Since the the beginning, the earth has undergone many changes. Rocky Mount, for example, has changed tremendously since its beginning in the 19th century. Since its establishment, buildings, houses, and roads have taken over the once untouched land. With the one of the first cotton mills in North Carolina and the Wilmington-Weldon Railroad, Rocky Mount became a historical and developed city. This picture is a bird's eye view of the city of Rocky Mount in the early 1900s. Although this picture shows the construction of many buildings and roads, a lot of things have changed and have been built since then. Growing up in Rocky Mount, it is strange to see how much has changed since the 1900s. Rocky Mount has developed a lot since then and it is weird to see all the empty lots of nature. I love seeing old pictures of how things used to look like, but at the same time, it sad to see how much things have changed. Even today, I watch big areas of trees being knocked down to build roads or unnecessary buildings. Seeing how nature has been destroyed by development of the past years is upsetting that nature is being damaged and disappearing. 

I believe the relationship between the environment and religion is small. God created the earth and I think it is important to respect and protect what God has created. When one thinks about religion, one does not usually think that the environment is a valuable part of religion. In the video, Mary Evelyn Tucker talks about how humans today no longer see the earth as sacred. She thinks that humans do not know who they are anymore and it reflects by the way they are treating the earth. In the article "A Green Future for Religion", Bron Taylor incorporates many environmentalists belief on the crisis of the environment. He mentions Maurice Strong, a Canadian who served as General Secretary for the 1992 “World Summit on Environment and Development”, and his view on the earth. Strong says that he worships the earth because it is sacred. He sees the forest and the trees as churches. Slowly, the nature of the world has gone down hill and is no longer able to provide as much because of pollutants, population growth, exstinction of animals, industrialism, and so on. People are starting to realize how the the deterioration of nature is effecting the poor and religion. We rely on the environment for so many things, but it is quickly being destroyed and it makes one ask the question, what are humans going to do if they continue to treat nature like this? Tucker and Grim believe that the way we are living now is causing a huge crisis. We need to change our relationship with the environment because it is threatening everything on the earth. Although I do not believe religion is mainly about nature, I do think God wants us to protect it. The earth provides one with so many resources, and with those resources disappearing, the beauty and the value of the earth is going away too. Although Tucker mentions people worshipping the earth, I do not agree with her. No one should worship the earth because God created the earth to provide for us, not to be worshipped.  Even though people know that the earth provides us with plentiful resources, God is the one who put those resources on the earth not the earth itself. I think people look too deeply into ideas like this and religion should be simple and not overanalyzed. I do agree that the way we are treating the earth is harmful, but the earth is changing over time. The population is the largest it has ever been, areas around the world are being industrialized more and more, and new inventions are being created that are not always the most efficient and green. People should not rely on the earth for everything they need in life, they need to rely on God. God should be the one people go to for help and desperation. He is the one who created everything in life and is able to do anything. Religion is not about focusing on protecting the earth, so I think people should more concerned with their relationship with God and worshipping God for all that He does.

Synthesis of Richard Kahn’s “Towards Ecopedagogy”

            Ecopedagogy is a movement towards promoting environmental education to the public. Being educated about the environment is important because it is essential to alerting awareness, teaching skills and behaviors towards the environment, developing sustainability, and promoting balances between human’s life and relationships with animals and the environment. Although environmental education is very important, Richard Kahn, in “Towards Ecopedagogy”, also explains how environmental education has been “unable to provide either solutions or stop-gaps for ecological disasters that have continued to mount due to the mushrooming of transnational corporate globalization over the last few decades,” (Kahn 7). He describes how globally, we need to be more than environmentally educated to become more environmentally sustainable.

