I love the end of the academic year. There’s a sense of closure, of having completed your task that is probably missing in other jobs. Sometimes, however, this happiness is mingled with a little bit of sadness for having to say goodbye to yet another bunch of nice students. This is particularly the case this year, with both my groups. You have been nice, hard-working and enthusiastic and trying to help you improve your English has been a pleasure rather than a job.
Good luck and hope to see you around!
Archive for June, 2007
Summer is here!
Is music and video piracy a crime?
The General Society of Authors and Editors (SGAE), the music industry and Spanish Government are clear about that and actually they are carrying out an intensive campaign warning people about the criminality of piracy. But not everybody shares that point of view.
To answer the question a group of 16 students (13 females and 3 males between 18 and 46 years) at Mieres EOI have been interviewed. The survey consisted on six written questions, posted to the Fifth Year’s Blog on the Internet.
The first part of the questionnaire dealt with the general opinion about piracy. The answers are absolutely clear, 100% of the students said that it is unfair for artists and the rest of the workers of this industry but they considered it is caused by the high prices of CDs and DVDs. However, only 40 % believed that downloading music or videos from the Internet or buying pirated copies is a crime and has to be punished.
Analyzing by ages, the research shows that students between 18 and 26 years download music from the Internet almost every day, whereas students between 30 and 46 years do it not very often and only when they are interested in a specific film or song. In contrast, only 4 students said they have never done it.
The vast majority of students interviewed said that they don’t buy very often at a music shop (neither did they do it before) and only do it when they are fans of an artist or have to make a gift. It is remarkable that only a person has admitted to do it frequently.
Finally, when they are asked about how to fight against piracy, almost all the students interviewed agreed that the best way would be to reduce the prices of DVDs and CDs, and more than 80% believed that at least this fact would help to reduce it.
In conclusion, the survey suggests that the people’s opinion about piracy is clear and they don’t doubt about the ‘moral legality’ of it. It also appears that there is a connection between the age and the use of the internet and music piracy. From my point of view perhaps the industry should offer more competitive prices instead of worrying about how to catch the ‘criminals’.
Holidays
The purpose of this report is to present the findings of a survey into male/female preferences about holidays. The information was gathered from a group of 13 students (8 female and 5 male) aged 18 - 32 at Mieres, Fifth year of English.
Interviews were conducted using a questionnaire and answers analysed for significant similarities and differences in the young preferences about holidays.
The first part of the survey dealt with female preferences to choose holidays and the frequency of them. The majority of the interviewees can only travel once or twice a year and the reason to choose a destination is to know new and interesting places. Few of them can afford to go on holidays more than twice a year. Lack of money and time are the main factors for this. Three of the female students choose a specific destination in order to relax and look for a best climate. Sunny beaches and peaceful places are the most common places to enjoy themselves. The vast majority of the female students doesn’t mind to go abroad or around Spain, while just two of them choose Spain as destination. Over 90% usually travel with their partner rather than with their family while few of them go with friends. None of the females travel alone. Friends’ experience and the Internet are the most common sources to find a good destination in addition to brochures and travel magazines. A minority of them organize their holidays through travel agencies. Well over 90% choose hotels as accommodation in their holidays while the 50% prefer to rent a house or another kind of accommodation.
On the other hand, frequency in the male students’ holidays is very different between them. Half of them travel once a year, while the other half not only go on holidays three times a year but also they are on constant holidays. In contrast with their female partners, male prefer to travel with friends rather than with family or their partners and prefer to go abroad. Same as female students they usually visit new and interesting places, while a few of them are looking for the sun. The Internet and friends’ experiences are also the main source of information to choose their holidays, while very few look for the best journey through brochures or travel agencies. The majority take hotels as accommodation same as the female students.
In conclusion, the survey suggests that apart from gender most people can’t afford to travel more than twice a year, mainly because of work or lack of money. Young people prefer to have new and interesting experiences travelling abroad rather than relaxing in sunny beaches. Internet, as the new discovery of the century, is the main source of information when looking for cheap and good destinations, while travel agencies are rarely used by young people. It is important to point out that hotels are the most common accommodation used by people between 18 and 32 in addition to rented houses. But the gender of the interviewees influences their preferences when choosing who to go on holidays with. Males prefer to travel with friends while females opt for travelling with their partners. But answers reveal that none of them like to go alone.
