Hi everyone. Okay, so research data management training. This question, what are we training librarians for? It's been weighing heavily on my mind actually. So today I want to talk about how how the library community frames research data management for our own development, as well as meeting our client community needs and what's been happening at UTS. So when I first got here, I thought that my plan was fairly simple. Research data management is the future of libraries. All I had to do was teach research data management to my colleagues, turn them all into librarians, data librarians, provoke the university into action on research data management by any means necessary, figure out what works and do more of that. But it wasn't actually that simple. Research data management may be the future, but it's hard to promote that future when it looks like another freaking web form. So at UTS, research data management is largely driven by an asset management imperative, which is very important actually. So we have policy which mandates data management plans for all projects, including PhD students and higher degree research. We also have stash records for research data, which are mandatory as well for any researchers publishing data, even as a supplementary item to a journal article. That's going to be official in January next year and that will be very interesting for us. In general, the library is responsible for research data management training and the research group in the IT division at UTS develops the infrastructure. But my question is how you say RDM? Not just how do you say it, but how we say it. Okay, I'm increasingly uncomfortable with these ideas around RDM and DMPs. These are terms that we've created by and for librarians. I think that RDM is as much an artificial construct as a DMP, which is more often than not an administrative requirement or matter of compliance rather than an actual thing that is supporting the doing of research. I've realised that my anxiety around research data management has come from having the responsibility of persuading my colleagues to make space for a new area of expertise, which is still as relatively abstract as the myriad training resources and online courses that are available to learn it, while still remaining fully committed to business as usual. Moreover, on reflection, I learnt how to be a data librarian by actually doing it, not through doing a course. It was through working on projects, learning how to be a partnering with researchers that the skillset required had more in common with the data scientists than traditional librarians. Of course, I think every librarian here probably begs to differ with that straight away, but as a data librarian, a growth mindset and problem solving skills are potentially more valuable than the myriad pieces of the puzzle that make up the many matrices of research data management, life cycles and modules. Okay, so at UTS, we're kind of doing research data management by stealth, okay? Internally, my department is piloting a tinker time project using learning analytics expertise from UTS data scientists to develop our growth mindset and data literacies. So for example, I'm in a little affinity group of amateur game developers, and my project will be creating a character called Bogan the librarian who must curate research data for a death metal cultural studies researcher. Well, that's just level one. I haven't got beyond that yet. Also, we're developing introductory data management, which is mainly data cleaning, but also including data visualization skills for undergraduate faculty classes. And we're also promoting open data sets for teaching as part of our open educational resources for our academic teaching staff. So these examples are not strictly in the research data management world because that tends to be skewered more towards or aimed at our research communities. But I believe they're gateway drugs toward it. I guess we could call it seeding the commons for one to the better word. So speaking of other research data management by stealth initiatives, the recent resbazz that we held in Sydney in July is an excellent example of that. And that the research bizarre is a series of workshops on coding and software skills for being able to teach non computational researchers that kind of computational thinking that comes with using using our or Python to harness the power of these new next generation research tools. So we discovered that research students and staff want things like data science training and they want supporting data management tools applications and software. So they want to know what will help them how to do research faster smarter more competitively. And we found that from our pilot in July researchers also want to build community and learn about research tools across disciplines and institutional boundaries. So this is where we embed research data management by offering training in these open source tools and software where things like version control are integrated in things like GitHub alongside the resbazz software workshops. We also provided some research data management workshops by that very name. And I was I fell off my chair when I realized that that was the second most popular item in our expression of interest form that we sent out initially. And I don't know about you but we don't get more than 40 people registering for our regular research data management workshops. So there's something else that is happening there that enables people to see research data management as something valuable and useful for them rather than just RDM on its own. This year UTS has also established a joint steering committee in e-research and research data management training and this is more at the executive level and that's going to allow us to embed research data management across a broader spectrum of specialized research support and data science services. And finally we're integrating librarians into research e-research infrastructure projects such as our the provision of project that e-research is running and giving librarians roles such as the go-to trainers for research tool training for example lab notebooks and in the future red cap the research data capture application and also by giving librarians roles in say user acceptance testing of our in-house research data management tool stash. We can engage them as experts developing those specifically data librarian skills. So to answer the question I started with this is what we're training our librarians for three roles as active participants in providing enhanced research support services. We're training them as instructors in delivering real data management skills from undergraduate through to our researcher communities. We're training them as advisors to deliver research data management by stealth in a way saying oh would you like research data management with that as one might offer fries or curly fries or something like that. And finally as engaged librarians collaborating in in e-research infrastructure development who can knowledgeably refer clients to more specialized data services for example statistical instruction or high performance computing so being able to perform quite a triage role in that way and that's the end of my presentation.


Go back everybody, DroneTech here. Please hit that like button, share, and subscribe if you could. So I'm sure that we all saw this video today from AOC. I'm not going to attack her for making those claims. I mean, she's never made them before, but obviously criticizing that sort of a thing is dangerous. And that's kind of what I want to talk about is the Democrats and this propensity that they have for shield, and this is something that I've noticed them doing, you know, going back to when I first got into politics, but they always shield themselves with some, with their identity or with how they identify. And they shield themselves against criticism or any sort of scrutiny. And that's why, you know, you look in the media and do you ever see any criticism or scrutiny of anything that they say or do or any of their policies? Do you see anything like that? It's almost certainly from the left. It's that they're not left-wing enough. Not only is this, I think, this is about AOC shielding herself from criticism. She just, you know, these people like AOC, they're either, they're either talking about how strong they are, you know, how, how as a person they're so strong and they can rise above everything. But then in the next sentence they're a victim and they're powerless against these monstrous forces. And then, and yet the next sentence, they're spewing hatred about people that they disagree with. They're fellow Americans. AOC was just out there the other day saying that certain Republicans should be put on an enemy's list. I mean, how does, there in no way does that unite the country. That sets this country on a path for conflict. It also incites violence, just like AOC incited violence by supporting it, uh, cheering it on when BLM and Antifa and Democrats were out there burning down businesses.  What about all the fear that these store owners, these business, small businesses, felt just trying to defend their business and people are throwing rocks through their windows, burning it down, threatening them. You know, some of these groups went into residential neighborhoods and threatened these people's homes and threatened them based on their skin color of all things. You remember that on CNN, Chris Cuomo said, and you know, this isn't AOC's fault, but Chris Cuomo is a parent of AOC and he's parroted her BS on more than one occasion when she started talking about how ICE detention facilities were concentration camps. What happened? Well, you had members of Antifa or Antifa related groups actually launching several attacks on several different ICE facilities. Did she ever pay a price for that? Was she ever brought up and censured? No. No, they weren't. And you also remember that there was a time when a guy showed up and tried to assassinate half the GOP Senate. He only succeeded in shooting one of the Republicans, Steve Scalise, but there were many Republicans there that he could have taken out. That guy was acting on in part rhetoric that he was hearing coming from the Democrats about how healthcare that Republicans wanted you to die.   And this all really ties into what happened at the Capitol. It seems like they're just really, they're really trying to get as much as they can, as much benefit out of that as they can. Never let a good crisis go to waste. And I'm not saying that I support, you know, I'm on video multiple times saying that I did not support what happened there, but let's be real. I mean, it was several thousand people, most of which were peaceful. You know, they didn't do anything that even, they didn't even enter the Capitol. But then there was a few hundred people or more that went in and they walked around and they came out. And then there was a smaller amount of those people that were actually violent. But for some reason they're not held to the same standard. And in the same vein, there was an unarmed woman who was shot and killed by police. In any other case, you know, the media would be outraged about that. But in this case, they actually cheered it on. And, you know, it's hard to keep up with these standards that are constantly shifting and warping and always in service of the Democrats and protecting them. They have to blow that event out of proportion as much as possible to enact as much as they possibly can while they have the power to do so. And the scary thing is, is that they're using this to incite anger, hatred, and even violence towards their political opposition. I did a video the other day of a guy saying that if a terrorist in the Middle East had said the things that Trump had said, well, we'd be setting a drone strike over. Anyway, that's all I have for this one. It's freezing out here right now. Make sure to check out all my alternate platform links that you can find in the description or pinned comment. Thanks for watching. Hit that like button and subscribe. And I'll see you all next video.


