The Burr Magazine - Fall 2018

POLARIZING VIEWS 28

REMEMBERING NICK MASSA 34

THE MENTAL GAME 44

ABORTION: MORE PERSONAL THAN POLITICAL 62

Fall 2018

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Table of Contents Departments 8 17 26

CAMPUS COMMUNITY CURRENT

Features 34 REMEMBERING NICK MASSA The story of a would-be college senior told by his family, and what he dreamt to be

41 THE ‘BEST YEARS OF YOUR LIFE’ CAN ACTUALLY BE THE LONELIEST A look into why college students may be more lonely today than ever before

44 THE MENTAL GAME Controllers, keyboards and mice help connect students to eachother and life

56 A MADHOUSE CANVAS Beautiful photos and the story of Carrie Esser, a local makeup and body paint artist

62 ABORTION: MORE PERSONAL THAN POLITICAL A look into the lives of those who have experienced abortion, and why its not so black and white

67 THE LAST SHOT

51 #GIRLBOSS Interviews with women who are taking the lead on campus and in the community

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ABOUT THE BURR The Burr Magazine is the first student-produced magazine for Kent State University, the city of Kent and anyone looking for strong, journalistic storytelling. The Burr strives to provide its readers with interesting, humorous and hard-hitting stories that tap into current events, trends and the lives of those who have made a home in Kent.

MEET THE STAFF

From the Editor B

efore I sat through my first lecture, before I unpacked my suitcase in the not-yet-air-conditioned Olson residence hall and before I graduated high school, I was a member of The Burr Magazine. I joined between my high school graduation and the start of college, making me a Burr staff member before I was a Flash.

Over the past four years, The Burr has been my biggest constant. That stability is hard to come by for any college student. It’s something even harder to come by in the current state of the nation.

Tension. Uncertainty. Restlessness.

Loss. Loneliness. Change.

Hope.

These are some of the ideas we sought to cover throughout this issue.

You will find life advice on page 9 from the presidents of College Democrats and Republicans, Kent’s Academic Diversity Outreach Coordinator and the most rated professor on RateMyProfessors. On page 28, I delve into tension at the open carry rally and those opposing it, and the polarization each stance can cause. Managing Editor Ray Padilla explores the stigmas and mental health tolls of esports on page 44 and how video games change the lives of those players. On page 34, senior editor Shelbie Goulding recounts the life and love of Nick Massa, a Kent State student who was shot

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and killed, through the eyes of his family during what would have been his senior year.

You will find an emotional story on page 62 about living life after having an abortion or experiencing a miscarriage written by senior editor Cameron Gorman.

At the start of the semester, most of the stories started as ideas with black and white issues and clear, defined sides. After the stories began, each revealed the grays and colors in between the issues and the writing evolved to reflect that. These stories parallel the evolving state of the U.S., and the world, both politically and socially.

We tried to capture all of this in our cover — the melding of two different sides and the words emphasising the themes of each story.

It’s through these stories I hope you are able to find solace and understanding, and perhaps we’ll reach a better understanding of one another in the process.

Thank you for picking up The Burr Magazine as we strive to continue to create award-winning content. Without you, without our readers, we would not be able to tell these stories. You are our biggest inspiration.

MEGAN AYSCUE

Editor-in-Chief

MEGAN AYSCUE

RAY PADILLA

Editor-In-Chief

Managing Editor

MADELEINE KIDD

SARAH RIEDLINGER

Art Director

Assistant Art Director

CAMERON GORMAN

SHELBIE GOULDING

Senior Editor

Senior Editor

SOPHIA ADORNETTO MOLLY SPILLMAN

Photo Editor

Web Editor

COPY EDITOR

DESIGNERS

Jenna Borthwick Chelsea Panin

Cameron Luiza Mary Wagner Katie Studnicha Erin Lavender

WRITERS

Taylor Robinson Collin Cunningham Amanda Levine Hannah Miller Henry Palattella Cameron Hoover Lindsey Sellman Contributing Writer Valerie Royzman

PHOTOGRAPHERS

Sophia DelCiappo Richa Sheth Olivia Seidel Jacob Golen Tessa Poulain Kamryn Rowe ILLUSTRATOR

Sophia DelCiappo BLOGGERS

Hannah Miller Holly Liptak ADVISER

BUSINESS MANAGER

Jacqueline Marino

Norma Young

DIRECTOR

SALES MANAGER

Kevin Dilley

Christian Caudill

MEDIA SPECIALIST

OFFICE MANAGER

Jacyna Ortiz

Lorie Bednar

ADVERTISING MANAGER

Tami Bongiorni

NATIONAL AWARDS

REGIONAL AWARDS

AEJMC STUDENT MAGAZINE CONTEST 2014

SOCIETY OF PROFESSIONAL JOURNALISTS REGION 4 MARK OF EXCELLENCE AWARDS

Second Place First-Person Consumer Magazine Article Nick Shook, “Head Games” (May 2014)

Finalist

ASSOCIATED COLLEGIATE PRESS 2014 DESIGN OF THE YEAR AWARD

Finalist

Second Place Yearbook/Magazine Page Spread Rachel Mullenax, “Kent’s Flashiest Cocktails” (April 2014)

AEJMC STUDENT MAGAZINE CONTEST 2015

Third Place

Feature PhotographyLeah Klafczynski, “Unbreakable Bond” (May 2014) Nonfiction Magazine Article Carley Hull, “Don’t Sweat the Small Things” (May 2014)

Finalist Nonfiction Magazine Article Chrissy Suttles, “Nightfall” (November 2014) Chrissy Suttles, “Two Seconds in Cudell” (April 2015)

Finalist General News Photography, Jacob Byk

Chrissy Suttles, “Two Seconds in Cudell” (April 2015)

Finalist

Honorable Mention

Feature Writing Top 20 Matthew Merchant, “Shelter Realities” (February 2015)

Chrissy Suttles, “Nightfall” (November 2014)

2015 NATIONAL COLLEGE MEDIA CONVENTION Sixth Place Best of Show for a Feature Magazine

AEJMC STUDENT MAGAZINE CONTEST 2016 First Place Blythe Alspaugh, “Can’t Fix What Isn’t Broken” (April 2016)

Third Place Online Magazine

Second Place Single Issue of an Ongoing Magazine-Design

Finalist Best Student Magazine (Nov. 2017) Kelly Powell, “Breaking Down the Crown” (Nov. 2017) Carter Adams and Aaron Self, “Road to Recovery” (Nov. 2017)

Read On

Find past issues of The Burr Magazine online at issuu.com/theburr

Follow Us @THEBURRMAGAZINE Published with support of Kent State and the Kent Community. No part of The Burr Magazine may be reprinted or published without permission. © 2018 The Burr Magazine. 330-672-2572 | theburrmagazine@gmail.com

NICK HOLLEY SIDELINED

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SPECIAL REPORT: HURRICANE IRMA

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VEGAN FOR A MONTH

It’s just so much more than standing onstage and looking pretty.”

–ALICE MAGOTO

FALL 2017

Miss Ohio 2016

SOCIETY OF PROFESSIONAL JOURNALISTS MARK OF EXCELLENCE AWARDS Best Student Magazine (Nationwide), Staff

Student pageant contestants defy industry stereotypes to accentuate inner beauty

AEJMC STUDENT MAGAZINE CONTEST 2017 First Place Neville Hardman, “Living on the Edge” THEBURR.COM | 1

SHOW PLACE LIKE HOME 29

HERE I AM, SEND ME 36

HAZED 45

HIGH FIDELITY 58

OHIO SOCIETY OF PROFESSIONAL JOURNALISTS First Place Best College Feature Writing Neville Hardman, “Living on the Edge”

SPRING 2018

Second Place Best College Feature Writing Kelly Powell, “Stress on Screen”

Finalist Best Non-Fiction Magazine Article Samantha Ickes, “Flowers vs. Guns”

#KENTTOO

Winner THEBURR.COM | 1

Jamie Brian, “Gaining Perspective”

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WORDS BY

Megan Ayscue

PHOTOS BY

Sophia Adornetto

O

n Janik Drive, next to the Honors College residence hall and behind the Center for Visual Arts sits a beige, yellow and rusted building with a zig-zag roof. Built in 1972, the School of Art Building, originally designed by Art faculty, would hold six major exhibits every year as well as clubs and classes.

The building has officially and finally started getting a renovation as part of Phase 1 of the “Kent Campus Gateway Master Plan.”

Once complete, this new building will be a new innovation hub and dining area. It will include a lecture hall, studios, classrooms, makerspaces and dining.

The Innovation Hub will connect several already existing innovation nodes throughout campus, such as FabLAB, the Robotic Fabrication Lab, TechStyleLAB, MuseLAB and the Clean Energy and Sustainability Lab, among others. It will also connect several proposed, but not yet implemented, innovation nodes such as the Humanities Quad, Entrepreneurial Lab, New Research Labs and Interdisciplinary Studios/Innovation Zone.

“The goal is to nurture a design innovation ecosystem that enhances the cross-pollination of ideas from student and faculty teams across campus,” says J.R. Campbell, executive director of Kent State’s Design Innovation Initiative

in a press release. “It will be comprised of human, physical and intellectual resources that knit together Kent State’s broad disciplines to develop a uniquely distinctive community of creative problem solvers.”

Based on the Board of Trustees Facilities Master Plan and Phase 1 Proposal, this project costs an estimated $44.9 million. This is roughly 20 percent of the proposed total funding for Phase 1, $220.8 million. Phase I should complete in 2020, with the Innovation Hub to complete in the summer of that year. B MEGAN AYSCUE | mayscue@kent.edu

State of the University

100 YEARS OF HOMECOMING Kent State celebrated 100 years of Homecoming on Oct. 6 as it welcomed back alumni. Originally called Campus Day, the event is Kent State’s oldest tradition and included long-established events such as a parade, homecoming king and queen and the Kiss on the K.

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DELTA TAU DELTA CREATES ’CONSENT MATTERS’ The Fraternity Delta Tau Delta of Kent State hangs a new a sign reading ‘kNOwMore Sexual Assault’ from it’s chapter house on East Main Street. The original sign held the same message, but had to be replaced because it was over 40 feet, too large for city standards.

NEW MEAL PLAN CREATES CHANGE Students’ meal plan changed from a declining balance to limited swipes and a minimum declining balance. After social media backlash, the university released a “You Talked, We Listened” campaign and updated some aspects of food services, including hours of operation.

CREDITS: 1975 Chestnut Burr; 100th Homecoming – Stephen Francis; Delta Tau Delta ‘Consent Matters’ – Kyle Austin; The New Meal Plan – Sophia Adornetto

Through the lens

The Chestnut Burr was Kent State’s student-produced yearbook, published from 1914 to 1985. In 1986, students Lauren Buterbaugh and Thomas Lewis transformed the yearbook into The Chestnut Burr Magazine, which was shortened to The Burr in 1988.

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CAMPUS

Advice for O PHOTOS BY

Kamryn Rowe

F

or Esquire’s 85th anniversary issue, it gathered celebrities like Joe Biden, Clint Eastwood and Margaret Atwood and told their stories of advice called “Sane advice for crazy times.” It’s an interesting year. Everything is chaotic and yet people are still making progress and advancements. There’s peace and there’s disruption. The world has not ended — but no one can tell if we’re getting closer to that day. It’s an odd time. To help, we gathered some well-known people around campus to help share some lessons.

MADISON NEWINGHAM ON INVOLVEMENT President of the College Democrats Get involved on campus, whether it be a club related to your degree or merely your interests. It is helpful to befriend professors and student leaders for advice in your field or references in your career search.

That said, do not stick with something you do not enjoy. I wasted too much time with organizations that were inefficient and made me unhappy and unfulfilled. I started to selectively narrow down where and with whom I spent my time to ensure it was beneficial to my interests and happiness. I tried being involved

in too many things and later tried being involved in nothing, and in both instances, I felt anxious and depressed because I felt as though I was not experiencing the things I was doing. Find a few things you love with people you love, but do not overwhelm yourself.

I was not particularly shy at any point; however, I know what it is like to feel intimidated and the desire to back out of challenges. I eventually decided the only way for me to overcome these barriers was to simply force myself to commit to events and public speaking.

Rather than worrying too much and giving myself too much time to prepare, which only stressed me out further, I prepared just enough to “wing it” insofar as I was able to speak naturally and knowledgably. I hate to call this procrastination, but you have to decide when something is good enough so that you can move on to something else going on in your day, even if that is just “you-time.”

If you are a busy-body, you need to slow down and find even an hour of the day for yourself. If you are not involved on campus, you should find one thing in which you can meet more people and have fun while networking.

Doing so now will help alleviate the stress of the inevitable networking you will have to do in your career.

RACHEL WALKER ON THINKING FOR YOURSELF President of the College Republicans Don’t let people dictate how you think.

The ability to think for yourself and fight for your own convictions is a powerful thing. In today’s society, individuals are often cast to have certain beliefs if they have a certain appearance.

This is a dangerous trap we often find ourselves in. For example, people never expect me to have conservative values and then when they do find this out, I feel the need to justify my opinions.

Attending a left-leaning university has not always made it popular for me to go against the trend and express my beliefs. I find this even more empowering. I only hope others who face this issue can have the same strength to think for themselves, no matter what their beliefs

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may be. I have found strength in my differences, and it has made me a stronger person. In these odd times, I have learned to never assume anything about anyone because you never know what a person has been through. As a female, I encourage other women to find their own convictions and stick with them. There is no better feeling than being your own leader and not waiting for someone else to show the way. Find something to be passionate about and use this passion to inspire others. Have a civil discussion with someone who has different opinions than you, and you might have more things in common than you think.

CREDITS: Photo taken by Sami Scozzaro

WORDS BY

Ray Padilla

Odd Times WILLIAM PERRINE ON KEEPING A POSITIVE ATTITUDE Most rated professor on RateMyProfessors for Kent State We are all trying to make sense of our lives and the world we live in — whatever world that may be. I give a lecture to my graduating seniors every semester called “William’s Advice.”

It’s a 75 minute journey through some of my personal observations and reflections from my own experiences. Here are just two of the things I feel are important for keeping a positive attitude in daily life.

“TRUE success is going from failure to failure without loss of enthusiasm.” I’ve failed at a lot of things in my life but never let it dampened my passion for life and what is next. Looking for potential and seeing what’s next is what gets me out of bed every day. How you approach your day can determine your success for that day.

The success of that day will define your success for that week, month and year. You determine your own success: It could be getting to the Rec, applying for a job or internship, studying or

just getting laundry done. Look at all the little successes you have each day and you might be surprised how much you are accomplishing.

“No matter how bad things may seem, don’t forget how fortunate you are.” We all have bad days and things may seem hopeless sometimes.

Seem is the key word here; very often we perceive things as much worse than they actually are. This negative perception changes how we look at other parts of our life and before you know it, you are anxious and wondering how things got so bad. In all likelihood your life is perfectly fine, you just need to focus more on the good parts of your life and deal with the not so good parts. You’re receiving a world class education, have a roof over your head, food to eat, clothes to wear, friends and family. No one’s life is perfect, but if you are reading this you are probably doing OK!

AJ LEU ON BEING YOURSELF Academic Diversity Outreach Coordinator Be unapologetically yourself, without hesitation and without regret. This may seem overly simple and a little cliché, but I find that this is so much easier said than done.

Throughout my life, I have unfortunately found myself making decisions about my self-expression based on my fear of what other people would think of me. As a female, I questioned whether I could wear a shirt and tie to work when I first got into my profession. I have questioned whether I should get a tattoo in a visible place because I wasn’t sure if it was going to affect my ability to hold a good job. I have talked to so many people who want to wear their hair naturally, or wear braids or dreads, but they are worried to do so because it may make them “unemployable.” It’s time to make a decision. Are you willing to censor yourself and invalidate the authenticity of your identity and self-expression just to please

someone else? Are you going to be happy in that job if you aren’t able to be your full, authentic self? If someone doesn’t want to hire me because of my clothes, my hair or any other way I express myself, then I don’t think I would be happy working there. So wear what makes you comfortable, rock those braids, get that tattoo, gauge your ears, dye your hair pink, and do whatever else it takes for you to be unapologetically true to yourself. As long as you are good at what you do and you care about your job, I have no doubt that you will find a place that values the work that you do and values your freedom of self-expression. B

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Campus

Interesting Credits

WORDS BY

ILLUSTRATION BY

Megan Ayscue

Sophia DelCiappo

Across Kent State’s campuses, students can enjoy a variety of unique classes BLACK GIRL MAGIC

FAIRY TALES

SPORTS IN AMERICA

Kent Campus

Kent Campus

Stark Campus

“Black females are virtually invisible in psychological science textbooks. Within the field, black women and girls are under researched and underserved. Black Girl Magic is designed to give students an in-depth look at the psychological lives of this population,” emails professor Angela Neal-Barnett. “Topics covered include colorism, hair, suicide, acting white, identity, depression, anxiety and LGBT issues.”

“I love the simplicity of the tales, the ways they cause you to [imagine] alternate realities, the ways they offer comfort by showing characters survive common human fears and predicaments,” professor Keith Lloyd says.

This course discusses where fairy tales originated and how they have changed. With a plethora of sexual innuendos, murders and maimings, these stories are far from their Disney counterparts.

“People … do not realize how much we can learn about American history by studying sports,” professor Leslie Heaphy says. “We can see race relations reflected in baseball and gender issues in 19th century sports. The influence of the Industrial Revolution on professional sports is followed by … how sports can add to the support of a war.”

This course includes the development and growth of American sports such as boxing, skiing, baseball and football.

ALL ABOUT DINOSAURS

ADAM SANDLER

BAKING AND PASTRY FUNDAMENTALS

Tuscarawas Campus

Kent Campus

Kent Campus

This course delves into Adam Sandler’s work as a comedian and musician. Two moments still stick with professor Ronald Russo. The first is when Sandler sent a personalized video with advice for students. The second was when Terry Crews sent the class two voice messages about the film “The Longest Yard” and industry tips. Students also received a cheeseburger or Quarter Pounder based on his character’s preferences.

