European parliament approves sweeping ban on single-use plastics

The European parliament has overwhelmingly backed a wide-ranging ban on single-use plastics in an effort to tackle pollution in seas, fields and waterways.

Under the proposed directive, items such as plastic straws, cotton swabs, disposable plastic plates and cutlery would be banned by 2021, and 90% of plastic bottle recycled by 2025.

Described by the European commission as a clampdown on “the top 10 plastic products that most often end up in the ocean”, the proposed legislation passed 571 votes to 53.

Labour MEPs said the EU plan must be respected by the UK after Brexit. Seb Dance, the party’s environment spokesman in the European parliament, said: “These new measures will slash the use of single-use plastics in the EU. With more than 700,000 plastic bottles littered in the UK every day, it would be negligent if the UK does not maintain these new targets if we leave the EU.

“Unless the UK mirrors EU action on plastics after Brexit, the Tories risk turning the UK into a dumping ground for cheap, non-recyclable plastics.”

Much plastic waste is washed into the ocean, where it may take centuries to fully degrade. Lightweight single-use items are among the most problematic of plastics because they can easily travel long distances, absorbing toxins along the way that damage marine flora and fauna.

The proposed legislation catapults the EU into a leadership position in tackling the growing plastic pollution crisis.

EU states still have to back the directive before it becomes law, but commission sources said they were optimistic that action would continue to move quickly.

“We hope to have a vote in the European council in November,” one told the Guardian. “If all goes well, we could have it in law by the end of the year.”

The UK is yet to bring forward primary legislation addressing the plastics issue despite publication of more than 20 consultations on the matter since the general election last year.

In February, the environment secretary, Michael Gove, became embroiled in a Twitter spat with the European commission’s first vice-president, Frans Timmerans, in which he denied that the EU was one step ahead of the UK in tackling the problem. Similar measures regarding single-use plastics are expected to be announced by the chancellor, Philip Hammond, the budget on Monday.

After Wednesday’s European parliamentary vote, the environment commissioner, Karmenu Vella, said: “Today we are one step closer to eliminating the most problematic single use plastic products in Europe. It sends a clear signal that Europe is ready to take decisive, coordinated action to curb plastic waste and to lead international efforts to make our oceans plastic-free.”

The Guardian 24 Oct 2018

Still I Rise

Maya Angelou, 1928 - 2014

You may write me down in history
With your bitter, twisted lies,
You may trod me in the very dirt
But still, like dust, I’ll rise.

Does my sassiness upset you?
Why are you beset with gloom?
‘Cause I walk like I’ve got oil wells
Pumping in my living room.

Just like moons and like suns,
With the certainty of tides,
Just like hopes springing high,
Still I’ll rise.

Did you want to see me broken?
Bowed head and lowered eyes?
Shoulders falling down like teardrops,
Weakened by my soulful cries?

Does my haughtiness offend you?
Don’t you take it awful hard
‘Cause I laugh like I’ve got gold mines
Diggin’ in my own backyard.

You may shoot me with your words,
You may cut me with your eyes,
You may kill me with your hatefulness,
But still, like air, I’ll rise.

Does my sexiness upset you?
Does it come as a surprise
That I dance like I’ve got diamonds
At the meeting of my thighs?

Out of the huts of history’s shame
I rise
Up from a past that’s rooted in pain
I rise
I’m a black ocean, leaping and wide,
Welling and swelling I bear in the tide.

Leaving behind nights of terror and fear
I rise
Into a daybreak that’s wondrously clear
I rise
Bringing the gifts that my ancestors gave,
I am the dream and the hope of the slave.
I rise
I rise
I rise.

Would you like to participate in a musical?

Invitación a participar en el musical

STILL I RISE: THE MUSICAL

en la EOI de las ROZAS

Desde la EOI estamos muy contentos de invitaros a participar en el musical que vamos a realizar este año como actividad extraescolar. Se trata de un musical con guión original basado en el poema Still I Rise de Maya Angelou, con música afroamericana de todos los tiempos como telón de fondo.

Se trata de un proyecto en el que el coro es el elemento central del espectáculo. Este escrito es un llamamiento a todos aquellos que queráis participar. Necesitamos músicos, actores, bailarines y cantantes, pero dado que el coro es la pieza más importante del espectáculo, hacemos un llamamiento específico a todos aquellos que nos queráis acompañar en la aventura de cantar en grupo bajo la dirección de Beatriz Graells, excelente directora de coro con amplia experiencia con coros pop-rock-folk. No es necesario cantar excepcionalmente bien, ni mucho menos ser profesional del asunto. Se trata de conseguir un coro lo más nutrido posible, lleno de gente con muchas  ganas de disfrutar. Una vez que el coro esté en marcha, os iremos dando más detalles del resto del espectáculo.

