Volume 108, Issue 14

The Spectator The Stuyvesant High School Newspaper

Features

OPINIONS

Get to know the Nobel Prize Winning Chemist and Stuy Alum, Roald Hoffman with features writer Talia Kahan, and read about his reflection on his career and time at Stuyvesant.

Opinions writer Mia Gindis argues that by mandating only STEM-based classes and limiting the number of humanities classes a student can take, the administration is entirely underestimating the value of these classes.

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Volume 108 No. 14

NEWSBEAT Thirty-four

Stuyvesant

Stuyvesant Girls Chess Team competed in the The

2018 All Girls National Chess Championship in Chicago,

placing second in overall team standings. Sophomore Sophie Morris-Suzuki placed third in the indi-

vidual standings of the under age-18 division.

Stuyvesant’s Robotics Team, StuyPulse 694, attended the Robotics World Championships in Detroit this past week, and won the Regional

Chairman’s award.

Japanese teacher Chie Helinski and her students traveled to Washington D.C. last week to attend the National Japan Bowl, with various Stuyvesant students placing within the top three throughout all divisions.

The Stuyvesant Envirothon Teams, led by Biology teacher Marissa Maggio, placed first and second at the NYC Envirothon Competition in Prospect Park last Friday. Those teams will advance to represent Manhattan County at the State competition in May.

Seniors Md Abedin, Jawadul Kadir, and Aryan Bhatt won third place overall in the Annual Cornell University High School Programming Contest.

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May 4, 2018

stuyspec.com

Freshman Caucus Hosts Lecture by Nobel Prize Recipient Richard Axel

By Annette Kim and Hayeon Ok Nobel Prize winner and Stuyvesant High School Alumnus Dr. Richard Axel (‘63) spoke to students about his research on the olfactory system in Lecture Hall A on Thursday, March 29. The event was the fourth Freshman Caucushosted lecture this school year.

Axel is a university professor and investigator at the Howard Hughes Medical Institute at Columbia University Medical Center, as well as a member of the Departments of Biochemistry and Molecular Biophysics at the Neuroscience and the Comprehensive Cancer Center. In 2004, he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for his discoveries on how the olfactory system affects learning in the brain.

Axel started the lecture, titled “Order from Disorder: Internal Representations of the Olfactory World,” by describing his childhood and the start of his career in science. Axel was initially a geneticist, and studied different genes to determine how they control certain properties of cells. By using his research observations, he concluded that groups of neurons controlled

behavior rather than genes.

Axel proceeded to use an example of how the brain interprets paintings to discuss how neurons influence the brain.

He showed two different paintings of the same scene of Adam and Eve, but one was created

by Lucas Cranach and was full of details, while another was created by Barnett Newman and made of lines. “[The Newman painting] consists of lines, forms, colors, that depict the scene but have no basis in reality,” Axel said. “This painting is an abstraction, and meaning must by imposed upon the abstraction by experience. [...]

The brain depicts the world - it depicts more than the world, it depicts perception, motion, cognition, memory, [as is the role] of active neurons.”

Axel then explained how the brain works in a similar fashion for the olfactory system.

“All organisms have a mechanism to recognize olfactory information in the environment and [process this information] to create an internal representation of the world,” he said.

“This internal representation then translates [...] into a meaningful firing of neurons, to ultimately result in appropriate thoughts and behaviors.”

The lecture received a lot

Zoe Oppenheimer / The Spectator

students competed in the state level National History Day Competition this past week in Cooperstown, NY. Junior Benson Goldman won second place in the individual website category, and junniors Claire Liu and Eliza Spinna also won second place for their group documentary. The three are expected to compete in the National level competition.

“The Pulse of the Student Body”

of positive feedback from the audience. “The most memorable was when Axel [discussed] the vast number of ways humans remember certain odors,” freshman Rebecca Kim said. “These lectures provide me with more insight regarding a scientist’s work and research in the real world,” freshman Brian Zhang said.

Freshman Caucus Vice President Jonathan Schneiderman, who helped plan the lecture, shared the positive opinions.

“When freshmen and other students are exposed to advanced

ideas, it lets them expand their horizons. If they decide that they want to pursue one of those ideas as a career, that’s really superb, and we’ve changed a life for the better,” he said.

Many students are looking forward to more lectures from the Freshman Caucus in the future. “I would appreciate more informative lectures like Axel’s because it had left much of an impression on me and was able to provide insight into a topic that most teachers at school do not go into much detail to,” Kim said.

Second Annual Wellness Night Discusses Screen Time and Students

By Maddy Andersen and Erin Lee Stuyvesant’s second annual Wellness Night was hosted in the auditorium on Thursday, April 12. The event included a screening of the documentary “Screenagers,” which explores the relationship between modern technology (specifically cell phones, social media, and video games) and teenagers. The film was followed by a discussion led by Assistant Principal of Counseling Casey Pedrick.

The Wellness Night aimed to address the effects of video games on the teenage brain, how to find a balance between schoolwork and social media, and how parents can guide teenagers in the digital age. Pedrick, Parent Coordinator Dina Ingram, and the Parents’ Association organized the event in response to unease from parents regarding their children’s use of technology. “They expressed that as a concern, so when we found out about this documentary, and that it was being well received, we thought that it’d be a very helpful event to bring to Stuyvesant,” Pedrick said. Out of the 120 attendees of the screen-

ing, only three were students.

Screen time use is definitely an existing problem among many Stuyvesant students. A survey conducted by The Spectator in the fall reported that 37 percent of freshmen surveyed spent one to three hours each day gaming and watching television, Netflix, and YouTube, and 15 percent of freshmen spent five to seven hours per day online.

“Screenagers” was geared toward parents, and explained how they can adjust to the quick-paced trends in today’s society. “Technology is moving so fast that parents often are finding it challenging to keep up with what are the newest things,” Pedrick said.

In one part of the film, a girl works with her parents to create a contract about using her new iPhone. In response, Pedrick and Ingram encouraged parents to have similar conversations with their kids. “We wanted to empower the parents to know that they can put some parameters on [screens]. We know from a school counseling standpoint that students crave structure and rules, knowing what rules there are, and know-

ing what the consequences are to breaking those rules.”

Following the documentary, Pedrick led an open questionand-answer session with the audience. “We needed the film to be our jumping-off point, but the discussion was for me one of the best discussions that I’ve had at an event at Stuyvesant,” Pedrick said. “[This event was] one of the rare times [...] when it was parents getting to speak to other parents.”

Both Pedrick and Ingram expressed the idea that parents and children should work together to find a balance that works for both parties. “That is often advice we give to parents on a variety of things from the counseling department, to be able to say, ‘This is a goal that you have, and if your child’s goal doesn’t line up with that, then there has to be a discussion and a compromise, and you both have to buy into the solution,’” Pedrick said.

Many parents found the Wellness Night informative. “[My mom] was surprised and kind of confused at the same time,” freshman Asif Sami said. “[She] finally knew some context as to what was going on.”

That night, Sami and his mom discussed how social media and his phone were having a negative effect on him and causing homework to take longer than it should. “Her statements do have truth in [them] because us kids, we’re doing our work, and all of a sudden there’s a notification bell that goes off,” Sami said.

However, many also have controversial opinions toward “Screenagers” due to its skewed presentation of technology. “[The event] was definitely eye-opening, but it was contradictory at the same time,” Sami said. For example, the film placed the blame on students for being unable to stay off their screens, but did not mention how teachers also assign homework using digital means, requiring students to use laptops and other devices.

Looking forward, Pedrick and other school administrators see Wellness Night as just the first of many technology-oriented discussions to come. “Technology is evolving so quickly,” Pedrick said. “We’ll need to have this as an ongoing event in order to keep up with all the changes that are happening.”

The Spectator ● May 4, 2018

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News Annual Hidden Ivies College Panel Presentation Held at Stuyvesant

By Sasha Spajic

Courtesy of Wikimedia Commons and NASA

WORLDBEAT North Korean leader Kim Jong-Un walked across the country’s demilitarized zone and met with South Korean President Moon Jae-in, last Friday, making him the first leader of the hermit-state to set foot in the South since the Korean war. The two are set to discuss the denuclearization of the Korean peninsula.

T-Mobile and Sprint said on Sunday they had agreed to a $26 billion merger deal, which will unite the third and fourth largest U.S. wireless carriers. This comes from the second round of merger talks between the two companies, after the first ended unsuccessfully in 2014 when the then-Obama administration expressed antitrust concerts.

California Gov. Jerry Brown said Tuesday his state was suing the Trump administration over its decision to ease national vehicle-emissions standards.

The lawsuit challenges the Environmental Protection Agency’s decision to revise tailpipe emission rules, saying the move was a violation of the Clean Air Act and Administrative Procedures Act.

The Pentagon has begun an investigation into Navy Rear Adm. Ronny Jackson, who served as the personal physician for three presidents until misconduct allegations emerged last week, dooming his bid to become secretary of veterans affairs.

Undead Art

Every issue, we bring back old or unused art and slap a caption underneath.

Stuyvesant hosted its annual Hidden Ivies College Panel presentation in the Murray Kahn Theater on Wednesday, April 11. The event was organized by Director of College Counseling Jeffrey Makris and featured four panelists from the “Hidden Ivy” colleges. The presentation was open to all grade levels.

The panel was based on the book “The Hidden Ivies” by Howard and Matthew Greene, which features numerous selective schools outside of the Ivy League. This year, the panelists included Alex Bates from Lafayette College, Leslie Braat from Oberlin College, Arron Marlowe-Rogers from Wake Forest University, and Sarah Lyons from the University of Chicago.

Juniors Jane Rhee and Joshua Weiner moderated the presentation, which started with an information session about

the admissions process specific to each school, and then transitioned into a question-and-answer session with the audience.

“The goal [of the panel is] to have deeper conversations about admissions, the higher [education] landscape, [and] the college experience,” Makris said. “[It’s important] that students and parents [who] attend, regardless as to whether they like those specific schools, learn [...] what’s going to be a good fit for them when their time comes.”

Weiner believes that the presentation did a good job of advising the audience. “A lot of students have this preconceived notion that they’re only going to apply to certain schools. I think that most students (and parents) who were there got to learn a lot about schools which they otherwise would have never considered,” Weiner said in an e-mail interview. “Even if people don’t apply [...], it’s worth learning

CATCH Program Begins at Stuyvesant

By Peter Tam The Connecting Adolescents To Comprehensive Healthcare (CATCH) program was recently launched at Stuyvesant.

It gives students free access to birth control and prevention tools such as pregnancy tests and Plan B. The program attempts to address “gaps in sexual health education in NYC public high schools,” according to Public Health Educator Alexandra Pamiloza.

The CATCH program began in 2011 with five pilot sites. Currently, there are 52 CATCH locations scattered around New York

City that cover over 100 schools and 55 percent of high school students in New York City.

The program is entirely confidential and students can utilize it anytime at the nurse’s office. “In New York state, any adolescent of any age can access reproductive health services [through CATCH] without parental permission,” CATCH Project Director Pamella Haller said.

Parents have the ability to opt their child out of the program.

CATCH also provides training to school nurses on how to use reproductive services such as pregnancy testing and

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emergency contraception for students who need them onsite. Training is conducted under a medical consultant who is experienced in reproductive health and family planning.

The program connects students with health educators who can teach them about sexual and reproductive health.

Students are able to meet these educators to discuss whether they should get testing or receive referrals to outside clinics. The health educators plan to promote and discuss CATCH in Stuyvesant health classes in the upcoming months.

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YOUNG WRITERS Angel Zheng / The Spectator

about [...] what to look for that makes institutions unique,” he said, “and how to market oneself on their application.”

Despite this, many others felt that the event was lacking, and had hoped for more detailed insight on the college process. “Most of what the [panelists] discussed was general and basic: that you are consistent with extracurriculars and that you challenge yourself. But if [I didn’t] know anything about the college process, I see how this could have been informative,” sophomore parent Ida Zheng said.

The administration is eager to continue this yearly panel with a greater target on underclassmen in following years. “I think it would be really nice for [more] kids to hear [how] to be a bit calmer about the process and get a sense that there are so many options out there,” Makris said.

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The Spectator ● May 4, 2018

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Features

By TALIA KAHAN

Courtesy of Roald Hoffmann

When I asked Roald Hoffmann, a Nobel Prize winning scientist, for his advice regarding Stuyvesant, he told me something I never would have expected to hear from a Nobel Prize winner in Chemistry. He said, “Take every opportunity to take a non-science course [...] You come to the sciences as it is, naturally, but the chance to take a course in poetry, or anthropology, or a foreign language is not going to come your way again easily because you’ll be caught up in real life and in a profession.”

Looking at Hoffmann’s past will give us a clue for understanding his perspective. Hoffmann, whose name was Roald Safran at the time, was born in Zloskow, Poland in 1937, two years before Germany invaded Poland. After the Nazis invaded Poland in 1939 and occupied his town, his family was transferred to the Lackie labor camp.

He and his mother escaped to a friendly Ukrainian family in 1942. They hid Hoffmann and his mother in the schoolhouse attic where one of the family members taught.

Hoffmann explained the lesson that he learned from this generous family’s help: “It is very easy to make moral choices in peacetimes, but in a time of war, that family that saved us. They risked their lives to help five people in an attic in a schoolhouse, and they were a family of five themselves, the risks that they took. We paid them, but that’s not why they saved us— they could have lost their lives.”

Hoffmann’s father, Hillel Safran, stayed in the Lackie labor camp and led an attempt to break out. He was a civil engineer who had built bridges.

This gave him access in and out of the camp and allowed him to smuggle weapons into the camp in an attempt to break out. Safran died during World War II. The Soviet army freed Hoffmann and his mother in 1944.

From hiding, they followed the Soviet army into western Poland and went through refugee

camps in Czechoslovakia, Austria, and Germany, ultimately ending up in Munich in 1948.

All the time while talking about the Holocaust and World War II, Hoffmann maintained his calm and kind presence, never raising his voice or expressing any bitterness.

Hoffmann disagrees with the popular belief that surviving something like the Holocaust makes you a better human being. He elaborated, “That is a romantic notion, that suffering improves you. I don’t think that there is any evidence for this.

All I can tell you from observing the behavior of my aunts and uncles and others who survived is they were normal human beings, and they were no better than other people. They were subject to all the usual foibles and failings that people have.”

