The Southerner, Volume 68, Issue 2

HENRY W. GRADY HIGH SCHOOL, ATLANTA

Oct. 20, 2014

VOLUME LXVIII, NUMBER 2

Citing traffic, noise and damage to the park, multiple neighborhood groups around Piedmont Park voted against the festival’s disruption of their community. page 7

Decker D’Alesio

Does Music Midtown help or hurt the Grady community? Guest columnists Carolyn Capelouto and Chase Kleber offer contrasting opinions. page 4

Hackers expose flaw in security systems

By Harrison Wilco and Will Taft ow I know your face, I will find you … I will get you.”

This threatening message confronted a Grady student after his Mac laptop’s webcam turned on without his command.

During the peak of a wave of hostile computer takeovers that began around Labor Day, students exploited the sharing capabilities see HACKERS, page 6

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After more than 10 years of delays, Atlanta’s streetcar project is finally moving forward.

The line, which is set to run through Auburn Avenue and Edgewood avenues, will have a total of 12 stops throughout downtown.

Jennifer Steckl

Carter Guensler

Margo Stockdale

Music Midtown Atlanta native and Music Midtown artist Ron Pope discusses the long road from festival attendee to performer in an exclusive Southerner interview. page 16

To soak in the sights and sounds of this year’s festival, please visit our website where you will find videos and a comprehensive photo slideshow. thesoutherneronline.com

BELTLINE FUNDING CREATES DISPUTE BETWEEN APS, CITY T

By Mary Claire Morris he Atlanta BeltLine is a work in progress, but the walking and biking trails have already gained popularity across the city. The multibillion dollar project, however, is primarily funded by a Tax Allocation District, or TAD, which uses a portion of property tax revenue that would otherwise be allocated to the Atlanta Public Schools and Fulton County. In return for reallocation of tax revenues for BeltLine development, the city is required to make fixed payments to APS and the county over time. Although the city has remained up to date on payments to Fulton County, payments to APS have recently lagged behind.

In 2005, the BeltLine TAD was created by then Mayor Shirley Franklin. In an agreement negotiated between APS, the City of Atlanta and Invest Atlanta, both APS and Fulton County agreed to give any increases in the amount of property tax revenue they would receive from the TAD to the city.

The is obligated to make annual and biannual pay-

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Nikolai Curtis is more than your average science teacher. Formerly employed at Zoo Atlanta, he now volunteers at DragonCon. Despite tragedy, Curtis remains optimistic with help from his friends and Grady family.

ments to the schools and county until the projected completion date of the project in 2035. The payments to APS will total $165 million and increase over time, peaking at $16 million a year. The most recent sum of $6.75 million was due in January 2014.According to Linville and multiple media sources, as of Oct. 20 this sum has not been paid. Another $6.75 million is due in January 2015.

City officials maintain that the delay in payment is not a breach of contract because the contract stipulates no legal action is warranted until the cumulative missed payments total $15 million are two years late.

According to Linville there have been no formal negotiations regarding the issue, but if these were to take place, APS would be prepared.

“We fully expect the city to make the payment that is owed currently and the next payment,” Linville said. see APS, page 5

15 thesoutherneronline.com

For many Atlantan artists, the BeltLine is not just a walking path through the city; it’s an ever changing art exhibition. Sculptures, graffiti and other art mediums can all be viewed by the walkers, bikers and visitors to the Beltline.

For complete coverage of the gubernatorial and senatorial debates, including blogs and photo slideshows, please visit our website. Stay tuned to our Facebook and Twitter feeds for full Election Night coverage on Tuesday, Nov. 4.

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Editorial Board Margo Stockdale Mary Claire Morris Jenni Rogan Ben Simonds-Malamud Anna Braxton Carter Guensler Lucia Lombardo Griffin Kish

Applying ourselves Applying to college is perhaps the most stressful part of high school. First semester of senior year is spent toiling away on formulaic applications that determine our entire futures. The sheer amount of work required to apply to college–writing essays upon essays, answering in-depth questions about our backgrounds and tirelessly scouring our resumes–adds up.

Navgating the gauntlet of homework, extracurriculars and the stress of adolescence, seniors often can only find time to work on their college applications in the wee hours of the morning or during spare minutes they have on the weekends. And that isn’t fair.

College applications should not be worked on haphazardly, and the most productive environment to work on them would be the classroom. All seniors should have a class in which they work solely on college applications. It would likely benefit all seniors, as those who aren’t sure of what they need for college applications can receive assistance and those who simply don’t have enough time to sufficiently complete their applications can get them finished.

Grady offers a few electives in which teachers grant senior students some time to work on their applications, but the majority of seniors are placed in electives simply to fill their schedules. These classes are far less useful to seniors than a class dedicated to the completion and revision of college applications and essays would be.

Grady offers students with part time jobs a co-op plan. This plan, however, does not specify that this time can be used to complete applications. While this kind of plan may be a liability issue, a class scheduled during school hours for this purpose would be beneficial.

It may be too late this year to implement this plan, but the editorial board urges the administration to consider it for future classes. p

Useless fight policy After a week with three fights on three consecutive days and a riot in the Grady parking lot Friday, Grady administration announced on Sept. 29 that fights will not be tolerated in the future. Under the new policy, students caught watching fights will be punished along with the students fighting. Although the message of this announcement is good, the execution was poor.

First, it is no secret that the majority of students do not listen to the announcements. Yes, there are a few teachers who urge their students to stay quiet, but most teachers use this time at the end of the day to hurry through the rest of the lesson. Even if the announcement is opened with "attention all students," there will still be students that fail to pay attention.

Second, in the past the administration has also sent home written notices so parents can learn about a change in policy. For this new policy on fights, however, a letter was not issued. Although official letters often get lost in backpacks or thrown away before they are able to reach home, the letters that do make it home allow parents to have discussions with their children to make sure that both parties understand what the letter says. With no letter about the fights, parents who will inevitably learn that their child was sent to the discipline office for watching a fight take place will be reasonably confused and possibly angry.

Third, the casual announcement at the end of the day brought up a question in many students’ minds: Will the disciplinary actions mentioned in the announcement actually be enforced? After four years at Grady, we as an editorial board have experienced a lot of changes and even more plans for changes that were never implemented. Frankly, if nothing changes in regards to fights during school hours, very few students will be surprised.

Finally, and most importantly, students will be students. We will have rap battles during lunch and squeals of friendship in the hallway. We will roam the halls and, on occasion, we will fight each other. All of these things, no matter what attempts the administration makes to stop them, will always exist. It’s part of what makes us who we are. Becasue of this, administration’s attempts to curtail these student behaviors will always be in vain. p

Dear editors, The Cooper Harris case was indeed a tragedy (“Is it always a crime to leave your kids in a car alone,” page 4, Sept. 5). I don’t think that anybody disputes that. I’m afraid, however, we don’t see eye to eye on the Charnae Mosley case. While 16 minutes may not seem like a long time, there are still several things that could happen in the short period.

Should the amount of time that it’s acceptable to leave your child in the car alone be some arbitrary figure?

What’s the “criminal” amount of time? Thirty minutes? An hour? It’s necessary to take action in cases like that of Mosley. It may seem harsh, but if it prevents even just one child from being harmed by this method of neglect, then I believe it is 100 percent justified.

Zach Peters, senior Dear editors, I loved Ludovica Longo and Ann Poznyak’s stories (“I come to praise Grady, not bury it,” page 3, “Firstday contrast creates confusion, clarifies corollary,” page 3, Sept. 5).

These seemingly sister stories compare and contrast the two student’s first day at Grady to their first day

at their schools in Italy and Russia, respectively. The worldly perspective the stories provided was both intriguing and beneficial. I think it provided readers with a unique voice and material students could only find in The Southerner.

In the future, I would love to read similar types of stories written by our foreign-exchange students. A series of stories, even, commenting on the differences between Grady and other countries (or even state s) schools would be really interesting, and I think you would receive a lot of positive feedback!

Meredith Fossitt, junior Dear editors, I really liked “The Young and Deskless: Scheduling Madness Ensues” (page 8, Sept. 5). Being an 10thgrader at Grady, I have gone through two new school years. I experienced trouble with scheduling both years.

In ninth grade, my science class got switched several times, and in 10th grade, I was put into a rec games class that I had already taken. Both conflicts were solved relatively quickly.

The article does a really good job explaining what is happening behind the scenes. When your schedule is

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screwed up, it is extremely frustrating, but it is nice to know that there are many people working to straighten it out. I do wish that there weren’t scheduling issues in the first place.

Hannah Stockdale, sophomore Dear editors, I liked the student stance, as I always do, but this time the kids didn’t have a clear stance (“Has the media’s portrayal of Michael Brown been accurate?,” page 4, Sept. 5). I liked the interview with the new teacher.

I think it shows that he is a nice guy, and helps the students get to know him. Some of the questions were unnecessary, but funny. I thought it was a really good issue, and I enjoyed reading it.

Sam Lombardo, sophomore

We want to know what you think!

Love an article? Hate one? Find an error? Tell us about it! The Southerner welcomes letters from all of our readers. Submit comments to room E106 or contact us on Facebook.

f the month

What is your favorite fall drink?

C O R R E C T I O N S Nick Caamano, a senior staff writer, was not listed in The Southerner staff list.

Griffin Kish played on the Atlanta U19 Youth Club Championship team, but was not mentioned in the story. Our May page-one lead story (“Creationism in classroom causes concern,” page 1, May 21) inaccurately paraphrased Isabel Olson’s statement. Olson told The Southerner Anquinette Jones had the students in her spring 2013 biology class prepare to debate creationism versus evolution.

The story reported incorrectly that the debates occurred in Olson’s class.

Website Editor: Madeline Veira Staff: Josey Allen, Reilly Blum, Nick Caamano, William Chapman, Sophie Durham, Grace Dusenbury, Hannah Ferguson, Carson Fleming, Gracie Griffith, Nick Hamilton, Keegan Hasson, Grace Hawkins, Eli Hendler, Bailey Kish, Gabe Kovacs, John Lansing, Noah Li, Katherine Merritt, Conrad Newton, Isabel Olson, Matthew Peterson, Brett Pollock, Anna Poznyak, Chloe Prendergast, Max Rafferty, Anders Russell, Graham Russell,

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Sparkling seltzer-water .”

Skyler Diacou, junior

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Pumpkin-spice latte.”

Harrison Thweatt, sophomore

Southerner Staff 2014-2015 Editor-in-Chief: Margo Stockdale Managing Editors: Mary Claire Morris, Jenni Rogan, Ben Simonds-Malamud Associate Managing Editors: Anna Braxton, Carter Guensler, Lucia Lombardo News Editor: Brandon Kleber Comment Editor: Griffin Kish Lifestyle/A&E Editors: Emily Dean, Maxwell Rabb Sports Editors: Chris Brown, Ike Hammond Photo and Social Media Editor: Jennifer Steckl

Oct. 20, 2014

Caramel cappuccino.”

Summer Gebba, freshman

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70 percent Coke slushy, 15 percent blue raspberry slushy and 15 percent cherry slushy. “ Decker D’Alesio, senior

An upbeat paper for a downtown school Kelly Scollard, John Slovensky, Will Taft, Jaleel Vaughn, Kate Weatherby, Harrison Wilco, James Winer, Sydney Wolfe, Matt Wood Adviser: Dave Winter The Southerner, a member of GSPA, SIPA, CSPA and NSPA, is a monthly student publication of: Henry W. Grady High School 929 Charles Allen Drive NE, Atlanta, GA 30309

To our readers, The Southerner welcomes submissions, which may be edited for grammar, inappropriate language and length. Please place submissions in Mr. Winter’s box in the main office.

Subscriptions are also available. For more information, please contact Mr. Winter or a member of the staff.

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CHLOE PRENDERGAST

Oct. 20, 2014

Sleepless nights lead to straight F’s Even as I write this, I’m yawning. My eyelids are drooping and they’re a little bit watery, and I know if I just closed them and put down my head, I’d be out like Reilly Blum a light. But thanks to school work, extracurriculars and early morning tutorials, I’m perpetually tired.

I know I’m not alone. According to a 2006 study by the National Sleep Foundation, about 62 percent of high school students regularly start their days with insufficient amounts of sleep, and another 25 percent wake with what is considered “borderline” sleep, between eight and nine hours. The optimal amount of sleep for high school students is about 9.25 hours, but for me, at least, that goal never quite becomes a reality.

The night before I wrote this column, I stayed awake far later than I should have because I had two study guides, a Latin project, and a calculus problem set to complete. My alarm blared way too early, but I rose anyway and stumbled to the bathroom. I nearly shrieked with fear at the sight of the bleary-eyed monster looking back at me in the mirror.

How was my day? Take a guess. Yeah, it

wasn’t too great. I spent most of Latin trying to wake up properly. I’m pretty sure I fell asleep in the middle of a history test, but maybe I just drifted off. I definitely fell asleep with my eyes open while trying to decipher derivatives and tangent lines in calculus, and because I wasn’t paying any attention to the lecture, I knew that I’d have to go home and study extra hard. I had a particularly difficult time in cross-country practice— it’s hard to focus on running and endurance when your eyes keep trying to shut.

When I got home, I wanted nothing more than to collapse in bed, but I had work to do.

I’m in the midst of a vicious cycle: I wake up too early and stay up too late. Because I’m used to this pattern, it’s difficult to break. Part of this routine is due to homework. Junior year has thrown me a curveball—I’ve probably done more work in the past six weeks than I did all of freshman year.

Electronics are another important factor.

Computers and phones emit light that effectively tricks the brain into thinking it’s still daytime by delaying the release of a chemical called melatonin. This is why I feel like I could die from tiredness during the day, and only feel awake right when I should be hitting the sack.

The greatest enemy to my sleep, however,

is psychological. What does another hour of sleep matter when I could be finishing some homework or doing something productive?

The answer: a lot. Sleep deprivation has consequences serious enough to keep anyone up at night. Besides a sluggish, grumpy day, it can lead to memory impairment, depression, high blood pressure, stunted growth and obesity. In more serious, prolonged cases, it can also cause stroke, heart failure, heart attack and diabetes.

As if these weren’t bad enough, a study published last year by the Journal of Sleep Research found that sleep-deprived teenagers are generally more prone to colds and other illnesses.

Sleep is especially important for adolescents, but unfortunately high school students tend to prioritize everything over their rest.

Snoozing extra on the weekends doesn’t help matters at all. In fact, this binge sleeping can lead to more detrimental sleeping habits during the week. Sleep deprivation is such a sneaky self-destructive habit, and it can’t be justified with a thick stack of worksheets.

Working at night generally isn’t very productive—it’s far easier to work with a full-night’s rest.

Here’s the bottom line: stop reading this article, put your head down, and take what is probably a much-needed nap. p

Ballet dances on the barre of equality Search “ballet” on Google images, and you will have a hard time finding a man.

You expect to see girls dancing in tutus with pink tights, shoes and bows in their perfectly formed ballet buns. I know I do.

Being a dancer myself, I respect the dance world. I also acknowledge, however, a problem that has been perpetuated over the course of centuries and still remains today: Isabel Olson ballet’s mixed reviews on feminism, or equality between the sexes.

Beginning in the Renaissance, ballet spread, rapidly changing everywhere it went. At first, both men and women held equal stature in the dance world, but over time ballet has become increasingly skewed towards females.

Today ballet is branded as a girls’ activity, and is rarely considered a sport. These stereotypes have become conflicted with the art form, convincing boys that ballet is “gay” and not for them. Ballet companies around the world are trying to fight this image, attempting to get more male dancers into the sport. Altering ballet’s gender roles would change long-standing traditions.

For people to see ballet as an opportunity for both sexes, men can’t always be the ones supporting women, and women shouldn’t always be the ones starring in the pas de deux, or dance between leads. If men take on more lead roles, ballet will begin to showcase the male’s potential and opportunity.

Ballet continues to perpetuate the stereotype of the “perfect” bal-

lerina. Young girls are told they must be skinny and petite. Being put in front of mirrors every day in only a leotard and tights, having to be light so the man can lift you, and having to be thin so you are easier on the audience’s eye, are all damaging myths that ballet perpetuates.

A ballerina does not need to be thin, skinny or light. They need to be lean, have solid muscles, but most importantly, be confident.

Today, the dance world is gravitating away from the “classic” ballerina body and toward girls with substantial muscle and weight. Misty Copeland, the principal dancer for the American Ballet Theatre, is known for her curves and muscle, but she had to fight her way to the top of the world-renown ballet company. No longer is it interesting to watch a petite woman dance while being held up by a man.

Starting ballet 10 years later than most girls, and having come from a gymnastics background, I was not skinny. I was built. I was never embarrassed of being in just a leotard because I had done that my entire life, but being in a ballet class was different than being in a gym. For the first year of ballet I could barely make myself go to class because of how my body compared to those around me. It took me all year to overcome the stereotype and realize my body was an advantage. After all, the only things that are going to get one’s leg into a grand battement a la seconde are those sturdy thighs.

With the ever-changing audience and companies’ views of the art, dance is rapidly altering its means of entertainment, especially when it comes to showcasing gender equality: getting men larger roles, treating women as more than stick figures and creating a true pa de deux, or dance of two, for both men and women to share the spotlight. p

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Testing tribulations: excess tests just test students’ tolerance Sweaty hands, racing heartbeat and a sense of dread and anxiety are all feelings I have had before taking a standardized or “high-stakes” test. The thought of determining a student’s mastery of a subKate Weatherby ject based on the results of a single test is ridiculous. These days, however, students are tested often throughout the school year in excessive amounts.

Standardized testing doesn’t only judge students on their knowledge of the subject, but also how well they can problem solve and dissect the true question being asked. The questions are rarely clear on any of these tests, causing simple mistakes just because the purpose of the question was not as straightforward as it could have or should have been.

