Issue 4, 11/8/19

Friday November 8, 2019

The Campanile

Vol. CII, No. 4

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

www.thecampanile.org

Palo Alto High School, 50 Embarcadero Road, Palo Alto, CA 94301

Robbery suspect arrested on campus Armed police officers ran through campus chasing robber, causing chaos among students

Items stolen in boys locker room break in

By Kaitlyn Lee & Rebekah Limb

P

Art & Photo Director & Sports Editor

aly administration and Athletic Director Nelson Gifford are directing efforts to catch the burglar who broke into The Peery Center boys locker room on Wednesday, Oct. 30.

After football practice, which ended at 6 p.m., the JV and varsity team returned to their locker room in the lower level of the gym and found that someone had slashed the locks on their lockers, backpacks and clothes had been scattered on the ground.

“The locker room was completely torn apart with stuff everywhere,” senior captain Louis Passarello said. “People were mad, some lost their Macs, iPhones, AirPods and wallets, some even lost their shoes and pants.”

MIRANDA LI/THE CAMPANILE

Palo Alto Fire Dept. paramedics drove through the Paly campus on Nov. 4. near the 800s building. A Palo Alto Police Dept. officer injured his leg while chasing suspected robber David Esqueda Jr. through campus. “He was an adult and had a stack of cash in his hand," said senior Kai Douglas when walking past the library hallway and seeing the robber run into the boys' restroom.

By Anna Meyer & Miranda Li

Science & Tech Editor & Editor-in-Chief

A

rmed Palo Alto police officers chased suspected bank robber and Redwood City resident David Esqueda Junior across Paly’s campus shortly after noon on Monday. He was subsequently arrested on the bike path behind the school and taken into custody, according to the Palo Alto Police Twitter account.

A press release by the Palo Alto Police Department said the police received a dispatch call reporting that Bank of America on Quarry Road was robbed just before noon.

The suspect, who was wearing a face mask at the time, handed the teller a note demanding money, according to the press release.

The teller complied with his demand, and the suspect then fled on bicycle.

Palo Alto police responded to the call and found the suspect, later identified as Esqueda, on Paly’s campus. According to Supt. Donald Austin, the alleged robber had a partner, who was arrested on the

scene. Esqueda is currently being held in Santa Clara County Main jail on charges of robbery, commercial burglary and resisting arrest, according to the press report.

A police officer was injured while pursuing Esqueda, and was treated by paramedics outside the 800s building before being taken to the hospital, according to an officer at the scene.

Panic incited while police were chasing the suspect on campus, and many students fled into nearby classrooms. Some staff members began lockdown proceedings, although no directions to do so were given by administrators.

“My mind instantly jumped to the conclusion that there was a shooting threat on campus,” senior Kevin Cullen said.

Senior Mitali Kessinger said that many students feared for their safety during the incident.

“We just sat there like sitting ducks waiting to be killed,” Kessinger said.

During the pursuit, the alleged robber entered the library, approached a librarian and asked where the restroom was, according to a source who agreed to be interviewed on the condition of

anonymity because she fears for her safety.

Senior Kai Douglas said she called the police during the pursuit when she saw the alleged robber inside the library.

“As I was walking past the library, I saw him in the breezeway,” Douglas said. “He was an adult, and he had a stack of cash in his hand. I wasn’t sure what to do, but eventually I figured out that I should call the cops. There was 30 seconds (on the phone) and then the cops were there, yelling and asking people which bathroom he was in.”

Douglas said she saw the suspect run from the hallway in the library into the boys’ bathroom attached to it. She had previously seen the suspect run between the Haymarket Theatre and 100s building, and was asked by a police officer about his whereabouts.

“I had seen someone running through (campus), and I just thought it was a bizarre place, to run to a school campus during the day,” Douglas said. “I didn’t think much of it until the cops asked where he went.”

According to Douglas, the suspect was dressed in sweatpants

and a dark shirt, and looked to be in his 20s.

“I don’t really know what his face looked like,” Douglas said.

“He had dark hair and a beard and he wasn’t wearing a baseball cap at first, but he was when I saw him in the library.”

According to Austin, high school administrators did not initiate a lockdown procedure because the events unfolded so quickly.

“I think another minute on this and it would have been locked down,” Austin said. “We just didn’t have enough information right there on the spot.”

Moving forward, Austin said administration will discuss developing a system for communicating directly with students through text messages. Such a system could help alert students who were off campus at the time of the incident and stop the spread of misinformation, he said.

“There were some rumors,” Austin said. “We probably could have just made it more clear that no one was shot. There wasn’t a stabbing. I think there's some opportunities to grow as far as how we communicate with students.”

“People were mad, some people lost their Macs, iPhones, AirPods and wallets, and some even lost their shoes and pants.”

Louis Passarello According to Assistant Principal Jerry Berkson, the robber was wearing a hoodie and is not a student from Paly.

“Through video surveillance, we were able to get a decent picture, and it’s not a student from here,” Berkson said. “It’s not a great picture, so I know the Palo Alto Police Department is investigating it.”

Berkson said he doesn’t know the specific details about the break-in, as the issue is being handled by PAPD. “I don’t (know how much was stolen) since everything was reported to the police department,” Berkson said. “It’s a lot bigger than a school thing — it’s kind of the police department’s deal.”

According to Berkson, the lockers in the boys locker room were locked all day.

“We’re trying to figure out

how the guy got in there — he could have mixed himself in with the crowd when the door was open,” Berkson said.

According to Passarello, although there are no significant leads in the case, he thinks it was carried out by a professional.

“Our team was very upset because a lot of kids lost value items are going to be hard to be returned.”

Louis Passarello

“From my perspective, this was a job that was carried out by a professional,” Passarello said.

“The robber knew what time and place to be in order to steal a lot of stuff. Our team was very upset because a lot of kids lost valuable items that are going to be hard to be returned.”

However, according to senior co-captain Will Moragne, this robbery has not made players wary of the security and safety of the Peery Center, as they are confident that the administrators and Gifford will help make sure an incident like this doesn’t happen again.

“Everyone was pretty mad and confused how someone did this,” Moragne said. “I know we have pretty good facilities here with cameras and all. It was just unfortunate timing, and this person planned out what they were doing.”

“It’s a lot bigger than a school thing — it’s kind of the police department’s deal.”

Jerry Berkson Moragne said since the robbery, the players are not yet aware of new updates or any findings.

“We haven’t heard much from what's happened,” Moragne said.

“It seems that people aren’t getting their stuff back since it’s already been a week.”

Broken pipes lead to Fired water polo coach sparks controversy sewage on pool deck Interaction with player causes administration to fire coach, players respond in protest

By Siddhartha Sahasrabuddhe & Kris Risano

C

Business Manager & Staff Writer

onfusion engulfed the Paly pool deck around 4:45 p.m. on Nov. 2 as the pipes of the small gym malfunctioned, leading to a sewage backup onto the pool deck and chaos regarding the Santa Clara Valley Athletic League boys water polo playoffs. Gunn High School sophomore and varsity water polo starter Cole Vale was in the pool when the backup started.

“Our team started to smell something, and we looked behind the bench to see a fountain of sewage,” Vale said.

“Our team started to smell something, and we looked behind the bench to see a fountain of sewage.”

Cole Vale Gunn was playing Mountain View High School for fifth place in the SCVAL playoffs when the sewage first appeared.

“Our game against Mountain

INSIDE

View was called off,” Vale said.

“We gave them the game instead of heading over to Gunn to finish the last quarter.”

According to Vale, Gunn and Mountain View agreed to end the game early because Mountain View had a substantial lead.

“It was kind of our big home game to prove to the rest of the league that we are the best team in the league.”

Loic Ijzerman While Vale said the outcome of the game was not affected by the sewage issue, he was perturbed with the timing of the event.

“I was disappointed that the game we were sending our seniors off in was ruined by the sewage,” Vale said.

While Paly and Gunn had the rest of their game canceled, Paly’s team, who was going to play in the SCVAL finals against Los Altos High School, was forced to move its game as a result of the situation.

“The game was supposed to

Broken Pipes A3

By Kiana Tavakoli

P

ink water polo caps replaced the usual green and white caps worn by the girls water polo team during the senior night game against Los Gatos High School late last month as the team protested Palo Alto Unified School District’s handling of the dismissal of the head varsity water polo coach.

“We had a team meeting with the athletic director about two hours before a game, and they told us that he was indefinitely suspended and they could not give us a reason why.”

Alexandra Lee On Oct. 15, former head coach Doug Stotland benched two players due to several occurrences of open conflict between him and the players during the game. The next day, the JV and varsity assistant coaches stepped in for Stotland, who had been suspended,

Lifestyle

the edition

News. . . . . . . . . . . A1-A4 Opinion. . . . . . . . .A5-A7 Editorials. . . . . . . . . . .A8 Lifestyle. . . . . B1-B3, B6 Spotlight. . . . . . . . B4-B5 Science & Tech. . . B7-B8 Sports. . . . . . . . . . . C1-C4

FOUNDRY/PIXABAY

Rise of female rap

Female rappers have recently increased in popularity.

PAGE B1

Business Manager

GRACE LINDSTROM/USED WITH PERMISSION

Junior Hana Erickson, talks to the girls varsity water polo team at Senior Night against Los Gatos on Oct. 22. The team is dressed in black swimsuits and pink caps in protest of their coach's firing. “I don't think the way the district handled this sets a good precedent for the next coaches,” Malagrino said. with only an hour and a half of notice until their next game began, according to the team’s statement presented and printed on flyers during Senior Night.

“We had a team meeting with the athletic director about two hours before a game, and they told us that he was indefinitely suspended, and they could not give us a reason why,” senior captain Alexandra Lee said. “On Friday (Oct. 18), they fired Doug.”

In an interview with Palo Alto Online, Deputy Superintendent

Spotlight

ART BY SHIVA MOHSENIAN

Anti-vaxx

A look into the controversy behind the anti-vaxx movement in the US. PAGE B4-B5

Karen Hendricks said he was fired due to his “performance.”

However, at the Nov. 5 PAUSD Board meeting, several parents and Stotland’s attorney addressed this reasoning.

“This decision was based on politics not merit. The district bowed to the threats (of ) a couple parents without even asking to hear the voices of pretty much all of the other parents and players.

This is why (the team and parents) are protesting. This is why this is just the beginning of this,” Stot-

Science & Tech

MAYA RATHORE/THE CAMPANILE

Ketogenic diet

Exploring the world of alternative diets and their benefits.

PAGE B8

land’s lawyer, Todd Emanuel, told the Board.

According to Emanuel, Stotland’s employee file lacked a single negative comment or criticism.

Parents were alerted of Stotland’s dismissal earlier than students were. According to Lee, athletes received a text from Athletic Director Nelson Gifford around 8:30 p.m. on the day Stotland was dismissed. Lee said that the way Stotland’s termination

Water Polo Coach

A3

Sports

UNITED STATES NAVY/FAIR USE

Sport broadcasting

Students delve into the world of sports commentary.

PAGE C4-C5

Friday, November 8, 2019

The Campanile

A2

NEWS

New mental health center Stanford announces expansion cancellation to be added to Midtown Stanford University declines Santa Clara County General Use Permit conditions

By Kai Vetteth & Sloan Wuttke Online Editor & Staff Writer

S

tress, anxiety and other mental health issues have become increasingly common in teenagers across the nation, prompting Allcove, a network of standalone, integrated youth mental health centers, to pilot one of its first centers in Palo Alto.

Allcove’s public, walk-in mental health center geared for ages 12-25 is expected to open in May 2020 on 2741 Middlefield Road at Midtown Shopping Center, two blocks away from Greene Middle School.

Ana Lilia Soto, Allcove’s youth outreach specialist, helped facilitate youth involvement in Allcove through a youth advisory board composed of racially, culturally and socioeconomically diverse 16-25 year olds from the area.

Through this board, she hopes to receive valuable input and to ultimately use the board’s insight to create a service to cater to all teenagers’ needs.

“These youth were asked to envision a center that would ensure that youth would engage with and recognize (the center) as a place to connect with themselves,” Soto said. “They have been active in choosing the site locations assessing safety and access, part of the evaluation system as we look at outcomes and sustainability and will now work on the design of the centers.”

“There’s evidently a need for more support in our community for youth.”

Phebe Cox

Stanford clinical professor Dr. Steven Adelsheim, partnered Allcove with Santa Clara County Behavioral Health Services, Soto said.

Subsequently, Allcove applied for Mental Health Services Act Innovation funding, they were approved in August 2018 to open two sites in Santa Clara County.

Allcove, originally inspired by the Australian meditative mental health app Headspace, aims to holistically serve the mental health needs of youth and provides a wide array of support systems in a judgement-free zone, according to their website.

Senior Ellie Fitton, a member of the Allcove Youth Advisory Board, works alongside Soto and other board members to reimag-

ine youth mental health services in the U.S. “(The Center is) basically to create a space where (teenagers) can get primary health care, but then also be free of judgment, so it’s redesigning health seeking (for teenagers),” Fitton said.

The center will be free and will not require parental consent for teens looking for help with mild to moderate mental health issues, Planned Parenthood services such as sexual health counselling and sexual health testing, therapy, employment services, substanceuse counselling and relationship counselling, all tailored to target the specific needs of the Palo Alto community.

“We want to create a space where everyone feels safe and valid, regardless of which services they’re seeking.”

Phebe Cox

As compared to on-site school mental health services, Allcove is more discreet and privatized, according to Fitton.

“Our high schools have given (students) a lot of resources in the past couple years , but I think having a center like this you wouldn’t immediately know from the name ‘Allcove’ that it’s a mental health center, so it’s very private and judgement free,” Fitton said.

The space offers students the capacity to compartmentalize their school life and personal life rather than having to risk social or emotional turmoil that can come with having mental health services on campus, possibly garnering unwanted attention, according to Fitton.

“Some people don’t like getting that call slip to go to the school counselor as there’s stigma around that,” Fitton said. “They feel judged getting that call slip in class, and people just won’t go out of their way.”

With teenage suicide rates at the highest level ever according to a 2019 report by the Journal of the American Medical Association, Phebe Cox, a Gunn senior on Allcove’s Youth Advisory Board, said services like Allcove are more necessary than ever before.

“There’s evidently a need for more support in our community for youth, especially more preventative care within the mental health system,” Cox said. “We want to create a space where everyone feels safe and valid, regardless of which services they’re seeking.”

By Bruno Klass

Board Correspondent

S

tanford University’s decision to abruptly cancel its 3.5-million-square-foot expansion means that the Palo Alto Unified School District won’t be getting extra students from the planned housing, but also won’t be receiving the tens of millions of dollars that would have come along with these new students.

Stanford’s surprise announcement on Nov. 1 to pull back from major expansion plans that were at least three years in the making also apparently ended the side agreement that the school district was hoping to implement with Stanford.

“Our major concern was mitigating the impact of additional housing that was going to be built under the new GUP (General Use Permit),” said Todd Collins, vice president of the PAUSD school board. “If there is no GUP, there won’t be any new housing, so no need to mitigate.”

Stanford’s announcement was made four days before a meeting on the GUP, which could have been the last before Santa Clara County decided its fate. If the permit had been approved, Stanford would have been allowed to build additional academic facilities and more than 2,600 new beds for students by 2035, plus additional housing for workers.

Collins said he thinks Stanford did not want to implement some of the conditions the county wanted.

“I can’t speak for the Board as a whole, but from my point of view, I wasn’t surprised,” Collins said. “Stanford had indicated for several months that it wouldn’t accept a permit with the conditions the county had proposed, and the county had continued to indicate that it would not negotiate or even discuss a development agreement. Something had to give, and the upcoming vote forced the issue.”

Collins does not think that the cancellation will have a big impact on the district.

“I think it does not affect the District or our students,” Collins said. “In some ways GUP process has been good for PAUSD - it has improved our ties to and relationship with Stanford, and we’ve found areas of common interest.

We’ve also established a structure and floor level for mitigation, for if and when Stanford does build future rental housing.”

Two weeks prior to Stanford’s announcement, the Stanford Coalition for Planning an Equitable 2035 organized a rally to address its perspective on the planned expansion. SCoPE 2035 is a group of students who support a “fair”

BRUNO KLASS/THE CAMPANILE

At the rally, people hold up signs in protest of the new housing, transportation and greenhouse gas emission issues. “The issue that everyone is trying to solve is what happens if Stanford builds and more students come into PAUSD for whom there is no funding,” said Palo Alto Unified School District Board of Education member Shounak Dharap. outcome in the negotiations between Stanford University and the county. The committee was particularly interested in issues regarding housing, transportation, labor provisions and greenhouse gas emissions.

According to SCoPE 2035 board member Shelby Parker, the rally was successful.

“We had hundreds of students show up for an action off campus, which is hard to do,” Parker said.

“We were also excited that 100 or so students stayed for the beginning of the hearing (on Stanford’s proposal.”

“Our major concern was mitigating the impact of additional housing that was going to be built under the new GUP. If there is no GUP, there won’t be any new housing, so no need to mitigate.”

Nancy Crop

In addition to Stanford students, public school advocates and community leaders were also present at the protest at King Plaza in Palo Alto. Rally attendee and PAUSD Board of Education member Shounak Dharap ad-

dressed one concern: “The issue that everyone is trying to solve is what happens if Stanford builds and more students come into PAUSD for whom there is no funding,” Dharap said.

One controversial aspect of the GUP involved the agreement between Stanford University and PAUSD, in which Stanford agreed to pay $138 million to the district over 40 years. The deal specified that the university would pay $5,800 yearly for each new student who joined PAUSD as a result of its expansion plan.

“We agree that PAUSD deserves money for extra students being sent into the district,” Parker said. “However, it is unethical for Stanford to make this money contingent on a development agreement.”

Due to objections from Santa Clara County, Stanford suspended the agreement it negotiated directly with PAUSD. According to the Daily Post, the agreed-upon $138 million represents about 30% of the cost of educating the additional students that the Stanford expansion likely would have brought.

“Ideally, the outcome is full mitigation,” Dharap said. “For every student that comes into PAUSD, we will get a corresponding amount of money to support the infrastructure that will overall support those students…this is what everyone is advocating for.”

Crop also said the part of the $138 million Stanford agreed to

Service fair showcases variety of groups

Community-oriented service groups inform students of potential volunteer options

By Leila Khan

T

pay the district would have gone toward the cost of building 550 additional homes for students and employees.

“For every student that comes into PAUSD, we will get a corresponding amount of money to support the infrastructure that will overall support those students.”

Shounak Dharap

Crop also raised concerns with the funds attached with the agreement.

“We absolutely can’t accept hundreds of new students unless they come with funding.”

The university expansion would have generated more than 9,000 jobs. Crop said that for this many people, 550 homes is not enough, but rather the actual number of estimated homes needed would be closer to 2,000.

According to SCoPE, another goal of the rally was to show the Santa Clara Board of Supervisors how much Stanford students care about improving the conditions of workers on campus, specifically including their experience as it relates to commuting, traffic and housing.

UPCOMING EVENTS NOV

VETERANS DAY

NOV

ALMOST MAINE PREMIER

NOV

TURKEY TROT

NOV

THANKSGIVING BREAK

NOV

HOLIDAY TREE LOT

DEC

FINALS

DEC

WINTER BREAK

11

Practice for Thanksgiving break.

Managing Editor

he Youth Community Initiative hosted their annual Service Fair, in which student-led and other communityoriented service groups gathered on the Quad on Nov. 6. The services represented at the fair each year include a range of companies and organizations working towards better animal care, hospital service, entrepreneurship and humanitarian projects.

“Our goal is to make people feel more connected to each other and feel a sense of belonging in the (community).”

Jimmy Nguyen

The fair consisted of several tables set up for different organizations, with one to four representatives per group. The representatives displayed their goals and past endeavours on bright presentation boards.

Magical Bridge, a foundation which aims to provide a safe and welcoming environment for all children, was represented by five ambassadors. Deborah Getz, the Director of Community Engagement for Magical Bridge, recruits middle and high school students for internships over the school year and summer.

14

21

Another school play you won’t go to.

Trade in your old food for new food.

LEILA KHAN/THE CAMPANILE

Seniors Kate O’Connor, Mitali Kessinger and Nathan Strope gather around the Magical Bridge Foundation table to learn more about volunteer opportunities. “Magical Bridge Foundation builds inclusive playgrounds that welcome everybody,” Deborah Getz the director of community engagement said.

“Magical Bridge Foundation builds inclusive playgrounds that welcome everybody,” Getz said.

“It’s not a special needs playground, but it’s a place where children and adults of all abilities are able to come play and have fun.”

The foundation hosts stands at local farmers markets and puts on free weekly concerts over the summer to attract members of the community to the playground.

“I run our team volunteer program called the Kindness Ambassador Program where we work with students to come out and help us on the playground, program events and other activities out in the community,” Getz said.

Getz and her team of teen members have been gathering donations to create playgrounds around California and other states.

Another popular organization at the fair was the Ronald McDonald House, an organization partnered with the Stanford Children’s Hospital. Jazmin Cervantes represented the program as a youth program associate at the fair.

“We provide support to kids and families that are being treated at the Stanford hospital,” Cervantes said. “We have many volunteers that come in and help us keep track of the kids, making sure they’re safe and making sure that all the families are being treated in a way that it gives them hope for their life threatening diseases.”

Along with the Ronald McDonald House, students can get involved with the community through the Youth Community Service club on campus. Senior Laura Kim is on the board and

the vice president of YCS at Paly.

“We try to promote a lot of different opportunities for students on every club meeting,” Kim said. “This week, we’re doing Veteran’s Day cards, whereas sometimes we do maybe blankets for other organizations.”

Jimmy Nguyen represented the YCS club and is the current program coordinator of the Youth Community Initiative, aiming towards connecting the student body with organizations in the surrounding area.

