Issue 4 12/6

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Friday, December 6, 2013

Palo Altan detained in North Korea Channing House resident, Korean War veteran pulled off flight home

By Arjun Parikh Senior Staff Writer

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errill Newman, an 85-year-old Palo Alto resident, is currently being detained in North Korea.

Newman, a Korean War veteran, was initially detained on Oct. 26 a day after North Korean officials questioned him on his history in the Army during the Korean War. As his plane, departing from Pyongyang, the country’s capital, was set to depart, Newman was escorted off the plane. Newman had been travelling with friend and neighbor Bob Hamrdla. Hamrdla got home without complications.

According to the San Jose Mercury News, Jeffrey Newman, Merril Newman’s son, does not think the issue is his father’s military work in the country.

“My dad was not breaking any new ground,” Newman said.

“He’s always wanted to go [back] to North Korea. These places had profound, powerful impacts on him as a young man, and he wanted to see it again.”

North Korean officials released a four-page written statement that was apparently written by the el-

der Newman. According to Yahoo News, there has been some speculation that the letter was not written by Newman, as it contains numerous grammatical errors, such as “I want not punish me.”

“I have been guilty of a long list of indelible crimes against DPRK government and Korean people,” Newman purportedly wrote.

North Korean officials also released a video that shows Newman apologizing for his alleged crimes. Newman is shown saying that he will tell the truth about North Korea and that there is incorrect propaganda against the DPRK (Democratic People’s Republic of North Korea).

The apology is widely considered to have been forced, as North Korea has been accused of forcing apologies from detainees in the past.

North Korea has detained several Americans in the past, according to North Korean expert Daniel Sneider, the associate director for research at Stanford University’s Walter H. Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center. However, this case is extremely odd as those who have been detained in the

past have been Korean Americans. “[The fact that Newman is not Korean American] may indicate that they haven’t decided what to do with him yet, and therefore they don’t want to admit that they’ve arrested him,” Sneider said.

Sneider believes the video is a positive sign.

“I’m hoping that the forced apology, which the North Koreans extracted from him, is a prelude to him being released.”

Last year, American Kenneth Bae was arrested in North Korea and sentenced to 15 years of labor.

Bae is a Korean American Christian missionary and was accused of planning a religious coup. In Bae’s case, however, North Korea was very open with the situation.

The United States have asked for the immediate release of Newman and hope for a prompt resolution to the situation.

coutresy of al jazeera

Athletic Director Earl Hansen “The Bachelor” comes to announces retirement after 26 years town at Madrigal Feaste

By Daniel Tachna-Fram Editor-in-Chief

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Jensen Hsaio/Campanile

Coach Hansen leads the breaking of the grounds ceremony for the new renovated Viking Stadium on Aug. 30.

egendary Palo Alto High School football coach and Athletic Director Earl Hansen announced his retirement Monday after 26 years of serving the Paly community. Although the retirement came as a surprise to everyone at Paly, Hansen made the decision to retire following the 2013-2014 school year over a year ago but waited until after the football season ended to inform the public.

“It’s time,” Hansen told the San Jose Mercury News. “I’ve been doing this for 40 years and I want to go off and do a couple of other things.”

Hansen has become a staple of Palo Alto athletics, but after 26 years of service his retirement did not come as a complete surprise.

“Some people were kind of guessing, but it shocked a lot of people at the same time,” senior football captain Andrew Frick said.

Hansen informed the team at their annual end-of-season meeting following the Vikings’ loss to the St. Francis High School Lancers in Central Coast Section (CCS) Division II semifinals.

“It was quite a meeting... to start off the week,” Frick said. “There was this huge applause, everyone was just taken away. Myself and all other seniors, especially, it’s really something special to be able to be the last senior class under this legend. It was really something to see the end of this era that we’ve been a part of now.”

Hansen will retire as one of the most successful coaches and athletic

See HANSEN, page A4

By Sarah Tayeri Staff Writer

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his year, the Palo Alto Choral Program is putting a new twist on its annual Madrigal Feaste, theming the event after the reality dating game TV show “The Bachelor.” The Feaste traditionally stars King Henry VIII and his wives, so this year, the show will focus on the king’s pursuit to find his perfect match. Elizabeth and Mary, daughters to King Henry, will help their father find a “Mrs.” that will please him, as well as protect their line of succession.

Junior Rebecca Moragne, a chorist and participant in the Madrigal Feaste, looks forward to the comedic touches in this year’s production.

“There have been themes in past years, but I don’t think the other themes have been as obvious or ap-

parent as ‘The Bachelor’ theme will be this year,” Moragne said.

While it is expected that the new twist to the Feaste will garner laughs from the audience, the concert still focuses on the choir performances and students’ musical abilities. All choir groups are participating in the show, from Paly’s Concert Choir to its a capella groups.

Moragne is a part of the Concert Choir, an advanced girls’ vocal group called Spectrum, and is also in one of choir’s a capella groups, “Folk Yes.” “Every group can sing,” Moragne said. “As long as the group prepares a song themselves and the song is approved by [choir teacher Michael] Najar, [the group] can sing it.”

Although the concert features songs from the Middle Ages, choir members have worked hard to pre-

See MADRIGALS, page A3

Typhoon Haiyan devastates sister city in the Philippines, residents struggle to recover

By Grace Kim

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Staff Writer

evastated by Typhoon Haiyan, Palo Alto’s Filipino sister city of Palo is struggling to recover as a result of scarce supplies and the many displaced, injured or dead.

Typhoon Haiyan hit land in the eastern Philippines just east of Leyte Island on Nov. 8. Thousands have died from the storm, but the exact number is unknown, as bodies continue to be found and accessibility to

many places are obstructed. The official government estimates the death toll to be somewhere around 5,500 people.

According to the UN office of the Coordination of Human Affairs, as many as 800,000 people have been displaced and an estimated 9.5 million people have been affected by the storm. Those affected are desperate for necessary supplies like food and clean water.

Many areas continue to be isolated as the lack of electricity prohibits communication. Necessary supplies

are scarce and many areas continue to go without relief.

With maximum sustained winds at 195 mph and gusts at 235 mph, Typhoon Haiyan is reported as possibly the strongest tropical cyclone to hit landfall in recorded history, according to World Vision.

Palo is a coastal city located on Leyte Island with a population of about 63,000 people and shares part of its name with that of its sister city in Silicon Valley. According to the

OPiniOn At what cost?

SPOTLiGHT Top Lists for 2013

See TYPHOON, page A3

Courtesy of AGence France-presse

A residential street in Palo inundated with debris in the aftermath of Typhoon Haiyan.

INSIDE N e w s . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . A 1- A 5 Opinion............................A6-A8 Lifestyle . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . B1-B3, B8 Spotlight...............................B4-B5 Music................................B6 StudentLife............................B7 S p o r t s . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . C 1- C 8

Itís time to finally address PAUSDís A6 elephant in the room.

Paly students decide the biggest trends, newsmakers and more.

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sPORTs Hazing

Athletes try to differentiate team C8 initiation from hazing.

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Friday, December 6, 2013

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Tower Building to be renovated, new classes to come

By Galen Byrd

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@YahooNews Police, protesters clash outside Ukranian government buildings in Kiev over rejection of European Union deal.

@HollywoodReporter Fast and Furious actor Paul Walker dies in a car accident at age 40.

@FoxNews Police say 2 arrested after person killed in parking lot after ChiefsBroncos game.

@CNNBreakingNews At least 4 dead, 40 injured in Bronx train derailment.

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@WallStreetJournal Online sales accounted for 44% of Black Friday weekend sales, up from 41% last year and 23% in 2006.

@Discovery On Sunday, China launched its first spacecraft- a six-wheeled rover- to the surface of the moon.

@BBCBreakingNews Syrian president Bashar al-Assad directly implicated in war crimes for first time folling UN inquiry.

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Staff Writer

ccording to Principal Kim Diorio, the main office and Tower Building will undergo renovations over Winter Break.

The school allotted about $100 thousand out of bond money to repaint, install new carpet, add teacher mailboxes and move some administration members’ offices.

In addition to renovating the building, the administration is buying new furniture in order to make the space look more professional.

Diorio is focusing on revising the school’s vision and mission statement, updating it to fit current goals.

“We did some work with the staff on thinking ahead to Paly in the future, thinking what our students will need from us a few years in the future,” Diorio said.

One of Diorio’s goals is to make learning and Paly’s classes more student-driven. There are a group of nine teachers on campus being trained in a new style of teaching — blended learning — that will allow more stu-

Harden/ The campanile

The Tower Building — Palo Alto High School’s oldest building — will undergo major renovations over Winter Break. The administration is looking to implement new, student-driven classes that require fewer prerequisites to increase accessibility. dent collaboration and critical thinking rather than teacher lectures. Next year, a few new classes will be implemented utilizing this model.

“One of my goals is more innovation in our course offerings so we are going to offer more pathways next

year, opening access to more courses so we don’t have so many prerequisites in place and make it easier for students to take classes,” Diorio said.

Lastly, a group of students and teachers alike are working with Diorio to reword and finalize a new aca-

Trader Joe’s supplier recalls salads, wraps after E. coli outbreak in chicken

By William Shin

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Staff Writer

lass Onion Catering, a California-based company, recalled its grilled chicken salad and wraps after it was alerted of an Escherichia coli (E. coli) bacterial outbreak. These tainted items were distributed to Trader Joe’s supermarkets, including the market across the street from Palo Alto High School at Town and Country Village.

Glass Onion Catering distributes these chicken salads to Arizona, California, Nevada, New Mexico, Oregon, Texas, Utah and Washington, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA).

USDA officials say that 26 individuals in three states have been infected by the bacterial strain of E. coli in Glass Onion Catering products.

E. coli is usually a harmless strain of bacteria, but some variations can cause severe problems and lead to symptoms such as diarrhea, abdominal cramps and nausea. Most individuals recover on their own after a few days of rest; however, there is a possibility of E. coli leading to other diseases.

Students at Paly were not affected by this outbreak, and many say they will continue to buy lunch at Trader Joe’s.

“I’ll keep buying lunch from Trader Joe’s because I don’t think that

their other products will be affected, and they are good about regulating outbreaks and recalling products if necessary,” junior Ryan Drover said.

Some students were opposed to the outbreak and took a cautionary

approach, but some were not aware of the bacteria could be and had not been alerted about the outbreak.

Trader Joe’s says that the recall has been successful and should have no further incidents.

Conner Hardmen/ The campanile

Trader Joe’s at Town and Country Village is one of the many locations found to have chicken products contaminated with E. coli.

NEWS BRIEF

ASB update

By Alec Sullivan

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Staff Writer

he upcoming events being planned by Palo Alto High School’s Associated Student Body (ASB) include a dance in either mid-January or early February. ASB is giving students the ability to vote on the theme of the dance through an online survey.

Theme options include a formal masquerade ball, zoo theme, a traditional winter formal and one that requires students to dress up as something that starts with the first letters of their names.

ASB is also planning to continue the annual tradition of hot cocoa and cookies at the end of finals week.

“We are currently planning our winter dance, which will be a formal masquerade ball,” ASB President Parker Devine said. “We hope we can continue the trend of Homecoming by maintaining high dance attendance and high dance quality. Other than that we are planning multiple dress-up days and plan on having cookies and hot chocolate ready for students after finals.”

ASB also has the winter rally to look forward to on Jan. 16, but in the meantime plans closer events.

Furniture in buildings could be decided by students

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Senior Staff Writer

s the school year progresses, the Palo Alto High School community eagerly awaits the time when the construction will come to an end and the new media arts and math/social sciences buildings will be available for use.

According to Principal Kim Diorio, the construction is advancing at a good pace.

The buildings should be finished somewhere around January or February, but then the contractor must go through an additional evaluation process before students and staff can begin using the buildings, according to Diorio.

Diorio is hoping that the buildings will open around spring break.

“I’ve been able to go in the two buildings,” Diorio said. “They’re beautiful and really nice.”

Paly staff members have begun picking out the new furniture and Diorio hopes to veer away from the type of desks and chairs that can be found in most classrooms, and in-

School Board working on new budget

By Seth Alston

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Staff Writer

he Nov. 19 Palo Alto Unified School District Board of Education meeting saw the introduction of the first interim budget update of the 2013-14 year.

This meeting an update of the district’s financial situation, the budget changes to be implemented in 201314, multi-year financial projections for the district as well as uncertainties in the budget.

Addressed in the meeting was Palo Alto’s property tax and how it is projected to increase over six percent since last school year, which is an increase of $5.2 million over the adopted budget.

Also addressed was the issue of Educational Protection Account (EPA) and Proposition 30.

This 2012 initiative passed to raise taxes in order to prevent $6 billion in budget cuts, which would affect schools. Much of that money would be transferred to technology.

In November, the district tentatively settled with California teachers’ unions PAEA and CSEA for four percent ongoing and two percent one-time increases to the salary schedule.

Other issues raised in the meeting were the renewal of the CPA and Cubberly lease and unfunded Public Employee Retirement System and State Teacher Retirement System

UPCOMING EVENTs

Construction advancing, but completion pushed back to spring

By Lauren Giurata

demic honesty policy. The policy is made in response to complaints about the current one. It will be finished in January and put in place soon after.

There have been many delays so far, but the completion seems to be in sight.

stead replace them with more flexible, ergonomic furniture with adjustable height settings.

Desks will hopefully have wheels, allowing for easier movement of the furniture to accommodate more group work while simultaneously having the freedom to separate for individual work.

As the furniture selection process continues, Diorio says she would love to receive student input and is currently trying to decide the best way of hearing student input as to what kind of furniture would be most conducive to a modern and relaxed learning environment.

“We are really thinking about learning styles of the future,” Diorio said. “Part of that is giving teachers more options for grouping students.”

Diorio says that the main goal is to get furniture that will still be useful in the future, possibly even 10 to 20 years from now.

She has also recently met with landscapers to discuss and design what the outside areas around the buildings will look like.

DEC

FIRST SEMESTER FINALS BEGINS

DEC

WINTER BREAK BEGINS

18 20

Trade in your free time for study time. Time to worry about your future!

“SANTA! OH MY GOD! SANTA’S COMING! I KNOW HIM! I KNOW HIM!” - Buddy the Elf

DEC

NEW YEAR’S EVE

JAN

NEW YEAR’S DAY

31 1

JAN

16

It’s almost New Year’s Day. Seriously.

It’s here — we told you so.

WINTER RALLY

Watch as the seniors start a brawl... to get onto the basketball team that plays the staff.

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NEWS

Friday, December 6, 2013

A3

56 percent of Palo Alto residents reject Measure D

By Irene Ezran

Lifestyle Design Editor

Hannah Nguyen

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Staff Writer

he fate of the 2.5 acre property lot on Maybell Avenue is still in question after citizens of Palo Alto voted down Measure D on Nov. 5. The measure proposed building affordable assisted living housing for senior citizens.

Over 14,000 residents cast a ballot, 56 percent of which voted against the measure. The proposal, if passed, would have allowed the Palo Alto Housing Corporation (PAHC) to build 60 apartment units and 12 single-family homes in the empty plot in the 567-596 area of Maybell Avenue.

When the Maybell Project was presented to the City Council, the Council members voted unanimously to support the Palo Alto Housing Corporation.

However, many Palo Altans, especially those in the Green Acres and Barron Park neighborhoods, opposed the construction of the high density housing and passed a referendum petition with 4,000 signatures in order to have a public vote on the Maybell Project. The main issues with the Maybell Project were the building design, parking, child safety and traffic.

“What concerned us was that you’re putting in this big building, high floor area ratio, inadequate parking and traffic problems [in the area],” Barron Park resident and leading opponent of the Measure D campaign Bob Moss said.

In addition, many voters feared that adding the low income housing would increase density not only in Barron Park and Green Acres, but would also lead to similar projects in other areas in Palo Alto. “[The Maybell Project] was just the start of increasing density anywhere in the city where there was an opportunity,” Moss said.

There were several points of conflict between Palo Altans and the

City Council throughout the process of approving the Maybell Project.

When discussing the Maybell Project, many opponents were upset that their attempts to compromise with the City Council and the PAHC were refused.

“We tried at least four times to get [the PAHC] to negotiate and come down, but they would not do it,” Moss said.

City Council member Marc Berman expressed that in hindsight, the Council should have made more of an effort to compromise with the opponents of Measure D by encouraging the PAHC to reduce the single housing units from 12 to eight, and then giving the PAHC $4 million to make up for the loss of income.

“The Council at that moment could have decided to cut the number of market rate homes further, and then subsidized PAHC with additional city funds,” Berman said.

What concerned us was that you’re putting in this big building, high floor area ratio, inadequate parking and traffic problems [in the area].

Bob Moss Barron Park resident and leading opponent of the Measure D campaign

Greg Schmid, also a member of the City Council, agreed with Berman that a compromise could have bettered the relationship between the City Council and the opponents of Measure D. “My feeling was, at that point, the Council should have stepped in and considered a compromise of ten houses,” Schmid said.

Another source of conflict was the election date for Measure D. According to Moss, the cost of voting on the referendum this year was $584,000, since it was the only item on the ballot. If the voting had taken place next November, where there would have been more items on the ballot, the cost of voting on Measure D would have been only $303,000.

Many Palo Altans would have preferred to wait one year to vote on

Ahmed Awadallah/The Campanile

This is one of many houses in the area that would have been be affected by the Maybell Project proposed in Measure D. the issue in order to save taxpayers the extra money. They also felt that the City Council wanted to have the election this year to approve the project so that the Housing Corporation could move forward with their building plans.

“We wanted [the elections] back one year because it would have been much more cost effective,” Moss said.

In addition, several months before the election, the City Council lent $5.8 million to the PAHC to help the nonprofit organization buy the land for the low income housing. Many Palo Altans criticized the City Council because they felt that loaning the money to the PAHC meant that the project would be approved. However, the Council believed that this loan simply provided the nonprofit organization assistance with buying the land on Maybell and Clamo.

“We [the City Council] saw [loaning $5.8 million] as help in having the Housing Corporation make an application,” Schmid said. “But it did not necessarily say that we were going to approve the application.”

Another major disagreement between the City Council and oppo-

nents of Measure D occurred when some leaders of the opposing side falsely accused the City Council of having “back room” or “under the table” negotiations with the PAHC. Berman confirms that these allegations were completely unfair and inaccurate.

“These unfounded accusations cheapen the political discourse in Palo Alto,” Berman said. “And as far as I'm concerned, there's absolutely no place in our community for those types of unsubstantiated attacks.”

However, despite the tension between the City Council and the opponents of the campaign, several Council members recognized that the opponents ran a great campaign.

In fact, some were not surprised by the election results, considering the large amount of people who were against the Maybell Project. Many were impressed that the Barron Park and Green Acres residents were able to convince Palo Altans that the Maybell Project was an important issue that concerned not just those living near the Maybell and Clemo area, but that it in fact concerned all residents of Palo Alto.

“The ‘no’ side ran a very energetic and strategic campaign, and they deserve credit for that,” Berman said.

Berman was surprised by the amount of people who sympathized with the Barron Park and Green Acres residents, and by the fact that so many citizens were active in the Measure D campaign.

“I think it's fantastic when residents get engaged in the issues the Council is grappling with, regardless of whether they agree or disagree with me,” Berman said.

Schmid concluded that part of what makes Palo Alto unique is the ability of the citizens to express their opinions and engage in discussions with the City Council.

“When issues come up, [Palo Altans] are quite willing to organize and present their opinions,” Schmid said. “It makes a very exciting city to be in.”

Now that the Maybell Project was rejected, the PAHC is exploring the possibility of selling the property, according to San Jose Mercury News.

City officials say that if sold to a private organization, 34 to 46 houses could be built in the area.

Choir to perform at Madrigal Feaste with modern theme MADRIGALS, Continued from A1

manuel mogato/Creative commons

Victims of the typhoon in the Philippines walk the streets, surveying the damage.

Sister city devastated Palo Altoís sister city in the Philippines suffers after Typhoon Haiyan TYPHOON, Continued from A1 Philippine Global Media Arts News, the city has buried at least 150 people and many remain missing.

