Hasta La Gadget!

Talking on the phone is a lost art. No one’s really doing it anymore.

If you’re under 40, you probably text, email, tweet, Skype, Facetime, “Yo“…anything but phone. If you’re under 18, you probably don’t even use actual words to communicate — just tiny cute pictures, emoji, to get your point across.

Even Jeff Bezos, the 50-year-old CEO of Amazon — which just launched a phone! — recently admitted he doesn’t use a phone. “I haven’t made a phone call on my phone in a long time,” Bezos told a New York Times reporter.

Still not convinced? Eighty-seven percent of high school seniors surveyed by school review site Niche said they text every day (it’s far and away the most popular thing for them to do on their phones) while only 37 percent talk on the phone daily.

Still, sometimes people want to TALK to you. Like, maybe your grandmother or your dad? Or someone who wants to give you a job and pay you “money.”

If you don’t remember how to speak out loud to humans on the phone, these situations may become overwhelming.

“I don’t pick up the phone when people call me because I’m anxious someone has died or is terminally ill,” Maxwell Strachan, 26, told me via Gchat — he declined to be interviewed by phone. Strachan, a HuffPost Business editor, said the only reason anyone uses the phone anymore is to break really bad news. “I don’t want to have to react to that news in front of people, so I let it ring and hope to get the bad news in a room on my own via text or email.”

I want to help Maxwell and others like him. I’m here to offer guidance on Phone Talking 101.

So what makes me, a 24-year-old who works on the Internet and spends her time writing about how to text people GIFs, qualified for this task? I, dear reader, am an only child. I speak to both of my parents on the phone every single day. Every. Single. Day. If you just count my conversations with my parents, I spend — by a conservative estimate — 30 minutes a day on the phone. That’s 182.5 hours a year. I spend at least one week of the year on the phone.

Here are some things you need to remember when talking on the phone. For those of you uncomfortable with written language we offer a helpful emoji translation:

1. Listen

It’s hard to know what to do while talking on the phone since you don’t have your phone to look at. You may have a computer or iPad, however, and be tempted. Don’t do it!

Don’t check your email. Don’t look at Facebook. Don’t go on Twitter. Don’t look at your computer at all.

This isn’t Skype. When you’re talking on the phone, you’re not looking at the person you’re talking to. Actually, let’s be real…when you’re on the phone, you’re not looking at the video of yourself in the corner of a screen the way you do on Skype.

Odds are, you won’t know what to do with your eyes when you’re on the phone. Consider looking into a mirror while you talk if it makes you more comfortable. The mirror is the original front-facing camera.

2. Speak

It’s easy to let your mind wander when you’re talking on the phone. When you’re texting, you can respond whenever you like. When you’re talking on the phone, though, you’re expected to reply the moment the other person stops talking. If you’re unsure of what to say, you can choose one of these generic phrases:

“Oh, wow.”
“Tell me more!”
“That’s interesting.”
“And then what?”

These phrases should work in most situations.

3. Feel

There are no emoji to use while you’re speaking out loud. If your friend has a crying kitty face, you’ll have to imagine it. One way to determine someone’s mood without emoji, video or Snapchat, is to listen to their tone of voice.

Listen to their voice. Does it sound especially high? Are they short of breath? Is their voice cracking? Wimpering? That might mean your friend is crying. Try to pay special attention to a friend who is crying.

Is he or she saying outrageous things in a calm, serious voice? That might be sarcasm! The list of emotions goes on and on. Try to make sure you can identify different emotions before you take a lot of phone calls.

If you’re a fan of hominy and already know all about it, you’ve just earned major life points from HuffPost Taste. But if the word hominy makes you stop and say, “Huh?” read on.

Even if you’ve never heard of hominy before today, chances are you’ve eaten quite a lot of it. Hominy is a very special ingredient in so many of our favorite Mexican foods, and in a few recipes closer to home, too. You’ve all passed by a can of hominy at the grocery store, whether you noticed it or not; some of you may have even been adventurous enough to buy it, though most of you probably let it sit in your cupboard forever. Maybe you’ve even knowingly eaten hominy, like as a side of hominy grits, but never stopped to think about what it was.

Don’t feel bad, you’re not alone. It’s pretty common for us to eat things having no idea what they are, like saffron or capers. But that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t find out. So here it is — hominy, explained (for all of you who never knew you wanted to know).

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Business class has been a thing since the late 1970s and it’s had a pretty sweet existence. And, thanks to new initiatives by several airlines, it’s getting a whole lot snazzier to fly in swanky style.

Here’s how:

1. JetBlue is getting faster.

Mint, JetBlue’s new business class, will probably make their competitors turn a nice, envious shade of green. Featuring the “longest lie-flat beds in domestic business class,” four private suites, and a 15-inch flat screen TV loaded with channels, the best part of the flight might take place before you take off — an expedited check-in comes with your ticket!

