The News Feed

It’s Electric! Or, It might be

by Carolina Nunez-

Many schools in Virginia have been granted the opportunity to have electric buses in their communities in April and September of 2022 as a part of the 2021 American Rescue Plan Electric School Bus Rebates and the annual 2021 Diesel Emissions Reduction Act (DERA) School Bus Rebates. Some of these areas include Newport News, Loudoun County, Culpeper County, Petersburg City, and Carroll County public schools. Each of these zones were granted upwards of $100,000, the highest fund awarded being $900,000, going towards acquiring electric school buses according to WXFR with New River Valley news.

When it comes to Blacksburg public schools, Mayor Leslie Hager-Smith states that “[Blacksburg] will hopefully have about half our fleet in electric buses.” What exactly does this mean for schools in the New River Valley?

Dr. Bernard Bragen, superintendent for Montgomery County Public Schools, said, “In the Montgomery County Public Schools, as of right now, we have 4 electric school buses.”

“It all comes down to economics. If the state of Virginia incentivizes the buses where the costs are the same in gas- we would do it in a heartbeat,” Bragen continued.

Montgomery County Public School Administration office entrance. Picture taken on March 24, 2023 by Carolina Nunez in Christiansburg, Virginia

Bragen explained that electric school buses are not cheap in price. The 2021 American Rescue Plan Electric School Bus Rebates had planned to offer approximately $10 million to public and private fleet owners for the replacement of old diesel school buses with new buses certified to EPA’s cleanest emission standards. This plan mostly applied to schools in more “densely populated areas” because these are the areas that are developing a more “clean” environment.

The idea to replace regular school buses with newer electric ones has been circulating throughout the nation. But why is it necessary? Dominion Energy reports that replacing one diesel bus can reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 54,000 pounds each year. This means the air quality inside a diesel bus is 5x worse than outside the bus. Replacing a diesel bus with an electric bus improves air quality for students inside the bus and for the communities outside of them.

Diesel powered school buses produce more than 5 million tons of carbon dioxide emissions. According to the NYBCA, There are more than 480,000 yellow school buses across the United States that transport an estimated 26 million students to and from school. This alone saves close to 2.3 billion gallons of fuel and saves families more than $7.3 billion in fuel costs each year. This is great for our economy, but terrible for the environment and the children who are constantly being exposed to their buses exhaust fumes.

Despite the benefits of having an electric school bus, it is not so easy to acclimate them to certain areas. Bragen explained that, “The issue with the electric buses is that some things like temperature matter. Typically you would be able to get 200 miles with one charge on a bus, which would normally be okay, but the temperature we experience affects that rate.” Because the New River Valley does experience temperatures that vary from cold to warm in one day, this is an issue worth considering before converting to electric buses.

With school buses being one of the most common vehicles on the road, the carbon footprint they leave behind has a big impact on the air we breathe every day. The nation as a whole has slowly inched towards replacing the regular diesel powered buses with the more efficient electrical school buses, but the question remains of whether the New River Valley will be a part of this change.

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AI: Changing the music listening experience

by Kate Haas-

With artificial intelligence becoming a hot topic across various industries, Spotify’s new AI-powered DJ has raised concerns about the future of music streaming platforms.

As a leading music streaming service, Spotify attributes its success to one major hallmark: they provide a personalized music experience for users. By partnering with the company that owns the ubiquitous ChatGPT, OpenAI and Spotify launched one of the most personalized features for Premium users.

This new feature, currently only available in the United States and Canada, creates a unique radio station for each listener based on past favorites, recent repeats and new recommendations.

In between each song, the AI-powered host, DJ X, provides commentary about different artists and tracks using a generated, realistic-sounding radio voice.

DJ X also updates commentary each month to include cultural references during song breaks. In honor of Women’s History Month, DJ X has been recommending users listen to the playlist “Women of Pop Throughout the Ages.”

The goal of the new feature, explained Spotify, is for the platform to get to know listeners well enough for the DJ to choose what to play with the click of a single button. Or, as Spotify said in their press release, it’s putting an “AI DJ in your pocket.”

