Successful People

    People can succeed in many aspects. Here are some successful people.

    Stephen Hawking

    Much more than the namesake of Into the Universe with Stephen Hawking, Stephen Hawking is one of the most well-known physicists in the world, and he was able to achieve that in spite of being diagnosed with ALS when he was 21. He can now only speak with the assistance of a computer and has been a full-time power chair-user since the 1980s. His disability, however, has never been an excuse to give up on his desire to study the universe, specifically the framework of general relativity and quantum mechanics. His best-selling book, A Brief History of Time, stayed on the Sunday Times bestsellers list for a surprising 237 weeks.

    Franklin Delano Roosevelt

    A beloved U. S president who helped guide the nation successfully through World War II, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt is considered a great president and the entire time he was in office, FDR was also a wheelchair-user. Upon starting his political career in excitement, he got illness while drinking water at a campground and became disabled from the waist down. Even though it wasn't made public until years later that he couldn't walk for fear of the public doubting his ability, FDR proved disability wasn't a roadblock to being a great leader.

    Marlee Matlin

    An Academy Award winning actress for her leading role in Children of a lesser God, Marlee Matlin is one of the most successful actresses who are deaf. She has been deaf since she was 18 months old. She also received a Golden Globe Award for her role in Children of a lesser God. Since receiving her Oscar, Marlee has been a character on many TV shows including The Word and Law & Order: SVU, and has appeared on reality shows such as The Apprentice and Dancing with the Stars.

    Steven Wonder

    One of the most beloved singers alive today, Stevie Wonder is a musician, singer and songwriter who was born blind. He was born six weeks early. The blood vessels at the back of his eyes had not yet reached the front and stopped their growth, therefore leading to his blindness.

    Considered a child talent, Stevie signed with his first record label at age 11, Motown's Tamla label, and he's been performing since. Over his wildly successful music career, Stevie has recorded more than 30 U. S. top ten hits, including his singles “Superstition” “Sir Duke” and “ I Just Called to Say I Love You”.

    In 1869, the Smiley family purchased an area of land about 100 miles north of New York City. Over time, some of their property and much of the surrounding landscape became the Mohonk Preserve, which has since grown to 8,000 acres and attracts visitors and rock climbers.

    But the Mohonk Preserve also has a long scientific legacy. In the 1930s, Dan Smiley, a descendent of the original owners, began keeping track of the plants and animals that lived in the area.

    Megan Napoli is a research ecologist with the Mohonk Preserve in New York. She thinks Smiley's efforts produced a rare long-term data set of observations, which is useful for studying the impacts of climate change. For instance, other research has shown that songbirds are migrating north earlier and earlier in the spring.

    It's important for the birds to arrive at the proper time in the spring, because they need to time their arrival with the insect emergence. So they need to be here to establish their nesting sites, lay their eggs. Once the eggs hatch, they have their baby birds, so they need to time it when the insects are most abundant.

    Napoli has begun analyzing about 76,000 observations of songbird migration dates collected by Smiley and his team to see if they, too, show that climate change has altered the timing of migrations. Her results suggest that they do.

    Napoli found that short-distance migrants that spend their winters in the southern U. S. now arrive an average of eleven days earlier than they did in the 1930s. Long-distance migrants that overwinter in the tropics arrive roughly a week earlier. Napoli presented her results at a recent Ecological Society of America meeting in Portland, Oregon.

    Meanwhile, who knows how many other long-term, personal data collections like Smiley's are out there, waiting to be discovered and to help improve official attempts to track the planet's changes.

    City College

    ADMISSION REQUIREMENTS

    All high school graduates and anyone 18 years of age or older, with or without a high school diploma, are suitable for admission. Individuals under the age of 18 who possess a high school diploma are also suitable for admission.

    HOW TO ENROLL IN CREDIT COURSES

    New and readmitted students must complete and hand in a credit admissions application form available online at www.ccsf.edu.

    BEFORE YOU REGISTER:

    Learn about your skill level in English and Math through our assessment service;

    Attend an orientation (新生报到会) to hear about support services

    Meet with a counselor (adviser) to select your courses;

    Find out if you are required for attending the entrance examinations.

