Teamwork And Leadership Skills Management Essay

Teamwork And Leadership Skills Management Essay An organization is a formal group of people with one or more shared goals. Organisation has people working for them with the sole motive of making profits for the company. It is rightly said by Lewis B. Ergen, The ratio of Wes to Is is the best indicator of the development of a team. According to Henry Ford Coming together is a beginning. Keeping together is progress. Working together is success. The concept of two or more people working collectively is called a team. It is also define by the Websters dictionary that teamwork is a combined action by a group of people who keep their personal interest and opinions aside for the unity and integrity of the group. Though this is a definition but it does not imply that the individual people in the organisation are not important unless they are in a group. Meaning or definition of teamwork, in general terms means that efficient and effective team efforts are always ahead of the individuals reach. The best result of teamwork is produced when all individual in the group are focused towards one common objective or goal. In order to inspire the employees to a greater level, companies need a Leader. I believe in the saying that Leaders are made not born. Anyone who has the willpower and the desire can be a potential leader. Leaders can be developed by proper education, experience over the years and the right training. Over the period of time, the leaders also have to keep them up-to-date by the process of continuous learning. Thus, leadership is a process which is used to motivate other people in order to achieve the desired goals and objectives of the company. A perfect example of a leader is Mahatma Gandhi, who fought the non-violence fight for the freedom of his nation, India, having the entire nation as his follower. ROLE OF TEAMWORK Over the years, teamwork has become an extremely important term for any company. It has been laid down in the culture at workplace and hence making it a major and crucial part of the selection process for many companies. All companies understand the importance and the wonders what team can do. Organisations believer that nothing is impossible if all great minds, work together. There is a very famous saying that there is no I in the word Team. Having teams can result in faster and efficient outputs with better decision making skills. The various advantages of teamwork for all organisations are: It improves profitability as well as productivity as all the employees are highly motivated and skilled. There is a major reduction in wastage which in turn reduces the cost. A team leader constantly keeps a regular check on the quality of the products. The level of motivation within employees is also increased due to development of the personnel by exchange of great thoughts and idea within teams. Recognition of individual members within teams also motivates member to put more efforts. It also leads to low turnover rate of absenteeism is also reduced as employees develop a sense of belonging towards the company. All complex issues or decision are handled in a better manner and at a faster rate. Therefore, the all critical issues of the company are dealt with greater variety of knowledge experience and skill. ROLE OF LEADERSHIP A leader needs to perform the following to remain on his position. Encourages the heart   A leader should enjoy all the moment of glory with the followers whereas try to restrict the sad news away from them. Enable others to act   It is extremely important for a leader to provide other with all possible tools and ideas at the leaders disposal to the members which could help in quicker decision making. Model the way   the basic difference between a manager and a leader is that a manager will tell others what to do and how to do it , whereas a leader will actually perform the task himself and then ask others to follow by doing the same. Challenge the process   A leader also brings about change in the organisation. Since the managers role is to guide what he has bee told by the top management but leader, initiates new developments and seeks things for improvement. Inspire a shared vision   A good leader should never hide anything from his followers. The leaders should share all his ideas and plans with the followers. Leadership theory models can explain more Bass Theory of Leadership In order to understand, how normal people can become Leaders, we can analyse Bass theory of leadership which says there are three major theories which can explain this phenomena: People are born with difference in traits or personalities that may naturally take the individual to perform leadership role. This theory is known as the trait theory. In case of a crisis or a deadly situation, the person who stands up on that moment which brings out the astonishing qualities in a normal man is called the Great Events theory. Some people can choose to become leaders and learn the required leadership skills. This theory is called the transformational or process theory of leadership. It is widely used theory these days, universities and colleges are having special courses and lecture to guide students who plan to become great leaders of the future. CHARECTORSTICKS OF A TEAM IN A WORKPLACE Leadership- it is important for all teams to have a leader who could provide them with right direction and guide them. The leader of the team should not consider himself above the team members, A team leaders is the one who work as a part of team, keeping all members joined together. Clear goal- all members of the team should have a clear idea of what has to be done. The objectives should be SMART, specific, measurable, achievable, realistic, and time bound. Results-driven structure- the teams should be given some freedom from the management in order to try different ways in which they feel that the output can improve. The team leader should have enough authority to change things around a little. All competent team members- it is vitially important for any team to have good team members. One bad fish can dirty the entire pond, similarly, if one member is not contributing as expected of him, the work is divided among other member of the team. Unified commitment- the member should only have one common goal and not few separate individual goals as difference in motives might lead to conflicts within teams. Collaborative climate- A team must posses a climate that has clouds full of trust, respect and honesty among the team members for each other as well as the team leader. High standards- it is very important for the leader to set a high standard for the members as they should know what is expected from them. Just by having bold meeting and saying big words wont make any difference, the leader has to perform his duty and demonstrate how are things needed to be done. External support and encouragement- A team comprises of many individuals, all oh who are thirsty for appreciation and encouragement from their managers and leaders for the efforts. Motivation also plays a key role in better output of a team. CHARACTERISTIC OR FACTORS OF LEADERSHIP Leader- A team leader should be honest, intelligent, and understanding person, who should know his capabilities and capacity. The level of success of the leader is determined by the followers and not the leader himself therefore, in order to be a good and successful leader, the person should be able to convince his followers about the things he can achiever by their support and hard