Prisoners Normative Reintegration into Society Essay -- Social Issues,

Normative reintegration into society and the resocialization of released prisoners has long been a prominent problem in society. With recidivism rates in the United States upwards of 69% it is quite clear that released prisoners are having difficulty readjusting and returning to normative lives in society (Bureau of Justice Statistics, 2008). Prison aims to serve retribution, incapacitate, deter, and rehabilitate offenders, but much of the research on recidivism rates criticize the idea that â€Å"prison works† (Dhami, 2006). However, it seems with so many prisoners returning to prison within a year of being released, the prison system is not providing inmates with the rehabilitation and therapy needed to function once they return to society. In the past many studies have shown that inmates who take place in vocational and therapy based programs are more successful with reintegration into everyday life upon their release. Additionally, there have been numerous studies that h ave shown the healing and therapeutic abilities of animals when used in programs with deviant, sick, or mentally ill individual(Deaton, 2006) (Dell, 2011) (Field, 1951). So it would seem that the combination of vocational programs with the use of animals would be the next logical step in prison programs. While animal therapy programs are relatively new in the justice system, there are quite a few currently in use in prisons around the United States (Furst, 2006). The proposed study would be exploratory in nature and seeks to answer the following question; are prisoners that complete animal therapy programs while incarcerated more successful with normative reintegration into society when released? The researcher proposes that inmates who complete animal th... ...olees who experience homelessness are far more likely to return to prison than parolees that have a place to live (Visher, 2003). The emotional health, well being, and social comfort of a parolee is very important to reintegration into society as well. Many parolees have a difficult time controlling anger, relating to people, adapting to new situations, and maintaining friendships and family relationships. Programs with animals teach prisoners social and emotional skills that may help ease the transition for a parolee into society upon release. According to a study done on an animal therapy program in Virginia women’s correctional facility, in the last three years the prisoners that completed the program have a 0% recidivism rate and 100% employment rate, which is a far cry from the statistics of prisoners who did not participate in like programs (Deaton, 2005).