This focus on testing creates multiple problems.

First, teachers not only have to teach the material, but also to invest time in teaching test-taking skills so that students can succeed on these cryptic tests. As a result of high-stakes testing, teachers must teach only the curriculum on the test and not try to expand students’ knowledge. Classes are not supposed to be centered around one test to judge everything students have learned in a year, but rather on the curriculum and how students do throughout the year at multiple intervals.

Second, high school students are already extremely stressed out. The choices of colleges, AP classes, extracurriculars and normal classes are enough of a burden for a teenager to bear. Success on End of Course Tests is irrelevant to the students’ actual understanding of their classes.The SAT and ACT are even worse. These analytical tests are used to judge how prepared students are for college, but in reality are just tests of memorization. None of these tests actually test students’ mastery of their courses.

When students do get a break from these tests critical to our future, they have to toil over other standardized tests that may not be as important but are just as demanding as the other tests. This year, new requirements for pre-tests and post-tests were implemented, along with the continuation of Student Learning Objective assessments.

During the first month of school, an excessive amount of class time was spent completing these futile tests which elicit no prior knowledge. Many students don’t even read the questions and just fill in the bubbles to show completion. The SLO and pre-tests don’t count for a grade for the students, but they do matter to the teachers and their evaluations.

In the past, we’ve seen the results of highstakes testing on teachers; APS is still recovering from the 2009 cheating scandal. It seems a little early for a new superintendent to pressure students and teachers for high performance expectations on tests.

In addition to the stress on teachers and students and the extensive time used to take them, tests incur large costs. In 2012, a study by Brookings Institute estimated that the United States spends $1.7 billion a year on standardized testing.

This money could be better spent on improving education in lower-income cities and areas, or giving teachers better resources.

The amount of standardized testing in the district and the country has reached an all-time high with an equally high cost, and it is completely unnecessary to have these tests be a standard part of our education. p

EXCLUSIVELY @ theSoutherneronline.com Have theater audiences lost their minds?

In a recent article on Market Watch, personal finance reporter Quinten Fottrell wrote that “If marquees were emblazoned with critics’ opinions of audiences, they might read something like, ‘The spotlight is meant to be on the stage– not on you!’ or ...

Atheletes must be brainy, not just brawny “Play it smart!” Coach yells from the sidelines. We’re losing our cool as well as the game, and she is not happy about it. I crouch low and keep my hands oustretched as I eye the server. I know the drill, get the ball over and in. Cheat back because...

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Oct. 20, 2014

Music festival brings money, fun and fans

Music Midtown does more harm than good

The beeping of the construction vehicles has finally ceased. The traffic is back to (what we call) normal. The brown puddles begin to form, and at first glance after Music Midtown ended, most would look at the music festival as extremely harmful to our community.

The benefits to the Grady community, however, easily outweigh any potential risks that Music Midtown may have caused to our school and community.

The first benefit is the money. With Live Nation hosting this massive event, the money made is distributed among many different parties. Obviously, Live Nation and the actual artists receive the majority of the revenue, but there’s still a substantial amount of money distributed to local groups. Last year, the City of Atlanta received $400,000 from Live Nation. On top of that, the Piedmont Park Conservancy was given $100,000 for providing consulting services, and though I don’t know the specific amount, APS was definitely given money.

Critics of the festival claim that it harms the park, but Live Nation can’t control the weather. Rain or shine, the shows will go on, and the festival will be packed no matter what. Last year, people looked at someone to blame for the destruction of the parks’ fields, and naturally, people pointed at Live Nation as if it was their fault that it rained.

What those people may not have known, however, is that Live Nation invested the time and money necessary to repair the fields. They left the park better than it was before Music Midtown, and they were willing to do whatever is essential to restore and improve any issues with the park.

Another perceived problem is the setting. Based on what I see in today’s news, I personally have experienced very few times that I am proud to say I’m from Atlanta. Our sports teams disappoint us every year, we had Ebola for a few weeks, we have the highest unemployment rate. When I see how much people from other cities love their hometown it makes me envious. Music Midtown changes that. Finally, there is something that I enjoy seeing next to the word “Atlanta” in the papers. Throughout the year, my friends from all over the Southeast (and the country) reach out to me with their excitement to come to MY city for this festival. A big city like Atlanta deserves a big music festival, and Music Midtown tries its hardest to boost the reputation of our music scene.

The atmosphere. The fun. Music Midtown, even for just two days, provides us with a break from reality—a weekend where we can sit back, hang with friends and enjoy the amazing bands and artists. When people pinpoint any minor negatives that may occur from Music Midtown, ask them if they had fun listening to Enimem or dancing to Iggy Azalea. Regardless of whether or not they actually went into the concerts, nine times out of 10 they will say yes. The City of Atlanta shuts down and is able to exhale for once. We lounge, we listen and we have a great time because of all that Music Midtown provides for us. p

On Sept. 19 and 20, the wildly popular Music Midtown festival took place in Piedmont Park, right across from Grady. The festival attracted more than 150,000 people, including many Grady students. Although it’s hard to find someone who didn’t enjoy themselves at the concert, the negative effects of Music Midtown on Grady overrule the positive, especially when you consider that Grady barely gets anything in return.

Construction for the concert began as early as two weeks before the festival. This caused a lane on 10th Street to be closed, clogging up traffic going in and out of the student parking lot. I can only imagine how long it would take a student to get into the 10th Street lot on an already crowded weekday morning. During the weekend of the festival, 10th Street is blocked off, as are many side streets. As a concertgoer this year, my plans were not affected because I was in the park, but for many neighbors, going anywhere on Music Midtown weekend was a nightmare.

Luckily, the weather held out this year, causing the damage to the park to be not nearly as bad as last year, when it rained the whole weekend. Even given the perfect weather, Piedmont Park was left trampled and nearly ruined, due to the amount of people running, dancing and jumping during the festival. Even weeks after the festival, it’s still obvious that the park is in worse condition than usual.

This year, the Midtown Neighborhood Board voted down the application for Music Midtown 2014 because of traffic concerns, noise and safety. Their vote didn’t hold the power to move Music Midtown from Piedmont Park, but it certainly says something about how the community feels about the festival.

Sound checks occurred on the Thursday and Friday before the festival and could be heard throughout the school. Because I was attending Music Midtown, the sound checks got me even more excited for the weekend and made it harder to focus on my work. I can see, however, how a teacher would find this frustrating and distracting, especially if there was a test planned for that day.

While Atlanta Public Schools gets paid

by Live Nation (the company that organizes Music Midtown), little or none of the money goes to Grady specifically. I think this is unfair, because no other APS school is as affected by it as we are.

While I do think Music Midtown is a wonderful thing for the city and Piedmont Park in particular, the effects of it on the Grady community are too extreme for us to not get more compensation. I don’t think the festival should be moved, but Grady should directly receive money from Live Nation. Music Midtown itself is not a harmful event, but it can definitely benefit from improved logistics and thinking more about how it affects the surrounding community. p

BY Carolyn Capelouto

by Chase Kleber

e h T

STUDENT

Stance

Does Music Midtown hurt or help the Grady community?

Movie, work days allow slacking to become a norm Over my four years at Grady, I have watched countless movies during class, most of them unrelated to the class in which they were shown. On at least Griffin Kish 15 different occasions, one of my teachers has not shown up for class and failed to get a substitute. And I’ve had more than a few “work days,” when the teacher gave the students the class period to do any work they wished to do.

To the uninformed reader, it probably sounds as if I am describing a pretty comfortable four years of high school, as there have been many occasions when I have been encouraged to slack off. As nice as they might sound, the reprieves during my time here have not been beneficial.

Whenever teachers show a movie, give the class a “work day” or fail to commission a substitute teacher, they deny their students the most basic purpose of attending class: learning. While every student in the class may not be a passionate learner, all students should

attend school expecting to be taught. Movies (excluding films and videos related to the subject) do not help students learn. “Work days” are thinly veiled excuses for teachers to spend class time grading work or recording grades instead of teaching. When a teacher doesn’t show up, the entire class period goes out the window. Students get parceled off to other classrooms on the hall, possibly to one where a movie is being shown.

Moreover,there is no valid for a teacher to show a movie or give a work day in the first place. Teaching is obviously the most important part of being a teacher and shouldn’t be sacrificed in order to grade papers or enter grades. Many teachers stress time management to their students. Teachers need to practice what they preach and set aside time outside of class to grade work. I understand sometimes teachers have to miss school, but, if the absence is planned, they should do their best to leave some kind of valuable assignment for the substitute to administer.

I cannot remember a year when a teacher has not told my class, “There’s no slacking off when you get a job, so don’t get into the habit now.” This can be confusing, as a teach-

er showing a movie or giving a work day in order to spend time grading only shows the teacher’s ability to slack off—something we were told wouldn’t be tolerated in our future jobs. While it is understandable that teaching comes with a high level of stress, it is one of the most important jobs in society. Teaching high school students is especially important.

According to a 2013 poll by the ACT, 89 percent of high school teachers think their students are well-prepared for college, while only 26 percent of college professors think incoming students were well-prepared for college.

Teachers aren’t the only ones to slack off.

Students do so even more often. While every student comes to school expecting to learn, not all of them come prepared to do so. A student begging a teacher to show a movie is like a pastry chef dangling a doughnut in front of a person on a diet. While the person may be compelled to take the doughnut, they have the discipline to stay committed to eating healthy.

Just because teaching is a profession in which movies are sometimes shown doesn’t mean that they should be demanded. In the same way that teachers should reserve time outside of class to grade work, students should do home-

work at home. In addition, students really gain nothing by complaining about the amount of homework demanded. Everyone is busy, but that doesn’t mean that your education should be lacking. While some teachers do slack off every now and then, there really is little room for laziness in most careers after high school.

While I admit watching a movie or having a work day can feel great, it can come back to bite you. Time spent in class not learning has to be recovered sometime.

Students should understand that watching a movie for a class period will inevitably lead to more difficult classes in the future, as material not covered on the movie day has to be taught later in the semester. If course context was considered efficiently all semester, there would be more time at the endr to spend reviewing or working on other important facets of the class.

In the end, slacking off is bad regardless of whether teachers or students do it.

While the times I slacked off or my teachers slacked off were nice when they happened, I can guarantee that my time at Grady would have been significantly less stressful overall had they not occurred. p

news

news briefs

The trial of 12 former APS staff members accused of cheating began Sept. 29. Thirty-five staff members were indicted by a grand jury last year. Many of those who pleaded guilty will not go to court.

Former Superintendent Beverly Hall’s trial has been postponed due to her battle against stage IV breast cancer. The trial is expected to last several months.

Homecoming court and student council positions announced Winners of the homecoming court and SGA were announced Sept 26. Congratulations to all winners. The executive council is as follows: President Teryn Shipman, Vice-President Simone Howard, Treasurer Salome Araya and Secretary Kami Holland. Chloe Thatcher and Roderick Smith were named Ms. Grady and Mr. Grady.

Murray assigned to new mentoring role Former Grady principal Dr. Vincent Murray has been reassigned from his position as “interim assistant principal” of Bolton Elementary School. Murray is currecently working at the Office of High Schools, where he provides support to 10 APS high schools.

“The job is interesting and challenging,” Murray said.

Ebola comes to U.S. American aid worker is currently in treatment for Ebola in Manhattan after he was admitted on Oct. 23. This is the fourth case of Ebola diagnosed on American soil. The first was diagnosed on Sept.. 28 and died Oct. 8. Shortly after, two health care workers who treated the patient came down with the virus. five others have been treated in the U.S. , and have all recovered.

5

Streetcar rolls into Atlanta despite delays

By Anna Braxton All along Edgewood Avenue and Auburn Avenue, tracks have been placed for the Atlanta Streetcar Project, but despite the months of planning and construction, there is still no streetcar running on the tracks.

The Atlanta Streetcar Project began in 2003 when a group of like-minded prominent Atlantans came together to form Atlanta Streetcar, Inc., a company with a vision to bring a streetcar to the city. It took 10 years of planning and paperwork before construction on the streetcar project began in early 2013. Recently, however, the streetcar project has had its setbacks.

The project’s opening date was projected to be summer 2014 but has now been moved back to November. Sharon Gavin, communications director for the Atlanta Streetcar Project, wrote in an email interview that the delays were largely due to construction.

“Atlanta is an older city that’s been rebuilt many times, and we were building in the oldest part of the city­­—so that was a challenge,” Gavin wrote. “This past winter’s severe weather also played a role in the delays.”

The streetcar is a collaborative effort between the City of Atlanta, MARTA and Atlanta Downtown Improvement District. The Department of Transportation awarded the city a ransportation Investment Generating Economic Recovery capital grant of $47.6 million on Oct. 15, 2010. Local funds from the ADID and the City of Atlanta covered the other costs.

The current cost of the streetcar is $89 million, though the Atlanta Streetcar Project has budgeted $98 million for the project.

The streetcar’s route will go through Auburn Avenue and Edgewood Avenue into downtown Atlanta, with stops at 12 destinations along the way.

The streetcar is part of the city’s transportation plan, Connect Atlanta, which was developed to accommodate Atlanta’s growing population while creating a more desirable place to live.

“Streetcars are more than the ‘next new thing’ in urban transportation,” Gavin wrote.

“With a growing number of people—both younger workers and empty nesters—choosing to move into or near large cities, streetcars make sense because they can easily connect passengers with a wide array of activities and jobs in the urban corridors.”

Matt Ruppert, chef and owner of Noni’s Bar and Deli located on Edgewood Avenue, said the construction has had a negative im-

Photo courtesy of The Atlanta Streetcar

APS cheating trial launches into action

August 30, the Southerner Oct.2014 20, 2014

DESIRE A STREETCAR? The Atlanta Streetcar stops at 12 locations including Centennial Olympic Park, Sweet Auburn Market, King Historic District, Hurt Park, Peachtree Center, Woodruff Park and Dobbs Plaza. pact on his restaurant. ly testing and the expectation that the car will run “Up until now it’s been mostly negative be- by December,” Joiner wrote via email. cause they’ve been building it,” Ruppert said.

While an official opening date has not been “So we’ve had to deal with a lot of construc- set, the streetcar is rumored to open by Notion on the streets for several months now, vember or December according to Ruppert. actually a little over a year and it’s gotten a lot “Mayor Reed has said from the start that better than it used to be.” the Atlanta Streetcar will open in 2014, and Ruppert said the management behind the it will,” Gavin said. “He has consistently said streetcar, however, has done a good job at the only deadline that matters is his promise keeping the affected businesses informed on of opening by Dec. 31, 2014.” the progress of the streetcar.

Ruppert is hopeful for the streetcar’s suc“They’ve sent out massive amounts of cess and thinks it will draw a variety of difemails,” Ruppert said, “and representatives ferent people, from Georgia State University have physically entered my bar, restaurant, to students to big business workers and tourists shake my hand and tell me what’s going on to the area. He also believes the streetcar will many, many times in the last year.” make Atlanta a contender to be recognized as Another business located on Edgewood Av- a world-class city. enue along the streetcar route, Sweet Auburn “I think one of the things that contributes Curb Market, has seen a renewed focus to the to that idea is public transportation,” Rup90-year old market because of the construction pert said. “The ability for folks to not have of the streetcar. Like Ruppert, Pamela Joiner, to get in their car and drive around, I think, general manager of Sweet Auburn Curb Mar- contributes in large part to a city being idenket, said she has been consistently informed tified as more advanced, more cultural, more on the progress of the streetcar and any con- sophisticated. So I think that, I hope that, Atstruction problems along the way. lanta will be perceived just like that and then “The most recent update I know of is the night- some." p

continued from front page An email exchange obtained by The Atlanta Journal-Constitution through open records requests reveals heated discussions between APS and the city over late payments. When APS lawyers pressed the city for the funds to be paid, city attorney Cathy Hampton wrote back by pointing to the recession.

“The agreement dates back to 2005, prior to the collapse of the real estate market, and includes terms that are not viable in today’s economy,” she said.

In 2005, city officials expected that the TAD would support 60 percent of the project’s costs. After the recession kicked in, however, this estimate shrunk. Currently, it is expected to fund only 33 percent of the $4.3 billion.

“There were risks on all sides,” Linville said. “And I think the recession impacted everyone involved.”

In Decemeber 2013, the board of directors for Atlanta BeltLine adopted the 2030 Strategic Implementation Plan, which outlines the completion of the project over 17 years. The initial Atlanta BeltLine Redevelopment Plan anticipated that the TAD would provide up to 66 percent of total funding. The SIP anticipates using the $4.3 billion generated by the TAD as a tool to leverage other funding sources which include federal, regional and local funding in addition to private donations.

“The economic impacts of the Great Recession resulted in re-

duced revenue and delayed delivery dates for several projects,” Jenny Odom, communications and media relations manager for the Atlanta BeltLine, told The Southerner via email.

Odom said the BeltLine investments are expected to significantly increase the APS share of the tax base. According to Odom, the long-term effects will result in higher revenue from the BeltLine TAD that can be invested in the school system directly once the TAD is retired at the end of 2030.

“The Atlanta BeltLine is already providing safe routes for students to get to and from school,” Odom said. “When completed, the multi-use trails and transit will connect more than 40 schools over 45 neighborhoods. New public infrastructure in form of trails, transit and parks will create safe, healthy mobility options for parents and children and will improve access to healthier lifestyles. Healthier neighborhoods will create healthier students that are better prepared to learn and succeed.”

According to Linville, the money that is owed could go to early education, college preparation programs and other services to help struggling students.

“For Atlanta Public Schools this is all about the students,” Linville said. “We are good partners with the city and want to help the city, which is why the contract was engaged to begin with. But nothing is more important than education and developing our children in the classroom, and that’s where our focus is.” p

Photo by Ludovica Longo

City owes APS January payment

App assists BeltLine users

By Ludovica Longo Over a million people use the Atlanta BeltLine to run, cycle or simply walk. Now, there is a new app to help users navigate and explore the trails.

