The Voice - February 2018

February 2018

THE VOICE

Tt Oo c C

1 Voice

3. Whats the word?

4. Photo wrap up

5. Gardening club

6. the lost art of podcasts

7. kc crawl

8. reviews

15-16. feature: big sonia

17. personality quiz 18. voice of reason

19-20. letters to the one

that got away 21-22. black panther

10. kickin' it with kincaid 11-12. richard mchorgh

13. headmaster search

14. academic integrity

23-24. teacher feature

25. daca

26. Middle School

9. photo poll

27-28. global warming 29. comic

30. crossword/whispers

Cover By Kate whitney '19

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Voice 2

Buzz

Audrey O'Shaugnessey and Katie Kimball Columnists

The 52nd Annual Super Bowl took place on February 4, 2018 resulting in an exciting win for Philadelphia Eagles.

The Punxsutawney Groundhog, Phil, saw his shadow on February 2nd, predicting six more weeks of winter.

Upper Schoolers attended the annual winter WPA dance on February 11th.

Will Powell, ‘18, celebrated his 1000 point basketball record at home game!

Leadership Advisory Board (LAB) organized LAB-Love week in preparation for Valentine's Day. The 2018 Winter Olympics began on February 9th in Pyeongchang, South Korea.

Pembroke Hill students received over 40 Scholastic Art and Writing awards.

E B RU A RY

Aquarius (January 20 - February 18)

aquarius picesS

Strengths: Progressive, original, independent, humanitarian Weaknesses: Runs from emotional expression, temperamental, uncompromising, aloof

Monthly prediction: Although this month may be difficult, it is truly a time for you to grow in the challenges you face. Dig into what you fear, and feel yourself be rejuvenated by overcoming that which holds you back.

Pices (February 19 - March 20) Strengths: Compassionate, artistic, intuitive, gentle, wise, musical Weaknesses: Fearful, overly trusting, morose, desire to escape reality Monthly prediction: February is your month to be creative! Make time this month to immerse yourself in a new form of art, and be inspired to experiment and take risks. Follow new ideas, and take a leap.

3 Voice

What’s the Word?

A View From Each Grade on: Dating in High School

Caroline Salzman Columnist

Dating in high school can be very complicated. You could each go to separate schools, although Julia Rosher would advise that you “don’t date any Rockhurst boys.” You could also be in different grades, but Caroline O’Keefe states that makes prom as a Sophomore very “interesting.” Julia Pfluger’s advice for dating in highschool is that “it’s not for everyone” and Zach Jonas would add that you “don’t have to force a date, hanging out is fun too.” Wise words from Will Powell are that “high school relationships can be really good. They just depend on who you are with.”n

Jay Mehta Columnist

In terms of dating, high school operates as sort of a liminal space between the playground relationships of elementary and middle school and the real relationships of adult life.

However, for those who participate in the ritual, relationships at any level are meaningful insofar as they are part of one’s development as a person. Moreover, it is by no means unheard of for high school sweethearts to get married.

The way I see it -- and I am no authority on the subject -- everyone’s life has its own, unique, romantic narrative.

Everyone has that first awkward relationship. Everyone makes mistakes and learns more about themselves in the process. Everyone gleans lessons from past experiences and moves forward, hopefully as a better person. The difference lies solely in when that narrative begins. So, “dating in high school” is different for everyone, depending on where one is in that story.n

Charlotte Henry Columnist

Jackson Chu and Rishabh Gaur Columnists

High school relationships are complicated, and sophomore dating is no different. Oftentimes, we are left questioning how long couples are meant to last, but as Sophomore Zara Johnson put it, “People sometimes think it is a waste of time because it won’t last, but I think to each their own. If you and another person both like each other exclusively, then why not?” The truth is that few relationships truly outlast high school, but like most things we do in these four years, dating is worth a shot for many. High school is our opportunity to try new things and prepare ourselves for the future. Between school and extracurriculars, dating seems like an unnecessary addition, but despite the complications, sophomore John Butler has found that, “[Dating] is full of confusion and heartbreak, but for some reason we still want it”. Even given the immense trials that dating presents, the excitement and mystery surrounding it easily attract sophomore attention.n

One aspect of teenage life is dating and relationships.

Whether or not you should date or have a boyfriend or a girlfriend is a question most people ask themselves in high school. Although for freshmen it may not be as important as for seniors, it is a subject that is talked about a lot through the drama that surrounds dating or just figuring out how to ask someone to a dance. Some relationships in high school have more to do with social status and popularity, which only seems to complicate things. Overall, most high school relationships are not that serious and are usually just a situation where two people can share the ups and downs of being in high school.n

Spoken word poets and members of Project V.O.I.C.E. Sarah Kay and Robbie Q. Telfer performed their poetry to a group of students in Centennial Hall to raise money for the Child Protection Center.

A group of senior students enjoy their night out at this year’s WPA.

Pembroke had the honor of hosting a wonderful group of shortstay students from around the Kansas City area. The group enjoyed ice skating and a delicious international buffet dinner to finish off the long weekend together.

The Pembroke Hill Community celebrated our five seniors, Syke Cozad, India Gaume, Garrett Kincaid, Connor JordanHyde, and Garrett Presko, as they commit to further their athletic and academic careers at their respective universities. We all wish them the best of luck!

5 Voice

Gardening Club An exclusive interview with the students that make it possible

Cat Leal, Audrey Lu, and Ira Vats Staff Writers any of you have seen the new upper school garden, located in between Jordan Hall and Centennial, just outside of the fence: this work is a culmination of the efforts of Garden Club members, including Andrew Hughes (AH) and the President of Garden Club, Julie Jones (JJ). In 2015, Julie came up with the idea to found Garden Club in order “to both foster a better sense of community between students at Pembroke and also to interest more students in the natural world around them and where their food comes from.” By the end of their sophomore year, Andrew and Julie had not only established the Garden Club, but also built the first Pembroke community garden on the lower campus. This year, they expanded the program to the upper school, with the new Centennial garden. We asked Andrew and Julie about the process that they underwent to build the new garden.

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V: What made you interested in the Garden Club?

JJ: I had the idea to start the Garden Club a few years ago because I thought a community garden would be a great way to both foster a better sense of community between students at Pembroke and also to interest more students in the natural world around them and where their food comes from.

V: I think most students have noticed the new garden by Centennial. How did you guys start implementing that?

AH: We first had to get permission from the school and then needed to raise the money for lumber and soil.

JJ: So far the club’s garden on the lower school has been very successful! Garden Club wanted to expand onto the upper campus so that more high schoolers would get involved and excited about growing fresh vegetables on campus.

V: What altercations did you have with the school?

AH: The school has been very concerned with aesthetics with the garden. It has been difficult get approval for the garden because they worry it will impede on the school’s look.

V: What motions are you making this year to improve the club?

AH: Right now all we really need to work on is getting more people involved. Julie and I graduate this year, so we need to find someone willing to take on the responsibilities of the garden.

JJ: To improve the club this year we are focusing on getting the new garden by Centennial up and running. Hopefully now that we have these two new beds more students will want to become involved with the club. We are also hoping to distribute more of the vegetables we produce to the PHS community.

V: What are you future plans for the Garden Club?

JJ: Our future plans for the Garden Club is to see the garden producing organic vegetables for years to come. I think it is very important for our school community to have a garden, so hopefully Garden Club can ensure that there is always a working garden on campus.

Throughout Pembroke’s past, they have been concerned with their campus aesthetic. Despite Pembroke’s apprehension, a garden on the upper campus would bring a sense of unity to the students.

Although Julie and Andrew will graduate, they hope to leave a foundation of the Garden club that students can sustain in the upcoming years.n

The Lost Art of Podcasts

Voice 6

Hunter Julo Head of Design

I

‘m driving down Ward Parkway at 6 PM in the middle of or maybe something for school. It doesn’t matter where I am going fall. The trees are just beginning to turn orange and red because my reasoning is all the same. It wasn’t until I took a creaas I speed past, Nate DiMeo’s voice piping through my tive nonfiction class over the summer, and actually wrote my own stereo as he tells me some story of forgotten history. Every podcast, when I realized the beauty behind this artform. Podcasts episode of The Memory Palace manages to make me nostal- are like writing and music had a beautiful child. Just like music or gic for places in time that I have never been to and happy poetry, podcasts are written so that they can be listened to easily. for where I have been. I am a regular listener, and tell just about Yet, podcasts are still usually informative or educational in some everyone I can about how great this podcast is. way or another. It is like reading a book except you’re not readI didn’t even listen to ing or like listening to music expodcasts 9 months ago. cept you’re listening to words. I If someone had asked me am entertained as I drive to some

