El Sol Latino | November 2018 | 14.12

November 2018

Volume 14 No. 12

Un Peri贸dico Diferente / A Different Kind of Newspaper

Un Peri贸dico Diferente / A Different Kind of Newspaper

Celebrating

Un Peri贸dico Diferente / A Different Kind of Newspaper

14 Years 2004-2018

Un Peri贸dico Diferente / A Different Kind of Newspaper

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Editiorial / Editorial

contents

Celebrating 14 years: 2004-2018 With this issue we celebrate the fourtheen anniversary of El Sol Latino.

As in every anniversary, first of all we wish to extend our thanks to all of you who have supported our work through the years. We are deeply grateful to our graphic artist, Tennessee Media Design, for its outstanding and impactful artwork. A special thanks to our friend Gaddier Rosario who has designed memorable front pages for the newspaper honoring special editions.

For fourthteen years we have continued to be a different kind of newspaper in many ways. We remain a local, community newspaper. We are still a Puerto Rican/Latinx-owned newspaper. We continue to be an alternative voice with a mission to develop and promote independent, diverse, and inclusise journalism with a commitment to social justice. ¡Gracias y pa’lante!

Cita del Mes/ Quote of the Month “Diversity is being invited to the party; inclusion is being asked to dance.”

Verna– Myers is a Harvard-trained lawyer, activist, author and cultural innovator committed to making the most difficult conversations around bias, cultural competence, and inclusion accessible to all.

Foto del Mes/Photo of the Month

2 Editorial / Editorial Celebrating 14 years: 2004-2018 Tinta Caliente / Hot Ink 3 Portada / Front Page Martin Espada y Magdalena Gómez Hightlights of Latinx Heritage Month at Nueva Esperanza 4 Puerto Rico’s Colonial Legacy and its Continuing Economic Troubles 5 The Common Magazine Features Portfolio of Puerto Rican Writers 6 Nueva Esperanza is growing and expanding 8 Opinión / Opinion Food as a commodity 9 Working Together For a Better Life 10 Educación / Education New Study Examines Costs of Dual Language Immersion Programs 11 Libros / Books Soldiers of the Nation 12 Música / Music Miguel Zenón regresa a UMass Amherst Ciencia / Science HCC opens $4.55 million Center for Life Sciences 13 Honey Crime!!!

New Martín Espada Library at Nueva Esperanza, Inc.

14 Deportes / Sports Caribe Reds Campeones de la Liga de Softball de Springfield 15 Legends Campeones de Holyoke Oldtimers Softball League

Left to right - Natalia Muñoz, Manuel Frau Ramos, Irene Feliciano, Martín Espada, Nelson Román, Juan Falcón y Sonia Nieto.

Founded in 2004

OT TINTNAT E H INK CALIE

In Holyoke... it happened again!

It was surprising to see that Puerto Rican/ Latinx-owned media was not invited to be AU RAMOS FR EL U AN M part of the sponsors of the 2018 Celebrate por Holyoke edition. The cultural event was held in October in the city where Puerto Ricans make up almost half of the city’s population yet the organizers appear to disregard media diversity in their events.

In Springfield... The independent candidate for the U.S. Senate from

Massachusetts, Shiva Ayyadura, was not the only one not invited to participate in the U.S. Senate Debate held on Oct. 21, 2018 and hosted by the Western Massachusetts Media Consortium. He was not allowed to be on stage together with candidates Democrat Elizabeth Warren and Republican Geoff Diehl because, supposedly, he did not meet the eligibility rules for participating in the debate.

Where was the Puerto Rican/Latinx owned media in this event?

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Volume 14, No. 12 n November 2018

Editor Manuel Frau Ramos manuelfrau@gmail.com 413-320-3826 Assistant Editor Ingrid Estrany-Frau Managing Editor Diosdado López

Art Director Tennessee Media Design Business Address El Sol Latino P.O Box 572 Amherst, MA 01004-0572

Editorial Policy El Sol Latino acepta colaboraciones tanto en español como en inglés.

Nos comprometemos a examinarlas, pero no necesariamente a publicarlas. Nos reservamos el derecho de editar los textos y hacer correcciones por razones de espacio y/o estilo. Las colaboraciones pueden ser enviadas a nuestra dirección postal o a través de correo electrónico a: info@elsollatino.net.

El Sol Latino welcomes submissions in either English or Spanish.

We consider and review all submissions but reserve the right to not publish them. We reserve the right to edit texts and make corrections for reasons of space and/or style. Submissions may be sent to our postal address or via electronic mail to: info@elsollatino.net.

El Sol Latino is published monthly by Coquí Media Group.

El Sol Latino es publicado mensualmente por Coquí Media Group, P.O Box 572, Amherst, MA 01004-0572.

Portada / Front Page

El Sol Latino November 2018

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Martin Espada y Magdalena Gómez - Hightlights of Latinx Heritage Month at Nueva Esperanza

by MANUEL FRAU RAMOS Nelson Rafael Román, executive director of Nueva Esperanza, Inc., inaugurated the Martín Espada Library on Oct. 15, 2018 at their main building on 401 Main Street in Holyoke. This was the closing event of the first ever Latinx Heritage Month celebration organized by Nueva Esperanza.

Martín Espada, the acclaimed poet, read poems from several of his books during the dedication event. Martín donated most of the books in the new library.

During the opening remarks, Román said he is hoping that this new library “becomes a knowledge corridor for South Holyoke and the Puerto Rican Cultural District. We’re proud to work with the Holyoke Public Library, Martín Espada, and all these groups to bring knowledge to the community.”

Espada’s The Republic of Poetry was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize.

Among his other books of poems - The Trouble Ball, Alabanza, A Mayan Astronomer in Hell’s Kitchen, Imagine the Angels of Bread, City of Coughing and Dead Radiators and Rebellion is the Circle of a Lover’s Hands.

Another highlight of the Latinx Heritage Month took place on October 3, when Magdalena Gómez, actor, playwright, poet, national keynote speakers, teaching artist and Springfield resident, brought an evening of poetry, music, and a review of her latest book Shameless Woman, to the recently created Puerto Rican/ Afro Caribbean Cultural Center, part of Nueva Esperanza.

Seven of the poems in this new collection are part of the acclaimed OffBroadway musical, Dancing in My Cockroach Killers, co-produced by Pregones and the Puerto Rican Traveling Theater. In 2010, Pregones named her a National Endowment for the Arts Master Artist.

Gómez is the co-editor of Bullying: Replies, Rebuttals, Confessions and Catharsis, the first multicultural, intergenerational and multigenre book on bullying. Her poems, essays and plays have been featured in nationally recognized publications, such as Massachusetts Review, Los Angeles Times, Ollantay Theater Journal, among others. She has also been a writer contributor to many well-known publications such as The Progressive, Los Angeles Times, and La Palabra Journal.

Photo by MFR: Martín Espada

In 2018, Martín Espada became the first Latino recipient of the Ruth Lilly Poetry Prize. This is a lifetime achievement award given by the Poetry Foundation to a living U.S. poet that carries a $100,000 prize.

Espada, a former tenant lawyer in Greater Boston who is currently a professor of English at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, has also received an American Book Award, the PEN/Revson Fellowship, a Guggenheim Fellowship, Shelley Memorial Award, and an Academy of American Poets Fellowship, among others.

The Poetry foundation describes Espada as having “dedicated much of his career to the pursuit of social justice, including fighting for human rights and reclaiming the historical record. His critically acclaimed collections of poetry celebrate—and lament—the working class experience. Whether narrating the struggles of immigrants as they adjust to life in the United States, or chronicling the battles that Latin Americans have waged against their own repressive governments, Espada has given voice to otherness, powerlessness, and poverty into poetry that is at once moving and vivid. He is the author of more than a dozen collections of poetry and several books of essays, the translator of Puerto Rican poet Clemente Soto Vélez, and the editor of influential anthologies such as El Coro (1997) and Poetry Like Bread (1994).”

