SaludToday

Is the “modern neighborhood” a root cause of the U.S. obesity epidemic?

Check out this new video featuring Dr. James Sallis, a psychology professor at San Diego State University, who works to change how U.S. residential areas are designed and constructed by emphasizing pedestrian access and public parks and de-emphasizing the need for cars for everyday life.

Sallis also directs Active Living Research, a granting program for The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation that supports studies to prevent childhood obesity and promote active communities.

SaludToday

Check out these cool youth-oriented videos on diabetes.

“The Corner,” a diabetes public service announcement performed by Jose Vadi:

[vimeo]http://vimeo.com/28728893[/vimeo]

“Death Recipe,” performed by Erica McMath Sheppard:

[vimeo]http://vimeo.com/28708852[/vimeo]

By Carlo Alaimo
CSI Today

Irvin Ibarguen, College of Staten Island Valedictorian for 2012, is the first CSI undergraduate to be admitted into Harvard University’s prestigious PhD History program.

Irvin Ibarguen (center, bottom) credits the support of his family for making his academic dreams a reality. (Photo courtesy of the Ibarguen family.)

Irvin, a senior History major with The Verrazano School honors program, began his college career as a Marketing major. When asked why he made the switch from Marketing to History, Irvin answered, “People usually think of history as a set of names and dates, but, in reality, it’s a lively and, at times, acrimonious debate. I wanted to be a part of it.”

Although Irvin is aware of his achievements, he regards his admittance to Harvard’s PhD program as one stop in a long, academic ride, which so far has earned him several scholarships including an IME Research Fellowship: a full-tuition scholarship awarded to Mexican Americans, and the prestigious Jeannette K. Watson Fellowship, which provides undergraduates with three consecutive summer internships.

As part of the Watson fellowship, Irvin has worked for the Institute of International Education; Crain’s New York Business, writing several articles for the seminal business newsletter; and will be traveling to Tunis, Tunisia to work for Amideast, a non-profit organization offering education activities in the Middle East, as a program assistant. “Tunisia will be a radically different experience,” said Irvin. “I am looking forward to the challenge.”

Irvin maintained a 4.0 GPA and is quick to credit his CSI professors, namely, Drs. Calvin Holder and Richard Lufrano of the History department, for establishing “my love for reading and writing about History.”

On Irvin’s success at CSI, Dr. Lufrano noted: “In my 25 years of college teaching at different institutions, Irvin is among the top two undergraduates I have taught.”

Irvin especially credits his family with supporting him throughout his scholastic life. His parents moved here in 1990 while his mother was still pregnant with him.

Growing up in a small apartment with ten inhabitants would seem like a drawback to many people but to Irvin it was more of a blessing. “I was never alone… They were the best support group,” he said of his parents who worked several jobs while raising him. “I was able to focus exclusively on my education.”

A graduate of Midwood High School in Brooklyn, Irvin also credits his background for motivating him to pursue a History PhD. “The scorn directed at illegal aliens often found its way down to me,” said Irvin, who admits to having distanced himself from his heritage while growing up. It was not until Irvin enrolled in an advanced seminar, in which he completed a paper about Mexican immigrants in New York City that he was able to “embrace the beauty of [his] Mexican background.”

At Harvard, Irvin hopes to continue to write about illegal immigration in a way that can contribute to ongoing debates. In this regard, his background puts him in a unique position. “I am here because of the sacrifices of ‘illegal immigrants’ and I am deeply respectful of their plight, but I also grew up detached from them, so I can analyze their history with an interesting mix of passion and objectivity.”

Irvin eventually hopes to publish his dissertation, and establish himself in a tenure-track professor position where he can produce quality scholarship and influence students’ lives for the better.

For now though, he is “simply grateful to the CSI community for its constant support, especially Dr. Lufrano, Dr. Holder, [The Verrazano School's] Katie Geschwendt, and [the Career and Scholarship Center's] Dr. Geoffrey Hempill.”

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uZjUQ4Gd5Ew[/youtube]

SaludToday!

The ¡Nunca Más! Novela Health Series seeks to educate Latinas and their families about the importance of safe medication use.

