Thursday, November 28, 2019

Relative Roles of State and Ngos in Community Development with Respect to Housing as Service Delivery Essay Example

Relative Roles of State and Ngos in Community Development with Respect to Housing as Service Delivery Essay What are the developments options the state and the Non-governmental organisations have performed for the Peddie Extension area with regard to the housing delivery. Aims and Objectives of the study: Two aims and objectives have been identified for this study, namely to: * assess whether the stakeholders from the community are satisfied with the housing delivery process and how they have benefitted from the process. * Understand, and analyse the roles played by the state in housing delivery and Non-governmental organisations in service delivery for the rural poor in Peddie Extension.When a state attempts to employ strategies to reduce poverty, to provide necessary service delivery, to involve the poor in their communities in development decision making and resource allocation, it is probable to find its normal and suggested mechanisms inadequate. Additionally when the state endavours to develop the communities by providing with economic policy, basic services and infrastructure, but i s rarely targeted toward rural areas and people. Within the context, more is being asked whether the contribution of voluntarily sector to development provides more emphasis on poverty reduction, a community and participatory development.As the state endavours to develop communities, the social, economic and political environment created an operational environment for the NGOs. Literature on Non-governmental organizations indicates that NGOs have played a major role in an attempt to secure the protection of human rights nationally and internationally. Chakawarika (2011) argues that, the existence of NGOs is proving to be a necessity rather than a luxury in societies throughout the modern world. It is evident that in many developing countries, the role of NGOs has evolved in response to the market gaps left by the government (Gaist: 2009).Impelled by the inadequacies of the state and the market, citizens across the globe have developed NGOs to deal with a diversity of social needs. C onsequently, it could be argued that NGOs are increasingly identified as crucial role-players in community and people-centred development. Gaist (2009) indicates that the NGOs have frequently been regarded as very important for democracy since they have a strong support at grassroots level and their ability to develop and empower poor communities. This is a well-needed attribute in Zimbabwe as most of the communities are beyond being poor.Nzimakwe (2002) also supported this nature of NGOs saying they are enormously vital mechanisms in rural development as they benefit from the goodwill and reception of the community, consequently the NGOs have become very crucial players in the field of social development. There are other researchers who have conceptualized development such as Manuel Castells who was a sociologist who has theorised about the information age. His emphasis on development is mainly on the economic, political and cultural aspects.His major claim relevant to this study i s that, because of the rise of the information age, individual states are no longer able to do what is needed to develop the citizens of their individual countries. He is therefore very pessimistic about the role of the state as agent for development. 2. THE BACKGROUND OF THE STUDY The issue of service delivery in Eastern Cape has become the point of interest in the past few years in South Africa. The Bill of Rights embodied in the South African Constitution (Act No. 108 of 1996) (RSA, 1996) states in section 24 that: ‘Everyone has the right to have adequate housing’.Consequently authorities are increasingly confronted with challenges to increase the delivery of houses to citizens. Scholars (Irurah and Boshoff, 2003) argue that, the delivery has not been followed through in implementation in various sectors of the economy. It is essential that these challenges be addressed by making use of correct implementation knowledge, proper analysis and evaluation policies of hous ing delivery. There is no public service can be rendered without suitable governing and administrative arrangements.Millions of historically disadvantaged South Africans, however, still live in rural communities or informal settlements that lack basic shelter and other services (Lawson, 1991). The Eastern Cape housing department provides the legislative and constitutional mandate to provide houses to the poor rural citizens of this province. It stands to reason that, citizens of this province would have access to decent and adequate houses. Rendering of housing services by government has resulted in uncompleted and defective houses due to inexperienced contractors providing poor workmanship and corruption in the housing programmes.Consequently, the state interventions of attempting to provide basic service delivery such as housing delivery in rural areas have been largely ineffective. Castell (2000:92) argues that some obstacles for development come from government bureaucracies. Ho wever, the latter, is only possible when the government policies are haphazard and an approach to community development is uncoordinated. Thus far, there are comprehensive national housing policies to really guide developments.After 1994 the ANC-led government embarked on housing delivery programme to rectify the past imbalances and this hampers the provision of housing in post-Apartheid South Africa. This provision enhanced human settlement development nationally, provincially and locally to meet the needs of South African citizens. These include, among others, expressing housing policies, confirming adequate access to relevant information so that citizens and civil society can mobilise around housing rights, and ongoing monitoring and evaluation of housing progress and implementation (â€Å"Expanding Socio-Economic Rights and Access to Housing, 29 October 2003, p. ). African communities from urban areas benefited from housing delivery as they were entitled to have title deeds of the houses they lived in and some have their houses built. In contrast, black rural communities were not part of the planning and development decisions that affect the quality of their lives as a result, the state did not build houses for people from rural areas. Consequently, the government has been criticised by many dissatisfied South Africans, politicians and the media. Some criticisms were mainly from the media highlighting the corruption, mismanagement with regard to community projects as well as poor service delivery.According to the state which remains as the major protectors and abusers of human rights, NGOs have materialised as central players in the promotion of human rights around the world. Varona (2006) further argue that, citizens felt that there is a need for organising NGOs to develop alternative strategies and acquire new skills and capabilities in order to facilitate this access to housing, serviced land and basic services as lately, for informal settlements to ge t the attention of government in their bid for housing and land tenure, a presentation of concrete development plans, studies and options for housing development is needed.A year after 2006 local government elections, the Minister of Safety and Security reported some 5085 protests against unskilled and corrupt local government nationwide (Robert, 2007: 14). It stands to reason that, there is an escalation of corruption and squandering of resources by government officials and of which result on poor service delivery. In Philippines for instance Varona (2006) argue that inefficient government housing programs has aggravated and made poor communities lose confidence in an ability of the government to provide for basic services like housing and serviced land.Marie Huchzermeyer (2003) points out that, it is the lack of formal rights that allows for exploitation by politicians, by irresponsible or even repressive bureaucracies, and by informally operating groups or individuals in the cont rol over land, access to services, commercial activities, etc. Some researchers indicate that black rural communities have been excluded from participating in the conceptualisation process, planning and development decisions that affect the quality of their lives.Miraftab (2003) advocates that critics point out that viewed in this way, community participation may indeed ameliorate communities’ immediate problems but seldom then continues beyond the life of the specific projects and does not result in any greater community influence in decision making. As a result of that, the rural communities do not actively participate in local governance. 3. THE PROBLEM STATEMENT The purpose of this study is to show that the state has not been performing or has performed poorly in its role as provider of houses in the rural areas of Ngqushwa Local Municipality in Peddie Extension.Therefore, rural citizens are left with no other option than to make use of alternative building, their houses built with mud of which are sometimes not safe and secure. The absence of the decent houses has the risk involve to citizens namely, catching cold and storms outbreak. This problem is predominant in the remote rural areas. In some areas foundations of houses have been laid or walls are built for almost years but no roofs, windows or doors. But there are elected politicians, NGO officials and appointed officials who are supposed to be role-players for the benefit of the citizens.Theirs is to play the role of local government in terms of community development and service delivery as mandated by the constitution. They need to be able to deal with the challenges confronting the local government with regard to service delivery. It stands to reason that, community involvement in decision making is vital during planning. If community participation is neglected or limited then planning and delivery will experience implementation problem.Other problem that has been identified with regard to officials is a lack of understanding of the service delivery processes as well as lack in capability to administrative work. It is thus clear that there is a fundamental problem of rendering service delivery in Peddie Extenstion by incompetent local and non-government officials who do not play their essential roles in satisfying the demand for rural community development. It is thus evident that the municipal officials hamper the implementation processes of the housing delivery provided by the state policies.Consequently they fail to satisfy the demand for the sustainable housing service. 4. RESEARCH QUESTION What are the community development programmess the state and Non-governmental organisations have implemented for the Peddie Extension with regard to the housing delivery service? 5. AIMS AND OBJECTIVES OF THE STUDY * To assess whether the community members from the Peddie Extension are satisfied with the housing delivery process and how they have benefitted from the process. Un derstand, and analyse the roles played by the state and Non-governmental organisations in housing delivery for the rural poor in Peddie Extension. 6. LIMITATION OF THE STUDY The study will be limited to the Ngqushwa area particularly in Peddie Extension. The intention is to look at community with rural geographical location. Participants in this study will be voluntary. Thus, factors that may limit this study may include access to information, time, travelling funds, unwillingness of participant and insufficient literature on the specific study. 