Linking American Indian Communities With Veteran Services

Linking American Indian Communities With Veteran Services Richard Downs I’m choosing to focus on helping to inform Minnesota American Indian Veterans on their opportunities for higher education and to help increase educational attainment rates, completion rates, and self-efficacy. I think it is important to raise awareness on the unique barriers faced by American Indian Veterans, especially those who live outside the metropolitan area or on reservations. Veterans are a very important part of American Indian communities. They are highly regarded, and honored in many different ways. Serving in the military is common and highly regarded in the American Indian community. â€Å"Native Americans have the highest record of service per capita when compared to other ethnic groups† (defense.gov). During powwows, veterans carrying eagle feather staffs, tribal flags, the American flag, as wells as flags representing all branches of the military are the first dancers in the arena. After the first Grand Entry song, a flag song is sung, which is comparable to the Star Spangled Banner, followed by a victory song honoring the veterans. At community events, veterans do not get their own meals; rather other community members serve them. There are benefits and services available to American Indian veterans. Currently, tribal veteran service officers visit reservations in Minnesota on a monthly basis. For example, in the Upper Sioux community, veterans learn about the visits via monthly newsletters. The veterans who attend enjoy a lunch, and the representative meets with them during this time about any concerns or needs they have. This also occurs in the Twin Cities urban area. These representatives are beneficial in that they connect American Indian veterans to services and resources that they might need. However, not everyone who is eligible takes advantages of these services. Veterans may be disconnected either by communication or location and therefore not be aware of these opportunities. They may live in rural areas, but not near their home reservation. Another barrier may be lack of information. They may hear about these services, but not know everything that is available and do not attend, because they think it may not be beneficial to them. Some veterans may be aware of these opportunities and want to utilize them, but not be able to attend, possibly due to lack of transportation or funds. Some reservations such as the Upper Sioux Community have transportation services available for its members, but not all reservations may be able to offer this. A combinatorial organization may be beneficial in linking American Indian communities with veteran services. This model has successfully worked in other areas. For example, the American Indian Cancer Foundation implements programming work to lower the burdens of cancer in American Indian communities. Many times, funding for these programs comes from grants from the government, such as the Centers for Disease Control. The CDC would be unable to implement programs directly to American Indian communities for many reasons, including knowledge of the communities and cultural competency, and lack of the trust in the government by Americans Indians. A linking organization, like AICAF, is necessary, because they have expertise working with and in American Indian communities, as well as extensive education and experience with public health. American Indians are more likely to participate in programs when they are familiar with the people implementing them and can relate to them. Using such a non-profit organization might be the answer to preventing American Indians from falling through the cracks and helping them to overcome life’s obstacles or barriers that cause them to either abstain from participating in educational degree programs or to complete them. In this approach to prevention, the purpose will be to devise a way to build collaborations between multi-cultural student departments, in conjunction with student-veteran offices at college/universities and link them directly to state and federal veteran liaisons or departments, while at the same time keeping in sync with the veteran’s community or tribal affiliation. Moreover, with suicide and substance abuse being major problems in the American Indian community, not to mention similar issues in the diverse aggregate veteran community, feelings of well-being will also likely increase as a result of such a program being successful. A combination of websites, both private and government, such as the United States Census Bureau, will be used to obtain statistics and some background information. A multitude of books will be used to better understand the mindset and culture of American Indians such as Fixico’s (2003), â€Å"The American Indian mind in a linear world: American Indian studies traditional knowledge†, whereas books like Bandura’s (1997) â€Å"Self-Efficacy: The Exercise of Control† will be used to understand veterans self-efficacy. The class’s text books will be used along with Kettner, Moroney, Martin’s (2008) Designing and Managing Programs: An Effectiveness-based approach.† Additionally, relevant material from peer reviewed journals will be introduced and used to support the research. References Bandura, A. (1997). Self-efficacy: The exercise of control. New York, NY: W. H. Freeman and Company. Barsh, R. L. (2001). American Mosaic: Social Conflict and Cultural Contract in the Twentieth Century. Journal of American Studies, 35(3), 371-411. Retrieved from http://www.jstor.org.ezproxy.metrostate.edu/stable/pdfplus/27557003.pdf Bureau of Labor Statistics US Department of Labor. (2014). The employment situation — December 2014. Retrieved from http://www.bls.gov/news.release/pdf/empsit.pdf Cohen, L., Chavez, V., Chehimi, S. (2010). Prevention is primary: Strategies for community well-being (2nd ed.). San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass Conyne, R. K. (2008). Prevention program development and evaluation: An incidence reduction, culturally relevant approach. Las Angeles, London, New Delhi, Singapore, Washington DC: Sage. Data.gov. (n.d.). Education. (2014). Retrieved from http://www.data.gov/education/ Data.gov. (n.d.). Inventory. (2014). Retrieved from https://inventory.data.gov/dataset/032e19b4-5a90-41dc-83ff-6e4cd234f565/resource/38625c3d-5388-4c16-a30f-d105432553a4 Fixico, D. L. (2003). The American Indian mind in a linear world: American Indian studies traditional knowledge. New York, NY: Routledge. Kettner, P. M., Moroney, R. M., Martin, L. L. (2008). Designing and managing programs: An effectiveness-based approach (3rd ed.). Las Angeles, London, New Delhi, Singapore: Sage. Minnesota Department of Veterans Affairs. (n.d.). Retrieved from http://www.minnesotaveteran.org http://www.mn.gov/mdva Minnesota Department of Veterans Affairs: Tribal Veterans Service Officers. (n.d.). Retrieved from http://www.mnveteranservice.org/maps/tvso/index.html National Congress of American Indians. (2014). Education. Retrieved from http://www.ncai.org/policy-issues/education-health-human-services/education National Native Veterans Association. (2011). The voice of the Native American Veteran. Retrieved from http://www.nnava.org/ Reyhner, J. Eder, J. (2004). American Indian education: A history. Norman, OK: University of Oklahoma Press. United States Census Bureau. (2014). Education. Retrieved from http://www.census.gov/geo/education/ United States Department of Veterans Affairs. (n.d.). Education and training. Retrieved from http://benefits.va.gov/gibill/school_resources.asp United States Department of Veterans Affairs. (2014). National Center for Veterans Analysis and Statistics. Retrieved from http://www.va.gov/vetdata/Report.asp U.S. Department of Defense. (n.d.). American Heritage Month: 20th Century Warriors: Native American Participation in the United States Military. Retrieved from http://www.defense.gov/specials/nativeamerican01/warrior.html Westermeyer J, Canive J, Thuras P, Thompson J, Crosby R, Garrard J. (2009). A Comparison of Substance Use Disorder Severity and Course in American Indian Male and Female Veterans.American Journal on Addictions, 18(1), 87-92. Retrieved from http://www.jstor.org.ezproxy.metrostate.edu/stable/pdfplus/27557003.pdf

