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VOLUN-TOURISM               Some do it to get into heaven, some to get into medical school. Some do it because everyone else is doing it. Whatever the motivation, the number of health care volunteers heading from developed to developing countries has soared recently. The reasons to applaud are self-evident: The old epidemics are compounded by the new ones, and the health-related fallout of wars and natural disasters never ends. If both skilled and unskilled labor can help, then surely those who provide such labor should do good, feel good and learn much.             Not necessarily, critics say. Some concur instead with a Somali blogger who in 2013 said that the developing world has become a place for young adults from developed countries to “pay” for being lucky enough to be born in a wealthy country. Indeed, as sociologist Judith Lasker watched groups of American and Canadian volunteers in matching T-shirts surging through the Port-au-Prince airport two years after Haiti’s disastrous 2010 earthquake, she was reminded of “the weekly Saturday turnover at American vacation resorts.” Dr. Lasker, a professor at Lehigh University, asks: “Do volunteers help or hurt?” she asks. “In what ways?”             It turns out these questions cannot be answered very precisely. Still, anyone thinking about a volunteer stint is likely to be interested in Dr. Lasker’s results. Tens of thousands of religious and secular institutions send hundreds of thousands of health volunteers from the United States into the world, generating close to an estimated $1 billion worth of unpaid labor. Volunteers include experienced medical professionals and individuals who can provide only manual labor; between these extremes of competence are the students in the health professions, among whom global volunteering has become immensely popular.             Dr. Lasker presents data from a few hundred programs, gleaned from several surveys, dozens of interviews, and some brief trips of her own. (She did not look at large organizations like Doctors Without Borders, which are organized differently and generally do not use unpaid volunteers.) Most of the programs she considers sponsor volunteer assignments that last just weeks rather than months, despite almost universal agreement among hosting communities that longer stays are much more helpful.             The hosts generally have fairly simple expectations: Volunteers should do as they are asked, know enough about their destination not to violate local norms (“Women in shorts!” grumbled one African social worker), and understand that dirt, dust and discomfort are part of the experience.             However, students may take advantage of the circumstances to attempt tasks well beyond their expertise. Experienced professionals may adhere to standards of practice that are irrelevant in poor countries. Unskilled volunteers who do not speak the language may monopolize local personnel with their interpreting needs while providing little value in return.             Problems may lie with the structure of a program rather than the personnel. One set of volunteers may not be told what the previous group had been doing and not be able to leave suggestions for the next group. Medications may run out. Surgery may be performed with insufficient provisions for postoperative care.             Nor are the benefits to the volunteers themselves clear. Do they learn the true meaning of charity? Do they become more educated global citizens? A few studies on the long-term effects of short-term good works are ongoing. In the meantime, “there is little evidence that short-term volunteer trips produce the kinds of transformational changes that are often promised,” Dr. Lasker finds.             She winds up cautiously endorsing short-term volunteer work, provided the volunteer chooses carefully among programs and behaves responsibly while at work. Still, she suggests that returning volunteers be “humble” when it comes to claiming they have made a difference, either for others or for themselves.

