The Signal Vol. 86 No. 5

VOL. 86 | NO. 5

SEPT. 18 - SEPT. 25, 2018

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@gsusignal

Marble, Glass and Brick The eclectic architecture of Downtown Atlanta

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back e h t o t p li F PHOTO COURTESY OF JOHN YEO

EXPANDING EAST AND WEST

ROTTEN TO THE CORE

STAY SHARP

RINGS MADE HERE

Students will have more space to game, legislate and socialize in a proposed student center expansion.

Mark your calendars: the beginning of the end of the Trump administration is here.

Clarkston hosted a sword fighting exhibit to celebrate 50 years of their auditorium.

Atlanta has an argument to be the best sports city in the country by hosting the nation’s largest events.

NEWS | PAGE 5 GEORGIASTATESIGNAL.COM

OPINION PAGE 7

News 3

ARTS & LIVING | PAGE 13

OPINION 7

SPORTS | PAGE 16

Arts & Living 9

Sports 15

NEWS TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 18, 2018

www.georgiastatesignal.com/news

Diversity: it’s not so black and white Georgia State’s faculty is less diverse the higher you go up ADA WOOD Staff Reporter

G

eorgia State has boasted about being one of the most diverse universities in the nation. However, that diversity doesn’t extend past the student level. Faculty remains primarily populated by white teachers and administration.

As of the fall semester of 2018, according to IPORT, a Georgia State database, 15.5 percent of Georgia State’s 2,854 faculty members are black, while 64.7 percent are white. Asian faculty only represents 10.6 percent of total faculty.

“The higher you go up, the less diverse the school is. This is part of the problem that I think President Becker is trying to address.”

- DR. JAMES AINSWORTH chair for the Cultural Diversity Committee “Oftentimes we have students who come through this department and say taking African-American studies is the only time they have ever experienced a black professor at Georgia State,” Makungu Akinyela, an associate professor and the director of undergraduate studies in the AfricanAmerican Studies (AAS) department, said.

He said that Georgia State has a habit of touting diversity even though there is an apparent lack of it at the faculty level.

“Georgia State is making a real point of bragging about the number of [black graduates] coming out of the university,” Akinyela said. “We probably graduate more black students than just about any other university in the country.”

According to Akinyela, students benefit from having a professor that shares their background.

“It is important in terms of having examples of the possibilities of what you can do, having role models, being able to bounce your experiences off of someone who may have

shared a common experience,” he said.

Akinyela said the AAS department not only benefits black students but also contributes to unifying African-American faculty on a campus-wide level.

“I’m here in the department of AfricanAmerican studies, which is a very comfortable place to be black,” he said. “In fact, what we find it is that a lot of faculty of color outside of our department, just like the students, look to our department for a sense of support, a sense of community.”

Despite a stark contrast in the amount of white faculty employed versus any other race, Georgia State has historically included faculty diversity in many of its goals and initiatives.

The 2011 Strategic Plan was a start, which was updated in 2016 with a new initiative on diversity.

“President Becker has organized a committee focused on ‘faculty diversity’. What is that committee doing?” Dr. Joyce King, a professor in the College of Education, said.

James Ainsworth is a member of the University Senate and serves as the chair for the Cultural Diversity Committee.

“That’s what motivated me to get involved in the University Senate because somebody needs to hold them accountable and keep them focused on trying to achieve that stated goal,” Ainsworth said.

He said that upon creating The Commission for the Next Generation of Faculty, a committee that oversees diversity, he told Georgia State University President Mark Becker that it was a chance for him to take action.

“To President Becker’s credit, I remember him saying, ‘Look, we are on the same team.’

And he proactively created a commission.

Now, we are working really hard and trying to seriously do something about faculty diversity,” Ainsworth said.

Becker commented on the ambition of Georgia State in a letter to specific faculty in request of their membership committee.

“Many universities have established programs intended to promote faculty diversity, and yet very few have truly moved the needle. Good intent is laudable and yet inadequate,” Becker’s letter stated. “We therefore seek to once again be innovative in establishing programs that will become nationally recognized and adopted by showing that it is indeed possible to move the needle.”

Now, the committee is actively trying to

find a solution to the ongoing challenge of diversifying the faculty.

“This semester, the commission is going to be conducting focus groups with faculty to try to figure out issues around how to recruit and retain a diverse faculty,” Ainsworth said.

But, he is realistic and knows that change does not come overnight.

“Frankly, this university’s administration has shown that they are good at getting done what they set their mind to,” Ainsworth said.

“By creating the commission there is now a data-driven process. This school is not the ‘number two most innovative university’ by chance.”

Ainsworth said that he is interested in what Georgia State will look like in 10 or 20 years.

“You plant seeds now,” he said.

Currently, at the highest levels of administration, there are few black faculty members at Georgia State.

Only one Georgia State college dean is a minority.

None are black or Hispanic, one is Asian and all others are white.

“The higher you go up, the less diverse the school is. This is part of the problem that I think President Becker is trying to address,” Ainsworth said.

Ainsworth hopes to see real, numerical results in the

diversification of faculty but he also looks forward to the other results of the commission’s work.

“What one of the commission members said is, ‘What you really have to do to diversify the faculty is lay out the welcome mat,’ to say people from all racial backgrounds are welcome here at Georgia State as faculty,” he said.

Ainsworth has committed himself to this cause at Georgia State.

“I’m a believer that making a difference on this will enhance the quality of the education that minority students have at this school for the next generation moving forward,” he said.

ILLUSTRATION AND PAGE DESIGN BY AMBER KIRLEW | THE SIGNAL

NEWS

4

GEORGIASTATESIGNAL.COM

Does Georgia State have a gender pay gap?

Inequity as a faculty concern and the Georgia State response ADA WOOD Staff Reporter

T

he average salary of a professor at Georgia State for men is $125,928 and for women is $107,505. This seemingly exposes a $18,423 gender pay gap.

This is according to data for the 2016-2017 academic year from The Chronicle of Higher Education, a newspaper and website whose primary audience is university faculty.

However, Georgia State’s Michael Galchinsky, who is the associate provost of the Office of Institutional Effectiveness (OIE), disagrees with the accuracy of these numbers.

“That aggregate data is very misleading,” Galchinsky said.

“They appear to tell a story that women are generally making less than men but without knowing all the other factors, it’s really hard to make sense of this data.”

The Chronicle receives its numbers from the U.S. Department of Education’s Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System (IPEDS). IPEDS reports faculty pay for all degreegranting colleges.

Galchinsky said that data from Georgia State itself will soon be publicly released.

“Provost [Risa] Palm has directed the OIE to undertake a study of faculty salary by rank and gender in spring 2019. We’ll have data to share when that’s completed,” he said.

Dr. Peggy Albers is a professor at Georgia State and she was on the University Senate in 2010 when Georgia State conducted a gender equity report.

Mary Finn, the former associate provost for institutional effectiveness, is the author of the report titled “Analysis of Faculty Salary: Differences by Gender,” which was published in June 2010.

The results of the study concluded that pay discrepancies at the university did exist, although they were minimal and localized within only one college.

According to official Georgia State University Senate minutes, a meeting was held on Oct. 19, 2010 to discuss the results of this study.

Following this, Becker requested further analysis for a corrective action plan from Peter Lyons, the former director of institutional research.

“Because the study wasn’t as in-depth as we wanted it to be,” Galchinsky said, the senate agreed to move forward with further analysis.

However, it was ultimately decided that “adoption of [a corrective plan] might be premature,” according to the meeting’s minutes.

This further analysis came in the form of an independent study in 2012 by Edsel Peña, a professor of statistics at the University of South Carolina (USC).

“Georgia State brought in an outside statistician. I believe [Becker] and this statistician were contemporaries at USC. The two of them knew each other and, from my perspective, very predicatively they found there was very little gender inequality at that time,” Albers said.

Albers contested that the results of the study were skewed, claiming the statistics were influenced by an existing relationship between Becker and Peña.

“Along with other faculty on the university senate, we thought that it was largely because of how the statistics were run. Numbers can tell you anything you want them to tell you,” she said.

“I was told that I was a ‘personnel issue’ and ‘uncollegial,’ a profile I contend was largely created because of my outspoken attention to issues of salary equality and other faculty concerns.”

— DR. PEGGY ALBERS a professor at Georgia State

Through email correspondence, Peña confirmed that he previously met Becker during Becker’s time at the University of Michigan from 1989 to 2000. Becker later became the executive vice president and provost at USC, where Peña still works today.

Peña said his participation in a study of gender equity at Georgia State was contingent upon receiving full longitudinal data where faculty members would be individually unidentifiable.

“I believe President Becker knows my objectivity and that I’m only interested in the truth, and I believe he respects my academic credentials, specifically my statistical knowledge,” he said.

Ultimately, Peña’s follow-up study found little to no difference in pay between male and female faculty, including at faculty hire, and no difference in the ability of female faculty to receive promotions in rank.

“It’s a more difficult question than it might seem because there are a lot of factors that go into faculty salary. Finding out which factors are relevant and active can be complicated,” Galchinsky said.

He said gender was only one factor, and that Peña’s study also considered faculty member department, tenure, rank and number of years employed, which can influence pay.

“This is a national trend because there are different standards in different fields. Business professors all over the country tend to make more than humanities professors,” Galchinsky said.

Despite this, Albers believes she has seen instances of inequality among her colleagues.

“In my college, we have several regents’ professors.

According to the Department of Audits and Accounts in [Open Georgia], one regent’s professor, male, earns $211,000 while a female faculty member who is also a regent’s professor, earns $165,000,” Albers said.

Galchinsky said that there can be differences in faculty salary, and those differences are not necessarily evidence of gender inequity.

“One of the things about discrimination is that perception of inequity matters,” he said.

Since Peña’s 2012 study which found no inequity at Georgia State, the university has not conducted any further internal research on the matter. Albers provided what she believes to be the reason for a lack of further study.

“Georgia State is often in the news for its achievements, and so consequently the optics around the differences in pay equality would not look good,” she said. “The issues around pay equality run much deeper than gender, and involve university policies that favor some faculty over others.”

