Sunday

Reflections on World Soccer, The Body's Wisdom, and Latino Students' Challenge

What I learned this week:
To truly win or succeed, you have to lose and fail many times.

What I am grateful for:

After rainfall, the sun always comes out.
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Germany's crushing defeat of Argentina
Since I was a little girl, I never truly understood the lure of soccer in Argentina. I remember the quiet Sunday afternoons where families would eat their "asado" and watch their favorite soccer team at play. Then the children would go out to the streets and continue playing with whatever ball they could find. As I grew older and went to my first world cup in 1978, I lived a thrilling experience when Argentina won and then in 1986 when Maradona's hand of God led the team to the final. I however became very leery of the injustices committed by referees and the refusal to use instant replay to make fair decisions. (I didn't much care for the Maradona goal with the "hand of God.)" On Saturday we watched as Argentina got clobbered by Germany and I realized there is so much that the soccer players from the country show us about Argentine idiosyncracies in victory as well as defeat.
Diego Maradona is Argentine's best known export. He was very poor as a child and quite misguided in his life. No one doubts a great, brilliant unique soccer player, but with too many personal challenges to mention. For many Argentines, he is considered a genius, a god, with almost superman qualities. No one remains indifferent to him. He is either adored or reviled. Everyone knows however that a good player does not a good coach make! Maradona is not a technical coach but I will let the experts better explain why. Some examples of his failures are: He never called on his best international defense players and as a result had a weak back field. His midfield players failed to control the game when most needed. When a clear change was needed he didn't make it, but here is why I don't blame him.

Maradona is not God and he is not a coach and he could not make a team with the highest paid players in the world work as a team simply because he doesn't know how.But here is what Argentines tend to do, They either treat him like a genius or like an idiot. I don't believe he is totally to blame for the loss to Germany. He did the best he could. I blame those who chose him to be coach based on his celebrity status. That's right. He was never or ever will be a good coach. The reason the Argentine team did so well in this tournament is because individually most of the players are very good and very well paid thank you, but that does not make a great team. There is so much more to it than that.

They love their country and probably get along very well, but when it comes to soccer as in life you must know your strengths and weaknesses. Argentina for instance may have one of the best forwards and strikers in the world but in this tournament, Maradona chose a very ill prepared defense. Maradona had no strategy or the technical capacity to make the right changes.Do I blame him? No way. We in the United States know about celebrity culture. Heck we had to watch Paris Hilton in a ranch for weeks. There was nothing real about that! Now we had to watch a soccer player, suddently become a world cup award winning coach. Maradona did what he knew best. He was his old self, funny, emotional, loving, erratic, arrogant and somewhat bewildered. He was not ready for that particular job. We may love to watch him at work, but if we want a winner, we must find a coach with winning qualities. Let bygones by bygones. It is time for change. Argentina must realize that they can't win with the same belief system that they have had in the past 24 years. Do you want a winning coach? Get one. As a player Maradona may have won for Argentina, but as a coach, you are asking for way too much.

I want to thank him for entertaining us and for the players for their commitment. As for Messi, please stop picking on the guy or questioning his patriotism. He's used to playing with a team that absolutely knows how to play as a team and posesses very few weakneses. Barca is one of the best if not the best club team in the world. Messi did as well as he could. It has nothing to do with his love of country but it does have to do with the idiocyncracy of many in a nation who believe Diego is God!
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Here’s a sneak-peek into what’s on Living Smart and Latina Voices this week!
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Living Smart: The Body's Wisdom

By Production Assistant: Shamsa Mangalji

(Sun, 3pm July 11th-- Repeats following Friday at 10pm)


Obesity. Depression. Marriage Problems. We know all too well how much these issues plague our society. This week’s Living Smart guest, Dr. Kimerer Lamothe, will give us a devastatingly simple solution to solve all of our problems: (drumroll please…) Listen to our bodies! Lamothe believes that one’s body is the best doctor.
In America, we’ve made it a habit to prioritize mind over body. Most of us live our day-to-day lives by quelling our true desires for food, sex, and spirit. More often than not, we fall victim to outside forces like advertising to dictate what we need:
Though companies will swear that (blank) food and (blank) sex position will ‘make you happy’, don’t listen to them; our lack of awareness of our inner selves leads to unhappiness and debilitating habits.
We don’t want to raise those horrifying health statistics even more. Learn how to help yourself on this week ‘s ‘Living Smart’ show with Dr. Kimerer Lamothe!

Our
green tip segment for this show is about glass recycling with Mark Austin.


Click
here to see more of your favorite Living Smart shows!

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Latina Voices: Latino Students' challenge

By Production Assistant: Shamsa Mangalji

(Sun, 2:30 PM, July 11)

Multiple studies have shown that Latinos lag far behind any other ethnic group in pursuing higher education. Experts deem poverty and engrained cultural beliefs as key factors contributing to this issue. Researchers also point to serious faults in schools’ institutional structures; many Hispanic students feel socially excluded and underrepresented in their high schools.
A UTSA research report stated that high school history classes painted an overwhelmingly negative picture of Latinos in general; the classes failed to showcase Mexican/Chicano’s achievements and contributions to U.S. society. Stereotypes and discrimination reign supreme in many institutions.
This week on Latina Voices, listen to top educators Dr. William Flores, the President of University of Houston Downtown, and Dr. Guadalupe San Miguel, Mexican-American Studies Professor break down sad numbers of Latinos seeking at higher education, and discuss promising solutions.

3 comments:

Jelsa said...

The plight of Latino students is terrible. So many complex issues involved...Have you heard of KIPP academy in Houston? That school best prepares and educates students to achieve higher education.

Anonymous said...

It's definitely a tough issue because it's almost like a self fulfilling prophecy, stereotypes discourage kids to do better and therefore they tend to act out what is expected of them.
Another thing that contributes in addition to the education system in schools is the education system at home. The majority of kids' knowledge will come from the parents. If the parents lack the will to strive for higher goals, the probabilities that their children won't either are rather high.

Rice_gal64 said...

One effective solution that the creators of the KIPP program (Mike Feinberg and Dave Levin) propose is SUPPORT. In the beginning of the program, they were strict with the kids--telling them that these stereotypes were unnecessary, and saying the kids should dispel them. The men also worked with the parents of the kids to make sure the students were getting their work done. The parents were really impressed with the teachers' dedication--they'd never seen teachers so passionate about their children's education before. The directors even let the schoolkids call them at home if they needed help! I highly recommend the book, 'Work Hard, Be Nice' by Jay Mathews to read more.