Master ed2 2014

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the communicator

BEAUTY SICKNESS

p. 26

Vol. 31, Edition 2 • December 2014

contents.

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vacation stories Students share their funniest vacation stories.

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poetry night Local and national poets showcase their work at Ann Arbor’s poetry night.

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santa’s magic mushrooms The untold story of Christmas and a certain fungus.

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eliza vs. food Eliza Upton takes on the Vermonster Challenge at Ben and Jerry’s.

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17 heidelberg Arson threatens the houses on Heidelberg Street in Detroit.

22 zingerman’s Zingermans co-owner explains their previous success and plans for the future.

24 beauty sickness The modern girls stuggle with body image and how to change culture surrounding it.

30 playing politics How music can be used to alter political opinions.

what we’re sayin’

Dear Readers,

Thanksgiving has come and gone, but here at the Communicator we’re still giving thanks. We’re thankful that we go to a school that was able to raise $15,000 for Food Gatherers. We’re thankful that we go to a school where our educational opportunities are limitless.

And as the holiday season and the end of the semester approaches, our gratitude will continue. Above all, we’re thankful that our voices are heard through this publication. We hope that you enjoy this edition and that you can all find things to be grateful for in your lives.

Not only are we grateful, but we are excited for what’s ahead as the year comes to a close. The little-known story of Santa’s magic mushrooms is perfect for reading as you travel on your way to holiday festivities (p. 10). If you feel stuffed over the holidays, remember Eliza as she embarked upon her Vermonster challenge (p. 14). If you’re ever bored over break, we’ve got some fun ideas to pass the time (p.

12), including some staff-made puzzles towards the back of the edition (p. 46). Having a bad break? You’re not alone (p. 4).

The new year brings new beginnings. If you’re searching for some love advice, look no further: the Love Doctor is here (p. 13). Wanting to change up your look? Check out Heavenly Metal (p. 18). If you’ve ever felt useless when it comes to your car’s upkeep, we’ve got you covered (p. 45).

So as you skim through this edition, we hope you get some inspiration for the new approaching, and that you have a chance to look back on all that we’re thankful for this past year. We’re excited about what 2015 will bring, and wish you all a safe and happy new year.

Peace out cub scouts. See y’all in a year! xoxo,

communicator girl(s) (and marcelo)

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letter from the editors

we’re ready now

THE COMMUNICATOR

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Printing thanks to Edwards Brothers Malloy.

Emily Ojeda Eleanor Olson Kelly Arnold Kelsey Albig Isabel Ratner Madeline Halpert Ada Banks Hannah Rubenstein Eva Rosenfeld Hannah Davis Sophia Simon Marcelo Salas Dominic DiFranco Grace Stamos Chase Dudley Katerina Stegemann Managing Editors Emily Fishman Caroline Phillips Sophie Steinberg Cameron Fortune Eliza Upton Hannah Tschirhart Kathryn Garcia Alexandra Hobrecht Kea Von Emden Adviser Devin Weeks Marie Jacobson Tracy Anderson Sophia Werthmann Jack Kelley Josh Krauth-Harding Abe Weiner Cover Art Frances MacKercher Eva Rosenfeld Jeff Ohl

Editors-In-Chief

Staff

About the cover: A self-selected acryllic piece, inspired by a photograph of young Ann Arborites. Artist: Eva Rosenfeld th e com municator

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from best to worst.

community students share their stories of what they’ve faced on vacation.

Lia Kahan “When I was eight and my sister was six, my mom decided to take us canoe camping, which is where you canoe to wherever you’re camping. We’re not really a camping family, so my mom wasn’t that experienced. Since we were so young, my mom decided that she would be the only one who would steer. We ran into so many big bushes that spiders would just rain on us. My sister jumped out of the canoe at one point. It was crazy.”

alexandra hobrecht eleanor olson illustration

Sam Uribe “We got there pretty late. It was one in the morning and we were super hungry, so we went to a restaurant. I was so hungry I just ordered the biggest thing they had on their menu. I started gobbling everything down, and at one point I just stopped breathing because I had something caught in my throat. My dad thought that I was just joking, just messing with him, so he got mad at me. He jumped up and he started doing the [Heimlich] maneuver, and I threw up this huge meat thing right on the table. We were so embarrassed. It was really nasty. My brother was just laughing. We paid for the food and walked out. It was pretty bad.”

Zara Zangana “I was in a pool in Tucson, Arizona. I was wearing a bikini and my top fell off, just somehow. It was tied in the back and it came undone. And there was a hot life guard there, and he saw my top fall off and that was really embarrassing.”

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Las Vegas, NV

Tucson, AZ

shorts

Maya Gurfinkel

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“So my family is really close with this other family, the Steigers, and we always go on trips together. Our vacation was a road trip from Ann Arbor to Traverse City. But basically it was kinda crazy because we had to stop so many times and get their little sister dolls because she kept throwing them out the window. Eventually we got her to sit still and just be happy with the five dolls she had, [but] we had to lock the windows and everything.”

Northern MI

Traverse City, MI

Hannah Davis

Atlanta, GA

“I was going to Atlanta for a Bar Mitzvah. I was on the plane, and I really had to go pee, so I walked back to the bathroom. I was nine years old and I was really awkward and little, and I sat down on the toilet. But then I saw pee on the floor and I was really confused.

Then I realized that I had left the toilet seat down, so I got pee all over myself.

And I was wearing pink gauchos, and I remember I took them off and tried to dry them on the little hand-driers on the plane. But that took too long, so I got a trash bag, poked some holes through the feet, and wore those as pants for the rest of the plane ride. It was great, really comfortable, loved it.”

Orlando, FL

Mike Stauder “We were at the zoo in Orlando and we went to the monkey exhibit. And we were walking by and then the monkey decided to throw its feces at us. [It was] a bad experience.”

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news

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An unusual trio of social issues, personal narratives and art collided on stage in the presence of both local and nationally known poets at the Lydia Mendelssohn Theater in Ann Arbor.

On Thursday, Nov. 13, The Neutral Zone and the University of Michigan’s Helen Zell Writers Program collaborated to put on Poetry Night in Ann Arbor, an annual showcase of local youth poets and featured professional poets. The Neutral Zone, a youth center in Ann Arbor, holds a weekly youth poetry workshop called Volume.

This year, the featured poets were Franny Choi, a recipient of the Frederick Bock Prize, and Danez Smith, who received a 2014 Ruth Lilly & Dorothy Sargent Rosenberg Poetry Fellowship from Poetry Magazine & The Poetry Foundation. Both published books in 2014.

Choi and Smith spent a portion of the day preceding the reading performing their poetry and leading a workshop for Ann Arbor high schoolers at the Neutral Zone, as well as visiting an English class at Pioneer High School.

“I know that the Neutral Zone and Volume have really created a great history and reputation with what they’ve done with Poetry Night, and through all of the events that they’ve done through the years, so it feels good to be a part of this. Ann Arbor has a really well-respected literary commu-

nity,” said Smith. “We’re probably seeing some of the youth that will be becoming the emerging and established artists of tomorrow.

A lot of dope writers come out of Ann Arbor.”

Both Smith and Choi read poetry covering a wide range of themes from racism and oppression to pieces speaking out about about transexuality and feminism.

While answering a question at the Neutral Zone event, Smith voiced that he paid special attention to making sure he worked actively towards social change as opposed to just writing about it.

“A lot of both of our work has a lot to do with the intersections of race and gender and sexuality, as well as class, family and love,” said Choi. The youth followed suit, using their poems to address a host of topics including race, sexuality and sexual abuse.

Both poets recognize and appreciate the influence their words have on young audiences.

“It’s an amazing opportunity to be able to reach so many young people at one time with one performance in this beautiful space,” said Choi.

Jeff Kass, an English teacher at Pioneer High School and staff of Volume introduced the poets, many of whom had never performed their work publicly before.

“For these young poets tonight, I want them to walk away from this experience thinking, ‘I really

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loved that moment’, when people were really responding to their work,” he said. He encouraged noisy responses and affirmations, like snapping, clapping or shouting. He also noted that like one wouldn’t tell an artists not to use a certain color, poets would not be censored from using certain language. “This is not your grandfather’s poetry reading,” he said.

Carson Borbely is a youth poet who performed at the reading and attended Brave New Voices earlier in the year, an international youth poetry slam festival.

“What I really like about [this event] is that there’s no competition,” they said. “There’s a difference between a reading and a slam. In a slam your poems are scored and there’s a way you can win. At a reading, everyone’s just there to hear the poems. It takes a lot of the stress off.”

Not only are Smith and Choi two of Borbely’s favorite poets, but the paths they’ve taken illustrate a possible outcome for the youth they shared the stage with.

“If I were to get a tattoo, it would be something Danez Smith said in a poem,” said Borbely. “They’re two of the best, most wonderful young poets ever. They both went to Brave New Voices, and after Brave New Voices gained a lot of exposure and people are into them, and now they make a living off of their art. So youth slam matters!”

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he dangers of winter driving are real. Student drivers in Michigan are required to take 24 hours of Driver’s Education classes, along with six hours of authentic driving and observaton of fellow drivers. They are also required to pass several tests before being allowed to acquire a license and drive without parental or guardian supervision. However, a major issue that has been surfacing is that while many drivers try to obtain their licenses over the summer many graduates have little experience driving in snow.

Driving in snow can be dangerous for both the driver behind the wheel and the bystanders. The roads can become slippery and not only can cars slip off the road, but there is also the risk of getting stuck. While most intermediate to advanced drivers in Michigan know how to handle snow covered roads, even they run the risk of falling victim to a crash.

However inexperienced drivers run a far greater risk during the winter season as they may not know how to prepare.

Sam Rickman, a Community High School junior, said, “Whenever I go anywhere in my car during the winter, I make sure I have an extra coat in my car in case I get stuck somewhere.” Bringing the proper equipment to deal with

unexpected situations is viewed as a necessity by many more experienced drivers who have faced such a situation and been unprepared to deal with the consequences.

Roads are often most dangerous during the winter season because drivers run the risk of hitting patches of ice or losing traction in the snow and spinning out, running off the road and even hitting other cars. During the winter, it’s commonly recommended to keep space between you and the car in front of you. This helps to keep from causing a major accident due to your car being rear ended and slammed into the car in front. There is a significant increase in the number of accidents that occur during the winter driving season, mainly due to the ice and snow on the roads.

The idea of driving in the snow for the first time terrifies many new drivers out of fear that they may be the next victim of a car accident. It’s difficult to gain experience in snow driving because you have to learn by doing. Ashley Jackson, a more experienced driver tips younger drivers: “Never be in a rush to go anywhere; you’ll just get there when you get there, and I think you’ll be fine.”

the dangerous season of driving jack kelley

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shorts

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valuable study methods

how to make it through midterms. kelsey albig and hannah davis eleanor olson illustration

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idterm week has proved stressful for students but arranging time right, being able to study and keeping up with normal routine is possible.

Ella Ruderman believes studying for midterms can be tedious, but waiting until the night before can leave someone stressed and unable to handle the overflow of information. Waiting to study the night before won’t allow time to learn the information and forces someone to cram in the information, likely not remembering the context.

“Studying last minute is something I would not recommend because it adds pressure,” Ruderman said.

Clara Kaul believes if you space out your studying and plan certain amounts of time for studying it will make midterm week easier. Making a schedule can be a crucial part of midterm week, because you need a lot of time to study. Without planning you can be left confused and overwhelmed with what you have to do.

“I make a lot of lists and I budget my time.

I will dedicate a certain amount of time for each subject to study,” Kaul said.

Eve Zikmund-Fisher believes if you study

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in advance and don’t stress too much, you will go into your exam feelings relaxed and confident.

“You have to find a happy medium between being worried and not. Not worrying at all and not studying is going to make you feel like an idiot when you are doing your final, but if you over freak out you will be totally stressed even when the final is over,” Zikmund-Fisher said.

Juliet Gustafson believes depending on how you learn and how you want to space out your studying periods, a couple hours for each subject is beneficial. This also gives you time to study with friends, get help from teachers, make notecards or review sheets, and ask questions.

“I think how much I study has decreased as I have aged but usually around two hours per class. If it is a harder subject like math I will set up times to meet with my teacher to help me with what I am struggling with,” Gustafson said.

Annie Noffke believes that deciding on what subjects are hardest for you can be helpful when studying and when organizing your workload. If you have trouble on a certain subject you can study more for it and also set up meetings with teachers for help.

“For me the exams that are the hardest are Latin or Science but it really does depend on the person and where their strengths are,” Noffke said.

Mira Kaufman believes that depending on what type of learner you are, notecards can be very helpful for simple information such as, vocabulary, math formulas, foreign languages and definitions. Notecards are also easy to make and you can quickly study yourself wherever you are. The other great thing about notecards is studying with your friends or family.

“I like notecards because it’s a quick way to remember information and switch up the order opposed to study guides,” Kaufman said.

Noffke believes that while it is apparent that you will get stressed during midterm week just make sure you take breaks and pace yourself. It is important to take time for yourself, sleep, eat, and don’t worry too much.

“I usually just accept the fact that I am going to be super stressed and don’t try to combat that,” Noffke said.

stress relievers: “Hot tea.” -Mira Kaufman “Music, television and netflix.” -Marin Scott “Drinking tea and watching netflix.” -Eve Zikmund-Fisher.

“Writing, sleeping, walking around and sometimes procrastinating.” -Clara Kaul “Eating and sweets.” -Ella Ruderman

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santa’s magic mushrooms. the untold story of christmas. josh krauth-harding + eleanor olson

shroom science.

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hristmas time is one full of red and white, Santa Claus coming down the chimney, presents underneath pine trees, and of course, reindeer. But where did this all come from?

Does any of it have to do with the birth of Jesus? Many theorize no, suggesting that these traditions originated from one little white and red hallucinogenic mushroom.

Making appearances in many fairy tale illustrations, the Amanita muscaria is a well known beloved mushroom. The iconic red cap is between 3 and 8 inches on average with dotted with white spots. Carl A. P. Ruck, a professor of classical studies at Boston University, has done extensive research on the Amanita muscaria and its manifestations in folklore and tradition.