7. THE LITERATURE OF THE STUDYService delivery programmes played an important role in the development of South Africa. The housing sector this is particularly significant as the delivery of housing to low-income communities has been one of the key programmes of the South African government since 1994 (Irurah and Boshoff, 2003). Housing delivery in Eastern Cape in particular which is mostly rural, is forced by a various challenging issues. Pr imarily the Apartheid government has focused only to the white people, the African people in rural areas were almost forgotten, hence the backlog.As a result, this backlog and other challenges overlapped into the present state. Castells (1996) also wishes to demonstrate the role of information technology in transforming the whole economic, social and cultural environment of our times. Researchers such as (Cassier and Kesteloot, 2012) stress that in an information society, there are increasing inequalities that bring about intensifying processes of economic globalisation, capital and labour flexibility and welfare restructuring. Information society, however, is empowered by capital rules in financial form.It stands to reason that the information age comprises of unevenness of development, of the new inequalities and deprivations. Castells claims a new society has risen as a result of the information technology revolution, the economic crisis of capitalism and statism (communism) and the blooming of new social movements like environmentalism and feminism. He argues that more of the worldwide communication is happening through the electronic media, like social networks, electronic mails, cellular phone and so forth.And this network society is global, it is based on global networks and it manifests itself in many forms of production systems and new culture. Castells indicates that, together these three processes are causing a new social structure ‘ a network society’, a new economy ‘a global informational economy’ and a new culture ‘a culture of real virtuality ( in van Dijk, 2001). Harding (2006) argues that multifaceted virtual culture, enforces powerful economic decisions at every moment in the life of the network. Castells’ focus and ideas about development contradicts with those of neo-liberals and neo-Marxists.He focuses on the economic as well as the political and cultural aspects of development while neoliberalsâ€⠄¢ view of development as about the shift of control of the economy from the ‘public sector’ to the ‘private sector’. The philosophy behind neoliberalism is to maximise the role of the private sectors. In essence the aim of neoliberalism is to strive for national success in terms of the global market and that social life should be determined by the market which can be considered to be the best design for the society. Neoliberals also encourage the maximization of contract as well as the entrepreneurial precepts.It also resulted into the forms of work contracts, such as temporary, part-time, contract, and casual workers (Peck, 1996:119) Globalization and neoliberalism are sometimes used interchangeably, if one could argue under the notion of making the economic structure in an outline of a uniform, that is, interconnection of nations through trading. In addition, the keywords between globalization and the neoliberalism are, ‘global capitalism’ a nd ‘privatization’. Neo-liberal restructuring is central to the globalisation process which demands free-market, privatisation, externalisation, casualisation, and more.Conversely, Holm and Sorensen (1995:4) define globalization as the intensification of economic, political, social and cultural relations across borders. Globalisation is made to be valid and it is not seen as an economic aspect, however; one could argue that it is a new phase of capitalism. Harding (2006) adds on what Castells propounds on that the new flexibility offered to capital by information technology is intimately linked to the accelerating progress of globalization, permitting capitalists to keep down labour costs while exploiting emerging markets.Moreover, ideology serves as tool belief with a great political influence to make neoliberalism and globalization acceptable. On the other hand neo-Marxism focuses the most on the social inequalities and it shows the uprising of opposition that counter s inequalities. This theory arose from the work of Karl Marx and it is for the ideas of Max Weber who have theorized on social inequalities for example status and power. Neo-Marxism theory view class division as more important than gender or sex division or issues of race and ethnicity.Moreover Neo-Marxism theory seeks to reveal the hegemony of the dominant class which results to political power. Castells attributes that indeed, the vanguard social and cultural values are in the very design innovations that powered and shaped the oncoming technological revolution (Harding, 2006). There exists what is known as the policy making which is a large sector of elite control within government whereby the corporate community consisting of the upper class work hand in hand in overlapping spheres of economic and political entities (Domhoff,1990: 105).The economy is considered as a fundamental strong point of any society (Livingston, 1939: 53) as people are dependent on an income for basic surv ival necessities, thus if the government favours policies which inadvertently co-operate with the views of the corporate power then the needy are inevitably cared for and corporate elitist take on roles of leadership within the community (Domhoff 2006: 103). 8. FOCUS STUDY AREA The Ngqushwa Municipality is in the ex-homeland an area of the Ciskei. It has only one small town and the majority of the population live in rural areas.Consequently they live in traditional dwellings made of wattle and mud bricks. A large number of citizens build their own dwellings using their own labour and local materials. The most common houses or brick structure are on separate stand or yard, which applies to rural settings. High levels of poverty and difficulties prevails throughout the country, in urban and rural areas alike, due to high levels of unemployment and severe shortages of formal housing. Most members in rural community would not have access to credit for the construction of dwellings in co mmunal or informal tenure areas. 9.RESEARCH METHODOLOGY This will provide an understanding in which the methodology will be used in this study. In this study, it will cover the essence of research design, data collection and data analysis. 9. 1 RESEARCH DESIGN Research design is concerned with defining the type of study to be assumed to produce the intended results. The research design is a key element in its success. Leedy (1997) states that the design process is the planning of the research and includes visualization of the data and problems associated with the use of those data in achieving the results of the research project.The study will make use of an empirical research design which will be informed by the literature review and analysis. Qualitative research is descriptive in that the researcher is interested in process, meaning, and understanding gained through words or pictures. According to Leedy (2001:191) descriptive survey involves distinguishing the characteristics of something. He further suggests that descriptive method is suitable for data obtained from observation. Qualitative researchers are concerned primarily with process, rather than outcomes or products.Struwig and Stead (2001:12) identify that qualitative researchers are very interested in understanding the issues being researched from the perspective of the research participants. The quantitative principles are based on the view that the world is organised and bound by rules. Also quantitative research seeks to use the existing data to analyse the given data in order to validate the representations with regard to the role of state and NGOs in development. Quantitative research makes perfectly clear that seeks to employ mathematical and statistical models pertaining phenomenon.The reason for using quantitative research, intends to understand participants’ experience pertaining to challenges of housing delivery in Peddie Extension by describing housing project management which res ulted in poor or better quality of housing delivery service. It also brings about the broader understanding of the effectiveness of the state or NGOs in rural housing delivery to develop the community. 9. 2 DATA COLLECTION AND ANALYSIS The data to be used in this paper will be developed from both primary and secondary sources.Primary data The primary data will come from in-depth interviews with grass-roots members of community and government officials. The reason to focus on government officials is that they have detailed information and knowledge on housing delivery. Representatives from non-governmental organisations could be interviewed so as to acquire a broader understanding of the social and political relations in Peddie Extension. Observations and photographs will be used to collect more primary data. Secondary dataThis information will be collected through quantitative approach by describing the state and NGOs’ effectiveness in the issues of service delivery in rural areas. A desk study and network research will be employed to review more additional data from archival documents, housing legislations, policies and programmes in government housing interventions. And from resource relevant databases, related case studies, researches, surveys and publications. The quantitative data on housing delivery will be obtained from the local state municipality offices.The other data will be attained through analysis of relevant sources focusing on housing delivery, statistics, housing policy, frameworks, process and practice and other official reports on housing programmes or projects. 10. TIME FRAMES AND BUDGET To make the study to have meaningful analysis with regard to the role of the non-governmental organisations and state, the study will be based on collaboration between NGOs, government officials and other participant in housing delivery projects during the period April to October 2013 in the Ngqushwa rural area.The rationale for this period will be a ffected by factors such as financial constraints and the nature of the study. 11. OUTLINES OF CHAPTERS Chapter one will be concerned with an introduction to the study which describes and explains the background, problem statement, research questions, objectives, necessity, study plan, limitations of the study, and the definition of words and terms used in the study. Chapter two will provide a literature review of study, framework, concepts and theories which are concerned with community development.Theories that describe the role of the state and NGOs in service deliver. The challenges of grow of homelessness of rural community members as revealed by poverty; lack of access to basic services, facilities and lack of participation of communities in decision-making in the poor communities. Chapter three will outline the research methodology; define the research techniques, data collecting instruments, and the analysis techniques. Chapter four will represent the data presentation, analy sis and interpretation and will provide the criteria for analysis and the actual analysis.Chapter five will deal with the conclusion and will summarise the findings and deductions made in the preceding chapters. Specific inadequacies and problem areas in the role of state and NGOs in community development services will be explained and recommendations to remedy such situation and future actions will be provided.

