Educational Policies of Nigeria and South Korea Essay Example for Free

Educational Policies of Nigeria and South Korea Essay Education has been the corner stone of the success of every economy. In terms of those countries which have been colonized and have adopted a government that was highly repressive in nature, one could significantly argue that such would post an effect to how education was being delivered, the degree of excellence of the aforementioned, the demands of the market and the availability of jobs, and finally its effects to the economy. This paper focuses on the educational history and policies of Nigeria and South Korea in relation to the British military government of the Nigerians and the Japanese occupation and the American military government of the South Koreans. These policies and norms are then significantly related to their employment systems and its effect on their economy. The objectives of this essay are the following: 1. To establish a brief account of the educational policies and norms of Nigeria and South Korean and significantly identify its relationship to the military government. 2. To significantly identify the effects of the educational policies and norms in relation to the availability of jobs to the citizens and consequently the continuous demands of the market for such jobs; and finally 3. To know the effects of educational excellence, jobs availability and demands to the sustainable development of an economy. Review of Related Literature Education and Military Government in Nigeria One of the major constitutional changes that happened to the government of Nigeria was in 1953, a few years after the World War II. Such a change took effect through the London Conference attended by both Nigerian and Colonial officials which places the country under the rule of a Governor General, having the aforementioned the leader of the three principle regions of the country. Such a change of the name of positions was a way for the British regime to increase the autonomous powers of the country thereby making education vested at the local level, which is in accordance with the aim of unifying the region (Patterson, 1955, p. 94). Education, other than representation and taxation was one of the autonomous areas of governance that is designated to the central government. As such it is with this respect that the government had ordered that the youth of Nigeria regardless of any region should be given sound and uniform standards of performance (p. 95). The objective of this educational policy is to have the youth fully prepared on their primary and secondary education so as to enable them to take higher education both inside and outside of the country. Within the new constitution, 34 subjects or areas of concern were given to the federal government to oversee. In addition with this, 14 subject areas were also created and delegated to the federal government to be administered to individual regions. Consequently, it has also been perceived that the successful implementation of these subjects could only happen if the individuals administering these areas were competent enough, hence resulting to the very high standards were implemented by the government in terms of employee recruitment (p. 5). Such a drive for the development of skills for the Nigerian youth resulted to the perceived shortness in terms of trained senior administrators and other technicians for various government and technical posts for the country. The federal government perceived that the shortage could only be remedied through higher education and long experience of the youth. At the end of 1953, it has been perceived that 5,000 senior service positions were available in which 3,300 of them were taken by overseas personnels or the expatriates. Only 800 positions are given to Nigerians, and there were still 900 positions more that were vacant (World Bank, 1955, p. 23). The drive of the British Government to improve the education in Nigeria resulted to the establishment of a program for development for African Territories under the British Crown. The program which was called the Colonial Development and Welfare Schemes was inaugurated in 1945 in which required the British Government to contribute 23,000,000 pounds sterling for ten years that would enable the country to develop and another loan of 26-500,000 pounds sterling that would be used to fund a number of projects including education and other research facilities (Patterson, 1955, p. 97). The result of such an effort on the end of the British Government paved the way for a consuming ambition among young Nigerians to be associated with the Government and take a number of white collar jobs (p. 8). Technical Education in Nigeria Technical education is placed as one of the major projects of the Ten-Year Plan for Development and Welfare for the post-war Nigeria. Institutions that would cater to technical skills, trade, and handicrafts were created after the Second World War. For instance, the Technical Institute of Yaba, the first center that was created outside Lagos offered three full-time and two part-time programs and special short courses. These skills were those relating to junior and senior technical and also teacher training. For a four-year education, the country had been offering instructions in wood working, drafting, sub-professional engineering, commerce and printing to those students who have completed eight years of primary education and have already passed a special entrance examination. The senior technical course offered by the institute focused on courses in electrical, mathematical and civil engineering, architectural assistance and economics. Consequently, there were also teacher-training programs which offer a two-year course to prepare teachers for handicraft centers and secondary school craft courses (World Bank, 1955, p. 582-583). On the other hand, the Trade Centers at Yaba aimed to produce skilled craftsmen by offering courses which range from two to five years. The students primarily learned on an apprenticeship basis after which they have already familiarized themselves with the tools of the trade and have learned to do simple tasks; consequently academic instructions were given to the students averages one day every week. After the students have already gained the skills that are necessary, they were contacted by the trade center to go to large cities in order to work. Part of the educational system was also the refusal to accept new students until a new class graduates. As such, the intake and output for some courses happened only once in every five years. For the first five years of the operation of the Yaba Centre, there were only 85 students who had graduated while 18 were dismissed and 13 of them resigned (p. 84). The Weakness of the Nigerian Education One major weaknesses of the Nigerian education was the inclination to have all areas of the Government to have properly staffed and well-trained individuals; as such resulting in having schools to have its own standards and specializations and independence from other educational efforts. Such an act resulted at times to the replication of jobs or over specialization on some skills, which were often criticized to prevent holistic development. It has been argued by some scholars that schools that were operated by the departments of governments had the inclination to emphasize subjects that were too technical up to the extent of neglecting certain subjects such as English, Mathematics and the Social Sciences. As such, some students after graduating from departmental schools normally look for jobs that they believed will be necessary for their employment rather than their abilities and interests (Patterson, 1955, p. 7-98). In effect of this, the inclination towards education had been something that was relative to that of available employment. Outside the market, it had been perceived that education had no value and in the long run, had stimulated little demand to the public. It is with this respect that competition among available jobs had been perceived to be very keen wherein the colonial Nigeria has clustered to commercial areas within the region (Davis and Kalu-Nwiwu, 2001, p. 1). It could also be significantly noted that education for women during the post-war Nigeria had also been problematic as although there were already several domestic science centers that were established, very few of them remained in actual operation. As such, the education of women had been lagging in the country. The education that was provided to women were those solely with regard to food preparation, sewing, cleaning, general sanitation and elementary skills in nursing (World Bank, 1955, p. 588).