“Every semester, a student pulls off the most beautiful brioche or stunning pie, and they are beaming with pride and otherwise overwhelmed with self fulfilment. Which makes sense because just two weeks prior they didn’t feel confident boiling water,” says professor Anthony Hamilton.

In this course, students can expect to create breads, cakes, tortes and more. Students will also learn advanced decorating techniques and “the production and selection of quality handcrafted and purchased products,” according the the university catalog. B

ILLUSTRATION BY Sophia DelCiappo

This course discusses evolution and how dinosaurs relate to animals living today. Students also take an optional behind-the-scenes tour of dinosaur exhibits at the Carnegie Museum of Natural History.

“Although [students] may not go into paleontology,” professor Jeremy Green writes in an email, “the ability to process and understand a large body of complex, foreign information … teaches them a different way of thinking and processing the world around them.”

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The Art of

Crew Necks

WORDS BY

Mickayla Wawrousek

PHOTO BY

Alyse Nelson

T

he Fashion School Store, a piece of the upstanding Kent State Fashion School, can be found nestled into the heart of downtown Kent. This shop offers students numerous opportunities to better understand the fashion industry they are working tirelessly to be a part of.

It allows direct involvement by giving students a place to display and sell garments that shaped their education and personal design development alike.

Encouraging visiting parents, new students and community members to support local work as well as the Fashion School, this carefully curated space proudly provides one of a kind offerings. Patrons can find laser cut detailed dresses, machine knit outerwear, tops and skirts featuring hand placed and sewn findings and finishes, and the most simple and minimalistic of all; neutral toned, screen printed, crew neck sweatshirts.

A noticeable trend the Fashion School Store has had a hand in igniting is just this, the screen printed crewneck styled to a perfectly unique, quirky and even loud degree of fashion. It’s known and recognized that students of the Fashion School do not shy away from working to break a few boundaries when it comes to their personal style, so in response to this burning want and desire the Fashion School Store has provided. Students themselves have taken over the helm of the ship in execution.

These crewnecks are seen paired with statement jewelry, colorful bandanas and matching socks, tied around the waists of skirts and dresses and tucked into business casual plaid pants and slacks, effortlessly elevating something of once a quiet demeanor.

The variance of these looks are responsible for shifting the identity of an item, typically recognized as one you wear while sipping tea, laying in bed binge watching Netflix or tirelessly tackling essay after essay your professors decided to assign at once (with maybe a little more Netflix thrown on in between). Although these looks may provoke you to surface from the depths of the blankets piled high on your couch, or move from behind your computer screen to take on the world outside of your apartment door, they definitely don’t sacrifice the comfort you were once reveling in moments ago. Truly, how much more comfortable can you get, having the focus of an outfit be a crew neck; a softly lined, perfectly worn in, always and forever sought after, crew neck. And if this still isn’t enough or if you may have missed the memo, they’re available for your styling needs right down the street.

Read More theamag.com

A Magazine is a student-run fashion, beauty and culture Magazine on campus. For more, visit theamag.com and look for its new issue on stands Fall 2018.

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Campus

Jaylin & Jalen

KENT STATE’S BACKCOURT DUO SHARE MORE THAN A NAME

The Kent State men’s basketball team will once again lean on senior stars Jaylin Walker and Jalen Avery WORDS BY

Henry Palattella & Cameron Hoover PHOTO BY

Nate Manley / The Kent Stater

C

hances are that if the Kent State men’s basketball team has any success this year, it’ll be because of the senior duo: Jaylin Walker and Jalen Avery. Avery is the Flashes’ point guard who captains the team both on and off the floor. Walker is the team’s shooting guard who has never seen a shot he doesn’t like. Both serve as the Flashes’ heartbeat. They’ve been through numerous peaks and valleys during their college career, but no matter what, they both keep fighting to be the best.

The Burr’s writers Henry Palattella and Cameron Hoover sit down with Jaylin and Jalen to discuss their upcoming season, as well as their past accomplishments with the Flashes.

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HENRY PALATTELLA: How do you feel so far through practices?

JALEN AVERY: I feel like we’re a

CAMERON HOOVER: What have you both been doing individually this?

JA: [The coaches] have really been paying

different team from last year. This new team, we’re not as big. Our bigs aren’t as dominant as Adonis [De La Rosa] was. We’re going to be a more scrappy team and push the ball more on offense as opposed to playing out of the post.

JAYLIN WALKER: We’re going to be more athletic as well, more fast-paced. There’s going to be a lot more ball screens for guards.

It’s going to open up a lot more.

attention to our body fat this year, so they’ve been wanting us to work on cutting down our body fat as much as we can. We’re trying to finetune every part of our game, especially shooting and driving. Losing [Kevin] Zabo will hurt. He was the guy on our team who got to the rack to get baskets or got fouled. That’s things we’ll have to pick up on.

Then-sophomore guards Jalen Avery and Jaylin Walker celebrate after tying the game against Central Michigan University with under a second to go in regulation at the M.A.C. Center on Jan. 28, 2017. Kent State lost 105-98 in overtime.

HP: Since you’ve come here, this will be the first time you’ve played in a guardfocused offense. That means more shots for the both of you — has that set in yet?

JA: It’s more opportunity for us, but it’s more responsibility too. Before you could throw it into a big man and there’s not as much weight on your shoulders. Now we have more weight on our shoulders, but we also have more opportunities, so we just have to come in ready to play night in and night out.

CH: How have you seen the team respond to seeing [big man] Adonis De La Rosa leave this offseason?

JA: Honestly, the best part about this team is that we have a lot of new guys. A lot of guys didn’t even get to meet Adonis. They’re coming in from junior college or high school, and they’re coming in hungry to play themselves.

HP: Not a lot of guys recently have been at Kent for all four years. What does that say about you to be able to go through this with a revolving door of teammates?

JA: It’s been tough since it’s been a revolving door of coaches as well. Me and Jaylin Walker, we’re just trying to keep the tradition.

HP: When you lost to Bowling Green at home your freshman year in the MAC Tournament, do you think that motivated you through your four years at Kent? Do you still think about that game?

JW: I still think about it from time-totime. When players from that year come back we always reminisce and talk about it like ‘Damn, we should have had that game.’ That made us come back even harder the next year.

JA: That game I think I probably played like two minutes — if I got in at all. Going into the next year both me and J-Walk were mad because we both didn’t play a lot that game. We feel like we could’ve been out there to help, but that’s just how it goes.

CH: How have you seen your individual games grow since you’ve come to Kent?

JA: When I first came to Kent I really couldn’t shoot. High school was easy. I could just get to the basket, so I never really shot.

Over time I’ve improved my shot and gotten stronger and quicker. My overall game has gotten better, and I’ve gotten more confident.

JW: Coming in as a freshman I really couldn’t dribble that much. I couldn’t use my left hand at all. That’s another thing I’ve gotten better with as the years have gone on. My basketball IQ has gotten better too.

HP: When you committed to Kent, do you remember what Kent was like

compared to the other offers you had?

JA: My decision was between Kent and Ohio University, and it was pretty easy. At that point, Ohio had Jaaron Simmons, and he was coming off a big year. It was really a no-brainer for me; I knew I was coming to Kent. But still to this day, whenever I go to Ohio I want to get a win. I still haven’t gotten one there. We’ve beaten them here, but I’ve never gotten one in Athens.

JW: I only had one offer so it was a nobrainer for me as well. I also committed early in my senior year. I probably would have had more options, but I’m glad I chose here; it all worked out.

HP: Go back to the 2016 NCAA Tournament run. Being able to show out on the biggest stage, Jalen leading the offense and Jaylin shooting the lights out.

What did that do for your confidence?

JA: We just realized it was possible as long as we make the team first. We really feel like anything is possible. That team, we didn’t have the greatest year heading into the MAC Tournament. We didn’t win the MAC in the regular season or anything like that, but we came together late. That’s something we’ve been preaching to our new guys: As long as we come together as a team, anything is possible. We had Deon [Edwin], who was 6 feet, 3 inches tall, playing power forward, and we still won. We may be small, but it’s still possible as long as we come together as a team.

CH: You both have a sort of bulldog mentality. I know Jaylin likes to talk shit on the court, and Jalen has that in him too.

How do you think that mindset motivates you as the seasons go?

JW: Have a killer mentality always. That helps through everything, through my life, not just basketball.

JA: I think that separates Kent State, not just us individually, but Kent State from other teams. We have a lot of other teams that play what I call “pretty boy ball.” I think Ohio plays pretty boy ball. Western Michigan plays pretty boy ball. Here, we have to be tough.

HP: I know Jalen Avery’s favorite player is Chris Paul. Jaylin, who’s your favorite NBA player?

JW: [Russell] Westbrook. Everything. I only like players I can relate to with my game.

Me and him, we have the same mentality. We always talk junk. We’re always hyped. When we score, we’re always hyped, active. We’ve both got the ball in our hands most of the game. He’s also explosive and stuff like that, athletic. I’ve also got that in my game as well. I’m just a better shooter than him.

(Jalen Avery laughed at that comment.)

HP: As you move forward, what’s the one thing you hope you do yourselves this season, your individual goals?

JA: An individual goal for me is really just winning, man. I just want to show our younger point guards the way here. I feel like as long as I lead our team and win, all the accolades will come. When you worry about accolades, that’s where you mess your game up. As long as we win and lead our team, especially back to the MAC Championship, the accolades will come.

JW: Yeah, same. Just win. Once we win the MAC Championship, everything else will come.

JA: Sophomore year, when [Walker] got [MAC] Tournament MVP, he didn’t even get on an [all-MAC] team. He didn’t get anything at all.

And that was crazy. Even last year, he got third team, but me, personally? I think he was better than third team. It’s simple as that. It’s always the same. In the rankings, we’re going to be ranked like fourth in the East. They always do that to us. It’s just what happens.

JW: Every year, we’re always the underdogs.

But, shit, we’re always in the MAC Tournament, so it is what it is.

CH: Jalen, last year you did — kind of — get an accolade. You led the country in assist-to-turnover ratio, got that plaque from the NCAA. Did that accolade mean anything to you?

JA: It definitely meant a lot to me. That’s not politically based. It’s just stats. It’s just numbers. For me, that’s what it’s about. That wasn’t based on another person’s opinion. They didn’t have to like me. Numbers are numbers.

That was a big thing for me.

CH: Jaylin, he mentioned the tournament run a few years ago, and then last year you had a few big games against Akron.

What do you think it is that excites you for the big games?

JW: That’s the word right there: big games. You should always do your best in every game, but for the big games, you’ve really got to do something. We are mid-major. We really don’t get that type of crowd or any type of platform when we’re out there. But when we do get it, I have to take it to full advantage and do my best. B HENRY PALATTELLA | hpalatte@kent.edu CAMERON HOOVER | choove14@kent.edu

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Campus

Easy as pie We’re spilling the beans on the best recipes to make in a Kent State dorm

WORDS BY

Megan Ayscue PHOTOS BY

Kamryn Rowe & Sophia Adornetto

BREAKFAST Mug Omelette INGREDIENTS: 2 eggs Bell pepper Cheese (optional) Salt and pepper Other options: spinach, onion, deli meats

DIRECTIONS: 1. Using a fork, whisk together eggs in a mug with a small splash of water, salt and pepper until well combined.

2.

Stir in other desired ingredients. If using cheese, stir in ¾ of it. Sprinkle remaining ¼ of cheese on top.

3.

Microwave for 2–3 minutes.

TIPS: Use water and not milk. Milk makes the proteins in the eggs rubbery and/or watery.

For healthier eggs, use more vegetables, no cheese and only egg whites. If using egg whites, whisk more until there are plenty of bubbles.

Take salt and pepper packets from The Market

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DINNER Best Microwave Noodles EDITOR’S RECIPE INGREDIENTS: 1 package chicken ramen 2 tablespoons butter 1 handful (very accurate) bacon bits 1–2 tablespoons goat cheese (found in Eastway) Optional: grated Parmesan cheese, chives, other meats, vegetables

DIRECTIONS: 1. Cook each side of the noodles in ¼ cup of water at 1 minute each until cooked through.

Drain if needed.

2.

Add 1 tablespoon of butter to noodles.

Heat to melt. Stir.

3.

Add goat cheese to noodles. Cook in bursts and stir until melted.

4.

Stir in bacon. Cook for another 15 seconds tops.

5.

Add any desired toppings. (I recommend Parmesan.)

DESERT Mini topless ice cream pie INGREDIENTS: 4–6 vanilla wafers A little butter or milk Nutella and/or peanut butter, almond butter Honey Vanilla ice cream

DIRECTIONS: 1. Crush wafers in a plastic bag into a powder.

Place in a small, microwavable bowl.

2.

Add a few drops milk or ¼ tablespoon of butter. Melt, then mix (if applicable). Add a squirt of honey (or ½ packet if stolen from The Market or Starbucks). Mix.

3. Heat in the microwave for about 20 seconds. Remove. Stir.

4. Press cookie flat to the bottom of the bowl, packing it. Freeze for about five minutes.

5. When cool, add a thin layer of peanut or almond butter, or a thicker layer of nutella (or both, I’m not your mom). Freeze until it’s solid (maybe 15–25 minutes).

6. Add a hefty scoop of vanilla ice cream, and drizzle with honey (Trust me on the honey thing). If you can wait another minute, place it back into freezer until the honey is solid. B

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AD

16 | THE BURR MAGAZINE

COMMUNITY

The College Rivalry COMPETITION GOES BEYOND THE WAGON WHEEL The Kent State and Akron University contention spans decades, but it inspires healthy competition

WORDS BY

Collin Cunningham ILLUSTRATION BY

Sophia DelCapio

A

s legend has it, University of Akron founder John R. Buchtel set out in the spring of 1870 to establish another college in the town of Kent. While traveling by horse-drawn wagon across leagues of muddy fields, Buchtel’s carriage became entrenched in the earth, causing the wheel to break off.

After construction, employees uncovered the wheel while working on a Western Reserve Trail pipeline in 1902. It found its way into the hands of Raymond E. Manchester, the Kent State Dean of Men at the time. Manchester wasn’t sure if the wooden hoop he’d been given

was actually Buchtel’s, but he made the most of the situation. In 1945, he declared the wheel a trophy to be given to the winner of the annual Kent versus Akron football game.

Like that, a rivalry was born, though Manchester never could have imagined how a football game between Kent and Akron might look today. The excited fans, wearing “Beat Akron” T-shirts, holding signs urging on their favorite teams, both of which confusingly sport extremely similar colors.

“It’s part of what college, just being in college, is all about,” Kent State Director of

Athletics Joel Nielsen explains. Nielsen started in his position in 2010.

Five years ago, Nielsen collaborated with Tom Wistrcill, the former director of athletics for Akron, to create the Wagon Wheel Challenge, an athletics comparison system that scores the 14 different men’s and women’s sports that play against each other.

“I think it’s just been a great rivalry,” George Van Horne, the University of Akron’s senior associate athletics director says. He also explains the origin of the wagon wheel.

“We’re two of 130 schools playing in the

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Community football bowl subdivision, so we work closely with our counterparts at Kent State because we have a lot of similarities.”

Van Horne has been with Akron’s program since 1994, when he was a student baseball player himself. He’s watched the program grow and reshape itself in the years since, and he thinks the rivalry between Akron and Kent inspires a healthy sense of competition.

“There are things that we can share,” Van Horne says. “There’s not many people in the community who work in college sports at our level, and we’re close.”

The universities are only 15 miles apart, and this fact, combined with the similar size of the schools, leaves Kent and Akron with little reason not to work together. That goes beyond athletics.

Like a big blue and gold blanket, the rivalry envelops almost every aspect of student life.

their freshman year, while Akron manages to keep 73 percent of its students after their first-year.

Calil Cage is the president of the Kent State Integrated Greek Council, a member of Phi Beta Sigma and a junior majoring in business. He first heard about the rivalry at a Kent versus Akron football game during his freshman year.

“Growing up, the rivalry has always been looked at as a good thing, like sibling rivalry,” Cage says. “You look at your siblings and there’s obviously clear-cut aggression, but overall, we’re really close. Kent and Akron are about 30 minutes away from each other and the students, we get to know each other through different things, through sports, through social activities and organizations linking from campus to campus.”

“We compete with Akron on a number of different levels, everything from recruiting students to our campus to corporations and business that we all deal with in the community.”

– JOEL NIELSEN, KENT STATE DIRECTOR OF ATHLETICS

“We compete with Akron on a number of different levels, everything from recruiting students to our campus to the corporations and businesses that we all deal with in the community,” Nielsen says.

Colleges are businesses, and anyone who’s spent enough time in Northeast Ohio will admit that neither university is afraid to throw all kinds of advertisements in your face, usually boasting about academics.

“It spills over into other areas, but students make decisions about where they want to pursue academics, where they feel that it’s the best fit for them,” says Wayne Hill, Akron’s vice president of University Communications and Marketing.

This brings up another aspect of the rivalry: Kent and Akron are constantly compared on the quality of their major programs. Kent’s School of Fashion Design and Merchandising ranks as the third best for merchandising and the fourth best for design in the country. Akron’s College of Engineering has been around for more than a century and is home to one of the oldest traditional co-op programs in the United States.

A school’s success in academics is often measured by its retention rates. Kent tends to hang on to 82 percent of its students after

18 | THE BURR MAGAZINE

Cage works with members of his fraternity in Akron to plan community service events.

In this way, playful opposition can be good because it inspires improvement on the behalf of all parties. Each school wants to look better, and if they want to attract future students they have to try and offer superior studies and resources to the other.