A Lifetime of Perceived Reality :: Literary Analysis, Fitzgerald

Everyone has moments when you put up veils to either hide, or feel comfort in a situation. We all even sometimes focus on past events to aid our put-on-faces. It sounds natural to periodically take part in this, but imagine if you became so consumed with you illusioned face you took part in this for years on end. After a period of time you would no longer be able to tell your created image from your true image- So you’d turn to what you do know that can be altered just as your image, you would turn to past memories. You’d convince yourself that whatever you had in the past could easily be obtained in the present, which is not true (sp. 2). This is the situation of Jay Gatsby and Daisy Buchanan. Each of these characters from the story The Great Gatsby (F.Scott Fitzgerald) constantly put up facades, and when distinction between actuality and desire became meshed they became abnormal, and a sure price was to be paid for unwittingly turning to the past. Theses two char acters told a fact that’s to last a lifetime- putting up veils for too long, while living in a parallel universe and prior times will lead to your permanent extinction, eternally altered, or utterly lost when actuality apprehends you.(sp.3) Jay Gatsby, the torn man who envisioned himself into â€Å"James Gatz†, who at seventeen invented and transformed himself into Jay Gatsby† (Telgen 67). Gatsby was a man who hid under facades, lived for them sometimes blindly.(Sp.4) This Caused him to unconsciously process â€Å"double vision† -(Telgen65) Meaning he saw in two sets of eyes his uncontrolled natural ones, and his robotic cloaked ones.(sp.5) The Cloaked set (which he could control at this point) distracted him from the present state of Daisy. The realization that the girl he â€Å"loved† was not the golden image he perfected numerous times with memories of his constructed past. He failed to comprehend that he was only in love with the illusion he had created years ago. He allowed these memories to drive him and push him toward things he didn’t understand he could never have. Daisy’s faint crystal memories obsessively drove him â€Å"toward the green light† (Fitzge rald 13), in which nourished and protected the fragile, attained Daisy. Jay â€Å"Gatsby brought [a] House so that Daisy would be just across the bay† (Fitzgerald 147) .