“They are well known throughout Europe in folklore, particularly well documented in the Celtic tradition especially Ireland where it is associated with fairy people and creatures,” said Ruck.

Popularly seen in the Mario video game saga, this toadstool mushroom is commonly known as the fly agaric, a psychoactive basidiomycete fungus. However, it is rarely

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used for recreational purposes, as the effects have been said to be depressing, delirious, dissociative, and hypnotic.

“It’s not necessarily a pleasant state that you enter, especially if you don’t know how to use it,” Ruck said. “You can vomit. If you haven’t prepared it correctly, you might just fall asleep and nothing will happen.”

Fly agaric is also said to cause perceptual illusions where surroundings’ scale are disproportionate and confusing. A user might feel their surroundings are much larger than actuality, while feeling much smaller.

The opposite can occur also, and is known as macropsia and microtia. This phenomenon may have been the inspiration for Lewis Carroll’s Alice in Wonderland.

Some say that the fly agaric can explain many parts of the Christmas tradition.

Donald Pfister, the interim dean of Harvard and a professor of systematic botany, has studied this connection between the mushrooms and Christmas traditions.

“I think the best way to think about it is there are a lot of complex myths around Christmas holiday, part of it is some of these were pagan rituals and other things that were incorporated into the celebration of Christmas,” Pfister said.

all I want for christmas is… psychedelic mushrooms?

In the shamanistic cultures of Northern Scandinavia, in a region known as Lapland or Sámpi, and Siberia, these mushrooms were consumed for their trance-like qualities and other religious purposes. In some areas, the shamans and the common people used the mushrooms for recreational purposes. By some accounts, these mushrooms were harvested, dried, and then distributed by the shamans during the solstice as presents, thus becoming the tradition of exchanging gifts during the christmas season, an ancient example of gift giving.

jolly ol’ saint nick.

Although it is mostly agreed that Santa Claus originated from Germany and the surrounding countries as Old Saint Nicholas, his habit of dropping gifts into the chimney could link back to the gift giving shamans of the arctic circle.

“If you were making comparisons Santa Claus and the chimney, well it may har-

ken back to this idea that [lay] people were living in these little hut like things where the only entry point at certain times of the year would be [a] smoke hole,” said Pfister. These nomadic people built tepee like structures from logs, canvas, brick, or even the earth itself. When snow covered the entrance, the only way in or out would be via a smoke hole at the apex of the structure.

red and white.

Red and white are also the iconic colors of Santa Claus, although it was not always that way.

“When Santa Claus first entered American lore, his coat was green, that is interesting too because that shows he is a spirit of the forest,” said Ruck. “So I wouldn’t make too big a deal about the red and white. But it is a bearskin that he is wearing inside out, which is connected to the berserkers.”

The colors of Christmas are almost as iconic as Santa Claus himself.

“This red and white mushroom became involved in these Christmas decorations, when you go out at Christmas now you see these mushroom ornaments and part of it may be that they’re pretty, but its also true they have been a part of decorations for a long time,” Pfister said. The mushrooms themselves even make appearances on cards and Christmas decorations as signs of good luck and holiday wishes.

o’ christmas tree, o’ christmas tree.

The Amanita muscaria grows at the base of trees, such as pine trees.

“The particular mushroom forms a relationship with the roots of the trees, this is called mycorrhizal, these fungi provide mineral uptake for the plant and these plants provide carbohydrates for the the fungus. So it’s in a symbiotic relationship, a mutualistic relationship,” Pfister said. One theory states that the red and white presents under the tree were meant to represent the mushrooms under the tree. Another theory by the late author James Arthur says it’s because of the mushrooms importance to the people. “It is because, underneath the pine bough is the exact location where one would find this ‘Most Sacred’ substance, the Amanita muscaria, in the wild,” he wrote in his 2003 novel “Mushrooms and Mankind.” The idea of bringing a tree into the house also could have related to the tree of life idea.

rudolph.

Lastly, perhaps the most convincing example of the mushrooms effects of the Christmas traditions is the phenomenon of the flying reindeer.

“Some people think that Santa Claus and his reindeer have something to do with Siberian shamanism, that is probably true,” said Ruck. “You can begin with the simple facts that reindeer can fly, and riding in this magical sleigh lead by reindeer Santa Claus is flying.”

The Sami, people of Sámpi Northern Scandinavia, and Siberians were mostly nomadic herders of reindeer. The reindeer of this tundra too have been known to consume these mushrooms, confirmed reports that they purposely dig through the snow to find them.

“This is an extraordinary situation, an example of shamanism and the reindeer are associated with the mushroom that is integral to Siberian shamanism because it loves to eat them,” said Ruck. “And when it eats them it gets ecstatic and dances around it is somehow the importation of that tradition into our christmas tradition.” In 1940, Rudolph was added to the team of reindeer.

Ruck, amongst many others see his bright red nose as a clear example of the mushroom.

Even though Santa Claus and his magical flying reindeer may have more to do with hallucinogenic mushrooms than Jesus Christ, nothing can take away the magic from this special time of year. Happy holidays!

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winter day ideas

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Walk down town to see a movie. Go watch the new movie Bird Man or go see a holiday movie at the State Theater. They are playing Elf and It’s a Wonderful Life.

go sledding

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With all this snow, why not go sledding? Make some hot chocolate and go to Burns Park or the Huron Golf Course to go sledding.

build a snow fort

Last winter Ann Arbor’s snow record totaled over 100 inches, and this year there’s a good chance we’ll be spending a lot of time shoveling again. With mounds of snow, why not build a snow fort? Over winter break, building a snow fort with friends and family would be a great way to pass the time, and a great spot to seek shelter during an epic snowball battle.

try ice fishing

Ever gone fishing? If you enjoyed it, why not try ice fishing? The Ann Arbor area offers some great spots to spend the day on a frozen lake sipping hot chocolate, and hooking bait. If this sounds appealing to you, check out Whitmore Lake and Independence Lake Park.

attempt to snow shoe

Don’t let the cold stop you from being outside. If you don’t already own a pair of these awesome shoes, go to your closest sports retail shop and take them for a gander. Once you try them on and take a walk, grab a friend and go on those long walks you miss taking in the summer.

make ginger bread house

Next time you are snowed in your house and dying of boredom, entertain yourself by making a gingerbread house. Not only will you have a bunch of candy and delicious cookies to eat, but you also have an edible homemade holiday decoration.

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go see a movie

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love doctor

The holidays are here again, and you know what that means; it’s time to snuggle up with that special someone, maybe with a nice lil’ cup o’ cocoa! For those of you whose relationships might be becoming frosty along with the weather, never fear! The Love Doctor is here to make all of your significant others fall madly in love with you. Keep in mind, however, that our credibility is nonexistant, so we can’t be held accountable if this advice turns out to be a lil’ bit unhelpful.

Dear Love Doctor, I am in a huge dilemma for what to get my boyfriend for Christmas. I have it narrowed down betweeen two things.

One is a designer Gucci scarf and the other is a puppy from my neighbor’s new litter. His dog recently died, so I’m not sure if it’s too soon. He lives in California and I have to send it to him over mail. What should I do?

-Sorrowful Sophomore LD: Well, to be perfectly honest with you, Sorrowful Sophomore, my biggest concern with the puppy is the idea of sending it all the way to California. If you do choose that one, I’d just recommend to poke some air holes in the box.

But on the bright side, it’s a puppy! Aww, puppies! And if he does turn out to like the puppy, he’ll have you, his wonderful girlfriend, to thank. If he doesn’t like it, however, or if something bad happens to the puppy on the way there, the two of you will probably slowly grow apart and develop an extremely unhealthy relationship that will eventually end in heartbreak. Wow, that’s quite a situation you have there.

You have my deepest sympathies.

-The Love Doctor

Are you having love problems for which you don’t actually need help? Drop some letters to the Love Doctor in our submission box in room 320!

Dear Love Doctor, I have a large dilemma, with a capital D. Everyday my boyfriend avoids me in the hallway. I cannot figure out why. I mean it could be because he says that my hugs make him very out of breath, but I mean, I can’t help it! Like when we hang out he’s like, “This is a no hug zone,” and I’m all like, #hurtful. What should I do?

-Jumbled Junior LD: You need to tell him how you feel. Just let it all out. Tell him that you think avoiding you in the hallway is #hurtful.

Keeping things from each other will only leave your relationship more broken than before. Also, try and keep in mind that it may be partially your fault. It seems that by saying your hugs leave him out of breath, he’s made an attempt at telling you how he feels, and that you may have ignored it.

Maybe the best thing to do would to have an open discussion about what you expect from each other. How can you hug in a way that won’t leave him out of breath? Should you stop hugging him altogether? Make him feel like you care about his opinion.

-The Love Doctor

Dear Love Doctor, Help! I’m in love with this girl I’ve been friends with for years, and I’m worried if I ask her out it will ruin our friendship. Not only that, but she just dumped my father’s godson and it might cause tension in the family. What should I do?

-Frustrated Freshman LD: Woah there, Frustrated Freshman! If you really like her, just tell her. You seem like a really cool, caring dude, and if this girl is worth her salt, she knows it too. Don’t worry about asking her out, just be yourself. After all, what’s the worst that can happen? She’ll say no? Go back to your father’s godson? Ridicule you in front of your entire family? Faint and crack her head open? Pull a Pride and Prejudice on you and say, “From the first moment, I may almost say — of my acquaintance with you, your manners, impressing me with the fullest belief of your arrogance, your conceit, and your selfish disdain of the feelings of others, were such as to form that groundwork of disapprobation on which succeeding events have built so immoveable a dislike; and I had not known you a month before I felt that you were the last man in the world whom I could ever be prevailed on to marry”? Hmm...maybe this isn’t such good idea.

-The Love Doctor

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food

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One girl.

One bucket of ice cream.

This is her journey to find love. eliza upton isaac scobey-thal photo

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ello all you boojie baes and welcome back to Eliza vs. Food.

As you excitedly read about in November, in my first food challenge of the year I competed in the Dairy Queen Chili Cheese Dog Lunch Challenge, and oh yeah by the way did I mention that I WON! Well, for my second challenge (to my taste

buds’ delight) I ditched the chili dog, but kept the ice cream and attempted to eat Ben and Jerry’s Vermonster in under 30 minutes.

If you are not familiar with the Vermonster, it is pretty much tens of thousands of calories packed into a bucket. The Vermonster consists of 20 scoops of ice cream, hot fudge, caramel, a cookie, a brownie, two bananas, a lot of whipped cream, and two scoops each of your choice of four toppings. It’s pretty much a bucket full of delicious meant for a hungry football team, not just one awkward seventeen-year-old who wasn’t smart enough/didn’t have the will-power to fast during the day of the challenge.

In theory I thought this would be a great idea. I, afterall, am the best eater I know, and ice cream is my favorite food. Knowing my previous ice cream eating capabilities, I thought this would be quite doable. I knew what the Vermonster is, but for some reason I didn’t comprehend how much food it

ACTUALLY IS. I was feeling great, thinking everything was going to be a breeze, until I walked into Ben and Jerry’s that cold Wednesday evening and realized two things: it was 50 degrees outside, and not 80, and two, this challenge cost a whopping $40.00, which meant I was getting my money’s worth. And by the way, when I say ‘my money’s worth’ I really mean all the people whom I solicited during Forum and Communicator to get $40.00 for this challenge. Thanks for the loan you all. I greatly appreciate it and probably won’t pay you back.

So anyways, there I was that Wednesday standing nervously in Ben and Jerry’s with my photographer, videographer and cheerleader tracking my every move, when the Ben and Jerry’s worker pulled out a piece of paper and pen to take my order. A PIECE OF PAPER AND PEN FOR JUST ONE ICE CREAM ORDER. That was tip number one for the hugeness and complexity of this or-

The ice cream itself tasted pretty good.

I had gotten some of my favorite flavors: Milk and Cookies, Coffee Coffee Buzz Buzs Buzz and Phish Food. However, in an idiotic and panicked moment I chose to add a flavor I had never actually tried before. In theory Coconut Seven Layer Bar sounded delicious and I’m sure on its own it tastes great, but as soon it got mixed together with all the flavors of the Vermonster, the coconut was not appealing to my taste buds.

So I spent the first fifteen minutes of the challenge shoveling spoonfuls of the Vermonster into my mouth, trying to eat as much as possible without stopping. I figured if I paused at all then I would lose momentum. Little did I know that the Vermonster, when consumed by one person, inflicts pain very quickly. By minute fifteen I was a little more than halfway done, but my stomach felt like a crammed suitcase that was going to split its zipper any second.

After minute fifteen, every bite I took was

der. Tip number two came when it took a good ten minutes to make. Finally, I heard the doomful voice announce, “The Vermonster is ready,” and I headed over to the counter. To my horror, the worker lugged a gallon and a half bucket across the counter with a grin that seemed to say, “You’re screwed.” I felt like I was in Personal Fitness as a walked over to the table, carrying the weight of that huge tank spewing with ice cream.

At last it was time to begin the challenge. I was as ready as I would ever be, and so with the timer set to thirty minutes, I began.

Sadly though, I immediately came across a problem. I only had a plastic spoon that was too flimsy for the big scoops that I was trying to shovel into my mouth. The spoon was too small and it was slowing me down. As I gripped the spoon firmly to keep it from breaking, my hands became covered in ice cream. With face and hands coated in ice cream, and my spoon on the edge of breaking, I was already struggling.

harder and harder to swallow. My gag reflex was on high alert and it was taking extreme power not to throw up. The Vermonster was taking over me; I was shaking, drooling and wanted nothing more than to cry, especially when my Cheerleader, Kelly, and Videographer, Marcelo, began to perform the “Be Aggressive” cheer. I had entered a nightmare.

After a painful last few minutes, the timer finally hit zero, and unfortunately the Vermonster bucket was not empty. It devastates me to say that I could not beat it.

