Welcome back to the next lecture of statistical thermodynamics. Today we are going to learn about the molecular partition function. In the previous lecture we have derived expression for Boltzmann distribution and we will move ahead from there. The Boltzmann distribution that is n i upon n where n i is the number of molecules or particles in i th energy state n is the total number of molecules exponential minus beta E i E i is the energy of the i th state and then we have this summation j exponential minus beta E j and that you remember. That came for alpha in the derivation of this expression we have used method of undetermined multipliers and in that method of undetermined multipliers we had to constant alpha and beta alpha we have already accounted for and we will soon find out an expression for the beta. Now, I want to specifically draw your attention to the denominator the denominator which is summation j exponential minus beta i j this is called the molecular partition function. We will name this as small q we will write q is equal to summation j exponential minus beta E j. This j can run from 0 onwards that is 0 1 2 3 4 etcetera. So, let us expand this and see what happens this will be equal to when j is equal to 0 exponential minus beta into 0 is exponential 0. So, first term exponential 0 it is going to be 1 the second term is going to be exponential minus beta E 1. Third term is going to be exponential minus beta E 2 and you keep on going this is the expansion for molecular partition function. Here E 1 E 2 etcetera are first excited state second excited states and so on. Now, suppose that 2 or more states have the same energy. So, if different states have the same energy that forms a level. Therefore, a particular energy level can be 2 fold degenerate if 2 states are having same energy it can be 3 fold degenerate it can be more. So, therefore, in general what we will do is we will write G j fold degenerate C right I will include that G j into my expression now. What I want to say is if 2 states are having same energy then the same term will appear twice. If 3 states have the same energy then the same term will apply thrice. Therefore, the way to incorporate this is that let us include G j exponential minus beta E j and that this G j is the degeneracy of a particular level that is the jth level is G j fold degenerate. So, obviously when you expand this G 0 exponential 0 is going to be 1 then second one G 1 exponential minus beta E 1 plus G 2 exponential minus beta E 2 and then plus will have other terms. So, remember that we started from the ratio n i upon n what is this ratio n i upon n number of molecules in the i th state divide by the total number of molecule. It represents fractional population of i th state and I am going to discuss this in more details soon. So, obviously a question will come in the mind that earlier we have accounted for alpha. So, what is this beta soon we are going to show that this beta is connected with temperature by this expression beta is equal to 1 over k t and this k is Boltzmann constant t is the temperature in Kelvin. Sometimes you even say beta as temperature because we beta is connected with temperature through this term 1 over k t. So, therefore remember that the partition function is given by this expression that is q is equal to summation j G j exponential minus beta E j where beta is equal to 1 over k t. What we need to know is the degeneracy of each energy level. Once we have the values for G once we have the values of E therefore, we can explicitly calculate the value of molecular partition function. Also remember that I am highlighting that this is molecular partition function because we are talking in terms of individual particles we are talking in terms of individual molecules. So, what we have discussed we have started with Boltzmann distribution where n i upon n we refer to as population of the state to be more precise read it as fractional population of the state because it is n i upon n. What is this equal to exponential minus beta E i and this denominator we have just discussed that this is molecular partition function. So, therefore fractional population of any state can be calculated once we have the information about the various energy levels and also we need to know the temperature and the molecular partition function. Reemphasizing on the meaning of each term that we have discussed Boltzmann distribution, fractional population of ith state expressing molecular partition function and also highlighting that the requirement of degeneracy of the ith energy level and that that beta is connected to temperature by 1 by k t how it comes that we will be discussing a bit later. Now, let us discuss what is the interpretation of partition function what does it physically convey. So, some insights into the significance of partition function can be obtained by considering how it depends on temperature. Let us try to understand. Molecular partition function we just discussed is equal to summation j g j exponential minus beta E j or permit me to write in terms of temperature g j exponential minus E j upon k t. Let us expand it what we have now q is equal to put g is equal to 0.  Now, if you look at the comment that I made that some insights into the significance of a partition function can be obtained by considering how it depends on temperature. Let us concentrate on that we want to talk about what is the effect of temperature. So, when whenever we want to discuss about the effect of temperature the easiest thing is let us first take the extremes. First extreme is when temperature approaches a value of 0 when temperature approaches 0 exponential minus any E upon k into 0 what is this? This is exponential minus infinity this will tend to a value of 0.  So, what will remain is only the first term q is equal to 0 or q approaches 0 when t approaches 0 ok. So, let me write this q approaches a value of g 0 as temperature approaches 0 fine. So, we have talked about the first extreme let us talk about this second extreme. Now, temperature approaches a value of infinity when temperature approaches a value of infinity exponential minus E upon k times infinity this will approach a value of 1 because it is exponential 0 is equal to 1. Therefore, this term is going to be 1 this term is going to be 1 and other all other exponential terms are going to be equal to 1 what will remain is g 0 plus g 1 plus g 2 plus so on. So, in that case your q will become g 0 plus g 1 plus g 2 plus keep on going that means very high value. I want you to appreciate the discussion that when t approaches 0 your partition function approaches a value equal to the degeneracy of the ground state on the other hand when t approaches infinity the value of partition function you see it approaches a very high value. So, therefore, what do we conclude from this kind of result? That means, when the temperature is approaching a value of 0 q is equal to 0 g 0 which is degeneracy of the ground state and when temperature approaches infinity the value of q also increases it increases to a very high value depending upon the temperature. That means, the partition function gives an idea of how many states are thermally accessible at a given temperature when t approaches 0 only ground state is thermally accessible when t approaches infinity infinite number of energy