Arlingtonian volume 86 issue 1

SEPTEMBER 2, 2022

VOLUME 86, ISSUE 1

ARLINGTONIAN

COVER PHOTO AND GRAPHICS

BY CAROLINE KEGG ’24

IN THIS ISSUE NEWS & FEATURES

4

A GAPP in the Summer

6

Back to School, Back to Normal?

7 8

A closer look into the German Exchange Program students took part in this summer.

A look at six aspects of the UAHS experience that have returned to “normal” this school year for the first time since the start of the pandemic.

Old Stars on the Modern Screen

The recent rise in Hollywood biopics has connected present fans to past icons.

The Book You’re Reading Could be Banned

Familiar titles are being taken off shelves across the country to restrict minors’ access.

10 New Kids on the Block 11 12

Arlingtonian sat down with the two new assistant principals, Nikole James and Matthew Jordan, to discuss their upcoming first year at UAHS.

Bear Connection Born Again

Now in its second year, Bear Connection has transformed. Here’s why and how.

Aesthetic for Aesthetic’s Sake

How a 19th-century artistic movement permeates itself in 21st-century students’ lives through the creation of aesthetic trends on social media.

14 The Golden ’60s ARLINGTONIAN INVESTIGATES UA SPEAKS

Largely forgotten today, the UAHS countercultural scene of the late ’60s and early ’70s included protests and an underground newspaper.

20 Farewell, Roe.

A look into the overturning of Roe v. Wade and what it means for America going forward.

26 Cartoon: Skoracki By the Numbers 27 8-in-8 Yay or Nay

OPINION

28 Summer Sounds

Columnist discusses some of her favorite music from the summer, plus upcoming music.

29 Mission: Success

Pilot gives “Top Gun: Maverick” the thumbs up.

30 Tensuke Express STAFF EDITORIAL 2

31

Critic steps out of his comfort zone and enjoys Japanese food.

The Importance of Now

This school year is the time to grow as students and unify as a community.

Issue 1 • September 2, 2022

ARLINGTONIAN

EDITOR’S NOTE

ARLINGTONIAN Volume 86 • 2022-23 EDITOR IN CHIEF James Underwood DIGITAL EDITOR IN CHIEF Greta Miller MANAGING EDITOR Carly Witt COMMUNITY LIAISON Matthew Doron COPY EDITOR Thea Postalakis

M

aybe the pandemic warped my sense of time, but the summer seems to have flown by. Somewhere in the flurry of summer jobs, summer reading, summer vacationing and summer relaxing, the days slipped by: June gave way to July, July gave way to August, and before I knew it, the 17th was upon us and it was time to lug out my backpack and brace for a new school year.

As we collectively settle into this new year, rebuilding the routines we retired three months ago, I encourage you to allow Arlingtonian to be your guide. We aim, both as your classmates and as student journalists, to play a role in nurturing a connected and informed school culture and to spark dialogue in the classrooms and hallways (well, hallway) of UAHS. We hope that our publication can serve as a meeting place, a metaphorical town square, for the UAHS community — a space to learn, share, explore and discover.

So make yourself at home within the pages of this magazine. Write a letter to the editor. Come crash W1307 second period and pitch us your story ideas. Check out our website, www.arlingtonian.com, for stories just ARLINGTONIAN EDITOR-IN-CHIEF as engaging and hard-hitting as those printed in this physical issue. Follow us on social media — we have a presence on Instagram, YouTube, Twitter, Facebook, and, for the first time, TikTok — and check out our podcast, The 3:05.

For now, though, enjoy this first print issue of the 202223 school year. Our staff has worked hard to produce timely and relevant coverage of the most newsworthy topics affecting UAHS students today. So whether you’re curious about the German exchange trip (check out page 4), or you simply want to know what’s up with Bear Connection (page 11 has got you covered), dig in.

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MULTIMEDIA EDITOR Gracie Helfrich ARTS EDITOR Caroline Kegg STAFF WRITERS Ali Abubakr Emily Ayars George Bernard Ryan Cho Ezra Liu Safia Malhotra Iris Mark Katie Messner Adelaide Petras CARTOONIST Lukas Skoracki

GRAPHIC ARTISTS PHOTOGRAPHY Lindsey Acker MANAGER Noé Beaudoin Edith LeBlanc Chloe Harris Mallory Johnson PHOTOGRAPHERS Scarlet Poor Jayden Banks Luke Rockey Mary Kate Basil Parker Sanford Hailey Hoffman Cynthia Song Sydney Hollern Violet Houser BUSINESS Camryn Johnson MANAGER Emerson Katz Laila Dillard Sarah McCulloch Julia Oakley BUSINESS ASSOCIATES Ceci Croci Katy Trombold

ARLINGTONIAN ONLINE www.arlingtonian.com Twitter: @uaarlingtonian Instagram: @uaarlingtonian TikTok: @ua.arlingtonian Facebook: @arlingtonians

SUPPORT OUR WORK Arlingtonian is free to all UAHS students and staff thanks to contributions from generous readers and businesses. We do not receive district funding.

DONATE Arlingtonian accepts donations throughout the school year. To find out more, visit arlingtonian.com/donate.

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EDITORIAL POLICY Arlingtonian is a studentproduced newsmagazine published

by Journalism III-Arlingtonian students at UAHS. The publication has been established as a public forum for student expression and for the discussion of issues of concern to its audience. It will not be reviewed or restrained by school officials prior to publication or distribution.

Arlingtonian welcomes letters to the editor, guest columns and news releases from faculty, administrators, community residents, students and the general public. The Arlingtonian

editorial board reserves the right to withhold a letter or column and return it for more information if it determines the piece contains items of unprotected speech as defined by this policy.

The Arlingtonian staff raises and pays all printing and production costs through advertising sales, donations and fundraisers.

The Editor in chief shall interpret and enforce this editorial policy.

To read our full editorial policy, visit our website at arlingtonian.com.

3

A GAPP in Summer A closer look into the German Exchange Program students took part in this summer.

BY EMILY AYARS ’24

I

n sixth grade, the six weeks of German classes required by the school were meant to draw students to the language, but it had a lasting impact on the 24 students who took learning the language to another level this summer.

The German American Partnership Program, otherwise known as GAPP, started up again this summer after a delay brought on by COVID-19.

“It’s a cultural exchange between [UAHS] students and students at our partner school and it involves a homestay and a school experience,” German teacher and American co-coordinator of GAPP Emily Alaudini said.

On June 22, UAHS students boarded a plane for Frankfurt, Germany, suitcases in hand as they chatted GRAPHIC BY CHLOE HARRIS ’24

4

amongst themselves. In the midst of everyone was junior Harrison Carlisle.

“To start off… I didn’t want to go because I didn’t like the idea of doing an exchange and staying in somebody’s house,” Carlisle said.

Christy Charlton, a German teacher at Jones and the other American co-coordinator of GAPP, added to this sentiment.

“You do need to have the type of personality that is willing to take some chances, that’s willing to communicate with other people,” Charlton said. “But for some kids, even the shyer kids, it helps them come out of their shell a little bit...”

The trip lasted about three weeks, including a trip to the city of Heidelberg. The three days students spent there were without their exchange students.

Alaudini noted that the intention of this was to bring UAHS students closer together.

“One thing we always notice is that the Americans also build friendships within the Upper Arlington group so you connect with friends,” she said. “You meet new people that maybe you otherwise wouldn’t have met because maybe they’re not in the same extracurricular activities as you, or maybe they’re not in the same classes as you, or maybe they’re not in the same grade level.”

In addition to separate grade levels, this Issue 1 • September 2, 2022

year’s trip included seniors from last year whose 2020 exchange was canceled.

“Some of the American students that went, I got to know them and it was really cool because I’ve known some of these people for a while but we’ve never talked,” junior Elizabeth Saint-Jacques said. “But we’ve become friends and we hang out a lot since we’ve gotten back.”

UAHS students were also taken to a handful of surrounding cities with their host families.

“I visited I would say within the realm of probably 10 different cities other than the town that we were in,” Carlisle said.

The exchange community of Bad Bergzabern is located near the border of France, allowing access to multiple different areas.

“My exchange student took me to Switzerland, and a bunch of different cities in France and a couple of different places in Germany, which was really cool,” Saint-Jacques said. “So we had a mixture of supervised time and then freedom throughout the city.”

Throughout the trip, students gained the privilege to explore independently and experience Germany in a new light. Charlton views it as an opportunity to expand students’ freedom and teach them responsibility.

“There are times where we’re not with [the students] and so you learn to be a little more self-sufficient. You learn to do things that you’re not comfortable with and that can just help in the long run,” Charlton said.

Junior Natalie Yurkiw agreed with this, explaining how that freedom could prove useful in her future.

“It kind of was a college expeARLINGTONIAN

rience per se,” Yurkiw said. “I really enjoyed being able to walk around the city with my friends and kind of have the freedom to see the city and to interact with Germans.”

The majority of the trip was spent shadowing the German exchange students in their community. UAHS students spent 10 days following their students’ school schedule each day to grasp an idea of how their education system works. Occasionally, students would present slideshows on different topics in classes and serve as a native translator in English classes.

Attending school was also a beneficial way for the students to practice the German language.

“I think it’s really interesting: these students have been in German, some of them for several years, and they learned about the culture and they learned about the everyday [life].

This is their opportunity to experience that, to live that first hand, things that they’ve learned about in class,” Alaudini said. “It’s a very authentic learning experience.”

Yurkiw had a similar observation with her exchange student and the lifestyle in Germany.

“I think it was an eye-opening experience,” Yurkiw said. “I got to experience everyday life in Germany.”

The German education system runs very differently from what UAHS provides. The school year lasts year round, with shorter and more frequent breaks rather than one large break.

“It’s a lot more split up, and I feel like people enjoy going to school there a lot more because it’s less strict,” Saint-Jacques said.

Along with this, schedules are more personalized with subjects students pick and choose to take. School days also vary in length depending on these classes.

