WSS shares the stories of immigrants at West and their journey to Iowa.
Lydia Evans ‘26 plays with the Trojan Marching Band during the University of Iowa Homecoming parade Oct. 28. SACHIKO GOTO
Hey friends,
Congratulations on completing the first trimester! As the days shorten and a chilly breeze settles, the West community finds ways to stay grounded while entering the months ahead.
Every Friday morning, students gather to share their passion for chess. To learn more about Chess Club and how its members use the game to connect with others, turn to page 8.
Others find joy in the people around them. At West, we are surrounded by many who have the unique experience of being an immigrant. Read the stories of these students on page 18.
For some, cozying up in front of the TV is the way to go. If you want some recommendations, flip to page 26 to see WSS staffers’ top comfort flicks for this time of year.
We hope you find serenity in the ways you embrace the next couple of months. See you next issue!
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KRISHA KAPOOR (she/her) FRONT COVER DESIGN BY WILL CHENGErnie Found’s farm was full of spooky spirit at Club West’s Halloween Party Oct. 22, which raised around $12,000 for West athletics. Over 400 attendees participated in activities including a jack-o’-lantern design contest, costume contest, cornhole tournament, haunted hayrack ride and silent auction. Wildwood Smokehouse & Saloon in Iowa City catered the event and local businesses such as Radiance Medical Spa, Joseph’s Steakhouse, Tavern Blue and Marcus Theatres donated items for the silent auction
BY ISABELLA TISDALE
As fall sports come to a close, here are a few end-of-season highlights. Varsity volleyball won the annual Battle of the Spike Oct. 4, beating City High in five sets with a final set score of 17-15. Varsity football players ended their home season in a 28-49 loss to Prairie on senior night Oct. 14. Boys golf finished their season at the Class 4A District Tournament Oct. 3, where they placed fifth. The girls swim and dive team took home the MVC championship Oct. 22 and won regionals Nov. 5 with a total of 456 points. Boys cross country runners Seth Cheney ’23 and Moustafa Tiea ’25 qualified for state and placed 51st and 69th, respectively. Girls cross country placed fourth at the state qualifier, marking an end to their season. West’s competitive cheerleading team wrapped up their season with a 6th-place finish at the state championship Oct. 29.
PHOTO BY ZOE SMITH
Shanza Sami ’26 won third place in 3M’s Young Scientist Challenge, a nationwide innovation competition for students in 5th to 8th grade. Sami developed Pura Aerem, a five-stage extension to catalytic converters aimed to purify emissions from gas-powered vehicles. As one of nine finalists, she was paired with 3M Division Scientist Patrick Zimmerman to further develop her project this summer. In the final event Oct. 17-18 at the 3M global headquarters in St. Paul, MN, finalists were evaluated through a series of challenges and a final presentation. Sami received a $1,000 prize and a special destination trip.
PHOTO BY ISABELLA TISDALE
The ICCSD School Board approved a $10.6 million renovation plan for West High Oct. 11. The renovation will begin this summer and is expected to be complete by 2025. It includes a new main entrance, main office, auditorium, band and orchestra rooms, library and outdoor seating area. Local architecture and engineer ing firm Shive-Hattery is collaborating on this project with ICCSD Director of Facilities Jeff Barnes.
Over 70 West High band, orchestra and choir members auditioned Oct. 22 for the annual Iowa All-State Music Festival at Washington High School in Washington, IA. The 37 accepted musicians from West will perform at Iowa State University Nov. 19 with students from across the state. This year, West is sending 19 students from orchestra, 17 from band and one from choir. Seniors Jonathan Fan, Haoran Wu and Sophia Wang are now four-year All-Staters, one of the greatest accomplishments for Iowa high school musicians.
BY ISABELLA TISDALE
Students and faculty participated in Fall Spirit Week Oct. 24-28, planned by West Student Government. Monday’s theme was country club vs. country, Tuesday’s was BBQ dad vs. soccer mom, Wednesday’s was biker vs. surfer, Thursday’s was Zoom class day — formal on top and casual on bottom — and Friday’s was pink out for breast cancer awareness month. Student Government sold pink bandanas, glasses and cowboy hats, donating $1,000 in proceeds to Team Breast Friends, a local organization dedicated to breast cancer awareness and support.
BY ISABELLA TISDALEIn February, tenured Columbia University math professor Michael Thaddeus published a lengthy investigation challenging the ac curacy of data Columbia submitted to the U.S. News & World Report Best Colleges rankings. In his investigation, Thaddeus described the data as “inaccurate, dubious or highly mislead ing.” Columbia, after being removed from the 2021-2022 ranking due to Thaddeus’s report, withdrew from the 2022-2023 rankings and lat er admitted to using dated or incorrect methods to determine some of its data points. U.S. News responded by relying on its own calculations, along with federal data, to place Columbia as the 18th-best university in the country. This was a staggering demotion from the 2021-2022 school year when Columbia was tied for second with Harvard University and the Massachusetts Insti tute of Technology.
William Zhang ’20 is a current junior at Co lumbia studying computer science. Although Zhang was disappointed to learn that Colum bia’s administration had doctored numbers to improve its standing in the college rankings, he wasn’t shocked.
“It shouldn’t come as such a surprise that they dropped in the rankings,” Zhang said. “There are a lot of issues with undergraduate education at Columbia that I feel like you shouldn’t have to deal with if you’re going to the supposedly sec ond-best school in the nation.”
Zhang cites overcrowding as a major problem
on campus. A March 2022 report by the Colum bia Spectator, a news organization run by un dergraduate students at Columbia and Barnard College, found that there are nine Columbia stu dents on a meal plan for every seat in the dining halls. Thaddeus also questioned the university’s former position on class sizes. Columbia initial ly claimed that 83% of its undergraduate classes enroll under 20 students per class when in reali ty that number is around 57%.
Due to overcrowding, Zhang was unable to take the classes he wanted during his first three semesters at Columbia, even though they were required for his major. Once he got off the wait list and was able to enroll in a computer science class, Zhang’s first in-person lecture was over filled.
“The first day [of computer science] was [in] September 2021 when there was still COVID-19 in New York City,” Zhang said. “It was a packed auditorium. There were people sitting in the aisles of the classroom just to be able to hear the lecture.”
Disappointment over the ranking scandal was a common feeling among Zhang’s peers, who have long been frustrated with Columbia’s ad ministration.
“The general sentiment toward the Columbia administration has always been negative,” Zhang said. “[The administration] seems to only try to find ways to earn more money with little regard for the students or community. This scandal seems to be the latest instance of the administra tion being shady.”
Dana Rolander, a private college coach at Mid west College Consulting, believes submitting misleading data for college rankings likely isn’t unique to Columbia.
“Colleges have long been suspected of and found manipulating data to improve their posi tion in the rankings,” Rolander said. “I think Co lumbia’s long-standing Ivy [League] reputation is safe; I think the reputation of the rankings is more likely to suffer than Columbia’s.”
Senior Ashley Seo is applying to Columbia, also suspects other colleges are guilty of submit ting false data to improve their status.
“I think all the top colleges would do some thing similar [by] tweaking their rankings,” Seo said. “They just don’t have a professor who is go ing to release it to everyone else in the world.”
Rolander holds that the accuracy of college rankings is undermined because schools self-re port data which can hinder reliability and trans parency. Additionally, Rolander describes how schools can easily manipulate statistics like acceptance rates. For example, selective uni versities can encourage unqualified students to apply to their institutions in large numbers and then reject these students, lowering acceptance rates. Further, schools may defer acceptance to lower-caliber students until the spring term; as a result, their statistics, like test scores, aren’t re ported with those of the incoming class.
Considering the misleading nature of college rankings, Rolander believes a college’s rank and perceived prestige play an overly important role in students’ decisions about where to apply for college.
“I think getting into an elite school can feel like an acknowledgment or a reward for hard work,” Rolander said. “I feel that students should be open to the mindset that the reward doesn’t need to necessarily come in the form of an invi tation to an elite institution.”
Zhang was initially drawn to Columbia be cause of its core curriculum, a set of courses involving history, philosophy and literature that all undergraduates must take in order to achieve a solid grounding in the liberal arts. However, he admits the biggest factor behind his college search was how prestigious colleges were, a drive
make it, not even because of interest,” Seo said. The West Guidance Department advises taking a more individualized approach throughout the college search that places less emphasis on a col lege’s ranking.
“While rankings can provide valuable infor mation, they do not tell the story of whether or not [a college] is actually a good fit for the stu dent,” the guidance department wrote via email. “When we advise students, we do not look at how the college ranks. We focus on meeting stu dents’ needs.”
With her clients, Rolander uses college rank ings as a resource for college ideas but not as a key factor dictating where students should apply.
“I think college advisors have long discour aged families from placing too much weight into the college rankings,” Rolander said. “The data points themselves are not necessarily relevant to what makes a particular college better than an
are not going to tell you most of those things. I think it’s really important to dig deeper when you’re looking [for colleges].”
