Round 2 - Tomas Moreno

A Friend

So, for this blog, I thought I would allow one of my friends, David to write about what is going on in his life. So, without further ado, David!

Hello future students! Well interim has gone by quickly. I've really enjoyed this month which has been much more about fun and independent study rather than practical skills (though there are some serious interims!) I've been doing one called "Demonstrating Science" where I go out to local elementary schools and teach forth and fifth graders about physics and magnetism. Its been really fun, but challenging too. Putting complex topics such as position graphs into words a fifth grader can understand has been hard at times, but its all worth it when we come in and see their faces when we do something we would consider simple, like making dry ice clouds, they really eat it up. Its been fun and I think I maybe got one of the easier ones in terms of "out of class" work. When class is over there is no homework or out of class prep so I'm getting a lot of time to really get to know the people I've been studying with over the first semester. I've meet a lot of really cool professors like Dr. Arrington who tolerates my complete inability to show up any earlier than 3 mins after class starts, or Dr. Bass who has easily the smartest sixth grader in existence. He came in one day and thought of something totally new that worked really well something a group of college students totally missed.
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So, that was David. And well, now...Interim is ALMOST over. And well....its kinda sad. I mean I want the next semester to come but at the same time, Interim is AMAZING. And this just brings my freshman year one step to closing...

But, I have to go, I have a paper to write.

Quote of the blog: "Everything has been said before, but since nobody listens we have to keep going back and beginning all over again.”--Andre Gide

More Myth Than Man

Today is a special day in case you did not know. Today is Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Day. Today is a day to remember the man that helped to lead us to where we are. No, not just in the sense of racial desegregation, but in the sense of gender desegregation, the idea of service to others, and many, MANY more.

As a child, I like most (if not all) children simply regarded MLK Day as a day that I didn't have to go to school and my mom didn't have to go to work. It meant another day for going to see a movie, another day for doing homework (ok, actually another night I could procrastinate but nonetheless). And overall, that's it, a day off.

As I grew to be a high schooler, I learned about who Dr. King was. But like most none of this really set in. I just knew that I had to know about him. Dr. King was to me what he is to many people, simply another name that must be memorized for a test, a footnote in history. Now, while teachers (and many of them at that) attempted to imbue me with a sense of who this man was and why he was important it never really meant that much to me.

But, this year, the 40th anniversary of Dr. King's assassination, I realize how important he is. I realize how much I owe to him. I realize how amazing and complex of a person he was.

Today, I attended a prayer breakfast in honor of Dr. King. Today there is also a convocation in honor of Dr. King and his legacy (sadly I cannot go because of my internship). One thing that all of the speakers at the prayer breakfast highlighted is the fact that Dr. King is turning into a footnote, into a myth of a man. This is not doing justice to Dr. King and all that he has done.

Dr. King as was said this morning may have been "the last great orator". It is because people do not speak this way that Dr. King and his complexity of character has been lost to us.

One thing that we constantly forget is that what Dr. King did was unpopular. Dr. King fought to change a system that was wrong, should we wish to honor Dr. King's memory, we should fight injustice wherever we see it, as he said, "Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere".

Dr. King fought hard against antisemitism, poverty, militarism, and more. He wasn't just fighting against racial injustice.   We need to be the new torch-bearers and show the next generation that injustices, however small must not be allowed. Because if we don't, we will not only fail to truly honor Dr. King's memory, but we will also fail to honor all of those people who fought alongside Dr. King who as Wofford College's President Bernie Dunlap said this morning, there are so many who's names we do not know.

I can honestly say that I believe that Dr. King would support the efforts of the ONE Campgaign to end poverty because it is all about people putting others ahead of themselves and serving people.

For further reading I would recommend this article. Or if you are feeling adventurous, go and pick up a biography of Dr. King (there is a stupendous children's book if you would like to teach it called My Brother Martin: A Sister Remembers Growing Up with the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.).

Attacked at the "Children's March"

Quote of the Blog: "In the end, we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends."--Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Don't let your silence be remembered, stand up against injustice.

