NEW CANDIDATE FOR BOARD OF TRUSTEES Page 2
BLACK STUDENT VISIBILITY Page 4
ANOTHER WIN FOR RAMS
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Vol. 169, Issue 4 | Feb. 19 – March 4, 2020 | City College of San Francisco | Since 1935 | FREE | www.theguardsman.com
Commuters Advocate For Better Muni 29-Sunset Line
City College EMT Student Saves Man from Overdose By Rachel Berning rachelo.berning@gmail.com
City College student Nicholas Stallcup saved a man’s life on Monday, Feb. 3. Stallcup was waiting for a friend to catch a 11:30 p.m. train from Civic Center to MacArthur, his home station. As he walked down the station stairwell, he found a man lying on the floor, unresponsive and overdosing on opioids. Stallcup immediately jumped into action to perform CPR and restore the man’s breathing. Stallcup has been a student at City College for about two years. and believes that learning to be an Emergency Medical Technician (EMT) is a wonderful career path Muni passengers attempt to cram into the already crowded 29 bus headed towards the Bayview at the for students who are looking into corner of Mission Street and Persia Avenue on Feb. 28, 2020. Photo by Claudia Drdul/The Guardsman health careers. “CCSF's EMT program stops, leaving passengers waiting row because there is no other alterBy Alexa Bautista is a great way to start an entry for the next bus to pick them up. As native. The actual ride itself is abauti34@mail.ccsf.edu a result, many commuters choose completely fine even in a congested level career in health care and it From the Sunset to Bayview, to take an Uber or Lyft to their bus we find a way to be okay with affords the opportunity to really the Muni 29-Sunset line is infa- destination. start helping people relatively things, it’s mostly scheduling.” mous for having many passengers City College students who take Other City College students soon compared to other health from different schools along its the 29 line experience these prob- such as Max Ejima have encoun- care professions,” he said. “I am route such as Lowell High School, lems often and consequently attend tered what the 29 bus was like really glad I chose this program San Francisco State, and City class late. Ocean Campus student during one of its busiest times, as opposed to other EMT schools College. The 29-Sunset is the Jack Placios said he thinks schedul- around 1 to 2 p.m. when many around the bay for sure.” longest daytime route at 17.4 miles, ing is the main problem with the students from City College are Stallcup added that the instrucand with an estimated 20,000 daily 29 bus. finishing their classes to attend tors at City College are outstanding riders the bus is often plagued by and have valuable life experiences “For the most part, the 29 is a work. delays and overcrowding. smooth ride,” Placios said. “The “It gets way too crowded as paramedics and firefighters.“The On several occasions, the 29 major issues are when you get two during one to two, and I have had class cuts have affected me by bus comes in quickly to pick up to three buses back to back and the experiences with the bus skipping increasing the difficulty of getting all the passengers waiting at a second bus is halfway full and the my stop once or twice. I would be the classes I need to transfer,” he stop, yet other times it is late, leav- third bus is just an empty wagon. late to school because of it. I would said. ing many passengers waiting for The other frustrating problem is wish for the bus to come every After the incident, Stallcup was almost an hour. In addition, due when you get an incredibly packed ten minutes rather than fifteen to featured by several news organizations and was formally recognized to overcrowding, it sometimes skips bus and it just skips six stops in a twenty minutes.” cont. on page 3 by the City College Board of
City College EMT student Nicholas Stallcup, 28. Photo by Nicholas Roark/Special to the Guardsman
Trustees at their February meeting. It was “surreal” for Stallcup to have all the media attention since he’s “fairly reserved.” He added that it didn’t seem right to receive recognition “for something that EMS professionals do multiple times a day and get no recognition for.” “Saving that guy’s life was the right thing to do. I don't consider myself a hero, just someone who was willing to do the right thing because he had the skills to do so,” he said. “I'm certain anyone of my classmates would've done the same had they been in that situation.” When asked about drug use in San Francisco, Stallcup said, “I won’t pretend to have the answers to these problems but all I can say is from my viewpoint the rift between those who have and those who have not is only increasing, which makes me wonder what the future of San Francisco will look like in the face of the economic disparity.” He was careful not to demonize people for using drugs, noting that “it’s important to regard them as human beings.” “A year or two ago the man I helped wasn't in the position of being homeless and on drugs,” he said. “It could happen to any of us if we lost our support systems or made a few really bad choices while in a vulnerable or fragile mind state."
Summer 2020 Schedule to be Significantly Smaller Than Last Year By Tyler Breisacher tbreisac@mail.ccsf.edu
The summer 2020 schedule will likely be about half the size of the summer 2019 schedule, according to a memo sent to department chairs Feb. 13. The budget detailed in the memo corresponds to approximately 280 classes, including both credit and noncredit classes, down from over 500 classes in summer 2019. Many of those 280 classes are for high school students, leaving roughly 150 college-level classes
offered during the summer. In addition to the overall reduction, the memo indicated that there would be no summer classes at all for several departments, including Administration of Justice (which had 15 classes in summer 2019, according to the web4 registration system), Computer Science (18 classes in summer 2019) and Photography (5 in 2019). Another department slated to run no classes this summer is the Music Department, which held 16 classes last summer. Department Chair Madeline Mueller was
skeptical of the need to reduce the summer session so drastically. She said classes taught in summer can give the college a “fiscal bump,” because instructor salaries are lower for summer sessions. According to the memo, the decisions about how to allocate the budget were made based on priorities set by the Enrollment Management Committee, which is composed primarily of administrators and faculty members. Classes run in conjunction with SFUSD were considered the highest priority, followed by those “for cohorted
programs that have summer offerings,” and finally general education classes that are transferable to CSU campuses. The memo uses the term “initial instructional budgets” and notes that department chairs can propose adjustments, so there may be some changes to the budgets before the summer schedule is finalized. A representative for City College's administration did not respond to a request for comment by press time.