“It sparks an energy on both campuses, though we’ve had a lot of cooperation as well,” Hill explains. “In the last couple years, through social media efforts, we’ve had some good fun with our mascots. It’s a healthy, fun rivalry.”

Just in time for Valentine’s Day 2017, Kent and Akron released a pair of videos that explains an alternative origin story for the rivalry. There’s a scene where Kent’s mascot, Flash the Golden Eagle, is shown exchanging a Valentine with Zippy the Kangaroo, Akron’s costumed caricature, and the two skip away. Another part hilariously features the two playing a whipped cream prank on a person wearing an Ohio State hoodie.

These social media novelties are a cute way to get people motivated to support their school, but there are some students who attend Kent and Akron who don’t know much about it.

“The first thing I think of is ‘what rivalry?’”

University of Akron resident assistant Tyler Gaydosh says. “The only thing that I ever really hear about it is the poking fun, the easy jokes.”

Gaydosh first heard of the rivalry when he was touring Akron as a senior in high school, when one of the tour guides cracked a joke, asking, “Hey, can someone give me the time?”

When someone gave him the answer, the guide replied with “And Kent State still sucks!”

The way Gaydosh puts it, the rivalry is almost nonexistent in all but name, though it does serve to highlight some of the differences between the schools.

“Akron does feel busier, because the campus is a block away from downtown,” Gaydosh says.

“One of our buildings in downtown Akron, you have to cross bridges to get there. You get more of a campus life in Kent.”

Existing in a city as compared to a more suburban town means that Akron students have a drastically different college experience than people who attend Kent, leading them to have different ideas and impressions of what attending a university is like.

“I also applied to Akron, [and] choosing colleges as a freshman, it was the people, it was the feelings of home for me,” Cage says. “Even when it comes to concerts, people don’t go to Akron for concerts, they come to Kent for concerts. But when you look at the party scene, everyone in Kent goes to Akron for parties rather than Kent.”

Van Horne says, differing mindsets in combination with the rivalry can mean all the difference in post-graduation life.

“I think the thing is now, when you look at it, a lot of the households in this area are split,” Van Horne says. “A Kent grad and an Akron grad might be married to each other, so you’ve got that in-house rivalry in the family, where you might be betting who does the laundry this week, or you’re gonna have a little dinner bet going on the game.”

The consensus seems that everyone has a different take on the rivalry, depending on where they’re from, what kind of environment they prefer and, of course, which school they attend. Regardless of which side you root for, if you stand behind one at all, you know about the rivalry. It’s everywhere.

“We take, very seriously, involving students in our entire athletic department, and the rivalry is the epitome of that, and so I think it deals with a great sense of student pride and pride in the university,” Nielsen says. “I think it permeates throughout the student body and our fans, that rivalries are great for a lot of different reasons.” B COLLIN CUNNINGHAM | ccunni19@kent.edu

Campus Buzz Students continue to use Juuls despite campus and community regulations WORDS BY

Lindsey Sellman

PHOTOS BY

Tessa Poulain

J

uuls — you may have seen the strange devices in the hands of friends and peers and the white clouds billowing from the mouths of fellow students.

Juuls are a small vapor devices that look suspiciously like a flash drive. The device even charges when plugged into a computer. Because of this, Juuls are easily concealed — even in a classroom or other smoke-free place, such as the Kent State campus.

Karlyn Kanuckel, a freshman majoring in nursing, first tried Juuling in May. She says a lot of people at school have Juuls and, at first, she thought they were stupid. Kanuckel’s best friend is the person who eventually coaxed her into trying the e-cigarette. Now, Kanuckel says she is addicted.

Kent State has been a smoke-free campus since July 1, 2017. The city of Kent passed an ordinance, Tobacco 21, on July 18 preventing the sale of tobacco or tobacco products to anyone under the age of 21. The Juul is included in both bans.

For these reasons, Kent State offers a free smoking cessation program to its students and staff to aid in quitting smoking. The DeWeese Health Center offers various forms of support for students interested in quitting, including the KSU Freedom from Smoking program, ways to get involved with nicotine replacement therapy and suggestions for apps that help with the quitting process. Coordinator of the Office of Health Promotion, Scott Dotterer, also suggests that students looking to stop smoking have “multiple layers of support.” He says the Ohio Intergroup of Nicotine Anonymous is another place to find the tools one needs to quit.

Kanuckel says she is not affected by these bans because she purchases her JUULpods outside city limits, often in her hometown,

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Community A student smokes a Juul outside of Midnight Oasis, blowing a cloud in front of an advertisement for the product.

which does not have its own version of the Tobacco 21 Ordinance.

In 2015, PAX Labs introduced Juuls to the electronic cigarette market. By 2017, JUUL Labs, a daughter company of PAX, was created due to the increasing popularity of the devices. JUUL Labs was founded by two former smokers and Stanford University graduates James Monsees and Adam Bowen. In April of 2018, JUUL Labs held more than 70 percent of the e-cigarette market, according to an article

by The New York Times.

Since its creation, Juuls have become increasingly popular among teens and young adults. Matt Myers, the president of Tobacco Free Kids, says a 2018 survey showed 63 percent of teens and young adults who use Juuls do not realize the product contains nicotine.

After trying the device for the first time, Kanuckel was only informed of the nicotine content after she asked her friend why she was “buzzing.” The nicotine buzz, she says, is what made her think, “Dang, I need a Juul.” Although she says she doesn’t like being addicted, the

20 | THE BURR MAGAZINE

nicotine buzz is calming and helps her cope with anxiety.

“Without a doubt, nicotine is a highly addictive drug,” says Dotterer via email. “The use of tobacco in any form is considered unsafe, especially for teens and young adults.”

The Juul has become notorious amongst young people that the Food and Drug Administration has been giving JUUL Labs special attention in recent months. In April, the FDA requested the company hands over information on its marketing tactics in hopes to better understand the notoriety of the product amongst youth. Kevin Burns, the chief executive officer at JUUL, says it handed over more than 50,000 pages in documents. More recently, the FDA made a surprise visit to the JUUL headquarters in San Francisco and seized more than 1,000 documents. Things like marketing and product design are believed to be linked to the popularity among the younger generation.

Dotterer says there are concerns for the product due to its promotion on online media and the large variety of flavors available.

On South Water Street in Kent stands Midnight Oasis, a tobacco shop. Among smoking accessories and apparel sits a small display of Juuls. The store began selling Juuls through its tobacco distributor.

“I don’t know why they’re picking on Juuls,” owner Chris Todd says. He claims most of the customers who go to Midnight Oasis to buy JUUL Pods are middle aged. Todd also says there are plenty of other e-cigarettes just as appealing to younger people because they market flavors, some with even more flavor options than Juuls.

JUUL Pods are the part of the Juul that contain the nicotine. They are filled with liquid and nicotine salts that are turned into vapor.

The pods come in selections of three and five percent nicotine and the company does not currently offer a nicotine-free pod. The pods containing five percent nicotine are equivalent to an entire pack of cigarettes. Each pod is designed to last 200 “puffs,” but it varies depending on the person. Midnight Oasis sells 50 to 70 pods per month, down from the 80 pods the store sold prior to Kent’s Tobacco 21 Ordinance. Kanuckel estimates she spends $100 on JUUL Pods each month alone.

The Tobacco 21 Ordinance has not only affected businesses, but the whole town, in Todd’s opinion. It is driving customers out of the city limits in search of tobacco products. Todd believes kids with Juuls are possibly stealing the pods from older relatives. Kanuckel thinks, just like her, many young people have someone who can legally buy the products for them. She says it’s no different than alcohol, as “kids will always get their hands on it.” Whichever theory is correct, both Todd and Kanuckel agree the Tobacco 21 Ordinance is not going to do much good for the teens it is trying to protect.

“If they’re going to do it here, they should do it in the whole state,” Todd says. B LINDSEY SELLMAN | lsellman@kent.edu

Want more info?

Students interested in the smoking cessation program at Kent State can contact the Office of Health Promotion by telephone at 330-672-2320. They can also look online at www.kent.edu/smoke-free for more information.

Best of Kent Tattoos Tattoo artists around the Kent community share their style and love for designing tattoo art

BLACK SHEEP TATTOO STUDIOS

WORDS BY

Shelbie Goulding

1679 E. Main St.

ILLUSTRATION BY

“I just love the permanency and the trust,” owner Alex Barba says about tattooing. He opened Black Sheep Tattoo Studios about five years ago and says it couldn’t be more fun. “It’s all about the art in the end and enjoying what you’re doing.” Barba says his favorite style is black and gray tattoos, but he loves doing almost anything. The minimum tattoo price starts at $60 and larger designs are usually $100-150 hourly.

Madeleine Kidd

DEFIANCE TATTOOS

163 E. Main St.

St. ain

SOUTH WATER STUDIOS TATTOO

mit

St.

850 S. Water St.

St.

WAR HORSE INK

107 E. Summit St.

Sum

S. W ater

KENT STATE UNIVERSITY

E. M

Mike Jagel began designing tattoos when he was 18 years old. “I was never into regular art [like painting], tattoos just grabbed me,” he says.

Jagel created street and graffiti art as a kid, but over time he switched to tattoo art. He has worked with Defiance Tattoos for seven years, and his style is American traditional-tattoo designs featuring bold black outlines with a limited color palette. Defiance Tattoos does small designs for $20-30, and the price increases depending on the piece. Larger tattoos, like sleeves, are charged $100 per hour.

Carlos Gonzales undertook designing tattoos at South Water Studios in January 2014. “I like art and have been [designing tattoos] for 18 years,” Gonzales says. “When I was 21, I was studying art in college and my friend was a piercer at the time. He liked my art and asked me to do tattoos.” He says his style of work is American traditional, but he can tattoo almost anything — or any style — requested. South Water Studios price minimum is $80, and it charges (on average) $100 per hour for larger designs — depending on the design.

Tattoo artist Samantha Coster started designing tattoos with War Horse Ink when the store opened three years ago.

“Essentially, [designing tattoos] is one of the most gratifying art forms,” Coster says.

“It’s surreal and silly to say, but you get a little ‘high’ from it.” Coster prefers doing cartoon and Disney-style work. War Horse Ink’s small tattoos start around $30-40, and the studio charges between $80-120 per hour for large tattoos — depending on the design.

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Community

Escape Artists Exploring the phenomena of escape and puzzle rooms

I

WORDS BY

Cameron Gorman

ILLUSTRATION BY

Justin Golenberg

’ ll start by letting you know that under the Ohio Building Code, we weren’t actually allowed to be locked into the Western-themed escape room in downtown Kent.

If you haven’t heard of these attractions, well — they’re popping up everywhere, including college towns like Kent. Basically, you pay them to lock you into a room. There, you must uncover clues in order to break out of whatever dangerous situation you’ve found yourself in within the time limit. To be honest, as a fan of immersive experiences, they’re a dream.

But with that dream comes the nightmare.

For every moment of light there is an equal balance of darkness, and in every escape room, there is family infighting and panic. For you see, if you can’t break out or get through certain puzzles, you may never know the answers. I must confess, with my personality — not knowing stuff never goes down smoothly.

The day of, my boyfriend Justin and I, along with true trooper and intrepid Burr photographer Tessa, arrive at Cracked Escape downtown, above Insomnia Cookies.

Unfortunately, because of my luck (and through no fault of accomodating business co-owner Ann Marie Rotunda), the air conditioning to the entire building that houses the puzzle rooms is off. On the positive, this serves to make the Western setting of the room more realistic.

Now, this isn’t my first — rodeo — in an escape room (Yes, I know. I had to). But,

standing beside Tessa and Justin, I feel a growing but familiar uncertainty in my stomach even as I place a 10 gallon hat on my head, and a vest across my chest. Even as a pre-recorded video of a cowboy describing our plight introduces us to the room, his tale of woe including a menacing villain by the name of Kent.

I suppose it is just the memories of previous panicked attempts at other escape rooms that bubble up.

I glance at Tessa and Justin, both donning festive cowboy hats. I feel warm under my vest.

Once we enter the room, however, natural teamwork between us begins to take hold. We pick around for a bit, unearthing odds and ends and clues. I wish I could reveal more about the puzzle room’s contents (beside the fact that it contained a full-scale bar and mounted sheep’s head), but that would be giving away too much of the story. Needless to say, the pressure was on.

I stand at the bar, in front of the liquid-filled bottles, listening to Tessa and Justin discuss boots and lanterns.

As we work toward finding the key to unlock the door, however, I begin feeling tense.

I begin to do what is expressly frowned upon by Justin’s game style: call out to the game runners for extra clues, immediately knocking us out of the running for the leaderboard.

Tessa and Justin, of course, are the driving forces, though I like to think I provide morale — or at least entertainment. As we get closer to the

CUFFING SEASON

cuffing season may have brought out jackets and boots, some people have found someone to cuddle up with to get them through the longer, colder nights.

“When it starts getting colder, especially people that are [flirtier], we run out of things to do outside,” said Austin Lynch, a junior at the University of Louisville. “We start to look for a boy to stay inside with and cuddle.”

People participating in cuffing season usually look for short-term relationships to replace the serial dating and one night stands of the warmer months.

“I am more monogamous in the winter than in the summer,” Lynch said.

WORDS BY Dustin Massengill The seasons affects most of our lives.

The period from autumn until Valentine’s Day, which some are calling “cuffing season,” describes when people would rather stay inside than go out and try to flirt with others. While

22 | THE BURR MAGAZINE

end, I ask (beg) for another clue. We only have 10 minutes left on the clock, and we are struggling! I ask again.

The smoke from the dynamite sticks grows thick as time ticks. The room is strewn with clues. The screen, which had been feeding us clues, does not give. Instead, what is typed is much simpler: 10 minutes is a lifetime.

Amazingly, despite my constant calling for clues, we eventually find the key with around six minutes to spare. Triumph is the right word as we pose in front of the Ghost Tavern’s facade, (sweaty vests and hats worn proudly).

I shake my head. The clues were sassy, but we did get out — and, in the immersiveness of the room’s atmosphere with no phones allowed, the hour certainly felt full. B CAMERON GORMAN | cgorman2@kent.edu

Cuffing season may affect anyone who is single during the period. The season, partly dating and partly hookup culture, can be confusing and full of inexplicit rules.

“People aren’t looking for their perfect partner, they just want to have someone so they don’t have to work for the [intimate parts],” said Chad Frommer, a sophomore photo illustration major at Kent State.

Read On

Continue reading at ohiofusion.com Fusion is a student-run magazine focused on LGBTQ issues on campus. For more, visit ohiofusion.com and look for its new issue on stands spring 2018.

Bev’s Accomplishments

PHOTOS BY

Chris Spegal & Nate Manley / The Kent Stater

1.

KENT STATE’S HEALTHY CAMPUS

Words by Shelbie Goulding

Thanks to Beverly Warren’s ambition in launching a series of wellness initiatives, Kent State received the prestigious 2018 Healthy Campus Award for being one of the healthiest universities in the nation. “We know that the habits formed during the college years often travel with our graduates when they leave the university and shape their quality of life for years to come,” Warren says in a prepared statement. “To assist students in making healthy choices, both on and off campus, we have strategically enhanced our wellness initiatives to include the creation of innovative programs and the expansion of services supporting overall health and well-being.” One initiative included creating a smoke-free, tobaccofree university in July 2017. Warren envisioned a campus providing safe and healthy learning, and clearing the air helped initiate a more productive and comforting environment for students, faculty and staff.

After five years, President Beverly Warren is leaving Kent State in July. In an email to staff and students in October, Warren states she wants to “shift [her] focus to family and personal considerations,” a decision she says was difficult to make.

The Burr would like to take this space to recognize Warren’s accomplishments since she came to Kent State from Virginia Commonwealth University. There are a plethora of things Warren has done during her presidency we simply cannot fit in this space, but these are five accomplishments we know will live on after she leaves.

2.

KENT STATE RANKS AMONG THE TOP 100 PUBLIC COLLEGES IN THE U.S.

Words by Molly Spillman

Kent State has landed a spot in the top 100 public schools in the U.S. News and World Report ranking for 2019, WKYC reported in September 2018. Under Warren’s leadership, Kent State has soared into its highest collegiate ranking in years.

In the 2017 fiscal year, Kent State reported it’s highest fundraising record to date with over 20,000

alumni supporting and $11.4 million dollars in private support. “Across all of our campuses, we’re focused on providing opportunities and experiences that develop the whole student in order to create graduates who are poised to change the world,” Warren says in an October 2017 press release from Kent State.

This financial support and these rankings earned under Bev’s tenure speak to Kent State’s accomplishments, as well as Warren’s superior leadership and ability to bring the Kent State community together. “We are a truly distinctive university, not only because of what we have accomplished, but for our deep commitment to working together under the common causes of learning, discovering purpose and creating positive change in the world,” Warren says in a September 2018 press release.

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Community

3.

FIRST FALL BREAK EVER

Words by Molly Spillman

In February 2017, Provost Todd Diacon announced a proposal to add a fall break into the Kent State calendar during the eighth week of the fall semester. In October 2018, that proposal came to life as Kent State students enjoyed the first fall break of their college careers.

Warren had an instrumental piece in pushing this legislation through the Faculty Senate, a lengthy process that was debated heavily. From the beginning, she supported the proposal saying, “I believe students would embrace a fall break, not as a vacation, but as a time to just catch a breath, get your projects up to speed, prepare for midterms and all of the things that I think would help you be the best students you can be,” in a KentWired article posted in November 2017.

Despite faculty concerns about loss of instructional time, KentWired reported the university proceeded in announcing the break in December 2017. The Faculty Senate came to a resolution by starting the fall semester two days earlier during the 2018-2019 school year to make up for the lost time.