states are thermally accessible that is what is highlighted in this slide that as t approaches 0 we just discuss that q approaches a value of g 0 g 0 is degeneracy of the ground state and when t approaches infinity q value also approaches infinity that means very high number many energy states are thermally accessible. So, in some idealized cases the molecule may have only a finite number of states then the upper limit of q is equal to the number of states. Suppose in some idealized states idealized cases you have only 2 states available you have only 3 states available you have only 10 states available then the limit of q will be equal to the number of states to conclude this that partition function how do we interpret partition function gives an idea of how many energy states how many energy levels are thermally accessible at a given temperature. Let us take certain examples consider only the spin energy levels of a radical in a magnetic field spin energy levels that means in this case there are going to be only 2 states with the spin quantum number plus half and minus half. Therefore, how do we interpret that that the partition function of such a system is expected to rise to a value of 2 because there are only 2 states available as the temperature increases towards a value of infinity. Now, let us consider another system in which there are only 2 states available look at this the ground state energy equal to 0 because you know we have discussed in the beginning we will start with the ground state energy equal to 0 and then if there is some 0 point energy that number can be added if we want to calculate total energy of the system. We will address that a bit later the second energy state is at a separation of e how do we write the partition function for this system q is equal to 1 plus exponential minus beta e q which is equal to summation j g j exponential minus beta e j there are only 2 states the degeneracy of the ground state is 1 and energy is 0. So, 1 into exponential 0 is equal to 1 plus degeneracy of the second state is also 1 or second level is also 1 and exponential here the energy is e that is the expression for the partition function and that is what is written over here and expressing beta in terms of temperature you have 1 plus exponential minus e upon kt we should be able to conveniently write the expression for molecular partition function depending upon how many states are there in a system. Here we are talking about some idealized case in which there are only 2 states and in that case in that system the partition function is given by this expression. Let us have a little bit more discussion on this. So, we have these 2 states we have this expression for the molecular partition function we can have some discussion on the effect of temperature. If you plot molecular partition function versus temperature look at this left hand side figure the value when the temperature you know is 0 the value starts from 1 and then sharply rises starts from 1 which is that 1 this is 1 it sharply rises and then if you look at figure which is given on the right hand side it rises towards a maximum value of 2 when temperature approaches infinity it is exponential minus e upon infinity exponential 0 that means this part also becomes equal to 1. So, 1 plus 1 2 the partition function value starts from 1 and then rises as the temperature becomes very high it goes towards a value of 2. So, look at the comment the partition function for a 2 level system as a function of temperature is shown in this figures. The 2 graphs differ in the scale note here 0 2 about 1 which is shown in a expanded form over here the idea is to show that how the value of partition function will sharply rise and when k t upon epsilon becomes relatively very high the value then moves towards a value of 2 partition function a value of 2. Initially very fast and then a slow approach towards a value of 2 as the temperature approaches a value of infinity all right. Now, let us talk about fractional population of each state p i is equal to exponential minus beta e i upon q we have discussed this. So, therefore, we can write p 0 fractional population of the ground state equal to exponential 0 which is 1 upon q and p 1 which is equal to exponential minus beta e this is the energy upon q. So, p 0 is 1 upon q q is 1 plus exponential minus e upon k t or minus beta e and p 1 is given in this form.  So, in that case this is going to be let us say first p 0 this is 1 over 1 plus 1 0.5 p 0 is 0.5 in the second case p 1 is also going to be 1 over 2 which is 0.5 as temperature approaches infinity as temperature approaches 0 you will see that when temperature approaches 0 then in that case what you have p 1 will turn out to be 0 p 0 will turn out to be 1. But what is important to note in this discussion is follow usually a common error is to suppose that once we increase the temperature and then all the molecules should be pushed to the upper state that is a common error that is a common error is to suppose that all the molecules in the system will be found in the upper energy state when t is equal to infinity that is the common assumption. However, if you look at this result what does this result say that when t approaches infinity each state is equally populated here we have 2 states and p 0 is also equal to 0.5 that is the fractional occupancy of ground state is 0.5 and fractional occupancy of the first state first excited state is also 0.5 that is what is written over here. However, please note that as t approaches infinity the populations of states become equal. So, we can generalize that the same conclusion is true for multi level systems here we talk about 2 level systems, but the conclusion can be extended to multi level systems that is as t approaches infinity all states become equally populated. Remember that it is not that when t approaches infinity all the molecules from the ground state are you know populated in the excited state no when t approaches infinity all states become equally populated. So, therefore, the take home lesson from this lecture is that the molecular partition function gives an indication of the average number of states that are thermally accessible to a molecule at the temperature of the system. What are the other key points at t equal to 0 only ground level is accessible and g is equal to q is equal to g 0 that is molecular partition function is equal to degeneracy. At very high temperature virtually all states are accessible and q is correspondingly very large that also we discussed high temperature means this k t is much higher than the energy of that state and q has a very high value and low temperature means k t is much much lesser than energy and q is close to g 0. Therefore, let us remember what is the expression for molecular partition function how to interpret the molecular partition function and how to express the fractional population of a state in terms of molecular partition function. We will discuss further how to express molecular partition function for states or for the number of states which are more than 2 in the next lecture. Thank you.


Look after your friends. Ensure they don't get into trouble or hurt themselves. Keep an eye on them. Don't leave them alone and ensure they get home safely. Stay safe. Watch your mates. Be safe. It's your responsibility.