The Vermonster is certainly a monstrosity and if there is ever a person who is able to eat that thing by themselves in 30 minutes, then I would like to meet that person and do a DNA test to find out if they are indeed human. However, I did make quite a dent in the bucket and I probably walked away from the challenge with a few new pounds of fat as a consolation trophy.

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robert morgan new kid on the block emily fishman ada banks photo

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obert Morgan, a new World History teacher at Community, is very excited about his school. “Community is the best. Go zebras, go rainbow zebras, go horses that are colorful,” he said.

Though he has as much energy as if he were brand new to the building , this is not his first year at CHS. “I student taught at Community last year for Judith, in her American Lit, Chinese Lit and Creative Writing classes,” he said.

After student teaching for Judith DeWoskin last year, Morgan loved Community and all the kids that attend.

“I really like the students, which is kind of a cutout thing to say, but you guys are just great,” said Morgan. “You are really open to trying new things, which is super exciting.”

Morgan loves how enthusiastic everyone is about learning and says it certainly makes his job more enjoyable. Morgan also teaches 8th grade English at Clague Middle School, where things can be incredibly different.

“You guys are a lot less rowdy than the middle schoolers, but you also do not have the crazy slang that the middle schoolers have that I’m hoping to bring to Commu-

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nity – sort of bridge that gap,” he said. “The middle schoolers are fond of saying ‘savage’ and ‘crispy.’ I’m not exactly sure what those words mean yet but I’m looking to find out.”

Morgan has great interest in current slang. He believes it provides a stronger connection between him and his students.

Although Morgan sometimes does not quite understand what his students are talking about, he still finds that his young age makes him more relatable to students in a way.

“It is this crazy feeling of being both really old and really young at the same time,” he said. “Sometimes I hear different musical artists you guys like, which are musical artists I also enjoy, which is kind of surreal. Other times I hear words like ‘crispy’ or ‘savage’ and then I realize that I am so far away from high school.”

Morgan adds that while being one of the youngest teachers at CHS may give him an advantage with relating to his students, it is important for him to remember that he is not in high school.

This year Morgan is teaching World History, but he would also love to teach English in the future.

“I did not really have a choice in the manner of World History, but I’m really coming to enjoy it,” he said. “It would be cool to have a balance.” Morgan enjoys World History mainly because of the variety it gives; almost any subject can be talked about in World History.

An exciting happening in Morgan’s life was being in Community’s production of “Twelfth Night”, where he played the captain of a boat that sunk at sea. Teachers are often invited to be part of the school productions, and Morgan felt lucky to be offered a role.

“The play was great,” he said. “I saw Urinetown last year, twice, because I was so amazed by the performance. I never dreamed I could actually be a part of it, but when Quinn invited me to be the ship captain, I was super excited. I was just super impressed by the determination and organization of CET. The students seemed so into the production.” As Morgan talked about how he loved the play, a fellow cast member waved to him. Morgan smiled back with lots of excitement showing through his fluffy beard.

the heidelberg project frances mackercher ada banks photos In the middle of Detroit on Sept. 30, smoke poured from Heidelberg Street. One of the houses that was part of the Heidelberg Project was burning. Known as the Birthday Cake House, flames burned the interior to the ground, leaving only remnants of the cake-covered structure.

The Heidelberg Project, a series of houses on Heidelberg St. in Detroit dedicated to improving the lives of people and neighborhoods through art, has been plagued by fires since May 2013. Eight of the decorated houses have been burned in suspected arson fires. This year alone, three houses have been burned despite police investigations into the burnings.

Katie Hearn, the marketing and communications coordinator, has no answer to why someone would set the houses on fire.

“As someone who knows the Project inside and out, as someone that hears first hand every day how much the HP has positively impacted lives around the world, this senseless destruction simply doesn’t make sense,” she said. “This attack, no matter the motivation, was unprecedented and completely unexpected.”

Because there have been so many fires this year, the Detroit Fire Department and the Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms (ATF) division of the FBI are investigating. The team and board members of the project also started an IndieGoGo campaign to raise money that was used to install solar street lights that contain cameras.

The team still struggles with the aftermath of the attacks.

“I can tell you first hand that staff is still dealing with the fallout of

the attacks,” Hearn said. However, the team tries to make the best out of a bad situation.

“Many of the sites where houses once stood have been turned into new pieces of artwork, made possible by the hundreds of volunteers that helped us clear away the ashes and debris,” she said.

The Heidelberg Project began in 1986 as a political protest. Tyree Guyton returned from the army and was shocked to see how much his neighborhood had deteriorated after the 1967 race riots. Guyton and his grandfather began fixing up vacant lots and painting them. Soon, the street became a piece of art, and the movement was named after the street: The Heidelberg Project.

The mission of the project is to inspire people to use art to enrich their lives and to improve the economic and social health of their community. The organization includes student artists and uses all recycled materials. Multiple awards have been given to the project, which continues to fight the deterioration of Detroit.

Despite the financial and social problems the fires have brought on, the team continues to stay strong and continue growing the project.

“At the end of the day, we aren’t concentrating on why this is happening,” said Hearn. “Instead we’re zoned in on why we can’t stop it. The Heidelberg Project is bigger than all of us now; it belongs to the city and the world. No fire can tarnish a legacy that lives on in the heart of so many.”

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need a

trim? sophie steinberg

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Growing up with three brothers gave Vicki Honeyman plenty of opportunities to practice cutting hair. Whenever they needed a trim, she was ready with a stool and scissors. She now spends her days in a small business, cutting hair everyday. Honeyman never predicted that she would make a career of this hobby, but when she knew, she turned her passion into a living.

In 1979, Honeyman moved to the small town of Harbor Springs.

She was amidst complete strangers. She began running a small movie theatre in town, using her film major as background. While she was there, she discovered her true talent and passion for the art of cutting hair.

“By the time I left, I was cutting everyone’s hair,” Honeyman said.

Honeyman went back to Ann Arbor and got her hair cutting license.

She opened a small plant store that had two hair cutting booths.

“It was hippie heaven,” said Honeyman. “It was wonderful.” When the plant store became too cramped for her growing hair-cutting business, she opened the store Heavenly Metal.

Honeyman started picking up items wholesale to fill her newly opened store. A woman in New Orleans, whom Honeyman admired greatly, made artwork from recycled metal. Soon after, Honeyman’s store was known as Heavenly Metal.

She is not keen on the idea of hair products, hair irons, or even brushing hair. She believes hair should be cut the way it naturally wants to go.

“With somebody who doesn’t know what they want, I could look at them, and look at their hair, and their face, and know immediately what they need,” Honeyman said. “My clients tend to not tell me what they want.”

Honeyman isn’t just the lady who cuts your hair. Her customers describe her as “the coolest person in Ann Arbor” and “such a hip lady.”

Although Honeyman’s business is successful, she does have her difficulties attracting customers as her store is off the beaten path.

“It’s a big challenge to get people to come into my store,” Honeyman said. “I’m definitely Ann Arbor’s best kept secret.”

In her younger life, she attended the University of Michigan. She ran a number of campus film societies, and continued on to become the director of the Ann Arbor Film Festival. While directing the Film Festival, she was simultaneously running Heavenly Metal.

“I wound up working two full time jobs, which was interesting to say the least,” Honeyman said.

Honeyman’s success didn’t come easily. Earlier in her life, she was diagnosed with breast cancer.

“I spent $120,000 in ten years on premiums for health insurance,” Honeyman said. Being self employed is not easy, but for Honeyman, it’s worth it.

“I love what I do,” Honeyman said. She lives by her motto, “If it’s not fun, f*** it!” Honeyman doesn’t want to stop doing what she does anytime soon. She feels the business that she created from nothing is rewarding and thriving.

inside heavenly metal punctuality

Are your loved ones always late? Or early? Send a subtle - but fashionable - hint for the holidays! Heavenly Metal has an assortment of fashionable and trendy watches.

decorate

Have you noticed your friends house are a little.... boring? Offer them some help by buying a crazy candle from Heavenly Metal for the holidays! Not only will there house smell good but it will add some spunk.

style

Have your friends been looking awfully strange recently? It’s probably because they aren’t sporting these metal monk stylish sparkle braclets sold at Heavenly metal!

write

Tired of getting annoying texts and emails from your relatives? A small notebook from Heavenly Metal can quickly solve this problem. Redirect your loved ones “cute animal pics” into a notebook. th e com municator

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alternative paths

students explore different options from traditional schooling jeff ohl and abe weiner

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hoenix Patterson’s Twitter name reads “32 DAYS.” This seemingly arbitrary name signifies how many days Patterson has until her last day of high school. This length of time places Patterson’s graduation in early January, approximately five months before the rest of the Ann Arbor Public Schools seniors will graduate. This is because Patterson is taking one of the alternative paths to traditional schooling.

phoenix patterson

Phoenix Patterson is a senior at Community High School. At the end of her junior year she realized that she only needed one more English credit to fulfill her graduation requirements. She then enrolled herself in a Brigham Young University correspondence course which she planned to complete over the summer, allowing her to graduate approximately nine months before her peers.

“My summer was just a mess, so I didn’t have time to finish the class,” she said.

“Then the deadline came and I didn’t complete the class and my school counselor was

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like ‘I guess you’re coming back.’” Despite this, Patterson still wanted to graduate early. So, this semester she is taking two English classes to fulfill her one year requirement: an art class with a friend’s mother and two classes at Washtenaw Community College: an anatomy-physiology course and a college algebra course.

“For most colleges, those are prerequisites for nursing, which is what I want to go into,” Patterson said.

Patterson had her reasons for wanting to graduate early.

“I was really not motivated to be in school, so I was like ‘might as well just finish if I can,’” Patterson said.

Patterson will be doing more than simply enjoying the fact that she is done with high school come Jan. 5. In fact this date was planned in coordination with her post-high school plans.

“All summer I was looking at different things I could do, and was like ‘I can ski.’”

Patterson said. There were no openings for ski instructor at the nearby Mount Brighton, however, so Patterson looked a little

further west.

“I looked at Breckenridge [Colorado] and thought ‘might as well apply,’” Patterson said. “Then I got the job.” However, Patterson has to be 18 before she can go to the orientation at Breckenridge. So, she will be arriving there one day after graduating high school for a 7 a.m. fitness test on her eighteenth birthday.

“I start January 6, and work until the mountain closes, which is April or May,” Patterson said. “Then I come back and I get to walk with my class.”

While Patterson is excited for this opportunity, it also means finishing her high school classes by Dec. 19 instead of Jan 23.

Despite these alternative plans for graduation, Patterson will be attending a regular college next fall. Patterson has already been accepted to the University of Colorado Denver and is also applying to Michigan State University and the University of Michigan.

emma parow

Emma Parow is another senior at Community High School. Unlike Patterson, she will receive her diploma in June. However, once next fall comes, she will begin pursuing a culinary arts degree from Baker College in Muskegon.

In her freshman year of high school, Parow decided that she wanted to get a degree in Culinary Arts because it tied one of her passions to a real-world application.

“I like baking at home and also watching all the Food Network shows and I thought ‘I want to do that one day,’” Parow said. “Near big holidays I bake at least twice a week.”

Parow says that seeing her grandmother cook fancy dishes during the holidays is one of the main factors in her decision to start baking. However, Baker College would be more than just baking.

“I’m going to learn preparation, how the meal looks visually, and the restaurant aspect,” Parow said.

Her tests will also be much different from other college students’.

“There are exams where you have to make the food in front of your instructor, in front of the class,” Parow said.

In addition to this, most of Parow’s professors will be professional chefs. While food is a big part of culinary school, it’s only half of the pie. Parow will get two years of culinary education while at Baker followed by two years of business education.

Parow assumes that this is because most students, including herself, getting a degree in culinary arts eventually want to open their own restaurant. In the latter two years of her time at Baker, Parow expects to learn about the financials of owning a business, how to own and operate a business, or working for someone else.

Parow said that this apprenticeship stage is a common intermediate step for culinary arts students, and that Baker has an internship program for this very purpose.

“Baker College says that if you decide to do an internship, they take you anywhere. So people can go to Disney cruises and spend the whole time making food there,” Parow stated.

After culinary arts school, Parow would like to work at a bakery and eventually open her own shop.

Parow says that she wouldn’t have been able to pursue a culinary career in this way without her parents’ support.

Parow’s parents were supportive of her choice because they knew how much she enjoyed baking and like how she’s sticking to one thing.

john boshoven

Community High School counselor John

Boshoven is fond of alternative directions students choose after high school instead of going directly to a two or four year college, especially gap years.

He believes that for many students, gap years can be advantageous before going to college.

“Not all kids are ready for college when they graduate,” Boshoven said. “College will be there when you are ready for it.”

Boshoven believes that there is unecessary pressure to go to college right after high school. With this inevitable pressure comes the fear that if a student does not go to college after they graduate, they will never go at all. This fear is common among parents.

“The worry is that you will be digging latrines in Pakistan and never come home,” Boshoven said.

According to the Wall Street Journal, this is not true, with 90% of students taking a gap year returning to college within one year. Boshoven also points out that studies have been done, one by Bob Clagett, showing that students who take gap years have on average higher GPAs in college than their counterparts who went straight to college.

“You guys have been working hard for 13 years and you sometimes need a break,” said Boshoven.

Boshoven is not the only one who believes this break is useful. Harvard encourages their matriculants to take a gap year in their acceptance letter. Princeton University and Middlebury College have whole programs for students interested in taking gap years.

According to Boshoven, they do this because they believe students will come back the next year more prepared, more mature, and more hungry to learn. Boshoven said that the only caveat to this was that scholarships usually cannot be used the next year even though a student will probably be a candidate for the scholarship next year.

He explained that schools have to use the scholarship money when they have it so they cannot hold it over.

Boshoven believes that a gap year is important because he believes the freshman year of college can be wasted on many freshmen.

“College is supposed to be a life changing experience, so if you go into your freshman year of college, thinking it is grade 13, don’t go,” said Boshoven.