Rolander believes Columbia’s ranking scandal brings publicity to the inherently manipulated and potentially inaccurate ranking system.
“I think that the best thing that's happening, for families and students especially, is that atten tion is being drawn to rankings and that Colum bia did get caught with their hand in the cookie jar,” Rolander said.
Like Rolander, Zhang hopes that Columbia’s misconduct will prove educational by demon strating the irrelevance of a university’s ranking.
“My ultimate goal is that because of ranking scandals like these, people will put less empha sis on the ranking of universities and consider universities as places to get educated and meet people … not as fancy names to flaunt around,” Zhang said.
he feels is common at West High. “I regret how much I cared about getting into a prestigious institution,” Zhang said. “[West stu dents are] probably familiar with the immense pressure everyone feels about applying and get ting into target universities. I think a huge part of that pressure is a feeling that one’s self-worth and intelligence is tied to how good of a school one attends.”
For Seo, however, ranking isn’t the central fac tor determining her college application process. As someone who has lived in Iowa City most of her life, Seo is interested in Columbia because of its location in New York City. Additionally, Columbia is one of few schools that offers her desired major, financial engineering. Seo does recognize that some of her peers may apply to an institution solely because of its reputation.
“I feel like a lot of people just apply to the top ten schools and the Ivy League to see if they can
other for any one student.”
U.S. News & World Report Best Colleges rank ings, considered the gold standard of college rankings, evaluated 1,500 institutions across 17 metrics in their 2022-2023 edition. Based on how well a college performs across individual categories, it receives a weighted score on a scale of 0-99, with 99 as the highest score attainable.
Graduation and retention rates, undergraduate academic reputation and faculty resources are the three categories that hold the most weight in determining a school’s score. Columbia’s fabri cated data largely fell under the faculty resourc es umbrella, as the falsified data regarded both class sizes and the percentage of faculty with the highest degree available in their respective fields.
Rolander, instead of relying on college rank ings, emphasizes the importance of how well a school fits a certain student with consideration to a variety of factors like location, academics and financial aid programs.
“What can you afford? How rigorous is the curriculum? Is it a culture that you feel com fortable in?” Rolander said. “The rankings
“I THINK COLUMBIA’S LONG-STANDING IVY [LEAGUE] REPUTATION IS SAFE; I THINK THE REPUTATION OF THE RANKINGS IS MORE LIKELY TO SUFFER THAN COLUMBIA’S.”
- DANA ROLANDER, PRIVATE COLLEGE COACHSource: US News Rankings
do and I [thought] the chess scene was really dy ing in Iowa.”
This year, with a similar mindset, Chen and Anish Lodh ’23 decided to renew West High’s chess club, held Fridays before school in room 206.
BY HEIDI DU & MARIE STIERWhether verbal or nonverbal, communi cation is the basis of human connec tion. However, it is not limited to sym bols and syllables. Even games, like chess, can be a medium for communication — through its multitude of strategies and styles, a single game can act as a bridge between any two players.
Nathan Chen ’23 has been playing chess since second grade and considers the game a universal language.
“You can move anywhere and learn how to play chess,” Chen said. “You could speak any language and still play with [any] chess player.”
Chen began his chess career by attending a chess club held at Coralville Central Elementa ry. Minou Emmad ’23 developed her skills at the same club, which was coached by Jess Fiedoro wicz, a longtime member of the Iowa City chess community. Emmad found the club to be a place that fostered connections between players.
“Jess Fiedorowicz was an awesome coach for [Coralville Central],” Emmad said. “He got me really into chess; he’s really good at building a community.”
Both Chen and Emmad played competitive chess up until high school and had private chess coaches who helped them train and improve for tournaments. However, when the COVID-19 pandemic started, Chen transitioned from com peting to coaching.
“I started teaching students because I was burnt out, but I still wanted to do something in volved that just wasn’t practicing for two hours a day,” Chen said. “During COVID, I had nothing to do, I knew a lot of other kids had nothing to
“Chess club was online because of COVID, [so] I feel like attendance dwindled,” Anish said. “This year, (club advisor) Mr. Kirpes told us we brought in the most attendance in the 25 years he’s been here.”
The increased popularity of chess at West has been reflected in the global chess communi ty. During the pandemic, membership on the chess-playing platform Chess.com skyrocketed. According to a June article by the New York Times, the number of monthly active users on Chess.com more than doubled from eight mil lion to 17 million from Oct. 2020 to April 2022. With many people isolated or in search of new hobbies during the pandemic, chess has become a means of entertainment and connection.
“[Chess club is] a place that teaches kids that there is a sense of belonging, even if they don’t find it in other outlets,” Chen said.
Additionally, Emmad believes practicing chess can further one’s strengths in diverse aspects of learning.
“[Chess] makes your mind more accustomed to learning,” Emmad said. “Focusing or paying attention in school becomes easier; [you] exer cise your mind as you’re playing chess.”
Anish found that the lessons he has learned from chess are applicable to other aspects of life.
“Chess is a great analogy for [how] sometimes you have to make a decision and move on,” An ish said.
In September, the chess community encoun tered another instance of increased public at tention. At the Sinquefield Cup chess tourna ment in St. Louis, Hans Niemann, a 19-year-old grandmaster, defeated world champion Magnus Carlsen in a game. Carlsen then withdrew from the tournament and later implied that Niemann cheated. An investigation by Chess.com and the Wall Street Journal concluded Niemann private ly confessed to cheating before in online tourna ments but not against Carlsen or in recent on line games. As of print time, Niemann has sued Carlsen and Chess.com for defamation.
“I think it’s embarrassing for chess,” Chen said. “Not just the cheating thing, but for how people have handled it. To me, usually, if you play chess, you’re able to think more with your brain than
As West High’s Chess Club starts back up in person, chess players discuss its uniqueness and recent popularity.
-NATHAN CHEN ‘23
your heart. You’re able to give people the benefit of the doubt.”
Anish believes the media coverage of this inci dent has brought popularity to chess.
“[The coverage] definitely draws a lot of atten tion to chess and gets people interested, even though it might be a little bit exaggerated,” An ish said.
Furthermore, the release of the hit Netflix show “The Queen’s Gambit” in October 2020 displayed a new side of chess to the public. The show focused on the struggles of a female chess prodigy in a male-dominated communi ty, bringing attention to the gender disparity in competitive chess. In 2019, a record-high per centage of 14.6% of U.S. Chess members were female. While virtually all chess tournaments are open to people of any gender, a few, such as the Women’s World Chess Championship, are restricted to women in an effort to boost par ticipation.
Anjali Lodh ’25 has been playing chess for eight years and thinks the success of “The Queen’s Gambit” and the increased popularity of chess highlights its inequities.
“I do think that ‘The Queen’s Gambit’ is a little exaggerated,” Anjali said. “But, the part about women being discriminated against in chess is spot on. It’s obviously not as prevalent today as it was 30 or 40 years ago, but it still carries on that men were a lot less kind to women in the chess field because they deem women not capable of playing well enough.”
In 2019, after noticing the discrepancy be tween girls’ and boys’ participation in chess, Anjali started a chess club for girls called Chess Butterflies that holds weekly meetings at the Coralville Public Library.
“I decided to found a chess club for girls that would encourage them to play with each oth er, keep going with it and not drop out so as to foster community between them and keep the bonds,” Anjali said.
Since founding the club, Anjali has noticed changes in the area’s chess gender demograph ics.
“I can definitely see that [the club] piqued a lot of interest in young girls,” Anjali said. “That re ally means a lot to me to know that I’ve made a difference in some people’s lives.”
Anjali also has noted how economic inequi ties have begun to be mitigated through online chess. In addition to hefty tournament entrance fees upwards of $200, in-person tournaments of ten require travel expenses such as airfare, gas or hotels. Chess lessons from an experienced coach are crucial to many competitive players, adding to the cost of competing.
“There is definitely a barrier when [people]
get older,” Anjali said. “In order to participate in these tournaments and to get better, you have to invest in chess lessons, so it’s not really equita ble.”
Despite gender and economic imbalance at higher levels, chess can still act as an equalizer.
“You might see a five-year-old playing a guy that’s maybe 30, yet the five-year-old could still win that game,” Anish said. “It’s all about your mind and not your appearance or anything like that.”
Chen has similar insights into chess’ indepen dence from superficial social factors.
“[Chess] is just such an escape to me because when you’re playing chess, you’re not thinking about how others are looking at you or what you say or how you walk,” Chen said. “You’re just so focused on what’s in front of you.”
At West High’s chess club, Chen and Anish hope to further attendees’ chess abilities while promoting chess’s constructive aspects.
“Seeing [members] so focused on something and being so interested and passionate about it, [that’s] something that’s unique and doesn’t hap pen much,” Chen said.