Albers said she directly approached the Provost regarding the inequity she saw.

“We were later told by the department chair that the Provost said we were never to bring up salary issues again with her,” Albers said. “[That] the Provost chooses not to discuss issues around salary equality with faculty is highly troubling especially since some faculty are treated differently than others,” she said.

And according to Albers, even her finances have been personally impacted by this issue.

“From my perspective, the university has done little to adjust my salary, especially given my strong job performance,” she said. “I was told that I was a ‘personnel issue’ and ‘uncollegial,’ a profile I contend was largely created because of my outspoken attention to issues of salary equality and other faculty concerns.”

Gender pay gaps at higher higher education institutions are not uncommon, as 96 percent of these institutions pay men more than women for at least one rank, according to an annual report by the American Association of University Professors.

Whether there is a pay gap at Georgia State or not remains unclear.

“Georgia State is a data-driven university. We have made huge leaps over the last 10 years and a lot of that is due to the fact that we are willing to follow the data wherever it leads us, and we’ll do the same in this case,” Galchinsky said.

ILLUSTRATION BY DEMETRI BURKE | THE SIGNAL

TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 18, 2018

NEWS

5

$25 million Student Center expansion

NEWS BRIEFS LOCAL ‘Unknown drug substance’ at Georgia smoke shop sends 5 to hospital The Atlanta-Journal Constitution reported that a man is in custody after authorities executed a search warrant on a smoke shop in Pickens County.

Law enforcement officers and emergency response personnel encountered an “unknown drug substance” that sent five to the hospital.

Atulkumar Jayan Patel was arrested later that day, and he faces charges of manufacturing, distributing, dispensing or possessing controlled substances and distributing Nitrous Oxide.

Feasibility study to assess needs and costs underway WILL SOLOMONS News Editor

G

eorgia State students may not have to differentiate between Student Center East and Student Center West for much longer. In the next few years, both buildings could possibly merge following an estimated $25 million construction project.

At the Fall Student Involvement Fair on Thursday, Sept. 6, representatives from the architecture and design firm Perkins and Will (PW) took in feedback on what students would like to see happen with the centers as part of a feasibility study for the proposed project. PW also consulted with various staff through focus groups earlier that morning.

Director of Student Media Bryce McNeil, whose office is within Student Center West, shared his thoughts on the proposed expansion.

“I am very excited about this assessment. I’ve encouraged all of our volunteers to be active in the feedback process. The implications of a potential expansion would be far reaching, from redefining our space to having more recreational events for student press to cover. I am hopeful that Student Media’s connection to the Student Center will be stronger than ever in students’ minds whatever the results of this assessment,” he said.

After analyzing an excess of funds across multiple university accounts, the idea of investing those funds into an improved student center came to fruition. The ongoing study also seeks to discover how much the project would cost and if the university would be able to allocate the funds appropriately.

“When we’re done with [the feasibility study], essentially it will help us to determine, ‘Can we afford to enhance the student center with our given financial resources?’” Senior Director of the Student Center Boyd Beckwith said.

Students shouldn’t have to worry about the cost either, as there are no plans to use student activity fees to contribute to the project’s cost.

“We are not going to make a request of the student body to raise activity fees either to them or to the Board of Regents because we know that’s not going to happen. If we’re making any enhancements to the student center we need to do it with our existing money,” Beckwith said.

He visited the Student Government Association (SGA) senate meeting on Thursday, Sept. 13.

After delivering a slideshow filled with imagery of bowling alleys, floor-to-ceiling windows and a Georgia State-branded clock tower, Beckwith was met with a charged series of comments by Senator Spencer Bivins.

Bivins was skeptical as to why the university can’t use apparent excess funds for other more timely issues, such as funding new buses or purchasing testing supplies. Beckwith said that the excess of money is drawn from multiple departments and cannot be transferred across the university.

Probably the largest challenge that the student

NATIONAL Trump administration transferred $9.8 million from FEMA to ICE Perkins and Will, an architecture and design firm, spoke with Georgia State students at the Involvement Fair on Sept. 6, 2018 about their ideas for expansion of the Student Center on the downtown campus.

centers face now is a lack of ballroom space, according to Beckwith.

“We’re turning away 3,000 events a year because we don’t have the meeting room space for them,” he said. “We host over 8,000 events a year in the spaces that we have.”

Beckwith wants to increase student involvement within the student centers’ existing space since he said many students have indicated on surveys that they felt as though the student center lacked activity.

“We just hired a new digital marketing specialist and one of the things we’re hoping she can help us with is we’re changing the forms when student organizations or departments reserve space they’re going to let us know, ‘Are you okay with us sharing this on social media?’” he said.

This way, Beckwith believes more students will attend events at the student centers and be generally more involved on campus.

“Students pay the fees to operate the building,” he said, expanding on why students need to be aware of the events taking place.

For the location of the actual expansion and construction, Beckwith provided a rough, unconfirmed idea of what would happen.

“Right now, the most logical footprint for an expansion is essentially over Unity Plaza where it would potentially remove the bookstore building and have a new building to combine or access east and west.”

Pounce’s statue, an iconic landmark on campus, sits within Unity Plaza. During the SGA meeting, Beckwith said that they will either relocate Pounce to Urban Life Plaza, place him inside the expansion or place him underneath an elevated platform of the expansion.

“I think Urban Life Plaza is one of the most underutilized spaces on campus. It’s got some really cool plantings, especially on the side that overlooks Gilmer. Part of it is clearly it gets hot here and sunny,” he said.

PHOTO BY UNIQUE RODRIGUEZ | THE SIGNAL

Beckwith said he wants to see the expansion not only impact the student centers but also the campus as a whole.

“I think [after] we added the solar powered tables, I’m seeing a few more students using that space but again, trying to think of this project as part of a whole not just, ‘All we want to fix is the student center’ part but how is it going to affect the whole campus. And again really providing a better space [where] all of our students feel welcome. We know that quite frankly the student center is only reaching a fraction of our 34,000 students,” he said.

In the event that the first floor is enclosed, Beckwith said outdoor student activities that presently occur in Unity Plaza could be moved into the expansion, to Hurt Park or to Urban Life Plaza. Activities could also move to what will soon be the greenway once Kell Hall is demolished (Beckwith noted that that demolition will cost a whopping $5 million).

The university hopes that students will use the new space for more than just a pathway between classes. Within rough plans for the expansion, there are talks of adding a gaming center, a dedicated SGA senate chamber, a wellness minute-clinic and more ballroom space.

“We know there are tons of students who go to classes and go home,” Beckwith said.

Beckwith stressed that all the plans for the new student center expansion are extremely tentative and construction wouldn’t begin for a few years.

The university hopes to gain the approval of the Board of Regents early spring semester and begin drafting designs by the end of it.

After that, Beckwith said construction could begin, but anyone attending Georgia State right now would not see the completion of the expansion unless they’re a freshman planning to get their doctorate, due to how long it would take until construction actually begins.

The New York Times reported that the Department of Homeland Security transferred nearly $10 million from the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) to Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), according to a budget document released by the office of Oregon Senator Jeff Merkley. It showed that the money transferred from FEMA’s operations and support budget went into accounts at ICE to pay for detention and removal operations.

GLOBAL Typhoon hits Philippines and southern China

The Associated Press reported Typhoon Mangkhut hit the northern Philippines and southern China, forcing millions to evacuate and leaving dozens dead. The storm made landfall on Saturday, Sept. 15 on the northeastern tip of Luzon island in the Philippines. It moved on to Hong Kong and farther into southern China. More than 2.4 million people have been relocated and nearly 50,000 fishing boats were called back to port, according to the Guangdong provincial meteorological station.

NEWS

6

Michael Hughes, the director of the International Defensive Pistol Association (IDPA), at a weekly meeting on the topic of the campus carry bill.

GEORGIASTATESIGNAL.COM

PHOTO BY DAKOTA SMITH | THE SIGNAL

Not everyone should carry a gun

Gun supporters weigh in on Campus Carry at a pistol competition ZACH SALLING Staff Reporter

“I

’m not a fan of campus carry,” Michael Hughes, director of Stoddard’s Range and Guns pistol match, said. “I’ve seen so many people come and go in [competitive shooting] that I’m quite confident to say there are a whole lot of people that should never touch a gun.”

In wake of recent Georgia State shootings, attention shifted to the campus carry policy, legalized in Georgia on July 1, 2017, which allows anyone properly licensed in the state to carry a handgun in a concealed manner.

Georgia State provides information regarding campus carry on their website but has not promoted gun safety.

Hughes directs the competitive International Defensive Pistol Association (IDPA) matches at Stoddard’s Range and Guns in Midtown every Wednesday at 6 p.m. and advocates gun safety and self-defense.

“The concept is to simulate what would happen in a parking lot or parking center and it’s timed, so it’s a competition,” Ken Baye, owner of Stoddard’s Range and Guns, said. “And they’re using techniques that one might use in a self-defense situation.”

The IDPA sets up various self-defense obstacle courses: eight cardboard targets, wooden barricades, nets strewn between barricades and blue tarps incised for gunfire.

Ten men and one woman competed.

“I got a Glock 19 for my thirtieth birthday,” Renee Alyworth, an IDPA match contender, said. “I felt like [competitive shooting] would be a good way to use it. I thought target practice was kind of boring, but this was fun.”

Alyworth, equipped with protective earmuffs and glasses, stood at starting position, facing a wooden barricade. A dress shirt covered her pistol holster and magazine cartridges. Hughes stood a couple feet behind with a timer. “[IDPA’s setup] utilizes self-defense principles like shooting behind cover and shooting with a garment on, so you have to move the garment to get the gun, learning to reload quickly,” Hughes said. “You shoot the zero zones. You take a raw time and add to it the number of seconds with your score.”

Hughes pressed the timer.

Alyworth swatted the dress shirt hem from the holster, grabbed the Glock with her left hand and quickly shifted it to her

right hand so she could grab the magazine and load the pistol.

