Ethics vs. Morals

Ethics and morals relate to “right” and “wrong” conduct. While they are sometimes used interchangeably, they are different: ethics refer to rules provided by an external source, e.g., codes of conduct in workplaces or principles in religions. Morals refer to an individual’s own principles regarding right and wrong.

	Ethics	Morals
What are they?	The rules of conduct recognized in respect to a particular class of human actions or a particular group or culture.	Principles or habits with respect to right or wrong conduct. While morals also prescribe dos and don'ts, morality is ultimately a personal compass of right and wrong.
Where do they come from?	Social system - External	Individual - Internal
Why we do it?	Because society says it is the right thing to do.	Because we believe in something being right or wrong.
Flexibility	Ethics are dependent on others for definition. They tend to be consistent within a certain context, but can vary between contexts.	Usually consistent, although can change if an individual’s beliefs change.
The "Gray"	A person strictly following Ethical Principles may not have any Morals at all. Likewise, one could violate Ethical Principles within a given system of rules in order to maintain Moral integrity.	A Moral Person although perhaps bound by a higher covenant, may choose to follow a code of ethics as it would apply to a system. "Make it fit"
Origin	Greek word "ethos" meaning"character"	Latin word "mos" meaning "custom"
Acceptability	Ethics are governed by professional and legal guidelines within a particular time and place	Morality transcends cultural norms

Collection

Online University Offers Poor Students a Chance

Undocumented immigrant Emmanuel studies at the tuition-free University of the People

By VOA News

Like many young people around the world, Emmanuel dreamed of getting a university education in the United States.

The 26-year-old only told VOA his first name because he is an undocumented immigrant. This means he does not have the official documents needed to enter, live in, or work in the U.S. legally.

Emmanuel came to the U.S. from Mexico five years ago. But, when he arrived, he discovered that his dream was much more difficult to achieve than he thought.

“First I had to learn English and realized that there were very few opportunities for me to really study into formal education in the United States.”

But then Emmanuel read about University of the People. University of the People is a university that has no tuition costs. The university’s classes and teaching materials are all free online. Also, all of the teachers are volunteers.

Federal laws in the U.S. do not prevent undocumented immigrants from going to college. But laws do ban undocumented immigrants from receiving government financial aid.

The Pew Research Center is an organization that studies social issues around the world. The organization recently reported there were 11.3 million illegal immigrants living in the U.S. in 2014. Of those, 49 percent were from Mexico.

Many undocumented immigrants like Emmanuel come to the U.S. with little money to pay for things like higher education. College Board is an organization that collects information and resources to make higher education more available.

The organization recently reported on the average cost of a four-year degree at both public and private U.S. universities.

The average cost at a public university is $9,410 for a resident of the state where the university is located. The average cost at a private university is $32,405.

College Board also reported that 69 percent of financial aid came from the U.S. government in 2014.

Emmanuel had no other choice, so he chose to study at University of the People. Quickly, he said, he believed that the university would give him the skills for a future in computer science.

Shai Reshef is the president of University of the People. He was born in Israel. Reshef made millions of dollars as the chief executive officer of the Kidum Group. The Kidum Group was a company that helped students prepare for tests.

Reshef decided to create a tuition-free university after visiting several poor countries. People in those countries had limited higher education opportunities.

“We built a model to show universities, to show governments that the issue of higher education can be solved. Higher education can be accessible,can be affordable, can be high-quality and shouldn’t leave anyone behind.”

Currently, the University of the People only offers degrees in computer science and business administration. Though tuition is free, the university does require students to pay a $50 application fee. Also, the university requires students to pay a $100 test fee when they complete a class.

The total cost for a four-year degree is $4,000. But the university does offer scholarships.

Students must be at least 18 years old. They must be highly skilled in English. Students must also have completed high school.

The university has students from 170 countries. Refugees are among the university’s student population. Reshef also said that almost 25 percent of the students are undocumented immigrants.

To help these students, the University of the People works with other schools such as New York University, Oxford University and Yale University.

University of the People also works with companies like Microsoft and Hewlett-Packard. Some of these partners provide students with financial help. Other partners offer students internships.

The Distance Education Accrediting Commission or DEAC is a U.S.organization that reviews the quality of online schools and schools without physical classrooms. The DEAC approved the University of the People’s quality of education in 2014.

Emmanuel said he misses seeing and working with other students in a classroom. But he does love working with students in many countries online.

“It helps me to realize that I’m not limited to just staying in one country.”

There are more than 2,500 students studying with the University of the People. The university expects that number to double next year.

Massive Open Online Courses or MOOCs are free online classes that universities all over the world provide. Stanford University began offering free MOOCs in 2006. Oxford University began offering free online classes in 2009.

But, these classes are not part of a degree program.

Russia plays down idea of coalition with West to strike ISIS in Syria

Protester holds a poster depicting Russian President Vladimir Putin and reading "Putin, killer!" during a demonstration against Russia on Nov. 27, 2015, in Fatih district in Istanbul. AFP PHOTO / CAGDAS ERDOGAN/AFP/Getty Images (Cagdas Erdogan/AFP/Getty Images)

By Andrew Roth

November 27 at 9:29 AM

MOSCOW — The Kremlin on Friday played down the possibility of a grand coalition with the West to strike the Islamic State in Syria, despite personal visits by French President François Hollande to both Washington and Moscow following a spate of horrific terrorist attacks tied to the terrorist group.

“At the moment, unfortunately, our partners are not ready to work as one coalition,” Dmitry Peskov, President Vladimir Putin’s personal spokesman, told reporters during a conference call on Friday.

Peskov’s comments came less than 24 hours after Putin himself sounded hopeful notes at a meeting with Hollande in the Kremlin, where he said Russia “was ready to cooperate with the coalition which is led by the United States.”

But Russia has sought cooperation on its terms, providing diplomatic and now military shelter to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and attacking rebel groups that include the Islamic State but also more moderate opponents of Assad backed by Western countries. President Obama and other Western leaders have sought to bring Putin into a U.S.-led coalition instead, a force that Putin has called illegal because it is launching airstrikes in Syria without Assad’s permission.

is is one of multiple videos released by the Russian government which shows hits on targets in Syria between Nov. 23 and Nov. 26. (Russian Defence Ministry)

French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius raised the prospect Friday that Assad’s troops could be used against the Islamic State, but only in the context of a political transition in Syria that would remove Assad from power, French news media reported. The Islamic State, a heavily armed al-Qaeda offshoot also known as ISIS and ISIL, has declared a “caliphate” in tracts of Iraq and Syria under its control and has claimed responsibility for terrorist attacks against Russia and the West.

The opposing goals of Russia and Assad’s opponents burst into conflict on Tuesday, when Turkey shot down a Russian plane that was allegedly in its airspace. Russian and Turkish political analysts have said the plane was more likely targeted because Russia had been bombing Turkish-trained Turkmen rebels in Syria’s north.

One pilot of the Su-24 attack aircraft was killed after parachuting from the stricken plane. Another was rescued, but a Russian marine was killed in the operation.

Putin called the shootdown a “stab in the back” and has refused to take phone calls from Erdogan since.

“There have been requests from Erdogan of a telephone conversation in the past two days,” Russian presidential aide Yuri Ushakov told reporters Friday, the Interfax news agency reported.

When asked why Putin had not taken those calls, he said, “We see Turkey’s non-readiness to bring elementary apologies over the aircraft incident.”

Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan warned Russia not to "play with fire" in a dispute over the downing of a Russian warplane this week, but added he did not want to harm relations with Moscow. (Reuters)

Erdogan has also formally asked for a meeting with Putin when the two join other world leaders in Paris on Monday for the 2015 United Nations Climate Change Conference. Peskov said Putin has been informed of the request but has not said whether he would meet with Erdogan.

Russian is introducing widespread sanctions against the Turkish government because of the shootdown. The Russian government took aim at deep tourism ties between the two countries on Friday, as Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced that Russia would cancel a free-visa regime with Turkey, a move that would likely be reciprocated by the Turkish government.

Putin’s two-month-old intervention in the Syrian civil war was seen as a way for Russia to break out of international isolation after the West imposed sanctions over Moscow’s 2014 annexation of Ukraine’s Crimea region and its backing of pro-Russian separatists in eastern Ukraine.

