Lowell The
April 2016
If you
start seeing
the signs
step up and
I
just remember
running
overcoming
domestic
violence
say
something
Lowell APRIL 2016
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INSIDE “The only question I have for you all today is this: why did it take this long?” 6
ONLINE EXCLUSIVES New Japanese teacher shares Japanese-pancake flipping dilemmas and more
by Giping Huang
Alumni media pros share memories of Lowell journalism
by Adrian Hung and Noreen Shaikh
Take a ‘bridge year’ — alumna describes the perks of her year in India before college
by Alana Poole
Award-winning Filipino-American writer returns to alma mater to talk about her success Chris Hackett
by Luming Yuan
Vars girls’ basketball ends season run with loss to Mustangs in semifinals
by Joyanne Ibay
Road to champs: Varsity baseball boils down O’Connell 7-3
by Giping Huang
Vars boys’ tennis serve up another victory against the Westmoor Rams
by Josephine Dang
Swim teams outpace rival school the Washington Eagles
by Clarissa Wan
Softball hits it out of the park 14-12 against rival AMBER LY
to Lowell to investigate diversity at elite public high schools
team Balboa Bucs
by Joyanne Ibay
COVER: Photo subject: senior Alexis Picache. Photo illustration by Aida Irving and Kiara Gil.
EDITORIAL
Lowell’s green policy: time to spruce things up
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N AN ECO-MINDED CITY like San Francisco, Lowell and other San Francisco Unified School District schools have a responsibility to set an example as public institutions educating the city’s youth about the environment and their roles in supporting it. Besides recycling bins throughout the main building and compost bins in the cafeteria and courtyard, Lowell can and should do better. SFUSD’s curriculum department says it has a “robust sustainability program that incorporates the twin goals of promoting student ecoliteracy while reducing the district’s environmental footprint.” Ecoliteracy is the understanding of the natural systems that sustain life on earth. The district received the national 2016 Green Ribbon Schools award because of its “innovative efforts to reduce environmental impact and utility costs, improve health and wellness, and ensure effective sustainability education,” according to the SFUSD website. In line with these goals, the school board has passed several resolutions promoting environmentally friendly facilities, water and energy conservation, green cleaning, sustainability, transportation and waste diversion, which were implemented from 2003 to 2015. The plans include “a system for providing healthy, local, and whenever possible, organic food,” and state that “schools have found resource conservation and waste diversion programs as valuable tools for learning and creating environmental stewardship.” But what’s not clear is how well the school and district overall are reaching these goals. The current plans are incomplete and do not have enough impact to make a difference. SFUSD, or at least Lowell, needs explicit, detailed policies such as increasing composting, reduced cafeteria waste, and increased vegetarian options, which would go a long way to improve our school’s environmental impact. One resolution, set in 2003, was to increase waste diversion to 75 percent by 2015. This would mean that of all the waste SFUSD produces, 75 percent would not go to landfills and would instead be recycled or used as compost. Currently, the district waste diversion average is 65 percent, ac-
cording to the data published on the SFUSD Share the Savings website. Lowell’s rate is 60 percent. Similar large schools like Washington, Lincoln and Balboa have rates of 40, 62 and 73 percent, respectively. The simplest and most cost effective issue to address is the lack of compost bins around the school. Currently there are approximately 10 compost bins located around the school. Having more of those bins around the school would make it convenient for students and staff to dispose of food and soiled paper as compost rather than as trash for landfill. Many students just throw their waste in the classroom or hallway garbage bins while rushing to class. These compost bins are funded by the district and can be serviced by the custodians as long as they are on wheels because their contracts require this for physical reasons, according to Giles. Additionally, it would be ideal to have bins in each classroom, as long as they could be taken out daily to avoid attracting pests — something that has been a problem in the previous attempts to increase campuswide composting. An issue would be figuring out who is responsible for smaller classroom bins. Advanced Placement Environmental Science teacher Katherine Melvin has stored around 30 compost bins in her classroom and estimates that she has passed out 20 of those 30 to various classrooms whose teachers have been interested and willing to take out the compost themselves. Melvin says that both she and head custodian Ulises Parada continue to encourage this reform across the school. For maximum effectiveness, small compost bins should be a requirement in every classroom, like recycling bins. However, this would be a large undertaking, and a pilot program to test this idea would be an easier start. Teachers could take out the individual bins in their classrooms at the end of the day. The Lowell has also reached out to the Recycling Club, which, according to senior club president Sophia Qin, is interested in getting involved. A second proposal is to implement a meatless lunch day once a week in the cafeteria. According to Student Nutrition Director