“You think you can stand in a range and shoot a gun and hit a target,” Hughes said. “But as soon as somebody puts a clock on you out there … [peoples’] minds go blank.”

Alyworth was not one of those people. She planted her feet squarely behind the barricade, knees bent, shoulders edging around the corner for aim.

One shot fired. Then a second.

She shuffled left to right behind an adjacent wooden board.

The other contenders stood some distance behind, following her run.

Alyworth popped her shoulders out of the barricade’s pocket, firing another couple of bullets, and sifted between nets, wooden planks and barrels to the final targets.

The last targets hit, Hughes pressed the timer and a Stoddard’s employee swept the brass-jacket cartridges into a dustpan.

Alyworth holstered her pistol and rejoined the group of contenders, spectating the last couple of runs.

Hughes followed the remaining contenders at a measured pace, keeping a distance, but also close enough to observe their handle on the pistol to ensure safety.

“We’ve had to send people home and tell them to look at themselves in the mirror and say ‘Am I really the kind of person that needs to be doing this,’” Hughes said. “Under pressure you’ve got an explosive device that can cause immense damage.”

Most of the contenders moved calm and collected through the course. However, this has not always been the case.

“There was one college professor, and he was one of the [most] dangerous people I’ve ever seen [with a pistol]. He would come up with some philosophical argument about it,” Hughes said. “I would say, ‘No. This is not [theory]. When you turn the gun on someone, it becomes real.’”

During the contenders’ runs, regulation requires them to hold the pistol in front of the taped line. If your pistol passes the line, you’re out.

“This why you want to learn how to handle yourself under pressure, and this is not even under pressure. People lose their minds,” Hughes said. “Cops even do it. They shoot in the range, they think they know what they’re doing, but they get in the scene and think ‘What if he’s got a gun. Oh, no. That was a cellphone.’”

A study shows anxiety decreased the time officers look at their target and their attention focused more on threatening cues. A separate study showed ‘reality-based’ training improved officer performance under anxiety.

“[College] is the cockiest time in your whole life. I know I was,” Hughes said. “If you carry a gun, you have to take the responsibility of life and death, and not just yours, but everybody around you.”

That’s a lot to ask of Georgia State students who have enough stress as is.

“Very kind, noble people make horrible mistakes with a gun that ruins everybody’s life,” Hughes said. “If I ever made a safety mistake where I were to accidentally fire my gun, drop it in a public place, or God forbid, shoot myself or somebody else, I would never touch one again. I would never even consider it.”

Four out of ten self-defense handgun owners have received no formal training. Despite this, firearms awareness has shown some success reducing incidents. “[Georgia State] creates safety awareness and basic crime prevention as far as the campus, but not specific to the gun carry,” Crystal Turnage, a Georgia State police officer, said.

Colleges rarely implement gun-safety programs, though several colleges offer trapshooting, or competitive clay pigeon shooting.

“Everyone should go through some training,” Hughes said.

“When you carry a gun, you need a cool head to use it.”

Georgia State promotes campus safety, having recently offered training regarding active shooters on campus, but has not initiated any gun safety or education programs on guns in and of themselves.

“We have no actual program in place and I don’t see one happening,” Turnage said.

GEORGIA ON KEY GUN LAWS: Requires permit Background checks Prohibits domestic abusers Requires hands-on safety training (to carry a concealed handgun in public)

OPINIONS TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 18, 2018

www.georgiastatesignal.com/opinions

Trump’s circle, rotting from the inside out The anonymous New York Times op-ed is the beginning of the end

SHARI CELESTINE Staff Reporter

T

hanks to the arrival of an anonymous op-ed published in The New York Times last week, we now know there is a resistance within the White House working to frustrate parts of President Donald Trump’s agenda and his worst inclinations. It’s no secret that many Republicans don’t like Trump very much—both senators and senior White House officials have made clear they don’t see eye to eye with the President’s values. But now, what the still-unnamed author behind the op-ed piece has made clear is, the trust and loyalty Trump insists upon so much isn’t as substantial as he elicits.

Trump is unhinged. A spotlight has been placed over him since he became the Republican nominee in the 2016 election, but now he’s disturbing his own people. He rambles, frequently goes off topic and repeats himself all while missing the point of his argument. He doesn’t read important briefing documents and ignores his advisors in favor of an earful of Fox and Friends. Is this the leader of the free world? Sad. Donald Trump does not believe in democracy. His open approval and praise for dictators like Vladimir Putin and Kim Jongun are troubling. If left to his own devices, I have no doubt in my mind he would destroy our form of government, the republic, simply because he could profit from it in some way.

Is this the beginning of the end of the Trump administration? It’s could be. The writer of the New York Times piece knows the President, knows his triggers, knows just what to say to make him boiling mad, and it worked. With the temperament of a spoiled five-year-old child, Trump has, as expected, ranted and raved on Twitter in response to the op-ed.

“Does the so-called ‘Senior Administration Official’ really exist, or is it just the Failing

New York Times with another phony source?

If the GUTLESS anonymous person does indeed exist, the Times must, for National Security purposes, turn him/her over to government at once!” his tweet stated on Sept.

5, 2018.

The author of the Times op-ed is a senior administration official, as described in the piece itself. But this vitriol isn’t from just one man or woman inside his cabinet—there are many who are opposed to the President’s agenda. Trump is constantly going off the rails on important topics. Trump has always boasted about how amazing he is as a businessman. But he has 13 business related failures under his name alone, from Trump University, to Trump Airlines and Trump casinos.

We, the American people, liberals, conservatives and anyone in between, must move away from simply thinking of impeaching Donald Trump.

We need to seriously discuss

the 25th Amendment. Trump will never submit written documentation that he is unfit.

Trump would have to admit, in a written document, forever cemented in history that he no longer held the mental capacity to hold the office of President of the United States. Trump is far too narcissistic for an admission like that to ever cross his desk.

The anonymous op-ed writer might find solace in there being adults in the room, but I do not. Those adults might have helped Trump move important pieces of legislation he will forever credit to his administration, like tax reform; however, it’s not enough. Work gets done in the White House despite him, never because of him.

ILLUSTRATION BY SHANCHEZE JOHNSON | THE SIGNAL

“Last mile” scooters: a necessary evil in Atlanta?

Are Bird and Lime a long-term solution or just an unnecessary nuisance?

MARC LOUCHEZ Staff Reporter

W

hile walking in the city over the summer, I began to notice that scooter ownership had become very popular among intown residents. Of course, I was way off in my observation...sort of.

As most of you probably know by now, Bird and Lime electric scooters are now woven into the fabric of our city. Seemingly overnight, these two companies have become to scooter commuting what Uber and Lyft are to ridesharing.

The key difference is that while Uber and Lyft compete with traditional methods of public transportation (e.g. buses, trains, taxis), Bird and Lime aim to be the perfect complement to these services. In fact, the

term for this complement is “last mile.” This is meant for destinations that are too close to wait for an Uber but too far to walk.

While Bird and Lime seem to have filled the void left in the “last mile” stage of the carless commute, one thing is clear: this solution is far from perfect. Because they are simply part of traffic, you may not notice the presence of ridesharing vehicles. However, it’s hard to miss the dockless scooters zipping up and down sidewalks.

Of course, the use of scooters in this manner poses many safety risks to pedestrians and riders alike. Collisions are always a possibility, not to mention that motorized scooters aren’t even legally allowed on sidewalks.

If you’ve been on the BeltLine recently, you’ve undoubtedly seen these scooters zipping around there too—which is also illegal. However, until the Atlanta City Council chooses to act on this scooter phenomenon, law enforcement appears to be looking the

other way.

Another safety related problem is riders leaving scooters in the middle of sidewalks and blocking egresses. This can be more than just a simple annoyance for foot travelers.

For example, pedestrians who depend on wheelchairs could find it more difficult to bypass scooters left behind on narrow sidewalks.

In an effort to deter riders from doing this, both Bird and Lime apps make you take a picture of your scooter in its drop-off location before the meter stops running. In reality, there may be little they can do to actually stop this from happening. Thus, the age-old honor system seems to be the policy.

The system of discovering these Bird and Lime scooters isn’t perfect either. Finding a scooter that actually works can sometimes become time-consuming in and of itself. Not using the map service provided by the two apps can result in time wasted by finding

scooters that are either damaged or have low batteries.

Once a scooter has been located, the reasons for Bird and Lime’s popularity become obvious: ease of use and convenience. Simply unlock by scanning a QR code and your ride begins. When you arrive at your destination, just lock it and make sure the scooter isn’t blocking any public pathways.

The pricing is also straightforward. Bird and Lime charge $1 to start and each additional minute of use is 15 cents.

So, while not being a perfect solution to commuting deficiencies in Atlanta, electric scooters are providing some “last mile” relief to a city served by a measly 38 heavy rail stations. In a city with a metro population approaching 6 million, the only long term answer is expanding MARTA’s heavy rail system. However, until that happens, Bird and Lime are providing some necessary outsidethe-box thinking.

OPINIONS

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Hurricanes and human rights The appalling nature of the past few days

A

s Hurricane Florence battered the coastlines of Virginia, North Carolina and South Carolina, United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) received roughly $9.8 million that was within the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s (FEMA) budget. President Trump’s administration is essentially making the statement that funding detention camps that abuse children and separate families is more important than aiding coastal cities and helping evacuees seek refuge.

Poor money usage isn’t the only gambling with people’s lives happening.

Inmates in South Carolina’s MacDougall Correctional Institution are being denied evacuation by prison officials even though it is within the mandatory evacuation zone, roughly 35 miles from Charleston.

So apparently, according to those wardens and other administrators, logistical concerns, which are essentially negligible since North Carolina and Virginia have already evacuated their prisoners, are more important than the lives of United States citizens that are incarcerated.

As individuals who share citizenship with the evacuees and with the prisoners, we are appalled that Trump and the prison administrators would be so against aiding and helping people.

