"THE CONTINUATION OF OUR WAY OF LIFE"
“Behold, the LORD hath proclaimed unto the end of the world, Say ye to the daughter of Zion, Behold, thy salvation cometh; behold, his reward is with him, and his work before him.”
Isaiah 62:11
Introduction | Task | Roles | Process | Proposal for President and Advisors
The Vote | Evaluation | Conclusion
INTRODUCTION
Astrophysicists have identified a large comet speeding through space on a path that will result in a collision with our planet in five months. Governments all around the world are scrambling to take steps to respond to this seeming ELE (Extinction Level Event) that will change our world forever. In the Solomonic decisions about what very limited resources might be saved from destruction, the government struggles to decide how best to react to this crisis.
TASK
The President of the United States has secretly convened a panel of experts who will make recommendations to him about who the government should help to relocate to safety in immense caves being hurriedly excavated in the soft limestone of Missouri during the impact of the comet. Army engineers estimate there will be room for one million Americans, in addition to food, animals, books, power generators, and other necessities. But who should be relocated there underground? What skills and persons do we need? How will we choose them? What is fair? What is best for the future? What limited resources will be most important if we wish to continue our way of life after the comet hits? It is your job to come up with answers to these difficult questions.
You will meet as a group and then present your recommendations to the President for his consideration.
ROLES
Roles:
- Leader
- Speaker/Orator
- Writer/Researcher
- Technology Specialist
PROCESS
This project will proceed in the following order:
- Identify your role and group
- Brainstorm with group members and come up with a name for your group
- Set up your group wiki page with members and roles
- Debate, discuss, and reach consensus as a group on who will go underground for two year (and, by implication, who will not)
- Technology specialist will develop a slogan and logo and post it to wiki page.
- Writer/researcher will develop a flyer to be handed out during presentation.
- Leader and speaker/orator will build a Power Point and plan a brilliant, persuasive presentation for the President.
- Technology specialist will make a brief trailer video for use in Power Point, as well as a custom background.
- Group will present to President, defend plan, and field any questions the President and/or his advisers might have. (Most important stage of project!)
- As a warm down, group will write a 30 second public service announcement for use on the radio, should the President adopt your plan.
- President and his advisors will vote on which is the best plan that should be adopted for use by the United States Government in this moment of crisis.
PROPOSAL FOR PRESIDENT AND ADVISORS
In professional attire groups will present to President and his advisors with a Power Point and wiki page completed. Group should be ready to defend plan and answer questions about it in person after presentation.
Please remember that the President is very much focused on making the best decision for the United States and its future, while still being "fair" as possible, under the circumstances. Please always keep this in mind!
THE VOTE
After hearing all the presentations and asking questions about them, the President and his advisors will vote for and adopt one of the plans as official policy. Each adviser gets one vote while the President gets five votes.
Each member of the victorious group receives a "no questions asked" "A" for the project
EVALUATION
Be advised beforehand of the individual rubric for this project, as well as this group rubric; you will be responsible for filling out both an individual and group rubric. During the presentations each of us will fill out an evaluation of the presenting group.
CONCLUSION
Author Richard Bach once wrote, “What the caterpillar calls the end of the world, the master calls a butterfly.” Who knows what the earth will look like fifty years after that fateful hour when the comet hits earth?
Elie most likely will mean the end of civilization as we know it. This much seems beyond our best efforts, and much which is beautiful and old will pass away. Nevertheless, you will be able to take steps to make the recovery of planet earth faster and easier. It is not an easy task to leave huge parts of the human and animal population to fend for themselves, but that which you save will be the seeds that will become a new era in world history. It make take many decades, but human beings (not to mention other earth creatures) are a resilient and malleable species that will adapt, as we always have.
And who knows? Maybe this new world will be wiser and more just that the old one? Through your wisdom and sound choices, you and your fellow students may have helped to make it so!
HERALD OF A NEW ERA IN WORLD HISTORY?
“There are things that we never want to let go of, people we never want to leave behind. But keep in mind that letting go isn’t the end of the world, it’s the beginning of a new life.”
author unknown
CHANGE AND CONTINUITY:
But what kind of change will it be? What kind of continuity?“The heart of a man to the heart of a maid - Light of my tents, be fleet - Morning awaits at the end of the world, And the world is all at our feet.”
Rudyard Kipling“In this world of change, nothing which comes stays, and nothing which goes is lost.”
Anne Sophie Swetchine
NOT copyrighted - SPREAD THE WEALTH!
"He who receives an idea from me, receives instruction himself without lessening mine; as he who lights his taper at mine, receives light without darkening me. That ideas should freely spread from one to another over the globe, for the moral and mutual instruction of man, and improvement of his condition, seems to have been peculiarly and benevolently designed by nature, when she made them, like fire, expansible over all space, without lessening their density at any point, and like the air in which we breathe, move, and have our physical being, incapable of confinement or exclusive appropriation."
-- Thomas Jefferson