Topic 7: Change and the Future

The biggest change so far is to transfer from local school to an American-institution school. Under 9.5 years of Taiwanese education, it is pretty hard at first to adapt to American school. Not only the language is different, but also the cultural differences. In spite of the differences I have to adapt, I also need to face new challenge such as SAT. Applying foreign college is lots more complicate than I thought. Also even after college, I need to worry about what job to do. Parents would expect their children to become doctor, lawyer, or engineer. The social expectations for Asians are also jobs that require good math ability. However, interested in human mind, I want to do the types of the job that can help people to cope with their mental problems. Though for now it might somehow be hard for Asian to be a psychological counselor in United States, since most of the Whites would prefer not to share their feelings with an Asian psychological counselor (at least my dad said so, which is totally nonsense). However, I think the working environment in the future will be totally different from now because the whole society is changing. In the future it seems that Western countries will be inhabited with Asians and Eastern countries will be inhabited with Europeans. Working environment might also change in the sense that people are not that discriminatory.

Topic 6: Who's Running the Show?

PAS is both a corporation and a cooperative. It is a corporation because it hires professional workers to teach the students and officers to run the office. It is a cooperative in the sensed that it is non-profit. It aims for preparing the children to be compatible in going into States College.

 

PAS is created by Ms. Pamela (I am not sure) and, apparently, all decisions are made by her. I am not sure about how PAS really started; the following would be based on hypothesis. The fund (tuition fee) might be contributed by parents who also want to make their children get into foreign college but lack of a person who help them to organize everything. They might need to hire teachers, set up the school, and follow the governmental regulation. PAS has unlimited liability: those parents only need to pay for the money they wanted to contribute. PAS also has unlimited life, even the parents’ children go to college, they can still invest the money for the good of later students or just simply find other parents to give the money. At first the school might need to borrow money from banks. Yet, after the debts are paid, the “profit” will stay the same since it’s non-profit based. Being a corporation-school also has the advantage for the better access for resources. Though it’s going to face lots of government regulation, corporation is one of the business organizations that could forever.

 

If I am going to start a school, I might choose to run a partnership. We can start with a smaller class and provide intensive quality education. There would be fewer governmental regulations and it is easy to open and close.

Topic 5: A Different Phone?

To compete with the saturating cell phone market, Nokia has to develop mobile TV by the means that it needs to differentiate the product in order to increase the sales. Not only Nokia, more and more cell phone producers include many features in the phones in an attempt to attract the consumers. Manufacturers are more likely to offer differentiated products in old markets. It is because the consumers in the old market are somehow “adapt” to ordinary cell phones. Those consumers need featured phones to meet their specific interests. For example, a business man might need a cell phone featuring well-organized contact list and agenda software so that it can remind him what need to be done.

 

For my wanted features cell phone, I’d like to have a cell phone featured with 3D projection. It would be like Tony Stark’s technology in Iron Man II. You can touch the icon not on a screen, but a 3D projection. Also when someone calls you, it would be like the contacting system in Star War. You can see the projection of who is calling. If this technology is available, we no longer need to “bring” a phone but “wear” a phone. This technology can be put on small accessories such as necklace or watch, it will be very convenient.

Topic 4: Ripple Effects and Elasticity

Aware of the ripple effect is extremely important since a simple change in a good or service can have an impact on many other aspects. The change of oil price influences other parts of the economy because oil is the material of many products and oil is the essential factor that we use in everyday life. Oil is the raw material in producing plastic, and plastic is everywhere in our daily life. So if the price of oil increases, the price of plastic might also increase. It will increase the cost of consumers, making them reduce their quantity demanded for anything involves with plastic. Other goods that have a ripple effect are critical things in our everyday life such as gas, water, and electric energy. Take water, specifically, for example. We need water every day: we drink it, use it when taking a shower and washing dishes. Once the price of water rises (either due to shortage, pollution, processing cost increase…etc.), the capability for us to afford it decreases. Cost of having meals in restaurants might rise because the money that pays for water washing dishes increase. The drinks the restaurants provide would also be more expensive. A single change affects everyone.

Topic 3: Where Choices Lead

In analyzing the benefits and costs when making choices, many tend to ignore the things that they need to give up---opportunity costs. As a student transferring from other school to PAS, I have to give up my original high school—HGSH. As for getting into the HS Econ. class, I have to give up the Public Speaking class. To tell the truth, indeed both decisions aren’t my own decision. Getting into PAS is apparently a decision from my parents. To them, it might be a “rational” decision because I can go to foreign college that can increase my opportunity for finding a better job. However, to me this decision distant my friends and me –physically and mentally—and the educational system I grown up with for 16 years. This decision just suddenly threw me to an unfamiliar system. The higher intuition fee and less schooling hours seem to be costs that can never balance out with any benefits. Yet, I might be wrong. Though the intuition fee is high (and much higher than that of local school), but it ensure quality intuition. Also, the potential benefit (going to foreign college rather than staying in Taiwan) could outweigh the costs. A typical Taiwanese stereotype: graduating from foreign countries is far “cooler” than graduating in Taiwan. If I could take the full control of making this decision, I might choose to stay in the original school. Though getting a foreign degree might indeed increase job opportunities, I believed that one can achieve whatever goal he wants as long as he has single-minded determination.