Northwood April 2017

Points of Interest

Chantal Shine/The Omniscient

TERRENCE FOUSHEE shares his insight on becoming a spoken word poet. pg 8

Chloe Maynard/The Omniscient

SOPHOMORE ANDREW BONOMOLO plays the jester in “Once Upon a Mattress.”

Jessica Kolomichuk/The Omniscient

SENIORS discuss their decision to join the Army after graduating high school. pg 9

Northwood’s Theatre Department presented “Once Upon a Mattress” March 30-April 1. “It was crazy to see how fast this [musical] came together. All the musicals in the past have been really beautiful, but this one was probably one of our best ones yet,” said Brenda Ruto, who played Princess Winnifred. Sophomore Marcus Jackson played Prince Dauntless. “The best part about the musical this year was that mostly everybody came to rehearsals, and everyone was enthusiastic and got their lines down quickly,” Jackson said. “It wasn’t problematic. It was a great show overall.”

- THE NORTHWOOD -

O M N IS C IE N T

EDITORS Sara Heilman & Jessica Kolomichuk Editors-in-Chief Leah Kallam Opinion Editor Peri Kennihan/The Omniscient

LEAH WILHELM (left) and Kristen Oakes make an odd couple in the dance department. pg 15

Chloe Maynard Social Media Editor STAFF WRITERS Colin Battis Cameron Bernstein Karina Black

Meera Butalia Madison Clark Jessie Craig Declan Dolan Dane Hagens Carolyn Hammond Ava Johnson Peri Kennihan Riley Koch Hailey Neal Carter Owings-Hurgronje Cooper Patterson

Lanna Read Samantha Rhyne Adam Rimolt Mary Scholle Tory Scott Chantal Shine Sarah Helen Shepherd Briana Stone

ADVISER Neal Morgan nmorgan@chatham.k12.nc.us

The Northwood Omniscient is published by journalism students at Northwood High School. It aims to present accurate coverage of events of interest to our readers, as well as provide an open forum for the opinions of students, faculty and the community.

We welcome letters to the editor, which can be delivered to the advisor in Room 607 or sent to the school’s address. Letters must be signed, and the staff reserves the right to reject any letter containing libelous statements, to edit for length and to ascertain the truthfulness of the content.

Unsigned editorials represent the majority view of the editorial board. Columns, letters and cartoons represent the views of the authors.

Sarah Helen Shepherd/The Omniscient

EMILY NETTLES, along with other athletes, prepare all year for their sports. pg 23

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Front Cover: Three-time pole vaulting state champion, Tessa Sheets, pole vaults during a recent practice.

Photo Credit: Colin Battis

9.3 PERCENT OF HIGH SCHOOL STUDENTS in 2015 admitted to smoking a cigarette in the past 30 days.

Chloe Maynard/The Omniscient

Going Up in Smoke: Are cigarettes making a comeback at Northwood?

By Chloe Maynard Social Media Editor The names of juniors Maria Hill, Caroline Chester and senior Jack Dotson have been changed to protect the students’ identities.

“I definitely think I’m addicted,” junior Maria Hill said. “It’s kind of like I need cigarettes. I rely on them, so that’s how I know I’m addicted.”

Hill is a regular smoker, and she consumes up to half a pack of cigarettes a day.

“The first time I ever smoked a cigarette was in eighth grade,” Hill said. “I was sitting in my room, and I saw my mom smoke cigarettes, so I went to the kitchen, and I stole one of the cigarettes from her pack. I opened my window in my room, and I smoked it out of the window. I wasn’t inhaling the cigarettes, I was just like pulling the smoke in my mouth and blowing it out. I remember inhaling for the first time. I set down the cigarette and threw up all over myself.”

Hill’s first experience with cigarettes is not uncommon among smokers. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), nine out of 10 cigarette smokers tried their first cigarette before the age of 18. They also reported that 9.3 percent of high school students in 2015 admitted to smoking a cigarette in the past 30 days.

According to science teacher Sarah Robertson, teenagers have been smoking cigarettes for years. However, sophomore Taylor Puckett believes that it is on the rise at Northwood recently.

“A lot of people I know smoke cigarettes, and I think it’s pretty stupid,” Puckett said. “I don’t understand why it’s such a trend now.”

Senior Jack Dotson recalled the first time he smoked a cigarette.

“I was in like seventh or eighth grade, and I was at home sick one day, and we had [cigarettes] in our house

for bee stings (using the tobacco in cigarettes to soothe a bee sting is a common home remedy), and I went out and smoked it,” Dotson said.

Robertson believes that a larger problem may be the recent increase in use of devices like electronic cigarettes.

According to the CDC, 16 of every 100 high school students reported in 2015 that they used electronic cigarettes in the past 30 days—an increase from 1.5 percent in 2011.

“I think vaping is [making a comeback], and the store across the street is probably not helping matters,” Robertson said. “The fact is that the information about vaping is completely misleading. People are like, ‘Oh, it’s just harmless. It’s just water vapor.’ There are chemicals in there, in fact one of the main chemicals that’s in e-cigarette juice is the same chemical that we use to preserve our specimen that we dissect in anatomy… There is not enough time that has gone by to know the long-term effects of vaping. So I think that cigarette smoking might be going down, but vaping is definitely picking up because too many kids think that it’s harmless, and it’s not.”

Dotson and junior Caroline Chester both engaged in other forms of smoking before trying cigarettes, but do not believe it influenced them. Hill, however, thinks these actions may have influenced her.

“I used to vape, and I didn’t really like it that much, and I used to smoke weed, but it gave me anxiety,” Hill said. “I wouldn’t really say it led me to smoking cigarettes, but it came before it, so maybe.”

Growing up around family members that were cigarette smokers impacted Hill’s decision to smoke.

“My mom smokes and my grandma smoked for about 30 years,” Hill said. “I think that being around my mom smoking all the time probably influenced my decision on me smoking or not, because I would always see her do it, and I’d be like, ‘Maybe I can try it one day.’ I tried it, and I didn’t like it, and then a few years later I started smoking again, so I definitely think that she influenced me a little bit.”

No matter how cigarettes were first introduced to

them, Hill and Chester share a similar reasoning behind continuing the habit.

“I would maybe smoke like twice a week,” Chester said. “I did not smoke that often, and if I smoked any more than that, then it was due to something that had happened or stress or something like that.”

According to Hill, smoking relieves her stress and helps calm her anxiety.

“Smoking is a stress reliever because right before I do my homework, I usually smoke, and right after I do my homework I smoke,” Hill said. “It just calms my nerves, because it’s kind of like you sit down, and it’s just something that you have to yourself while you’re alone.”

Although Hill is currently a smoker, she hopes to quit one day.

“I definitely plan to quit in the future, but I don’t think I can quit now,” Hill said.

Dotson, however, said he does not plan to quit anytime soon, and Chester has already quit.

“I quit just because I felt as though my stress levels had gone down, and I didn’t feel like I necessarily needed that kind of release anymore,” Chester said. “It wasn’t hard for me honestly. I just finished my last pack and threw it away, and I haven’t smoked anything since.”

Robertson explained the effect smoking has on the body, such as the chemicals involved and how it changes the physiology of the brain. According to the CDC, cigarette smokers are 15 to 30 times more likely to get lung cancer or die from lung cancer than nonsmokers.

“First off, you’re inhaling hundreds of carcinogens, so you’re playing with fire every time you take a drag off of either an e-cigarette or a regular cigarette,” Robertson said. “It stimulates the circulatory system, it stimulates the brain; it actually causes the brain to have to rewire a little bit as far as the way that nicotine plugs in. That’s why quitting is so difficult, because you actually have to rewire the way the synapses work in the brain.”

April 2017, The Omniscient, Page 3

Coming For a Better Life Immigrants tell their stories about life in the United States.

Tory Scott/The Omniscient

AN UNDOCUMENTED IMMIGRANT expresses her feelings toward being called illegal.

By Tory Scott Staff Writer All names, except that of ESL teacher Christopher Atkins, have been changed to protect the identity of undocumented immigrants.

Sofia Lopez left Cuernavaca, Mexico at the age of one with her two-year-old brother and mother to come to the United States without papers.

The journey through Mexico to get to the U.S. was strenuous. Sofia and her family spent days working their way up to the Mexican-American border, hiding from danger and hitching rides with strangers.

They slept in ditches and tunnels with small towels on the ground. Sofia would wake once the sun came up and continue walking with her mom and brother. Her family walked miles in the desert and the woods in order to get to the U.S. When it was time to cross the border, Sofia did not cross with her mother. Her father, who was already in the U.S., had arranged for two strangers to pick up Sofia and her brother at a small cabin. All Sofia’s mom knew were their names.

“We crossed over with fake papers so we wouldn’t have to deal with crossing over the rivers like [my mother] did,” Sofia said.

Her mother, Christel Lopez, spoke through a translator about her fears of bringing her two young children across the border and handing them to strangers.

“I felt very bad, because my children were so young, and if they kidnapped them, I wouldn’t be able to ever find them again,” Christel said. “Since they were little, they wouldn’t be able to recognize me, and I wouldn’t be able to recognize them. I was scared, but then again, I understood that I could give my children a better future in the United States than in Mexico. That’s why we risked everything.”

Christel knew the United States would have better opportunities for her children, but it was hard to leave her life behind in Mexico.

“I started thinking when I left there that it was really hard to leave my brothers and sisters and my mom,” Christel said. “You leave and you just look back at the place you grew up, and you begin to walk, and everything is left behind. I just told myself that everything was to better my childrens’ futures.”

Under the Obama administration, a program was created known as Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA).

According to U.S. Citizens and Immigration (USCIS), DACA allows children the opportunity to go to school and work if they meet the criteria and “will not be placed into removal proceedings or removed from the United States for a specified period of time.” DACA recipients must resubmit their application every two years. Although they are safely in

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the U.S., there is a fear of deportation that lurks in the minds of undocumented immigrants.

“I have mentally prepared myself for being deported because now they are deporting people with DACA too,” Sofia said. “I’m trying to be prepared to not see my family anymore—that’s my biggest fear.”

DACA recipient Daniel Ramirez, 24, was arrested and detained by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) Feb. 10. Ramirez is the first DACA recipient in the country to be arrested with no criminal charges. Ramirez was released from Tacoma Northwest Detention Center Mar. 29 with a $15,000 bond.

According to National Immigration Law Center (NILC), President Donald Trump has not clearly stated a plan to either repeal DACA or to keep it. USCIS confirmed Jan. 23 that they are still taking applications for DACA and processing them.

