An article posted by The Daily Collegian in August detailed Penn State President Barron’s move to block white supremacist Richard Spencer from speaking at Penn State. While this move did not spark controversy because people actually wanted to listen to Spencer speak, people did begin to question whether or not it was up to Barron to decide who can speak on campus. The issue of freedom of speech seemingly proves that Barron cannot ban Spencer from speaking, but his decision stood and the white supremacist did not step onto Penn State’s campus.

The second article I looked at was also from the Collegian, posted in October of 2017. As a follow-up to the previous article, this one delved into the lawsuit against Penn State for denying Richard Spencer the right to speak on our campus. Penn State was sued by a seemingly random student at Georgia State University, but still to this day, no progress has been made in this student’s favor. Both of these articles play into our deliberation focus on freedom of speech and what should and should not be allowed on college campuses.

These articles connect to tell the entire story of Penn State’s actions in regards to free speech and how those actions were received by the public. Although one person did not like Barron’s move, most other people did not seem to mind Barron’s discerning of who should speak on campus at Penn State.

In our deliberation, we plan to use articles like these to localize the debate of whether or not free speech should flow unfiltered on college campuses. In pulling from articles covering Barron’s actions in the case of Richard Spencer, we can make this discussion more focused on Penn State and how we should go about allowing or diminishing free speech on our campus.

My group’s deliberation “WE ARE… Free to Speak: Or Are We?” focuses on freedom of speech and its limitations on college campuses. Our first approach focuses on the negatives of free speech, which would include heckling in front of the HUB and safe spaces. Our second approach covers the positives of free speech like diversity and inclusion and our third approach covers PSU policies like the Willard Preacher, policies from Eric Barron and other colleges’ policies.

 

 

My role is on the outreach team, which for me pertains to creating and sending out invitations to organizations and keeping track of which organizations answer.

On top of these personal tasks, my mini-team will work together on the post-deliberation questionnaire, formatting post-deliberation reports and sending them to policy makers.

Currently, I’m creating and sending visually engaging and personalized emails to the list of organizations I put together earlier that I think would enjoy our deliberation. I will send these emails two weeks in advance of the deliberation and then send a second email one week in advance to anyone who didn’t respond to the first email.

The importance of making your bed in the morning

I believe that the two-minute task of making your bed in the morning is enough to transform your entire day and possibly your life.

Background

I believe that making your bed is a habit that can be passed down through generations. More specifically, I think that I inherited this belief from my mother.

My mom has always been a very put-together woman who never leaves the house without her bed made, her hair blow-dried and her clothes ironed.

If I left to go to school without making my bed she wouldn’t let me do anything after school. I would first have to come home and make my bed with my bed skirt tucked in and my throw pillows in the right order.

While this may seem a little extreme and I did disagree with the notion in my younger years, I definitely understand her logic looking back.

Interestingly enough, my grandmother is also a firm advocate for bed-making and although I never met her, everyone has told me that my great-grandmother was the exact same way.

Accomplishments

Making your bed is a small accomplishment. Organizing the disheveled sheets and out-of-place pillows into a clean and put-together bed starts your day off with a success.

Completing this task will give you a small sense of pride and motivate you to complete another task, and another, and another. And, by the end of the day, making your bed will have turned into a list of accomplishments.

If making your bed isn’t enough to inspire achievements and you have a bad day, then at the very least you’ll still come home to a nicely made bed.

Productivity

A messy bed also symbolizes a messy mind. When your thoughts are in an array like the crumpled sheets and discarded pillows from your unmade bed, how could you possibly get work done?

A clean, put-together bed promotes productivity. If you leave your bedding in a messy heap then you tend to muddle through the day until it’s time to fall back into bed again.

I cannot count the number of times in my life that I have left without making my bed and come back to my room later with a long list of things to do that I simply couldn’t get through.

Perhaps it’s the allure of how quickly I could just crawl back into my unmade bed. Or maybe it’s the guilt of avoiding such an easy task, but once this happens I need to either make my bed or leave the room in order to actually get work done.

If you don’t believe me, feel free to ask my roommate who has frequently watched me leave our dorm room to do schoolwork if my bed was left unmade that morning.

Good habits

 Making your bed every morning is correlated with a greater sense of well-being, too. Somehow that initial shift starts a chain reaction that helps other good habits take hold.

Making your bed every morning without fail is a habit and if you can stick to that simple habit, then you should be able to stick to other habits like eating healthy, going to the gym or drinking enough water.

This may seem like a bit of a stretch, but scientific studies have proven this correlation.

Making your bed gives you a small sense of pride, increases productivity, inspires other good habits and proves that the little things in life matter.

So perhaps you still think that making your bed isn’t worth the time it takes in the morning, but I can assure you that those two minutes can change your life. Not to mention how great it feels to get into a perfectly made bed at the end of a long day.