“We had a video on ADHD (Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder) awareness, and now we’re working on depression awareness,” Nguyen said. “Our goal is to make people feel more connected to each other and feel a sense of belonging in the (community).”

25

29

17

21

It’s like Winter Break but it’s shorter and you have to study.

Contribute to climate change.

Seniors’ last day of school.

You’ve been looking forward to it since Aug. 13.

Friday, November 8, 2019

A3

The Campanile

NEWS

False alarm of shooting at Great America frightens students A misreported robbery disrupted park operations, caused attendees to flee park

Water Polo Coach Continued from A1

was handled was disrespectful because the administration was not transparent enough.

“We haven't felt like the promise (of transparency, respect, and equity) was maintained. To me, it just feels like a lack of respect for the team.”

Laura Malagrino

CREATIVE COMMONS/USED WITH PERMISSION

A robbery misreported as a shooting sent park visitors running for the exits during the Great America Halloween Haunt. There were several Paly students in attendance, many of whom fled the park. "There were a lot of people crying, but mostly people were in shock," sophomore Hadar Shoval said.

By Siddhartha Sahasrabuddhe & Benjamin Stein Business Manager and Staff Writer

P

anic swept through the Great America Halloween Haunt when theme park security misreported a robbery as an active shooter situation, sending attendees running for the exits on Oct. 26.

The Santa Clara Police Department confirmed that no shots were fired, and said the robbery led to a fight. Chaos ensued, and someone screamed about an active shooter.

The Halloween Haunt is an event popular with Paly students, as it is geared towards young people. Every year, Great America transforms into a haunted house that includes conventional attractions such as mazes and scare zones, but also novelties such as

live performances.

Sophomore Tony Jeon attended the Haunt on the night of the chaos and said he was with his friends when he heard screams and saw people sprinting for the exits.

“It was a really scary moment because of how many times I had seen shootings on the news, and I thought that I might be experiencing it,” Jeon said. “I was just trying to keep my friends and myself safe from whatever was in that park.”

While the reports of a shooting ended up being unsubstantiated, Jeon said he still found the experience scarring.

“It was very traumatic for me because of the feelings of adrenaline and fear,” Jeon said.

Sophomore Hadar Shoval was also at the park during the incident. Shoval ran to a nearby hotel when he heard rumors of a shooter.

“It was really intense in the

moment,” Shoval said. “There was a lot of screaming and crying, but I was just trying to get as far from the park as possible.”

“There was a lot of screaming and crying, but I was just trying to get as far from the park as possible.”

Hadar Shoval Shoval said that he was deeply affected by the reactions of others around him.

“There were people crying, but mostly people were in shock,” Shoval said. “It was kind of weird because the incident just felt like a big misunderstanding.”

Great America returned to normal operations later that night, once police had confirmed that there was no threat at the park.

“The safety and security of our guests and associates is our highest priority,” the park said in a Tweet.

In order to aid students who feel traumatized as a result of this incident, Paly Assistant Principal Dr. Clarisse Haxton said she urges students who want help to communicate with any of the guidance and counseling services that Paly offers.

“If there is any issue that they want to talk about, students can go to any of the four support systems,” Haxton said. “You can talk with your teacher, teacher advisor and guidance or wellness.”

Haxton also said teachers have been informed about the incident per the District Student Services office policy.

“Our approach is to communicate about these events to staff,” Haxton said. “Because staff are aware, when students come to talk teachers know about the event and are able to help.”

Author speaks to parents at Haymarket Theatre about parenting The talk encourages parents to slow down and focuses more on quality parenting

“We don’t want to play for an administration that is prepared to treat its athletes and its coaches and its students like this,” Lee said.

The team ensured there would be a balance between the attention drawn by the protest and the attention given to the seniors, according to Lee. She also said the protest was beneficial in bringing attention to Senior Night.

“For instance, we (printed) out flyers and on one side is our statement to explain why we are wearing pink caps and on the other side it’s a senior night flyer with photos of the seniors and brief captions about the seniors,” Lee said. “We bought a pink banner and wrote ‘Senior Night’ on it.”

“We had a team bonding event last weekend and a team dinner this weekend.”

Alexandra Lee According to junior Laura Malagrino, the team thinks it is not getting the respect it deserves from the administration.

“The PAUSD Promise is about transparency and treating all students with respect and

Broken Pipes

Continued from A1 “And it was kind of our big home game to prove to the rest of the league that we are the best team in the league. Having it moved to Gunn (High School), who doesn’t have as nice of a pool, affected our performance.”

“I was disappointed that the game we were sending our seniors off in was ruined by the sewage.”

Cole Vale

NEIL KAPOOR/THE CAMPANILE

Slow down! Carl Honore discusses the benefits of letting children explore the world at their own pace on Nov. 4 in the Haymarket theatre. Honore is an award winning author and speaker who focuses on slow parenting. He believes kids' lives are constantly being directly by adults, and there is no room for them to explore in life. Honore said that slowing down in parenting will positively affect children's health. "It's about quality, not quantity," Honore said.

By Neil Kapoor

News & Opinion Editor

S

tudents across the country are racing to keep up with extracurriculars, work and family life, author Carl Honore presented his “Slow Parenting: Raising Children in a Fast World” talk Monday night.

“(Young children) need time to explore the world at their own pace, to unpack, make mistakes, then reflect on it.”

Carl Honore Hosted in the Haymarket Theater, the talk aimed to teach parents the benefits of slowing down in parenting and its effects on children.

“We have stumbled into a unique moment in childhood, where kids’ lives are hijacked by adults like never before, by agendas and timetables,” Honore said. “We parents feel the need to push, polish and protect our children with superhuman zeal, to be the best of everything and the best at everything.”

Honore, an award-winning

author, broadcaster and TED speaker, cited research from The Economist, a popular magazine in the fast-paced business world, that concluded, “Forget frantic acceleration. Mastering the clock of business is about choosing when to be fast and when to be slow.”

Honore said going “slow” will enrich people’s lives.

“More and more people are doing the unthinkable. They are slowing down,” Honore said.

“This goes against the conventional wisdom, which tells us if we slow down, we’re lazy, unproductive, boring, etc. The tectonic plates are shifting; there’s a seismic shift occurring.”

Honore said this rising surge of deceleration is called the “slow movement.”

“Mastering the clock of business is about choosing when to be fast and when to be slow.”

Carl Honore “It’s about quality, not quantity, living in the moment, the present,” Honore said. “Not as fast as possible, but arriving at each moment as well as possible.

Once you realize that, it can revolutionize everything you can do.

How can I do this thing better by slowing down a bit? By finding the right speed for what I’m doing.”

“It can feel like it's all or nothing, if we're not completely on the alpha track, if we deviate even slightly, our children will be ruined for the rest of their lives.”

Carl Honore Young children, for example, should not feel the need to constantly have someone or something to play with, Honore said.

“We need more boredom,” Honore said. “(Young children) need time to explore the world at their own pace, to unpack, make mistakes, then reflect on it.

People learn how to think, innovative, create, use their imagination to think about who they are rather than what we or anyone else wants them to be.”

For adults, a more structured boredom can be in the form of mindfulness, a proven technique to improve one’s thinking abili-

ties, he said.

“Mindfulness begins to rewire the brain and increase gyrification, or more folds in the cerebral cortex, which helps you process information,” Honore said.

“People who meditate find that a small injection of slowness can achieve huge results.”

According to Honore, schools around the globe have become high-pressure assembly lines with constant testing. Coupled with parents trying to pad their children’s resumes, a noble and natural instinct, Honore said, parents often feel responsible for their children’s success.

“The content of a child’s resume becomes more important than the child’s character,” Honore said. “It can feel like it’s all or nothing. If we’re not completely on the alpha track, if we deviate even slightly, our children will be ruined for the rest of their lives. It’s like a cross between competitive sport and product development.”

Honore said students should try many extracurriculars with an open mind and then focus on one or two so they are not overloaded.

“To thrive in a fast world, you have to master the art of slowness,” Honore said. “To invoke the military adage, ‘Slow is smooth, smooth is fast.’”

Ijzerman said until the sewage problem is fixed, water polo practices will be held at Gunn, and he’s not happy with the situation.

Look said his team moved its final game to Gunn on such short notice because the girls SCVAL tournament was being held there, and the pool was already set up.

Steve Haney, a parent of a player on the team, was working the desk at the Gunn v. Mountain View game when the sewage problem arose.

“We could see the raw, brown sewage flowing from the sewer clean out.

It just kept flowing and flowing and flowing.”

Steve Haney “We kept smelling something very strong and very odd,” Haney said. “It wasn’t something that went away, so I thought the Gunn bench had done something. But the entire bench jumped up, and the ref noticed and stopped the game.”

Haney immediately could tell something was wrong when he

equity so that students never feel like (they are in) a toxic environment,” Malagrino said. “We haven’t felt like that promise was maintained. To me, it just feels like a lack of respect for the team.”

The sudden termination of their coach comes at a critical time because Central Coast Section Championships are just around the corner, and according to Lee, their coach’s dismissal has negatively affected their season.

“Good girls water polo coaches are few and far between,” Lee said. “And most coaches are spoken for.”

Malagrino adds that the intensity of the sport contributes to the difficulty of finding coaches.

“Because of the way (the dismissal was handled), the team is pretty divided,” Malagrino said.

“It’s not hostile, but you can feel that there is tension between the players.”

“Good girls water polo coaches are few and far between, and most coaches are spoken for.”

Alexandra Lee Malagrino also said Paly girls water polo usually has a reputation of being tight-knit. However, now, with the dismissal of Stotland, the team has become less unified.

“Like (assistant varsity coach Yen Lee) said, ‘In tough times you see who your real friends are,’ and that’s definitely happened,” Malagrino said.

According to both Malagrino and Lee, the team is taking steps to bond outside of practice and reunify.

Lee said, “We had a team bonding event last weekend and a team dinner this weekend, so we are looking for ways to unite outside of the pool.”

saw players and coaches reacting to something on the other side of the pool.

“We could see the raw, brown sewage flowing from the sewer clean out,” Haney said. “It just kept flowing and flowing and flowing. The game was called to a halt as the sewage seeped under the visiting team’s bench.”

Haney said a plumbing problem in the small gym lead to the overflow.

“As I understand, there was a toilet running for days in the small gym, which, when faced with a blockage has to come out somewhere,” Haney said.

Paly varsity water polo coach Ethan Look was also on the scene when the sewage first appeared.

“To my understanding it was just all superficial on the deck, and they were able sanitize the deck.”

Ethan Look “I noticed water running by our outside locker rooms, and thought, ‘That’s weird. Is someone using the outdoor shower?’ and then noticed that water smelled.” Look said. “And that’s when I looked up, and put it into high gear.”

Both Paly girls and boys varsity teams practiced at Gunn on Nov. 4, having to share pool time due to scheduling issues.

According to Look, Paly was able to clean the pool and deck quickly, and all Paly teams were able to resume normal practice schedules.

“To my understanding it was just all superficial on the deck, and they were able sanitize the deck,” Look said.

Both teams resumed practice at their home pool on Nov. 5, aiding their preparation for the Central Coast Section tournaments.

t

The Campanile

Friday, November 8, 2019

NEWS

A4

Facebook helps fund housing for teachers Board seeks to add Palo Alto Unified School District moves forward with affordable staff apartments affordable housing

By Olivia Ericsson Staff Writer

W

CC-BY-SA-2.0/CARDNL12

In January 2018, Santa Clara County Supervisor Joe Simitian proposed the affordable housing project to reduce the impact of the Bay Area housing crisis on teachers. Simitian announced Facebook pledged to help fund the project on Oct. 17. "We're excited to deepen our commitment to housing for people across the economic spectrum," said Facebook Vice President for Real Estate John Tenanes.

By Alex Liu Senior Staff Writer

D

ue to a shortage of affordable housing in the Bay Area, teachers in the Palo Alto Unified School District and other regional districts endure long commutes every day in order to get to and from work. Now, a donation from Facebook may enable regional teachers to obtain affordable housing.

Facebook has pledged to donate $25 million to help fund a project in Palo Alto that would build affordable housing for teachers, according to Santa Clara County Supervisor Joe Simitian in an announcement made Thursday, Oct. 17. According to Facebook’s vice president for real estate, John Tenanes, Facebook’s donation conveys the company’s commitment towards helping solve the regional teacher housing crisis.

“We’re excited to deepen our commitment to housing for people across the economic spectrum,” Tenanes said in an announcement.

“We hope partnerships like this can inspire other communities to develop their own innovative solutions to providing housing for teachers and other public service professionals, keeping them in the communities that depend on them.”

According to PAUSD Superintendent Don Austin, Facebook’s donation was necessary

for the project to continue.

“It is my understanding that the financing was essential for the project to proceed,” Austin said. “The donation allows teachers from East Palo Alto and San Mateo to now join with the five original members of the arrangement, including PAUSD.” Although the donation from Facebook permits the teacher housing project to increase the number of housing units that can be built, it will not increase the number of housing units allocated to PAUSD staff, according to Austin.

“We’re excited to deepen our commitment to housing for people across the economic spectrum.”

John Tenease

“I have read that the project has grown to around 100 units, and I have advocated more than the twelve spots we were allotted when the concept was formed,” Austin said. “(The donation) does not lower our contribution amount of $600,000 or increase the roughly twelve units set aside for our staff.”

Originally contracted to only provide housing to five school

districts — Palo Alto Unified, Mountain View Whisman, Mountain View Los Altos, Los Altos and Foothill-De Anza Community College — that number has since expanded to include districts in Menlo Park and East Palo Alto. With Facebook’s donation, teachers in nine districts, including the original five, will have access to the housing.

The housing is set to be developed on 231 Grant Ave in a 1.5 acre lot in Palo Alto, which is currently occupied by a parking lot and the Santa Clara Office of the Public Defender.

Santa Clara County Supervisor Joe Simitian first proposed this project in January 2018 in response to the Bay Area teacher housing crisis. In August 2019, the Santa Clara County Supervisors unanimously approved the project with a vote of 5-0, giving the project over to the Mercy Housing and Abode Communities — organizations focused on providing affordable housing — for design and development.

According to Teri Baldwin, president of the Palo Alto Educators Association, the teacher housing crisis stems from unaffordable housing prices due to insufficient salaries.

“Not only are house prices unattainable, but rents are outrageously high, teachers are part of the ‘missing middle’ — our

salaries are too high to qualify for low-income housing, and we don’t make enough to afford market-rate rents,” Baldwin said.

“Many teachers who rent live far from Palo Alto and have very long commutes, meaning they can’t stay after school for very long because they will be stuck in traffic for hours.”

However, according to Baldwin, this crisis not only pertains to Palo Alto and the Bay Area, but also to the entire state.

“Over the past seven years, studies have found that over 40,000 teachers left the state, and while it isn’t clear that housing costs was the only factor, many have stated it is a major one,” Baldwin said. “This has exacerbated the state’s teacher shortage.”

In an effort to keep teachers in Palo Alto, PAUSD is seeking different avenues to solve the lack of affordable housing in their own district. Currently, the district is looking into developing housing on 525 San Antonio Avenue.

“We are exploring our own project exclusively for PAUSD staff at...a property adjacent to Cubberley that is owned by PAUSD,” said Austin. “Housing is a complex issue and needs all of our best thinking. The process is not fast and would realistically take about five years for anything to be built on either property.

Until then, we continue to do our research and learn as we go.”

ith the last Palo Alto Unified School District Board of Education meeting, the board addressed many of the problems in the Palo Alto community on Oct. 15. The most prominent matter discussed is that of the new staff and teacher housing.

During the meeting, the board discussed the potential for staff housing on San Antonio Road on district-owned property. Many teachers and staff say they can’t afford to live in the Bay Area, which has a median housing cost 10 times above the national average.

A staff housing survey conducted in March 2019 by the district asked 1,365 respondents about their commute time to school and affordability in their current housing arrangement.

53% of respondents said they were unsatisfied with their housing arrangements, 59% of respondents said they were considering leaving the district because of the housing costs in the area and 79% of respondents said they would be interested in housing provided by the district.

Andrew Lie, president of Jefferson Union High School District Board of Education, said he believes his district’s efforts at providing affordable housing for staff will be well-received by many staff members.

“In the short term, providing below-market rate housing will alleviate the financial strain caused by soaring Bay Area rents,” Lie said. “In the long term, we hope that providing housing will help faculty and staff develop the financial stability needed to purchase a home with the money saved on rent. We plan to offer financial planning so that staff can come up with a savings plan.

We already offer mortgage down payment assistance through Landed.”

Lie said housing is an important benefit that helps recruit and retain high quality faculty and staff.

“If we can lower the cost of housing, we can remove one barrier for staff to live in the community in which they teach and work,” Lie said. “The cost of housing in the San Francisco Bay Area makes it difficult for educators to live in the communities in which they work.

The problem is very acute with our district, which comprises the communities of Daly City, Pacifica, Brisbane, Colma and Broadmoor.”

With the lowest property tax

base of the high school districts in San Mateo County, Lie has expressed that this means that we have lower revenue than our neighbors “This leads to lower salaries for our employees," Lie said.

“Many employees commute from communities outside of the District, or have second jobs to cover the high cost of living.”

Board President Jennifer DiBrienza said the No. 1 matter the district is addressing equity.

“Our test scores, as well as stories from our low income students and students of color, tell us we are not serving all students equally well,” DiBrienza said. “We are working hard to address this at multiple levels — academic supports for those who benefit, anti-bias work for all members of the community and family engagement to better serve all families and their needs.”

DiBrienza said the board is also focused on examining the middle school experience in the

“If we can lower the cost of housing, we can remove one barrier for staff to live in the commujntiy in which they teach and work.”

Andrew Lie

district.

“Part of that is related to the equity issue, but I also think middle school is a challenging time for all kids, and we need to be really thoughtful about how we structure the experience for students,” DiBrienza said.

DiBrienza said surrounding districts are starting to build workforce housing for their teachers.

“The county is already moving forward on a county-wide program to build housing in Palo Alto for surrounding districts to take advantage of,” DiBrienza said. “While that project is important, it is by no means enough housing for us. There is potential to eventually build housing on San Antonio at one of our properties. I look forward to working with my colleagues and the district staff to consider our options on this issue.”

Finally, the board discussed the updated designs proposed for the turf fields at Gunn and Paly. According to the district, at both sites the turf fields that are 10 years old and torn up. The new project includes removing existing turf and placing drainage systems.

ASB reflects on spirit week, looking to make improvements

After some controversies regarding point allocation, ASB hopes to improve sportsmanship between grades

By Johnny Yang

T

Sports Editor

he spirit dance rally on Nov. 1 marked the end of Spirit Week. Last month, the Associated Student Body has been planning for all activities and events leading up to that, Sophomore Class President Nysa Bhat said.

"Different people with different roles have had jobs in organizing Spirit Week,” Bhat said. “The four class presidents have been going over shirt designs, dance practices, float materials and it definitely was a lot of work.”

Senior Site Council Representative Mahogany Grissom said a big discussion during Spirit Week keeping the games fair.

“There was a large debate

“I think it would make Spirit Week more enjoyable for our officers instead of having to worry about the public eye questioning the ways that we handle issues like cheating during games.”

Mahogany Grissom

around who really got first place during the Wrap Your VP game because seniors hadn’t wrapped Teddy Butler’s head,” Grissom said. “Originally, (we were going

to) wipe (the points of that game) out of the scoring system because rules weren’t clear, and there was a lot of miscommunication. During our last meeting, however, (ASB Adviser Matt) Hall brought the topic up again because according to the ASB Constitution, points/ scores cannot be changed during Spirit Week.”

In addition to the fairness of

“The four class presidents have been going over shirt designs, dance practices and float materials and it definitely was a lot of work.”

Nysa Bhat

FRIDA RIVERA/THE CAMPANILE

games, Grissom said another unresolved item that ASB needs to spend more time on is the hostility between grades during rallies, such as when the seniors all sat down during the spirit dance of the juniors.

“For the future, I think we need to look more into how to control rivalry among grades,” Grissom said. “In doing so, I think it would make Spirit Week more enjoyable for our officers instead of having to worry about the public eye questioning the ways that we handle issues like cheating during games.”

Despite how other grades reacted to their dance, Grissom said

Sko vikes! The senior class cheers for their peers at a lunch-time rally during Spirt Week. Each grade competed in a game of cornhole, where students threw pillows through a tarp. Although losing the game, the seniors won spirit week with 22,425 points. "Class of 2020 worked really well as a group and put their whole hearts into the game," Senior Site Coucil Representative Mahogany Grissom said. she was impressed by the energy and enthusiasm demonstrated by the juniors.

“I think the juniors did a really good job with their numbers and creativity in their attire every day,” Grissom said. “During lunch rallies, you could see they had the largest group of people in the stands. Almost every day of the week they won best-dressed out of everyone. It goes to show how much passion they had for representing their class.”

Freshman Class President

Ashley Meyer said she is proud of her class during Spirit Week, given that it was their first year at Paly.

“I think our grade did a good job for our first year at Spirit Week,” Meyer said. “For the float, we had many people come and help make it, and we were able to finish with the final product very quickly. I love how our class was able to come together and work to create something.”

While Bhat said she was also happy with her class’s achieve-

ments during Spirit Week, she said she hopes Spirit Week will be able to evolve into more of a social event than a competition in the future.

“A lot of people during the games claimed grades were cheating, or that judges were marking classes on sportsmanship for stupid things,” Bhat said. “But in my opinion, these things should not have mattered. It’s a competition, but at the end it was more of a class bonding event. During Spirit Week, especially during

float building, I really got to know my class and meet many people. It was awesome.”

ASB is taking a week off but will resume its duties Monday, According to Meyer.

“After this week we will jump right back into planning events for this year,” Meyer said.