    HOW TO ENROLL IN NONCREDIT COURSES

    Courses in Noncredit Programs are free of charge (no enrollment fee). For information on how to enroll in noncredit courses, click here.

    PARKING

    Students, faculty and staff are encouraged to use public transit. Click here for Parking Regulations.

    SERVICES

    City College services include a bookstore, cafeteria, health center, tutoring center, career and transfer center, counseling, financial aid, library, learning resource center, student government offices, campus police, disabled students programs and more.

    Tattoos (纹身) are becoming more and more common. But they are not a new thing. Scientists have found some frozen bodies from around 3,000 BC and their skin shows the marks of tattoos. For example, Otzi, the Iceman (the oldest body ever found), was discovered in the mountains of Austria. He had many different lines and crosses tattooed on his back and his knees.

    The most common places to get tattoos are the tops of the arms for men and the bottoms of the backs for women. Any mark can be used but there are some common ideas. Some people like to get animals, like dragons, birds and tigers. Other people like to get something written in a foreign language, so Chinese and Japanese words are common in America and the UK. If you can't read the language, make sure you get someone to check what they represent because the tattoo artist could write anything and you would never know.

    It is a big decision to get a tattoo because they are very difficult to remove. It is possible with expensive laser surgery (激光手术) but this is very painful and amazingly expensive and the skin will never be perfect afterwards. You want to do a test, to see how you look with a tattoo, you can get a temporary tattoo which disappears after about a month. This kind is very popular in India, where people often have them for festivals.

    In some countries, such as Japan and Korea, tattoos are still connected with law-breaking activities and it isn't normal to see a tattoo in public. In many places of Europe and America, most people don't care very much whether you have a tattoo or not, though there are some types of job where they don't like tattoos. But some Presidents of the USA have had them.

    At times my mom has been uncomfortable seeing these qualities in me. For example, when I was 12, I went to Puerto Rico all by myself to stay with my grandmother for the summer. My mom was extremely nervous about it. She kept telling me how things were different in Puerto Rico, to always put on sunscreen， not to wander away from my grandmother, and other warnings. She helped me pack and did not leave the airport until she saw my plane take off.

    But despite her worries, she let me go on my own. As I moved into my teens, she continued to give me space to grow and learn, even when it might have been difficult for her. When I reached my senior year, I decided to move away for college. Once again I found that I differed from my peers. While many of them wanted to stay close to home, I couldn't wait to be out in the world on my own. While my mom may not have been happy at the thought of my going away, she was supportive and excited for me.

    One big thing I realized during my senior year, as my mom granted me more freedom, was that she actually believes in me and trusts me. That means a lot. Most of my life, and especially when I was little, the main person I tried to impress in my schoolwork or other things was my mother. I knew she expected nothing but the best from me. Sometimes it was hard to live up to her standards: getting a single B on my report card would make me feel bad because I knew she wanted me to have all As.

    I know that her high standards have helped me stay focused on what's important, like education, and made me who I am. I am thankful for her support and involvement in my life. Most of all I respect her. She is the strongest woman I know and that's why I have turned out so strong and independent.

    Have you ever considered all the English expressions that include words about clothes? Let's have a look.

    People wear pants to cover the lower part of their bodies. We sometimes say that people who are nervous have ants (蚂蚁) in their pants. Sometimes, people may get caught with their pants down. They are found doing something they should not be doing. And, in every family, one person takes control. Sometimes a wife tells her husband what to do. Then we say she wears the pants in the family.

    Pants usually have pockets to hold things. Money that is likely to be spent quickly can burn a hole in your pocket. Sometimes you need a belt to hold up your pants. If you have less money than usual, you may have to tighten your belt.

    I always praise people who can save their money and not spend too much. I really take my hat off to them. Yet, when it comes to my own money, I spend it at the drop of a hat, which means I instantly spend it.

    Boots are a heavy or strong kind of shoes. People who are too big for their boots think they are more important than they really are. I dislike such people. My father is an important person. He runs a big company. He wears a suit and tie, and a shirt with sleeves (衣袖) that cover his arms. Some people who do not know him well think he is too serious and never shows his feelings openly. But I know that my father wears his heart on his sleeve.