“Almost all 983 Eastern Visayas policemen based in Palo, Leyte are still missing after a 15-meter-high storm surge hit their headquarters at the height of typhoon Yolanda,” ABS-CBN journalist Leo Lastimosa tweeted.

Palo has been relatively isolated since the storm, but many residents have been using social media sites to describe their firsthand experiences.

According to Palo Alto Online, residents of Palo have reported that people have resorted to looting in search for needed supplies such as water and food. Desperate Palo resident Cleve Arguelles tweeted: “Water, food badly needed.”

The Palo Alto City Council has donated $10,000 to the relief effort.

Palo Alto Mayor Greg Scharff encourages Palo Alto families to help their friends in the Philippines especially as they became our sister city when they aided us after the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake.

“As a community, we’ve often come together to lend a hand to others and this is one of those times when our thoughts and prayers are with those affected by the devastating typhoon in the Philippines, especially to our friends in our sister city Palo, which has really sustained catastrophic damage,” Scharff said in an interview with the San Jose Mercury.

Local residents are encouraged to help our Philippine sister city by sending donations for relief to: Neighbors Abroad, P.O. Box 52004, Palo Alto, CA 94303.

To donate to those affected by the storm, not specifically to Palo Alto’s sister city Palo go to www.redcross. org/donate.

pare a spectrum of pieces across all time periods.

“We have a wide variety of songs, and not all are necessarily from medieval times,” Moragne said. “We’re singing ‘Hallelujah,’ but we’re also performing an African piece called Kapanlango”.

The Madrigal Feaste is the most prepared for and most highly anticipated of the choir event of the choir events each year. Senior Hannah Wilson, who is part of the Concert Choir, girls’ vocal group “The Heartbeats” and the Madrigal Choir, looks forward to the upcoming concert.

“The best part is the performance is when all the hard work pays off,” Wilson said. “We’re all looking forward to it.”

Another distinguishing factor of the Madrigal Feaste is the manner

in which the choir dresses. Sophomore Clare Kemmerer is in charge of the beautiful costumes that all choir members will wear to the Feaste.

Girls will dress in full-length gowns, and boys will wear traditional royal medieval attire. Being fitted for the costumes weeks in advance excited the choir. While each costume is different and unique, the most sophisticated clothing is reserved for upperclassmen.

“The costumes are very unique and very intricate,” Moragne said.

Buying a ticket to the Madrigal Feaste ensures an afternoon of comedic entertainment, musical merriment and a full meal. While attendance has been satisfiable in past years, choir members hope more students will be present at the event this year.

“We get a lot of family members, but they don’t really fill up the seats as we’d like,” Wilson said. “[The choir]

really encourages students to come to our shows!” “[Paly students] should go because it’s a unique experience,” Moragne said. “There’s nothing like this the whole year. A lot of people go to sporting events, but not necessarily [to] choir events. It’s a really cool event we get to do and people put a lot of effort into it.” “[The choir is] definitely more excited to perform when there are a lot of students in the audience,” Wilson said. “I don’t really think we get enough support from our peers.

When we have classmates to sing for, we really exert more energy and confidence.”

The Madrigal Feaste takes place on Dec. 7 and Dec. 8, both at 2 p.m. in Paly’s Small Gym. The cheapest tickets cost $15 each and can be purchased on the Palo Alto Choral Program website: palymadrigals.com.

Two million dollars earmarked for PAUSD staff

By Zach Levitan

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Staff Writer

he Palo Alto Unified School District (PAUSD) has confirmed several changes for the district next year in the new Board of Education discussion packet. The California School Employees Association (CSEA) and PAUSD have reached a tentative agreement regarding a $2 million increase in staffing for the 2014-15 school year.

This agreement offers most employees — including teachers, janitors, administrators and counselors — in PAUSD many benefits such as a four percent raise and a one-time payment of two percent of the employees’ current salaries.

“We’re going to add some staff at the high schools,” Superintendent Kevin Skelly said. “We’re going to

add three teachers to [Palo Alto High School]” The increase in staffing will allow Paly to accommodate the increasing number of students that it has been experiencing the last few years. “[These staffers] will enable us to either open up some new courses, or in some situations where we have large class sizes, be able to split those classes so that they’re smaller,” Paly Principal Kim Diorio said.

The money will fund places like the library. It will allow the library to stay open later during crucial times of the year, such as during finals weeks.

As of now, the library is only open until 5 p.m. Monday through Thursday and 4 p.m. on Friday, but the new staff will extend these hours and give students more support.

In addition, Paly will receive more technological and custodial support.

“[Tech and custodial support are] really important because our campus has grown student-wise, but we haven’t increased the number of custodians,” Diorio said. “More students means more mess,” “The salary increases are a great thing because what it does is when we need to hire teachers, it helps us attract and retain the best teachers,” Diorio said. “PAUSD attracts many teachers because of its reputation, but the Bay Area is an expensive place.

By having a competitive salary with comparable districts in this area, we’re able to entice the best teachers to consider coming here.”

Due to the $2 million staffing proposal, Paly will be able to provide more teaching, technological and custodial support for its students allowing Paly to run smoothly, making everyone’s lives easier.

Friday, December 6, 2013

A4

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NEWS

PiE holds donation fundraiser

By Will Snodgrass Staff Writer

courtesy of palytheater.com

Theater student junior Cara Kienitz acts in last years’s Play in a Day.

Paly’s Play in a Day coming soon

By Coby Parker

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Staff Writer

alo Alto High School Theatre Club’s annual Play in a Day festival will occur on Dec. 20 at the Haymarket Theater.

The concept of the festival is to have students come up with and totally write an entire play in a 24-hour period. Students that choose to participate must write and perform the play from the time school is let out on the last day — a Friday — until they have to perform it on Saturday night, the next day. It is a fast-paced process where students must memorize lines and rehearse in 24 hours to present immediately to an audience of peers, parents and the general community.

Sign-ups for this year’s Play in a Day were on Dec. 4 at the Haymarket Theater. More than 50 people were signed up on the Facebook group for the event, and even more signed up in-person at the theatre. The students who sign up are generally those who are already in some part of the theatre program, yet others who have no prior association with theatre also joined the play.

Paly alumnus and Play in a Day participant Aaron Spolin thinks highly of the program and its effect on student’s productivity.

“Play in a Day was an exciting, fast-paced process,” Spolin said. “I re-

member wondering how I could possibly remember all my lines … in such a short time. Ironically, it was some of the mistakes that made for the funniest moments, and those of us on stage were as entertained and surprised as the members of the audience.”

Alumni are limited to acting and cannot be a part of the scripting team, which writes the entire performance.

Generally, alumni tend to continue acting in Play in a Day for a year or two after their graduation, however they usually stop to allow newly graduated alumni participate as well.

The play is generally performed only once a year and is totally run and directed by the students and alumni of the Paly Theatre program. The program is not only for Paly Theatre students, but anyone who is interested in acting or in writing a script can participate. “Play in a Day attracts a wide variety of students, including many theatre department alums,” according to Paly Theatre’s website. It’s a great opportunity for unfamiliar students to try acting.

The Play in a Day tradition started over a decade ago by the former head of the theatre department at Paly.

Since then, it has been a huge success.

Generally, attendance for the play is fairly high, as there is only one showing per year. However, not everyone can make it because it is on the first night of Winter Break.

Palo Alto Partners in Education (PiE) reached 69 percent of its fundraising goal for Palo Alto Unified School District (PAUSD) next year.

This year’s $5 million goal is a two percent increase from the $4.9 million raised last year.

PiE is a nonprofit foundation focused on fundraising to enhance educational excellence for every student in the Palo Alto Unified School District [PAUSD],” according to its website.

Donations to PiE help pay for multiple resources around PAUSD, including counselors, aides and science and art classes. Donations are also used for teacher grants, which are given to teachers that apply. This

year, PiE’s goal is to raise $100,000 for teacher grants.

“PTSA is already looking at ways to trim their budget, some of it will be in technology and Viking grants,” Diorio said.

During its double donation day campaign from Nov. 1 to Nov. 15, all donations up to $250,000 were matched by a private donor. PAUSD staff campaigned for donations on the edges of PAUSD campuses during on campus donation days on Nov. 14 and 15.

In conjunction with district staff, PiE will decide how to distribute donations once their 2013-2014 campaign ends. The donations are spread equally throughout PAUSD schools, based on the number of students.

Despite the recent campaign efforts by PiE, Palo Alto High School

Principal Kim Diorio says that PiE donations have fallen down from last year.

“I know PiE donations are down this year, as are PTSA [Parent Teacher Student Association] donations,” Diorio said. “We think a lot of that has to do with the fact that we went all digital on the back to school mailing. Both organizations are trying to figure out a way to fundraise and make sure people understand that there is a need for those donations.”

Paly families are encouraged to donate $800 per student, but families that give over $2,500 can become members of the Leadership Circle.

PiE’s double donation campaign will continue until Jan. 31, 2014. Donations can be made by check or with a credit card online at https://www. papie.org.

Football coach Earl Hansen looks to retirement

Marc havlik/the campanile

Football coach Earl Hansen participates in a celebratory parade following the state championship victory in 2010.

HANSEN, continued from page A1 directors in CCS history. Hansen won four CCS championships in his time at Paly and brought two teams to the California State Championship.

In 2010, Hansen led the Vikings to a 14-0 record and took home the Division I State Championship with a 15-13 win over Centennial High School, a school led by the current Arizona State University quarterback Michael Eubank and with the most prolific offense in California high school football history to date.

For leading this impressive run, Hansen was named Coach of the Year by Cal-Hi Sports. In his entire career at Paly, which included a brief five-year break in which he coached at San Lorenzo Valley High School, Hansen ended up winning over 200 games.

In his younger days of football coaching, Hansen coached former National Football League (NFL) quarterback and current San Fransisco 49ers Head Coach Jim Harbaugh.

“Coach Hansen has helped me in so many ways,” Harbaugh said. “I owe a lot to him. He’s a great man, a great coach.”

Hansen’s son Peter Hansen is currently an assistant coach under Harbaugh with the 49ers.

Other sports also thrived under Hansen; the volleyball team captured back-to-back state titles in 2010 and 2011, and the Paly athletic program as a whole won four CCS championships in 2010 alone.

Hansen will continue as a physical education teacher and athletic director until end of the 2013-2014 academic year. A replacement has not yet been named.

“I do have people in mind, so hopefully that will work out,” Hansen said. However, Hansen did not go on to speculate further as to who has in mind to name as his successor.

“We’re fortunate we have a lot of great internal candidates within the district who are interested in both the coaching and athletic director position,” Principal Kim Diorio said.

“Hopefully we’ll get people lined up by second semester.”

As for Hansen’s retirement plans, he looks forward to taking some time off to watch his son coach with the 49ers. He plans to attend some of senior Quarterback Keller Chryst’s games at Stanford University next year. He also just plans to rest and spend some time “cooling his jets.”

“Maybe I’ll sit in Hawaii,” Hansen said. “I haven’t had a summer off since I don’t know when.”

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The Campanile

Friday, December 6, 2013

NEWS

A5

App-controlled sculpture comes to Palo Alto

ahmed awadallah/The CaMpanile

Since 2012, two Walter Hays Elementary School students have put in countless hours and made a sterling effort to bring the 30-foot tall Aurora sculpture to Palo Alto, which was installed on Nov. 16.

Palo Alto High School students Aurora was brought to Palo Alto to Palo Alto, although not enough to stay for the entire time whether or

By Coby Parker like the display and appreciate the after a huge effort by the two stu- to do all necessary revisions. The city not the full funds are raised.

Staff Writer artwork brought to Palo Alto by dents and the Palo Alto community also waived the usual fees that would The sculpture is completely conurora, an interactive light residents and by the city government. at large. The project was thought to be required to put artwork on public trolled by smart phones of those looking at it. sculpture shaped like a Senior Eli Weitzman is glad that cost $100 thousand, and the students property.

In order to raise the rest of the Those who download the app can willow tree, was moved City Hall will have some beauty to attempted to raise money through a fundraising campaign. funds, those who worked to bring the control the brightness and color of and temporarily installed distract from its monotonous shape.

“The light sculpture in front of statue made a crowd funding cam- the lights on Aurora. In order to conin front of City Hall in downtown paign on Kickstarter. According to trol the piece of art, one must connect Palo Alto on Nov. 16 from an art City Hall is actually really amazing,” festival in Nevada to Palo Alto for a Weitzman said. “It’s going to bring a It’s going to bring a lot of beauty the website’s policy, the goal must be to its independent wireless network year. A group effort, started by two lot of beauty to the city and it makes to the city and it makes the bor- fully filled for the person to receive and use controls to change the color and design. elementary school children, raised the the boring, old, tall building a lot bet- ing, old, tall building a lot better. the money.

Although the goal is to raise $100 Although not completely customfunds to move the tree, which will ter.”

Eli Weitzman Walter Hays Elementary School thousand, they have only raised $30 izable to the user, the web application stay in Palo Alto for a year.

Senior thousand so far. In order to get all the allows one to control the color, speed Bay Area artist Charles Gadeken students Sam and Julia Hirschman money, they would need to raise the and pattern of the lights on the sculpcreated the sculpture to display at the became invested in bringing the piece remaining $70 thousand within four ture.

Burning Man art festival in Nevada of art to Palo Alto after they were They did not raise the full amount, days in order to get the payoff, which “I really like [Aurora],” Julia in 2011. The parent of two Palo Alto shown the picture. They admired its students took a photo of the sculpture beauty and thought it would look but the students were able to get seems unlikely. Regardless, the proj- Hirschman said. “It’s really pretty and great in front of City Hall. enough money to bring the sculpture ect is already in Palo Alto and is likely it kind of brings hope to people.” while at the festival.

A

SF transportation system to be improved

By Leslie Wan Senior Staff Writer

A

fter debating for numerous years behind closed doors, the Transbay Joint Powers Authority has decided to take down the last mile of Interstate 280 and replace it with a highway that can be connected to an electrified Caltrain and high-speed rail tracks.

Additionally, a part of the San Francisco Transbay Terminal project and largest project in the Prop K Expenditure Plan — the Transbay Joint Powers Authority’s California Downtown Extension (DTX) — will transform the San Francisco transportation system. The extension will be roughly 1.3 miles long, from Fourth and King Streets to the new Transbay Transit Center (TTC) and will include an underground tunnel, the creation of a neighborhood with 3,000 new homes and mixed-use of commercial development.

According to the Transbay fact sheet, the primary goals of the new DTX include improved access to rail and bus services, improved Caltrain service and other major transit companies, reduced motor vehicle use, reduced traffic congestion, improved air quality and support of local economic development goals.

Greg Riessen, the city planner who developed the idea, told the San Francisco Bay Guardian that the main goal of the new extension and high-speed rail is to elevate Interstate 280, better integrate the city’s Mission Bay and Potrero neighborhoods and decrease traffic.

Paly moves up in national high school rankings

By Josefin Kenrick

I

Lucius Kwok/Creative Commons

The Caltrain stops at the San Mateo station to pick up passengers. The new DTX will improve San Francisco public transportation.

“If you get the freeway out of the way, it’s a ton of space,” Riessen said.

“The whole corridor of the freeway is blocking the ability to do anything else.”

The new extension will connect Caltrain, AC Transit, Golden Gate Transit and SF Muni, according to the Bay Alliance. Moreover, the DTX will be able to accommodate a new “blending system” in which the new high-speed rails will merge with the original Caltrain rails.

According to the Green Caltrain Bay Alliance blog, the new corridor will be able to handle up to six Caltrain trains per direction per hour, and up to four high-speed rail trains per direction per hour.

The program budget is estimated to be around $4.1 billion. In May

2010, the Transbay Joint Powers Authority (TJPA) acquired $1.6 billion for the first steps of the new DTX project, which includes pedestrian ramps, a train box and a high-speed rail station; the TJPA believes that the next steps will cost about an additional $2.5 billion.

However, a downside of the DTX includes its effect on a train’s ability to turn. The time for the high-speed rail to turn the opposite direction is roughly 15 to 20 minutes, in comparison to a BART train, which only takes five minutes.

The TJPA will be working to amend this aspect of the high speed rail trains. In addition, because of the development of the new Golden State Warriors arena, unaddressed traffic issues may be exacerbated with

3946 Middlefield Road, Palo Alto, CA 94303

the introduction of the new Caltrain system. “[The traffic] could drown the city, this tsunami of cars, particularly with all the development planned all the way down to Hunters Point,” former San Francisco Mayor Art Agnos told the Bay Guardian. “I like the idea, but we need a serious discussion of the details, particularly with all these development proposals.”

The DTX is scheduled for completion in June 2018. However, due to lack of funding, the project is currently on hold.

The TJPA, the city of San Francisco and other funding partners will work to support the first phrase of the project and to advance ideas to close the funding gap for the second phase with construction beginning in 2017.

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n a recent survey by Newsweek magazine, Palo Alto High School ranked 161 out of the top two thousand public high schools in the United States. Paly moved up 17 slots from its 178 spot in the 2012 rankings.

According to Newsweek, the top two thousand high schools are the most effective in preparing students for college.

The six components used to create the rankings are the high school’s graduation rate, college acceptance rate, average AP/IB/AICE tests taken per student, average SAT/ACT scores and percentage of students enrolled in an AP/IB/AICE course.

Paly has a 95 percent graduation rate and college-bound rate, and its students boast an average SAT score of 1935, ACT score of 28 and Advanced Placement test score of 4.3.

Newsweek used these scores to calculate the school assessment score, which is taken out of 5. Paly’s school assessment score for 2013 is 3.47.

Other high schools around the Bay Area appeared on the list, including Saratoga High School (81), Monta Vista High School (103), Mission San Jose High School (114) and Lynbrook High School (122).

Henry M. Gunn High School was ranked 583 in the nation; however, it should be noted that there were data corrections sent to Newsweek after they created the list.

Friday, December 6, 2013

A6

The Campanile

OPINION

The cost of being a student at Palo Alto High School Passion for learning at all-time low, value of applicable life skills in need of greater recognition

By Hillel Zand

A

Editor-in-Chief

s students in the Palo Alto Unified School District (PAUSD), not a day goes by that we are not reminded of our great fortune to be in such a prestigious district. Our students rank among the top in the nation, perform above average on nationwide testing and often obtain coveted internships in many academic fields.

While all this may be true — and then some — nobody ever seems to ask: “At what cost?”

Although Palo Alto High School students are bright and ambitious, we have been thrown into a system that force-feeds information, thus restricting our capacity for application of knowledge and lessening enthusiasm for learning. In the end, the purpose of a holistic education has been defeated.

While we as students certainly experience the trials and tribulations of a stressful academic and extracurricular workload, the rigor is not put into perspective until graduates have the opportunity to reflect on their high school years.

Unfortunately for us, graduates seem to wish their high school experience was just a tad different. In fact, some think they are over-prepared.

PAUSD recently conducted a survey of its high school graduates from Paly and Henry M. Gunn High School from the Class of 2012 who felt most prepared for college in respect to the ability to complete multiple choice tests and homework.

“High school needs to stop teaching students to make them excel at college and should start teaching them so they can excel at just being people,” one Paly graduate wrote.

“The college focus (which is literally palpable at Paly) leads many, many people... to look at a class as a means to a grade, and not as a means to knowledge.”

High school needs to stop teaching students to make them excel at college and should start teaching them so they can excel at just being people.

Anonymous Paly graduate Class of 2012

This constant, unspoken and “palpable” expectation of achieving academic perfection has destroyed the infatuation of learning that many students possessed yesteryear in the naïve days of elementary school and middle school. It is this same passion that Paly must recapture.

“People forget to enjoy high school because they are so pushed to get a 4.0 [GPA] or 2400 [SAT],” a graduate wrote. “I am terribly overprepared for college and I wish that I’d known that would be the case so I

Courtesy of Jacques Manjarrez

could have taken a step back in high school and relaxed more.”

Education does not only mean systematic training in certain topics, but is also defined as “an enlightening experience.” For many Paly students, “an enlightening experience” has lost its true meaning and is now associated with the moment of receiving an A on an assignment, which means an A in a course, which means a higher grade point average, which signifies reaching the Mecca of Palo Alto: college admission.

“Stop trying to only work for what colleges will want to see,” a Paly graduate warned students in the PAUSD survey. “It makes it hard to become interested in learning for the sake of learning.”