So why don't we say we'll go until 7 with this discussion? And then we'll have to go to the next agenda. I'm going to pause that for a minute. OK. So please go ahead and read it. Actually, suspending the rules for the record, so that I won't open the meeting formally in the discussion. Suspend the average rules? Yeah. Yeah. Thank you. And if I can have people sign in, I'll just go ahead and read it. Do you want everyone to sign in before we move? No. OK. I'll just pause it for a moment. Can I begin to speak? Yes, please do. So I'm here to call attention to an incident that happened on Thursday, page 23, with the New Mountain Transit, which is contracted by Burlington School District to transport children from home or to wherever they're going from Edmunds Hill School and Edmunds Elementary School. The incident occurred at 3 PM on May 23rd on bus line number 47, bus number 913, Green Mountain Transit. The bus driver of this bus carrying Edmunds Middle School and Edmunds Elementary School students forced approximately 17 students of color to disembark because they were singing and clapping. Two of these students are my own children. I happened to be at Dario Bakerie, which is on North Newsy Avenue. At the time, I saw the group of students walking on North Newsy Avenue. I came outside to see what was going on, and the students asked me to take a video testimony. They report that the bus driver targeted students of color on the bus, threatened to call the police, and made all students of color exit the bus while white students remain seated. These children ranged in age from approximately 13 to five years old, middle schoolers and elementary school students, kindergarteners. They report that the driver's action was unilateral, whether or not the children were making any sound. It is against Green Mountain Transit policy to eject children from the bus without first calling the supervisor. Some children refused to exit the bus because they knew their right to safe transportation. When the driver threatened to call the police, they were scared and exited the bus. Some ran. One child lost his shoes. Many of the children were far from their destination. Some did not know how to get where they were going. All were students of color. When I saw the group of children, they were sad, confused, and angry. This is clearly a safety concern. It is also a community concern as the children were apparently targeted on the basis of skin color. It is not a crime to sing and clap while brown and black. Some of these children were enjoying each other's company and making music at the end of a long school day. Others were sitting quietly on the bus. As a mother and community member, I am outraged at what I saw. I do not want my children or any others growing up to believe that they will endanger themselves by being joyful, by singing out loud, because of the color of their skin. Thank you for addressing this complaint. And that is what I emailed to the Green Mountain Transit but for a big company. And I have also shared that with members of the school district. I have, before I take any questions, I have also a few points that I identified of my asks for this committee, from the school board and from the district in general. These are my requests. The first is to seek justice and resolution for the families who are affected, to make sure that everything is followed through according to all the proper channels and that the families are contacted and that they are aware and that they have the support that they need to process the event. My second request is to review the contract between Burlington School District and Green Mountain Transit. Review the supervision of students on transportation while they're under Burlington School District supervision and make sure that this never happens again. My third ask is to reach out to the students and families who are affected to affirm that the school community understands their experience and does not condone discrimination against children of color. And that's one where I think you folks can be very helpful. I know that you're working on reparative processes, restorative practices. That's one where I think that you could really do a lot there and I'm also asking for complete follow-through on the event with any possible means that you have to follow through with it, including contacting all of the families because it may be the case that all of the families do not know that this event occurred. The families of the kids have been affected. There were many children affected. I knew some, so the children asked me to take a video testimony, which I have shared only with concerned family members and with the school. I'm not sharing that with media or on social media because I think it's very important to protect the children's identities in the event that there were any retaliations. So the purpose of taking that video was really to just get their testimony which I've written up here as best as I could and to speak for them because that's my job as an adult, as a caring adult, is to represent their voices when they need to be protected. Thank you. Does anyone else want to speak at this time? Yeah, I think I do, thank you. So I- What do you just say or name me? My name is Erin, Erin Starhuse. I want to say that while this incident was really got wrenching as a parent, especially a family young child, I want everyone to know and to go out there and do their own research that this is a drop in the bucket of the grievances that have happened with these bus drivers and with these children. I know of a young woman who's raised in this community. She's a woman of color. She's a sophomore in college. Her first experience with racism was at the age of eight years old by the hands of a bus driver in the city of Burlington. I have heard white students repeat the things that they've heard bus drivers say about black and brown children when the black and brown children are there. I have had other fellow parents not know where their children were because the bus driver chose to call the police and have the bus pulled over on the side of the road for an hour and a half because somebody threw an empty plastic water bottle. The things that happen on these buses are, it's like this is going on and on and on and on. And the Burlington Police Department is aware and there's the very distinct feeling that they don't care. I had a very scathing email from Brandon Del Pozo himself basically accusing me of not having good parenting skills when I made it very clear in the email that I addressed to him that my child was not involved in the incident but I'm raising the incident as a concern for community member. I do not feel like it's a good use of my taxpayer dollars to see three cruisers and four uniformed officers involved for a school bus or a plastic water bottle. It makes me angry as a community member and it makes me upset as a parent. So I think that this is like the push that we need but I've spoken with Jamie Smith at Green Mountain. His response is that the onus is half on BSD and half on him and that there's gonna be some meetings and we're gonna have some talks and we're gonna see where we can go. And my answer to him was I was like way too little and way too late. Do you know what day and age we're facing right now? With what's going on nationally, the sensitivities are so heightened it's becoming a very hard line. You're on one side or the other. There is no more gray area in these issues. And as a Burlington community member, it's really important to me that this community stands on the right side of history. And these are the times and this is the moment to start making those changes and making those voices heard and really letting it known where there is no tolerance. And so this is something that has been going on for a really long time. And like for me now I've got this like burning thing and me like this is one area where we're gonna see this stop. And I think GMT needs to be doing so much more. They do not have a code of conduct that drivers have to sign. They have no enforceable accountability measures for misbehavior of conduct. The only thing they've done with this driver is take him off this route. He has not been suspended. He has not had any deduction and pay. He has not been penalized in any way. They further do not offer any implicit bias training cross cultural communications training or training on how to deal with children. They take a standard CDL holder and put them in this environment and then blame the problems on the Burlington school district. I find the approach from GMT extremely problematic. And I know we don't have a lot of options here in Burlington, but if we had an option I would say let's pull contract right away and find some in another form of transportation because their responses have been not even half a percent of what I would expect. For sharing. This is not your last chance. So before I just didn't want to start sharing information until they feel felt if they want to be heard first. So I'm gonna just share some information personally and then we do have the information from the district that we can share which I would ask Jean and Monica to share. But I just want to let you all know that I used to work for what was CCTA. And so I had some, I was the federal compliance manager and for that reason I want to give you kind of an explanatory description of the arrangement between the bus, transit authority and the school district. So under FTA rules, because there's a very strong lobby from private busing companies, public transit authorities are not allowed