His most recent collection of poems is Vivas to Those Who Have Failed, inspired by the work of Witman. The book includes 10 poems about the death of his father, Frank Espada, documentary photographer, community organizer, and civil rights activist. In one of the poems, he imagines his father’s return to a bay in Puerto Rico: “May the water glow blue as a hyacinth in your hands.”

Photos courtesy of Nueva Esperanza: Magdalena Gómez.

She is a regular columnist with the African-American Point of View (Point of View), the only newsmagazine in Western Massachusetts owned and published by African-Americans, and Co-founder and Artistic Director of Teatro Vida in Springfield. Gómez is a New England Public Radio commentator. In 2018, she was the recipient of the New England Public Radio’s Arts and Humanity Award.

Since 2014, Magdalena’s archives are permanently housed at the University of Connecticut at Storrs, in the Thomas J. Dodd Research Center.

In addition to her book presentation, on October 12, Dancing In My Cockroach Killers, was presented, sponsored by Pa’lante Theater Company and MIFA/Victory Theater of Holyoke.

The collection of poems and monologues is equal parts musical, poetry, and dance club. Adapted for the stage and directed by Rosalba Rolón.The piece focuses on complex life issues like domestic violence, racial prejudice, and sexism. The combination of poetic language and song and dance made these heavy topics palatable. Family, friends and Latino icons such as Lolita Lebrón, Iris Chacón, and Joe Cuba provide support to the characters in the face of real-life challenges.

Los Angeles based arts journal pLAywriting in the city said, “The show is strongest when it hones in on the revolutionary and pioneering lives of such Puerto Rican icons as Lolita Lebron, Joe Cuba and the wild, pelirroja dancer, singer and entertainer Iris Chacon. Lebron was Puerto Rican national who, in 1954, led an assault on the U.S. House of Representatives following the announcement of the Constitution of the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico. Joe Cuba was a conga drummer of Puerto Rican descent also known as the “Father of Boogaloo” a genre of Latin music and dance popular in the 1960s.”

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Portada / Front Page

El Sol Latino November 2018

Puerto Rico’s Colonial Legacy and its Continuing Economic Troubles by LARA MERLING Center for Economic and Policy Research Originally published by UN Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) and Common Dreams | Thursday, September 20, 2018.

When Puerto Rico was hit by Hurricane María, the island was ill-equipped to handle the storm that claimed thousands of lives and devastated most of the island’s infrastructure, leaving it in the dark for months. Prior to the storm, Puerto Rico’s economy had already experienced two decades without economic growth, a rare occurrence in the history of modern capitalism.

Neither a sovereign country nor a US state, Puerto Rico has had constrained ability to respond to negative economic shocks, while only receiving limited federal support. The island’s prolonged economic failure resulted in the accumulation of an unsustainable debt burden, and Puerto Rico’s bankruptcy.

Puerto Rico became a territory of the United Stated in the aftermath of the Spanish-American War of 1898. While residents of Puerto Rico were given US citizenship in 1917, they still cannot vote in US presidential elections on the island and have no voting representation in the US Congress. The UN officially removed the island from its list of colonies in 1953 after the US Congress approved a new name, the “Commonwealth of Puerto Rico,” along with a constitution that granted the island authority over internal matters.

Despite this semblance of autonomy, Puerto Rico continued to be subject to the Territory Clause of the US Constitution, which grants the US Congress “power to dispose of and make all needful Rules and Regulations.” Recent developments have shown beyond doubt that Puerto Rico continues to be a colony, with the island now effectively ruled by a Federal Oversight and Management Board (the Board), created by the US Congress, which supersedes the authority of the island’s elected government.

After Puerto Rico defaulted on its $74 billion debt in 2015, the US Supreme Court struck down a bankruptcy law passed by the island. In 2016, the US Congress then passed the “Puerto Rico Oversight, Management, and Economic Stability Act” (PROMESA), to create a framework for Puerto Rico to restructure its debt. While many attribute Puerto Rico’s accumulation of unsustainable debt to irresponsible government spending, this narrative ignores the fact that much of what led to Puerto Rico’s prolonged economic failure was out of the island’s control.

During the last two decades of the twentieth century, Puerto Rico’s economy more than doubled in real terms as it became an attractive destination for US manufacturing, offering strong legal protections and relatively cheap labor. As the rules of the global economy were rewritten with the creation of the World Trade Organization and the passage of trade deals such as the North American Free Trade Agreement, Puerto Rico became much less attractive as a manufacturing hub.

The island’s economy has not registered any growth since 2005. Puerto Rico did not have the policy tools available to sovereign nations that could have allowed it to more effectively address the shifting global trade

environment, e.g., by adjusting its exchange rate. Between 2005 and 2016, Puerto Rico’s economy was shrinking at an annual real rate of 1 percent per year. Investment, which was over 20 percent of GDP in the late 1990s, fell to less than 8 percent of GDP in 2016.

Furthermore, Puerto Rico did not receive the same federal support that US states do, meaning that as the economy worsened, its government had to foot the bill for a large share of social programs. Just in terms of health care, it is estimated that the Puerto Rican government has had to spend more than $1 billion per year more than it would have had it received the same reimbursements from the US federal government that states do.

By 2016, before Hurricane Maria, Puerto Rico had a poverty rate of 46 percent, and 58 percent for children, and had already lost 10 percent of its population to migration. With higher overall living costs than the mainland US, and lower incomes, many Puerto Ricans have chosen to leave the island and seek better opportunities on the mainland. In Maria’s aftermath, Puerto Rico is predicted to lose another 14 percent of its population by 2019.

As Puerto Rico’s economy declined, so did the revenues of the government, which increasingly financed operations through borrowing. Puerto Rican bonds were part of US municipal bond markets, and carried special tax exemptions that made them sufficiently attractive that buyers ignored the island’s macroeconomic reality ― something explicitly mentioned in Puerto Rico’s credit assessments. The bonds were only downgraded to “junk” in 2014 after Puerto Rico could no longer make interest payments on its debt.

PROMESA established a process to reach a consensus with creditors, and, were that to fail, it created a legal path to access bankruptcy court, where the Board would also represent Puerto Rico. As part of the consensus process, the board was tasked with certifying a 10-year fiscal plan that would keep the government operational, provide essential services to residents, adequately fund public pensions, and set funds aside for debt repayment in agreement with creditors.

The Board has taken an austerity approach that fails to address any of Puerto Rico’s long-term economic problems and is likely to exacerbate the downward spiral of economic decline and outmigration. In the aftermath of Maria, despite inadequate relief, the Board is using the increase in liquidity provided by relief funds to set aside more funds for creditors.

Yet many creditors continue to demand even harsher austerity, and the bankruptcy case is currently being heard by a bankruptcy judge in the New York District Court. Ironically, many of the most aggressive creditors are hedge funds that bought bonds at a steep discount after the default, and in the aftermath of Hurricane Maria.

To add insult to injury, the undemocratically appointed Board is setting aside $1.5 billion of the island’s budget for its own expenses, including legal and consulting fees for the next five years. Many of the advisors and lawyers now profiting from the bankruptcy process are the same actors who were involved in issuing the unsustainable debt. Meanwhile, island residents face pension cuts, layoffs, benefit freezes, and school closures. Given that the people of Puerto Rico have no democratic representation or say in this process, it is not surprising that their colonial rulers are ignoring their needs.

LARA MERLING is a research associate at the Center for Economic and Policy Research in Washington, DC.

Portada / Front Page

El Sol Latino November 2018

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The Common Magazine Features Portfolio of Puerto Rican Writers AMHERST, MA. | THE COMMON | October 15, 2018 – The last month of September 2018 marked one year after Hurricane María devastated Puerto Rico, striking an island already in the thick of political and economic instability and causing an estimated 4,645 deaths. In the aftermath of the storm, many wondered: “What is the role of art in times of tragedy? What should writers and artists do with their talents?” THE COMMON’s Issue 16 features a special portfolio of Puerto Rican writers and artists that recognizes the vibrancy of literary and visual arts both on the island and in the diaspora.

