Carlmont Highlander September 2018

The Highlander September 2018 Vol X Issue I

Carlmont High School — Belmont, California

LYING is in our

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DNA

Sophie Lynd

Kaylee George Scot Scoop Editor-in-Chief Honesty may be the best policy, but lying makes us human.

Everyone tells lies. From the “On my way!” text to the “Of course you look good in that dress, honey,” lies are a natural part of daily life.

“Recently, I lied about where I was so my friends wouldn’t get sad that I couldn’t hang out with them,” Amy Fullerton, a senior said. “I do it to protect people.”

As Fullerton suggests, there are different types of lying. Lies can be generally categorized into four areas: lying to protect yourself, lying to promote yourself, lying to impact others, and pathological lying.

In a study headed by Timothy R. Levine, published in the Journal of Intercultural Communication Research, teenagers aged 13-17 years old lied the most frequently, with 59 percent telling between one and five lies and 15 percent telling more than five lies over a 24-hour period.

“The frontal lobe is responsible for decision-making and judgment. If this is not fully developed, it could result in someone lying more,” psychology teacher Michelle McKee said. “In addition, [Lawrence] Kohlberg’s theory of moral reasoning sug-

gests that teenagers are in the conventional stage, which says that moral decisions are made based on approval. If teenagers are seeking approval from family and/or peers, they may lie to get it.”

The experiments that Dan Ariely, a professor at Duke University, has devoted his time to have made him one of the leading experts on the subject of lying. He is fascinated by not the ubiquity of lying, but instead why people don’t lie more.

In one experiment he conducted, Ariely rigged a vending machine to give back the money that customers put in to buy candy.

A big sign even read, “If there’s something wrong with this machine, please call this number” — Ariely’s cell phone number.

Nobody called, but nobody took more than four bags of candy.

“At one hand, we all want to look at ourselves in the mirror and feel good about ourselves, so we don’t want to cheat. On the other hand, we can cheat a little bit and still feel good about ourselves,” Ariely said in a Ted Talk. “There’s a level of cheating we can’t go over, but we can still benefit from cheating at a low degree, as long as it doesn’t change our impressions about ourselves.”

According to Ariely, most humans place limits on how much they lie in order to in-

ternalize honesty as a societal value. However, to lie in the first place is embedded within our ancestral moral code.

Just like walking and talking, learning to lie is a part of developmental growth; children start lying between ages two and four when they are testing their independence.

As they age, they become more sophisticated liars.

In a study by Kang Lee, a psychologist at the University of Toronto, kids peeked under a cloth to guess a toy. The three- and four-year-olds blurted out the correct answer. At age seven or eight, kids try to deliver a reasoned guess or intentionally say a wrong answer. At five or six, kids typically are in-between.

“So she puts her hand underneath the cloth, closes her eyes, and says, ‘Ah, I know it’s Barney,’” Lee said, in reference to a six year old girl. “I ask, ‘Why?’ She says, ‘Because it feels purple.’”

Researchers speculate that humans started lying shortly after we started speaking somewhere between 50,000 and 100,000 years ago.

Being able to manipulate others without the need for physical force was likely an advantage in the battle for mates and resources, acting similar to the evolution of deceiptive abilities in the animal kingdom

like camouflage.

“Lying is so easy compared to other ways of gaining power,” Sissela Bok, a Harvard University ethicist, said. “It’s much easier to lie in order to get somebody’s money or wealth than to hit them over the head or rob a bank.”

Lying comes in many forms, but writing only emerged 5,000 years ago. This means humans were primed to lie without there being a record. Every word they said disappeared, no trace whatsoever.

However, with a developing technology sphere, there is an online print and society has entered a period of human evolution.

Prior to this, people evolved to communicate in a way where their words disappeared, but now, everything is recorded.

In a Ted Talk about the future of lying, Jeff Hancock said, “Not only are you leaving a record for yourself on your machine, but you’re leaving a record for the person that you were lying to, and you’re also leaving them around for me to analyze with some computer algorithms.” for more on the truth

Nature vs. Nurture

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Blue Collar jobs in America

page 13

Truth behind search history

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In This Issue

News Lifestyle Sports Campus

Social Media Pressures

Veganism Behind the pros and cons of going vegan and the effect it has on our society.

Page 4

History of Carlmont Carlmont’s 65 years of schooling includes a rich history, including a 1995 box office hit.

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Artificial Impressions Social media creates false expectations.

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Features Opinion Community Behind the Brand

2-3 4-5 6-7 8-9 10-11 12-14 15-17 19 20

NEWS

2

September 2018

Where does the Belmont water bill go?

A closer look at the city’s government bedfellows Sam Hosmer

Cut the check, get the service.

This is the modus operandi of public and private utilities everywhere. So long as the money ends up in the right hands, the water keeps flowing and the lights stay on.

If you live in Belmont, the check for the water bill ends up in the hands of the MidPeninsula Water District, a public agency headquartered at 3 Dairy Lane just next to US-101. They in turn purchase and pipe water originally from the Hetch Hetchy reservoir in Yosemite National Park, through the San Francisco Regional Water System, to the homes of Belmont residents as well as those living in small portions of San Carlos, Redwood City, and unincorporated San Mateo County.

The Water District is a local government. It has a board of directors, an appointed general manager, and staff. This all sounds a lot like Belmont’s city government, which is, on a broad level, also composed of those same core elements: it has a governing city council, an appointed city manager, and several departments which are populated by staff.

But the Water District and the City of Belmont, despite both servicing city infrastructure and sharing a nearly indistinguishable boundary, are completely separate entities.

The Water District is a special district.

Special districts, unlike departments of the city government or the city government as a whole, are independent, mostlyautonomous organizations charged with maintaining one or more essential utilities or services. They have independent bureaucracies, in most cases elected governing boards, and are funded by taxpayers and ratepayers. According to their website, MPWD was formed as the “Belmont County Water District” in 1929 when seven former sanitary agencies consolidated. And as the city grew over the years, the Water District grew to accommodate it.

Today, the City and the Water District, each with a separate administrative bureaucracy, share a jurisdiction that is nearly identical. Matt Zucca, who has sat on the

Sam Hosmer

The Mid-Peninsula Water District headquarters is located on Dairy Lane.

Board of Directors of the Water District since he was appointed to fill a vacancy in 2005, estimates that, excluding the Harbor Industrial Area, only 5 percent of the district’s customers lie outside of city limits.

“Ours is really a function of the history behind the aggregation of the six Water Districts,” Zucca said of their jurisdiction.

But given the single-service nature of the Water District, some think that perhaps the time has come to consider alternatives.

Douglas Kim, who is currently the mayor of Belmont and has served on the City Council since 2015, is one such person.

“When you’re looking at a special district that, for all intents and purposes, mimics our city boundaries, I think I have the same kind of questions a lot of people do about whether or not that governance structure is the right one to plan, operate, maintain, and deliver our water to the people of Belmont,” Kim said.

Zucca agrees that all decisions should be informed by what would best serve the ratepayers, and that further study should be undertaken to advise the best path forward based on overall benefit to the customer.

But he also notes that the City of Belmont is currently responsible for the city’s sewer and storm drain infrastructure, both of which, he says, the district could be better equipped to maintain.

“I would argue that we ought to equally study if it’s cost-effective to have us take over utilities,” Zucca said. “If you’re going to study, you have to study the flip-side: would it make sense for us to take over sanitary and storm?”

Furthermore, Zucca emphasizes the benefits of having an agency of specialists operate the city’s water supply, a utility of which he believes proper management is critical. Many members of the Water District’s board of directors have long backgrounds in public and private utilities — credentials which enable them, says Zucca, to make decisions regarding water policy not affected by the politics that might influence similar votes of the city council.

San Mateo County’s Local Agencies Formation Commission, or LAFCo, is a county agency charged with “jurisdiction over changes in organization and boundaries of cities and special districts including annexations, detachments, incorporations and formations,” according to their website. They routinely produce reports called municipal service reviews to “attempt to capture and analyze information about the governance structures and efficiencies of service providers, and to identify opportunities for greater coordination and cooperation between providers,” according to the California Association of Local Agency

Formation Commissions.

In January, 2011, LAFCo produced a municipal service review of the Water District analyzing the solvency and future of the agency. The report was ultimately submitted with the primary recommendation “that the district be established as [a] subsidiary district of the City of Belmont.”

Making the Water District a subsidiary district of the City would likely lead to staff consolidations and would eliminate the District’s Board of Directors, which would become the City Council.

That recommendation was made before a November 2011 scandal in which a former employee of the Water District, who was in charge of managing the agency’s finances, was found to have embezzled a substantial quantity of money — $248,000 over a three year period, according to the SF Examiner — after she suffered a stroke and fiscal improprieties were discovered by the employee who took over her duties.

“In this particular case, the investigator said it was incredibly creative. They’d never seen anything this sophisticated,” Zucca said, who was president of the board at the time of the scandal. “During an audit, her system allowed her to avoid the random scrutiny of records from the third-party auditing team.”

Still, that scandal had widespread ramifications for the district, which received intense media scrutiny and faced questions concerning oversight and accountability.

Kim said, “I think there needs to be better accountability from my standpoint.”

Tammy Rudock, who has served as the general manager of the Water District since 2012, was appointed in the wake of the embezzlement scandal. She says that levels of transparency and accountability have never been higher.

Read more on scotscoop.com

Three city council seats up for November election

Local elections overshadowed by national drama despite heated race Ben Balster It’s election season in Belmont.

Candidates race for three Belmont City Council seats.

As a wave of historic political fervor heats up elections for seats in both the House of Representatives and the Senate, city council elections are occurring across the Peninsula.

In Belmont, three city council positions are on the ballot, as well as measures regarding an increase on the hotel tax and to make City Clerk and City Treasurer appointed — as opposed to elected — positions.

The three incumbents running for re-election include Warren Lieberman — who has served on the City Council since 2005, Charles Stone — who served since 2013, and Julia Mates — who was appointed to succeed Eric Reed following his death in December 2017.

Challenging the three incumbents is Deniz Bolbol, whose campaign aims to increase the City Council’s transparency and responsiveness.

“Based on my experiences, the current Council is not responsive to the majority of residents,” said Bolbol. “On Council, I will insist that resident concerns are openly discussed, instead of being rebuked as they have been by this council. I will call out any lack of transparency.”

Even as political divisions plague national politics, Bolbol expresses her interest in speaking for Belmontians

rather than political parties.

“We have enough divisive politics in our country; what we need in Belmont are candidates who represent Belmont residents, not parties,” Bolbol said. “I have no ‘agenda’ except to respect and represent concerns expressed by residents [...] — my campaign is by residents, for residents.”

On the other hand, the incumbents have explicitly laid out their priorities for the city moving forward.

“I have several priorities I’d like to focus on as a city councilmember: maintaining 911 response and neighborhood police staffing levels, fixing our streets, potholes, and old infrastructure, keeping Belmont a family-friendly community, and managing traffic,” Mates said.

Behind these plans, Mates describes her primary concern to be ensuring that the City Council represents the desires of Belmont.

Mates said, “My overarching goal is to continue to work for the people of Belmont in listening to all perspectives of an issue, taking in all the available information on an issue, and then analyzing all the facts and making the best decision possible for residents.”

Likewise, Stone echoed Mates’s outlook and reaffirmed his commitment to fixing Belmont’s infrastructure and traffic congestion.

“Traffic congestion on Ralston Avenue can be brutal at peak commute times,” Stone said. “However, the Council and staff have been working hard to find funding to imple-

ment the Ralston Corrridor Study solutions and Four Corners [Alameda de las Pulgas] Corridor Study solutions.”

Recent implementation of these study solutions have included the installation of new stoplights along Ralston Avenue — at Tahoe Drive and South Road — as well as improvements at Davis Drive.

Stone also highlighted the recent successes of Belmont’s housing development.

Stone said, “For the first time in decades, the City Council is not anti-development. As a result, we have finally been successful with smart and reasonable housing development along the transit corridor.”

Beyond the search for solutions to Belmont’s problems, Stone expressed his interest in community-oriented developments.

“We really need to continue focusing on dealing with financial, housing, and transportation issues, but I would love to see more focused work on building a modern community and rec center at Barrett that could bring the whole town together,” Stone said.

While discussions of increased development have become central to the City Council’s work in recent years, the incumbents’ vision is not shared by everyone.

“I have the support of residents all over Belmont who feel disenfranchised because the current Council members ignored their input,” Bolbol said. “The incumbents are running as a slate and are heavily funded by political insiders.”

NEWS

September 2018

3

Trump’s rhetoric affects public faith in press Julia Rhodie

As the largest figure of our democracy, President Donald Trump’s words carry a lot of weight. American citizens are taught to respect the office he holds and to believe that his words are truthful. However, recently, there has been controversy surrounding the free press.

The president has vocalized his distrust of the media. Some believe that this rhetoric could have lethal implications.

According to The Guardian, “Donald Trump’s attacks on the media have been condemned by experts at the United Nations, who warned that the U.S. president’s vitriolic rhetoric could result in violence against journalists.”

Many believe that the president’s statements represent ignorance about America’s main principles of democracy.

Statements such as, “The media can make anything bad because they are the fake, disgusting news,” from the president demonstrate “a more fundamental lack

of understanding in the role of the free press in a society,” according to The Guardian.

Some wonder whether or not the president is on a mission to expand unbiased journalism or diffuse criticism of himself.

U.S. history teacher David Gomez speculates if Trump “truly distrusts the media because he feels most journalists are liberals ‘out to get him,’ or does he truly believe that he is on a crusade for balanced journalism?”

Additionally, Americans have criticized mainstream news channels such as Fox, MSNBC, and CNN for their supposed lack of portrayal of all sides.

“Each individual source seems to be becoming more narrow — for example, the political spectrum on the Washington Post is so different from the political perspective on Fox News that you would think they were covering entirely different events and people,” Theresa Fitzgerald, a lawyer at Drinker Biddle Reath, said.

According to Gomez, issues involving the free press are so heavily discussed because, “It

[free press] informs the people and MSNBC pick certain experts about economic, political, and to come on panels based on their social matters, to help them make political viewpoints. A channel daily and long-term decisions like CNN might invite more conand plans to be aware of what our servative political commentators leaders are doing, or not doing, for the sole purpose of arguing on our behalf with them,” and to quesLily Navab, a tion/chalBurlingame lenge them High School when they are senior, said. wrong.”

Some beWhen the lieve that the free press, resolution one of Amerto this issue ica’s most starts with important how journalpro p on e nt s ists interact of its democamongst each racy, is critiother. cized, global “To be citizens are more objecbound to retive, or just act. This has simply obDavid Gomez caused some jective, they American [broadcasters] U.S. History Teacher citizens’ to must let their distrust the guests state President, while others are dis- their views without interruption,” trusting journalists.

Gomez said.

“I personally think that mainTo make watching the news stream news sources such as Fox more tolerable, Gomez said that

“No matter which path our nation takes, who our President is, which party has the majority, I can only hope that we move away from divisiveness, and work together from both sides.”

he would love to see “discussions where those with opposing views have at least three minutes to state their views without interruption, and then give the other side a turn.”

For many, this interruptive discussion causes viewers to turn off the news out of frustration.

News commentators could find themselves speaking faster than people can listen because they know that they will inevitably be interrupted.

