Students recharge in the Energy Pod

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PKG: Students recharge in the Energy Pod

by Johnny Kraft–

Hokie Wellness launched the Hokies Sleep Well campaign by releasing an energy pod at Squires Student Center. The energy pod allows students to take a quick 20-minute power nap to recharge their battery and finish the semester strong.

According to the National Sleep Foundation, college students need seven to nine hours of sleep each night. However, research shows that on average most college students get only six to seven hours of sleep per night, and the college years are notoriously sleep-deprived due to an overload of activities, which negatively affects academic performance, according to the University Health Center at the University of Georgia.

The Student Government Association (SGA) health and wellness team at Virginia Tech came up with the idea for the Hokies Sleep Well campaign. They wanted to focus on one health issue and landed on sleep, as it is the first thing to go for college students.

“It’s not really a priority and it’s almost a badge of honor if you don’t sleep, so we wanted to change the narrative of that a little bit,” said SGA co-director of health and wellness, Anna Pike.

The energy pod allows students to sit, sleep, adjust seat tilt and play relaxing music to refresh with a quick power nap to help balance the end of semester stress.

According to Pike, the energy pod was to get attention, but their campaign also included signs on the Drillfield with different sleep deprivation facts such as how memory attention goes down by 40 percent as well as handing out ENO hammocks to any students that would listen to the information they had.

“Even 20 minutes is equivalent to having a couple of cups of coffee, you might even just need to rest your eyes, so the nap pod is good if you can’t fit in a full night sleep just to rejuvenate you and get you back into a full state of mind,” said Pike.

While it is impossible to measure if the campaign has led to students sleeping more, the energy pod has been a huge hit garnering a lot of excitement around it from students. Hokie Wellness released a video introducing the energy pod that has over 20,000 views and has been shared multiple times demonstrating the positive feedback from students.

While the energy pod is in Squires for a limited time, Hokie Wellness expects to get four more pods soon.

Energy Pod #5Blacksburg, Va., May 3 – Energy Pod: Hokie Wellness released a new energy pod at Squires Student Center as a part of their Hokies Sleep Well campaign. The energy pod allows students to recharge with a 20-minute power nap as they prepare for their finals. Photo: Johnny Kraft

POLITICS: Buy American, Hire American

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POLITICS: Buy American, Hire American

by Anna Friesen, Alison Cuevas, Johnny Kraft–

On April 18, 2017, President Donald Trump signed an executive order titled “Buy American, Hire American” during his visit to Wisconsin. Ironically, he chose to sign the order at headquarters of Snap-On Tools, a Wisconsin-based manufacturer.

This order has two initiatives. The first being “Buy American.” Buy American is intended to raise the standard of American products with stricter laws and more reviews. Trump’s goal as President is to make America great again and he intends to through making better quality and the best quality products America can make.

The second initiative is “Hire American” which direct American companies away from hiring workers with H-1B visas. Companies tend to hire these workers because they are willing to be paid for less than American workers which Trump considers “fraud.” The H-1B visa is often used by immigrants coming work in America and achieve a better life for their families. In 2016, The number of applications for H-1B visas fell to 199,000 this year from 236,000 in 2016. Many immigrants are now losing these opportunities.

SCI/TECH: Era of cyber warfare

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SCI/TECH: Era of cyber warfare

by Sidney Cook, Johnny Kraft, Richard Chumney–

For decades the threat of cyber warfare has been on display in movies and television. Now, well into the 21st century cyber warfare has become a disturbing reality of modern life.

After investigations into the high profile hacks of the Democratic National Committee and Sony Pictures Entertainment authorities determined the attacks were directed by foreign governments. Vladimir Putin and the Russian government, according to FBI officials, weaponized the information gathered from the hack of the DNC in an effort to disrupt the 2016 presidential election in the favor of Donald Trump. North Korea backed the hack of Sony to intimidate and embarrass the American corporation.

Experts believe Russia is likely to strike again. Putin’s government is expected to target U.S. communication and information technology infrastructure but not conduct attacks which could trigger a military response.

In the meantime government agencies and multibillion-dollar corporations will have to find ways to strengthen their digital infrastructure to prevent future attacks.

Intramural sports: Big difference, similar impact

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Intramural sports: Big difference, similar impact

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Blacksburg, Va., Feb. 23 – Intramural Basketball: Virginia Tech students compete in an CoRec intramural basketball game at War Memorial Hall. Photo: Johnny Kraft

by Johnny Kraft–

While intramural sports differ from official collegiate sports, they have a similar impact on the Virginia Tech community. Sports are an important aspect of the college experience at Virginia Tech, but many do not realize that also includes intramurals.

