May 30, 2024

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VOLUME 147, ISSUE 29 | THURSDAY, MAY 30, 2024

ASUCD third annual Pride Festival to be held on May 31 The festival seeks to highlight the global diversity of the LGBTQIA+ community

BY SYDNEY AMESTOY campus@theaggie.org ASUCD will host its third annual Pride Festival on May 31, from 3 to 8 p.m. on Russell Field.

This year’s theme for the festival is Pride Around the World, according to Hallie Wong, the ASUCD Pride Festival Unit Director.

“We chose this theme because we see the need to highlight the beautiful diversity within our community,” Wong said.

The festival will feature small and locally owned LGBTQIA+ businesses, various resources on campus tabling and providing activities, literature and music booths to “highlight queer and trans poets and musicians from all over the world,” according to Wong.

As for expected

entertainment, there will also be numerous performances by local musicians and drag performers, and attendees can also expect a fashion show.

“This year, we added a mini fashion

show session to kind of let the audience know more about queer fashion as well as an open mic to highlight even more talent from our community,” Wong said.

UCD Academic Workers Union begins strike on May 28, joining UCLA and UCSC

UAW 4811, covering 5,700 workers at UC Davis, initiates total work stoppage and calls for cancellation of classes, research and discussions

These performances will include student organizations, such as the Rocky Horror Club and the Pole Dance Club.

Organizing the event has been done through funding throughout the

year, including through a Drag Brunch put on by the unit and the Gender and Sexuality Commission earlier in the year held on April 5, according to Wong.

Wong addressed the challenges that have come from organizing the event with a rise in homophobic and transphobic threats in Davis but stressed the importance that an event like this can hold for the student community.

“It’s so important for a public institute to hold a student-run Pride festival on campus because it shows that the student government supports the LGBTQIA+ community here in Davis,” Wong said.

“Sometimes it’s really hard to understand or to know that the school is still a safe environment for the community. With events like this, we hope to create a safer environment for students.”

Senate hears multiple quarterly reports, responds to concerns regarding SR #10

The meeting also gave several members of the Senate table a chance to voice their goodbyes as their term comes to an end

BY BENJAMIN CARRILLO campus@theaggie.org

UC Davis academic workers and supporters enter the Katherine Esau Science Hall. The UAW strike is a response to the UC system’s handling of the pro-Palestinian protests. (Jenna Lee / Aggie) how many kids have you

BY VINCE BASADA and RIVERS STOUT killed today?” campus@theaggie.org “The regents and Office of the President [need to] take leadership UAW Local 4811, the union to make sure that the situation is derepresenting academic workers across escalated because this is one university the nine undergraduate UC campuses, system and it is their job to make has now initiated strikes at UC Davis sure that it’s functioning well,” Emily and UC Los Angeles, joining colleagues Weintraut, a Ph.D. student in the UC at UC Santa Cruz. Union members on Davis Food Science Graduate Group these campuses — including teaching and UAW 4811 Davis Academic assistants, graduate students, postdocs, Student Employee Unit Chair, said in researchers, some undergraduates and an interview. other academic workers — are asked The tensions between UC to stop all work-related duties, from leadership and UAW 4811 stem from teaching discussions to grading papers several alleged unfair labor practices and conducting research.

(ULPs), with the catalyst being The strikes, announced on May an accusation of failure to prevent 23 before the Memorial Day holiday an attack on the pro-Palestinian weekend, took effect Tuesday, May encampment at UCLA, where several 28. UAW 4811 held a rally at the union members were present, and the MU Quad late that morning, where subsequent arrests of 200 students and approximately 1,000 individuals academic workers from May 1 to 2. joined the UAW picket line, marching Other ULPs include “unilateral around campus and through lecture changes to standard for employee halls for an hour. UAW leadership at discipline,” as well as disciplining UC Davis plans to hold programming and calling police on UAW members and workshops at the MU as the strike engaging in peaceful protests for continues. workplace changes which the union Marchers walked through the says infringe on members’ right to free MU, toward Wellman and Storer speech.

Halls, and then looped around to go At the same time as the UAW through the Teaching and Learning march, UCD Popular University for Complex and around Mrak Hall. They the Liberation of Palestine (PULP) carried identical signs that read “UAW and leaders of the pro-Palestine On Strike, Unfair Labor Practices,” as encampment staged a similar march, well as homemade signage with pro- recruiting undergraduates. The march Palestinian messages and imagery. followed a similar route through Chants, initiated by march leaders, campus, and at one point marched included, “There is only one solution! through Shields Library.

Intifada, revolution,” and “Gary May, Weintraut says that encampment leaders, UAW 4811 and other unions have formed a “community coalition” with aligned ideals. She also asserted READ MORE that the union maintains a separate list of demands and that it will not The California Aggie’s negotiate on behalf of protestors.

Literary Magazine “This strike is objectively about the ULPs,” Weintraut commented.

“It’s about the extreme unsafe work environments that we’re dealing with.”

Also according to Weintraut, the union covers 5,700 workers at Davis.

By the group’s own acknowledgment, not all union members have participated in the strike.

The union’s strike authorization SEE PAGES 6-8

vote was held from May 13 to 15 and passed with a supermajority, giving the union’s executive board power to call campuses to strike until June 30.

Weintraut did not go into detail on how the board and union leadership choose which campuses would be called to strike, and when. But she did say that union leadership and campuses currently not on strike were making preparations in anticipation of possible expanded work stoppages.

The union previously went on strike in November of 2022 over a pay and benefit dispute resolved that December.

The ULPs have been cited to the California Employment Relations Board (PERB), which handles collective bargaining relating to workers at California public schools, UCs and other civil and public offices throughout the state. On Thursday, May 23, PERB rejected a University of California injunction request which argued that the union’s labor stoppage was illegal. Weintraut called the UC’s actions “illegal,” and says it has resulted in further ULP filings by UAW 4811.

A statement on the union’s expansion released by the University of California on May 23 reads, “[We remain] disappointed that the UAW is engaging in an illegal strike in violation of our contract’s mutually agreed nostrike clauses to advance issues that have no bearing on employment at UC.” The statement continues, “We are working with campus administrators to minimize disruption as much as possible, but it is inevitable and unfortunate, especially amidst an already stressful quarter and educational experience for students.”

On UC leadership, Weintraut said, “I think sometimes we see the regents, and the folks like Michael Drake in the Office of the President, taking a step back.”

Weintraut added, “We don’t have separate deals [or] side door things. That’s not within our purview or contract. We negotiate as one union.”

V i c e Pr e s i d e n t A a r u s h i Raghunathan called the May 23 Senate meeting to order at 6:21 p.m. After roll call, she read the UC Davis Land Acknowledgement.

First on the agenda, the Bike Barn presented their quarterly report, discussing some of the issues presented by the Bike Barn in recent times.

Teddy Mates-Munchin, the Business Manager for the Bike Barn, asked during the presentation if any lawsuit could arise from the Bike Barn publicly supporting Palestine.

“Would you pay for your own lawyer in that situation?” Senator Jacob Klein asked. “Or would you expect that to come out of reserves.”

“I’m not sure why it’s only an issue of a lawsuit when it’s Palestinian rights in question,” Senator Yara Kadaan responded. “Through a quick scroll through the bike barns page on Instagram, I see a post supporting pride month. And yet there’s no issue of a lawsuit there?”

Next, the Senate approved Vanessa Sandoval, a third-year environmental science major to be the Internal Affairs Commission Chair. With the previous chair, Thuyanh Truong, stepping down, she delivered a speech with her goodbyes and her time working with the senators.

“So much time I have spent here has been spent reflecting on the past, but I think now as I’m leaving I can say that I enjoyed my time here, and that I feel as if I have made an impact with my time on the Senate,” Truong said.

Afterwards, there was a quarterly eport presentation by the Whole Earth Festival (WEF) The presentation went through the highs and lows of the festival, which took place from May 10-12.

Senate President Pro Tempore, Trinity Chow, then gave her quarterly report, and talked about the highs and lows of being a president pro tempore

the last two quarters. The senators and chairmen all applauded Chow once she finished, and thanked her for not only being a great president pro tempore but also for her kindness and care for the table.

Then followed public comment, where three students, including a previous Senator, went up and discussed their opinions with the recently passed Student Resolution (SR) #10, which affirms support for UCD Popular University for the Liberation of Palestine (PULP) and the encampment going on in the Memorial Union Quad.

“I’m not only hurt but scared about what this bill means, and the nuance that ASUCD neglects to acknowledge,” one student said. “I’ve been stalked, harassed, and bullied for my Jewish and Israeli identity.”

Senator Katia Bouali said to the student that no one should feel unsafe in this environment, and most senators nodded in agreement.

A previous senator was the next to make a public comment.

“Your commitment to democracy and transparency is disingenuous at best,” the previous commenter said.

“You all manage and vote for the budget you vote on. While you consider my ex-[Senate] table to be toxic, we would never usurp the democratic process.”

Kadaan was the first to respond that she didn’t want to give any validity to the undemocratic claims, continuing to say that she only sees with her own eyes, and calls out what she says.

Senator Bouali, Senator Nur Ambaw, Senator Gabriel Gaysinsky and Senator Jonathan Ng also all answered to this public comment, saying that there was no validity to the claim of undemocratic actions.

The senators then decided not to reconsider Constitutional Amendment #90 this meeting, and postponed the voting to the next meeting. The senators then passed the consent calendar, looked at the status of previous legislation and approved the meeting minutes.

The meeting was adjourned at 10:08.

2 | THURSDAY, MAY 30, 2024

THE CALIFORNIA AGGIE

The 10th annual Davis Pride Fest returns on June 1 The Davis Phoenix Coalition hosts an all-inclusive, family-friendly Pride celebration

BY ALEXANDRA SHAPIRO city@theaggie.org June in Davis is filled with excitement as the annual Davis Pride celebration kicks off. Davis Pride, is inviting the community to join in on the fun with various events welcoming members and allies of the LGBTQ+ community.

The Davis Pride Fair and music festival will be held on June 1 at the new location of Davis Civic Center Park, starting at 11 a.m. Voted "Best California Pride Celebration" for three consecutive years, it's also the oldest and largest LGBTQ+ celebration in Yolo County.

Held to celebrate and support the LGBTQ+ communities in Yolo County, Davis Pride aims to foster allyship and increase awareness. The event is in part organized by the Davis Phoenix Coalition (DPC), whose mission is to unite the Davis community against intolerance while promoting diversity.

Proceeds from Davis Pride support the coalition's initiatives which include anti-bullying campaigns, workshops and outreach programs involving local law enforcement, churches and schools.

The 10th annual Community Fair is made possible by 100+ volunteers, around 125 local exhibitors and Northern California-based businesses and community organizations. These include craft vendors, informational booths and some of the most popular food vendors in Yolo County.

The event has remained free with support from the city, county and sponsors such as Outward Magazine, Armadillo Music and Dignity Health.

Additionally, the California Department of Public Health (CDPH) and the Yolo County Health Department are sponsoring this event by providing the first dose of the MPOX Vaccine, also known as the Monkeypox vaccine, during the festival. In recent years pride events have offered this vaccine due to the way the virus has disproportionately affected Gay men.

The highlight of this year's celebration is the music festival held at the Sutter Health Main Stage, starting at 11 a.m. with eight performances by various groups, including Butterscotch and Willie Gomez.

One of the performers at the festival is the Sacramento Gay Men’s Chorus (SGMC), originally established in 1984 as the Sacramento Men's Chorus. In

1996, their name was officially changed to The Sacramento Gay Men's Chorus, and in 2017 SGMC began to diversify and now aims to reflect the LGBTQ+ community as a whole. Davis Pride is just one of many events that SGMC participates in throughout the region.

“We love to perform and give back to the communities that always give back to us,” Don Henkle, the vice president of SGMC, said via email.

“Our mission statement is to foster pride and enhance lives, one song at a time. SGMC looks forward to a fabulous performance at Davis Pride.”

After the music festival ends at 5 p.m., patrons can continue at the Davis Pride After Party from 6 to 11 p.m. on G Street between Second and Third Street. DJ Mellax of Davis Rave Co. will perform a DJ set, and attendees can purchase food from downtown restaurants.

Additional community Pride month events include the Drag Story Hour hosted by the Avid Reader Bookstore on June 9, Davis Pride Comedy Night on June 21 at the Stonegate Country Club, Skate with Pride on June 8 at Central Park and Drag Queen Trivia on June 27. In 2015, after a 10-year hiatus, the board of directors at the DPC rebranded the community celebration event as Davis Pride which has grown from about 500 attendees to an estimated 6,000 to 8,000.

Following a violent anti-gay assault on a Davis resident in 2013, the DPC was founded by city councilmember Gloria Partida, the victim’s mother, alongside Sandré Nelson and others.

“Our mission ensures individuals have a community [where] they are welcomed in and can get the resources they need,” Davis Pride director Sandré Nelson said. “We want to make sure that those who are struggling [have] a place [where] they can reach out.”

