Monthly Archives: April 2016

Opinion

Trending now: thrift stores galore

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Although NECC campuses have been coated with fresh snow on this first week of April, students can’t deny that one of the best parts about spring is shopping for a new wardrobe. With loans breathing down your neck, and a long list of other expenses, this might be a great time to start being frugal. Buying clothing from a thrift shop will not only save you money, it just might help to save the planet.

Another common ritual to participate in is spring cleaning. This is where you can make a huge leap toward environmental awareness. The old saying goes, “One person’s trash is another person’s treasure.” Unfortunately, many of us are still throwing recyclable items (especially clothing) in the trash.

According to the Environmental Protection Agency, Americans generate more than 2 million tons of trash each year, and the shocking truth is that more than 1/3 of the items that end up in landfills could have been recycled.

Resale stores like Goodwill and Salvation Army have become abundant and increasingly popular in the Merrimack Valley and surrounding areas. Although most of the goods are collected from donation receptacles that have been placed in the parking lots of various shopping plazas and churches, some stores such as Savers in Plaistow, N.H. have a community donation center located within the same building.

If donating your items wasn’t enough to make you feel good, many of these two-in-one locations offer a store credit as incentive for your good deed. However, if you feel that your unwanted clothing is worth too much to you to be tossed into a receptacle behind Market Basket, you can try to sell your gently worn clothing at a consignment shop.

Most consignment shops welcome sellers by appointment for an initial evaluation and pricing of their goods. If and when your are items are sold, the store will disburse your payment. A small commission is usually taken by the store. Think of it as paying your share of the rent for keeping your clothes there.

BloomingDeals in Salem, N.H. is one the area’s more upscale, resale stores carrying everything from designer purses to seasonal items, such as prom dresses and Halloween costumes. Proprietors Patti Rappoli and Sara Rapolli-Vienneau are constantly receiving new merchandise and re-organizing the store to make it fun and inviting. In fact, I was able to get my mother a mother-of-the-bride dress at BloomingDeals for $40 and it was prettier than the $200 dresses at the mall.

Since the 2012 release of Macklemore’s “Thrift Shop,” college students have been less reluctant to be seen in a secondhand store. Actually, it’s kind of where the “cool kids” shop nowadays. Sure, there is an ongoing argument about the true meaning of “pop some tags.” Some believe it is a slang term for shoplifting. Others say it simply means to go clothes shopping and that the satisfaction of “popping” the tags off is one of most exciting aspects of the shopping experience.

In all honesty, most of the clothes I own were either handed down by my sister or found on the

clearance rack of a department store. I have never been into brand names or trendy styles; I mean, I wouldn’t even know the difference between a Leo diamond and cubic zirconium from Walmart, but I have only recently begun to visit thrift shops to scope out more unique and bargain priced items. If you have the time to browse, it can definitely be worth the trip.

As a starving artist who has always had one combat boot firmly planted in 1988, I have definitely visited my share of pawn shops in search of  search of cheap guitars and amplifiers. I used to snag some pretty sweet deals back in the day, but that was before the pawn brokers became internet savvy. Now they can easily find out how much they can get for that vintage distortion pedal.

Editorial

The Observer is a space for every student voice

 

Over the last few weeks, I’ve been asked (at least three times) why we ran Dan Potocki’s scathing letter to the editor in the March 9 issue.

My answer each time has been the same: the Observer tries hard to be a place where everyone in the NECC community can have a voice.

We welcome and respect every opinion, even if we may not agree with it.

We have made it our mission to reach out to the NECC community and ask them what they would like to see more (or less) of in the Observer and the answer is often that we should include more interactive pieces. While an opinion  article about a spa day may not have been interesting or relevant to Mr. Potocki, some of the students and faculty here spend a tremendous amount of time and money on health and beauty care, including reading tips about it.

Besides being an NECC student and talented journalist, Rachael has been a beauty care professional for many years.

