May 28 2020

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VOLUME 138, ISSUE 29 | THURSDAY, MAY 28, 2020

THEAGGIE.ORG

UCD POLICE CHIEF ASSERTS DEPARTMENT IS RELEASING RECORDS PURSUANT TO STATE LAW

Recent investigation by UC San Diego alumnus details use-of-force cases across UC

UC President Janet Napolitano speaking during the investiture of Gary May as chancellor of UC Davis in 2017. (Aggie Files)

UC REGENTS UNANIMOUSLY VOTE TO SUSPEND USE OF SAT AND ACT IN ADMISSIONS New test that more closely aligns with what students need to

know to prepare for UC will be identified or created A UC Davis campus police car outside the School of Education. (Courtesy Photo)

BY R E BE CC A BI H N -WAL L AC E campus@theaggie.org Senate Bill 1421, passed in 2019, requires police departments statewide to release records regarding use of force, sexual assault or misconduct within their departments if asked. A recent investigation by Gabe Schneider, an alumnus of UC San Diego and founder of The Triton, a student-run newspaper at UC San Diego, questioned whether UC police departments are releasing those records, as required by law.

Schneider, who used public records laws to compile his data, said that neither UCLA nor UC Berkeley provided responsive records. UC Riverside could not release applicable police records due to an ongoing investigation, while UC Santa Barbara, UC Merced and UC Davis each provided one record.

The record from UC Davis was related to a shooting in 2004 when a man came on the UC Davis campus and attempted to kill his girlfriend.

The perpetrator died in the gunfight.

“It took months to get anything back; it seemed way too low to have three records from all years from three campuses,” Schneider said. “[I figured out that there were] around 200-plus instances of use of force around UC campuses, and around 80 involved someone who was injured.”

While Schneider expressed concern about the fact that there were few records available following his request, UC Davis Police Chief Joe

Farrow explained that there is a relatively high threshold regarding the parameters in SB 1421, especially since Section A of the law specifies that all police records are confidential unless requested under court order or by a grand jury.

“Notwithstanding Section A, the following are releasable: discharge of a firearm at any person by a police officer, an incident with use of force by a police officer resulting in death or great bodily injury [...] or any incident related to a sustained finding released by a law enforcement agency involving sexual assault or dishonesty,” Farrow explained. “That’s a real threshold. At the end of the year, I still am required to notify the Department of Justice about all use of force that applies to the parameters.”

According to Farrow, the law can also apply retroactively, although there was initially confusion about that after it passed.

“There was a little controversy when it first came out, because there were people who felt that it only applied from the day it was passed,” Farrow said. “Some departments released everything from the very beginning and some didn’t.”

Farrow stressed the importance of transparency between police and the communities they are in, describing the implementation of the Police Accountability Board (PAB) at the university.

PAB was created in 2015, partially in response to an incident where police officers used pepper spray against student protestors at UC Davis in 2011.

Mikael Villalobos, associate chief diversity

officer in the Office of Community Relations at UC Davis, is on the board.

“We are an independent body but we do have a healthy working relationship with the police department,” Villabolos said. “Chief Farrow works with us and that informs the work we do with PAB, especially within the context of civilian oversight.”

Complaints about police department behavior are taken up by PAB, which is composed of students, staff members and faculty to allow for maximum input. UC Davis is the only campus to have such a board. UC President Janet Napolitano’s police task force report, released in 2019, recommended the creation of a similar program on other campuses.

“These independent advisory boards can be helpful in identifying needed changes in police practices and training and providing an important forum to bring stakeholders together,” the report said. “In order to carry out their work, these independent advisory boards should have access to all publicly available reports, audits or data involving their respective police departments and their operations and should meet regularly with their campus community.”

The task force report also noted that complaints about UC Police Department behaviors decreased by 24% between 2016 and 2017, yet concerns remain among students about increased transparency. Some have called for the campus police to be disarmed, for example.

FORCE on 13

CITY FACES $22 MILLION LOSS DUE TO COVID-19, CONSIDERS IMPLEMENTING HIRING FREEZE After grim economic forecasting, city must cut costs but remains hopeful for future, citing “resilient” community

KATHER IN E FR A N KS / AGGIE

BY E D EN W I N N I FO R D city@theaggie.org At a May 5 special meeting, Davis City Council viewed a presentation assembled by Management Partners about the city’s financial status as well as long term economic forecasts as a result of COVID-19. Councilmember Dan Carson summarized the expected future losses.

“These are very serious problems that the city of Davis faces — the current estimate is that over four fiscal years, we would face a revenue loss of about $22 million,” Carson said.

To save money in the short term, the presentation recommends that the councilmembers freeze hiring and cut “50% of positions that become vacant in one year” and either temporarily reduce pay or defer the cost of living adjustments for employees.

Carson explained the importance of reducing

staff as employee-related costs represent a significant portion of the city’s budget.

“A very large part of our general fund operations is people — benefits, healthcare and other things — and we’re going to see if there are any opportunities to reduce cost there,” Carson said.

Management Partners also recommended lowering city contributions to previously-approved projects including the Nishi Gateway and the West Davis Active Adult Community.

The city will most likely not cut costs by postponing work on roads and bike paths. These issues grow worse with time, Carson said, and it’s cheaper, in the long run, to fix them quickly.

“We want to prioritize maintaining things like roads and bike paths, because we know if you put off fixing those things, it makes them significantly more expensive down the line,” Carson said.

City staff released a staff report detailing the reasoning behind taking such drastic measures to save money, describing how that COVID-19

crisis has caused massive drops in gross domestic product (GDP).

“The impact of the pandemic has been unprecedented on not just the City of Davis, but on the US and the State’s economy,” the staff report reads. “The gross domestic product (GDP) declined 4.8% in the first quarter of 2020, and is expected to decrease 30-35% in the second quarter, when the full force of the economic shutdown will be reflected.”

Carson acknowledged that the stay-at-home orders issued because of the pandemic and UC Davis’s transition online have caused much of this economic downturn but still believes these cautionary measures were necessary for public health.

“I would definitely say that the shelter-inplace orders have had a significant impact on the economy of the City of Davis,” Carson said. “We understand the reasons for these actions — lives are at stake, so this isn’t a criticism. We’re also happy that UC Davis has taken serious steps to allow students to take the spring quarter classes remotely. But by having taken those actions, those cash registers aren’t ringing as much in Downtown Davis.”

Despite the grim forecasting, City Manager Mike Webb remained confident in the city’s ability to get through this crisis during the city council meeting.

“I think one of the realities is that it’s going to take multiple measures to mitigate the revenue loss impacts,” Webb said. “Some of these decisions are not going to easy ones — they are really going to require a shifting of mindset, […] but I think it’s quite doable. And I think we’re very fortunate in that our community is very resilient.”

Carson felt similarly hopeful for the future and was confident that the Davis economy will bounce back as soon as it’s safe enough to lift pandemic-related restrictions.

“It’s important that we take the steps that will keep us healthy and safe, and when we’re able to fully reopen our economy, I’m quite sure we’ll be able to rev up our local economy,” Carson said.

BY J ESSI CA BAGGOTT campus@theaggie.org The UC Board of Regents unanimously voted to end the use of the SAT and ACT in admissions until 2024. It aims to replace the SAT and ACT with a test better aligned with the UC’s academic expectations for incoming students by 2025.

The entering class of 2021 and 2022 will be considered test-optional; students may submit SAT and ACT scores but are not required to.

From 2023–2024, the UC will adopt a testblind model where standardized test scores will not be a factor in admission decisions but may be used for class placement and scholarship purposes. By 2025, any use of the SAT and ACT will be eliminated for all California students.

Beginning summer 2020, the UC will work to identify or create a new test that more closely aligns with UC values and expectations of content mastery for incoming California firstyear students. If, by 2025, the UC finds that the creation of a new test is infeasible or the test is not yet ready, SAT and ACT scores will still be eliminated from the admissions process and no admissions test will be used for California applicants.

Though non-resident students complete similar coursework to California students, out of state and international courses cannot be “pre approved” as is the case in California, and the UC will have to determine an equal and practical way to admit these students.

“Several possible options for nonresidents that may be considered include extending the new content-based test required of California students to out-of-state applicants as well, or requiring scores from the ACT, SAT or other approved standardized test(s),” a press release from the UC Office of the President read.

This decision comes a mere month after the UC’s Standardized Testing Task Force (STTF) recommended to UC President Janet Napolitano that the university system continue to use the SAT and ACT in admissions while identifying or creating the new UC approved test.

President Napolitano went against this recommendation a week ago when she proposed that the UC Regents eliminate the SAT/ACT while identifying or creating a new test.

“In a staff report released last week, President Janet Napolitano presented new recommendations for your consideration that we fear will inadvertently create more confusion, present varying scenarios without clarity of a final direction and ultimately drive more angst,” the CEO of the ACT Marten Roorda wrote in a letter to the Regents on May 18.

Roorda voiced concerns about the cost of creating a new test, especially now with unexpected losses due to COVID-19 and raised doubt about the feasibility of the timeline. Roorda also cast doubt on the decision as Napolitano steps down as UC President at the end of the summer and questioned whether this action will address discrimination in testing.

With six of the UCs topping the list of most applied to schools in the country, Roorda has more to worry about than just the success of these tests in predicting success in college; the UC phasing out the use of SAT and ACT will have major impacts on the larger academic sphere, especially in large public institutions.

“One thing I can predict pretty strongly is if UC gives up the SAT and the ACT, those tests are going to be dead,” said member of the STTF James Griesemer.

Though the most recent actions were taken in quick succession, it is in fact standard policy that the UC revisit the role of testing in the admissions process about every 10 years.

“This is really the result of many years of work from a variety of different perspectives,” said Chair of the Board of Regents John Pérez after the Regents voted to move forward in phasing out the SAT and ACT in admission.

“It [was] important that we came at this question from a variety of points of views and we come out of this question unified in this 23–0 vote.”

THE CALIFORNIA AGGIE

2 | THURSDAY, MAY 28, 2020

UC SANTA CRUZ POLICE MONITORED PICKET LINES OF GRADUATE STUDENTS SUPPORTING COLA

Recent discovery reminiscent of COLA organizers’ previous, current experiences with policing, drums up motivation to keep movement alive

Supporters of COLA march on Shields Ave. at UC Davis on Monday, March 2 to demostrate against the actions of the UC Santa Cruz, administration which fired dozens of UC Santa Cruz graduate students from their TA positions for striking. (Photo by Justin Han / Aggie)

BY JA N EL L E M A R IE SAL ANGA campus@theaggie.org Graduate students at UC Santa Cruz striking for a Cost of Living Adjustment (COLA) had their picket lines monitored by California police using “friendly force trackers,” VICE News’ Lauren Kaori Gurley reported on May 15.

According to emails from Feb. 11 and 13 that Gurley acquired, police who were assisted by the California Office of Emergency Services (Cal OES) used the FBI surveillance portal LEEP to keep track of social media in order to plan a response to the protestors.

Scott Hernandez-Jason, a spokesperson for UC Santa Cruz, said via email that the VICE story’s headline and lead made unsupported “bold claims.”

“Throughout the strike, UC Santa Cruz police officers were focused on supporting the safety of our community on and off campus and

protecting the rights of everyone in our campus community, including those engaged in expressive activity,” he wrote.

COLA activism has gained traction across the UCs since February earlier this year, when UC Santa Cruz graduate students in support of a COLA decided to go on a full “wildcat” strike — one not sanctioned by their union, the United Auto Workers (UAW) 2865. They stopped all teaching, grading and research, gathering at the base of the UC Santa Cruz campus to form a picket line and pledged to withhold grades from the classes they taught.

That strike, which started on Feb. 10, ended

by May 1.

UC Santa Cruz, UC San Diego, UC Davis, UC Santa Barbara and UC Berkeley COLA supporters withholding grades submitted them to their respective registrar’s office.

Only one COLA movement — at UC Irvine — is still on some variant of a wildcat strike. Its

organizers are focusing their efforts on what they call a “social welfare” strike, devoting their teaching, grading and labor time to connect students and workers with resources.

In an interview with the Daily Cal, Cal COLA organizer Juliet Lu said that COVID-19 had a major impact on the movement’s ability to physically gather and be active in public spaces.

Though in-person organizing has ceased, the VICE article uncovered concerns around policing that COLA supporters have had since February.

“Cops on campus, COLA in my bank account” has been an oft-chanted slogan for COLA supporters. During UC Santa Cruz internal meetings, external vice chancellor Lori Kletzer said the university spent over $300,000 on riot police.

One fourth-year UC Santa Cruz graduate student who wished to remain anonymous for privacy reasons said that on Feb. 12, the police were “evidently very excited” to get into full riot gear when they saw the protestors.

“We actually saw them pose for pictures in their gear at one point,” the graduate student said via email. “I think many of us were very angry to see such an unwarranted show of force directed at ourselves and the undergraduates.”

Police arrested 17 people at the picket line.

The graduate student allegedly saw the police pick out the supposed leaders of the protest and bruise, bloody and beat them.

“Many of us who were not being brutalized just kept speaking to the officers and asking them not to arrest us — we were protesting peacefully,” they said. “Even so, all of us underwent some degree of pain compliance techniques and were chained around the waist, handcuffed and loaded onto the Alameda Sheriff’s paddy.”

While a video posted on Feb. 12 does not show police beating protestors, it does show police pulling back protestors’ arms and handcuffing them. One person had their head pushed down, though it is unclear if it led to further injury.

Hernandez-Jason said in a previous statement

with The Mercury News that the officers repeatedly tried de-escalating the situation, given that protestors were blocking a major roadway.

“Demonstrators locked arms, sat in the roadway and refused to move back onto the university field,” he said.

At a Feb. 20 demonstration where UC Irvine students rushed into the administration building, videos were released showing UC Irvine police using force on students. A black woman unaffiliated with the action was also arrested, according to an email statement UC Irvine’s COLA movement provided to The California Aggie.

Another student, who wished to remain anonymous for privacy reasons, was affiliated with the UC San Diego COLA movement and witnessed what they called “police surveillance/ intimidation” at a small town-hall style meeting the movement’s supporters were holding back in February.

“Two UCPD officers were watching us through the glass walls of the meeting room,” they said, though they noted that the meeting was not a protest action.

Emails provided to The Aggie show that UC San Diego COLA organizers reached out to the university’s assistant vice chancellor, Patricia Mahaffey, and proposed a discussion about the police presence.

“Is the administration now going to call [the] police any time we gather as a community!?” one organizer wrote.

Mahaffey responded by saying she was unaware of the police presence and that she did not intend to call the police, though one student said they were unsatisfied despite the response.

After a discussion between her and the UC San Diego police, Mahaffey emailed back saying the police presence at the gathering would be an anomaly and that students were free to hold open forums and discussions without feeling surveilled.

R EAD FULL ARTI CLE ONLI NE

ALL BIS 2B SEATS HELD FOR INCOMING FIRST-YEARS FOR FALL QUARTER 2020 Students encouraged to take series out of order for smoother transition, stronger chemistry foundation

The Sciences Lecture Hall at UC Davis. (Photo by Quinn Spooner / Aggie)

BY GRASC HEL L E FAR I ÑAS HIPO L I TO campus@theaggie.org During Fall Quarter Schedule Builder pass times, continuing students found that all seats for BIS 2B were closed. According to Evolution and Ecology Professor Susan Keen, all of the seats for

BIS 2B in Fall Quarter will only be open to incoming first-year students until after orientation.

“Normally what happens is continuing students register first and if they still need the BIS 2 series, they take all of the seats and incoming first-years don’t have any seats,” Keen, the previous associate dean of Undergraduate Academic Programs, said. “Last Fall Quarter, we told all ad-

visors across the campus that we were not going to let continuing students register first for BIS 2B for this coming Fall Quarter.”

With incoming students registering for classes online using Zoom conference advising, Keen said it is particularly important to have those reserved BIS 2B seats to lessen worry and better ensure that students will be able to register for a class they need. She explained that incoming students will have the first opportunity to register for one of the roughly 1,300 open seats in BIS 2B in order to begin the BIS 2 series. Any remaining seats will be reopened to continuing students once orientation is over.

In previous years, incoming College of Biological Sciences students were advised to start with BIS 2A — an introduction to the fundamental chemical, molecular, genetic and cellular building blocks of living organisms and universal core concepts in biology — if they wanted to begin the BIS series in their first quarter. Beginning in fall of 2018, however, students were encouraged to take BIS 2B, which examines ecological and evolutionary processes that shape biological diversity.

“If a student says they are really strong in chemistry and they want to start with BIS 2A, we don’t stop them,” Keen said. “We just encourage people to start with BIS 2B, which doesn’t

require nearly as much chemistry.”

