The Stadard Tea

This week's post is roughly about food standards. I have been trying to find the most strange standards I can find. This post is a continuation on my previous [blog post][last].

After taking several classes with Professor Vinsel, I have learned about *a lot* of standards. At this point, I am more surprised when I find something that does not have a standard. To try and spice up standards, I am trying to find things that are standardized and surprise me that they are. This means many things in our life are standardized, including many things you probably have never considered. Where possible, I will try to link to the source material.

If the British Government was to standardize one thing, what do you think it would be? Perfectly fulfilling a stereotype, they decided to standardize tea. This standard is codified in [ISO 3103][tea], which was taken from the British Standards Institute Like it was described in class, the smaller national standards boards make the standards, and the international groups adopt them. This standard does not say what kind of leaves have to be used, but does list exactly how the tea should be brewed. The tea must be brewed in a porcelain pot with an exact volume of water, with exactly two grams of tea leaf. Unlike many other food standards, which seem to be about making sure food is safe to eat. The goal of this standard is to make sure that tea tasters have a standard experience.

ISO 3103 was standardized in 1980, how much could have changed in the world of tea? According to other tea standardization documents I found, a lot can change. [This document][tea-ng] I found from the "Intergovernmental Group - on Tea 10th Session" details how tea standards have had to stay up to date. Although it seems that tea has not changed, the spreading usage of instant tea packets has upset the standardization committees. Honestly, this document is filled with more chemistry than I know what to do with. Unlike the standard, this one seems to be more focused around health and consumer expectations. There are also some points that make me think they are trying to use the data they collected to prove or disprove health effects of tea.

I was am a little surprised at how much work goes into studying tea, and figuring out how to make it properly. With Britain's stereotypical tea consumption, it does not seem that strange that someone would try to say they have the standard tea. Since there is so much work that went into this, I am curious if there were any major tea company that funds the research. It is possible that since it is such a cultural drink that it is expected for this to be a standard, but I am unsure how I could properly research the funding. Hopefully for next week's blog post, I can find something even more bizarre.

[tea]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ISO_3103 "ISO 3103"
[tea-ng]: http://www.fao.org/fileadmin/templates/est/COMM_MARKETS_MONITORING/Tea/Documents/Andrew_Scott_ISO_Dehli_13_May_10.pdf "Updating Tea Standards"
[last]: http://stevensstandardsandsociety.blogspot.com/2014/09/shopping-cart-safety-standards.html

Double Standards? Education and Employment (STEM)

Last class the topic of female under-representation in certain STEM fields was briefly brought up with the suggestion that some universities have considered starting female computing colleges to encourage a growth in numbers.  Double standards, “any code or set of principles containing different provisions for one group of people than for another…”(Dictionary.com), based on the history of society’s patriarchal infrastructure have perhaps implicitly discouraged females from entering certain fields.  Affirmative actions against gender discrimination have elicited criticism for encouraging double standards against men and reverse discrimination, resonating in phrases like ‘women don’t want equality they want rights’.  Double standards are ubiquitous, but is affirmative action remediating one double standard at the cost of promoting others?  And is it giving women “equality” in education and employment opportunity or is it giving them “rights”?

In light of the Women’s Rights Movement, affirmative action was expanded “to prohibit discrimination in employment because of race, color, religion, sex or national origin” and “to promote the full realization of equal employment opportunity through a positive, continuing program in each executive department and agency”.  It’s been accused of curing “discrimination with discrimination”.  Equating educational/job discrimination with affirmative action overlooks that the former is based on practices of exclusion while the latter is an attempt at inclusion.  To undo decades of exclusion without “special efforts” of inclusion trivializes the immediate action that was necessary. 

Still some critics suggest that the practice is outdated, citing generalizations like ‘women make up more than fifty percent of the work force’, yet they make seventy eight cents to the dollar when compared with men.  Generalizations are rarely fair, painting multidimensional social construct with a broad brush.  It’s not like we’re mixing red and blue marbles; while the representation of women in STEM has increased since the 1970s, they remain underrepresented in 80 percent of STEM employment (specifically engineering 13 percent and computing 27 percent).  According to a government census, less than a third of STEM workers were women in 2011.  To put that in perspective, that year the total workforce was made up of 48 percent women and 39 percent of science and engineering graduate were women, but the STEM workforce was 24 percent women. 

                According to a 2010 AAUW study sponsored by NSF “about as many girls as boys leave high school prepared to pursue science and engineering majors in college. Yet fewer women than men pursue these majors…By graduation, men outnumber women in nearly every science and engineering field…Women’s representation in science and engineering declines further at the graduate level and yet again in the transition to the workplace.”  After the idea of a female computing college was mentioned in class there was push back.  I think the regression of number of females in STEM as they transition from high school to undergraduate to graduate school to the workplace isn't as much an issue of opportunity as it is an issue of discourse. 