It was through Hoffmann’s perseverance that he was able to live a fulfilling life filled with notable achievements. Hoffmann migrated to New York City with his mother in 1949 on the Ernie Pyle from Munich, Germany when he was 11 years old. Hoffmann moved all throughout New York and ultimately ended up in Jackson Heights. He recounted, “We first moved to Ridgewood in the corner of Queens and Brooklyn. Then we moved to the old Williamsburg before Williamsburg became gentrified. Then we moved up in the world to Queens again to Woodside and Jackson Heights.” He attended PS 93 in Queens, then P.S. 60 in Brooklyn, and finally came to Stuyvesant for high school.

When Hoffmann moved to America at age 11, he knew very little English. In fact, English became his sixth language.

Hoffmann’s first two languages were Polish and Yiddish. He also knew German, Ukrainian, and Hebrew before moving to America. Hoffmann explained that there was no other option but to keep learning new languages and adjusting to new cultures. He said, “Americans have trouble understanding this, but my experience is not just because I am smart, but because we were refugees, and when we went from one country to another one you were put

Courtesy of Roald Hoffmann

Holocaust Survivor, Stuyvesant Graduate, and Nobel Prize Winner

through a school, and nobody asked you what language you spoke. You did the local language, and you learned it.”

Hoffmann, just like students today, had to take a specific test to get into Stuyvesant. However, in Hoffmann’s time, only three specialized high schools existed: Stuyvesant, Bronx Science, and Brooklyn Tech. At the time, Stuyvesant was an allboys school where the majority were Jewish. Despite the difference between the ethnic makeup of Stuyvesant in the 1950s and today, Hoffman thinks that not much has changed. “In my time it was 70 percent first or second generation JewishAmerican immigrants, and today it is 60 percent plus AsianAmerican immigrants. You know, my mother wanted me to be a doctor. And that child of the local Korean grocer in Manhattan near my sister’s house

who goes to Stuyvesant, their parents want them to be a doctor.”

Other things have not changed, like the large number of Advanced Placement (AP) courses offered and students’ desire to learn. Hoffmann remembered, “I think I never felt as much of a concentration of people wanting to know as I did [as] among those 900 boys in my graduation class. It was a wonderful experience. I have friends from that time who I remain friends [with].” Hoffmann took AP classes in math, physics, biology, and English.

However, during Hoffmann’s Stuyvesant career, he was not the best science student. He preferred the humanities, like history and English. His predilection is evident in his extracurriculars: Hoffmann was in the history club, the United Nations club, and on the staff of The Caliper. Hoffmann’s favorite teacher was his English teacher, Mrs. Sara Brodie.

Hoffmann credits his experience on The Caliper, and at Stuyvesant generally, with teaching him how to write.

He advises all Stuyvesant students to take writing courses and learn how to write clearly even if they are interested in the STEM fields. He explained that without a solid basis for writing, students will be unable to explain their scientific research.

In addition to enjoying many of the social-science related activities Stuyvesant offered, Hoffmann also entered and won the Westinghouse Science Talent Search, now known as the Regeneron Science Talent Search. His research focused on a bubble chamber, a then modern piece of physics equipment. Hoffmann did know that he was interested in chemistry during high-school, but he did not take AP Chemistry because a weak teacher taught the class.

Hoffman attended Columbia College after Stuyvesant as a pre-med, per his parents’ de-

mand. However, the humanities continued to interest Hoffmann in college. He described, “If you had asked me what I would really like to do if I didn’t have to think about getting a job or a career, I would have said at the end of college that I wanted to do art history. But that would have killed my parents. That was not in their idea of what you should do.”

But chemistry was good enough for them. He was exposed to chemistry in some pre-med requirements and summer research. And ultimately, it was good enough for him too.

He ultimately won the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1981, along with the late Kenichi Fukui. Hoffmann won for his research combining quantum mechanics with chemistry. He worked with R.B Woodward, an organic chemist. He described his conclusions saying, “We understood why certain reactions went easily. It sounds like numerology, but it comes from physics, which has to do with the molecular orbitals, which are just the places the electrons move and their sort of wavelike properties.”

After explaining these complicated and revolutionary ideas, Hoffmann reflected on the advice that got him to where he is today: “There is about one percent of the smart people I know [who] get by on brains alone. Ninety-nine percent [of them] get along by telling of their work clearly and comprehensively. They always have to explain their work. There’s no way—whether it’s a scientific research article or a report to your boss in industry—to do this without writing clearly. So, writing is very important.”

He added, “just to have fun” and “enjoy what you are doing.”

That seems to have worked for him.

The Spectator ● May 4, 2018

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Features

By MAX MAH

Rabbi Hillel said, “If not now, when?” If now is not the time to talk about gun violence prevention legislation, when is? The time for sophomore Zeynep Bromberg was during the midwinter recess, when she spoke these words on Capitol Hill in Washington DC while lobbying for gun violence prevention. A Reform Jew, Bromberg participated in the L’taken Seminar with her peers at the Brooklyn Heights synagogue. The program allowed teenagers to learn about various political issues and forms of social justice, to delve into their significance from the Jewish perspective, and to deliver a speech to office representatives to lobby for an issue of interest.

The program was sponsored by the Religious Action Center, a progressive organization that is the political voice of the Reform Jewish Movement. Today, the movement is largely secular, based in the concepts of social justice and Jewish values, such as “tikkun olam,” which translates to “repair of the world.”

In recent years, social media has revealed the shocking, increasingly widespread incidents of gun violence that have taken the form of terrorist attacks and school shootings. The 2017 Las Vegas shooting on October 1 saw the deranged Stephen Paddock open fire on a crowd of concert goers at the Route 91 Harvest music festival. Fifty-eight people were left dead and 851 were injured. On Halloween, Stuyvesant witnessed a terrorist attack when Sayfullo Saipov killed eight along the Hudson River bike path. For a long time, we thought we were victims of a terrorist shooting.

Most recently, a school shooting occurred on February 14 at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Florida, where 17 were killed and 17 more wounded.

These shootings throughout the US have added to roughly 19 incidents this year. “The situation we’re in right now is really terrible, and the statistics are insane.

The US has a lot of problems, and this is a big one,” said Bromberg.

She wrote in her speech that gun

violence in the form of school shootings is a uniquely American experience; the rate of gun violence in this country is up to 20 times more than in other developed countries, which results in nearly 34,000 deaths a year. hese incidents, in addition to her personal experiences during the terrorist attack near Stuyvesant on Halloween, prompted Bromberg to research the topic of gun violence prevention and lobby for the issue. “The fact that a school shooting could have happened, and that some people thought that was the case, was scary and was not okay,” Bromberg said. “I spent four hours in my school under the impression that I had come this close to being a victim of a school shooting, and I’ll never forget how frightened I felt,” she wrote.

Bromberg’s family history has also had a huge impact on her decision to lobby and speak out about the issue. Her grandfather worked for non-profit organizations, including the Anti Defamation League, and spent lots of time on Capitol Hill lobbying throughout his life. Naturally, this spread to Bromberg’s father, and has continued on to influence her. “I think their ‘liberalness’ has rubbed off on me,” she remarked with a smile.

“The want for change and the knowledge that everyday citizens make change in the world have been something my parents have always taught me, and they’ve encouraged me to do things like this,” she said. “There’s never been a moment where my parents didn’t want me to speak out for what I believe in.”

In addition to Bromberg, a number of Stuyvesant and New York City school students alike were deeply provoked by school shootings in recent years and decided to take action. Sophomores Grace Goldstein, Morgan Hesse, and Rebecca Collins founded the Stuy Says Enough! organization earlier this year.

They created a platform on Facebook to spread awareness of the school shootings throughout the nation, and organized two school walkouts to protest gun violence. The movement quickly gained momentum around the

school; many Stuyvesant students took part in the walkout on March 14, and more walked on April 20th for the collective “NYC Says Enough” rally. Bromberg participated in both walkouts.

“I think it’s fantastic that they’re using their platform to speak about these issues. I think Stuy students more than others often need encouragement when it comes to this sort of thing. We think of ourselves as ‘go to class, study, get 100 on the test, and you’re a success,’ but there’s so much more than that.

Especially as teenagers in New York City, we have voices that deserve to be heard, and Stuy students aren’t as good at expressing those voices because of our environment and the way we are taught we should be acting,” Bromberg said.

Bromberg also effected change within this community of encouragement. Before her trip to Capitol Hill, she reached out to the Stuyvesant community through Facebook, where she informed the student body about her trip and welcomed further contributions to her speech from her peers. “I was affected [by these events], but so were so many others. It made sense for me to see how people were feeling and if there was anything they wanted me to talk about; it wouldn’t be fair if I didn’t. I got really lucky in that I had this opportunity to speak to these representatives,” she said.

There was also a strong sense of personal duty that went into Bromberg’s actions. “I thought it was my responsibility as an American citizen and as a global citizen. But also, it was knowing that someone [office representatives] took time out of their busy day to listen to what a bunch of teenagers had to say. That’s important, even if what I said did not automatically cause cause immediate change.”

“I think that the way our government works is that people are forced to listen to their constituents and hear their voices— it’s a beautiful thing. Especially with our current administration in this day and age, it’s most important for us to at least try and speak our minds. Because if we

Courtesy of Zeynep Bromberg

Zeynep Bromberg: From Lobbying to Walking Out| Fighting Against Gun Violence

don’t, then we’re just not taking advantage of [the system], which is just sad.”

Bromberg delivered her speech with one of her best friends, Violet Kopp, who lobbied separately in front of representative Nydia Velazquez and senators Kirsten Gillibrand and Chuck Shumer. In addition to speaking of the vast statistics surrounding the effects of gun violence, Bromberg and Kopp supported the Assault Weapons Ban of 2017, which would ban 205 military-style weapons from the factories and marketplaces, and the Background Check Expansion Act, which would expand background checks to occasions not previously covered by the background check.

Through sharing her experi-

ences and showing her support for these bans, Bromberg and Kopp received positive feedback.

“The response that we got from chiefs of staff was really positive.

You could tell that they wanted to hear from us—this was my main takeaway. Because young people are going to become the adults, and it’s our opinions and our thoughts that are going to change the world in the next couple of years—so why not now? All over the place, there are opportunities [to lobby], and it’s only one Google search away from finding them and trying to make your voice heard. Literally all you need is to want to do it.”

Kwibuka 24: Remembering the Rwandan Genocide

By AMANDA PENG Entering the grand General Assembly Hall of the United Nations building, Stuyvesant students were met with the beautiful sound of a musical performance by the String Quartet of the UN Symphony Orchestra. Filing into seats, teachers and students quietly settled down, ready to listen and learn from the speeches that were soon to be given by those impacted by the Rwandan Genocide.

The A.P. World History classes taught by history teachers Zachary Berman, Allyson Compton, Brenda Garcia, and Kerry Trainor were in attendance at the 24th International Day of Reflection on the Genocide Against the Tutsi in Rwanda on April 13th. This ceremony, called Kwibuka, raises awareness each year for the brutal Rwandan Genocide of 1994, in which members of the Hutu ethnic majority murdered nearly one million Rwandans of the Tutsi minority.

“We’ve been studying decolo-

nization in Africa in my AP World History class the last few weeks, so the students that were able to attend the conference were able to deepen their understanding of the topic” said Compton over an email interview. “Kwibuka means ‘remember,’ and it is especially important to me as a history teacher that my students understand that one objective of studying history is remembering the past so that events like the genocide of the Tutsis in Rwanda are not repeated. [...] I hope my students were challenged to think of why genocide is still occurring, and to what extent international organizations like the United Nations have adjusted their efforts at stopping genocide since 1994.”

The first speaker was Consolee Nishimwe, the author of “Tested to the Limit: A Genocide Survivor’s Story of Pain, Resilience, and Hope”. A Tutsi survivor of the Rwandan genocide, Nishimwe told the heartbreaking story of her family’s experience.

At only fourteen years old, she was forced to grow up quickly to help her family survive.

“My family was a beautiful family. They were teachers and serving the community. They taught me to love everybody, to care for others,” she recounted. “[But] people we considered to be our friends, neighbors, they did the most horrible things. [...]

During those three months, you didn’t know who was kind.”

Nishimwe went on, describing how her home was destroyed and her family torn apart. “I never thought that they were going to say that they had murdered my dad. My dad who taught their kids, my dad who was carrying every young person in our town, and now, their reward [was] to kill him simply because he was a Tutsi. [...] [On] May 9th, these killers came and they took my brothers. [...] We saw them walking, [holding] each others’ hands, [...] and they said they are going to join dad in heaven.” Soon after, fourteen-year-old Nishimwe was taken hostage along with her mother and sister.

She spoke tearfully about how she was dragged away by a soldier and was raped. “On the way

[back to my mother], I wanted to find anybody to kill me because there was no reason for me to be alive anymore,” said Nishimwe.

Concluding her speech, she said, “There are so many survivors, fellow survivors, who cannot even speak [about] what they went through, but I had to speak on their behalf.” Nishimwe made one final statement, reminding every person listening that it was a genocide perpetrated against the Tutsis in 1994, and upon her descent from the podium, each person in the audience stood up to applaud.

Valentine Rugwabiza, the Permanent Representative of the Republic of Rwanda to the United Nations spoke as well. She thanked Secretary General António Guterres for being the first Secretary General of the United Nations since 1994 to have named the targeted group and victims of the genocide.

Rugwabiza continued, acknowledging the presence of students at Kwibuka. “I am especially encouraged today to see many young people in this room. Your

presence here today shows your willingness to listen. Our hope is that what [you] would have heard today will convince you that each one of us has the responsibility to protect our community. It starts by standing for what is right and speaking up against what is wrong” she said. “Stating the truth of what happened in Rwanda in 1994 during the genocide is central to our reconstruction. [...] We know far too well that the decision not to name the victims of genocide is never accidental. It is always intentional. The intention is to deny the truth of what happened, and in doing so, deny the humanity of the victims and survivors on one hand, and on the other, deny the responsibility and obligation of accountability of the planners and perpetrators of the genocide. [...] They know what they planned. And they know what they did.”

This interview has been edited and condensed.