The app provides interactive maps, suggesting routes for a leisurely stroll or a hard-core workout. It notes spots to stop by including parks, restrooms, access points, MARTA stations and artwork.

Also featured are sections allowing users to improve the BeltLine by reporting damage or contributing money.

news

6

Oct. 20, 2014

For-profit colleges award students with degrees, debt Percentage of students who borrow for tuition

information provided by the Senate Health, Labor and Pensions Committee

13% Data taken from a 2012 Study

community

48%

public

type of college

pay off, for one. Education was never intended to be a way of putting people in tremendous amounts of debt before they’ve started their lives,” Ross said.

Regardless, several different factors draw nontraditional students to for-profit colleges. “[There] are four reasons: [one is] the fact that [the students] want to go to school,” Ross said. “A lot of times they offer degrees no one else offers.”

Ross also cited “the fact that they have amazing advertisement and also the fact that a lot of times people don’t know there are other options for them.”

Critics claim that strong marketing and recruitment departments at for-profit colleges are one of the reasons for this shortage of information. One former registrar at a for-profit college, who asked to remain anonymous, described her job to be a stressfull and sometimes ethically challenging position, where she was often indirectly made to choose between her job and her morals.

“There was a lot of pressure like that, where as a registrar I wouldn’t necessarily be acting to advise,” she said. “In particular, if I was going to advise, I want to advise what works best for you, but in those environments a lot of times you’re working to make sure you have the numbers that you need so that you as an employee aren’t in trouble.”

The registrar said that the marketing staff, or “student advisers,” have specific requirements they need to fulfill to keep their jobs, ranging from numbers of phone calls made to “sit credits,” or people enrolled in the first day of class. “[Advisers] who were successful were often the people who had to be the most creative, which ... unfortunately, doesn’t equate to necessarily being ethical,” she said.

The former registrar described instances of recruiters approaching people at bus stops, offering to buy them lunch or even babysitting their children, just so they would sit in on a class.

“If we did convince you to come in, convince you to do a little test and to sit in the class, you may not even be aware that by sitting in that class, that you are being charged to sit in that class,” she said.

Ross says that one reason this financial ma-

57%

private non-profit

96%

for-profit Emily Dean

By Emily Dean Three advertisements for various for-profit colleges line the walls of a single MARTA car, promising convenience and a stable career.

MARTA isn’t the only place overwhelmed by advertisements for for-profit colleges. In 2009, Sen. Tom Harkin, D-Iowa, conducted a nationwide study on for-profits, finding that they spend more of their revenue, much of which comes from government programs like Pell Grants, on recruitment (22.7 percent) than they spend on instruction (17.2 percent). “[For-profit colleges aim] to make money,” said one former instructor at a for-profit college.

Although the instructor said she enjoyed teaching there, she asked to remain anonymous. “so sometimes they may lose the essence of what we’re trying to deliver to students and that’s to educate them.” Atlanta’s Bauder College is closing this December due to declining enrollment, and no longer accepts applications.

Despite promises of a quality education and eventual gainful employment, for-profits have faced several lawsuits in the past decade. Atlanta’s Westwood College has been the subject of multiple law suits, including a Supreme Court case in which the school paid $7 million for misrepresenting its graduation statistics.

Harkin’s study found that most students at for-profit colleges leave with debt and are less likely to meet the gainful employment rule (a recent Atlanta Department of Education development to “establish measures for determining whether certain postsecondary educational programs prepare students for gainful employment in a recognized occupation.”

The schools themselves paint a much different picture of their graduates’ employability.

“Approximately 70 percent of our 2013 ITT Technical Institute employable graduates obtained employment in positions using knowledge and skills taught in their program of study as of April 30, 2014,” Nicole Elam, an ITT Tech public representative told The Southerner in an e-mail.

While for-profit colleges aren’t notorious the hazing or date rape allegations that plague some traditional schools, many educators, like math teacher Jermaine Ross, find more to dislike in for-profit universities. “[Education from a for-profit college] doesn’t

0

20

40

60

percentage of students who take out loans

nipulation often goes unnoticed is for-profits recruit poor and uneducated students.

“The demographic that they’re recruiting from are the most vulnerable people,” Ross said. “They’re the people who need education the most, and education has typically been a stepping stone for people from poor communities to rise up and to go off to do more things than their parents did.”

Elam said that desired outcome is what happens for most for-profit college students.

“The average annual reported salary of our graduates nearly doubles when compared to the salary of students before entering our programs of study,” Elam said.

The former for-profit teacher said her students needed more handholding than students at traditional schools.

“Actually I had a pretty good relationship with my students,” she said. “These were students that didn’t take the SATs, they didn’t take ACTs; some of them may be that first generation going to college; some of them had never been exposed to a college environment, so we did a lot of mentoring and nurturing.”

80

100

Many for-profit schools offer outreach scholarships. Art Institute of Atlanta, for example, has a program designed to educate the city’s homeless population.

Ross is skeptical of these scholarships, saying that the schools get government money whether or not the scholarship recipients complete their degrees.

In fact, much of the criticism for-profits have faced regards the gainful employment rule.

“A lot of that was happening where people would complete these programs, and they still weren’t finding jobs,” the former registrar said.

One solution that for-profit schools find to resolve this dilemma is in an ethical grey area. “[The school where I had worked] had a career services director who would try to find employment for these students, but when they couldn’t, the trick was, [to] get them to re-enroll and to do the bachelor’s program,” the former registrar said. “ ... It allows you to circumvent that [gainful employment] requirement, ... it feels unethical, because these people go to school thinking, in two years ... I’ll be able to move on.” p

HACKERS exploit security flaws Midterms approaching continued from front page of Mac computers on the school network to remotely control other Mac computers.

The first incident, which appeared in an Atlanta Police Department offense report, took place on Aug. 28 in social studies teacher Mary Carter Van Atta’s classroom. Mouse pointers moved without anyone touching the laptops, and “big booty” websites appeared on screen.

“Someone was taking over students’ computers and doing things that were fairly benign but very annoying,” Communications and Journalism Pathway leader Carrie MacBrien said of these initial incidents.

Six days later, on Sept. 3, more serious reports provoked the confiscation of the MacBook laptop carts.

“The computers stopped letting us type, the mouse started moving by itself,” sophomore Bryan Young said. “It went to YouTube, and searched up horse pornography. Then the pornography started playing.”

Young was in mathematics teacher Jermaine Ross’ 3B class when the explicit video began playing, and then quickly spread to approximately half of the class’ computers.

Ross immediately took action, shutting down the MacBooks before notifying the administration. Administrators then contacted the APD, who assigned resource officer M. Williams to the investigation.

The police report describing the offense only notes three classrooms as being “hacked;” however, additional teachers were affected, including graphic design teacher Patricia Kendall.

Kendall’s incident was distinct because it involved Mac desktop computers, rather than the MacBook laptops described in the police report’s accounts. Thaddeus Roberts, Grady News Now adviser, and David Winter, Southerner adviser, both alleg-

edly experienced similar issues with classroom Mac desktops.

A concurrent investigation by the APS information technology department revealed that the “hacking” was not as complex as it may have appeared. “[The information technology department] was trying to get to the root of the issue, and [they] determined that it was likely just the sharing capabilities as opposed to any real hacking,” MacBrien said.

Despite the simplicity of the exploitation, the IT department confiscated the Mac laptops so that they could be reimaged, and stripped of their sharing functions.

Kendall said that the vulnerability in the Macs existed due to the wide knowledge of Grady’s administrative password.

“Teachers have been writing it up on the board without any consideration that when you say it’s an admin password, it’s a high level security threat,” Kendall said.

The IT department worked with Guiney, deciding to reset the administrative password to prevent any further “hacking.”

The new password will only be made available to two high-level staff members. Media specialist Brian Montero predicts that taking the right steps can avoid inconveniences.

“If you from the outset set the configuration to what people need for day-to-day business, they wouldn’t need the password,” Montero said. “I think what happens is it’s just so locked down right now that people end up needing the administrative password all of the time.”

Teachers only hope the increased security will not come at the cost of efficiency. “[Entering the administrative password is] not something that you need to be waiting on for someone to come up and do because these things have to happen immediately because we have deadlines,” Roberts said. “It’s unfortunate that this is the way things are going to be.” p

Mock Nov. 4 election

Please check the box next to the candidates for whom you wish to vote. Then cut out the U.S. flag and place it in the envelope marked “2014 Mock Election” on the door of room E106.

Governor:

Republican Nathan Deal (i)

Democrat Jason Carter Libertarian Andrew Hunt Lieutenant Governor:

Republican Casey Cagle (i)

Democrat Connie Stokes U.S. Senate:

Republican David Purdue

Democrat Michelle Nunn Libertarian Amanda Swafford House of Representatives:

District 5: John Lewis (i) State School Superintendent

Republican Richard Woods

Democrat Valerie Wilson (i): incumbent

news

Oct. 20, 2014

7

By Kelly Scollard A flood of teenagers adjust their ties and smooth their skirts as they uniformly ascend the stairs for the 7:30 start of classes.

Their pristine outfits, however, are perhaps the least significant feature differentiating these teenagers from their peers. Many have risen as early as 5 a.m. to commute to this campus. Most will not return home until after 7 p.m. and all will be expected to complete at least three hours of homework per night. On top of these expectations, each student must maintain a high profile part-time job. This lifestyle, however demanding it may be, is one these students cherish, and fought to obtain.

For the past few years, Atlanta has been in the process of obtaining and creating a Cristo Rey Network school. The Cristo Rey Network is a web of 28 Catholic charter college preparatory high schools designed for students with the motivation to receive a good education spread across 27 cities across the United States. The network model combats that problem with a unique work-study program that aids the students with their tuition and opens their eyes to the professional world.

On July 14, two years of hard work paid off when Cristo Rey Atlanta Jesuit High School opened its downtown doors to its inaugural freshman class.

“It’s really amazing to see students learning in the classrooms … after we’ve been imagining it happening for a long time,” principal Rev. James Van Dyke said.

Instruction began with a two-week summer academy where students were introduced to the unique ways of Cristo Rey, ranging from the tight dress code to the expectation that every student be admitted to college.

During the Summer Academy, the students were observed and subsequently matched with one of the 41 corporate partners of Cristo Rey Atlanta, including sponsers from Delta Airlines, Coca-Cola and Northside Hospital. Five days a month, each student goes to work in the offices of their corporate sponsor, with four Cristo Rey students creating the equivalent of one full-time position. They have the same duties and expectations as any regular employee of that company.

The students learn through the responsibilities and tasks required of their positions, and collaborate with a spectrum of people they’ve never been around before, all of whom serve as both collegues and role models. “[The goal of the work-study program] is for our students to have the confidence to go out into the adult world, regardless of race or background, regardless of economics, and know that they’ll have the intelligence and capability to function well, and even excellently in that setting,” Van Dyke said.

The money the students earn from their work study covers about 60 percent of their tuition.

Kelly Scollard

Low income students excel at intown charter school

WORK HARD, PLAY HARD: Four Cristo Rey students socialize in the sunshine after a long day of learning at their Atlanta-area charter school.

The administration marketed to potential students through Marcia Pecot said. “This is the most caring environment I’ve church Masses at low-income parishes and through organiza- ever worked in, and the students prove every day that they tions like The Boys and Girls Club and the YMCA. The num- fought to be here.” ber of Atlanta applicants set an all-time record for any Cristo Students at Cristo Rey come from heavily variant educationRey Network school. al backgrounds. While this disparity in academic levels could “I knew if I came to Cristo Rey, I would have a brighter be seen as a negative, the teachers at Cristo Rey embrace it as a future,” freshman Andrea Galvan-Tavera said. positive. This gap is countered by an extended school day, peer After undergoing the intense and extensive interview and mentorship and group learning. evaluation process, Galvan-Tavera was one of the deserving Because of its religious foundings, Cristo Rey emphasizes the 163 students admitted to the class of 2018. According to importance of giving back as it stresses strongly as academics.

Van Dyke, the students come from communities inside the Students are expected to participate in regular community sergreater Atlanta metro area and are roughly 50 percent La- vice to strengthen their sense of character. tino and 50 percent African-American.The average family “We aren’t interested in manufacturing academic drones,” income is under $30,000 per year.

Van Dyke said. “We want first and foremost for our students to Cristo Rey plans to cap its number of students at 500, once be good people with good hearts.” the school serves ninth -12th graders, to maintain the close reWell-dressed and good-hearted, these students can look lationship of the students and teachers. forward to the long-term effects of their investment. They Teachers at Cristo Rey Atlanta went through a three-to- understand that the hard work and determination associfour-month application and interview process. Once hired, ated with a Cristo Rey education transforms lives. A college they completed Cristo Rey Network Training where they were education is the first critical step to securing a high-paying taught how to best communicate the principles of the school to job. According to the school website, Cristo Rey Network their unique student population. students graduate college at a rate twice as high as their peers “It sounds corny, but we really are a family,” biology teacher from the same income bracket. p

By Brandon Kleber Peter Conlon, president of Live Nation Atlanta, which puts on Music Midtown each year, has always said “great cities have great music festivals.” In his view, Music Midtown is one of those for the city of Atlanta.

This year, though, the show went on without the support of surrounding Midtown neighborhoods.

On July 31, the Midtown Neighbors’ Association, which represents the community most affected by major events in Piedmont Park, voted down the event at its board meeting “due to safety, logistics, Piedmont Park wear/tear, and noise issues,” MNA board member Dana Persons said. Along with these complaints, Neighborhood Planning Unit-E, which surrounds the southern and western boundaries of the park, voted unanimously to “not support” the Music Midtown 2014 festival.

“Music Midtown is unlike any other festival in its sheer size,” said Terry Bond, president of the Midtown Neighbors’ Association and a member of the NPU-E board.

In a statement Bond shared with the Mayor’s Office of Special Events, City Council members and the Atlanta Planning Advisory Board, he explained that the surrounding neighborhoods have grown tired of the festival taking over Piedmont Park for the past four years.

Over that time he said the inconvenience to residents and the damage to the park has grown along with the increasing scale of the festival.

“I am not opposed to the concert and music per se,” said Ellen Sacchi, who lives east of Piedmont Park. “But I am opposed to a longterm disruption of traffic in the neighborhood,

Brandon Kleber

Piedmont neighborhood tunes out Music Midtown

NOTHING BUT TREBLE: Nearly 170,000 people came to Piedmont Park over the weekend for Music Midtown. damage to the park and disruption of public The MNA is opposed to closing 10th Street use of the park for 10 to 12 days or more. If the for this festival because, according to Bond, festival cannot set up and pack up in four to “there really is no viable alternative routing.” five days without damaging the property, they Even though he’s regularly attended the fesneed to find another venue.” tival, Dan Matisoff, a Georgia Tech professor, a But promoters say moving the festival is public sector economist and a concerned resinot feasible. dent, was also critical of the festival.

“There is no place to do these events other “Essentially, the city has leased a good than Piedmont Park,” Conlon said in an portion of Piedmont Park, two lanes of trafinterview with Atlanta Business Chronicle fic, the BeltLine crossing at 10th and Moncolumnist Maria Saporta. “We are under- roe and the bike lane to Live Nation for parked as a city.” $500,000,” Matisoff said. “$400,000 goes to Atlanta’s other parks may be too small, but the city, $100,000 goes to the park. As far as residents say the same of Piedmont Park.

I know, this amount has not changed, even “Music Midtown, in my mind, has now though they’ve tripled the size of the event gone beyond the capacity of Piedmont Park,” over the past three years, taken up more Virginia-Highland Watch coordinator John space of the park, caused more damage to the Wolfinger said. park and more traffic and other public space Before the vote, the neighborhood had been inconvenience each subsequent year.” in discussions with promoters of the festival to During the 2013 Music Midtown, a serious try to devise solutions to some of its concerns. downpour on the second day of the festival

turned the grassy meadow in Piedmont Park into a muddy mess as more than 55,000 people came to listen Saturday night.

Conlon’s response as told to Sapora: “You can fix grass.”

In other words, Live Nation and Music Midtown feel that the benefits outweigh the costs.

Conlon believes the return of Music Midtown is a boost for the city’s economy.

“This is a good event for the city,” Conlon said. “It puts us on the map with other cities and their music festivals. During Music Midtown, the hotels, bars and restaurants are full.

People are spending money.”

But many residents ask if the park receives enough money to be worth the damage.

“While the city may raise some revenue from Live Nation, it’s not clear how the residents of Midtown benefit from that revenue,” Matisoff said.

The city was presented with Midtown’s safety and logistics concerns and suggestions for improvement for Music Midtown 2014, but as the concert went on as planned Sept. 19-20, all they were able to do was hope for the best.

In an email Conlon sent to both the MNA and NPU-E, he said that Live Nation and Music Midtown did as much as they could to address the community’s concerns. In the end, though, he says the festival and the park are complementary parts.

“This is our Central Park. It is a great place for music festivals,” Conlon said. “There is no other place where we can do major festivals in the city. If we can’t have Music Midtown at Piedmont Park, there’s nowhere to go. We’re done.” p

news

Uzuki Kakinuma

8

Oct. 20, 2014

ADEAFENINGSILENCE:HundredsfromtheAtlantacommunity come together to support the ASO players on Sep. 25, the original 70th anniversary opening night of the symphony.

ASO strings together some last-minute agreements

By Isabel Olson and Uzuki Kakinuma In the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra’s composition contest, Grady sophomore, Mason Johnson, won for his original work.

As his prize, the world renown symphony would play and orchestrate his composition at the Concerts for Young People. But the prize, the concert and even the symphony itself are in limbo thanks to the ongoing financial conflict that has yet to be resolved.

