Teenage Pregnancy Essay Example for Free

Teenage Pregnancy Essay One of the societal problems that our country encounters is the teenage pregnancy or the early pregnancy. Many Teenagers are involve in premarital sex. This also lead to other societal problem like overpopulation and poverty. The sexual revolution has ushered in a period in which the average adolescent experiences tremendous pressures to have sexual experiences of all kinds. Filipino teens get a higher exposure to sex from the Internet, magazines, TV shows, movies and other media than decades ago, yet without any corresponding increase in information on how to handle the input. So kids are pretty much left to other kids for opinions and value formation when it comes to sex. Sexual misinformation is therefore equally shared in the group. Parents at home and teachers in school feel equally inadequate or uneasy to discuss the topic of sex with youngsters. The problem mounts because the barkada (gang) has a more profound influence than parents do and they exert pressure and expect the adolescent to conform to the rest of them. In the Philippines, according to the 2002 Young Adult Fertility and Sexuality Study by the University of the Philippines Population Institute (Uppi) and the Demographic Research and Development Foundation, 26 percent of our Filipino youth nationwide from ages 15 to 25 admitted to having a premarital sex experience. What?s worse is that 38 percent of our youth are already in a live-in arrangement. In fact, female adolescents whose friends engage in sexual behavior were found to be more likely to do the same compared to those who do not associate with such peers. If the teen perceives her peers to look negatively at premarital sex, she was more likely to start sex at a later age. Teenage mothers tend to have poor eating habits and are less likely to take recommended daily multivitamins to maintain adequate nutritio n during pregnancy. They are also more likely to smoke, drink or take drugs during pregnancy, which can cause health problems for the baby. Unplanned pregnancies lead to a higher rate of abortions. In the Philippines, although abortion is illegal, it would shock you to know that we even have a higher abortion rate (25/1,000 women) .For sure, there are more abortions that happen in our country that are not even reported. Backdoor abortions are resorted to with untrained ?hilots? with questionable sterility procedures, increasing the possibility for tetanus poisoning and other complications. Even though there are many ways to stop this problem, there will always be the lak of discipline of the teenagers.That is why there is the controversial RH Bill which will solve the problem or maybe it cannot.

From Stars and Stripes to Rising Sun: A Study of Patent Laws in the United States and Japan :: Patent Laws Japan USA Essays

From Stars and Stripes to Rising Sun: A Study of Patent Laws in the United States and Japan Introduction There is no question that the United States and Japan are technological leaders of the world. They are two of the nations with the highest annual number of intellectual property patents granted.1 Both nations have achieved such great successes in the world of intellectual property as a result of a variety of reasons. Among these reasons is the encouragement of innovation and invention with monetary benefits in return. Both the United States and Japan have well-defined, stringent patent laws for intellectual property. These laws encourage competition among organizations and individual inventors to create new innovations, rather than to redundantly develop products that have already been invented by others. While some critics argue that such laws are unfair and cause monopolies in societies that enforce them, this paper will address how intellectual property laws actually benefit societies and how their enforcement is necessary for societies to adhere to a strong ethical code. In order to understand intellectual property laws, it is first important to have an understanding of the term â€Å"intellectual property.† As defined by the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), intellectual property â€Å"refers to creations of the mind: inventions, literary and artistic works, and symbols, names, and images used in commerce†.2 Software is an example of intellectual property. When you buy software, you buy the tangible disk that the program comes on, but the disk is not what is of value in your purchase. You also buy the rights to use the program contained on the disk, and that software is the intellectual property that you pay for. In most Western nations, an invention of intellectual property is patentable. Patents are granted in order to protect the rights of the inventor for some period of time after the initial release of the invention. The justifications for enforcing patent laws include the advancement of technology, the increase in economic growth, and the improvement of the quality of life.3 These are compelling reasons for nations to have clearly defined patent laws on intellectual property, and they are some of the reasons that the United States and Japan have similar patent laws. In addition to patent laws within individual nations, WIPO is an international organization that oversees international patents. Individual nations can voluntarily join WIPO, whose current membership is 179 nations.

