World History: Journal #5

Don't forget that you must type out (or copy and paste) the questions along with your answers. This is a MAJOR assignment that will have a big impact on your overall grade. Also a reminder about due dates:
Periods 2, 4, and 8--at the beginning of the period on Thursday, May 21
Periods 1, and 5--at the beginning of the period on Friday, May 22
Here is the 5th and final journal:
Schindler's List Journal #5

World History: Journals 3 & 4

Here are journals 3 and 4. Scroll down the page to find journals 1 & 2.

Schindler's List Journal #3
Schindler's List Journal #4

Remember, we're looking for carefully thought-out, thorough answers. You must type the questions and answers.

See Mr. Fong as soon as possible if you have any problems accessing the documents.

Check the Source!

We've talked before about how important it is to check our sources of information for accuracy. This article drives that idea home. The student said, "I am 100 percent convinced that if I hadn't come forward, that quote would have gone down in history as something Maurice Jarre said, instead of something I made up. It would have become another example where, once anything is printed enough times in the media without challenge, it becomes fact."

Irish student hoaxes world's media with fake quote

Irish student hoaxes world's media with florid but phony quote from dead French composer

Shawn Pogatchnik, Associated Press Writer
On Monday May 11, 2009, 12:07 pm EDT

DUBLIN (AP) -- When Dublin university student Shane Fitzgerald posted a poetic but phony quote on Wikipedia, he was testing how our globalized, increasingly Internet-dependent media was upholding accuracy and accountability in an age of instant news.

His report card: Wikipedia passed. Journalism flunked.

The sociology major's obituary-friendly quote -- which he added to the Wikipedia page of Maurice Jarre hours after the French composer's death March 28 -- flew straight on to dozens of U.S. blogs and newspaper Web sites in Britain, Australia and India. They used the fabricated material, Fitzgerald said, even though administrators at the free online encyclopedia twice caught the quote's lack of attribution and removed it.

A full month went by and nobody noticed the editorial fraud. So Fitzgerald told several media outlets they'd swallowed his baloney whole.

"I was really shocked at the results from the experiment," Fitzgerald, 22, said Monday in an interview a week after one newspaper at fault, The Guardian of Britain, became the first to admit its obituarist lifted material straight from Wikipedia.

"I am 100 percent convinced that if I hadn't come forward, that quote would have gone down in history as something Maurice Jarre said, instead of something I made up," he said. "It would have become another example where, once anything is printed enough times in the media without challenge, it becomes fact."

So far, The Guardian is the only publication to make a public mea culpa, while others have eliminated or amended their online obituaries without any reference to the original version -- or in a few cases, still are citing Fitzgerald's florid prose weeks after he pointed out its true origin.

"One could say my life itself has been one long soundtrack," Fitzgerald's fake Jarre quote read. "Music was my life, music brought me to life, and music is how I will be remembered long after I leave this life. When I die there will be a final waltz playing in my head that only I can hear."

Fitzgerald said one of his University College Dublin classes was exploring how quickly information was transmitted around the globe. His private concern was that, under pressure to produce news instantly, media outlets were increasingly relying on Internet sources -- none more ubiquitous than the publicly edited Wikipedia.

When he saw British 24-hour news channels reporting the death of the triple Oscar-winning composer, Fitzgerald sensed what he called "a golden opportunity" for an experiment on media use of Wikipedia.

He said it took him less than 15 minutes to fabricate and place a quote calculated to appeal to obituary writers without distorting Jarre's actual life experiences. He noted that the Wikipedia listing on Jarre did not have any other strong quotes.

If anything, Fitzgerald said, he expected newspapers to avoid his quote because it had no link to a source -- and even might trigger alarms as "too good to be true." But many blogs and several newspapers used the quotes at the start or finish of their obituaries.

He said the Guardian was the only publication to respond to him in detail and with remorse at its own editorial failing. Others, he said, treated him as a vandal who was solely to blame for their cut-and-paste content.

"The moral of this story is not that journalists should avoid Wikipedia, but that they shouldn't use information they find there if it can't be traced back to a reliable primary source," said the readers' editor at the Guardian, Siobhain Butterworth, in the May 4 column that revealed Fitzgerald as the quote author.

"It's worrying that the misinformation only came to light because the perpetrator of the deception emailed publishers to let them know what he'd done, and it's regrettable that he took nearly a month to do so," she wrote.

Fitzgerald said he had waited in part to test whether news organizations or the public would smoke out the quote's lack of provenance. He said he was troubled that none did.

And he warned that a truly malicious hoaxer could have evaded Wikipedia's own informal policing by getting a newspaper to pick up a false piece of information -- as happened when his quote made its first of three appearances -- and then use those newspaper reports as a credible footnote for the bogus quote.

"I didn't want to be devious," he said. "I just wanted to show how the 24-hour, minute-by-minute media were now taking material straight from Wikipedia because of the deadline pressure they're under."

It's All Good

Technical difficulties are fixed. Rather than waiting on our school district folks to fix my website, we're just going to find a way to post the journals without that site. I'm going to use Google Documents instead and post the journals there. So, click on the links below to read each journal and answer the questions. The formatting for Journal #1 is a little bit off, but you'll be able to read it just fine.

Schindler's List Journal #1
Schindler's List Journal #2

Technical Difficulties with Journals

Hey folks, I'm working out the kinks with my website. I've emailed the district technology head and should be hearing back soon. We'll get the journals up and available to you soon.

Reminders for UC Santa Cruz Trip

• Bring lunch and dinner or money for lunch and dinner

• Be sure you are in dress code.
• Bring a sweater/sweatshirt/jacket and wear comfortable shoes.
• On Wednesday, ask your period 1 teacher to excuse you at 8:50.
• Report to the faculty parking lot (flag pole area).
• Make sure someone is available to pick you up from the faculty parking lot at around 8:00pm.

U.S. History: Current Events--Voting Rights Act Still Needed?

We recently finished our Civil Rights unit in U.S. History and discussed the Voting Rights Act of 1965 along the way. This article discusses some of the continuing controversy over this decades-old court case. (from Reuters)

Left: Joseph Armstead, from the Baltimore city branch, holds a sign at the rally for the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People in front of the U.S. Supreme Court in Washington Wednesday, April 29, 2009, as the court was hearing arguments in a Voting Rights Act case. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)

Supreme Court conservatives criticize voting rights law

By James Vicini James Vicini Wed Apr 29, 3:56 pm ET

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – U.S. Supreme Court conservatives on Wednesday sharply criticized a central part of the 1965 Voting Rights Act that is aimed at more than a dozen states with a history of racial discrimination.

