The Nexus Issue 3, 18-19

Nexus

the

Westview High School

November 16, 2018 Vol. XVII | Issue 3 wvnexus.org | @wvnexus 13500 Camino del Sur San Diego, CA 92129

Junaid finds new home after fleeing Syria, Turkey Evan Buckland Managing Editor

Andrea Chen

Sarthak Madan (12) helps a student fix bugs in his mobile app’s code. He and Andy Alawani (12) volunteered at the Appa-thon as mentors, presenting the grading rubric, answering questions, and judging the students’ final products, Nov. 4.

Alawani, Madan mentor, judge for EKAL App-a-thon Andrea Chen Editor in Chief

Sarthak Madan (12) and Andy Alawani (12) stood in front of a sea of teal-clad elementary-and middle-schoolers for the EKAL Appa-thon, Nov. 4. The lights dimmed as Madan stepped forward.

“Let’s go!” he yelled.

The kids cheered back in response, their parents smiling at the entire group’s enthusiasm. In the span of eight hours, the kids split into groups, and then planned and designed their apps or animations with the help of their mentors. Madan and Alawani were two of eight high-school mentors.

“Since San Diego Code merged with Catalyst for Success to form Catalyst Coding, we have

Afrin, Syria was always a place Junaid* called home.

This Kurdish city is where he grew up, met his childhood friends and learned to read and write in English and French. It was here that his grandfather taught him about Kurdish history, how to speak Arabic, and how to pray.

Life in Afrin was good.

But in 2011, his life turned upside down: the Syrian Civil War had broke out. Afrin became a militarized zone and Junaid could no longer attend school as war was being waged in his city. On top of that, Junaid’s dad was confronted by President Bashar al-Assad’s army, who was looking for soldiers to be drafted.

“They would come to my house and tell my dad that they wanted me to go to war,” Junaid said. “I was 11 at the time. They would come and take kids all the time.”

They even tried to recruit Junaid’s dad, who was 55 years old, and had just suffered a heart attack. After two years, Afrin had become a grisly battlefield. Junaid’s dad decided that his family couldn’t live there anymore. He chose to send Junaid and his cousins to Turkey so that they would be safe. However, reaching Turkey would not be easy.

“I didn’t have a car or anything like that,” Junaid said.

“We had a friend from Turkey help me and my cousins get in. It took an hour or so but my cousins and I just ran.”

Running straight for the Turkish border, Junaid and his cousins left and never looked back, bringing with them just a few provisions and the clothes they were wearing.

Upon reaching Turkey, their friend helped smuggle them in. He then showed them a cheap place to live and helped them get a job. Junaid immediately began working in a Turkish clothing factory. He stitched clothes from 7 a.m. until 9 p.m. for very little money. Day in and day out, he worked. He sent all the money he made to his family so that they could come to Turkey and reunite.

“After two months of working we were able to rent a house in Turkey and my family was able to come over,” Junaid said.

See Refugee, page 6

Shine rolls with derby teammates, shines as blocker in skating rink

been searching for opportunities to expand our reach to new children in our community,” Alawani said. “When Ronak Shah (’18), our former Director of Technology suggested we mentor in the appathon, we jumped at the opportunity. We contacted the EKAL Vidyalaya and Qualcomm representatives that ran the App-a-thon, and pitched a partnership.”

See App-a-thon, page 3

Isabelle Ritter Staff Writer

Chin takes photos, joins body positivity project Jessica Lin Photo Editor

Her finger hovered over the post button as Lindsay Chin (12) contemplated whether to post the picture. This wasn’t any ordinary photo: this was one that showed off her stomach, her skin, her insecurities. She kept staring at the bikini photo of herself, feeling her inner conflict grow increasingly tense.

“I was very anxious as to what people might think of me posting such a showy picture,” Chin said. “People might’ve said it conflicted with my beliefs in modesty [based on my Christian beliefs].”

