center of Juvenile Justice also stated that, â€Å"juveniles from the ages of 11-15 are very incompetent and that 16-24 year  olds have similar levels of competence.† The juveniles who are younger, or in the 11-15 range, are less likely to understand the risks and consequences of the adult justice system, and therefore may not benefit from it. They also possess weaker decision-making skills. Since they lack decision-making skills, they are more likely to make poor decisions when committing crimes, but also when agreeing to sentencing or plea agreements, leading them to an unfair trial because of the unfair advantages that justice system would have over them. Adult prisons are very harmful to one’s mental, physical, and emotional capabilities especially when they are juvenile. Being placed in an adult prison can make them susceptible to sexual harassment, physical harassment, and psychological harassment from other inmates. They could also face longer, rou gher sentences than they would have if they would have stayed in the juvenile system. A study that was done on 946 juveniles found that 87% of them faced longer sentences than they would have if they had stayed in a juvenile justice system, according to Mulvey and Schubert. In 2005, 21% of all inmates that were sexually victimized by another inmate were under the age of 18, states Mulvey and Schubert. The risk of a juvenile being physically abused in an adult prison is much higher than that of an adult in the same system because juveniles are â€Å"easier† targets and less likely to create a struggle. â€Å"Doing the time for doing the crime might be seen as fair, but doing much worse time because the crime was done while an adoles ­cent seems to tip the balance beyond even-handed justice† (Mulvey et al 846). Adult prisons also have a different effect on juveniles than they do on adults when it comes to their development; since juveniles are receiving the punishment they are at a younger age it can cause problems for them in the future. According to Mulvey and Schubert, â€Å"Adolescents in the adult system may be at risk for disruptions in their personal development, identity formation, relationships, learning, growth in skills and competencies, and positive movement into adult status.† Identity formation is just one of the aspects in which their developmen t can be affected. Identity formation is when you find out who you are as a person, this is often discovered through learning from your parents, friends, peers, etc., but when you are placed in a facility like an adult prison you are surrounded by people who have all committed a crime and are bad influences to you and cause you to create your true self around that type of behavior. Juveniles in the adult systems also lose great opportunities such as their ability to learn about all aspects of life and the responsibilities and goals they should have. They are instead learning about the inside of a prison, jail, etc. Being in these facilities causes juveniles to miss out on learning the responsibility of a job, school, family, values, goals, finding qualities in someone that could be a potential spouse, making new friends who could be positive influences, and a. All of these statistics prove that adult prisons are very harmful to juveniles, especially mentally, physically, and emotionally. It is also often found that juveniles will make the choices they do based upon the choices they watched their close peers make or just the types of people they are surrounded by in general which shows that they are immature and very easily influenced. It is hard to prove that most, or all, of juveniles have a full understanding of the justice system and the courts, making it di fficult to believe that they should be tried as adults in this system. Many juveniles have the ability to change their behavior through the programs that we have specifically for them not through adult prisons. A child who comes from a broken home, or a home without both parents, a family that is part of the lower class, or from a family that is rather large in size have been found to be the majority of juveniles facing time in juvenile or adult systems. Families who are large in size and of a lower class often find that the children are more likely to grow up without any values or goals because they are often left home alone or there is at least less supervision over each individual child, therefore causing them to be hurt and sometimes wanting to inflict pain upon someone or something in hopes to make themselves feel better. â€Å"Family relationships, duties, responsibilities and privileges, and the amount of control exercised over children all play roles in forming character and influencing behavior. The attitudes and actions of parents can create an important influence in the lives of children. Families in crisis will most likely affect the behavior of juveniles. If one member of a family becomes sick, schizophrenic, or alcoholic, a child may react based on the family’s structural problems,† according to Joseph Wickliffe. Families who contain an unstable parent(s) can create a child that is more likely to be disobe dient, especially if the way the rules are portrayed is too aggressive, too passive, or just unclear. According to a study that Joseph Wickliffe talks  about, â€Å"It was discovered that 4.1 percent of fathers were found to use sound discipline practices; 26.7 percent, fair; and 69.3 percent, unsound. Sound – consistent and firm control but not so strict as to arouse fear and antagonism, fair – control which is indefinite: sometimes strict, sometimes lax, and unsound – extremely lax or extremely rigid control by the parents, which, on the one hand, gives unrestrained freedom of action and, on the other hand, restricts to the point of rebellion.† Juveniles are also prone to make decisions based off of what the people with authority want, for instance, they are more likely to confess or accept a plea agreement if their lawyer is telling them that they should do so. After learning of all of the negative consequences that come with placing a juvenile in th e adult courts and/or prisons, I have concluded that for most cases a juvenile should be processed through the juvenile system and take the punishment given there.

List of All U.S. Colleges with a Meteorology Major

You might think of meteorologists simply as the people who deliver the weather on TV, but in reality the field has a lot more to offer. In fact, only about 10% of meteorologists are on TV . Meteorology is the study of both short-term weather predictions and long-term climate processes. As climate change becomes an increasingly urgent issue, the need for skilled and educated meteorologists will only increase too. Many colleges offer a meteorology major. If you’re ready to learn about new technology, collect and interpret weather and climate data, and apply your math and science skills to a constantly changing field, meteorology may be a good choice for you. To learn more about applying to meteorology programs and which colleges in the U.S. offer a meteorology degree, keep reading. Like most STEM fields, meteorology is projected to have strong job growth and security over the next decade, with solid earning potential to match. The Bureau of Labor Statistics predicts that the field will grow 12% by the year 2026, and notes that the median pay for a meteorologist in 2018 was $94,000. Generally, a student graduating with a degree in meteorology can expect to go straight to work. If you want to go into research, you’ll need to pursue a masters or PhD, but there is no shortage of jobs for meteorologists with a bachelor’s degree. In addition to becoming a weathercaster on TV, students with a degree in meteorology may also work for private companies in businesses like aviation, insurance, energy, or agriculture. Meteorologists can also become federal employees working for the National Weather Service, or similar agencies. If you’re interested in studying climate processes, how and why storms or other weather events occur, how to predict weather patterns, or how weather might influence specific areas or projects, meteorology is a good choice for you. Meteorology is a field of applied science and math, meaning that to be successful in it you’ll need to have knowledge in math and science, and you’ll need to know how to apply this knowledge to new and changing situations. STEM fields can be competitive, so thinking ahead and creating a strong applicant profile is a smart move. Here are some tips for getting started: Take Advanced STEM Classes. You’ll want to show that your academics are up to par for the STEM fields, and taking advanced classes is a simple way of doing this. Take AP Chemistry, AP Physics, and advanced classes in earth science and math. Some of your AP classes may even allow you to place out of required entry level prerequisites when you start your degree. Find a Weather-Related Extracurricular. Meteorology is a niche field so it can be easy to set yourself apart by pursuing it early in your high school career. Find an extracurricular that is related to weather of climate. This could be an independent science project that you progress to higher levels each year, a weather club, your own weather blog, or something else that you start from scratch. Showing that you have a long-term interest in this field can really set you apart from other applicants. Consider Getting Help From Someone Who’s Done It Before. Planning the track to college as a ninth or tenth grader is daunting and sometimes confusing. Three or four years is a long time, and there’s a lot that will change between now and then. Luckily, you don’t have to go into the process alone. ’s Early Advising Program pairs high school ninth and tenth graders with successful students from top-30 schools to provide current high schoolers with advice on everything from selecting classes and extracurriculars to setting and achieving long-term goals. Estimating your chance of getting into a college is not easy in today’s competitive environment. Thankfully, with our state-of-the-art software and data, we can analyze your academic and extracurricular profile and estimate your chances. Our profile analysis tool can also help you identify the improvement you need to make to enter your dream school. California University of Pennsylvania | Cal U Embry–Riddle Aeronautical University Florida Institute of Technology | Florida Tech Millersville University of Pennsylvania | MU New Jersey Institute of Technology | NJIT Pennsylvania State University | PSU Rutgers University–New Brunswick | Rutgers State University of New York at Oneonta | SUNY Oneonta State University of New York at Oswego | SUNY Oswego The College at Brockport, State University of New York | SUNY Brockport The State University of New York at Albany | SUNY Albany United States Air Force Academy | Air Force University of Nebraska–Lincoln | UNL University of North Carolina at Charlotte | UNC Charlotte University of Tennessee at Martin | UTM University of the Incarnate Word | UIW Meteorology is a strong career choice with many options and lots of potential for growth. Graduates with a meteorology degree can find employment in many different sectors from federal jobs to private companies and even the entertainment industry. That being said, getting into the meteorology program of your dreams may not be easy, so it’s essential to make sure that you apply to schools that are a good fit for you. Take a careful look at admissions statistics and the freshman class profile to see how your academics and test scores stack up to those of admitted students. Also consider things like geographic location, student resources, cost, and class sizes. For more help, consider the Applications program , which exists to help you optimize your application and ensure that you’re supported through every step of the way. You can trust us to help you gain the tools you’ll need to attend your dream school.