Mutual Funds Essay -- essays research papers

Mutual funds are an easy, convenient way to invest, without having to worry about choosing individual stocks. A mutual fund can be defined as a single portfolio of stocks, bonds, and/or cash managed by an investment company on behalf of many investors. The investment company manages the fund, and sells shares in the fund to individual investors. When one invests in a mutual fund, they become a part-owner of a large investment portfolio, along with all the other shareholders of the fund. The fund manager invests the contributions when shares are purchased, along with money from the other shareholders. Every day, the fund manager counts up the value of all the fund's holdings, figures out how many shares have been purchased by shareholders, and then calculates the net asset value(NAV) of the mutual fund, which is the price of a single share of the fund on that day. If the fund manager is doing a good job, the NAV of the fund will usually get bigger and the shares will be worth more. There are a couple of ways that a mutual fund can make money in its portfolio. A fund can receive dividends from the stocks that it owns. Also, the fund might have money in the bank that earns interest, or it might receive interest payments from bonds that it owns. At the end of the year, a fund makes another kind of distribution, this time from the profits they might make by selling stocks or bonds that have gone up in price. Unfortunately, funds don't always make money. For example, the fund manager could have made some investments that didn't work out, sold some investments for less than the original purchase price, and there may be some capital losses. Most mutual funds invest in stocks, and these are called "equity funds." Some funds specialize in investing in large-cap stocks, others in small-cap stocks, and mid-cap stocks. Large-cap stocks have market caps of billions of dollars, and are the best-known companies in the U.S. Small-cap stocks are worth several hundred million dollars, and are newer, up-and-coming firms. Mid-caps are somewhere in between. There are also bond funds that purchase bonds issued by corporations, municipal governments, or the federal government agencies. You can invest in tax-free bond funds, just as you can buy tax-free bonds, and the interest you earn is exempt from federal a... ...nd some of the advantages and disadvantages mentioned earlier I found a fund that was interesting. The Domini fund only invests in companies that are part of the Domini Social Index. The index excludes companies that derive more than 2% of sales from military weapons, sell any alcohol or tobacco or own interest in nuclear power plants. The remaining large-cap stocks are then evaluated according to other social criteria: diversity, employee relations, the environment and the product. For example, a company may give a lot of money to community organizations but may be rabidly polluting the environment. In a situation like this, the analyst will carefully consider the pros and cons before including the company in the index and in the fund. Investment requirements were also a factor for considering this fund and the Domini fund requires a minimum initial investment of $2,000. However, the company can waive the minimum investment to a mere $25 each month. The fund has been around sinc e 1991 and has had an average annual return of 20.61% for the last 8 years. It returned 32.99% in 1998 (while the S&P500 returned 28.58%). It invests 25.85% of its assets in technology and is no load.