Grissom said the focus of the group will include breaking into small groups and discussing the issues, including an anti-vape committee, an advisory committee and a vlog committee.

Friday, November 8, 2019

The Campanile

A5

OPINION

PG&E ought to adjust allocation of funding to stop wildfires

By Emily Asher Managing Editor

H

ere in California, mid-August to late November used to be a peaceful time of year. It was a time when I would be reunited with my classmates, watch the leaves change colors and look forward to trick-or-treating on Halloween. But for the past two years, this time has been filled with face masks, air filters and air quality apps.

This once exciting season has now turned deadly. I now consider this time of year “wildfire season.”

In areas that are prone to fire, PG&E should be constantly updating the equipment to make sure that when the dry and windy season approaches, their equipment is ready to withstand the weather.

Just last year, California experienced its deadliest and most destructive wildfire recorded in history. It burned over 153,000 acres of land and destroyed over 18,000 structures, costing around $16.5 billion in repairs and property damage. An investigation by California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection found that the Pacific Gas and Electric Company bears the majority of the responsibility, believing that a badly maintained steel hook that held up a voltage line caused the initial ignition, and a distribution line damaged by bullets caused the second ignition.

PG&E faced liabilities of up to $30 billion and started filing for bankruptcy a couple months after the fire. They are still currently working with the Cal Fire and U.S. District Judges to

sort out all liabilities and payments.

PG&E received a tremendous amount of backlash from government officials and the public, causing intense scrutiny due to starting something so destructive. Many people, including myself, believed that they would try and fix this issue for the future.

However, the Kincade wildfire, which started on Oct. 23, 2019, has already burned 77,758 acres. This fire is yet again being blamed on PG&E because one of their transmission lines failed moments before the fire broke out, and another pipeline had fallen down, causing broken wires to be near two other fires in Contra Costa County, according to Newsweek. So what is PG&E doing wrong, and why hasn’t this issue been fixed?

In an effort to reduce the risk of more wildfires, PG&E has been doing “Public Safety Power Shutoffs,” in which they cut off electrical service to certain regions in California.

While these shutoffs vary by region, PG&E typically turns off the power for around 48 hours until the fire risk has passed. After the shutoffs, the company reinspects the electrical lines to make sure they are safe to turn back on.

As a result of the power shutoffs, schools, government offices and businesses are being greatly impacted.

Without utilities such as heaters, refrigerators and hospitals, many people are evacuating their homes due to the unhealthy living conditions.

This tactic is not practical and, in reality, is not the most effective way to reduce the risk of fire. In fact, it seems that PG&E is not looking out for the safety of the public, but instead is trying to save themselves from more financial debt and accusations. Even Gov. Gavin Newsom accused PG&E of “greed” and “complete dis-

ART BY ZANDER LEONG

missal of public safety” in a press conference.

PG&E has not acted in the best interests of California, as there are many different options that the company could have pursued to minimize wildfires other than leaving hundreds of people without electricity.

According to Newsom, the company had plenty of time to anticipate the wildfires and could have developed a better plan. For example, the company could have focused on improving equipment or increasing inspections throughout the year. Instead, the company ended up picking the least expensive option, leaving thousands of paying customers with no electricity.

Specifically, in areas that are prone to fire, PG&E should be constantly updating the equipment to make

sure that when the dry and windy season approaches, their equipment is ready to withstand the weather.

According to Business Insider, PG&E is currently making a promise to replace their poles with fire-resistant ones in fire-prone areas as well as invest $1.6 billion to trim trees near their wires.

However, this is something that should have been happening a long time ago.

After state regulators started investigating the company, they found that PG&E collected $244 million more than they were authorized to collect in oil and gas revenue while spending millions less than they were supposed to on maintenance of their equipment. This made them “fall short of industry safety standards,” according to Business Insider.

For example, the transmis-

sion line that caused Campfire was apparently 25 years too old by PG&E’s own standards, according to the New York Times.

However, PG&E is not solely responsible for the fires. The lack of funding for Smokey Bear, a U.S. Forest Service, also contributed to the incidents.

According to Popular Mechanics, 50% of Smokey Bear’s annual budget is aimed toward fighting the fires instead of the necessary prescribed burns, which are “natural” forest fires that reduce the amount of biomass, or brush, that causes major fires.

Because Smokey Bear spends a majority of their time and money focusing on putting out fires, they are left little to no time to do the prescribed burns.

Without the prescribed

burns, the risk of wildfires increases drastically. As a society, we need to make sure that Smokey Bear is receiving enough funding from either government funding or tax payers to perform preventative maintenance on the forests.

Without utilities such as heaters, refrigerators and hospitals, many people are evacuating their homes to places with power due to the unhealthy living conditions.

If PG&E and California do not make adjustments soon, wildfires will continue to be a massive and recurring problem.

Test-optional universities should be considered more viable

ART BY ADORA ZHENG

By Paige Knoblock Multimedia Editor

E

ach year tens of thousands of students across the country prepare to apply to choice colleges and universities.

Many high-achieving institutions have made the move to become testoptional on the grounds that standardized tests can not be indicative of students performance and ability.

Unfortunately, the process has turned from a seemingly simple process to a stress-inducing race to get

perfect scores, write eloquent essays and have a perfect assortment of extracurricular activities. One of the more short-term aspects of the application process is standardized testing; though the test itself only takes around four hours, testing takes up a significant amount of time for students on the front end.

Between taking APs, asking teachers for letters of recommendations and writing college essays, students have enough to stress about during their senior and junior years to also stress over standardized tests.

To reduce the number of standardized tests throughout sophomore, junior and senior year, students should consider test-optional schools, reducing overall stress and wasted time.

Test-optional schools al-

low students to apply to their school the traditional way, but instead of submitting test scores, they can write an additional supplement.

Other aspects of schools’ applications such as activities, grades and essays are factors that many work toward throughout their lives.

Activities such as sports, musical instruments and other extracurriculars many spent years doing and perfecting. However, these standardized tests are something that are completed at one point in your life, and often don’t indicate a students worth and abilities.

Numerous factors affect standardized test performance, which is the reasoning many schools give for not requiring test scores.

For example, according to their website, Middlebury College “is aware that

a range of factors can affect test scores, including socioeconomic background, test preparation, schooling and financial and educational resources.” As the school’s admissions department states, many different factors can affect students’ scores, which is why the SAT and ACT are not always accurate measures of students’ intelligence.

Though these tests originate from the idea that they are an equalizer as they can measure students’ natural intelligence, a new problem has recently arised, changing this philosophy. In more recent years, there has been a rise in private tutors and enrollment in classes for students to boost their scores.

This causes a disparity between students without the resources to hire tutors to help improve their score and

those with the money to do so.

Since Bowdoin College first implemented the option in 1968, more schools have become test-optional. Many high-achieving institutions have made the move to become test-optional on the grounds that standardized tests can not be indicative of students’ performance and ability.

The University of Chicago famously launched the Empower Initiative for first generation and low income students.

The initiative allowed qualifying students to apply test-optional with the hopes of increasing the number of minority groups on their campus.

Test-optional schools also help many different kinds of students in a wide range of situations. Test-

optional schools help those who feel their test scores are not an accurate representation of their intelligence and students who feel their application would be better without their test scores.

The process has turned from a seemingly simple process to a stress-inducing race to get perfect scores, write eloquent essays and have a perfect assortment of extracurricular activities.

Test optional schools are a great option for many students and should be seriously considered as a viable option.

Friday, November 8, 2019

The Campanile

OPINION

A6

Growing cancel culture prevents effective conflict resolution

ART BY NOA LEHRER

By Frida Rivera Editor-in-Chief

T

hree years ago, James Charles was a makeup-loving teen from New York who lived with his family and made YouTube videos for fun. A few years later, Charles got his first taste of fame when he began signing brand deals while hitting over 10 million followers on YouTube and Instagram.

This method enforces the idea that individuals should be immediately punished for their actions, disregarding any offers of apology.

Winning a People’s Choice Award for Beauty Influencer of the Year in

2018, Charles evidently found success as a celebrity.

However, a quick turn of events drastically changed his life.

Tati Westbrook, another YouTube beauty creator and former friend of Charles, labeled him as "cancelled" in a video, explaining she no longer wanted to associate herself with Charles because he betrayed her trust by signing on to a brand deal with one of her competitors, as well as voicing allegations of Charles' sexual misconduct. This ultimately led to a significant decline in supporters for Charles as well as hateful comments towards him on social media platforms.

What happened to Charles is an example of cancel culture, a growing trend that began on social media where consumers boycott an individual after deeming their actions questionable, problematic or

offensive. This fad is detrimental as it leaves no room for open conversations and explanations.

Westbrook and Charles ultimately resolved the conflict after a couple of YouTube video posts, which ended with Westbrook expressing her regret on Twitter for having publicly conveyed her frustration, saying she would communicate any conflicts in private in the future. We should mirror Westbrook’s realization and cancel cancel culture.

Cancel culture may seem distant for the average person, but it's much closer to home than we realize. Even in our own community, we claim to be tolerant of mostly everyone, but our actions do not reflect this.

One example of this is the aftermath of the 2016 presidential election—there were multiple instances of students at Paly being harassed over their views because they

were different than others’.

Regardless of if you agree or disagree with someone’s political beliefs, it is incredibly important to be tolerant and open to hearing out the other side.

At the Obama Foundation Summit on Oct. 29, former president Barack Obama urged his audience to take a step back and evaluate people as a whole, instead of defining them through specific incidents.

“This idea of purity and you’re never compromised and you’re always politically ‘woke’ and all that stuff,” Obama said. “You should get over that quickly. The world is messy. There are ambiguities. People who do really good stuff have flaws.”

The rise of call-out culture and cancel culture has given people the stepping stones towards putting people down and “cancelling” people for minor flaws. Society needs to instead recog-

nize that people are imperfect but have the capability to learn.

The sense of aggression linked with political beliefs is evident on many politicians or political candidates’ social media posts. Politicians’ comment sections are typically flooded with angry interactions between supporters and detractors, who are seldom willing to hear out the other side and tend to rely on ad hominem arguments instead of focusing on a person’s beliefs While some people would agree it is important to call out injustices and stand up for one's beliefs, cancel culture is not the most appropriate way to go about communicating these feelings. This method enforces the idea that individuals should be immediately punished for their actions, disregarding any offers of apology.

Most people want to

progress and grow but need to be provided with the opportunity to do so. Cancel culture blocks off any chance for individuals to redeem themselves before people make a decision to block or unfollow someone.

usually given priority, followed by a randomization of remaining students. The system ensures that those who are given less priority one year would then be given more priority the next.

Such radical independence bestowed upon students may seem unfeasible, but the use of arena scheduling at schools across the country has proved otherwise. A journal article written in 2008 by Andrew Surloff of the National Association of Secondary School Principals researched the effectiveness of arena scheduling, and concluded that it improved scheduling processes on multiple fronts.

In the article, Surloff claims that principals have technological tools that can enable more scheduling efficiency, cut down on scheduling complaints and teach students independence and maturity through their scheduling responsibilities.

Arena scheduling works towards giving students more free reign and, in turn, boosts their morale as they are more than capable of compiling their schedule themselves.

In this system, guidance counselors individually support students who fall behind, are overlooked or need help in the scheduling process. Following the “arena,” counselors work to fix a minority of students who may face scheduling inconsistencies, incomplete schedules or other miscellaneous issues that would prove to be detrimental.

A 2018 study conducted by an American analytics company, Gallup, found that 88% of superintendents agree that student engagement increases a school’s effectiveness. Arena sched-

uling provides just that—as a system that would theoretically increase student engagement, it would improve Paly’s academics and student morale.

Though arena scheduling has many upsides, some people are quick to note the potential drawbacks. Ken Tray, a social studies teacher at Lowell, notes of the drawbacks arena scheduling can precipitate. According to Tray, arena scheduling can lead to more work for school counselors to properly distribute students into evenly sized classes.

In order to prevent this

issue, the online arena process would have to implement stricter restrictions (i.e. capping class sizes) that would ultimately counteract uneven class sizes. The restrictions would ensure every class would be more or less equal in students. Some colleges even give their students the option to make three different schedules in that they’ll be guaranteed one of the three.

Arena scheduling exposes high school students to college-style scheduling systems, helping create more independent young adults.

Why do people go through

hours upon hours of mindless scheduling when students are fully capable of doing it themselves via technology?

Paly's scheduling system as of now requires students to change their schedules over the summer in person if there were to be any mistakes or last-minute changes. This process is unnecessary as a whole as it can be fully digitized through arena scheduling, minimizing the amount of time spent over the summer by both students and counselors to fix scheduling errors.

Paly must implement

arena scheduling. We’re in the epicenter of technological innovation—yet there’s no evidence of that in our outdated scheduling systems.

Regardless of if you agree or disagree with someone’s political beliefs, it is incredibly important to be tolerant and be open to hearing out the other side.

This generation will be facing many problems worldwide. Solutions require optimism, collaboration and plenty of communication, which will be impossible if this culture continues to grow.

Paly should use arena scheduling for student course selection

By Sloan Wuttke

E

Staff Writer

very school aims to cultivate ownership, responsibility and instill independence in its students. Yet schools often don’t give students the tools or opportunities necessary to properly exhibit these traits.

Arena scheduling, a system in which students create their ideal schedules, is necessary to change this.

Typically seen in college scheduling processes, arena scheduling is dependent on students to assemble their own schedules individually online. With granted access to the school’s master schedule, students can see each class taught in each period and construct their schedule from scratch, including prep periods.

Lowell High School, a public high school in San Francisco, has had an online arena scheduling system since 2013. They have previously utilized a lower-tech, physical version of arena scheduling since 2006.

Seniors are usually given priority, followed by a randomization of remaining students. The system ensures that those who were given less priority one year would then be given more priority the next.

In arena scheduling, the system randomly assigns students to time slots in order to finalize their course selection periods. Seniors are

ART BY SLOAN WUTTKE

Arena scheduling exposes high school students to college-style scheduling systems, helping create more independent young adults better prepared for life beyond high school.

Friday, November 8, 2019

The Campanile

OPINION A7 Academic opportunities should become more inclusive

By Tien Ngyuen

Art & Photo Director

F

or about three years before high school and even after, the most common advice I have heard on how to make friends or simply be happier in high school is to join as many clubs and teams as possible. Joining interesting groups introduces you to interesting people, supposedly.

This culture leads to the mindset of "not being good enough," which is detrimental, especially at this age when we are just beginning to discover our potential and true passions.

But oftentimes, joining these groups can be harder than it seems.

To become a part of many of the academic teams at Paly, including Science Olympiad and Paly Robotics, students have to compete with their peers through an exam or a try-out period.

This can discourage some students who are genuinely interested in learning more about the subject because they may be worried that they will not be able to make it onto the team. Teams offered at schools should be used as a learning opportunity so that even if the

ART BY GINA BAE

student cannot initially pass the test or try-outs, they will be able to improve their experience and enjoy doing it.

If a student’s initial knowledge is not up to par with the standards of the team to be competitive in regards to other student members, they are unable to join and cannot reach their fullest potential in terms of their knowledge and experience. Because of this, academic opportunities at schools ought to be more inclusive to allow a broader range of people to join.

This is just one of the things that contributes to Paly’s culture of prioritizing competition and

intelligence over interest and a genuine passion for learning. This culture leads to the mindset of “not being good enough,” which can be detrimental on the students’ mental health, especially at this age where we are just beginning to discover our potential and passions.

Students should be allowed to join any academic team that captivates them so that they learn that they are able to try new things that they are really interested in, rather than being discouraged to join new groups because they feel they are not good enough.

Though I understand a major reason for the

current try-out or test entrance is to enhance the group’s competitive edge, there are many ways to keep the competitive spirit alive while still including all interested students.

One option for a solution could be to have a no-cut or amateur version of all academic teams on campus so that students would be able to join a no-cut team if they are interested and potentially build their way up to the cut team if they wanted to.

This way, students could see if they really enjoy the activity and the no-cut teams would still be able to participate in

and attend competitions against other amateur leagues.

This ensures that students who are genuinely interested in the subject can test out of teams and are encouraged to explore their interests. Not only that, but it helps to alleviate the stigma and pressure of trying out.

Though students could possibly join teams outside of school that promote inclusivity, those options tend to have a higher price tag, so many people may not be able to afford it.

Academic opportunities should be more inclusive, as high school is the time when students

are able to explore and develop their interests. Their ability to join extracurriculars should reflect that.

Though students could possibly join teams outside of school that promote inclusivity, those options tend to have a high price tag, so many people may not be able to afford it.

The exclusivity of teams along with the negative attitude towards trying to do new things students are interested in but may not exceed in adds to the toxic culture at Paly.

Friday, November 8, 2019

The Campanile

A8

EDITORIALS

The CCC should digitalize All students should be able to college application materials choose to have a flipped class

O

ne by one, students tentatively enter the Guidance office and place their cover sheets and secondary school reports in the designated basket.

While some students lift up the stack of forms, discreetly sliding their own papers to the bottom, others cautiously linger near the basket to double-check that their college lists aren’t seen.

For many students, the college admissions process is private. Unfortunately, this need for privacy on some students’ part is not fostered by the form submission system in place.

The Campanile thinks Paly ought to digitize the college application material process to increase efficiency on both the student and school ends, as well as ensure student privacy.

Digitalizing this system would significantly decrease the risk of accidentally sharing of private information.

Currently, submitting materials such as cover sheets and secondary school report forms involves physically obtaining the necessary forms, filling them out using pen and paper, and placing them in a basket in the Guidance office. Afterward, according to

Ann Deggelman, coordinator of the Teacher Advisory Program, the information is entered into Naviance to pre-populate the Senior Survey and is screened for any missing documentation or confusing information.

The data entry portion for the cover sheet is a time consuming processing.

The main disadvantage of this system is that, because the senior class size is large and most students are applying to multiple colleges, the data entry portion for the cover sheet is a time-consuming process, according to Deggelman.

By utilizing digital forms in place of physical ones, we think necessary information could be more easily and more quickly transmitted, which Deggelman said will hopefully happen.

Furthermore, the current submission process does not ensure student privacy or security.

Because all seniors turn in their forms in the same basket, students’ college lists, which are considered private, are easily visible to peers.

Secondary school reports also require sensitive information, including a student’s social security number, which other students may be able to see. Digitizing this system would significantly decrease the risk of accidentally sharing of

private information, as it would only be able to be accessed by designated school officials.

Additionally, using digital methods for college material submission increases flexibility for students, as they would not have to physically submit their forms to the Guidance office during school hours. It’s also a more environmentally friendly option.

Despite these advantages, The Campanile understands the digitization of college application materials is not simple. According to Deggleman, although efforts have been made to digitize the process, there is still no direct method to transmit data between Google forms and Naviance.

Because all seniors turn in their forms in the same basket, students’ college lists, which are considered private, are easily visible to peers.

Although implementing a new digital process may be difficult, The Campanile thinks Paly should prioritize finding a better submission process. The introduction of some form of a digitized process would ensure added security for student information and enhance overall efficiency.

A

s education continues to evolve, traditional teaching methods have begun to make way for newer instructional approaches designed to not only accommodate advancements in technology but also cater to alternative learning styles.

Students should be able to decide whether they want to be in a flipped class or not.

In particular, several Paly teachers have implemented flipped learning-style classrooms, where students learn content on their own outside of school, through videos or textbook notes, and complete homework in class.

While this may be effective for some, others prefer a more conventional format.

However, the lack of indication in the course guide of whether a course is taught in a flipped style has left many students stuck with a teaching method that does not align with their learning preferences, making the class more difficult.

In order to prevent students from being unnecessarily enrolled in classes that do not meet their learning styles, The Campanile thinks flipped classrooms should be easily identified in course guides and during course selection.

This would be similar to blend-

ed courses, which offer periods where students do not have to sit in the classroom and can instead learn material more independently.

Blended classes are labeled in the course guide and during the course selection process due to their distinctive structure.

If blended learning classes are plainly classified because of their specific teaching and learning approach, it is only logical that an equally unconventional teaching method such as a flipped class be treated the same way, and labeled in the course catalog.

Students should be able to decide whether they want to be in a flipped class or not, but, since teachers do not currently specify whether they operate their classes in a flipped way, The Campanile suggests implementing standard requirements that a class must meet in order to be classified as flipped.

The Campanile suggests implementing standard requirements that a class must meet in order to be classified as flipped.

This includes specifics such as how much time is dedicated to teaching versus homework in the classroom.

Classes that meet these requirements should be distinguishable

from traditional classes in the same subject during course selection so that students can register for the teaching structure they prefer.

The lack of indication in the course guide of whether a course is taught in a flipped style has left many students stuck with a teaching method that does not align with their learning.

While some may argue identifying courses as flipped would give students the opportunity to “teacher shop” or sign up for a certain version of the class because they want certain teachers, it is essential to prioritize student learning over this possibility.

In addition, this potential for “teacher shopping” already exists with blended courses and even in some electives with only one teacher.

In order to maximize student learning and ensure that class structures are designed to best serve the students, ought to be able identify flipped classes on the course guide and course selection platform, and choose whether or not to participate in them.

School-wide saftey procedures, communication require reform

A

s the lunch period came to an end on Nov. 4, students began mentally preparing themselves for fifth period. But as they walked to class, armed Palo Alto police officers raced after a suspected bank robber, causing panic and confusion.

The Campanile thinks Paly students and staff also need to take safety drill procedures seriously and capitalize on opportunities to practice them.

This same level of uncertainty from teachers, admin and campus supervisors led to a wide range of reactions – some faculty members told students to head off campus towards Town & Country, some started a lockdown procedure, and some teachers opted to continue with their lesson plan.

The Campanile thinks Paly should implement a school-wide Remind system in order to avoid confusion in chaotic situations, and change the way the school educates students about safety procedures.