Peskov said Putin and Hollande on Thursday did not discuss the possibility of repealing the European Union’s financial and individual sanctions against Russia.

These iconic American leaders were once refugees

By Jena McGregor November 20 - The Washington Post

In September, Silicon Valley's Churchill Club honored former Intel CEO Andy Grove with its "legendary leader" award. The tech industry icon transformed Intel from a struggling memory chip maker into a microprocessor powerhouse. Grove has since devoted his substantial wealth and intellect to research on two diseases for which he's been diagnosed during his life—prostate cancer and Parkinson's.

After the videos and accolades were over, Grove stepped onto the stage and asked if he could say a few words. "Let's remember that millions of young people who had the misfortune of being born in the wrong national boundaries are going through all the horrors [that] I had to," Grove said. "I made it. Let's try in a little way to help them make it."

You see, Grove—one of America's most admired business leaders, up there with Bill Gates and Steve Jobs for the impact he had on the tech industry—was once a refugee. Born to a Jewish family in Hungary in 1936, he survived the Nazis only to flee Hungary after Soviet tanks rolled in to Budapest to crush the Hungarian Revolution of 1956.

Grove is one of many people who have fled persecution, violence, war or political oppression to create something extraordinary out of their lives. Former U.S. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright and her family fled to America following the Communist coup in 1948. Albert Einstein was a German-Jewish refugee who escaped Nazi Germany in 1938.

Albert Einstein accepting U.S. citizenship certificate from judge Phillip Forman.

The film director Billy Wilder ("Sunset Boulevard," "Double Indemnity," "The Apartment") left Germany amid Hitler's rise and his mother, grandmother and stepfather were killed at Auschwitz. Thong Nguyen, whose family escaped Vietnam in 1975, is now a top executive at Bank of America.

The list goes on.

Such stories are a stark reminder of one thing that seems to have gotten lost amid all the negativity that current and would-be political leaders are slinging over Syrian refugees coming to the United States. Nearly all the focus has been on what the chances are that one of them could be a terrorist, rather than the possibility that many of them or their children could become notable leaders.

Never mind that, according to the Migration Policy Institute, just three of the 784,000 resettled refugees since 9/11 have been arrested connected with terrorist activities. (Two of those instances were not in America and "the plans of the third were barely credible," according to the institute's co-founder.) Or that the process of screening refugees in the United States is actually quite onerous, rigorous and lengthy. Or, among other things, that rejecting refugees could actually help ISIS.

On Thursday, the House passed a bill that would require intelligence, FBI and Department of Homeland Security leaders to certify that each refugee applicant is not a security threat. This followed moves by more than half the country’s governors to oppose letting Syrian refugees into their states—with New Jersey Governor Chris Christie going so far as to say even young orphans shouldn't be admitted under current vetting. Texas Governor Greg Abbott put it this way in a letter to President Obama: "Texas cannot participate in any program that will result in Syrian refugees - any one of whom could be connected to terrorism - being resettled in Texas."

Yet it's worth remembering that the inverse is also true: What if, in turning away Syrian refugees, we were to miss out on the ones who could change industries, upend scientific theory and create cultural masterpieces? What if we keep out the next Andy Grove? What if fear, ironically, causes us to reject someone whose leadership, courage and creativity could make the world a safer, better place?

What we're seeing right now is a pessimistic and reductive worldview for leaders, one driven by fear at the expense of possibility. Of course, it is critical for our country's leaders to worry about security, remain vigilant and weigh all the risks. But weighing those risks requires not just thinking about whom we might let in, but what remarkable individuals we might keep out.

Did You Know...

People remember:
10 percent of what they read,
20 percent of what they hear,
30 percent of what they see,
50 percent of what they see and hear,
80 percent of what they say, and
90 percent of what they say and do.

If you tell 100 people something without repetition:
After 24 hours, 25 percent have forgotten it.
After 48 hours, 50 percent have forgotten it.
After 72 hours, 75 percent have forgotten it.
After one week, 96 percent have forgotten it.

Collection

Student Speak

Chi Le

1/ What was your childhood like. Talk about your family, education, friends, aspirations, challenges, successes.

I was born in a small town in the southern Vietnam. When I was 12, the communists won in the Vietnam war and imposed a totalitarian regime throughout Vietnam. When I took classes in high school, the communists rushed people into a new war against their comrades in the West and North of the country. After the end of the wars, the economy was exhausted, but every expense for education was paid by government, such as tuition, food, and housing because every young person, like me, could become a soldier whenever it was required.

In the difficult situation, I was admitted into a university in Saigon, an old capital of the South of Vietnam. First days at the University were really memorable and different from my expectation, which was tempered by my father. He always thought that an escape way from the backward condition was to go to school. However, when I was in a far-away place from my family to study and carry out things that communists called a socialist revolution, I couldn’t figure where my future would approach.

The first days at the University, we were gathered in a large room to study politics and economics in the new era. Every day we had to eat rice mixed with other cereals, and gasoline really lacked for cars; however, we were taught that socialist economy was rich and fair. On the sidewalks, there were a lot of slogans to praise the socialist regime and leaders, but nothing for ads of the business. Although we were fighting against Communist China, our first enemy was still the American empire.

In those years, after the communists defeated in the Vietnam War, they strained their powers to bring out harsh rules to govern the country. One of their rules was to burn books of authors who had lived in the South of Vietnam and books stemming from the U.S. imperialism. Books in English and books which they called the depraved and reactionary culture were burned first. In my early days at Saigon University, I was guided to burn such books. First, if I had the books, I would burn them myself. Second, I had to campaign acquaintances to burn their books, or report to leaders whom was keeping the books. Finally, I had to attend one event of burning the books at House of Culture.

After about one month of studying the political awareness and burning books, we were gathered to attend military trainings to be ready to join the army. First, we learned to obey commands to line up, turn left, turn right, go ahead, and parade. Then we learned to roll, drag, creep, and crawl. Finally, we learned to shoot with a rifle.

In the first semester in the Saigon University, I learned to have political awareness, burn books, and be ready for joining army, although my major was math. My parents couldn’t image how I began to study in the Saigon University, and how I carried out our dream.

However, after some years from when I graduated, the government began to innovate. The innovation was stronger after socialism collapsed in the Soviet Union and countries in Eastern Euro, especially, after the U.S. lifted the embargo. From the country closed its door to the Western World as North Korea today, Vietnam accepted investment from foreign countries. At that time, I was fortunate to work in a joint company for producing and servicing software. I began to read books in English, only reading to work, and participated some software projects. However, the company early bankrupted after four years operation. The company's employees were gained great knowhow in the information technology which was termed pioneers in the economy at the time.

In 2000, I opened a software company for producing accounting software and some other management software. The company is small and is a cooperation of some friends in my old company.

I am a father of two children, a boy and a girl. In 2010, my family immigrated to the U.S., but my old company still wanted me to maintain and develop old software and deploy some new projects which it get. Therefore, I have kept the job based on the internet.

2/ Tell how you came to SJCC. Did you go straight from high school? If not, what did you do in between? Were you thinking about furthering your education during that time?

I took classes at SJCC because I liked to take English online classes. Maybe, stemming from my job working far from my company and usually contacting through the internet, I have formed a habit of doing at home. I feel more self-confident when I read or write something on my computer. I can check vocabulary and some grammar points, and especially rearrange my ideas so that they are coherent and smooth.

Since living in the U.S., it seems the internet is my only door to enter the world, from study, work, contact to shopping.

I came to the U.S as an immigrant more than 5 years ago, and from then on, I have been a middle-aged adult going to school, so I began in college. After I graduated from UC in Vietnam, I got a job at an information technology company in 1987. The company existed no longer four years and then it went bankrupt. However, employees, including me, got gain to knowledge, such as how to assemble parts of a computer and set up an operating system, know-how to make software, and almost of us were like pioneers in IT field at that time. Some of us were successful in running a company which traded and set up computers. I continued to develop software along with some my friends, and sometimes I taught information technology applications in a university.

3/ What is being at SJCC like? Academically, emotionally, socially? If you’ve graduated, talk about it in the past tense.