The club aims to promote collaboration in chess rather than only competition.
“[Chess club] is a really relaxed environment,” Anish said. “It does feel [like a] community.”
Chen believes that chess’ explorative nature makes it a unique activity.
“If you have no knowledge about chess, you see a chess game [as] futile and meaningless,” Chen said. “But I think there really is a beauty in the game that just grows as you see more and more patterns. But [chess] is something that’s over looked, which makes it even more satisfying.”
I THINK THERE REALLY IS A BEAUTY IN THE GAME THAT JUST GROWS AS YOU SEE MORE AND MORE PATTERNS. BUT [CHESS IS] SOMETHING THAT’S OVERLOOKED, WHICH MAKES IT EVEN MORE SATISFYING.
For most students, election season means an influx of debates on television, campaign signs in neighbors’ yards and a Tuesday off from school. However, a select few have a larger, more personal connection to the chaos of elec tion time: their parents are involved in politics.
Zola Gross ’23 is accustomed to the activities that election time brings. Her dad, West High Principal Mitch Gross, also serves as a Coralville City Council member and has worked in nu merous campaigns from the local to federal level. Since Zola was born, her house has hosted campaign staffers, events and even presidential candidates like 2020 Pete Buttigieg.
“We’re always knocking on doors, making or delivering signs and going to speeches,” Zola said. “[We’re at] anything you think you have to make a public appearance at.”
Sophomore Kenton Huynh’s mom, Hai Huynh, is also a member of Coralville’s City Council. When Hai started campaigning, Kenton felt a shift in his family life.
“She would stay up really late sometimes on a call with other nominees for the City Council talking about … plans that they had,” Kenton said. “That was when she needed [me and my siblings’] help the most, like helping out around the house, and also just helping with her cam paigning.”
Rachel Zimmerman Smith is a West High par ent and serves as the Johnson County Attorney. Smith understands the toll campaigning can take on a family and took her family life into consideration before running for County Attor ney.
“[My family] talked about it before I made the decision to run because it affects everybody and you’re committing yourself to this job,” Smith said. “It’s more than just showing up from eight to five.”
Smith valued her family’s input before run ning, but she found it even more important while campaigning.
“My family has definitely been involved. Both
my kids and my husband, but also my parents, brothers, sisters and cousins. They’ve all been very supportive,” Smith said. “[They help with] door knocking, going to parades, wearing my T-shirts and practicing speeches.”
One of the most exhilarating moments for a politician and their families is when they hear the results.
“On the day the votes were coming in, we went to this restaurant, and we waited there. It took a long time, but at the end when my mom’s name was called, there was a lot of excitement,” Ken ton said.
After the excitement of an election, elected officials and their families assume public posi tions. From the Obama family’s Easter Egg Roll in 2011 to living room chats with Iowa Senator Zach Wahls, Zola has had unique opportunities to interact with many politicians. Through these experiences, Zola has learned the importance of being cautious in the public eye.
“You get to talk to some cool people, but at the same time, you have to be on your best behavior at all times. Even at school in the hallway, I feel like I have to think about what I’m saying,” Zola said. “[Having a parent in politics] is so public. You can literally google things about our life be cause of my parent’s political background. I’ve just gotten used to it.”
Because of her position, Smith understands her kids will have different experiences in public.
“Whenever there’s something in the news, like a crime or something happening with schools, my kids might hear things differently than other kids,” Smith said. “Somebody might be criticiz ing the attorney’s office while one of my kids is right next to them. That’s part of having a public job.”
Kenton wishes more people understood the inner workings of being involved in politics. He admires the amount of resilience his mom’s po sition takes.
“It’s hard to have to make those decisions for a large group of people. And sometimes, when
things aren’t going the way you like, you have to try to fix it, but it doesn’t always work,” Kenton said. “Being in a position of power like that … takes a lot of work. And if you really want it, you have to work hard for it.”
Outside of the office, Smith has noticed how her unique perspective plays a large role in the values she instills in her kids.
“Every day, I see the results of people not mak ing good choices that can be dangerous, not only in a criminal record but also in personal safety. So I tend to be a little more, as my kids would say, ‘overbearing,’” Smith said.
Zola says her exposure to politics has impacted her interests in the long term.
“[My dad’s involvement in politics] always kept me interested in history. I have an obsession with JFK, and that started because my dad loves JFK. I’ve definitely been interested in the factu al side of things and how things came about in terms of presidents and politics,” Zola said.
Furthermore, all this exposure has given her insight into her future career aspirations.
“[Politics] is something I’ll always be interested in, but it’s just too intense all the time for me. I need something a little more chill,” Zola said. “Even if the public doesn’t know about it, there’s always something happening behind the scenes.”
Although Kenton appreciates the lessons and opportunities his mom’s work has provided him, he stresses that her position doesn’t consume his identity.
“I wish [other students] knew that your life doesn’t have to change that much just because your parents are in politics. Your parents’ jobs don’t define who you are, and you can still be whoever you want,” Kenton said.
Even with all of the challenges that come with a family being involved in politics, Smith hopes that her kids will ultimately understand why she’s passionate about her job.
“I’m doing it to make the community better for them and their kids and just making the world better,” Smith said. “That’s not something you understand all the time when you’re a teenager … but hopefully someday they will.”
-RACHEL ZIMMERMAN SMITH, JOHNSON
After student athletes took the leap and left their hometowns to dive for the University of Iowa, they were met with unexpected frustration. Following the 2021-22 school year, the University of Iowa cut its men’s swimming and diving programs due to budget ing issues. Despite the program ending, one of these athletes, Kasijaden Natarajan, hoped to continue his diving career at Iowa and found an outlet for his passion through coaching.
Natarajan’s diving journey began in his home town of Pittsford, New York where he gave the sport a try because of his siblings.
“I did [diving] when the rest of my siblings did it,” Natarajan said. “I was the last one to join it. I did karate instead so I offered them, if they tried karate, I would try diving.”
What seemed like a simple deal
with siblings turned out to be the discovery of Natarajan’s new passion. Following his grad uation from Allendale Columbia in Brighton,
New York, Natarajan moved to Iowa to attend the University of Iowa as a diver and business student.
BY ZAIRA AHMAD & ESTHER PARK“As a freshman [in college], I was on the men’s swimming and diving team before that got cut. I was [also] here to join the business school … so it was just a good fit for my athletic and academ ic career,” Natarajan said.
After the program cut, Natarajan took on new opportunities to further his diving career. He started off by coaching the University of Iowa’s women’s swim and dive team. He also worked at the Iowa Diving Club every Tuesday and Thurs day during his sophomore year.
At Iowa Diving Club, Natarajan had the chance to mentor high school-aged athletes. A few months after he began coaching, Liberty diver Ainsley Young ’23 and City diver Greta Stanier ’23 approached Kasi with a proposition. Their high school dive coach had recently quit, and the two were hoping to find someone to take his place. After some communication back and
“I WANTED TO GIVE THAT EXPERIENCE TO OTHER KIDS.”
-COACH KASIJADEN NATARAJANAfter growing up in Pittsford, New York, Kasijaden Natarajan followed his passion for diving to Iowa City to begin both his collegiate diving and coaching careers.
forth, Natarajan found himself coaching divers on the Trojan Bolt swim and dive team. He felt coaching high school athletes would help him stay connected to the sport.
“I just wanted to find another way to be pas sionate about the sport that I’ve dedicated so much of my time to, and I wanted to give that experience to other kids,” Natarajan said.
At just 19 years old, Natarajan believes the small age gap has a large influence on the rela tionships he builds with the divers.
“I’m a little more approachable because most of the time high school coaches are their teachers and they have different dynamics with them,” Natarajan said. “So they’re much more open with me and we are able to communicate much bet ter. It’s a good thing for especially high schoolers who need someone to talk about things that are going on in their lives.”
Aimee Varga ’24, a diver on the Trojan Bolts Swimming and Diving Team, believes it is easier to connect to Natarajan due to his recent experi ence in the sport.
“The one benefit that we do have is that his [college] diving career just ended, so he’s still re ally familiar with diving and knows everything about it,” Varga said. “He knows what it’s like to do the sport and how tough it is, especially men tally, and he understands if you’re having a bad day or can’t get through a dive.”
Despite being a full-time college student and coach, he adjusts his schedule every week ac cording to whatever help is needed from his divers.
“I am an undergraduate student. I coach [high schoolers]. I help out the college team. And I work on the side as well. So it is extremely diffi cult, but once you get into a routine, anything’s possible with a lot of coffee and very little sleep,” Natarajan said. “It is difficult, but it’s definitely doable.”
Although coaching comes with its challenges, Natarajan remembers why he keeps going.
“Just seeing [the divers] improve the same way you would, helping out someone who’s trying
to learn something new in general, you’d like to see them succeed,” Natarajan said. “I remember my high school seasons and I remember exactly what they’re feeling. And it’s kind of fun to see them face those challenges that I faced and see how they fare.”