The Spectator ● May 4, 2018

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Editorials STAFF EDITORIAL

The Spectator

Four Steps to a Better Stuy 1. Get Rid of the Stuyvesant Diploma To obtain a Stuyvesantendorsed diploma, students must take a number of classes that are mostly in STEM fields not required by the DOE. Drafting, for example, is an outdated and time-consuming class that serves little purpose for students not looking to go into architecture. While there is a clear rationale for requiring underclassmen to gain exposure to various fields, classes like drafting, at least in its current form, merely add to the workload of already overworked students.

Upperclassmen in particular, who already have a sense of their interests, should not be required to take such technical and niche classes.

Furthermore, the fact that a “Stuyvesant-endorsed diploma,” which is just a diploma with a sticker slapped onto it, even exists is a testament to the elitism and emphasis on arbitrary measures of achievement—as opposed to emphasis on learning—that exist at Stuyvesant.

Contrary to its intention of pushing students to take more classes, all the diploma fosters is a celebration of our own perceived excellence because we took a few classes that we didn’t want to. If Stuyvesant students are really the cream of the crop, they should not need to be motivated, validated, or confined by a sticker.

2. Make Programming More Flexible Upperclassmen should have more control over their own schedules, as most juniors and seniors already have a sense of which classes they need and want to pursue their desired career paths. For example, according to the New York State Higher Education Services Corporation, physics is not a required course in order to graduate with a New York State Regents diploma. The only requirement is passing one Regents science exam. Students should also be able to take classes such as health and drafting during their freshman year or over the summer, in order to free up periods as upperclassmen so that they can make better use of their last few years. This is something that the school has already started experimenting with.

Another option is including more interdisciplinary classes for students who are weaker in certain fields. Physics, for instance, is mandatory for all students, but as of this year, all classes are taught at the hon-

talent to classes in other fields.

Taking interdisciplinary classes that focus more on a holistic view of all three core sciences, or math classes with a stronger focus on reasoning rather than calculation, can offer a healthy medium.

“The Pulse of the Student Body”

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Taking interdisciplinary classes that focus more on a holistic view of all three core sciences, or math classes with a stronger focus on reasoning rather than calculation, can offer a healthy medium.

3. Require Teachers to Teach Both Underclassmen and Upperclassmen Each year, a few lucky students have the opportunity to take classes with teachers who are considered the top of their department because of their intellectual achievements or the quality of their teaching. These classes are almost always honors-level courses that are only offered to the top students in each field. While these students are given an amazing opportunity and almost always take advantage of what their similarly high-achieving teachers have to offer, other lower-achieving students are left with weaker teachers.

This system of good students getting good teachers creates an academic trend of tracking, where students who get lucky early are then given the chance to develop their skills in that area and thus also take honors courses in the future. The other students, who have weaker teachers in their introductory courses, often struggle to gain a hold of the content and thus cannot take honors classes in the future.

Instead of this system of tracking, teachers should be more evenly distributed across departments. High achieving teachers should be required to teach some standard courses, in addition to teaching honors courses. Honors courses should still be taught by strong teachers, but the very best of Stuyvesant’s teachers should not be simply allowed to teach honors courses

and nothing else.

Teachers should also not be able to limit their course load to junior and senior classes. Introductory level classes, such as

Thus, department Assistant Principals should require each teacher to teach one upperlevel (junior, senior, or honors) course, and one lower-level (freshman, sophomore, or nonhonors) course when allocating classes.

4. Shorten the School Day Eighty-one percent of seniors surveyed earlier this year stated that they got less than seven hours of sleep a school night, and over 40 percent got less than six hours. That’s far below the eight to 10 recommended for teenagers by the National Sleep Foundation. Taking into consideration the hours of homework, tests, and extracurriculars that students contend with, lack of sleep can be significantly detrimental to the mental health and academic performance of students.

Stuyvesant students come from all over the city and many experience commutes as long as two hours hampered by frequent train delays. However, most view the long commute as simply one of the sacrifices they have had to make in order to attend Stuyvesant. The majority of the student body wakes up at around 6 a.m. in order to get to school by its 8 a.m. start time. For context, the average New Yorker wakes up nearly two hours later at 7:47 a.m.

The length of student commutes is often left unaccounted for by administrators. Some teachers dock grades based on lateness alone, and others refuse to recognize train delays as an excuse. Those who have P.E. first period are locked out of the locker room and marked as unprepared if they arrive after the start bell.

The American Academy of Sleep Medicine states that schools should start no earlier than 8:30 a.m. to allow teenagers to wake up at the optimal time for academic activity. With a modified schedule, this can be possible. Docking two minutes from each class period and omitting the morning announcements (which no one heeds anyway) adds up to 24 minutes. Shortening the time between classes to four minutes can increase extra time to 30 minutes.

IN

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Jane Rhee* Sophie Watwood* N EWS

The other students, who have weaker teachers in their introductory courses, often struggle to gain a hold of the content and thus cannot take honors classes in the future. ors level. This is an unnecessarily high standard, especially for students who are not strong in the sciences and can better devote their time, attention, and

Global I and geometry, should also be taught by stronger teachers, who can give students the bases they will use later in their academic careers. Weaker teachers should be distributed across the grade levels, where they can do less damage.

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Page 7

Opinions Midterm Elections: Blue Wave or Silent Majority

By AIDAN GRIFFIN The upcoming midterms in 2018 will be decisive in shaping what the next two years of Trump’s presidency will look like.

If the Democrats manage to reclaim enough seats in Congress, impeachment could become a real threat for President Trump.

If Republicans are able to expand on their Senate majority, largely due to a very favorable electoral map, and maintain their House majority with Kevin McCarthy as the new Speaker of the House, the country may be faced with the further repeal of Obamacare, the passage of funding for the border wall, and much of Trump’s policy agenda being implemented. Whatever your political convictions, these midterms will have a significant impact on the future of the country.

The existence of a “blue wave” seems to be strongly backed by recent election results. Democrat Conor Lamb’s nail-biting victory over Rick Saccone in a district that voted for Trump by a margin of 20 points and Doug Jones’s victory over Roy Moore in Alabama last year seem to suggest that Republicans are losing popularity, even amongst Trump’s own base. Factor in the high number of GOP retirements, ranging from Trey Gowdy to Speaker Paul Ryan, and it seems as if it would take a miracle for Republicans to maintain a majority in the House.

However, these predictions are overwhelmingly hyperbolic, irrational, and premature.

With Paul Ryan, the Republicans will lose a tireless advocate for entitlement and tax reform as well as a man with loads of experience on economic pol-

icy. However, Ryan recognized that he was not the right person to be Speaker of the House, even showing reluctance before taking the post. Ryan’s retirement, although poorly timed due to the significance of the upcoming midterms, could turn out to be beneficial for the Republicans since his replacement, Kevin McCarthy, has been a consistent supporter of Trump and is less likely to be subject to criticism from the Tea Party and a grassroots base than Paul Ryan was as an establishment figure.

McCarthy seems like the ideal person to unite the base along with the establishment and build a strong coalition capable of winning elections.

M a n y Democrats point to the generic congressional ballot, where the Democrats have a 6.5 percent lead, and the fact that the incumbent party has gained seats only once during

midterms in the last 50 years is an indicator that the Democrats will likely take the House in 2018. While these are not unreasonable points, it is too early to claim that they point to a wipeout in November. After all, Ronald Reagan trailed Jimmy Carter in the polls by 25 points in March of 1980 and eight points a couple of weeks before the election; but he ultimately won with a 10-point landslide in November.

Every political pundit and

Rebecca Collins / The Spectator

poll had Thomas Dewey, the Republican candidate, beating incumbent Harry Truman in 1948, but Truman ended up winning by

a convincing 303 to 189 margin in the Electoral College as well as a four and a half point victory in the popular vote. Nothing can be taken for granted in politics.

Although the Democrats have history on their side, momentum can shift very quickly. More significant legislation passed

by Congress, details proving Trump’s innocence in the Mueller investigation, or more Democratic contempt for what Trump calls “middle America” are all examples of changes that can be used to the advantage of Republicans during midterms.

Other than having a promising leader in McCarthy, the Republicans have many accomplishments to tout.

Chief among them is tax reform legislation, which is estimated to lower taxes for 80 percent of Americans this year according to the Tax Policy Center. Furthermore, 64 percent of Americans earned a wage increase of three percent or more with no wage decrease in 2017, far better than the 15 percent of people with a three percent wage increase and 19 percent with a wage decrease in the previous year, statistics that have been a l most unreported in the media.

GDP growth is approaching three percent, with 2.6 percent being the latest annual estimate in the fourth quarter of 2017.

In the National Association of Manufacturers’ quarterly outlook survey, optimism among small manufacturers has risen to 94.5 percent, the highest in the poll’s history. As if these statistics aren’t enough to encourage people to vote Republican, Hillary’s recent comments in India claiming that Trump’s campaign was “looking backwards” and that his supporters were motivated by displeasure with “women getting jobs” or “blacks getting rights” show the contempt Democrats have for what they perceive to be bigoted middle-class Americans.

This attitude will further alienate potential Democratic voters. In addition, while the radical nature of the March for Our Lives and a recent op-ed by former Chief Justice John Paul Stevens calling for a repeal of the Second Amendment may be popular among younger people and the media, they won’t lead to better election results. This is exactly what happened in 1972, when what Nixon called the “silent majority” opposed the radical, left-wing agenda of George McGovern, the Democratic candidate, and delivered a huge 520 to 17 electoral landslide in which McGovern only won Massachusetts.

The radicalism and overt contempt of the Democratic Party toward mainstream, middle-class Republicans will likely draw a strong conservative turnout and result in the Republicans maintaining the House by roughly 15 seats (the current margin is 23) and extending their majority in the Senate to five seats, helping them defy expectations once again, like they did in 2016.

Elena Sapelyuk / The Spectator

Colorism: More Than Skin Deep

By ANGELA WONG Walking through Flushing, a predominantly Asian neighborhood in Queens, I’ve encountered many stores advertising skin-lightening products. Such advertisements usually include a before and after picture of an Asian person having a whiter tone after using a lightening cream. Throughout my life, I’ve also been subject to comments concerning skin color among my relatives. Since then, I’ve always asked myself about the importance of skin color and why lighter skin is valued more than dark skin in our society.

These products are highly utilized in Asian countries: according to the World Health Organization, around 40 percent of women in China have admitted to using them. But these products aren’t exclusively used by

Asians—77 percent of Nigerian women have bleached their skin at least once in their life, according to the same source. Such statistics show a frightening trend: people of color view lighter skin as a status symbol.

This view is commonly referred to as colorism, the form of prejudice or discrimination in which people are treated differently based on the social meanings attached to their skin color. Colorism enforces the idea of lighter skin being associated with wealth and success, with the opposite being true for darker skin tones. And unlike racism, colorism is discrimination within a single race. Such associations stem from historical interactions.

For example, this hierarchy of skin color was present in slavery, where the slave masters would be light-skinned and the slaves would be darker-skinned. For East Asians, darker skin is associated with poverty: tanned skin would have come from working in fields, whereas lighter skin is synonymous with being rich and historically being able to stay indoors.

As a result of the widespread nature of colorism, darkerskinned people of color have lower incomes, lower marriage rates, longer prison terms, and fewer job prospects than their lighter-skinned counterparts.

Colorism is not limited to Asian culture, but is present in the lives of all people of color. In Latino culture, the phrase “mejorar la raza” is very common. In Eng-

lish, it means to “improve and advance the race,” and such improvement comes from marrying and having children with lightskinned people. Due to their lighter skin, these children are likely to be more successful and thus improve the Latino race.

And such beliefs have real-world impacts. For instance, according to Shankar Vedantam, author of “The Hidden Brain: How Our Unconscious Minds Elect Presidents, Control Markets, Wage Wars and Save Our Lives,” lightskinned Latinos make $5,000

ing to Stanford psychologist Jennifer Eberhardt.

Unfortunately, the media further encourages this interracial divide based on skin tone in Hollywood. There is a lack of diversity in black skin tones in Hollywood movies, for lighterskinned black actors are usually cast over their darker-skinned counterparts.

Furthermore, darker-skinned actors are often given roles as the villains of movies. These roles often enforce negative stereotypes about darker-skinned blacks, including

centric beauty ideal is that “it doesn’t just exist in Hollywood.

I think it exists in society...The closer we were to White, the more freedom we thought we could have or the more acceptability. Beauty was defined as White and the farther away you get from that White-blonde-hairblue-eye definition of beauty, the uglier you are...that’s what we’ve been doing amongst ourselves for a very long time.”

The message that all shades of skin tones are beautiful and equal should be shared and en-

The lack of representation of the array of skin tones that people of color come in encourages a strict interpretation of beauty—a toxic perception that centers around the glorification of European characteristics. more on average than their darkskinned Latino counterparts.

Furthermore, a Villanova University study found that light-skinned black women received shorter sentences than their darker-skinned counterparts. In addition to shorter sentences, lighter-skinned black defendants were half as likely to get the death penalty for crimes involving white victims than darker-skinned blacks, accord-

being poorer, less attractive, and of lower social status.

The lack of representation of the array of skin tones that people of color come in encourages a strict interpretation of beauty—a toxic perception that centers around the glorification of European characteristics. African-American actress Tatyana Ali has faced discrimination in the workplace for having dark skin. Her opinion on the euro-

couraged by the media in 2018.

By casting more diverse people in Hollywood and battling to change what it means to be beautiful, the stereotypes and distaste regarding darker tones can be broken. When I think about the countless advertisements for lighter skin products, I realize that these products are more than skin deep: they represent a larger historical context, which is our duty to change.

The Spectator ● May 4, 2018

Page 8

Opinions

Anna Yuan / The Spectator

Trump’s Costly “Money Saving” Ideas

By SEHRISH ALI Despite being one of the most powerful nations in the world, the United States, to this day, has been relatively ineffective in its efforts to provide aid to its citizens. The U.S. has one of the weakest safety nets among Western industrialized nations.

It provides the least amount of money in social insurance and assistance to its citizens in poverty as a percentage of gross domestic product compared to other countries.

What makes it worse is that President Donald Trump and House Republicans have proposed a bill that will reduce the number of people covered by programs such as Medicaid and food stamps and cut back their budget. Simply put, the government will be giving even less to people in poverty than it does now.

The country’s lack of social assistance is currently one of the main reasons for the preva-

lence of child poverty in the U.S. hood poverty.

