Summer Swimming Spots

For our final project, we decided to pick a topic we were all looking forward to: swimming! Since each member in our group comes from a different part of Vermont, we chose six popular swimming places we all enjoy during the summer.

Joe’s Pond is located thirteen miles west of St. Johnsbury and twenty-five miles east of Montpelier. The depth of the pond is over one hundred feet and the altitude is fifteen hundred feet above sea level. Loons, deer, moose and bear are popular critters to be seen around the pond. Joe’s Pond is most famously known for its Ice Out contest, which has been a local tradition since the 1980’s. Basically, people buy tickets and guess when a block will fall through the ice, winning up to four thousand dollars (last year’s winner.)

Lake Memphremagog is a fresh water glacial lake located between Newport Vermont, and Magog, Quebec Canada. The lake is 27 miles long with 73 percent of the lake's surface area in Canada, where it drains into Magog river. Three-quarters of its watershed is in Vermont. The total is 687 square miles. Some claim Lake Memphremagog contains a reptile-like monster named Memphre, that has been spotted way back since the 18th century. Memphre has claimed to been seen in 2000. Lake Memphremagog is a popular tourist spot during the summer months, and really boosts Newport’s economy, especially with it’s beautiful sunsets.

Lake Seymour is located in Morgan, Vermont and is a very hip scene for young adults to go and “hang out.” Beach bums, water skies, sea-doos, boats and barbeques take place among many, many campers that rent out small cottages during the summer. It has two local stores within walking distances for all your cook out needs, and the people are extremely friendly.

The Four-Corners swimming hole in North Troy Vermont is a truly hidden gem. It is a little nippy, even in the summertime, because many trees block the hot sun. Large cliffs provide lots of jumping opportunities and the rope swing is a must try. This swimming hole is polluted with swimmers all summer long! Swimmers cannot be shy because of this, guarantying you will never swim alone.

Lake Willoughby is considered by lots of people to be the most beautiful lake in Vermont. It’s nickname is the Lucerne of America, and is located in Westmore, Vermont, thirty miles north of St. Johnsbury. Lake Willoughby is known for it’s crystal clear water, amazing scenery, sandy beaches and terrific fishing.

Cummerford Dam is well off the "beaten-path" but worth the drive to find it. While it doesn't offer a large beach it does have a well known rope swing, as well as picnic tables and grills to enjoy a full day. It has a boat access to the Connecticut River and lots of great spots for kayaking or canoeing as well.

Northeast Kingdom Swimming Spots

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Newspaper Critiques

I hope I understood the assignment correctly, I looked at two newspapers and comparedd their sites. I looked at USA Today, and the Caledonian Record. (I note ahead that this may be an unfair comparison since obviously they're on different levels as far as audience, budget, etc.) USA Today had a great website, the opening page was really easy to navigate and it had all sorts of options. It was easy to find the section for video, slide shows, etc. Each one had a separate section on the opening screen. A lot of the stories had video and they made it fast and easy to get the story. The site is regularly updated and so is presenting up to the minute news stories. The Caledonian Records site was much less impressive. It doesn't give you all the stories from the newspaper unless perhaps you subscribe to it. There is very little use of multimedia. They did have a section with slide shows but they had little or not text accompanying them and no audio. The only video on the site came from the AP site and was really just a link these stories were good but they weren't actually a product of the caledonian record. I would say it was due to budget restraints except that in this class we've shown that anyone can create multimedia projects with just a little knowledge and effort.

Example from Ireport

Ireport Critique

I found this site a little hard to navigate. I had to search to find reports that used video, possibly because so many of the reports prominently displayed were also on CNN. I did find three different reports to look at. The most interesting story that I found did not use video which is unfortunate. It was posted by habforham and called "Houses Being Given Away in Detroit" It only had one picture which was too bad but the story had a lot of information and explained about the organization that is buying and giving away houses in Detroit. It would have been a much better story if it had a slideshow or even better video to go with it. It was very interesting and news worthy, I think I would put it on CNN if it had more of a multimedia aspect to it. I could do the same because it really just took some research, not much else. The first video I looked at was posted by Sessle called"Castle Wall Video from Sweden" it was terrible. There was video but no audio and no text so it was just a look at a castle wall. It was not at all interesting and it definitely wasn't news. I would not put it on CNN. The final video I looked at was posted by Coryboehne called "Bosque Fire Video" this was a much better example of video journalism, it was a man covering a wild fire in New Mexico. Unfortunately the audio was terrible, the creator must not have edited at all because if he had done a voice over and lowered the background noise it would have been much better. It was not as interesting as the first story could have been but it was much more interesting than the other video I watched. It was news and with audio adjustment it could have possibly been on CNN. I think I could probably do the same thing because it's pretty clear he didn't do any editing to his video or his audio.

Go Green...Even With Construction

Today, more than ever, the world is creating more and more ways to "go green." Or simply, live more efficiently. Many of us have realized the world will eventually run clear of resources if we don't effectively start to conserve them, immediately. By living greener, one can minimize pollution, protect our environment and create a healthy, non-hazardous place for us all. This is very important for those of us who plan to build new homes as well. The new building LSC is constructing is using recyclable wood all throughout the structure. The California Energy Commission offers the following tips for "greener" building.
First of all, make sue your project is appropriate for where you live. Certain materials and methods are better suited for specific geographical locations. Heavier construction materials should be used for drastic temperatures in the Southwest, for example, and lighter ones in places like Southern Florida. Secondly, when possible, build with materials that are of recycled content. This aspect pretty much speaks for itself. Examples of materials that can be recyclable are: metals, timber, plastic, glass and ceramics. Thirdly, buy your materials locally so you can cut down on transportation and environmental costs.
Following these easy to follow tips will help our environment and the home builder in the long run. Investing in quality products may cost a little bit more, but will last a lot longer in the end. which is the efficiency the world needs now more than ever.

CNN Critique

CNN.com is definitely a "professional" website. It is very organized starting with the numerous news categories you can choose from at the top of the site. This makes it really easy to navigate right to what you're looking for. They have a video section so you can be sure you're getting a video newsclip if that's what you're looking for. Near the top is also a list of headlines (about half of which I could understand) You can pick a story based on the quick headline although you don't know if it will be text or video until you have clicked on it. There's a section on the main page to find what's on CNN's television station, and a section called "Quick Vote" which is interactive and allows you to vote on a question, then see what others have voted. It also brings you to an editorial about the question throughout which there are links to a number of related stories. Another section of the main page allows you to get your local weather and news headlines which I thought was really great because it means you can access this one site for all your news instead of having to find a local site also. In addition to the interactive feature of the vote they have a section called ireport which is a site where anyone can send in news stories, CNN has specific stories that they use and you can look at them based on the people reporting them or the topics that are being covered.
There are also a number of blogs and podcasts that you can get to from the main page. There is a lot of information on the opening page, and it's really easy to get lost in the site because there are so many options but for CNN this is probably a good thing. I thought that there was pretty minimal advertising on any given page which is nice because with so much information in front of you a lot of advertising would be really distracting.