elestoqueonline.com Student spends summer performing overseas.
online elestoqueonline.com
Responses to the “Off and Away” cell phone policy page 7
Father-son relationship parallels junior’s experience in playing cricket. page 19
“Twilight” series captivates teenager audience. page 15
opinion
entertainment
elestoque
sports at full capacity
Student population approaches limit, pg. 9
Volume XXXX • Issue 1 • Monta Vista High School • Cupertino, CA
September 24, 2008
Erasing the dots Last year, staff and students made 4.5 million copies in the copy room.
That’s 391 trees. This dot represents 1,200 sheets of copied paper.
This year, administration is trying to do something about it. by Alice Lee
D
ean of Students Michael Hicks stores multiple plastic bags in the drawer behind his desk to be reused at a moment’s notice. He brings fabric shopping bags to his local Trader Joe’s when grocery shopping as to not waste multiple discardable plastic ones. He has even incorporated the concept of recycling in his professional career, emphasizing, for example, going green during the first unit of ecology in freshman Biology, a course he taught for the previous two years. So this year, when the administrative team decided to emphasize environmental consciousness to all staff members and students, Hicks found that he had already made a conscious effort to do so both in the classroom and at home. “It’s not really a fad or new thing in my life; I’ve been aware of going green for a long time,” he said. “I honestly believe
that the more effort you put into the little things, the easier it becomes.” At the beginning of the year, Principal April Scott announced to teachers that the copy center had made 4.5 million copies in handouts, flyers, and other paper products in the past year. According to the State of Washington’s Office of Financial Management, one tree makes about 11,500 copies of 8.5 by 11 inch papers, equating to approximately 391 trees used. “Everyone was completely blown away,” Hicks said. “It’s not like we have that many copy machines. We only have four, which totals to about a million sheets of paper per machine.” As such, teachers were encouraged to think twice about paper handouts they request from the copy center.
Here are 3,750 dots, which represent the 4.5 million copies made last year.
see GREEN on page 6
Patty Chao and Alice Lee | El Estoque Photo Illustration
The dark before the dawn
Cell phone confiscation
Teacher’s weight loss experience inspires lifestyle change by Kanwalroop Singh
S
Administration urges stricter enforcement by Mansi Pathak
“O
ff/Away,' “Off/Away,” “Off/ Away.” You see it in your history class, science class, and art class. Teachers flashed it in your face the first day of school and you read about it over and over again in those endless green sheets. What is this ominous red sign and where did it come from? The new “Off/Away” cell phone policy instituted this school year has a very clear message: keep cell phones off and away. If students fail to do so, their parents must pick up the cell phone from administrative assistant Crystal Coppel in the main office at the end of the day. This policy was adopted—verbatim—from Cupertino High School after a number of incidents at MVHS violated the Academic Honesty Policy and caused tension between teachers and students. According to Principal April Scott, MVHS’ first priority is to eliminate the distraction for students and teachers. Now that cell phones have QWERTY keyboards and cameras, using them during class has become common and easily concealed.
Daniel Stenzel | El Estoque
LOCKED UP AP Secretary Crystal Coppel stores students’ cell phones in her desk until parents pick them up. “It’ is an unfair distraction to students who are trying to pay attention in class,” Scott said. Another of Scott’s top priorities is to stop cheating via technology, which unfortunately occurred numerous times in the past school year. Scott confirmed rumors that last year, a student photographed and forwarded a final exam to other students. Scott also confirmed other incidents, which involved texting questions and answers to classmates and using the Internet to find answers. The “Off/Away” rule also prevents students from illegally taking photographs or videos of teachers without permission, which caused problems last year. According to juniors Kevin Chen and Divya Veturi, a YouTube video showed a long-term see PHONE on page 3
he towered over the others—29 perky women and two balding men. Visible from all corners of the room, her black rimmed glasses glinted and her brown hair bobbed and her sagging skin hung beneath her arms, and in the midst of punches and kicks, hooks and jabs, jumps and swirls, she bent down to tie her left shoe. At 6 feet 4 inches, she stood up. And when the cool down began, English teacher Stacey Cler grabbed her bottle and her bag and left the room. This is turbo kick boxing class. A whirlwind of an hour, where those led by an instructor listen to torrents of encouragement like, “Yes we can!” and “Beautiful!” as they sweat profusely to the pounding beats of Britney Spears and Danity Kane. But Cler has not always been like this. She was not always bursting with energy, not always at the gym,
not always healthy. Seven years ago, Stacey Cler was 413 pounds. She was obese and limited to her sedentary life. She spent all her time caring for her brother and sister, leav-
carrying the
weight
This is part one of a series of articles discussing English teacher Stacy Cler’s decision to lose weight, her journey through weight loss, and the impact it has had on her and her students.
ing less than none for herself. Over a period of five years she lost 189 pounds, unhealthy habits, and a tendency to quit. The Stacey Cler that emerged was not the same one that had trouble lifting her arm above her head. This Stacey Cler had reached the unthink-
able, a point so low that she needed more than hard work and determination to keep herself healthy. In high school, Cler was quiet—the kid that sat in the back of the room and watched as the class went by. She had friends. But she was tall and overweight, like her father, her mother, her sister, and her brother; and that made her feel inferior. “It’s important when you’re young,” Cler said, “that you have people in your life that reassure and reaffirm who you are and what you want to be.” But Cler did not have people to reassure her, she had food. Food meant comfort, safety, warmth, escape. And addiction. In her 33 pages of reflection on weight loss, Cler writes, “Food is the ugly stepchild addiction that everyone knows is there, but nobody wants to claim.” see CLER on page 3