             While the gender gap needs to be remediated to encourage more females in STEM studies, we need to shift the conversation so we’re no separating “female engineers/scientists” from engineers/scientists in the workplace.  A qualified engineer is an engineer and a qualified scientist is a scientist.  When we stop tagging on the gender then we've shifted the “male-dominance” rhetoric associated with STEM disciplines that are implicitly holding on to the outdated standard “male engineer/scientist”. 

Sourecs:

http://www.aauw.org/files/2013/02/Why-So-Few-Women-in-Science-Technology-Engineering-and-Mathematics.pdf

http://www.understandingprejudice.org/readroom/articles/affirm.htm

http://www.census.gov/prod/2013pubs/acs-24.pdf

http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/?pid=60553 

Academic Standards for Collegiate Athletes

Recently it was revealed that Division I football players attending the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill were "registered" for fake courses and given passing grades for these fake classes. There is a long history of academic exceptions made for collegiate athletes. There is more attention than ever before on college football and basketball programs than ever before. With the increased attention comes increased pressure to preform academically and athletically. Competing as a Division I football player can easily consume 30 hours a week of practice, meetings, games, events, etc,  essentially a part time job for a student, who must be enrolled with at least twelve credits to compete athletically for any given school. However, there should be not be a double standard for academic performance for any enrolled student at any academic institution in the United States. 

For example one researcher found: 

"As a graduate student at UNC-Greensboro, Ms. Willingham researched the reading levels of 183 UNC-Chapel Hill athletes who played football or basketball from 2004 to 2012. She found that 60% read between fourth- and eighth-grade levels. Between 8% and 10% read below a third-grade level." 

 It is incomprehensible to think that college students may fail to pass elementary academic proficiencies. No other ordinary college student would be allowed to pass a literature course or humanities course if they were not capable of writing/reading above a third grade level. By allowing athletes to be held at no or very minimal academic standards, universities are failing these athletes. Student athletes, who cannot complete their minimum academic standards without inflated grades or made-up courses, should not be allowed to compete on the field.

Schools need to raise their standards for student athletes or at a minimum enforce the existing standards for students. In addition, the media should adjust the attention they devout to college football. Thereby lowering the pressure placed on student athletes.  Coaches and school administrators should work to ensure athletes are capable of the academic requirements, and work to assist them with additional tutoring or special attention if needed. But it is not ethical to lower the academic standard for student athletes.

It is unethical to other students attending these academic institutions that athletes’ grades are held at lighter standards, while these athletes may be receiving significant monetary awards/scholarships from the school. As well it is unfair for the athletes to be cheated of an education because of the incredible amount of pressure placed upon them. Therefore the student athlete overseeing board, NCAA, needs to investigate and if necessary, enforce the proper academic standards for student athletes.

Sources:

http://www.cnn.com/2014/01/07/us/ncaa-athletes-reading-scores/

http://online.wsj.com/articles/is-notre-dame-football-too-demanding-1408726455

http://www.cnn.com/2014/10/25/us/unc-report-academic-fraud/index.html

Initial Steps—Implementation of Food Safety Standards

Food safety is an issue that concerns anyone who eats food. Whether or not a person thinks about food safety before eating a meal, a host of other people have thought about the safety of that food, from farmers to scientists to company presidents to federal government officials and public health officials. Maintaining the safety of food is a shared responsibility among producers, industry, government, and consumers. Safe food is food that is not only free from toxins, pesticides, and chemical and physical contaminants, but also from microbiological pathogens such as bacteria, parasites, and viruses that can potentially cause illness.

The earliest food safety regulations in the United States did not emerge from a desire to provide safe food to consumers, but rather out of foreign trade concerns. In 1641, Massachusetts passed the Meat and Fish Inspection Law to assure foreign trading partners that the colony produced high-quality food products. As the population shifted from rural to urban, people no longer had a personal connection with food producers, and thus the food supply became more national in scope and distribution. This national scope required national regulation.

The year 1906 was an important one for federal food safety regulations with the passage of both the Pure Food and Drug Act and the Federal Meat Inspection Act. Writings such as A Popular Treatise on the Extent and Character of Food Adulterations and Upton Sinclair’s famous book, The Jungle, about the filthy conditions and adulteration of meat that was common in the Chicago meat industry, ignited the consumers’ interest in food safety.

The Federal Meat Inspection Act protected consumers by “assuring that meat and meat food products are wholesome, not adulterated, and properly marked, labeled, and packaged.” The act created sanitary standards and mandated continuous inspection of cattle, sheep, goats, and equines before, during, and after slaughter. The 1906 Pure Food and Drug Act forbade the adulteration of foods, drinks, and drugs in interstate commerce.