But after years of struggling to feel comfortable in her own skin, she had a realization that she wanted to celebrate her accomplishment.

“Modesty is important to me but for the purposes of encouraging body positivity and showing off only my stomach to get the point across, I realized that I shouldn’t have to feel guilty about posting something like that,” Chin said.

So, she gathered the courage and finally pressed the button: the picture was on the in-

ternet, and there was no turning back. While Chin felt surprised to have had been flooded with positive online comments about the post, she was the only person who knew that the post was much bigger than herself.

“Yes, the positive comments felt good, but that wasn’t my main goal,” Chin said. “I had hoped that the post would have encouraged other young women that I know that they are beautiful just the way I am.”

Prior to the post, Chin knew that she wouldn’t have had the confidence she had now. Elementary school was a time where Chin faced criticism from other classmate based on her looks.

“I was bullied a lot for my looks and [classmates] would call me ugly,” she said. “I was always the girl who hid under the playground in the slide and be by myself.”

The start of Chin’s body image issues had first begun in middle school due to P.E. classes.

“I started dealing with anxiety and stress. I felt like I was getting fat because in the P.E. classes, you start

News in Numbers

85

Percent of students make self-deprecating jokes, according to a Nexus survey of 342 students.

Half of the responders found these jokes funny.

See Self-deprecation, page 4

9

Cents is made per copy for mechanical royalties.

The Modernization of Music Act updated music copyright laws, supporting artists’ livelihoods.

See Music Copyright, page 8

20

Percent of Senate seats are occupied by women.

However, 97 percent of Republican and 57 percent of Democratic officials are still white males.

See Pink Wave, page 9

See Body Image, page 4

Jessica Lin

Lindsay Chin (12) photographs Rebecca Mendoza (12) in an acrobatic pose during a body positivity shoot, Nov. 11.

Xochitl Shine (10) is a self-proclaimed “Derby Girl.”

No, not horse racing derby. Roller derby.

During her eighth grade year, Shine’s mother found a video of roller derby on Facebook and showed her daughter, who was immediately hooked.

“She showed me the video and I was actually so confused,” Shine said. “I was thinking, ‘What’s going on?

She’s hitting her, she’s hitting her, they’re all falling,’ and I was like, ‘You know, this seems pretty fun.’”

Upon arrival at her first roller derby practice only a few weeks later, Shine had never roller skated before.

“Oh my gosh, I had no idea how to skate before my first practice, not at all,” she said. “I learned while I was learning the game. It was weird but really fun.”

Shine had dabbled in other sports before, but had a hard time finding the right one.

“There was a really long time where I just wasn’t doing anything [active] and my mom said ‘You need a sport,’” she said. “I didn’t want to play basketball or soccer, I wanted to do something fun and something that I really liked.”

Shine said the biggest challenge when trying out different sports was finding a way to channel her aggressive nature as an athlete.

“I’m aggressive, and there’s definitely those sports where the refs are being stupid or the people on the other team are just infuriating and you just get mad at them,” she said. “In basketball, like for me, I just couldn’t get

See Roller Derby, page 5

Campus Counted...

Do you usually listen to singles or full albums when you listen to music?*

Singles Albums

53% 47%

*Poll sample of 300 students

Why? “Artists create their albums as one entity rather than just a single alone, and so by listening to all the different songs together as an album, it creates more of an overall artwork,” Blake Parker (11) said.

See Albums, page 7

Ashley Ma (10) organizes carnival fundraiser Ma and Hannah Nguyen (10) dress up at the “Going UP for a Cause” carnival’s photo booth, Nov. 3.

See Carnival, page 2

Tiffany Le

Nexus

Nov. 16, 2018

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2 News

Wu composts Halloween pumpkins as fertilizer, animal feed for farmers Evan Buckland Managing Editor

Tiffany Le

Ashley Ma (10) plays a round of ring toss at the carnival she hosted at Twin Trails Park, Nov. 3. After being diagnosed and recovering from thyroid cancer last winter, Ma used her wish from Make-A-Wish Foundation to raise funds for charities through the event.