By Jay Mehta what a podcast was back changing destination, but I am then, I probably would engaged, thinking about new have said it was a radio ideas that are limitless. There are show. Radio shows and podcasts about every topic for iTunes Soundcloud podcasts, while they overevery person, so there is endless lap in many areas, are possibilities to what new topic I two separate entities that am going to hear about today. accomplish two separate If you ever want to listen to a things. Radio shows traditionally focus on music. Even when con- podcast now, you can check out Radiotopia, NPR, or any of the sidering radio talk shows, the talking portion usually serves as an other major media companies that produce wonderful podcasts. interlude between songs. Podcasts are episodic. While they may Or, you can support Pembroke directly by listening to our podcast. not follow a chronological order, they usually focus on one central Written and produced by Jay Mehta ‘19, The Voice podcast delves idea which each installment of the podcast follows. into the important ideas covered in each issue of the magazine. Jay So, why listen to podcasts over reading, listening to music, or interviews members of our faculty and student body about their any of the other numerous ways we can entertain ourselves in this opinions on the feature article so we can take a more indepth look era? I go back to that drive on Ward Parkway in the middle of the on the opinions of our community. You can access the Voice podfall. I’m headed to dinner with my family, or a movie with friends, cast on Soundcloud or iTunes, or using the code below.n

The Voice Podcast

7 Voice

KC CRAWL 4525 Oak St, Kansas City, MO 64111

Emma Knopik Columnist Finally, The Nelson-Atkins Museum has a coffee shop! I am particularly thrilled as now I can combine two of my favorite things in the same building, art and coffee! Quay Coffee is newly located in the Bloch building, on the South side of the museum (the reflection pool side). Quay (pronounced “key” as I eventually learned after embarrassingly calling it “kway” for years) coffee, owned by Dominic Scalise, first opened in the River Market in 2012. In the 1970’s the River Market was also called the River Quay- which is where Quay coffee got its name. It quickly became popular for its coffee and cozy space. Even if you have already visited Quay in the River market, there are essential aesthetic differences between the original Quay coffee shop and the one at the Nelson. The River Market Quay feels warm with autumnal tones of classic brick walls, string lights, and hardwood floors. Ordering a cup of coffee in this space

is like a hug on an October afternoon. The new location is different in that it blends right into the minimalist, modern look of the Bloch Building. Quay sources coffee from a variety of different roasters, alternating every few months, so there is always something new to try. When I first went to Quay’s new location, instead of coffee, I ordered a London Fog (an Earl Grey Latte) and was not disappointed. Along with coffee and tea drinks, Quay also offers pastries and breakfast burritos if you want to grab breaky or an afternoon snack.

Especially exciting is the rumor that this Spring, Quay will offer affogato- Betty Rae’s ice cream with espresso poured over the top.

So this weekend, or any day, show your local KC businesses some love and pick up a latte on your way to see the Picasso exhibit.n

- FEBRUARY REVIEWS Film

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Gina Pepitone Editor-in-Chief

The movie Lady Bird is a captivating coming of age story masterfully directed by Greta Gerwig. Set in Sacramento, California, we follow the lead character Christine “Lady Bird” McPherson throughout her senior year in high school.

The very first scene sets the tone of the movie, opening with Lady Bird and her mother sharing a touching moment in the car together, both softly crying to an audiobook of Grapes of Wrath. My breath was then taken away as the scene escalated into an intense argument about college and the future, in which Lady Bird throws herself from the car. From this point onward, viewers can’t help but fall in love with Lady Bird and her headstrong personality.

While we follow the friendships and love life of Lady Bird throughout the movie, Gerwig’s main focus of the plot is centered around the tenuous mother-daughter relationship. We learn about Lady Bird’s dream of attending college in New York City to escape her Catholic school education and and her self-declared dull life in Sacramento. She is an idealistic thinker, romanticizing the great metropolis, but her mother thinks it best that she abandons her dreams and focuses on more realistic goals.

What makes the movie successful, in my opinion, is how authentic the characters are. From the audience, we see how naive and vulnerable Lady Bird truly is under a guise of carelessness and confidence. Similarly with Lady Bird’s mother, we see how overprotective she is of her daughter and how these critical maternal instincts are blown out of proportion. All the characters have apparent flaws, which comprises the essence of what makes them human. This allows us to empathize with the characters as we come to truly care for them, making for perhaps one of the best movies of 2017.n

Game

Phinney Sachs Contributor

Music

Charlotte Lawrence Staff Writer

There has been a wave of unity, a strain of common ground, sweeping the globe in the midst of seemingly ubiquitous turbulence, and this movement goes by the name of Fortnite.

Fortnite: Battle Royale can be played in three different modes: solo, duo, and squad. The general structure of the three game modes is the same in essence: there are one-hundred players who are either competing as individuals, groups of two, or groups of up to four. The players try to eliminate each other and be the last person or group remaining alive in the game. While heavily based in this classic, but rather unoriginal concept, Fortnite has multiple deeper dimensions. In order to maximize the chances of winning, it is highly incentivized to obtain the best weapons, which range in status from common to legendary, and resources, including wood, brick, and metal.

The purpose of the weapons is obvious, the better ones having greater accuracy or dealing more damage and such, while the resources can be used more creatively. Players can create certain constructs, depending one how much of a resource they have, for the purposes of protection or even just overcoming obstacles and getting from one point to another. There are also many power-ups which are randomly found on maps in chest or more random nooks and crannies along with weapons and resources. Weapons are placed around the map and so are limited resources, but a majority of materials must be earned by destroying objects, which in turn creates a large amount of noise, thus sacrificing your position. Despite its cartoonish graphics and less serious aura, Fortnite does in fact require quite a bit of strategy to master, something I cannot say I have done, and even win with luck it is extremely difficult to win.

The less technical side of Fortnite is equally important as the tactics and difficulty to the overwhelming popularity of the game. It is able to promote a sense of camaraderie with both the closest of friends and most distant strangers, and its generally fun feel appeals to the kid in all of us. Fortnite: Battle Royale is a truly unique kind of game; it is capable of uniting players from all backgrounds and producing a warm youthful nostalgia within us all through its challenging, exciting, original, and colorful gameplay.n

This year at the Grammys, the two artists that stood out to both viewers and in the musical community were Kendrick Lamar and Bruno Mars. Mars took home six Grammys, Lamar took home five and both performed. Mars was accompanied by Cardi B and played their top hit Finesse. Their crowd-pleasing performance had many hommages to early hip hop roots and got people on their feet. Kendrick Lamar was accompanied by U2’s Bono and the Edge while Dave Chappelle made small interjections between powerful vignettes.

According to many students at Pembroke Hill, Kendrick Lamar’s groundbreaking and nihilistic album DAMN. was snubbed from the overall Album of the Year title by Bruno Mars’s 24k Magic. Many students agreed that Mars produced a somewhat honorable album with hits like Finesse and 24k Magic, but lacked the depth and social relevance of Kendrick Lamar’s album. Kendrick Lamar created an album that was popular, memorable, and addressed numerous problems in our culture today. Bruno Mars produced great songs with rhythmic beats and powerful vocals, but lacked a much needed message that Kendrick had in every song, especially in songs like XXX FEAT. U2, LOVE FEAT. ZACARI, and ELEMENT. Although he did win Rap Album of the Year and many other titles, Kendrick still deserved Album of the Year for the incredible work he produced and the impact he made on communities across America.n

9 Voice

PHOTO POLL Who's Your Secret Crush?

Lily Cooper & Kennedy Wolf Contributors

Campbell Robinson ‘19 Secret Crush: Allie Jones (Please take me back)

Ava DiCapo ‘21 Secret Crush: Ross Bunch

Benny Dai ‘18 Secret Crush: Skye Cozad

Dasha McDonald ‘20 Secret Crush: Graham Boswell

Athletes to Watch: Kelly Clark (Snowboarding) Brianna Decker (Hockey) Erin Hamlin (Luge) Erin Jackson (Speed Skating) Chloe Kim (Snowboarding) Steve Langton (Bobsled)

Jacqueline Kincaid Columnist Everyone has heard of the Winter Olympics, but very few people know what exactly happens over the course of those eighteen days. This year, the games are in PyeongChang, South Korea, ninety minutes from Seoul and sixty miles from the Demilitarized Zone.

PyeongChang, formerly Pyeongchang, changed its name to ensure no one mistakes the city for Pyongyang, North Korea’s capital. South Korea has adopted Soohorang as its official mascot.

Soohorang is a black and white tiger that is viewed, through Korean folklore, as a sign of strength, protection, and trust. However, this isn’t the city’s first time hosting the games. PyeongChang previously hosted the summer games in 1988 and beat out two other cities in 2011 to secure the hosting position for the twenty-third Winter Olympics. The estimated cost for the winter games is ten

Ted Ligety (Alpine Ski Racing) Chris Mazdzer (Luge) Elana Meyers Taylor (Bobsled) Mirai Nagasu (Figure Skating) Lindsey Vonn (Alpine Skiing) Shaun White (Snowboarding)

than what was spent to create the games at the Sochi Olympics in 2014. Though ticket sales have been slower than anticipated, at the PyeongChang resort, spectators will watch seven sports, with fifteen variations from February 8th-February 25th.

