3/25 Gautaman Asirwatham Period 2 - LATE

What is it like working from home?

Working from home gives me the freedom to do whatever I want. This comes with challenges and advantages. I have pursued interests of mine that I had put off for a long time and have had a lot of time to relax and enjoy myself. I have also lacked motivation to participate in school and finish my studies. I never thought senioritis could be so bad. Weighing the pros and cons I would say that quarantine and isolation has been fruitful in many ways. My conception of school and society has changed a lot. I realize that school isn’t what makes you learn but rather the effort it demands of you. I have also learned that I should spend more time doing what I enjoy rather than what is asked of me. I learned that I genuinely liked going to school and that what I hated all along was homework. These realizations will inevitably change the decisions I make in college. I only hope that I do not squander the talents I am gifted with by choosing to enjoy my life more actively.

What are you learning about your world/community based on the reactions?

On an individual level, I am learning how social people are meant to be. With everyone isolating everyone is going a bit crazy. I also am learning how important a routine is as I see my friends slowly fall into degeneracy. I learned that getting sunlight and air is necessary to avoid depression for many people.

On a societal level, I am learning that large scale problems require a severe and visceral impetus to cause change. The US specifically perpetuates many obvious problems simply out of negligence and fear. The list is too long with racial injustice, unsustainable industries, lack of universal healthcare, and many others. The youth are very progressive judging from their public reactions but older people are generally more fearful of change. 

Your own personal feelings and thoughts about what is happening right now.

I feel that isolation creates a unique environment for self growth and understanding and as such people should take advantage of the current global circumstances. I am doing my best to stay positive and productive day by day.

I am sad about the damages caused and lives ruined by the various problems in 2020. I am also sad that many people are not treating each other humanely or listening to each other. I think that when such tragedies are happening we should all try to support each other and solve the problem together. Instead, people are dividing further and not being kind to one another. Of course, this is easier said than done but I believe it is a simple sentiment that goes a long way to make the world better.

Finally, I feel hopeful about the future as many of the world’s problems are being exposed for what they are. In the short term many will suffer but in the future people will be better off for our struggles. If there is another outbreak or social problem people will be faster to solve it and more understanding of each other.

Jacob Fox, Period 1, 5/1/2020 (LATE)

What are the updates around the world/community regarding the virus?

Within a short period of time last week, the subject of media attention has rapidly shifted from updates about Covid-19 to the ongoing protests and demonstrations across the country. Cases in the United States are still increasing at a considerable rate, and this has been exacerbated by the recent reopening of many states. With almost two million cases, over twenty thousand new cases daily and over a hundred thousand deaths, it’s clear that there is still a serious threat. In New York, under the direction of Governor Cuomo, stay at home orders and other restrictions on gatherings and business have been extended until June 27. It’s evident from looking at the numbers that these measures are effective. Comparing the graphs of daily new cases in New in New York versus the entire U.S. shows a clear difference. The highest number of daily cases in new york was 11,571 on April 14. There were 941 new cases on May 31. Comparing that to the entire United States, in which there was a peak of 36137 cases on april 24, but there was still 21703 on May 31. New York has experienced a decline by more than a factor of 12 since the peak, while daily cases in the United States as a whole have declined by less than a factor of 2.


What are you learning about your world/community based on the reactions?

As always, it’s difficult to get people to cooperate when you want to place temporary restrictions on their freedoms. A lot of people make it out like it’s either an all or nothing situation. Either we’re all locked inside our homes by an oppressive government, or we’re free and we can go wherever we want, do whatever we want, and not have to wear masks. Some of the stricter measures to reduce the spread of the virus wouldn’t be necessary if everyone observed some reasonable precautions such as minimizing time spent outside, especially around other people, standing at least six feet apart, and wearing a mask. I’m learning that a lot of people don’t take things seriously until it affects them personally.


Your own personal feelings and thoughts about what is happening right now.

