David Wallace

The commencement speech written by David Wallace is not the typical speech given to college students on graduation day, which already made me find it very interesting. I really enjoyed this speech because it made me think a lot, and I learned some important values that Wallace shares. His main focus is the real value of an education that you intake from the world around you, while having an aware, focused, and disciplined conscious. If you approached the world in this manner in every situation, Wallace says that, “That is real freedom, That is being educated, and understanding how to think.” He says that humans have natural default settings, that are unconscious which leads us to analyze situations or other humans without really realizing what truly is going on. He gives us an example of this when he tells the story of a fatigued, hungry, and stressed out adult who is in line at the grocery store. Being all these things, the adult unconsciously views everything and everyone around him according to himself and his mood. Wallace says, “If I don't make a conscious decision about how to think and what to pay attention to, I’m gonna be pissed and miserable every time I have to shop.” His point is, if you actually make the decision to have the freedom to be aware, then you will live you life happier.

I have certainly taken a lot of Wallace’s advice, and do agree that there are times where I have made unconscious thoughts because I have lacked the effort to try and think. I want to be more aware and be able to give myself a choice to look differently at life, and to just think instead. If I am more conscious and aware, then I believe it will open me up to more things in life. I agree with Wallace when he says it will be tough to over come these natural default settings, but I believe it is well worth it.

The "Banking" Concept of Education

The “Banking” Concept of Education was a really interesting piece that I felt that I could relate to being an everyday student.  Freire states that, “students are depositories and the teacher is the depositor” (318) In the traditional banking type of teaching. Many of my classes are like this, where the teacher lectures the whole period without getting any input from the students. I find that during these classes that I am not exceeding my potential of learning, because I am not fully engaged in what is going on. I find classes where the teacher encourages the students to be more involved are more successful in the long run. The problem-posing method allows students to become “Critical co-investigators in dialogue with the teacher” (Freire, 324) In our English class we are encouraged to express our thoughts through the blogs and the classroom. In both of these situations we are able to create opinions of our own, along with a feedback from the teacher.

Rsearch Paper

Hayley Katzenberger

Research Paper

The topic that I will be researching and presenting is how the American economy has recently been affecting the average couple’s budget for a traditional wedding. I found this topic interesting and completely relevant to my undergraduate studies in event planning and recreation. The topic exemplifies the strong relation between economics and the main focuses of my studies.

My thesis is that the average budget for marriage ceremonies in the United States has proved to be correlated with the decline of the country’s economic status. In light of the economic troubles our country has been experiencing since 2008, the amount of money spent on wedding ceremonies has drastically declined. To support my thesis, I would have to analyze data since 2008 pertaining to the average American couple’s budget for all that is involved in a wedding. One method of gathering such information would be to research U.S. Census records. This would allow me to get a solid understanding of the current average American earnings and budgets. Then with this information it would be possible to survey a sample of American couples to determine how they appropriated their resources for just their wedding ceremony.

A counter argument could be that the economy wouldn't effect the budget for wedding ceremonies because it is something that is very important to the average American family that they wouldn't sacrifice such a religious commitment. But in fact,

As you can see, the economy does have an affect on how much Americans couples are willing to spend on their wedding ceremonies. From a recent survey from the National Association of Catering Executives, “48% said they've seen a decline in wedding spending.” Catering is a huge part of weddings and for that fact, they would be able to determine the decline in wedding budgets.

I plan on using google scholar and other highly known resources to obtain my research. Since the economy is still in a recession, I am able to find current information that is relevant to my research. I think that this topic is important, because it targets almost every individual within the country.

The Achievement of Desire

Rodriguez’s “The Acheivement of Desire”, is about a young man who comes from a uneducated family who finds himself respecting the educational establishment over his own parents. He begins to separate from his family physically and emotionally after becoming obsessed with attaining more knowledge and more company with educated people. He references himself to the “Scholarship Boy”, who is a person that comes from an uneducated family that reaches out of his environment to get away from limited opportunities that his parents were faced with. Eventually he feels a sense of loneliness and wants to reconnect with his family and try and rebuild what was lost.