The Possibility of Investing in a Developing Country Essay

The Possibility of Investing in a Developing Country - Essay Example As the discussion stresses the combination of the latter two factors is actually what brings out the beauty of doing business in country B. Rarely is it possible to find that an investment idea that is both cheap and popular. However, choosing to take one’s business to developing nations is likely to change all of this in one instant. (Vernon, 2001) Research conducted earlier this year in Europe indicated that close to forty six percent of investors are choosing to take their businesses to emerging markets. What this means for the company is that there will be substantial levels of capital getting into such an economy thus reflecting on the overall returns obtained there. In 2008, it was asserted that percentage returns from emerging economies approximated to about fifteen percent. One the other hand, the level of returns from developed nations was eleven point one percent. Consequently, this company will be at a better footing if they chose to invest in country B which is an emerging economy. From this paper it is clear that some experts may argue that launching one’s services or products into a lucrative area is always a risky thing to do because one can never be sure when investment costs will go up or down. Consequently, it is always advisable to be cautious. However, projections made about developing countries have indicated that prices are likely to remain positive and that returns will still be higher in developing nations rather than in developed ones.

Material and Inventory Findings Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

Material and Inventory Findings - Essay Example In this case, the troubles experienced with materials and parts on a regular basis signal that the underlying problem is hidden and should be detected and explored further. Although number of the solutions to the symptom problems is available, ranging from the radical moving the S close to T and P to, for example, more frequent deliveries from S, the problem is not the physical flow of the parts but the informational flow between the divisions. There are "gaps" or "gray areas", as Steven Spear and H. Kent Bower name them, in the information flows and the relationship between the supplier (facility S and its three manufacturing divisions) and customer (facilities T and P) with regard to the product supplied (parts and assembly materials). The above mentioned two authors in their article Decoding the DNA of the Toyota Production System (1999) formulate an important rule with regard to customer-supplier relationship within the company's supply chain and internal production system. They emphasize that every connection must be standardized and direct, unambiguously specifying the people involved, the form and quantity of the goods and services to be provided, the way requests are made by each customer, and the expected time in which the requests will be met (p. 100). The rule creates a supplier-customer relationship between each person and the individual who is responsible for providing that person with each specific good or service. As a result, there are no "gray zones" in deciding who provides what to whom and when. In Oregano plants manufacturing system embracing facilities S, T, and P does have the "gray zones". It is the result of ambiguous and not streamlined flow of physical parts and information between the facilities. It should be also noted that all the three facilities have different process design and their needs are slightly different. Nevertheless, the facilities T and P, having the single high-volume customer and limited product line range, face the certain demand situation. It is true for the S facility as well, with regard to the demand for the parts from two other divisions, which is derived in nature. Quality control is another issue to be addressed. Possibility of having up to seven subsequent shifts of producing the defective parts in the molding department due to the machine malfunctioning and raw materials defects, indicates that the currently established raw materials, process and finished goods quality control system does not work out. Recommendations: The adequate documentation flow system should be developed, implemented and monitored for possible improvements on a regular basis. The produced, shipped, received, and consumed components should be entered into the system in a correct way and

Business-Supply Chain Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

Business-Supply Chain - Essay Example These are competitive times. While the petrochemicals sector may not be that much competitive, the electronics industry has a numerous players with similar product profile. Therefore, the company needs to focus its attention on the businesses in such a manner that both segments get due attention. In fact of late, due to the recessionary trends, the petrochemical business too has come under pressure and efficiency has become an important yardstick for survival in the industry. Therefore in order to be successful in the industry the company will have to resolve some of the issues, which appear to be not in line with the professional standards. Some such issues include; i. The Nebraska facility is not able to deliver quality products and services. David A Garvin (1984) suggests that there are 7 dimensions of quality which are performance, features, reliability, conformance, durability, serviceability and aesthetics. But in case of Canbide couple of these dimensions require due attention. b. Customers, who need to pick up multiple products, are made to around the 2km by 1km facility, which leads to undue harassment of the customer and a bad image for the company. In addition when customer keep frequenting inside the production facility, this is bound to lead to further delays in the production schedule and meeting the targets. Hauser and Katz (1998) point out that mere investment in new technology doesn’t guarantee success. Such an investment need to be matched with value creation for the stakeholders for survival and success. In this case, the stakeholders like customers and employees are not in best position to feel comfortable with the arrangement being made within the company premises. v. The copier rehab facility near Charleston, SC receives "trade-in" copiers from distributors across the country and restores them to "good as new" condition.

Research paper based on the life of Edgar Allan Poe Essay

Research paper based on the life of Edgar Allan Poe - Essay Example aware of his life story realize that he was orphaned at a very young age and was never able to achieve any sense of connection to his foster parents, the Allans. The author is also famous for his marriage to a young girl. At the age of 27, Poe decided to marry his 13-year-old cousin Virginia, the only girl he ever truly loved and who tragically died while still considered a young girl. Contributing both to his despair and his alienation from his foster father, Poe is known to have also engaged in a number of poor personal habits such as drinking, gambling and using opium, perhaps even as an addict. Despite these issues, he was able to find early commercial success as a writer. He published his first book of poems at the age of 19 and began publishing his short stories by the age of 23. Unfortunately, though, he never achieved the kind of financial success he felt his innovation and talent were entitled to and he remained a mostly disillusioned and miserable man through most of his li fe. Setting the rules for the art of the short story he’d brought into popularity, Poe said â€Å"If any literary work is too long to be read at one sitting, we must be content to dispense with the immensely important effect derivable from unity of impression† (Mowery, 1997). Like many writers, though, Poe wrote of what he was most intimately familiar with, in this case his own inner demons, and his stories were thus themed primarily around the concepts of sorrow and loss. By examining works such as â€Å"The Fall of the House of Usher† or â€Å"Ligeia,† one begins to understand much about the author’s personality and inner character through the revelation of his anima. The term anima was introduced by Carl Jung’s work on dream analysis as a means of understanding the psyche on a different level than what had been proposed by Sigmund Freud. According to Neumann (1954), â€Å"the Anima is the personification of all feminine psychological tendencies within a man, the

Project Management Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2000 words - 10

Project Management - Essay Example The new club will be larger than Benimhannas’ existing clubs. This is due to the additions of a small 100 seat cinema, and an extensive beauty spa. The beauty spa will have a vast range of treatments and services available including: spray tanning, massage, and non surgical â€Å"face lifts†. As project manager appointed by Benimhanna at the feasibility stage, you are required to prepare a report (2,000 words) outlining the activities required to successfully manage this major project of building the new private health and fitness club, and ensuring that it is completed on time, and within budget. The analysis should include the skills and competencies required by the Project Manager, along with the project management process. Use examples of the concerns, stages, processes, leadership, administration and control problems associated with managing the lifecycle of this major project. Benimhanna is a firm operating within the British leisure industry. The firm focuses on the provision of health and fitness services. Since the first establishment of the company in 1994, its development has been rapid reaching today approximately the 24 clubs across Britain. The entire firm’s clubs follow the same standards and are structured in accordance with specific guidelines and plans. The firm is currently planning to establish a new club, bigger from existing ones which will have all features that can be normally met in the firm’s clubs (i.e. a 25 x 12 metre swimming pool, a fitness facility, a health suite (including 5 tanning beds, and a sauna and steam room), 3 aerobic/dance studios, two meeting rooms, and a small cafeteria/bar lounge area, see case study) while in addition it will also include ‘a small 100 seat cinema, and an extensive beauty spa’ (case study). At a next level, the services offered by the beauty spa incorporated in the new clu b will be more than the ones provided through the firm’s current clubs across the country. The above plan is expected

