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February 25, 2019
THE MERCURY | UTDMERCURY.COM
ATEC dean addresses student petition Concerns raised include large class sizes, lack of job market for graduates
NIKITA BANTEY | MERCURY STAFF
Eight of 10 Chartwells employees who spoke to The Mercury said they did not receive state-mandated food safety training in a timely manner.
chartwells workers allege lack of
FOOD SAFETY TRAINING Management claims all associates receive ongoing training during employment MEGAN ZEREZ Mercury Staff
F PAVAN TAUH | MERCURY STAFF
ATEC Dean Anne Balsamo said she is working to respond to the concerns students mentioned in the petition. ANNA SCHAEFFER Mercury Staff
A group of ATEC students created a petition raising concerns and complaints about their school. The group, called Concerned Students of ATEC, created a website and circulated the petition, calling attention to what it calls the “overall instability and irrelevance” of their school, according to a Feb. 6 press release. Founded in 2015, ATEC — the School of Arts, Technology and Emerging Communications — offers an undergraduate Bachelor of Arts degree through a program designed to teach students “foundational skills in media studies, cultural theory, computer programming and creative production,” according to the ATEC website. The circulating petition states this degree description is false advertising, and the website for Concerned Students of ATEC lists specific recommendations for its vision of the school. After her appointment as the inaugural dean of ATEC in 2016, Anne Balsamo developed a three-year plan to develop curriculum infrastructure, build culture and market ATEC to the DFW metroplex and the world. She said she understands where the students’ concerns come from and hopes to address their suggestions fully. "I’m excited about engaging these questions,” Balsamo said. “We’re on it, and it actually takes a little bit more behind-the-scenes to get where we want to get to, which is very much in line with what they want." Balsamo said the student petition provides feedback that will help her advocate for their needs to President Richard Benson and Provost Inga Musselman. She said it also shows her that students may not know what ATEC already offers. “There are things for me to clarify, things for me to explain, things for me to bring people up to date and maybe even things for me to suggest that they can do next that would really help the effort,” she said. Concerned Students of ATEC did not respond to requests for an interview, but primary concerns listed in the petition included too-large class sizes and courses dropped from curricula, restricting individual learning. “Design is the backbone of ATEC, and that curriculum has not been as carefully created as it needs to be,” Balsamo said. “It was like patchwork. So we took a step back — and this is part of the ‘dropping courses’ and larger course size — and putting in place kind of foundation courses, eliminating redundancy, which is why some courses went away.” ATEC revamped all sound design
→ SEE PETITION,
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ollowing student concerns about food safety, The Mercury obtained evidence that suggests many Chartwells workers did not receive state-mandated food safety training until earlier this month. In Texas, the certification is considered the responsibility of the employer and is typically administered through a third-party company and must be obtained within 60 days of hire. In a Jan. 16 interview, Chartwells’ Resident District Manager Steven Goodwin said he was unsure of the specific provider Chartwells utilized to certify employees. In a Jan. 23 email, a corporate spokesperson later said the UTD operation utilized a training company called ServSafe. The Mercury compiled a list of 101 Chartwells employees who were employed during the fall 2018 semester. When checked against a public database maintained by ServSafe, only 15 of the employees on the list held valid training certificates, 11 of whom were managers. Eighty-five of the 101 employees worked in jobs in which they were expected to handle food on a regular basis.
→ SEE FOOD HANDLER,
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ALESANDRA BELL | MERCURY STAFF
Student commemorates Parkland shooting victims Freshman paints Spirit Rocks on anniversary of shooting to honor friends killed in tragedy PATRICIA MATHU Mercury Staff
SOUJANYA BHAT | MERCURY STAFF
Political science freshman Katie Silverman painted the Spirit Rocks on the anniversary of the shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida.
A UTD student spent this Valentine’s Day honoring the lives of those lost in the Parkland, Florida shooting last year. Though Katie Silverman, a political science freshman, attended elementary and high school in Southlake, she went to middle school in Parkland. On Feb. 14, 2018, a gunman opened fire at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, killing 17 people. Last year, as a senior in high school, Silverman heard about the shooting dur-
ing class. Her mom picked her up from school that afternoon. “We both just started hysterically crying because we didn’t know what to do or what was going on,” she said. “This was the high school where my sister and I would have been.” She spent the rest of the night watching the numbers climb as more students were reported missing. “I was in a panic the whole time,” Silverman said. “I just kept reciting, ‘I’m going to know someone. I’m going to know someone.
→ SEE PARKLAND,
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Text to 911 available in Plano New platform to allow access to emergency services without placing phone calls MANSI CHAUHAN Mercury Staff
By the summer of 2019, residents of Plano will be able to text their 911 call center. The software upgrade will cost the city upwards of $350,000. The funding was first approved by the city council on Feb. 11, said Susan Rodriguez, a public information specialist for Plano Public Safety. “The text to 911 system has been in the works for a while, but there are only so many tech projects the city can handle at one time,” Rodriguez said. “It was proposed by the 911 center itself, but they have to go through a pretty strenuous process to get it on the budget.” Text to 911 is still not available in many areas across North Texas, including parts of Collin and Dallas
County. However, other large cities such as Houston and San Antonio do have the technology. Rodriguez said the existing 911 infrastructure, which was built in 1968, is based on traditional landline technology. “It takes a lot of funding to renovate it, which is the main reason the texting system is not yet widespread,” she said. Currently, people who are deaf or hard of hearing use a TTY, which is a telecommunication device for the deaf. It is a keyboard with an attached phone that allows for text communication over a phone line. The message is transcribed onto a teleprinter at the 911 call center or shows up on a digital monitor. “I think this is a move in the right direction,” said Milind Wadhwa, a finance junior and Plano resident. “There are so many dangerous situations where talking
out loud can just make it worse. This will prevent that from happening.” Kortney Sorrell, a community outreach coordinator for The Turning Point Rape Crisis Center, said the new 911 system will be especially useful for sexual assault and domestic violence cases. Perpetrators may become aggressive if they hear the victims talking, she said. “Overall, I think that victims of sexual assault and anything related to trafficking and domestic violence will all find this very useful,” Sorrell said. “The only downside is that only the big carriers like T-Mobile, Sprint, AT&T and Verizon will support it. People (who) either have a prepaid cell phone or don’t have a major carrier can’t take advantage of the service.” Once a 911 call center requests the text to
→ SEE 911,
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LOUISE NILLAS | MERCURY STAFF
Feb. 25, 2019 | The Mercury
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THE MERCURY UTDMERCURY.COM Volume XXXVIV No. 38
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Feb. 11 • A student reported his bicycle stolen on West Campbell Road at 12:41 p.m.
