What is Anxiety? Anxiety is the mind and body’s reaction to stressful, dangerous, or unfamiliar situations. Anxiety has a bad feeling before a significant event. For some people, a certain level of anxiety helps us stay alert and aware. Still, it feels different for those suffering from an anxiety disorder, like the whole world is collapsing and caving in on you. Anxiety can be anything from a feeling of worry, nervousness, or unease, to fear or terror that reaches a peak within minutes, which leads to a panic attack. Panic attacks begin all of a sudden without giving any warning. They can strike at any time and may have occasional or frequent attacks.
Panic Attacks can cause chest pain, sweating, shaking, palpitations, chills, nausea, and so much more. Panic attacks are different for everyone, but every person who has experienced a panic attack has felt the fear of not knowing what will happen to them. It’s one of the scariest feelings like you’re going to die at that moment or someone else will die. Having frequent panic attacks could be a sign of an anxiety disorder. Anxiety disorders are characterized by excessive fear or anxiety that can have negative behavioral and emotional consequences. With an anxiety disorder, you can have anxiety and a trait of another mental illness, for example, Anxiety with Obsessive-Compulsive tendencies. There are many long lists of different anxiety disorders someone could have. It is important to remember that everyone feels anxiety to some degree regularly throughout their life. Fear and anxiety are helpful emotions that can help us notice danger or threats that keep us safe and help us adapt to our environment. If you believe that you could be suffering from an anxiety disorder, it is essential to get diagnosed by a doctor and consider getting further help in therapy.
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April is Distracted Driving Awareness Month. What is distracted driving? Distracted driving is any activity that diverts attention from driving. Distracted driving can be texting, talking on the phone, having friends in the car, or something simple like changing the radio station or drinking water. Anything that diverts your eyes from the road or takes your attention away from the road is considered distracted driving.
Texting is the most significant form of distracted driving. Reading and sending texts is common among all age groups and is very dangerous. Texting only takes your eyes off the road for five seconds, but at 55mph that is about the length of a football field. Using a cell phone while driving increases your chance of injury and death. In a study compiled in 2019, 3,142 people were killed in car crashes involving distracted drivers. Distracted driving could be something simple, such as: changing the music, eating, drinking, or talking to passengers. Changing music diverts your eyes for even a second, but so much can happen within that second. Eating can be very distracting, especially if you drop something on yourself. Drinking is also very distracting, if it is hot or even cold and it spills on you that is very distracting. Be safe when driving. Emma Watson was born on April 15, 1990 and was raised in England. Emma Watson is an English actress whom I have always admired. Emma is most known for her role as Hermione Granger in the Harry Potter franchise. She basically grew up on screen, because she reprised the role in all eight films. Since the last film she has gone on and furthered her education, became an activist, and starred in other movies.
Emma attended the Stagecoach Theatre Arts school at Oxford, where she studied singing, acting and dancing. She first discovered her love for acting when she was 7 and won a poetry competition for reciting James Reeves' "The Sea." She had never acted professionally when her theater teachers suggested agents looking to cast an upcoming movie based on the first novel of the Harry Potter series. At 9 years old she auditioned 8 times for the role that would change her life. After finishing up 8 movies in 2011 she departed from acting. She decided to further her education by enrolling as a freshman at Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island. She graduated from Brown in 2014 with an English degree and in that same year, she was appointed a UN Women Goodwill Ambassador. After she took time to Focus On Women’s Activism, she went back into acting to be seen as someone other than Hermione Granger. Yesterday we were given the fantastic opportunity to virtually attend The Women’s Empowerment Panel hosted by the Rho Kappa National Social Studies Honor Society. All speakers coincidentally graduated from Immaculate Conception. The first strong woman who spoke was Ashlyn Hernandez, an Interior Designer and the Owner of Ashlina Design Atelier. The second speaker introduced was Maria Morgana, Educator in the North Bergen School District. The third brilliant speaker was Dr. Melissa Alvarez, an Internal Medicine Resident in her third year of residency at Mercy Catholic Medical Center. The fourth and final speaker was Lori Laverty, a Social Worker for the New Jersey Division of Child Protection & Permanency.