Audience and Purpose Essay

Write an essay in which you show how food–its production, preparation, and/or consumption–affects everyday life beyond its obvious role as one of the basic necessities; that is, try to explore in your essay the cultural, psychological, and social influences of food on you and those around you. For example, explain how your childhood was defined by the constant struggle between you and your parents to get you to eat healthy foods; or describe the most elaborate meal that you have ever eaten, perhaps at a fancy restaurant, and how it made you feel. Also, you might relate your first experiences with growing a garden and enjoying fresh vegetables or catching and cooking your own fish on a camping trip. If your family still maintains its ethnic origins by preparing food from the old country, you might use your essay to describe such a meal and how it connects you to your roots. This is not a process analysis paper on how to prepare a certain dish; instead, you should use you r essay to interpret the meaning of food in your own life and culture. Audience and Purpose. Food is a necessity for life, but it is so much more than that. It is used in social settings to help members of a group bond and to make parties festive; it is used to pass from generation to generation family and national customs; it is used to make friends and observe special occasions; and it is used to the express artistic values of those who prepare it for consumption. Writing about the role of food in our lives can teach us much about ourselves and our culture. Interpreting the meaning of food in our lives can help readers understand life in general. Development Strategy. To develop this kind of personal essay, use division/classification (like the sample essay), comparison/contrast, or narration/description. Begin by brainstorming some interesting experiences you have had with food, and make a list of potential topics. Try to list eight or ten topics, and then choose the one that seems the most interesting. To test drive this topic, do some free writing for five or ten minutes to see what you have to say. If this results in some interesting material, try some focused free writing in which you use a specific strategy, such as narration or comparison/contrast, to organize your thoughts. If this results in a detailed, creative look at the art of eating okra or why your Cajun grandmother used food as bribery, try writing a  thesis (main idea sentence) that will help you shape the first draft into a purposeful, coherent essay. If this works, share your first draft with a preliminary audience before writing a final draft. Develop your topic with specific supporting material from personal experiences and use sensory language to help readers experience the food you describe. Sample Topics  my first experience with haute cuisine at the Commander’s Palace Restaurant in New Orleans learning to like liver  watching my little brothers eat dinner: not a pretty sight  dining on exotic foods during a mission trip to the Caribbean how my mother cooks for six very different people without going crazy why breakfast foods are my favorite  on refusing to eat anything slimy  fresh vegetables from my grandparents’ garden: the ultimate in dining pleasure grilling the steaks as a manly act: how to wear an apron and still look macho on learning proper table etiquette during the potluck suppers held at church the cultural significance of ___________ cuisine  in quest of the perfect junk food  on the importance of not letting your foods touch each other on the plate: confessions of an obsessive/compulsive vegetarianism: not a disease  on saying grace before a meal Aunt Virginia’s secret weapon, the best fried fruit pies you’ve ever eaten a total sensory experience: observing the kitchen on a busy night at Tavern on the Green putting the soul into soul food  why Thanksgiving dinner is more than a meal at the Salvation Army one of God’s most amazing inventions, the sweet potatoSample Thesis Statements 1. Passover is more than just a meal; it is a religious experience rich in symbolism and history. 2. Preparing a family dinner for the first time can easily turn into disaster. 3. Al fresco dining at the Catalina Restaurant in St. Augustine involves all of the senses. 4. The parents of finicky children have to be resourceful when tricking their kids into eating enough to stay alive. 5. People eat out of necessity but also as an important form of social interaction. Sample Essay Sandy Renfro Mr. Carter English I 14 February 2004 Eating as a Social Act Can you imagine a party without food? Have you ever bellied up to the buffet, even though you were already full, just to be sociable? Does the act of breaking bread with someone with whom you’re angry ease the tension? Is it easy to be quiet at a dinner party? If you answered no-yes-yes-no to these questions, you have probably noticed the social implications of eating. Yes, we eat to stay alive, but there’s much more to it than that. We eat with others to establish and maintain friendly relationships. Four main occasions illustrate this social reason for eating: parties, banquets, family meals, and funerals. By definition, a party involves more than one person and almost always includes food and beverage. My mom’s birthday party last August wouldn’t have been the same without the birthday cake, the homemade ice cream, and the large trays of finger foods that her two sisters prepared for friends and family. The focus remained on my mother, but the delicious food gave us something to do while she opened her gifts and joked with her sisters. A banquet is usually a catered affair at which a large group of people who are bound together by a special interest or endeavor sit down to a dinner to honor a person or persons who have contributed to their shared interest or cause during the year. The high school sports banquet last year gave athletes and their families a wonderful opportunity to form social bonds by reminiscing about the year’s games and track meets over filet mignon, baked potatoes, and green beans. Recognizing the outstanding athletes with short speeches and aw ards also created a social cohesion in the group that have made this year’s teams perform well. Family meals also perform an important social function when parents use these occasions to teach their children proper table etiquette, find out what’s going on in their children’s lives, and entertain interesting guests who can expose the children to new ideas and different cultures. My parents expect me and my two sisters to be present at every family meal, and some of our most enjoyable times as a  family have taken place around the dinner table. We also have some interesting discussions about politics, religion, and culture, especially if we have guests like our pastor and his wife, the Muslim family that lives down the street, or any of the international students from the university where my mother works. I have learned my conversational skills sitting at the family dinner table. Food also has a social function at most funerals or wakes. When my grandfather passed away two years ago, I was amazed at how much food poured in from neighbors and fellow church members . This was their way of saying, â€Å"We care about your loss.† During the home visitation time the night before the funeral, my grandmother made sure everyone had something to eat. After the funeral the next morning, the church ladies prepared a nice lunch for family and friends in the church’s fellowship hall. We used this occasion to share memories about Grandpa. Our dinner that night at Grandma’s house became a kind of impromptu family reunion when we caught up on all the news from aunts, uncles, and cousins who came in from out of state to attend the funeral. Of course, there are other occasions when eating together helps us form social bonds, but these are the ones that have helped me become the person I am today. Bottom line: people eat out of necessity but also as an important form of social interaction. Essay Reminders. Don’t forget: 1) a good essay consists of three basic parts: the introduction, the body, and the conclusion; 2) the main idea is stated clearly in one sentence called the thesis; 3) the topic is narrow and well developed; 4) the author writes about the topic from personal experience for an audience of readers who will benefit in some way from reading it; 5) the material is divided into paragraphs logically to make reading the essay easy; and 6) the topic is developed specifically, using one or more of the following development strategies: analogy, definition, description, cause/effect, comparison/contrast, division/