According to studies done by One of the new bill’s proposOxford University’s Study Work als is to cut the budget for food Research, child poverty costs the stamps by $213.5 billion. This U.S. about $1.03 trillion a year in would be achieved by capping tax money. This is a result of all of benefits for large families, rethe problems that are linked to stricting availability to the unpoverty, including a higher employed, and risk of impoverished raising the age individuals being inlimit for recipivolved in criminal acents that are tivity or psychonot required logical to work. Achealth cording to probgovernment lems records, that 2 8 e n d u p costi n g a lot of tax money for insurances to cover.

This money is lost Vanes sa as a result of chilM an /T dren in poverty growing he Sp up without the basic educaec tat tion and skills that would help or them contribute to the country’s economy. If the U.S. spent p e r the same amount of money in cent of the fedsocial assistance for the poor eral budget was being every year but changed its pro- spent on feeding poor families grams to make them more effec- and children, yet 14 percent of tive—using the money to build the country is still living in povand fund new schools in im- erty. poverished areas, providing free These budget cuts for food school lunch for everyone in all stamps will, according to prestates, and providing more after- dictions made by economists, school programs for schools so further impoverish many civilthat parents can work longer— ians and increase the risk of chilless of the country would be dren not being provided for and in poverty. As a result, the U.S. subsequently falling under the would be spending a fraction poverty line. More hungry chilof the money it does now on dren now means that more of the cost of various interrelated the population will be under the problems that come with child- poverty line in the future, and

the country will end up spending more to help these people in the long term.

A $6.8 billion cut is also being proposed to the Department of Housing and Urban Development. This will severely reduce the budget for the reconstruction and repairs of old public housing buildings. At the moment, it is estimated that 80 percent of public housing tenants suffered heating and hot water outages in recent months because of failing and outdated boiler systems in desperate need of repair. With even less funding, these repairs will not happen and those living in the buildings will continue to be subjected to uncomfortable living conditions.

Though billions poured into public assistance that is given out every year is going to waste because of a lack of change, cutting the budget will not help fix the problem of poverty. It would be more effective to change the way that the money is being spent instead of cutting it completely.

If welfare programs are refined and implemented in ways that will not result in billions being spent yearly to no substantial effect, the poverty rate in America would get better instead of getting worse.

With these cuts as of now, the government is allowing more and more children to live

in poverty and grow up without the education, skills, or resources needed to provide for themselves or contribute to the economy, creating an even bigger population under the poverty line. Instead of cutting the budget, the government should put money toward making sure that those in poverty are given a real chance at education: fund schools in poor areas in order to give them the same opportunities as others and better prepare students to take an active role in the economy or provide free lunch and breakfast to all students in public schools in order to promote attendance in school and feed hungry children. These programs would cost around the same, but produce real results.

These are just a couple of the many reforms that could take place in the country’s social welfare system.

For every dollar spent on childhood poverty, the government would save another $7.00 with respect to the economic costs of poverty. These are statistics that should be taken seriously, and if social assistance programs are revised to make them more effective and directly attack the growing problem of poverty in the country, there will be no need to make budget cuts.

24 percent of Americans receive some type of government assistance each month. If this help is taken away, this 24 percent will suffer and more of the American population will fall under the poverty line, all in an attempt to save the government some money.

Joan Xiao / The Spectator

Hey, Humanities are Here Too!

By MIA GINDIS For a self-proclaimed STEM school, Stuyvesant has an excellent humanities department. Offering a variety of courses from basic Freshman Composition to English APs and electives such as Poetry and Existentialism, as well as boasting some of the school’s best teachers, there’s hardly a lack of resources. However, Stuy’s policies make it difficult for students who lean toward the humanities to choose an appealing course load. Instead, humanities-oriented students are forced to take classes such as drafting, computer science, and extra science electives.

This drought of diversity in subject matter often hinders humanities-oriented students academically. The intensity that excess STEM classes add to a course load often cause a noticeable dip in grades, and students feel a lack of willingness to learn.

And with a motivated student Students are enticed by what body being the crux of Stuyves- Stuyvesant has to offer: it seems ant’s repute, this isn’t conducive like the right place to go to put to a thriving school environ- themselves on the path for sucment. Encouraging students to cess, and for a lot of them, it is. take STEM classes and forcing Classes such as drafting and them onto students are two very computer science also teach different things, and the admin- important skills valued by many istration should stop doing the potential employers. But the latter. skill set they cater to is extremely To be fair, Stuyvesant is defi- specialized, and students nitely a school that concentrates who aren’t interested on the sciences above all else, in going into engiand every student who goes neering, for inhere was made aware of that stance, will find fact beforehand. From the mul- very littiple floors devoted to science classrooms and renovated laboratories, it’s obvious just by stepping into the building that the administration tends to prioritize STEM. But most humanities-oriented individuals couldn’t afford to count this imbaltle ance as a factor when choosing u s e to attend this Ra in taking ihan a Su school.

Most drafting. But ltan a/T humanities-ceneven if someone he S pect ator tered schools are both is only interested in limited in presence as well as pursuing a career in the size and resources, which re- medical field, knowledge of the duces the number of opportu- humanities is universally essennities offered to their students. tial to excelling in future fields.

Stuyvesant can provide students Studying subjects such as with outstanding faculties, and language arts or social studalong with its prestigious repu- ies helps improve writing and tation, this hardly makes it an critical thinking skills. These acceptance one can afford to disciplines encourage a more decline. creative thought process. At the

bare minimum, these classes help students write an important biology research paper, nail an engineering presentation, or even speak more eloquently during a deciding interview. And with schedules already chockfull of extracurriculars, core classes and APs (that are already arguably much more rigorous and math/science-focused than in a regular high school), it isn’t fair for the administration to mandate such an excessive number of STEM-based classes. This can be especially frustrating for students who are already struggling in their math and science classes.

Piling on so many classes on these students

has a backward effect. Their workload in such subject matters simply doubles, but understanding does not. While students are being immersed in the content, it can often become overwhelming, and—for students whose skills don’t lie in STEM—almost impossible to handle.

In order to remedy this, the administration should relax the policy surrounding electives, or at least switch one out for a humanities subject. At the very least, students should have somewhat of a choice between computer science and advanced English. Humanities classes are meant to culture future generations and make them wellrounded citizens who can not only contribute to society, but also do it intelligently. By mandating only STEM-based classes and limiting the number of humanities classes a student can take, the administration is entirely underestimating the value of these classes.

Most humanities-centered schools are both limited in presence as well as size and resources, which reduces the number of opportunities offered to their students.

The Spectator ● May 4, 2018

Page 9

Opinions

Catherine Yu / The Spectator

Why the Storm With Stormy Daniels?

By DARIUS JANKAUSKAS Adult film actress Stephanie Clifford, better known by her stage name Stormy Daniels, allegedly had an affair with President Donald Trump in 2006. She is now suing Mr. Trump in order to be released from a non-disclosure agreement that prevents her from discussing the affair, which she had signed in exchange for hush money. Media outlets have pounced on covering the scandal, and the public has lapped it up; a 60 Minutes interview with Ms. Clifford led to the show attracting the most viewers since its interview with former President Obama after his election.

However, this persistent media coverage is ultimately a distraction from an administration increasingly plagued by high turnover, incoherent policy, and an impending sense of doom stemming from special counsel Mueller’s investigation of Russian interference in the election.

These flaws, if any, will be the ones that bring Trump’s presidency down. After all, Trump has survived accusations of sexual misconduct by at least 15 women since the 1980s. Even his infamous quote from the 2005 Access Hollywood tapes, “you grab them [women] by the pussy,” stirred up little discord among his ardent supporters.

If a string of accusations and a blatantly predatory quote weren’t enough to harm Trump, Ms. Clifford’s allegations barely threaten him. Ms. Clifford herself has said that she “was not a victim.” The relationship, if it did occur, was fully consensual, with Ms. Clifford using it to try and secure a role on Mr. Trump’s show, “The Apprentice.” The actions of both Mr. Trump and Ms. Clifford in this relationship were morally questionable. However, they were almost certainly not illegal, leaving little reason for his impeachment or his voting out of office come 2020.

On the other hand, the actions of Mr. Trump’s lawyer, Mi-

chael Cohen, may not be as legal.

He was responsible for paying Ms. Clifford $130,000 in 2016 in exchange for her silence. The payment raises questions of mismanagement of campaign funds.

Cohen claims he used his own money to pay off Ms. Clifford.

However, if he did so, this may amount to an illegal campaign contribution, as the payment was designed to help Trump’s election campaign and could thus be considered an “in-kind” contribution, one that exceeded federal contribution limits. According to Trevor Potter, a former commissioner of the Federal Elections Commission, that could create “an enormous legal mess” for Cohen, Trump, and others involved in the election campaign. Fortunately for Trump, this potential legal quagmire holds little potential for threatening his place in office.

That’s not to say that the Stormy Daniels saga doesn’t further tarnish Trump’s reputation.

Ms. Clifford’s account of spanking the sitting president with a magazine serves to reduce his credibility by painting the oft-loathed politician as submissive and unthreatening. And amidst constant media coverage, the usually outspoken Trump has barely addressed his accuser, whether on Twitter or in rallies, only saying that no relationship occurred.

With Ms. Clifford’s hush money and her non-disclosure agreement exposed for the public to see, this weak denial holds little water for those who are inclined to dislike the president.

But Trump’s supporters are more than willing to dismiss and ignore Trump’s infidelities.

During Donald Trump’s election campaign, many social conservatives eventually resigned themselves to supporting Trump, even enthusiastically, despite his two previous divorces. And as the National Review’s Jonah Goldberg charged, social conservatives like Mike Huckabee have simply deflected the scandal, and Trump’s broader voter base shows no sign of deviating off course. Amidst the scandal, Trump’s approval rating has climbed to the highest it’s been for months at 43 percent. If the Stormy Daniels scandal holds little legal trouble for Donald Trump and is unlikely to sway his base into voting differently, it’s less of a scandal so much as a distraction.

At the root of the problem is the media’s preference to cover the character rather than the policy of presidents. Exposing presidential moral failings and affairs tends to attract more readership and viewership than dry discussions of their more substantive actions. However, more sensational coverage tends to only

have a partisan impact. During the Republicans’ impeachment proceedings against former Democratic president Bill Clinton, Democrats felt that the Monica Lewinsky scandal was only an attempt to disrupt his presidency. Trump supporters now have a similar view of the many scandals that have enveloped Trump.

Instead, the media should refocus its attention on exposing the corruption lying beneath the surface of the Trump campaign.

Special counsel Robert Mueller continues to drive the investigation into the Trump campaign’s alleged collusion with Russia, and ethically compromised officials such as the E.P.A.’s Scott Pruitt have come under fire. The only U.S. president ever to have resigned, Richard Nixon, was compelled to do so after an investigation into his interference with the Democratic campaign for re-election. While that outcome may seem inevitable now, it was the result of over two years of investigation and coverage by government investigators and the media. If the media takes its role as government watchdog seriously, it should remember that policies, not porn stars, take down presidents.

Jade Lo / The Spectator

The Spectator â—? November 18, 2016

Page 10

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The Spectator ● November 18, 2016

Arts and Entertainment Theatre Review

By Shruthi Venkata When Lydia Lensky (Anna Chlumsky) resolves to paint her hometown red, she isn’t celebrating. Her town, home of childhood memories and friends, is faltering. It’s a Rust Belt town that used to ship axles down a river that “doesn’t even exist anymore,” and the red color, emulating Morocco’s blue city Chefchaouen that boasts 258 hotels and 9,000 European tourists per year, is supposed to spur an economic comeback. She lobbies her idea to Mayor Jeff Torm (Adam Pally), with whom she has a convoluted romantic relationship, and finally garners enough support to go forward with it.

What does the red mean? It might be the color of bloodshed, luck (in China), communism, or maybe it was chosen because the other primary colors were taken

by Chefchaouen and Izamal, Mexico.

“Cardinal,” recently shown at the Tony Kiser Theater, has a way of capturing layers of meanings and themes within seemingly simple dialogue. It discusses problems shared by many American Rust Belt towns and communities beyond them, like Asian stigma, sexism, gun violence, and romance.

A theme explored in one of the boldest ways was race and Asian American identity. I am torn over whether it was portrayed in a necessary or a negative light, but with Asian Americans being underrepresented in American theater, it was a provocative story representing a complex topic. It revolves around Li-Wei and Jason Chen, father and son, who open a string of new businesses.

Throughout the play, there is the lingering notion that the townspeople who have been settled for many years have a predisposition against the newcomers—not be-

Film Review

“Cardinal” At the Tony Kiser Theater cause of the sudden influx, but because they bring a new culture.

There is widespread fear that the beloved town will become a new Chinatown. A Tribune article within the play discusses Chinese entrepreneurs always being one step ahead. With the closing of a bakery, Bread & Buttons, and several families (long-time inhabitants of the town) moving away, it makes you question whether the economic benefit of painting the town red did any good at all. “Isn’t a place about the people in it?”

At times, I wonder whether the playwright, Greg Pierce, meant for us to side with Lydia’s relatively welcoming attitude towards Asian Americans or with the others’ reluctance to see them. While there is an emotional appeal to the latter, the play somewhat rationalizes xenophobia. Moreover, while Li-Wei and Jason Chen are meant to be realistic, yet perhaps caricatured Chinese Americans, their portrayal is question-

be an optimistic one that reinforces our sense of community. I think plays like “Cardinal” do far more good than harm, and with other Asian American plays like “M. Butterfly” and “Office Hour” being viewed in NYC, “Cardinal” adds color to t h e

Anika Hashem / The Spectator

able— espec i a l l y father Chen, a shameless, headstrong character with a thick accent bent on building his business empire by advertising Chinese goods and a false history in a predominantly non-Asian town.

Nonetheless, “Cardinal” is a relevant play, and turns out to

scene. It also has the benefit of being able to be viewed and appreciated through so many lenses. It exhibits tremendous artistic and acting talent, including three actors I had the opportunity to speak to: “Happy Endings” and “The Mindy Project” actor Adam Pally, five-time Emmy nominee and “Veep” actress Anna Chlumsky, and Stuyvesant’s own Eugene Young (’02).

Adam Pally, who had no prior theater roles, emphasized how much he enjoyed working with this cast. Chlumsky and Young,

nounced and everyone swarmed into the first-floor lobby, a friend threw him up onto his shoulders and then there was total silence.

Then he screamed “SENIOR SING!” and the crowd erupted.

