College News

Even professional writers claim that they need some special atmosphere when they have to write something. That is quite understandable for creative writing is not a technical process and lots of factors play their role in what will be as final result. It is known that some fiction writers may even go to the mountains if they want to get special inspiration. Moreover, some of them prefer absolute solitude when creating their masterpiece work. That’s because writing requires a lot of meditation and reflections. Sure, some people may write even newspaper articles being surrounded by other correspondents in the office, where telephone is constantly ringing and the sounds of printers, voices of workers are filling the room. Others may find difficulties in writing an ordinary essay, if it is too loudly or hot in the room. So, it depends. Actually, there is no single way that would be appropriate for everyone. That’s because as it was already said, some people need solitude, and they might go to parks for impulse to create, while others can get incentive in the overcrowded places. In fact, one and the same person can get inspiration in different places, depending on mood, etc. However, most people say that when they really have to write something, they need peace and quietness, in order to mobilize their ideas, skills and talent and give way to something authentically creative.

What we’ve been witnessing in Western societies concerning technological development for the last decade is more than impressive. Top plasma TVsets are considered such banalities that are even seldom mentioned when speaking about high-tech products. Actually, novelties are so many and they are so various that a common person can hardly even keep track of them. One more phenomenon is the one which impact on society should be well researched not only by IT specialists, but by philosophers, sociologists, and other scholars. That phenomenon is Internet. Indeed, nowadays people not only search for information there, they even buy lots of stuff through Internet. There are so many diverse internet services that they can satisfy needs of most demanding users or customers. That one can easily buy food via Internet shop would have probably sounded like some fantasy for a person from the 1980s, let alone, from earlier years. Data reveal that Internet shopping is becoming more and more popular, and the number of people who use such kind of service is growing rapidly. Sure, that is a characteristic of Western societies. Still, there are similar tendencies even in some developing countries. Some observers fear that purchasing on-line may substitute traditional way one day. We can hardly stand for one or the other answer, because future is indeed unpredictable, as we can see it. However, in the visible future traditional shops, super-markets and other market places are unlikely to disappear. And reasons are numerous. First of all, such trade makes an enormous share of both world and national economies. Secondly, people are prone to keeping traditions and they will hardly give up habitual shopping. Besides, we shouldn’t depend on our Internet provider if we want to buy some food for the supper. So, in the nearest future Internet selling will function along with traditional forms of trade and may even expand. Eventually, we are here to observe the way our world is developing.

If count time spent at school, we may see that students indeed spend a really great part of their day at school, which means that school life is an indispensable element of students’ life and feelings about being at school influence satisfaction from life as such. Most students go to school every day but how many of them enjoy schooling? Polls indicate that students are very often reluctant to go to school and feel depressed there. Reasons are different and they are many. Very often teachers do not motivate or encourage students, instead they treat students the way that discourages them to learn and even go to school. What is important in this respect is that teachers had a special approach towards each of the students and were able to see peculiarities of character and capabilities of this or that student. It does not often go that way. Careless attitude towards students leads to frustration of the latter and no need to explain why it is bad for students themselves, for schools, and last but no least for the entire society. Of course a lot of students do not enjoy schooling not because of bad teachers but rather because of laziness and lack of personal motivation. Writing a common book review. may seem unbearable burden to them, because that requires reading some book and personal reflections. Besides, there are many other reasons which discourage students to study or which influence their behavior at school. However, as students we should try to find motivation to acquire knowledge for ourselves and mobilize all our abilities, skills and will. As teachers, we should find a common language with students and evoke interest in learning.

Values shared by people can be compared to anchors that keep society stable. Values not only unite people; values become a component of identity. That is why nowadays we hear so many discussions on different values of different communities and subsequent conflicts. Although, as any statement, it might be debated, still there is a commonly shared view that western civilization is characterized with specific values. Traditionally, such values as liberty, individualism, progress, development and growth in various respects are considered to be social values of the West. Are these values still valued, pardon for tautology? At first sight, the answer seems evident. “Yes, these values are shared by majority in the society”, one would reply. Indeed, individual liberty now allows lots of things, even getting a custom made paper instead of writing your own essay when assigned at school. But the problem is that all the values mentioned above have turned into truisms and are so widely used that authentic meaning has been lost to some extent. Sure, there are philosophers, sociologists, and other scholars who would offer their opinion with a full-fledged report on tendencies in modern society. Actually, the whole issue of values and their modification is for debates and there is no one set answer that would reflect reality, because when speaking of values we come to many options and that is quite natural. Scholars can and should observe everything and make theoretical stands, but there is something anyone might feel about changes in society. The most important thing is not to stop reflecting and thinking about such phenomena.

Television is probably one of indispensable attributes of modern man’s daily life. Sure, some people ignore TV and do not even want to have TV sets, those hated machines, at their places. However, most people can hardly get without TV. Television was first designed to provide information and entertain, but with time people use it most as a source of entertainment.

Many people complain that Television takes too much time of theirs. The question is, why then not to switch it off and do what you have to do? Evidently we do not voluntarily stop doing something as long as we like doing it. What do people like about TV? The results of various polls indicate that people like watching TV, because thus they have some kind of ‘activity’ and don’t have to think of what to do while resting. Nowadays there are so many TV channels for any taste that you can watch whatever you wish. If you are keen Formula 1 and feel crazy about cars, it’s all available to you through Television. If you want to watch a concert of some pop-star, that is held 3 thousand mile away from your place, just tune your TV to the right channel and you can watch it on-line. Fantastic, isn’t it? World of politics, culture, sport (to name but a few things) is opened to you through TV. But that’s only one side. And, as usual, there is an opposite one, which claims that TV makes us lazy and offers us a slight copy of the world, while we should rather discover authenticity of the world by ourselves.