“I think the president is used to being in reality television and similar situations where there is control over the message,” Fitzgerald said.

In a time where the American people are desperately looking for a trustworthy source, many fend for themselves, analyzing current events based on a variety of news sources, historical conflicts, and one’s own personal experiences.

Fitzgerald said, “We all have to make a living, tend to our families, maintain our homes, pet our cats, and get some enjoyment out of life. Keeping up with the media could be a full-time job.”

White House restricts access to women’s health care Providers are forced to choose between funding or reproductive resources Nina Heller

Roe v. Wade was decided in 1973, but in 2018 women all around America face a growing threat to their access to reproductive health care.

“A person may choose to have an abortion until a fetus becomes viable, based on the right to privacy contained in the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. Viability means the ability to live outside the womb, which usually happens between 24 and 28 weeks after conception,” according to the decision for the case.

Before Roe v. Wade was put in place, abortion laws varied by state. Many women sought illegal and unsafe abortions if they could not access one safely.

According to the Guttmacher Institute, an organization that researches sexual and reproductive health, the number of illegal abortions in the 1950s and 1960s ranged between 200,000 and 1.2 million per year.

However, since President Donald Trump took office in January 2017, many of the protections afforded to women since the Roe v. Wade ruling have started to crumble.

In May 2018, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) proposed to bar federally funded facilities that offer family planning services from providing or referring patients to have abor-

tions. This proposal would, according to Planned Parenthood, prevent organizations like themselves from receiving federal Title X funding, the funding from the only federal grant program dedicated completely to providing individuals with family planning services that are comprehensive, as well as their related preventive health services.

This policy would also allow alleged “crisis pregnancy centers” to receive federal funding as well.

According to the Huffington Post, crisis pregnancy centers are part of a national network of about 2,500 Christian centers that advertise health and pregnancy services, but do not offer abortions, contraception, or prenatal care. Instead, they are intended to talk women out of having abortions and to advocate abstinence until marriage.

“For decades, American taxpayers have been wrongly forced to subsidize the abortion industry,” Trump said at a gala in May 2018 for the anti-abortion organization Susan B. Anthony List.

“I pledged to stand for life, and as President, that’s exactly what I’ve done,” Trump said.

Other policies that Trump and his administration have put into place since taking office include policies that affect access to other family planning services, such as birth control.

“As a male, I really don’t understand why people

think they have the right over someone else’s body. I have control over my body, and women should be able to have control over their bodies. I don’t see how in any way, shape, or form, it is my decision [regarding] what someone else does,” Will Nadan, a senior, said.

In addition to domestic policies, Trump has also been able to have an effect on healthcare worldwide with his reinstatement of the global gag rule since taking office.

In 1984, former President Ronald Reagan instituted the Mexico City Policy, also known by its critics as the Global Gag Rule. This policy prohibits U.S. funding from being allocated to foreign non-governmental organizations (NGOs) that offer information about abortion and family planning, or the actual service of abortion itself, according to Time Magazine.

“I think a lot of men in government believe that a woman’s body is not her own, because that is how it has been for some time now, and I think that they are just ignorant and don’t understand how a woman’s body is not up for grabs,” Kelly Moroney, a senior, said.

In the past several decades, U.S. presidents and policymakers have gone back and forth with this policy, typically getting enacted by Republicans and repealed by Democrats as administrations and Congresses change. Trump put

the policy back into place upon entering his term of office.

Attempts to restrict women’s access to healthcare take place not only on the federal level, but also on the state level as well. In May 2018, a bill passed in the Iowa Legislature banned abortions after six weeks, the point at which a fetal heartbeat can be detected.

The bill has since been temporarily blocked by a judge.

In 2017 there were 19 states that instated 63 restrictions in total to abortion procedures in 2017, the highest number of state laws on the issue since 2013, according to the Guttmacher Institute.

Some people cite religion as the reason for these policies, and others cite purely their morals.

Despite the fact that according to Pew Research Center, 90.7 percent of the 115th Congress is Christian, one of the main groups that has both frequently and publicly opposed abortion from the basis of their religion.

“It’s not just religion.

People who oppose abortion and birth control think that morally it’s wrong. And I think that it just brings it down to morals, which won’t change. You aren’t going to be able to convince everyone of what you think about abortion or birth control, because that’s an opinion, but I think it’s whether or not you are giving women the choice to do what they want with their own bodies,” Moroney said.

Information from istandwithpp.org

Sophie Lynd

4

LIFESTYLE

September 2018

The vegan diet remains to be debated Andrew Shen

Veganism is on the rise.

According to a Pew Research Center study, the number of vegans has risen in recent decades, with more young Americans following a mostly veggie-based diet.

Therefore, 12 percent of the 18 to 29-yearold population in the United States is vegan, while only 5 percent of 50 to 64-yearolds are vegan.

With plant-based diets becoming more prevalent, many are beginning to learn about the different types of diets, including veganism and vegetarianism.

With research showing many health benefits to veganism, some Carlmont students have decided to adopt the diet.

Brooke Seim, a senior, has been vegan for the past two years. She talked about her experience.

“I have definitely seen positive effects on my health and energy levels since going vegan. It has changed my life for the better because I feel happier knowing I’m not personally supporting harm to another creature,” Seim said.

However, there are some individuals that do not understand and disagree with the vegan diet.

Seim said, “One negative effect of going vegan is constantly having to explain myself to others who don’t support me or my diet. I am quiet about the fact that I’m vegan because once people find out, they always disagree with me. They tend to want

to argue with me and tell me my choices are wrong.”

However, some non-vegans do not disagree with Seim’s way of life.

Kyle Wilkinson, a junior, said, “I am not against it. As long as the person stays healthy then there isn’t a problem. My overall opinion is that if someone wants to become vegan, that’s 100 percent their decision.”

While veganism can be considered a healthy diet to follow, some have adopted a vegetarian diet as opposed to a fully vegan diet.

Jordan Lin, a junior, said, “Being vegetarian has helped me with my personal health issues and allowed me to understand more about how my diet impacts the environment. I have also been happier and cleaner because of the food that I eat.”

With the increase of vegans and vegetarians, plant-based and organic food sales have risen dramatically.

According to Forbes magazine, the sales of plant-based foods rose 8.1 percent from 2016 to 2017.

Research conducted in recent years has shown numerous health benefits of veganism.

According to the Journal of the American College of Cardiology, people are less likely to develop heart disease while adhering to a diet free of animal products.

A 2016 study from the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America stated that going vegan may help one lose weight, help the environment, and

increase the chance of having a longer life.

While going vegan can have health benefits, studies have shown that it can negatively impact one’s health as well.

According to the National Institute of Health, many vegans do not get adequate protein and Vitamin B12, leading to potentially serious health concerns, such as anemia.

Another possible consequence that can Andrew Shen come from veganism is that it can increase the The vegan diet consists of no animal byproducts while a nonrisk of osteoporosis, a vegan diet does. and that is what she has guided me to do.” disease that occurs when Morgan McClellan, a junior, gave her the body loses too much bone marrow opinion on the vegan diet. from a lack of calcium.

McClellan said, “As an athlete, I think it According to Harvard Health, by not eating fish, vegans may not receive enough is just hard to incorporate enough protein of the vitamin Omega 3 to help sustain [when vegan] in your diet because the major sources of protein are meat and fish.” long-term brain health.

While the vegan diet can be beneficial David Bedrosian, a senior, said, “One major argument for being a vegan is that to some, it is not ideal for every individual. you’re not harming or killing animals. Many diets, including veganism, have their However, mass agriculture and cultivation advantages and disadvantages.

Seim said, “I never try to convince of crops hurt animals because of the destabilization of large plots of land. I think that people to go vegan or tell them that their eating meat is very important to everyone’s dietary choices are wrong. Everyone has dietary needs and I believe in a balanced their own beliefs, and we live in a world diet that incorporates different types of where we have the choice to eat whatever food. My mom happens to be a dietitian we want.”

Behind the determination of music taste Charlie McBrian

Music.

Widely considered the universal language, yet each individual has a dialect.

According to the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (IFPI), in the past year alone, the music industry made 15.7 billion dollars.

The most popular genres were hip-hop, pop, and rock.

“Music is a human universal,” English teacher Erik Migdail said. “It’s one of the things that brings us together most as a society.”

Music can both manipulate and complement how the listener feels at any particular time, and many listen to music for that reason.

For example, Erwan Pal, a freshman, uses music for relaxation during stressful, tougher times.

“I like music because it helps me remain calm and not stressed. Sometimes school can be a bit much, and music is great for dealing with that,” Pal said.

Discovery of music is some of these people develanother aspect that informs op a relationship with this taste. music that speaks to them,” According to The Guard- Music teacher Brian Switzer ian, there are five types of said. “There’s a good chance ways one discovers music: that that music teens listen through one’s friends, the to now will stick with them populace, a curator, an al- for the rest of their lives.” gorithm, or total serendipA recent study co-auity. thored A

by MasN e w sachuY o r k s e t t s Times Institute analyof Techsis of nology Sp ot i f y (MIT) showed Profesthat the sor Josh peak age Mc D e rErik Migdail of influm o t t ence on found English Teacher future that one’s taste is taste in when one is 13-14 years music is more cultural than old. It claims people stop inherent. discovering new music afMany students enjoy a ter the age of 30. wide variety of music, in“I think it’s important cluding hip-hop, pop, alterthat I spend time at Carl- native, and rock. mont exposing the music Many students, includstudents to a wide breadth ing Pal, enjoy the more of music that they might mainstream genres of pop not find on the radio or and rap.

YouTube because hopefully “I like hip-hop because it

“Music is a human universal. It’s one of the things that brings us together most as a society.”

really speaks to me. Sometimes the songs can be annoying, but a lot of other times it can have a nice message,” Pal said.

Others like Nicholas Mattas, a junior, prefer calmer alternative music as opposed to the more predominant genres of pop and hip-hop.

“I grew up listening to a lot of stuff my parents showed me, so I like artists like Coldplay, Radiohead, [and] Jason Mraz,” Mattas said. “While some might say that it’s soft, I think that it’s really nice to listen to.”

However, in recent years, Mattas believes that his taste has changed from what it originally was.

“As you become a teenager your taste in music expands and evolves,” Mattas said. “I used to only listen to Eminem for rap music, now I’m listening to Kendrick Lamar, J. Cole, and anyone from 88rising.”

In modern times, the internet and streaming services like Spotify, Apple music, and SoundCloud

have broken down the barrier between underground and mainstream music.

This has allowed anyone to upload music and possibly become known. This also allows the consumer to have the ability to listen to anything from any time.

“It used to be that those in a band and those at a concert had a shared experience of euphoria due to there being part of a group of people collaborating to make music and an audience of thousands experience,” said Switzer. “Nowadays much of music is an individual endeavor and that has brought down that collaborative energy.”

Another trend in popular music that stems from the proliferation of musicmaking technology is that music can be completely synthesized, removing the need for live recording, as much of the recording process can be simulated.

“Music that is too sterile, such as contemporary pop I don’t tend to enjoy as much,” Migdail said. “I feel

like there needs to be some artistry there in order for me to enjoy it fully.”

The mediums in which people consume music have also changed drastically. The streaming services have removed the need for past physical mediums.

In response to the growth of digital music, many like Migdail have turned to Vinyl.

“Music sounds better analog and specifically on vinyl. Of course, you get the physical deformations, your hisses, and your pops and your clicks, but it’s still a fuller richer sound if you[‘ve] got a halfway decent system just because it’s analog, not digital,” Migdail said.

Whether you like jazz, rap, folk, or country, music continues to be a culturally unifying force.

“Music is hardwired into humanity, there’s no culture that exists that doesn’t have music,” Migdail said. “To ask why do you like music is in some ways to ask are you a human.”

LIFESTYLE

September 2018

5

Determination of success: talent vs. genes Mandy Hitchcock

“It’s not my fault — I was born without any talent.”

“I’m just unlucky because my parents’ genes aren’t helpful.”

“This is so unfair; they don’t have to work hard to be good at this.”

Such statements can be common excuses for measuring a peer or competitor throughout daily life. The sizing up of another out of the corner of one’s eye can consume the thoughts of anyone.

While the outstanding qualities of a select few may appear as a God-given gift to those hailed by their abilities, the true balance of talent relies on genetic makeup in relevance to the extent of their hard work and endeavors.

Malcolm Gladwell is a writer for The New Yorker and the author of “Outliers: The Story of Success.” He has been acknowledged by The Washington Post, Time magazine, and The New Yorker, as well as a recipient of the American Sociological Association’s first Award for Excellence in the Reporting of Social Issues in 2007.

“Achievement is tal­ ent plus preparation. The problem with this view is that the closer psychologists look at the careers of the gifted, the smaller the role innate talent seems to play and the bigger the role preparation plays,” Gladwell said in Outliers.

Dr. Ling Fu is a biomedical researcher at the biotechnology corporation Genentech.

“Before you are even born, your genetic makeup is already decided. However, it is your habits and choices that you make right now that will ultimately decide what your

Photo by Josh Tseng Design by Mandy Hitchcock

future will be,” Fu said.

Contrary to popular belief, experience appears to play a more crucial role than DNA ever would, according to Fu. Karina Tseng, a junior, is a musician in Carlmont’s Symphony Orchestra and looks to pursue music in college.

“There is always a certain level of talent or how good someone naturally is at something, and it might give people an advantage, but ultimately, this doesn’t define how strong of a musician you are,” Tseng said.

“If someone who is really talented doesn’t practice and work hard, not only is their progress going to be slower, but it’ll also be really apparent that their effort and passion is lower.”

Of course, a set threshold of attributes can be taken advantage of in such an example of possessing beneficiary traits.

According to Gladwell’s research, once this inherited “threshold” is met, a steady stream of effort then further defines success.

Caleb Metzler, a junior, is a runner on the Varsity Cross Country team. His personal best mile time is 4:33. Metzler’s parents both took part in their school’s cross country and track teams throughout high school.

“It is very hard to identify certain hereditary traits that may help me run faster, but I do feel like I am very lucky to have fit parents who value exercise,” Metzler said.

Having supportive parents and peers can aid in promoting a constant source of encouragement for a person to further their chance at the achievement. This, in part, can contribute to the overall focus of experience and practice for that individual

to reach success.

Metzler said, “The best piece of advice for any runner or athlete that has a goal is to stay consistent — consistent training is the only way a runner is able to improve and reach their best.”

Parallel to such a perspective, the amount and degree of practice that is accumulated over time reap greater benefits than innate talent overall.

Gladwell’s research has determined a practice time quota that incurs success.

“In fact, researchers have settled on what they believe is the magic number for expertise: ten thousand hours,” Gladwell said.

Fu confirms the extent of genetic traits impacting daily life as influenced by the corresponding surroundings.

However, the amassed experiences according to a constant setting and those in present company will by far leave the lasting effects.

“I believe that one’s genetic makeup plays a substantial role in defining their life, but its exact impact varies depending on the individual,” Fu said. “Environment and its subsequent influences on our choices can also have a big impact on a person’s development.”

And once the limited genetic variations existing at birth are overcome by a steady stream of hours of dedication and practice, true enjoyment and passion can consummate the appreciation for doing what one loves.

Gladwell said, “Practice isn’t the thing you do once you’re good. It’s the thing you do that makes you good.”