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Feb. 13 • A student reported their parking permit had been removed from their vehicle in Lot E at 7:26 p.m.
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Feb. 18 • Students reported that someone egged their patio door in Phase 8 of University Village at 11:35 p.m.
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Mailing Address 800 West Campbell Road, SU 24 Richardson, TX 75080-0688 Newsroom Student Union, Student Media Suite SU 1.601 The Mercury is published on Mondays, at two-week intervals during the long term of The University of Texas at Dallas, except holidays and exam periods, and once every four weeks during the summer term. Advertising is accepted by The Mercury on the basis that there is no discrimination by the advertiser in the offering of goods or services to any person, on any basis prohibited by applicable law. The publication of advertising in The Mercury does not constitute an endorsement of products or services by the newspaper, or the UTD administration. Opinions expressed in The Mercury are those of the editor, the editorial board or the writer of the article. They are not necessarily the view of the UTD administration, the Board of Regents or the Student Media Operating Board. The Mercury’s editors retain the right to refuse or edit any submission based on libel, malice, spelling, grammar and style, and violations of Section 54.23 (f ) (1-6) of UTD policy. Copyright © 2019, The University of Texas at Dallas. All articles, photographs and graphic assets, whether in print or online, may not be reproduced or republished in part or in whole without express written permission.
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Feb. 25, 2019 | The Mercury
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NEWS
UTD celebrates legacy of founding faculty member Holocaust survivor, retired physics professor who taught at university for 66 years passes away at age 94
UTD COMMUNICATIONS | COURTESY
Wolfgang Rindler (right) was a mathematician and physicist who taught at multiple universities, including Liverpool University and Cornell University, before teaching physics at UTD. ANIKA KOTARU Mercury Staff
Wolfgang Rindler, a professor emeritus of physics and one of the founding faculty members at UTD, passed away earlier this month on Feb. 8. He was 94. Rindler was born in Vienna, Austria in 1924 and fled to England from the Nazis in 1938 because of his Jewish ancestry. He received his bachelor’s and master’s degrees in mathematics at the
University of Liverpool before receiving his doctorate in mathematics with a focus on relativity from Imperial College London. He began teaching as a graduate student at the University of Liverpool in 1947 and continued teaching until his retirement. He taught at Cornell University during 1956 before coming to Dallas in 1963. Rindler gained recognition for coining the term “event horizon,” a key idea of general relativity that space and time are not separate concepts but are uni-
fied in four-dimensional space-time. Physics professor Mustapha IshakBoushaki worked with Rindler as a part of UTD’s Cosmology, Relativity and Astrophysics research group. “He was a very kind man and a very good friend,” Ishak-Boushaki said. “Of course, he was older than anyone I was working with, but he respects the ideas of others and keeps his own ideas as well.” Both professors collaborated on four papers from 2007 to 2010, which fo-
cused on misconceptions regarding papers published in the early 1980s about how the cosmological constant does not affect the deflection of light by a massive object. They discovered the constant does indeed affect the deflection of light. “He would always find a way to make a nice comment or observation. He would listen very well and encourage other ideas, but again, if he knew he was right on something, he would try to explain it,” Ishak-Boushaki said.
“He had a very collegiate way of working and was very humble.” Michael Kesden, an assistant professor of physics, also collaborated with Rindler on several occasions. “It’s just amazing, trying to encapsulate his career. He had a passion for a lot of different things, but he was mostly a mathematician and mostly understood the mathematical foundations of relativity,” Kesden said.
→ SEE RINDLER,
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7/11 to accept Comet Cash
ANNA PHENGSAKMUEANG | MERCURY STAFF
The Center for BrainHealth is conducting a 10-year study which involves testing calculated thinking strategies to expand the capacity of the human brain.
Center for BrainHealth conducts national study Research aims to unlock human brain’s potential by including over 120,000 participants in coming decade DULCE ESPINOZA Mercury Staff
The BrainHealth Project, a research study headed by UTD’s Center for BrainHealth, is confronting the challenge of enhancing the brain’s potential through a national study involving 120,000 people throughout the next 10 years. BrainHealth Project Leader Sandra Chapman said she and her team are trying to change the way people view their brains with this project. “Everyone right now has a lot of stigma and worry about their brain because they think about it as testing of IQ that’s fixed (and can’t be changed), but not, ‘What can I do to keep a men-
tal edge?’” Chapman said. “We’re going to change and turn on its head the way we look at our human brain.” The study is currently projected to reach 120,000 participants across the nation over the next 10 years, but Chapman said those estimates will increase. The project’s overview document also states that the main goal of the study is moving the focus of clinicians and scientists from general brain health to improving the brain’s potential. “We have the immense potential to keep our brain functioning stronger every single day,” Chapman said. “I think, for me as a cognitive neuroscientist, one of the most surprising things is that compared to other aspects of our health, the brain is the only part of
our body that we only focus on when something goes wrong.” Recent studies regarding brain health have shown that carefully designed tactical thinking strategies, when combined with lifestyle changes, have the potential to drastically enhance the capacity of brains, according to the project overview. The study aims to determine which training patterns work best when it comes to improving the brain’s performance. Chapman said the study will test brain measures, cognitive measures, psychological well-being, the complexity of what people are tackling in everyday life and social connectedness. “I think that it’s going to be a very big explosion for what can happen out of UTD,” Chapman said. Chapman said the study attracted
partners from major institutions such as Stanford, MIT, Harvard and UC Berkeley. She said initially she wasn’t confident that UTD would be able to lead the project when it started attracting east coast institutions such as Johns Hopkins and Harvard but was surprised when each of the institutions chose UTD to lead the study. She said for her, the most exciting part is removing the societal stigma surrounding brains and brain health. “It is going to transform humanity,” Chapman said. “To be the best version of yourself and to make sure our brain gets better and better every year instead of thinking in this limited way about the most amazing engine that was ever created — it’s exciting.”
