Trick-or-Treating pandemic alternatives
Proctoring services a cause of concern
The Collegian NEWS, PAGE 8
ENTERTAINMENT, PAGE 6
Issue 4 • Friday, Oct. 30, 2020 •
/deltacollegian
Aging student email system to be replaced
PRACTICES CHANGE, IMPORTANCE DOES NOT
BY DAVID VICTOR Senior Staff Writer
General Election sees differences in procedures due to COVID-19, but casting a vote still accessible BY ITZEL ESPINOZA Staff Writer
This year has brought many challenges and has caused many things to adapt, this is not any different when it comes to voting and Election Day. Although voting by mail has always been an option to voters in California, this year there was an even greater urge to do
so by mail because of COVID-19. Many voters were concerned about their vote not being counted because of delays in the postal service as a result of COVID-19 so they opted for early voting to ensure it would. “I wanted to do it by mail because I wanted to make sure my ballot was delivered on time
to be counted because of the issues going on with the postal services,” said Michelle Lopez, a Stockton resident. San Joaquin County Health and Human Services Secretary Mark Ghaly announced on Sept. 29 that San Joaquin County would be moving on to the red tier of the coronavirus pandemic, according to
sjgov.org. Red tier signifies that more businesses will be allowed to open up and be able to operate indoors by following certain guidelines. Although San Joaquin County has now moved onto the red tier, people still fear inperson voting. “If it was in-person, I
See VOTE, page 8
Big issues at center of mayoral race BY HANNAH WORKMAN Editor in Chief
With the general election nearing on Nov. 3, Stockton voters will soon have to decide who will lead the city as mayor for the next four years. Voters have two options: Incumbent Mayor Michael Tubbs, a member of the Democratic party, or challenger Kevin Lincoln, a member of the Republican party. The mayoral race in Stockton is non-partisan. Tubbs and Lincoln moved on after earning the most votes in the March primary. Ahead of Election Day, The Collegian reached out to Tubbs and Lincoln to allow both candidates to inform readers on their solutions to problems the city faces. Tubbs did not respond at the time of publication. HOMELESSNESS The biggest problem Stockton is currently facing is homelessness. Between 2017 and 2019, the number of homeless residents in Stockton nearly tripled from 311 to 921, according to a biannual census. In an effort to combat homelessness, Tubbs launched the Stockton Economic Empowerment Demonstration (SEED) in 2019. This pilot program, which received $1 million in funding by the Economic Security Project, ensured 125 residents would collect $500 per month for 24 months with no strings attached. With the launch of SEED, Tubbs became the first mayor to launch a guaranteed monthly income program for low-income residents and inspired 17 mayors across the country to follow suit, according
LINCOLN
deltacollegian.net
TUBBS
to a 2020 article by Vox. Universal basic income is only one of Tubbs’ proposed solutions to combat homelessness. Stockton also recently obtained $6 million from the state of California to expand emergency shelter space by 50 percent. With these funds, Tubbs said on his official website he will implement a Housing First solution. According to the National Alliance to End Homelessness, Housing First “is a homeless assistance approach that prioritizes providing permanent housing to people experiencing homelessness, thus ending their homelessness and serving as a platform from which they can pursue personal goals and improve their quality of life.” In September, the City of Stockton purchased a motel with part of the money received from the grant. This motel will be converted into permanent
See MAYOR, page 8
Delta College is getting ready for an email switchover to Microsoft Office 365 on Okta, a single sign-on service to replace the school’s current email platform. A little more than a decade has passed since the email system has changed, and Director of Information Technology Chelsy Pham said the current system is obsolete and needs an upgrade. “The current email system is 14 years old and it breaks down sometimes,” said Pham. “It goes offline and we have to manually reset it every week.” The expected rollout date is Nov. 2. The implementation of this new email system is designed to help students and staff in organizing their work and provide access to apps in the Microsoft Office 365 suite for everyone to use. With the new email system, students and faculty will only need to login once to obtain everything they need to complete their tasks. Students will have many tools in the Office 365 suite made available to them while at Delta. Students will have access to app and softwarebased products. “What you can do here is you can actually download and install copies of Microsoft Office onto your personal computer. This is nice because you can get a copy for yourself while you’re at Delta College,” said Pham. The new email system will also provide more space for students and staff to receive attachments and graphics in their emails. “Right now in your email box you have about 10 megabytes of space to receive emails. These days that’s less than one picture you take with your phone,” said Pham. “In the future you’ll have 50 gigabytes for your email.” Delta College’s information technology (IT) department has planned this switch for a year, but the implementation of this new system has had some delays. The IT department has been discussing with the Associated Students of Delta College (ASDC) about when would be the best time to do the switchover. “We’ve been collaborating with the ASDC. We actually had several meetings with them and we’ve worked on a good time to launch this,” said Pham. IT saw implementing the new system at the beginning of the term would be inconvenient since this is when students are adding their classes. “Can you imagine at the beginning of the term trying to get all your classes, adding courses and then getting a new email account? That’s kind of crazy,” said Pham. Pham also sees a similar inconvenience if the system were to launch at the end of the semester when everyone is dealing with finals. “At the end of the term that’s crazy too because you’re trying to work on finals. We tried to pick the best of the worst times to get this launched,” said Pham. Delta College opted to launch the new system halfway through the semester in order to avoid these inconveniences. Pham said Delta College’s tech support was going through orientation for the switchover to Okta. “Our Mustang tech support is our student help desk, and they were getting trained this entire time,” said Pham.
NEXT ISSUE: Nov. 13 • CONTACT US: deltacollegian@gmail.com or (209) 954-5156 • ONE FREE COPY