Sunday, November 24, 2019

College Essay Prompts Complete List, Analysis, and Advice

College Essay Prompts Complete List, Analysis, and Advice SAT / ACT Prep Online Guides and Tips When talking about college essays, wetend to focus on the Common Application prompts, and it's true that many students will need to write a Common App essay. However, there are actually quite a few schools, including both public and private universities,that don't use the Common App and instead ask applicants to respond to their own college essay prompts. Luckily, college essay prompts tend to be pretty similar to each other. In this guide, I'll list all the college essay questions for popular schools in the US (and a few abroad) and then break down the patterns to help you brainstorm topics and plan how to approach multiple essays efficiently. After reading this guide, you'll be able to strategize which essays you'll write for which colleges. Feature image: Mayr/Flickr Why Do Colleges Ask For an Essay? The short answer: the essay gives admissions committees a sense of your personality beyond the statistics on the rest of your application.The essay is your chance to show the committee your unique perspectiveand impress them with your maturity and insight. College application essay promptsarewritten with this goal in mind. Admissions officers want to give you the chance to share your interests, aspirations, and views on the world, so most prompts ask about how yourexperiences have shaped you or what you're excited about studying or doing in college. I've collecteda ton of examples below and provided some analysis to help you begin planning and crafting your own essays. Keep in mind that the personal statement alone won’t be enough to get you in- your grades and test scores are still the most important factors in your application. That being said, a stellar essaycan help bring a borderline applicantover the top or give an excellent but not extraordinary student the opportunity tostand out in a competitive applicant pool. As such, the essay tends to matter most for very competitive schools. Non-competitive schools generally don’t ask you to submit an essay. Complete List of College Essay Prompts This list collectsthe 2018 college essay prompts formajor state universities, top-50 schools, and other popular schools. They're divided by region, with all optional essays listed at the end. I left off the Common App supplements, as those often require a substantiallydifferent approach. I also stuck tofour-year schools, meaning Ididn't includespecial two-year programs, such as Deep Springs College or Miami Dade College’s Honors Program (both of which require essays). Finally, note that these prompts are for freshman applicants, so the requirements might be different for transfer students. General Applications There are three general applicationsyou can use to apply to many different schools at once: Common Application Universal College Application Coalition Application Each application has its own personal statement requirement. Some schools will ask for additional supplemental essays. Many more schools accept the Common App than they do the UCAor Coalition Application, though some will accept more than one of theseapplications. Common Application For the Common App essay, you pick one of the prompts and write 250-650 words about it. Here are the prompts for the 2018-19 school year: Some students have a background, identity, interest, or talent that is so meaningful they believe their application would be incomplete without it. If this sounds like you, then please share your story. The lessons we take fromobstacles we encountercan be fundamental to later success. Recount a time when you faced achallenge, setback, or failure.How did it affect you, and what did you learn from the experience? Reflect on a time when youquestionedor challenged a belief or idea. What prompted yourthinking? Whatwas the outcome? Describe a problem you’ve solved or a problem you’d like to solve. It can be an intellectual challenge, a research query, an ethical dilemma- anything that is of personal importance, no matter the scale. Explain its significance to you and what steps you took or could be taken to identify a solution. Discuss an accomplishment, event, orrealizationthatsparked a period of personal growth and a new understanding of yourself or others. Describe a topic, idea, or concept you find so engaging that it makes you lose all track of time. Why does it captivate you? What or who do you turn to when you want to learn more? Share an essay on any topic of your choice. It can be one you've already written, one that responds to a different prompt, or one of your own design. Universal College Application The UCA essay prompt is completely open ended and has a 650-word limit. Here is the 2018-19 prompt: Please write an essay that demonstrates your ability to develop and communicate your thoughts. Some ideas include: a person you admire; a life-changing experience; or your viewpoint on a particular current event. Coalition Application For the Coalition Application, you'll pick one of five prompts listed below. While there is no hard word limit, the range guidelines are 500-550 words. Here are the prompts for 2017-19: Tell a story from your life, describing an experience that either demonstrates your character or helped to shape it. Describe a time when you made a meaningful contribution to others in which the greater good was your focus. Discuss the challenges and rewards of making your contribution. Has there been a time when you’ve had a long-cherished or accepted belief challenged? How did you respond? How did the challenge affect your beliefs? What is the hardest part of being a teenager now? What’s the best part? What advice would you give a younger sibling or friend (assuming they would listen to you)? Submit anessayon a topic of your choice. Northeast/Mid-Atlantic The Great Dome at MIT Georgetown University Georgetown asks applicants to writeone short essay (about half a single-spaced page)and two longer essays(approximately one single-spaced page each).Each applicant must respond to the first two prompts and can choose among the other four based on the specific program she's interested in. Short Essay:Briefly (approximately one-half page, single-spaced) discuss the significance to you of the school or summer activity in which youhave been most involved. All Applicants: As Georgetown is a diverse community, the Admissions Committee would like to know more about you in yourown words. Please submit a brief essay, either personal or creative, which you feel best describes you. Applicants to Georgetown College: What does it mean to you to be educated? How might Georgetown College help you achievethis aim? (Applicants to the Sciences and Mathematics or the Faculty of Languages and Linguistics should address their chosencourse of study). Applicants to the School of Nursing Health Studies: Describe the factors that have influenced your interest in studyinghealthcare. Please specifically address your intended major (Global Health, Health Care Management Policy, Human Science,orNursing). Applicants to the Walsh School of Foreign Service: Briefly discuss a current global issue, indicating why you consider itimportant and what you suggest should be done to deal with it. Applicants to the McDonough School of Business: The McDonough School of Business is a national and global leader inproviding graduates with essential ethical, analytical, financial and global perspectives. Please discuss your motivations for studying business at Georgetown. Massachusetts Institute of Technology MIT doesn't ask for a single personal statement but rather asks applicants torespond to a series of questions with just aparagraph or two. We know you lead a busy life, full of activities, many of which are required of you. Tell us about something you do simply for the pleasure of it. (100 words or fewer) Although you may not yet know what you want to major in, which department or program at MIT appeals to you and why? (100 words or fewer) At MIT, we bring people together to better the lives of others. MIT students work to improve their communities in different ways, from tackling the world’s biggest challenges to being a good friend. Describe one way in which you have contributed to your community, whether in your family, the classroom, your neighborhood, etc. (200-250 words) Describe the world you come from; for example, your family, clubs, school, community, city, or town. How has that world shaped your dreams and aspirations? (200-250 words) Tell us about the most significant challenge you've faced or something important that didn't go according to plan. How did you manage the situation? (200-250 words) Midwest University of Wisconsin, Madison Indiana University Bloomington IU asks for 200-400 words on your plans and interests. Describe your academic and career plans and any special interest (for example, undergraduate research, academic interests, leadership opportunities, etc.) that you are eager to pursue as an undergraduate at Indiana University. Also, if you encountered any unusual circumstances, challenges, or obstacles in pursuit of your education, share those experiences and how you overcame them. (200-400 words) This essay may be used in scholarship consideration. University of Illinois The University of Illinois asks for two essays only if you have selected a second-choice major other than what's noted on your application. Both responses should be 300-400 words. Explain your interest in the major you selected and describe how you have recently explored or developed this interest inside and/or outside the classroom. You may also explain how this major relates to your future career goals. If you're applying to theDivision of General Studies, explain your academic interests and strengths or your future career goals. You may include any majors or areas of study you're currentlyconsidering. If you select a second-choice major other than the Division of General Studies on your application, write a second essay explaining your interest in this major, too. University of Wisconsin–Madison All applicants must complete two essays for UW–Madison. Theessays should be 300-500 words each (with a max of 650 words) and may be used for scholarship and campus program review.For the first essay, you may also use any of the Common Application prompts if you apply through the Common Application. Tell us about your academic and personal achievements. What have you learned from your success and/or challenges, and how will this influence you as you pursue your college education? Tell us why you would like to attend the University of Wisconsin–Madison. In addition, please include why you are interested in studying the major(s) you have selected. If you selected undecided please describe your areas of possible academic interest. Want to write the perfect college application essay? Get professional help from PrepScholar. Your dedicated PrepScholar Admissions counselor will craft your perfect college essay, from the ground up. We'll learn your background and interests, brainstorm essay topics, and walk you through the essay drafting process, step-by-step. At the end, you'll have a unique essay that you'll proudly submit to your top choice colleges. Don't leave your college application to chance. Find out more about PrepScholar Admissions now: South Kyle Field at Texas AM (Ed Schipul/Flickr) ApplyTexas The ApplyTexas application is used by all Texas public universitiesand some private colleges. There are four ApplyTexas essay prompts. Which ones you need to respond to will depend on where you're applying.UT Austin, for example, requires applicants to submit one essay responding to Topic A and another on a topic of their choice. While there's no set word limit, the online application will cut off eachessay at 120 lines (~1000 words). Topic A: What was the environment in which you were raised? Describe your family, home, neighborhood, or community, and explain how it has shaped you as a person. Topic B: Most students have an identity, an interest, or a talent that defines them in an essential way. Tell us about yourself. Topic C: You’ve got a ticket in your hand – Where will you go? What will you do? What will happen when you get there? Topic D: Please Note: The essay in this section is specific to certain college majors and is not required by all colleges/universities that accept the Apply Texas Application. If you are not applying for a major in Architecture, Art, Art History, Design, Studio Art, Visual Art Studies/Art Education, you are not required to write this essay. Personal interaction with objects, images and spaces can be so powerful as to change the way one thinks about particular issues or topics. For your intended area of study (architecture, art history, design, studio art, visual art studies/art education), describe an experience where instruction in that area or your personal interaction with an object, image or space effected this type of change in your thinking. What did you do to act upon your new thinking and what have you done to prepare yourself for further study in this area? University of Georgia For UGA, applicants mustwrite two essays of 200-300 words each. One prompt is required. You may choose your other essay from among four options. Required: The college admissions process can create anxiety. In an attempt to make it less stressful, please tell us an interesting or amusing story about yourself from your high school years that you have not already shared in your application. Choose One: UGA’s 2017 Commencement speaker Ernie Johnson (Class of ’79) told a story from his youth about what he refers to as blackberry moments. He has described these asâ€Å"the sweet moments that are right there to be had but we’re just too focused on what we’re doing †¦ and we see things that are right there within our reach and we neglect them.Blackberry moments can be anything that makes somebody else’s day, that makes your day, that are just sweet moments that you always remember.