Spartan Daily Vol. 160 No. 14

UPD holds community discussion

By Matthew Gonzalez STAFF WRITER

San Jose State’s University Police Department (UPD) held an open forum conversation in the Martin Luther King, Jr. Library on Monday, discussing recent crime trends and answering questions from the SJSU community.

UPD Chief Michael Carroll said the event focused on providing a space for people to see the work the UPD is doing while also being able to voice any concerns SJSU community members had.

“We really thrive on trying to build relationships and foster wholesome relationships that can help us identify sustainable solutions to our campus safety,” Carroll said.

UPD Capt. Frank Belcastro said a common theme he has seen with incidents on campus is the prolific presence of drugs, specifically crack.

“It looks like crack is making an appearance again because this is the second case where we’ve gotten crack on an individual, so it looks like it’s coming back.” Belcastro said.

Along with drugs, weapons are prevalent on campus, according to Belcastro.

Belcastro said a laundry list of drugs was often accompanied by the possession of at least one gun, knife or other form of

SJSU President talks campus safety

By Alina Ta STAFF WRITER

Editor’s note: some answers have been edited for clarity and grammar.

President Cynthia Teniente-Matson

Do you have any plans to collaborate with UPD or any policy plans to reassure students that these issues will at least decrease over time?

I don’t think there’s any one human being that could suggest that we have all the answers to how to decrease crime. If we did this problem would have been solved in the United States already, right? [. . .] Some of these issues are very common across university campuses across the United States. They tend to ebb and flow with the economy, sometimes with weather, sometimes with other localized issues in our community. I have met with Chief Carroll and I have talked with him about how we are helping to lift campus safety because I’ve heard from students that campus safety is always a concern. And they are addressing this by doing more Meet and Greet information[. .

.] Recently I had an opportunity to speak with Mayor Mahan and one of his initiatives is to look at improving our statistics, meeting and lowering the incidences of crime in our city. [. . .] We’re the largest landholder in Downtown and we have the largest mass with 40,000 people that are here on any given day [. . .] So we’re talking about the potential for putting some meetings together

Task Force style, between the city of San Jose, the sheriff, our campus police, perhaps other entities of which they have large security forces that are also doing business in this region, to help put all of our best minds and efforts thinking about how we improve and ensure safety reduction of crime incidences as you’re referring to around the community.

What have you been hearing from students?

What have you been learning from students?

My second day on campus.

I went over to the residence halls and participated in the orientation sessions with some of the orientation advisors, just a handful of the advice or not the orientation advisors, but the orientation employees, student employees, and the student RAS to talk with them about safety. And actually, they brought it up. I didn’t go to talk to them about safety. I went to

talk to them about what their experiences were and wanted to introduce myself how I can help them and they brought up some of the conversations around safety. So I brought that back to Nina Chuang, our A.S. President to say, ‘What can we do more together to address some of these comments that are coming up?’ And we’ve also then followed up in a meeting with Chief Carroll. [. . .] He is putting a lot of effort and initiatives into what’s

occurring in the university community to try to reduce incidences. When I talk with other students, one of the questions I’ve been asking some students and I’ve been going to the various colleges and meeting with students so I met with some students in the science College of Sciences and I met with some students in engineering. Some of the things I was asking them specifically, is about communication. Do they feel they are getting the emergency alerts? Are they aware of what these methods mean? To help all of us build a community of safety, sort of say something? See something, do something because many, there’s many more students and they’re our staff and police. So we all need to be moving on this in the same direction. So those are the types of discussions I’ve been having with students, not just about safety, but about a number of things to help us all solve the problem together. We talked about it last month, Michigan, just happened. The students do get notifications about shootings that happen near campus. Do you have any response on how students can feel safer on campus?

We have active shooter training that comes through our police department. [. . .] We offer quite a bit of training to students on the runway. [. . .] Run Hide Fight training here to ensure students know what to do if they find themselves in that sort of situation. Our police department is a bit

MATTHEW GONZALEZ | SPARTAN DAILY

UPD Capt. Frank Belcastro speaks during an open forum conversation event at the MLK Library on Monday afternoon.

ALEXIA FREDERICKSON | SPARTAN DAILY ARCHIVES

President Cynthia Teniente-Matson speaks about her goals and vision for the SJSU community during a previous conversation with student media in her office in Clark Hall on Jan. 26.

Continued from page 1

dangerous artillery.

He said 95% of UPD arrests were of non-students.