As the world has become more focused on industrializing and less on conservation, the environment has been the most effected by it. With the population doubling and growing extremely larger every year, forests, animals, ecosystems, and fossil fuels are all disappearing. Kahn explains that we need to change the way we are living or everything is going to become extinct. He mentions that capitalism is responsible for the poverty and the suffering people are experiencing today. Worldwide, people are not realizing and are not educated on the issues of today’s environment. People are quickly destroying and damaging what is left of the environment and that is why Kahn, along with many others, is towards ecopedagogy. Recent studies have shown that Americans want environmental education to be taught, but the same studies show that Americans have a huge misunderstanding of a lot of the basic environmental ideas and facts, which show that even with environmental education, there is still a lot work left to do. Modern environmental movements have tried to come up with ideas to help preserve, protect, conserve, and help the environment, but they have not been successful. William Stapp, founder of environmental education, believed that “the goals of environmental education were: knowledge of natural environment, interdisciplinary exploration, and inquiry-based student centered framework,” (Kahn 7). Kahn states that the development of cultural ecoliteracy is essential for our goal of sustainability. Being ecoliterate gives one an understanding of the roles imperialism, colonialism, and industrial capitalism has had on the environment and an understanding of how to act towards the environment.

Many founding figures of the ecoliteracy movement believe in multiple parts of the environmental education, including education for sustainability, humane education, and ecojustice education.  Founding figures see the essentialness of environmental education, but they also see the problems of it too and wonder why it is not fixing the crisis. In Apple Valley, Minnesota, students, who attend the School of Environmental Studies, go to zoos to incorporate it into their studies and environmental themes into their work. Students who attend Zoo schools have shown to “improve reading and math scores, performed better in science and social studies, and develop ability to transfer knowledge from familiar to unfamiliar contexts,” (Kahn 7). Although students are being educated with environmental issues and ideas, it lacks students becoming involved in environmental programs and reaching out to environmental issues and rights.

In “Towards Ecopedagogy”, Kahn discusses the importance of ecopedagogy, the movement of development of environmental education and sustainability. Federal and state governments have said that environmental education needs to be taught in public schools, and most Americans have agreed that this is important. Even though being educated about environmental issues and ideas is important, it is shown in studies that most adult Americans do not know the basic facts and information about the environment. Followers of the ecopedagogy movement see how essential it is to inform the public about the environment, but they see how, even with education, we are still struggling to conserve and be sustainable. The amount of animals and species being killed and ecosystems being destroyed annually is increasing large and it keeps getting worse. With environmental education, people are able to understand how to treat the environment and be aware of the problems we are facing. It is important to be educated on environmental issues, but it also important to act on ideas that are working to help the environment and are promoting well-being of animals and ecosystems. 

In the article "Pollution Alert System Launched in Scotland", it discusses how Scotland is now sending text messages or emails to people who subscribe to air quality alerts. These alerts tell people the air quality that day. Sending alerts to people about the air quality is important because it lets people know if they should not be spending a lot time outside that day. The air quality in Scotland is improving, but some days it can be extremely dangerous. It is damaging to people's health and can lead to breathing problems or heart attacks. As Postel mentioned in her article, "Water Adapting to a New Normal", technology is and will be important for solving environmental problems. As technology is able to send alerts to farmers about irrigation levels or operators about leaking pipes, technology is now able to tell people who live in Scotland when it is safe to be outside. I believe that technology has a lot of opportunities to help benefit the environment by alerting people about problems.

In the Patagonia Trailer, a group of guys spend two months traveling around South America. Hitchhiking and camping out in the wilderness, these guys show how nature is so enjoyable. From the video, they recorded the places where they traveled too. This video, in response to the Patagonia Feature Story, shows how wonderful nature is. One can see from this video how the environment, in this area, has not been destroyed by construction and human population. Many places are being destroyed by the growth in population and industrialization, but this video shows an area that has yet been affected by the changes in the world. It is important to keep areas like this and preserve the environment.