“You could probably imagine how disappointed you would be if your work was to be played by One World,” Johnson said.

The season was scheduled to begin on Sept. 25. Due to the ongoing negotiations between the executive management of the best orchestras in the and the musicians’ union, however, the opening was has been pushed back to Nov. 8. after the old contract expired Sept. 6 at midnight. Locked out by management, rge nusicians of the ASO headquarters have taken to a new stage, lining the streets, protesting not only for their jobs but for the arts.

“This situation may eventually destroy the quality of the music [scene in Atlanta],” ASO board member Ron Antinori said after his resignation over the issue. “We want the music to go on. We have a world-class orchestra, and the musicians have the higher ground.”

Antinori was not the only one to resign over the heated debates. CEO Stanley Romanstein also submitted his res-

ignation Sept. 29, leaving his job to the ap- pointed interim president Terry Neal.

In the 2014-15 fiscal year, the symphony accumulated a $2 million deficit, and over an extended period of time accumulated nearly $5 million in debt. Even with the opposing parties hoping for the same end goal, a long-lasting resolution for the ASO, these negotiations which have lasted nearly nine months, have no end in sight.

“We are all working toward a common goal of keeping the music alive in Symphony Hall, and we realize that it can be an emotional issue,” said Holly Hanchey, ASO’s director of marketing.

After the 2008 recession, audience rates decreased steadily.

The symphony runs purely off of ticket sales, donations and attendance; however, within the last few years, ASO has lost several private donors, who refuse to continue to fund the growing deficits. The endowments of the symphony have depleted in order to reduce its expanding debt, leaving the orchestra in its current state.

“They’re saying ‘yes’ we need to balance the budget, not realizing that what they’re doing is declassing the orchestra,” ASO bass trombonist Brian Hecht said.

Georgia’s arts funding is ranked the lowest of all 50 states, with only 6 cents per citizen in support of the arts, whereas most average states average nearly $1 per citizen. The combination of increasing debt and declining funding has

forced the symphony to rely heavily on the support of the Atlanta community. ASO must rethink its financial strategy in order to survive stay afloat in the 21st century.

“Symphony orchestras are a very expensive form of art because of the human capital required to produce the art,” Hanchey said. “Art museums can buy fewer or less expensive pieces, and theatres can choose acclaimed plays that require fewer actors and less scenery, but orchestras require highly skilled performers in large numbers. It takes just as many musicians to play a Beethoven symphony today as it did 200 years ago.”

Facing the possibility of a shorter performance season, salary cuts weekly salary decrease, a reduction of the total size of the paid orchestra or a reduction in healthcare benefits, musicians opted to choose “none of the above.” So far, with the musicians and management refusing to compromise on any of these matters level, the negotiations have agreement have s made little to no progress toward a new agreement.

While the season has yet to begin, the musicians have refused to put down their instruments. They performed free concerts for the Atlanta community at Kennesaw State University entitled ‘“Deafening Silence’” to take a stance. On the night of what was supposed to be the start of the 70th season, hundreds of people gathered to show support and love toward the ASO community. p See the full story at www.thesoutherneronline.com

By Ben Simonds-Malamud In July of 2008, the Georgia General Assembly voted to amend Title 20, the state education code. The amended laws gave school systems new ways to seek exemptions from certain laws and rules originating from Title 20, the state Board of Education or Department of Education.

The state gave school districts until June 30, 2015 to choose one of three operating models—Investing in Educational Excellence (IE2), charter system or status quo system— all of which will redefine the nature of school districts’ relationships with the state.

An advisory committee composed of APS principals, teachers, central office members and community members made a report to Superintendent Meria Carstarphen recommending the “charter system” model. Carstarphen will make a recommendation to the Atlanta BOE. School districts can already seek waivers—APS currently utilizes waivers for rules pertaining to maximum class sizes, Quality Basic Education expenditures and direct classroom expenditures. The 2008 change offered even more flexibility at a time when school systems were struggling financially.

“From what I remember, this was a way to go in and help the systems with the recession,” said state Rep. Howard Maxwell (R-Dallas), a sponsor for House Bill 1209, the catalyst for the change.

Maxwell said the law’s philosophy was that if the state offered more flexibility from state regulations, in the form of waivers, school systems could innovate and save money.

For example, all classes taught in a district originate from a list approved by the state BOE. IE2 and charter systems could offer new classes. Under state law, schools may not hire people without teacher certifications. Another possible waiver would allow uncertified “content experts” to teach.

Some districts have already completed the process—the state has approved three

new IE2 districts and 28 new charter systems—but APS is just beginning the process. Angela Smith, APS special assistant to the superintendent, is leading the project to choose an operating model.

“My understanding from Erroll [Davis] is that he wanted to make sure that the incoming, long-term superintendent would be able to adopt a model that would be well-suited for that administration,” Smith said. “So he really wanted to wait on making any sort of decisions regarding this for a permanent superintendent and a long-term board.”

To facilitate the three-month process of choosing an operating model, APS hired Clarification and Mediation, Inc., a management consulting firm based in Atlanta.

Clara Axam, the firm’s CEO, hosted “community visioning sessions” at seven APS schools in late August and early September, including one at Grady on Aug. 27, to introduce parents, teachers and community members to the flexibility options.

“We’re helping APS to design the sessions,” Axam said, “and making sure the conversation is meaningful, and that we are talking as an APS community with each other and not at each other.”

At each meeting, Axam introduced the three models. The first model, IE2, offers school districts a five-year contract with at least one waiver, though they can apply for more as needed. In exchange for each waiver, the Governor’s Office of Student Achievement sets targeted performance goals to hold schools accountable for their flexibility. An IE2 school might need to show a 3 percent increase in test grades in order to meet the requirements of the contract.

If a failing school prevents an IE2 district from meeting the terms of its contract, then that school can either convert to a charter school or face takeover from the state, another district or a private or nonprofit entity.

The second model, a charter system, in-

Ben Simonds-Malamud

APS to choose new cluster model for state ruling

DIFFICULT QUESTIONS: Angela Smith (right) had trouble responding to concerns of community members raised at the operating model question and answer workshop held at Maynard Jackson on Sept. 13. volves a five-year contract granting school that school systems would grant maximum districts a broad waiver from almost all Title autonomy to clusters and schools.

20, BOE and DOE rules, allowing the most If a school fails to meet accountability reflexibility of the three plans. This system quirements in an IE2 system, it could face localizes governance to the school level by conversion into a charter school. creating school governance councils at ev“They actually gain more flexibility by ery school. The charter system measures becoming a charter school,” Smith said. “So accountability at the district level, with tar- it’s kind of counterintuitive.” geted academic requirements for the entire APS released an online survey to collect school system. more public input, available at www.surIf a charter system failed to meet the per- veymonkey.com/s/Visioning_Session_Feedformance requisite in its contract, it would back. Additionally, advisory committee and face reversion to the third model, a status quo board meetings are open to the public. The system. Under this model, schools have no schedule for all events related to operating waivers from state rules; they can only apply models can be found at www.atlanta.k12. for waivers under extreme duress, like in the ga.us/Page/42380. Community members atcase of a natural disaster. Smith said if APS tended and spoke at public hearings during chose this system, they would lose about $50 the weeks of Oct. 14 and 21. The Atlanta to $60 million in lost waivers.

BOE will meet on Nov. 3 to review CarstarAs an alternative to the aforementioned phen’s recommendation and make a decimodels, districts may also choose to become a sion. Later that week, the board will submit system of charter clusters or a system of char- its decision to the state DOE and begin to ter schools, different from a charter system in negotiate the future of APS. p

9

Richie Elgar, patient

Anna Elmers, doctor

Sarah Woodworth, occupational thearapist

Melissa Underwood, patient

James and Alana Shepherd, founders

Shannon Iannarelli, nurse

Frosty, service dog

Rebecca Hammad, occupational patient

Brian Morgan, patient

A Shepherd’s Flock Body surfing accident victim fosters a unique environment of healing, care herd Center, however, accomplishes much more than that. he building that houses the Shepherd Center looks unremark“It creates an environment of compassionate care, education and acute mediable next to its neighbor, Piedmont Hospital, which dwarfs it cal rehabilitation for a patient and family,” founder and chairman James Shepin size, architecture and even name recognition. A sapphire herd said. “And hope. Hope that life’s not over.” insignia on the outside depicting a mystery man blooming Hope has played a dynamic role in Shepherd’s own life. Forty-one years ago, out of a hand provides only the subtlest of hints that something magical hope meant the difference between life and death—and consequently, the formamight be happening within. Inside, however, first-time visitors discover tion of the Shepherd Center. a recurring image far more memorable than the logo—and far more telling.

BECOMING A SHEPHERD Everyone appears to be wearing it— patients, doctors, nurses, even security oon after graduating from the guards: a smile. It’s the first indication University of Georgia in 1973, that the Shepherd Center isn’t like othShepherd embarked on an epic er hospitals. backpacking trip. He had little money, With canine companions roaming the but he also had no commitments, so he grounds, team games in the gym, peer supand a friend set out to explore the exotic port groups and skiing trips, the Shepherd Center instills a strong sense of community that makes patients excited to get out terrain of Africa and South America until their money ran out.

“We figured that we would never get another opportunity, once we had of bed in the morning.

“I always tell my patients that [the Center] is a combination of Disney- a job, to disengage from responsibility for that long of a period of time,” land, summer camp and boot camp,” Dr. Anna Elmers said. “Disneyland Shepherd said. “[We wanted] to see things: photo-safariing, climbing the because it’s so overwhelming—you get up, get your schedule, see all of pyramids and the Valley of the Kings, and [going into] the gold mines in these people and don’t know where you’re supposed to be. Summer camp South Africa.”

In Brazil, things suddenly took a turn for the worse. On what seemed to because you get here, and you [think], ‘Wow, there are all these people out here.’ And then boot camp because our therapists, as pretty and petite as be an ordinary morning at the beach, he grew tired in the blistering sun and swam out into the surf. The third wave he swam through, however, they are, will work you to the core.”

The Shepherd Center serves as a rehabilitation hub for victims of spinal sucked him under and broke his neck on the ocean’s floor.

“I couldn’t move, and I hurt from the base of my skull all the way to cord and brain injuries from all across the nation. Patients of different ages, my tailbone,” Shepherd said. “[I remember] sitting there in a wonderful, attitudes and accidents arrive there with a common goal: to heal. The Shep-

By Keegan Hasson and Jenn Steckl

T

“

I wouldn’t go to a high school reunion, but I’d definitely go to a Shepherd Center reunion.”

-Jolyn Ludwick, parent

S

protective mode of denial, going, ‘Well, I’ll be OK’—but I don’t know if I ever defined what ‘OK’ was in my mind.”

James’ mother Alana Shepherd believes he was left in the hands of haphazard Brazilian medical care for much too long. If it was not for the head of the CIA, with whom her friend had connections, the trip back to America would not have been possible. At that point, James’ health was in critical condition, and once back, matters barely improved. After spending two months in Piedmont Hospital, the Shepherds knew it was time to relocate again—the treatment left James weighing only 83 pounds. The final stop was Denver, where he received proper care at last. Five months later, James walked out of the rehabilitation center with a crutch and a leg brace.

Despite the rehabilitation center’s assistance in James’ recovery, the distance between Denver and Atlanta was hard on the family. One year later, while at lunch with an old mentor, James decided he wanted to station a rehabilitation hospital much closer to home. He pitched the idea to his parents, and 14 months later, the Shepherds opened their doors to the public.

From that moment on, the Shepherd Center’s reputation grew more quickly than the hospital could handle. The Shepherds expected the original 22 beds to take five years to fill; they were full in less than a year.

“When you can’t serve people, it’s pretty heart-rending,” James Shepherd said. “[So the question] has been, ‘How fast can you run? How much money can you raise? How many supporters can you get? And how well can you become known to take care of the un-met need?’”

Although expanding the Center was a priority, the Shepherds could only renovate if they had the money to do so, which, according to James, came from anyone they “could beg, borrow or beat up for a nickel.” A bank foundation that helped fund the Denver rehabilitation center gave the Shepherd Center seed money, and other banks soon followed suit.

Eventually, in May 1982, the Shepherds secured the funding required to move into their current location on Peachtree Road. Despite having more room, it was difficult to settle into the new space.

“We had 40 beds, a third floor that was shelled in, light bulbs hanging and a little bit of ventilation,” Shepherd said.

Today, the Shepherd Center is equipped with 152 beds and nine full-time physicians whose time and dedication, James believes, makes a huge difference. He predicts the Shepherd Center sees more than 40,000 visitors a year. But there is more to the center than an impressive number. A lot more.

GETTING BACK TO LIFE

S

Busts of historically generous donors line the walls of this Shepherd Center hallway in appreciation.

Occupational therapist Sarah Brockman works with patient Brian Morgan to help him regain his strength in the wake of a spinal-cord injury.

Rebecca Hammad and Sarah Woodworth conduct a physical-therapy session for Michele Bishop.

Warren Cleary and company share a laugh during aquatic therapy.

Nurses Shannon Iannarelli and Andrea Schretzmann carefully look over patient charts.

James Shepherd, founder of the eponymous Shepherd Center that has helped thousands of people since its establishment.

Stephen Suddath is recovering from a spinal-cord injury with the help of a robotic gait trainer called Lokomat.

lives,” Elmers said. “You can actually change what happens by what you do here.”

Often times, rehabilitation at the Shepherd Center can be extremely grueling. While some patients have difficulty pulling through those dark days, 16-year-old Massachusetts native Ritchie Elgar feeds off of the constant labor. The rigor of rehabilitation reminds him of wrestling practice back home. “[Wrestling] gives you a workout like no other,” Elgar said.

“The amount of work they make you do makes you puke

Cleary, who came to the center for help recovering from a skydiving accident, now serves as peer-support liaison. A statue of James Shepherd depicts the center’s founder.

and dizzy, and you can’t walk down stairs because your legs are so sore. It’s really fulfilling once you’ve seen how much you’ve improved from before.”

Elgar says his disciplined work ethic has enabled his miraculous recovery. His injury started off much worse than most. He was sleeping on the floor of his family’s car when it crashed into a guardrail and catapulted him out of the car. Elgar’s T1 vertebra and lung both imploded. He spent an extended amount of time in an Intensive Care Unit due to his lung but has now been released

Photos by Jenn Steckl

ince she was 8 years old, Melissa Underwood’s life has revolved around swimming. Back in July, she jumped off a pier into a lake of unknown depth. The dive after that fateful decision broke her C6 vertebra and stole her legs’ motor abilities. The consequence was especially bad for Underwood because of how much she loves the water.

“I got in the pool yesterday, and it was probably the hardest experience of my life,” Underwood said. “I didn’t really realize that my legs didn’t work until they told me, ‘We have to put a buoy to hold your legs up.’ [Then,] I learned how to flip myself over—but when you almost drown, having your face fully submerged in the water is really hard.”

Underwood has had a particularly difficult time adjusting to life with limited movement but believes rehabilitation at the Shepherd Center helps patients appreciate that they are alive.

“I’ve got these three fingers coming back, and I’ve never been so happy in my life,” Underwood said. “You take these teeny, tiny steps, and you find the joy in them.”

Warren Cleary, another patient, said that sometimes the results of other patients’ recoveries provide needed inspiration. “[When] I saw a guy named Pete jump out of his wheelchair and onto a couch, take his whole chair apart and throw it back together, get back in it and go screaming down the hallway at 20 mph, I was just like, ‘Whoa, I’m about to follow that guy because I want to know what he knows.’” Cleary said. “I valued that interaction of seeing someone else hurt but not letting it pull them down.”

Having worked as an instructor in rock climbing, skiing and snowboarding, and, above all, skydiving, Cleary contends that nine times out of 10, he is doing something dangerous. For 12 years, he explored the earth’s atmosphere, and eventually

honed his skills enough to travel to Dubai with the U.S. parachuting team and compete at a world level. While training for the next world competition, however, Cleary pushed his body too far. On a botched landing one day, he crashed into a rogue mound of dirt. The accident hurt his back, but he decided that the pain was nothing a few ibuprofen and a good night’s sleep couldn’t fix. The next morning, on what would normally have been a routine landing, Cleary’s L1 vertebra shattered.

While recovering at the Shepherd Center, he found that supporting his peers helped him to recover as well. Given only a 1 percent chance to walk again, Cleary can now walk slowly with a cane. But Cleary has had his sights on something much more ambitious: skydiving. He convinced his doctors that it would be as simple as stepping off the back of a pickup truck and now he skydives regularly.

“We all promise our moms when we get hurt like this, ‘I won’t do that again.’” Cleary said. “I didn’t. I still skydive.

I’m sure my mom hates it, but she’s gotten used to it. Seeing someone go after their passions after injuries was important to me, and I think that’s why I wanted to work here. I wanted to show everyone that just because you have a traumatic injury—I mean, yes, your life is going to change, no doubt—it doesn’t have to be the end of your pursuit of happiness.”

Cleary now works at the center as a peer support liaison, inspiring others in the way others inspired him.

On the way back home from a rafting trip, Sierra Maihack and her friends drove too quickly down a curvy, highway entrance ramp. The car left the road and flew into a pine tree. Shortly after the accident, she endured a six-hour surgery to repair her C1 and C6 vertebrae. When Maihack woke up, she discovered a beacon of hope.

“After being in the ICU, I was getting more and more motion back and was feeling little things a little more every day,” Maihack said. “Holding on to that [feeling] throughout my journey here at Shepherd Center has especially helped my outlook on recovery.”

The center provides constant opportunities for patients to reconnect with the world outside of the hospital. From scuba-diving and wheelchair basketball games to just getting out of the building and going to Taco Bell, the Shepherd Center provides a spectrum of therapeutic recreational activities, all intended to help patients resume their pre-injury lifestyles.