Personal development plan Statement Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Development plan - Personal Statement Example Having been into Loughborough expanded my interests and knowledge better. I came to realize that Business Management requires me to be well-rounded. Having numerical skills is an advantage, but there are other traits required of me such as a good market sense, excellent inter personal skills, people skills and management. Along the way, I felt the drive to improve in each area. Most of my subjects became the driving force for me to be always one step ahead of my curriculum. I also took pains in improving my communication skills and became involved in activities that helped me become a good speaker and enabled me to improve my public relations skills. My one year internship in PricewaterhouseCoopers, Hong Kong, gave me the opportunity to put my skills and knowledge into practice, as I became involved in customer management while I assisted in providing accounting and business advice to clients. Being in the workplace challenged me not to make mistakes. Accuracy is one of the goals I h ad to achieve, being in a situation that allowed me to influence the clients’ business decisions. For one year, I was able to see Business Management on a personal note, seeing firsthand the challenges that businessmen face. Figures, when transformed into useful data, can make or break a business. From then, I had a much clearer vision of what I want to do after pursuing my bachelor’s degree in Business Management. I see myself employed in a Multi National company, rising from the ranks in the span of ten years, most probably specializing in Marketing and Financial Management. My short-term goal includes immediately getting into a post graduate degree in Business Management after my graduation. Pursuing higher studies will translate into obtaining better qualifications so I can land a good job in any of my dream companies. A Masters Degree will also enhance my skills, provide me more opportunities to hone academic skills and hopefully, apply them in a real business set ting. I plan to do this by getting an entry level job in the middle of pursuing my Masters Degree. I firmly believe that one can only fully understand the concepts learned in school by putting them into practical use. Having a real job will allow me to do this. To succeed in post graduate school will prove to be a challenging feat to me, but I see no reason why I would fail. Academically speaking, I have sufficient knowledge and experience for me to understand the ropes of this course. My quantitative skills and immense interest in Business will definitely get me across my goals. I also recognize my personal skills that would help me get through graduate school. I am a results oriented person who always has a set of goals, short term and long term, to accomplish. I set my own pace basing on the goals that I have set. I am motivated, self driven, who always strive for excellence in the things I do. I am highly inquisitive, always wanting to go deeper into my interests. Moreover, I co nsider myself to have above average leadership skills. I have the ability to encourage a group of people towards achieving goals. Further to this, I have special interest in the culture and the arts, which was brought forth by the fact that I have travelled in various countries and immersed into difference cultures. I can adapt well in any

English Speech Journeys Essay Example for Free

English Speech Journeys Essay Journeys can be long, journeys can be short, journeys can be difficult. Life is a journeys, something we all experience. Goodmorning/afternoon fellow students, Mrs. Grant, my understanding of the concept of journey has been expanded through my study of Samuel Coleridge’s poetry of â€Å"Frost at Midnight† and â€Å"This Lime-tree Bower My Prison† to just name a few. Samuel Coleridge was recognised for his romantic and a natural conversational type of poetry. 1. Journeys can be long, journeys can be short, journeys can be difficult. Life is a journeys, something we all experience. Goodmorning/afternoon fellow students, Mrs.  Grant, my understanding of the concept of journey has been expanded through my study of Samuel Coleridge’s poetry of â€Å"Frost at Midnight† and â€Å"This Lime-tree Bower My Prison† to just name a few. Samuel Coleridge was recognised for his romantic and a natural conversational type of poetry. 1. Coleridge’s poetry draws the audience into his imaginary world in a poem such â€Å"Frost at Midnight†, which is using the journey to reach enlightenment and through it we the audience are able to realise some of the values we hold as human being like our family, loved ones, freedom and security. For an example and a quote â€Å"My babe so beautiful! It thrills my heart with tender gladness†. This quote evokes Coleridge’s preciousness, protective love for his son and for his childs future. Coleridge’s poetry draws the audience into his imaginary world in a poem such â€Å"Frost at Midnight†, which is using the journey to reach enlightenment and through it we the audience are able to realise some of the values we hold as human being like our family, loved ones, freedom and security. For an example and a quote â€Å"My babe so beautiful! It thrills my heart with tender gladness†. This quote evokes Coleridge’s preciousness, protective love for his son and for his childs future. 2. 2. The dark gothic atmosphere of the opening creates a sense of mystery. As Coleridge is isolated in a cottage away from everyone else, which Coleridge to recall both on his school life and his happier life as a country man, and to channelled that unhappiness into a resolution that his infant son will not share in Coleridge’s unfortunate imprisonment in the city, but will grow up in the natural surroundings of the countryside. The dark gothic atmosphere of the opening creates a sense of mystery. As Coleridge is isolated in a cottage away from everyone else, which Coleridge to recall both on his school life and his happier life as a country man, and to channelled that unhappiness into a resolution that his infant son will not share in Coleridge’s unfortunate imprisonment in the city, but will grow up in the natural surroundings of the countryside your imagination that changes our approach towards reality and forces us to look more deeply into what we perceive to be true isplay the capacity of language to change us and force us to look more deeply into what we perceive to be true Coleridge expresses his childhood memories through the quietness of the cottage. Which begins Coleridge’s imaginative journey that son It is a beautiful text that portrays the imaginative journey undertaken by an unusual girl; through her reflection of her childhood memories, she is able to go beyond time and reach a state of contentment. The core concept of the story revolves around ‘moving on’ and not dwelling in the past. There is a very sombre tone that resonates in the text. It eventually changes to one of gratification as the character ‘spoke quietly to the gravestone of his son. ’ This contrast of tone highlights the power of the imaginative journey to change us and instils this very notion into our minds.