Partida sparked the idea for a 5K race and recognized a need for an accompanying event, which eventually evolved into the Davis Pride festival, according to Nelson.

The annual Walk for Equality remains a popular tradition, with over 250 participants in the 5K. This year, the Walk for Equality begins in Central Park at 8 a.m. on Sunday, June 2.

Austin Arredondo, third-year clinical nutrition student, is ecstatic to attend this year’s Pride.

“I grew up in a town with only a couple thousand people [where] there was no such thing as pride in any aspect,”

Sidewalks near Central Park painted for Pride Month in June 2023.

(Aggie File)

Arredondo said. “It is such an amazing thing to feel accepted here, largely because of the uplifting LGBTQ+ community in Davis.”

The pride website, https://www. davispride.org/, has a complete calendar

list of events that attendees can look to for information. Nelson shared that this year’s pride has more sponsors and that the community has a lot to look forward to. “[This year] there are more sponsors,

the musical artists are excited and our pride is out there,” Nelson said. “This is an event that our community is looking forward to.”

Yolo County, city of Davis host engagement event to discuss upcoming library project The Walnut Park Library is expected to be finished in 2026

Davis community members head to the Mary L. Stephens Library to check out books and sign up for the Summer Reading Program. (Jenna Lee / Aggie)

BY ALMA CULVERWELL city@theaggie.org On May 15, Yolo County and the city of Davis hosted a Community Engagement and Information Night about the Walnut Park Library.

The Walnut Park Library is a project made possible from an $850,000 check to the city of Davis from Representative Mike Thompson. Thompson secured the funding in an appropriations government funding bill that was signed into law on March 9, 2024.

The project will be located at 2700 Lillard Drive, at the west end of Walnut Park, and will measure approximately 12,000 or more square feet. It includes specialized features such as a large community room and terrace, study rooms, children’s area, teen spaces, computers and Wi-Fi, dedicated parking and more.

The project is estimated to cost $21,330,000 and is scheduled to start in winter of 2024 to 2025 and be finished in October 2026.

Mayor Josh Chapman stated his excitement for the library in a press release.

“The Walnut Park Library project will be a tremendous asset to the South Davis community,” Chapman said. “The funding support received, including $850,000 from Representative Mike Thompson’s office, $8.7 million from

the California State Library and the City’s own donation of $1.5 million, will bring invaluable services and programs to the children and residents of this community. I am so proud to have been a part of this collaborative process to provide a state-of-the-art library to South Davis.”

The community meeting was intended for people to learn more about the building and landscape design of the library, the community art process and specific features that will be included.

Yolo County District Supervisor Jim Provenza described his thoughts surrounding the recent progress made on the project press release.

"The Walnut Park Library is moving forward on schedule, and we are excited to offer community members a chance to look at the design for the interior of the new library,” Provenza said. “I am grateful for the hard work of our County Librarian and her team in taking the lead on this project."

The event was structured in an openhouse format that provided a space for community members to engage with the city of Davis, Yolo County, YoloArts and WMB Architects — the organizations in collaboration to create the project.

Dwight Coddington, the Yolo County public information officer, explained the success of the event.

“The evening was a tremendous success, highlighting the strong community support and enthusiasm for the Walnut Park Library project,”

Coddington said. “We received valuable feedback that reinforced the community’s desire for a space that serves as a center for learning, connection and resilience. Attendees expressed excitement about the library’s potential to provide educational programs, technological resources and cultural events.”

Coddington expressed the importance of the feedback that they were able to receive after the informational meeting.

“Additionally, the event provided us with the opportunity to clarify the concept of a resiliency center, which is simply a place for everyone in the community to go during inclement weather — such as extreme heat or winter storms and to charge devices during power outages,” Coddington said.

Coddington explained his further hopes for the future surrounding the development of the Walnut Park Library project.

“Our main priority is to ensure the Walnut Park Library serves as a transformative space for all Yolo County residents,” Coddington said.

“While we're focused on meeting residents' needs, we're also dedicated to supporting the county's sustainability goals. To achieve this, we are seamlessly integrating the library with the park's natural landscape and incorporating solar panels and other eco-friendly features.”

All Things Right and Relevant Foundation continues legacy of former thrift and consignment store

The Yolo Community Foundation announced they will be creating an endowed fund from the property sale of the store to assist local mental health non-profits

BY HANNAH SCHRADER city@theaggie.org The Yolo Community Foundation (YCF) has recently announced the launch of the All Things Right and Relevant Foundation. The All Things Right and Relevant Foundation is an endowed fund that will be managed by the YCF. The Executive Director of the Yolo County Community Foundation, Jessica Hubbard, spoke about the background of the All Things Right and Relevant Foundation and the nonprofit behind the former thrift and consignment store.

“Friends of Allied Non-Profits is a longtime non-profit organization based in Davis that has run a thrift store called All Things Right and Relevant for many, many years,” Hubbard said.

“So the non-profit is called Friends of Allied Non-Profits, but definitely, the brand that everyone in the community is familiar with is the store name All Things Right and Relevant.”

All Things Right and Relevant was a thrift and consignment store in Davis that closed in March.

“They executed their mission through the store in two ways,” Hubbard said. “First, profits from the thrift store were donated to a number of local non-profits that worked in the mental health space,” Hubbard said. “I believe it's over $500,000 over the course of

their history that was donated to local organizations. And then secondly, they also had people who had various mental health diagnoses who worked in the store in, like, a support and employment model. And so, this year, the Friends of Allied Non-Profits made the decision to close the All Things Right and Relevant store, due to, you know, just the changes in the retail market.”

Hubbard then talked about how the YCF will manage the endowment fund.

“We'll also manage the grant making as well,” Hubbard said. “All in accordance with the goals established by the Friends of Allied Non-Profits when they set up the fund. So they basically determined the philanthropic priorities, the parameters for the grant making, and then the foundation will execute on those parameters.”

The President of the Friends of Allied Non-Profits, Nancy Temple, spoke about the origins of the All Things Right and Relevant Foundation.

“Someone just mentioned that the Yolo Community Foundation did this sort of thing,” Temple said. “I can't recall who it was or how it came up, but somebody mentioned that that might be a good place for the funds to go.

And it was just the whole idea [that] this money that we endowed is going to earn somewhere around 50,000 a year forever for mental health causes.”

The Yolo County National Alliance on Mental Illness Executive Director, Jen Boschee-Danzer, talked about

Board members from the Yolo Community Foundation, Friends of Allied Nonprofits and the CEO of the Sacramento Region Community Foundation stand at Yolo Community Foundation event. (Courtesy / Jessica Hubbard) the impact the closing of All Things Right and Relevant has had on the community.

“It's definitely a loss to the Davis community, but also the mental health community too,” Boschee-Danzer said.

“You know to be losing not just that source of support or financial support for the mental health program, but having an opportunity for people with

serious mental illness to be employed.

They're in an environment where they were getting a lot of support, as well.

So, it's definitely a big loss to the mental health community.”

Boschee-Danzer then talked about the work that the Yolo Community Foundation has done to assist local non-profit organizations.

“The Yolo Community Foundation

does a really wonderful job of supporting non-profits in general in Yolo County,” Boschee-Danzer said. “I cannot say enough good things about them. That organization has really developed to be [an] almost kind of a hub for nonprofits; they do a lot to support us. So, and really, spearheading the Big Day of Giving for Yolo County. I mean, they just do really important work.”

THE CALIFORNIA AGGIE

THURSDAY, MAY 30, 2024 | 3

Head coach of Sacramento Kings to speak at UC Davis 2024 undergraduate commencement

The speakers for the graduate ceremonies include an undersecretary of food safety, a law professor, a chief medical officer and a philanthropic consultant

BY MADISON PETERS campus@theaggie.org The Sacramento Kings’ Head Coach, Mike Brown, was chosen to speak at the UC Davis undergraduate commencement ceremonies at the Golden 1 Center from June 14 to 16.

Among the other speakers for the graduate ceremonies are the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) undersecretary of food safety, the chief medical officer of Covered California, a UC Berkeley law professor and a healthcare and philanthropic consultant.

Brown graduated from the University of San Diego and has since had an impressive career in professional basketball, according to the National Basketball Coaches Association.

He has helped coach various teams, such as the Cleveland Cavaliers, Los Angeles Lakers and Golden State Warriors, before accepting the head coach position for the Sacramento

Kings in 2022.

Since his coaching career started in 1997, Brown has won four National Basketball Association (NBA) championships as an assistant coach and was voted NBA Coach of the Year in 2009. Brown will be delivering his speech to the graduating class via recorded video.

Alex Lanham, a fourth-year biological sciences major, provided her thoughts on a coach being chosen as the undergraduate speaker and expressed concerns.

“Didn’t [New York University] get Taylor Swift?” Lanham said.

“I just get nervous having anyone from a sports team, because we all learned from [the Kansas City Chiefs player] Harrison Butker’s speech at Benedictine College, where he went on a misogynistic and homophobic rant. That type of speech would not slide at [a] UC Davis graduation, we already know that everyone would flip out.”

The Undersecretary of Food Safety for the USDA, Dr. José Emilio

Esteban, spoke at the commencement of the UC Davis School of Veterinary Medicine on May 24.

Esteban is a UC Davis alum and has had an extensive career working for the Center for Disease Control and Prevention before accepting his current position in January 2023, according to the United States Department of Agriculture.

As undersecretary of food safety, his main responsibility is overseeing the Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS), which ensures that various meat and egg products are safe and correctly labeled.

Dr. Monica Soni, the chief medical officer of Covered California, was chosen to speak at the School of Medicine’s commencement ceremony on May 18.

Soni will lead the Health Equity and Quality Transformation division which entails overseeing various clinical operations such as health equity, medical management and improving California’s specialty care delivery system, according to Covered

California’s website.

Soni is a Harvard alum and board-certified physician and continues to use her credentials to fight for equitable healthcare access.

Additionally, her passion for equity goes beyond healthcare to support affordable housing by being a board member of Mercy Housing California.

UC Berkeley Professor of Law Khiara Bridges spoke at the UC Davis School of Law Commencement on May 10.

Bridges received her J.D. from Columbia Law School and Ph.D., with distinction, from Columbia University’s Department of Anthropology. Her studies and publications have focused on the intersection between race, class and reproductive rights.

Bridges has successfully published many articles and three distinguished books, her most recent being “Critical Race Theory: A Primer,” published in 2019. Her scholarships have been discussed in many prominent law reviews such as the Harvard Law

Review, Stanford Law Review and Columbia Law Review.

Lastly, healthcare and philanthropic consultant Susan Baade Song will be speaking at the commencement ceremony for the Betty Irene Moore School of Nursing on June 13.

Song has had an extensive career in healthcare, previously holding the title of program manager for the Clinic Leadership Institute Emerging Leaders program at the Center for the Health Professions at the University of California, San Francisco, according to the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation website.

Her efforts in working with the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation were key in their sponsorship with programs such as the Family Caregiving Institute and the Betty Irene Moore Fellowship for Nurse Leaders and Innovators.

A range of faculty and professors will also be speaking at the undergraduate ceremonies alongside Brown.

COMMENCEMENT on 11

Davis Anime Club holds UC Davis Bicycle Program, ASUCD second annual Cosplay Cafe Bike Barn celebrate at Akiba HQ on May 18 cafe featured cosplayers, dance performances, games, ‘May is Bike Month’ The raffles and an anime-themed menu for guests to enjoy

Events throughout the month included Loopalooza, Mobile Bike Clinics, a regional challenge, opportunities to win MiBM swag and more

BY RODRIGO VILLEGAS campus@theaggie.org Throughout the month of May, the UC Davis Bicycle Program and the ASUCD Bike Barn celebrated 20 years of May is Bike Month (MiBM) in collaboration with Sacramento Area Bicycle Advocates (SABA). To celebrate, the Bicycle Program held a series of events, such as Loopalooza and a bike valet, and the Bike Barn held Mobile Bike Clinics and free e-bike demo rides.

Additionally, riders could participate in the regional challenge to win prizes.

Established in 1956 by the League of American Bicyclists, May is Bike Month promotes the benefits of biking and encourages people to ride a bike. This year, SABA, a non-profit organization dedicated to making the Sacramento region a safer, healthier and more bike-friendly region, is celebrating 20 years of local MiBM. “The main goal of May is Bike Month is to get people out of car trips and onto bikes during their one to three-mile errands,” Rob Youngren, a project manager for SABA, said. “The more people we get on bikes, the more we convince the city [of Sacramento] that bike infrastructure is important, and it helps achieve environmental goals too.”

In Davis, MiBM began with Loopalooza, a community bike ride around a 12-mile bike loop, on Sunday, May 5.

“We’ve been looking at how busy events have been and if people have been able to stay engaged,” Jeffrey Bruchez, the Bicycle Program coordinator, said.

“At Loopalooza, there were about 800 participants in that community ride, and there wasn’t really a dull moment.”