“So sometimes they’ll be done at 11 a.m. or they’ll be done at 3 p.m. … and there are periods that are… an hour instead of 45 minutes,” Saint-Jacques said. “So it’s a little more involved bewww.arlingtonian.com

cause you’re not going through the same seven classes over and over and over again.”

But school wasn’t the only part of the trip these students got to experience. Allowing UAHS students to build a relationship with the exchange students was an objective for Alaudini.

“That is probably one of the main goals, to build bridges of intercultural understanding,” she said.

Each of the 24 UAHS students was paired off with a student from the German exchange school, Gymnasium im Alfred-Grosser-Schulzentrum. Students lived with their exchange families and built connections throughout the community. SaintJacques bonded admirably with her student before they met and even more so after. “[My exchange student] used to describe us as being like sisters and best friends forever because we did everything together and we like the same music and the same TV shows and it was just, like, a perfect match to find someone like that,” Saint-Jacques said.

Charlton can relate to this, along with understanding the students’ experiences, as she found herself in the same position 40 years ago and still to this day stays in touch with her exchange student whenever they visit.

“I was an exchange student at this same exact school when I was 16 for three weeks, and obviously it made an impact because I’m a German teacher,” Charlton said. “More than that, it just opened me up to [that], ‘Oh wow, there’s a whole world out there that I know nothing about and I want to find out about it.’”

The influence this program had on her clearly struck the current students in a similar way. Despite his reservations in the beginning, Carlisle said with confidence that he would recommend this program to future students.

“Absolutely,” he said. “It was definitely life-changing.”

A Memorable Trip

Arlingtonian staff member recounts a memorable learning moment from the German exchange program.

BY KATY TROMBOLD ’24

F

or me, the German exchange program was one big learning experience. So going into the trip, I was expecting there to be a heavy learning curve, but my first big lesson was one I was not expecting. It all started in the City of Heidelberg, where the German exchange group spent the first few nights before meeting up with our exchange partners. This was a time to adjust to German culture and bond as a group.

On our first night, a group of us went to dinner at a restaurant near our hotel. Honestly, except for our questionable German skills, the meal went surprisingly smoothly. Until the waiter presented us with the check. Now you might not know this, but water in Germany is not free like at restaurants in the United States, and there are no free refills. This was something our whole group was warned about, but honestly, I didn’t fully appreciate or realize what it meant. Throughout our dinner we all ordered water after water (which came with no ice I might add. This might have been my least favorite part of Germany). So when the bill came, we were shocked to see that our refreshing cups of lukewarm water cost more than all the food we had ordered! We all stared at the check in shock, not realizing why the bill was so high until we saw the price of the drinks — which to this day is the most I have and will ever spend on room temperature water.

It was the quickest lesson I learned in Germany. So, the advice I have for all of the students reading this is to never assume water is inexpensive or that there are free refills in other countries! Overall, though, I loved the Germany trip and have a ton of advice for people traveling abroad for the first time with a school group. It can feel nerve-racking but it will be an amazing experience you never forget.

5

Back to School, Back to Normal?

A look at six aspects of the UAHS experience that have returned to “normal” this school year for the first time since the start of the pandemic.

BY IRIS MARK ’23 AND JAMES UNDERWOOD ’23 Service Hours

Summer Reading

Sixth-grade Camp

The COVID-19 pandemic closed many opportunities to volunteer, and as such, the service hour requirement was dropped. Now it has returned, and students, with the exception of freshmen, must log six hours of volunteer work by Sept. 30.

Summer reading was largely discontinued for the past two years. This summer, students had to read one book with “personal connection”; honors, AP and IB courses had an additional teacher-selected book.

Sixth-grade camp is something of a rite of passage for young middle schoolers in the district, and an enjoyable getaway for the UAHS upperclassmen selected as counselors. However, due to COVID-19 concerns, camp has not been held since 2019, with the 2020 and 2021 camps being canceled.

This year, though, the tradition is making a comeback, with one main change: “Instead of it being two nights, three days, it’ll be one night, two days,” according to UAHS environmental science teacher and camp coordinator Jordan Walker.

Senior Ruchika Raj is one student interested in returning to camp as a counselor this year.

Her own experience at camp as a sixth-grader led her to apply.

“Even the bus ride was fun, and it just brought me closer to classmates I hadn’t really seen outside of school,” Raj said. “That was a huge factor in me applying.”

Masks Masks were required for all of the 2020-21 school year and for most of the 2021-22 school year. Throughout that time, the mandates drew controversy, with some supporting them and some favoring a mask-optional approach. When the mandate was lifted last year, a student protest through Golden Bear Boulevard demonstrated varied student opinions.

Now, students have entered a school year in which masks are entirely optional and unlikely to be required again.

6

Still, some students, such as senior Azrael Hudson, continue to wear a mask at school.

“I visit my grandma every week, and I have friends who are immunocompromised,” Hudson said. “So I just figured that it’s safer for all of us. I’m not super worried about myself getting sick. But I definitely don’t want to get anybody around me sick.”

Hudson said she respected others’ decisions to wear a mask or not.

“I try not to judge, whether or not somebody is [wearing a mask], because it’s a personal choice,” she said.

Issue 1 • September 2, 2022

ARLINGTONIAN

Old Stars on the Modern Screen

GRAPHIC BY CYNTHIA SONG ’24

The recent rise in Hollywood biopics has connected present fans to past icons.

BY CARLY WITT ’23

M

ovie theaters have made a return, and with them has come a rise in biopics depicting the lives of famous musicians, actors and actresses or iconic people of past generations. Biopics — an abbreviation of “biographical picture” — are films that dramatize the life of a public figure, past or present. For example, “Bohemian Rhapsody,” which came out in 2018, was a Freddie Mercury biopic, which showed the rise of Queen, and the lives of the people involved. It was the first of many biopics to come out the past few years, and in 2022, Elvis and Blonde made their posthumous debuts on the biopic scene.

Adam Barney and Roger Legg, members of the Columbus Film Critics Association, said they’ve seen biopics grow over the years.

“I think we are currently seeing an increase in biopics because of the huge financial success of ‘Bohemian Rhapsody,’ which grossed over $900 million worldwide. I think the success of that film made this summer’s ‘Elvis’ a very easy greenlight for Warner Brothers,” Barney said.

The actors cast to portray these icons tend to be a popular topic of conversation — and controversy. Austin Butler, who played Elvis in the Baz Luhrmann biopic, isolated himself for two years and watched endless footage of his character to train himself how to talk, walk, sing, dance and act like Elvis.

“Some actors are method [actors] and dive completely into their character for a long stretch in an effort to represent them,” Barney said. “Some actors don’t like the preparation and want to experience the situation and have a more realistic ‘in the moment’ performance because they believe it is a more authentic portrayal. Some work with families and study videos of the person so they effectively mimic the subject. Others want to be more distant so that they can portray the subject as we all know them from the public persona and not have their personal lives bleed into the portrayal.”

Film critics and fans of original icons can find fault in the processes that actors go through to mimic their character.

But another camp claims that it takes bravery and courage to portray a famous figure, and demands accolades for that actor.

The recent rise in biopics has also ignited a new love for old icons, mostly by those in younger generations. People of younger ages are falling in love with stars from older generations, bringing back the cycle that older fans experienced when they were younger with icons such as Elvis, Queen and Marilyn Monroe.

Junior Kennedy Thompson, a fan of the Elvis biopic, said, “Even if all the facts about Elvis and his personal life in the movie weren’t true, I think I still got a lot of important info that I wish I had known sooner.”

This has caused almost a reversal of generations, with the younger generations repeating the same cycle of adoration and obsession that older fans had when they were younger.

“As the younger generations are now seeing biopics on Elvis, Elton John, Freddie Mercury, David Bowie, etc., I would expect future generations will be seeing biopics on Lady Gaga, Britney Spears, Beyonce, Jay Z, etc.,” Barney said.

Moving forward, there are many more biopics to grace viewers’ screens in the coming years, and with that will come more and more young fans of the same icons that older generations worshipped.

“I think a good biopic will give you a better appreciation of the film’s subject. If you just wanted an understanding of the key events of the subject’s life, a documentary is obviously the better way to go, but a biopic can give us a new or different appreciation by focusing its lens on a specific facet of their lives,” Barney said.

GRAPHIC BY CYNTHIA SONG ’24

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7

THE BOOK YOU’RE READING COULD BE BANNED Familiar titles are being taken off shelves across the country to restrict minors’ access.

BY KATIE MESSNER ’24

B

ook banning has been on the rise recently. Lawmakers and protective parents are zoning in on certain titles to restrict them from minors and public use.

“Book banning” is when a book is challenged by a group or person and restricted or removed from access due to the material covered.

“Book banning takes that book out of someone’s hands and doesn’t allow them to read it,” Judy Deal, the UAHS Learning Center media specialist, said.

Policies on how to “ban” a book can differ, but usually the book needs to be challenged by a person or group and presented to a school board, committee or assigned group to decide whether or not it should be removed.

Usually, the challenger is required to read the book and explain why, how and where the offensive material took place, according to PEN America, a non-profit organization created “to protect free expression.” If found guilty, it will be restricted from access or restricted to certain age groups.

However, many books are removed without a formal challenge or process, or even removed from access while the books are still being reviewed, according to PEN America.

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In 2021, “Gender Queer” by Maia Kobabe was the most challenged and banned book, according to the American Library Association, the oldest and largest non-profit library association in the world.

A common reason cited for these challenges is concerns of explicit sexual content.

According to the ALA Office for Intellectual Freedom, there were 729 challenges in 2021 and among the most challenged were “Gender Queer” by Maia Kobabe, “Lawn Boy”

by Jonathan Evison, “All Boys Aren’t Blue” by George M. Johnson and “Out of Darkness” by Ashley Hope Perez. The number of challenges has risen in recent years. Reasons behind “book banning” and restrictions differ, but are usually due to sexually explicit content, offensive language and sensitive topics.