Earlier this month, the 7/11 store at Northside began accepting Comet Cash as a form of payment. Paulina Schleppenbach, the director of the Comet Card office, said UTD students now have the option of putting Comet Cash into a general account — via the GET portal — and using that money both at on-campus vendors and select offcampus vendors. Schleppenbach said it is important to distinguish between meal money and Comet Cash, both of which are tied to Comet Cards. “Students also can have a meal plan and have meal money and swipes to enter into the dining hall,” she said. “Those students cannot swipe or cannot purchase anything at 7/11, if they don’t have Comet Cash. The meal money is separate from the Comet Cash.” Schleppenbach said the off-campus merchant program began at the end of 2015. By the end of 2016, the program had three vendors — The Halal Guys on South Central Expressway, Corner Bakery Café and Chipotle on Campbell Road. The most recent vendors to join the program — in addition to the 7/11 at Northside — are Snappy Salads on Campbell Road and American Tap Room at Northside. Schleppenbach said both vendors and students benefit from the program. “(The students) are able to use other locations outside campus,” Schleppenbach said. “The purpose of the program was to expand the services of the card and give the students more options.” Schleppenbach said her office is updating its website and marketing and that she is hopeful for more outside merchants joining the program in the near future. “We always welcome any suggestions of vendors outside campus that come from students that might be interested in using the card at those locations,” Schleppenbach said. “We will be more than happy to forward those leads to our outsource contract and see, hopefully, if they’re fine for the program.”
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LIFE&ARTS
Feb. 25, 2019 | The Mercury
Q&A: Ben Orlin Former instructor combines math with witty illustrations
FORGING NEW TRADITIONS Students join local resident in placing small trinkets around campus
PAVAN TAUH | MERCURY STAFF
Orlin published his book, “Math with Bad Drawings,” in September 2018.
Ben Orlin is the author and illustrator of the blog Math with Bad Drawings, which was launched in 2013. He recently published a collection of cartoons called “Math with Bad Drawings: Illuminating the Ideas That Shape Our Reality.” The book uses humor and popular culture to contextualize math for its audience. The Mercury sat down with Orlin when he visited UTD for a talk at the Mathematical Sciences Colloquium, “The Unlikely Friendship between Science and Math,” on Feb. 13 and discussed both his blog and his book. Do you have your own hypothesis as to how your blog got so popular? I think there’s a certain amount of randomness to anything that gets popular on the internet. I know that visuals are very important for teaching math and talking about math. I also knew that I couldn’t draw, so I explored other options for a while. I thought about asking a friend to illustrate the blog, I thought about doing photographs or something and wound up deciding that basically it was going to be too inefficient to try to get anyone else to illustrate it, so I was going to have to do it myself. And then at that point I needed to have a very upfront disclaimer as to how bad the drawings were, so that’s where the title came from. Would you have any tips for college students who are struggling with math? I think every experience that a student has in a class is kind of individual and unique, so the best thing you can do is try to draw upon the teacher who’s a person there in the classroom for you who’s there to bear witness to whatever your particular successes and struggles are. Trying to develop a relationship with the teacher and going to them during office hours with questions is probably the No. 1 thing that’s useful across all subjects. And then the other advice I would have would basically be aware of some of the obstacles that can crop up particularly in math. About struggle and failure, why do you think it feels so bad to fail at a math test? There is something about mathematics where … there is kind of a black and white quality to mathematical truth. But there isn’t a black and white quality to mathematical thinking — mathematical thinking can be just as rich and varied and have all different directions and different elements to it. I think because mathematical work is often graded in this black and white way, we have this impression that our thinking is either purely right or purely wrong when it almost never is. How long does it usually take you to come up with a post? It depends. I tend to have a whole junkyard of half-baked ideas. I’ve got a few random documents with scraps and pieces and a paragraph that might grow into an idea. But working on books is taking up more of my time. There’s more stuff in early stages of completion that I haven’t seen through to the end … back when I was doing a post a week and really diligently doing a post a week I feel like anywhere from, if I was in a real rush on a Tuesday night like an hour or two, to something I could poke at for hours and hours.
→ SEE MATH,
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Virgil, who often leaves small toys around campus, drapes a scarf around the bust of Cecil H. Green.
STORY BY: EMAAN BANGASH | MERCURY STAFF PHOTOS BY: MEGAN ZEREZ | MERCURY STAFF
Throughout the year, small decorations can be seen on the Cecil H. Green bust on the side of Green Hall. Behind the decor is a Richardson resident who said he hopes to make passersby smile with his trinkets. Virgil, a local resident who does not use a last name, said he started putting up figurines and toys in various places around campus three years ago. He took a Zurg figurine he found at a car wash and put it up in his local Starbucks. Virgil said he is unaffiliated with UTD but often passes through campus whenever he plays Pokemon Go. He said he doesn’t remember when he started putting things up around UTD, but he started by placing rubber ducks in the reflection pools of the mall. “It was just harmless fun and it makes people smile,” Virgil said. “That’s why I do it.” Neuroscience freshman Rohini Kallianpur said she would walk by Green’s bust on the way to different activities during her time at UTD completing the Clark Summer Research Program in the summer of 2018. She said she was inspired by the little trinkets on Green’s bust such as Mardi Gras beads and began placing toys of her own on the bust. Virgil said they met in August 2018 on the UTD subreddit and became friends from there. “It was really cute and quirky, and I felt like since our campus is really young, it could be the kind of thing that’s a tradition,” Kallianpur said. “Those are the kinds of things you see happening where 40 years from now, (it’s like) ‘Oh my gosh, everyone puts stuff up by Cecil.’” Virgil said he gets the objects he places around campus from garage sales or thrift stores and places them around campus at random times and locations. He said he sees other items put up on the bust, such as candy or cups. “One time, I went by Cecil and there were five things up and only one of them was mine,” he said. “Other people, and this was before (Kallianpur) was a student, had gotten involved. I do it religiously.”
