Ted Koppel

According to the Newsweek magazine "the smartest man in television", Ted Koppel is coming to Ball State University to speak tomorrow. I actually am pretty excited to see Koppel after doing a little research about him. I enjoy public speakers, because they are unique and have a special talent. I love listening to their story, and how they did what they did. Koppel has many accomplishments such as; winning 41 Emmy Awards, 11 George Foster Peabody Awards, 12 Alfred I. DuPont-Columbia University Awards, 10 Overseas Press Club Awards, 2 George Polk Awards and 2 Sigma Delta Chi Awards, the latter the highest honor bestowed for public service by the Society of Professional Journalists.
After reading a little bit on Koppel from The New York Times, NPR, and Faigely. My favorite piece that really left me thinking was “Breaking Point” from The Discovery Channel. It is really something how he can compared two completely different things and make people think twice about them. It does not seem right that a prisoner in California and a student at Harvard University, cost just about the same. This makes me think what is wrong with our country that we have prisons overfilling, while students are denied the education for financial reasoning. This statics really jumped out at me, “Designed to accommodate no more than 100,000 inmates, California’s prisons now hold 173,000, each at an annual cost of $43,000.” (“Koppel”). What needs to be done to change this static? How do we condense the overcrowded prisons, and why is Harvard so darn expensive?! =)

--Works Cited--

“Koppel.” T. Breaking Point. The Discovery Channel. 22 Feb. 2010.

“Waite.” C. Ted Koppel. The Museum of Broadcast Communications. 22 Feb. 2010. Web Image.

Winter Olympics

RINGED: Canada's Robert Fagan, right, leads Germany's David Speiser, Canada's Francois Boivin and Swizerland's Fabio Caduff during the men's snowboard cross quarterfinal at Cypress Mountain.
(Robert Gauthier / Los Angeles Times)


Everyone hears about the Olympics, but along with others, I too was not aware of many things. The Winter Olympics 2010 are being held in Vancouver, Canada from February 12-28. The sports that occur in the Winter Olympics are: alpine skiing, biathlon, bobsleigh, cross-country skiing, curling, figure skating, freestyle skiing, ice hockey, luge, nordie combined, short track speed skating, skeleton, ski jumping, snowboard, and speed skating. Before watching the Olympics, I had no clue what most of these sports were, and that they even existed. My Two favorite sports to watch are ice hockey and snowboarding. I enjoy watching hockey because I am a daddy’s little girl, and have watching many Blackhawks games with my father. I enjoy watching snowboarding because as of this winter it has becoming another of my many hobbies. I went snowboarding for the first time over break and had literally FALLEN in love. GO USA!

Current score of the Winter Olympics
First column are gold metals, second column silver metals, third column bronze metals and the last column total are the totals;

United States 5 3 6 14
Germany 3 4 3 10
France 2 1 4 7
Canada 2 3 1 6
Korea 3 2 0 5
Austria 1 2 2 5
Norway 1 2 2 5
Switzerland 3 0 1 4
China 2 1 1 4
Italy 0 1 3 4

--Works cited--
“Vancouver”. 18 Feb. 2010. Web.

Frog Baby

One of the most known pieces of Ball State University is Frog baby. This famous piece of art was sculpted by Edith Barretto Stevens Parsons. What is this artwork that everyone’s knows of, and why is famous? Frog Baby is a sculpture of a joyous little girl playfully holding a frog in each hand. Legend has it that Ball State students with final exams coming up, used to make a journey to the Ball State University Museum of Art to rub her nose for good luck. The statue was moved outdoors several years ago to stand in the center of a new fountain north of Bracken Library. The tradition took a more protective turn: students now make sure that Frog Baby is kept warm through this cold season and is given a scarf and hat. This is my favorite artwork on campus, and it is shown to most parents and students touring the campus. This fountain and sculpture is a great place to relax and take a break out of our hectic days and really appreciate this artwork. Sometimes I will take a special route to class just so I can pass this beautiful signature of my community, Ball State University.

S.T.A.N.D

During middle school, I was very involved in a club known as (STAND) Socially Together And Naturally Diverse. STAND works with students from diverse backgrounds to promote an appreciation of God's kingdom in its fullness. Through events, discussions, and fellowship, STAND offers opportunities for learning and celebration of the diversity in the body of Christ. Being a part of this group really showed me how people are special and different in their own ways. One project that I took part in was were schools from completely different diversities and cities came to shadow us at our school, and vise-versa. This allowed us to see the similarities and differences between the communities.

We also organized and made possible a few food drives in my school, and my community. A select few were given the opportunity to deliver the food to families in need. To see the smiles on these families face really touched my heart, and made me realizing you can make the community a better place by volunteering. This was a great club. I was so glad I was a part of this, and helped to make a difference in my community.