School Work Sample

To give some of you an idea of what I’m currently studying, here is the work I still need to do for my two classes this week:

Corrections and Penology–Due Sunday, October 17th, 2010

• Answer discussion question #1…post and reply to others: “Discuss whether incarceration pays. If so, to whom?”
• Answer discussion question (essay-like) #2…post and reply to others: “Discuss what role, if any, should private prisons play in the future of incarceration in the United States? Should there by limitations to the usage of private prisons? Should only the government run and operate prisons? Why or why not? (In other words, discuss the pros and cons of private and government prisons). If you you were incarcerated and had a choice, which prisons would you choose – government or privately operated? If you were a new prison inmate, how would the classification process be important to you, if it was? How would you like to be treated by the system?”
• Quiz #4

Crime and Place–Due Thursday, October 21st, 2010

Module 3:

• Read Chapters 4 and 5
• Answer discussion question…post and reply to others: “Select one (and only one) of the following three questions and respond to it:1. What was the Chicago Area Project and what important lessons can we learn from it?
  2. What is the relationship between social disorganization (theory) and community policing?
  3. What are the primary elements of CPTED, and what is some concrete evidence that it can be an effective prevention technique?  (You may have evidence from your own experience as well.)”
• Complete written assignment: “Choose one of the following options and write approximately 2 pages (double-spaced) discussing the linkages between the one you choose and the information in the text.1) Ride along with a police officer. (Many agencies permit citizens to sign a waiver and accompany officers on patrol.  Call your local sheriff’s office or police department and see if they participate.) Talk to him/her about community policing issues, police problem solving, and other community building and crime prevention issues.

  2) Choose a place you are familiar with, such as your home (house, dorm or apartment), your workplace, or somewhere you spend recreational time
  regularly (mall). CAREFULLY evaluate the location, using CPTED guidelines, found at http://cptedsecurity.com/cpted_design_guidelines.htm  Write out your evaluation of each element. In so doing, respond to the following:

  1. How does my location (apartment, workplace, etc.) compare regarding CPTED techniques for this land use? In responding, BE SPECIFIC. Look at features such as territorial reinforcement, access control, target hardening, etc.

  2. What might be done to improve my setting?

  3. Are there any liability concerns that seem apparent?”

• Quiz #3

Module 4:

• Read Chapter 6
• Answer discussion question…post and reply to others: “Select one (and only one) of the following four questions and respond to it:1.  What is ‘smart’ policing, and how does it relate to crime analysis?
  2.  Discuss hot spots and how law enforcement can benefit through understanding the temporal and spatial dimensions of hot spots.
  3.  Evaluate crime analysis as a career option.
  4.  What is the SARA model, and why is it effective as a problem solving technique?”
• Complete written assignment: “Technology, data, and privacy:  how far is too far?Closely related to crime analysis (particularly the gathering and entry of data) and intelligence analysis, are the concepts of GIS tracking of offenders, computer and camera-assisted enforcement, and surveillance of citizens (some of which have controversial elements).  View the video at this link (78 minutes long) and write a 1 – 2 page evaluation of it.  In doing so, please consider covering the following:  http://www.fmgondemand.com.ezproxy.lib.ucf.edu/play/NPPHGK

  Evaluate the argument that you shouldn’t have to be concerned about the government monitoring aspects of your personal life if you are not doing anything wrong (why should I worry if I have nothing to hide?).

  As the government relies more and more on intelligence analysis, what ethical responsibility does it have regarding the origin of the intelligence it analyzes?”

• Quiz #4

Exam #2 opens on Friday, October 22, 2010.

I hope that gives everyone a better idea of what I’m learning and why my time is very limited during the college terms.  In addition to this I have my children to take care of (thank goodness they go to school!)…dropping them off, picking them up, making sure they do what they are supposed to (homework, brush their teeth, go to bed, eat, etc.); household responsibilities (grocery shopping, cooking, laundry, finances…it’s luck if I’m able to do much cleaning, but I throw that in every once in a while, too); volunteering (twice a week at the elementary school); and more…

Anyone else in school?  What are you studying?

That’s It…

…summer is now officially over.  School starts bright and early tomorrow morning for my sons and me.  Well actually my classes start at 12am, but I’ll be going to bed so I can wake up on time to get my boys up to go to school.

My 11-year-old (son #1) will be going to middle school for the first time.  I think 7th grade is a bit scarier for me than it is for him!

My 8-year-old (son #2) is going into the 3rd grade and has a wonderful teacher!  I can’t wait to bring him to class tomorrow!

The unfortunate part is that there is such a time difference between the two schools even though they are right next door to each other.  The middle school starts at 7:30am and gets out at 2:15pm…the elementary school starts at 9:00am and gets out at 3:15pm.

There goes my day!  I’ll be dropping off and picking up all day!  Or at least it will feel that way!  When will I fit my nap in????