A graphic novel about the Holocaust, “Maus” by Art Spiegelman, was removed from a school in Tennessee because of explicit language and nudity. Other familiar books that have been challenged or banned include, “To Kill A Mockingbird” by Harper Lee, “Of Mice and Men” by John Steinbeck, “The Handmaid’s Tale” by Margaret Atwood and “The Hate U Give” by Angie Thomas.

From a study done by PEN Issue 1 • September 2, 2022

America, from July 1st, 2021, to March 31, 2022, there were 1586 individual books banned or restricted from access. There are 86 districts with book bans, affecting 26 states, with Texas, Pennsylvania and Florida having the highest number of bans. Of these books, 33% included LGBTQ+ themes, 22% dealt with race and racism, 41% contained characters of color and 25% included books involving puberty, sex or relationships.

In most cases, even if a book is banned, it can still be found online.

However, some students and families cannot afford to buy these books, causing these restrictions to disproportionately affect lower-income families.

In addition, online sites are now being targeted to restrict access to books all together. In Virginia, Barnes and Nobles is being sued for selling “Gender Queer” by Maia Kobabe and “A Court of Mist and Fury”

by Sarah J. Maas. Tommy Atlman, a congressional candidate in Virginia, argues that the two books are “obscene for unrestricted viewing by minors” and is fighting to get them removed from access. If the lawsuit is successful, it could set a precedent for more books to be even further restricted.

ARLINGTONIAN

GRAPH IC BY M ALLORY JOHNSO N ’24

Moms For Liberty, one of the proponents of these book restrictions, is a nonprofit group founded in 2021 that is “dedicated to fighting for the survival of America by unifying, educating and empowering parents to defend their parental rights.”

This message of parental choice has been growing more popular as more books undergo scrutiny. Parents have become more involved in school curriculum and what their children should be reading, while free-speech groups and libraries have been trying to fight back against these challenges.

“If you’re a minor, obviously if your parent has a problem with you personally reading it, that’s their prerogative, but when institutions start banning books, it becomes an issue,” Deal said. “If you say ‘I don’t want my child reading this and no one else can read it’. Then, that is censoring the rest of the population.”

In Ohio, not many challenges have been made. However, three books in the Hudson City School District have been restricted from access. “Lawn Boy” by Jonathan Evison, “Gender Queer” by Maia Kobabe and “642 Things to Write About” by San Francisco Writers’ Grotto, were pulled from the shelves after being challenged by community members.

In addition, Bill 327 was introduced in the Ohio House in 2021 and could restrict schools and reading materials further. The bill deals with ‘divisive concepts’ which refers to something that implies that the “United States is fundamentally racist or sexist” or that “an individual’s moral character is necessarily determined by the individual’s nationality, color, ethnicity, race, or sex” and “bears responsibility for actions committed in the past by other members of the same nationality, color, ethnicity, race, or sex,” according to the proposed bill. This bill would prohibit the teaching of any divisive concepts and would permit books to be challenged based on this concept. Bill www.arlingtonian.com

322, which is also in committee in the Ohio House, uses similar language regarding teachings.

Maria Ionno, a high school student from Grandview Heights, testified for Bill 327, arguing that according to the bills, “teachers are restricted from teaching honesty in education” and that students “deserve to have multiple viewpoints.”

As more and more books are being challenged, students are still finding ways to fight back despite their lack of involvement in the decision-making process.

Banned Book Clubs have appeared in schools across the country and students are continuing to read books that have been taken out of their libraries by purchasing them online. In addition, “banned book

we e k , ” created by the American Library Association to “celebrate the freedom to read” will be from Sept. 18-24. The theme this year is “Books Unite Us. Censorship Divides Us.” During that week, Deal said, “We will have multiple displays here in the Learning Center of books that have been challenged and why they’ve been challenged as well as a slideshow on the big screen of books that have been challenged, just to kind of raise awareness.”

GRAPHIC BY MALLORY JOHNSON ’24

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New Kids on the Block Arlingtonian sat down with the two new assistant principals, Nikole James and Matthew Jordan, to discuss their upcoming first year at UAHS.

BY MATTHEW DORON ’23

MATTHEW R. JORDAN

NIKOLE JAMES working in education?

A: I was a teacher at Central Crossing High School for 15 years. I taught psychology and US history for the majority of those. Then, I was an administrator for the last three years at Jackson Middle School.

Q: Are you excited for this new position?

A: Yeah, I’m really excited.

I live about eight minutes from here, so we’re a UA address, but my kids go to Hillard schools, so I feel like this is an opportunity for me professionally to stretch and grow a little bit, as well as personally, just being so close to my family and my children.

Q: Where did you receive your education?

A: I went to The Ohio State University and got my bachelor’s. At the time, Ohio State did not give you a teaching license, so I went to a master’s program right away that also included the teacher licensure program at Cleveland State.

I got my MED [Master’s in Education], then returned to the Columbus area and got hired at Central Crossing [High School]. About six or seven years ago, I started with Ohio Dominican University to get my second MED in leadership.

Q: What are some of your main goals?

A: My four big things that I’ll be responsible for are operations, the budget, DEI [Diversity, Equity and Inclusion] and Bear Connection. In operations, a big component of that is safety, [which is] constantly in motion as laws are adjusting, and as policies and practices are adjusting. I’ve met with the UA Police Department to strengthen some partnerships and get some background knowledge and some practices. I have meetings scheduled with the fire [department]. With the budget, obviously lots of people want lots of things. With Bear Connection, I’m super excited. I’m open to feedback and kids telling me things: what works for them and what doesn’t.

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Q: What is your speciality or

concentration as an assistant principal?

A: I’ll be working primarily with the math department and I’m working on the building master schedule, so I do a lot with teacher schedules and student schedules, and also the intervention department. So those are my big responsibilities.

Q: What is your background in education?

A: For 14 years, I was a teacher at the original Olentangy High School. I taught math: I taught AP Calc BC and then I taught Algebra 2. This past year, I was an assistant principal at Berkshire Middle School.

Q: Where did you receive your own education?

A: I grew up locally. I went to Dublin Scioto High School, and then I went to Miami University. Then I moved back up here. I got my first job teaching at Olentangy High School.

I’ve always been in central Ohio, but I went back and got my master’s in administration at Ashland University. I really like school and I like learning a lot, so I feel I’m always taking classes and trying to learn something, to better myself.

Q: What are some of your main goals for this year?

A: Really the first goal would be just building relationships with teachers and students. Coming in brand-new to Upper Arlington, I think that for me the big pieces [are] building relationships, then just try to contribute as much as I can.

I think we all have our individual talents and just trying to contribute as much as I can and bring out the strengths and talents of others that are in the building.

Q: What do you want students to know about you?

A: I just would like students to know that I’m approachable.

I love having that interaction with students, so that’s a big part of it.

Issue 1 • September 2, 2022

Responses have been edited for length and clarity.

ARLINGTONIAN

PHOTO BY EDITH LEBLANC ’23

PHOTO BY EDITH LEBLANC ’23

Q: What’s your background

Bear Connection Born Again

Now in its second year, Bear Connection has transformed. Here’s why and how.

BY EZRA LIU ’24

“W

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“We were having a lot of issues with space for everyone, lots of students had to be on the [Golden Bear Boulevard] which was not conducive to having sensitive discussions if the group wanted to and so forth,” Julie Hiner, a teacher involved in planning Bear Connection, said. “A lot of staff and students on our survey at the end of the year were [also] saying that 20 minutes once a week wasn’t enough to really get to know people in your group, and when you’re in a class every day you tend to get to know people fairly well.”

These remedies were reflected in the new look of Bear Connection, with class-centric Bear Connections allowing for all students to be in a classroom, while emphasizing connections with classmates who students already spend a large portion of their time with. In order to get the most out of the time, Hiner recommended that students communicate with staff.

“I would really recommend that students reach out to their teachers and have a conversation about what they like to do,” she said.

Although the current iteration of Bear Connection is planned to continue for the rest of the year, if issues arise future adjustments may be made. Although the times, location and look of Bear Connection may change, Hiner said that the overarching goal remains the same.

“It’s all really about making more connections — deeper connections among students themselves and among teachers and students as well,” Hiner said. “We really are trying to find a way to help everyone feel connected in the school.”

HIC BY LUKE ROCKEY ’23 GRAP

hat’s up bears, it’s time for Bear Connection!”

Those eight words, enthusiastically broadcast after fifth period every Friday, became iconic in UAHS. They heralded the start of a new, 20-minute class, one which would prove controversial not only among students, but also among the whole of UAHS. Now, the program has undergone various changes, with its basic goal intact: to help better connect students to one another.

In the past, Bear Connection was held every Friday for 20 minutes, in a class consisting of 15 to 20 students from each grade. Originally, the group of students were intended to remain consistent for all four years of high school, along with the teacher leading the class. During the time period, students would play games, complete projects or meet with other Bear Connections for group activities. While some saw the program as an enjoyable break on a Friday afternoon, others thought that the time felt awkward or forced.

“I’d rather it [have been] with people I know instead of random people I got placed in a class with,” said Zach Root, a junior who participated in the original Bear Connection last year. “I didn’t know the teacher at all, which didn’t help when they tried to start conversations or play games with us.”

Because of input from students, as well as other issues, staff in charge decided to change the program for the 2022-23 school year.

This year, Bear Connection will be held following various class periods throughout the year, on Wednesday every week. On Aug. 31, students met with their first period class for 20 minutes after the end of the period. A week later, on Sept. 7, Bear Connection will be held during second period, followed by third period the week after, and so on. During this time the class will engage in activities decided by the teacher of that week’s Bear Connection period. For students who have a delayed arrival or early release during the Bear Connection period, they will be able to either come to school at the end of the Bear Connection time frame or leave at the beginning of the period. School staff are also working on a way to allow students who have a forum during Bear Connection to be included in the program.

Changes to Bear Connection were made for several reasons, with two being primarily responsible.

11

Aesthetic For Aesthetic’s Sake How a 19th-century artistic movement permeates itself in 21st-century students’ lives through the creation of aesthetic trends on social media.