Spotify’s new AI-generated radio station is a popular choice for students as background noise while doing homework. Photo was taken by Kate Haas on 3/23/23 in Blacksburg, Va.

How do other online music streaming services plan to compete with Spotify by integrating AI into their own systems? Will AI change the future of the music business? Experts within the industry have their own responses to these burning questions.

“I think that we’ll see other platforms attempt to integrate AI into their systems in unique ways – maybe YouTube Music will implement AI searching or Pandora will try to create AI talk shows,” said Artem Bank, an esteemed audio engineer and professor of audio technology at Virginia Tech. “I think for any service, AI integration is the buzzword right now, just as ‘algorithm’ was for search relevance not too long ago.”

Bank said there are several dangers that arose when Spotify merged AI with music.

The priorities of Spotify’s version of AI focus on data sets of popularity. This means when DJ X is recommending artists for a user to listen to, popular artists with a higher listener count will get priority over a smaller artist, even if the user listens to both. This specific piece of the algorithm could be threatening to smaller names trying to gain popularity on streaming platforms.

“AI can replicate based on what it’s learned, but it struggles to create something brand new in terms of style and genre,” said Bank, the lead live audio engineer for the PBS series “Live at 9:30.”

Bank also noted that until AI seeks to replace composers and songwriters as a whole, a major shift in the future of the music industry won’t happen.

Although Spotify has taken the lead in integrating cutting-edge AI technology into their streaming service, the challenge for musicians to create unique and innovative sound becomes even more difficult amidst an evolving industry landscape.

Taxes explained

by Nicole Tutino and Emaryi Williams —

Taxes are a complicated thing that millions of working Americans deal with every year. In this video, we explain how taxes came to be in the United States, why citizens need them and why the current filing system remains complicated.

Religion’s influence on health

by Savannah Webb-

March 24, 2023 – Blacksburg, Va. – A woman meditates on religious scripture while sitting on the Drillfield. Photo credit: Savannah Webb

Religion and health are often kept separate, but studies show there is more overlap than might be expected.

“Religious involvement is related to virtually every single aspect of health — mental, social, behavioral and physical,” said Harold Koenig, director of Duke University’s Center for Spirituality, Theology and Health. “Literally every health outcome is in some way connected to religious involvement.”

Koenig has over four decades of research experience studying the health effects of monotheistic religions like Christianity, Islam and Judaism.

“It’s really about devoutness,” Koenig said. “To what extent is a person’s attitudes and lifestyle driven by their religious beliefs? If it doesn’t affect the way they make their decisions and the way they treat other people and think about themselves, it’s not going to help.”

Positive mental health benefits such as lower levels of anxiety and lower risk of suicide are associated with religious devotion, and Koenig explained that religious involvement also lowers risk of cardiovascular disease.

“If you have a sense of purpose and meaning and you feel that you’re in control, because God is in control, all of that lowers your stress level,” Koenig said. “It makes perfect, logical, rational sense that you would then be at lower risk for high blood pressure, stroke or a heart attack.”

The Harvard School of Public Health has found similar results with larger research samples, specifically in women. While there’s no foolproof explanation for this gender disparity, Koenig offered insight on the phenomenon.

“I think religion is a little bit easier for women to engage in because they’re more social, and they’re more in touch with their emotions,” he said. “It’s harder for men. There’s a general tendency for them to not be as social or in touch with their emotions.”

March 24, 2023 – Blacksburg, Va. – A Christian Bible sits closed on the Drillfield. A majority of research on religion and health has been conducted on subjects belonging to the Christian faith. Photo credit: Savannah Webb

While gender seems to play a part in the relationship between religion and health, Koenig said the research indicates there is another factor at play — locus of control.

An individual with an internal locus of control believes their health is heavily influenced by their behavior and decisions, whereas an external locus of control places an individual’s health outcomes in the hands of fate or God. Surprisingly, Koenig has found that greater religious involvement is related to an internal locus of control.

“People who have strong faith actually have a greater sense of control, but it’s an indirect control through their dependence and belief in God,” he said. “They believe they can do things to influence God’s actions — like prayer — and in giving up control, there is actually an increase in control. It’s extraordinary how it all psychologically works.”