The Observer staff editors feel that it is entirely appropriate to allow our resident expert to share her tips with us, and we stand by that decision 100 percent.We hope that some of you went home and treated yourselves to a spa day. If you missed it, don’t worry: You can still see Rachael’s article, and Mr. Potocki’s letter, on the website at observer.necc.mass.edu. If you have an opinion about goings-on at NECC, the Observer gladly welcomes letters to the editor at observer@necc.mass.edu.

Features

Math professor holds to traditional family values

 
Sujatha
| NECC Observer

By Sarah Colpitts
Correspondent
[learn_more caption=”Sujatha Thiruvengadathan”] Content goes here[/learn_more] , known to students and faculty as “Sue” and by her family members as “Suji,” teaches math courses here at NECC. Thiruvengadathan was born in Tamilnadu, India.
Thiruvengadathan studied electrical engineering in undergrad school while living in India before moving to the U.S. in 1991 to study for her Masters in computer engineering at Manhattan College.
After graduate school, Thiruvengadathan moved back to India for three years before moving back to the U.S. in 1996 with her husband.
“My husband wanted to work somewhere outside of India, so he picked Boston of all places. I hate the cold, but I supported him and I would go wherever it was he chose.”
Thiruvengadathan found herself extremely passionate about her work as an engineer, but after the birth of her son, she said, “I knew there was no time to invest all of my passion into engineering, because I had a duty to raise my son.”
It is very important to Thiruvengadathan to make sure her son is raised in the traditional way in which she was raised in India. She knew wanted to make sure she was able to cook traditional Indian meals and teach her son how to speak her native language. When it came time to work again, Thiruvengadathan chose to leave her career as an engineer in favor of teaching. “I always helped people in my engineering classes, and I felt I could balance teaching and raising my child,” she said.
She first began her career in teaching by volunteering at Middlesex Community College. Now she teaches math at both NECC and Merrimack College.
Her teaching philosophy, she says, is all about individuality.
“I don’t look at my students as only math students, but as an individual person,” she said. Thiruvengadathan understands that people from different backgrounds and of different ages all learn differently.
Thiruvengadathan does her best to help students by relating math problems to their individual lives.
“When I can’t relate a problem to a person, I feel like I failed and it bothers me until I get home that night … even until I see that person again,” she said. “My most favorite part about teaching is when someone gets that sparkle in their eye and says, “Wow!” I feel like I’ve opened doors for them.”
If you talk with Thiruvengadathan, it’s clear she’s an open book. However, she said that she wasn’t always as outgoing, and growing up, she was a very introverted person.
“Back home, girls and boys are separate, so growing up with three brothers and five uncles, I never knew how to talk to girls and make friends with them. Back then, you didn’t have time outside of school for friends.”
She even confessed that, even to this day, she has never even been to the movies with a friend before.
Nonetheless, Thiruvengadathan has a very positive perspective on life and she shared that her grandmother is her spiritual role model. She describes her grandmother as a completely uneducated woman who didn’t even receive an elementary education but always had the best outlook on life.
“She always smiled and never said a bad word about anyone,” she said.
Thiruvengadathan tries to pass down some of what she learned from her grandmother and apply it to her parenting.
She said, “My most over-used saying to my son is, ‘I don’t care what you grow up to be, but being a good person in non-negotiable.’”
Thiruvengadathan admits that the thing she is most proud of is also the biggest risk she ever took, which is the decision to leave engineering and become a teacher. She also joked that getting married was “truly the biggest risk” she ever took.
As an Indian, Thiruvengadathan let me in on a little secret, and that is that the delicious Indian food we eat here in America is not necessarily authentic. She says not many people know this, but every state in India has its own cuisine, and even speaks a different language. She admits that she and her husband don’t even speak the same Indian language.
When she isn’t teaching, Thiruvengadathan can most likely be found spending her time reading non-fiction literature. Her favorite book is “The Promise of a Pencil” by Adam Braun.