He said the data is directly correlated with SJSU campus being open to the public and its vulnerable location in the middle of Downtown San Jose.

Carroll said some of the core values UPD tries to maintain while protecting campus include respect, professionalism and courage.

Another value talked about was approachability.

Carroll said one way UPD has gone about strengthening its approachability is taking officers out of their cars and using foot patrol, which allows for quick and friendly interaction between officers and students.

Belcastro said UPD has had multiple events like Coffee with a Cop and Holiday with a Cop, in which students could simply introduce themselves to officers and meet them in an affable setting.

“It’s the positive contact we’re trying to emphasize,” Belcastro said. “Yeah, when you call us we’re

Q&A

Continued from page 1

coming there, and it’s probably not your best day if you needed the police but, we’re trying to get out there and emphasize that positive contact.”

Carroll said accountability is important within UPD.

He said he encourages officers to look at five random pieces of body camera footage a month to recognize areas of good, acceptable work and areas that can be improved.

“We want to be able to recognize

people it serves is paramount and officers have even participated in cultural humility courses to try and bring more awareness to the importance of cultural diversity.

“We can learn a lot from our community, and sometimes we may not have the demographics in our police department that the community may have. So we try to be real invitational about bringing in people who fall under different cultures or ethnicities,” Carroll said.

rights of the greater San Jose community.

“One thing we can’t do is be discriminatory,” Carroll said. “So I can’t walk up and say, ‘This person looks homeless’ and assume that they’re homeless, and ask them to leave the facility.”

The public nature of SJSU campus seemed to be a large point of contention for UPD, but MLK Library, one of campus’ largest public buildings, has found great support from UPD.

facility, so you know it’s really important that we have a positive working relationship with UPD,” Dunn said.

She said she wants to cater to the sensitivities of San Jose’s community and knows not everyone shares the same amiable relationship with law enforcement.

“From an administrative perspective we’re very grateful to have UPD’s presence within our building, but we also realize that maybe for some folks who enter the building, they don’t have that same type of relationship with law enforcement,” Dunn said.

Michael Carroll UPD Chief

that there may be some areas in which the officer may need some additional training and we may be able to recognize it,” Carroll said. “We look for professionalism when it comes to communicating with the public, so there’s a number of things we look for.”

He said UPD finds that understanding the culture of the

available to provide specialized training for groups in the residence halls, we offer the training on a regular basis, quite frankly, a lot of students don’t participate in the training. They don’t find it of interest, or they don’t think it’ll happen to them. So there are quite a few proactive things that are occurring.

Is there any conversation around that?

They still expect what we’ve encountered here on the university campus, they’re worried about the national issue. So they’re worried about Michigan State, they’re worried about Memphis. They’re worried about issues that impact law enforcement globally. [. . .] We try to reassure them that our department operates a little differently than what you see in the national news. We try to assure them about public safety with our new route high fight initiative. So our officers are continuously scheduling Run Hide Fight training, campus wide initially, it was just something that we had available to those who inquired but now we’re more

An issue that arose during the meeting was the blurry line between public usage of university resources and the comfort of students.

Carroll said the problem is tough to solve, as UPD has to balance being both firm in accommodating students’ concerns and cognizant of the

intentional by holding about posting in our own meetings.

UPD Chief Michael Carroll

Can you explain how police address crime issues on campus?

As the chief of police, we try to identify some of the issues and concerns of the entire college campus, that faculty staff, as well as the student population. And we use what is considered a Community Capital policing model. [. . .] That’s where we invest resources, we invest strategic plans to try to address the community concerns. We have a model that we use, if you see something, say something to UPD so that we can actually address it. As we work collaboratively, I hope that it helped with public safety on this college campus. So one of the things that we see an increase then is death. We try to strongly advise the student population.

How is the situation with blue phones on campus?

There’s over 300 blue light phones on our campus. Prior to joining July of last year, we did an assessment about the blue light phones. We found out

Wendy Dunn, MLK library Director of Operations and Administrative Services, said she is proud of the relationship between the library and UPD.

“Not only university folks are in the building, but also our relationship with San Jose Public Library brings in a lot of community members to our

that 35% were not working. And so as of September of last year, we had 100% compliance, blue light phones are actually operable. I strongly encourage people to believe that we have to trust the system. We have to trust that the blue light form actually works. The minute you pick up a blue light phone, that’s going to go directly into our dispatch center. And our dispatch center is going to answer the blue light phone and ask you Where you are located. What is your concern and how can we assist you. How many students so far have been attending these, some of

Chicano studies graduate student Rachel Flores said she attended the meeting as a way to see what topics UPD were going to cover, as she believes violence on college campuses can be solved without the use of weaponry.