The series, launched in October 2011 by the Office of Women’s Health at the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, provides consumers and community leaders with access to four video novelas and free health materials about safe medication use, which is vital given that each year thousands of preventable injuries and deaths are caused by improper medication use.

The series follows the lives of main character Lourdes and her family. In each episode, the family faces a problem because they don’t use medicines wisely.

Find more about the campaign in English or Spanish.

Watch all episodes here.

When you watch them, ask yourself: What lessons do Lourdes and her family learn about medication safety? How do they handle the challenges?

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VRzSxHZoUJs[/youtube]

By Slyvia Longmire
Mexico’s Drug War

A little over a year ago (maybe more, maybe less…my memory is like a sieve), I was asked to serve on the Board of Advisers for an organization out of Stanford University called Love Thy Neighbor, Mexico.

In a nutshell, their goal is to educate people between the ages of 18-30 that American drug use/demand is one of the primary and immediate causes of the violence in Mexico. College kids are one of their largest target audiences, mostly because many use marijuana, and are more prone to experiment with drugs during that time frame.

I had no problem saying yes right away to supporting their organization, and trying to get their message out whenever possible. They have a Facebook page with almost 20,000 likes, a great website with lots of good information, and you can even follow them on Twitter at @LTN_Mexico.

My interest in their cause was rekindled last night during a conversation I had with someone, who astutely pointed out that most American drug users don’t make the connection in their minds between their drug use and the drug war.

It’s very frustrating for someone like me who reads about the brutal violence and cruelty on a daily basis, and it makes me ask (to no one in particular), Where do these people think their drugs are coming from? And where do they think their money is going?

That’s the problem: they don’t think.

I did a podcast several months ago with the head of Texas NORML (the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws), who made the very interesting comment that NORML encourages its members to “buy local,” meaning to buy their marijuana from US growers, not the dope that comes from Mexico.

While I think this is great, I know even that is a challenge for many. American-grown marijuana is often higher quality (i.e. higher THC content and seedless) than the Mexican imported stuff, but it’s usually more expensive. Many marijuana users here aren’t connoisseurs, don’t want to pay a lot of money for their dope, and often just use whatever their friends have on them.

So, for all you Americans out there who use drugs – whether casually or habitually – and think it’s a victimless crime: You are a big part of the problem!

Yes, the other part of the problem is the fact that marijuana, cocaine, heroin, and methamphetamine are all illegal. That is not what this post is about, and I’m not going to debate that here.

I have to point out to you that your drugs have to come from somewhere, and right now there’s a 90% chance they come from Mexico. In turn, the money you use to pay for those drugs has to go somewhere, and there’s a 90% chance that money is going into the hands of a Mexican cartel.

They will use that money, in part, to buy guns. Those guns are used to kill other Mexican cartel members, Mexican police officers and soldiers, and innocent people (some of which are children and infants) who don’t do what the cartels order them to do.

Bottom line, the actions of American drug users have immediate and deadly consequences in Mexico. They are also putting our US law enforcement officers along the border and beyond at high risk.

Our cops are increasingly being confronted by violent drug smugglers all because those smugglers are willing to kill just to make sure you get your baggie of pot for the weekend’s parties.

Just think about it.

Watch the short video below, and let the facts – and the connection between us and our neighbor to the south – sink in.

Pass this on to young folks, college kids, people you party with, and anyone who needs a bit more understanding of how we’re connected.

[vimeo]http://vimeo.com/40754363[/vimeo]

LatinaLista — If anyone out walking in the Tucson desert last week thought they saw a white object gliding silently across the Arizona sky, they can be forgiven for thinking it was a UFO. It wasn’t but it was something never before seen, maybe anywhere, in the U.S.

It was a 800-pound paper airplane.

800-pound paper airplane soars over the Arizona desert (Photo: Pima Air & Space Museum)

The 45-foot paper plane was the culmination of a contest sponsored by the Pima Air & Space Museum’s The Great Paper Airplane Project. Wanting to encourage kids to go into math, engineering and science, the museum invited kids back in January from the Tucson area to go to the museum and fly paper airplanes that they had made.