We'll continue our definition of data science by looking at the roles that are involved in data science, the way that different people can contribute to it. That's because it tends to be a collaborative thing. And it's nice to be able to say that we're all together working together towards a single goal. So let's talk about some of the roles involved in data science, and how they contribute to the projects. First off, let's take a look at engineers. These are people who focus on the back end hardware, for instance, the servers, and the software that runs them. This is what makes data science possible. And it includes people like developers, software developers, or database administrators. And they provide the foundation for the rest of the work. Next, you can also have people who are big data specialists. These are people who focus on computer science and mathematics. And they may do machine learning algorithms as a way of processing very large amounts of data. And they often create what are called data products. So a thing that tells you what restaurant to go to or that says you might know these friends or provides ways of linking up photos, those are data products. And those often involve a huge amount of very technical work behind them. There are also researchers. These are people who focus on domain specific research. So for instance, physics or genetics or whatever. And these people tend to have very strong statistics. And they can use some of the procedures and some of the data that comes from the other people like the big data researchers. But they focus on the specific questions. Also, in the data science realm, you'll find analysts, these are people who focus on the day to day tasks of running a business. So for instance, they might do web analytics like Google Analytics, or they might pull data from a SQL database. And this information is very important and good for business. And so analysts are key to the day to day functioning of business. But you know, they may not exactly be data science proper, because most of the data they're working with is going to be pretty structured. Nevertheless, they play a critical role in business in general. And then speaking of business, you have the actual business people, the men and women who organize and run businesses. These people need to be able to frame business relevant questions that can be answered with the data. Also, the business person manages the project and the efforts and the resources of others. And while they may not actually be doing the coding, they must speak data, they must know how the data works, what it can answer, and how to implement it. You can also have entrepreneurs. So you might have, for instance, a data startup, they're starting their own little social network of their own little web search platform. An entrepreneur needs data and business skills. And truthfully, they have to be creative at every step along the way, usually because they're doing it all themselves at a smaller scale. Then we have in data science something known as the full stack unicorn. And this is a person who can do everything at an expert level. And they're called a unicorn because truthfully, they may not actually exist. I'll have more to say about that later. But for right now, we can sum up what we got out of this video by three things. Number one, data science is diverse. There's a lot of different people who go into it. And they have different goals for their work, and they bring in different skills and different experiences and different approaches. Also, they tend to work in very different contexts. An entrepreneur works in a very different place from a business manager works in a very different place from an academic researcher. But all of them are connected in some way to data science and make it a richer field.


Ladies and gentlemen, please welcome the executive director of the Presidio Trust and our host sponsor, Craig Middleton. You guys look beautiful out there. Colors, blue, red, white, green, gray. You just look terrific. I want to welcome you on behalf of the Presidio Trust and our esteemed chairman, Nancy Bechtel over here and our former, in fact, founding chairman, Toby Rosenblatt over here of the Presidio Trust. I want to all welcome you to the Presidio today. Thank you for being here. Thank you, Governor Brown, for being here today. We're very honored to have you. And thanks to all of you for your service to our communities and your service to our country. Thank you to Karen Baker, our Chief Service Officer of the State of California. Give her a round of applause. And thank you to all the staff people, Karen staff, everybody who has worked here so hard over the last few days to make this event possible. You deserve a round of applause as well. Thank you. Particularly pleased to welcome you to the Presidio because for 238 years, the Presidio has been a place of service. It has stood for something. It has been a place of service to something greater than oneself. Service is the thread that ties all of the generations of the Presidio together through three different nations and a number of different communities all tied together through this idea of serving something greater than oneself. No one can claim to this idea of service, this ideal of service that you're all here to celebrate today. It is an enduring idea. It's something that's made manifest every day by the work that you do. So I am really proud of AmeriCorps. Thank you, AmeriCorps. I'm really proud of what you've done here at the Presidio and I'm really proud of what you've done in the Bay Area and in the state and in the country. You are terrific. You are awesome. Thank you so much. So service is the Presidio's cultural legacy. Service is our grand tradition here. So we are so honored to have all of you here today to celebrate yourselves, celebrate 20 years, celebrate service, celebrate that whole ideal. Give yourselves another hand. And when we raise the flag, think of it as a salute to all of you. Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, please welcome the Oakland Military Institute for the Raising of the Flag and Natalia Loken for the singing of our national anthem. Please welcome the Chief Service Officer for the State of California, Karen Baker. Well, good morning. Well, there is absolutely nothing more inspiring to me than seeing a sea of AmeriCorps members passionate about getting to work in their communities. Am I right? Governor, just so you know, we have over 1,000 AmeriCorps members here today. But they are only one-tenth of the Californians who are going to work this year alone. That's mind-boggling. There's 10,000 of you each year that are going out and serving in California communities. We are here to celebrate the past 20 years of our work to swear in these men and women and to hear about what's to come. But none of this today would have been possible without the support that we've received. I want to thank the Corporation for National and Community Service, our federal funder, AmeriCorps National Civilian Community Corps. Let's hear it. Go in. Triple C. Our funder, Bank of America, is the number one investor of service initiatives in California. And Janet Lampkin is an amazing leader who really needs to hear your gratitude. AT&T. Kathy McKim is not only a supporter. She is our 20th event chair. And I'd like to thank both Kathy and her vice chair, Clara Chu, for their efforts about making today such a special one. If they could please stand. The Presidio Trust which has provided us with this beautiful campus at the Presidio Institute where we will be celebrating and conducting over 42 service projects today. In the areas of education, the environment, we're going to be building drought tool kits and sending them to Central California. We're going to be building homeless veteran comfort kits. And I really also want to thank Secretary Peter Gravitt from CDVA who is here today joining us for that project. Peter, if you could stand. I will say none of those projects would have been possible unless HP was behind us, Blue Shield of California, Bank of America, and Kaiser Permanente. Thank you all to our service day project sponsors. Erin Mark, Deloitte, you're always there with your sponsorship support. Thank you. And then we have these companies who they get volunteerism. They gave pro bono, amazing services, a special thank you to three fold communications and trapeze who did a beautiful job on the video you'll be seeing. Volunteer match that got you all connected to the service projects you're going to be doing. And Home Depot who provided not only today's drought tool kit supplies, but a total of over 300,000 tool kits that are going to be assembled in the state. Thank you to all of our pro bono sponsors. You know, events like this just don't happen without a lot of hard work. We got to thank that 20th anniversary committee. If you could wave your hands. Thank you. And of course, we have the best and most amazing California Volunteers Commission appointed by the governor. If you could please stand. These guys are working it year round to promote service. Thank you so much. We have about 42 nonprofits and public entities that are our partners. Could they please stand. These are the folks, the executive directors, the individuals who run programs. Yeah, they're kind of shy. They're like, yeah, I need you to stand. And the last shout out is to the 20 service trailblazers earlier today at a beautiful breakfast hosted by AT&T. We really celebrated the 20 people that helped create and shape and support service here in our state. They're in that poster that you have as part of your program. We don't like to waste paper, but we gave you a little poster. That's a history lesson, and they tell you the legacy and the role that they played if they could please stand. An outstanding group of individuals. Now earlier today, there was another swearing in on the east coast in a little house that's painted white. There was apparently some important people present in the United States. You know, Bill Clinton and some other very impressive guests, but they didn't have who we have. We have the founder of the modern service movement, California Governor Jerry Brown is in the house. We have him. They don't have him. And we have him all the time. It's so wonderful. You know, I hope you take a moment today to look at these impact pillars. At the base of these pillars, you will be able to see some snapshots of just what's gotten done in the four areas of impact where we do our work. You know, when you can help over 4,000 vets in just one year of service, you're doing something amazing. When you can tutor over 10,000 children so that they graduate on time, you're doing something right. When you can plant trees and do the critical conservation work our state needs, you're making a difference. And when you have over five applicants on average for every AmeriCorps position, you're creating a service opportunity that people are so hungry for. So let's talk about the future. You ready? I said, are you ready? Okay. We're going to grow service in California. We need to ensure that more people who want to do more and who want to serve can do so. We need the resolve that growing our civic force here in California, people who want to make this place a better place, you know, is