→ SEE TRADITIONS,
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Two cultures blend in border valley region
chinese new year EMAAN BANGASH Mercury Staff
MEDHA SOMISETTY | MERCURY STAFF
Psychology senior Nicole Cavazos (left), interdisciplinary studies junior Erick Castillo (center) and computer science junior Ansel Krauss transferred to UTD from University of Texas Rio Grande Valley. ANNA SCHAEFFER Mercury Staff
For UTD students who hail from the Rio Grande Valley — the region that defines the border between the United States and Mexico — the prospect of a reinforced border wall hits close to home.
On Feb. 14, President Trump announced he would sign a spending bill that would allow the government to remain running, but he also declared he would use executive power to declare a national emergency that would allow for
→ SEE BORDER,
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Chinese New Year is an extremely important holiday for Chinese people and is celebrated worldwide. It’s based on the Chinese lunar calendar, which existed since 14th century B.C., and lasts about 15 days, from the end of January to the end of February. Each year is represented by one of 12 animals which rotate every year in a cycle that lasts 12 years. This year was Year of the Pig, which is the 12th animal in the cycle and symbolizes wealth, compassion and generosity. The celebration itself is characterized by an emphasis on spending time with family, indulging in feasts and making way for good luck in the coming year. This time, my fellow Chew Crew
member Marco Salinas and I visited Kirin Court, a local Chinese restaurant, to celebrate Chinese New Year with the Malaysian Family Club, a cultural group that caters to Malaysians in Texas. The demographic is quite diverse, as Malaysia consists of mostly Malays, Chinese, Indians and other indigenous peoples. Malaysian Chinese people make up the largest portion of overseas Chinese people in the world. However, since Malaysia is so multicultural, people from the Malaysian Family Club often celebrate traditions and holidays beyond Chinese New Year, including celebrations such as Eid for Muslims and Diwali for Hindus. At Kirin Court, the banquet hall was filled with the color red, and everyone who attended wore some kind of red in their
→ SEE CHINESE,
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SPORTS
Feb. 25, 2019 | The Mercury
men's Basketball takes asc title
Team brings home championship victory for first time since 2014 season CINDY FOLEFACK Managing Editor
The men’s basketball team became fourtime ASC champions after taking home an 88-74 victory against Hardin-Simmons University in the final game of the conference. The Comets competed in three games from Feb. 21-23, where they earned double-digit wins against McMurry University, Concordia University-Texas and Hardin Simmons. The victories mark the first time since 2014 that men’s basketball has taken the title and hosted the tournament. The Comets’ first game of the tournament saw the team trailing behind McMurry, who had an eight-point lead by halftime, leaving the score at 39-31 until the Comets made a comeback in the second half for a final score of 99-63. Junior guard Dimitrius Underwood finished with eight rebounds in the second half of the game, earning himself a double-double with a total of 10 rebounds and 19 points for the game. Sophomore forward Michael Forster followed closely behind Underwood, earning 13 points for the team in the second half, with a total of 18 points for the game. The Comets also saw a jump in their three pointers after going 0-for-8 in the first half, and their free throw percentage increased to 81 percent in the second half for a quarterfinal victory. Head coach Terry Butterfield said going into the remainder of the Comets’ conference games, the team would decide how the season would turn out. “This is a special moment when the team has a chance to compete for the conference championship, so it’s really up to the players
to rise to the occasion to do the things that we need to do to be successful,” Butterfield said. “The longer I’m in coaching, the more I realize that it’s all about the will of the team, and I think we showed a strong will in the second half tonight, and I think that this ride is all up to them.” The Comets earned another second half win against Concordia, where a jump in three pointers and free throws pushed the team to an 88-69 win. Junior guard Jalen Weber led the first half with 12 points and five assists. The team held a tight 40-38 lead at halftime. Forster led the second half with 16 points. Underwood finished the second half with eight rebounds, earning another double-double with 15 total rebounds and 21 points for the game. Weber and Forster also led with points, earning 24 and 22 for the game, respectively. During the tournament, Underwood broke UTD’s single-season scoring and rebound records, earning 593 points and 279 rebounds. Both records were previously held by former forward Kyle Schleigh in the 2012-2013 season, where he earned 578 points and 266 rebounds. Underwood said he attributes these achievements to his teammates. “The floor has so much more space when you’ve got guys who can knock down shots and make plays,” Underwood said. “They really make the game easier for me and it just comes naturally.” The Comets faced off against HardinSimmons for the championship game, where UTD ended the first half with a sixpoint lead for a score of 38-32 at halftime.
Underwood led the game with 24 points and 10 rebounds, earning himself a doubledouble in all three games of the tournament, a feat that earned him Most Valuable Player after the team’s win. Underwood and Weber each went 6-for-6 in free throws in the second half, where the team made 22 out of 24 free throws. The team scored 50 points in the second half for a final score of 88-74. Heading into the team’s second match with Concordia, Butterfield said win or lose, he hoped the players would enjoy their time on the court. “Working hard together toward a common goal is the essence of team sports, and I love the heart and the character of our guys. They’re not only great students, they’re great athletes — they’ve got great priorities, they’re a lot of fun to be around.” Butterfield said. “I want our guys to really embrace the moment and enjoy the experience they’re having together because not everybody has this.” With the team hosting for the first time in five years and claiming a double-digit victory, Butterfield said the support from friends and family in the stands helped motivate the players. “(The players) want to be under the bright lights, they want to be in front of people — that’s how they see themselves,” Butterfield said. “They all want to be champions, and there’s a golden opportunity that lies ahead of them, and I think to be able to lift a trophy and cut a net would be the thrill of a lifetime for these guys.” Additional reporting by Dulce Espinoza
PAVAN TAUH | MERCURY STAFF
Junior guard Dimitrius Underwood attempts to score against McMurry University in the ASC quarterfinals.
PAVAN TAUH | MERCURY STAFF
The Comets won 99-63 against McMurry University.
SAMANTHA LOPEZ | MERCURY STAFF
PAVAN TAUH | MERCURY STAFF
Junior forward Jordan Castillo shoots a basket.