work. Followers- different companies require different kinds of leaders and their abilities. A company like Anita Rodricks Body Shop requires a leader to be human oriented, who could lead the team by motivating them at every step and consider the followers as a part of the business, whereas in companies like MacDonalds, a followers are normal part time staff members, who learn the job in a day and thus need a leader with close supervision. Communication- two-way communication is the key for any successful teamwork in any company. Communication forms a very basis of any team, mostly the non-verbal form. It is very important that the leader communicates his vision across to all the members and the members in return communicate their responses to the change and how can they contribute towards it. Situation- it is extremely important for a leader to be able to adapt him-self according to the changing situations on a daily basis. For instance a people-oriented leader, who usually tends to soft towards employees, has to take a firm decision of telling some one they cant go on leave due to high work pressures, and deadlines. The situation normally has more impact on the leaders act rather than his traits due to the fact that, leaders can stabilise their inner traits over a period of time but difference in situations is the real test for any leader. Due to this reason many authors have claimed the situational theory more effective than the process or the trait theory. BELBINS TEAM ROLES If a team wishes to have 100% success, the members should have one of the following eight roles formulated by Dr, Meredith Belbin, called as the Belbin team roles. These roles are: The MONITOR-EVALUATOR, one who contributes a specific study by the help of objectivity and stops. The PLANT is a member who has original ideas, solutions, suggestions and plans. TEAM WORKER performs even if other members fail to contribute their respective part of the work and works even under immense work pressures. The IMPLEMENTOR is the person who, implements the taken decision into meaningful information and implements the decision into manageable tasks. The RESOURCE INVESTIGATOR is a member who thinks out of the box and gathers information from all possible sources and starts the discussion e.g. sales people of the team. The CO-ORDINATOR is the one who combine all the other members together and reminds the member of their task and set objectives on a daily basis in order to lay down the daily agenda. The SHAPER provides direction and shape to the team and their efforts, but does not really interfere in the discussion. The FINISHER is the one who keeps reminding all the member of the deadline and the urgency being a bit hard. Thus, as discussed above, that different situations require different team members contribution. For instance- all new teams would require a good shaper, competitive situations would require an innovator, who could provide innovative ideas to have a differentiated product or service. CRITICAL REVIEW The main reason that affect any team is its- Purpose and mission The most important and the basic requirement for any team for be successful is to have clear purpose and mission of the company which explains the team, what they have to do and then they make their own short and long term goals in order to decide how to achieve them. We can illustrate motivation by a simple hypothetical situation. In a construction company project, there are group of electricians hired to perform all the work related to making cable terminals. The company assumed they would work together, after two months, all the electricians were about to leave the job on asking the reason, they explained that they were having issues with maintaining their focus as they could not maintain their interest in their jobs because some of them were conduit specialist, some being good at cable trays while other who did not directly work with cable terminals. Thus the company got the problem and realised that is the purpose of any job is different between members they will tend to have conflicts and result in lack of motivation as well. Along with clear purpose and mission, motivation has also be described as a key element of the driving factors behind a successful team. If the teams are not fully motivated by their leaders, how ever the big company is, whatever the money involved is, without inner drive or the urge to attain something is missing, nothing could be achieved. It it is the prime duty of the team leader to keep his team highly motivated and make them ready to crack and hard rock that comes on their way to success. PRATICAL EXAMPLE Leadership I work in Mark Spencer for the past two years in London; we have a busy retail outlet. Recently, during the Christmas period, our Sales Team leader/ supervisor in the store had to take a leave for 2 weeks. Being the most experienced member after him, I had to take the responsibility on my shoulders and ensure that the targets of the team werent hampered due to his absence. At the beginning it all seemed out of place, i)various tasks needed to be completed for Christmas ii) I was the youngest member of the team yet the leader of the lot. This is where my degree in Business management came to be applied, through application theories and techniques learnt at University, I was able to become the leader of the team, having an approach of management of commitment and not management of control, along with other management skills like planning, implementation, delegation, control I was able to run the store smoothly for those 2 weeks. Teamwork: Working in MS, we mostly have a team of 15 employees working in a shift, along with 2 supervisors and 2 line managers. We are always busy during special days like Valentines and Christmas day, during Christmas time, our store was really busy and we were also short of staff being the festival season. There was a team of 7 employees and 3 being new Christmas staff. I was the most experienced staff at that point of time and all my supervisors assigned me work, so I had to co-ordinate that work among my team members and I had to act as a team leader. I asked them to divide the task in different sections and try to finish it as soon as possible and then let me know when they were done and by this we reached are daily targets and the managers appreciated my work and contribution towards sales. CONCLUSION Thus, teamwork is an essential feature for all modern companies. They believe if all their employees are equipped with good teamwork skills, it can also lead to their competitive edge and hence teamwork has been laid down in the recruitment and selection process of the workforce in order to get the right man, for the right job at the right place and at the right time. Teamwork, without a leader is like boat in the middle of the sea but have no idea where to float. The leader along with providing direction also binds the team together and aligns all the members towards the companys goal. A good leader and a strong team is all a company needs in order to capture any market in the modern world. Thought not always all members get along well, the problems with teams are, many a times not all members contribute equally and like to pas the buck onto other shoulders, thinking that they would not be caught by anyone. But due this reason there are taken out of the team and new member is introduced. It is the duty of the leader to make sure all members in the team are happy with each other and performing to a level that will take them towards success.