It is the second major race case heard by the justices after Barack Obama became the nation's first black president.

The justices seemed split along conservative and liberal lines in considering a provision applying to all or parts of 16 states, mostly in the South. It requires them to get federal government approval before changing their voting procedures.

Congress adopted the Voting Rights Act, an historic piece of U.S. civil rights legislation, to make it easier for millions of blacks and other minorities to exercise their right to vote.

Congress extended it in 2006 for 25 years, with then-President George W. Bush signing it into law.

Last week the justices considered whether race still can be used as a factor for job promotions and hirings, an issue that could affect millions of employers nationwide.

Opponents of the voting rights law argue that the protections for minority voters are no longer needed after more than 40 years of progress, and they cite Obama's election as evidence of how America has changed since 1965.

Defenders of the measure say minority voters still face discrimination in some local elections.

The legal challenge was brought by a Texas municipal utility district. It says it should be exempt from the law and that it should be struck down.

'GREAT DISPARITY IN TREATMENT'

The Supreme Court in four separate previous rulings has upheld the part of the law at issue in the case. But the court in recent years has become more conservative with the addition of Chief Justice John Roberts and Justice Samuel Alito.

Roberts questioned whether the law would continue for too long. "I mean, at some point, it begins to look like the idea is that this is going to go on forever," he said.

Alito asked why Congress did not extend the law to the entire country. He called it odd the law covered the Bronx section of New York City, but not other boroughs like Brooklyn and Queens.

Justice Anthony Kennedy, who often holds the decisive vote on the closely divided court, appeared troubled by the law.

Kennedy said defenders of the law have a "very substantial burden" in showing the continuing need for the "great disparity in treatment" between states that are covered and those that are not covered by the law.

Obama administration lawyer Neal Katyal argued the law should be upheld.

"After 16,000 pages of testimony, 21 different hearings over 10 months, Congress looked at the evidence and determined their work was not done," he said.

The court's liberals expressed support for the law.

"I don't understand ... how you can maintain as a basis for this suit that things have radically changed," Justice David Souter told an attorney who argued against the law.

Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg said Congress, in extending the law, referred to how discrimination in voting rights cases initially was blatant and overt, but now is more subtle and difficult to detect.

A ruling is expected by the end of June.

STAR Test Review Games

Here's a link to my STAR test review games from last year. Even though they are last year's games, they may just be that extra boost that carries you to the next level on the test. Good luck!

U.S. History: Current Events--Bakke in Action?

In U.S. History we've been reviewing landmark civil rights court cases in preparation for the state test. One of the cases we've discussed is the Regents of the University of California v. Bakke case where a Caucasian student, Allan Bakke, sued the UC system because he was denied admission to the medical school at UC Davis and claimed that it was because he was Caucasian.

The University of California recently revised their admissions policy with changes that will take effect in three years. Some in the Asian American community claim that the revisions will reduce the number of Asian Americans accepted to the UC system and that the intent of the changes is to increase the number of Caucasian entrants to UCs, which are comprised of 40%-50% Asian Americans in the cases of UCLA, UC Berkeley, UC San Diego, and UC Irvine.

New UC admissions policy angers Asian-Americans

By TERENCE CHEA, Associated Press Writer

Friday, April 24, 2009

(04-24) 16:32 PDT San Francisco (AP) --

A new admissions policy set to take effect at the University of California system in three years is raising fears among Asian-Americans that it will reduce their numbers on campus, where they account for 40 percent of all undergraduates.

University officials say the new standards — the biggest change in UC admissions since 1960 — are intended to widen the pool of high school applicants and make the process more fair.

But Asian-American advocates, parents and lawmakers are angrily calling on the university to rescind the policy, which will apply at all nine of the system's undergraduate campuses.

They point to a UC projection that the new standards would sharply reduce Asian-American admissions while resulting in little change for blacks and Hispanics, and a big gain for white students.

"I like to call it affirmative action for whites," said Ling-chi Wang, a retired professor at UC Berkeley. "I think it's extremely unfair to Asian-Americans on the one hand and underrepresented minorities on the other."

Asian-Americans are the single largest ethnic group among UC's 173,000 undergraduates. In 2008, they accounted for 40 percent at UCLA and 43 percent at UC Berkeley — the two most selective campuses in the UC system — as well as 50 percent at UC San Diego and 54 percent at UC Irvine.

Asian-Americans are about 12 percent of California's population and 4 percent of the U.S. population overall.

The new policy, approved unanimously by the UC Board of Regents in February, will greatly expand the applicant pool, eliminate the requirement that applicants take two SAT subject tests and reduce the number of students guaranteed admission based on grades and test scores alone. It takes effect for the freshman class of fall 2012.

Some opponents have charged that the university is trying to reduce Asian-American enrollment. Others say that may not be the intent, but it will be the result.

UC officials adamantly deny the intent is to increase racial diversity, and reject allegations the policy is an attempt to circumvent a 1996 voter-approved ban on affirmative action.

"The primary goal is fairness and eliminating barriers that seem unnecessary," UC President Mark Yudof said. "It means that if you're a parent out there, more of your sons' and daughters' files will be reviewed."

Yudof and other officials disputed the internal study that projected a drop of about 20 percent in Asian-American admissions, saying it is impossible to accurately predict the effects. "This is not Armageddon for Asian-American students," Yudof said.

At San Francisco's Lowell High School, one of the top public schools in the country, about 70 percent of the students are of Asian descent and more than 40 percent attend UC after graduation.

"If there are Asian-Americans who are qualified and don't get into UC because they're trying to increase diversity, then I think that's unfair," said 16-year-old junior Jessica Peng. "I think that UC is lowering its standards by doing that."

Doug Chan, who has a teenage son at Lowell, said: "Parents are very skeptical and suspicious that this is yet another attempt to move the goal posts or change the rules of the game for Asian college applicants."

One of the biggest changes is scrapping the requirement that applicants take two SAT subject tests. UC officials say the tests do little to predict who will succeed at UC, no other public university requires them, and many high-achieving students are disqualified because they do not take them.