Each child, ages 6-14, had only one sheet of 8.5 x 11″ paper to fold into the design they thought would fly their plane the farthest. Arturo Valdenegro, a 12-year-old seventh grader from Santa Cruz Catholic School in Tucson, developed the winning concept. Experimenting with different designs, he was able to get his paper plane to fly 75 feet — beating out the 150 other kids who had entered the contest.

Arturo Valdenegro creates the winning paper airplane design. (Photo: Pima Air & Space Museum)

While everybody who entered the contest won a free family membership to the museum, Arturo’s winnings is making him a part of aviation history (according to the museum). Arturo’s design was scaled up, way up into the 45-foot model. Arturo got to help with the designing process and flew to Los Angeles to work with the design team, some who had worked with NASA and the U.S. Air Force.

The team used a type of corrugated cardboard to build it but they saved the most important feature for last — the name. It was christened “Arturo’s Desert Eagle.”

After a few rough starts — it was a little heavier than anticipated — the paper plane was hoisted into the air by a helicopter which released it over the desert — flying it into aviation history before it crashed and suffered extensive damage.

However, the plane achieved something else even more important — it inspired Arturo to think about going into engineering.

Arturo poses for the media alongside the plane that bears his name. (Photo: Pima Air & Space Museum)

By Rudy Girón
REVUE: Guatemala’s English-language Magazine

GUATEMALA — In Poland they were able to get 209 people inside a bus. That was the Guinness World Record until yesterday (February 12) when in Jocotenango they were able to get 221 people and one chicken inside the chicken bus. This will be the first Guinness World Record for Guatemala according to the Mayor of Jocotenango, Sacatepéquez.

[youtube]http://youtube.com/watch?v=A263KFQZJV8[/youtube]

By Jennifer Barreto-Leyva
LatinaLista

CARACAS — The day has arrived when I couldn’t be any more proud to be a woman in Venezuela. It’s all because of Venezuelan Presidential Candidate, Maria Corina Machado. Machado challenged President Hugo Chavez in such a way that so far no man has ever dared to do before.

It was on Saturday night, January 14, 2012, after 8 eternally long hours of being subjected to President Hugo Chavez’s annual Memoria y Cuentas (a loose Venezuelan version of the State of the Union address) when something happened.

Maria Corina Machado campaigns in Venezuelan presidential race.

Congresswoman and Presidential Candidate, Maria Corina Machado, with the courage that only a Latina can have, stood up and faced President Hugo Chavez, as no one has ever done before in Venezuelan history, and called him a liar and thief.

Her outburst was because of his abuse of expropriating without giving the mandatory compensation by law for every property.

“Expropriating is robbery President Chavez, you’ve been so far on an 8-hour broadcast telling jokes, personal anecdotes and describing a country that doesn’t exist,” said Machado. “ I’ve seen with my very own eyes women fighting for a milk can, in desperate search for medicines, people shutting down their businesses, being robbed, kidnapped, and having a worst life style and quality of life while you are telling us everything is great and can’t be better.”

Venezuelan presidential candidate Maria Corina Machado challenges Pres. Hugo Chavez.

The entire country was shocked into silence. The tension could be cut with a knife. The adrenaline rush all Venezuelans felt was literally indescribable. For the first time in 13 years of Chavez being in power, someone, a very brave woman, had the courage to tell him — looking him straight in the eyes, face-to-face, doing it like nobody else, what 80 percent (or more) of Venezuelans have been thinking, living, feeling during these last 13 years.

What came next was predictable; at least something that shouldn’t have been a surprise to anyone.

Chavez, in his usual arrogant, overbearing and offensive style, responded to Machado, telling her pretty much that she was a nobody and she wasn’t even on his same level. Breaking his own national broadcast record, he concluded his address after 10 hours.

Congresswoman María León demands sanctions against Machado for "disrespecting" Chavez.

However, while one woman lifted the nation, another shamed and repulsed us. Congresswoman María León (she belongs to the PSUV and is a major Chavez supporter) stood up and demanded Chavez judge and sanction Congresswoman and Presidential candidate Maria Corina Machado because of her disrespectful behavior towards him.

This comes from a woman who prides herself on being a passionate human rights activist.

Venezuelan congresswoman Maria Leon demands Chavez sanction the outspoken presidential candiate.