Filmmaker Michelle Falcón will screen her documentary film PROMESA, which tells the stories of people affected by Puerto Rico’s economic crisis.

Holyoke MA

Issue 16’s portfolio De Puerto Rico: Un año después de la tormenta/ From Puerto Rico: One year after the storm celebrates the resilience and talents of Puerto Rican writers working in a variety of genres. In March 2018, Editorin-Chief Jennifer Acker spent a week in San Juan, interviewing and collaborating with writers, artists, and performers. “Hurricane Maria was not merely a setback or temporary disaster,” she writes in an essay published in LitHub in September. “The threat was existential. Would the island ever recover enough to support full lives and future generations?” These finely curated pieces explore this and many other questions related to the storm and its aftermath.

Reading and Conversation 7:00 pm, followed by a wine reception at 8:30 Brief readings by and conversation with Puerto Rican writers and translators Ana Teresa Toro, Sergio Gutiérrez Negrón, María José Giménez, Willie Perdomo, and María Luisa Arroyo Cruzado, moderated by The Common Editor in Chief Jennifer Acker.

In “4,645+,” María Luisa Arroyo Cruzado asks, “What are the Puerto Rican Spanish words for aftermath?/ Disaster capitalism? Intentional erasure of a modern colony?” In “Native Shore,” poet Mara Pastor drives home the unwelcome post-Maria reality: “They were counting on the debt,/ but not on heavy metals in the water,/ cadmium in the ash they breathe./ Nothing prepared for the poverty of the house,/ for a piece of the pool collapsing…”

Mara Pastor’s poems appear in both Spanish and English, celebrating the beauty of her verses in two languages. In addition to these poems, two essays appear bilingually, and the issue features a number of works translated into English for the first time.

While portfolio explores the harsh details of post-hurricane life in Puerto Rico, it also showcases the strength and beauty of the island. In renowned artist Adál’s photo series Los ahogados/ Puerto Ricans Underwater, a woman submerged in a bathtub holds a smiling baby above the water. In another photograph, from his series Los dormidos/ The Sleepers, a couple sleeps curled around a can of gasoline, the woman’s head on a pillow of ice.

“Santurce, Un Libro Mural/ Santurce: A Mural Book” brings to the page a collaboration by writer Francisco Font-Acevedo and artist Rafael Trelles currently installed on the streets of Santurce, the most populous and artsiest barrio of San Juan.

Sergio Gutiérrez Negrón tells the story of Bimbo, a shy man who learns to love himself and the sea in “People Who Go to the Beach Alone.” National Book Critics Circle Award Finalist Willie Perdomo’s “We Used to Call It Puerto Rican Rain” is a love story to the island’s tropical weather and to its inhabitants.

“I believe the creative process of this issue of The Common is in itself a reflection of the kind of conversations we should be having between the people of the United States and the people of Puerto Rico,” reflects Issue 16 contributor Ana Teresa Toro, whose essay “To Abandon Paradise” opens the portfolio. “We share the same passport but have very different experiences. To be part of this portfolio represents to me the chance not only to show our view of the world, and to tell our stories, but also to connect with readers who will expand our perspective with their own experiences.”

Issue 16 Launch Events On November 5 Wisteriahurst Museum - 238 Cabot Street, Holyoke Free and open to the public.

Reception 5:30 pm, Reading and Conversation 7 pm Featuring Puerto Rican writers and translators Ana Teresa Toro, Sergio Gutiérrez Negrón, María José Giménez, and María Luisa Arroyo Cruzado.

On November 6 Powerhouse, Amherst College The event is free and open to the public.

About The Common An award-winning print and digital literary journal published biannually, The Common includes short stories, essays, poems, and images that embody a strong sense of place. The Common Online publishes original content weekly, including book reviews, interviews, personal essays, short dispatches, poetry, contributor podcasts and recordings, and multimedia features. Based at Amherst College, the magazine is a joint venture between the College and The Common Foundation. The Common also runs the Literary Publishing Internship at Amherst College, mentoring students in all aspects of literary publishing, and hosts public programming regularly.

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Portada / Front Page

El Sol Latino November 2018

Nueva Esperanza is growing and expanding HOLYOKE | NUEVA ESPERANZA | October 26, 2018. Team Nueva Esperanza is growing and expanding. We are pleased to welcome three amazing women to our Nueva Esperanza staff.

Damaris Aponte, Community Outreach and Engagement Coordinator Damaris Aponte was born in San Lorenzo, P.R. She moved to the Flats of Holyoke in 1978, where she lived for 35 years until she bought her own house in 2011. Damaris worked in the medical field for 20 years, and has recently changed career paths to become the new Community Engagement Specialist for Nueva Esperanza. She loves working with the community and wants to be a great asset to the Spanish-Afro culture in Holyoke.

Cassandra Cardona, Program Specialist and Marketing/PR Cassandra Cardona, born in the South Bronx, New York, moved to Western Mass in 2014 and has been a resident of West Springfield for the past two years. Cassandra was the first one in her family to graduate from college. In 2014, she obtained her Bachelors degree from Johnson & Wales University North Miami Campus and was on the Dean’s list.

She brings to Nueva Esperanza her tenacious attitude, worldwide views of culture, and creativity.

As the new Public Relations, Marketing, Program Specialist, and CoFacilitator of the Woman’s Group of Nueva Esperanza, she hopes to make a difference in the lives and future of the Puerto Rican and Afro Caribbean community in the city.

Cassandra Cardona

Damaris Aponte

Rafael Arcángel Restrepo Octubre 24, 1926 ~ Octubre 4, 2018 HOLYOKE- Rafael Arcángel Restrepo, 91, de Holyoke, falleció el jueves 4 de octubre de 2018 en el Holyoke Health Care Center con su querida familia a su lado.

Nació el 24 de octubre de 1926, hijo de Néstor-Flavio Restrepo y Laura Ramírez.

Rafael obtuvo su título de Asociado en Reparación Audiovisual y pasó gran parte de su vida trabajando en varias fábricas como técnico y mecánico. Se casó con María (Yepes) Restrepo y pasaron más de 72 años juntos.

Rafael Arcángel Restrepo

Antes de su muerte disfrutaba de la agricultura, trabajando con sus manos, tocando la guitarra y viajando a su tierra natal, Colombia. Más importante aún, disfrutó y valoró el tiempo que pasó con su esposa y su familia. Su hija Rosalba Restrepo, su yerno Humberto Giraldo, sus nietos Willer Bedoya y Daniel Escobar, y otros siete hermanos, le precedieron. Sus hijos le extrañarán mucho: Noralba Bedoya, Esperanza Bedoya, Néstor Restrepo, Margarita Ossa-Restrepo, Helda Lucia Muñoz, Rafael Restrepo; Leticia Restrepo, Emerida Giraldo y Rosalba López; veintiséis nietos y 19 bisnietos.

Sus hermanos Fabiola, Luisa, Mariela, Jorge y Carlos también sobreviven a Rafael.

Su funeral fue el pasado 12 de octubre de 2018 después de una Liturgia de Entierro Católico en la Iglesia de la Inmaculada Concepción, 54 N. Summer St., Holyoke. El Rito de Compromiso y Entierro se llevó a cabo en el Cementerio Mater Dolorosa, Pittroff Ave, South Hadley.

Evelyn Ortiz, Afternoon Administrative Assistant Evelyn Ortiz has had a long career working and helping in the Holyoke community. She’s previously worked for Gary Rome Hyundai and Marcotte Ford Sales.

Through a collaboration with Citizens for Citizens MA, she will be the new afternoon administrative assistant for Nueva Esperanza Inc. Evelyn has three grown children who have successful careers.

Evelyn Ortiz

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El Sol Latino November 2018

Sponsors to Date – UMASS Fine Arts, Springfield Technical Community College (STCC), Univision Nueva Inglaterra, WGBY, El Sol Latino, Holyoke Media, The MacDuffie School, United Bank, Fortuna Auto Sales, Holyoke Tax Service and City of Holyoke.