I challenge you to find more than a dozen students on campus who wake up each morning excited for the material they will learn that day in all their classes. Rather, they are more likely dreading the impending notetaking and piling-up of work that will greet them.

This regression from learning to learning for the sake of learning has also led to the rise in the great elephant in the room: cheating.

Few teachers are aware of the reality where many students hastily copy a peer’s assignment five minutes before it is due. But why couldn’t this student just do their own homework?

Because they spent the whole night completing a project and only got five hours of sleep. So as a sacrifice they chose not to do their homework for another class, copied the information they were supposed to learn as if they were a computer and as a result failed to learn the actual material. And this cycle will continue for days, weeks and years. This is the cycle that has taken a toll on the well-being of our students.

“There’s some questions as to how well we’re preparing [students] socially, emotionally or for some of the life skills you need to have when you go off to college,” principal Kim Diorio said. “I’ve always thought that there’s just way too much work and pressure on students.”

Less than 50 percent of the Class of 2012 felt adequately prepared in “making ethical, constructive choices” and “resisting peer pressure.” Has the ability to act as a moral member of society become secondary to the ability to bubble in A, B, C, D or E?

Less than 50 percent of the Class of 2012 felt adequately prepared in “making ethical, constructive choices’’ and “resisting peer pressure’’

Time and time again students complain about the monotony of Living Skills, a course required by all PAUSD students to complete before graduation and one that promises “to make informed, responsible decisions about issues that affect personal health and well-being,” according to the 2013-2014 Paly Course Catalog.

However, alumni input from the survey clearly implies that there is merit in the argument that this course is not only a waste of time, but also that there is no course nor place on campus where students can attain sufficient skills that are applicable to the modern world in terms of maintaining ethics and principles, as opposed to maintaining a 4.0. While students may be prepared to recite Shakespearean monologues and construct parabolic graphs, the emphasis on more applicable real-life skills is lacking.

“Money management was never mentioned [in a Paly course] and I felt unprepared to suddenly work three on-campus jobs without any previous money-making experience,” a Paly graduate wrote. “I was also unprepared for actually wanting to learn, as Paly was more of a machine to get good grades than a place to teach me a love of academics.”

Putting academic instruction aside, the real shame lies in the mental toll that students incur from this “educationpocalypse.”

“I hate when I hear people say they spent eight hours doing homework last night or spent all day on a Saturday or Sunday doing homework,” Diorio said. “I think teachers need to do a better job empathizing with what it’s like to be a high school student and I think they need to hear [student] voices. I’m very confident our kids are going to go off and be good students, but we need to make sure it’s not coming at the expense of something else.”

Even worse is the fact that students are not recognized for the pressure they place on themselves. Rare is the case when a teacher pulls a student aside after class and congratulates them for improving their grade on a recent test — which may be a result of studying for five hours, unbeknownst to the teacher. Students feel underappreciated and may not even realize it because methodically doing work has become so innate.

In fact, some of the brightest students on our campus are those who do not complete an assignment because they do not feel educationally prepared to properly finish it. Such students are often overlooked because their drive for learning is not evident in what schools use to quantify drive for learning: letter grades. These students ought to be more admired than

those who simply fabricate their work to get the grade for completion.

Learning to be a successful student — and hopefully a model citizen — should not come at the expense of mental, physical and emotional well-being, which can be found most tangible in sleep deprivation. Only eight percent of high school students get enough sleep on a school night, according to a 2007 finding by the Journal of Adolescent Health.

According to The Oregonian, hypomania, a measure of anxiety and an irritable mood state, was six times more prevalent in students in 2007 than it was among students in 1938.

The prevalence of depression among students has also increased sixfold during the same time frame.

The importance of mental health should not be overlooked; it should be reinforced by things as simple as encouraging students to go out and have a good time and live a little.

“We don’t want to create a culture of workaholics,” Diorio said. “Work hard, play hard. You gotta play hard, too.”

A Palo Alto education is an opportunity that should not be overlooked and those who say we should continue to strive to be the best in academics are right. However, how we define “best” and how we educate our students must be amended.

Palo Alto should not apologize for its success, but rather revisit its measure of success and how it achieves implementation of its first-rate education so it can be proud of answering the question of “at what cost?”

Students’ drives for learning has disappeared. Sleep deprivation is widespread. Applicable skills are undervalued. It is time to stop merely acknowledging Paly’s trademark stress problem and actually attack the root of the issue.

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The Campanile

OPINION

Friday, December 6, 2013

A7

Community service should take priority

By Claire Liu

H

Staff Writer

ere at Palo Alto High School, most students pack their afternoons with a plethora of extracurricular activities.

With sports, clubs, music, theater and other organized activities taking precedence above all else in the world of after-school activities, community service often is omitted from a student’s list of commitments. It is uncommon to hear of a student volunteer who dedicates his or herself to weekly service causes.

Many students only volunteer a handful of times every year, usually just in order to fill Living Skills’ course requirements. Service is not considered a consistent activity or extracurricular, but seen rather as a single two-week trip to a tropical island or 100 hours gathered in the span of a couple months for the sole purpose of securing the President’s Volunteer Service Award.

Let us step back and think about the significance and effects of volunteer service on the community.

Examples of well-known volunteer opportunities include working with the homeless, elderly, mentally disabled and underprivileged. The goals of many organizations are to minimize achievement gaps, end vicious cycles of poverty and help people off the streets. The problems that charities face are very real. These are the flaws in society that we talk about in class and at home.

Despite the education of social issues, volunteering and helping others on a normal basis is rarely ever strongly encouraged. Service is promoted as a one-time or “do it until you get the hours” type of activity.

It is considered unimportant in the scheme of everyday life because as high school students, we are often encouraged to act in college-savvy ways and dedicate all of our energy on school and practiced talents.

A topic of conversation that is rarely confronted, perhaps due to tradition, is the huge discrepancies in expectation among afterschool activities. For example, student-athletes are willing to and have been conditioned to dedicate hours a day to practice their sport. The ultimate goal of this dedication and hard work is to build character, team chemistry and take

steps toward some sort of ultimate, almost sacred, athletic championship.

These goals are undoubtedly very important.

However, this same passionate drive is for some reason not applied to serving the community. This is bizarre given the fact that these charitable issues are so huge and influential. Teenagers in our city and across America are taught that they must be fully dedicated to a football team or a choir group, but it is never suggested that perhaps dedicating that same amount of energy and effort into a humanitarian cause that enhances and improves a community or another individual’s life would be just as rewarding and life-changing.

Although it is important to emphasize athletic programs and artistic hobbies, it is time to shine the light on volunteering as a viable and legitimate extracurricular — a do-it-oncea-week-or-more type of afterschool activity that students can be passionate about, and personally obligated to. This does not mean undermining the emphasis on traditional extracurriculars; it simply means opening our minds and teaching teenagers and younger children that putting on an apron and making dinner for and conversing with the local homeless at a daily soup kitchen is just as meaningful and legitimate as throwing on a jersey for soccer practice every afternoon.

On a professional level, volunteering shows colleges that the student possesses what a former admissions dean at Stanford called ‘generosity of spirit’ — a sense that they’re connected to a larger community, that they are committed to causes other than their own self-improvement.

Irena Smith Pal Alto college counselor

Volunteering not only benefits the community as a whole, but also the individual students.

In an ideal world, masses of high school students would flock to serve the community out of the simple goodness of their hearts. There would be no need for conversation on how volunteering could benefit the student. But because this is a proposal on establishing community service as a legitimate extracurricular and because legitimate extracurriculars almost always garner some sort of personal-gain, consistent and dedicated volunteer work benefits students and helps college applications.

Being a great football player or winning a robotics award is clearly beneficial to students who partake in such activities. These accomplishments are traditionally established examples of extracurricular success.

Although measurements of “success” or accomplishment are not as clearcut in regards to volunteering, they are certainly present.

Students who truly commit to service and volunteer multiple times a week gain insight on teamwork, dedication, responsibility to others and character. The lesson won’t be a “I need to memorize these lines so this musical runs smoothly” sort of responsibility, but perhaps a “I need to help with the afterschool program each day because I care about the academic success of 6-year-old Jessica” kind of responsibility.

Nick Xu, a current Stanford University student, volunteered frequently with the St. Vincent de Paul charity during his high school years in Sydney, Australia. He reflects on his experiences and the lessons gained from his service work.

“Every fortnight I would be involved with the making and delivering of sandwiches to the homeless population of Sydney,” Xu said. “Over many months of doing this, I realized that it was never about the food or snacks.

Creating conversation was the most important part of the service.”

In addition to the lessons on the meaningfulness of developing relationships with those he served, Xu states that his community work taught him habits of consistency and upholding himself to a higher standard, not just when he was volunteering.

All of these important skills can be developed through community service activities, just as they can be through other after-school activities.

The character-building that comes with participation in sports or theater can also be found through serving the community.

On the topic of more tangible examples of student benefits through volunteering, there seems to be two schools of thought regarding community service and college admissions. Some seem to believe that flying to a third-world country and sacrificing a week to build houses will greatly benefit them in entering a prestigious university. This is not so, as colleges are now aware of such short-term, costly programs and the ease with which a well-to-do family can secure such an experience for their children.

On the other end of the spectrum are those who do not consider volunteering an impressive or interesting activity to pursue consistently. They believe that sports and organized team activities are often considered to be more sought after and appealing to schools.

Irena Smith, a Palo Alto college counselor who worked for four years as a Stanford admissions officer, dispels the misconception that volunteering is an inferior addition to a student’s high school resume.

Alex Harui/the campanile

A student researches volunteering opportunities available in the Paly community “In college admissions, there’s no hierarchy of good, mediocre or bad extracurriculars; colleges are far more interested in the quality of a student’s commitment to an activity than in what an activity is called,” Smith said.

“It’s perfectly possible to be an indifferent or mediocre debater or a poor sport on the soccer field. It is also perfectly possible to be a valued and valuable presence in a senior community, an after-school program or a youth sports league.”

Smith further notes that not only does a consistent volunteer service indicate serious commitment, but it also shows good character on the student’s part.

“On a professional level, volunteering shows colleges that the student possesses what a former admissions dean at Stanford called ‘generosity of spirit’ — a sense that they’re connected to a larger community, that they are committed to causes other than their own self-improvement,” Smith said.

However, Smith makes a point to emphasize that superficial volunteer initiatives and short-term responsibilities can often be sniffed out by college officers. In order to benefit from service opportunities, there must be a clear sense of passion and willingness to dedicate, rather than “will this get me into college?” type of attitude.

“Students should be involved like they mean it,” Smith said. “Showing up once a year to serve Thanksgiving dinner in a soup kitchen is a nice gesture, but not more than that. In order to establish a true presence and genuine relationships within the activity, students need to treat volunteering with the same intensity of purpose with which they might treat being on a sports team, participating in de-

bate or performing in theater. Like anything else, volunteering takes practice. Having a conversation with a senior citizen with dementia or explaining math to a middle school student hazy on basic math facts are not easy tasks.”

As citizens of a city that constantly preaches the importance of reaching out and helping to improve the greater community, it is time we begin practicing the actions necessary for reaching these goals. In order to act as productive citizens in bettering Palo Alto and our surrounding neighbors, we must ponder the ways in which we can dedicate more energy, passion and time into solving the problems that are very real in today’s world.

Perhaps we can begin thinking about encouraging volunteerism, a cause created to improve lives and communities, as an activity that students can and should participate in on a consistent basis. Perhaps we should contemplate the idea that feeding the hungry, teaching the uneducated and working with the mentally disabled is just as important as practicing a dance routine or scoring a touchdown.

Lastly, as we introduce extracurricular activities and personal hobbies to teenagers and younger children, we should place community service on the map. As an activity that demonstrates to college admission officers that students takes the wellness of their community just as seriously as the leading roles they’ve secured in school plays or the medals they’ve won in Science Olympiad. Furthermore, volunteer experiences will gift young people the opportunity to develop character, find their passions and actually act in ways that directly benefit people besides themselves.

Curriculum must include public speaking

By Alvina Zou

S

Business Manager

weaty palms, shaky voice, blurred vision. This is the experience of students who have not been taught the skills necessary for public speaking. Every year students are assigned presentations in order to fulfill state education standards.

However, there needs to be a stronger emphasis on a more robust curriculum to surpass the current standards in order to improve verbal communication skills.

Although public speaking is a portion of the school curriculum, interpersonal skills and becoming an effective public speaker are crucial for attaining jobs and maintaining relationships in the future. Having confidence in one’s ability to speak differ-

entiates an individual from the rest of the crowd, as public speaking is a skill that every individual will need to use at some point in his or her life.

“I think there should be more emphasis on public speaking in class simply because no matter what career a person enters, they will need [that skill] in life,” senior Jonathan Mackris said. “It’s a skill that is used in nearly every career, especially in job interviews. Being able to speak well and fluently in front of an audience big or small can really help people go far in life.”

According to a survey taken by Workforce Solutions Group at St. Louis Community College, 60 percent of employers say that job applicants lack the necessary communication and interpersonal skills.

Interviews with employers, presentations in front of customers and designating tasks are all actions that require public speaking skills in order to efficiently deliver a message.

Beyond the workplace, public speaking is applicable in life including giving a toast at a wedding or speaking about a friend who has passed away. If one is able to communicate with others through public speaking, one can better convey an opinion to a small group of people or an individu-

al person. Practicing public speaking skills allows for a speaker to become comfortable with speaking in various situations and eases one’s anxiety and nervousness as one speaks in front of a group of people.

Senior Camila Vasquez is a member of the Palo Alto High School speech team and practices these skills at various tournaments. She believes that the benefits of public speaking go beyond participating in speaking in school and on the team.

“I don’t [just] think learning these skills can be applicable and useful,” Vasquez said. “I know that they can.

In almost any profession that I can think of, public speaking plays some small role. Even an interview, while not actually public speaking, requires the poise and confidence needed to make a good speech. Knowing how to speak makes people confident in their everyday life. Almost any situation is public speaking on various levels. And being able to communicate with your peers usually is a good thing.”

Mackris has taken theater throughout high school, which has allowed him to develop his skills and increase his self-confidence in public speaking.

“Theater [has] been really helpful for me,” Mackris said. “I rarely get

nervous for presentations anymore, and memorizing things is no longer a problem. It also helps build charisma because the more comfortable you are speaking in front of an audience, the easier it is to become more personable and entertaining while speaking.”

Not only does public speaking influence one’s verbal and nonverbal communication skills, but it also affects one’s ability to use emotion to persuade others and convey a certain perspective.

“Without question, Paly students would benefit from more training in public speaking,” performing arts teacher Kathleen Woods said. “Training in public speaking specifically, as well as training in theater, helps students develop a skill set to succeed in prepared presentations as well as interviewing, speaking persuasively both in the classroom and on the job and thinking on their feet in challenging situations.”

Throughout Wood’s years teaching, she has noted reflections of previous students and observed students applying public speaking skills beyond the classroom “Many students are not receiving adequate experience or training in this area,” Woods said. “As with any discipline, there is a toolbox of

skills that can be taught and learned and presentation skills are useful throughout a person’s life. Over the years, students have consistently shared with me how the skills they learn in theater [and] speech class help them present themselves with more confidence and ease in public speaking situations.”

A portion of public speaking includes thoroughly understanding the information given, applying it and expressing a specific interpretation to others.

“Other than just public speaking, the big thing is memorizing,” Mackris said. “In theater you spend a lot of time memorizing big chunks of text that you pretty much need to know word for word, or close enough. That skill has been so, so helpful in school, I really can’t stress it enough.”

Theater is a class that allows students to improve upon their public speaking skills. Student should not be limited to just theater as an option in order to improve these skills. Instead, there should be a class that is dedicated to allowing students to improve upon their verbal communication abilities and allows students to gain the appropriate confidence needed in order to equip students with a skill set that prepares them for the future.

Friday, December 6, 2013

A8

The Campanile

EDITORIALS

Administration, contractors have not followed through on construction deadline promises

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imply walking across Palo Alto High School campus without hearing the constant buzz of construction sites has proven to be an impossible task. For the past two years, Paly has played host to three gigantic construction projects — the football stadium, the social sciences and math building and the new media arts building. Although Viking Stadium celebrated its new opening this past September, the two other semi-completed buildings continue to cause a disturbance.

The Campanile is disappointed that the administration, in conjunction with Taisei Construction Corporation, has failed to deliver on its original promise of completing the two buildings by the end of the 201213 school year. Then, the construction management promised a December 2013 opening, but alas, Paly students remain affected by the ongoing projects, which are months away from being completed. New projections estimate the buildings to open sometime in April 2014.

Taisei Construction Corporation filed suit in Santa Clara County Superior Court on June 21, claiming that the Palo Alto Unified School District owes $1.65 million. It is a shame that district politics are getting in the way of completion of the two buildings.

The two buildings are located in the midst of other departments, continually distracting students and staff throughout the school day. In order to someday enjoy the perks of the new buildings, the school must accommodate the distractions that construction sites create, but only to a certain extent; two and a half years later, time is running out. The Campanile acknowledges the future benefit of housing two new structures; however, the bigger issue is the constant prolonging of the projects.

As the school anticipates breaking ground in less than a year on the newly approved athletic complex and swimming pool, The Campanile fears that postponement of deadlines will carry over to that project as well. This

project will be a vital part of Paly and it will be detrimental if the administration and contractors cannot work together to provide students credible information in regards to the status of the construction. Students cannot afford to continually be told opening dates of buildings that they believe to be accurate, when in fact, they are not.

The fact that the only one of the three original constructions projects to be completed on time was Viking Stadium is also a fact of interest, but it is acknowledged that this could be due to the project’s contractors and the difficulty of the project.

The Paly administration does a fairly commendable job of informing the student body and connected community of any delays in the progress of the two buildings. However, considering the drastic delays that the buildings continue to undergo, The Campanile believes that the administration needs to take a stronger stance, insisting the construction companies stick to a previously decided timeline for completion.

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thereby improving the school environment. Aside from the more obvious assets of improving the school’s physical appearance and utilizing student artists, adding murals will provide other, less obvious benefits. It is a rather well-established sentiment that the arts are too often underrepresented and under-appreciated in high schools across the nation. At Paly specifically, there is a visual and arts program available for students to partake in; however, the program is dwarfed by the much larger athletic and media arts programs. Therefore, including murals on the Paly campus will promote the underrepresented art department, enriching the array of Paly’s non-core classes.

Art is form of self-expression as well as a method of entertainment for onlookers. High school students undergo an extensive amount of pressure from an ordinary school day. In a normal day of school, teenagers deal with social, emotional, mental and academic stresses.

Considering the problems that students encounter on a daily basis, the very least Paly can do as a school is add art to the campus in order to provide students with a friendlier, more inviting school environment.

Although adding murals, thus improving the appearance overall, will not be the means for solving all the problems that students face on a regular basis, taking the necessary steps in order to improve the school atmosphere will undoubtably improve the overall experience.

School board should vote to continue starting the school year on a Tuesday

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n Dec. 10, the Palo Alto Unified School District (PAUSD) School Board will vote on next year’s calendar. Options are currently being devised by the district-wide calendar committee, which has representatives from each school: Deanna Chute and Kathleen Laurence for Palo Alto High School.

As of now, there are two main calendars being considered by the School Board, with the school year start date being the main distinction.

One of the calendars, similar to the one the district has used for the past two years, starts on Thursday. Students would attend school on Thursday and Friday before jumping into a full week of school after a weekend of rest. The other calendar option has school starting a few days later on Monday; students would start school with a full week of classes.

The Campanile recommends that the School Board heavily consider the 2014-15 calendar with a start date on Thursday for the benefit of both students and administrators of Palo Alto High School and Henry M. Gunn High School. For students, a start date on Thursday would allow students to gradually adjust back to the school schedule after two months of break. Students would go to school for two days and have two days of rest to prepare for their new schedule before heading straight back into

classes for a full week. This calendar would allow students to ease back into school with a weekend to relax immediately after the start date. A start date on Monday would force students to endure a week of a firm and rigid school schedule, particularly difficult after returning from the flexibility and relaxation of summer vacation.

