TOW 30

I’m going to start off with a bombshell.  APELC is not actually that difficult.  In terms of actual amount of work, there is just as much as any other English class.  Over the course of the year we only wrote two out of class essays.  We also read a handful of difficult passages.  Other than that the only legitimate work we had was the tons of in class essays that we wrote.  The thing is that we did benefit from this because this it was a good proxy for the AP exam. Even though the actual workload may not be that heavy the actual grading is very strict.  This may seem like a pain when you get your grades back but it is beneficial in the end.  This is because, after Mr. Yost’s grading, the grading on the AP exam seems very lenient.   Over the course of the year it only benefits you to put in the extra work.  To be honest I did not put too much effort into my TOWs but I somewhat regret it.  I suggest that you actually try for your TOWs and write them in the style of a timed essay.  If you do that you will actually gain something out of the work you do and it will be helpful.  If not than there is no gain from it.  I would also say to put in a maximum amount of work in the beginning.  The first marking period is a make or break time.  It is when Mr. Yost grades the hardest, and it is also when you pretty much lock in your grade.  It is not to hard to come back from a single letter grade drop, but if you drop the ball in the first marking period it makes it almost impossible to get an A, and can even make it a challenge to get a B.  The last thing that I want to say is that Mr. Yost is a reasonable guy.  If you have a problem or need something go talk to him because he is willing to bend a bit and help you out so at least go and talk to him.

TOW 29

The documentary Who Killed the Electric Car? was an piece about why the electric car did not thrive after one of its initial pushes into the market in California in the ‘90s.  I can say that I agree with many of its assertions in the fact that they were many of the important reasons, but I feel like it would have been much easier to present.  The documentary was long, well over an hour, and said little more then I can explain in the next three sentences.  The people who killed the electric car were the direct producers of the car because they did not see it as profitable as a gasoline-powered car.  This profitability laid not in the actual demand, which would have likely been similar to gasoline powered cars, but in all of the after market products from engine parts to maintenance to even the gas to power it.  With all of this money as stake not many companies who are well invested in the way things are are willing to make a change because they will result in losses, and so these companies instead invest in the limiting of change through lobbying and PR.  Essentially what I said in the last three sentences are all that the documentary had to say as a whole to get their point across.  From there I just believe that it was a strongly spirited and emotionally tied team making this movie and think that they tried to make this show.  I believe that this documentary could have easily been slipped into 30 minutes but in an attempt to make their rhetoric more convincing and their back story more full the crew added a lot of essentially unnecessary fluff, which may have made the piece better, but detracted from the abruptness in attaining their initial point.