Reality television does not represent reality Veronica Roseborough

Every morning, one wakes up, eats breakfast, and gets ready to start their day, nothing out of the ordinary. All they have to do is complete the day’s tasks, go home, sleep, and do it all again the next morning.

If they have some time to spare throughout the day, they may turn on the television and perhaps watch a show involving people that get up, eat breakfast, and get ready to start their day.

Nothing out of the ordinary, except for the fact that these people are being filmed.

This kind of entertainment is known as reality television. While today, most associate the term with shows such as “Keeping up with the Kardashians” or “The Bachelor,” it started out as quite simply the filming of an average American family.

Has reality television strayed too far from its roots?

According to The Washington Post, PBS piloted reality television with their series “An American Family,” which aired from January to March of 1973.

Producer Craig Gilbert’s initial purpose, they said, was to expose the imperfections of American society through an accurate portrayal of an average family. He valued simply recording over editing and truly wanted to portray reality, hence the name reality television, so that the audience could relate.

Today, that title takes on a whole new meaning. In contrast to Gilbert’s original perspective, current reality television revolves around real people being put into somewhat unrealistic situations to see how they react.

However, sophomore Sophie Brack watches “The Bachelor” series, and believes that this newfangled take on reality hinders the relatable aspects of its origins. “[Reality tv] mainly features wealthy people in society like the Kardashians that many people cannot relate to,” Brack said. “The show can sometimes be convincing as a realistic portrayal, but in the long run, it is mostly for entertainment.”

“Project Runway” is a popular reality television show in which self-proclaimed fashion designers have the opportunity to audition, compete in design challenges, and jump-start their careers.

Ultimately, the top designers get to display their collection of 10 or so pieces at New York Fashion Week for the chance to win $100,000 and much more.

Though there was little discrepancy in the storyline of “Project Runway: Season 12,” in an interview with SF Gate, runner-up Alexandria von Bromssen revealed that it housed a very manipulative environment, especially in the editing.

Like most shows today, it is somewhat apparent that the participants, such as those on “Project Runway,” are not filmed 24/7, as each only has a limited amount of time on air.

This can raise the question of whether or not the editing and possible writing of a show take away from the reality of it, therefore hindering the name.

“I don’t think it’s scripted per se, but I do think that it is more produced than it seems. I think that the producers have their voices in the contestants’ ears feeding them little white lies and such to make them do things like start fights, etc,” said Abby Brendza, a junior. “I’m sure some things are genuine, but I think most of the contestants’ actions have some prompting from the producers.”

Before becoming a contestant on the show, von Bromssen did not know how difficult of a task it would be.

“In a million years, I could never have imagined how hard doing the show was. I never realized the kind of conditions you have to go through. I’m shocked. I didn’t sleep much during the show and I got very sick at one point,” she said.

Though some may argue that these pressing conditions are what makes the show entertaining, audiences are unaware of what those conditions actually are, just as von Bromssen was.

“I tried my best on every challenge but remember, you don’t sleep, you’re under pressure, and people are crazy.

You don’t know how hard it is to wake up at 3:45 a.m. every day after going to bed at midnight without a day off. I didn’t even look like myself,” von Bromssen said.

The environment of “Project Runway” seemed to have not only influenced von Bromssen’s experience, but also the portrayal of her personality.

“They wanted to make me the villain. It’s a strategy, it’s all a strategy. If you were thrown in a room with 15 strange people, you need to develop a superhero character or something to deal,” von Bromssen said. “After you step away from it and see if you know who you are, it’s not you.

It’s sad.”

No longer does reality television show it like it is, but what it could be, with a little editing.

Von Bromssen’s account of her time on “Project Runway,” however, is just one of many experiences.

“Global Extremes,” which aired primarily in 2003, was a reality television show that involved teams of four racing all over the U.S. and competing in different challenges along the way, similar to the more current “Amazing Race.”

Victor Nunnemaker, a contestant on episode five of the show titled “Global Extremes: Mt. Everest” said that although the contestants were influenced by the conditions imposed upon them, the events that took place were not staged.

“It was extremely authentic and difficult, however, they did tend to try to find dramatic events and create stories around people. The races were real though, and we slept out in an igloo, ran and rode bikes in the snow, swam across the Colorado River in freezing rapids, rappelled, kayaked, and did a plethora of exciting competitions, often for 24 hours straight without sleep,” Nunnemaker said.

Nunnemaker was one of 100 contestants selected for the show out of over 700 applicants and for a while, he was very successful.

“I made it to the final 12 and was poised to be selected for the final five when I found out that my wife Marie was pregnant and that if I went on in the competition, my first child would be born while I was climbing the mountain,” Nunnemaker said.

He was then forced to choose between conquering Everest, a feat that few people have accomplished, or being there for the birth of his daughter, and of course, he chose his daughter.

“Each show some of the racers would be cut based on judging, races, fitness, etc. I told one of the judges who had become a friend the situation and that they should cut me as I could not go on to the finals, so they just cut me before Everest,” Nunnemaker said. “He told me I would have made it otherwise as I had always finished in the top six to seven athletes.”

However, if the show had stayed true to Gilbert’s original depiction of reality television, the reason for Nunnemaker’s departure would have been revealed.

So, the reality of it is that reality television has strayed from its original intent, depicting real life in its truest form.

However, at the end of the day, no matter the controversy, it’s all entertainment.

Reality is not something one watches, it something they live.

SPORTS

6

September 2018

New football regulations shatter enjoyment Briana McDonald Scot Center Editor-in-Chief

As the defender completes what looks like a clean hit, a flag is thrown.

What were previously seen as textbook tackles are now being penalized.

In March of 2018, the NFL approved that it is a foul if a player lowers his head to initiate and make contact with his helmet against an opponent. “Contact does not have to be to an opponent’s head or neck area — lowering the head and initiating contact to an opponent’s torso, hips, and lower body, is also a foul,” according to the NFL. Penalties for this violation include a loss of 15 yards, an automatic first down if initiated by the defense, and the ejection of the player.

This new penalty has been on full display throughout the 2018 NFL preseason. The San Francisco 49ers received a few of these new penalties in a Saturday night game on Aug. 18 against the Houston Texans. 49ers’ running back Raheem Mostert executed a play on punt coverage earning him a penalty that only led to more controversy on the new rule.

“Another ridiculous interpretation of the NFL’s new lowering-helmet law: Raheem Mostert delivered a great on punt coverage, only to get flagged,” Cam Inman of the Bay Area News Group tweeted.

“Looked like he led with shoulder and not his helmet.”

Not only are football analysts critical of this new rule, players are especially disapproving of the regulation because of the effect it has on how they play.

Cornerback Richard Sherman of the 49ers tweeted, “There is no ‘make adjustment’

to the way you tackle. Even in a perfect form tackle, the body is led by the head.

The rule is idiotic and should be dismissed immediately. When you watch rugby players tackle they are still lead by their head. Will be flag football soon.”

Even in a world of instant replay and slow motion from many angles, it is difficult to determine what kind of tackles fall under this new rule.

“Rules to prevent injury are needed within reason,” athletic trainer Ann Sbardellati said. “Leading with your head can be judged in a lot of different ways.

Leading with your head towards a target you’re trying to hit with your shoulder — there’s a very fine line between the two.”

The coaching of how a tackle is going to be executed has evolved throughout the years, with player safety on the forefront.

Varsity linebacker and guard Darian Dennler, a senior, said, “When I first started playing we were taught to put our head in the impact zone, but as the years

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have gone on, ever since my sophomore year of high school, they started changing the protocol in which you tackle. We went from the well-known football tackle to what’s now called a rugby tackle, using the ball carrier’s momentum against them rather than running through them, which to many high school players is significantly harder than the classic way of stopping your opponent.”

The transformation to a rugby tackle and the addition of new regulations in the game of football has also been a big factor on how players go about playing on the field.

Varsity linebacker Jayden Kuhn, a senior, said, “As high school football players we’re taught to just keep our head out of tackles completely and to force our body into a position where we hit with our shoulder every time. It definitely helps perfect our technique, but there are also sometimes when we have to give up a play in order to prevent any penalties.”

The game of football is still seen as one of the greatest forms of entertainment in American culture.

Fans anticipate the big hits and crave to see the physicality of the game, but many fans aren’t aware of how much force there is behind those big hits and the impact it has on the player’s bodies.

“From the fan’s point of view, they want to see the player that is going to hit really hard. When watching football games, you can clearly see how players are being held back from making big tackles. It can take the entertainment away from watching a player play the game as it should be,” Kuhn said.

Football fans are engaged with

the player’s passion for the game. The feeling players experience from powerful plays is one of the reasons why players continue to play the game.

“I don’t think football players hate to be seen as entertainment,” Dennler said.

“When you go out and make a big hit and hear the crowds reaction, it makes you feel good. Football players play the game to make those big hits, it’s a rush, an energy you don’t get from anything else.”

Yet with the constantly growing list of rules on how football is played, both players and fans are afraid that the game of football is changing significantly, and not for the better.

Varsity head football coach Jake Messina said, “I do believe that the sport of football is changing and it has to change. We have highly affluent people in our area, and when they see reports about concussive episodes they are understandably concerned about concussions and some cases pulling their kids from football.”

With the obvious need for regulation in the sport for player safety, who makes rules comes into question.

Varsity tight end Matt Vo, a junior, said, “The game of football is dying out because of the fear of head injuries, so I believe that these regulations are needed for the health of the players and the health of the game overall. I think if players are going to risk their bodies to play a sport like football they should also have a say in what rules are made to the game.”

It is a balance that committees such as USA Football and the NFL have to make between keeping the player’s safety in mind and letting the players play when creating and implementing new rules.

“I don’t think new rules and regulations are making the game any softer,” Messina said. “New regulations are there to eliminate a lot of concussive episodes.”

Specializing in more than one sport increases enjoyment Alena Ruhstaller

It’s a widely held belief that athletes must specialize in a sport as a middle schooler in order to be recruited to play in college.

That’s often not the case.

According to a study by the National Collegiate Athletic Association, in 2017, 71 percent of Division I football players played multiple sports in high school. In addition, 30 of the 32 first round picks in the 2017 NFL draft were multisport athletes.

“I played soccer, basketball, and softball throughout middle school,” said Amanda Kondo, a junior. “Playing all these sports allowed me to improve my agility and skills along those lines.”

Kondo committed to play softball for the University of California, Berkeley, “I started my recruiting process around seventh grade. I was always interested in playing Division I softball and wanted to stay close to home, so UC Berkeley became the perfect

fit.”

Due to her early commitment, Kondo wasn’t able to participate in other high school sports. However, new regulations offer another avenue for high school athletes.

“The college recruitment process has recently changed their rules, where people can’t verbally commit to play college sports until Sept. 1 of their junior year of high school. I think these new rules will allow people to stay multi-sport for longer,” Kondo said.

Carlmont Athletics offers a large spectrum of sports to all of its students, varying from golf to football. The extensive athletic programs give students the opportunity to compete in sports to represent their school or try something that they’ve never played before.

“I started to play water polo and compete in swimming during my freshman year,” sophomore Zachary Nathan said. “Initially, I wanted to play water polo because

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I love the water and I also thought it would be a great way to meet new people and make friends going into a new school.”

By swimming and playing water polo, Nathan was able to experience the significance of both team sports and individual performance.

“Water polo is a smaller team with more cooperation between teammates and feels more like a team sport than swimming does.

Both teams are very spirited, but I find that water polo has a tighter team bond and everyone is friends inside and outside of the pool,” he said.

According to Dr. Charles Popkin of Columbia University, children who specialize in sports at a younger age are the first ones to quit their sport and end up having higher inactivity rates as adults.

By encouraging their children to play multiple sports during their youth, parents can help ensure that their children will maintain their interests for a longer period

of time.

“I’ve been playing basketball since I could walk and volleyball since eighth grade and played both of them back home in Arkansas,” Gaby Pierce, a junior, said. “I started track for Carlmont for the first time during my sophomore year since my dad longjumped for track at James Mason University so I tried it as well.”

Due to participating in basketball and track at Carlmont, Pierce was able to greatly increase her vertical for volleyball while also developing a passion for each.

“I honestly can’t think of specializing in one sport and giving any up, because the sports that I play have become who I am,” Pierce said. “I might not be outstanding at them, but I put in the effort and it keeps me in shape.”

On the other hand, a lot of athletes have chosen to play only one sport in high school because of their passion and dedication to it.

Vincent Wai, a junior, started playing soccer in third grade and

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played baseball from fourth grade to eighth grade. Wai then decided to focus on pursuing soccer and plays for Carlmont along with the San Carlos United Soccer Club.

“High school soccer is a much bigger commitment than club which is sometimes hard to give.

Club is more enjoyable because you are with a group of people you’ve been playing with for many seasons,” Wai said. “Your coach and teammates in club also know your strengths and weaknesses, so the team chemistry is much stronger and it’s easier to play.”

By playing both club and school, Wai is able to experience a combination of coaching and practicing styles.

Wai said, “I benefit more from club from the technical aspect of the game, the movement, skills, and the tactical part of the sport.

High school soccer gets you in better shape as you have practice every day with two games a week.

It’s a mix of both that makes them so fun.”

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SPORTS

September 2018

7

Booster club less biased than perceived Samantha Chu

A football player walks into the football locker rooms. He puts on his custom-fit jersey, and gets ready for the game. As the game is about to start, he enters the field through a flurry of pompoms.

A baseball player walks into the physical education locker rooms. He puts on his jersey, which has been used by numerous Carlmont players before him, and heads out to the baseball field.

On his way there, he passes the portable toilets and sets his bag down in the dugout.

The common belief is that these differences are caused by football unjustly getting more Booster Club funding than other sports out of popularity, but that is not the

case.

The Booster Club was created to raise money and awareness for Carlmont Athletics.

Around $75,000 is raised annually, and according to Athletic Director Patrick Smith, every sport is a part of the budget.

Every sport at gets some money from the Booster Club, though it may be uneven due to differences between the sports.

Different sports get differing amounts of money. Lacrosse requires more equipment than swim.

“Anytime you’re looking at funding, you have to look at the cost for an individual player to be in that sport. Look at a soccer player; they have a uniform, a soccer ball, and goals. A lacrosse player needs a

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stick, helmet, shoulder pads, shorts, and a jersey. You can tell the difference,” Smith said. “Another example is football. Football teams cost more to run, so football gets more [money]…[Football] definitely will cost more to fund than a sport that has less equipment just by nature of the differences in sports.”

Some sports, such as boys water polo, understand this concept and find that the amount of money they get is sufficient enough to buy what they need.

“We [water polo] don’t get much money, however, we also require less money than other sports,” Justine Hedlund, the varsity and JV boys water polo head coach, said.

Additionally, according to Smith, any item that the athlete gets to keep is not paid for by the Booster Club.

For instance, the Booster Club did not pay for the football jerseys with the players’ last names on the back; the football program paid for them by themselves.

Students, however, are frequently unaware of this, and they often don’t know that the unevenness in Booster Club funding is due to the varying cost of different sports; some athletes like Camden Scholl, a sophomore who was on the JV baseball team last year, think that funding is based on the popularity of the sport.