Si lo que preferís es participar como actores, es necesario que os apuntéis también al coro, ya que es imprescindible que los personajes se sepan las canciones. En cuanto a músicos, necesitamos guitarras, ukeleles, bajos, percusionistas, teclistas, trompetas, violines, saxos etc. También nos vendría bien la colaboración de alguien con cierta experiencia en dirección teatral, así como de gente con ganas de ayudar con escenografía.

Para que os podáis apuntar en cualquiera de los equipos, vamos a dejar unas hojas en información donde podréis apuntar vuestro nombre, cómo os gustaría colaborar, teléfono y otros datos de contacto.

Los ensayos del coro serán los viernes de 18:00 a 20:00.

Si queréis más información, os invitamos a todos a asistir a una reunión informativa que tendrá lugar el viernes 9 de noviembre a las 19:00 en la Sala Multiusos de la EOI. El primer ensayo del coro comenzará el viernes 16 de noviembre a las 18:00 horas en la misma sala multiusos.

¡¡¡Animaos!!!

REUNIÓN INFORMATIVA                                 PRIMER ENSAYO DEL CORO

Cuándo: viernes 9 de noviembre, 19:00h                     Cuándo: viernes 16 nov, 18:00h

Dónde: sala multiusos de la EOI Dónde: sala multiusos de la EOI

The consequences of the crisis

Read this really interesting BBC article about the 5 most important consequences of the crisis that started in 2008 and quickly spread all over the world.

Lehman anniversary


Can you think of more consequences?

Talking about learning languages

Canada becomes second country to legalise recreational marijuana

The first recreational cannabis to be legally bought in Canada was purchased at midnight on Wednesday (02:30 GMT) on the eastern island of Newfoundland amid queues of hundreds of people.

Canada has become the second country after Uruguay to legalise possession and use of recreational cannabis.

Medical marijuana has been legal in the country since 2001.

But concerns remain, including about the readiness for police forces to tackle drug impaired driving.

Information has been sent to 15m households about the new laws and there are public awareness campaigns.

Ian Power, from the town of St John's began queuing at 20:00 local time so he could "make history". Newfoundland is half an hour ahead of the next province to the west.

"It's been my dream to be the first person to buy the first legal gram of cannabis in Canada, and here I finally am," he said.

Canadian provinces and municipalities have been preparing for months for the end of cannabis prohibition. They are responsible for setting out where cannabis can be bought and consumed.

This has created a patchwork of more or less restrictive legislation across the country.

How ready is Canada for legal cannabis?

There remain unanswered questions on some key issues around how legal cannabis will work in Canada.

A number of analysts are predicting a shortage of recreational marijuana in the first year of legalisation as production and licensing continues to ramp up to meet demand.

And the marketplace itself is still in its infancy.

Ontario, Canada's most populous province, will only begin opening retail stores next spring, though residents will be able to order cannabis online.

British Columbia, one of the provinces with the highest rates of cannabis use, will only have one legal store open on Wednesday.

Until retail locations are more widely available, some unlicensed cannabis retailers, which have flourished in the years since the law was first proposed, may stay open.

It is unclear if police will crack down on them immediately, or if they will turn a blind eye.

What's at stake?

Jessica Murphy, BBC News, Vancouver

Legal pot has been an inescapable topic for months in Canada, as governments and companies prepared in earnest for 17 October.

That day is finally here, and Canadians will learn just how much - or how little - the new framework will change the country. But this is not just a domestic affair.

With global trends shifting away from a strict prohibition of cannabis, the world will be watching this national experiment in drug liberalisation.

A measure of success - whether legalisation will be a win for Prime Minister Justin Trudeau ahead of the 2019 federal election - will depend on whether it meets his stated goals: restricting access of the drug to youth - who are among the heaviest users in Canada - reducing the burden of cannabis laws on the justice system, and undercutting the illicit market for the drug.

And if the outcomes are positive, other countries might just be more willing to follow suit.

Click here to read more: Canada legalises marijuana

Why I share my breast milk with other mothers

With NHS milk banks often reserved for premature babies, parents are turning to informal networks. It’s time to make the milk-sharing system as efficient as that for blood donation

As I watched a woman leave my house with a carrier bag full of my breast milk, I felt proud. Although my breastfeeding journey had not worked out as I had imagined, it comforted me to know that my breast milk would be nourishing other babies. When I gave birth to my daughter, five months previously, she did not take to breastfeeding. After losing 15% of her body weight due to severe tongue tie that prevented her from feeding directly, I picked up my breast pump and began pumping exclusively – I would feed her my milk, just not from the breast. Before long, I had filled my family’s freezer with my milk, then a whole new freezer.

