Los Angeles School District Votes in Favor of Cellphone Ban
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Newsbites
Ten Commandments in Schools: A new Louisiana law requires that the 10 Commandments be hung in “large, easily readable font” at every public school classroom from K-12 to universities in the state. The legislation has received heavy pushback and will likely be appealed in court. Opponents of the law say it violates students' constitutional rights and the separation of church and state. Proponents of the bill say the 10 Commandments have historical significance to the founding of America similar to a document like The Mayflower Compact. State funds will not be used to implement the policy, which will rely on donations. “If you want to respect the rule of law, you’ve got to start from the original lawgiver, which was Moses,” Gov. Landry said as he signed the bill into law.
U.S. Deficit: The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) now estimates the federal government will run a $1.9T budget deficit in 2024, up 27% from their original estimate published in February. The increase was primarily driven by the recent spending bill that sent aid to Ukraine and Israel, along with the increased cost of broader student loan relief. The U.S. government has essentially run deficits every year for the last 50 years, and in recent years, the deficits have become significantly larger.
Pope Francis and Comedians: Pope Francis invited more than 100 well-known comics and late-night hosts to meet at the Vatican and discuss the role of comedy. “When you manage to bring intelligent smiles to the lips of even a single spectator, you also make God smile,” Pope Francis said to the group of comedians that included Jimmy Fallon, Chris Rock, Julia Louis-Dreyfus and Conan O’Brien. The Pope added that "in the midst of so much gloomy news, immersed as we are in many social and even personal emergencies, you have the power to spread peace and smiles." Each comic was then given the opportunity to briefly greet Pope Francis following the event. (video)
Immigrant spouses: The Biden Administration is creating a path for immigrant spouses of U.S. citizens living in the country illegally to achieve permanent legal status. Under current immigration rules, if someone entered the U.S. illegally - even if they are now married to a U.S. citizen - they are required to leave the country for 10 years before becoming eligible to apply for a green card (permanent residency). The new program, for which an estimated 500k spouses will be eligible, will give them deportation protection and temporary work visas while they apply for a green card. To be eligible, a person must already have been living in the U.S. for ten years.
Mystery monolith: The Las Vegas Police Department posted a photo on Monday of a mysterious monolith structure found near Gass Peak in Nevada. It marks the latest discovery in a series of similar objects found around the world. According to Monolith Tracker, there have been 245 monoliths located since 2020. The first one was found on November 18, 2020, in the Moab desert in Utah. The origin or purpose of the monoliths remains a mystery.
Nvidia became the largest company in the world by market cap this week, overtaking Microsoft. Since the start of 2024, Nvidia’s market cap has ballooned from $1.2T to over $3.3T. For context, the 6th largest economy in the world (UK), has a GDP of $3.5T. Nvidia’s primary business is making Graphic Processing Units (GPUs), a type of computer chip that has become indispensable for training AI models.
34 people die from alcohol: More than 34 people died and 100 more were admitted to the hospital after consuming toxic alcohol in India this week. The booze, which is made by non-licensed brewers, is often called hooch and can contain methanol and other potent substances. This deadly batch was brewed in the southern state of Tamil Nadu, India. The bootlegger industry is extremely profitable in India as they don’t pay taxes and have a large customer base of mostly lower-income people. In 2020, more than 120 people died in India’s Punjab state from spiked alcohol.
Main Stories
Los Angeles School District Votes in Favor of Cellphone Ban
What happened?
The 2nd largest school district in the U.S. voted 5-2 to ban cell phones across all their campuses. The new rule, which will launch in January 2025, will not allow any phone use throughout the school day, including lunch and free time.
In the meantime, the Los Angeles Unified School District will consider what approach to use to remove the phones entirely. One popular method happening across the country consists of locking phones in a secure location that students do not have access to. Other school districts have given their students light phones, which only have texting and calling.
Whatever method they choose, it will be quite the undertaking to implement a successful policy for a school district that has 800 campuses and 414,000 students. But given the large nature of the district, whatever they pick could become a replicable model around the country.
“The research is clear: The harmful effects on kids, mental health, the physical health, their academics,” said one of the board members for the district. “I’m fine to be the bad cop here.”
The move comes as numerous studies show the negative impact cell phones have on teens' mental health as well as the almost impossible task of teachers to keep attention and order in the classroom.
A few notable effects of social media on kids
One study from 2019 found that kids (ages 12 and 15) who used social media more than three hours a day had twice the risk of symptoms for depression and anxiety.
Another piece of evidence came directly from Facebook’s internal files in 2021. Their data in slides discovered by the WSJ found that “thirty-two percent of teen girls said that when they felt bad about their bodies, Instagram made them feel worse.”
A brand new report shows that 13-year-old Instagram users are being actively recommended sexual content on their feeds through the algorithm.
Momentum moving forward?
Multiple states including Oklahoma, Washington, Kansas, Vermont and Connecticut have introduced legislation to at least restrict cell phone use in schools. Florida passed a law that bans the use of cellphones in classrooms across the state.
