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Over the years, there has been a long debate about whether parents should implement curfews in their homes as a way to keep their children away from crime or harm, to keep order in the household. Although this is true, studies have shown that curfews aren’t as effective as people believe them to be.
Several studies have been conducted to determine if curfews are useful to cities and homes, and they showed they are not effective.According to the news outlet, WHYY, in 1976, Detroit implemented a curfew for children that lasted from 10 P.M to 9 A.M. A study done on this showed juvenile crime dropped by six percent, but mid afternoon crimes rose 13 percent. The news outlet, BrandonGaille, covered a study done in Monrovia, California, a city that had a daytime curfew. They discovered that crime rose by 53 percent during curfew hours, and it decreased by 12 percent while the curfew was suspended. I believe there is enough evidence that suggests that curfews do not automatically keep children safe from danger, but there have been results where curfews are useful in keeping kids safe. I am not discrediting curfews as being completely useless, but people need to understand their children can be in the middle of danger at anytime, and that’s reality. Curfews will not prevent children from staying out of trouble, as they can easily go looking for it before their set curfew time. Anyone can be kidnapped, go rob a store, or commit any other crime, and it can take place in the middle of the day. From my personal experiences, I can attest to this. I have witnessed several family members, teens, get arrested for vandalism or doing drugs, and they occurred before the sun goes down. Although there is enough information that suggests curfews are completely effective, it has been useful to a lot of families. There are many families who set curfew for their children, and it works like a charm. Parents should not give their children a curfew because they are ineffective and fail to show significant change in juvenile crime. The police should not be involved in the decision making whether a parent will assign a curfew. Parents and their children should come to agreement on set terms for when they are out of the house. Reporter: Andrew Camberos
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Video games have become a central focus on today's media captivating different people and age groups with reasons varying from the games visuals, story, soundtrack, or play style. Today games continue to become more influential in today's pop culture, with many people starting to make assumptions that video games are the cause of mass violence and domestic terrorism, although video games were made only made for entertainment purposes.
A game that has been heavily praised and criticized is the Mortal Kombat series, which introduced a new concept to the fighting game industry by inputting a certain command the player was able to perform a fatality, which were finishers used after defeating an opponent. With the popularity that the game received with fatalities, there were also criticisms from the American public and parents who were concerned over the belief that these fatalities were influencing their children into becoming more rebellious and violent. With the controversies behind the Mortal Kombat and other games for their use of video game violence, on September 16, 1994 the Entertainment Software Association, established the ESRB rating, which began to provide information to both consumers and parents about the games purchased, and began to separate video games by age groups with I.D.’s being needed in order to buy violent video games. Today games are being used as a scapegoat and also wrongfully coming back under fire, with shooter games such as the Call of Duty series being called out after the 2019 El Paso and Dayton shooting, by President Trump and politicians for being a driving “cause” of those events. In a press conference in the White House, President Trump implied that video games are the problem and the main cause for the shootings, with the former being “A culture that celebrates violence”. It is true that some video games are unnecessarily violent, and it might influence aggressive tendencies, with the American psychological association finding “consistent relation between violent video game use and increases in aggressive behavior, aggressive cognitions and aggressive affect''. Although video games may cause teens to be more prone to aggressive tendencies from it’s violent nature, it does not cause mass shootings, with shooters often being exposed to video games. What should be done instead is for people to acknowledge video games aren’t the problem, and should focus on different solutions to overcome shootings like improved background checks, the banning of assault rifles to the public and high capacity magazines, while also pinpointing the actual cause of these tragedies instead of a narrow minded view towards video games. Video games are being used as a convenient scapegoat, the longer it takes for people to realize it the longer it hinders any progress in finding any real solutions for mass violence in America. Reporter: Lorenzo Sevilla Standardized tests have been around since 1926 when the College Board introduced the Scholastic Assessment Test (SAT). Since the SAT was released, it has been a staple in the college admissions process, but there has been some controversy to this test recently. These recent controversies show that the SAT should no longer be needed as a means for college admission.
Starting in 2001, the University of California school system (UC) began to think of dissipating the need for SAT scores for admissions. College Board began to think of ways to keep the SAT requirement for UC schools and released the essay portion of the SAT in 2005. The essay portion of the SAT failed to produce the results they hoped for, and again the UC school system is thinking of eradicating the need for SAT scores. In fact, “Nearly 50 accredited colleges and universities that award bachelor’s degrees announced from September 2018 to September 2019 that they were dropping the admissions requirement for an SAT or ACT score” according to Robert A. Schaeffer, public education director of FairTest, in a Washington Post interview for the article “A Record Number of Colleges Drop SAT/ACT Admissions Requirement Amid Growing Disenchantment with Standardized Tests.” This has added to the 1,050 schools that have already done the same. In 2019, news broke that some high profile parents had been bribing school officials millions of dollars to forge SAT scores to get kids into college. One of these bribes was upwards up $6.5 million. This shows that the system is corrupt and needs to change to be fair to all, not matter their money situation. Dozens of parents and college coaches have been accused in the college admissions scandal, with many facing jail time, but they did it to provide a better future for their child. In the end, was it worth it? Students work hard everyday to get into their dream school, but are losing to people who can buy their way in. I worked with a woman who was a C student in highschool, but was able to get into Stanford University with her SAT score. The system is broken, especially with colleges getting rid of SAT requirements and the recent college admissions scandal. The need for standardized tests should be eliminated to provide the most fair college admissions process. Students should be looked at based on their excellence in school and extracurricular activities, not just one test. In order to have the most fair college admissions process, the SAT requirement for college admissions should be eliminated. Reporter: Myles Witte |
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