The events that followed included a complimentary bike valet for the Thank Goodness for Staff event, the May Bike Auction and Bike to Everywhere Day. Engagement at these events was great, with the Bike Program parking between 30 to 40 bikes at the Bike Valet and selling around 210 bikes in the auction,

according to Bruchez.

The Bike Program also tabled outside of the Bike Barn on Thursdays to help students register with Love to Ride, an app that tracks people’s bike rides, to help win the regional competition. This year’s challenge is for participants across the Sacramento region to collectively ride 500,000 miles. Riders earn points for every bike trip and have the opportunity to win prizes.

The Bike Barn celebrated by holding Mobile Bike Clinics every Friday throughout May. They visited each residence hall (as well as The Green and Orchard Park) around campus and set up a bike trailer, a cargo bike, a bike repair stand and various tools typically outside of the dining commons. While there, they engaged with students to inform them of the services the Bike Barn provides, addressed students’ misconceptions about the Bike Barn and provided repair services like adjustments, oiling chains and pumping tires.

“The Mobile Bike Clinics are an idea to try to build more awareness for the services that we offer, as well as to go meet students where they need our services,” Oscar McBain, general manager at the Bike Barn, said. “We want to be proactive in outreaching to students to teach them about how we can help them be successful on their bike.”

The Bike Barn also piloted an e-bike demo ride program, where they organized 30 to 60-minute guided group tours around campus twice a week. The test rides allowed participants to try out an e-bike and promote the UC E-Bike Purchase Program. Demo riders were also entered into a raffle to win prizes.

“MiBM is a great send-off for the year,” Bruchez said. “It gives us an opportunity to identify how beautiful biking is during this nice weather and harness that energy to carry us all the way through fall quarter when it’s most challenging.”

Students gather at Akiba HQ in downtown Davis for the second annual Anime Cafe. (Courtesy / Rodrigo Villegas)

BY RODRIGO VILLEGAS campus@theaggie.org On May 18, 2024, the Davis Anime Club (DAC) held their second annual Cosplay Cafe at Akiba HQ, emulating the maid cafes of Akihabara, Japan.

The event ran from 12 to 8 p.m. and included food served by cosplaying hosts, dance performances, games, a photo area and prize raffles.

Several DAC members welcomed guests with a dance performance choreographed by Leah Tahmassian, the vice president of public relations for DAC. In true maid cafe fashion, cosplaying hosts took orders from guests, who were able to choose a food, drink and snack from an animethemed menu. As attendees continued to interact with hosts and others, they could also request a solo dance performance or an art commission from hosts or take a cheki (Japanese for polaroid photograph) with cosplayers.

David Li, a second-year English major, attended the event to step out of his comfort zone and enjoyed the casual and fun nature of the cafe.

“It was nice to have an hour to hang out with others,” Li said. “The anime club and this event have been a good stepping stone for me to come out of my shell, so I think it would be a good experience for others if they are comfortable trying it.”

Ryusen Sasa, a fourth-year economics major, appreciated the

connection of anime to his own culture.

“This was a celebration of anime and Japanese culture, and I appreciate that people enjoy my country’s culture,” Sasa said.

The Cosplay Cafe served as both a fundraiser and promotional event for the club, replacing the club’s formerly biggest annual event, the Davis Anime Convention (DAiCon).

The club launched DAiCon over a decade ago and held it several times throughout the years, the last time being in 2019. The club had plans to hold the event again in 2020 — however, the pandemic prevented them from doing so. Post-pandemic, DAC was unable to run another DAiCon as they lacked the necessary funds and resources.

The club was “really broke” once the university returned to in-person classes, and the passion for the club and membership dwindled, especially as anime became more accessible online, according to Tahmassian. As a result, less people attended DAC meetings.

Last year, the club’s former vice president of public relations spearheaded the Cosplay Cafe in the downstairs lounge of Kobe Mini Mart, despite having only three weeks to plan, to reignite the club’s passion for anime.

Inspired by the maid cafes in Akihabara and UC Berkeley’s maid cafe, she launched the first Cosplay Cafe, which turned out to be a massive success.

“Last year’s successful Cosplay Cafe was the start of bringing the club back to life,” Tahmassian said. “People started

coming to meetings more. This past fall, we had a full room of people come to watch ‘Your Name’ during week zero.”

Consequently, DAC decided to hold another Cosplay Cafe this year, with more planning.

Talks for the event started in November and official planning began in February. The club opened applications for people (club members and non-club members) to join the event staff. They also held weekly meetings to decide on characters to cosplay, menu items, art commissions, stickers, advertising and more.

“This year’s was a success because everyone was much more comfortable to be there,” Tahmassian said. “Everyone was happy and smiling, creating a great community environment. We even had a guest perform a dance with the host because he knew the dance.”

Tahmassian hopes guests learned what DAC is, a welcoming and fun community for anime enthusiasts and non-anime fans alike. She also hopes guests enjoyed experiencing the cafe, had fun and overcame the stereotype associated with liking anime.

“There’s this cringe culture associated with liking anime, and I think it is unfair because there are so many great and smart people that like anime,” Tahmassian said. “It’s not embarrassing or weird to like anime, so I hope [guests] consider coming out to club meetings.”

THE CALIFORNIA AGGIE

4 | THURSDAY, MAY 30, 2024

To Yerb or not to Yerb: the Maté Revolution

Pass time tension

BY LANHUI ZHEN lazhen@ucdavis.edu

Guayaki, a Yerba Mate energy drink brand, is replacing coffee for many college students

BY MAYA KORNYEYEVA mkornyeyeva@ucdavis.edu You’ve probably glimpsed the yellow Guayakí truck driving around campus, delivering cans of yerba mates to stock the shelves of the CoHo. Maybe you’ve seen some of the student brand ambassadors handing out free cans at the MU. Perhaps you, like many others, rely on this beverage to get through your daily studies.

But what exactly is Yerba Mate, and why is it gaining such swift popularity among today’s college students?

Allow me to take you back to the jungles of Latin and South America 16th century, where native tribes such as the Guaraní, the Jibaro, Quechua, Ch’unchu and the Charrúas all brewed beverages using yerba-maté (also known as “mate”) leaves. These tribes — dispersed throughout regions of Uruguay, Chile, Paraguay, Brazil and Argentina — used mate leaves for both ceremonial purposes such as social gatherings and for its medicinal properties.

When French botanist Augustine Saint-Hilaire encountered this varietal, he gave it the Western scientific name of Ilex paraguariensis. However, the common name we use to refer to it now (“Yerba mate”) stems from the Spanish word for herb, “yerba” and “caamate,” a Guaraní term formed from the combination of “caa” for plant or herb and “mate” for the gourd from which it is drunk.

This plant, which has a high caffeine level and health properties that reduce fatigue, improve mental health and strengthen the immune system against disease or inflammation, intrigued Spanish colonizers as they sought to conquer the “New World.” Yerba Mate became the first cash crop out of South America and thus was entangled in the dark history of colonial exploitation of native peoples. Referred to as the “tool of empire,” the Guaraní, in particular, were forced by Spanish settlers to cultivate and harvest the plant for export. While mate was later pushed to the sidelines in favor of more resilient crops like cacao, maize and coffee, it remained a big influence on the early economic development of Spanish colonies.

Today, traditional means of preparation are still practiced and preserved. Mate drinks can be made in a wide variety of ways, with the most popular method involving the roasting of yerba mate leaves over a fire and then steeping the dried leaves in a small gourd with hot water. The drink is then sipped from a filtered straw called a “bomba” or “bombilla,” and hot water is repeatedly refilled into the gourd. It most closely resembles a strong green tea, which can be taken with additives such as milk, sugar, coffee grounds, lemon juice and other herbs. Mate gourds also hold cultural significance and are often elaborately carved and well taken care of.

College students are constantly craving an energy boost, and Guayakí, a U.S. Yerba Mate company founded in the 1990s, recognized this need and provided an attractive answer. With a strong emphasis on strengthening community and sustainable agriculture, Guayakí brought the social traditions and celebration of South American yerba mate to the college scene.

With great success, Guayaki employs “cebadors” (a word for an individual who shares mate in a circle with friends and family) to promote their drink to local communities, typically in college towns and on university campuses.

This marketing strategy continues to prove extremely effective, and it has definitely worked on me. Without ever

hearing of yerba mate before arriving at UC Davis, I quickly became enamored with the delicious range of flavors and the company’s impressive mission.

When I don’t have time to make coffee at home or stop by one of Davis’ downtown cafés, I grab a can from the MU and merrily go along with my day.

As both a tea and coffee lover, Yerba Mate is a beverage that has its own distinctive flavor yet is reminiscent of the herbal and roasty undertones of both tea and coffee. Combined with fruit or berry juice and just a touch of sugar, mate provides a pleasantly smooth and refreshing experience and has become one of my favorite sources of caffeine.

While a single can of mate doesn’t seem to be anything special, the deep history behind the traditional consumption of yerba mate in South America is astounding and diverse, steeped in centuries worth of tradition.

Through clever branding and energyboosting qualities, Yerba Mate claims its spot as a top choice for students who prefer their studying motivation in the form of a beverage.

Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed by individual columnists belong to the columnists alone and do not necessarily indicate the views and opinions held by The California Aggie.

Egghead cracks under the pressure

Disclaimer: (This cartoon is humor and/or satire, and its content is purely fictional. The story and names of “sources” are fictionalized.)

Davis MoMA: The Pspsps

BY NIMRA FARHAN nfarhan@ucdavis.edu

BY EMMA LAPIDUS eblapidus@ucdavis.edu

Disclaimer: (This cartoon is humor and/or satire, and its content is purely fictional. The story and names of “sources” are fictionalized.)

Eco-guilt

Hot take: You should feel bad for your carbon footprint

BY MOLLY THOMPSON mmtthompson@ucdavis.edu

We live in a “treat yourself ” era.

Which, socially, is a good thing — it’s the result of a movement of selfacceptance and learning to recognize

self-worth. But there’s an air of guilt that surrounds indulgence, like purchases that are just for fun need to be earned, and we’re only just beginning to divest from that mindset.

We should never feel guilty because of the things we enjoy. A sweet treat on a nice afternoon or a little present for yourself every once in a while is a positive — it makes us happy, which is incredibly important.

However, guilt does have a time and a place. Here, I think guilt is warranted for decisions that contribute to climate change. As harsh as it sounds, you should feel guilty for making a choice that you know will have environmental consequences if you could have easily made a better one. Granted, it’s next to impossible in this modern society to carry out a productive, realistic day without producing a carbon footprint, and in many cases being able to live an eco-friendly lifestyle is a privilege, but there are still decisions that we all make on a daily basis that we need to

be conscious about.

Again, in no way do I think we should feel bad for treating ourselves because we don’t think we deserve a reward (these things aren’t prizes that need to be won). But I do think we should feel bad for choosing options that are harmful to the planet because they’re slightly more convenient or trendy — or whatever the case may be.

The reason I think this is so important is that if we don’t feel bad, if we keep making excuses and living the way we currently are, things will never change. That’s not an option. We have to start making drastic changes, we’ve passed the point of having the luxury of taking baby steps. We can’t just go on being okay with destroying our Earth system; we quite literally won’t survive.

I do want to make it clear that I’m not trying to place all the blame on consumers. Climate change is the result of decades of multifaceted, systemic issues, and there’s no singular evil that we can point fingers at. We can’t only blame

Disclaimer: (This cartoon is humor and/or satire, and its content is purely fictional. The story and names of “sources” are fictionalized.) corporations and take no responsibility ourselves, and corporations can’t claim that it’s exclusively our fault either.

It’s all connected; it comes from both ends and it’s so tangled that it’s futile to waste time complaining that it’s not our responsibility. We do have a responsibility, as do big corporations.

Our actions have consequences, and we need to be aware of them. It’s difficult though, because the consequences are hard to comprehend. They’re not immediate and they’re not always easy to notice. They occur slowly, and they don’t necessarily seem like direct effects of the choices we make. That makes it seem like the ways in which we live our lives don’t actually take a toll on the environment, but this couldn’t be farther from the truth.

Of course, each individual action isn’t killing the planet on its own. One plastic water bottle, in isolation, doesn’t have a measurable impact on climate change. But there are eight billion of us

who are living here and making those choices individually.

One package from Amazon isn’t a big deal, but when they all add up it is. But the only way that we can make those necessary changes is for everyone to work together and play their part.

Everyone telling themselves that their one disposable coffee cup is fine is what got us here in the first place (bring a reusable one, it’s worth it).

However, it’s not an all-or-nothing game. Just like with everything, it’s about creating positive trends. None of us are perfect, and sometimes you forget your reusable grocery bags. It’s okay. The point is to reduce harmful actions, not to eliminate them — that’s unrealistic. We all make mistakes, it’s inevitable, but we should feel bad when we mess up; it’s how we learn. It’s not the end of the world, but it is harmful and we need to acknowledge that.