I went to SJCC from running on freeway 280. Some first days, sometimes I exited wrong to lead loss the way. Because it was night, I stopped over at a gas station and asked a cashier for a way to come to the college. He immediately instructed me and proudly told me that he was also taking classes at the college.

SJCC made me impressed about oldness and narrowness; Perhaps, being narrow because it belongs to the center of the San Jose city. However, I also recognized some new buildings. In fact, I am not enough perception to make an appreciation. I only felt friendly in an informal manner when I took a placement test and studied in the lab room.

I took some online classes and hybrid classes as well as one lecture class. Especially, I like English online classes because I believe the classes help me to write papers more than lecture classes. I have to research and read more to find ideas, and then I can arrange, change layout, and write early ideas coming in my mind. Moreover, I can arrange a schedule based on my work. I think that self-conscious learning is an important base to take online classes.

4/ What are you hoping for the future? What part does your education play in that? What part does SJCC, specifically, play in that.

I hope I will use English well, especially the writing skill. I don't think I will write as a writer or journalist. My profession is like a programmer, so I manage to write some things, such as a user guide, or a report in the software field. To practice, I make a blog and write on it something that I think. Sometimes, I also cite some articles which I feel good or suitable to my thought. I think the articles can be reference sources in my papers. A thing which education changes my perception is writing papers. From a person who doesn't like to write, I have a liking for writing and become liking to writing. I write a lot of things in my first language, and write some favorite things in English. In the first week of English 1B, you gave an instruction as the following:

"Don't worry about there being a "right" answer. Just give it a shot. YOUR response is as right an answer as anyone else's b/c you are the one reading the story, and being affected by it."

I have written as the instruction on my blog papers.

5/ If you have graduated, tell us where you are in your life now.

Now, I am still living in San Jose and taking classes at SJSU in Management Information System (MIS) major. Being a middle-aged adult, I don't find a degree as a requisite for my work. I think I can myself do a work which is appropriate to my ability. I go to school to learn English more than to acquire professional knowledge. First, I want to know what the college is teaching about the MIS field which I have worked for more than 10 years. I am curious to know as a foreigner wants to know what the U.S. education brings great success in the country. Second, I want to communicate with everyone in English which I hard struggle every day.

However, I think I will change the second goal. Maybe, I will either come back SJCC to get an AA associate degree in English which I find some online classes in the major, or I will make an accounting software and use it to trade or to teach VB.NET programming language and database. I hope I can communicate with everyone in English through the work.

I have a middle-aged friend who immigrated to the U.S. three years ago. Although he was an English teacher at a high school in Vietnam, he is still difficult to communicate with everyone in English. From then on, I think how to be a middle-aged adult can be educated to well communicate with everyone in English. The best way is the middle-aged adults should be talked in English about their own works, rather than unfriendly topics. For example, doing the work of a tutor is the best way to communicate in English.

My work is started at twilight

Chi Le

Since I lived in the U.S., I have had a lot of changes in my life. One of changes has been effecting to my life that is my work’s schedule. I have worked from the evening to the morning of the next day instead of normal working hours because I have been still keeping up my work as a programmer in Vietnam. When the twilight in the U.S. is the dawn in Vietnam, I start my work.

My work is to maintain software that I attended developing, and I also attend a new project that my company needs. For example, I attend to analyzing a management system before it is programmed. All the works, I do through the internet which I am authorized to connect to the company’s server directly. Through connecting the internet, I can talk or chat to my company's customers and coworkers to deal with emerging problems.

When I am living in a place far away that has a difference of time zone and without a contact face to face at work, to do well all the assigned works is really difficult. Moreover, I also like to go to school to learn English and to get a degree because that is my goal. From all those requirements, I have had to work hard to complete them as well as possible.

I like to take online classes to able to be more proactive to arrange my study time because I want my work to be completed on schedule and homework to be done well, too.

Because of going to school in the daytime and working at night, I have a little time to go out. I rarely go shopping, and sometimes I only go online shopping to buy some things are needed. I have lived in the San Jose for five years, but I have never gone to a place that is farther than San Francisco Airport.

In every summer, I have had to come back Vietnam to approach my work and to meet face to face with my colleagues in the company. In a travel to come back Vietnam, some friends asked me to know New York, Washington DC, or the Status of Liberty. I said that the Golden Gate Bridge is near my house, but I had not yet stepped on it. They had been really surprised, but I had not been surprised!

I have to work at night and go to school in the morning, so I have not had time to go out. I must accept the situation as my selection. The difference of time zone at a working place has changed my life.

ISTJ Personal Growth

What does Success mean to an ISTJ?

People with the ISTJ personality type are serious, methodical, analytical, and hard-working. They store knowledge gained from their experiences, and use this knowledge to tackle new problems and ideas. They will work a problem through to its identified conclusion. They work towards defined goals; their analytical objectivity gives them the tendency to make goal-oriented decisions that are not waylaid by the concerns of individuals. They're uncomfortable with ideas that are completely new to them, or that are totally theoretical in nature. Since they have no direct experience with the new concept, they have no tools for knowing how to deal with it or what to think about it. They need to get the framework for a new concept before they're able to deal with it. An experienced ISTJ is usually a very capable person, and makes an excellent manager. ISTJs have great value for the "tried and true" approach, and are reluctant to adopt new systems until direct experience proves the validity of the new system. They internalize and value the rules and structure of the society in which they live, and disapprove of behaviors that go against these rules. ISTJs highly value the cornerstone institutions of society such as Family, Work, and Church. Their hard-working, dedicated nature is especially well-suited for holding up such institutions. An ISTJ's feeling of success depends upon being able to use their experience for the benefit of an institution, and also upon the level of structure and lack of chaos in their life, and in the health and welfare of their family or other social structure.

Allowing Your ISTJ Strengths to Flourish

As an ISTJ, you have gifts that are specific to your personality type that aren't natural strengths for other types. By recognizing your special gifts and encouraging their growth and development, you will more readily see your place in the world, and be more content with your role.

Nearly all ISTJs will recognize the following characteristics in themselves. They should embrace and nourish these strengths:

• Their desire to execute known systems against concrete facts makes them happy to chunk through large amounts of routine work.
• With their respect for rules and order, they value honesty and integrity and seek to live with these ideals.
• An ISTJ has a "stick to it" attitude. They're not afraid of hard work, and will put forth a great deal of effort towards something that they are interested in. This persistence will help the ISTJ to achieve any identified goal.
• The ISTJ's value for social structure makes them more interested in being social than is true for many Introverts.

ISTJs who have developed their Extraverted Thinking will complement their interest in their inner world of concrete data with an interest in the welfare of the rest of the world, especially with regards to upholding social systems and traditions. These ISTJs enjoy these very special gifts:

• They will move beyond an expectation that others should follow rules into a dedication and willingness to work hard to uphold standards themselves.
• They show a dedication to maintaining personal relationships that lends them a respect for individual differences.
• They will use their inner store of facts for the benefit of an institution or society in general, rather than to satisfy their own interests.
• The more they develop their Extraverted Thinking, the better they will become at strategizing. They will be able to brainstorm multiple possible solutions to problems.
• ISTJs are often uncomfortable with decisions based on values rather than on objective criteria, but the more they develop their Extraverted Thinking, the more likely they will become able to use Introverted Feeling as a positive force rather than strictly a negative one. This will allow them to understand a value judgement that is based on personal perspective rather than social obligation.

Potential Problem Areas

With any gift of strength, there is an associated weakness. Without "bad", there would be no "good". Without "difficult", there would be no "easy". We value our strengths, but we often curse and ignore our weaknesses. To grow as a person and get what we want out of life, we must not only capitalize upon our strengths, but also face our weaknesses and deal with them. That means taking a hard look at our personality type's potential problem areas.