Another terrible event occurred back in 2012 that affects recovery and response today. According to The Huffington Post, North Carolina’s lawmakers “barred policymakers and developers from using up-to-date climate science to plan for rising sea levels on the state’s coast.” Climate change science isn’t something that can just be thrown out the window. Now, North Carolina faced a torrent of rain and storm surges that proves climate change is here and very real. When waves swallow houses on the coast and winds uproot trees, there is nothing denial will do.

Speaking of denial, 3,000 people did die in Puerto Rico during its last hurricane, Mr. Trump. Families torn apart by tragedy have the proof that you’re looking for. Why would you deny that people died, especially when they are so close to citizenship within the country that you’re in charge of? And not only is it bad when you first deny that

people died, but it’s even worse whenever you double down on your claim and say that it was the democrats’ fault. Because yes, democrats love to fudge the numbers on death and destruction. Absolutely no amount of paper towel throwing and “Kobeing” will bring people back or coincide reality with your delusional world.

It’s really pitiful that a president would blame the mayor of San Juan, Puerto Rico for a lack of emergency response and aid when the federal government has the resources to do so.

Climate change denying will only lead to more deaths in the future. There’s not a single life that will not be affected unless Trump and his lackeys accept science for what it is. We can only hope that the next hurricane that batters our coast will be met with the same energy and ferocity that Trump embodies with rounding up immigrants. Also, Mr. Trump, it’s going to be a whole lot harder to play a golf game when the holes are filled with water from the rising sea levels, or when you can’t finish more than a couple of holes because the temperature is too hot.

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ARTS & LIVING TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 18, 2018

www.georgiastatesignal.com/artsandliving

The clout behind the cloud

How the stigma behind smoking shapes people’s views SYDNEY BLOEME Arts & Living Editor

A

fter the introduction of the vape and the Juul, cigarettes are no longer in vogue, with many different options when it comes to picking your next buzz. These come with pros and cons leading many people with many different options of smoking. Today, smoking devices act as almost an accessory that speak for themselves.

To some students, the traditional cigarette is treasured for being just that—traditional. Mari Mujiri, an Arts and Sciences student, has been smoking throughout college, and despite the introduction of new vapes, she’s been faithful to the cigarette.

“It’s old school. It’s a routine. You light it, you ash it, you put it out. It sounds weird to non-smokers,” Mujiri said.

After being heavily glamorized in Hollywood with timeless classics like “Breakfast at Tiffany’s,” (think Audrey Hepburn’s distinct cigarette holder), there’s now a certain old Hollywood aesthetic associated with it. But today, cigarettes are no longer the standard or even the norm, instead serving as an active choice—an accessory.

And whatever kind of cigarette you smoke can say a lot about your personality. Ryan Capone is a Georgia State student who frequents the various areas used for smoking on campus.

He thinks there is a lot that can be said about someone based on the brand and kind of cigarettes they smoke.

“There’s a kind of culture. Like if you smoke cigarettes, you view someone who smokes Newports differently than Marlboros differently than American Spirits,” Capone said.

Capone even remembers a time recently when he tried to buy Newports and the woman behind the counter told him no, because he was “too pretty to be smoking Newports.”

But today, as technology progresses and advances, so do the methods of smoking. In modern times, the vape is a popular choice. Vape culture is filled with their custom mods; many vapers take pride in the creativity and do-it-yourself attitude.

Kyle Louis was first introduced to vaping through one of these crafty friends.

“I had a friend who had a whole tackle box of parts, tools and five different vapes. She was serious about it,” Louis said as a cloud of cotton candy smoke swirled around him.

When vapes first gained consumer appeal, users were building their own from scratch. Vape

enthusiasts would quite literally build the machine they wanted to smoke from, often assembling batteries, tanks and coils.

This popularity led vaping to quickly spread through the mainstream. Suddenly, with the sale of prebuilt devices and pre-packaged nicotine juice, vapes became accessible to everyone, no prior knowledge necessary.

And as with cigarettes, there is a distinct style of vape for every person.

For example, the larger the tank on a vape, the more battery life it has and the “fatter” the clouds are produced. Significant modifications (“mods,” as they’re called) are useful for people who vape frequently or perform tricks. In contrast, smaller vapes are more discrete—perfect for any novice looking to get started, or those not interested in longer battery life and cloud size. Vapes are also specialized for whatever e-juice or “tobacco product” you may be smoking.

The popularity of the vape springboarded it into the territory of subcultures and social networks. Today, vape lounges pepper street corners in almost every city and vape competitions set out to rank those who rip the fattest clouds.

But vape culture has now led us to new territory, what is referred to by many as the “iPhone of vapes”: the Juul.

The concept behind the Juul is almost ingenious. It bears no resemblance to a cigarette, opting instead for a monolithic black design that looks more like a USB stick than anything.

It’s discreet—the Juul’s size and vapor production make it easy to enjoy indoors and without the risk of secondhand and thirdhand smoke. But unlike its flavors, not everything about the Juul is peachy, or even mango.

THE STIGMA BEHIND IT

“Juuls are a meme,” Capone said.

Because most smoking devices are stereotypically associated with certain groups, like Marlboros versus Newports, the Juul is often seen as a joke—or worse, a meme.

Right now, there is a dramatically high number of Juuls infiltrating high schools. And with Juul’s mass-market appeal, the U.S. is now seeing an increase in teen nicotine usage. And because of it, the Food and Drug Administration just declared teen e-cigarette smoking an epidemic.

A simple search on YouTube for “Juuls” instantly pulls up hundreds of thousands of videos labeled “Juul challenge,” “Juul Tricks,” “Juul Compilation” and “How to Hide Your Juul.” Many of these videos display high school students boasting their Juuls and even performing their tricks

inside classrooms.

Capone is interested in the Juul because he thinks cigarettes affect his dating opportunities but he is apprehensive to buy a Juul because of all the connotations that come with it.

“I’m embarrassed to go to a gas station to buy pods or a Juul,” Capone said.

Such meme stigma is nothing new. Vapers have been experiencing for years with the onset of memes like “vape god” and “vape nation.” And many people still have negative associations with vapers.

“People have that stigma where if you smoke vape, you’re a p----. Like, you have a Honda that’s lower to the ground and you’re a d--------,” Louis said.

But most smokers don’t care—they’re still getting their buzz whether it’s a meme or not.

Louis explained that he was originally weary of owning one of the larger vapes but stopped caring once he stopped focusing on what others thought. Instead, he focuses on how it improves his life, like being able to smoke inside his house and no longer smelling like cigarettes all the time.

“In the beginning, yeah I was embarrassed. I had a small [vape] pen. But it just wasn’t doing enough for me,” Louis said.

While various vapes and cigarettes all have their own upsides and downsides, smokers agree that it’s not what you’re smoking; it’s who you’re smoking it with.

CAMARADERIE OF PASSING LIGHTERS

Many Georgia State students are able to network and meet people with similar interests in the various areas used for smoking on campus. They appreciate the community that smoking builds.

“It’s a social thing. You give out cigarettes and you hand around lighters. When it’s cold, we’re huddled together,” Mujiri said.

And the camaraderie isn’t only confined to cigarette smokers, as people can still mingle in the circle with their vapes.

“You connect with someone else when you see a vape,” Louis said. “I can hang out with the cigarette smokers with my vape but not have the need to pick up a cigarette.”

Stigma or not, these smokers know they can follow the clouds and meet each other on the other side.

ILLUSTRATIONS BY DAO NGUYEN | THE SIGNAL PHOTO ILLUSTRATION BY VANESSA JOHNSON | THE SIGNAL

The growing face of Georgia State From brutalisT to neoclassical, this architectural palette is as diverse as the student body flatiron building JOSH WINSTON Staff Reporter

T

he patchwork fabric of architecture united under the blue banner of Georgia State’s downtown campus comes across to some as disorganized and unappealing, while to others it’s an architectural reflection of the diversity that makes up the university’s population. To student Iv Fisher, it allows Georgia State’s “equally diverse student body to occupy their own unique spaces on campus.”

However, whatever view Georgia State’s range of buildings inspires, it is unarguably unique.

kell hall

a.

Kell Hall, like Sparks Hall, can easily be seen as an architectural relic of the past. Built in 1964, Kell is illustrative of the constructive bravado necessary to undertake the transformation from a parking garage to a science building. Its sloping ramps and dimly lit corridors make it one of the most unique buildings on campus, and perhaps for the wrong reasons. It should be commended on its dedication to wheelchair accessibility (no matter how steep those ramps are) but not much else. And it’s evident the university agrees, as the building is slated to be demolished in the next year.

b.

The Flatiron Building, while not a Georgia State property, has nonetheless become an inextricable part of the downtown campus. With its soaring neoclassical architecture and peculiar planar shape, the building marks itself as one of Downtown’s prettiest facades. Completed in 1897, the Flatiron Building is one of the city’s oldest skyscrapers and is subsequently protected as a historic landmark.

Now home to the Microsoft Innovation Center and the Women’s Entrepreneur Institute, the building assumes a new role as one of the many commercial resources that make Downtown such a fertile environment for young minds. And interestingly enough, Atlanta’s Flatiron Building actually precedes New York City’s by five years.

sparks hall Sparks Hall occupies a special place in university history because it was the first building Georgia State could truly call its own. Sparks was built specifically for classroom use by the university in the 1950s and was named after former Georgia State University President George M. Sparks. While the historic significance is important to acknowledge, it’s also worth noting the very midcentury modern feel of its architecture.

Common characteristics of this style include sleek lines, minimal ornamentation and an emphasis on utility, borrowing from the German Bauhaus style of the 40s and 50s following World War II.

a.

PHOTOS BY VANESSA JOHNSON | THE SIGNAL

b.