Mass Effect Ending Controversy

In game shown Normandy fighting in the final battle to retake Earth from Reaper forces peephole not telling us why Joker retreated from the battle as the victory fleet continues to fight the Reapers. Leaving fans questioning if the only reason for it was to have the Normandy crash on a unknown world for a Adam and Eve illusion in one of the three endings in this case synthetic where Sheppard is given the choice to merge humanity with synthetic life to increase understanding and to prevent further wars.Also raises the question why the other crew members would abandon Sheppard so readily and everyone who was fighting to save the galaxy. 2. Beam me up Sheppard Members from your squad who were with you in the final run to the citadel suddenly appear out of the crashed Normandy with no explanation of how they got there. This is made worse as Gamers love interest for Sheppard suddenly emerges from the ship making gamers question further why they would abandon Sheppard after 2-3 games.No mo urning or empty grave for Sheppard. 3. Destruction of the Mass Relays In all the endings no matter what you pick or how high your Effective Military Strength Is the Mass Relays get destroyed. When in the Arrival DICE for Mass Effect it was established that destruction of a Mass Relay will completely obliterate a solar system. As shown on the galaxy map Sheppard would have killed billions of souls in the few seconds than the Reaper themselves would ever have. No matter the explosion it would have the same effect. 4.The Victory Fleet Stranded With the Mass Relays gone the entire fleet would be stranded at Earth which is made of thousands of ships and hundreds of different races. Which all of which would be orbiting a ruined and devastated Earth that might not be able to support its own people. While the Quarries and Turbans can't even eat human food. Supplies would run out would the fleet starve to death ? 5. Collected War Assets for What ? Fan's expected a suicide battle like Mass Ef fect g's ending only involving the entire galaxy.Also that the hours of gamely , Multilayer and Relationships that would have been repaired would have been shown in the final battle as none of the forces you collect are shown fighting during the take back of earth. Battle takes place same as space. With humans looking at a multi colored explosion surrounding Reaper forces. 6. No Closure At the end of Mass effect the game prompts you to buy more content and an insulting scene where a grandpa tells a story to a child and refers to our hero as â€Å"The Sheppard† .No closure on what happened to the people we cared about for five years except for the relationship which developed between Joker and DEED which started in Mass Effect 2. No scenes showing what happened to your character's friend or minor species also undoes some of these friendships as we don't see were telling stories of Sheppard which means hero. Or seeing tall on her homework rebuilding it all Were left teahouse is that there all stranding in the sol system. 7. Another Twist Ending?Players left no choice by developer instead going for a twist ending that is barely relevant to the story which offers no pay off . 8. The Final Revelation The God Child) After your hit by Harbingers beam things go off the rails. As you see both Anderson and The illusive man on the Citadel which player's would like an option to save Anderson and an option to convince the illusive man to stand down. It feels cheap to be introduced to the ultimate villain â€Å"the god child † as the true force your fighting against in the last few minutes of the trilogy.As he destroys the mysterious and lore with the reapers by saying Hess the one that created them and the reason for the creation was using circulatory logic saying the created will always rebel against the creator after you make peace teen the quarries and the get during a key part of the game disproving this. As this child says † without us synthetics w ould destroy all organics† when during the final scenes On Rancho the Get primes addresses Admiral Ran and says † your welcome to return to Rancho Admiral Ran with us. 9. Shepherd's Acceptance of the God Child's Bonkers logic Extended cut Good â€Å"Mass Effect 3 may have added a multilayer component, but many fans were interested in keeping their experience restricted to the single- player. That's why some were upset to learn that certain scenes (like Sheppard apparently surviving in the â€Å"destroy† ending) can only be seen by raising Galactic Readiness – something that can't be done through single-player missions. Teases been changed with the Extended Cut.According to Beware, your Effective Military Strength only needs to be about 3, 100 to see all of the scenes. As long as you're thorough in your solo efforts, you won't miss anything important at the end anymore. † Bad â€Å"One of the major complaints about the original endings is how all thr ee of them were basically the same, with just different colors for the beam shooting out of the Citadel. There's still mom of that going on here, even with the new endings.Many scenes are reused or only altered slightly from one ending to the next† ugly : The worst looking part of the new content is the series of AD art that appears in the red, green, and blue endings. They are supposed to depict friends and allies living their lives in the post-war world, but the static images feel odd and out-of- place considering the cinematic flair of every other major moment in the series. They aren't even in-game stills; they're more like concept art. I'm sure Beware has a reason for making the choice, but that doesn't change the fact hat a slideshows feels cheap and cheesy.