Supt. Don Austin said Paly administrators did not call for a school-wide lockdown because of the quick turnaround time of the incident.

This made it impossible for administrators to contact all stu-

dents and staff simultaneously, particularly because the incident occurred in between lunchtime and 5th period. But a Paly remind could send information about an emergency to students and staff immediately, regardless of when the situation occurs.

With alarmingly high incidents of school shootings nationwide, The Campanile thinks Paly students and staff also need to take safety drill procedures seriously and capitalize on opportunities to practice them. To prepare for disasters, Paly currently holds Safe and Welcoming Schools Day, a minimum day allocated to covering topics such as changes to the student handbook, academic integrity, student wellness, Title IX policies and safety protocol drills.

Paly can have stateof-the-art emergency equipment and have flawless emergency operation plans, but it will only find success when students and staff take training seriously.

Though covering all these issues on the same day is a good idea in theory, Paly has historically had low student attendance on Safe and Welcoming Schools Day because it is a minimum day,

and takes place on a Friday before a long weekend.

Paly should implement a school-wide Remind system in order to avoid confusion in chaotic situations and change the way the school educated students about safety procedures.

The Campanile thinks the best approach to covering safety procedures is to periodically sprinkle them throughout the school year, as opposed to concentrating them all on one day. This would likely lead to higher student attendance during drill practice and ensure increased understanding of safety procedures.

According to Palo Alto Unified School District Safety, Security and Disaster Preparedness Manager Mike Jacobs, one of PAUSD’s main goals for the future is to ensure its students and employees feel as safe and as confident as possible in the face of a man-made or natural disaster.

Paly can have state-of-the-art emergency equipment and have flawless emergency plans, but it will only find success when students and staff take training seriously and perfect these plans.

NOVEMBER’S TOP TEN LIST Top ten things NOT to do in November 10) Set up Christmas decorations Nov 1.

9) Participate in "No Shave November."

8) Get a concussion in line on Black Friday.

7) Bring up politics at Thanksgiving dinner.

6) Let Fantasy Football ruin your holidays.

5) Eat that last slice of pie.

4) Host Friendsgiving just to post cute pictures.

3) Take that special someone on a date to Winter Lodge.

2) Pretend you like pumpkin spice lattes.

1)Post a picture at a pumpkin patch and caption it #itsfally'all.

—EMILY ASHER, PAIGE KNOBLOCK & LEILA KHAN

ART BY ANNA MEYER & LUCY NEMEROV

The Campanile Editors-in-Chief Annie Chen • Miranda Li • Lucy Nemerov Frida Rivera • Jaures Yip

Online Editor Kai Vetteth

Managing Editors Emily Asher • Leila Khan

News and Opinion Editors Neil Kapoor • Sophia Moore

Lifestyle Editors Maya Rathore • Adora Zheng

Science & Tech Editor Anna Meyer

Sports Editors Rebekah Limb • Johnny Yang

Multimedia Editor Paige Knoblock

Business Managers Siddhartha Sahasrabuddhe • Kiana Tavakoli

Art & Photo Directors Kaitlyn Lee • Tien Nguyen

Board Correspondent Bruno Klass

Olivia Ericsson Alex Liu Shiva Mohsenian Sarah O'Riordan

Staff Writers Jace Purcell Kris Risano Krista Robins Benjamin Stein

Photographers Emily Asher • Olivia Ericsson • Kaitlyn Lee Shiva Mohsenian • Jace Purcell Benjamin Stein • Emma Todd Andrew Toteda • Johnny Yang

Emma Todd Andrew Toteda Andy Wang Sloan Wuttke

Illustrators Kaitlyn Lee • Noa Lehrer • Zander Leong • Rebekah Limb • Shiva Mohsenian • Sophia Moore • Tien Nguyen Frida Rivera • Kiana Tavakoli • Andrew Toteda • Sloan Wuttke • Adora Zheng

Advisers Rodney Satterthwaite • Esther Wojcicki

Writing Coaches Evelyn Richards • Elisabeth Rubinfien

Letters to the Editors: Email all letters to editors to theeds20@googlegroups.com The Campanile prints letters on a space-available basis.

We reserve the right to edit submissions.

The Campanile only prints signed letters.

Advertisements: Advertisements with The Campanile are printed with signed contracts.

For more information regarding advertisements or

sponsors in The Campanile and their size options and prices, please contact The Campanile Business Managers by email at campanile.ads@gmail.com.

Note: It is the policy of The Campanile to refrain from printing articles that misrepresent or alienate specific individuals within the Palo Alto community.

The Campanile would like to thank the PTSA for supporting the mailing of our newspaper!

Our Vision Statement: The Campanile strives to uphold the highest standard of journalistic integrity through diverse mediums of storytelling and responsibly informing readers about local news, culture, opinion and athletics.

The Campanile

Friday, November 8, 2019

L FESTYLE ap is associated with a breadth of connotations. While some people think of the controversies associated with the lyrics and actions of rappers, others think of the people who have come to define the world of rap such as Tupac, Eminem, Kendrick Lamar and Kanye West.

Lately, however, a new group of people have entered the rap scene: women.

Since t h e

1990s, female rappers have been gaining recognition, with the first Grammy nomination for a female rap single being M C L y t e’s “Ruffneck” in 1993.

D e s pit e this groundbreaking event, it was not until 2018 that a woman won a Grammy for Best Rap Album, when Cardi B won for “Invasion of Privacy.”

Fu r t h e r more, 2018 featured the highest ever number of female rappers on the list of top 100 hip hop albums.

Junior Laura Malagrino frequently listens to rap a n d said that C ard i B ’s

award can be attributed to the increased popularity of female rap.

“Female rap didn’t enter the mainstream until recently and a lot of these award shows are just a popularity contest,” Malagrino said.

According to Malagrino, the surging prevalence of female rap is influenced in part by the popularization of “ghetto” culture.

“I believe (female rap) is a mixture between feminism and the popularization and gentrification of ghetto or hood’ culture,” Malagrino said.

“A lot of these female rappers are girls that grew up in poorer neighborhoods.”

Malagrino said Cardi B is one of the many examples of a rapper overcoming a tough past, speaking about how the famous rapper grew up in the Bronx and worked as a stripper.

“These situations have become romanticized and glorified, allowing for these girls to express themselves to the world.” Malagrino said.

Malagrino said these difficult experiences help influence the unique styles of female rap.

“Having faced discrimination and sexism, that creates that new sound that you might not hear in normal popular rap,” Malagrino said.

Female rap is also gaining recognition because women, including Malagrino, can easily relate to it.

“With male rap, it’s a lot harder for me to identify with the artists because it’s a guy talking about gangs, drugs and sex from a male perspective,” Malagrino said.

Furthermore, the themes of female rap are often less aggressive, Malagrino said.

“Female rap tends to be more about confidence and the hot-girl-summer ideals,” Malagrino said. “I actually would maybe consider it not confidence, but rather empowerment.”

Although male and female rappers sometimes act in similar, questionable ways,

public perception towards their actions vary. While Cardi B came under fire for accusations of rape and burglary when she was a stripper, Snoop Dogg, who was once tried for mu rd e r, emerged unscathed and has had a successful career since then.

Malagrino said that female and male rappers are frequently held to different standards, and that they are judged differently, even when they are rapping about similar topics.

“In reality, both girls and guys rap about similar stuff,” Malagrino said. “But because women have been told that it’s unattractive to be arrogant and cocky in the same manner that men are, it’s more noticeable when a woman does it.”

Similar to Malagrino, rap fan and junior Trisha Razdan finds that the themes in female rap generally differ from those in male rap.

“Male rappers o f t e n bring up (mention) women in their music and female rappers d o n’ t ,” Razdan said. “One similarity I see s o m e times is when listening to Cardi or Nicki, they both sometimes talk about men the way a lot of male rappers talk about women, but overall, female rap seems to have less talk about h--s and such.”

While Razdan said she generally listens to more male than female rap, Malagrino prefers listening to female rap.

“I like the sound of it better and I find that female rap has a lot of interesting tones and beats that I haven’t heard before,” Malagrino said.

While Malagrino is a fan of the lyrics of female rappers, junior Teg Singh, another avid

rap listener, prefers male rappers due to the more sexualized and materialistic lyrics of female rappers.

“Rap should communicate a message t h a t’s deeper t h a n money and lust, which is precisely why I prefer Rapsody’s m u s i c to other, more famous female rappers,” Singh said.

However, Singh agrees with Malagrino that double standards exist in rap.

“Among casual listeners, double standards do exist,” Singh said. “Average people tend to listen to female rap through the subconscious lens that a female rapping is unconventional, while someone who seeks to objectively value a rapper by their musical and lyrical skill does not care what gender the rapper is.”

According to Razdan, the rise of female rappers will have an impact on those growing up with mainstream female rappers.

“It’s important for anyone to see themselves represented in an industry,” Razdan said.

“Having prominent female rappers will allow younger girls to know that could be a career option if that’s something that they’re interested in.”

Despite the tremendous growth of female rap, it still has not reached an equal popularity level with male rap.

Rolling Stone only featured seven albums by female rappers in their list of top 30 hip hop albums of 2018.

Furthermore, despite increasing social acceptance of female rap, double standards regarding lyrics lead to female rap being criticized for dealing with themes of similar gravitas as male rap.

But Malagrino doesn’t let the criticism of the lyrics bother her; in fact, she finds them to be one of the aspects that makes female rap so empowering.

Malagrino said, “Something about a woman telling you how much money she’s made and how much she doesn’t give a f–-k really just does something for me.”

“(female rap) is a mix between feminism and the popularization and gentrification of ghetto culture.”

Laura Malagrino

“Someone who objectively values a rapper by their skill doesn’t care what gender the rapper is.”

Teg Singh

Text & Design by Siddhartha Sahasrabuddhe Art & Design by Kiana Tavakoli Lifestyle

SCIENCE & TECH

Keto diet

While many diets grip America, the ketogenic diet is one of the most popular.

As the standard American diet ravages many young Americans, the low carb diet prevails as one of the most beneficial options.

MAYA RATHORE/THE CAMPANILE

PAGE B8

KIANA TAVAKOLI/THE CAMPANILE

Homelessness

Paly alumni and community reflect on experiences with homelessness.

PAGE B2

Spotlight

ART BY SHIVA MOHSENIAN

Anti-vaxx parents

Community members explore the pros and cons of vaccination.

PAGE B4-B5

Lifestyle

ARTTESANO/CC BY-SA 2.0

Street art

Bay Area residents engage in adventurous, artistic activities.

PAGE B6

Friday, November 8, 2019

The Campanile

LIFESTYLE B2 Paly alumni, community members reflect on homelessness Former students share experiences with homelessness, discuss significant impact District had on their education

By Kiana Tavakoli

T

Business Manager

ucked away along a fence lining a rarely used Union Pacific railroad track in Redwood City, a dozen tents and makeshift shelters blend into the trees.

Named by those who reside there, Camp Seaport and other homeless communities have become increasingly common in the Bay Area.

The disparity between the wealthy and poor along the Peninsula is significant. Despite boasting an average income double that of the rest of the nation, according to Business Insider, the Peninsula has the third largest homeless population in the country, as reported by the Bay Area Council Economic Institute.

“California is both America’s richest state, and its poorest,” Gov. Gavin Newsom told The Campanile when he spoke to the class in February 2019.

Contrary to popular belief, the causes of homelessness are not always rooted in substance abuse.

Rather, the reasons for homelessness are much more diverse – a variety of life-changing events could propel one to the streets. At the same time, the generosity of others can help relieve such hardships and divert the path of those who may slip into homelessness.

According to Camp Seaport resident Elizabeth MelendexWank, homelessness is often brought on by a major life event such as the passing of a loved one.

“People say homelessness is (caused by the use) of a lot of drugs, that everyone uses needles and it’s not true,” Melendez-Wank said. “There are a lot of mental health problems out here. Some people have been here a lot longer and tend to try to cope with everything (using) drugs or alcohol.”

Melendez-Wank said her husband passed away in 2008. After that, she was laid off due to budget cuts and spent five years unem-

ployed, living on $1,400 a month.

Then, her father, who had been battling cancer, passed away.

“Something told me I had to go see my father, so on June 5, 2012, I got a plane ticket and went over (to New York),” MelendezWank said. “I became homeless after I used my last paycheck to go to my dad.”

Paly alumni Mark-Steven Holys, who graduated in 1976 and was recently interviewed by The New York Times about how he became homeless, also attributes his homelessness to a family crisis, which he said he did not want to go into detail about.

This crisis, he said, led him to drug use and consequent prison time, which made him unemployable, and eventually homeless. “(Homelessness) is a combination of a lifestyle problem and heavy-duty life problems outside of that,” Holys said. “I was totally crippled.”

According to MelendezWank, who received a masters in psychology, people from all walks of life can become homeless. “(People) have to understand that we are them,” Holys said. “If we are in this area, we were possibly your neighbor, the people who lived down the street from you last year. Do not think we are different because we are out there.”

Holys’ daughter, Julia Morrison, grew up in foster care and said her current success is due to the empathy her community showed her when she faced difficult times during her childhood.

Morrison went to Greene Middle School and now attends the School of Cinematic Arts at the University of Southern California.

“I truly believe that we can’t be successful without bringing other people with us,” Morrison said. “I wouldn’t be anywhere if it weren’t for, like I said, PAUSD (Palo Alto Unified School District).”

While attending Greene Middle School, Morrison’s grandmother, who had been taking care

KAREEN TAVAKOLI/USED WITH PERMISSION

Camp Seaport is a tight-knit community of homeless people. According to Camp Seaport resident Elizabeth Melendez-Wank, members of the community look out for one another and help each other. "We watch out for each others’ tent and for each other,” Melendez-Wank said. of her and her brother, passed away. Because her passing came around Christmas time, Greene Middle School held a gift drive for Morrison and her brother.

“I became homeless after I used my last paycheck to go to my dad.”

Elizabeth Mendez-Wank “(PAUSD) put us in special programs so we would get extra attention because we started to have behavioral issues,” Morrison said. “(The school was) really attentive to us…I am so grateful for that. I attribute so much of my success to all of the different people along the way who were paying attention.

Morrison contrasts the support she received in her time of need with the current lack of attention given to homeless people.

“When we look at the people living out there in tents and on the

street, they’re in a really different situation,” Morrison said. “I was homeless at the age of eleven. I didn’t have anywhere to live — I lived eight places that year. If it wasn’t for all of those people who noticed and cared, I wouldn’t have gotten to where I am today.”

Supporting homeless people through treating them as equal — not less than human — could go a long way toward alleviating the Bay Area homelessness crisis, according to Melendez-Wank.

“There are families that come out and pray and give us bags of food, and the kids say, ‘God bless you,’” Melendez-Wank said.

“That’s what’s needed out here because (homeless) people feel disconnected. They only come out at night, and they become antisocial.”

In order for the homeless to reconnect with society, Holys said people need to be more empathetic.

However, according to him, there is a current dehumanization of people who live on the streets.

In many cases, when there is a lack of outside empathy, the home-

less develop connections with each other and find motivation through building their own communities.

The people of Camp Seaport have built a tight-knit community, according to Melendez-Wank.

They watch out for each other, keep an eye on each other’s tents, take turns collecting water and share a communal kitchen where anyone can use a supply of propane gas to cook.

“What makes me the most happy is cooking,” MelendezWank said. “When there are people in the kitchen, there’s no fighting. You enjoy a good home cooked meal, be friendly and communicate. You are grateful that we have what we can get and be grateful for each other. I try to instill that in everybody.”

Melendez-Wank said she is still the same person she’s always been — she’s humble and she cares for people. Her son lives in a camp nearby and visits frequently, however most of her family does not know she is homeless.

Melendez-Wank said she keeps this information a secret

from most of her family because she does not want them to feel sorry for her. Beyond that, Melendez-Wank said there is a greater reason for her journey.

“I felt like I needed to do something here — I needed to help,” Melendez-Wank said. “I don’t think my mission was finished. I didn’t say anything because I felt I had something to do here — a mission.”

About a month ago, MelendezWank said she received a call from her brother, who lives in Canada, offering her a room in his home.

“My phone wasn’t even working at the time — I think God had something to do with this — he called me and he wants me to go to Canada,” Melendez-Wank said.

“He didn’t know I was homeless, he goes, ‘I’m not gonna let my big sister be out there like that.’ He was crying.”

Upon reflecting on their experiences, both Melendez-Wank and Holys have become much more resilient.

Holys said, “The brightest flowers are from the darkest roots.”

Experiences on newspaper have taught students valuable skills

Former staff members of The Campanile look back fondly on time on publication,which positively impacted careers

By Kai Vetteth Online Editor

I

n May 2005, Karishma Oza faced a difficult decision: accept the Editor-in-Chief position after just one year on The Campanile staff or continue her basketball career, a sport which she loved and had dedicated many years of her life to.

“After deep soul-searching, many tears and a career counseling session with (The Campanile co-adviser Esther Wojcicki), I ultimately gave up basketball,” Oza said. “Looking back, this was, indeed, the right choice. The aspects of basketball that I thought I’d miss — camaraderie, teamwork, (accomplishing) something incredible together, friendship — were actually all present in the journalism lab.”

“(The Campanile) taught me how to think on my feet in a fast-paced enviorment, handle criticism gracefully and pay meticulous attention to detail.”

Ashley Zhang

In addition to working towards a common goal and building lasting bonds with her peers, Oza said her time on The Campanile staff challenged her intellectually, too, forcing her to regularly make time-sensitive decisions under pressure.

“In my first month as an editor, we received news that rocked our community, our school (and) our classroom,” Oza said. “A middle school physical education teacher was accused of a sexual relationship with a minor.”

According to Oza, the teacher’s son wrote for The Campanile, adding an additional layer of complexity to their approach to reporting the news.

“After a multiple-day impassioned debate involving all the editors and eventually Woj, we decided to print the news,” Oza said.

“None of the editors had ever had

STANLEY WOJICKI/USED WITH PERMISSION

Flash from the past! 2017-18 and 2018-19 Editors-in-Chief and Managing Editors from The Campanile gather at the end of the 2017-18 school year. The group pose for a photo, celebrate the year and look back on their favorite memories. According to former Editor-in-Chief Ashley Zhang, many of her favorite high school memories are from her time on staff. “Memorable moments include taking pictures of various protests (once in the pouring rain), caffeine-fueled production nights, along with randomly meeting celebrities that Woj would bring in unannouced,” Zhang said.

to make a real-world decision like this before.”

Oza said these shared experiences improved her ability to collaborate, despite the editors’ sometimes dichotomous viewpoints on a given issue.

“I recall thinking of us like Supreme Court judges; we had liberal, moderate and conservative decision-makers,” Oza said.

These disputes, however, made her more equipped to handle different situations, according to Oza. After graduating from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill with a master's degree in Public Health, she joined a cancer research center, where she worked to make medical treatment more accessible to the deaf.

“I thrived in anthropology courses and in qualitative research because of years of experience interviewing people, hearing their stories, sharing their truths,” Oza said. “I use design and storytelling principles in my daily work as a public health professional through data dashboards, grant reports and applications, along with

print (and) online educational resources.”

Ashley Zhang, who served as Editor-in-Chief during the 201718 school year, said her experience not only developed crucial skills such as writing and but also changed the way she responds to difficult situations.

“As cheesy as it sounds, the feeling of rushing into the (Media Arts Center) on Fridays to distribute the papers is something I'll always treasure.”

Ashley Zhang

“(The Campanile) taught me how to think on my feet in a fastpaced environment, handle criticism gracefully and pay meticulous attention to detail,” Zhang said.

“More broadly, it’s shown me how

students are more capable of far more than we often believe, and we shouldn’t let age bar us from attempting anything.”

Since graduating from Paly, Zhang has continued to pursue journalism — first at the Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting in Washington D.C., then at The Daily Trojan, the University of Southern California’s newspaper.

“As cheesy as it sounds, the feeling of rushing into the (Media Arts Center) on Fridays to distribute the papers is something I’ll always treasure,” Zhang said. “There are few things more rewarding than holding a physical copy of something you put so much labor and love into creating.”

Recently, USC paid Zhang to contribute to the USC Beacon Project, which employs both students and professional investigative journalists to shed light on the Varsity Blues college admissions scandal.

“Being on Campy was the springboard to many incredible opportunities during and after high school,” Zhang said. “I’d

never considered journalism as a potential career path prior to joining The Campanile, and it’s now something I could envision myself doing for the rest of my life.”

“The Campanile definitely had a role in reminding me that I had a voice and that I had to speak up about issues that mattered.”

Nanor Balabanian

In contrast, Paly alumna Nanor Balabanian chose not to pursue journalism in favor of entering the nonprofit sector.

“I formed a nonprofit to aid Armenia, later on I got my Masters in Education from Stanford and became a history teacher in East Palo Alto,” Balabanian said.

“I never imagined doing these things as a high schooler.”

Balabanian said her experience writing for The Campanile demonstrated to herself that she could effect meaningful change, in the community and beyond.

“Getting my first article published when I had just moved from Lebanon and had never experienced anything like this,” Balabanian said. “I was able to write about the lack of the U.S. government in recognizing the Armenian genocide and the importance of doing so.”

After graduating from Paly, Balabanian attended the University of California, Santa Barbara, double-majoring in Political Science and International Relations, Balabanian said her experience shaped the trajectory of the rest of her life.

“The Campanile definitely had a role in reminding me that I had a voice and I had to speak up about issues that mattered,” Balabanian said. “Later on in life, my goal became to educate and inspire others to do the same.”

The Campanile

Friday, November 8, 2019

LIFESTYLE

B3

Caffeinated beverage consumption compensates for lack of sleep

Student energy drink usage rises despite recommendations to address fatigue through exercising, eating well, getting sleep

By Kris Risano Staff Writer

F

or junior Aarushi Khuranax, it is difficult to get enough sleep while balancing extracurriculars and the homework junior year entails. This lack of sleep has led Khuranax to seek other sources of energy.