Ma hosts Make-A-Wish carnival Tiffany Le

Editor in Chief Last October, Ashley Ma (10) was diagnosed with thyroid cancer after she noticed a bump on her throat. When her mom told her the news, she didn’t cry or yell. She just responded with an “okay.”

“I was almost expecting it,” Ma said.

“I prepared myself for the situation if it was cancer, and it ended up happening.”

Ma underwent surgery to remove her thyroid, Dec. 23.

“I remember coming home from the hospital right on Christmas,” she said.

“It was like my Christmas present.”

After the surgery, a round of radiation expelled any remnants of cancer cells. While her journey was not an easy one, Ma has been cancer-free for almost 11 months now.

During the summer, the Make-AWish Foundation approached Ma, asking if they could grant her a wish.

Instead of meeting a celebrity, going on a vacation, or attending a movie premier, Ma decided to use her wish to put on a carnival where all the proceeds earned went to two charities of her choice.

“I didn’t expect to get a wish because movie screen stood to the side. my cancer was not extremely serious,” From face-painting, to ring toss, to she said. “I just thought that even cake walks, to photo booths, people though I had cancer, there are people of all ages engaged in the plethora of out there dying so I wanted to use my activities such cake walk, ring toss, wish to help them.” and pebble painting. Participants won After some consideration, Ma de- tickets that could be used to redeem cided on the Rady Children’s Hospital a prize or enter into raffles for prizes San Diego and the Ronald McDonald such as Comic-Con tickets and a Prom House Charities. These two charities package. use the funds to help people, especially “I wanted to do an outdoor movie, children, during but I wanted people their battles with to come and have cancer. fun doing other Even though I had Ma's wish came stuff too,” Ma said. true, Nov. 3, when cancer, there are people out “And I thought, she saw all her I’ve never there dying so I wanted to use ‘Well planning of a carbeen to a carnival nival come to life my wish to help them.” so sure.’ It was a at Twin Trails for me to hang —Ashley Ma (10) way Park from 5-10 out with friends and p.m. Tickets were have a bunch of bought beforehand and at the door, other people have a good time too.” costing $10 for students and $15 for Ma said that because she wasn’t adults. well-acquainted with carnival games, As guests entered the carnival she designated game-picking to her through a white and yellow balloon Make-A-Wish manager. However, arch, they were met with red and white during the planning, Ma chose the tents with music, food stands, and ac- movie Up and made food recommentivity stations. dations.

A giant bouncy castle towered in the After the sun set and the raffle tickmiddle of the grass field, and a blow-up et winners were announced, everyone

“

set up their picnic chairs and laid down their blankets in-front of the big blowup screen. At 8 p.m., the crowd settled and the movie began.

“I chose Up because it’s a classic and a lot of little kids would like it, and a lot of other people would like it too,” Ma said. “It’s a nice and funny movie.”

One of the perks of watching the movie, Ma said, was that she could finally sit and relax after three hours of hosting the carnival, meeting new people, greeting friends, getting interviewed numerous times by journalists, news anchors, and radio hosts, and taking pictures with people.

“I don’t like attention because it makes me nervous and uncomfortable,” Ma said. “It was definitely weird how people I didn’t even know came up to me and asked to take a photo with me.”

To Ma, overcoming cancer and deciding to use her wish to help charities simply seemed like the right thing to do.

In the end, Ma’s carnival raised over $7000.

“There’s no reason to be idolizing me,” Ma said. “Everyone can be a good person. I think everyone has the potential to do good things.”

While walking down his street on the day after Halloween last year, Jason Wu (12) noticed something. On almost every house, pumpkins laid out on the porch. From there, he had an idea.

Wu decided to start a composting project. More specifically, he decided to compost pumpkins. The original idea came to him after he was given an assignment in his Environmental Science class.

