Samples of student assignments

April 14, 1998

Students roll ahead with the times

Amy Nathan and Jill Leggett

In Canada today, students have realized that education is more important in the present day with jobs demanding more training than a high school diploma.

The 1996 Census showed that Canadians continued to attain higher levels of education, which has been increasing since the 1950s. Of the post secondary graduates, over one-third were university graduates with a university certificate, bachelor's degree or higher. More young people are geared towards staying in school; 79% of young people aged 15 to 19 were attending school on a full-time basis, up from 66% in 1981.

At the university level, the most popular field of study for graduates aged 20 to 29 was the social sciences, followed by commerce, management and business administration. As in 1986, the first time the census collected data for the study, women chose the social sciences more frequently than men did.

In 1996, about 59% of women aged 25 to 34, who had less than a high school diploma and who were not attending school, were in the labour force. That is, they were either employed or looking for work. In comparison, 74% of women from the same age group with a high school diploma, and 90% of those with a university degree or certificate, were members of the labour force.

Women of the 90's have realized that needing a high education is important and more than half of the women in their 20's have pursued post secondary education. The times are changing quickly and students are becoming more aware of the real world.

Comparison of the article from Globe and Mail

In the article Globe and Mail "Women jump to head of class", many of the statistics printed were the same as ours. Although we did not focus in on the topic of mainly women succeeding in the work place and their higher rate of achievement compared to the men, we did get to the point of mentioning these point.

In our article, we tried to focus in on the subject of students in general achieving higher educational goals, not just the women.

What goes down must come up

April 20, 1998

According to Statistics Canada, crude oil prices fell another 4.9% in February, a continuation of the decline of oil prices for the sixth month in a row. In this four month period, crude oil prices have fallen 23%, which can be compared to the 25% drop after a twelve month period in February 1997.

For what reason has this good fortune been bestowed upon us? We could thank the Asian economical crisis which has weakened their demand for crude oil.

Prices also weakened because of our mild winter, which reduced the demand for heating oil. The major reason for this good fortune, though, is the generous surplus available. OPEC and non-OPEC countries have boosted output. Iraq has been give approval by the United Nations, as the gradual lifting of it's embargoes, to increase its production of 1.1 million barrels per day to 2.3 million barrels per day, over a six-month trial period. That represents almost 2% of the world's oil supply.

Unfortunately, gasoline prices would have to eventually come up anyway because they are at levels that are unrealistic for their costs. That's what oil ministers from some of the largest crude oil producers were hoping when they announced they will reduce world oil output by up to 2 million barrels a day, hoping to stop six months worth of downward prices.

Qatar announced Tuesday it would cut its oil production by 30,000 barrels a day. Qatar is an OPEC member and has a quota of 413,000 barrels a day, but is widely believed to be pumping some 700,000 barrels per day.

Also on Tuesday, Iran's oil minister said that OPEC would hold an emergency meeting soon to "revise ways of boosting oil prices."

The official Islamic Republic News Agency said Bijan Namdar Zanganeh gave no date for the expected OPEC meeting, saying only it would be "in the coming days."

Iran, the second-largest producer in OPEC behind Saudi Arabia, has agreed to cut 140,000 from its production. It has a quota of 3.94 million barrels a day.

The good news is that prices have dipped so low it will take them awhile to climb back up again.

Written by Sonia Riahi

From the Consumer Price Index distributed by Statistics Canada, both the Globe and Mail and I have written articles based on that information. I have decided to focus on the declining oil prices, while the Globe and Mail article wrote a more general article on the inflation of prices. They noted the fact that there has been a declination in price, yet that is as far as they got. I, on the other hand, took it deeper, researching for information on the net on the reason for decrease and the probability of increase. The quality of the article was fine for the purpose it served, yet for a person looking for details, my article would benefit them more. So, although we both decided to take different routes on the same information, we both wrote great articles that serve different purposes for the reader.