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Opinión / Opinion

El Sol Latino November 2018

Food as a commodity by MIGUEL ARCE and WALTER MULLIN Most Americans know that hunger prevails throughout the world in spite of an abundance of food. Many Americans, however, do not believe that hunger is a problem in the United States. Food is essential for life. According to the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA), which sets government policy for food accessibility, 12% of US citizens live with food insecurity. At its most critical point, food insecurity leads to hunger. In a lesser, but equally important way, food insecurity also leads people to reduce food intake, chose lower quality foods and live with anxiety about how to obtain food.

individuals must buy prepackaged, less healthy and less expensive foods.

A poor family is faced with a choice: either pay 75 percent of its income on food or simply not eat enough.

In the United States, food is treated as a privately owned commodity: if you do not have money, you cannot access food. The private, frequently transnational food market is failing to feed people adequately. The privatization of food does not consider that food is

• All households with children (15.7 percent), • Households with children under age 6 (16.4 percent), • Households with children headed by a single woman (30.3 percent), • Households with children headed by a single man (19.7 percent), • Women living alone (13.9 percent), • Men living alone (13.4 percent), • Black, non-Hispanic households (21.8 percent), • Hispanic households (18.0 percent), and • Low-income households with incomes below 185 percent of the poverty threshold (30.8 percent; the Federal poverty line was $24,858 for a family of four in 2017).

• A basic human need and • A fundamental human right that should be guaranteed to every person.

The United States government needs the political will to eliminate food insecurity. One major way to overcome the problem of hunger is for the United States government to guarantee that all people in the United States have access to healthy food.

There is a problem of food insecurity People are challenged with food problems throughout Massachusetts, the United States and the world. Enough food is produced to feed all people of the world but, despite this, over 1.2 billion people are undernourished.

Hunger is not limited to far reaches of the world. Feed America reports statistics on food insecurity and they note that more than 46 million people in the United States need extra support to provide an adequate diet for their families and that 58% of food insecure households participate in federal assistance programs—Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP); school lunch programs, and special programs such as Women, Infants and Children (WIC).

Massachusetts has hunger. In our state, Project Bread seeks to provide access to food for people who are hungry. Project Bread’s Food Source Hotline received over 28,000 calls from individuals looking for assistance in fiscal year 2017. Food insecurity is too common in the four western Massachusetts counties. The Food Bank of Western Massachusetts served of 223,821 individuals: 38,000 in the Berkshires; 17,939 in Franklin County; 30,114 in Hampshire County; and, 136,906 in Hampden County.

The Food Bank is clear that it is not just about the lack of food. Families are likely to be malnourished due to limited access to nutritious foods. There are major repercussions including the way that hunger impacts children’s lives including that they are more likely to repeat a grade, have developmental impairments and other social and behavioral challenges. One in six children does not know where the next meal will come from.

The challenges of providing food The economy of the United States is driven by the free market. In this “market perspective”, food is a “commodity”. The Economist (January 3, 2017) indicates commodities are vital components of commerce and are essential to the definitions of a healthy economy. Commodities are intended to be exchanged for other goods with a value. The financial value of commodities, however, can be controlled by manipulating the supply and demand of these products. Fewer products equal higher prices for those goods which are needed or desired.

Beginning in the 1980s, there was an influx of speculation on agricultural products by banks and others. Speculators are driven by profits and their work is not connected to the product as much as to how it will make money.

In this way of marketing food, hoarding large quantities has the potential of maximizing profits. Higher prices equal more profit. Higher food prices, however, substantially hurt the poor who must reduce other living expenses expenditures, change dietary patterns and look for cheaper, sometimes less healthy foods. So, instead of buying fresh milk, meat, fruits and vegetables,

Shifting paradigms Framing “food” as a “commodity” is an invisible form of oppression. Food insecurity does not occur equally among all races, family structures, and social classes. According the USDA the rates of food insecurity were higher than the national average (11.8 percent) for the following groups:

Furthermore, according to Unnatural Causes, a zip code is more indicative of the diseases connected to poor nutrition than a person’s genetic code.

What’s needed?

Beliefs and assumptions are at the foundation of social policies. When conceptualizing an approach to hunger and food insecurity, it is important to capture the underlying assumptions about the problem. When people choose to see food as a commodity rather than as essential to human need and human success, it puts whole groups of people in a disadvantaged position. When viewed as occurring to “other people, not me”, this very significant social problem becomes minimized.

There are federal and state government programs intended to assist with food insecurity. In 2018, in this current political scene, the structure of these programs and therefore the lives of people who need them has become a “political football” with frequent discussions of how to lower costs connected to solving this problem. For example, on the federal level, two programs, Supplemental Nutritional Program (SNAP) and Women, Infants and Children (WIC) are subject to changes in cuts and ways they will be delivered. Much of this is done without a real understanding of how it is to live as food insecure.

The United States government needs the political will to eliminate food insecurity. Regulations could prevent get rich quick speculators from preying on the weak and vulnerable. The current system keeps the poor from eating healthy foods then blames them for poor personal choice. Food should not be treated speculatively. It is essential for survival. Food should not be hoarded by investors. Regulations could provide balance between the interest of consumers and the profiteers. Protected by regulations, local initiatives and local entrepreneurs should be leaders in collective actions.

This guest opinion is one in a series on living in poverty. Dr. Walter Mullin (wmullin@springfieldcollege.edu), Professor of Social Work and Miguel Arce (marce@springfieldcollege.edu), Associate Professor of Social Work at Springfield College.

at https://www.facebook.com/ El-Sol-Latino-280862535259910

Opinión / Opinion

El Sol Latino November 2018

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Working Together For a Better Life by MOISÉS POLANCO From the series editor:

“Working Together for a Better Life” is the first in an anticipated series called “Through the Bars,” from and about Boricua prisoners in the US. These writings give voice to incarcerated Boricuas, sharing their vision, realities, and struggles, and reflecting on the conditions that put them and keep them behind bars. This inaugural essay is by Moisés Polanco, a Boricua prisoner in Connecticut imprisoned since 1999. Moisés had just turned 18 when he was involved in an armed robbery. He has been incarcerated half his life and is facing a 34-year sentence. MARIANA MCDONALD

For most of us, living a healthy life style could become a very difficult full time job. Finding good fresh and organic food in this age of fast food restaurants and mega-supermarkets, filled with mass-produced quick-cook items in every corner, is next to impossible. But if you look close enough, outside the beaten path, you could find a nice mom-and-pops store or maybe even a community farm or garden to get what you need to support a healthy life style. You have to make the choices for whatever life style you choose to embark on. Every decision you make is all on you, whether it is where you live, where you go to school, what you eat, or your job. It is all on you.

Moisés Polanco, a Boricua prisoner in Connecticut imprisoned since 1999.

But now imagine for a moment that you were stuck in a place where you couldn’t make any such choices, where you didn’t have any rights or say on anything concerning your life, and where your life depended entirely on the decisions others make for you which, more likely than not, won’t be the right decision anyway. A place where if you don’t learn very fast how to work together with your fellow men in order to have any chance of being heard, you won’t survive.

This story takes place in such a place. Prison! A very hostile and dangerous environment where life is hard for anyone who has the bad fortune of living through it. I came to prison in 1999 when I was just 18 years old, and to tell you that it has been a hard life is an understatement. But we do what we must to survive. This I will say, even though it has been hard, I’ve been blessed in many ways, because along the way and through the years I have gotten the opportunity to meet some very extraordinary people who taught me many valuable life lessons, and the importance of understanding that my enemies are not the gangs on the other side of the yard, what they represent, or the colors they wear. No, they are not my enemies. We are all victims in one way or another of a broken-down system that pushes kids to the brink. You who are reading these words right now, as well as the millions of incarcerated Black and Latino youth lost and abandoned by society in U.S. prisons, are desperately looking for someone to call “family.” That someone ends up being, for them, who but “gangs.”