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COMICS
Feb. 25, 2019 | The Mercury
VAPE TRICKS
LATE NIGHT CATS
SARAH BESSERER| MERCURY STAFF
CRUISIN’ LIKE ROYALTY
BIANCA DEL RIO | MERCURY STAFF
EUNJEE CHONG | MERCURY STAFF
OFFICAL GAMER (TM)
TWO UNDERGRADS IN A TRENCHCOAT
JENNA CHERREY | MERCURY STAFF
OLIVER & BLUE: BED SHARING
SARAH STREETY | MERCURY STAFF
VENTI WATER, PLEASE
ELIZABETH NGUYEN | MERCURY STAFF
GENIE IN A BOTTLE
CHIAMAKA MGBOJI | MERCURY STAFF
V BIKES ARE EVERYWHERE
CAROLINA ALVAREZ | MERCURY STAFF
KEATON NATIONS | MERCURY STAFF
Feb. 25, 2019 | The Mercury
NEWS
→ PETITION
CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1
courses last year, including those teaching audio playback and sound mixing equipment, but that meant classes could not be offered in sound design during the transition period. Additionally, a new user experience and user design lab is now up and running but has not yet been integrated into the curriculum. Balsamo said the school had to comply with the university’s mandate on course sizes, and ATEC is still in the process of building up its faculty to teach advanced courses. “It’s part of the growth of ATEC that is absolutely top priority,” she said. “That’s the message that I will want to talk with students at the town hall about.” The student petition also expressed concern about job availability for ATEC students fol-
lowing graduation. On a Reddit post about the petition, one commenter wrote that the inability to specialize in a topic contributes to the difficulty many ATEC graduates experience when it comes to finding a job. Balsamo said the school is currently performing market research on job availability for ATEC graduates who have different kinds of design expertise. “I need to make sure we’re matching what we’re doing with what jobs are out there,” she said. Recommendations from the petition website also included the creation of an Industry Advisory Council to draw feedback from industry professionals on the relevance of ATEC course content. ATEC launched an Industry Advisory Board in September of 2018 and continues to invite and confirm members of the board. Concerned Students of ATEC
also requested the development of a Dean’s Advisory Council composed of students. “There’s a structure for an Advisory Council that is not on my plate to start,” Balsamo said. “It’s on the students to self-organize. No one will resist it, but if I were to pick the people it would only be those who I know.” She said ATEC graduate students recently formed a Graduate Student Council with elected officers, a group that has already advocated for change in the school. “I take (the concerns) seriously and these are very thoughtful suggestions,” Balsamo said. “What I’m hoping is those who are concerned could come to the town hall and we can discuss them more broadly.” The upcoming town hall meeting will take place March 28 at 11 a.m. in the ATEC lobby. All students and faculty are welcome to attend and discuss concerns.
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OPINION
Feb. 25, 2019 | The Mercury
— LETTER TO THE EDITOR —
Recent op-ed inconsistent with position on open discourse ALEXANDER CHRISTIE Contributor I organized and supervised the Steven Crowder event on Jan. 22 and thought it went quite well. Outside of a couple of protestors, I think a lot of students would agree with me. One such protestor was Nicholas Provenghi, who wrote an op-ed in the Jan. 28 issue of The Mercury titled “Steven Crowder harms debate: Change my mind.” I would hate for his article to be the main takeaway from our event, so I hope to respond to some complaints that he and other protestors raised and engage in a little
discourse of my own. First, many wonder why we invited Steven in the first place, a question that has been lobbed at my organization since the previous time he was here. The answer to this is simple. Almost every student organization tries to bring speakers occasionally to gather interest to their respective organizations, and many of these speakers charge high fees. When we invite Steven Crowder here to film his “Change My Mind” videos, it doesn’t cost us a penny, but it also generates a substantial amount of student interest in our weekly meetings. Second, some have said that hosting an event centered on a debate about a border wall is racist or xenophobic since UTD is a very diverse campus.
This view is untenable. Had Crowder gone to a predominantly white campus to talk about building a wall, the accusation would have been that the students he was interviewing would not be diverse enough. They cannot have it both ways, and the way I see it, UTD’s diversity probably led to more interesting responses. Third, there is the accusation that Steven Crowder is simply too provocative to contribute anything positive to the UTD student body. While it is Crowder’s job to make hot-button issues such as gun ownership or combatting illegal immigration interesting and digestible for people on the internet, that has not endangered quality discourse on our campus. In fact, I would
suggest it has led to more meaningful and higher quality conversations on campus. UTD often seems like a relatively apolitical school, so it can be difficult to gauge what students think of these issues. That is one of the reasons why it is useful to bring someone like Crowder here intermittently. It helps give a snapshot of what students think about divisive issues, whether in the event itself or the coverage following it. UTD is filled with bright students, so I expect that a lot of students can give substantive responses to whatever view Crowder chooses to articulate. If you think I’m wrong, come to a UT Dallas College Republican meeting and change my mind.