Finally, Koenig’s research indicates that the extent of psychological and physical relief from anguish depends on how long a person has been practicing religion.

“The people who benefit the most are those who are younger, because they have their entire lifetime to reap the benefits of that religious faith,” Koenig said. “Religious involvement protects you from drug and alcohol abuse, cigarette smoking, and stress levels — all of which keeps you healthier.”

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Uptick in clothes thrifting

by George Waters-

Photo by cottonbro studio from Pexels.com

Thrifting clothes is becoming more popular by the day. According to a report by ThredUp, the second-hand market is projected to boom 127% by 2026 from where it was only two years ago.

In the business world, that type of growth is generally beyond even the most optimistic of expectations, but why are so many people flocking to this market?

The best way to look at this is from the beginning, and reusing clothes and materials has been a facet of society for generations. As the authors of this Tryst article cover, thrifting in the U.S. is commonly linked to the Salvation Army’s inception in the early 1900s.

In reality, its roots go back even further as immigrants found ways to make what money they could selling used clothes and items on the streets. Before that, families would pass down clothes from one kid to the next as they were handmade.

As time went on, and thrifting became more of a social phenomenon and less of a familial one, its popularity dipped before rising back up in recent decades.

This can be attributed to a number of factors. Thrift shops have always been valued because of how cost-effective they are for the consumer, but a concern for the environment has likely sparked a new wave of conscientious customers.

Gen Z is especially contributing to this sentiment and is commonly attributed to the market’s rapid growth. Fashion guides using thrift hauls are extremely successful over social media.

There are some concerns, as this NY Times article points out, about how second-hand markets are growing however. The rise in fast fashion is flooding stores with cheap, poorly made clothes that consumers are less likely to buy but still take up precious time for employees to catalog.

Additionally, the surge in consumers has the potential to deplete the quality stock and create a rise in pricing, driving away the individuals with little cash flow that these institutions were originally designed for.

Either way, the second-hand market is making its push to become the first choice in the eyes of consumers.

How the pandemic changed restaurant industry

by Alana Kirsch-

The Covid-19 pandemic was brutal for small businesses in America with restaurants, getting particularly hit hard. But if you’re looking for a silver lining, many of these changes provided options that brought alternative forms of revenue, opened a door for new customers, and changed the trajectory of the industry itself.

Prior to 2019, a restaurant was a place to gather and share a meal. New safety regulations led the restaurant industry to re-evaluate its service model. Operators’ priority became their customers’ safety and restaurants worked quickly to implement new offerings that would keep them in business.

While in-person dining services were paused restaurants focused on alternative forms of revenue. Sixty-seven percent of restaurants implemented curbside pick-up with another 27% implementing third-party delivery.

People were able to order food from their favorite restaurants while reducing the risk of exposure. Many places even provided customers with a contactless delivery option, requesting the deliverer to leave the food at the door.

New changes continued to be implemented even after the option for in-person dining services was re-opened. Physical menus were replaced with QR Codes. This allowed customers to scan a code on their mobile devices which would direct them to an online version of an establishment’s menu. Contactless menus were an easy and accessible solution for most people.

Cashless payments became the new normal. Many establishments adopted tablets to avoid giving customers physical checks. This allowed for the rise of contactless payment all together. Most restaurant establishments have continued using the new practices they implemented during the pandemic.

Automation was not the only solution. Mandatory physical changes lead to deeper reconstructions within the system. Restaurants have been known for long hours, low wages, and few benefits. This too was changed by the pandemic.

Social distancing called for restaurants to reduce their in-person dining availability. This allowed restaurant owners and operators to focus on the quality of their employees instead of the quantity.

With fewer and better employees to pay wages and benefits grew. The independent restaurant coalition reports since February of 2020 84% of restaurants have raised wages and 34% have added paid sick leave to benefits for their employees.

An essential characteristic of working in any restaurant is the ability to adapt. This was especially true during the pandemic. Although these changes are a departure from the pre-pandemic world they lead to many necessary changes for employees and customers.