On the national level, Natarajan notices strug gles within diving. Despite diving being one of the most viewed sports in the Olympics, it does not gain as much attention in the United States.
“It’s difficult sometimes, especially at the col lege level, getting funding and being appreciated for what you do as an Olympic sport,” Natarajan
every major university who I dove with when I was 14 years old,” Natarajan said. “So you stick to it. Once you get on the circuit, everyone knows everyone.“
As they strive to seek improvement, it is com mon for high school divers to put pressure on themselves, which may lead to negative self-talk.
“[Kasi] tells us quite frequently to not be so negative. All the divers are like, ‘Oh, this is gon na go terribly’ or ‘We’re gonna smack.’ He’s like ‘Don’t be hard on yourself, think positively,” Varga said.
Along with promoting a positive mindset, Na tarajan also makes sure to push the divers to be their best.
“He is one of the [coaches] who pushes me the most.” West High diver Rowan Russell ’26 said. “I’ve learned a lot more and gotten a lot better than I have with other coaches.”
One of the unique ways Natarajan helps the divers improve is through physical demonstra tion of the dives.
“He mimics [the dive] and then he will retell it to you,” Russell said. “He definitely knows what he’s doing and he makes sure that we know what he’s thinking.”
As he continues his journey as a coach, Natarajan keeps his hopes and goals for the
said. “It’s always difficult because diving isn’t un derappreciated in other nations.”
Regardless of the challenges diving offers, the feeling Natarajan receives from the sport keeps him motivated.
“[Diving is] a safe way of getting an adrenaline high because it is incredi bly difficult mentally and incredibly demanding physically,” Natarajan said. “There’s really noth ing like jumping and flipping through the air that comes close to it.”
Natarajan also appreciates the closeness of the diving community.
“Diving is a very tight-knit community … I know people in college now at almost
Trojan Bolts Swimming and Diving Team in mind.
“I’d like to bring a couple of these girls here in high school to the state [meet] and hopefully continue their diving career at a club and try to get them into college,” Natarajan said.
“THERE’S
-COACH KASIJADEN NATARAJAN
Brad Wymer, a science teacher at West for 29 years, has grown his passion for the outdoors and education over a lifetime of adventures, discoveries and hardships.
BY ELLA DE YOUNG & JESSIE LI
When West High students hear the name Mr. Wymer, they likely think of the biology teacher with the multitude of plants in his classroom or the AP Environ mental Science teacher who often takes students outside to the prairie at West. However, much less known is Brad Wymer’s journey develop ing an undying passion for the outdoors and becoming persistent in helping others achieve their academic and athletic goals.
From a very young age, Wymer enjoyed be ing immersed in nature. Often, he bailed hay or caught crayfish from Crane Creek in his home town of Lawler, Iowa. Wymer also worked odd jobs for farmers in his rural community of about 500 people.
“I picked up rocks out of fields in Northeast Iowa. The glaciers deposited rocks, and farm ers would hire kids to come out and pick rocks out of the field, so it wouldn’t destroy their farm
equipment,” Wymer said. “I walked beans. They didn’t have Roundup Ready soybeans back in the day, so we actually had to go out and remove the weeds from the field by hand.”
The abundance of time Wymer spent out doors caused his enthusiasm for nature to ex pand tremendously as he grew up. Furthermore, Wymer’s dad and his dad’s colleague were influ ential in solidifying Wymer’s love for the natural world.
“My dad was a teacher [and coach] in the lit tle school that I went to. The [school’s] biology teacher was also a football coach with him,” Wymer said. “So I would hang out in the biology teacher’s room. He had all this cool preserved stuff everywhere, and I used to dive into that and ask him tons of questions.”
Heading into college, Wymer initially wanted to pursue marine biology. However, many fac tors including finances, location and football opportunities kept him in Iowa. He ultimately attended Ellsworth Community College. He played football there for three semesters before transferring to the University of Northern Iowa to finish his academic and athletic college ca reer. During his time at these schools, Wymer realized his true passion for not only biology but also education.
“The biggest thing was I didn’t want to be a lab rat. I couldn’t see myself sitting in a cubicle or at a lab bench,” Wymer said. “I had some coaching experiences where I worked with young people,
and I was like, ‘That was really fun and reward ing.’ That started to flip the switch in the direc tion of education.”
Now, Wymer is in his 29th year of teaching at West. Through his years of experience, he has developed a specific teaching style, especially for his biology classes.
“I’m pretty direct; I wear my heart on my sleeve, and I have high expectations for students. That’s certainly part of my style,” Wymer said. “Other than that, I try to teach [biology] as a sort of dis covery, followed by the information to help the students understand what they discovered.”
Wymer values the prairie at West and often uses it as an outdoor classroom.
“We go up to the prairie, and we write down the names of all the living things that we find out there,” Wymer said. “Then, we come back and start thinking about how all those living things interact with one another.”
Wymer’s students are only able to benefit from the prairie now because of the work he and other dedicated members of the Iowa City community put in to restore it beginning in 1999.
“[A few community members and I] worked together with the Johnson County biologist and the Iowa Department of Natural Resources. They came out and did all the work for free; it was great,” Wymer said. “They put herbicide on it to kill everything back, and then we just did it up again — we burned it, and then we seeded it.”
Madi Beiermann ’23 was able to determine her future career path through AP Environmental Science and Wymer’s interactive teaching style.
“I’m going into environmental engineering,” Beiermann said. “[Wymer] really swayed that [decision] with environmental science — a lot of stuff that we learned in class [made me] re
ART & DESIGN BY ATHENA WU PHOTOS BY GIANNA LIU, COURTESY OF BRAD WYMER & UNSPLASHalize that was really something that I wanted to continue.”
Another person in the West community that expresses appreciation for Wymer is Assistant Principal Maureen Head ’00. In the time that Wymer has taught at West, Head has transi tioned from being a West student to a science teacher and now to an administrator. Head describes one of many important lessons that Wymer has taught her over the years.
“[Wymer has shown me] it’s important to be a good community member so that people feel supported,” Head said. “It wasn’t like a lesson he was trying to teach or anything. But, just hearing him talking about the importance of having that supportive community made me realize even a tough guy like Wymer really values that type of thing.”
In addition to helping the community of West, Wymer has coached football and boys’ track and field at Solon High School for 31 years. His teaching philosophy in the science classroom coincides with his coaching style on the field and the track.
“Coaching is just an extension of teaching. Every [student] chose to be [in that sport], and they enjoy what they’re doing and want to get better,” Wymer said. “Every single human being brings their own body type, their own person ality and their own challenges that I have to try to figure out how to work with. That makes ev ery individual a challenge for me, and it’s a lot of fun. That’s how I approach it — ‘How can I help this person achieve their goal?’”
Although teaching and coaching have brought Wymer much joy, he has had to endure a great deal of grief. Over the past six years, Wymer has been coping with the loss of his 17-year-old son Tanner Wymer, who died during a canoeing ac cident Jan. 3, 2016.
“At the time, he was a senior, and I was working with young people that were his age. That was a big challenge,” Wymer said.
Wymer credits numerous people for support ing him through the most difficult time of his life.
“I was surrounded by great people. My family and the community at West High were amaz ing,” Wymer said. “The community of Solon,
where my son went to school, was amazing and still is. I didn’t do it by myself; that’s for sure.”
Wymer’s mom, Coleen Wymer, describes how the Wymer family carries on her grandson’s memory.
“We do try to go out of our way to pay it for ward, to help our neighbors and to do things that Tanner did,” Coleen said.
Head shares how Wymer has kept Tanner’s memory alive through simple acts of kindness towards her own family.
“He was the first person who showed up to visit and hold my brand-new baby. It was heart warming to see him in ‘papa bear’ mode. Not a lot of people get to see that side of him, but he was a pro at baby holding and bottle feeding,” Head said. “Since then, my son and I have visited Wymer at least a couple times, and he is so fun. My son got to sit in his son Tanner’s car, play with the power washer and pretend to put gas in the lawn mower.”
Although the Wymer family has found ways to spread good after Tanner’s death, the impact of his death is felt every day by the family, especial ly Wymer.
“Facing [Tanner’s death] was certainly an ob stacle, and then, still to this day dealing with students that don’t take advantage of their op portunities — they’re squandering their abilities — is a really frustrating thing for me to watch,” Wymer said. “It’s probably why I get really pas sionate about trying to motivate those young people to realize their opportunities.”
This is only a snippet of “A lifetime of using this QR
REEM KIRJA, GIANNA LIU & ROSEMARY TIMMER-HACKERT
ART & DESIGN BY WILLIAM CHENG
Immigration can be a difficult process, with immigrants facing hardships such as navigating complex legal systems, leaving friends and family behind and sometimes learning a new language. However, hope for a new life con tinues to influence individuals to migrate all over the world. For some, their journeys have brought them to West High.
