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My First Week at Goonj

Hello Everyone! This summer I have taken up an internship at an Indian NGO called Goonj. I have just finished my first week and it was a fun one. The main focus of this week was shadowing one of the members of the organization. I shadowed an individual who was in charge of packaging ecologically sustainable and reusable sanitary napkins for women in villages that cannot access regular disposable sanitary napkins due to the stigma attached with menstruation or the cost of buying such items. Here are some pictures of the process: Above are some of the completed packs of 10 pads which I spent my entire day making Above are some of the lovely ladies who cut and trim the cloth which goes into making these pads. Today, I started my campaign to sell bags made out of donated cloth to stores. I had to go door to door knocking and canvassing of the area.  I am happy to report however that I got a 40% conversion rate from door to door knocking! I plan to visit more shops in t
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The Difference Between Texas and Puerto Rico Flood Responses

Hurricane Harvey was a category 4 tropical storm that made contact with land on August 17,2017. Estimated damage was about 125 billion dollars. After hurricane Harvey, the city of Houston received large amounts of aid and help from FEMA. More than 15 billion dollars in aid was approved by Congress. FEMA housed about 70,000 people in hotels and slowly that number declined to 47,000. Due to most housing units in Houston being insured, there were many insurance payouts. In fact, 608 million dollars were given in payouts. There were 107 confirmed casualties. Houston's developed facilities enabled the city to brace the impact of the storm and allow for minimal damage. The same cannot be said about Puerto Rico. Hurricane Maria was a category 5 hurricane. It caused about 91.9 billion dollars in damages. It made contact with land on September 16, 2017. Puerto Rico received about 16 billion dollars in total aid with no plans of expanding that package. Electricity has not yet been re

My Progression with Technology

Hello everyone! This might be the first post where I am addressing you personally. Today I wanted to talk to you all about my experience with technology. I think this will be especially interesting for some as I am one of the many people who has seen multiple revolutionary changes in technology within my lifetime. Today I will be taking you through the different computers/laptops I have owned and operated on over a long period of time. Here we go: Computer 1: Dell Dimension XPS R400@400MHz 256MB RAM VINTAGE COMPUTER PENTIUM II This was the first computer I remember ever using. The primary usage of the computer was to play games (keep in mind I was about 5) Computer 2: Lenovo ThinkPad This technically wasn't mine. My father got it from his office for working on the go. It was at this time I was first exposed to the many different capabilities of Excel. This was truly one of the first machines that sparked my love for software and hardware. It was at that time truly amazing

Why do Women Make Less Compared to Men?

The Bureau of Labor Statistics in 2013 reported that women made approximately $706 a week whereas men made approximately $860 a week. The top paying fields are: Medicine STEM However only 24% of people in STEM are female, and about 40% of people in medicine. The reason women don’t make more compared to today’s calculations is that they don’t participate in high-paying fields. Why does this happen? Because women are discouraged from majoring in such fields during college. They also usually don’t have a lot of experience in high school of high-level math and science which makes college-level math and science very hard for them. The average starting salary in STEM is $65000/year The average starting salary in medicine is $85000/year Fields in which most women are employed and average starting salaries Elementary/ middle school teachers - $36000/year Secretaries and Administrative assistants - $37000/year A good article to read on the problem of lack

Jean Sizes and Why You Should Ignore Clothing Ads

The average waist size for a woman in 2014 in the united states was 36.3 - 37.8 inches (Roughly a 14). https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2014/09/16/waist-sizes-expanding-study/15723771/ http://www.cleveland.com/style/index.ssf/2010/08/size_14_is_average_american_wo.html The sizes most advertised in commercials is 0 to 4. There is a clear mismatch in this. If clothing companies claim to clothe the average person, they should have ads that target the average person. That means this ... http://www.okayafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/HM-Spring-Summer-14-Model-Maria-Borges-Pret-a-Poundo-11.jpg ... is not the representation of the average woman. This is ! http://fashiongum.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/03/Robyn-Lawley-Plus-Size-Fashion-Model.jpg Go forth! Ads are not targeted towards the average person, do not hold yourself to that standard. A post for men will follow soon

College Prices are Soaring

It’s no secret that college is pricey these days. Yet, some people do not truly comprehend how much it has increased. The causes are pretty apparent. The most elegant way to put it, According to Forbes.com is, “If you artificially inflate demand for something and don't let supply adjust, prices will go up.” To put it in non-economical lingo, if everyone wants more of something and you don’t create more, the cost of what already exists will go up drastically as there is less to go around for an increasing amount of people. Data from the college board shows the trend over the course of 35-36 years. Feel free to leave a comment! Sources: Gobry, Pascal-Emmanuel. "The Reason Why College Is So Expensive Is Actually Dead Obvious." Forbes. Forbes Magazine, 07 Aug. 2013. Web. 25 July 2017. "Tuition and Fees and Room and Board over Time, 1976-77 to 2016-17, Selected Years." Tuition and Fees and Room and Board over Time, 1976-77 to 2016-17

Why do Women Graduate faster than Men Now?

According to the U.S. Department of Education, only 59% of college undergraduates are able to graduate on time(on time being 4 years). Within this brackets, the Department of Education says that females graduate more on time than males in both public(61% vs 55%) and private(68% vs 62%) institutions. https://www.usnews.com/dims4/USNEWS/892240c/2147483647/resize/970x/quality/85/?url=%2Fcmsmedia%2F4b%2F17%2F756988c7417faedcfe91e12563a2%2F141031-women1-graphic.JPG The National Bureau of Economic Research gives many reasons for this shift.They start off by saying that women were in better financial conditions post World War II and were likely to enroll in universities. Then the next factor was that women started to marry later in their lives, enabling them to be serious students instead of being occupied with finding husbands. The last reason was the introduction of the contraceptive pill which allowed women to plan out their futures in a better and safer way. Sources: Why Do