I can relate to this essay because I am the first in my family to go to college. I don’t agree with Rodriguez, because even though I have received a higher education then my family, I am still able to communicate and relate to my parents without looking down upon them. There is even a specific time in the essay where Rodriguez says his parents weren’t able to help him with his homework he writes, “I was oddly annoyed when I was unable to get parental help with a homework assignment.”(pg 516)This has happened to me in high school and I felt frustrated at first, but then realized it was only going to benefit me in the future because I learned to rely on other resources such as the library or friends. They have supported me by always encouraging me to do my best, which I have always really appreciated. The “Scholarship Boy” instead pushes his family away by discriminating against them. I think there should be a balance between school and family; everybody has something to offer in a relationship, and we should always accept people for who they are.

The Pain Scale

The Pain Scare by Eula Bliss was definitely an interesting piece of writing. In this essay she is trying to find a way to measure her pain, but finds it very difficult. She claims that there isn't a number that you can put on pain to rate how strong the feeling is. she ties in a lot of analogies with christ, the number 0, and chronic pain. She struggles to find the desire of measurement for her pain, for an example she says, "The problem with scales from zero to ten, is the tyranny of the mean." I think that this is interesting for her to say because how exactly do you rate your pain with that being said? From her reading, I realized that I too had questioned how to rate my pain when being asked. In conclusion Eula Bliss implies that it is useless to have scales that use number to rank your amount of pain. This piece was at times difficult to read, but I think that she has some really great connections that are apparent throughout the essay.

Michael Pollan- Why Bother?

          Michael Pollan's article Why Bother, has risen the awareness of the controversial issues of Global Warming.  He starts his article off by bringing in the shocking feeling he got after watching Al Gores, "An Inconvenient Truth" His biggest issue with the document was when Gore asks the viewers to change their lightbulbs during the closing credits. After watching how threatening Global Warming is to the earth, he was expecting a bigger request from Gore considering how important the issue is. Knowing that it would be such a struggle for people to change their lives to go green, he asks himself "why bother", meaning why change his life to a extreme extent to go green when the majority of people aren't going to. Would his decision going green even have an effect on the world? He decides to take the challenge of leaving a carbon footprint, but questions himself in situations that he doesn't know what will be the better choice. An example of this is when he says, "According to one analysis, if walking to work increases your appetite and you consume more meat or milk as a result, walking might actually emit more carbon than driving". Pollan also brings up the issue that argues no matter what people do, no individual personal choices can not do enough to make an impact. What is also needed is laws and money, along with countless of little everyday choices people can make to save the planet. The problem with society is the Cheap energy, that is keeping people from going green. So the question is Why Bother, if all these other factoring issues are in the way of a person trying to make a difference? Well Pollan says, " If you do bother, you will set an example for other people. If enough other people bother, each one influencing yet another in a change reaction of behavioral change, markets for all manner of green products and alternative technologies will prosper and expand." Another way a person can make a difference according to Pollan, is to plant a garden which he claims is one of the most powerful thing an individual can do. Pollan's whole point of bothering to make a change is because he can and also because he has the ability to spread an effect on other people.
        I think that this article is really good, because it really arises the issue of Global Warming and targets an audience that involves the world. He uses great rhetoric writing throughout it by using statistics, emotion, and credibility. The tone of the article was negative towards the beginning, but then quickly shifts to a more positive one when he expresses that there is a reason to "bother". I think that he gives great reasons and statistics to give the audience an understanding of why we should bother and change our lives to a green one for the sake of our planet.


Pollan, Michael. "Why Bother?"New York Times 2008
Ramage John D.,Bean John C., Johnson June. The Allyn and Baco Guide to Writing
New York: Pearson, 2006 (88-94)

Research Paper Ideas

As an Event Planning and Recreation major, I wanted to research wedding statistics to gather more information about recent trends in the wedding planning business since it is a multi-billion dollar industry. Since it is such a large industry, I decided to pick the recent decline in the budget of the average American wedding as my research topic. Due to the economic recession, American's have been spending less and less on weddings since the economy took a turn for the worse in 2008. Out of all events to choose from, I thought that weddings would be the most appropriate to do a research topic on since it involves almost everyone.