There are many ways to boost energy besides the most common source, caffeine. According to Harvard Medical School, people can increase energy by drinking water, getting exercise, eating healthy foods and getting more sleep. According to the National Sleep Foundation, the recommended amount of sleep for a high school student is 8-10 hours, which many students fail to meet.

However, at any school, there will inevitably be students who do not reach the recommended amount of sleep. At Paly, students are turning to various resources to help remedy this issue, which often take the form of caffeinated beverages.

“I used to drink coffee in the mornings before school, but after a while I was not getting the same uplift of energy that it was giving me in the start.”

Leon Romeo

According to a 2014 Stanford study, many students listed excessive homework as the main cause of their sleep deprivation.

This study sampled over 4,000 high school students, and the

data showed that these students were averaging over three hours of homework per night.

“I do not get enough sleep nightly, because I am always staying up late studying for my classes,” Khuranax said.

“Long-term well-being means examining and working to change the habits and circumstances influencing how we use our time, energy and resources.”

Josh Bloom

Coffee is one option many students who struggle with low energy turn to. Many notice a boost in their energy levels after drinking it — however, coffee is just a temporary boost, and one cup typically does not provide sufficient energy to get through the entire day.

Once students begin to rely on coffee for an energy boost, the possibility that they will need a beverage that contains more caffeine increases, according to a study by the Department of Behavioral Sciences at Johns Hopkins University.

“I used to drink coffee in the mornings before school, but after a while I was not getting the same uplift of energy that it was giving me in the start,” junior Leon Romeo said. “I began looking for drinks that tasted better, and had more caffeine than one cup of cof-

KRIS RISANO/THE CAMPANILE

Junior Aarushi Khuranax fights her sleep deprivation by drinking a 20 oz Redbull in her 5th period class. In the afternoon it is difficult for her to stay focused due to her lack of sleep. She often turns to energy drinks to combat her tiredness. “It often kicks in after half an hour,” Khuranax said. fee in the energy drink sections.”

While coffee generally has more caffeine than energy drinks, students are often drawn to other energy drinks because of their cheap price, better taste and accessibility.

“I used to always turn to drinks such as Red Bull, especially when I was on the go,” Romeo said.

According to Romeo, healthier alternatives to energy drinks such as Monster and Red Bull do exist.

Romeo said that Yerba Mate is a highly caffeinated drink that has

less sugar and more naturally added caffeine than energy drinks.

The caffeine concentration in a 15.5 oz. can of Yerba Mate is more than double that of a 8.4 oz can of Red Bull, but they often contain the same sugar content.

Some types of Yerba Mate have less sugar than an energy drink or no sugar at all.

“Yerba Mate keeps me more energized without having to worry about the health concerns of the artificially added caffeine in Red Bull,” Romeo said.

However, science teacher Joshua Bloom does not recommend caffeinated beverages for students.

Bloom said students should try to address the root cause of the problem instead of attempting to mitigate the effects.

“I’d prefer someone focus on the root causes of their low energy and address those,” Bloom said. “That is a wellness approach.

Addressing long-term well-being means examining and working to change the habits and circumstances influencing how we use

our time, energy, and resources.”

Bloom said exercise is a crucial part of staying energized. For students, it is important that they try to find time to exercise during the day. However, it can be difficult to do this due to their busy schedules.

Bloom mentioned that it is important to eat balanced meals, especially breakfast. However, overeating weighs the body down due to body diverse energy towards digestion in addition to feeling overfull.

Paly student describes experiences living in foreign countries

Junior Ehsaan Mohammed discovers competitive academic culture after moving to Palo Alto from United Arab Emirates

By Neil Kapoor

News & Opinion Editor

N

ot many teenagers have lived in three continents.

Or studied at two high schools. Or persuaded their parents to move to Palo Alto.

But for junior Ehsaan Mohammed, these uncommon experiences are central to his multicultural life story, capturing a part of Paly’s diverse student body.

“I’ve lived in a lot of different places, in different countries, so I have a really international background, which is unique,” Mohammed said.

“South Africa was really dangerous.

I couldn’t just walk home by myself after school. I had to wait for my mom to come pick me up inside.

It just wasn’t safe, and I’m glad I don’t live there anymore.”

Ehsaan Mohammed

Mohammed came to Paly in the fall of 2018 during the middle of his sophomore year. Born in Pretoria, South Africa, Mohammed said his family originally hails from India.

“Several generations ago, my ancestors came to South Africa for opportunity,” Mohammed said. “My family has been there since.”

While South Africa brought economic opportunity — Mohammed’s mother worked in software while his father worked at the family-owned store called Casey’s — living there also came with challenges, including unsafe streets and the slow social progress in its post-apartheid state.

“South Africa was really dangerous,” Mohammed said. “I couldn’t just walk home by myself after school. I had to wait for my mom to come pick me up inside.

It just wasn’t safe, and I’m glad I don’t live there anymore.”

One incident in particular stood out. One night, Mohammed was getting picked up from soccer practice by his aunt. When they stopped at a traffic light, a man shot at the car door window, bullets just barely whizzing past the two of them.

“Luckily, we survived, but it was a very scary incident, and soon after we decided to leave

South Africa,” Mohammed said.

“We wanted to go somewhere safe, somewhere nice.”

That wish brought his family to Dubai when Mohammed was six years old. While safer than South Africa, he said Dubai’s social and academic culture were a stark contrast from Pretoria.

“Dubai was an amazing place,” Mohammed said. “I had to leave behind my life there, all my friends and school, and I still haven’t gotten a bunch of my stuff from Dubai. But the teachers were kind of mean sometimes and would yell at us. And school, the British curriculum, was so much easier there. I was the smartest kid in the class, taking triple science, but at Paly I’m just normal.”

However, Dubai’s exorbitant living expenses motivated Mohammed’s family to try to move to Vancouver, Canada last summer. But first, in the process to get to the Great White North, Mohammed moved temporarily to Istanbul, Turkey for two months as he awaited his Canadian papers to come through.

“Moving (to Istanbul) was not so easy,” Mohammed said. “I had to leave Dubai at the end of the school year in April, when important exams were going on, kind of like AP exams. So I missed some of my exams to go to Istanbul. It was just temporary, so I couldn’t go to school for two months because Dubai schools finish at the end of June.”

Around the time Mohammed moved to Istanbul, his older brother Yusuf began attending college in London.

“Everyone is so competitive. It’s cutthroat here...No one cares about their life at all.”

Ehsaan Mohammed “When the time for me to go to college came, although saddened, Ehsaan always knew I was there for him and can help with anything,” Yusuf said.

After visiting him on vacation in Ireland for a few weeks, Mohammed’s family moved to San Francisco at the end of summer last year, where they stayed with a friend while waiting to hear if they could go to Vancouver.

“Around fall of last year, I hadn’t gone to school in like six months,” Mohammed said. “I began to get really bored, just staying inside all day. I would wake up, do some math or English,

COURTESY OF EHSAAN MOHAMMED

Junior Ehsaan Mohammed, pictured left, competes in a trivia competition in Dubai. Mohammed moved to Palo Alto after living in South Africa and the United Arab Emirates. “Dubai was a very cool place,” Mohammed said. “It was very international and had lots of fun activities.” then play video games, and then sleep and repeat the whole cycle.

My parents were hoping our papers to Canada would come through soon, but I couldn’t take it anymore, not going to school.”

However, Mohammed’s papers were rejected. Eager for an education, Mohammed persuaded his parents to move to Palo Alto.

“I searched where the best schools in California were, and it said Henry Gunn and Palo Alto High Schools were number one in the state,” Mohammed said. “I visited Paly, and I liked it more than Gunn because Paly was less depressing. I researched the apartment I’m living in now and convinced my parents to move there.”

Arriving at Paly in early November last year, Mohammed said he felt a huge cultural shock compared to education in Dubai.

“Everyone is so competitive,” Mohammed said. “It’s cutthroat here...No one cares about their life at all. It’s just about grades, grades, grades. The first thing people ask me here is ‘What’s your grade?’ No one in Dubai asked about each other’s grades. It didn’t matter as much. I don’t like that aspect at all.”

However, Mohammed said he appreciates the good relationship between teachers and students.

“It’s a new thing for me to have teachers that respect you, that talk to you nicely, and I like that,”

Mohammed said. “In Dubai, the teachers were hated because they were disrespectful to students.”

Palo Alto’s suburban feel and fewer international students also mark a cultural shift from Dubai.

“I feel like I’m learning more, but I’m not really enjoying my life like in Dubai,” Mohammed said.

“It’s so different here due to the competition, and it’s more suburban. Plus here, most people were born and raised here, whereas in Dubai, everyone was international.”

Mohammed said some of his credits transferred from Dubai, but he had to take freshman year credits, mostly for history.

“Ehsaan struck me as a smart, hardworking kid who just needed a little help making the transition.”

Ethan Hwang

“For the second half of first semester, I was in a quiet room by myself, just grinding away history assignments, so I could get my credits caught up,” Mohammed said. “I had three preps, and it sucked. I didn’t really get to know Paly. I didn’t even understand

Spirit Week. But I caught up and started going to regular classes the last few weeks of the semester.”

Mohammed’s former math peer tutor, junior Ethan Hwang, who he met in their sophomore PE class, said the difference in school curriculum made the transition to Paly challenging.

“Ehsaan struck me as a smart, hardworking kid who just needed a little help making the transition,” Hwang said. “I offered to help...and he told me that the transition from the British system of math to Paly’s system of math was tough. I agreed to meet with him once or twice a week, and saw that (he) really benefitted from individualized attention that he otherwise wouldn’t have gotten from an instructional teacher.”

Even at the end of the 201819 school year, Mohammed said he wasn’t sure if he’d continue into the 2019-20 school year.

“I wasn’t sure whether my papers to Canada would go through, but I decided to continue at Paly,” Mohammed said. “I think it was the right decision for my education because I didn’t want to miss any more school.”

Although moving around the world may have been challenging, Yusuf said the family supports each other whenever needed.

“Ehsaan and I have always been there for each other as we moved around, and taking care

of our little sister together,” Yusuf said. “He still constantly asks me for help with his work in math and science and sometimes just to talk and catch up.”

“Ehsaan and I have always been there for each other as we moved around, and taking care of our little sister together.”

Yusuf Mohammed

In fact, Yusuf credits Mohammed’s experiences after Dubai with making him stronger.

“Ehsaan has grown up a lot since leaving Dubai,” Yusuf said.

“In the past two years, I have been witness to the growth in his ambitions and strong work ethic. He has developed into a very passionate and hardworking young man. I see him on track to achieve all his goals and much more.”

Even with his success as a student here, Mohammed maintains a balanced view of Paly.

Mohammed said, “Paly is a nice place but I don’t think I’ll enjoy it as much as Dubai because I’m not from here, and my childhood is in Dubai.”

The Campanile

Friday, November 8, 2019

B4

SPOTLIGHT

Shots Fired: A look into the impl

Backg

H

Art by Kaitlyn Lee, Sophia Moore, and Adora Zheng

undreds of parents and activists clad in red shirts lined the halls of the state Capitol, hoisting signs that read ‘DO NOT BULLY DOCTORS INTO NOT PROTECTING THEIR PATIENTS!’ and chanting ‘YES TO EDUCATION, NO TO MANDATION!’ Some even facing arrest for their actions, the protesters all had one thing in common — they opposed a groundbreaking new law making it more difficult than ever for par-

Pro-Vaxx Political

I

n 2014, a widespread outbreak of measles in New York prompted the state’s health officials to issue a warning urging residents to ensure that they were vaccinated against the disease. This incident was not isolated: According to the CDC, the number of reported cases of measles in the United States triped in 2014 from the previous year, and this year is on track to reach a recent high of more than 1,300 cases.

After another measles outbreak in late 2014 was traced to what was thought to be a safe and welcoming place for families, Anaheim’s Disneyland, sickening nearly 150 people, then-Gov. Jerry Brown signed into law landmark legislation that limited the types of valid vaccination exemptions to only medical exemptions.

According to state Sen. Scott Wiener, the law, SB277, had loopholes that allowed doctors to grant fraudulent exemptions, creating the need for another bill.

“This law is being undermined by a small handful of unethical doctors that are putting children at risk for disease while profiting from selling inappropriate medical exemptions to misinformed parents,” State Sen. Richard Pan said when explaining the need for

a second law. “The lack of community immunity at schools with students granted inappropriate medical exemptions is contributing to the spread of preventable diseases.”

"SB 276 simply standardizes and provides greater overight of the exemption process, which will make all students safer from preventable diseases."

Marc Berman In April 2019, Pan proposed Senate Bill 276. This marked the start of chaos at the Capitol. SB 276 was written in reaction to the increase in what its supporters believe are fraudulent medical exemptions; it also aimed to maintain high vaccination percentages in schools to achieve community

immunity, which is obtained when 95% or more of the student population is vaccinated against a disease.

The number of unscrupulous medical exemptions increased rapidly after the passage of SB 277, with many of the exemptions occurring in the same communities, creating the possibility of a rapidly spreading disease in one geographical area, according to Assemblymember Marc Berman, a Paly graduate.

Berman supports the stricter regulations around what constitutes a valid exemption from vaccinations, saying “SB 276 provides state-level oversight and standardization of exemptions, which were lacking before.”

Berman believes the new law can help regions attain community immunity quickly and safely.

“SB 276 simply standardizes and provides greater oversight of the exemption process, which will make all students safer from preventable diseases,” Berman said.

According to Emmalee Ross, public information officer of the Medical Board of California, the stricter law was in part a reaction to the rise in complaints to the California Medical Board about doctors filing inappropriate vac-

cination exemptions over the last four years. Depending on the board’s findings when investigating, the board may file an accusation against the doctor for not following the standard of care when providing vaccine exemptions.

Currently, the board has filed formal accusations on these grounds against three doctors — Dr. Robert Sears of Orange County, Dr. Kenneth Stoller of Sonoma County and Dr. Tara Zandvliet of San Diego County, Ross said.

According to Ross, the board is not allowed to discuss investigations that have not yet resulted in an accusation. However, the legal processes that take place in conjunction with investigations are public.

In June, the Department of Consumer Affairs, the agency that oversees the medical board, sued in state court to acquire medical records for patients of Dr. Kelly Sutton and Dr. Michael Fielding Allen, doctors who were revealed to be under investigation by the California Medical Board for alleged unmerited vaccination exemptions. Sutton, who works as a family practice physician at Raphael Medicine in Fair Oaks, near Sacramento, is also a physician for some Palo Altans.

Court documents show the Board received numerous complaints

from other California doctors about Allen and Sutton, which triggered the investigations.

Ross said the Board believes that the state’s added ability to review medical exemption requests will reduce the time and resources spent investigating complaints.

“The law will make it easier for the Board to identify physicians who may be inappropriately granting medical exemptions and obtain medical records for complaints,” Ross said.

People against vaccination mandates, or anti-vaxxers, often cite the Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System Harvard Pilgrim Study published in 2009 to validate their concerns regarding the safety complications associated with vaccinations. The study concludes that 2.6% of vaccines result in varying forms of vaccine-related injuries.

Operated by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, VAERS provides a reporting system that explains “adverse event” reports from various medical officers and the public.

The CDC, however, did not adopt this statistic as the national average for vaccine injuries, as it is based upon public complaints and not official medical reports.

for his diagnosis consisted of two back-to-back bone marrow transplants, leaving him highly susceptible to viruses.

fied School District’s Lead District Nurse Rosemarie Dowell, Goldsmith’s concerns are warranted, and she said the best way to support immunocompromised children is through community immunity or herd immunity.

“With the stricter laws in California about immunization exemptions, (immunocompromised children) who should not receive some or all vaccinations are protected to be able to attend school, while others will need to receive the vaccinations and in turn keep our community immunity levels high enough to keep our risk of outbreak low,” Dowell said.

Because of their potential interaction with immunocompromised children, like Goldsmith’s son, a medical exemption must be completed by a Californialicensed physician and must state the specific nature of the physical condition for which the physician does not recommend an immunization.

“Your choosing not to vaccinate your child poses a risk for all the other children to get sick,” Goldsmith said. “It’s not fair to the other parents in the school not to vaccinate your child.”

Personal

M

ost doctors, backed by medical literature, believe vaccinations are completely safe, and that the controversial presence of various forms of aluminum in some vaccines is not toxic, but rather used to enhance their immunogenicity, or their ability to provoke an immune response to fend off a virus.

The debate surrounding the safety of aluminum in vaccines continues to wage because some studies indicate aluminum exposure can impede cellular and metabolic processes, resulting in various neurological diseases.

Anti-vaxxers think that children, because they receive a large number of vaccinations, can be susceptible to aluminum-linked abnormalities.

But according to the National Library of Medicine at the National Institutes of Health, aluminum in vaccines is safe enough for repeated injection as well as effective in the immunization process. Another concern held by anti-vaxxers is the notion that childhood immunizations can lead to the development of autism. This idea is thought to have been introduced by British physician Andrew Wakefield and antivaxx leader, who wrote an article

in the 90’s which has since been retracted. The article had used manufactured evidence to falsely link the MMR vaccine to the development of autism. Though Wakefield and his findings have since been discredited, the notion that childhood vaccinations cause autism is still spread by parents worldwide.

Yet according to board-certified pediatrician and geneticist Dr. Robert Wallerstein who worked at Santa Clara Valley Medical Center, the likelihood of a complication following a vaccination in a healthy child is insignificant, and the benefits of a vaccine significantly outweigh the unlikely probability of an issue. Vaccines in short, he said, are safe.

Wallerstein said the link drawn by parents between autism and the MMR vaccine likely occurs because the events follow one another chronologically. Generally, Wallerstein said, autism is diagnosed in children when cognitive development begins, between the ages of 18 months and two years, which is shortly after they received the MMR vaccine.

“Because the autism diagnosis can usually follow the MMR vaccination, people can make the assumption that their child was

well, and then they had the MMR vaccine, and then they got diagnosed with autism,” Wallerstein said. “There isn’t one sole cause for autism, so for people to assume the reason for autism to be vaccines is incorrect.”

Wallerstein supports California’s strict new vaccine exemptions standards because of the impact vaccinations have on the health of others, because he believes that immunocompromised people are more likely to fall ill to a virus.

“People who are immunocompromised are at risk of getting a virus from an unvaccinated child.

That idea is indisputable,” Wallerstein said. “At this point, this is when vaccines become a matter of public concern and not just of personal preference. By vaccinating children, you’re protecting not only yourself and your family, but also kids who medically can’t get vaccinated.”

His point hits close to home for Palo Alto mother Meredith Goldsmith, whose son was diagnosed with high-risk neuroblastoma, a cancerous tumor that matures with the fetus, in nerve cells called neuroblasts.

Goldsmith said the treatment her son, now 4 years old, received

"It’s not fair to the other parents in the school not to vaccinate your child."

Meredith Goldsmith “His immunity was terrible for a while after his treatment, so he had to stay completely isolated like a prisoner for eight months,” Goldsmith said. “It depends on each child, but they could lose the benefit of their prior immunizations, and they can’t have new vaccinations for possibly years afterward. Regardless of the severity of treatment on his immune system, my son could possibly not be able to receive vaccinations for quite some time and can become more at-risk than other kids in catching a virus.”

According to Palo Alto Uni-

ents to keep th being vaccinate hood diseases. which originate 276 and was sign Newsom in Sep the controversy cination mandat ents, doctors and sides of the issue already being on eliminate person liefs as a valid ex cination, the eve

The Campanile

Friday, November 8, 2019

SPOTLIGHT

B5

lications of vaccine mandates

ground

heir children from ed against childThe divisive law, ed as Senate Bill ned by Gov. Gavin ptember, reignited surrounding vactes, fueled by pard activists on both e. With California ne of five states to nal or religious bexemption for vacen tougher law has

Text, Design, and Art by Shiva Mohsenian, Sarah O’Rioridan and Andy Wang

been met with both support and pushback, with one concern at the center of the debate — the safety of children and communities. The law grants the state the authority to review medically related vaccine exemptions in certain cases, such as if the child with the exemption attends a school with a vaccination rate under 95%, if the doctor issuing the exemption has given five or more exemptions or if the school did not provide its vaccine rates to the state.

V

ote for Choice founder Christina Hildebrand advocates for the public’s right to know the composition, quality and shortand long-term side effects of all food and pharmaceutical products.

“Our mission statement is to educate and advocate for informed choice and transparency of anything that goes into your body,” said Hildebrand, who lives in the Bay Area.

The bill signed by Newsom incited what she considers a “witch hunt” against doctors who have given unwarranted medical exemptions to children at the doctor’s discretion.

According to Hildebrand, the plan of the assistant director of the California Department of Public Health to obtain the medical records of vaccine-exempted students is a ploy to provide the Medical Board with the names of doctors who issued those medical exemptions.

“Once you’ve got doctor’s names, then you’re going to file complaints with the medical board,” Hildebrand said. “Then the medical board can take it from there. And once it’s in the investigative process, everything else is covered up.”

Anti-Vaxx Political

Hildebrand said the Medical Board sent notice to doctors who had issued medical exemptions warning that they would effectively be under close watch after the new bill became law.

“I would say before that letter came out we probably had about 150 doctors in the state of California that were willing to do medical exemption evaluations … after that letter, we dropped to probably 20,” Hildebrand said.

Hildebrand believes breaking the standard of care should not be an act punishable by investigation and the potential loss of a medical license.

“Standard of care is what 95% of doctors would do in that situation to treat those symptoms.

What standard of care does not include is the people that are on the cutting edge of research,” Hildebrand said. “I agree with the medical board. They’re not in the standard of care, but why should they be penalized for being on the cutting edge research and being on the cutting edge of vaccines?”