The Times We Wish We'll Never Forget

Well, I know its been a while since my last post, but it has been a ridiculous time! :D

So, my internship is going splendidly. Even though I don't want to go into bankruptcy law (and this is sorta affirming that) I am learning A TON! Sharon (my lawyer) is amazing, she understands what I need to know and is really trying to make sure I know all that she can teach me. And, beyond that I am able to dress up all nice everyday which I LOVE!

This week we were also graced by Ms. Samantha Power who is the foreign policy expert who is advising Barack Obama in his campaign and (they hope) his presidency. She gave us her perspective on Obama and why he should be voted into office and went over the issue of genocide and her perspective on it as an expert on the topic.

Wofford was also graced with some SNOW! :D This was great! It was so much fun to go out in the snow and play in it (though there was like 2 inches (maybe!). It was great to see people so excited about the snow. More than that, I simply LOVE the snow! So that was GREAT!

Snow and politics go GREAT together!

Snowy friends!

Wofford was also able to have presidential hopeful Mike Huckabee come and speak. While he didn't accept questions (grrr) or have Chuck Norris there (double grrr) it was an interesting thing to hear someone who I don't agree with's views.

We also had a great week for activism here!

We had the first official meeting of the ONE on Wofford Club. We discussed what we want to do during the rest of the year and what we want to do before stage 2 of the OCC finishes. And we were able to organize a massive outreach event for all next week.

ONE also partnered up with Health Services to show the movie RENT (which is my first time seeing it) to show the effects of HIV/AIDS in our country. So, this was a great thing as well.

So, now I am off...to do what, I don't quite know...but I like it like that!

Quote of the Blog: "True peace is not merely the absence of tension: it's the presence of justice." --MLK (think about that for a while)

Got Enough Hairspray!?

So, I finally have gotten the hang of this "interim thing" It took some time but I finally have it. And not soon enough, my interim class has just ended the classroom work and we are being thrust out into the "real world". Ok, let me rewind and get you caught up.

So the Pre-Law Internship interim class is structured so that we have about a week of instruction followed by a week of "travel" to laws schools and then two weeks of interning at a local law office. So, after missing the initial half week of instruction I did the travel part and now I am about to do the interning! YAY!

But interim ROCKS! It is really the time of the year that people can relax while taking classes and really get to know one another. It has been a great time. And it has given me some time to work on ONE and the issues that I learned about at the conference I went to. It has been GREAT!

Also, interim has brought about an AMAZING/RIDICULOUS amount of movie watching which has been fine by me! :D

Quote of the Blog: "I firmly believe that any man's finest hour, the greatest fulfillment of all that he holds dear, is the moment when he has worked his heart out in a good cause and lies exhausted on the field of battle-victorious." -- Vince Lombardi

WOW....

Yea, the title pretty much sums it up! So let's see if I can sort this all out and tell you.

The Power 100 Summit is over and it was PHENOMENAL! Ok, so actually the Summit was over on Saturday but I've been going non-stop since then so I can only now tell you this. :D

Well, the remaining two days of the conference were filled with even more amazing speakers such as directors of specific items at ONE such as Government Affairs, Communications, the Press Secretary, and the ONE Vote '08 Policy Manager. Moreover, we had Gene Sperling, President Clinton's former Economic Advisor, Paul Begala, one of the leaders of President Clinton's 1st Campagin along with a contributor to The Situation Room, David Lane the CEO of ONE, Newt Gingrich the former Speaker of the House, and (my hero) Senator Frist, M.D. who was former Senate Majority Leader.

All of these speakers were truly amazing and I cannot go into great detail about them because of the obvious amount of space it would take but to hear from other attendees of the conference and their feelings on the speakers, feel free to check out the ONE Campus Challenge Blog. This also includes some AMAZING pictures taken during the conference.

So, now I'm back...and its GREAT! I can now implement all the things that I learned and learned about at the Summit (and I have been working a great deal on that!). So, I don't know much about the whole interim experience but from what I hear from my friends and about my class (we are going tomorrow at 9:45 and then again at 12:35) I'm sure it and I will get along just fine! :D

Quote of the Blog: We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly." --Martin Luther King, Jr. (Letter from a Birmingham Jail)

The Real Fun Begins

So, today was the first real day of the ONE Power 100 Summit. It was very interesting. We have had some really great speackers that spoke about some of the most pressing issues of our time and they are issues that I’m passionate about. Some of the issues that have been discussed include the obvious ONE platform builders such as poverty and disease on a global scale but it is how they are discussing we finish this that is the interesitng thing.