Furthermore, starting school on Thursday benefits the school administration, facilitating the administrations’ preparations of both high schools for the new school year.

The administration trains Link Crew leaders, plans freshman orientation and holds picture day right before school starts on Thursday. In addition, this calendar would allow teachers time at the inception of the school year to handle classroom introductions and syllabuses so that after the weekend, both students and teachers can start the new week directly with material and lessons rather than class introductions.

The difference between the two schedules does not impact when the school year would end, but when it starts.

The Campanile hopes that the PAUSD School Board will choose the calendar that starts the school year on Thursday to allow students and schools to ease back into the school rhythm.

Ways to get through finals studying 10) Go for a run 9) Take a two hour nap 8) Tell yourself your grades can’t get any worse 7) Browse the “Best Vines” Facebook page 6) Netflix 5) Drop out of high school 4) Ramen noodles... and a lot of them 3) Snapchat 2) Study with your significant other ;) ;) 1) Meditate with Mr. Bloom -JACK PALADIN

LETTERS TO THE EDITORS Got something on your mind?

Submit a letter to the editor at theeds2014@googlegroups.com

COMIC OF THE MONTH

Campus should include murals to improve school environment alking down the streets of Downtown Palo Alto, murals of entertaining scenes involving everything from trash cans to aliens appear on various street corners. These murals add personality and flair to the otherwise uninteresting Palo Alto buildings. However, walk a couple of minutes away from University Avenue and onto the Palo Alto High School campus, and the whimsical murals quickly disappear.

The Paly campus hosts many buildings void of any color or decoration, creating the perfect opportunity for Paly to introduce murals onto school campus. Furthermore, considering the plethora of construction currently occupying the school, the campus could use some scenic additions in order to compensate for the construction-ridden environment.

Aside from the ample amount of space available to accommodate murals, Paly also has a sizable population of student artists whose talents should not be overlooked, but rather utilized. Allowing students to take charge, hone in their artistic abilities and channel it into a project intended to improve Paly as a whole benefits all parties involved. Asking student artists to undertake the task of creating murals around campus provides additional opportunities for artists to improve their skills by creating a situation in which artists can apply their acquired skills.

The Campanile believes that the administration should seriously consider adding murals around campus,

DECEMBER’S TOP TEN LIST

Courtesy of Jane Gorelik

The Campanile Editors-in-Chief Rachel Cui • Jensen Hsiao • Maya Kitayama Daniel Tachna-Fram • Hillel Zand • Stephenie Zhang News Editor Josefin Kenrick

Opinion Editor Jack Paladin

Lifestyle Editors Kian McHugh Michelle Yin

Sports Editors Julia Kwasnick Ziv Schwartz

Online Editor Jonathan Ziegler

Lifestyle Design Editor Irene Ezran

Spotlight Editor Emily Semba

Photography Editors Ahmed Awadallah Andrew Sternfield

Cartoonist Jane Gorelik Jacques Manjarrez

Business Managers Shivonne Logan Alvina Zou

Seth Alston Galen Byrd Parker Devine Esther Doerr Haley Fang Lauren Gargiulo Bowen Gerould Lauren Giurata

Staff Writers

Conner Harden Jeffrey Ho Grace Kim Emily Lee Zachary Levitan Claire Liu William Mendenhall Paul Mewes

Ahmed Awadallah Andrew Choi

Kevin Mullin Hannah Nguyen Arjun Parikh Coby Parker William Shin William Snodgrass Angela Stern Andrew Sternfield

Photographers Conner Harden Jeffrey Ho

Heather Strathearn Alec Sullivan Nicholas Sullivan Sarah Tayeri Oliver Tucher Jacob van Zyll Leslie Wan Lily Zhang

Grace Kim Andrew Sternfield

Advisor Esther Wojcicki

Letters to the Editors: E-mail all letters to editors to theeds2014@googlegroups.com The Campanile prints letters on a space-available basis.

We reserve the right to edit submissions.

The Campanile only prints signed letters.

Advertisements: Advertisements with The Campanile are printed with signed contracts.

For more information regarding advertisements in The Campanile and their size options and prices, please contact The Campanile Business Managers by e-mail at campanile.ads@gmail.com.

Note: It is the policy of The Campanile to refrain from printing articles that misrepresent or alienate specific individuals within the Palo Alto community.

Friday, December 6, 2013

The Campanile

Not So Silent Night

L FEST LE

By Kian McHugh

palo alto holiday traditions

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hristmas Tree Lane, originally named “Christmas Fairytale Lane,” is the most commonly known Palo Alto holiday tradition. Lighting up Fulton Street for two weeks every year, holiday lights and decorations brighten the night and bring glee to the community. The tradition started when a committee proposed an idea to the Palo Alto City Council in 1940, claiming “a common desire to promote Christmas joy throughout the holidays, particularly for the children...and to foster a similar spirit throughout the community,” according to christmastreelane.org. As the city has evolved since 1940, the street now includes some Jewish decorations to celebrate both Christmas and Hanukkah. Along with individual decorations for each house, the city contributes miniature Christmas trees lined with colored lights down the sidewalk, and colors the street lights red. Christmas Tree Lane became such a big part of the community that in 1983 the Addison School Chorus performed a song dedicated to the lane titled “Let’s Go Strolling Down Christmas Tree Lane,” according to christmastreelane.org. Although none of the original residents still live on Fulton Street, the tradition lives on with many of the original decorations from 1940.

In the middle of Lytton Plaza, on the corner of University Avenue and Emerson street, a 20-foot Christmas tree brightens the winter atmosphere of downtown Palo Alto. For the third consecutive year, the City of Palo Alto hosted a tree lighting ceremony on Nov. 30. At this event there was live music, hot cider and for the first time, a miniature snowman contest. The City provided snow for the snowman contest, with contestants building and decorating 12-inch snowmen. Prizes were handed out for Best in Show, Most Creative and Best

Family Effort. The Keys School Choir, 37th Parallel, Starr Saunders, Bay Bells and the Palo Alto High School Pep Band all contributed live music to the event. Along with the celebrations, the city encouraged attendees to bring a warm jacket to donate to the Downtown Streets Team to help those in need.

On top of all the holiday decorations around the community, there are also many annual events. There is no better way to celebrate the holidays than going a to locally-performed traditional ballet. Three local student dance companies perform holiday classics, “The Nutcracker” and “A Winter Fairy Tale.” Dance Connection Palo Alto and Pacific Ballet Academy both perform “The Nutcracker” and have done so for many years. Dance Connection’s performances will be held at Henry M. Gunn High School’s Spangenberg theatre, Dec. 6 through Dec. 8. Bayer Ballet Academy traditionally performs A “Winter Fairy Tale,” the story of a Russian magician’s New Year’s Eve. They will perform at the Mountain View Center For The Performing Arts on Dec. 21 and Dec. 22. Support- i n g local student dance organizations and watching classic holiday performances is a great tradition for the whole family.

There was another Christmas tree lighting ceremony Nov. 30 at the Stanford Shopping Mall.

With Holly Berry, the holiday ferry, holiday music, dancing and the tree, the shopping center will be illuminated with Christmas cheer for the holidays. To top off the numerous and abundant decorations throughout the mall, there is a replica North Pole. With the holiday atmosphere also comes photos with Santa and his elves and fun for all ages.

Text by Galen Byrd Staff Writer

Design by Irene Ezran Lifestyle Design Editor and Galen Byrd

holiday gift ideas Text by Haley Fang Staff Writer

Jar filled with cookies

Who doesn’t love cookies over the holidays? This could be one of the most delicious gift ideas because not only is it affordable, but it is also perfect for anyone with a sweet tooth. To start, bake your recipient’s favorite type of cookie. Next, fill a clean jar with the cooled cookies, and your present is ready to give away. For those who do not want to spend the time baking dozens of cookies, you can measure out the dry ingredients, place them into the jar and include an index card detailing instructions such as what liquid ingredients to add and how long the cookies must bake.

You can also decorate the outside of the jar with ribbons, permanent markers or sequins.

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s the holiday season approaches, a major problem that many students face is what to give friends and family members when on a limited budget. The following are DIY (do-ityourself) holiday gift ideas that fit the basic needs of most people this holiday season.

Picture frames

Picture frames are especially favorable gifts for parents and grandparents who enjoy memories from the past, but they can also be meaningful presents for friends to remind them of all the good times you have had together. For this project, you only need a few brushes, paint and a wooden frame. These essentials (plus other decorations) can all be bought at nearly any arts and crafts store, such as Michaels. The sky’s the limit when it comes to decorating frames: you can add in as many details as you want or simply paint it a single color and glue colorful buttons or ribbons on. Another fun alternative is cutting out paper or cloth with desired designs and gluing it onto the frame.

Before wrapping it, let the frame dry and insert a picture of the recipient or of you and the recipient together. As an alternative to pictures, you can also insert a message or drawing.

Decorated mug

Mugs are great because not only are they practical, but they are also used by just about everyone and can be decorated any way you want. All you need for this project is a mug and porcelain paint, which can both be bought at Michaels. For decorating, you can either draw designs or illustrations on the mug, or personalize it by writing the recipient’s name on the mug. After decorating, make sure to follow the directions on the bottle of porcelain paint and bake the mug for the right amount of time to make the stain permanent. When the mug is complete, fill it with candy or little snacks and wrap it in wrapping paper.

Polling app to debut

By Grace Kim

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Card

Cards are perhaps the simplest thing you can get someone, but they are also one of the most meaningful gifts. Instead of buying a card this year, try making one.

Cards are extremely easy to make and can be created from almost anything you have at home. Glue buttons or bows on the front of the card or decorate it with hand-drawn pictures. If you have photos, they can be glued on, as well. The inside of the card can be decorated with drawings and photographs, but try to fill the space with a personalized message to make this gift truly meaningful. If you cannot think of something to write, include a seasonal quote or general wishes for the holiday season.

Goodie bag

A simple and easy DIY gift to give away is a holiday-themed goodie bag, which is exactly what it sounds like: a bag with personalized gifts for friends. The great thing about this gift is that you only need a paper bag which can even be found around the house, and an assortment of gifts If you do not have goodie bags at home, decorated paper sandwich bags will do just fine. The amount of money you spend on each bag is totally up to you— you could even choose not to spend any money at all if you place items found around the house in your bag. You can also write little compliments or quotes on separate sheets of paper and fold them before filling the bag with the slips of paper.

INSIDE

B6

Terrorist is not spelled M-U-S-L-I-M

By Hillel Zand As we approach the one-year anniversary of the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting in Newtown, Conn., the time comes to deem whether or not we as a nation stand for better or for worse than we did that day on Dec. 14, 2012. In the past year there have been 22 mass shootings of four or more people, most of which have gone by relatively unpublicized. So I propose to you this: It is time we stop focusing on associating “terrorism,” “threat” and “violence” with the faraway lands of Iraq and Afghanistan.

When I say the names Pedro Vargas and Jeremiah Bean, you probably think of just an average American — maybe a blue-collar worker just minding his own business. On July 26, Vargas murdered seven people in South Florida, including a family of three. On May 10, Bean shot and killed two happily married couples and a newspaper delivery man who was just minding his own business.

Just because those names don’t rhyme to the tune of “Osama bin Laden” and “Khalid Sheikh Mohammed” does not mean us Americans have not experienced terrorism within our own borders. Those two, more publicized men have been arguably the most popular names associated with the intangible and ever-confusing War on Terror, but when was the last time we stopped for a second and considered the notion that terrorism may be occurring inside our country?

To begin, we must first define terrorism: ter·ror·ism [ter-uh-riz-uhm] noun 1. the use of violence and threats to intimidate or coerce, especially for political purposes.

2. the state of fear and submission produced by terrorism or terrorization.

3. a terroristic method of governing or of resisting a government.

Notice how terrorism is not defined by “Islamic fundamentalist” nor “member of Al-Qaeda” nor “one of those names former President George W. Bush probably mispronounced a few times.” But its definition does fit with the aforementioned shootings and the others We’re climbing out of the Great Recession. We’re continuing to pull out troops from Afghanistan. Now’s the time to worry about preventing the latest trend that faces this nation.

This is not a pro- or anti-gun control column nor is this a call for subjecting mass murderers to cruel and unusual punishment. This is merely a wake-up-and-stop-pretending-likeAmerica-is-perfect column. Someone who thinks they’re perfect doesn’t notice their own flaws and Uncle Sam has many blemishes that we oftentimes don’t like to notice, just as a pubescent teenager and his acne. But most will agree that he or she who takes the initiative to fix the blemish is better-off than he or she who continues to ignore it and hope it will pass. (Per my poor analogy: going to the dermatologist is better than just hoping and praying that your zits will go away.)

“This too shall pass” is the proverb that we all probably think of when we hear of yet another mass shooting, but it is time to start acknowledging what we may not want to notice.

What non-90s Inside the mind of the Goodwill kids are missing truck artist

By Lauren Gargiulo

By Claire Liu

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B8

Friday, December 6, 2013

B2

The Campanile

LIFESTYLE

Simple, eco-friendly ways to reuse The Campanile

By Heather Strathearn Senior Staff Writers

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hat are you going to do with this newspaper when you are finished reading it? Drop it on the ground? Put it in the trash? Recycle it? Although these options get progressively better, why not reuse this newspaper instead? The saying “reduce, reuse, recycle” is not in a random, arbitrary order as some might think. Rather, this order represents the order of the steps we should take in order to further increase our positive impact on the environment. Although recycling is great, it is not quite as effective as reusing, just like reusing is not as helpful as reducing. On this note, despite the fact that there are many cool things to do with this newspaper once you are done reading it, if you are not going to read it in the first place, do not feel obligated to take one. That said, I would highly suggest taking a newspaper and at least browsing a few of the articles.

Wrap those presents away

Celebrate New Year’s Eve with confetti ... and New Year’s cleaning it up

During this holiday season, everyone is bound to give at least one gift to a friend or family member, and ripping open a present is much more satisfying than opening a bag. However, gift wrap is expensive and a waste of paper, so why not wrap presents in old newspaper? Newspaper gives the present a cool look and shows the recipient of the present that you are not only giving them a gift, but giving Mother Earth a gift as well. If you are intent on using a bag rather than wrapping, but still want to show your love for the planet, newspaper can be

This can be done in a traditional method — simply cutting small pieces of the newspaper and throwing in the air as the clock strikes midnight — or in a less-common method. While blowing up balloons, place pieces of the confetti inside so that when they are popped (at midnight) the confetti will fall. To be extra unique, cut the newspaper into snowflakes rather than small rectangles. Who says it doesn’t snow in Palo Alto?

PHILLIP FRIEDMAN/Studio d

A perfect way to reuse The Campanile is by wrapping presents.

Make some word-erful nails

Courtesy of ifitshipitshere

Newspaper nails can make anyone feel artsy and stylish.

Your nails have been looking a little boring lately.

No problem, all you need is some your edition of The Campanile.

1. Paint your nails with the light colored nail polish and wait for it to dry.

2. Soak a nail in alcohol for a few seconds and apply a strip of newspaper print­side down.

3. Hold the newspaper on your nail for a few seconds but do not shift the paper or the design will blur. If the paper is too dry, you can add a few drops of alcohol.

4. Remove the newspaper, let dry and finish with top coat.

5. Repeat for all nails.

6. Show them off to your friends to show them how artsy you are.

Accessorize with some style... lifestyle that is

Courtesy of Beads-etsy

There are many possible styles that can be strung into different types of accessories.

Courtesy of BUngaloChicago

If you’re feeling extra artsy on New Years, make some heart shaped confetti with your newspapers.

In need of some new jewelry or a cool gift? Why not make some paper beads? These beads can be strung into a bracelet, necklace or earrings.

1. Gather materials: newspaper, scissors, glue and string.

2. Measure and cut strips of the newspaper. Different styles of cuts lead to different shaped beads so be sure to stay consistent unless you want each bead to look different. See photo for details as to which cut leads to which shape of bead.

3. Use a needle or toothpick and start wrapping the paper tightly around the needle. Start with the thickest end of the paper. Make sure that the width of the needle or toothpick you are using is the same thickness as the string you want to use for the bracelet.

4. Once you are done wrapping the strip of paper, put a dab of glue (preferably liquid paper) at the end and hold firmly for a few seconds until dry.

5. Thread the beads on a string a little larger than your wrist (so you have room to ties the bracelet). Once all of the beads are strung, varnish the beads, hang them and let dry for two or three days.

A tale of two cities: crime differences New mobile app produces customized statuses

By Paul Mewes

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Staff Writer

gunshot. It is a sound foreign to the streets of Palo Alto, but nothing unusual in the neighboring town of East Palo Alto.

Although the crime rates in East Palo Alto have been dropping steadily over the last few years, its crime rates are still higher than those in Palo Alto.

“The statistics are there,” East Palo Alto Mayor Ruben Abrica said. “We do have a few more homicides than Palo Alto does.”

According to Abrica, the two main causes of violence are gangs and the accessibility of guns.

“In areas where there are organized gangs, the violence usually is going to go up,” Abrica said. “The other thing is there are way too many guns, so if someone is in a gang, instead of going and beating someone up, they go shoot them.”

Abrica believes that stricter gun control could be a viable way to deter violent crime.

“Most industrialized countries have much tougher gun control, and they don’t have as much violence,” Abrica said. “That tells me something.”

Abrica believes that the best way to reduce crime is from within.

“You have to work with the community,” Abrica said. “You can’t control the violence just by having police.

By Jake van Zyll Staff Writer

H Courtesy of palo alto online

Sergeant Wayne Benitez, also president of the Palo Alto Police Officers Association, stands with two police patrol cars.

It’s a social problem where families and other people in the community have to be more responsible.”

According to Abrica, the Palo Alto and East Palo Alto Police Departments work closely together in order to deal with serious crime that may spread into bordering areas.

“When serious problems happen, our police departments work very closely together,” Abrica said. “You never hear it, but Palo Alto police and East Palo Alto police work together on anything and everything.”

Detective DuJuan Green of the Palo Alto Police Department agrees that crime is not contained within boundaries and asserts that his job takes him all over the Bay Area.

“The jurisdiction for Palo Alto police officers is contained to crimes that occur in Palo Alto,” Green said.

“However, if something happens in Palo Alto and it leads you to an outside city, we’re allowed to go to those cities to conduct follow-up [investigations]. You can end up having something that happens here in Palo Alto and wind up in San Francisco or East Palo Alto for that matter.”

However, Green has a different opinon t and believes that the solution is more police officers.

“If we had enough officers, we could put officers at the various locations where crimes are occurring because we can see the trends,” Green said. “But how do you stop the trends if you don’t have enough people to apply force.”

Regardless of their varying opinions about how to prevent crime, both Abrica and Green assert the importance of crime prevention.

aven’t posted a Facebook status in a while? Not sure what to post? Scared of what others might think of you? Well, a Facebook app released earlier this year might be your solution. This unique app, “What Would I Say?”, does something unlike any other app, it generates a status for the user.

Unfortunately, the generated status will most likely be irrelevant and may not make any grammatical sense.

Developed by a small group of Princeton University students, “What Would I Say?” predicts a Facebook status by taking into account the pages you like, your Facebook friends, hobbies, places you’ve been and more.

It is easy to use too — you simply log onto your Facebook account, open a new tab, go to what-would-i-say.com, click “generate status” and if you want to post the status, click “post to Facebook.”

If you want a clever, brilliant status that you might actually post on Facebook, this app is not for you. The status will almost certainly contain blatant grammatical errors, which might not matter to you, but it sometimes gets to the point of just being random misspelled words jumbled together.

The app has access to everything you’ve ever done on Facebook and

all of your friends and likes, yet the statuses it produces are surprisingly irrelevant.

Although the status updates produced by “What Would I Say?” are difficult to read and may be hard to comprehend, some people enjoy the obscurity of some statuses.

“The status [the app] gave me was ‘nah, I kno its already sunday.’” junior Alex Dees said. “That doesn’t make sense to me, but I thought it was pretty funny.”

In fact, many Facebook users only post a status produced by the app when the status is so grammatically incorrect and random that it’s purely entertaining.

If you want to get a laugh from a predicted Facebook status produced by a mediocre app that doesn’t make much sense, “What Would I Say?” is your best bet.

