VOLUME 77, ISSUE 10 | WWW.ELACCAMPUSNEWS.COM | WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 20, 2019 | SINGLE COPY FREE - ADDITIONAL COPIES 50 CENTS
Students fear for future of annual altar project BY LUIS CASTILLA Staff Writer For Chicano Studies students, their long-running Day of the Dead altar project is a cause they must fight for every year. The Vincent Price Art Museum has celebrated The Day of the Dead and Latino culture for the last 16 years with the Annual Día De Los Muertos Student Altar Exhibition. For the past three years, however, it has been an uphill battle to keep the exhibit at VPAM said Angelita Rovero, professor of Chicano studies. “Every year, we pretty much have to make a case for it,” Rovero said. Rovero said that VPAM director, Pilar Tompkins Rivas micromanages their projects by allowing them little time to work on the altars. “For the past three years, we
“It would be a shame for not only the students, but also our community to be deprived of this experience.” NATALIE HERNANDEZ
Chicano Studies 054 Student
CN/LUIS CASTILLA
REMEMBERING THE DEAD—Students enrolled in Chicano Studies 054 created atlars honoring Selena Quintanilla, Gilbert “Magu” Lujan and Anthony Quinn. have been suggested by some administrators and VPAM to do the altars to do the altars in an alternate space on campus,” Rovero said. Last year, the exhibit was held in Los Angeles Pierce College, 30 miles from ELAC. The exhibit, which features Chicano studies’ student-made altars honoring noteworthy Latinos, received criticism from Kerrin McMahan, dean of instructional
ELAC classified as safest campus in California BY MELISA VALENZUELA Staff Writer Out of more than 250 colleges and universities in California, East Los Angeles College was ranked as having the lowest violent crime rates in the state. Compared to other schools in California, ELAC made the list for having the lowest incidents of violent crime per 1,000 students, according to Safehome.org. These incidents include murder, rape, negligent homicide, robbery, aggravated assault and arson. University of California Berkeley had the highest violent crime rates in the state. In 2017, ELAC had a total of zero rapes, zero robberies and seven motor vehicle thefts on campus. UC Berkeley had 21 rapes, 26 robberies and 21 motor vehicle thefts on campus for that same year, according to a report done by the Office of Postsecondary Education of the United States Department of Education. Safehome.org used data from this report for theirs. Safehome.org is an organization that researches, reviews and compares the latest security trends. Its research covers school and city safety for college students, but is limited in scope to nonprofit colleges, universities and community colleges in the United States with an enrollment of at least 10,000. “We are on campus 24/7 and we’re always visible and constantly patrolling,” said deputy Romero, one of ELAC’s campus deputies. “We also have a Los Angeles Sheriff’s Department substation and armed personnel, which are things that not all college campuses have.” This semester, there have been no major crime incidents that have been reported. The ELAC Sheriff’s Station is located in room B5-104, which is connected to Weingart Stadium. The campus deputies have the authority to apprehend and arrest individuals involved in illegal activity both on and around campus. They work with state,
local and federal law enforcement agencies and have access to national crime databases. Some of the services that they offer to students are The Emergency Notification System and escort services. The Emergency Notification System is used to notify students, faculty and staff via text and email in the event of an emergency. Students are asked if they wish to receive these notifications when filling out the ELAC admissions application. Students can also contact the sheriff ’s station if they need someone to escort them to class or to their vehicle.Emergency call boxes are located throughout the campus and are lit up by blue lights. These emergency phones are a direct line to the ELAC Sheriff’s station and are located near C1 men’s gym, E9 women’s gym, the E5 building, P1 AutoTech building and K5 Music building. For more information, for safety tips or to report an incident, students and staff can visit the station or call them at (323) 2658800. In addition to the deputies, ELAC also employs cadets. The Los Angeles Community College District Cadet Program offers students an hourly, part-time position as a campus cadet. Under the direction of the LA Sheriff’s Department and LACCD personnel, cadets perform safety services such as traffic control and escort services, law enforcement police desk operations, public relations, clerical/administrative support, investigation assistance, property collection, crime prevention, parking enforcement, hand-held radio use and other related campus duties. Students interested in becoming cadets can stop by the station to fill out a Cadet Interest Card. “Yes, I do feel pretty safe here,” said ELAC student Veronica Hernandez. “I went to another college before I came here and I would receive alerts about robberies and assaults at least once a month. But not here.”
services in social sciences. McMahan said in an email to interim president Raul Rodriguez that the altars are all identical in format, calling them “amateurishly executed.” “In my opinion, this display is an embarrassment. I see no educational or artistic value in continuing it after this year,” McMahan said. McMahan has since apologized for her comments.
“I made some ill-considered remarks which caused hurt feelings. I regret doing so and I hope the opportunity I have been given for self-reflection will help me be more mindful in the future,” McMahan said. VPAM director, Pilar Tompkins Rivas, could not be reached for comment. Rovero said that there are guidelines students must follow
when making the altars, but everything else is up to the students. The altars were also criticized for featuring the same celebrities and colors every year. Rovero and her Chicano Studies 054 class work with the families of the celebrities to create the altars. Actress Lupe Ontiveros and artist Gilbert “Magu” Lujan have both been honored in the exhibit for the past six years.