4. BROKE SEVERAL ENROLLMENT AND RETENTION RECORDS

Words by Cameron Gorman

According to a KentWired article, Bev made “enrollment and retention rates” a priority during her time as president — and the results were clear. Kent State has proudly touted the achievements recorded during Bev’s tenure. Kent’s e-Inside reported in September of 2016 that the main campus “boasts records in enrollment growth, retention and freshman class size, quality and diversity.”

And though enrollment rates across Kent State’s eight campuses, as of September of this year, are falling, there are still positive notes. KentWired reported in September that retention rates were at a “record” high of 81 percent in 2017, and WKSU reported in the same month that, though enrollment declined, the freshman class was the “largest ever” for the university.

5.

ONE BIG COMMENCEMENT GRADUATION

Words by Ray Padilla

Before Beverly Warren, Kent State University commencement ceremonies consisted of just students from the main campus. After the 2016 ceremony, two years after Warren arrived, an email from the Office of the President was sent. In it, Warren said their evaluation of the ceremony did not meet their goals.

As a result, the Office of University Ceremonies and an advisory committee comprised of faculty, staff and students suggested adding a university wide commencement ceremony. They started this with the 256th commencement on

24 | THE BURR MAGAZINE

May 13, 2017 — inviting all eight Kent campuses to the main campus to be recognized together.

“A unviersitywide commencement is a model used by many top-tier universities,” Warren says in an April email update leading up to the One University Commencement Ceremony. “For Kent State, it also manifests our shared comment to be one united university family.” B

AD

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CULTURE

Kent Conspiracists Conspiracy theories emerge to connect the missing pieces of an unfinished puzzle WORDS BY

Hannah Miller

S

ILLUSTRATION BY

Sarah Riedlinger

omething we can all forget to do in the midst of daily routines is set aside time to think through current events and newsworthy things going on around us. But it is important to step back and do so every once in a while. Learning, creating or researching conspiracy theories is just one way to challenge the status-quo and exercise creativity. Some people tune out as soon as the phrase ‘conspiracy theories’ is said, some theories are far-fetched and have no evidence to back them up, but there are a handful of theories that are well thought out and may have some truth to them.

Questioning the status-quo seems to be a must, and with that, conspiracy theories emerge to connect the missing pieces of an unfinished puzzle. A lot of historical events and places around the world seem to have missing information which is overlooked.

Talking through evidence and other supporting research is what may bring light to hidden truth.

It’s become more common to be skeptical and see things in an alternative light, whether it be a good or bad thing. An article published in 2015 from The Washington Post states, “about half the public generally endorses at

least one conspiracy theory.” One of the most common theories deals with the assassination of President John F. Kennedy.

J.F.K.’S ASSASSINATION — ONE MAN OR TWO? On Nov. 22, 1963, John F. Kennedy was shot and killed while riding in a motorcade through Dallas, Texas. This tragic event left the world shocked and confused about who could have committed such a crime. There are many conspiracies surrounding the death of J.F.K., with one of the most popular and compelling being that Lee Harvey Oswald didn’t act alone.

The theory that Lee Harvey Oswald, the alleged assassin of Kennedy, did not act alone began with the release of the Zapruder film.

This was the first time the public saw the assassination. The film shows J.F.K.’s head moving backward as a result of the impact, as if he was hit from the front, but government conclusions say he was shot from the back.

When a person pushes someone from the back, they fall forward, not backward.

“I was a little kid then, but I remember the assassination of John F. Kennedy,” Michael Olszewski, who teaches a conspiracy theory class at Kent State, says. “It wasn’t until 1974, about 11 years later, when the full film, the Zapruder film, was shown and after that I thought, ‘Well why did they keep this under wraps for so long?’”

Following the film’s release, The Warren Commission was created by former President Lyndon B. Johnson to investigate the assassination and give the public answers.

The commission concluded that the gunman acted alone in the killing of J.F.K. Yet, the U.S. House of Representatives Select Committee on Assassinations had a different conclusion. It reported there was a high probability there were two people who fired upon J.F.K. “I think the whole thing doesn’t really add up,” says Malania Birney, a sophomore majoring in political science. “Literally everything you

can find on it goes against the story … I don’t think it was just Oswald.”

Some other aspects that don’t add up with the official report of the assassination is the aftermath of the gunfire. The Zapruder film shows a piece of J.F.K.’s head blowing off and Jackie Kennedy reaching for it.

“In my high school forensics class we learned about how blood splatter is and the closer you are the bigger the effect of blood splatter,” Caleb Huffman, a freshman majoring in interior design, says, “If [the shooter] was as far as they say he was, there’s no way that his brain would have been everywhere like that.”

Although some people believe Oswald wasn’t a lone wolf, that possibly the government or the mob was behind it, others believe it may not be that extreme.

“I wouldn’t say it was a grand organization.

I don’t think it was the Russians, or the mob, or the United States,” says Josh Wampler, a senior majoring in philosophy. “I would say it’s a fringe group of 10 to 20 people who all got together and came up with shooters and killed J.F.K. I think there’s probably a plausibility, but as a government society, it’s easier to blame one guy and then move on from it.”

Olszewski’s class is not just about conspiracies, but why people are so quick to accept them, along with the role media organizations play in the influence of conspiracies. Some theories Olszewski covers in the course include the J.F.K. assassination, 9/11 and the moon landing.

“I’m quick to point out that I can be critical without being skeptical,” Olszewski says, “but I am a little bit skeptical of a lot of different conspiracy theories.”

In the digital era where news and information are at our fingertips, it’s hard to differentiate between real and fake news. “I’m fascinated by just how much people are willing to accept conspiracy,” he says. “I don’t think they trust media.”

Wampler, one of Olszewski’s students, says he enjoys the class and appreciates how the professor makes you think about the theories and concepts.

Culture

SOUTH AMERICA AND ADOLF HITLER In April of 1945, days after his birthday, Adolf Hitler committed suicide by shooting himself in the head while hiding out in one of his bunkers in Berlin. A conspiracy theory emerged soon after his reported death with the idea that he could have faked it and fled to South America, as many other Nazis did at the time.

DENVER INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT’S FANCY TUNNELS There are many different theories surrounding the Denver International Airport. One theory created the idea that underground tunnels run throughout the United States for military operations or government workings.

The third day it opened, luggage operations and trams at the Denver International Airport stopped working. Passengers were then led through tunnels that weren’t the stereotypical cold, dull and grim type. These tunnels were decorated with beautiful murals that were more inviting than the airport itself.

“It’s weird, it all points in that direction,” Birney says. “It’s a simple solution to aide in the concealment of sketchy stuff, which I think we can all agree happens quite a bit.”

There are other things that add to the theory that something else may be going on at the Denver airport.

“I read an article that said allegedly when they first built the airport they screwed up the first five buildings,” Huffman says, “and instead of scrapping them, they buried them underground, so that could go along with it.”

Some are not as skeptical of the airport.

“Think about this, if it was just going to be for one particular use, I don’t think they would decorate it for the people using it,” Olszewski says. “I think that a lot of times there are alternate routes to move people and to make that as pleasant and comfortable as possible is not surprising.”

Wampler says even if the theories are true, the intent may not be what the theorists want.

“There’s probably a little bit of plausibility … but I wouldn’t say there’s malicious intent or a secret black government that’s actually pulling the strings,” Wampler says. “I think it’s more money talk, and you’re going to try and make your influence better by having more communication and have access to each other, especially at different airports.”

Huffman saw another conspiracy theory while watching TV: perhaps Adolf Hitler isn’t dead. Or, at least, he didn’t die when it was reported he did. Huffman remembers being home alone one night, scrolling through YouTube and stumbling upon a show on conspiracies about Hitler. “It was going into DNA records and it was really intense,” he says.

Some evidence used to back up this theory is that only one person saw Hitler’s dead body.

“They could easily be lying,” Huffman says. “It’s Hitler. I would lie. I wouldn’t want him coming after me.”

The Soviet Union also admitted to not having Hitler’s body after they claimed they did. Although the Soviet Union thought they had a fragment of his skull, it was later proved to be from a woman. People have also claimed to have seen Hitler after his reported death in April 1945. One man claimed he was in contact with Hitler in Columbia until he moved to Argentina early in the year of 1955.

“There was even some concern with the recently released papers about the Kennedy assassination where they happen to mention that [Hitler] may have been alive in South America,” Olszewski says. “I hope we get to the bottom of that at some point. I would like to think that justice was served and when the Russians stormed Berlin that they did get him, but if that evidence isn’t there, then that’s where the controversy begins.”

Birney thinks it’s probable Hitler may have escaped, but since there’s so many theories about iconic figures in history faking their deaths, it’s a little crazy to think about.

Wampler also believes it may be a little crazy to think Hitler faked his own death.

“The bunker he was in we bombed,” he says.

“And we bombed it a lot so there’s nothing left. If he was in there, he would’ve been dead.”

WWI AND THE LUSITANIA In1917, three years after World War I began, a German U-boat sank the Lusitania — a British ship with over 1,000 people on board. Approximately 128 Americans died, which propelled the U.S. to intervene in the war. The theory is that the Lusitania was purposely sent into German waters so the U.S. could enter World War I.

This theory is one of Wampler’s favorites.

“I think that’s the catalyst of why we went to war,” he says. “I think we just needed public opinion, some kind of sway in politics over the public for us to have a justified war.”

Winston Churchill, the prime minister of the United Kingdom at the time, wrote that the British encouraged Germany to sink ships. The crew members of the Lusitania also knew the exact location of the German U-boat, but failed to report it to the captain.

“It is really interesting that America tested its might and then went to war over it,” Wampler says.

In contrast, some believe it could have just been a mistake.

“The torpedo hit the Lusitania in the place where it would do the most damage, in this case a fatal hit,” Olszewski says. “Plus, the Lusitania’s captain may have altered the ship’s speed putting it in the wrong place at the wrong time. Also, I don’t believe there were proper precautions like escort ships, which obviously played a factor. Historians may find out more to this story than was originally written.”

But there are a lot of people who think this theory may be true because of America’s past in foreign affairs.

“It makes sense,” Huffman says. “I think [the United States likes] to stick [its] nose in other people’s business, and when there’s a war we tend to be the last to join, which is odd. And there is always a random attack or event that makes us finally bite the bullet.”

Even when people are not extremely familiar with this theory, there is still some skepticism.

“I think it’s totally possible, lots of crazy stuff goes on in the world of politics,” Birney says. “I haven’t heard that one before, but I’m definitely going to look into it.”

Conspiracy theories are just theories until proven otherwise, but that doesn’t make skepticism and curiosity any less important.

A healthy dose of skepticism could end up revealing a truth that would have otherwise gone untold.

“Look at Woodward and Bernstein,” Olszewski points out. “The two guys that really reported on the Watergate affair that brought down a president. I think it’s dangerous not to analyze a lot of the things that are proposed.” B HANNAH MILLER | hmille60@kent.edu

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Culture

Polarizing Views The open carry standoff in September mirrors the state of our nation with steadfast views, uncertainty and distrust

“Y

our rights do not end where their feelings begin.”

Ryan Fournier, the national chair of Students for Trump, shares this sentiment with gun rights activists in the parking lot next to Satterfield Hall. The group of roughly 70 stand with posters in hand and many with guns slung over backs.

It’s a bright, autumn Saturday on Sept. 29, minutes before the start of the Open Carry Walk on Kent State’s main campus. At the edge of the lot, with their backs to the Student Center, dozens of police troopers wait for the group to move.

As the walk starts, moving from the lot, across the street and toward the Esplanade, a river of 200 or more counterprotestors — a mix of students, Black Lives Matter members and Antifa — flows from the Student Center where they had gathered. Shouts begin with “Go home, commies” and “Stop crossing my campus.”

More counterprotestors run alongside those walking, some running farther ahead

28 | THE BURR MAGAZINE

and in front of the group, followed by even more. “Let’s go!” “Get close!” “Lock arms!”

Within mere minutes of the walk beginning, counterprotestors halt the procession between Bowman and Olson Hall.

When the counterprotestors do not give any sign of allowing the walk to continue, police troopers surrounding the walkers don riot gear, pulling their face shields down. The only thing separating the two groups is this line of police.

Some counterprotestors stand in their own line with linked arms while others stand farther back around the sides of the walkers. Together, they chant “No Trump, No KKK, No Fascist USA. No Trump. No KKK, No Fascist USA.” Soon the police begin a chant of their own: “Move back. Move back. Move back,” as the officers attempt to break the human wall of counterpostestors and clear the brick path.

The counterprotestors hold their ground. The standoff begins, on campus and in the country.

WORDS BY

Megan Ayscue

PHOTOS BY

Sophia DelCiappo

Before the standoff, before the walk, before there was even mention of a rally, there was Kaitlin Bennett.

Bennett graduated Kent State in May when she also posted her graduation photos online.

These photos show her walking across campus, the Kent State water fountain to her left, an AR10 strapped to her back and a graduation cap in hand reading, “Come and take it.”

These photos were captioned on Twitter with “Now that I graduated from @KentState, I can finally arm myself on campus. I should have been able to do so as a student — especially since four unarmed students were shot and killed by the government on this campus. #CampusCarryNow.” The photos have gathered nearly 7,500 comments, 9,000 retweets and 38,000 likes since initially posted, a rise from the 3,000 likes they originally received. Bennett and these photos gathered attentioned from the likes of the Washington Post and USA Today, BBC and CBS, and even more.

LEFT: The sign of an anti-gun activist rises above the crowd during the walk on Sept. 29.

TOP: A line of Troopers walks beside the pro-gun activists during their walk down the Esplanade.

ABOVE: A pro-gun activist holds their sign above their head during the standoff.

Currently, Bennett works at a gun shop.

Even before the rise in notoriety, Bennett had no problem voicing her views, especially in regard to a students’ right to carry on campus.

“I went to Bowling Green State University my first year as a freshman,” Bennet says. “After I transferred [to Kent State], I started to realize that the conservative voice needed to be heard better on campus.”

Bennet started a chapter of Liberty Hangout, which now has about 20 regular members, at Kent State while she was a student.

She also held her first open carry rally before she graduated and before her photos went viral.

“I did the exact same [event] in April with Jeffry Smith from Cincinnati … out there on the K and there was no problem,” she says.

“We stood out there for five hours talking to students about gun rights, especially gun rights on campus, and it went perfect. The university didn’t have a problem. It was an unregistered event [and] we had a speaker that day.”

While no guns are allowed inside university buildings, non-students are allowed to open carry on state university grounds — Kent State included. Students, faculty and staff of Kent State, however, cannot have any guns on university property.

When the September rally was planned, it was planned in a similar way to the April event, with both speakers and open carry of guns. This time around, however, there was a lot more attention, both from the university and the public. Kaitlin shared and promoted the event on Facebook, and people from all over the country responded from all sides.

“Back in April, I didn’t know about the gun rally until the night before it was going to happen,” says Nathaniel Adams, a graduate student at Kent State. He holds the same sign he held then, a list of mass shootings from Columbine to Douglas High School that killed as few as five and as many as 57 people.

Despite the September rally being the same kind of event as the one in April, Bennett claims the university “had a problem with it” this time around.

“I think they don’t want Kent State to be a platform for gun rights,” Bennett says.

When it was still a rally, President Beverly Warren said, “the last thing we need is for all of us to be carrying guns, thinking that we will be safer.”

She also said the rally could continue as long as university rules were followed.

The rally had to be sponsored by an on-campus group. Liberty Hangout agreed to sponsor the event, but the group then received a bill of more than $14,000 in security. The group and Bennett found this to be an unfair amount, which is why the rally became the walk.

The university ended up spending $65,000 on security for the event with more than 300 officers present.

Bennett was not the first to hold an open carry event on Kent State’s campus. In 2016, Smith organized open-carry walks at several Ohio campuses including the University of Akron and Ohio State University. This included about 30 participants at Kent State and the atmosphere was significantly different.

The group carrying that day in 2016 listened to the story of the May 4 shootings and visited the memorial. They walked across campus with little to no confrontation. Those who opposed the walk were few in number, just about 10, and stood to the side. Some held signs saying “’Flowers are Better than Bullets,’” a quote from Allison Krause as well as other May 4 specific signage.

While those opposing this walk did shout sayings such as “not on my campus,” it was peaceful.

Some of the problems people have with open carry demonstrations at Kent State is due to the college’s history. On May 4, students were shot and killed by those who had guns on campus. Bringing guns back to the same grounds seems disrespectful to some.

“Kent is just not the right place to try and make your point knowing Kent’s history,” says Erin Casenhiser, who went to Kent State Stark.

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Culture

30 | THE BURR MAGAZINE

A counterprotestor holds their sign saying “No Fascists on campus” during the counter rally on the “K” on Sept. 29.

“You want to make your point, and you want to believe in something, even if I disagree with it, that’s fine but … I don’t feel like it’s the right place to do it.”

Others found the whole event frightening.

“A lot of people agree [with the counterprotestors] but didn’t want to come because they felt unsafe with [Bennett’s] policies and the kind of people they would bring in with their weapons,” says Annie King, a student at Kent State, before the walk begins. “They didn’t think this would be a safe environment for them so they went home or stayed in their rooms. That just shows how uncomfortable people would be if that’s just a normal thing.”

Her sign reads, “You fear we’ll take your guns but we fear you’ll take our lives.”

Bennett’s father wasn’t a gun owner until about a year ago. He says, “People are normally afraid of something they don’t understand.

“I was not a gun owner … I would have to say that I probably didn’t like guns. Guns are unforgiving,” he says in the parking lot before the walk, Kaitlin’s AR-10 from her graduation photos slug around his shoulders. “Now that I’m knowledgeable and I’m educated on the firearms, I love them.”

For others, however, the walk wasn’t about the guns themselves but the people carrying them. The biggest counterprotest was started on Facebook by Black Lives Matter Cleveland called No Fascists on Campus. This was in response to Joey Gibson, who was originally supposed to speak at the event.