“I feel insecure about what my future could look like in this country,” senior Emilia Escobar said. “If I get deported back to Mexico, I’m also insecure about how things are going to go.”

According to NILC, over 750,000 people have applied to or received DACA. This allows DACA recipients to obtain driver’s licenses, social security numbers and get better paying jobs.

“If DACA was repealed, I would lose my work authorization card and my social security,” Sofia said. “When I got DACA, I got a social security number. Without DACA I wouldn’t have gotten the job I have. College would be more expensive, and I couldn’t get sponsored [allows students to receive in state tuition] either.”

Northwood English as Second Language teacher Christopher Atkins gave his perspective on DACA. “I certainly think the DACA program is welcome and it certainly gives a lot of students a sense of purpose and a sense of safety and wellbeing,” Atkins said. “I do believe that if you were brought into this country as a child, and you are technically illegal, there should be some way to readjust your status in a way that allows you to become a member of society so that the U.S. benefits from you in a legal way.”

Christel spoke about the hardships she faces as an undocumented immigrant in the United States. “[Bosses] pay some people more because they are from here and they don’t know the work,” Christel said. “[Workers] come in and are told they will get paid $10 an hour. And people like me have to start at $7.25 or $8, because people like me aren’t from here—we don’t know their language— and I have to accept it.”

According to the American Psychological Association, an estimated 25 percent of children who live in the United States have at least one undocumented parent.

Escobar shared her story as an undocumented student.

“My family decided to originally come because of all the drug and war violence and gang violence in Mexico,” Escobar said.

At the age of five, Escobar crossed the border with her parents.

“My family and I came and crossed the border through Texas,” Escobar said. “We were with a lot of Honduran people and Salvadoran people. We were in a house for like a week where we couldn’t go outside. We were just there in the dark. Food was limited. The scary part was we were in the desert for a whole night because one van was supposed to take us, but the man never came because he got scared.

Eventually, a van came.”

Lucas Martinez remembered his mother mentioning how sometimes women were not respected during their journey to the U.S. “She said that the coyotes, which are the people that help others cross the border, can be very aggressive at times, and sometimes they would take advantage of women,” Martinez said.

Atkins has lived in many different areas and seen how people react to undocumented immigrants.

“I noticed when I was in Miami, you would walk in, and it wouldn’t be the color of your skin that says what language I’m going to speak to you; they will just speak in whatever language they first think of,” Atkins said. “I think here in North Carolina, it’s a different atmosphere. They haven’t had that connection with Spanish speaking people, and so there’s a fear. It’s easy to fear, and people are afraid of what they don’t know.”

Atkins was originally from Great Britain, so he described his process of becoming a U.S. citizen.

“The process [to become a citizen] was over four years,” Atkins said. “It was expensive—it cost thousands of dollars. I made it a point to find out what I needed to do. I was living in a place where I had easy access to find a consulate or an embassy to go and talk to. I think for a lot of these people, those situations don’t really occur, and I think for them it’s mostly an economic issue.”

Atkins described how immigration was encouraged and needed when jobs were not being filled.

“When I first came to Chatham County, businesses were encouraging people to come here to work, undocumented or documented,” Atkins said. “They didn’t care—just come here and work. Do the job. I think it’s a bit of a canard that people say they are going to come here and take our jobs away, and I think they are going to come here and do the jobs we don’t want to do.

That’s the truth, and it’s nothing new. Waves of immigration have done the same thing throughout the history of the U.S.A.”

Chantal Shine/The Omniscient

KIMBERLY MONROY-ROMAN leads a LASO meeting.

Chantal Shine/The Omniscient

ARTURO BASILIO (left) and ROSALIA BASILIO (right) listen to the club agenda.

Making a Connection: LASO students assemble B y C hantal S hine Staff Writer For some, it’s def lating to see a Homecoming court that doesn’t represent the entire student body.

From 2010-2015, Northwood’s Homecoming Court has included three male Latino students. There have been no female Latin American students on Homecoming Court. No Latino students have ever been crowned the Homecoming King or Queen.

Senior Samantha Aguilar created the Latin American Student Organization (LASO) at the end of 2016 with help from social workers Rachael Norris and Saundra Gardner. Aguilar began this club because of her personal experience at the 2015 homecoming dance.

“I was upset about the ballot for homecoming because there were no Latina girls on it,” Aguilar said. “I feel like I could be a candidate, or any other [heavily involved Latino students] could be a candidate for that position. Why do white people get recognized? I was upset about that, so I felt that I should start something that recognizes Latinos and our accomplishments. Because of me being Latina, people don’t look at me and think, ‘Oh she’s done stuff.’ That’s how it started.”

Latino students have been a growing demographic at Northwood. Northwood’s student population was 9 percent Latino. Now in 2017, Northwood’s student population is 13.4 percent Latino.

The number of Latino students is increasing, yet they are not represented in Homecoming Court.

Henry Foust, advisor of student council, agrees that the Homecoming Court confirms the underrepresentation of Latino students.

“It’s a ref lection of who students choose,” Foust said. “[student council] receives 20-30 nominations from teachers, and then it’s completely up to the students. It’s a popularity contest.”

According to Aguilar, the purpose of LASO is to make people more open to the Latino community. She also believes that LASO differentiates itself from other clubs in that LASO is conducive for Latino students to feel like they belong.

“I’ve never started [a club] or been part of one where I felt like I was welcomed,” Aguilar said.

“I remember when I did Key Club, I wasn’t really

there. I couldn’t relate to anybody. No one really cared that I was talking or doing this and that. No one cared if I helped or not. But in this club, I know everybody and it’s easy to relate. We have the same struggles and jokes and face the same stereotypes and racism. It’s easier to connect and be a part of something where I know people feel the same way as me.

Now the president of LASO, Aguilar feels like she stands out in her classes due to ethnicity.

In 2015, Aguilar remembers feeling like the only one who could connect some of the lessons taught in her English class.

“I had a class with Mrs. [Jill] Jackl where we read the Tortilla Curtain last year,” Aguilar said.

“That book was the thing that most changed me in high school. I related to everything the book was talking about. [That book] spoke the truth, but no one else saw the truth.”

Senior Jennifer Cervantes, vice president of LASO, discuss their experiences in honors/AP courses.

“We need to be more welcoming to others,” Cervantes said. “Especially in honors classes, where you’ll see three or four students who aren’t white.

That stands out to me, because I remember in my AP Psychology class, there were like two Hispanic students including myself. It was like, ‘Yeah, we can take these classes too, but we also want to be in those classes and feel welcomed.’”

In addition to reading the Tortilla Curtain, Aguilar remembers in her English class watching a video of an American mayor’s experiences emigrating from Guatemala.

“The video made me cry because [I saw the mayor] struggling so hard and knew that my dad is from the exact same place and did the exact same thing,” Aguilar said. “I remember Mrs. Jackl asked,

‘Do you guys sympathize with this man?’ I was the only one who raised my hand and said, ‘Yes. I feel so bad for him. I have a personal connection to that.’’’

While Cervantes feels like she can talk to other people, she notices that other minorities in her class are not as forthright in the classroom.

Spanish teacher Cristobal Herrera has been the teacher advisor of LASO for approximately five months.

Herrera, who said there was not a club like LASO when he was a student, believes that LASO serves an important purpose.

“It’s not only to integrate them more in school or make them more known, but also to empower them,” Herrera said. “It’s to make them see the world differently from what they’re used to. It’s to open them up to more opportunities and to get to know other people. Also, it’s to educate others about [Latino students’] culture, background, simple stories and where they’re from. That’s why it’s important to have a LASO club in school.”

Cervantes says that members of LASO aren’t as recognized by the school as other students who get accepted into college.

“There are some very, very special kids in our club and a lot of them have been getting accepted into college,” Cervantes said. “I feel like it’s no big deal to others, but it is, especially because a lot of these kids come from immigrant parents. They don’t really get a, ‘Oh great job for getting into college’ as other students in our school. We just want more recognition from the school.”

LASO’s president is determined to make sure that Latino students receive acknowledgement.

“The most important thing is getting everybody to know that there is a strong Latino community,” Aguilar said. “That and making sure nobody is overlooked.”

“It’s to open them up to more opportunities and to get to know other people.”

— Cristobal Herrera, Spanish teacher

April 2017, The Omniscient, Page 5

STIs on the Rise:

Students discuss the stigma around getting tested

By Lanna Read Staff Writer According to the Chatham County Public Health Department, Sexually Transmitted Infections (STIs) have been on the rise in Chatham County. In 2015, the rate of chlamydia in Chatham was 260.8 (per 100,000 population), up from 206.8 in 2012. Gonorrhea was 74.7 (per 100,000 population), up from 50.2 in 2012. These two STIs are most common in adolescents, and their increase can be seen as a negative indicator of the county’s overall adolescent sexual health.

In order to promote methods for safe sex, Lyn Smith, department chair for the Health and Physical Education Department, brought Reducing the Risk (RTR) to Northwood. This program is designed to build skills to help prevent pregnancy, STIs and HIV in high school students. The 16-session curriculum aims to inform students not only of methods of contraception that prevent pregnancy and the spread of STIs, but also of the availability of local clinics for STI testing, treatment and counseling.

Although RTR was first implemented at Northwood, the Chatham County Health Department saw improvement in students’ knowledge of the subjects over the course of the program and chose to expand its implementation to other Chatham County schools.

“In an ideal world, I think all of our students wouldn’t have sex until they were married, and it [would be] with somebody they really love,” health teacher Cameron Vernon said. “But the statistics and studies show that kids are having sex before they’re married. So, with that being said, I think it’s very important for our kids to have methods of contraception, to have the knowledge of what they should use and also to have all those forms of testing so that they can stay safe and keep their partners safe.”

The information provided to students encourages them to get tested for STIs every three to six months if they are sexually active. Junior Brenda Ruto agrees with this advice.

“If you’re sexually active, you need to have that level of maturity to get tested, because you want to be able to keep up your own health as well as the health of the other people you’re having sex with,” Ruto said.

However, there is a stigma around getting tested. A 2013 study done by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found that of about 4,000 young adults, only 11.5 percent had been tested for an STI in the previous year. Students believe this is due to misinformation about the process of getting tested, such as parents or friends finding out or the costs being too high.

“I think some people are afraid because they might be sexually active, but maybe their family doesn’t know about it because of morals or rules,” sophomore Taylor Puckett said. “Maybe they think their friends will judge them. I think a lot of social boundaries or just their families are stopping them from getting tested.”

Others think that people avoid getting tested to protect their social standing.