Keen said the real motivation for the change was BIS 2A faculty wanting to give their students time to take general chemistry classes first.

“A lot of what [BIS 2A faculty] were finding was that a lot of students did not remember or had not taken high school chemistry, so they felt if students had taken some chemistry at UC Davis, they would feel happier in the class and more comfortable in the material,” Keen said.

Some students who took BIS 2B before BIS 2A, however, found that the overlap with 2A and chemistry would have been more beneficial and cohesive.

“Because I took the chem series my first year and BIS2A this quarter, it was challenging for me to recall some of the concepts that I had learned back in the chem series,” second-year human development major Megan Alejandrino said. “I think the material for BIS2B was unrelated to anything I was learning at the time, so it did seem out of place.”

After encouraging students to start the BIS series with BIS 2B while also holding BIS 2B seats for incoming first-years this coming Fall Quarter, Keen said she is interested in seeing if those changes would make first-year students’ transition to UC Davis smoother and their progression through the series easier.

AN ENSUING CRISIS OR OPPORTUNITY? THE ROLE, QUANDARY OF REPLICATION IN SCIENCE UC Davis researchers, faculty speak to the reasons behind, the impact of the replication crisis

KI YO M I WATSO N / AGGI E

BY A N D R E W W I L L I A M S

science@theaggie.org

A 2015 exposé revealed that political scientist Michael LaCour had fabricated results in his ground-breaking paper about the effects a conversation with gay canvassers can have on voters’ preferences. Having recently read the article, my interest in the validity of research piqued. After just a few clicks, I discovered that within the scientific community — beyond just fabricating results — lies a more nuanced issue: a replication crisis.

The replication crisis refers to the inability of researchers to recreate studies from the past to yield similarly robust results. Repeated replication is a vital element in upholding the integrity of the scientific process, and assessing the validity and applicability of experiments. Some major, well-known studies that haven’t been able to be replicated in recent years are the Stanford Marshmallow test and power poses. In 2016, the weekly science journal Nature conducted a survey of 1,500 scientists asking their thoughts on replication — 90% said the issue was a crisis (52% said it is a significant crisis and 38% said it is a slight crisis).

Noah Yardeny, a third-year chemistry major,

discussed his own experience with irreplicability while working in David Olson’s lab where he helps conduct research on psychoactive drugs, exploring their potential to increase neuroplasticity to treat anxiety and depression.

When attempting to yield a specific chemical by recreating previous experiments, Yardeny said he finds that, oftentimes, his results don’t align with the research. He described one instance where the research from an older, peer-reviewed journal didn’t even come close to producing the stated results.

“I followed it to a tee,” Yardeny said. “Did what they did. I had the re-agents, my timing, my solvent, but it went to absolute sh-t. And I was like, I wonder what this is? I went to one of my graduate mentors, and they’re like, ‘Where did you find this?’ I said the source and they said there’s no way that’s reliable.”

It’s natural that some studies and their results are irreplicable, especially ones from older, less reputable journals like the one Yardeny referenced. The inability to replicate on larger scales, however, is a problem that even the most revered journals, like Nature and Science, have.

In a study published by Nature, researchers attempted to replicate 21 social science studies from Nature and Science. Of the 21 experiments,

only 13 were replicable and many of the 13 that could be replicated yielded results that were significantly less robust than the original papers denoted. The failure to replicate by no means is a cut-and-dry condemnation of a study, as irreplicability can arise for a variety of reasons: For example, the replicating team may have botched their own attempt or obtained their own false positive.

The impact of nonreplication is not evenly distributed across all scientific disciplines. Experiments that deal with human subjects — especially social psychology — have a particularly hard time holding up to scrutiny. That said, replication issues are not isolated solely to psychology — they have reared their head in other areas, such as economics and pharmaceutical studies.

Kate Laskowski, an assistant professor in the Department of Evolution and Ecology, remarked that a couple of breakthrough studies on the effect of water acidification on fish behavior within her own field drew attention for replication issues.

“A handful of papers came out a few years ago that ocean acidification is having really horrible effects on fish, changing their behavior in really detrimental ways, and it got a lot of attention,” Laskowski said. “Recently, a group of researchers tried to replicate these results with an actual, true replication. They redid the experiments, they reran analyses and the results didn’t replicate. They found no effects of ocean acidification on fish behavior. So the moral of the story was that one or two fancy results do not necessarily mean that this is the be-all to end-all truth.”

Within the academic community, there is a formidable bias toward groundbreaking work, skewing the rate of positive results in publications — the more groundbreaking research, the more funding and prestige. This leads to the publication of a higher number of false positives. Emily Merchant, an assistant professor and historian of science and technology at UC Davis, discussed her understanding of the problem.

“I think it is more of a structural issue in science than an issue of people doing sketchy things with their data,” Merchant said. “There are instances of outright fraud, but I don’t think that’s really what’s behind this replication crisis. I think

it’s been that there hasn’t been any incentive to try to replicate. And there has been a bias toward positive results without any attempt to figure out whether it’s a true positive.”

Merchant explained how nonreplication can be a byproduct of the current structure of academic publishing.

“In the social sciences, in particular psychology, it’s really hard to publish negative results,” Merchant said. “You can only publish a new finding where you’re statistically able to reject the null hypothesis with an alpha value of .5. That’s a confidence of 95%. With that standard, you get false positives 5% of the time, but if you can only publish the positives, then you have a higher concentration of false positives in what gets published.”

For people without a background in statistics, Merchant rephrased the issue in layman’s terms: “A really useful thing that I heard someone say is that if all you find is groundbreaking research, you just end up with a bunch of holes in the ground.”

This effect is further augmented by the “publish or perish” environment where researchers fight to establish credibility and advance their careers by breaking into major publications.

“Within academic research, we just don’t have enough jobs for all the people that are trained,” Laskowski said. “It’s highly, highly competitive.”

Laskowski stressed that the arrangement with researchers fluctuates between universities — some being more high-pressured and others more accommodating.

“I think it’s important to note that academia is extremely heterogeneous,” Laskowski said.

“There are differences from university to university and how strong the level of competition is and certainly, there are many universities where it’s cutthroat and you are expected to have really high power publications coming out every year or every few years. Other universities are, I think, a bit more humane. They value quality science and people who are making good, solid progress, even if maybe that doesn’t result in a Nature paper every other year.”

RESEARCHCRISIS on 13

THE CALIFORNIA AGGIE

THURSDAY, MAY 28, 2020 | 3

INSTRUCTION TO BE DELIVERED REMOTELY FOR SUMMER SESSIONS AS ENROLLMENT SPIKES Number of total units enrolled across all students jumps by 27.9%

Dutton Hall at UC Davis. (Photo by Timothy Li / Aggie)

BY AARYA GUPTA campus@theaggie.org Summer Sessions, split up into Session 1, Session 2 and Special Sessions, will be delivered remotely this year. Despite this, enrollment is still up from last year by over 30%.

The number of unique students enrolled in any summer session was 12,649 as of May 21.

Enrollment in general, accounting for student enrollment across multiple sessions, is 19,161.

“We’re up about 30% over last year’s enrollment at this same time,” said Danica Fisher, the director of Summer Sessions.

Similarly, the student-credit hours number, which indicates how many units are being enrolled in total, is 123,604 units as of May 21. This is a 27.9% increase over last year’s student-credit hours number at this time.

“I think that this remote model, in particular because some courses may be offered asynchronous[ly], means that students can take Summer

Session courses in some cases at any time, anywhere,” Fisher said.

According to their mission statement, Summer Sessions “offer and promote UC Davis quality courses during the summer to support [their] students’ successful advancement toward timely graduation.”

The 2020 Summer Session course fees are $297 per unit for UC undergraduate and graduate students and UC career staff and $349 for a non-UC Student, according to the Summer Sessions website.

Session 1 will take place from June 22 to July 31; Session 2 will take place from Aug. 3 to Sept.

11 and the Special Session will take place from June 15 to Sept. 11.

“I think that it opens up summer for a lot of students who might not have been able to do [Summer Sessions] in the past,” Fisher said.

“They’re probably a lot of students who had other plans for the summer, and those plans are falling through. They may have planned to study abroad or travel abroad or they may have planned to work or do an internship. It might be that the reality of those experiences just aren’t the same because of COVID-19.”

Because of the unique chance to offer so many classes remotely, more offerings may be available this year.

“Summer Sessions has made a recommendation to the associate deans of the undergraduate colleges on campus that they consider, in cases where courses may be impacted or might be in high demand, that more sections may be added for the summer,” Fisher said.

For instance, “because of the large amount of students on the waitlist for the summer,” two additional sections of BIS 2B — Introduction to Biology: Principles of Ecology and Evolution for Summer Session 2 was added, according to an email sent on May 19 by Meghan Munn, a BIS 2B staff member.

“This is an opportunity for students to either get on track or get ahead,” Fisher said. “One of the campus goals is to decrease time to degree for students and also to ensure that students can actually finish from the university.”

Students also have access to academic advising and tutoring centers over summer, Fisher said.

Fisher also said she encourages students to pace themselves and to be realistic about their ability to handle the pace of summer sessions, as the time is condensed.

“This summer they’ve got a very full menu of offerings that they’re going to provide students online,” Fisher said. “There will be individual tutoring, group sessions and workshops. It might be a great time for even students who aren’t enrolled in summer sessions to review some of the workshops, as a way to think about what instruction might look like in the fall, [and] help to work through some of the challenges that may be inherent in this new virtual context.”

Instructors teaching this summer are planning their courses while keeping in mind that remote learning will continue throughout all summer sessions.

“In the midst of what’s going on in the world, I think that the university has committed to making sure that offerings are available in this way, and that instructors are developing courses on platforms that they may have not used before,” Fisher said. “It’s a time to leverage some of the special technologies and training that are available to faculty, staff and to students to think about how we can better serve students in the future.”

CARNEGIE FELLOWSHIP AWARDED TO UC DAVIS PROFESSOR ANDRÉS RESÉNDEZ Exploration of 500-year-old sea voyage relevant to COVID-19 today

Andrés Reséndez. (Courtesy Photo)

BY ALLY RUSSELL campus@theaggie.org Andrés Reséndez, a Latin American historian and professor, was recently awarded the Andrew Carnegie Fellowship, becoming the first professor at UC Davis to receive this award.

The fellowship awards exceptional scholars engaged in research in the social sciences and

humanities who are working to address important societal issues. Award recipients receive a $200,000 stipend to help further their research.

Reséndez is a foremost scholar in colonial Latin American studies and has published several acclaimed works focusing on labor coercion and enslavement of indigenous peoples in the Americas.

His research focuses on Ferdinand Magellan’s voyage from Spain to both Latin America and Asia. Magellan’s initial voyage in 1519 helped cultivate a dense network of trade, exchange and cultural transformation that flourished for multiple centuries. Beyond commerce, this trade route fostered a sustained evolution of ideas, industries and diseases that impacted historical realities going forward. While other trade routes have been explored at length, the Magellan Exchange is an exception and has not been widely studied.

“I wanted to focus on exactly what exchange entails and how it shapes societies on both sides of the Pacific,” Reséndez said.

A key aspect of understanding the trade route’s significance is contextualizing the global influence China had at the time, Reséndez explained. With over 25% of the world’s population, China was a critical force that influenced the trade route and its impacts. Sustained trade led to the evolution of China’s agricultural sector, production of both luxury and low-cost goods and demand for New World minerals like silver. Delving into the complex realities of the trade route’s impacts on both Chinese and Latin American societies, Reséndez’s research moves away from a Eurocentric historical worldview.

“The story [of silver mining and extraction] is traditionally told as one of Europe extracting silver from the New World, but the end consumer was in fact China,” Reséndez said. “Most of the silver ended up in China either directly through the Manilla Galleon, or indirectly through Europe.”

While Reséndez originally applied for the fellowship in November, his research focus has uncanny relevance to the ongoing pandemic.

“COVID-19 is, after all, the transfer of a disease from China to other parts of the world,” Reséndez said. “This [voyage and trade route] is really the start of that transfer of germs, plants and animals to other parts of the world.”

Professor Charles Walker, who also teaches Latin American history, commented on the significance of the award.

“This is a timely and fascinating topic,” Walker said. “The Andrew Carnegie fellowship is a wonderful acknowledgement to a fantastic historian and dedicated teacher.”

Twenty-seven Carnegie fellows are selected each year out of over 300 applicants. Over the next year, Reséndez will engage in research surrounding his topic.

History Department Chair Sally McKee expressed enthusiasm about the award and its significance for the department.

“We in the History Department are extremely proud of our colleague,” McKee said. “The public attention and affirmation his scholarship has received are entirely deserved. In addition, he’s a great colleague.”

Due to COVID-19, Reséndez’s plans to engage in archival research are somewhat constrained. With hopes to travel to Mexico, China and Spain among other countries, the realities of his travel plans have been severely impacted by the pandemic. Reséndez said he can delay dispersal of travel funds until it is again safe to travel.

SENATE CONFIRMATION HEARINGS BRING UP CONCERNS THAT “RULES ARE BEING APPLIED WILLY-NILLY”

Contention over bylaws, cultural tensions on campus arise in hearings for Judicial Council, Ethnic and Cultural Commission AGGIE FILES

BY HANNAH BLOME campus@theaggie.org The May 14 ASUCD Senate meeting was called to order at 6:11 p.m. Vice Controller Alexis Lopez was absent and Chief of Staff Justin Hurst stepped in for Academic Affairs Commission chair Naomi Reeley.

Vice President Akhila Kandaswamy clarified that the ASUCD Judicial Council ruled that Senator Samantha Boudaie could continue as senate pro tempore.

Second-year international relations and history major Jenna DiCarlo, who was recommended

by Boudaie, was confirmed as a Judicial Council (JC) member. DiCarlo’s confirmation hearing sparked debate over her previous slate affiliation and her ability to remain impartial as part of the neutral JC. “What steps have you taken to make yourself unbiased and prevent any association with any slate affiliation?” Senator Khalil Malik asked DiCarlo.

“I like to get both sides of every story,” she said. “Last week, I did say that I had previously run on a slate, but I don’t think that will affect my impartiality at all.”

DiCarlo outlined her experience disaffiliating from her Panhellenic chapter during her time as a Panhellenic recruitment counselor to emphasize her ability to remain impartial.

“Given that a lot of cases in JC don’t have hard evidence, because it is the word of one student against another, what measures are you

going to take to make sure you’re really upholding this welfare of the entire student body when you’re making a decision?” Senator Shreya Deshpande asked.

“Your question actually relates to the trial back in 2019 that I served as a jury on,” DiCarlo said. “A majority of the evidence in that trial was oral evidence, so it was really a matter of what was being said rather than who was saying it.”

When Deshpande asked DiCarlo to name an article and clause in the ASUCD Constitution that outlines the goals of the JC, DiCarlo was unable to provide a clear answer.

“I’m not the best public speaker,” DiCarlo said.

She again provided an example of her experience on the Panhellenic judicial council as her response to Deshpande’s question.

Senator Camille Randolph asked what DiCarlo thought about last year’s Judicial Council’s ruling that Senate Resolution #17 was unconstitutional on the basis that it benefitted one group of students at the expense of another group.

The resolution, passed in 2015, urged the UC to “divest from ‘corporations that aid in the Israeli occupation of Palestine and illegal settlements in Palestinian territories.’”

“If I’m presented a case in the future, I will make sure to consider all the evidence and the UC Davis Principles of Community to ensure that my ruling is as fair as possible for all students on campus,” DiCarlo responded. “SR #17 is a precedent, but precedents can be changed.”

In response to DiCarlo’s answer, Randolph said “saying fair and equitable doesn’t have anything tangible.”

“I think having concrete ideas and decisions in the future is something that we, as a table, can agree upon,” Randolph said.

Senator Lucas Fong motioned a roll call vote to confirm DiCarlo to the Judicial Council. DiCarlo was confirmed in an 8-4 vote. Senators Malik, Randolph, Deshpande and Tenzin Youedon voted no — all are members of the BASED slate.

Senator Laura Elizalde was the lone BASED senator to vote yes to confirm DiCarlo.

Randolph said they voted no due to DiCarlo’s lack of clear answers to several interview questions.

The table then moved to quarterly reports.

The DREAM Committee informed the table of efforts to arrange cap and gown rentals in Davis through a drop-off and pickup system, adding that graduating seniors can still take graduation pictures amidst campus closures.

Unitrans General Manager Jeff Flynn delivered the Unitrans quarterly report, addressing reduced lines and a transition to an hourly schedule.

“In the category of happier news, we are taking advantage of this time to kick off construction on our new unitrans facility that will support electric buses,” Flynn said.