“They banned cigarettes before they banned Nazis and people carrying guns,” says Lydia, a junior at Kent State who did not want to disclose her last name. “This is my school, not the Nazis’ school. I go here, the Nazis don’t go here.”

Casenhiser echoes this sentiment.

“I will not stand for fascists and white supremacists being in our town,” she says.

Allie Bielinski, who came with Casenhiser to the event, feels similarly.

“Her [having this walk] is supporting white supremacists and Nazis because she has that following and she knows that following and she is letting it happen,” Bielinski says.

Bennett does not associate herself with white supremacists or anything near that label.

“They have said that I am lying about what the event is, that it’s not pro-second amendment, it’s actually white supremacy and it’s fascism and it’s literally just gun rights,” Bennett says. “I think they’re trying to grab onto the platform I have been given to get attention for themselves.”

“They banned cigarettes before they banned Nazis and people carrying guns.”

– LYDIA While this walk was different than walks in the past, it is also different than protests of the past. Some of the biggest protests in history came from the anti-war movement in the 1960s and 70s.

The movement began, for the most part, on college campuses as organizations hosted teach-ins to talk and discuss their opposition to the Vietnam War. The war continued to progress, and it was then that marches began. This is what lead to the four students killed on Kent’s campus, and this is what lead to nationwide strikes that closed many colleges and universities.

In 1989, students in Beijing began a hunger strike in the attempt to get the government to have a dialogue with them. In the 1940s in Germany, a group called the White Rose Society created leaflets to persuade mostly students and professors to resist the Nazi regime. In all of these cases, action started when dialogue failed.

“The goal of the rally was to talk to students about gun rights and especially gun rights on campus,” Bennett says. “When I have the chance

to talk to people in person, I don’t think I’ve ever spoken to somebody that wanted a real dialogue that left with their heels more dug into their idea. I think that every person that has wanted meaningful dialogue with me on campus since I took my pictures has left the conversation with an open mind or maybe even a changed mind.”

At the walk in September, dialogue was hard to find. While many of those who attended the walk were peaceful, it was many of the counterprotestors who were brash.

“I feel like [this kind of event] brings out the worst in people, but also the best,” says Ben Sandvick, a sophomore majoring in integrated science. “I saw one sign I really liked that said ‘Arms are for Hugging,’ and so I was a fan of that one. But then you see ones likes ‘Gun Owners Fuck Off ’ and things like that just inflaming everything around, making it more unsafe for everyone.”

The protestors were not able to complete their walk. After the standoff, the protestors walked back to the parking lot, the troopers maintaining space between the groups. They were only able to walk a few hundred feet total.

In this way, the counterprotestors felt they won.

Because the counterprotesors stopped the event and many focused on yelling about “fascists” and “neo-Nazis,” the protestors also felt they won.

Four people were arrested from the event, none of them students.

Despite everything that happened, Bennett does not plan on going anywhere. In fact, she wants to return to Kent State, hoping for more dialogue than the “walk” was able to give.

“I will come back in November and we’re going to request the Kiva for me to speak and be able to talk to students that way,” Bennett says. She hopes to have an open discussion with students about the message she’s maintained since before her photos went viral: Campus should be open carry. Because the event will be inside a university building, there will not be any guns allowed. B MEGAN AYSCUE | mayscue@kent.edu

NONVERBAL LOVE SONG WORDS BY Carrie George

Big hands blocking wind.

Kite flies backward. Tension rocks between ankles. Heel pulls against toe.

Ribbon at the wrist ribbon at the knot.

A red balloon floats along the tide of dawn. Sunrise glares.

Shivering teeth, blue-stained, cold car drenched after a storm.

Day breaks with ice cream

on pavement, an ant trail feasting long past noon. I breathe dusk.

Welcome hazy evenings where we are fat, frizzy, grass-wet, listening to spring peepers, moth wings clapping against the last light left on.

You are a dandelion in the crack.

I thumb your lip. I search for a wish.

I blow a secret into you.

Read More lunanegramag.com

Luna Negra is a student-run Literary Arts Magazine on campus.

For more, visit lunanegramag.com and look for its new issue on stands Spring 2019.

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Culture

A New Home

for Activism O

n a rainy, cold spring day in 2017, students marched down the Esplanade, holding signs reading “I defy racism” and “I defy sexism” while others chanted “My body, my rights.” Other cheers focused on the Trump presidency. The march ended at front campus, when the students painted the rock with hot pink spray paint, Planned Parenthood’s colors. Around 30 students gathered in Risman Plaza while leaders from different student organizations led speeches to encourage students to resist hatred and bigotry.

The first time senior Emma Getz walked into a Planned Parenthood Advocates of Kent State meeting she instantly felt welcomed.

Activism wasn’t a part of her life until college, but she is now the President of three organizations on campus: Planned Parenthood Advocates of Kent State, The United Nations Children’s Fund KSU and The Flashes of Fem Coalition. Getz is also an intern at the Women’s Center.

“A lot of times you hear Planned Parenthood thrown around, but I didn’t know a lot about it,” Getz says. “I had never gone to the clinic, but I just knew that the type of people who were in

that organization usually aligned with my values, my beliefs and the things I like to do.”

Planned Parenthood’s initiative is to educate college students on women’s reproductive health. During meetings, they discuss topics such as different methods of birth control, prices and insurance, as well as weekly meetings the organization participates in outside events, such as the PRIDE parade in Akron.

Getz compared the protests she participates in on campus to the ones she has gone to that aren’t affiliated with the university. Last January, Getz went to the women’s march in Cleveland which she describes as empowering.

“I was amazed at how much people care,” Getz says. “There was a girl who’s up there talking, and she was a DACA recipient. She was crying because she was having a really hard time talking about it, and she kept apologizing and were just shouting out ‘Oh, it’s ok. We love you, you got this.’”

Getting involved on campus is a part of the college experience for many students at Kent State. From 4 the Love of Paws to History Club, there are over 400 student organizations to join.

Professor Ashley Nickels of the political science department believes the large amount LEFT: Emma Getz, president of Planned Parenthood Advocates of Kent State, The of opportunities colleges United Nations Children Fund (UNICEF) KSU and The Flashes of Fem Coalition. offer is the catalyst for MIDDLE: Kevin Cline, secretary of YAL and senator for the College of Communication and Information for Kent State’s Undergraduate Student Government. college activism.

RIGHT: Tala Niwash, president of Students for Justice in Palestine. Niwash is “The college wearing a checkered and floral scarf called a keffiyeh, which she describes as “a scarf experience [is] a space to that represents resistance and solidarity with Palestine and the Palestinian people.”

College students find their voice through advocacy WORDS BY

Amanda Levine

PHOTOS BY

Sophia Adornetto & Olivia Seidel

become immersed in different opportunities. So getting involved in different clubs, different student organizations, you see students becoming participants and members,” Nickels says. “Over time, as people are invited to engage more, they see this as a being a part of creating change.”

Kent State is no different. Kent has a history of activism. On May 4, 1970, students were protesting the Vietnam War on Memorial Field, when the National Guard opened fire — killing four and wounding nine. The May 4 museum, located in Taylor Hall, is now recognized as a national landmark.

More recently, alumna Kaitlin Bennett has held multiple open carry protests along with Liberty Hangout, a student organization Bennett formed on campus. She was previously the president of Turning Point USA-Kent, before resigning. Bennett and Liberty Hangout teamed up to educate fellow students on open carry laws and the second amendment and brought Kent into the national spotlight when her graduation pictures went viral for holding an AR-10.

Tala Niwash, president of Students for Justice in Palestine, didn’t consider herself an activist until she attended Kent State. During Niwash’s freshman year, she went to Blastoff where she saw the Students for Justice in Palestine group. It was here that she found people with beliefs and values similar to her own, especially after living through the occupation in Israel-Palestine.

Members of the group Planned Parenthood Advocates of Kent State meet in the Kent State Student Center on Sept. 20 to discuss the prospects and candidates for the midterm elections.

“I just started going to their meetings after that. My biggest motivation was that I’m Palestinian, and I lived through the occupation, and know firsthand experience about everything,” Niwash says.

SJP focuses on educating its members about issues in Israel-Palestine. Each weekly meeting involves a discussion about current events and culture. In the spring, SJP has a week dedicated to talking about the occupation called Israeli-Apartheid. Each night SJP holds meetings about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

They constructed a model wall based on the wall Israel built on the West Bank and a map of Israel-Palestine with facts about the occupation.

Last year, Students Support Israel held an Israeli education day for the anniversary of Israel’s independence. SJP held a silent protest against SSI in retaliation where it gathered in Bowman Hall with the Palestinian flag and homemade signs. With masks covering their faces, SJP walked down the Esplanade to the second floor of the student center where they stood in a line holding the flag and signs.

“We wanted to do something to show people the other side of everything,” Niwash says.

Sociology professor at Kent State Stark Katrina Bloch says activism is “engaging in activities to try and further positive change.”

Bloch and Nickels both agree college is a space where students with different backgrounds can get together and share their personal experiences.

“They’re asked to think about their ideas, think about what’s important to them and reevaluate those thoughts,” Bloch says. “For some students, it’s just reaffirming what they already knew, coming to new ideas, but then you create a space where you can act on those.”

Before the 2016 election, Kevin Cline, a senior majoring in public communication, hadn’t been involved with campus activism. Later, he noticed there weren’t any Libertarian groups on Kent State campus and worked with recent Kent graduate Colton Dalton to create one.

Young Americans for Liberty’s national branch worked with Cline and Dalton to start a chapter at Kent. YAL says it is a nonpartisan group that isn’t associated with any political party on campus, including the Libertarian party. It aims to focus on educating students on libertarian values.

“We don’t back candidates or legislation or anything like that. A good way to differentiate is we’re pro-lowering taxes and tax cuts, but we wouldn’t endorse a tax cut bill,” Cline says.

For the past three years, YAL has hosted an event on Risman Plaza where students can

sign an eight-foot beach ball to advocate free speech. The goal of the event is to educate students on the First Amendment. In addition to the beach ball event, YAL has focused on informing others on its civil liberties, such as the “Restore the Fourth” event. Last spring the organization went up to students and asked if they could look through their phones and bags to inform students on the fourth amendment.

“I think in a messaging standpoint, the best thing is to find out what [students are] passionate about. So politics in government in general, intrude on all of our lives,” Cline says. “I like to say that you may not care about politics, but politics sure as hell care about you.”

In fact, Nickels believes activism on college campuses comes from being exposed to people with the same values.

“The more you move from this involvement as a member of an organization to adopting kind of that as part of your identity definitely influences your own form of activism, seeing yourself as an activist, seeing yourself as an agent of change,” Nickels says.

Organizations like SJP and Planned Parenthood Advocates partner with other activist organizations on campus as an effort to fight oppression. Both groups partnered with other clubs to work together to educate students about their values.

SJP partnered with the Spanish and Latino Student Association to host an open panel about the similarities between Israel building a wall on the West Bank and President Trump’s idea of building a wall on the U.S.-Mexico border.

“I feel like most of the organizations that we do deal with are activists and they’re all fighting for their interests and what they want to see in the future,” Niwash says. “We all just help each other out by standing in solidarity.”

Unlike Planned Parenthood and SJP, YAL only partners with other organizations on nonpartisan issues. Because it is not a political party group, it can’t work with the College Democrats or the College Republicans to support a candidate or policy; however, YAL and these two organizations have held debates together on a wide range of social issues.

After the election of President Trump, Cline noticed a rise in right-wing groups organizing on campus. He believed the election gave people with these platforms a space to voice their opinions.

“Post 2016, I think there’s a lot more political tension on campus than there was because there is a battle of these ideas that we’re both bringing to the table with the left and right wing,” Cline says. “I’ve had a lot of great interactions with people that we have completely different worldviews, and every time we talk we get to learn something new about them and they learn something new about me.

We generally agree more than we disagree is what I find.”

Nickels says although people are mobilized by political events, it is hard to see if there is a rise in activism or not. However, some research has shown mass demonstrations leading up to — and following — the 2016 presidency have been some of the largest.

“There was a mobilization of people interested in re-engaging in politics or engaging in new ways,” Nickels says. “I think for many, especially on the left, this was motivated by concerns around what the implications for a Trump presidency might mean for policies that were both important to them ideologically, but also had very real implications for their lived lives.”

For Cline, activism doesn’t stop on campus.

Cline and his friend have recently opened Mil Liberty Initiative. This organization is an advocacy nonprofit that focuses on “advocacy of the ideas of liberty to improve people’s everyday lives.”

Like Cline, Getz also has a love for activism that goes past her college experience.

After college, Getz wants to work for the Peace Corps and eventually attend graduate school or work for a nonprofit organization.

“I think activism is probably my passion. I think it’s what drives me,” she says. “Quite honestly, that’s pretty much what I want to do for the rest of my life.” B AMANDA LEVINE | alevine3@kent.edu

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Remembering Nick Massa

A son, brother, best friend and fisherman: Nick’s family tells his life story and who he dreamt to be one day

WORDS BY Shelbie Goulding ILLUSTRATIONS BY Sarah Riedlinger PHOTOS BY Sophia Adornetto

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PALE BLUE WAVES DANCE IN A GLASS BOX STRETCHING ALONG A BARE WALL. Flashes of vibrant blue, orange, purple and yellow flitter back and forth in the water while seagrass and other aquatic plants sway. The setup is a homemade fixture made to perfection by someone who loved to be out on the water.

It was his dream to have a piece of the ocean to call home.

The fish tank sits in the living room where it could be shown off with pride by its creator. “I had a saltwater tank as a kid, and it was a lot of work,” Joe Massa says, “but Nick talked me into doing it.” His son, Nick Massa, was 17 years old at the time. “I helped, but Nick did most of the job by himself.”

“Look, just let me do it, leave me alone, let me get it done,” Nick had told his father when building the tank.

Behind the tank are pipes that slip through drilled holes in the wall. Following their path, the pipes lead to a large, homemade filter system based in its own area of a finished basement. On the ground, tubs filled with water are interspersed with tubes twisting every direction, leading to more tubs filled with more water. It is a complicated, high-maintenance system with a lot of responsibility, but Nick knew what he was doing.

“When he went off to college, he had to show me how to do everything,” Joe says. “This is a daily thing I got to do every morning.”

Nick’s handwriting is stretched across the homemade device explaining what each tub is. He even wrote a to-do list on how to take care of the tank for when the family went on vacation. “This was Nick in a nutshell,” Joe says as he points to his son’s creation. “This was his fish tank.”

–––––––– Feb. 7, 2016. Most remember this day as Super Bowl 50, where the Denver Broncos defeated the Carolina Panthers 24 – 10.

However, it wasn’t the same for the Massa family. Instead, they received a phone call that changed everything.

Nick Massa — a freshman in college studying business and entrepreneurship, starting his adult life and following a lifelong dream — was shot and killed during an attempted robbery.

Although Nick wasn’t a student for long at Kent State, he still made an impact on the lives of many, especially his family and friends.

–––––––– “We called him the fish whisperer,” Nick’s mother, Jackie Massa, says. “He always said he had a way with fish.” A large fish is mounted on the wall in Nick’s bedroom. It was his first big fish: a pike. He caught it in Ravenna when he was 13 or 14 years old.

“I watched him [reel it in],” Joe says, “but he said, ‘No, dad, I got this.’ I never thought he was gonna be able to bring it in. It took about 20 minutes but he got it.” Nick’s fishing hat hung draped over the side of its fin. Joe says his son loved being out on the water, and he thought if Nick was out on the water every day he’d grow to hate it. But that wasn’t the case.

Nick fell in love with fishing at a young age.

Joe says the family went to Florida every summer, and it was a vacation dedicated to fishing for him and Nick. The girls would go to the beach while the boys rented a boat and spent the day off coast.

“He was all about family,” Jackie says. “We were super close and did everything together, and the vacations were always awesome.” Both say the best memories with the family were in Florida, and Nick always planned to move down there someday.

“He wanted to go down to Florida and open his own fishing charter business,” Jackie says.

“He’d say ‘Just let me get down there, let me get things started. I’m gonna make a lot of money and then I’m gonna buy a big house and move you guys down there with me.’”

Her face becomes distressed, and she wipes a tear from her eye. “I’m sorry. It’s still so hard. Every day.”

The Massa family hasn’t been to Florida together since Nick’s death. The vacation there was always about fishing and getting out on the deep blue water, but it’s not the same.

Nowadays, the family vacations are more low key, and the destination is anywhere but Florida.

“We’ve wanted to go to Disney, but it would be really hard,” Jackie says. Joe begins joking about how his wife is a Disney addict, and

Jackie laughs in denial of her love for it. They say the family went to Disney in Orlando at least five times. It was one of Jackie’s favorite memories to look back on with the family, but she doesn’t know if she could do it without Nick.

Most vacations are now spent around Christmas. “We decided we didn’t want to spend Christmas [at home] anymore,” Jackie says. The family travels to a destination far from their home every holiday. The Massa family used to spend the holiday taking the same family picture in front of the fireplace each year.

After Nick died, the tradition died with him. Now a photo of the last family Christmas from 2015 hangs above the fireplace with Nick smiling ear-to-ear. Jackie says his smile and presence could always light up a room.

Nick was the comedian of the family. He was always cracking jokes and breaking the tension. Both Jackie and Joe agreed Nick was the reason the family had fun, lively vacations and road trips.

“He’s the funniest person I’ve ever met,” Joe says, “and it’s weird saying that about your son.”

Jackie breaks in, “Yeah cause we’re not that funny,” as she chuckles looking at Joe. Although his way of sharing laughter is greatly missed, no one misses his humor more than Nick’s sister Kelly, 27.

“The one thing I miss the most is how funny he was,” Kelly Massa says. “He could do the best impressions of almost anybody.

Like, I’ve seen a lot of the things he could do impressions of that make me laugh.”

Jackie describes the two siblings as inseparable; they even shared the same birthday, Aug. 17.