The policy also widens the pool of candidates by allowing applications from all students who complete the required high school courses, take the main SAT or ACT exams and maintain a 3.0 grade-point average. Under the current policy, students have to rank in the top 12.5 percent of California high school graduates to be eligible.

Students still have to apply to individual campuses, where admissions officers are allowed to consider each applicants' grades, test scores, personal background, extracurricular activities and other factors but not race.

The policy is expected to increase competition for UC admission. This year the university turned away the largest number of students in years after it received a record number of applications and cut freshman enrollment because of the state's budget crisis.

"I'm getting all sorts of e-mails from parents, alumni and donors who are quite upset by the action UC took," said state Assemblyman Ted Lieu, chairman of the Legislature's 11-member Asian-American caucus.

http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2009/04/24/national/a131734D64.DTL

Jackie Chan: Cold Warrior?

The timing for this article couldn't be any better as we continue our unit on the Cold War and China's communist revolution. Story from the Associated Press.

Spokesman: Jackie Chan comments out of context (AP)

Source: AP Tue Apr 21, 2009, 1:55 am EDT

HONG KONG - Jackie Chan's comments that freedom may not be good for China were taken out of context, his spokesman said Tuesday, while Facebook users and Chinese scholars condemned the veteran actor on the Internet in a spreading backlash.

The 55-year-old star of the " Rush Hour " action films caused a huge uproar after he told a business forum on Saturday that it may not be good for authoritarian China to become a free society .

"I'm not sure if it's good to have freedom or not," Chan said Saturday, adding freedoms in his native Hong Kong and Taiwan made those societies "chaotic." Taiwan, which split from China in 1949, is democratic and Hong Kong , a separately ruled Chinese territory, enjoys some free elections.

"I'm gradually beginning to feel that we Chinese need to be controlled. If we're not being controlled, we'll just do what we want," he said.

Hong Kong and Taiwanese legislators lashed out at the comments, with some accusing Chan of insulting the Chinese race.

Solon So, the chief executive of Chan's company JC Group and his main spokesman, told The Associated Press in a phone interview Tuesday the actor was referring to freedom in the entertainment industry and not Chinese society at large.

Chan was speaking at a panel discussion about Asian entertainment industries and was asked to discuss movie censorship in China.

"Some people with ulterior motives deliberately misinterpreted what he was saying," So said.

Meanwhile, the public backlash against Chan grew.

A group of Chinese scholars published a letter on the Internet on Monday accusing Chan of "not understanding how precious freedom is," even though "free Hong Kong provided the conditions for you to become an international action star."

A Facebook group set up by Hong Kong users calling for Chan to be exiled to North Korea had drawn more than 2,600 members by Tuesday. The group also posted form letters urging Hong Kong's Baptist University and Academy for Performing Arts to strip Chan of honorary degrees they gave the actor.

The Hong Kong Tourism Board , for which Chan serves as an ambassador, had received 17 complaints as of Monday that his comments "hurt the image of Hong Kong and aren't reflective of Hong Kong people ," a publicist said. She declined to give her name because of company policy.

Opposition Taiwanese politicians on Monday demanded that the city government of Taipei strip Chan of his role as ambassador of the Deaf Olympic Games to be held in the Taiwanese capital in September.

World History: Warrant Out for Nazi War Criminal

In World History we've been talking about the rise of Adolf Hitler and the Holocaust. I mentioned that every once in a while you'll read about an older man being arrested for alleged crimes during World War II. Such is the case in the article below. This was published yesterday. (article from Yahoo News; photo--1992 picture of John Demjanjuk)

German arrest warrant for 'Ivan the Terrible' Nazi

by Francois Becker
Wed Mar 11, 2009 2:30 pm ET

BERLIN (AFP) – A German court on Wednesday issued an arrest warrant for John Demjanjuk, 88, the alleged Nazi war criminal "Ivan the Terrible" suspected of killing thousands of Jews in World War II death camps.

The Ukrainian-born Demjanjuk has lived in the United States since 1952 though he has already been tried in Israel for war crimes.

"The accused is currently still in the United States," a court official said in a statement released in Munich. "As soon as he arrives in Germany he will be questioned and tried."

Demjanjuk is now accused of taking part in the deaths of at least 29,000 Jews when he was a guard at the Sobibor Nazi concentration camp in what is now Poland from March until September 1943, the German prosecutor said in a statement.

The new German inquiry has been carried out by the Central Investigation Centre for Nazi Crimes.

Demjanjuk has been fighting notoriety since 1977 when former inmates at the Treblinka death camp identified Demjanjuk as "Ivan the Terrible" as part of a US Justice Department investigation.

He was extradited from the United States to Israel in 1986 and a court there sentenced him to death in 1988. He was released in August 1993 when the case collapsed after statements by former guards assembled by the Soviet KGB identified another man, Ivan Marchenko, as being "Ivan the Terrible".

Demjanjuk then returned to Cleveland, Ohio even though his US nationality had been taken from him for lying about his wartime activities. He has lived under near house arrest since his return and faced other investigations in the United States.

The case against him was revived in 1999 after new evidence emerged that he had worked as a guard at three other Nazi death camps.

US investigators brought together witness accounts which described how Demjanjuk was seen at Sobibor, kicking Jews or hitting them with his rifle butt to get them out of railway wagons more quickly.

Demjanjuk is still on a Simon Wiesenthal Center list of the most wanted Nazi war criminals still alive.

"My reaction is one of great joy and satisfaction and a sense that we are hopefully on the way to seeing justice being achieved in this very difficult and complex case," said Efraim Zuroff, director of the Simon Wiesenthal Centre in Jerusalem.

"Every victim of the Holocaust deserves that an effort be made to find and bring to justice those who turned them into victims," he said, adding: "There is no doubt that he's a Nazi war criminal."

A German justice ministry spokesman told a press conference that Germany now has two ways to pursue the case.

"Either Demjanjuk is expelled by the United States, he arrives in Germany and the arrest warrant is carried out," or an extradition request is made.

On Friday, Demjanjuk's wife Vera told the Bild daily that the couple "now only wanted to die in peace."

She said her husband "had already been condemned so often. He was on death row in Israel for six years."

Demjanjuk, who changed his first name from Ivan to John after emigrating to the United States in the 1950s, had moved to Cleveland, Ohio after the war to work as an auto mechanic.