† Tell us about one of your â€Å"blackberry moments† from the past five years. Creativity is found in many forms including artistic avenues, intellectual pursuits, social interactions, innovative solutions, et cetera. Tell us how you express your creativity. Tell a story from your life, describing an experience that either demonstrates your character or helped to shape it. Describe a problem, possibly related to your area of study, which you would like to solve. Explain its importance to you and what actions you would take to solve this issue. West The Campanile at UC Berkeley University of California Students applying to the UC system must respond to four out of eightshort personal insight questions.The maximum word count for each response is 350 words. Describe an example of your leadership experience in which you have positively influenced others, helped resolve disputes or contributed to group efforts over time. Every person has a creative side, and it can be expressed in many ways: problem solving, original and innovative thinking, and artistically, to name a few. Describe how you express your creative side. What would you say is your greatest talent or skill? How have you developed and demonstrated that talent over time? Describe how you have taken advantage of a significant educational opportunity or worked to overcome an educational barrier you have faced. Describe the most significant challenge you have faced and the steps you have taken to overcome this challenge. How has this challenge affected your academic achievement? Think about an academic subject that inspires you. Describe how you have furthered this interest inside and/or outside of the classroom. What have you done to make your school or your community a better place? Beyond what has already been shared in your application, what do you believe makes you stand out as a strong candidate for admissions to the University of California? University of Oregon The UO is interested in learning more about you. Write an essay of 650 words or less that shares information that we cannot find elsewhere on your application. Any topic you choose is welcome. Some ideas you might consider include your future ambitions and goals, a special talent, extracurricular activity, or unusual interest that sets you apart from your peers, or a significant experience that influenced your life. If you are applying to the UO's Robert D. Clark Honors College, feel free to resubmit your honors college application essay. University of Washington As part of theCoalition for Access, Affordability, and Success, UW will accept an essay on any of the five Coalition prompts. This essay will ideally be around 300-400 words long.UW also requiresan answer to a short-response question, with a maximum of 300 words: Our families and communities often define us and our individual worlds. Community might refer to your cultural group, extended family, religious group, neighborhood or school, sports team or club, co-workers, etc. Describe the world you come from and how you, as a product of it, might add to the diversity of the University of Washington. International Generally speaking, international schools are less likely to ask for an essay, since admission tends to be heavily focused on grades and test results. However, a few popular international schools do ask for a personal statement as part of their application. Universities and Colleges Admissions Service(UK Schools) UCAS is a general application for UK schools (similar to the Common App in the US). There's no specific prompt for the personal statement- instead, applicants are required to write an essay describing what they want to study, why they want to study it, and what they bring to the table. There is a 4,000-character limit. University of British Columbia UBC asks applicants to fill out a personal profile consisting of five to seven short-answer questions that vary depending on the program you're applying to. Answers should be 50-200 words. While UBC doesn't provide specific questions for your program until you start an application, they do advise that you think about the following questions as you prepare: What are the qualities you think make for a successful university student? How have you demonstrated such qualities in the past? Think about your first-choice UBC degree. What kinds of activities, accomplishments, and insights- learned in or outside of the classroom- do you think would be relevant to this degree? Think about your accomplishments and activities. What have you learned from these experiences? When have you taken on a leadership role? What do you excel in at school or outside of school?What do you enjoy learning in school? Or what do you enjoy doing outside of school that has influenced what you want to learn? Think about the role others have played in your accomplishments and experiences. Think about how your favourite teacher would describe you. Why would your teacher describe you this way? Be specific. Try to incorporate this information into your responses. Think about two or three adjectives that best describe you. For each, provide some evidence of why they describe. Be specific. Try to incorporate this information into your responses. Think about the challenges that you have had to overcome in your life. What have those experiences taught you about yourself and about your community? Want to write the perfect college application essay? Get professional help from PrepScholar. Your dedicated PrepScholar Admissions counselor will craft your perfect college essay, from the ground up. We'll learn your background and interests, brainstorm essay topics, and walk you through the essay drafting process, step-by-step. At the end, you'll have a unique essay that you'll proudly submit to your top choice colleges. Don't leave your college application to chance. Find out more about PrepScholar Admissions now: University of Cambridge Optional Essays Some schools don't require an essay from all applicants but do recommend or require an essay for certain programs. I've listed a selection of those prompts below. Arizona State University Students applying to the Barrett Honors College at ASU must submit two essays of up to 300 words each on the following topics: How will your honors educational experience enrich you, both in relation to your chosen field of study and in relation to your broader education? How will you and your experiences contribute to the Barrett educational and residential community? City University of New York Applicants to MacaulayHonors College mustrespond to one of two "Personal Reflection" prompts and one of two "Social Issues" prompts. The maximum length is 500 words per response. Personal Reflection: Describe an experience that either demonstrates your character or helped to shape it. Reflecting on your experience and aspirations, discuss how your life will differ from your parents' lives. Provide concrete evidence to illustrate your position. Social Issues: Pick a story of local, national, or international importance from the front page of any newspaper. Identify your source and give the date the article appeared. Then use your sense of humor, sense of outrage, sense of justice- or just plain good sense- to explain why the story engages your attention. If someone gave you a $50 million grant, how would you use it to make New York City a better place? Florida International University Only applicants who don't meet the criteria for automatic admissions and whose applications undergo holistic review will need to submit a 500-word essay: Qualities such as motivation, drive, courage, perseverance, resolve and strength of character play an important role in students' ability to succeed at FIU and in life. Write a 500-word (one-page, single spaced) essay explaining which of these measures makes you a good candidate for admission to FIU and what strategies you will use to ensure your success in and out of the classroom. The Ohio State University Applicants to the University Honors program or the Ohio State Scholars program must respond to the following prompt: To what fictional character do you most relate, and why? You may select a character from animation, art, film, literature, television, theater or any other medium. Ohio University For theOhio University application, students who've been out of a school for more thana year must submit an essay explaining what they've done in their time off from school. If there is a period of three months or longer that you have not been enrolled in a high school, college, or university, please provide a statement documenting your activities for that period. Examples include language study, vacation, work experience, family responsibilities. Additionally, applicants to the journalism schoolare encouraged to write a 250- to 500-word essay "detailing how they want to help shape the future of journalism, advertising, or public relations." For all other applicants, submitting an essay here is optional. Finally, those interested inOhio University's Cutler Scholars Program must answer the following essay prompt (max 250 words): Reflect on a service activity or other efforts you've undertaken to contribute to your community or communities. Your actions might involve individual service, a group project, or substantial activities to support your family, such as employment or caring for a sick relative. What did you learn about yourself and your community? What did you learn about how society functions more generally? Ohio University in the 1970s (Sent From the Past/Flickr) Pennsylvania State University Penn State allows applicants to complete the two following optional essays, each withalimit of 500 words: Please use this space to discuss your activities (other than academic work) during the last several years (for example: school organizations, jobs, athletics, the arts, community service, religious groups, or other individual interests). Please tell us something about yourself, your experiences, or activities that you believe would reflect positively on your ability to succeed at Penn State. This is your opportunity to tell us something about yourself that is not already reflected in your application or academic records. Additionally, applicants to the Schreyer Honors College must answer the following three essay prompts. There are no word count or formatting requirements. There are 27 amendments to the Constitution of the United States. What should be the 28th? Are China and India developing countries? Why or why not? The Seven Wonders of the World is a well-known list highlighting spectacular natural phenomena or human-made structures. Please describe some of the Seven Wonders ofyourworld: They could include people, places, events, or things that have significantly affected who you are. Lastly, if you took any time off before starting college, you'll need to explain what you did during this time and whyin the area of the application titled "Educational Gap Statement." University of Arizona Applicants to UA who do not meet the assured admission criteria will go through the comprehensive review process, which allows for an optional personal statement: The inclusion of anoptionalshort answer, personal narrative or statement to the UA application gives you the opportunity to include unique life experiences and personal achievements in your application University of Central Florida The essays for UCF are optional but recommended. Applicants are asked to pick two of the prompts and compose responses of no more than 500 words (or 7,000 characters) each. If there has been some obstacle or bump in the road in your academic or personal life, please explain the circumstances. How has your family history, culture, or environment influenced who you are? Why did you choose to apply to UCF? What qualities or unique characteristics do you possess that will allow you to contribute to the UCF community? University of Kansas Applicants to KU's honors program must answer one of the following three essay promptsin 500 words or fewer: Give us your top five. Elaborate Consider a time when you strongly held a position, then changed your mind. How did you come to your original stance and how did it change? The University of Kansas cultivates visionaries who contribute to local and global communities. Discuss your passion and why it’s important to you Applicants may also submit an "Extenuating Circumstances Statement." The word limit for this response is 150 words. Is there additional information about yourself, your family, your background, or any adversity (e.g. financial hardship, illness, etc.) you would like us to take into consideration while reviewing your application? University of Nebraska, Lincoln UNL doesn't require applicants to submit an essay, but you will need to write one to be considered for scholarships. There is a 500-word limit. Tell us about the experiences that have shaped you as person- the community circumstances you’ve overcome, your leadership experiences, your career goals, examples of your commitment to help under-served communities and experiences you’ve had with the global community. University of Utah Applicants to the Honors College must complete two essays. The first has a limit of 500 words, and the second has a limit of just 50 words: In 500 words: Keeping in mind that there are many ways to think about â€Å"justice† and a â€Å"just society†, what would YOU personally require of a society in order for YOU to consider it â€Å"just†? It might be helpful to explain what you believe is â€Å"just† or â€Å"justice† but please don’t incorporate a dictionary definition in your essay.Take a little risk, and have fun. In 50 words:... Please give us a hint about what makes you, YOU: a personality quirk, an unexpected interest, an unusual hobby or pursuit, how your earned your nickname, your most embarrassing moment, your wildest dream, the title of your autobiography, why your friends think you’re funny, what you’re doing to get into the Guinness Book of Records, your latest invention? This parrot has questions. Do you have answers? (Matthias Ripp/Flickr) Want to write the perfect college application essay? Get professional help from PrepScholar. Your dedicated PrepScholar Admissions counselor will craft your perfect college essay, from the ground up. We'll learn your background and interests, brainstorm essay topics, and walk you through the essay drafting process, step-by-step. At the end, you'll have a unique essay that you'll proudly submit to your top choice colleges. Don't leave your college application to chance. Find out more about PrepScholar Admissions now: The 3 Main Types of College Essay Questions As you can see above, a few schools ask simply, â€Å"Tell us something about yourself,† but most have a more specific prompt. Still, many questionsare pretty similar to each other and can be grouped intothree general types. In this section, we'll break down each type of college essay question to see why colleges ask about it and how you can respond effectively. Type 1: QuestionsAbout a Meaningful Experience This type of college essay question is the most common. The exact focus of these prompts can vary quite a bit,but they all ask you to reflect on an important experience. Some questions specify atype of experience whereas others don't, simply opting to have applicants write about whatever matters to them. There are three basic sub-types that you'll see when dealing with these prompts. Let's look at an example of each. #1: Overcoming a Challenge These prompts ask about how you dealt with a particular challenge or solved a problem. Below is a typical example of this question type from the MITapplication: Tell us about the most significant challenge you've faced or something important that didn't go according to plan. How did you manage the situation? To address a question like this, you need a topic that has real stakes- that is, something that you genuinely struggled with.Even though it can seem as though you should only discusspositive experiences and feelings in your college essay (you want to impress your readers with how awesome you are!), unwavering positivity actually hurts your essaybecause it makes you seem fake. Instead, be honest: if you're writing about a negative experience, acknowledge that it was unpleasant or hard and explain why.Doing so will just make your overcoming it that much more impressive. #2: Engaging WithDiversity Questions about diversity ask how you interact with those who are different from you. See an example below from the Common Application: Reflect on a time when youquestionedor challenged a belief or idea. What prompted yourthinking? Whatwas the outcome? When approaching this type of question, you need to showthat you're thoughtful about new ideas and perspectives.Colleges are full of students from all kinds of backgrounds, and admissions officers want to know that you'll be accepting of the diversity of other students, even if you don't necessarily agree with them. Also, make sure to pick aspecific instance to focus on. Writing a general essay about how you accept others won't impress admissions officers- you needto show them an example of a time that you did so. #3: Growing Up Finally, this type of prompt asks about a transitional experience or rite of passage that made you feel like an adult. I've reprinted another example from the Common App: Discuss an accomplishment, event, orrealizationthatsparked a period of personal growth and a new understanding of yourself or others. For these types of prompts, you want to show personal growth. Explain to the reader not just who you are but also how you've changed. (Really, this is a good idea no matter which prompt you're addressing!) College can be challenging, soadmissions officers want to know that you have the maturity to deal with (likely) living on your own, managing your own life, and planning for your future. Regardless of the exact prompt, the key to this type of college essay is to show what you’ve learned from the experience.Admissions officersdon't care that much about what happened to you- they care about what you think and feel about that event. That's what will give them a sense of who you are and what kind of college student you'll make. How have you changed between graduating from kindergarten and graduating from high school? Type 2: Questions About How You Would Fit Into the Community Examples:UW–Madison, FIU, UCF When admissions committees evaluate applicants, they consider how a student will contributeto the college as a whole. These college essay questions ask you to explain what you would bring to the college’s community and how you'd fit in with its values. Here is an example fromUW–Madison: Tell us why you would like to attend the University of Wisconsin–Madison. In addition, please include why you are interested in studying the major(s) you have selected. If you selected undecided please describe your areas of possible academic interest. To address this type of prompt, you’ll want to give specific examples of how you embody the traits they’re looking for or what benefits you’d provide to the school’s community. Some prompts will ask youto addressmore specific ideas about the school than others, but it's always a good idea to touch onthe individual school's values or philosophy. Balancing talking about your experiences and traits with describing what excites you about the school can be tricky, but it's vital that you touch on both. If you don't talk about yourself, you're missing your chance to give the admissions committee a sense of who you are and how you would fit in to their community. And if you don't discuss the school itself, you risk coming off as uninterested. So make sure to do both! Type 3: Questions About Your Goals Examples:MIT 2,University of Illinois,ApplyTexas C These college essay questions ask about your professional, personal, or academic goals and how you’ll pursue them.They also often ask you to outline how you’ve worked toward these goals so far. Take a look at an example from the University of Illinois application: Explain your interest in the major you selected and describe how you have recently explored or developed this interest inside and/or outside the classroom. You may also explain how this major relates to your future career goals. If you're applying to theDivision of General Studies, explain your academic interests and strengths or your future career goals. You may include any majors or areas of study you're currentlyconsidering. When addressingthis type of question, you'll want to prove to admissions officers that you’re thoughtful about your future and excited about the opportunities college provides.Colleges want to admit students who will be successful, and a big part of finding success is having the drive to work toward it. As always, remember to use specific examples to illustrate your point.What relevant experiences have you had or interests have you pursued? What made you think this subject or career would be a good fit for you? Are there related classes or activities you're excited to participate in at the school? The more specific you can be in addressingthese questions, the stronger your essay will be. Of course, these three types of questions don't cover every essay prompt, and some questions will be more unusual (especially those for supplemental essays). Nonetheless, you should analyze any prompts you encounter in the same way. Ask yourself why the college is asking that question and what admissions officers are hoping to see- not in terms of specific topics but in terms of general trends and traits. Understanding what admissions officers are hoping to get out of your essay will help you pick a great topic that'll help you exhibit your unique personality and perspective in the most effective way possible. How to Plan Your College Essay Writing Now that you’ve seen the range of questions you might be asked to answer for your college apps, let’s discuss how you can plan your college essay writing process most efficiently. Make a Chart of All the Essays You Need to Write Depending on how many schoolsyou're applying to and what their requirements are, you might have to respond to10 or more college essay prompts. Therefore,you'll want to make sure that you're organized about what needs to get done. I recommend creating a chart with the school, its deadline, and its essay's word count in one column, and theprompt(s) in the other. Then, prioritize your essays by deadline and preference. In other words, focus first on essays for the schools with the earliest deadlines and the ones you’re mostexcited about. You’ll also want to consider whether you truly need to write a different essay for each school. If the prompts are similar enough, you might be able to reuse essays for more than one college. I'll go over how to make these calls in more depth below. When Writing Multiple Essays for OneSchool, Use DifferentTopics You probably noticed that many of the schools listed above ask for more than one essay. When completing one of these applications, make sure your essays aren’t repetitive.You want to take the opportunity to give admissions officers as fleshed out a sense of who you are as you can,so pick topics that show different sides of your personality. For example, let’s consider a student who’s hoping to become an engineer. If she writes her first essay about competing in a science fair, she’ll want to focus on something slightly different for her second essay- perhaps an unexpected interest, such as figure skating, or a time that she used her scientific skills to solve an unscientific problem. Be Careful About Reusing Essays A common question students have is whetheryou can just write one essay and submit it to every school. The answer is, unfortunately, no. As you can see,college essay questionsdiffer enough that there's no way you could use the same essay for every single one (not to mention the fact that many schools require two or more essays anyway!). However, it doessometimeswork to reusean essay for more than one school. The key is that the prompts have to be asking about basically the same type of thing. For example, you could use the same essay for two prompts that both ask about a time you solved a problem, but you probably wouldn't want to use the same essay for one prompt that asks about a problem you solved and one that asks about a time you interacted with someone different from yourself. You can also reuse an essay bysubmitting an essay originally written for a specific prompt for a more general prompt as well.For example, you couldsubmit your ApplyTexas topic B app (the one that's about overcoming a specific obstacle) for the Coalition essay prompt 1 (the one about a meaningful story from your life and what you learned). In that case, you might want to tweak the essay slightly to address the question of what you learned more explicitly, but you could likely use the same personal statement with minimal changes. The other reason thisinstance of essay recycling works is because the ApplyTexasand Coalition applications have compatibleword limits.In general, you can't reuse a 600-word essay for a prompt with a 250-word limit. Why? Because by the time you've cut out that many words, you'll usually be left with something that either doesn't make much sense or that doesn't show much about you (since you've only left enoughof the story to explainwhat happened). Although, technically, you could use a short essay (200-300 words) for an application with a higher word limit (say, 500-650 words), I strongly advise against doing this. If you have the space to tell a more in-depth story and explain your perspective and feelings in more detail, you should take it. Reusing a much shorter essay out of laziness is a waste of an important opportunity to impress the admissions committee.(You can, however, write a longer essay on the same topic.) Ultimately, whether you can use a recycled essay for a given prompt willdepend on the specific prompts involved and your chosen topic. However, I've outlined some general guidelines below. Essays About Experiences Arethe Most Easily TransferredBetween Schools There’s a reason the Common App promptsare all type 1: Because they ask about important experiences, these prompts are much more about you than they are about the school. As such, it’s much easier to use them for more than one school. That being said, as I described above, if the prompts are different sub-types or are otherwise clearly distinct from each other, you’ll still need to write unique essays. Essays About a Specific School Generally Can’t Be Recycled If a prompt asks about why you’re interested in a specific school or how you'd fit in, don't try to use it for more than one school. Admissions officers want to see that you're excited about their school and will bring something interesting or special to their community. It's impossible to show them this if you can't be bothered to write a unique essay for their application. Take the time to think about what appeals to you about the specific school or how you relate to its core values. Essays About Your Goals or Interests Might Need to Be Customized to Each School For questions that ask about your future, you might be able to keep the same basic structure- assuming you’re interested in studying the same subject- and simply tweak the section about your plans for the future to reflect eachschool's specific programs or activities. However, don’t lie to avoid having to write a new essay. If one school’s music program interests you while another school’s architecture program does, write a unique essay for each. How to Write a College Essay That Works: 3 Key Tips There's one key takeaway from looking at the many prompts above: colleges are looking for your essay to tell them something about you.This idea should be your guiding principle as you write and edit your essay. I've summarized our top three college essay writingtipsbelow, but for a more in-depth take on the writing process, check out our step-by-step guide to writing a great college essay. #1: Pick a Topic You're Excited About A great essay requires a great topic, and a great topic is one that you really want to write about.Remember that admissions officers want to get to know you: you'll have to be honest about your interests and your perspectives if you want to impress them. For more guidance on picking a great topic, check out our guides to brainstorming college essay ideasand finding the besttopic for you. #2: Focus On Specific Details No matter how great your topic, your essay won't be compelling without detailed descriptions that put the reader in your shoes and let them see the world from your perspective. Details are what make an essay stand out because they're unique to you. For example, alot of people might have volunteered with Habitat for Humanity, but only one could have stood outside in a pink hat listening to her high school history teacher drone on about the different types of screws for 25 minutes.In short, don't settle for telling readers what you did- show them with specific details. You also need to explain howthe experience affected you and/or whyyour topic is important to you. Students often get so wrapped up in telling astory that they forget to show why it matters, but your feelings arethe most important part of your essay. This aspectof the essay should also include plenty ofdetails. Otherwise, it's easy to fall into clichà ©s that bog down your storytelling. #3: Edit Carefully As you embark upon the college essay writing process, keep in mind thefamous Ernest Hemingway quote: "The only kind of writing is rewriting." It might be extremely tempting to just write a draft and call it a day, but revising is a vital step in crafting an engaging essay. Once you write a first draft, put it in a drawer for a week. Taking some time away from it will allow you to come back to it with fresh eyes. Then, try to read your essay from the perspective of someone who knows nothing about you.Would they be able to understand the story? Do you explain clearly what you learned? Does yourintro grab the reader's attention? It can also be helpful to ask someone you trust, such as a parent, teacher, or peer, to read your essay and give you feedback. Really listen to what they say and think about how you can improve your writing. Finally, try reading your essay aloud. This will help you catch any weird or awkward phrasings. What's Next? If you're struggling with how to approach your personal statement, consider looking at some college essay examples. The essay is just one part of the college application process. Check out our guide to applying to college for a step-by-step breakdown of what you'll need to do. Finally, if you're planning to take the SAT or ACT, consider taking a look at our expert test-prep guides for some helpful advice on whatever you might be struggling with. Want to improve your SAT score by 160 points or your ACT score by 4 points?We've written a guide for each test about the top 5 strategies you must be using to have a shot at improving your score. Download it for free now:

Thursday, November 21, 2019

Module C - Educating Rita - Moving Into The World Essay

Module C - Educating Rita - Moving Into The World - Essay Example â€Å"Everything I know--and you must listen to this--is that I know absolutely nothing† – Educating Rita This quote aptly sums up the experiences of those venturing into a new world as the very experience tends to challenge and at times question everything one knows including their values and beliefs. The experience of venturing into a new world often leads to encountering various challenges that detain attitudes and beliefs that ultimately define an individual’s psychological dispositions, however history bears testimony to the fact that such challenges or obstacles encountered by individuals are often short term and yield innumerable benefits in the long run. Willy Russel's Educating Rita offers an intriguing perspective on the manner in which Rita - a young and ambitious hairdresser from Liverpool, undergoes various trials and transformations in the pursuit of goals and manages to get various rewards in the forms of life changing qualities such as self-confid ence, independence and education which she so longed for. Her exhilarating journey is in many ways similar to that of the characters Ernesto Guevara and Alberto Granado, in the MotorCycle diaries. The transition into a new world is almost synonymous to encountering endless challenges which individuals are forced to fathom in the midst of their journey as they adapt to their new surroundings. The composer Willy Russell has creatively portrayed this in the opening scene in the play through various symbolic elements. Here â€Å"we see† Rita is presented struggling to open the door to Frank’s office. This gives â€Å"us† an insight on the very pinnacle of Rita’s character and the manifest challenges she is likely to face as she strives to ‘enter’ the ‘new world’. The stage directions used here emphasize the stark differences and the characterisations of the two – signifying, Rita’s seeming state of ignorance and lack of dexterity to manoeuvre her way into the world unknown to her. On being unable to open the door she exclaims â€Å"It's that stupid bleedin' handle on the door. You wanna get it fixed!† The use of slang and the tone of her voice shock not only Frank but take the reader by surprise, since Rita seems completely oblivious to the social conventions and the use of formal speech. Thus this enables â€Å"us† the audience to paint a more precise image of Rita’s boldness and her values. In addition the stage directions used in this instance that focus on Frank’s confused face further emphasizes her naivety and exposes the intricacies of her character and attitudes. The moving into a new world despite age or background is one that requires sacrifice. Defying dominant socio-cultural norms is an inevitable and inherent part of the struggles encountered by those venturing into a new world. In Educating Rita, the challenges faced by Rita are highlighted through the var ious dialogues between her and Frank in relation to the complications of her background, education and marital life. Rita is depicted inept to pursue her studies due to her husband’s disapproval of her ambitions and beliefs. These obstacles ultimately stand in the form societal pressure or the pressure to conform to dominant cultural expectations during her schooling years. This is highlighted in the text â€Å"See, if I'd started takin' school seriously I would've had to become different from me mates, an' that's not allowed† – this indicates the social pressure experienced by Rita forbidding her to defy the set social standards and

Wednesday, November 20, 2019

Nurses Role in Communication of Health Promotion Initiative Assignment

Nurses Role in Communication of Health Promotion Initiative - Assignment Example Also, studies have proved that even though most nurses agree that obesity is a diagnosis that needs intervention, they do not pursue matter with overweight patients (Birse, 1998). Since obese people do not feel free to got the hospital to seek medical intervention and nurses are not fully committed to assist them when they encounter them at the hospital, what could be advocated is a social website that will educate the obese people on how to lose weight. People today tend to express their feeling at the social sites, which are gaining fast recognition (McCarthy, 2009). Hence, having a hospital social site that seeks to assist obese people share their feeling will, without doubt, work. The social site could also mean that nurses will stop worrying about countering obese people in reality and only face them when the matter is critical. It also acts as a cheaper alternative to actual medical

Monday, November 18, 2019

Case study ( Examining Students Learning Development )

( Examining Students Learning Development ) - Case Study Example This helps the instructor plan for the activities in the lesson and the form of assessment that he will use to gauge the student understanding (Vinson, 2015). The domain chosen here was the science domain in the broad academic domain. Different children have different qualities and abilities. The term exceptional or special, therefore, covers both of the two groups and is a huge factor in teaching planning (Heward, 2006). It is unavoidable that in the process of teaching every instructor has the chance of working with some exceptional or low ability students or students with special needs. There is a need to provide for a package designed for these diverse students. Different characteristics of students with extraordinary needs and characteristics that influenced my planning included a child with dyslexia, who had difficulty in acquiring the literacy skills and felt abused by the other students due to her inability to learn. The result was that she felt demoralized and unable to participate in class since she felt intimidated by the others. The other student who influenced my planning was a child with Downs syndrome. Children with Downs syndrome usually take longer to learn in class and introduction of new concepts need to be done in steps. This child with Downs syndrome had difficulties in expressing himself verbally, which was also a necessary aspect to look at in planning my class. In teaching my science lesson, I chose an afternoon where we could have a long session in the lab. The lab was a necessary resource. The main reason for choosing this reaching context is its relevance in teaching science. In this context, I divided my students into groups. The student with Downs syndrome and the student with dyslexia were also grouped. The other reason for my choice of teaching context was the ease of using charts and hands-on learning in the lab compared to the class environment. The lab also