Despite being a good start, the Pure Food and Drug Act had some very evident flaws. Since the act did not set standards as to what exactly should be in a particular food, it was near impossible to prove the adulteration of a food. The act required that the government prove that the offenders intended to deceive or poison consumers with their product. When brought to court defendants pleaded ignorance.

In 1938, Congress passed the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act (FDCA). This act, with some adjustments and amendments, is still the major force regulating food. The act succeeded in broadening the scope of federal regulation and eliminated many of the loopholes that were present in the 1906 act. The law defined adulteration to include bacteria or chemicals that are potentially harmful; allowed the FDA to inspect food manufacturing and processing facilities; required ingredients of nonstandard foods to be listed on labels; prohibited the sale of food prepared under unsanitary conditions; gave the FDA the authority to monitor animal drugs, feeds, and veterinary devices; and authorized mandatory standards for foods. The overall goal of the law was to avoid the distribution of harmful or deceptive food and drug products.

In August 1996, Congress passed the Food Quality Protection Act (FQPA), essentially changing the way the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) regulates pesticides used in the production of food. The FQPA set special provisions concerning pesticide ingestion for infants and children because very little data exists on pesticide intake for children. The EPA is required to periodically review pesticide registrations, with a goal of establishing a fifteen-year cycle, to ensure that all pesticides meet updated safety standards. Most importantly, the law establishes a health-based safety standard for pesticide residues in all foods. It implements “a reasonable certainty that no harm” will result from all combined sources of exposure as the general safety standard. This facet of the FQPA is arguably the most important because it prohibited the addition of any cancer-causing substance to foods.

Color by Application

                Roses are Red, Violets are not Blue, Colors are Cool, and so is Blue. I’m not a poet, but I do know that calling a color cool means it’s blue-ish. Humanity’s best sense is its vision, and while not as good as say an Eagle, we still have specific interactions and reactions to color usage, and it all depends on how it’s applied. It was no random act that red means stop, green means go, yellow means caution. But while color definition is standardized, along with lighting, the uses of them vary by application, country, region, language, industry, government, and preceding standardization organization.

                For a start, depending on the country and language, color or colour may be used. The difference is quite literally the difference between having a dictionary or not. Both were perfectly fine ways of spelling color, with many English-speaking or French-based scientific communities using “colour” and everyone else, including the numerous American and international standards organizations choosing “color” instead. For a boring list of existing color organizations, we have Pantone, Color Marketing Group, The Color Association of the United States (CAUS), International Colour Authority, International Commission on Illumination (CIE), International Color Consortium, and International Colour Association.

•  Pantone defines colors primarily for printing books, magazines, and other physically read material.
• Color Marketing Group defines colors for textiles, such as clothes.
• CAUS defines colors used in the United States from everything from the colors of that can be used within car interiors to the American, Philippian, and other national flags.
• The International Colour Authority determines the “in” colors of the year, along with the Color Marketing Group, and defined using colors defined by Pantone, for publication by the International Trade Centre.
• CIE defines color, plain, simple, and as blunt as possible. When they say something is “red”, they aren’t picking a color like Pantone, they are defining a range of colors as seen and interpreted by humanity that fit to the physics definition of light and its wavelength. If they say something isn’t red, you would be hard pressed to find any organization or group aside from possibly a color blind individual to tell you otherwise (of which those colors are standardized too).
• International Color Consortium is a group of computer companies defining how a color defined by CIE should look on a computer.
• International Colour Association encourages discussion and research between the prior color groups and advocates International Colour Day every March 21.

Countries have some of the greatest variations of standardized colors. For example, in the United States, right-wing Republicans are often categorized by “red”, while left-wing Democrats are “blue”, but outside of the US, red is a left-wing color and blue is a right-wing color. In the Netherlands often use Orange in any national and international event, but with the exception of the usual usage of red and blue by opposing political parties, the next most common political color is green, which has four different shades between the numerous political groups. In China and other Asian countries, Red is a good, lucky color. Many other countries see red as bad, danger, halt, etc.

This brings my examples to direct examples such as transport, where railroads and automobiles use red for stop, yellow/amber for slow/prepare to stop, and green for go. Red also tends to mean love, danger, heat, joy, revolution, and socialism/communism. Green has been used to identify nature, death, merchants, permission, the environmental movement, the US dollar, and is very important within Islam. Yellow is associated with wealth, sunshine, happiness, caution, phone books, and is well known for school buses and taxis within the US. Blue is known for water, the sky, cold, and sadness which is very often used in paintings, art, movies, plays, etc. Lastly, black and white: black often defining death, evil, and mourning while white is often used in association with good, clean, neutrality, and is often a color looked at as quality in fabrics such bed sheets, matrimony, or in Asian countries, it is used for funerals. They are opposing colors, while also being differences of the other, so “white” is total color while black is the total lack of color.

