Crimson Quarterly - Fall 2017 issue

crimson QUA RT E R LY

Baker Mayfield aims to lead the Sooners to their 6th Heisman Trophy and 8th National Championship page 12

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CONTENTS Fall 2017 Volume 2, Issue 3

EDITORS

4

Studio artist Jane Hsi redefines beauty standards through fusion of three majors

8

Local businesses band together to survive Lindsey Street construction

12

Baker Mayfield’s personality drives team into title contention

20

Fiction writer Mel Odom shares love of writing with students

23

Column: The private takeover of Oklahoma’s public schools Crimson Quarterly is a publication of University of Oklahoma Student Media. Nick Jungman, director of student media, authorized printing of 10,000 copies by University Printing Services at no cost to the taxpayers of the State of Oklahoma.

Torri Sperry

Editor-in-chief

Alexandra Goodman Managing Editor

Levi Wiltfong Design Editor

CONTRIBUTORS Adam Johnson: columnist Emily McPherson: copy editor Siandhara Bonnet: photographer Sean Cummings: photographer Megan Ross: photographer

Chandler Kidd: writer Clara Linhoff: writer Lauren Owen: writer Kelli Stacy: writer

Baker Mayfield leads the team onto the field for the 2016 Red River Rivalry.

PHOTO BY SEAN CUMMINGS

3

4 Senior Jane Hsi sits in front of her inspiration wall, which features magazine covers and other images depicting different types of beauty and color.

PHOTO BY SIANDHARA BONNET

BEAUTY UNDER A MICROSCOPE Studio artist redefines beauty standards through fusion of three majors

BY ALEXANDRA GOODMAN Two desks in Jane Hsi’s studio are covered with piles of books and papers. A couple of wooden palettes are streaked and smudged with bright, rich oil paints. Two easels with works-in-progress guard her studio space on the fourth floor of the Fred Jones Art Center.

Hsi is a senior at OU with three majors: studio art, biochemistry and letters.

Her inspiration board on the wall at the back of her studio space is covered with past covers of Vogue magazine and other colorful posters thumbtacked to the white wall.

“I need to stop drawing

magazine models,” Hsi said.

She said she saw patterns in her work of portraying that narrow beauty standard and realized it is not attainable or inclusive.

For her senior project, she is working with other students to create her own version of a fashion magazine cover, one that highlights different types of beauty and women from different races and backgrounds. She wants to incorporate the beauty of people she knows. She is even asking Dr. Bette Talvacchia, the director of the OU School of the Visual Arts, to participate.

This awareness of patterns of thinking and stereotypes informs much of Jane’s thinking about art and life.

“I want to make the human condition more empathetic,” Hsi said.

To do that, she’s challenging herself to take a closer look at her surroundings and to change how she and others see beauty. Hsi believes that by expanding beauty standards, people see and treat one another more kindly. By finding beauty in everyone, such as in the planes of their faces or the tones of their skin, Hsi hopes to change stereotypes about people.

5 As for her three majors, Hsi said, “It just happened in sequence.”

When she started at OU, Hsi was on the pre-med track to become a doctor, but she wanted to find a way to pursue her love of art.

She compared her majors to starting an oil painting. “You build color on color,” she said. In this case, each color is a different major.

Hsi realized she didn’t want to be a doctor, but wanted to push herself to create art. Ultimately, she wants to become an art professor.

Hsi said she’s happy with the decision. She knows it’s not driven by logic but by passion, and that she will have to work hard for it.

“If I don’t try, I don’t have a chance,” she said, referring to the hard work and dedication she knows following her dreams of making art will take.

Hsi also spoke about the guilt of wanting a career in art instead of medicine. She said she often wonders about how practical art is and if it adds to the world.

Balancing three majors is challenging for Hsi, but she said she sees her majors connecting in indirect ways. Being in a scientific field requires patience and discipline, which she said is critical in art, too.

A letters major requires classes in history, literature, philosophy and ancient and modern languages. She said letters is like the glue that holds everything together.

Learning about those different areas provides a context for her art and challenges her views on the world, which she explores in her art.