It’s strange to me how quickly everyone has moved on from talking about the virus to talking about the protests. Coronavirus is still a threat, and is affecting the lives of thousands of people across the country. I think that it is entirely possible to stage a peaceful protest while observing the precautions necessary to minimize the spread of Covid-19, and there have been many examples of exactly that occurring across the country. In an ideal world, these types of protests would be the only ones occurring. Police officers would be able to stand by peacefully, only being there to protect the right of the nonviolent protesters to assemble or to intervene if any situation becomes violent. However, some people have been taking advantage of the distractions caused by the protests to vandalize and loot businesses. This has caused issues for law enforcement, and has caused a lot of unnecessary and unwarranted force to be used on demonstrators operating entirely within their first amendment rights. It doesn’t help that the message from the White House has been to condone violent acts against citizens and seemingly seek only to escalate the conflict. I’ve never seen a situation this bad in America in my lifetime.

Jacob Fox, Period 1, 3/11/2020 (LATE)

Write about what you learned in your online English lessons.

Over the past month, we’ve been reading World War Z by Max Brooks. It’s about a zombie apocalypse, but it’s not told from a narrow point of view like most dramatic zombie stories. It’s written in the style of an informational report, documenting the history of the worldwide zombie war. However, the story is not just about the zombies themselves. It’s about the worldwide effect of fear, panic, and ignorance, which causes more destruction than the zombies themselves. It is rich with real life lessons about our nature as humans. We’ve also been working on our final project, which is to create our own monster. Our monster has to be a metaphor of something that happens in real life. This ties in well to the themes of World War Z, and the curriculum as a whole, which reinforces the idea of monsters being a reflection of humanity. Monsters have to be relatable on some level in order to make an interesting and compelling story. Even mindless monsters like zombies, that seem completely disjointed from humanity, Humans fear death and decay, and we fear not being remembered. That fear is personified in the form of a mindless walking corpse that has lost all sense of what it used to be. Still roaming the world as only a shadow of its former self.


How is what you’re learning applied to any other classes/the world around you?

For our final project in macroeconomics, we are playing the stock market game again. We get five thousand dollars which we can invest however we want to try to make as much money as possible over the course of a few weeks. It’s becoming increasing apparent to me that stock prices, especially those of the big name companies are mostly influenced by human psychology and bandwagon mentality. News media headlines play a much bigger role than actual data. This is especially apparent during the volatile situation we currently find ourselves in. With new stories breaking every day, it’s hard to guess what will happen to stocks. Mrs. Fink says it’s all about who gets the information first, because the people who spend the time (or have inside connections) to get information before everyone else can act before the market reacts and make a profit. As we’ve learned from reading World War Z, fear is a powerful motivator, and there are always people waiting to take advantage of it. I’d encourage everyone reading this to look up publicly available statistics about U.S senators selling stocks back in February.


What is it like working from home?

Working from home has been difficult. It’s hard to stay focused with all the distractions. Being able to come to school put me in a certain mindset, and I took for granted the fact that I could talk to any of my teachers in person basically any time I wanted. At first it seemed that completing my last semester of high school from home would be much easier than going to school. Purely in terms of workload, it’s definitely been less. However, actually showing up to a school building makes it much easier to coast by, because you’re always reminded of the work that needs to be done. At home, it’s hard to keep up, with senioritis being in full kick. I can close my computer whenever I want, I can’t just walk out of the school building or skip classes. I’ve had to work very hard recently to get things back on track, and it’s been much more difficult than usual to communicate with my teachers. Still, I’m hopeful that I can close out the year well, and be prepared for college next year.

Bernard Kelly 4/17/20 Pd 2 - LATE

4/17/20

Bernard Kelly Period 2

While I have been social distancing before it was cool, this shutdown of schools is severely negatively impacting my schoolwork while also hurting my relationships with my friends due to lack of contact. When I work at home, I find it difficult to concentrate without my classmates and teachers nearby to stimulate the learning. We are not much closer to reopening, and those that are suffering from unemployment are beginning to protest the quarantine.

Unsa Munir 4/28/20 Period 2 - Blog #3 (LATE)

Modern Mythology 2020

Unsa Munir

 4/28/20

What is it like working from home?