He reported that Unitrans will be operating six electric buses by 2021 and its goal is to operate solely electric buses by 2030.

Elections Committee Chair Karolina Rodriguez delivered the committee’s quarterly report, during which she announced that the committee is searching for students to fill vacancies. She emphasized the importance of continuing to promote ASUCD elections throughout the transition to distance learning.

Aggie Public Arts Committee (APAC) Chair Kinu Koide then delivered the APAC quarterly report. Koide said APAC is working with multicultural clubs and campus organizations to spearhead campus murals celebrating UC Davis’s diversity.

Alexander Cohen delivered the Student Health and Wellness Committee (SHAWC) quarterly report. Cohen announced that SHAWC has seen a recent significant growth in membership. The committee currently has 15 members, which he said is a substantial number considering its relatively new presence in ASUCD.

The next item addressed was the confirmation of the Ethnic and Cultural Commission (ECAC) chair, which sparked heated debate over cultural and ASUCD constitutional issues.

Former ECAC Chair Jonina Balabis recommended third-year sociology major Yalda Saii for ECAC chair. Deshpande also recommended Saii for the position.

“She goes out of her way to make sure she’s listening to other people,” Deshpande said. “She has a strong head on her shoulders.”

Saii was asked about her involvement with ECAC and community outreach.

“There’s always room for improvement in how effectively and how often we reach out to community members on campus,” she said. “At the end of the day, while it is great that we bring our own ideas to the table, we exist to work with marginalized communities on behalf of their interests. The more we reach out to those communities, the more ideas we have for projects.”

Boudaie asked Saii about her experiences working with the Jewish community on campus, noting that Jewish students have, in the past, felt that ECAC’s outreach to and involvement with the Jewish community has been lacking. Boudaie referenced recent incidents involving anti-Semitism on campus.

“I don’t know if you know this, but UC Davis has continually ranked as one of the top anti-Semitism universities in the nation, so I think it’s really important that ECAC recognizes that Jewish students are marginalized and deserve respect as well,” Boudaie said.

Saii said ECAC was “very dedicated” to eliminating anti-Semitism at UC Davis.

“I was part of the commission where we reached out to the Jewish community leaders [following anti-Semitic messages posted around campus], so in that regard, yes,” Saii said, addiing that that effort was done by the commission and not an individual effort.

When Boudaie asked how familiar Saii was with issues surrounding the Jewish community, Saii said she knew Jewish students were being targeted and was open to learning more.

Boudaie’s next question — about whether Saii believed Jews were indigenous to Israel — received contention from the table.

Balabis asked for a point of clarification on whether nominees could be questioned on their political ideologies.

R EAD FULL ARTI CLE ONLI NE

THE CALIFORNIA AGGIE

4 | THURSDAY, MAY 28, 2020

CURBSIDE PICKUP GIVES RETAIL BUSINESSES MORE FLEXIBILTY, ECONOMIC OPPORTUNITIES DURING CALIFORNIA’S SHELTER-IN-PLACE

AGGIE FILES

Yolo County loosens restrictions for non-essential businesses as California enters stage 2 of COVID-19 response

Customers picking up orders from Thai Canteen in Downtown Davis. (Photo by Quinn Spooner / Aggie)

BY MA D E L E I N E PAY N E city@theaggie.org Yolo County is allowing retail businesses to sell their products through curbside pickup and delivery following California’s transition into stage two of the state’s COVID-19 response.

The updates to the county’s shelter-in-place order encompass other parts of the supply chain, including manufacturing and warehouse operations which are opening up again under these guidelines.

In a press release on May 8, Yolo County officials explained how curbside pickup differs from traditional transactions in retail stores.

“Curbside pick-up and delivery allows retailers to resume operations in a modified contactless format where customers can pre-order, pay for items and either pick up items outside the store or have them delivered to their home,” the press release read.

The press release added a list of businesses that are allowed to reopen, which included “clothing stores, bookstores, shoe stores, jewelry stores, home and furnishing stores, sporting good shops, antique stores, music stores, toy stores, and florists.”

County officials stress that this is not a complete reopening of businesses, as retail stores are

still required to follow strict social distancing guidelines and adhere to the requirements set forth by the state. The press release continued to explain how California was allowing more variation between counties in their progression through stage 2 of the “Resilience Roadmap”.

“Counties can move further into Phase Two, if they can attest to meeting the State’s criteria by submitting a readiness plan approved by the local health officer and Board of Supervisors,” the press release read. “In preparation for this, Yolo County is developing a draft readiness plan for future review by the Board of Supervisors.”

California’s “Resilience Roadmap” explains the four stages for safely reopening the state during the COVID-19 pandemic. In a press release announcing California’s transition from stage 1 to stage 2, Governor Gavin Newsom explained that though the shelter-in-place order and other public health measures have allowed California to transition to stage 2, the disease has not been fully eliminated.

“It’s critical that businesses and employers understand how they can reduce the risk of transmission and better protect their workers and customers,” Governor Newsom said. “COVID-19 will be present in our communities until there is a vaccine or therapeutic, and it will be up to all of us to change our behavior and eliminate

CORRELATION BETWEEN SHELTER-IN-PLACE AND DOMESTIC VIOLENCE SUGGESTED BY DAVIS POLICE DEPARTMENT STATISTICS Victims of domestic violence now forced into isolation with abuser, limited access to support

opportunities for the disease to spread.”

For Erin Arnold, the owner of The Avid Reader in downtown Davis, curbside pick-up makes it easier to interact with the local Davis community, who have shown an outpouring of support amid the financial hardships impacting local businesses.

“We’re lucky in that people love books,” Arnold said. “We’ve had a significant cut in our daily sales of books, but we’ve had a constant stream of people frequenting and supporting the store.”

Other sources of relief, like the Downtown Davis’s Business Association’s stimulus program and the Book Industry Charitable Foundation’s emergency grant program, have also helped to alleviate some of the financial burdens from lost revenue. Despite these hardships, employees are staying positive and finding creative ways to reflect a sense of normalcy. For instance, transitioning to curbside pickup has inspired staff to develop new ways for customers to interact with books while still enforcing social distance guidelines.

“We have a table blocking both entrances that are set up with hand sanitizer and a couple [of ] books so people can have the experience of browsing,” Arnold said. “I think a lot of people are missing being able to browse and look at books, particularly now that libraries are closed.

We wanted to provide a sliver of that experience.”

As for public health measures, staff are required to wear masks and clean their hands frequently with hand sanitizer or by washing their hands. Additional precautions, like bagging books for pick-up and not accepting cash payments, are enforced to protect employees and customers alike.

“We have hand sanitizer that’s CDC-approved on the table so when people hand us their cards, [and] when we hand them back — people can wash their hands,” Arnold said. “We’re putting books in bags which decreases a little bit of the contact. We were contactless payment before this, but once curbside opened, we are now accepting card payment, but we aren’t accepting cash or checks.”

Though the financial effects of curbside pickup are not yet certain, positivity and hopefulness remain as small businesses navigate the current economic crisis with support from local Davis residents.

NOISY CHICKEN EDITION May 14 “Chickens.”

“Screaming chickens.”

May 15 “Loud chickens.”

“Neighbor just threatened to pull a gun on respondent as respondent was trying to mediate the chicken issue.”

May 16 “Groups of girls in front of the residence with signs requisitions — people honk vehicle horns for the past hour.”

May 17 “Rooster is very noisy at all hours of the day.”

May 18 “Rooster is crowing.”

May 19 “Something about a dog, and I’m going to sue you.”

May 20 “Large white german shepherd wandering around this area.”

YOLO COUNTY PASSES KEY REOPENING BENCHMARKS AFTER CHANGE TO STATE GUIDELINES

More Yolo businesses will be allowed to reopen under relaxed public health metrics

MARIO RODRIGUEZ / AGGIE

BY JE L EN A L A P U Z city@theaggie.org With the extensions of the shelter-in-place order, there have been negative consequences for those who are trapped in unsafe living situations with domestic violence.

Sarah Meredith, the director of the UC Davis Center for Advocacy, Resources and Education (CARE), defined domestic violence as “any form of violence or abuse that is committed within an intimate partner relationship or prior intimate partner relationship.”

Meredith explained that domestic violence typically exists within a pattern of abuse based on power and control, and the abuser will often seek to isolate their victim. Due to this isolation already being imposed on all households as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, victims no longer have access to normally-available support and resources.

“Many of them are living in the home or sheltering in place with the person who is also trying to keep them isolated,” Meredith said. “Until we get back to a place where people have access to their support system, the isolation just further exacerbates the effects of domestic violence.”

Since the first shelter-in-place order back in March, domestic violence calls to the Davis Police Department have increased by 6.4%, according to The Davis Enterprise.

Forensic Science International, a journal about medical and scientific contributions to administering justice, released a report on the necessity of social distancing despite its negative impact on domestic violence.

“Though necessary to slow the spread of the novel Coronavirus (Covid-19), actions such as social-distancing, sheltering in-place, restricted travel, and closures of key community foundations are likely to dramatically increase the risk for family violence around the globe,” the report reads.

Amy Groven, the director of clinical programs at Empower Yolo, explained how the mandatory shelter-in-place order has resulted in an added financial burden that can significantly impact a person’s stress level, possibly leading to increased incidence of domestic violence.

Stressors such as reduced employment hours or job loss are additional factors for people to worry about, along with the initial stress caused by the pandemic itself.

“All of these things can add to a person’s stress level,” Groven said. “While stress itself is not something that makes people necessarily violent, it is a contributing factor.”

These times are already challenging enough, and Groven fears a further increase in domestic violence incidents if the shelter-in-place order continues to be extended. “[Providers] need to be innovative with the way that we handle domestic violence and helping people,” Groven said. “The most important thing if you are in a domestic violence situation is to let somebody know, whether it’s calling a crisis line or telling a friend or family member.”

Empower Yolo and CARE both serve to help survivors of domestic violence and sexual assault.

CARE offers support-based resources including confidential crisis intervention, information about reporting options, safety planning and resource referrals. Empower Yolo has a 24-hour crisis support line, peer counseling, specialized support groups and a therapy department.

The CARE website provides a message for families during the COVID-19 pandemic.

“CARE recognizes the additional hurdles created for survivors by the COVID-19 health crisis […] the need for resources and support has never been greater for our community,” its website reads.

Meredith emphasized that resources like CARE are still available no matter where people experiencing domestic violence are sheltering in place and that they will work with survivors through a communication method that is safest for them.

“Our job is to understand survivor rights and options,” Meredith said. “We provide confidential crisis intervention, advocacy and accompaniment.”

Meredith had a few final words of advice for anyone currently experiencing domestic violence.

“This is not your fault,” Meredith said. “You don’t deserve to be treated in a way that is abusive, and you deserve to have healthy, respectful relationships.”

KIYOMI WATSON / AGGIE

BY T IM LALO NDE city@theaggie.org Yolo County has been cleared for further reopening under new, relaxed guidelines issued by the State of California on May 18. Gov. Gavin Newsom’s office amended earlier public health benchmarks that may have otherwise prevented further reopening in the county.

Previous guidelines stipulated that individual counties must have no deaths from COVID-19 in the past 14 days in order to move further into Stage Two of the state’s Pandemic Resilience Roadmap — which would allow dine-in restaurants, in-store retail and other businesses to reopen — according to the original attestation form. Other benchmarks included the number of recent positive tests, contact tracing and hospital surge capacity in the county. Individual counties were required to submit attestations that detailed how they were meeting each of these “pandemic readiness” requirements in order to be cleared by the state for further reopening.

For Yolo County, the initial death-count benchmark was the sole metric that prevented the county from progressing further along the reopening process. In the May 19 Board of Supervisors meeting, Public Health Director Brian Vaughn said the state rejected the initial attestation form submitted by the county.

“We submitted that [form] with the caveat around that one benchmark we didn’t meet — that zero deaths in the last fourteen days,” Vaughn said. “We considered that a very high benchmark and one that wasn’t realistic for our local context. We provided that explanation, submitted it and just received feedback that we did not meet that requirement, and our attestation wasn’t approved for round one.”

Vaughn pointed to new May 18 guidelines issued by the state which replaced the death-rate metric with one of two potential metrics measuring hospitalization rates. These had been outlined the day before in a press conference by California’s Secretary of Health and Human Services, Dr. Mark Ghaly.

“Those two data points are hospitalizations

looking at no greater than 5% increase in hospitalizations over the past days on average,” Ghaly said. “And for some counties that have very few hospitalizations already, we’re looking at no more than 20 people hospitalized with COVID-19 throughout your County in any one of the last 14 days.”

According to Vaughn, Yolo County easily met both of these new state standards.

“Both those metrics — whichever we choose — we meet them with flying colors,” Vaughn said.

On Thursday, May 21, Jenny Tan, the Yolo County Public Information Office’s Manager of Public Affairs, announced in a daily briefing that the county had submitted a new attestation form under the amended guidelines and that the state approved the plan.

“This means that our county has met criteria outlined by the California Department of Public Health to move more quickly through Stage Two,” Tan said. “Activities and businesses that are now eligible in Yolo County to reopen include dine-in restaurants and shopping centers like retail stores and swap meets.”

This approval doesn’t mean that all businesses of this nature will reopen right away, however.

Tan emphasized that the county would be proceeding with caution, and there would be substantial discussion between county public health officers, supervisors and business owners about “which business to reopen and when.”

“Even though we’re eligible to reopen restaurants and retail, we’re not quite going to do so yet,” Tan said. “We will be taking a gradual approach while communicating with business and partners to keep public health a priority.”

Any businesses that do eventually reopen — as well as their future patrons — will still have to abide by public health guidelines, like mask requirements and social distancing protocol, according to Tan. The upcoming Board of Supervisors meetings will include discussions of which specific Stage Two business and activities in Yolo County will be approved for reopening in the near future, Tan said.

THURSDAY, MAY 28, 2020 | 5

THE CALIFORNIA AGGIE

SOME PRE-TRIAL INMATES RELEASED IN EFFORT TO PREVENT SPREAD OF COVID-19 REARRESTED IN YOLO COUNTY Inmates released after California Judicial Council adopts new rule aimed at lowering prison populations during pandemic

KI YO M I WATS O N / AGGI E

BY M A D E L E I N E PAY N E city@theaggie.org Pre-trial inmates in Yolo County released due to the statewide emergency $0 bail schedule due to COVID-19 have committed several crimes.

The plan was instituted by the California Judicial Council on April 6.

The emergency rule set the bail for pre-trial inmates charged with misdemeanors and lower-level felonies to $0 — an effort to decrease crowding in California jails during the COVID-19 pandemic. The Yolo County Sheriff’s Office expressed its disapproval for this decision in a press release a few days after the rule came

into effect.

“We have made important decisions in order to prevent the spread of the COVID-19 virus and to protect the health of staff, inmates, and the community,” the statement read. “Unfortunately, the efforts of this Office and the efforts of our public safety partners throughout Yolo County are not being considered as decisions at the state level are made and imposed upon us.”

The Sheriff’s Office noted that they had already taken measures to protect inmates against COVID-19, like reducing the jail population to 250 below maximum capacity and allowing each inmate to be individually housed to enforce social distancing.

“Additional efforts we have made include enhanced medical screening procedures for all incoming inmates, a screening for all inmates already in custody, and daily medical screenings for all staff arriving for duty,” the press release added.

County officials expressed concerns that inmates could pose a threat to the public if released before their trial date.These concerns were confirmed only a few days later, when the Yolo County District Attorney’s Office announced that a man had been charged with additional felonies after being let out on $0 bail.

After his release, Woodland resident Jacob Dakota James was charged with auto theft on three separate occasions before being rearrested on April 18, according to a press release from the Yolo County District Attorney’s Office. James allegedly committed two felonies the day of his release, April 9.

Since then, the District Attorney’s Office noted three other inmates who were released due to the Statewide Emergency “0” Bail Schedule and have been rearrested for allegedly committing more crimes. The four men who were rearrested faced charges such as assault with a deadly weapon, attempted carjacking and looting within an affected county in a state of emergency, among other crimes. Additionally, each man was charged with the misdemeanor, “violation of an order issued by Yolo County Public Health officials during an epidemic.”

Shaun Lamar Moore, one of the men rearrested, was initially charged for burglary and attempted possession of a restricted biological agent after allegedly stealing a COVID-19 specimen from Davis Sutter Hospital. He allegedly

impersonated a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention official in order to obtain the sample, as reported by The California Aggie.

After his first arrest, police noted that they did not think Moore intended to harm others and added that they were investigating whether any mental health conditions played a role in the crime. During his bail hearing, the court ordered that Moore could be released if he was fitted with a GPS tracking device and monitored by the probation department.