Religion And Confession Essay

a. Define your topic in a relatively brief paragraph. The topic I chose is Confession. Confession is a basic part of living a spiritual life. For some cultures and organized religion, confession is a physical act of going to the priest, telling the priest your sins and asking sincerest repentance. One cannot partake of the Feast of the Holy Eucharist without confession because confession clears one’s conscience, is the way of receiving the Lord’s forgiveness. â€Å"Confession is the popular name for the Christian Sacrament of Penance or Reconciliation recognized by the Roman Catholic and Orthodox churches. The rite consists in the acknowledgment of sins to a priest, who grants absolution in the name of God. Its biblical basis is found in the action of Jesus forgiving sins (Mark 2) and his commissioning of the Apostles to forgive sins (John 20:22-23).† (Favazza, 1982) b. How does the experience of guilt relate to or inform your topic? Guilt directly relates to confession. Confession is the act of asking forgiveness. Others are burdened with the issue of telling one’s sins to a priest who is only human at one end. But more than going through the complications of the process, one cannot go to confession willingly if one cannot first accept his guilt of sins that he committed. There is actually a part in the process of confession when one stipulates the sins that one is guilty of. Confession lets a person open himself to the Lord. â€Å"Keep your wants, your joys, your sorrow, your cares, and your fears before God. You cannot burden Him; you cannot weary Him. He who numbers the hairs of your head is not indifferent to the want of His children.† (White, p. 101). When the act of letting go of all the fears, desires and wants of a person is also the act of unburdening one’s self to his sins. Only when a man is empty of sins can the love of God enter his heart. â€Å"The more holy a man is, the more humble, self-renouncing, selfabhorring, and the more sensitive to every sin he becomes, and the more closely he clings to Christ. The moral imperfections which cling to him he feels to be sins, which he laments and strives to overcome. Believers find that their life is a constant warfare, and they need to take the kingdom of heaven by storm, and watch while they pray.† (Easton, 2006) c. What is the relationship of your topic to the experience of justification by faith God`s forgiveness and reconciling acceptance? Confession is a process institutionalized by God to show how forgiveness works. Through confession, one can experience repentance, forgiveness, reconciliation with the faith once again and the joy of feeling accepted by God’s love once more. A sinner who repents and asks forgiveness of his sins that he is guilty of is ready to accept the penalties of his sins. The kind of penalty bestowed upon a remorseful soul shows the kind of justice that faith exemplifies. Nothing compares to the experience of confession when a man is transformed from evil to good, from sinner to follower. â€Å"Confession of sin is also emphasized in the NT (Matt. 3:6; Mark 1:5), and with it is connected the promise of forgiveness of sins (I John 1:9; cf. Matt. 6:12), a forgiveness which is based solely on the death of Christ (Eph. 1:7)† (Quanbeck, 1968.) The death of Christ was able to save human souls from damnation to salvation. His dying on the cross was proof of God’s love to save human souls from sins. Without the death of Jesus, forgiveness will not be made manifest. The path of confessions is part of the path towards salvation. Part of Jesus seven last words, â€Å"Father, forgive them for they know not what they do,† exemplifies the absoluteness of forgiveness and the love of God to his people. d. In what way does your topic contribute to or inform growth in Christian character and service (commonly called sanctification and victory over sin)? Confession is a part of growing into a full Christian. Human