VOLUME 77, ISSUE 8 | WWW.ELACCAMPUSNEWS.COM | WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 30, 2019 | SINGLE COPY FREE - ADDITIONAL COPIES 50 CENTS
Electronic census will not question citizenship BY MELISA VALENZUELA Staff Writer
CN/STEVEN ADAMO
The 2020 Census will no longer include a citizenship question and, for the first time in history, will allow residents to respond online. On April 1, the United States Census Bureau will conduct the decennial census. Its purpose is to count every resident living in the country as mandated by Article 1, Section 2 of the U.S. Constitution. The website, 2020Census.gov, said that beginning in mid-March residents will receive an invitation to respond to a short questionnaire by phone, by mail or, for the first time, online. Giovany Hernandez, Regional Census Campaign Manager for Los Angeles County and a member of the National Association of Latino Democratic Officials which has been a leader in the census world for over 40 years, said the questionnaire will contain nine questions and will not include a citizenship question. “As of June 27, the Supreme Court made the official halt decision to the citizenship question and it will no longer appear on the questionnaire,” Hernandez said. “It (keeping the citizenship question) was a last-minute addition that the (Trump) administration tried to force. It would’ve hurt the second largest population in the country, which is the Latino community.” The question instills fear in immigrant communities and makes them less likely to participate in the census. The census helps guide planning for the future of communities by determining how billions of dollars are allocated annually.
The funds are used to support fire and emergency services and other social programs like MediCal and Social Security. If under-resourced communities don’t participate, they don’t receive the funds that they need for education, healthcare, transportation and housing. “California receives $115 billion every year based on the data from the census. This includes money for programs like Food Stamps, WIC and Title 1 funding for schools in low-income areas,” Hernandez said. The decision to allow online responses was meant to make the census accessible to everyone and follows the latest web accessibility guidelines. However, technology is accessible to only a certain part of the population. There are still people who are not as up-to-date when it comes to technology, especially older Americans. Even though replies by telephone and mail are still accepted, Hernandez said it could be a great opportunity for young people to get involved by sharing their knowledge of technology with those who aren’t so savvy. “Young people can be the bridge to the digital divide,” Hernandez said. “They can ensure relatives are participating and become ‘Census Captains’ for their families.” Special accommodations can be made for blind and disabled residents, including braille and large print guides or an in-person meeting with an official 2020 Census taker. The most important thing the results do is provide a basis for reapportioning congressional seats. Since 1790, population
figures from the census have been used to make sure that the government represents the people by determining how many seats each state gets in the U.S. House of Representatives. This process is called apportionment. As the country’s population grows, the apportionment process will guarantee equal representation for everyone. Preparations for the 2020 Census are already underway. On Aug. 4, the bureau began conducting address canvassing. They hired people from local communities to confirm the locations of houses, apartments, shelters and other places where people can live. Canvassing helps ensure a complete and accurate address list for the census. Although address canvassing ended Oct. 18, there are still many opportunities for employment. This is another way for young people to get involved. Part-time and full-time positions are available, which are perfect for students.It’s a way to earn extra money while helping to make sure that the community gets counted. To qualify, the applicant must be at least 18 years old, have a valid social security number, be a U.S. citizen, have a valid email address, complete an application, be registered with the Selective Service System, pass a censusperformed criminal background check, commit to completing training and be available to work flexible hours. Most jobs also require access to a vehicle and a valid driver’s license and access to a computer. Applications are available online at USAJobs.com.
District representatives collecting input on new ELAC president BY IVAN CAZARES Staff Writer
The East Los Angeles College community can communicate what they want from the college’s next president with Los Angeles Community College District representatives on Monday. The discourse will take place during a town hall meeting in multipurpose room 201 in the Campus Center from noon to 2 p.m. Francisco C. Rodriguez, Los Angeles Community College District chancellor, will host the free event, which is open to the public. It is an opportunity for the community to share their opinions and learn about the selection process. Campus wide free parking will be provided. A selection committee will be formed and vote on who will take on the position, which will be highly coveted among community college administrators said Jeffery Hernandez, member of the ELAC Senate Executive Committee during an interview earlier in the semester. “The next president will have
to continue our forward-thinking approach to enrollment. Something that all community colleges are struggling with is enrollment,” Hernandez said. “It’s going to take a visionary leader in guided pathways, and one who’s collaborative with faculty and staff (to fill the position).” Hernandez said there is a demand for more online courses as well as short term classes from both incoming high school students and returning students looking to “get things done.” “Before (Former ELAC President) Marvin (Martinez), it seemed like the number of transfers always stayed the same. It almost didn’t matter how many students we had,” Hernandez said. “Now, year after year we’re sending thousands of students into universities and future careers. That’s amazing and something I’ll always be grateful for and find important as a community member,” Hernandez said. He said the next president will have to be an innovative individual that can continue the progress made by previous presidents in enrollment and transfer rates. The new president will become the leader of a growing college on its 75th anniversary with more than 40,000 students.