Are you a good driver?
Everlasting is the battle of sexes in the matter of driving. I am sure that everybody has wondered sometime who are better drivers, men or women. If we analysed our behaviour when we are driving, we could see that we all commit infractions. The information was gathered from a group of 17 students (12 female and 5 male) aged 18-38 at Mieres EOI. Interviews were conducted using the net and answers analysed for significant similarities and differences.
Almost all the people interviewed consider that their driving attitudes are safe and cautious. However, the number of infractions committed everyday is increasing and they can vary depending on the sex of the driver. According to the infraction ranking elaborated for this report, men obtain a better score (80 points) than women (70 points).
Comparing both sexes, the research reveals that 70% of the women accelerate when the traffic lights are in amber, 40% do not stop at the zebra crossings, while the 35% confess that they do not observe the speed limits, exceeding them frequently. Figures which contrast with the results for the men: 40%, 20% and 20% respectively.
According to our research women have more accidents than men, although these accidents are not important, the reason is that women usually drive around the city while most men drive in the highway where the speed is higher and the accidents more serious. Apparently, most of the females interviewed were not fined whereas one of each four men has been fined or has lost some points from his driving license.
In conclusion, the survey suggests that men are more respectful, cautious and have better behaviour when they are driving. However men are fined more frequently than women, and have worst accidents, which can explain why driving insurance is cheaper for women.
Do men and women share the housework?
AIM OF THE REPORT
This report aims to present the findings of a survey about housework (preferences, skills and responsibilities).
The information was gathered from a group of 21 students of English (5 men and 16 women) aged 17-40 using a written questionnaire on the Internet. Then, answers were analysed comparing male and female comments.
In many ways the situation is not very different from ones to others.
PREFERENCES
The vast majority of women stated they do some kind of housework (only one admitted she did no household chores at all) being making the beds and dusting the most common chores among women under 25, whereas those who were over 25 included cooking, ironing, washing and hoovering. However, when they were asked about their favourite chores, fifty per cent answered it was cooking, being ironing what they disliked the most.
On the other hand, most of the men interviewed also stated they do household chores (only one of them said he did not do any), being making the beds the one all of them do at home, and ironing the only one they never do.
As far men’s favourites, sixty per cent said they preferred cooking whereas twenty per cent preferred making the beds and the other twenty per cent preferred vacuuming.
SKILLS OR APTITUDE, COMPETENCE
Regarding the question of who does the housework better, very few of the women interviewed, just eighteen per cent, agreed they do it better than men. Also it was generally felt that the way you were brought up encourages you to do it better or not.
According to the men’s answers, all of them stated they are as good as women at doing household chores and only twenty per cent of them added there is a connection between upbringing and better aptitude.
RESPONSABILITIES
Both men and women seem to agree housework must be shared, although the reasons they give are not the same.
According to women, thirty one per cent said working out of their homes was the main reason for sharing; twenty five per cent said it was a question of mutual respect; eighteen per cent said they could do the household chores faster that way (by sharing); and thirteen per cent claimed it was the right thing to do if both members of the couple owned the house. Other reasons given were couples must share bad and good times, or that we are living in the 21th century what means “a new age” has began.
As far as men are concerned, forty per cent stated mutual respect was the main reason for sharing housework, being living together, living in the 21st century, and doing it faster, the other reasons they gave. It is surprising the fact that none of the men put working out as the main reason (as it turned out to be in the case of women).
CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATIONS
To sum up, the survey suggests that the gender of the interviewees influences their preferences about housework chores.
In addition, it appears that there is not a widely held belief in the connection between how both sexes are brought up and their better skills for doing the same chores.
Besides, both men and women are aware of their mutual responsibilities in sharing chores, although they don’t share the same opinion about which is the main reason for sharing them.