to formally provide school bus transportation. So what the city and the transit authority do, and so the way bus service works as a transit authority there's all these member municipalities and I apologize if I sound like I'm wondering. There's these member municipalities that's us, Winooski, South Burlington, Williston, blah, blah, blah. They all purchase hours from the bus service, okay? So in order to transport our kids to school, the city purchases hours and infinite organization parents who use for change arrange for this Winooski as well. The city has to purchase hours from the transit authority when it wants to add service. And so the city purchases hours to add service in the morning and at the end of the day in order to accommodate kids coming and going to school. This district does not have a contract with the transit authority. We do not have a written agreement with the transit authority. We are not allowed to have an agreement because it would violate FTA regulations. The city purchases hours and pays for those hours. That's the way it works. Having said that, and so the fairs are paid by, I think the city or the school, like the city bills the school for some fair revenue. So having said that in the past, and so Erin, if some parents were here who have had kids in the schools for a long time, use the bus system, they would corroborate what you're saying and more around the arrangement being not only less than perfect, but occasionally spiking into the harmful zone. So in the past, we have had resources put into bus monitors to ride with the kids. That happened like when things got bad enough and then we'd like pay some people to ride in the bus. Very inconsistently, very resource dependent, very much dependent on which district administrator was dealing with the situation. Totally inconsistent. So personally, I think bus monitors is a good idea and so what I will say to you is what I say to all constituents, if there's a budget need, people have to show up and advocate for it or it won't happen. The time to advocate for it is in November and December, advocate loudly, organize, don't let up and your voice will be the loudest. That's just budget 101. Secondly, I would say that having worked at Green Mountain Transit Authority, they have a union contract and the union contract is what governs things like code of conduct and accountability. So they also have a board and every member of municipality has two representatives to the board. And so I know it's tiring to go to public meetings and bring information and advocacy. There's a board meeting every month at Green Mountain Transit and there is another lever to push. And I think as we saw recently with the police, they have a union contract too. Firing people is governed by union contracts. Can I just tell you one thing that with the irony of this that came up to me and I know it was, I think it was CCTT which was doing the union drive a few years ago and the kids were really supporting the drivers in this and I think that's the saddest part about this. All the kids were out there really supporting everybody. And I think going to the Green Mountain Transit Board would be interesting to say, hey, we stick together in these kinds of things and we gotta call each other out on this kind of thing. Yeah, I mean, I think it's important like personally I support unions because they advocate for high wages and benefits. So, unions are really important and we should have more. However, unions can do more than just advocate for wages and benefits. They can advocate for other things like social and racial justice. Right, exactly. And it would be great if unions did that too but they don't, at least not in locally, sure. I wanna add something that's not in my statement. According to the children with whom I spoke after I saw them exit the bus, the bus driver threatened to call the police on them and I wanna point out explicitly that that threat is received very differently from for people of color than it is for white people. It scared those children very much, very much so that even one child was running off the bus and lost his shoes. Another child found his shoes and brought them back to him. Like that kind of practice is racist. Yeah, and in the district we have learned that and so our relationship with the police department has changed because of this very lived experience. I think it would be important for Green Mountain Transit to hear that and to be pressured to have implicit bias training. Their training is governed by the FTA. Their training is paid by the FTA and so when you want them to add training that's not required. It requires advocacy and other kinds of things. So yeah, I agree. And so the district doesn't have access to the drivers to train them or prevent that sort of thing. It's, you know, that's Green Mountain Transit and the city who are kind of the authoritative bodies in terms of paying for things and contractual arrangements and requirements. So I wish the district could do something but I do wanna hand it over to Gina Manica to share what the district is doing and I think in terms of like notifying on the parents, you know, I would ask staff about that but I believe we would support. I personally would support that. I personally would ask if we have to do that and follow through and let us know and get back to the community. Just one correction. Transportation service that we organized for in Manuski had nothing to do with the city of Manuski or the district paying into G of T. Oh really? We actually organized, there was a contract, there's a contract with the South Brawleton School. And so they used their food in the concert. We used South Brawleton buses in Manuski. Oh, so it's the private bus company. Oh, I thought you, okay, and I left off at a certain point but I didn't realize it had changed. Yeah, so I'll stop talking and there's another question. So my name's Thomas Chedenden. I'm currently the chair of the Green Mountain Transit Board. Great, thanks for coming. I'm sorry, I thought it started at seven. I apologize for missing your opening remarks. I'd love to talk with you afterwards. I think you're gonna receive that. My apologies and I'll watch the tape as well. I just wanna say, I'm sorry this happened. I'm still getting up to speed on what happened and what we can do. And I just took some notes on the last few remarks you made and I'm fully supportive of doing a full investigation of this, doing implicit bias training, also looking at the code of conduct. This is paramount, it has our paramount attention right now, we're absolutely gonna take this up at our June 18th, Tuesday morning meeting at 7.30 a.m. You're all welcome to come to that. We also have a leadership committee meeting the week before and I'd be happy to meet with any of you as well. But just know that this has our full attention and we wanna do better. So our full board meeting is at 7.30 a.m. But there's free coffee. And that's on June 18th, which is always the third Tuesday of the month, of three month. And it's at Green Mountain Transit on Industrial Ave in Burlington. And there are subcommittee meetings that meet the week before and those would be a great time to also hear from anybody that wants to be heard. We'd be glad to hang around and talk to anybody afterwards as well. So do you wanna, someone wanna share the but the description is still in here. So we wanna talk about what the plan is. Yeah, I mean we asked the staff, what are you guys doing, you know? And communication that. So what I found out was that all the students on the bus were from EMS and EES. The young, the student that was asked to leave the bus was five, which concerns me because where's this five year old going? And I think BSC staff and GMT met to review the video of the incident this morning. The bus driver didn't follow numerous protocols. But I don't know if it was according to the video. The video shows a group of students dancing, singing and screaming in the back third of the bus in an unsafe and distracting manner. They can be heard hitting the bus or windows. After yelling unsuccessfully for the students to stop hitting the windows, the driver stopped the bus, went to the back of the bus and asked everyone in the rear of the bus to leave or he would call the police. All students in the back of the bus in cases of ball races were asked to leave the bus. All students in the front of the bus inclusive of ball races were allowed to remain on the bus. And then I guess the five year old appeared to be confused but he was asked to leave but then he appears that he was under the guidance of an older student. GMT is apologetic and agrees this never should have happened. And then going forward, the driver has been removed from the bus route. And this says that GMT is starting an internal investigation. Now this says that you are already, I'm already talking to your meeting tomorrow to be brief and that principals have been meeting with students to figure out ways to best process the incident. There's plans for some of the conversations to answer the very thing you're asking what should the proper process systems and procedures be. And then admins and administrators are looking to hold special assemblies to discuss rules and expectations regarding bus safety and protocols and how to record an incident. Yeah. For the children, how did the children record them? Any, anybody. That's actually a recurring theme. How do people find resources? Many of these children do not have phones. Most of the children who are ejected from the bus did not have phones. They had no way to