Lowell The
Editors-in-Chief
luke haubenstock whitney c lim amber ly
Managing Editor News Editors
cynthia leung joseph kim whitney c lim emily teng sophia wu
Sports Editors
cynthia leung amber ly
Opinion Editors
ophir cohen-simayof stephanie li olivia starr
Columns Editors
luke haubenstock noreen shaikh
Multimedia & Photo Editor Art Manager Reporters
aida irving emily teng nia coats josephine dang adrian hung joyanne ibay alyssa poon rachael schmidt clarissa wan luming yuan jennifer zhang leonard caoili jocelyn lee
Photographers
kenny dzib kelley grade aida irving tobi kawanami ciara kosai alexis picache lily young
Business Managers
sherissa go shania lee aaron liang kelvin luu shania qin
Head of Research Collaboration with Web Designer
Adviser
Awards
maximilian tiao data and research club michelle chi
samuel williams
2014 nspa online pacemaker 2012 nspa print pacemaker 2011 nspa all-american
2011 nspa online pacemaker 2009 nspa first class honors 2007 nspa all-american
2007 nspa web pacemaker 2007 cspa gold crown
The Lowell is published by the journalism classes of Lowell High School w All contents copyright Lowell High School journalism classes w All rights reserved w The Lowell strives to inform the public and to use its opinion sections as open forums for debate w All unsigned editorials are opinions of the staff w The Lowell welcomes comments on school-related issues from students, faculty and community members w Send letters to the editors to thelowellnews@ gmail.com w Names will be withheld upon request w We reserve the right to edit letters before publication w The Lowell is a student-run publication distributed to thousands of readers including students, parents, teachers and alumni w All advertisement profits fund our newsmagazine issues w To advertise online or in print, email thelowellads@yahoo.com w Contact us w Lowell High School Attn: The Lowell journalism classes w 1101 Eucalyptus Drive w San Francisco, CA 94132 w 415-759-2730 w thelowellnews@gmail.com
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CARTOON TO THE EDITOR FROM THE EDITORS
Former student encourages better mental health support at Lowell Dear Editor, Let me preface by saying that I transferred out of Lowell last October due to mental illness. For those of you that are curious, yes it’s depression. I thought it would be nice to share some insight about what it feels like to have a mental illness at Lowell. Throughout my time at Lowell, I have never felt that the people there truly cared about mental illness. Sure we have a Wellness Center, but I sure didn’t know how many people actually go there (well at least until my last couple weeks there). Why you ask? Until this day I still don’t exactly know, but I’ve always had this feeling that school was not the right environment to talk about something so disregarded. I felt alone and had no one else to relate. Even when I did talk to an adult at Lowell, they did not understand enough about mental health to help me. I could only barely scratch the surface. Then there were the teachers that knew absolutely nothing about mental health whatsoever, told me directly that I should put my academics first, and would badger
me about my attendance track (or lack thereof). In short, I felt angry, confused, and did not know what to do with my life. It wasn’t until I transferred to another high school that I realized how many people at Lowell were and are struggling with the same thing. I found out that students were going to places like Kaiser Permanente during after school hours for therapy and medication. I urge Lowell staff and student government have more in depth trainings and outreach efforts pertaining to mental health. Not only do we need to know what mental health is, we need to learn more about how to support and recognize mental health when we see it. Mental illness is not obvious and sometimes it’s easy to forget that — but we won’t. Thank you to those who supported me throughout my transition. Forever a Cardinal, Anna He
Shedding light on part 3 of Finding Equity Dear readers of The Lowell, This issue’s cover story details the steps that groups at Lowell are taking to mitigate racism and cultural insensitivity at the school, including an alumni of color panel and the focus on inclusion during Social Awareness Week. The suggested programs and reforms in the article, such as annual alumni of color panels and mandatory ethnic studies classes, are attempts to ameliorate the issue — not perfect solutions, since racism can never truly be erased. However, we as a staff believe that communal efforts can reduce the racial tensions that have come under the spotlight this past school year.