ELAC to tackle water scarcity BY STEVEN ADAMO Staff Writer The theme for Friday’s Global Awareness in the 21st Century conference will focus on the issue of water scarcity. The event will feature a keynote speaker and multiple workshops in a wide-range of subjects as well as free breakfast and lunch. The keynote speaker for the event is George McGraw, founder of the Los Angeles-based nonprofit DigDeep. McGraw, who served as a consultant for the United Nations
Development Program, first took an interest in water poverty in Afghanistan. Infant and women mortality rates rose when half of their community water sanitation projects were failing. He has given TEDx talks on the subject and is currently working with the Navajo Nation in the United States. The volunteer-organizers want to bring awareness of local and global environmental issues, as well as inspiring students to get involved in the solutions to these big problems.
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New bill causes students to drop out AB 705 mandates transfer math courses to be finished in the same year BY JONATHAN BERMUDEZ Staff Writer Students of East Los Angeles College are dropping out of math classes due to Assembly Bill 705, which takes away remedial classes for transfer classes. With this new bill, students are forced to take transfer math classes and pass them all within the same year. This new bill is putting a lot of stress on students and the math department is trying to fix that. Chair of the Math Department Joseph Kazimir said, “No good, bad bill.” He said that since the bill has been in effect, he has been getting visits from students asking for help. He said a lot of students can’t pass the classes and need the prerequisites. He said a lot of the math teachers are having trouble with this bill because they don’t know how to help students. Because of this bill, a lot of math professors are disconnected from their students and don’t know how to properly teach them when a lot of students need a refresher on math. Kazimir said last school year,
2000 students had no classes to go to because they were all enrolled in prerequisite courses when the bill was in the early stages before it went into full effect. He said that Math 125 was too hard for students so they dropped out. He believes that Francisco C. Rodriguez, chancellor for the Los Angeles Community College District, misinterpreted the law because some schools still have their prerequisites, but also have the bill applied to them. “I believe that the law is ruining the community colleges in this district,” Kazimir said. “Our rights were violated by the Chancellor.I’m filing a grievance on behalf of the Math Department to have those remedial classes restated.” A grievance is a complaint about something that is unjust. Faculty file grievances to the teachers union when they have a complaint. There is a three-step process when filing a grievance. Other colleges in the district are also filing a grievance because they feel the bill is unjust. Most colleges are still on the first step of filing a grievance, but Pierce College has already secured
a hearing with an arbitrator. An email sent out by the community college district shows how many students have successfully passed the transfer classes after the bill was implemented. They show that in regular math classes, the number of unsuccessful students was even with the number of successful students but was still considered too high. Another section showed that there were more unsuccessful students than successful students who were enrolled in BSTEM. These classes are for science majors and business majors. “There is nothing to catch a student if they fall,” math professor and Chair of District Math Counsel Daniel Judge said. This means if a student takes one of the AB 705 classes and fails, they don’t have any class to go to for support, so they are going to have to stay in the class and fail over and over again. Kazimir and Judge believe that this bill affects all students and not just first-year students. They both hope that with the new data they will be able to change the bill so that students won’t have a stressful time at school.
News Briefs One Book,One College
Read-ins for “When They Call You A Terrorist: A Black Lives Matter Memoir” will be held today at 12:30 p.m. in room 101 in the library.
Architecture lecture series
The fall 2019 lecture series will begin Friday with a free lecture by James Rojas on Latino urbanism at 7:30 p.m. at VPAM.
Thank you
ELAC Campus News would like to thank News Publishers Press for being flexible and working with the team during the flodding of the E7 building the past two weeks.