contact their parents and they didn't have anyone to advocate for them at that time. Yeah, so I think that's what the district was trying to do is be as proactive as possible and like you showed up with the bus number. That's like a key piece of information people usually don't know. If you have the bus number, it makes all the difference because you know which bus, who is driving. Like literally that's kind of the key. So if the district's going to create processes and empower kids, then the district needs information about or suggestions for how to empower the kids. So if you're saying they don't have phones, they don't talk to their parents but they found somebody to tell, then that's not really a formal process. I think the district was trying to say how do we equip our kids with a formal process and their parents and families as much as we can. So if someone on the bus will remember, oh yeah, we're supposed to get the bus number or whatever, but there is videotape of every bus. So when the incident happened, it's like if the procedures fall apart which is plausible. May I reply? Yeah. That afternoon I spent some time with a couple of the other children who were on the bus because we had a day to get ice cream. I was driving them around to their basketball practices so I was able to overhear some of their conversation. One conversation that I overheard, these were all children of color, friends of my own kids. And one of the conversations that I overheard was their friend telling them, always look for a badge number, always look for the bus number, always know like what the, find out who the name of your person is. And I really do want to make this explicitly clear. That is training that is handed down but in families of color because you need to be able to represent yourself when nobody else will. So this is training that my children were receiving from a friend of theirs. Always look for a badge number, always look for a bus number. That's not something that tends to happen in white families so much and I really want to make that clear. Yeah, thank you. And I think that's the kind of training that the school can reinforce for everybody and try and get the information to parents about what the arrangement is, what to expect, what not to expect, code of conduct on the bus, all those sorts of things.  And I understand that sort of like in terms of the rules that there's limitations for what BSD can do, I think sometimes saying like our hands are tied is, I think sometimes is a way to like not really advocate for like change. And so I understand that like on paper, BSD might not have, doesn't have a contract with the district. I also know that like, if enough people in positions of power like y'all are actually extremely clear about needs that need to be met in the community that people often listen. And something I'm noticing and I think saying like, oh well kids have a clear way of reporting is really important but that's a really reactive response and just hearing, I think kids, it was the notes were saying like that they were yelling and to me it seems like there's a real lack of trust between the kids and the drivers and it seems like that, there's a lot of reason why that's really true. And so I'm interested too about potentially what it looks to like go a step up and imagine sort of like as a community organizing project what does it look like to do restorative, justice work to do reparative work so that like the drivers like actually maybe know the kids names or that the kids know some things about the driver that they actually like we talked about like community policing like the cops like, you know, instead of driving on their cruisers they need to walk around the neighborhood and it seems like there might be, I'm interested in what it might look like to really do some relationship building between the bus drivers and the kids so that when the bus drivers are like hey that's really unsafe, could you stop? The kids feel like actually they're like respected and valued by the bus driver enough so that they have an incentive to listen.  It seems like maybe that's happening. Yeah, so I'm interested in what sort of going a level up looks like and really kind of imagining what trust building looks like. I'd also like to make sure that when we're examining this we're bringing into the sort of folder perspective the very real and proven data and research is out there that shows that the same behavior by a white child versus that behavior by a child of color is not viewed the same by those in charge and that every time these incidences have happened there's always this thing of oh well the kids are misbehaving. I was like well they're children at 3 p.m. Okay, they've just gotten out of school.  It's so grossly disproportionate and in these incidences with the drivers all of these bad behaviors and even the cops being like all those kids aren't behaving right those kids every single time excludes the white children from this equation and it only points to the children of color when the behaviors are equally as rambunctious across both. If not even more rambunctious because usually the other students are a little bit more concerned about getting in trouble because they get in trouble more often. So I take a lot of like sensitivity to this I'm sorry I have a lot of sensitivity around this idea that the kids need to be doing something. I understand yes they need to respect the bus driver they need to respect adults but the onus is not on the children to solve this problem or to change the way in which a 13 year old feels at 3 p.m. because that's not gonna change. The onus is on the adults to behave better. And so I just like I hear us going back to the kids a lot and that's what I've heard from a lot of other authority figures in the community and I take a lot of sort of offense to that perspective. I did see a video from one child I cannot share this because it identifies the children but I saw a video from one of the children that was taken before the bus driver ejected the kids and I could see exactly what they were doing in the video and they were going like this. They were clapping and they had a little chant going that they were singing and they were smiling. They were joyful. They were enjoying themselves. They may not have been following exactly the bus rules at that moment. Perhaps a reminder, you know, to that I cannot speak but what I can tell you for sure is that they were beautiful, playful children. That's what I saw. So you didn't see any knocking on the windows? No, I didn't see that in the video. And it was like four students and 17 of them got kicked off the bus. Oh. So that's the other issue. So four students were clapping and singing? Or maybe five. There weren't many. In the video there was maybe four or five and they were having a bit of time. 17 was how many I counted when I saw them. Many others had scattered already by the time they had got because they got dropped off on North Street. I saw them on North Queenski Avenue. So there were others too and I wasn't a witness on the bus. So I don't know who all was on the bus, who all got picked off, who all stayed seated. But I can tell you that what was going on, I am also a teacher as well as a mother and I really try to protect the right for children to have joy and play. And if that wasn't the time, that's a thing. But that is not cause to eject them from the bus or to call the police. Yeah, I wanna just, you know, everything you're saying we can validate. I think what Monarch was trying to do is just read to you where the administration is at in terms of what their perception is of what they can do around what the district has control over. We're not here to justify it or to say whether, you know, like as a board member, I totally wanna validate everything you're saying. And we'll definitely advocate for the district. You know, we can go to Tom Chitman and, you know, I know the administration is talking with Green Mountain Transit, they've admitted, this shouldn't have happened, they've admitted. I agree pulling the bus driver off is not the solution. We all, I think, have been for this same issue in the past few months with another city department. So, you know, we are living with racial injustice and implicit bias throughout our city and our institutions and the district's no different, the bus is no different, and we all have to, you know, be able to come and tell this story over and over, which I don't know how exhausting that is for people of color, but I know how exhausting it is for all of us and it's, you know, exponentially magnified. So, just because of time, I just wanna say, we hear you, we will advocate, there's nothing, you know, I can offer you other than our ability to do that and to support you. Since we, if we had a contract with the Transit Authority, we'd be in a completely different, it would be a completely different conversation, but the district has, you know, a bill from the city that we pay so the city can pay the Transit Authority for providing more service at the beginning of the day and the end of the day. All of this about, like, you know, blaming kids is, I will personally, like, I think the staff would never blame the kids for, you know, what happened today. That is just not, you know, an option or real. So, it is all about training and, you know, making the path to shine the light on how, you know, inactable, in just this kind of situation is. And so, I don't want anybody to feel like we're just passing this off on kids or blaming kids, but, you know, at the same time, there are protocols, there are codes of conduct on both sides, there are, you know, and it sounds like the kids were totally following a code of conduct. I mean, we all hopefully ride the bus and we know there's all kinds of conduct on the bus that happens. So, you know, it's not just kids, people get excited and, you know, exuberant, exuberance, it's not a crime. And usually they don't let adults on those buses. I think it's just the driver. I don't know, I think that, I don't know what it is here. I have a quick question.  