“I think the fact that the Shepherd Center was established by a family who has been through this—and that they understand the families’ and patients’ needs physically, emotionally and what it takes to get back to life— is what makes all the difference,” Maihack said. Just ask James Ludwick.

Four months ago, Ludwick, an 18-year-old from Maryland, was set to attend a Division III university with a lacrosse scholarship. Now, after a tragic accident, the only motion he can make is a shoulder shrug. Even though the college still plans to value his scholarship, Ludwick faces a long and difficult recovery process—but he doesn’t have to make the journey alone.

“I’ve been part of the adolescent program, so the therapists and everyone I’ve worked with are geared to help people of my age,” Ludwick said. “Day by day, you learn that you can do it, you will recover and you will get through it.”

Ludwick, like Underwood, also fell victim to what Alana Shepherd notes is the one of the most common causes of spinal cord injury: diving into shallow water. Though Ludwick still has a long way to go to regain the range of motion he can restore, he has already come a long way, thanks to the adolescent team, a program unique to the Shepherd Center.

“The reason I love the adolescent team is because that’s where you can really make a difference in [the patients’]

into outpatient care after only one month of inpatient treatment.

While Elgar’s chances of walking again are slim, his outlook is more than optimistic.

“I just have to keep fighting,” Elgar said. “There is no quit in me.

It’s nice to have people around me with the same type of injury, but I came here solely for me, myself and I, just to recover and get to be the best that I can be.”

Upon being wished good luck with the rest of his treatment, Elgar replied, “Thanks, but I’m not going to need it.”

protective mode of denial, going, ‘Well, I’ll be OK’—but I don’t know if I ever defined what ‘OK’ was in my mind.”

James’ mother Alana Shepherd believes he was left in the hands of haphazard Brazilian medical care for much too long. If it was not for the head of the CIA, with whom her friend had connections, the trip back to America would not have been possible. At that point, James’ health was in critical condition, and once back, matters barely improved. After spending two months in Piedmont Hospital, the Shepherds knew it was time to relocate again—the treatment left James weighing only 83 pounds. The final stop was Denver, where he received proper care at last. Five months later, James walked out of the rehabilitation center with a crutch and a leg brace.

Despite the rehabilitation center’s assistance in James’ recovery, the distance between Denver and Atlanta was hard on the family. One year later, while at lunch with an old mentor, James decided he wanted to station a rehabilitation hospital much closer to home. He pitched the idea to his parents, and 14 months later, the Shepherds opened their doors to the public.

From that moment on, the Shepherd Center’s reputation grew more quickly than the hospital could handle. The Shepherds expected the original 22 beds to take five years to fill; they were full in less than a year.

“When you can’t serve people, it’s pretty heart-rending,” James Shepherd said. “[So the question] has been, ‘How fast can you run? How much money can you raise? How many supporters can you get? And how well can you become known to take care of the un-met need?’”

Although expanding the Center was a priority, the Shep1.55 in could only renovate if they had the money to do so, herds which, according to James, came from anyone they “could beg, borrow or beat up for a nickel.” A bank foundation that helped fund the Denver rehabilitation center gave the Shepherd Center seed money, and other banks soon followed suit.

Eventually, in May 1982, the Shepherds secured the funding required to move into their current location on Peachtree Road. Despite having more room, it was difficult to settle into the new space.

“We had 40 beds, a third floor that was shelled in, light bulbs hanging and a little bit of ventilation,” Shepherd said. 5.28 in Today, the Shepherd Center is equipped with 152 beds and nine full-time physicians whose time and dedication, James believes, makes a huge difference. He predicts the Shepherd Center sees more than 40,000 visitors a year. But there is more to the center than an impressive number. A lot more.

GETTING BACK TO LIFE

S

Busts of historically generous donors line the walls of this Shepherd Center hallway in appreciation.

Occupational therapist Sarah Brockman works with patient Brian Morgan to help him regain his strength in the wake of a spinal-cord injury.

Rebecca Hammad and Sarah Woodworth conduct a physical-therapy session for Michele Bishop.

Warren Cleary and company share a laugh during aquatic therapy.

0.93 in

Nurses Shannon Iannarelli and Andrea Schretzmann carefully look over patient charts.

James Shepherd, founder of the eponymous Shepherd Center that has helped thousands of people since its establishment.

Stephen Suddath is recovering from a spinal-cord injury with the help of a robotic gait trainer called Lokomat.

lives,” Elmers said. “You can actually change what happens by what you do here.”

Often times, rehabilitation at the Shepherd Center can be extremely grueling. While some patients have difficulty pulling through those dark days, 16-year-old Massachusetts native Ritchie Elgar feeds off of the constant labor. The rigor of rehabilitation reminds him of wrestling practice back home. “[Wrestling] gives you a workout like no other,” Elgar said.

“The amount of work they make you do makes you puke

Cleary, who came to the center for help recovering from a skydiving accident, now serves as peer-support liaison. A statue of James Shepherd depicts the center’s founder.

and dizzy, and you can’t walk down stairs because your legs are so sore. It’s really fulfilling once you’ve seen how much you’ve improved from before.”

Elgar says his disciplined work ethic has enabled his miraculous recovery. His injury started off much worse than most. He was sleeping on the floor of his family’s car when it crashed into a guardrail and catapulted him out of the car. Elgar’s T1 vertebra and lung both imploded. He spent an extended amount of time in an Intensive Care Unit due to his lung but has now been released

Photos by Jenn Steckl

ince she was 8 years old, Melissa Underwood’s life has revolved around swimming. Back in July, she jumped off a pier into a lake of unknown depth. The dive after that fateful decision broke her C6 vertebra and stole her legs’ motor abilities. The consequence was especially bad for Underwood because of how much she loves the water.

“I got in the pool yesterday, and it was probably the hardest experience of my life,” Underwood said. “I didn’t really realize that my legs didn’t work until they told me, ‘We have to put a buoy to hold your legs up.’ [Then,] I learned how to flip myself over—but when you almost drown, having your face fully submerged in the water is really hard.”

Underwood has had a particularly difficult time adjusting to life with limited movement but believes rehabilitation at the Shepherd Center helps patients appreciate that they are alive.

“I’ve got these three fingers coming back, and I’ve never been so happy in my life,” Underwood said. “You take these teeny, tiny steps, and you find the joy in them.”

Warren Cleary, another patient, said that sometimes the results of other patients’ recoveries provide needed inspiration. “[When] I saw a guy named Pete jump out of his wheelchair and onto a couch, take his whole chair apart and throw it back together, get back in it and go screaming down the hallway at 20 mph, I was just like, ‘Whoa, I’m about to follow that guy because I want to know what he knows.’” Cleary said. “I valued that interaction of seeing someone else hurt but not letting it pull them down.”

Having worked as an instructor in rock climbing, skiing and snowboarding, and, above all, skydiving, Cleary contends that nine times out of 10, he is doing something dangerous. For 12 years, he explored the earth’s atmosphere, and eventually

honed his skills enough to travel to Dubai with the U.S. parachuting team and compete at a world level. While training for the next world competition, however, Cleary pushed his body too far. On a botched landing one day, he crashed into a rogue mound of dirt. The accident hurt his back, but he decided that the pain was nothing a few ibuprofen and a good night’s sleep couldn’t fix. The next morning, on what would normally have been a routine landing, Cleary’s L1 vertebra shattered.

While recovering at the Shepherd Center, he found that supporting his peers helped him to recover as well. Given only a 1 percent chance to walk again, Cleary can now walk slowly with a cane. But Cleary has had his sights on something much more ambitious: skydiving. He convinced his doctors that it would be as simple as stepping off the back of a pickup truck and now he skydives regularly.

“We all promise our moms when we get hurt like this, ‘I won’t do that again.’” Cleary said. “I didn’t. I still skydive.

I’m sure my mom hates it, but she’s gotten used to it. Seeing someone go after their passions after injuries was important to me, and I think that’s why I wanted to work here. I wanted to show everyone that just because you have a traumatic injury—I mean, yes, your life is going to change, no doubt—it doesn’t have to be the end of your pursuit of happiness.”

Cleary now works at the center as a peer support liaison, inspiring others in the way others inspired him.

On the way back home from a rafting trip, Sierra Maihack and her friends drove too quickly down a curvy, highway entrance ramp. The car left the road and flew into a pine tree. Shortly after the accident, she endured a six-hour surgery to repair her C1 and C6 vertebrae. When Maihack woke up, she discovered a beacon of hope.

“After being in the ICU, I was getting more and more motion back and was feeling little things a little more every day,” Maihack said. “Holding on to that [feeling] throughout my journey here at Shepherd Center has especially helped my outlook on recovery.”

The center provides constant opportunities for patients to reconnect with the world outside of the hospital. From scuba-diving and wheelchair basketball games to just getting out of the building and going to Taco Bell, the Shepherd Center provides a spectrum of therapeutic recreational activities, all intended to help patients resume their pre-injury lifestyles.

“I think the fact that the Shepherd Center was established by a family who has been through this—and that they understand the families’ and patients’ needs physically, emotionally and what it takes to get back to life— is what makes all the difference,” Maihack said. Just ask James Ludwick.

Four months ago, Ludwick, an 18-year-old from Maryland, was set to attend a Division III university with a lacrosse scholarship. Now, after a tragic accident, the only motion he can make is a shoulder shrug. Even though the college still plans to value his scholarship, Ludwick faces a long and difficult recovery process—but he doesn’t have to make the journey alone.

“I’ve been part of the adolescent program, so the therapists and everyone I’ve worked with are geared to help people of my age,” Ludwick said. “Day by day, you learn that you can do it, you will recover and you will get through it.”

Ludwick, like Underwood, also fell victim to what Alana Shepherd notes is the one of the most common causes of spinal cord injury: diving into shallow water. Though Ludwick still has a long way to go to regain the range of motion he can restore, he has already come a long way, thanks to the adolescent team, a program unique to the Shepherd Center.

“The reason I love the adolescent team is because that’s where you can really make a difference in [the patients’]

into outpatient care after only one month of inpatient treatment.

While Elgar’s chances of walking again are slim, his outlook is more than optimistic.

“I just have to keep fighting,” Elgar said. “There is no quit in me.

It’s nice to have people around me with the same type of injury, but I came here solely for me, myself and I, just to recover and get to be the best that I can be.”

Upon being wished good luck with the rest of his treatment, Elgar replied, “Thanks, but I’m not going to need it.”

COURTESY OF SHEPHERD CENTER

12

attachment that patients, peer supporters, doctors and therapists share. Essentially, they are all part of one big Shepherd family.

“I wouldn’t wish this upon anybody, but I hope a lot of people take the opportunity to come, get to know us and hear our stories,” Underwood said. “I want them to see how different we all are, but how alike we are in our appreciation for the Shepherd Center. This place has saved a lot of people’s lives, including mine.”

Elmers believes peer support groups and therapeutic recreation are the crux of the Shepherd Center’s emotional rehabilitation efforts. Shepherd believes that Elmers may have more to do with the success than she lets on. “[The staff ] has got this culture of relentless intentional caring for the patients and the families,” Shepherd said. “When it happens in a family, it’s not just the patient that you need to take care of, it’s the family too. The family is sometimes impacted more than the patient.

While both James and Alana Shepherd claim they are too busy to stop and think about the good they have done for the world, James said he will always remember rather unexpected, intimate moments with patients, which he believes are the true fuel of his motivation.

“I’ll leave this building to go to the parking deck and sometimes I’ll get three or four families who stop me, hug me and cry,” he said. “I pull out on Peachtree YOU CAN’T QUIT A FAMILY and I’ve got tears running down my face. Someone one time [told me], ‘You probably ought to quit.’ I said, ‘No, you don’t get it. I need to quit when the wouldn’t go to a high school reunion,” said Jolyn Ludwick, James Ludwick’s tears quit running down my face.” mother. “But I would definitely go to a Shepherd Center reunion.”

While you can quit a job, you can’t quit a family. As long as the Shepherd CenThe Shepherd Center isn’t unique because it has an innovative approach ter runs itself on that notion, its impact will be lucidly exposed on the faces of so to physical healing. The center stands unparalleled because of the emotional many people that it has touched: a perfect blend of tears and smiles. p Grady alumnus James “Woody” Morgan was a star sweeper on the Grady soccer team, an excellent student and a sports editor for The Southerner.

During his first two years at the University of Georgia, Morgan planned to go into medicine. Even after breaking his C5 and C6 vertebrae from a dive into what appeared to be a normal wave and spending months in the Shepherd Center, Morgan’s career plans did not falter—if anything, his experiences in rehabilitation drove his motivation in medical school and beyond.

“Shepherd introduced me to a whole new kind of medicine that I never knew about,” Morgan said. “Going through the whole rehabilitation process as a patient let me see exactly what patients went through and how the doctors are there to interact with the whole team.”

Morgan is currently studying at Tulane University to receive an M.D. Afterwards, he plans to join the residency program at Emory University and work in the field of physical medicine and rehabilitation. If he is successful, Morgan will rotate in with the doctors who treated him.

“I think I’d be able to give a whole lot back and also get a lot out of it personally by working with the [Shepherd Center’s] patient population,” Morgan said.

“It would be a pretty unique experience, a pretty cool story to tell.”

I

EXCLUSIVELY @ theSoutherneronline.com Want to watch the full stories of patients: Melissa Underwood, Ritchie Elgar, James Ludwick; be a part of a day in the life of a Shepherd physiatrist with Dr. Anna Elmers; and understand what inspriaration behind the Shepherd Center is firsthand? If so, please visit thesoutherneronline.com

“You take these

tiny steps little

and you find the

JOY

in them.”

-Melissa Underwood, patient

lifestyle

Oct. 20, 2014

13

Former teachers flourish in entertaining adventures

Courtesy of Deedee AbBott

about languages, Stephens has also returned to fulfilling a passion he has neglected since college: working on political campaigns.

“I went down to south Florida to work on the Obama campaign,” Stephens said. ‘This fall I’ve been working on the Carter/Nunn campaigns.

It’s a lot easier to do that when you’re not working.”

Deedee Abbott After seven years of teaching English at Grady, Deedee Abbott was ready to go back to being a full-time mom to her two children, Flora and Finn, who are in seventh and third grades, respectively.

“I was just not successful coordinating my school life with the school lives of my children,” Abbott said. “A lot of stuff fell through the cracks.”

Abbott has enjoyed the opportunities she’s had to spend with her children.

“I’ve been able to do things like the book parade [at the Atlanta Neighborhood Charter School],” Abbott said, “and I was never able to do Flora’s book parade [before] because I was working. [There aren’t] enough consistent things to fill up every day,

jenni Rogan

PLETHORA OF PLANS: With extra free time, former teachers are able to pursue activities not available otherwise. Abbott walks Finn, her son, to the nearby Atlanta Neighborhood Charter School (top left). Cramer explains the figure-eight drill to the girls cross country team (center).

Leahy straddles the prime meridian,thereby standing in both the Eastern and Western hemisphere (bottom right). Stephens reads The Southerner while waiting for students to arrive to the Writing Center (top right).

Courtesy of Brian Leahy

Scott Stephens After 15 years of teaching at Grady and 11 years in the Fulton County School System, Stephens was ready for something different and more relaxing. When ninth and tenth-grade literature teacher Nalin Needham began as a student teacher in his class, Stephens knew he would be leaving his position in good hands.

“When I turned 60, I started thinking about [retiring],” Stephens said, “but when [Needham] showed up and indicated he was interested in teaching here, that was an easy decision at that point.”

In his 1995-1996 break between Fulton County and Grady, Stephens lived with his wife in Egypt. During his year there, Stephens developed a love for the Arabic language. Now he’s been able to indulge that interest by taking language classes at Georgia State University.

“The first semester after I retired, I took an Arabic class,” Stephens said.

“I took three classes in Arabic and I took an Arabic literature class, but this fall I tried to switch to French literature. … I learned French in a French-speaking country, but I never took French literature or writing classes, so this is all new stuff. ” Despite the year he spent in Egypt, the classes Stephens took were much harder than he expected.

“There’s a reason that young people go to school,” Stephens said. “It’s so much easier for young people to learn, and they’re so much quicker, and I felt like the dunce in the corner, sometimes, because it just takes me a lot longer, and of course I don’t have that same motivation. I’m not taking anything for credit, I’m not trying to get a degree, so, you know, if something comes up, and I don’t do my homework I’m just ‘oh, too bad, no big deal.’”

In addition to learning more

Jenni Rogan

By Jenni Rogan When most people dream of retirement, they imagine days filled with golfing and resting. For five former Grady teachers, however, time away from Grady has been anything but typical.

but when they are going to say the pledge of allegiance at Morning Meeting I want to be there, or if they’re sick I want to be able to pick them up. I just don’t want to sideline them.”

In addition to devoting more time to her children, Abbott has also been able to complete more household-related jobs like cleaning, cooking and doing laundry.

“I also go to the farmer’s market once a week with a group of stayat-home parents, and we talk about recipes and plan our healthy meals,” Abbott said. “This year I do notice that I have a little too much time on my hands, and I’m going to fill it with some creative, peaceful passion that is yet to be determined.”

Although she does not currently plan on returning to teaching once her children get older, she is thinking about returning to education. She is starting by auditing a class on Southern authors at GSU next semester.

“I would like to be a student again more than I would like to be a teacher,” Abbott said. “I’d like to just get really involved into

a single author or maybe even a single work and just study it.”

Jeff Cramer With almost 17 years of teaching at Grady under his belt, Jeff Cramer was ready to finally leave Grady in May of 2014.

“I was never going to get to the point where I could say, ‘Well this is the last group that I want to teach,’” Cramer said. “The parents were never going to say to me, ‘Well, you’ve done everything for our community that we want you to do, now you can leave.’ They were always going to say, ‘You’ve got to wait for my fifth grader, you’ve got to wait for my second grader,’ and the only way to get out of that loop is to just draw a line. So I asked Dr. Murray if it was ok for me to just announce a year ahead of time that it was going to be my last year.”