While not the most colorful post, it should paint a better picture of uses and applications of color throughout the world.

How the Standard of Communication Has Been Affected through the use of Cell Phones

      A standard that has come to my attention in my recent life is that of communication and how it has broadened since the creation of the cell phone and not to mention the smart phone. Often in today's society we fall into the trap of judging our relationships based largely on the number of connections we have with that individual via various social media outlets. In the technological realm we live in, we are constantly being lured to our phones by new fashions of 'communication' in the form of apps, meaning we are spending much more time face-to-phone rather than face-to-face. The lack of physical interaction with the people and connections in our lives means that the standard of communication is deteriorating, as well as stunting progression.

        One of the biggest drawbacks to 'communication' via technology is that one cannot see or evaluate the reaction or tone of what is being said or sent to them. This problem is often the trigger to the deterioration of a relationship, due to miscommunication. Without this vital part of a conversation being present, the quality of the conversation is far lower and the message is much more likely to be confused. The manner in which cell phones and their connectivity to social media are being used is actually morphing the way people interact with each other. The way in which we utilize the resource that technology currently and becoming, is something individuals are responsible for. Human to human interaction is seeming to become increasingly more rare and based how you "behave" in the virtual world.

     The power of communication has changed with the use of the cell phones.  Often the way we express ourselves via technology is not true to that what it would have been if communication had been in person. Technology often allows us to discover new found confidence. Our opinions are often expressed far more extreme in either direction when using virtual communication. When one receives a call, text, or email the reciever holds the virtual power to not respond to the communication. The lack of respondence will shape the way in which the two parties interact with one another afterwards. 

     The standard to which virtual communication is held to will continually evolve and change direction. With the ever evolving technology, face to face communication will also compliment the evolution. The way we communicate and the language individuals use will be based on the technology of the time period. 

Changing the way we live, one app at a time.

With the recent release of the IPhone 6 and IPhone 6 Plus I decided to take a look back and examine how the “smartphone” has evolved in the previous years and how it got to the extremely powerful handheld devices we all have and use today.

The first phone that incorporated PDA functions was an IBM phone called SIMON in 1992 and apart from receiving messages and calls, it was also able to send and receive faxes and emails and had other capabilities such as a calendar an address book and was able to keep track of appointments.

From this moment on the era of the PDA was born, with companies such as Blackberry, HTC, Nexus and Nokia dominating the market. We must remember that at the time the word “smartphone” was not yet coined, therefore these phones were only known as PDA’s or Personal Device Assistant.

It was only in 2007 when Apple released the first generation IPhone, a breakthrough in “smartphone” mass production, that the world started shifting from regular phones to the so-called smartphones.

The first generation IPhone successfully introduced to the masses the functions of the multi-touch touchscreen, even though it wasn’t the first (Mitsubishi DiamondTouch 2001). With the IPhone 2G Apple successfully and forcefully set a standard for the phone industry and since then every company has imitated the competitive advantage that Apple created by incorporating the functions of a PDA and part of the functions of a PC into a handheld device, into a design that was acclaimed and resulted in a domino effect where everyone wanted to have an IPhone. Since then Apple has been progressing at a steady pace and released a new version of its IPhone lineup every year. After 7 years since the introduction Apple has released 8 versions of the Phone, one significantly better than the last one, but competitors like Samsung have been catching up and now create phones that are more powerful.

Two companies, Apple and Samsung, which fight every time a new device comes out creating a division between the customers, dominate this market.

People often argue displaying empty statistics such as market share and performance. These statistics are useless unless seen under the big scheme of things, for example Samsung as a slightly bigger market share, but apple make way higher profits, plus 70% of apple users keep updated and use the newest OS that Apple has to offer while only 35% of Android users run the latest version KitKat.

It’s statistics like these that obfuscate the market and do not let the true facts emerge. Apple created the first MASS PRODUCTION AND MASS DISTRIBUTION smartphone and since then has been leading the market, I’m not talking about performance, quality or appeal ability. From a strict economic perspective Apple is way beyond Apple, and at the end of the day that is the only fact that matters because both companies are in the market to make profits, otherwise they’d give out phones for free.

Apple has set THE standard for phones and as a result has overthrown dominating companies like Nokia and Blackberry. The IPhone took the world by storm and set the benchmark on which phones had to be compared from that point on, and since then it has steadily increased that benchmark higher and higher. I’m not saying that IPhones are the best smartphones out there, I’m simply stating that if you mention to the majority of people you mention the word “smartphone” the first thought that comes into their head is IPhone or Apple.