something that we're willing to invest in. Our one very exciting step in this direction is a brand new commitment that I just have to let you know about that AT&T has made. They have come up with a coding challenge. We are going to connect the over 116,000 AmeriCorps alums that are out there, if you can believe it, okay? In our state so that they can continue to work together on the issues that they care about and help us grow this service movement. Let's hear it for AT&T. We will continue to lead the nation in service where the number one state in service will continue to be the number one. Today is just one of many steps we're going to take to make the Golden State shine even brighter. Thank you so much for all that you do. Service is a calling, often rising or starting from a single and simple beat. It moves you to do something, to connect, to serve others, to have an impact on your community. The rhythm of service changes us for the better. It becomes a movement and by working together side by side we can all make a difference. Do you hear the drumbeat? Today is a huge day in our history. We're here today to celebrate the foundation that we were built upon and thanks to Governor Brown who started the California Conservation Corps. You have AmeriCorps that was started 20 years ago. There were a lot of visionary people who had an idea to work with states and local organizations in a whole different way. And we created AmeriCorps which is an amazing avenue for communities to be able to get involved in serving on the issues that they care about. In the healthcare arena, in human needs, in the education arena, in the environment and also public safety. AmeriCorps is a key strategy that helps mayors engage their citizens in solving our city's toughest problems. Service is critical to the strength of our communities, meeting community needs, transforming lives. Today we're also honoring 20 service trailblazers. These are the people that created, supported, shaped everything that we are throughout California over the last 20 years. Trailblazer really means charting new territory, trying new things, being willing to innovate, being willing to keep trying. When I think of trailblazer, I think of somebody out there beating the path. Service to others no matter what the conditions. Not only giving back to the community but becoming stronger leaders themselves. It's really been just an honor to be part of this movement. I think what we're seeing in communities throughout California is obviously really challenging times, especially for our local governments as they really struggle with meeting the needs of their community. Government can't do it alone. We need the private sector, the public sector to invest together. More companies need to understand. We need them involved. Communities are ready for the solutions. We've got great strong nonprofits that are ready to host more AmeriCorps members. We have the people lining up five applications for every position. There's virtually an endless amount of important conservation work to do, so we need to get everyone involved. Partners working together are stronger, but the most important piece is the future and looking toward what's next. At AT&T we're all about innovation. The coding challenge is an online competition where we will have someone invent an application that will connect almost 100,000 AmeriCorps alumni across California. Imagine the possibilities if we're all connected and we can grow the service movement together. It's really exciting to think about just what we could tackle, what issues we could make a difference in if we put AmeriCorps to work. If we had the resources we needed, we could change the world. And 1,000 new people being sworn in is an amazing accomplishment. We are so thrilled about this moment. We've got people here today, some for their very first day as a part of AmeriCorps who are going to be sworn in. I think it takes a very special kind of person to want to serve their community. Our generation is excited about helping people. Young people are able to contribute to this environment that they're going to inherit. They don't get paid a lot. It's a tough job. Life begins at the end of your comfort zone.  Please welcome California Volunteers Commission Chair Rita Holliday. Our next speaker burst onto the movie landscape with his role as Richie Valence in La Bamba. He appeared in notable films such as Stand and Deliver, Courage Under Fire, and has played the role of the critically acclaimed A&E series, Longmire, since 2012. More importantly, he has been an active in many social and humanitarian causes within the Filipino-American and Native American communities, and in 1993 received the Oxfam American Award for his dedication toward ending world hunger. Ladies and gentlemen, and be still my heart, please give a warm welcome to actor, activist, humanitarian, and philanthropist, Mr. L- Wow, thank you Rita. I gotta follow that. Good morning. It is absolutely an honor to be here with America Core this morning. It's so great to look out at all these beautiful smiling faces. I'm assuming that's because you're all here voluntarily. These are the jokes, folks. These are the jokes. I'll take groans. It's okay. I don't mind. Real quick, I'd like to make a quick shout out to my dear friend Ted Benito who brought me here today. Karen, thank you so much for having me. I am also this year's national spokesperson for the veterans of foreign wars. I always want to shout out to my brothers and sisters in the military and in uniform. When you talk about service, these are young men and women who answered the call of duty and put themselves in harm's way to protect our way of life, so I always remember them. I am incredibly proud to look out and see the diversity in this crowd today. It kind of reminds me not only of my film career, but certainly my career in the service sector. I've always kind of lived by the UPS motto, what can Brown do for you? Governor, you're more than welcome to use that, but you might want to check with UPS. They might sue you. It is my belief in this country, in this society, that there is a pendulum that measures public interest in issues other than their own immediate needs. Now, that pendulum swings from apathy to action, and in the middle there is complacency. Obviously, we do not want apathy or complacency. What we need is action. I look out at this group today and I am heartened. You give me hope because I think the pendulum is on an upswing. We are taking action. We are making a difference in our communities. Every single one of you is representative of your individual community and the overall community of America and the world.   You are leading by example, and your example is contagious.  I've done a lot of work with Native American communities. As Rita said, I was just adopted into the Cheyenne Nation on the lame-deer reservation in Montana. I'm very proud of that. One of my longtime friends, Thomas Onewolf, has a saying. He used to call celebrities, because for some reason people listen to us. I don't know why. But he used to call us thunder voices, because what we said would go far beyond the horizon, far beyond our own sphere of influence and touch the lives of people we would never meet. And so we must be careful about what comes out of our mouths. You are thunder voices, those of you today who are starting your career with AmeriCorps. What you do and what you say, your actions will go beyond the horizon. They will touch and change the lives of people you may never meet. But you are creating this karma. You are creating this goodwill throughout the universe that will continue and will grow and will make a difference in this world and our country.  I used to be a young gun. With over 116,000 AmeriCorps members having served in California, it is difficult to pick just one person to tell their story. However, in the case of our next speaker, she is someone whose story tells us the full circle benefit of national service. It is my privilege to introduce to you Angela De Los Santos, an inspirational AmeriCorps alum member with a compelling story. Good morning. From as long as I can remember, I've always wanted to help others.  At one point in my life, my children and I ended up homeless having to sleep on the streets. That was tough and things got pretty tough sometimes. One day I was approached by an outreach worker who offered me a transitional housing opportunity at the Midnight Missions Family Housing Program. All I heard was mission and thought, no. But after some time, I decided that I had had enough and I reached out to him and told him I'm ready. My family lived at the Midnight Mission where we eventually stabilized and became one of their success stories. It was there that I learned of the AmeriCorps Hope for the Homeless program in effort to have formerly homeless people reach out to people on the streets and connect them to critical services. I was asked to serve and I said yes. AmeriCorps taught me how to transform my passions and ideas in a service. They accepted me where I was and I learned to work with a team of people that shared the same goals and passions as I did. I learned that there's not just one right way. I learned unity. I felt like I was a part of something huge and I was. AmeriCorps opened a whole new path for my children and me and we started volunteering during our spare time. I can remember one Christmas when I went to help with the Christmas event for homeless families in downtown Los Angeles. As I went out the door, my then seven-year-old asked, where are you going, mommy? As I told him, he asked to come along. He never thought that he was leaving all his new presents behind. He too wanted to help others. In May of this year, that seven-year-old graduated from high school and applied to be an AmeriCorps member. And in his bio, he wrote that his inspiration comes from his mother. He says that I motivate him and I, what makes him want to serve and to make a difference in his community. Today, he's serving with public allies. Some leaders may be born leaders. However, through AmeriCorps, I learned to be a leader. Today, I'm the program manager of Hope for the Homeless and I oversee a team of 20 AmeriCorps members and together we strategize ways to make our community better. And I hope that as you are sworn in today and groomed as a leader, you too will see that you're a powerful example of how to serve. Please know that you too will be an inspiration to many. Thank you and best wishes on your new journey. Ladies and gentlemen, please welcome the President of Bank of America, California, Janet Lampkin. Good afternoon, good morning, everybody. This is so great to get up here to see this. As we are here today to celebrate the 20th anniversary of AmeriCorps here in California and throughout the country, it's really all about connecting individuals, families, and communities together through service. I want to start by thanking Secretary Karen Baker, who is an example to all of us. And I think that when President Kennedy had that encouragement to the nation that said, ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country, Karen was probably a toddler, but she was obviously listening carefully. So Karen, thank you for all you do for the state of California. And on behalf of the 