While most immigrants seek a better life when moving to a new country, motivations behind the move are different for each person. Econom ic opportunities play a major role for many, in cluding Didier Kasongo ’23 and his family who emigrated from the Democratic Republic of the Congo to the U.S. in 2018.
“My parents came here first [and sent] money to me, so I could come,” Kasongo said. “[In the DRC,] we didn’t have money, and then when we came here, everything changed … Better jobs, better money, better life.”
Others make the journey to pursue alternative educational opportunities. Isabel Garcia Rascon ’25 came to the U.S. from Mexico at the start of the school year. She believes this education will give her better opportunities in the future.
“I came here because I wanted to learn English, but I plan to return to Mexico,” Garcia Rascon said. “Learning English opens more doors in Mexico — more work and more schools.”
Nomi Wang ’23 emigrated with her mother from China right before this school year for bet ter educational opportunities as well.
“[My mom was] always talking about [how] she [want ed] to send me to either [an] interna tional school in Shanghai or just wanted me to come to the U.S. as soon as possible, so when she told me, ‘Hey, you have the chance to come with me to Iowa,’ [I took] it,” Wang said. “I think America will be a better place for my own de velopment, both in academics and other stuff.”
Chances for economic and educational growth can also be a push for people to emigrate from the U.S. to another country.
After spending the first 10 years of his life in Minneapolis, Minnesota, Bashir Eltyeb ’25 and his family decided to move to the United Arab Emirates. Since then, they immigrated to Sudan and then ultimately returned to the U.S. Employment was the deciding factor in Eltyeb’s family’s first move.
“My parents left the U.S. to go to the UAE be cause [of] jobs, basically,” Eltyeb said. “My dad is an electrical engineer, and the UAE is still a growing country … So there’s a high demand for [electrical engineers].”
Additional opportunities aren’t the only fac tors immigrants take into consideration. Ac cording to Eltyeb, family was the main reason his family went from the UAE to Sudan.
“Sudan is our home country,” Eltyeb said. “My extended family is all there like my grandma, my uncles, my aunts. Some do live here, but most of them are back there.”
Eltyeb and his family moved back to the U.S. from Sudan this August due to political insta bility.
“At the end, safety issues from crime forced us out,” Eltyeb said. “I got beat up by the military. One time we got robbed, me and my friends. We got a machete pulled on us … I told my parents, and they were like, ‘Yeah, this is not a place we can stay.’”
Forced migration occurs when a person moves to avoid conflict, violence or natural disaster. Immigrants who have experienced forced mi
gration are refugees, but the requirements for official refugee status and being granted asylum vary from country to country.
University of Iowa professor Bram Elias leads the Immigration Advocacy section of the Uni versity of Iowa Legal Clinic, which provides free legal representation for people who need it. According to Elias, in order to qualify for asylum in the U.S., the individual must have a well-founded fear of persecution on account of race, religion, nationality, political opinion or membership in a particular social group.
“Being afraid of being persecuted or tortured or having something really bad happen when you go home, that’s part of what you need [to get asylum]. But, that’s not all of what you need,” Elias said. “It turns out that for the law, why you are being persecuted matters a lot.”
For those looking to become a lawful perma nent U.S. resident, three other ways exist: the Diversity Visa Program, employment spon sorship or family relationships. The Diversity Visa Program is a lottery that grants permanent residence to 50,000 immigrants annually from countries with low levels of immigration.
According to the Migration Policy Institute, the most common pathway is through family relationships, with 45% of green card holders in 2020 being immediate relatives of a current lawful permanent resident.
“If you have a close family connection to any U.S. citizen or sometimes a green card holder … you can use that family connection, and that’s a way for you to apply for a green card,” Elias said.
After obtaining a green card, immigrants can legally stay in the U.S. for as long as they want, but they are not yet U.S. citizens.
“Once you stay here for a period of time, usual ly five years, then you’re eligible to apply for cit izenship,” Elias said. “You take a naturalization test to see if you speak English well enough and if you know enough about American history. Then if you pass the test, you take an oath. Then you’re a citizen for the rest of your life.”
The Immigration Advocacy section of the Uni versity of Iowa Legal Clinic works on all types of cases regarding U.S. immigration and the natu ralization process.
“There are some cases where the government’s trying to deport someone from the United States, and winning is stopping them. There’s other cases where one of our clients has a com
plicated path from where they are right now to becoming a citizen, but they want to become a citizen,” Elias said. “We’re not fighting against the government. We’re just helping [immigrants navigate] the process.”
The journey to the U.S. and becoming a lawful permanent resident are only half the battle. The adjustment to life in a new country is difficult. For some, the people back home are what they miss most about leaving their country.
Garcia Rascon traveled to Iowa alone and has been living with her aunt and uncle ever since.
“[My parents] stayed in Mexico. It’s difficult because I have brothers, and I have more family in Mexico, and I miss my family,” Garcia Rascon said.
Polina Avdonina ’26 immigrated to Iowa from Kazakhstan a year ago and has found keeping in touch with her old friends difficult.
“Missing my friends [is a challenge]. When you are far away from your friends, [it’s hard to keep in contact], but we still sometimes talk,” Avdonina said. “[The time difference] is 10 hours apart.”
The language barrier that numerous immi grants face adds to the challenge of making friends in a new country.
“[When I found out I was coming here], I was kind of sad because I didn’t let some people know that I was coming here. It was just a sur prise,” Kasongo said. “When I came here, I was kind of shy in middle school. So I was just going to learn English first … When I came to West, I started speaking.”
Garcia Rascon agrees that it takes a lot of brav ery to reach out to new people.
“[Making friends] was difficult. I had to dare to speak the language; [then], for the most part, people could con
nect,” Garcia Rascon said.
Language acts as a barrier in more than just friendships, which is why the English Language Learning program exists. Upon enrollment in the Iowa City Community School District, if a family indicates on the Iowa Home Language Survey that a language other than English is pri marily spoken at home, they are required to take the English Language Proficiency Placement Assessment per Iowa law. ELL eligibility is based on the results of this test, previous English lan guage assessments, past academic records and interviews with parents.
In the 2021-22 school year, 12.9% of students in the district were ELL-eligible. Jessica St. John, an ELL teacher at West High, explains what stu dents learn when they attend an ELL class.
“[During] day-to-day class, we would start off with vocabulary, and then do a reading strategy … Then we’d read, and we try to use the reading strategy. Then, we talk about it and then try to answer questions,” St. John said. “A lot of times, [ELL students] develop speaking skills so early, before writing skills, so they’re pretty good at communicating verbally. A lot of our students you wouldn’t even know are [in] ELL.”
While teaching English is the primary func tion of the class, ELL teachers help their stu dents with much more than just their language skills.
“My job is teaching English, but also teaching kids about the culture here and then advocating
for them in their other classes to make sure they’re getting the right help, and just helping them with life,” St. John said.
In the ELL classroom, the shared experience of the language barrier has allowed many students to form connections.
“Communicating and making new friends [was hard],” Avdonina said. “[ELL] helped with English and with finding people.”
St. John has noticed ELL students feel more comfortable socializing with each other.
“I think it would be great if they could so cialize with more people, especially outside of their own demographic and their own language group,” St. John said. “But there’s that language barrier. Sometimes they get comfortable in their cliques just like [non-ELL] students.”
St. John wishes ELL students had more oppor tunities to talk to people outside of their estab lished social groups, especially underprivileged students.
“After-school activities like sports [would] help their social lives, but then comes into play trans portation, cost of
sports, uniforms — all those things that we as people who grew up here take advantage [of] or take for granted,” St. John said.
English courses can also be uniquely chal lenging for immigrants.
“Most of the subjects [are] fine for me. Only literature is a little bit hard. You have to learn some terms in English, and you can’t find the exact Chinese definition of it,” Wang said.
Besides providing ELL to help students im prove their English, the ICCSD also helps En glish language learners with their courses by offering “sheltered” versions of regular courses. These classes have a core curriculum teacher working alongside an ELL teacher.
“The idea is to help the teachers, who have generally always taught kids who are already fluent, help them teach ELL [students],” St. John said. “[The teacher I work with] knows math way better than I ever will, and I know ELL, and so if we work together, then we can try to help the kids the best we can.”
Other resources are available for immigrants to learn English, such as private tutoring ser vices or the Friendship Community Project, an organization whose goal is to help immigrants in the Iowa City Area learn English. Wang used private tutoring to prepare for the Test of En glish as a Foreign Language.
“U.S. universities will ask you for your TOE FL test score,” Wang said. “I [have] four tutors; one is for reading, one is for listening, one is for speaking and one is for writing ... It does help me a lot.”
Another way immigrants at West speed up their language-learning process is by consum ing content in that language.