These extraordinary people taught me that by working together, and not killing and fighting each other, we could accomplish great things in prison or outside these prison walls. So for the past 19 years that’s what I have been doing with my time. I’ve dedicated my life to spreading the message that someone once passed down to me, of unity and working together for a common goal, learning, growing and improving our quality of life in here in the process, and with action making it all into a reality.

One of the ways that we, by working together, have improved our quality of life in here is with our food. Anyone who knows anything about prison life knows that the food in here is just bad and unhealthy. We saw the need to improve this aspect of our lives, and working together we came up with a plan which we needed to bring before the prison administration. Our plan? Start a small garden. This would improve a lot the quality of our food and wouldn’t cost the tax payers anything. We knew that if we brought our idea directly to the prison administration they wouldn’t even hear us. We needed an ally from within the prison staff, so we approached and spoke with a civilian prison supervisor and presented our initiative to him. We explained how it wouldn’t cost them anything, how it would help the prison population take pride in what they were

doing, in their work, and teach them the importance of being healthy, growing our own food, and being self-sufficient. He liked our idea, but it took a little more time to convince him to take it to the prison administration.

We finally convinced the supervisor to go before the administration to present our idea. It took a while, months of waiting to convince the administration, but convince we did, and they ended up allowing us the use of an unused part of the prison grounds, and were given permission to start our garden. We started our garden in a small place using buckets and whatever we could find to use as planters. We were able to get a local garden store to donate seeds for us to get it started. None of us were gardeners, so at first we were just experimenting and learning by trial and error. But eventually we did learn.

The first year we had some success with our little bucket garden, but many plants died. We didn’t know the timing of when to start planting, how deep we needed to plant, how to prepare the soil, or when to water, especially in a cold northern climate where we only have about 6 months, if that, in a growing season. So reading a few gardening books, I learned that by starting the planting process earlier, meaning indoors, we could extend our growing season. We needed some help again, and back to our supervisor we went. We asked him if there was any chance he could get us some growing lights. He was perplexed by our request but there was a plan which we explained. If we could get the growing lights, we could start the growing season earlier, and there wouldn’t be so many loses as the year before. We also needed a place to get these lights set up. So I explained that if I could convince the school department to allow us to set this up in one of their classrooms, there would be a twofold benefit, because they would help us with the space we needed and in turn it would help their students learn with our experiment. So that’s how we did it. The supervisor got us the growing lights, the school department allowed us the use of one of their classrooms, and from the kitchen department we got a whole lot of foam cups which we used to plant what seeds we had. That year we had about 80% to 85% percent success.

With all this success, it was time to leave the buckets behind and grow, expand.

So we asked for a bigger place, which was granted. That year we had to break and prepare the ground, make beds, etc. Lots of hard but very satisfying work.

This was also the year that we learned that if we were to preserve some of our crop and get the seeds from them, we would have more than enough seeds for our next growing season, and thus become self-sufficient. We also learned that to attract bees and all other beneficial pollinators, we needed to grow flowers.

So now we grow sunflowers and many other kinds of flowers to attract our little friends the honey bees and bumblebees. That year we were so successful that we had enough produce to feed the whole prison population, but also to donate some of it to a local soup kitchen.

Now, many years later, we are seasoned veteran gardeners, our garden has grown from a small bucket garden to a full-fledged small farm, where we make our own compost, seeds, plants, feed our fellow men, and the poor and less fortunate when we can. All conceived, worked, and sustained by the hands and hard work of prisoners working together for the benefit of all. How cool is that. It sounds easy, doesn’t it, and for many of you it would be, but when you take into consideration that all this took place in a maximum security prison, the scope and magnitude of our achievement really comes into perspective.

We overcame our own fears, biases, and hate to convert it into compassion for others, hope for a better future, and love for all. I’m not saying that it is a beautiful life, nor that there are no problems in here, because there are and big ones, but by working together shoulder to shoulder, in time, there is nothing we cannot do or change. And if we, the “worst of the worst” can accomplish this just by uniting and working together, I wonder what you reading this paper, or the politicians sitting in their positions of power, the white house or anywhere else, could do if you were to put your differences aside, which more likely than not are petty and not important at all, see each other as the brothers and sisters that we are, and learn to work together.

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Educación / Education

El Sol Latino November 2018

New Study Examines Costs of Dual Language Immersion Programs by INGRID T. COLÓN Originally posted on newamerica.org | September 28, 2018 Dual language immersion (DLI) programs—where students are given academic instruction in two languages—are becoming increasingly popular due to the economic, cognitive, and academic benefits bilingualism may confer on students.

Because DLI programs offer specialized instruction, it’s often assumed that they cost more to implement than monolingual programs. For example, they need qualified bilingual teachers who understand the different program models as well as teacher professional development. They also need curricula and instructional tools in languages other than English. Moreover, logistical costs in DLI programs need to be considered, including the process of enrollment in DLI programs, which requires the management of slots and transportation for students in these programs. While many studies have examined the academic impact of DLI programs, there is scant research on the costs of these programs.

A new study, published in the Educational Evaluation and Policy Analysis (EEPA), explores the costs of DLI programs and monolingual English programs in Portland Public Schools (PPS). The study aims to uncover differences in these programs spending over time and analyzes the processes by which these programs are connected with student achievement. Portland Public Schools (PPS) has a long history of supporting DLI and uses a lottery process for student admission into these programs. In 2012, PPS partnered with the Institute of Education Sciences, U.S. Department of Education, RAND Corporation, and the American Councils for International Education to conduct a comprehensive study of their DLI programs, including academic impact and implementation.

regarding the differential impacts of DLI on student subgroups. In addition, the authors warn that these results are not generalizable beyond this study meaning that they can’t be taken to mean that all DLI programs have the potential to close the achievement gap. Rather, researchers write that their findings “show us what is happening . . . in a large urban district with a well-established, large-scale system of immersion programs, but effects will always depend on how well such programs are implemented and on the relative quality of the next best alternative available to students.”

Importantly, the study highlights that African American students were underrepresented in PPS’ DLI programs and that the district has taken action to promote access to DLI programs in historically African American neighborhoods. For example, Martin Luther King Jr. School in Portland—a predominantly African American and Latinx school—offers a Mandarin language Immersion program. Although this program has been challenging to implement at the King School due to its selection of the Mandarin language, the immersion program at the King School is trailblazing and slowly gaining buy-in from the school community. In a study by the Center for Applied Second Language Studies at Oregon State University on PPS’ Mandarin programs, parents at King reported an appreciation for its diverse student population and that their children “love the program.”

Overall, this study highlights that DLI programs in PPS are cost-effective and result in positive academic gains for students. Specifically, the authors note that their findings suggest that it is possible to scale the positive academic impacts of DLI program participation “with modest investments at the central office level, concentrated on supporting high-quality dual language instruction through professional development and curriculum support.”

These resources can help teachers provide effective dual language instruction to impact students’ academic achievement.

In this new study, researchers examined the annual costs of DLI programs compared to monolingual education and the sources of these costs. Then, they looked at the ways DLI program enrollment, spending, and classroom characteristics (i.e., teachers, peers, and class size) are connected to the relationship between immersion access and student achievement. And finally, they explored differences in the effects of participation in DLI on English language arts (ELA) and math achievement by student race/ethnicity.

There are three important findings in this study: First, researchers found that resources were distributed equally across DLI programs and monolingual English programs. But an analysis of school-level and district-level spending revealed that DLI programs incurred higher spending at the central office due to the need of qualified staff to provide specialized professional development, assistance to the human resources department on the recruitment and hiring of qualified teachers, and support to the curriculum department to provide compatible curriculum in the partner language.

Second, findings highlighted that an additional cost of $100 per student was associated with a positive impact on ELA achievement. Moreover, findings showed that students enrolled in DLI increased ELA achievement by an additional 8 percent on average across grades. However, researchers found that neither teacher or peer characteristics were related to the ELA achievement of students in DLI programs.