From my point of view, things are changing (hopefully) and men have taken more responsibilities, but governments should encourage them more to take part in all aspects of family life (sharing household chores included).
The penalty points system.
The aim of this report is to present the findings of a public opinion poll about the penalty points driving licence conducted among the fifth year students of Mieres EOI ( English).The tool was a five item questionnaire which can be answered simply with yes/no or in a more elaborated way, giving reasons for the answers Due to the heterogeneity of the group , with ages that range between 18 to 46, males and females indistinctly, the information gathered has been diverse and recovers many of the most popular feelings about the new system and obviously many others not so popular…
The first question was just to make a necessary division into people with a licence, whose opinions should be more pragmatic and those without a licence whose ideas will have, undoubtedly, a very different perspective. Unfortunately, only three participants didn’t have licence but their answers were in some cases quite surprising; as for example that “on the road there is no risk if you don’t want” .The main question of the survey was about the effectiveness of the system, more than a half of the interviewees thinks that it is inefficient , there is also a small minority that suggests we should wait and see how it works but they add that failing a better suggestion…, it is a good try. Nearly 90% agreed with the idea that the number of offenders is in inverse proportion to the hardness of the punishments. The other 10% added that not all the offences are the same so not all the penalties should be enforced. About the presence off traffic police the vast majority admitted that when officers or radars are patrolling the roads they try to be more careful.
Asked about the biggest risk off our roads speed and drugs, especially alcohol were pointed out as the most important ones. There is also a special mention to the luck of respect to other drivers, the bad conditions of the roads or the poor security measures off some cars. When offenders don’t even have a driving licence or their points can’t be subtracted participants are rigorous: higher fines, total prohibition of obtaining a licence and jail, in this order.
In brief, the survey suggests that time will show the effectiveness of the system, although people aren’t so confident about its supposed achievements. In contrast it is a widespread belief that laws must be enforced for this kind of offence because its consequences are irreversible and devastating for all of us.
Sports
The purpose of this report is to present the findings of a survey into male/female preferences in viewing and practising sport. Nowadays sports are something that everybody talks about, because the vast majority of people say they would like to do some sport it but in most cases they never get down to it. A common problem derived from not practising sports is obesity especially in children and, what parents have to do is to encourage their children to do sport since they are very young.
The information was gathered from a group of 20 students (7 male 13 female) aged 17-38 at Mieres Official school of languages. Interviews were conduced using a written questionnaire and answers analysed for significant similarities and differences.
The first part of the survey dealt with female attitudes to viewing sport. The vast majority of women interviewed said that they like watching sports, specially Formula 1 and incredibly football. It seems that customs are changing. A smaller group of females said that they do some sport, but most of the women who didn’t explained that it is because they don’t have enough time.
In contrast, nearly all the males in the group usually watch sport events on TV, in most cases, without any preferences. The vast majority said that they will watch any kind of sport if there is nothing more interesting on the television.
Almost all the people interviewed said they thought the best age to start doing any kind of sport is when you are a little child, because then, you will grow up doing sport. Another interesting thing is that 60% of the people think sports like boxing should be banned and 75% said they don’t have a favourite athlete.
In conclusion, the survey suggests that the gender of the interviewees, influences their preferences in viewing sport, but less so than some years ago, which is a clear symptom that society is changing.
Life after Death
The purpose of this report is to find out people’s beliefs about the most transcendental question in our life. Is there life after death? 17 students (12 females and 5 males between 18 and 38 years) at Mieres EOI have been interviewed for this survey with a written questionnaire, which shows an interesting result.
The differences between males and females are not very significant in this survey. Most of them don’t know where we go when we die. A very small group believes that we go to heaven or hell, and a significant group thinks that when we die we go nowhere.
The vast majority of them don’t believe in heaven or hell, some of them think that this is a religious invent. In contrast, only another small group believes in heaven or hell. Only a person believes that our present life is not the first life we live.
Over 70 % believe in spirits and ghosts, they think that when we die we turn into them but in contrast most of them think that poltergeists are not something supernatural, they think that there is a logical explication for them.