The price of interference Why U.S. intervention in Venezuelan politics promotes imperialism
MARCO SALINAS Mercury Staff Juan Guaido, who did not receive a single vote in Venezuela’s elections, swore himself in as president of Venezuela on Jan. 23. Guaido’s declaration follows the controversial elections in May 2018. The elections were originally scheduled for December but were pushed up to May. In response, United States officials rejected the re-election of President Nicolas Maduro. In recent days, coverage of Venezuela has been decidedly anti-Maduro, but this coverage fails to see the issues deeply embedded in the Venezuelan opposition. Guaido did not participate in the May 2018 elections. However, both the United States and the European Parliament recognize Guaido as the leader of Venezuela. According to a report from The New York Times, the U.S. State Department has even given Guaido control over U.S. bank accounts of the government of Venezuela. This interference from the U.S. and E.U. jeopardizes the sovereignty of Venezuela and should be stopped. Under Hugo Chavez, Maduro’s predecessor, Venezuelan oil fields that were previously operated by American companies ExxonMobil, ConocoPhillips and Chevron were nationalized, boosting the Venezuelan economy. Maduro was Chavez’s chosen successor, with Chavez urging voters to vote for Maduro if Chavez were to die. Since Chavez’s passing, Maduro has maintained many of Chavez’s policies, including keeping Venezuelan oil reserves in Venezuelan hands. It is no coincidence that Guaido, in communications via an envoy, has shown a desire to privatize these oil reserves, al-
lowing for American companies to return. Guaido’s communications with the U.S. encourage political and military intervention to further transfer power to Guaido. In late January, the Trump administration placed oil sanctions on Venezuela to further damage Venezuela’s hurting economy, stirring political unrest. But Venezuela is not our enemy. President Maduro is not a threat. Under both Chavez and Maduro, Venezuela gave hundreds of millions of gallons of heating oil to homeless shelters, households in poverty and indigenous people in a program that lasted from 2005 to 2017. After Hurricane Katrina, President Chavez donated a million barrels of oil and $5 million to the relief effort. But beyond these issues, there are problems with the anti-Maduro opposition that are hardly recognized in American media. Chavistas, the term for supporters of Chavez and politicians similar to him, are often stereotyped as being poor, uneducated and dark-skinned. In 2017, during anti-Maduro protests, Orlando Jose Figuera was burned alive by opposition protestors for being a suspected Chavista. Figuera was black. To interfere with Venezuela’s elections by recognizing Guaido as president is to delegitimize the democracy of a country that has helped Americans in tangible ways. But to profit off a change in regime and the destabilization that comes with it is sinister. UTD is a diverse and understanding community that should see Venezuela as a country that has been damaged by American interference, not one that can be helped by it. The U.S. has previously used official recognition of illegitimate rulers for personal gain. In 1952, Fulgencio Batista staged a coup three months before the Cuban elections. Despite there being no election, the U.S. recognized Batista as the president of
ALESANDRA BELL | MERCURY STAFF
Cuba. By the late 1950s the U.S. owned a significant portion of Cuban industries. President John F. Kennedy recognized this in a 1960 speech. “At the beginning of 1959,” Kennedy said, “U.S. companies owned about 40 percent of the Cuban sugar lands, almost all the cattle ranches, 90 percent of the mines and mineral concessions, 80 percent of the utilities and practically all the oil industry and supplied two-thirds of Cuba's imports.” The U.S. has made the mistake of interfering in foreign elections for economic gain before. We should remember the one-sided profit and instability that comes with it. One way we can help the citizens — specifically working class people — of Vene-
zuela is to better understand the complexities of the issues surrounding Venezuela. It’s also important to remember that most voices from Venezuela heard in the west are the voices of privileged Venezuelans, not those of the working class or marginalized. U.S. imperialism has many faces and we should know all of them. Supporting any kind of intervention in Venezuela is supporting imperialism. We have seen the tensions that emerge from imperialist attitudes in our own communities. Don’t mistake American interference for American generosity. Imperialism manifests itself in several ways, and it’s on us as students in a community that values diversity to detect the differences.
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Feb. 25, 2019 | The Mercury
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clothing. Red symbolizes prosperity and happiness and is often emphasized in clothing and decorations during the New Year celebrations. We ate a traditional Chinese New Year dinner, which consisted of a full, eight-course meal. I wasn’t used to anything beyond three courses, and it turned out that the portion size of each course was small enough that you could eat a few bites of each dish without getting full too quickly. The meal itself consisted of crab meat and seafood soup, jellyfish and fried shrimp balls, beef tenderloin in red wine sauce, Hong Kong-style prawns, roasted quail, mixed seafood and vegetables, stir-fried flounder with greens, fried rice and — my personal favorite — sliced oranges.
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Virgil said he posts photos of the objects he puts up on his Instagram under the username “virgils_visuals” and started posting photos of those put around UTD in March 2018. Kallianpur created an Instagram in October 2018 called “utdcecilgreen” where she exclusively posts pictures of Green’s bust. “I think it’s definitely the one that students walk by,” Kallianpur said. “It’s definitely the one that you notice.” Virgil continues his project around
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Between the feedback that you’ve gotten for your book and on your blog, is there any feedback that stands out to you? Any favorite things that readers have said? I think the most meaningful feedback I ever got was, it was the fifth or sixth post on the blog called, “What it feels like to be bad at math,” which was just an essay about a math class that I struggled in. That was sort of the first post from the blog that went a little bit viral and started getting passed around on Facebook and … an editor at Slate was really nice and saw it and asked if I wanted to have it reposted at Slate, where it reached a much wider audience than it would have otherwise. And actually, just seeing the comments on that, cause
I couldn’t eat a handful of the dishes because I eat zabiha halal meat, but I indulged in all the seafood that was new to me. The crab meat and seafood soup tasted distinctly like egg drop soup and was creamy and chunky with bits of fish in it. The jellyfish had the texture of zucchini noodles and tasted like sweet chow mein, but I couldn’t eat more than a bite because I was slightly off-put by the fact that I was literally eating tentacles. My favorite savory dish was actually the stir-fried flounder, which turned out to be a crispy, bony flounder fillet with stir-fried bits of flounder on top. Despite my fear of eating fish bones, the crispy bones underneath were the best part of the dish. Marco and I doused them in red chili sauce, and they tasted like spicy potato chips. During the meals, members of the
Malaysian Family Club performed several dances including the famed lion dance — not to be confused with the dragon dance, which is performed by multiple people in a large dragon costume held together with poles. The lion dance mimics the movements of a lion and is said to bring good luck and prosperity. This time, there were two lions that interacted with one another on stage and throughout the hall. The dance was accompanied by thunderous drums and cymbals that played to the rhythm of the lion’s steps. There was something enchanting about seeing people from so many different cultures celebrating the same tradition. Some people I spoke to there weren’t Chinese or Malaysian. It goes to show that holidays and celebrations aren’t just reserved for people of one culture.
other places on campus by placing trinkets on trees and against campus buildings. He said he also decorates bus stop signs to amuse bus drivers. “They never really know what I’m going to put up,” Virgil said. “One of the bus drivers, she wanted me to put penguins on her bus, and I did.” Today, two small figurines of SpongeBob and Patrick can be found under a staircase in ATEC. A Snoopy ornament hangs on one of the trees near the SU. Virgil said he sometimes attaches small magnets to figurines he finds and sticks them to metal surfaces around campus.
“One of my first attempts in ATEC was when I had something glued to a magnet that I put on a second-floor eye beam, and it lasted about a day or two,” Virgil said. He said he made acquaintances with students on campus and gives them trinkets to put up around campus and in classrooms. Virgil said none of his decorations are damaging or permanent. “If (UTD says) stop, then I would stop. I’m not here to create a problem,” he said. “Or if they see some old creepy guy wandering around campus putting things in trees, they’re like, ‘Ok, we know who that is, it’s no big deal.’”
almost universally the way people responded was to share their own story of mathematical struggle … was really cool that felt like something that I had blundered into, but that piece of writing, which was sort of hard for me to write, had made it easier for other people to share the same experience and had kind of unlocked that for people. That was, I think, much more than a piece full of jokes that makes people laugh — it’s nice to make people laugh, but there’s a lot of things out there that are funny, and so having something that, yeah, that opened up a conversation that people otherwise might not have had about a painful experience that now they were able to revisit maybe with more sympathy for their own past, struggling self — I think that was probably for me the most memorable and potent experience of feedback.
