All posts by Observer Staff

Editorial

Meta Toolkit

 

A news employee wears a lot of hats, especially on a small, student-run paper like this one. That can be a really good thing! It’s a great opportunity to learn a whole lot of valuable skills and acquire some very useful knowledge.

To take the best possible advantage of that, there are some other skills you’ll want to keep in mind.
Getting good at things is a skill you can get good at. It’s called rapid skill acquisition — you can learn how to identify the core principles in any discipline, and, with a little time, effort and enthusiasm, get pretty good at it. Not great. Maybe not even professional. But good enough that you could put it on your resume.

If you sign up for the Observer (and there are openings) you’ll have the opportunity to get reasonably competent in some very valuable computer skills. You’ll get experience with programs like Adobe InDesign and Photoshop, and with WordPress.

These are the programs that professionals use to edit photos, to design publications. They’re very powerful programs, and one of the things you should keep in mind is that if you think something ought to be possible using them, there’s a really good chance that it is. You may have to do some Googling to figure out what the feature is called, where to find it and how to use it. (Though with experience you’ll get the hang of exploring to find the things you’re looking for.)

But when you know it should be there, you’ll often be able to figure out where to find it.
Also: Learn keyboard shortcuts. You can’t imagine how much time you’ll save.

You can also learn how to Google. Like, really Google. It’s one of the best research skills you can develop for getting good introductiory information about any given topic.

I’ll let you do some digging on your own but the main points are: use search settings to narrow your range; learn search modifiers (putting site:[url] returns only results from a particular website. Putting a phrase in quotation marks returns only results that contain those words in exactly that order.); and word choice.

Word choice is possibly the most powerful one. Definitely a good one to learn as a writer: get the hang of guessing what other people would say about the thing you want to find, and you’ll be able to effectively search for it. (And you’ll be better at writing about things in a way that helps people find it. Which is called Search Engine Optimization, or SEO. Which is a skill you can put on your resume.)

In some small part, journalism is about becoming a kind-of-expert on a dozen things a week for long enough to explain the basic idea to non-experts. That’s a really cool thing to be able to do! And it’s a thing you can learn how to do, and get better at.

It’s really important to understand that you can improve your ability to acquire skills, and you can improve your ability to learn and use information.

Opinion

Plane Crash Corner

 

Most people think the cause of air disasters is plane malfunction. In most cases it’s actually human error, not only the pilots’, but the people inside the towers.

Even small errors can cause catastrophic consequences.

One of the most known cases of a plane collision involving human error is the Tenerife airport disaster that left 583 dead. The crash involved KLM Flight 4805 and Pan Am Flight 1736.

On March 27, 1977, the runway was filled with fog and the pilots had a hard time seeing so many flights were delayed or cancelled.

The flights that were able to continue on track had the extra eyes of the air traffic control.
On the day of the crash the weather wasn’t exactly “flying weather.” It was extremely foggy on the runway, so most flights were cancelled until the fog subsided. With the help of Air Traffic Controllers (ATCS) directing planes were to go flights were continued as planned.

Due to the intense fog and several misunderstandings of communication the ATCS gave KLM flight 4805 the ok to take off not realizing that Pan Am flight 1736 was still on the runway.

Due to the fact when the ATCS and Pan Am flight 1736 try to both contact each other at the same time the connection was lost and neither received the message, so Pan Am 1736 flight was still on the runway not knowing that KLM flight 4805 was heading right toward them.

With no time to move both, planes collided with each other resulting in 583 fatalities according to the Tenerife Information Centre.

Now this crash happened on the ground, the planes were not even in the air. The crash didn’t involve the planes’ materials; it was the fault of human error involving both the pilots and the air traffic control.

In this situation the crash didn’t involve plane malfunction but human error.

The Tenerife incident changed the way flying schools teach their lessons. If you went to get your air license 20 years ago at time before Tenerife happened, the section regarding human factors and decision-making wouldn’t be listed.

The incident scared many pilots and changed the aviation world forever. Due to the crash it is now mandatory that human factors and pilot decision making, is a key component for recreational, private, and commercial ground training like Langley Flying School to abide by these rules.

The captain of KLM flight 4805, who had 30 years of experience, was in a hurry, and wanted to get the flight started. He knew the conditions on that day regarding the weather that flights weren’t going to run as smoothly as pilots wanted them to.

In seconds, 583 people were perished to death.

Thirty-two years later after the Tenerife incident, another plane crash caused by human error claimed 228 lives.

This crash was years after the Tenerife incident, since then pilots have been trained much more now than in 1977. Once again, minor errors caused by the pilots’ result in tragedy.

In 2009 an Air France flight 447 leaving from Rio de Janeiro to Paris crashed into the Atlantic plummeting 38,000 ft. in three minutes and 30 seconds killing all 228 passengers according to CNN news reports.

Questions arise on how the plane could just fall out of the sky having such experienced pilots in the cockpit.

Minutes leading up to the crash, pilots got conflicting air speeds. The aircraft climbed 38 thousand feet when the stall warning was triggered and the plane stalled.