Health Code Standards in NYC

Pretty much everyone who will read this has been to a restaurant in New York City. The first thing you see when you’re walking in the door is the huge health grade. Usually this doesn’t affect whether or not we actually eat at the certain establishment, we figure if it wasn’t safe to eat at they probably would shut it down, but it definitely does matter. So how exactly do they assign the health grades? Do they quiz the owners and give them a letter like an elementary teacher? Well they sort of do.

In 2010 the city Health Department required all restaurants to post their health results. Each year they inspect about 24,000 establishments. They assign the score based on the amount of points (or demerits) against the city and state regulations. If a restaurant accrues 0-13 points then it receives an A. 14-27 receives a B grade, and anything higher receives a C (unless it is so bad that they fear for the health of the patrons and shut it down).

There are differing degrees of violations too. A public health hazard, such as not maintaining food at the right temperature warrants a minimum of 7 points. A “critical violation” such as not washing salad or serving meat raw earns 5 points. Then a general violation like improper utensil sanitation earns 2 points. There is a lot of wiggle room for the graders to assign more points based on the severity of the violations.

To keep the inspections as accurate as possible, inspections are unannounced. If there is a new restaurant, that hasn’t been inspected it is still required to post a sign saying “inspection pending.” The only time owners can definitely be expecting an inspection is if they are initially inspected and receive a grade below an A. In this case they are re-inspected randomly within the next month or so and are given the chance to get a higher grade.

Basically the moral of the story is that the standard for food hygiene in NYC restaurants is pretty straight forward. If an establishment has an A, then it’s good to go; there are definitely no vermin problems and the owners have firm control over sanitation. If it's lower, then theres probably some deep seeded issues with that place. If you happen to have a questionable dining experience you can call the Department of Health and there’s a solid chance they will inspect it in the next year.

How to Lose a Plane

There are several items we use on the daily that seem very easy to lose; phone, wallet, keys, maybe your watch, but how about that Boeing 777 with 227 people. Of all things I would see in my time, one was not seeing a plane of that size just completely vanish without a trace.

Some seven months ago now I remember following this story very closely and seeing the grip on the search slip right through our hands. This event really shows the importance of having quality standards to follow with the importance being on that you actually follow them! To me it sounded like a bad judgment call back on that day to not check out the situation as soon as they lost contact and the gps of the plane. That was just the first lack of adhering to standards. From what I could gather from the news reports, they waited something like 4 hours to check out the situation and then had another delay in sending out the search party. Although something like this thankfully does not happen often, when we do hit a situation like this we need to make sure that we handle it with the utmost care and use the standards put in place to deal with it. IT is very much relate to fire alarms and the drills we have every so often. Even though most cases are false alarms or drills, we have to take them seriously in the event of that one time out of a million.

After the entire beginning of this event was botched, we had created quite the task ahead of us for the search that would soon become the hardest geometry and math problem some specialists have ever had. Using what we hoped was good information from a few pings of the airplane and the range left in the Boeing 777, we had to find where in the world is MH 370. These tough calculations of course take time to get right, therefore pushing us back even further on a distinct search zone, therefore wasting valuable time, and expensive time also. Several countries spent millions of dollars aiding in the search. The next error, unintentional or not, that I see is the slow pace at which the airline decided to release important information such as the cockpit transmission or the cargo manifest and other important stats on the plane and exactly what was on it. All of these delays and bad calls and mystery behind this plane has led to a mess that someone has to step in and clean up, which may take longer than anyone ever expected.

With the way everything has unfolded through this story, it has left many to create theories on their own, even the scientists and experts. Did it actually land in the water? CEO of Emirates Airline, Tim Clark seems to not think so. In a recent article he has expressed his thoughts that the plane may have never been in the water seeing as there has not been a single piece of debris found. He states that the plane has several components that are plastic and non-absorbent and would therefore float indefinitely. If there were a crash there should be pieces all over, and if there miraculously a safe water landing, I’m sure a search plane would have seen a floating plane in the ocean.

All starting from not adhering to just a few standards in this emergency situation has caused a massive ball of miscommunication, stress, confusion, and theory. It seems as though we may never find MH 370 now. You can bet that the standards to dealing with situations such as these will be looked at, revised, and strongly enforced as well as the technical details of planes and the tracking hardware inside.  

http://flightclub.jalopnik.com/airline-ceo-knight-says-mh370-may-not-be-under-water-1647944102

http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2014/06/22/who-gagged-the-search-for-mh370.html

A Dumb Rule (and Dumber Implementation)

I'm a bit behind on blog posts (I still owe one), and it was becoming quite an ordeal to think of a topic for this week that I cared about... until the man oppressed me.

