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By Sara Strnad

June, 2021

Dogs are some of the most beloved pets in the world. But you might see them only for their cute faces and playful, loving nature. Dogs do make great pets, but they also play a huge role in helping people in society. These dogs are called service dogs. A few examples of service dogs are guiding eyes dogs, police dogs, therapy dogs, avalanche dogs, sniffing dogs and other kinds too. Keep reading to see the important and influential role service dogs play in society!

Early Life of Service Dogs:

Some kinds of service dogs start their training from a very young age to maximize the difference they can make in the world. For example, the guiding eyes dogs have very rigorous training that starts when they are taken into homes of volunteers at only eight weeks old!  Police dogs begin training when they are a year to 15 months old, so they have better focus.

Guiding Eyes Dogs

No matter what kind of service dog a canine friend might be training to become, they all must undergo training specific to their area of specialization with its own challenges.  Guiding eyes dogs, for example, are training from the moment they go home with their volunteer families. The family cares and trains for the four-legged friend for a year and teach them basic skills. Have you ever wondered what it would be like to bring your dog to school? Families who volunteer can! As guide dogs in training, they are given permission to attend, so they can learn how to behave in a busy and occasionally chaotic environment. This experience teaches important social skills as to how to remain calm, so they can later learn to navigate a visually impaired person through tough situations.

After the initial training by volunteer families, the are trained by guiding eyes professionals. After they pass their tests, they are paired with a visually impaired person with whom they would work well. They work hard throughout their lives to guide their owner and retire when they get too old to continue working and enjoy retirement.

Therapy Dogs

As you might remember, last year before the coronavirus shutdown, two dogs came to JJMS, and we were allowed to go pet them during lunch. These dogs were actually trained therapy dogs! A therapy dog is a dog trained to provide a sense of comfort and support. Therapy dogs might visit people in hospitals, nursing homes, or in last year’s case, schools!

Therapy dogs are not recruited from specific breeds, but some breeds are more common to see in the role than others. For example, Golden Retrievers, Labradors, and Cavalier King Charles Spaniels have been found to make great therapy dogs because they are bred to have sweet, uplifting natures.

Therapy dogs must also be able to follow a few basic commands and have good manners. For example, they can’t be jumpy or unfriendly. All therapy dogs undergo a test before being certified to make sure they meet the requirements before they visit people.

Therapy dogs are used to alleviate stress from the person they visit. Some colleges use therapy dogs on campus to help relieve stress in the students. But therapy dogs don’t just visit kids, they will go see nursing homes or people in hospitals to bring a sense of joy and calmness to everyone.

Police Dogs

The training for a police dog is very rigorous, and only certain breeds are used for this job. Breeds like the German Shepherd or Belgian Malinois are popular in the police force. Police dogs have very difficult work and must obey their owners without hesitation to be successful. These dogs are respected and in many countries hurting or killing a police dog is a criminal offense. In countries that speak English, these dogs might be referred to as K-9s, a play on the word “canine.”

There are several kinds of police dogs, all carefully trained to specialize in something. Many police dogs have jobs that take advantage of dogs’ powerful sense of smell.  For example, some dogs are trained to find a missing person by following their scent.  Others are trained to sniff out illegal substances, like drugs or explosives.  Cadaver dogs have the grim job of sniffing out dead bodies that might be hard to find at a crime scene. It is an important job, no matter how upsetting it might be, and important in the police force.

Police can also use dog in other ways.  Public enforcement dogs will do things like chase and hold down a running criminal while human reinforcements come or guard an area with criminals, like a jail to help prevent a break-out. Overall, each kind of police dog is well-trained in their field to assist our police force.

When police dogs retire, they are treated respectfully, like heroes, for all the hard work they put in to keep our community safe. They might live with their human partner for the remainder of their lives to live a happy, comfortable life with their favorite people.

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All service dogs have jobs that play important key roles in our society. Whether that is leading people who cannot do certain things for themselves, lifting people’s spirits, or keeping our communities safe, all working dogs contribute to society in important ways.

By Haley Frantz

June, 2021

Commonly referred to as AOC, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez was elected Representative of the 14th district of NY in 2018 and was recently re-elected in November of 2020. Her campaign is solely based off of her belief that all humans should be treated equally, regardless of race, gender and gender identity, sexual orientation, social class, or any other description that is commonly used to determine self worth or validation.

AOC was born on October 13th 1989, into a working-class Puerto Rican family in the Bronx. She lived with her mother, Blanca, her father, Sergio, and her younger brother, Gabriel. The income inequality that she experienced here inspired her to run for office on a progressive platform. When AOC’s father died in 2008, she worked low-wage restaurant jobs to help support her family. This is often used against her when people say, “What does a waitress know about politics ?” The truth is, a lot. AOC graduated from Boston University with a degree in Economic and International Relations.