Every year Boshoven holds a gap year fair which showcases 20-40 vendors that provide programs ranging from free to expensive for students interested in taking a gap year. Two years ago, two University of Michigan professors attended this fair and told him that they believed a gap year

should be mandatory for all male freshman.

“They told me that these students waste their freshman years drinking, smoking, sleeping and partying,” said Boshoven.

Boshoven recently had a student come in and talk to him that had visited friends in college. She expressed that she might want to take a gap year because she does not want to go to a university and drink every night in the dorm. She feels that she could be doing more important things.

There are many things students can do for a gap year. Boshoven says the most popular are ones that immerse a student in a foreign language, provide them with an opportunity for service, adventure programs, and religious ones.

“Many students get an itch for a foreign language in high school and they need to scratch that itch. The best way for them to do it and learn a foreign language is to immerse themselves in that culture,” Boshoven said. Many of the vendors at the gap year fair will offer programs that do exactly this. Boshoven believes these programs are also great for students interested in being a linguist or a translator.

“There are also adventure programs through organizations such as Outward Bound and NOLS that really let you explore and see the world,” Boshoven said.

According to Boshoven, service programs offer students opportunities to make a difference in a community that would really need it.

Finally, there are religious programs for students interested in a pilgrimage trip or performing an outreach for their faith.

Students also take a gap year if they need to make money in order to pay for college.

“If your parents cannot or will not afford for you go to go to college then you can spend a year making money and earning valuable experiences,” Boshoven said.

The Gap Year Fair will be held at Skyline High School on Jan. 29, from 6:30-8:00 PM. Contact John Boshoven if you are interested.

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looking ahead.

ari weinzweig, zingerman’s co-owner, explains zingerman’s previous success & future plans. isabel ratner ada banks and isabel ratner photos

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wo men sat on the hard floor with a few beers and open minds. Ari Weinzweig and Paul Saginaw were brainstorming ideas for a name for their business. It was a week before they were scheduled to open and they needed a name quickly. They knew they wanted either an ‘a’ or a ‘z’ name because it would be easily found in the Yellow Pages. They wanted a Jewish sounding name as they were both of Jewish descent. The name came to them quickly. So did an incredibly successful business.

music or blocking and tackling in football,” Weinzweig said. They don’t get headlines but not many good things will happen if you can’t do them.”

Zingerman’s opened in 1982, and along with the big opening came a new idea. In the early 90s, Zingerman’s learned that they needed to have incredibly specific plans of what they want their business to look like in future years. They began to create visions. In 1994 they created a vision called “Zingerman’s 2009” which consisted of a “community of businesses.”

ing about spices. When Weinzweig sees an idea as brilliant as this, he knows he must include it.

“How could you not put it in? How could you not be super excited?” asked Weinzweig.

Fairly often customers will move out of town and realize they miss having Zingerman’s close by.

“They call and go, ‘Even in New York you can get everything but you have to go to 20 places and they’re so mean to you,’” Weinzweig said.

Weinzweig grew up in Chicago and later attended the University of Michigan, studying Russian history. After graduating, he started to work at a restaurant called “Maude’s.” He washed dishes. It was there where he met Saginaw, the general manager, who now co-owns the business with him.

Frank Carollo, was a line cook for Maude’s, is now one of the managing partners at Zingerman’s Bakehouse. Maggie Bayless, was a waitress at Maude’s and is currently the managing partner at ZingTrain.

Weinzweig learned many important skills while working at Maude’s, including how to do cleaning schedules, how to portion meals, and how to do performance reviews.

“None of those things get much attention in the world at large, but they’re critical.

[It’s] like learning how to play scales in

“It’s just easier to get where you want to go if you know where you want to go,” Weinzweig said.

Zingerman’s has found this path. Weinzweig feels that Zingermans’ rapid success can be attributed to their attitude. They are continually striving to improve.

“I believe we’re always pushing ourselves to learn about the food and improve all the time,” Weinzweig said. “I would imagine the best teachers you have are the ones that are learning a lot. You know the ones that are teaching the class the same way they taught it in 1999, which there’s probably less of in Community High than in your average high school, then it gets boring,” They recently began a new line of spices.

The idea came from a family in Montreal that has much experience with spices. They have traveled the world for 30 years learn-

Weinzweig is deeply interested in food because of its interesting past.

“It helps bring history alive - when we taste food it’s as much to be about the story behind the food - the people who made it, the culture and context in which it comes, the history of how it came to be, why it’s meaningful in its homeland, et cetera,” Weinzweig said.

In 1994, Zingerman’s wrote their vision of 2009 with the possibility of having a community of businesses. They are currently working to get to their 2020 version. Zingerman’s is still successful because they are continually looking at their future, while succeeding in the present.

“It’s a strong belief that we want to, can and will get better,” Weinzweig said. th e com municator

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ada banks graphic

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ommunity senior Phoenix Patterson moved from Traverse City to Ann Arbor just before eighth grade. Accompanied only by her mother, she spent her summer fairly immobile due to sports injury. When her eighth grade year began, Patterson didn’t play her usual variety of sports that she participated in back in Traverse City. She put on a bit of weight.

Arriving at high school, she started sports again, but said it was “too late.” That’s when the comments began.

“My mom told me that the guys would be ‘falling all over me’ if I lost twenty more pounds, that I’d have the perfect body,” she said.

“I tried to tell her it’s not as easy for me as it is for her, because we have different body types.”

In the past year, Patterson has begun working out almost daily, and as a result has lost twenty pounds. When she mentioned it to her mother, Patterson was irritated, as her mother hadn’t noticed the change until that moment. Her mother was uncomfortable, and upset with herself that she didn’t see it before.

For a bit of time, Patterson’s mother ceased to comment on her daughter’s weight. Yet recently she has begun to make similar comments as before the weight loss.

“I live with that,” said Patterson. “In our relationship, we say things pretty straightforward. She knows that I’m pretty confident.

It’s coming from my mom. [I know] she only wants the best for me.

But when she makes comments about my weight, it’s always a little bit negative.”

According to DoSomething, approximately 91 percent of women are unhappy with their bodies. Dr. Renee Engeln has been studying obsession with appearance in her body image laboratory at Northwestern University. She calls it beauty sickness, and says that it comes from many different sources, according to a recent interview with YouBeauty.

“Comments like ‘I’m getting so fat’ are coming from everywhere,” said Engeln. This really public way of disparaging the amount of fat on your body is something new.”

Beauty sickness can be described as an obsession with appearance, and with meeting the physical expectations of those around you. These can come from various sources in a person’s life, whether it be a mother or friend, or a company, like a magazine or a clothing line.

Examples of beauty sickness are blogs promoting “thinspiration.”

These have popped up over the course of the past few years, filled with posts of women who have lost significant amounts of weight, sometimes an unhealthy amount.

“It really makes me sad,” said Community High senior Jula Heckendorn. “I see it all over the place – people who try to get the thigh gaps or the hip bones to stick out and stuff,” she said. “[It] has so much to do with wanting to change yourself.”

Also occurring in the media is the rising popularity and acceptance of an hour-glass shape — big butts, defined hips, a curvier physique — which young women are beginning to notice, including Community High freshman Lily Gechter. “[The media has been] promoting that every size is beautiful, but then songs like [Meghan Trainor’s] All About that Bass say that if you’re skinny, you’re a bitch,” said Gechter. “They seem to be promoting all sizes, but it [also] seems to be aimed more towards larger sizes.”

Heckendorn says she’s on the fence about how she feels about the recent surge of plus-size positivity.

“I really think it is a good thing that people are accepting bigger women, but why should we have to live in a world where we have to tell people to feel good about themselves because they aren’t the same size that people want to see?” said Heckendorn. “That’s basically them saying ‘Well you aren’t what we are, but you’re also pretty.’ It’s this conflict of ‘Oh thank you for telling me I’m good in my body, but you’re also telling me I’m not the same as everybody else.’”

Community High senior Raven Eaddy, however, sees the promotion as a step in the right direction.

“Everybody should feel like they’re beautiful, and it’s just important for everyone to have something that makes them feel [worthy],” said Eaddy. “I was thinking about it and I’m wondering when fashion magazines will start to embrace curves, because right now that’s becoming the thing, to have curves. And I’m wondering if they’ll catch on to that.”

Dr. Engeln gave a talk on beauty sickness at a TEDx event at the University of Connecticut last year. In it, she addresses not only the damaging media culture we live in, but how to treat body negativity as well.

“Invest less in beauty,” she said. “Instead invest in things that last and things that you don’t have to keep in middle and older age.

Limit your mirror time. Try not to think of your body as a collection of parts for other people to look at. Think of your body as unified, as whole, as your tool for exploring the world. Your body is not for looking at, it’s for doing things.”

A few media sources have attempted to ease the symptoms of beauty sickness. Back in 2004, the Dove brand announced its Real Beauty campaign, which has evolved over the years, promoting “real women whose appearances are outside the stereotypical norms of beauty” through online films, commercials and by holding educational programs in organizations like Girl Scouts of the U.S.A. and the Boys & Girls Club of America.

Earlier this year, lingerie brand Aerie announced the end of retouching its models for advertisements, and Seventeen magazine promised not to adjust the body sizes and face shapes of its models as well. Clothing company H&M displayed a size 12 model as the face of their beachwear collection this summer.

Students agree that, rather than promoting one image of beauty over another, media should instead embrace all girls regardless of shape.

“I know that not everyone, regardless of their size, is comfortable with their weight or actual size,” said Gechter. “I think it’s good to try and promote everyone to be more confident, either way.”

Heckendorn feels passionately about the way girls are currently perceived.

“It needs to be more focused on seeing every size and shape of women, not just targeting one size and saying ‘you’ve had hate, so here, let’s make you feel better.’ Singling them out isn’t going to make them feel any better. You’re just addressing their problem publicly and trying to make yourself feel better by supporting them. [It’s about] having this idea of ‘not everyone is going to be the same size as me, or the same size as her, or the same size as you’ and I don’t think that’s a problem.”

“We need to focus on everybody by saying that not only big girls are great, but so are skinny girls, so are average girls; every girl is great,” said Heckendorn. th e com municator 25

“Everybody should feel like they’re beautiful. It’s important for everyone to have something that makes them feel [worthy].”

a tarnished reputation feature

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nce a week, nearly like clockwork by week three. This is how Eric Satori, the maintenance supervisor of Kerrytown Market and Shops described the graffiti incidents thus far in the 2014-15 school year.

School had been back in session for less than twenty-four hours when Satori found this year’s first graffiti. This first encounter with vandalism was the worst this year. The tag hit the farmer’s market building doors and the side of the Kerrytown building.

“Clearly the same person, same paint, everything,” Satori said. “They were enormous tags, those took the most time and money.” The market had to hire someone to repaint their building after the incident. Even after this, Satori did not place any ban on Community students.

Satori found the second round of vandalism during school’s second week while conducting a standard check on Kerrytown’s second floor bathroom. Satori discovered a tag of a cherry and a pear in the men’s bathroom. It was after this second incident of vandalism that Satori called for a ban on students from the second floor. Despite this, the graffiti persisted.

During Community’s third week, the third tag hit Kerrytown. The tag fell on the second floor men’s bathroom once again. This time the graffiti came in the mocking form of a cherry with the lettering “cherry” underneath it. Satori assumed the culprit of the second and third incidents to be the same person due to their similar themes and locations.

While Satori, nor anyone else, was unable to prove that Community students caused the graffiti, Satori did note that the timing would imply quite a coincidence if the offender were not affiliated with the school.

“The timing of it all is really what tells me it is Community High, because it starts Sept. 3 and it happens between ten and two. Crazy enough, somebody tagged the bathroom and it is a Tuesday,” Satori said.

The graffiti incidents affected Satori and Kerrytown shop-owners in a multitude of ways.

“I think the perspective from a building owner or anybody - for example a homeowner who spends a lot of money cutting their grass, painting their house, making their lawn look good - would be really bothered if someone showed up in the middle of the night and decided to do something to what they work hard at,” Satori said. “These people have businesses they work hard at, they pay rent and I’m responsible for the building and the upkeep of it. Everybody’s trying to make a living and tagging, to me, is sort of a slap in the face of what people are trying to do.” In addition to the demoralizing effects graffiti can have, it also has practical implications.

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“I have to stop what I am doing when I find it and I have to prime and paint,” Satori said. “There’s a cost involved and it’s not cheap. I would probably put a price at anywhere from 50-100 bucks per time. ” A remodelling of the upstairs bathrooms are planned for Kerrytown in January, and Satori said that tagging of these brand new bathrooms would not be good, another layer of the complicated problem. Satori also talked about how graffiti affects his day-to-day work.

“When it starts taking over what I am doing in the middle part of the day my frustration level rises a bit,” Satori said. In addition to physically cleaning up much of the graffiti, Satori also has to deal with the authorities.

“The first thing I always do is call Kevin. I am always hopeful he will be like ‘Oh I recognize that tag.’ Second, I call the police and file a police report.” Satori did not bother contacting the police for the cherry graffiti on the second floor. He did contact them regarding the farmer’s market incident, though.

Satori said that if the police found out who was responsible for the incident, they would come to him and ask if he wanted to prosecute them. Satori believed that incident would be worthy of prosecution. Satori had experience with this process during his first year at Kerrytown during the 201213 school year.

“The first year I was here I know for a fact it was a Community High Student,” Satori said. “I even know his name. He has been prosecuted. Everybody knows his name.” Satori said that in terms of total number, his first year was the worst year, with about eight total incidents. This year, at its current rate, however, would easily eclipse 2012-13, which on average had one incident a month.

Satori believed that banning students from the second floor would lower the probability of graffiti on that floor at least, since they can’t cause trouble if they aren’t there. He also believed it would make it easier to catch whoever is responsible for future graffiti since there will be so few people on the second floor.

Satori said graffiti was the main problem he’d had with Community students this year. Shop owners, on the other hand, have had other problems with students over the years as well.

While some shop owners were not even aware of the predicament Kerrytown was having with graffiti, they were aware of another problem that has been a persistent one for at least the last ten years.