Spider-man

Spider-man Spider-Man is a fictional Marvel Comics superhero. The character was created by writer and editor Stan Lee and artist and co-plotter Steve Ditko. He first appeared in Amazing Fantasy #15 (Aug. 1962). Lee and Ditko conceived of the character as an orphan being raised by his Aunt May and Uncle Ben as an ordinary teenager, having to deal with the normal struggles of youth in addition to those of a costumed crime fighter. Spider-Mans creators gave him super strength and agility, the ability to cling to most surfaces, shoot spider-webs using devices of his own invention which he called web-shooters, and react to danger quickly with his spider-sense, enabling him to combat his foes. When Spider-Man first appeared in the early 1960s, teenagers in superhero comic books were usually relegated to the role of sidekick to the protagonist. The Spider-Man series broke ground by featuring Peter Parker, a teenage high school student to whose self-obsessions with rejection, inadequacy, and loneliness young readers could easily relate.[1]:210 Unlike previous teen heroes such as James Buchanan Bucky Barnes and Robin, Spider-Man did not benefit from being the protege of any adult mentors like Captain America and Batman, and thus he had to learn for himself that with great power comes great responsibility a line included in a text box in the final panel of the first Spider-Man story, but later retroactively attributed to his guardian, the late Uncle Ben. Marvel has featured Spider-Man in several comic book series, the first and longest-lasting of which is titled The Amazing Spider-Man. Over the years, the Peter Parker character has developed from shy high school student to troubled but outgoing college student to married high school teacher to, in the late 2000s, a single freelance photographer, his most typical adult role. He is now a member of an unofficial splinter group of the Avengers, one of Marvels flagship superhero teams. In the comics, Spider-Man is often referred to as Spidey, web-slinger, wall-crawler, or web-head. Spider-Man is one of the most popular and commercially successful superheroes. As Marvels flagship character and company mascot, he has appeared in many forms of media, including several animated and live-action television shows, syndicated newspaper comic strips and a successful series of films starring actor Tobey Maguire as the friendly neighborhood hero. Spider-Man was named Empire magazines fifth-greatest comic-book character.[2] Spider-Man has been adapted to television many times, as a short-lived live-action television series, a Japanese tokusatsu series, and several animated cartoon series. There were also the Spidey Super Stories segments on the PBS educational series The Electric Company, which featured a Spider-Man (played by Danny Seagren) who did not speak out loud but instead used only word balloons. Spider-Mans first cartoon series ran from 1967-1970. It became known famous for its catchy theme song, which begins, Spider-Man, Spider-Man, does whatever a spider can From 1978-1979, Nicholas Hammond starred as Peter Parker in the live-action television series The Amazing Spider-Man. Two Spider-Man cartoons aired on television in 1981: the syndicated series Spider-Man which ran for one twenty-six episode season, and the more popular Spider-Man and His Amazing Friends, which aired on the NBC network for three seasons (ultimately totaling twenty-four episodes). hand appears shooting a web to save a citizen in the Third season X-Men Episode Phoenix Saga 5 Child Of Light, This episode aired just months before The web-swingers longest-running show, Spider-Man, which ran five seasons from 1994-1998, totaling 65 episodes, on Fox Broadcastings afternoon programming block, Fox Kids (in this series, Spider-Man was voiced by Christopher Daniel Barnes in the English version, and by Toshiyuki Morikawa in the Japanese dub, who later played Venom in the Japanese dub of Spider-Man 3). That series continued as Spider-Man Unlimited the following year. A small reference is made to Spider-Man in the X-Men: Evolution episode On Angels Wings, when Angel is seen reading the Daily Bugle, the place Spider-Man/Peter Parker usually works. In 2003, MTV aired a 13-episode Spider-Man CGI series based loosely on the film continuity, Spider-Man: The New Animated Series, developed by Mainframe Entertainment. Peter Parker made a cameo in the Fantastic Four: Worlds Greatest Heroes episode Frightful. Johnny Storm hires him to make him look good it, no one let him state what his name was so Johnny Storm refers to him as photographer guy. Johnny Storm also stated he was freelance. A new series, The Spectacular Spider-Man, premiered on March 8, 2008. In its first season it received critical acclaim and rocketed to the top of the ratings. Spider-Man/Peter Parker is voiced by Josh Keaton. * The original Spider-Man cartoon theme song has been covered and reinterpreted by numerous musical acts, including The Mr. T Experience, Ramones, Aerosmith, Michael Bublà ©, Moxy Frà ¼vous and Tenacious D. The 2002 and 2004 movies have featured buskers performing the song; Jayce Bartok and Elyse Dinh respectively. * In 1972, Buddah Records released Spider-Man: From Beyond The Grave, a rock musical story LP record with an included wordless comic strip for listeners to follow. Kingpin appears as the villain and Doctor Strange guest stars. * In 1975 Ramsey Lewis released a single titled Whats the Name of this Funk? (Spider Man) [sic].[14] * In 1975 Marvel Comics and Lifesong Records released an album entitled, Spider-Man: Rock Reflections of a Superhero. It contained songs of various styles altered to elucidate certain moments and feelings of Spider-Mans origin, such as No Ones Got a Crush on Peter and Peter Stays and the Spider-Man Goes interspersed with narration clips by Stan Lee. * In 1979, German singer Peter Griffin had his first hit with a song called Spiderman. * In 1983, Muse Records released Woody Shaws jazz version of Spider-Man Blues, based on the television theme, on Shaws Setting Standards album. * In 1992, the Italian rock band 883 made it onto the European charts with a song called Hanno ucciso luomo ragno (They Killed Spider-Man) from an album of the same name, describing how after the death of the superhero, the streets are being overrun by gangs of stressed accountants in double-breasted suits.[15] * In the 1993 Wu-Tang Clan song Protect Ya Neck, Inspectah Deck raps the lyric Swingin through your town like your neighborhood Spider-Man in his verse. * In 1994, Joe Perry of Aerosmith wrote and performed the theme song for the Fox Kids Spider-Man: The Animated Series. He is a noted fan of Spider-Man. * In 1998 Michale Graves wrote the song Spider-Man (aka The Spider-Man Song aka Spider-Man Save Me) while still in The Misfits. It is yet to be officially released, although he has played this song live in every band hes played in since. On his 2006 solo release, Return to Earth, Michale again mentions Spider-Man in the song Butchershop. * The 2003 Weird Al Yankovic album Poodle Hat has a track entitled Ode to a Superhero. It is a parody of the Billy Joel song Piano Man, and recounts the events of the 2002 film. * In 2004 Nelly performed a song called Spida Man, on his double album Sweat/Suit. * A soundtrack album and score was released with each of the two Spider-Man films. The two soundtracks were mainly songs thematically linked to the film, performed by popular rock acts. Both soundtracks included hit singles (notably Hero by Chad Kroeger and Josey Scott, Bother by Corey Taylor (of Stone Sour and Slipknot), and Vindicated by Dashboard Confessional. The two scores were composed by Danny Elfman. * For the second Spiderman film, Michael Bublà © recorded a big band version of the Spider-Man theme. * Danish pop group, Aqua, mention Spider-Man in the chorus of their single, Cartoon Heroes. * In his 2005 album, Lost and Found, Will Smith uses the theme music from the 1960s Spider-Man cartoon series in his song Here he Comes. This song was produced by DJ Jazzy Jeff. * In their 2005 album Animetal Marathon VII, Japanese heavy metal band Animetal cover the opening of the 1970s tokusatsu adaptation. * In his 2006 album, Kingdom Come, Jay-Z raps Peter Parker: Spider-Man, all I do is climb the charts. * J-pop singer DJ Ozma heavily dedicates Spider-Man in his 2007 single Spiderman. The music video for song features a club full of dancers wearing black Spider-Man masks and a man dressed in a white Spider-Man suit. * There is an underground song called Crank Dat Spiderman. In this song Spider-Man is a sexual action in which the male ejaculates in his hand and throws it into the females face like Spider-Mans web. * The British indie pop band Los Campesinos mention Spider-Man in their song entitled Broken Heartbeats Sound Like Breakbeats. * On the song Candy Land from Insane Clown Posse Member Violent Js album The Shining rapper Esham references Spider-Man.

William Faulkners A Rose for Emily Essay -- William Faulkner Rose Emi

William Faulkner's "A Rose for Emily" As any reader can see, " A Rose for Emily" is one of the most authentic short stories by Faulkner. His use of characterization, narration, foreshadowing, and symbolism are four key factors to why Faulkner's work is idealistic to all readers.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  The works of William Faulkner have had positive effects on readers throughout his career. Local legends and gossip trigger the main focus of his stories. Considering that Faulkner grew up in Mississippi, he was very familiar with the ways of the South. This award winning author has been praised by many critics for his ability and unique style of writing. One of Faulkner's most popular works, which also was his first short story nationally published in 1930, "A Rose for Emily" is one of the most authentic short stories by Faulkner. By writing about the political and social ways of the South, Faulkner was able to create an illusion of the New South as being what we know today as mainstream America. His use of characterization, narration, foreshadowing, and symbolism are four key factors to why Faulkner's work is idealistic to all readers.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Faulkner's use of characterization in "A Rose for Emily" is clearly important to the story. It is obvious to all readers that Miss Emily Grierson is the protagonist, or the principle character. According to a prominent critic, Elizabeth Sabiston, "Emily is a gothic character" (142). Sabiston is referring to Emily that way because of the fact that she slept with skeleton of her lover Homer Barron for forty years. She was awfully stubborn in the opinion of the townspeople. This stubbornness also ties in with Emily's ability to live in reality. After she refused to pay her taxes, directly to the mayor, she tells them to go see Colonel Satoris, who has been dead for ten years. This portrays that Emily's illusion of reality was greatly distorted. Miss Emily was motivated by her lover, Homer, she isolated herself in an old decaying house and she refused to recognize that time had passed. Emily was proud, disdainful and seemingly independent. This shows the importance of characterization. Without these characters, the story would be radically changed. When the reader understands Emily, they can achieve a clearer view of the actions that go on during the story (West 149). Several other characters in "A Rose for Emily" are set in oppositi... .... 158-159. Howe, Irving. William Faulkner A Critical Study. New York: Random House, 1951-52.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  265. Madden, David. "A Rose for Emily." vol. 5 of Masterplots II Short Story Series. Pasadena:   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Salem Press, 1986. 1986-1989. McMichael,George. ed. "A Rose for Emily." Concise Anthology of American Literature.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Fourth edition. Upper Saddle River, New Jersey: Prentice Hall, 1998. 1922-1929. Pierce, Constance. "William Faulkner." vol. 3 of Critical Survey of Short Fiction.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Pasadena: Salem Press, 1990. 848-857. Sabiston, Elizabeth. "Faulkner". Vol. 52 of Contemporary Literary Criticism. Ed. Daniel   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  G. Marowski and Roger Matuz. Detroit, Michigan: Gale Research, 1989. 142. West, Ray B. Jr. "A Rose for Emily." Short Story Criticism. Eds. Laurie Lanzen Harris   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  and Shelia Fitzgerald. Detroit: Gale Research Company, 1988. page numbers. Rodriguez, Celia. " An analysis of A Rose for Emily." U of Texas. 3 Sept. 1996.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  <http://www.cerl.utexas.edu/~daniel/amlit/reader/south/rodriquezerose.html> The Mississippi writers page. U of Mississippi. 15 June 2000. <   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  http://www.olemiss.edu/depts/english/ms-writers/dir/faulkner_william/>

george gershwin :: essays research papers

In 1910, the Gershwins had acquired a piano for Ira's music lessons, but George took over, successfully playing by ear. He tried out various piano teachers for two years, then was introduced to Charles Hambitzer, who acted as George's mentor until Hambitzer's death in 1918. Hambitzer taught George conventional piano technique, introduced him to the music of the European masters, and encouraged him to attend orchestral concerts. (At home following such concerts, young George would attempt to reproduce at the keyboard the music he had heard). He later studied with classical composer Rubin Goldmark. His 1916 novelty rag "Rialto Ripples" was a commercial success, and in 1918 he scored his first big national hit with his song "Swanee". In 1924, George and Ira collaborated on a musical comedy, Lady Be Good. It included standards as "Fascinating Rhythm" and "The Man I Love." This was followed by Oh, Kay! (1926); Funny Face in (1927); Strike Up the Band (1927 & 1930); Girl Crazy (1930), which introduced the standard "I Got Rhythm"; and Of Thee I Sing (1931), the first musical comedy to win a Pulitzer Prize. It was in Hollywood, while working on the score of The Goldwyn Follies, that George Gershwin collapsed and, on July 11, 1937, died of a brain tumour. He was interred in the Westchester Hills Cemetery, Hastings-on-Hudson, New York. Gershwin had a ten-year affair with composer Kay Swift. Swift was a frequent consult of Gershwin; he named the musical Oh, Kay after her. Posthumously, Swift arranged some of his music, transcribed some of his recordings, and collaborated with Ira on several projects. Gershwin died intestate and all his property passed to his father.