In the beginning of AOC’s career, she worked in the office of late Senator Ted Kennedy. The work that she did in his office, having to watch the heartbreak of families having to be separated by the ICE, led her to work as an educational director with the National Hispanic Institute where she helped many people in community leadership and college readiness.

In 2016, AOC began to work for Bernie Sanders where she expanded her skills and knowledge in electoral organization and activism.  With all her knowledge from these positions, Ocasio-Cortez decided to run for her own congressional seat in the House of Representatives in 2018, which she has held ever since.

Being a woman of color in politics, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez went through many hardships to get where she is today, and she still faces some of these problems nowadays. For instance, there have been public remarks by politicians towards her and some of her colleagues, telling them to "go back and help fix the totally broken and crime infested places from which they came."  But this incredibly racist comment didn’t stop her.

In fact, this racism has brought her to the forefront of national politics as former President Trump often invoked her in his speeches as a threat to America from which he pledged to save them. This seems to be an example of a backlash that women of color entering politics are dealing with nowadays, as it’s being experienced not only by AOC, but also by many of her women-of-color colleagues.

Despite the people trying to destroy her influence, AOC has many goals and policies for which she plans to fight.  Some of these include abolishing the ICE, The Immigration and Customs Enforcement Agency.  This policy is very meaningful to her due to her personal connection to immigrant communities. Some of Ocasio-Cortez’s other policies are that people should not suffer because they cannot afford health care or higher education.

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is a woman and a person of color that challenges traditional society. She challenges society, politics, and the economy to be more just and more sensitive to the needs of all people, not just those who have traditionally held power. Although she has many supporters and attractors, she makes headlines because she represents the future of America - a future that lives up to the ideals for which America stands - "with liberty and justice for all."

By Nina Vigil

June, 2021

It goes without saying that the coronavirus has been rough on everyone. Millions of Americans lost their jobs. Students and teachers alike struggled to keep up with the abrupt changes to the education system. Countless businesses were forced to close. Hospitals have been overflowing. Meanwhile, many peoples’ personal lives have fallen apart, and the rate of mental health issues have skyrocketed in a matter of only a year. 

Of course, as with virtually every crisis, not everyone has been affected equally. The pandemic has had a staggering impact on working mothers, millions of whom were forced to drop out of the workforce or decrease working hours in order to care for their children.

Since the coronavirus has caused schools and childcare centers to close across the country, parents have been obligated to play a larger role in caring for their children and facilitating their education. Some of this extra load could be handled by a parent who was already staying at home. But for most families in America, that was not an option. In 2019, 64.2 percent of families in the country had two working parents. So, when the pandemic hit, most families found both parents forced to juggle between work and childcare much more than before.

This struggle, however, has hit women disproportionately. It is generally acknowledged that the majority of childcare responsibilities in families with a mom and a dad are still, for the most part, handled by the mother. In addition, according to the US Census Bureau, 84 percent of single custodial parents are moms. The pandemic, therefore, has had significant effects on mothers’ ability to stay employed—in the short term and the long term.

Out of desperation, many working mothers in dual-parent households have relinquished their careers and income to care for their children, who are suddenly at home full time. While some have chosen to simply reduce the number of hours they work or switch to part-time instead of full-time, others have been forced to completely quit their jobs. According to the Washington Post, one in four women who had become unemployed during the pandemic did not go back to work (as compared to one in eight men) so that they could take care of their kids.

And these effects are hitting mothers differently with respect to class and race. While many middle-class and white mothers are finding that they must quit their jobs, many working-class women and women of color simply do not have the option of quitting. Instead, these women have had to significantly alter their schedules or find some other way to make sure their children are being looked after. For those who are already disadvantaged financially, parenting in the pandemic is even more difficult to manage.

Though all these disruptions may seem like an unfortunate but temporary hardship, for many women, this hardship will not go away when the pandemic is over. In fact, the pandemic will have a long-term effect on women’s careers. Just to start, long-term unemployment (about six months or more) negatively affects the chance job searchers have of finding work again, even if they have plenty of experience. On top of that, given the limitations put in place by COVID precautions, thousands of childcare centers have had to close, and childcare workers such as nannies have not been able to continue to do their jobs. The result is that, even after the pandemic ends, many unemployed mothers who relied on alternative childcare options will be unable to go back to work. Not only does this mean that countless families will end up with only one source of income and may end up barely staying afloat, but also, many mothers will feel the need to give up on their career dreams to look after their children.

