The Exponent

We may not have a catchy name like "generation x," but our generation has made some of the most revolutionary social changes in history. Stephen Black, a Birmingham attorney and University of Alabama in Birmingham Honors adjunct professor, noted the extreme paradox about those of us who grew up in the eighties and nineties in his visit to the Honors Forum class on January 20th. Apparently, numerous studies have shown that this generation (people between the ages of 15 and 25) is the best in regards to volunteerism that the United States has ever seen. This fact has continued to prove its validity in the past eight years with increasing levels of young participants in community service activities. On the other hand, Mr. Black stated what many young people may already know to be true. As far as "structural change" is concerned, that is attempting to make a difference on a large scale such as state or national government, this generation is the worst. Mr. Black was able to substantiate this argument with the example of children's health insurance. "The United States is the wealthiest country in the world and there are nine million children without health insurance," said Black. It goes pretty much without saying that most responses would be in the area of "That is awful and changes should be made, but I cannot really do anything."

One theory Black described could be the reason for this is widespread lack of motivation. Essentially, suburbanization has changed the natural human notion of obligation-what is expected of a person as a member of the human race? This ideal entails a series of consequences eventually leading up to a focus on charity over justice. First, people generally learn about things like doing the right thing from family. In the South especially, this concept of good is derived from religion. In the past few decades, as people in search of better schools and safer environments moved to suburbs, churches have followed. Most churches rely on donations from the congregation to remain functional. Building a new church, most likely bigger than the previous one, on most likely more expensive property causes churches to compete for membership. As the idea of justice can often be controversial, churches promote charity in sermons instead. "Charity does not challenge anyone," said Black. Therefore, somewhat of an evolutionary process could be responsible for the kind of universal feeling of large scale weakness.

The whole point behind his explanation of this trend was to force students to think about possible opportunities to affect an issue so major. In doing research regarding children's health concerns, Stephen Black found the issue of eye care. Although vision testing is mandatory in schools, many major problems could be reduced to minor ones if discovered earlier. Unfortunately, testing takes place in schools to reduce costs for the companies that perform them. At ages three and four, children may be in day care programs but it is difficult to find such a high concentration in one area. It would be much too expensive and time-consuming for the companies to go around and test possibly only 10 children at one time. Mr. Black chose amblyopia or lazy eye as a prime example. When diagnosed at age six, it possible to repair vision to approximately 65% of the full ability using an eye patch for around six months. However at age three, an eye patch is only required for about a week and fully repairs vision.

Stephen Black then introduced the major idea of the entire talk, UAH student involvement in this issue. An eye scanning camera would be purchased by the school for students to use. Three hour training sessions will be held to teach students the appropriate manner to operate the equipment. From there, students can go out around Huntsville, possibly to various daycare centers, and test children for any kind of optical trouble. These results will be sent to an organization that specializes in vision treatment of needy children. While this project does have a community service and charity sense about it, students will be taking part in battling national structural issues. A difference can be made by UAH students. A training session for students is tentatively scheduled for Saturday, February 12 from 9:00 am until 12:00 pm. More information is available at www.impactalabama.org. Dr. Jerry Mebane, Director of the Honors Program, and Ms. Delois Smith, Vice President for Student Affairs, also have information regarding the project.

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