beings will sin against the Lord as he walks the Path. Confession sharpens one’s Christian character because through confessions, a person learns what and how forgiveness is. When people go to confession, the advocacy itself informs other people about how Christians grow in the love of God. Through confession, people can allow themselves to be one with God again through the Holy Spirit. â€Å"Sanctification involves more than a mere moral reformation of character, brought about by the power of the truth: it is the work of the Holy Spirit bringing the whole nature more and more under the influences of the new gracious principles implanted in the soul in regeneration. In other words, sanctification is the carrying on to perfection the work begun in regeneration, and it extends to the whole man (Rom. 6:13; 2 Cor. 4:6; Col. 3:10; 1 John 4:7; 1 Cor. 6:19). It is the special office of the Holy Spirit in the plan of redemption to carry on this work (1 Cor. 6: 11; 2 Thess. 2:13). The Apostle’s Creed mentions the basic principle that sanctifies confession in, â€Å"I believe in the Holy Ghost; the holy catholic Church; the communion of saints; the forgiveness of sins; the resurrection of the body; and the life everlasting.† The Church of God is developed by sinners who have gone back, believed in the â€Å"forgiveness of sins† that is why confessions are important in reminding people of the faith. And so even the most hideous crime and guilt, if confessed with sincerest repentance, has the hope to be forgiven. e. How can your topic help one to know and understand God personally? The ordinary man would not really know how sorry a sinner is. Sincerety can be seen in gestures but this is not enough when it’s a case when one asks forgiveness. People may have an idea how sincere the apology is but in the case of murder in the first degree, at the moment before serving death sentences, at that moment, confession is but a process between you and the Lord. The personal relationship of a person and God is a very special one. The act of confession is a venue where that personal relationship can start and can be kept. This keeping will have great effects towards advocating the sanctity of that kind of relations so that others may be able to have that special relations with God. â€Å"If Christians would associate together, speaking to each other of the love of God and of the precious truths of redemption, their own hearts would be refreshed and they would refresh one another.† (White. p 103) f. What are the social consequences of your topic? In other words, how does your topic affect or inform your relationship to other persons in your life? Confessions better a person. A person who understands and believes in the concept of confessions believes in concepts of forgiveness, repentance, salvation and above all, humility. Amidst the many challenges expected of modern man, the value of confessions will enable a person to keep his morals intact and act ethically in life. Much of evil ways happen because man has forgotten that his life, his body and the resources around him are not his own. They are essentially gifts from God. Abuse of these gifts happen because man thinks he is on top of the food chain, sole predator of all things on earth. When a person forgets that there is a higher being than him, he is corrupted. Confession will be an insitution that will remind that the sinful man is a given thing on earth but due to God’s almighty love, God forgives the sincerely repentful human being thereby giving him another chance to enter the kingdom of heaven. Bibliography Favazza, Joseph, The Order of Penitents (1988); Martos, Joseph, Doors to the Sacred (1982). Holy Bible. Crossway Books; Compact edition (April 2005) W.A. Quanbeck, IDB,I,667-68; R.H. Alexander, TWOT,I, 364-66; O. Michel, TDNT,V, 199-219; V.C. Grounds, ZPEB,I, 937-39. White, Ellen. Steps to Jesus. Adventist Book Center New Jersey; Booklet edition (January 1998)