I heard about milk sharing through Facebook, via the page Human Milk 4 Human Babies (HM4HB), which is an informal group for women to share milk with other mothers. One of the veteran pumpers on the group had donated her milk to between 20 and 30 babies and suggested I give it a try. I wrote on HM4HB’s page: “Baby is 20 weeks, five litres to donate, no cigarettes or alcohol,” and was inundated with messages from women willing to collect my milk.

Milk sharing has been recorded as far back as Ancient Egypt. More familiar to many people in the form of wet nursing, it was traditionally an informal practice between mothers. In the 19th century, hospitals started building directories of wet nurses whom they could contact should breastfeeding falter, such as when a mother was too ill or her milk had not come in.

The first formal milk bank opened in 1939, at Queen Charlotte’s hospital in London, as a place to collect, process and distribute donated milk to sick babies. As the birthing and feeding of infants became medicalised during the 50s, more milk banks opened within hospitals. “There used to be milk banking mechanisms in most hospitals with maternity services,” says Dr Natalie Shenker, the co-founder of Hearts Milk Bank in Hertfordshire. “That’s how sick babies were largely fed in hospitals until the 80s.”

However, the development of formula milk – which became widespread due to heavy marketing campaigns and cheap supply to hospitals – caused donations to dry up. When the HIV crisis hit, it almost eradicated milk banks entirely, because the infection could be carried in mothers’ milk; by the 90s, only the six milk banks with pasteurisers remained. If you were unable to breastfeed, you had little choice but to use formula.

Now, however, social media has fostered a revival of milk sharing, much of it informal, as women are able to contact each other via groups such as HM4HB. Sourcing milk from strangers is legal, but it is not ideal, as not only HIV but also bacteria and diseases can be transmitted. “We are aware that, with social media, there have been developments in [informal sharing],” says Clare Livingstone, a professional policy adviser for the Royal College of Midwives. “No one is telling women not to do it, but they need to be aware there are some risks.” A spokesperson for the Department of Health said it “does not recommend informal breast milk sharing, without the safety controls offered by the official NHS milk banks.”

There are 16 NHS milk banks in the UK, 14 in England and one each in Northern Ireland and Scotland. They are closely regulated. Donating mothers are screened for viruses, then their milk is tested, pasteurised and tested again before being distributed. Almost all the banks are funded by the NHS and contained within hospital neonatal wards. This means that NHS donor milk is extremely difficult to obtain and that funding for it is usually limited to babies who are born extremely prematurely. This is how informal groups such as HM4HB came about. Set up in 2010, the network has 130 local Facebook pages and more than 20,000 members. “Through our pages, hundreds of babies in need receive breast milk every single day,” it states on its website.

Harriet Tutton has donated milk informally through HM4HB for more than two years, since the birth of her daughter Luna. Her first recipient was an expectant mother who had previously experienced breastfeeding problems; she drove for five hours to collect the milk. “Her baby came 10 weeks early. Luckily, it was two weeks after I had given her milk. She didn’t have to supplement with formula, because she had milk ready and waiting for her baby,” Tutton says.

Brexit and their problems

Is there a way out?

The Guardian, Ben Jennings

Sun 14 Oct 2018

Teacher Man - Let's begin!

TEACHER MAN (Frank McCourt)

Activity 1 - prereading (groups of 4-6 people)

Each group does a different research:

• Search the Internet to find some background information about the social and economic situation of Ireland in the 1930s.
• Look for some information about the situation of the Irish immigrants in America in the 1950's.
• Look for films that deal with the topic of immigration in America. E.g. The Immigrant (1917), West Side  Story (1961), The Godfather (1972), El Norte (1983),  Stand and Deliver (1988), My Big Fat Greek Wedding (2002), etc., and describe the difficulties of those people in the places where they settled down.
• Find out about the education system in the USA. Make sure you include vocational studies.
• Compile a glossary with the new and most interesting vocabulary you'll find while reading the book. 

All the groups must be made on Tuesday next week to make sure you have time to prepare your part and put it together.

Final task:  

Write a summary (max. 200 words) of each research and choose one speaker to present it to the rest of the class . They summaries will be published on the blog too.

The glossary will also be published on the blog in 3 parts, according to the 3 parts of the book, to make sure everybody can use it. 

Deadline for the oral presentations:
- 11th December (Tuesday)
All the material will be immediately posted after the presentation.