Issue 9, 5/22/15

Page 1

PALO ALTO UNIFIED SCHOOL DISTRICT PALO ALTO HIGH SCHOOL 50 EMBARCADERO RD. PALO ALTO, CA 94301 NON-PROFIT ORG U.S. POSTAGE

PAI D PALO ALTO PERMIT #44

The Campanile

Vol. XCVII, No. 9

Palo Alto High School • 50 Embarcadero Road, Palo Alto, CA 94301 • www.palycampanile.org

Grad events to close out school year

Several senior events on horizon for the Class of 2015, beginning with baccalaureate Maggie Rosenthal

Apartment smoking ban fails to pass Rachel Farn

Staff Writer

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Business Manager

alo Alto High School’s graduating seniors will have several activities to look forward to in their final weeks

at Paly. The senior activities will begin with the baccalaureate ceremony on May 29, the last day of senior finals. Seniors are instructed to arrive at De Anza College’s Flint Center by 7 p.m. for baccalaureate, which will run from 7:30 p.m. to 9 p.m., and will include student performances, such as dances and songs, and speakers. Venture capitalist and Paly alumnus Ann Miura-Ko and Senior Class Pres. Maya Ben-Efraim will both speak at baccalaureate. The next graduation event will be the Senior Class Picnic on June 1. Students will be taken to the Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk via buses, which will leave from Paly at 9 a.m. and return at 5:30 p.m. The event will be put on by Paly’s Parent Teacher Student Association (PTSA), and the $75 tickets include transportation, lunch and unlimited rides at the boardwalk. Following the picnic is the graduation rehearsal on June 2. The PTSA will hold a breakfast for seniors at 7:45 a.m. Directly afterwards, there

Friday, May 22, 2015

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Design By Maggie Rosenthal

The graduation ceremony will take place at Paly on June 3. A reception and graduation night party will follow the celebration.

will be a mandatory graduation practice lasting until 10 a.m. Tickets for graduation will be distributed during the rehearsal, with each senior receiving up to 10 tickets for family and friends. The graduation ceremony and reception will be on June 3 from 5:30 p.m. to 8 p.m. Seniors need to be at Paly by 5 p.m. and guests are encouraged to arrive early as well, as seating will be available on a first-come, firstserved basis. Immediately after the

diploma ceremony, the junior class will host a reception, giving students a chance to take pictures with the new alumni before buses arrive for the graduation night party. The PTSA-sponsored graduation night party will follow the graduation reception. Seniors should assemble at 8 p.m. in front of the Tower Building for an 8:30 p.m. bus departure. The location for the party has been kept secret, though several details have been released about the

party. Students have been instructed to wear casual clothing and bathing suits. The party will include dinner, breakfast, games, a movie room and a casino with cash prizes, as well as other activities which have not yet been announced. There will also be entertainers throughout the night, including DJ Miguel Hightop, who also deejayed at this year’s prom. Buses will return at 2:30 a.m., ending the final graduation activity for the Class of 2015.

fter the vote on May 12 regarding a proposal to ban indoor smoking in multi-family complexes, the Palo Alto City Council decided to not extend the current smoking ban to apartments, but to instead include electronic cigarettes among those in existing bans. Because of multiple existing smoking restrictions for smokers, the council decided against extending the smoking ban to multi-family complexes. Despite choosing to not involve cigarettes in the bans, the council decided to include electronic cigarettes in current smoking bans because of the increasing use of electronic cigarettes by teenagers. During the council’s discussion, the council was surprised by a letter from the Santa Clara County Health Department talking about the spreading use of electronic cigarettes among youth. “Youth are now witnessing smoking behaviors in public spaces that have been smoke-free for most, if not all, of their lives,” the

Apartment Smoking A3

City council to vote on PAPD body cameras

Mindfulness to be introduced into curriculum

Jeremy Fu

C

Online Editor

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he Palo Alto Police Department (PAPD) will equip 90 more police officers with body-mounted cameras if the 2016 Palo Alto city budget passes in June, ending the one-year pilot program and moving to advance this technology to all officers. The city’s recently announced budget includes allocating $95,000 towards new body cameras, which will allow the police department to expand the use of this new technology in order to promote transparency. According to a report from the city manager’s office, the PAPD pilot program began in 2013 and consisted of nine body-mounted cameras which were tested primarily with officers on motorcycles. “This will allow officers, primarily on motorcycles, to capture video evidence when they are away from their vehicles,” the 2015 report said. In the 2016 budget proposal, body-mounted cameras are noted as a piece of a larger video recording system, as the current in-car recording systems only capture approximately 40 to 60 percent of police field patrol interactions with the public. The body cameras will work alongside the police department’s recently installed video camera system in patrol cars, which can capture a 270 degree view. This fivecamera system is an improvement from the traditional front-facing dash camera. According to the budget, the body-mounted cameras are predicted to help assist in criminal prosecution, reduce civil liability and aid in the review of alleged misconduct. If the budget is approved, Palo Alto will join a growing number of cities