“Outside of school, I read books, and I listen to music in English … I watch Marvel movies, and I watch programs [for] children, but I learn new
Source: U.S. Census Bureauwords,” Garcia Rascon said.
Most immigrants expect to face the language barrier, but many cultural differences come as a surprise.
“In [the] Congo, we will usually use books, math books, and here we have computer stuff — fancy stuff. In [the] Congo, we didn’t have this stuff,” Kasongo said.
While the educational resources are different, Wang also found the social environment of school in America different from China.
“I tried to make a TikTok video with my teammates yesterday because we were shooting [hoops] … They just invited me to be involved in their TikTok. I’m not such a confident per son to do such things, like expressing myself. I always think that students in America, they’re really confident about themselves. [Everyone] wants to share their own opinions and express their true self,” Wang said.
Cultural differences can also lead to misunder standings; information one party communicates can be perceived differently by another party.
“[My teacher] says things like, ‘It’s only seven days before the midterm,’ and I just think maybe midterm is some kind of test because midterm means test in China,” Wang said. “At the time, I was a little bit stressed because I just [saw] the [word] midterm and these seven letters just [freaked] me out. [When] the midterm actually [came], I found out, ‘Wow, there’s no test.’”
While the effects of these cultural differences are usually harmless, some can cause serious issues. Immigration and Refugee Community Outreach Assistant for the Iowa City Police De partment Joshua Dabusu came to Iowa from the DRC in 2016. Dabusu acts as a bridge between the immigrant community and the police to fa cilitate trust between the two groups.
“Policing in Africa, it’s very different, it’s very brutal … Imagine if somebody who [has] expe rienced this kind of stuff in their country comes here — [When they see the uniform], they try to process it like, ‘What is this person gonna do to me?’ So they are already going through a cri sis, and if you don’t know how to interact with them, you’re just creating another issue,” Dabu su said.
West High provides cultural liaisons to help teachers and students navigate issues caused by
these cultural differences.
“If we have a cultural liaison, and there’s a problem at home, they can kind of take the cultural experience, and take that into consideration and be like, ‘Hey, in our culture, this is how we deal with death.’ Right? And so maybe [the student] needs three or four days. They can just give us advice about what that student [needs],” St. John said.
Eltyeb believes it is important that students are understanding of cultural differences and pro vide help without being patronizing.
“There needs to be a balance of bearing with us, but also not underestimating us,” Eltyeb said. “Bearing with us in situations where people are like, ‘You don’t know what this is?’ and I’m like, ‘No, I don’t, it wasn’t a thing back home.’ … But at the same time, I’ve realized there are a lot of people that treat us like we don’t know anything, which is also wrong.”
Life takes people down many unexpected roads, and this was the case for West High Span ish teacher Javier Montilla. Montilla returned home to Venezuela after his university studies in the U.S. ended, but decided to move back to the U.S. when Venezuela was going through un stable times.
“I never planned on staying [in the U.S.],” Montilla said. “[But] what happens with immi gration [is] when you decide to move to another country, [it is because] things are going so badly in your [home] environment or in the country as a whole.”
For many immigrant parents who escaped a hard life in their previous country, it is reward ing to provide their children with opportunities they didn’t have. Rosa Villanueva, head cook at West High, started working when she was seven years old in Mexico. She believes that the diffi
Source: United Nationscult move from Mexico to the U.S. was worth it in the end.
“It’s hard when you are poor. You don’t have the opportunity to have a car. You don’t have the opportunity to go to the theater to see a movie,” Villanueva said. “This country brings me a lot of happiness because I see my daughter [get] this stuff I [thought about] when I was a little girl.”
Esther Zhang, Wang’s mother, sees Wang’s fu ture as having more possibilities now that they live in the U.S.
“A lot of Chinese students think they don’t have a future because in China, there aren’t many op portunities, and they are pessimistic because their parents are very disappointed in them. I think the future is hopeful for Nomi [after mov ing],” Zhang said.
Wang already has an idea of what this future may look like.
“I lost three years of traveling because of the pandemic [and lockdown] in China. I want to compensate myself a little bit in the following years, just go traveling and see people from dif ferent nations,” Wang said. “[I also want to at tend] the university here to continue my stud ies.”
Eltyeb also sees education as an important part of his future, as well as pursuing his interest in programming.
“I want to graduate from West High and go to a really good university somewhere in the U.S. … I want to be a computer engineer,” Eltyeb said. “When I was living [in Sudan], I was really start ing to get into programming, but I could never download these things because the internet is limited.”
While settling into a different place is strange and discom forting, the West High
community plays a large role in helping students adjust.
“Everybody in school that I [meet] are all friendly and kind to me,” Wang said. “When I need something academic, my counselor will stand up and help me, and when [I] feel like I don’t have [many] friends, someone in class will show up and be like, ‘How’re you doing?’”
However, there are still things the community can improve on. St. John thinks it is important for other students to be aware of the privileges they have as individuals who grew up in the U.S. “[PALs] come in and do conversation partners and try to get [ELL students] to talk about dif ferent topics and meet people. So that’s kind of fun. But then it’s like the students aren’t prepped … Some of the students are very affluent or their families are rich, and so they ask students, ‘Where’d you guys go for spring break this year?’”
St. John said. “I feel like as a school, we don’t do a good job of saying, ‘Hey, this is who’s in our school.’ Some people come in, [and] they’re like, ‘I had no idea that there were classes like this.’”
While generally inclusive, some in the West High community are ignorant about the experi ences of immigrants.
“I feel like people just underestimate im migrants … at certain times, some people would speak slowly, assuming that we do not speak proper En
glish,” Eltyeb said.
When cultural differences become frustrating to navigate, it can be comforting to have a space where people with similar backgrounds can connect.
“I really like the concept of the [Sudanese Stu dent Organization] because it’s bringing people who are like me together, people of the same cul ture,” Eltyeb said.
Along with finding community, Montilla en courages immigrants to invest time in them selves and dream big.
“Everybody can have a different version of the American Dream and what you can do in this country,” Montilla said. “[When you arrive], you realize that not everything is like what they told you, but on the other hand, there are so many opportunities. You can accomplish anything if you have the right disposition, and you look for the skills to accom plish what you want.”
WSS suggests shows and movies to watch during this chilly autumn season.
BY JACK ALDEN & GINGER MCCARTNEYBased on the webcomic turned graphic novel, “Heart stopper” is a heart-warming, slow-burning romance be tween British high schoolers, Charlie and Nick. It begins when Nick, a charismatic rugby player, is seated in class next to Charlie, a nerdy student who was out ed as gay the previous school year. They become close friends until they realize it might be something more.
Following the lives of coworkers at Dunder Mifflin, a small paper company in Scranton, PA, a cast of quirky and entertaining characters are bound to provide comfort and laughter to viewers. “The Office” is a mockumentary that has captivated America since its 2005 release.
The greater Boston area isn’t just home to the likes of Harvard and MIT but also the undiscovered mathematical genius, Will Hunting. Hunting is soon to find out that he has a separate life waiting for him if he wishes to realize it. With the help of Robin Williams starring as his future therapist, and Stellan Skarsgard, a mathematician, Hunting’s life changes forever.
Warning: this movie is fit for anyone wanting a good scare. The story centers around a young girl named Coraline who just moved into a new house. The house holds many se crets, including what lies behind a secret door. Coraline navigates this new world, but she must be careful as ev erything is not as it seems. It is an animated movie that has haunted kids’ imaginations for years.
Though it is from the ’90s, don’t be fooled: “Friends” continues to stay relevant as it explores the bonds between six 20-somethings adjusting to adult hood. The iconic coffee shop scenes and the gen tle glow of the show’s pre-21st century camera make ‘comfort’ this show’s main adjective.
Wes Anderson seldom fails to create a movie without an in credibly distinct style. In this film, Mr. Fox, despite his crafty ways, is no match for human characters Boggis, Bunse and Bean as he decides to pull one last job stealing chickens, ducks and of course Bean’s famous alcoholic apple cider. “Fantastic Mr. Fox” examines the animalistic nature of society and invites viewers to consider how these ideas apply to our human world.
Directed by Greta Gerwig and based on the 1868 novel written by Louisa May Alcott, “Little Women” is a story of sisterhood and friendship. Struggling with the hardships of the American Civil War in New England, the four March sisters navigate growing up and growing apart.
A classic fall comfort show focused on the relationship between Lorelai, a single mom, and Rory, her teenage daughter. The beginning seasons are concentrated on Ro ry’s time at a highly competitive private school as she bal ances grades, relationships and the impending threat of applying to college. Through ups and downs, watch Lorelai and Rory evolve against the backdrop of Stars Hollow, a small town where it is seemingly always autumn.
A blockbuster movie, “Home Alone” is about a young boy named Kevin McCallister who is left home alone by accident while his family goes on Christmas vaca tion. Two burglars try to rob the house thinking no one is there, but Kevin will stop at nothing to protect his house, no matter how dangerous it is.