ECOGUILT on 12

THE CALIFORNIA AGGIE

THURSDAY, MAY 30, 2024 | 5

OPINION The Editorial Board stands in solidarity with the UAW strike

Support our student academic workers in their fight for fair treatment

BY THE EDITORIAL BOARD It feels like it was just yesterday when student workers on our campus striked for better working conditions; but in reality, it was more than a year ago, in November of 2022. Now, the time has come again. Another strike is upon us, having been authorized across the UC system and active at several campuses.

UC Davis and UCLA student academic workers have officially walked out of classes and paused their work as of Tuesday morning, May 28.

These schools are just the most recent to join in the UAW strike against the UC administration that has affected all campuses under its lead. The workers left their positions with signs claiming that the UC administration has violated their rights by unfairly punishing union-associated proPalestinian protesters.

The UAW (United Auto Workers Local 4811) is a UC-wide branch of the national UAW organization. The UC branch represents 48,000 teaching assistants, tutors and graduate student researchers who work at any of the 10 UC campuses. For the last two weeks, unionized student workers have been contemplating a strike across UC campuses in light of increasing tensions surrounding pro-Palestinian protests on campuses.

On Monday, May 20, the tensions came to a head when student workers at UCSC declared the start of a nation-

wide walk-out and labor strike. The UC administration released a statement on May 23, calling the striking academic workers’ actions illegal and saying that “The University remains disappointed that the UAW is engaging in an illegal strike in violation of our contract’s mutually agreed no-strike clauses to advance issues that have no bearing on employment at UC.” The UC administration has continued to stand by this statement and has not attempted to engage in solutions, though they filed an injunction to end the strike. As more and more UC campuses and California campuses are set to join the initiative, the matter will surely continue to evolve.

The Editorial Board supports the strike movements taken by the UAW condemning the recent actions at other UC campuses that have suppressed academic-employee protesting and self-expression.

This is a stressful time for undergraduates to go without TAs, as final exams are just a couple of weeks away and student academic workers play a key role in grading assessments and mentoring students. Regardless, it is important to stand by student workers who have been mistreated for exercising their personal rights.

Student academic workers should not be blamed for doing what’s necessary, but rather the administration should be held accountable for putting the workers in this position.

The UC Davis community has

been outspoken about the violence in the Gaza strip, and we are grateful that our protests have tended to be far safer than other campuses. Not everybody has access to the same freedoms and privileges as our community, so it is important to use the voice we have and stand up for what is important.

Our community must stay united and allied in protecting freedom to protest.

The Editorial Board asks for students, faculty and administration to remain open-minded during these pivotal times and engage in respectful discussion. We ask the administration to engage with the strike participants in a timely manner, so that their lack of action does not impact our undergraduate education.

SEE ONLINE Scan to read our editorial about fast fashion

Let’s hear some good news

There is more good in the world than gloomy headlines will have you believe

California must not cut spending on crucial financial aid programs

BY JOAQUIN WATERS jwat@ucdavis.edu “No news is good news” — that’s the old adage.

As adages go, I’m not a big fan of that one. It is deeply cynical, and above all things I think that cynicism will be the end of humanity should we allow it to take hold of us entirely. “No news is good news” — the implication of such a phrase is that the news is never good.

The natural inversion might well be “All news is bad news.” And sure, often these days that can feel true. The planet is warming, the cost of living is sky-high, fascistic attitudes are spreading across the world. It’s natural to greet each new headline with a combination of revulsion and fear. There is a lot in this world to be disgusted by.

But the news needn’t all be bad.

There is light in the world, and there is good news to be heard. We don’t hear about it often because the news industry is built on clicks, and few things draw more clicks than fearmongering headlines. Fear-mongering breeds cynicism, and cynicism leads to an atrophy of morality that contributes more than any active form of evil to the decay of the world. So how about some good news for a change?

Remember “Some Good News?”

That YouTube thing that John Krasinski made early in the pandemic spotlighting positive stories in a world plagued by negative ones (before he sold it to CBS, who proceeded to do nothing with it)?

No? Well in any case, I propose a similar column for all news outlets: a column dedicated to evening out the darkness sure to be plastered all over the front page with examples of genuine good in the world, of kindness given and taken, of hard labors paid off, of second chances and long-delayed victories.

Here are some examples of stories I would include in such a column — recent stories of monumental positivity that have been lost in the shuffle of the world’s evils: In the heart of New Orleans, there is a school called St. Mary’s Academy.

St. Mary’s was founded by an African American nun in 1867 — a mere two years after the Civil War — as a school dedicated to protecting and educating young women of color. It remains active to this day, as evidenced by a pair of recent alumni who discovered a new proof for the Pythagorean Theorem through trigonometry, something long thought impossible. Even more amazing is that the two young women — Calcea Johnson and Ne’Kiya Jackson — were not mathematicians, nor do they plan to pursue careers in that field. They were simply taught to aim high and prove naysayers wrong, and so they tackled a near-impossible school-wide bonus question on a math test in late 2022 and made mathematical history.

Randy Travis is a legendary country music singer who, in 2013, suffered a stroke that rendered him nearly unable to speak (let alone sing), effectively ending his musical career. But on May 3, he released a new song titled “Where That Came From.” How? Through a long and complicated process — which Travis himself was heavily involved in — of recording another artist singing the song, layering his voice on top of it, and working closely with him to make sure the final sound was true to what he would have performed had he still had full control of his vocal cords. Yes, artificial intelligence is a tool that can be (and is) wielded by the wrong hands for the wrong purposes, but I for one find it heartwarming and inspiring that it was able to give an artist desperate for the chance to keep making things the ability to do so.

In India, a revolutionary form of responsive care is being developed.

The Bharat Health and Initiative for Sahyog, Hita and Maitri has unveiled a small portable hospital designed to be airlifted into dangerous areas during disasters to provide aid to people. In a recent successful test, it was shown to be capable of treating over two hundred patients and fully operational in just twelve minutes. Each unit contains provisions for burn victims, major bleeding, broken bones, breathing difficulties and a wide variety of other injuries one might suffer during a disaster.

The project as a whole, should it be deemed viable, represents a leap forward in the evolution of rapid response to disaster zones the world over.

There are other such stories to find, should you look hard enough. My point is not that the good in the world outweighs the bad — there is a lot of bad in the world; seemingly more so by the day, and we must keep informed.

What I am trying to demonstrate is that the news need not be a place of intermittent dread, despair and creeping numb apathy toward the state of the world. We can — and should — inform people of the light as well as the darkness, so that we do not lose hope that there is any light at all. The world is full of monsters and cruelty, but it is also full of heroes and kindness. A little bit of sunshine goes a long way.

So no, I do not believe that “no news is good news.” On the contrary, good news is what we need to hear so that we may be better equipped to take on bad news.

Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed by individual columnists belong to the columnists alone and do not necessarily indicate the views and opinions held by The California Aggie.

The Middle Class Scholarship and Cal Grant provide millions for California students, and cutting them will cause students to suffer

BY CLAIRE SCHAD cfschad@ucdavis.edu For many students, attending college would not be possible without financial aid and scholarships. Luckily for myself and many others, California has been a leader in the efforts to make college more affordable to all students.

However, in early May, a shadow was cast over California’s progressive approach to financial aid when Governor Gavin Newsom unveiled a revision of the state budget which included many cuts and limits to higher education grants and scholarships.

For many years California has been one of the few states to acknowledge and act on the increasing burden that paying for college has on not only lowincome families but also middle-class families who had previously been left out of financial aid opportunities. The disproportional rise in college prices in relation to income has made paying for college more difficult for the middle class, who were once defined by their ability to pay for their children’s college.

Now, many middle class families struggle to afford the price of college without spending an outrageous and often impossible amount of their income on tuition.

Unfortunately, the revolutionary Middle Class Scholarship program, which is designed to alleviate financial stress for middle-income families, was hit hardest in Gov. Newsom’s May budget revision. Since its founding in 2013, the Middle Class Scholarship has provided financial assistance to over 300,000 students attending the University of California (UC) and California State University (CSU) systems, as well as California Community Colleges (CCC) that have a household income of less than $217,000.

If the newly unveiled budget revision is finalized in June, the Middle Class Scholarship will undergo cuts totaling $510 million, affecting students as soon as next fall. This means students who currently receive the scholarship could see their award amount reduced by as much as 80%. This will undoubtedly create issues and increase financial strain for eligible students at UC Davis and across the state, who currently receive anywhere from $500 to over $7,500 per year from the scholarship.

Additionally, if approved, Gov. Newsom’s proposed budget revision would also put a halt to the promised yearly expansion of the Cal Grant, which provides support to over 350,000 students, with awards ranging from $1,000 to upwards of $15,000 yearly.

In 2022, Gov. Newsom signed AB-

KELLY GUAN / AGGIE 1746, the Student Financial Aid: Cal Grant Reform Act, saying the state would increase the reach of the Cal Grant each year, allowing more students access to the program and increasing the amount of aid many students receive.

This promise helped modernize the Cal Grant system, which hadn’t been updated in nearly six decades, allowing the expansion of access to the Cal Grant and making the California financial aid system more equitable and inclusive overall. However, Gov. Newsom’s signing of AB-1746 came with one important condition: the expansion of the Cal Grant would only occur if the 2024-2025 budget year allowed it.

This very condition is why we are now grappling with the proposed cuts to financial aid.

Despite this, the governor has made it clear that he doesn’t want to make cuts to public education funding, saying it ultimately boils down to the fact that California has “a math problem,” referring to the state’s $27.6 billion deficit.

Ultimately, whether Gov. Newsom likes it or not, cuts to financial aid will have lasting negative effects and are not the solution to the state’s budget problems. If these cuts are implemented, thousands of students will see their financial aid reduced next fall, placing more strain on families and forcing students to take on more loans that will take years to repay. California’s budget deficits are undeniably problematic, but cutting spending for financial aid programs that will fund the education of our future leaders is not the answer.

Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed by individual columnists belong to the columnists alone and do not necessarily indicate the views and opinions held by The California Aggie.

6 | THURSDAY, MAY 30, 2024

THE CALIFORNIA AGGIE

Soil Seeps, So Do Secrets

BY ANA BACH Third-year English Major

LUNA SU / AGGIE

In the olden days, people had other ways to cope with secrecy. They would trek up a mountain/find a tree/carve a hole/ whisper their secret/cover it up with dirt that crumbles. The dirt continues to crumble and trickle-down tree bark. A seedling would embark on the dampened soil within the hole. I realized something could grow in secret. Something could grow out of a secret. Something beautiful could be preserved, and no one has to know. No one at all has to know the pain or the joy that was once felt. Only that something beautiful came out of it. I realized then that I better start trekking. Finding the highest mountains. Mountains that touch the clouds. In those mountains, I must find a forest.

A forest full of thousands of redwoods. I hope that I am lucky enough to hide my secrets in Yoshino Cherries, Dragon Bloods, and Traveler’s trees. I wish that all of my thoughts could be preserved in such beauty. The parts of myself that are the most sacred. The internal and external beauty that overwhelms me. It continues to overwhelm me. It will never stop. The beautiful parts of the world are fleeting. My only desire is for the soil to soak up every ounce of my soul. So I can live, embedded in the ground.

Forever.

And ever.

And ever.

And ever.

The Sky’s Minutes

H o w many stars shine on you tonight?

BY NIA HADI How many brilliant specs of Third-year English Major light watch over you in my place?

If I could, I would give all of them to you, My own present of celestial bounty, As ethereal as the beings we originate from.

My Darling Wolf, where has your soul traveled?

What sights have your eyes seen?

What scenes have you imagined?

Tell me Let me peek inside your mind, Show me everything you adore.

Every piece of you is precious to me: Every laugh, every habit, every story.

More than I want to explore your body, I want to explore your mind.

I want to know you so well I don’t have to search for your favorite drink.

I want you to know that I am yours and I will remain so Every hour, minute, second until I cease to be.

Be my muse and let me shower my adoration like stardust in the sky.

You will not be forgotten through literature,

BY SOPHIA ORACION The form in which written survives Third-year English Major through humanity’s constant pursuit To understand its past /’don,’dän/ To find its roots and build up verb Again, and again, until we progress.

1. the darkness shrieks and retreats out the window of your chest from a ribbon of It is literature which reminds us from whence we came. wind. vines of light comb through the bones that hug your lungs and shame dissolves It is literature which preserves the thoughts, emotions, and events from the past. into petals of mist.

Nothing more than words on a page, yet 2. no one knows how dew soothes wounds except a traveler’s bare feet and everyone their weight is greater than Atlas’ burden. forgets the weight they carry when they find an altar to lay it on. your body is a Worlds connected through temple and no one’s altar. time by simple words on a page.

3. here is a language you know best: truth. the sky swallows your scars, bruising Even if only our descendants remember you, your story will still exist. bronze into eminence into scarlet into gossamer.

And in this vast world, per4. two pierced palms hold your heart and you breathe like lazarus. haps one day another will find it, We will be revived as gods are: surviving through humanity’s remembrance.

To be forgotten through the cold passage of time Is the same as a candle’s flame vanishing in a strong wind.

So, my dear Wolf, stay and show wme the inner depths of your soul.