Finally, there are only two students who think that our destiny is written, the rest of them believe that we write our own destiny and we can change it with the things we do.
In conclusion, the most relevant thing that the survey shows, is that people are confused about this topic. With this survey we can see how culture and religion are changing in our traditionally catholic country. In the past, people believed in life after death and I think that old people still do, but the new generations are changing their beliefs.
Politics and Politicians
The aim of this report is to analyse some information about how politics and politicians are seen in today’s society. The information was gathered from a group of 18 students aged 18-38 at Mieres EOI. Interviews were conducted by written questionnaires, posted in the school’s blog, and all of them analysed attending to their age and gender.
The first part of the survey dealt with a general vision of politics and politicians in relation with their interest in politics and people’s confidence in politicians. About 70% of the students said that they were not interested in politics without any difference between genders. The vast majority of peopled interviewed also reported that they had not much confidence in politicians. Only one of the students said that he felt “some” confidence in our public representatives. Consequently is not very surprising that only one of the interviewees belonged to a political party.
Almost all the people interviewed said that politicians are not worried enough about people’s problems. People are generally convinced that politicians are only worried about themselves forgetting which their real purpose is. Surprisingly the only people who agreed that politicians worried about our problems were women and all of them said that facing these social and political problems must not be an easy job.
Many of the people interviewed said that the main problem in our society is terrorism, followed by unemployment, although a lot of people reported that they didn’t see any preference and they considered all the problems with the same importance. It was generally agreed that politicians are not doing enough to solve these problems, just a very small number of these people felt that the political situation is very hard and all these problems are very difficult to solve.
The vast majority of students interviewed said that the most important characteristic in a politician must be honesty. They prefer an honest, committed and hard-working politician, to a friendly and ambitious person. Surprisingly, most of the women interviewed thought that a committed politician would be better than a hard-working one, and only one of them put hard-working as the main characteristic for a good politician.
In conclusion the survey suggests that there is a huge distrust in our politicians and in our political system. Young people are not involved in politics, and they show complete disagreement with modern politicians. It also appears that there is a big gap between political views and the real situation. It’s generally thought that modern politicians are only interested in their own success, without paying enough attention to the real problems of the people. Can this situation be profitable for our system? I don’t think so.
Death penalty
This report has been written to provide the findings of a survey about the present attitude of our society towards death penalty. Death penalty has always been the centre of a big controversy. Despite the fact that it violates human rights, it is applied in several countries to punish different crimes such as murder, rape, robbery… Moreover, it is applied in some African countries to punish other “crimes” such as homosexuality or adultery. According to Amnesty International, in 2006, 1,544 people were executed in 25 different countries and 3,861 people were sentenced to death in 55 countries. However, it is thought that the real number of executions was even higher. The majority of these executions -90%- were carried out in only five countries: China, USA, Iraq, Pakistan and Iran.
The report is based on a blog survey where 21 people –students aged between 17 and 38- answered a questionnaire. It was generally agreed that nowadays death penalty is applied to punish murders in some countries. However, only 50 per cent of those interviewed knew that adultery, homosexuality, rape, robbery, political crime or drug dealing are equally punished with death.
The survey shows that the vast majority of people -76.2%- are against death penalty. However, about 12 per cent of this majority would justify it in special cases –terrorism, rape or murder. Only 66.7 per cent of the people would be against it in all cases.
Regarding the question about the best punishment for murderers, about 71 per cent of those interviewed would sentence them to life imprisonment. 14.3 per cent of the interviewees would sentence them to a maximum of 30 years’ imprisonment and the remaining 9.5 per cent of those interviewed would sentence them to death.
It must be pointed out that the vast majority of people agreed that death penalty is not particularly useful to fight against crime.
Apparently, men are more inclined to support death penalty than women. About 50 per cent of men are in favour of the death penalty while only 86 per cent of the women support it.
Summarizing, the survey shows that the majority of people reject death penalty. However, it has still many supporters. What is really surprising is that, in the 21st century, the whole society does not respect human rights.
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