Three days following his release, Moore allegedly committed petty theft in Sacramento, and sexual battery in Woodland, according to a press release by Yolo County. His bail is currently set at $10,000.

Though the $0 bail schedule is facing pushback on local levels, Justice Marsha G. Slough noted that this rule strikes “a balance between public safety and public health,” during a California Judicial Council meeting on April 6.

Those with, “serious and violent offences, domestic violence, sex offenders, restraining order violations, and certain gun offenses,” would remain at the current bail schedule, according to Slough.

She added that this rule will bring greater consistency across all California courts — some of which had already adopted a $0 bail schedule before the April 6 meeting — and still allow for some local discretion.

“During this time, however, there is a need for greater uniformity throughout the state,” Slough said. “This proposal provides that uniformity while still allowing for higher amounts of bail and local discretion for the most serious offenses.”

STUDENTS ALTER COURSES THEY PLANNED TO REGISTER FOR IN LIGHT OF UNCERTAINTY SURROUNDING FALL QUARTER Adjustments to schedule may change planned graduation date, other quarters’ schedules

KATH E R I N E F R A N KS / AGGI E

BY AN JI N I V E N U GO PAL features@theaggie.org With no clear answer to the question of how instruction will look in the fall, many students took the possibility of online instruction into consideration when deciding the courses they want to take during the first round of registration for Fall Quarter.

For second-year history and anthropology double major Dhanya Indraganti, that deliberation centered around one course, ANT 100 (Sociocultural Theory), which is generally offered only in the fall. Indraganti had hoped to take the course this fall so that she wouldn’t have to take the heavy theory course along with her history seminar in the fall of her fourth year. Based on her experience with online instruction this quarter, Indraganti decided that she would push ANT 100 to her fourth year and try to take her history seminar another quarter. She said the quality of

online courses is lower, in part due to decreased accessibility regardless of the quality of the professor.

“For me, I’ve noticed that I feel like I’m not understanding the things that are going on in class even though I’ve been doing the readings,” Indraganti said. “If it’s a really difficult and more intense course, I might as well wait to take it.”

Making these changes meant that she had to shuffle around the courses she wanted to take, something that is a little inconvenient for her since she planned her courses carefully to ensure she would meet all the requirements for her two majors. As a result of these changes, she has decided to take courses over the summer too, which she had not anticipated.

On top of this, Indraganti, who is currently still in Davis, is an international student from Qatar. If she is able to go back home over the summer and decides to do so, there is the additional concern that she won’t be able to return to

Davis in the fall.

“I don’t want to be taking courses that will be really difficult to do remotely,” Indraganti said.

“Some courses have office hours in the middle of the day, and if I’m home I can’t [attend them].”

Indraganti plans to be back in Davis in the fall, but with things as they stand, there’s no way for her to be sure.

“Mostly it’s just a concern of whether I can handle courses,” Indraganti said. “Because it’s really difficult to pay attention, finish my homework on time, finish reading on time and just make sure I’m still okay.”

When second-year sustainable environmental design major Andrea Ayotte was considering classes for Fall Quarter, she made two potential schedules — one for if classes were online and one for if classes were in-person. Ayotte said this quarter has been difficult, in large part due to a course that is supposed to involve field trips and outdoor labs that are no longer feasible.

“They’ve done their best to teach what they can remotely, but I definitely feel like I’m missing out on skills and field experience that would help me in school and my future career,” Ayotte said via email. “It’s also an issue because we aren’t able to get as much feedback as before. My major has a lot of studio classes and it’s really hard to get that kind of individual experience remotely.”

Ayotte made her decisions for her fall courses based on her experience this quarter — she says that although remote instruction has made courses easier in some ways, it seems like professors know this and are trying to compensate through more difficult open-note exams, for example.

“It’s interesting because I didn’t expect the standards to be higher during a global pandemic,” Ayotte said. “Because of this, I ended up having to drop a class at the beginning of the quarter because I couldn’t handle the workload, even though I was taking an amount of units I usually feel is well within my ability.”

Ayotte’s pass time was on May 18 and she opted to register for the classes in her online schedule based on her experience this quarter.

She said she made her decisions because she felt that it would be better to be prepared for online courses and not “set [herself ] up for failure.”

If “things had been normal,” as she put it, she planned to take the LDA 140 series, the capstone courses for her major, starting this fall, setting her up to graduate early or allowing her to add a minor and decrease her course load intensity if she chose to stay for a fourth year.

“It is really hard to make decisions when nothing is definite and you have no applicable life experiences to draw from,” Ayotte said.

“Unfortunately, I feel sure that if they had to be taught online I would not get the full experience I want. Part of the classes are community projects and group work that I can’t see happening anymore. I had to make the tough decision to wait a year and work on minors and other classes instead of following my original plan.”

As a design and communication double major, second-year Dorothy Hung has a number of studio courses, which she describes as “labs for design students.” This quarter, she was supposed to have two three-hour long studios, but her two professors have approached remote learning differently.

“One of my professors decided to go the asynchronous route and meet with us briefly at the beginning of each week, while the other preferred to meet in person,” Hung said in an email. “It’s been interesting since both value social interaction differently.”

Hung feels that a lot of her courses are “quite relevant” and are “born to be taught online.” One course she is taking for her minor is a course on learning in the digital age, which she finds interesting especially since everyone seems to be figuring that out by trial and error this quarter.

“As we analyze the pros and cons of technology and doing school away from school, we get to tie the content into current events and situations that we are experiencing with COVID-19,” Hung said.

FALLQCLASSES on 13

ONLINE ACTIVISM: CLUB LEADERS DISCUSS PROMOTING CLIMATE JUSTICE WHILE QUARANTINED Environmental Club, Sunrise Davis continue activist work digitally KA IT LY N PA N G / AGGI E

BY S O P HI E D EW E E S features@theaggie.org Whether it be the Women’s March or a Climate Strike, most activism is characterized by people taking to the streets, marching or gathering with cleverly-worded signs, finding strength in numbers. Although COVID-19 prevents this kind of physical protest, the Environmental Club at UC Davis and Sunrise Davis, the local hub of the national Sunrise movement, have found new ways to continue their work for climate justice

and environmentalism.

Activism at home The Environmental Club has held Zoom meetings and workshops to allow UC Davis students the opportunity to get involved. According to third-year plant sciences major and club treasurer Nathalie Gomez, even if students do not attend the club’s meeting, there are still many ways to promote sustainability.

“Reducing your energy use, composting, staying informed and taking political action, thrifting and eating less meat are a few ways to

start,” Gomez said. “[Take] this time to reflect on some changes you plan on implementing in your everyday life.”

Sunrise Davis has also had to find new ways of organizing, hosting their own online workshops relating to climate justice and the Green New Deal in addition to joint workshops with groups such as the COLA movement.

“We did some educational workshops on how to facilitate meetings [...] and lots of other educational tools for people who want to key in to the climate movement and also develop their own skills,” said fourth-year environmental science and management major Ben Claire, co-coordinator of Sunrise Davis.

Despite the challenges of online meetings, according to Claire the group has seen an increase in participants, as students have more flexible schedules in quarantine.

“I feel like people are more drawn to in-person workshops,” he said. “However, one of the advantages of quarantine is that people don’t have normal schedules to attend to. In this time when everything is kind of slowed down, I think people have the time to actually join in and get involved.”

The current climate Shelter-in-place orders have caused a significant decrease in fuel emissions, as many no longer need to travel to and from work or for any nonessential reasons. Although this trend is encouraging for climate activists, in Claire’s words, much more is needed to effectively combat climate change.

“It would take a massive cultural shift,” he

said. “But it’s really hard to put pressure on politicians and make them change when we’re all in quarantine and can’t get out and talk to them.

Finding new ways to organize is the way to go in order to make that happen.”

Claire said he hopes politicians will view this difficult period as he does: as a chance to reorient and refocus priorities within the economy.

“The slowing of the U.S. economy as a result of the pandemic kind of shines a light on the hyperproductive aspect of the U.S. economy and how we don’t need to be polluting in such magnanimous amounts in order to survive,” Claire said. “We’re in an essential point in history where we absolutely have the opportunity to redirect our economy in a manner that protects against climate change.”

Looking forward For Gomez, environmental activism not only takes the form of large-scale participation in strikes or marches but also conscious decision-making.

“As individuals the choices we make everyday matters, so we have to think about ways to lower our carbon footprint,” Gomez said.

Once shelter-in-place orders are lifted, she hopes that everyone will continue thinking about their environmental impact.

“I think once everything resumes we should reflect on how much we have accomplished over the years as a community and what we need to improve on to meet our goals and continue a healthy environment,” Gomez said. “We should all remain optimistic for our environment as we continue striving for a sustainable home.”

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Opinion THE

C ALIFORNIA A GGIE

E DI TO R I AL B OAR D KAELYN TUERMER-LEE Editor-in-Chief HANNAH HOLZER Managing Editor

Asian Pacific Islander Americans are an integral part of our campus, community May should serve as a month to honor API Americans, not disparage them

KENTON GOLDSBY Campus News Editor STELLA TRAN City News Editor HANADI JORDAN Opinion Editor CLAIRE DODD Features Editor LIZ JACOBSON Arts & Culture Editor DOMINIC FARIA Sports Editor CECILIA MORALES Science & Tech Editor

HANNAN WALIULLAH New Media Manager JUSTIN HAN Photo Director SYDNEE RODRIGUEZ Design Director ARIANA GREEN Layout Director SABRINA HABCHI Copy Chief ISABELLA BLOOM Copy Chief ZOË REINHARDT Website Manager SYDNEY ODMAN Social Media Manager

Each May marks Asian Pacific American Heritage Month, in honor of the checkered history of Asian Pacific Islander (API) Americans who helped to shape the U.S. This month serves as a reminder of API Americans’ profound impact on American history and continued contributions to this country as one of the fastest-growing ethnic minorities. Though a growing population, they have become even more vulnerable.

Xenophobic attitudes toward the API community during the COVID-19 pandemic have perpetuated systemic racism, despite the community’s diverse backgrounds and experiences.

In light of present-day racism, it is important to acknowledge and understand the history of API Americans to better educate one another moving forward.

The API American story is everyone’s story — race is an intricate, interwoven subject that affects all who set foot in the U.S. With the same goals of advancing the American Dream, API Americans have a tenacity that is no different from all who look to have a better life in the U.S. Their experiences have contributed to American values and laws today, going back to Wong Kim Ark, who was born in America yet was denied entry back into the U.S. after a trip abroad. He took his case up to the Supreme Court, where the court ruled that all who are born in the U.S. will automatically be considered a citizen. The racist experiences that API Americans faced allow people to have protected citizenship today.

President Donald Trump frequently calls COVID-19 the “Chinese virus” and has spoken on behalf of all API Americans, claiming that they are “angry at what China has done to our Country, and the World.” This ignorant rhetoric only exacerbates the effects of racism on the API community. Trump’s words spurred hatred because of the historical “othering” of API Americans, due to the variant cultures and genetic makeup that prevented people like Wong Kim Ark

from setting foot back into the U.S. While Trump specifically targeted Chinese people, other API Americans are rendered vulnerable too, facing threats because bigotry cannot decipher a difference amongst a diverse group of people.

Rhetoric has powerful impacts on others, even when there is no malintent. It is especially important to be mindful of tone, given the current circumstances. For instance, Gov. Gavin Newsom specified that the first community spread in California allegedly came from a nail salon, many of which are owned by Vietnamese Americans.

While he did not explicitly target API Americans, Newsom’s decision to publicly speculate as to where the spread might have started can have an incredibly harmful effect on people, especially during a heightened time when many are looking for any reason to assert hate or blame on others. If individual consumers make choices to not go to nail salons or eat food from restaurants run by API Americans — based on nothing but unfounded prejudices and biases — they fail to support businesses that are the cornerstones of families and communities. Consumers must make their choices based on public health guidance, not horribly misplaced fears.

The Editorial Board recognizes the contributions of API Americans to our country, many of whom are at the frontlines of this pandemic. Nearly 20% of registered nurses in California are Filipinos. API Americans are also our classmates, as they made up 32% of UC Davis’ undergraduate population in fall of 2019.

It is crucial to remain cognizant of one’s words now more than ever. Students are dealing with the implications of the virus, on top of the added weight that racism against API individuals bears. It is imperative to be kind to one another during these difficult times.

JOSHUA GAZZANIGA Distribution Manager LAURIE PEDERSON Business Development Manager

Female rappers are the future of hip-hop WITH FRESH STORIES AND PERSPECTIVES, FEMALE RAPPERS ARE ELEVATING HIP-HOP HIGHER THAN EVER BEFORE

BY I SAB E L L A C H U E COS ifchuecos@ucdavis.edu

KIYOMI WATSON / AGG IE

We’re lucky enough to be living in a period that, despite the COVID-19 pandemic, is musically rich and diverse. Excluding the frequent tone-deaf decisions made by the Recording Academy, the world is fully embracing the hip-hop genre and its many faces.

Hip-hop and its contemporaries are based on the business of storytelling. These stories aim to highlight different individual experiences: from childhood memories to fortune and fame.

Female rappers have distinct voices and unique stories to tell. The ways in which female rappers continue to direct the hip-hop narrative to stories of womanhood and feminism is instrumental in furthering the genre as a whole.

“Not Tonight” is a ’90s collaboration that celebrated unity among female rappers and is where Missy Elliot, Lil’ Kim, Da Brat and other influential female rap figures celebrated spending time with their squads during ladies’ night. Elliot tells listeners they “should be like Missy ‘stead of being like Mike,” referencing the infatuation with Michael Jordan.

At the same time, however, there have been moments where hip-hop feminist rhetoric has faltered. Ignoring these moments would undercut the work done to progress feminism in hip-hop.

Ms. Lauryn Hill is one of the most popular hip-hop artists. “The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill” became the first rap album to win Album of the Year at the Grammy Awards. She was the trailblazer for female hip-hop artists at the turn of the millennium.

For all of her amazing achievements, Ms. Hill used the formerly prominent trope of “giving it up” (with “it” being one’s body or sex) on “Doo Wop (That Thing).”

On the classic track, Ms. Hill remarks on how women “give it up so easy” and let men “hit it.”

Some argue that these phrases were nothing more than colloquialisms for sexual activities, but they are actually steeped in internalized misogyny. It perpetuates the idea that sex is a one-way street: Women are giving and men are taking. Despite this criticism, Ms. Hill is consistently lauded for her feminist appeal and rightly so.

“Doo Wop (That Thing)” as a whole is a very empowering song with some pertinent messages throughout: “Don’t be a hard rock when you really are a gem!”

Feminism in hip-hop isn’t perfect or concrete. What is? The movement is constantly growing and evolving. The same thing goes for the music industry — trends ebb and flow to mesh uniformly with current culture. To fully discuss the aspects of hip-hop feminism is to understand the nature of the movement as it changes through history.

Due to the cyclical nature of musical trends and fame, the hype surrounding Lil’ Kim and Missy Elliot eventually dropped, leaving a gaping hole in the hip-hop scene where mainstream female rappers previously reigned. Nicki Minaj’s 2010 al-

bum “Pink Friday,” and especially her hit single “Super Bass,” managed to make up for this tragic disparity. Hip-hop found its next shining star.

Minaj’s indisputable talent — evident in her showing up Kanye West on his own song — and infectious energy catapulted her past one-hit wonder status from the success of “Super Bass.”

In grade school, I was struck by how Minaj was so uniquely herself. Minaj famously voiced her opinion in a documentary clip, now known as the “pickle juice” clip. Here, Minaj demands more for herself as a female artist and addresses double standards in the rap game. She was one of the earliest female figures to do so for my generation, which is somewhere between millenial and zoomer.

Lil’ Kim, Missy Elliot and Minaj alike paved the way for today’s artists to create mega cultural phenomena like Megan thee Stallion’s “Hot Girl Summer” (a moment of silence for Hot Girl Summer 2020). Before this, women had to pick between two lifestyles: “nine to five or shaking that ass.” Now we can have both. Our culture allows women to be simultaneously college-educated, independent and sex-positive — or just some (or none) of these things.

This isn’t just a win for feminism. It’s a win for hip-hop. In a genre where women were often disparaged or barred from inclusion, putting female rappers like Megan thee Stallion, Noname, Rico Nasty and City Girls at the forefront of today’s hip-hop is a critical step to creating a more multifaceted genre. The feminine experience is finally being included.

People argue that hip-hop doesn’t have to change, and that’s simply not true.

Society is progressing, and it would be a disservice to the artists and the genre if hiphop didn’t follow suit.

reduce. reuse. recycle.