“He was my best friend,” Kelly says as she looks over to her mother. “I don’t even know where to start,” Kelly says Nick had the best taste in music — classic rock, Green Day, Blink-182 and rap.

“Lately I’ve had all these free concert tickets, and the first person I would have asked to go would have been him.”

“I’ve never heard Nick rap,” Joe breaks in with a look of confusion. Both Kelly and Jackie begin saying how he would listen to rap during a workout, at a party or in a car. “He never sings it though,” they both say. Joe’s face fills

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Remembering Nick Massa with shock as though he learned something new about his son.

–––––––– Feb. 7, 2016. While Nick was visiting his friend Justin Lewandowski’s apartment, Damantae Graham — who was 17 years old at the time — broke into the apartment with a gun demanding money. According to Nick’s friend Alex Mangels, Lewandowski said Graham threatened them. Nick responded to the threat saying Graham wasn’t going to shoot him. Aimed at Nick’s chest, the gun was fired.

Nick was gone in a matter of minutes.

Not only was a caring, honest and compassionate friend lost that day, but also a loving son, brother, comedian and fisherman.

–––––––– “The girls aren’t the same as they used to be,” Joes says about Nick’s three sisters. “It’s hard to describe.”

Nick was the third born of his four siblings.

Both Jackie and Joe say how Nick’s sisters don’t talk about it often and the family as a whole has changed. “We talk all the time and are still close, but we’ll never be as happy as we once were,” Jackie says.

Nick would have been 21 years old this past August, and it was hard for his sisters,

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especially the youngest Sarah, 19. “It’s hard on her because she realizes she’s getting older than Nick was,” Jackie says.

Sarah’s in her sophomore year of college at Baldwin Wallace University. Jackie says every time she and Joe take their daughter to college it’s difficult.

“She originally wanted to go to Kent, but everything changed after,” Jackie says as she stares down at the wooden floor. “The choice was up to her on whether she wanted to go or not, and I hoped she wouldn’t.”

She says her daughter, Jess, 24, had a

Photos courtesy of Nick Massa’s Instagram account.

wonderful four years there, but going back isn’t the same anymore.

“We went out to the campus again and everywhere Sarah looked she said she could see Nick,” Jackie says. “It would have been too much of a struggle for her.”

“They’re still going to be themselves,” Joe says about his three daughters, “but if Jess was out and Jackie texted her at 11 p.m. and she doesn’t answer, Jackie’s going to think ‘what’s wrong?’”

“Until you lose a child you don’t know what that feels like,” Jackie says. “You don’t know if it’ll happen again.”

Jackie says the girls know and understand “There are some nights where I can’t sleep how she feels when it comes to staying in because I think of Nick,” Joe says. He says his touch. She says they do their best to not put her siblings and members of his band have sons, through that kind worry and panic. and it’s hard to cope with it sometimes.

Kelly says she used to fish with Nick and “The [band members] would complain still tries to go, but it’s not the same for her about their sons,” he says. “And I never had father. “We had a boat here up in Cleveland,” anything to complain about Nick. But when Joe says. “We loved it, but it wasn’t the same as I hear them complain, they don’t realize how being out on the ocean.” lucky they are.”

He sold the boat six months after Nick died.

Jackie says how people forget the things “I just couldn’t do it.” He says he doesn’t they say makes it harder for them sometimes, fish anymore unless it’s with Kelly. “It’s hard for but they don’t know or realize it me to just be by the water.” half the time.

The day before Nick died, he surprised “You don’t want people to understand his parents at home. He and a group of friends, because that means they go through it,” she says. including Alex Mangels and Justin Lewandowski, “You just have no clue how bad it hurts or how were roaming around Cleveland taking pictures lost you feel. There’s a piece of me missing and and adventuring to different places.

I’ll never be the same person again.”

“They would always go to obscure places in Jackie says she would run into people at Cleveland and take pictures,” Jackie says. “In fact, the high school she works at, and they would I was looking at Nick’s Facebook the other day ask the basic “how are you” question. The other and the last message I sent him was this article day she asked that question to a mother she on these underground tunnels in Cleveland, and knew that had a daughter the same age as Nick.

I said ‘Next adventure?’” She looks down in her The mother said, “Oh, I’m good. My daughter lap. “I don’t think he got to read that.” is graduating from college this year.” Jackie is While visiting, Nick showed off his fish polite in these situations, but she responded tank to his friends and shot airsoft guns in the “Yeah that’s great, but I know she is because backyard. They had to head back to Kent soon Nick would have graduated this year.” after. “At least I got to hug him and he told me People don’t necessarily forget what he loved me,” Jackie says. “It was like he knew.” happened, but they forget out of context.

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Remembering Nick Massa

“I feel close to Nick when I’m by the water.”

– JACKIE MASSA

Both Joe and Jackie agree this makes it hard to talk to people sometimes. And even though Nick never got to finish his college experience, his parents saw him change significantly in his first semester of college.

“He had grown a lot lately,” Jackie says. “He started going to the gym to start losing weight, and he dated a girl for a short time — they had just broken up a month before it happened.”

Jackie says she saw Nick flourish in just a short amount of time. “He was in love and really happy, and I’m glad he got to experience that.”

Nick was starting to finally feel comfortable with himself by being himself. Jackie saw him start to embrace his personality and flourish.

“He struggled to find his niche,” Jackie says, “and when he went to Kent, I saw him start to blossom. I knew he was going to do a lot of great things there. It would have been nice to see him and where he was at his senior year. God only knows what he would have went on to do after that.”

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Joe mentions they have a family song: “More Than a Feeling,” by Boston.

“The weirdest things would happen with our family and for some reason that song would come on,” Joe says as he tears up. “It became our family song.”

He says now when they hear the song they think of Nick and how he would be there listening to it with the family. “The pet store where Nick worked at — I still go there, and I came walking in six months ago out of the blue and at 11 in the morning I walk in and the song came on. I looked at Greg [Nick’s boss] and I said ‘Come on!’ And Greg said ‘It’s one of those days, Joe. He’s here.’”

Since Nick died, his picture hangs on the wall behind the counter of the pet store.

“If I could have five more minutes with Nick, I’d ask, ‘Is there any way I could turn back time to keep you here?’” Joe says. “He was my best friend, and it hurts to know he’s gone.” He knows nothing is going to bring his son back,

but he says he’s as proud of him today as the last day he saw him.

“I’d ask if he realized how many lives he touched,” Jackie says. “I don’t think he realized that.” She said she wears his finger print around her neck every day. The family made necklaces of his finger print to always keep him close to their hearts.

When it comes to the water, Nick’s parents both have different perspectives on how to look at it since they’ve lost their son. Where Joe finds it hard, Jackie finds peace. “I feel close to Nick when I’m by the water,” she says. “Just sitting by the ocean, I can feel Nick’s with me. I know that’s where he’d be.” B SHELBIE GOULDING | sgouldi1@kent.edu

TOP: An enormous fish tank sits in the Massa home. Nick Massa created his own homemade salt water fish tank and filter system to always keep a part of the ocean close to him and his family. Nick’s father, Joe, tends to the fish tank every morning to keep Nick’s dream alive.

BELOW: Jackie Massa, Nick’s mother, holds her necklace of Nick’s finger print that she wears every day to keep Nick close to her heart.

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‘The Best Years of Your Life’ Can Actually be the Loneliest

Today’s college students are struggling to navigate loneliness — high expectations and social media could be why WORDS BY

Valerie Royzman

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‘The Best Years of Your Life’ Can Actually be the Loneliest

Last fall, Lauren Woodbury waited outside the lecture hall for “Introduction to Statistics” to start.

The professor was running a few minutes behind. Synchronously, students, many of them freshmen, rubbed tired eyes, yawned, directed attention back to the glowing companions in hand.

As the professor unlocked the heavy, gray double doors, Woodbury shuffled into the crowded classroom of Generation Z robots where everyone was a stranger.

“And all of the sudden, I was overcome with emotion,” says Woodbury, a Kent State sophomore studying psychology. “This big moment of ‘Is it all worth it?’”

She quickly ditched the class and wound up in the bathroom, where the frustration welling up in her wide blue eyes turned to aggressive crying. She trembled, but she managed to pull herself together enough to call her boyfriend. Jared, a University of Akron student, stayed on the line with her for three hours. He wanted to reassure her she didn’t have to brave this flood of eelings on her own.

Woodbury says she had a mental breakdown that day.

She also says this was the moment she realized she was incredibly lonely.

–––––––– Woodbury, surrounded by people, felt alone.

Across the country, college students — freshmen, especially — feel this same sense of isolation, says Nance Roy, the chief clinical officer of the JED Foundation, a nonprofit that aims to protect the mental health of teenagers and young adults.

“You’re thrust into an environment where you typically don’t know anyone… Now you’re in a place that’s completely foreign to you,” Roy says. “You don’t have a ready-made group; you don’t have the support on a daily basis that you

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were comfortable and surrounded yourself with for 18 years.”

A nationwide survey from the health insurer Cigna in May reported loneliness is reaching “epidemic levels in America” — and young people are among the hardest hit.

According to the 2018 study — which surveyed 20,000 online across the country — nearly half of Americans report sometimes or always feeling alone or left out. Based on the UCLA Loneliness Scale, which ranges from 20 to 80, those who score 43 and above are considered lonely, and the average score in America is 44.

Generation Z, born between the mid–1990s and early 2000s, scored 48.3 and the survey found them to be the loneliest generation. Millennials follow this trend, though not to the same extent, and they scored 45.3. Baby Boomers, ages 54 to 72, and the Greatest Generation, age 72 and above, scored lower — 42.4 and 38.6, respectively.

Roy, who was not involved in the Cigna study, says loneliness, which she defines as an emotion and not a mental illness or condition, strikes individuals in this age group particularly hard because they’re stumbling through a transitional period.

“What most college students hear before they go off to college is, ‘Oh, these are going to be the best years of your life,’ and, in fact, that’s a pretty unrealistic picture, and you have unrealistic expectations,” she says. “You don’t have 100 friends as soon as you step on campus.”

When this realization settles in, Roy thinks students begin to feel like something could be wrong with them. And so, the loneliness unfolds.

Alexander Colbow, a psychologist for Psychological Services at Kent State, echoed these sentiments. He says loneliness “regularly comes up in the counseling office.”

“Any major transition that people experience in their lives can make them a little bit more vulnerable… especially when they’re moving and being uprooted from their social networks that they had,” Colbow says.

Woodbury says her assumptions of college didn’t match the reality.

“I couldn’t really find anyone who wanted to do anything, ever,” she says. “And last year, I didn’t have a car with me either, so I was like, ‘I’m stuck on this campus doing nothing.’ There was a lot of times that I would just come back to my room and cry.”

This realization arrived too late for Woodbury, who says the “magnitude of difference” from high school to college escalated her loneliness.

“In high school, there were a lot of things just thrown into your lap,” she says. “In college, those opportunities are still there, but you kind of have to look for them and take the initiative and realize, like, ‘I’m not just going to be handed things anymore.’”

Ericka Schneiderman, a Kent State junior studying conflict management, says she normally doesn’t have much trouble starting up conversations with strangers. When she fails to prioritize her social life and spends extended periods of time on her own, though, she feels her loneliest.

Schneiderman recalls a period when even a companion didn’t help. She says her exboyfriend was even more introverted than her, and they spent the bulk of their time shoulder to shoulder, not interacting with many others.

They were lonely together.

Today, Schneiderman gushes she’s happily dating someone new. Like Woodbury, her relationship is easing her loneliness. But still, when Schneiderman’s boyfriend graduates at the end of the semester, she knows this all-toofamiliar monster will creep into her life again.

“He says he’ll still make time to see me, but I know how difficult adult life can get,” she says.

“And there I’ll be, feeling like no one cares, that if I disappeared tomorrow, who would really notice?”

–––––––– Although loneliness isn’t new, how it’s affecting today’s college students — a culture in a committed relationship with its cellphones — could be.

Roy says college students are attached to technology, and the colossal amount of time they spend with it may have repercussions.

Friends post their “best selves” to social media — glamorous grins and red Solo Cups in hand — and if students are refreshing their Instagram

feeds repeatedly, they begin to feel bad about their decisions to stay in their dorm rooms or home for the night.

“If I’m seeing that 24/7 or I’m glued to my screen and tracking what everybody else is doing all the time, it can certainly exacerbate feelings of loneliness and isolation,” she says.

“Even though, somewhere in the back of your mind, you know it can’t be as good as it looks — even still, it has an impact.”

In a July 2017 study, American Journal of Preventive Medicine researchers found young adults who frequently turn to social media “seem to feel more socially isolated than their counterparts.”

Roy and Colbow agree social media use alone isn’t the culprit of loneliness, but because young people rely on it so heavily, they may be having trouble navigating their loneliness.

Even though her friends would say she “gets along well with others” and “is such an entertainer,” Schneiderman says this is only one version of herself she shows the world. The other spends her time alone, locked in her room.

“Netflix and Hulu and movies and music are my main companions,” she says. “It’s not that I don’t like going out — I do. I just don’t feel motivated enough.”

Students occasionally post to Kent State’s class pages on Facebook with messages like, “SOS in need of friends to hang with” and “Looking to make some new friends. Drop your Snapchat snapcode below.”

Woodbury hasn’t tried this. She says she doesn’t think her social media use is detrimental because she didn’t have “super strong connections” with people back home in Cincinnati, so she doesn’t feel jealousy, guilt or loneliness when she sees them online.

“I actually, since graduating, haven’t talked to anyone I graduated with… I never really felt that distance, I guess, because there wasn’t really anybody from home that I was missing,” she says.

Face-to-face interaction has changed Woodbury’s outlook as a sophomore. For her own sake, she stepped into a busier life. With a full course schedule, an internship at Akron Children’s Hospital and involvement in two psychology clubs, she feels less lonely.

“It’s just realizing that you really need to make an effort yourself to look out there and figure out what’s fun to you… When you find those things, that’s when you’re going to find those people that have the same likes, the same dislikes as you,” she says.

–––––––– Colbow says because loneliness stems from a variety of things, solutions are case by case and depend on the student’s identity — the LGBTQ community, first-generation students, international students and others

have differing situations — and what concerns they’re dealing with.

“Some of it is exploring the thoughts you have about yourself or the fears that come up when interacting with people if somebody is isolated,” he says.

Besides digging for the root cause of that student’s loneliness, Colbow recommends seeking new social interaction, which could mean joining clubs and study groups on campus, participating in residence hall activities, volunteering or sports.

“And then also kind of exploring what makes it hard to take those risks or share about something you’re struggling with or putting yourself out there in some way and saying ‘hi’ to somebody new and developing those deeper connections with people,” he says.

Woodbury says conversations with her residence hall assistant, who agreed her expectations of college were too extravagant, led her to realize her loneliness was normal.

When she made more of an effort to stop toting around her loneliness, things slowly improved.

On the first day of class in the spring of her freshman year, she checked with the girl beside her to be sure she was in the right music class. That conversation, Woodbury says, led her to her best friend.

Woodbury says counseling at the Counseling Center in White Hall helped remedy her loneliness. She attended sessions in the fall and spring of freshman year out of fear her loneliness would grow too heavy for her to carry.

Roy says loneliness is not necessarily a precursor to anxiety or depression, common among college students.

“I do think that when folks are isolated for long periods of time and are lonely for an extended period of time that it certainly can be helpful to get some support, whether that be your counseling center or your family or clergy, if that’s who you go to,” she says.

Roy urges students to take note of when their loneliness — what she calls the “single biggest struggle for first-year students” — develops into “staying lonely for three years.”

–––––––– Though Woodbury feels better this semester, she suspects loneliness will wrap its eerily familiar arms around her again, especially during stress-filled weeks or on weekends when fewer students are roaming campus.

This time, though, Woodbury says she isn’t so afraid.

“It’s definitely survivable,” Woodbury says. “You kind of have to have an ‘aha’

moment to get yourself out of it. You have to know that it’s not a switch that once you’re out of it, you’re going to stay out of it. You’re going to have moments — and that’s OK.” At the start of this fall, Woodbury’s phone rang. On the other end was the secretary from the Counseling Center, who asked if she was interested in sessions this semester — asked if her loneliness was overwhelming her.

“No,” Lauren says, smiling into the phone.

“I’ll reach out if I feel the need to, but so far, I’m definitely not in the same place as I was last year.”

Then she hung up. B VALERIE ROYZMAN | vroyzman@kent.edu

12

9

3

B

6

Those who spent more than two hours per day on social media had

2x

higher odds of feeling isolated compared to those who spent less than 30 minutes

According to Social Media & Use and Perceived Social Isolation Among Young Adults in the U.S. study which sampled 1,787 people between the ages of 19-32.

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The Mental Game

Breaking stereotypes and finding an accepting, open environment in the gaming world

WORDS BY

Ray Padilla

PHOTOS BY

Jacob Golden, Olivia Seidel & Ray Padilla HIDDEN ROOM

J

unior Cody Minnick joins another student in the library room — each bringing their own controller and headset. They connect through the application Discord and load up the vehicle soccer game “Rocket League” to add an additional player. Meanwhile, Minnick connects to the group’s Twitch channel and began streaming — beginning their practice.

The practice took place in the basement floor of the Kent Library. There, I met Cody to interview him about the program in a small room with no cell service. This room houses six monitors, keyboards, mice and desktops.

After the interview, he sat down at one of the computers and began playing.

Nowhere on the stream are the names Cody Minnick. Instead, listed above the cars were MinnickToWinIt (Minnick), ChrisWithaK

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(Holliday) and Rubik (freshman Wesley Miller).

These three are players for Kent State’s esports’ “Rocket League” team. MinnickToWinIt and ChrisWithaK are among four students on the varsity team for the game.

In May, Kent State offered a community tournament featuring teams from the University of Akron, Bowling Green University and surrounding high schools — starting the esports program for the school.