Hildebrand also takes issue with the composition of the bill, pointing out the lack of regulatory process open to public comment in earlier drafts of the bill.

“You know, that’s probably the

biggest issue we had and we were just like, look, and it’s where we came up with our amendments and we said, look, if there’s no regulatory process, then the bill has to be really, really succinct,” Hildebrand said.

"Public health regulators were not being either well informed in these cases or they were being dishonest."

Bobby Kennedy Jr. Hildebrand attributes the ugly protests in Sacramento to parents who are legitimately fearful of vaccines.

“It comes out of fear,” Hildebrand said. “Absolutely fear.

Because I would say that the majority of parents who have medical exemptions are parents that have had vaccine reactions either

in their own family or in these children.”

Another leader of the antivaxx movement, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., an environmental attorney and president of the Children’s Health Defense, says that fellow concerned parents have inspired him to further his investigative work into the safety of vaccines.

“Women who had vaccineinjured children would approach me after I was speaking, all around North America, Canada, the United States,” Kennedy said.

“Almost every speech there were women who had intellectually disabled children who had been injured by vaccines who would approach me and say, ‘If you’re genuinely concerned about mercury exposure to children, you need to look at vaccines.’”

Kennedy, nephew of the late President John F. Kennedy, was drawn into the controversy through people he met while traveling.

“One of them came to my house, with a big pile of scientific studies a foot deep, and she put them on my front porch and said she wasn’t going to leave. Her son had gotten autism from a vaccine and had gotten a $20 million award … which acknowledged

that the child had gotten autism from the vaccine.”

After reviewing scientific studies, Kennedy said he was struck by the disparity between what science said and what public health regulators said.

“Public health regulators were not being well informed in these cases or they were being dishonest in other cases … I was shocked by how clear that science was,” Kennedy said. “And I thought if people really understood this, nobody’s reading it. ” Kennedy said vaccines are unnecessary for healthy people.

“I think we need to do that cost-benefit analysis for every vaccine,” Kennedy said. “I had 11 brothers and sisters and nobody had an allergy. I had 70 cousins and nobody had an allergy. Why do all my children have allergies?

Well it’s from the vaccines they received.”

Kennedy believes some companies issuing vaccinations are falsifying science.

“We’re living in a weird world right now where we are having forced, coerced medical interventions against unwilling people,” Kennedy said. “Vaccines is the only place where they can commit crime and never get caught. ”

cines. She said because of aluminum’s immunotoxicity, any level of it in the human body is detrimental to a person’s health, especially a child’s.

when they could be injured in order to protect the immunocompromised is no more ethical than it is to remain unvaccinated.

“If anybody wanted to make me have a vaccine to prevent… an immunocompromised child from getting a vaccine preventable disease, I’d say no way. I can’t go through that again.”

Many anti-vaxxers claim the CDC’s decision to not endorse the Harvard Pilgrim study is part of an elaborate plan to hide the truth about vaccine safety. The mother points out that the CDC disregarded the study after reviewing the data, the same data that the scientific community found to be inadequate.

“When they reported the results in this paper, suddenly the CDC stopped calling them back because they didn’t like the results,” she said.

According to the mother, the paper tracked the amount of vaccine injuries: 2.6% of vaccines result in vaccine injury within 30 days.

“My guess is one-fourth of the population is vaccine injured and doesn’t even know it,” she said, citing the study. “Vaccines can cause debilitating injuries, temporary or permanent.”

Personal

R

egardless of the generally accepted medical point of view, Sutton believes the concerns most parents have regarding the potential complications from the MMR vaccination are justified, and that the vaccine increases the risk to a child with an underlying genetic mutation.

In response to the argument that vaccinations protect the immunocompromised, Sutton said although immunocompromised people are more likely to catch a virus, unvaccinated individuals pose no more of a risk to their health than vaccinated people.

“A healthy, unvaccinated person is no more of a risk than a vaccinated person to the immunocompromised person or any neighbors,” Sutton said. “The immune system needs exercise to be at its best, meaning that it needs to naturally fend off viruses without the aid of vaccinations to create antibodies in order to fight off recurring viruses.”

Moreover, Sutton supports California families who continue to argue that religious and personal beliefs should be viable reasons for a vaccine exemption.

“A religion or strong belief should be accepted as an exemption,” Sutton said. “The

fundamental idea that makes us healthy is not vaccines, but the basis of public health is sanitation, nutrition, education and last vaccines in that order. It’s not like we depend on vaccines to have a defense against germs. Instead, in general, the responsibility of each person taking care of their own health, without vaccines and just through cleanliness, will contribute enough to keep the community healthy.”

In response to being under investigation, Sutton believes that the risks exponentially increase from exposures to substances that trigger adverse events following immunization.

“I support the selective use of vaccines,” Sutton said. “In the face of a vaccine mandate, it is very important to have medical exemptions available from doctors who are free to act in the patient’s best interest.”

According to Sutton, measles, an extremely infectious disease, is now considered extremely rare.

The decrease in cases of this disease, says Sutton, was not because of vaccines.

“The history of dropping mortality from measles is clearly not from vaccines, as the drop occurred 60+ years before the vaccine was introduced,” Sutton said.

“Eat plenty of vitamin A foods, and you will not have compli-

cated measles. As many as 92% of the patients hospitalized with measles complications were deficient in vitamin A. ” A Palo Alto mother who asked to stay anonymous to avoid implicating her children with her own beliefs agrees with the concerns brought up by Sutton, Kennedy and Hildebrand, saying vaccinations she had in adulthood caused her severe health problems.

“I was physically disabled,” she said. “And then a few months after [my vaccinations] I was brain-damaged. I couldn’t remember anything I was reading anymore.”

Some of the symptoms she said she had following her injections include arthralgia, neuropathy, vertigo, tachycardia, dyspepsia and eczema. She said that she suffered ongoing nausea and headaches directly following her vaccinations. She cites the Hepatitis B vaccine with the development of her most disruptive symptoms, affecting her personal and professional life.

“I lost my job and my entire career,” she said. “I was running a worldwide group. I have an MBA from a top 10 school. I can’t tell you how much I’ve suffered.”

Her greatest concern stems from the aluminum in most vac-

"If anyone wanted to make me have a vaccine to prevent... an immunocompromised child from getting a vaccine-preventable disease, I’d say ‘no way’."

Palo Alto Mother

“There should never be any aluminum in the human body at all, and it shouldn’t even exist in the environment,” she said. “The idea of taking aluminum out of the ground and injecting it into someone’s body is madness.”

In addition, she believes that forcing people to be vaccinated

The Campanile

Friday, November 8, 2019

B6

LIFESTYLE

Students take part in making illegal graffiti, street art

Street artists use material such as spray paint to create artwork on public walls, other structures

By Rebekah Limb

EMMA TODD/THE CAMPANILE

Column: How to understand politics

By Krista Robins

P

Staff Writer

oliticians represent honesty and transparency; they embody the gateway to a better country, albeit, world. They are modern day prophets meant to lead their followers to a brighter future.

Sike.

Ever since Nixon ruined the whole game with Watergate, no one can ever see politics the same way. The adjectives used to describe today’s politicians may as well be straight out of a horror movie review. Slimy. Grimy. Unpleasant. With America angering nearly every country, Russia forming alliances with our enemies and China engaging in shady activities, global politics are becoming nearly impossible to keep up with.

Thanks to the reality of unlimited and uncensored content (barring the 1.2 billion souls in China), apps like Facebook and Twitter are great platforms for receiving factual updates on what is happening in the world. Who better to fill you in on the drama than our unbiased, defectless God-Emperor and king of Twitter, President Donald J. Trump?

“Ding …”

Oh, what’s that you hear? Your daily update from the big man himself.

“Guys I have this under control, I REPEAT UNDER CONTROL, we have the best nukes, the most beautiful women, and lucky for all you small ratty democrats, I am friends with EVERYONE.” While strolling the path of media to stay updated on politics, on your left you will see MSNBC and on your right you will see Fox News. Both broadcast an array of legitimate media made to enhance your day, and both bear correctly sourced, unbiased and trustworthy stories that assure not to offend anyone. With holy media outlets such as these, there is no need to ever seek contrasting opinions.

Every issue discussed on either of these platforms requires no further speculation — always believe what you read online.

With our country gearing up for a new election, televised debates are an ideal way to stay updated on politics. Although many may watch these debates in order to become acquainted with the views of potential U.S. presidential candidates, the primary takeaway from these debates should be, who seems the fittest for the role of president. As the representative of our nation, a president must be undeniably beautiful.

They are the eye-candy that leads other nations to become our allies.

We as Americans should not be concerned with our leader’s values, education or beliefs. The most important aspect of a president is their beauty. The most physically appealing leader will be the most successful: it’s obvious.

But if following political news bores you, there is always the alternative — move to China where freedom of press is highly valued.

While strolling the ath of factwatch outual and relevant media, on your left fakeoutou will see MSNBC and o your right you will see Fox News. oth broadcast an array of legitimwhinnie Winnie the Poohate newsmedia made to enhance your day, and both bear correcnewstly sourced, unbiased and trustwhy stories that assure not to offend anyone.

With holy meisisdia outlets such as these, there s no need to ever seek contrasting opinions he path of factual and relevanyou media, on your left you will see MSNB watchingC and on your right you will see Fox News. Both broadcast an array of legitimate media made to enhance your day, ayound both bear correctlourced, unbiased and trustworthy stories that assure not to offend anyone. With holy media outlets such as these, there is no need to ever seek contrasting opinions.i’ll see MSNBC and on your right you will see Fox News.

Both broadcast an array of legitimate media made to enhance your day, and both bear correctly sourced, unbiased and trustworthy stories that assure not to offend anyone. With holy media outlets such as these, tforms is simply one sided and requires no further

Sports Editor

A

s he follows the sea of art masking the “Gunn Tunnels,” a former sewer system turned graffiti hub, a Paly senior, who agreed to be interviewed under the condition of anonymity, rattles his third can, lays out his new stencil and carefully sprays his initials on his illicitly tagged art.

Street art, including graffiti and tagging, became a popular art form during the 1980s, but has stirred up controversy as artists’ public statements and messages are often seen as vandalism and are usually painted over.

“When I do street art, I always ask myself whether or not I would count it as graffiti,” the senior said.

“Whether or not I have been given permission, I will never paint in a highly visible area or on private property. Tastefulness is one of the most important responsibilities when it comes to street art, because people may appreciate a well-placed art piece, but certainly not vandalism.”

Tagging and graffiti, both unauthorized markings of public structures with writing or drawings, are just a fraction of the forms of street art created by the senior and his friends.

The senior started doing street art in ninth grade and said he was inspired by the unexpected placement of artwork rather than any specific artists.

“Whenever I see something I like, I take note of what is working well for that particular artist and try to incorporate it into my own practice,” he said.

A Paly junior, who asked to remain anonymous because she is engaging in illegal activity, also enjoys the thrill that comes with venturing into the Gunn tunnels and getting the chance to create her art on a vast public space.

“I usually try to paint in covered areas, so that I can focus on the art rather than not getting seen.”

Paly Senior

“Spray painting is exciting, and it’s like you can create whatever you want and other people will see it, and I think that’s spe-

PHOTO BY ANONYMOUS SENIOR GRAFFITI ARTIST/USED WITH PERMISSION

Paint away! An anonymous Paly senior created this personalized piece of art for others to see. “I was pretty (bad) at graffiti when I first started because I didn’t know how to use spray paint. (Now), I like to do big tags on walls and skate parks.” cial,” she said. “Any wall to someone who graffitis is like a blank canvas.”

“Whenever I see something I like, I take note of what is working well for that particular artist and try to incorporate it into my own practice.”

Paly Senior

The junior said she has always been familiar with materials like spray paint and has been experimenting with them for years.

What started as a few small projects became a newfound passion that expanded to graffiti art.

“I started messing around with spray paint when I was in seventh grade, starting with spray painting my bike multiple times,” she said. “I then started to go to tunnels and the creek to actually spray paint designs and symbols and stuff.”

Another Paly senior, who also wanted to stay anonymous, said graffiti art is harder than it looks and it took him a couple months to develop his skills. Once he

practiced using spray cans frequently, he said he started to do big tags on walls and skate parks in the area.

However, not all street art is against the law. If an artist receives permission from the owner of a building or public space, then they can legally create street art there.

This is the case for one of the most notable and extensive public art contributors in San Francisco: Sirron Norris.

Norris is best known for his murals “The Calumet” and the “Victorion: El Defensor de la Mission” located in Balmy Alley, home to one of the biggest collections of murals in San Francisco.

According to Norris, he started to make street art and create murals legally in 1999, and since then, he has built a business around it.

“Any wall to someone who graffitis is like a blank canvas.”

Paly Junior

“All my work is commissioned,” Norris said. “I have had my own company for ten years. I have only done one free mural in my entire life. My work is called

‘cartoon literalism.’ It’s an art form I created for storytelling.”

For Norris, public art is a medium where he can share his message and opinions about various topics including politics. “‘The Disruption’ on Bryant and 20th (is) very personal and political,” Norris said. “I raised funds to paint it. I never get that many opportunities to be political.

No one pays for that.”

The Paly senior said street art often offers its creators many benefits. For him, tagging and graffiti are effective ways to relieve stress and are rewarding to view later on.

“Doing graffiti is sort of a way for me to pass time, and it’s a bit addictive in the way that it lets you meditate and see your tag somewhere months after you throw up your art,” he said.

For the senior, although the act is illegal, he said he tries to give himself a calm environment for him to create his pieces.

“Doing graffiti/street art should be as relaxing an experience as possible,” he said. “I usually try to paint in covered areas, so that I can focus on the art rather than not getting seen.”

The rush of producing art on public spaces contributes to the excitement of street art, according to the senior.

“I have placed some stencils and stickers in plain sight, which usually brings an adrenaline rush,” he said. “Mostly though, my street art is an outlet for creativity. I enjoy it because of the anonymity that comes with painting in public places.”

“Spray painting is exciting, and it’s like you can create whatever you want and other people will see it, and I think that’s special.”

Paly Junior

Street art, although illegal, has given many students an outlet for expression and a refreshing passion for art, the junior said. Legally created or not, these artists all use public surroundings to tell stories through their spray cans and creative visions.

She said, “Usually when I go to spray paint I try to create things that relate to me and who I am, and try to create a sense of individuality and leave a specific mark that represents me.”

Teen arts council introduces new recording studio Recording, editing equipment allows teenagers to freely create media, such as music, video

By Jace Purcell

O

Staff Writer

nce junior and City of Palo Alto Teen Arts Council member Jonathan Sneh wraps up the drum pads in the Media Lab and adds the finishing touches on his very first self-produced, self-composed track, he knows he wants to ensure that everyone can experience the joy of making music, just as he does.

Traditionally confined to professional producers, the ability to record, edit, mix and produce music and video has often been out of reach for the average person because of a lack of accessibility due to the price of the equipment. The TAC, a youth organization that holds events for teens in Palo Alto and the surrounding community, seeks to change this with the introduction of the Media Lab on Oct. 12, a free recording and editing studio for members of the community.

“We had the idea that we wanted to create a space where teens could create audio, video and different media.”

Leo Marburg

The TAC has always been focused on the visual and performing arts, according to CoPresident Leo Marburg. In the past, the TAC has accomplished this goal through hosting concerts with student performers and Open Mic Nights, where students get a short set to perform, throughout the year. However, the Media Lab is different from their usual work — it’s the first time

they’ve offered a resource rather than an event.

“Our focus has always been events,” Marburg said. “That is easier to promote because we can just say, ‘come this Saturday.’ But this is quite a different situation for us because rather than a one time event, it’s year-long.”

The Media Lab is a new work space for editing audio and video, meant to help students develop producing and editing skills, which is located in the Mitchell Park area. The lab boasts professional microphones, synthesizers, drum pads and computers loaded with premium software such as Logic and Ableton to satisfy the creative needs of all its users.

“We had the idea that we wanted to create a space where teens could create audio, video and different media,” Marburg said. “We acquired an old storage room and converted it into the new space.”

After the TAC, which is funded by the City of Palo Alto, obtained the necessary equipment and space to set up a recording studio, they needed a team to put the Media Lab together and oversee its implementation. TAC member junior Jonathan Sneh decided to step forward and lead the project after having a transformative learning experience from testing out the Media Lab on its trial run.

“I walked into the Media Lab (and) there was a brand new computer, a drum pad (and) a keyboard,” Sneh said. “I started figuring things out, and it was amazing. That’s why I wanted to head this project.”

Marieke Gaboury, Director of Theatre Operations for the Palo Alto Children’s Theatre and overseer of the TAC, is most excited to give teens the opportunity to use their creativity.

“I think one of the best things that can happen is to be given the tools and a platform to create,”

MARIEKE GABOURY/USED WITH PERMISSION

Ready, set, record! The new Media Lab has been set up and is ready for community members to use.

Jonathan Sneh, a member of the Teen Arts Council, greatly appreciates the equipment. “I think this is an amazing tool for people,” Sneh said. “I’ve sat in the lab for hours and just made music.”

Gaboury said. “Initiating individual creative projects, or projects with my peers, turned out to be very important life events and moments for me — having tools like this would have been amazing (as a teen).”

A major goal of the Media Lab project is longevity, according to Gaboury. She said the TAC wants the Lab to provide media tools to the community for years to come.

“My hope is that this is a place that teens will look forward to coming back to again and again,” Gaboury said. “A place without critical academic pressure, where they can create and learn and feel that the space is their own.”

The Media Lab is open for sign-ups on the TAC website and is available Friday evenings and weekend mornings. However, Sneh said the council hopes to expand those hours, as well as eventually have drop-ins and as appointments in the future.

To ensure everyone can utilize

the Media Lab, the TAC has a mentor for beginners at the Lab who answers questions about the equipment. For people wanting to gain more knowledge about using the Lab’s services, the TAC is also considering running a production class next semester.

“We’re looking for ways to utilize the Media Lab,” Marburg said. “It’s just a matter of getting the word out.”

“My hope is that this is a place that teens will look forward to coming back to again and again.”

Marieke Gaboury

Junior and TAC member Rein Vaska, had the opportunity to use the Media Lab for music production. He said he was impressed by the system but he would also like

to see space available for bands.

“I like that they have analog synths, keyboards and drum pads,” Vaska said. “They are great for production. The only limitation is that right now there isn’t proper equipment to mic (microphone) a whole band, but (the) TAC is working to get more gear in there so hopefully soon that will be available.”

According to Sneh, however, serving bands is not a goal the council is currently working on.

“It (serving bands) would be nice and I would love to do it, but right now we’re focusing on being a simple editing and recording space,” Sneh said.

With that goal in mind, Marburg said the TAC is excited to share the lab with the community and give more people exposure to recording and editing tools.

Marburg said, “I feel like it’s going to give teenagers a chance to explore this technology in a way they might not be able to otherwise.”

Friday, November 8, 2019

The Campanile

B7 SCIENCE & TECH Popularity of mobile payment increases among students Applications like Apple Pay widely adopted among local teens, used much more often by youth than by general population

By Adora Zheng

A

Lifestyle Editor

s Junior Kira Sterling walks to the Trader Joe’s checkout counter, instead of rummaging through her backpack for her wallet, she takes out her phone, taps it on the card reader and pays for her food with Apple Pay. “Anytime I go to buy something from somewhere that takes it (Apple Pay), I will use it,” Sterling said. “When I have my wallet in my backpack, and my phone in my hand, it's a lot easier to double click my home button and (use) Apple Pay, as opposed to reaching all the way into my backpack and finding my wallet, then finding my card and taking it out.”

“The younger

generation is more attached to their phones than to their wallets. If you look at where younger people spend money versus older (people), it’s more adaptable to mobile payments.”

Rene Ho Like Sterling, over 80% of Paly students use mobile pay as often as they can, according to a Google Form distributed on social media in which 50 students responded.

However, a 2018 study by pymnts.com found that the adoption of mobile pay by the general population has proven to be much less enthusiastic. In 2018, just 24% of the iPhone users in the U.S. reported ever using Apple Pay, and only 5% reported using Apple Pay during their last transaction.

During his time as Senior Vice-President of North American Operations at Visa, Rene Ho led

ART BY SHIVA MOHSENIAN

the implementation and market launch of Apple Pay, the platform that 97% of Paly students who use mobile pay prefer, according to the Google Form survey.

Ho said this disparity between usage at Paly and among the general population exists mostly because the older generation is used to traditional cards and does not see a compelling reason to change.

Teens, on the other hand, have used mobile pay since its inception and have not developed the same reliance on plastic cards.

“I think the younger generation is (also) more attached to their phones than to their wallets,” Ho said. “If you look at where younger people spend money versus older (people), it's more adaptable to mobile payments — for example, at a restaurant where older people tend to pay, you can't really use your

phone (because) you need to give the waiter or waitress your card.”

“It’s a lot easier to double click my home button and (use) Apple Pay, as opposed to reaching all the way into my backpack and finding my wallet then finding my card.”

Kira Sterling According to Sterling, adults are often hesitant to try new products and may have reserva-

tions about using them.

Adolescents, however, are generally more open to trying new things that might be more convenient, Sterling said.

According to the same survey of Paly students, over 90% of students who use mobile pay believe it is more convenient than using traditional plastic cards.

However, several fundamental issues with the leading mobile payment platforms keep some students from making the switch.

First, mobile pay inevitably relies on the limited battery life of mobile phones, which makes some students wary of using it as their primary method of payment.

“Plastic still works even if there's no battery,” Ho said. “At least for someone like me, if I know that if my phone battery runs out, I can use my card, then

I’ll still carry plastic with me.”

“Plastic still works even if there’s no battery. At least for someone like me, if I know that if my phone battery runs out, I can use my card, then I’ll still carry plastic with me.”