Show me your mind so I can properly reanimate you on paper.

Let me keep your memory in my heart and spread it through my writing hand.

Even when we live amongst the stars, we will not be forgotten.

DAWN

THE CALIFORNIA AGGIE

THURSDAY, MAY 30, 2024 | 7

Daphne

drowning and suffocating all at once, she howled.

They might never listen to her,

BY MOLLY THOMPSON but she would make sure someFirst-year Communication and Political Science Major one would. She was eclipsed; the Please, she choked out. She might But even when she whispered and sound stopped. But someone had have screamed, but she knew they only spoke when she was heard her, not any of them, someone wouldn’t hear it. spoken to, they hardly cared. higher. She was freed They wouldn’t stop. She remembered So she ran, but she was running out from the massive burden, carried hearing stories of Atlas shouldering of breath. Soon they’d catch up to away to somewhere safe. Somewhere the weight of the her. not of this world, whole sky — she didn’t have to wonShe’d tried to warn them. She’d told somewhere they couldn’t go. Here, der what that felt like. them they were killing her — they her hair entangled itself with the They kept following her, they kept insisted she was sprawling branches of the throwing things. She was drowning being dramatic. They said she’d surin a mountain of vive, that she’d survived before. She trees, her legs reached and deepened rotting matter, suffocating under told them she was into the woven tapestry of roots in heavy sheets of plaster and oil and dying, they told her she was misthe ground, her fingertips gold — they thought they taken. were tossing roses.

She’d held on — tread scalding water stretched and bloomed with the wispy, flowering leaves. Here, she They only heard her if she spoke for years, ignoring her blistering was cradled. nicely. If she dared to raise her voice skin. But now, she Now, there would be no one left to above a polite, was slipping. Please, she tried again, carry everything they had thrown at ladylike trill they ignored her. She’d help me. They said she would be her, no left to given up roaring long ago; she fine. They said she had hold up the sky. From way up high, learned it was futile. If she plenty of time. bothered them, things got worse.

As she was going under, burning and she heard them scream that they were dying.

‘The Jacket’

BY JORDAN ALVARADO Second-year history and Chicanx studies double-major I slip into a jacket two sizes too big, The one you gave me two summers ago, And looking in the mirror, Then tying my shoes I laugh thinking about how young we were When you offered me a ride To the cafe from the beach, I was flustered beyond belief, You know it’s true, But I said I was too busy, Staring you up and down, I couldn’t eat pesto sandwiches with you. * Still, nostalgia talks to me now, After I moved away, Learned to be my own person, Wide-eyed but brave, So today I lock the door to my apartment And hop on the train Headed to the city three and a half hours away, Where the weather is warmer And kinder Than you ever were.

Surrounded by an ill-tempered sea And above a billion bits of sand, I sit on your old jacket,

Wearing blue shorts and a white tank top with My face smothered in sunscreen, Here, she’s talking politics and movie soundtracks with me, Her conversation covered in curt wit and benign humor, And in response, Since I can’t resist, I say, “I wish it could stay like this forever.” * This is my life now, And I think I’m the better for it: A casual connoisseur of weed who’s Compassionate without the sarcastic brass, Learned by meeting soft strangers And making them laugh.

My northern friends who don’t really know me think I’ve always had it together, But they don’t know that you were once my only friend, Nor how long it took for me to finally look forward, Ahead to a future without you.

New Beginnings: A Student’s Ode

BY YIXING MA Third-year Applied Mathematics Major Far from the mountains I knew, Across seas and lands anew, Youth’s chapter opens, why should I rue?

The brightest star in the night sky, Seems like home’s watching eye, Gazing, tears glimmer with a silent cry.

In language, laughter and wounds entwine, Coffee bitter, life divine, In foreign lands, each step a sign.

The college bells ring through morning mist, Pages turn, in knowledge’s tryst, Thoughts like breezes, through corridors twist.

Friendship, like vines, wraps around, In strange cities, solace found, Every smile, a light profound.

A new beginning, no more a lone quest, In this realm, deeply impressed, It’s courage, it’s dreams, life readdressed.

I Don’t Know That Much better track of my belongings, you would think right then I might’ve realized that even when we’re so totally sure we definitely know what is and isn’t going to happen to us, we don’t. But who really learns anything when they’re 18?

BY SONORA SLATER Fourth-year Managerial Economics Major In high school, my friends and I ate lunch on the grass by the English building, next to a tall tree with leafy branches that gave us shade. I got it in my head that I should photograph it every day, from the same spot, so that we could look back and see the seasons changing.

After several months, approximately five poorly framed pictures were the fruit of my vision. Beyond the fact that I am terrible at project follow-through, you would think right then I might’ve accepted that despite our best attempts to capture it, time always gets away from us — but who really learns anything when they’re 16?

My first real job as a journalist was at a local broadcast media group, where I was one of two news anchors piecing together a weekly show about local elections, local drama and lost dogs (don’t worry, he was found safe — we covered the tearful reunion). Driving away from the building on my last day, I was overwhelmed with this feeling of sadness that I was never going to be there again.

Joke’s on me — I left my AirPods there and had to turn around and go back, like, 20 minutes later. Also, I’ve been there several times since to work on multimedia projects.

Beyond the fact that I should keep

I did ballet from the time I was three until I graduated high school, with my final performance abruptly canceled because of the pandemic. I was burned out by years of 20-hour practice weeks and the way my time at the dance studio fizzled to an end rather than coming to a close with a final bow, a cheer and a bright bouquet. So, when I came to college, I didn’t join a dance group. I put that part of my identity on pause, assuming it would come back when my love for dance returned and I found a club on campus to join.

I never did. But in my sophomore year, a girl I had connected with when I was searching for a roommate the year before texted me and asked if I’d want to teach ballet to kids. She had heard about the opportunity at a local studio, remembered that I was a dancer and thought I might be interested. Suddenly, I was put in charge of a group of 20 first graders for an hour every week.

They were absolutely chaotic, and spent more time swinging on the barre than they did using it for plies, and quite possibly remember nothing that I taught them that

year. But they performed a dance I choreographed for them in their end-of-year showcase, and I think at least three of them pointed their feet.

And all of them loved their sparkly dresses.

Beyond the fact that networking is truly the best way to get a job nowadays, you would think right then I might’ve been assured that the things we love come back to us in unexpected ways.

But who really learns anything when they’re 20?

On a bike ride to class in early March this year, I was stressed about the future and also my current life and also my recent mistakes, et cetera, because that’s simply the vibe of March, when I glanced up in front of me and saw a beautiful tree. It was fresh with new life, pink flowers vibrant and plentiful, and I heard two words rushing through my mind, on a loop: new beginnings.

I think I’ve learned a few things, at least, up to being 22. Here they are: 1. I am terrible at project folowthrough 2. I should keep better track of my belongings 3. I am, in fact, quite bad at predicting the future 4. Networking is great for your career 5. There are always new beginnings

What I Learned in My Year of Not Sleeping

By Sarah Wylie Slater, UC Davis alumna of ‘95 with a degree in English

On the plains of Oklahoma on an early summer afternoon in 1904, my great-great-grandfather was working in his fields. I imagine his belly was full after lunch at the farmhouse with his wife and seven children.

He’s driving a team of horses behind a plow, preparing to lay the seeds that would yield the harvest that would provide for his family in the coming year.

He looks to the sky, groans at the dark clouds threatening to interrupt his work.

Hears a rumble in that treeless, flat terrain, ideal for farming, but not for sheltering from a storm.

Begins guiding the horses to the barn, but the skies are full dark now and the next crack and flash strike too close.

The horses shriek and toss their heads; he drops the harness leathers and breaks into a run.

Next day, The Daily Ardmoreite would report his death: “struck and instantly killed by lightning while running home from work in his field.” He was forty years old; my great-grandmother had only three years with her father. Not enough.

More than a century later, I like to think there’s still some of the

Oklahoma farmer in my blood. I harvested strawberries this morning, though harvest is a hopeful summation of the final tally: 17 berries in total, some nibbled by gophers or snails, most no bigger than the tip of my pinky finger. Just enough to top off my oatmeal this morning and scatter over our salad greens tonight.

My year of not sleeping began as you might expect, with a single night of wakefulness. One night stretched into three, and then the insomnia passed.

No big deal.

Two weeks later, it happened again.

Soon, it was every week. I stuffed pink plugs into my ears so I wouldn’t hear the sounds of a sleeping household, my husband and dog trading snorts and snuffles and contented, sleepy groans.

When you feel like you cannot sleep, sleep consumes you. You measure the success of every day before it’s even begun, tallying the hours you slept and hypothesizing whether those hours were enough to sustain you through the day ahead.

Suddenly every social media algorithm brought me articles about the health risks associated with getting fewer than eight hours of sleep. I was, it seemed, literally going to die

if I couldn’t make myself sleep more.

I read books on insomnia, downloaded meditation apps, listened to the Insomnia Coach podcast obsessively.

I learned about the first stage of sleep, what I like to call “caveman sleep”—as in, I’m sleeping, but I’m also ready to jump up and wrestle a sabertooth tiger at any moment.

In my case, the tiger was sleep. I’d wake up in a mad panic an hour after I’d fallen asleep, certain I hadn’t been sleeping at all, determined to fight my way to slumber.

Yes, I was, in fact, sleeping. But not well and not, I felt certain, enough.

In a couple weeks, my second child, my oldest daughter, will graduate from the same school I received a degree from almost 30 years ago.

I thought I learned about self-sacrifice in the early days of becoming a mother—when every moment of every day (and night) suddenly became about someone else’s wants and needs instead of my own.

But somehow, (and really rather quickly!), my kids’ needs became my own.

A gift for them felt like a gift to myself. Their successes were also mine.

Seeing them happy made me happy

in equal measure.

For 22 years I have been the conduit of my daughter’s joy—supplying her with cupcakes and pink clothes, cats and Disneyland. As a toddler she would ask me every night, “What are we doing tomorrow?” and I, the homebody, would reach outside myself for a satisfactory answer.

They call it “cutting the cord” or “flying the nest,” euphemisms for a stage of life that is at once an end and a beginning and altogether more shocking, I think, for the parent left with a quiet house, an empty fridge, an open calendar, and not enough time with the daughter she’s spent 22 years loving with her whole heart.

Enough is enough.

Long before exasperated mothers were shouting the phrase at bickering siblings, before civil rights marchers were painting it on signs, John Heywood recorded the expression’s early use in his 1546 collection of English proverbs: “Here is enough, I am satisfied (sayde he.)

Sens enough is enough (sayd I) here maie we, With that one word take end good,

as maie be geast.

For folke say, enough is as good as a feast.”

Here is what I did in my year of not sleeping: I taught my 14hand cow horse to jump three-foot fences. I hiked 20 miles over two days through Rocky Mountain National Park to witness an unexpected maelstrom of axolotl and a powder blue alpine lake. I walked with reindeer and rode behind a team of sled dogs through the Alaskan wilderness. Was my brain sometimes foggy? Were my emotions erratic?

Yes and yes. Was I sleeping enough?

An argument could be made that I was, in fact, getting enough sleep.

Not a surplus, but enough.

Sometimes lightning strikes. But more often you do the work and you reap the harvest. And that harvest, even as meager as 17 strawberries on a summer morning, or four hours of sleep on a restless night, or a surprise visit from your daughter on a Friday evening with the whole family squeezed onto the couch, pizza on paper plates and Buffy on the television, is usually enough.

And enough? Enough, it turns out, really is as good as a feast.

6 | THURSDAY, MAY 30, 2024

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Soil Seeps, So Do Secrets

BY ANA BACH Third-year English Major

LUNA SU / AGGIE

In the olden days, people had other ways to cope with secrecy. They would trek up a mountain/find a tree/carve a hole/ whisper their secret/cover it up with dirt that crumbles. The dirt continues to crumble and trickle-down tree bark. A seedling would embark on the dampened soil within the hole. I realized something could grow in secret. Something could grow out of a secret. Something beautiful could be preserved, and no one has to know. No one at all has to know the pain or the joy that was once felt. Only that something beautiful came out of it. I realized then that I better start trekking. Finding the highest mountains. Mountains that touch the clouds. In those mountains, I must find a forest.

A forest full of thousands of redwoods. I hope that I am lucky enough to hide my secrets in Yoshino Cherries, Dragon Bloods, and Traveler’s trees. I wish that all of my thoughts could be preserved in such beauty. The parts of myself that are the most sacred. The internal and external beauty that overwhelms me. It continues to overwhelm me. It will never stop. The beautiful parts of the world are fleeting. My only desire is for the soil to soak up every ounce of my soul. So I can live, embedded in the ground.

Forever.

And ever.

And ever.

And ever.

The Sky’s Minutes

H o w many stars shine on you tonight?

BY NIA HADI How many brilliant specs of Third-year English Major light watch over you in my place?

If I could, I would give all of them to you, My own present of celestial bounty, As ethereal as the beings we originate from.

My Darling Wolf, where has your soul traveled?