He recounted, “It was the top… top one moment of my life.” In a way, theater for Young has been about chasing that high.

While Young has appeared on shows like “Veep,” “Revenge,” and “Jane the Virgin” and has dedicated his past two years in LA to television, theater has always been something special; nothing compares to a live audience watching you. In New York, old friends from Stuyvesant have periodic mini-reunions. Young’s experience attests to Stuyvesant’s valuable theater community and general community as a whole.

He feels lucky to have been cast in “Cardinal”—he’s done lots of off-off-Broadway theater, but Tony Kiser is the largest stage he’s ever performed on. The dynamic between actor and audience is what makes it as enjoyable an experience. He pointed out that he likes when a younger audience connects with the “millennial things,” from mannerisms like swiping his phone to the play’s bold female protagonist. “There aren’t full answers in the play, but presenting all these issues and letting you decide, that’s something younger audiences are excited to do,” Young said.

His words of advice to Stuyvesant students: do it for the process, not for the result. It’s great to want to be the best, but it’s good to be invested in theater because you appreciate the process of reaching there, including the long hours, endless auditions, and a smaller paycheck. Whatever you do, do it fully. Lastly, watch theater! New York is the place to be to learn from icons.

Black Panther: The Superhero Movie We’ve Been Waiting For

By Venus Nnadi

© Marvel and Disney

too, remarked on this.

Chlumsky’s character Lydia is a personal favorite—as Li-Wei remarks, she’s a strong woman, and she has a well-meaning, enterprising spirit despite many tragic decisions. An incredibly successful television actress, Chlumsky describes theater as more of an endurance sport—you know each time you put on a show where the characters will end up, whereas you may not in television. Having acknowledged that the play was loaded with messages before I saw it, she said that she wanted the audience to be moved, and to question their sense of change, identity, and community.

I think the play did just that.

Eugene Young’s character, Jason, is as much of a favorite.

Jason is a Stanford graduate, a little bit of a stoner, kind, not exactly timid, but overshadowed by his father. He finds himself torn between his own dream of being a high school English teacher and the grip of his father, who wills him to inherit the business empire he is building in the town. His internal conflict—who he wants to be versus who he wants to want to be—is reminiscent of much in our own lives.

He played a more eccentric character in 02’s senior SING!, a whodunnit where someone stole the pins (or something similar) from the bowling alley Chunky Lanes: Fabrizio, a man who hung around the alley. He had skintight clothes, spiky hair, and an unplaceable accent, and sang “Do You Really Want to Hurt Me.” Through his several formative experiences growing up doing theater, starring in senior SING! was a “turning point.” In the former tradition where winners were an-

In a thrilling fight scene in a South Korean casino in “Black Panther,” Okoye (Danai Gurira) and Nakia (Lupita Nyong’o) fiercely fought off a malicious group of men, displaying an impressive mastery over the use of traditional African spears while also using their bare hands.

Okoye, tired of the Western wig she was wearing to disguise herself, snatched her own wig, revealing the bald head characteristic of the female warriors of the Dora Milaje. With Okoye clad in a stunning red dress, accentuated with pieces of gold from Wakanda, and Nakia natural-haired and donning a glimmering 3D-printed dress patterned with African symbolism, the two women flipped both men and society’s idea of femininity upside down. This scene epitomizes the subject matter of the entire movie; focused especially on black and female empowerment, this movie is an ode to black history and contemporary culture.

“Black Panther” moves between inner-city Oakland and the fictional country of Wakanda, a technologically advanced African nation that poses as a third-world nation in order to

avoid being exploited by the Western world. The Wakandans possess vibranium.

“Black Panther” has the characteristics of a classic Marvel film—the intense battles, the metal uniforms, and the top-notch special effects, visuals, soundtrack, and costume design. Director Ryan Coogler makes many well-thought-out artistic choices. At the South Korean casino, Okoye’s red dress, T’Challa’s black suit, and Nakia’s green dress intentionally make up the colors of the Pan-African flag. The film’s soundtrack was a skillful collaboration of hip hop pieces from American rapper Kendrick Lamar, as well as traditional African tribal music featuring local Senegalese and South African musicians and choruses singing in the native Fula and Xhosa languages, all led by Swedish composer Ludwig Göransson.

A female cinematographer, which is uncommon, was behind the impressive cinematography of the film. From the thrilling car chase in Busan, featuring Okoye’s flowing red dress as she rode on top of the car, to the suspenseful challenge scenes between T’Challa and M’Baku and then Killmon-

ger on the edge of the waterfall, Rachel Morrison’s use of different camera angles, such as the Dutch angle, as well as wide shots and saturated colors, brought the action of the movie to life.

A female cinematographer, which is uncommon, was behind the impressive cinematography of the film. From the thrilling car chase in Busan, featuring Okoye’s flowing red dress as she rode on top of the car, to the suspenseful challenge scenes between T’Challa and M’Baku and then Killmonger on the edge of the waterfall, Rachel Morrison’s use of different camera angles, such as the Dutch angle, as well as wide shots and saturated colors, brought the action of the movie to life.

“Black Panther” stands out, however, in its thoughtprovoking exploration of many pressing real-world problems and flips social constructs upside down.

continued on page 12

The Spectator ● May 4, 2018

Page 12

Arts and Entertainment Review

continued from page 11

“Black Panther” is the first film in the Marvel series with a black superhero as the lead, and Black Panther, created in 1966, was also the first black superhero

Black Panther: The Superhero Movie We’ve Been Waiting For smaller, predominantly black subcultures. But Black Panther has the marketing and viewership that comes with being a part of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Additionally, while many acclaimed black films are centered around black suffering and poverty, “Black Panther” depicts black people as rulers,

black female at the forefront of the country’s STEM scene, an image that is very much needed for all the young girls around the world who are interested in STEM but are severely lacking in role models. W’Kabi, charging at Okoye, halts, demonstrating a black woman having power and respect in a relationship. When

movies are capable of mainstream success. The excitement and energy with which the black community approached the premier of Black Panther was unprecedented. My Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter feeds were flooded with photos of what everyone wore to the movie theaters: dashikis galore, the

been waiting for: a rich, thriving country, spared from colonization. Furthermore, to those whose ancestors were torn from the motherland centuries ago and to those who have no specific country to tie their African roots to, Wakanda is a place they can call home, a reclamation of what was taken away from them so long ago.

Critics of the film have claimed that Wakanda is nothing more than an overly fantastical depiction of a country in what is, in actuality, a third-world continent. But Wakanda is much more than the country we dream of—it offers a vision of a promising future, and there is no doubt that anyone who leaves the theater after watching “Black Panther,” especially younger generations, will come out inspired to become leaders and agents for change in American society and worldwide.

The film includes many scenes in inner-city Oakland, California, a city with a large black population. It is directed

by Ryan Coogler, who some may recognize as the director of “Fruitvale Station” (2013), a film centered on the 2009 police shooting of Oscar Grant, an unarmed black male, which also took place in Oakland. Decades earlier, again in Oakland, the Black Panther political party from which the film takes its name was created.

While it is true that there have been many movies with black leads and predominantly black casts in the past, “Black Panther” is different. Many of these aforementioned movies were pushed out of the mainstream and formed their own

warriors, and inventors. Rather than the actors’ blackness being ignored, coincidental, or the cause of their woes, their blackness is put at the forefront and is the source of their strength.

Though there are white actors in “Black Panther,” they are fewer in number and play relatively minor roles—the roles that are usually given to black actors.

Not only does “Black Pan-

in danger, T’Challa shamelessly calls on the help of his sister Shuri, as well as Nakia, Okoye, and Ramonda—all the strong women in his life—and these ladies are the ones who ultimately save the day, a reversal of the typical outcome of most storylines.

Remarkably, some of the most action-packed scenes in the film are dominated by wom-

beautiful sight of black men clothed in traditional African garb with crowns adorned upon their heads, women dressed as African warriors, complete with tribal face paint—I have never seen African culture more embraced by our community. Black Panther positively changed the way black Americans view Africa, teaching us to be proud of our roots.

Minseo Kim / The Spectator

mother, a Nigerian immigrant, said to me, “At least now, people will think twice about Africa.”

The portrayal of Africa in the media—a third-world continent with poverty, starvation, and corruption—is not one to be proud of. But Wakanda is a much-needed escape from reality and the depiction we have

in mainstream American comics. The name of the film is not purely coincidental, as Killmonger, a young black revolutionary, closely embodies the spirit of the radical Black Panther party. Killmonger, though the villain in the movie, has motives that many blacks in America can sympathize with; he simply wants Wakanda to use its resources to help liberate members of the African diaspora who are suffering from racism, poverty, police brutality, and mass incarceration, and despite his violent tendencies, I feel his anguish. When T’Challa offers to save Killmonger’s life using Wakandan technology, Killmonger delivers the most heart-wrenching line of the entire film: “Bury me in the ocean with my ancestors who jumped from ships, ‘cause they knew death was better than bondage.”

The film addresses not only issues of race, but also the debate over whether it is the responsibility of a wealthy, advanced nation to provide foreign aid to less developed nations.

Nakia, like Killmonger, also feels that “Wakanda is strong enough to help others and protect itself.”

However, the rulers of Wakanda have always employed a Wakanda First policy, never finding it necessary to relinquish the anonymity they have held in order to use their resources to aid other countries, espousing a stance similar to the Trump administration’s America First policy.

Black Panther doesn’t propose an easy solution to all of these difficult questions; rather, it highlights the complexities of these issues, and I often found myself torn between both sides.

At the end of the movie, my

At the end of the movie, my mother, a Nigerian immigrant, said to me, “At least now, people will think twice about Africa.” The portrayal of Africa in the media—a third-world continent with poverty, starvation, and corruption—is not one to be proud of.

ther” uplift the black community at large, but it also empowers women, who are so often given the lesser, subservient roles in major films. Shuri (Letitia Wright), charming the audience with her intelligence, wit, and hilarious sarcasm, is the master of her lab, in which she harnesses the power of vibranium to create a wide array of impressive technological gadgets, from her brother’s Black Panther suit, to Kimoyo beads capable of storing information, making calls, and producing holograms.

“Black Panther” depicts a young

en, from the ending fight scene featuring all of Wakanda’s female warriors, to Shuri remotely controlling her brother’s car chase in South Korea. Wakanda is protected by an all-female military force, the Dora Milaje, which is headed by chief general Okoye. The Dora Milaje, as well as Okoye’s position as the strongest warrior in Wakanda, is the ultimate symbol of female strength.

Black Panther is a testament to the importance of representation, and as it continues to break records, it proves that black

As the final credits rolled, I walked out of the theater nearly in tears—both times I watched the movie. As a black female with strong African roots, Black Panther uplifted every single aspect of my identity—something I never see in Hollywood blockbusters. Growing up, I never had superheroes who looked like me to look up to. But it means the world to me that now, little black girls and little black boys will know that they are powerful, that they are royalty, that their culture is rich and beautiful, and that they matter.

The Spectator â—? May 4, 2018

Page 13

Art The Fashion Week of Our Dreams By the art department

Alyson Lin / The Spectator

Joyce Liao / The Spectator

Taylor Choi / The Spectator

Katherine Lwin / The Spectator Rachel Zhang / The Spectator

Page 14

The Spectator â—? May 4, 2018

Art The Fashion Week of Our Dreams By the art department

Vivian Lu / The Spectator

Janice Tjan / The Spectator

Mandy Mai / The Spectator

Lynne Wang / The Spectator

Maryann Foley / The Spectator Camilla Cheng / The Spectator

The Spectator ● May 4, 2018

Page 15

Humor Angry Junior Blows Off College Spam, Gets Acceptance Letter

By Helena Williams

words and eloquence. We were blown away by how creative you were in your response to

If I had a penny for every college admissions spam letter I’ve received, I’d have enough money to afford your overpriced college by now.

our e-mail requesting that you “observe our grassy campus, blue light systems, and new building that won’t be available until after you graduate.” As a result, we are willing to allow you to Darren Liang / The Spectator

Junior Tahmid Jamal appears to have discovered a new tactic for getting into more colleges: sending snarky replies to their spam e-mails.

“I was up really late, having not slept for seven days because I was studying for my next science mini quiz. When I refreshed my e-mail, it was full of college spam,” Jamal says.

Like any typical junior would, he began marking them all as read, when he came across five Harvard e-mails in a row.

“I could tell they were mocking me! So I did the logical thing by closing my e-mail account, crying for half an hour, clicking on the first e-mail that popped up, and writing back.”

Inspection of Jamal’s e-mail account reveals the following email was sent from his address at 4:20 a.m.

Tahmid Jamal <tjamal@stuy. edu> to Harvard University Office of Admissions

This was what he received in return: Harvard University Office of Admissions <admissions@harvard.edu> to Tahmid Jamal Congratulations on your acceptance to Harvard University!

We here at Harvard are happy to extend a full scholarship to you for your incredible use of

skip the mandatory walkingbackward jokes from the tour guides and enroll!

We hope that you will accept.

Sincerely, Presti G. Flimflam Colleges Admissions Officer, Harvard

Many students remain stunned by Jamal’s easy acceptance to the university, but no others have succeeded using his trick yet. However, in the past several days, college spam e-mails have dropped in frequency from one in every two e-mails in a junior’s inbox to one in every one hundred, for unknown reasons.

Spring Fever Strikes Stuyvesant

By Renee Kim and Mohamed Eleish

and work. They’re just piling stuff on my desk and cutting me off after every sentence to participate, all while half of the class is absent. It’s crazy!”

Indeed, many students are claiming they can’t come to class due to their deteriorating health. “I’ve never felt this feeling before. I feel so alive and functional and restless. It’s like I’m a whole different person. All I want to do is work!” said senior Joel Johnson, portraying some of the common symptoms.

“I’m completely baffled,” P.E. teacher Mr. Barbin said.

“There have been no cuts or latenesses this whole week.

Students are actually beginning to attend my class. They come extremely early before I even unlock the lockers. It’s as if they all realized the importance of Physical Education in their future lives. The best part is that they’re beginning to channel all this energy into their PSAL games. All our teams have won

Aries Ho / The Spectator

It’s spring at Stuyvesant, and Billy Chen is considered by many as scrawny, depressed most of the time, bashful, and pretty average. But with the recent change in weather, he has begun to participate in his classes, even staying after class to converse with his teachers.