“I think a lot of teenagers are afraid of hurting their image,”

senior Joe Friedman said. “They’re very protective of it and they want to make sure that that information doesn’t get out, because they don’t want their friends to look at them differently.”

Some students even believe that people avoid getting tested to protect themselves from the results.

“They’re afraid of finding out,” senior Chance Gustafson said.

“I mean, I don’t want to know if I have chlamydia. It’s scary.”

Nurse Melissa Lassen wants the student body to be informed about the truth to getting tested.

“The best source available and the easiest route is through our public health department,” Lassen said. “It’s little to no cost to a student to come in and [the results] are confidential information.

They are not shared with anyone other than the patient; that includes the parent.”

The clinic goes beyond solely testing for STIs. “They can also talk with the student at that time about safe practices to prevent those sexually transmitted infections,” Lassen said. “And if the student is interested, they can even talk about birth control options.”

The Chatham County Public Health Department determines fees on a sliding scale, meaning cost is dependent on the ability to pay. For most students, any income they earn is too low to prompt a fee, so they will not be charged.

According to the Journal of Adolescent Health, young people between the ages of 15 and 25 account for half of all the newly diagnosed STIs in the U.S. Nearly half of those who had sex and had not been tested believed they were not at risk.

Sports Medicine teacher Jackie Harpham thinks that despite the tendency for students to feel “young and free and reckless,” they should take care of their bodies, and getting tested is part of that.

“I think that you get one body for the rest of your life, and it’s important to realize that the decisions you make now can have an impact down the line,” Harpham said. “Getting tested is big. It’s the only way you know for sure that you’re healthy and safe and it also is going to impact all the people you chose to have relationships with.”

Harpham encourages students who are sexually active to take responsibility for their actions.

“I think it’s really important that if you are deciding that you are old enough and responsible enough and mature enough to have sex that you also need to be mature enough to make sure you’re staying safe, and part of that is getting tested and encouraging any partners that you have to get tested as well,” Harpham said. “It’s easy for kids to think that they’re ready to have sex and to act like an adult, but if it means that you can’t also be mature enough to go to Planned Parenthood or go the doctor and get tested and have those tough conversations, then maybe you aren’t ready.”

Senior Tatyana Barrett put it simply.

“If teenagers have the balls to have sex, then they should have the balls to go get tested as well,” Barrett said. “If more people felt comfortable getting tested, then we would have a lot less problems with STIs.”

Young people account for a substantial portion of STIs nationally

Graphics courtesy of The Centers For Disease Control

April 2017, The Omniscient, Page 7

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Terrence Foushee plans a poetry slam at a recent club meeting.

Figuring Out Foushee: Teacher spreads love of poetry

By Riley Koch Staff Writer

as a senior at Chapel Hill High School. He received an amazing response from the audience, which led him to continue to perform.

“I turn off my television and say I love reality “We had a Black History Month program durTV, but in actuality this is a tragedy that tears down ing my senior year, and a friend of mine who was our community and nation while we are molding a a poet asked me to be in [it],” Foushee said. “I new generation,” English teacher Terrence Foushee was originally going to act out a slave narrative… said in one of his spoken word poems. [but] then I decided to act out my own piece and Foushee first became interested in poetry in talk about my experience. So I did that, and I perhigh school. He enjoys being able to control what formed it in front of pretty much the entire school the audience perceives when he performs. and got an incredible response. [My teacher] was “Even though I’m talking crying, and I was like, ‘Well to a lot of people I feel like I “Within that space, all maybe I’m good at this!’ So have the control over what then I joined the poetry club they know,” Foushee said. of these people recognize ,and from that moment on, “Even though sometimes I end that everybody’s stories I thought that was the easiup giving more of myself than est way for me to be able to I would in a normal conversa- are just as important as share things and talk about tion, I feel like it’s my choice, situations that I think are the others.” and I get to say it the way I unique to me.”

— Terrence Foushee want without anybody interFoushee and English rupting me to ask me a questeacher Christine Mayfield tion like, ‘Why do you feel that way?’ I get to say are the teacher advisors of the poetry club at Northwhatever I want to say… in a judge-free space.” wood. Sophomore Trevor Kikuyu is a member and Over the summer, Foushee performed a spo- believes that Foushee encourages students to exken word poem at the University of North Carolina press themselves freely.

Chapel Hill’s Remembrance Ceremony. The cer“He doesn’t judge, at all—whatever I say, I can emony was held in a segregated cemetery. just feel free to say it, but he makes sure whatever I “I had the opportunity to perform a piece that say has to be real, has to be true,” Kikuyu said.

I wrote that was really speaking to the idea that Foushee has always enjoyed the environment we should not forget the history of Chapel Hill,” of the many poetry clubs he has joined.

Foushee said. “Chapel Hill is seen as a very pro“The community that [poetry club] creates gressive town but underneath there are still some [has] people from all different walks of life,” issues of racism that we try to hide, because we Foushee said. “[In poetry club], you have the most want people to see [it] as this beautiful place with popular to the least popular, extremely confident no blemishes. But there are blemishes, and that [people] to people who have low confidence. doesn’t mean that Chapel Hill is not wonderful, but Within that space, all of these people recognize we to need take in all of what makes Chapel Hill that everybody’s stories are just as important as what it is. Once we can do that, I feel like Chapel the others. I think it creates some long-lasting Hill can be even better.” friendships, and I also think it teaches people how Foushee performed his first spoken word poem to treat one another.”

Page 8, The Omniscient, April 2017

Jessica Kolomichuk/The Omniscient

9 percent of North Carolina seniors enlist in the military after high school graduation.

From Books to Bootcamp: Seniors join the Army after graduating high school

By Sarah Helen Shepherd Staff Writer

Imagine being abruptly woken up at 4:30 a.m. to your drill sergeant yelling at you. You scramble to put on your uniform and boots within the allotted time and then race outside to begin your daily physical training, which mainly consists of running and push-ups until breakfast at 6:30 a.m.

Generally, seniors spend the summer before college preparing their goodbyes for their family and friends, but seniors who join the military leave their homes at the beginning of summer to attend basic training for 10 weeks. At least five Northwood students have enlisted in the military.

Senior Mercedes Magnon has been thinking about joining the military since her sophomore year. She will become a Wheeled Vehicle Mechanic once she joins the Army. Magnon believes that serving in the military will better the world.

“There are not equal opportunities for every gender or for every race, so I want to make sure that everybody is getting the same amount of attention,” Magnon said. “They are humans just like I am.”

Staff Sergeant Donald Braun joined the Army after high school. He has been recruiting in the triangle area for the past four years.

“I have the easiest, best paying job that there is,” Braun said. “A lot of people are scared of deployments, and they are just not that big of a deal. You think they are because of the fear of the unknown. You don’t know what it is going to be like in Afghanistan and you don’t know what it is going to be like in Iraq where you are going. But it is going to be that way every time you transition to a new job. You don’t know what it is going to be like.”

DeLisa Cohen, CTE coordinator, schedules military recruiters to visit Northwood and helps students find other options besides attending a fouryear university.

“I think a lot of it is breaking the stereotype that it is not like the war movies that you’ve seen,” Cohen said. “People can be a chef for example in the military, or someone can be a mechanic or they can do almost anything that you can think of in the military.”

Senior Caleb Stewart is looking forward to the discipline and organized schedule associated with the Army. He hopes to attend college after serving the minimum of three years in the military.

“I just want something different,” Stewart said.

“Living in the Army is [different] because you have a set schedule for everything, and not only that, but I’m

going in as an Airborne Ranger, so I get to jump out of planes. So I’m looking forward to that.”

Braun believes the scariest part of being in the Army is the fear of the unknown.

“The scariest experience I have ever had being in the Army was as an 18 year-old leaving,” Braun said.

“I left home.… I was going to do my basic training but I had no idea what that experience was going to be like…. The first time I deployed was pretty scary too.

I went to Afghanistan and I was going to be stationed in [Kandahar]. But I did not know what it was going to be like…. I realized that it was not what I had built up in my mind. Because we all do that, as humans we do that, the fear that we build up, of what is my first day of school going to be like and what is my first day of college going to be like, whatever it is, we just build that fear up.”

Senior Kyle Sirls will be going to basic training in South Carolina eight days after graduating. Sirls wants to enjoy his last few months of high school before he joins the Army.

“I’m ready to leave for basic [training], but I am also trying to enjoy being a kid, because unlike other people, our lives are going to start sooner,” Sirls said.

Braun hopes to reach out to students to let them know the many benefits of joining the military.

“In all honesty, I try to not be a salesman,” Braun said. “That is not what I want to be. I want to give people the real idea of what the Army really is and how it can benefit them. Not everyone has the money to be able to go to college; we provide that money for them to go to college. You do three years, you get a full-ride education to any state school…. The Army is merely a stepping stone. I use the army today, how can you use the Army to get to where you want to be.”

Cohen hopes that students will not feel pressured to only attend a four-year college to further their education.

“There are so many options out there I don’t think kids realize that you don’t have to go to a four-year college. There are great careers from a community college or if you don’t have enough funding you can go into the military,” Cohen said. “You can get your college while you are in the military and job skills at the same time.”

Magnon hopes that high school students will consider the many opportunities associated with the military.

“I think that the military is definitely a good choice that every high school student should look at and not cancel it out of their plans for the future,” Magnon said.

April 2017, The Omniscient, Page 9

Page 10, The Omniscient, April 2017

Defining AP Culture Students participating in the AP program balance challenging coursework with extracurricular activities, learning time management and preparing for the rigor of college courses.

By Leah Kallam Opinion Editor Staying up late to finish a research paper, spending extra hours in the science lab or working weekends on an art portfolio are tasks many students add to their schedules. These activities are part of the Advanced Placement (AP) Program, a series of courses offered by The College Board for students wanting to engage in higher-level learning and critical thinking environments. AP classes expand upon what students have previously learned and provide extra challenges on prior topics. Students taking AP courses can earn college credit, build college skills and, depending on the AP exam score they receive and their prospective school, skip introductory college classes.

Participating in the AP program involves balancing schedules and managing time well. Students may find themselves with less time extracurricular activities and having to focus more on work for AP classes.

“That’s part of the balancing act that everybody has to do,” AP United States Government and Politics teacher Skip Thibault said. “Time is a limited resource—we only have so much of it—so you’ve got to decide how to spend your time, just like how you’re going to spend your money. Do I want to spend my time reading things I’m not interested in, or do I want to do it playing my sport or doing my club? It’s an economic decision: opportunity cost.”

Balancing the coursework of AP classes with other activities presents a challenge for many students. This challenge grows when students take numerous AP classes over the course of a year or a semester.