What sights have your eyes seen?

What scenes have you imagined?

Tell me Let me peek inside your mind, Show me everything you adore.

Every piece of you is precious to me: Every laugh, every habit, every story.

More than I want to explore your body, I want to explore your mind.

I want to know you so well I don’t have to search for your favorite drink.

I want you to know that I am yours and I will remain so Every hour, minute, second until I cease to be.

Be my muse and let me shower my adoration like stardust in the sky.

You will not be forgotten through literature,

BY SOPHIA ORACION The form in which written survives Third-year English Major through humanity’s constant pursuit To understand its past /’don,’dän/ To find its roots and build up verb Again, and again, until we progress.

1. the darkness shrieks and retreats out the window of your chest from a ribbon of It is literature which reminds us from whence we came. wind. vines of light comb through the bones that hug your lungs and shame dissolves It is literature which preserves the thoughts, emotions, and events from the past. into petals of mist.

Nothing more than words on a page, yet 2. no one knows how dew soothes wounds except a traveler’s bare feet and everyone their weight is greater than Atlas’ burden. forgets the weight they carry when they find an altar to lay it on. your body is a Worlds connected through temple and no one’s altar. time by simple words on a page.

3. here is a language you know best: truth. the sky swallows your scars, bruising Even if only our descendants remember you, your story will still exist. bronze into eminence into scarlet into gossamer.

And in this vast world, per4. two pierced palms hold your heart and you breathe like lazarus. haps one day another will find it, We will be revived as gods are: surviving through humanity’s remembrance.

To be forgotten through the cold passage of time Is the same as a candle’s flame vanishing in a strong wind.

So, my dear Wolf, stay and show wme the inner depths of your soul.

Show me your mind so I can properly reanimate you on paper.

Let me keep your memory in my heart and spread it through my writing hand.

Even when we live amongst the stars, we will not be forgotten.

DAWN

THURSDAY, MAY 30, 2024 | 9

THE CALIFORNIA AGGIE

Sudoku

Enter digits from 1 to 9 into the blank spaces. Every row, column and 3x3 square must contain each digit. Each Sudoku has a unique solution that can be reached logically without guessing.

Answer to previous puzzle 05/23/24

Crossword

Scan to order your very own California Aggie merchandise!

HUMOR

My Editor is trying to silence me!

Readers beware, you’re in for a swear

BY MALCOLM LANGE mslange@ucdavis.edu For three whole quarters I have been held back by my editor, Annabel.

Every time I submit an article all I ever hear is, “You can’t curse Malcolm!” or “Really, this isn’t appropriate, Malcolm.” And I have had enough! I thought this was a place for students to express their voice without censorship.

But I guess I was wrong, because time and time again Annabel has thwarted me with her editing powers. That is why this week, I take a stand. I will convince Annabel to let me use swear words in the school’s newspaper, even if it is the last thing I do.

Throughout this article, I will be giving some reasons as to why I should be allowed to curse in my opinion pieces. I will be labeling these reasons fittingly to help you follow my argument. Starting with S) This is a newspaper for adults and if adults use curse words, they won’t mind reading them. H) Curse words really help the punchline of my jokes. Imagine how much better any of my articles would have been with curse words. I) Some curse words are not really that rude to say, take **** for example. This is just a word for a normal bodily function. Did you just bleep that out Annabel? What the ****! Finally, T) If I can’t curse in English, I should at least curse in a different language, one

that almost no one speaks. Something like Latin or Esperanto. It’s such cacas that I am not allowed to curse in any language.

Now, some might be thinking, “Malcolm, is this really that important to you that you would write a whole article about it?” Yes, yes it is. In fact, I just thought of more reasons that the cruel, curseless Annabel should let me swear.

Finding the curse words could be like a little puzzle for readers to do. Understanding how to solve that puzzle could be fun. Consider, if you will, looking at the first letter of each sentence in a paragraph. Knowing what you now know, can you find the secret curse word?

I also thought it would be fun to add random words in a different language, and having my sinister, swear-denying editor Annabel have to go through and try to figure out which one is a curse word she would need to take out. So let’s give it a try. My list of words begins here: witam, ben je, adjö.

Anyway, I truly believe that I should be allowed to curse in my articles if I see it fit to do so. In all honesty, this is the hill I feel like dying on so, Editor Annabel, do your worst.

Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed by individual columnists belong to the columnists alone and do not necessarily indicate the views and opinions held by The California Aggie.

Petition to get Jojo Siwa to headline Lawntopia 2025 I finna be in the pit

BY ALLISON KELEHER adkeleher@ucdavis.edu If you are as chronically online as I am, you probably know all about Jojo Siwa’s interesting exit from childhood fame. In order to emphasize her newfound adulthood, she began her song “Karma” with the lyric, “I was a bad girl, I did some bad things.” Dare I say that her lyrical creativity is unmatched in the music industry? I would love to hear this lyricist live at UC Davis in 2025.

Along with her inspiring lyricism, Jojo redefined her style to look like a modern-day KISS band member on crack. If you can’t remember, Jojo’s wardrobe before the rebrand was very bright, colorful and covered in glitter. To top it off, she slicked her receding hairline back into a ponytail with a bow. Actually inspiring if you think about it — she was doing slick-back ponytails before they were popular. Although her wardrobe is now very dark and edgy, she remains covered in glitter.

In addition to her edgy style, Jojo acquired astounding confidence — she was able to say that she invented a new music genre called gay pop. You might be confused, because names like David Bowie, Freddie Mercury or Lady Gaga are

coming to your mind right now. Your suspicions would be correct, because, famously, Jojo didn’t invent gay pop.

However, this is the confidence that UC Davis needs in its performer.

We need a performer who thinks they are better than they actually are.

Lawntopia will be forever changed, just like you will be after you see this performance. I can imagine it right now: Jojo Siwa will arrive in her Tesla covered in pictures of her own face, and she will take the stage in that terrifying jumpsuit and rock our worlds.

We could have the once-in-alifetime chance to witness Jojo Siwa doing the infamous dance to “Karma.”

We won’t need to know the moves, because her presence will inspire us in that moment to do the dance flawlessly. I can feel it.

Now, you must be wondering how UC Davis will be able to get such an A-list celebrity like Jojo to headline Lawntopia. On the surface, this seems like a difficult task, but let’s use some critical thinking skills. If you analyze the outlook of this whole child-star rebrand on Jojo Siwa’s image, I predict her net worth will decline over the next year. She will be desperate for a creative outlet by this time next year — this is where UC Davis comes in with Lawntopia.

In other words, dream guest at Lawntopia? Let’s make things interesting, Jojo Siwa.

Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed by individual columnists belong to the columnists alone and do not necessarily indicate the views and opinions held by The California Aggie.

10 | THURSDAY, MAY 30, 2024

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Local art collective Third Space What is the still thriving after 11 years importance of news

The rich history of Davis’ community space for artists of all types

BY GRETA FOEHR features@theaggie.org Third Space Art Collective, a local non-profit, provides a space for artists to come together, hone their craft and share what they create.

Shannon Tracy, a Davis resident and the collective’s treasurer on the board of directors, explained what Third Space represents.

“We are a space that people can think of as their creative space outside of their home and their work,” Tracy said. “That’s why we call it Third Space.

Right now we have studio spaces that we have rented out. We have regular gallery shows. We have a music studio for musicians who come in to practice solo or who practice with their band.

CJ Borges, a Davis community member, has been involved with Third Space from the very beginning. The idea for Third Space originated with Lauren Norton who started an art market and display that took place on the E Street Plaza, called the Davis Flea, according to Borges. On Sundays, vendors would set up tables and sell art, along with live music from local bands.

Eventually, the Davis Downtown Business Association expressed concerns regarding the location of this market, so they were forced to rethink their event — that is when the idea for Third Space was born, as a place to promote local artistic endeavors. For a duration of time, they rented temporary spaces to put on events with live music and a gallery space. In 2013, they found a

warehouse just beyond downtown Davis at 946 Olive Drive.

From 2013 to 2017, Third Space operated out of this new location.

Borges described how Third Space functioned throughout that period of time.

“It had three sections,” Borges said.

“The front area was an amazing event space; the middle section was group art, and they had lots of tables for doing group art. The back space was where my studio was. There’s more private studios in there, and they all had roll-up doors and big garage doors. And the event space would all be opened up; we had lots of big windows, and there [were] no neighbors or anything, so we didn’t have to worry about sound.“ When Third Space lived on Olive Drive, they hosted live music events often.

“Pretty soon there were three or four shows a week happening at Third Space, and it became a place for bands, like touring indie bands,” Borges said. “They would come here. It was on the circuit.

Due to unfortunate events, Third Space had to give up their location in 2017.

“In 2017, there was a fire at a warehouse in Oakland where artists were working in a collective, and that gave a lot of landlords cold feet,” Tracy said. “[Third Space] ended up losing that physical space.”

Borges expanded on the reason Third Space moved locations and how it was related to the fire at the art collective known as “Ghost Ship.” “‘Ghost Ship’ happened recently

in Oakland at this community art warehouse space that wasn’t zoned correctly,” Borges said. “People were living in that spot. There was a fire, and a lot of people died because they couldn’t get out because there was only one exit. It was a horrible thing. So in light of that, we got in trouble for having an event with too many people inside a building, it was against the fire code.”

Third Space could not afford to make all of the changes that were necessary to stay up to date with the fire code, so they were pushed out of the Olive Drive location in 2017.

Borges shared that a longtime member of Third Space was upset about it getting shut down and wanted to start it up again. A group of people gathered to figure out how to restart the collective and found their new location, which is 17 Arboretum Drive, Unit C. “We all had some meetings, a board was created, and we became an actual non-profit,” Borges said. “We were only sheltered under a non-profit [when we were at the old location]. And so now, Third Space is even more legit than ever.”

There are now seven people on the board, and they worked hard to find a new location and recreate Third Space.

“When we reformed, we wrote all-new bylaws and went through the process of becoming an official nonprofit [...] under the IRS code 500 and 1C3,” Tracy said.

THIRDSPACE on 12

and media literacy?

Experts and students discuss the purpose of becoming media literate

BY SABRINA FIGUEROA features@theaggie.org According to research done by the International Data Corporation, the amount of information available online hit 64 zettabytes in 2020 — a number with 21 zeros and equivalent to a trillion gigabytes. The same study also predicted that there would be at least 175 zettabytes of online data by 2025. However, this number does not include physical data such as books, print articles or manuals, so the amount of information in the entire world is much higher.

Our brains can’t hold all that information, nor can they read it all. So, how do we deal with the overwhelming amount of data that we see through our phone screens, laptops and TVs? James Potter, a communications professor at UC Santa Barbara who studies media, suggests and encourages people to achieve a higher degree of media literacy to deal with the problem.

“Media literacy [is] a perspective from which we expose ourselves to the media and interpret the meaning of the messages we encounter,” Potter wrote.

The argument that media literacy is helpful lies in the way the human brain works: the hardware and software.

Potter defined our mental hardware as the biological and neurological components of the brain and our mental software as the way our brains are “programmed,” or how the mind tells the brain how to function.

While the hardware of our brains cannot be changed easily, mental software has additional programming that is heavily influenced and changed by one’s social and cultural background, as well as their exposure to media.

“All this additional programming shapes how we make decisions in our everyday world about what to wear, what to eat, what is important, how to act and how to spend our resources of time and money,” Potter wrote.

Additionally, this type of programming relies on the automatic processing of information that humans often do without any effort or thinking

— also known as automaticity.

“We encounter almost all media messages in a state of automaticity. We cannot consider every possible message and consciously decide whether to pay attention to it or not. There are too many messages to consider,” Potter wrote. “Over time, we have developed automatic routines that guide this filtering process very quickly and efficiently so we don’t have to spend much, if any, mental effort.”

Because humans tend to automatically process information they come across and that information transfers to our programming, we are prone to believing and sharing misinformation. This behavior is especially prominent in the news we consume, where it is likely that some people will not fact-check for accuracy.

Dan Evon, the senior manager of education design at the News Literacy Project, expressed that news literacy — a type of media literacy — should be an important skill for everyone.

“People are bombarded with information on social media. Being able to sift through what is reliable and what’s not is an extremely important skill. If you’re not careful about the media that you’re consuming, you might develop some opinions that aren’t based on credible information,” Evon said.

MEDIALITERACY on 12

Third Space Collective’s current studio space and latest gallery show. (Courtesy/Greta Foehr)

Roadside furniture Which fields are going to be most affected by AI development? finds new life with UC Davis students discuss their fields of interest and the help of college whether AI poses potential risks to them students, community members

BY ZOEY MORTAZAVI features@theaggie.org

College students and community organizations help turn trash into treasure

BY EMME DUNNING features@theaggie.org Springtime brings many changes: flowers bloom, temperatures rise and, in Davis, furniture appears on street corners.

As June marks the end of the academic year for UC Davis, many students head home for their summer break, leaving a trail of unwanted furniture behind. Despite being in great condition, much of this discarded furniture has the potential to end landfills each year if unclaimed. Luckily, the Davis community has come up with creative solutions to this problem.