However, other students were not so fond of the idea of their accounts having statuses generated for them, noting that it does something the usere can do themselves.

“It’s pretty stupid for a website or application to generate predicted statuses for you when you can just log on and do it yourself,” junior Sheila Subramanian said. “I mean there’s no point for them to post statuses under your profile that they predict, other than to incrase activity for their own [Facebook’s] interests.”

The Campanile

LIFESTYLE

Friday, December 6, 2013

B3

Wise words from Goodwill truck employee

By Claire Liu Staff Writer

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eet Ernest Kirk, the man who sits at the Goodwill truck in the Embarcadero parking lot at Palo Alto High School. Kirk was born and raised in Louisiana, then moved to the Bay Area during his teenage years. He lived in Oakland and San Francisco in the 1950s, and served in the Army in the early ‘60s.

He was stationed in Europe for 18 months and returned to California just in time for the ‘60s movement — a time he greatly enjoyed. Today, outside of working with Goodwill, Kirk is an artist who paints black folk scenes. He enjoys reading and fishing. Kirk was kind enough to share some life experiences and words of wisdom for Paly students.

On working at the Goodwill truck: “Once you’re over 50, you might start to realize it’s difficult to get jobs. Working at the truck keeps a roof over my head. I wouldn’t exactly say I’m happy, but I’m doing fine.

If I could make a living off my art, well, that would be just wonderful.

The good thing about working with Goodwill is witnessing the giving spirit. You see people from all walks of life with all types of personality come to give — the people who donate clothes with tags still attached, those nice folk who fold the clothes neatly and pack them, the people who are busy and just load the pants and shirts in. No matter what though, I get to see these people donating and I feel the giving spirit.”

On growing up in the Deep South as a young African American boy: “I actually never did experience any negativity myself, although I sometimes heard about some of the mistreatment my grandma or other older members of my family may have experienced. I had a very sweet childhood — I remember catching fireflies, also the beautiful scenery that surrounded me. I am always very grateful that my parents exposed me to the problems an African American might have had to face in the past or in the present, but they never made me hateful or bitter toward others. I am lucky and thankful for that.”

On education in Oakland in the ‘60s compared to today: “When I was growing up in Oakland, the public school system was excellent. I was taught very well at school. All the supplies were provided and the teachers were fine. I went to an after-school program where they fed me graham crackers and milk.

Today, it’s very different. The youth of parts of Oakland are struggling in life and school, probably because they don’t have the same support that people of my generation had back many decades ago. It’s pretty sad. Oakland is a beautiful city.”

On reading, life-long learning and his own favorite literature picks: “Reading is it. If you don’t read, you don’t have anything. Reading gives you the opportunity to escape and to explore. It’s also important to read so you know where you come from and the history of where you live.

It’s shocking to me how some young people in our country, who don’t read up on our history, know less about America than new immigrants, who have to take a citizen test and learn about the United States. It’s crazy. I like to read a little bit of everything.

[Paly English teacher] Lucy [Filppu] and I started conversing after she saw me reading The Lovely Bones one day at the truck. I deeply enjoyed Sherlock Holmes mysteries in my youth.

Moby Dick is a classic. I’ve also read a lot of art books and psychology stuff.

Really, I’ll pick up and read anything that captures my interest.”

On pursuing a lifestyle and career based on passion and interest: “It’s very important to get an education. However, you should also be in touch with what you love.

Today, we’re always talking about who’s gonna be the next Steve Jobs, or who’s gonna be the next big inventor or doctor. But there’s kids out there who don’t want to do that.

There’s youth who might be interested in carpentry or what not, and we need those kids too. You have to know what you are passionate about and try and pursue a career out of that. Palo Alto is a Mecca, filled with amazing stories, amazing people. It’s a great place for young people to realize their dreams and to go out and chase them. I look at this city as a very special place.”

claire liu/the campanile

Ernest Kirk works at the Goodwill truck in the Paly parking lot and enjoys seeing the charitable spirit in donors.

On his art career: On his experience in the army and On love and family: “I have loved art for much of my his 18 months in Europe: “I’m a man who is very big on life, and I’ve been an artist for decades.

“Something sort of funny is that family. I love to spend time with I’ve been a member of the Sonoma all of this was actually started by a my family. I’m a very proud faValley Art Club and have participated bet my friend and I made. We ended ther of two daughters and a son. in several art shows in the Bay Area. up going to the recruiting office. I My kids are college graduates — I’ve sold a few pieces. Early in my art passed the test and my friend didn’t. very hard workers. I could not endeavor, I’d give my art pieces away Then I decided to go through with be more proud of them. I have a — now I don’t do that anymore. I’m it, and I was sent to Europe for 18 mother who is almost 100 years currently have archival prints made of months. My time in Europe was life- old! Lots of people don’t have my original pieces. It’s been a way for changing. America is a new world, good family relationships [and] me to make something out of my life it’s a modern country. Europe is an- people don’t talk to each other. [and] accomplish something. That’s cient — its art, its cities, its culture. I believe in saying ‘I love you.’ I been my attitude [with art]. I’ve read The history, the cobblestone archi- always encourage people to tell and looked at the works of many of tecture...My biggest regret is I never the people they care about that the great masters of art, Rembrandt took any photos during my time they love them. It’s very imporand all those Renaissance guys. For there.” tant. Those three words can be me, I paint scenes of black folk — hisvery powerful.” toric stuff too. Whether they’re work- On returning from Europe to Ernest Kirk is a symbol of the ing in the fields or resting in a family California in the ‘60s: incredible individuals and storoom, I paint the life of the African “I was in my early twenties. It ries that lay embedded in all corAmerican man, woman and family. I was a great age to be experiencing ners of our diverse community. focus on this topic because I am an the ‘60s movements. It was a time of There is much more to a person African American man, and my roots peace and love — it really was beau- than we could ever guess at first are with this subject. A lot of my in- tiful and inspiring. Everyone was glance — whether it be a politerest comes from feelings of inspira- thinking how can we improve and tician, a banker,or a Goodwill tion and empathy that come with the make peace. People would hitch- donation-collector. He can be African American story. I love what hike as a form of transportation and found at the truck on Tuesdays I do, and maybe after another year or there would be no fear of violence or and Thursdays. Kirk’s art can two with the truck, I’m going to try kidnapping. Today, people go out to be viewed and purchased on his and dedicate all my energy and time hitchhike and they never come back. online web-store blackfolkartist. on my art career.

Times have changed.” com.

Local charities kick off holiday fundraisers Parents and students use charitable organizations to give back to their communities

courtesy of second harvest food bank

Members of the Second Harvest Food Bank of Santa Clara and San Mateo counties unpack oranges in order to prepare for the 2013 holiday food and fund drive.

By Angela Stern

T

Senior Staff Writer

he holidays are quickly approaching, and while most students anxiously await the end of a long semester and the bounty of festivities winter break brings, they should also take time to join in the seasonal spirit of giving back. A wide

range of charity drives spring up around this time of year, from the Salvation Army Red Kettle stations disseminated across Stanford Shopping Center to the Palo Alto YMCA Giving Tree, the gamut of charities offer opportunities for anyone who wishes to donate money, objects or time.

A short drive down Embarcadero Road lies the Ecumenaical

Hunger Program (EHP), located at 2411 Pulgas Ave. in East Palo Alto, which will be hosting special holiday distributions on Dec. 17 and 18. The nonprofit organization is currently in need of volunteers, as well as items such as frozen meats, clothing and new gifts (especially for children ages eight to sixteen.) To participate as a volunteer in distribution over the holidays, contact the EHP volunteer coordinator at (650) 323-7781 or florence@ehpcares.org to be added to the volunteer schedule and for additional information on volunteering opportunities during the holiday season.

The Second Harvest Food Bank of Santa Clara and San Mateo Counties is another organization hosting a holiday drive that aims to benefit the 250,000 people it serves every month. Second Harvest, which is one of the largest and most renown food banks in the country, has recently launched its Holiday Food and Fund Drive for the 2013 winter season.

Looking to raise nearly half of its revenue during this season as it has done in years past, Second Harvest has extended drop-off hours at its three locations within the counties from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. Food in its original, sealed packaging may be

dropped off at the lobby or warehouse of any of the following locations: the Curtner Center (750 Curtner Ave., San Jose 95125); the Bing Center (1051 Bing St., San Carlos 94070); or the Cypress Center (4001 North St., San Jose 95134). Turkeys are in high demand during the holiday season, and fresh or frozen turkeys may be dropped off only at the Curtner and Bing Centers and not at any Second Harvest-labeled barrels located around town. Traditional donations of canned goods and other packaged foods may, however, be deposited in the barrels.

For more information on what and how to donate, visit www.shfb.org or contact the organization at the address listed on their site.

Another way to benefit local Bay Area families is through the Feed 4 More Program ran by KPIX/KBCW and Whole Foods Market. This drive, which runs until Jan. 1, allows anyone the option to purchase a breakfast for $5, lunch or dinner for $10, or a full-day-meal for only $25 for someone in need. Donations can be made at local Whole Foods supermarkets and stores. Stores will also have food barrels available for donations of non-perishable goods.

For parents or friends aged 21 and older, Santana Row in San Jose, in conjuction with the Second Harvest Food Bank, will be hosting a “Shop, Enjoy & Give” Wine Stroll event on the first three Tuesdays of Dec. 3, Dec. 10 and Dec. 17 from 6 p.m. to 8 p.m.

Participants will receive a complimentary signature Santana Row wine glass and “a passport to the participating Santana Row shops, spas and restaurants that will each offer appetizers, cocktails/wine and exclusive shopping discounts,” according to the event’s website.

Tickets are $10 and can be purchased online at www.santanarow. com or inside the Concierge Center. Additionally, if you donate a canned food item, you will receive $2 off of your ticket price. All proceeds of the event will benefit the local Second Harvest Food Bank.

Regardless of how busy everyone is during this holiday season, there is always time to give back.

Whether this is achieved through a simple online donation to benefit Bay Area food banks or physically in order to help distribute food and supplies, there are a plethora of ways in which both students and parents can give back to their communities during this holiday season.

Friday, December 6, 2013

SPOTLIGHT

B4

2O13:

SPOTLIGHT

a year

B5

people 3. Eric Snowden (Former CIA/NSA employee,

Top Newsmakers

in

who publicly disclosed U.S. mass surveillance program)

4. Bashar al-Assad (President of Syria) 5. Pope Francis (Newly-appointed pope) 6. Vladimir Putin (President of Russia) 7. Bryan Cranston (walter white in “Break-

review

ing Bad”)

1. Barack Obama

2. miley cyrus

8. Justin Bieber (Music superstar) 9. Bill Gates (Founder of Microsoft and the

[President of the United States]

[music superstar]

Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation)

Compiled By Hillel Zand, Editor-In-chief; Design by Emily Semba, Spotlight Editor

Based on the survey results of 72 randomly selected Palo Alto High School students across all four grades

entertainment

Friday, December 6, 2013

The Campanile

The Campanile

10. LeBron James (NBA superstar) top movies

top tv shows

moving on

moving in

top songs 1. "''""“Blurred Lines''” by Robin Thicke feat. Pharrell and T.I. 2. “''Wrecking Ball''” by Miley Cyrus 3. “''Royals”'' by Lorde 4. “''Radioactive''” by Imagine Dragons 5. “''Get Lucky''” by Daft Punk feat.

Pharrell Williams 6. ''“Wake Me Up''” by Avicii 7. ''Holy Grail''” by Jay-Z feat. Justin Timberlake 8. “''We Can’t Stop''” by Miley Cyrus 9. "''Mirrors'' by justin timberlake 10. ''roar'' by katy perry

top apps

1

2.

3.

4.

5.

6.

7.

8.

9.

10.

11.

12.

1. Breaking Bad 2. Game of Thrones 3. The Walking Dead 4. Modern Family 5. Pretty Little Liars 6. The Big Bang Theory 7. Saturday Night Live 8. Grey’s Anatomy 9. Parks and Recreation 10. New Girl

Top sports headlines

+

north west

prince george

&

cory monteith 1. The Great Gatsby 2. Iron Man 3 3. Zero Dark Thirty 4. Man of Steel 5. Gravity 6. Star Trek Into Darkness 7. Despicable Me 2 8. World War Z 9. This is the End 10. Monsters University

+ roger ebert margaret thatcher david frost

james gandolfini top trends

vines

Top paly headlines

twerking

miley cyrus

Top INTERNATIONAL headlines

news

Top viral videos

1.

1.

2.

Miley Cyrus' VMA ''The Fox (What Does the Fox Say?)'' performance

3.

Harlem Shake videos

4. “''Wrecking Ball'' music video” 5. TerRio: ooo kill em 6. Jimmy Kimmel's YouTube Challenge:— ''I told my kids I ate all their Halloween candy'' 7. How animals eat their food 8. Jake Davidson asking Kate Upton to Prom 9. Key & Peele videos 10. Charles Ramsey: hero of Cleveland kidnapping case

Lance Armstrong admits to doping

1.

Streaking scandal

2. New England Patriots tight end Aaron Hernandez charged with murder

2. Kim Diorio named principal after Phil Winston’s resignation

3. Boston Red Sox win the World Series 4. San Francisco 49ers lose to the Baltimore Ravens in Super Bowl 5. Miami Heat win second consecutive NBA Championship 6. Tokyo named host of 2020 Olympics 7. Ryan Braun, Alex Rodriguez suspended for performance-enhancing drugs 8. Manti Te’'o fake girlfriend hoax 9. Jonathan Martin-Richie Incognito bullying case 10. The Miami Heat'’s 27-game win streak

3. Intensity of Spirit Week 2013 4. Two Paly students arrested for bringing weapons on campus 5. Viking Stadium opens 6. Downfall of Paly football 7. New gym complex/athletic center proposed 8. STAR testing cancelled, replaced with new assessment 9. The 45 minutes of "Palo Alto Gossip Girl 10. Construction delays

1.

Two-week government shutdown 2. Boston Marathon terrorist attack 3. Continuation of the Syrian Civil War and the use of chemical weapons on civilians 4. Eric Snowden reveals United States mass surveillance program 5. Defense of Marriage Act ruled unconstitutional by the Supreme Court 6. Typhoon Haiyan devastates the Philippines 7. North Korea conducts third underground nuclear test 8. Asiana Airlines Flight 214 crash at San Francisco International Airport 9. Egyptian president Mohamed Morsi overthrown 10. Release of iPhone 5C/5s

Friday, December 6, 2013

B6

The meanings of assorted holiday gifts

The Campanile

MUSIC

Top artists to perform at annual Not So Silent Night music concert

By Kian McHugh Lifestyle Editor

By Hannah Nguyen Buckle up Palo Alto, it’s December.

That means decadent Christmas lights wrapped around houses, incessant holiday tunes blaring through the static-filled speakers of every grocery market in town and my personal favorite, the seasonal drinks that Palo Altans unashamedly drink by the buckets. With all of the holiday festivity and cheer comes the traditional exchanging of gifts, a custom practiced by Americans of all religions. If you receive a present, but you’re not sure what it means, have no fear. I’m here to help you analyze all of your assorted holiday gifts.

Book: If your parents give you a book for the holidays, then you know you’re from the Silicon Valley because it’s probably an SAT study guide.

Better get to work. If you’re a boy and receive a book from a guy friend, then his mom probably told him what to get because he didn’t know what to get you. If you’re a girl and got a book from another girl, it is most likely a romantic novel that you may use to compare to your love lives. What fun.

Makeup: If you receive makeup this holiday season, then you’re probably a girl, and another girl most likely gave it to you. The gift of makeup doesn’t really mean much because girls tend to give each other make-up, whether they are best friends or just acquaintances at a Secret Santa party.

Sweater: If you’re a girl, and you receive a sweater as a gift from a sister or friend, it probably means that either she bought it for herself and it didn’t fit, or she plans on borrowing it sometime in the near future. If you’re a boy, and a girl gave you a sweater, be cautious putting it on for the first time because it is very likely that it is doused in her perfume. If it’s from your grandmother, embrace it forever because she probably knit it herself.

If that’s the case, lock it up in your closet for “safekeeping.”

Soap: The frugal population of Palo Altans, myself included, heavily rely upon the various scented soaps as staple gifts for family members or friends. If you are given soap this holiday season, don’t fret, because it doesn’t necessarily mean you have poor hygiene practices. Instead, soap likely implies that the gifter thought, “I don’t know what this person wants, and I’m not sure I care enough to figure it out.”

Something related to an inside joke: When you get a customized present from your closest BFF that reminisces one of your fondest moments together, they probably spent a minimum of $20 on customization, and you two are probably going to have a good laugh about it when you open it. Enjoy it because as we all know, the best of friendships are defined by both shared moments as well as the amount of money one is willing to spend on the other.

Expensive Jewelry: A gift of nice jewelry could mean one of two things.

It could say, “I like you, and I’m ready to take our relationship to the next level,” or it could say “I like you, but I also really want to get in your pants.”

Tech gadget: If you’re 15 and you get an iPhone from your parents, then they’re probably fed up with hearing you complain that everyone else has one and you don’t. If you get some snazzy electronic device from a friend, it probably means they spent half their allowance on it and you should bake them some cookies or something to thank them.

Band Merch: If you and a friend spend excessive time fangirling (or boying, no judgement) over a band, then your friend probably got you a T-shirt, poster or other object with the lead member’s face or inappropriate slogan branded on it. This most likely means that they were expecting something in return, and you probably got them the same thing, maybe in a different color or something.

I hoped this helped, fellow members of the Palo Alto community. Enjoy your time with loved ones in the ceremonious exchanging of gifts, and remember, you only have 30 days before most gift receipts expire.

T

he annual Not So Silent Night music festival, hosted by radio station Live 105.3, will take place on Dec. 6 and 7. Each year when the lineup of artists is released, people ecstatically purchase tickets to see their favorite indie and alternative bands in concert.

The event, split up into two nights, features some of the most prominent artists of the genre, attracting just under 20 thousand fans to purchase tickets each year.

The first night of this event features the artists Kings of Leon, Vampire Weekend, Queens of the Stone Age, AFI, Arctic Monkeys and Capital Cities. The second night will feature Arcade Fire, Phoenix, Alt-J, Lorde, Bastille and The Neighbourhood. Each of these bands represents a different sub-genre of the alternative industry. For example, AFI is considered to be an emo punk band,

Courtesy of www.lastfm.es

Capital Cities will perform at this year’s Not So Silent Night music festival. The Not So Silent Night festival begins on Friday, Dec. 6; and continues on Dec. 7. whereas Vampire Weekend is an indie rock band known for their use of less traditional instruments. The beauty of Not So Silent Night is that all of these bands will be found on the same stage and on the same night.

The band to look out for on the first night is Kings of Leon. The Kings of Leon, out of Nashville, have failed to disappoint since the four brothers formed their group in 1999.

It was not until their third album,

“Because of the Times”, that they began receiving major commercial success. Their hit song “Use Somebody” earned them to two Grammy Awards and sent them into the mainstream.

The band is only getting more popular, gaining momentum after the release of their latest album, “Mechanical Bull.” This is a great opportunity to see Kings of Leon before they embark on a 2014 tour, playing in venues such as Madison Square Garden.

The most unique act of the second night will be the performance by the Lorde, who can be heard on practically every single radio station for her track “Royals.” What makes this artist so exciting is that she, having just turned 17, is even younger than some Paly students. Though she is young, Lorde has a powerful voice and great stage presence. She is not leaving the industry anytime soon so take advantage of the opportunity to say you saw her at such a young age.

Regardless of the night, this show is going to be one to remember, so get your tickets before they sell out.

Bay Area youth orchestras provide classical music exposure for students

courtesy of nagisa ariza

ECYS performs with soloist Yujin Ariza, a Julliard violinist, at the Mozarteum Hall in Salzburg, Austria during its Central European Tour last summer.

By Michelle Yin

A

Lifestyle Editor

s Zuill Bailey steps onto the stage, with his beautiful copper-colored instrument in hand, the eyes of the spectators already begin to bulge. The captivated audience leans in as Bailey’s voluminous hair flies around and his body tremors with the soul-warming chords he plays with the glorious ending of the piece.