This is an issue of Community students being loud, loitering and not exhibiting appropriate behavior for a marketplace. This issue is mainly one on the second floor specifically for: Encore Studio, Ann Arbor Spice Merchants and Princess Designs.

These stores are located the closest to Community

LEFT: The bathroom where Satori found the fruit-themed graffiti. MIDDLE: Less prominent tags inside the men’s bathroom stall. RIGHT: Benches between Encore Studio & Spice Merchants High School as well as the second floor seating Kerrytown offers.

Encore Studio is a high end hair salon, so it receives little, if any, of the business Community students bring to Kerrytown. It does receive the more negative effects of Community students, however. It is only a thin wall away from the three tables Kerrytown offers on the second floor that are predominantly taken up by Community students. The wall for Encore Studio, like all other Kerrytown shops, does not extend all the way up to the ceiling. This creates a space between the wall and ceiling so that noise can travel from the hallway into the shop.

Hillary Monty is a hair stylist at Encore Studio. The only problem Monty has with Community students is that they are loud.

“We have a spa on the other side of the hallway with the tables,” Monty said. “Our customers are paying a fair amount of money for the services we provide through the spa and the customers want to be relaxed. But when kids are yelling and talking over each other it is hard for them to relax.”

Monty has had experience with customers coming out of facials and complaining about the noise.

This lead Monty to believe that, unless Community students are shopping on the second floor, they should not be there.

Monty does note that in 2011 and 2012 there was less of a problem.

She attributes this to the fact that her and shop owners around her gave Community’s former dean, Dean Jennifer Hein, a call. This group of shop-owners included Princess Designs owner, Christy Jones.

Princess Designs is a jewelry

store across from Encore Studio that has been in existence since 1998. It sells mostly ornaments and jewelry handmade by the owner, Christy Jones.

“When you cannot hear a customer talking to you, it is not good for business,” Jones said.

Jones also has issues with Community students sitting in the second floor hallway not only because they create noise but because they loiter.

“They move chairs and tables together so it is very difficult for customers with strollers or walkers to get by and they can find this intimidating,” said Jones.

Jones believes these tables and benches should be reserved for paying customers or someone who is accompanying a customer.

“If there is an older woman who is shopping and she has a husband with her that wants to sit down while she is browsing he should be able to; but if students are sitting there then he cannot sit down,” said Jones.

Jones does not hesitate to tell Community students if they are being too loud but would rather not do it. This also lead Jones to the conclusion that Community students should not be on the second floor.

On Sept. 24, community assistant Davis found tags on Community High School. It is not known yet if the student went to Community or not.

BOTTOM: Tables that Community students typically sat at. The wall of Encore Studio is on the left. MIDDLE: Signs for the second-floor stores most affected

by Community students. TOP: A View of Kerrytown from the Communiity’s parking lot. th e com municator

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the advantages of being bilingual emily ojeda ada banks photo

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ay, 2010: José Benki and Teresa Satterfield wait anxiously for the first families to arrive. Expecting only 20 students, they had no idea what they have created.

En Nuestra Lengua is the Spanish School that takes place on Saturdays at Bach School. It was created in Fall of 2009

by Teresa Satterfield, Linguist at the University of Michigan, and co-directed by José Benki, a researcher at the University of Michigan Survey Methodology Program.

Their goal was to create a school in which children could be taught in Spanish. They requested a grant, and the following January, they received the money to help start the program.

“We started that spring with a pilot program. In this school, as it was a magnet school for English as a second language,” said Benki. “And so we thought there would be only 20 students. But instead, 50 showed up.”

Classes continued for six weeks. Ann Arbor has French Schools, Chinese Schools, and German Schools. According to Benitez, “[This] was the first time that we had a school for native speakers of Spanish in Ann Arbor,” explained Benki.

But, what exactly are the benefits of having this school? How does being bilingual affect children?

According to the American Speech-Language-Hearing Association (ASHA), these children are able to learn new words more easily. The National Center for Education-

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al Statistics has said that more than 21% of children speak another language at home.

New studies have shown that a multilingual brain is quicker, nimbler, and better able to deal with uncertainty and conflict. Benitez said that there are many important aspects about maintaining bilingualism. Many of these children’s parents do not speak English well. Their main language with their child is one other than English. So, if a child begins to lose the ability to speak that language, they are losing a major communication path between them and their parents.

“Because of my ability to speak both languages (Spanish and English), I can communicate with more people: my family, friends, and others who cannot speak Spanish. I can also be a part of two cultures,” said CHS Alum Alexandra Cubero-Matos.

“Because I am fluent, I have had experiences where some teachers think that I am not as adequate as other students because I might have difficulty speaking English.

That is not the case. Although I have been discriminated against, I find a lot more light and positivity than negativity and I am very proud to be not only Latina but bilingual.”

“Learning another language was how I got to Europe,” said Danelle Mosher, who is the French teacher at Community High School.

“I got to learn about the German culture. I studied French when I was in high school, but I traveled with the German club to Germany because the French club wasn’t going anywhere,” Mosher said. “I loved being in Europe and learning about another culture.

I went to college at a school where I knew I could study abroad for a year. I studied in France when I was a junior.”

Classes at En Nuestra Lengua began on Sat, Oct. 11. To mark the beginning of a new year, Benitez and Satterfield invited ESPN/ Telemundo reporter Michele LaFountain to the School. She talked to parents about her experiences as a Latina professional in the U.S. “Practically all of my work has been bilingual,” LaFountain said. Satterfield invited LaFountain to the school after her conference, Latino Sports and Media, at the U of M. “She invited me here to talk in the classrooms. Read books to the little ones, and to talk about the importance of being bilingual with the older kids. And, I am more than happy to do so.”

Jose Benki, co-director, drops in on a class at En Nuestra Lengua. Benki helped create the program in 2010.

“My first job was interviewing doctors in Spain for a company that did research for the pharmaceutical industry. I interviewed them in Spanish over the phone, and traveled there often. Then I wrote the reports in English. I moved to New York and began to work on recording voice announcements. That was when I started working in journalism at ESPN Latin America. At first I did “Magazine Shows” which are half an hour to an hour. [They] could be about anything. A Triathlon. Figure Skating. Everything was in English. We listened, and translated.”-Michel LaFountain, ESPN Sports “I am a linguist. All languages fascinate me. Especially those with a Latin base. You know that a bilingual child has a positive advantage. They are better problem solvers. They have better ways to express themselves. A bilingual person can adapt easily.

They can form relations and friendships with people from different groups and countries. The world is yours and you need to be bilingual in every way.

Read, write, speak, understand. With these components you can do whatever you desire.”-Teresa Satterfield, Ph.D., Romance Languages, University of Michigan “We know from all the research on bilingual children that they do better in their process of alphabetism and their academic career if they dominate the alphabetism in their first language. With every child that improves their Spanish, that is going to help them read English. There are also other important aspects about maintaining bilingualism. There are many parents who do not speak much English, and their language with their child is Spanish. We found that children that do not learn Spanish in this type of environment do not develop [it] fully. They are no longer able to communicate well with their parents.

It’s not a very healthy relationship between parents and children. These kids can maintain their bilingualism. In this world, there are more people who speak Spanish as a first language than English. So it is very important to know Spanish. English, Spanish, Mandarin. The three largest languages in the world.

Our children can master two of the three. Then they will be the teachers.”-José R. Benki, Ph.D., Research Investigator, Survey Methodology Program, University of Michigan

“I went to France and Germany over the summer, which was amazing to know the language and be able to interact with the people and the culture. I’m going to France again in the spring.” -Phoebe Engel, CHS Class of 2017 “It has certainly been helpful in maintaining a relationship with my extended family. I also think it’s very important to have a strong connection to your heritage and where you come from. I feel more connected to my Latina heritage because I have the means and ability to completely transition from being a person in a primarily English speaking country where I’ve lived my entire life into someone who both represents my European and Latin American background. I believe that if an entire side of your family speaks a language other than your first that it is most definitely worth the while to learn that language and better understand your family.”-Clara Motiño, CHS Class of 2015 “I can help people who are new to the English language by translating and helping them understand things. [Being bilingual] has made me a very culturally rounded person.” -Giselle Roca, Huron Class of 2017 “Speaking French has allowed me to realize that I want to be an interpreter. Knowing another language opens up a door to a new world. The differences in culture aren’t just based on geography.

They’re based by language, like all the little idioms or sayings in languages. Th ey affect people’s perception of the world. If you can look at the world through the lense of another language, it’s useful to get multiple perspectives.”-Mari Milkie, CHS Class of 2015

En Nuestra Lengua Saturday 9 a.m.- 12 p.m.

Bach Elementary School Dr. Teresa Satterfield Dr. Jose Benki (734) 717-0178 th e com municator

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playing politics. how music can be used to alter political opinions

hannah rubenstein eleanor olson illustration

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hether it is the radio, a sound system in a public space, a television commercial or a personal collection, music is everywhere in society. It can be used to make a statement and change the opinions of listeners.

The influence of music is felt around the world. Professor W. Anthony Sheppard, a musicologist at Williams College whose specialties include popular music in the 20th and 21st centuries, said that the “heavy rotation of specific songs enables music to reach the general population in an intense, repeated, and even intrusive way.”

This exposure to music has been capitalized upon by different artists or producers, looking to ingrain opinions or causes into the minds of others. Specifically, the political use of music has proven itself to be so important, it has been turned into a profession.

According to Professor Stephen M. Whiting, a musicologist at the University of Michigan with particular background in the 18th and 19th centuries,u “you can’t have any political campaign without some pretty judiciously chosen music. People are payed good money to figure out the musical trappings of a political campaign.”

America is no stranger to music being used to change political stances; President Franklin D. Roosevelt ran for office with the song “Happy Days are Here Again”, turning himself into a beacon of hope for down-ontheir-luck voters during the Great Depression. President Bill Clinton did the same in 1992, using “Don’t Stop Thinking About Tomorrow” by Fleetwood Mac to appeal to a target demographic of voters.

While music might play a substantial part in political campaigns, the use is not always so blatant. It is not always the campaign managers that promote certain songs. Oftentimes the artists themselves wish to make a difference with their work. Sometimes they attempt to address one specific problem, such as Neil Young’s “Living With War”, written as an attempt to get President George W. Bush out of office in 2004. Other times, artists will create music to bring attention to broader issues. Examples of this are particularly prevalent when it comes to

social justice movements.

Musicians such as Bob Dylan, Joni Mitchell and Pete Seeger played huge roles in social activism in the 60s and 70s. Their songs could be used as symbols of particular movements or the changing mindsets of the protestors.

According to Professor Whiting, “These were [artists] that, to those of us in a certain generation, seemed to have the answers to a social situation that many of us found increasingly intolerable.”

Musicology Professor Judith Ann Peraino of Cornell University who specializes in history of rock, punk, and other popular musical genres, questioned whether songs from artists such as these, which were routinely played at protests or marches, truly changed minds or simply preached to the choir. She added that the Sex Pistols’ “Anarchy in the UK” and “God Save the Queen” were strong examples of “punk songs that are working class critiques of the government. But the government certainly did not change because of these songs, except to attempt to censor them.”

If a government is aware of the influence that music can play to benefit them, they must be aware of the fact that music can hinder their power. Censorship of political music shows itself most obviously in nondemocratic countries, particularly in times of political unrest. Well-known examples of this include Cuba and the Soviet Union.

Both of these countries have been known to imprison artists who do not comply with their musical restrictions.

Professor Whiting said, “Music is dangerous stuff. It’s [interesting] that the societies that take music most seriously are most willing to censor it, whereas societies that don’t take it seriously use it for entertainment.”

Ideas of nationalism play a huge part in this issue. The propaganda song “Over There” was used during both world wars to motivate Americans to enlist for the army.

It played to the public’s sense of loyalty and pride in their country with a catchy, anthem-like tune, stating “Every son of Liberty, hurry right away, no delay, go today… hoist the flag and let her fly, Yankee Doodle do or die… Send the word over there that

the Yanks are coming… and we won’t come back till it’s over”.

In places such as Germany and Japan during World War II, there was a push to eliminate American music, especially jazz, from their cultures. This stemmed from both the war effort and racist opinions in the government.

Despite the anti-African American prejudices, Professor Whiting added, “the Nazis still found ways to foster [Jazz] because the music was too appealing, and they wanted to find ways to exploit it.”

The majority of musical genres with heavy American influence, such as Jazz, Rock & Rock, Hip-Hop and Rap, have deep roots in the African American population that experiences an ongoing history of oppression. Those prejudices manifest themselves in the fact that the musical innovations of African Americans tend to end up getting white-washed with increasing popularity.

Professor Peraino had a strong opinion on this topic. “The early history of rock ‘n’ roll during the Civil Rights Era is chock full of songs written and performed by African Americans such as Little Richard and Chuck Berry that entered the mainstream radio and even movies geared to teenagers, thus promoting integrationist ideas within the youth culture,” she said, also adding that cultural shifts stemming from “Beatlemania” and “The British Invasion” changed this. “It brought rock ‘n’ roll into the white middle class as something that was not too threatening to parents, but still rebellious enough for teenagers. Rock suddenly became safe, and it also became white and British.”

Now, even more than during the 60s social movements, music is easily accessible.

Social media websites, particularly YouTube, spread musical ideas and innovations throughout the world with merely the touch of a button. It becomes easier to incorporate stylistic features of another culture’s music, which, according to Professor Sheppard, often makes a political statement on its own. Musical censorship has become much more difficult to control, which is a testament to the tremendous influence that can be made on society through the spread of ideas through music. th e com municator

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fresh feet. two chs athletes share their stories of making varsity teams as freshmen hannah davis rob kerr and mihail mihaylov photo

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hether it begins with kicking the soccer ball in the backyard at a young age, or joining a Rec & Ed team in third grade, many student athletes have aspirations to make the varsity team their freshmen year of high school. Maggie Mihaylova, Community High School sophomore, and Mairead Erhardt, Community High School freshman both had this goal.

Mihaylova has a long line of soccer players in her family history, so when tryouts came around, she received a lot of support from her family. Her brother in particular was responsible for getting her in better shape and bettering her skills on the field.