“All [of my majors] are looking for some sort of truth in humanity,” Hsi said. “Science isn’t necessarily the most true.”

Hsi sees her majors as exploring different aspects of truth, because each can provide a different understanding to create a broader, more comprehensive whole.

Though studio art majors learn about different media to work with, Hsi prefers oil paint.

“It’s charming, but tedious, and doesn’t always do what you want,” she said.

Hsi said oil paints are the richest and the most flexible, as artists can fix or paint over certain parts before they dry completely. Oil paints, she said, allow for beautiful gradients of color, especially in faces.

She starts with drawing the image she will eventually paint, getting to where she is 50 percent happy with the image before tackling painting it.

Next she makes her own

wooden panels or stretches her own canvases to paint on. She paints the surface with white gesso, a thin acrylic-like paint used to prevent paint from seeping into the surface of the canvas. From there, Hsi makes an underpainting, the first foundational layer of paint, before layering oil paints.

Her process is more traditional, Hsi said, though some of her peers use more experimental or nontraditional methods.

Hsi said this semester is an exciting time for her, as she’s working on her senior project and recently got out of a creative slump.

Last year, she struggled through an artist’s block. She said it may have been the exhaustion of three majors catching up with her. It might also have been the stress of making the decision to pursue art, not medicine, as a career. It was especially hard to tell her family, she said, because of their different expectations of her.

She learned from that experience though.

“It’s okay to be frustrated or disappointed,” she said. “It makes you stronger, because you have to rebuild.”

By not giving up and putting in the effort necessary, Hsi now has more ideas and is ready to work.

ART BY JANE HSI SKETCHBOOK PAGES

“

For these pages, I was experimenting with color, writing and figure drawing. The figures are different perspectives of one of my friends, while the writing in the background are my anecdotes on memories I have with her.

“SURGICAL UNRAVELING OF WHITENESS”

“

“BELOVED”

Both of these paintings explore the importance of diversity through the utilization of bright colors and diverse skin tones. The painting with the surgical clamps represents the need for beauty standards in society to be open to include women of color. In the asymmetrical painting, I chose to depict two women wearing each other’s cultural clothing. This is meant to symbolize communication and sharing between different cultures.

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8 The Lindsey Street Project designed and sold T-shirts to raise money and bring awareness to struggling local businesses.

PHOTO BY MEGAN ROSS

#LOVELINDSEY Local businesses band together to survive construction

BY CLARA LINHOFF Cruising down Lindsey Street used to be part of the daily routine for many Normanites. However, the road construction that began July 5, 2016 — the largest single contract in the history of the Oklahoma Department of Transportation — has made the drive less appealing. The subsequent interruption and traffic jam is causing many locally owned businesses to suffer, including Classic 50’s and International Pantry.

“We took a pretty bad hit,” said Jeri Sieber, the owner of Classic 50’s, “I think about nine businesses on the street have closed since the start of the construction and I’m really afraid.”

Sieber’s grandfather, a former OU football player, opened Classic 50’s in 1957 after graduating from OU. The drive-in was originally called “Glen’s Drive-In.” It changed to be one of the first Sonic Drive-Ins in the state, before changing again to

its current name, “Classic 50’s.” The restaurant has been in the family for 60 years.

“After my grandfather died, my uncle took over. I was overseas,” Sieber said. “But once I came back, my uncle wanted to sell the place, so I bought it, because I wanted to keep it in the family. Just about three months later, the construction began.”

Sieber has taken money from her own pocket to keep the business running during the past two years of construction. On average, the restaurant’s profits are down 35 percent. However, when both bridges on the street were closed, they were down 50 percent. She had to cut labor and says she is working at the restaurant night and day, seven days a week, in order to save money.

“Over the summer we closed on Mondays, and we have had to change our hours,” Sieber said. “I just really want people to have access to

be able to get to my restaurant.”

Lunch hours have significantly decreased for Classic 50’s as people don’t have enough time to drive through the construction, get their food and make it back to work or school on time.

“Nights are still okay, because people can take their time, but the daytime is so slow,” Sieber said.