BY IRIS MARK ’23

E

GRAPHIC BY LINDSEY ACKER ’24

merging at its most prominent during pandemic-issued quarantine, the presence of “aesthetics” on social media in the form of mood boards, filters on posts, and other such collections of media, have become a way for teenagers to selectively identify with specific styles and presentations of themselves. In similar fashion to the creative minds of

12

Victorian England, aesthetics are used by both parties as platforms for personality and inspiration in living.

However, it can become dangerous to rely completely on already manufactured identities for complete influence in all actions, and can be limiting when building oneself based solely on what’s seen online.

Championed by artists and critics like Oscar Wilde and Walter Pater, the Aesthetic Movement, or Aestheticism, was an art movement that pushed against traditional ideas of the moral function of art in society.

Instead of art being made to uphold a message or narrative, “art for art’s sake” claimed beauty to be the most important element in life and therefore writings, paintings and other mediums were there to reflect this.

Exalting taste and pursuing self-expression over restrictive conformity, “aesthetics” were people who were desperate to distance themselves from Victorian materialism and expectations. In a similar light, teenagers, through platforms like Pinterest and Instagram, define themselves by certain aesthetics, either by what they wear or what music they listen to.

Junior Ashley He describes her opinion on aesthetics and maintaining one.

“I think I like the ideas of aesthetics, [and] I think a lot of people take them very seriously, [but] I think it’s pretty so, as long as it’s not hurting anyone [I think] it’s like a cool thing to do,” He said.

It is natural for people to switch up their wardrobes as they get older, just like how they change as peoIssue 1 • September 2, 2022

ple. Having a premade guide readily available at the tap of a screen is helpful when deciding what to do next.

“I think especially if we’re talking about social media as Instagram and Pinterest, you kind of see people and it’s like, ‘Oh, I might want to dress like that,’ so there’s a lot of inspiration influence I guess, that’s helped in perpetuating [aesthetics through] social media,” He said.

The eradication of narrative in aesthetic movement artwork made way for the creation of mood through colors, tones and certain compositions. Pinterest, especially, is built upon the collection of pictures to evoke atmosphere and aesthetic that people can then associate themselves with.

Personality connotations also come with having an aesthetic and maintaining the aesthetic through personal presentation. If someone is wearing something specific, something about their personality is assumed.

“I think that if you see a girl with a long maxi skirt and one of those really cute Bolero cardigans, [you get] the impression that [you] might be talking to, like, a manic pixie dream girl type,” He said.

This adopting of personality based on aesthetics was typical of aesthetic movement artists, who took up public personas through which they lived according to aesthetic principles.

But in today’s world, it is not always enough to have an aesthetic; some students feel that they must defend their aesthetic of choice to others.

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GRAPHIC BY C ARO LIN EK EGG ’24

“I remember especially as I was transitioning to high school, [I wanted] to find a style that suits me, because I was like, ‘God, I do not like the way that I present myself now’… [and] the Receiptifys? That you have to [post] on your story, oh my…

There was a time where I was like, ‘I’ve got to stream this song a little extra so that it makes it to the top’ [or] sometimes I just wouldn’t put a song on a playlist even though I enjoyed it because I was like ‘this is kind of cheugy.’” He said.

The placing of categories can become limiting because once a person decides and cultivates their aesthetic of choice, it can feel like if they step outside of that defined zone, they can no longer be a part of it.

“You can lose your sense of self if you try to fit into an aesthetic. The aesthetic can be a part of who you are, but if you try to change everything about yourself just to be placed in a box, you miss out on other parts of your identity that may not necessarily fit into any aesthetic,” senior Lucy Cheng said. “I know I’m not alone www.arlingtonian.com

in purchasing clothing and accessories that I don’t need [in order] to look and feel a certain way, and this is not necessarily a bad thing, but is definitely the result of aesthetic culture.”

The 1851 Great Exhibition marked a turning point in British visual art of predictable, repetitive designs that fostered a stifling environment for aesthetic artists. Students looking to escape the monotony of generic retail gravitate toward aesthetics as a way to define themselves.

Individuality is hard to come by in adolescense, which is why the journey of finding oneself is hindered, especially by the environment that social media creates.

“I think [social media] makes it harder [for someone to be their own person] because everyone’s trying to be the model person that everyone thinks they should be instead of just being themselves,” freshman Matthew Schmersal said. “I feel like they kind of feel like they have to live up to the aesthetic that they are trying to be.”

Aesthetics, the need to follow them, and the need to stand out while doing so may cause students to create a false version of themselves.

“I think it’s very easy to fall into the trap of creating a false image in order to fit into social norms. It’s good to explore different aesthetics to figure out what you like and who you are, but it’s also not healthy to have the mindset that you must always fit the aesthetic, nor that anyone else is ever perfect, in that sense,” Cheng said. “Everybody is much more complex than they may appear at first glance on

an Instagram profile, or from what you see every day in class, so it’s not realistic to [judge] an entire individual on just their aesthetic.”

It is not bad or unhealthy to want to have an aesthetic. It can be a chance to show creativity, or to try something new. But when relied on for a complete cast of what one’s identity should be, that’s when it can be more harmful than helpful.

“I think for one thing all of us are works that are constantly in revision.” He said. “And so [I think], in the journey to [find] oneself, at least for me it’s about consuming everything around you, taking it into stride and thinking about, ‘What about this do I want to become part of myself and what part of this do I want [to keep out]?’”

BY IC PH A GR

24 G’ EG K E LIN RO CA

13

The Golden ’60s

Largely forgotten today, the UAHS countercultural scene of the late ’60s and early ’70s included protests and an underground newspaper.

BY JAMES UNDERWOOD ’23

he counterculture of the 1960s is well ingrained into America’s national consciousness. The peace symbol adorns the bumpers across the country. Events like Woodstock have found a spot in the popular imagination. The scene’s key figures, and the debates they had, are represented in historical films like “The Trial of the Chicago 7.” And the stereotypical hippy — peacenikish, long-haired, free-loving, tree-hugging and strung out — is a cultural trope.

But while ’60s radicals and their progressive politics are well known, few within the UAHS community are aware of UAHS’s very own anti-establishment movement. Yet against the tumultuous national backdrop of the 1960s, discontent brewed within some pockets of the student population at UAHS. In the late ’60s and early ’70s, UAHS students organized protests, rallies and demonstrations. These students campaigned for greater rights, focusing on issues both local and national. And like figures in the national countercultural scene, they faced oppression from those with power, in this case the school administration.

The budding counterculture within the walls 14

of UAHS was supported by an underground press. In the spring of 1969, students founded The Gilded Bare, a newsletter created and distributed by students that rebelled against establishment mores and promoted the movement’s cause of freethinking and individual rights.

But these lofty ideals, while they would go on to figure prominently in the paper, were not the initial focus. Instead, the publication — and the students to whom it catered — began by focusing on a more immediately tangible issue: the dress code.

First adopted during the 1968-69 school year, the original dress code at UAHS was far more conservative than it is today. Female students could not wear pants, including jeans. Male students could not have long hair or facial hair. Graphic T-shirts were forbidden.

The dress code drew the criticism of some students, such as Bruce Mitchell, who graduated from UAHS in 1971 and served as the Gilded Bare’s editor his senior year.

“It seems like a trivial issue today,” Mitchell said. “But at the time, it was a pretty big deal.”

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ARLINGTONIAN

As Gilded Bare railed against the dress code, school officials attempted to crack down on its circulation and those who wrote for it. The publication was not allowed to be circulated on school grounds. The students shifted to distributing on the street corners surrounding the high school, just off school property.

“It was free press,” said Paul Reynolds, a Gilded Bare co-founder who graduated in 1970. “And it was outside the school premises, so they couldn’t really do anything about it.”

Still, the suppression that the paper faced motivated the students behind it to branch out. They became more ambitious and diverse in their goals and took up topics beyond the dress code. Foremost among these topics was free speech.

“As soon as they came down hard on the newspaper, and hard on students who were involved, it shifted from the dress code to freedom of expression, freedom of assembly,” Reynolds recounted. ◀ “He Needs a Mind of His Own!” Pages from the Gilded Bare, an underground newspaper active at UAHS in the late ’60s and early ’70s, chronicle student activism from that time.

for such a policy to Arlingtonian a few months later.

“The administration does not fear anything from students, but it would be foolish to assume that a disturbance may never occur,” he said. “We want to be prepared for what might happen.”

Something did indeed “happen.” The controversial policy was put to the test on Oct. 2, 1969, less than two months after it was adopted, when a group of students came to school donning shirts featuring the word “Union” and an orange clenched fist. The Student Union, or Union, was a newly formed student group that advocated greater free speech rights, an open-speaker policy, a looser dress code and more.

The school administration was not pleased with Union’s shirts.

“Teachers were told to send every student wearing the t-shirt to the principal’s office,” Reynolds said.

Approximately 40 students wore the shirt, and 16 refused to remove it. Those students were locked in ▼ Unionizing?

Members of the UAHS student group “Union” wore these shirts to school one day.

PHOTO COURTESY COLUMBUS DISPATCH

* * * In the late 60s, high schools across central Ohio, and across the country, saw a wave of student protests.

In response, the Upper Arlington Board of Education proactively passed a policy on Aug. 12, 1969, stating that “disorder and disruption of school process will not be tolerated and persons attempting such actions will be held accountable.” The policy, which was left to individual building principals to implement, further enabled the school district to “seek the prosecution of those who would violate the laws” in cases of school disruption.

The policy drew criticism from some students.

According to an article published in the UA News, Gilded Bare-affiliated students attended the meeting at which the policy was adopted and “said that the new policy is ‘not specific’ and asked if ‘disorder’ was considered merely physical in nature.”

The school district, on the other hand, argued that the policy was needed regardless. UA Schools superintendent Walter Heischman explained the need www.arlingtonian.com

15

the teacher’s lounge, Reynolds said, as the administration went through the process of calling parents. There, the students discovered a telephone and a phonebook.

