Invention Activity
Invention ActivityPossible Topics:
People that have made a difference:
- Benjamin J. Alling, Coulee Dam — He served for 20 years as volunteer firefighter/EMT fire chief for Coulee Dam, and then 10 years as the community’s ambulance director. He also served on the Coulee Dam Council. For 30 years, Alling has used his welding talents to provide volunteer services to a variety of his fellow citizens.
- John Blackwell, Lake Stevens — He served on the Lake Stevens Planning Commission from 1985 until 1993, when he was elected to the City Council. Blackwell has also volunteered for the USO at Sea-Tac, the Lake Stevens Food Bank and the American Red Cross, traveling to Florida and Louisiana to help after hurricanes hit those areas.
- Machot Lat, Everett — Born in Sudan, he became, at age 8, one of the Lost Boys of Sudan, a group of orphaned refugees forced from their villages by war to trek hundreds of miles through African wilderness to refugee camps in neighboring countries. Now 24, Lat formed the Southern Sudanese Community of Washington, which helps southern Sudanese refugees and immigrants here become self-sufficient by offering K-12 tutoring, family and job assistance and orientation to American life. He has been accepted as a full-time engineering student at the University of Washington and became the sole caretaker of two nephews and a niece whose parents were killed in Sudan.
- Steve Stockwell, Bremerton — What started as a heartfelt gesture to help a grieving father turned into the Washington State Patrol Tissue Donor Program, thanks to this detective. He identified a lack of process for donations from victims of traffic fatalities who don’t receive treatment at health care facilities. Stockwell contacted the Northwest Tissue Center, identified and engaged the needed partners, started a pilot program for donations and turned it into a statewide program, all within a year’s time. Stockwell is now working with donation agencies and 911 centers in the state to expand the program.
Places that should be noticed:
- The Asian American Cultural Center is dedicated to fostering appreciation and understanding of Asian American experiences. It is a unit within the Office of the Dean of Students of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and supports the missions of Student Affairs as well as the University.
- The clinics that provide free blood tests and counseling for teens that are in risk of contracting sexually transmitted diseases. They are found in many locations around New York and are dispersed within the 5 boroughs.
- The Youth Basketball program of the YMCA. It is dedicated to help promote healthy competition among young adults and help keep them off the streets and away from trouble. You might have noticed kids selling candy either in subways or at certain places, this is all to raise money for this program.
Other Topics:
- If gun control laws were made stricter will it have any effect on the gun crime rate in the United States or just simply in New York?
- Why do foreigners or visitors know more or have seen more of New York than New Yorkers have.
Choice: The Importance of Gun Control Laws.
I think this is a very good choice because crime involving a gun is among the most frequent of any other crime. Also, I think that this tpic will be interesting and informative. Gun control is the regulation of the sale and use of handguns. The problem is that it is way too easy to purchase a gun and we need stricter gun laws for our safety. Many people don’t realize this but owning a gun is a constitutional right. The second amendment entitles everyone the right to bear arms. It is because of this amendment that the purchase and trading of guns is legal in the United States. There has been research done that in places around the world where guns are completely illegal in general with no exceptions, the gun related crimes for those places are significantly lower than that of the United States.
Another interesting choice would be why foreigners and visitors know more about Ney York than the actual New Yorkers. I am sure that if I were to go around the classroom asking everyone who has lived in New York for almost their entire life to tell me if they have ever been to the Statue of Liberty or any museums or other things in New York, I wouldn’t be able to find too many. This would be a fun topic to research and there would be many people to interview and be able to create my own statistics.