Many fail to realize that Bailey is actually performing a classical cello concerto, not a rock or pop culture song on his guitar. With the mesmerizing nature of social media, our generation seems to be undergoing a revolutionary shift towards mainstream music and away from classical music.

Although classical music is dormant on the Billboard Hot 100, there still exists a world where the greats like Mozart and Beethoven are celebrated — a world in which classical musicians thrive.

“I think people our age don’t appreciate classical music because they don’t understand it,” senior William Yang said. “It is the most theoretically complex genre and takes a certain level of musical profundity and exposure.”

School music programs are generally rudimentary because they must accommodate all levels of music players, and this seems to influence students’ belief that classical music

is humdrum and boring. However, the Bay Area itself exemplifies the existence of this classical appreciation with its abundance of symphony level youth orchestras, including the prestigious San Francisco Symphony Youth Orchestra (SFSYO).

I think people our age don’t appreciate classical music because they don’t understand it. It is the most theoretically complex genre and takes a certain level of musical profundity and exposure.

William Yang Senior

Sponsored by the San Francisco Symphony, SFSYO not only shares the same grand practice and performance space, Davies Symphony Hall, but its coaches also consist of Symphony members. SFSYO also offers a multitude of benefits for its musicians including free membership, unlike any other youth orchestra in the Bay Area. String players receive complimentary strings and bow hair every couple of months, making it one of the most desired and selective orchestras for young musicians in the area.

“I know some musicians in SFSYO and I have a great deal of respect for their program because they have some of the best musicians in the

Bay Area, and I know they have great conductors, too,” Yang said. “However, the culture around SFSYO is that kids are competing to beat out one another, and the focus is on performing rather than educating.”

Palo Alto Chamber Orchestra (PACO), the organization that Yang participates in, differs from the big symphony style programs in that it focuses on chamber music, so it only contains string players, including violin, viola, cello and bass.

“Not only does playing chamber music allow me to branch out and make friends, but it has also really helps make me a better musician overall because it really forces me to listen, and makes more cognizant of how different parts fit in together, and I have to be more attentive to know how and when to blend in, or stick out,” Yang said.

Also a selective orchestra in the Bay Area, the El Camino Youth Senior Symphony (ECYS) offers a similar professional experience for youth musicians including annual competitions where winners receive a solo experience with the accompaniment of the entire symphony. Every two years, the symphony also goes on tour with a professional solo artist and has recently performed in world-renowned halls such as Franz Liszt Hall in Hungary and Rudolfinum’s Dvorak Hall in Prague. It offers musicians the opportunity to learn the universal communication through music.

“ECYS is a great way for me to experience being in a symphony and is probably something I won’t be able to do for the rest of my life,” junior Alex Hwang said, a former member of the Paly orchestra. “Tour in Central Europe was amazing and I made a bunch of new friends and had some unforgettable times.”

Classical music is more than the dull, obsolete genre our generation generally makes it out to be. Its artistic intricacy makes it an outlet of expression — a medium in which people can manifest their emotions.

“I’ve been bullied before and to be honest Paly isn’t a place where I always feel safe being myself,” Yang said. “Playing classical music really gives me a chance to separate myself from whatever stress I face in my everyday life.”

For a large part of the youth population, classical ensemble music, specifically the struggle of finding the perfect harmony, the highly complex yet unadulterated ring, between every musician’s unique style serves as a coalescing language. Classical music takes more than just an ear for pleasing euphonies but proves to be a mental challenge and takes dedication to acquire the sensitivity needed to appreciate it.

“There’s something about devoting hours to the challenge of practicing your music then mixing your part with others’ to produce harmonies that’s beautiful,” Hwang said.

The Campanile

STUDENT LIFE

Friday, December 6, 2013

B7

Filipino American entrepreneur adjusts to Paly Senior transfer juggles schoolwork, college coursework and two international technology companies

By Lauren Giurata Senior Staff Writer

A

t first glance, senior Eric Manalac looks like any other typical student at Palo Alto High School.

However, few people are aware of his intriguing background and the amazing achievements he has made in the fields of computer science and programming.

Manalac, 17, has already founded two start-up companies: MVE Systems and Gen4Web in December 2011 and July 2012, respectively; both specialize in mobile and internet technology. Manalac has offices in Palo Alto and the Philippines.

“My first goal was to immediately become profitable so that I wouldn’t have to tell my investors that I had lost their money, because that would have been a horrible fall out,” Manalac said.

His first company became profitable in December 2012 when his software was licensed by the U.S. Department of Defense. As of date, Manalac has made $1.3 million from Business to Government contracts using the software that he designed and licensed.

Currently, he is working with the U.S. Department of Defense and the Philippines Department of National

Defense, creating training simulations for use in their navies. He has also previously created research databases for the U.S. Department of Defense.

“Because I am a Filipino American, I feel it is essential to help both of the countries that I consider my homes, which is why I am working with both departments of defense,” Manalac said.

Connections that his parents had in the two departments of defense helped Manalac gain the opportunity to begin working with them.

Manalac’s father was a computer science major at University of California, Berkeley and received a master’s degree from Columbia University.

Watching his father work has provided Manalac with regular exposure to computer science and programming since a young age. He learned to code when he was ten years old and taught himself a simple coding language known as Visual Basic.

“I got interested in coding because I thought telling computers what to do so that you did not have to do it yourself was an interesting concept,” Manalac said.

Since then, he has learned how to write seven languages fluently. While he knows Java, Visual Basic and Python, three of the more commonly known languages, he has also learned

other languages such as C++, Haskell, R and MATLAB. For the software that he previously licensed and sold to the U.S. Department of Defense, he used the coding language Python and C#. However, the team he works with also uses HTML for online components, a language which Manalac himself is not as familiar with.

Manalac is also taking courses at Stanford University. He began his involvement with Stanford last summer through a program called Stanford Summer High School College.

“The program was great because it allowed myself and other high school students to take both undergraduate and graduate courses for college credit,” Manalac said.

He registered for five classes, including a graduate class, in the subjects of statistics, math, business and computer science.

“While the workload was challenging, it was a really rewarding experience,” Manalac said. “It showed me that even though I am a high school student, I could still handle even graduate level courses at Stanford.”

Currently, Manalac is involved in a program at Stanford called Stanford Center for Professional Development (SCPD) and is auditing five Stanford graduate courses for computer sci-

Polling app Wislr makes its debut

COURTESY OF PR WEB

Senior Eric Manalac has developed software licensed by the U.S. Department of Defense and is also working with the Philippines’ Department of National Defense.

ence and foreign policy. Each class meets for two one-hour sessions per week and tends to require an extra two hours of outside class work for each hour spent in class.

Unbeknownst to most of his peers, Manalac leads an atypical life that keeps him busy at all times.

TEDx arrives in February

By Shivonne Logan

By Grace Kim

Business Manager

Staff Writer

T

W

islr is a new mobile app tailored for high school students. Recently released, Wislr is an invite-only polling app designed to keep high school students connected with their peers.

Wislr is unique because it is only available to high school students. It is strictly invite-only and requires a high school-specific code for registration, allowing students to stay further connected with not only their high school, but also with other high school students nationwide. Palo Alto High School’s registration code is “Paly5”.

“Wislr is basically the only high school app,” Wislr community manager Zoya Singh said. “We’ve found that there really is no other media outlet designed exclusively for high school students, so we wanted to create a space that is just a high school community [in which students are] able to engage with other high schools in [their] area, as well as nationwide.”

Wislr allows users to ask questions, which other users then “thumbs-up” or “thumbs-down.” These questions are then answered anonymously by the sharing group of the user’s choice. “[Wislr] just tells [users] the votes and the percentages. It doesn’t [share] people’s names, which offers a nice amount of anonymity,” Wislr crew member and senior Jonathan Kosaka said. “For example, we’re doing a college week [during which] students are posting about college, so if you’re a little sensitive about that sort of in-

Andrew Sternfield/ the Campanile

From left: seniors Payton Dwight and Scott Powell intern at Wislr. formation, you can still vote, but not where we can test our theories. I be associated with your response.” think it’s an interesting opportunity Wislr allows users to personalize in Palo Alto just because technology sharing groups through four catego- use is so high we have this ability to ries: “Friends,” “Class,” “School” and test quickly to get people engaged “Everyone.” “Friends” are people who with the app quickly. It creates a reusers have “peeped,” a function simi- ally great opportunity for us to get an lar to Facebook’s “friending” function. original high school view.”

The “Class” group consists of students There are currently 25 high school in each user’s graduating class. The students on the Wislr crew, rang“School” group encompasses every- ing from freshmen to seniors, with one in each user’s school, while “Ev- Paly students making up the majoreryone” includes everyone else on the ity. Crew members work with both app. development and social event planDue to its focus on the high school ning. Wislr has held two promotional community, Wislr, a local startup, has events geared toward Paly students reached out to local high schools, in- within the past month at Town and cluding Paly.

Country during lunch.

“We’re located literally down the Wislr is available on both iPhones street [from Paly],” Singh said. “The and Androids. High school students proximity is great to engage with can learn more about the app at www. crew members. It’s nice to have a facebook.com/wislr or on wislr.tumhigh school right down the street blr.com.

Paly Special

5

00

$

7” Classic Philly cheese with Fries & Soda

6

$

99

10” Philly Cheese with fries & soda

Despite this, he continues to flourish and progress as both a programmer and student. He keeps himself occupied by setting high personal goals.

“My goal is to become a billionaire by the time I am 20 years old,” Manalac said.

EDx events are speaker series and conferences hosted in different areas with different themes, all sponsored by the central TED Talks organization. In 18 minutes or less, speakers with expertise in any area give “the talk of their lives,” according to the TED website.

As TEDx youth events — which focus on different issues facing the future of today’s youth, are becoming increasingly popular — students from as close as Henry M. Gunn High School and as far as Egypt are organizing their own events. Students can perform spoken word poems or discuss nonprofits they have founded, among a wide range of other topics. This February, Palo Alto High School will become another one of the forward-thinking schools and will host a youth event, hosted by the Paly TEDx club.

On Feb. 24, Paly’s TEDx club will host their first TEDx event in Haymarket Theatre, which will start during second period and will continue through the remainder of the day. Local adult student speakers will cover a variety of topics, from technology to non-profit founding. The talks will be interspersed with twenty five minutes of video material that TED requires each TEDx event to show.

“TEDx is really all about bringing new ideas into your community and sharing them on a local scale,” TEDx club treasurer Yumi Temple said.

According to Temple, Andrew Lu, founder and president of the TEDx club, founded it because he felt that

an official group would be necessary to establish a TEDx tradition at Paly.

In order to host these events, the club must follow strict TEDx rulesuch as having the entire event filmed according to TED’s standards and the total audience under 100 people at all times. The event must be entirely locally funded, and all logistics fall to the club members to organize.

The club has recently been granted $1,000 by ASB, and around $1,000 transferred from the now defunct Global Literacy Club, which was run

by Paly TEDx advisor Rachel Kellerman. Temple expects their total costs to reach nearly $8,000, a staggering sum due to the $5,500 to $6,000 necessary for the professional videography TED requires. Though they originally hoped to have students videotape the event, they decided not to ask students to miss class in order to do so.

Because of the limit of 100 audience members, club officers plan to circulate students and other viewers in and out in order to allow everyone interested to see at least one talk.

According to Temple, club officials hope to showcase around nine speakers, including one to two student speakers. Though they are still looking for student speakers, they have seven confirmed adult speakers, many of whom work in Silicon Valley.

Temple hopes to find an acceptable student speaker, but is not looking for a talk on a particular subject or in any specific format.

Having a TEDx event at Paly is an incredible opportunity for students and other community members and Principal Kim Diorio says ,“It’s going to be awesome!”

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Friday, December 6, 2013

LIFESTYLE

B8

What Non-’90s Kids Are Missing out on

By Lauren Gargiulo Staff Writer

Renting VHS tapes at Blockbuster

Classic Toys:

Nearly everyone remembers the excitement of going to the local Blockbusters in search of the perfect movie to rent: running through the door, scanning every single row and reading every title — even the ones that you knew your parents would never let you watch. Some trips to Blockbuster consisted of playful fights among siblings over certain tapes and pretending to read video descriptions. While waiting for their children to finish the hunt for the perfect video, parents often occupied themselves with reading newspapers or chatting with other parents in similar situations. Every tiring trip ended with the satisfying feeling of popping the newly rented movie into the VHS player and waiting for the screen to come to life.

In early childhood, life is surrounded by toys. Everyone had their favorite toy and one they always wanted.

Playtime was filled with dolls, cars and board games, but there were a few iconic toys everyone remembers. In our early years, Beanie Babies were arguably the most popular collectible toys. They came in various colors, were easy to bring around and fun to play with. Even adults loved to collect them, thinking that it would one day bring them great fortune. Other famous furry friends were Furbies: hamster-owl hybrid creatures that came in many bright colors and patterns and would never shut up. Other devices like Tamagotchis and Bop-Its were also widely loved.

‘90s Sh0ws

In the ‘90s, children never dreaded waking up early on Saturday mornings because they usually ended up curled up on the couch, watching their favorite cartoons. Cartoon Network had classics such as “Dexter’s Laboratory,” “Johnny Bravo” and “The Powerpuff Girls.” It was easy to lose track of time as TV marathons consumed the day. Perhaps the most well-known television comedic act was Nickelodeon Slime. Any day could be brightened after watching people get “slimed” with the iconic bright-green liquid. Others like “Hey Arnold,” “Rugrats,” “CatDog” and unforgettable shows like “All That” and “The Amanda Show” also kept everybody laughing.

CD players In the modern-day world of iPhones and tablets, it’s rare to find a CD player still in use. However, less than a decade ago, CD players were highly requested on many children’s holiday wish lists. They were the perfect device for any trip because they were both mobile and an easy distraction. Having the power to control the music that the device plays was a key factor in the CD player’s success and a revolutionary feature during the pre-iPod era.

Photos By andrew Sternfield

Heelys Any kid who owned Heelys loved them and anyone who did not own them wished they did. Giving those who wore the sneaker-skate hybrid the ability to both walk and roll, Heelys made going anywhere fun.

After mastering the basic glide of the Heelys, tricks were then practiced and performed.

Though they brought joy to those who enjoyed tricks, Heelys also brought pain, as anyone who wore Heelys remembers the physical trauma of wiping out on concrete sidewalks with them on — why many schools banned Heelys, which have since lost popularity.

The Campanile

2

in

2000

Jensen Hsiao/ The Campanile

This edition featuring

Bryn & Griffin Carlson with The Campanile’s own Parker Devine, Jensen Hsiao and Hillel Zand

The Campanile: When did you find out you were twins?

Griffin Carlson: I’ve never not known we were twins. I never remember being told, “Oh you guys are twins” and me being like,“Woah.”

TC: They say twins are no more alike than regular siblings. Do you agree or disagree?

GC: We have more in common than we do with our brother because we are being raised at the same time and in the exact same social and school setting and we share some teachers, so naturally we are more similar.

Bryn Carlson: But we have a lot of differences.

TC: How likely are you to tell your secrets to your twin?

GC: Not likely.

TC: What’s the deepest secret you’ve ever told each other?

BC: That’s a secret!

TC: Who gets the better Christmas presents?

GC: I probably do.

BC: I don’t know. I’m trying to remember; it changes each year.

One year, I got a snowboard, which is pretty cool. He was jealous.

TC: [To Bryn:] Do you like making him jealous?

BC: No, not exactly.

TC: Which one of you was born first?

BC: I was — 18 minutes.

TC: What’s your tender moment together?

BC: He doesn’t like when I touch him. Like, he gets mad at me when I try to put my arm around him in a photo.

TC: Why are you afraid of girls?

GC: I’m not afraid of girls. I just don’t like getting molested by my sister.

BC: Clearly I’m molesting him when I put my arm around him.

TC: Who’s faster?

GC & BC: Griffin.

TC: Who would win in an allout wrestling match?

GC: Me. BC: No, no, I would win.

GC: Ummm no, I’m about a foot taller than Bryn is.

TC: Really?

GC: Okay, like a couple inches.

TC: Who pulls more?

GC: Probably Bryn.

BC: [smiles sheepishly] TC: What would you say the most similar thing about you is?

BC: We are both pretty competitive, which is sometimes good and sometimes bad.

TC: If you could have dinner with two Paly teachers, who would they be?

GC: Mr. Gallagher? Ms. Taylor?

BC: No, Ms. Steiner.

GC: I love all my teachers. Make sure you put that down so they read it.

TC: Name an experience when you realized you two are pretty dependent on each other.

BC: My mom told me a story once about me. I was a late walker because I would point at what I wanted and [Griffin] would go get it for me, so I guess I was dependent on him in that sense.

TC: What’s your favorite curse word?

GC: F**k.

BC: You have a favorite curse word? I don’t know what mine is.

Friday, December 6, 2013

The Campanile

SPORTS

Winter Sports Preview With fall teams closing out their seasons, you might be worried. But have no fear, winter sports are here! See what there is to look forward in the upcoming months.

See C4-5

Flipping out over freshman sensation Nationally ranked freshman reveals his talent for gymnastics after impressive Spirit Week performance

Courtesy of Bennet Huang

Freshman Bennet Huang captivated the crowd during his stellar Spirit Week performance in October. Huang started gymnastics at a young age and has competed and won many competitions nationwide.

By Jeffrey Ho

E

Staff Writer

ver since Spirit Week ended, freshman Bennet Huang has been known throughout much of Palo Alto High School as the freshman who flipped, twisted and turned during his class’s Spirit Dance.

But what the audience didn’t see was his passion and dedication for gymnastics.

Huang began gymnastics at the age of three, but his journey began in a strange way.

“I started [gymnastics] at the age of three or four, and it was because my mom said I was too hyper,” Huang said. “For me, [gymnastics] is [something I] want to continue. Just as like any [other] sport, you just want to keep [participating].”

Huang’s devotion to gymnastics has led him to many successes.

“Usually I spend a little over twenty hours a week [practicing gymnastics],” Huang said. “I attend

a gym in Pleasanton, so it’s about another hour drive there and back.”

In part due to the effort he puts into practice, Huang has excelled in many gymnastic events. At an early age, Huang had earned recognition at the state level. In addition to winning a multitude of state championships since the age of eight, Huang also qualified for the national team this past year.

“I’ve won four state championships,” Huang said. “I won the all around [competition] at [the State Championships] in Levels Five, Six and Nine.”

Levels Five and Six are the divisions for athletes between the ages of eight and ten, while Level Nine is the division for athletes ages 13 and 14.

Huang is currently a member of the United States Junior National Team in the Level Nine division.

To determine the national team’s roster, gymnasts compete at the national trials for the top fourteen spots. Throughout the selection process, the gymnasts are evaluated

based on overall performances at state championships, as well as their performance at individual events.

Huang qualified for the national team because of his best events — the floor routine and the vault.

[Balancing both school and gymnastics] was a little rough at first but I’ve been able to balance my schedule very well; I just have to be on top of myself Bennet Huang Freshman

“My favorite events are the floor and vault; those are also my best events,” Huang said. “At the last [ Junior Olympic] National Championships, I got second place in the all-around competition. I [also] got first in the nation on the floor [routine] and third on the vault and [parallel] bars at the Junior Olympic National Championships.”

Huang plans to continue gymnastics and hopes to compete on an

international scale. Similar to many students at Paly, Huang plans on continuing to juggle his school and sport commitments with a positive mindset. “[To many, gymnastics] is considered the hardest sport in the world, so I will continue and push through even when it’s hard,” Huang said. “[Balancing both school and gymnastics] was a little rough at first but I’ve been able to balance my schedule very well; I just have to be on top of myself.”

At Paly, Huang has already gained the attention and recognition of many students due to his amazing performance at the end of Spirit Week during the freshman class’s Spirit Dance. Huang’s main role in the dance was to perform flips and other high flying moves across the freshman class’s float; the moves are similar to what he executes in his typical gymnastic floor routines.

Although the accompanying music to the dance experienced technical difficulties, Huang was

able to perform his flips flawlessly throughout the multiple runs. Junior Noah Hashmi was personally impressed by Huang’s execution of flips.

“Seeing the freshman do the flips the first time was amazing enough, but to see him repeatedly perform the flips through the technical difficulties during the dance was astounding,” Hashmi said. “His flips were extremely cool and his endurance and willpower were quite clearly evident, by the fifth time he did his flips. His flips were, in my opinion, a highlight of the freshman Spirit Dance.”