“I think that it makes sense for Carlmont to focus on football [regarding funding] because they’ve been trying to hype up football for the last couple of years, and football is more obvious to the rest of the school,” Scholl said. “The football field is right in the middle of campus, and the baseball field is all the way up away from the central campus. Because of that, the school is just more aware of football.”

Another factor that may have caused the general belief that football funding is

biased is that football makes money based off of crowd attendance.

According to head varsity football Coach Giacomo Messina, football is the only revenue-producing high school sport.

However, the money gained doesn’t go directly to the football program.

“Ninety-nine percent of our students [at Carlmont] wouldn’t go near a football practice [...] Meanwhile, it’s the guys that stay subject themselves to collisions and violence that many parents say are too dangerous for their child,” Messina said.

“Yet on Friday, magically, all the people that don’t want anything to do with football show up by the hundreds, sometimes thousands, to watch the game. And here is the kicker: they pay to get in… And all that money goes to the athletic department to fund the same sports that complain football gets too much money.”

Some athletes, however, still feel that the differences in funding are unfair, and they don’t see how the money made from football games or the amount of money they get from the Booster Club is adequate enough.

“For football, when they have a better season, they just get more stuff, which is good because it awards them for their achievements. But for girls golf, we went to PALs, and we won every match, but we still haven’t gotten any recognition for it,” Isabel Coughlan, a junior on Carlmont’s girls golf team, said.

In spite of the controversy surrounding the fundings for different sports, Booster Club still strives to provide money for what each sport is in need of.

Smith said, “Different coaches ask for different things; sometimes we can give it to them, and sometimes we can’t. It all just depends on what they’re asking for: if it’s really a need, or if it’s just a want.”

Being a student-athlete comes as a challenge Samantha Dahlberg Playing a sport can be all fun and games, except when trying to balance that sport with school.

Sometimes dealing with complicated practice hours makes it challenging to get work done.

Darian Dennler, a senior who plays both varsity football and tennis, said, “I have to choose between homework and sleep because I will get home from practice at 7 p.m. Then I need to have dinner and take a shower at 8:30 p.m. Either I do all of my homework, or I sleep, so something’s not going to get done. It is like if I finish all of my homework, I will not sleep a good amount.”

Dennler is not the only athlete who sacrifices sleep for school.

One way many student athletes try to balance school and sleep is by setting goals.

“Many athletes write their goals down. Dwight Howard, the Orlando Magic’s superstar center, keeps his goals on a sheet of paper, taped to a wall by his bedside.

Visualization is a very important technique for athletes. You cannot score a goal if you don’t see yourself shooting it in the top right corner of the net, correct? Creative visualization, as it is known, puts the athlete into a positive mental state. A happy player is a better player. Many pitchers use visualization as a mental training technique in order to achieve

peak performance on the mound,” according to Kevin Bertha from Bleacher Report.

Goal setting can be a possible benefit for coaches because it helps them see how their players want to improve.

“I try to get my athletes to achieve their goals through their own motivation. I mean it is not what you do during the season to become a better athlete is what you do during the offseason that is going to make you a better athlete. So I always tell them if they want to be competitive, then they have to learn how to compete with themselves first in order to get out of their comfort zones instead of sitting on the couch doing nothing versus getting up and going for a run, lifting weights, or whatever it might be,” James Jewett, basketball and track said.

Coaches tend to encourage their athletes to succeed, but it comes down to if the player is willing to listen to them or not.

“The motivation comes from within for them and they have to want to become better athletes.

They have to be prepared and ready when the season gets here versus waiting to get in shape since that is too late. It is based on the amount of work you put on your body and it all leads up to the season that you are going to participate in,” Jewett said.

One way in which players can boost their effectiveness, both on

the field and off, is by picturing themselves achieving their goals.

According to Laura M. Miele, Ph.D., from Psychology Today, “Athletes who can visualize themselves having success will be successful. Individuals must battle the inside voice that is telling them they cannot complete their goals. To silence this negative voice, athletes can visualize success and practice self-talk. Positive self-talk goes hand in hand with visualization with the athlete both hearing and seeing success.”

Playing on a team allows players to find ways to work together so they can win their game.

It can also contribute to the high school experience by mak-

ing them feel more a part of their community.

“I like being a student-athlete because it makes me feel healthier and sociable. Playing a school sport makes me feel more connected to the school and I really like it. I also like knowing the people that are not in my grade,” freshman Natalie Martin, who just joined varsity cheer, said.

Student-athletes sometimes believe that playing a sport shaped them into the person that they are today.

Marina Ferme, a junior, plays water polo and swims on the swim team.

“Sports have definitely made me a much harder worker by

making me understand how to work with people who are on different teams. I’ve become a much harder worker while also being more aware of things that may become tough. Sports teach you how to be tough and that is definitely something you need in life since you need to have pickle skin. Not everyone in life is going to be who you expect them to be and someone may hate you and you just need to deal with it on your own,” Ferme said.

Although the balance can be challenging, if athletes put time and effort into their work, they might realize that putting effort into both school and sports, will pay off.

Sean Vanderaa

8

CAMPUS

September 2018

Recycling doesn’t reduce or reuse Ailee Lim

Even though some people put effort into getting their waste in the right place, most recyclable items do not get recycled.

As of 2014, only 9 percent of the world’s plastic ends up recycled according to the Environmental Protection Agency.

There are several reasons why people choose not to recycle.

Some don’t think that recycling would make a difference, while others can’t recycle due to lack of resources, and many just don’t know how to recycle properly.

Lack of recycling around the world has detrimental effects on the environment. Plastic often is dumped in landfills even though it should be sent to a recycling center.

Plastic is a man-made substance that that is hard for the environment to break down; plastic bottles can take 450 years or longer to decompose.

Some recyclables have a dif-

ferent fate than ending up in a landfill; instead they get drained into the ocean. Currently, there is a massive pile of trash known as the Great Pacific garbage patch that floats in the ocean between California and Hawaii; it is about twice the size of Texas.

The response to this may be to recycle more. However, not all plastic is recyclable. There are seven classifications of plastic, and not all of them can be recycled.

Paul Keck, the Material Recovery Facility manager at South Bay Recycling said, “If it’s a marketable plastic, we get it to market.

Ones and twos are all we seek to market today.”

The other plastics don’t have much of a market nowadays, especially since China stopped buying recyclables from the United States, and they were the United States’ biggest buyer.

According to Keck, China bought 14 million tons of recyclables from the United States while

the rest of the world didn’t buy that much combined. The other plastics are the kinds of plastic that people need to limit their use of because they still take a long time to biodegrade and they can’t be recycled since there’s no market for them.

Some people can’t tell the difference between different kinds of plastics. Plastic that is recyclable includes mainly bottles: water bottles, shampoo bottles, and milk jugs.

Objects such as yogurt cups, straws, plastic toys can’t be recycled. However, there are some exceptions. Each collection company has a full list of what can and can’t be recycled.

Plastic bags especially are a problem due to their light weight.

Recycling companies use machines to sort the items. However, the plastic bags are separated from paper so they have to be sorted out by hand later.

According to Keck, this is the reason why places like the Bay

Area are trying to eliminate the use of plastic bags.

“Many communities are outlawing plastic bags. Bags you get at the check out are not the only plastic bags in the environment though. The bread I buy comes in a plastic bag. So it is hard to completely outlaw them because they are everywhere,” Keck said.

According to the Los Angeles Times, one of the main problems with Californians is that they try to recycle everything. This is okay until objects like batteries, golf balls, styrofoam, and other nonrecyclable objects also end up in the recycling bin.

When these items get recycled it costs the collection company because it is expensive to have to sort through all the items.

This is also the reason a fire started at South Bay Recycling in 2016. A lithium battery got recycled and blew up in the assembly line. It lit the paper and cardboard on fire and cost the company an estimated $6.5 million in repairs.

“Only recycle things that are shown by your collection company. When in doubt, don’t recycle it,” Keck said.

There have been measures at Carlmont to try to help with the plastic problem.

The tri-bin is a waste system that helps students get their waste into the right bin. Three bins next to each other are for trash, recycling, and compost.

There are pictures on the bins to show what goes where.

On some parts of the campus, however, there is only one trash can. For many students, it is easier to throw a plastic bottle in a trash can that is 10 feet away than to go searching for a recycling bin somewhere else on campus.

Kristen Leong, a junior, said, “I’ll throw my trash into the bin that is appropriate if it is in sight, but I won’t carry around trash all day to recycle it properly. We are killing our environment just because it’s more convenient.”

AP classes prepare students for college

Some question the value of the test versus the stress Taisiia Yakovenko Students take Advanced Placement classes (AP) in spite of the fact that many colleges do not accept them.

“The pressure to take as many AP classes as possible is very high,” Divya Menon, a senior, said. “If you don’t take AP classes you are labelled as a loser and people seem to believe that you just couldn’t do it.”

Today, the pressure to do well in high school is at an all-time high. Students nowadays, strive to show their talents by becoming a part of various organizations and try to show their academic excellence by taking rigorous classes.

The development of the AP Program and other similar programs has added onto that burden while attempting to provide the best form of education for students all across the board.

“The students are in an arms race to take as many AP classes as possible, paying a $100 per test for all the AP tests,” American government and economics teacher Karen Ramroth, who taught AP classes during the 2017 and 2018 school year, said. “The test only reflects certain kinds of skills that don’t necessarily represent all students well.”

Many students believe that they need to challenge themselves academically to the point where it does more harm than good in order to be more competitive with their college applications.

Based on that philosophy, students take as many AP classes as they can fit into their schedules which is clearly reflected in the rising participation rates as well as the number of classes in the AP program.

According to College Board, the AP participation increased

from about half a million students in 2007 to over a million in 2017.

With such popularity amongst the nation’s student population, AP classes have become a virtually mandatory element for those who want to be considered successful. The success of the AP program and its goal were reflected by the college graduation rates in the United States.

According to the Open Data Network, college graduation rates have risen from 27.9 percent in 2010 to 30.3 percent in 2016.

The AP program was not always perceived this way. Unfortunately, its original purpose has been slightly twisted and reinvented in the minds of students and their parents.

According to the College Board, during the 1950s, American educators started to notice an enormous gap in student knowledge between high school and college. This gap caused students to underperform and, overall, be unprepared to succeed in college.

In order to address this problem, the most prestigious schools established a program that attempted to span the widening gap between secondary and higher education.

By the start of the 1955 school year, the program was underway and College Board, a non-profit organization that tries to expand access to higher education, was invited to step in and take over the administration, creating what is now known as the AP program.

Over the years, the AP program has expanded its courses. As of today, they offer 38 courses and 38 AP exams.

According to College Board, the courses and tests allow students to stand out in college applications, skip introductory college classes, and learn the necessary

skills for academic success in college.

“I wish we got rid of the AP exams because the most competitive colleges no longer allow students to use them for college credit and they cause more stress among students than needed,” Connie Dominguez, a UC Davis application reader and Carlmont counselor, said. “Students feel that they need to load up on AP tests in order to build a competitive college profile. The College Board has capitalized on their anxiety by offering more AP tests and raising the cost.”

The original intent of the AP program was to allow for a more successful transition from high school to college with the necessary academic preparation. Indeed, the college graduation rates have been going up ever since the AP program was introduced.

With a clear pattern of success, the AP program became one of the crucial parts for those students that would like to show how academically competent they are.

Many choose to take AP classes even if they are not interested in them, putting more stress on themselves and even further emphasizing the role and importance of the AP Program in modern college applications. Though a balance of AP classes is encouraged, ultimately students should strive to take classes that spark their desire to learn.

“College Board is trying to justify their existence by modifying the AP Exam, which allows them to raise its passing rates,” AP Comparitive Government and U.S. History teacher Jarrod Harrison said. “Instead of just trying to take as many classes as possible, students should only take an AP class on the subject they are truly interested in.”

Molly Donaldson

Every May, students gather in the Scots gym to take their AP tests.

Molly Donaldson

CAMPUS

September 2018

9

Behind the cameras, trench coats, and fences Anna Feng

It’s passing period, and your Vans slap the pavement as you hurry down Highland Road to your next class. Out of the corner of your eye, you see a golf cart whiz by you. No, this isn’t the golf course staff — it’s Carlmont’s security team.

Mike Peni, Mary Tagilala, and Don Newt form Carlmont’s security personnel. They oversee the campus and make sure all the rules are being followed.

“Part of our duties entails us to monitor student behavior, secure the campus and investigate any disruptions or disturbances on campus,” Tagilala said. “We also enforce regulations and assist to make the campus a secure and safe place for students and staff.”

Carlmont has a closed campus, which means that students are not allowed to leave campus during school hours. For some students, this can be seen as a lack of freedom.

Tram Phan, a junior, said, “Over here, I know there are a lot of people who would like to go off campus — when I tell them that I went to an open campus, they

will tell me that they want to do that, they want to be able to leave campus.”

Phan attended Gunn High School, which has an open campus, her freshman year. This means that students can leave campus during school hours, while students on a closed campus such as Carlmont, cannot.

“There’s nothing wrong with having a closed campus, but after being at a school where open campus was a thing, I sort of miss having an open campus. It’s that little freedom that you get from having the option to not have to be at school for a short amount of time,” Phan said.

Closed campus schools have been a point of controversy for a long time, dating back to the 1950s. However, Carlmont’s administration feels that a closed campus offers an atmosphere of security and community that an open campus may not provide.

Administrative vice principle, Gregg Patner, said, “There are many dangers that could occur that we would be powerless to support with an open campus.

If they [the students] weren’t on campus, I feel that school may be

more transient, divided, and po- delivered to the office during this tentially less safe.” time.

Furthermore, an open campus However, this rule is often brocould pose an issue for student ken. security. According to Tagilala, an An app called DoorDash alopen campus woul change how lows students to order food and she does her job. have it delivered to them on cam“Having a pus. closed campus Kyle Wilkinmakes it easier for son, a junior, said, us to monitor and “I DoorDash only maintain a secure when me and campus,” Tagilala my friends [are] said. “The ability in the mood for for some students something speto bring drugs or cial or different. alcohol back into I’ve never been campus is an iscaught, but that’s sue that is already because I didn’t Mary Tagilala hard to monitor know it was not as it is with closed allowed. I thought campus, and I am it was okay just to pretty sure this will be even hard- get food.” er with freedom given to students The main concern of adminto leave campus.” istration regarding DoorDash is According to Tagilala, this may that it may create dangerous enviresult in the need to hire more se- ronment, according to Patner. curity to maintain a safe campus.

“When DoorDash drivers Additionally, Carlmont restricts come onto campus, we are not outside access to school grounds certain if they are safe. They have by non students while classes not been cleared by the school to are in session. Parents and other be present around students,” Patadults must be cleared by admin- ner said. istration, and all food must be According to the National

“It is our hope that students will see us around campus and feel at ease”

Center for Education Statistics (NCES), 89.6 percent of high schools in 2016 had a similar school policy. Another popular security device often used in high schools is the security camera.

“The security cameras assist us in identifying issues that occur or people involved in issues that occur on campus,” Patner said. “The footage is stored in computer memory if needed for later use.

Eventually, it is erased.”

Over the past 16 years, the use of the security camera in high schools has risen 44 percent, from 38.5 percent in 1999 to 82.5 percent in 2015, according to NCES. While these cameras can be found all over Carlmont’s hallways, only certain administrators and campus security can access and operate them.