Bus/210 Week 8 Assignment Developing Good Business Sense

Name: Date: 04/28/2011 Course: BUS/210 Assignment: Developing Good Business Sense ? BUS/210 Week 8 Assignment Developing Good Business Sense There are three fast food restaurants that I chose as the businesses for this assignment; Sonic Drive-In, McDonalds, and Kentucky Fried Chicken. All three of these businesses are fast food restaurants. Sonic Drive-In is a curb side restaurant in which car hops bring the customer’s order to their car. McDonald and Kentucky Fried Chicken are both dine-in sit down restaurants that also offer a drive-thru window in car service. The three businesses have similar operations involved in their inputs. The main goal of the employees is to make high quality fast food. While Sonic Drive-In prepares their menu items as they are ordered, McDonalds and KFC precook there items and use heat lamps to keep the food warm. McDonalds and KFC organize their employees in a very similar manner, while Sonic Drive-In is slightly different. McDonald’s and KFC utilizes the cook stay to prep and cook all the food items, the front counter and drive through staff run the registers, take order prepare drinks, and sack or tray customers’ orders. Assistant Managers and managers help out in all positions and oversee all operations of the restaurant. Sonic Drive organizes their cooks and Managers in a similar way, the difference is that Sonic Drive-In does not utilize a front customer counter and register. Sonic utilizes a curbside menu’s and speaker system for customers to place their orders. Carhops replace the counter help normal seen at traditional fast food restaurants. The carhops deliver the orders to the customer’s car. Sonic Drive-In allows their customers to custom order their menu items any way the customer wants. They also offer over 350,000 different drink combinations. That is something that is not offer by any other national fast food chain. The OMM costs of these three restaurants are very similar. The all three of them have operating costs such as rent, utilities, inventory, franchise fees, royalty fees and labor. I found it surprising that all three restaurants actually do not own the property that they are on. All three of them own the restaurants but rent the land that there restaurants operate on. With all three of these restaurants, the time of years and the weather have a huge effect on their sales volume. The lower their sales volume the higher percent of operating cost that they have. During the winter, sales are at their low and in the summer they are at their high. Each restaurant experiences high profits during the summer months and low profits during the winter months. Operating cost such as inventory and labor are the biggest monthly expense from all three restaurants. Since all three of these restaurants belong to national franchise chains they are required to pay franchise fees and royalty fees each month. The manager at Sonic Drive-In stated that their franchise and royalty fees are determine by their net sales each month. They are required to pay 15 percent of their net sales for franchise fees and 10 percent of their net sale for royalties. The manager at Sonic Drive-in also Stated that they are doing very good if they can profit 15 percent of their sales each month after paying all the expenses, and the best way to do that is by controlling the inventory and labor expenses. The managers of McDonalds and Kentucky Fried Chicken were unwilling to release any of their business information to me. While the manger of sonic Drive-In was willing to answer some question, they were very restrictive of the information they did give. The way McDonalds, Kentucky Fried Chicken, and Sonic Drive-In all three conduct their business is very similar. They are designed to produce quality fast food at a price that is considered a value to the customer. They each use the small batch operating system to make customized products. In all three case their own customized food for individual customer orders. KFC makes small batches of fried chicken that is to be sold to individual customers. Because the time it takes to make the fried chicken, KFC cooks batches throughout the day so that it is ready when the customer orders it. This reduces the waiting time for the customer. McDonalds precooks their hamburgers and makes the sandwiches when the customer orders to reduce the waiting time for their customers. Sonic Drive-In cooks the customer’s food when it is ordered, but states that none of their menu items take more than three minute to cook, therefore the wait time for the customer should not exceed three minutes. All three of these businesses focus on delivering fast quality food at an affordable price to keep their customers satisfied and insure they maintain repeat business. This is what keeps their sales value up and allows them to be a profitable business.

Using Expository Text in the Secondary Classroom Essay - 1

Using Expository Text in the Secondary Classroom - Essay Example Moreover, Hall, Sabey, and McClellan (2005) indicate that effective use of expository text between early childhood and middle school classrooms helps decrease the decline in reading scores. Akhondi, Malayeri, and Samad (2011), in complementing claims by Hall, Sabey, and McClellan (2005), show that teachers may find teaching expository texts and their structures as an effective technique for improving the common reading achievements. The structure of expository text is such that it facilitates the study process in prospective readers because the structure contains elements that guide a student through the reading. Students who comprehend the concept of expository text structure as well as the way to analyze it are capable of learning more than their counterparts who lack this understanding. Therefore, students’ comprehension skills in reading improve when they acquire this knowledge with regard to the development of text structure and its proper use (Akhondi, Malayeri & Samad, 2011). Knowledge of rhetorical relations between main ideas and sustaining details enhances a reader’s comprehension of expository text. This results from text features in expository texts capable of helping a reader to find and organize information within a text. For instance, heading in middle school text introduces a student to detailed bits of information, which helps the student to keep each bit of information within the short-term memory. This allows the student to process or even connect the information to background knowledge and later store it to the long-term memory. Without headings, information presented in expository text would be overwhelming to the middle school students because it would be difficult to process it effectively (Akhondi, Malayeri & Samad, 2011). Since expository texts’ structural elements vary, it is essential that middle school students be introduced to the components throughout the year. This

Strategic Management in Action Assignment Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2750 words