Most of the weaker characteristics that are found in ISTJs are due to their dominant Introverted Sensing function controlling the personality to the point that all other functions are being used to defend Sensing demands, rather than for their more balanced purposes. In such cases, an ISTJ may show some or all of the following weaknesses in varying degrees:

• Excessive love of food and drink
• Lack of interest in other people, or in relating to them
• Occasional inappropriate emotional displays
• General selfish "look after oneself" tendencies
• Uses judgement to dismiss other's opinions and perspectives, before really understanding them
• May judge others rather than themselves
• May look at external ideas and people with the primary purpose of finding fault
• May become slave to their routine and "by the book" ways of doing things, to the point that any deviation is completely unacceptable
• May have difficulty communicating their thoughts and feelings to anyone

Explanation of Problems

Nearly all of the problematic characteristics described above can be attributed in various degrees to the common ISTJ problem of Introverted Sensing overtaking the ISTJ's personality to the point that all other functions become slaves to Introverted Sensing. A more "whole" personality needs to have a good balance between its dominant and auxiliary functions. For an ISTJ, the dominant Introverted Sensing needs to be well-supported by the auxiliary Extraverted Thinking function. If Extraverted Thinking exists only to support the desires of Introverted Sensing, than neither function is being used to its potential.

Introverted Sensing is a personality function that constantly gathers data and stores it in a sort of informational database to be accessed at will in the future. As the dominant player in a personality, it has the effect of constantly bombarding the psyche with facts to store. As something new is perceived, it is added to the vast warehouse of Introverted Sensing data. Introverted Sensing does not in itself analyze this data for meaning or connection--it just takes it in as information. In order to sort through and make use of this information, a judging function must be applied. It is the judging function that does the analysis and ordering of the data.

When Introverted Sensing is too dominant, or Extraverted Thinking is not developed sufficiently, we see the ISTJ using Extraverted Thinking to order the individual's world in such a way that Introverted Sensing can reign without interference. This may include dismissing the importance of relationships, or pushing away anything that threatens the ISTJ's highly introverted way of life. In this manner, Extraverted Thinking is used against the external world, rather than against the ISTJ's internal data. It is a defensive shield, rather than a useful filter.

The better, more "whole" use of Extraverted Thinking for the ISTJ would be to use it to order and evaluate its own rich store of data, and therefore generate useful solutions to problems and efficient systems. Like all types, most ISTJs will show some signs of this kind of weakness. This does not mean that they're hopelessly flawed. The real problems occur when an ISTJ personality has become so imbalanced that its owner is extremely selfish and unable to consider the importance or validity of anyone else's perspective.

Solutions

To grow as an individual, the ISTJ needs to focus on applying their judgement against information that they have gathered, rather than against single facts or ideas coming from others. Before judging, put all new data into the context of existing facts. Working with all of the facts at your disposal will greatly improve your ability to judge effectively, and will reduce the likelihood that you will become offensively reactionary and isolationist.

An ISTJ who is concerned with personal growth will pay close attention to the subject of ther judgments, and their motivations for making judgments. Are they judging something external to themself, or are they judging something within the context of their stored knowledge? Is the motivation for judging something to be able to understand its usefulness in the world, or to dismiss it? Too often, an ISTJ will judge something without properly understanding it, and with the intention of dismissing it. Seek first to understand, then to judge.

Living Happily in our World as an ISTJ

People of all personality types sometimes experience problems dealing with specific aspects of civilization and human interaction. For the ISTJ, problems are generally associated with being unable to tolerate behaviors that go outside perceived norms, and with not putting forth effort to meet others' emotional needs. These problems stem from building up the importance of the ISTJ's inner world and diminishing the importance of the external world. ISTJs who recognize that their knowledge and experience can be enriched by the synergy of other people's knowledge and experience will find that they can be committed to their internal worlds and still have satisfying relationships with others. The key to accomplishing this is development of their highest extraverted function, Extraverted Thinking.

An ISTJ who uses Extraverted Thinking to find fault externally rather than internally may become so strongly opinionated that they form rigid and unreasonable expectations of others. Their hyper-vigilant judgments about the rationality and competence of others may be a very effective way of keeping themselves at an emotional distance from others. This will preserve the sanctity of the ISTJ's inner world and lifestyle, but will reduce a lot of valuable input, arrest the development of their social character, and stagnate the development of the ISTJ's rich store of experiential data. In extreme cases the ISTJ may find him or herself quite alone and lonely.

More commonly, the ISTJ will run into trouble when they try to order and structure the outer world, rather than their inner world. Trying to structure people into a predefined, acceptable system is problematic. The personality types who value the unique individual will be offended by the apparent lack of respect for their person, and people with personality types who follow social values will want to be honoring their own system, rather then being forced to follow yours. Many people experience being controlled or manipulated as a form of suppression, and resist it. Eventually, they may harbor serious resentment against the suppressor.

Specific suggestions:

• Take care to listen to someone's idea entirely before you pass judgment on it. Ask questions if necessary. Do whatever it takes to make sure that you understand the idea. Try not to begin judging anything until you understand the details.
• Try to identify the personality type of everyone you encounter frequently in your life. Remember that Intuitives often have a wandering style of expression. Try to exhibit tolerance for this.
• Before you being talking to another person, pause for a moment and look at that person. Take in that person's attitude and feelings at that moment. Be aware of the person with whom you are speaking.

Ten Rules to Live By to Achieve ISTJ Success

1. Feed Your Strengths! Do things that allow your excellent organizational and logical abilities to flourish. Explore the worlds of business management, accounting, and medicine.
2. Face Your Weaknesses! See your weaknesses for what they are, and seek to overcome them. Especially, strive to use your judgment against your internal store of knowledge, rather than as a means of disregarding other people's ideas.
3. Talk Through Your Thoughts. You need to step through your vast amount of information in order to put things into perspective. Give yourself appropriate time to do this, and take advantage of discussing ideas with others. Some find that externalizing your thoughts is a valuable exercise, as is expressing your ideas clearly in writing.
4. Take in Everything. Don't dismiss ideas prematurely because you don't respect the person generating the ideas, or because you think you already know it all. After all, everybody has something to offer, and nobody knows everything. As Steven Covey says, "Seek first to understand, and then to be understood."
5. Quench Your Desire to Control Others. Remember that most people do not want to be controlled. Again, turn your controlling tendencies inwardly rather than outwardly. You can only really control yourself.
6. Be Aware of Others. Take time to notice where others are coming from. What is their personality type? How are they currently feeling?
7. Be Accountable for Yourself. Don't blame the problems in your life on other people. Look inwardly for solutions.
8. Be Gentle in Your Expectations, and judge yourself at least as harshly as you judge others.
9. Assume the Best. Don't distress yourself and others by dwelling on the dark side of everything. Just as there is a positive charge for every negative charge, there is a light side to every dark side. Remember that positive situations are created by positive attitudes, and vice versa. Expect the best, and the best will come forward.
10. There is Nothing to Fear but Fear Itself. Sometimes it's necessary to take a risk to initiate change. Don't be afraid to do so when that time comes. In most cases, the obstacles and burdens standing in the way of your goal are not really there--they just exist in your perspective. Change your perspective--change your life.

According to BSM Consulting, Inc.

Portrait of an ISTJ - Introverted Sensing Thinking Judging

The Duty Fulfiller

As an ISTJ, your primary mode of living is focused internally, where you take things in via your five senses in a literal, concrete fashion. Your secondary mode is external, where you deal with things rationally and logically.

ISTJs are quiet and reserved individuals who are interested in security and peaceful living. They have a strongly-felt internal sense of duty, which lends them a serious air and the motivation to follow through on tasks. Organized and methodical in their approach, they can generally succeed at any task which they undertake.

ISTJs are very loyal, faithful, and dependable. They place great importance on honesty and integrity. They are "good citizens" who can be depended on to do the right thing for their families and communities. While they generally take things very seriously, they also usually have an offbeat sense of humor and can be a lot of fun - especially at family or work-related gatherings.

ISTJs tend to believe in laws and traditions, and expect the same from others. They're not comfortable with breaking laws or going against the rules. If they are able to see a good reason for stepping outside of the established mode of doing things, the ISTJ will support that effort. However, ISTJs more often tend to believe that things should be done according to procedures and plans. If an ISTJ has not developed their Intuitive side sufficiently, they may become overly obsessed with structure, and insist on doing everything "by the book".

The ISTJ is extremely dependable on following through with things which he or she has promised. For this reason, they sometimes get more and more work piled on them. Because the ISTJ has such a strong sense of duty, they may have a difficult time saying "no" when they are given more work than they can reasonably handle. For this reason, the ISTJ often works long hours, and may be unwittingly taken advantage of.