This year, the International Olympic Committee added four sports to the schedule:

freestyle skiing, big air snowboarding, mass start speed skating, and mixed doubles curling. You can probably guess a few eventsskiing/snowboarding, figure skating, ice hockey- but there are probably some that are new to you. A poll of the student body showed that what takes place at the Winter Olympics remains relatively unknown.

Next to each sport (below) is the percentage of students who can explain that particular sport. In case you plan to watch a new event this year, I’ve included descriptions of what you might see.

Curling (87%)

Luge (44%)

Skeleton (87%)

Founded in Scotland, curling became popular around the mid-nineteenth century. The object of the sport is to use one of two types of brooms to push a curling rock across the ice, in the direction of a target. While one broom- the most common- is called the push broom, the other is called either a Canadian, corn, or straw broom. Since the rocks weigh nearly forty-five pounds, the game has been referred to as “the roaring game” due to the sound the curing rocks make when they cross the surface, which is covered with pebbled ice that aids in the stone’s grip.

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In the mid-nineteenth century, British tourists tried sliding down roads throughout the Alps. Inspired by this instance, the first toboggan run was built.

Skeleton stems from these roots, as it’s considered the world’s first sliding sport, in which the athlete plunges down an icy hill, on a small sled, head-first.

Bobsleigh (83%)

Bobsleigh came after skeleton, since the sport was originally founded by the combination of two skeleton sleds in Switzerland around the late nineteenth century. The Swiss eventually created a steering mechanism, making a toboggan. Today, the sleds are made out of fiberglass and steel, with a protective covering, to accommodate two to four athletes who speed down an icy track.

Though the luge was created

by Swiss hotels to attract tourists in the nineteenth-century, its origins date back to the sixteenth-century, making it one of the oldest winter sports. It is extremely dangerous, as participants speed down an icy track on a sled, while lying on their back, feet first. There is no way to stop the sled, though it travels close to ninety miles per hour on the ice. Luge is both an individual and two-person sport, in which the larger of the two lays on top of the smaller one.

Credit: Time, CNN, Olympic, Mirror, CBS, Team USA, Olympic, PyeongChang, NY Daily News, Sky Sports

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Student Spotlight: Richard McHorgh Daniela Rodriguez-Chavez and Lauren Washington Staff Writer and Managing Editor As busy, hard-working students of Pembroke Hill, we often don’t hear about or see some of the amazing work our classmates are pursuing outside of school. Richard McHorgh ‘19, for example, is one of these students. He is the programmer and web designer for the business he created, McHorgh Web Design. To our delight, we sat down with Richard to hear about the process of how his business came to be and a little insight on his experience with Bitcoin.

V: How did you get started with coding?

RM: Around 2011, I started building websites for people with Wordpress. Then, I started getting into Codecademy, using some of Mr. Baber’s material because he worked there, and just got better and better. I think that up to a point, those websites can’t teach you enough though because you have to get more experience in the field. A lot of people on Youtube say you have to do research for yourself, make an idea, and then execute that plan. That mantra has worked pretty well for me, and then I started getting into more complex versions of the basic languages I knew already like HTML and TSS. V: When did you create your website?

RM: I bought both my domain and hosting, which is where all the files for the website are stored, in the library halfway through 3rd semester of last year. Then, over the summer, I became more serious about my work, so I started surfing through Reddit to find jobs. On Reddit, I came into contact with my business partner, Daniel, who lives in Canada. Through that connection, we started contracting together and doing some pretty large contracts. I officially bought my website when things started getting really serious, so I began coding everyday instead of just reading about it.

V: What does your business partner, Daniel, do?

RM: Daniel does a lot of the advertising through Google Adwords. In terms of what I do, I just do the coding and one of the big tools that we use, which is Wordpress. It’s for blogs and other things, but you can use it to where you can change the content on the website. So, those are kind of the two sides that we work with, but we’re both experts in each side with coding and advertising, so now we just do contracts together and it’s more easier to get a lot of jobs that way.

V: Does your business work with Bitcoin or has used it?

RM: Yeah Daniel and I actually built a site for this guy who was selling Bitcoin, and I’m really glad we did because that was when Bitcoin was worth $3000 a coin. That was in August and I held onto it until it was at $5000, but then I sold it and bought my phone, the Galaxy Note 8. That was really stupid, though, because I could’ve

quintupled my money.

V: When you do contracts now, do they pay you in Bitcoin or actual money?

RM: They pay me through Paypal, but then I convert that into Bitcoin. I prefer getting paid in Bitcoin upfront because Paypal has conversion fees. The fees for Bitcoin have changed a lot- it changes on depending where you send them to. With Bitcoin and all other cryptocurrencies, you have a wallet that can be on your phone, hard drive, or some people even spend thousands of dollars on these hardware wallets where you can physically hold them.

V: If someone wants to get involved with Bitcoin now, how do they even start?

RM: Probably the easiest way is going through this company called Coinbase. Their fees are ridiculous, but they have wallets for Bitcoin, Ethereum, and Litecoin. Once you want to get more serious, you could use this chinese company, Binance, who are more focused on trading different coins. Basically, Binance has a variety of coins that they sell where you can trade between and a few good ones I’ve heard about, like Ark, Iota, and others. You want to start out with a little bit of money because it’s so volatile, it could change in an instant, like one day it could be up 30 or 40 percent but then the next day it’s down 40 again. The good thing about Binance is that they have their own type of cryptocurrency which mitigates some of the fees because it’s theirs. Both Binance and Coinbase are good, but Coinbase is also nice because you can transfer into bank accounts which Binance doesn’t allow. To use your coins with Binance, its a multistep process where you have to have two accounts, a Coinbase account to put dollars into and then a Binance account where you can send those coins to which you can sell from Binance as well.

Voice 12 V: Who are some of the clients you’ve worked with and how do they find you?

RM: Usually through Reddit I’ll find clients like in this forum called R/For Hire where people will place bids on how much money they’ll do the job for. For example, I did a website for a client over in Jakarta, Indonesia which was an interesting experience because I used a different application to build the website that was called Adobe Muse. It’s definitely for simple stuff, but it was pretty interesting to learn how to use some of the tools in it. Most of my contracts are in Canada actually, and I’m working on one now that is for a gadget company that sells tiny drones. I also worked on another project for this guy in Quebec who is a Wellness and Life coach, so I’ve worked with a lot of different people. I think probably the hardest thing I ever did was when I built this social network for an art school. One of the most wild contracts Daniel and I have had was this woman who didn’t give us enough information so of course we couldn’t finish her website. We’d email her for more information, but she wouldn’t email back. The woman decided to send a letter to sue us, but the funny thing was that she sent this letter to Daniel.

Daniel plead to her not to sue because she’d receive a full refund and he could refer her to someone who could finish the site, but he referred her to me and so we were still able to make money from that contract and finish the site for her.

V: Do you plan to continue coding in college and make it a profession or is it an on the side thing?

RM: Yeah definitely, it’s really fun for me. I think over the summer, I want to start a foundation to teach underprivileged kids about Python. I want to do something like that for my capstone as well.

Hearing what Richard told us, Daniela took it further to research on what exactly Bitcoin is. So, in 2009, a person (or group) by the name of Satoshi Nakamoto created the Bitcoin in response to the economic crisis at the time. Made up of thirty-one thousand lines of code, Bitcoin is a type of crypto-currency that allows for direct, and anonymous, transactions between people, erasing the need for a government or bank “middle-man.” Unlike paper money, which can be printed when needed, there is not an unlimited supply of Bitcoin. Nakamoto programmed his code to release 21 million Bitcoins in total, with about 12.5 Bitcoins currently being distributed every 10 minutes. Receivers of this distribution are called “miners.” Whenever a transaction occurs within the Bitcoin community, a piece of code (called a block) is created specifically for each bitcoin in order to ensure it’s not reused in multiple transactions at once. Miners use computers to create code to add onto a block after each transaction, which help with future transfers within the Bitcoin network. Thousands of “miners” do this all at once, with the highest contributors of computing power winning a higher percentage of the Bitcoin awarded than lesser miners. As more people join the mining community, it gets harder and harder to win.

The main two factors behind the apprehension regarding Bitcoin is its legality and stability. Bitcoin is known for being a popular currency among transactions in the Dark Web, most of which are illegal. However Bitcoin itself exists in a gray area in which many

governments are trying to place regulations on, making it legal in some places, but not in others. As of right now, there are only six countries where it is explicitly illegal: Morocco, Bolivia, Ecuador, Kyrgyzstan, Bangladesh, and Nepal. However in other countries such as Taiwan, Vietnam, and Russia, financial banks and the government have differing opinions about the legality of Bitcoin, making it questionable. Currently, in the United States, Bitcoin is deemed legal.