Ultimately, these security measures are in place to protect the students, not to hinder them.

Tagilala said, “We enforce regulations and assist to make the campus a secure and safe place for students and staff. It is our hope that students will see us around campus and feel at ease knowing that we are there to help them and not otherwise.”

How ‘reel’ are Hollywood’s movies?

A deeper look inside Carlmont’s hallowed halls Victoria Valle Remond When walking the halls of Carlmont, it’s easy to forget that the school is over 65 years old.

It’s even easier to forget that its notable alumni extend from an NFL defensive tackle to a Saturday Night Live comedian. Or that half the school buildings we know today didn’t exist five years ago.

Yet some have managed to forget that in 1995, a movie based on one teacher’s experiences at Carlmont became a surprise boxoffice hit and dominated the popular culture of the late 1990s.

“Dangerous Minds” is based on the true story of LouAnne Johnson, an ex-Marine who took a position at Carlmont in 1989,teaching a support English class made up of teenagers from East Palo Alto.

The film is based on her book “My Posse Don’t Do Homework,” where she describes her efforts in teaching a class of black and hispanic teenagers below grade level.

However, it’s not widely known that much of what is seen on the screen is a Hollywood fabrication that doesn’t reflect Johnson’s true experience at Carlmont.

After she sold the film rights, Johnson had zero involvement with the script. As a result, the final product did not resemble her original narrative, but rather a dramatized, distorted version.

“I was really upset and so were my students about the way they were portrayed,” Johnson said in a 2015 interview with Slate Magazine.

For example, the movie in-

vented an interaction between Johnson and one of the students’ parents in which the latter insulted her and told her to stop teaching the kids.

“I asked them why they put [that scene] in,” Johnson said in the Slate article. “They said, ‘Well, we were sure that a lot of the black and Hispanic parents resented you for being white.’”

Johnson said that “[I] did have a student who told [me] he hated white people, [I] otherwise didn’t encounter such blatant name-

calling or hostility.”

Both the book and movie talked about the Hispanic and African-American students at Carlmont at this time with a focus on the tensions between East Palo Alto (EPA) kids and Belmont and San Carlos students. However, the movie presents EPA teens as a majority representative of the school’s demographic.

In reality, only 30 percent of students attending Carlmont in the 1990s were students from East Palo Alto, according to a 1997 SF

Gate article by John Wildermuth.

The presence of EPA kids at Carlmont has been a fixture since the 1970s. In 1976, alleged budgetary concerns forced the closure of the local Ravenswood High School, according to a 34page report submitted to the Sequoia Union High School District in 2013.

As a result, the district was subsequently forced to bus EPA students to nearby high schools such as Carlmont.

The sudden presence of black

Molly Donaldson

Carlmont has made many additions to campus since the premiere of “Dangerous Minds.”

and Hispanic students in a predominantly Caucasian demographic gradually resulted in racial tensions and academic imbalances such as those portrayed in the 1995 film.

However, “Dangerous Minds” is structured in a white savior narrative that undermines Johnson’s students and warps the truth behind the truth. Even then, Johnson’s story has not been the only one distorted by the silver screen.

For years, the lines between “a true story” and “based on a true story” have been blurred.

David McCandless is a data journalist who created the website Information is Beautiful, where he picks apart biopics scene by scene to determine historical accuracy.

Out of all the films he ranked, this average percentage of historical accuracy in a biographical film was 73 percent.

McCandless’s study shows that “Dangerous Minds” is not the only movie whose accuracy has been sacrificed for entertainment value.

Although things have changed drastically since the early 1990s, many who grew up during that time may remember “Dangerous Minds” and the impact it had on Bay Area culture and even our society as a whole.

Because of this, “Dangerous Minds” will inevitably live forever as a representation of Carlmont’s past, leaving the students and staff needing to work hard every day to prove to the world that Carlmont goes beyond its Hollywood portrayal.

10

Behind the Screens The Posting Cycle: Shoot, Edit, Post, Repeat

Step One

Olivia Gutierrez

Alisha Mitha

Nicolette Bolich

The process of posting a photo often follows a pattern: take multiple pictures, choose the best one, edit it until “perfection,” ask friends if it’s worth posting, come up with a seemingly “effortless” caption, and finally, post.

Many teens go through this cycle of trying to post the “perfect” picture.

The first step in making a picture “post-worthy” begins with editing it.

Typical apps used by teens to edit pictures include VSCO and Facetune. VSCO focuses on filters, lighting, and tools like exposure and saturation, while Facetune focuses primarily on altering a person’s physical aspects, such as reshaping their nose or heightening their cheekbones.

According to Facetune’s App Store preview description, “Every photo could use a touch up. Facetune provides easy-to-use, powerful tools to perfect every photo or selfie, making each one look like it came straight out of a high-fashion magazine. Now you can be sure that all your portraits show only the best version of you.”

Editing apps enhance a photos lighting or color in a positive way, too. However, there is a negative connotation when it comes to editing one’s physical appearance. Many teens don’t admit to making these alterations. “‘Photoshopping’ has a bad reputation and it can be embarrassing

because everyone just jumps and calls it fake,” a teenager who preferrs to stay anonymous said.

After editing a couple of photos and choosing the best, many ask their friends which one is “good enough” to post. Selectivity with pictures helps teenagers conform to the acceptable status quo and their social image.

“I’ll ask my friends if I should post a photo or not because sometimes I feel like I need a second opinion. If I send them two photos, I’d hope they’d help a friend out and choose the better one,” Nicolette Bolich, a junior at Notre Dame High School, said.

The photo is only half the battle; now comes the time to brainstorm caption ideas. The picture’s caption can make or break the post’s success.

According to a 2018 Slate article by Heather Schwedel, “The caption has become like the essay question after a multiple-choice test: the hard part.”

“I try to be as quirky and funny as possible. I’ll also ask my friends for any of their ideas. I have a section in my phone’s ‘Notes’ of just Instagram captions that I’ll always look at if I can’t think of anything,” Bolich said.

Once the edited picture is posted, it’s now time to wait, respond to comments, and see how many likes the post receives.

Soon enough, the process will repeat itself.

of the Perfect Post Social Media Perpetuates Artificial Impressions

Step Two

High schoolers often feel extensive pressure to fit in at school.

Acceptance from peers is determined by their appearance, friend group, and social status, all contributed to by social media.

Many famous influencers have published videos on YouTube that focus on how to model and edit to have “Instagram-worthy” photos, or have shown themselves holding photoshoots specifically for their Instagram accounts.

In her video titled “How to look good in every photo - Insta/Model Tips,” YouTuber Allegra Shaw said, “Tip number one is know your angles. You should know your face, you should know what looks best.”

These videos and posts often pressure teenagers to look a certain way and to post photos with the intentions of impressing their peers.

“Society always makes you want to look perfect all the time.

Whether it’s seeing ‘perfect’ people all the time on Instagram or at school, it’s always a constant race to be the best-looking,” Maya Debono, a senior, said.

This is where editing photos comes into play. Because of society’s standards and pressures, students edit their blemishes to hide their “imperfections.”

“I’ve used Facetune to edit acne,” Supriya Haldankar, a junior, said. “I used to [feel pressured by society] but to be honest now I don’t really care about my appearance.”

With age and increased exposure to influencers, teenagers

have become more comfortable with themselves and their social media profiles. Many now understand that influencers’ social media platforms are not a true depiction of reality.

“Looking at a model’s picture of course makes you reflect on your own life and compare it to theirs. However, I feel like our society is improving in recognizing that no one’s Instagram accurately reflects their life,” Kenna Kwok, a junior, said.

While some teens have become more comfortable with their image on social media, others have not. The pressures of society have grown to negatively impact adolescents as they develop into adults.

“I have worked with many situations where social media has impacted students in various ways, especially females. It’s a matter of someone posting a selfie, feeling good about how they look in the photo, and then a flurry of hateful comments follow in an attempt to chip away at their self-esteem,” S.O.S. coordinator Shelley Bustamante said.

Beauty influencers are fully aware of the impacts they are making on the younger generations, and some even disapprove of the attention they’re receiving in response to their posts.

In a 2017 Cosmopolitan interview, social media influencer Alexis Ren said, “Looking up to girls for [inspiration] is a beautiful thing, but comparing yourself is what creates the anxiety and self-hatred [...]

It’s really important that young girls know the difference.”

Pictures by Anna Zigmond-Ramm, Articles by Rachel Matatyaou, and Page Design by Nisha Marino

12

FEATURES

September 2018

Doctor shortage plagues America The number of U.S. doctors is failing to meet demand Kylie Lin Scotlight Editor in Chief In the spring of 2018, Will AlvarezRutz, a junior, was hospitalized six times for severe cases of lung collapse known as pneumothorax.

After his stay in the hospital, undergoing lung surgery twice for his condition, Alvarez-Rutz’s admiration for medical professionals soared.

“I gained an even greater respect for doctors than I already had,” Alvarez-Rutz said. “I knew that was where I wanted to be when I grow up.”

Medical physicians were the heroes of Alvarez-Rutz’s story. On a grander scale, they treat people all over the United States, maintaining people’s health and saving lives.

However, the U.S. currently faces a severe shortage of medical physicians, and it’s not because their numbers are dropping.

Rather, demand is expected to skyrocket.

A 2018 annual study from the Assosiaation of American Medical Colleges (AAMC) found that by 2030, the demand for physicians in the U.S. will exceed supply.

The report projected a shortfall of between 42,600 and 121,300 medical physicians.

“There’s already a divide between people who can access health care easily and those who cannot,” Taejoon Ahn, president and CEO of the John Muir Medical Group in Walnut Creek, said. “I think that this shortage will exacerbate that inequality between the haves and the have-nots.”

In the U.S., there is an especially pressing shortage of primary care physicians. These doctors, such as general pediatricians, usually will perform the initial evaluation of patients in a community. One potential reason for their shortage is that primary care physicians are generally paid less than

Kylie Lin

specialists like surgeons.

“We are among the lowest paid in the medical industry, but we’re sort of the happiest,” Angeline Hadi, a general pediatrician from the Palo Alto Medical Foundation, said. “I think that’s because of the population that we serve, young families who are very upbeat and energetic.

For an older population, it’s harder to feel like that.”

Furthermore, the 2018 AAMC study found that the U.S. population aged 65 and over is projected to grow by 50 percent by 2030. Because senior consumption of health care is higher than that of younger populations, the study indicates that the overall percentage in demand for medical care will increase correspondingly.

The initial solution to this shortage would appear to be just training and hiring

more doctors.

However, according to a 2017 press release from the AAMC, medical school enrollment was up 28 percent from 2002.

Meanwhile, the national shortage of doctors persists.

“It may not even be a matter of training more doctors,” Ahn said, “but instead incentivizing clinicians to enter primary care and other shortage areas.”

Universities across the country have offered scholarships and lowered the costs of medical school to allow students to choose a wider range of practices upon graduation.

New York University eliminated medical school tuition altogether in August 2018.

“NYU making tuition free for their medical schools is nice in theory,” Ahn said. “One of the things I’ve heard from the NYU folks is that medical students will be

able to pick specialties based on what they love doing rather than being saddled with debt that forces them into high-paying subspecialties.”

Nevertheless, according to Ahn, salaries still tend to be a driving factor.

“I think a major factor for them choosing high-paying subspecialties is because once they graduate residency and start practicing in the real world, those specialties pay higher,” Ahn said. “That’s always going to be a driver.”

Other solutions to the doctor shortage take a more technological look at the problem. According to Ahn, telemedicine (the practice of communicating with a physician virtually) and artificial intelligence (where a programmed software interacts with patients) are two potential solutions to meet the impending demand for doctors.

“It remains to be seen whether scalability, quality, and acceptance will be doable,” Ahn said. “What we’re talking about are folks who are going to try to use artificial intelligence or different telemedicine options to try to figure out if there’s a way we can scale health care delivery in the primary care sphere.”

In the meantime, a new generation of doctors-to-be is on the rise. Students, like Alvarez-Rutz, are continuing to pursue medical careers.

“I can really understand the impact that one surgery or one procedure can make on a patient,” Alvarez-Rutz said. “Even if it’s a smaller thing, it improves their quality of life. In the more extreme cases, it saves their life. It would be so gratifying to know that I helped someone.”

But not all doctors can be specialists surgeons. The hope for the future is that students will enter all types of medical careers to counter the doctor shortage.

Loopholes in FDA approval process could pose a threat Sam Hanlon Only one in one thousand products that enter the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) testing process will make it to clinical trials.

The FDA has approved countless products such as the antibiotic Penicillin, allergy medication Allegra-D, and common HIV therapy, Antiretroviral.

The approval process can take up to 12 years and cost up to $350 million.

The process can be divided into three main sections: laboratory testing, clinical trial, and application approval.

According to Drugs.com, the laboratory testing phase lasts around three and a half years. It involves the company testing their product in a synthetic environment in order to determine its safety and marketability.

If said drug passes the lab testing guidelines, it then moves on to a multi-step clinical trial phase. Testing it in a human environment allows the company to make the necessary changes to the product for its ability to be used by human beings.

The clinical trial phase allows for the drug or device to be tested and manipulated in real life scenarios and brings forth any problems which were not found in the previous phase.

The following step involves the application for the product to actually go to market. In their application, a company must submit all the findings of their laboratory and clinical trials. They also must include a sponsor (someone who takes responsibility for the performance of the drug or device) and an investigator ( the individual who was in charge of the clinical trial). This final component of the approval process can take as long as two years to complete.

Given the thoroughness of the traditional FDA approval process, many assume the FDA is equally vigilant with all their products: that is not necessarily the case.

“Most people believe when they get [a medical de-

vice] implanted like a pacemaker, that the device has gone through appropriate testing to show that they are effective and safe,” Dr. Michael Carome, director of Public Citizen’s health research group, said. “But for more moderate and high-risk devices, that’s not the case.”

In fact, a loophole within the approval process allows companies to bypass the majority of the standard testing process.

The loophole, known as the 510(k) plan, saves years of testing and clinical trials for companies.

As technology improves, medical devices change and improve as well. If these devices change or update, they must be re-approved.

The 510(k) process simply requires that companies prove their product is equivalent to a product that is already on the market.

Though this path was created as an exception for truly similar devices on the market, it has now become the unofficial rule.

According to the Netflix documentary “The Bleeding Edge,” 98 percent of products on the market have gained approval through the 510(k) plan. One example of this is cobalt, used as the metal for hip replacements. The cobalt or “metal on metal” hip joint was approved via the 510(k) plan and still remains on the market.

But these joint replacements have caused numerous complications.

According to “The Bleeding Edge,” thousands of patients who received cobalt hip replacements face problems such as implant failure and cobalt toxicity.

Implant failure requires that the joint be surgically removed and then replaced once again.

According to the British Medical Journal, cobalt implants have above a 50 percent failure rate within six years.

Perhaps the most alarming complication, however, is the decaying of the joint and subsequent metal debris in the body.

This can cause metallosis and cobalt toxicity, the poisoning which occurs when cobalt levels in the blood are too high.

Cobalt poisoning can cause symptoms with varying degrees of severity.

However, psychosis and tissue decay seem to be the most troubling side effects.

Despite this, cobalt joints remain on the market alongside countless other products which Victoria Valle Reymond were approved using the same 510(k) plan.