WSS: WHAT IS THE BEST PART OF PERFORMING AT FOOTBALL GAMES?
LAUREN YACOPUCCI : Getting to watch the game from right on the side of the field and hearing the cheering from the crowd, especially when we use the fire batons.
WSS: WHAT TRAINING DO YOU HAVE TO GO THROUGH TO BE ABLE TO USE FIRE IN YOUR PERFORMANCES?
LY: At our studio, we start fire batoning when we get to Level 3, and it’s only a summer class, so we don’t practice it as much. We all have our own fire batons, and we can do it at home, but no training is required. We just learn how to handle it and not hurt ourselves or others.
WSS: WHO IS SOMEONE YOU LOOK UP TO?
LY: Ella McDaniel. She is the University of Iowa twirler and the current Miss Majorette of America. She also won a national title [in cheer] before the age of 18. She’s just so amazing.
WSS: WHAT ARE YOUR GOALS WITH TWIRLING?
LY: I’m training just in general to become a better twirler, but specifically, I’m hoping to do better at nationals this summer than I did at the past nationals. My goals are just to make sure I’m having fun and working to the best of my ability.
WSS: WHAT IS THE COOLEST EVENT YOU’VE PERFORMED AT?
ASHLEY NIEMIEC : We have twirled on ice at a Iowa Heartlanders hockey game before which was pretty fun.
WSS: WHAT DOES YOUR TRAINING REGIME CONSIST OF?
AN: I have practice for three and a half hours Monday through Wednesday. On Wednesdays, Julia Dorale, Ava Frese and I have dance class together. We also all have private lessons with our coach. Then on weekdays, we practice with the West High band.
WSS: WHO IS SOMEONE YOU LOOK UP TO?
AN: I look up to my coach, a previous West High student, Jessica Baker Maxwell. She is very patient and like a big sister to everyone at our studio.
WSS: WHAT IS A FUN FACT ABOUT YOU?
AN: I coach baton twirling at Ambition Baton and Dance Studio and co-teach one of my classes with Ava Frese. We teach a class called Tiny Tots, which are 3 to 5 year-olds and a class called Gems, which are 5 to 6 year-olds.
WSS: DO YOU PLAN ON TWIRLING IN THE FUTURE?
AN: Yes, I plan to twirl through college. I’m looking to twirl at Mississippi State University or and the University of Maryland.
Hidden within the marching band, four girls emerge twirling and tossing fire-lit batons. Here’s a look into the lives of West High’s baton twirlers.
BY LILY PROCHASKA(7 year twirler)
WSS: HOW DO YOU FEEL LEADING UP TO A PERFORMANCE?
AVA FRESE : I used to get really nervous before perform ing, but now, I am mostly really excited.
WSS: WHAT ARE SOME OF THE COOL EST EVENTS YOU’VE DONE?
AF: Nationals, which is at Notre Dame, and we’ve also performed at the halftime show for Iowa basketball games at Carver Hawkeye Arena.
WSS: WHAT IS THE BEST PART OF PERFORMING AT FOOTBALL GAMES?
AF: The crowd. I love their reactions when we use the fire batons; they get so excited.
WSS: WHAT DO YOU ENJOY ABOUT TWIRLING?
AF: My favorite thing about twirling is that many people don’t know about it, and it’s fun when people ask you what twirling is. I like to get people interested in it.
WSS: WHAT ARE YOUR GOALS FOR YOUR TWIRLING CAREER?
AF: A scholarship would be really cool. If there is an opportunity at a college that I want to go to, I would take it.
WSS: WHAT ARE YOUR FAVORITE AND LEAST FAVORITE PARTS OF TWIRLING?
JULIA DORALE : I really like how unique it is. When I tell people that I’m a baton twirler, not a lot of people know what it is, and there’s definitely some fun in that. My least favorite part is that it can be hard if you have a bad routine to bounce back. Mentally being able to turn around even if you have to do the same [routine] again and still give it your absolute best is difficult sometimes.
WSS: DO YOU PREFER PERFORMING AS PART OF A TEAM OR INDIVIDUALLY?
JD: Performing as a team and performing individually are so different, so I can’t choose. With a team, it’s all about practicing together and working out the routine. Perform ing individually is just as important because it’s you trying to do your personal best.
WSS: WHAT IS THE BEST TWIRLING ADVICE YOU’VE EVER RECEIVED?
JD: General advice that we’ve always been told is that anyone can have a bad day at practice. None of us are perfect, and there are so many things that can go wrong with a routine, so keeping that in mind when performing is important.
WSS: DO YOU PLAN ON TWIRLING IN THE FUTURE?
JD: I definitely will be doing it throughout the rest of high school, college is up in the air right now.
PHOTOS BY MEGAN BARNES, CECI DE YOUNG, KATHERINE SHOPPA & MCKENNAThe ICCSD should be more transparent with sexual violence protocols.
THIS IS AN EDITORIAL. WHILE BASED ON FACTS, IT’S PURPOSE IS TO SHARE CONCLUSIONS AND OPINIONS DERIVED BY THE WSS EDITORIAL BOARD.
Although sexual violence can happen to anyone at any age, 15% of sexual assault victims are between the ages of 12-17. Based on this statistic, it is highly likely that stu dents in the ICCSD are faced with sexual vio lence. To support these victims, ICCSD should clearly outline its procedures for students who are considering reporting a case of sexual vio lence.
When a student reports a case of sexual vio lence, clarity cannot always be provided about the specific consequences perpetrators will face due to the Family Educational Records Privacy Act. Still, it is important that victims have infor mation regarding what the investigation process will look like. Victims will likely become more comfortable reporting the perpetrator if they know what will happen after the statement.
Transparency is essential because there are a lot of nuances and distinct levels of authority who handle the cases in different ways. All dis trict staff are mandatory reporters, which means they are legally required to report any signs of abuse or neglect to administration immediately. Students should know that if they confide in a teacher, their case will be shared with an admin istrator. Once administration has been notified, if wanted, they can help the student’s case get into the hands of local law enforcement to take action and potentially press charges. Adminis tration will respect a victim’s choice if they pre fer not to tell their parents; however, legal action requires parental permission. These details can be confusing, but it’s necessary for students to understand the procedure that will be taken depending on what level of staff member they report to.
There is nothing specific about sexual violence reporting procedures or resources on the ICCSD website. There is only a phone number to report general bullying and harassment with no infor mation on the procedure after the number has been contacted. The district should provide an easily accessible page on its website explaining the course of action that schools will take upon receiving a report of sexual violence. No student should have to look beyond the website to find out how their school can help them.
Even after a clear procedure is made available
on the website, the district can push for in creased sexual violence awareness in classrooms through the use of Social-Emotional Learning lessons. This can be done through videos spe cific to sexual violence procedures and by bring ing in experts to talk to students. One potential source of these experts could be the University of Iowa Rape Victim Advocacy Program, which is dedicated to providing free and confidential support for those affected by sexual violence. RVAP provides counseling, therapy, support groups, legal guidance and advocacy.
Sexual violence negatively impacts students both in and out of the classroom. Teenagers who experience sexual violence can suffer from PTSD, substance abuse, depression and anxiety. Students should not have to struggle to find help when they are already experiencing trauma. The number of sexual assault cases is underre ported because survivors may feel ashamed or afraid to tell adults. It is crucial for the district to make the sexual violence reporting process more approachable for students by providing them with a clear picture of what happens after a report is made. Students deserve transparency
Sexual contact or behavior when consent is not willingly given or re ceived, including both assault and harassment.
Sexual contact or behavior that occurs without explicit consent of the victim. Rape is a form of sexual assault, but not all sexual assault is rape.
Verbal or physical unwelcome sexual advances and requests or demands for sexual favors.
Source:EEOC,CDC
An agreement between partic ipants before engaging in sexual activity.
1. Are the participants old enough to consent?
2. Do both people have the ca pacity to consent?
3. Did the participants agree to take part?
Source:Rainn.org
An American is sexually assaulted every 68 seconds
For more information and resources, scan this QR code to find the University of Iowa’s Rape Violence Advocacy Program.
From 2009-13, on average, 63,000 children a year were sub ject to sexual violence, 2 out of 3 between the ages 12-17
Out of every 1,000 sexual assault cases, 310 are reported to the police with only 25 perpetrators being are incarcerated
Source:Rainn.org
Aslick black cape drags along the floor behind them, and a long dark wooden staff glows green and clicks with every step. Their eyes are piercing, and their jawline is sharp. They possess a devilish smirk and clench a rotten apple dripping with poison.
This mystical scene is what I imagine for someone who’s in their “villain era.” However, this term stems from a trend that started on TikTok and is used to signify an era of setting boundaries in relationships, being assertive and prioritizing oneself, which can sometimes elicit negative reactions from others.