The first speaker on the panel, Ashlyn Hernandez, talked about her experiences and journey to becoming an interior designer. After hearing her speech, definitely made me view interior design differently; I was not aware of the amount of work put into it. She talked about getting inspired by nature and the world around us. “Take a variety of courses in high school and in college. When looking for inspiration, go to museums. Travel and explore different locations. Meet and network with professionals. Connections can help you be successful,” is a direct quote from her speech talking about getting inspired. The second speaker on the panel, Maria Morgana, Talked about her experiences as an educator in the North Bergen School District. She spoke about how she never intended to step into the education field, but she found her passion in teaching younger children. She enjoys teaching second grade and continues to learn new things about her field each day. My favorite part of her speech was when she advised that it’s okay if you don’t know your field, ask questions, and don’t be afraid to try new things. The third speaker on the panel, Dr. Melissa Alvarez, told about her long continuing journey to becoming a Doctor. Dr. Alvarez is in her third year of residency at Mercy Catholic Medical Center and continues her path to become an attending. She explained how when she attended college and medical school, she failed a few of her classes, she emphasized that even though she failed classes, she was still able to get to where she is today. “Do not let anything or anyone stop you. Follow your heart and believe in yourself,” was a quote that she said that stuck with me. The fourth speaker on the panel, Lori Laverty, spoke about her experiences as a Social Worker for the New Jersey Division of Child Protection & Permanency. She emphasized the fact that Immaculate Conception shaped her for the future. She advised to “make decisions that will fulfill you and are right for you.” Every speaker on the panel was very inspiring, and their speeches were truly beautiful. Fern Hunt is a Mathematician born on January 14, 1948 in New York City. Her grandparents immigrated to the United States from Jamaica before World War I. At a young age she developed an interest in science, which only magnified when she started attending Saturday Science Program at Columbia University. She then attended The Bronx High School of Science, then college at Bryn Mawr College where she received her A.B. in Mathematics. Hunt then entered New York University's Courant Institute of Mathematics where she earned her M.S. degree and later her Ph.D. degree in mathematics.
She started her career at The University of Utah and later went to Howard University's Mathematics Department. Hunt went on to work in the mathematical biology laboratory at the National Institute of Health. She also was a member of the Graduate Record Examinations Mathematical Advisory Board with the Education Testing Service. Then she decided to go down a new career path with the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) in the computing and applied mathematics laboratory. Hunt focuses her abilities on mathematical models that describe different kinds of movement, such as applied probability and dynamical systems. In addition to mathematical modeling, she has also researched biomathematics to look at genetic variation and patterns in bacteria. She has written several scientific articles and is active in the scientific and local communities. In 2000, Hunt won the Arthur S. Flemming Award for Outstanding Federal Service for her contributions to mathematical biology, computational geometry, nonlinear dynamics, and more. Fern Hunt is truly an outstanding role model to all. Most people don’t know her name, but she is definitely someone to celebrate during Black History Month. Angie Thomas was born and raised in Jackson, Mississippi. She has a BFA in Creative Writing from Belhaven University. The non-profit organization, We Need Diverse Books, awarded Angie with the Walter Dean Myers Grant 2015 along with Naadeyah Haseeb, Jami Nakamura Lin, Yamile Saied Méndez, and Shveta Thakrar. She was awarded with 2,000 dollars.
Angie released her debut novel, The Hate U Give, in 2017. The Hate U give is an expansion from a college short story she wrote. Her book is about a teen black girl from a poor neighborhood who goes to a mostly white populated private school. The narrator, Starr, encounters a white police officer murder her childhood friend, Khalil, and she speaks publicly about what she witnessed, this ultimately leads to a riot. Her book was number one on the New York Times Best Sellers list, and was eventually made into a movie. Angie’s second novel, On the come up, was just as successful as The Hate U Give. Differing from The Hate U Give (film), Angie Thomas is now producing. Angie Thomas is truly a remarkable role model to all. Most people don’t know her name, but Angie Thomas is someone to celebrate during Black History Month. January 20, 2021 was an important and a historical day for Democrats and people everywhere. In case you missed it, Joe Biden, American Politician and Former Vice President, was sworn into office as the 46th President of the US. Not only was President Joe Biden sworn into office, but also Vice President Kamala Harris made history by being the first female, first Black, and first South Asian Vice President.
I feel like this event is very important in history. One day in the future we will be asked about the events of January 20, 2021, and we will tell them about the Inauguration. The inauguration doesn’t just affect me it affects every American citizen. It does not matter what political party you support, our new president will most likely change America. The article I read was very fact based and informative, they were not biased towards a side. This event is significant because a presidential inauguration only happened every four years. It is important to know and care about what is going on in this country. This event will also go down in history because the first female, first Black, and first South Asian woman was sworn in as the Vice President. Personally and respectfully, I think that this country has come so far, 100 years ago I bet no one would have guessed that there would be a Black South Asian female in politics. |
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