The Script
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Student News at Foothill Community College / Fall Quarter 2017
Journalism Is Dead By William Robertson Mass lay-offs. Shrinking overseas coverage. Decimated circulation and advertising revenue. Journalism’s decline is old news. At Foothill College, however, the journalism program is making a comeback. Foothill College and 15 other California community colleges considered student newspapers key institutions when founded in 1957. The original Foothill student newspaper, The Sentinel, was joined by De Anza Community College’s student newspaper, La Voz, in 1967. Unlike The Sentinel, La Voz has remained active to this day. The Sentinel’s decline began when it was threatened with termination by Foothill College early in 2004 after publishing an extremely controversial story about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict received national attention. Allegations arose that the reporter who broke the story had deliberately misrepresented a profes-
JUDY WALGREN | THE SCRIPT
The Script editorial team work on publishing the Fall 2017 issue.
sor by printing an interview with him about the conflict without including contextual information or opposing perspectives. The Bay Area community responded
by sending hundreds of letters and emails to The Sentinel voicing anger about the professor’s comparison of Israel to Nazi Germany. On February 16th, 2004,
DACA in the Foothill community Student perspectives, fears, and dreams
By Liza Turchinsky “First I lost my mom, then I lost my dad...I cried myself to sleep. I was three years old when I was seperated from my parents.” This quote from a Foothill student describing his family’s experience moving to America speaks to the great emotional turmoil and distress the topic of immigration can bring. After President Trump’s September 5th decision to rescind the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program enacted by Former President Obama, the future of immigrant children all across the country became immediately uncertain. The program, established in
2012, allows children under 16 that were brought to the United States illegally deferred action
gram, must have clean criminal records and are able to re-enroll after the 2 year permit expires. The Trump Administration stated that the policy was to be rescinded, but offered Congress 6 months to negotiate what to do with those already registered as DREAMers. Foothill College has around 300 DREAMers, and a 15% international population. The decision to rescind DACA, which directly threatens the academic and personal future of students in the Foothill ILUSTRATION BY TIMOTHY TANG | SPECIAL TO THE SCRIPT community, provoked both fear and empowerment. from deportation and eligibiliJuan, a Psychology/Childty for a work permit for a period hood Development major, of 2 years. DREAMers, individ- reflects: “I don’t know Mexuals who are enrolled in the prosee DACA on pg. 8
La Voz broke the news that Foothill’s administration was threatening the newspaper with censorship. Poised to engage in a lengthy legal battle, lawyers from the Stu-
dent Press Law Center came to The Sentinel’s defense. After this scandal, student journalism at Foothill suffered a long, slow decline. In Octo-
ber 2006, La Voz reported that The Sentinel hadn’t published an issue for a whole year and students seemed unenthusiastic about journalism, overall. A Sentinel staffer told La Voz that the seven students on the newspaper staff were not enough to publish a full newspaper. According to the article, “Foothill did not publish a newspaper during the winter or spring quarters due to lack of enrollment in the English 114 class that produces the newspaper.” Funding for the program was eventually pulled in 2007 amid wider budget cuts — it didn’t seem to make much sense for the Associated Students of Foothill College (ASFC), the student government, to continue doling out scarce resources to a program which few students were participating in or utilizing. Nearly a decade later in early 2016, the current Script advisor Brian Lewis, Professor Valerie see Journalism on pg. 9
Better this way
How campus involvement revived my passion for academics By Nicole Ronnie Miller “Okay. If I have class from 10:00-11:50 and then again from 2:00-3:50, that means if it takes me 20 minutes to get home and 20 minutes to drive back, I’ll have an hour and a half to go home and watch a few episodes of 30 Rock.” “Man, that Marine Biology class looks really interesting, but five hours including lab? I don’t want to be on campus for that long.” “Today is Club Day? Better take the long route to class in order to avoid the quad. I might be a few minutes late, but… everything is better this way.” These were the inner monologues of me, circa January 2016. This perspective, mind you, was self-imposed. Many
NICOLE RONNIE MILLER | THE SCRIPT
Ronnie contemplates her time at Foothill College while kicking back near the fountain by the campus library.
students cannot afford to be on campus for as long as I had the opportunity to because of external commitments and obligations. However, as a result of my negative attitude, I didn’t make full use of the wealth of resources at my fingertips. All I wanted to do was stay at home as much as I could. I was relatively unhappy this way, but never made the con-
nection between my poor outlook on being at Foothill and my unhappiness. When I was in high school, my schoolwork had been at the core of my character and identity; but after abruptly leaving university before the end of my first semester, my previous love and dedication for academia was significantly damaged. But as my first quarter turned see Better on pg. 10
Inside the mind of a LiberatarianRepublican at Foothill College
Foothill parking lot survival guide
Student resources at Foothill College
How to get involved in the ASFC
Meet the Script team
Foothill College sports calendar
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