“I see a lot of times when high achieving students take five or six AP courses,” Principal Justin Bartholomew said.

“I think that it’s good that you’re challenging yourself, but I really think you have to sit back and say, ‘Okay, what else am I contributing to my school community, to my surrounding community, because if I’m taking six AP courses, my time is non-stop dominated by schoolwork. What opportunities do I have to really get involved in a club and be of any value to that club, or contribute to a sport and be of value to

that sport?’….We’ve gotten into this very big, huge culture of, ‘I gotta get to Harvard, I gotta get to Yale, I gotta get into UNC—if I don’t get into UNC I’m a failure.’ No, you’re not. It doesn’t matter where you go, it’s what you do with the time you have, and that means the most. It depends on the student. I would not want my daughter to take five or six AP courses. I don’t care if she was brilliant, I would not want her to do that.”

Last year, senior Brennen McAllister took five AP classes. McAllister says AP classes were a challenge at first, but the challenge grew easier with time.

“It was hard,” McAllister said. “Lots of nights I didn’t get sleep, but eventually, when I got into the routine of having all the homework, I got used to it.”

Every student adjusts to AP classes differently. Junior Jasmine Wilkie said one of her AP classes was overwhelming, and chose to drop the class.

“I was in APUSH (AP United States History) for about three days,” Wilkie said. “I have really bad generalized anxiety disorder, and also a little bit of a panic disorder, and APUSH really brought that out for me, because it was just a crazy workload. I went home, I didn’t get any sleep. The summer before with all the summer work was when I really knew it wasn’t going to work for me. I stayed up days at a time, doing things, and it just wasn’t healthy for me, so I dropped it.”

There is no limitation to how many AP classes students can take. However, each AP class centers around a specific topic, and the coursework for each AP class focuses on the course’s subject matter.

“Don’t take the AP unless you love the topic,” AP Biology teacher Victoria Raymond said. “You don’t have to have five or six AP’s to get into a good college. Take what you’re willing and desiring to invest that kind of level of effort in.

My students know I froth at the mouth for what I teach, so come on and join the fun. And that’s the kind of thing we’re hoping to do. I think students would be better off just being very selective in that AP’s that they do take, so that they can enjoy the ride.”

According to some teachers, too often students take an

Leah Kallam/The Omniscient

AP class for the extra GPA weight these courses carry. AP classes give students the opportunity to study a topic in more depth and detail, and some teachers say grades should not always be a student’s primary fixation.

“My least favorite thing about teaching AP kids is how obsessed they are with grades, because I’m not so obsessed with grades,” Thibault said. “I just want a roomful of students who want to talk about stuff, and I know they’re learning stuff and they’re getting into it, and they’re thinking about things they’ve never thought about before at a level they’ve never thought about before. To me, that’s pretty cool. I put a grade on that?”

As a straight-A student, junior Brenda Ruto had to come to terms with making a B in an AP class. Ruto said she eventually realized that it’s not always about the grade you make, but about the work you do.

“When I was younger, if I didn’t get an A, I would be so upset, and I was a straight-A student until this year,” Ruto said. “It was a little bit hard getting my first B, but at the same time, I still realized that I did a lot of extra work, and I was in a bunch of extra clubs. I’m not trying to say that I had to sacrifice my grades, but I realized that you don’t necessarily have to push yourself to the point where you’re so stressed out about it…. In the past, a B would’ve made me so upset, but now, it’s something to be proud of, because I’m involved in so many more things than I was before.”

AP United States History teacher Sara Keever said if students maintain a positive response to a challenge and work hard, the experience and rigor of an AP class is worth the time and the effort.

“I think that if a student is going to have a positive outlook about meeting a challenge head on and doing the best that they can, regardless of the result, then I would say that the AP is the right place for them,” Keever said.

“Because if you end up with a C in an AP, first of all, your life is going to continue just fine, and second of all, you’ve had an incredible experience and practice in what college courses are actually going to be like. You’ve got your eyes a little more open to what it’s going to be like later. It’s not exactly the same, but it’s a great experience.”

Leah Kallam/The Omniscient

April 2017, The Omniscient, Page 11

E ntertainment 12

Upcoming Concerts APRIL

14 • Chris Brown, 50 Cent, O.T. Genasis & Fabulous at Spectrum Center, Charlotte • Big Sean at The Filmore, Charlotte

17 • Red Hot Chili Peppers at Spectrum Center, Charlotte 23 • The Wild Reeds at North Carolina Museum of Art, Raleigh

28 • Sarah Shook and the Disarmers at Cat’s Cradle, Chapel Hill

Photo courtesy of Tom Barta/Flickr

SARAH SHOOK & THE DISARMERS will be performing at Cat’s Cradle, Chapel Hill April 28.

MAY­

JUNE

3 • 21 Savage, Young M.A., Tee Grizzley,

3 • Train, Natasha Bedingfield & O.A.R. at

6 • Mipso with River Whyless at Cat’s Cradle,

6 • The Orwells at Cat’s Cradle,

Young Nudy at The Filmore, Charlotte Chapel Hill

13 • Nobody Safe Tour: Future, Migos, Tory Lanez & Kodak Black at Walnut Creek Amphitheater, Raleigh

17 • The Weeknd at Spectrum Center, Charlotte 24 • The Chainsmokers at PNC Arena, Raleigh

Photo courtesy of NRK P3/Flickr

THE WEEKND will be performing at Spectrum Center, Charlotte May 17.

PNC Music Pavilion, Charlotte

Chapel Hill 9 • Chance the Rapper at Greensboro Coliseum, Greensboro

13 • Kaleo at North Carolina Museum of Art, Raleigh

18 • J. Cole at Cone Denim Entertainment Center, Greensboro

Photo courtesy of DeShaun Craddock/Flickr

J. COLE will be performing at the Cone Denim Entertainment Center, Greensboro June 18.

Local Adventures

Photo courtesy of Jed Record/Flickr

Honeysuckle Tea House and Herb Garden

Photo courtesy of bobistraveling/Flickr

The Rocky River

Photo courtesy of Kevin Buckstiegel/Flickr

Apex Skate Park

8871 Pickards Meadow Rd, Chapel Hill 27516

411 North Rocky River Road, Sanford 27330

1250 Ambergate Station, Apex 27502

Enjoy a day in the open air, at this herbal and tea farm for music, snacks and more.

Great river for kayaking during the summer and seeing the sights of nature.

Hit the high ramps in downtown Apex, near the Outfitters and Board Co.

— Compiled by Jessie Craig & Hailey Neal

April Horoscopes Aries (March 21-April 19): You can charm your way out of any sticky situation if you set your mind to it. Problematic situations are ahead, so turn that charm on, and you are likely to get what you desire.

Taurus (April 20-May 20): You truly excel at communication, and that’s where you need to funnel your energies. So talk, talk, talk it over if you’re having an issue with someone.

You could be shocked at how well it all turns out!

Gemini (May 21-June 20): Your brain is your secret weapon. Use it to approach an obstacle as a way of learning something new. After all, if everything was always smooth sailing, you would never learn anything.

Photo Illustration By Jessica Kolomichuk/The Omniscient

Cancer (June 21-July 22): You’ve got a lot of good energy circulating around you in the beginning the month. Keep this energy going by pampering yourself. Go to a sauna, lie in the sunshine, get a massage… the possibilities are endless.

Greetings, readers. Step right into Briana’s Burrow. Make sure to take your shoes off before you enter my home. Let me help Leo (July 23-Aug. 22): Remember the story about the you get that weight off your shoulders by taking your coat off. Once you have taken a seat and gotten comfortable, I, Briana tortoise and the hare? When it comes to a big project at work, Stone, will reveal to you some of my supportive words and fresh perspectives. Please remember that I am a student, just as take the tortoise as a model: instead of rushing through it, do you are, simply trying to help those stuck in a sticky situation. your work slowly, and you’re in for a solid finish.

I’m going on a double date for prom, but it’s hall! I can’t just hold it for four years. Do you more like me and my friend go to dinner, while my best friends are on a date across from us.

I used to have a crush on my “date” but that passed awhile ago. He wants it to be a date, but I don’t think I do. How can I make the most of the night without hurting his feelings?

Honesty is the best policy; if you do not want it to be a date, then state how you feel to him. You can deny someone while being polite at the same time. Using a “compliment sandwich” could be a good approach. Essentially, you “sandwich” your negative comment between two positive things. An example of a compliment sandwich is to say something such as, “You’re an amazing person. Unfortunately, I’m not interested in going on a date you. Someone else is going to be really lucky to go on a date with someone like you.” Be sincere, however. Do not offer up false compliments, because they will likely be able to notice, and then they will feel hurt.

How can you tell if someone is a true friend or not?

Firstly, examine the way they talk to you. True friends offer supportive comments, encouragement and make you feel good about yourself. Additionally, true friends will listen to you and your problems, and they care about your well-being.

Likewise, true friends are honest and true to their word. If your companion never seems to do what they say they’ll do or forgets about plans you’ve made, then you have a flake on your hands, and you don’t have a true friend. Moreover, true friends don’t have ulterior motives for becoming your pal.

If they are hanging out with you for some kind of personal benefit like popularity, convenience or boredom, they are not someone you should want to keep around. Also, look at the way this person treats their other friends. If they routinely trash talk people they claim to be their closest friends, then they could be doing the same to you when you aren’t around.

Lastly, just follow your instincts. If some thing does not feel right, it probably isn’t.

Hey! I am a senior and am very concerned about one of the aspects of college. And that is the fact of: how am I supposed to poop at college? The bathrooms are communal! Only one or two bathrooms per floor of each residence

have any ideas for how I might be able to prepare myself? Thank you.

Virgo (Aug. 23-Sep. 22): Your experimental side is really coming out later in the month, so let it show. After all, There are many measures that you could take to make it why do things the same old way you’ve always done them, easier for you to adjust. One thing that could help would be just because you’ve always done them that way? to pick a specific stall to use each time. This way, you can Libra (Sep. 23-Oct. 22): Sometimes, we get so caught become so comfortable in it that it feels like home. Secondup in the ups and downs of our daily routines that we forget ly, you can bring in something to distract you from the idea to stop and smell the roses. So whenever your routine is disthat it is a community bathroom, so you can think of it as rupted, be glad! It gives you a chance to slow down and see less of a “public” restroom but more like “your” restroom. what really matters.