The aggie

THURSDAY, MAY 28, 2020 | 7

THE CALIFORNIA AGGIE

COMFORT FOOD: SOLVE YOUR PROBLEMS BY EATING THEM Have your cake, eat it too

TE SSA KO G A / AG G I E

BY KAC E Y C A I N klcain@ucdavis.edu Nothing is more comforting than a strong cup of coffee on a bad day. Although most people wouldn’t call coffee “comfort food,” I do

because I consume more coffee than actual food on any given day –– especially on my worst days.

The smell of coffee brings a smile to my face, and the first sip always warms me from the inside out.

To others, brownies, cake or something savory like chicken noodle soup bring out those same feelings of comfort. Whether it’s a family

recipe or a favorite snack, everyone has a go-to food that cheers them up when they’re feeling down. It’s important that we allow ourselves to indulge every now and then, especially when it offers a moment of happiness.

Health professionals have frequently warned us that it’s unhealthy to rely on comfort food to make us feel better, as “comfort foods” typically tend to be high in sugar and fat. But now more than ever, there are moments of sadness or distress that warrant a little indulgence in the foods that make us feel good.

Yes, it’s critical we take care of our bodies.

But in order to do so, our minds need to be in the right place, and sometimes the best way to achieve that is through the help of our favorite foods. In excess, anything can be bad. But every once in a while, we should feel free — even encouraged — to watch our favorite show and open up a pint of ice cream.

For college students, comfort food, especially convenient foods like cookies or chips, is an easy way to deal with daily stressors. But a family dish that reminds us of home can bring the most comfort. Family meals are often associated with our favorite traditions, special celebrations and holidays spent with loved ones. For me, nothing compares to the comfort that comes with eating my nana’s chicken casserole.

It might be because my nana is an exceptional cook, but it’s more likely that it’s because she

makes it with love. No matter where I am, taking a bite of her casserole brings back all the memories we’ve shared as a family, making me feel at home even when I’m farthest from it.

When it comes to our mental health, it’s important that we revel in the activities and pleasures that make us feel better. If that means staying in and eating junk food for a day, we should allow ourselves to have those moments.

Of course, if the desire to have those moments persist, then we should seek other healthier ways to cope with our feelings. We shouldn’t, however, pass judgement on those who rely on a bit of comfort food when they’re down.

Life is about having your cake and eating it too. Most days you’ll stick to your diet, but when bad days come around, you’ll need to eat your feelings instead — it’s all about balance.

Consistently relying on food to feel better is dangerous. But every once in a while, on a bad day, our favorite food might be just what we need.

In the end, all that matters is your well-being, and only you can determine what makes you feel good. By all means, good dietary health is crucial, but every now and then we can afford to ignore society’s health standards for a day.

Whether it’s a piece of apple pie or, if you’re like me, a few cups of coffee, treat yourself.

PRIVACY CONCERNS: A SYMPTOM OF COVID-19

The pandemic will end, but mass surveillance in Russia won’t J OE LL E TA H TA / AG GI E

BY JU L I E T TA BI S H A RYA N jsbisharyan@ucdavis.edu With a global pandemic comes the consequential expansion of mass surveillance.

Instated in the name of public health, a system of facial recognition cameras is being used to track the spread of coronavirus and to catch those who have violated quarantine orders in Russia. In a time of desperation and uncertainty,

technology is a double-edged sword. Tracking and monitoring civilians technologically violates civil liberties, but it is also an effective means of managing the spread of COVID-19.

Like most cities, the streets of Moscow are empty, with only a handful of cyclists and cars delivering groceries. Installing an expensive surveillance system hardly seems worth it if the goal is just to catch a couple of rule breakers.

In a country known for its corrupt government and violation of civil liberties, these surveillance cameras will exist long after the pandemic is over.

Privacy concerns have been an issue in Russia for some time now. In 2016, President Vladimir Putin signed the “Yarovaya laws” –– a set of provisions drafted by lawmaker Irina Yarovaya, a member of the ruling political party, to combat terrorism. Dubbed as “Russia’s ‘Big Brother’ Law,” the reforms included mandatory data retention, providing government access to all data transmitted in telephone calls, text messages and other modes of electronic communication without a warrant.

As a result, the country’s top telecom companies said they had to spend billions of dollars to cope with data storage demands, which ended up costing nonconsenting customers.

Russian citizens not only paid the monetary cost of privacy violations, but the laws unjustifiably expanded surveillance while compromising human rights.

Now, the Russian government is using the pandemic as an excuse to further expand surveillance, with the main concern being the fate of mass protests post-pandemic.

Anonymity is a key component to activism, the importance of which was recently made evident during the Hong Kong protests. Although police couldn’t arrest entire crowds, those identified on camera could be singled out and punished. Later, the Hong Kong government’s ban on masks raised the stakes further as peaceful demonstrators would no longer be able to hide their identities and evade retaliation.

The same goes for Russia. In a nation where protests are a frequent occurrence, the use of city-wide surveillance would only undermine the nation’s already limited freedom of speech.

Plans to enforce quarantine using QR codes and tracing the movement of all citizens are also in the works. Though the proposal is unrealistic, as it would take months to develop, the intent reveals the Russian government’s interest in

building a dystopian world.

“On the one hand, you have to fight the pandemic,” said Mikhail Klimarev, the executive director of the Internet Protection Society. “On the other hand, you have to be very conscious about the process of building a system like that.”

A legislative package intended to prevent terrorism –– the “Yarovaya laws” –– cost everyone their privacy. And now, a facial recognition system meant to discourage a few rule breakers will undoubtedly stifle future activism.

Back in January, lawyer Alena Popova and opposing party politician Vladimir Milov filed a lawsuit, seeking to ban the use of facial recognition technology at mass events and protests against Moscow’s Department of Technology, which directs the capital’s video surveillance program.

Unsurprisingly, a Moscow court ruled that the system did not violate the privacy of citizens and dismissed the case.

In response to expanding surveillance, the Telegram-based campaign “Sledui” encouraged followers to protect their privacy by covering their faces in bright, bold makeup to confuse facial recognition.

“When did we allow the state to follow us everywhere?” said activist Ekaterina Nenasheva in a post on Facebook. “Why was the decision about us made without us?”

While we all wait for a return to normalcy, it’s clear that the effects of the pandemic will be permanent. Considering the Russian government was already developing a facial recognition network –– larger than China’s 200 millioncamera system –– long before the pandemic even started, it’s clear that Russia’s motivations lie far beyond public safety.

As for the future of activism, protestors will have a new set of challenges to face in their fight for change.

HUMOR

CHANCELLORS HOLD SECRET MEETING DURING COVID-19 “How can we keep screwing students if there’s a pandemic?”

M A R I O R O D R I G UE Z / AGGI E

BY MAT T HE W SI MO N S mrsimons@ucdavis.edu In this series of investigative pieces, The California Aggie investigates how the COVID-19 crisis has affected individual lives in our community.

“Ladies and gentlemen, please take your seats,” announces a hooded figure from the head of a skull-shaped table. Her throne is ash black, and screaming faces are ornately carved into the stonework. One by one, hooded men and women

shuffle to their chairs. They all wear blood-red cloaks fastened at the neck with a skull pendant.

“As you know, COVID-19 is one of the greatest challenges our organization faces. Never before in the history of California has it been harder…” she pauses. “...to f-ck with students trying to get an education.”

She removes the hood from her death cloak to reveal the face of the UC President Janet Napolitano. “We’ve put millions of dollars into R&D on this one, but COVID-19 presents a

unique challenge to our staff. How can we keep screwing over students if they’re safe at home? I’m now opening the floor to suggestions.”

“What if we spend a bunch of money on Zoom licenses?” offers Chancellor Henry Yang of UC Santa Barbara.

“That’s a good start,” Napolitano adds. “That means they’ll have to use Zoom for everything.

And when they use it for personal meetings, they’ll feel like they’re blurring the lines between work life and their personal life!”

“We should use this to distract from the COLA protests that are happening too!” exclaims Chancellor Cynthia Larive of UC Santa Cruz.

“Yes! I… uh…” Napolitano hesitates.

“What do they want again?”

“A livable wage for Grad Students.”

“Oh, yeah,” Napolitano recalls. “F-ck ‘em.”

“Some students might have hope that they can go to school in the fall. How do we taint that?” inquires Chancellor Pradeep Khosla of UC San Diego.

“Hmmmm… How about we call it something really vague like Hybrid Mode,” suggests Napolitano. “And then raise serious questions about how it’ll be conducted?”

“Brilliant!” says Chancellor Howard Gillman of UC Irvine.

“Now that the cost of school is lower, should we issue any refunds to tuition?” asks Chancellor Gary May of UC Davis.

“No!” shouts Napolitano. “In fact, let’s use the money they’re spending on tuition to fight the lawsuits we’ll get for not returning their tuition!”

All at the table murmur in agreement and clap excitedly.

“Then what should I do instead?” asks May. Napolitano pauses to think. “Try sending out inspirational emails every week about how hard things are.”

“Will anyone read them?” May asks.

“No, but if you send out enough of them,” she smiles evilly, “it might get on their nerves.”

“Should I do anything?” asks Chancellor Kim Wilcox of UC Riverside.

“Nah. Your guys go to Riverside. Give ‘em a break.”

They all cackle loudly. It echoes through the chambers of the Hall of Doom.

“Now, let’s start planning on that project about raising tuition in three years for some new reason. My yacht won’t buy its own fuel.”

THE CALIFORNIA AGGIE

8 | THURSDAY, MAY 28, 2020

THE CALIFORNIA AGGIE IN 100 WORDS OR LESS LUSH

BY JACK H YS LO P A chalky pink-blue bath bomb falls ~plunk~ into the sea.

A modest tub yet comfy enough to fit just you and me.

Its fizzle stops and in we go.

We soak for a while with cheek-sore smiles.

We rock the waves - going slow.

Our love is the product of fine brushwork in the lavender foam and cerulean murk.

Come drown inside it.

Where there’s no tide to guide it.

We’ll soon be warm and breathless.

The drain plug pulled And the bathwater swirled.

With it went our locket necklace

“On your graduation day, 2016”

BY CARO LINE RU T T EN AND HER MOM You are golden: shiny, valuable, precious, admired, treasured.

Hold your goldness close — let it radiate from you always.

Now lean in, my love. Move forward with deftness, Watch for handholds and check your footing, But don’t hold back. Lean in.

Expect much of yourself.

One Day

BY MAE VE AS H MO RE We took the B train, rattling all the way to Coney Island, my butt sweating onto the plastic seat. It was nearly empty by the time we got there but I dragged you on to the swings and we went up and up. The wind whipped through our hair and I grinned at you hard. I can see it now, the stars twinkling down to touch the murky water, my hand reaching out to grasp nothingness. It felt as though the clouds had opened and we’d reached some dirty heaven. But it wasn’t real was it, things like that don’t last.

UNTITLED

BY T E NZ IN YO U E DO N like many Tibetans in exile, i have never had the privilege of going home will it feel like home? when i see the low foothills and the high peaks of snow will i start crying uncontrollably? will the soil beneath my feet feel familiar? will the newly paved sidewalks break my heart? every child is yearning for this day every grandparent is reminiscing i like to imagine myself feeling an undeniable connection to this unfamiliar land hugging each yak kissing the cheek of each child touching foreheads with one another desperately consuming what had been stolen from me and patiently learning to love what is left

UNTITLED

BY JE SS ICA B AG G OTT The second it hits your tongue, it shrivels up Sour permeating every crevice Watering, trying to dilute Eyes and nose scrunch, waiting for it to pass Winter morning with clear skies Sharp and cold, coat draped over The only warmth, a patch of sun Seeping deep into the soul Walking down the stairs with sleep in your eyes The crackling of a hot skillet Batter ready for pouring And family sitting at the table Eyes opening slowly with another’s Wrapped close in tight embrace Under the covers and completely content Drifting back to deep sleep This is the color yellow

Promise me Giggle dirt

BY KYLIE RICK MAN We had some giggle dirt tonight. I laughed in a way that made me feel young again. You were working on one of your quarantine puzzles, with such motive in your every thought. I was watching you puzzle amusing about it as I sipped my cheap red wine from Rite Aid. In that moment a wave of gratefulness wafted over me. I am so lucky to have you as a best friend, especially right now in a world that is so confusing to navigate. Giggle dirt with you makes life better, so let’s never stop?

Promise me Giggle dirt

The Cowboy

BY NICH O LAS CH E N Off a train, and through the town, The cowboy pranced all around, Fingers tight, his trigger loose, He wound up in a lawman’ noose, Before the end, above the crowd, His feet dangling above the ground, Regrets ran through his mind apace, Hoping uselessly for an escape Clouds gave way and sun shone through, In the crowd, stood his old crew Shots rang out, quick puffs of smoke, He disappeared beneath a cloak With friends of old and freedom new, To wander beneath a sky of blue, Having cheated an early end, He went and did it all again

After School Snack

BY E LIZ AB E T H ME RCADO

Nothing would mark Camille as bold. Surrounded by apple cores and banana peels, she sat munching on half a peach remembering the poorly hidden snickers and shoves in the hall to and from class. She swallowed the peach pit.

Ephemeral

BY DIANA O LIVARE S At St. Peter’s Children’s Hospital, little Lucia Ortiz lay in bed staring at the ceiling. An unfamiliar young boy in a white hospital gown stands at her bedside. “Are you a ghost?” she asks. “Perhaps,” he says, his smile weak. Lucia’s brow furrows as she thinks for a moment, “But, you’re just a kid, like me.” The boy’s pale face softens, his eyes poignant. “Looks like you’re staying,” he says. Lucia’s eyes shoot open. She’s surrounded by frantic nurses, her parents heaving tears of relief. Her head throbs, wrapped in bandages.

In another room, a comatose boy’s heart stops beating.

THURSDAY, MAY 28, 2020 | 9

THE CALIFORNIA AGGIE

THE CALIFORNIA AGGIE IN 100 WORDS OR LESS Night Dance

BY CORA L I E BOR DE R I look for you, knocking feet and tongue drum, mugwort soft.

I see you, faceless, again. spool of thread for a pinky. knitting me a pair of shoes, to salsa the garden path with you. alone. with you. the night’s body is broken and woven, your smile becoming the red rose on the trellis. then becoming the donkey under the willow tree. I part the leaves, thread slipping past my fingers, and you are my pillow, soft on the floor. I come to you and rest. I wake up with you in my arms.

We Didn’t Give Them a Global Warning

BY S OP HI A TO N G Crack. Splash! That’s the last of them. Waters too blue. The ice is gone. Their heavy white fur troubles them more. Tired they look. Miserable they are. Sunrays burn their lifeless eyes. Three, two, one crack!

The family loses grip, slips, and falls. And we just watch it all.

You, With the Face

BY AKSHAY SHA R MA I like your face Your hair grows out of your scalp, that’s dope Every time I look at you it’s like my heart’s on a tight rope Your eyes are evenly spaced Your eyebrows are where they should be I stay awake at night thinking about what we could be Your neck is right underneath the center of your head The thought of being without you fills me with dread

UNTITLED

BY JU L I A SHURM A N The little girl was oblivious to her surroundings as she danced nonsensically around piles of produce to the song in her head. So the little girl didn’t notice when her mom stopped moving as she grabbed apples, going unnaturally still. And as the little girl bopped her head to the imaginary beat, she didn’t see her mom then drop her partially filled bag and grab her chest. Nor did the little girl hear her mom’s gasp of pain—too focused on remembering lyrics. It was the thud of her mom collapsing that broke her concentration, and the girl stopped dancing.

UNTITLED

BY SAV RE N E D UDWAL Sometimes when she got that constricting feeling in her chest, and she couldn’t breathe, she would lie down, and stare up at the sky. The soft grass would caress her fingers as that blue nothingness stared back at her. It was peaceful. She wasn’t spiritual or religious or anything like that, but she hoped that was what death was, a blue nothingness. She’d lie there, spread out like the pages of a book, and the sky would throw her breath back into her, and she would catch it, closing her eyes, and exhaling.

UNTITLED

BY S O NO RA S LAT E R Well, I deleted Notes from my laptop, clearing up storage, and accidentally permanently deleted every note I’ve written over four years from my phone, too. Quotes, verses, to-do lists, a message I wrote to myself on my 18th birthday. I don’t remember what I wrote, something about remembering what really mattered. Maybe the message sucked and this was a sign that my future self needed better advice.

All my good advice was written in my notes.

I have a singular screenshot of one where I wrote, “strangers are just friends you haven’t met.”

Sounds like something a kidnapper would say.