The word ‘censorship’ often if not always arouses negative associations and feelings. For a long time Internet was praised for providing free communication possibilities. But as it often happens, too much freedom turns into chaos. People started submitting inadequate information in Internet, misrepresent truth. A lot of web-sites of doubtful content appeared. Which is more, feeling secure in their home places or offices, a lot of Internet users post different comments on various blogs, forums. And what they post often demonstrates lack of communication culture.

Taking all these aspects into consideration, we may come to conclusion that certain censorship can be justified. Freedom of expression is a great thing but it should go in line with ethics and proper understanding of how to interact with others. The whole issue is quite problem-bearing, because a lot of questions appear. Who will determine a measure of ethical or non-ethical on-line presence? Will Internet users be deprived of freedom of speech under the cover of “ethic censorship”? Besides, there are a lot of technical aspects, which are not easy to comprehend for vast majority of users. What can be actually done by each of us is ignoring certain web-pages, which present stuff we find inadequate or promote unethical communication or behavior. This may sound a bit moralistic, but actually any website is a special piece of virtual life and Internet as such reflects everything we have in daily life, comprising great things or phenomena and shameful ones. Ignoring shameful ones in Internet is a possible option if we want to cultivate tolerance as such.

It is evident that people started advertising various products and services long time ago. However, due to development of technologies, today’s advertising is unique phenomenon in variety of forms and reaching capability.

We can barely make a single step out of our apartment without getting into the flood of commercials. City-lights, bill-boards, brochures, newspaper ads, TV commercials, radio shows, printed production – all these types of advertising are around us almost every minute of our life. We often get irritated with the same pictures of the same products, with repeating slogans and annoying advertising agents. Still, we go to the supermarket and among two similar products choose the one which looks familiar to us due to previously watched TV commercial of that very product. This effect of being familiar with some product is no more than illusion imposed via means of advertising. This illusion makes us choose what producers want. Of course no one forces us to buy well advertised juice brand instead of the other, but we often do that. There is one more interesting thing about commercials. Commercials kind of create an atmosphere of belonging to one group. Thus, if you buy some expensive watch you become a member of a virtual community of people wearing the same brand of watches. Commercials are a great driving force. When hearing an ad on some extra sales offer a student would rather rush into mall instead of writing a term paper. We are unlikely to get out of influence of commercials. However, we can make their influence not so crucial for our daily life and everyday choices.

Parties, busy campus life, interesting (or boring) lectures…These are our memories of college life.  Sorry, I forgot to mention “N” number of sleepless nights struggling over another writing assignment.  Writing assignments are meant to develop literary orientation and analytical thinking, teach us to express our ideas in a clear and convincing way. Good. But do they attain their goal in present academic realities? I doubt.

The terrifying statistics show that most of academic projects are almost 99,9% plagiarized: students  just  rewrite the content of their textbooks,  or use the prewritten essays from online databases. As a result the educational value of the assignments is nullified.  At best mechanical copying will help the student better to memorize the topic in question.

However writing a paper on a particular topic will not give you understanding of the whole subject. Working on the paper requires a lot of time and most probably spending this time on studying the subject you will attain higher educational effect.

It’s not a secret that many students prefer to order their papers from custom writing services than to work on the papers themselves.  I am not going to blame them, as they have their motives for doing so.  Ordering your paper from a quality writing service makes sense if you are going to spend the saved time on something really valuable.

This or another day each of us faces the necessity to look for a job for him. Few would deny that this process is time consuming and efforts taking, and may even bring frustration. People are stressed when they have to find a job, because any change of conditions or life style is stressful. Besides, a lot of people are dismayed with the necessity to make a choice.

So what are the things we should think of when searching for job? First of all, one should always keep in mind what activity he truly wants to perform. Although some companies claim they will guarantee satisfaction of all your rights, like, for example, employee privacy rights in workplace, numerous bonuses and fascinating prospects for promotion, always think well if this is the position you would like to spend your time for. Of course, materialistic aspects very often turn into nice motivation, but that’s not only it. You may feel like being a librarian or a gardener or providing professional assistance writing and that even may be your calling. In this case never be afraid of trying and go ahead. Certainly, rationality is still a good thing and we have to search reasonable grounds when estimating this or that proposal. Anyway, the more extensive experience you possess, the more flexible you become and the more prospects to succeed you get. Thus take as many instruments, putting it figuratively, as possible when starting search for a job. And do not forget that any experience, even of going into interviews, will be useful to you and might bring unexpected results.

The world has changed dramatically for the last decade in terms of information circulation. If in the 1980s you had to go to the library when preparing to some common classes, now Internet is at hand and you can find whatever information. Sure there are problems with search of information, because not all information is relevant or actual, there are lots of advertisement and spam, etc.

However, one definitely has got much more options for making a research on this or that topic in any field. Society now faces the problem of people addicted to computers and Internet as a powerful source of information. Children do not read books, because they know they can type some word in Google and they will get many answers. There are numerous on-line encyclopedias, dictionaries, thesauruses and many other tools that assist in studying process and substitute real books; even book reports are available online. A lot of entertainment opportunities, abundance of movies, video games make children forget about books. That is why the level of kids’ acquaintance with literature is constantly getting lower, according to various researches. Well, from time to time extremely popular bestsellers appear and gain tremendous attention. An evident example that comes to mind is J. K. Rowling’s “Harry Potter”, which popularity arouses no slightest doubt. Thus, despite a general tendency of books becoming less popular, the whole industry is still on the run. And probably that can be explained not only in terms of book industry business, but because literature is still appreciated and valued in society.