Friday, November 15, 2019

Information Theory and Thermodynamics

Information Theory and Thermodynamics In order to develop better tools, machines and technology we have had to develop our understanding of the physical world. This has allowed us to construct machines that are more capable than those preceding it. The French scientist Carnot was studying machines and was trying to understand how to make them better and more efficient. As part of his studies he calculated the maximum efficiency of any machine and was able to relate this to temperature. Carnots idea was to simplify the machine to its simplest form (this generality that makes it universal) and analyse that Carnot knew that machines of the time (and of today) work as a result of a temperature difference across the machine. In his time it was obvious, fire produced steam which turned a turbine that did work; today is not too different, all of our machines still need a temperature difference to make them work, however the temperature difference driving the machines may be at some distance, for example a power station producing electricity. Even wind, and solar require temperature differences to work. Analysing these machines further lead to concepts that we, perhaps, take for granted: work, power and energy notable examples. Whilst working on these concepts Boltzmann came up ideas that grew into statistical thermodynamics. It was extended and correctly describes a whole range of phenomena. The idea of thermodynamics is to relate various physical properties of a substance to the bulk behaviour of the constituent parts within. Microstates and Macrostates: Boltzmann realised that by knowing the number of different states that a system could be in and the number of configurations that each state would enable him to work out the probability of a particular state occurring. And that on average when something is observed it is more likely to be found in one of its more probable states. Many systems have lots of moving components and this means that over time a system will have evolved into a more probable state. This may now seem obvious, but it hadnt been pointed out explicitly at the time. A Macrostate is the global state of a system. For example if we consider a box with red, blue and green balls a possible macrostate might be to find all of the red balls are in the bottom left corner, whilst all of the others are randomly distributed in the rest of the box. Another example of a macrostate might be that the total electrical charge of block could be Coulombs. A Microstate is one particular configuration of the system that produces a macrostate. In the balls example if the balls are identical apart from colour we can permute the balls with the same colour amongst themselves and end up with different microstates. An example with the charged block might be that we have 4 particles each with charge as one microstate, and another might be to have 1 particle with and another with Below is a figure that represents a hypothetical macrostate of three colours of balls three particular microstates that can be used to achieve it. In the leftmost diagram we have a macrostate with all of the red balls in the bottom left corner, the other diagrams show different permutations of the balls that also achieve the desired macrostate. In order to calculate the probability of this state we would need to know how many combinations of it there are. This is a simple counting argument: we have 1 way of putting the green ball in its spot, two ways of putting the blue balls in their position and ways of arranging (we can pick any of the 5 to go in the corner, then any of the remaining 4 to go next to that, then any of the remaining 3 etc). There are a total of 8 balls and so the In general if there are objects we have possible arrangements; if we also have different types and if of them are of type 1 (say red), are of type 2 and are of type then we can find the total number of permuted arrangements with: We can use these two facts to calculate the number of accessible microstates of type , this is called the weight of the microstate and is denoted by, : The weight of a microstate is proportional to the probability of the system being in it. So one way to calculate the probability of being in the state is via: where the summation is over the weights of all the other possible microstates. A handy way to view a microstate is with a pack of cards (Birks bath), in a pack of playing cards the statistical weight of a club is 13 since there are 13 of then the statistical weight of a queen is 4. The probability of selecting a club card is the chances of picking out a club are times greater than picking out a queen. The statistical weight of the queen of hearts is 1. There is one obvious constraint that can always be imposed and that is that the total number of particles is the sum of the number of particles in each state: We can impose other constraints on the system as they are required later. Because the particles of each type are identical it is natural to assign a probability that a randomly selected particle is of type, , as: We are also able to define an Expectation value for the system. If we were interested in the average occupancy of each of the types we would have: which would represent the average occupancy of each type. If we were interested in the charge (or energy (I shall use for either) we would similarly have: Let us take some examples and compute the statistical weights, average occupancy and average energy (represented by the value of the type index e.g. if , the energy would be two units). I shall consider that the atoms are all identical apart from the energy that they have and that a macrostate is the same for each. For the first case let us assume that we have 5 atoms and the macrostate corresponds to an energy of 5 units. The table below shows that (for example) the microstate 3 has a weight of 20, this means that there are 20 microstates with the occupancy levels given that correspond to the macrostate We can tabulate the various combinations as below: microstate number Occupancy of type i weight probability n0 n1 n2 n3 n4 n5 1 4 0 0 0 0 1 5 0.0397 2 3 1 0 0 1 0 20 0.1587 3 3 0 1 1 0 0 20 0.1587 4 2 2 0 1 0 0 30 0.2381 5 2 1 2 0 0 0 30 0.2381 6 1 3 1 0 0 0 20 0.1587 7 0 5 0 0 0 0 1 0.0079 totals 15 12 4 2 1 1 126 1 Average occupancy 2.222 1.389 0.794 0.397 0.159 0.040 Table 3.1: Table showing occupancy levels for a 5 atom system with a macrostate of 5. This table was generated by finding all of the numbers that sum (in this case) to 5 which is the macrostate. It shows the number of atoms with a particular energy in the columns headed , the statistical weight of each microstate is in the weight column, the probability column next to it shows the probability of randomly selecting this microstate from a given macrostate (in this case 5 atoms and a total energy of 5). The row titled average occupancy shows the expected occupancy of an energy level of type , calculated from the table. Looking at the table there are two equally most likely microstate arrangements. The first of these corresponds to and , both occurring with a probability of 0.238. Another possible macrostate is listed below, this time we have 7 atoms and an energy of 7 units. The headings of the table are the same as in the previous example. We can see that the weight of the most probable microstate is 420 and that we have a probability of 0.245 of randomly selecting one of them. The occupancy levels are: microstate occupancy of type i weight probability n0 n1 n2 n3 n4 n5 n6 n7 1 6 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 7 0.004 2 5 1 0 0 0 0 1 0 42 0.024 3 5 0 1 0 0 1 0 0 42 0.024 4 5 0 0 1 1 0 0 0 42 0.024 5 4 2 0 0 0 1 0 0 105 0.061 6 4 1 1 0 1 0 0 0 210 0.122 7 4 1 0 2 0 0 0 0 105 0.061 8 4 0 2 1 0 0 0 0 105 0.061 9 3 3 0 0 1 0 0 0 140 0.082 10 3 2 1 1 0 0 0 0 420 0.245 11 3 1 3 0 0 0 0 0 140 0.082 12 2 4 0 1 0 0 0 0 105 0.061 13 2 3 2 0 0 0 0 0 210 0.122 14 1 5 1 0 0 0 0 0 42 0.024 15 0 7 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0.001 totals 51 30 11 6 3 2 1 1 1716 1 Average occupancy 3.231 1.885 1.028 0.514 0.228 0.086 0.024 0.004 Table A3 2: a seven atom system with a total energy of seven A final example consists of a system of 10 atoms and a total energy of 9. As will be readily seen as the number of atoms and the energy increases the number of microstates corresponding to a given macrostate increases so does the size of the table. It was quite difficult to work out the number of combinations of energy that could occur and I wouldnt want to do it again for larger tables. In the next part we shall use the method of Lagrange multipliers to massively simplify the calculations for the probabilities and expectations. For the case of 10 atoms and an energy of 9 units. We see that the most probable microstates have the following occupancy levels: The most probable microstate has a probability of 0.1555, but there is another microstate that is only slightly less probable (a probability of 0.1300) and this has occupancy levels of: The two least likely microstates are the following: Both have a probability of 0.0002 which is very small indeed. Table 3 is below: d occupancy of each type i weight probability n0 n1 n2 n3 n4 n5 n6 n7 n8 n9 1 9 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 10 0.000205677 2 8 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 90 0.00185109 3 8 0 1 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 90 0.00185109 4 8 0 0 1 0 0 1 0 0 0 90 0.00185109 5 8 0 0 0 1 1 0 0 0 0 90 0.00185109 6 7 2 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 360 0.00740436 7 7 1 1 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 720 0.014808721 8 7 1 0 1 0 1 0 0 0 0 720 0.014808721 9 7 1 0 0 2 0 0 0 0 0 360 0.00740436 10 7 0 2 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 360 0.00740436 11 7 0 1 1 1 0 0 0 0 0 720 0.014808721 12 7 0 0 3 0 0 0 0 0 0 120 0.00246812 13 6 3 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 840 0.017276841 14 6 2 1 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 2520 0.051830522 15 6 2 0 1 1 0 0 0 0 0 2520 0.051830522 16 6 1 2 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 2520 0.051830522 17 6 1 1 2 0 0 0 0 0 0 2520 0.051830522 18 6 0 3 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 840 0.017276841 19 5 4 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 1260 0.025915261 20 5 3 1 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 5040 0.103661045 21 5 3 0 2 0 0 0 0 0 0 2520 0.051830522 22 5 2 2 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 7560 0.155491567 23 5 1 4 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1260 0.025915261 24 4 5 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 1260 0.025915261 25 4 4 1 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 6300 0.129576306 26 4 3 3 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 4200 0.086384204 27 3 6 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 840 0.017276841 28 3 5 2 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 2520 0.051830522 29 2 7 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 360 0.00740436 30

Wednesday, November 13, 2019

Analysis of an Article on Obesity in America Essay -- Article Review

Obesity kills at least 111,000 Americans per year (Greenstreet 107). The government has made many approaches to reshape our food system and attempt to force us to buy the foods that make us fat. Especially during our recession, it is that much easier to buy fast foods because it simply is the cheaper thing to do. We have many needs as human beings that need to be met, with food being one of the most important and being in this recession has made us easy targets for the government. Organic foods and less-fatty foods are more expensive these days so even health-savvy people try to find cheaper alternatives and look for the positives in these not-so-healthy foods. Due to this, many people believe that the government and its power to control how expensive or cheap food is sold for is the biggest reason for obesity in America but in retrospect, it is simply our own fault because we make the decision to save money and eat less nutritiously over spending more money on the best food for yo ur diet. The reason for the growing population of obesity is not due to the government creating this epidemic because they in turn are trying to help out the growing obese population. Also, the obese population is constantly growing because of the personal choices of the people, the environment around them and the genetics of each individual. Immediately in the subtitle of the article, Greenstreet is quick to declare â€Å"how corporations and the US Government create the obesity epidemic† (Greenstreet 107). He makes the government seem like they are the main enemies and contributors to the growing obesity epidemic, â€Å"the government takes an extremely damaging and passive-aggressive role in contributing to a national health crisis...† (Greenstreet 107). ... ...): 1095-1105. Raj, Manu and R. Krishna Kumar, â€Å"Obesity in children & adolescents.† Indian Journal of Medical Research 132.5 (2010): 598-607. Kouzoukas, Demetrios L. â€Å"Legal Preparedness for Obesity Prevention and Control: The Structural Framework and the Role of Government.† Journal of Law 37 (2009): 24-27 "Major Crops Grown in the United States | Ag 101 | Agriculture | US EPA." US Environmental Protection Agency. N.p., n.d. Web. 1 May 2011. . "Obesity and Genetics." Columbia St. Mary's Medical Moment. N.p., Web. 1 May 2011. . "Ten ways to distinguish between healthy and unhealthy food." Choosing and cooking healthy food. N.p., n.d. Web. 1 May 2011. .