March 17 2020

BY B RO O K E H ARRINGTON what does a city do when its life grinds to a halt unsure of where it stands no more economic figures to prop up against no more shop lights or car noise or pedestrian gatherings overhearing conversations while walking down the street not knowing what’s to come a park after sunset the quiet lull of freeway overpasses the familiar no longer a given a collective sigh a cycle of repeating old into new until old is irrelevant again how does one start preparing for the end when even the end is not a given

Quarantine

BY ALLIS O N N ROS E I don’t know how to feel I’m not clean With my family, I can not deal How long will I be at home?

I have baked so much bread I am afraid of being alone I can’t stand the voices in my head What about the people who are dying?

I ask the people who choose to be in groups This should have been a time of unifying But their response is, who me? Whoops!

Does your “mental health” matter more than lives?

Tell that to all the husbands and wives Who walked into their afterlives

THE CALIFORNIA AGGIE

10 | THURSDAY, MAY 28, 2020

TRAFFIC, EMISSIONS, FUEL-TAX REVENUES DECLINE DUE TO SHELTER-IN-PLACE GUIDELINES

Social distancing mitigations put U.S. on track to meet goals of Paris Climate Accord

Before the shelter-in-place orders, traffic could be found on Interstate 80 during late afternoons. (Photo by Timothy Li / Aggie)

BY MA RG O ROSE N B AU M science@theaggie.org As individuals across the country slow down their lives and practice social distancing, they are driving less, flying less and using less public transportation. Since early March, car travel has reduced by billions of miles, greenhouse gas emissions have decreased by millions of metric tons and fuel-tax revenue reductions have resulted in states losing millions of dollars, according to the latest special report from the Road Ecology Center.

The Road Ecology Center released two reports regarding the impacts of COVID-19. Their first report, “Impact of COVID-19 on California Traffic Crashes,” was released on April 1 and focused on how traffic reductions have led to fewer car crashes, according to Fraser Shilling, the director of the Road Ecology Center. Researchers

then investigated the additional benefits of reduced traffic, leading to the next report, “Impact of COVID19 Mitigation on Traffic, Fuel Use and Climate Change,” published on April 30.

“For America, I strongly believe that the pandemic has brought a huge, huge disruption to transportation, which most likely will not only act as a temporary effect,” said Giovanni Circella, the director of the Three Revolutions Future Mobility Program at UC Davis.

Using data from Streetlight.com, the Road Ecology Center researchers estimated the changes in vehicle miles traveled across the U.S. each day from before and after the shelter-in-place guidelines were enacted. From early March to the second week of April, vehicle miles dropped from 103 billion miles to 29 billion miles. Across all states, travel by vehicle reduced by at least 60%, according to the report.

The report also noted a correlation between

a state’s quantity of COVID-19 cases and their reductions in traffic. People drove fewer miles in states with higher reports of infection cases and death. During the reporting period, New York had the highest case rate. Drivers in New York and surrounding states drove at least 80% fewer miles.

Reductions in travel caused fuel use to drop from 4.6 billion gallons to 1.3 billion gallons from early March to mid April. Overall, drivers saved $8.6 billion per week. These cutbacks in driving have had major impacts on the economy, especially in California, Shilling said.

“In California we’ve created an economic system that’s very dependent on people’s driving vehicles, and to suddenly not drive can have big effects on the functioning of that economic system,” Shilling said.

Driving less also results in lower fuel-tax revenues, which vary by state. In California, vehicle miles dropped more than 75%, causing state fuel tax revenue to plummet from $61 million to $15 million during the reporting period.

“It’s probably going to result in billions of dollars of reduced tax revenue from just the sale of gasoline and diesel, so that’s a big deal,” Shilling said. “It’s a big deal for the consumer, because we must pay for gas and it’s a big deal for the states because then they’re getting less sales tax money.”

For an eight week stay-at-home order, states lose an estimated $370 million, which normally supports public transportation improvements aimed at reducing emissions, highway construction and maintenance, according to the report.

“The fuel tax reduction has a ripple effect through the economy,” Shilling said.

Additionally, less individuals have been using public transportation, threatening their financial wellbeing, said Susan Handy, a professor in the department of environmental science and policy.

Her advice for those looking for transportation that is social-distancing and environmentally friendly is biking, especially in Davis.

“To what degree [public transportation] will be able to maintain good service is a big question,” Handy said. “There’s a concern that this will have less transit ridership than before, and that would be a bad thing from an environmental standpoint.”

Overall, reductions in transportation have lowered greenhouse gas emissions, placing the nation closer to Paris Climate Accord goals. The report’s authors noted a 71% decline in carbon dioxide emissions from local road travel across the U.S. For all of 2020, this represents a 13% decrease in transportation-related annual emissions and a 4% decrease in total emissions.

“If there’s less fuel being bought and burned in our vehicles, we’re producing less greenhouse gas emissions,” Shilling said.

In 2015, the U.S. committed to the Paris Climate Accord agreement by agreeing to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 2.5% per year.

Due to reductions in emissions over the past two months, the U.S. has already exceeded the annual commitment. While the U.S. was formally able to withdraw from the Paris agreement on Nov. 4, 2019, the notice, and thus the final withdrawal, does not become official until a year later.

“If a stay-at-home guidance continues, if people continue to drive less during this year, then we will greatly exceed our commitment,” Shilling said. “This is what it feels like to follow the Paris Climate Accord.”

Other than greatly reducing driving over a small two month window, there are other ways to meet the Paris Climate Accord. If people reduced their driving by 10% per day, per month, or across the whole year, or if vehicle fuel efficiency increased by 5 to 10% per year, then the targets would be met, Shilling said.

COVID19TRANSIT on 13

UC DAVIS ANNOUNCES TWO NEW COVID-19 LIVE VIDEO SERIES New series updates public on COVID-19 research

KATHERINE FRANKS / AGGIE

BY MI C HEL L E WO N G science@theaggie.org To provide the public with regular updates on COVID-19 research by UC Davis clinicians, veterinarians and faculty, the university launched two new series to be broadcasted on social media platforms. One of these series, “UC Davis LIVE: COVID-19” features Soterios Johnson, the di-

rector of humanities, arts and cultural partnerships at UC Davis, as the host.

The UC Davis LIVE series has been in production and was broadcasted prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, covering topics such as the Ebola outbreak and research surrounding it, according to Johnson. Although the LIVE series team went on a hiatus due to stay-at-home orders, they decided to develop the COVID-19 se-

ries after seeing all of the relevant research being done by the university during this pandemic.

“One of the things that we focus on is letting people know how much interdisciplinary collaboration happens between researchers who are working in totally different fields who normally wouldn’t work together,” Johnson said. “One of the really great things about how UC Davis is able to get people to collaborate is that [...] it can lead to really exciting and novel approaches to solving problems.”

The first episode of this bi-weekly series aired May 7 where Johnson interviewed guests Allison Brashear, the dean of UC Davis School of Medicine; Michael Lairmore, the dean of the UC Davis School of Veterinary Medicine; and Prasant Mohapatra, the vice chancellor for research.

Topics discussed during the event included the importance of collaboration between disciplines, recent research in each field and the role of UC Davis amid this pandemic.

“Being a Research-1 university, we should share our research efforts to the world,” Mohapatra said via email. “In addition, being a public university, we should avail all possible channels of communication with the general public to educate them about the pandemic situations and the progress being made to address the challenges.”

Future topics that may be discussed include antibody testing, vaccine development and virus tracking, according to Johnson. People can watch the discussion live via Facebook or YouTube and are able to submit questions through Facebook.

“People can have access to these brilliant minds who are working on these really challenging problems to find out answers to the questions that they have,” Johnson said. “I think it’s a really

great way to share the expertise with the outside world on topics and the work that they’re doing that may not have had public exposure yet.”

The other series, set to begin late May, is titled “Deans Discuss: COVID-19” featuring a discussion between Brashear and Lairmore about the contributions their schools are making to COVID-19 research. Lairmore stated that both schools have a long history of collaborating and that this pandemic has further solidified their partnership.

“Dean Brashear and I know each other quite well and have frequent meetings, so it was easy to arrange a project like this,” Lairmore said via email. “We have held calls and emails to organize, but for the most part we take pride in knowing about the research and clinical programs in our Schools and feel comfortable talking about the subject.”

Lairmore hopes that this new series will provide accurate information based in real-time to inform both the campus community and the general public about the impact of each school.

Because UC Davis has both a medical school and a veterinary school, researchers in various disciplines can focus on a common problem and come up with a creative solution, according to Lairmore.

“The advantage we have is a very comprehensive campus that includes not only veterinary medicine and medicine, but also agriculture, engineering, and biological sciences,” Lairmore said. “When these disciplines come together the magic happens, we call this One Health.”

Both series can be accessed from the UC Davis channel on YouTube.

ALMOND ORCHARD RECYCLING A SUSTAINABLE AND BENEFICIAL STRATEGY FOR GROWING ALMONDS UC study reveals soil health improvements, increased yields associated with orchard recycling

TESSA KOGA / AGGIE

BY A L M A M EC KLE R - PAC H E CO science@theaggie.org Whole orchard recycling of almond trees is a sustainable practice that can significantly increase the productivity and health of subsequent replanted orchards and soil according to a study conducted by UC researchers.

This practice entails on-site grinding of whole, removed trees and the incorporation of the wood chips back into the almond fields before the next replanting. Brent Holtz, a UC cooperative extension county director and farm advisor in San Joaquin County, has been studying whole orchard recycling for over 10 years.

Holtz began the first orchard recycling trial site in 2009 at the Kearney Research and Extension Center in Fresno County after seeing the potential benefits of this practice on his own family’s almond farm. The trial had two main treatments, whole orchard recycling on one plot and a separate plot that incorporated ashes from burned trees into the soil.

“We could see that putting the wood chips back on on our farm was improving our soil quality and as that went on several things happened,” Holtz said. “The Clean Air Act caused growers to be restricted on burning their trees and co-generation plants were being built which took farm waste and forestry waste to burn to generate elec-

tricity.”

The stricter air quality regulations were forcing farmers to find alternatives to the common practice of on-site burning of their trees. Farmers still had the option to give their waste to biomass power plants, but in 2015 this all changed. In a shift to renewable energies, utility companies stopped renewing contracts with biomass power plants, causing the shutdown of many plants.

“Growers needed an alternative option to co-generators so there was a sort of biomass crisis so I published an article in a magazine that most growers read and that’s when I started getting more attention because they needed an alternative practice,” Holtz said.

Over the last five years, Holtz has continued the field site in Fresno with additional help from Amélie Gaudin, an associate professor of agroecology in the department of plant sciences.

With data reaching back almost 10 years, they have collected substantial long term data showing the many benefits of whole orchard recycling.

In terms of soil health, the researchers found a 58% increase in soil carbon as well as a 32% increase in water holding capacity compared to conventional burning practices. Overall productivity of the trees increased by 20% as well.

As droughts and variable weather patterns occur more often in California, the increased water holding capacity of the soil proves to be highly beneficial. Higher water holding capacity allows the soil to retain more water during heavy and wet winters providing extra support during the dry months that may follow. Additionally, increased water holding capacity allows farmers to lower the amount of water they demand for irrigation.

“The soil will be able to absorb the water rather than having it running off site because of the better soil condition,” Gaudin said. “The soil is less compacted and more porous which helps recharge the groundwater as well.”

While the cost of whole orchard recycling is $1,000 per acre and more expensive than purchasing permits for the burn method, the ben-

efits of increased yield and soil health provide incentive for growers.

“Whole orchard recycling is expensive but when research came out that it was better for their soils and had increased yields, growers became very interested,” Holtz said.

Additionally, last year the California Department of Food and Agriculture began the Healthy Soils program, which provides growers with funding to support their own implementation of whole orchard recycling. The benefits of this practice span even further than just soil health, since its use has the potential to decrease a grower’s contribution to climate change. By preventing the burning of trees, large amounts of carbon are not being added directly into the atmosphere.

“When you take all this wood and burn it, all of the carbon trapped is released back into the atmosphere,” said Kelsey Brewer, a postdoctoral student in the soils and biogeochemistry graduate group. “When we bury the wood into the soil, some carbon will decompose and then some carbon will long-term stay sequestered in the soil.”

Soil is one of the largest carbon sinks on earth and the opportunity for farmers to add this immense amount of carbon to the soil does not come often. Growers typically remove their orchards every 25 to 30 years, so Holtz sees this as a special chance to increase the carbon in soils.

“The huge thing is that our soils in California and especially in San Joaquin County tend to be very low in organic matter,” Holtz said. “Most times, growers plant their trees and add synthetic fertilizers. They typically don’t add a lot of organic matter back to their soil, so this is a once-in-a20-years opportunity.”

Over the next decade, 30,000 to 40,000 acres of almond orchards will be removed each year, according to the Almond Board of California.

The researchers hope that widespread adoption of whole orchard recycling will occur and allow for increases in soil health and carbon sequestration across the state.

THE CALIFORNIA AGGIE

Sudoku

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

THURSDAY, MAY 28, 2020 | 11

Answer to previous puzzle

THE CALIFORNIA AGGIE

12 | THURSDAY, MAY 28, 2020

REVISITING “FRIENDS” IN 2020 The iconic, trendsetting ‘90s sitcom is both revered, criticized today

CULTURE CORNER

The Arts Desk’s weekly picks for television, movies, novels, music

BY JOS H MADRID arts@theaggie.org

Television: “Hollywood” on Netflix Hollywood is a miniseries that fantasizes about the LGBTQ experience the 1950s never gave actors. The story follows Jack Castello, a World War II veteran, who moves to Los Angeles to pursue an acting career with Ace Studios and a group of other actors and writers that don’t fit the Hollywood mold of the time. Historical Hollywood figures such as Rock Hudson and Vivien Leigh are woven into this historical fiction where the cast is fighting to produce and film a movie about a girl who jumped off the Hollywood sign after being rejected by the industry. And along the way, avoid getting killed.

“Friends” cast. (Courtesy Photo)

BY A LYSSA I L SL E Y arts@theaggie.org The NBC sitcom “Friends,” which first aired in 1994 and ran for 10 seasons, was a hit from the start. The ensemble cast of six 20-somethings in New York City trying to figure out life resonated deeply with the American public. The series was nominated for 62 Primetime Emmy Awards and the 2004 finale was the fifth most-watched television finale of all time.

More than 25 years later, new viewers have come to question the merits of “Friends” and wonder why older generations were so obsessed with it. There have been debates about some of the offensive humor and antiquated messages.

And there are critiques regarding the dozens of fatphobic jokes surrounding Monica’s character as well as the lack of diversity in the cast. “‘Friends,’ a show about white people being thin and having the pointiest nipples in the continental Americas...is absolute garbage,” writes Scaachi Koul for BuzzFeed News.

Others, however, have defended the series for being progressive for its time. The series was created in the early ’90s, and some argue that it should not be held to the same standards shared by a more modern and progressive audience.

“The truth is also that show was groundbreaking in its time for the way in which it handled so casually sex, protected sex, gay marriage and relationships,” said David Schwimmer, who played Ross Gellar. “I feel that a lot of the problem today in so many areas is that so little is taken in context. You have to look at it from the point of view of what the show was trying to do at the time.”

Both sides of the debate are valid and present important discussions about the way art ages and how we should interpret it. More than 25 years after the debut of the series, “Friends” has aged both well and poorly, and that’s okay.

Cons There are certainly aspects of the series that have aged poorly. For example, there were only two significant characters of color in the show’s 234-episode run. In New York City, it is hardly plausible that the six main characters ran into people of color so infrequently.

There were also many insensitive, fatphobic jokes. The characters would mock the “Ugly

Naked Guy” that lives across from the girl’s apartment because of his weight. Even more mean-spirited jabs were directed toward Monica, who struggled with her weight in her teenage years. Flashbacks to the ’80s include Courtney Cox in a fat suit, often seen dancing or with a candy bar in hand.

There were also several jokes where people in the LGBTQ community were the punchlines.

Chandler’s father was a transgender woman, which was constantly played up for laughs. The role was also played by cisgender heterosexual actor Kathleen Turner. The male characters were always mocked for acting too effeminate or showing too much emotion, and when they did, they were quickly accused of being gay, used as a pejorative.

Not only were these storylines offensive and tasteless, they were also lazy. Having an overweight character dancing around should not suffice for comedy, regardless of the year it was written.

The Pros While there are glaring issues we can’t ignore about “Friends,” there are also ways to appreciate it today and view it as even progressive for its time. The characters are adamant about having protective sex, and the female characters are just as sexually active as their male counterparts without being shamed or being the butt of a joke.

“Friends” definitely passes the Bechdel Test, as Monica, Rachel and Phoebe are written to be dynamic, three-dimensional characters. They all have successful careers and deeply value each other as friends. The series even explores the concept of infertility in a sensitive and progresive manner.