PAGE DESIGN BY DEVIN PHILLIPS AND UNIQUE RODRIGUEZ | THE SIGNAL

Baptist Collegiate Ministries

d.

c. creative media industries institute One of the more nascent buildings on campus also happens to be the most technologically advanced. The Creative Media Industries Institute (CMII), birthed out of the university’s desire to keep up with the nation’s growing demand for entertainment production, was completed in 2017. The international style building is attached to 25 Park Place and shares its history of former ownership by SunTrust Bank. However, what’s more compelling than its past is its future. With a fleet of digital labs, 3D printers, virtual reality and robots, the CMII promises to usher Georgia State into the future.

georgia-pacific building The pink granite walls of the Georgia-Pacific tower extend 52 stories into the Downtown sky, making it easily the tallest building on Georgia State’s campus. Once the site of the historic Loew’s Grand Theatre, the Georgia-Pacific Tower now houses the world headquarters for Georgia-Pacific pulp and paper company. It also notably houses the downtown office for the High Museum of Art, which is fitting for its cubist stacked step facade.

25 park place

c.

The looming office tower that is 25 Park Place was completed in 1978 and was once the headquarters of SunTrust Bank. Completed in the International Style, 25 Park Place’s exterior puts a visual emphasis on volume over mass with its ornamental use of alternating flat and glass surfaces.

The building, while echoing the numerous skyscrapers that neighbor it, stands in stark contrast to the warm tones and horizontally organized weight of Aderhold Learning Center and quite literally towers over most other Georgia State facilities. Its uniform exterior also does little to hint at the assortment of Arts and Sciences offices inside.

e.

Fulton County Public Library

d.

The Fulton County Public Library makes a unique, yet polarizing contribution to Georgia State’s campus. While also not an official Georgia State property, the library offers a wealth of knowledge and educational resources to Downtown’s population. Its heavily brutalist architecture is itself a monument to the post-war sculptural style, but is regularly criticized for its windowless and dark interior. Conversely, the building’s stark architecture is routinely praised as a masterpiece by design experts. Despite community pushback, library officials are adamant about soon renovating the Bauhaus-inspired facade with large windows.

Helen M. Aderhold Learning Center The Helen M. Aderhold Learning Center is situated in the historic Fairlie-Poplar district of Downtown Atlanta and is routinely considered to be one of Georgia State’s more impressive facilities. Aderhold, as it is colloquially known to students, was completed in 2002 and was at the time considered Georgia State’s most technologically impressive building. Its eclectic exterior, composed of blonde brick and copper accents, borrows heavily from the surrounding architecture and manages to incorporate a range of styles such as chicago, neoclassical and art deco. This blend of architectural inspiration allows Aderhold to uphold the aesthetic integrity of its periphery while also making a unique educational contribution to the area.

Baptist Collegiate Ministries The Baptist Collegiate Ministries is easily one of the most aesthetically striking buildings on campus mainly because of how out of place it looks alongside the skyscrapers and modernist architecture of Downtown. At first glance, the building resembles a museum or a monument to the Old South, and in some ways it is, but after a cursory glance at the many religious fliers and posters decorating its facade, it becomes clear that it is home to Georgia State’s Baptist student union. The building’s history is intriguing, as it was once a plumbing shop, produce market and women’s lingerie store.

However, its most interesting historic claim to fame is as the first Dixie Coca-Cola bottling plant in 1900.

petit science center

e.

The Parker H. Petit Science Center, completed in 2010, sits as a gleaming monument to science, technology and innovation on Georgia State’s downtown campus. Its high-modernist facade of blue glass ascends upwards in a vertical triumph over Georgia State’s less aesthetically pleasing facilities. It looks unlike anything else on campus and highlights one of the advantages of going to school in a rapidly evolving urban environment.

ARTS & LIVING

12

GEORGIASTATESIGNAL.COM

Laughing gas, your doctor and your friends Whippits: the festival party drug and its very real dangers SAM PUCKETT

Associate Arts & Living Editor

G

o to a rave, concert, festival, club, bar or house show and you might see people with balloons.

“What are those for?” you wonder.

“Probably nothing legal,” you decide.

It’s called whippits. It is affectionately named after the horrible noise it makes coming out of the dispenser and the euphoric “whah-whah” feeling it produces. Whippits are nothing new—they’ve been a popular recreational drug since the 1960s. Research from the Journal of Psychopharmacology

“Nobody comes in to buy one box.

Because the high lasts 20 seconds, you could finish one box in a night by yourself. A guy from Kennesaw would come in to buy seven or eight boxes every Friday night.”

— ZACK WILLIAMS the store manager at World Piece conducted in 2014 found that almost 30 percent of Americans have tried the drug.

The story of its use is a complicated one. It was first documented in 1793 by the English scientist Joseph Priestley, but its pain relieving effects were discovered by Sir Humphry Davy in 1799. It was Davy who then coined the name “laughing gas”.

Medically, it is used for its analgesic and anaesthetic properties. In layman’s terms, it takes you out of your body and away from the pain of medical procedures, commonly dental ones. But the effects are short-lasting. A moderate dose lasts only 20 seconds before you’re back on Earth. At higher doses, it can produce up to five minutes of a “lifted” sense of euphoria.

At non-recommended doses, its dissociative effects can produce hallucinations. Frequently, it is paired with stronger dissociative agents or hallucinogens, like LSD or ketamine, to boost the effects of the other drugs.

Thomas is the owner of Happy Hookah, a smoke and vape shop downtown. They sell nitrous oxide as a novelty item in cute packs labeled as whipped cream chargers, complete with a dainty latte on the box. He had a lot of assumptions about the business he’d be doing when he moved near a college campus, but Thomas was surprised to find that Georgia State students aren’t part of the whipped cream charger clientele.

“Most customers coming in to buy [nitrous canisters] are business professionals, late 20s and early 30s,” Thomas said. “I’ve actually never sold any to students, which

surprised me. When I started here, I expected 80 to 90 percent students and that’s not the case.”

Zack Williams is the store manager at World Piece, a smoke and vape shop in Little Five Points. At World Piece, the whipped cream chargers are packaged in boxes suggesting they be used for food-related sex play. Williams is under no illusion about how his clients use the product but says it’s none of his business (legally, he’s not required to care). Nitrous oxide regulations are fairly lax as compared to other controlled substances.

Under Georgia law, it’s illegal to sell or own nitrous oxide for non-medical purposes, but the enforcement of that law is laughable. Determining what purposes are medical or not is impossible for the average shop owner. And since whippits are often performed with balloons, lawmakers pursued both together as “paraphernalia.”

“Because of certain Georgia laws, we can’t sell the canisters next to the balloons,” Williams said.

He then pointed to a row of balloons, just a few counter spaces past the canisters— completely within the law.

Some studies suggest science has outgrown the use of nitrous oxide, claiming that modern alternatives are more effective and for less risk. But as we all know, habits are hard to kick and it could be a while before the medical community at large moves away from nitrous gas.

Emerging studies suggest the gas could have a place in medical practice. Numerous studies indicate nitrous oxide can be used to curb symptoms of withdrawal from opiates, alcohol and nicotine. However, those studies caution that nitrous oxide can cause dependence issues on its own, though incidents of serious dependence remain rare.

Dr. Peter Nagel in the journal Biological Psychiatry presents nitrous oxide as an alternative treatment for otherwise treatment-resistant major depression. Nitrous is being considered as an alternative N-methyl-D-aspartate antagonist, something psychiatrists were previously considering the drug dissociative and psychedelic drug, ketamine, for. However, there was a skittishness in prescribing ketamine because of its potential for overuse and popularity as a recreational street drug.

But these worries plague nitrous as well. There is the conventional understanding that nitrous oxide kills brain cells, a rumor you have undoubtedly heard before. Party-goers and regular users will tell you that is bogus. It sounds convincing— after all, it’s the same laughing gas your dentist uses, right?

In clinical settings, its use at high doses is relatively safe. The problem comes from regular and unsupervised use, such as in social circles that bond through frequent drug use, where nitrous is most common.

“Kids today are catching up with the hippies, [Nitrous]

was big then too,” Williams said.

Nitrous oxide is often a party drug.

Most frequently sold in canisters no larger than your little finger, and with a high lasting around 20 seconds, the list of reasons to do it alone is slim.

Williams says that because the high is so short-lived, frequent customers buy in bulk. This led them to give customers a discount (for example, buy three cases and get a fourth for free), which they have since ended. They couldn’t keep the product on the shelves.

“Nobody comes in to buy one box.

Because the high lasts 20 seconds, you could finish one box in a night by yourself,” Williams said. “A guy from Kennesaw would come in to buy seven or eight boxes every Friday night.”

The danger of nitrous is a little more complicated. Nitrous oxide bonds to vitamin B12. This reaction is dosedependent and cumulative, meaning the amount and frequency of use directly affects the negative side effects.

The reaction renders the B12 inert, leading to a deficiency.

Vitamin B12 is necessary for many brain functions and a deficiency can lead to poor balance, memory and energy levels, long-term nerve damage and eventually death. In a two-year study following at least monthly users, 4 percent of participants reported symptoms consistent with longterm nerve damage.

What remains clear is that prudence and judgement never hurt anyone.

“Everything in moderation,” Williams said.

ILLUSTRATIONS BY EVAN STAMPS | THE SIGNAL

TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 18, 2018

ARTS & LIVING

13

Get a few pointers about sword fighting

Clarkston celebrates 50 years of the Marvin Cole Auditorium SYDNEY BLOEME Arts & Living Editor

“I

t’s not as big as the America’s Got Talent stage, for sure,” Nicole Harsch said whilst walking around stage twirling a three-foot rapier blade and adjusting her tunic.

Nicole Harsch and Mike Sakuta are world-famous “stage combat professionals.” They have traveled all across the globe, from Paris, Moscow, Berlin, Canada and the U.S., for their staged combat performances and choreography. You can see their work on America’s Got Talent, at Dragon Con and even in a few Star Trek Klingon battle scenes.

This past week, the Georgia State Clarkston Campus celebrated its 50th anniversary of the opening of the Marvin Cole Auditorium with a performance from the world-famous duo, Crossed Swords. This duo shared some insight from their twenty years of experience performing on stage across the globe. They gave us some pointers.