Mothers who have managed to keep working but have still had to reduce their hours or change to part-time work are not much better off. Part-time workers are given fewer benefits, less paid-leave time—if they get paid leave at all—and far lower wages than full-time workers. This might not be an issue for mothers who manage to find work again or can return to working full-time, but it will be for those who cannot. The result is not only a loss of tens of thousands of dollars for each of these women, but also a loss of tens of billions of dollars for the entire country.

If America is to recover, actions will need to be taken immediately to assist unemployed and part-time mothers. First things first, employers should be more flexible with schedules going forward. Traditional work schedules are incompatible with school hours (9:00 to 5:00 versus 8:00 to 2:30, in most cases) and their children’s needs was one of the chief reasons that mothers changed their hours or quit their jobs. Flexibility would allow more parents to work outside the home while also attending to their children’s needs and would hopefully slow the rate of women reducing hours or leaving their jobs.

However, that wouldn’t totally solve the problem. At the heart of the matter, the cause of mothers’ mass resignation is that America does not have stable, easily affordable childcare. This was already a problem before the pandemic, as numerous parents were already obligated to stay home instead of working, and it is still a problem now.  The coronavirus didn’t so much create an issue as expose an underlying, deep-rooted flaw in the system.  And it will continue be a problem for the foreseeable future unless something is done. Americans ought to have access to inexpensive (or even free), quality day care and preschool; paid parental leave should be mandated; greater funding should be devoted to improving public schools. With such provisions made, caring for children wouldn’t require parents, mothers especially, to sacrifice their jobs and their ambitions, whether or not the world has been hit with a pandemic.

The bottom line is that the closing of schools and childcare centers due to COVID-19, which resulted in millions of mothers altering their schedules or dropping out of the workforce, is symptomatic of a lack of structural support for families. If we want to rebuild a more equitable post-pandemic American society, that will have to change. The loss of mothers in the workforce won’t be rectified so quickly, and it may take years to see the same numbers of women working outside the home again. Eventually, though, with accommodations for parents and enough time, gender equality in the workplace could see an advancement, and no woman will ever need to choose between children and a career again.

By Nico Vigil

June, 2021

This is the most boring movie you should watch. I know what you’re thinking. Why should I watch something that is boring? What is this movie? I’m talking about 2001: A Space Odyssey. It was released in 1968. That’s right. You should watch a movie that is as old as most of our parents.  Worse, it is two hours and thirty minutes long.   I know you might think that this length is not that long, because most Harry Potter, Marvel, and the Lord of the Rings movies run a long - or longer. But the film moves very, very slowly, and about one-fifth of the movie has almost no action.  

Still, you should watch it. 

The beginning is important. The movie opens with a bunch of prehistoric hominids in an African veldt (like a savannah, without the grass) who are drinking from a watering hole. We’ll call them “Group A.” Suddenly, a second tribe of hominids comes in and takes over. We’ll call these guys “Group B.” Group A is hopeless without their water but suddenly, in the middle of the night, appears a monolith, a large black stone or metal rectangular prism.  After being in the presence of the monolith, Group A goes on a hunt, and they figure out how to use a bone as a weapon. Then, they come back to attack Group B who are forced to retreat.  

You might be confused - what do prehistoric hominids have to do with “space?” Well, in the next scene fast forwards a couple thousand years to the year 2001, and we see astronauts excavating a similar-looking monolith that they have found on the moon.  

Where the original monolith influenced the hominids to learn how to use bones as weapons, this new monolith marks modern-day humans’ next technological revolution - a computer named HAL 9000. HAL is no ordinary computer.  He has a human personality and is extremely intelligent. HAL is used on a space mission voyaging to Jupiter to investigate why the monolith on the moon was sending a signal towards it.  

Slow.  Very Slow.  But after many, many minutes of watching this film, the astronauts on the mission decide that they must turn HAL off in order to save their own lives, and this prompts HAL to try to kill them first in order to save his own “life.”  We’ll leave the rest of the story for you to see for yourself.  

So, why should you watch this film?  This can be perceived as a warning to us about our developing of artificial intelligence, or AI.  Since HAL has artificial intelligence, he can feel human emotions and make his decisions of his own.  His decisions are not based on him just following what he was coded to do but based on his feelings. 

Today, we have the beginnings of AI, services like Siri or Alexa who can respond to our voice.  But in the future, we may have computers like HAL, who are connected through the Internet to almost every machine our world uses.  They will oversee managing things that are vital to our human survival - our automobiles, hospitals, food supply chains, communications networks, and electrical grids.  We’d like to think that AI is here to help us do what we want to do; but what if someday AI wants to do something else? 

By Nina V.