“The goal is to create an environmentally beneficial program that would also help the community,” Wu said.

Wu said how he initially had trouble coming up with an idea until he noticed that many people in his community had left pumpkins on their porch.

“That’s when the idea came to me that if I were to collect all the pumpkins and jack-o-lanterns at the end of Halloween, I could then transfer them to local farms in order to be recycled and from there the farmers can grow different crops,” Wu said.

Because Wu’s dad is a rancher, he understood how much local farmers could benefit from a fertilizer source. Wu says that farmers constantly need fertilizer in order to grow a variety of crops.

“I thought that it would be great if they could incorporate something that is environmentally friendly,” Wu said. “Fertilizer is not great for the environment, because it causes runoff and pollutes the waterways. However, pumpkins are a natural fertilizer.”

The farmers have a plethora of wide-ranging options as to what they can do with the pumpkins.

“They can take the seeds or use the pumpkins as feed for chickens or cattle,” Wu said. “Or if they can’t do that, then they can at least compost it so then the nutrients can end up back in the soil, which is good for raising crops.”

In order to prepare for this year’s event, Wu tried to use as few resources as possible, the idea being that the project is supposed to be as beneficial to the environment as possible.

“My dad and I collected recycled materials from the farms that are next to him,” Wu said. “So using those recycled materials we built the composting bins from there. Then, after that, we transported it in a truck and distribute it to the farms.”

According to Wu, distributing the pumpkins is a tedious process, as many of them are decorated or carved. These pumpkins can’t be used for animal feed and must be used as compost.

Wu held his second annual pumpkin collection and composting event at Sundance Elementary School, Nov. 2-3. He and his brother were able to collect about 1,500 pounds of pumpkins.

“This is a decent accomplishment since we didn’t do as good of a job planning and advertising the event as we did last year,” he said. “The important process from this year I think is to be able to show how the project could be run successfully so that we can get other schools on board and grow the project as a whole.”

Wu plans to expand the project by building more collection sites and growing a network of farms and farmers. He wishes to get more areas of the community involved as a whole in order to turn the project into something bigger.

“A big problem with our landfills is the trash,” Wu said. "If stored for a long time it can eventually pollute the underground waterways. Hopefully if we can launch this project on a larger scale, we can change this pattern.”

Buddies unite through Friendship Walk, work with ABE on garden

Deepali Yedulapuram Staff Writer

Best Buddies held its third annual Friendship Walk in Crown Point, Mission Bay, Nov. 3. Buddies from all over San Diego County came and walked together.

Co-president Ava Andrade (12) has played a big role for the club. A member of the club since her freshman year, Andrade has participated in the walk for the past two years, keeping the Best Buddies program close to her heart. Seeing Buddies from all over the school district walking together was a joyful experience for her.

“I felt an interconnectedness between everyone there because we all were there to support the specially-abled community and fundraise for the organization that has impacted all of our lives and people around the world,” Andrade said.

The main goal of the Best Buddies program, according to their mission statement, is to help create opportunities for leadership and development for people with intellectual and developmental disabilities. One of the ways Best Buddies raises money to assist their efforts for helping specially-abled high school students is through the Friendship Walk.

“All the donations [we raise] go straight to the international organization,” Andrade said. “It goes to establishing new Best Buddies in differ-

ent communities that maybe don’t have enough money to start up a Best Buddies.”

Andrade and the club represented Team Westview at the event and raised $375, which will be going to the International Organization.

Alongside fundraising for the organization itself, one of the other goals Andrade has been pushing for more inter-school involvement with Best Buddies.

“I think a lot of people are hesitant to work with Best Buddies just because it is a very diverse group of people,” Andrade said.

So, when Advocates for a Better Environment (ABE) asked to work with Best Buddies on a garden project, Andrade and the rest of the Buddies were thrilled.