“I don’t believe that there needs to be a use of weapons necessarily and so I think that, you know, willing community members would be better able to serve and make folks feel safer,” Flores said.

Follow Matthew Gonzalez on Twitter @MattG2001

these trainings are the majority of these trainings, do you have an estimate?

I don’t have an estimate, but I know that each class is really populated. So I don’t have an exact number of how many students because we just trained individuals who show up. We don’t require whether you’re student faculty or staff. If you’re just there for the training, we tried to train.

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Do you feel safe on campus?

SJSU’s campus is open to the public. Leaving

month,

60 Day Crime Log reported 46 incidents of theft, 26 instances of grand to petty theft and six incidents related to possession or purchasing narcotics near or on campus. Students weigh in on whether or not they currently feel safe on campus.

University Police Department’s (UPD) crime log recorded numerous incidents of theft, drug possession,

“I usually feel safe. There’s just certain times when I have dance practice here at night and we practice sometimes in front of (the) MLK Library and it’s pretty public. So there’s usually some crazy people here and there, but overall, it’s not too bad.”

Ray

“I feel pretty safe. I mean, at night, I do feel a little bit more unsafe just because it’s at night and you don’t know who’s around the corner. But for 90% of the time I feel super safe.”

CAMPUS VOICES

“There really isn’t anything that you know makes me not feel safe.”

Jesus Camacho business senior

“Yes [. . .] But I would say that the danger is more outside of the campus instead of inside because most of the people here are students.

Rodrigo Espilco chemical engineer sophomore

Kalana Parker communicative disorders and sciences freshman

Ton business freshman

SJSU’s community and SJSU’s campus vulnerable to crime in San Jose downtown. Within the last

SJSU

vandalism and more. UPD’s

We really thrive on trying to build relationships and foster wholesome relationships that can help us identify sustainable solutions to our campus safety.

Spartans go 4-1 at Silicon Valley Classic

By Oscar Frias-Rivera SENIOR STAFF WRITER

The San Jose State Softball team won four of five games at home at the Silicon Valley Classic I, the past weekend.

The Spartans took down Saint Mary’s College twice, California State University, Sacramento and the University of Northern Colorado, but lost in the final game against the University of California, Santa Barbara.

On Friday, SJSU went up against Saint Mary’s and beat them 1-0 in seven innings.

It was an offensive struggle for most of the game as the Spartans’ lone run came on a Gaels’ error in the fourth inning.

Saint Mary’s catcher Jenavee Amador attempted to throw out SJSU redshirt junior infielder Karizma Bergesen as she tried to steal second base, but ended up throwing the ball away. Sophomore infielder Taylor Squires advanced to home plate and scored the only run for the Spartans.

Immediately after winning a hardfought game against Saint Mary’s, the Spartans played Northern Colorado, wrecking them 7-0.

Freshman infielder Ahmiya

Noriega was SJSU best hitter on the field as she batted 3 of 4 and scored an RBI. Senior infielder

Alyssa Graham helped secure the victory going 2 for 4 with an RBI while hitting a triple for the first time.

Sophomore pitcher Lacie Ham pitched a shutout against the Bears, recording 6 strikeouts and allowing just 5 hits in 7 innings.

“Just a phenomenal job by the team. The energy level, coming out and swinging the bats,” said SJSU head coach Tammy Lohmann after both victories on Friday “They are changing their focus and really

trying to find their true identity as a team.”

With the two wins, the Spartans had three shutouts in a row for the first time in three seasons.

“I want the same focus and the same coming out and competing [Saturday’s games,]” said Lohmann. The Spartans were up against the Gaels again in their first game Saturday.

SJSU secured its second win over the Gaels, winning 15-7 in five innings.

“We are finding ways to compete at the plate. We’re swinging and running aggressively and our pitchers are doing the job at the mound,” Lohmann said after their

second win over Saint Mary’s.

In a high scoring game, the Gaels scored 5 runs in the fifth inning to take a 6-5 lead. The Spartans bounced back and had a big scoring run of their own in the fifth inning, scoring 7 runs and taking home a win.

Noriega managed to lead again in this game with an inside the park home run while going 2 for 3 with three runs scored.

The next matchup for the Spartans was Sacramento State. Through the first two innings, no team had a hit.