U.S. History: The War, Up Close

On Monday the 9th, I'm going to be showing an excerpt from one of the defining films about the second world war. Ken Burns created The War, a very moving documentary about World War II and we'll be watching about 20 minutes from episode seven, entitled "A World Without War." We'll be viewing a portion about the atomic bomb.

U.S. History: The Civilian Conservation Corps

Recently in U.S. History we discussed Franklin Roosevelt's New Deal and the programs that were intended to jump-start the economy. One such program was the Civilian Conservation Corps.

I like to read different blogs and one that has a fashion slant to it is called A Continuous Lean. One of today's posts on that blog contains photographs from the Oregon State University archive of photos of the CCC. Click here to see some beautiful photographs of that program in action.

World History: World War I Review Games!

The World War I test is right around the corner--Friday February 27 for odd classes and Monday March 2 for even classes. Don't forget that I'm available to help you study on even days at lunch or ANYTIME by appointment.

Here are the review games that I mentioned in class. Remember that on the day of the test, the review sheet and the World War I map are due at the beginning of the period. It's a BIG day for your grade!
World War I Vocabulary Games
World War I Background/Causes Activity

U.S. History: Battle of Midway

In class on Thursday, we discussed the turning point in the Pacific Theater of World War II. I showed the class the National Geographic website about the battle and the sunken American ship the Yorktown. I had posted the website on the blog last year, so if you want to examine that site and my blog posting, click here.

U.S. History: Link to Quicktopic

(Image from lonesentry.com)

For my period 3 U.S. History class, here is the link to our Quicktopic discussion page. Be sure to follow all of the directions in my first message.

Best Universities in the World

(Above: Harvard University's Widener Library. Image from wikimedia.org)

Thought you might be interested in seeing how U.S. News and World Report ranked the world's top universities (not just American schools). Here's the list:
World's Best Colleges and Universities.

Thank you to BTSA teachers

Just wanted to send a shout-out to the teachers I got to work with this past week. I enjoyed helping you out with some new resources and I hope you found something useful!

World History: THE World War I Website

In World History, we're going to be making propaganda posters for different European countries. The site I use to show examples of authentic propaganda posters is found at www.firstworldwar.com. Clicking on the Propaganda Posters link takes you to these attractive pieces of history.

World History and U.S. History Review Games II

U.S. History Great Depression Review Game from the other day.
World History Review Game that I said I would post.
Play 'em!

World History & U.S. History: Review Games

Get rid of your XBox and Wii, history review games are here! Prepare for the final exam by studying and playing these games. For World History, there are fifteen terms and that amounts to fifteen test questions. Click on this link and the game will help you prep.

For U.S. History, the Great Depression game is one that will review key ideas from that unit. Play the game here.

U.S. History: Harlem Renaissance Resources

New York City is one of the favorite places I've visited. It's bustling and dynamic and our 1920s unit, which includes the Harlem Renaissance, highlights this ever-changing city landscape. Here are some of the resources that I'm using to teach through the unit. I searched the internet high and low to find great resources to share with you, but you can find them here with a simple click.

• Good, short overview of Manhattan and its unique neighborhoods with links to other boroughs
• Really cool interactive walking tour of historical Harlem Click on the map (may have an extra credit assignment related to this site soon--stay tuned).
• Claude McKay's poem If We Must Die Find poetry from other Harlem Renaissance figures (and other American poets) on that site by simply searching their name or the poem's name.

World History & U.S. History: Extra Credit Reminder

Don't forget that the optional extra credit assignment is due the day you come back to my class (even classes on Tuesday, January 6 and odd classes Wednesday January 7). Be sure to review my previous blog entries to see exactly what is required, then follow those directions carefully. Hope you enjoyed the movies. Remember, no late assignments will be accepted.

UPDATE: Showtimes and Dates for Benjamin Button and Valkyrie

Hope you all had a great Christmas today. Alright, I checked the show times and dates and I have a bit of a change. I am going to watch Benjamin Button at 10:45 am tomorrow, Friday December 26th as I'd been announcing in class. However, I'm going to change the Valkyrie date and show to Saturday, December 27th at 11:30 am. With family visiting from out of town, it's going to work out better for me to split it up over two days. Don't forget to follow the guidelines for the extra credit assignments. And remember, no late assignments will be accepted: they are due on Tuesday Jan. 6 or Wednesday Jan. 7 (depending on which day you have my class). Hope to see you at one of the showings!

World History Extra Credit Opportunity: Valkyrie

Over the winter holidays, in addition to the extra credit I'm offering to my U.S. History classes, I will also be offering an extra credit opportunity for my World History classes.

During the spring semester we will be studying World War II and the rise of Adolf Hitler. Valkyrie with Tom Cruise is based on the true story of an assassination attempt on Hitler and will open in theaters on Christmas Day.

To earn extra credit, you must:
1. Be in my World History class.
2. Watch the movie.
3. Write a summary of the story and detail key plot elements and convince me that you were paying attention.
4. Attach your original ticket stub to your summary.

This will be due the day you return from winter vacation (January 6 for even classes, January 7 for odd). No late assignments will be accepted.

Also, some of us will be watching it together on December 26th at the Sierra Vista theaters. Stay tuned to the blog for that showtime.

U.S. History Extra Credit Opportunity: The Curious Case of Benjamin Button

In my classes students may earn a few extra credit points from time to time during different activities (vocabulary games, review games, etc.). For the first time in years, I am offering an extra credit assignment worth a full...drum roll please...TEN points.

My U.S. History class is entering the 1920s and the American writer that is most often associated with the 1920s is F. Scott Fitzgerald. Most know him for his classic American novel The Great Gatsby among other works. He was also a writer of short stories, one of which is The Curious Case of Benjamin Button which is currently available by itself and in a Penguin edition that includes other Jazz Age stories. Here is what the back cover of that Penguin edition says about Benjamin Button and Fitzgerald's other short stories:

IN THE TITLE STORY, a baby born in 1860 begins life as an old man and proceeds to age backward. F. Scott Fizgerald hinted at this kind of inversion when he called his era “a generation grown up to find all Gods dead, all wars fought, all faiths in man shaken.” Perhaps nowhere in American fiction has this “Lost Generation” been more vividly preserved than in Fitzgerald’s short fiction. Spanning the early twentieth-century American landscape, this original collection captures, with Fitzgerald’s signature blend of enchantment and disillusionment, America during the Jazz Age.

