Word of the Week:

Word #5

1. Diminutive

2. The Glass Castle, by Jeannette Walls

3. But we'd call the baby Maureen, a name Mom liked because it was a diminutive of Mary, so she'd also be naming the baby after herself but pretty much no one would know it.

4. Small; little; tiny; a charge, as an ordinary, smaller in length or breadth than the usual.

5. She could hardly see the diminutive figure waving at her from the other end of the tunnel.

Blog Post #5-Mystery Character

This man is not only tall and ridiculously handsome; he embodies one of Hollywood's most formidable renaissance men. As a remarkably intelligent and capable actor, he’s also a director of surprising skill and intuition. He has almost completely excused himself from criticism. His impressive charm and devastating physical appeal seem, astonishingly, to be almost incidental. He has a cool confidence when he speaks, he’s captivating, funny, and extremely smooth. He has also been named one Time magazine’s 100 Most Influential People in the world for his humanitarian work. He also made salt and pepper sexy.

Blog Post #4-What Makes It News?

Already under fire, crime labs cut to the bone

Budget cuts, lack of training, standards raise doubts about tests’ reliability

Written by Alex Johnson

Msnbc.com

Tues., Feb 23, 2010

Crime labs all over the country are suffering from backlogs that already reach back years in many cities and states. Budget cuts due to the recession are threatening credible crime scene analysis as a lost art, forensic specialist and law enforcement officials say. They are also suffering from what specialist call the CSI Effect, American see television lab technicians solve crazy cases with barely any evidence, and think that’s how it works in the real world. This is not the case. There are serious questions about the credibility of nearly every kind of lab analysis, and with the lack of funding these numbers are increasing. There are thousands of cases all over the country where people have been falsely incarcerated due to mistakes in lab test, and even technicians sabotaging evidence. With budget cuts and inadequately trained lab technicians, these mistakes will just continue to increase and cause cases to be thrown out of court.

This article is newsworthy because it can affect anyone across the country; innocent people are going to jail because of mistakes made in labs. Also, if you are sexually assaulted or someone you know is injured by a drunk driver, or even murdered, and there are mistakes made, the case could be thrown out and the guilty party could go free. I think the news values involved in this story are:

Impact: information has impact if it affects a lot of people

Conflict: information has conflict if it involves some kind of disagreement between two or more people.

Timeliness: information has timeliness if it happened recently.

This story could be localized by doing an article on a local crime lab or a case where someone local was accused of a crime they didn’t commit. Another way to localize this article could be to do a report on how in January of 2009, California (along with 11 other states) widened the scope of its DNA collection, drawing samples not just from anyone who is convicted of a felony, as the state does now, but also from anyone arrested for a felony. The genetic profiles will be dropped into the state’s criminal offender database and eventually the FBI’s much larger CODIS database, which at last count held more than five million profiles. Unquestionably, these databases are powerful crime-fighting tools. Now that it’s 2010 you could do a follow up on if this has helped with solving crimes and getting convictions.

Word of the Week:

Word # 4

1. Collusion

2. The American Dream, by Jim Cullen

3. As it turned out, Adams was deeply disillusioned by Franklin Roosevelt and his New Deal, feeling they represented a betrayal of American traditions of autonomy and a case of government collusion in the creation of a soulless, materialistic consumer society.

4. A secret agreement, esp. for fraudulent or treacherous purposes, conspiracy. A secret understanding between two or more persons to gain something illegally, to defraud another of his or her rights, orto appear as adversaries though in agreement.

5. Some of his employees were acting in collusion to rob him.

Library Scavenger Hunt

1. There is more than one system. The University uses the library of congress. The Public library uses the Dewey decimal system.

2. It contains current hot best sellers, CD’s, and is more of a book store.

3. There are many different types for example: business, economics, educations,social science, and many more.

4. You can use your library pin number and library card to access databases.

5. San Jose Mercury, San Francisco Chronicle, Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, New York Post, New York Times, Boston Globe, USA Today, Chicago Sun- Times, LA Times.

6. Call number: J DVD 781.1 Musical; Musical baby [videorecording] / Fisher-Price.

7. Call number: J 973.03 Student Table of contents only; The student encyclopedia of the United States. This is an encyclopedia of the United States with information about the people and places that shaped the United State.

8. Call number: SPA DVD Mujer, La mujer de todos [videorecording]

9. Entrepreneur magazine, Bicycling magazine, Yankee magazine, Golf magazine, Mountain Bike magazine

10. McNally and Steinbeck. Frontain, Raymond-Jean, 0895769X.

11. John Steinbeck: banned, challenged, and censored / Maurene J. Hinds

Call Number(s): PS3537.T3234 Z7143 2008

12. Farm labor needs and farm workers in California, 1970 to 1989 / Juan Vicente Palerm. Call Number(s): HD1527.C2 P34 1991

13. Haunts of San Jose, California, David Lee REF CAL 133.1097 Lee

14. Women and minorities in California public postsecondary education: their employment, classification, and compensation, 1975-1985 / California Postsecondary Education Commission

Call Number(s): LB2331.73.C2 W65x 1987

15. The collection is made up of three collections including, African, Asian American and Chicano.

16. Lock of his hair, receipt signed by Beethoven, and manuscripts.

17. Scholarly journals have articles written about academics, information, findings, and is geared towards a certain group of people and a popular magazine is full of ads and can appeal to the masses

18. American communication journal, Communication, culture & critique, Global media and communication, Media, war & conflict, popular communication

19. 33- Road Trip: The Birth of California Car Culture is based on three extraordinary photograph albums created by members of the Polhemus family between the years of 1906 and 1909, as they traveled in their new-fangled automobiles from their home base in San José to many local and regional destinations. I think that this is a very important piece for locals of San Jose.