Other than its legality, the second problem is its value. Because its value is determined by the users, Bitcoin is known to be very volatile. One day it could be worth in the thousands, while the next it could drop down to double-digits. Regardless, many people think it’s worth the risk. Bitcoin started off at around seven cents back in 2010. From there, it stayed relatively low until it grew, almost breaking a thousand, at the end of 2013. It stayed in the low hundreds for the next two-ish years until mid-2016. That’s when Bitcoin started growing exponentially. In just six months it had doubled in size, breaking a thousand dollars in early 2017. Flashforward to December 2017, the time this article was written: Bitcoin is worth about $16,500 per coin, growing at a rate of about $150 every hour. It’s a new technological world and the crypto-currency world of bitcoin is perhaps the new breakthrough in electronic money.n

13 Voice

A Search for the New Headmaster William Carolan and Charlie Thorne Contributors

A

fter Dr. Bellis announced his resignation that he would be leaving from the school in 2019 in early September of last year, the search for a new headmaster has been a popular topic throughout the school. An advisory committee consisting of a diverse range of parents, teachers, and alums allows the school to have numerous perspectives to choose the newest head of school. Notable teachers such as Anna Toms and Noah Liable, as well as director of college counseling, David Burke, will team up in the Advisory Committee, along with veteran teachers like Kit Smith and Billie Barnes from the lower school campus. In addition to the Advisory Committee, the school board has created a sub-committee of trustees specifically aimed at finding a new headmaster, a decision that has not been made since Dr. Bellis became headmaster eleven years ago. To ensure a thorough search process, these committees have combined with Educators’ Collaborative, an “educational search and consulting firm.” This company specializes in the hiring of heads and other senior administrative positions for independent schools. Not only does Educators’ Collaborative (EC) provide strategic planning, it also provides leadership coaching. To start the process, EC tries to understand the school’s main values and from there is able to identify a potential candidate. EC has an in-depth website with multiple listings for head of school positions. The Pembroke Hill School has a committed mission statement: “to enable all students to build character and to develop their intellectual, physical, and creative abilities to their highest level.” In addition to the mission statement, respect, compassion, scholarship, and integrity are at the top of Pembroke’s values. EC “seeks an individual of outstanding character, whose personal and professional skills match the school’s culture and who will inspire and enable Pembroke Hill School to achieve its vision for the future.” Between the Board of Trustees, parent, teacher and alum committee, and the experienced Educators’ Collaborative, it is inevitable that the next headmaster will be the perfect person for the job.

“The most important strength Pembroke needs to preserve is its sense of community” As the Board of Trustees begins the process of selecting the school’s next headmaster, Dr. Bellis shared his thoughts about his eleven year tenure as headmaster with us. We asked him what he is most proud of during his time here. He stated that he is extremely proud of Pembroke’s culture. Dr. Bellis admires the passion that students, faculty, and principals have for excellence in academics, but more importantly, he admires the high level of care that everyone has for each other at Pembroke. Additionally, he vocalized that he was utterly impressed by the diversity at our school,

not just in terms of race and religion, but also in the wide range of skills that Raiders demonstrate on a daily basis. He passionately exclaimed that he is often taken aback by the diversity of activities that students participate in and how they continue to excel in those activities. Dr. Bellis said that the most important strength that Pembroke needs to preserve is its “sense of community”. We then asked Dr. Bellis what are some of the biggest challenges that Pembroke faces in the future. He claimed that the largest challenge to come will be keeping the school “affordable and accessible.” Dr. Bellis asserts that maintaining an affordable tuition and keeping a budget that fairly compensates the faculty and principals is difficult because he wants Pembroke to be accessible to its diverse students while retaining its excellent staff. In addition, he wants to ensure that students are not overwhelmed by stress. Dr. Bellis stated that, “student stress is a function of college pressures, everyone’s high expectations (families, students, staff) and our rigorous program.” Dr. Bellis added that he is extremely pleased with how well students navigate through said stress. He also encourages the importance of continued growth in STEM programs. We inquired of Dr. Bellis what the most important qualities are in a headmaster, and he replied, “the person needs to be optimistic, love kids of all ages, be ready to work hard, and be resilient.” We asked Dr. Bellis to summarize in two sentences the most important advice that he would give the new headmaster. He answered without hesitation, “Get to know the kids. Trust the faculty and principals.” Luckily, Dr. Bellis informed us that he will be available to the new headmaster for advice after his retirement in 2019. Last, we asked what aspect of his job is the most rewarding. He gleefully recalled all the students that he had the pleasure of watching mature from young kids to young adults and smiled, stating how incredible it is to see students grow up.n

Voice 14

Academic Integrity Zandy Swartzman Copy Editor

T

he Pembroke Hill School uses four words to describe their most important values: scholarship, compassion, respect, and last but not least, integrity. Integrity is not only integral for schoolwork but a crucial quality for life in general.

Recently, teachers had students sign a form that delivered a promise to remain academically integrous throughout their high school career. The assistant principal of faculty, Dr. May-Washington, explained that there were “a vortex of factors” leading up to this renewal of the code of academic integrity. One key problem was that many students, as well as new teachers, were unaware of the school’s rules surrounding this subject. Rather than keeping them buried at the bottom of the school website, teachers decided to take action by re-familiarizing the students with the rules and consequences of academic dishonesty. There were also recurring instances of students reporting cheating. At the senior “talk back”, the final organized senior meeting of last year, many students admitted to seeing others around them cheat. In addition to this, in an anonymous survey last year involving all high school students, a high percentage admitted to cheating.

Across the country, cheating has grown rampant.

Stuyvesant High School, one of the most prestigious schools in New York, found that 83% of students confessed to academic dishonesty. Obviously, Pembroke needed to take a stand to ensure it did not fall under the same spell.

Teachers have implemented new ways to pre-

Illustration by Sloane Withers-Marney

vent cheating in the past, such as making students use the website turnitin.com to identify and prevent plagiarism in essays. Recently, a new rule was actually added to the collection of pertinent offenses. Teachers noticed students giving each other the answers to a test they had previously taken, so they added that to the list. Many teachers have enforced these rules as they passed out the forms, in hopes of helping students realize the shamefulness of cheating. Dr. May-Washington says that the goal of this action is to “make sure everyone knows” that cheating is not tolerated. The parents, students, and faculty need to know the harms of academic dishonesty.

She hopes that more students will “be proud of their own work and be authentic”. Students that work hard to succeed often receive the same credit as those who cheat, and the school is adamant about putting an end to that. Hopefully, high school won’t set a false precedent in a student’s mind that cheating can help them succeed.

Most schools actually have a “one and done” policy on cheating that opts for immediate action after the first offense. By handing out this form and making students sign it, the school hopes to reduce cheating.

Making sure students know what academic dishonesty is and what the consequences are should lessen incidences. Integrity is a salient value of Pembroke Hill because working hard to meet your goals will get you far in life, but constantly cheating will get you nowhere.n

15 Voice

BIG SONIA

Kate Stokes Contributor Sonia Warshawski has lived in Kansas City for over fifty years, hidden inside the almost deserted Metcalf South Mall off 95th Street, drawing customers from near and wide to her tailor shop.

Before Sonia came to the United States, she suffered through the unimaginable: The Holocaust.

Sonia and her family are Jewish and lived in Poland up until their captivity when Sonia was just seventeen years old. Sonia and her mother were taken to the Majdanek death camp, while her sister miraculously escaped to the woods. Her father was never to be seen again. Living in Majdanek, Sonia was confronted with “The Angel of Death,” Dr. Josef Mengele, the man who determined if she were to live or to be sent to the crematorium.

Mengele is infamous to this day when people think about the Auschwitz concentration camp. He took pleasure in arrival days, deciding who would die immediately and who would live. At this same camp, Sonia watched her own mother meet her death in a gas chamber, an image she says will haunt her forever. After being moved to other camps such as Auschwitz-Birkenau, Sonia and others were finally liberated.

Sonia met her husband, John, a fellow survivor, at the BergenBelsen concentration camp, and together they moved to Kansas City to begin their new lives together. Although Mr. Warshawski has passed on, Sonia remains to tell their heartbreaking but in-

spiring story. The film Big Sonia, produced by her granddaughter, tells Sonia’s story of the Holocaust, as well as the eviction notice she received for her thirty five year-old tailor shop. Sonia tells the audience that her tailor shop keeps her “distracted from thinking about all that she has been through.” Not only will the movie bring individuals to tears, it will give people a perspective on the Holocaust that one could never have unless hearing about it from someone who has experienced it firsthand. The film goes on to show Sonia traveling to numerous schools and prisons to educate people about her story and her positive mindset. In my own experience, interviewing Sonia when I was eight years old and hearing about the horrors of the Holocaust moved me to hate less and forgive more. The film talks about this approach to life, making the argument that life is too short for hatred. Sonia’s powerful and emotional journey shows audiences all around the country to love, but not to forget.

I had the honor of sitting down with Sonia to ask her a few questions about her outlook on life and how other people can deal with hardships in their lives. As she was finishing her presentation to the whole upper school, Sonia told everyone to “put love in your heart, please.” While talking about her experiences and history, she urged this: “We must educate our youth. I find that most people are not informed. Don’t follow the crowd: edu-

These two shots present Sonia is her beloved pink Buick. In both she is figured in a Sonia fashion essential: leopard print.