As technology and medical devices continue to evolve, the FDA approval process and 510(k) loophole will remain prominent in the biotechnology field.

Consumers should be wary of defective medical devices.

FEATURES

September 2018

Behind the Bay Area

Beyond the white collar Lizzy Hall

Silicon Valley, the epicenter of innovation, the home of Tesla and Apple, the center of unprecedented wealth creation; unless, you are a blue collar worker.

In the past 20 years, the closure of factories and the growth of startup companies have affected the culture of Silicon Valley.

This change has directly impacted those in manual labor jobs and has altered future career paths of Bay Area high schoolers.

This cultural shift is evident in the manufacturing field of Silicon Valley.

One such company in this field is General Pencil company. Katie Vanoncini, the president, oversees the factory in Jersey City, N.J., and its Bay Area warehouse.

The company’s sustainable layout and unwillingness to outsource jobs have kept General Pencil thriving for the past 130 years.

“One way that [companies] can make money is to outsource their middle-class sort of middle management jobs to cheaper jobs overseas. When they do that they can show a higher return on investment to their shareholders or their investors and so it’s just a fast solution to make you money, but it’s not a sustainable solution,” Vanoncini. said Many Silicon Valley tech corporations have sent their manufacturing jobs overseas so that they can pay lower wages and give fewer benefits to their employees.

In March 2017, Apple stated in a press release that they have created and supported 4.8 million jobs in China.

According to 24/7 Wallstreet, this is nearly 2.5 times the number of jobs that Apple has created in the United States.

The outsourcing of labor jobs by large corporations such as Apple has left the working class few opportunities in the manufacturing field.

General Pencil is the rare exception.

“Keeping jobs in US you know that there’s already regulations in place for fair living wages, there’s an emphasis on having health care, and there’s other benefits that help you have a higher standard of living,” Vanoncini said.

Finding employment is just one challenge that blue collar workers in the Bay Area must overcome.

Dave Mercurio is the owner of Complete Carpet and Upholstery Cleaners and he witnesses the impact of Bay Area housing prices on his employees.

“I live in San Mateo, and my employees live in San Mateo.

My employees live at home with their parents because the cost of living is so high here. Paying rent, PG&E,

food, utilities, and other expenses make the cost of living so high,” Mercurio said.

Many other members of the working class are forced to commute into the Bay Area for work from as far as the San Joaquin Valley.

Workers at a local San Carlos nail salon emphasized the changes to the cost of living: “We live in San Jose because it is too expensive to live on the Peninsula.

However, even in San Jose, the housing has become more expensive.”

The cost of living in the Bay Area is continuing to increase, so schools are trying to compensate by preparing students for high paying careers.

Classes that were once offered such as woodshop and home economics, have been replaced by classes such as computer science and graphic design.

According to Palo Alto online, the Computer Science Curriculum Design Advisory Committee from Palo Alto has recommended that computer science be treated like a core subject taken from grades K-12 and be a requirement to graduate from high school.

They reason that making instruction of Computer Science more widely available would level the playing field between the “haves” and the “have-nots” in Palo Alto.

Another reason for supporting this is that courses would mirror the typical jobs of Silicon Valley.

Bay Area youth are proponents of the tech industry because they can get high paying jobs directly out of college.

In contrast, traditional blue collar jobs are typically mastered after years of practice.

“Now people want to go out and get high paying jobs, but you need to start from the bottom and work your way up and learn like I did,” Mercurio said.

This shift in industry has come as a result of high housing prices, as well asthe outsourcing of labor jobs, and the loss of career training classes in the non tech spectrum.

If this loss of career variation continues, the future of both blue collar workers and the economy of Silicon Valley could look grim.

“People are blind to the fact that no matter what what area you live in you still need teachers, you need doctors, you need police officers, you need people to clean houses and people to paint houses, you need gardners,” Vanoncini said. “We’re the capital of innovation, so obviously tech rules the culture here, but every type of job [is important].”

13

Sex trafficking and child exploitation Kimberly Mitchell

Among technology’s titans lies one of the largest criminal industries in the nation, one that some have labeled “the new crack cocaine” — the human trafficking industry.

While drugs can only be sold once, children on the streets of California can be sold over and over again.

It is estimated that an exploiter can make $650,000 per year selling children.

In an interview with NBC News in 2010, Alameda County District Attorney Sharmin Bock said that the child sex industry is “far more lucrative than selling drugs and there’s none of the risk and none of the overhead.”

The San Francisco Bay Area has become a magnet for child exploitation; however, due to its underground nature, child exploitation has long flourished under the radar of many Bay Area residents as well as local officials.

Terri Goehner is the Director of Resources Development of Advent Ministries, a non-profit that runs one of the few residential programs in the nation for survivors of child exploitation called the Nest.

According to Goehner, there are several misconceptions surrounding human trafficking.

“People need to understand that the trafficking of children is not something that happens overseas,” Goehner said.

“There are children being bought and sold right here, in our communities.”

In the past two years, California’s nine human trafficking task forces identified 1,277 victims and though the public perception is that human trafficking victims are from other countries, a report made by the California Department of Justice in 2012 found that 72 percent of human trafficking victims in California were native born.

There is no specific profile for a child who is exploited.

Organizations such as the Nest have found that the trafficking and exploitation of children cuts across socioeconomic and ethnic lines.

However, the full magnitude of the child sex trade is unknown.

“Since it’s such an underground industry it’s hard to say [what] a true representation of human trafficking in the Bay Area,” Bian Wo, the co-founder of the Bay Area Anti Trafficking Coalition (BAATC), said.

Though the percentage of human trafficking cases the Rape Trauma Services (RTS) encounters in a year is slim, Program Director Amanda Freeman believes

that when it comes to identifying and treating victims of human trafficking — they are just at the tip of the iceberg.

“Because human trafficking is so traumatic, people will often say that they have not been exploited even when they have,” Freeman said. “So we don’t really have an accurate number on how many are being trafficked in areas such as San Mateo County, we do know that we are missing a lot of it.”

Over the last decade, the Bay Area income inequality has become one of the highest in America.

With the deepening divide between the haves and the have nots, not only has the price of housing has skyrocketed, but also homelessness and the human trafficking industry.

Vanessa Russell is the founder of the non-profit organization, Love Never Fails.

She believes that the lack of affordable housing has given rise to the number of human trafficking victims.

“People are getting involved in survival sex,” Russell said. “I can’t tell you how many people I have encountered in the streets being exploited that’ll tell me that they have jobs and that they’re in nursing programs that they’re in school, but because they can’t make ends meet they’re standing on a street corner on East 14 International Boulevard having their body being sold to strangers.”

According to Freeman, over 40 percent of teenagers who were sexually exploited for the first time did so in order to pay for housing.

“There’s this mentality that we can’t do anything about this, that it’s so overwhelming that we just can’t do anything and I think that is not true,” Freeman said.

One of the most powerful ways people can help fight human trafficking is through spreading awareness and understanding not only what human trafficking is, but how to identify it.

Goehner believes that high school students and young adults have an even greater platform to protect other children in their communities.

“High school students have a great deal of power because they understand technology, and can spread awareness through social media, encourage politicians, and can volunteer at local organizations,” Goehner said. “We have a responsibility to be the voice for those who don’t have a voice and children who are being trafficked.”

If you know a vitcim of sexual assault, call: (888) 373-7888

Emma Romanowsky

FEATURES

14

September 2018

Consumers ask for advertisements Internet cookies boost marketability Nihal Karim

For the past few decades, the use and influence of the internet has shaped people’s lives, making it one of the biggest parts of today’s culture and society.

The wide access to the internet allows millions of people to do a variety of things, such as communicate with friends, connect with family, start a business, and of course, shop.

One of the reasons for the increased popularity of online shopping is the use of cookies, which allow businesses to collect data that can be used to advertise.

The popularity of online shopping has gradually increased over the years. According to Pew Research Center, 79 percent of adults have made an online purchase of any kind, showing an increase from just 22 percent in 2000. In addition, 15 percent have purchased something through social media links on platforms such as Twitter and Facebook.

Digital advertisements allow online shopping to become easier for both the customer and the seller. Social media’s extensive use allows it to become one of the most convenient and common places for retailers to advertise their products.

In an article about top marketing tools, Forbes said “social platforms like Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and Snapchat are the new homes of conducting business, creating consumer bases, and advertising products.”

With a swift development of many businesses, personalized advertisements became one

of the most powerful tools for effective advertising in 2018.

According to research by Epsilon, a global marketing company, 80 percent of consumers are more likely to make an online purchase when brands offer personalized advertisements.

Furthermore, 90 percent have indicated that they find the personalization of advertisements appealing.

“Sometimes when I look something up, I’ll keep getting an ad for it on YouTube for seven months straight,” freshman Elle Horst said.

According to a Business Insider guide on deleting search history, browsers track users’ information every time they access the internet. This allows the browser to build a user profile, which contains information such as the user’s age, location, and interests.

Clearing one’s search history will not actually eliminate the data gathered by the browser.

Browsers track users’ history by using one primary method: cookies. While people may think of cookies as delicious, chocolatey treats, in the world of computer science they mean something else.

According to a “how-to” guide

by Symantec Corporation, an HTML cookie is a packet of data that a computer receives and then sends back to the server.

Cookies allow users to have a better experience while browsing the web. They are responsible for storing the users’ passwords, often visited locations, and other preferences.

When a user makes online

Emma Romanowsky

purchases, for example, retailers use cookies to keep track of the items in the user’s shopping cart.

Without that, the shopping cart would reset to zero every time the user clicked on a new link.

“Cookies store your information which makes the browsing experience simpler for many people,” AP Computer Science teacher Karyn Voldstad said. “You can clear them but then you will lose certain privileges. You might have to enter your passwords every time and have to manually log in instead of allowing the browser to remember your information.”

While cookies usually gather data automatically, some websites began to ask the user’s permission before allowing them to further explore their site.

Since cookies make the browsing experience easier for the user,

most people tend not to think too much about it.

“I always click ‘Yes’ when I’m asked if I want to use cookies,” freshman Emma Scott said.

Aside from those features, the information gathered by the cookies proves to be useful when it comes to marketing. The data sold to companies aids the creation of personalized advertisements for many users. While private and personal information, such as the users’ names, is not sold, other useful information that shows users’ preferences is sold to the companies.

“They use that information to make more personalized ads,” Voldstad said. “For example, they can make political ads based on the user’s search history.”

While many look at personalized advertising as a convenient

way to shop or browse the web, some have expressed concerns about being so exposed to companies.

“It feels kind of weird when you think about it, but I also understand why they do it,” sophomore Shawn Vinogradsky said.

“They want to sell me stuff and it’s a good way to make money.”

Whether the user is an eager online shopper, or if they prefer to store their passwords in the browser, cookies and other similar features allow the user to have a pleasant and comfortable browsing experience.

As always, there are always two sides of one coin, as those features may put your privacy in danger and create a situation in which your personal data is revealed in ways that you may not wish it to be.

Bay Area restaurants move to be more eco-friendly Julia Rhodie You are at the coffee shop you visit every morning as an essential step in your routine.

The routine is automatic. You don’t even think about what you’re doing.

You order a decaf iced mocha, wait by the pick-up counter, and receive your coffee. You look down, and that’s when you realize something is missing.

Where is your straw?

Chances are, it’s legally banned. Restaurants throughout the Bay Area are eliminating the use of plastic straws due to a recently passed legislation in San Francisco.

This is a trend seen thorughout the nation. Several cities including nationwide Calabasas, Calif., have enacted a total ban on plastic straws.

During the month of July, the Land Use and Transportation Committee authorized the ban on selling, using, and distributing plastic straws and other related food accessories.

Some have also taken notice of additional efforts to consider the environment.

Alyssa Nguyen, the president of Carlmont’s Green Team, said, “We have seen restaurants around the area converting to tri-bin systems. There have also been changes to recyclable and compostable take-out boxes and utensils.”

Although this change in restaurants may be due to legal obligations, restaurant workers still find it important that they are contributing to preserving the planet.

Barry Piotrkowski is a server at Black Bear Diner and has been in the restaurant business for over 10 years.

“It is important that our restaurant makes efforts towards helping the environment to help preserve for future generations and to keep from destroying animal habitats with plastic and trash,” he said.

This proactive approach to combat pollution is being repeated throughout a variety of American industries.

According to National Geographic, major corporations such as Starbucks, Bon Appetit Management Company, Marriott hotels, and American Airlines have made public announcements that they will wane off of plastic straws in the coming years.

Restaurant customers have also seemed to embrace this break of tradition.

“The reactions from guests have been mostly positive,” Pitrkowski said. “We have been seeing more people bringing their own straws or using no straw. There have

been some ecosystem-conscious guests complimenting us on our efforts.”

Despite the changes that Bay Area cities are undergoing, many question the impact that these efforts will actually have on the environment.

To some, it is a very small step towards a greater goal for an eco-friendly feature.

According to Michal Nozik, the head of Carlmont’s science department the potential straw ban is a small contribution to a much larger problem: “Banning plastic straws is sort of like a baby step. If every possible step is taken to improve the environment, it will create a big impact. However, banning plastic straws alone is not enough. It will take much more to establish a sustainable world. If we combine all of our efforts, we will have a better chance of preserving our environment.”

OPINION

September 2018

15

What is truth? Seeking it instead of being slapped by it Talia Fine

It used to be that the first job given to a bank teller was to stack bills: $20, $50, $100 day after day. They do it to get used to what the real thing feels like. Theoretically, that way the moment a counterfeit bill was laid in their hand, they’d know. They could feel it.

We are all bank tellers. We fill our vaults with information that we are given. Our friends, parents, teachers, newspapers, media, and more hand us the currency that is information.

For the real bankers, there is always the possibility that they are wrong: that when they were handed a counterfeit, they believe it was real. Their senses can fail them.

Lucky for them, now there are special flashlights and machines that can identify bogus bills.

For us, there’s always the possibility that we are wrong when we choose to trust information, and there isn’t really a machine we can use to help find the facts. So how do we keep ourselves from missing the truth if our beliefs are left up to us?

With

Pers

the current whirlwind of information, the ever demanding question of whether or not we are presented with the truth, and general anxiety over issues in society today, many feel like they’re drowning.

But there are ways to find the truth. According to the popular modern philosophical novel “This is Water” by David Foster Wallace, we find the truth by first becoming aware of the water we’re drowning in.

He uses a fish as a metaphor. You’re the fish and information is the water. The fish is not aware that it is in water because it is just living its life in the way that it always has; it is not necessarily ignorant, but it is definitely complacent.

If the information that surrounds you does not provide you with any challenge or discomfort in your beliefs, that is the water which you (the fish) can’t necessarily see.

It keeps you complacent and at ease to not question that environment, which is why news channels and publications tend to project a lean.

In efforts to keep a solid reader base, they exhibit a force keeping you complacent in their water of information.

The problem is, we can’t make news organizations more or less objective. We can’t make social media ban or reinstate people. We can’t keep people from saying things that are offensive any more than we can keep

people from being offended by them.

But Wallace has a theory that might help. We can train ourselves to think more openly. True freedom lies in awareness, discipline, and effort. You can be aware of your surroundings, rather than feeling lost in the “rat race.”

If the current political climate makes your head hurt, practicing this skill of getting out of the water by watching the news from a site that you may not agree with, reading publications you don’t necessarily lean towards, and taking it all with a grain of salt.