Unlike the previous two installments of the Finding Equity series, this third piece is an opinion. We would like to make suggestions about racism at Lowell, especially after we have heard many stories from our interviewees and dug deeply with our investigative research on the topic throughout the series. To further clarify our intentions for the series, we chose to highlight the experiences of African American and Latino students in the past two installments because those two racial groups are particularly underrepresented at Lowell compared to their representation within
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Part three
AIDA IRVING
FINDING
EQUITY Why we must promote cultural sensitivity and diveristy among students. Part three of a series about low minority enrollment at Lowell
By Stephanie Li
COVER
“The only question I have for you all today is this: why did it take this long?” The inquiry rings out from junior Tsia Nicole, president of Lowell’s Black Student Union (BSU). She’s accusing the administration’s efforts to address the discrimination faced by the school’s African-American students as being long overdue. The San Francisco Unified School District meeting room is silent after her words. Its inhabitants are anticipatory as they listen to the BSU jump start what will hopefully be a series of reforms. This moment at the Board of Education meeting on Feb. 23 followed a student walkout and speech at City Hall. These were the culmination of a school year where the insensitivity that minority students experience at Lowell was brought to light, partially through parts one and two this series. The last straw for the students at the walkout was an unpermitted photo display demeaning Black History Month. The administration responded by taking down the display and holding mandatory school assemblies, but many believed the response was insufficient. The recent events reflect a serious issue in the Lowell community: a lack of understanding of underrepesented minority cultures. In order to create a more welcoming atmosphere for every student, Lowell must take steps towards supporting minority students and educating all students about cultural awareness and sensitivity. What are the district and Lowell doing? The school district, working with the Lowell administration, has agreed to meet select demands of the BSU. The school is currently engaging in discussions to build a community center for minorities, require cultural competency training for staff, and hire a recruitment officer to enroll prospective African-American students. Matt Haney, the SFUSD Board of Education president, announced this at Youth Advocacy Day on March 17. At Lowell, students believe that the administration is not doing enough to fix diversity issues, according to a survey conducted by The Lowell and the Lowell Data Club on Feb. 4, the day before the administration reacted to the offensive Black History Month display. Although 76 percent of students think that the administration should address Lowell’s racial issues, only 28 percent feel that the administration is doing so effectively. In April, principal Andrew Ishibashi an-
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nounced new efforts, including a new Alumni of Color Mentor Program, a Cultural Club Council, and diversity in hiring teachers and recruiting students. The latter was a specific BSU demand, considering that since the 1999-2000 school year, the African-American population at Lowell has never exceeded three percent. This year is no different — only 45 Lowell students are African-American. The Lowell administration has been attempting to address diversity issues. In 2013, they hired special consultant Hoover Liddell as a part of Lowell’s African American Core Education and Support program. This year, Claudia Anderson was hired to play the same role for Latino students. Professional development for teachers this year included a video on and discussion of systemic oppression in the U.S. and segrega-
These efforts fail to directly confront the problem behind the events that happened this year.
tion in SFUSD schools. Next year’s professional development will include a similar section, according to Ishibashi. Yet these efforts fail to directly confront the problem behind the events that happened this year — a problem related to why minorities feel unwelcome at Lowell. The heart of the problem is the lack of cultural understanding on the part of the students. When the Class of 2016 Board decided to print “Most Ratchet” as a category for the Senior Pop Polls, they “were unaware of the negative connotations of the term ‘ratchet,’ or of any racist implications behind the word,” as they said in a Nov. 28 letter to the editor. The student who posted the racist pictures about Black History Month said he “didn’t realize it was something [other students] would get mad at.” In fact, over 30 percent of students see people using racial or ethnic stereotypes about once a day, and over 20 percent see it many times a day, according to our student survey. While teachers have and will continue to obtain cultural competency training, there has yet to be a similar effort made to require students’ awareness about cultural sensitivity. So how can we expect that similarly insensitive situations won’t occur again, if students are not taught how to be culturally aware? What happens in the classroom? Currently, the main way diversity enters the classroom is through the efforts of teach-
AIDA IRVING AND LILY YOUNG
ers. The Lowell asked teachers at the school how they diversify their classrooms and curriculum. Most responses included randomized seating and grouping assignments. Many Social Science and English teachers said they incorporated diverse points of view into the curriculum. Although the World History state standards and textbook are not Eurocentric, according to World History teacher Matthew Bell, he still reinforces his teaching with diverse documents. “If students are just reading the textbook and we don’t introduce other voices and sources, then it can seem very Eurocentric,” Bell said. “I think it’s a matter of how it’s presented and how the students are assessed.” Bell’s teaching of World War II in his eleventh grade U.S. History class focuses on the Asian theater of war rather than the European — a flexibility he has since state standards for the 20th century curriculum are not specific. He chooses to do so because his Asian students could have families that immigrated during the 1960s and 1970s, and hopes that they can discuss with the experiences with their parents. One student recorded and brought to class an interview with her parents about their decision to leave Vietnam. Armenian students have also told the class personal family histories related to the Armenian genocide. “Those have been some of the best moments teaching here, when students bring their stories,” he said.
Starting next year, Bell wants to begin framing his course using a continuing narrative of identity. The formation of the working class during the Industrial Revolution and the slaves who successfully led the Haitian revolution are just two of many events in history where identities are created by force, domination and oppression. “If we just use identity as a theme throughout and take a historical approach to it, I think that’s a better way to teach it,” Bell said. Similarly, Advanced Placement English teacher Jennifer Moffitt tought Invisible Man by African-American writer Ralph Ellison, a novel that covers issues of identity, internalized racism and stereotyping. Last year, to prove the relevance and persistence of the issues raised in the book, Moffitt gave her class a passage from the book of a funeral speech, with characters’ names removed, for a black man who was shot by the police. “They thought it was actually a speech that somebody had given at one of the funerals of somebody killed by a cop,” she said, comparing the fictional work from 1952 to the 2014 police shooting of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri and other similar occurrences in the recent years. Moffitt supplements the book with a reading of Martin Luther King Jr.’s “Letter from Birmingham Jail,” a defense of civil disobedience and human rights, and a showing of Spike Lee’s Bamboozled, a satire film about the success of a modern minstrel show with black actors in blackface. The experience and issues faced by black men trying to succeed in their respective lives are parallel in all three works. Although teachers can evidently incorporate diversity into their curriculum, it should not depend on a teacher’s choice alone. According the student survey, 72 percent of students believe that teachers should be addressing racial issues in class. However, only 33 percent of students felt that teachers were doing so effectively. Are not enough teachers choosing to teach a diverse curriculum either due to personal preference or time constraints? Or is it just not effective enough? What should students be doing? In response to the incidents of the past year, the Lowell Student Body Council chose Inclusion as this year’s theme for Social Awareness Week from Feb. 22-26. Among the events aimed towards raising awareness about minority cultures and experiences were San Francisco Public Defender Jeff Adachi’s presentation of his new short film Racial Facial, which features images of racism in the US, and the Alumni of Color panel, where alumni told stories about their experiences at Lowell as minorities.