Voice 16

“We must educate our youth. I find that most people are not informed. Don’t follow the crowd: educate yourself then decide.” cate yourself then decide.” Sonia went on to tell me that her mission is to “tell the story for the people who didn’t make it.” “I couldn’t talk about it for a long time,” she admits. “Survivor’s guilt a very real thing.” I then asked Sonia about the hatred in our country today and her advice for people facing hatred, hardships, and discrimination. “Even with all our problems, this is still the best country in the world and I mean that,” she told me as she clasped my hand. “The haters come over here and take advantage of our first amendment. The hatred comes from how we mold these little angels into adults, it’s all about how they are raised.” I will admit, I was enlightened about Sonia’s outlook on America and she argues a wonderful point: the hatred comes from how we are raised as adolescents, and how we continue to live our lives from then.

I think most of us can agree that Sonia’s incredible attitude and

honesty towards life can really put into perspective how someone coming from “Hell,” as Sonia put it, can still live a happy and successful life. The point of the film, she told me, was “to show how survivors coming from Hell live and function on a daily basis.” I know that by hearing this outstanding woman speak, I now definitely look at my life and consider myself very grateful for my family, friends, school, and opportunities I am given by each group. Sonia repeatedly told me that “if you can save one life, you can save the whole world.” Listening to a Holocaust survivor’s story and how they became the person they are today is a very rare occasion, considering there are not many survivors left today. With hearing Sonia Warshawski’s story, I can definitely say I am trying to put more love in my heart than hatred. I hope everyone in this school is inspired by Sonia to do the same. n

Here poses Big Sonia in her tailor shop, next to her famous “Whatever” pillow. A photograph of her late husband John is visible on the wall behind her.

17 Voice

Which Ben is for You?

Jean Li and Allie Pierce Contributor

START If you could travel anywhere, where would you go?

Disneyland USA

Orange Islands to catch rare pokemon

What do you look for in a relationship?

Germany

What’s your favorite Valentine’s Day candy?

Claey’s Sanded Candies

A trustworthy person I can tell anything to

Conservative Values

Which team are you rooting for in the Superbowl?

Reese’s I was wondering why there were so many footballs in the comics today

Who is your favorite history teacher?

Kory Gallagher

Respect, Compassion, Scholarship, Integrity

Patriots

What’s your favorite vine?

Mr. McGee Ms. Dolan

Ben Bracker

I like ping pong

Ivy, I suppose

Bennie Dai

DAMN DANIEL

The one with Chris Christie

Ben Graves

v o F

R

O

D e A R

i

E a S o N

c E

Voice 18

,

What do I do if I’m dating someone that I really like but I think I might like someone else more?

The classic ending to a high school relationship: you like the person you are dating, but not quite enough. While I don’t know you or your relationship, I’ll go ahead and make some assumptions. You’re in a relationship and it is fun, and the person you’re dating is really really sweet. They make you feel loved and safe, but you’ve spotted someone else in the distance who seems mysterious or exciting. Before I say anything else, I want to institute a disclaimer: mysterious or exciting doesn’t guarantee healthy or stable, which are necessary aspects of a productive relationship.

That being said, if there is someone else who shines a little bit brighter in your eyes than the person you are currently with, you need to break up with them. If you’re having second thoughts, or thoughts about a second person, now, what makes you think there might not be a bunch of other second people who will catch your attention? I don’t mean to be blunt about it, but you’re wasting everyone’s time and energy by fueling a relationship that’s going to end eventually.

Maybe your boyfriend/girlfriend is the best person in the entire world, but not the best person for you. Let them be the best person they can be for someone else. People are often terrified to break up with people because they don’t want to be single, but if you open yourself up to new opportunities, you have the ability to find something so much more special. You may really like the person you are dating, but if you don’t like them the most, it is time to reevaluate. n

x

o

x

O,

t

Illustration by Sloane Withers-Marney

H e

V

O

i

C

E

Have a question you’ve been dying to ask?

Email voice@pembrokehill.org and we might answer...

?

19 Voice

TO THE

ONE

Dearest,

Our twenty first century love affair ended far too soon. As we grew older, we had become used to each other, the endless hours of laughing, the late nights lost, and bringing me up when I was down. You seemed eternal and I forgot how important you were. I took you and all of your humor for granted. Then you left. One day you just got up and left me. With no one else to turn to, all I could do was relive our good times together. I tried everything to distract myself from the thought of you. Twitter, compilations, and youtube but, nothing could compare to how I felt with you. We could have grown old together. When I begged you to stay all you said was “Cause I don’t want to. No. No. No. Permission denied. That’s an off topic question. Next!” We could have been two bros chillin in a hot tub. But, no.

My heart aches because I thought you were bae... turns out you’re just fam.

Vine, you were six seconds of heaven.

Every. Single. Time.

Yours, Liz Konecny

To the one that got away: I forgive you. I forgive all the times you lied to me, screwed me over, and cheated on me. I found through you that timing is key, and we were so in love, however time was not our friend. Even after all the hurt you put me through, I always wanted to end up next to you every night. What I’ve learned through you is to not wait for someone to see your worth, because in the end they don’t deserve it, least of all you. I can’t say that you stole my heart, rather I handed it to you on a silver platter and haven’t seen or felt it since. There is nothing you could say or do to make up for the countless nights I stayed up thinking about you next to another girl. My family still wonders what was so special about you that I still fall asleep crying every night, and so do I. To the one that got away: I let you go when I realized you were never mine in the first place.

-Anonymous

WHO GOT

AWAY

Voice 20

Ode to April

By Emma Knopik ‘18

We were one, two peas and a pod Scenic bike rides under mango trees Valentines day with chocolate and jewelry Love minty fresh was our cosmic bond, A dark brunette and a dirty blonde.

I have only known you a few short years, Now i’ve given you up and it feels like spears.

We stalled on our feelings, Caught up in the moment.

I know this was my fault, I lost you, I own it.

-G

Lady, I love you I’ll change these rough ways Sold my soul to the Oracle of the West She told me I’d better be gone.

Lady, I love you- but, Please don’t come back.

You see, I’ve made me A life down here Southern California ain’t so bad.

Sure, I sleep in a motel’ But it’s ten bucks a day!

Still miss your hair blowin’ Over sweet honey skin I’d break all my bones Just to see you again When it’s time to move on She’ll tell me to go But I can’t never settle in San Diego.

An’ now that I’m older I’ve outgrown my shoes Singin’ lullabies to the cracks in my walls Guess I’ll always have the blues.

Note: Inspired from a Summer of reading Bob Dylan’s lyrics.

21 Voice

Black History Month: For The Culture

Lauren Washington Managing Editor 28 days of celebration! Although February may be the shortest month, it doesn’t fall short with its richness, celebration, and appreciation of black history. As African Americans have continuously shaped culture throughout decades, there are so many forward thinkers whose work is a direct parallel of the legends from our past. With a plethora of accolades and strides to choose from in recent history, here are some recent examples of black excellence that have only built on the work of past trailblazers.

2/14/2018

Recent Timeline of Achievements:

18 years ago, President Clinton and Hillary Clinton commissioned Simmie Knox to paint the official White House portrait. Simmie Knox was the first African American to paint a portrait of a president and first lady which he debuted in 2004 at the White House. Now, 18 years later, on February 12th, the Smithsonian’s National Portrait Gallery unveiled the portraits of President Obama and Michelle Obama done

by African American artists, Kehinde Wiley and Amy Sherald. Wiley and Sherald’s stunning work are the first portraits to capture a black president and first lady, and are a first for the Smithsonian’s museum hall. Wiley’s portrait surrounds President Obama in jasmine, African blue lilies, and with the official flower of Chicago, the chrysanthemum as he sits in an embellished chair. In Michelle Obama’s portrait, Sherald captured her seated in an alluring, flowing dress with geometric patterns and a faint blue framing the background.

2/14/2018 In 1998, Wesley Snipes starred as a black superhero in Marvel’s vampire hunter film, “Blade” and now here we are in 2018 to see Chadwick Boseman playing the Black Panther, the first real black superhero with superpowers. Although there are of indeed black superhero films that came before “Black Panther” like “Blade I-III” in 1998-2004, “The Meteor Man” in 1993, and “Hancock” in 2008, “Black Panther” is on a whole different playing field. Stan Lee and Jack Kirby created King T'Challa, the Black Panther, in 1966, comics’ first black superhero with real superpowers of immense strength, agility, speed, instincts, super-acute senses, martial artistry, intelligence, and plus he’s royalty. T'challa is the leader of a whole nation, the king of Wakanda, which is a made up location set in Africa. The film features an unprecedented acting lineup for Hollywood with an almost entirely black cast along with black director and co-writer, Ryan Coogler. According to early box office projections, the film is on pace to have the biggest superhero opening on all time, as its outpacing all other superhero films in advance ticket sales. The soundtrack is legendary in itself as hip-hop artist, Kendrick Lamar and his label, Top Dawg Entertainment, curated the music for the film featuring the likes of Ab-Soul, Anderson Paak, Jorja Smith, SZA, and more. As Wesley Snipes tried to create interest in filming “Black Panther” years ago, it’s groundbreaking to finally see Marvel bringing it to the world. This film is revolutionary in all areas and strongly reflects the importance of representation in Hollywood, and I for one, cannot wait to see it.