February, 2021

Fascinated by nature? Love animals? Want to do something for the environment? As it happens, there’s a program that allows you to pursue all of those interests and all from your own backyard - even during a raging pandemic. 

Project FeederWatch, an initiative run by the Cornell Lab of Ornithology and Bird Studies Canada, aims to protect bird populations in the United States and Canada. To accomplish this, they charge amateur birdwatchers from across both countries with recording data about local birds in their areas and submitting them to them for analysis. The enthusiasm among birders has been massive, with almost 16,000 people participating in the program from November to April each year.  

The data each person collects contributes to the study of bird migration patterns, population, and even diseases. This information can then be used to protect birds affected by pollution, habitat loss, and infectious disease. In fact, Project FeederWatch was the first to document the bacterial infection avian conjunctivitis, also known as House Finch Eye Disease. Through the simple act of counting birds, citizen scientists are helping to protect this important piece of North America’s ecosystem. 

After paying a small fee and downloading the FeederWatch app, I selected my designated “count site,” a specific spot in my yard that I committed myself to monitor on a regular basis. Ideally, a count site should include a bird feeder or some other food source, but this is not required. Participants commit to watching this spot for two consecutive days at a minimum of five days apart. The total time spent at the site during each two-day count can be anywhere from half an hour to more than eight hours, depending on how much time you have. To avoid duplicate counts, bird counts are recorded according to the maximum number of each species seen. You are not allowed to count birds that fly overhead or that you see on non-count days. The data collected is recorded into the FeederWatch app, which is then submitted to Cornell. 

Over the past two months, I have religiously documented the birds visiting my own bird feeder. Every Saturday and Sunday afternoon, I’ve sat by the window for a half hour and counted every single one. I have learned to identify species of birds such as the song sparrow, the black-capped chickadee, and male and female cardinals. On one particularly busy day, the grass below my feeder was mobbed by thirteen mourning doves. 

“This sounds like a lot of work,” you may think. “Why should I bother?” First of all, it isn’t as intense as it sounds - you don’t need to be completely laser-focused. If you want, you can listen to music or have a small snack while you watch. The most important thing is ensuring that your data is accurate. Second of all, although it seems simple, your research greatly benefits ornithologists throughout the continent. Lastly, it can really be fun, and you can find yourself getting attached to the different birds who visit your yard.  

Even though it is the middle of the FeederWatch season, it is not too late to sign up. Go ahead and join! You may discover a new hobby even in the middle of COVID times, and perhaps an interest that lasts a lifetime. 

By: Sophia S. 

February, 2021

This past year has been hard on all of us. During the coronavirus pandemic, it has been difficult to stay connected with friends, family, and peers. However, social media has provided a simple solution. Through social media, you can connect with anyone… friends, family, and even meet new people. Certain platforms have grown significantly in their number of users, while others have shrunk.  

Social media is not just used for entertainment purposes anymore, although that still is often the case.  Social media has also proven useful for educational reasons. Social media provides many useful opportunities for communication. During this past year and into the future, we needed and will continue to need social media. One such example of this need is Zoom. We would not be able to have school, clubs, business, or even this article without it.

Have you ever heard of Zoom? If not, here is what it is. Zoom is a video chatting platform founded in 2011 and launched in January 2013. Eric Yuan was the original founder of Zoom. In the beginning, Zoom was developed for business purposes. Throughout 2020 - mainly from the beginning of March- Zoom blew up across the world. The pandemic had separated families and businesses, putting people into lockdown. Suddenly, Zoom became the ideal option for most people. It was put into use for not only business but education and even personal connection.  

But why is Zoom so popular? What has made it seemingly the perfect option for everyone? While Zoom was similar to competitors such as Google Hangout and Skype, it was also quite different from them. For one thing, Zoom had easy-to-use features. These included chat, hand raise, reactions, virtual backgrounds, and more.

However, Zoom is not perfect. Because the number of people using it went up so drastically, bugs and glitches began to appear. But Zoom employees went to work, and the glitches, including some major security features, were addressed promptly. This combated such problems as "Zoom bombing," which was an issue during early 2020. Zoom bombing is when an internet troller joins a private Zoom call and causes a disturbance. Zoom employees worked hard to ensure that this problem did not continue to happen by adding features such as waiting rooms and passwords. Overall, Zoom has had a positive affect on many lives and will hopefully continue to do so moving forward.  

Although Zoom is relatively new, social media as a whole is here to stay. Adults and kids alike have come to rely on social media. However, their interests differ. Throughout the many options for social media, the most used site for adults is Facebook. However, Facebook is not the only app that has a popular ranking. Snapchat has also grown in popularity amongst teens and young adults during the past couple of years. A 2018 PEW report showed that 49% of Snapchat users tend to visit the app several times per day. Some suspect it my even continue to grow. Instagram is another app popular with teens and young adults. Instagram, commonly called Insta or IG, is owned by Facebook. These popular social medial apps have done quite well in 2020 and will hopefully continue to do well in 2021. Whether you’re a kid, teen, or adult, there is definitely an app for you. 