SHOULD YOU HAVE A PET?   America is experiencing a population boom — of pets. Driven by rising disposable income and urbanization and by evolving attitudes toward animals, the number of pets has grown more rapidly since the mid-1970s than the human population, to the point where there are now about as many pets as there are people. We don’t just buy pets as never before, we also treat them differently. More animals are living in our houses and are given over to a life of leisure. Animals are spoken of as family members — and not just dogs and cats, but rabbits, rats and snakes. We feed them scientifically formulated organic diets and take them to veterinary specialists. Veterinarians and psychologists describe these changing practices as evidence of a deepening “human-animal bond.” I have become increasingly uncomfortable with the very notion of “pet.” Scientists studying animal cognition and emotion are continually peeling back the mysteries of animal minds, revealing an incredible and often surprising richness in the thoughts and feelings of other creatures. For instance, the more I’ve learned about goldfish the guiltier I feel that I subjected several of these creatures to a life of endless tedium, swimming circles in a small bowl on my daughter’s dresser. When I came upon the conclusion by the University of Tennessee ethologist Gordon Burghardt that the best we can do for captive reptiles is a life of “controlled deprivation,” I wished I had never bought Lizzy, our gecko. I felt awful when I learned that Lizzy’s perpetual clawing at the glass wall of her tank was most likely a manifestation of captivity-induced stress. We had basically been torturing her, and it is not surprising that she died after only two years, despite our efforts to give proper care. The ethical problems with the small creatures we stuff into cages and tanks are relatively clear-cut. The more challenging moral questions arise in relation to our closest furry friends: dogs and cats. Unlike animals that must spend their entire life in a cage or that must struggle to adapt to a human environment, most cats and dogs have it pretty good. Many have the run of our homes, share in many of the activities of their human families, and may even have opportunities to form social relationships with others of their kind. They have lived in close contact with humans for thousands of years and are well adapted to living as our companions. They can form close bonds with us and, despite species barriers, can communicate their needs and preferences to us, and we to them. Yet the well-being of our cats and dogs is perhaps more compromised than most of us would like to admit. There are, of course, the obvious systemic problems like cruelty, neglect, abandonment, the millions wasting away in shelters waiting for a “forever home” or whose lives are snuffed out because they don’t behave the way a “good” pet should. But even the most well-meaning owner doesn’t always provide what an animal needs, and it is likely that our dogs and cats may be suffering in ways we don’t readily see or acknowledge. We can too easily forget that although we have an entire world outside our home, we are everything to our animals. How many dogs, for instance, are given lots of attention inside a home, but rarely get outside? How many spend their weekdays inside and alone, while their owners are at work, save for the one or two times a dog walker or neighbor drops by for a few minutes to feed them and take them out briefly? Is it going too far to suggest that these dogs are suffering? It may be hard to recognize the harmful aspects of pet keeping when all we hear is how beloved pets are, how happy they are to be in our company, and how beautiful and enduring the human-animal bond is. Yet if we really care about animals, we ought to look beyond the sentimental and carefully scrutinize our practices. Animals are not toys — they are living, breathing, feeling creatures. Perhaps we can try to step into their paws or claws and see what being a pet means from their perspective. We might not always like what we see.

Identify the gland pictured below. [A] Identify the hormone released from the structure in the black circle #2 that would be released in response to low blood glucose levels. [B]

Identify number 21

Which sentence demonstrates the elimination of wordiness? a. The sun rose. The birds sang. The flowers bloomed.b. As the sun rose, the birds sang and the flowers bloomed.c. The rising sun welcomed singing birds and blooming flowers.d. Rising, singing, blooming: nature awakened with the sun.

Please upload the scan of your quiz here.  Remember that it needs to be a SINGLE pdf file in portrait orientation with clear, legible work in numerical order and final answers clearly marked. If you are having trouble accessing your email to get the file, this link should work for your K-State email.  outlook.office.com 

The majority of arrests are made _____________.

            Figure 1                             Figure 2                                 Figure 3 Each of the figures above best illustrates one of the Gestalt principles.  Correctly identify two of these three principles.  For EC, name all three correctly. Figure 1: [i] Figure 2: [ii] Figure 3: [iii]

Above is a numbered diagram of brain areas.  For each, first name the area, and then name a function of the area.  For extra credit {EC}, name a second, different, function of the area. Label Area Name Function EC Additional Function 1 [i]  [ii]  [iii]  2  [iv]    [v]    [vi]   3 [vii] [viii] [ix] 4 [x] [xi] [xii] 5 [xiii] [xiv] [xv]  

10 POINTS: Go back to review the 6 items you skipped.  Pick one additional question to answer from the 6 “skipped” questions.  Remove the word “Skip” from that blank and type in your answer using 3-4 sentences.