On Christmas Day, the movie version of that story comes out and it stars Brad Pitt and Cate Blanchett. Here is the trailer:

To earn extra credit, you must:
1. Be in my U.S. History class (World History will have their own opportunity for extra credit; stay tuned to the blog).
2. Read the story in its entirety.
3. Watch the movie.
4. Write a summary of the story and compare and contrast the book and the movie.
5. Attach your original ticket stub to your summary.

DUE DATE
This will be due on the day you return to U.S. History after vacation, Wednesday January 7th. No late assignments will be accepted.

You might be thinking that this is a pricey venture. It doesn't have to be. First, thanks to Annie V. from my World History class, I found out that the story is available to read online for FREE. Follow THIS LINK to get there. As for the movie, if the price of a movie ticket is out of reach for you or your family, talk to me and we'll see if we can work something out.

You can also buy the story at the bookstore. I saw the Penguin edition pictured at the top of this blog post (and which, again, has other stories from Fitzgerald) at Borders for $13. You may also find that same collection in a previous edition entitled Jazz Age Stories. Borders also has just the Benjamin Button story for about $10.
I say why not get more stories from one of the greatest writers this country has produced for just three bucks more?

Also, I think it would be fun to go watch the movie together over the winter break. And no, you would not have to sit next to me; I realize that would ruin your social life forever.

Details to come.

Cheating and You

I came across this article today from the Associated Press. It discusses cheating and high school students and explains that the problem is getting worse. It also quotes Michael Josephson whose Character Counts material is used by our very own district and in our schools.

I hope that my students will use this information as a challenge to rise above what other high school students are doing and stand up to make the right choices.

Students lie, cheat, steal, but say they're good

By DAVID CRARY, AP National Writer David Crary, Ap National Writer – Sun Nov 30, 4:27 pm ET

NEW YORK – In the past year, 30 percent of U.S. high school students have stolen from a store and 64 percent have cheated on a test, according to a new, large-scale survey suggesting that Americans are too apathetic about ethical standards.

Educators reacting to the findings questioned any suggestion that today's young people are less honest than previous generations, but several agreed that intensified pressures are prompting many students to cut corners.

"The competition is greater, the pressures on kids have increased dramatically," said Mel Riddle of the National Association of Secondary School Principals. "They have opportunities their predecessors didn't have (to cheat). The temptation is greater."

The Josephson Institute, a Los Angeles-based ethics institute, surveyed 29,760 students at 100 randomly selected high schools nationwide, both public and private. All students in the selected schools were given the survey in class; their anonymity was assured.

Michael Josephson, the institute's founder and president, said he was most dismayed by the findings about theft. The survey found that 35 percent of boys and 26 percent of girls — 30 percent overall — acknowledged stealing from a store within the past year. One-fifth said they stole something from a friend; 23 percent said they stole something from a parent or other relative.

"What is the social cost of that — not to mention the implication for the next generation of mortgage brokers?" Josephson remarked in an interview. "In a society drenched with cynicism, young people can look at it and say 'Why shouldn't we? Everyone else does it.'"

Other findings from the survey:

_Cheating in school is rampant and getting worse. Sixty-four percent of students cheated on a test in the past year and 38 percent did so two or more times, up from 60 percent and 35 percent in a 2006 survey.

_Thirty-six percent said they used the Internet to plagiarize an assignment, up from 33 percent in 2004.

_Forty-two percent said they sometimes lie to save money — 49 percent of the boys and 36 percent of the girls.

Despite such responses, 93 percent of the students said they were satisfied with their personal ethics and character, and 77 percent affirmed that "when it comes to doing what is right, I am better than most people I know."

Nijmie Dzurinko, executive director of the Philadelphia Student Union, said the findings were not at all reflective of the inner-city students she works with as an advocate for better curriculum and school funding.

"A lot of people like to blame society's problems on young people, without recognizing that young people aren't making the decisions about what's happening in society," said Dzurinko, 32. "They're very easy to scapegoat."

Peter Anderson, principal of Andover High School in Andover, Mass., said he and his colleagues had detected very little cheating on tests or Internet-based plagiarism. He has, however, noticed an uptick in students sharing homework in unauthorized ways.

"This generation is leading incredibly busy lives — involved in athletics, clubs, so many with part-time jobs, and — for seniors — an incredibly demanding and anxiety-producing college search," he offered as an explanation.

Riddle, who for four decades was a high school teacher and principal in northern Virginia, agreed that more pressure could lead to more cheating, yet spoke in defense of today's students.

"I would take these students over other generations," he said. "I found them to be more responsive, more rewarding to work with, more appreciative of support that adults give them.

"We have to create situations where it's easy for kids to do the right things," he added. "We need to create classrooms where learning takes on more importance than having the right answer."

On Long Island, an alliance of school superintendents and college presidents recently embarked on a campaign to draw attention to academic integrity problems and to crack down on plagiarism and cheating.

Roberta Gerold, superintendent of the Middle Country School District and a leader of the campaign, said parents and school officials need to be more diligent — for example, emphasizing to students the distinctions between original and borrowed work.

"You can reinforce the character trait of integrity," she said. "We overload kids these days, and they look for ways to survive. ... It's a flaw in our system that whatever we are doing as educators allows this to continue."

Josephson contended that most Americans are too blase about ethical shortcomings among young people and in society at large.

"Adults are not taking this very seriously," he said. "The schools are not doing even the most moderate thing. ... They don't want to know. There's a pervasive apathy."

Josephson also addressed the argument that today's youth are no less honest than their predecessors.

"In the end, the question is not whether things are worse, but whether they are bad enough to mobilize concern and concerted action," he said.

"What we need to learn from these survey results is that our moral infrastructure is unsound and in serious need of repair. This is not a time to lament and whine but to take thoughtful, positive actions."

Propositions

Here's the propositions site I showed my classes. It seems to be non-partisan and gives nice short descriptions of each prop.
californiapropositions.org

Who Am I? Election Edition

Found this Who Am I? activity on the Scholastic website. It tells you where the candidates stand on major issues. I like the Scholastic Word Wizard that pops up. Double click on any word on the page and it gives you a definition.

Get Your Pin!

Found these on the Yahoo 2008 Presidential Election page.

By the way, I put the pins in alphabetical order so don't think I'm trying to push a certain candidate on you!