Conjugate the French Apercevoir (to catch sight of)

Conjugating the French verb  apercevoir  is a little more complicated than other verbs. This is because it is an irregular verb and does not follow the most common patterns for conjugation. Apercevoir  means to catch sight of or to foresee and it is one of the French verbs of sensation or perception. While this lesson may be a little difficult, its a good one to understand as you continue to expand your vocabulary. Conjugating the French Verb  Apercevoir Verb conjugations are important when learning French because they help a phrase make sense. When we conjugate, we change the ending of the verb to coincide with the subject pronoun and the tense. Without these special endings, your French would not be grammatically correct. Irregular verbs  like  apercevoir  pose a challenge to French students because they do not follow a typical pattern. However, the endings here also apply to the conjugations of other French verbs ending in  -cevoir. This includes  concevoir  (to conceive),  dà ©cevoir  (to disappoint),  percevoir  (to perceive), and  recevoir  (to receive). That said, you will probably have a more difficult time memorizing these verb conjugations. Yet, with enough practice, you will do just fine. Explore this chart and focus on the present and future tenses at first. The imperfect is not as important because you can often use the  passà © composà ©. For example, to say I foresee, you will say j aperà §ois. Subject Present Future Imperfect j aperois apercevrai apercevais tu aperois apercevras apercevais il aperoit apercevra apercevait nous apercevons apercevrons apercevions vous apercevez apercevrez aperceviez ils aperoivent apercevront apercevaient Apercevoirs Present Participle The  present participle  of  apercevoir  is  apercevant. The -​ant  ending is similar to the -ing we use in English. It can also act as an adjective, gerund, or noun if need be. The  Passà © Composà © of  Apercevoir In French, its very common to use the  passà © composà ©Ã‚  for the past tense. This makes the conjugation easier, because you only have to remember the past participle for the verb. In this case, that is  aperà §u. You also need to use an  auxiliary verb, which is avoir  in this case. When we put this together with the past participle, we can say I foresaw. In French, this is jai  aperà §u. The ai is the conjugate for  avoir. More Conjugations for  Apercevoir Its not like  apercevoir  isnt complicated enough, but we also have to add a few more conjugations into the mix. These are not as important, particularly the  passà © simple and imperfect subjunctive because these two are used in formal writing. However, you should be aware of them. You may use the subjunctive and conditional forms from time to time. The subjunctive is a verb mood that implies the uncertainty of the verb. The conditional means just that: the verb is dependent on the conditions.   In the case of  apercevoir, these two forms are actually quite useful. Given the nature of the word -- as a perception that is not necessarily tangible nor true -- you may find use for these conjugations in conversation. If you tend to skip other subjunctives and conditionals, consider spending some time on these. Subject Subjunctive Conditional Pass Simple Imperfect Subjunctive j aperoive apercevrais aperus aperusse tu aperoives apercevrais aperus aperusses il aperoive apercevrait aperut apert nous apercevions apercevrions apermes aperussions vous aperceviez apercevriez apertes aperussiez ils aperoivent apercevraient aperurent aperussent One last conjugation and were done with  apercevoir. This time, it is the imperative, which is another mood often used in short, direct commands or requests. In the imperative conjugation, you can forget about the pronoun as it is implied in the verb. Instead of saying nous  apercevons, you can simply say apercevons. Imperative (tu) aperois (nous) apercevons (vous) apercevez Another Verb for to Foresee You might have noticed that apercevoir  ends with  voir, which means to see. The prefix changes it to foresee, which is exactly what happens with  prà ©voir. You can look at  prà ©voir  as pre-seeing to remember the correlation. Because  apercevoir  and  prà ©voir  both mean to foresee, you can use the latter in the right context. The conjugations are very similar, so learning how to conjugate  prà ©voir  as well may not be a bad idea.