This could be anything from a magazine, homework or, of course, your phone. If you’re focused on reading about Scorpio (Oct. 23-Nov. 21): You and that special somethe latest celebrity gossip or taking a BuzzFeed quiz to debody are in for a month of depth and discovery, love and tentermine which fruit you are, you’ll have less time to freak derness, growth and fun. Give this person your attention, and out about your human needs. Thirdly, bringing something communicate to them how you feel. with you to mask the scent could make the whole process much more effortless, and others will appreciate it too. ObSagittarius (Nov. 22-Dec. 21): Things may seem a viously, you might not want to bring a full can of Febreze, bit topsy-turvy, but do your best to roll with it. A little improvibut some simple Poo-Pourri can do the trick. If nothing I sation could remind you that last minute solutions can be better have named sounds helpful, you could always make a sign than well-thought out ones. that says “Out of order,” and put it on the door to do your thing. Or, just visit a camping store and get a portable toilet Capricorn (Dec. 22-Jan. 19): You are the go-to perto put in your dorm room. son when it comes to creating out-of-the-box ideas. Don’t be My mom constantly thinks I am lying to her surprised if everybody is coming to you for answers, because because of the mistakes I have made in the you’ve got ’em. Make sure that you’re getting the credit you past. How can I convince her that I actually am deserve, though. telling the truth? Thank you.

Earning back trust is a lengthy process, so you must have patience. You will have to consistently prove to your mom that you are being honest with her. If she accuses you of lying and you are being honest, remain calm. Your first reaction may be to get angry or defensive, but remember that this will only make things worse. The best way to prove to someone that you are not lying is to offer evidence that directly contradicts their claim. For example, if she doesn’t believe that you went to Sally’s house to work on a project, prove that you actually did. If you cannot convince her of your honesty, ask for more information about why she seems to distrust you and what you can do to regain her trust. In the end, you can’t force another person to believe something different than what they are already committed to believing, but you can acknowledge the situation from their perspective and try to meet them halfway.

Aquarius (Jan. 20-Feb. 18): Do you really need those new things? Before you whip out the cash, ask yourself several times whether this is something you need or can afford. Cut back on spending this month and your future self will thank you.

Pisces (Feb. 19-March 20): Look good, feel even better. Get in touch with your fitness side this month, and get out of the sheer laziness you’ve been wallowing in for the past few weeks. Try a different approach to exercise opposed to your typical ones.

How these horoscopes were configured: I created an astrological chart on paper. Then, I used an astrological event calendar for the month of April to determine the movement of the stars and the planets. Lastly, I consulted a book on the interpretation of the planets in each sign and house and made observations.

April 2017, The Omniscient, Page 13

KAYLA SHARP laughs as she shows off her Beyoncé gear.

Jessica Kolomichuk/The Omniscient

Sharpyoncé: A Q&A with the Queen Bey fan

By Sara Heilman & Jessica Kolomichuk Editors-in-Chief When you think of Beyoncé, what are the first five words that come to your mind?

Innovative, flexible, not meaning body, but flexible with her art, talented, what’s a word for morphing? Like ever changing? ...Transformative?

Yes, and influential.

Why do you think she has her following? What about her makes you want to be like her?

I think she has a very clean image being that she doesn’t have a lot of tarnish to her name so she represents what you could be in life. She works diligently, she has career, family, passion and all of these things are kind of things people wish [they had]. Whatever career you’re in, you want to be at the top. She’s at the top…. These ideas, she kind of has a pillar for each one, and she’s at the top of her game in everything that she does.

How has she influenced you personally?

I just remember that I really wanted the Destiny’s Child album that had “Bootylicious” on it, and I remember “Bootylicious” because my parents told me that I could not get the album because that song was on there…. I was very sheltered as a child, musically and everything, my parents only let me listen to gospel

Page 14, The Omniscient, April 2017

stations and NPR, that was it. I would sneak over to my neighbor’s house, and she had the Destiny’s Child album, so she burned me a copy of it…. I’d sneak over there and listen to it, and I was like, “She has the most beautiful voice I’ve ever heard.” And so it was just like one of those things where I was like, “I want to sound like her when I sing….” [She’s an] independent woman, she kind of says, “I want to buy my own diamonds. I don’t want someone to give me a diamond. I want to buy my own.” And that kind of pushed me to not just settle.

What do you see in yourself that you also see in Beyoncé?

Nothing. That would be blasphemous to say that I emulate Beyoncé, but I guess that I try not to settle, and I don’t think she ever settles. I think she’s always like, “Let’s go, push the mark, push the mark, push the mark.” And every play and musical and class I teach I say, “Okay, this is where it was.” I reflect upon that practice…. I see what I did, I’m like, “Okay, I want this to be better next time.”

So even if I do the same lesson, I’m like, “Let’s upgrade this.”

What part of Beyoncé should students look up to?

I think the questioning part…. I think sometimes the Beyhive gets this wrong: Beyoncé’s about questioning things and starting discussions and I think some people absent-mindedly follow things. So I

think that’s where people get it wrong, so I think what they should do is really question why is this something, not be obstinate…. So the questioning aspect, and really relating it to, “How does this affect me, and how can I affect others?”

Can you tell me about walking into your first Beyoncé concert and your experience from start to finish?

First of all, I’m a teacher, so those tickets were a one-time deal. I wanted to make it special, so I got the VIP at the Formation World Tour 2016. So I was like, “I want to make this special. I want to sit on the floor….”I don’t know how—it was by the grace of Beyoncé—but I got an aisle seat, so I was right on the edge, so I could step out and we could make eye contact if I was so blessed….She came out with her hat and started with “Formation”. Me and the person beside me, we didn’t talk before, and we were all of a sudden holding onto each other bouncing and screaming every lyric. Everyone knew every song.

She sounds the same, if not better, than she does on her albums in person, and you know that she’s singing everything…. Every member of her band is a woman, which I thought was really cool too, because it kind of represents that power. The whole thing was incredible. It got rained out but everyone kept going.

It was still amazing. She paid to rent [the stadium] longer so that she could finish her performance for her fans. So her loyalty, however much she gives back, that’s how much she gets.

KRISTEN OAKES (left) and LEAH WILHELM (right) share a moment of laughter while working on choreography.

Peri Kennihan/The Omniscient

The Odd Couple: Dance teachers discuss their relationship

By Peri Kennihan S taff Writer “If you’ve ever seen The Odd Couple, she is the Oscar to my Felix,” dance teacher Kristen Oakes said. “That’s kind of how we describe each other.”

When Oakes began at Northwood, fellow dance teacher Leah Wilhelm noticed differences in their personalities. Wilhelm first brought up the comparison to The Odd Couple.

“It is my understanding that Felix Unger was the one who had a routine and a schedule and an order,” Oakes said. “Things were neat and organized and everything had its place. Oscar was a little bit more laid back, go with the flow kind of thing.”

Oakes and Wilhelm have been the faces of the Northwood dance department for five and 12 years, respectively.

“I am a little bit more organized but in different aspects,” Oakes said. “Not right this moment, but I like my desk to be nice and neat and organized so that I know exactly where the stuff is. She can just throw stuff anywhere on her desk and find anything you ask her to.

We just have different ways of organizing stuff.”

Before they taught alongside each other, Wilhelm was Oakes’ high school dance teacher. Their relationship has evolved from student and teacher, to mentor and mentee, to peers.

“She was sent to Northwood when she was because I was supposed to be her student,” Oakes said.

“I’m just so thankful that her as a teacher turned into a mentor and one of my best friends.”

The relationship between the two teachers has developed because they can depend on each other, regardless of the circumstances.

“Wilhelm is just someone who, no matter what happens in my life, I can call her, and she can make it okay—even if she can’t fix it,” Oakes said. “She has been there for me at my lowest, and I feel like kind of vice versa.”

Their professional relationship has grown to the cares very much about every single little detail and every point where they can execute certain preparations for single little problem. She is just not go with the flow.” a concert wordlessly.

Oakes acknowledges that she and Wilhelm have “Wilhelm and I have also figured out our sys- different personalities, partly because they have extem,” Oakes said. “I’ll do this while she does that. perienced different aspects of life.

When it’s concert time, one of us will type up the After getting married and welcoming her program and the other will print daughter, Magnolia, Wilhelm’s it. One of us will get the list of has grown. Her husband “Wilhelm is just some- family senior questions and the other teaches at a small private school one will fill it out. Just like a in Durham, which her son, Linone who, no matter tag team, we don’t even have to will be attending next what happens in my life, coln, ask—we just kind of know who fall. The growth and movement does what.”

I can call her, and she in her family is cause for WilWilhelm and Oakes work so planning to sell her house can make it okay—even helm well together partly because they and move closer to her husband teach in a similar fashion, coverand son’s school. The commute if she can’t fix it.” ing the same topics. This partfrom Durham to Northwood is —Kristen Oakes nership has been so successful too long for Wilhelm’s liking. because they share a passion for This has led Wilhelm to look for what they do and the students they teach. other positions, but she has found none.

“Our respect for our students and caring for them “I do not have a new job, at all,” Wilhelm said. and the love for dance and the art that we make, I “Northwood might be stuck with me for another year.” think we share that,” Oakes said. “And plus we like At this point, Wilhelm is unsure of what the next to have fun while we work hard.” school year will hold for her.

Wilhelm and Oakes try to portray all aspects of “I think she still loves teaching and loves dancthe dance world while supporting and respecting ing, but she’s just trying to figure out what is going to their students. make the most sense for her family,” Oakes said.

“We want to show them a different side of If Wilhelm were to leave Northwood, it would have dance,” Wilhelm said. “It isn’t just twirly fun and an impact on the status of her relationship with Oakes. sparkly costumes. There’s a method to our madness.”

“It would change because we won’t be on a day to Although Wilhelm and Oakes share many views day basis,” Wilhelm said. “We won’t see each other about the dance department and their students, they and know everything about one another. And I think have very different personalities. it will take on more of a not necessarily a mentor kind “Wilhelm is loud and outrageous, and Oakes, I of role for myself, but more just teacher to teacher.” feel, is not more on the conservative side, but defiAlthough their relationship would change slightnitely less than,” senior Ali Knowles said. ly due to separation, both Wilhelm and Oakes believe Wilhelm agrees that she and Oakes are different. they will stay close.

“We are very different,” Wilhelm said. “I’m very “I’m always going to love her and support her, much go with the flow, easy going, not too caught up because first and foremost, I want her to be happy,” with non-important stuff. [Oakes] is very organized and Oakes said.

