Passage 1

The "one big thing" Reagan knew was the power and value of human freedom, which proved to be the defining principle of his worldview. It guided what he thought about domestic politics and was central to his vision for the world. For more than thirty years, Reagan embraced a vision for dealing with the Soviet Union and ending the Cold War that was remarkably consistent and proved to be decisive. People who note his apparent lack of interest in the details of diplomacy, missile throw weights, and international law fail to see his larger strategic vision. Details that animate so many in the word of politics, academe, and journalism did not interest him so much as the "metaphysics" of the Cold War.

• Peter Schweizer, Reagan's War, $2003$

Passage 2

But collapse was not inevitable in the 1980s... Structural contexts influenced decisions taken by individuals such as Gorbachev. Economic decline, technological backwardness, and modernization pressures shaped the preferences of the decision-makers who initiated institutional reform in the Soviet Union. Most basically, Gorbachev had to perceive problems in the system before setting out to address them through reform.

Nonetheless, it was decisions taken by Gorbachev and other Soviet leaders that started the process of institutional change. A different leader at the top taking different decisions might have produced a different reform trajectory or no reform at all. Gorbachev opened the range of the possible, allowing other forces in Soviet society to emerge and then articulate alternate models for organizing the federation, the polity, and the economy.

• Michael McFaul, Russia's Unfinished Revolution, $2002$

Based on the two interpretations above of the collapse of the Soviet Union, complete the following three tasks:

a. Briefly explain the main point made by Passage $1$ .

b. Briefly explain the main point made by Passage $2$ .

c. Provide ONE piece of evidence from the late $1990$s or early $21$st century that is not included in either passage but which supports the interpretation of one of the passages.

What changes in the federal government and American foreign policy of the United States followed in the wake of the attacks of September $11, 2001$?

New technologies compete with old ones-for time, for attention, for money, for prestige, but mostly for dominance of their world-view. ... In the United States, we can see such collisions everywhere-in politics, in religion, in commerce - but we see them most clearly in the schools....

In introducing the personal computer to the classroom, we shall be breaking a four-hundred-year-old truce between the gregariousness and openness fostered by orality and the introspection and isolation fostered by the printed word. ... Over four centuries, teachers, while emphasizing print, have allowed orality its place in the classroom, and have therefore achieved a kind of pedagogical peace between these two forms of learning, so that what is valuable in each can be maximized. Now comes the computer, carrying anew the banner of private learning and individual problemsolving. Will the widespread use of computers in the classroom defeat once and for all the claims of communal speech? Will the computer raise egocentrism to the status of a virtue?

A new technology does not add or subtract something. It changes everything. In the year $1500$, fifty years after the printing press was invented, we did not have old Europe plus the printing press. We had a different Europe... And that is why the competition among media is so fierce. Surrounding every technology are institutions whose organization-not to mention their reason for being-reflects the world-view promoted by the technology. Therefore, when an old technology is assaulted by a new one, institutions are threatened. When institutions are threatened, a culture finds itself in crisis. This is serious business, which is why we learn nothing when educators ask, Will students learn mathematics better by computers than by textbooks?... They direct our attention away from the serious social, intellectual, and institutional crisis that new media foster....

• Neil Postman, Technopoly: The Surrender of Culture to Technology, $1993$

In this text, Neil Postman argues that

a. technology determines the worldview of a culturepriorities, symbols, and even how humans relate to one another.

b. computers will soon take over the classroom and eliminate the need for teachers.

c. computers will have the effect of keeping people from reading great books and going to museums.

d. computers and related technology have damaged our culture irreparably by diminishing person-to-person contact.

(A) Briefly explain ONE major difference between Gaddis's and Sherwin's historical interpretations on the origins of the Cold War. (B) Briefly explain how ONE specific event, development, or circumstance during the Cold War that is not explicitly mentioned in the excerpts could be used to further support Gaddis's argument. (C) Briefly explain how ONE specific event, development, or circumstance during the Cold War that is not explicitly mentioned in the excerpts could be used to further support Sherwin's argument

Explain how the presence of notonecta chemical cues affects gene expression in the daphnia.

Price discrimination A. is the opposite of volume discounts. B. is a practice limited to movie theaters and the airline industry C. can lead to increased efficiency in the market. D. rarely occurs in the real world. E. helps to increase the profit of perfect competitors.

Why did Reconstruction policies split the women 's suffrage movement?

How did voting reforms in the Progressive Era expand the democratic process and the right to participate in that process?

Identify the following term or individuals and explain their significance. Industrial Revolution

Identify

What strategy did the politicians known as Redeemers employ to gain political power? What was the outcome?

What developments in the conservation of natural resources occurred in the early 1900s?

Identify the following term or individuals and explain their significance. National Road

Define and explain: patent, transcontinental railroad, trunk lines, telegraph

What views on private property did farmers and ranchers have, and how did these views affect the settlement of the Great Plains?