For Sherry Richter, a former Davis resident, move-out week might as well be a national holiday. Richter is an avid scavenger and has repurposed countless items.

“You know that saying, ‘One man’s trash is another man’s treasure?’ Well, I took that to ridiculous levels,” Richter said.

This “treasure” came in many forms: lamps, bedside tables, chairs and dressers, all in completely usable condition. Richter found most pieces on street corners and in apartment complex dumpsters, many dropped by college students.

Although Richter uses some of the furniture to adorn her own home, she has also used this hobby to help those in need. Working with various organizations including the Yolo Crisis Nursery and a group of community members helping refugees, Richter has helped many meet their furniture needs in an equitable way.

The prospect of assisting people in meeting these needs helped Richter to rationalize the sometimes grueling task of collecting furniture, particularly from dumpsters.

“Those were the times when I really did walk into the dumpster because people would just leave [furniture] in there,” Richter said. “There was nothing wrong with them — didn’t need a paint job, didn’t need anything.”

During her time in Davis, Richter learned all about where to find the best pieces.

She noted that the places she has been most successful in her salvaging ventures have been college student apartment complexes and neighborhoods with student rentals.

Richter also utilizes online networks,

namely freecycle.org, to give and receive items that might otherwise end up in landfills.

While scavenging can be a very cost-effective and rewarding way to get furniture, it is certainly not for everybody. If late-night dumpster diving is not your thing, Community Mercantile may offer a solution.

Stephanie Koop is a co-founder of Community Mercantile, a reuse store in Davis that makes giving and getting second-hand items easy.

Their space, located on Cantrill Drive, is filled to the brim with salvaged items, from furniture to craft supplies to clothing. Although similar in model, Community Mercantile differs from a thrift store in a couple of ways.

“We prioritize salvaged goods over donated goods,” Koop said. “Our goal is to find things that would otherwise have been thrown into the landfill and get them back into use.”

This philosophy makes move-out season of great importance to the nonprofit organization, who strives to give new life to old items.

They source their items from street corners, dumpsters and through partnerships with organizations like Recology which aim to reduce their waste.

They also accept donations from community members, helping furniture get off of the streets and into homes.

In addition to furniture, Community Mercantile offers harder-to-find items like hardware, electronics, games and cleaning supplies.

The non-profit has been excited by their community engagement so far and will be moving locations in the next year to accommodate increased demand for items. They hope to increase their offerings into larger appliances, as well as implement a lending system for items that people may only need for shortterm use. “[The store] has been really well embraced by the community as a whole,” Koop said. “It’s really been fun and exciting.”

Juliette Price, a third-year design major at UC Davis, has used both scavenging and second-hand shopping to find unique items. For Price, giving old furniture new life is not just beneficial from an environmental standpoint, but also a budget-friendly form of expression.

FURNITURE on 12

In 2023, the release of the newest Artificial Intelligence (AI) software, ChatGPT, took the world by storm.

Suddenly, AI was not only capable of answering nearly any question possible, it was also completely free and accessible to the public.

The emergence of artificial intelligence software has changed the dynamics of both educational and professional fields. AI was first discussed at Dartmouth College in 1956, and was further developed at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology during a special interest group later that year. This group intended to understand how we can better comprehend the human mind by developing artificial minds.

After this research was initiated, professionals began to notice a connection between artificial intelligence and cognitive science as they attempted to explain the relationship between computational and cognitive processes.

Many, at UC Davis and beyond, are beginning to ask this question since the emergence of advanced AI tools: which

fields are at risk of jobs being replaced

by AI? AI has many overlapping qualities with cognitive science, and the software has the potential to complete a number of tasks in seconds. This poses a potential risk to many different fields, which may include technical and finance-based jobs.

For example, AI’s ability to produce code and program computers may risk data science, logistics and computer science professionals in upcoming years.

Many UC Davis students are pondering AI development and questioning whether their own career paths are at risk.

Nora Modica, a first-year cognitive science major, discussed the possibility of AI posing a threat to her field of interest.

“When it comes to the potential impact of AI in the field of cognitive science, I think it will advance many cognitive scientists’ careers,” Modica said. “Personally, I’m majoring in cognitive science because I’m interested in the computational aspect of it, and how that can be applied to AI.” Modica continued by noting that, if handled correctly, AI can be utilized as a learning tool for professionals, as opposed to posing a threat to those in the job market.

“The cognitive science major [at Davis] has been gaining popularity recently, which I think is because more people are becoming familiar with the possibilities and opportunities that AI presents for the future,” Modica said. “I think the field as a whole will experience growth as AI becomes more advanced and more people become interested in studying and using it.”

There are some jobs that AI just cannot do, according to Forbes. A primary example includes leadership roles, which require creativity, vision and collaboration skills. Other careers, including creative writing and communication-driven jobs, are also at a low risk of being intercepted by AI. AIIMPACTS on 11

HackDavis encourages learning and growth for students interested in technical innovation

UC Davis student-run hackathon brings together designers, developers and computer programmers from California and around the globe

BY LYNN CHEN features@theaggie.org On campus, innovative students can find many opportunities to explore their potential. One of these opportunities is HackDavis, a once-a-year hackathon event that attracts hundreds of undergraduates from California and other parts of the world. This year, HackDavis was held on April 27 at the University Credit Union Center.

A hackathon is an event where you “transform your crazy ideas into real projects,” according to HackDavis’ official website. Under a 24-hour or 36-hour time limit, students will form teams and collaborate to create technical solutions to problems facing their local communities.

Their final product can be a website, mobile app or hardware invention, which they enter into competitions in

various categories, such as “Best Design” or “Most Technical.”

While undergraduate teams compete for prizes in recognition of their projects, student coordinators of the event provide sleeping and dining accommodations for the participants.

The HackDavis team also hosts workshops on topics such as computer programming for participants who are more interested in learning from the experience, rather than competing.

Because of how well-organized HackDavis is, it is one of the top 50 student-run hackathons in the world, according to Win Cheng, third-year computer science major and lead technical director of the event.

“We had a thousand plus participants this year,” Cheng said.

“Students didn’t just code, they were also designers or just people interested in pitching business ideas.”

Cheng explained that one of the

most impressive products that he has seen participants invent is a facial recognition machine for those with Alzheimer’s Disease.

The invention consists of a head accessory with a camera installed on top, which identifies different people’s facial features. The wearer of the machine can record another person’s name while the camera captures and memorizes their facial features.

The tool’s objective was to assist Alzheimer patients to more easily remember people that they’ve met before.

“Maybe it’s because I’m a [computer science] guy, but it’s [a] very good [product],” Cheng said.

Students at HackDavis hone and improve various skills while they’re there, whether that be in technical design, computer programming or just becoming a more effective team worker.

HACKDAVIS on 11

THE CALIFORNIA AGGIE

THURSDAY, MAY 30, 2024 | 11

SCIENCE AND TECH New sugar alternative discovered

Allulose is a cost-effective sweetener with a similar taste to table sugar

BY ARYAMAN BHATIA science@theaggie.org Researchers at UC Davis, along with the Mars Advanced Research Institute, have announced a breakthrough in the production of low-calorie sugar substitutes like allulose. This discovery could also substantially lower production costs for sweeteners.

“Due to the rampant rise in obesity and diabetes, consumers are desperately seeking ways to reduce their sugar intake,

but to date there are no options that are both accessible and without sacrifice of palatability,” the study reads. “One of the most promising new ingredients in the food system as a non-nutritive sugar substitute with near perfect palatability is D-psicose [allulose].”

Allulose is a naturally occurring sugar that is similar in taste and texture to table sugar. Allulose provides nearly 70% of the flavor and sweet taste of sucrose, yet it is minimally metabolized as it passes through the body. It also negligibly impacts blood glucose and

COMMENCEMENT

AIIMPACTS

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Zoe Hareng, a fourth-year neurobiology, physiology and behavior major, expressed her thoughts on Brown as the undergraduate commencement speaker.

“Reading about the speakers for the graduate [ceremonies] makes me feel like us undergraduates were a second thought,” Hareng said. “I don’t see how a speech from a sports coach relates to graduating college. [It] seems like they chose this speaker for the student athletes who seem to get the most amenities at this university.”

Lanham agreed with this sentiment.

“I’m excited to see some people of scientific backgrounds to inspire those going into those fields, myself included, but I’m just confused about the basketball speaker,” Lanham said.

“What does he provide to the event?”

Hareng then expanded on her disappointments with the video format of the speech by saying it will have a negative effect on the ceremony as a whole.

“When I found out that our commencement speaker was giving his speech through a recorded video, I was very disappointed,” Hareng said.

“After not being able to have a high school graduation due to [COVID-19] in 2020, I was looking forward to all the aspects of graduation, including inspirational words, preferably in person. The fact that we have to sit and watch a video when the majority of our college careers were on Zoom is ironically disheartening.”

In fields such as mental health, general counseling and education, individuals are at a low risk of AI threatening job availability because human connection and interpersonal relationships are often necessary to do those jobs. At least for now, professions which require one-on-one communication cannot be replaced or replicated by AI technology.

Overall, AI seems to pose the most significant risk to jobs that are based on computation, particularly statistical and data-based professions.

Many accounting, economic and officebased computational jobs are at risk of AI replacement because of AI’s ability to rapidly work through calculations.

Hannah Wen, a second-year data science major, shared her thoughts on AI development as someone going into a high-risk field.

“As a data science major, I’m somewhat concerned about AI as a threat to my field in the same way I’m concerned about how our economy will adapt to it as a tool,” Wen said.

“I definitely think AI could take jobs from professionals; I also think that it will fully be incorporated into databased fields eventually, as well as all other fields.”

Wen continued by sharing her positive outlook on the future of AI working alongside professionals working in statistics and data science.

“I think that AI can 100% be optimized to improve productivity and working conditions,” Wen said.

“However, I’m more of an AI optimist.

insulin levels.

Shota Atsumi, professor of chemistry and author of the paper, commented on the production aspects of allulose.

“Allulose is a great alternative to sugar, but we have not had a costeffective way to manufacture it,” Atsumi said. “Our new method is efficient, economically feasible and could be scaled up for commercial production.”

The new approach works by evoking a process in microorganisms that leads to a theoretical yield of 99% with high

purity. Other methods have a much less effective output in quality and yield, but the new method allows allulose to be widely sold in markets.

Atsumi, Ph.D. candidate Jayce Taylor, professor Justin Siegel and a team of co-workers from the Department of Chemistry and the Mars Advanced Research Institute edited a microorganism’s metabolism to redirect its pathways. This led to the organism converting glucose to allulose.

The modified cells consumed all the glucose they were fed and converted it

to allulose with a notable concentration, achieving a yield of over 60% and purity of over 95%. This outperformed existing production methods.

“Once flux was redirected, it turns out the cells have everything they need; they just need [...] turned on and undesired pathways turned off,” Atsumi said.

UC Davis has filed patent applications on the process and the modified organisms, and researchers are currently working with a commercial partner to discuss scaling up the process.

I know a lot of people are concerned about AI taking away jobs, but I’m not one of them.”

A 2023 report by the Pew Research Center shows that one-fifth of all jobs are in a high-exposure position to AI. The term “exposure” recognizes how much fields will likely interact with AI, not necessarily the posed risk to the jobs themselves.

To that end, it is still up in the air whether labor availability is at a significant risk as a result of AI’s rapid development. Either way, AI will certainly have a known presence in almost every field within the next few years.

The Pew study also states that while most feel more hopeful about how AI tools can be utilized to benefit most professional realms, 11% of workers in information and technology have reported that they think AI will hurt job availability more than it will help as a tool.

Vedika Iyer, a first-year biological systems engineering major, shared her thoughts on AI and its relationship to her field of study.

“I aspire to work in the extremely new and complex field of biofuels and renewable energy,” Iyer said.

“Since these products require a lot of agricultural and environmental research, artificial intelligence will be useful in the field.”

Iyer continued by explaining how researchers are optimizing the use of AI tools, rather than running from them in fear of their jobs being at risk.

“Rather than replacing work for researchers, AI has had tremendous success in helping scientists optimize plant growth in order to sustainably produce agriculture for feedstock,” Iyer said. “As I’m preparing to enter this field

of new technology, I also hope to utilize AI to reach new limits in research and develop more sustainable ways to fuel the future.”

Regardless of the field you’re interested in entering, AI will likely continue to develop rapidly. In an ideal world, we will find ways to utilize these technologies to our advantage, as opposed to allowing them to pose a substantial risk to countless fields.

As these students have expressed, finding a balance in the use of AI in professional fields is the key to keeping it a resource to be used in the workplace.

Hopefully, we will be able to adapt to the rapid technological progress and keep the use of AI tools at a beneficial level worldwide.

through communication setbacks that resulted between the organizers.

“Working amongst teams across sponsorship, technical and marketing [was] very similar to talking in professional settings,” Yap said. “I’ve definitely grown in my communication and trying to keep everyone on the same page.”

