PHOTOESSAY: Looking through
FEATURES: A look at people’s lives before they came to Tino
IN-DEPTH: Defining Friendship
THE PROSPECTOR CUPERTINO HIGH SCHOOL’S
VOLUME 52 NO. 3
10100 FINCH AVENUE, CUPERTINO, CA
Stepping up to the Challenge How student leaders return to help newcomers at Challenge Day
ONLINE AT: WWW.CHSPROSPECTOR.ORG
DECEMBER 3, 2010
Career Opportunities for Pioneers PTSA offers new alternative to Job Shadow Day for students
ANAND HEMMADY news assistant
On Tuesday, November 16th, around 100 new students stepped into the Wagon Wheel for a life changing experience: Challenge Day. Unlike the Challenge Day last March, November’s Challenge Day had student leaders. The addition of student leaders in Challenge Day made a significant difference in the overall outcome of the event. In Challenge Day, participants were put through numerous games and activities which revealed to them how similar they were and how many of society’s stereotypes, such as gender and racial stereotypes, are untrue. They also learned about the weight of their actions and how those actions could harm other people. “I began realizing that people aren’t that different from each other and I learned that hurting people’s feelings can last forever,” said sophomore Ritvik Dhavale. The most recent Challenge Day had student leaders help the participants feel more comfortable. Student leaders are people who participated in the Challenge Day program in March and opted to return in order to help the people this November. Allen Zhou, a senior who chose to become a student leader, said, “I wanted to give other people the same Challenge Day experience that I received. I wanted people to know that I was there for them and that if they needed me, they could come over.” The reasoning behind the inclusion of student leaders is simple; it is often much easier for students to open up to other students than to interact with adults. Through-
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The student leaders were people that really knew what was going on and they kept a lot of things from falling apart. Brent Knaack Sophomore
out the day, student leaders interacted with the participants to help them feel more comfortable. Clearly, this approach worked. Sophomore Brent Knaack said, “The student leaders were the people that really knew what was going on and they kept a lot of things from falling apart.” The inclusion of student leaders changed the overall effect of Challenge Day. The experience was enriching for those who went and for the leaders themselves.
ERIC JANG
ERIC JANG
GUEST SPEAKERS | On Wednesday, November 22, aeronautical engineer William Chan, bioengineer Shawn Kavayalil and software engineer spoke to a group of students in the library as part of the second Cupertino Options for Pioneers panel ERIC JANG opinions editor
ERIC JANG
B
y the time Zuri Barniv decided to pursue a career in dentistry, he had held jobs in information technology, law enforcement, biotech and many other industries. Although experimenting with various jobs led him to discover his true passion, Barniv maintains the importance of making smart career choices early on instead of dabbing indecisively as he did. Barniv’s dentistry career was one of the jobs featured at the Career Options for Pioneers (COPs) Healthcare discussion on October 27, which aims to help students make those smart choices. The COPs program launched this year, replacing the previous Job Shadow Program in explaining the different professions available to students after college and helping students explore possible majors. The Career Options for Pioneers program arose out of a need to show students their career options beyond the preconceptions of popular professions. Monthly panel discussions, which take place before school on the 3rd Wednesday of each month, include a ten-minute description about a particular occupation followed by a question session where students can ask the speakers specific questions. In previous years, the Job Shadow Program was the primary source of career information available to students. A small handful of students would be selected in February to follow employees from local companies around for a day. However, the Job Shadow Program did not allow enough students to participate; few students are ever matched to their first choice and those who are selected are not able to explore other career options. Monta Vista offers a Career Day where students go from room to room to talk to speakers, but Career Days are difficult to plan and require more financial and human resources. In addition, many students who go to Career Day or Job Shadow do not get a comprehensive overview of a profession. The COPs offers an efficient alternative by allowing more students to share the experience. Although COPs is on a smaller scale than Career Days, it is easier to plan and thus more sessions can be held throughout the year. Said College and Career Counselor Xuan Cao, “With Job Shadow, you only get to shadow one person; you only get the perspective of one job and what it entails”. see COPS, pg 2
Most popular career fields Engineering 15% Health Care 25% Legal 12% Media/ Communications 9% Life Science/ Environmental 10% Arts/ Entertainment 11% Education 4% Nonprofit/ Public Service 3% Business 11%
COMPILED BY AZADEH RONGERE 128 POLLED ARTWORK BY EMILY CHENG