Also poor son #2 needs to get up super early just so we can drop off son #1 to school on time.  Though I’m not waking him up too early, just enough to get up, get dressed, and get in the car.  The rest can wait until we get back, then he can finish getting ready, have breakfast, etc. before it’s time to drop him off at school.

Another thing I’m dealing with now that school is starting is the huge amount of bread loaves we go through due to school lunches.  I’m tired of finding myself out of bread when it’s too late or inconvenient to go pick more up at the store!  So I decided to buy some of the frozen bread loaves to keep in the freezer and make my own whenever we run out.  Except they apparently don’t sell them anymore!  UGH!

I could make them myself by using my KitchenAid to mix up the dough, then bake them in the oven.  But with how busy we are going to be and the amount of bread I’ll probably have to make, I’ll probably forget to make it on purpose because it’s such a hassle!  So it seems I’ll have to buy a bread machine after all!  I’ll be buying bread until I find the one I want, then it’s fresh bread for the remainder of the school year!

I hope everyone has a great beginning of the school year…whether it’s elementary school, college, or something in between!

Random Updates

I wanted to update some of my summer plans now that I only have 2 1/2 weeks left before school starts back up.

In June, I said I wanted to complete some tasks during my time off….you can see the post here.  Well, I haven’t done a whole lot of them, but here are the results so far:

• Finish entry floor –  Completed
  
• Finish painting the entry walls  –  I’ll be completing this in the next couple of days
  
• Finish making hanging coat rack for entry  –  Hoping to get this done this weekend
  
• Finish the main area of the kitchen floor  –  Feels like a hopeless case!  Still waiting for hubby to fill in cracked and uneven areas with liquid concrete…I may give up and do it myself!
  
• Finish painting the kitchen walls  –  This is what I’ll be working on after the entry walls…hopefully in the next week
  
• Finish painting the hallway walls –  Completed
  
• Finish spray painting the outlet covers –  Completed the ones I’ve removed
  
• Write out at least one book outline  –  Put this off…still thinking about it
  
• Work on book already outlined  –  Put this off…not sure I want to continue with the book or change it up
  
• RELAX…take breaks with the boys, take mini vacations with the family –  I’ve done a whole lot of this!  And we took a mini-vacation to Ft. Walton Beach/Destin!  You can see some pictures here.

In addition to this I also said in June that I was going to try to not do a big grocery shopping and use up everything.  This did not include quick trips to the grocery store to buy produce, milk, or very good deals we stock up on.  While I still have some of that food left, there is too much I need now to keep on considering my next shopping trip a “quick trip”.  I’ll be spending significantly more so it’s a regular big grocery shopping trip.  You can find my original post here.

Other than all that there’s not much more going on.  I got my school volunteer badge renewed.  The first one was for three years and the new one is for five years.  So I won’t have to renew again until my boys are finished with the 11th and 7th grades.  That really puts things into perspective!  Their only going into the 7th and 3rd grades now!  Yikes!

What has everyone else been up to this summer?

What a Hectic Week!

And it’s not even done yet!  UGH!  I didn’t even have time to make a weekly meal plan this week!  It’s made dinners a little harder, but we’ve been managing so far.  I really must get back on track next week for sure.

The reason for this hectic week–it was the last few days of school for my boys.  It feels like it has been non-stop and yet it has only been one full day and two half days!  Unbelievable!

Monday I just dropped them off for the day and went home.  My oldest, P, was having a party in his classroom, and the youngest, N, was going to be watching movies and cleaning out their supplies/desks.  I ended up doing laundry, some of my own school work, and finding some items online we needed to get.  I ordered N the dresser/wardrobe that I wrote about earlier.  It should be here by the end of this week.  I also found P the baritone mouthpiece he’ll need for band next school year.

The light for the kitchen was a little harder to find, but I did find a few choices that I liked.  My husband, C, and I looked over the choices and finally picked one out.  It will replace the light in our kitchen that goes over our dining room table (which I still need a new one of those, too), since the light fixture there has some sort of electrical issue…oh and it’s ugly!

Tuesday was a half day and we all went in.  I helped out in the media center for about an hour before heading to N’s class for a party.  N gave his teacher a going away gift and card before the other parents got there.  The kids read us some stories they wrote using The Three Little Pigs, but changing the animals.  N called his The Three Little Penguins with a polar bear coming to knock down their houses made of water, snow, and ice.  All the kids were so creative!

We then watched a video of photographs from the year set to music and put together by the teacher.  She made a copy for all of us, too!

The kids got awards next.  N got a Certificate of Completion for earning 77 points in the reading counts program and an Honor Roll certificate for all A/B honor roll for the 4th quarter.  He was promoted to 3rd grade with high honors (all A average for the year)!  We had pizza for lunch, collected the last of his items, and left for P’s class.