And third, findings indicated that in ELA, there are more positive effects for African American students than for White students in DLI programs. These findings were not statistically significant, but show interesting trends

This study recognizes the need to continue examining the cost and academic achievement of students enrolled in DLI programs by race/ethnicity in different contexts and settings and to conduct longitudinal studies that explore DLI students’ graduation rates, college enrollment, employment, and non-academic abilities. Hopefully, as more school districts seek to create and implement dual language immersion programs there will be a commensurate increase in research partnerships to help study and document the impacts of these programs.

Ingrid T. Colón (coloni@newamerica.org) is a researcher in the area of English learner education with the Education Policy program at New America, formerly the New America Foundation. New America is a non-partisan think tank in the United States that focuses on a range of public policy issues, including national security studies, technology, asset building, health, gender, energy, education, and the economy.

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Libros / Books

El Sol Latino November 2018

11

Soldiers of the Nation: Military Service and Modern Puerto Rico, 1868-1952

by HARRY FRANQUI-RIVERA • University of Nebraska: June 2018 | 342 pages This excerpt was originally posted on UNP Blog | June 11, 2018.

During the summer of 2001 I interviewed several Korean War veterans in Puerto Rico. Those interviews were part of my research on the renowned 65th Infantry Regiment, also known as the Borinqueneers. I hoped the interviews would bring a more personal feeling to my project. But those veterans did more than that. They opened my eyes to larger historical processes. Many described themselves as jíbaros, as humble Puerto Rican rural folks. When I met them, they no longer lived off the land.

In fact, after the war many finished high school and attended vocational schools and colleges. They set up small and medium-sized businesses, from the local colmado and barra to an engineering contracting firm and everything in between. Some became local leaders or assemblymen or joined the army of technicians and technocrats in charge of carrying out the socioeconomic restructuring of the island as envisioned by the creators of the political experiment we know as the Estado Libre Asociado de Puerto Rico (ELA), or the Commonwealth.

They had been transformed by their military service.

Their professions had little to do with the romanticized figure of the Puerto Rican rural folk. However, they proudly claimed that they continued to be jíbaros. And true to form, they showed me the hospitality for which the rural folk are famous. I was invited into their houses and to their tables. I quickly figured I was going through a vetting process. At their tables I was offered a mix of imported goods and the fresh plantains, green bananas, tubers, avocados, mangoes, and oranges that they continue to grow in small plots of land (el patio) behind their cement houses. The generous meals they offered me were representative of two worlds. There was the modern world exemplified by the processed, imported food bought at the supermarket, Sam’s Club, or Costco. But there also was a world that had supposedly disappeared during the march toward a modern industrialized Puerto Rico.

That world was represented by the viandas (tubers) and other products they offered me from their gardens. As I enjoyed their hospitality and broke bread with them, I realized that these veterans had not just negotiated these two worlds. They had fused them. Military service had transformed them in many ways, but it had also allowed them to subsidize that jíbaro way of living. And in that sense, they had made their colonial encounter with the military a collaborative experience in which, to borrow Michael C. Hawkins’s description of the clash between the Moros of the Southern Philippines and the U.S. military, they “established the parameters of their own modern selves.”

These soldiers did more than negotiate and establish their own identities.

They were instrumental in redefining Puertoricaness and modern Puerto Rico during the transformative 1940s and 1950s. In 1952 a military news release from Korea announced that a can full of Korean earth, hallowed by the sacrifices of Puerto Rican American soldiers, is on its way to Corozal, Puerto Rico, where it will become part of a monument to Puerto Ricans who gave their lives in Korea. The frozen, snow-covered soil was taken from ground over which the Puerto Rican Regiment has battled, and from an area where men have died. It will be placed in the cornerstone of the Corozal monument.

Corozal, a mountain town in Puerto Rico, was but one of numerous towns that erected monuments and plaques commemorating the fallen in Korea. Far from being a sad reminder of the lives lost in combat or of the disappearance of the jíbaro before the juggernaut of industrialization and modernization, these monuments recognize the role of the island’s common folk in the creation of modern Puerto Rico.

The political entity we know as the Estado Libre Asociado de Puerto Rico came into existence during the Korean War. Tens of thousands of Puerto Ricans participated in this conflict. Political figures and the press portrayed the war as a battle for the decolonization of Puerto Rico and the soldiers as the embodiment of the philosophy behind commonwealth status. Calls for more autonomy and support for the commonwealth formula appeared in mainstream local newspapers alongside articles lauding the men of the 65th as a possible catalyst in forging a new national identity. The rationale behind these articles was that the Borinqueneers’ commitment to Korea as first-line troops “will help Puerto Ricans to come out of their complexes of insularism, and erase the marks of inferiority, which are the by-product of hundreds of years of colonial type regimes.” The local press and politicians saw service as a regenerative process that would prepare the Puerto Ricans for self-government. The men of the 65th were praised as the quintessential example of what it meant to be a Puerto Rican: modern, manly, and hence deserving of self-rule and self-determination by virtue of his military training, service, and sacrifice. As local leaders equated mass participation in the Korean War with a new national identity anchored on modernity and manhood and the promise of decolonization, el sesenta y cinco, as the 65th was popularly called, became a national icon. In this sense, the foundation of the monuments symbolizes the foundation of the modern Puerto Rican state and of modern Puerto Rican national identities— at least as imagined by the new colonial entity’s ideologues.

The active participation of Puerto Rican troops in the Korean War, however, was just the climax of a long process in which Puerto Ricans, like many colonial and subaltern groups, sought to prove their manhood and right to self-determination and decolonization through military service. In this study, I analyze the impact of military service on the converging sociocultural and political histories of Puerto Rico. In particular, I explore the military mobilization and demobilization of rural and urban working- class sectors from the 1860s to the 1950s. The analysis centers on patterns of inclusion/ exclusion within the military and how they transformed into socioeconomic and political disenfranchisement or enfranchisement. It is of paramount importance to analyze these processes from three perspectives. First, what compelled the metropolis to either mobilize or demobilize the Puerto Ricans? Second, what roles did the Puerto Rican elites play in these projects? Third, how did these processes affect and in turn become altered by the colonial subjects going through them? To answer these questions, I rely on an intersectional analysis of gender, race, and class to understand modernity projects driving nation-state building and identity formation processes via military service taking place in a colonial setting under two empires.

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Música / Music

Miguel Zenón regresa a UMass Amherst

El saxofonista de jazz y MacArthur y Guggenheim fellow, Miguel Zenón, regresa al UMass Amherst Fine Arts Center junto al Spektral Quartet, conjunto de cuerdas de Chicago nominado al premio Grammy. El Cuarteto cuenta con Clara Lyon (violín), Maeve Feinberg (violín), Doyle Armbrust (viola) y Russell Rolen (cello). El programa de esa noche presenta Yo Soy La Tradición, un trabajo con duración de concierto, grabado recientemente e inspirado en la cultura de su tierra natal, Puerto Rico. El concierto será en el Bowker Auditorium el miércoles 14 de noviembre a las 7:30 pm.

Yo Soy la Tradición, el cual debutó en el Festival de Jazz de Hyde Park en 2016, es una suite de ocho movimientos que combina exuberantes cuerdas melódicas con complejas interacciones rítmicas, difuminando las líneas entre el jazz, la música clásica y la música popular.

Yo Soy la Tradición se grabó y se lanzó como un álbum en Septiembre 2018. Apenas dos días antes de que Zenón entrara en el estudio de grabación, el huracán María golpeó la isla de Puerto Rico. Durante los descansos de las sesiones de grabación, Zenon llamó a familiares y amigos para recibir noticias sobre la devastación. El álbum resultante “Yo soy la tradición”, o “Soy la tradición”, tiene la originalidad característica de Zenón, pero el desastre natural también le da una urgencia emocional.

Michele Mercer del programa All Things Considered de National Public Radio (NPR), dio esta reseña, “Miguel Zenón no solo está ondeando una bandera musical para Puerto Rico. Ha compuesto sus profundas

El Sol Latino November 2018

tradiciones en nuevos paisajes musicales. Y grabando tan poco después del golpe del huracán María, el álbum resultante es una gira imaginativa y sincera de su tierra natal.”