Their children, Elias Ontiveros and Naiche Lujan, respectively said that they support the continuation of the exhibit. Francisco Rodriguez, Los Angeles Community College District chancellor, said he was proud to have the altars in ELAC. Several students who worked on the altars have written letters to president Rodriguez in support of continuing the exhibit. “It would be a shame for not only the students, but also our community to be deprived of this experience,” Chicano Studies 054 student Natalie Hernandez said. “Being a part of this class and having professor Rovero as an instructor has made me feel more connected to my culture,” another Chicano Studies 054 student, Anglei Ibañez said. Richard Montoya, son of poet and artist Jose Montoya, also wrote a letter showing his support for the exhibit. “ELAC has been a historic epicenter for nuestra raza (our race). The very unspoken definition of safe space,” Montoya said. “We should not undermine that because of our subjectivity.” Rovero said that former ELAC president Marvin Martinez strongly supported the altars staying at VPAM. There has been no official statement on whether or not the Día De Los Muertos Student Altar Exhibition will be discontinued from being displayed in VPAM or if it will be moved to another campus again.
WiFi issues cleared up IT Depratment provides insight into poor WiFi on campus BY JUAN CALVILLO Staff Writer WiFi is imperative at school, and getting a lasting connection at East Los Angeles College can be challenging, but not if students understand the system. Students and faculty have voiced concerns over the WiFi connection on campus as was covered in an opinion piece in the Campus News Oct. 30 issue. Nghi Nghiem, associate vice president of administrative services, said the campus WiFi has been updated since he first arrived on campus five years ago. There are currently over 450 access points that cover the South Gate, Monterey Park and the corporate centers of ELAC. Each of these access points have 20 to 22 reservation spots. Nghiem said that the issues students and teachers have with their devices logging out can be explained quite easily. He said that when a device takes a reservation spot, connects to an access point for WiFi, it will stay logged on as long as the device remains active. If the device goes into sleep mode, or remains idle too long and goes into power-saving mode, the access point will take this as the device not needing to be connected. The access point will then kick the user from the network and allow for an open reservation to be used by a device that is searching for WiFi. Nghiem said that this often explains why disconnections happen to students. With so many devices taking reservation spots all at once, all it takes is for one to go into a power saving mode and log out. Because so many other devices are looking for WiFi, that spot is quickly taken up. Nghiem said that the higher populated areas on campus have more access points than those with less traffic. As students move around the campus, coverage changes just with cell phones and the towers where they get signal.
“So if you’re walking from one point of the campus to another point and you enter a point where the access point is covered (full), well, there is no other reservation you can utilize. So at that point you may get dropped. You know what I’m saying. It’s a capacity issue,” Nghiem said.
If a device goes into sleep mode, or remains idle too long and goes into power-saving mode, the access point will take this as the device not needing to be connected.
This is the same as when you are on a call and you go from one cell tower to another. Nghiem said that the quality can change because the new cell tower may have reached its limit of devices it can cover. He said that because of the technology that the campus currently has, this is how things work. Teachers on campus are split on the state of the campus WiFi system. Leo Medina, associate professor in Computer Applied and Office Technologies Department, said he has never heard students complaining about the WiFi. Many of the classes for the CAOT Department are held in building E7. Instructor assistants and other faculty in the E7 building said that the building has great signal for students. Frank Aguirre, professor in the Business Administration Department, said he never has issues with the wired computer in the classrooms he uses. He said that he has only had two issues, one was a laptop that had
inconsistent connection. The second was an issue with Canvas, the online system for students and teachers that holds assignments and grades. Aguirre said he has had issues with grades, not recording and being kicked off the system at random intervals. Nghiem said that classrooms have access points inside them. However, understanding that being idle can cause a laptop, tablet or phone to disconnect, can explain why sometimes students’ and teachers’ devices can disconnect even within a classroom setting. Nghiem said that when it comes to Canvas, the ELAC Information Technology Department, IT, doesn’t have any real way to help aside from giving new passwords to teachers who forget theirs. “If instructors are experiencing a lot of those struggles, unfortunately, I wish I could help. But, yeah, the district will be the one that can answer those questions,” Nghiem said. Ramon J. Posada, professor of philosophy, said that he allows his students to use the campus WiFi to look up terms for his classes. He said that often times, new students don’t even know the campus offers WiFi. Posada tried logging onto the campus WiFi to search for something random, his office is in building F7. His phone ended up using his carrier’s connection to accomplish his search. Nghiem said that the IT Department, the district at large and bond managers are trying to create projects to improve the WiFi across not only at ELAC, but throughout all of the district. “ We ’ r e a l w a y s l o o k i n g a t improving. We won’t sit on our laurels thinking everything is great and nothing needs to be improved or done better,” Nghiem said. “We recognize that the world of mobility is here. So we are, again, trying to create projects that can improve our capacities and services that all of our constituents are able to utilize.”
News Briefs Correction
In the last issue of Campus News in “Event updates immigrant community,” Johanna Perez and Mayra Pereyra’s names were misspelled.
Turkey Trot The 5th Annual Turkey Trot and Food Drive will take place Thursday. Registration will begin at 11:30 a.m. and the race will begin at 12:15 p.m. in the Weingar t Stadium. Donations of canned goods are welcome.
The Most Fabulous Story Ever Told
The ELAC Theater Ar t’s Department will begin its production of “The Most Fabulous Story Ever Told” Friday at 8 p.m.