Overall, social media has had a positive effect on our lives so far, especially throughout the pandemic. The coronavirus pandemic has made it hard to stay in touch with our friends, family, and peers. While we might not be able to see them in person, social media provides a simpler route to them for now. Through the different features of the sites and apps, we now have many options. Whether it’s Zoom, Instagram, or Facebook, there is a social media platform out there for those who are interested. Thankfully, social media is here to stay, leaving a dependable option for all of us. Connecting us. Uniting us.  

By Emma H.

February, 2021

Ruth Bader Ginsberg, often referred to as RBG, was an extraordinary, impactful, inspiring, hard-working and (don’t forget!) smart woman who really fought for what she believed in.  

Joan Ruth Bader was born on March 15, 1933 in Brooklyn, New York to Jewish immigrant parents. Before she went to college, her mother died due to cancer. RGB did not let this sad experience stop her.  She went on to receive a full scholarship at Cornell University. That is where she met her future husband, Marty Ginsberg. The young couple were happily married in 1954. Later, they had a daughter named Jane and a son named James. Soon, Marty was accepted to Harvard Law School. One year later, RBG was accepted into Harvard Law School as well. 

RBG had a hard time fitting in at Harvard Law School, with her being one of only nine women out of 500 students at the school. During this same time, her husband Marty was diagnosed with testicular cancer. This made her life so much harder, especially with a three-year-old daughter to look after. But she persevered still. At the same time as being a student at Harvard Law School, RBG kept watch of her daughter and took care of her very sick husband. Luckily Marty recovered.  While RGB’s experiences at Harvard were not easy, she continued to prevail. 

After Marty graduated from Harvard, RBG transferred to Columbia Law School and graduated first in her class.  But after graduation, RBG had trouble finding a job at a law firm because people discriminated against her. She was discriminated against because she was Jewish, a woman, and a mother of a young child. RBG finally scored a position teaching at Rutgers Law School. It is here where she continued her fight against gender discrimination. After working at Rutgers for almost ten years, she was nominated by Bill Clinton to fill a vacant Supreme Court seat in 1993. RBG went on to serve as a Supreme Court Justice for a full 27 years.  

Throughout her career as a Supreme Court Justice, as well as throughout her life as a whole, RBG fought for women’s rights and had an amazing impact on American policy and culture. Women of all ages have fought for equality for decades upon decades, working for women to be treated and respected the same as men. Ruth Bader Ginsberg made sure of that. Many people admire Ruth Bader Ginsberg for her strength, perseverance, and courage to fight for what she believed in – gender equality, and she is a role model to many.  

RBG Is a huge part of our country’s history in the fight for gender equality. It wasn’t just a dream or an image in her head, but something that she brought to life with hard work and dedication. Her impact can be felt by all, making it hard to forget the name Ruth Bader Ginsberg. 

By Sophie B.

February, 2021

Traveling during COVID-19 for holidays or family events? This article will show you how you can stay safe in this pandemic so you can maintain your health for whenever you are traveling.  

You will need to take precautions both before and after travel. The options that you should expect are quarantining for ten to fourteen days (depending on the rules in the state where you are going) and testing for COVID-19 or other viruses. If you’re feeling off before travel, stay in your house for three days or so, and if the feeling doesn’t go away, consider getting tested. Remember, just because COVID-19 is at a high rate right now does not mean that contracting other viruses or germs isn’t still a possibility. 

Which mode of transportation to use is always a question for what to do when traveling, especially during this time. The three main ways of traveling are plane, train or car.   Flying on a plane requires a lot of contact,  including security checks, baggage checks, and sitting close to other people during the flight.  Trains not much safer.  Not only will you still be sitting next to others, but because you often have to switch from train to train to get to where you are going, you may have to come into a lot of contact with people while coming on and off the train.  Cars are not perfect either.  True, you do not get a lot of contact with strangers getting tickets, passing through security, or waiting at the baggage pick up, but you still have to get gas and food and get out of the car during long trips. So which method do you think is better? 

People do travel for holidays and family events, but what if you’re the one hosting the event? When having people over, you might want to make sure everyone that was planning on coming over has been tested or has quarantined for fourteen days. You should also give guests their own towels and skin/hair care for showering. Disinfecting the house with cleaning wipes or other cleaners is also a good way to keep the house clean and safe for your guests and yourself. 