We showed up at P’s class right before they were going to hand out awards.  But first I gave both his teachers their gifts and cards.  It’s bittersweet for us because they have been P’s teachers for the last 3 years (they teacher share)!  They’ve watched him grow up from 4th through 6th grade and we’ll really miss them both a lot!  At the same time we are excited for P to move on to the middle school.  I put a picture of P from 4th grade in each of their cards, which was a big difference than what he looks like now.

For awards, P got an Honor Roll certificate for all A/B honor roll for the 4th quarter, and a Promotion with Honors certificate (all A/B average for the year).  They also gave us a video of photos set to music.  P will be going into the 7th grade next year and with that my boys will never be in the same school at the same time again.  By the time N gets to the middle school, P will be in 11th grade at the high school.  P will be in college when N gets to the high school.  How sad!

Before leaving for the day, we went to visit P’s Kindergarten teacher.  We usually visit with her at the beginning of every school year, but she’ll be leaving the school for another job next year.  We also have her a card and gift.  This time I put a picture of him in Kindergarten in her card.  I’m sure we’ll still be seeing her from time to time, though not to the same extent as before.

On Wednesday, the boys hung out in their classrooms watching movies.  I helped out in the media center with the last amounts of inventory that was left over.  I should be back there to help for at least one more year starting in August.

So now I have the rest of the week left, but I still have school going until June 25th!  Today through Sunday will be filled with school work!  For my Sociology of Law class I have a 6-8 page paper to write that is due on Monday.  For my Victims and the Criminal Justice System class I have several assignments and a quiz to take before Sunday.

It should be a busy few days, but at least I can sleep in!

Sick Child and Painting

My 11-year-old is sick again.  He has childhood asthma so every time he gets a cold, it gets into his lungs and makes him wheeze.  I sent him to school on Tuesday because it was just beginning, by Wednesday it was full-blown wheezing and fever, and today (Thursday) there’s no fever, but the wheezing is still there plus he’s worn out.  So today will be the second day home for him.  I expect he’ll be back to school by tomorrow (Friday) though not completely better so no physical activity for him.

This is something we’ve been dealing with practically since he was born.  What he is going through now is really minor and easily managed than what he had to go through when he was younger.  In the past it was so bad that the Albuterol and nebulizer would barely work to ease his breathing, he refused to take the steroid medication, and he was in the hospital frequently.  Once we barely got him out in time for Christmas!

Being older now helps a lot!  He rarely needs the nebulizer anymore and never needs the Albuterol.  Also, it doesn’t last for weeks as it did when he was younger.  Usually it’ll last a few days at most, then he’ll get over it as quickly as it came on.  Thank goodness for growing out of it!

Because he’s having trouble breathing though, I’m unable to do any more painting until probably next week.  I don’t want the paint fumes to bother his already weak lungs.  The middle of next week will be soon enough to paint my walls again.  Hopefully, I’ll be able to get a bunch done so I’ll at least have a couple of rooms complete.  I’d love to finish up the foyer, hallway, and kitchen, then save the rest of the great room until after my summer classes are finished.

I guess I’ll just have to relax myself for a few days!

10 Days Left!

There are only 10 days left to vote for Belle Terre Elementary in VerdeGo’s Victory Garden Contest!  We are behind by over 700 votes!  While our school appears to not need these plants to beautify the landscape, the picture shown for the contest is deceiving!  We have large areas with dirt and very little grass on much of the school grounds that could use the landscaping given away by this contest.

Voting is allowed once per day, per IP address!

This means that even if there are 3 computers in one household, only 1 may vote each day.

So we need your help!

For the next 10 days, please click the link above and vote for Belle Terre Elementary!  It is the first school on the list.

Pass the word on to others so they may also vote for us!

Voting ends on March 26, 2010!  Please make sure to vote daily!

Thank you!

Sick Boy

We have a sick boy at home today.  Our 11-year-old suddenly didn’t feel well and Junior Motrin didn’t seem to be working very well.

His fever spiked to 103.4!

We finally were able to get some Tylenol to rotate with the Motrin.  With the meds and some cooling measures (ceiling fan, ice pack, and wet, cool facecloth), his temperature finally came down to the low-grade fever range.

He has childhood asthma, where every time he gets a cold it gets into his lungs causing him to cough and wheeze.  Luckily, he is growing out of it and episodes like this one are gone through within a day or two.  When he was younger, it took a week or more and usually required albuteral in the nebulizer at the very least, and a hospital stay during the worst episodes.

His wheezing and coughing were minor this time around and with his fever almost gone now, hopefully he will be able to go back to school tomorrow. *Crossing fingers*

UPDATE: Looks like he won’t be going back to school tomorrow.  Temp not as high as it was, but he went back into the 101- 102 range tonight. *sigh*