Voice 22

1/22/2018 Last month, Sterling K. Brown, became the first African American actor to win Best Actor in a Drama Series at the SAG Awards for his role as Randall Pearson in “This Is Us”. Shortly before, Brown also became the first black actor to win a Golden Globe for Best Actor in a TV Drama, as well as the first black actor in about 20 years to win an Emmy for Best Actor in a Drama. Likewise, just last year, Viola Davis won her fifth SAG award, making her the first African American actress and woman of color to do so. Flashing back to 1940, to put in perspective of some historic milestones in film, Hattie McDaniels, who was born in Wichita KS, became the first black person to win an Academy Award and first black woman to win Best Supporting Actress. The historic win of Sterling K. Brown is bittersweet, as it’s a tremendous accomplishment, but still signals more work to be done.

2/9/2018 In 1948, at the London Olympic Games, Alice Coachman became the first black woman to win an Olympic gold medal for her high jump event in Track and Field.

Coachman paved the way for future female black Olympic track stars like Wilma Rudolph, Florence Griffith Joyner, and others. Coachman knew “If I had gone to the Games and failed, there wouldn’t be anyone to follow in my footsteps. It encouraged the rest of the women to work harder and fight harder.” Alike Coachman, at this years Winter Olympics, there are many firsts like for Nigeria’s first-ever bobsled team composed of female athletes, Seun Adigun, Akuoma Omeoga and Ngozi Onwumere, are the first to compete for their country at the Winter Olympics. The Nigerian squad reflects Coachman’s spirited determination as the bobsled team made it to the Olympics because of their GoFundMe they formed in 2016 to help fund their journey. Moreover, member Adeagbo, only touched a sled for the first time last year after failing to qualify in the triple jump at the U.S. Olympic trials in 2004 and 2008, and member, Adigun created her own wooden sled for the team to train with.

1/10/2018 Daniel Day, more famously known as Dapper Dan, opened his boutique in Harlem on 125th street in 1982. Dapper Dan solidified his imprint on fashion decades ago through finessing high end fashion, but is finally getting his deserved recognition and respect with the opening of his new Gucci-backed Atelier in Harlem last month. Simply put, as Dan described himself, “Everyone paid homage to Dapper Dan, but no one ever paid him,” said Dapper Dan in a statement. “The people have spoken and Gucci has listened.” Dan is known for his street luxury looks for well known hip-hop artists, athletes, and celebrities in the 1980s like Rakim, LL Cool J, Mike Tyson, and more out of his boutique. The use of designer logos in Dan’s fashion wasn’t to create knockoffs, but rather to tackle racism in the fashion industry as black customers came to Dan because luxury brands weren’t affordable and didn’t have sizes that fit everyone like Mike Tyson, for instance, who came to Dapper Dan. However, in 1992 Dan’s boutique closed after luxury brands sued him for the use of their logos, so he’s been underground ever since. Things finally came full circle as Gucci unveiled a similar jacket that Dan designed for Olympian Diane Dixon decades ago and rightfully so, Gucci acknowledged their debt to Dan with the new Atelier opening. A$AP Ferg’s father who worked for Dapper Dan back in the 80s summed up Dan’s legacy as “What Dap did was take what those major fashion labels were doing and made them better. He taught them how to use their designs in a much more effective way. Dap curated hip-hop culture.”

Although we're almost through February, the celebration doesn't stop. Ever.n

23 Voice

Teacher Feature We have 2 gas masks, a hard helmet and some newspaper clippings arranged in the form of a shrine in our house. Let me tell you why.

Before moving to Kansas City in the summer of 2016 from Istanbul, Chris (aka Mr. Schooley) and I stopped over in Vermont to attend a friend’s wedding. We were swimming in the pool, among the lush green of summer when my friend, clad in a bikini with a phone in her hand and a confused look on her face, said, “There was a military coup d’etat in Turkey.” With the contrast between the serene setting and the gravity of the news it was a surreal moment.

Chris and I lived in Turkey for 7 years.

I was born there. I grew up in Turkey and came to the US as an international student.

When I lived in Asia, I commuted to Europe for work on a daily basis. Istanbul is divided by a body of water, called the Bos-

Oya Nuzumlali Schooley

phorus, which is a strait that connects the Black Sea to an inner sea, which then connects to the Mediterranean Sea. I haven’t seen another city that interacts with the sea as beautifully as Istanbul does, (except for maybe Venice) but the Bosphorus is a beautiful, deep blue color, and Istanbul is a bustling, living city. The city comes all the way up to the water. There are old wooden homes right on the water, with little coves underneath them for storing boats. You can dine 2 feet away from the water. Manhattan is an island too, but you hardly get to see the water if you don’t live in a highrise apartment facing the right direction. In Istanbul, the sea is everywhere.

We lived in Istanbul during a very exciting time. Turkey has a young population with 50% of its citizens under the age of 30.

There is a burgeoning civil society, and we lived in the middle of it. Turkish economy

was being boosted by a myriad of construction projects. Shopping malls and high-rise residence popped up liked mushrooms.

Since 2013, a bridge, an underwater railway and a tunnel has been added to the infrastructure. Not to mention a third airport and a ‘canal’ that is supposed to mimic the natural straight, which was an environmental disaster for the city and its water sources.

Many of these projects came at the expense of national parks and green spaces previously reserved for military bases for urban development. Public land was auctioned off to construction companies一public squares turned into shopping malls, parks into luxury residences, and when they ran out of space, they started to fill the sea to build even more developments. Istanbul is covered in construction dust and heavy vehicles. There is a major infringement of green spaces and a deteriorating air quality.

Pictured Top Left: Chris, our friend Mignon and I. This is a temple that predates organized religions and the rise of agriculture. This is is close to Turkey’s Syrian border, and now it is impossible to visit due to the fighting less than 50 miles from this ancient site.

Pictured Top Right: This is when the Gezi protesters took over a government building that has been abandoned. The banners have many different messages celebrating the political resistance of college students, commemorating people who lost their lives during protests, asking for liberties for Kurdish people, demanding freedom of the press and of assembly, and many socialist and anti-capitalist banners.

Voice 24 Gezi Park was one such park一a park in the heart of the city, known as Taksim Square. Besides being a major hub of transportation, Taksim Square is also a historical landmark and a space for public demonstrations. It represents the struggle for the freedom of assembly and expression. Even though the bid to redevelop the park into a shopping mall had been rejected by the courts, excavators started uprooting the trees illegally. First responders were college students from a nearby public university, who started occupying the park. They pitched tents and guarded the park with their bodies in order to prevent its demolition. A member of the parliament joined them. Police used tear gas to disperse the peaceful protesters. The protests continued, and 4 days later, there was another police crackdown against the occupiers, which was televised widely. People watched students get tear gassed from their television sets. Undue police violence aimed at these young adults who were peacefully demonstrating against the illegal demolition of a park enraged the public, and that night, thousands of people took to the streets to take a stand against the rising authoritarian state, which had too often resorted to the use of tear gas and water cannons to further its economic gain at the expense of its own people.

Everyone went out that night, including my parents, and started walking towards Taksim Square. People from the Asian side flocked to the Bosphorus bridge to walk over to the square in such huge numbers that one of the two bridges that connects the metropolis of 17 million people was closed to traffic. The occupation grew bigger.

That night, a resistance was born. We needed to speak up against unwarranted police violence, and to protect our right to peaceful assembly, even if the state didn’t like our banners. We were going to guard the park day and night. Gezi Park grew into a commune. Everyone was welcome.

A kitchen opened in the park that provided free food to its occupants. There were medical emergency teams and a park library.

The occupation had its own publications.

College students pitched and slept in tents.

After work, we would don our backpacks, take our goggles and anti-acid solutions (which helped treat the eyes after being exposed to tear gas) and head over to Gezi Park. It was so crowded that it was hard to find a place to sit. We met our friends there instead of in cafes, ran into old pals and even students of ours. While students guarded the park during the day and night, working people joined them in the evening. Everyone else joined over the weekend. Everyone: parents, friends, aunts and

uncles, grandparents, laborers, corporate workers, high school and college students, Kurds, LGBT+, socialists, feminists, environmentalists. Everyone who felt that their rights were being infringed upon showed up.

It was Turkey’s own version of the Arab spring. It was May, the weather was lovely, and our cause was noble. Chris and I went almost every day. Instead of going home after a regular day at work, we would go to the park to hang out, talk about political developments, read banners, make our own banners, and listen to speakers. There were spontaneous concerts, and one night people brought a grand piano to the square for a public concert. At one point Chris exclaimed, “This is so exciting. I can’t remember what our lives were like before Gezi.”