Just because COVID-19 is around, it doesn’t mean that people have stopped traveling. According to TSA.gov, about one million people or less traveled every day in 2020. Traveling during COVID-19 can be tough, but so can not being able to see your family. When those family events or holidays roll around, you'll need to be ready and safe. In the end, as nice as it will be to see your loved ones again, keep safety at the forefront. 

By Parker W.

February, 2021

Although the pandemic has placed many strains on all of us, there seems to be a difference in how the pandemic has affected each generation. The Purple Press has decided to explore how the pandemic has affected three generations: Boomers (people born from 1946 to 1964, such as your grandparents), Generation X (people born from 1965 to 1979, such as your parents), and Generation Z (people born from 1995 to 2012, young people like you!) 

For Boomers, the pandemic had made many of them feel very much out of control, like they cannot do anything about their situation. Because most of the deaths are in this age group, they need to take the guidelines more seriously, and this has caused almost everything to change for them. My Boomer interviewee said she misses traveling, participating in activities like exercise classes, and going to work in person instead of online.  

All this loss has taken a big toll on the Boomers.  They’re also feeling disconnected from people, such as family and others.  Because they don’t have young children and are probably retired, they are not friends with their children’s friends’ parents nor have work colleagues they see every day.  Unfortunately, for Boomers, this time of life is supposed to be a time to relax with family and friends, and the pandemic has messed all that up for Boomers. 

Generation X, however, seems to feel like they have more control over the situation. My Gen X interviewee feels worried because this is a new experience but does not feel she has to be as cautious as the Boomers.  Although they miss traveling and seeing friends as much, they have not had to give them up completely.  This could also be because as parents, they have to be connected to other parents through their children and their children’s friends, and all parents want a good feeling of community for their children.   

Meanwhile, Generation Z seems to be worried less about control and more about missing out on typical childhood experiences. My Gen Z interviewee thinks about how the pandemic will affect our friendships because we have not yet had much time to develop them. We spend so much time alone now, and we miss hugs, fun in school, and being able to meet in person.  Luckily, technology is very much integrated into our lives, making it easier to maintain relationships than the other generations.  It’s not the same as before the pandemic, but it’s better than nothing. 

As you can see the pandemic has affected all of us differently.  Boomers are worried about getting COVID-19 and the loneliness, Generation X is worried about keeping its children connected to the community, and Generation Z is worried about how this will affect childhood experiences.  In the end, the important thing to remember is that we are all working through this together, and the main goal is to stay safe.  

By Nico V.

February, 2021

You might have heard the term ‘swing state’ a lot in the news prior to the election. You might have even heard your parents talking about it. But what is a ‘swing state’ and how does it affect an election?  

 When you look at the electoral map, you will notice that each state is labeled with numbers. These numbers represent how many electoral votes a state has. These numbers are determined by the population of the state. In a presidential election, the winner is not determined by the number of states a candidate wins, but by the number of electoral votes.  The whole system is called the Electoral College. 

So, you would probably think that the states that have the most electoral votes are the most important.  Look at California, Texas, New York, Florida, and Pennsylvania. Look at how big their electoral college numbers are: 55, 38, 29, 29, and 20. Obviously, candidates must spend all their time and money trying to win these states. These states must be the deciding states in any presidential election. 

But actually, the candidates usually campaign in only two of these big states, leaving the other three alone. Why? Because two of them are swing states, and the other three are not, and swing states are the states that matter most in an election! 

Candidates break up the fifty states into two categories – "solid” and "swing’ states."  Solid states are states where the candidate whom the state will elect is not even in question.  Usually, this candidate wins the state over the other candidate by a margin of 15% or more.  A swing state, however, is a state where the candidate whom it will elect is uncertain, and either candidate has a chance of winning it. Even if one party won this state in one election, the other party might be able to win it back in the next election with a lot of campaigning. The winning candidate in these states usually wins by less than a 7% margin. 

The 2020 Election 

Swing states played a key role in the 2020 election last year. Both candidates spent an enormous amount of money and time in Florida and Pennsylvania.  Both states voted for Trump in 2016, but both candidates knew that, as swing states, they were both flippable. 

But after all of that time and money, they both got mixed results. Despite Biden’s hard work, Trump was still able to hold on to Florida and even increase his numbers from the 2016 results. Biden’s hard work, however, did pay off in Pennsylvania, which he was able flip. Again though, despite the victories and losses, the margins were very narrow – Trump won Florida by 3%, and Biden won Pennsylvania by less than 2%.   

Biden’s win in Pennsylvania, along with victories in other swing states, like Michigan, Wisconsin, and Arizona, were all very close races, but were also the deciding factors in his victorious campaign. 