Strategic Management in Action - Assignment Example Introduction Technology sector in the US includes more than 140,000 companies with combined annual revenue of about $900 billion. AT&T, IBM, Intel, Adobe, Apple, and Microsoft are the major companies (US Technolgy Sector Analysis, 2010). â€Å"Industry concentration is high in many segments with the largest 50 participants generating more than 60% of the segment revenue† (US Technolgy Sector Analysis, 2010). Scientific discoveries and new product developments form the basis of profitability in this industry. Both large and small companies can compete successfully – the mammoths have access to capital and marketing and the miniatures have domain-specific expertise. In the period Aug-10 to Jan-11, the Application Software industry has been on a bullish trend before being thrust into a bearish mode in the wake of the European sovereign debt crisis. The history of Apple begins in 1976 when Stephen Gary Wozniak and Steven Paul Jobs began working on the Apple I. When the design was finished Wozniak and Job’s tried to sell it to Hewlett Packard but there was no interest in the Apple I. By April 1976 Ron Wayne had joined Jobs and Wozniak and designed the first Apple logo. Wayne sees the financial risk being too high and resigns. In 1977 Apple becomes incorporated and in 1979 the Apple II is introduced. At this time development began on Apple’s first business computer, the Lisa. In 1980 Apple went public and by 1983 Apple had become the fastest growing company in history. Flash forward to 1998 when the iMac is announced and releases, it becomes the fastest selling PC in history. May 19th, 2001 Apple opens its first retail store in Los Angeles and Washington DC, followed by the introduction of the iPod in October (TAM, 2010). Among Apple’s long list of products include the iPad, iPhone, iPod, iTunes, Mac, PowerBoo k, and Power Mac. As of May 2010 Apple had a gain of 1.8% at $222.12 billion (Nosowitz, 2010). While Apple has produced some products that have experienced the same success as the iPod, for example Apple TV, the authors believed that the new projector laptop will be among Apple’s more popular products. SWOT Analysis The primary strength of APPLE is its strong presence in the market. It could be realized from the fact that it is the world’s number one brand in Asia, US and Europe. It has outperformed technology giants like Intel, IBS and Microsoft in many segments. Its strong presence in the market has helped it to aggressively acquire market share compared to many other companies that only have strong presence in their local markets. The company has the largest market share in MB and motherboard segments selling approximately 22 million pieces in FY09. APPLE is one of the rear technology companies that had made operating profits even though global economy was undergoin g a recession (Apple Annual Report, 2010). Another Strength of APPLE is its advanced and excellent Research & Development capability, efficient and effective supply chain, and mass production at a competitive production cost. These competitive strategies of APPLE have helped it to become a market leader in many products. In 2009, the company came up with first of its kind notebook and motherboard that was compatible with USB 3.0 securing a leading position in the segment (Apple Announcements, 2011). This was a shear display of Research initiatives of the company. With the use of technologies like e-commerce, the company had created an efficient supply chain which helps it with seamless flow of information and products among resources. Mass production done by APPLE helps it achieve economies of scale thereby increasing operating profits of the company. The primary weakness of the company is that it is investing a lot of amount in restructure activities involving spin-off of certain s ubsidiaries

Care of the severe asthmatic paediatric patient Essay

Care of the severe asthmatic paediatric patient - Essay Example Unless severe asthma is adequately treated it can become life threatening. Treatment regimen in the case of severe paediatric asthma is giving high concentrations of oxygen to the patient, nebulized salbutamol and systemic corticosteroids. One of the most frequent causes of children being presented in hospitals is asthma. The important concern with paediatric asthma is that a significant percentage of children hospitalized with a severe attack of asthma are likely to die. This makes understanding paediatric asthma and maintaining guidelines for managing severe paediatric asthma important to the reduction of paediatric mortality in hospitality Weinberger 2008 p.633, defines asthma as a disease characterized by hyper-responsiveness of the airways to various stimuli, resulting in airway obstruction that is reversible to a substantial degree either spontaneously or as a result of treatment†. The airway obstruction observed in asthma arises from the different levels of severity of broncho-spasm and inflammation. Inflammation in asthma is the result of mucosal oedema and the secretion of mucous (Weinberger, 2008). Guill, 2004, points out that asthma does not occur as a set of episodic events spread over periods of time, but is rather present as a state of inflammation and hyper-responsiveness of the airway that presents in a varying manner in an individual suffering from asthma and also among the different individuals having asthma. Such an observation suggests the severity of an asthmatic event in a child varies from time and time and the severity of an asthmatic event is not necessarily the same between different indiv iduals (Guill, 2004). The varying severity of asthma in children gives rise to asthmatic events that may be present with minimal symptoms that have hardly any impact on the health of the child to asthmatic events with life threatening potential. The available indicators of the severity levels of asthma in children are the