In the three months since his retirement, Cramer has not completely distanced himself from Grady.

“I’d worked 16 years to build up the cross-country program,” Cramer said, “and we’d been very successful in the last 16 years, and I didn’t want that to fall apart, and I felt that keeping the cross-country team was fairly

easy and that emotionally I was prepared to do that.”

Cramer is currently scouting for a new cross country coach and would like to find one within a year or two.

When he’s not at cross-country practice every afternoon and Saturday morning, Cramer has been filling his days with more timeconsuming interests he didn’t have the time for while teaching: attending old-people yoga classes, playing the violin, interpreting dreams, swimming every morning and volunteering at his church.

Although his days tend to be filled with activities, Cramer still feels open to even more novel experiences.

“One of my philosophies of life is that you don’t go out and try to find a group and push yourself into the group,” Cramer said.

“You get involved in the idea, immerse yourself in it, and then opportunities present themselves... and I want to be open to doing whatever presents itself.” p To read a profile of Brian Leahy please see thesoutherneronline.com

Curtis faces tragedy with support from staff, a smile

By Margo Stockdale If you head to the C-400 hall on “Talk Like a Pirate Day,” (Sept. 19) in addition to a heavy aroma of several dozen original doughnuts, you will likely see science teacher Nikolai Curtis dressed in full pirate garb. Curtis is a self proclaimed life-long nerd and enjoys all things science fiction and fantasy from DragonCon to dabbling in voice-over work. As one of Grady’s biology teachers, his love of sci-fi is well suited.

Curtis was born in Heidelberg, Germany into a military family, which may explain why he uses such intense eye contact despite his otherwise playful appearance. As a child he moved several times, both in the United States and Germany, eventually settling in Whitefield, NJ. Curtis came to Atlanta in 1998 to work in the reptile house at the Atlanta Zoo as a staff herpetologist (or reptile expert).

Curtis worked at the zoo until the summer of 2002 when he began his teaching career through the Atlanta PLUS (Preparing Leaders for Urban Schools) program, a program which hires teachers with real world experience to work in inner-city schools.

“I loved the zoo world and I loved working

with animals but I wanted to do more,” Curtis said. “I didn’t see any opportunities to do more unless I went to graduate school. I had always said I wanted to be a teacher so I applied to the program.”

The program’s selection committee accepted Curtis and eventually placed him at Grady.

Curtis worked that summer at West Fulton Middle School, now BEST Academey “[West Fulton Middle School] taught me a lot about classroom management,” Curtis said.

“A lot of the kids there, they weren’t bad kids.

They just were kids who weren’t good students. ... they needed a lot of support, and luckily I was able to learn a lot [at] that middle school.”

Curtis has a confident swagger and a quick smile, so it’s hard to imagine that he has so recently experienced great tragedy.

Last year, Curtis lost his wife, Rachael, to a pulmonary embolism, and shortly after, his father lost his battle with cancer. Curtis said he could not have gotten through such a hard time in his life without the friendships he has made with other teachers and the relationships he has made with students. Curtis said many of his former students check up on him and that

one of his classes even made a birthday card tasy into his teaching, through outlets like for his wife. Despite all the generosity from his cosplay and a genetics lesson based on Harry Potter characters. friends, Curtis says it’s still hard.

Curtis’ other hobbies include improvi“I’m centered to a degree,” Curtis said. “But, believe me, my wife’s picture is over here on the sational theater, ju jitsu and soccer. He is wall and I give her a kiss every morning. This the staff adviser for the Grady Gamers Club place is wonderful, but I’m only able to do it and the Wellness Club. He began many of these hobbies with his wife. with support.”

Despite his investment in several clubs, CurIt was with his wife that Curtis started returning to DragonCon each year. Now, Curtis tis said the most rewarding part of teaching is the relationships he volunteers with the convention This place is wonderful, but I’m forms with students.

“When I came here, through guest only able to do it with support.” I was only 27 and I transportation, was extremely independriving special Curtis said. “I’m guests from Nickolai Curtis dent,” not gonna lie, I was their hotels to science teacher a little arrogant, and their seminars, teaching has taught me panels and to be willing to rely on workshops. This year, he met Cary Elwes, Wesley from The other people, to reach out for help. A lot of Princess Bride, while volunteering. He said that kids say that I’m one of the strongest people although the guests aren’t always well-known, they’ve ever met, to see me be able to handle science fiction actors and writers, interacting these things. I was only able to handle these things with the help of my fellow teachers and with them is still exciting.

Curtis hopes to incorporate his love of fan- my students.” p

“

lifestyle

14

Oct. 20, 2014

Twenty Questions for Uzuki Kakinuma On Beyoncé, busking, sushi, social media, finding happiness and making the world a prettier place

Carter

Guensler

By Carter Guensler All right! Cool, cool, cool. Thanks for doing this with me!

“Yeah my pleasure!”

OK, so tell me. What do you love to do?

“Well, I really just try to be a happy person. So I’m not Beyoncé, but my aspiration in life is definitely to be happy. Other than that, you know, obviously music. As dorky as it sounds ... I love it. It’s kinda what brings me the happiness, really. And I love being with people who enjoy music as much as I do, you know, all the other dorks. So yeah! I like to jam. I like to busk [to perform in public for donations]. And I want to leave an impression. I like the connection when people know me as, ‘Hey, there’s that violin girl!’ even though I don’t play violin.”

Right! You play viola. What’s the difference there?

“Ooooh! OK, the violin has a higher register. The viola is slightly lower and has the same strings as the cello, which you put on the ground. And I really think the viola represents me...” ...because you have cello strings and you’re slightly lower?

“Yes! I mean, maybe it’s not a direct relationship, but the viola was a very ignored instrument throughout the ages of Bach and Mozart, and if you play pieces from back then, the viola parts are really boring. But at some point in the composer period, composers started to feel the beauty of the viola. When you hear a viola solo, it’s very rich. Not as powerful or melodic, but it’s just that underdog kind of instrument of the orchestra. I like to compare the whole orchestra to a cake...” ...I like where you’re going with this... “ ... then the viola would be [the top layer] you put on the cake. You don’t really think about it, but it’s something you can’t take it out. And that’s what I want to be, a figure in someone’s life that you can’t really take out. I don’t have to be the big spotlight or main character. I’m happy in the ensemble, I just want to be up there on the stage.”

So who are you currently playing for?

“The Emory Youth Symphony Orchestra! It’s run by the university, and it’s really great. The conductor’s British, so ... enough said!”

What’s it like being one of the few Asians at Grady?

“I have great dumplings for lunch! Actually, you know, I’ve gotten used to the ... how do I say this ... playful racism? Like, ‘Can you see outta those eyes?’ That used to really hurt me.”

Whoa, that doesn’t sound so playful.

“Yeah, I dunno. I am foreign; I’m not a U.S. citizen. I can’t vote or anything, but I’d like to keep my Japanese citizenship. Being a foreigner in Atlanta merges my personality, really. I tend to have an international view on news subjects and stuff. I think being from Japan gives me a unique view. ” You said your parents have been a strong influence. What do they do?

“My mother studied to be a journalist in Japan. She wanted to be in the whole mass communications thing, which I’m also interested in ... so ... genes! But then she was dragged to America by my father, so she’s does imports. It’s a typical office job. She always talks about what she wanted to do. Makes me feel like ... you should do what you want in your life. YOLO! Oh wow, I really regret saying that.”

YOLO? Yep, that’s going in there.

“I mean, that’s what she taught me! And my dad?

His story is pretty cool. He’s a third-generation sushi chef in Tokyo. You know those pictures of really crowded cities? With all the cars and the people and the buildings? That’s where I was born.”

Wow. “So he was an understudy sous chef. Have you seen Karate Kid?” ‘Wax on, wax off?’

“Yeah! In sushi terms, he had to make.—What would that be in English—Omelets? He would just have to constantly make omeletes and wash dishes. The Sushi World is all about discipline, patience and sacrifice. That’s why Japanese people are so collected. Lots of patientce. He got a job in Atlanta, and he worked for 10 years, worked his way up to executive chef over 10 years. We moved here when I was 4, so until I was 14. He had, like, connections, and he got a job in Hong Kong.

He moved [to Hong Kong] two or three years ago.

Really? So who do you live with at home?

“My mom and my brother. Moving away was a very big sacrifice for him and for us. But I like to think that I was a push factor for him because I really wanted him to follow his dreams. Atlanta is a great city, but I didn’t want him to be in a fishbowl! So I told him to go, and he left. He got them a third star this year, and it’s one of the only three-star sushi restaurants. I’m very proud of him. He’s moving on up in the world.

You know, there are magazine articles about him ... and for the record ... his sushi is delicious. It’s great.”

How often do you get to see him?

“He comes back once or twice a year for a week at most. The shortest was one and a half days. His travel time was longer than his stay.”

Woooooow.

“Lots of sacrifice. My brother’s in fifth grade. For him, it’s a very hard thing, not having a father at home. He’s too young, but I hope he realizes someday how proud you can be of someone. That beats any other feeling. It’s great. I miss him, but I’d rather him be over there being so successful, than him being here and being disappointed of how much potential he has. So yeah, I’m very proud.”

How does that affect life at home?

“Not to get too personal, but there are issues. My parents are quite young for my age.

They’re both under 40, and they have their own issues. Between me and my mom, we’re kind of like sisters. We fight about the stupidest things. He was an annoying and embarrassing dad, but when he’s not here, I realize how important he is.”

Final question, favorite food?

“Have you ever tried Korean barbeque? My favorite is cow tongue.They bring it out in slices, and you cook it on the stove table in front of you. We need it. It’s great.” p

for the complete QUESTIONS interview please visit thesoutherneronline.com

by Carter Guensler

Quirky and quaint: Little Five Points beckons visitors

By Brett Pollock Little Five Points is what many people call “different.” The area is colorful– quite literally–with murals covering many buildings. The shining personality of the unique individuals, the shops and the art being sold by street merchants all add to the Little Five spirit.

While the blocks-wide neighborhood may seem a bit odd, it brings in visitors from far and wide.

“Little Five Points has always been somewhere people can go who aren’t quite considered part of normal society or are what others call an outcast,” said Mckagan Smith, co-owner of Psycho Sisters, a popular shop in Little Five. “I think that alone brings a lot of people to Little Five.”

Words several tourists used to describe Little Five include “unique,” “eclectic,” “cultured,” “crazy,” “diverse,” “urban” and

“funky.” The style of the stores vary, from “I probably visit Little Five a couple times hectic stores like Junkman’s Daughter and a week,” Carrie Manning said. “I go for stuff Rag-o-Rama to more “normal” stores like like Arden’s Garden, gas and restaurants. I don’t see many people coming down from American Apparel and René René.

“Some places can try to be artsy while Little Five Points very often. I only see it others don’t try to be anything, Little Five when I’m walking or driving through.”

Many stories Points regular Maya Smith from Little Five said. “They just involve the local [have] wild gifts homeless community stirring and gadgets.” up benign trouLittle Five difble. Little Five fers greatly from its surrounding Zack Morris Points’ homeless neighborhoods, frequent visitor to Little Five Points community is a large part of its acting as a hole in the wall between Inman Park and Can- uniqueness, clustering around the center dler Park. Most locals have all visited or squares. In this area everyone seems to repassed through Little Five Points regularly, lax, socialize, compose music, and perform even though they usually don’t perceive it their different talents. People passing by describe the group as pleasant and kind as being near their homes.

“

It’s literally every day when something crazy happens.”

with a couple of crazies here and there.

The crazy ones tend to cause Little Five’s infamous scenarios.

“There used to be this crazy lady; she carried around a music box and was the one that usually got too wild,” said Zack Morris, a Little Five Points regular. “One day she was running through the streets; she had a shirt on but no pants. The cops had to chase her all the way down the street to tackle her, and that pretty much stopped traffic. I don’t see her much anymore, but it’s literally every day when something crazy happens.”

Little Five’s most well-known event is its Halloween parade and festival. The parade consists of maniacs running around with chain saws, realistic-looking zombies and wicked costumes. It’s a great experience that shows every aspect of Little Five mashed together in just a few of hours. Like the rest of Litle Five Points, it's not to be missed. p

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Oct. 20, 2014

15

What does PSA stand for? Please Stop Asking

Photos By: max rabbb

By Maxwell Rabb Grady-based rap group PSA, or Please Stop Asking, performed at the Masquerade’s Purgatory Lounge on Sept. 21.

PSA consists of seniors Javarius Sawyer (far right), Telly Myers and Brian Stewart, juniors Sermanu Whitten (top and right), Justin Hinnant (top), Christian Hogan and Morehouse freshman Malcolm Dean.

PSA released its first album (Please Stop Asking) on Soundcloud. The group plans to release a new album by the end of the year.

“PSA is my family for the first part so it’s just like [performing] with your brothers,” Sawyer said. “We all love going crazy and [having] positive vibes and getting them hype.”

Fuiste, another Grady group composed of senior Johnny Bakos and juniors Skylar Brillante and Sam Wilson opened for PSA. Fuiste is a three-piece instrumental group with Brillante on drums, Wilson on guitar and Bakos on bass. p

Photos by:Max Rafferty

BeltLine shaped by local sculptors

Clockwise from top left: J. Aaron Alderman’s “Pathos, Sweet, Lost & Found”; Phil Proctor’s “The Herd”’; and David Landis’s “Northern White” are all located on the BeltLine’s Eastside Trail. All along the BeltLine murals, live performances, and other sculptures fill the pathway.

By Max Rafferty and Anders Russell In the last few years, the Atlanta BeltLine project has transformed a decrepit, unused railroad into a thriving public path and art space. From murals to live performances to sculptures, local artists have done their best to turn a bland concrete path into a living art exhibition.

The Eastside Trail, the most developed part of the Beltline, consequently features a large portion of the art.

“The arts are a building block for a community, neighborhood or group,” sculptor David Landis said. “They can lift spirits, promote awareness or memorialize. There are many types of public art, all with different reasons for their creation, and all integral parts in defining community. [The BeltLine] is a large uninterrupted space upon which a viewer can experience art, and the BeltLine is smart in its approach by mixing permanent works with temporary ones.”

Landis is one of many sculptors who work on the BeltLine.

His metallic sculpture of a Northern White Rhino was inspired by the animal’s interesting story. Not long ago, there were just four of the species left, but zoologists decided to let them roam free instead of putting them in zoos, and they are now making a comeback. Though the sculpture was designed before the species recovered, Landis still finds meaning in the poetic nature of the lives and fates of animals.

Every year the BeltLine puts out a request for art submissions, and a committee decides on some permanent and some temporary installations. The BeltLine Art Foundation then helps to streamline the process by helping artists with everything from

contracts to connections with experts in other fields.

Many Grady students utilize the BeltLine daily to commute to and from school.

“Seeing the art on the BeltLine makes me realize how great the community really is,” freshman Reid Barry said.

In fact, the only complaint about the BeltLine’s art installations is that they are too eye-catching.

“I feel like it gives me a lack of convenience,” junior Skylar Brillante said. “It makes me slow down and look at art.”

Some of the art reflects the BeltLine’s history. Jac Coffey’s railroad worker sculptures draw from the railway on which the path was built, turning the rusting iron that was a scar on the city’s surface into a pleasingly utilitarian work. In a similar vein, Phil Proctor’s Iron Column, a 24-foot tall solitary giant overlooking Fourth Ward Park, was built solely from old railroad artifacts.

Other works deal with modern problems such as Dorothy O’Connor and Craig Appel’s interactive sculpture of 365 origami birds that fly around a hand powered tornado. The artists made this piece to draw attention to the problems faced by Fulton County Animal Shelter, each bird representing the shelter’s average daily intake of 25 animals.

“I’m just proud to be a part of Atlanta’s ever expanding art experience.” Landis said. “Art enthusiasts will have their hands full as we [move] forward.”

Art on the BeltLine is just getting started and the future holds exciting new possibilities. p For more coverage of the BeltLine please see pages one and five.

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Oct. 20, 2014

By Anna Braxton White tents filled with art lined the sidewalks around Piedmont Park’s active oval spanning from 12th Street to 14th Street during the two-day festival. Artists from all over the country participated in the event and brought with them unique art ranging from photography to glass to wood sculptures. More than 20,000 art enthusiasts and casual festival attendees were expected to be at the event, which has been ranked as one of the top 100 finest arts shows in the country according to Sunshine Artist magazine.

Despite the construction surrounding Music Midtown, Piedmont Park still hosted the annual Atlanta Arts Festival Sept. 13 and 14. The festival had approximately 200 vendors and featured chef demonstrations and live music.

Greg Stones, an artist who creates “miniature gouache paintings of penguins, zombies and sock monkeys,” was a vendor at the festival and has been for the past four years. Stones, who is from South Carolina, participates in several art festivals around the country including festivals in Boston, Pittsburgh, Chicago and Miami. He wrote in an email interview that the Atlanta Arts Festival is more laid-back than the other art festivals he attends.

“Art festivals are a great way for artists to interact with the human race,” Stones wrote. “Art festivals expose artists to lots of different people and expose lots of different people to lots of different artististic sensibilities. Everybody wins.”

New this year to the festival was the Art of Cooking Stage, sponsored by Krog Street Market. This event highlighted prominent chefs from KSM, such as Todd Ginsberg of Yalla and Fred’s Meat and Bread, in a setting that allowed them to connect with the audience through cooking demonstrations.

The festival also featured 11 live performances from local bands such as Mudcat, Georgia Flood and No Komment.