Education and Poverty Essay

Education of poor is a challenge that has kept American political and academic quarters on a precipitous edge. Although the government spends billions of dollars on various social welfare activities especially directed towards eradicating poverty and bridging up the enormous gap that exists poor have always found education a distant realm, where their access is limited and its longevity is in doubt. The issue takes a very drastic form when even the children of American poor are unable to avail available educational opportunities. Among all the developed countries, United States of America reports highest levels of child poverty where one child in every six children lives below poverty line. According to US Bureau of Census (1998), out of total 36 million poor living in USA, 15 million of them were children and among them, around 25 percent children face extreme poverty. Incidences of poverty among children have extremely negative implications for their academic and educational opportunities, seriously devastating their early formative years, that in turns jeopardize rest of their life. An overwhelming volume of research in the field brings out conclusive relationship between social economic status and educational opportunities. The relationship becomes more proportional with lowering economic status where academic underachievement and discrepancies in educational opportunities are very acute. This paper looks into the social, economic and political implications of under-education of poor children in USA and identify the ways that can prove effective in ensuring compulsory education for every American child, irrespective of their socio-economic status. Education as a social problem The issue of education has become a matter of great public and social concern due to the differential nature of the education policy and the school system, creating and an unbalanced and destabilized social structure. Moreover, as academicians, have indicated, the reason for worry is that while school system has been made elaborate, their deliverable content has been not, negating the purpose of the education and creating a society of literate but uneducated people (Kumar, 1997). Educationists and public policy makers, despite their claims and efforts of creating a world class school system and education model to cater to the needs of future America and meets the purpose of extending education’s benefits to every class of the society, have missed the beat by focusing more on academic parameters while ignoring the socio-economical-cultural aspects that play equally important part in determining the final outcome (Pipho, 1999). A failed socio-economical system, with widespread social evils and depleted living conditions, especially in the semi-urban areas and urban slums creates diversified pockets within the social structure that makes the possibility of any qualified education and school system a difficult proposition under the existing set of circumstances. The vicious cycle Education and poverty share a very deep, although inverse relation, each one determining the eventual impact and influence of other. For example, according to National Assessment of Educational Progress (2000) evaluation, educational outcomes is determined by birth weight, nutrition, housing quality, and access to health care. These factors have important bearing on cognitive functioning of child and quality of parenting, that in turn determines educational achievement. Low quality of educational attainment is a major cause of poverty, and poverty is a key determinant of academic performance. Therefore, poverty establishes a vicious cycle where it reinforces its effect in a continuing cycle to make educational underachievement chronic, inflicting heavy costs on social development. Educational standards are further effected by lower public funding for schools serving low-income group than schools serving higher-SES children. Funding equity is yet largely unimplemented , and a number of discrepancies, including differential state and federal policies in fund allotment comes in question to affect equitable distribution of resources. Need for Early Intervention One of the most important determining factors of effective education is children’s academic interest that has substantial impact on academic achievement ((Wagner, Spiker and Linn, 2002)). Children displaying interest, motivation, engagement, goals, values, and self-efficacy demonstrate higher degree of academic success, highlighting the importance of these factors in educational outcome. According to Chapman et al (2000), quoted by Wagner, Spiker and Linn, (2002) shows that the relation between interests and skills starts to develop in the early formative years, and it has crucial role in predicting future achievement and learning capabilities of children. (Chapman et al. 2000). Research has shown that in the early years of development, children from both lower and higher socio economic groups show comparable degrees of confidence level, learning attitude, grasping ability and concentration(Alexander & Entwisle 1988, Stipek & Ryan 1997). However, as they are denied further opportunities to pursue education in an orderly and timely manner, they lose interest in school within the first years and gradually their competence, self confidence and educational inclination dwindles, bringing instability and disorientation in their approach. (Stipek & Tannatt 1984, Wigfield et al. 1997 as quoted by Wagner, Spiker and Linn, 2002). Skills and interest are reciprocal in nature and their outcome is often influenced by the available exposure and opportunities. Thus children who read more, get to develop better reading habits and children who give more time to mathematics have their numerical skills sharpened. Similarly, children who do not get to read or do not get engaged in mathematical exercises are likely to stay behind others. Children also get discouraged from actively taking up education due to their repeated academic failures, increasing frustration levels, and lack of motivational educational guidance. Failure, distress and teachers’ negative attitude towards children from low socio-economic groups are the key de-motivational factors that severely affect poor children and keeps them at permanent disadvantage against children from higher soci-economic structure((Wagner, Spiker and Linn, 2002)). Lower levels of expectations; parents’ indifference, and ground economic condition are other demotivating factors. These problems take irrevocable form as children get older and form their own peer groups that create substantial barrier in their integration with educational mainstream. ((Wagner, Spiker and Linn, 2002)). Students from lower economic groups form a disadvantaged lot from the very beginning of their life. They have very few books, educational toys and experience with education. Research about poverty and educational facilities have shown that less than half the pre-school children from lower economic groups have access to educational books, while for better off families, almost 98 percent of pre school children have complete set of educational accessories. Children from poor families on average receive only 25 hours of book reading by the time of school entry, while the same figure is 1000 to 1700 hours for middle-class children. Poverty misshapes the entire educational construct and context of children. It substantially alters their emotional and behavioral function, relationships with adults and peers, and family, school, and community; In these key areas of development, low-SES children are placed at risk and disadvantage against their peers from higher income group (Stevenson, 1997) Poverty instigates a range of externalizing problems such as aggression, inattention, impulsivity and rebelliousness- all of these leading to gradual academic underachievement. Children become disruptive and noncompliant and develop behavior problems such as problems in paying attention, relating to others and controlling their emotion. This problem is further compounded by teachers’ reaction to situation, who adopt a stricter code of conduct for children displaying behavioral problems in attempt to bring their focus back on studies. However, more than often, children from lower socio-economic background are knowingly or inadvertently discriminated. It pushes them closer to each other and instigates rule breaking habits, indiscipline, disobedience and finally delinquent behavior-a process that completely sew off their connection with schools and academics ((Wagner, Spiker and Linn, 2002; Stevenson, 1997) Analysis of Academic Influence One of major initiative in bridging up the gap among children from middle and higher income group and children form lower income group is application of technology and science. It is envisaged that computers could play a important role in bringing about a harmonized and equitable educational structure. Although current computer access is very limited for low-income group children, the increasing pace of their expansion in educational framework holds many promises towards its re-design and restructure that could benefit large number of children from lower economic groups (Stevenson, 1997) Researchers have constantly identified need of integrating technology through the earliest phases of education to prepare them to compete with other children when they grown mature. Issues in improving public education to include Poor With huge investment and cash flow, but insignificant results to show for, following are the major issues in improving the American school system to orient them to needs of all the socio-economic group (Barnes, 1997)