Coming up, do you have anything in the works? Is there anything to look forward to? Yeah! I’ve got a second book, same publisher, coming out called “Change is the Only Constant,” which is about calculus, so if you liked to read a synthetic experience, I think that was a couple years ago. I sort of write about calculus through stories. It has a little bit of a book of lost folklore, anecdotes, some of them from the history of calculus, some from literature. Authors like Tolstoy and Borges and Foster Wallace have all drawn on ideas of calculus and they’re fiction and so kind of weaving together — it’s sort of a humanistic approach to calculus. But very much in the spirit of the first book.
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the construction of a border wall. The Rio Grande Valley includes the southernmost tip of Texas and would constitute a significant portion of the border wall. Erick Castillo, an interdisciplinary studies junior, lived in a small town called Los Fresnos just outside the border of Brownsville before moving to Dallas. He enrolled in an earlystart high school program that partnered with the University of Texas Rio Grande Valley, the Mathematics and Science Academy, where the parking lot stood immediately next to the border fence erected during the George W. Bush administration. “Sometimes I’d park my car right next to the wall, and sometimes you’d see the border patrol driving on the levy next to the river,” Castillo said. “Nobody really gave it a second thought.” Castillo said most of his friends are first-generation students from homes with parents who had just come to the U.S. Los Fresnos is a rural, majority Hispanic town, and many students who hold American citizenship at the local Brownsville high school live on the other side of the border because their parents have Mexican citizenship. “I think it will make those kids feel like outsiders, having to cross through a very obvious barrier,” he said. “They already drive across a bridge and are checked by the official border patrol every time they want to go to class, but I think having a physical wall there will make them feel alienated, like they’re
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“I think he will always be recognized as one of the founders of this university from an academic perspective. He will be seen as an inspiration to current and future students.” In 1963, UTD was a private research organization known as the Graduate Research Center of the Southwest. One of Rindler’s
more visitors than home even though they’ve studied in the U.S. their whole life.” Psychology senior Nicole Cavazos spent parts of her childhood in both Brownsville and Monterrey, Mexico. She said the Valley is a mixture of American and Mexican cultures, and she had a number of friends who cross the border every day for school. “I knew a friend who would cross the border every day from Matamoros on foot, and it’s such a normal thing,” she said. Ansel Krauss, a computer science junior, transferred to UTD in August 2018 from UTRGV. He spent his childhood in Mexico until 2011, when he moved to the Rio Grande Valley. He received his Green Card last June, but he said the five-year-long process was nerve-wracking. Krauss said he never encountered any serious violence on either side of the border. Both Cavazos and Castillo said their hometown on the border was diverse and safe, with coexisting subcultures that mixed Mexican and American traditions. “I have never experienced the dramatic crime that they talk about in the media in all of my years growing up there,” Castillo said. “With all my friends and siblings and cousins, I’ve never known anybody who’s had interaction with crime because we’re living near the border.” According to reports by the FBI, the Rio Grande Valley is “extremely safe.” Brownsville was the safest metropolitan area in Texas in 2015. In the past decade, crime rates in the
Rio Grande Valley have been far lower than the U.S. average. Castillo said the money for a border wall could be better used to improve the medical disparities of the Rio Grande Valley, where the two main hospitals are nearly a two-hour drive apart from one another. Cavazos said federal investment in the Rio Grande Valley, where budget cuts began to feel routine, could go to the education system. “A lot of people would’ve loved to stay in the Valley, like my brother, but were forced to leave because of school, would have stayed if there would be more investment in education,” she said. “I think the Valley is a lovely place to grow up and live, but the public education system could improve a lot. That’s why I … did not finish high school in a public school.” Cavazos said she’s often asked about gangs and violence when people find out her hometown sits at the border. “Everyone thinks there are gangs everywhere and its unsafe, and I’m taken aback,” she said. “It’s a normal city with mixed cultures but it’s as safe as (UTD).” Nearly all of Cavazos’ extended family lives in Mexico, in Monterrey and Baja California, and she travels numerous times per year to visit them. She said the border wall proposed by President Trump would change her hometown tangibly but also intangibly. “I feel like you’d be splitting families, like the Berlin Wall,” she said. “It would feel the same way. There’s no us and them. In the Valley, it feels like we’re all the same people.”
friends, Ivor Robinson, the head of the Division of Mathematics and Mathematical Physics and another founding member of the research center, offered Rindler a position teaching mathematics, relativity theory and cosmology. In 1969, when the center became what is now UTD, he published his first undergraduate textbook, “Essential Relativity: Special, General, and Cosmological.” In 1984, he co-
wrote and published the first volume of “Spinors and Spacetime,” and in 2001, “Relativity: Special, General, and Cosmological.” Other than textbooks, Rindler also published multiple papers in The American Journal of Physics. Rinder taught UTD students for 66 years before retiring in 2013. He is survived by his wife, Linda, his daughter, Cynthia and his two sons, Eric and Mitchell.