Erhardt, on the other hand, didn’t prepare much for the conditioning aspect of the two week preseason in mid-August. Conditioning comes more naturally to her than most, so she decided to focus on specific skills for preseason.

Mihaylova and Erhardt had different reactions when they received the news that they had made Varsity sports teams at Skyline and Huron.

“I cleaned my room [after I found out]because that needed to be done,” said Erhardt.

Once tryouts had ended for Mihaylova, she began checking her email obsessively until she received the news of what team she had made. She had a real “drama queen moment” by dropping her phone and exclaiming to her parents that she had made the varsity soccer team.

“I didn’t want to be that person that posts it on social media and brags about it, but my brother did, so the word got out,” Mihaylova said.

While some might have anxiety joining a team composed of primarily upperclassmen, Mihaylova welcomed the opportunity.

“The only person that ever made fun of me was Amanda Collins, the JV coach. The rest of the team was super nice.” Erhardt said.

Mihaylova and Erhardt found inspiration from the older girls on their teams, both sharing aspirations to be captains in the future.

Being on varsity comes with its challenges, regardless if one is an upperclassmen or a freshman. Mihaylova feels proud to have contributed to Skyline soccer’s success this year.

“We won districts which was really cool,” said Mihaylova. “Even though it ended in penalties and I had to take the last shot, which was nerve wracking, it was still a really cool experience.”

For Erhardt these challenges and nerves came from the intimidation of knowing that her team had won three out of the last four division one state titles.

“I was very impressed,” said Erhardt. “It also made me a lot more nervous when I played.”

Both Mihaylova and Erhardt faced issues with playing time, which isn’t uncommon to see among freshmen playing varsity teams.

“It kind of worried me in the beginning,” said Mihaylova. “But in the first few games I started and didn’t sub, and then in the middle of the season there was a game that I didn’t play. That put me down a little. Then I talked to my coach and she told me what I needed to do to get some more playing time. After I did that, I began to play around half of the game.”

LEFT Mihaylova age five, playing soccer in her backyard.

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RIGHT Erhardt playing in the Saline Play Day in 2014.

Huron Field Hockey had an unusual 2014 season.

“There was definitely a lack of motivation at some points during the season,” said Erhardt. “Wth Jamie Cohen, our coach, stepping up last minute from being the JV coach to the head coach, that [made us] slightly unprepared for the upcoming season. Part of my team’s struggle was finishing when we were in the circle. I remember when we had 17 corners in a row and only scored one goal. We were in need of a good offensive push. Apparently Katie Yeatts and Leah Davis had that offensive push last year, but this year we were just lacking in that.”

Erhardt wishes to further her field hockey career by following in her sister’s footsteps by one day playing in college. Mihaylova, on the other hand, believes she needs to keep up her routine habits for success.

“I am kind of a hypochondriac,” said Mihaylova. “When I pick my white cleats over my pink cleats, I have a bad game, which is bad because I shouldn’t be superstitious.

One time I wore small shoes that were really small on me to the point where I got bunions, but I wore them because I played better in them. In reality, it’s all psychological. ” With or without these superstitions, Mihaylova intends to follow her passion on the field.

“I have been playing soccer my whole life.

It has had a pretty big impact on my life because it’s my family’s ‘thing.’ I feel like every person has that one ‘thing’ about them, and soccer is mine, which I am really proud of.”

career profiles

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cameron fortune & hannah tschirhart

officer matelle

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oug Martelle has always prefered to walk rather than drive while patrolling the streets of Ann Arbor; he likes to be active and enjoys connecting with the public, something that is harder to do from his police car. Martelle has been a police officer in Ann Arbor for 25 years and can’t see himself doing anything else anytime soon.

Martelle’s interest of law enforcement was sparked just after high school when he was 18 years old during a jury duty. He set his sights on becoming a police officer and after 440 hours of police academy training, a rigorous fitness test, and obtaining a bachelors degree, Martelle was able to reach his goal.

Today he is working in the Community Engagement Office where are proactive and try to stop crime before it happens.

“We educate people and give them access to the tools in their minds they need to make the right decisions to help prevent them from committing or becoming a victim of a crime,” said Martelle.

This is different from standard patrol where officers have to be more reactionary when they respond to dispatch calls to solve a problem.

He enjoys working in the Community Engagement Office because it allows him to do more of what he enjoys.

Martelle said, “My favorite part of the job is doing programs with kids at schools, talking to people, and educating them about different things.” He is also training officer, for brand new members of the police force meaning he takes them on patrol with him.

Martelle is proud to work for the Ann Arbor police department because of how professional it is. Martelle said, “The police department tends to be a reflection of the community, people here tend to make good decisions in different situations.”

Martelle’s advice for becoming a police officer is to have a very clean background and to be not only mentally prepared for the job, but also to be physically prepared. For example, one of the requirements for becoming a police officer is to pass a gruelling physical test based off of your age and gender.

Some officer’s goals are to make the most arrest or to get a pat on the back, to Martelle, neither of those are important; what is important to him is that he has a positive effect on the community by making peoples lives better one person at a time. “Little victories, that is my motto,” said Martelle.

doctor cherry

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rom an early age Jill Cherry-Bukowiec was involved in volunteering at medical centers. From the experience she gained there, she found her calling. After years of college education she began to form an even clearer vision of what her career would be. After high school, four years in undergrad continuing on to four years of medical school is followed by residency years. Residency is dedicated to the exploration of a specific practice the student is interested in. The quickest someone can go through residency is five years. Surgical residency is similar to an internship. In smaller programs the student can have as little as one to three residences a year. In larger programs the student can have up to eight. During this time you would shadow surgeons and act as a physician. At Michigan, being a larger college, The residency years can be more extensive. Michigan has a 7 year program where after completing the first 3 years the student moves on to two years of specified studying. During this time a student might go into academic research, get their critical care credentials, masters or PHD. Once those years are complete, the student begins the final two residency years- the chief residency years.

“Those are the years where you really learn to be independent,” said Cherry-Bukowiec. Following residency a student will enter fellowship. That is another 2 to 3 years of delving into the specifics of the type of surgery the student wants to practice.

Cherry-Bukowiec has been working in the general surgery department and is an assistant professor and director of the Trauma Burn ICU for five years now. There are many faces to her job.

A day can vary from working in the ICU and being prepared for anything that comes in the door, to teaching several classes or leading lectures. There are ten people who work the same practice as Dr. Cherry-Bukowiec in the Trauma Burn ICU each with slightly different jobs to do. Most days being at 7am and end at 6pm.

For Cherry-Bukowiec the most difficult part is the work-life balance however, with the hardships come the rewards. Maintaining focus and being fulfilled is a big part of whatever career path one might decide to follow.

“If you do what you do to the best of your ability anyone that’s a naysayer will go away as long as you keep your focus,” said Cherry-Bukowiec. “People respect you for doing your job the best way it can be done.”

To any aspiring surgeons, do your homework, know if it is really what you want, find people to lead you through, gain world experience and, “Don’t let anyone suede you from what you want and make sure the career or what you’re doing is your own decision,” said Cherry-Bukowiec. th e com municator 33

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artist profile: blue kirkpatrick hannah rubenstein blue kirkpatrick photo

What is the story behind the photo above?

Is there a certain reason that you favor doing photography This is a picture of Emma Alson on the bottom of the train tracks by compared to other kinds of art?

Knight’s. I like this picture because of the lighting and colors in the I guess it sort of feels right. I don’t know why, but I find that it is the background in contrast with the lack of color in the model. easiest way for me to tell a story, which is what I think art does.

I like it becaue you can tell the truth, or you can lie. I think it’s a How did you get into art and photography? powerful tool because you can capture real things and show how My dad was a painter and a poet so I grew up around it. He taught they really are. me about artists and art. With photography, I had been trying a lot of different art forms, trying to figure out what I was good at, and How has art changed or helped you? for a while I was doing a lot of writing, but I found that photography I have struggled with a lot of drug addiction problems in my life, was an easier way to tell a story than writing for me. It just felt right. and I could never really find a way out of it. I pretty much lost evSo I started doing photography in a more serious way about a year erything to drugs, and pretty much the only thing that I didn’t lose ago. was art, so I really stuck with that.

Who or what inspires your art?

My dad inspires me a lot, and Steve [Coron]. Steve is probably my Why do you think art is important? biggest inspiration. Steve is the person that made me want to be Because it lets you tell the truth. And because even if you don’t a photographer. When I’m taking pictures, the things that really in- have anything, you still have art. Even if it’s just in your head. You spire me are graffiti. I love doing portraits, too. can always have art, even if you’re living on the streets, art is always there for you. Art is my best friend. It always has been.

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tumblr. the blogging universe that has expanded into a forum for expression

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kea von emden

hat at first view seems to be a misspelling is actually the social network Tumblr. It is a popular blogportal built for creative minds. But what is tumblr really for?

Tumblr was created in 2007 for people to publish their blogs. There they can post pictures, videos, audio, quotations or text. The blog’s content is diverse, just like the bloggers. There are over 206 million blogs existing on Tumblr right now. The main idea is the “reblogging” of others’ post. Tumblr users can follow other blogs and explore multi media content on their dashboard. But you don’t need your own

adabanks.tumblr.com

>>

account to look at users blogs.

Tumblr, like many other social media sites, is constructed in an easy-to-understand way.

“I started blogging one year ago in the summer holidays when I had too much time to spend and I never did blogging before. I thought that it was harder to understand,” said Aiyana Schroeder, a 15-yearold girl from Germany.

Normally when someone is creating a blog it is clear that they want to share their blog with family or friends, but Tumblr works differently. Users have the option to post under distinct usernames and blog titles - some anonymous.

“When someone is asking me about my

username on tumblr, I usually don’t give them my blog. It’s something private and I don’t want people who know me to look my blog”, said Vivienne Miller, a sophomore from Community High School.

“On Tumblr, I can show what worries and anxieties I have by reblogging referring photos, gifs and texts or quotes, but I also reblog happy things that I’m interested in,” said Schroeder “I am not depressive. I just do not like talking about my problems because it does not help me.

Therefore, I release some feeling on Tumblr. I have that blog for myself and not for the purpose of gaining followers.”

photos courtesy of ada banks

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The good thing about the color black is that it never clashes. I feel like with the color black there comes a lot more emotion and you can say a lot more with very little when you wear black.

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- Sam Works

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1. Sarah O’Connor rocks her new purple hair.

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Eva Rosenfeld shows off a new look that includes hair dyed at Orbit hair salon located in downtown Ann Arbor and some cute new eyewear from SEE.

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Gloria Fall, a junior at Community, pulls off unique and stlyish glasses effortlessly. Gloria purchased this eyewear from SEE, a store located in downtown Ann Arbor on State Street near the Michigan Theatre.

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.Isaac Scobey-Thal dresses in a crisp blue button up, “I wanted to go with a button up cause it’s sort of like a nice crisp day out,” Scobey-Thal said. “I love blue, I wear too much blue, especially my shirts. I have so many blue shirts. It’s my favorite color and I think everyone looks good in blue.” Isaac purchased this button up at Salvation Army, a great resource for fashionistas looking for a bargain..

9. Sam Works dons black shoes from the Launch Board Shop.

4. Avery Farmer sports statement red pants, a tan sweater, and a complementary watch.

10. Sophie Steinberg models shoes from H&M.

5.

11.

6.

12.

Anders Rasmussen wears a watch from Michael Kors gifted to him by his girlfriend.

Sam Works, a junior at Community, looks snazzy wearing a watch from Fossil in New York.

Tyler Schmeader wears red Addidas with cuffed jeans. This is a way to cleanly accentuate bold footwear.

Vivian Miller sits on the stairway ledge in a chic floral print skirt.

7. Devin Weeks stays warm in a scarf from Calvin Klein 13.

Sophie Steinberg looks cozy in a blue button up and sweater from Forever 21.

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what should I listen to now? hannah tschirhart

what to listen to 2pac, ice cube, Biggie, Mobb Deep, Nas, The Game & Jay-ZStill D.R.E. Remix .

Saturday Looks Good to Me- Polar Bear She & Him- Stay a While .

Tame Impala- Mind Mischief

when to listen bumpin’ in the whip

wearing a sunhat laying on your best friend’s floor/girls night staring at the clouds

Tyler, the Creator- She (feat. Frank Ocean)

you have 30 minutes left until you have to drive home, sitting with your friends just talking

The Notorious B.I.G.- Big poppa

counting your money

Best Coast- The End

if you’re trying to tell that special someone how you feel but you’re struggling, let the music do the talking

Proportions- We Run Sh*t

friday afternoon and you’ve got the whole weekend ahead of you

Led Zeppelin- What Is and What Should Never Be

showering

Washed Out- Feel it All Around

when you’re really missing summer

Tone-Loc- Wild Thing

bumpin’ in your friends whip

Jai Paul- BTSTU

during a massive thunderstorm

Curtis Mayfield- Move On Up

first day of summer/spring break

The Smiths- This Charming Man

first song on your roadtrip mix CD

The Zombies- Time of the Season

you see someone across the room and you know... it’s love at first sight

Frank Ocean- Pink Matter (feat. Andre 3000)

going to bed

LCD Soundsystem- Home

late night cruising home

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shorts.

shower thoughts. why we come up with our best ideas during bath time

W

marcelo salas

hen I step into the shower, I find myself bouncing ideas off the stained shower curtains and the grimy tile with incredible

how it works

ease. Most recently, I dreamed up a scene that I would feature in a semi-fictitious, autobiographical film. It went a little something like this: my co-worker wreaks havoc at the movies, pointing moviegoers in the wrong direction and cleaning the-

>>

The shower is an environment that requires concious focus on soaping, shampooing, etc. But your brain is still unconciously working at other ideas. As a result, when you begin conciously brainstorming, creativity comes with more ease.

success in the shower

aters at a glacial pace. The mise en scéne was right before my eyes – in my head.

Why the sudden boost of creativity? The shower serves as a sort of “incubator” for the brain, an environment for unconscious thought.