“This is the first time a club’s reached out to us like, ‘Hey, let’s do this [project] together’ and we really appreciated that,” Andrade said.

Best Buddies has partnered with clubs previously but in the past it has been Best Buddies trying to reach out to other clubs.

“We partnered with Golden Leaders and we worked one time with Fight Against Hunger and organized a sock drive,” Andrade said.

But, this has been the first time a club has reached out to Best Buddies.

“We would reach out to clubs but with ABE, we noticed they reached out like four or five times, which was really sweet,” Andrade said.

The Buddies started working on their new flower garden project with ABE, Oct. 31. “[ABE] wants us to help them with their garden, like planting seeds, watering,” Andrade said.

Being able to work with another club was an enjoyable experience for Best Buddies members.

“It was nice to have a different scenery when we eat lunch because we always eat lunch on the lawn, by the amphitheater, but we sat by the garden,” Andrade said.

Andrade and co-president Jake Schwartz (12) are also looking for new ways to make sure the students with disabilities have more activities to participate in at school.

“We want the Buddies to find fun stuff to do on campus, outside of just Best Buddies,” Andrade said. “We just want to work with other clubs.”

Although getting more involved with other clubs on campus has been challenging, Best Buddies has been working with other Poway Unified School District Best Buddies programs for the past two years, when they held their very first Friendship Walk. Andrade and other club leaders are also advocating for outreach programs for middle-schoolers as well.

“We really would like something to start that early exposure,” Andrade said. “Being around people with disabilities helps break the social isolation of people with disabilities when we’re in high school.”

Jessica Lin

Isabelle Ritter (12) and Paige Riza (12) assist Larissa O'Beirne (9) water plants grown in the ABE Butterfly Garden, Oct. 31.

News Stand What's happening around campus...

Nov.

26

... and around the world.

Theatre Company will host auditions for its upcoming musical, The Addams Family, Nov. 26. Callbacks will be held Dec. 3.

“This is a very stubborn fire early in an extraordinarily dangerous fire season.”

KELLY B. HUSTON, deputy director of the emergency

The American Red Cross is hosting a blood drive Nov. 27, from 8 a.m-2 p.m. Students must be at least 17 to participate.

Dec.

3

Nov.

27

The school dodgeball tournament is scheduled to have its first match , Dec. 3, and will continue until Dec. 13.

services office, describing the Camp Fire in California.

Being reported as the deadliest fire in state history, 48 deaths have been confirmed as of Tuesday night.

“Our turnout estimate is 114 million votes cast in the House, breaking even our high expectations.”

NATE COHN, New York Times reporter, commenting on the unusually high voter turnout during the 2018 midterm elections. This year’s turnout increased dramatically since 2014, when the turnout was 83 million.

“Teenagers are becoming regular users, and the proportion of regular users is increasing.”

SCOTT GOTTILEB, FDA Commissioner, stating his concern for millions of e-cigarette consumers. By imposing stricter age limits and sales, the FDA hopes to ban flavored e-cigarettes from convenience stores.

“I don't want prayers, I don't want thoughts, I want gun control.”

SUSAN-SCHMIDT ORFANOS, mother of 27-year-old Telemachus Orfanos who survived the nation’s worst shooting in Las Vegas last year, only to be killed at the Thousand Oaks shooting last Wednesday.

Compiled by Jocelyn Mi, and Julie Zhu

Nexus

News 3

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Nov. 16 , 2018

Alawani, Madan volunteer at app-a-thon, help students create apps, animations From App-a-thon, page 1

Andrea Chen

Andy Alawani (12) answers questions as he passes out pens and paper for the students to sketch out their mobile app and animation ideas on. He and Madan mentored for the App-a-thon, Nov. 4.

As mentors, Madan and Alawani answered questions about the different platforms groups could use, helped the kids fix bugs in their code and presented the judging rubrics at the App-a-thon.

“It was really fun to help the kids,” Alawani said.