Life was extraordinary.

What initially motivated people to come to the park was the same: to protect our right to assemble and express ourselves, and to condemn state violence, committed by way of the police on dissident opinions.

However, the park became a platform to express other discontents. LGBT+ groups, environmentalists and socialists had a wide presence. So did Kurdish rights activists, as Kurds are a minority population that has been banned liberties and systematically discriminated against since the founding of the republic in 1923. We learned about each other’s struggles. People who, under ordinary circumstances would not associate, listened to each other for the first time. We learned that a movement for human rights has to be inclusive on all fronts. We were critical of the policies of a government that had been in power for 11 years (16 years as of now) and was growing more authoritarian every day.

Great slogans came out of Occupy Gezi.

People who were unwilling to go to Gezi Park protested in their neighborhoods every night, assembling locally, or simply hanging out of their balconies at 9 pm, banging on pots and pans, and yelling, “Taksim is everywhere一resistance is everywhere!” It was reinvigorating. We had found a platform to voice our concerns and realized the power of our masses. Going out to the streets to demonstrate became second nature to us. I joined a Twitter account called, “Where is the protest?” I posted on Facebook a flyer demonstrating how to immobilize a riot van by tucking a rag in its exhaust pipe, only to remove it hours later when my brother chided me that it could be grounds for arrest, which were becoming more and more frequent. We had become anarchists.

Every now and then, the police confronted the sit-in with tear gas and water cannons. We learned to read the warning signs

so that we could leave the square when we felt in danger. Other people stayed and persevered. Everyone in the park was unarmed. We reminded each other of the urgency to stay unarmed. Our biggest weapons were humor and words that spread like wildfire on social media. Every confrontation by the police brought out more people to the park.

During one big confrontation, police used so much tear gas that the whole city could witness the clouds of gas rising from Taksim well into the night. The next morning, we tried to go to the park, but all public transportation to Taksim was shut down.

We walked up a hill leading to the square only to find that defenders of the square had taken apart the cobblestone pavements and had built barricades on all major roads leading up to the square in order to prevent the advance of riot vans. It was as if Taksim square had declared its independence from the state. An abandoned building that had once been a state-funded performing arts center, which had long ago become underfunded and eventually defunct, was donned with flags of the variety of civil rights movements that represented the causes of the occupiers.

On June 15th, 2013, police went in with an endless supply of water canons, tear gas and riot vehicles. They evacuated the park and burnt down the tents. After the park was cleared out, the police guarded it for a couple of months一guarding the public park from its people. Such ludicrous sights only happen in authoritarian regimes. Gezi Park commune was shut down, but its spirit lived on. People started organizing community gathering and forums in their own neighborhoods.

Gezi Park was saved from urban development. It’s green and open to the public.

Sadly, we have grown accustomed to seeing heavily armed, riot-control vehicles in most public spaces. Tear gas is ubiquitous.

The resistance lives on, but many of its founding elements are now behind bars.

Things aren’t so hopeful these days in Turkey. People are oppressed. Prisons are full.

Press isn’t free. Everyone speaks under their breaths. Turkey has been under a state of emergency for more than a year now, since the failed military coup d’etat. Turkey will recover from this stalemate, as it has from the coups of 1960, 1971 and 1980.

It is baffling to me, but not my parents, who have seen this replay before. The Occupy Gezi movement resulted in the politicization of an apathetic generation. Taksim regained its significance in our minds. Our ears are pricked. The lion sleeps tonight, but it knows there is strength in numbers.

It’s just a matter of time. n

25 Voice

The Deal With DACA Daniela Rodriguez-Chavez Contributor

L

et’s go back, way back. I’m talking about when-everybody-thought-the-world-was-going-to-end back: 2012.

In June of 2012, former President Barack Obama created DACA, otherwise known as Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals. It’s program that defers the deportation of certain individuals, nicknamed Dreamers, on a two-year basis.

There are a couple main requirements that have to be met in order to apply for this deferral: Being under the age of 31 as of June 15, 2012, arriving to the US before your 16th birthday, residing in the US since June 15, 2007, currently attending school (or have obtained a GED or is an honorably discharged veteran of the Coast Guard/US Armed Forces), and having a clean record with the law.

In addition to adhering to these guidelines, participants must be able to pay the $465 fee (this cost applies to first time applicants as well as subsequent renewals). Even though these sound like strict requirements, as of last fall, around 700,000 people were enrolled in DACA which is slightly less than double the 2016 population consensus of Kansas City (not including metropolitan area). This also is enough people to fill about nine Arrowhead Stadiums or 18 Kauffman Stadiums completely.

Now that we have background as to the creation of DACA, let’s skip forward a little bit into 2016: election year. During President Trump’s campaign, Trump frequently said he would end DACA and after he was elected as President. On September 5, 2017,

Trump announced that his administration was effectively ending the program. However, whether sadly for Trump’s administration, or luckily for Dreamers, this decision was met with backlash all over the country, including a rally held right here in Kansas City at the Plaza.

The month of January 2018 held many events regarding DACA. On January 9th, a federal judge ruled that the government keep DACA the same as before Trump’s rescindment. January 11th to 15th brought worldwide attention to the U.S. as President Trump made strong remarks regarding immigrants from non-European countries, leading many to believe that perhaps this was an inside look into how our President truly feels. On January 16th, the Trump administration took to the Supreme Court to review the federal judge’s review from January 9th. Finally, the most recent news on this issue: the government shutdown on January 20th. One of the main reasons for the shutdown was because of the exclusion of a deal for Dreamers, causing many Democrats to reject the deal.

E v e n though the government ended the shutdown on January 22nd, the next big deadline is February 8th.

Lawmakers on either side of the political spectrum have to decide on a budget bill in which Democrats are likely to use as an opportunity to pass some additional legislation regarding DACA. By the time you read this, February 8th will have come and gone.

Hopefully, another government shutdown has not occurred and some DACA legislation has passed. If Democrats and Republicans don’t cooperate to pass bills regarding this situation, then March 5th is when DACA permits begin to expire. 700,000 Dreamers will be losing the ability to stay, teach, work, and learn here safely. Isn’t America supposed to be where dreams come true? n

Credit: USCIS, CNN, Time, Politifact Photo Credits: Stephanie Alba ‘17

Voice 26

Middle of the Middle Grace Weber Middle School Writer

A

lmost every grade has something special (for example 5th grade camp out). But one of those grades that doesn’t have anything is 7th Grade, until this year.

On January 23, 2018, the 7th Grade class (2023) had their Middle of the Middle. They would have had it two weeks earlier, the actually middle of the year, but there was an ice storm that postponed it.

First, all of seventh grade went to see a show, “The Secret of Courage” at the Coterie. In the afternoon they had various activities. One of these activities was a logic puzzle with algebra teacher with Mr. Emery. In the puzzle, the student has twelve different colored blocks, with two of each color. Each person was given a clue on how to arrange the blocks, but they couldn’t show their clue. They had to say it out loud. The team who solved it the fasted won. Another game was called “The Best Game.” English teacher, Mrs. Blankenship, ran this game. In the Best Game, you were given a statement, such as “the longest.” Then, the team had to choose someone to go

up. When you were up, the rest of the challenge would be filled in, like “the longest time standing on one foot.” If the student stood on one foot longer than their opponent, they won a challenge you got a point, and after several rounds, whoever had the most points won.

After these games, there was a four square tournament. If you don’t know how to play, you play with there being four squares, going from king/queen, prince/princess, knight, and then peasant. When students were in the king/queen position, they had the chance to score points. Every time someone got out, even if the student didn’t personally get them out, each student got a point. Everyone was split up, then the winners of the first round played each other, with the winners going onto the final round winning $10 of bookstore money.

Finally, everyone gathered in the middle school commons for a dessert bar. While we were eating, we wrote letters to people, teachers or kids, in the school for appreciation and thanks. All in all, Middle of the Middle was really fun, and a definite plus for 7th Grade.n

27 Voice

Anonymous Contributor

GLOBAL

The twenty-first century is filled with more existential perils than at any point in human history. These perils are ones that we have created. They threaten, at best, to rob us of our humanity and, at worst, to cause the extinction of all mankind. In fact, we are already on the latter course: slowly, we are moving towards a literal hell on earth, for which industrial civilization and the lifestyle it supports have laid the foundations.

These are the stakes of climate change, an issue whose thorns have been pricking us more and more sharply for about forty years now. In speaking of this issue, I am sure to alienate at least half of my prospective readers; I see them now, groaning, throwing this article to the side, not wanting to read any more about it. Their reasons are clear. Enough has been said about climate change to fill whole libraries; enough guilt-tripping on the issue has been done to give the fire-and-brimstone revivalists of The Great Awakening a run for their money. And we, especially in America, have so much else to be concerned about: North Korea, Russia, immigration, race relations, the national debt. In light of all this, they say, talk of climate change must take a back burner. I cannot blame them for saying as much.