Rene Ho Some students also do not trust the security of the platform. Junior Naomi Boneh said she does not feel completely comfortable with mak-

ing payments with her phone.

One other factor that inhibits widespread use of mobile payment is the non-universal acceptance of contactless payment methods, according to Boneh, with only 65% of all American retailers accept Apple Pay. However, this issue seems to be less prevalent in Palo Alto, according to Sterling. Most vendors at Town and Country take Apple Pay and all other contactless payment methods — these vendors include Trader Joe’s, CVS Pharmacy, Boba Guys, Lulu’s Taqueria, Jamba Juice, Peet’s Coffee and more.

“It seems like a lot of vendors (in Silicon Valley) have been willing to adopt it and almost anywhere I go takes Apple Pay nowadays,” Sterling said. “Once more of the general population realizes how much more convenient it is, more vendors might adopt it (nationwide).”

Paly’s average annual carbon footprint recently on the rise Increased campus square footage, addition of new buildings contribute to all-time high generation of emissions

2,766 metric tons Increase in the annual amount of carbon dioxide emissions Paly has generated in the last two years.

1,272 metric tons Total amount of electricity used at Paly.

In addition to going on road trips, Essenmacher said her family uses an electric vehicle on a daily basis.

“Electric and hybrid cars have become a lot more popular,” Essenmacher said. “My family has a hybrid car, and we use it more than our (standard) gasoline-fueled car.”

According to Essenmacher, who is currently enrolled in AP Environmental Science, with the increase in carbon emissions into the atmosphere, there is a potential for health problems.

“As a school, we can turn off lights and unplug appliances when they aren’t in use. We’ve already installed solar panels in the parking lot, so that helps.”

Rebecca Navarro

ART BY SOPHIA MOORE

By Olivia Ericsson Staff Writer

W

ith the prominent fire danger and risk of destruction of many homes in Northern California, global warming is in effect.

In response to the increase in global temperature due to pollution from humans, many people are taking action in order to reduce practices that may negatively affect the environment.

A carbon footprint is an estimated calculation of the amount of carbon that an individual contributes.

A report released by Paly in 2015 showed that the total electricity used at school is 1,272 metric tons.

However, during the past two years, there has been an in-

crease by 2,766 metric tons in the amount of carbon dioxide Paly has generated.

Most of Paly’s increase in carbon dioxide levels comes from the addition of new buildings, according to Paly Sustainability Program Manager Rebecca Navarro.

“Using alternative energy sources, such as nuclear, solar, wind and geothermal is a great way to reduce carbon emissions.”

Nicole Loomis “The biggest contribution to

Paly’s increased carbon footprint would be additional square footage, particularly the expansion of the gymnasium and the addition of the Media Arts Building and Performing Arts Center,” Navarro said. “Fortunately, the additional square footage is all built to CHPS (Collaboration for High Performance Schools), and the overall impact is significantly offset by the solar array and the LED conversions.”

Navarro said that changes to the use of lighting in classrooms has helped decrease the amount of carbon dioxide each school produces.

“In the past three years, Paly has had all exterior and interior lighting upgraded from a variety of different styles, most frequently (from) fluorescent tubes to LED lighting,” Navarro said. “Paly also has a new solar array in the foot-

ball field parking lot, and the one in the PAUSD (Palo Alto Unified School District) courtyard also serves to offset Paly's electricity consumption.”

“The most relevant impact of climate change for many Paly students will be increases in extreme temperatures.”

Rebecca Navarro With an increase in the amount of carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere, Navarro said the direct impact on the Palo Alto community will be seen through

drastic weather changes.

“The most relevant impact of climate change for many Paly students will be increases in extreme temperatures,” Navarro said. “Palo Alto will probably see longer, colder freezes during the winter months, and has already seen an increase in heat waves with higher maximum temperatures sustained for longer periods of time than is historically common for this region.”

Many Paly students are engaging in small changes in order to ensure a brighter future, one of them being junior Stella Essenmacher.

“A major way I reduce my carbon footprint is by going on three-week road trips because it teaches me to appreciate the outdoors while also consuming a lot less carbon than traveling abroad (in a plane) would,” Essenmacher said.

Science teacher Nicole Loomis also said that students have many transportation options such as biking and carpooling, which will reduce the carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere.

“As a school, we can turn off lights and unplug appliances when they aren’t in use,” Loomis said. “We’ve already installed solar panels in the parking lot, so that helps. The new buildings also have updated lighting systems that are more energy efficient.”

As a community, Loomis said that alternatives can be put in place in order to reduce risks of further global warming.

“Using alternative energy sources, such as nuclear, solar, wind and geothermal is a great way to reduce carbon emissions,” Loomis said. “People are also improving industrial processes and building designs to be more energy efficient.”

The Campanile

Friday, November 8, 2019

SCIENCE & TECH

THE KETOGENIC DIET

HOW DOES CUTTING CARBS AFFECT YOU?

TEXT & DESIGN BY MAYA RATHORE

DESIGN BY OLIVIA ERICCSON

V

Cowell said. Non-starchy vegetables include leafy greens, asparagus, brussel sprouts, zucchini and cucumbers.

In addition to vegetables, a keto diet is also heavy on fats, such as olive and coconut oil, nuts and seeds and avocados, in addition to the fats naturally found in meat and dairy. Protein also makes up a large portion of the ketogenic diet, typically coming from cheese, yogurt, eggs, meats, fish, tofu and legumes. Cowell recommends small servings of low-sugar fruit, such as berries, and plenty of water and exercise.

There’s a variety of reasons someone would choose to eat this way because of its versatility.

According to Cowell, many people choose t o f ollow a keto-

IN

%

PROTEINS

E OT PR

70

CARBS

%

FA T

5%

CA

RB S

ketogenesis ke·​to·​gen·​e·​sis

busy schedule, Shelton said he found Additionally, many people on a himself skipping dinner and eating a keto diet experience carbohydrate small salad or nuts, instead causing withdrawal for the first couple of days him to lose calories. after starting the diet. This can result “I stopped eating dinner most of in headaches, fatigue and cravings for the time because of lacrosse,” Shelton carbohydrate-heavy foods, according said. “I wasn’t even getting home by 9 to Cowell. o’clock every night on average, and so “If you’ve been accustomed to I would eat again and look for somerunning on glucose for daily fuel, then thing…but it wasn’t a full meal. it can be a shock to the body when My total calorie int a k e that supply is suddenly not there, as for the day was happens when we reduce our carbs,” going down Cowell said. “Firstly, the body will because I use up the glucose wasn’t eating it has stored in “It was the lightest I a third or fourth the muscles and meal before going had ever been as an the liver…(but) to bed.” the body needs to From a com- adult. I hadn’t weighed switch to convertbination of skiping and burning that much since ping out on dinner fat for fuel. It can and carbohydrates, take a few days eighth grade.”

Shelton said he lost to make the nearly 30 pounds switch efduring his six fectively, and Daniel Shelton months on the kewhile the body togenic diet. is making the “It was the change, it’s true lightest I had ever been as an adult,” that we don’t have a lot of Shelton said. “I hadn’t weighed that energy to spare.” much since eighth grade.”

Shelton said he also experienced Although Shelton said he got keto flu symptoms — general fatigue leaner and lost a lot of body fat, and loss of energy — but then steadihe also lost muscle mass from ly acclimated to his new baseline eninactivity and having a seergy level. vere caloric deficit.

“I got used to it,” Shelton said. “I “Everything was was tired, but I did stop feeling that shrinking,” Shelton craving for snacks.” said. “It was crazy.

Cowell remarks that a loss of apI’ve never been a petite is also a byproduct of the keto small person, but diet, simply because when someone it was weird cuts out carbohydrates, they typically how little my eat healthier. generally “People usually experience a nopretty large ticeable drop in their appetite when muscle in ketosis…because they are eating areas a good variety of nutritionally-dense were foods,” Cowell said.

While these symptoms may seem disheartening at first, they typically subside after a couple of days, Cowell said.

“Often a little salt, broth or some electrolytes in water can help with the headache, and with a few days of perseverance, the switch to burning fat for fuel is complete, energy comes back and the cravings for sugar and carbohydrates usually disappear,” because I wasn’t working out much Cowell said. either.”

While the ketogenic diet is a bioNo diets come without logically viable possibility for many potential side effects, people, Cowell said, changes in diet and the ket o should always be discussed with a genic diet is healthcare profesno different.

“In general, (SAD) is sional.“There is no Many people who follow the diet or style of eatconsidered to be keto diet experience ing that fits every keto breath, a bioindividual person,” responsible for the logical phenomena Cowell said. “Eatwhere the mouth diabetes epidemic we ing plans need tastes unusual from to be carefully ketone excretion. now find ourselves in.” constructed ac“Keto breath is cording to the evidence of ketoindividual, Sandy Cowell sis,” Cowell said. taking into “When ketones are account their being produced, age, gender, lifeand we are finished with them, they style, their health, their are excreted in the breath and urine. l i k e s and dislikes and overall The smell is not unpleasant, but it is personality. A diet needs to fit like a evidence that the person is converting glove, and this takes time and care to fat into fuel.” put together.”

25

when humans ingest highly-refined egan. Paleolithic. Vegetarian. carbohydrates such as white rice, sugar, Low-fat. High-carb. Plantbread and pasta, insulin spikes sharply based whole foods. Juicing. to remove glucose from the blood sysAtkins. Over the course of the 20th tem. century, there have been dozens “The body receives a fast load of glu— if not hundreds — of fad diets, cose, which is too much to be circulateach just as destructive as the next. ing in the bloodstream all in one rush,” However, after years of research and Cowell said. “The body releases insulin, regrets, only a couple of these diets a substance which removes this extra have stood the test of time — one of glucose from the circulating blood, and them being the ketogenic diet. stores it, like a bank account of energy, In the 1920s, the ketogenic diet in the body’s was devised muscles and to be an liver.” extremel y In a low-carregular diet, bohydrate if there’s diet to too much treat paglucose still tients with the production of in the cirepilepsy by ketone bodies culatory mimicksystem after ing a state induced by cutting a release of of fasting. insulin, the Nowadays, out dietary body conwith a burverts it into geoning carbohydrates a longer$72 bilterm source lion dollar of energy: U.S. weight body fat distributed around the body. loss market, according to markeFollowing a ketogenic diet is tresearch.com, many Americans quite a departure from typical eatare looking for quick ways to drop ing patterns, especially because pounds, and the ketogenic diet is the Standard American Diet, one way to achieve that. a generalized pattern of what According to Sandy Cowell, a Americans typically eat crecertified nutritional consultant at ated by the Dietary GuideSandy Cowell Nutrition and Health lines Advisory CommitCoaching, a ketogenic diet — also tee, gets 50% of the referred to as a “keto” diet — is a recommended 2,200 pattern of eating that causes the calories from carbobody to enter ketosis, a state where hydrates, according stored fat is used for energy instead to the Center for of carbohydrates. One can enter this Disease Confat-burning state quite simply by trol. cutting out carbohydrates entirely. “(SAD) While many people choose to is unforeat this way to lose body fat, this diet tunately is sometimes prescribed in a medical setting to treat pre-diabetes, Type 2 diabetes, high cholesterol and those with metabolic illnesses, according to Cowell.

“The ketogenic diet…takes advantage of a natural process, causing the body to obtain its fuel by breaking down fat — either dietary or stored — rather than glucose,” Cowell said. “This is achieved by heavy on processed carbohydrates and withholding dietary carbohydrate, sugar,” Cowell said. “Individuals eating which forces the body in this way might eat cereal or pastry to turn to its stored at breakfast, sandwiches or pasta or energy: our other breads at lunch, potatoes or rice fat.” or pasta at dinner, W hen the human “The ketogenic diet... along with proteins and vegetables.” body breaks Over time, acdown fat as optakes advantage of a cording to Cowell, posed to glucose natural process, this way of eating can for energy on a destructive to the ketogenic diet, causing the body to be body. the body produces “In general, “ketone bodies,” obtain its fuel by (SAD) is considered which are used for energy. breaking down fat... to be responsible for the diabetes epidemic In contrast, during a regu- rather than glucose.” we now find ourselves in,” Cowell said. lar diet, the body A healthy typically uses gluSandy Cowell keto diet concose for energy. sists of large quanPeople obtain this tities of non-starchy glucose through vegetables, plenty of protein eating foods such as grains, starchand gen- erous amounts of fat, es, fruits and vegetables. However,

ART BY KAITLYN LEE

FATS

THE KETOGENIC FOOD PYRAMID genic diet to lose weight and shed body fat, to lower cholesterol or to treat metabolic illnesses. However, varsity lacrosse coach and World History teacher Daniel Shelton decided to follow this low-carb eating pattern for seven months in 2016 because of its popularity.

“It definitely was pretty popular back then,” Shelton said.“I usually like salads and stuff for lunch anyways, so it wasn’t a huge stretch. I just wanted to push it and see what it would do.”

During his stint on the ketogenic diet, Shelton said that for lunch he ate large salads with chicken, or large portions of lean meats such as fish, chicken or steak. His breakfast was most of his carbohydrate intake for the day — typically oats with unsweetened almond milk. Shelton also said he ate snacks such as keto-friendly trail mixes or chopped up raw vegetables such as bell peppers and carrots.

However, as a byproduct of his

STANDARD AMERICAN DIET

KETOGENIC DIET arbs 5% C

14.3% Proteins

25% Proteins

52.4% Carbs

Source: NCBI

33.3% Fats

vs.

70% Fats

The Campanile

Friday, November 8, 2019

SPORTS

d e w e k S STATISTICS

A

fter every baseball game they play, junior Zander Darby and his team are always eager to check the game statistics to see if their averages and percentages went up or down, as these numbers can make or break their futures.

When assessing the skill of a player or athlete, oftentimes one of the only criteria considered by coaches, scouts, players and even everyday consumers of sports is statistics. However, these numbers don’t always tell the whole story, and can lead to many capable players being overlooked simply because their stats are not up to par with their peers.

Senior soccer goalkeeper Jackson Druker said statistics are not the best measurement of skill. Rather, usually the team on top gets the recognition despite worse individual performances.

“The best player on the field is not necessarily the one from the winning team, and stats sometimes don’t reflect that,” Druker said.

According to Druker, for some sports and positions, stats play a bigger role than others.

“It depends on the sport. For track, stats are super important because that’s all they do,” Druker said. “For goalkeepers, the only stats you have a r e shots saved versus shot o n targets saved, so it is i m p o rtant to me.”

At its essence, according to Darby, a baseball, basketball and water p o lo player, stats do a good job as a general reflection of skill, but should not affect how someone plays.

“Stats are something I look at to gage how I’m doing,” Darby said. “But it’s important to forget about them in the moment. But it can also apply pressure to you. I try to forget, but in baseball, it is a good general reflection on how you are as a player.”

Druker said stats can often be inflated by other factors and be misleading.

“If you’re looking at a forward’s stats, they could have had 10 shots in a game and only three shots were on target and two goals,” Druker said. “So it looks good on them since they scored two out three shots on target, but it took them three tries. Whereas a good striker would have most of their shots on target.”

This, he said, can be deceitful since it makes some players appear more

skilled than they are.

Another aspect of “The score just doesn’t statistics that influreflect how well individual ence athletic teams or players someperfortimes,” Druker said. mance Another factor that is how “My can sway statistics is stats recoa the inconsistencies kno flect opch ws of each game, which ponents. m play may provide outliers “The er s e as a that can skew the only stats o aren stats data. we look at ’ “You can have t in baseball a i s mp a bad game,” is how hard a orta Darby said. pitcher throws, to m nt “You aren’t aland we adjust e.” ways gonna our playstyle,” play the same, Darby said. and it’s also While many an intimidateams like Darby’s tion factor change how they on a day to play depending on day basis. You the stats of the opcan’t expect everyposition, Druker said thing to be the same.” he does not give much Druker said he has personal expericonsideration to other ence with this issue. team’s data.

“Everyone has a bad game every once “I don’t take stats into consideration in a while, and everyone has amazing with opponents,” Druker said. “There games,” Druker said. “It’s not a good have been times where we played teams measurement.” ranked 200 below us, but we get deThese mis- stroyed.” leading stats While scouts and recruiters may look become espe- at stats closely, coaches generally are less cially detri- concerned with the numbers. Los Altos mental when boys varsity tennis coach Thor Holt said an athlete ratings in tennis are not important to wants to him. play in col“Tennis players that play in USTA lege.

(United States Tennis Association) tour“ T h e naments have a Universal Tennis Rating, thing that or UTR,” Holt said. “I would not build o r i g i n a l l y my team using a player’s UTR. It’s more a t t r a c t s of a way for the players themselves to see c o a c h e s how they hold up to their teammates and and scouts opponents.” to you Players generally don’t stress about are your stats as much with regards to the roster s t a t s , ” of their team, Druker said.

Druker “My coach knows me more as a plays a i d . er, so stats aren’t as important to “Coach- me,” Druker said. es, when However, both coaches and they are players agree that statistics over looking a long period of time can be an for a accurate measure of skill. goal“As you play more games, keeper, you are going to see t h e y a more accurate g o , UTR,” Holt said. ‘ H e ’ s “The system is 6’6,’ and generally accucome watch me play.” r a t e .

This means thousands of athletes T h e across the country go unnoticed because o n l y they did not check every box on a list of t i m e traits scouts looks at.

“For recruitment, my stats are important because at the beginning, it gives the coaches a better gage of who you are,” D a r b y said.

Jac Drukson ker

e “Stats ar g I look n i h t e m so e how g u a g o t at . But it’s g n i o d I’m rget o f o t t n a import em in about th ent.” the mom

According to Druker, statistics can be a great tool to sift out the best athletes.

However it can also be altered, misleading and discount deserving athletes.

“Stats do their job,” Druker said.

“But right now, they are more important than they should be.”

TEXT, DESIGN & ART BY Jace Purcell DESIGN BY Johnny Yang ART BY TIEN NGUYEN

SPORTS

The Voice Behind Paly Athletic Events Junior Jason Goldie discovered his gift of broadcasting during high school, and came to commentate many Paly sports to ensure exciting games.

KAROLE GOLDIE/USED WITH PERMISSION

someone might not trust UTR is when a player is coming back from an injury and hasn’t played in tournaments for a while.”

Druker adds that aggregate stats over a window of time can be trusted.

“The best way to determine how good a player is by looking at stats over the whole season instead of just a game,” Druker said.

Holt said this type of statistic can give athletes confidence if their rating is higher than their opponent.

“Let’s say you know that an opponent has a higher UTR than you,” Holt said.

“If you are getting beaten really badly — down four sets — you can find a bit of comfort because statistically they outperform you anyway. That’s not to say that you should give up, but you know that it was likely that you were not going to win. On the other hand, if the match is really close, knowing that an opponent’s UTR is higher than yours is still helpful, because you know that you are doing really well.”

PAGE C4

Sports

MARINA MATA/USED WITH PERMISSION

Paly golf makes states

After a successful season, the girls golf team prepares for the championship.

PAGE C2

Sports

JENNA HICKEY/USED WITH PERMISSION

Basketball captain profile

Varsity captain Matthew Marzano looks back at past seasons on the team.

PAGE C3

Sports

JENNA HICKEY/USED WITH PERMISSION

Switching sports

Paly athletes discuss their experiences transitioning sports.

PAGE C3

The Campanile

Friday, November 8, 2019

C2

SPORTS REPORT FOOTBALL RECENT SCORES

Paly vs. Mountain View 11/1, W, 36-7 Paly vs. Los Gatos 10/25, L, 29-22 Paly vs. Fremont 10/11, W, 42-0 UPCOMING GAMES

Paly vs. Milpitas 11/8, 7:00 p.m.

GIRLS VOLLEYBALL RECENT SCORES

Paly vs. Menlo Atherton 11/2, L, 3-2 Paly vs. Mountain View 10/29, W, 3-0 Paly vs. Gunn 10/24, W, 3-0 UPCOMING GAMES

CCS Tournament 11/2-9

BOYS WATER POLO RECENT SCORES

Paly vs. Los Altos 11/2, L, 15-7 Paly vs. Homestead 10/31, W, 9-3 UPCOMING GAMES

Paly vs. Menlo Atherton 11/9, 1:00 p.m.

GIRLS FIELD HOCKEY RECENT SCORES

Paly vs. Homestead 10/31, L, 1-0 Paly vs. Monta Vista 10/29, W, 2-0 Paly vs. Saratoga 10/24, L, 1-0

GIRLS GOLF RECENT SCORES

Norcal Regional 11/5, 3rd Place, 377 CCS Tournament 10/29, W, 370 SCVAL Tournament 10/22, W, 373 UPCOMING GAMES CIF State Championships 11/19

GIRLS WATER POLO RECENT SCORES

Paly vs. Los Gatos 10/31, L, 8-1 Paly vs. Los Gatos 10/22, L, 8-3 Paly vs. Saratoga 10/17, W, 10-4 UPCOMING GAMES Paly vs. Mountain View 11/9

GIRLS TENNIS RECENT SCORES

Paly vs. Mountain View 10/24, L, 6-1 Paly vs. Cupertino 10/21, W, 5-2 UPCOMING GAMES

CCS Tournament 11/11

SPORTS Girls volleyball redirects efforts following loss

Teammates practice methods to help strategic gameplay with hopes of succeeding in Norcal playoffs

By Sloan Wuttke

A

Staff Writer

fter losing its first round of Open Central Coast Sectionals to Menlo-Atherton High School 3-2 on Nov. 2, the girls volleyball team hopes to recover and redirect their efforts towards Norcal playoffs, according to senior captain Grace Thayer. The team was undefeated in the Santa Clara Valley Athletic League competition this season.

Last year, the team made it past the first round of Open CCS and was the first public school to do so ever.