Why We Should Stick To Qwerty :: essays research papers

Why We Should Stick To Qwerty Computer Science 10 The Qwerty keyboard - named Qwerty because the letters q, w, e, r, t, y are arranged next to each other - has been the universal standard since the beginning of the 1890s. Since then, there have been many proposals by other keyboard makers to market products that would enable users to type faster. Other proposals put the most frequently used letters - dhiatensor - in the middle row.i Although these keyboards enable users to type far faster than the qwerty keyboard, they are rarely sold. There are several reasons for this. First, there is no need for the regular users to type any faster than at the current speed. Second, for the people whose job require fast typing, the new keyboards can lead to bigger health problems that develop from continuous typing. Third, and most importantly, standardization has led the qwerty keyboards to firmly hold the position as the keyboard. There are major differences between the two types of keyboard users; the regular users and the other typists. The regular users are people who uses the keyboard for word processing, e-mailing, and internet; there is not much of a need for them to type extremely fast. They do not type mechanically but rather based on their thought, and thinking takes time. In other words, faster keyboards are irrelevant for them because they are not continuously typing. They need to think what they are going to write, one sentence one after another. On the other hand, the typists whose job is simply to type, do so continuously. They also happen to be the major victims of repetitive Strain Injury (RSI) which is in large part caused by continuously stroking the keyboards. In an article about RSI, Huff explains the changes that the companies are undergoing to become more productive: Many work practices are changing with automation to increase productivity. These include fewer staff, heavier workloads, more task specialization, faster pacing of work, fewer rest breaks, more overtime, more shift work and nonstandard hours, and more piece work and bonus systems. These work practices can entail very prolonged rapid or forceful repetitive motions leading to fatigue and overuse of muscles.ii Because RSI is a major problem to the typists, it would be a suicidal move for them to adopt faster typable keyboards. More of them will develop RSI. As for the companies that hire these typists, not only will the frequency of RSI development increase, the amount of money that the companies have to compensate to the employees who develop RSI will also increase.

Mining group gold: How to cash in on the collaborative brain power of a team for innovation and results Essay

Mining Group Gold Introduction   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   To be a collaborative leader, there are crucial behaviors that one needs to understand. It requires one to be good at building collaborative partnerships. Additionally, this demands facilitation of team work within individual group and across work groups, committees, problem solving teams and in task forces. Studying group gold mining enables one to learn to be more accomplished in the field of facilitative leadership, whereby one leads from the center of the team rather than from the top of individual pyramid (kayser, 2011). This assists in acquiring important facilitation strategies and skills necessary in carrying an individual team to new heights in the pursuit of innovative thinking. This essay will discuss the five basic steps for mining group gold for the team meeting management while outlining the steps for dealing with emotions. In addition, the paper will explain and describe how mining group gold process will improve teamwork em powerment and effective communication.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   The group session foundation is a clear understanding of its purpose, and the desired outcome. The purpose of the session is the reason why the group has been called and it should be clearly written. On the other hand, desired outcomes which may also be called goals are specific statement identifying what is to be in the time of the session during the time spent in the session. Therefore, when people leave a session, they will know specifically what was completed, and what wasn’t .The desired outcome gives a description of the session being conducted, provide focus during the session and create common expectations for all the participants. In addition, they provide a benchmark against which the outcomes can be compared to gain a sense of the session’s productivity. A team without a desired outcome will definitely fail. Confused and frustrated group members may be tangled in endless arguments over every purpose of the meeting. Furthermore, a group’s purpose and the desired outcome helps a group gets back on track when necessary.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   A facilitator helps a group free from internal obstacles or difficulties so that it may effectively pursue the achievement of the desired outcomes of the group. Facilitation occurs any time a group member behaves in a manner that makes the group advance towards developing or refining a structure, making certain information and data are shared and getting rid of any internal blockages hindering the accomplishment of the desired outcome of the session. Although only one person is appointed to be the facilitator, all the other team members are designated to be secondary facilitators. The scribe and the time keeper also act as support for the facilitator as well. The time keeper does this by accurately taking into account the time taken for each agenda and alerting the facilitator when the group is using more or less that he allotted time the scriber helps the group, not only by making precise notes of the group session, but also by listing wh atever action items may have been identified.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   For the manager or the team leader, acting as the primary facilitator, being able to deal with feelings is the single most critical facilitation skill to be honed. Feeling is information that need to be processed and a primary facilitator should guide that process using the following sequence: feelings, facts and emotions. (Kayser, 2011) To begin with, when a group is in the feelings stage, it is pointless to ignore them.to handle this stage, feelings must be acknowledged as real and accepted. At any time in this stage, the primary facilitator encourages individuals to express their emotions in an organized way. Secondly, the primary facilitator is in a position to help the group generate and use fact and to identify and analyze the problem. The group should the facts in a less emotional way. Once the facts have been identified, the group is now ready to generate the potential solutions.