40,000 employees of Bank of America and colleagues of mine here in California, it's my privilege to say thank you AmeriCorps and to the many AmeriCorps members here today, past and present, whose commitment over the last two decades has improved the lives of so many people, strengthened our communities, and inspired us all with your vision of power and grace, of helping other people. Congratulations to all of those here today. Hopefully you've got your backpacks on your back and on your seat from us that will help you go forward. When I stop and think about the work that AmeriCorps does, it's clear to me that government can't do this type of work alone, nor should it. It takes a collaboration between public, private, and non-profit to address those big issues successfully. And AmeriCorps is a very powerful example of this collaborative principle in action. We get that at Bank of America, and we stand up to that call. It's one of the reasons we're so drawn to this program. We approach others in a similar fashion. For example, we think it might be possible to eliminate the scourge of the AIDS epidemic in Africa in a single generation, and we've partnered with the Red Organization, and Bono, to raise millions of good dollars. It's that kind of unusual collaboration to take on these issues. Of course, it helps if you have a platform like ours that connects so many people to these issues. That's why I was drawn to last week's New York Times editorial celebrating the 20th anniversary of AmeriCorps. When they pointed out, and I quote, the demand to join AmeriCorps far exceeds the number of positions available, end quote. The Times credits AmeriCorps with enhancing not just the service that members provide in our communities, but also, and I quote again, the culture of service, end quote. That's because you, AmeriCorps recruits, are far more likely than the general population to continue to be engaged in your communities as a result of the experience you get with the Corps, and that's why this country needs maybe more than anything else you today. At the end of the day, it's not AmeriCorps, and it's not the private sector. It's you. You are the service, and on behalf of everybody, we want to thank you for what you will do for us and what you have done for us. Now, I want to give you just a brief glimpse, also, of the power of what goes on at AmeriCorps. This is a story of a 23-year-old AmeriCorps member serving with City Year Silicon Valley on the Bank of America team at Goose Elementary School. Last year, she worked with a third grade student named Jose. She found him disengaged, disrespectful. He was clearly slipping through the cracks. In fact, he was two grade levels behind his peers, but she also saw that he was full of potential. So she worked with Jose during and after school all those long hours that it takes, and she saw him come alive. His passion for science was palpable, and so one day he asked her if she would help him with the School of Science Fair. Well, together they created an incredible solar energy project that not only won the School of Science Fair, it went on to win the District Science Fair. By the end of the year, Jose was fully engaged and eager to come to school, and now he's jumped two levels in one semester. That AmeriCorps member is here today with us, Kayla Zamora. Kayla, please stand and let us thank you for your service. Kayla's story is a powerful one, and each of you are going to have your own stories to tell for generations, so thank you. And now it's my extreme pleasure to introduce California's Governor Jerry Brown, who we've all heard already today, really started this movement when he created the California Conservation Corps in his first tenure as governor. But if you all think about it, Governor Brown is a man who has dedicated his entire life to service and who throughout his long career has always championed the value of people serving. I think Governor Brown was echoing the President Kennedy act not speech when over a year ago, he told the graduating class at UC Berkeley, and I'm quoting Governor Brown, many have told you to get ready for the pressures of the marketplace.  Please welcome our Governor Jerry Brown. Thank you very much. This is a pretty exciting day, impressive group of people. You really are in a long tradition. It didn't start with Kennedy, it really started with Roosevelt in the Civilian Conservation Corps. That was during the Depression, things were really screwed up then. Although if you look around today, they're screwed up in a very different way. Things don't work in Washington. Europe is having its problems of stagnation. We've got issues with Russia and Asia, they've got problems. I mean, there's a lot of things you could be worried about. But the point is not to worry about stuff, but to do things and to get engaged as you are.  But where you can have an impact is right where you are and where you're working. In a neighborhood, on a block, in a service center, in a community. Because all the big stuff basically is built on top of little stuff, of individual people. Families, schools, neighborhoods, little businesses. It's all a big pyramid. And you're working at the base. And if the base is strong, then the entire structure will be enduring and sustainable. We are living in a point of throwaway, obsolescence, impermanence, and the whole notion of sustainability is an idea that is as crucial and as urgent as it is not fully embraced yet. Because a lot of stuff is made just to be passed on. We extract and we push it through the system, then we throw it away. And I see service as something in its essence as connecting people together. One human being or another human being working in a relationship that knits together the neighborhood and the community. So AmeriCorps is building on the California Conservation Corps. Yeah, watch those folks there. And the California Conservation Corps built on the Peace Corps and the Peace Corps built on the CCC, the Civilian Conservation Corps. The reason I named the California Conservation Corps I wanted that CCC to have the same initials as the original CCC. And even today, you can find trails and benches and murals that came from earlier service organizations. There's also something called the Works Project Administration. And they actually hired poets and painters and muralists. And they did stuff that exists even today. So really realize you're a part of a long and important movement of awareness and consciousness and solidarity. So with that, let's swear all you folks in so we can stop talking and get going. All right, what do you do? Stand up, yeah. I think I can handle this. All right. Do they raise their hand or anything? Okay, raise your right hand, folks. And repeat after me. I'll say the whole sentence. But can they remember it? All right. I will get things done for America to make our to make our people safer, smarter, and healthier. I'll bring Americans together to strengthen our communities. Face with apathy. I will take action. Face with conflict. I'll seek common ground. Face with adversity. I will persevere. I will carry this commitment with me this year and beyond. I'm an AmeriCorps member and I'll get stuff done. Congratulations. Let's go for it. Thank you so much, Governor Brown, for those inspiring words. Did we learn a little bit about our history? It's fabulous. Fabulous. I wish you could see what we see from this podium. It is just so inspiring. Now we're going to have a little bit of fun opportunity, which is to have a great barbecue reunion lunch. Are you ready? What we're going to do this is going to be really interesting. I got this worked out. What we're going to do is we're going to start. We're going to have you guys go to the wonderful food lines. If you look two buildings down, you're going to see a gentleman waving his hands with a red apron.  Those are your picnic blankets. Each picnic blanket seats about four to five people. Okay. The one thing I will tell you is after you get your meal, you'll find your blanket, have a sit-down, visit, just have fun before we do our service project at one o'clock, and we'll announce when those get started. The fun thing is there wasn't enough picnic blankets for everybody to get one, but you get to decide what's the blanket. You can do rock, paper, scissors. You can do what you need to do. I don't know why that meant something, but I'm glad it did. Use anything you want. That'll be part of the fun. We're going to start first and I would like our VIPs to please feel free to rise and they're on this section here. I need all other people to remain seated. They're going to be walking and following our great AmeriCorps ambassadors that you see in the gray scarves. They're there as your ushers, your escorts, answer any questions you might have, and they'll be taking groups this group first, then this middle section, and then this section. It's okay, guys. It's going to go real fast. Okay? After you enjoy your meal and I will let you know there's going to be three places where you sit. The VIP section is the lower part of the field. Then there's AmeriCorps programs with the letters A through C. Okay? So if you're A through C, regardless of when you go through the food line, where you sit, be sure you sit in the section C and then there's D through Z. Yeah, for some reason there's a lot of AmeriCorps programs that have A through C as their first letters. So that's why it works out that way. So we have about 1,500 of you eating today and we're ready for it. This is going to be awesome.  Okay? So they're going to go out there with the name of your program and just own it. Okay? So now you're going to be reserved. You don't have to worry about it. The one thing I remind you is to please take your Bank of America drawstring backpack. Hopefully you will very much enjoy that. Your program, if you would like to take that side so we have no littering, that would be really appreciated. And then at one o'clock you're going to be hearing an announcement letting you know about the service projects. Our drought project will be taking place on the black top behind the water stations which are on a cement sidewalk right next to the blankets. Okay? There's also going to be our veteran homeless veteran comfort toolkit project also back there. Our environmental service projects those participating environment you're going to be meeting with a group over here when it's time. Our education over here and then you're going to board buses in the case of some of those environment and all of those education. You're going to be taken to your sites to do your service and then we'll all meet back here between right around four o'clock. Okay? So you're going to want to take everything with you just to be safe. Sound good? Is there any questions from a group of a thousand people? I don't think so. Okay? It is my birthday, yes. Very much. Thank you. Gotta say I've never had a thousand people say it's your birthday to me. So thank you very much for that. That was very kind. So the first group is almost done. Do you see how fast that went? Okay? You're going to find this to be lovely. Okay? There's going to be music playing up here and also visuals of the swearing in that took place this morning. If you'd like to look at that. Enjoy you guys. You deserve it. Thank you.