The ISTJ will work for long periods of time and put tremendous amounts of energy into doing any task which they see as important to fulfilling a goal. However, they will resist putting energy into things which don't make sense to them, or for which they can't see a practical application. They prefer to work alone, but work well in teams when the situation demands it. They like to be accountable for their actions, and enjoy being in positions of authority. The ISTJ has little use for theory or abstract thinking, unless the practical application is clear.

ISTJs have tremendous respect for facts. They hold a tremendous store of facts within themselves, which they have gathered through their Sensing preference. They may have difficulty understanding a theory or idea which is different from their own perspective. However, if they are shown the importance or relevance of the idea to someone who they respect or care about, the idea becomes a fact, which the ISTJ will internalize and support. Once the ISTJ supports a cause or idea, he or she will stop at no lengths to ensure that they are doing their duty of giving support where support is needed.

The ISTJ is not naturally in tune with their own feelings and the feelings of others. They may have difficulty picking up on emotional needs immediately, as they are presented. Being perfectionists themselves, they have a tendency to take other people's efforts for granted, like they take their own efforts for granted. They need to remember to pat people on the back once in a while.

ISTJs are likely to be uncomfortable expressing affection and emotion to others. However, their strong sense of duty and the ability to see what needs to be done in any situation usually allows them to overcome their natural reservations, and they are usually quite supporting and caring individuals with the people that they love. Once the ISTJ realizes the emotional needs of those who are close to them, they put forth effort to meet those needs.

The ISTJ is extremely faithful and loyal. Traditional and family-minded, they will put forth great amounts of effort at making their homes and families running smoothly. They are responsible parents, taking their parenting roles seriously. They are usually good and generous providers to their families. They care deeply about those close to them, although they usually are not comfortable with expressing their love. The ISTJ is likely to express their affection through actions, rather than through words.

ISTJs have an excellent ability to take any task and define it, organize it, plan it, and implement it through to completion. They are very hard workers, who do not allow obstacles to get in the way of performing their duties. They do not usually give themselves enough credit for their achievements, seeing their accomplishments simply as the natural fulfillment of their obligations.

ISTJs usually have a great sense of space and function, and artistic appreciation. Their homes are likely to be tastefully furnished and immaculately maintained. They are acutely aware of their senses, and want to be in surroundings which fit their need for structure, order, and beauty.

Under stress, ISTJs may fall into "catastrophe mode", where they see nothing but all of the possibilities of what could go wrong. They will berate themselves for things which they should have done differently, or duties which they failed to perform. They will lose their ability to see things calmly and reasonably, and will depress themselves with their visions of doom.

In general, the ISTJ has a tremendous amount of potential. Capable, logical, reasonable, and effective individuals with a deeply driven desire to promote security and peaceful living, the ISTJ has what it takes to be highly effective at achieving their chosen goals - whatever they may be.

According to BSM Consulting, Inc.

When Yeats comes knocking

Donald Trump addresses the press at the Beverly Wilshire Hotel in Beverly Hills, Calif., in July. (Frederic J. Brown/Agence France-Presse via Getty Images)

By E.J. Dionne Jr. Opinion writer / August 16

The Washington Post

W.B. Yeats’ “The Second Coming,” written in 1919, is my nominee for the most cited poem in political commentary. The line invoked most — “The best lack all conviction, while the worst are full of passionate intensity” — is irresistible. It’s always tempting to assume that the side we oppose brings vast reservoirs of demonic energy to bear against our own sad and bedraggled allies.

The other oft-quoted verse comes four lines earlier, “Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold.” This sentiment comes back again and again, at times of stress when Establishments seem to be tottering and when moderate and conventional politicians find themselves outshouted and outmaneuvered.

We are definitely in for another “Second Coming” revival, and Donald Trump is the least of it. The center is under siege all over the democratic world.

Trumpism does have its uniquely American characteristics. Not many places would turn a loudmouthed real estate tycoon first into a television celebrity and then into a (temporarily, at least) front-running presidential candidate. You can see Trump as a gift to us all from a raucous entrepreneurial culture that does not hold bad taste against someone as long as he is genuinely gifted at self-promotion.

But Trump is a symptom of a much wider problem in Western democracies. In country after country, traditional, broadly based parties and their politicians face scorn. More voters than usual seem tired of carefully focus-grouped public statements, deftly cultivated public personas and cautiously crafted political platforms that are designed to move just the right number of voters in precisely the right places to cast a half-hearted vote for a person or a party.

The word of the moment is “authenticity,” and that’s what electorates are said to crave. There’s certainly truth here, but the science of persuasion is advanced enough that authenticity can be manufactured as readily as anything else. In any event, I am not at all certain that an authentically calm, authentically moderate, authentically practical and authentically level-headed politician would have a prayer against the current tide. Voters instead seem in a mood to demand heavy doses of impatience, resentment and outrage, whether these emotions are authentic or not.

Reihan Salam, a conservative writer, is also struck by the similarities between Trumpism and a variety of rebellious movements to the left and right of the middle-ground parties in Europe. He noted recently in Slate that Italy, Britain, Denmark, Sweden, France, Spain and Greece have all seen the rise of new parties that “manage to blend populism and nationalism into a potent anti-establishment brew.”

The decay of middle-ground politics is a problem for both the center-left and the center-right, but it may be a bigger problem for the moderate left whose task, as the late historian Tony Judt put it, has always been to provide “incremental improvements upon unsatisfactory circumstances.”

When voters are this disheartened, incremental improvements aren’t good enough. Especially when discontent congeals around issues of culture and nationalism rather than material need, the promises of social democrats and labor liberals can seem too humdrum and insufficiently inspiring.

Paradoxically, the moderate left depends on a successful and reasonably responsible capitalist system to make its social and economic programs work. When capitalists behave negligently or when inequalities get too severe, as is happening now, social democrats find themselves simultaneously outflanked on their left by more vociferous critics of the system and by nationalist or xenophobic parties on the right who offer a different kind of salvation rooted in identity.

But the center right is hurting, too. If social democrats in Europe (and labor Democrats in the United States) are weakened by the decline of the unions, Christian Democrats are hit by the decline of the churches. Globalization weakens the ability of moderate governments of both varieties to deliver on their promises. Capital can flee easily to more congenial climes, undercutting a nation’s tax base and its regulatory efforts.

And widespread immigration can weaken social solidarity by complicating national identity and setting off new debates over what the word “us” means. The economic crash of 2008 aggravated the sense of distress in factory and mining towns far removed from the large cosmopolitan city centers.

Political Establishments worthy of the name and middle-ground politicians who care about more than power understand the dangers of a Yeats moment — to social harmony, to tolerance and, if things go really badly, to democracy and freedom. The next decade will test whether the political classes of the world’s democracies are up to the challenge.

Vietnamese IT More Than 20 Years Ago

Chi Le

Reading the article, "Cubans Forward to Using Internet," I remember the situation of Vietnam in earlier years of 1990s. This was the stage of an economic embargo of the U.S. over Vietnam, which was similar as Cuba now.

In that period, the Internet was not popular, so we, a programming group, could connect computers together based on local network to share files and printers. I remember the operating system which was set up in the computers was MS DOS (Microsoft Disk Operating System), and later it was Windows 3.x. In that time, we also made an accounting software to manage foreign currency which was transferred to Vietnamese through my company while banks didn't have the function. Software which helped to develop the accounting program was Dbase and then Foxbase.

In that time, computers were not common because they were too pricey and imported from foreign countries in strictly surveillance, portable hardware more than official hardware. I fortunately worked for a state-run software company, which joined with Vietnamese living in the Germany, so I had a good opportunity to acquire knowledge of the new technology. We had also made some applications, which were sold in the Germany market. However, the company failed finally. One of reasons of failure maybe is from the following.

I remember we could not directly make a call phone to foreigners, so to contact, we must wait for the post officers to connect on our behalf. The assisted connection took no less than 30 minutes to connect, and such a call's cost was too pricey.

The event which Cuba and the U.S. are approaching a diplomatic tie evokes my memories about the passed period of the economic embargo of the U.S. over Vietnam.

Tragedy of a "Golden" Daughter

Pan’s parents, Huei Hann and Bich Ha Pan, arrived in Canada as political refugees from Vietnam, and Jennifer Pan, 28, fed her parents lies about her success and then hired hit men to kill them. (Court exhibit)

Under pressure of parents' requirement to study excellently, a daughter in the family, a Vietnamese family living in Canada, lied her parents for a long time about the study's performance from high school, university, and to getting a job. In fact, she didn't graduate from high school, and of course, she never went to a university.