But then it makes me wonder, like, does the school district have that requirement of all the teachers and all the administration? And then do they have that requirement for everybody who then also works with the kids? Cause it's kind of like, is that part of what the SDC? Okay, so then, why wouldn't that, aside from it not, I'm sorry, my name's Hilary Martin. Um, I guess it's just like, if it's not a contract, why does that mean that if kids that are in the district are relying on that GMT for transportation, then why wouldn't that be kind of advocated for by the district? Even though I hear what you're saying, like there's not a contract, so you kind of can't like ask for certain things from GMT or require them. But, I mean, if GMT is shuttling kids to school and we're working with them. No, we can totally advocate for it. I'm just saying we can't, we don't have any leverage. Leverage, sure. It's not like, we have an MOU with the police. Like that is a document, an agreement, where we can say, these are our expectations, these are outcomes that we want to see and we should probably include implicit bias training in that MOU, because I don't think we have one. But we don't have anything, like we don't have a formal arrangement. I'm sorry, sorry. Anybody? Yeah. So we can totally advocate it, it advocated for it and we will. It's, I guess, I mean, I think in situations like this we all want to come to the entity in charge and say, please change things. And what I'm saying is we can try and do our part. This is a very weird situation that most people don't understand because it's just a federally regulated arrangement and we're not allowed to pay for a school bus on public transit. So we, so the city buys the service. So there's no leverage. That doesn't mean that the administration, so Tom Chittin and his hearings, the chair of their board, doesn't mean they're not working on it, but not trying it he, before people came in, already spoke, said they hear us, they're working on it. We all know when we hear they're working on it what that means, and it means we all have to work twice as hard, three times as hard, four times as hard, it gets relentless, right? And so I think what I'm saying is, I think in this committee you're gonna find people who are all on the same page and we will do what we can and when we hear you and we will bring that back to the administration, our communications director said, we're looking for suggestions. We're looking for what to do. We're looking for how to prepare families. We're looking for that. And so there's an openness here. There's just not the ability to say, we screwed up and we'll change things because we didn't screw up and we'll change things. It's like our society screws up and our society needs to change things.  And so there's a process there. So I'm sorry to say that on camera, but. I just want to thank you what you said earlier to your point on, you do have leverage. The city of Burlington, not the school district, pay zero largest municipal members, and you pay a large amount every year. If you really wanted to, you could exit municipalities. Please don't do that. We will get better. We will work on this. So you do have leverage, but just not as much for the school board, more in the city. We could buy public, I mean, private school service and it would be a million point six dollars a year out of some other programs. And Chapin Spencer, one of your two reps on the board is fully aware of this. We've been talking all day. He is committed to a full investigation. So am I. And also on, I really like the sensitivity training. Also de-escalation procedures. I have a six year old. I have a nine year old. She's here with me. We never want any kid thrown off any bus anywhere in Vermont. So we need to work on that. And that should just be our first policy. So this is our top priority. I have time for sure. And we're wrapping up this session. But I just want to say one more thing. We're talking a lot about the procedures, like how to continue procedurally. And I just want to remind and highlight that the lives of these children were affected this week in a way that can't be changed. It can never be erased. These children have experienced what they feel strongly. And I also feel as a racist incident that changes their worldview. And they need to know that their community supports them. They need to know that we do not support any procedures, any adults that racist discrimination is not supposed to be part of their lives as children or as adults. So I don't have an answer right now. For a lot of people have been asking me, like, well, how do we show support to the children? How do we tell them that we care? I don't have an answer for that. I can say that one of my own children said, Amma, why are you trying so hard to make people listen? Nobody cares if it's not their own kid. So I appreciate everyone taking time out of their days. And I appreciate everyone who's here for their time to do whatever they can to communicate to these children that actually we do care. We care very much. Yeah, thank you for that. As board members, we can definitely do that. We can communicate with our families. And will you leave your comments? Will you send them? I can have this copy if you want. Thank you. Let's stand there. Good evening. Thanks for having us out and taking the time off of the schedule to listen to us. I'm deeply concerned. I just found out about this a couple hours ago, quite frankly, and I was over. Some of you saw me at the police commission meeting that didn't happen tonight. And I just got off the phone with Brandon as well because I think that there could have been some criminal activity that happened here. And I didn't come with a pitchfork, but I just think that there are a lot of different levels to what we're talking about here. I think that I don't want to create a situation that seemingly deals with this thing in a vacuum because we've got some big problems here in Burrington. They're manifesting themselves in various ways. 17 kids were walking down to the age of five. It was a shame. Isaiah Longmore was on that bus as well, along with 16 other kids as Christine's grandson. So there's, so now it kind of hit home. I just got off the phone with the Human Rights Commission Executive Director as well. And we're having those conversations too. So this is serious.  So, but let's not get it confused. At the end of the day, the school is responsible because when parents put their kids on a bus in the morning to go to school, they expect them to get off the bus when they come home from school, period, okay? I don't care about the relationship that you have with the city or what the city has with, at the end of the day, HRC, the Civil Rights Commission, they're gonna be pointing you. And we're gonna be pointing you, okay? So I'm not trying to put you on the spot personally, but at the end of the day, when we fix this, as we fix this, there needs to be some culpability involving the school's responsibility. Whatever standards that you require, that we require in our schools for everybody who comes in contact with our children, inherently extends to anybody else who's in contact with our children throughout the entire day until they get off the bus, okay? So that's how we should be dealing with this and any other way of dealing with this, I think is short-sighted and it's irresponsible. So it's an adult who endangered the safety of children. That is a criminal charge. It really actually is. And if it was a black bus driver dropping kids off up on Spear Street, we'd be having a totally different conversation. That's really all I have to say. It's horrendous. It's not that complicated. It's horrendous, that's it. Something needs to be done. You'll definitely see me again. I mean, I'm happy to talk to you guys further. I don't wanna... Yeah, I'll say everything I need to say. Yeah, talk about it. I want to continue to do that. Thank you for coming, everyone. And thanks for coming back next month. If you'd like and we can continue the conversation, I don't know if we'll have information for you, but we can keep it on the agenda. What can you do with me? It's the, typically the third Tuesday of everyone. And hopefully... Oh, thank you for the Tuesday. Yeah. That's because it's up to me. Yes, it's up to me. What will you name the subcommittee please? Diversity, equity, and inclusion subcommittee. And the full school board meeting, the next one is on June 11th, is that correct? I thought we just talked about this today, that that one's not happening, so it's June 18th. We are having one on the 4th, and then one on the 18th. Those are the full school board meetings? Yes. And where will those take place? Typically, they're both in high school, but they do move around, so you have to check the warning, the agenda warning. How do you find that on the internet?  Yes, it's on the website.  I could just send you the link to Board Dots. Okay. I think that... Probably the one that wants to know as well. All right, well thank you, everyone. Thank you. Thank you very much. Thank you. Thank you.