When the brain is provided with a distracting task, you are able to come up with more original ideas when prompted with a new creative task, a study shows. In this case, the shower serves as a distraction, enhancing your thought process later on.

source: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/16019229

Avery Pieronek’s Shower Thought Process

• Coming up with philosophical sayings of her own • Planning out her artwork -Pieronek planned a Sherlock-inspired painting while showering.

The piece was a gift to her cousin.

submit your wonderful shower ideas: email thecommunicator@googlegroups.com with the subject line “shower thoughts” include your first & last name th e com municator

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We are proud to print

The Communicator for

Ann Arbor Community High School

Full Service Book and Journal Manufacturing Since 1893

www.edwardsbrothersmalloy.com

op-ed

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respecting pronouns kelsey albig

“When people misgender you, they are assigning you something that you are not,” said Carson Borbely, a junior at Community High School. “Especially if you have communicated to them that you don’t identify with what they are assigning you, they are saying that their perception of you is more important than how you feel.”

Borbely has had many experiences where people disregard their gender identity.

Even if someone’s gender expression and how they present themselves is different than the norm, their identity is up to them.

Pronouns are used as a substitution for one’s name, often characterized to the gender someone identifies as. What some people don’t know is that there is a difference between someone’s gender and someone’s sex. Gender is what a person may identify as, while sex is what someone is assigned at birth. Sometimes a person’s sex doesn’t correspond with their gender, and this results in someone being transgender. Transgender categories fall into trans women, trans men, and non-binary individuals. Pronouns are a large part of the transgender community because it’s

eleanor olsen art

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important to respect an individual’s gender identity to make them more comfortable within society.

Different pronouns that are widely used throughout modern society are he, she, they and many other non-binary pronouns.

In today’s era, many people are respectful of transgender individuals and their pronouns, but there are also many who don’t accept them.

According to statistics from 2014, 54% of transgender kids were harassed and or bullied at school. More statistics show that 41% of transgender people attempt suicide.

More prominently in people who are discovering their identity, teenagers are often confused and feel unaccepted among society. Someones pronouns help them feel more at ease with the big changes they are making in their lives.

When transgender people come out they are sometimes not accepted by their family, friends, and peers. 69% of transgender people have experienced homelessness because of an unaccepting society and transphobia. The transphobic population is often a lot of older individuals and par-

ents who do not fully understand or want their child to transition. Parents who are unaccepting often throw out their kids and refuse to speak to them or use their correct pronouns. Parents also often refuse their transition by not letting them change how they look, receive testosterone or estrogen, or get surgery.

An important aspect to consider is not assuming one’s gender but simply asking or referring to them as some sort of neutral pronoun such as “they/them” (but never “it”). Cisnormativity is assuming someone’s gender identity is the same as the sex they were assigned at birth. This can make people feel hurt and not respected. Using correct pronouns and accepting transgender/ non-binary people is crucial for the well-being and mental state of many teens and adults in today’s society.

“I know I don’t live in a world today where everyone is going to get their pronouns used. What I hope for future generations is that your gender is not assumed or assigned to you, but you live in a world where you can define who you are and not have it defined for you,” Borbely said.

op-ed

ineedit: the new age of childhood development

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griffin roy

A blood-curdling wail erupted down the aisle as I closed the cooler, skim milk in hand. I turned to see a mother, embarrassed by the disruption, and her son, a toddler heedless of the volume of his bawling. In the mother’s raised hand was an iPhone, at which the toddler desperately but fruitlessly grabbed. I remembered back to my own childhood, when only the loss of one of my wooden train cars would elicit such a reaction.

Times have changed.; Cchildren are being exposed to mobile technology at a younger age than ever before. Content publishers are beginning to tailor their content towards young children, claiming to provide an educational environment that makes learning fun. What are the implications of these changes? Should children be using tablets and iPhones at such a young age?

I never thought that I would say “back in my day…” without using satire. But as I see more children engrossed by technology rather than friends, and more information about why technology is useful to children’s development, I can’t help but feel sentimental about my own childhood and how different it was, though only a decade ago.

A report published by Common Sense Media in 2013 revealed that 38% of children under two years old had used mobile technology to consume media. In 2011, the statistic was 10%. As technology is becoming more and more accessible for children, more and more will be influenced by it during critical stages of development.

Only time can tell how this generation of media-inundated children will develop, given that the phenomenon is so new that scientists haven’t been able to extensively test the effects of mobile media on language learning.

Technology is useful, but as an educational medium it has its limits. For decades, children have been brought up reading with parents, using tangible books (of like simplicity) to teach syntax and vocabulary. This has offered a way not only for children to be educated and entertained prior to formal education, but for children to bond with their parents by sharing the experience of learning. By passing on the teacher responsibility from parents to content developers, a connection between parent and child is lost. In addition, a 2013 study cites “infant activity, fussiness, and crying were associated with greater infant

TV exposure.”

The same study reports that before even being a year old, almost 40% of children watch three or more hours of TV per day.

This implies a growing lack of interaction with other children, which is important for social development.

The integration of technology into childhood is inevitable; while retailers continue to sell Lego and Thomas the Tank Engine, there is and will continue to be a growing pressure by the content creators to experience the world through technology. Technology itself is not a bad thing, but parents are allowing their children to consume too much media in place of discovering adventure in a park or on a bus; it is too early an age for children to be addicted to iPad or iPhone use if they are unable to communicate effectively with other people.

Though my fellow shoppers felt irritated by the sudden disruption of their purchases, the fault is not the toddler’s for wanting what has been such an integral part of his life. Rather, it is the fault of a generation of parents willing to pass on their parental responsibilities to an inanimate machine.

u.s. & china climate deal is welcomed matthew ferraro

The sweeping agreement reached between the United States and China on Wednesday, Nov. 12, 2014 has surprised the world, highlighting a ray of compromise in an area of previous dispute between the two nations. I know it certainly surprised me.

In the deal, the United States would cut carbon emissions by 26 to 28 percent, and China would reach peak carbon emissions before 2030, and from that point restrict its emissions.

Currently, the US and China are the world’s top polluters. The Environmental Protection Agency puts the percentage of the world’s carbon emissions for the two nations at 19 percent for the United States and 23 percent for China.

Not many were expecting such an announcement, which was jointly unveiled

by U.S. President Barack Obama and the President of China, Xi Jinping--but as in past cases, Republicans were quick to fire back. CNN noted harsh responses from Speaker of the House John Boehner and

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell.

Senators McConnell and Inhofe (R-Oklahoma) are quoted by CNN as saying “the American people spoke up against” the President’s policies in the midterm elections. To them I respond that some matters transcend party politics, petty feuds, and small men. Climate change certainly does this. It appears the Republican leadership is short sighted. It is their future, too, that depends upon whether or not the nations of the world act on climate change. It is the future of their children and their friends and all of us.

And in the joy of the announcement of this deal, the New York Times reminded us all that according to top scientists, this will not prevent the earth from warming 3.6 degrees Fahrenheit--or in other words, the minimum temperature that will wreak havoc on our planet’s weather, making a much more volatile earth. Horrible storms, droughts, floods and increased sea levels will ensue.

Climate change is going to get us all if

we don’t act now. It will--there’s too much science behind that statement to believe otherwise.

In many ways climate change is all about responsibility. The sooner we take responsibility, the sooner we will start to mend our differences with the world, and the sooner we will create a safer future for us all.

The president’s actions are responsible, and applauded here. In the United States especially, where it seems politicians have been increasingly lacking in responsibility, President Obama’s efforts show his great effort at trying to work out the paramount problem of our time. And we need people who are responsible about climate change.

Rich and poor, black and white, gay and straight, Christian, Muslim and Jewish. No one will be left unscathed. Climate change is dark, and for our world, our society, and ourselves we absolutely must begin to implement solutions to save us all. th e com municator

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op-ed

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fearsome fast food alexandra hobrecht

Eight out of ten Americans eat fast food at least once a month, according to a recent Gallup survey. In the United States, there are 232,611 fast food establishments, 14,267 of those being McDonalds. These establishments offer tasty food at cheap prices and are, most importantly, convenient. Given the option between taking the time to shop and cook a homemade meal or stopping at a drive-thru on the way home, it’s understandable to see the popular choice being the drive-thru. And whether that choice is made by a college student or parent of four, it’s hard to realize the consequences that lie hidden behind such a decision.

McDonald’s alone sells more than 75 burgers every second worldwide; in America, one billion pounds of beef are consumed every year. That is the equivalent to five and a half million head of cattle. These numbers are obscenely large, yet fast food restaurants continue to pop up in cities across the world. For the next three years, McDonald’s plans to open a new store every day in China, all the while continuing to sell disgustingly unhealthy food. It would take an average person seven straight hours of walking to burn off the equivalent of eating a Big Mac, French fries, and large coke. As shown in the table below, a homemade meal has under one third of the calories of a meal at Burger King or McDonald’s.

McDonald’s is not the only restaurant to

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stay away from. In 2013, journalist David DiSalvo reported some of the ingredients in a Subway breakfast sandwich. The ingredients in the “eggs” are anything but natural; chemicals such as glycerin, a solution used in soap and shaving cream, and calcium silicate, which is used as a sealant on roofs and concrete, are used in making the egg paste. Restaurants’ attempts at being healthy also often backfire. Although Burger King introduced a side salad, they also released a list of ingredients for their lettuce. Normal lettuce should not require a list of ingredients, let alone propylene glycol, which has been labeled safe for human consumption, but can be found in antifreeze and sexual lubricants. The fact that restaurants can keep passing off these items off as “food” continues to amaze me.

With information like this, how do such restaurants manage to remain successful?

As awareness about the quality of their food continues to grow, it would seem there should be a decline in chain-restaurants’ popularity overall. The answer is what makes fast food fast food; it’s cheap, tasty, and quick. Thanks to drive-thrus, customers do not even have to leave their cars to buy meals. The economic decline also makes fast food a more buyable option, even for those who would rather support local restaurants. These factors often out-weigh the unhealthiness.

However, sales have started to decline in the fast food market. According to Time.

com, McDonald’s has posted its largest sale decline in a decade. Stores in the Asia Pacific, Middle East and Africa had a 14.5 percent drop in sales in August 2014, mostly due to news of restaurants selling expired meat to their customers.

McDonald’s sales in the United States also dropped by 2.8 percent, which the corporation claims is due to current competition. Their sales have not been this low since 2003 and I hope to see the decline continue.

Fast food has no nutritional value for your health overall. There is nothing to gain by eating a Big Mac but high cholesterol. The attraction that people, particularly Americans, see in fast food is its convenience, when in reality it is anything but convenient. The food is loaded with unpronounceable chemicals and one mealcan use more than half of a day’s allotted calorie intake. It should seem that even the most vacuous of people can tell fast-food is something to stay away from, let alone feed to children.

As the public continues to learn about what they are actually eating and stops supporting fast food chains, an end to such poor standards could be in the future.

Next time you find yourself in a dilemma of what to eat, don’t choose what may seem to be the simplest option. It may be convenient at the time, but will ultimately turn harmful in the end.

op-ed

the n-word

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eva rosenfeld

Hard R, soft R, in a song, in everyday speech, in front of black people, in front of white people, the variables make no difference; white people should not use the N-word.

From 1619 to about 1860, roughly two and a half centuries, black people were kidnapped from their homelands. They were brought to the United States on slave ships with conditions so brutal that many died on the trip over. Did they survive, they were deemed property and condemned to a life of hard labor and violence at the hands of white people.

Even after the Civil War and the outlawing of slavery, black people were still treated as inhuman; their oppressors continued to murder them on account of their race and fought to refuse as many of their human rights as they could think up.

Today, the effects of all this still rule our social systems. A Pew Research Center analysis of government data from 2009 found that the median net worth of black households was $5,677, versus the median net worth of white households at $113,159. White people still reap the benefits of these centuries of oppression, and black people the repercussions.

Over the course of this, a word was used to assert control over black people and maintain these hierarchies. It was spat as a neat little justification as black people in America were enslaved, beaten, lynched, raped, denied basic human rights, denied education. That word is the N-word. So as a white person, if you choose to use that word, that is the context in which you are using it - as a tool of oppression.

A common argument for the universal use of the N-word is the idea that its meaning has changed, and so it’s okay to say now. However, its meaning has been changed as an act of reclamation by the black community. The reclamation of a word or term occurs when a group adopts a term that was once

disparaging for the group as its own.

It is not logically within the rights of the oppressive group to reclaim a term.

Moreover, this word has been reclaimed as something that black people can do that whites cannot, which is powerful in its own right because among the things that white people have more access to than black people are: education, employment, freedom from incarceration, and living spaces in any neighborhood. So white people can get over being denied access to this one word.

But frankly, its meaning should deter us enough.

The turmoil and confusion that surround this word makes sense. In a few short decades, the word switched from being used as a flagrantly derogatory term unto black people to a reappropriated term used affectionately and in music by black people (it still is used as a derogatory term, but for a long time that was its only meaning).

In 1940, Langston Hughes wrote, “The word n***** to colored people is like a red rag to a bull. Used rightly or wrongly, ironically or seriously, of necessity for the sake of realism, or impishly for the sake of comedy, it doesn’t matter.

Negroes do not like it in any book or play whatsoever, be the book or play ever so sympathetic in its treatment of the basic problems of the race. Even though the book or play is written by a Negro, they still do not like it. The word n*****, you see, sums up for us who are colored all the bitter years of insult and struggle in America.” Since Hughes wrote this, parts of it have become outdated; his “never acceptable” ideology exemplifies the N-word’s previous meaning.

In 1970, Clarence Major published his “Dictionary of Afro-American Slang”, which offers the definition, “used by black people among themselves, it is a racial term with undertones of warmth and goodwill - reflecting…a tragicomic sensibility that is aware of black history.” The word “kaffir”, a comparable

term used as a slur for black people in South Africa, is nowhere close to being used in an affectionate context, so it is truly a phenomenon that the N-word was so rapidly converted from its historical context.