“Al igual la mayoría de los países de América Latina, la música ocupa un lugar muy especial en la vida cotidiana de los puertorriqueños,” dice Zenón.

“Sale de cada esquina, brota de cada conversación. Incluso las interacciones humanas más básicas parecen tener algún tipo de cadencia musical. La música puertorriqueña es una parte integral de quién soy, y mi objetivo final como artista sería sintetizar y expresar todo lo que significa para mí.”

Considerado ampliamente como uno de los saxofonistas más innovadores e influyentes de su generación, Miguel Zenón ha desarrollado una voz única en la industria de la música como compositor y como conceptualista, perfeccionando su mezcla única de música folclórica latinoamericana y jazz. Zenón representa a un selecto grupo de músicos que han mezclado con maestría la innovación y la tradición.

Entradas son $35, $25; estudiantes universitarios de los 5 College y jóvenes de 17 años o menos $10. Para boletos al 545-2511, sin costo al 800-999UMAS, o compre en línea en fineartscenter.com/Spektral.

Ciencia / Science

HCC opens $4.55 million Center for Life Sciences HOLYOKE | HOLYOKE COMMUNITY COLLEGE | October 25, 2018 – Holyoke Community College marked the official opening of its new Center for Life Sciences today with a ribbon-cutting celebration featuring lab demonstrations and tours of the 13,000-square-foot, $4.55-million state-ofthe-art facility.

“This is an amazing space,” said HCC president Christina Royal, standing in the crowded lobby of the center on the first floor of the Marieb Building.

“This building has not been renovated since 1972. With this facility, we›ve just brought the education level of our biotechnology and life science programs into the 21st century.”

The Center for Life Sciences, which opened for classes in September for the start of the fall semester, features a suite of new science labs and classrooms and the only ISO-certified cleanroom at any community college in Massachusetts.

“As we›ve watched what›s happened to the cost of higher education, we are all reminded that it is more important than ever to have a flourishing community college system,” said Congressman Richard Neal of Springfield and ’70, an HCC alumnus.

biotechnology and microbiology students as they conducted experiments dressed in white lab coats.

“These are our future doctors, future scientists and future researchers,” Royal said. “These are the types of aspirations that they have as they start here at HCC and look to move on into the workforce or toward opportunities to transfer and continue their educations. It›s wonderful to watch.”

The Massachusetts Life Sciences Center provided the majority of funding for the project in the form of a $3.8 million grant, with the balance of the total cost coming from the HCC Foundation.

“We are committed to providing the innovative infrastructure, alongside dynamic educational and experiential opportunities, and other necessary resources to develop the next generation of great scientists, engineers, and life science entrepreneurs,” Travis McCready, president and CEO of the Massachusetts Life Sciences Center, said in a statement before the event. “HCC is providing its students with state-of-the-art equipment, facilities, and instruction to gain the skills necessary to further fuel our world-class talent pipeline.”

Center for Life Sciences Ribbon Cut

Jim Peyser, state secretary of Education, said the ribbon-cutting celebration was an important part of the state›s first annual STEM Week.

“What we›re trying to do is shine a spotlight on all the great things that are going on around the Commonwealth in STEM education,” he said. “In Massachusetts, there is something on the order of 600,000 jobs in STEM fields. There are 270,000 or so postings for STEM jobs in the state. This is not just a big part of our economy, but the fastest growing part.”

“The fact that this new lab facility is open is a reflection of the forward thinking of this institution and this community to find out where the future is leading and to move in that direction,” he said. “This is a really exciting moment.”

Among the other officials and dignitaries on hand for the celebration were Holyoke mayor Alex Morse, state representatives Aaron Vega of Holyoke, also an HCC alumnus, and Angelo Puppolo of Springfield, who, along with the many visitors and guest, toured the new science labs and talked to

HCC president Christina Royal and state Sec. of Education Jim Peyser cut the ceremonial ribbon officially opening the Center for Life Sciences at Holyoke Community College. Also pictured, from left to right: state Rep. Angelo Puppolo of Springfield; state Rep. Aaron Vega of Holyoke; Martha Waldron, vice president of Marketing & Communications for the Mass. Life Sciences Center; U.S. Rep. Richard Neal of Springfield; Holyoke mayor Alex Morse; and several HCC students.

Ciencia / Science

El Sol Latino November 2018

13

Honey Crime!!! by JORGE L. MURIEL MUNDO Honey is one of the most purchased foods in America, presumably because of its incredible and distinctive flavor profile that we all have previously experienced. Moreover, it is one of the best natural sweeteners with a greatest value. Because of that reason, humans have been savoring it for centuries.

Interestingly, honey profitability ranges around the 161.8 million dollars just in 2016-year revenues, belonging to one of the most lucrative food industriesbusinesses that currently existed.

According to the report Honey Bee Colonies, released August 1, 2018, by the National Agricultural Statistics Service (NASS), honey bee colonies for operations with five or more colonies in the United States on January 1, 2018 totaled 2.63 million colonies, down slightly from January 1, 2017. The number of colonies in the United States on April 1, 2018 was 2.69 million colonies.

During 2017, honey bee colonies on January 1, April 1, July 1, and October 1 were 2.64 million, 2.69 million, 2.99 million, and 2.85 million colonies, respectively.

Honey bee colonies lost for operations with five or more colonies from January through March 2018, was 425 thousand colonies, or 16 percent. The number of colonies lost during the quarter of April through June 2018 was 270 thousand colonies, or 10 percent. During the quarter of October through December 2017, colonies lost totaled 425 thousand colonies, or 15 percent, the highest of any quarter in 2017. The quarter in 2017 with the lowest number of colonies lost was April through June, with 286 thousand colonies lost, or 11 percent.

These proposed methods demonstrate the curiosity of the public about trying to investigate the quality or veracity of their honey at home. These methods are indeed quite cheap to execute and very easy to follow, even while their effectiveness might still be in question.

JORGE L. MURIEL MUNDO (Murielmundojorge@gmail.com) is a PhD student at the Department of Food Science - UMass Amherst.

¡MATRICÚLATE AHORA! HCC.EDU

This alarming report has created a national concern. The official numbers provide solid evidence about the decreasing of honey-bee colonies across the nation. Moreover, as a result, the famous term called the “colony collapse disorder” was established. Surprisingly, this phenomenon has been occurring for a while, notably during the past recent years, but was first described on 2006. These disasters can be attributed to different factors like parasites, insecticides, environment conditions, etc. However, it is well believed that a combination of different stressors are the main cause for the disappearance of thousands of bee colonies. Consequently, the supply cannot meet the demand.

Source: Healthveins. How To Identify Fake Honey At Home | 4 Easy Methods

whether the honey is 100% organic by dipping a dry matchstick into the honey. Take the matchstick out, and strike it on the matchbox as if to light it. If the honey is pure, the matchstick will light with ease. However, it its adulterated, it will not light, because fake honey contains more moisture based on the impurities it contains. Finally (4) The “Tissue Paper” test consists of dropping honey on a tissue paper. If honey is diluted/adulterated with water, it may be absorbed and leave a wet trace on the tissue paper while pure honey should not be absorbed by the tissue paper.

Interestingly, the overall consumption of honey, honey-products and/or honey derived products has kept growing, considerably during the last few decades (FoodSafetyNews). Moreover, with the disappearance of these bees, a gap has been created related with the honey production. It is well believed that this decrease in colonies has been devastating in the food industry market. This has lead farmers around the world that export their products into the United States to illegally mix and/or fake their product in order to keep up with the high-demand and the constant increasing honey requirements by the consumers population. Commonly referred to as “Honey Adulteration”, this practice consists of mixing natural conventional honey with adulterants to increase or meet expected volume’s criteria.