Hello learners. In this class, we are going to discuss a unit of the paper business organization and business ethics of become first semester. The name of the unit is multinational corporation. In simple term, a multinational corporation is a corporation which operates in different countries. That means a corporation which has its registered office in one country and it has its business operation in different countries or in different parts of the world. Those companies are known as multinational companies. You might be hearing the name of many companies like Sony, LG, Hyundai, Honda, etc. All these companies are multinational companies which operate in many countries of the globe. In simple word, a multinational corporation is a corporation which operates in different countries. Now, if we talk about types of multinational companies, we can divide multinational corporations into three types. Number one, ethnic and ethnic, number two, polycentric, number three, geo-centric. Now, these ethnic and ethnic multinational corporations generally more concentrate towards the home country. That is the country of origin. The country in which the corporation originates, they concentrate on that country. They give preference to the people of those countries. They try to generate more employment for that country. So, those types of multinational corporations are known as ethnic and ethnic multinational corporations. Number two is polycentric. Polycentric multinational corporations are just opposite to the ethnic and ethnic multinational corporations. Polycentric multinational corporations give importance to the host country or that is the country in which MNC operates. In those countries, they try to generate employment and they give preference to the host country. That is the country in which the company operates. And number three is polycentric. A polycentric multinational corporation give importance to the global operations. They make decisions on global perspective. They neither give preference to the home country nor the host country. They give preference to the world as a whole. So, these three are the types of multinational corporations. Now, the objectives of multinational corporations. Why a company want to operate in different countries? What are the objectives? The number one objective is to earn maximum profit. So, to earn maximum amount of profit a company tries to expand its business operation in different parts of the country. Number two is in search of SIPP labor or in search of SIPP infrastructure. In developed countries, the cost of labor, the cost of infrastructure is very huge, very high. So, the corporation search for alternatives and they establish their business operations in other countries where the labor are SIPP. So, next objective is to achieve efficiency. The multinational organizations, the multinational corporations try to achieve maximum efficiency by employing efficient person, efficient worker by using the latest R&D, the latest technology. They try to increase their efficiency. Next objective is by operating in different countries, a company can create a global image. So, that is another objective of multinational corporation that is to create a global image. Like if you talk about Sony. So, Sony has a global image. Every country knows about Sony. So, that is one objective. Next objective is to capture the market. So, we know that nowadays the entire globe is a market. So, this MNC tries to explore the market every knock and corner of the globe. The next objective is use of technology, advanced technology. Since multinational corporations invest a huge amount in the research and development that is R&D. So, they always try to find out the best technology and that is one objective of going multinational. Now, characteristics of a multinational organization. The multinational organization has some characteristics, fissures. If we talk about the fissures, number one fissure is big size. These MNCs are huge in size. They have huge capital investment. They have numbers of production facilities throughout the globe. Like if we take again example of Sony, Samsung, then Hyundai, Honda. We will see that these companies are very large. They invest huge amount of capital. They have production facilities throughout the globe. They have corporate offices throughout the globe. So, MNCs are very big in size. Number two is international operation. That is to be an MNC, it must operate in more than one country. So, if you talk about the MNCs or if you look at the MNCs, we will get that or we can see that it has international operation. It operates in many countries. Next characteristics is use of advanced technology. So, these MNCs, all MNCs, their technologically they are very developed because their research and development team is very strong. They invest a very huge amount. They even provide financial assistance to many research organization to conduct research for the company, product and their technologies. That is why their technology is very advanced. They use advanced technology. Next characteristics is high efficiency. Since the MNCs are having maximum amount of capital, they are having good technology, they are having efficient people in their hands. So, their operational efficiency, the level of efficiency is very high. Next objective is quality. All MNCs are very conscious about their qualities because to operate throughout the globe, their product must be of good quality. So, they never compromise in quality. They always try to produce good quality product and they try to explore the new market by making available good product or quality product. The next characteristics is most of the MNCs are originated in developed countries. Like if you talk about big, big companies like Sony, like Samsung, then Apple, all these companies are originated in developed countries. Because of the reason MNC requires huge amount of investment which is available only in developed countries. MNCs requires or MNC they use high technology or advanced technology can be developed by investing huge amount of money or by investing huge capital. So, that is why these MNCs are originated in developed countries or rich countries. We will get all the most of the MNCs originated in UK, US, Korea, Japan, China. So, this is another characteristics. Now, if you talk about advantage or disadvantage of MNCs, so, we will get two thoughts. One is in favor of MNCs, another is against the MNCs. MNCs are good as well as bad for a country or for a society, for an economy. Like there are two countries. One is host country, one is home country. If you talk about MNC, the country where the MNC is originated that is called home country, the country where MNCs are operating that is called host country. So, there are both advantages and disadvantages to both the countries. So, if you talk about the advantages, first we will talk about the advantages to the host country. Now, for a host country, there are many advantages. MNCs bring many advantages to a host country. Number one is when MNC or when corporation come to a country, it gives employment, it brings investment, it increase the level of income of that country. So, that is one big advantage to a host country. That is when a MNC comes into a country or when one MNC start functioning in a country, number one it gives employment opportunities to its citizen, number two it brings investment to the country and number three it increase the level of income of the citizen of that country. So, which is very important especially for developing and less developed countries. In developing countries or less developed countries, there are lack of employment, there are lack of capital, there are income level is very low. So, if MNC comes to one developing country or one less developed country, so it brings all these things. Next advantage to host country is as we already talked that MNCs use high technology, MNCs use very advanced technology. So, when one MNC come to one country, it brings the technology with them. So, thereby the country is technologically developed. The next advantage to host country is MNC brings technological skill then entrepreneurial skill and management experience with them and thereby they improve the condition of host countries. Another advantage of MNC