Polling

We've been following the presidential campaign in class and have talked about how different polling organizations are predicting Barack Obama to be the clear winner on November 4. I'm reprinting an article from today below. The article gives some insight into how polling works and provides data that seems to go against what most agencies are reporting. One interesting fact: a current poll has a 3.5 point margin of error which means Obama could be up as much as eight percentage points or down as much as six.

AP presidential poll: All even in the homestretch

By LIZ SIDOTI, Associated Press Writer Liz Sidoti, Associated Press Writer 3 mins ago

WASHINGTON – The presidential race tightened after the final debate, with John McCain gaining among whites and people earning less than $50,000, according to an Associated Press-GfK poll that shows McCain and Barack Obama essentially running even among likely voters in the election homestretch.

The poll, which found Obama at 44 percent and McCain at 43 percent, supports what some Republicans and Democrats privately have said in recent days: that the race narrowed after the third debate as GOP-leaning voters drifted home to their party and McCain's "Joe the plumber" analogy struck a chord.

Three weeks ago, an AP-GfK survey found that Obama had surged to a seven-point lead over McCain, lifted by voters who thought the Democrat was better suited to lead the nation through its sudden economic crisis.

The contest is still volatile, and the split among voters is apparent less than two weeks before Election Day.

"I trust McCain more, and I do feel that he has more experience in government than Obama. I don't think Obama has been around long enough," said Angela Decker, 44, of La Porte, Ind.

But Karen Judd, 58, of Middleton, Wis., said, "Obama certainly has sufficient qualifications." She said any positive feelings about McCain evaporated with "the outright lying" in TV ads and his choice of running mate Sarah Palin, who "doesn't have the correct skills."

The new AP-GfK head-to-head result is a departure from some, but not all, recent national polls.

Obama and McCain were essentially tied among likely voters in the latest George Washington University Battleground Poll, conducted by Republican strategist Ed Goeas and Democratic pollster Celinda Lake. In other surveys focusing on likely voters, a Washington Post-ABC News poll showed Obama up by 9 percentage points, while a poll by the nonpartisan Pew Research Center had Obama leading by 14. A Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll, among the broader category of people registered to vote, found Obama ahead by 10 points.

Polls are snapshots of highly fluid campaigns. In this case, there is a margin of error of plus or minus 3.5 percentage points; that means Obama could be ahead by as many as 8 points or down by as many as 6. There are many reasons why polls differ, including methods of estimating likely voters and the wording of questions.

Charles Franklin, a University of Wisconsin political science professor and polling authority, said variation between polls occurs, in part, because pollsters interview random samples of people.

"If they all agree, somebody would be doing something terribly wrong," he said of polls. But he also said that surveys generally fall within a few points of each other, adding, "When you get much beyond that, there's something to explain."

The AP-GfK survey included interviews with a large sample of adults including 800 deemed likely to vote. Among all 1,101 adults interviewed, the survey showed Obama ahead 47 percent to 37 percent. He was up by five points among registered voters.

A significant number of the interviews were conducted by dialing a randomly selected sample of cell phone numbers, and thus this poll had a chance to reach voters who were excluded from some other polls.

It was taken over five days from Thursday through Monday, starting the night after the candidates' final debate and ending the day after former Secretary of State Colin Powell broke with the Republican Party to endorse Obama.

McCain's strong showing is partly attributable to his strong debate performance; Thursday was his best night of the survey. Obama's best night was Sunday, hours after the Powell announcement, and the full impact of that endorsement may not have been captured in any surveys yet. Future polling could show whether either of those was merely a support "bounce" or something more lasting.

During their final debate, a feisty McCain repeatedly forced Obama to defend his record, comments and associations. He also used the story of a voter whom the Democrat had met in Ohio, "Joe the plumber," to argue that Obama's tax plan would be bad for working class voters.

"I think when you spread the wealth around, it's good for everybody," Obama told the man with the last name of Wurzelbacher, who had asked Obama whether his plan to increase taxes on those earning more than $250,000 a year would impede his ability to buy the plumbing company where he works.

On Wednesday, McCain's campaign unveiled a new TV ad that features that Obama quote, and shows different people saying: "I'm Joe the plumber." A man asks: "Obama wants my sweat to pay for his trillion dollars in new spending?"

Since McCain has seized on that line of argument, he has picked up support among white married people and non-college educated whites, the poll shows, while widening his advantage among white men. Black voters still overwhelmingly support Obama.

The Republican also has improved his rating for handling the economy and the financial crisis. Nearly half of likely voters think their taxes will rise under an Obama administration compared with a third who say McCain would raise their taxes.

Since the last AP-GfK survey in late September, McCain also has:

_Posted big gains among likely voters earning under $50,000 a year; he now trails Obama by just 4 percentage points compared with 26 earlier.

_Surged among rural voters; he has an 18-point advantage, up from 4.

_Doubled his advantage among whites who haven't finished college and now leads by 20 points. McCain and Obama are running about even among white college graduates, no change from earlier.

_Made modest gains among whites of both genders, now leading by 22 points among white men and by 7 among white women.

_Improved slightly among whites who are married, now with a 24-point lead.

_Narrowed a gap among unmarried whites, though he still trails by 8 points.

McCain has cut into Obama's advantage on the questions of whom voters trust to handle the economy and the financial crisis. On both, the Democrat now leads by just 6 points, compared with 15 in the previous survey.

Obama still has a larger advantage on other economic measures, with 44 percent saying they think the economy will have improved a year from now if he is elected compared with 34 percent for McCain.

Intensity has increased among McCain's supporters.

A month ago, Obama had more strong supporters than McCain did. Now, the number of excited supporters is about even.

Eight of 10 Democrats are supporting Obama, while nine in 10 Republicans are backing McCain. Independents are about evenly split.

Some 24 percent of likely voters were deemed still persuadable, meaning they were either undecided or said they might switch candidates. Those up-for-grabs voters came about equally from the three categories: undecideds, McCain supporters and Obama backers.

Said John Ormesher, 67, of Dandridge, Tenn.: "I've got respect for them but that's the extent of it. I don't have a whole lot of affinity toward either one of them. They're both part of the same political mess."

___

AP Director of Surveys Trevor Tompson, AP News Survey Specialist Dennis Junius and AP writer Alan Fram contributed to this report.

Book Review Brief: Napoleon by Paul Johnson

Napoleon by Paul Johnson

My review

rating: 3 of 5 stars
It's good but it also assumes the reader has a foundation of knowledge about European history and about the man. I like to think I do (in fact, I'd better as a history teacher) but I'm not sure this book is for everyone.