This power of being in control of taking in and processing information may very well save your mental health, but it’s really hard to forgo comfort at the expense of awareness. Not everyone does it.

Still, it could be comforting to note that, aside from the encouragement from “This is Water” to get out of comfortable or complacent surroundings, people have the capacity to learn and accept the knowledge that they would have been fine with or even preferred, not knowing.

In “Meno” by Plato, Socrates teaches a slave boy geometry. By doing this, he proves that learning is possible for anyone and shows how important it is to value knowledge instead of just believing in what you want to believe.

Just how modern-day inventions help the bank teller use knowledge instead of belief to identify counterfeit bills, Wallace’s metaphor of the fish in “This is Water” helps us by sharing tools to

increase awareness through the pursuit of knowledge instead of staying complacent in one’s own beliefs.

We have the capacity to adapt to this way of viewing the world: as a bank teller, as a fish, and as an observer.

Rene Descartes said, “I know that I know nothing,” which is beautiful in a way.

It can also be intimidating (the guy was a philosopher and a mathematician so if he knew nothing then there’s no hope for the rest of us), but that’s not what he meant.

He meant that even though he may know a lot, he knows barely anything in the context of all the information in the world.

If he wants to expand his knowledge, then he has to practice the skills discussed here.

He has to count the bills like the bank teller, but also rely on the technology given to him to make sure he did the job correctly.

He can’t be complacent in whatever he thinks he knows, like the fish unaware that it is in water.

He must accept his own ignorance, and keep searching. He must have the capacity to learn because everyone has the capacity to learn.

The tricky thing about the truth is you can find it in anything. Even things that aren’t necessarily true. But when we tie in the past, the present, the future; other points of view, other people’s experiences; random habits or philosophy; when we practice taking in information; when we refuse complacency and broaden our horizons; when we learn through adversity; when we are never satisfied.

That is how we find the truth.

Diffe onal a n rent d c p e r cepti ollecti S C ons o ve m f trut oral h cul s sla tivat nt o e soc ne’s ietal t conflruth ict arah

heung

Pink is the best color.

Global warming is affecting our planet.

Violent video games instill aggressive tendencies in young people and should be eradicated.

All of these statements are debatable. But to those who believe them, they’re true. How can challengers prove they’re not?

The answer is that they probably can’t. Although factual evidence to support one or more of these statements may exist, that doesn’t mean that all of it will be interpreted in the same way or even acknowledged by everyone.

Perceptions of truth are derived from many different sources.

Namely, your background, environment, faith, relationships, and education can factor into how you as an individual develop your sense of what is true and what isn’t.

But how can we differentiate between personal perceptions and objective facts?

According to the Merriam-Webster Dictionary, facts are things of actual existence, make up objective reality, and are attached with evidence.

For example, it’s pointless to challenge the fact that men and women are biologically different. Anyone with open eyes can prove its obvious factuality and its defense isn’t likely to falter anytime soon.

Yet, someone might argue that aside from their bodily distinctions, the

two are interchangeable and that no one is innately “male” or “female.” In other words, as some may say, gender is nothing but a social construct.

This would fall under the category of a belief.

Beliefs are interpretations of facts and how they are relevant in the context of the world, and they can be deemed true or untrue.

Beliefs foster problems in society when different groups and individuals all insist that their understanding of facts is the absolute truth. Friedrich Nietzsche, a German philosopher of the 19th century, claimed that everyone sees the world differently because everyone has their own unique tendencies.

In his book “The Will to Power,” Nietzsche said, “[The world] is interpretable… it has no meaning behind it, but countless meanings — ‘Perspectivism.’ It is our needs that interpret the world; our drives and their For and Against.

Every drive is a kind of lust to rule; each one has its perspective that it would like to compel all the other drives to accept as a norm.”

His theory seems probable because a variety of thought is part of human nature. In a positive light, our differences are what define us and enhance the human experience.

They determine the values we hold and cause us to gravitate towards particular subgroups in our culture, whether those groups are

religious, cultural, or related to a political party.

While I suspect this is predominantly a valuable aspect of human behavior, it undoubtedly has its side effects.

These include labeling, stereotypes, assumptions, and general discord among people when each claims their own views to be the most accurate perceptions of reality.

A clash of ideas is inevitable despite the calls for improvement that seem

especially prominent today. As suggested before, the benefits of diverse opinions outweigh the countless arguments they spark.

I agree that our society should be better at explaining our beliefs and why we hold them. All people need to learn how to genuinely listen to each other and be sensitive to others.

However, is that it’s impossible to achieve a perfect

society that can create solutions for all the disagreements we have. While some people might make this harmonious world a goal, it’s not realistic as long as human nature prevails. It could even be detrimental to compare our lives with it because it causes us to see our opponents as a burden.

Therefore, rather than viewing our different beliefs as obstacles to progress, let us re-evaluate where our variance comes from and use it to understand one another better.

Andrea Butler

OPINION

16

September 2018

The truth about the Black Panther Party Maya Benjamin

No, this not about Wakanda or T’Challa. This about the wrongly smeared Black Panther Party, a group of black nationalists, who rebelled against the normand embraced their uniqueness as beautiful.

It all began following the passage of the Civil Rights Act in 1964 which prohibited segregation in public spaces, many black Americans were still being treated as second class citizens which led to the many cases of police brutality black Americans unfairly witnessed or endured.

Black Americans’ economic status would also not change with the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, as blacks were still trapped in ghettos with poor resources and unfair wages.

As a way to respond to the unfair police brutality, Huey P. Newton and Bobby Seale decided to found the Black Panther Party in Oakland, Calif. in 1966.

Newton and Seale armed their members with guns, monitored the behaviors of police officers for excessiveness, and challenged police brutality when it occurred.

Over time, as the party grew, the Panthers began to embrace their culture and heritage, and eventually reached 2,000 members and chapters in every major city, according to History.com Many felt that Newton and Seales’s choice to arm their members with guns and monitor police was a sign of uncalled for aggression. Many white Americans were unaware of the plight black Americans wrongly suffered at the hands of police.

Shortly after their founding, the Panthers began to enact a variety of community programs that were ahead of their time and

Andrea Butler

stood for things all Americans should support. Their community programs included voter registration and their highly successful Free Breakfast for Children program. The party also provided TB testing, education assistance, legal aid, transportation assistance, and ambulance service, but as the party achieved more, they drew the attention of the FBI. While the government should have been praising the work of the Panthers and their efforts to provide the black community with resources, the FBI felt threatened due to the Panthers potential to bring radical yet needed change to the black community.

The longstanding FBI director at the time, J. Edgar Hoover, had been suspicious of civil rights activists despite their heroic actions.

Hoover infamously called Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., “The most dangerous Negro of the future in this nation from the standpoint of Communism, the Negro, and national security.”

As one can imagine, the Black Panther Party had Hoover on edge. Hoover declared the group

a Communist organization and an enemy of the United States.

In an attempt to discredit the Panthers in the eyes of America, Hoover began to use his counterintelligence program otherwise known as COINTELPRO. COINTELPRO had long been used as a way to monitor or destroy a variety of groups, including the Communist Party and the anti-Vietnam movement, but things took a turn for the worse with the Black Panther Party.

Hoover and his associates spread false news stories and used the legal system to harass the group by creating up false charges.

Through COINTELPRO, the FBI also developed tactics to increase the tension within the party itself and various different groups in the black power movement. These tactics were used most noticeably with the Black Panther Party and the U.S. Organization, according to Timeline.

While the FBI had committed a series of reprehensible acts, one of the most notable and illegal acts was the murder of Fred

Hampton.

Hampton was a rising and popular leader of the Black Panther Party in Chicago and his effective leadership style and natural charisma made him a significant threat in the eyes of the FBI. Another organization the FBI did not approve of, the US Organization, aimed to promote black cultural unity. In order to cause conflict between The US Organization and the Panthers, the FBI sent a fake letter to the US Organization exposing an alleged Black Panther plot to the murder the head of the US Organization, Ron Karenga.

Similarly to Hoover’s use of COINTELPRO to discredit the Panthers, President Donald Trump’s attempts to discredit illegal immigrants worked. A 2017 Gallup poll found that 45 percent of Americans believed illegal immigrants were making the crime situation in America worse. In actuality, illegal immigrants are 44 percent less likely to be convicted of a crime than native born citizens according to the Cato Institute.

The president has also used his position to attack illegal immigrants and sanctuary cities. For example, last week Trump said, “Everyday, sanctuary cities release illegal immigrants, drug dealers, traffickers, gang members back into our communities.”

After the Unite the Right Rally in Charlottesville in August 2017, Trump refused to condemn the white supremacists claiming “there was bad on both sides.”

Due to success of COINTELPRO the Black Panther Party’s legacy is forever tarnished. While most black Americans are grateful of the community programs the Panthers enacted, the majority of Americans still view the party by the negative image painted by the FBI. Despite Hoover’s illegal and clearly wrong actions, he is still hailed as a national hero. The FBI headquarters is even named after him. Instead of rewarding men and women who fought to create fair policing for all and improve their community, the government choose to reward Hoover.

The Panthers also wanted to change blacks’ perception of themselves and make them appreciate their beauty in a world that did not perceive blacks that way.

The party did this through a variety of initiatives including wearing their hair in a natural style.

Today, the Black Panther Party does not exist. After the party dissolved in 1982, some attempted to renew the party by creating a a party known as the New Black Panther Party but to no avail.

Some members of the Black Panther Party have even condemned the New Black Panther Party.

While the Black Panther Party was never perfect, they did work that should be admirable in the eyes of Americans, not despised.

Facts, feelings, and why the media is not trusted Joseph Gomez

First off, don’t expect this to be yet another overbearingly redundant self-victimization of the media. I’m not Jim Acosta.

On Feb. 17, 2017, President Donald Trump tweeted, “The FAKE NEWS media (failing @nytimes, @NBCNews, @ABC, @ CBS, @CNN) is not my enemy, it is the enemy of the American People!”

Did he mean it? Maybe. Should he have said that? Probably not. Is he a 72-year-old man born into money, glued to his Twitter account, driven by nothing but the plentiful infatuations of the id? Yes. But, the media took what the president said as their death sentence anyway, and panic ensued.

Chief White House Correspondent for CNN Jim Acosta, for example, fervently questioned Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders on the president’s comments on Aug. 2 at a White House press briefing.

Unsurprisingly, the media was shocked when Sanders never confirmed that the press was not the enemy of the people.

This would be a problem if one doesn’t consider that the cynical summary of the press secretary’s job is constantly lying to protect the interests and actions of the president.

In reality, the media is as far from the spawn of Satan as they are a sacred entity.

It’s imperative that we, as journalists-intraining, recognize that.

Mainstream media journalism is a business, first and foremost. According to the Forbes World’s Most Valuable Brands List, Fox News is worth $11.7 billion. Rachel Maddow, an anchor on MSNBC has a net worth of $20 million and an annual salary of $7 million, according to Celebrity Net Worth. From Business Insider, CNN is worth $10 billion, and Town and Country claim Anderson Cooper’s net worth is $100 million.

Ethics don’t run the world, but money does. But, if money means ethics, then we ought to get our news from Netflix ($11.5 billion) and Nestle ($11.7 billion) as much as Fox News, and get our shrieking political commentary from Colgate ($10 billion) as much as from CNN. This money comes from ratings, which are the motive for the mainstream media.

However, according to the Pew Research Center, only 50 percent of Americans relied on TV news in 2017, a 7 percent drop from 2016. With television falling out of favor, extra embellishment can be useful to keep viewers hooked.

The 2016 election truly enlightened me to this fact. Every debate was advertised as if it were a WWE match. I half-expected John Cena to punch through a wall, shrouded in smoke and glorious masculin-

ity, to make a special appearance and join the smackdown.

Mainstream news is entertainment now.

The viewer knows exactly what they’re getting into — which team to root for — when they go to watch CNN, FOX, or MSNBC. It appears scripted and fake, like the latest season of “The Real Housewives of New York City.”

This leads to the all-important subject of bias and fake news and to the countless examples of such bias and fake news.

Those abundant instances from all sides will not be explicitly mentioned, or else I would be Martin Luther constantly repenting for my sins. Instead, I’ll focus on the impact this actually has, what to do about it, and whose job it is to fix it.

The obvious impact of bias is a suspicious populace. A survey from Gallup by Kimberly Fitch recorded that 76 percent of Republicans, 71 percent of Democrats, and 75 percent of Independents believed that the spread of false information via the media is a major problem.

“Americans at least agree on the problems: They do not like inaccuracy in reporting or any type of control over the stories they select,” Fitch said.

This in itself is not awful. It’s best for citizens to not blindly follow anyone, especially when it comes to politics, truth, and world events. The more skeptical people

become, however, the more a certain question must be addressed: should the media be trusted? Or, does the media deserve to be trusted?

The big news sources are not all that the mass media has to offer. The rest of the media — the struggling local papers, the interns that barely get paid, and the various other publishers, broadcasters, and members of the fourth estate — are the most important piece.

This is the place where it nobly starts, or where it slowly descends into bias and fake news. This is the place where we, journalists-in-training, must start to make some sort of difference.

It was Ernest Hemingway, the novelist, short story writer, and determined journalist that said, “The writer’s job is to tell the truth.” That should be our primary focus, nothing more and nothing less.

The consumers of mass media share an equal amount of the responsibility. Pew Research Center found that in 2017, 78 percent of Americans wanted unbiased news media. It is in the power and interest of the consumers to turn off or scroll passed an impure press that they assisted in creating.

If journalism itself turns into a giant, unreliable, and biased corporate conglomerate, it will be the responsibility of the people to find the truth, and reinvigorate an honest voice.

September 2018

OPINION

17

Editorial The The Lei Way R L Highlander Journalists are not the enemy of the people Editor-in-Chief y

Sophie Lynd

Managing Editor Kathryn Stratz ScotCenter Editor-in-Chief Briana McDonald Scotlight Editor-in-Chief Kylie Lin Scot Scoop Editor-in-Chief Kaylee George Social Media Director Ry Lei Faculty Adviser Justin Raisner

Editors Andrea Butler Molly Donaldson Francesca D’Urzo Nisha Marino Emma Romanowsky Sean Vanderaa Staff Writers Ben Balster Maya Benjamin Samantha Chu Sarah Cheung Samantha Dahlberg Anna Feng Talia Fine Nina Heller Joseph Gomez Lizzy Hall Sam Hanlon Mandy Hitchcock Sam Hosmer Rachel Hunter Nihal Karim Ailee Lim Rachel Matatyaou Charlie McBrian Kimberly Mitchell Julie Rhodie Veronica Roseborough Alena Ruhstaller Andrew Shen Taisiia Yakovenko Victoria Valle Remond The Highlander is a newspaper dedicated to providing Carlmont students, staff, and the community with high-quality news, features, and opinion articles. We want to keep our readers informed on important issues ranging from events at Carlmont to international news, and want to engage them with unique stories and images. The Highlander is a publication completely run by the students of the journalism classes at Carlmont High School.

Story ideas are generated by the students and the published content is up to the discretion of the editorial staff.This month’s editorial was written by Sophie Lynd.