The pilots should have responded to the stall by pulling the nose of the plane up instead of down to recover.

When pushing down on the nose the plane will gain air speed, but pulling the nose up will create an aerodynamic stall. This is what made the plane plummet 38 thousand feet midair.

The crash is one of the most deadly Air France has had to endure.

It took nearly two years for divers to find the black boxes, which held the voices of the pilots seconds leading up to the crash. Knowing this information, the pilots should have been ready, and known how, to act if something went wrong.

All pilots know to pull the nose down not up when it comes to plane turbulence or stalling out. No one knows what was going through the minds of the pilots except for the pilots themselves.

If it weren’t for miscommunication and human error Air France flight 447 wouldn’t be 4,000 meters at the bottom of the Atlantic.

The risk of plane collisions runs through the minds every time someone steps into a plain. You only hope that everything goes as planned, but when something does goes wrong you hope the pilots and aviation control know how to handle the problem.

When air incidents happen, what first pops into many minds is that something was wrong with the plane or it had a malfunction.

But in the cases shown, human error and decision making play a key role in the probable cause.

Sports

NECC Knights Keep On Winning

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The NECC Knights just keep on winning. The Knights closed out the season with an incredible 20-game winning streak and finished the year with a 25-2 record. Both losses occurred back on April 18 when they were still in Florida for spring training. The Knights are 13-0 in conference play.
In 27 games this year, the Knights have scored 203 runs. They average roughly 10 hits per game (271 total), but they have only hit four home runs on the season. The key to their success is timely hitting and good baserunning.

With a .339 team batting average and a .449 on base percentage, it’s hard to keep these guys off the basepaths. NECC has also stolen 81 bases as a team this year. They’ve only been caught 18 times for an 82 percent success rate.

Sophomore catcher Harrison Smoske has been a big part of the offensive success this year, leading the team with a .462 batting average. He leads the team with four triples on the year and has driven in 16 runs. He is also second on the team with 13 stolen bases.

Freshmen Colby Maiola and Ellidio Reyes have continued to make an impact in their first year with the Knights.

Maiola leads the team in home runs (3), RBIs (26) and stolen bases (16), while Reyes is hitting .370 with 34 total hits and 22 RBIs. MacDaniel Singleton has knocked in 18 runs and leads the Knights with 10 doubles this year.

The pitching has also been stellar this year. Knights pitchers have thrown three shutouts and have a collective 3.87 ERA with a .263 opponent batting average.

Ryan McAuliffe and Zarif Pajazetovic continue to lead the way on the mound for NECC, and it’s almost hard to tell who is the ace of the staff.

McAuliffe leads the team in innings pitched (44), strikeouts (46) and ERA (1.84) and has notched a 5-0 record this year.

But Pajazetovic isn’t far behind. He has thrown 40 innings this year and leads the team with a 6-0 record, and his ERA is 2.03.

While it may be hard to pick an ace, it is certainly a good problem for coach Jeff Mejia to have.

Freshmen Anthony Dally, Robert Barry and Gianni Esposito have also made an impact for the Knights this year. Dally, a lefty, is 2-0 with a 4.23 ERA and 32 strikeouts in 27.2 innings pitched.

Barry and Esposito are both right-handers and have both pitched 19 innings this year. Barry has put up a 3.28 ERA, while Esposito has a 1.89 ERA.

The Knights will look to continue their success into the playoffs, hopefully culminating in another trip to Tyler, Texas for the NJCAA World Series.

With the quality depth both on the mound and at the plate, the Knights will look to be a serious contender to win it all in 2015.

Arts and Entertainment

Children’s Present Stuart Little

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Stuart Little by the NECC children’s theater class opened Friday, May 1 at 10:30 a.m. to a small audience.

Stuart Little is the story of a walking, talking, car driving mouse who is adopted by the Little family. The older brother, George, is not happy to welcome Stuart into the family, creating a very unusual sibling rivalry. The only character more reluctant to accept him is the family cat, Snowbell.

The story is based on a classic children’s novel written in 1945 by E.B. White and was released in 1999 as an American family comedy film with an all-star cast, including such greats as Michael J. Fox, Geena Davis and Hugh Laurie.

Though the budget was considerably smaller for NECC’s performance, this small cast did a great job creating a very entertaining show.

Uncategorized

Android App Inventor Workshop

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The CIS department at NECC is holding an Android App Inventor Workshop on June 9, 10 and 11 at 420 Common St. in Lawrence.

The workshop will take place from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. Students will need to have a Google account for the workshop.

AppInventor for Android is web application originally created by Google and now maintained by MIT media lab. It uses a blocks based language, similar to Scratch, to create applications that can run on Android devices.

Completed Apps can be uploaded to the Google Play Store. Android devices will be available for use.

More information can be found at appinventor.mit.edu/explore/
To register, go to http://goo.gl/forms/cy7zGFETp1 or email mpenta@necc.mass.edu

Uncategorized

Network Night for Graduates

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NECC will be hosting a network night for graduates on Thursday, May 14th from 5:30 p.m. to 7 p.m. in the Hartleb Technology Center.