How Do Swing States Swing? 

Swing and solid states are not set in stone, though. Over time, a solid state that predictably voted Republican or Democrat in each election can eventually swing.  One such example is Arizona, which voted around +6% Republican in the 2000 and 2012 elections, around +10% in the 2004 and 2008 elections, and +3% in the 2016 election. Yet, in the 2020 election, Arizona swung to elect the Democratic candidate, Joe Biden.  In the next election, therefore, Arizona will be considered a swing state.  

The main reason why a state changes from one party to another over time is the change in a state’s demographics. Demographics are ways to describe groups of voters. Race, age, level of education, and religion are examples of categories used to analyze groups of voters. Though membership in any of these categories does not 100% determine the way a person will vote, voters in some particular groups statistically tend to vote in particular ways. 

The demographics of a state can change as people move from one state to another. One example of this is Texas.  Texas has traditionally been a solid Republican state.  But as many Californian Democrats have started to move there, Texas has started to show signs of becoming a swing state.  Likewise, Florida has been shifting away from a traditionally solid Republican state as Democrats from the New York and New England retire there. 

Sometimes what is thought to be a ‘swing state’ in polls before the election will turn out to solidly vote for one party in the actual election.  This discrepancy occurs mostly because of the inaccuracies of polling.  When results of a poll claim that 60% of voters support one particular candidate, it seems as if the pollsters asked every voter, and 60% of all voters support that candidate.  But in reality, pollsters only ask a small sample of people from a certain area how they will vote, and then they use those results to predict how all of the voters of that area will vote.  Sometimes the polls are accurate.  But often the results of the poll do not reflect how all of the voters will eventually vote. 

It is important to understand swing states. There is always a lot of media coverage in a state that could go either way in presidential or congressional races, so we hear a lot about those states before and during the election. 

Swing states can affect where candidates spend their time and money campaigning. The closer a state’s polls are, the more attention that state receives. And even though New York has 13 more electoral votes than Georgia, we can now understand why election coverage spent all of its focus on Georgia, and not New York. 

By Nina V.

June, 2020

Sixth grade is rapidly approaching. Your friends have gathered to discuss language choices. One friend wants to someday move to France, so they decide on French as a language choice. Another friend decides that Spanish is more practical because of how widespread it is. The French and Spanish supporters soon start arguing over which is superior. Then one friend pipes up, “What about Latin?” Everybody else immediately beats them down, saying it’s dull and difficult and useless. But is that true? 

Of all things taught in school, Latin is one of the most controversial ones. From year to year, schools debate over whether to even teach it because so few children take it. Despite the general lack of enthusiasm for Latin, it’s actually a very useful and enjoyable class. 

1) Latin isn’t relevant to anything I like. 

You might not think Latin has anything to do with your interests because Latin isn’t usually front and center in the action. Usually, Latin is used for things like character names to give them a hidden meaning. Take, for instance, the Harry Potter series. All the spells in Harry Potter are in Latin. Wingardium leviosa comes from the Latin words arduus, “high, steep” and levis, “light (as in weight)”. Accio means “I send for”. A few character names are also based on Latin, such as Draco Malfoy, whose name comes from the Latin words for ‘dragon’ and ‘bad’. Dolores Umbridge’s first name means ‘pain’, and her last name comes from umbra, “shadow”. 

Harry Potter isn’t the only place where Latin can be found. The nation of Panem in the Hunger Games is an allusion to the saying “panem et circenses”—bread and circuses. The saying originated with the poet Juvenal, who stated that the Romans only cared about bread and circuses. The emperor gave the people free grain for bread, and they loved to watch gladiator fights and chariot racing. ‘Panem et circenses’ represents the whole idea of the Hunger Games: distract the citizens from real problems with rewards and competitions. 

Additionally, if you’re Christian and/or are very interested in the religion, the Bible was written in Latin. It could be fun to try to read the original Latin transcript. There are multiple references and mentions of Rome in the Bible as well. Rome played a role in the formation of the religion in the first place. Learning Latin and Roman history adds a lot to the study of Christianity. 

2) Latin is boring. 

Latin isn’t boring in the slightest! When people say this, they’re usually thinking about dusty textbooks and minute grammar rules. This is not an accurate picture of the language. The technicalities are left to professional scholars. When you’re learning Latin, you read a lot of mythology, and aside from the well-known myths, you get to hear a few truly bizarre stories. Weird stories are universally loved, and Roman mythology is packed full of them. 