Comparing Dada to Pop Art

In this essay I will compare the Dada and Pop Art movements by depicting the characteristics of each art period, their style and social conditions that may have influenced the creation of each movement. The essay will describe the relationship between the Dada and Pop Art movements. The essay will show their similarities, differences, and the reason why Pop Art did not continue with the Dada tradition although Pop Art also utilized everyday objects as subjects to create art just like the Dada. Lastly, the essay will show how Pop Art is still very much part of today’s art world.Dada or Daism was an informal international art movement, with artists and followers in Europe and North America. The beginnings of this movement coincided with the outbreak of World War I. This artistic and literary movement started in 1916 and ended around 1923. Dada was born out of negative reaction to the World War I and as a way to protest against the conventional middle-class which the artists beli eved were the cause of the war. Dada excluded reason and logic, valuing nonsense, irrationality, irony and humor. The movement primarily involved visual arts, literature, poetry, manifestoes, art theory, theatre and graphic design. Art in the traditional sense was all about aesthetics, Dada represented the opposite. Dada’s intention was to offend and shock common sense. (â€Å"Pop art/dada†, 2013)Dada artists developed the collage, photomontage, assemblage and readymade techniques. The collage, which imitated the techniques used during cubism through the pasting of cut pieces of paper items to include items such as transportation tickets, maps, plastic wrappers in order to represent features of life instead of still life. Photomontage – this technique used scissors and glue rather than paintbrushes and paints to express views of modern life from images represented by the media.The assemblage technique – is a three-dimensional variations of a collage; whic h again used everyday objects to produce meaningful or meaningless (relating to the war) pieces of work. Lastly, the â€Å"readymades† – these were everyday objects found or  purchased and declared art by an artist. These objects would sometimes have titles and/or the artist’s signature to provoke deeper thinking on the viewer. During this period there was no predominant medium to Dadaist art. (â€Å"Dada†, 2013)Pop Art (short for Popular Art) emerged in England in the early 1950s and late 1950s in the United States lasting through the early 1970s. Pop Art origins developed for different reasons in Great Britain and the United States. In the United States, it was a response to impersonal, mundane reality, irony and parody. In Britain, the origin of post-World War II also included irony and parody but its main focus was on the images of American popular culture.Pop art was also a form of rebellion against abstract expressionism whose audience was a greed y middle class, according to the artists. Pop Art understood popular culture or so called material culture which was focused on the post-World War II generation who rebelled against the mysterious undertone of the abstract art. Pop artists wanted to express their hopefulness after so much poverty had been experienced during the World War II. (â€Å"Pop art-†, 2013)Pop Art was rooted in urban environment – London and New York. Pop Art used pieces of familiar images like advertising, labels, comic books, ordinary cultural objects, film, and television, to express conceptual formal relationships. In addition, the artist also duplicated common mass production images such as beer bottles, soup cans, comic strips, road sign paintings, collages and sculptures either by incorporating these objects into their paintings, collages and sculptures. Artists usually used very bright colors, and flat images. Pop art is symbolic and realistic. Lastly, Pop Art’s subjects are non- traditional which involves the viewer on the subject unlike the traditional still life motif which engaged the viewer on the formal qualities of the painting ignoring the subject. (â€Å"Pop art-†, 2013)Dada and Pop Art developed in part to oppose the status quo, standing