At Stevens, I've come to understand that there is a rule regarding the central air and air conditioning of the dorms: if there are three consecutive days of 60-degree weather (or less) around Fall time, the air will be turned off until post-Winter. This de facto (hey — terms!) standard wouldn't bother me had the weather not being extraordinarily hot and humid last week. Obviously, nature doesn't conform to what we do, so I wasn't annoyed that it was hot — I was annoyed that our ability to counteract the heat was removed. Moreover, I was frustrated at the seeming lack of thought put into the standard that kept this person sweaty, and this person's roommate up until 4:00 a.m. because he couldn't sleep.

Before I continue, let me simply say that I don't intend this piece to be ranty or whiny, but because of the nature of my complaint, it will, at some points, inevitably sound so. According to a few sources that I've asked about this (namely Residence Assistants in my dorm, Jonas Hall), the standard in place is to revoke the functionality of our thermostats (there is central air in my hall; other dorms have air conditioners) if the powers-that-be notice a trend in the weather shifting. The standard makes all the sense in the world: turn off the air when it isn't needed to save money. I love it. However, when the statistical backing of this kiddie standard is three days, I hate it.

I understand that we can't fully predict the weather, and I don't expect that out of anyone. However, three days is unacceptable as a basis for rescinding air conditioning rights campus-wide, especially when we are all aware that, for whatever reasons, the weather is more unpredictable than it ever has been. In my eyes, the solution is simple: fix the basis by which the standard is constructed. A week of 60-degree or lower weather? Take our A/C away; it's probably the beginning of the cold Fall weather. But three days is clearly a weak basis, for the weather, a day after revoking our air conditioning (or the day of; I can't recall), defied the three-day trend that the school implemented and left us in uncomfortable conditions.

Now, let me address that last sentence. I know we are not in the Sahara, and the weather is back to being cool — I'm over it. The issue I have with the standard in place is that it seems like its creation took place on a napkin inside Pierce Dining Hall, less than three minutes before a meeting to approve the standard. None of this is world-changing, and we're "just college kids" after all, but when creating a standard, a margin of error has to be accounted for always. Without it, a standard's scope will quickly become outdated, ineffective, and ultimately unsatisfactory to all parties affected by the standard.

Encryption Standards and Law Enforcement Agencies

Over the past 30 years, many law enforcement agencies like FBI and NSA have argued for weaker encryptions standards that ultimately allows them to break encrypted data with minimal computing power and effort. This has been done  in the  1970s, with NIST and NSA introducing the Data Encryption Standards “DES”, a encryption algorithm that originally was designed for 64 bit keys but later weaken to 56 bit keys making it vulnerable to brute force attacks. In 1993, law enforcement agencies promoted a chipset called clipper chip intended to be a built-in hardware backdoor to prevent any encryption communication. Initially,the intention was for clipper chip to be adopted by telecommunications companies and for it to become a standard practice across all digital devices.

Based on public caution, government intentions and the rise of the Internet , new stronger encryption standards were developed from academia and private enterprise that require infeasible amount of computing power to brute force the keys of encrypted data. Many algorithms like AES and B-crypt achieve this level of security, yet many companies like Microsoft, Apple and Google had not  initially implemented or conform to any form of cryptographic security. However over the past few weeks, Apple has implemented “full disk encryption” and has enabled it by default stating that Apple “...cannot bypass your passcode and therefore cannot access this data. So it's not technically feasible for us to respond to government warrants for the extraction of this data from devices in their possession running iOS 8.” In addition Google and Microsoft have follow implementing and enable full disk encryption by default in Android and Windows 8.

In a speech given at the Brookings Institute in Washington DC, the FBI Director James B. Comey raised concern over the expanding options for communicating over the Internet and the increasing adoption of encryption technologies. Comey has claim that the expansion of encryption could leave law enforcement agents “in the dark” and unable to collect evidence against criminals. He argues that default encryption schemes give child predators, violent criminals, and crafty terrorists the upper hand and unintentionally provide protection and privacy against evidence collection. In addition Comey uresh companies to  build surveillance capabilities into the design of their products and allow lawful interception of communications.  He argued.“Those charged with protecting our people aren’t always able to access the evidence we need to prosecute crime and prevent terrorism even with lawful authority,” Comey said in the published speech. “We have the legal authority to intercept and access communications and information pursuant to court order, but we often lack the technical ability to do so.” In essences, law enforcement agencies want citizens to accept spying as a possibility and to rely on policy, rather than on encryption technologies.

