OPINION: Open Letter - Give Us a Break

 by Kaylie Kirkham, junior

An Open Letter to the NASD School Board

I moved to the Nazareth Area School District at the start of my 8th grade year. Previous to that, I had lived in Houston, Texas for 12 years. Obviously, there were a lot of differences between my old school district and NASD, but the most noticeable difference for me was the short holiday breaks. I grew up getting 5 school days off for both Thanksgiving and Spring Break, as well as 10 or more school days off for Christmas Break. I was shocked at the meager long weekend Fall/Spring breaks and one week Christmas break that NASD provided.

This year, the 2021-2022 school calendar for NASD consisted of three Holiday Breaks: 5 days at Thanksgiving, 10 days at Christmas, and 4 days at Easter (all of which include weekends). In actuality, 8 of those “days off” are on Saturday/Sunday, which we would already have off of school. The School Board simply isn’t giving students enough time off to destress from school.

School is very taxing on students. We have to get up early to attend classes and stay up late to finish our mounds of homework due the following day. Not to mention the extra hours of studying for and stressing over tests. KidsHealth conducted a survey of students and their stress levels during the school year. The results of the study reported that 32% of students attribute high stress levels to school work issues and 30% attribute high stress levels to the social pressures of school (Bratsis). All of this stress compounds over time and it can have both physical and mental effects. Cynthia M Thaik, a Harvard trained physician, said on Psychology Today, “Stress that continues without relief can lead to… physical symptoms including headaches, upset stomach, elevated blood pressure, chest pain, and problems sleeping” (Thaik). Students need to be given the opportunity to take time for themselves and to destress. I have personally felt some of these physical effects caused by stress and I know others do as well. We need a break during the Fall, Winter, and Spring to keep us healthy.

As I mentioned before, I have attended schools where we got longer breaks. I always looked forward to spending two weeks off with nothing but time for me, something I never get during the school year. I had no homework pressing my mind if I tried to relax, no test anxiety keeping me up late at night, and no alarm dragging me out of much needed sleep at 6am. Statistics prove that living a life of constant stress and anxiety can be dangerous for students' mental health. Michael Agnew, Heather Poole, and Ayesha Khan, researchers for Canadian Universities, headed a project on the perception of students who were granted a fall break. They reported that at Candian Universities without a fall break, “60% of [students] had felt hopeless, 90% felt overwhelmed, 88% felt exhausted, 65% felt overwhelming anxiety, and 13% had considered suicide.” The observed students attribute the cause of these emotions to “stress, anxiety, sleep difficulties, and depression” (Agnew, Poole, and Khan). Agnew, Poole, and Khan went on to study Canadian Universities who did have time off for the Thanksgiving Holidays and found that students perceived it as “a meaningful reprieve from their academic commitments.” Other students used the break as “an essential opportunity to attend to their emotional and mental well-being,” and even more as “a window…to recover from significant sleep deprivation and physical illness” (Agnew, Poole, and Khan). The students with a fall break felt that they were able to step out of the constant merry-go-round of stress for a few much needed days of rest. It gave them the time to refresh and refocus themselves.

Another common use of time off school is going on a family vacation. This is an especially popular activity during the holidays. It is now January, and the students of NASD have just returned to school from Christmas break, which began on December 24: Christmas Eve. School went right up to holiday, making it impossible for students to travel without missing school. Statistically speaking, this affects a significant number of students. Muntean and Wallace, writers for CNN, reported in an article that “AAA estimates more than 109 million Americans will travel over the long Christmas and New Year's week” (Muntean and Wallace). That is approximately ⅓ of the nation. Although Christmas is a popular time to travel, the single busiest travel day of 2021 was actually during the Thanksgiving holidays. Muntean and Wallace recount that “The Transportation Security Administration reported screening 2,451,300 people on November 28” (Muntean and Wallace). Both NASD’s Fall and Winter breaks went right up to the actual holiday, forcing students to either skip school or forgo the vacation. If the School Board would give us just 3 or 4 more days off, students would be able to travel for the holidays without having to worry about making up missed assignments.