Catherine Slopers Self-realization in Henry James Washington Square E

Catherine Sloper's Self-realization in Henry James' Washington Square In his essay, "Washington Square: A Study in the Growth of an Inner Self," James W. Gargano argues convincingly that the Henry James's novel, Washington Square, revolves around the emotional, psychological, and spiritual development of Catherine Sloper. With one small exception, Gargano makes his case so persuasively that it seems hard to believe that there could be any other view of Catherine and her role in the book. Yet, Gargano asserts that James scholars before him have persistently focused elsewhere leaving Catherine to be categorized much the same way her father characterizes her as dull and listless (Gargano 355, 357). Gargano rightly shifts the critical debate from fascination with the ethical conundrum of Dr. Sloper's behavior to concentration on the process of self-realization which takes place slowly and silently in Catherine's mind (Gargano 355). Finding proof of his thesis in the exacting way James investigates Catherine's growth, Gargano sees that James has purposely shown Catherine as innocent in the beginning of the story to demonstrate a contrast to who she becomes as she begins to wake up to herself as the story progresses, and contends that upon meeting Townsend, Catherine "emerg[es] from a sort of dormancy" (Gorgano 356). Gorgano astutely points out that meeting Townsend is not a horrible mishap in the life of Catherine Sloper, but an event which catalyzes the girl to mature in her thinking and feeling. Gargano pays special attention not only to Catherine's behavioral changes, but to the way James notes those changes as part of an inner process (Gargano 356). From her deceptive replies to her father's straight forward questions t... ...orsel of fancywork, [and] seat[ing] herself with it again-for life, as it were" imply an empty period of waiting for death (Gargano 362, James 219). This interpretation of the end of Washington Square is inconsistent with Gargano's earlier contentions, and should be re-examined. Another possible and significantly more powerful interpretation of the ending of the book-that James is showing Catherine as fully self-contained and ultimately satisfied with the choices that she has made-makes more sense. Despite his final reticence, the quality of his thinking and the quantity of his evidence suggest that James Gargano has a good understanding of Henry James's main artistic occupation in writing Washington Square. Works Cited Gargano, James W. "Washington Square: A Study in the growth of an Inner Self." James, Henry. Washington Square. New York: Signet, 1979.

Nutrition †Fast food Essay

Many people eat fast foods because they are cheap, tasty, and convenient. But do people know what fast foods are made from? Is it healthy to eat fast foods everyday? Do fast food companies really fool their customers? In the essay â€Å"The Big Fat Case Against Big Macs,† Ellen Goodman doubts that the best lawyers can prove that fast food companies, like McDonald’s and Burger King, are the causes that make many people become overweight and have health problems, but they can prove that fast food companies fooled their consumers, especially young kids. For example, McDonald’s uses toys as attractions to make kids buy its meals. She also states that fast food companies put slogans to make kids think that eating their â€Å"Big Kids Meal† will make them grow up faster. She also doubts that fast foods have nothing to do with the health problems because why would McDonald’s in France take out an ad telling parents that kids should not eat more than one hamburger in a week. She believes that many people become overweight and have health problems not just because of the fast food companies. Instead of blaming fast food companies, people should blame their sedentary lifestyles. Many people think that fast food companies fooled their customers, young kids, by selling their meals that come with toys. Selling food with toys does not mean fooling people. Well, is there any law that forbids people from selling food with toys? That is how people do business; they just want to get more profits from selling food with toys. Fast food companies don’t force people to buy their products, it’s our own choice. If the toys are the reasons why kids keep buying the meals, why don’t just parents take their kids to toys stores and buy a toy there? We can’t say that fast food companies fooled kids. Well, maybe in some cases they do fool kids, like in the part where they put slogans on their meals that say: â€Å"Do you want to be a Big Kid ? † Kids don’t have any idea about fast foods. The first thing that comes to their minds is that they have to eat this foods to get big ,and kids will just keep eating this foods, while parents keep telling their kids to be strong and big. Fast foods are made from some ingredients that are not healthy. Believe it or not, eating a lot of fast foods is not good for our bodies. In fact many people believe that fast foods are usually high in fat, calories, and cholesterol, which can lead to health problems like high blood pressure, and heart disease. For example, a friend of mine likes to eat fast foods such as McDonald’s. He eats McDonald’s three times a week, and now he has a high blood pressure. He needs to check his blood pressure once a week, so that he can maintain it. Fast foods are not healthy, so try not to eat fast food as much as you can or you will regret it. Ellen Goodman believes that there is no different between eating fast foods and eating slow foods. In this case, slow foods mean foods that are good, clean, and fair. She is right about that. People will get fat from eating both, fast foods and slow foods, and she also thinks that many people become overweight not just because of the fast food companies. Once again, she is right about that. Many people usually blame fast food companies when they become overweight. But the truth is fast food companies don’t make people fat, we are the one who makes ourselves fat. Let’s take an example, how many people do you think will sit down and watch a television after they eat? Probably almost all of them right? Well, instead of sitting down and watch a television, they could walk at park to burn their calories. The point is people won’t get fat if they do a lot of exercises. There are a lot of bad rumors about fast foods, like fast foods are not healthy and can make people fat, and fast food companies fooled their customers. Maybe some of the rumors are true and some of them are false. For examples, it is true that fast foods are not healthy for our bodies and it is false that fast food companies fooled their customers. As the conclusion, there are both good sides and bad sides about fast foods.