They sensed an opportunity.

“We just looked up the phone numbers of the newspapers, news desks, and the TV stations,” Reynolds recalled. “And we just were all high-fiving each other and saying, ‘This is great.’”

The students watched through the window as crews from at least four Columbus-based news outlets — The Columbus Dispatch, the defunct Columbus Citizen-Journal, TV 4 (NBC) and TV 10 (CBS) — arrived on the UAHS campus to report on the detaining of the students. Those outlets published stories or ran segments on the incident, which Reynolds said gave the movement a publicity boost.

“We kind of instantly knew that we had made a really big mark relative to what would otherwise have been just an almost invisible protest,” he said.

Indeed, the incident sent ripples throughout the broader UA community, attracting both praise and criticism. For example, opposing the students’ actions were members of the UAHS Parent-Teacher Association (PTA), who in a scathing letter published in the Columbus Dispatch in October, 1969, stated that they were “ashamed of [the students] as parents, as we are of ourselves when our children disappoint society.”

For his part, the UAHS principal at the time, A. L. Guesman, criticized the ▼ News from Suburbia The UAHS counterculture, and students when the protests they organized, was interviewed by covered in local newspapers.

16

the Columbus Dispatch. The students who wore the Union shirts, Guesman said, were “honorable kids, but the tendency of the young is to be too caught up in rights.”

The students were officially punished for their shirts — Guesman told the Columbus Dispatch that “any unnecessary drawing or writing on” t-shirts was prohibited — but the students alleged that the decision was actually a matter of suppressing the Union.

“The reason students were dismissed was not because of any violation of the dress code or any other reason the administration may draw up in the future,” an unnamed columnist stated the next week in the Gilded Bare. “They are out to get the Union, but instead of destroying the Union, they have fortified it through their vivid imagination and convenient ignorance of the law.”

The protest was one among many that took place during this time. In the coming years, students would hold sit-ins, demonstrations and rallies throughout UAHS and the community.

Meanwhile, the Gilded Bare continued to produce issues, alternately attracting ire, curiosity and admiration.

“People were fascinated with it,” Mitchell said.

“The parents dropping their kids off for school would stop the car, get out, come over, and get a copy of it.

Everybody was very interested in what the underground newspaper had to say.”

Operating without a formal organizational chart (“it was definitely not formal, not organized,” Reynolds recalled) and publishing a masthead that

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ARLINGTONIAN

seemed to change by the issue, the paper served as a community space for students discontent with the status quo.

“It was just a volunteer group of students that were all trying to do approximately the same thing,” Mitchell said.

The paper resonated with disaffected students and curious readers alike by finding stories that Arlingtonian — the “establishment” paper at the time — was not covering.

Writers and contributors for Gilded Bare made the contrast between the papers clear. In one letter, the publication decried Arlingtonian as a “symbol of the establishment” alongside football. In another, Mitchell called on Arlingtonian to “drop dead” in response to an article it published. And in 1970, Mitchell said at a school board meeting that Arlingtonian was “fearful of taking a stand against the administration,” according to the Columbus Citizen Journal.

The publication also continued to face censorship and suppression from school authorities, such as the inability to distribute on school grounds. The students behind the publication attempted to curtail this censorship. At a UA School Board meeting on Oct. 13, 1970, Mitchell spoke to the Board requesting that the paper be allowed to circulate on school grounds.

The Board president, Margaret Postle, responded that the publication would need, among other things, a teacher-adviser.

At the meeting, Mitchell called this requirement “unfair,” saying, “no teacher wants to stick his neck out for us.”

Suppression of the Gilded Bare took other, less explicit forms as well. For example, school administrators attempted to exert pressure on parents aiding in the printing of the publication.

“We were using mimeograph during the first two years, and we would do it at somebody’s mom or dad’s office,” Mitchell recalled. “If the school administration found out where we were printing the paper, they would call the parents and try and get them to stop.”

Further, the administration targeted Gilded Bare writers for other violations, such as dress code, Reynolds said.

And at the Board’s Nov. 10, 1970, meeting, representatives for the publication complained that “school administrators refuse[d] to negotiate grievwww.arlingtonian.com

ances with them” and that members of the publication had “been threatened with expulsion from academic teams,” according to a Columbus Dispatch article published the next day.

That meeting “proved very disappointing to the students who attended,” the Gilded Bare wrote.

Gilded Bare eventually fizzled out by spring of 1972, when the Norwester yearbook listed the publication as “dead.”

These events at UAHS did not unfold in a vacuum. Rather, they served as a microcosm of broader national change.

One of the core national events during this time was the Vietnam War. As more and more individuals were drafted into the war, it became a major fighting point for American activists, who advocated an abolition of the draft and the discontinuation of America’s involvement in the conflict.

One notable demonstration against the war occured on May 4, 1970, at Kent State. At that demonstration, members of the Ohio National Guard opened fire on unarmed students protesting the war on campus, galvanizing the nation.

Gregory Duncan, UAHS class of 1969, was a Kent State student on campus when the guardsmen opened fire.

“When the shooting took place, we were naive enough to think, first of all — some of the people [around me] were saying there couldn’t be live ammunition in those rifles,” Duncan said. “​​To hear the shots — we had no idea that they were aiming at people.”

In the end, four students died and nine others were injured. The nation was galvanized; the event set off mass outrage in colleges and high schools across the country. * * * Throughout this time, the dress code remained a potent issue, even as students took up other causes.

One provision in the dress code — pertaining to male hair length — proved especially controversial among students. Male UAHS students in 1970 were to keep their hair “short enough and well-enough in place so as not to fall below the ears at the sides,” according to the student handbook from the time. They were further instructed to “keep the back shorter than ducktail length. Sideburns are to be no lower than the bottom 17

of the ear.”

Discontent against this provision reached a boiling point in the fall of 1970, when Glen Ortman, then a senior, was suspended for five days after refusing to cut his hair. In response, Ortman’s parents and an attorney attended the September 8, 1970, Board of Education meeting to ask for an appeal of the decision.

“Whenever an authoritative agency uses power arbitrarily, it creates issues that need not exist,” the Ortmans’ attorney, Bruce Campbell, said at the meeting, according to UA News. “What we are considering is one man’s right to be the person he wants to be.”

In denying the request, Board President Postle cited a survey indicating broad student and parent support for the dress code.

“Actually, the community set the dress code,” Postle said, according to board minutes.

Unsatisfied with the district’s response, the Ortmans sued the district. In court records, Ortman’s attorney, argued the case on three grounds. First, he contended that Ortman’s hair was “a matter of personal style, taste and self-expression” and that it did not interfere with the educational process. Campbell argued that the school’s rules violated Ortman’s rights under the first, ninth and fourteenth amendments, as well as two provisions of the Ohio Constitution. Second, he argued that the school had “interfere[d] with his right to raise his son in accordance with his own philosophy and standards,” violating “the privacy of the parental relationship.” Finally, Campbell argued that Ortman’s suspension prevented him from getting accepted to college and therefore from earning a living.

That, Ortman’s attorney wrote, meant a “permanent impairment of his earning capacity” amounting to $220,000.

The school district, in response, laid out a slew of arguments in favor of their dress code and their decision to suspend Ortman.

The district argued that long hair on males was a safety hazard in shop and physical education classes. Further, the district contended, long-haired males were “a source of disruption and distraction in the classroom” who “antagonize[d] many other students who wear conventional haircuts.”

The district didn’t just build its defense out of pragmatic arguments of safety and academic function18

ing, though; it also appealed directly to the establishment culture’s standards of propriety.

“Since shoulder-length hair is not generally accepted in the professional and business community, the school is responsible for assuring that students learn to know and respect such societal standards,” the district wrote. “While shoulder-length hair may be acceptable on a rock festival sound stage, it is not proper in a school, where the maintenance of a businesslike, academic surroundings is necessary.”

On Sept. 17th, 1970, a hearing was held in which Franklin County Court of Common Pleas judge Charles Petree denied Ortman’s request for a temporary injunction allowing him to attend school with his shoulder-length hair.

“It is not fair for other students to have to put up with someone like this,” Petree said, according to the Columbus Citizen-Journal. “If a boy dresses as a girl it isn’t good for school morale. If he wants to go to school, he has to have his hair cut.”

At a second hearing on October 20, students testified for Ortman, who this time was seeking a permanent injunction. However, he once again lost. * * * Despite some of the tension, students who attended UAHS during this time stress that there were and are no genuine animosities among students, and that the alumni retain a strong sense of community to this day.

And while this was a transformative and tumultuous era in American history, core hallmarks of the high school experience — school dances, pep rallies, graduation — continued as usual, as they do to this day.

Indeed, the time period saw a series of wins by the UAHS football team. For three consecutive years — 1967, 1968 and 1969 — UA held the state championship title. That winning streak, students say, united the class.

“It wasn’t like [two sides] were opposing each other; I think that’s a pretty important thing,” Reynolds said. “It was just two populations facing opposite directions.”

Issue 1 • September 2, 2022

ARLINGTONIAN

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19

Farewell, Roe. A look into the overturning of Roe v. Wade and what it means for America going forward.

BY ADELAIDE PETRAS ’24, THEA POSTALAKIS ’24, AND SAFIA MALHOTRA ’24

ROLINE KEGG ’24

BY CA PHIC GRA

I

n 1970, a Texas woman, under the pseudonym Jane Roe, filed a lawsuit against the district attorney of Dallas County, Henry Wade, challenging a Texas Law that outlawed abortions unless the mother’s life was endangered.

Roe alleged that the state laws violated her right to personal privacy, and the Supreme Court found that this right to privacy was protected by the First, Fourth, Fifth, Ninth and Fourteenth Amendments to the United States Constitution.

This case was prodigious in many ways: not only did it grant people the right to have an abortion, but it also established a constitutional right to privacy for Americans that would influence future cases.