April 2017, The Omniscient, Page 15

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178 Hillsboro St. • Pittsboro NC www.french-nc.com • (919) 545-9296 Page 16, The Omniscient, April 2017

Rising Through the Ranks of Rap: Artists share their passions

By Meera Butalia Staff Writer

“I just don’t do homework most of the time and focus on my music—go hard core,” Kikuyu said. “I do it as if it is homework; I do Senior AJ McCrea was put into foster care at rap everyday.” age 12, and with nothing else to do, started writVisual arts teacher Leslie Burwell has ing lyrics, surprising himself and those around had both McCrea and Kikuyu in her art him with his talent. classes. Kikuyu went straight into Visual Art “I wasn’t very good with words actually, and 2, instead of Art 1, so as Burwell tried to get I had nothing but time on my hands, and I just to know him, she learned about his passion started writing—all I had was a pad and a pencil,” for music.

McCrea said. “The first thing I wrote, I showed “I was asking him questions, and Trevor was it to my social worker, and she was actually sur- like, ‘I really love music,’” Burwell said. “With prised that it was written by me, and she told me Trevor he’s always got a notebook, and he’s alI should continue writing, so then I continued to ways writing music.” write and write.”

Each musician has had struggles while purJunior Caleb James first became interested suing music but believes these won’t hold them in music during the fourth grade, when his back from their dreams. mom signed him up for guitar lessons.

James worked “odd jobs” for two years “From there I was hooked, and I just start- to get enough money to buy the studio equiped listening to more music in my free time, ment he uses to make his music, and says that and learning more songs on the guitar, and a career in music “isn’t a matter of if, it’s just it eventually evolved into writing my own,” a matter of how.” He acknowledges the chalJames said. lenges many musicians face, but says they Sophomore Trevor Kikuyu says his musical don’t scare him. beginnings were shallow, but then evolved into “I’m acquainted with the struggling musisomething deeper. cian model, and I’m “It started off with prepared for it,” me just trying to be James said. cool in eighth grade,” Kikuyu says that Kikuyu said. “But why his dream is to influI became so passionence as many people ate about it is it’s just a as possible with his way for me to get negmusic and “maybe ative energy out of my make their lives a body. I feel like weight little happier.” One is lifted off of me when of his biggest obstaI’m done writing.” cles is creating work Though each has a that stands out, so his different story of how voice will be heard they started, they are in the rap world. all dedicated to making “Nothing’s ever music, and they devote promised, which is time and energy to it why you have to try Graphic courtesy of Caleb James; Designed by Cassandra Navarro each day. as hard as possible “I never really do homework,” said James to be better, to upgrade hip hop itself and bring about time management, saying he would rather it further, instead of saying in the same spot,” spend time working on his music. “I’ve never re- Kikuyu said. ally met anyone who likes music as much as I do.”

Burwell says that both McCrea and Kikuyu McCrea sets aside two hours every night to are genuine artists, and she has seen them develop write, saving homework for later in the night, even over the past year. because if he’s tired, his writing isn’t as “viv“Both of these young men are really passionid or clear.” Even with his set writing time at ate about the words that they write, and they’re night, he continues to write throughout the day, very influenced by some of the things that they’ve wherever he is. experienced personally,” Burwell said. “I think “Throughout the day I’m constantly writ- that that’s what takes a really good rap artist, is ing, no matter what time it is,” McCrea said. that it has to come from within, and it has to have “I might think of a verse, and I’ll write it down a personal touchstone.” on my arm.”

McCrea’s struggle is deciding between maKikuyu mirrors the sentiments of James joring in production, business or graphic design. and McCrea, saying he prioritizes music over Though music is his dream, he acknowledges that school, and that he’s struggled with staying it’s hard to make it in that world. He says a video of academically focused. him rapping on YouTube has gotten 3 million views “There’s a whole lot of homework—that’s in the past, and that helped him realize that he has what I have to battle,” Kikuyu said. “Last year I a chance. His ultimate dream is “just to change the just said, ‘Forget homework.’ I just completely world,” and says music is the best way to do that. ignored it. I just didn’t do it; I just didn’t feel “Music is the perfect way for you to get your like I had to.” message out,” McCrea said. “People won’t listen Kikuyu says that not much has changed in his if you scream or you talk, but they’ll listen if it’s sophomore year, as he tries to improve his music. put into song, and that’s what I’ve realized.”

AJ McCrea

Twitter: AJ McCrea (@king_ kahleed) Soundcloud: AJ(Kahleed) Featured Songs: Hell and Back Living Through My Struggles No Peace

Caleb James Twitter: Charley James (@chrlyjms) Soundcloud: Charley James Featured Songs: Baby We’re Optimists Remember Still Your Fool Tony (feat. Sab & Dorizon Smith)

Trevor Kikuyu Twitter: Lil T.R.E. (@SHEHAS empire) Rap Group: True Real Empire Upcoming Album: Overconfident Coward April 2017, The Omniscient, Page 17

O pinion 18

In Loss, I Found Myself

Lanna Read It has been a year. I still vividly remember the seemingly never-ending ride home filled with the silence of me staring at my shoes. I remember the bumps in the road being more noticeable than usual, my head banging against my knees at every single one. I remember the indescribable numbness and shock in my chest and how I felt sick to my stomach. I remember not being able to sleep that night, staring at the ceiling thinking of nothing and everything at the same time.

My dad died on a Thursday. I found out in the school parking lot after fourth period. My friend’s dad picked me up from school and told me that the ambulance had tried to revive him, but they were unsuccessful. He had passed away and my mom didn’t want to pull me out of school early because she wanted me to have one last normal day.

When my dad told me that he had cancer, I honestly didn’t think it was that big

of a deal. I’d heard about plenty of people who lived long lives with their diagnoses, and of course I didn’t think my dad could die. He was a superhuman. He was the guy who picked me up and tossed me around, the guy who protected me from everything that came near, the only guy who would always be there for me no matter what. He was my one and only hero.

I have learned a lot about grieving. I feel like people see movies where girls lose someone close to them and instantly break down, unable to keep themselves together. I felt pressured to act like these girls. I felt like if I wasn’t crying, people would think I was inhuman and soulless for not truly grieving the loss of my father. But the truth is, everyone reacts differently to death.

I found myself surrounded by my own thoughts. Suddenly, I couldn’t hear what other people were saying because my brain spoke too loudly over their voices. I was numb and quiet. When people would laugh and question why I had looked so sad lately, I would say flatly, “My dad died last week,” with a half laugh to diffuse any awkwardness. I found it hard to be happy, but hard to be sad. I felt stuck.

It is now a year later, and I am not the

Photo courtesy of Lanna Read

LANNA and her father, CHRIS READ, sit with their new puppy. same person. I am louder, more sarcastic and honest, and overall much more confident in who I am and who I hope to be. I have learned to put my truest self forward no matter what people end up thinking about it. I have stopped holding myself back from the things I want. It has become easier for me to cry. In loss, I found myself.

So I want to thank my daddy for teaching me to be confident and love myself. His name is Christopher Jon Read. He was a sailor, computer geek, science-fiction lover, photographer, conspiracy theory enthusiast, handy man, inventor and superhero who always had the biggest smile in the room.

Today, I think I am a lot more like him.

Acceptance: What growing up with a gay mom taught me Chloe Maynard I was at soccer practice in seventh grade when a teammate approached me and asked a simple question.

“Does your mom like girls?”

Her straightforwardness caught me off guard, and I stood there silent for a minute. Growing up in the South where the majority of my peers regurgitated their parents’ unfavorable views of homosexuality made me assume it was something to be ashamed of. I thought having a gay mom was something like a family secret that I didn’t just share with anyone. I assumed that if people found out my mom was gay, they would think differently of me.

My mom has been openly gay for almost as long as I have been alive. This being so, I was always raised in an inclusive and open home, where being

“different” was normal. My mom taught us the importance of being kind to everyone. Before entering kindergarten, I thought everyone had two pairs of parents: a dad and step-mom, and a mom and step-mom. However, after starting school, I quickly realized this wasn’t how many people were raised, and I tried to hide this aspect of my home life.

As I grew older and started to develop my own opinions, I began to comprehend that I had no reason to be ashamed of my mom. Unfortunately, this took me until almost freshman year to understand.

I never told my mom that I was once embarrassed by the fact that she was gay because I knew it would hurt her.

I always accepted my mom for who she was because her homosexuality had no bearing on what type of parent she was to me or my brother. I know this statement seems contradictory since I avidly hid the fact that my mom was gay, but I was afraid that other people wouldn’t accept her and that it would affect me.

I know now that my motives were self-

ish, but as a young girl I was constantly worried about how others would perceive me. I wanted to be liked, and I thought that the conservative-minded kids I went to school with wouldn’t want to be my friend if they knew my mom was gay.

That soccer practice in seventh grade was the first time someone had asked me about my mom. I stood silent and tried to decide if her question came from malice or curiosity. After a moment of thinking I just said yes.

The girl nodded her head and told me she thought it was cool, that she was just curious. This moment has stuck with me ever since, and I’m now ashamed of myself for being embarPhoto courtesy of Chloe Maynard rassed of something that I CHLOE and her mother, STEPHANIE ARNDT, should be proud of. bask in the summer sun after a day at the pool.

Chew? More Like Ew Meera Butalia “Crunch, crunch, crunch.” That’s the sounds of my 12-year-old brother as he scarfs down his dinner, happy and carefree, unbothered by the sounds of others eating at the table. But for me, onomatopoeia can’t possibly convey the horrifying sound of someone munching away at a loud snack. This sounds incredibly melodramatic, and ever since the sounds of people chewing started to affect me at age 14, I assumed my internal reaction was just me being sensitive.

As the problem started to affect me more and more at the dinner table, the issues I had with the sound of eating baffled me, and caused many pointless fights between my brother and I. In fact, the idea for this column came from a quarrel my brother and I had over that very noise of him crunching away. It’s the same story every time: he sits down at a table and starts smacking away, I politely ask him to try to be quieter, one time, two times, five times, ten times, until we both get annoyed and it erupts into a fight. This is a small part of my everyday life, and only certain types of chewing really get to me, so when I’m not experiencing it, it can seem so insignificant. But the moment I start to hear the sound of certain chewing, the problem seems like the most impor-

Don’t Have to Be an American Idiot

tant thing in the moment, and I experience a flight or fight response. Often, physical symptoms of anger appear, and my reaction is immediate.

For about a year after these sounds began to bother me, I had no idea why, and I assumed that I was just overreacting to sounds that annoy everyone.

Then, one day, I was in the car with my friend and her mom, and we were talking about that problem. It turned out that her mom had the same issue, and it had a name: misophonia. When translated literally, it means “hatred of sound.” The technical name for it is “select sound sensitivity syndrome.”

According to The Huffington Post, 20 percent of people experience misophonia, with varying reactions, from disgust to rage. Finally finding a name for this issue helped me to deal with it as a tangible problem, and acknowledging that my reaction is coming from somewhere has helped me when it does affect me.