Ethnic Studies: A DEEPER LOOK African-American Culture Among the topics explored about African-American culture in Park’s Ethnic Studies class are Jim Crow laws and the Civil Rights Movement, which are available in regular history classes. However, Ethnic Studies takes this a step further by investigating “the single story” — when people are taught a story about a member of a race, and then it is subsequently retold again and again, until it becomes overgeneralized to the entire population. It’s a phenomenon that limits African-Americans’ experiences and general variety and richness of life to a single, repeated story, creating half-truths and stereotypes about the race.
The Model Minority Myth Beyond the more widely known Japanese internment camps and the Chinese Exclusion Act, Ethnic Studies allows students to study the “model minority myth.” Asian-Americans’ higher socioeconomic achievement statistics, like college degree attainment and median family income, than that of other minorities in the U.S., cause them to be considered as the “model minority.” Such thinking leads to false beliefs that Asian-Americans no longer face discrimination and that none need financial or social support.
Gentrification in Manilatown The Filipino unit covers the I-Hotel Struggle right here in San Francisco. In the 1970s, the International Hotel was part of the community of Manilatown, between Chinatown and the Financial district, and was home to thousands of Asian, especially Filipino, laborers for decades. The owner wanted to develop the hotel into a parking garage for the financial district, and the Filipino inhabitants received a two-month notice of eviction. In response, the Asian-American community got out of their homes, took up signs, and protested. They lost. A court decree ordered the police to force them out. Today, the issues of lowincome housing, eviction and gentrification surround San Franciscan politics, and inspire similar protests.
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However, attending these events is voluntary. Students should not be able to opt-out of an education that aims to increase cultural awareness. Social Awareness Week was a beneficial opportunity for students to learn about inclusion and culture, as are the Social Change and Critical Thinking elective and the Ethnic Studies elective, but the fact that none are compulsory means that the people who need the education the most are not getting it. Peer Resource Leaders, who participated in the planning of Social Awareness Week, agree that the largely voluntary participation lessened its potential impact. “The people that were interested in it were the ones who ended up going, as opposed to how the people who aren’t interested in it didn’t take it as seriously,” senior Peer Leader Regina Gomez said. In the first- and second-year of Social Change and Critical Thinking, taught by Peer Resource coordinator Adee Horn, students learn about oppression and race, and educate their peers by creating workshops. The third year Social Change and Critical Thinking course, home to Peer Resource Leaders, has taken initiative to support minority students through the Peer Mentoring program and the Stress Free Fair. Taking the advice of BSU, La Raza and other cultural clubs, the 2015-2016 Peer Mentoring leaders assigned a mentor of color to every reg that had a freshman of color to provide a role model for minority students. April 22 marked this year’s Stress Free Fair, and it included
presentations on stress caused by institutional racism. Why we need Ethnic Studies The limits of voluntary participation are true for Ethnic Studies as well, despite the importance of the class. The value of Ethnic Studies, a new year-long elective added this school year, was demonstrated in the Board of Education’s decision in Dec. 2014 to require every SFUSD high school to offer an Ethnic Studies course. Ethnic Studies’ curriculum covers identity, systems and power, countries’ influence and transformation and change. Ultimately, the course seeks to examine the social construction of race and the resulting marginalization of communities that have historically been critical to the development of the United States, according to Ethnic Studies teacher Soo Park. The course is also invaluable because it retells history from the points of view of African-Americans, Latinos, Asians, Filipinos and Native American — perspectives that can be absent from other history classes without teachers’ choices to use supplemental material. Ethnic Studies takes a different disciplinary approach and is a different side of history, according to Bell. He cites Ethnic Studies’ focus on critical race theory, sociology, structures of power and the psychology of identity as material that distinguishes it from World
History. However, Bell supports Ethnic Studies as a separate elective course, but not as a mandatory course. “One thing I do know about Ethnic Studies is that it employs a narrative of white supremacy and I think that is a great narrative to explore,” he said. “To avoid it would be to miss a complete education.” Ethnic Studies can also help minority students feel more comfortable at Lowell and inspire empathy among non-minority students. “I think that starts with empowering our students of color and by educating our community about what it feels like to be marginalized, to be empathetic,” Community Health Outreach Worker Xavier Salazar said. Courses like Ethnic Studies can increase non-minority students’ willingness to act to promote diversity, according to a 2011 study published in the Cultural Diversity and Ethnic Minority Psychology journal. Ethnic Studies is already an essential part of the curriculum at the Urban School of San Francisco, a private high school with a white majority. Required for all students, the course completely changed the perspective of junior Casey Leffers, who had always studied at schools where the majority of the population was white like he is. “Beforehand, even the idea of racism wasn’t the reality to me,” he said. His understanding and education on race and racism had been limited to simply learning about Martin Luther King Jr. in sixth grade. “I just couldn’t grasp the concept of someone murdering someone else because of