In 2018, Mississippi passed a law called the “Gesta-

tional Age Act,” which prohibited all abortions, with few exceptions, after 15 weeks gestational age. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, the last remaining licensed abortion facility in Mississippi, filed a lawsuit in federal district court challenging the law and requesting an emergency temporary restraining order (TRO). The case reached the Supreme Court, with Mississippi asking initially for the Court to uphold its ban arguging that it was consistent with Roe v.

Wade, but later asking the Court to overrule Roe v. Wade outright.

On June 24, 2022, the court ruled in favor of the state of Mississippi in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, overturning Roe v. Wade and revoking the federal right to an abortion for Americans, leaving it to the regulation of the states instead.

PRE-ROE AMERICA Initially, the reproductive rights movement wasn’t widely supported in the United States. At the time, information about birth control was considered obscene and was therefore outlawed.

The stigma and secrecy surrounding birth control are evident in reflections from people such as Kaye Martin, who is a member of a liberal political activism group called the ReSisters. “[Sex] was something nobody could admit to doing, and there was no birth control because nobody had heard of birth control,” Martin said.

Upper Arlington resident and fellow ReSisters member Elaine Long concurred, describing the subject of abortion as “hush-hush” in the years before Roe v. Wade.

Legal restrictions surrounding reproductive issues were weakened with a court ruling in 1936 that decriminalized the transfer of birth control information in New York, and birth control was protected with the decision in Griswold v.

Connecticut. By the early 1970s, contraceptives were completely legal and much more widely available. Additionally, after the Roe v. Wade decision in 1973, abortion was determined to be constitutionally protected.

However, before Roe, abortions weren’t nonexistent in states that banned it; illegal abortions were frequent occurrences. According to the Guttmacher Insitute, an organization that researches reproductive health, estimated numbers of illegal abortions range from 200,000 to 1.2 million per year in the United States in the 1950s and ’60s. Additionally, it was common for people to receive abortions from unknown and potentially unsafe sources out of necessity.

“I had several friends. These were nice girls. These were popular girls from good families, and they got pregnant,” Martin said. “I suspect that one that I 4 ’2 N know probably had an O NS

BY OH abortion; she just disC J HI Y AP LOR R appeared… They would L G A M either go somewhere and have an abortion, or they go live with a relative and have the baby.”

Additionally, due to religious reasons and societal standards, many women without access 22

to birth control or abortion were pressured into getting married. For some, this is viewed as a consequence of one’s decision to engage in sexual intercourse. But to others, it is seen as an unfair loss of autonomy in making life decisions. “[The girls who had babies in high school] weren’t able to finish school,” Martin said. “It was just the end of choice for them and what their lives would be like. And the ones that married ended up divorced. So I just couldn’t think that that was a good solution.”

However, others disagree with this so-called end of choice.

“I realize that rape happens, but for the most part, it’s completely your decision to get pregnant. Right? You’re able to stop that from happening,” senior Jim Butz said. “Excluding rape, I think [that] if you get pregnant it is your fault and you should be forced to have the baby.”

According to a study by the National Library of Medicine, an estimated 32,000 pregnancies in America result from rape each year. 32.2% of those kept the baby whereas 50% had abortions, 5.9% placed the baby for adoption and 11.8% had miscarriages or spontaneous abortions.

After the repeal of Roe v. Wade, women in some states will lose the right to terminate their pregnancy or not, no matter the situation in which they were impregnated.

Before the reproductive rights movement gained momentum, especially before Roe, the figureheads of the movement were white women such as Margaret Sanger, founder of Planned Parenthood. Alongside her progressive views on reproductive rights, Sanger was a supporter of eugenics, the notion that certain demographics should not reproduce in order to “improve” the human genome. In some ways, she used her advancements in reproductive justice as a way to spread the idea that a fetus should be aborted if it were going to be born disabled or of color. She endorsed the forced and non-consensual sterilization of those deemed “unfit” to have children.

For reasons like this, some still argue that abortion is used as a tool of eugenics and that the reproductive rights movement is more harmful than beneficial to minority groups. In fact, some consider the unborn to be a minority group themselves due to their lack of power and decision-making ability.

Planned Parenthood has run advertisements reading: “BABIES ARE LOUD SMELLY, AND EXPENSIVE. UNLESS YOU WANT ONE.” The Center for Bio-Ethical Reform’s Genocide Awareness Project (GAP) describes pro-choice advertisements like this one to utilize “the dehumanizing rhetoric of genocide.”

The project urges readers to substitute a racial group for the word “babies,” claiming it would induce public outrage.

Additionally, GAP points out that minorities are most likely to choose abortion, arguing that abortion contributes to the erasure of these groups.

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ARLINGTONIAN

A SUMMER OF DISSENT

www.arlingtonian.com

GRAPHIC BY MALLORY JOHNSON ’24

— this unconstitutional policy that was in place for so long — that was saying that it’s okay to kill innocent little boys and girls,” Created Equal program coordinator Evangeline Abaffy said. “It was just a great moment to see this stone be turned over and to look to what’s next.”

The controversial ruling released this summer has further polarized an already extremely polarized country, as some people mourn the loss of Roe v. Wade and others celebrate it. Tensions run high between pro-abortion and anti-abortion Americans.

“Created Equal has added to a lot of harm to Ohioans here. They’re the group that stands outside high schools or on college campuses or outside the statehouse, with really graphic images,” Planned Parenthood Advocates of Ohio director of communications Aileen Day said.

There is tangible hostility between those holding the pro-choice and pro-life standpoints.

“I’ve talked to plenty of people… [that] would look at the evidence of embryology and they would come to the conclusion that that’s wrong to do because they have some basic morality,” Abaffy said.

Seeing as abortion is such a sensitive topic, some may believe that the decision to have an abortion should be left to individuals, rather than legislation.

“If you don’t want to have an abortion, don’t have an abortion. But you know, kind of like hands-off making that decision for others. You know, everybody should have the right to make their own decision,” Long said.

CHANGING LEGISLATION Ohio State Bill 23, which passed July 11, 2019, prohibits abortions once a detectable heartbeat is 23

GRAPHIC BY NOÉ BEAUDOIN ’24

Prior to the official SCOTUS ruling for Dobbs v.

Jackson Women’s Health Organization, Politico published a leaked draft majority opinion penned by Justice Samuel Alito on May 2, 2022. Thus began what has since been coined as “the summer of dissent.”

Within 10 days of the draft leak, UAHS students were met by protestors holding large, graphic signs depicting aborted fetuses and words such as “eternity is a long time to be wrong” and “never forget that everything Hitler did in Germany was legal” in front of the school following the final bell.

These protesters were members of the organization Created Equal, a non-profit, pro-life organization inspired

by Mark Harrington’s vision of uniting human rights defenders.

Harrington and the other members of the Created Equal organization compare themselves to the anti-racist Freedom Riders movement of the 1960s, a historical group of protestors dedicated to abolishing segregation. Their website reads: “like the Freedom Riders, we’re focusing the attention of America on injustice — this time, it’s the ageism of abortion, by which young humans are killed daily for reasons we would not permit the killing of older (born) humans.”

Created Equal was only one of many organizations holding protests over the summer. Planned Parenthood alone organized more than 400 “Bans off our Bodies” protests the day following the draft leak and has since continued to organize protests and rallies in defense of abortion rights.

On June 24, the court released the official ruling for Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, only slightly altered from the leaked draft Politico had published.

The ruling overturned Roe v. Wade and revoked the constitutional right to an abortion for Americans after half a century of precedent.

Junior Shira Bohrer, who is interested in political activism and works at the Ohio Center for Sex Education, recounts the day Roe v. Wade was overturned.

“I think when it happened, a part of me and a lot of other people just sort of shut down. I remember being really frustrated with Instagram. I didn’t want to see it on the stories. I didn’t want to see people posting about it,” Bohrer said. “I was just, like, kind of over it. And it was just kind of a frustrating thing to be around because you just see all of this and it’s like, ‘Well, what can we do?’”

Meanwhile Created Equal, and other anti-abortion Americans, experienced that day much differently.

“It was very surreal at first. I couldn’t even believe it.

And then, once it kind of sunk in, I had tears streaming down my face — we all did. This joy, that Roe had fallen

N ’24 HNSO ORY JO L L A M HIC BY GRAP

found — typically within six weeks of conception. This can cause most abortions not to be performed, since, at six weeks, many people don’t know that they are pregnant, according to the Abortion Fund of Ohio.

According to the bill, illegal abortion, classified as a fifth-degree felony, entails “knowingly performing or inducing an abortion once a fetal heartbeat has been detected unless designed or intended to prevent the death of the pregnant woman.”

This bill has no exceptions for rape or incest. This ruling has not been changed since the case of Dobbs v. Jackson.

To combat this bill, organizations that are pro-choice, such as Planned Parenthood, have been using resources such as patient navigators. Patient navigators help people who want abortions to obtain the help that they need, whether it be directing them out of state or connecting with health centers that could. Planned Parenthood can connect people seeking abortions with these patient navigators and steer them in the desired direction.

“One out of 10 people in Ohio is having an abortion at under six weeks, so we’re sending around 90% of people out of state,” Day said.

However, the topic of patient navigators is becoming increasingly controversial as states adapt to a post-Roe life.

Recently, an anonymous ten-year-old girl became a key point in abortion topics. The girl was pregnant due to rape and was denied an abortion in Ohio. She was directed to Indiana, where Dr. Caitlin Bernard administered her medication for an abortion.

Bernard underwent tremendous backlash for this decision, mostly from fervent Republicans in Indiana, but she said she hoped that her decision made a difference.

“I think people realize how important our voice as physicians as advocates for access to care can be,” Bernard said in a July interview with NPR. “I hope it will be inspiring and not deterring.”

However, shortly after, Indiana passed a new Senate bill restricting abortion. The bill was passed on Aug. 5 by the state House 62-38 and the state Senate approved it 28-19.

Indiana Governor Eric Holcomb stood in favor of this bill, outwardly declaring his opinions on the anti-abortion side.