One thing he says in the beginning is that next to Jesus Christ, more biographies have been written about Napoleon than about any other figure in history. I find that hard to believe but I'm willing to go with it until someone proves it wrong.

Make Me Proud

Do me a favor.  When you're 25 and walking down the street and some interviewer comes to you and asks you who the president of the United States is, if you do not know, PLEASE do NOT tell him that Mr. Fong was your history teacher.  If you DO know, then by all means.  Check out this article.

Americans Flunk Simple 3-Question Political Survey

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LiveScience Staff

LiveScience.com – Wed Oct 15, 5:25 pm ET

Some news audiences are more politically savvy than others, according to a new poll, with readers of The New Yorker and similar high-brow magazines being the most knowledgeable.

The survey, conducted between April 30 and June 1 by the Pew Research Center for the People & the Press, measured the political knowledge of 3,612 U.S. adults. Participants were asked to name the controlling party of the U.S. House of Representatives, the U.S. secretary of state and Great Britain's prime minister.

Overall, just 18 percent of participants answered all three questions correctly.

More than 50 percent of Americans knew that the Democrats have a majority in the House, while 42 percent could identify the secretary of state (Condoleezza Rice). Less than 30 percent could name the prime minister of Great Britain (Gordon Brown).

Perfect scores

The best-informed news audiences crossed the ideological spectrum. Nearly half of regular readers of The New Yorker, The Atlantic and Harper's Magazine answered all three political knowledge questions correctly.

A perfect score was obtained by 44 percent of regular listeners of National Public Radio (NPR), 43 percent of regular viewers of MSNBC's "Hardball with Chris Matthews" and 42 percent of the Fox News Channel's "Hannity & Colmes" audience. Thirty-four percent of "The Colbert Report" audience and 30 percent of "The Daily Show" audience got all three questions correct.

While most news audiences knew that Democrats have a majority in the House, participants struggled to correctly name the current British prime minister.

Just four news audiences had a majority who correctly identified Gordon, including regular readers of The New Yorker and similar magazines such as The Atlantic, regular NPR listeners, regular readers of political magazines, such as The Weekly Standard and The New Republic, and regular viewers of "Hardball."

Just 44 percent of BBC viewers identified the prime minister correctly.

Here's a detailed breakdown of the percentage of individuals answering each of the three questions correctly from the different news audiences:

• The New Yorker/Atlantic: 71 percent (correctly identified Democrats as the majority in the House), 71 percent (correctly identified Condeleeza Rice), 59 percent (correctly identified Gordon Brown)
• NPR: 73 percent, 72 percent, 57percent
• Hannity & Colmes: 84 percent, 73 percent, 49 percent
• Rush Limbaugh: 83 percent, 71 percent, 41 percent
• Colbert Report: 73 percent, 65 percent, 49 percent
• Daily Show: 65 percent, 48 percent, 36 percent
• NewsHour: 66 percent, 52 percent, 47 percent
• O'Reilly Factor: 70 percent, 60 percent, 41 percent
• C-SPAN: 63 percent, 59 percent, 35 percent
• Letterman/Leno: 51 percent, 42 percent, 31 percent
• CNN: 59 percent, 48 percent, 29 percent
• National Enquirer: 44 percent, 32 percent, 22 percent

Education factor

In general, well-educated news audiences scored high on political knowledge. For instance, 54 percent of the regular readers of publications such as The New Yorker, The Atlantic and Harper's Magazine are college graduates, as are 54 percent of regular NPR listeners.

However, several news audiences with relatively low proportions of college graduates also scored well on the news quiz. Just 31 percent of regular "Hannity & Colmes" viewers are college graduates. Even still, 42 percent Hannity viewers got perfect scores on the political knowledge quiz, compared with 44 percent of NPR listeners.

Nearly 40 percent of the regular audience of the news parody "The Colbert Report" are college graduates, compared with 30 percent of "The Daily Show" viewers. Both shows have younger audiences than other TV news sources, with less than a quarter of Colbert and Daily Show viewers over the age of 50, compared with more than half of "Hardball" and "Hannity & Colmes" viewers being 50 and older.

Book Review Brief: The Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad

Just finished Heart of Darkness tonight. This book is an example of the kind of book that I really like to read. It is well-written, heavy at times, and made me come away with the feeling that there was a deeper meaning to it (though not in a frustrated way as with a certain other book I read).

I loved reading the final scene. Conrad puts to words a sad situation and feeling that I would imagine a writer would have a difficult time describing. He does so in a way that had me glued to the pages, eager to see what was coming next. Hard to believe that English was Conrad's THIRD language.

Book Review Brief: The Trial by Franz Kafka

I finished reading The Trial last week. A couple of my old college roommates and I took up this book as it is on a list of must-read classic books.

I was really disappointed. It wasn't at all captivating and had a very disappointing ending. In addition, it was translated from German and some of the sentences were quite awkward. It made me realize that I enjoy books written in English much more. Because I am a native English speaker, I can appreciate more the turn of phrase and intricately described scenarios from an English-speaking author than I can a foreign work that has been translated. That's one of the reasons I liked Heart of Darkness so much (see above).

World History: A Holocaust Love Story

I had seen this couple on Oprah (no, I don't usually watch it) a couple of years ago and was AMAZED at their story.  I just saw this article and had to post it.  Incredible.

Holocaust survivors tell love story

By MATT SEDENSKY, Associated Press Writer

Sun Oct 12, 12:16 PM ET

In the beginning, there was a boy, a girl and an apple.

He was a teenager in a death camp in Nazi-controlled Germany. She was a bit younger, living free in the village, her family posing as Christians. Their eyes met through a barbed-wire fence and she wondered what she could do for this handsome young man.

She was carrying apples, and decided to throw one over the fence. He caught it and ran away toward the barracks. And so it began.

As they tell it, they returned the following day and she tossed an apple again. And each day after that, for months, the routine continued. She threw, he caught, and both scurried away.

They never knew one another's name, never uttered a single word, so fearful they'd be spotted by a guard. Until one day he came to the fence and told her he wouldn't be back.

"I won't see you anymore," she said. "Right, right. Don't come around anymore," he answered.

And so their brief and innocent tryst came to an end. Or so they thought.

___

Before he was shipped off to a death camp, before the girl with the apples appeared, Herman Rosenblat's life had already changed forever.