Tough. Senior year was rough from the start. Senioritis was slowly creeping up on me ever since eighth grade and this year it really attacked me. If doing work while going to school was hard, this is another level. It was an easy switch at first. I thought it wouldn’t last long, and many teachers were giving basic work. As time went on I lost motivation and it was too easy to ignore my responsibilities. Going to school I was forced to pay attention (to some extent) and establish a work setting. Now that there’s no difference between home and school, it’s hard to create it myself. I open the tab for Google Classroom and next thing you know I’m seven videos deep into some oddly specific conspiracy theory. It’s comforting knowing that a lot of my friends are/were in the same situation. Of course, I would never encourage this or hope for anyone to be going through the same, but the fact that I’m not alone does make me feel better. The worst part of working from home is that there is no escape. Even if I slacked off in school, I was able to socialize easily or deal with my problems by playing handball or eating some good food nearby. Now I have to deal with everything in my home and it begins to get suffocating. Regardless, school is a priority and in the end I am determined to finish all my work! Even if it takes me forever, and I lose a lot of points, I want to do my best until the end. I’m just hoping some things get better in time for college because I would hate to have this mentality/environment while starting a major time in my life.

What are you learning about your world/community based on the reactions?

It’s nothing I didn’t know before, but wow some people are selfish. There was a tweet written by Jeff Kasanoff saying “Very American to decide we are bored with COVID and therefore it is over.” While other countries are dealing with their last cases, reopening schools, and safely roaming the streets, we are out here in war. It is beyond me that there are groups of people protesting the right for a haircut. Do they not know scissors exist? Do they not know how to use them themselves? Considering that they’re protesting for things like that, I would believe it if they didn’t know how to use them. But really, America had a lot of time to prepare. Instead of making racist ‘jokes’, our fellow citizens and people in power should’ve been taking the time to educate themselves about what was going down. Even when things finally got serious, there were/are still groups of people taking this lightly. I don’t understand how over 100,000 people have died from this in the US yet there are still people who are going out unprotected because they want their freedom. We all want a summer, a life, a job, etc. but in order to get there we need to work together. I’m pretty disappointed in how the US has responded, especially people from my community who I thought would’ve known better. But then again it’s Staten Island. Apparently a tanning salon should’ve been an essential business. What’s going on?

Your own personal feelings and thoughts about what is happening right now.

These past few months, especially this past week, has felt like a never ending boss level in a terribly hard video game. Everyday there’s a new issue and it’s truly unpredictable. What’s been on my mind, especially after Ahmed Aubrey and George Floyd is the BLM movement. There was a news headline that read “ Two Deadly Viruses are Killing Americans” Covid-19 and Racism.” The acts committed recently are absolutely disgusting. Yet, I can’t say I’m surprised. Things like this have been going on for years. Every day, another life is turned into a trending hashtag. I’m glad things have been recorded recently. Without evidence and proper exposure, these names wouldn’t be known. Imagine how many cases aren’t even cases because of that. I’m doing what I can to help but I know I don’t have much power. The worst or maybe the best part of these situations is finding out who the closeted racist is amongst my followers. I’m incredibly passionate about these situations, as are many others. Seeing videos of innocent people being tortured because of their skin color is something everyone should have a strong feeling about. In all honesty, I’m scared but excited. I’m scared because in a few days it’s June which means it's basically level six of Jumanji. I’m terrified to know what next month holds. However, I’m excited for the movement. It’s sad that these riots happen often but these ones seem different. There’s more power to them. Perhaps it’s because of the power of the media. More cases are being exposed and many celebrities have been sharing them as well. The protests going on are being covered and I feel like we’re closer to change. I could be completely wrong and this could just be another act of racism we write off until the next, but I’d hope not. 

Lillian Tong PD1

Lillian Tong Pd 1

Modern Mythology

Write about what you learned in your online English lessons.

     Something I learned was the cultural differences that may lead to determining who is and who isn’t considered an outsider. In the book WWZ, two of the characters have majorly different backgrounds but hold a similar status of being an outsider. Kondo Tatsumi being a closeted otaku that spends all his time sitting in his room huddled around his computer versus Tomonaga Ijiro who holds strict and traditional Japanese values by heart and works to earn his keep but is severely depressed on account of being a survivor of a tragedy that millions perished from on top of having to live with being blind. These two contrasting characters were able to meet and create the Tatenokai- a group of trained martial artists that defended against zombies. It is incredible how two men who have been scorned can overcome those odds and create something like that. 