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   The mining gold group will help improve teamwork by inviting everyone to participate in the meeting and during regular work assignments. For instance anyone can facilitate the meeting and everyone has their own responsibilities. The process can help empower members since the leader addresses the group in a circle rather than in a pyramid where it is hard to reach him. The scribe and the time keeper are also empowered in a group. Employees work together hence it strengthens their relationship with each other and with the leader.in a gold mine group, anyone can voice their opinion and what they feel about a situation like new hires, layoff and deadlines. This helps improve communication.in addition, they have a policy where member are to each communicating to each other and not at each other talking to each other and not at each other. This enables people to listen to each other.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   To sum up, groups are the life blood of organizations. Sitting down with group of people is often the right way to process the information and achieve goals. Groups are better because they can think in more verity and they can process more knowledge. Unfortunately sometimes the objectives are not realized (kayser, 2011). On the other hand, the group may realize its full potential and produce a superior output which encourages people to be committed to it and they feel satisfied with it. Therefore mining group gold is a very powerful technique. References Kayser, T. A. (2011). Building team power: How to unleash the collaborative genius of teams for increased engagement, productivity, and results. New York: McGraw-Hill. Kayser, T. A. (2011). Mining group gold: How to cash in on the collaborative brain power of a team for innovation and results. New York: McGraw-Hill Source document

Amateur College Athletes Essay Example

Amateur College Athletes Essay Example College Athletes Review Essay Sample College Athletes Review Essay Sample The topic of paying college athletes has been the most debated issue in collegiate athletics for decades. Every autumn it is renewed with the new force. Despite the longstanding debates, it is, however, difficult to say â€Å"yes† or â€Å"no† to the question whether amateur athletes should be paid to play or not. The existing situation must be examined from all points of view. A role of college athletes has drastically changed over the last two centuries and should be re-examined. Beginning as a means to â€Å"build character or contribute to an individual’s intellectual development† for middle- and upper-class students, athletic participation is no more an extracurricular activity that hardly demands a few hours a week (Flowers 346). Nowadays, collegiate athletics is a multi-million-dollar entertaining enterprise. Television broadcast revenues of college sports have soared to nearly $2 billion a year as CNBC has reported. Revenues from merchandising and other licensing rights were estimated to be $4.6 billion in 2012. Meanwhile, players do not see a dime from using their images on jerseys and video games. The athlete conferences are reluctant to acknowledge the athletes as their employees as it will entail serious payments and tax-exempts. Amateur Athletes Should Be Paid to Play For the last several years, a series of lawsuits was filed in the courts concerning violations of NCAA regulations on any unauthorized benefits. The Ohio State merchandise scandal ousted football coach Jim Tressel. A series of financial scandals at the Fiesta Bowl led to a $1 million fine, the firing of Fiesta Bowl CEO John Junker and the indictment of five other bowl employees (Taylor). Meanwhile, what really can change the situation with amateurism is the lawsuit led by former UCLA basketball star Ed O’Bannon, who sues the NCAA with antitrust violations of law and seeks revenues from TV broadcasts of college games during and after their collegiate careers, as well as profits from merchandise licensing fees on video games and paraphernalia. The court ruling has moved the O’Bannon suit another step closer to bringing compensation and more rights to college athletes (Waldron). The main governing body for college athletics is the National Collegiate Athletic Association. The NCAA’s stand on paying student-athletes, as they prefer to call them, is categorical. NCAA president Mark Emmert is â€Å"adamantly opposed to† compensations for students, â€Å"As long as Im president of the NCAA, we will not pay student-athletes to play sports† (Roberts). That stubborn stance comes from the old definition of college athletes as student-athletes. The hypocrisy hidden here is double-folded. Firstly, the amateur athletes are no longer as amateur as they used to be. They spend on training around 50 hours a week during the season with a â€Å"grueling workout of running, weight training, and cardiovascular conditioning, including long-distance running and wind sprints† (McCormick 106). Secondly, a term ‘student-athlete’ implies that a person is not mere an athlete, but is closely engaged in the educational process. Emmert states tha t they provide athletes â€Å"with world class educations† (Roberts). However, in reality, college athletes are more employees than students, and their relationship with their universities is an economic one (McCormick 106). Ivy League schools supported the NCAA’s decision not to pay their athletes. The league, composed of eight private institutions of higher education in the Northeastern U.S., has a strict policy regarding academic standards for their athletes and does not provide sports scholarships. Executive director of the conference Robin Harris says, â€Å"We’re not going to do a stipend. Our general philosophy is that our athletes should be treated as close as possible to our students† (Eichelberger). The offer of a stipend was introduced two years ago. In 2011, Division I schools were allowed to pay their athletes an additional $2,000 to cover their college tuition/ the gap between athletic scholarships and the true cost-of-attendance, which includes the tuition, room-and-board, books and other expenses. Not only does the stipend look like an inadequate sum (when a scholarship is worth $15,000 to $45,000 a year), but some universities disagreed that they could afford it. The motion was put on hold. At the same time, the universities can afford keeping coaches with bloated wages. A