According to Laura W. Murphy, director of the Washington Legislative Office of the American Civil Liberties Union, “ALCU” “Whether the FBI calls it a front door or a backdoor, any effort by the FBI to weaken encryption leaves our highly personal information and our business information vulnerable to hacking by foreign governments and criminals,”

From my perspective, we have seen the same debate and actions from law enforcement agencies over 30 years due to computational encryption.

Evolution of the Standard "Checkbox" Diversity

Last weekend I finally started filling out graduate school applications; identification, educational background, future educational goals, grades, grades, grades, essays, essays, essays … it’s all pretty standard stuff.  But then I got to the race/ethnicity checkbox on one school’s application and I was floored.  The  standard “Black, White, Hispanic, Asian, and Other” format was replaced with “Hispanic, Alaskan Native, Asian, Black or African American, Native American, Native Hawaiian or Other Pacific Islander, White, Arab/Middle Eastern/North African, Other”.  Granted this isn’t perfectly inclusive, but as a second generation “Arab/Middle Eastern/North African” who in the past has checked off “Other” or, in one instant, checked off something like “White/Caucasian: including Middle Eastern/ North African”, my surprise was a little bias. 

Every ten years the U.S. Census Bureau conducts a survey of the population to allocate seats in the House of Representatives to states.  Along with other federal censuses, this decennial census has seen a lot of changes in its ethnicity/race section.  In 2000, the Census Bureau allowed people of mixed race to select more than one box to describe their makeup.  The last decennial census conducted a “2010 Census Race and Hispanic Origin Alternative Questionnaire Experiment” testing different questionnaire design strategies.  The standard is the one drawn out by the U.S. Office of Management and Budget which separates the race/ethnicity question into two parts; the first part asks you if you’re Hispanic or Latino (an ‘ethnicity’ section) and the second asks you to specify one or more races from the options provided. Colleges can have their own form, which is why some are more detailed than others, but they must ask the ethnicity question. In 2009 the U.S. Department of Education also made responding to these questions on applications optional for students applying for higher education.

Census data have been integrated in many areas of government, education, healthcare, etc. which have attempted to reduce racial and ethnical disparities.  But aside from inclusion/exclusion, self-reporting discrepancies (a half, a quarter, an eighth race X?), and the non-identifiers-ambiguity, standard checkbox diversity in higher education are “arbitrary and unworkable—especially in light of the narrow tailoring requirements of equal protection”, as critiqued by Chief Justice Roberts and Justice Scalia during the Fisher versus University of Texas case, reported by St. Johns University’s Philip Lee in his 2014 article “On Checkbox Diversity”.  Lee goes on to say, “This truncated conception of diversity, however, does not capture the educational benefits of diversity that prior cases have recognized [including Grutter versus Bollinger, Gratz versus Bollinger, and Regent of the University of California versus Bakke].”  He offers that “evaluation should not be the checkbox itself, but how the applicant describes the importance of the checkbox to his or her identity.”  So it was interesting to see the application mentioned in the first paragraph ask (again optional) how the applicants diversity, racial or experiential, would contribute to the school, allowing for an applicant to express the personal significance of where they fall within the boxes.  It’s another essay, which isn’t ideal, but in previous applications I remember thinking ‘now you kind of know my race, so what’, what’s the school going to do with that information to promote “’cross-racial understanding’ [to help] break down racial stereotypes, and ‘[enable students] to better understand persons of different races’.” 

There are three suggested ways to define race: externally (how others see you), internally (how you see yourself), and expressively (how we present ourselves).  Lee suggests that checkbox diversity “focuses on the applicant’s internal definition of race, while downplaying the expressive dimension,” and I think the diversity essay portion does the later, “contextual diversity analysis”.  Additionally, in narrow selections, the checkbox can sometimes be an external definition - how the administration sees you, and maybe it’s like “Other”. 

The changes in race subsections on applications from when I was applying to high school, undergraduate, and now graduate schools show shift in racial demographic but more importantly in how ethnicity and race is perceived and weighed. It’s only going to get more complicated; there’ll always be a need for the “Other” box for those who can’t fit in anywhere else and eventually more and more individuals will be checking off multiple, and at some point, almost every box. 

Sources:

“On Checkbox Diversity”, Philip Lee.  St. Johns University. Journal of Civil Rights and Economic Development

http://nces.ed.gov/ipeds/news_room/ana_Changes_to_10_25_2007_169.asp

http://www.education.ne.gov/ADED/pdfs/Race%20and%20Ethnicity.pdf 

Standards for Measurement in the US

Standards for Measurement in the US

While the majority of the world uses SI units, mostly metric units, the United States Continues to use the Imperial System of Measurement. The American football field is measured in yards, while the track around it is measured in meters. The Imperial System has been used in the United States since the US consisted of British Colonies, in fact the system was brought over from Great Britain. Although most of the world has adapted to use a more convenient system, the metric system. The metric system originated in France, and is a decimal system of measurement. Therefore all values are multiples of ten, thereby making conversions easy and reproducible. The imperial system varies in its intervals but several measurements are multiples or integers of twelve. Clearly when dealing with numbers, multiples of ten are much easier to manipulate, convert, or identify than multiples of twelve.