2. And Air France is following “suite.”

Air France is also upgrading their business class, La Première, and will feature the same lie-flat beds and four private suites. However, the French seem to be upping the ante a bit with a personal coat service, 24-inch HD TV’s and beds made by Sofitel, a luxury brand that promises “to ensure magnifique nights” (and flights).

3. But British Airways has more space for your gadgets.

British Airways is upgrading those sitting in “Club Europe” (their form of business class) with the introduction of new leather seating, a redesigned headrest, a console between seats to make eating and working easier, and even a tablet holder on the back of seats.

4. And this new airline promises to be business class ONLY.

With plans to fly only between Paris and Newark, the newest twist on business class only is coming from an airline calling themselves “La Compagnie.” With designer flight attendant uniforms, in-flight amenity kits, personal tablets, Michelin-starred meals and seats that fold all the way back, we can’t wait for tickets to go on sale in the US on July 1st.

5. But Etihad Airways still might have the “World’s Best Business Class.”

Etihad’s Pearl Business Class is a bit out of this world. Sure, the aisle seating for everyone, 6-foot beds, and your very own Food & Beverage Manager is pretty outstanding, but just wait until you land. Upon arrival, passengers are treated to the luxury of limo service with a personal chauffeur. Definitely beats that never-ending taxi line…

When leaders from around the country gather at the White House Summit on Working Families this week, they’ll be focusing on a moving target. What constitutes working families these days is in flux.

As The Shriver Report: A Woman’s Nation Pushes Back From the Brink reported in January, today only 20 percent of U.S. families have a working father and a stay-at-home mother. Instead, two thirds of families depend either partly or wholly on the wages of working women, and many of those families are barely making it. Fully 42 million women in this country and the 28 million kids who depend on them are teetering on or over the brink of poverty.

These aren’t women on welfare. They’re working. They work in our offices and schools, care for our children, stand in line next to us at the store, sit next to us in church. Still, they’re living one single incident — a flat tire, a emergency-room visit — away from having to choose between putting food on the table or paying the rent.

Both of us writing this column lead nonprofits dedicated to creating opportunities for these women who are struggling to be both breadwinners and caregivers. The ongoing series of Shriver Reports has raised nationwide awareness, ignited coverage and conversations, and inspired and informed policy makers dealing with the fundamental issues facing modern women and their families. Tipping Point Community in San Francisco has screened hundreds of nonprofits each year to identify those with the leadership, financials and results to make a real impact in the fight against poverty. Tipping Point has impacted 385,000 individuals and families, with 100 percent of every dollar raised going out the door to fight poverty.

We may have different tactics, but both organizations are committed to identifying and scaling best-in-class solutions in the fight for those living on the brink. We’ve both learned that it’s through program models with measurable results that we can create real change.

For instance, take Elizabeth, a single mother in Antioch, California. Elizabeth worked tirelessly to support her family but struggled to find anything more than short-term work in a slow economy. She had hoped that her medical assisting certificate would be all she needed, but she quickly discovered that she did not earn enough in that position to make ends meet. Discouraged at her prospects and not sure where else to turn, Elizabeth started to feel depressed about the future and how she would be able to take care of her daughter.

She attended Opportunity Junction, a job-training program that has been a Tipping Point grantee since 2011. Today Elizabeth is earning $17 an hour as the Inventory Control Coordinator for a local property management firm. Elizabeth and her daughter just moved into their own place and are back on their feet, thanks to an effective organization and the community of smart leaders and investors behind it.

We’ve both been approached by people who have plenty of compassion, motivation and desire to help mothers like Elizabeth, but they don’t know where to go. Not all nonprofits in this field are created equal. Which organizations deserve your help, when good intentions alone aren’t enough? Which ones are doing the hard work on the ground to provide not just any shot but the very best shot for women like Elizabeth? It takes due diligence to find out.

First, look locally. You might not know it, but there are likely dozens, even hundreds, of organizations in your area helping these women and needing your support. Identify two or three issues you personally connect with and zero in on a few organizations.

Second, ask questions. Schedule a visit to learn more about the services they provide. Ask what population they serve and why. What essential services, like housing, health care, and job training or college-preparatory education, do they provide? Assess their leadership. What differentiates their model from the others? How do they measure their impact? Great organizations collect data on outcomes not only to prove that what they’re doing works but to adjust programming to improve results.

Third, make your choice, and then pledge your time and resources. And finally, hold the organizations accountable by following up to find out where your dollar is going and what happened as a result.

Of course, donations and volunteering alone won’t solve poverty. A higher federal minimum wage would give families more breathing room. And with women earning only 77 cents for every dollar men earn doing the same work, an equal-pay law is long overdue. Women also need access to training and education to develop the skills they need to succeed and move ahead. And how about child care and paid sick leave and family leave, like working women get in all other industrialized nations?

But it’s not only about government solutions. We’ve both learned that ending poverty will take a three-pronged approach: public, private, and personal actions and solutions. We can get results not only by voting for leaders who will implement innovative solutions to longstanding problems but by supporting corporations with family-friendly policies, and, with our own “disruptive philanthropy,” investing in organizations with known track records of getting the results we want to see.