When Monica and Chandler cannot conceive, they decide to go forward with adoption. This is never written as an invalid way to have a child.

“While it’s hard to convey the emotions surrounding infertility, the Friends team didn’t just dismiss them out of hand: instead, they tackled them head on — proving that you can still cover heavy topics while allowing the audience to laugh,” writes Kayleigh Dray for Stylist.

Movie: “God’s Own Country” This 2017 movie has since rotated out of Netflix, but it’s reemerged in the media — although this time its reemergence was not to praise its successful portrayal of a gay experience with raw emotions and grueling internal turbulence. The UK film director, Francis Lee, pointed out that the version that recently began streaming on Prime Video censored gay sexual scenes. Amazon has responded by saying that the distributor, Samuel Goldwyn, is to blame for the censorship. Regardless, the film is about a young farmer named Johnny and a Romanian migrant named Gheorghe falling in love after Johnny hires Gheorghe to help the family farm during lambing season. It is a carefully crafted drama that shows that circumstances and years of tradition can’t block out love.

Book: American Carnage: On the Front Lines of the Republican Civil War and the Rise of President Trump That long title is in itself the summary of this fascinating book that provides a bird’s eye perspective as to how right wing politics have built up to where they are now. Author Tim Alberta explains that in the days after the George W. Bush era, the Republican party was left without an identity and a clear path for the future and the changing American society. Factions within the GOP began to form with influences from familiar names like Mitch McConnell and Ted Cruz, as well as groups like the Tea Party. Together, they all set the stage for soon-to-be president of the U.S., Donald Trump.

Album: “Madame X” by Madonna The “X” in Madame X, the secret agent name Madonna gave to her jack-of-alltrades character, represents a multitude of professions and positions that the madame identifies with. The album intrinsically asks why one can’t embody a whore, a saint and a head of state — among other things — in the eyes of society. My favorite song on the album is the seductive club song, “Medellin,” sung with Medellín that begins with Madonna whispering, “One, two, one, two. One, two, cha-cha-cha…” The song mixes latin drums and heavy-synth with autotune that shapeshifts much like Madame X. The album discusses gun control, politics and trans rights all while simultaneously entertaining. And of course, there are several high-budget music videos that follow her trend of controversial music videos — a trend spanning long before “visual albums” were the norm.

FRIE NDS on 13

“I DIDN’T WANT TO CHANGE MY NAME” — FROM SPENDING SIX YEARS IN A REFUGEE CAMP TO COMING OUT AS A TRANS WOMAN, HOW KO SER LU HTOO CAME INTO HER IDENTITY Former ASUCD senator shares what motivates her, future aspirations TE SSA KO G A / AG G I E

Ko Ser Lu Htoo. (Courtesy Photo)

BY L I Z JACO BSO N arts@theaggie.org “People believe in you.”

Ko Ser Lu Htoo’s father told her this when she was elected to serve as an ASUCD senator.

Most would consider this a remarkable victory in itself, but for a trans woman of color and Karen refugee, this was yet another testament to Htoo’s tenacity and courage.

There are 7.5 million Karen people in the world. The Karen are an ethnolinguistic group from southeastern Myanmar (formerly Burma) and they make up approximately 7% of the Burmese population. Although they used to have their own independent state, the Karen people are now the target of persecution and ethnic cleansing by the Burmese military. Only 15% of the Karen people are Christians, making Htoo and her family a minority within a minority.

Htoo, the fifth child of a Karen Christian missionary, was forced to flee her northern village when they heard the bell ringing, installed by the village to signal when the Burmese military was near. With just the essentials, her family left their burning village and walked for 10 days over the mountains to a refugee camp on the Myanmar-Thailand border.

In the United Nations refugee camp, Htoo (who also uses they/them pronouns) focused on her education. Her family no longer farmed for their food but instead relied on rations. After five years, her father applied for asylum in Canada, but they didn’t qualify; after seven years in the refugee camp, their asylum application to the U.S., which 12-year-old Htoo pushed to get submitted, was approved.

“I was so scared!” she exclaimed. “But it was totally crazy and amazing. The whole time I thought the plane was going to fall out of the sky!”

“Really?”

Htoo thought to herself when she saw the small apartment she was expected to share with her seven siblings and parents.

“It wasn’t at all like we saw on TV or in magazines,” she said. “We thought America was all big, fancy houses.”

But she was fortunate to have a new home in the U.S., and her apartment building became a community. There was no hierarchy — everybody was from somewhere else. She started her first day of middle school speaking no English, and endured bullying from her classmates.

“You don’t know your homework!” they taunted in a sing-song manner.

For high school, Htoo transferred to Oakland International High School, where there were 300 students from 35 countries who spoke 37 languages. Here, no one was bullied.

“I need help.”

Although no longer bullied, Htoo felt an all-consuming feeling of confusion. Htoo needed to “discover who she was” and joined her school’s Gay Straight Alliance (GSA), of which she would later become the president. In this space, she and her fellow students shared stories, watched movies and learned from each other. Still not out to her family as transgender, Htoo did what many other teenage girls were doing: put red lipstick on in the school bathroom before the first period bell rang.

At her senior prom, she wore a dark blue women’s suit but no tie — nothing too girly or too boyish. Her boots had a one-inch heel. Her older brother dropped her off, and once she was at school, she put on her red lipstick in the bathroom. When she made her appearance on the dance floor, some peers clapped, others flashed a smile — overall, she was met with acceptance.

“I feel happy,” she thought to herself. “I wasn’t ready to come out to my parents or my teachers. I just wanted to explore.”

After graduation — where her alluded to her identity in her speech — she came out to her very traditional family during a family meeting. She was met with some acceptance but mostly tolerance. Htoo understands that not everyone will like who she is, but the most important thing is that they respect who she is. It wasn’t until she won her seat on the ASUCD Senate table that her father would see in her what she saw in herself. But she still doesn’t wear her signature red lipstick and high heels at home or at church, where her father is the pastor.

“We need to care. We have to go and participate.”

Like many students, UC Berkeley was her first choice for college. Originally disappointed, she took the advice of her English teacher and enrolled at UC Davis, taking the challenge to go off on her own in a new, scary place — again. She found a sense of community at the LGBTQIA Resource Center, the Cross Cultural Center and her floor in student housing.

A political science major, she took to ASUCD and got involved as quickly as she could. At UC Davis, as in her home of Myanmar, there were people who weren’t being represented by the administration and government. At the Senate table, as part of the community advocacy-focused BASED Slate, Htoo fought against bigotry and

homophobia. People in positions of power purposefully misgendered her and disrespected her community, but that didn’t matter — she was there to give a voice to the marginalized.

“It’s important to be transparent and inclusive and make sure their voices are heard at the table,” Htoo said. “It can be partisan, but you can’t leave anybody behind, any communities behind.”

As a senator, Htoo adopted countless units and served on countless committees, so many that she can’t even name all of them anymore, but she cared deeply about each and every one. She fought for more scholarships and endorsed both the Unitrans Fee Referendum and the ASUCD Basic Needs and Services Referendum.

“We need to know what’s going on in the university, where our money gets spent,” she said shortly after being appointed the BASED Chair.

“I am proud of who I am.”

Last year, Htoo received her American citizenship — she is officially a U.S. citizen, no longer a refugee. But she still values her culture and carries it with her every day. Every weekend, she teaches at Karen Sunday school where she wears her traditional clothing.

“I want them to know who they are,” she says about her students. Her lessons focus on her native language and their traditions.

In her native language, Ko Ser Lu Htoo means gold crown. As both a trans woman and recent American citizen, she has twice made the decision not to change her name because it carries her ancestors and her identity.

“It’s about my ethnicities, my blood, the Karen people,” Htoo said. “It has to do with my identities. By keeping the name, it doesn’t mean it’s going to take away my identities with the LGBTQIA+ community. I could change my name to Carol or Katie, but it doesn’t reflect who I am as an ethnic minority from Burma.”

Htoo and her mother, who also just received her American citizenship, recently returned from a mission trip to Myanmar after taking a quarter off to work with their family and fellow Karen people. Now back in school, Htoo commutes to and from Dublin in the East Bay every day so she can be near her family.

This passion for her people’s struggle does not fade away when she is in Oakland or Davis. One day, she hopes to move to Washington, D.C. to continue her advocacy work and give hope to the Karen people.

“I will not rest until my Karen people regain their state and freedom from the corrupt and evil Burmese government and its military.”

THURSDAY, MAY 28, 2020 | 13

THE CALIFORNIA AGGIE

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USWNTLAWSUIT

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But UCPD remains critical, the report said, especially with “threats being made to individuals on campus.” Due to these concerns, the report added, the UCPD owes students a “heightened standard of care.”

The report further revealed that individuals on campus often don’t know how to file

complaints or are uncomfortable contacting the police directly about their concerns. It cited the need for better communication about these efforts and for the existence of independent advisory boards to ensure transparency in interactions among officers, students and other community members.

RESEARCHCRISIS CONTINUED FROM PAGE 2

The pressure to publish positive results can occasionally leak into experiment methodology when researchers, either subconsciously or willingly, p-hack — the practice of changing their original hypothesis during the experiment and retesting the data to render a desired, but often flawed, positive.

“If you run the data in 20 slightly different ways, you’re going to get a positive result at least one time, even if it’s not a true positive,” Merchant said.

Merchant takes issue with the phrasing “crisis.” She noted that the issues of replication are not occurring due to an increase in faulty methodological practices, but because only recently has there been a significant effort to replicate results.

“The way that some people see this is kind of the self-correcting nature of science,” Merchant said. “The issue is that we don’t know if these findings are robust until we try to replicate them.”

So how does the scientific community start-up the charge for tackling replication?

Although some solutions require long-term institutional transformations, there are a couple helpful steps to be taken in the meantime. Merchant suggests establishing procedures for hypothesis registration to eliminate p-hacking.

“The idea of registering a hypothesis is that you can only register one hypothesis and then you can only test that hypothesis,” Merchant said. “So you’re not doing 20 different experiments, you’re just doing one.”

Laskowski mentioned the need for more rigorous training in statistics for researchers.

“If you have a firm understanding of statistics, you’re at least more aware of these

problems so you can’t make them ignorantly,” Laskowski said. “I think maybe a more firm grounding in statistical training certainly helps. It lets people understand the power of what they can do with the data that they collect. It also helps them collect better data and actually test the hypotheses they want.”

Laskowski also advocated for more transparency within the publication process by increasing accessibility to the procedures and data used to carry out studies.

“The other thing I think is really important is moving toward more open and transparent data practices, in the sense that any data that you collect and [publish] should be uploaded with that paper,” Laskowski said.

“My data and the code that I use to analyze my data should be available for anyone to look at.”

Replication is not a new issue in science; however, the widespread discovery of nonreplicating experiments is. The magnitude of this issue cannot be understated, especially when politicians and special interests use irreplicability as a crux to undermine science that they don’t agree with — with most setting their sights on fields such as climate science.

Addressing the issue demands careful reflection about the pressure academic institutions and academic publications place on positive results.

“You’re much less likely to get published if you show, ‘I did this, this and this and this and it doesn’t work,’” Yardeny said. “You did the science, you had a hypothesis, you ran a good experiment, you just didn’t get the result. There is still this power in saying something didn’t work.”

FALLQCLASSES CONTINUED FROM PAGE 5

“I’m also taking a class called Designing for Quarantine, my studio class that meets in person each week. This class was created after the fact that school got canceled and this pandemic blew up, so it wasn’t much of a coincidence but still an interesting experience with designing to help people cope with social distancing.”

Hung also registered for an interpersonal communication course this quarter but ended up dropping it as the professor recommended students take it in person. She has registered to take the course this fall, but depending on how it goes, she may drop it again.

For second-year political science and American studies double major Moa Smith, a number of the upper division courses that she is most excited about are being offered in the fall. Given the circumstances and what she had heard about other universities making their fall semesters and quarters entirely online, she decided not to register for them.

“Since they’re the classes I’ve been looking forward to taking most since I’ve been at Davis, I really want to take them in person,” Smith said. “I feel like I learn so much better in person and you just get so much more out of it.”

Smith has chosen to take easier upper division courses and her last few lower division courses this Fall Quarter — classes that she

cares about less. Even when she took a hybrid class as a first-year, she felt that it was harder to learn and to get as much work done in comparison to a traditional in-person class.

“I don’t want to risk not getting what I want to get out of a class just because it’s put online,” Smith said.

This quarter has been interesting for Smith, who was enrolled in a year-long program in Sweden but had to return home in mid-March as a result of COVID-19. She described it as a big shock — even though everyone had some idea that their programs would be canceled, it all happened very fast and was stressful and chaotic.

She said she is glad to be back home now, but she is not a huge fan of online courses.

She has signed a lease and is looking forward to returning to Davis in the fall where she will have a better space in which to study and an environment more conducive to focusing on schoolwork.

“There’s so much uncertainty, it’s definitely hard to plan,” Smith said. “So I wish, in a way, that the school would just decide out of best interest to make [Fall Quarter] online so that we can plan for that for sure instead of sort of guessing and then hoping that classes will be offered later. Or just that there would be some sort of certainty so that it would be easier to plan ahead.”

COVID19TRANSIT CONTINUED FROM PAGE 10

Learning to change one’s behavior to drive less is the most important lesson to take away from the report, Shilling said.

These lessons can be applied to help the U.S. meet the greenhouse gas emission targets after stay-at-home orders are lifted.

“A lot of people are suffering economic consequences and many people are suffering from health conditions, but at least the planet can breathe, and has been breathing for 10 weeks,” Circella said.

Due to major changes in greenhouse gas emissions, Shilling predicts a stalling in the global temperature increase causing climate change.

“There’s such a high rate of greenhouse gas introduction into the atmosphere that if you suddenly slow it down by half, at some point, you’re going to have a slowing down of the rate of climate change,” Shilling said.

The study acknowledges that emission benefits of the stay-at-home order could go away once normal activity resumes. Shilling predicts that the shelter-in-place restrictions for the coming months will be less strict,

causing driving to increase. In California, instead of the 75% reduction in driving that was witnessed in the reporting period, Shilling believes these values will oscillate between 25 and 50%.

“The big question is, ‘What’s going to happen as the restrictions are lifted?’” Handy said. “‘Are people going to go back to their old ways?’ Some of the current data shows that driving is starting to increase again. It’s still less than it was, but it is likely to trend back upward.”

As the tight grip of shelter-in-place restrictions begin to loosen, individuals must learn to disconnect economic well-being from driving in order to continue the decline in greenhouse gas emissions, Shilling said.

“There’s going to be a huge political pushback against trying to do climate change policy, when people realize, ‘Oh, if we do that, we’re not going to have a job,’” Shilling said.

“The short term benefits of having a job will outweigh the seeming long term benefits of having a planet.”

FRIENDS CONTINUED FROM PAGE 12

The 1996 episode “The One with the Lesbian Wedding” featured one of the first weddings between two women to be shown on television. NBC even expected complaints about the episode, but aired it anyway.

Despite some distasteful jokes about the pair, the episode was unanimously positive about the union, and the wedding scene was touching. Even Ross’ character, whose betrayal after Carol left him for another woman led to some serious homophobia, walked Carole down the aisle and supported her completely.

To summarize, “Friends” is not — and never has been — perfect. The characters are clueless at best and sexist, homophobic and closed-minded at worst. But they reflect the level of education and awareness the average person held at the time. The fact that so many struggle with the issues of “Friends” shows how far we have come. Nonetheless, there is a lot to be enjoyed about the series for what it is. It may not be fair to hold the series accountable for norms that did not exist back when it was the most popular show on television.

The lawsuit’s 25 page filing from March 2019 explains that the 2015 women’s team was far more successful than the men’s team, garnering a $17 million profit for the USSF. Yet, female players were still paid substantially less than the men.

The women’s team claims a representative for the USSF stated that “market realities are such that the women do not deserve to be paid equally to the men” in response to the demands for equal pay in 2016.

The USSF has also previously presented a shocking suggestion that male players have “more responsibility” and “require a higher level of skill” than the women’s team.

This claim is disputed by the USWNT in the March 2019 filing, part of which referred to the fact that from 2015-2018, the women’s national team competed in 19 more matches overall than the men’s team, mainly due to the womens’ high level of success in those years.

The filing also demonstrates the differences in pay, comparing the revenue each team would receive if they were to play 20 friendlies and win all 20 of them. Female players would receive a maximum of $99,000 compared to $263,320 for the male players.

As far as payments for advancing through the rounds of the World Cup tournament, the men’s national team received over $5 million in 2014 for being defeated in Round 16 of the tournament, while the women’s team received $1.7 million for winning the entire tournament in 2015.