Body cameras

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Meditation will be added to physical education classes next year after success at Gunn Nicole LI

Staff Writer

urrent Palo Alto High School science Instructional Supervisor Josh Bloom hopes to move towards bringing mindfulness to Paly as next year’s Teacher on Special Assignment (TOSA) for Social Emotional Learning. Bloom believes that mindfulness will greatly benefit the student body, and hopes to follow in the path that Henry M. Gunn High School has taken with respect to mindfulness and intraspection, Gunn’s Student Executive Council recently voted to introduce a mindfulness curriculum to physical education (PE) classes in the upcoming school year. Gunn’s mindfulness curriculum will be taught by the national organization Youthful Empowerment Seminar (YES!). According to the YES! website, the curriculum strives to lead students in exercises, deep breathing and social lessons, including conflict resolution and management of different forms of stress. A Palo Alto Online article on Gunn’s decision to include mindfulness detailed that the 30-minute sessions will be delivered over four to five weeks in PE.

Danny Hammerson/The Campanile

Paly students participate in a meditation activity led by Palo Alto Medical Foundation mindfulness instructor Clia Tierney.

Bloom wants all of Paly to have access to the stress-relieving tools that YES! provides. “There are tools that all of us can learn to help manage … and decrease that stress in our lives,” Bloom said. “Part of that has to do with increasing [our] level of self-awareness, including an awareness of our thinking and our emotions.”

Bloom will attempt to create environments where students can reap the benefits of self-awareness, possibly in PE classes and advisory. He mentioned PE as a place where students already learn about physical health and should learn more about emotional health. Paly PE teacher Sheri Mulroe also sees mindfulness as an important tool for students and has currently made arrangements for Palo Alto Medical Foundation (PAMF) instructors, including mindfulness instructor Clia Tierney, to lead classes in mindfulness exercises. “[The PAMF instructor] is going to come every [seven period] day until school’s out,” Mulroe said. “Their hope is then to bring it to more of the [PE] classes. They are working on a proposal to bring to the district.” While Mulroe is in support of formally bringing mindfulness to PE classes, she noted that many teachers already implement meditation in their classes, and that self-awareness should not be strictly limited to PE — teachers of other subjects should adapt activities which promote mindfulness as well.

“It really is important that [the school knows that] it’s happening in other classes too, and it doesn’t have to be in [PE],” Mulroe said. “There’s not a particular way you need to be in order to practice mindfulness, so any teacher can do it, in any classroom.” In accordance with Bloom’s and Mulroe’s views, many students think that the option of having the selfawareness program in PE is beneficial for their mental health. Freshman Rebecca Young remarked that such a program would significantly improve the PE experience. “I think right now people look at PE as something [they do not] look forward to or … want to do because it’s not relaxing at all, and it doesn’t help,” Young said. “I think [the program] would help us look forward to all of our classes more and make [us] feel more awake for the rest of the day.” However, others view the integration of mindfulness into school curriculum not as a benefit, but instead as a potential time-waster. Freshman Layla Jiang mentioned that mindfulness would be unneces-

Spotlight

Lifestyle

Sports

See the different colleges that the seniors will be attending. B4-B5

What does the Class of 2015 have to say about their time at Paly? B3, B6

A guide to the most prestigious European soccer tournament. C4-C5

I see mindfulness and meditation as something that is very simple and very much related to [good habits] — it’s a practice and habit that makes us healthier.

Josh Bloom

Social Emotional Learning TOSA

sary and difficult to facilitate successfully. “I feel like maybe some students wouldn’t take it seriously, just because people don’t really take PE as a serious class in the first place,” Jiang said. Similarly, junior Andy Kotik said that the exercises introduced would not be carried into students’ everyday lives. “It would be good to [teach mindfulness], but [students] wouldn’t do it afterwards,” Kotik said. Despite the criticisms, Bloom wants to seamlessly incorporate a balanced dose of mindfulness into students’ school lives. “We always talk about eating well and exercising and getting enough sleep,” Bloom said. “All of those are just simple practices and habits, and I see mindfulness and meditation as something that is very simple and very much related to that — it’s a practice and habit that makes us healthier.” With these ideas in mind, Bloom hopes to implement major changes to Paly’s culture in order to help the community reassess student wellbeing.

INSIDE N e w s . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . A 1- A 5 Opinion............................A6-A8 L i fe st y l e . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . B1, B8 Te c h n o l o g y. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . B 2 College Map......................B4-B5 Senior S ection....................B3,B6 S p o r t s . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . C 1- C 8

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Issue 9, 5/22/15 by The Campanile - Issuu