María León’s concept of human rights and respect is extremely curious, when she, on behalf of all Venezuelan women, was the number one supporter and female host of Iran’s Mahmoud Ahmadinejad on his recent visit to our country.

Since her courageous confrontation, Machado has gained the respect of her opponents in the race for the Venezuelan presidency, as well as, many Venezuelans. Many have said that while Machado maybe wasn’t their first choice in the primary election, she definitely has earned their respect and admiration for being so brave.

For other countries, this may seem like a bizarre occurrence but as I once described on Latina Lista in a post, Venezuela is a bipolar country — where the Hall of Fame and the Hall of Shame battle it out on a daily basis.

Learn more about Jennifer Barreto-Leyva

Jennifer Barreto-Leyva lives in Caracas, Venezuela where when this 5″11 venezolana is not defending the rights of her clients as a lawyer or inspiring people as a motivational speaker, she is an outspoken defender on the rights of plus-size people.

Jennifer is Miss Plump Venezuela and the first Latina who participated and won the Miss Universe for Plus-size title. She is also the first venezolana plus-size model and, consequently, is credited for introducing the plus-size modeling division throughout Latin America.

Since 1999, Jennifer has penned a regular column, Tu Rincon con Jen, for the only online site dedicated to plus size people in Spanish, gordos.com. In addition, Jennifer is also taking her message about body issues as a blogger with Estilos Blog, a celebrity blog based in Florida.

Because of her sassy outspokenness and willingness to force the issue that beauty does not lie with a person’s weight, Jennifer has found her message much in demand from South and North America to Europe and Asia.

As a result, Jennifer has launched the first spanish-language magazine in history for plus-size people — Belleza XL.

In addition, Jennifer continues to provide constant inspiration for women of all sizes through her blog and Facebook page. She says that she always knew that when it came to defending who she was, no one was going to do it for her.

I saw myself different (as a child), not only when it comes to my size but my beauty as well. I’ve always had to deal with people’s cruelty because they think I’m ugly and have no hesitation letting me know that. I had to be strong and mature when no one around was. I’m beautiful because I’ve decided and feel that way, not because everyone else says it is so.

SaludToday

Texas’ severe shortage of mental health professionals is compounded by a disparity in diagnosing and treating the state’s rapidly growing Latino and other minority communities, the Texas Tribune reports.

The report indicates that 64% of all psychiatrists were white, 3.5% were black, and 12.4% were Hispanic in 2009.

Watch this captivating video to see more about this issue.

LatinaLista — A teenager’s life has always been tough. There have always been bullies, “mean girls,” that one special guy or girl that gave you butterflies in your stomach, and for some teen girls that one guy who professed his love like Romeo but acted more like Chicago Bears quarterback Jay Cutler.

But what has not always been a part of a teen’s life is digital technology. That is unique to this generation, and for today’s teenage girls that technology is bringing an added problem to their young lives — digital dating abuse.

Specifically, it’s about girls being pressured to send nude pics of themselves to their abusing boyfriends. To vulnerable girls who don’t want to lose their boyfriends, it’s a hard decision, for other’s it’s a no-brainer that “That’s not cool.”

In fact, “That’s not cool” is the name of an initiative created by Futures Without Violence in 2009 to “educate kids about healthy relationships, encourages them to draw their own digital line and helps young people recognize, avoid, and prevent dating violence in their lives.”

The campaign consists of a web site where youth view videos on the subject and now can do something new — create their own talking avatar.

That’s Not Cool launched a new speaking avatar application that allows teens to “Have Their Say” when it comes to relationship abuse. After watching an animated video addressing digital dating abuse, teens create a personalized character and voice to respond to the “Pressuring Someone for Nude Pics, Cool or Not Cool?” question posed in the video.

That’s Not Cool uses text-to-speech technology so the teen-created character speaks the answer to the question in the voice style each teen selects.

Everyone’s avatar is their entry into the campaign’s new online contest. Until August 30, teenagers can create their avatar, answer the question about digital dating abuse and post the video on the campaign’s website for a chance to win one of 100 special t-shirts.

With a new school year only a few weeks away, the hope is to get the message to more young people that anyone who asks for a nude pic is just plain not cool!