The intramural sports program at Virginia Tech serves over 8,500 students, faculty and staff every year, according to Intramural Sports Coordinator, Jeff Feldhaus. The program offers over 40 activities throughout the year including flag football, soccer and basketball as well as non-traditional sports such as inner tube water polo and battleship.

The biggest difference between intramural sports and varsity sports is that it is not about wins and losses. It is an inclusive, social experience emphasizing having fun, sportsmanship and making new friends by playing your favorite sports regardless of skill level.

“Intramural sports differ from varsity athletics in that our mission is to provide recreational opportunities for participants of all skill levels,” said Feldhaus. “We strive to get people engaged in exercise and sport-related activities that promote teamwork, leadership and build healthy lifestyles.”

Each year, teams and organizations join in the quest for the Hokie Grail, awarded annually to the All-University Intramural Champion based on a point system. It gives certain groups such as fraternities and sororities a chance to compete and earn points by participating in intramural activities over the course of the entire year, according to Feldhaus. In short, a group earns points by participating, displaying good sportsmanship, etc. and their points are tallied throughout the year so an overall champion can be determined similar to the Olympic medal count.

According to the Department of Recreational Sports, intramural sports enhances the quality of life for the university community by educating and encouraging participation in activities that promote healthy lifestyles, social interactions and leadership skills.

Intramural sports are a big reason why Virginia Tech has been named no. 1 fittest college, no. 1 best quality of life and no. 1 in their students love these colleges by The Princeton Review. According to Feldhaus, a survey from a few years ago, in which alumni were polled, showed that intramurals were one of their top three favorite things about going to school at Virginia Tech, behind only academics and athletic events.

In addition, the intramural and recreational sports programs at Virginia Tech take pride in serving the community in the spirit of Ut Prosim. Every year, student employees volunteer for a number of activities that serve the campus and local communities including Hokie Helpers and the Southwest Virginia Special Olympics Basketball Tournament.

These programs hope to continue to grow and serve the Virginia Tech community as an atmosphere that encourages individuals to develop life-long involvement in recreational activities and are dedicated to meeting the changing needs of a diverse community by offering quality structured and informal recreational opportunities.

“One of our goals for the intramural program is to increase the number of people we serve until we hit the 10,000-member mark,” said Feldhaus. “Additionally, many of our recreational sports programs will continue to pursue avenues for promoting health and wellness, not only on campus but in the local community.”

Algorithm to fight cyberbullying

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Algorithm to fight cyberbullying

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Blacksburg, Va., April 20 – Professor Bert Huang: Huang continues his research on algorithms to detect cyberbullying. His tool is only about halfway complete as he looks to take it to the next level of preventing cyberbullying. Photo: Johnny Kraft

by Johnny Kraft–

Cyberbullying is quickly developing into one of the most popular forms of bullying as social media and technology can be used as a weapon 24 hours a day, seven days a week. However, an assistant professor at Virginia Tech has built his own weapon in the battle against cyberbullying.

Professor Bert Huang has developed an algorithm to detect traces of cyberbullying. Huang is an assistant professor in the Virginia Tech Department of Computer Science, where he is using his knowledge of machine learning to develop algorithms to combat cyberbullying.

According to bullying statistics, about half of adolescents experience some form of cyberbullying, and 10 to 20 percent experience it regularly. However, Huang has found in his research that adults experience cyberbullying more frequently than people realize, and that men experience about the same amount of cyberbullying as women, although they are much different forms of cyberbullying.

Huang developed computer algorithms to identify cyberbullying automatically by using machine learning, which is a type of artificial intelligence that provides computers with the ability to learn without being explicitly programmed.

“We have to provide information as human experts for the machine-learning algorithm to learn from where these are explicit examples of here’s something that I am looking and here’s something that I’m not looking for,” said Huang. “So in this case, it would be here’s an example of cyberbullying and here’s an example of not cyberbullying. Doing that is really expensive and takes a lot of human effort, and is really tricky for humans to do.”

According to DoSomething.org, 81 percent of teens believe cyberbullying is easier to get away with than bullying in person. Right now, the algorithm can only detect traces of cyberbullying, but Huang’s challenge is to eventually find a way to prevent cyberbullying after detection. Huang acknowledged this as the biggest obstacle and focus of his research.

“That’s the goal. There’s a big open problem beyond the detection task. So once you detect it, what do you do?” said Huang.

The algorithm is still developing, as it is not completely accurate yet. Huang hopes to keep evolving his weapon, as a practical tool for social media and other Internet users in the future, but the next step is not completely clear.

“There’s a big question of what you do if you actually detect cyberbullying. This is a problem that we as humans have not solved,” said Huang. “How you intervene and how you fix that problem is not obvious, so getting a computer to do that is an even harder problem.”

Bert Huang

Blacksburg, Va., Virginia Tech Assistant Professor Bert Huang built an algorithm to detect traces of cyberbullying. Photo: berthuang.com