Elizabeth Catano: Success

We have all read about people who are successful. They make a fortune. They seem to do well in many areas of life and do it over and over through a lifetime. Hard work and creativity are two of the most common traits in succesful people.


They work hard ! yes, they play hard, they get up early, they rarely complain. Also they expect extraordinary results from themselves. Most of them did well in school. They study hard and they are incredibly curious. Successful people want to learn everything about everything !

They are very creative. They go around asking why not? They see new combination, new possibilities, new opportunities and challenges where others see problems. They wake up in the middle of the night thinking I've got it! They ask for advice, try things, consult experts and amateurs, always looking for a better, faster and cheaper solution. Successful people create stuff from everything.

Successful people know lots of people, and they know lots of different kinds of people. They listen to friends, neighbors, co-workers and everybody. They value people and relationships. Succesful people are always insatiable learners.

Judit Koncz: Homeschooling

“Less is sometimes more” says the proverb. Nowadays parents can choose among different school types and teaching methods. But how can they decide which one is the best for their child? Which one fits their needs, and which one can they really profit from? Reaching a decision is very difficult, because all school types and teaching methods have both positive and negative sides. Some parents think, homeschooling is the best way for teaching their children, but it has pros and cons too.

Homeschooling has a lot of advantages. It is an effective way of teaching, for it is individualized. Children have the opportunity to learn in their own tempo, giving them time to understand and practice everything. In their own home, there is no peer pressure, no negative impacts of social environment. Therefore, they can concentrate on the subjects. Another important advantage of homeschooling is the comfortable environment without academic pressure. The students can rediscover their natural curiosity and enjoy learning. Not only is homeschooling an efficient teaching method but also it plays an important part in the parent-children relationship. Families spend more time together. Children can share their secrets and their fears with their parents and this can make their relationship more deep and intimate. Through the homeschooling, parents can have control of their kids. They always know where they are, and they don’t have to worry about negative impacts in the school. Parents can quickly realize if their children have special abilities, good sense of something and can encourage them.
However, homeschooling has a lot of disadvantages, too. It can cause serious socialization problems. The kids don’t have any classmates. They don’t know how to interact with other children in the class; they don’t have a challenge to be the best in the class, and they don’t know what teamwork means. They won’t have other idols, who could change their lives in a positive way. Unqualified teachers are another disadvantage of homeschooling. Most parents are not qualified teachers. They don’t know the exact methods to improve special skills, and sometimes they can give false information. All these can cause the shortcoming of their children in the education and on the job market.

All in all, homeschooling is an effective way of teaching, but we have to follow a lot of rules when we want that it works.

Bonny Zhang: Poverty

What Are the Causes of Poverty? How Can Poverty Be Eliminated?




Poverty is still a big problem in many countries of the world. People cannot help to ask: What are the causes of Poverty? H-ow can poverty be eliminated? In my opinion, Unsuitable gove-rnment policies and diseases are the main causes of poverty.



Unsuitable government policies include war and poor economic policies. Firstly, wars caused by any reason could cost huge a-mounts of money and damage the whole economy of the coun-try heavily. As a certain result, people will suffer from poverty. Secondly, bad economic policies are connected with people’s li-fe. Bad economic policies can lead people to poverty. Besides, paying too much attention to politics instead of trying to devel-op economy causes poverty. To illustrate, in some countries, th-e political leaders are idolized and politics always acts as the focus of people’s life, So people live in top poverty.



Disease is another main cause of poverty. The first reason, cur-ing serious diseases requires a lot of money. That is a heavy burden on many families. In some developing countries, health insurance system can only cover few people. Serious diseases will put the families in debts. Even in advanced countries, heal-th insurance system cannot cover all expense or any conditions,diseases also make the families feel tight in their life. Another reason, Diseases make people lose job opportunities. On the on-e hand, Serious diseases make people lose their work ability. On the other hand, some companies refuse employing people with serious illness. No work opportunities lead people to pov-erty direc-tly.



Since we already know that poverty is caused by government policies and diseases, we can also find the proper way to solve the problem. The long and short of it is: to eliminate poverty, governments should establish suitable economic and political policies, people should live in a healthy life style.




Bonnie Zhang

Sally Lam: Poverty

Although some people can make ends meets in their lives, there are still many people who live in poverty. Poverty exists not only in poor countries but also in well develop countries. Especially in those poor countries, many children live on donations. According to a statisticRE., more than 800,000 Canadian children are living in poverty. There are two main causes for poverty.




