Monday, October 19, 2020
The Student Voice of California State University, Fullerton
Students push to expand voting accessibility
Drag queens slay the Zoom runway The LBGTQ Center held the show for Coming Out week on Wednesday. ANTHONY ROBLES Staff Writer
PHOTO ILLUSTRATION BY KARINA GUTIERREZ
University will explore making election day a campus-wide holiday. LETTICIA PEREZ Asst. Editor
While holding elections during a pandemic brings its challenges, Cal State Fullerton’s Associated Students offered a resolution which aims to expand and promote campus-wide voting to the Academic Senate.
The resolution states that voting is the cornerstone of our democracy and was adopted unanimously with zero objections. The document highlights the university’s hope to keep Titans informed, active and engaged citizens during this election season. “CSUF Academic Senate encourages collaboration between CSUF and the Orange County Registrar of Voters to secure accessible vote centers at the CSUF
main campus and at the CSUF Irvine Center for all future elections,” according to the resolution. Besides opening a voting center on campus, the installation of a drive-thr u vote-by-mail ballot drop-off in Lot R outside of the Titan Student Union was suggested to make drop-offs more accessible for students, faculty and staff. SEE BOOTH
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Volume 108 Issue 9
The music was blasting and spectators were commenting as drag queens performed for a virtual crowd Wednesday night, as part of an event for National Coming Out Week. The show was organized through a Zoom meeting by the Cal State Fullerton LGBTQ Resource Center in cooperation with the CSUF Housing and Residential Engagement, it featured a brief history of drag as an art form, which was followed by the main event of performers in full drag dancing and lip syncing to popular songs. The event was hosted by Alessandra Divine, a CSUF alumni and drag performer, who said through an Instagram direct message that she enjoys performing
shows for students, which brings back memories. “I do this specific show because it brings back memories of my undergrad. All the students always have so much fun at the shows and I have a blast doing it,” Divine said. “Drag has become more mainstream on media and it is good to bring it to the youth live and in person.” Among the virtual crowd was Monserrat Rodriguez, a music education major, who said that gatherings like this really bring together the community and are a safe space for people to be themselves. “I wanted to attend because I wanted a sense of community and really miss seeing everyone doing their thing,” Rodriguez said in the chat room. “It makes me happy that people are able to be themselves in a social (virtual) gathering/ environment like this and have a good time.” SEE DANCE
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Gastronome Visual artists challenged by lack of creativity reduces staff amid low need New COVID-19 safety protocols are similiar to public restaurants. CAMERON BLUNT Staff Writer
The Gastronome closed its doors in March along with the Cal State Fullerton campus and student housing due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Though it has since reopened at the start of the 2020-21 academic year, things have changed. Ali Hamze, the food service director at the Gastronome, said in an email to the Daily Titan that they had made the decision to furlough and lay off a majority of the staff due to the reduced demand. “With the decrease in demand, we could no longer maintain our staffing levels,” Hamze said. “During a typical school year we employ about 130 employees. We have been able to bring back about 30 team members, with an additional 25 on extended leave.” Those who remain working at the Gastronome had
to go through many new changes this semester. Jorge Reyes, a fourth-year student majoring in cinema and television arts at CSUF, had worked at the Gastronome for a year and a half before getting laid off recently. He saw significant changes with the amount of employees and students he would see. “We restarted the Gastronome in late August, everything is way different, it’s a lot more precautions with your work basically,” Reyes said. “Another big change was just the amount of students, we went from 2,000 to about 200. We had 70 student workers and then it went down to 20.” Many of the new protocols put in place are like most public restaurants, with temperature checks, frequent hand-washing, changing gloves and limited food contact. As for the customers, wearing a mask and social distancing is required when inside the Gastronome. Temperature checks are also mandatory for employees. SEE FOOD
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CINDY PROAÑO / DAILY TITAN
Students struggle to find inspiration with the new virtual format. JASON SANCHEZ Asst. Editor
In addition to the economic stress caused by COVID-19, Cal State Fullerton’s visual art students are facing another challenge: a lack of creative muse. When the country shut down in March, Sami Meza, a junior art education major
and portrait artist, suddenly had more time to work on her art now that she didn’t have to commute to campus. But after a while, Meza said she felt burnt out, and her desire to draw was starting to wear thin. “I felt like I resented it in a way, I kind of felt like ‘ugh’, like I have to do this again,’” Meza said. For Meza, feelings of guilt quickly set in for not using the extra time she had to hone in on her
craft, she said. “It’s like you want to draw every day, and you want to be really diligent with making sure you’re improving. But it does become really hard when you’re tired of doing that all day,” Meza said. Meza said it has also been a challenge to manage both her home and work life now that it’s all at the same location. SEE CRAFT
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