Infographic by Maximilian Tiao
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what they look like,” Leffer said. After taking Ethnic Studies, Leffer’s pointof-view on race, racism and oppression expanded. “It’s definitely made me look at things differently, especially when I’m thinking about whether events are racially motivated or not,” he said. Leffers said that if Ethnic Studies had not been a requirement at his school, he would not have known — or wanted — to take the class. When Ethnic Studies is offered as an elective as it is at Lowell, some non-minority students hesitate to take Ethnic Studies because of its reputation as a course that is unwelcoming to non-minority students. Freshman Isabella Dang, who takes Ethnic Studies, has white friends who asked her what the class teaches. “A few of them said that they were warned not to take this class because they’d feel discriminated against,” Dang said. “But Ethnic Studies isn’t a class where we [throw] shade on a race, it’s a class to learn about diversity and solidarity.” That learning extends even to minorities, especially for those who say they grew up in a bubble. San Francisco State University junior William Juarez, who studies at the only College of Ethnic Studies in the U.S., was raised in Los Angeles, where he saw only other Latinos, African-Americans and Koreans and did not personally experience racism. His studies in school reinforced his belief that racism did not exist: from elementary school to high school, he was taught that slavery was a benign institution and that slaves were paid. He was therefore reluctant to take Ethnic Studies. “I remember telling my roommate, a Latino Studies alumna, that I didn’t like the courses because I felt that racism was behind us now,” he said. The readings he did in Ethnic Studies changed his view completely. Especially impactful for Juarez was the poems of Gloria Anzaldua, a lesbian and Chicano scholar, whose work showed Juarez that he belonged in the Latino community despite being gay. “Ethnic Studies is critical because the curriculum provides the coursework and research to understand all our collective histories, better understand our present, and the possible implications for our future,” he said. Lowell freshman Kaitlyn Evangelista initially was reluctant to take Ethnic studies because it is an elective, but she quickly saw the value of the class. The course connects concepts such as systems of power and oppression to relevant current events like the water contamination crisis in the poor and minority communities of Flint, Michigan, as an example of environmental racism. “We talked about what people are experiencing and how
the government tried to cover it up, the way power can manipulate, and what the media hasn’t covered about the damaged water,” she said. The course also taught Evangelista the importance of being able to understand other people’s points of view. When watching the film Korla, which explores the life of a black man from Louisiana who passed as an Indian musician in the 1950s, Evangelista was first confused as to why the protagonist was denying his identity as a black man, but soon realized why. “In this period of time, a black man would experience discrimination, racism, and microaggressions,” she said. “Posing as an Indian man would allow him to live a better life.” With its ability to educate both nonminorities and minorities and help students come to terms with their own and others’ identities, Ethnic Studies is undoubtedly a valuable class. Therefore, Ethnic Studies must be mandatory. Some members of the SFUSD Board of Education are already looking into this possibility. The resolution passed in December 2014 that established Ethnic Studies at every SFUSD high school, including Lowell, states that in the 2020-2021 school year, legislators will determine if Ethnic Studies should be implemented as a graduation requirement. Although concerns were raised that a mandatory Ethnic Studies class could inhibit students from taking as many AP courses as they do now, the benefits of Ethnic Studies outweigh the costs. “We live in a world with lots of different people in it, and we need to learn to get along with them,” counselor David Beauvais said. “And APs are fine if you can take it, but if not, you can take it in college.” Nicole put it the best when she said, “The problem at Lowell is that people care more about taking APs, which really aren’t mandatory or necessary at all, rather than trying to learn about other people’s culture so that other people can feel welcome in an environment where they don’t.” Some people, like Ishibashi, recognize the benefit of having all students learn Ethnic Studies, but believe that the material should instead be incorporated into existing classes — much like the Plan Ahead activities for freshmen is an incorporation of the College and Career course into freshmen classes. However, doing so is unfair to Ethnic Studies. Incorporation will allow other material to overshadow Ethnic Studies material. “The problem with incorporating Ethnic Studies into history classes is that it won’t be focused on Ethnic Studies,” Nicole said. “It’ll be more focused on other things and it’ll stray away.”