Development from Conception to 16 Years Essay

E1- The age group I have chosen to describe is birth to 3 year olds on their physical development and communication and language development. In this age range the physical development changes from birth where they generally don’t do anything which develops as between 3 – 6 months the child can hold a rattle for a moment, reaching for a toy, putting toys in their mouth, lifting their head up, moving their arms to indicate wanting to be picked up and rolling over. This development changes much more as when the child is 9 – 18 months as they can grasp objects, can sit unsupported, can crawl , can point at objects, start to use a spoon and self-feed, start to walk, start to scribble and build a tower of three blocks. Then at 2 years the child can draw circles and dots, can use spoons to feed their self’s effectively, can run, climb on furniture and use sit and ride toys. At 3 years the child can do all the stuff from the ages before but also turn the pages of a book, wash and dry their own hands, run forwards and backwards, kick a stationary ball and throw a ball as this develop is done with the help of the child’s family as the encourage the child’s physical development. The communication and language development happens because at this age there co-operation from early motherese by asking them to show you objects and then learn to follow simple instructions but their communication and language develops as first all the can do is cry and make cooing noises which then turns to babbling at 6 – 10 months where they â€Å"goo† and â€Å"ma† as the child blends vowels and consonants together to make tuneful sounds. Then at around 12 months this develops to the child saying â€Å"momma† and â€Å"dada† as they start to show facial expressions and gestures but can now combine sounds. From 1 – 2 years they learn more words so they can make mini sentences when they speak and manage to name things when you point to something, and from 2 – 3 years they can communicate well and manage to ask questions and say full sentences as at this age there is a large increase in a child’s vocabulary combined with an increase in the use sentences. E2- The age group I have chosen to describe is 3 – 7 year olds on their physical development and communication and language development. In this age range the physical development changes from being 3 years and being able to just learning to walk and run, walk on their tiptoes, wash and dry their hands, put a coat on and off and use a spoon to feed them self’s without the  food spilling. To when they are 4 – 5 years where the child should start being able to button and unbutton their own clothing, cut simple shapes, put puzzles together specifically for their age range, write their name, form letters, draw recognisable pictures, cut out shapes with scissors, draw around a template, walk on a line, hop on one foot, skip with a rope, run quickly avoiding objects and use a variety of large equipment on their own (e.g. slide, swings†¦). Then at the age 6 – 7 years the child should be able to join handwriting, cut shapes out accurately, make detailed dra wings, tie and untie shoelaces, hop, skip and jump confidently, chase and dodge others, balance on a beam and use a bicycle. This is because in this age the child is helped through their physical development by their parents, family, teachers and peers as they encourage the child. Communication and language development happens very effectively in this age range as at 3 – 4 years they are able to ask questions and be fascinated with answers given to them by saying â€Å"if† to find out what happens, say their name age address and be more accurate in speaking how they pronounce words. At 4-7 years the child tries to understand the meaning of words, talk more confidently and begins to be more and more fluent, manages to add vocabulary all of the time in their speech, begin to share ideas, begin to realise different situations and define what objects are, this is because in this age range a child masters the basic skills of language and masters the reproduction of most sounds. E3- One theoretical perspective linking to E1 and E2 is Chomsky’s theory of language development. His theory is a nativist theory as he suggests that humans have a built in ability to learn a language. Chomsky states that children have a â€Å"Language Acquisition Device† (LAD) which encodes the major principles of a language into a child’s brain. Chomsky’s theory also states that children are able to use language so accurately from an early age because they only have to learn the new vocabulary and apply the structures from the LAD to form sentences. Chomsky believes that they cannot be learning the language purely through imitation as the speech around them is often broken and ungrammatical. Even with extremely complex languages children will become fluent in their native language by the age of 5 or 6. A second theoretical perspective linking to E1 and E2 is Skinner’s theory of language development. Skinner’s theory is a nurture or behaviouristic theory. According to Skinner’s theory a child initially  acquires through an operant process this means that the child learns voluntarily without any external force so learning of its own free will and without any sort of pressure. According to Skinner the whole process is based upon 4 elements as it is stated on slideshare.net which are â€Å"stimulus, response, reinforcement and repetition†. For example a child will make a sound if they want something. If the child gets the response it wants they will associate that sound with the act or response and will continue to use it to achieve that response. Skinner believes that learning language is no different from learning anything else and anything which is lodged in the mind of the child becomes part and parcel of the child’s life. E5- for my observations I have done a tick chart, time sample and written narrative on a child aged 3 years and 11 months E6- In order to maintain confidentiality throughout the observations each child is referred to as child A, B or X rather than their names being used so that other people do not recognise who we are observing should they know the child. Each setting is referred to in a general form such as primary school, pre-school and nursery. The information gathered is only accessible to the observer and in some cases the teacher or a high member of staff if something is noticed that is either of a concern or needs addressing. Also maintaining confidentiality is very important in a setting as it shows respect to people so then they can trust you so if they have any concerns then can come and tell you. But if a child is at risk confidentially may be broken if a practitioner thinks child protection should know. D1- The observations that I carried out show that child A struggles to recognise numbers and letters in general. This may be because they are a kinaesthetic learner and is more confident in absorbing information through practical methods rather than through visual methods. This suggests that child A needs more help with their numbers and writing so to help we could plan activities to help do these which are more appropriate to the child’s learning style and suggest at home they practise counting and writing to develop on this to get them up to the same or a similar level as the rest in their year. Also the observations show that child A is not yet confident about showing and talking to the rest of the class at show and tell, this may be because the child is very shy which could be because the child is not used to being at the school yet and doesn’t feel confident enough as they might still not know everyone and become shy because they  have never noticed or spoke to s ome of their peers. D2- the observations in E4 can help with planning to meet the child’s needs as from observing you can see the child’s interests and find the best way to help them reach the next level of development or ways to maintain a desirable behaviour. Doing observations also helps early years practioners learn more about the age group they are working with so then they will be able to plan activities to each individuals learning styles and individual needs. For example the child I observed in E4 is not very confident talking to the whole class at show and tell so from knowing that I would plan for them to do group work with friends at first then try and mix groups so she still has 2 friends with her so they can make new friends with the people in the class they haven’t spoken to, to try and gain confidence to talk to all other peer’s in the class. Also the child turned out to be a kinaesthetic learner so while planning I would make sure there are activities to just get on with and do so the child can do activities that are to their interest and learning style as well as trying things that are not their favourite learning style but my help them in some way. C- Confidentiality and objective observation are both subjects that are seen as important; this is because confidentiality is very important in teaching and for practioners to keep confidentiality which means they can only speak of things they have seen in the workplace to other members of the staff or supervisors if it is a concern, but no one else outside of the placement should be informed. By using confidentiality we are assuring the safety of the child and their family. Also we are able to make and keep a reputation for ourselves and the setting so we gain the trust of parents, guardians and the local community by protecting information and the children plus working to a child’s best interest. Each child and their family are diverse as they all have their own differences so if we include every child in an observation it shows to be unbiased. The issues which are essential to confidentiality are personal attitudes and values, sharing information, safe storage of information, working with parents, legal requirements and polices.