It was during college that the duo began taking staged combat as a profession seriously. They used it to fund their college careers, which they affectionately refer to as “fighting [their] way through college.” They performed at renaissance festivals on weekends and invested those earnings back into their education, an education that would later grant them their Master’s, Ph.D. and even a teaching experience at the very Georgia State campus they performed at.

Because this fighting is so complex, they jokingly exclaim how ridiculous stage fighting is in most medieval movies. Their best advice: watch the background. Harsch and Sakuta point out that many times, the extras do everything from dropping their weapons, to missing contact between the swords and even holding their shields uselessly either above their heads or behind them.

One example of silver screen dramatization is the famous “knocking or twirling one’s sword out of their hand” move’.

Harsch demonstrates that it is not that easy because of a little thing called grip; knocking a sword into the base of another isn’t enough to cause the other fighter to loosen his fingers and drop his sword. So every time a sword is knocked or twisted out of an opponent’s hand, it’s purposely dropped.

They say that most fighting on-screen is based on a few simple moves; to increase tension in scenes, actors don’t advance their moves but rather repeat simple moves quickly, giving the illusion of a larger fight. To prove how easy these moves really are, Harsch and Sakuta demonstrated a performance while sitting in chairs.

Real sword fighting involves full-body movements with everything from foot placement to body blocking on stage, even borrowing movements like the “passing step” from fencing and baton twirling. As for the Star Trek Klingon combat, it’s not as mystical as you might think. The famous, oddly-shaped Klingon Bat’leth fights more like a quarterstaff than a sword. The intimidating sword twirling is just the figure-eight move from baton twirling.

Nicole Harsch and Mike Sakuta of Crossed Swords offer a sword fighting demonstration during the Festival of Arts at Clarkston on Sept. 13, 2018 at the Marvin Cole Auditorium.

While the combat is all staged, it’s still very much dangerous.

Harsch and Sakuta made it clear to their audience at the Perimeter festival with the message, “Do not try this at home.”

They explain that while anyone can do staged combat and theatrical fighting, it takes practice and proper training. The fighting might be fake, but the injuries can be very real.

“You can’t pick this up by just watching us. We have a tendency to make it look easy. But it’s very dangerous and you have to practice,” Harsch said.

Because every venue differs in stage size, costumes and even atmosphere, a light sprinkle of sand on the ground can lead to a

PHOTO BY CHRIS YOUNG | THE SIGNAL

dislocated shoulder or a concussion. The moves are performed and planned ahead of time, but any uncalculated addition in the arena, such as sand, can alter footing and slow down momentum, leading to an accident.

And there must be a lot of trust between performers. Harsch could miss the inside of Sakuta’s thigh and accidently land a steel toe right in his groin. Sakuta could swing out a little too far and catch Harsch’s head. Much like art, each scene is a dance. It must be choreographed and practiced. As such, the skill must be treated with honor because you never know when someone might toss down gloves to commence a duel.

Learning tranquility through meditation class The meditation group on campus is here to help you destress TIFFANY RIGBY Staff Reporter

W

hen your schedule is overbooked and you feel overworked, all-nighters can get anyone stressed out of their minds. You may even feel like you need a breather or else you’ll explode. Luckily, there are ways to cool down, relax and get a clear mind right here at Georgia State.

Enter: the Sahaja Meditation Club.

Sahaja Yoga is a unique method of meditation based on an experience called self-realization, or Kundalini awakening, that can occur within each human being. According to Sahaja Yoga International, the Kundalini is an energy located at the base

of the spine. This form of meditation differs from other forms because it focuses more on spirituality and how to get to the highest amount of “inner energy” possible. It seeks to help the body become more balanced and efficient.

The organization’s faculty advisor Ruchi Bhatnagar personally lives by this form of meditation and has been practicing since 1997. Bhatnagar feels that meditation is integral to academic success with the prevalence of modern stress.

“Everybody on the Georgia State campus [has] stress as an integral part of our [lives],” Bhatnagar said. ”We are always running to achieve the max deadline and there is always so much work and there is no break from it but it’s important for us to mentally calm down, relax and feel a few minutes of silence within.”

The Sahaja Meditation Club took notice of the stress that anyone can have whether it be faculty, student or staff. The club’s

main focus is to help work through stressful situations in a positive manner.

The organization isn’t new. It was founded in 2011 by Yash Pakala, a student at the time in the J. Mack Robinson College of Business, who wanted to provide students an opportunity to achieve inner bliss.

The club meditates every Friday in Student Center East at 6 p.m., no prior sign-up required. Whether you are a beginner or an expert, simply come prepared with a yoga mat and desire to open your Kundalini.

Each class begins by telling participants a history of the yoga practice before starting the meditation session. The instructors provide a detailed description of the steps and mantra that go along with each pose. But students shouldn’t feel discouraged if they can’t attend in person. Sahaja Yoga meditation can be performed in the comfort of your own home or even chair.

ARTS & LIVING

14

GEORGIASTATESIGNAL.COM

things you don’t want to miss

More events and info at georgiastatesignal.com

thursday

wednesday

tuesday

saturday

friday

monday

sunday

Braves vs.

Cardinals

Moms!

Anime Weekend Atlanta

It’s Here!

Free Museum Day

Color Run at Six Flags

Vegan Dinner Night!

September 18

September 19

September 20

September 21

September 22

September 23

September 24

If you like baseball and thoughtlessly named mascots, this one’s for you! Take a trip to Atlanta’s backyard, the Cobb SunTrust Park.

Get a corndog or something.

The Independent Moms of ATL host a mimosa lunch to celebrate four years of moms supporting each other. The group fosters an environment of mothers teaching and connecting with each other.

Enjoy a weekend of anime-themed panels and workshops, costume play, a dealer’s room, an art show and a ball. And if you’re not a fan, take care.

Anime fans get their power from conventions.

The first Haunted House of the fall season opens this weekend in Newnan.

Go out to the sticks for a scare! It’s never too early. You might just take home a pumpkin.

Museums are dope! Get excited for museums because for today, nationwide many of them are free. Go to smithsonianmag. com for information on museum availability.

The infamous Color Run, a favorite Instagram event of people we went to high school with.

Run a 5k and get paint thrown at you because you love to make things difficult.

Ladies Vegan Dining will host a dinner party at Herban Fix, an upscale Asian-fusion vegan restaurant super close to Downtown.

games

SuD0KU medium

easy

games

HARD

1

crossword 2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

11

12

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this week’s theme: 14

Disney Channel Throwback (1999-2010)

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This week, we take a look back at all of the classic Disney Channel shows we loved as kids. Maybe some of these clues will inspire a DCOM throwback marathon.

We hope you enjoy!

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To suggest a topic, email us: signalprod@gmail.com

across

3. What team!? WHAT TEAM? 9. The Hot Chili Steppers were double dutchers in this movie 10. Who was London’s roommate on the S.S. Tipton?

11. Who was the popstar Lizzie McGuire mistaken for?

12. Which Russo sibling won the family wizard competition?

14. I’m the man who’s got the cheese! I’m the man who’s got the ___!

15. With your parents’ permission, you could have voted for this celebrity to make a cameo in “High School Musical 2”

17. What was Lily’s alter ego?

19. What was Hector Zeroni’s nickname in “Holes”?

20. I’ve got beef between my teeth, it would be boss if I had ___.

22. This girl had to get used to living “Life with Derek”

DOWN

1. Which hotel did Zack and Cody live in?

2. What was the name of Cory Baxter’s rat?

4. What was the name of Camp Rock’s rival camp?

5. Victor Baxter’s restaurant was called the _______.

6. This “Supernova Girl” was the star of a spacey trilogy

7. What was Ron Stoppable’s favorite restaurant?

8. Who was Major Monogram’s intern?

13. Who was Alex Russo’s best friend?

14. Esteban ____ Ricardo Montoya de la Rosa Ramirez 15. What was Kim Possible’s high school’s mascot?

16. Penny Proud’s friend Dijonay had a crush on this character 18. What brand of lemonade inspired the members of Lemonade Mouth?

21. Hip-Hop is her passion! She loves to pop and lock and ___ and break.

SPORTS TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 18, 2018

www.georgiastatesignal.com/sports

THE MEN IN BLACK AND WHITE Officials have one of the toughest jobs on the field and can’t win JOSHUA FIFE Staff Reporter

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magine a stadium filled with thousands of fans booing and cursing, with frustration and hatred in their faces. All of the animosity is pointed towards you and at any point in the game at least half of the fans are likely to despise you. Alas, this is just another day at work for a college football official.

Many people hardly think about the man behind the striped shirt, but officials for America’s four major sports—football, basketball, baseball and hockey—have an incredibly stressful job. These referees have a small margin of error and must pay close attention to detail in extremely fast-paced environments.

The job also requires several hours of continuously being on your feet, walking and running without a break, not to mention the travel and preparation that goes into it throughout the week.

Referees are required to count players, keep up with the clock and pay attention to formations. The game never slows down for them, and if anything it’s speeding up—the paces of college football and basketball have actually increased in recent years with uptempo offenses becoming more popular.

Football is especially difficult to officiate, and there’s been a growing shortage of officials at the high school, college and professional levels.

NFL officials are also being stolen by TV networks as rules analysts. The networks pay much more than they would receive from the NFL for a much less stressful position, essentially to provide expert insight on the calls that current referees make. Officials are quitting and retiring faster than new ones join, and experience is becoming much more rare.

Some officials work as many as 30 or more games a week and often work more than one sport. Keith Flo, a retired referee of 20 years, spoke with The Signal about his career as a baseball, basketball and football official.

“Everytime you blow the whistle, somebody loves you, somebody hates you,” Flo said.

Officiating is a thankless job, and referees are often treated worse than anyone on the field or court. They are screamed at by coaches and players on both teams and criticized by fans on both sides. The job is a constant balancing act of taking in all of the negativity and concealing any frustration or impartiality.

Some officials even need therapy or professional help to deal with the stress of the job. NBA referee Joey Crawford admitted to ESPN that his therapist was the reason he didn’t lose his job.