Profile of Serial Killer Robert Berdella

Robert Berdella was one of the most brutal serial killers in U.S. history who participated in despicable acts of sexual torture and murder in Kansas City, Missouri, between 1984 and 1987. Berdella was born in 1949 in Cuyahoga Falls, Ohio. The Berdella family was Catholic, but Robert left the church when he was in his teens. Berdella proved to be a good student, despite suffering from severe nearsightedness. To see, he had to wear thick glasses, which made him vulnerable to being bullied by his peers. His father was 39 years old when died from a heart attack. Berdella was 16 years old. Not long afterward, his mother remarried. Berdella did little to hide his anger and resentment towards his mother and stepfather. When Murderous Fantasies Began to Fester In 1967, Berdella decided to become a professor and enrolled in the Kansas City Art Institute. He quickly decided on a change of careers and studied to be a chef. It was during this time that his fantasies about torture and murder began to fester. He got some relief by torturing animals, but only for a short time. At age 19, he got into selling drugs and drinking a lot of alcohol. He was arrested for possession of LSD and marijuana, but the charges did not stick. He was asked to leave college in his second year after murdering a dog for the sake of art. For a few afterward, he worked as a chef, but quit and opened his store called Bob’s Bazarre Bazaar in Kansas City, Missouri. The store specialized in novelty items that appealed to those with darker and occult-type taste. Around the neighborhood, he was considered odd but was liked and participated in organizing a local community crime watch programs. However, inside his home, it was discovered that Robert ‘Bob’ Berdella lived in a world dominated by  sadomasochistic slavery, murder and barbarous torture. What Went On Behind Closed Doors On April 2, 1988, a neighbor found a young man on his porch clad in only a dog collar fastened around his neck. The man told the neighbor an incredible tale of sexual tortuous abuse that he had endured at the hands of Berdella. The police placed Berdella in custody and searched his home where 357 photographs of victims in various positions of torture were recovered. Also found were torture devices, occult literature, ritual robes, human skills and bones and a human head in Berdella’s yard. The Photographs Disclose Murder By April 4 the authorities had an overwhelming amount of evidence to charge Berdella on seven counts of sodomy, one count of felonious restraint and one account of first-degree assault. After closer scrutiny of the photographs, it was discovered that six of the 23 men identified were homicide victims. The other people in the pictures were there voluntarily and participated in  sadomasochistic activities with the victims. The Torture Diary Berdella established the Rules of the House which were mandatory for his victims or they risked being beaten or receiving bolts of electric shock on sensitive areas of their bodies. In a detailed diary that Berdella kept, he logged details and the effects of the torture he would subject upon his victims. He seemed to have a fascination with injecting drugs, bleach, and other caustics into the eyes and throats of his victims then anally raped or inserted foreign objects inside of them. No Indication of Satanic Rituals On December 19, 1988, Berdella pled guilty to one count of first and to an additional four counts of second-degree murder for the deaths of other victims. There were attempts by various media organizations to try to connect the crimes of Berdella to the idea of a national underground satanic group but the investigators responded that over 550 people were interviewed and at no point was there any indication that the crimes were connected to a satanic ritual or group. Life in Prison Berdella received life in prison where he died of a heart attack in 1992 soon after writing a letter to his minister claiming that the prison officials refused to give him his heart medication. His death was never investigated.