Hello, my name is Roger Watson and I am the Editor-in-Chief of Nurse Education and Practice and that is published by Elsevier. In this session I want to give you some top tips to becoming a better academic writer. These tips are not specific to any particular kind of article or to any journal, they are general. Whenever I speak to people about writing for publication and offering them my advice, I always start at the same place. I always say, write for a specific journal. Have a journal in mind before you start and aim to write in that journal. Therefore you must read the guidelines for that journal and I would also advise you to take a look at some of the articles in the journal just to familiarise yourself with the way that people write for that journal, in other words what the editors want. Clearly if you submit to that journal and you happen to be rejected, which does happen, you will have to start again and find another journal and the process starts again. So always have a journal in mind, read the guidelines for that journal and familiarise yourself with the contents. When you're writing always have a plan in mind, not just a plan for the paper but a plan for your writing. The plan for the paper is that it should be organised and you should organise it under the headings and the subheadings given to you by the journal. They will give you a structure for each type of paper. Follow that structure. One really good thing that I always do is I create a document and put in all the headings that they give you with a page break and then I start filling in under those headings. You don't have to start at the beginning and work your way through to the end. You can start anywhere in the paper. I would also advise you to have in mind and keep telling yourself this is going to be a really good paper. Visualise yourself writing a great paper and don't make it mundane, don't make it ordinary, don't make it like other papers. Try to be clear that you have something to say and try to say it clearly and try to say it concisely. I would always advise people to write to a plan in terms of time. Now what I usually advise people to do is to have a certain number of words in mind to write either every day or every time you sit down to write. I actually find that half an hour at the beginning of the day may be shortening your lunch break or spending some time at your computer before you go home. Just short times, quality times often help you to progress your writing. Now when it comes to the actual writing, most academic writing or at least the best academic writing is concise. Try to use as few words as possible and try to convey your arguments as clearly and concisely as possible. Now this may not be something that you can do as you write. I would strongly advise you not to worry too much about the final product as you are writing.  Check the wording. Can you remove words? It's nearly always possible to remove words and to use even shorter words and more clear and concise words. Try to avoid using colloquialisms, everyday speech idioms. Try to avoid cliches at all costs. Try to use the active voice at all times. So avoid saying things like the researcher did. If you did it, say I did. If it's a team that you're writing with, we did. It's more direct, it's clear who did it and it uses fewer words. So try to use the active voice. Another good tip for writing particularly in English is to vary the sentence structure and the sentence length. Clearly you need sentences. They shouldn't be too long and they shouldn't really be too short and staccato. And then your sentences are organised into paragraphs of course. But in terms of sentences try to have some that are long and some that are short. If they're all very short it's difficult to read. If they're all too long it's very difficult to understand. And what I like to think about is that your sentence structure is really like gentle waves on water. In other words they should go up and down gently and help the person, give them a rhythm as they are reading through your manuscript. And do try not to make your paragraphs too long. A paragraph should gather together sentences that all refer to the same ideas. But there's an aesthetic aspect to paragraphs too. In other words if they're too long do try to find somewhere sensible to break them up. Avoid repeating things. If you've tell somebody something don't say it in exactly the same words again. So once you've written your manuscript and maybe of the required length it may be a little bit too long. But you should go through and edit it and also of course at the same time proofread it. Now it can be very hard to proofread your own writing. But try to put it away for a while. Maybe even for a day and go back to it. But if you find it really difficult to proofread your own writing and most of us leave errors in our own writing. Ask someone else to do it. And I always think it's a really good idea from the point of view of editing, from the point of view of readability, cutting downwards and proofreading to always give your writing to someone else to look at. Especially if you are an inexperienced writer.


Thank you. You can also follow along with the slides. I uploaded them to the internet. You can click on or go to Jim Birch, jimbr.ch slash Drupal dash meta dash tags. Okay, and today this is me. I'm an engineering manager at canopy studio. A couple modules, bootstrap paragraphs being the most popular today and talk about SEO starter. And I'm always hanging out in the Drupal SEO channel on the Drupal stack. Like I said, I work at canopy studios, we're a distributed digital agency that does Drupal and WordPress, and we're hiring if you are looking for a job. I'm speaking to you today from Cape Cod, Massachusetts, original home to the Nasset and Wampanoag people. And today we're going to talk about meta tags and social media and search engine strategy implementing in the Drupal. We're going to go over the tools. We're going to talk about content modeling, implementing some advanced scenarios, and then how to test. And if we have time, we can do some QA. So first up the tools. As I mentioned, the SEO starter. This is a configuration only module that I created after going through Ben Finkley as Drupal eight SEO book. It installs a suite of modules and gives you some default configuration to start your, your meta tag and your schema journey. And it installs meta tag token, then some sub modules of meta tag open graph and meta tag Twitter cards. It also installs the schema meta tag module and the schema website sub module. So what are these modules meta tag module provides a base for all meta tags. It provides sub modules that provide additional meta tagged types. And there the schema dot org meta tag module extends the meta tag module to implement schema dot org vocabularies as JSON LD instead of meta tags. And then it also has some modules to provide additional schemas. Here's what the meta tag module looks like at the top you have the base module, and then you have the sub modules that in the installed additional. Sub modules are very sweet, basically so if you want to install Pinterest or Twitter cards, you can do that if you have to verify a lot of sites like Yahoo, or Google Webmaster tools, you can install verification sub module. The schema dot org is even more advanced it has the base module and then it has additional sub modules for each schema that you need and this is going to come in handy when we talk about content modeling. The configuration that gets set is from Ben's wonderful book and you have these settings that you pull in in the meta tag has global settings. The global settings cascade down like cascading style streets CSS, the children of the parent meta tag setting inherits the settings unless it's overwritten. You fill in these meta tags using tokens and text. So you can specify just text like unsafe URL in the refer or English you from the US in the locale, or you can use tokens, which convert settings and field data into content from a Drupal site. The front page settings get inherited one under global. And we do a little bit more we add the same name here. We add what type of website it is for the open graph here on the left the og we can set some Twitter cards. Oops. And so on. The SEO starter module does not set the site logo, which is needed for the schema website at the bottom here. So you need to just hard code your site logos into this front page meta tag. The content settings. This is the default settings for every node every content on your site. So the SEO starter module assumes we have a body field on our node uses the node summary, and it also assumes we have a field called field image, like the default profile install profile that you will installs on article. So as you can see here it gets even more involved we're setting the title of the page, the image, the open graph image which Facebook uses in the open Twitter card image. There's some updated times and what Twitter card type we want. So this is where it gets even more detailed. So from there, let's go into the content modeling. We're going to do two things we're going to talk about social media first, and then we're going to talk about search engines and what they're looking for in our content model. So for our social media model. We want to find out if our clients or the website has a Facebook page or a Pinterest page or accounts, we can enable those sub modules and add their credentials in for those two platforms. If the organization has a Twitter account, you can also set that as their at Twitter name, and also their Twitter ID. And then if the authors of the site, if you have a blog or news authors, you can also set the author, Twitter and ID. And usually we do that by having a field on either the user node, or the author content type that has this data on it. So if you share the site, you can share the page on Twitter that had the organization's Twitter and the author's Twitter, they could both appear in the Twitter card. From the baseline, we set one meta description. And it's also used for the open graph for Facebook and the description for a Twitter card. But you could have two or three different ones you could set one for social media, the meta description for Google. You could set three different ones I could have a description for Twitter, I could have a description for Facebook LinkedIn Pinterest, and then I could have a description for search engines for Google. And you could do that for the title. Also, in the social media image. And