The community of businesses on Lindsey Street have teamed up to help one another. The Lindsey Street Project sells T-shirts that say, “Use ‘em, Don’t Lose ‘em” in order to raise money. They are also raising awareness of the situation using social media. Sieber has fundraisers of her own at least once a month at Classic 50’s.

“We heavily depend on our OU population and the greek population within the university,” Sieber said.

“Mondays are our busiest nights now because of chapter [meetings].”

9 Sieber says she hopes once the construction is over, business will increase beyond what it was prior.

However, she would be content if her business returned to normal.

The drive-in will add new items to the menu once the street is open in hopes of attracting more customers.

“I would like to thank Norman, of course, the ones who have made the effort to come to us, no matter how difficult it was,” Sieber said. “I also would like to thank the students of OU — we wouldn’t be here without them. Just please don’t forget about us. Construction is supposed to be done soon, but still, please make the effort to eat on Lindsey Street so that way once the new, beautiful street is ready, the restaurants are still there.”

Jocelyn Wall, owner of The International Pantry, has similar sentiments about the construction and has also been affected tremendously the past two years.

The store is an independent local

business unique to Norman, offering cooking classes, kitchen products and instruction in the art of cooking.

“During the summer we offered cooking classes for the first time ever, because we needed more business,” Wall said.

Wall said she took a huge pay cut and tried her best to be financially prepared before construction began.

“I knew once construction started, we wouldn’t be as busy,” she said. “In fact, we still get calls today asking if our store is open yet, but [we] haven’t ever closed.”

The International Pantry joined the Lindsey Street Merchant Association and has participated in many benefit nights.

“We now are starting a campaign with a hashtag and slogan that is #LoveLindsey,” she said. “We also have ‘Transformation Tuesdays,’ where if you spend $10 at a participating Lindsey Street business and turn in the receipt, your name is

entered into a drawing for prizes. The raffle will be going until the Saturday after Thanksgiving.”

The roadwork on Lindsey Street is estimated to be completed December 2017. Wall believes that once construction is done, it will be positive for Norman and the state as a whole. However, she does worry about her future income.

“I just hope all of our old, regular customers come back to our businesses,” she said. “I hope they haven’t found other places to get their food or groceries or anything.”

Although businesses have been hurt tremendously, Wall believes the construction provided a unique opportunity among local business owners.

“I have to say, one positive thing that has come out of this is that basically all the business owners on Lindsey have created relationships and given one another moral support,” she said.

LINDSEY STREET CONSTRUCTION PLANS Norman staple Classic 50’s suffers a 35 percent profit loss amid construction.

PHOTO BY MEGAN ROSS

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12

FUELING THE FIRE Mayfield’s personality drives team into title contention

Baker Mayfield looks for a receiver during Bedlam 2016.

PHOTO BY MEGAN ROSS

13

BY KELLI STACY It was a moment of elation — a win signifying redemption from the previous year’s loss, a win proving they’re not pretenders and — most importantly — a win proving they’re national title contenders.

In a moment that immediately became college football legend, senior Oklahoma quarterback Baker Mayfield ran toward midfield of Ohio Stadium after the Sooners’ 31-16 win over No. 2 Ohio State and asserted what fans everywhere already knew: he’s emotional, fearless and full of fire.

“Oh no he’s not,” ESPN’s Chris Fowler said. “He’s not going to plant it at midfield of the O, is he? Oh wow.

Yes he is.”

He planted the OU flag in the middle of the renowned O logo.

The game was emotional, fueled by a perceived lack of respect and topped off with a spur of the moment act on a national scene — pretty much the epitome of Mayfield’s career. Now more than ever, Mayfield’s energy has transcended to his teammates and may be the key to a national title run for the Sooners.

“I think that’s a good mentality to have — just block out everything else and prepare like nobody

believes in us and just go to work,” Mayfield said.

Controversial to some, beloved by others, Mayfield has become one of the premier figures of college football.

Fans have come to expect a lot from Mayfield: Fourth-quarter comebacks that lead to triple overtime in Neyland Stadium, 545-yard, seven-touchdown performances in front of Texas Tech fans donning “traitor” shirts in his homecoming at Jones AT&T Stadium and touchdown after touchdown scored on elusive scrambles.