“I felt in my element as I was able to share and teach what I was passionate about.”

Alawani helped create tutorial videos and the curriculum for the students who wanted to use platforms like XCode and Swift to make iOS apps.

“My main goal was to ensure that students were prepared for the various platforms supported at the Appa-thon,” Alawani said. “For the first time, the EKAL App-a-thon was supporting multiple platforms like Swift, Thunkable, and MIT App Inventor.”

Meanwhile, Madan’s mentoring focused on the use of problem solving with code.

“I was hoping to be able to inspire the students to look beyond and figure out different ways to apply their coding skills,” he said. “The most important influence this App-a-thon had on the students was that they began thinking about how to use technology to solve challenges they or others face. That is an invaluable skill that these students are learning at an incredibly young age.”

Each group had to incorporate the use of a prop and the theme of “Smart Schools,” which emphasized the use of technology in school.

The first-place winners received $500, while the second and third runner-ups won $300 and $100, respectively.

These winners were chosen through two judging sessions: one in the morning, and one in the afternoon.

“In the morning, a big part of the judging was about the idea that the students came up with and the way they brainstormed completing the project,” Madan said. “We wanted to emphasize [brainstorming] in the judging, as eight hours may not have been enough time for many students to complete their apps. In the evening, we judged their actual coding and style and functionality of the app.”

Last year, the App-a-thon only judged the students’ mobile apps. This year, they expanded the competition to include animations.

“We wanted to promote STEAM [Science, Technology, Engineering, Art, Math] rather than STEM [Science, Technology, Engineering, Math] as art is a very big proponent in our society, and plays a large part in the STEM fields,” Alawani said. “For this reason, we incorporated a completely unique judging category for animations along with a category for mobile apps.”

Though the kids had the choice of making either an animation or a mobile app, all were judged on a threepoint scale.

One point was awarded if the group barely met requirements, two points if requirements were met, and three points if the group went beyond the requirements of incorporating their props and the “Smart Schools” theme.

“For animations, we judged their story, their message and purpose, and how well it connected with the theme of Smart Schools,” Alawani said. “Similarly, for mobile apps, we judged them based on the functionality of their app, their outline and flowcharts, and their code.”

The participants also had to make a presentation on their product, which was graded on succinctness and the inclusion of each team member in their talking points.

“My favorite part of the event was definitely the judging,” Alawani said. “The mentors were in charge of judging, and through this process I was able to see a wide variety of apps. Each app was unique and complex and I enjoyed talking to the kids about the process they went through to complete it.”

Alawani and Madan agreed that their favorite app was a school-wide AMBER alert app. Madan said he liked the app because of how it could reduce panic in emergencies by giving teachers and students details about what was occurring. Alawani liked the practicality of the app.

“It also served both to connect and protect the school,” Alawani said. “I also enjoyed the app because it was extremely complex despite the group losing their code completely twice. The determination and perseverance the group showed was admirable.”

By the end of the eight-hour App-a-thon, Madan and Alawani said they had bonded with their students after guiding them through their apps and going over bits of code together.

“I was really struck by how close I was able to get to some of the students,” Madan said. “We got so close with each of the students by playing their games or helping them with their apps. At the end of the Appa-thon, many asked if we would continue mentoring them.”

Alawani said he enjoyed teaching and working with the students more than he expected because many of them were extremely smart and creative, despite their age.

“The App-a-thon helped me understand that age does not matter for learning,” he said. “The software skills of the kids were surprisingly refined. Some of the kids were so smart, and that helped me realize that there truly are no boundaries for education and knowledge.”

Alawani emphasized the importance of technology and teamwork in kids’ pursuits of knowledge. One of the main goals of the App-a-thon was to promote these ideals, he said.

“Technology is the future, the betterment of our society,” Alawani said. “The kids are also the future of society itself. Thus, preparing kids to learn about technology is important in ensuring that the future of society is better than society today. The challenges I faced in assisting the students allowed me to realize the power of sharing knowledge with each other.