His family had been forced from their home into a ghetto. His father fell ill with typhus. They smuggled a doctor in, but there was little he could do to help. The man knew what was coming. He summoned his youngest son. "If you ever get out of this war," Rosenblat remembers him saying, "don't carry a grudge in your heart and tolerate everybody."

Two days later, the father was dead. Herman was just 12.

The family was moved again, this time to a ghetto where he shared a single room with his mother, three brothers, uncle, aunt and four cousins. He and his brothers got working papers and he got a factory job painting stretchers for the Germans.

Eventually, the ghetto was dissolved. As the Poles were ushered out, two lines formed. In one, those with working papers, including Rosenblat and his brothers. In the other, everyone else, including the boys' mother.

Rosenblat went over to his mother. "I want to be with you," he cried. She spoke harshly to him and one of his brothers pulled him away. His heart was broken.

"I was destroyed," Rosenblat remembers. It was the last time he would ever see her.

___

It was in Schlieben, Germany, that Rosenblat and the girl he later called his angel would meet. Roma Radziki worked on a nearby farm and the boy caught her eye. And bringing him food — apples, mostly, but bread, too — became part of her routine.

"Every day," she says, "every day I went."

Rosenblat says he would secretly eat the apples and never mentioned a word of it to anyone else for fear word would spread and he'd be punished or even killed. When Rosenblat learned he would be moved again — this time to Theresienstadt, in what is now the Czech Republic — he told the girl he would not return.

Not long after, the Russians rolled in on a tank and liberated Rosenblat's camp. The war was over. She went to nursing school in Israel. He went to London and learned to be an electrician.

Their daily ritual faded from their minds.

"I forgot," she says.

"I forgot about her, too," he recalls.

Rosenblat eventually moved to New York. He was running a television repair shop when a friend phoned him one Sunday afternoon and said he wanted to fix him up with a girl. Rosenblat was unenthusiastic: He didn't like blind dates, he told his friend. He didn't know what she would look like. But finally, he relented.

It went well enough. She was Polish and easygoing. Conversation flowed, and eventually talk turned to their wartime experiences. Rosenblat recited the litany of camps he had been in, and Radziki's ears perked up. She had been in Schlieben, too, hiding from the Nazis.

She spoke of a boy she would visit, of the apples she would bring, how he was sent away.

And then, the words that would change their lives forever: "That was me," he said.

Rosenblat knew he could never leave this woman again. He proposed marriage that very night. She thought he was crazy. Two months later she said yes.

In 1958, they were married at a synagogue in the Bronx — a world away from their sorrows, more than a decade after they had thought they were separated forever.

___

It all seems too remarkable to be believed. Rosenblat insists it is all true.

Even after their engagement, the couple kept the story mostly to themselves, telling only those closest to them. Herman says it's because they met at a point in his life he'd rather forget. But eventually, he said, he felt the need to share it with others.

Now, the Rosenblats' story has inspired a children's book, "Angel Girl." And eventually, there are plans to turn it into a film, "The Flower of the Fence." Herman expects to publish his memoirs next year.

Michael Berenbaum, a distinguished Holocaust scholar who has authored a dozen books, has read Rosenblatt's memoir and sees no reason to question it.

"I wasn't born then so I can't say I was an eyewitness. But it's credible," Berenbaum said. "Crazier things have happened."

Herman is now 79, and Roma is three years his junior; they celebrated their 50th anniversary this summer. He often tells their story to Jewish and other groups.

He believes the lesson is the very one his father imparted.

"Not to hate and to love — that's what I am lecturing about," he said. "Not to hold a grudge and to tolerate everybody, to love people, to be tolerant of people, no matter who they are or what they are."

The anger of the death camps, Herman says, has gone away. He forgave. And his life has been filled with love.

Current Events: Daddy Yankee to Host Debate

Thirty-one year old reggeaton star Daddy Yankee will serve as the moderator for a debate among four candidates for governor of Puerto Rico. The article states that it is part of an effort to get young people more involved in the political process. What's next, Jay-Z hosting Meet the Press?

World History: Russia's last czar declared victim of repression

Came across this article about the Russian czar and his family being restored in Russia.  What it really means is that even though they were condemned by the Bolsheviks and Russian history books in the subsequent decades, they are now officially being looked on as positive elements in Russia's past.  You can view the article HERE.

Inspiration-by-the-Sea

Spent some time in Monterey and Carmel this weekend. That area is so picturesque; I'd forgotten why it's such a popular place. There was a stretch where, as a kid, my family would visit somewhat regularly but I hadn't spent quality time there in some years. The weather there this weekend was drizzly, cool, and just perfect--a nice antidote to the reeeediculous ongoing heat we get here.

One place we went to was the famed Monterey Bay Aquarium. The girls had a wonderful time and were exposed to things they don't get a chance to see very often, especially because we live inland. When I grew up in the Bay Area I remember going on field trips to Half Moon Bay every year for pumpkin-picking and to tide pools where a certain Mrs. Terwilliger would be our docent. It was a somewhat regular part of life. So it was good to have the girls be awed by touching starfish, and seeing the bay, and smelling the salty air. In addition, because it made financial sense to do so, we purchased member passes that will allow our whole family admission for the next year.

What a visitor can't escape on a trip to Monterey is the area's past. At a local museum, a Robinson Jeffers and John Steinbeck exhibit opened Saturday. Being in Monterey and seeing Steinbeck's influence on the place (and vice-versa) made me want to explore some of his work. With Monterey's weather, scenery, and industry, half of a great novel is already written (not to take anything away from Mr. Steinbeck). The place has a certain intrigue about it. So I picked up Cannery Row and am looking forward to giving it a good read-through, especially because we'll undoubtedly be making a few trips to Monterey over the course of the next year.

Perhaps with enough time spent over there, I'll work on my own great American novel. Something about a superhero teacher with impeccable character and biceps to match.

United States Current Events: GOOD

Recently at Starbucks, I picked up a mini-newspaper they have near the drink-pick-up-bar called GOOD. Apparently Starbucks is sponsoring this non-partisan publication which is trying to educate the public on major issues, particularly leading up to the November elections. The current issue, on immigration, caught my eye because immigration is one of the topics we are covering right now in U.S. History. Among the interesting things I learned: the top five countries of birth for recent U.S. immigrants are (5) Vietnam (4) Philippines (3) India (2) China and (1) Mexico with 11.67 million.