Saturday, April 26, 2014

Slime!





Freestyle rapping at the ampitheater!





Equestrian Club





Wednesday, April 16, 2014

Ron talks about Walking on the moon at #marylandday





Wednesday, February 26, 2014

Social Media Can Make One of the Hardest Time in Your Life Even Harder

If anything has defined the last 10 years or so, it might be the use of social media, especially amongst teens.
Credit: SheKnows.com
Facebook, Twitter, and other platforms have made billions off of teenage users, with nearly 90 percent of teens having tried social media.  










This can lead to some major problems

Teenage years are notoriously tough. Kids use this time to figure out who they are, and their self-images are fragile. Dr Jessica Vitak, who studies this topic at the University of Maryland, says that social media can make this even more stressful, because now, all the world can see (and judge). 





Bullying becomes much easier when the tormentor can hide behind a computer screen. (This is called the "Online Disinhibition Effect"). In fact, studies show that more than half of all teens and adolescents
 have been cyberbullied, and 14 percent have considered suicide. 

There are some important steps that parents can take 

Social media creates a tricky situation for parents. According to Vitak, they often fall into one of two traps:

  • They are too hands-on, either by heavily monitoring their child's social media activity, or banning them from it entirely. This tends to cause kids to feel even more isolated.
  • They ignore it, out of fear of angering their child. 


Vitak says that the best thing that a parent can do is to be available. 






By having open dialogue between kids and their parents, Vitak thinks that social media can be what it's supposed to be- a fun, healthy form of self-expression. 










Wednesday, February 19, 2014

Teen Social Media Use Has a Dramatic Effect on Self-Image

1. Teenage social media use is higher than ever before

2. They carefully manage their self-image, seeking out "friends" for validation

3. This makes an already confusing time even worse



1. Do you believe that the use of social media, in particular, can have a damaging psychological effect on a child, or is self-doubt and a lack of fitting in simply a part of growing up?

2. What are responsible steps that parents can take to combat the problems of social media? Should parents ban it entirely, or will this just make fitting in even more difficult?

Wednesday, February 12, 2014

UMD students use email alerts to find out about bad weather

The forecast for this week is scheduled to be nasty, with 5-10 inches of snow expected in the D.C suburbs. This has many Maryland students hoping for a day off. Most students use the campus alert system to stay on top of school closing.



The university sends both emails and text messages to students to keep them up to date. The system is also used to tell students about any crimes committed on campus.





The alert system has three main functions:
-Weather emergencies
-Safety emergencies
-Basic campus information


Tuesday, February 11, 2014

Monday, February 10, 2014

A unique soccer team





Kirsten on the lego movie





Wednesday, February 5, 2014

Adam Kuhn was pulling for Peyton, but watched the SB for a completely different reason





Adam talks Super Bowl





Story Pitches

1. Exploring how teenage use of social media effects  self perception/ how it makes this generation of young people different than ones in the past.

Expert:

Jason Farman
Assistant Professor
American Studies and Digital Cultures and Creativity


2. A profile of Jordan Tessler, a UMD student who created the widely-used weather forecasting service TerpWeather.
Expert:
Jordan Tessler