college coach can make as much as a professional coach, especially if one speaks about football. In 2011, Ohio State signed with football coach Urban Meyer a six-year contract worth $24 million. Top three football coaches earn around 5 million a year each (Warner). With the existing state of affairs, almost everyone, but athletes benefit from the colleges seeing an increase in application to the athletic conferences reaping revenues for TV translations and selling the themed merchandise. Not all people seem to understand what it is like to be both an athlete and a student. The statistics from USA Today highlights that a typical player spends 45 hours per week on sports, which includes playing games, practicing and training (qtn in Linvill). Add to it approximately 40 hours that have to be spent on school, and it is clear that no time is left for a job to earn some extra money like all students do. Athletes have short careers. Best years are spent working for free. Injuries happen. This year, the University of Louisville basketball player Kevin Ware suffered one of the most horrible knee injuries (Laird) during a March Madness game. Ware’s recovery goes well, but if the problem will flare up later in life, no insurance is there to compensate for additional medical care. That was the case for the former University of Oklahoma basketball player Kyle Hardrick, who helped Putnam City High School win the 6A state championship in 2009 and sustained a serious knee injury at University of Oklahoma in 2010. Hardrick’s health insurance did not cover all medical bills, and now he is in litigation with the NCAA for a hardship waiver (Casteel). The tradition not to pay athletes has had a long history. Sports used to be viewed by college officials as â€Å"tolerated affairs† necessary only to â€Å"let go off some steam† and get fresh for intellectual activity (Flowers 345). It was organized by students with no help from the administration. Later, the leadership of universities understood that the student-run sporting activities can be used for marketing purposes to improve the image of educational institutions and to attract new students. The potential commercial possibilities were seen by sponsoring entrepreneurs. Thus, by the 1870s, â€Å"the foundation of intercollegiate athletics had been established† (347). With time, the student’s organization was substituted with business structures - professional coaches were hired; an extensive staff was needed to serve the whole college sports enterprise; proper stadiums were built; spectators were charged for viewing (351). From the very beginning, co llege sports were separate from the educational objective of higher education. Increasing demands for victories and successful athletic programs brought into the game â€Å"tramp† or â€Å"migrant† athletes who were not up to par academically but enjoyed the high performance athletic abilities (354). The amateurism concept let the elite institutions reconcile with the presence of working class athletes within their walls without losing their prestige. It begot the hypocrisy when in order to win competitions, universities had to have sports on the professional level, and in order to keep up respectability, they had to call it amateurism as it was ungentlemanly to receive money for doing sports. Therefore, it is possible to see that the intricate invention of the amateur code was a result of commercialization of college sports, and it was hypocritical from the very beginning. The next step in securing the right not to pay athletes was made by the NCAA fifty years ago. The National Collegiate Athletic Association introduced the term ‘student-athlete’ to describe the young men and women who are athletes at their member schools. The stress on underscoring the status of both a student and athlete hides the fact that in reality, they are the NCAA employees. The myth of student-athletes has worked for many decades as a shield for the athletic conferences allowing them to obtain the overwhelming monetary gain in comparison to the bare minimum provided for athletes (McCormick 74). College sports are a multi-billion-dollar industry. By way of one example, in 2003, the NCAA signed with CBS a $6 billion-worth 11-year deal for the right to broadcast the annual men’s basketball tournament March Madness (McCormick 74). Meanwhile, college athletes are compensated with grants-in-aid, such as accommodation, tuition, books, and other education related expenses, without the possibility to spend as they choose and work to make some extra money themselves. According to all legal standards, student-athletes are treated like employees: they perform services for the benefit of their universities; their daily lives are strictly regulated and controlled by the coaching staff. Their student status is subverted by demanding playing and training schedules with the football and men’s basketball seasons lengthened over time, or with a requirement to enroll in weight-training courses outside the permissible practice season, or attendance ‘voluntary’ practices on top of the required twenty hours per week (141). Students who once went to school only for an education and participated in these kinds of competitions in their free time now often attend these same universities solely for the purpose of participating in sports. The sub-standard academic performance among some athletes is the further evidence that they do not function primarily as students. Universities create academically undemanding courses primarily predominantly for athletes, not to mention special treatment from professors cutting athletes some slack and going easy on their weak academic performance (144). The final nail in the coffin of the student-athlete concept is low graduation rates among college athletes, which shows that they are not primarily students. Many non-athletic students leave school without graduating due to financial reasons. For grants-in-aid athletes, the situation should be reversed. Under otherwise equal conditions, college athletes should graduate at much higher rates than regular students in general; yet they do not. Studies show that sports success can contribute to lower graduation rates of players (152; Grimm 18). According to a recent Penn GSE report â€Å"Black Male Student –Athletes and Racial Inequities in NCAA Division I College Sports,† only about half of black male student athletes graduated within six years, and 97.4% of BCS institutions graduated black male student athletes at rates lower than undergraduate students overall (Harper, Williams, and Blackman). The pressure to succeed at the highest level takes the focus away from the â₠¬Ëœstudent’ in student-athlete. Over