this is what that look like so you could have, you know, on Google this is the incredible website of Jim Birch, but on Twitter I could throw in you should really follow at the Jim Birch on Twitter because he posts interesting things. You know, in Facebook you could have the open graph description say like, you have to click on this link or will I go gets it. So it's basically Twitter. Everybody else and then for the social media platforms. The open graph takes it. Slack actually pulls in whichever Twitter or open graph gets pulled first in the content, which I thought was pretty interesting. So for search engines. When we do our content modeling for our content types we also want to figure out how these content types figure into Google's search gallery. So this is a listing of all the rich features that they have in Google search results, which are, you know, events, articles, carousels fact check map listings. In the search gallery they actually present a detailed list of what schema dot org vocabularies they're looking for, and which fields or components in those vocabularies are required in which are recommended. So here I linked out to the article. The article basically has one requirement in that it's which type, you can have article news article or blog posting. And then there are recommended properties so you will, they recommend you have a title headline, they recommend you have an image, the date modified and date published. So we can easily take those fields from our content type and put it into the meta schema meta article type for events. It gets a lot more complicated. So this is a really long page I took three screenshots of it. They are required fields, the name, the start date and the location, and virtual is one of the locations now. And then there's dozens and dozens of types of recommended. So if you have events on your site, then you wanted to get your event listed on the search sidebar. This is how to do it. So which schemas are we talking about besides article and events. There are certain schemas that you can pretty much put on every website. So there's schemas for breadcrumbs to help Google navigate through your website. There's organization schemas. You can have the corporate contact, what the logo of the site is, what the social profiles are. So this is the, this page on the internet is the same as my organization. And then under the one that we installed by default with SEO starter, you can also specify the search action. So if your site has search, you can specify that. And then you get into content types. So there's about two dozen and every time I do a presentation like this, there seems to be another one. This year we've added home activities and COVID-19 announcements. We've added standard things like facts, QAs, recipe products, local businesses and job postings. These are all things that we make content type specific for on our site, and we can make schema.org vocabularies to go with it. So how do we implement. We're going to walk through just a simple one article. The schema.org article module. Yeah, looks like my slide didn't make it. Then you create a default. Sorry about this. There we go. And then, yeah, repeats. If I can get it to load one more time. So we're basically setting a default under content for the article, and then we're adding our schema.org article type in there. And sorry, that was a pretty impressive slide that is missing. So there's also a meta tag field. In addition to the defaults that we're setting, you can have a field on each content type where the content editors can override it. You can choose which forms appear. In on the right, you can see you're expanding basic tags advanced open graph. But it can be super overwhelming for administrators. So these forms get really, really long and have a ton of options and especially when you get into the schemas. You know, there could be hundreds of new fields on this form. The content administrators are likely to get overwhelmed. Additional forms on the node edit can be a performance issue. schema.org data should be the same as it is on the page. So these are all reasons why we recommend using field data instead of that actual form. What we do is we create fields in a field group on our node. So we have a teaser field, we have an image field, you know, we have any of those event data or open graph image if we wanted to separate ones. We create those fields like we did with any fields, and then we use the tokens to set the forms. This gives the administrators a really clean way to add the content, maintain it, only touch what they need to, without seeing those huge ugly forms. And then you don't need to use these fields in the node display. You can also just display it, disable them. So you can have that image that appears, you know, just for Facebook. And then, you know, not display it when you have it on the node. The teaser description is actually really good, you know, to set it for the meta description and then maybe use it for teaser views of the node all over the site. Some advanced scenarios that image that I just showed you, we create a preset an image just for social media. I've had some situations where the confident admins would upload these big, beautiful pictures and they're like 10 megs or 20 megs and they're just too big for Facebook or Twitter to render.  So we go in and we set, you know, the exact size that Facebook needs right now. Facebook is 12 is 1200 by 628 and Twitter is 1200 by 630. So we do a scale and reprop the image for that specific size. And then when you do this, you can also do super fun things like I'm using the image effects module and I can put a watermark on there, or you could do some other pre processing on this Facebook image that only the social media site scene, not your site. When you do this in the field tokens, you get this extra colon. You can also find the image style name. So in this case social image, and then you can also find the with the height, the mime type. And then you can also find the alt text of the image, which the social media sites have meta text for those two. Here's what that looks like. We have the meta info at the top the image the type the with the height and the alt, and then the processed image which gets cropped to fit and then my nice canopy watermark and the bottom left. A note about tokens on each of the image, the meta tag presets. You have this browse available token link which opens up the token browser. Anything with an arrow to the right can be unfurled and you can really drill down into the tokens to get deeper into the data that you need so you know from the node you go to the image fields, and then you can go to the, you know, image preset name and then you can create. Drupal comes with core meta tags that are not easily removed. There's no way to configure it. If you look at every Drupal site it says generator Drupal eight. I developed a really simple module called meta tag remove. I just keep it on GitHub until there's this one issue in the meta tag issue queue. It was working to remove this in the module. So this is just a install it has one hook or you can copy the hook and put it into your own custom module or theme and high identify CMS identify meta tags. What about token fallback. There are times when you want to be able to provide a fallback for certain tokens. So if they have an image field and nobody loads uploads anything for the image field. Nothing gets rendered there. But I found this wonderful guest just by Samuel Martinson, who is a super smart Drupal developer web developer that gives you the ability to put an or statement in there with two pipes. One is a fallback for these fields. So some scenarios are if you have a social media image and a hero image on the page. You know, it'll pick the first one it finds so if you have a hero a layout that has a hero image it's a huge beautiful image at the top. And the admins upload that then you don't need the social image, but if they want to upload a social image they can. So if it would be there. Another one is that node summary only appears on pages that have bodies. Body fields. So if you're using paragraphs, you know, you might have this paragraph you might have not have this paragraph so you might want to, you know, check where that summary is coming from. There's a meta tag issue about in the queue about this also and some smart people are working on it and maybe this will get into the issue q someday also. And then the last thing I wanted to talk about was testing. For the meta tags, the W3C has developer tools, the Twitter card validator in the Facebook sharing. gmail.org Google has a rich results test where you can test your schemas. For the schemas especially you need it to validate or you could actually do more harm than good getting your site into Google. And there's do more Bing has one Yandex has one. And there's another link to a structured data or linter. And that is my time. There's some more sessions coming up in 13 minutes, including two of my co workers, Marky and Donna. So thank you all for coming. And I'd be more than happy to answer any questions if anybody wants to stick around, or you can always find me on the Twitter or in the Drupal Slack, or on LinkedIn.


Hello and welcome to This Week in the City. Highlights brought to you from the Public Relations, Media and Marketing Department with the City of Columbia. I'm your host, Alicia Utsi. This week in the City, on Monday, City Council will hold a special called meeting at 9.30 a.m. They will also hold special call meetings on Tuesday, both at 12.30 p.m. and 2.00 p.m. For agenda items for any of these meetings, please visit our website at columbiasc.gov. On Wednesday, the Columbia Fire Department will hold a promotional ceremony for some of their firefighters. This ceremony will begin at 6 p.m. and it will be held at the Columbia Fire Department headquarters located at 1800 Laurel Street. This ceremony is open to the public. As we roll into the weekend, join us for the Fall Harvest Festival at Riverfront Park, starting at 12 p.m. and ending at 6 p.m. This event is family friendly and open to the public and it's also free. Come out and enjoy the Fall Festival at Riverfront Park this Saturday, starting at 12 and ending at 6 p.m. If you're looking for any other information regarding events, meetings and other activities this week, please visit our website at columbiasc.gov. Follow us on social media on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. And also, you can call our office at<PHONE_NUMBER>.