up in opposition to the established elite art of their respective times. Pop Art and the Dadaist thought that the traditional artist was a prop of the elite and the powerful; hence, both movements created art that was anti aesthetic. Pop Art and Dadaism both used everyday objects to create art that was symbolic, realistic, and descriptive. Both movements used what was considered non-traditional motifs. Dadaism and Pop Art used their movement as a means of criticism for their respective times in which they lived. Lastly, Dada and Pop Art movements – to some degree – were influenced by a war. (â€Å"Pop art-† 2013)Pop Art was somewhat an extension of Dadaism. Pop Art also delved into some of the same subjects as Dadaism; however, Pop Art substituted the harsh, sarcastic, and radical impulses of the Dada movement with an appreciation to popular culture. Pop Art artists wanted to express their optimism to a culture born during post-War World II who sought to acquire consumer goods in response to mass media advertising. Pop Art did not critique the consumerists it simply recognized it as a natural fact of the times. (â€Å"Pop art/dada†, 2013)Marcel Duchamp’s, Fountain, 1917 is considered a ‘readymade’ artwork from the Dada movement. The sculpture has become one of the most recognized modernist works from the Dada movement. With the Fountain, Duchamp took an everyday object of life, and changed its useful significance by calling it something else. By giving it a new title and point of view, Duchamp created a new thought for the urinal. Duchamp’s insight that art can be about ideas instead of things, a notion that would ring true with la ter generations of artists. (Pop art/dada, 2013) Andy Warhol’s, Campbell’s Soup Cans, 1962, consisting of 32 canvases each being a painting of a can of soup flavor being offered at the time.There is no clear explanation as to why Warhol  chose to paint the soup cans, his usual reply to interviews as to why he painted the cans – he had soup every day. One of the traits of Pop Art is creating art from popular recognizable object that most everyone could relate to. Just like the Fountain, the concept was more important than the image. The fact that he chose to ‘create’ art by painting the cans correlates to Duchamp’s Fountain by which both artists style was more anti-art; utilizing common objects as subject matter, evoking interest from the viewer on the concept rather than the object. (â€Å"Campbell’s soup cans†, 2013)Pop Art is a direct descendant of Dadaism because it mocks the art world by using everyday motifs as subjects t o create art. The Dadaist originated an irrational way of images to provoke reaction from the public on their work. Pop artists adopted the same visual method but concentrated their interest on popular culture. The Pop Art movement replaced the negative, satirical and radical elements of the Dada movement. The Dadaist concentrated on anti-war politics, rejecting the prevailing standards in art by creating anti-art cultural works. (â€Å"Pop art†, 2013)The dawn of the Pop Art movement in the 50†²s not only impressed the wealthy, it changed the culture. So iconic and profound were the motivations behind this movement that its art is still featured, studied and produced today. It is clear that Pop Art was much more than just a fad, it is still very popular and it is continued to be called a success. It is hard to not identify traits of Pop Art as some of its peculiarities like the dotted image, strong and multiple colors, series of images on one print, famous people faces, and everyday objects continue to be used today. Pop Art can be found in print design on birthday cards, T-shirts, calendars, canvases, poster, and contemporary graphic design. (â€Å"The influence of†, 2010)

Betsu in Translation

The Japanese word  betsu is pronounced almost entirely without that s  Ã‚  in the middle: beh-Tsu. The word is translated to indicate distinction: discrimination, difference, another thing. Japanese Characters åˆ ¥ 㠁 ¹Ã£  ¤ Example Iu no to okonau no to wa betsu da.è ¨â‚¬Ã£ â€ Ã£  ®Ã£  ¨Ã¨ ¡Å'㠁†ã  ®Ã£  ¨Ã£  ¯Ã¥Ë† ¥Ã£   Ã£â‚¬â€š Translation:  To say is one thing, to do is another thing.