the last fifty years, the revenue-generating college sports have had the increased number of African-Americans. In fact, today, black male student athletes are 57.1% of college football players and 64.3% of college basketball players (Damario). Given multi-billion-dollar TV deals for the mainly white NCAA institutions, profitable merchandising deals for universities, and high wages for coaches, many view black amateur athleticism as â€Å"the new plantation† akin to the â€Å"exploitation endured by internally colonized people in the system of slavery† (Hawkins 13). Young athletes are lured into universities by perspectives to ‘make it’ to the pro-level. Meanwhile, it is a destiny of few. The rest often either lose their health after injuries, or turn out to be lacking â€Å"educational and life skills†, when their short sports life comes to an end (Damario). Therefore, the true nature of relationship between the NCAA and college athletes is one of an employer and employee. It was unintentionally confirmed in the statement of the American Athletic Conference commissioner Mike Aresco. â€Å"We will not pay players,† said Aresco last month. â€Å"That is not what college athletics is all about, and it is the road to ruin. We will not establish an employer-employee relationship† (Heitner). The true reason behind the NCAA reluctance to pay for playing is the fact that it will result in huge losses. First of all, they will lose their valuable tax-exempt status. Second, if student-athletes are recognized as employees that will result in the full package: additional costs, including potential workers’ compensation for injuries, medical insurance, retirement benefit plans, etc. Proponents of the non-payment variant claim that even without getting cash, in the economic sense, student-athletes at a major conference school on full scholarship are â€Å"paid $50,000 and $125,000 per year depending on their sport and whether they attend a public or private university† in the form of â€Å"education, room, board, and coaching/training† (Dorfman). However, not all student-athletes are able to receive a scholarship, and not all scholarships cover the full cost of college. In addition, many full-scholarship athletes live below the poverty line (Mc 79). Actually, the point that college athletes are provided with all necessary such as educational and living expenses can easily be refuted by a mere assumption that it is not all that people need in that life. College athletes may need to support their families or any other expenses not covered by ‘grants-and-aid’. Another argument in the discourse is that college athletes are exposed to publicity that is able to gain them contracts in pro-teams. It is supposedly easier to evaluate their sporting performance after observing their college athletic careers. It is a relevant argument, though it concerns only top players. In reality, a great number of college athletes do not become professional athletes. Only 2% of the NCAA football players and 1.3% of men’s basketball players joined professional leagues in 2006. Some never become professionals because of injuries suffered in college (McCormick 79). Also, paying college athletes is considered non-realistic as it will provoke problems between the revenue and non-revenue sports, better and worse players, male and female athletes. Will it be fair if a football player gets more than a field hockey player? No, it will not. The life is unfair. Non-revenue sport participants should just accept it as it is. If a sport is unable to keep itself afloat, then there is no need for the school to keep it around. In other professions, people also do not obtain equal payments; all depends on the amount of abilities and talent. Supporters of the ‘non-payment-for-college-athletes’ concept cannot see the difference between college sporting activities and any other extracurricular activities, such as flag corps, cheerleading, chorus, band apart from their living expenses paid for. It is being left aside that regular students have classes and free time that they can spend as they wish either for additional learning, earning extra money, or socializing. Meanwhile, for student-athletes, education cannot be their first concern as demanding playing schedules effectively bar them from studying as true students and leave no time for an extra job. The main culprit in the existing situation is the presence of the NCAA. It is absurd that the money do not go directly to the schools which the players represent but to a third party organization. Not least because the American public, including athletes, has taken in stride the widespread inequities that the most revenue-generating college sports programs were ridden with. The NCAA has no right to appeal to amateurism as there is no such thing. As Taylor Branchsep concludes in his article â€Å"The Shame of College Sports,† â€Å"any attempt to create [a legal definition of amateur] in enforceable law would expose its repulsive and unconstitutional nature- a bill of attainder, stripping from college athletes the rights of American citizenship.† While the O’Bannon case is not finalized, in November, Sports Illustrated.com informed that it â€Å"took a major step towards empowering current and future college athletes† by both parts to begin settlement discussions. The NCAA remains a defendant in the case. In 2011, Sports Illustrated published an editorial in favor of allowing college athletes to be paid by outside sources without compromising their eligibility (Branchsep). The educational premise that lays in the basis of amateur athletics is absolutely unnecessary; in fact, high-level sporting activities are often perceived as a distraction for proper academic results. When placing college sporting activities within a proper historical context, the understanding comes that its role in the higher education must be revised. â€Å"People generally had no idea what was occurring in the college philosophy or history class, but could easily relate to the institution through a visible athletic program† (Flowers 352). Mixing education with high-profile entertainment turned to be not the best idea in the long run. The solution is to employ the best athletes to win and pay them for promoting their institutions, or separate sporting activities and not mix them up with the higher education. With thoroughly commercialized college sports, college athletes deserve some kind monetary compensation for all the work they put into promoting the prestige of university sports teams. It should be nothing outrageous like what professionals make but just something equivalent to what an average college student would make at a part-time job.