Journalists report facts, not opinions

The First Amendment not only gives journalists the freedom of press, it gives the people right to information, more specifically, truths about their government. It gives us journalists the power to write and publish what we see fit, and readers the right to access this information.

Being a journalist comes with a great amount of responsibility. After all, journalists are responsible for bringing the truth to the people. But journalists are still human.

And humans make mistakes.

A mistake is misplacing a comma, spelling a name incorrectly, or even misquoting someone’s answer to a question asked during an interview.

There is a fine line between making a mistake and publishing fake news.

Journalists are trained to cover all angles of a story, all perspectives, and all voices.

The context in which this information is presented can affect the viewpoints of readers after reading it.

Regardless of readers’ conclusions, the facts remain the same. Our founding fathers believed that only a well-informed people can determine justice.

Thanks to social media, people today are more informed than ever.

Social media is a blessing and a curse, however. Twitter, for example, allows users to get their news conveniently and quickly. The 280 character limit allows for a one sentence summary of the latest news stories for users who are being exposed to more news than ever to catch up.

But headlines are not always what they seem. While journalists have a responsibility to inform the public of the truth, readers have a responsibility to find that truth and use common sense to realize everything they read may not be true.

Twitter allows first-hand sources to reach the people more directly. Following someone on Twitter almost feels as though they are talking to you. By tweeting their thoughts or experiences, these first-hand sources allow the people to hear the facts right from the horse’s mouth. Because of this, journalists have been put under a microscope. Who is more reliable: a journal-

ist reporting someone else’s story? Or that same someone telling their own story?

While the latter may appear to be the obvious answer, the close contact between first-hand sources and the people through social media has become extremely dangerous. There are rules and ethics in place for journalists when it comes to reporting and covering all sides of a story. However, there are no rules in place that prevent politicians from making exaggerated claims on social media platforms.

To reiterate, this is dangerous.

Journalists are trained to cover the news, follow stories, and to deliver them to the people. Contrary to popular belief, popularity on Twitter is not an equivalent to years of school, experience, and training in the journalism industry.

The use of social media as a news platform has blurred the line between journalists and those who think they are journalists.

Mob mentality is becoming the norm for those who fail to inform themselves of real news. Many believe that having thousands of followers, likes, and retweets proves one’s credibility.

In reality, those thousands of people have just one thing in common: that they agree with one statement or belief; the quantity of people that agree with a statement does not determine the legitimacy of that statement.

Modern technology has allowed for our society to become exposed to anything and everything within a few seconds.

This means that when readers don’t like what they’re hearing they can find another ‘source’ that tells them what they wish to hear, whether it be truthful or not.

Hence, the declining respect for journalists.

Journalism is a craft and it deserves to be taken seriously. Journalists have been bringing the facts to the people for hundreds of years. Yes, the birth of technology and social media has forced journalism to adapt in order to keep up with today’s society, but reporting the truth has never changed.

Ry Lei

ei

“Journalism can never be silent: That is its greatest virtue and its greatest fault.”

— Henry Anatole Grunwal

Coming Out

I hate coming out.

I hate the nerve-racking moment when I have to stand in front of someone and tell them answers to questions I’ve had about my identity for my entire life.

I don’t like that in order to live my truth I have to make a statement about it.

It happens in waves. It starts on Twitter, then Instagram, followed by Facebook, and if you’re lucky, I might come out to you in person.

I thought about not doing it. Not coming out, I mean. I thought about how it’s my senior year in high school and that maybe coming out now is a little too late, and wouldn’t it just be exhausting to reinvent myself and what people think of me and have to start all over just to leave for college a year later and then start over again?

Maybe. But I do it anyway.

“Hi. I’m Ry Lei. Cath if you’re talking to my parents. I’m queer. My pronouns are they/them.”

I’d love it if I could just say it and move on, but there’s usually a lot of stumbling and, “Oh my gosh, I’m so sorry, I didn’t know!” that goes on.

Well, I mean, yeah. Isn’t that sort of the point of coming out? I don’t think I’d have to do it if you knew I was queer.

If you feel like it’s awkward for you, just know that it’s much more awkward for me to come out to you than it is for you to be there while I come out... to you.

Anyways. I hate it.

It’s not that I’m not proud of who I am, because I am. At least, most of the time.

It’s just that every time I say those words out loud, I am reminded of the many times I’ve had to — and still have to — lie about it. I start thinking about whether or not I know myself as well as I think I do, or about the fact that I might have to go through this whole ordeal again if I start identifying as something other than just “queer.” And every time I do it it’s like doing a trust fall — off of a cliff. What sane person would do that? And willingly?

I would.

I have to.

LGBTQ+ people often spend their entire lives coming out over and over again; it’s in the simple act of two girlfriends holding hands, two men kissing each other, a transgender person telling someone their name or their pronouns.

My discomfort means that others like me can exist more comfortably. I become someone they can trust just a little bit more. I wear my labels proudly as a subtle act of resistance and I come out because there’s no way to exist comfortably without doing so.

I wish it wasn’t like that; I wish I didn’t have to try and figure out who I can comfortably talk to by whether or not they have a pride pin on their backpack, or whether or not they participated in National Day of Silence the year before. I wish I didn’t have to listen in on conversations and figure out whether or not that joke was homophobic.

I wish I didn’t have the analyze a situation before referring to myself as Cath or Ry — I wish going by the former wasn’t safer than going by the latter.

So here it is, one more time: My name is Ry Lei, Cath around my parents. I’m queer.

And as cheesy as it sounds, this is me living my truth.

That shouldn’t be as big of a deal as it is.

COMMUNITY

September 2018

The mid-peninsula tightrope

19

Downtown

Sam Hosmer

Strife and scandal To understand Belmont during this transformative period, one must first bear witness to just how vitriolic and bizarre the city’s politics were. As far as civil discourse is concerned, Belmont is in a golden age. It has been since 2013.

That statement holds special gravity now. As I write this, I sit in the audience of a “Forum on Civic Engagement,” hosted by the Belmont Library and featuring the entire city council. This is notable for the following reasons: first, the entire city council is in attendance and members are sitting within two feet of each other, second, no security is necessary, and third, violence — both physical and verbal — is at a minimum.

You’re probably thinking: “that sounds normal.” And you’d be correct, given the sheer banality usually attributed to municipal politics. But — and you’re going to have to partially take my word as gospel here — it was not always this way.

By this I mean there was once a time when feuding councilmembers got into fistfights at local carnivals. Political activists assaulted each-other’s houses with Frisbees.

Councilmembers would not sit together at League of Cities meetings. A 1995 Independent article likened attending Belmont city council meetings to “going to a professional wrestling match.” Pseudonymous local revolutionaries penned pamphlets accusing a certain city councilwoman of organizing municipal coups. Heavyweight journalists determined the fate of local elections. 3-4 city managers were hired and fired (seven counting interims) in the span of 10 years.

A website was created showing the aforesaid councilwoman’s head in a spiderweb.

Leaked email scandals revealed endemic elected backstabbing. And so forth.

In fact, it once got so bad that an actual group therapist was hired to help the city council with “team-building,” a strange frivolity that the taxpayers seem to have been tellingly comfortable with. (Although, for what it’s worth, the linked article says that “Peter Markovich, father of a 7-year-old boy, said he would rather see the money spent on upgrading and maintaining the city’s playing fields.”)

There are simply too many examples to list them all. But I can think of a few right off the bat that would probably be the most illustrative.

Jerry Fuchs, who at the time was San Mateo County’s foremost political quarterback and wrote for San Francisco-based newspaper, himself awoke that morning to find a Frisbee in his lawn.

Sam Hosmer

Belmont is walking a fine line between preserving what is and anticipating what will be.

Heroes and villains

Firehouse Square, after over a decade of negotiation, is beginning to reach fruition.

Apartments have come to life at the corner of Davey Glen Road and El Camino Real, replacing a dilapidated credit union and a 7-11 whose most notable feature was the number of calls it generated for the Belmont Police Department. The Davey Glen neighborhood now has a park after 25 years of stalling. Two new hotels are being built on Shoreway Road. Plans are finally in the works to redevelop properties on Middle Road that have sat vacant under city ownership for years.

Last November, the city council approved the Belmont Village Specific Plan, which rezones Belmont’s downtown in order to facilitate future growth where there currently exists a smattering of commercial storefronts and an enormous Safeway. The list goes on.

Former councilwoman Coralin Feierbach, whose lengthy tenure allowed her to preside over the council as mayor in 1999, 2007, and 2011, says these are symptoms of a problem.

Or, rather, that the lack of backlash — and, in all fairness, community opposition to the projects has been decidedly tepid, for Belmont — is cause for concern.

“It’s like someone sprayed the city with an anesthetic,” said Feierbach. “It’s been asleep for five years.”

Five years ago, in 2013, Feierbach and her longtime colleague on the council, Dave Warden, did not seek re-election. Instead, they endorsed Gladwyn d’Souza and Kristin Mercer. Neither received enough votes to win a seat, although Mercer did ride the coattails of a pro-growth incumbent. Elected to fill their seats instead were Charles Stone and the late Eric Reed, both of whom represented a pro-growth, development-friendly local attitude.

Americana

There is a Facebook group, populated by current and former residents of Belmont, dedicated to sharing memories of what it was like in decades past. It’s an amazing resource of local history. But while the typical, rose-tinted nostalgia for youth is sometimes on full display, it occasionally crosses into the territory of something else — something difficult to identify — something tinged with anger. One of the group’s most popular posts asks members, “do you miss the old Belmont?” (I’ve edited this slightly for the sake of syntax and grammar, but the tenor is the same.) Thus far, it has amassed a total of 194 replies, and by far the most prevalent point of objection to “the new Belmont” is that it is too populated, too expensive, and too dense.

Living in the Bay Area has its sacrifices.

But even if they can’t be quantified empirically, few would be so bold as not to acknowledge them. Perhaps the foremost evolution lies in the area’s astronomical home prices, which — sitting at an average of $1,898,000 according to Coldwell Banker as of this writing — are 481 percent over the national average. As a result, census data shows that median incomes have risen dramatically, the population has diversified, and the tech sector has become, overwhelmingly, the predominant employer.

Community leaders of Old Belmont have watched their city become unfamiliar. Feierbach moved to the city in the early 1970s with her husband from Berkeley.

Della Santina moved to Belmont in the late 1970s. Our third requires a bit of introduction.

For those who went to Carlmont in the 1970s, lived in Belmont during the years he taught at Central Elementary School, or have ever gone to an event hosted within city limits, Metropulos is likely a familiar name.

I say “downtown” not in reference to any specific thing, because Belmont, infamously, has no downtown. Instead, I say “downtown” in reference to a geographic region that is inclusively referred to as Downtown (or “Village Center”) on city zoning basemaps. Downtown Belmont, really, does not exist.

The causes for this are numerous, but one is by far the most important: Belmont’s geography, at least for much of its life, has precluded the organic development any sort of a community center. Carlmont Village Shopping Center is a convenient stop for western neighborhoods; the region ostensibly known as Belmont Village services those east. And in both cases, our commercial offerings pale in comparison to what is available elsewhere on the peninsula, where spotless rows of boutiques and immaculately-kept storefronts reign supreme. Both of Belmont’s neighboring cities, San Mateo and San Carlos, have celebrated downtowns, while others in San Mateo County, like Redwood City, have made names for themselves with massive downtown revitalization campaigns.

But Belmont’s supposed nucleus, in spite of decades of campaign promises and shallow rhetoric vowing downtown redevelopment, has been a stagnant and putrefying corpse since at least the 1950s — candidate statements earnestly pledging downtown revivals are a staple of every mailed flyer I can find in the Belmont Historical Society archive.

It seems natural — to me, anyway — that downtown should be a point on which all interested parties can find some common ground. Regardless your attitude towards development in the canyon, or on whether Belmont has a Village Ambience that must be preserved, creating some kind of city center seems a natural step in the remediation of a community that has had its fair share of developmental defects.

But unfortunately, as the broad is made specific, minor disagreements explode into major inhibitions. Firehouse Square, a proposal located on the edge of the Village Center district, is a perfect example.

Read more about these topics and Belmont’s next generationon scotcoop.com

Thank you to the Carlmont Academic Foundation

CAF

CARLMONT ACADEMIC FOUNDATION

for their generous donation to the Carlmont Journalism program!

BEHIND THE BRAND Expensive

A majority of people wear makeup daily. However, most are not aware of the marketing tactics that drive the beauty industry, affecting the wide range of product price points.

The determining factors of inexpensive drug store makeup lie between the different levels of toxicity within the product, which can provoke skin irritations and breakouts.

According to U.S. News, “The best cosmetics have limited filler ingredients like talc, which can irritate skin and encourage breakouts. A highly regarded alternative to talc-ridden cosmetics is mineral-based makeup, which is available in designer names and drugstores alike.”

MAKEUP

On the other hand, an abundance of people prefer to splurge on their makeup products as high end department stores, such as Sephora and Ulta, provide a more luxurious product quality.

The determining factors of expensive department store makeup lies between the different minerals pressed into the products, which can provide benefits for the skin.

According to U.S. News, “Aside from potential skin reactions that makeup ingredients may produce, color pigmentation is also a key factor to detecting quality cosmetics products. Greater pigmentation means the product’s raw composition is more finely milled, leading to vivid color with less application.”

As for clothing brands, the price point lies between the quality of the fabric used and the environment the clothes are produced in.

Big name brands, such as Forever 21 or Zaful, are known for selling extremely cheap clothing due to their use of cheap labor and inexpensive fabric choices, as well as their unoriginal designs.

“Forever 21 moved most of its production to Asia following the settlement of a 2001 lawsuit in which American workers complained of sweatshop conditions. Forever 21 has also faced more than 50 copyright lawsuits for allegedly stealing the work of designers,” according to Business Insider.

FASHION

On the contrary, high-end fashion brands sell their clothing at higher price to compensate for their higher quality fabric choices and the detailed manner in which their products are made.

Big name brands, such as Gucci or Chanel, rely on their expensive fabrics and infamous logos in order to charge customers so high for their products, which can be deceiving.

Luke Grana, founder of clothing label Grana, said in a Huffington Post interview, “Luxury [products] can cost more because they have detailed and expensive trimmings and generally a luxury brand name has a reputation. It does cost more to make, but it doesn’t need to cost 6-8 times more.”

HAIR

Cheap

Compared to the prominent difference between cheap and expensive makeup, expensive hair products tend to have higher end packaging, but do not always contain better ingredients.

Expensive hair care brands, such as Pureology, utilize mineral based ingredients that help volumize or color correct the hair, but can also damage hair if used too frequently.

Paula Begoun, a globally recognized cosmetologist, said in a CBS News interview, “To some extent, [expensive products] work, because it deposits ingredients similar to those in styling products.

You’ll get volume. But the boosting ingredients can build up, so do not use volumizing shampoo every day.”

Despite cheap and expensive hair products having different quality packaging, many contain the same quality ingredients.

Most cheaper hair products, for example shampoo, often provide similar benefits as department store hair products due to the lack of deposits ingredients that can damage the hair if used too frequently.

Paula Begoun, a globally recognized cosmetologist, said in a CBS News interview, “Expensive does not mean better. You should not spend more than $6 on shampoo. There is absolutely no difference between expensive [hair] products and inexpensive [hair] products, and I say that unequivocally.”

Article and Photoillustration by Francesca D’Urzo