The energy Mayfield brings to every game has catapulted him into the spotlight as one of the most exciting quarterbacks in college football, but it’s also been problematic at times. Take OU’s game against Texas in 2016. Mayfield scrambled early and often, throwing two interceptions and going 22 of 31.

This season, it appears that Mayfield has learned how to better control that energy.

“I thought he was, for an early game, probably the most settled in that he’s been,” Oklahoma coach Lincoln Riley said after the seasonopening win against UTEP. “(I’m) proud of the fact that he did it with a lot of different guys. It was just one

game, but we took that step in the right direction.”

Now, Mayfield’s seemingly found a way to harness that energy into more productive performances, such as in his game against Ohio State where he amassed 386 yards and three touchdowns. He’s found a way to reign in his emotions while still using them to fire up his teammates.

“In big games the worst thing you want to do is psych yourself out.

You’ve still got to go out there and do your job,” Mayfield said. “It’s still football. It doesn’t matter who’s in front of you. If you’re playing a little league team or playing the Patriots, you’ve still got to go try and do your job and do it at a high level. So that’s the focus and what we’re going to carry into next week.”

Mayfield’s teammates have absorbed parts of his personality, from his energy to the characteristic chip he’s carried on his shoulder for years. From not receiving offers from D1 schools after leading the Lake Travis Cavaliers to a state championship to being benched after winning five games as a true freshman at Texas Tech, Mayfield has felt slighted fairly often. Now, his teammates are on the same page.

OF THE 144 HEISMAN FINALISTS SINCE 1982, OU RANKS 2ND IN NUMBER OF FINALISTS BY SCHOOL

PHOTOS OBTAINED FROM SOONERSPORTS.COM

BRIAN BOSWORTH (‘86)

JOSH HEUPEL (‘00)

JASON WHITE (‘03)

JASON WHITE (‘04)

ADRIAN PETERSON (‘04)

SAM BRADFORD (‘08)

BAKER MAYFIELD (‘16)

DEDE WESTBROOK (‘16)

CONTINUED ON NEXT PAGE

14 “I think just continuing that ‘chip on your shoulder’ mentality, that ‘us against the world,’ is going to be big for us, and I think we have carried it through,” junior tight end Mark Andrews said.

One of the most recent slights came when ESPN’s Lee Corso said the Sooners are most likely to disappoint this season — that they’re “pretenders.” Mayfield did what anyone would expect — he took it personally — and his team followed suit.

The senior will face slights again come Spring as the 6-foot-1 quarterback prepares for the NFL

Draft, but for now he’s focused on leading his team to a national title in his final year as the face of college football.

When the odds are against him, Mayfield does his best work, and that’s led him to potentially being the best quarterback in Oklahoma history. In 2016, he was a Heisman finalist, landed fourth in Heisman voting in 2015 — despite not being invited to the ceremony — and won the Burlsworth Trophy both years.

He’s the only player in program history to register 5,000 passing yards and 500 rushing yards in a career.

Mayfield, who returned for his senior year, believed in his coaches and he believed in his team.

This year he’s determined to win a national championship, and his drive only amplifies that of his teammates.

“I really do think this is the closest team I’ve ever been on, and that’s special,” Mayfield said. “You don’t ever get that on college teams because you come from all over and you have your own ego and your own agenda. You talk about guys that have focused on going to the NFL and things like that, but this team is very close.”

Mayfield throws a pass downfield during the 2016 game against Kansas State.