Forty-six percent of students see segregation by race or ethnicity at Lowell during free blocks.
See ‘FINDING EQUITY’ on pg. 22
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LEONARD CAOILI
Dancers move with Momentum Top left: Dance Company performs “He Said She Said” at the ‘Momentum’ dance concert on April 15 in the Carol Channing Auditorium.
Top right: Junior Laura Rosas-Lara performs with the Dance Company to “Propinquity.” Bottom left: Sophomore Alayna Kwan poses while dancing to “All That Jazz.” Bottom center: Senior Laura Kennedy dances to “Propinquity.” Bottom right: The Dance Company performs to “Fight Song.”
Tobi Kawanami
LEONARD CAOILI
LEONARD CAOILI
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Who
run the field? Girls Flag football’s rookie season
By Jocelyn Lee
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Freshman Paola Dominguez wrestles through the Galileo Lions’ defenders in the game on March 9. Photo by Chris Hackett
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“I wanted to start the flag football team so girls could be a part of football too.”
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he girls huddle on the field and wrap their arms
around each other, talking quickly. They’re wearing similar hairstyles and hand-me-down jerseys from the girls’ basketball team. They break and seven of the girls get into position while the rest return to the sidelines to cheer on their teammates. This is what a typical game began with for the girls’ flag football team, the newest addition to Lowell athletics. The Cardinals also join a fairly new league in the city that started in 2012 with the Lincoln Mustangs, Mission Bears, Balboa Buccaneers, Burton Pumas and Galileo Lions. The league now has seven teams after Washington joined in 2015. Even though they lost their first match against the Mission Bears 36-12 on March 2, the girls were still proud. “We were able to score some points which I thought wasn’t going to happen,” junior Widya Batin said. “Our coach was really proud of us and said we exceeded his expectations by scoring two touchdowns.” The team’s passion and drive have been shown game after game. The second time the girls faced the Bears was on April 6,their final game, and the Lady Cardinals won 13-12 in overtime. This time the girls were much more comfortable and worked better together. They also had more time to work with their coaches and perfect their plays, so they felt more prepared. “We worked on keeping the other team’s score down by doing flag pulling drills, working offense versus defense to really get the plays down,” sophomore Yunah Smirnov said. From the very beginning the team has exceeded expectations. The girls finished the season with a record of 2-10 and tied for fifth place with the Washington Eagles and Mission Bears in the Academic Athletic Association (AAA) league. A Rough Start Batin, junior Tatianaevelyna Ahoia and junior Tsia Nicole wanted to be on a flag football team at Lowell since their freshman year but saw nothing come out of the petition they signed expressing interest in the team at the time. So Batin decided to take charge and passed around her own petition this year to restart the process. Athletic director Robert Ray said that she would need at least 16 names on her petition to prove that there was significant interest at school to get a team started. Commitment to the sport is crucial when starting a team because once a school joins the AAA league, that school’s team is included in the season’s schedule and is expected to attend all matches. So Batin scrambled to find the girls who had previously signed petitions expressing interest in the hopes of finally creating a team. “The beginning process was kind of weird, because it was student-run and we didn’t have anyone to support us,” she said. The team also needed practice space, uniforms and a coach since all teams need a leader and supervising adult at all practices and games. Becoming a coach is no easy task either as it requires many qualifications, such as CPR, First Aid and concussion certifications. Security guard Gwendolyn Hinkle stepped up after principal Andrew Ishibashi asked her if she was interested in coaching. After doing multiple online courses for weeks, she coached the team for a month and played a vital role in starting the team, according to Ray. Hinkle was replaced by Bill Winderoff, a flag football coach who is part of a league on Treasure Island. “Tsia and Widya came out [to Treasure Island]… and all of us in the Treasure Island league were so impressed with their initiative and drive to put together a team and seek a coach that I did my best to come out here and help,” Winderoff said.
CHRIS HACKETT
Junior Raina Serrano runs with the ball on the field in the game against the Galileo Lions on March 9.