Patient Recording System Essay

The system supplies future data requirements of the Fire Service Emergency Cover (FSEC) project, Fire Control, fundamental research and development. Fire and Rescue Services (FRSs) will also be able to use this better quality data for their own purposes. The IRS will provide FRSs with a fully electronic data capture system for all incidents attended. All UK fire services will be using this system by 1 April 2009. Creation of a general-purpose medical record is one of the more difficult problems in database design. In the USA, most medical institutions have much more electronic information on a patient’s financial and insurance history than on the patient’s medical record. Financial information, like orthodox accounting information, is far easier to computerize and maintain, because the information is fairly standardized. Clinical information, by contrast, is extremely diverse. Signal and image data—X-Rays, ECGs, —requires much storage space, and is more challenging to manage. Mainstream relational database engines developed the ability to handle image data less than a decade ago, and the mainframe-style engines that run many medical database systems have lagged technologically. One well-known system has been written in assembly language for an obsolescent class of mainframes that IBM sells only to hospitals that have elected to purchase this system. CPRSs are designed to review clinical information that has been gathered through a variety of mechanisms, and to capture new information. From the perspective of review, which implies retrieval of captured data, CPRSs can retrieve data in two ways. They can show data on a single patient (specified through a patient ID) or they can be used to identify a set of patients (not known in advance) who happen to match particular demographic, diagnostic or clinical parameters. That is, retrieval can either be patient-centric or parameter-centric. Patient-centric retrieval is important for real time clinical decision support. â€Å"Real time† means that the response should be obtained within seconds (or a few minutes at the most), because the availability of current information may mean the difference between life and death. Parameter-centric retrieval, by contrast, involves processing large volumes of data: response time is not particularly critical, however, because the results are us ed for purposes like long-term planning or for research, as in retrospective studies. In general, on a single machine, it is possible to create a database design that performs either patient-centric retrieval or parameter-centric retrieval, but not both. The challenges are partly logistic and partly architectural. From the logistic viewpoint, in a system meant for real-time patient query, a giant parameter-centric query that processed half the records in the database would not be desirable because it would steal machine cycles from critical patient-centric queries. Many database operations, both business and medical, therefore periodically copy data from a â€Å"transaction† (patient-centric) database, which captures primary data, into a parameter-centric â€Å"query† database on a separate machine in order to get the best of both worlds. Some commercial patient record systems, such as the 3M Clinical Data Repository (CDR)[1] are composed of two subsystems, one that is transaction-oriented and one that is query-oriented. Patient-centric query is considered more critical for day-to-day operation, especially in smaller or non-research-oriented institutions. Many vendors therefore offer parameter-centric query facilities as an additional package separate from their base CPRS offering. We now discuss the architectural challenges, and consider why creating an institution-wide patient database poses significantly greater hurdles than creating one for a single department. During a routine check-up, a clinician goes through a standard checklist in terms of history, physical examination and laboratory investigations. When a patient has one or more symptoms suggesting illness, however, a whole series of questions are asked, and investigations performed (by a specialist if necessary), which would not be asked/performed if the patient did not have these symptoms. These are based on the suspected (or apparent) diagnosis/-es. Proformas (protocols) have been devised that simplify the patient’s workup for a general examination as well as many disease categories. The clinical parameters recorded in a given protocol have been worked out by experience over years or decades, though the types of questions asked, and the order in which they are asked, varies with the institution (or vendor package, if data capture is electronically assisted). The level of detail is often left to individual discretion: clinicians with a research interest in a particular condition will record more detail for that condition than clinicians who do not. A certain minimum set of facts must be gathered for a given condition, however, irrespective of personal or institutional preferences. The objective of a protocol is to maximize the likelihood of detection and recording of all significant findings in the limited time available. One records both positive findings as well as significant negatives (e.g., no history of alcoholism in a patient with cirrhosis). New protocols are continually evolving for emergent disease complexes such as AIDS. While protocols are typically printed out (both for the benefit of possibly inexperienced residents, and to form part of the permanent paper record), experienced clinicians often have them committed to memory. However, the difference between an average clinician and a superb one is that the latter knows when to depart from the protocol: if departure never occurred, new syndromes or disease complexes would never be discovered. In any case, the protocol is the starting point when we consider how to store information in a CPRS. This system, however, focuses on the processes by which data is stored and retrieved, rather than the ancillary functions provided by the system. The obvious approach for storing clinical data is to record each type of finding in a separate column in a table. In the simplest example of this, the so-called â€Å"flat-file† design, there is only a single value per parameter for a given patient encounter. Systems that capture standardised data related to a particular specialty (e.g., an obstetric examination, or a colonoscopy) often do this. This approach is simple for non-computer-experts to understand, and also easiest to analyse by statistics programs (which typically require flat files as input). A system that incorporates problem-specific clinical guidelines is easiest to implement with flat files, as the software engineering for data management is relatively minimal. In certain cases, an entire class of related parameters is placed in a group of columns in a separate table, with multiple sets of values. For example, laboratory information systems, which support labs that perform hundreds of kinds of tests, do not use one column for every test that is offered. Instead, for a given patient at a given instant in time, they store pairs of values consisting of a lab test ID and the value of the result for that test. Similarly for pharmacy orders, the values consist of a drug/medication ID, the preparation strength, the route, the frequency of administration, and so on. When one is likely to encounter repeated sets of values, one must generally use a more sophisticated approach to managing data, such as a relational database management system (RDBMS). Simple spreadsheet programs, by contrast, can manage flat files, though RDBMSs are also more than adequate for that purpose. The one-column-per-parameter approach, unfortunately, does not scale up when considering an institutional database that must manage data across dozens of departments, each with numerous protocols. (By contrast, the groups-of-columns approach scales well, as we shall discuss later.) The reasons for this are discussed below. One obvious problem is the sheer number of tables that must be managed. A given patient may, over time, have any combination of ailments that span specialities: cross-departmental referrals are common even for inpatient admission episodes. In most Western European countries where national-level medical records on patients go back over several decades, using such a database to answer the question, â€Å"tell me everything that has happened to this patient in forward/reverse chronological order† involves searching hundreds of protocol-specific tables, even though most patients may not have had more than a few ailments. Some clinical parameters (e.g., serum enzymes and electrolytes) are relevant to multiple specialities, and, with the one-protocol-per-table approach, they tend to be recorded redundantly in multiple tables. This violates a cardinal rule of database design: a single type of fact should be stored in a single place. If the same fact is stored in multiple places, cross-protocol analysis becomes needlessly difficult because all tables where that fact is recorded must be first tracked down. The number of tables keeps growing as new protocols are devised for emergent conditions, and the table structures must be altered if a protocol is modified in the light of medical advances. In a practical application, it is not enough merely to modify or add a table: one must alter the user interface to the tables– that is, the data-entry/browsing screens that present the protocol data. While some system maintenance is always necessary, endless redesign to keep pace with medical advances is tedious and undesirable. A simple alternative to creating hundreds of tables suggests itself. One might attempt to combine all facts applicable to a patient into a single row. Unfortunately, across all medical specialities, the number of possible types of facts runs into the hundreds of thousands. Today’s database engines permit a maximum of 256 to 1024 columns per table, and one would require hundreds of tables to allow for every possible type of fact. Further, medical data is time-stamped, i.e., the start time (and, in some cases, the end time) of patient events is important to record for the purposes of both diagnosis and management. Several facts about a patient may have a common time-stamp, e.g., serum chemistry or haematology panels, where several tests are done at a time by automated equipment, all results being stamped with the time when the patient’s blood was drawn. Even if databases did allow a potentially infinite number of columns, there would be considerable wastage of disk space, because the vast majority of columns would be inapplicable (null) for a single patient event. (Even null values use up a modest amount of space per null fact.) Some columns would be inapplicable to particular types of patients–e.g., gyn/obs facts would not apply to males. The challenges to representing institutional patient data arise from the fact that clinical data is both highly heterogeneous as well as sparse. The design solution that deals with these problems is called the entity-attribute-value (EAV) model. In this design, the parameters (attribute is a synonym of parameter) are treated as data recorded in an attribute definitions table, so that addition of new types of facts does not require database restructuring by addition of columns. Instead, more rows are added to this table. The patient data table (the EAV table) records an entity (a combination of the patient ID, clinical event, and one or more date/time stamps recording when the events recorded actually occurred), the attribute/parameter, and the associated value of that attribute. Each row of such a table stores a single fact about a patient at a particular instant in time. For example, a patient’s laboratory value may be stored as: (, 12/2/96>, serum_potassium, 4.1). Only positive or significant negative findings are recorded; nulls are not stored. Therefore, despite the extra space taken up by repetition of the entity and attribute columns for every row, the space is taken up is actually less than with a â€Å"conventional† design. Attribute-value pairs themselves are used in non-medical areas to manage extremely heterogeneous data, e.g., in Web â€Å"cookies† (text files written by a Web server to a user’s local machine when the site is being browsed), and the Microsoft Windows registries. The first major use of EAV for clinical data was in the pioneering HELP system built at LDS Hospital in Utah starting from the late 70s.[6],[7],[8] HELP originally stored all data – characters, numbers and dates– as ASCII text in a pre-relational database (ASCII, for American Standard Code for Information Interchange, is the code used by computer hardware almost universally to represent characters. The range of 256 characters is adequate to represent the character set of most European languages, but not ideographic languages such as Mandarin Chinese.) The modern version of HELP, as well as the 3M CDR, which is a commercialisation of HELP, uses a relational engine. A team at Columbia University was the first to enhance EAV design to use relational database technology. The Columbia-Presbyterian CDR,[9],[10] also separated numbers from text in separate columns. The advantage of storing numeric data as numbers instead of ASCII is that one can create useful indexes on these numbers. (Indexes are a feature of database technology that allow fast search for particular values in a table, e.g., laboratory parameters within or beyond a particular range.). When numbers are stored as ASCII text, an index on such data is useless: the text â€Å"12.5† is greater than â€Å"11000†, because it comes later in alphabetical order.) Some EAV databases therefore segregate data by data type. That is, there are separate EAV tables for short text, long text (e.g., discharge summaries), numbers, dates, and binary data (signal and image data). For every parameter, the system records its data type so that one knows where it is stored. ACT/DB,[11],[12] a sys tem for management of clinical trials data (which shares many features with CDRs) created at Yale University by a team led by this author, uses this approach. From the conceptual viewpoint (i.e., ignoring data type issues), one may therefore think of a single giant EAV table for patient data, containing one row per fact for a patient at a particular date and time. To answer the question â€Å"tell me everything that has happened to patient X†, one simply gathers all rows for this patient ID (this is a fast operation because the patient ID column is indexed), sorts them by the date/time column, and then presents this information after â€Å"joining† to the Attribute definitions table. The last operation ensures that attributes are presented to the user in ordinary language – e.g., â€Å"haemoglobin,† instead of as cryptic numerical IDs. One should mention that EAV database design has been employed primarily in medical databases because of the sheer heterogeneity of patient data. One hardly ever encounters it in â€Å"business† databases, though these will often use a restricted form of EAV termed â€Å"row modelling.