Blog Post #3- A Fly on the Wall-REVISED

As your driving along 41^st avenue in Capitola down towards the beach, you pass small local clothing, surf, and house ware shops. Right before the road turns in to a one way you can’t go down along the cliffs, there’s a little coffee shop on the left side called Verve. When you walk in the aroma of hot coconut cream tea and yummy lattes engulf you. You can either sit at the modern wooden tables or along the bar that looks out the window across the street to Zen Trading Company, and the palm trees that line the street. Looking around the coffee shop local artist’s art lines the walls from painted skateboards, strange sculptures, and abstract paintings that stretch from the floor to the ceiling. I chose to sit at one of the little wooden tables and had a heavenly soy latte, served in an oversized white mug. The baristas at Verve always make each coffee special and unique by forming heart or leaf shapes into the foamy milk with the delicious espresso, which is roasted right next door in their roasting shop. The latte is so flavorful you don’t even need sugar, but a little sprinkle of their homemade Mexican chocolate powder makes it to die for. Even though everyone in Verve is working on homework, work projects, or just surfing the net, on Verve’s free Wi-Fi internet, every seems very content with their warm tea, hot coffee, or delectable pastry.

Word of the Week:

Word #3

1. Felonious

2. My Sister's Keeper, by Jodi Picoult

3. True love is felonious, you take someone's breath away, you rob them of the ability to utter a single word.

4. Criminal, wicked, villainous.

5. Her behavior was felonious, she stole everything from the apartment before she moved out.

Word of the Week:

Word # 2

1. Ameliorate

2. My Teacher for PR 190 used it.

3. It was from a handout on Simplicity and Brevity and choosing shorter words.

4. to make or become better, more bearable, or more satisfactory; improve; meliorate.

5. You can ameliorate your writing by doing rough drafts, having your peers edit it, and cut out unnecessary words.

Blog Post #2-My Favorite Writing-REVISED

"Iron was in the red rocks, copper in the green. There was so much turquoise--nuggets and even big chunks of it lying on the desert floor--that Brian and I could fill our pockets with until the weight practically pulled our pants down. You could also find arrowheads and fossils and old bottles that had turned deep purple from lying under the broiling sun for years. You could find the sun-parched skulls of coyotes and empty tortoise shells and rattles and shed skins of rattlesnakes. And you could find great big bullfrogs that had stayed in the sun too long and were completely dried up and as light as a piece of paper"

Page 55 of The Glass Castle by Jeannette Walls, Scribner 2005

I really like Jeannette Walls' type of writing, she uses very descriptive writing to the point that you feel like you're in the story. Her writing style is so open, candid and honest. Her book, The Glass Castle, is written with amazing descriptions and details throughout the entire book. You become absorbed in her story and can't put the book down. It's written from the perspective of her growing up as a child and she conveys that perfectly. It takes you back to being a child and everything that goes with it; exploring, playing games with other kids, wild imaginations, scrapped knees, and how the littlest things like a lucky rock can mean so much. She has become one of my favorite writers and I can't wait to read more books and article written by her.

Blog Post #1-About Me

My name is Suzanne Welles, I was born and raised in Santa Cruz, California, and I currently live there now. When Igraduated from high school I moved to San Diego to go to Mesa Community College. I took a fashion class and got really inspired; I decided I wanted to major in Fashion Marketing. That dream got a little side tracked when I moved up to South Lake Tahoe to work at Heavenly Ski Resort for the winter season and ended up staying for three years.

I moved back to Santa Cruz right before my 23^rd birthday. At that point Fashion School was out of the question because my college fund went when the economy did. I decided to go to Cabrillo, the local college in Santa Cruz. I transferred to SJSU in the spring of 2009, where I am currently a Public Relations major. I am hoping to graduate in December of this year and go into Fashion PR. My ultimate dream is to one day be able to open my own clothing boutique.

I think one good strength I have, when it comes to writing, is my organization and the ability to clearly convey my thoughts. My main weakness is starting. Any type of paper, whether it’s a paragraph or a 10-page report, once I get going it’s easy, but those first couple sentences always give me trouble.

My favorite color is Kelly green, and in the free time I have, I enjoy spending time with my friends, laughing, dancing, going to the beach, traveling, music, art, and just being a goofball.

Word of the Week:

Word #1

1. 1. Periphery

2. 2. The Last Summer (of you and me) by Anne Brashares

3. 3. She’d sat with bare feet on the bench at the periphery, her book resting on her knees so she wouldn’t have to interact with anyone.

4. 4. The external boundary of any surface or area, the external surface of a body. Noun.

5. 5. He walked to the periphery or the bluff; he looked down and saw the waves crashes against the jagged rocks below.