When her parents discovered the fact, they prevented her from cell phone, laptop, and dating with her boyfriend. She became angry and plotted a plan to kill them.

Three hired hit men joined into the plan. They staged a murder by shooting her fatal mother and severely wounded her father in front of her witness. However, the police disclosed their guilty.

The story happened in January this year, and the Ontario court sentenced the daughter and her three hired hit men.

The story caused a storm on the Facebook in amount of immigrant Asian children living in America and Canada. They shared their childhood over the story and attributed their parents' high expectations to lead spoilage of fear. The expectations put burdens on Asian American children to cause long-term and chronic affects for bearings of failure. The accumulation of lies because of the girl felt changes to be impossible.

A lot of comments struck on the parents who have not cared of their child like people, and they have molded their child based on their expectations, rather than the child's expectations, and then they would dependently live through the child's life.

There are some other ideas. When the parents discovered the fact of the daughter's study courses, they should not go to extremes which immediately have pressed to a prevention against their daughter, maybe the story was not so tragic. On the other hand, if the daughter understood her parents' hardness and expectations, she should turn the failure into a lesson to recover, rather than to ruin her own life and parents.

In the case, the both sides went to extremes.

Chi Le

According to Washington Post

The Ambitious Guest by Nathaniel Hawthorne

One December night, a long, long time ago, a family sat around the fireplace in their home. A golden light from the fire filled the room. The mother and father laughed at something their oldest daughter had just said. The girl was seventeen, much older than her little brother and sister, who were only five and six years old.

A very old woman, the family's grandmother, sat knitting in the warmest corner of the room. And a baby, the youngest child, smiled at the fire's light from its tiny bed. This family had found happiness in the worst place in all of New England. They had built their home high up in the White Mountains, where the wind blows violently all year long.

The family lived in an especially cold and dangerous spot. Stones from the top of the mountain above their house would often roll down the mountainside and wake them in the middle of the night. No other family lived near them on the mountain. But this family was never lonely. They enjoyed each other's company, and often had visitors. Their house was built near an important road that connected the White Mountains to the Saint Lawrence River.

People traveling through the mountains in wagons always stopped at the family's door for a drink of water and a friendly word. Lonely travelers, crossing the mountains on foot, would step into the house to share a hot meal. Sometimes, the wind became so wild and cold that these strangers would spend the night with the family. The family offered every traveler who stopped at their home a kindness that money could not buy.

On that December evening, the wind came rushing down the mountain. It seemed to stop at their house to knock at the door before it roared down into the valley. The family fell silent for a moment. But then they realized that someone really was knocking at their door. The oldest girl opened the door and found a young man standing in the dark.

The old grandmother put a chair near the fireplace for him. The oldest daughter gave him a warm, shy smile. And the baby held up its little arms to him. "This fire is just what I needed," the young man said. "The wind has been blowing in my face for the last two hours."

The father took the young man's travel bag. "Are you going to Vermont?" the older man asked. "Yes, to Burlington," the traveler replied. "I wanted to reach the valley tonight. But when I saw the light in your window, I decided to stop. I would like to sit and enjoy your fire and your company for a while."

As the young man took his place by the fire, something like heavy footsteps was heard outside. It sounded as if someone was running down the side of the mountain, taking enormous steps. The father looked out one of the windows.

"That old mountain has thrown another stone at us again. He must have been afraid we would forget him. He sometimes shakes his head and makes us think he will come down on top of us," the father explained to the young man. "But we are old neighbors," he smiled. "And we manage to get along together pretty well. Besides, I have made a safe hiding place outside to protect us in case a slide brings the mountain down on our heads."

As the father spoke, the mother prepared a hot meal for their guest. While he ate, he talked freely to the family, as if it were his own. This young man did not trust people easily. Yet on this evening, something made him share his deepest secret with these simple mountain people.

The young man's secret was that he was ambitious. He did not know what he wanted to do with his life, yet. But he did know that he did not want to be forgotten after he had died. He believed that sometime during his life, he would become famous and be admired by thousands of people. "So far," the young man said, "I have done nothing. If I disappeared tomorrow from the face of the earth, no one would know anything about me. No one would ask 'Who was he. Where did he go?' But I cannot die until I have reached my destiny. Then let death come! I will have built my monument!"

The young man's powerful emotions touched the family. They smiled. "You laugh at me," the young man said, taking the oldest daughter's hand. "You think my ambition is silly." She was very shy, and her face became pink with embarrassment. "It is better to sit here by the fire," she whispered, "and be happy, even if nobody thinks of us."

Her father stared into the fire. "I think there is something natural in what the young man says. And his words have made me think about our own lives here. It would have been nice if we had had a little farm down in the valley. Some place where we could see our mountains without being afraid they would fall on our heads. I would have been respected by all our neighbors. And, when I had grown old, I would die happy in my bed. You would put a stone over my grave so everyone would know I lived an honest life."

"You see!" the young man cried out. "It is in our nature to want a monument. Some want only a stone on their grave. Others want to be a part of everyone's memory. But we all want to be remembered after we die!" The young man threw some more wood on the fire to chase away the darkness.

The firelight fell on the little group around the fireplace: the father's strong arms and the mother's gentle smile. It touched the young man's proud face, and the daughter's shy one. It warmed the old grandmother, still knitting in the corner. She looked up from her knitting and, with her fingers still moving the needles, she said, "Old people have their secrets, just as young people do."

The old woman said she had made her funeral clothes some years earlier. They were the finest clothes she had made since her wedding dress. She said her secret was a fear that she would not be buried in her best clothes. The young man stared into the fire. "Old and young," he said. "We dream of graves and monuments. I wonder how sailors feel when their ship is sinking, and they know they will be buried in the wide and nameless grave that is the ocean?"

A sound, rising like the roar of the ocean, shook the house. Young and old exchanged one wild look. Then the same words burst from all their lips. "The slide! The slide!" They rushed away from the house, into the darkness, to the secret spot the father had built to protect them from the mountain slide. The whole side of the mountain came rushing toward the house like a waterfall of destruction.

But just before it reached the little house, the wave of earth divided in two and went around the family's home. Everyone and everything in the path of the terrible slide was destroyed, except the little house. The next morning, smoke was seen coming from the chimney of the house on the mountain. Inside, the fire was still burning. The chairs were still drawn up in a half circle around the fireplace. It looked as if the family had just gone out for a walk.

Some people thought that a stranger had been with the family on that terrible night. But no one ever discovered who the stranger was. His name and way of life remain a mystery. His body was never found.

The Birthmark by Nathaniel Hawthorne

People who are high ambitious but lack of knowledge are causing damage over other people. The husband in the story always has an ambition to make his wife perfectly beautiful, for him not for her, and its result is too tragic.

His ambition is hidden in the sentences, "She hoped that for just one moment she could satisfy her husband's highest ideals. But she realized then that his mind would forever be on the march, always requiring something newer, better and more perfect." In the story, it shows that the girl is not only a wife, but also a sample in his scientific experiments. Finally, without any different way, she accepts to die in his hand. The story concludes because of unmeaningly perfect ambition, he throws his happiness.

---

A long time ago, there lived a skillful scientist who had experienced a spiritual reaction more striking than any chemical one.

He had left his laboratory in the care of his assistant,washed the chemicals from his hands and asked a beautiful woman to become his wife. In those days new scientific discoveries such as electricity seemed to open paths into the area of miracles. It was not unusual for the love of science to compete with the love of a woman.

The scientist's name was Aylmer. He had so totally given himself to scientific studies that he could not be weakened by a second love. His love for his young wife could only be the stronger of the two if it could link itself with his love of science.

Such a union did take place with truly remarkable results. But one day, very soon after their marriage, Aylmer looked at his wife with a troubled expression.

"Georgiana," he said, "have you ever considered that the mark upon your cheek might be removed"?

"No," she said smiling. But seeing the seriousness of his question, she said, "The mark has so often been called a charm that I was simple enough to imagine it might be so."