“We are able to not only provide a cultural experience, but also one that festival attendees can participate in, learn from and be fully engaged in,” Atlanta Arts Festival founder Julie Tepp wrote in an email interview. “Each year

Anna Braxton

Festival includes art with a beat and art you can eat

PIEDMONT ART: The Atlanta Arts Festival had art from 12 mediums of art represented: clay, drawings/graphics/printmaking, fiber/leather, glass, jewelry, metal, 2-D mixed media, 3-D mixed media, oil/acrylic painting, watercolor/pastel painting, photography/digital art and wood. we return with an amazing group of talented artists from around the country showcasing artwork in 12 different mediums, and the vast buying community of Atlanta is exposed to a diversified collection of art pieces.”

Tracy Tepp, co-founder of the Atlanta Arts Festival, wrote via email that the goal behind the festival is to have

a positive impact on the community by enhancing its cultural environment.

“We hope that our efforts will produce an event that is fun and enlightening to a wide range of people,” Tracy Tepp wrote. “From kids to adults ... from art novices to the experienced collector.” p

Q&A with Music Midtown artist Ron Pope

Artist goes from crowd to center stage in 14 years the tour bus will come and pick us up in a couple of days and bring us to Boston and then it gets kind of hectic. You know traveling to a new city every day. It’s actually kinda crazy coming here without a bus because when you don’t have a bus you show up and they’re like, ‘Uh you have a van and a rental car and a whole bunch of people.

What are you here for?’ ‘Playing! We’re here to play.’ So we drove around forever, and we talked to police officers.

No one

knew what was going on. Being in a bus is just easier because you just wake up and you’re where you are supposed to be all the time.

What’s your favorite thing about playing at Music Midtown?

My favorite thing about playing at Music Midtown is that my family and friends from Atlanta can come and see me, I mean it’s right here! My wife had aunts and uncles and other friends, and I played early enough so people who don’t like to stay out late like they do when I play in clubs, so they came for this. And like I said the little ones got

to come. A lot of my friends from growing up who actually went to this festival with me are here seeing me, so that was surreal.

That must have been so gratifying.

Yeah! And like when the gates opened people were running to get a spot in front of my stage and there were so many people. I mean I’ve been to festivals where I’m playing later in the day and the first band plays for like 50 people, and a lot of people showed up to watch me play, especially for 4:30 in the afternoon on a Friday. I think that was a surprise for everybody. Especially for this stage, like you don’t know where this is. I didn’t know where this is. My dressing room is like 45 minutes away from here. p

Stockdale

MIDTOWN HOMECOMING: Ron Pope grew up outside of Atlanta, in Marietta. He attended Wheeler High School and wrote for the school newspaper, which Dave Winter advised. Pope said that Winter was incredibly supportive and the first person to tell him that he was a good writer. Pope began focusing on music after an injury forced him to end his college baseball career. He performed on MTV’s TRL in 2008, launching his career. He released his most popular single, “A Drop in the Ocean,” the following year. Currently, Pope is working to release a new album while touring the United States.

Margo

By Carter Guensler When you were younger did you ever go to Music Midtown?

I did go to Music Midtown! I graduated from Wheeler in 2001, and I went to Music Midtown in 2000 and maybe 1999. ... I’m not sure but like ... a long time ago. Yes. So who were the boys you were hugging a little while ago?

Well my wife grew up here in Atlanta too.

Her older brother has two sons, and so my nephews are here for their first concert. One is 4, his name is Carson and the other one, he is a little over a year or so? His name is Wesley. My little nephews are wearing the giant earmuffs things—y’know so before people say we are abusing little kids or something. And we got little tiny Ron Pope T-shirts, and it’s so cute.

What is that like to be able to influence lives like that and be that awesome figure in their lives?

I would assume that they probably won’t remember this, but I’m hoping that in like 10 years that they will think it’s really cool.

And you said that there was one song you never played before so did you write it just for Music Midtown?

Well, I’m making a new album, and we’re up in Blue Ridge, Georgia. And we’re going to mostly work on it on the road. So yeah I wrote that, and I’m going to save my others for my tour and that was the first time I played that song and it’s called “After the Flood” and another new one today, “Life Over Junction.”

So what’s life on the road like?

Right now it’s pretty mellow because we are in Georgia for most of time, you know, we are just working on the album and then

dining

Oct. 20, 2014

17

The story of Southern food is teeming with generations of visionary chefs who have spent their lives refining their craft. Though not as popular as fried chicken, waffles are an integral part of Southern culture.

One only has to drive a few blocks before seeing the inevitable gold and Lucia Lombardo black block letters of a Waffle House sign. Other restaurants, however, have popped up in the Grady area offering alternatives to the monopoly of the “waffle with every-way hash browns.”

In my journey to find the perfect waffle, I ventured first to the International House of Pancakes (428 Ponce De Leon Ave.). IHOP has branched out to include the pancake’s textured cousin. Unfortunately, the waffle options were slim, and I settled on the Berries N’ Cream waffle. In theory (and according to the menu), this dish came with a dollop of cool vanilla cream topped with blueberries and strawberries, but the reality on the plate was much less appetizing. While the waffle was fluffy, it relied on the over sweetness of the cream for its actual flavor. And the fresh fruit? The strawberries had definitely been frozen, and the blueberries were shriveled. For $6.99, I received an over-sized bland waffle with too much vanilla cream and too few berries. My verdict is that IHOP should stick to flapjacks and leave the waffles to the specialists.

Next, I ventured downtown to Gladys Knight’s Chicken and Waffles (529 Peachtree St.) to sample their, you guessed it, chicken and waffles. I had never tried this Southern dish before and figured that heading to one of the definitively Southern restaurants in Atlanta would give me the best introduction. And I was right. My enormous waffle came with four fried chicken wings and syrup. I was only able to eat two of the wings, but the waffle really commanded my full attention. Although it wasn’t as fluffy as IHOP’s waffle, the flavor was spot on, especially when combined with the crunchiness of the wings and sweetness of the syrup.

Even though I am not a chicken and waffles connoisseur, I recognized the thought and finesse required to create the complementary flavor profile I was tasting. The crispy chicken combined with the syrup created a great addition to the subtle waffle. Although the meal was $13.50, by far the most expensive of the waffles I tried, the chicken was a foreseen cost I was willing to pay to get such an iconic dish. This was a definite contender for the title of best waffle.

My third stop was the big daddy of them all, Waffle House

Photos By Jennifer Steckl

Quest for the Best: No waffling on this, West Egg it is

WAFFLE TOWN: West Egg’s honey butter waffle took home the prize (above) with Gladys Knight’s Chicken and Waffles (far left), Waffle House (middle left) and IHOP (close left) taking up the rear.

(2264 Cheshire Bridge Road). I was there to find out if its waffles measured up to their lofty name and decided not to be influenced by their oily, yet delicious, hash browns. I ordered a spin on the classic: a chocolate chip waffle. This came in at only $3.20, the least expensive waffle in my search. I was worried the low price would negatively impact the flavor and, unfortunately, that concern was warranted.

Although not as bad as IHOP’s, the WH waffle was too thin and the chocolate chips did not smother or even cover the waffle but rather were unevenly scattered over the top. While the flavor was not terrible, the actual restaurant left much to be desired.

Before I was served my food, I had to change seats twice because of flies swarming around the table. The table was sticky, just like at IHOP, and the whole presentation of my food left much to be desired. The complementary flavor of the chocolate with the waffle was just enough for Waffle House to beat IHOP. My fourth and final restaurant was West Egg Cafe (1100 Howell Mill Road). I had never heard of West Egg Cafe before visiting and was eagerly anticipating their waffle. West Egg not only serves a full, all-day breakfast, it also has a lunch and dinner menu along with dessert items. The atmosphere was charming;

a table held games guests could play while waiting for their food.

We played Jenga at our table outside. I ordered the signature (and only) waffle on the menu, a Belgian waffle with spiced honey butter. The price, $5, had me wondering how good it could actually be despite its reputation among my friends. I was wrong to ever have doubted them. With one look at the waffle, I knew it was in a league of its own. With a generous scoop of the spiced butter on top and a perfectly golden finish, this waffle is head and shoulders above the rest. The waffle was beautifully pressed with crispy edges and a soft center. It wasn’t too large, and there was more than enough butter to cover the entire waffle. The taste didn’t disappoint, with the butter really enhancing the flavor. The subtleness of the waffle’s flavors combined with the cinnamon-y taste and sweetness of the butter sealed the deal for me; I had saved the best for last.

For die-hard Waffle House fans, I strongly encourage you to branch out and try either Gladys Knight’s Chicken and Waffles or West Egg’s waffle with spiced honey butter. For those on a budget, however, don’t make Gladys Knight’s your first stop.

You can never go wrong with Waffle House, but acknowledging the better waffles out there is a step in the right direction. p

I’ve never eaten so much chicken in my life.

I’m not talking about deep-fried, grease-coatReilly Blum ed, arteryclogging poultry, but instead, broth-soaked, artfully-seasoned nibbles of heaven.

Gio’s Chicken Amalfitano is an authentic Italian restaurant located on Hemphill Avenue in the Westside. Upon entering, I first noticed communal tables surrounded by people smiling, laughing and yes, eating chicken.

Gio’s isn’t the “typical” Italian restaurant; there’s no pizza on the menu at all. Though the chef ’s main focus is certainly chicken, Gio’s also offers several promising pasta options.

I ordered the Arancia Di Capri and was not disappointed– even the complimentary salad that came before my meal was spectacular. At first glance, it just looked like a bowl of lettuce with shaved parmesan on top, but then I took a bite. It was lightly dressed with a peppery vinaigrette that made my tastebuds sing.

Reilly Blum

Taste of Italy alive in fierce, flavorful chicken dishes

DON’T BE CHICKEN: Gio’s Chicken on Hemphill Avenue serves up gourmet chicken dishes ranging from Arancia Di Capri with orange and potatoes (above) to a Sorrento Lemon chicken with fresh lemons and oregano.

I had barely started to eat my salad, however, when a glorious bowl of chicken arrived.

It’s important to note that this chicken is not for the faint of heart. Each order comes with half of a chicken: breast, wings and all, and it’s still on the bone.

Gio makes the customers work a little–after my meal I felt like a fully qualified butcher–but it was certainly worth it.

I was skeptical at first. My chicken dinner cost a pricey $15, and

it wasn’t even off the bone. By the end of my meal I understood.

My meal was certainly enough for two people, and it came with both fingerling potatoes and crispy garlic bread to dunk in the wonderful broth. Had etiquette allowed, I probably would have drunk what remained straight from the bowl. It was artfully flavored with orange, rosemary and garlic that complemented the chicken beautifully. The chicken was perfectly cooked, and I was

left with enough leftovers for another meal.

I also tasted the Spaghetti & Polpette, a more authentic name for spaghetti and meatballs, and was blown away by the quality of the food. Though it cost $14, there was definitely enough for two people. A generous dollop of thick cream, that tasted like ricotta mixed with herbs, topped the steaming bowl of pasta. I could have eaten a plateful of just the cream, but the rest of the dish

was even better. This is spaghetti for two very hungry people. Two meatballs the size of my fist swam in extremely rich sauce, the noodles were perfectly al dente, and bread served on the side made the meal.

Caffé Gio’s, a coffee, dessert and panini shop, connects to the middle dining room and patio out back. I couldn’t resist trying the stracciatella gelato. I can still taste the rich, creamy vanilla and the bittersweet chunks of chocolate that was the perfect end to my meal.

Gio’s is a part of the Westside district’s Piazza San Gennaro, or “Little Italy-” a small group of authentic Italian restaurants all located on Hemphill Ave. Antico, a celebrated pizza restaurant, and Bottega Luisa, an artisan Italian grocery, are other destinations in the piazza.

Gio’s superior chicken puts Zaxby’s, Popeye’s and Bantum and Biddy to shame. Don’t let the high prices turn you away: the portions are huge, definitely large enough for two people to share.

If you don’t eat anywhere else, eat at Gio’s. The food is incredible, the atmosphere is inviting and the adjoining Caffé scoops up some of the most delicious gelato I’ve tasted. p

dining

18

Oct. 20, 2014

By Ben Simonds-Malamud The news that the property at 544 Ponce de Leon Ave. was closing brought Cynthia Wyatt and Penelope Glass to the 1950s-themed eatery for one last ice cream cone.

The two church friends frequented Zesto, which resided at that address from 1954 until Sept. 20.

“We come here a lot for lunch after choir rehearsal,” Wyatt said.

“This is our lunch spot. Now we gotta find another lunch spot.”

After 60 years of serving up comforting fast-food fare like ice cream, burgers, hot dogs and fries, the trustees of Zesto sold the property to Cook-Out, a North Carolina based burger chain. The staff were some of the most surprised by the news.

“We all looked at each other, and we were just speechless,” said Cherlyn Roberts, a 21-year veteran of Zesto’s kitchen. “We were just shocked.”

Roberts, her sister, Ellen Roberts, and co-worker, Olivia Moses, were managers of the Ponce Zesto at the time it closed. They have worked there a combined 84 years.

When asked about their plans going forward, Moses replied, “We’re going on vacation.”

When the Ponce Zesto closed, the

Photos by Ben Simonds-Malamud

Ponce Zesto closes doors on 60 years of open mouths

ZEST OF LIFE: Lividatis points to pictures of past Zesto FLOUR POWER: Moses (left) and Cherlyn Roberts (right) CONELY THE BEST: Wyatt (left) and Glass (right) enjoy a locations as he reminisces about his family’s history feed a large closing-day crowd. “We know people loved final ice cream at the Ponce Zesto, which had become their operating Zestos from 1948 throughout the Southeast. Zesto, but boy we found out how much,” Roberts said. regular lunch spot following church and choir events. memories of the managers contain the location’s rich history, such as the many celebrities who visited over the years: Tyler Perry, Maynard Jackson, T.I. and many others.

“Walt Frazier [a hall-of-fame NBA player for the New York Knicks] worked here,” owner Jimbo Livaditis said. “He used to love to eat all the shakes.”

Zesto’s story began in 1945, when the Taylor Freezer Company launched it as an ice cream-only chain restaurant to compete with Dairy Queen. Jimbo’s father, “Big” John Livaditis, brought the franchise to the Southeast in 1948, opening a Zesto in Columbia, S.C. He opened a Zesto on Peachtree Road in 1949.

At that point, Zesto franchises were operating in 46 states. Then, in 1955, Taylor Freezer abandoned Zesto and granted its franchises autonomy.

Livaditis then moved the operation fully to Atlanta and began expanding Zesto’s presence.

Zesto’s menu underwent a gradual evolution Livaditis orchestrated. He introduced hot dogs, French fries and roasted chicken, a midwestern fried chicken preparation, along with other fast-food specialties.

When John retired in the mid1980s, he left his two sons, Jimbo and Lee Livaditis, in charge.

Jimbo Livaditis has worked at Zesto most of his life, beginning in the eighth grade. After graduating

from Davidson College in 1980, he came back to Atlanta to work for the family company.

Jimbo oversaw the 1991 renovation which resulted in the neon-lit, chrome-paneled establishment Atlantans recognize today, and which Cook-Out promised it would not change drastically.

He began by researching diner and drive-in designs extensively, amassing a personal library of about 30 to 40 books. He then worked with Atlanta architect Dennis Dubey to put his ideas on paper.

“The neighborhood loved [the design], and my father thought we were crazy,” Jimbo said.

Zesto unveiled its new design in

1991, and in the same year the Atlanta Urban Design Commission gave it the first place award for architectural excellence.

“So really, that kind of put us on the map,” Jimbo said.

Some Ponce employees will continue to work at other Zesto locations, and Jimbo said he would oversee the writing of recommendations for others.

As Jimbo looked around the Ponce Zesto in some of its final moments of operation, speaking with its customers and recounting its history, his love of Zesto and his devotion to the company were evident.

“It’s gonna leave a hole in our hearts,” he said. p

Decatur is not in Atlanta, despite what many outof-towners may assume. Just a few miles down Ponce lies a city with its own customs, culture and tradiChloe Prendergast tions. Its restaurants define it as a city even more. From Italian to Indian, the cuisine takes you on an international voyage even though you only have to travel next door. no. 246 With a unique menu, and an even more unique ambiance, no. 246 demonstrates what it takes to make a place distinguishable.

The Italian restaurant prepares fantastic, locally sourced food that’s good for your mind, heart and, sometimes, your wallet.

The sharp white and grey walls at no. 246 are met with exposed bricks and classic tiles that create a crisp atmosphere. The restaurant is adorned with custom-made light fixtures, revamped chalkboard school tables and hardwood floors taken from a barn.

This eclectic barnyard feel is reflected not only in the décor but also in the food. Ingredients from farms neighboring Atlanta are used in many of no. 246’s dishes.

“There’s some that are 20 miles away; the furthest one is in Athens,” head chef Andrew Isabella said. “We are using several different farmers right now, which is really great. A little west, a little north, all around from where we’re at; it’s pretty awesome. You get almost the same product but a different twist on it.

You can tell if the soil is different, you get a different sweetness from that, a different spice off the peppers; it’s really good.”

The staff at no. 246 prides itself on all of its dishes, ranging from margarita pizzas to octopus, but its pastas are a specialty. Made fresh daily, the ingredients and clever combinations make the pastas unique to this restaurant.

“There’s a lot of time put into [making the pastas],” Isabella said. “Definitely just the feel of it is amazing, but also the texture when you’re eating it is a lot different than you would get buying it. It’s a huge asset to our restaurant that we can put in our own ingredients to our pastas making different colors, different flavors.”

Isabella has another area of expertise that sits close to his heart. Inspired by his mother’s home cooking as a child, Isabella has worked to make brunch an important meal to no.

246. Served from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. every Saturday and Sunday, the brunch menu includes deviled farm eggs, baked grapefruit, breakfast pizzas, chicken and biscuits, pancakes and much more.

Every city has Italian restaurants, but not every city has a no. 246.