Although Billy was doing great in and outside of school, Billy began to decline. He would spend the whole day outside playing basketball. After following this routine for a few days, Billy got extremely bored again.

This problem wasn’t Billy’s alone. The Stuyvesant nurse’s office has been overcrowded with students suffering from similar symptoms recently, feeling restless and lazy. Nurse Danielle has diagnosed these students with the notorious Spring Fever. “It’s a real threat to teenage wellbeing,” she

said. “Although you won’t have an actual fever, there are good chances that you’d be bedridden, itching like crazy, or experiencing a real energy surge. Basically, you won’t be functioning normally, although I’m not saying many Stuy student do that on a daily basis anyway.” Nurse Danielle has also reported that she has been sending students away with placebo pills due to a skyrocketing demand for beds in the nurse’s office.

As an increasing number of students have been plagued with this disease, the classrooms have been going through a dramatic change. Teachers have reported that the majority of their classrooms remain empty and that those that show up have been displaying concerning amounts of manic behaviors. “I’ve never seen anything like this in my 20 years of teaching,” history teacher Dr. Berman said. “Students are putting in too much extra effort

games this week.

It’s insane!”

Although suffering from the same disease name of Spring Fever, everyone experiences different symptoms, which can be explained through science.

The reason: change in daylight.

According to AP Biology teacher Marianna Reep, the mitochondria is the powerhouse of the cell. This hormone affects everyone in a different way, accounting for the different symptoms in each person.

Jaded Juuling Genie gally engaging in SMOKING—” “Oh, quit being the Morality Police,” the angsty sophomore pointed at the genie’s ensemble.

“Don’t you know that marijuana is illegal in NYC, hypocrite?

Don’t you know that half of the students protesting really just went to Ferry’s to cut school? Don’t you know that kids are falling asleep in class and finessing their homework?” The angsty sophomore paused for a moment before she laughed dryly. “Frankly you seem a little too enthusiastic in your cause to be considered ‘jaded.’”

Then perhaps you should take my place.” The genie snatched the juul from the angsty sophomore’s hands and took a whiff before emitting a fiery breath that swept through the seventh floor. Oddly enough, rather than incinerating the place, it just replaced Environ/ Th

e Sp

ecta

tor

noble cause or sharpening their minds in a classroom, and you

Lin

The angsty sophomore extracted the eccentrically-shaped juul from her pocket. Turning it in her palm, she noted that it looked like an archaic oil lamp.

Since the walk-out was taking place that day and over half of the school’s population was gone, she was indiscreet in taking a long drag from its opening— “Huh?” There was no vapor to be seen, none to be felt. She shook the device in her hand, tapped it gently, held it to her lips once more. Nothing. Had she confused it for a USB once again? Brushing her pointer and middle fingers against the juul in a tsk-tsk gesture, she scolded herself. “I knew something was up with the smoke shop owner when he told me that buying this was a ‘legendary deal!’”

Suddenly, the juul levitated and began to flood the area with poofs of cotton candy smoke while the sophomore started to cough. Oh, she was DEFINITELY going to get a REFUND the next time she saw the smoke shop owner— “WHO DARES TO AWAKEN THE JADED GENIE?!” A goddess-like figure emerged from the colorful condensation. Her

eyes shone with more rage than those of Brian Moran. She was dressed entirely in tie-dye and gave off the aura of the backend of the bridge.

The angsty sophomore winced. Indeed, middle school health had warned her of the physiological consequences, breakdown of social relations, and legal repercussions regarding drug activity. But she was not given any warnings regarding the provocation of the spiritual realm. The only thing that shielded her from panic was that the genie wore clothing featuring leaves that were most certainly not from the maple tree.

“A jaded genie…?”

The genie turned to her and seethed. “Most of your classmates are either protesting for a

Alex

By Laura Ilioaei

c h o o s e to spend your lunch period ille-

mental Club’s plant life with pots of cannabis. The angsty sophomore had crouched behind the pot of pot, avoiding the flame as the genie approached.

“Your soul will become trapped in here,” said the genie menacingly, before being taken aback by how the angsty sophomore immediately howled with laughter.

“Are you dumb?” The angsty sophomore slapped her knees and cackled harder. “Stuyvesant students don’t have souls!” She struggled to regain her composure. “That being said,” she snatched back the juul. “I think it’s best that you—” “You don’t need to say anything else,” the genie began to creep back into the juul. “Don’t you know that even the devil has a soul? I’m terrified.” And with that, the genie used the last of her momentum to propel herself out of the window before reentering the juul, safely landing in the Hudson River.

The angsty sophomore looked toward the river with regret, silently lamenting all the money that was now wasted.

With a huff (but not a puff), she swiped out for the remainder of her lunch period, hoping she could dig up a replacement in Battery Park.

The Spectator ● May 4, 2018

Page 16

Humor These articles are works of fiction. All quotes are libel and slander.

By Omar Ali AP season: the second most stressful time of the year, the first being looking your mother in the eye as you try to explain your mysterious 57 absences in P.E. Every year, Stuyvesant students begin showing up to class with their Barron’s review books and bloodshot eyes, barely able to hold their sixth venti cup of coffee (Antarctic Vanilla Mocha with a shot of pumpernickel) from Starbucks with their jittery hands.

The hallways are filled with nothing but the deranged whispers of memorized essay grading rubrics and test-taking tips.

The situation has become so disastrous that the very safety of

The Ultimate AP Test-Taker

our beloved school has become compromised: security guards can no longer keep up with the hordes of students desperately trying to cram on benches and endless gallons of contraband caffeine that have been smuggled into the building.

And yet, amongst this atmosphere of pure despair, one visionary stands out. A student by the name of DeDarn Collageberd has decided to enroll in an AP course, only after signing up for the exam. Most people have laughed at DeDarn for his foolish decision, but little did they know the ingenuity that he was brewing. He wasn’t planning on studying a month before, a week before, a day before, or even the morning

of the test—he had the ultimate trick up his sleeve. His master plan was simple, yet mind-blowing: to study DURING the test. No one would see it coming.

While many students chugged cups of black coffee and violently flipped through their AP review books, DeDarn was as cool as a cucumber. As he confidently walked into his testing room, the proctor suspiciously eyed the briefcase DeDarn was carrying.

When asked what it was, DeDarn quietly slipped him a $20 and put a finger over his mouth. What ensued afterward was simply unbelievable.

As he sat down and opened his briefcase (that was so packed with papers that we still don’t

understand how he managed to close it), hundreds of study guides and torn-out packets began flying everywhere. The students in the room had gone into full testmode, intensely filling out their test packets, and hadn’t even noticed the spectacle.

DeDarn calmly began reading through his packed papers, even highlighting key points he may need for the test. For the first five hours and 18 minutes of his AP Chemistry exam, DeDarn was completely focused on trying to figure out what an atom was.

Then, with five minutes remaining, he completed 784 multiple choice questions, 15 essays and 31 short answers at a speed that left his proctor blind in the right

eye and DeDarn’s right hand almost completely eroded. As he exited the test room, DeDarn knew without a doubt that he had been educated in college level chemistry.

Weeks have passed, AP exams have concluded, and the spirit of death and gloom has vanished from Stuyvesant High School (for about a day until everyone realized it was finals week). As June goes by and July is almost in sight, a sense of peace and unity has returned to the school community; it looks as if World War III won’t happen after all. And yet, far away in Flushing, Staten Island, DeDarn Collageberd logs in to unveil the score of his AP Exam. It is “Undefined.”

How to Write a Spec App

By Victor Kuang Hi, it’s me again! If you don’t remember, (cue shameless selfpromotion) I was the guy who gave y’all the dirt on the inner workings of the Spectator (or as Features might put it, an “exposé”)! But if you still want to join The Spectator, your boi has your back with some critical tips!

Step 2: Don’t waste your time at The Spectator’s interest meeting The Spectator interest meeting is heavily advertised by the editorial board because they are desperately in need of attention and want to prove that they are in charge. So, you might think that you should go in order to network or charm their pants off. However, considering the amount of people who do this and fail to submit applications, the chances that they will remember

Step 3: Take a break!

After finding the Spec app form, just take a break. You deserve it: those countless minutes of trying to find the form were some of your most exhausting efforts. Plus, the form is only due in a few weeks.

Step 4: You suddenly realize that you have an hour before the deadline As weeks pass, you suddenly remember that the Spec app form closes in an hour. You now have a handful of options: Step 5a: Cry Deep panic sets in. You realize you have to give out deeply personal information such as your homeroom and OSIS number (why do they need this information?!).

The multiple essays and example articles show no sign of writing themselves. Desperately trying to find a solution, you break down, cry, and fail to start the form. Your parents find you on the floor wailing and shake their head in disappointment.

Step 5b: Finesse everything Committing

to

completing

the form, you can: a) load yourself with caffeine and attempt to write as much stuff as possible or b) use my comprehensive answer sheet to common questions asked on all forms.

Why do you want to be in this department?

Cause y’all are looking for applicants and I want the job.

What is your favorite article and what do you like about it?

They all suck, but I guarantee that if I were in your department rn, I’d make the entire thing so much better.

What experience do you have that makes you qualified?

I don’t: my lack of experience is one of my strongest features. I guarantee that I will be able to accomplish all of your tasks extremely creatively. (For example, note my ingenuity in using “extremely creatively” as a synonym for “incorrectly.”)

The sample article/artwork/ photo is on you fam. #AcademicHonesty

Suzy B. Ae / The Spectator

Step 1: Think about which department to join

Everybody might tell you to join the department that you’re “most passionate about” or “is most compatible with your interest in writing,” but what’s actually most important is being tight with the editors. That’s right, not only do Jane Rhee and Sophie Watwood completely destr—I mean edit your articles, but there are also people such as Kerwin Chen and Gabrielle Umanova (who are amazing Humor editors. Amazing. [Make me Editor]), who will take their time to add “suggestions” in the writing process as well!

you in the face of their plummeting self-esteem are slim.

The better option is to conserve your energy and just find information and Spec app forms on Facebook. (Remember to leave an incredibly flattering comment and love reacc!)

Step 5c: Just don’t do it You shrug your shoulders and continue your normal routine. This is easily the smartest choice because you’ll be avoiding future suffering in the form of overbearing and poorly colored e-mails.

Step 6a: Get rejected With your completely incoherent application, the people who read it send you a rejection e-mail,

Culture Festival Rejects

By Tony Moh

filled with lies such as “We can only accept a limited number of members” or “We received applications from so many talented people.” You then perform step 5a upon hearing this news.

Step 6b: Get accepted

You somehow get accepted, and you sacrifice your social life in gratitude to the deity who allowed this to happen, Peter Stuyvesant. Feeling incredibly accomplished, you proceed to contribute the absolute minimum to your department.

Undead Art

Iron Maiden Magic Trick (German): Based off of the classic “saw a person in half” magic trick, German III students decided to put a cultural twist on the trick by switching out the basic metal box for the postmedieval torture device known as the iron maiden, an eight-foot tall spiked metal coffin of death. As they didn’t have an actual replica of the historical device, students resorted to making their own out of their classroom’s closet, lining the interior with untwisted paper clips and rusty screws.

When the students were performing a demo of their routine, the student being sawed in half accidentally sneezed and trapped himself inside before the performers could open the secret hatch and was promptly killed by the device.

Suzy B. Ae / The Spectator

After another successful Stuyvesant Culture Festival, we here at The Spectator are looking back at some of the *less* successful auditions that didn’t quite make the cut this year.

Here are a few of our honorable mentions:

Indoor Fireworks (Chinese): Though originally meant to be the finale of the show, the performance was scrapped during the final rehearsal when a random performer accidentally tripped over the fireworks’ fuse line as the act was being set up. While the original idea was to have the fireworks shoot outward and explode above the audience, the unnamed performer accidentally redi-

rected all of them toward the ceiling, where they shot straight up through the building. As the fireworks disappeared, so did most of the stage itself, buried under a pile of rubble of what was once the ceiling and part of the second floor bathroom.

Singing (Multicultural) It just didn’t work out.

Tony Chen / The Spectator

What a beautiful towel!

The Spectator ● May 4, 2018

Page 17

Sports Sports Editorial

The Final Four are Set

By Ahmed Hussein and Sunan Tajwar A few weeks have passed, and the Champions League has returned, but this time with much more on the line. In the quarter-finals, eight teams faced off with the four winners booking tickets to the semifinals. The teams returned with a hunger and drive that was evident in their play and which made the matchups much more intriguing than those of previous rounds.

Liverpool (England) vs Manchester City (England) Most believed that Liverpool was dealt a tough hand when they drew Manchester City, and rightly so. The English Premier League title holders had cruised through their domestic competition due to the intricate passing they have adopted since manager Pep Guardiola’s arrival. Their mesmerizing passing as well as the incessant runs made by their pacey attackers have given them the tools to dismantle most teams’ defenses. That would not be the case against Liverpool.

Before the game, Liverpool had been the only team to beat City in the Premier League all season, edging them 4-3 in a scrappy game. However, many considered the victory a fluke and attributed it to complacency on the part of Manchester City since they are so far ahead in the league standings. Naysayers expected Liverpool’s poor defense to crumble so much that even their deadly trio up top would not be able to keep up, but their defense was a problem of the past.

Since their acquisition of Virgil van Dijk in January, Liverpool has solidified their backline. That, partnered with their young full-backs, Andrew Robertson and Trent AlexanderArnold, being in great form as of late, was just too good for the Cityzens to break down. Liverpool won 3-0 at home without conceding an away goal, which would have turned the return leg in City’s favor. After an ear-

ly goal from the PFA Player of the Year, Mohamed Salah, Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain smashed one in from outside the box, and Sadio Mane sealed the deal with a third goal. The second leg was more of the same, as Liverpool cruised to a 2-1 victory and advanced 5-1 on aggregate.

The story of this win, however, wasn’t Liverpool’s attack.

They have been great at scoring goals all season, with Mohamed Salah scoring 40. The real shock was how well they defended. Conceding only one goal against City over two games is respectable for any team, especially Liverpool, given their

would be enough to edge them through. Soccer doesn’t usually work that way. Madrid scored in the third minute via Cristiano Ronaldo. Shortly after, he scored his second goal with an unbelievable bicycle kick that almost broke the Internet.