Since the women’s 2019 World Cup win was not until after their March 2019 filing, a good amount of their claims reference the success of their 2015 victory campaign. The USSF has previously claimed that this is the team’s way of selecting an especially successful year from which to draw conclusions.

The filings also cite multiple instances of discrimination outside of wage inequality. The women indicate that their team had to compete on artificial turf, which has a higher potential to cause serious injury to athletes, for 21% of their matches from 2014–17, compared to only 2% of the men’s team’s matches.

The men’s team has also received better travel

conditions from the USSF, receiving charter flights 17 times in 2017, compared to none for the women’s team.

While these are just a few of the many claims made against the USSF, they reveal clear discrepancies in the treatment of the women’s team compared to the men’s team on multiple occasions.

The USSF has a new president, Cindy Parlow Cone, following the resignation of former USSF president Carlos Cordeiro. Cone and Cordeiro have apologized for the language that the USSF has used in previous claims, and Cone claims she would like to work to rebuild the relationship between the USSF and the women’s national team.

Cone’s claims do not amount to much, considering the USSF continues to move forward with challenging the USWNT’s desire for something as basic as the right to equal pay.

Since Cordeiro’s resignation, the USSF has also moved on from its original arguments that the men’s and women’s teams do not perform equal work. It now has the majority of its claims riding on the fact that the women’s players willingly entered their collective bargaining agreements during the time period that their case references and that the difference in their CBA’s are not enough to prove discrimination.

Regardless of the changes made by the USSF, its past claims should be enough on their own to indicate multiple instances of gender-based discrimination. The apologies from USSF along with the decision to switch its main focus in this case does not erase the past.

The fact that multiple public statements made by the USSF, along with the evidence presented in the 2019 filings, are being overlooked demonstrate how unnecessarily challenging the fight for equal pay remains to this day.

Nonetheless, the drive demonstrated by the women’s team in this battle and the utilization of its platform to fight for something the players believe in is commendable. As the USWNT continues to fight for something that should not even be in question, they have presented other female athletes, and women in general, with a clear message of what it means to keep fighting through adversity.

SPSPRING CONTINUED FROM PAGE 14

“I think, right now, too much time by ourselves to kind of sit in our own thoughts can sometimes be a little bit dangerous,” Thorpe said. “Especially during this time, just to be able to connect and communicate with each other and see each other and be able to provide that support, and just knowing that we’re there for each other, I think is really important for the girls to not only adjust to the shelter in place, but also for their own mental well-being.”

Adapting to online communications has also been important in preparing for the future of the team. During a typical season, the incoming freshman players might have been able to spend the summer on campus working with the coaches and athletics staff to train and get used to the new environment. But with the remote learning model and the halt on athletics activities, Thorpe and the coaching staff have had to get creative. They have been working with the new recruits through Zoom and phone calls to prepare them for the upcoming year.

“Our strength staff has gone virtual with some of our summer workouts,” Thorpe said. “Our strength staff has been utilizing [these platforms] that allow them to interact with our student athletes digitally, in terms of providing them workouts or providing them assistance with their workouts. So all of our incoming freshmen also have that as well. We’re try-

ing to keep them connected that way.”

While the team is currently not allowed to meet in person, the NCAA recently announced that some voluntary, in-person practices would be allowed to resume for certain Division I sports starting June 1.

The athletics department must now determine what activities will be allowed for this summer and, possibly, the upcoming year.

“Right now, we’re just kind of taking the lead from the NCAA as well as our local governing bodies as far as what’s safe to do moving forward,” Thorpe said. “Right now, we are not allowed to do anything with our teams through May 31 with regards to physical activity and face to face and that type of stuff. We just kind of have to wait to see how things go.”

Despite being unsure about what life will be like for the softball program in the coming months, Thorpe is planning for a typical start to training in September. From there, she will be able to wait and take cues from the fall and winter sports seasons.

“It’s definitely going to be different, our seasons are going to be different, maybe how the game is played is going to be a little bit different,” Thorpe said. “It’s going to be interesting. It’s gonna feel weird for a little while, and that’s okay, and we’re trying to prepare for that.”

THE CALIFORNIA AGGIE

14 | THURSDAY, MAY 28, 2020

A NEW REALITY

As sports begin the process of returning, packed arenas aren’t coming with them

UC Davis Health Stadium. (Photo by Justin Han / Aggie).

BY OMAR NAVARRO sports@theaggie.org There is nothing like walking into your favorite stadium or arena and feeling the tense atmosphere of competition. From the second the game starts to every exciting moment during it, being at a live sporting event is an experience that is nearly impossible to recreate. But at this moment, that feeling seems like a relic of the past.

With the ongoing COVID-19 crisis and no signs of returning to normalcy anytime soon, the belief is that sports will have to enter a new era — the era of empty arenas.

If leagues like the NBA, MLB and NHL elect to resume their activities, they will have to do so by following health guidelines, including the exclusion of fans.

When you think about the most iconic moments in sports, the swell of cheers and emotional reactions from the crowd are a significant part of them. Whether it’s a big shot, a clutch home run or a timely goal, the explosion of sound that accompanies it is unique. For the time being, it appears to be the end of that.

Before the season came to a halt, the NBA was gearing up for its postseason that was sched-

uled to begin in mid-April. Now, the league is beginning to finalize a plan to continue the season in July, and it seems like all games will be played in Orlando, Florida without fans. The playoffs are always intense, but if the NBA ends up proceeding with this plan, the element of homecourt advantage will not be a factor. In terms of any sort of advantage, everyone seems to be on equal footing.

“You still focus on winning the game, but you need the extra wind in the back to push you and give you energy that basketball is all about,” Dallas Mavericks center Boban Marjanovic told Bleacher Report. “When you hear the fans, hearing everyone cheer your name, say something good to you, you feel awesome."

Fans give players an extra boost of adrenaline in a NBA game and can sometimes be the deciding factor in the outcome of a series. At least for this season, that won’t be the case. But, some still see this as a positive and unique experience.

“I guess playing without fans would be much more like a typical practice environment and I think that the one thing about these guys is they don’t compete any less hard in practice,” Boston Celtics head coach Brad Stevens told reporters a few weeks ago. “In fact, sometimes in those quiet

US WOMEN’S NATIONAL SOCCER TEAM’S ONGOING BATTLE FOR EQUAL PAY USWNT continues to fight after court sides with U.S. Soccer Federation

TE SSA KO G A / AG G I E

BY RAIN YEKIKIAN sports@theaggie.org The U.S. Women’s National Soccer Team (USWNT) is continuing its fight against the U.S. Soccer Federation (USSF) following a federal judge’s decision to dismiss their equal pay claims.

The lawsuit, which asserts that USSF is in violation of both the Equal Pay Act and Title VII of the Civil Rights Act, is aimed at putting an end to the long-standing gender-based discrimination that the women’s national team has faced

for years.

On March 8, 2019, 28 players from the USWNT filed a wage discrimination lawsuit against the USSF, claiming that not only are they paid substantially less than the U.S. men’s national soccer team for the same work, but that the women face “institutionalized gender discrimination” under the USSF. On May 1 of this year, a federal judge ruled in favor of the USSF, stating that the USWNT did not prove any wage discrimination under the Equal Pay Act and had not presented any triable issues.

UC DAVIS SOFTBALL DEALS WITH AN UNPRECEDENTED SPRING QUARTER

Softball team discusses new training schedules, recruitment, team bonding

A view of the stands at La Rue Field at UC Davis. (Photo by Quinn Spooner / Aggie)

BY PRIYA REDDY sports@theaggie.org With the spring season of collegiate athletics canceled, teams and coaches have had to adjust their training strategies for a season where most players are scattered across the country — and the UC Davis Softball team is no exception. The

team is currently unable to practice together in person due to mandatory restrictions on any physical activity that uses UC Davis facilities. In addition, most of the members of the team have left Davis since the season’s suspension.

While the cancellation of the season did not necessarily come as a surprise to many of the players, they still felt the loss of the season that

gyms where you can hear everything somebody else is saying, it gets even more feisty. And so, I think that it would be great basketball if we’re able to do that.”

The MLB was preparing for the start of its season when everything was put on hold. Now, it is working on a plan for a shortened 82-game season without fans in attendance. Anaheim Angels superstar Mike Trout doesn’t seem to mind it.

“It’s going to be strange,” Trout told FOX Business. “I think any baseball is better than no baseball, so if we have to do it, we have to do it.

It’s definitely something to get used to. It’s the world we’re living in right now. If that’s what it takes to get back, obviously that’s what we’ve got to do to get back.”

“I think that’s going to be tough for a lot of guys because people feed off the electric crowds, people feed off the energy,” Trout said. “But I think everybody’s just anxious to get back.”

Unlike the NBA, which was close to wrapping up its regular season, the MLB’s regular season never officially got underway. After the extended hiatus, there is now a growing competitive itch among those in baseball to get out on the field, regardless of whether the season is shortened or not.

The NFL regular season does not begin until September, but what happens from now until then is still largely unclear. Being that football stadiums are typically outdoors and much larger in capacity than that of other types of arenas, there could be a case where fans are allowed in the stadium under social distancing guidelines.

But at the moment, it seems that the NFL is planning to carry on as normal.

“We are planning to have full stadiums until the medical community tells us otherwise. Now remember when we're talking—we're talking about September, August, September,” NFL Executive Vice President of Football Operations Troy Vincent said on "The Brian Mitchell Show" on The Team 980. “So there's a lot that can happen here. So we're planning for full stadiums.”

“We also know that we have to plan for half stadiums. Three-quarters. So we're planning for all of these different scenarios. But first and foremost, we're making every effort, working with the medical community, if we can have those stadiums with all people until they tell us otherwise when that time comes, that's our plan. That's our plan of action."

As Vincent said, a lot can change, for better or worse, between now and the beginning of the NFL season. There is still concern that games may be played without fans in attendance, and that doesn’t seem to sit well with some players.

"You need fans to play a game," Los Angeles Rams all-pro defensive tackle Aaron Donald said in a video conference with reporters. "I don't see how you could play a game without no fans. I feel like that takes out the excitement and the fun out of the game.”

Many other athletes and many of the team owners share similar sentiments. For owners and league executives, the financial losses that would result from a shortened or fan-less season would be quite large. The hope is that this will be the only year that these types of changes would have to be made, but it will take some time to recover from the billions in lost revenue.

The return of sports with games being played in empty gyms, rinks or stadiums could offer some interesting new features for fans watching at home. With no noise aside from the action itself, fans could be able to hear everything players and coaches say, from trash talk to coaching tips throughout the game. How television networks approach this new reality remains to be seen, but they will have to get creative if they want to avoid some vulgar language.

"Now you're gonna hear everything," former New York Knicks coach David Fizdale told NBC San Diego. "You're gonna hear dialogue between people. You're gonna hear a lot of vulgarities. You’re going to hear a lot more conversations. I think it’s going to add a cool element to TV games."

As Fizdale suggested, the idea of miking up players across all sports during the games could provide those watching with a unique experience.

It will definitely take some adjusting, but it has the potential to be positive if done correctly.

Another thing that could change is the mental side of the game for players, where the absence of fans could help those players who tend to crack — or “choke” — under pressure. It could also affect those who do show up in high-pressure situations, as the pressure may not be as intense, leading to a let-down from someone who would otherwise show up.

“You remove (the crowd) altogether, you're probably going to see changes in performance for individual players," chairman for the University of Buffalo's department of communication Mark Frank told CBS Sports. "Those who tend to rise up for the moment, their performances may not be as good. Whereas others, for example, some who have a reputation for choking may choke less because of the lack of arousal that takes them into that domain."

This new reality of limited fan attendance will take some time to get used to, but for those who crave sports, it will likely not matter as much.

Just the return of sports alone would be enough

Megan Rapinoe and Alex Morgan, two of the stars from the women’s team, were shocked by the decision and spoke out following the court’s dismissal of their claims. They made it clear that they were going to keep fighting.

One week later, the USWNT announced that it will be asking for a postponement of their currently scheduled trial date of June 16 and filing a motion to immediately appeal the court’s most recent decision, sending it to be reviewed by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit.

Several months after the initial filing in November 2019, the case took a step forward in the USWNT’s favor, when the court granted it the ability to pursue the case as a class action lawsuit.

This meant the players would be able to fight the case as a group and any players from the U.S. women’s team dating back to 2015 would have the ability to “opt in” to the class.

At the time, this ruling appeared to be a huge step forward, giving players hope that the court would acknowledge the ongoing discrimination against the team. The court’s most recent decision to side with the USSF proves the fight toward equal pay is not even close to being over.

The main reasoning behind the court’s decision to side with the USSF is that the women’s team entered a collective bargaining agreement with the USSF that it now wants to get out of.

Collective bargaining agreements are a result of negotiations between players and management, and the court claims that the women’s team previously agreed to their current pay conditions.

The USWNT countered this claim, explaining that the contracts received by the male players were never presented to the women’s team and the reason that the women accepted the CBA was a result of equal pay never being on the table to begin with.

The lawsuit is not only seeking back pay of $66.7 million plus punitive damages, but is also looking for some form of acknowledgment of the blatant gender discrimination that has been car-

ried out by USSF through the years.

The recent events of this case are only the latest in a long dispute between women’s players and the USSF that dates back to boycotts from the women’s team during the 1996 Olympics. At the time, the USSF claimed it would only present bonuses to the women if they received gold medals, explaining that it “cannot reward mediocrity.”

The unsteady relationship between the two groups reached a tipping point following the women’s 2015 World Cup victory.

In March 2016, five players from the 2015 World Cup side, including Morgan and Rapinoe, filed a federal complaint against the USSF. The women explained that they earned only 40% of what the men’s national team made, despite the fact that they put in the same amount of work and have consistently outperformed their male counterparts.

At the time, the USSF was standing by the argument that the men’s national team brings in “multiples” of the revenue, attendance and television ratings compared to the women’s team.

While that argument was largely unjustifiable to begin, it has proven to be especially untrue today, considering the unparalleled success that the women’s team has enjoyed.

The USWNT has four World Cup victories and four Olympic gold medals under its belt, compared to zero World Cup titles from the men’s national team. The women’s 2015 World Cup victory had over 500 million viewers worldwide, along with a record one billion who tuned in to their 2019 World Cup Final match. They have also received a huge amount of support from the public, including chants from fans demanding equal pay during their 2019 World Cup Final appearance.

they had been preparing for.

Junior outfielder Alyse Rojas said that because the team had been receiving regular updates from the coaching staff about other conferences and games being canceled, they were able to guess that this was the direction their season was heading.

“It was really upsetting when we first figured it out and everyone was crying and stuff — the seniors especially,” Rojas said. “[We felt] really sad, honestly, [...] in that hard moment.”

According to Head Coach Erin Thorpe, the team has felt the loss of what would have been the last season for those senior athletes.

“To know that we have players on our team that were set to graduate this June and were not able to have their senior days and go out and finish their career the way that they wanted to, [that] really affected everybody,” Thorpe said.

Thorpe, along with UC Davis Athletics staff, has been working with the players over the past several weeks to grapple with the feelings that came with the loss of the season. And when the NCAA announced that it would be granting spring sport student athletes an extra year of eligibility, Thorpe worked through the options with each player to come to a decision.

“The first six weeks of this, we kind of worked through that process with each of the seniors,” Thorpe said. “I think that we've found a really good place where each of our seniors have made their decisions. They feel good about where they're at and they feel good about what they're going to be doing next year, but it was quite a process.”

Beyond losing their season, the athletes also lost out on spending time with their teammates.

Prior to the switch to remote learning, many of

the players saw each other every day. So with most of the team split up and no longer in Davis, they have turned to regular team Zoom calls to stay connected.

“It definitely is really nice to see your teammates,” junior catcher Riley Siegel said. “Me and Alyse [Rojas] probably spent 24 hours a day together, because we [were] teammates, roommates and we have some of the same classes. And now we don't see each other at all. So it definitely is a huge adjustment for some people, because [...] a lot of girls on the team lived together.”

As part of the team’s mandatory virtual training, Thorpe has arranged a variety of weekly coach-led — as well as student-led — team bonding activities through Zoom. These activities include leadership pep talks, weekly checkins, Aggie EVO program meetings and alumni guest speaker talks.

“It's a great opportunity for us to be able to utilize this time to grow in other aspects of the game that's not just physical [such as] our leadership skills and our life skills,” Thorpe said.

“And it's mostly related around team bonding, the team just being together and doing some activities.”

In giving other examples of bonding activities, Thorpe mentioned that team members have written letters of gratitude to frontline workers, made face masks and baked banana bread together.

These bonding activities serve not only as a check in with the athletes, but also as a way to strengthen the bonds between players as they deal with the disappointment of a season cut short.

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