Girls in Football The girls may have different reasons for joining the team, but they have one thing in common: their interest in the sport itself. “I always wanted to be a part of a football team but they said ‘If you’re a girl, you can’t really be part of the football team; you’ll just be a water girl if you want to be part of it,’” Batin said. “So I wanted to start the flag football team so girls could be a part of football too.” Girls have joined the football team in the past, but did not stay on the team for long. Senior Olivia Scott was on the football team in her freshman year as a running back and quarterback. Despite being on the team for only one season, she found it to be a rewarding experience. “It was fun and I really liked it and was pushed athletically… but sometimes the coaches didn’t know how to act around girls being on the team,” she said. Physical contact was a major factor that pushed Scott and other girls away from playing football. According to Scott, many football players were injured throughout the season. Scott’s concern about football injuries is justified. A study conducted in October 2013 by the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine revealed that high school students are twice as likely to sustain a concussion than college players in football games. The contact that some girls were worried about is reduced in flag football. They wear belts with flags on them and the flags are pulled in lieu of tackling each other and other rough contact, like blocks and tackles. Also, once a ball is dropped, it is considered dead rather than a
fumble so that players do not pile on each other trying to recover the ball. All other rules are the same as football, such as the four downs allowed before the ball changes position. Despite these differences from football, the girls realized that contact is inevitable. There were multiple injuries this season, like those sustained by freshman Susan Wong, who tore her anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) and had to be taken out of the game against the Galileo Lions. A Team Effort Some girls, like Smirnov, had prior football experience before she joined the team, but Smirnov still finds that playing flag football is a learning experience for her and all of the girls. They get the chance to rotate their roles until they find what works best for each player and the team as a whole, according to Smirnov. “It’s really interesting to learn together as we play together,” she said. “It’s a lot of work, that’s the way it’s been throughout the whole process, but I love pushing myself and knowing I was getting better with everyone else.” Practices are every day except Saturday and are run by head coach Winderoff as well as members of the varsity football team. Senior Tony Ahoia has helped the team since the beginning by teaching the girls plays similar to the ones he learned on the football team. “I wanted to get involved because I was really happy with my varsity football experience and I wanted to share my experience with the flag football team,” he said See FLAG FOOTBALL on pg. 20
The Lowell April 2016
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CIARA KOSAI AIDA IRVING
Spring into
Action
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The Lowell April 2016
CHRIS HACKETT
KELLEY GRADE
Clockwise from left: Swimming: Junior Anthony Tsatskin races in the 50 meter butterfly stroke race at Sava Pool against the Lincoln Mustangs on April 8. Softball: Sophomore pitcher and outfielder Kelly Lai winds up to pitch during the game against the the Balboa Buccaneers on March 15. Fencing: Senior Samantha Prado fences against the Urban Blues at home on April 7. Badminton: Freshman Cameron Ness returns the shuttlecock during the team’s victory over Burton on March 17.
LEONARD CAOILI
From LETTER FROM THE EDITORS on pg. 4 the San Francisco Unified School District. We did not choose to single out African
minority enrollment in the future. v
Americans and Latinos because their experiences are more important than those
of others. Although this article concludes this year’s Finding Equity series, we are committed to continued coverage of new developments on race at Lowell and will also work on related investigative pieces around
From FLAG FOOTBALL on pg. 17 early on in the season. “The girls have been really open to me and they’re a strong team... Because they’ve had so little time to practice it’s hard for the girls to memorize all these plays, but once they get that down things will get better.” The girls saw the effects of having little practice time in their game against the Galileo Lions on March 9. The Lions scored two touchdowns in the first quarter, and another two in the second quarter before Wong was injured and had to be taken out of the game. The Cardinals were able to intercept the ball during the fourth quarter, but lost the ball to the Lions who went on to score again and finish the game 33-0. The loss was tough, but the girls were ready to get back on the field and practice hard the next day. With drills and a lot of conditioning,
the girls got better and faster. “We started to work on it at practice bit by bit, snapping, blocking, and passing to create a better and complete team,” Smirnov said. The huge commitment and effort the team puts in started to pay off. The team scored points almost every game and won their first match against the Washington Eagles 19-18 in double overtime on March 23. “We won today [March 23] because we started using more passing plays that worked, and our receiving got better,” Smirnov said. Winderoff has seen the improvement too. Though the girls only practiced with him only three times before their first match, he has noticed progress since day one. “It’s been a long road to get the team in shape, but it’s been progressing exactly
as I anticipated,” he said. “It’s disappointing because they want to win games but there’s no way to win the games until you know what to do. The team has a lot of heart — they come out here fighting and they’re very enthusiastic and are a great bunch of people who are a lot of fun to coach. The drive and initiative they’ve shown in putting together a team is great, so if we can build a strong foundation then I suppose it will have been a successful season.” They went from a group of girls who just wanted a football team of their own to an ever-improving team with a proud head coach and a strong team bond. “At the end of the day this is still our team that we founded, and that’s a lot to be proud of,” Batin said. v
From FINDING EQUITY on pg. 13
according to Salazar. A joint panel, consisting of both alumni and students of color, would provide a personal view of discrimination at Lowell and bring words like “racism” to ground level for non-minority students. An annual event would help the community understand more intimately what minorities’ experiences at Lowell are really like. A recent recruitment event for Latino students demonstrated the weakness of a joint panel. The panel, consisting of students, alumni, counselors and current parents, was successful, according to Anderson. The honesty present in the panel encouraged parents to be equally candid, asking questions like “Is my child going to feel included here?” Understanding the reality of others’ experiences could decrease self-segregation at Lowell, allowing all students to feel more included. As it stands now, self-segregation is a real issue. According to our student survey about diversity, 46 percent of students see segregation by race or ethnicity at Lowell during free blocks and 43 percent when students choose their own seats and groups in class — both situations that occur when students are given choice on whom their companions are. With the addition of Ethnic Studies and an annual panel of minority students and alumni, students of all races will better understand the experiences of minorities, thereby increasing inclusion.