One psychologist, Jonathan Haidt, whose books are changing the ways schools and parents think about the issue, gives four practices he thinks should become the norm for kids:
No smartphone until high school. Use a flip phone if needed before then.
No social media until at least the age of 16
Phone-free schools from kindergarten through high school
More responsibility and independence for children -- more playing outdoors
Jonathan Haidt quote from an interview with CNN:
“Givens that the rates of mental illness and self-harm and suicide are still going up, we don’t know where the limit is. We don’t know whether it’s possible to have 100% of our kids be depressed and anxious. We’re already getting close to half for the girls; we’re already in the ballpark of 30% to 40% having depression or anxiety, and about 30% currently say they’ve thought about suicide this year. Things are already really bad, and the levels could just continue to rise to the point where the majority of kids are depressed, anxious and suicidal.” (Jonathan Haidt gives a talk titled Smartphones vs. Smart Kids)
Putin and Kim Jong Un Sign Agreement Strengthening Military Partnership
What happened?
Vladimir Putin and Kim Jong Un have signed a comprehensive partnership agreement, further strengthening the ties between the two countries. The treaty stipulates that if either country is attacked by an adversary, the other country will “immediately provide it with military assistance by all means at its disposal.”
The treaty was signed during Putin’s visit to Pyongyang, North Korea this week. It marks the second meeting between the two leaders in the past year, but the first time Putin has gone to Pyongyang since 2000.
Putin was greeted with a parade and fanfare, with video appearing to show tens of thousands of North Koreans welcoming him.
The new pact also contains pledges for greater economic, technological, and scientific cooperation. (Read more details of the document here). The agreement has drawn comparisons to the treaty the two countries had in place from 1961 until the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991.
Is the agreement significant?
As expected, political observers are split as to whether the agreement will bring about meaningful changes in the two countries’ relationship or whether it is primarily a symbolic gesture. Previous reports have indicated that North Korea has already been supplying arms to Russia in its war with Ukraine. In return, Russia has been sending fuel oil, and other raw materials for weapon development according to South Korea and the U.S.
Regardless, the agreement marks Russia’s latest action to increase its security ties with its U.S.-opposed allies, which primarily include China, Iran, and North Korea.
South Korea’s response
Following Putin’s meeting with Kim, South Korean leaders convened an emergency meeting with its security council and said they would now consider sending military arms to Ukraine, something they had previously dismissed.
TRENDS: U.S. Customer Experience Drops for Third Year in a Row
According to Americans, customer service from companies and government agencies has gotten worse…and worse…and worse.
For the third year in a row, the customer experience rating dropped, according to a new study from Forrester that surveyed 98,000 people and 223 companies across 13 sectors. It found that the average score of customer experience was 69.3 out of 100 - the lowest since Forrester began using its current methodology in 2016.
Pete Jaques, the lead analyst on the study, said consumers are growing more skeptical of the value they get for the price they pay for things. In comments to the Wall Street Journal, Jaques said, “Somebody is paying more, but then they’re not seeing the benefit of paying more…they’re not getting a better experience that they think should accompany that higher price.”
Chewy (pet food store) earned the highest score at 81.2 out of 100, whereas the IRS had the lowest score at 49.6.
Increase in chatbots
Although AI-powered chatbots are expected to get much better, their growing use as a customer facing interface hasn’t seemed to help customers' experience to date. Another finding of the study is that companies are hesitant to invest more money into service experience vs. other areas.
Note from David:
Anecdotally, I’ve been impressed how valuable it is to have senior employees that are really knowledgeable about products and can direct a customer to what they need - I’ve had this experience at stores such as The Home Depot and Menards. It seems like these employees’ contribution to a company’s level of service is undervalued. However, the problem seems to be that young workers are not being adequately trained and mentored to the same standard.
Question: From your experience/perception, is customer service getting better or worse? What do you think is driving the improvement / decline? Comment below.
GetSmart
🧂U.S. Champion Bryson DeChambeau Floats His Golf Balls In Epsom Salt Before Matches
“Thanks for the salty balls question. I appreciate that,” he responded. “Yeah, I put my golf balls in Epsom salt. I’m lucky enough that Connor, my manager, does that now. I don’t have to do it. But essentially we float golf balls in a solution to make sure that the golf ball is not out of balance. (video)
There was a big thing back in the day where golf balls are out of balance, and it’s just because of the manufacturing process. There’s always going to be an error, especially when it’s a sphere and there’s dimples on the edges. You can’t perfectly get it in the center.
So what I’m doing is finding pretty much the out-of-balanceness of it, how much out of balance it is. Heavy slide floats to the bottom, and then we mark the top with a dot to make sure it’s always rolling over itself.
It kind of acts like mud. If there’s too much weight on one side, you can put it 90 degrees to where the mud is on the right-hand side or the mud is on the left-hand side. I’m using mud as a reference for the weight over there. It’ll fly differently and fly inconsistently.
For most golf balls that we get, it’s not really that big of a deal. I just try to be as precise as possible, and it’s one more step that I do to make sure my golf ball flies as straight as it possibly can fly because I’m not that great at hitting it that straight.”
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