The Many Faces of La Llorona Essays

The Many Faces of La Llorona Essays The Many Faces of La Llorona Paper The Many Faces of La Llorona Paper La Llorona, the Crying Woman, is a tale of endless versions told over the centuries by an endless array of anonymous storytellers to scare curious children into doing as they are told. The literary form of orality, though fluid and dynamic, is in this case the force behind the cohesion of the contents of the various versions of this Chicano legend. I shall show that the different contents found in the multiple versions of La Llorona are of the same form, and further, that the variations depend on the locale of settled Chicano populations. In truth, the farther away a distinct Chicano population is from its cultural heritage, the more opaque and sinister the mystic tale of La Llorona is told within that local population. Let us look back to the beginning, the time of Hernando Cortes during Spains conquest over the Aztec tribes of Mexico. This is where the tale of the Crying Woman was said to have begun (La Llorona 79). In this ancient history, La Llorona is part of a holy trinity, mirroring the Christian faith. According to Gloria Anzaldua, All three are mediators: Guadalupe, the virgin mother who has not abandoned us, la Chingada (Malinche), the raped mother whom we have abandoned [Malinche is the basis for many of the La Llorona versions], and la Llorona, the mother who seeks her lost children and is a combination of the other two (3047). We see at the time of the tales birth that the Crying Woman is seen as a mother to the Aztec people and she is crying for her children being lost to the Spaniards and their religion. Here at the origin, amid the still pure Aztec culture, La Llorona is a figure of compassion and respect: not a story to scare children. Though the shortest of the versions, La Llorona in Mexico still has some of the compassion and culture of the long ago displaced Aztec civilization. It reads simply, At night, in the wind, a womans voice was heard. Oh my children, we are now lost! Sometimes she said, Oh my children, where shall I take you? (La Llorona 79). The oral form between this version and the original Aztec version has changed little in content. Both still speak of a sad mother crying for her lost children. However, the meaning between the two has changed. Where the ancient version sees a mother goddess crying for a lost culture, the Mexico version tells of a family in dire straits, lost within the howling winds of the cold night. Time has carried the Mexico version away from its Aztec culture. As a result, the meaning of La Llorona has changed for this group of the Chicano population. In La Llorona in Texas, the contents of the tale have changed drastically from the previous two accounts. In this version, a vaquero [cowboy] sees a haunting vision of the wailing woman near a river. He is terrified of the apparition, and in his terrified state yells at the ghost as he draws his pistol, Now Im going to kill you (La Llorona 80). There is no longer any mention of the children she is known to be crying for in the other versions. Instead, we have a man afraid of a woman, which is a stark contrast to the macho culture of Chicano men. As the Chicano culture moves farther away from its roots, both in distance and time, the more poisoned the tale becomes to its listeners. Even farther away from their ancestral lands than the Chicano populations of Texas are those of California. Within this version, La Llorona in California, the tale has taken on a dark and horrible tone. No longer is the Crying Woman a holy mother, no longer is she a mother with lost children in the ebony night, nor is she just a wandering ghost along a lonely river. Now she has become the stuff of childrens nightmares. One part of the tale goes, She told Him [God] that†¦she had thrown one [her child] down the toilet†¦another had been thrown into the sea†¦and that she had thrown the other one into†¦a river (La Llorona 79). We now are told to see her as a murderous beast that has drowned her own children: a far cry from the noble goddess of the Aztecs known for her compassion. Even more, we are told that she does this deed so to continue her wild life of sin, not wanting to be tied down by children (La Llorona 79). In interviews with two different people of Chicano culture, I found yet two more variations of the tale. In the first interview, with Ofelia Chavez, I was told that the tale of La Llorona was revealed to her by her mother as the story of a weeping mother whose children had died when rossing the Rio Grande River. It is a parable teaching of the dangers of crossing the border. In the second interview conducted with Sallie Babb, La Llorona was the story of a ghostly woman wandering the night in search of children. Babb related to me that as a little girl, her mother would tell her and her siblings not to go out after dark or La Llorona would snatch them away forever. Chavez is from West Texas an d Babb is from the border area of the Rio Grande River. Even with that slight distance between them, the tales that each heard vary in their contents in extreme ways. When asked, neither of them knew of La Llorona as a tale of a compassionate mother-goddess crying for her lost people from the days of the mighty Aztec Empire. As the Chicano culture is separated from its past, it loses respect for itself. Walter Ong has said, †¦oral societies live very much in a present which keeps itself in equilibrium or homeostasis by sloughing off memories which no longer