Huang has proven himself to be a talented gymnast, one who is capable of making the national team and impressing the entire school with his talents. “[In the future] my goal is to hopefully make the Olympic [Gymnastics] team in 2020,” Huang said.

Who knows, we may even see him competing in the 2020 Summer Olympic Games which are in Tokyo.

INSIDE

Girlsí Golf Finishes Impressive First Season In their inaugural season, the girlsí golf team finished fourth in the

Ice Skating Sensations Learn about fellow classmatesí athletic endeavors on the ice.

state of California.

See C3

See C6

Pick-up Basketball Places Bounce around town to find the hottest places to shoot hoops with your friends.

See C7

Friday, December 6, 2013

The Campanile

SPORTS

C2

Football falls to St. Francis in CCS semifinals Vikings cap off a disappointing season with a 45-21 loss in the Division II CCS semifinals

By Arjun Parikh Senior Staff Writer

T

he Palo Alto High School varsity football team’s inconsistency continued through the final games of the season. The Vikings closed out their season with two wins and two losses to finish with a disappointing 6-6 record overall and a 4-3 record in league. The Vikings were knocked out of the Central Coast Section (CCS) Division I bracket with a 45-21 semifinal loss to Saint Francis High School on Nov. 29.

The Vikings lost at home to Los Gatos High School on Nov. 28 by a score of 35-21. The game was close for the first quarter, with senior fullback Andrew Frick scoring on a three-yard touchdown run and senior wide receiver Keesean Johnson scoring on a 30-yard touchdown throw from senior quarterback Keller Chryst to even the score at 14 apiece. That was as close as the Vikings would get, as Los Gatos rushed for three more touchdowns while limiting the Vikings to only a late third quarter touchdown.

The team followed up their loss with a dominant 43-point victory at Santa Clara High School on Nov. 15, winning by a score of 48-5. Sophomore Oliver Svirsky took the snaps at quarterback for the day and helped the offense drive for six touchdowns and a field goal. Svirsky, sophomore

Shaun Pike, junior Jon Martinez and senior Malcolm Davis each had one rushing touchdown as the game brought in 289 yards on 34 carries.

For the first and only time all season, the Vikings managed to string together consecutive victories, smashing Leland High School on the road 54-24 in their first round of CCS. matchup. Chryst had a typically productive day, limiting turnovers while throwing for five touchdowns. The star of the day, however, was Johnson, who finished with a stellar 191 yards on eight receptions and four touchdowns, one of them coming on a 55yard punt return.

The Vikings headed into their showdown against Saint Francis as a confident bunch, having won their last two games by a combined total of 73 points.

The Vikings headed into their showdown against Saint Francis as a confident bunch, having won their last two games by a combined 73 points.

The Vikings managed to stay within a touchdown for the first half, but the Lancers pulled away in the second half, scoring 17 unanswered points to win by a score of 45-21. The Vikings finished with their worst record since 2002, when they went an even 6-6.

Conner Harden/The Campanile

Senior quarterback Keller Chryst takes a snap during a 35-21 loss to Los Gatos High School on Nov. 28.

Cross country teams qualify for CCS, fail to reach state

Courtesy of Tara LawrencE

Sophomore Winston Rosati, as well as other underclassmen, give the boys’ water polo team hope for a strong future heading into next season.

Boys’ water polo team still optimistic after let down in CCS playoff semifinal Boysí varsity water polo team reflects positively on the 2013 season after CCS semifinal defeat

By William Shin and Zach Levitan

The boys’ cross country team, pictured here at the Crystal Springs cross country course, placed ninth at CCS.

By William Snodgrass

D

Staff Writer

espite hopes to qualify for the California Interscholastic Federation Cross Country State Championships, the Palo Alto High School boys’ and girls’ cross country teams fell short at the Central Coast Section (CCS) Championship meet. Neither the boys’ nor girls’ teams, nor any individual runners, qualified for the state meet.

Before the CCS meet, both teams participated in the Santa Clara Valley Athletic League (SCVAL) Championship meet on Nov. 5. The meet was held at the Crystal Springs cross country course, which is 2.95 miles long. The boys’ cross country team finished fourth overall, one spot behind crosstown rival Henry M. Gunn High School. Junior Lucas Matison led the way for the Vikings, finishing first overall in the race with a time of 15:29.7. Matison was followed by junior Aaron Chandler and freshman

Kent Slaney, who finished 16th and 20th respectively.

The girls’ team had similar success at the SCVAL Championship, placing third overall, trailing only Gunn and Mountain View High School.

Sophomore Bryn Carlson and junior Katie Foug were the first Paly runners to finish, placing fourth and 11th overall, respectively. Carlson finished with a time of 18:53.7.

Prior to the CCS Championship meet, the boys’ team lost their top runner Matison to a bike injury.

“Our top two runners both injured themselves in bike accidents, and there were a few injuries from strain throughout the season,” senior team captain Jack Hansen said.

Despite these injuries, the boys’ team still managed to place ninth overall at the CCS Championship meet, but the injuries may have been the main factor in preventing the team from qualifying for the state meet. The CCS Championship meet

jensen hsiao/the campanile

was also held at the Crystal Springs Cross Country Course. Chandler and Slaney were again among Paly’s top finishers, finishing 37th and 43rd overall respectively.

The girls’ team also finished ninth overall, with Gunn taking first overall. Carlson and Foug again led the way for the girls, with Carlson placing 28th overall and Foug finishing four spots behind at 32nd.

To improve, we have to continue doing what we already have been doing.

Jack Hansen Senior team captain

“Next year, we have a strong underclassman group,” Hansen said. “To improve, we have to continue doing what we already have been doing. The same group is going to come back and continue working together so that the team continues to grow and get stronger.”

T

Staff Writers

he Palo Alto High School boy’s 2013 water polo season came to an end with a 13-5 loss to Bellarmine College Preparatory in the semifinals of the Division I Central Coast Section (CCS) playoffs on Nov. 19.

Although they did not reach their ultimate goal of competing in the championship game, the team believes that they have accomplished a lot and proved themselves as worthy competitors.

“We made great progress as a team this year,” senior captain Ethan Look said. “Coming into the season, nobody really thought anything of us.”

Many of the team’s critics thought that the loss of half a dozen seniors from the 2012 season was too much for the team to overcome. The boys’ team ended up finishing with the top regular season record in CCS. “Losing six of seven starters, who expected our team to end the season with the best record in CCS?” Look said. “From day one we came in with a tough mentality, we practiced hard, battled through losses and played better than anyone could’ve expected — [all] in our head coach’s second

season. I couldn’t be happier with how this year turned out.”

The team won their first two games of the CCS tournament against Pioneer High School and rival Henry M. Gunn High School, but eventually fell to Bellarmine College Preparatory. Bellarmine went on to lose in the championship game to Sacred Heart Preparatory.

Although they fell short of their goal this year, captain Ethan Look believes that the core of returning players next year can compete for a CCS title.

“As for next year, they are going to be good,” Look said. “There are great leaders on that team in guys like [junior] Lukas Novak, [sophomore] Winston Rosati and [freshman] Andrew Jozefov, among many other extremely talented guys.”

In addition to the returning players from the varsity team, Look believes that the upcoming players will help the team stay tough.

“Great, physical [junior varsity] guys are coming up, and the rest of the varsity squad I know will step up to any challenge,” Look said. “Losing 11 seniors won’t matter [and] I don’t expect those guys to miss a beat. They are going to be a fast, tough team that everyone should keep an eye on.”

Friday, December 6, 2013

The Campanile

C3

SPORTS

Tennis falls to Monta Vista in CCS semifinals

By Nick Sullivan Senior Staff Writer

By Haley Fang Staff Writer

W

ith a strong winning streak to end the season, the girls’ varsity tennis team had performed better than previous seasons and made it to the semifinals in the Central Coast Sections (CCS) playoffs.

Senior co-captain Aashli Budhiraja believes that the team’s success was due to their tight bonds within the team.

“We were successful this season because we are so close,” Budhiraja said. “It’s indescribable how close we are. We really bond and pump each other up, and we went to every match wanting to win really badly.”

The team lost to Saratoga High School 3-4 on Nov. 15 but beat Mountain View High School in its last league match by 5-2. The team was then seeded seventh in CCS and got a first-round bye.

The girls demolished Robert Louis Stevenson High School in its second-round CCS match with a final score of 7-0. They went on to defeat Saratoga High School by a score of 4-3 in the third round of CCS. The Vikings’ went on to play Monta Vista High School, a perennial powerhouse, in the CCS semi-finals, but lost.

The Vikings’ 2-5 loss to Monta Vista ended their season. Though disappointed, the girls are still proud of their effort.

courtesy of Samantha Dewees

Jonathan ziegler/The Campanile

courtesy of Samantha Dewees

Left: senior Felicia Wang jumps for a serve; top right: senior Julianne Le returns a shot; bottom right: the entire team huddles before a CCS match with coach Harader.

“The season actually went a lot better than I had expected,” sophomore Kelsey Wang said. “We improved our record considerably from last year, and team morale overall was very high. I’m especially proud of our seven seniors, and the team will miss them so much next year.”

Senior Samantha Dewees echoed Wang’s sentiment about the season and how the girls on the team performed as a whole.

“As a whole, I am really happy with the way this season turned out.

I think we all gave it our best and played really well,” Dewees said. “We made it farther than the team has ever gone in CCS since the 80s, so that’s something. This was our best season since I have played for Paly, and I had a great time being a part of such an amazing team for four years.”

Though the team faced many hardships throughout the season, the

Golf takes CCS team title and fourth place in CIF states

girls played their best and earned a better record than last year. However, after getting ahead in the season, the girls were disappointed that they did not make it into states.

“It’s obviously a bummer that we lost [in the semifinals], but I think we played well given the circumstances,” Budhiraja said. “We found out really late that one of our top starters couldn’t play, so we went in kind of stressed out and unsure.”

Volleyball loses in NorCal semifinals

By Sarah Tayeri and Jake van Zyll

T

Courtesy of Annie Chen

Senior Audrey Horn pushes her golf clubs at the CIF state tournament. Horn shot a 90 at CCS in her first year on the team.

By Ziv Schwartz Sports Editor

Emily Lee

P

Senior Staff Writer

alo Alto High School’s newly formed girls’ golf team captured the Central Coast Section (CCS) team title and qualified for the California Interscholastic Federation (CIF) State Championships, which took place on Nov. 20 at Quail Lodge Golf Club at Carmel-by-the-Sea. Junior captain Michelle Xie won the individual CCS title and competed in the state final.

The team put up an aggregate total of 423 strokes, placing fourth in California after Torrey Pines, Walnut and Diamond Bar High Schools. Individually, Xie golfed a 74, while, senior Annie Chen and freshman Emily Hwang each finished with an 80.

Senior Audrey Horn, a newcomer to Paly, finished with a 90.

Xie is proud of her team’s performance considering it was the first year of the program. Xie has shot several hole-in-ones through the season.

“This year was our first year and so we were super excited to be able to make it to states,” Xie said. “We made sure that we kept on improving, trying to get [better].”

The girls’ golf team is composed of a variety of athletes of different backgrounds. Xie competes in golf tournaments independently and flied across the country to Florida to compete in an outside-of-school golf tournament just days after CIF State Championships.

Xie was surprised by how well the team got along and how many girls signed up. In addition to a new member from out-of-state in Horn, the team also attracted junior Sophia Robinson, who is relatively new to the sport.

“I thought it would be fun and something completely different,” Robinson said. “I wanted to try something new and fun. I’ve only been playing for about six months now.

Robinson hopes to work on her game and come back next year even better, given that her performance was not as good as she had hoped for .

All proceed will be donated to Right To Play Charity Session A (Girls) : June 2-6, 2014 Session B (Boys) : June 9-13, 2014 Session C (Girls) : June 16-20, 2014 www.lacessoccercamps.com arjun@lacessoccercamps.com

“I definitely think I’m going to try and improve more now that I’ve seen how awesome the game is,” Robinson said. “I think it would be super fun to do golf again next year, I really enjoyed playing with the team.”

Robinson had chosen to play golf this year over cross country, which she had participated in for two years prior. She is unsure of whether she would like to continue with the sport, given that she might want to return to cross country again.

“The only confliction that I have [with playing on the golf team next year] is that I really miss cross country.” Robinson said.

Ironically, the entire team is going to either take physical education next year or must take another sport to have a prep. All of the juniors and seniors on the team have either a semester or a year left of PE, including Robinson, who did not take PE freshman year.

The team grew surprisingly close over the course of their first season, netting some strong results in tournaments as well.

Having over half the team graduating this year, the remaining girls are worried about replacing the class of 2014 next year, but the seniors are very confident that with hard work, next years’ tennis team will still do great.

“I’m not going to be there next year, but I think that if the team is able to maintain a strong dynamic and bond, they’ll do fantastic next season.” Budhiraja said.

Staff Writers

he Palo Alto High School volleyball team won their first Central Coast Section (CCS) playoffs match against San Benito High School. The game took place on Nov. 16, where the Lady Vikes defeated the Haybaylers 3-1.

“I think we did a good job starting off strong,” senior Becca Raffel said.

“They had a lot of fans there, so I was proud of the way we were able to just focus on our side of the court and our game and pull out a win. We have to play as hard as we can against Menlo-Atherton High School and do our best to try to make it back to CCS. ” Claire Dennis was selected as the player of the match. The sophomore had a season high six blocks to go along with her exceptional hitting performance, with ten kills and no errors on fourteen swings.

Keri Gee also had a notable performance, with 41 digs. Raffel and junior star Jade Schoenberger, had fourteen kills each.

“Going into the game, we were well prepared for a line up which we assumed they would put out,” Schoenberger said. “After they switched things up ... I feel we did a great job adapting fast. What really differed the two teams was our execution in the middle. Both Claire

[Dennis] and Lauren [Kerr] dominated at the net with both blocking and hitting. By the end of game three, which we lost, I feel you could clearly tell we were the team that wanted to win. We went in minimizing errors and bringing great energy throughout.”

Despite high hopes for a win after beating San Benito, the team lost to Homestead High School in the CCS finals on Nov 23. The team was looking to come back and beat the team after two losses to Homestead High School in league games, but were unable to get their revenge. Beaten in four matches, Paly started off strong winning the first set, but were ultimately overcome by the Mustangs in the remaining three. Despite their loss, Palo Alto was happy with the team dynamic and hoped their loss would add to their motivation in future games.

After their CCS loss, the team moved on to Nor Cals, and was able to defeat San Roman High School 3-2 in the quarterfinals. Although the team felt prepared going into the game, they lost to Granite Bay High School in the NorCal semifinals on Nov 30.

The team was happy with their overall record and season in general.

“We had an amazing season, and we did much better than people thought we would,” junior Abby Strong said.

conner harden/the campanile

The volleyball team prepares to receive the serve in a regular season game at Paly.

Friday, December 6, 2013

C4

The Campanile

SPORTS

By Paul Mewes Staff Writer

T

Courtesy of The Viking

Boys’ Basketball

By Esther Doerr and Alec Sullivan Staff Writers

A

fter a successful season last year, the Palo Alto High School boys’ basketball team starts its 2013-14 season with the hopes of winning the De Anza Division and reaching the NorCal tournament for the second year in a row.

Despite the graduation of crucial players Aubrey Dawkins, Mathias Schmutz, Aldis Petriceks, Eilon Tzur and Scotty Peery last year, the team maintains a high morale.

Players to look out for this year include juniors Alex Dees and Jonathan Rojahn, among others.

The teams had its first scrimmage against Junipero Serra High School on Dec. 2, losing 66-44. However, the team has not lost hope, as Junipero Serra has been a basketball powerhouse for a long time in the Bay Area.

“I think we had good effort and shot the ball well when we got good looks,” Dees said, looking back on the scrimmage against Serra High School.

Junior Kevin Mullin and senior Clark Schmutz started off the season with strong performances and were the leading scorers for the Vikings on Monday.

Junior forward Corey Bicknell feels confident about the team going into the new season. He feels that they have the necessary personnel to pull of crucial wins. According to Bicknell, a goal for the Vikings this season is to be more physical. “[Serra] was a lot more physical than us and we couldn’t handle their big men,” Bicknell said.

Playing with an increased physicality will be just as important as the team’s allaround court game this season.

“I think that we mainly have to work on executing our half-court offense and playing better team defense,” Dees added.

Coach Adam Sax wants the team to compete in their league, pull off some upsets and make a solid run this season. The Vikings are currently projected to finish sixth in the De Anza Division.

The team next plays on Dec. 12 in the Piedmont Hills Tournament and begin league play on Jan. 8 at Los Gatos High School.

Conner Harden/The Campanile

SPORTS

Winter Sports Preview

Girls’ Soccer he Palo Alto High School girls’ varsity soccer team has set lofty goals for itself heading into the 2013-14 season.

The team dynamic this year will be very similar to that of last year’s, as only four seniors graduated, which could help the team carry over its momentum from last year into the upcoming season.

“We have good team chemistry already, giving us an edge in training, which will hopefully take us far in CCS [Central Coast Section playoffs],” junior Katie Foug said. “I think our goal will be to win it.”

Although not everyone is quite as ambitious as Foug, the other players agree that the team should have a good season this year.

“I think we will do better [than last year’s league record of 12-0-1] because we have a lot more confidence coming from last season,” senior Megan Tall said. “We really want to prove ourselves this year.”

“We have a really talented team this year, as we did last year,” sophomore Jacey Pederson said. “I think we have a good chance of doing really well, and one of our goals is to get into CCS. I know it’s definitely achievable.”

Last year, the team won in the opening round of CCS, but was disqualified because of an issue regarding Pederson’s eligibility, when she played on the junior national team. This year, the team is determined to be extra careful regarding eligibility. The disqualification disappointed the team, but the team will not let the disappointment from last season deter them from a run for CCS this season. In fact, some players view it as motivation to succeed in this coming year.

“We have some unfinished business,” junior Olivia Mussil said. “I feel like we didn’t get a chance to show everyone how far we could go in the tournament.”

Other players also share Mussil’s sentiment.

“I think we are all looking for redemption after last year’s CCS disqualification,” Foug said.

After a great season last year, the team moved from the lower El Camino Division into the more prestigious De Anza Division.

“I’m really excited,” Pederson said. “Our competition is going to be much tougher this year, which will be fun.”

Tall added that the increased competition will be a chance for the girls to “show how [they] have improved as a team.”

Although most would consider last season a success because the team was promoted into the De Anza League and entered CCS undefeated in league only to be disqualified, the team is determined to improve further for the coming season.

“We are going to focus on being an offensive team to create more chances on goal and work on finishing those chances to maximize goals scored,” Tall said. “We were more of a defensive team last year.”

Paly was fortunate to have had only four seniors graduate last year, but according to Mussil, the seniors they lost were key players.

“We lost some important seniors,” Mussil said. “Without Erin Chang we have been looking for a new goalie. Katherine Maniscalco and Nina Kelty were both important on defense and [Kelty] was always very upbeat and her positive energy will be missed.”

Luckily, the team believes that the new players who will fill the spots left by the departed seniors will be good additions.

“We have some promising incoming freshmen,” Foug said.

The team lost its first game against Carlmont High School 0-2 on Dec. 2.

The Campanile

Friday, December 6, 2013

C5

Girls’ Basketball

By Kevin Mullin Staff Writer

P

alo Alto High School’s girls’ basketball team hosts a roster of much younger players, which means the team will suffer from a lack of experience. The team will return with four active players from last year, in addition to two starters. The team will be led by seniors Charlotte Alipate and Hope Crockett, who are currently dealing with injuries.

Sophomore Maddy Atwater is optimistic about the team’s chances.

“Well, we are really young, but it’s looking good,” Atwater said. “We will be fine.”

Although the team is full of young players, Atwater believes that they can maintain a reputable level of competitiveness.

“We only have freshmen and sophomores,” Atwater said.

Crockett and Alipate still attend practices, helping out the underclassmen as they head into the season.

“We have great leadership from the injured seniors,” Atwater said. “The team is going to shoot a whole lot of threes.”