CHAI PANI Five years after debuting in Asheville, Chai Pani opened a new location in Decatur in January of this year. The very popular establishment serves up authentic Indian food to its ever expanding customer base in Atlanta and Decatur.

The menu includes recipes inspired by Indian street vendors, who prepare fresh, fast food for foot traffickers in the country. Street food is a part of India’s culture that many other Indian restaurants in the United States don’t capture.

“The inspiration came from seeing the misrepresentation of Indian food in the U.S.,” head chef Daniel Peach said. “knowing what real Indian street food was, what even real Indian home cooking was and not being able to eat it, we wanted to eat it so bad we opened a restaurant,” Beyond this personal motivation, the chefs at Chai Pani wanted to be able to share India’s culture with America.

“India is so diverse; there are a huge number of ethnicities in India: its unfathomable,” Peach said. “So in that way, if a person thinks about a country and thinks

Photos By Chloe Prendergast

International food warms hearts in City of Decatur

all they eat is curry and rice, that not only limits their food, but it limits their ethnic group. When you learn more about the diversity of their food, you also end up learning more about a culture. You see them as a more diverse people.”

Decatur seemed like a perfect second location for Chai Pani. The owner and head chef thought, like Asheville, Decatur is a little hippy and funky. But Decatur, and Atlanta, also had another quality Chai Pani was in search of: families who enjoy ethnic food, or would appreciate Indian street food, and a large Indian population who could feel at home with their chaats, uttapams and thalis.

“My favorite thing about cooking is that spontaneous act of seeing how much you have of maybe, the vegetable you’re making the curry for, and adding the spices and tasting as it goes along, seeing how the flavor changes and really just having this back and forth with the pot in front of you,” Peach said.

DE”CATERS” TO THE WORLD: Patrons of no. 246 enjoy their meal while watching sous chefs at work (upper left).Customers wait on Chai Pani’s patio (bottom left).

The bar of Chai Pani serves drinks native to India, such as house specialties: the Mango Lassi and their lime beverages Lime Ricky and Nimbu Pani (top right).

Chai Pani tries to reflect India in more than just its food, though. The colorful walls, massive photographs, posters and bouncing sounds showcase India in an even more sensory way.

“This is more what we remember India as,” Peach said. “It’s what India’s like. It’s bright, it’s loud, it’s in your face, a lot of color, a lot of beauty. The pictures on the wall aren’t stock photos; those are people we know in the village where the owner is from. The ambiance came from wanting to represent the vibrancy and life of India.”

There is more to the restaurant than just recreating the true Indian experience for Americans, Indian, and other ethnicities alike in this county, a feat already difficult to master.

“At the end of the day, it’s about trying to make people happy and trying to make the world a better place,” Peach said. “We feel what we’re doing is making the world a better place, whatever small way it may be.” p

sports

Oct. 20, 2014

19

By Chris Brown When I walked into the College Football Hall of Fame, I saw a towering display of helmets from each of the 768 NCAA schools. After I purchased my ticket and received a lanyard with an all-access fan badge, I entered the museum. I was then directed to a kiosk where I needed to enter personal information (name, email, number, etc.) and to select my favorite school (I chose the University of Georgia).

One of the best parts of the Hall of Fame experience was that my badge was coded with each college I’d chosen, so when I approached an exhibit, the exhibit automatically provided information unique to that school. After I had selected UGA, the helmet on the massive display that represented UGA lit up to let me know I’d been registered.

The lobby of the museum was also decorated with a massive mural of some of the most iconic moments and figures in college football history, including legendary Alabama coach Bear Bryant and famed Georgia running back Herschel Walker. The mural was painted by Atlanta artist Steve Penley.

Interactivity was a primary focus of the exhibits in the College Football Hall of Fame. After the lobby, I was greeted with an exhibit entitled “Why We Love College Football,” which featured a 52-foot touchscreen wall. As I approached it the wall displayed photos and videos specific to UGA’s football history.

The museum also featured an exhibit known as the “Game-Day Theater,” which entranced me with an original 10-minute film about what makes college football one of the most exciting pastimes in America today. This exhibit fed into the “Fans’ Game Day” exhibit, which allowed me to experience what the typical college game day is like. The exhibit included models on the evolution of tailgating, as well as the College Game-Day desk, which allowed me to “sit” beside the hosts of ESPN’s College Game Day and select the winner of that week’s big game.

Located atop the museum’s football-shaped rotunda, the Hall of Fame itself was designed to be the highlight of my experience. The exhibit consisted of several augmented reality monitors. When I approached them, they scanned my badge and automatically showed me all of the Hall of Famers that had played (or coached) for UGA. Each figure was accompanied by a video detailing what made them great and a short biography. The room also had several plaques inscribed with the members of each Hall of Fame class since the first one in 1951, but beyond that, there were no three-

Chris Brown

New college football shrine touches down in Atlanta

STANDING IN THE HALL OF FAME: A towering display of 768 helmets, representing each school sanctioned by the NCAA, greets visitors in the College Football Hall of Fame. The College Football Hall of Fame and Chick-Fil-A Fan Experience had its grand opening in Atlanta on Aug. 23, 2014. dimensional attractions to snag my attention.

The final stop in the College Football Hall of Fame experience is the “Chick-fil-A Peach Bowl Skill Zone.” Located on a 45-yard long turf field, this exhibit had several different drills and activities to test out my football skills.

I got to try my luck at kicking a field goal and tested my passing precision with a throwing game. The exhibit was geared towards the museum’s younger audiences but still offered older visitors a fun time.

The College Football Hall of Fame was opened in SouthBend, Ind., in 1951 by the National Football Foundation but was closed in 1992 due to poor attendance and high maintenance costs. In 2009, the NFF made the decision to find a new home for the Hall of Fame and, after considering several other locations, chose Atlanta as its new host city.

Construction on the $68.5 million, 94,000 square-foot

facility began on Jan. 28, 2013. The Hall of Fame completed its move to Atlanta when it officially opened to the public on Aug. 23, 2014 as the College Football Hall of Fame and Chick-Fil-A Fan Experience (250 Marietta St.).

The museum is located on the outskirts of Centennial Olympic Park, near other notable attractions, including the World of Coca-Cola and the Georgia Aquarium. The museum’s mission is to provide a highly modernized and highly personalized experience to college football fans.

Although the museum was low on notable artifacts and conventional exhibits, the College Football Hall of Fame excelled at creating a new niche for itself. The interactivity and focus on modernism caters to the more technologically savvy visitors, but is not too difficult for old-school patrons to grasp. At $19.99 for each adult ticket and $16.99 for each kid’s ticket, the museum delivered a quality, worthwhile experience. q

By Nick Caamano At the start of the school year, administrators faced a vacancy in the job of athletic director.

In addition to the various prerequisites for the job, they were looking for someone who was organized, and possessed strong communication and who exhibited leadership skills. They felt like they found all of these attributes in new athletic director Myss Johnson-Jelks.

“Throughout the interview process, all five of the candidates were very impressive,” principal Timothy Guiney said. “She seemed to have a vision for the athletic department at Grady, she seemed to be highly organized and intelligent, and we knew that organizational skills are critical when it comes to our compliance with GHSA.” Born and raised in the south side of Atlanta, Johnson-Jelks is more than proud to find herself working at an inner-city school.

Johnson-Jelks earned multiple degrees after graduating from North Spring High School: first at the University of West Georgia, where she received her Bachelor of Science in recreation and sports management and then her Master of Education in health and physical education, and at Argosy University of Atlanta where she received a degree in educational leadership. She is currently working on her doctorate, which she hopes to finish in the next year.

Johnson-Jelks also said that working as a deputy sheriff at the Fulton County Sheriff’s office helped her learn how to work with people.

“It just allowed me to deal with different types of people,” Johnson-Jelks said. “It gave

Ludovica Longo

Athletic director starts job one month after day one

BACK TO THE ROOTS: An Atlanta native, Johnson-Jelks is excited to teach at a school inside the perimeter. me the ability to just be more diverse and not be judgmental. It definitely helps with my communication skills because [I am] able to talk to people ... like they’re people. A lot of times when people are police officers or when you’re on the outside looking in, you just think they handle them differently because they’re criminals, but at the end of the day they’re still people.“ She began her teaching career as an adjunct professor at Atlanta Metropolitan College. During that time, she also taught for the DeKalb County School System at Lithonia High School.

In 2012 she began teaching at Washington High School. In addition to teaching health and physical education, she also coached cheerleading, soccer and softball. After enjoying these

positions, she was enthusiastic about landing the position of athletic director at Grady.

“I’m excited. I’m really excited,” JohnsonJelks said. “I know we have great programs here. We have a history of winning. I want to continue that.”

Rodney Hackney, the athletic director and head football coach at Washington High School, has been a colleague and close friend of Johnson-Jelks since 2007.

“She always finds a way to turn a negative into a positive, no matter the situation,” Hackney said. “She is just a breath of fresh air to be around daily.”

Guiney said that he and others on the interview committee were impressed with JohnsonJelks’ positive, passionate and eager attitude.

“I was looking for somebody who is very

organized–someone who has great leadership attributes because essentially that person has to work with all of the coaches, the teachers, parents and students,” Guiney said.

Johnson-Jelks participates in a number of extracurricular activities including sitting on the board of the Georgia Association for Health, Physical Education, Recreation and Dance and chairing a committee on secondary physical education. She is also active in professional development, training others to teach health and physical education and to improve their classrooms by integrating technology and differentiated instruction.

“This [job] is a great opportunity for me because it’s taking me to the next level,” Johnson-Jelks said. “It’s expanding my expertise even more.”

When asked about the address fraud investigation that occured at Grady, JohnsonJelks maintained a positive outlook toward Grady’s future.

“I’m not aware of all the details, but it was an unfortunate situation for the school and the students, and we just don’t want any repeats of any of that,” Johnson-Jelks said.

“My goal is to be sure that we are always in compliance and build upon the current success of our great program.”

With a direct objective to make sure that all fall sports are in order and to get an early start on spring sports, Johnson-Jelks is eager to get started in her new position.

“We have great programs here,” JohnsonJelks said. “We have a history of winning. I want to continue that.” q

the Sports section

thesoutherneronline.com

HENRY W. GRADY HIGH SCHOOL, ATLANTA

Oct. 20, 2014

John slovensky

VOLUME LXVIII, NUMBER 2

WE ALL WE GOT: The specators prepare for the football team’s home game on Sept. 27. The team lost to St. Pius 31-28.

Grady football fans seek to supply new life to games

By John Slovensky The Grady football team’s players give their all to the program. Its fans, however, do not. Grady’s average attendance numbers are lower than most other high schools in the Atlanta area. Lovett, a private school with a student population of 629, averages an attendance of over 3,500 people per game. Grady, however, averages about 3,000 spectators per game, despite having a student population of over 1400.

This year, the Gridiron Club, a support system for the football team, is seeking to change the low attendance.

“For the most part, the booster club is there to support the kids,” Kelly Bray, co-president of the Gridiron Club, said.

Bray addressed the issue of attendance at the request of Tim Langan, a community member and Grady parent. Langan has gone to football games with his kids for the past few years.

Recently, he has noticed a decline in attendance, which he attributes to poor scheduling.

“Grady kind of got a bad schedule the last couple years,” Langan said. “There were lots of 5:30 games, and the whole idea of Friday Night Football starting at 5:30 isn’t the greatest.”

Langan said that Grady moving up a division has also hurt attendance.

Bray agreed with Langan.

“There was a time when my son and I used to go to football games,” Bray said. “We were there probably five or six years ago and the attendance was amazing. Some of the games were incredible to watch and the crowd noise and the support and spirit from the stands was definitely intense.”

Bray and Langan seek to bring back that kind of supportive atmosphere at Grady.

Bray has implemented initiatives in order to drive up the attendance. One of the programs is called “Spirit Knights,” which focuses on bringing elementary school students to games.

Elementary schools are paired together, and then students are encouraged to go to football games.

The Gridiron Club also has activities oriented towards the students to make the game exciting.

For the SPARK and Intown Academy Spirit Knight, the Gridiron Club provided an area for families to sit and gave out water bottles with both the schools’ and Grady’s logos on them.

The Gridiron Club planned to hand out noise makers and have the cheerleaders interact with the younger kids at the home game against Redan on Sept. 9, but the game experienced significant delays due to rain.

Langan has handed out flyers to local businesses with the schedule of the football team and sent out emails on neighborhood email lists in order to raise community awareness.

“The businesses around campus have all been really receptive,” Langan said.

Currently, the initiatives to bring more people out to the games only involve Grady, rather than the Atlanta Public Schools System.

“I did contact the Athletic Director for APS, Jasper Jewell,” Bray said. “He thought it was a

good idea and something that they might want to look into in a system wide way.”

Last year, APS held cluster nights, where they encouraged people in a school cluster to go to watch their high school’s football game.

The Gridiron Club does not have the power to waive admissions or allow processions onto the field like APS does, which makes it harder for Grady to create cluster nights.

Bray thinks that by dropping admissions prices, more people may show up. Bray also suggested allowing the football program to retain some money from the ticket sales, advertisements or concessions sold at the games, which may further encourage community members who want to support the football team.

Both fans and players believe larger crowds are beneficial to the team. Sophomore Javon Sapp enjoys having a large crowd.

“I feel like a bigger crowd would help us win more games,” Sapp said. “[We] feel like we are actually doing better.” p

By Reilly Blum and Gracie Griffith They’re not in the gym. They aren’t in the stadium. They aren’t in Piedmont Park, or even at any APS facilities. Where is Grady’s elusive softball team?

The softball players are forced to practice on the sliver of grass wedged between the trailers and Charles Allen Drive. Though the team occasionally practices at Crim High School, it is usually relegated to a weedy, unmowed field.

Many members of the team cite the lack of practice space as a major factor affecting their performances in games.

“We have to practice on the grass, and that affects how people know where the ball [will bounce], because they haven’t seen bases before,” senior softball player Nadia Kendall said.

Freshman Simone Anicetce agrees wholeheartedly.

“If we had a field I promise we’d be much better,” Anicetce said.

The team’s coach, Patrick Thomas, has tried to organize practices at Crim, which is Grady’s official home field. Unfortunately, the team’s busy schedule makes it hard for him to schedule these off-campus training days. He hopes the team will return to the Crim facilities later in the season.

“When we have gotten to Crim, we’ve had pretty good practices,” Thomas said.

The softball team has a 13-2 losing record as of Sept. 25.

They suffered a tough loss to Marist High School on Sept. 15, allowing the War Eagles 15 runs, while scoring none.

“When scores like that come up, we’ve just gotta try to keep them in the game,” Thomas said. “I try to say ‘come on, come

on, let’s go!’ You gotta keep them motivated.”

However, the team emerged victorious over Langston Hughes High School on Aug. 25, beating the Panthers 20-14.

Most of the team’s players have never played softball before, and Thomas believes progress is coming in baby steps.

“We’re trying to work on fundamentals, and then we can get better,” he said. “[I’m teaching the team] how to catch, how to field ground balls, things like that.”

“They’re willing to learn,” he said. “The young ones are catching hold of what softball is all about.”

Despite the team’s drive to improve, attendance at practice is usually not very high. Thomas occasionally cancels practices when more than half of the team members are not present.

“Coach says lack of attendance at practice affects the team’s performance,” Eva Arnold, freshman first baseman, said.

The team had to forfeit two games this season when too few players arrived ready to play.

Attendance aside, Thomas is dedicated to expanding participation in Grady’s softball program. He believes spreading awareness of the program is the next step.

Thomas hopes to become more active in convincing students to try out for the team next year.

This year, there wasn’t enough player interest for the softball team to hold official tryouts.

“Whoever showed up got in because there weren’t a lot of people who tried out,” Anicetce said.

The softball team also hopes for an increase in the number of Grady spectators at their games.

Reilly Blum

Limited space bats away chances for softball success

STRIKEOUT: Grady’s Sept. 15 game against Marist ended in a mercy rule with a final score of 15-0 after three innings.

“No one really watches our games; there’s not a lot of support,” Anicetce said. “Most of the time the other team has a lot more people and their bleachers are full.”

Despite the odds against the Grady softball team, Thomas remains optimistic.

“We’re young,” he said. “We have a lot of girls that have not played softball before but it’s a work in progress. Right now we’re struggling, but everybody’s getting better, especially the kids who’ve never played before.” p

Grady Sports Score Central: September/October FOOTBALL Grady 29, Redan 20 (Sept. 12) Grady 30, Lithonia 17 (Sept. 19) St. Pius 31, Grady 28 (Sept. 27) VOLLEYBALL Grady 2, Mt. Zion 0 (Sept. 16) Paideia 2, Grady 0 (Sept. 18)

Grady 2, Columbia 0 (Sept. 23) Grady 2, Therell 0 (Sept. 25) Grady 2, Carver 0 (Sept. 25) Grady 2, North Atlanta 1 (Sept. 27)* Decatur 3, Grady 1 (Sept. 30) SOFTBALL Grady forfeits to St. Pius (Sept. 18) *APS Championship Final

Arabia Mountain 15, Grady 0 (Sept. 23) Greater Atlanta Christian forfeits to Grady (Sept. 24) Grady forfeits to Columbia (Sept. 25) Grady forfeits to Redan (Oct. 1) WATERPOLO APS B 7, Cambridge 4 (Sept. 28)

APS A 16, SPX B 5 (Sept. 28) APS B 11, Lakeside B 8 (Sept. 28) Lakeside 11, APS 2 (Sept. 28) Pope 11, APS 6 (Sept. 28) Pace 10, APS A 7 (Oct. 1) Pope 11, APS B 2 (Oct. 1) APS A 6, Blue Devil B 4 (Oct. 4)

See complete coverage of games on thesoutherneronline.com and on The Southerner Facebook page.