But how can I sleep through the gradual swelling of our oceans, through the accelerating release of dangerous natural gas from thawing permafrost, through deep droughts raising Midwestern thermometers to 106°F, through heat waves claiming the lives of tens of thousands of people, through floods regularly inundating our southern states, through 2017’s meteorological assaults that laid waste to over a million and a half acres of the American West and cost the country over $300 billion.

I cannot sleep through what may be the

greatest threat humanity has ever faced with the expectation that things will turn out all right in the end. I am not a scientist, although I must trust the consensus of countless researchers who have affirmed the reality and danger of climate change.

I am not a politician, though my concern is the welfare of the people and society. I simply feel that I must do what I can, even something as seemingly insignificant as writing this editorial.

The time for inaction is over, as both science and the near-apocalyptic events of 2017 have made clear. And yet the necessary actions toward climate change--radical reduction of carbon emissions, implementation of carbon capture technology, and new policies on energy consumption and waste management seem to be lost on everyone with political power. The reasons for this are many. One is that climate change seems like the lesser of the evils of modern life, and often finds itself obscured by the noise of day-to-day weather (such as the cold waves of January this year). Another is the culture of denial (in this country in particular) which negates the danger of climate change and carbon emissions in order to preserve the existing economic order.

Economic prosperity is by no means an evil goal, but in the face of a threat so calamitous as climate change, continued denial is not only ignorant, but unethical and irresponsible.

An even more insidious form of denial, which threatens even those who acknowledge the seriousness of climate change, is the unconscious defense mechanism that Freud identified around the turn of the last century: when faced with a seemingly insurmountable threat, we usually choose simply to ignore it. We disregard it not because we feel it isn’t a problem, but because if we were to think about it directly,

we would become paralyzed by its magnitude.

I will be the first to say that I am guilty of this kind of denial. To some degree, I have to be-- I have a life to live, deadlines to meet, and cannot neglect them for the sake of contemplating the end of the world. But then, as I feel myself growing content, I will hear a song from some past summer on the radio, or see some children playing soccer in a spring field, and think: How many songfilled summers do I have left before the droughts, wildfires, floods, and heatwaves silence all singers’ voices? How many children of today and children not even born have we consigned to death at the hands of this hostile climate? How much is humanity depriving itself and its future generations of as a result of the greenhouse gases our civilization exhales every passing day?

How many lives will be shortened, how many memories will be lost, how many wonders will never be discovered on account of our ancestors’ and our ignorance and idleness?

Our moral imperative is to preserve what makes us human. However, this preservation is up to as us as a species, and even more so as a generation; the future of climate change is our future, whether we like it or not. It is already a cliché for the intellectuals of our parents’ generation, such as last year’s Hazard speaker, Steve Quarles, to speak of climate change as “one of your generation’s challenges” as if our lives were a video game with climate change as the final, though inevitably conquerable, villan.

By using words like these, the generation in power always seems to withdraw its responsibility. The plain truth is that climate change is everybody’s problem. We may blame past generations all we like, but someone must take action eventually, and in the current sociopolitical climate, that ac-

WARMING tion must come from the young people of the world.

Clearly, this is no small task. The stabilization of our world’s climate while maintaining a sustainable society will be the greatest feat of geological, political, and social engineering that humanity has ever accomplished, requiring a kind of social coordination and organization normally seen only in wartime. But this is a challenge we should seize, not shy away from.

And in this respect, we are not powerless; for the social organization that is necessary to affect such change has been already built up for us through our educational system. The school is the ideal unit in which the young people of America can create the rebuilding, the “greening,” as it were of society and take charge and ownership of the future that our parents have disowned.

Schools like Pembroke Hill are prime laboratories for experiment and execution in sustainability. The community of Pembroke Hill is close-knit, the school’s support networks are strong, its students are creative and willful, and it occupies a position in the educational community of Kansas City where the innovations it brings about will be noticed.

If climate change is our generation’s challenge, I ask my fellow students to rise and, through vision and innovation, green Pembroke Hill; to turn toward classmates to find the inspiration to build a beautiful and sustainable future; to organize into clubs and committees; to not be deterred by the diplomatic caution that has delayed action on sustainability in the past. Let our ideas flow freely with the urgency, strength, and

courage that the issue demands.

I am not calling for a radical upheaval of the social order in the name of the greening of Pembroke Hill. I am merely encouraging us to capitalize on what networks, connections, and friendships already exist to attack this challenge which we all face. Obviously, we are not the only players in this game. To achieve whatever ends are necessary to create a sustainable Pembroke Hill, we must collaborate with the faculty, staff, and ad-

sake of fulfilling some vacuous “special interest.” Our changes must not be reversed with the passing of an administration or the graduation of the Class of 2021, but they must last for more than a generation. Otherwise, they are meaningless.

At worst, the greening of Pembroke Hill will yield us a 21st-century school worth bragging about. At best, it will serve as a kind of beacon that radiates out possibility and hope, inspiring other communities in this city and nation to take similar charge of their future.

I have faith in this vision, for fundamentally I know that what the soul of our generation and our student body cries out for most is not wealth nor an Ivy League education, but purpose. Authentic and true, the purpose of preserving humanity is perhaps the highest one that can be. It is one born not from the constrictive values warped by the hands of society, but from a love of self, a love of people, a love of beauty, a love of life. It is one that reshapes the value that we have placed on societal norms and the materialistic desires we have been taught into a sense of urgency to protect both the raw beauty of the world and our seemingly durable lives that are in reality like the most fragile of flowers. We, the future of mankind, cannot let those flowers die. The responsibility for saving humanity and building a beautiful future has been left behind by our forebears, and it now falls onto us. n

"Economic prosperity is by no means an evil goal, but in the face of a threat so calamitous as climate change, continued denial is not only ignorant, but unethical and irresponsible."

ministration. The impulse toward changing the Pembroke Hill community must come from us.

My proposals may appear foolishly optimistic, at best, and provincially arrogant, at worst, and to claim that our school is the cornerstone of all existence, and that the engines of climate change will grind to a halt just because we plant a few trees, is simply naive.

The changes that we enact at Pembroke Hill may take a number of different forms.

They may be structural (solar panels and water heating installations) or changes in the campus lifestyle (recycling, food composting, carpooling). But whatever path we choose, we must walk it boldly, not for the

Voice 28

Crossword

Across 1. The Disaster Artist is based on this movie, which is also known as the “worst movie ever” 3. Beauty and the Beast antagonist 7. Little yellow things in the Despicable Me movies 8. Chris Pratt is Starlord in Guardians of the _______ 9. Name of the clown from It 11. Dear Basketball is an Oscar Nominated short written by this former NBA star 12. Ansel Elgort movie with the same name as a Simon and Garfunkel song 13. Get Out Director 14. She’s like superman but cooler 15. Number of Fast and Furious movies released so far 18. Actress who played Belle in the Beauty and the Beast (2017)

30

Down 2. Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, _______ 4. May the Force be with you 5. All Eyez On Me is about this west coast rapper 6. Christopher Nolan film about World War Two 10. Love story between a mute woman and sea creature 16. I, Tonya is about this notorious Winter Olympian 17. 2017 Pixar film about the Day of the Dead 19. Nickname of the star of the new Jumanji film

Letter from the

Editors

Dear Readers, Love is in the air! “Tis the time to give your friend a hug (and to give a possible enemy a less icy glare). It is this sense of loving thy neighbor and mutual respect which we highlight this month with our feature, written by Kate Stokes ‘19, spotlighting Mrs. Sonia Warshawski, the only remaining Holocaust survivor in the Kansas City area. This month, we were blessed with the opportunity to hold a screening of the documentary, Big Sonia, and to hear from Mrs.Warshawski herself. Kate Whitney ‘19 magnificently captures her strength in her portrait featured on this issue’s cover. Mrs. Warshawski inspires us to forgive others and remain optimistic, regardless what adversity we face.

Sincerely, Bella Barnes & Gina Pepitone

The Voice Podcast

whispers

hadley jetmore ‘21 … traveled to reno, nevada to compete in the national pole vault summit. will powell ‘18 … scored his 1000th career point for pembroke hill basketball against odessa high school. liam weaver ‘21 & ethan wolf ‘21 … coach a special olympics basketball team every monday at horizon academy. zöe ganter ‘19 … will be attending debate districts in representing pembroke hill. daniel bauman ‘18 … placed 1st in four different events at the viking invitational as the science olympiad team took 1st overall.

By Jay Mehta

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THE VOICE

The Official News Publication of the Pembroke Hill School The Voice is published monthly by the students of the Pembroke Hill School during the academic year to inform the Pembroke Hill Community about pertinent events and news. The paper is an open forum, distributed to the students, faculty, parents, alumni, and other members of the Pembroke Hill community. The views expressed by the writers are solely their own and do not reflect the sentiments of the editors, nor do they reflect the entirety of the Pembroke Hill community. All decisions concerning grammar, layout, content, and photography are made solely by the editors themselves.

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