A team of very smart teenagers have set out to discover ways that maggots might make the world a better place. Two are from Loudoun County. Two live more than 9,000 miles away in Singapore.[…]

   To many U.S. politicians, educators and business leaders, Singapore’s students have become a symbol of the fierce competition the nation faces from high achievers in Asia. But these four students call themselves as 'international collaborators' and friends.[…]

   Globalization has spawned classroom connections across oceans. Teachers, driven by a desire to help students navigate a world made smaller by e-mail, wikis and teleconferences, say lessons once pulled mainly from textbooks can come to life through real-world interactions. […]

   Ballou High School students made a dance video to go-go music and an Israeli school sent back a folk dance video. The sixth-graders from Harford’s Magnolia Middle School also chatted with Iraqis and Slovenians about popular music. Harford’s County students debated the merits of chocolate milk with peers in Uzbekistan and Morocco. A New York class talked to French students about Barack Obama’s visit to France. Older students tackle topics in more depth. For example students in Montgomery County and Romania last fall shared ideas on whether cyberbullies should be punished, and they talked about democracy, freedom of speech, depression and suicide. [….]

   Teachers see such exchanges not only as an exciting way to teach geography, history, language and science but also as a vehicle to forge connections that push children beyond cultural stereotypes. A teacher said her students saw that, no matter what country the kids were posting from, they seemed just like them. That was their biggest revelation. […]

   “I have really tried to get my kids to see themselves as citizens of a planet”, said the director of Loudoun’s Academy of Science. “There really are things to learn from each other.”

 

 

 

1. Are you in touch with young people from other countries?

2. If you are, who are they? What interests, ideas, likes or projects do you share?

3. If not, would you like to try? Who/what would you be interested in?

 

1. How have young Italians changed their attitude to alcohol?

2. How has the number of alcoholics changed in Italy?

3. Is the problem affecting teenagers?

4. What steps have been taken to fight teenagers’ drinking?

5. How have drinking habits changed in Italy?

6. Has the Anglo-Saxon drinking culture influenced drinkers?

7. What are pub crawls?

8. What would you suggest to stop binge-drinking?

 

 

Traditional restraints are breaking down, to the horror of parents, health authorities and the government, which has described the problem of alcohol abuse as a national emergency.

Where once becoming drunk was a social taboo and a cause for shame, it is now regarded by many young Italians as acceptable, even desirable.

The number of diagnosed alcoholics has tripled in the last decade to around 60,000 out of a population of 60 million – still modest by British standards – and two thirds of teenagers between the ages of 13 and 15 drink to excess, according to a government study published this year. Milan recently introduced an emergency law under which it will impose a €900 (£775) fine on the parents of under-age drinkers.

There is a nationwide campaign by lobby groups – so far unsuccessful – to raise the legal drinking age from 16 to 18. Rome launched its own drive to confront binge-drinking this week, making it illegal to drink in the street after 9pm, transforming the capital. Piazzas normally packed with revellers, many of them getting drunk on wine and spirits, have emptied. With large numbers of police on hand to enforce the new rule, teenagers instead had to make do with chain-smoking cigarettes and eating ice cream.

Whether the new measures will be able to turn around the changes in the country's drinking culture seems doubtful. Having been introduced to the cheap shots, happy hours, and down-in-one drinking games of Anglo-American drinking culture, many Italians are now hooked.

Neighbourhood enoteca bars, where a glass of wine is often accompanied by cured meat, cheese and other antipasti snacks, are being crowded out by British-style pubs with names like The Drunken Ship and Sloppy Sam's. "They are drinking a lot and they are drinking to get drunk," said Andrea, a barman in a hole-in-the-wall pub off Rome's Piazza Campo de' Fiori, in the heart of the city's historic centre. "They don't even like the taste of alcohol, but they feel that they need to get smashed to look cool in front of their friends."

Italian life is changing as the custom of drinking only as an accompaniment to eating is abandoned. The influx of foreign tourists is partly to blame for the shift in attitude to alcohol, according to residents. Budget flights have put Rome and other Italian cities within easy reach of young British, Irish and other hard-drinking northern Europeans, not to mention thirsty Australians and Americans.

"We are seeing a strong Anglo-Saxon influence on the culture of drinking," said Gianluca, the owner of a bar in Trastevere. "It's got much worse in the last five years. There's a lot more violence, and you see groups of 15 or 20 young teenagers drinking in the streets and causing trouble. There are gangs with knives. It's becoming just like England."

Italians may be taking their cue from the organised pub crawls which have becoming increasingly popular in Rome in recent years. Each night more than half a dozen criss-cross the capital, shepherding backpackers from one drinking hole to another. For €20, drinkers start off in a pub where, for an hour and a half, they can drink as much as they like. After that they have to buy their own drinks, but the ticket includes a 30 per cent discount at subsequent bars and free entry to a nightclub. The pub crawls originally attracted only foreigners, but Italians are beginning to join in and now make up five to 10 per cent of the nightly drinking expeditions.