But while it has adopted alternate meanings, it can’t be actually separated from its historical context, and certainly not as long as our society is still built on structural racial oppression. White people forget this- the context in which they’re using the word. White youth are the largest consumers of hip hop, so they are primarily exposed to this word in its reappropriated state, and are apt to overlook the suffering the word has inflicted and continues to inflict.

Another argument is that if we keep applying a negative connotation to the word it actually gives it the properties to continue to be bad. But this school of thought evades taking responsibility for centuries of wrongdoings; we did the damage, and we can’t just write it off when it’s convenient. This is a microcosm of a broader problem: the idea of being “color-blind”, or disregarding the disparities between whites and nonwhites by claiming that racial privilege no longer exists.

Finally, some equate black people saying words like “cracker” to white people’s use of the N-word. While derogatory terms directed at white people might be hurtful on an individual level, they are not contributing to a greater system of oppression and dehumanization, because white people are not systematically oppressed or dehumanized. So while they may not be “nice”, they are not on the same plane as slurs like the N-word in terms of harmfulness.

White people can use the n-word.

Freedom of speech allows that entirely.

However, freedom of speech does not protect us from the social consequences of using a word, justify its use in any way, or make its effects any less damaging.

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op-ed

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why community high should invest in a nap area. why community high dominic difranco & sophia werthmann

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school should invest in a nap area.

how to take the perfect nap: 1. Determine your chronotrype.

- if you sleep from around 9 or 10 pm and wake at 6am, your best nap will be around 1pm.

- If you sleep from around midnight to 8 or 9am, your ideal nap will take place at 2 or 3 pm.

O

ne of the worst naps Judith DeWoskin has ever taken was on the floor in the back of her classroom. It happened during her first year of instructing at Community during lunchtime. Her classroom was locked, so after she fell asleep, students knocked on her door.

“As soon as the kids saw me, they started laughing,” DeWoskin said. “It felt terrible, so I’m very careful that I don’t go down there and check out, because if I fall asleep, it’s horrible.”

Sometimes, naps just happen, which just goes to show how important and necessary they are.

“Once I fell asleep during my eighth grade english class because it was so boring,” Community student Mike Cadigan said.

But what if there was an actual place to nap at school?

The aptness to nap is in human nature; around 85 percent of mammals nap. Humans have made themselves into monophasic sleepers, meaning that they have a designated time for sleep and a designated time for being awake. It hasn’t always been this way. It is estimated that humans started to switch from polyphasic sleep to mainly monophasic sleep during the industrial revolution due to long day work hours. Polyphasic sleepers sleep for short periods throughout the day.

Not all humans today are monophasic sleepers. In Spain, a biphasic sleep pattern is common. Stores in Spain close in the middle of the day for lunch and a nap called a “siesta.” The siesta time lasts for around two hours. The second phase of the biphasic sleep cycle takes place at night and lasts for around five to six hours.

This tradition has been present for thousands of years.

“Back when I was younger, my family had a siesta time,” said Sebastian Iniguez, a junior at community. “My parents encouraged me to sleep or lie down with a book for a few hours every Saturday and Sunday. I was a bit rambunctious.”

According to an article on The Snoring Center’s website by Gary McCarty, “Napping still carries some social stigmas, the biggest of which is that many people view nappers as prone to laziness and napping in general as an indication of a lack of ambition.”

The prejudice towards napping needs to go away. If people are tired, napping is often a good solution. As stated by the National Sleep Foundation, “Naps can restore alertness, enhance performance, and reduce mistakes and accidents. A study at NASA on

2. Find a safe cool, and quiet enviroment.

3. Relax your breathing.

4. Enjoy a 20-45min nap that enhances creative thinking and boosts sensory processing.

sleepy military pilots and astronauts found that a 40-minute nap improved performance by 34% and alertness 100%.” Fortunately there already have been some advances in reducing napping stigma. According to today.com, “Companies like Google, Procter & Gamble and The Huffington Post have created ‘nap rooms’ with recliners for employees to rejuvenate themselves midday with a quick nap.”

But is sleeping everyday normal? Freshman Sabina Fall doesn’t think so.

“No, I think that’s a little excessive. But I mean if you’re really tired, you just need to nap, then you do you,” she said.

Fall, who doesn’t usually nap, also expressed her personal experience with napping.

“I don’t really have time to nap, and then if you just stay up, eventually, then you’re not tired anymore, and then you just go to bed at night, and then you’re good,” she said.

For Natsume Ono, napping occasionally makes her confused.

“Sometimes I’ll wake up super disoriented and I’ll be like, ‘ Where am I, what’s going on, am I where I left off or did I move somewhere?’” she said. Fall agrees. “Sometimes you just feel really like confused and tired,” she said.

The important thing is that naps can help boost people’s alertness. And with high schoolers’ exhausting schedules, napping couldn’t be more helpful. For this reason, Community High School should implement an area in the school where people can nap during free blocks. Established professional workplaces have created areas for employees to nap in order to increase their efficiency, so it would be advisable for CHS to do the same.

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holiday word search. can you find all the words? josh krauth-harding

S V V I

O D C C L

V D U J

S

J

K N G M S X S W N Z

O V L

H

O

L

F

H

Y

C P A

U

O O A P R A I

E F

W W W M J

N N A I

K M D M M W Y T K D T

Z

U A Z

Q I

O G G Z

E H I

B S S G D Z

N R N I

Y E Y B H L

E G F

Z

A C A W E E G I

W Z

T

J

N I

I

S T

R A B L

F

C K

E

G K

X

G W U

H

V J I

O D F F

D R S A M T

O E P N B I

E L

I

O N

E O Z

Y

A

V

R H

C

G S M J

Y

S I

E U

T

E R E

E

R A K K O E W Y H G E R C J

Y

D Q S T

W

S E E B W S I

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R W D C F O L

O C K I

Z

N G C I

CHRISTMAS

HOLIDAYS

SLEIGH

FIGS

ICE

SNOW

GIFTS

JOY

SNOWMAN

GINGERBREAD

REINDEER

STOCKING

HANUKKAH

SANTA

WINTER

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J

Y T

holiday crossword.

shorts 1

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katy stegemann

3

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6

5

8

7

9

10 11 12

Across: 1. A kind of log, not from a tree.

5. Individual hand pockets.

6. Jesus in the ______, French verb for, “to eat.”

9. What is a red, white, and blue treat during Christmas time? A sad _____ ____?

10. From Atlantic to _______, Gee, the traffic is terrific.

12. Skipper, Kowalski, Rico, and Private.

13

Down: 2. “There was more than one _______ present at the birth of Jesus?”

3. What Jewish people will be celebrating this holiday season.

4. There’s a tree in the _____ Hotel, one in the park as well.

7. Mean + Green.

8. Dancing and ________ in Jingle Bell Square.

11. The traditional Christmas meal.

12. Partridge in a ____ tree.

13. ___ geese-a-laying. th e com municator 49

shorts

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things to know about your car

chase dudley eliza upton illustration

adding wiper fluid

1. Purchase Wiper fluid from local auto store.

2. Open the hood of your car.

3. Locate the wiper fluid cap and open it to check the level of fluid inside.

4. Pour the wiper fluid into the reservoir until it reaches the top.

5. Close the wiper fluid cap and close the hood of the car.

changing your flat tire

1. Find a safe spot to pull over.

2. Locate the spare tire and tool kit.

3. Use the wrench to loosen the lug nuts.

4. Use the jack to lift the vehicle off the ground.

5. Remove the lug nuts and pull the tire off the car.

6. Place the spare on the car.

checking your car’s oil

replacing your air filter

1. Buy the correct replacement air filter.

2. Open the hood of the car.

3. Locate the air filter unit.

4. Remove the air filter cover.

5. Take out the air filter.

6. Replace with the new air filter.

7. Replace the cover.

replacing your car battery

1. Buy a replacement battery for your car.

2. Unscrew the battery hold down clamp.

3. Remove connection from positive and neg ative sides of the battery.

4. Place the new battery into the battery tray.

5. Reconnect positve and negatice connection.

6. Dispose of the old battery properly.

Checking tire thread

1. With the engine off, open the car’s hood and find the dipstick.

2. Pull the dipstick out from the engine and wipe any oil off from its end.

3. Insert the dipstick back into its tube and push it all the way back in.

4. Pull it back out, and this time look at both sides of the dipstick to see where the oil is on the end.

1. To see if your tires have enough tread you will need a penny.

2. Take the penny with Lincoln’s head pointing down and set it into the center groove of the tire.

3. If the thread goes past the top of Lincolns head, the tire has a legal amount of tread.

4. If the tire has an uneven amount of tread across the tire, you should consider replac ing them.

checking your tire pressure

replacing your wiper blades

1. Check the pressure recommended for your car.

2. Use an accurate tire gauge to measure psi.

3. You can add or release air from the valve stem until your tire’s pressure matches the recommended pressure.

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r

1. Buy your Blades. Before you go to buy them, make sure you know the exact model of your car.

2. Remove the Old Ones.

3. Pull the entire wiper assembly up, so that they remain vertical.

4. Attach the New Ones.

reviews.

Zingerman’s This cup of hot gloriousness is a little heavy on the green; however, if you are interested in a river of warm tangy chocolate streaming down your throat, it’s worth it. This Mexican hot chocolate blend has a nice array of spices that separates itself from other big dog competitors. Sweet, tangy, fun with a twist.

Starbucks The cocoa from Starbucks is a new, inventive spin on hot chocolate. While I admire the risk and individuality of the store, I feel as though the cup was heavy on the bitter accents.

After drinking a cup of hot chocolate my soul is searching for a warm, glowing sensation.

This drink may cater toward a certain person or palate, but in my opinion Starbucks should search for an emphasis on seasonal love in their price heavy hot chocolate.

Sweetwaters Our neighbors across the way have personally let me down. Their hot chocolate was quite watery and lacking overall personality. The liquid had very light chocolate and incorporated no original taste or expression. To make matters worse, this cup of disappointment is a whopping $2.90. It is pretty competitive out here in hot chocolate world and Sweetwaters is really not a major player.

Mighty Good

caroline phillips

Mighty Good delivered an excellent classic cup of hot chocolate – my favorite for the review. This cup had the original, excellent flavor with a satisfying density. It came with a magical serving of whipped cream and the perfect temperature creating a symphony of flavor and a lovely, smile-evoking experience.

zingermans prices rating

starbucks sweetwaters mighty good

$3.50

$3.50

$2.90

$2.50

8.8

6

3.3

9.7

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1/2 cup of walnuts

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cup of plain yogurt

Walnuts contain a powerfully beneficial amino acid known as L-arginine. This amino acid can benifit the heart by improving blood circulation, kidneys, and the immune system. Walnuts also contain Omega-3 Fatty Acids which can help lower cholestorol. Some studies suggest that Omega-3’s can contribute to decrasing symptoms of depression and ADHD.

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cup of dried cherries or cranberries

Dried Fruit is an excellent source of Dietary Fiber. Dietary is important to your digestive tract. According to Mayo Clinic, Dietary Fiber helps normalize bowel movements, maintain bowel health, lower cholestorol levels, and control levels of blood sugar.

The reccomended serving of fiber per day is 25-38 grams. 1 serving of dried cranberries provides 3 grams of fiber.

easy BREAKFAST sophia simon

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cup of chocolate chips In moderation, chocolate is a delicious desert providing strong health benefits. Accordingto WebMD, chocolate can “reduce the risk of cardiovascular disease and heart attack by lowering blood pressure and decreasing LDL oxidation.” In this particular recipe, chocolate chips add a bold and sweetened flavor to the nuts, yogurt, and dried fruit.

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cup of pecans Pecans are abundant in nutrients that provide energy. Pecans, like many nuts, are a good source of antioxidants; acids and vitamins that diltue toxins in the body. Vitamin B, also found in Pecans, is a nutrient that positively affects metabolism. Nuts in general are an efficient way of supplying yur body with more diverse selections of minerals and vitamins.

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RECALLING INFLUENTIAL LOVED ONES THROUGH PHOTOGRAPHS

Sabina Fall

James Farmer

As toddlers, Gloria Fall, and her younger sister, Sabina enjoyed running around half-naked outside their house in Dexter. They thought it would be a great idea to splatter paint all over their bodies. Gloria and Sabina remain just as close today.

After Gloria and Sabina’s two older sisters left for college, their relationship became closer than ever, as they were the only siblings left in the house. Gloria now calls her sister “Sabs” and likes to do almost everything with her. If she finds a weird Youtube video, the first person she shares it with is Sabina, as they share the same sense of humor.

One of Gloria’s favorite qualities that she sees in Sabina is her kindness. Every year for Christmas, Sabina makes homemade gifts for everyone in their family. Gloria admires this thoughtfulness.

The only time Gloria does not get along with her sister is when they steal each other’s clothes. These moments are few and far between, however.

Gloria sees the same unwavering confidence and honesty in her sister, but with more of a filter. She hopes this attitude carries her far in life.

“I hope Sabina can realize she is the nicest, coolest girl alive,” said Gloria. “I want her to learn how to be happy with herself. She doesn’t need to feel down on herself because she’s so freakin’ awesome.”

Three days a week, Avery and his younger brother James play Mario Kart together. Whether it be playing chess, or watching sports, Avery greatly values the time he shares with his brother.

Avery believes their relationship is so strong because he admires the type of person his brother is. James never fails to make Avery laugh, and adds energy and enthusiasm to otherwise ordinary situations.

Despite their great relationship, they still have the occasional tiffs, as many brothers do. Sometimes when Avery is trying to do homework, James will come down and play his trombone, which doesn’t always make Avery happy. Even so, Avery hopes to help James “navigate the confusing ocean of middle school.”

Avery believes that as an older brother, James picks up on some of the behaviors he exemplifies.

Because of this, Avery is honest with his parents, and James as well. He also encourages James to embrace who he is, and not worry what others think of him.

As James gets older and Avery will eventually go to college, his only hope for his younger brother is that he be happy. “I hope he finds something he’s passionate about doing and does it,” Avery said.

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art throb ada banks