I’ve used the phrase “villain era” several times within the past year while shifting the way I handle situations. Actually bringing up the is sues I had with people? So evil of me. Setting boundaries? How cruel. Cutting out unhealthy relationships? Just plain ruthless.
In those moments, I truly did feel the need to put myself into the mindset of a villain in order to speak up. Characterizing myself as a bad guy was the only way I could justify standing up for myself.
Once I started therapy, my perception of what healthy relationships are was turned up
side down. What I once thought were actions of a good person — always listening to others’ issues, saying “yes” to everything, prioritizing others’ needs and feeling guilt for doing any thing for myself — might be favorable for oth ers, but are not always beneficial nor fair to me.
Changing my seemingly good behaviors to help myself meant releasing the fear I had of being a bad person — being the villain.
The more I thought about my apparent “villain era,” the more I questioned it: why should I con sider myself a villain when I’m finally handling matters in a healthy manner?
Calling those choices a “villain era” character izes healthy behaviors — being direct and set ting boundaries — as bad. I have found that the people who struggle with doing these things for themselves most often grew up in an environ ment where they sought external validation to determine their self-worth. This trait can carry on after childhood and result in chronic peo ple-pleasers, like myself. If people are already worried that they’ll be considered a bad person for setting boundaries, it’s detrimental to refer to their actions as villainous.
However, when you make these changes, oth
ers might view you differently or like a villain. People aren’t used to you standing up for your self, but that’s not your problem. You’re not be ing a villain; they’re being immature. Calling it a “villain era” makes it seem like you’re the one in the wrong.
The issue with the term “villain era” worsens when you consider that most often, it’s assertive feminine-presenting people using or being re ferred to with this phrase. We’ve been regard ed as “less assertive” for a long time. Breaking out of this mold is important, but it shouldn’t have negative connotations attached to it. Fem inine-presenting people are villainized enough as is. For example, a Harvard Business Review study found when asked to describe men and women who are in leadership positions, par ticipants assigned women significantly more negative traits. Words assigned to women in cluded “inept,” “frivolous,” “passive” and “gos sip” while men were deemed only “arrogant” and “irresponsible.” As for positive traits, par ticipants gave women positive attributes like “compassionate” and “enthusiastic” while men were “analytical,” “competent,” “confident” and “level-headed.”
Setting healthy boundaries and being assertive should not be synonymous with being a “villain.”
When people who aren’t men display mascu line traits, society reverts to simply describing them as evil. Growing up as a confident and assertive, feminine-presenting person, I was al ways called “bossy.” Perhaps I really was bossy and overbearing, but when boys spoke and acted the same way as me, such as lead group projects, they were called “leaders” instead. Why are we described as “bossy” while men are called “leaders?” Why are we “overdramat ic” while men are “rightfully upset?” Why are we “shrewd” while men are “strategic?” Why are we being “villainous” while men are being “assertive?” We can never win, no matter how we act. It’s no surprise that people often refer to non-men as being in their villain era when they decide to exercise their personal power. Assertiveness and confidence should be nor mal for everyone, no matter what their gender identity is. We must continue to destigmatize setting boundaries and taking care of our men tal health. According to the National Alliance
on Mental Illness, or NAMI, some of the most important parts of removing stigmas are talking openly, educating yourself and others, being conscious of your language and being honest. Take time to reflect on your own life and what boundaries you need by taking into account what drains your energy or causes you extra stress versus what makes you feel supported. Write it down on a piece of paper and draw a line as a physical boundary between these categories: when you’re able to acknowledge and accept the boundaries you need, it’s easier to communicate them to others. Speak kindly and concisely with out placing blame on anyone, but do not waver. If you are too exhausted to do something, say, “I don’t have the energy to help you with this right now.” If you’re not in a place for someone to vent to you, say, “I want to be here for you during this hard time, but I don’t have the mental capacity to listen right now; is there any other way I can help?”
Remember you don’t need to apologize or ex
plain your boundaries. Whether they surround emotional energy, social media, time or person al space, your boundaries should be honored. If people can respect a “No Trespassing” sign, they can respect the feelings of someone they care about.
While the term itself has a negative connota tion, the actions a “villain era” stands for are pos itive and reasonable. In reality, they are normal, healthy behaviors that should not be villainized nor promoted as such. The most important thing we can do to remove these stigmas is to flip the script and remind ourselves that these manners are mature and should not be frowned upon. You don’t owe anyone anything, and you de serve to be respected. Protect your peace, own your time, say “no” to things that don’t serve you and prioritize yourself without the need to call yourself a villain. You can be empowered with out poisoning an apple or becoming a bad apple yourself.
Andrew Tate’s rise to popularity is representative of society’s susceptibility to hateful ideologies online, such as toxic masculinity. Warning: this article contains mentions of sexual violence.
“If you put yourself in a position to be raped, you must [bear] some responsibility.”
Andrew Tate tweeted this disgusting comment in 2017 at the height of the #MeToo movement but this isn’t close to it all; Tate has made countless, blatantly sexist claims, such as explicitly describing how he would assault a woman for accusing him of cheating and assert ing that men would rather date younger wom en because they’ve had less sex. These horrific claims have resulted in Twitter permanently banning his account for violating community guidelines in 2017 as well as Facebook, Insta gram and TikTok banning him Aug. 20 due to hate speech. Although he’s no longer on social media, Tate’s horrific legacy lives on within big oted people whose beliefs were reinforced due to society’s susceptibility to hateful ideologies online.
Although banned, the impact of Tate’s posts lingers due to the internet’s permanency. Dozens of fan accounts with thousands of followers are dedicated to actively spreading videos of him, racking up millions of views. Clips of him are easily available on multiple platforms, including those that romanticize violence against women. The worst part is that Tate is still active online; he offers memberships for paid courses that teach men that their value is derived from cars, wealth and their ability to impress women. The program is still operational today with videos, quotes and merchandise related to Tate — only an incentive to further share his message. Tate’s digital footprint has left a permanent scar on the internet, and people who idolize him will stop
at nothing to share his views. Tate’s legacy is implanted into society, showing just how easily the internet spreads his beliefs even without him present on mainstream social media platforms.
Along with the permanency of the internet, the manipulation Tate uses to back his statements adds to the extreme consumption of his con tent. One of the methods he uses is targeting the fragility of masculinity that is present in today’s society. The concept of toxic masculinity is used to glorify the worst aspects of masculine attri butes: dominance, control and aggression. This encompasses things like telling men to “man up” for expressing their emotions or saying “boys will be boys” to justify inappropriate behaviors. Tate uses toxic masculinity to promote a feel ing of superiority and power over women. For example, he deems women to be incapable of fighting or defending themselves with their only option to “scream and run” and seeds false in formation as to how women think, act and feel. Tate tells men to feel empowered by these socalled weaknesses and take advantage of wom en. Not only does Tate’s manipulation make his content addicting to digest, but it can also fester into targeted violence against women that we’ve seen time and time again.
BY KAMAKSHEE KUCHHAL ARTThe nature of social media also feeds into so ciety’s susceptibility to false information. This is due to echo chambers, or the lack of exposure to diverse perspectives and the formation of groups of like-minded users. Many people of ten find themselves only hearing one side of a news story; it’s hard to be fully informed with an overload of biased perspectives matching their own. Social media algorithms perpetuate echo chambers because they are designed to prioritize a user’s feed based on the likelihood of interac
tivity. People’s online feeds are tailored toward their own viewpoints instead of differing voices. Misogyny and toxic masculinity can easily be come normalized in these spaces, which creates a safe environment for personalities like Tate.
These echo chambers and the “shock value” of Tate’s radical beliefs likely contributed to his increasing influence within communities; Tate amassed over 4.7 million followers on Insta gram and 11.6 billion views on TikTok before being banned. Even after being removed from social media, he is still the third most Googled person of 2022 as of September, according to Glimpse. The issue isn’t just that his views are radical but that he abuses this growing influence to spread them. A teacher witnessed Tate’s im pact firsthand; freshmen boys refused to engage in assignments with female authors because they “belonged in the kitchen” and “women are infe rior to men,” specifically referencing Tate.
Moments like these demonstrate how influen tial extremist communities can easily turn be liefs into action in the real world. We saw this materialize when Trump supporters charged the capital Jan. 6, 2021 to riot against the Demo cratic presidential win. When personalities with a large platform spread misinformation within an echo chamber, terrifying events can occur. Who is to say that they won’t happen again?
Through the permanency of social media, tar geting weaknesses of viewers and natural echo chambers, Tate has shown how susceptible soci ety can be to radical ideologies online. The fact that we are still talking about Tate today proves that society needs to be aware of the unhealthy mindsets social media creates and recognize the severity of Andrew Tate’s influence.
Mary Danielle Gross ‘25 dances her solo at the “Wild West” dance competition held at West High Oct. 22. ZOE SMITH