Sunday, November 10, 2019

True Love: Hermia and Lysander

True Love Love is a strong-filled emotion, a bond which is shared between two persons. Love adds to the enchantment and beauty of life. Love has the power to lift the spirits of the persons who share this pure sentiment and is also capable of eliminating the controversies, jealousies and barriers existent due to blood lineage which may try to harm lovers. Egeus, Hermia’s Father, goes to Duke Theseus for assistance with his predicament. Theseus gives Hermia the option to either marry Demetrius, the man his father has deemed worthy of her, or for her to live a barren life as a nun.As Hermia heard what was to come, she replies to Theseus as she defends her love, †So I will grow, so live, so die, my lord, Ere I will yield my virgin patent up unto his lordship whose unwished yoke my soul consents not to give sovereignity. † Hermia’s pale cheeks and melancholic look reflected the sorrow settling in her spirit as she lost her right to love with her heart but in the eyes of another. The situation in which Hermia and Lysander are due to Egues complaint reveals the dominant male perspective of a fatherin society.Lysander in the situation they are in comforts Hermia by saying, â€Å"The course of true love never did run smooth. † Lysander assured her that they are only going through a phase which all lovers undergo but they will be able to conquer. In response to the Dukes options offered to Hermia, she and Lysander plan to elope in the woods and go to Lysander’s aunt. Lysander suggests to his love,†Therefore hear me, Hermia: I have a widow aunt a dowager of great revenue; and she hath no child. From Athens is her house remote seven leagues; and she respects me as her only son.There gentle Hermia, may I marry thee†¦Ã¢â‚¬  Hermia replies to him, â€Å"In that same place thou hast appointed me tomorrow truly will I meet with thee. † Hermia‘s and Lysander’s love is always put to the test by Egeus’ rejection of Lysander. In the forest, their love is put to the test simply by the fact that Demetrius is always after Hermia and tries to prevent her from eloping with Lysander. Their love is also trialed by Puck who confuses the Athenian lad which Oberon had sent him to put the love potion on.Puck was to place the potion on Demetrius for him to respond to Helena’s love but instead Puck placed it on Lysander’s. Throughout the plot of the story, Hermia always had the option to give up on Lysander’s love and stay with the lad her father had chosen for her, but she always had in mind to follow her heart and not give up on her love due to small adversities. Lysander is worthy of Hermia’s love and proves to be a brave lad who was willing to take risks in order to be with Hermia.While being with the Duke, Lysander tries to convince them that he is financially stable to be with Hermia by saying, â€Å"I am my lord, as well possessed. My love is more than his; my fortune every way as fairly ranked- if not with vantage- as Demetrius. † Through all adversities, He never left Hermia unprotected nor did he give up. Lysander comforts Hermia with his company and words of advice. Lysander was with Hermia in times of need as in the Dukes resolution.Lysander conquered all obstacles that came in between the love that he had for Hermia and proved he was truly worthy of Hermia’s love with his actions. The theme of forbidden love is reflected by the characters of Hermia and Lysander who live life as a daily battle in struggle to maintain their love alive. Even though â€Å"supernatural† powers and mountain-high problems may come in the way of true love, in the end love will always be victorious. Hermia and Lysander are an example of a couple who faced challenges on the way but the prize-being together as a couple, was far more rewarding in the end.

Friday, November 8, 2019

Importance of interview

Importance of interview To many firms, the interviewing process has always been a challenge to most of the human resource personnel in charge of this section in the employee recruitment process. As a result most of the organizations try to take the initiative of improving employees by taking their human resource personnel through the appraisal process.Advertising We will write a custom essay sample on Importance of interview specifically for you for only $16.05 $11/page Learn More This process is aimed at improving the employee’s ability and efficiency in carrying out an interview that enables the organization to recruit the desired individual with the desired skills. In this appraisal session, the trainer uses speeches to communicate with his/her audience, giving out brochures and video clips were necessary to explain his points (Laakmann, 2011). It is first of all necessary for the interviewer to be prepared before the actual interview is started in order to ensure that th e best candidate is selected with minimum errors. To start with the interviewer should be on the right track, he/she must be able to identify the goals of the interview and understand them clearly. This may be formulated through the identification of the present state of the firm, its needs in terms of the manpower, the quality and integrity of the preferred personnel. The interviewer should further be able to estimate the expected expenditure in the process, and expressly specify the estimated cost to be incurred on the employed personnel by the firm. This should be estimated based on what the firm can be able to afford at the time as salary to the additional employees, and the anticipated productivity of the individual to the output of the organization (Laakmann, 2011). After the preparation of this information, it should be passed to other colleagues in order to improve the performance and coordination of the team of interviewers.Advertising Looking for essay on business economics? Let's see if we can help you! Get your first paper with 15% OFF Learn More As the team of interviewers, we should be able to review the material presented by the applicants taking note that a resume will always give more information about the applicant than an application letter. The next step includes the systematic classification of all the application letters and resumes initially received from the prospective interviewees, following the posting of the job in an advertisement (Glasser, 2007). The material should be screened for consistency of information between the application letter and the resume. At this stage of the process, the personnel should be able to avoid generalization errors like the qualifying of unnecessary courses done by the some of the candidates. To create some level of order in the whole process, the documents of the candidates are then classified in to three groups. Group A (qualified), Group B (meet minimum requirements) and Grou p C (does not meet qualifications). The collection of documents that are categorized as qualified are then re-reviewed to determine the best candidates that should be taken through an interview. While the rest are kept as contingency applications that may be used in case the person initially selected fails to turn out as expected. Several other methods may be used by the interviewer in the selection process of the preferred candidate, for example, a telephone interview (Cosentino, 2011). This may be done with utmost discretion by avoiding asking irrelevant questions that may not be related to the job, to minimize on the risk that may arise for example, the discrimination acts that may be due to asking questions about the interviewee’s race.Advertising We will write a custom essay sample on Importance of interview specifically for you for only $16.05 $11/page Learn More The next process is the actual interviewing process between the representative of the company or the employer himself with the candidate. To begin with, the human resource department of the firm may call the applicants directly themselves, or schedule the interviews through the use of recruitment specialists. However, there are some general guidelines that may be used by the firm to ensure good results are achieved (Cosentino, 2011). In the scheduling of the interviewing process, the interviewees should be allotted equal time for the process without any form of discrimination. This ensures that the process is fair and just to the interviewees. Adequate time should be allowed between two consecutive interviews, this will help the interviewers to get enough time to arrange the details of the completed interviewee. Simultaneously, sufficient time should be allocated for candidates going and coming to the office to do so freely. The candidates should be informed before they come for the interview about the venue, the specific time and the day of the interview. This will enable the interviewee to plan their activities and allocate adequate time for the interview. The applicants should be well informed about the company before they come for the interview, this will be a sign of interest in the company and its activities. In return they will understand company activities and what to expect from the employment. The candidates may further be instructed to bring job related documentations such as, the work models or recommendation letters where applicable. Several methods may be used by the firm to get more information from the candidate that can help in the selection process like the use of questionnaires, or direct questions asked by the interviewer. At this point fliers of some of the questions are distributed to the audience. In most of the companies, the interviewing process is done through question and answer sessions between the interviewer and the candidate; however, these questions must be well devised for them to retrieve the desired info rmation from the candidate on his/her abilities (Cosentino, 2011). Using direct questions like those that require a yes or no answer should be limited as they restrict information obtained from the candidate. The interviewer should use open ended questions like; tell me about your worst experience? These types of questions are the best to be used as they challenge the candidate to tell what he/she thinks is important and necessary in the prevailing circumstances. The answers are then used by the interviewer to judge the credibility and potential of the interviewee.Advertising Looking for essay on business economics? Let's see if we can help you! Get your first paper with 15% OFF Learn More He/she may also make use of the situational questions that help to imply the type of reactions to expect from the applicant. These give the candidate the challenging context of the job like situation. The answers offered by the candidate are then used to assess their ability to identify the imperative circumstances in the job, analyze them, and provide reasonable solutions (Darling, 2009). Besides, some of the questions may be applied with the intention of getting general information about the candidates; these are recommended for use for a start up organization or first interviews before the final one is done (Posegate, 2008). Several of the questions may include; Questions used to identify previous work experience, for example. What are some of your key functions and responsibilities in your current job? Identify a time in your employment that you worked and achieved all you could? Questions used to establish the expectations of the interviewee on the Job being applied. What are the reasons that made you to apply for this position? Why do you think you should be hired for this position? Questions used to identify the candidate’s attitude towards management. What do you think are the most significant roles of a manager? Describe the type of directions that you prefer from a supervisor? Identification of the employee’s interpersonal skills, with reference to what the firm needs. How do you convince others to do what you want? Have you ever had conflict with the boss? How did you approach her/him and what solutions did you get? Were you satisfied with the solution? We need for you to describe a situation where you have a project in mind and you lack the necessary cash, how will you persuade your employer to grant you the cash. In some of the jobs, the firm may need someone who is creative and the only way to identify if for sure that person is creative is the use of questions whose answers require a creative mind. For instance, asking the cand idate to explain what he has done to improve the level of efficiency, effectiveness and ways to make work easier in his/her initial occupation (Glasser, 2007). Furthermore, in the assessment of whether the interviewer has a vision or not and his ability to understand the needs of the company, the interviewer may use questions like; have you ever been offered the position of leading a project? Explain how you were able to create and introduce direction in the team? Some positions in the firm may need an individual with good leadership abilities and the necessary influence on other people through inspiration of others, charisma and spurring. This kind of person may be identified through the use of well formulated questions, that lead to well thought out answers, for example, describe your approach to decision making and problem solving that make you unique? Or if you were to recommend for the transfer of certain functions from one department to another, what are some of the main facto rs that you will consider? These questions give the interviewee the chance to display his ability to make quick and creative solutions to the normal challenges that arise in the day to day work environment (Darling, 2009). After all the interviews have been done and the desired individuals have been identified. The personnel are supposed to develop a list of job related questions that should be used to verify the referees of all the candidates. Departments should carry out their own checks where necessary and if external help is required, one should conduct the staff recruitment specialists. We verify the interviewee’s referees for the following three reasons; To confirm employment; To substantiate new skills learned during the interview. To obtain employment recommendation. On the completion of the above procedures, a formal job offer is presented to the candidates. This is done later in form of an engagement letter and contract of employment based on the terms of the spec ific industry in which the firm operates (Posegate, 2008). References Cosentino, M. (2011). Complete Case Interview Organization. New York: Pre-press Publishers. Darling, T. (2009). How to Get Into Consulting Firms: A Surefire Case Interview Method. Boston: Person publishers. Glasser, C. (2007). Complete Case Interviewing Preparation. Chicago: Linder schrelber-Genster. Laakmann, G. M. (2011). Cracking the Coding Interview: 150 Programming Questions and Solutions. San Francisco: Brooks Cole publishers. Posegate, A. (2008). Climbing The Corporate Ladder. London: Front Row Press.