User:MarvinBuruca

About education: I am pursuing a degree in Network Administration and working on improving my English. About hobbies: I play soccer with my friends every other weekend.

Grand Challenge -Lifting farmers out of poverty 

Small farm owners and families from rural areas face a constant struggle to produce enough crops in order to have an income. There are many factors playing against them such as climate change, land degradation, high price of fertilizers, and in some countries, displacement from their land. Currently, organizations such as Partners Worldwide (https://www.partnersworldwide.org/our-work/the-goal/), the World Bank (http://www.worldbank.org/en/understanding-poverty),  The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (http://www.fao.org/farmingsystems/) are addressing this problem.

How do they do it? Partners Worldwide and the World Bank implement the concept of Value Chain. With this system, small farmers can accesses markets beyond their communities and obtain more fair prices for their crops. According to these institutions, all players in the chain benefit. With the extra income, they can satisfy needs such as health care, education and other basic needs( wpf). Also cooperativism help farmers to reduce the cost of supplies  and at the same time, they can get training and support to solve common problems related to crops.

https://www.wfp.org/stories/central-america-smallholder-farmers-get-plugged-markets

http://www.worldbank.org/en/topic/agribusiness

https://www.partnersworldwide.org/2017/05/16/agriculture-end-poverty/

Is technology providing support to small farmers to get out of poverty?

Access to mobile phones and other devices connected to the internet,  farmers can verify real prices and identify more profitable markets. http://www.worldbank.org/en/news/feature/2012/03/06/mobile-technologies-aiding-poor-farmers

 

Bill Gates from Microsoft explains four ways in which technology helps small farmers in

Africa. Mapping the soil with digital maps, genetic study of plants, and sharing plating techniques through Youtube and other video sharing platforms help farmers to produce more and have better profits. https://www.gatesnotes.com/Development/Innovation

Reducing poverty is certainly a big challenge. Cooperativism, access to markets, and training help farmers to alleviate their extreme poverty condition. But there are other factors such as climate change, abusive government policies, and violence that affect the poor people.Fortunately,  NGOs also provide great support to those in need. Here is a list of non-governmental organizations that provide support to people that struggle to satisfy basic needs https://agsci.psu.edu/international/intad/internship-career-resources/non-governmental-organizations.

 

1. TOPIC: Learning Literacies - Find it
(Recommended search)

https://www.safesearchkids.com/ (Best)

This website powered by Google offers content for kids from pre-k to 8th grade. Now that great part of our learning is done using technology, is important to ensure that the content children can access is adequate for them.

One can learn from this topic that parents and tutors should protect kids from accessing content that might be harmful for them.

(From selected media)

https://kids.kiddle.co/ (-)

This is a nice tool for parents that want to make sure their kids review material according to their age. The Kpedia section provides a list of contents with many different topics like science, astronomy, geography, history, and many other topics.

 

2. TOPIC: Privacy and Personal Information
(new resource search)

https://hbr.org/2018/07/what-you-need-to-know-about-californias-new-data-privacy-law (Best)

According to this article by Dipayan Ghosh, California has approved a new law that requires companies inform their customers what type of data have collected and the reason of the collection. The customers can as well ask for the deletion of all personal data collected from them after they end their ties with the company.

(Recommended search)

https://www.wired.com/insights/2013/10/internet-privacy-and-security-a-shared-responsibility/

This article mentions the importance of final user of web services to take action in protecting their personal data. There are laws that protect their privacy  but users also have to do basic stuff such as deleting cookies, protect their passwords, and using encrypted email.

3. TOPIC: Internet Predictions Database
(From Selected media)

http://www.elon.edu/e-web/imagining/surveys/2018_survey/Digital_Life_And_Well-Being_Home.xhtml  (Best)

The respondents to this survey expressed their worries about the connectivity that the Internet provides. A longtime leader of research at one of the top five global technology companies said that "Relationships are replaced by transactions". Even when most of them prize the benefits of the evolution of technologies, they point out aspects of such evolution that distort the traditional human behaviors.

(New search)

https://www.familycircle.com/family-fun/technology/effects-of-technology/

This article  talks about how everyday activities, where we interact with relatives and friends, have been affected by technology. As the evolution of technology continues and we need to keep online constantly, traditional rules such as putting away the phone when seating a the table should still  be taught to new generations or should be things from the past? In response to this question, the comments expressed by some classmates say that we should still teach this rules to younger people and also learn a balanced behavior where we use technology and preserve the social interaction.

4. TOPIC: Computers and Crime
(New search)

https://www.fbi.gov/investigate/cyber (Best)

This page on the official website of the FBI provides useful information about cyber crime. It includes a link to the to The Internet Crime Complaint Center(IC3), a service that internet users can use to report a criminal activity related to internet and cyber crime. Also the website gives information about ransomware, a tool used by malicious hackers,  this tool can lock important data of organizations to hold them hostage at the hand of the hackers who demand money or another kind of transaction.

