This pandemic has helped certain addictions to take root in us, especially in our young men and women. From Binge watching to overeating to phone usage, all are parts of the coping mechanism we have been using to survive. These addictions are the challenges we will have to address for quite a while in our homes and classrooms.
Stories have always been there to teach us, to entice us to pay attention to new ideas, but the way they have lured us into their environment since the inception of cinema is unique. In the past stories were on sidelines, whereas the religious text was at the center and therefore, at the core of moral values. Now, it seems that the order has reversed and stories through vivid cinema and well-made television series are at the center of life…
More than the struggles of online teaching, I am worried about the psychological impact on our students, particularly elementary and middle-school students. Schools are not only for learning, they also teach social norms…
American Spirit! We were so proud of it, and rightfully so. Traditionally, when we said “American Spirit,” we meant to say that our people, despite our chaotic history, survived, thrived and found new grounds for co-operation within the society. I have deliberately used the past tense because…
…second language learning is not just another part of the humanities which can be ignored in an academic world that is ruled by science and business. Learning a second language offers some crucial cognitive benefits to our students,…
Many new voices that we hear more and more today in politics, business and art and culture were not heard as recently as fifty years back. Colonialism, slavery and economic repression never let these voices surface and come onto the world stage.
The trend of rural populations moving toward cities has created huge problems in the urban societies of developing countries. In the year 2005, half of the world’s population was living in urban areas. In 1994, there were fourteen mega-cities (the cities that had at least ten million inhabitants). This number increased to thirty-seven in 2017.
I was the fourth child, a son, born to parents that fought every evening as if it were a ritual without which they couldn’t go to bed. My father left us when I was seven. My mother did her best to make ends meet, but it was obvious that three jobs, paying minimum wage, were killing her. When I was twelve, my two older brothers were killed—One by a rival gang and the other by police. The grief soon killed my mother. My elder sister, who had been paying the bills with some help from the state, disappeared a year later. Some says she was a victim of sex trafficking, but I never came to know what had happened to her. There was nobody to pay the bills so I came to live on the streets. Every night, I took the last green train and slept on it; then I went to my ‘hood in the morning.
What world we are leaving for the next generation? We have often heard this question in connection with the deteriorating environment. My question is: Are we leaving a planet where the next generation can thrive?
Since the dawn of the industrial era and particularly after the Second World War, education became more career oriented. Its value as a job grabber and a mode for competition for industrial and corporate positions has increased tremendously. Gradually the process of providing values and morals, both worldly and religious, moved to the end of the list of objectives of education.
Imran Omer 