The Hornets took the early lead in the third with two runs, but the Spartans bounced back immediately by scoring three runs led by

Bergesen, who went 2 for 2 at the plate with an RBI.

With the momentum shifted, redshirt senior Jenessa Ullegue led the Spartans in pitching, only allowing two runs and three hits in one of her best pitching games of the season.

The Spartans went on a six hit run to end the game in the 5th inning to win 10-4.

In the final matchup Sunday, the Spartans were up against the Gauchos but lost 9-4 and went 4-1 in the SVC.

“Gotta be a little bit more competitive today especially on Sunday. Sunday is always a challenge in the tournament… It’s just the

grind on Sunday. And we did not show up today,” said Lohmann.

The Spartans are scheduled to be at the Judi Garman Classic in Fullerton from March 3-5. They will face California State University, Fullerton, Louisiana State University, the University of Oregon, Seattle University and Cal Poly University.

OSCAR FRIAS-RIVERA| SPARTAN DAILY

SJSU Freshman infielder Ahmiya Noriega settles into the batter’s box during a game against Sacramento State on Saturday.

Follow Oscar Frias-Rivera on Twitter @oscar_frias408

Akbayan puts on cultural performance

By Brandon Nicolas STAFF WRITER

The Akbayan club hosted its 22nd annual KAPWA concert, Mula Sa Puso, on Saturday at the Student Union Theater, highlighting up-and-coming Filipino-American artists and performers.

All the proceeds from the concert went to the Project PEARLS charity.

Project PEARLS is a nonprofit organization aiming to help children in need with nutrition, education, shelter and medical services, according to its website.

Performers included San Jose State’s Commonality dance group, 16-year-old singer, songwriter and producer JMAYE, Sauce Dance Crew and former Akbayan member and SJSU alumna Ashley Mehta.

Akbayan, which is the only FilipinoAmerican association on campus, is a non-profit organization founded upon four pillars: cultural, social, academic and community & political.

The word Akbayan means “embracing friendship” in Tagalog.

“Our sole purpose is to spread and embrace friendship, and also embrace our culture through all of our events,” said Kylene Mercado, psychology junior and Akbayan cultural chair.

The KAPWA concert, originally called the Mabuhay Talent Showcase for 20 years, changed its name because of the coronavirus outbreak.

Mercado said the term KAPWA, a Filipino psychological concept that means “to see yourself in other

people,” or “the unity of self in I,” is a more fitting title following the social disconnect caused by COVID-19.

“That’s what we want to bring out in this showcase,” Mercado said. “With the KAPWA concert, its main purpose is to not only highlight Filipino-American artists and performers, but to also ultimately raise money for charity.”

The concert name Mula Sa Puso means “From the Heart” in Tagalog.

Mercado said she chose the name because she feels Filipino American students often feel disconnected from their culture.

“There’s a lot of reasons for that,” Mercado said. “We have different experiences from those in the Philippines, and I wanted to signify that your culture and your experiences come from the heart.”

Mabuhay means “long live” in Tagalog and is a way of welcoming others.

Mercado said the concerts previously took place in October to pay homage to Filipino American history month, but it was rescheduled from October 2022 to February because of COVID-19.

“This is an important night for me because as an artist I am being embraced into a community here that I can only find as a college student,” said aerospace engineering freshman Brent Cantillas. Cantillas, who exhibits under the name brntjc, opened the concert with a blend of jazz and rhythm and blues, accompanied by bass, drums and saxophone.

“I think it’s important for us to find our community and to be able to celebrate and embrace the people in our community as Filipino Americans,” Cantillas said.

He said, because of Project PEARLS, Filipino-American students are not only gathering together as a community, but are also helping to raise awareness of problems going on in the Philippines.

“Kylene wanted to surround the concert more with up-and-coming artists rather than big named ones,” said Lauren Malihan, aerospace engineering senior and Akbayan President.

Malihan said because the artists and performers chosen are not well known, it allows them to connect more with the crowd and establish reasonable representation.

“The charity is an amazing cause and being Filipino myself and a dual citizen, doing anything to contribute back to the community is really important to me,” said Jolene Lozano, a Filipino American singer songwriter from San Francisco and a returning performer at the KAPWA concerts.

Lozano said she was born and raised in New Jersey and decided to follow her dreams as an artist after graduating from Boston College.

“Personally when I was growing up, I didn’t see that many people that looked like me in mainstream media,” Lozano said.

Lozano said she felt warmth Saturday night because she never got to see that many Filipinos in one place, let alone

gather for an amazing cause.