"On another face it might," answered her husband, "but not on yours. No dear, Nature made you so perfectly that this small defect shocks me as being a sign of earthly imperfection."

"Shocks you!" cried Georgiana, deeply hurt. Her face reddened and she burst into tears. "Then why did you marry me? You cannot love what shocks you!"

We must explain that in the center of Georgiana's left cheek there was a mark, deep in her skin. The mark was usually a deep red color. When Georgiana blushed, the mark became less visible. But when she turned pale, there was the mark, like a red stain upon snow. The birthmark would come and go with the emotions in her heart.

The mark was shaped like a very small human hand. Georgiana's past lovers used to say that the hand of a magical fairy had touched her face when she was born. Many a gentleman would have risked his life for the honor of kissing that mysterious hand.

But other people had different opinions. Some women said the red hand quite destroyed the effect of Georgiana's beauty.

Male observers who did not praise the mark simply wished it away so that they did not see it. After his marriage, Aylmer discovered that this was the case with himself.

Had Georgiana been less beautiful, he might have felt his love increased by the prettiness of that little hand. But because she was otherwise so perfect, he found the mark had become unbearable.

Aylmer saw the mark as a sign of his wife's eventual sadness, sickness and death. Soon, the birthmark caused him more pain than Georgiana's beauty had ever given him pleasure.

During a period that should have been their happiest, Aylmer could only think of this disastrous subject. With the morning light, Aylmer opened his eyes upon his wife's face and recognized the sign of imperfection. When they sat together in the evening near the fire, he would look at the mark.

Georgiana soon began to fear his look. His expression would make her face go pale. And the birthmark would stand out like a red jewel on white stone.

"Do you remember, dear Aylmer, about the dream you had last night about this hateful mark?" she asked with a weak smile.

"None! None whatever!" answered Aylmer, surprised.

The mind is in a sad state when sleep cannot control its ghosts and allows them to break free with their secrets. Aylmer now remembered his dream. He had imagined himself with his assistant Aminadab trying to remove the birthmark with an operation. But the deeper his knife went, the deeper the small hand sank until it had caught hold of Georgiana's heart.

Aylmer felt guilty remembering the dream.

"Aylmer," said Georgiana, "I do not know what the cost would be to both of us to remove this birthmark. Removing it could deform my face or damage my health."

"Dearest Georgiana, I have spent much thought on the subject," said Aylmer. "I am sure it can be removed."

"Then let the attempt be made at any risk," said Georgiana. "Life is not worth living while this hateful mark makes me the object of your horror. You have deep science and have made great discoveries. Remove this little mark for the sake of your peace and my own."

"Dearest wife," cried Aylmer. "Do not doubt my power. I am ready to make this cheek as perfect as its pair."

Her husband gently kissed her right cheek, the one without the red hand.

The next day the couple went to Aylmer's laboratory where he had made all his famous discoveries. Georgiana would live in a beautiful room he had prepared nearby, while he worked tirelessly in his lab. One by one, Aylmer tried a series of powerful experiments on his wife. But the mark remained.

Georgiana waited in her room. She read through his notebooks of scientific observations. She could not help see that many of his experiments had ended in failure. She decided to see for herself the scientist at work.

The first thing that struck Georgiana when entering the laboratory was the hot furnace. From the amount of soot above it, it seemed to have been burning for ages. She saw machines, tubes, cylinders and other containers for chemical experiments. What most drew her attention was Aylmer himself. He was nervous and pale as death as he worked on preparing a liquid.

Georgiana realized that her husband had been hiding his tension and fear.

"Think not so little of me that you cannot be honest about the risks we are taking," she said. "I will drink whatever you make for me, even if it is a poison."

"My dear, nothing shall be hidden," Aylmer said. "I have already given you chemicals powerful enough to change your entire physical system. Only one thing remains to be tried and if that fails, we are ruined!"

He led her back to her room where she waited once more, alone with her thoughts. She hoped that for just one moment she could satisfy her husband's highest ideals. But she realized then that his mind would forever be on the march, always requiring something newer, better and more perfect.

Hours later, Aylmer returned carrying a crystal glass with a colorless liquid.

"The chemical process went perfectly," he said. "Unless all my science has tricked me, it cannot fail."

To test the liquid, he placed a drop in the soil of a dying flower growing in a pot in the room. In a few moments, the plant became healthy and green once more.

"I do not need proof," Georgiana said quietly. "Give me the glass. I am happy to put my life in your hands." She drank the liquid and immediately fell asleep.

Aylmer sat next to his wife, observing her and taking notes. He noted everything -- her breathing, the movement of an eyelid. He stared at the birthmark. And slowly, with every breath that came and went, it lost some of its brightness.

"By Heaven! It is nearly gone," said Aylmer. "Success! Success!"

He opened the window coverings to see her face in daylight. She was so pale. Georgiana opened her eyes and looked into the mirror her husband held. She tried to smile as she saw the barely visible mark.

"My poor Aylmer," she said gently. "You have aimed so high. With so high and pure a feeling, you have rejected the best the Earth could offer. I am dying, dearest."

It was true. The hand on her face had been her link to life. As the last trace of color disappeared from her cheek, she gave her last breath.

Blinded by a meaningless imperfection and an impossible goal, Aylmer had thrown away her life and with it his chance for happiness. In trying to improve his lovely wife, he had failed to realize she had been perfect all along.

Tax Dollars Will Be Useful in School behind Bars

Chi Le

I believe people who are educated always are good in every different situation, including in a jail. Moreover, when prison inmates really repent of their sins, they need to have an opportunity to restart life afresh. The opportunity is given through education, better than from labor jobs, which many prisons are applying over the inmates. If they are paroled with no career, skill, or degree, it is really difficult for them to reintegrate in the free society. Because social benefits of the rehabilitation are over money, I agree that institutions should provide college education programs to prison inmates from available tax dollars of the California state.

An inmate who is a model of a success earned his bachelor’s degree from Roosevelt University while still being in the prison, and now he gets a job in Northwestern University for a study on inner-city Chicago violence. The inmate, McElrath-Bey, got a bachelor’s degree behind bars and integrated into the society with a job in Northwestern University. According to Matthew Fleischer, McElrath-Bey’s success is a model of college education in a prison. He was in the Illinois Department of Corrections when he was 14 years old. And then in the Department, he realized the power of education. After he graduated with a GED, he continued to take college classes in the prison. He felt discovering more than about himself with realizing education as therapeutics. He wanted to be free and self-mastery when he came out. I think his success is only one, but for our society is two because the society loses a crime and adds a useful person. So, Pica has reasons to say, “Every dollar we spend on higher education in prison sees an 18 dollar return” (Fleischer). Pica’s reasons are included the whole society, so the social benefits should be invested by the government from the available tax dollars, rather than from companies. Clearly, the inmate’s rehabilitation brings a big social signification, and it also proves a need of providing college education programs to other prison inmates.

College education programs help inmates have a big opportunity to rehabilitate and reintegrate after they come out. Simply, the programs help to make a big goal for inmates to reeducate and decrease violence. According to “Inside San Quentin Inmates Go to College,” Richard Gonzales tells about an inmate, Chris Deragon, who has served 15 years and is eligible for parole next seven years. Deragon is taking college level courses and hopes to get out of the prison to recover his life. He knows that he is being punished and should not have the right to an education, but he says, “If I'm released onto the street and I'm not educated, then you're just releasing another criminal” (Gonzales). So, the college education program in the prison makes a goal for Deragon to restart his life, rather than there are inmates who fear a day to be paroled without an education, a skill, a means of living. Moreover, Richard Gonzales quotes a state of Scott Kernan, managing day-to-day operations at California's 33 adult prisons, who used to experience a violence, says that the college classes and other programs help to be safe for staffs and make prisons safer. Bobby Evans, who is a tutor for other inmates after earning his degree in the prison at San Quentin, says that new arrivals from other high-level prisons feel a calmer air at San Quentin and don't want to destroy it. So, it's what changing life is (Gonzales). Richard Gonzales concludes, “The program may be helping to change attitudes inside the prison, but there are no rigorous studies yet that show.” Therefore, the college education programs are a big goal for inmates to strive for their useful life and decrease violence.