With the track and field example, it is evident that the US has been more commonly using the metric system in many fields. In science laboratories and many technical industries, the metric system is the standard of measurement. This is because of the metric system’s simplicity of measurement, reproducibility, and international acceptance. The large majority of the United States, however still uses some form of the imperial system. This limits the ability of certain industries like the automobile industry or carpentry/construction industry to trade overseas.

The cost to fully convert the United States to the metric system would be extremely costly and time consuming. However, once the metric system was to be the standard for US businesses and manufacturers American businesses would have the potential to expand globally much easier and efficiently than before.

I believe the United States stands by the imperial system out of habit, stubbornness, and convenience. In the future where so many industries are becoming more and more global, the American use of the imperial system will be an obstacle to overcome for all American industries and businesses. Therefore the American government should change the standard of measurement in the United States to the metric system. By doing so the United States Government would be promoting business globally and allowing the United States to keep up with the best and most advanced players in every industry.

While a change in the standard measurement system in the United States would be very costly and time consuming, it will pay for itself in the long run. If the United States continues to use the Imperial System of measurement, global industries will be harder to enter and the United States will begin to lose its economic power. Especially when more and more American businesses are opting to use cheaper labor overseas where the standard of measurement is the metric system, therefore added costs are needed for the conversion of tools and designs. The imperial system is simply outdated, inefficient and costly, the US’s dependence on the imperial system will soon be a huge obstacle to overcome for many American businesses.

Sources:

http://chronicle.augusta.com/life/life-style/2013-04-04/metric-system-use-rise-us

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/08/24/books/review/whatever-happened-to-the-metric-system-by-john-bemelmans-marciano.html?_r=0

Regional design Standards in the U.S.

New discoveries are being developed every day to come up with stronger and more sustainable building materials to use across the country.  While these materials are the same in most buildings, different job sites will threaten the structure with environmental factors that have to be taken into account.  The National Council of Examiners for Engineering and Surveying (NCEES) requires that professional engineers be registered to work in their state of choice because the extensive diversity of the landscape and the different design standards that follows.

            When designing a structure the first thing taken into consideration is the different loading combinations that building is based on.  How much weight the structure can hold depends on the type of building and its surroundings.  For example, a library has additional support to hold the weight of books and schools have strict rules for a large population of students and teachers. This is the same for anything that can cause a negative impact from the environment.    Depending on what part of the country you are in this could completely change the standards that the structure has to follow.  A standard blueprint can be heavily affected by the influence of regional impacts such as an excess of snow in northern states, abundance of wind near the east and west coast, earthquake activity near fault lines, and a vast diversity of soil types. It did not take long for standards to develop in state building codes to accommodate the negative impacts of certain regions, all of which are still being used today.

            To accommodate conditions in areas of severe weather and adverse effects to a structure, several alterations can aide in reinforcement to prevent partial or whole failure and the possible loss of human lives.  Using a typical Office building as an example, the design will need to be altered depending on the severity of the combination of loading that was previously listed.  If the structure was built in a colder climate several design problems need to be addressed.  Due to the additional weight of snow, buildings need to have roofs that can hold additional weight or have a certain slope to prevent sticking.  Serviceability or the maintenance can also be considered due to the wearing of the structure from snowstorms or repeated freezing and thawing processes.  This may not be a problem in more southern states, but there the issue of excess wind loads need to be heavily considered.  With lateral bracing a building can resist the force of the wind and avoid being blown over.  With the addition of vibration dampers seismic activity can be reduced in a much similar fashion in a building near a fault line.  While all of these factors may only happen in portions of the United States a factor that always has to be taken into account is the soil type.  Geotechnical Engineers specialize in identifying soil types and different ways that they react to structures built on them.  Having a foundation based on an incorrect soil type could cause the soil from underneath a building to sink in the ground or be lifted off the foundation.

            No matter where a building is in the United States, there are going to be strict standards set by the state to handle unique construction conditions in that area.  Looking into the past infamous structures failed due to this crucial step such as the Tacoma Narrows Bridge that failed due to wind loading.  Design standards in different locations are imperative to the safety and wellness of the American population and should be assessed before plans to develop a structure even begin.

Source:http://www.metalconstructionnews.com/articles/magazine-features/constructing-metal-buildings-across-the-us.aspx