Area business professionals and potential employers will be present, and local businesswoman Rosalin Acosta will be doing a presentation titled “Why Networking Matters.”

The dress is business casual. Those interested should register at at www.eventbrite.com/e/necc-graduates-networking-event-registration-16003661382

News

Getting Enough Sleep to Survive Finals

 

By Rachael Sarcione​

NECC students are preparing for upcoming final exams, and possibly some sleepless nights. However, lack of sleep could cost them more than good grades.

Sleep deprivation in college students is a major contributor to poor academic performance. According to the National Sleep Foundation, students getting less than seven hours per night of uninterrupted sleep are more likely to experience severe memory loss.

“Talk about being stuck between a rock and hard place,” said NECC student Melissa Dow. “I need to rest so I can remember what I studied, but I have to stay up later and study.”

According to the American Psychological Association, being extremely tired can have negative effects on your attitude and social behavior due to the inability to tolerate noise and bright lights. When someone is tired, fluorescent lighting (often used in classrooms) can cause impaired judgement and poor concentration.

Besides the effects that sleep deprivation can have on brain function, some people experience visible symptoms, such as dull skin or even hair loss.

“I have a few clients who always develop Alopecia Areata (baldness in spots) during final exams,” said hair stylist Diana Brown. “I can’t wait for them to graduate and start getting some sleep.”

With so many distractions, some students find that time management issues make it hard to get to bed in time for a good night’s sleep. “There are way too many awesome shows on TV, and […] by the time I look at the clock, it’s like 4 a.m. I don’t know if I should even bother going to sleep at that point,” said Dow.

News

NECC Hosts First Speechapalooza

 

NECC’s first Speechapalooza event took place on Wednesday, April 8 in the Spurk building. The event was planned and promoted by Professor Amy Callahan’s Principles of Public Relations class.

Speechapoolza is a public speaking event that promotes student empowerment and gives student speakers the opportunity to present their work done in previous classes at NECC.

Professor Amy Callahan created this event because she wanted a chance to showcase the inspiring work her students do in public speaking and public presentation classes at NECC.

“I wanted to create a venue to celebrate these students and allow them to share their work with a larger audience,” said Callahan.

Students who participated in Speechapalooza gave five to ten minute presentations on various topics. Some of these topics included, the history of the chocolate chip cookie, sexualized images of women in media and graffiti as propaganda.

Shaina Richards, communication major at NECC, spoke about sexualized images of women in media.

“Getting the opportunity to speak in front of a larger group of people than I previously have in class settings was exciting and nerve-racking. One of my personal goals has become to improve my public speaking skills, and this was a great opportunity for me to be able to do that,” said Richards.

Being able to be a part of this event and speak to an audience about how the media sexualizes women was important to Richards.

“I identify as a feminist and am very passionate about women being treated and seen as equals to men. I’m probably going to continue to write and hopefully speak on this subject in the future,” said Richards.

According to a newsletter written by NECC President Lane Glenn, “An event like Speechapalooza brings you the best that colleges have to offer their communities and the world: the academic freedom, the critical thinking, and the voices of our students—tomorrow’s opinion-makers and leaders of change.”

“This event was a celebration of free speech and student voices, and I think the spirit of the event came across. It was meaningful because lots of people showed up to listen to students. In that way this event was about the importance of listening to each other — listening to young people — as much as it was about students demonstrating their public speaking skills” said Callahan.

Students and faculty can expect another Speechapalooza next year according to Callahan.

Opinion

Teacher Evaluations

 

By Kyle Benson

There are many different ways to evaluate teachers today. There are websites like ratemyprofessors.com, ratemyteachers.com and teachercomplaints.com, but the one way schools, including NECC, crack down on how students feel about teachers is
the end of the semester teacher evaluation sheets. This is a good tool, but do students take the evaluation seriously?

“When they hand those sheets out, it usually is at the end of class, and I just want to get home,” said Greg Komornick. “If I like a teacher I’ll fill out the sheet with all 5’s, and if I don’t like them, I’ll just fill out the whole sheet with the lowest number.”

Many students agree with Komornick. They would like to just get home at the end of the day and not fill out sheets that don’t concern themselves. There are others that take the evaluations seriously however.

“I take filling out the evaluations seriously,” said Mike Bilodeau. “They reflect upon how students feel the teacher is doing and lets the school know whether they are doing good or bad.”

These evaluation sheets and evaluation websites are important for teachers. It affects their jobs and whether or not student will sign up for their classes. If students don’t take the evaluations seriously, it could really end up negatively affecting a professor. These sheets and websites are there to rate a professor on individual parts of their jobs and then averaging the results out to have a better look at what they need to work on.

Uncategorized

Food Drive for Homeless

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The NECC chapter of PSI BETA, the National Community College Honor Society, is collecting food for the Emmaus Homeless Shelter in Haverhill from April 27th to May 4th.

Boxes will be located in the C-Building in Haverhill and the Dimitry Building in Lawrence. Most people are very generous during the holiday season and go on vacation in the summer, but people are still hungry and supplies are low, so please give generously.