Take one speaker, Adam Taylor, the Director of Campaigns and Organizing at Sojourners which is an organization which is the meeting of faith, politics, and culture. He discussed how it is the job of college students to patrol and attempt to influence public policy. This was around the idea of debt relief which he discussed was one of the most prevalent things stopping countires from moving foreward.

Another speaker was Douglas Walker who was the co-founder of the World Rock, Paper, Sissors Society. He discussed his successes of mainstreaming RPS (as it is called) as a real sport. He related this to grass roots efforts and how hard and how easy it is to do this (yes a paradox but it IS true!)

We also had Jenna Bush as a speaker who discussed her first hand experiences of hearing the stories of HIV/AIDS victims in Latin America and the Caribbean. Jenna was an intern for UNICEF and wrote a book about her experiences in her book Anna's Story. It was really nice to hear from her about her experiences and how she was using them to educate others about the truth. This is an easy read and a really good book (yes, I do have a copy, we each received one)

The last speaker that I am going to highlight here is Suprotik Basu who is a Public Health Specialist working for World Bank who discussed Malaria. Yes, Malaria is still a disease still affecting approximately 40 percent of the worlds population because they are at risk for the disease. Mr. Basu discussed how we may aid the fight to eradicate Malaria and meet the challenge that Bill and Melinda Gates set down for the world. Because currently 1 child is killed by Malaria every 30 seconds. For more information, go to www.malarianomore.org.

There is an interesting group of people that set up an antinuclear protest outside of The White House and have been maintaining it for almost 40 years 24/7! I really do want to get involved in some sort of a protest while I can (i.e. while I am in college still). Maybe Mal and I will have to set one up. Hmmmmm...Bush be warned! lmao!

Quote of the Blog: “The task of our generation is to cut through the illusion that we inhabit separate worlds. Only then will we find the heart to rise to the daunting but urgent challenges of global disparity.”—Losang Rabgey, Ph.D. (National Geographic Emerging Explorer) This was the quote on the back of my Starbucks cup….isn’t it so true though and fitting with the conference!

btw, in case you've been living in a box for the last few years/ haven't heard this is short commercial about ONE and the Campus Challenge which has allowed me to come to this conference on Wofford's behalf.

Join the fight at www.one.org/campus!

Quote of the Blog: "When spider webs unite, they can ensnare a lion."--an African Proverb, isn't so true though?

Gimmie a BREAK!

So, I haven't posted in a while so I am going to do a bunch of blogs today that I have written but haven't been able to post yet, so without further ado, here is the first one, regarding break:

So, I’ve been on Winter Break for a while now/its over now. And well…I TOTALLY missed Wofford and my friends there. And its hard not being there with them now.

But first, a recap.

My break was fun it was a lot of hellos from family members and old teachers. It was a fun time filled with presents (from Christmas) and snowboarding. But each day I yearned for my beloved Wofford. Yes, as corny as it sounds I really wanted to go back to school. I missed my friends. I missed my dorm room (my room at my house feels too big now). I miss…Burwell food, dare say it. Or at least the interaction I got there from the chefs and the amazing friends I eat with.

Me with one of my AMAZING pillows that my aunt made me.

And now for the reason for why I’m not at Wofford now. I am lucky enough to be able to attend the ONE Power 100 Summit on behalf of Wofford College. What this is is a conference where 100 delegates from the top 100 schools in the ONE Campus Challenge get together for a 2 ½ day conference about ending extreme poverty and global disease. People such as Suprotik Basu (A Public Health Specialist at World Bank), Jenna Bush (the President’s daughter), Newt Gingrich (Former Speaker of the House), and Senator William H. Frist, M.D. (Former Majority Leader in the U.S. Senate) are speakers at the conference. I am extremely excited to be here and overjoyed that I was selected from Wofford to go. But it is a little bittersweet just in that I am missing my friends, my dorm, my Wofford, and my new Wofford Pillow so much…

Quote of the Blog: “Do not distress for those you miss are undoubtedly missing you as well.”--Anonymous