Shooting threes will compliment the team’s hopes to play an up-tempo, run and gun style this year. Last year, the team finished fourth in the De Anza league with five wins and seven losses. The team’s overall record was nine wins and 14 losses. The team will look to improve upon that record this upcoming year, as it makes up for its inexperience with young talent.

After two heartbreaking losses in league play to Henry M. Gunn High School last year, the team will look to beat its crosstown rivals and avenge last year’s 55-19 and 44-26 defeats.

The team easily won its first game on Dec. 2, defeating Capuchino High School 74-51. Sophomore Siggi Bengston scored 20 points, freshman Lauren Koyama added 18 and Atwater dealt out nine assists as the Vikings shot 44 percent from behind the arc.

Courtesy of Scotty Peery

Andrew Choi/The Campanile

Wrestling

By Parker Devine Senior Staff Writer

T

he Palo Alto High School wrestling team looks to develop young wrestlers this season to counter the disparity of the many seniors facing injuries. The team consists of many young members who will try to improve over the course of the season.

“This season, we have a very young team,” senior Gunnar Felt said. “I’d say our main goal is to just develop our younger wrestlers and try to do well in league and [Central Coast Section (CCS) playoffs].”

It is important that the younger wrestlers develop quickly and efficiently. Multiple upperclassmen have potential season-ending injuries, and the team is likely to not have a single senior competing this year. One senior, Gunnar Felt, will miss the season because of a knee injury sustained from football.

“Even before I got hurt, we only had one other senior wrestler,” Felt said. “Plus, he just got injured as well and may not be able to wrestle.”

With many injuries and few silver linings, the team will try to focus on developing its young talent. However, the team is still strong in its work ethic and attitude. “[From] my experience, the team is always very hardworking and resilient,” Felt said. “We don’t always have the best wrestlers, but we definitely have wrestlers who are willing to put in the work to become great.”

Although the team is not expecting huge success, Paly can look for improvement over the next few years.

“I guess you could say it’s a ‘rebuilding year,’ but at the same time, we do have a couple really talented guys on the team and people always improve throughout the year,” Felt said. “It’s really impossible to make any sort of solid prediction until March rolls around, but I am hopeful that the team will be successful.”

Boys’ Soccer

By Seth Alston and Lauren Gargiulo Staff Writers

T

he Palo Alto High School boys’ soccer team anticipates the start of its season after a strong season last year and its promotion from the El Camino Division into the more elite De Anza Division of the Santa Clara Valley Athletic League (SCVAL).

After graduating several important seniors last year such as Chris Meredith and Kirby Gee, the young team looks to try and fill the shoes of those who left the team.

“We had eight starters graduate last year, so hopefully some of the underclassmen can step up and replace them,” senior Neal Biswas said.

Led by senior team captain and center midfielder Cina Vazir, the team has a strong contingent of seniors and juniors that worked together last year and a great amount of underclassmen take spots on the varsity team.

“We have a lot new players,” junior Preston Kuppe said. “Lots of sophomores and three freshmen.”

These new players are excited to take on varsity-level playing and are prepared to do what it takes to be successful on the team.

“Varsity has been a big step up from the frosh/soph team last year,” sophomore Cole Tierney said. “As opposed to an easy season of messing around and still be undefeated, this year, the rest of the team and I really need to work hard to do well.”

Despite last season’s relegation to the El Camino League, after its promotion to De Anza, the team has high aspirations for the 2013-14 season.

“We’re looking to make Central Coast Section Playoffs, like always,” Woo said. “[Since] we just got moved up last year, obviously our goal is to avoid getting relegated.”

“Other than working hard, our main goal this season is really just staying focused on what we need to do as a team,” Tierney said. “Our team is full of great guys willing to work hard and have a good time when we can afford to do so.”

With goals in mind for success and new eager players, the team is starting to foster chemistry, build a tight bond and enjoy each other’s company.

The team begins its season on Dec. 10 when it takes on Milpitas High School at home as part of the Oak Grove Tournament. The tournament continues at Oak Grove High School on Dec. 20 and the team enters league play when it takes on Los Gatos High School on the Wildcats’ home turf on Jan. 8.

Irrespective of the struggles it faced last year, the team has a positive outlook for the coming season.

“It’s definitely going to be an interesting season this year,” Woo said.

Andrew Choi/The Campanile

Conner Harden/The Campanile

Friday, December 6, 2013

C6

The Campanile

SPORTS

Ice skaters prepare for start of season Paly ice skaters discuss their personal reasons for skating and anticipation for the upcoming season

By Lily Zhang

I

Senior Staff Writer

t’s ice skating season again. For some, that may mean driving to the local ice skating rink with friends to laugh, skate and avoid falling on the ice for a few hours. But for some students at Palo Alto High School, the season entails hard work, long hours and dedication.

Senior Angela Pomeroy first picked up her ice skates at the age of four and has been skating at Winter Lodge ever since. Although she has never skated competitively due to Winter Lodge’s performance-based rink, Pomeroy practices around six nights per week on top of work and school. Despite the many hours of dedication, Pomeroy believes her time is well spent.

“The satisfaction of landing that one jump, getting that one spin down or polishing some foot work is always worth it in the end and makes me feel so accomplished,” Pomeroy said.

Along with the technical aspect, Pomeroy also appreciates the support she gets from those around her.

“The thing that motivates me the most when skating are my friends, boyfriend and coaches,” Pomeroy said. “They’re always there supporting me, giving me advice and helping me improve.”

Seniors Juliet Norvig and Corey Rogers, who both ice skate, also acknowledge the tight-knit social aspect of ice skating.

“What I really like about ice skating is the people who I interact with when practicing and at competitions,” Rogers said.

Norvig echoes the idea. “Watching my friends skate and growing and learning with them is amazing.”

Norvig, who began skating at the age of four, also practices at the Winter Lodge along with Pomeroy and other girls at Paly, such as sophomores Jessica and Kaitlin Jensen; juniors Maya Ben-Efraim, Sabrina

Courtesy of peter Norvig

Seniors Angela Pomeroy (left) and Juliet Norvig (right) perform at the Winter Lodge’s 2013 Ice Show. Below, Pomeroy and Norvig join in a group performance.

Goyal and Heather Shaw and seniors Leah Medoff and Robin Anwyl.

Practicing for about seven to eight hours every week, Norvig believes ice skating is unique compared to other sports.

“A lot of my friends who don’t skate can barely walk on the ice without holding a wall or hands, so there’s definitely a very unique learning curve for figure skating,” Norvig said.

Pomeroy also agrees with the tough and unique aspects that are required with skating.

“Skating is a very unique sport and requires strength, technique and rhythm,” Pomeroy said. “Landing a jump by itself takes a lot of power and strength to throw yourself in the air and get enough revolutions. But, if you don’t have the right technique, you could be making it a lot harder than it needs to be. Elements like jumps and spins are only one part of skating; once you have those down, we have to bring them together in a long program with a dance step, which takes lots of endurance.”

Rogers differs from Pomeroy and Norvig due to his competitive and individual skating style. Rogers began ice skating at the age of four and practiced at Nazareth Ice Oasis for an average of 14 hours a week. “[Ice skating] is a sport that requires athletic and artistic skills simultaneously,” Rogers said. “It also demands a lot of time and energy, along with effort.”

Rogers, who won the state games in San Diego with his team, recently stopped skating to focus on his

schoolwork. However, he still hopes to skate as a side activity in college.

“If there is an ice rink close to the college that I am attending, I would apply to be a teacher for a group lesson,” Rogers said.

Despite increasing schoolwork and pressure, the love and passion for ice skating is alive for Norvig as well.

“My top choice school also has a pretty low-key figure skating club, so I definitely would want to continue figure skating, but I will probably skate less than I do now,” Norvig said.

The Campanile

Friday, December 6, 2013

C7

SPORTS

Best locations for pick-up basketball Athlete of the month

By Nick Sullivan Senior Staff Writer

P

eople love playing pick-up basketball for multiple reasons: to exercise, meet new people and engage in friendly competition. The key to having the best pick-up basketball experience is finding the environment that perfectly fits your competitive nature. On some courts, the environment is set, while on other courts, players can set the environment themselves. There are numerous courts around Palo Alto that each offer a unique experience.

Ahmed Awadallah/The Campanile

This edition featuring

Michelle Xie with The Campanile’s own Stephenie Zhang and Kevin Mullin Senior Michelle Xie, who has been playing golf for seven years, is a co-captain of the girls’ varsity golf team. After losing to Henry M. Gunn High School in the Santa Clara Valley Athletic League Tournament by two strokes, Xie led her team to a CCS championship and a birth in the state tournament. Xie shot a 69 at the CCS tournament, the lowest out of all golfers in the tournament and finished fourth in the state.

courtesy of creative commons

Pick-up basketball is increasing in popularity at Paly as a recreational yet competitive athletic activity. Palo Alto possesses many great locations to play.

Gunn-Terman pick up games (780 Arastradero Road, Palo Alto, CA 94306) For the last few years, Henry M. Gunn High School students have been organizing pick-up games at Gunn High School and Terman Middle School. There is a Facebook group led by Gunn senior Patrick Skelly. Most of the players are current Gunn and Palo Alto High School students or recent alumni. The environment is highly competitive.

The Gunn gymnasium was recently renovated, making its sleek surface great to play on. However, the Skelly family decides when to schedule the games, so this option is not always accessible. But when these games do happen, they are easily the best pickup experience in Palo Alto.

Rating:

The Jewish Community Center (JCC) (3921 Fabian Way, Palo Alto, CA 94303) The JCC is a solid place to play a pickup game: the court is new and is primarily used for basketball. However, it is important to note that on occasion there are fitness classes. Additionally, the Kehillah High School basketball team uses it for its practices. The downside to the JCC is that players need to be a member or be accompanied by one in order to gain access to this gym. If someone is not a member, they must pay a small fee, even if they are with a member. The JCC has one of the most accessible courts in Palo Alto, and if you are a member or willing to pay a small fee, you can count on having a very enjoyable pick-up game.

Rating: ★

Scott Park (Scott Street at Channing Avenue, 94301) Scott Park is truly a hidden gem that makes for a unique pick-up basketball environment. The basketball courts have a concrete surface with painted lines and a basket. Because not too many people know about Scott Park, it is almost always an option when it comes to availability.

However, a downside to its availability is that one needs to always bring a group of friends to play basketball with. Joining a game already in progress is an unlikely option. Scott Park is a great place to play a variety of basketball games such as “knockout” and “21.” With few people around, there are little distractions, which makes for a competitive pick-up environment.

Rating:

Ross Road YMCA (3412 Ross Road, Palo Alto, CA 94303) The Ross Road YMCA gym can be used for playful pick-up games during its open gym and teen basketball hours. More competitive basketball games can be found during its adult gym hours during which participants vary from teenagers to adults trying to get in some exercise.

Although adult basketball is technically for only people 18 years or older, adults usually don’t care as long as teenagers who choose to play do so seriously. The YMCA also has a very good hardwood floor, so those worried about slipping won’t have to be concerned. It is important to check the gym schedule before going because the gym is often used for other athletic activities.

Rating:

Teacher-coaches PAVERS for PALY bring new perspective A wonderful opportunity to leave a legacy

Support the new Media Arts Building.

Purchase a Paly Sidewalk Paver to honor a Teacher, Class, Program or Club. Your personalized, engraved paver will be installed in front of the new Media Arts building, slated to open this Spring.

MAKE YOUR TAX-DEDUCTIBLE DONATION NOW! THIS IS A LIMITED TIME OPPORTUNITY!!

FOLLOW THESE EASY STEPS: 1. Provide your order information: Name: _______________________________________________ Address: _____________________________________________ ____________________________________________ Phone: _______________________________________________ Email: _______________________________________________ Student & Grad year: ____________________________________ 2. Circle payment option: A. Make checks to ‘Media Arts Boosters’ and mail to Debbie Crouch, 1800 Webster St., Palo Alto, CA 94301 B. Credit card payment online at the Paly Web Store on Paly.net 3. Pick your paver size and write your message in the engravable area:

6” x 6” paver (¾” Font, $100, 3 lines x 10 characters)

6” x 12” paver (¾” Font, $250, 3 lines x 21 characters)

By Kevin Mullin Staff Writer

I

t seems like many times coaches often do not realize that a high school student’s life is supposed to consist of more than school, homework, sports and sleep. These coaches, who may live in different areas than Palo Alto, have difficulty understanding the schedules and academic rigor of Palo Alto High School. However, there are some coaches who do understand: Paly teachers who also coach Paly sports.

In many ways, teachers and coaches have many of the same obligations: to help develop the player or student’s potential into the best they can be. A teacher who coaches can help students improve on the field and in the classroom by having a closer relationship.

What constitutes a good teacher?

“I measure my teachers by asking myself one question: can they be replaced by a computer?” junior Theo Zaharias said.

In this age of powerpoints and videos, it seems like so many teachers forget to form real relationships with their students.

“I want to feel like my teacher actually cares about how I do in the class and that I am really learning the material,” Zaharias said. Many students feel the relationship between teachers has become more electronic,

as sites like Schoology and Infinite Campus are used to deliver news that could be given in class.

Paly teachers are extremely efficient as Paly coaches. Doyle Knight, the Paly auto teacher, also coaches the freshman boys’ basketball and girls’ golf teams. He believes that there are multiple advantages to being a teacher and a coach at the same school.

“First off, you have better contact with the players,” Knight said. “It’s easier to have lunch meetings and stuff like that.”

Knight also feels that the advantages of being a teacher who coaches goes beyond just scheduling efficiency.

“I like the relationship I have as a teacher with my students and the relationship I have with my players as a coach, and they’re very similar,” Knight said. “And if I have both, then that only makes it better because we just have more in common and there’s more of a bond.”

Players who have teacher-coaches generally agree that it helps them have a better connection with the coach.

“I definitely feel like having a teacher at Paly coach your team is better than someone random,” junior Alex Dees said.

Paly teachers will continue to present an extremely viable option as role models and helpful resources in the classroom and on the field.

Michelle Xie: Hi my name is Michelle Xie and I am on the Paly girls’ golf team. I was co-captain this year with Annie Chen and we made it to states for the first time.

TC: So what’s your favorite color?

MX: Pink. [laughs] TC: When did you start playing golf?

MX: I started playing golf when I was eight. I went to my first golf camp with Annie in the good old days of ‘06.

TC: Would you say you’re better at: real golf or mini golf?

MX: Real golf. I’ve never been mini golfing before.

TC: How about Wii golfing?

MX: That depends. Sometimes the sensor does not like me.

TC: What was the moment that you decided golfing was for you?

MX: When I decided that I hated running. Golf was the first thing where it’s more stationary and more slow paced. Not as much fast reaction, but more technique.

TC: Do you have some type of inspirational figure? Like Michelle Wie? MX: I’m probably more of an Annika Sorenstam fan because she’s more business woman-y and she was number one in the world for a good couple of years.

TC: Have you ever won a tournament?

MX: I’m NorCal Champion and CCS Champion.

TC: What do you feel like after you win a tournament?

MX: I am proud of my team for placing first at CCS this year. First time coming out, we beat Gunn.

TC: You guys beat Gunn?

MX: Yes, they didn’t even make it to States.

TC: So can we draw from this evidence that Paly is better than Gunn?

MX: Probably not because they beat us in a match and they beat us in leagues by two strokes.

TC: Have you competed in any golf tournaments outside of Paly’s CCS? MX: Yeah, I just came back from Florida a week ago at the Polo Golf Classic. That one I got into because of my grades. I was named an HP Scholastic All-American, 12th in the nation, so I got my invitation.

TC: Good job.

MX: Thanks. This summer, I went to D.C. in another invitational called the PGA Junior Championship at Trump National.

TC: PGA? That’s like a huge thing.

MX: Yeah the course I played on in Florida was PGA National.

TC: Is there anything else about golf that you find makes it interesting or enjoyable?

MX: It’s like super mental and it’s more slow paced. It’s not your stereotypical fast sport. I guess a lot of people don’t even say it’s a sport. I almost a little bit agree with them.

It takes a lot more skill than you’d expect it to and I guess that’s good for me because I’m not the stereotypical athlete.

Friday, December 6, 2013

C8

The Campanile

SPORTS

The Danger Of

“we give the underclassmen

a hard time whenever we walk by them at school . but in general , i’d say track is a pretty close group.”

[Hazing] is how we bond.”

HAZING Text B y Julia Kwasnick

“Freshman year, there was

this cold pool at state championships — literally 20 degrees — and the freshmen had to jump in it. If you didn’t, then you were a wimp.”

“Besides giving the underclassmen

a hard time, we don’t participate in hazing. I feel like we all perform best in a situation in which we are free from the stresses that come with hazing.”

R

ecently, the bullying of second-year offensive tacke Jonathan Martin of the Miami Dolphins has become one of the most discussed issues in the media. Teammate Richie Incognito allegedly harassed Martin with racial slurs and threats. This scandal highlighted the issue of bullying and hazing within athletics and is now a highly controversial topic of discussion across the country. Although most people only debate the fine line between team-bonding and bullying when a scandal hits the news, hazing of all types occurs in many situations. Practices in professional sports tend to be replicated at the collegiate and high school levels, so I wanted to unearth what is beneath Palo Alto High School’s pristine exterior. Does extensive hazing still occur in Paly sports?

A

initially, I tried asking multiple Paly varsity athletes if they had ever been hazed. However, when first posed with this question, people instinctively and instantly said they had not.

Upon further explanation of what constitutes hazing, all of the athletes conceded that underclassmen on varsity teams did experience some sort of hazing, even if it was for the sole purpose of team bonding and done with non-negative intentions.

When people think of hazing, they often think of violence and “stereotypical” bullying; however, for general purposes, hazing is “a method of initiation or pre-initiation into a student organization or body...which is likely to cause serious bodily injury or personal degradation or disgrace resulting in physical or mental harm to a former, current or prospective student,” according to the Palo Alto Unified School District’s (PAUSD) conduct code. The key phrase in the definition of hazing is “personal degradation...resulting in... mental harm.” In short, an incident can be considered hazing if it results in any sort of “mental harm.” If a student believes that an incident was bullying and feels like the incident resulted in mental harm, then the student could report the incident as hazing to PAUSD. Therefore, since most people do not attend a team event with the intention of hazing members of the team to the point of physical or mental trauma, team members must take caution when partaking in any act that could be potentially harmful. If one person feels like the acts were hateful, then the entire team could possibly face suspension for hazing at Paly.

Most Paly athletes seemed to consider hazing as a bonding activity that is good for making the team a strong group. Varsity tennis player Brandon* thinks that hazing is “fun afterwards.” There is an expectation that a student who does not participate may face isolation from the rest of the team.

“Freshman year, there was this really cold pool at the state championship — like literally 20 degrees — and all the freshmen had to jump in it,” Brandon said. “If you [didn’t], you [were] a wimp. It’s a thing.”

Varsity track runner John* believes that hazing — in a light form — is how the team successfully bonds. “[The track team] doesn’t really do any hazing, but we often give the underclassmen a hard time about stuff, like calling them names and roasting on them,” John said.

This practice was said to extend beyond the track and into school. “[I give the underclassmen] a hard time whenever I walk by them at school,” John said. “But in general, I’d say track is a pretty close group. [Hazing] is kind of how we bond.”

It seems like hazing, when in a nonviolent form, is considered beneficial by many Paly athletes for helping the team bond. Players look at hazing as beneficial and an obvious aspect of being a team member.

However, varsity baseball player Sam* is adamant that hazing is not beneficial for a team.

“Besides giving the underclassmen a hard time [by making] them get the ball buckets, we don’t participate in hazing,” Sam said.

“I feel like we all perform best in a situation in which we are all a cohesive unit, free from the stresses that come with hazing. [Intense hazing] is distracting and hurts team chemistry.”

Essentially, athletes need to ensure that whatever they label or consider as team bonding is not perceived by other members of the team as hazing. What is done for the sake of bonding and initiation and what seems like good-natured fun can cross into the territory of hazing. Some words of advice: be cautious and think twice before acting.

*name changed to protect privacy

HAZING is a method of initiation causing injury or personal degradation resulting in physical or mental harm to a student - paraphrased from PAUSD Code of Conduct