 

 

 

Jared Rogalia, 25, a Hertz rental car manager-trainee in Alexandria, is as cranky as someone twice his age when he complains about his generation's work ethic. Here's how Rogalia characterizes his age group: "The first is, really spoiled and lazy. The second is, we're free-spirited. And the third is, they'd rather be poorer and have free time than have a lot of money."

The millennial generation – about 50 million people between ages 18 and 29 – is the only age group in the nation that doesn't cite work ethic as one of its "principal claims to distinctiveness," according to a new study. Young adults and their elders agree: baby boomers and Generation Xers have better work ethics and moral values than those in their 20s.

In a survey of about 1,200 people of all ages, millennials chose other traits to define themselves: 24 percent said "technology use," 11 percent went with "music/pop culture," 7 percent chose "liberal/tolerant" and 6 percent said "smarter." Only 5 percent noted their generation's "work ethic" – the same portion as who chose "clothes."

Among older generations, at least twice as many people cited work ethic as a badge of their age group's identity: 17 percent of boomers, 11 percent of Gen Xers and 10 percent of those 65 and older. The older three generations also take pride in their strong values or morals and in being "respectful," terms that hardly any millennials in the survey used. "Millennials may be a self-confident generation," the study concluded, "but they display little appetite for claims of moral superiority."

Some young adults believe such generalizations are nonsense. Maya Enista, 26, chief executive at Mobilize.org, a District-based advocacy group for young adults, said the term "work ethic" is misleading. "It's not about being at a desk from 9 to 5. I work part of every hour I am awake." Enista said her fellow 20-somethings' constant connection to technology keeps them at least as tethered to their jobs as older workers are. "It's a given that we work hard, because the reality is that millennials are the most educated and most in debt."

But other young people in the Washington area – and their older managers – can be their generation's harshest critics. At Potomac Pizza in Chevy Chase, Omar Haleem, 22, an assistant manager, said he likes being with his colleagues but is often put in the awkward position of haranguing those who are his own age. "I have to call out their faults and make it real obvious that they're not doing their job," he said. […] They leave food on the line that's ready to be delivered to tables or put in bags. They'll order food in the middle of a dinner rush and enjoy their slice and not answer phones, which is really annoying. And they talk on the phone to their friends outside."

Rea Pyle, 34, Potomac Pizza's owner, said many younger workers do not accept that it takes long, concerted effort to build a career. "They've been blessed with parents and grandparents laying the foundation to give them a better life," he said. "But that hunger is not really in them. But the desire for success is. They want to make money but don't want to put in the required hours or effort.”

In the high-salary realm of management consulting firms, which hire hundreds of young adults annually, the youngest employees are far more likely to request the flexibility to work from home or during off-hours, executives say.

Nicole Furst, 38, a senior executive at Accenture in Reston, said the younger generation at her firm has little interest in putting in long hours simply because that's what previous generations did. "They make it clear that it's not a pattern they would adopt," she said. "They look at all the Generation Xers and say, 'I don't want to put in all those hours when I am at that point.'” […] “Younger workers' emphasis on a better balance among work, family and friends even at the start of a career is admirable”, she said. […]

Jennifer Miller, 44, director of talent acquisition at Sibley Memorial Hospital in the District, said younger nurse recruits in job interviews frequently make demands about when they can and can't work. "The younger candidates start talking about how their shifts need to fit into a predetermined schedule, rather than working around whatever the hospital needs," she said. […]

Some young Sibley nurses crave more responsibility and grander titles without putting in the years of grunt work that previous generations saw as the gateway to advancement, Miller said.

"We had a new grad, she finished a master's degree and she wanted to be a nurse manager. But she had no nurse managing experience. I wouldn't have made the assumption that the mere fact I had finished this new degree meant that my employer would find me a new job."

At Hertz in Alexandria, Rogalia said his peers at work are sometimes easily distracted. "We've had to take disciplinary actions," he said. "We had a new hire who was watching video on his iPhone with his headphones on, and the customers were kind of looking around to see what this kid was doing. He was laughing. He stopped showing up after a while."

Rogalia, who wakes at 5 a.m. for work and does not get home until about 8 pm, said it was only recently that he felt he had a decent work ethic. After graduating from college in 2007, he lived at home in New York with his parents. "Life was great, but I didn't feel good about myself," he said. "I was lazy. I was working two part-time jobs. I think the older generations do have a better work ethic. My parents pampered me and gave me anything I asked for." […]

 

1. Three main generations are mentioned: how are they called?

a.    Born after World War II (1945-1964): _______________________

b.    Born between 1961 and 1981: ____________________________

c.    Born after 1981: ________________________________________

2. What makes them different?

3. How many people have been interviewed in the survey?

4. How many opinions are reported here? Whose opinions are they? (Make a table like the one below)

5. Do they agree or disagree?

6. What does the title mean?

 

1. No, it's just that the demands of today's workplace are different; quality, not quantity matters.

2. No, young people's work ethic is no different from any time in recent memory.

3. Yes, today's young workers have a better sense of work-life balance.

4. Yes, today's young workers grew up with an inflated sense of self-esteem and don't work hard enough.