In another case, a father graduates from college in the prison without a hope to be able to find a job as an ex-con after being paroled, but he is inspiring for his daughter to pursue a goal of a community college. Simply, he is a model of his daughter to restart her life. Richard Gonzales tells about Felix Lucero, who went to prison when his daughter, Desiree Lucero, was just a year old. After 17 years, his lessons in school behind bars changed his relationship with his daughter. He said, “The more I learned stuff, the more I wanted to give it to her” (Gonzales). When Desiree Lucero has downfall in high school, she turns her mind to the father what he did in the prison. And then she realizes she can restart her life as her father began 17 years ago. Her father is a model of restarting life afresh and is inspiring for her. So, the model is great for what a prison inmate makes for her daughter after finishing some lessons in school behind bars.

However, there is a different idea which doesn’t agree to provide more money than to prisons. Hansook Oh and Mona Adem say that because of lack of fund to college, the public four-year institutions increase tuition and fees to lead low-income and poor students cannot afford to go to school. They add that $1 billion allocated to prisons is too much if compared higher education received, and “charging students more for their studies, the government will gain more money and use it to supplement lacking tax revenue.” In fact, according to Association of International Educators NAFSA, in 2012-2013 academic year, foreign students in the United States contribute about $24 billion to the national economy, including $3.7 billion here in California State, and the amount is increasing yearly. Moreover, the government is still prioritizing public education and making the institution very affordable. I believe that all low-income and poor students in California have a fee waiver to ensure access to the college, and a financial aid helps the students fund their higher education as a subsidization of the federal government. Cleary, the California government has full of its duties for higher education, so it should also have a strong budget of college education programs for prison inmates. Therefore, using tax dollars available to provide the programs to prison inmates is the best resolution.

I believe many people don’t mind paying their taxes to those who are using them to make the society better. I advocate providing education programs to prison inmates who have a desire to be educated because the inmates will restart their life significantly, such as McElrath-Bey, Chris Deragon, Bobby Evans, and Felix Lucero. And then the taxes are used significantly to help the prison inmates rehabilitate and reintegrate to the free society. In the prison can be an ideal place for study, of course, people don’t want to jail to learn, but if they are in jail, they have more time, accept fate, and calm in mind. Through papers, I know many world leaders used to study in a prison, such as Nelson Mandela, Mahatma Gandhi, and Martin Luther King, Jr. So, a prison could be a good place to practice one’s will and ideal to fulfill a great intention.

Reference

http://www.npr.org/2011/06/20/137176620/inside-san-quentin-inmates-go-to-college

English as Lifelong Learning

Chi Le

I've been using English for my job since I lived in Vietnam. However, I only read comprehension some articles in the fields of information technology and computers, and I rarely use English for any other fields. Due to the need to integrate and work, when residing in the U.S. four years ago, I determined that I should spend more time in pursuit of learning English. Once settled in, I started to enroll in college. In the first days at college, with poor English, I was really difficult to communicate with everyone. This led me not to understand lectures and requisitions of instructors; however, reading comprehension skill has helped me, and I began to feel more confident after one semester. Moreover, while being an ESL student, I am always challenged to study other subjects, such as law, business, philosophy, and English to complete the ESL classes.

Sometimes I think an ESL student as a disabled, and schooling at ESL classes is like to restore missing functions of the disabled. Clearly, they cannot effectively use four English skills of listening, speaking, reading and writing. they can listen to but not understand and say but people not to understand. Then they can read but not understand and cannot properly write what their thoughts are. These are the most violent initial challenges which they meet.

Fortunately, when living in Vietnam, I have learned and used English, but also just reading comprehension and some knowledge of English grammar. My reading comprehension skills help me study some subjects well, such as mathematics and accounting, which professors require only reading comprehension and calculating; otherwise, some other subjects that require me to listen to professors and take notes for exams are really difficult for me.

However, in general, the courses in college are at a very basic level, so they are not really difficult for me to study. Eventually, the most difficult subject is still English. Moreover, being likely to transfer to a UC, English will continue to concern me as the important subject. In addition, I have to spend time on my work as an accounting programmer for a company in Vietnam. The work which I have been still hired since I started living in the U.S. comes to me every evening to 12:00 am next day through the Internet. Finally, it is sure that my English cannot be fluent as a native person, so I will meet some of the challenges in the future. The challenges ahead of me are much different to integrate into the community, know the law, acquire new knowledge, and respond to natural disasters.

ESL learners often have a limited English vocabulary or improperly use vocabulary in context in their papers. Through my work, I usually read many articles in English, but my vocabulary from reading is limited only in a field that I'm working. When reading articles or papers in other fields, my vocabulary is not enough to understand immediately those articles. In that case, I turn to analyze sentence structures and look up dictionary some key words. Then I continue to enrich my vocabulary. Although I can read comprehension well and always extend my vocabulary, in my papers I sometimes use improper words, causing confusing and misunderstanding readers. For example, in one case I use the word “appointment” instead of “dating” which their meaning is too different. Moreover, I often think with my first language and then translate to English. This causes confusing readers because sentence structures are too different between Vietnamese and English. The translation of a sentence is easy to put words in misnomer, as the example above, or creates a complex grammatical structure of the sentence, being difficult to understand because the sentence was described earlier in Vietnamese structure. And then, I am trying to write some long sentences with many phrases, but it seems I haven’t succeeded. I believe that I have good knowledge of English grammar and strengths in reading comprehension, but weaknesses in listening and speaking skills, so I'm trying to practice the weak skills daily. Someone recommended I should listen to the English radio a lot and practice pronunciation, so I have been practicing the skills since the last semester. Obviously, I have found myself more improvement in English, such as less afraid to communicate with other people, although it's not yet like I expect. In study for various subjects, I usually take online or hybrid classes because I believe in my reading comprehension skills.

I like to study hybrid and online classes, and I've learned a lot of the classes past semesters. I notice that hybrid and online classes, any other disciplines, often require students spend more time for reading comprehension more than if compared lecture classes. Maybe, lecturing compensates for reading. In contrast, the hybrid classes don’t spend much time to travel back and fore, and learning time of students is more flexible. However, the classes require students have self-discipline in learning and a serious schedule of learning. A timetable which is not clear and not taken seriously can lead to a late submission of homework and exam. This lateness is inevitable if online students are neglected and unserious. Consequently, online classes require students have high self-discipline in learning as well as awareness of learning by themselves without by others. I think colleges should remind students who must have self-discipline before enrolling online or hybrid classes. On the other hand, professors teaching online classes should have a clear and stable schedule and avoid disorder. I believe that writing essays on the computer helps students approach actual life better in comparison with writing handwritten essays because nowadays people almost use papers from word processing software. During writing on the computer, I can write comfortably because I know I can reorganize and correct vocabulary after writing. One sentence is written in the first paragraph before reorganizing; it can move it to the last paragraph after reorganizing. Moreover, I have to expose my idea quickly, so I can write some words in my first language, and then I will find English words to replace after correcting. Clearly, those cannot be fulfilled upon handwriting. Of course, there are other factors which need to be analyzed particularly to realize what to teach writing better, but computers and the Internet really are essential for my papers and work.

In the study process, the Internet helps me a lot in finding information, and sometimes it also helps me correct some grammar errors. Because today there are many websites, teaching English grammar, I easily search problems of grammar which I suspect in my writings. There are also several websites and word processing software that automatically corrects the English grammar, but they are not entirely accurate. Moreover, if I suspect a phrase is an idiom upon reading papers, I just search the phrase plus a word "idiom" on the Internet. Immediately I will have a result after that. In addition, for an ESL learner, I determined that learning English is a job for life; therefore, in any cases communicating with anyone or anything, I try to learn English when I can. For example, during reading books of accounting, if I meet a sentence or a phrase which I can use for my papers, I immediately mark the phrase. As the following sentence, “Its profit margin is unusually high in comparison with the industry average of 8% and J.C. Penney’s 1.4%,” I mark a phrase “in comparison with” which I believe it can be used in your papers.

As ESL students, I encounter many difficulties for communication, integration into English society which can cause to lose confidence in study and life. With persistently striving, I regain confidence after one semester in college and learn better. In addition, I determined learning English should be pursued as lifelong learning, to integrate and to overcome the cultural differences as well as job search. Therefore, in the future, I will still have to concern English though I finish ESL classes.