Here is a short list of the most interesting ones; (1) Apply a small drop of honey on your thumb. If it spreads around or spills it means it is not 100% authentic. Real, pure honey is supposed to stay intact on your thumb. (2) The water test, that consists of taking a glass filled with clean water and adding one teaspoon of honey to this glass. Adulterated or artificial honey will be dissolved in the water, in comparison with authentic honey that will remain/ settle in a single layer on top of the glass (without it dissolving in the presence of water). (3) The flammability test is more dangerous than the previous ones.

It is based on the fact that organic honey is flammable. This test can prove

HCC.EDU

However, at this present time, the traceability of this food is limited to the quality of each processor’s documentation. In case of doubt or fraud, there is no standardized analysis available that can discriminate or determine the botanical (floral or vegetable) and geographical (regional or territorial) origin of the honey.

According to Food Safety News and Food Safety Magazine, counterfeiting and product adulteration are now commonly practiced in the global food marketplace.

Domestic methods that have been proposed by some community leaders, and shared through different social networks, are exclusively designed to elucidate and/or to determine the authenticity of a honey product.

LAS CLASES COMIENZAN

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Deportes / Sports

El Sol Latino November 2018

Caribe Reds Campeones de la Liga de Softball de Springfield El equipo Caribe Reds ganó el primer campeonato de la recién creada Springfield Old Timers Softball League (Springfield OTSL). Los Caribe Reds vencieron en la seria final al equipo D-Backs, ganando 2 de los tres juegos de la seria final.

Ambos equipos ocuparon las primeras dos posiciones de la serie regular.

D-Backs ganó la serie regular con 13 ganados y 3 perdidos, seguidos por los Caribe Reds con 12 ganados y 4 perdidos.

La liga fue organizada a principios de 2018 y está compuesta de 5 equipos con un total de 100 jugadores de 40 años o más. Los juegos se jugaron en El Hoyo Softball Field y en Marshall Roy Field en la ciudad de Springfield.

La apertura oficial de la temporada se llevó a cabo el 5 de mayo del 2018.

Los cinco equipos que jugaron en la temporada 2018 fueron: D-Backs de Santiago “Chaguito” Suarez; KC Royals de David Feliciano; Caribe Reds de Guillermo De Los Santos; Los Artilleros de Eddy Almanzar y Caguas de Julio “Gato” Rivera.

La directiva de la liga está compuesta por Roberto Fontánez -Presidente, Daniel “Danny” Bellavista – Vice Presidente, José Santos - Secretario General y Orlando “Landy” López - Presidente de Árbitros Para mas información comuníquese con el presidente de la liga Roberto Fontánez al 313-297-1233 o fontanez374@comcast.net. Información adicional en www.springfieldoldtimers.com o en su página de Facebook.

Foto por Springfield OTSL

A night of poetry and conversation with

Foto por Springfield OTSL De izquierda a derecha; José Ortega - Los Artilleros, David Feliciano - KC Royals, Guillermo De Los Santos Caribe Reds, Roberto Fontánez - Presidente de la liga, Carlos González Representante Estatal, Daniel “Danny” Bellavista - Vice-Presidente, Santiago “Chaguito” Suárez - D-Backs, Julio “Gato” Rivera y Orlando “Landy” Lápez - Arbitro de la liga

RHINA P. ESPAILLAT

Thursday, November 29th

4:30-5:30pm : Poetry Reading with Ms. Espaillat The Poetry Center 7:30-8:30pm : “Poet of the Future: Rhina P. Espaillat’s Enduring Americanness” Book Talk with Nancy Kang and Silvio Torres-Saillant Dewey Common Room Free and open to the public.

For disability access or accommodation requests, please call 413-585-2407.

To request a sign lanugage interpreter, call 413-585-2071 (vocie or TTY) or send an email to ods@smith.edu at least 10 days before the event..

Sponsored by Latin American & Latino/a Studies, English Language & Literature, Study of Women and Gender, and Spanish & Portuguese.

Deportes / Sports

El Sol Latino November 2018

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Legends Campeones de Holyoke Oldtimers Softball League Los Legends se coronaron campeones de la temporada 2018 de la Liga de Oldtimers de Holyoke al derrotar al equipo de los Jibaritos.

Los Legends también ganaron la serie regular con marcador de 22 ganados y 2 perdidos, seguidos por Tira y Tápate, los Jibaritos y Cardenals. Borinquen, Non_Stars y Santa Isabela ocuparon las últimas tres posiciones y no participaron en los cuarto finales.

VAYACON

Los Legends - Campeones de la temporada 2018

Saturdays 10AM Domingo 7 pm WHMP radio 1400 AM

bilingüe arte, cultura, media politics Natalia Muñoz

MUÑOZ

Los Jibaritos -Sub-Campeones de la temporada 2018

¡Sesión de Invierno en STCC! ¡Reciba Créditos Universitarios durante las Vacaciones de Invierno!

Matricúlese para una Clase en Línea de 4 Semanas Clases comienzan el viernes, 21 de diciembre y terminan el jueves, 17 de enero

Todo estudiante pagará matrícula de residente del estado.

La matrícula comienza el lunes, 26 de noviembre.

www.stcc.edu/winter • Política & Gobierno Americano 1 • Destrezas Básicas de Teclado (Keyboarding) • Ética Empresarial • Introducción a las Computadoras: Conceptos y Aplicaciones • Composición en Inglés 1 • Composición en Inglés 2 • Psicología General • Introducción a la Sociología • Crecimiento y Desarrollo Humano • Terminología Médica 1 • Apreciación Musical 1 • Nutrición

• Principios de Gerencia • Principios de Mercadeo • Principios de Comportamiento normal / y no normal • Estadística • Visión General de la Historia Moderna de los Estados Unidos • Visión General de la Historia y el Gobierno de los Estados Unidos.

• Mujeres en la Literatura.

• Religiones del Mundo

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El Sol Latino November 2018

Fine Arts Center NOVIEMBRE 2018

MIGUEL ZENÓN & SPEKTRAL QUARTET: Performing YO SOY LA TRADICIÓN Miércoles, Noviembre 14, 7:30 pm, Bowker Auditorium

Esta presentación viene del deseo de Zenón de crear una suite concierto para honrar y explorar la cultura de su Puerto Rico natal. El trabajo no se puede encajonar en un solo género, si no que toma ventaja de las fortalezas del jazz, la música clásica y la música folclórica para crear este tour de ocho partes de un paisaje culturalmente único.

This performance comes from Zenón’s desire to create a concert-length suite to honor and explore the culture of his native Puerto Rico. The work does not fit into a single genre, but rather takes advantage of the strengths of jazz, classical, and folk music to create this eight-part tour of a unique cultural landscape. Fineartscenter.com/zenonspektral Auspiciado por:

FEBRERO 2019

CHRISTIAN SCOTT ATUNDE ADJUAH

Jueves, Febrero 14, 7:30 pm, Bowker Auditorium Christian Scott aTunde Adjuah ha tenido una carrera relámpago que lo ha llevado a la vanguardia del jazz, el hiphop, y el pop. Con raíces en las tradiciones de New Orleans, su ciudad natal, Scott es ampliamente reconocido como uno de los progenitores de “Stretch Music,” una forma musical que no mira el género y con raíces en el jazz, la cual intenta “stretch” (extender) las convenciones rítmicas, melódicas y harmónicas del jazz para abarcar muchas otras formas musicales, lenguajes y culturas. Extienda su definición de jazz con este quinteto este Día de San Valentín.

Christian Scott aTunde Adjuah, has had a whirlwind career that has brought him to the forefronts of jazz, hip-hop, and pop. Rooted in the traditions of his hometown, New Orleans, Scott is widely recognized as one of the progenitors of “Stretch Music,” a jazz rooted, genre blind musical form that attempts to “stretch” jazz’s rhythmic, melodic and harmonic conventions to encompass as many other musical forms,

languages and cultures as possible. Stretch your definition of jazz with his quintet this Valentine’s Day and share the evening with us.

Fineartscenter.com/Scott Auspiciado por:

Boletos: Llamar 413-545-2511 o 800-999-UMAS o en línea al fineartscenter.com