PHOTO BY MEGAN ROSS

2015 HEISMAN VOTING RESULTS RANK

PLAYER

SCHOOL

CLASS

POSITION

1ST PLACE

2ND PLACE

3RD PLACE

TOTAL

STATS SUMMARY

1

DERRICK HENRY

ALABAMA

JR

RB

378

277

144

1,832

395 ATT, 2,219 YDS, 5.6 AVG, 28 TD

2

CHRISTIAN MCCAFFREY

STANFORD

SO

RB

290

246

177

1,539

337 ATT, 2,019 YDS, 6.0 AVG, 8 TD

3

DESHAUN WATSON

CLEMSON

SO

QB

148

240

241

1,165

333 CMP / 491 ATT, 4,109 YDS, 35 TD, 13 INT

4

BAKER MAYFIELD

OKLAHOMA

JR

QB

34

55

122

334

269 CMP / 395 ATT, 3,700 YDS, 36 TD, 7 INT

5

KEENAN REYNOLDS

NAVY

SR

QB

20

17

86

180

61 CMP / 115 ATT, 1,203 YDS, 8 TD, 1 INT

15

Head coach Lincoln Riley and Mayfield laugh together after a 31-16 win against Ohio State Sept. 9.

PHOTO BY SIANDHARA BONNET 2016 HEISMAN VOTING RESULTS RANK

PLAYER

SCHOOL

CLASS

POSITION

1ST PLACE

2ND PLACE

3RD PLACE

TOTAL

STATS SUMMARY

1

LAMAR JACKSON

LOUISVILLE

SO

QB

526

251

64

2,144

230 CMP / 409 ATT, 3,543 YDS, 30 TD, 9 INT

2

DESHAUN WATSON

CLEMSON

JR

QB

269

302

113

1,524

388 CMP / 579 ATT, 4,593 YDS, 41 TD, 17 INT

3

BAKER MAYFIELD

OKLAHOMA

SR

QB

26

72

139

361

254 CMP / 358 ATT, 3,965 YDS, 40 TD, 8 INT

4

DEDE WESTBROOK

OKLAHOMA

SR

WR

7

49

90

209

80 REC, 1,524 YDS, 19.1 AVG, 17 TD

5

JABRILL PEPPERS

MICHIGAN

JR

DB

11

45

85

208

46 SOLO, 20 AST, 3.0 SK, 1 INT

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20 Mel Odom instructs a professional writing class while wearing one of his hundreds of superhero T-shirts.

PHOTO BY SEAN CUMMINGS

MAN OF A MILLION WORDS Author brings passion for writing to the classroom

BY ALEXANDRA GOODMAN & LAUREN OWEN Walk into Mel Odom’s office and you’ll notice two things: a giant bowl of candy and a superhero T-shirt worn by the man himself.

Odom has published more than 200 books in the past 30 years in almost every genre. He also teaches classes in the professional writing program at OU. Odom’s first book, a novel in the Mack Bolan series, was published in 1988. Odom wrote several novels in the series under the name Don Pendleton, the original creator of the character.

Don Pendleton was not the only alternative name Odom used to publish novels. He has written under at least a dozen pen names. One of these names is Meredith Fletcher.

“Harlequin romance editors generally want people to write under female names,” Odom said.

“So I created a female name, and I’ve written nine books as her.”

In 1995, Odom was inducted into the Oklahoma Writers Hall of Fame.

Today, Odom devotes much of his time to sharing his love of writing with his students.

On average he reads and grades about 140,000 to 180,000 words a week.

Sierra Voss, a professional writing major who graduated in 2017, estimated she wrote around 178,000 words, including complete drafts of three novels.

“All in all, it’s amazing he read that much of my writing, let alone all of the other students from his other classes,” she said.

Odom has also gained notoriety for his wide array of novelty superhero shirts.

“I believe in superheroes,” he said. “Superhero shirts, that’s just my thing.”

He owns more than 100 T-shirts and said he never has to wear the same shirt twice in a semester.

“I don’t play golf, I don’t smoke cigarettes, so this is my one vice,” Odom said.

His shirts help bond with his students, many of whom also love the characters.

Odom cherishes his relationships with students in his role as a teacher. While he said that writing is what he feels he was born to do, being at OU helped him discover that he was also meant to be a teacher.

“I never knew I was a teacher,” he said. “I didn’t know that I would come out here and fall in love with the kids.”

BOOKS BY MEL ODOM

STORM FORCE (2010) Kate Garrett must survive a deadly storm while being held hostage by a gang of convicts.

HUNTERS OF THE DARK SEA (2003) A crew on a whaling ship in the 1800s works to survive threats on the high seas.