Since then, it has boomed with popularity and features four different varsity teams; “League of Legends,” “Hearthstone,” “Rocket League” and “Overwatch.” This semester is the first for Kent State esports.

Currently, there are over 80 varsity esports programs across the country according to ESPN. Kent State has yet to be listed with

these universities. The varsity collegiate esports programs began at Robert Morris University in Illinois in 2014, and now esports programs have popped up regularly as interest levels have spiked.

“We are still working out some of the small pieces, but I’m not worried at all,” Steve Toepfer, the director for the esports program at Kent State, says. “We have a lot of student passion and interest. We have a staff in place and this is going to be a good year.”

As new esports programs emerge, opinions of the sport come along with them. Some people believe it’s not a sport at all because of the little physical activity needed. There’s still little we know about the effects it has on the players involved. In the aftermath of the tragic shooting in Jacksonville, Florida, where

CHRIS HOLLIDAY

Two varsity “Rocket League” players and one JV player practice their skills in the esports lab of the library. When playing together in person they talk to each other through the application Discord or they remove their headphones and communicate face to face.

three players were killed and 11 wounded at a “Madden 19” tournament, the esports industry has considered tracking the stress levels the players endure while competing.

Given its appearance just four years ago at Robert Morris University, there are many aspects of esports people still don’t understand. Some might think of this program as students just playing video games in the basement of a library for fun. Others might look at it as a dangerous environment where they are playing violent video games and damaging their mental health.

It might be where they sit at computers for long periods of time, affecting their blood pressure.

Fortunately, the program at Kent State has a solution. It’s setting up a research lab to find out the truth about esports.

Lazariel (Enrico Gandolfi) is an assistant professor in Educational Technology at Kent State within the Research Center for Educational Technology. He plans to conduct research on the gamers involved with Kent State’s esports.

“Esports are, I would say, a very complex phenomenon,” he says. “As researchers, I think our goal, our aim right now, is to understand them better — to understand why they work, why they don’t work, to understand what they can do for good or when they can be distracting.”

Lazariel’s focus is finding out how games might be used for educational purposes in classrooms. Before putting game consoles in

classes, he wants to understand the positives and negatives of gaming.

He says it’s hard to say if esports is good or it’s bad, and he believes we are in a grey area in between because there’s not enough research to prove one side or the other.

“The goal of our research branch is to look into this stuff and see what are the best practices, what really is negative,” Toepfer says. “I don’t for one second deny that this is a sedentary activity.”

He doesn’t want to ignore the stereotypes or controversial subjects related to esports.

Rather, Toepfer wants to tackle them head on and find solutions or prove that the program is beneficial to students who take an interest in the gaming world.

MinnickToWinIt was selected as captain of the “Rocket League” team by Toepfer. The director felt he needed to select someone who was not necessarily the best on the team, but someone well organized and had the ability to lead a group of students. He hoped for someone like MinnickToWinIt to kickstart the team.

In the basement room of the library, I could hear only the clicking noises coming from their controllers and the sounds of strategic planning or reactions. Not much conversation was happening between them and me. They were wired in and focused on winning their practice matches.

CODY MINNICK

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The Mental Game “Close one,” “It’s fine,” “It’s going down,” “I can beat him,” “I should have caught that sooner,” “I don’t have boost,” “I’m mid,” “Nice!”

“Oh my God, turn!”

These mentions only made sense as I watched over their shoulders at the game in front of them. The ball was flying all over their screens, and they used cars with attached rockets to chase it down and hit it into the opposing team’s goal.

Sporting a yellow car with blue lighting bolts was MinnickToWinIt — looking for the ball and being the “playmaker,” as he called it, of the team.

He didn’t always start out as an esports player though. Two and a half years ago he was introduced to Kronovi’s YouTube channel, where he would watch montage videos of “Rocket League.” The Youtuber has over 346,000 subscribers and focuses his videos only on the vehicle soccer game. After watching montage videos, MinnickToWinIt started a club called “Kent State E-sports” in January 2016, but he lost it a year later after the previous adviser had left and it was unable to find a new one in time.

FILTER MinnickToWinIt enjoys having a place where he can game with fellow members and friends. He says it’s much better to play in person because it helps avoid yelling. He explains how when someone plays remotely, it’s easier to yell at another teammate for a mistake; however, when that same person is in the company of others, it’s harder to show anger.

ChrisWithaK, the self-described defender of the team, calls it a filter.

“If someone messes up, you don’t really want to say, ‘Dude, come on man, you gotta step it up,’” ChrisWithaK says. “It would make you feel bad about saying it. So you have to think about how you want to say it because everyone gets video game rage now and then.”

Once, while playing “Rocket League” for fun before joining the team at Kent State, he experienced a rude Twitch streamer he had just met. He played a great game and was invited by the streamer to join a couple days later. He thought nothing of it and did. While playing with the streamer he was noticeably off his game — not playing as well as he (and the streamer) had hoped.

The streamer became angry and started criticizing ChrisWithaK saying he was terrible at the game and asking what had happened to the player he saw before. After the game was finished, the streamer kicked him from Discord and was never heard from again. ChrisWithaK was ghosted by someone he didn’t even know.

“I guess people have these standards after the one thing. They uphold you to this and if you can’t fulfill that all the time, you’re not even needed,” ChrisWithaK says. “But, it’s just a

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game in the end. I think of it that way. I play for fun all the time.”

He found that playing for fun was one thing, but while playing on the esports team at Kent, he’s created a bond with his co-players and a new purpose. One of his friends found out about the program first and told ChrisWithaK to try out because he could make the team easily.

He immediately contacted MinnickToWinIt once he realized he missed the second day of qualifiers. Luckily, MinnickToWinIt told him to come down to the basement floor of the library and try out that same day.

For the “Rocket League” team, both ChrisWithaK and MinnickToWinIt played with people who were “too emotionally involved” in games. With their team, they try to avoid it and remember it’s all just a game in the end.

ESCAPE Rather than chasing a ball from a rocketpowered car, Hazard (senior Shaun Anschutz) assembled his team for a new game focused on statistics and a little luck in the free-to-play online game called “Hearthstone.” Captain Hazard is not new to the esports scene and worked for three years with Tempo Storm as a general writer, client relationship manager and a manager for one of its teams, Heroes of the Storm.

Before working with Tempo Storm, Hazard went to school at Youngstown State University looking to study computer engineering or computer science, but quickly understood it was much more difficult than anticipated. After leaving YSU, he joined the U.S. Navy and was stationed with the Marines as a Fleet Marine Force Hospital Corpsman. He stayed for about three years until he was discharged.

“I had a very rough personal time while I was in,” Hazard says. “So I got out in 2013 with an early out — with a general under honorable conditions discharge.”

Hazard found the Navy difficult because he was serving as a gay man around the time of the “Don’t ask, don’t tell” repeal and his medical officer was a strong Republican from the South. At the same time, while in the military, he attempted suicide and sought out help shortly after — still talking to a professional to this day and feels much better. Video games have helped as well. “[Esports] makes me happy,” Hazard says.

“Especially when I have a team or a set of players that I can help navigate through a series of events or mentor.”

He later described in an email conversation about how esports is open and accepting of others — one of the most liberal spaces on the internet. There are trolls, but if people look past that, they can be themselves while being involved.

Hazard believes esports creates an open environment for people to be themselves,

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The Mental Game

GLENN MCDOWELL socialize and create a community with one another. He says it’s a way for some people to battle depression and it definitely helped him.

Like Hazard, varsity esports coach for “League of Legends”, XEndgamerX (Glenn McDowell) used video games to distract him from his problematic reality.

Ten years ago, XEndgamerX went through a divorce. During that time, he played “World of Warcraft” regularly.

“It was an escape from my life at the time,” XEndgamerX says. “But, it allowed me to stop thinking about that situation and actually go to sleep. It actually allowed me to rest during that and it got me through a really hard time.”

He says the game helped him recover from what happened and he felt video games were a better alternative than what most people turn to — alcohol or drugs. He’s seen the effects of alcoholism in his family before.

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XEndgamerX is also a Kent State employee working as a senior military science instructor. While he doesn’t play video games as much as he would like to, he says it’s a stress reliever at times.

It shocked me to realize that this fit military man in his 50s sitting in his office in front of me still played video games. Some of the most well known gaming YouTubers are in their 20s. Never did I picture a gamer with five children. Although, I will probably be in the same boat, playing the newest Call of Duty 30 years from now.

XEndgamerX says basically since video games were invented, he has always played.

He grew up in Silicon Valley in California and used to roller skate to the arcade with a pocket full of quarters. His mother would call him “Johnny Atari.”

While at Kent, he heard “League of Legends”

was played in the esports world and this game was not unfamiliar territory. The master sergeant had played it with his older cadets and approached Toepfer telling him he had a team ready and willing to play for the school.

THE PROGRAM The players, XEndgamerX and Toepfer all see this semester as a starting point for esports at Kent State and are hopeful it will continue to grow.

Toepfer says he sees a lot of “awesomeness” in the esports program and he believes the growth will be massive. With that, he sees awareness growing as well. Older generations find it hard to believe these programs are excelling and gamers have found a great deal of money within the industry.

“For this program, I think we are little behind,” Toepfer says. “But, we’re just in time to be there before everybody adopts an esports

program. There’s some resistance here and there, but it’s giving way pretty fast in my estimation.”

XEndgamerX says the younger generations need the older generations’ help to make esports grow and succeed. He believes the younger generations need to push and be active for what they want for the future.

“Look to the future of what the next generations are going to actually do,” XEndgamerX says. “And really see are we stagnant or are we progressive.”

During the esports Boot Camp in September, Toepfer highlighted the four “Pillars of the Program:” community, competition, health and research. In addition, he went over the guidelines, rules and expectations — focusing on students becoming representatives of the university. He made sure to include good sportsmanship, politeness and things to refrain from saying while playing for Kent State.

“We will be the most polite gamers in the world,” Toepfer says as laughter in the room follows.

It seemed like an unrealistic expectation the director was setting, but he made sure to go over the consequences — including probation, dismissal or a loss of scholarships — just as a reminder. B RAY PADILLA | rpadill2@kent.edu

Ryan Fine (joshie) competes in an intense multiplayer “Overwatch” match on Sept. 8 during Kent State University’s esports “Overwatch” try outs.

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Female leaders are on the rise in Kent with women stepping up to lead clubs, create organizations and manage businesses WORDS BY

Taylor Robinson PHOTOS BY

Richa Sheth & Sophia Adornetto

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#GirlBoss

W

omen in Kent and at Kent State are running organizations, founding clubs, running businesses and inspiring other women to become a #GirlBoss.

The term #GirlBoss was created by Nasty Gal clothing brand founder Sophia Amorusso in her 2014 book — later, a Netflix Original series.

Amorusso has since created a website around the term #GirlBoss, focusing on inspiring women to chase their dreams and support other women.

But the American Association of University Women (AAUW) says, “Women are less likely than men to be in leadership positions. In universities, businesses, unions and religious institutions, male leaders outnumber female leaders by wide margins.”

AAUW reveals the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commision reports 30,000 cases of sex discrimination creating hostile work environments, negative stereotypes of women in leadership and biases keeping women out of roles.

Women are breaking those stereotypes — creating positive work environments within Kent and offering advice to other women in the community to step up to become leaders, too.

Rachel Schrantz is a junior majoring in fashion merchandising. Last year, Schrantz formed the Kent State College Diabetes Network chapter after discovering there wasn’t any club or support group available for students with diabetes.

Last fall, Schrantz was testing her blood pressure before class when a classmate approached her. The pair bonded over being diabetic and when they realized there wasn’t an organization or support group on campus for diabetics, they decided to start something together.

Schrantz founded the Kent State College Diabetes Network and held the first meeting last spring. The network is a chapter offering a support group for type one diabetics to volunteer and gives them a network of students all going through similar problems.

While the club is open to all genders, the officer board and adviser are all women.

“From the get-go, this was a very empowering group of women,” Schrantz says.

“It helps to find other women who are on the same page because you can build each other up as you go.”

Elizabeth Ferry, a junior majoring in visual communication design, is the president of the all-women organization Changing Health, Attitudes + Actions to Recreate Girls (CHAARG).

While Schrantz did not face any challenges forming and running her organization, other women leaders on campus haven’t been as lucky. Elizabeth Ferry says her organization faces jokes from guys mocking the all-women organization.

“We actually get a lot of jokes from guys

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ABOVE: Rachel Schrantz poses as the president of the Kent State Diabetes Network, an organization aimed toward helping inform others and supporting young adults with Type I Diabetes.

BELOW: Elizabeth Ferry is the CHAARG ambassador for Kent State, a national health and fitness program directed toward college-aged girls.

saying, ‘Oh, why can’t we join?’” Ferry says. “I try to ignore them because I know we’re doing something great. We’re changing lives; we’re helping girls feel super confident with themselves. I try to tell everyone else not to let it get to them, because we’re doing a great thing and it shouldn’t matter what others think.”

CHAARG helps college-aged women find ways to make working out fun. Ferry says it is a great way to make friends and get involved in different social events. The organization hosts retreats, weekly workouts and small group workout days together.

“To have a bunch of girls looking up to you to make their lives better, it encourages me to make my own life better,” Ferry says. “It’s a whole different atmosphere because we are so supportive of each other and I love making all

the new friends and I think since it is all girls it is really special.”

In 2009, Michelle Sahr opened Off the Wagon after working with her dad in retail and other toy stores through the years. After learning of downtown’s development plans, Sahr decided on Kent to open a new toy store. Off the Wagon was the first store that was all her. It is also their most successful store.

“Sometimes you have to fight to be taken seriously. But the way I always approach it is I plowed on ahead and I acted very professional and serious,” Sahr says. “On occasion, I would just walk away from something if it wasn’t that important to my business.”

Sahr says she tries to never think about being a woman holding her back and moves

ABOVE: Jeanette Lansinger sports her jacket, showing off her role as an Independent Beauty Consultant for Mary Kay, a company focused on empowering the inner and outer beauty of women.

LEFT: Michelle Sahr stands in one of her colorful Downtown Kent businesses, Off The Wagon, which she owns and runs.

“Women have this nature to lead. Women leaders are incredible. We need more women leaders throughout the world.”

– JEANETTE LANSINGER forward expecting to be treated equally.

“It shouldn’t be in the back of your mind that being a woman could interfere with anything you try to do. I don’t even think about it and I think that actually helps,” Sahr says.

“People are going to take you seriously if that is how you present yourself.”

Jeanette Lansinger, a junior majoring in business, worked her way up from an Independent Beauty Consultant to a team leader of Mary Kay in the past three years.

Lansinger had similar experiences of men hearing she works for Mary Kay and judging her for being part of an all women’s company.

“Working in an all-women organization, I never really had any discrimination, but I definitely had people look at me and ask if I’m sure this is what I want to do,” Lansinger says.

“Mostly that comes from men. There are some people who look at it as a fun way to make money and not really a career.”

As a team leader, Lansinger says they focus on empowering women with their inner and outer beauty.

“I enjoy empowering other women,” Lansinger says. “I am a very self-confident person and I love to give that to other people. I love what I do and I help people by loving on them and telling they are loved.”

Lansinger says her experience working with all women has boosted her self-confidence.

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#GirlBoss

Scribbles Coffee Co. owner Beth Budzar took over the store from her friends and former owners after years of being a barista.

Budzar says while it hasn’t been a struggle, she feels motivated to be taken seriously in a predominantly male business, and she feels like she has to know every aspect of her business.

When Budzar took over the ownership of Scribbles, she worked to start the roastery side of the business. In about two months, the business outgrew the small roaster in the back of the coffeehouse. They recently found a location in Tallmadge to roast their own coffee.

“I know how to roast. Every Saturday my husband and I go to roast together,” Budzar says. “I want to know all about what a good bean looks like.

“Something that I am very proud of, is that being a woman in the coffee industry I find ways to support other women in the industry,” she says. “One of those ways is searching for farms that support women’s rights. We found a coffee farm in Honduras that supports gender equity which allows the woman to have the same rights and pay as the male workers. They have 77 woman working on the farm. We named the Honduras coffee Honduras 77 in honor of those 77 women. We hope that number grows.”

Schrantz, Ferry and Lansinger see the need for more female leaders in the world and hope to inspire and empower other women to become a #Girlboss.

“I think every woman has this overflowing self confidence inside them, but it’s about cutting through what other people have told you what you are and telling yourself you are beautiful, worthy, strong and you are a leader,” Lansinger says.

Women should believe in themselves and not care what other people think, Schrantz says.

“Be proud of what you’re doing because it’s hard, but be proud because it’s amazing. You should be lifting other girls up, whatever you’re doing,” Ferry says. B TAYLOR ROBINSON | trobin30@kent.edu

Beth Budzar enjoys a sunny afternoon at her quaint downtown shop, Scribbles Coffee Co. The business got its name from the paper sheets covering the tables that allow patrons to scribble as they sip.

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A Madhouse Canvas

Artist Carrie Esser uses her body as a canvas to express herself WORDS BY

Sophia Adornetto PHOTOS BY Sophia Adornetto & Richa Sheth

In Carrie Esser’s studio, paint brushes are neatly organized in a little white coffee mug with different colored lipsticks covering the cup. Vibrant palettes are spread all over the desk with bits of water droplets forming at the center. A drawing book is propped up against the wall with rough sketches drawn all over the pages, a master blueprint of what will come to life.

For Esser, art is a passion. From a young age, the senior majoring in entrepreneurship would paint canvases, work with clay and create crafts. It was during high school she decided to start using makeup to enhance her beauty and express her individuality. Soon after, Esser discovered body painting and realized she could combine her love for art and makeup together.

Her business, Makeup Madhouse, was created.