to the host country is it increase the volume of business in that country. So, when one MNC come automatically the business value of that country increases and that is one advantage to the host country. Next advantage to host country is it create competition in the market of that country and when competitions comes in the market, the quality of the product and services automatically improves. So, that is another benefit to the host country. Another advantage to the host country is when one MNC come into the operation or when one MNC come to one country, it increase or volume of export of that country. So, what happen suppose Sony comes to India and they start producing product of Sony in India. So, what will happen products will be exported to other countries from India and thereby India will gain foreign exchange reserve or India will earn foreign exchange reserve. So, that is one big advantage for a developing country or less developed country, it brings foreign exchange reserve. Another advantage is it increase the industrial and economic development. So, as you know that this underdeveloped countries or developing countries, they are lacking of industrial development due to lack of capital, due to lack of infrastructure. So, when MNC comes in a country, they improve or they increase the industrial and economic development of that country. Next is like any other company or like any other income generating persons, those MNCs are also need to pay tax to the country in which it operates. So, when MNC comes into a country, it improves the situation of national executor by paying tax. The next advantage to the host country is it improves the standard of life by many way. Number one, it starts producing good quality product in that country, thereby making the product available to the local consumers in the local market. Number two, by giving employment to its local people, MNC improve the level of income and thereby level of living standard of living. So, in that way, MNC improves the living standard of the people. Next advantage is it gives high return or high rate of dividend to its investors and motivate the people to invest more and more. So, that is another advantage to the host country. So, all these are advantages brought by one MNC to the host country. Next, we will discuss about the advantage it brings to the home country, how one MNC helps or how one MNC bring advantage to its home country, that is the country in which it originates. Number one advantage is it explore or it expand the market of the product to the whole globe. The entire globe become market for their product. Number one, number two is create employment opportunities to the people of home country. Basically, their corporate offices are located in the home country and in all the countries where they are operating, they employ their home country's people in key positions. So, it creates employment opportunity to the home country. The next advantage of MNC to its home country is it increase the responsibility, industrial responsibility of that country. When it goes for operating in many countries, the responsibility of the home country automatically increases. The most important advantage to the home country is the MNC's brings foreign exchange to the home country in terms of remittance of income or profit. Now, we talked about many advantages of MNC's, but it is not always true that MNC's only brings advantage to both home and host countries. It has many disadvantages. It face many criticisms. Now, if we talk about the disadvantages of MNC's to the host countries, number one is the technology it brings, that is the technology brought by the MNC's to the host countries are always the absolute technologies. The MNC's never brings the new technology and latest technology to the host country, that is the latest technologies are used in home country. So, number one is they always bring the absolute technology to the host country. So, that is one disadvantage. The next disadvantage or the next criticism against MNC's is that by using capital intensive technology, they reduce the employment opportunity, that is instead of human, they use machineries for producing goods. So, in that case, it reduce the scope of employability or a scope of employment. Another criticism against the MNC's are it creates threat to the host country. It may create because the MNC's are very huge, they are very powerful, they have capital with them. So, they may create threat to the sovereignty of the host country. The greatest example is ruling of India by East India Company. East India Company which came to India to do business and slowly, slowly, they acquire the whole India and they rule India for more than 200 years. So, that is the greatest threat. If the company is very big and the country is weak, then they may try to acquire the country. The next criticism is the MNC's, they generally, they try to create monopoly in the developing country or developed country since they have a very huge capital, they have a very huge production facility. So, they produce good quality product and thereby, they eliminate the product of host country, the domestic product of host country and they try to, the MNC's try to establish monopoly. Another criticism against MNC's are that it comes to a country only for profit, not for social or economic development of that country and they stick to that objective only. So, they try to maximize their profit only. They are not concerned about social development and economic development of that host country. The next disadvantage or criticism is somehow MNC's tries to influence the politics and administration of the host country. Again, that is due to their power, due to their capital. So, they try to or they, they try to influence the political system of host country. Next, criticism is this MNC remits a huge amount of fund from the host country as profit to the home country. So, it creates outflow of fund from the host country to the home country. Now, all these were disadvantages or criticism against MNC for host country. It's not like that MNC's create problem for host country only. There are many criticism against the MNC for home country also. Number one is MNC shift its capital and technology from the home country to the host country. That is one criticism against the MNC. Number two is one MNC may not create employment opportunities in the home country. It may, it may not employ people from its home country. It may employ, it may employ people from the host country or other country where it is safe because the ultimate objective of MNC is to maximize profit. Another very important criticism against the MNC's are that generally MNC produce non-essential items which are not essential for day-to-day living rather they give importance to the non-essential items and luxury item. So, all these are advantages and disadvantages of MNC's we discussed. So, if you talk about India or if you talk about developing countries out of our discussions it is evident that MNC's create employment opportunities. MNC's are increasing the employment level, increasing the income level and increasing the investment level in the host countries or in a country like India but at the same time it creates many trade. Nevertheless MNC's are very important nowadays because this MNC's since it operates in a large scale so it it really brings many economic benefit to a country. Thank you. Thank you learners. For further if you want to generate or if you want to study more about MNC's then you can consult the book written by R. K. Leahy. The name of the book is Economic Development and Planning published by Kallini publishers. In that book you can get a detailed note about MNC's. Thank you.


F-16 Fighting Falcon is a compact multi-role fighter aircraft. It is highly maneuverable and has proven itself in air-to-air combat and air-to-surface attacks. The Fighting Falcon provides a relatively low-cost, high-performance weapon system for the United States and allied nations. In an air combat role, the F-16 can locate targets in all weather conditions and detect low-flying aircraft. In an air-to-surface role, the F-16 can fly more than 500 miles, deliver its weapons with superior accuracy, defend itself against enemy aircraft, and return to its starting point.