Uncontrollable nature disasters are one of the causes of poverty. Firstly, earthquakes contribute to the increase of numbers of homeless people. For example, Haiti earthquakes left 230,000 people dead and 1,000,000 homeless. Similarly, Wenchuan earthquakes in China made 11 million people lost their home. Secondly, flooding increase the number of people who live in terrible situation. For instant, 1931 China floods killed people up to 4 millions and affected 28.5 millions of people living without enough food and clean water. More over, St. Lucia’s flood killed up to 80,000 people in year 1287. Much land was flooded in what is now the Waddenzee and IJsselmeer. It destroyed cities in the Northern Germany and the Netherlands. It ruined the road and the resident building, therefore it caused many people couldn’t work and they had to live in temporally tents



Negative attitude to life is another cause of poverty. For one thing, lacks of self-discipline prevent people from achieving a better life. For example, gambling causes people live in debts, but they still go to casino. Beside this, drugging keeps people borrowing money even thought they understand that taking drugs affect their health and cost a lot of money, but they can’t stop doing this. In addiction, lacks of motivation of reach a better life will keep people from improving their lives. To illustrate, some people who have work abilities, do not willing to work but prefer receiving subsidises from the government, these peoples’ lives will not improve until they change their attitude toward life. Moreover, for some people who live without hope in their lives will develop negative emotions, so they give up a self-improvement.



In conclusion, nature disasters are one of uncontrollable causes to poverty. We could hardly do things to protect ourselves against many nature disasters. However, having a positive attitude to life can eliminate poverty. Once you improve your self-discipline and increase your motivation of achieving a better life, you will find yourself living far away from poverty.

Hamideh Vahidi: Philanthropy

Every day we hear about philanthropists who spend their money helping people in different ways. Some generous people give money to develop health programs and scientific researches. Other donors prefer to donate to people in need, and still others fund scholarship for promising students. Although there is a variety of donations, there are only two reasons under lying all of them. Internal and external motivation make people engage in an act of philanthropy.


Some people have internal motivation for helping others. First internal motivation is giving an opportunity to others. For example, some donors give chances to someone to do something because they believe those people can do the things the donors wish they could have done. In addition donations encourage people to help others, be more responsible and kind. Therefore, society changes to a civilized society gradually because of donations. Second internal reason is self satisfaction that leads people to donate. Philanthropic acts bring happiness and usefulness for the benefactor. Furthermore, it helps to satisfy religious beliefs because all religions have some advice for their followers, so donors become satisfied by doing their religious duty.

Other benefactors become involve in philanthropic act because of external motivation. It seems the most frequent external stimulus is business. Companies and people who donate to charities do not have to pay income tax on the money donated. Therefore, they can save a big amount of money. Furthermore, they influence indirectly on people to buy their products which will increase their selling. Another external motive for donation is publicity. Some donors are interested in showing off and influence their society. They pledge a lot of money to help others just to be in the spot light. Such people seek fame by interviews and photos. For other donors, philanthropic act is a competition, and they want to be winners, so they try to show the other competitors up.

In summary, we find different types of donations, while there are only two motivations. It seems to me what is important about donation is the result. Therefore we had better not judge donors on their motivations. Generally, a philanthropic act is beautiful and humanitarian; philanthropists are respectable people, and this act should be encouraged in society.

Maryam Karami: Factors that contributes to success

  I guess everybody has heard many life stories of successful people in the world, and they have noticed that triumph has different meanings to different people. Success could be reached in different ways, but for any achievement, there are always some golden keys. I believe the most important factors that lead to success could be divided into two main groups; personal and environmental factors.

  Personal factors are important in achieving success. Firstly, hard work helps us to overcome most of the obstacles in our way. Practicing in any subject helps one to gain more knowledge and experience. For example, the more operation a surgeon does, the more skilful he/she becomes. Also industrious people are committed and focused. Moving from one interest to another one never leads anyone to success. Secondly, talent is a merit to achieve our goals. Innate abilities are a gift that makes someone more especial and powerful in some ways. To illustrate, Salvador Dalli, a great talented artist, achieved surrealism, a new method of painting, by his unique ability to bridge the dreams with realism in his paintings. Aptitude as another perspective of talent is another issue; the more easily, faster and better one learns, the closer he/she will be to success. On the social level people who have stronger ability to learn are more popular and ahead in the society.

  Environmental factors impact the achievement of success. First and foremost, to achieve an aim successfully, everyone needs some facilities. Money is one of them; as an example, to run a business strongly, for everyone the financial foundation is essential. Having the right equipment is as important as any other ones, such as outer space explorations which require stay-of-the art technology. Moreover, to reach triumph, everyone needs luck to play a beautiful role. Meeting right people who can advice, introduce or connect one to others can lead he/she to be fortunate. When someone wants to find a job in a very famous company and there are several other applicants, he/she will have advantage if he/she has an old friend in a high position there. Also luck depends on the right time too. There is always a golden moment that no one should let it to slip by, like when someone plays chess, every right movement should be in the right moment to win.

  Although being a successful person is not easy, it is truly worth working hard for it. For this reason, everyone needs to know himself and the environment as much as he/she can; Choosing the goal based on abilities and opportunities, persevering, working hard and tackling difficulties; they should always remember that every step toward success gives them steam and strength, which is an important achievement itself. Therefore it is good to be strong, smart and diligent and never let the golden opportunities flutter away.