To make matters worse, Paulo Dybala, Juventus’s best player, got a red card, causing him to miss the second leg. Madrid cruised to a 3-0 victory in Turin. With that, Madrid proved their superiority and went into the second leg with a newfound confidence. However, in the week leading up to the second leg, Juventus players assured their fans that they still had a

their seats, with Madrid pushing for the goal that would qualify them to the semi-finals while Juventus defended for their lives. At first, Juventus was successful, but late in the game, they took a turn for the worst.

Center back Medhi Benatia took out Madrid’s winger Lucas Vazquez in the box, giving away a penalty in extra time. Angered by the (correct) decision, Juventus’s veteran goalkeeper Gianluigi Buffon screamed at the referee, earning himself a red card in possibly the last Champions League game of his decorated career. Wojciech Szczęsny replaced Buffon in goal to attempt to save Ronaldo’s spot

The teams returned with a hunger and drive that was evident in their play and which made the matchups much more intriguing than those of previous rounds.

recent defensive woes. It seems that Liverpool has overcome these defensive struggles and now has the potential to go all the way to the final and possibly pull off an incredible win.

Real Madrid (Spain) vs.

Juventus (Italy) Similar to the City-Liverpool matchup, this draw was highly anticipated. A rematch of last year’s Champions League final (which Madrid won 4-1), this game would be very different. Much has changed since then, with players leaving and joining both clubs. Having just regained the top spot in Serie A while Madrid was still struggling in La Liga, Juventus was confident going into this one.

After all, it makes sense that that small boost of confidence

chance. Many blew these words off as failed attempts to save face. But again, the Champions League brought drama. With Madrid’s captain and strongest defender Sergio Ramos suspended for accumulating too many yellow cards, manager Zinedine Zidane was forced to field youngster Jesus Vallejo.

While a strong defender and great future prospect, Vallejo’s inexperience showed. Juventus scored three goals, with Mario Mandzukic scoring two in the first half before Blaise Matuidi pounced on a loose ball from Madrid goalkeeper Keylor Navas to even the aggregate score (sum of scores from both games).

This marked the beginning of a nail-biting final 30 minutes that had fans on the edges of

kick. Ronaldo would not be denied. After calming himself, he sunk the ball into the back of the net, pushing Madrid to the next round and ending a rather eventful tie that included some debatable calls and lots of goals.

Bayern Munich (Germany) vs.

Sevilla (Spain)

Here we go again. Another season and another Bayern team showing its quality on and off the pitch, right up there with Europe’s elite in pursuit of the coveted Champions League trophy. But here comes another Spanish team, the pain in Bayern’s behind for the past four years. Of course, Sevilla is not Real Madrid or Barcelona, but it is still one of the most dangerous teams in Europe.

Just ask Manchester United fans what happened when they decided to sleep on Sevilla last round.

Nonetheless, Bayern flew into Spain as the favorite against the Spanish locals.

It was a nightmare from the start for the Bavarians. Pablo Sarabia’s clean finish at the near post in the 32nd minute put the Spaniards on top. The nerves began to kick in as Bayern once again saw themselves down to a Spanish side. But then, under player-favorite interim manager Jupp Heynckes, Bayern pressed higher and got the equaliser from a Jesús Navas own goal in the 37th minute. They continued to pile on the pressure and were rewarded with a goal from Thiago in the 68th minute off a beautiful cross from Franck Ribery. Bayern won the away leg but not without some trouble.

For the second leg in Munich, the two teams played an uneventful match. There were not many significant changes throughout the game, and Bayern, being the team that often dominates possession, advanced on a 2-1 aggregate scoreline into the semi-finals.

No disrespect to Sevilla, but Bayern did not play up to their own high standards. They are consistently considered one of the top three clubs in Europe, but they didn’t show it in this fixture. While they may have gotten away with it against a smaller club like Sevilla, with Real Madrid looking across at them in the semi-finals, this type of performance just won’t do. Real Madrid has the mentality, the quality, the experiencand this guy named Cristiano Ronaldo, if you’ve ever heard of him, that will make Bayern pay for every single mistake they make. If the Bavarians want to win their sixth Champions League title, they will have to turn it up a few notches.

continued on page 18

Player Profile

Golf ? No Par-blem An Interview with Christopher Chan

By Allison Eng

At what age did you start playing golf? Why did you gravitate toward the sport?

I started playing golf at age eight. I went to summer camp

years, I just tried to get things done [one by one], not letting myself get distracted.

What is your strategy for constantly improving yourself?

I go to practice a lot, and I try and work on specific things each time, depending on what I think can be improved. I also always try and focus on one thought when I’m practicing, like proper alignment.

What is one of the biggest obstacles you’ve faced when playing golf?

Earning respect is one of the biggest obstacles because a lot of people think golf is just for old white men and that kids should play sports like basketball.

How do you balance schoolwork and golf? Do you have advice for others trying to do the same (with any sport)?

I generally practice 3-4 times a week during school months and almost every day during the summer. Since I’m currently a senior, I don’t really have much work, but in past

What’s one funny thing that’s happened to you on a course?

I was playing a match last year, and my teammate Nick attempted to hit the ball around the tree, but he hit the trunk [of the tree] instead, so then it came straight back and hit him.

What are your proudest moments?

One of my proudest moments was being part of a team that won the PSAL championship in 2015 and 2016. We were undefeated for both those years despite some strong competition, and I was really happy that the seniors got to go out as champions. Another of my proudest moments was winning the 2017 PSAL Individual Championship. I had come in 4th my freshman year and 3rd my sophomore year, and I had finally won it last year. Placing in the top six meant that I would play at states, which was a big deal. Finishing third at states was the cherry on top.

Are you going to aim for the Individual Championship

Allison Eng / The Spectator

Stuyvesant’s coed golf team is a quiet group, but is nonetheless extremely talented at the sport. The star of their team is Christopher Chan, who led the PSAL league in nine hole totals during the 2016-2017 season as a junior. A typical nine hole total ranges from 34-36, a proper mix of par-3, par-4, and par-5 holes. Chan’s nine hole total is 34, astonishingly good for a teenage golf player. Now a senior, he only looks to build on last year’s performance and better his teammates.

at Chelsea Piers, and golf was one of the sports that they [offered], and I was good at it.

again?

Of course! If I win it, I will deem this season a success.

The Spectator ● May 4, 2018

Page 18

Sports Sports Editorial

The Final Four are Set continued from page 17

FC Barcelona (Spain) vs.

AS Roma (Italy) It was almost agreed upon that Barcelona got the easiest draw in the quarter-finals by drawing Roma, who most people thought were just happy to be there. Well, the Romans showed the Catalans that they were there for anything but to concede defeat.

The first leg was in Barcelona, and to no one’s surprise at the time, they won 4-1 at

home. The scoreline does not represent how the game really played out, however. Barcelona scored off of two own goals in the first half. Even though they got two additional goals, they did not seem as threatening as previous Barcelona teams have. Their play looked dull, and their ball distribution was way too one-dimensional for a Barcelona team. In addition, Roma got an away goal via striker Edin Dzeko. This away goal would prove to be crucial, as in the case of a tie in the aggregate score, the team with the more away goals advances.

Even though they lost by three goals, Roma was not afraid to

press or attack Barcelona. At the end of the first leg they sensed weakness in the Catalans.

When the second leg came around, nobody was ready for the massive comeback they were about to witness in Rome.

Dzeko scored early in the sixth minute to quickly get the Roman crowd into the game, knowing they had the all important away goal on their side.

As they continued to press and attack, Roma was awarded with a penalty in the 58th minute, which was tucked away by their captain Daniele De Rossi.

By that point, panic began to settle in as fans realized Roma only needed one more goal to

advance. And that was exactly what they got from defender Kostas Manolas in the 82nd minute with a curling header off of a corner. Just like that, Barcelona’s hopes of the treble (winning your league, domestic cup, and European competition in one season) were flushed down the drain.

It was one of the greatest choke jobs in Champions League history. That day in Rome, Barcelona played in a way that made Johan Cruyff (Barcelona and Dutch legend as a player and manager, often credited as the founding father of the modern passing game) turn in his grave. There was no

presence of tiki-taka passing or the explosive offense that have become synonymous with the Blaugrana. Coach Ernesto Valverde simply refused to make adjustments to a Roma team who was playing desperate offense. Finally, no matter how great he is, there is still a M.I.A. out for Lionel Messi, who was uncharacteristically silent during the entire game in Rome.

For the third straight year, FC Barcelona failed to reach the semi-finals of the Champions League. Hopefully, two trophies will be enough for them this year, because that’s all they can get.

Girls’ Handball

Peglegs Seize Close Victory Over Rivals Laguardia, Seek to Dominate in the Playoffs

By Jared Asch and Ariel Glazman

Emily Siew / The Spectator

Senior and co-captain Ava Liu prepared to serve for the match-winning point in her second singles game against LaGuardia’s Jenny Chen at the Fiorello H. LaGuardia High School gym. Liu won the point after a short rally, resulting in a key 21-14 victory for Stuyvesant’s girls’ handball team, the Peglegs, and eventually a 3-2 victory overall.

The Peglegs are in the midst of another successful season within league play. So far, they’ve racked up a record of 7-0, winning most games by a large margin. Four of those victories were 5-0 shutouts, and two of the remaining three were 4-1 wins. In the past few seasons, the Peglegs have topped their

Manhattan League by either going undefeated or dropping one game to LaGuardia. This year’s success against weaker competition, coupled with an early season victory against LaGuardia, is a good sign for the Peglegs’ playoff prospects.

The team’s roster turnover was thought to be an issue, as all starters graduated except for current senior and co-captain Ariel Huang. Instead, the new upperclassmen have stepped up to the challenge, and seniors are currently first, second, and third singles, as well as both first doubles positions.

This year, the Peglegs are placing more emphasis on practice as well as scrimmages. “Our goal this year is to make it to the quarterfinals in playoffs, which is our highest record [from] the past years. We hope to achieve

our goal by holding more outdoor practices, as we share the indoor handball court in Stuy with the boys’ [handball] team, and we don’t always get to practice. We also plan to have our

playoffs.

The real test for the Peglegs will come in their postseason, as they have been unable to break into the semifinals for the past two years, being elimi-

Eric Wisotsky said. Last year in the quarterfinals, for example, the team lost 4-1 to Queens III League’s Benjamin N. Cardozo High School.

With the division again

Emily Siew / The Spectator

“Our goal this year is to make it to the quarterfinals in playoffs, which is our highest record [from] the past years.”

—Ava Liu, senior and co-captain

first unofficial scrimmages with the Bronx Science and Brooklyn Tech girls’ handball teams in the upcoming weeks,” Liu said.

Hopefully, more practices and unofficial scrimmages against teams like Brooklyn Technical High School, who have gone deep into the playoffs, will allow the Peglegs to develop their rotation and prepare for the

nated in the quarterfinals both times. Unlike the Manhattan League, both the Queens and Brooklyn divisions have many competitive teams which have given the Peglegs trouble in the past. “We don’t really face much competition in our division, and it hurts us when we move on to the playoffs where we face higher levels of play,” coach

shaping up to be a two-team race between Stuyvesant and LaGuardia, the Peglegs can spend the time practicing and gearing up for the playoffs.

With a senior-heavy starting lineup, the Peglegs are looking to use their experience to keep up their regular season success and push deep into the playoffs once again.

The Spectator ● May 4, 2018

Page 19

Sports Boys’ Baseball

Peglegs Show Promise Despite Losses Without Star Outfielder

By Dimitriy Leksanov “I always tap the plate three times before each pitch and if it’s full count, I take three practice cuts,” said senior Michael Gillow, a member of Stuyvesant’s varsity baseball team, the Peglegs. For more than three seasons now, this simple ritual has been the calling card for the tall, lanky outfielder.

Though he has made variations over the years, Gillow has used this process at the plate to stay both zoned in and relaxed, something that has apparently paid dividends.

When he was a freshman on the junior varsity team, Gillow batted leadoff and batted .471 with a double and seven runs batted in—the highest statistic among freshmen in all three categories. The following year, Gillow began to hit with even greater power, racking up four extra-base hits while driving in 16 runs. Now, this season, having finally earned a spot on the varsity team’s starting lineup, Gillow has again become the team’s most dominant offensive contributor.

With two home runs through just six games and hits in five of those games, Gillow currently leads the Peglegs with a .632 slugging percentage. Gillow does not look to be slowing down after he tallied another hit for Stuyvesant during the team’s 3-2 win over the John Adams High School’s Spartans on April 18. As such, when Gillow was due to miss the following two games due to a college visit, it was a cause for significant apprehension, especially with the currently 5-1 Cardozo High School

Judges second on the docket.

The potential offensive struggles somewhat came to fruition in the first game without Gillow, a 6-2 loss to Francis Lewis High School, who are currently just 3-3, as the Peglegs struck out a total of 11 times against a duo of pitchers that some players described as underwhelming. However, there was no shortage of scoring opportunities, given that the Peglegs totaled nine hits, three walks, and

one hit batter. This amounts to an average of just under two baserunners per inning, meaning that the Peglegs had bountiful scoring opportunities but were simply unable to capitalize.

This speaks less to a lack of a dominating presence in the heart of the order (namely, Gillow) and more to a lackadaisical approach at the plate that did not go unnoticed. “We weren’t fired up enough, and we weren’t taking aggressive swings,” senior Simon Carmody said when asked what head coach John Carlesi seemed most upset by after the game.

However, that is not to say that

Rising Expectations for the Greyducks’ Outdoor Season The Stuyvesant Greyducks, the boys’ track team, started their outdoor season on April 14 at Mayor’s Cup at Icahn Stadium. After a strong indoor season, the team was hoping to hit the ground running in their first meet. “During the 2018 Manhattan indoor Borough Championships, sophomore Nicholas Siauw managed to score a lot of points for the team, which helped us win the championships again,” sophomore sprinter James Chun said. He expects key sprinters such as Siauw and sophomore Harper Andrews to help carry the burden for the team this outdoor season.

Mayor’s Cup was not without its bright spots, as senior Thomas Thread placed ninth in the 200meter sprint in 23.76 seconds, and junior Richard Peng came in fifth for the 110-meter high hurdles. “With new faces joining the team this season, the underclassmen are more motivated to run faster and perform better. With every meet, the freshmen and sophomores are becoming more experienced in preparing for and performing in the meets,” senior and captain John Choi said.