Yap continued by explaining how her role in HackDavis has been beneficial to her.

“As a president, I definitely learned a lot about the importance of unifying everyone, especially in a team of 40

HACKDAVIS FROM PAGE 10 “From what I’ve heard, people learn a lot [about] teamwork and collaboration,” Rachel Yap, co-president and design lead for HackDavis, said.

“You might be forced to communicate with people who may not speak the same language as you.”

She elaborated by explaining that difficulties may also arise when students of different occupations, like designers or web developers, have to converse with each other. Two distinct professional fields can utilize contrasting jargon and vocabularies, encouraging undergraduates to enhance their verbal communication skills.

“This really reflects what it’s like out there in the industry, in the real world,” Yap said.

In fact, Yap found personal growth

12 | THURSDAY, MAY 30, 2024

THE CALIFORNIA AGGIE

SPORTS WOMEN’S WATER POLO

A review of the UC Davis women’s water polo team’s 2024 season

The Aggies end an eventful season with a thrilling home game

BY DIEGO CERNA sports@theaggie.org The UC Davis women’s water polo team ended their season with a 10-18 record, concluding a very up-anddown season for the Aggies.

On April 26, the No. 7 seed UC Davis was set to play their last game of the season to the No. 2 seed UC Irvine Anteaters in the Big West Women’s Water Polo Championships, which was hosted at the UC Davis Schaal Aquatic Center. The Aggies ended up losing a close game, as the Anteaters advanced with a score of 9-6.

Despite the loss, the Aggies displayed some spotlight athletes throughout the season, with four Aggies earning a spot on All-Big West Conference Teams this year. Grace Pelkey, a fourth-year communications major, secured her first-ever All-Big West Second Team placement — becoming the 16th Aggie to place on the Second Team. Pelkey had a significant impact on the team as she

ECOGUILT FROM PAGE 4 So yes, we should all feel bad when we get coffee in a plastic cup.

We should feel guilty when we order fast fashion clothes that we don’t need.

We should feel bad for turning on the air conditioning before opening the window or turning up the heat before putting on a sweatshirt. We should feel bad for buying apples in a big plastic container instead of the loose ones without packaging. We should feel bad for booking a flight that we didn’t really need to take. We should feel bad for buying a new water bottle because it’s going viral and it’s on sale on TikTok Shop. We should feel bad for overconsumption, and we should feel bad for careless consumption.

Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed by individual columnists belong to the columnists alone and do not necessarily indicate the views and opinions held by The California Aggie.

THIRDSPACE FROM PAGE 10 They currently have between 50 and 60 members, according to Tracy. Borges explained how Third Space functions in its current location.

“We have private studios for residential members,” Borges said.

“They have 24-hour access and can put their stuff in here and leave it. And then there are general members, which is pretty affordable — $65 a year — and they can come here during open hours, [which are held] three or four times a week, and work on their stuff using the facilities.”

In addition to the private studios and communal art space, there is a free art pantry.

“There’s also the art pantry, which is open on Saturdays, […where] people can donate art supplies, and then you can just get free art supplies,” Borges said.

There is also a studio space designed for musicians. Evan Sandler, a fourthyear cinema digital media major at UC Davis, is a member at Third Space and uses their recording studio. “[They have] been trying to revive it in its new location,” Sandler said.

“It’s a place where people pay for a membership and there are certain levels of access and certain people have rooms to [do their art form] and there is a recording studio; it’s a perfect studio space. Bands rent that out to practice.”

In the future, Third Space hopes to continue to grow and once again have space for an event venue. Tracy shared that they are hoping to take over the spot where the U.S. Bicycling Hall of Fame currently resides.

“This space that we’re in is kind of our prototype of what we eventually want to have — either an expansion of this or another location where we can have events, like a larger warehouse space that has more flexibility for music shows and stuff like that,” Tracy said.

Third Space has survived a variety of obstacles and is still able to provide a welcoming home for Davis artists.

MEDIALITERACY FROM PAGE 10 As social media becomes a top source for news in the US, according to a study done by the Pew Research Center, some argue that it will likely make the spread of inaccurate information easier.

Marissa Amato, a fifth-year sociology major, expressed her own opinion on the matter.

“I’ve come across so many lies on TikTok and I know there’s probably

led the Aggies with 37 points, 19 assists and 45 steals throughout the season. Pelkey also rallied five hat tricks throughout the season by scoring three or more points in one game.

Bridget Miller, a first-year undeclared major and center, and Chelsea Johnson, a first-year undeclared major and center defender, were named to The Big West AllFreshman Team. Miller provided excellent defense at the line of scrimmage, collecting 28 goals with a 45.2% shooting average. The best game performance she displayed was against UC Merced as she racked up a career-high four goals.

Additionally, Johnson was a valuable player to the team as she produced on both sides of the ball.

Johnson recorded 19 goals, 26 assists, 19 steals and nine field blocks in her first year at UC Davis. Her most notable game of the season was against California State University, Monterey Bay (Cal State Monterey), where Johnson recorded a hat trick. This is the first time that two first-year Aggies have made a Big-West All Freshman more that I didn’t actively seek out, which sucks,” Amato said. “Especially when it comes to politics, like the election in November, I think it’s important to try and seek out multiple sources of the same [event] for accuracy’s sake.”

In the 2016 election, the Pew Research Center found that 23% of adults shared fabricated political stories, some accidentally and some intentionally. Another study by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology showed that fake news can spread 10 times faster than true reporting on social media because of both algorithms and the fact that people prefer to listen to something that is entertaining or shocking.

“Honestly, it’s not surprising that false news spreads online so much. It’s so easy to repost a story you probably didn’t even read fully, other than the headline, because you thought it was hard evidence in favor of your views, ” Amato said. “It’s draining seeing fake information spread so fast, especially about politics, because we need to be truthfully informed about things. Our futures are on the line.”

While the world’s current political climate has become highly partisan, so has news consumption. This is known as selective exposure where people actively seek out information that only further proves their personal beliefs, no matter how accurate it is.

Although this consumption bias might be a challenge to learning accurate knowledge, research has shown that people with higher degrees of news literacy allow themselves to be “critically loyal.” So, these people still have strong beliefs and views, but do not let it cloud their judgment when it comes to reading, listening or watching news which inherently allows them to seek and discard inaccurate information.

If you are wondering about whether or not you have been lied to online in the past, chances are you may want to learn more about where to start gaining a deeper understanding and higher level of news and media literacy.

DeMario Phipps-Smith, senior manager of community learning at the News Literacy Project, gave a few tips on how to improve your news literacy skills in an interview with NBCU. “First, stop and slow down whenever you encounter a claim online and you feel a strong reaction. [Second,] evaluate the source; is this coming from a reliable, standards-based news organization, or is this clickbait or a third party that can’t be trusted? Third, talk to the people in your life about misinformation or things that can be debunked,” Phipps-Smith said.

Becoming aware of your decisions and actions while engaging with media messages is just another way to make sure you are getting the best out of the sea of information people will continue to create, according to Amato. “[Media literacy] is such an important skill, and many people don’t realize they’ve been practicing it for such a long time,” Amato said.

“Just because scrolling on TikTok or [X] is not academic, doesn’t mean you shouldn’t analyze what you’re watching.”

FURNITURE FROM PAGE 10 “I love that someone else’s trash becomes my treasure,” Price said. “As a college student majoring in design, I crave style and aesthetics but have to satiate that hunger on a budget.”

Price also believes that although it might require a little bit more work, buying or finding items second-hand can be much more rewarding than the offerings of modern furniture and clothing stores.

“Whatever gets broken can be repaired, and whatever gets dirty can be cleaned,” Price said. “We’re too quick to completely discard things when they break or when they even no longer meet

Team since 2018.

Gianna Nocetti, a second-year mechanical engineering major and attacker, received an All-Conference Honorable Mention. Nocetti recorded 31 goals, 17 assists and 17 steals throughout the season, which was invaluable to her team. The redshirt second-year was named to the Big West All-Freshman Team last season and will continue to be an important part of the Aggies’ offense.

As for the team’s overall season, UC Davis had a rocky start. The Aggies lost their first six games of the season yet broke the streak in the UC San Diego Triton Invitational with an overtime thriller against Long Beach State University on Feb. 2, 2024.

Pelkey contributed a hat trick, scoring two of her goals in overtime.

Following the match, the Aggies only won one of their next seven games until they built a winning streak in the Harvard Invitational from Feb. 24 to 25. The Aggies won all four of their games, beating out Harvard, Brown, Siena College and La Salle University. Nellie McAdams,

The UC Davis Men’s Water Polo dominates Cal State Fullerton with a 17-8 victory. (Aggie File) a fourth-year cognitive science major and goalkeeper, performed a defensive masterclass against Harvard as she saved 10 goals. Ryan Sund, a fourthyear undeclared major and attacker, also contributed a hat trick to squeeze out the 10-9 victory against Harvard.

The Aggies’ most dominant win of the season was against Cal State Monterey on March 27. The final score was 20-4, making it their largest margin of victory for the season.

Another important day of the season was Senior Day, held on April 13. The Aggies concluded the 7-6 loss against California State University, Northridge by recognizing Pelkey, McAdams, Ashley Salem, a fourth-year English major and attacker, and Tess Fundter, a fourth-year environmental

science and management major and center-defender.

Rounding off the season, the team ended the regular season with two straight wins against UC San Diego and California State University, Fullerton on April 19 and 20. Against the Tritons, both offenses produced an overtime classic, ending with a score of 17-16. The game ended with a lastsecond shot to win the game, as Kelly Hungerford, a third-year sustainable environmental design major and attacker, assisted Pelkey to drive the shot home.

The UC Davis women’s water polo team will look forward to building and improving for next season as they will be recruiting more players.

Valkyries spotlight the WNBA and a nod toward women in sports The Warriors are joined in the Golden State

BY EMMÍA J RIVERA sports@theaggie.org Amid the rise in popularity of the Women’s National Basketball Association (WNBA), the Bay Area welcomes a new team to its dominant merit: The Golden State Valkyries, marking the WNBA’s first expansion team since 2008.

The stretch of the existing 12-team league is yet another part of the women’s basketball expansion and its long-term goal of becoming a more prominent league. Following this year’s National Collegiate Athletics Association (NCAA) championship tournament, which gathered more than 24 million viewers and became the first women’s final to attract more viewership than men’s, women’s basketball continues to reach new heights.

Sharing the home court with six-time NBA champions, the Warriors, the Valkyries are envisioned to enlarge the Bay Area fan base and bring additional attention to the city. The team has already garnered significant support, with over 11,000 tickets being sold ahead of their debut season that is set to begin in 2025.

Deriving their name from Norse mythology, Valkyries are often portrayed as female warriors, which is what the team hopes to embody.

Following suit with the other WNBA team themes, the Valkyries want to bring more attention to the league and show individuality from the NBA. Additionally, the Valkyries have created a symbolic new identity, inclining toward a representation of strength and tenacity to pair with the team’s launch. The team logo is comprised of black and “Valkyrie Violet”, a color associated with women’s empowerment. It is shaped in a stylized “V” incorporating the Bay Bridge and representing where they will play starting next May. This new team theme shows the overall strong the trends. Brands like Temu and Shein have made it too easy to shift the trends and exponentially increase consumption while simultaneously allowing for the

Announced earlier this month, the Golden State Valkyries are the newest team to join the WNBA. (Courtesy of Sports Business Journal / fair use) female leadership currently becoming the face of the new WNBA franchise.

Golden State has selected Jess Smith, a previous executive for Angel City Football Club of the National Women’s Soccer League, as the team president and Ohemaa Nyanin, the previous assistant manager of the New York Liberty, as the Valkyries’ general manager. These women bring confidence and a backbone of experience to the table, not only promising a solid season inauguration but also igniting the importance of women’s leadership in basketball and all of sports. It will be interesting to see what Smith and Nyanin can accomplish in the league.

Despite the team not having played a single game yet, the Valkyries have already established a well-grounded fan base. Since launching their brand on May 14, tickets and merchandise sales as well as social media channels have recorded notable numbers. The weekend block party that was thrown to celebrate the new WNBA team on

May 18 was the first time that fans got to showcase their support. Despite only four days’ notice, the streets were flooded with black, purple and white to provide a glimpse of the new fan spirit.

Alongside the excitement that comes from the preexisting “Dub City,” Warrior fans may also join the Valkyrie force. Since its new team’s unveiling, the WNBA has been gaining more and more support with even celebrities joining the new fan base. Player, team and fan culture is expected to continue expanding throughout the next year.

The development of this team is believed to have arrived at the perfect time as women’s sports continues to flourish. It truly has been a long time coming, and the Valkyries will continue to be celebrated even as they begin their WNBA inaugural season in May of 2025 and shed more light on women empowerment.

standard of quality to be lowered.”

By exploring the options available for second-hand furniture from thrift stores, reuse stores and out in the

community, you may not only find cheaper items but higher quality ones as well.