My son is eight years old and is autistic. He is a very slow learner, has trouble focusing and communicating with others. Do you think that the martial arts can help him? I absolutely think that martial arts can help him. Now, I'm not speaking from someone that has experienced with someone on the spectrum, but a lot of the students that came through the school were on the spectrum. On the varying degrees, you have very high functioning students and we had a few that were not very well functioning at all and there's a great degree of challenges among them, but I definitely saw a difference in most of them. I mean, what's your opinion that do you believe that martial arts can help him on the spectrum? Well, I have both of my girls are on the spectrum at some point. My oldest is very high functioning, but I absolutely totally agree with it. Now, I've tried, got my girls interested into martial arts many times and both of them are not interested in martial arts. They're interested into lies and different things, but the real trick from going through and dealing with all the different therapies and all the different ways to handle it is it depends on how your kid is and how your kid is on the spectrum. I think martial arts can help them, but one, you cannot force your kid to take martial arts. They have to have an interest in it, especially if they're on the spectrum because the worst thing to do is force, if you force someone into something that they're not ready for, even though you know it will benefit them, it can have the, you know, when they're on the spectrum, it can really have a more dramatic effect. It's much more, you know, the little setbacks can be dramatic.  It upsets you for, I think, but the end of class, it's over. For them, it can haunt them for months.  So you have to be careful. So you have to make sure that they have an interest in it. Also, too, is there's, you know, in our area, which we're lucky, there's a lot of people that actually will have just special classes that will be just for autistic kids that are martial arts or dancing or singing that are just them. And what's great about that, especially if your kids are a little bit lower on the spectrum as they kind of say, or not as high functioning, that way, they're surrounded by their peers. Now the thing, though, is also what's beneficial to that is if you have, let's say, if your kid's more on the higher spectrum and you go to a more high functioning, sorry, and you go to the place that where it's caters to it. It's actually good for them to see that, you know, there's other people out there that are struggling with issues that they can understand. And also, too, is your now inspiration for the other kids that they can say, hey, you know, this kid is doing something and, you know, he overcompensated or she overcompensated through their, you know, through their problems. And it's actually a big help because, you know, it doesn't matter what you say sometimes. It's what they see and they'll make connections and you'll say something 50 million times into, you know, into your blue in the face, and they'll just see one or the kid do the thing and they'd be like, oh, that's it. I get it. That's okay. All right. That's what you're supposed to do. And that's a huge thing. But the thing that actually I think that, I mean, like my oldest, which I'm dying to, a lot of times on the spectrum, they have what they have lack spatial awareness. Like, she walks into doors. She walks into walls. She just, she and, and having martial art to actually start to teach them to learn where they are in space and learn their body and where, because they actually even say that it's a sense to actually know where your hands, your feet are in space and actually have them actually learn to learn that is a huge help. So like one of the things we actually do with, with, with our girls was actually set up little obstacle courses in our house and we would have them run through the obstacle course to teach them. And I had tried to teach them martial arts and they learned it for a little while. But it's just not their interest. And actually, it's interesting because my youngest, she has a huge aggressive side to her. She's confused. Like I said, in her, the best way to describe it, it's kind of like she suffers, you know, for no apparent reason from post traumatic stress order. Like all of a sudden it just clicks off and she's just at the high end. But to have her a couple of times to teach from our charts, she actually feels safer with it. She actually feels in connection and more control. She doesn't feel as danger all the time. So the benefits, like I said, it helps everybody. I can't, I just, it's hardly suggested. I don't care if you're in a wheelchair or if you're six, you know, six years old or 60s years old, one legged, blind in a wheelchair. I think it has benefits to everybody. And then Tracy brought up to, she said, and this is a great segue here.  I wonder if it would help with the spectrum disorders. So if you're just coming into the chat now, we are partnered with the Hero Circle Kids Kicking Cancer. It's a fantastic program. They are an organization that teaches all over the world and what they do is they teach martial arts programs to children who are fighting cancer, sickle cell disease, organ transplants, whatever their ailments are, but they use the martial arts as a way to cope with their pain. They have a very, very, very high success rate with pain management where the kids don't need the medication. And it also helps them process emotional distress. They've seen an 80% decline in emotional distress for not just them, but their families, their siblings as well. So it's a fantastic program. We do have a donation button. We're trying to raise money for them. I've been talking to them for a while. They are an excellent, excellent program. And as far as, you know, using the martial arts for something, for something good and helping other people, I can't think of an organization that's better than this. So if you guys want to, there's a donate button on the side or any super chance to go towards that. But I think Tracy brings up an excellent point, though, if we can use the martial arts to teach kids the mental side of dealing with something as devastating as cancer and emotional distress and management, why can't that be applied to other conditions as well, whether it be a spectrum or any other disability? I mean, just to answer the question in general, I think absolutely the martial arts is a fantastic way or could be a fantastic solution for anyone on the spectrum to hopefully get some footing or some developmental skills or whatever they might need to kind of help break their barriers. Oh, yeah. I mean, there's no, to me, there's no doubt in my mind. If you, if you're, if your kid, you know, is on the spectrum, but shows any inkling into martial arts, I would highly invest into it, you know, and spend the time and spend the energy to get him into it, because it only is going to help him directly.  And martial art is, I think, excellent for them in that sense. But if your kids on the spectrum, don't just throw them in a martial art class. I just just don't do that, just, you know, unless they're ready for it.  Me with the instructor, too, tell them what the challenges are so they know what they're going in with and they can prepare themselves, too. Yeah, that, that actually is a huge recommendation. I, yeah, you can't be shy about it. You can't be like, oh, you know, I don't want to tell anyone when my kid is on the spectrum. Oh, you have to be, you know, straight up for this, my kids on the spectrum, you be, most people are willing to help you and help your kid out, but they need to know it's, it's when it's out of right, you know, you know, out of the norm that they're not used to it, that it becomes a huge problem.   They know what's going on, and they're not going to push them in the wrong way. That's a huge, huge, huge thing. For those who are interested, we did do an episode looking at a study that was done with the martial arts. They did a program where they tested executive function for kids that were on the spectrum before and after doing some martial arts classes, a series of classes, and they did find an elevated performance in the executive function. So, what we do is after we're done with the stream, I'm going to add that link down below in the description, because if you guys haven't seen that yet, I think it's a great study. And it's definitely one I want to come back to, because I think that could be a whole topic on itself. So, this clip is an excerpt from one of our recent Art of Wendojo live episodes in which we talked about the martial arts and whether or not they should be allowed or taught in the prison system.  Do you believe that the martial arts should be taught or should not be taught? We look at it from both angles. So, you tell me what you think. Should the martial arts be allowed in prison?


Hey everybody, welcome to The Waldoch Way. I'm Jessica. Today's video is going to be our May Amazon haul. The majority of what I bought this month, actually almost all of what I bought this month was for like our summer homeschool. If you would like to see our basic summer homeschool plans, I will link them up here. I just filmed a video on them so you can kind of see what we're going to be doing. And then other than that, there's a few things that I got from Mother's Day that Kevin bought on Amazon. So I wanted to share those too. So that's the majority of what this haul is going to be. So I'm going to go ahead and start with books first. I bought a set of books for Emily. I normally give her some sort of book series at the end of our homeschool year, kind of as our end of year, beginning of summer celebration. We normally do one and I like to give her a gift. So these are the books that I'm going to be giving her in hopes that she'll read them throughout the summer. I don't force her to read them. I just try to find a book series. I think she'll like and gift them to her at the end of the school year with a few other educational items and hope for the best. So the series that I picked up is Zoe's Zoo Rescue. The set that I got has 10 in them. It didn't say they had to be read in any particular order, but they looked really cute. We have the puzzled penguin, the lonely lion cub, the playful panda, the silky, yeah, silky seal pup. Sorry, you guys, that was a tongue twister. The eager elephant, the lucky snow leopard, which I guarantee you is gonna be the first one Emily reads. The pesky polar bear, the cuddly koala, the wild wolf pup, and the happy hippo. Now, just so you can kind of see, I will open these up in case your kiddo is about the same age and you wanna know what the reading level is in these. There are about 120 pages, looks like eight chapters and an occasional picture, maybe every eight to 10 pages. So, if you have a kiddo who loves zoo animals, that might be a series for you. Okay, I also picked up two more books that were made into movies for our summer plans. Now, I actually forgot to mention that in our summer plan video. We've done it every summer, so it's just such a habit that I forgot to mention it. We try to read anywhere between, I guess, three to six books that were made into movies. It's just something we love doing, so we read the books together as a family. Then we have like a big viewing party. I even have some free printables on a blog to propose to go with that, so I will link the blog posts in the description box in case you want to do the same thing. The two that I picked up, though, are because of Wendixie and then since we live in Florida, I thought hoot would be well a hoot. Sorry for the bad joke there, but I thought that one would be a really cool one because it has a lot to do with like the Everglades area. So, those are going to be what I am going to read aloud to Emily along with these three books. I'm not sure if she will want to read them independently, if I'll read them aloud, or if we'll do them for shared reading, but I signed her up for an out-school class with my girl, Mary, from Celebrated Book and Mary Hannah-Wilson, and Emily is absolutely love the book clubs that she's taken with her, so they're really fun, and this one is a summer fantasy, so the books were fantasy-based. So, one of the books is Magic Misfits, which we've already read, so that one was perfect. Another one is Tristan Punches a Hole in the Sky, so I'm going to go ahead and pick that one up. The third one is The Wizard of Wants, so I picked that one up too, and then the last, actually, this is the last one I have to show you, but it's the first one they're reading, and we've already started it, and it is Amari and the Night Brothers. So, we are really excited for that. She also offered a fiction, a