THE ROVER (2002) Wick, a quiet librarian, gets swept into an adventure of magic and mystery.

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23

CHARTERED TERRITORY Column: The private takeover of Oklahoma’s public schools

BY ADAM JOHNSON Oklahoma’s three main exports seem to be oil, millennials and teachers.

From these millennials, I hear a chorus of “I can’t wait to get out of here” every time a new and embarrassing headline regarding Oklahoma makes national news, and I can’t say I blame them. Sometimes it seems like everywhere offers something except Oklahoma.

Oklahoma may have been considered a good place to raise a family once, but lately that doesn’t seem to be true — at least if you want your family to be healthy or educated. Family is the only tie I have in Oklahoma, and if I could pick them all up and transplant them to another state with me, I would in a heartbeat. With how things are shaping up in Oklahoma, I’ve just about had it.

There’s still some fight left in me, though.

Many have written about Oklahoma’s problems with revenue, education and prisons. From local papers to the Washington Post and The Guardian, Oklahoma’s dirty laundry has been aired out for the whole world to see.

Some corporations see our failures as an opportunity to gain capital.

To focus on one example, we’ve had snake oil salesmen creep into our state to sell us charter schools to replace our failing public schools.

These conmen, in addition to valuing the almighty dollar above education, are paying our legislators to buy what they’re peddling.

In a nutshell, charter schools are like regular schools, but with none of the financial transparency or performance accountability.

Taxpayers give their money to the state, which doles out part of that money to public schools and other services. The state gives another part

of that money to a charter school company that supposedly puts that money to better use than dumb old public school teachers who spend money on books and training.

Charter schools in Michigan provide a case study for what may happen with charter schools in Oklahoma. Education Secretary Betsy DeVos rose to prominence in Michigan for her lobbying efforts to expand the presence of charter schools throughout the state and to eliminate oversight on them.

According to the Washington Post, Michigan tolerates more lowperforming charter schools than almost any other state, in part due to DeVos’ lobbying. The state lacks any effective mechanism for shutting down or improving failing charters.

DeVos isn’t just a mouthpiece for charter schools; as of 2006, she had skin in the game. According to documents released during her husband’s failed bid for governor, they owned stock in K12, Inc. K12 is a publicly traded education management organization (EMO) that provides online education services to students of charter schools.

Management will ultimately remain beholden to student interests, not the shareholders’, right?

Speaking of shareholders, good news: K12 stock is at an all-time high.

However, the New York Times wrote that K12 company profits are used to pay for advertising and lobbying state officials. K12, which provides curriculum for two Oklahoma virtual charters, spent $31.2 million on advertising in 2016, including public television ads aired in localities.

According to Oklahoma Watch, the virtual charter schools in Oklahoma reported four-year graduation rates between 21 percent and 56 percent in 2016, and all online charter schools received Cs, Ds and

Fs on the state A-F report card.

Surely if those charter schools were private schools, the all-powerful market would have spoken by now and they would have closed or changed, but operating strictly from tax dollars provides these corporations a government safety net with little motivation to change.

Even though charter schools typically prove to be no better than their public counterparts, they still get a slice of Oklahoma’s evershrinking budget. This year, online charter schools received increases in funding despite most public school districts receiving deep cuts.

The Tulsa World detailed the funding gains, noting that Epic, the largest online charter in the state, received a funding increase of over $10 million, bringing its total annual funding to over $40 million. It benefitted from a nearly 50 percent increase in students enrolled.

Companies should not be able to turn a public service into a profitable commodity, and our legislators should not let them by doling out taxpayer money to enrich their biggest contributors. We need to hold our legislators accountable and demand better education, and by extension better futures, for students in Oklahoma. That does not come from lining the pockets of the corporations running charter schools.

Oklahoma public school teachers are doing the best they can with what they’re given. In fact, facing a major teacher shortage, Tulsa’s superintendent, Deborah Gist, is teaching a third grade class until a permanent teacher can take over.

Maybe one of Oklahoma’s main exports wouldn’t be teachers if the legislature funded better public school environments for them to teach in.

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