We hope the president and leaders meeting at the White House this week come up with pragmatic, actionable solutions to support working families trying to lift themselves off the brink. As for us, we bet on the “we” factor. We citizens can effect change. It’s up to us. We can be the tipping point.

Maria Shriver is an Emmy and Peabody Award-winning journalist who founded the Shriver Report, chronicling and reporting on the seismic shifts in American culture and society affecting women today. Daniel Lurie is the founder and CEO of Tipping Point Community, the San Francisco Bay Area’s leading poverty-fighting organization since 2005.

It’s been interesting to watch the great debate unfold as the federal government intervenes to provide students and their families with a more rational sense of the “fit” between college applicants and colleges and universities. Enter the “College Scorecard” whose principal data points include average net price, loan default rate, six-year graduation rate, median borrowing amount, and eventually, career data.

Critics of the federal effort argue persuasively that the value proposition of the Scorecard is principally the return-on-investment, measured by employment and job earnings. They note that outcomes assessment – where historically colleges are weakest – is one form of measurement that does not account for the differences among students, institutional mission, and academic quality, among numerous other factors.

Both are compelling arguments whose origins are embedded deep in the history of American higher education. This history is actually where the roots of the current debate begin.

American higher education is a decentralized system, originally a collection of private colleges on to which state and federal governments grafted a public college and university system in the 19th Century. As land grant institutions took hold, so too did Americans belief that access and choice should be the foundation of postsecondary education. The GI Bill, the creation of Pell Grants, and numerous additional state and federal initiatives complemented growing commitments to upper division research institutions made “in the national interest.”

In fact, it’s the very diversity in mission, programs and outcomes that Americans celebrate that makes it so difficult to rationalize and regularize a “one set of metrics fits all” approach to higher education.

Hard as it may be to admit, colleges and universities have not made their case effectively because they have been late to develop a rational system of outcomes measurements. While we have thoughtful consideration on how colleges judge admissions fit – and it varies widely by type, mission, and size – we know less about how colleges value outcomes. Just look at how much money many institutions commit to attract students in comparison to the resources applied to ensure quality counseling, mentorship, and career centers.

For the federal government, efforts to score colleges and universities does not square up to the history of how higher education developed. Do we expect the same outcome from an Ivy League university that we might from an inner city university with a very different mission? Should students be judged by a standardized series of metrics that do not recognize fully institutional purpose, resources, and student demographics and preparedness?

Let’s agree that some schools do a terrible job and should close or merge. The danger is, however, that the less resourced ones who do heroic work with diverse populations of all types might be pushed into the endangered category. Will Harvard make itself available to large numbers of “at-risk” students once the College Scorecard metrics effectively “thumbs down” other good places that have served America well?

Let’s use the example of a Boston program – College Bound Dorchester – to illustrate this point.

The mission of College Bound Dorchester is to increase college attendance and graduation rates among low-income students to transform local communities. Its proponents developed a place-based model in the Bowdoin-Geneva section of Dorchester, with 12,000 young men and women of whom 6,000 are at-risk or proven-risk youth. Among them, 70 percent have dropped out of school, 20 percent are academically off-track or display socio-emotional risk factors, and 10 percent face significant language barriers.

College Bound Dorchester promotes a “core influencer” model that intentionally recruits students who exhibit high risk factors, whether based on attitude, behavior or academic aptitude. It currently enrolls about 400 off-track youth aged 14 to 27 in its College Connections program, targeting “core influencers” in Bowdoin Geneva. Students of color represent 95 percent of the enrolled and 92 percent are from households with an income below $35,000, with 53 percent of the latter from families that earn less than $14,900 a year.

CBC encourages students to complete high school, and equally significant, to pursue an associate or bachelors degree. Staff members provide targeted assistance including academic counseling and mentoring groups. Today, 63 CBC students are enrolled in college, and the program’s college retention rate is 61 percent, significantly higher than national college retention rates for similar populations.

College Bound Dorchester illustrates the complexity of the factors that can affect the College Scorecard rankings. It’s an intensive program with a built in expectation that many will try and fail. But the program saves souls one at a time and potentially can change the neighborhood’s culture, as “core influencers” become positive role models.

This brings us to the basic national policy question. In an effort to score well, will college administrators – fearful that federal officials might turn off federal funding spigots if they rank poorly – add College Bound Dorchester to their admission pipeline of students? Will they even take a chance on good, effective grassroots programs like College Bound Dorchester when it might negatively affect their College Scorecard rankings?

What a tragedy if federal policy meant to inform consumers effectively forced changes in admission practices that squeezed out local innovation. Should the bureaucratic “metrics” design of the College Scorecard – itself a good faith effort to help students and families — impair the community/college partnerships that potentially make the most difference in the neighborhoods across America where so many disadvantaged students live?