† Examples of row modelling are the tables of laboratory test result and pharmacy orders, discussed earlier. Note also that most production â€Å"EAV† databases will always contain components that are designed conventionally. EAV representation is suitable only for data that is sparse and highly variable. Certain kinds of data, such as patient demographics (name, sex, birth date, address, etc.) is standardized and recorded on all patients, and therefore there is no advantage in storing it in EAV form. EAV is primarily a means of simplifying the physical schema of a database, to be used when simplification is beneficial. However, the users conceptualisethe data as being segregated into protocol-specific tables and columns. Further, external programs used for graphical presentation or data analysis always expect to receive data as one column per attribute. The conceptual schema of a database reflects the users’ perception of the data. Because it implicitly captures a significant part of the semantics of the domain being modelled, the conceptual schema is domain-specific. A user-friendly EAV system completely conceals its EAV nature from its end-users: its interface confirms to the conceptual schema and creates the illusion of conventional data organisation. From the software perspective, this implies on-the-fly transformation of EAV data into conventional structure for presentation in forms, reports or data extracts that are passed to an analytic program. Conversely, changes to data by end-users through forms must be translated back into EAV form before they are saved. To achieve this sleight-of-hand, an EAV system records the conceptual schema through metadata – â€Å"dictionary† tables whose contents describe the rest of the system. While metadata is important for any database, it is critical for an EAV system, which can seldom function without it. ACT/DB, for example, uses metadata such as the grouping of parameters into forms, their presentation to the user in a particular order, and validation checks on each parameter during data entry to automatically generate web-based data entry. The metadata architecture and the various data entry features that are supported through automatic generation are described elsewhere.[13] EAV is not a panacea. The simplicity and compactness of EAV representation is offset by a potential performance penalty compared to the equivalent conventional design. For example, the simple AND, OR and NOT operations on conventional data must be translated into the significantly less efficient set operations of Intersection, Union and Difference respectively. For queries that process potentially large amounts of data across thousands of patients, the impact may be felt in terms of increased time taken to process queries. A quantitative benchmarking study performed by the Yale group with microbiology data modelled both conventionally and in EAV form indicated that parameter-centric queries on EAV data ran anywhere from 2-12 times as slow as queries on equivalent conventional data.[14] Patient-centric queries, on the other hand, run at the same speed or even faster with EAV schemas, if the data is highly heterogeneous. We have discussed the reason for the latter. A more practical problem with parameter-centric query is that the standard user-friendly tools (such as Microsoft Access’s Visual Query-by-Example) that are used to query conventional data do not help very much for EAV data, because the physical and conceptual schemas are completely different. Complicating the issue further is that some tables in a production database are conventionally designed. Special query interfaces need to be built for such purposes. The general approach is to use metadata that knows whether a particular attribute has been stored conventionally or in EAV form: a program consults this metadata, and generates the appropriate query code in response to a user’s query. A query interface built with this approach for the ACT/DB system[12]; this is currently being ported to the Web. So far, we have discussed how EAV systems can create the illusion of conventional data organization through the use of protocol-specific forms. However, the problem of how to record information that is not in a protocol–e.g., a clinician’s impressions–has not been addressed. One way to tackle this is to create a â€Å"general-purpose† form that allows the data entry person to pick attributes (by keyword search, etc.) from the thousands of attributes within the system, and then supply the values for each. (Because the user must directly add attribute-value pairs, this form reveals the EAV nature of the system.) In practice, however, this process, which would take several seconds to half a minute to locate an individual attribute, would be far too tedious for use by a clinician. Therefore, clinical patient record systems also allow the storage of â€Å"free text† – narrative in the doctor’s own words. Such text, which is of arbitrary size, may be entered in various ways. In the past, the clinician had to compose a note comprising such text in its entirety. Today, however, â€Å"template† programs can often provide structured data entry for particular domains (such as chest X-ray interpretations). These programs will generate narrative text, including boilerplate for findings that were normal, and can greatly reduce the clinician’s workload. Many of these programs use speech recognition software, thereby improving throughput even further. Once the narrative has been recorded, it is desirable to encode the facts captured in the narrative in terms of the attributes defined within the system. (Among these attributes may be concepts derived from controlled vocabularies such as SNOMED, used by Pathologists, or ICD-9, used for disease classification by epidemiologists as well as for billing records.) The advantage of encoding is that subsequent analysis of the data becomes much simpler, because one can use a single code to record the multiple synonymous forms of a concept as encountered in narrative, e.g., hepatic/liver, kidney/renal, vomiting/emesis and so on. In many medical institutions, there are non-medical personnel who are trained to scan narrative dictated by a clinician, and identify concepts from one or more controlled vocabularies by looking up keywords. This process is extremely human intensive, and there is ongoing informatics research focused on automating part of the process. Currently, it appears that a computer program cannot replace the human component entirely. This is because certain terms can match more than one concept. For example, â€Å"anaesthesia† refers to a procedure ancillary to surgery, or to a clinical finding of loss of sensation. Disambiguation requires some degree of domain knowledge as well as knowledge of the context where the phrase was encountered. The processing of narrative text is a computer-science speciality in its own right, and a preceding article[15] has discussed it in depth. Medical knowledge-based consultation programs (â€Å"expert systems†) have always been an active area of medical informatics research, and a few of these, e.g., QMR[16],[17] have attained production-level status. A drawback of many of these programs is that they are designed to be stand-alone. While useful for assisting diagnosis or management, they have the drawback that information that may already be in the patient’s electronic record must be re-entered through a dialog between the program and the clinician. In the context of a hospital, it is desirable to implement embeddedknowledge-based systems that can act on patient data as it is being recorded or generated, rather than after the fact (when it is often too late). Such a program might, for example, detect potentially dangerous drug interactions based on a particular patient’s prescription that had just been recorded in the pharmacy component of the CPRS. Alternatively, a program might send an alert (by pager) to a clinician if a particular patient’s monitored clinical parameters deteriorated severely. The units of program code that operate on incoming patient data in real-time are called medical logic modules (MLMs), because they are used to express medical decision logic. While one could theoretically use any programming language (combined with a database access language) to express this logic, portability is an important issue: if you have spent much effort creating an MLM, you would like to share it with others. Ideally, others would not have to rewrite your MLM to run on their system, but could install and use it directly. Standardization is therefore desirable. In 1994, several CPRS researchers proposed a standard MLM language called the Arden syntax.[18],[19],[20] Arden resembles BASIC (it is designed to be easy to learn), but has several functions that are useful to express medical logic, such as the concepts of the earliest and the latest patient events. One must first implement an Arden interpreter or compiler for a particular CPRS, and then write Arden modules that will be triggered after certain events. The Arden code is translated into specific database operations on the CPRS that retrieve the appropriate patient data items, and operations implementing the logic and decision based on that data. As with any programming language, interpreter implementation is not a simple task, but it has been done for the Columbia-Presbyterian and HELP CDRs: two of the informaticians responsible for defining Arden, Profs. George Hripcsak and T. Allan Pryor, are also lead developers for these respective systems. To assist Arden implementers, the specification of version 2 of Arden, which is now a standard supported by HL7, is available on-line.[20] Arden-style MLMs, which are essentially â€Å"if-then-else† rules, are not the only way to implement embedded decision logic. In certain situations, there are sometimes more efficient ways of achieving the desired result. For example, to detect drug interactions in a pharmacy order, a program can generate all possible pairs of drugs from the list of prescribed drugs in a particular pharmacy order, and perform database lookups in a table of known interactions, where information is typically stored against a pair of drugs. (The table of interactions is typically obtained from sources such as First Data Bank.) This is a much more efficient (and more maintainable) solution than sequentially evaluating a large list of rules embodied in multiple MLMs. Nonetheless, appropriately designed MLMs can be an important part of the CPRS, and Arden deserves to become more widespread in commercial CPRSs. Its currently limited support in such systems is more due to the significant implementation effort than to any flaw in the concept of MLMs. Patient management software in a hospital is typically acquired from more than one vendor: many vendors specialize in niche markets such as picture archiving systems or laboratory information systems. The patient record is therefore often distributed across several components, and it is essential that these components be able to inter-operate with each other. Also, for various reasons, an institution may choose to switch vendors, and it is desirable that migration of existing data to another system be as painless as possible. Data exchange/migration is facilitated by standardization of data interchange between systems created by different vendors, as well as the metadata that supports system operation. Significant progress has been made on the former front. The standard formats used for the exchange of image data and non-image medical data are DICOM (Digital Imaging and Communications in Medicine) and HL-7 (Health Level 7) respectively. For example, all vendors who market digital radiography, CT or MRI devices are supposed to be able to support DICOM, irrespective of what data format their programs use internally. HL-7 is a hierarchical format that is based on a language specification syntax called ASN.1 (ASN=Abstract Syntax Notation), a standard originally created for exchange of data between libraries. HL-7’s specification is quite complex, and HL-7 is intended for computers rather than humans, to whom it can be quite cryptic. There is a move to wrap HL-7 within (or replace it with) an equivalent dialect of the more human-understandable XML (eXtended Markup Language), which has rapidly gained prominence as a data interchange standard in E-commerce and other areas. XML also has the advantage that there are a very large number of third-party XML tools available: for a vendor just entering the medical field, an interchange standard based on XML would be considerably easier to implement. CPRSs pose formidable informatics challenges, all of which have not been fully solved: many solutions devised by researchers are not always successful when implemented in production systems. An issue for further discussion is security and confidentiality of patient records. In countries such as the US where health insurers and employers can arbitrarily reject individuals with particular illnesses as posing too high a risk to be profitably insured or employed, it is important that patient information should not fall in the wrong hands. Much also depends on the code of honour of the individual clinician who is authorised to look at patient data. In their book, â€Å"Freedom at Midnight,† authors Larry Collins and Dominic Lapierre cite the example of Mohammed Ali Jinnah’s anonymous physician (supposedly Rustom Jal Vakil) who had discovered that his patient was dying of lung cancer. Had Nehru and others come to know this, they might have prolonged the partition discussions indefinitely. Because Dr. Vakil respected his patient’s confidentiality, however, world history was changed.