Opinions “Senior expenses dent students’ wallets” pg. 4
THE
Life & Art “Get Lit highlights student poets” pg. 9
Matador
Volume 60, NUMBER 7
WEDNESDAY, MARCH 11, 2015
Features
“Run, Robert, Run!” pg. 12
S a n G a b r i e l H i gh S c h o o l
801 Ramona St., San Gabriel, CA 91776
www.thematadorsghs.com
Speech and debate team competes, wins accolades, advances to State
Photo courtesy of Roy Conli Photo by Kelly Ho
From left: Roy Conli raises his Oscar triumphantly with colleagues Chris Williams and Don Hall.
San Gabriel alumnus Roy Conli wins Oscar Annie Huang “You should not be afraid to dream, and you should not be afraid to chase that dream,” were among the inspirational words alumnus and producer of the Academy Award-winning film, Big Hero 6, Roy Conli said. Conli graduated from San Gabriel with the class of 1972, along with math teacher Nadyne Lapi. With an an Academy Award for Best Animated Feature, Big Hero 6 is the first Disney animated film to feature Marvel characters, or according to Conli, “Disney animation with DNA from Marvel.” The film premiered on Oct. 23, 2014 at the Tokyo International Film Festival, featuring the emotional relationship behind the origin of a team of superheros and the lovable learning robot, Baymax.
Conli attributes part of his success to a former theater teacher at San Gabriel, Dennis Reed, who passed away during the making of this film; Conli explained that, pertaining to Reed, one of the major themes of Big Hero 6 is that those who go before us are not lost, they live on through us. “[Reed] set me on a course for making sure that the work that I’m involved with is always the best,” Conli said. “It was he that was [the] key of inspiration for us all. He set a bar so phenomenal that I can’t celebrate that aspect of my education at San Gabriel High enough.” Although Conli has never taken a formal film course, he studied theater and history at Cal Poly Pomona. Conli recalls that one of the...
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Kelly Ho After months of rigorous practice and preparation, the Matador speech and debate team bustled their way onto the campus of California State University, Long Beach for one of the most important tournaments of the year—State Qualifiers—on Feb. 28. Students competed in their respective events in hopes of qualifying for the state championships in April. Out of 15 competitors, eight broke into the semi-final round: senior Eric Hong in Oratorical Interpretation (OI), juniors Carolina Garcia in OI, Andy Le in Dramatic Interpretation (DI), Kenny Yeung in Foreign Extemp (FX), sophomores Tom Cheah in FX, Dion Jiao and Joy Portinga in DI, and freshman Elaine Tran in DI. After the semi-final round, five advanced to the finals: Garcia, Hong, Le, Portinga, and Tran. Four of these finalists placed between first to sixth place and qualified for the state championships: Garcia, Hong, Le, and Portinga. Results from the tournament allowed the team to bring back their third sweepstakes trophy this year, a feat that Coach Andrew Nguyen did not expect considering the shift in team size that occurred in the past two years, where the team went from four active members to 54. continued on page 2
San Gabriel FBLA defeats two-time champion Gabrielino High School Ju s t i n To y o m i t s u Future Business Leaders of America (FBLA) students, returning from their annual section competition at Six Flags Magic Mountain, stepped into the San Gabriel parking lot holding shiny wooden plaques after their success at competition on Feb. 28. Out of the 102 San Gabriel students, 77 won plaques in 30 events, ultimately winning the sweepstakes with a lead of 32 plaques over second place winner Gabrielino High School. “[Our chapter] did extremely well this
year, since we took first against two-time champion Gabrielino High School,” adviser Qui Nguy said. “I think this is the first year [we’ve ever] taken first place in sweepstakes and in the Alhambra Unified School District in general.” The events varied from Insurance and Risk Management to Job Interview, and tested the students’ knowledge in various business-related subjects. “[Since part of the park] burned down, the competition was unorthodox this year,” senior Brian Choy said. “We had to go through the back side of Magic Moments Theater
and sat there with a clipboard during the test-off with 100 questions, one hour for each event.” Choy, who won first place in Cyber Security and second place for Computer Problem Solving, expressed his happiness during the award ceremony. “At first I didn’t think I would be called [for Computer Problem Solving], since I took it [because] I needed a second event and I didn’t expect to place, but I did and I was really surprised,” Choy said. “The second was Cyber Security, but this one I studied really hard on, and I felt really suc-
cessful when I was called up for first [place].” During the months prior to competition, students prepared by attending three mandatory study sessions after school and learning the material through self-study. “We have packets and books from Mr. Nguy to study from,” FBLA president senior Michelle Lok explained. Students who placed in the top five for their events are eligible to advance to the three-day State Leadership Conference in Santa Clara on April 9-12, where they will compete among contenders from all around California.
Photo courtesy of Nelson Luong/El Camino Real