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A Madhouse Canvas

During her first full year learning how to body paint, the self-taught artist would only use eyeshadow and eyeliner to create pieces on both herself and her friends. On Halloween 2013, she created her first official body paint: a detailed sugar skull painted on the left side of her face as her costume. From 2013 to now, Esser has grown, not only as an artist, but as a social media influencer for other creatives around the world — with currently over 13,600 followers on Instagram.

Appreciating the following she developed from

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her social media accounts, Esser realized she could make a career out of her talents. When she came to Kent State in 2015, she was pleasantly surprised by how many people recognized her from social media.

“People were like, ‘Oh my gosh, are you Makeup Madhouse?’” Esser says.

She was recognized by the Kent State community and now the makeup industry. She was called by NYX Professional Makeup to be in the Top 30 of the 2018 Freedom and Artistry for Creative Expression (FACE) Awards. Esser

competed for a spot in the Top 20 and then Top 12 of the competition. After winning again in the Top 12, she competed for a spot in the Top 6, but didn’t get enough votes to move ahead.

“This wasn’t my time to move to that next step,” she says. “Big and better things will come, or I’ll make them happen. So I just realized that I need to keep doing what I love, and the right thing will happen.”

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A Madhouse Canvas

Esser finds inspiration for body painting ideas all around her. These ideas stem from musicians’ album covers, holidays like Halloween and Christmas, current events, television shows, movies and even her friends and family. One of the looks she created while competing in the FACE Awards was inspired by pop singer Shawn Mendes’ “In My Blood” album cover. Esser recreated the optical illusion of effervescent flowers blooming out of the left side of her face.

There are times when Esser hits a creative block where she struggles to come up with ideas for looks. She makes an effort to be patient and let the creativity come to her.

“Sometimes, I get stuck. If I do have an artist block or creative block and I don’t feel like I need to push myself to do it, then I just take a break. I wait till something comes in mind and I get really inspired,” she says.

Esser reminds herself that fighting through the creative block is part of the process because it makes her a stronger artist.

After her spring 2019 graduation, Carrie hopes to create body painting artwork for large companies to help market their brand and missions to their audiences.

“There was a company [Proteostasis Therapeutics] that I did a cystic fibrosis awareness piece for,” Esser says. “This company hired me to paint on myself, take pictures and give them the pictures to be used for marketing and so that people can get awareness. That’s what I want to be able to do more of.”

Esser also hopes to encourage others who are interested and passionate about body painting to use the artform as a creative outlet to express their emotions and feelings.

“I had a boy that treated me wrong at one point, and it was around Valentine’s,” she says. “I created this really dark makeup and I’m like, ‘You know what? I’m going to make myself look so badass and just be me and do me because what else matters.’ I use [body painting] to make me happy.” B

SOPHIA ADORNETTO | sadornet@kent.edu

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Abortion: More Personal Than Political

DISCLAIMER: To maintain the anonymity and privacy of the sources mentioned in this story, the woman portrayed in these photo illustrations is a model and was not interviewed.

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ABORTION While arguing what is right and wrong, we often forget about the individual WORDS BY

Cameron Gorman PHOTOS BY

Sophia Adornetto

itting in one of the leather recliners in an abortion clinic recovery room, a saline IV in her arm, Taylor Fearn feels overwhelmed. As she sits waiting for her surgical abortion, crying from nervousness, women are brought into the room in wheelchairs, some “barely able to stand up on their own.” She doesn’t like to see people in pain, and she sees women vomiting and “groaning,” many of them still in pain from their procedures. Fearn (not her real name) says what she saw affected her “more emotionally than the thought of killing a baby.”

“I just felt emotional, not because I felt bad about my choice, but I just felt emotional because of how invasive and just how intense abortion is physically on the woman’s body,” Fearn says.

It all began few weeks before school started. Fearn says she knew she was pregnant.

“I kind of just knew,” Fearn says. “Something just felt different and off in my body, and I just — I just knew I was pregnant. And I took tests probably like a week before my period should have been, so I was really worried about it. Something was off, I just knew something was going on with my body.”

Within 20 minutes of seeing “positive” on her pregnancy test and speaking with the man who she had sex with, Fearn, a senior at Kent State, says she called Planned Parenthood. Her first instinct was to look into having an abortion.

“I just was being kind of reckless with myself, and wasn’t taking care of myself like I should have, so the fact that I couldn’t take care of myself, I definitely couldn’t take care of a baby,” Fearn says. “Even if I get married one day, I know that I don’t want to have children, so I know that I never want to have kids, so just abortion was my only option in this case.”

Fearn isn’t an outlier. The Ohio Department of Health reported 20,893 “induced pregnancy terminations” in 2017 alone. The figure is a one percent increase from last year — but, the ODH says, abortions have been in “steady decline” since 2001.

Ireland legalized abortion in May. And with Brett Kavanaugh recently entering the nation’s highest court, abortion activists are heated in response to his stance (or lack thereof ) on Roe v. Wade, the 1973 decision that made access to abortion legal in the United States.

Looking at the world, abortion seems to be a thoroughly politicized argument. But if viewed through this lens alone, are we getting the whole picture?

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Abortion: More Personal Than Politics

The political environment isn’t lost on student activists such as Jordan Whidden, the Kent State Unite for Reproductive and Gender Equity (KSURGE) president. She says the group, which has around five active members this year, often advocates for abortion rights by speaking with politicians and lobbying.

“We would consider ourselves pro-choice, yes, but more pro-people,” Whidden says. “Like, we don’t consider a fetus a person until it’s born.

A baby isn’t a baby until it’s born, it’s a fetus until then, and so it doesn’t technically have rights, and we just want to protect the rights of the person who is having the child.”

Whidden considers herself staunchly for abortion rights. She believes the choice is up to the person carrying the fetus.

“I feel like it really is their choice to do what they want with their body,” Whidden says. “I feel like the right answer may be a little in the gray area, but for me it’s really up to the person carrying the child, and I don’t think it should be a law or anything against having an abortion because it’s really none of their business. It’s only about the person and maybe the other person involved with getting them pregnant.”

And opposite beliefs, on the other side of the aisle, are just as strongly held. Klara McKee, the president and co-founder of Kent State Students for Life, a student organization with about 15-20 active members, says she just doesn’t see abortion as a choice.

“Hypothetically, speaking more so with my group, I would say we want to see abortion become illegal and unthinkable,” McKee says.

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“But more on a personal level, I would say I would love to see culture change first. And laws follow culture.”

McKee believes that human life starts at conception.

“It is so unique; it is so innocent. It did nothing. And it needs to be something that we change the culture on, and make it so people feel that they’re supported in other choices besides abortion, more than, ‘You have all these options, figure out what’s best for you.’”

Still, McKee says she fears if abortion were made illegal today, it would hurt women — that they might begin having unsafe abortions and putting themselves at risk of death.

“There is so much cultural pressure, like presidential elections run on things like this … as we saw in the last election. And justices, and people aren’t moderate anymore,” McKee says. “It’s all or nothing now. It’s you’re fully for abortion or you’re fully against abortion, and that’s what it seems like.”

The world is up in arms about abortion, about who has rights and who doesn’t, about where life starts.

“It is a medical procedure, but I think that it’s all because it’s concerning what could potentially be a human life,” Emma Getz, the president of Planned Parenthood Advocates of Kent State, says. “And you know the whole idea of when does life start is still a continuing debate to this day.”

It has been, it seems, for a long, long time.

The 1973 decision of Roe v. Wade is often the first thing we think of when we recall the history

of the abortion debate — but the argument stretches beyond that. In the middle of the 1960s, according to NPR, the pope told bishops in the U.S. to make abortion a priority. Many women had illegal abortions before “Roe,” an article from The Cut says. They used items such as coat hangers to preform abortions at home. And through abortion’s contested history, we never have reached a consensus. Is our macro-level fight forgetting the individual stories in the abortion argument?

VITAMIN C AND PARSLEY Fearn says she was for abortion rights before she had her abortion — that she viewed it as a case-by-case decision.

“I kind of tell myself if I ever got to the place where I was pregnant and I didn’t want to be, I always knew that abortion would have been the right thing for me … I’m just pro choice, I feel like women should have the right to choose what they want to do with their bodies,” Fearn says.

Her family, however, doesn’t feel the same way. They’re highly religious, and Fearn says she’s afraid they might disown her as their child should they find out about the procedure.

At first, Fearn thought it might be easier to try to induce a miscarriage herself. She wanted to take care of the situation, she says, before her family found out. Fearn used Vitamin C and parsley, a method she says is used by women in countries where abortion is illegal.

“If you buy Vitamin C at the grocery store as a supplement, that type of Vitamin C, just

the chemical structure that it’s presented as won’t induce an abortion, but I got like special Vitamin C. I won’t really say where, but I got special Vitamin C that should have induced an abortion, and I used parsley to try to induce an abortion, and it didn’t end up working,” Fearn says. “It made me bleed and stuff like that, but it didn’t successfully produce an abortion.”

Instead, Fearn wound up going to Preterm, a Cleveland abortion clinic.

“My family doesn’t know that I had this done at all,” Fearn says. “There was a consultation appointment that took three hours at the abortion clinic and then the actual day of the abortion I was probably there for about four hours … but I had to lie to my parents about where I was going. I paid for it with my debit card, I didn’t use my parents’ insurance, I paid for it completely out of pocket, and I gave them a fake address too when I went there, in case they mailed me anything.”

Fearn didn’t feel as though she was pressured into her decision, but instead was given all of her options from the beginning of her journey. In fact, while waiting for her procedure, she witnessed another woman change her mind.

“The nurse doing her IV saw that the woman was distressed and crying and it was one of the nurses, the abortion facility staff, that said, ‘You don’t have to do this.’ It wasn’t the woman who spoke up for herself. That nurse could read her body language and could tell that she didn't want to go through with it,” Fearn said via email.

Fearn says that even now, she’s only told a few of her close friends about her abortion.

She still hasn’t told her family. It’s a sentiment echoed by Riley Katro, another Kent State student who chose to remain anonymous for this story. Katro is bigender, and uses they/ them pronouns.

12 YEARS OLD Katro, who had their abortion at 12 years old after sexual assault by a family member, says some of their family still doesn’t know they ever had the procedure. The decision to have an abortion was made by Katro and their stepmother.

“I, because the Ohio education system absolutely sucks, didn’t even know what sex was, didn’t know what abortion was, anything like that,” Katro says. “Found out I was pregnant and … she was just like, okay, well we need to get an abortion. And I didn’t really know, I was like, ‘I don’t know what that is,’ and she like tried educating me as much as she possibly could, because you know, she’s also a young mom in her twenties, and so we decided that was the best decision for my reality at the time.”

Katro recalls that, as they walked toward the clinic on the day of their abortion, protestors shouted at them.

“That is a long-term decision, as most decisions are in your life and if I were to decide to carry to term, hospital bills would have been so hard for us. Just doing that, because I mean, I don’t even know if my stepmom even had insurance.”

– RILEY KATRO

“There were a lot of protestors outside, and I was just scared because I didn’t really know what was going on — I did but I didn’t,” Katro says. “I’m a kid. This happened when I was a child. And a lot of people were screaming at me and I didn’t know why, and they were being really demonizing towards my stepmother, and this one lady actually tried grabbing on me … and my stepmom had to jerk me inside.”

Today, Katro feels as though they made the right choice. They haven’t experienced any lasting negative feelings about their decision.

“That is a long-term decision, as most decisions are in your life,” Katro says. “And if I were to decide to carry to term, hospital bills would have been so hard for us. Just doing that, because I mean, I don’t even know if my stepmom even had insurance.”

But what about from the other side of the experience?

LIKE A LITTLE BEAN In 2015, Kent State graduate Eric Felton and his girlfriend at the time decided to proceed with an abortion once they found out she was pregnant.

“She kind of just took a pregnancy test casually, not really thinking about it, and I just remember she started shaking kind of hard when she looked at the results of the test,” Felton says.

They’d only been dating a few months and Felton says his mind immediately turned to the procedure as an option. His girlfriend wasn’t so sure, and he says he wanted to leave the decision up to her in the end.

“I remember it took her a bit longer to come around and especially when I first presented the idea of getting rid of it, she was kind of like, ‘Wow, you heartless asshole,’ and … the more I let her have space and think about it, was kind of the more she came around naturally.”

Still, there were moments where the decision was hard for the couple.

“When we went to Planned Parenthood — they do an ultrasound, and then they actually give you the picture of the ultrasound so you can see the embryo or whatever stage it’s at forming,” Felton recalls. “That was kind of a rougher moment because I was like, ‘Oh, crap, you know, it’s like a little bean in there.’ They tell you, ‘This is what you’re getting rid of,’ and that was a tough, tough spot for us, because when you actually see a picture of it, it becomes way more real.”

Today, Felton feels that the choice was the right one, though it did take him some time to work through emotionally and “let go.”

“If I see a particularly young couple, like in their early 20s or even late teens that either have a kid or are clearly pregnant or something, I kind of think about it, ‘Man, that could have

Abortion: More Personal Than Political

been me,’” Felton says. “And usually my thought is, ‘Maybe it wouldn’t have been so bad’ as opposed to, ‘Oh, thank God I did what I did.’

But at the same time, I don’t necessarily regret my decision because I know it was for the best.”

McKee, though, maintains that those going through abortion can feel a sense of loss afterward. In fact, she’s been through a similar experience herself.

DISTINCT FEATURES “When I was in middle school, I was raped by a close family member of mine,” McKee recounts. “I became pregnant and I miscarried and I didn’t tell anyone. At all. And I didn’t come up and forward about that until I was…

I think the end of my freshman year of high school and I’m like, ‘This isn’t right.’ I would have been forced to have an abortion.”

McKee remembers the night she miscarried.

“When I had my miscarriage I had it on my own. In my own bathroom, actually, in my parent’s house when I was in middle school, I was actually coming home from basketball practice and I felt horrible,” McKee says. “And after I went to the bathroom, all you heard was a plunk. And I saw that in the toilet, and I freaked out. I have never reached my hand in a toilet before this, and I reached my hand in and grabbed it out. And I thought to myself — how.

How can someone do this, there are distinct features.”

From that point on, McKee says, she’s been an advocate for anti-abortion or (“pro-life”) causes.

She feels she would have been forced to have an abortion if she hadn’t miscarried — and she wants women to feel as if they have other options.

“Something that we need to work on as human beings is being more compassionate and loving and understanding of people’s situations,” McKee says. “Changing culture and changing the mindset that you can do whatever you want however you want whenever you want, and it won’t affect anyone else.”

Katro, though, still sees their decision as the result of factoring in the long-term choice of having a child.

“I do think about it sometimes, and I don’t think about it in the sense of regret. But I think

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about it in the sense that I shouldn’t have been assaulted,” Katro says. “That was the worst time of my life. The procedure was just helping me not make that whole experience of being assaulted worse.”

Cassandra Pegg-Kirby, from the Kent State Women’s Center, agrees that the decision has lifetime consequences.

“I think the whole thing emotionally weighs on them because you also think if you’re considering having a child — I mean, that’s a lifetime decision,” Pegg-Kirby says. “If you’re weighing both of them in terms of decisions that impact you, I think a lot of focus is played on the impact of someone choosing to have an abortion, but I also think we don’t always consider what that means if they have that child.”

Pegg-Kirby says that at the Women’s Center, she’s worked with individuals who’ve made a variety of decisions about their pregnancies.

“Everyone sort of hinges on that one decision, but we need to think about what — what are people bringing to this that they get to this decision? So are we providing them with education, are we providing them with birth control, are we providing them with these things? Okay, so we can sort of think about what happens before, and then we think about this circumstance. And then we think about after,” Pegg-Kirby says. “Depending on what you decide, you have a child and now you’re responsible for that child, or you choose not to and now there’s maybe other things that impact you because of that decision.”

Either way, Fearn says, it’s a decision that isn’t likely to be an easy one.

“It was just something else to see. All of the women recovering from the procedure, and because of how like physically intense an abortion is to go through, it’s not something that’s fun, it’s not something that’s easy, it’s not something that’s simple, it’s not something that I’d ever want to endure again physically, and people just talk about it as if it’s this easy thing to just magically get rid of a pregnancy,” Fearn says. “And that’s not what it is.”

And, Katro mentions, in all this fighting … we might be missing something.

“People are seeing what they wanna see,” Katro says. “People have tunnel vision, they wanna see point A to point B and not the mess in between. But it’s going to be a messy topic, right? Things about individual people and their journeys can be messy. And I feel like people just like the easy way out. They just want to say, ‘This is how I feel you can’t change my mind,’ and just never talk about it again. People don’t wanna think about individuals. And maybe sometimes I feel like that’s why these kind of topics are so easy to pick a side over. … They just want to think in the black and white, what’s easy. And to move on.” B CAMERON GORMAN | cgorman2@kent.edu

The Last Shot

The Last Shot PHOTO AND WORDS BY

Sophia Adornetto

O

n a brisk and clear Saturday morning, Layla Popik showed thousands of people that being a hero is more than battling the villain. The 10-year-old from Seven Hills, Ohio, was one of 18 patients of Akron Children’s Hospital who were highlighted in the 2018 Akron Marathon Race Series on Sept. 29.

Popik has faced many obstacles in her short life. She was born in China with achondroplasia, the most common type of short-limbed dwarfism. Adopted and brought home to the United States when she was eight years old, she had to understand a new culture, learn English and overcome the challenges of her condition.

Through the difficulties she has encountered, Popik remains positive and doesn’t let her condition get in the way of her independence, curiosity, interests and attitude toward life.

Heroes can overcome the most difficult challenges and inspire others to do the same.

Popik is a beacon of hope to those who are facing adversity. She’s not afraid to face her battles head on because she knows she will overcome them with the support from her family, friends, teachers and care team at Akron Children’s Hospital. Most importantly, she possesses the strength and charisma to carry on. B SOPHIA ADORNETTO | sadornet@kent.edu

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