Malihan said the concert is wellknown in the Filipino American student community, but could be promoted more by Associated Students or other organizations because the message of the concert is universal.

“Representation is a big deal to us,” Malihan said. “Being that it’s our 22nd concert, not a lot of people know about it.”

She said many of the topics shared in the event are about bridging different struggles together and understanding where we come from.

“When we see communities grow, it is a beautiful thing,” said biomedical engineering senior Steven Teddy, who performed several metal songs. “And to have this happen too is such an amazing wonder.”

During the beginning and end of the concert, Mercado asked the crowd to put their right hand to their heart and think of their experiences, loved ones, and community.

“No matter your identity, no matter your background, culture is from the heart,” Mercado said.

BRANDON NICOLAS | SPARTAN DAILY

Filipino American artists from San Jose’s Commonality Dance Group perform at the 22nd annual KAPWA concert, Mula Sa Puso, on Saturday at the Student Union Theater.

Poetry and films address mental health

By

Art With Impact, a mental health nonprofit organization collaborated with Active Minds, a San Jose State’s student run mental wellness organization, to host Wellness In Words, a film and poetry workshop at the Student Union, on Thursday.

Art With Impact presents student-made films relating to mental health issues on college campuses to spread awareness to students.

The nonprofit hosts monthly contests for student filmmakers showcasing their work, rewarding them with production grants to make films for its archive.

Active Minds has chapters across the country in universities, communities and workplaces that focus on reducing stigma surrounding young adult’s mental health.

The event’s host, Britt Martinez-Hewitt, is a queer artist who led the group in a calming land acknowledgment before defining poetry as “a condensed expression of your thoughts and feelings.”

“Anything that’s put with pen to paper with actual intention is going to be considered poetry here today,” Martinez-Hewitt said. “Whatever wants to flow out of you today, if it seems more like a song, if it’s rhyme-y, if it’s not rhyme-y . . . absolutely allow that to manifest.”

Martinez-Hewitt instructed everyone to close their eyes to visualize the elemental aspects of the Earth and how people can draw appreciation from it.

The event bridged poetry and film, empowering students to create poetic work after they watched short films and freely wrote their own creative deliberations.

“Another way that I’ll acknowledge and mention here is that coming together through the lens of art, and fostering the space for community healing is directly rooted in indigenous and ancestral practices and really to every single culture all around the world,” Martinez-Hewitt said. “That’s one really important iteration of how we can honor and remember is just by naming them.”

SJSU psychological services counselor Sarah Strader-Garcia said the films shown throughout the event were related to hope and resilience.

The event showcased the 2019 short film “Parallel,” directed by Naomi B. Smith, a movie about a man and woman flashing through their own separate episodes of heavy depression.

The ending of this roughly four-minute long film has the characters sharing the message of “live as if you’ll die today, it will be better tomorrow.”

Martinez-Hewitt led the group into having one-on-one conversations about what they could gather from the film’s messaging before freely writing and thinking over some soulful music.

The participants handed in their poems to be anonymously read in front of the group by Martinez-Hewitt, who

took upon poetic cadences in their voice to deliver the students’ work.

The event’s organizers requested that anything shared from the students stays confidential for privacy reasons, which included poems.

Wellness In Words concluded with a three-person panel between Strader-Garcia, Chris Mitchell and Evelyn Tran.

Mitchell works with the Eating Disorders Resource Center, a nonprofit aiming to help people in the Bay Area with eating disorders, according to its website.

Tran works with Mental Health America of California, a nonprofit working toward creating more accessible mental health care, according to its website.

Active Minds treasurer Nayeli Albino said her favorite part of the workshop was an exercise where students wrote a love letter to

themselves in the past.

“It’s really important to remember there’s a little you inside of everyone,” Albino said. “You can take care of him.”

Arianna DeRosa, community outreach coordinator for Active Minds, said the event gave people a place to express their thoughts and feelings surrounding their mental health experiences.

“Not a lot of people have a safe space to open up about those things,” DeRosa said. “I’m just glad we were able to create a safe space like that for everyone to feel supported and appreciated.”

From left to right: panelists Evelyn Tran, Chris Mitchell, and Sarah Strader-Garcia discuss mental

disorders and resources with the audience at Wellness in Words.

Dylan Newman STAFF WRITER

DYLAN NEWMAN | SPARTAN DAILY

Britt Martinez-Hewitt reads student’s poetic works during Wellness in Words workshop on Thursday at the Student Union. Follow Dylan Newman