“Following the overturning of Roe, I stated clearly that I would be willing to support legislation that made progress in protecting life,” Holcomb said in a statement.

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Indiana’s Senate Bill 1 will be effective Sept. 15, 2022. It prohibits the licensure of abortion clinics, as well as banning abortion unless in cases of rape or incest before the tenth week of pregnancy.

The differences in elected officials’ opinions are also being shown throughout the country, as many other states decide what they will do in a post-Roe society.

On Aug. 2, 2022, voters in Kansas, a primarily Republican state, rejected a constitutional amendment that would have allowed the legislature to restrict abortion rights.

Kansas’s situation is now seen to those on the prochoice side as a glimmer of hope, encouraging them to not give up.

Long agreed that the best way to resist is to speak one’s mind.

“If you’re unhappy, stand up,” Long said. “Have your voices heard.”

This same sentiment is held among many across the pro-choice spectrum.

“Abortion should not be stigmatized,” Day said. “One out of every four people who can become pregnant will have an abortion in their lifetime. But the majority of Ohioans don’t think that they know anyone who has been impacted by abortion.”

A POST-ROE FUTURE On the surface Roe v. Wade appears to just protect the federal right to an abortion; however, it runs much deeper than that. Roe v. Wade protects an individual’s constitutional right to privacy under the First, Fourth, Fifth, Ninth and Fourteenth Amendments to the United States Constitution.

Roe v. Wade also set a precedent that other SCOTUS cases rely on, such as Obergefell v. Hodges, legalizing same-sex marriage.

“I think this does kind of set the precedent of, you know, the national government, they have more power to take away people’s rights now. [But] I think most rights have been around since the beginning of the country; like everything the Bill of Rights said,” Butz said. “I don’t think there’s any danger of that going away… I am not personally worried about that.”

Day disagreed.

“This also opens the opportunity for justices to take away other rights like gay marriage and contraception and things like that,” Day said. “So it’s just really scary, especially because it’s opened the door to be able to further take away other rights.”

In its majority opinion, the court stated that “[n]othing in this opinion should be understood to cast doubt on precedents that do not concern abortion.” However, Justice Clar-

Issue 1 • September 2, 2022

ARLINGTONIAN

www.arlingtonian.com

in the foster care system; that’s not a solution,” Long said.

According to Court Appointed Special Advocates for Children of Ohio (CASA), there are more than 400,000 children in foster care in the United States, as well as more than 16,000 in Ohio alone. Additionally, 1,000 of those children in Ohio age out of foster care every year without having somewhere to live.

Oftentimes people who do not trust the adoption or foster systems will opt to terminate a pregnancy if they cannot afford to carry it to term.

According to the Center for Reproductive Rights, 25.1 million unsafe abortions are performed each year worldwide, and that number is predicted to increase drastically following the overruling of Roe v. Wade.

“People are either going to have to self-manage abortions by ordering pills online… and it’s actually very safe to self-manage your own abortion, but people just shouldn’t have to take healthcare into their own hands,” Day said. “So it’s either forcing people to take healthcare into their own hands or we’re forcing people to — if they even can — travel out of state a hundred miles to get healthcare.”

The SCOTUS overturning Roe v. Wade will have a drastic impact on American history going forward for dozens of reasons, one such reason being that the SCOTUS does not often overturn former court proceedings. “Stare decisis” is a Latin term that means “to stand by things decided” and is the legal principle of determining points in litigation according to precedent, as defined by The Oxford Dictionary. The court adheres to stare decisis, and values precedent in general. It rarely overturns former court proceedings. Typically, when a court overturns a former ruling it is to invoke rights, rather than revoke them — as demonstrated in Brown v. Board of Education, Gideon v. Wainwright and Lawrence v. Texas. Hence why the ruling in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization took many prochoice Americans — who believe the right to an abortion to be a fundamental human right — by surprise.

“Losing the right to abortion is a human rights crisis,” Day said. “The impacts are really drastic, and they’ll, unfortunately, be never-ending.”

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GRAPHIC BY NOÉ BEAUDOIN ’24

ence Thomas, in a concurring opinion, stated that the court “should reconsider” its rulings in cases protecting same-sex marriage, same-sex intimacy and contraception access.

The Biden Administration has backed contraception rights, issuing a warning to U.S. businesses and health insurance providers that limiting coverage of contraceptives is a violation of federal law. Moreso, The United States Department of Health and Human Services recently clarified that the Affordable Care Act requires insurance plans to provide free birth control to insured individuals. Democrats in the House of Representatives attempted to pass a bill protecting access to contraception, but were unsuccessful.

“That’s a crazy thing to do, in my opinion,” Butz said.

“I feel like having no abortions and no contraceptives, or I guess having fewer abortions and fewer contraceptives, means that there’s going to be tons of babies showing up all over the place.”

Same-sex marriage is also vulnerable to the ministrations of the SCOTUS, and the House has preemptively passed a bill to repeal the 1996 Defense of Marriage Act, which states that marriage may exist only between one man and one woman. The act remains on the books, but is legally unenforceable due to court’s decision in the Obergefell case.

These are only some of the impacts that may follow the Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization ruling, although some will vary based on certain demographics.

“Some states have completely banned abortion, while some states are completely fine with it, and it creates this huge discrepancy where the people that are the most affected by it are people that are unable to afford to go out of state to get the care that they need,” Bohrer said. “Abortions are still going to happen. That’s the reality. And it’s only affecting the people that aren’t as privileged as others and it’s kind of like a theme I think, in a lot of legislation in the US.” Certain demographics will be impacted differently by this court ruling than others. For example, low-income individuals and minorities will likely have less access to abortions and other forms of reproductive care.

“It’ll be harder for people who need an abortion who cannot afford to travel to other states, who can’t afford to travel to other countries,” Long said. “There’ll be people that will have to have these babies and have a hard time raising them or not have the resources to raise them. It’s going to have a huge impact on people living in poverty.”

Some, such as Butz, present adoption as a viable option for handling unwanted pregnancies.

“If worst comes to worst, you can always put him up for adoption or take him to an orphanage because you don’t have the money to care for him,” Butz said.

Others don’t view adoption as an effective solution, citing issues within the adoption and foster care systems.

“I think that we know the statistics about the number of people that are adopting kids. I mean, there’s so many kids

UA SPEAKS

Skoracki

Arlingtonian cartoonist Lukas Skoracki, a senior, reflects on college applications.

CARTOON BY LUKAS SKORACKI ’23

BY THE NUMBERS COMPILED BY GEORGE BERNARD ’23

2

new assisstant principals have joined the UAHS community this school year.

38

students went on a trip to Germany this summer as part of an exchange program.

students are part of the Arlingtonian staff this year.

$1.3B

GRAPHIC BY LUKE ROCKEY ’23

2035 is the graduation year of this year’s kindergarten students.

was the global box office sales for “Top Gun: Maverick.”

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24

Issue 1 • September 2, 2022

ARLINGTONIAN

EIGHT EIGHT IN

Eight students respond to a question in eight words

COMPILED BY SAFIA MALHOTRA ’24 AND THEA POSTALAKIS ’24 PHOTOS BY EDITH LEBLANC ’23

Describe your summer.

YAYORNAY COMPILED BY GEORGE BERNARD ’23

Data from polling on Arlingtonian’s Instagram account, @uaarlingtonian. May not be a representative sample of the UAHS student body.

I attended a concert over the summer.

YAY NAY 45% 55%

158 RESPONSES

Preparing for school… oops, I forgot summer reading.

I went on vacation to Hawaii.

T’was fun!

— Freshman Matthew Schmersal

— Freshman Elise Eisnnicher

I saw “Top Gun: Maverick.”

159 RESPONSES

This summer I went to the Pacific Northwest.

It was very fun and was very eventful.

— Sophomore Julia Newland

— Sophomore Alex Sullivan

I had a good summer break.

170 RESPONSES

I attended a protest over the summer.

NAY YAY 50% 50%

NAY 9% YAY 91%

YAY 15%

152 RESPONSES

My summer was good. I ate and slept.

I worked at the pool; it was fun.

— Junior Jared Rabadam

— Junior Audrey Dungan

I went back-toschool shopping.

156 RESPONSES

Lots of travel and fun with my friends.

My summer was pretty good and I fished.

— Senior Lauren Carmichael

— Senior Callum Davies

www.arlingtonian.com

I traveled outside the country during summer.

162 RESPONSES

NAY 85%

NAY YAY 32% 68%

YAY 20%

NAY 80%

27

OPINION

Summer Sounds

Columnist discusses some of her favorite music from the summer, plus upcoming music.

BY GRETA MILLER ’23

T

his past summer was full of a variety of things for UAHS students. Some kids were working a summer job, while others were hanging out with friends, completing the summer Capstone course, going to concerts or simply listening to music by the pool.

Over the summer, I listened to and enjoyed a lot of the newly released music by numerous artists. One of my favorites from this summer was SZA’s music release on June 9, 2022, called “Ctrl (Deluxe).” SZA published seven previously unreleased tracks that were made in 2014-2016 on the same date as her original album release, “Ctrl,” exactly five years later. Along with SZA, I also enjoyed artist Steve Lacy’s second studio album “Gemini Rights” that was released July 15. It followed Lacy’s debut album Apollo XXI and was preceded by the singles “Mercury,” “Bad Habit” and “Sunshine” featuring musical artist Fousheé.

While I did not attend any concerts this summer, many UAHS students enjoyed live music around Columbus. One of my favorites artists that came to Columbus for a concert was Rex Orange County. Rex Orange County played his concert at KEMBA Live!, Columbus on June 20, 2022. He played some of his most famous songs from several of his albums including “Who Cares?”, “Pony” and “Apricot Princess.”

Some of the music of the summer is still yet to come.

Two music festivals are coming to Columbus in the month of August. Breakaway Music Festival is being held at the Historic Crew Stadium on Aug. 26, 27 and 28. This festival is hosting various artists, some of the most popular being The Chainsmokers, Quinn XCII, Yung Gravy and 21 Savage. The second music and arts festival, Wonderbus, is also the same weekend at The Lawn At CAS and features Duran Duran, Lorde, the Lumineers and Daisy the Great.