Crawford was on thin ice with then-NBA commissioner David Stern after multiple incidents of him losing his temper and ejecting players for trivial offenses like laughing sarcastically on the bench. One NFL official, Lance Easley, was actually diagnosed with PTSD after a blown call on the infamous “Fail Mary” in 2012 between the Green Bay Packers and the Seattle Seahawks.

The process for training and development varies for each sport and at different levels.

Typically officials have different clinics and workshops across the nation that they can attend during the offseason.

These are not a requirement and expenses for traveling and attending clinics must be paid out-of-pocket, which further decreases the incentive to attend. A majority of officials, minus those at the Division I and professional level, also have another job.

Part of perfecting your craft as an official is putting in those extra hours, either discussing rules with colleagues, travelling to attend clinics or watching film to assess how certain plays are called.

This extra effort demonstrates the dedication that it takes to officiate well at a high level. Just like the athletes and coaches spend hours practicing, working out and watching film, officials have to sharpen their skills year-round.

“These teams, they practice. They spend hours in the gym, so we have the responsibility as officials to make sure one, we’re in shape, two, we’re updated on the rules and three, is really calling a game as fair as possible,” Flo said.

Officials are evaluated after every contest and your reviews determine future placement.

Whether you get to call a tournament game depends on how you are evaluated through the season based on various factors. Punctuality and professionalism play a part but the main focus is how well you call the game.

Basketball officiating is more reliant on judgement calls, as opposed to football which is more focused on rules. In basketball there is constant contact so a basic foul is usually the hardest call to make.

“I was taught to look at it from the

standpoint of advantage versus disadvantage,” Flo said. “Did the contact that was made either put you at a disadvantage or give you an unfair advantage. But you have to make that judgement call every time a play is made.”

Officials are under tremendous pressure, rarely get praise and are criticized in an instant for any mistake they make, so why take on such a demanding job?

Simply put, for the love of the game.

“It allowed me, as I got older, to stay attached to the games I loved,” Flo said.

“It allowed me to be a part of the game as opposed to being a fan. I was never in it for the money. I would do the games for free,” Flo said.

You also get the chance to watch stars emerge and develop over the years. Flo spoke about his experience watching two NBA first overall picks Derrick Coleman and Chris Webber going toe-to-toe in Detroit.

Even though the gig is typically underpaid and underappreciated, at the end of the day the experiences and stories to tell are worth it in their eyes.

PHOTO BY JULIAN PINEDA | THE SIGNAL PAGE DESIGN & ILLUSTRATION BY DIANA TAVERA | THE SIGNAL

SPORTS

16

Mercedes-Benz Stadium opened in August 2017. It was built as the new home for the Atlanta Falcons and Atlanta United FC.

GEORGIASTATESIGNAL.COM

PHOTO BY DAKOTA SMITH | THE SIGNAL

30 years in the making: a top-tier sports city

New business and infrastructure solidify Atlanta as a premier host city DANIEL RICHARDSON Staff Reporter

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s a city with an evolving presence in the sports industry, Atlanta has the opportunity to showcase its place in American history as a not just a major sports market but as a growing hub for business and entertainment. The city that hosted the 2017 College Football Championship game—with a successful weekend leading up the game—is slated to host the NCAA Final Four in 2020, but it’s the Super Bowl in 2019 that will prove the city’s mettle in terms of being a legitimate host city.

With the development of the Georgia Aquarium, the growth of Centennial Park as an event venue, the College Football Hall of Fame becoming a major attraction and the Georgia World Congress Center redevelopments, the Atlanta Sports Council (ASC) went into the bid for the Super Bowl in May of 2016 with the theme of “Atlanta Transformed.” The ASC confirmed in early 2018 that they are working on their bid to host the World Cup in 2026, which is set to be played in North America.

“The entertainment and infrastructure that we have to put on this event and all of the events around it...remember the Super Bowl is not just Super Bowl Sunday, it’s 10 days leading into the game,” Dan Corso, President of the Atlanta Sports Council, said. “We’ve got fan events both free and paid and with over 150 events associated with the event.

“It’s 10 days of pure entertainment and sports coming together, and we’re certainly in a spot now compared to where we were in 2000 to be able to accommodate it because the event has grown significantly since our last hosting in 2000. Thankfully, our community and our infrastructure has continued to grow and evolve with it,” Corso said.

Atlanta’s infrastructural growth hasn’t always benefited in the way of hosting major sporting events or being a significant player in that realm. In 1975, when Atlanta mayor Maynard Jackson and Coca-Cola CEO J. Paul Austin commissioned several business owners about bidding for the Olympic Games, the proposition was immediately shut down.

It would then be over a decade before the city would revisit the issue.

When Billy Payne, an attorney and former University of Georgia football player approached Mayor Jackson in 1987 about hosting the games, Jackson was doubly intrigued by the idea. According to historian and foremost expert on the city

of Atlanta, Dr. Maurice Hobson, the twosome of Jackson and Payne led the Georgia Amateur Athletic Coalition [sic] which gave Atlanta room to host 40 major events in the city. This was followed by the commissioning of the Atlanta Committee for the Olympic Games.

However, there were still questions about Atlanta’s infrastructural ability to host such a global event. This question was put to the test when the city hosted the Democratic National Convention in 1988 at the Omni Hotel.

After receiving the bid in 1990 to host the Olympic Games, Atlanta had ample time to prepare to cater to such a grand event. And even in the years after the games, Atlanta sports has benefitted from those games. The growth of the downtown area including Centennial Olympic Park and then-Turner Field can be traced back to the Olympics.

Panthers’ football has a somewhat bright future because of its physical and metaphysical place in Atlanta history. The team now plays in the old Turner Field, mere yards away from where Atlanta-Fulton County Stadium stood, where Hank Aaron hit his 715th career home run in 1974. Georgia State’s stature on and off the field will only grow alongside its relationship with the city, allowing its place in sports culture to expand.

What Atlanta now has going for itself is the plethora of venues that can actually host significant games. Atlanta’s sports market has bolstered with downtown area attractions. Corso refers to Atlanta’s “places to play” to “places to stay” as part of the major attraction that allows for the city to garner attention for major sporting events like the Super Bowl and the College Football Championship. The hotel rooms, restaurants and entertainment options available that are walking distance from the major venues are a massive plus for Atlanta’s industrial area.

“It’s the connection center space, it’s restaurants, it’s private party areas, it’s private spaces and things of that nature. Then it’s the fan attractions like the Hall of Fame, and the World of Coke and the Aquarium, and the [Georgia World Congress Center], places where those private events and public events can be held as well,” Corso said. “You have to have the venues and the hotels, but then you also need to have experience, and you have to have people involved that work well together, which we do here in Atlanta.

“All of those organizations are very collaborative and work very closely together including the Atlanta Sports Council and when it comes to putting all of these events on we all work very closely together to make it the best possible event that it can be. The idea is that we want to get it back, we want to be in the

regular rotation with these big events to keep coming back to our city, so we got to make sure it goes very well when we have it each time,” Corso said.

According to Dr. Hobson, from 1990 to 2000 the city of Atlanta grew by 22,000 people. In that same time, the city was “franchising itself for world consumption.” This marketing of the city for its lauded inclusivity and business acumen allowed for Atlanta to host Super Bowl XXXIV in 2000.

By 2019, the city will have three brand new venues to hold sporting events. Take one look at the renderings of State Farm Arena, previously Philips Arena, and there is a clear picture of what Atlanta is all about.

The Atlanta Hawks have worked diligently to prepare their renovated arena for fans to enjoy the next generation of Hawks games. Hawks CEO Steve Koonin proudly declared at the team’s private season preview celebration that the new arena will be the “best sports arena in all of Atlanta sports.”

“I think when it comes to recruiting and hosting the largescale events in this country we’re at the top of the list. Just because of the history and the track record,” said Corso. “Going back to 1977 when we held the first men’s Final Four held in Omni Arena, in 2020 we’re about to hold our fifth men’s Final Four, that’s pretty impressive. We’re on our third Super Bowl, multiple professional All-Star games, all of the collegiate activities–not to mention all of the annual events that are already here. We’re near the top of the list if not at the top when it comes to hosting big sports events.”

UPCOMING MAJOR EVENTS TO BE HELD IN ATLANTA: Super Bowl LIII (2019) Men’s Basketball Final Four (2020) Chick-fil-A Kickoff Games (2019-2022, 2024) SEC Championship Game (2018-2026) New Year’s Six & College Football Playoff Games (2018-2025) 2026 FIFA World Cup* *denotes Atlanta submitted a bid to host event and has not yet been awarded

TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 18, 2018

SPORTS

17

Golf programs searching for winning tradition

Women confident with best golfers returning; men have work ahead CHRISTIAN CRITTENDEN Staff Reporter

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he men’s and women’s golf teams have both tee’d off to begin their seasons. Both teams are coming off disappointing endings from last season.

The Panthers have worked this offseason to clean up their games, and they are underway to change their fortunes this season, beginning with their brief fall schedules.

MEN’S GOLF OUTLOOK

The men’s team won the Sun Belt Conference championship back in 2016, and the women finished second in the same year.

Last year the men’s team finished tenth out of 12 teams, a far cry from the year before.

Now they are on a track for redemption in head coach Chad Wilson’s second year at the helm. The team will have to replace Alex and Max Herrmann as two of the best golfers the program has seen. With those two now gone, it will be up to seniors like Nick Budd and Severin Soller to help lead the Panthers back where they need to be.

“They definitely are going to have to step it up, their game and I think they’re great young men and guys that the freshman can look up to on how to practice and how to go about their daily activities,” Wilson said. “But it is hard to replace the two Herrmann brothers on the golf course. They were two great golfers for us, and the seniors now are going to have to do a little bit better than what they are used to.”

In the first tournament of the year, the Panthers finished 11th out of 14 teams in The Invitational hosted by the College of Charleston. The match was shortened due to a state of emergency caused by Hurricane Florence. Budd led the Panthers on the final day with a 1-over par for 71 holes and 7-over par for the entire tournament. Freshman David Li shot 9-over for the tournament, and he was the team’s second best

performer at the tournament.