         In response to the Patagonia feature story "End of a River", Waterman talks about his hike and trip to the El Rio Colorado. During his journey with his good friend, they notice on the way the changes in nature and the way we are damaging nature. While they are paddling in the Rio Hardy, they are presented to a hidden river that has not been touched. This river is pure and has not been affected by humans or the damages other environments are being affected by. They are trying to cherish this paradise while they can, because they know that eventually it will no longer be a paradise. Many bodies of water are being run to the ground because so many people rely on the water it is providing. Waterman is trying to inform readers and the public that paradises are no longer paradises because of the damages people are doing on the environment. He is showing that now, paradises are rare to find because humans are damaging the earth. In the Youtube video "Water Changes Everything", it explains how many places around the world, especially Africa, South America, and Southeast Asia, are dealing with a shortage of water. People and animals are having to travel far to find any water because the earth is so dry and water is no longer available. Water is essential to humans and animals and most of the water families and animals are receiving, in this poor areas, is dirty and contaminated leading to health problems and death. Not only is water shortage in these areas, but it is also becoming a problem in many other places around the world that are not poor areas. In "Water Crisis", it names the reasons for water shortages are industrialization, population growth, urbanization, and global warming. World delegates are coming together to try to find solutions for the water crisis by coming up with ideas like, reusing sewage water and cleaning it, so it can be used for irrigation systems. There is a way to fix these problems and by thinking of solutions and giving to charities that are trying to help poor areas of desperate need of clean water is important and the only way to end these problems.

Since I was little, I have always wanted to become a dentist. I am not sure at what exact point I decided this, but there have been multiple times in my life where I catch myself being so interested in dentistry. I think one thing that has really made me interested in dentistry is the fact that I have spent so much time in dentist offices. Growing up, I always thought that my teeth were fine and I knew that I would eventually need braces, but I never thought I would have any more problems with my teeth. When it was time to finally get braces, my dentist took an x-ray of my teeth and told me that I was missing a tooth. I had one baby tooth left in my mouth and it would always start getting loose and then reattach itself because there was not a permanent tooth above to push it out. From this point, I have had braces twice, a bone graft, and dental implant. When people ask me what I want to do when I am older, they are often surprised that I want to become a dentist. Having so much work done on teeth, they think that it would drive me away from every wanting to become a dentist. Having a lot of different work done on my teeth has shown me and given me a lot of experience of what dentists actually do.

Last year in high school, we were given a week off of school to work as an intern wherever we wanted. I chose to be an intern at a dentist office and although I observed the whole time, it was so interesting watching the dentist fill a cavity, bond a tooth, take impressions, etc. I was only able to intern two days because I received permission to have my wisdom teeth removed during this week. Not only did I get my wisdom teeth removed, but I also had a bone graft. I rested the day of the surgery, but the next day, I felt fine, so I went and shadowed my oral surgeon, although my face was so swollen and my face was covered with bruises.

Right now, I am majoring in Fashion and Brand Management. I applied to Textiles undecided because I have always loved fashion and clothes and knew that one did not have to major in a science to go to dental school. During the first couple of weeks of the first semester, I was taking T 101 and TT 105. T 101 was focused on what Textiles is all about and what jobs one can gain from a Textile major and then the other class focused on Textile Technology and Medical Textiles. I found myself really enjoying learning about medical textiles, but as the semester went on, I no longer found interest in either side. I am hoping to change my major to psychology and get the prerequisites for dental school, so I can pursue my dream of becoming a dentist.  

Seeing a lot of different sides of dentistry has been so interesting to me and has made it so much harder to decide on what I want to do. Whenever I am given the chance to write about any topic of my choice, I always choose dentistry because I know I will not get tired of researching or talking about it. When I am bored, I often find myself looking up facts and information about teeth and rare diseases. Being able to have so many chances to go to the dentist office for all the problems with my teeth has really shown me how interested I am in dentistry and how much I have been learning. Although I am not thrilled about what I have to go through, I am almost thankful in a way that I have gone through all of this because it has given me the chance to experience and learn about dentistry.