Feb. 25, 2019 | The Mercury
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The Mercury also spoke to 10 current and former Chartwells employees across campus about their onboarding and training process. The employees spoke on the condition of anonymity, citing concerns over reprisal. Only two of the 10 said that they received any formal food safety training within 60 days of their hire date, as required by state law. Five others had recently completed training through a different company but only after the 60-day window, according to official hire dates and food handler licenses obtained by The Mercury. All five remained uncertified for several months after the state deadline. The certificate, which employees earn after completing a twohour training course, is required by state law of any person who handles unpackaged food. Bill Alsup, the director of Richardson’s health department, said while much of the course material is common sense, the training provides an important standard in preventing issues like cross-contamination and foodborne illness. “There’s a lot of confusion, especially with gloves, for example,” Alsup said. “People think, ‘Well, as long as I’m wearing gloves, I can touch anything I want.’ Well, you can’t go from preparing raw hamburgers to mixing salads with the same gloves.” A student worker said in her time at Dining Hall West, she was never asked to complete a food safety training program or asked to provide proof of a previous certificate until very recently, despite regularly handling food. “None of us knew when to use the sanitizer or how to do the towels or the gloves — like when do you (wear) them and when do you throw them,” the student said. “Only when you stay for a while do you learn that.” A former student worker in Dining Hall West said that generally, the
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only training she’d received came from her fellow student workers. Occasionally, a manager would come by and let her know if she was doing something incorrectly. Goodwin said all Chartwells employees are held to strict food safety standards, which he said surpassed the state-mandated certificate. “In addition to the food handler’s certificate … we do ongoing training with our associates every day and all day,” Goodwin said. Goodwin listed several training events, but declined to describe the trainings in detail, stating that the information was proprietary. In a Feb. 15 meeting, Chartwells’ Director of Operations Casey Teng said he had recently purchased training modules for hourly employees from a new certification provider in January but said he didn’t remember the company’s name. Goodwin later confirmed in a Feb. 17 email that the new company was Learn2Serve. According to an internal memo, workers were given a deadline of Jan. 24 to complete the state-mandated training through Learn2Serve. However, several employees said they did not receive the memo until weeks after the Jan. 24 deadline. Chartwells personnel declined to provide a list of certificates, stating that the information is proprietary, but said all of its employees hold valid certificates. Learn2Serve does not maintain a publicly searchable database of certificates. An official at the Texas Department of State Health Services, the agency responsible for enforcing food handling laws, said the health department does not maintain a centralized list of certified employees. “Some associates may have received their certification from other companies prior to joining Chartwells,” said a spokesperson for Chartwells’ corporate communications in an email. “All certifications, regardless of where they were from, are stored electronically by Chartwells.” Only one of the 10 employees interviewed said he had possessed a certification prior to his Chartwells job.
He said during the course of his employment at Chartwells’ Starbucks location last semester, he was never asked to produce the certificate. Several employees said international students make up the majority of student workers and that Chartwells represented not only their very first food service job, but their first job in the U.S. Of the 10 employees interviewed, six were international student workers, all of whom said they had not received any training or certifications prior to starting at Chartwells. Alsup said while most food establishments don’t generally have issues with compliance, there are factors that can make it difficult for inspectors to detect issues in certain companies, such as high turnover rates and large employee bases. “I can tell you that we don’t sit down and (say), ‘OK, what’s this person’s name and where’s this person’s card,’ because that could potentially take hours,” Alsup said. “We’ll look at the cards and make sure they have an appropriate number of cards for the number of employees that they have.” Alsup said inspectors rely on the employer to provide accurate employee information and valid certificates. Food handler training is listed as a “priority foundation item” on the inspection rubric, but in Richardson, establishments only lose a maximum of one point on health inspection reports for uncertified or improperly trained employees. Alsup said that nevertheless, there are legal consequences if the problem isn’t resolved within a timely manner, including the issuance of a class C misdemeanor and a fine. Alsup said if customers notice a potential health issue, they should file a complaint through the city’s website and include all known details. If a complaint is deemed credible, a health inspector is dispatched to complete a complaint inspection. Alsup said the results of complaint inspections are not always available online but can be requested through the city’s open records office.
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I’m going to know someone.’” She used Facebook to get updates from Parkland friends before news teams obtained the information. It was there that she learned her former classmate, Joaquin Oliver, was killed in the shooting. Later, Silverman’s mom told her that Meadow Pollack, with whom they were close family friends, had died as well. “That was rough. My parents didn’t really know what to do,” Silverman said. “‘No parenting book can tell you what to do.” Silverman said she found a new sense of purpose through the tragedy, switching majors from neuroscience to political science. “I was going to be pre-med. That is what I thought I was going to do for my entire life,” Silverman said. “After February, everything just completely flipped upside down.” Silverman planned a walk-out for her school, went to March for Our
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911 feature, the cellular providers in the area have six months to make the feature available to their customers. If someone tries to text a call center where the service is unavailable, the Federal Communications Commission requires that cellular providers send a
Lives in Washington, D.C., a student-led gun control demonstration, attended Marjory Stoneman Douglas’s graduation ceremony and spoke on a panel when Road to Change, a national tour of Parkland survivors encouraging youth voter registration, came to Dallas. Silverman said this month, she was torn over what to do to remember the anniversary. “Are you supposed to sit back and cry? Are you supposed to keep going with your day?” Silverman said. “I didn’t really know what the right answer to that was. I just knew that I wanted to do something so I wasn’t in my dorm all day. I wanted a creative outlet.” For her, the Spirit Rocks were that outlet. She painted “#MSDStrong” and the names of the 17 victims in Marjory Stoneman Douglas school colors. “They’re called Spirit Rocks,” Silverman said. “When you’re painting 17 names, it is almost an homage to spirits.”
ATEC senior Leth Davidson was walking to class when he noticed Silverman at the Spirit Rocks and offered to help. Silverman said while they were painting together, she was able to express to Davidson what “#MSDStrong” meant to her. “When Katie drew on the rock, she was largely doing it as a therapeutic measure,” Davidson said. “She mentioned it was either (do) that or sit in her dorm room all day. She decided to go out and do a thing. Even if no one notices, because quite frankly, most people walk past that thing and never notice, it made her feel better, and I’m glad I helped with that.” Silverman said the effects go beyond personal meaning. She shared her work with friends from Parkland, and their support made it all worth it. “I wish the Spirit Rocks drew more attention or there were more studentdriven objects around campus like it,” Davidson said. “Everyone’s got stories and even if it is presented poorly, frequently that is a story that someone else can get some value out of.”
bounce-back message advising users to contact 911 by calling. “The handling of the texts will be similar to how we deal with deaf callers now. The texts will show up on a machine, and that’s how we will communicate,” Rodriguez said. “The younger generation has definitely embraced the cell phone more than the TTY.” Rodriguez said though the new
text-to-911 feature will add convenience for some users, a phone call is still the preferred method of contacting emergency services. “We can glean a lot from the background noise of a call and the way a person speaks on the phone,” she said. “In addition, we cannot pinpoint an exact location based on a cell phone, but we can from a landline.”