(New search)

https://www.techrepublic.com/article/ransomware-reigns-supreme-in-2018-as-phishing-attacks-continue-to-trick-employees/

This article on TechRepublic by Alison DeNisco Rayome names ransomware as the responsible for the majority of malware attacks this year. The article says that "[e]mail continues to be the main entry point for malware, with 96% of attacks coming through use inboxes. Companies are also nearly three times more likely to get breached due to social attacks than actual vulnerabilities,..".

5. TOPIC: Open Textbooks
(New search)

http://nebula2.deanza.edu/~mo/holistic/HolisticStatisticsText.pdf (Best)

Open textbook titled  "Inferential Statistics and Probability-A Holistic Approach." by Professor Maurice A. Geraghty(Professor Mo)  for my statistics class in spring quarter this year. It was an excellent resource to consult for examples and reviewing lessons.

(From selected media)

http://openbookproject.net/thinkcs/python/english3e/

This book focuses on problem solving and critical thinking and not merely in syntax of the programming language. This book help the reader to improve skills for problem solving.

It is immensely helpful to have access to open textbooks online to complement the materials required in class. In many cases textbooks are very expensive and not all students can afford them.

= 6. TOPIC: Lifting Farmers Out of Poverty = (Recommended search)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mnX73GJQY4c (Best)

FAO(Food and Agriculture Organization of United Nations) is one organization that implements programs around the world in join with governments and NGOs to reduce poverty.

(Recommended search)

https://insights.som.yale.edu/insights/can-farming-startup-help-end-extreme-poverty

There are some for-profit institutions working with small farm owners in developing countries. Share-X is an example.

= 7. TOPIC: Internet of Things = (Recommended search)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s-kdRdzxdZQ

This video clip from the movie Wall-e shows how a world where everything is "smart" and connected looks like. Humans don't have to do much effort to do something. Everything is are the reach of their hand. It is something that it is not hard to imaging thanks to the Internet of Things(IoT). Many devices are redesigned to have WIFI connection and can be controlled remotely and many new inventions are introduced every year. We can find some examples of devices introduces for 2018 on this web page on CRN (Computer Reseller News).

(Recommended search)

https://www.crn.com/slide-shows/internet-of-things/300097786/20-crazy-connected-iot-products-at-ces-2018.htm/pgno/0/1

Some devices are useful but others have a negative impact in the privacy of people since they can get too much information that can fall in the hands of malicious people.

8. TOPIC: Medicine and Computers
(Recommended earch)

https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2017/08/170815110950.htm (Best)

This article on Science Daily provided by Case Western Reserve University says that a new method for diagnosing Alzheimer's disease is being developed. The method uses a computer program bases on an algorithm called "Cascaded Multi-view Canonical Correlation (CaMCCo)". This method will help to prolong independence in daily activities of those that have the disease.

(Recommended search)

https://techspirited.com/importance-of-computers-in-medicine

This article gives some important areas where computers have become an important key in the area of medicine. From patient’s data to surgical procedures.

9. TOPIC: Technology and Elections
(Recommended search)

https://cs.stanford.edu/people/eroberts/cs201/projects/2006-07/electronic-voting/index.html (Best)

There are arguments in favor  and against electronic voting. This web page give us some of those arguments. Technology is making possible to have access to people willing to cast their vote. Traditional method of voting becomes tedious and violent in some countries. With the use of electronic machines and computers to manage this process, many of those troubles or reduce or eliminated. But it still presents many risk of fraud. Hackers can manipulate the system to favor a candidate or initiative. But it seems that electronic voting is the thing of the future.

(New search)

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/02/21/magazine/the-myth-of-the-hacker-proof-voting-machine.html

This article by Kim Zetter focuses on vulnerabilities found in the voting machines manufactured by Election Systems & software, a company that sells electronic voting systems. According to this article, some of these systems have remote access software preinstalled in order to  perform configuration and maintenance. But this type of software gives the capability to hackers to manipulate the results. The company is working on fixing this problem.

10. TOPIC: Future of Computers
(Recommended search)

https://www.npr.org/sections/alltechconsidered/2018/02/05/583321707/can-computers-learn-like-humans (Best)

The article mentions a concept called "Deep Learning" which is the ability of a computer to differentiate one thing from another. According to the article, "Deep learning in computers simulate how the brain works." One important point to take into account is mistakes. As it is mentioned in the article, some mistakes can be costly. But computers and AI are being improved to have better accuracy in every situation.

(Recommended search)

https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2018/07/180712123938.htm?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+sciencedaily%2Fmatter_energy%2Fengineering+%28Engineering+News+--+ScienceDaily%29

This article talks about the ability of a machine to learn about its environment an make prediction of situations beyond what is already known. With this method, the machine returns equations that describe physical situation that will happen all the time. The equations are much simpler, so humans with the appropriate knowledge can work with those equations. According to the article, this method is being used to develop a robot that can learn about its capabilities and movements in order avoid dangerous situations.