Some people might claim that shorter holiday breaks still give students a chance to rejuvenate as long teachers are not allowed to assign homework. This statement would be true, if it were followed. I had several teachers assign work that was due the second day back to school so the students technically wouldn’t have to do it over it break. This either forced the students to do school work over break, or just push it off and have a very stressful first day back trying to finish a bunch of backed up homework. School officials in Princeton, NJ agree that breaks should give students “time to rest and recover from the stresses of school, as well as pursue interests outside the classroom” (Suresh and Cole).

This is hard to do with homework pressing down on our minds, but not everyone agrees that teachers should refrain from assigning homework over holiday breaks. One such person, Hansa Suresh, a student voice for Scholastic Magazine, explained, “We should get homework during breaks because…without homework, we might forget a lot of what we've learned in class by the time the break is over” (Suresh and Cole). Many teachers echo this statement, fearing that the students will forget what they have learned over a long break. If they feel the need to assign us work, then students should have adequate time off to complete both school assignments AND personal pursuits. A full two weeks at Christmas would give students plenty of time to do both.

Others might claim that lengthening the holiday breaks would shorten the summer. NASD usually gets out the first week of June and begins the next school year in late August or early September. If the School Board took just 2 weeks from summer vacation, (one for Christmas, the other to be split between Fall and Spring), students would receive adequate time off. No one would even notice the missing week or two during the long summer, but it would make it all the difference to students in January when they are tired, discouraged, and worn out.

Please, NASD School Board, consider the health of Nazareth students. We put everything we have into our school work, and we deserve time off. It isn’t fair to ask us to keep pushing past what we are capable of carrying. I am not the only one who believes this. A team of researchers from Stanford University and the Center for Wellness and Achievement in Education conducted a study on the effects of stress management techniques on students. The study reported that American teens experience stress levels that exceed what is considered acceptable. The students reported a “5.8 versus 3.9 on a 10-point scale” for stress levels (Valosek et. al.). Long holiday breaks would reduce that stress rating significantly for many students. We won’t miss that lost week in August, but we wouldn’t be able to thank you enough for that extra week in January. Please consider giving the students the time they need to care for their mental and physical health.

Sincerely,
    NAHS Junior, Kaylie Kirkham

Works Cited

Agnew, Michael, Heather Poole, and Ayesha Khan. “Fall Break Fallout: Exploring Student Perceptions of the Impact of Autumn Break on Stress.” Student Success Journal, Vol. 10(3), 2019, p.45-54. Gale in Context: High School, go.gale.com.

Bratsis, Michael E. “Health Wise.” The Science Teacher, Vol. 79, Issue 9, Nation Science Teachers Association, Dec. 2021, p.74, Gale in Context: High School, go.gale.com.

Muntean, Peter and Gregory Wallace. “Winter Holiday Travel Will Be Back With a Vengeance, Travel Groups Predict.” Cable News Network, Cable News Network, 16 Dec. 2021.

Suresh, Hansa and Tanner Cole. “Should Kids Have Homework Over Breaks?” Scholastic News/Weekly Reader Edition 4, Vol. 78, Issue 9, 23 Nov. 2015, p.7. Gale in Context: High School, go.gale.com.

Thaik, Cynthia M. “The Effects of Stress on the Body.” Psychology Today, Sussex Publishers, 14 Nov. 2013.

Valosek, Laurent, et.al. “Effect of Meditation on Psychological Stress and Academic Achievement in High School Students: A Randomized Controlled Study.” Education, Vol. 141, Issue 4, Project Innovation, 2021, p.129. Gale in Context: High School, go.gale.com.

FEATURE: Artificial Intelligence Saves an Extra Byte of Ice

by Jared Dewey, junior

During a hot summer day, many people stop at the Rita’s in Nazareth to enjoy a sweet, cool treat. Gallons of ice are eaten but still gallons are not. At the end of the day, gallons upon gallons of perfectly good spare Italian Ice must be thrown away.