have present relevance (Orality and Literacy 46). So it may be that although the oral literatures may change, it may not necessarily be a detrimental act. Like La Llorona in the view of Chavez, it is a story told to teach of the hazards of the borderlands. Ong also points out, When generations pass and the object or institution referred to by the archaic word is no longer part of present, lived experience, though the word has been retained, its meaning is commonly altered or simply vanishes (Orality and Literacy 47). In other words, when a people forget their roots, they change, or even lose, the oral interpretations handed down from storyteller to storyteller. The result is a loss of self for that people. They have no history that can be recalled to remind them of what they were and how great they were, and more importantly, what they are capable of becoming now. If you cut off the roots of any plant, then it will die. It is the same way with cultures. It is fact that the various versions of La Llorona arise from the distances in both time and miles. But why do these changes occur? It may be that as population groups from one culture amalgamate into the culture of another (i. e. Mexican into American), the smaller population tends to be suppressed by the larger dominant culture. As a result, the smaller population group is either forced unwillingly into blending their oral literature with the opinions of the dominant culture in order to survive in a foreign land, giving up their tales to the past to be lost forever, or adapting the stories to better teach the next generation lessons of life in a changing world. This is why the form of oral literature is so important to who we are as a people and as individuals. How can we know who we are and where we are going if we dont know where we come from? Personally, I cherish the stories my grandfathers would tell of my ancestors and how I came to be a cornucopia of Cherokee, French, German and English heritages that today define who I am in this world. Without orality in literature, I could not possibly with any truth say I know who I am and where Im going. It is a lesson for all of us. Word Count: 1480 Anzaldua, Gloria. from Borderlands/La Frontera. The Heath Anthology of American Literature. 3rd ed. Gen. Ed. Paul Lauter. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1998. 3042-3065. Babb, Sallie. Personal interview. Testerment, Charles A. 23 September 1998. Chavez, Ofelia. Personal interview. Testerment, Charles A. 16 September 1998. La Llorona. Hispanic American Literature: An Anthology. Ed. Rodolfo Cortina. Lincolnwood, IL: NTC Publishing Group, 1998. 79-80. Ong, Walter. Some Psychodynamics of Orality. Orality and Literacy: The Technologizing of the Word. New Y ork: Methven, 1982. 30-77.

Project Statistics Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words - 1

Statistics Project Example That is, an increase in Qatar’s GDP by one unit will increase the value of Qatar’s exports by 4268.572. An increase importing country’s GDP by one unit will increase the value of Qatar’s value of exports by 294.0738. On the other hand, an increase in distance by one unit will increase the value of export by 20763.51. from the analysis above, it is clear that distance is the greatest contributor of value of exports. The GDP of Qatar was valued at $192,390,104,345 billion in 2012. The Gross Domestic Product value of Qatar represents 0.30% of the world’s economy. Between the years 1970 and 2012, Qatar’s GDP was averaged at $27.03 Billion reaching an all-time high of $192,390,104,345 billion in 2012 and low of $0.30 in 1970. The World Bank is the principal reporter of Qatar’s GDP. To understand the link between real GDP and the imports of cereals in Qatar, it is important to examine the indicators of international trade. It is important to note that the distance from the location of a commodity will affect the costs of obtaining the same commodity. It is therefore prudent to obtain the commodity at a market that will not increase the prices of the goods. The volume of international trade will depend majorly on the GDP of a nation. This implies that productivity and consumption level of an economy are directly linked. An increase in the production limits in a country will resul t in a proportional increase in real GDP of that country and

Rdms.group project Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Rdms.group project - Essay Example The id fields, which will be used as unique field (i.e. primary key for the table), will be taken as AutoNumber data type so that it can automatically inserted for any new records in table. For AutoNumber data type, Long Integer field size is always taken (in Microsoft Office Access). For foreign key fields, Number data type with Long Integer field size will taken so that it can be easily linked with primary key fields. For name, description fields, we will take Text data type with field size 50 character. The 50-character size will be enough for storing student name, student type description and class name. The Student table will be linked with tables Student_Type. The Class_Registered table will be linked with two tables Student and Class_Type. The relationship between Student and Student_Type table will be One-To-Many (1:N). The relationship between Student and Class table will be Many-To-Many (M:N) and will be represented by two relationships: One-To-Many (1:N) relationship between Student and Class_Registered table and One-To-Many (1:N) relationship between Class_Type and Class_Registered