Moving closer to equity These attempts would only be the first of many steps that Lowell needs to be take to address racial issues. However, the truth of the matter is that racism exists beyond Lowell, San Francisco, and even America, and if we do not attempt to amend our faults now, then we enter a cycle of bigotry. For example, not not receiving an education on Ethnic Studies causes a lack of awareness in our youth, whose interactions with others are flavored with microaggressions, and who then grow up to be the leaders of our society and perpetuate the original lack of awareness. But what is crucial and commendable is that Lowell is playing its part to support its minority students, both by giving them direct support and by increasing the sensitivity of non-minority students. Recognizing that a problem exists is the first step to making amends — and moving closer to finding true equity. v
Why we need panels However, classroom instruction alone is not enough. Relating discrimination to the daily Lowell experience was done particularly well, recently, on two fronts. The first was when the BSU shared their experiences at City Hall and the Board of Education meeting, which led to student revelations that discrimination does occur at Lowell. It can be difficult to connect a concept or a distant event with daily life, according to Gomez. Gomez was therefore shocked by the discrimination at Lowell faced by her friend, senior Maya Bonner, who recounted her negative experiences at City Hall after the BSU walkout. “Her adversities really opened my eyes, even though as a Peer Leader, I’ve learned about cultural appropriation and such everyday,” Gomez said. “It was surreal.” The second was when Lowell alumni brought their stories to the Alumni of Color panel during Social Awareness Week. One Latino alumni was asked by her teacher if her black friends sold her drugs, another alumni reflected on the segregated seating in the cafeteria. Not only did the panel empower students who are going through the same experiences, but it also “educated other students about the way it feels like being on this campus and not seeing many people like you, even though you came from a middle school or a neighborhood where it is all people like you,” 22
v The Lowell April 2016
Luke Haubenstock, Whitney C. Lim, Amber Ly Editors-in-Chief
Ophir Cohen-Simayof, Whitney C. Lim and Rachel Schmidt contributed to this article.
From GREEN on pg. 2
cafeteria. According to Student Nutrition Director Zetta Reicker, SFUSD tested out an all-vegetarian day in middle and high schools two years ago. The number of students eating ended up dropping and there was “a lot of negative feedback.” When we asked in what specific way it was negative, there was no response. It is possible that the vegetarian lunches were not cooked in a way appealing to students, and were not unpopular simply because they did not contain meat. Nonetheless, it is still important to encourage students to eat with an environmentally conscious mindset. Meat, as compared to vegetables, requires more funding, heat energy, land, and water (2,400 gallons for one pound of beef, according to PETA) to be produced. In addition, a plant-based diet contains fewer saturated fats, and more vegetable matter, which leads to higher fiber levels
and a greater diversity of nutrients. Third, the plastic packaging of the cafeteria lunches made off site by Revolution Foods needs an overhaul. Recently, the San Francisco Chronicle reported that over the past few years, millions of SFUSD’s lunch trays had been going to landfills instead of recycling centers. It was later discovered that while the trays themselves are made of recyclable plastic materials, students were not cleaning the trays out because they were covered in food, and Recology was forced to send them to the landfill rather than recycling them. If the trays were solely made with paper, students could simply throw both the tray and their scraps into the compost. “You could really skip a step,” Melvin said. “And to me, anytime you can skip a step that’s smart.” According to SFUSD Director of Sustainability Nik Kaestner, when the
contract with Revolution Foods expires in a few years, the district will look further into changing the packaging but will have to consider costs as well as sustainability. Naturally, solving these issues begins with passionate community members who are willing to put in effort and improve their schools for good. According to Melvin, much of the school’s focus lies in other areas, especially for monetary reasons, so past environmental policies have been driven by those who were particularly dedicated to creating a more environmentally efficient school. It is key that students continue this forward-thinking behavior by educating themselves, speaking with the administration, and even calling out their friends for careless behavior. “It’s like the campaign on MUNI: if you see something, say something,” Melvin said. “And that doesn’t cost anything.” v
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Be Prepared! SUMMER COURSES
Calculus
Pre-Calculus
Algebra 1 & 2
Geometry
Description Upgrade Learning center has invited Mr. Karl Hoffman to teach the above summer math courses that are designed to help prepare students for the next year. Each course focuses in developing a strong foundation for our students by reviewing the prerequisite skills and introducing upcoming challenges. Arm yourself with knowledge and get ready for next year!
MR. HOFFMAN Lowell High School’s Teacher With 22 Years of Teaching Experience
www.upgradeteaching.com (415) 661 – 1225
In High School Mathematics
1443A Noriega Street San Francisco, CA 94122