Miles away in Easton, Rita’s probably doesn’t have this issue, right?

They still do.

Corporate guidelines force Rita's nationwide to throw away perfectly good ice. Countless Rita’s workers have seen what happens to the spare ice yet turn a blind eye.

Adam Kollgaard is one of these Rita’s workers, but knows something has to be done. Nobody else seemed to care enough to change it, so Kollgaard knew he had to be the one to change it.



Previous Experience

From the spring of his sophomore year to the fall of his junior year, Kollgaard worked at the Rita’s in Nazareth. He had to balance his time working, being at school, and doing extracurriculars such as track. Things got easier for him when school let out and he started to work on his own personal projects.

Simply put, Kollgaard likes to code. He is constantly either looking for something to program or working on a program. His passion started in middle school when he first learned about artificial intelligence and “got really into it.”

At this point he had only completed pre-algebra and couldn't properly understand the complicated calculus required to make artificial intelligence. Instead of spending months learning the algebra and calculus that he wouldn’t learn for years, he simply moved onto other projects.

In high school Kollgaard continued his “quest to find things to program” which brought him back to artificial intelligence. This time, however, he had more experience with math and could better understand the information provided to him.

He managed to create an AI that determined if a color looks better on a white or black background. The AI he made was very simple since he hadn’t completed precalculus yet, but it was still an improvement from his first exercise with AI.

Kollgaard continued his “quest” afterwards, which (right before his sophomore year) led him away from AI and towards game development. He, along with his friend and his older brother, developed a simple game for Android called Graze. This was a new world for Kollgaard as the skills required to make a game are very different from those required to make AI. Developing a game was fun and rewarding for him, but his quest wasn’t over.


The Problem

Between the spring of his sophomore year and the fall of his junior year Kollgaard worked at the Rita’s in Nazareth. Here he took orders, made orders, and served orders. He was somewhat of a trackstar, so he went to work later in the day. This forced him to watch as gallons of Italian ice were thrown away at the end of every day.

This waste is created for two reasons: the ice has to be made every morning and expires after only a couple of days. Jay Calandra, the owner of the Rita’s in Nazareth for over 8 years described the life cycle of ice: “Make it today, sell it today and tomorrow.”

After the second day, the ice has to be thrown away. This issue of getting rid of excess product at the end of the day isn’t unique to Rita’s, but it is unique how so much of their main product is thrown away.

Before the start of every work day, batches of ice have to be made. What is made is what is sold, so if too little ice is made then no one can buy it after it is sold out. Too much ice hurts business just as much since the mix for the ice has to be bought.

“[Rita’s] has to sell about one-third to one-fourth of what’s made to break even,” said Calandra. By selling a proprietary mix for ices to their stores, Rita’s incentivises owners to produce minimal waste. Unfortunately figuring out how much ice to make every day is a guessing game and an estimated 15%-20% of all that is produced is waste.

The Solution

Kollgaard came up with a clever solution to the guessing game. The amount of ice that people buy day-to-day may vary depending on weather, special occasions, seasons, work, etc. Now, for each individual person guessing what they may buy on a day-to-day basis would be very inaccurate, but with enough samples randomness can be modeled. Kollgaard realized that by using data from previous years it is possible to calculate how much of each ice is likely to be sold.

This may seem impossible due to confounding variables (unaccountable situations) such as people buying more when they randomly get a promotion or buying less after a break-up. These outlying events would mostly only affect a singular person, and since it would occur randomly they can be ignored.

Big events that could lead to a spike in sales such as school ending, weekends, or holidays could be accounted for by using the date to help calculate the amount of ice sold. Kollgaard described the previous day's orders, weather, and the date as having the most influence over what to produce..

There is one major flaw in Kollgaard’s plan: he needs a lot of data. Calculating the amount of ice consumed each day for a year would not provide enough data, so years of tracking orders would be required. At other businesses such as Red Robin or McDonalds this would be easy since they keep track of exact orders.