How is what you’re learning applied to any other classes/the world around you?

    The relationships that were went over in lesson 7 with how there are outsiders was interesting, because in Ap Psychology we’ve been talking about how human conform more often when there are influences that urge them to go against their own thoughts, even their own morals, all to please those that either have more power or in groups of people that all share something you don’t. And in particular with the group of people that share something that is not shared with one individual, it has been shown that they will actively try to copy the accepted behavior and forego their own. It also goes to show how invested we are in our own relationships with other people and how they think of us, that we never slow down and pick up on the relationships we have with other people, rather than other people having a relationship with us. The difference is it being a power grab versus a symbiotic relationship. 

What are you learning about your world/community based on the reactions?

     Based on the reactions of people around the world, specifically the United States right now, there is a lot of tension. With Covid-19 having people staying at home for almost three months now, it is an understatement when talking about the amount of pressure people have been put under, especially those in the emergency healthcare units. My cousin is a nurse and works in upstate New York, and being Asian American but also being the person who treats patients has created confrontations. It is difficult because I know how much time he is putting in his job only for him to be verbally assaulted on account of his heritage. I learned while there are people who uplift in this world, there are also others who won’t hesitate to bring you down, and it is important to keep true to your values.

5/29 Martin Zeng Period 1

5/29/20
Martin Zeng Period 1
Modern Mythology 2020
Blogger #32

How is what you’re learning applied to any other classes/the world around you?

Mr. Olsen, my physics teacher gave us an extra assignment after the AP tests where we choose theoretical or practical physics and from there we are doing assignments based on our choice. I chose practical physics and I’m finding it challenging but it has been made somewhat easier from the differential equations that I’ve been learning/learned in calculus. Its taken quite a while for science and math to line up in my educational career. I never thought I would see the day. In our Mythology class I’ve been using the ideas that I’ve learned and tried to use them to understand the events that are happening in our world right its almost like its a psychology class. An example would be blame game thats happening among the world leaders in order to take the blame off themselves. If they truly cared they would have admitted to their own incompetencies and the countless lives they have negatively affected. I understand why they would do it. If they didn’t they wouldn’t keep their job but I still can’t agree with their decisions. Being able to delve deeper into the underlying reasons behind the actions that people take gives the news an extra dimension of applicable thought and self-reflection.

What are the updates around the world/community regarding the virus?

Our current situation is that New York City is on the brink of officially ending the pause phase very soon. A bit sooner than I expected but a welcome surprise. Governor Cuomo intends to reopen the city but in a very limited fashion. Many businesses that do not require close contact between people are being reopened for the public to use. However social distancing protocols, face masks, retail pick-up only, and limited capacity are still in effect and large gatherings are still prohibited. The city is taking quick action in order to ensure that people make the best and safest decisions possible regarding going outside because they know that they cannot keep everyone inside when every week the weather is getting warmer and everyone is itching to get outside. Around the country there have been much more drastic reopening measures that have already lead to expected spikes in cases/deaths. I only hope that the virus is contained as well as possible while also reopening the economy. There has to be a balance or a lot more anger will be pent up inside the population.

My personal feelings and thoughts about what is happening right now.

I personally believe that what is happening right now is still very surreal even 2 and a half months into the lockdown. Even though I’m more of an indoors person I still miss the outside world and can’t wait for things to go back to normal. Hopefully our government takes the best steps in order to ensure that we can go back to normal as soon as possible. However, I don’t think that things will return to complete normalcy anytime soon. I believe that people will be much more conscious about cleanliness in public and the such. I really don’t want classes to be online instruction in the fall because I shudder at the thought of having to take online classes for classes that will probably be very challenging. My performance and work ethic has already been severely affected by online learning and I’m scared of what online college classes will do to my mental health and work ethic. Everytime I think of what it will be like once we return to normal I can’t envision it because it feels like we’ve been in lockdown forever and that I spent the entire school year at home. Everything that happened before the virus seems so distant that the pre-corona era jokes actually have a bit of backing behind them.