The scientific community has only just started to research this problem, and some early research suggests hyperconnectivity between the auditory system and limbic system, which controls your emotions. Personally, I find that misophonia affects me much more during times of stress, like during the school year. During the summer it is much easier to handle, and it is never a huge problem for me. Finding a name for it was what helped me deal with it the most, as it’s always been a rather trivial problem that only affects me in the moment.

In the world and in our own culture, the idea of “stupid Americans” has appeared again and again, from Homer Simpson to the capturing of stereotypical American behavior in the word “’Murica.” Few people are able to deny that the United States has its fair share of ignorance, but when you think about it, it’s really only ever a joke to us. The issue of American anti-intellectualism is, to the average American, not an issue at all.

In the past, that was less of a problem– because while America has always seen itself as a country of the working man, that was actually true. Despite many actions worthy of criticism, the attitude of “do, don’t think” actually achieved a great deal.

Many of America’s technological leaps came from the great minds fleeing world wars or the Soviet regime. Higher education was limited to those who wanted to dedicate themselves to scholarship. The collective ignorance of citizens was limited in its effects by the limitations of trade, communications and international politics. Today, none of these things are true.

But despite the fact that we live in a world where being well-informed and capable of critical thinking actually matters, many Americans are holding on tighter to their belief that too much learning is undesirable and that opinions are ultimately more important than facts. There are many reasons why we haven’t been able to accept this necessary shift. Often, what’s to blame is simply the fact that people dread giving up the way of life they’ve had for so

those other parts of life as well.

Classes like Personal Finance have been critiqued by many students for focusing more on small business finance than at the individual level. According to a study done by ING Direct, an overwhelming majority of teens–87 percent–admit they don’t know much about personal finance.

One of the main things students want to learn about is the process of applying for credit cards. A lot of high school students are turning 18, so cards are becoming available to us, but even if we did know how to get one, managing that account and keeping ourselves from destroying our credit scores (what even is a credit score?) would be completely foreign to us.

Outside of the monetary aspect, tools necessary in the process of applying for a job would ideally be accessible to us. Learning how to write resumes and the skills needed for interviewing

and negotiation are a crucial part of becoming a responsible adult.

As short-term actions, we suggest the possibility of offering small optional classes on specific topics after school or during Plus One for those interested. For the long run, we suggest an entire class devoted to the promotion of these subjects, structured somewhat like The Game of Life.

You enter the class having to apply for a job and as you go on, you face real life problems, having to make hard decisions and learning about all the things any adult today would have to face.

“Onomatopoeia can’t possibly convey the horrifying sound of someone munching away at a loud snack.”

Colin Battis

long, a perfectly understandable fear. But there are more dangerous factors at work.

For one, corporations who stand to gain greatly from an uninformed and distracted population are enormously powerful in our country. They have spent billions trying to convince us that regulations on business in any form are bad for America while lobbying and bribing legislators strengthens democracy. At the same time, there has been a broad crusade against science as a whole—it appears in the anti-vaxxers endangering children, in the fossil fuel and manufacturing lobbies gagging the researchers who work to protect the public, or the creationists who think that school systems should instill a fear of basic scientific tenets in students.

Americans have at their disposal greater communication and access to information than have ever been available in human history. But while the Internet has brought opportunities for open conversation and organization, the debates constantly raging over politics more often cause people to fall deeper into herd mentalities.

The Internet has intensified, not improved, the American aversion to critical thinking. People are presented with a selection of facts to ignore or accept as they please, while discussion and entertainment move so rapidly that thinking takes away from the immediacy of the online experience.

As the pace of the world grows ever faster, we need to step back from impulse and complacency. Education, the media and government institutions all have the potential to open discussions and expand people’s viewpoints instead of feeding biases and anger. Solutions don’t lie with any one person, but with an understanding of our responsibility to talk and deliberate about the issues in our country.

The Game of Life: Northwood should prepare us for more than college Staff Editorial

Graduation: we spend our whole high school career preparing to get there and doing everything we can to make it, but when we step off the stage after receiving our diplomas, are we really prepared?

High school curriculum gets us ready for college. We are required to take college preparatory courses on core subjects like English, math, social studies, and science. But shouldn’t we also be learning about taking out loans, having mortgages on our houses, setting up retirement funds and doing taxes?

The editorial board of The Omniscient believes that Northwood should offer more courses that prepare its students for life.

After all, not all of us are going to college, and a lot are going directly into the workforce. We believe high school should place greater emphasis on getting us ready for

If high school, the place intended for educating the youth and creating young adults ready to be a productive new generation, put more effort into providing the skills necessary to do just this, it would ultimately be for our benefit.

Photo courtesy of John Liu/Flickr

April 2017, The Omniscient, Page 19

S ports 20

By C olin Battis S taff Writer

Setting the Bar High: Tessa Sheets pole vaults to victory

It may be surprising now, but senior Tessa Sheets didn’t always want to be a pole vaulter.

To date, she has achieved first place in the state’s 3A pole vaulting championships on three separate occasions—two of those times she beat the next best vaulter in the state by a full nineteen inches. Sheets has won multiple invitational and conference meets in North Carolina, and her dedication to the sport has brought her to compete against the best vaulters in the state.

Yet she had never even considered pole vaulting until she tried some vaulting drills on her first ever day of track practice and told her father about it.

“He was surprised and said he did it in high school too, and he talked about the physics of it and was really enthusiastic about me pole vaulting,” Sheets said. “Both my mother and father were very supportive of the idea. Before I had a car, my father would take me to my separate pole vault practices as he was taking and analyzing my videos and hearing the coach’s feedback…. My dad now really understands the vault, and I can depend on him to coach and support me when my coach isn’t there.”

While her pole vaulting career came late, Sheets was never a stranger to athletics. Sports have been part of her family’s tradition and played a significant part in her life growing up.

“She used to do softball, and she excelled really well in that, and then it went to high jump and running track, then it was cross country,” Tessa’s sister Anna Sheets said. “[Athletics] have been in our lives ever since we were babies. Our family’s huge into it, so it’s definitely that family influence.”

When she began vaulting, Tessa showed great potential but was far from reaching the level she is at today.

“I think the hardest thing I learned from pole vaulting was learning how to get back up after defeat,” Tessa said. “At the state meet freshman year, I cleared 10 feet. It was a new personal record... and later that summer I competed in a meet and I got a no height—I didn’t clear a bar. And so it was really hard coming from a whole year of personal records and improvement to not clearing a single bar.”

It took a long time for Tessa to master the vault enough to begin growing consistently.

“She always had the potential, but now she’s gotten better,” track and field coach Richard McDonald said. “Freshman year, she was a little inconsistent at times. But I think she’s gotten stronger because she’s just worked at it. You don’t know how complicated the vault is until you do it.”

That determination to improve has carried on undiminished for the past four years. Tessa constantly works to develop her pole vaulting skills.

Colin Battis/The Omniscient

SENIOR TESSA SHEETS practices her vaulting technique at Kinesis Dynamics in Apex.

“You have to do a bad vault 500 times before you than getting a job or anything else.”

Most recently, Tessa reached a height of 12 feet, can get one single good vault, and so I’ve really seven inches at the indoor state championships. learned how to deal with frustration,” Tessa said. “[She’s] quietly competitive,” McDonald said.

“The best part of succeeding is knowing you suc“She sits and says, ‘I know I’m sure of myself, I can ceeded after all those failures.” get better and I’m going to do the work to do it.’”

She spends three afternoons a week practicing Before the end of her senior year, Tessa hopes to at a private facility in Apex, where she trains with break the North Carolina 3A women’s record of 13 Spencer Frame, a man who has been coaching Division I collegiate pole vaulters for 10 years. On other feet, six inches.

“I want to get the North Carolina outdoor state days, she often spends an hour and a half to two record and at least end up on the national podium,” hours running on Northwood’s track after school.

Tessa said. “I feel really close; I feel like I can get “All summer I’m training,” Tessa said. “I’m gothere…. It’s something that only you can do—in the ing to meets on Saturdays. Sometimes I can’t hang end, it’s not anyone else’s fault if you didn’t clear out with my friends because I’m at practice…. But that bar.” in the end I’d rather be practicing and getting better

BRAIN

Illustration by Jessica Kolomichuk/The Omniscient

Get Your Head in the Game: Athletes discuss the importance of mentality

By Cooper Patterson Staff Writer The game clock is winding down, you only have a few more seconds to win the game and your final shot must be precise. You have rehearsed this play in practice every day. However, you have not rehearsed your mentality under stressful situations.

According to Thinksport Consulting Services, sports are 90 percent mental, but usually, athletes only focus on the physical part of competing. Junior quarterback Alex Parker believes that an athlete’s mentality is what separates them on the field.

“Anybody can lift weights or run,” Parker said. “When you get to the point where you don’t think you can do anything else, that’s when you make the mental decision to keep going and put yourself above others.”

Junior Chris Keesor, cross-country and track team member, believes that because of their mentality, athletes don’t reach their full potential.

“There’s so much more inside of you than you think, until you just push through the mental barrier,” Keesor said.

Senior Hannah Fowler plays shortstop for the softball team. She believes that the mental aspect of the game has a large influence on how athletes perform.

“Your physical ability really means nothing if you can’t focus on the game or properly think about what you’re doing,” Fowler said. “If you’re mentally focused on the sport, then I feel like you’re more driven to work harder, and then your physical ability will improve because you’re more focused.”

Depending on the coach’s technique, a team may focus more on one aspect than the other. For girls’ basketball, they read a book focusing solely on the mental aspect of the game. This year, the team read the book The Energy Bus by Jon Gordon. The book focused on how everyone must be able to work together to perform well. For junior Erika Nettles, reading the book helped the team both mentally and physically throughout their season. Nettles stated that working together, or “getting on the same bus,” was a big step for her.

“Mainly just to get on the bus is huge for me; I realized that [I] personally wouldn’t be able to get

on the bus if I didn’t change my attitude and my perspective,” Nettles said. “The book focused on smaller parts of your game that I would have never noticed.

Throughout the book it was mostly little key concepts that made me focus during the game and that helped the team win.”

In her paper, Emotions in Sport: The Effect of Conflict on Collegiate Athlete’s Emotional Contagion, Self efficacy, and Cohesion, Valeska Hoath of the University of Portland states, “team cohesion has been positively linked to a number of important outcomes including increased willingness to accept responsibility for negative results.”

Fowler relies on her team to keep her positive after tough plays.