If you’re taking, say, Spanish, you might get to learn about the people who speak Spanish, their culture, their history, and their beliefs. In Latin class, you get to do that as well. You’ll hear about Roman houses, gods, buildings, customs, food, clothing, etc. As a Latin student myself, I have gotten the opportunity to learn all of this during class. Sometimes we even do activities based on these things. Last year, we built a forum and Mount Vesuvius, then made Vesuvius explode. Instead of final exams, we have a cena romana, where we dress up in togas and bring in food. Latin itself has never been dull, and Latin class is even less dull. 

3) Latin is hard. 

In many ways, Latin is easier to learn and use than English. For instance, in English, the same string of letters can be pronounced very differently depending on what word it’s used in. Take the combination “ough”. It's used in the words through, rough, cough, and borough, all of which pronounce this combination differently. Imagine how hard learning English must be for those who don’t speak it and have to deal with all these inconsistencies. Yet in Latin, letters mostly all sound the same, making it one of the easier languages to learn. 

Another thing that makes Latin easy is the cases and tenses. In English, word forms are kind of arbitrary. For example, in English, you have the words ‘cat/cats’, ‘wing/wings’, and ‘spider/spiders’. But then you have words like ‘mouse/mice’, ‘goose/geese’, and ‘genus/genera’. In Latin, everything is organized in a uniform manner, apart from a few irregular verbs, and you can use basic charts as a guide. 

If one compares Latin grammar rules to English grammar rules, it’s quite evident that Latin is less complicated. The only roadblock is that you already speak a different language. That makes it seem intimidating, but once you learn the basics, it’s a breeze. 

4) Latin is a “dead” language. 

True that almost no one speaks Latin as their primary language.  But many languages people do speak come from Latin.   

The Romans conquered much of Europe, and when the Roman Empire fell, Europeans in different areas changed Latin into new languages, the “Romance languages,” such as French, Italian, and Spanish.  Even English is a mixture of Germanic languages and Latin, and Latin roots are still very evident in much of our vocabulary. When you begin to learn Latin, you’ll start making connections between it and English. Oftentimes, I’ve encountered an English word and suddenly realized which Latin word it came from. 

Therefore, Latin is very much “alive” because it is a gateway language to multiple different modern languages, and learning any of them will be much easier if you’ve already taken Latin. You’ll recognize words as you go and get an idea of what they mean much more quickly.  

Latin is a language for all sorts of people. Class is nothing but fun (if you’ve got a good teacher, like our Magister Knittel), and you are guaranteed to learn something every single day. There is no experience quite like it. So, when your friends are dissing Latin, simply ignore them and take it anyway. You will find that it is much better than what they thought! 

By Miriam W.

June, 2020

We are all excited to be able to drive soon, but our parents are probably a bit concerned about accidents, car damage, and, most importantly, our safety. But luckily, there are new features found in cars that can help us avert accidents. What are these new features, what do they do? Are they helpful? The Purple Press has looked into this topic. 

Imagine, you are driving on a crowded highway and want to merge into the lane on the left.  You think that it is safe to merge into the next lane because you do not see any cars next to you, but what you don’t realize, is that there is a car in your blind spot. A blind spot is a part of the road next to your car that is not visible to you, even by looking in your side mirrors or turning your head.  Many accidents happen because drivers make land switches and do not see other cars hiding in their blind spot.  

This might have been a problem a few years ago, but now cars have a new piece of technology called Blind Spot Detection.  This system will flash an icon on your sideview mirrors to alert you that there is a car that is coming up behind you in your blind spot. This new piece of technology is helping people all over the world avoid accidents, so when we start driving, we will not have to stress over being unsure where the other cars are on the road. 

Next, picture that you are driving your family on a road trip through beautiful scenery, and you can’t help but look out the window. Now, looking out the window for just a moment is one thing, but getting totally engrossed and distracted is very dangerous.  

With a new piece of technology called Drivers Attention Monitor, however, we can better avoid accidents that are caused by looking out the window.  When a camera in the car notices that you are getting distracted and not paying attention to the road, the car’s steering wheel will start to vibrate, alerting you to refocus your attention to the road. A coffee-cup icon will also appear on the dashboard, suggesting that maybe you need to take a break from driving.  Getting this reminder is a very helpful because it will help you avert accidents.  

Finally, visualize yourself driving a car full of people. It is loud and noisy, and you can hardly even hear the music from the radio.  You are probably getting distracted and having a hard time paying attention to the road.  With a new mechanism called Emergency Automatic Braking, however, the car can slow or stop itself when it senses it is getting too close to a car or other obstacle in front of it.   

By the time we start driving, these new driver's assistance features will probably be standard in new cars.  So, hopefully, whenever we find ourselves in a dangerous driving situation, we should be able remain calm and know that we are going to be safe.  Even better, maybe cars will become so safe someday, that our own children won’t know what a “fender bender” even is.