GRAPHIC BY PARKER SANFORD ’24

CONCERT WATCH A look at some of this month’s upcoming concerts in central Ohio.

SEPTEMBER

COMPILED BY SAFIA MALHOTRA ’24

Sunday

Monday

Tuesday

Wednesday

4

5

6 Magic City Hippies A&R Music Bar

7

11

12 Father John Misty KEMBA Live!

13

14

Bad Omens The KING of CLUBS

Thursday 8

Murphy’s Law Rumba Cafe

15

Pusha T KEMBA Live!

Post Malone Nationwide Arena 25

Tessa Violet A&R Music Bar

19

Ben Platt Schottenstein Center Mom Jeans Athenaeum Theatre

26

The Melvins A&R Music Bar

20 The Luka State The Basement

Brooks Nielsen A&R Music Bar

16 The Front Bottoms KEMBA Live!

17

Matt Stell The Bluestone

Briston Maroney Newport Music Hall

Psychostick The KING of CLUBS

21 Panic! At The Disco Nationwide Arena

22

28 Ricky Montgomery A&R Music Bar

29

Disturbed KEMBA Live!

Trombone Shorty Newport Music Hall 27

Saturday 10

Demon Hunter The KING of CLUBS 18

Friday 9

Whethan The Bluestone

23 The Head and the Heart KEMBA Live!

30

Front 242 Skully’s Music Diner

glaive A&R Music Bar Spaceface Rumba Cafe

24

Conan Gray KEMBA Live!

Death Cab for Cutie KEMBA Live!

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Issue 1 • September 2, 2022

ARLINGTONIAN

OPINION GRAPHIC BY LUKE ROCKEY ’23

Mission: Success Pilot gives “Top Gun: Maverick” the thumbs up.

BY GEORGE BERNARD ’23

“T

www.arlingtonian.com

COURTESY PARAMOUNT PICTURES

op Gun: Maverick” was released into a tough environment: movie theaters were half-empty and after two years of delays, expectations were skyhigh (pun intended). As a pilot myself, I was particularly drawn to the movie because of how much I enjoyed the original. Despite the adversity, the movie became a smash hit because it does an exceptional job at balancing character development, action and humor that exceeds expectations.

Over a decade in the making, the film was crafted to perfection and has become my favorite aviation movie. Not only is “Top Gun: Maverick” a fantastic sequel to the 1986 original, it is a show of American exceptionalism and power delivered better than any precision bomb could.

Compared to the original, Captain Pete “Maverick” Mitchell, played by Tom Cruise, is more caring for others, showing compassion for his colleagues in the Darkstar program and acting as a father figure to Bradley “Rooster” Bradshaw, Goose’s son. Although he is more caring, Maverick doesn’t lose his characteristic ego and confidence, regardless of the situation. The action is near constant throughout the movie, whether it is Maverick going over Mach 10, practicing low altitude flying, playing football on the beach, or stealing an F-14 Tomcat from an enemy airbase, it is impossible to look away from the screen. Dispersed throughout the intense scenes, there are many well-placed jokes to relieve the tension. The movie also does a great job at calling back to the original without feeling like a repeat, including only a few seconds of flashbacks and despite fundamentally still being about airplanes, every flying scene is different and exciting.

In the box office, the film has been breaking records since its release on May 27, the movie has grossed $662.5 million domestically and $1.3 billion globally putting it in seventh and 13th place respectively. It also is the highest grossing movie released on Memorial Day weekend in addition to having a 99% audience score on Rotten Tomatoes. The reason it is so popular isn’t just because it is entertaining, it’s because it is a patriotic movie. It came out at perfect time, Covid was resurging, inflation was climbing rapidly and gas was hitting $5 per gallon. People

wanted a movie to make them feel good. Furthermore, in a time where a majority of Americans believe our country is going in the wrong direction, the movie reminded people of what makes our country great. A diverse group of highly talented pilots from the most prestigious flying school in the world competing to serve on a mission to protect our allies. Scenes of Cyclone risking his career for the good of the mission, Maverick downing far superior enemy aircraft in an F-14 and Hangman rescuing Maverick and Rooster remind people of their own ideals and values. The display of American military might against a threat reinvigorates a sense of patriotism and respect for the men and women who bravely serve our country that has been waning recently.

Notwithstanding the excellent storytelling, the undeniably best part of the movie is the flying. The movie gives the most authentic feeling of being in a F/A-18 Super Hornet going over 700 mph less than 100 feet from the ground that any of us will get. At the insistence of Tom Cruise, the movie never uses CGI to animate an airplane, although they do use computers to digitally change the appearance of three airplanes by putting a digital “wrapping” over F-18s to make them look like a different airplane. They did this for the Darkstar aircraft which doesn’t exist, the Su-57, a brand new Russian aircraft, and F-14, as there are no airworthy ones left. The audio captured from the engines during carrier operations is intense, but seeing four F-18s flying in close formation just a few feet from the ground just under the speed of sound through the Cascades Mountains of Washington is truly stunning. Moreover, the shots from the cockpit are amazing, showing the effects of the fast accelerations and how little room there is for error.

Lastly, as a pilot myself, I really appreciate the effort made to make the film accurate in terms of aviation terminology, air traffic control communications, procedures and aircraft capabilities, things most movies get atrociously wrong. In all, I would give “Top Gun: Maverick” a 10/10 and it will certainly become a go-to movie for years (maybe decades) to come.

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OPINION

Tensuke Express

Critic steps out of his comfort zone and enjoys Japanese food.

BY ALI ABUBAKR ’24 ever have I had more fun eating at a restaurant than I had at Tensuke Express. I’m usually a picky eater (I don’t know what they were thinking letting me do a food review), so when eating out I like to go to places where I know what to expect and eat large amounts of simple, plain food. If I’m feeling adventurous one day, I’ll let them put lettuce on my burger. So when I walked into the cute, welcoming Japanese restaurant, I was somewhat intimidated.

Tensuke Express is a Japanese ramen restaurant at the Kenny Centre Mall’s Japanese Marketplace. Surrounded by other Japanese restaurants and stores, Tensuke Express is conveniently located for shoppers and diners coming from other establishments. It has a large seating area, yet still manages to appear cozy and at the same time modern. Very clean bathrooms, an organized trash and recycling system and Japanese pop music playing over the speakers created a very pleasant dining experience.

The most Japanese food I’ve had are those orange packeted stove made ramen packets from a grocery store and I might’ve had some sushi like four years ago. So when it came time for me to order at Tensuke Express, I ordered what the menu said was the number one favorite, the Grilled Chicken Paitan Ramen for $13.50. I also took a large gamble and ordered some barbecue eel on rice. I had absolutely no idea what to expect with the eel, but I

was excited when I sat down at ROLINE KEGG ’24 CA my table to wait for my food.

BY After a 15-minute wait, my food was ready. The ramen was served in a large, dark bowl and came with a generous amount of thick ramen noodles, a few large pieces of grilled chicken, half a boiled egg, green onions and spinach, all soaking in a deliciously warm white creamy soup. The noodles were extremely tasty and worked great with the well-cooked grilled chicken. Along with the greens and the egg, you’ve got all your food pyramid sections covered.

I had some trouble eating all of this with chopsticks, but I persevered. It just took me a very long time. I was very pleased with myself and satisfied after I finished the ramen but those feelings quickly dissolved as I looked over at the eel.

The eel didn’t look bad at all. Two rectangular pieces of fish-looking meat covered in BBQ sauce and sat on top of white rice looked somewhat appetizing, but my obviously inexperienced self reeled at the fact that I was about to eat an eel. Yet after all my worrying, the underwhelming result was meat that had little to no taste, and a mouthful of BBQ sauce.

All in all, stepping out of my comfort zone turned out to be successful. Along the way I had to overcome hardships like the chopsticks and the eel, but the main dish of ramen was absolutely fantastic and the restaurant itself is a wonderfully cute place. Because of this, Tensuke Market is the first restaurant ever to be Ali Approved.

GRA PH IC

N

GRAPHIC BY CAROLINE KEGG ’24

◀ TASTY TASTY Tensuke Express serves a scrumptious chicken paitan ramen.

PHOTO BY ALI ABUBAKR ’24

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Issue 1 • September 2, 2022

ARLINGTONIAN

EDITORIAL

GRAPHIC BY CAROLINE KEGG ’24

The Importance of Now This school year is the time to grow as students and unify as a community.

BY EDITORIAL BOARD

W

e’re back. Returning to homework, tests, clubs and sports after ten weeks of time to grow. Last year was the first year in a new building, with lots of new things to get used to. For current seniors, it was their first full year of high school. Current sophomores will be the first graduating class to have all four years in the new school. Lots of big changes, additions and improvements have happened this fall as well in order to make this school year the best it can be.

As a student body, there are thousands of differences between us.

Everyone has a different aesthetic, music taste, favorite subject in school or amount of siblings. These differencwww.arlingtonian.com

es can cause separation, but through patience, listening and the desire to self-educate, our differences can be what brings us together. What unites us as one student body. One school.

Arlingtonian is diverse in its students, too. It is made up of writers, photographers, graphic artists, business associates, editors, and more.

Everyone has their speciality, what they’re on staff to improve and grow in. But when a writer sits down with a graphic artist to plan their graphics or an editor sits down and works with a writer step by step on their layout, it improves the culture as a whole.

Although being in high school can feel like the most important thing in a student’s life right now, we have

our entire lives in front of us. The education we are receiving in these four years is providing us with what we need to succeed later on, whether that be taking every honors science class offered, or every painting class, we all are working toward a common goal. We need to live in the moment now, taking in all that we can. We’re reminded every summer just how time flies, and the same will happen during the school year. Reminding ourselves that now is our time to grow, to make mistakes and learn from them, and harness the tools, characteristics and traits that will carry us into the future.

Now is the time.

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