graphic novel, and then the fantasy one we signed up for, so if you're interested in doing a summer book club, but you either can't do it because of whatever restrictions or you just don't want to do it yourself, they are some great options on out school because then they're just virtual, so it's a great way for Emily to be able to read the book and discuss it with other kids or other people, other than just me and Kevin. So, that's why we are doing that this summer. Okay, the other things that I have are things that we'll be using with our survival unit study, so in case you want to look inside that, and you want more details, I'll link that up here for you guys, but we are going to be doing that for the majority of the summer, and these are some of the suggested extras or suggested additional resources in the unit that I picked up. One of them was the Lonely Planet Kids Survival Guide. Then the Will You Survive? Foraging with Kids, which is 52 wild and free edibles to enjoy with your children. This just looked like fun. It just has all these different edibles that you can enjoy. You can, you know, where to find it, what its different names are, what you can do with it, serving suggestions, I just thought it would be a really fun one. And then another survival handbook as well. Now, of these two survival handbooks, actually of all of the survival handbooks that I found, this one is probably the most relevant for survival unit, so if you have the survival unit, the Lonely Planet Kids Practical Skills for Dangerous Situations, and I say that because in the table of contents, you are doing desert survival, mountain survival, forest survival, island survival, and tundra survival, which is a lot of the different things that you are experiencing in the survival unit, and then there's also some essential basic tips in the beginning. So if you are joining us and you're doing a survival unit study with us, based off of all of the handbooks I have seen so far with the exception of the Bear Girls ones because those are awesome, but if you're just looking for a general one, this would be my pick. And then the last thing I got, I actually bought this used because it's out of print, and I haven't even really looked in it yet to, I mean, I don't know all the pieces are there, but I don't know if it was even worth it yet, but I just really wanted it. And it is the worst case survival game. So it's, from what I can tell, it's just kind of like one of those player boards where you move around on the board and then it has what I think are like trivia questions. Let's see here, how to cross rapids.  If you think you can walk across, weigh yourself down with as many heavy stones as can fit in your pockets, et cetera. So it's just kind of basic survival, but there are a ton of different cards in here, like a ton. So I just thought it would be kind of fun to play as a family, but that being said, we are a trivia loving family. So if your family does not like trivia, then this is obviously not even worth looking for used. But if your family loves trivia and you like the survival technique, I think it's probably worth looking for used on like Amazon or eBay. But like I said, it's out of print, so you have to get it used. Okay, the next few things that I got are for our summer learning and you guys probably saw me mention this one in our summer plans video, which is the brain quest summer between grades three and four. I bought this one from Amazon. Then I found one, if you will recall, at Ollie's that was by Carson DeLosa and it's called the Summer Bridge. Then like the next day after I talked about both of those in the YouTube channel or the YouTube video here for summer plans, somebody messaged me and asked me if I had seen the Evan Moore's version of the summer between grades, which is this one, the daily summer activities. So I now have three different, these two I purchased from Amazon this month, the Evan Moore summer daily activities and the brain quest summer brain quest. And then I also have the bridge one. So I am going to be doing a flip through and my first opinions and impressions on all three of them. So stay tuned for that. I just kind of wanted to see all of the different ones and maybe be able to tell you guys which ones I thought were maybe the easier ones versus which ones were harder because the idea for me buying one of these one size fits all books was just kind of like, well this, I mean, because honestly in my opinion, all three are very different levels. So if that's a video that interests you, make sure you hit subscribe and that bell notification because it will be coming very soon, a look through all three of them because they are just different enough that hopefully me showing you guys will help you provide the intel that you need to pick the right one. All right, so then the last thing I got for the summer is for me for the summer and it is what your fourth grader needs to know. I love using these to help me plan our goals for the year. I use this along with the home learning year by year book which you guys have seen over and over and over on my channel but I didn't have fourth grade yet. So I went ahead and picked up fourth grade so that I could start planning our math and language arts goals for the upcoming school year. And then I also picked up the next two holidays that will be added to Holiday Fun around the world very soon and I wanted the books to go with them and so I have celebrations in my world Juneteenth and celebrations in my world Independence Day. So actually both of these along with hopefully the rest of the year will be added soon but I already have all of the books that I would need for the rest like for Halloween and Thanksgiving I already own all of those. So I just needed Juneteenth and Independence Day to finish off the rest of the year. Okay, and then the last few things I have are really for my mother's day gifts. So these were three books that I had in the cart that Kevin gave me on actual Mother's Day. That is The Girl on the Train by Paula Hawkins, Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn and The Last House Guest by Megan Miranda. Now in case you guys are new here this is the first time you are watching my channel I have recently discovered that I absolutely love psychological thrillers and so that is mostly what I am reading. Now Kevin did also give me an early Mother's Day gift. He picked me up those three books because he wanted to give me something on Mother's Day but we were on vacation a week or two before Mother's Day and he bought me a Kindle paper white with this case. I'm gonna go ahead and give you guys a review because a few of you know that I have it because I've posted on social media and you've asked. First and foremost, I never thought I would be somebody who owned an e-reader. It's not, I don't, something about the feel of a book about holding the book, about being able to see where you're at, flip the pages, dog ear the pages, I don't know what it is about it but it brings me so much joy, like sniffing the book, just everything about it, I love it. So I never thought I would like an e-reader but I asked you guys if you preferred hardback or paperback on Instagram and Facebook in a survey and so, so many of you told me in a message that it was the third secret option that I didn't offer and it was an e-reader. So of course that started a lot of discussion in my messages and my direct messages and many of you ended up selling me on it. You know, it's bright, you can read it in the sun, you can, this particular model is waterproof.  So he did and so I have had it now for I think about two to three weeks. I read with it at the beach, I've read with it here at the house and here is my initial reaction to it. I really did not expect to like it, but I love it. I love it because it's a really, really lightweight. I have literally only charged it once and it's still holding a charge. It is bright enough that I can read it in super bright Florida sun without even wearing sunglasses. I can dim it and read it in bed without bothering anybody without having to have like the book light hanging off my book. It's just been phenomenal. I will also link this case if you end up getting one and wanting one because a lot of people also told me I wanted a case that had the elastic hand grip in the middle because if you happen to look, a lot of them will be on one side. So it's made for like you to hold it with your right hand and it doesn't hold the same in the other hand. So I did a hunt until I found just a cheap, I think it was maybe $15, case that had the elastic band on the center. So it's the same, whether I'm holding it with my left hand or holding it with my right hand. Some of them don't even have those elastic bands. If you don't think you're gonna hold it like that, then don't worry about it. But I find it just convenient to make sure that it's not gonna like shift off your lap. So that's it. That is everything that I bought or that we, our family bought from Amazon in the month of May. I would love to know first, if you're a mama who has an e-reader, do you love it?  There's no way. I absolutely have to hold the book in my hand. Let me know in the comments down below because I would love to have that discussion continue there. And then let me know what else you guys purchased from Amazon in the month of May. I always like reading the comments and seeing what some of the things you guys are buying is.


Thank you for joining me for this episode of brutal battle beer break. I want to do something That I hope catches on quite a bit Want to talk about night caps, you know I don't know if people remember back in like 50s 60s probably before that who used to do night caps where before they're gonna Go to bed. They have a drink and relax and then go to bed so you see it in older movies all the time, but I Just took a shower. I'm in my pajamas, and I'm like Oh, this is a nightcap. I'm having a cap and hopefully this is a good nightcap. I've heard good things. This is white chocolate It's by the brewery out of Placentia, California. They just put orange County on the label, but it's Placentia specifically at sixteen point six percent alcohol by volume, and it is a Bourbon barrel each wheat wine with cocoa nibs and vanilla beans So there you have it white chocolate if you're familiar with the brewery and how they do their labels a lot of nerve very very similar So just different variations on it.  They do this kind of like shrink-wrapped ordeal Don't really matter to me that much. I'm fine with whatever I just want to make sure that this tastes good Pour that out Doing in high class You know nightcaps are high class.  So shout out to savor. It was an awesome event Um looks a little bit darker than I would assume a wheat wine to be but that's probably because of the Bourbon barrel aging We'll take on some of the you know caramel-y coloration of the oak the smoked or the scorched oak so Little orange-ish Ooh super aromatic See here's the thing I don't think I can smell that it's a wheat wine necessarily I guess if I really really try but the first thing it hits me big time are cocoa nibs It's like crazy cocoa nibs in there and then you have some nice vanilla beans in there But that's right under very very present caramel aspect. That's coming from the Bourbon barrel Smell some nice bourbon-y sweetness in there And you get a little bit of like an oakiness Smells so good. It smells so good feel a slight bit of a burn going down Coco nibs get a lot of the cocoa. I get a good amount of the vanilla It's actually coming off a little marshmallow wheat, which obviously is really good I'm assuming that's between the vanilla and the oak characteristics but this is Hmm nice bourbon sweetness in the flavor just like it was in the nose Yeah, I think this would qualify as a nice nightcap type beer high in ABB definitely a sipper 16.6% which I mean it kind of When you get me over like 12 You know unless it's something like 20 some I'm kind of like yeah, it's high So I'm guessing it tastes like 16.6 But a little bit of a burn that just kind of sits in the back of the throat not a bad thing It's just kind of warming and nice. This would be great on a cold night. It's not right now, but you know hey Anyway, thanks everyone for checking this out if you have the means ever To get some white chocolate check it out because this is nice probably the best we wine I've ever had I know there aren't a ton of we wines out there But the fact of the bourbon barrel aging the vanilla beans and the cocoa nibs really kick it up a whole lot I know a lot of people aren't huge on weed lines in general, but this is a really good way to make people get into it So anyway, thanks to the brewery. Thanks everyone for checking this out and go have yourself an awesome beer Have a nightcap