Wilson knows that his team is not where it needs to be, but he understands it’s a work in progress. There are several things that Wilson wants his team to improve on, but one of the big ones is the mental game.

“The mental side of this team is weaker than what it needs to be, we can hit just every golf shot that they’re going to see, but it comes down to the pressure of competing when it really means something,” Wilson said. “We’re just not there mentally to handle that, and that’s why we talk about being positive.

Hopefully, those things give confidence to our guys to hit shots when they really need to.”

In his second year, Wilson hopes that he will be better in the first. He learned some lessons last season that will help him this year.

“The most important thing that I learned last year is just understanding the type of people that we have, and understanding that we have 10 guys on a team and that every guy practices differently,” Wilson said. “And that’s a challenge as a new coach, to figure out how each person practices and what areas they’re good in and what areas they need more work in.

All those are items that I’ve had to learn over this past year.”

Wilson hopes that things will begin to start clicking for the team around mid-April before they prepare for the conference tournament. By then, he hopes to have his Top 5 golfers, and he will know where each player stands.

The spring schedule has not been released, but the Panthers have three more tournaments for its fall schedule. edule.

WOMEN’S GOLF OUTLOOK

Despite the slight drop in the finish from the women’s team in the conference championship, they return their best players and hope to improve. Junior Harmaprit Kaur and sophomore Chloe Howard will lead the charge for the Panthers this season.

“Our fall and spring are equally divided, and the fall tournaments count towards your rankings, which also count

Georgia State Men’s Golf team playing at The Invitational at The Ocean Course on Sept. 9 in Kiawah Island, South Carolina.

towards the potential of getting into the NCAA Tournament,” head coach Cathy Mant said. “So we’ve got to start performing well right off the the bat if we want to compete in the NCAAs.” Howard had a Top 5 finish last season, and one of her biggest goals this season is to win a tournament. Mant is confident the Panthers can do that this year.

“Chloe is an amazing competitor, she has one of the best competitive minds that I’ve seen since I’ve been coaching,” Mant said. “She knows that she’s going, but knows that she’s going to do great things as well. And what we hope this year for Chloe is to have her stroke average improve, and we think she will. She can compete with anybody in the country; she’s that good.”

Mant is also looking for improvements from Kaur as well.

During her freshman season, Kaur played No. 1 for the Panthers, and split time as the No. 1 golfer a year later as a sophomore.

“Harman had some issues with her swing that kept her from playing really well at the end of last year,” Mant said. “I think we’ve corrected that, and we’re really excited about what can happen. Harman has a beautiful game, and is probably the hardest worker on the team.”

Last season, Howard and Kaur were the team’s Top 2 finishers in six tournaments and were in the Top 3 in all of them. Howard had a Top 5 and a Top 7 finish last season.

This team only has one senior, and that is Jemima Gregson, so it will have to rely on youth. Mant added four freshmen to this year’s group. Two are scholarship athletes and two are walk-ons, but Mant believes that all of them can help. Two of the freshmen have qualified to play in the the team’s Top 5.

One freshman in particular that Mant and the coaching staff are impressed with is Emma Berlin, who posted a 3-over par during the qualification rounds.

As of now, the women are set to play in four fall tournaments. Every habit the Panthers build right now leads up to their chief goal, winning the conference championship in late spring.

PHOTO SUBMITTED BY GEORGIA STATE ATHLETICS

SPORTS

18

GEORGIASTATESIGNAL.COM

GSU returns home after winless road trip

Memphis beat the Panthers 59-22 with all-around great outing JERELL RUSHIN Sports Editor

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or the second consecutive week, Georgia State (1-2) was outmatched on the road. Memphis (2-1) defeated Georgia State 59-22 behind a dominant performance all over the

field.

Running back Darrell Henderson shredded the Panthers with 233 rushing yards and two touchdowns. The Panthers’ defensive line was beat badly and often by Memphis blockers.

Not only was Memphis’ run attack fluid, its passing game was also on point.

Brady White threw 19-26 for 269 yards and five touchdowns, and the Panthers applied rare pressure on him. Starting cornerback Cedric Stone and starting safeties DeAndre Applin and Remy Lazarus did not play due to injury. Fellow defensive back starter Jerome Smith did not return to action after an early ailment.

“Three of the four are freshmen out there playing in the secondary,” head coach Shawn Elliott said. “They’ve got to grow up, they’ve got to play a little harder, but it is what it is. We gotta get them better. It’s our job to get them better, and that’s what we’re going to do.

A positive Georgia State can take away is the running game from its true freshman running backs. Seth Paige ran in the Panthers’ lone score of the game, and Destin Coates ran for a season high 68 yards.

Memphis rebounded after falling to Navy 22-21 in the previous week. Elliott said the score says everything about how the game unfolded. The Panthers will want to do something similar against the Western Michigan Broncos (1-2) this week.

“I thought our guys’ mindset, their approach, the way they prepared for this week was what you’d hope for,” Memphis head coach Mike Norvell said. “It’s an expectation within our program that when you get knocked down, you’ve got to pick yourself back up. All in all, I thought it was a great win.”

Western Michigan is coming off its first win of the year after routing FCS opponent Delaware 68-0. When facing FBS teams, the Broncos have not played up to par, much like Georgia State hasn’t.

In week one against Syracuse, Western Michigan was 20 percent on third downs. They only slightly improved against Michigan the following week, finishing 24 percent.

Georgia State quarterback Dan Ellington’s play regressed again as he threw an interception and passed for just 107 yards against Memphis, but a bounce-back game is needed for Georgia State to play efficient offense. Improvement in blocking will undoubtedly be the start of a fix for the Panthers’ offense.

Western Michigan’s 122nd ranked run defense has been porous in its three games. Another career high game could be in store for Coates. Wide receiver Penny Hart is far off from the paces of his previous two seasons that strike fear in opposition

Georgia State Panthers played the Memphis Tigers on Sept. 16 at the Liberty Bowl Memorial Stadium.

defenses. He is due for a breakout game.

The Western Michigan meeting is the final game before the Panthers begin their Sun Belt Conference schedule. A win for

PHOTO SUBMITTED BY GEORGIA STATE ATHLETICS

Georgia State would salvage a non-conference showing that has turned disappointing after its opening day win. Kickoff is Sept.

22 at 2 p.m. inside Georgia State Stadium.

Men’s tennis gets set for fall slate

Panthers will use fall schedule as prep for the real season in spring CHRISTIAN CRITTENDEN Staff Reporter

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he Georgia State men’s tennis team is looking to rebound from a season that ended a lot sooner than it wanted.

The Panthers were the 2017 Sun Belt Conference champions, but they fell short in 2018.

Their goal to win the Sun Belt championship and make it to the NCAA Tournament remains the same, and their journey starts this September when they begin their fall slate.

“In the fall, there are a bunch of individual tournaments where you compete for your individual rankings and doubles rankings,” head coach Jonathan Wolff said. “At the end of the season you have your team events, the conference championships and NCAA team event, and after you have the singles portion and doubles portion. Every win during the fall

counts towards that ranking. It’s a way for them to work on their game.”

Georgia State will enter this season without their Top 2 players from last year in Sebastian Acuna and Andrei Andrukhou, but it has a good mix of returners and freshmen.

Players to watch out for this season are freshman Roberts Grinvalds, senior Giles Hussey and junior Quentin Coulaud.

Grinvalds is a Latvian native, and he has started his collegiate career off on a good note. The freshman was able to earn a few professional points during summer matches. The coaches expect him to play in the Top 3 this season. He has the size to compete with mostly anyone, and he won’t be overpowered on the court.

“He has the talent to succeed, on and off the court,” Wolff said. “So far the conversations I’ve had with him, he’s been doing everything right off the court as well, taking care of his body, going to classes.”

Hussey and Coulaud will be looked upon as leaders this season, with them being two of the better and more

experienced players on this year’s roster.

“He’s a senior this year, he’s a crafty player, a lefty, not the biggest guy, but he plays good defense,” Wolff said of Hussey.

“He has a tricky lefty serve, so I expect him to play at least Top 3 as well.”

During the fall session, each player is guaranteed to play in four matches, but the Panthers have nine on their schedule.

The first is on Sept. 21 at the Gamecock Fall Invitational in South Carolina, and the fall concludes with the Pro Circuit Futures in November.

“We schedule a great schedule of at least four tournaments per player, we have players of all different levels,” Wolff said.

“Some are playing a little tougher tournaments based on their of their level. Some are a little easier. Some like the fact that they have more opportunities to play matches, especially the younger guys—they want a tournament that gives them a certain amount of guaranteed matches. Whereas some of the higher level tournaments, you are guaranteed those matches, but I feel pretty confident that our top guys can play at that level.”

SPORTS

TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 18, 2018

SPORTS CALENDAR SOCCER SEPT. 21 women’s soccer LITTLE ROCK

8:30 P.M.

Little Rock, Arkansas

SEPT. 23 women’s soccer ARKANSAS STATE

1 P.M.

Jonesboro, Arkansas

SEPT. 22 men’s soccer MERCER

7 P.M.

Macon, Georgia

GOLF SEPT. 21-23 women’s golf LADY PALADIN INVITATIONAL

Greenville, South Carolina

ALL DAY

SEPT. 21-23 men’s golf MAUI JIM INTERCOLLEGIATE

Scottsdale, Arizona

ALL DAY

CROSS COUNTRY SEPT. 22 TEXAS A&M INVITATIONAL

College Station, Texas

TBA

VOLLEYBALL SEPT. 21 COASTAL CAROLINA

6:30 P.M.

GSU Sports Arena

SEPT. 22 APPALACHIAN STATE

7 P.M.

GSU Sports Arena

TENNIS SEPT. 21-23 men’s tennis GAMECOCK FALL INVITATIONAL

Columbia, South Carolina

TBA

FOOTBALL SEPT. 22 WESTERN MICHIGAN

Georgia State Stadium

2 P.M.

19