Some of these freshmen, Christian Nwenyi, Connor Ng, Laith Bahlouli, and Hadi Moukdad, exceeded expectations in their first meet. Their freshman team ran 48.76 seconds in the 4x100-meter relay, garnering a second place finish. However, with predominantly underclassmen on the 92-man roster, most members of the team are still getting used to the competition. The experienced team members believe that the potential of new members is high, though, and that they will play big roles this

two periods early to travel an insane distance—the length of the Queens-bound F line followed by a 30-minute bus ride further into Queens—only to have the game end with the Judges walking off on them in the bottom of the seventh inning. However, through all the chaos and late-game tumult, the Peglegs still managed to show tremendous promise against one of the city’s best pitchers, senior Mathew Miller.

“I always tap the plate three times before each pitch and if it’s full count, I take three practice cuts.”

—Michael Gillow, senior

Boys’ Track

By Yae June Lee

the game was entirely devoid of bright points. Sophomore Franklin Liou, for instance, emerged at the plate in a major way with three hits in three at-bats, including a double—the Peglegs’ first extra-base hit since Gillow’s double against Newtown High School on April 9. That hit also marked the first extra-base hit by a sophomore on Stuyvesant’s varsity team since junior Malcolm Hubbell’s double against Norman

season as it progresses.

Other than sprinters Siauw and Andrews, there are several other critical returning players that are expected to lead the Greyducks this season. “Our core players are our two sprint captains John Choi and Joshel Xiedeng, who bring us points in the jumping and throwing events, Jeffrey Wu and Harper Andrews in jumps, and Joseph Lee and sophomore Nicholas Siauw in the running events,” Peng said.

Choi feels that coach Mankit Wong has a vital role on the team, helping out players and aiming to unite the team so that everybody can enjoy a great outdoor track season. “Coach Wong is actively trying to prepare us in a variety of ways this season. He has implemented more meetings to help figure out all of our mistakes while allowing everyone to feel more open to criticism. In addition, we are starting to run outside at the tracks more often as the weather warms up to make us feel more comfortable when we are competing at outdoor track meets,” Choi said. A more regimented schedule has helped the team prepare meet to meet and tweak anything in running form and strategy.

Despite being a young team, the Greyducks have high hopes for this outdoor season, and another Manhattan Borough Championship title is well within reach. “Coach Wong is preparing us to maintain our manyyear reign in the Manhattan Borough Championships and get some seasoned runners to City’s,” Peng said. After a dominant indoor season, there is no reason to believe a similar outdoor season does not lie ahead.

Thomas on May 4, 2017. Considering that Hubbell is now batting .400, which is exceptional, especially for a junior, the future looks bright for the blossoming Liou.

While the Peglegs’ following game ended in a 3-2 loss to Benjamin Cardozo High School, it is difficult to describe it as a disappointment at all. Naturally, it had its low points. According the senior and captain Max Onderdonk, many of the Peglegs’ proverbial wounds were selfinflicted. “There were baserunning errors, and [sophomore] Owen [Potter] started off wild,” Onderdonk said. On top of that, the Peglegs had to leave school

Going into the game against the Peglegs, Miller had gone 4-0 through his first four starts, pitching 21 innings without giving up a single earned run. While the Peglegs could not get the best of Miller, they still managed to tag him for his first earned run, as well as nearly double his season hit total, taking Miller from 10 to 19 total hits allowed. Furthermore, numerous promising players continued their growth against Cardozo.

Liou again played a major role in the offense, slapping a single and going on to steal two bases.

Onderdonk, meanwhile, broke out of a short hitting slump with two hits, including a double,

over three at-bats, driving in one of the Peglegs’ two runs. This performance is especially notable for multiple reasons. Firstly, Onderdonk recognized that he had been playing poorly of late. “I’ve been struggling a lot as a hitter,” he said.

Onderdonk has also been attributing many of his times reaching base to good fortune. “I get on with walks and errors a lot, so I’ve been lucky so far. Hopefully that continues,” he said. More notably, though, it showed a rare display of power from the slender center fielder, as that double represents just the third extra-base hit of Onderdonk’s Stuyvesant career.

Looking ahead, the Peglegs have a chance to get back into the win column with a home-andhome series coming up against the Norman Thomas Tigers. Last year, the Peglegs managed to dispatch the Tigers handily, winning 7-2 and 9-3 over the teams’ two skirmishes. This season, the Tigers are struggling mightily, having started 1-5 with their only win coming against winless William Cullen Bryant High School, but are not to be scoffed at, given how unpredictable high school play can be. The real marquee matchup, however, will be the following week, when the Peglegs play their annual series against the rival Beacon High School Blue Demons, with games on May 2 and May 4. With Beacon currently undefeated (6-0), the Peglegs will need their offense to be at full strength, from Gillow down to Hubbell, Onderdonk, and Liou, to secure even one of the contests.

Girls’ Track

Greyducks Carry Momentum Into the Start of the Season

By Aryan Sharma and Bernard Wang

The Stuyvesant Greyducks, the girls’ track team, put on an outstanding performance this winter by winning their fourth indoor Borough Championship in a row. The indoor track team has since made the transition to outdoor track and also added many new members to their roster for the start of the new season.

Despite the changing faces of the team, all of the athletes are looking to carry the momentum and aggression from the winter into their outdoor competitions this spring.

The team traveled to Icahn Stadium on Randall’s Island for Mayor’s Cup, where they went against the top high school student-athletes from the PSAL, CHSAA, and NYSAIS leagues on Saturday, April 14 . Despite the tough competition, the Greyducks put up strong performances in a variety of events. On the field, senior and co-captain Venus Nnadi placed third in the varsity pole vault (7 ft, 9 in) and 13th in the triple jump (26 ft, 7 in), continuing her streak of strong performances.

The Greyducks did not perform at the high level they usually do on the track, but there were still some outstanding performances. Junior Clara Mohri came in sixth in the 1500-meter run (4:55:72), while setting a new personal record. Only two seconds separated third place and sixth place, showing the level of competition present at this meet.

In terms of other long-distance events, freshman Jessica Kwok and sophomore Elizabeth Reizis placed sixth (8:39:53) and 10th

(9:08:79) in the 2000-meter steeplechase, respectively. Kwok finished only eight seconds off the City Championships qualifying standard, a notable record considering this was only her second time participating in the steeplechase.

Stuyvesant also found success in the relays. Out of the PSAL teams present, the Greyducks finished third in the freshman 4x400-meter relay, thanks to runners Kwok, Chloe Terestchenko, Talia Kahan, and Grace Cantarella. The sophomores also didn’t disappoint, taking fourth place in the sophomore 4x800-meter relay with a collaborative effort from Jing Su, Tiffany Cao, Claire Zhu, and Ester Suleymanov. “We did pretty well, but at the end of the race, everyone on my relay was a little disappointed. If we all went a couple seconds faster, we could’ve placed a couple of spots higher,” Su said. In a sport in which seconds can mean the difference between advancing and getting eliminated, this mindset is crucial for the growth and success of the team.

For example, sophomore Angela Zhong barely missed the cutoff for qualifying for City’s.

She was one second away from making the cut for her event: the racewalk. However, she is using this as motivation in preparation for the upcoming meets. When asked about her results, she said, “Being a few seconds off from qualifying to City’s made me realize that I’m going to have to work harder and dedicate more of my time into practices. Of course, I was disappointed in myself, but my teammates were the ones who encouraged me to turn my disappointment into motivation,

and now I’m determined to cut those few seconds off to qualify.”

The main goal for the Greyducks this season is to send more athletes to City Championships, which takes place on May 27. So far, five members have qualified for City Championships: Nnadi for pole vault, Mohri in both the 1500-meter and 3000-meter runs, junior and co-captain Jeanette Cheung, and juniors Bernice Chen and Kayla Lew for racewalk. The Greyducks have multiple opportunities to raise this number, one of which is the Borough Championships.

The Greyducks have won Borough’s four straight times and are going to do all they can to extend that streak this May. When asked how the team was preparing for this important meet, Cheung kept it simple, saying, “We’re just doing what we have been doing all season—putting in the work and pushing ourselves at both practices and meets.”

Whether or not the Greyducks win Borough’s again, they can count on these meets to give real experience to the new freshmen and sophomores on the team. “We are working on developing the new girls who joined this season; our sprint/field event program hasn’t been as strong as our distance program in the past, so we’re really working on building a well-rounded team,” Cheung said. As the newer athletes get comfortable with the competitiveness that comes with track and field, and as they continue to learn more from the older girls, they will help the Greyducks maintain their dominance in Manhattan and beyond.

The Spectator ● May 4, 2018

Page 20

The Spectator SpoRts Boys Lacrosse

CALENDAR

Peglegs Look Strong Midseason

may

4

Friday

Allison Eng / The Spectator

Boys’ Baseball vs.

Beacon, Parade Grounds

4

Friday

By Lumi Westerlund and Lee-Ann Rushlow Two players position themselves at the center of the field.

Their sticks line up parallel to each other as they crouch low to the ground, preparing for the face-off. The athlete on the right, junior Terrence Jiang, glares at the Lehman Campus player opposite him. The referee blows his whistle. Jiang wins control of the ball and swipes it to his teammate, senior Brandon Lee. Lee picks up the ground ball and heads for the Lehman goal.

The Stuyvesant Peglegs go on to win their game against Lehman with a final score of 9-0.

Under the guidance of head coach Di Wu, the team has implemented a new playing technique that is relatively uncommon in high school leagues. This is what they call their fourth pole substitution strategy—having 4 defensive pole-carrying players (d-poles) on the field at all times and substituting out with offensive players. “The constant subbing of the midfield works really well for keeping the attackmen off the midfield and therefore keeping them fresh so they

can face d-poles, which was a problem last year because we always had to switch middies with attackmen,” senior and co-captain Dima Hvirtsman said. While the subbing means less playing time for some of their more experienced players, it also gives more opportunities on the field to younger players.

Rookies such as senior Rigneyla Akhotsang (d-pole) have been a strong force against opposing teams’ attackmen. In addition, a number of returning players have showcased improved abilities across the pitch: senior and co-captain Sam Brimberg is giving up the least number of goals in their division as starting goalie, Jiang is consistently winning faceoffs, and senior and co-captain Giorgio Vidali is leading the d-poles.

Despite the stout defense, the Peglegs still have holes in their game. “Our offense still needs work. While we may be one of the best defensive squads in the league, we generally don’t score that much,” assistant coach and Stuyvesantalum Andrey Ligayi (‘16) said.

“Our players just need to be more comfortable with the ball

in their sticks as ball-carriers, make sharper passes, and move more and more off-ball.”

The team has talented pieces on the offensive front, including junior Rubin Peci, junior Vian Shekhtman, Hvirtsman, and Lee, and they are working hard in practice to find new ways to score. “We’ve taken some college plays and reworked them to work for our team, and this year we introduced two new formations, the 2-2-2 and the 1-4-1, with plays for each that we would call out,” Peci said.

These new formations on the field have led to improvement on offense and will hopefully only continue to bolster the offensive front.

The Peglegs have won four out of their seven games so far, and with only three games remaining in their season, they begin to look toward the playoffs. “I think the PSAL has done a great job with balancing this division, and a lot of teams will fight for those final playoff berths. Ultimately, we’ll have to fight to clinch a playoff seed, and we’re ready for the challenge,” Ligayi said.

Girls’ Softball

Renegades’ Roll Hits Some Bumps

By Ethan Weisberg and Samuel Stammler Stuyvesant’s softball team, the Renegades, started the season with a bang. Filled with double-digit wins and multiple mercies, they slugged and pitched their way to victory.

However, they are currently going through the toughest part of their schedule, and have battled to maintain their place atop the Manhattan AA division.

The Renegades’ first and only loss thus far came on April 12 against Manhattan Center for Science & Math. The game quickly got away from the Renegades by the bottom of the second, having already given up four runs. “I think the biggest reason for our loss was the fact that it was our third game in a row, and we were pretty worn out after playing two long games before facing Manhattan Center,” senior and co-captain

Charlotte Ruhl said. “Frankie was tired, but even more so were our bats and gloves. We made a few careless errors that ended up costing us a lot of runs.”

Fatigue and errors weren’t the only things holding back the Renegades. They also failed to adapt to faster pitching, a concern that Ruhl had voiced before the season began. “We weren’t really able to adjust to the speed of their fast pitcher,” she said. The team will face Manhattan Center again later in the season, so that will be a game to watch, as the two teams hold the first and second places in their division by a wide margin.

Despite that loss, the rest of the Renegades’ season has been a resounding success. Outside of a hard-fought, 16-13 victory against Benjamin N. Cardozo High School, the team has handily beat their competition.

Against Lab Museum United, a usually strong team, the Renegades are 2-0 with a run differential of +35. Junior Talia Kirshenbaum is leading the way with a .714 average, and Ruhl and junior Ruby Gary both have three home runs.

Against Cardozo, “Stuy put up a really strong fight on offense, and our hitters really pulled through,” freshman Angelina Mustafa said. “We really out slugged one of Queens’s best softball teams.” Their offensive performance against Cardozo High was one of the best outings they have had thus far. The team batting average was .384 in the game.

The Renegades’ season is certainly going well, as they currently have a 7-1 record, but recent games have forced the Renegades to fight hard to maintain their top spot in the division.

Boys’ Lacrosse vs.

Murry Bergtraum, Randall’s Island Field 70

4

Friday Girls’ Lacrosse vs.

KIPP NYC College Prep, Randall’s Island Field 80

7

Monday Boys’ Tennis vs.

Eleanor Roosevelt High School, Hudson River Park

9

Wednesday

Girls’ Fencing vs.

Long Island City, Stuyvesant

Wrapup The Tigers, Stuyvesant’s cricket team, defeated Francis Lewis High School in a closely-contested match 119-117 to improve their record to 4-2.

Stuyvesant’s girls’ fencing team, the Vipers, improved to 4-0 this season after cruising to a 90-6 victory against Information Technology High School.

Led by senior co-captain Leila Storkamp’s three goals, the Huskies, Stuyvesant’s girls’ lacrosse team, won 12-1 against A. Philip Randolph Campus High School.

After defeating the High School for Math, Science, and Engineering, the boys’ volleyball team, the Beasts, remain undefeated in league play.

In a tight match, the girls’ badminton team beat Seward Park Campus 3-2 to draw even atop their division.