“It’s hard to come into practice and focus every second to be better when you’re already dominating.”

Grace Thayer

Junior Kylie Mies said the team’s loss in Open CCS had to do with their mindset.

“I think the game really tested the mental aspect of our game, and we faltered on that,” Mies said. “We just didn’t have enough mental strength to stay in and finish it all the way

through.”

The team thinks the loss will help their progress, junior Trisha Razdan said.

“We all just want to continue the season and that happens by winning.”

Trisha Razdan

“I think that, although it was tough to endure the loss, we will be more diligent in practice so we can hopefully win the Norcal title,” Razdan said. “We all just want to continue the season and that happens by winning.”

Thayer said the team’s undefeated season in SCVALs may have interfered with their effective use of practice time.

“It’s hard to come into practice and focus every second to be better when you’re already dominating,” Thayer said.

According to Thayer, the team’s abilities could have improved with more intensive practice sessions.

“I didn’t want to go through the season and look back and think, ‘What if we had worked a little harder’ and, unfortunately, at times I think we definitely could have,” Thayer said.

JENNA HICKEY/VIKING

Ace! The varsity team celebrates after they score a point against opponent Menlo Atherton at the Peery Center. “In games, we leave absolutely everything we have on the court,” senior captain Grace Thayer said Moving forward, the team hopes to recover from its Open CCS loss and use that loss as further motivation.

“We collectively as a team need to focus on minimizing our errors but, overall, I think (the loss) was a good

wake-up call,” Thayer said. “After the game, Coach Dan talked about how what we practice is reflected in how we play, and I know I took it to heart that we need to go into the next 10 days until Norcal (playoffs) with everything we have.”

Thayer is optimistic for the team and its abilities moving forward.

“We have great coaches who know what we need to do and we just need to find ways of executing better,” Thayer said. “I think the future of our team is bright.”

Boys water polo Girls golf defends CCS title, prepares for CCS continues onto state level

By Benjamin Stein

A

Staff Writer

fter a successful run in the Santa Clara Valley Athletic League playoffs, boys varsity water polo hopes to carry this momentum into Central Coast Sectionals.

The team ended its league season with a 7-6 victory over Los Gatos High School on Oct. 22.

Paly played Los Gatos again in the first game of the SCVAL Finals tournament. Despite past victories, junior Luke Thieman said the team knew the match would be tough.

“We were 2-0 against them, but both games were close, and it is hard to beat a team three times,” Thieman said.

“Despite the tough loss against Los Altos, we are going to take it in stride and improve going into CCS.” Luke Thieman

The Vikings ultimately won a 10-8 battle against the Cats, advancing the team to the next round against Homestead.

According to Thieman, the team knew what to expect from Homestead High School, leading to a 9-3 victory.

“We had prepared for their offense and played our best defensive game of the year,” Thieman said.

This win took the team to the

finals against undefeated Los Altos. Although the odds favored Los Altos, Theiman said his team was ready to take them on.

“We’ve been beating a lot of teams that we had trouble with in the past because we fixed what we were doing wrong.”

Nick Hoffs

“We approached Los Altos knowing that they had destroyed everyone all season, but we felt like we knew how they played and that we had a chance to upset them,” Thieman said.

However, their game against Los Altos ended in loss with a score of 15-7.

Sophomore Nick Hoffs said the team views the end of the season and the tournament as successes despite the loss.

“We’ve been beating a lot of teams that we had trouble with in the past because we fixed what we were doing wrong,” Hoffs said.

For now, the Vikings are looking forward to Division I CCS, where they are seeded third. Paly takes on Menlo-Atherton on Nov. 9.

“Despite the tough loss against Los Altos, we are going to take it in stride and improve going into CCS,” Thieman said. “We aren’t worried too much about the loss in the league championships because CCS is our ultimate goal.”

By Andrew Toteda

B

Staff Writer

y a razor-thin margin, the girls golf team defended its Central Coast Sectionals title at the Laguna Seca Golf Ranch on Oct. 29, cementing back-to-back-to-back wins at CCS over the last three years.

“After my first shot, I knew I was going to play well and I wanted to win CCS for the team. Winning the individual title was just an added bonus.”

Sydney Sung

The team hopes to maintain its winning streak after going 8-0 in the regular season, and sweeping the local league tournament three weeks ago at the Santa Teresa Golf Course, placing first by a comfortable 38 strokes.

With the CCS title under its belt, the players have set their sights on gold in the California State Tournament, which they qualified for on Monday.

Head Coach Doyle Knight said he is proud of the skill and concentration his team exhibited during the CCS tournament.

Even with additional CCS pressure, the team was able to bring a solid game.

“At the CCS tournament,

Valley Christian (High School) was playing really well at the beginning, and we were only doing okay,” Knight said. “After the first nine, Valley Christian started to lose steam and get higher scores, but we were able to stay consistent.”

Paly won the nail-biter over Valley Christian 370-377.

“In the seven years that we’ve had a girls golf team, we’ve won four CCS championships, and we’ve had four individual champions including Sydney Sung,” Knight said. “If you look at the history of the CCS girls tournaments, no other public school has been so successful.”

Sophomore and medalist Sydney Sung was the first Paly player to win the champion title in three years. Former Paly athlete Stephanie Yu last did it during the 2016 season.

“If you look at the history of the CCS girls tournaments, no other public school has been so successful.”

Doyle Knight

“I was really calm the day we played CCS,” Sung said. “I just wanted to go out on the course to have fun and play my best. After my first shot, I knew I was going to play well and I wanted to win CCS for the team. Winning the individual title was just an added bonus.”

Both team and individual placement came down to the wire.

“In the final stretch of the round, (Coach Knight) told me that the team was struggling a bit,” Sung said. “This pushed me to make two birdies on my last two holes to go one under.”

“In the seven years that we’ve had a girls’ golf team, we’ve won four CCS championships, and we’ve had four individual champions.”

Doyle Knight

Sung won the title with a score of 70, besting rival Valley Christian’s Varnika Achanta by a single stroke.

According to junior Marina Mata, the team is looking forward to the state tournament.

“Qualifying for the state tournament has been a goal of ours for this season, and we are extremely excited to have accomplished it,” Mata said. “It is the first time the Paly girls golf team has qualified since 2013.”

The team placed third in its qualification matches and was automatically promoted to the state tournament.

The top three teams from both the NorCal region and SoCal region are set to duke it out on Nov. 19 at the Poppy Hills Golf Course in Pebble Beach.

Girls field hockey exceeds expectations Team improves in second season due to experience, bonding and returning players

By Kris Risano

T

Staff Writer

he field hockey team had high hopes to end the season on a positive note, but lost to Homestead 1-0 on Oct. 31. However, the team had already surpassed expectations with its first winning season.

“Our team was extremely successful and exceeded expectations, especially for it being our second season,” sophomore Phoebe Kim said. “We went 8-63, which is a huge improvement from last year when we only had two wins.”

“Our team was extremely successful and exceeded expectations, especially for it being our second season.”

Phoebe Kim

Kim credits the improvements to the experience the team gained through the past two sea-

sons.

“Besides the new freshman, we all had a year of experience under our belts which helped us

“The main focus for the team this season was working together as a team and building a positive culture of class and character.”

Jennifer Crane

a lot this season,” Kim said.

Coach Jennifer Crane mentioned that the team focused on off the field bonding this season.

“The main focus for the team this season was working together as a team and building a positive culture of class and character,” Crane said. “I think one of the most important foundational pieces in being an athlete is developing positive characteristics that will support growth of healthy relationships and life skills off the field.”

According to Crane, a con-

JENNA HICKEY/VIKING

Junior Madeline Lohse passes to teammate Alexa Gwyn and secures a goal against Westmont. “I consider this season a success and look forward to continuing our success next season,” coach Jennifer Crane said. stant challenge for the team was it has had to deal with a lack of experience among most players.

“I still consider our team to be a JV team since we only have girls with one or two years of experience and they are competing with long time running Varsity programs,” Crane said.

Kim said the team was faced with a major setback midway

through the season, but credits Crane for propelling them through the setback.

“Despite getting all of our expensive field hockey equipment stolen, we overcame adversity, and still performed to the best of our abilities,” Kim said. “We couldn’t have done it without our amazing coach Jenny.”

Senior Jessie Arons is proud

of how far the team has come in the past two years. Arons said, last season, most of the players were new to the sport, but that was not the case this season.

“Last year practically everyone was new to the sport, but this year we got to hone our skills, and we improved so much,” Arons said. “I am really proud of how far we’ve come.”

Friday, November 8, 2019

The Campanile

SPORTS

C3

Captain of Paly basketball reflects on past, future seasons

Only underclassmen on the varsity team in 2017-18 recalls his experiences with the successful program over the years

By Emma Todd

A

Staff Writer

s a young child, Matthew Marzano would get up early and go watch his dad play in a basketball league with other local dads every Saturday morning. Marzano loved basketball since he started playing at 5 years old, but his real inspiration came from his dad. Marzano’s main way of connecting with his dad included getting shots up at the court across the street.

“I guess I thought it was pretty cool watching my dad play out there, and I just wanted to follow in his footsteps,” Marzano said.

This began an extraordinary adventure for Marzano, as he became the only underclassman on the varsity basketball team in 2017. While Marzano has played basketball for 12 years, he said that being on varsity as a sophomore was eye-opening.

“It was really cool to learn from and play against the seniors at that time,” Marzano said. “It was kind of like I was the little brother, and they were showing me the ropes.”

In his junior year and his second year on the team, Marzano was named captain.

“I didn’t really see it as a big deal because the team was just a group of friends,” Marzano said.

“No one really thought they were above each other.”

“It was about playing hard all the time.

I don’t care if they make mistakes.

Those kids gravitated to that, and Marzano especially gravitated to that.”

Rodney Tention Marzano said during his first two years at Paly, his training was more about gaining experience and playing in open gyms. Now, Marzano said he is focused more about getting in the weight room

and trying to work on smaller details on the court.

Marzano said his main motivation has always been maintaining Paly’s tradition of success in basketball, like making the Central Coast Section tournament multiple years.

“I remember as a freshman watching the team win the CCS Championship versus Los Gatos, and I’ve always wanted to continue on with the legacy,” Marzano said.

Marzano said basketball has led to a lot of friendships in his life as well. One of those friends, senior Conner Lusk, said Marzano was a great captain last year because he was one of four returning varsity players.

“Matthew will always push you to be the best version of yourself. He will always make the extra pass in order to find a teammate that is more open than him.”

Conner Lusk “Since he had the opportunity to play with a CCS Championship-caliber team his sophomore season, he was able to let us juniors know the difficulty of becoming a great team and the sacrifices we would need in order to get there,” Lusk said.

Lusk also said Marzano is one of the best teammates he could ask for.

“Whether it’s explaining how to execute a play more efficiently, critiquing your footwork or bringing an ample amount of energy to any team function, Matthew will always push you to be the best version of yourself,” Lusk said.

“He will always make the extra pass in order to find a teammate that is more open than him.”

According to Lusk, most of the players on the team look up to Marzano and see him as an outspoken leader.

“Most of our junior class

JENNA HICKEY/VIKING

Swish! Then junior Matthew Marzano blazes past a Los Gatos defender as he soars towards the basket. The 2018-19 boys varsity basketball team went on to defeat rival Los Gatos 62-50 in front of an electric crowd on Jan. 11, 2019. Paly plays Los Gatos on Jan. 8. has been playing together since middle school, and Matthew has always been the best player, so through the years he has always been the leader of our team whether it’s club or school basketball,” Lusk said.

“I remember as a freshman watching the team win the CCS Championship versus Los Gatos, and I've always wanted to continue on with the legacy.”

Matthew Marzano It wasn’t just Lusk who noticed Marzano’s effect on the team. Marzano’s old coach, Rod-

ney Tention, who became associate head coach at Cal Poly this year, was there when Marzano was a sophomore and junior on the team. Tention said Marzano’s leadership is both his key to being a good teammate and player.

“They knew what kind of player he was,” Tention said. “He just didn’t get to show it as a sophomore. But with the team last year, him being in that captain role and understanding how hard you need to play, the players followed him and they knew he was one of their key guys.”

Tention said Marzano's captaincy all started during an exhibition game at the beginning of the year. There was no official captain at that time in the season, so Marzano stepped up to be the leader, for that game and for the rest of the season.

“He and Marvin Zhou (cocaptain) took it upon themselves, and I would have done the same thing even if we hadn’t had a

meeting or anything to go out there and represent,” Tention said. “I would have picked him as a captain anyway, so it was good that he showed leadership right then and there.”

“It was really cool to learn from and play against the seniors at that time. It was kind of like I was the little brother, and they were showing me the ropes.”

Matthew Marzano During the season, Tention said he always told his players that if they performed and practiced well, they were going to have the opportunity to perform well in a

game, and it could be that simple.

“It was about playing hard all the time,” Tention said. “I don’t care if they make mistakes. Those kids gravitated to that, and Marzano especially gravitated to that.”

Marzano said his journey to holding the role of captain was influenced by the discussions that Marzano and Tention would have while he was an underclassman on the team. They talked about what it takes to be successful in basketball later in life, as well as if Marzano wanted to play basketball in college. If that was something Marzano wanted to do, Tention would tell him how hard he would have to play and what his commitment has to be like.

Although Tention now lives in Southern California, he said he is still in touch with Marzano.

Tention said, “If they need anything, or just want to talk or vent, they are more than welcome to call me at anytime.”

Athletes find passion through switching sports in high school

Several students who have committed much of their lives to the same sport begin a new path in their athletic career

By Benjamin Stein

W

Staff Writer

hen a friend recommended junior Luke Thieman try water polo during the fall season of his sophomore year, the lifelong baseball player never thought that it would soon become his primary sport.

Thieman had played baseball since elementary school, competing in year-round club leagues.

Throughout these years, Thieman developed a love for the game as well as many fond memories.

However, upon entering high school, Thieman wanted to expand his athletic horizons and take up an additional sport.

“I realized that it would be good for me to play different sports because playing multiple sports increases your overall athleticism by giving you a wider range of athletic abilities,” Thieman said.

For Thieman, this new sport came in the form of water polo.

“I swam in the past, and I had an arm from baseball, so water polo was a clear choice,” Thieman said. “Now, I devote a lot of time to it, and I still really enjoy playing.”

“I swam in the past, and I had an arm from baseball, so water polo was a clear choice. Now, I devote a lot of time to it, and I still really enjoy playing.”

Luke Thieman Thieman, like many other Paly athletes, started to play a new sport in high school. Beginning a new sport in high school comes with many challenges, most notably the fact that an athlete needs to compete with others who have

likely been playing the sport for years. However, athletes say the benefits derived from switching their athletic focus often outweigh these difficulties. Students try new sports for many reasons that range from dissatisfaction or boredom to not seeing future prospects in their current sport.

“I figured that if I’m not going to play collegiate soccer, then why am I investing all of my time into soccer? So then I decided I should try something new.”

Hailey Hwang Junior Charles Mitz played varsity water polo and swam during his freshman and sophomore years but switched sports altogether in his junior year.

“I got bored and wasn’t really enjoying water polo that much,” Mitz said. “I wanted to try something new.”

Mitz still wanted to play a water sport, so he decided to take the muscles he developed from years of swimming and try his hand in crew. He has already seen success in crew, winning first place in the men’s varsity four race at the Head of the Lake Regatta in Seattle.

Mitz said that being engaged and interested in a sport helps athletes practice and perform at a higher level.

“I think it’s important to do what you want to do, not something that you have been doing,” Mitz said.

Junior Hailey Hwang, who began to run cross country and track after playing soccer her whole life, decided to transition out of soccer after taking stock of her college options. She now runs competitively and has placed highly in varsity races.

ART BY SLOAN WUTTKE

“I figured that if I'm not going to play collegiate soccer then why am I investing all of my time into soccer?” Hwang said. “So then I decided I should try something new.”

For Hwang, the decision to play less soccer was bittersweet.

While she said she misses certain elements of the sport, she also said playing at a lower level makes the sport more enjoyable.

“I miss the intensity of soccer because I was playing at a high level, and I was at my peak performance,” Hwang said. “But I wasn’t very happy playing soccer. I would get really nervous and stressed, but now I am much happier playing more recreationally.”

According to Hwang, it is important to gauge the mental toll that a sport is taking on you, and make changes if you feel that

you are not enjoying your current sport.

“If it is something that's causing stress in your life then maybe you should try something new and diversify,” Hwang said.

Often, athletes who switch sports will have various regrets about what could have been had they continued to play the same sport. For Thieman, the move to water polo came with its share of consequences.

“When you play a sport for a long time, you develop as a player,” Thieman said. “I was in that process of development for baseball, and I felt that I was losing all of my progress when I started to play water polo.”

Thieman also misses specific elements of baseball, such as practicing his hitting and taking ground balls.

“I really miss the little things in baseball that you can work on by yourself and the ways in which you can take yourself further as a player by paying attention to the small details,” Thieman said.

“I was in that process of development for baseball, and I felt that I was losing all of my progress when I started to play water polo.”

Luke Thieman This factor made the decision to commit fully to water polo and

not play baseball in his sophomore year very difficult.

“It was hard to let that go,” Thieman said. “It's kind of like losing a part of myself. But on the other hand, that was kind of compensated for by finding this new outlet.”

In an atmosphere where kids grow up specializing in individual sports and playing them at a high level, Thieman believes that some athletes have lost sight of the benefits to playing multiple sports or even switching sports altogether.

“You can still remain at an elite level in one sport while playing other sports,” Thieman said.

“And by playing multiple sports, you can not only become a wellrounded athlete but also build connections and make friends within different sports, which is really special.”

The Campanile

SP RTS

Friday, November 8, 2019

THE VOICE OF PALY SPORTS T

he “On Air” sign eventually lead to a career glows a threatening in sports broadcasting. red, pixelated blue “I started doing broadwords cascade down the casting in eighth grade, teleprompter, and three and I found out that it imposing black cameras was my hidden talent,” point towards junior Jason Goldie said. “As soon as Goldie’s face as he stands I discovered this, I knew in front of a nylon green this was what screen to recount the lat- I wanted t o est sports news. be.”

Though Goldie has been “I ALSO STARTED a sports TAKING HIM TO anchor on Goldie InFocus said he GIANTS GAMES, since his began ansophomore nouncing 49ERS GAMES year, he has at football AND STANFORD long been games afpassionter Nelson BASEBALL AND ate about Gifford, s p o r t s Paly’s athbroadcast- FOOTBALL GAMES. letic diing and rector and THAT'S WHERE recently head footbegan do- HE LEARNED HOW ball coach, ing comdiscovered mentary for TO ANNOUNCE.” G o l d i e ’ s Paly footpassion ball, basesports Karole Goldie for ball and broadcastwrestling. ing.

“With the help of some “Last year, (Gifford) parents and coaches, he was co-teaching my math learned to keep score on class, and he wanted me to a baseball scorecard (in announce the varsity footelementary school), and ball games and, of course, later on iScore, which he I accepted,” Goldie said. loved,” his mother KarArne Lim, a Paly math ole Goldie said. “I also teacher, said he announced started taking him to Gi- football games for about ants games, 49ers games a year before Gifford inand Stanford baseball troduced him to Goldie and football games. That’s through Dias. where he learned how to “I get this contact … announce.” from Tina Dias, saying Goldie said that Jason Goldie would he hopes like to also announce his pas- games,” Lim said. “I exs i o n plained what I do and how w i l l it operates and he seemed quite amenable to it.”

According to Lim, Goldie was quickly learned the

DESIGN BY ALEX LIU

TEXT AND DESIGN BY KAI VETTETH

ropes of commentating gan announcing at other despite facing communi- Paly athletic events, incation challenges due to cluding baseball and autism. wrestling, after a Paly par“In a nutshell, we (peo- ent approached him. ple with autism) see the “I was at the Paly world differently,” Goldie Christmas tree drive and said. “Our social skills there was a wrestling aren’t that great. (Chris- mom there,” Goldie said. tina Dias) wanted the “She said that the another academic communi- nouncer for the wrestling cations students to come events was an outgoing to the first JV game that senior and she wanted me I announced just so they to take over.” could hear me.”

Despite never having Lim said Goldie is played sports competiespecially adept at the tively, Goldie said he loves preparation aspect of talking about them bebroadcasting because he cause sports are a major memorizes things easily. part of his family life.

“He’s also very good at “Football is the playremembering names that by-play, baseball you he repeats over and over announce who’s at-bat again,” Lim said. “For ex- and wrestling you anample, I would not be sur- n o u n c e who the prised if he actually knows n e x t wreseverybody on the team t l e r s are,” right now by number "LAST YEAR, and name.”

AccordGoldie (GIFFORD) WAS ing to Paly said. “It’s Education great caCO-TEACHING MY areer Specialist for a Christina sports fan MATH CLASS, Dias, who like me.” manages S e AND HE WANTED G o l d i e ’s nior Ella ME TO ANNOUNCE Jones, who individual education re g u l a r l y THE VARSITY plan, he attends has imFOOTBALL GAMES fgoaomt beasl l, proved both his AND, OF COURSE, said Goldconfidence ie’s comand commentating I ACCEPTED." municahas been tion skills positively Jason Goldie as a rereceived sult of his by players experience with sports and fans. broadcasting.

“I really enjoy listen“He’ll reach out to the ing to the announcer at other teams and get the the football games,” Jones list of the names of the said. “His voice is very players … he’s going to soothing.” be announcing,” Dias According to Dias, said. “He wants Goldie’s participation in to make sure sports broadcasting is part he pronounces of a pattern of increased their names cor- inclusion for students rectly and knows with disabilities. how to say their Dias said, “The District names, so he puts is really embracing the a lot of time into idea of inclusion, (which) prepping for it.” means that they're given In August, the same opportunities as Goldie be- your typical peers."

ART BY ADORA ZHENG