“I really lean on my teammates because they are able to keep me up and keep me focused on the game; they help me get over things,” Fowler said.

Freshman golfer Alex Snively believes that teams promote positivity. Snively didn’t start out the season like he wanted, but he stayed positive with help from his team.

“It’s easier with a team,” Snively said. “You aren’t always going to be in a good mood when you’re by yourself, but with a team you have people to cheer you up.”

Fowler believes that mood can make a difference in performance.

“It definitely helps because I feel like when I’m in a good mood, I am more focused on everything that is going on,” Fowler said. “If I’m in a bad mood, and I’m stuck on something specific that happened, then I’m not able to see everything in the game, and I’m not as focused as I should be.”

Even though sports involve a lot of physical skill, volleyball and swim coach Lyn Smith believes that mentality is a key aspect in any sport.

“I do believe that the mental challenge is there, because if the mental challenge is not there, the physical can’t be, because you’ve already set yourself up before you walk out on the court,” Smith said. “It’s just something athletes have to work on. You have to tell yourself up front it’s not going to come easy….

I think today kids need to put in harder work. They want to be a state champion, but do they want to put in the work to be a state champion, and in doing that, do you want to take time to mentally prepare?”

April 2017, The Omniscient, Page 21

Fifty Four Percent:

The epidemic of sexual assault and college athletes B y C ameron B ernstein S taff Writer

Pittsboro 35 Thompson St. Suite 103 Pittsboro, NC 27312 (919) 542-5481

Chapel Hill 101 Conner Dr. Suite 401 Chapel Hill, NC 27514 (919) 929-2365

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Page 22, The Omniscient, April 2017

College athletes are an extremely public face, as sporting events are some of the most popular events at a university. Crowds of thousands cheer, and press surrounds the team at each game.

However, sexual assault and rape has become increasingly frequent among college athletes. According to a study conducted by the Washington Post, 54 percent of collegiate and intramural studentathletes admit to coercing a partner into sex. In comparison, 38 percent of non-athletic students admit to coercing a partner into sex.

Recently, three Michigan State football players have faced ramifications for accusations of sexual misconduct.

According to the New York Post, the players have been banned from team activities and on-campus housing while the investigation takes place.

There has also been an ongoing scandal involving members of the Baylor University football team. According to Sports Day News, there have been 125 reports of sexual assault by players of the team from 2011 to 2015.

Kristian Eanes, who plays for Northwood’s girls’ basketball team, speculates that these actions may be attributed to the popularity of the offenders.

“Athletes are the popular ones on campus,” Eanes said. “They think that they have the power to do what they want, because they’re the people who make the money for the campus other than tuition.”

On the other hand, senior swimmer Leah Nelson believes that these actions are attributed to the nature of the offenders.

“Sportsmen are more competitive, which I know doesn’t relate, but maybe in one way, they could be more aggressive naturally,” Nelson said.

Depending on the state, the maximum punishment for sexual assault can be one to seven years in prison. However, in some cases of sexual assault involving college athletes, sentences are lightened.

This is exemplified in the case of Brock Turner, a former Stanford swimmer who was convicted of sexually assaulting an unconscious woman. According to CNN, Turner only served three months of his six month sentence in a California jail.

Some students believe that lighter sentences for charges of sexual assault occur because athletes are a figure of influence.

“People see them as individuals of value who made a mistake, as opposed to dangerous folks who committed a felony,” senior Nikolai Mather said. “It also has a lot to do with privilege. A lot of people who are involved in ath-

letics are straight, white men. That can have a lot of connotations in society, which would lead them to get lighter sentences.”

Nelson also agrees that the value of the athletes can affect their sentence.

“It’s definitely unfair, but I think a lot of times if there are students being talented and having a future, they are more likely to get out earlier or have a lighter sentence,” Nelson said. “They are needed for a team that could be making money for the school.”

According to the Pennsylvania Coalition Against Rape (PCAR), when assailants are figures of power and influence, it can be difficult for survivors to come forward about their assault. They fear that the offender’s crimes may not be justified or that they would be accused of being untruthful.

Steps are being taken by organizations such as RAINN (Rape, Abuse & Incest National Network) and PACT5 to prevent assault from happening in the first place. These steps include educating college students on alcohol and campus safety, how to detect warning signs of assault and how to keep others safe who may be at risk.

Along with these methods, sophomore Rocky Andrews believes that consent is important in the prevention of sexual assault and rape. “[It’s] a question of consent; just affirm that the other person definitely wants to engage,” Andrews said. “I think that once a certain level of drunkenness has been reached, consent isn’t really possible. If two people are black-out drunk, I don’t think that’s a safe situation for anybody.”

Gym teacher Cameron Vernon believes that education is also an effective mean of prevention.

“Here in high school it’s in our curriculum,” Vernon said. “We teach kids about sexual assault, violence and what healthy relationships look like. In high school, peers need to demonstrate healthy relationships, and when we see people being mistreated, we need to speak up about it.”

“54 percent of collegiate and intramural studentathletes admit to coercing a partner into sex.”

— Washington Post

Graphic courtesy of Eric Perlin and Keith Johnston/Pixabay

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SENIOR JAZANAE BILLINGS lifts weights out of season to keep in shape all year.

Are Preseason Workouts Working Out?

By Adam Rimolt Staff Writer Whether sprinting around the track, struggling out of a push up, hoisting weights above your head, pounding up and down the bleachers or gasping out of a stretch, preseason workouts can be some of the most grueling and difficult parts of a studentathlete’s career. However, because of today’s hypercompetitive high school athletic culture, almost every school sport has a non-mandatory period of preseason training to help their athletes and team gain a competitive advantage.

In tandem with this, over the past several decades high school athletics have seen a significant increase in importance. Participation in athletics has risen steadily for 22 consecutive years, according to data from usnews.com. This has resulted in 55.5 percent of high school students playing a sport for the 2012-2013 season, a dramatic increase from the 36 percent of high school students who did so for the 2000-2001 season.

Because of the rising popularity of off-season programs, some student-athletes can feel forced into participating in optional preseason programs because of the stress they feel from their teammates and coaches. Preseason workout schedules often last weeks or even months at a time and many studentathletes try to maintain a balance between their education, job, athletics and personal life.

Sophomore soccer player Juliana Hubbard feels that peer pressure is a definite burden on studentathletes surrounding preseason workouts.

“I always feel pressured to attend preseason workouts, but I usually just ignore it because they are an optional thing,” Hubbard said. “Only the most dedicated athletes go to every single

preseason workout.”

Junior soccer player Macie Marsh said if you are not there, you can feel as if you’re being left behind.

“I definitely feel pressure, you know?” Marsh said.

“Everyone else is getting better and working on their physical abilities, and I’m just sitting there being lazy.”

Sophomore track and field athlete Chris Ocariza believes that athletes owe it to themselves and to their teammates to attend preseason workouts in order to make themselves into the best athletes they can be.

“As an athlete, I want to get better each and every day, so as athletes it’s our responsibility to go to these practices, even though they are optional,” Ocariza said.

Despite the voluntary nature of preseason workouts, the consensus among coaches and students is that they are fundamental to achieving and maintaining a competitive advantage over teammates and opposing teams alike.

“People who take advantage of preseason workouts are going to get better, and people who don’t might suffer the consequences of not being as good,” Marsh said.

Girls’ basketball coach Cameron Vernon agrees, believing that preseason workouts are necessary to success in athletics.

“Would you not study before a test?” Vernon said.

“When you have to go out and compete, the game is your test, and you either pass or fail. Have I given spots to kids who have attended preseason workouts just because they put in the work? Absolutely.”

Even though preseason workouts are both demanding and difficult, both coaches and athletes agree that they are vital to the team’s success. For studentathletes who are seeking to compete and achieve at the highest level of high school sports, preseason workouts may be one of the keys to unlocking their capabilities and skills.

Average time NHS students dedicate to off-season workouts.

37.2%

13.2%

14%

16.3%

14%

5.4%

April 2017, The Omniscient, Page 23

SUPER

CHARGED

The student athletes shown below have exhibited traits that earned the recognition of their coaches for exemplary athletic accomplishments.

Hannah Gail Shepherd/The Omniscient

Chantal Shine/The Omniscient

Sarah Terzotis

Allison Grant

“I’m really excited about the serious and determined way she’s working as a veteran of the team, and I think she can qualify for regionals this year.”

—Coach Richard McDonald

“Allison Grant works really hard.

Above all, she is a very supportive teammate that will go really far in life.”

—Anna Goldman, junior

Davis Palermo

Hannah Gail Shepherd/The Omniscient

Recorded 14 strike outs against 15 batters faced in a shortened five-inning win against Southern Durham, March 14.

Featured Athlete: Dylan Hamer Chloe Maynard/The Omniscient

Austin Nykamp

“He is the one always motivating the doubles teams to get their win.”

—Sam Earnshaw, sophomore

Photo courtesy of Guillermo Ramos

Ben Ramos

Shot a 79 and placed first individually in team’s first match of the year at Chapel Hill Country Club.

Junior Dylan Hamer plays both defensive midfield and offensive midfield positions on the lacrosse team.

Hamer’s efforts have led him to become first in the state for goals scored by a defensive midfield player, with 17 goals scored through March 30.

“I think it’s pretty cool to have that stat,” Hamer said. “I think it goes to show that a lot of hard work pays off, and it’s a pretty good feeling to have.”

Hamer regularly plays as just a defensive player, but due to injuries occurring to midfielders, Hamer has taken up the mantle of the midfield position.

“He’s the only kid who can go from long-pole defense to short-stick offense and be dominant on both ends,” lacrosse coach Kevin McDaniel said. “He is well rounded, the most well-rounded kid we have on the team.”

Hamer offers some of his advice as to how to achieve success in sports.

“I think if you really want to be good at something, just dedicate

Chantal Shine/The Omniscient

Cameron Council

“Cam is one of the fastest guys we have, and I’m really proud of the way he has stepped up into a leadership role as a veteran of the team.”

—Coach Richard McDonald

Chloe Maynard/The Omniscient

yourself to it,” Hamer said. “I’ve dedicated myself to lacrosse for the whole year, rather than just during the spring seasons like I was doing previously. Just put time into something to be good at it.”

Hamer has hopes to play college lacrosse, but is unsure of whether or not he will be able to commit. He said his biggest goal right now is to have a good career at Northwood for his last two years and to do well with the team at the state playoffs.

— Declan Dolan

Photo courtesy of Mara Strayer

Ariel Glosson

“Ariel always has a positive attitude and continues to motivate the team to be the best they can be on and off the field.”

— Hallie Arnott, freshman