Unfortunately, at Rita’s the only thing kept track of on a receipt is the size and type of an order: not the flavor. This would be useful if each flavor was bought equally, but certain flavors are loved more than others. Knowing to make 50 gallons of ice isn’t really meaningful when you have 18 to 22 flavors to split across all at different, unknown proportions.

Keeping track of each flavor sold isn’t nearly as easy as it may seem. Relying on multiple people to keep careful records over several years does not always have the best results. If a lot of people come to Ritas at once then writing down what was ordered or keeping tally would become an obstacle in the way of making orders.

Requiring the flavor be recorded by the register would also be inefficient as it would add extra steps to placing an order. The flavors sold also change everyday and throughout the day, so each of the 81 unique flavors would have to be an option on the register. This would bloat any spreadsheet or interface used to record what is sold.

Kollgaard found a way to circumvent human error and inefficiencies. By placing a camera above where the ices are served, it is theoretically possible to track what orders were placed.


Collecting Data

The ability for a computer to detect information in an image is called computer vision. Right now in computer science, Convolution Neural Networks (CNNs) are the most popular way to give computers vision.

A neural network is a computer algorithm that attempts to mimic the nerves inside a human brain. It does this by taking an input (a picture of the ice in this case) and then using that information to activate different nodes. Nodes are like connection points and simulate neurons inside the brain. When one activates, it can activate many others.

What nodes are activated is decided by previously activated nodes and weights that a computer can calculate through a process of trial and error. A convolutional neural network is specifically designed to deal with detecting shapes, colors, outlines, etc. in an image. It achieves this by breaking an image into smaller pieces that it can manage easier. Filters are then applied to these smaller pieces to find certain shapes, outlines, etc.

Kollgaard is working on a CNN that would connect to a camera placed above where ice is served. Video taken from the camera would connect to the neural network so that it can discern the size of the cup and the flavor of the ice. While there are 81 possible flavors, there are only 18-20 available on any given day. Each flavor has a slightly different color which means his CNN should be able to discern between extremely similar colored flavors such as cherry and swedish fish,

Kollgaard said he is making his CNN the hardest way possible as he is attempting to make it from scratch. Templates of neural networks called frameworks are created to allow anyone to make a neural network. Kollgaard has opted out of using one so that he can learn more about AI.

Issues

In a perfect world, some issues would still exist with Kollgaard’s method and some waste would still be produced.

Even if every bit of ice that is produced and made for sale is sold, there would still be an estimated 5% of ice that gets stuck on the scoopers, stuck on the machine, or wasted by the customers. In order for no ice to go to waste then it would all have to be perfectly mixed, poured, and scooped. This is impossible in the real world, so Kollgaard is only attempting to mitigate the amount of ice being thrown away.

After collecting all the data, Kollgaard won’t be done with preventing waste. He will still need to find a way to transfer the data into an algorithm to determine how much ice to make and create a way to input data daily for the algorithm.

Getting input will be easy, but actually putting together an algorithm to accurately estimate how much ice to produce with a margin of error will be difficult.

“Modeling a real world event like [selling Italian ice] is no easy task,” said expert business analyst and data scientist Daniel Dewey. “Sure, you can use last year’s sales as a baseline, but externalities like unpredictable weather patterns, market competition, and changing [consumer] tastes layer complex variances in year on year sales.”

Essentially, in order to stay accurate Kollgaard would constantly need to be collecting new data. Kollgaard will likely plan for this and add data as it’s input into the algorithm, but the algorithm would still need to be complicated in order to account for all possible variances.

Accounting for variances would lead to forming a range of possible ices sold which would cause at least a little bit of waste in order to maximize profit. This is why even in a perfected world at least 5% of product would be expected to be wasted. While not ideal, even 7% would be better than the 15% - 20% that is currently expected. Kollgaard is making strides in reducing wastes produced by Ritas.