Working together to solve problems is so much more efficient than working alone, and the App-a-thon captured this idea.”

Newscast partners with PBS NewsHour, covers midterm elections

Kevin Lu

News Editor In the weeks leading up to the midterm elections, PBS NewsHour Student Reporting Labs (SRL) reached out to high school broadcast journalism programs across the nation to investigate how young people feel about political engagement, as well as the current political climate.

In response, Newscast sent out multiple teams to interview students around campus about their opinions and stances on youth voting in the midterm elections as well as what they thought about the current political climate.

Assistant Producer Taylor Stannard (12) and Anchor Amy Yakovlev (12) dove into the project, and sought out outspoken student voices.

“We specifically interviewed Gunner Spencer (12), Nathan Wang (12), and Geo Fratian (12), because we knew that they had very strong political voices,” Stannard said.

After gathering their interviews, Newscast compiled their best clips from all teams and edited them into a three-minute video, which was later featured on the PBS NewsHour SRL website along with 47 other school re-

ports from across the nation.

Stannard and Yakovlev felt thrilled to find one of their clips featured on PBS NewsHour’s national television show.

“It was just amazing that we were the ones that got that clip in and got a whole bunch of people to see it,” Stannard said.

Through working with PBS and their producer, students in Newscast 3-4 were also given the opportunity to contribute to PBS NewsHour’s story on Snapchat and Instagram about the midterm elections.

They connected with a Snapchat official on FaceTime to talk about the guidelines on kind of content they were seeking for their videos.

“They wanted a student perspective because in today’s social climate it is very important to get kids’ perspectives and how it is affecting us,” Stannard said. “In this generation we are very tech-savvy and the majority of kids at high school use Snapchat, so we are a good demographic to convey this information in this way.”

With a reporting style much different from the carefully edited videos they air every Monday during homeroom, these short and spontaneous interviews tested Newscast members in their ability to quickly generate

responses and find people willing to express their opinions on divisive topics.

“It’s on-the-spot and you don’t really come up with questions, and you don’t get to choose who you’re going to interview, it’s just walking up to people and being like, ‘Hey, can we interview you?’” Stannard said. “We had some people who were not comfortable being recorded at all and that’s something that’s hard about on-the-spot reporting. It’s about finding the character who’s willing to be outgoing enough and open enough to talk about it, and a lot of the people aren’t okay with giving their opinions about political events.”

Segment Producer Damien Henson (11) also provided coverage on Snapchat by traveling to different polling stations, Nov. 6, and talking to young voters as well as adults about their opinions.

He expressed his love for storytelling and journalism, as well as listening to other people’s stories.

“My job is literally to get out of the office, talk to people, and tell their stories, and that's something that I’ve always had a really fun time doing,” Henson said.

Not only did Newscast engage in a wider range of projects like their segments with

PBS NewsHour and Snapchat, but they also learned new skills in a field trip to the ITV Cable 16 newsroom, Nov. 9. Instead of spending days of editing clips together every week, students learned to turn key stories into full videos ready for broadcast in a shorter time frame.

“I think getting that feel for real life and what they do is motivating and inspiring,” Henson said. “It shows you what it’s like, and when you’re in a real TV studio it kind of furthers your passions a little bit more.”

Their partnership with PBS NewsHour will continue throughout the year, as they plan to tackle a wide variety of issues affecting high-schoolers in San Diego, such as immigration and settling into life here in America.

“Our new PBS story is on ‘Opportunity,’ so we’re trying to do a story on refugees coming in to San Diego through this program, specifically with high school students and getting them acclimated to the United States and getting them opportunities like schooling, extracurricular activities, clothes and that kind of stuff,” Stannard said.

Their involvement in covering the midterm elections and partnering with PBS and Snapchat, gave many students a newfound

appreciation for broadcast journalism. Henson noted the improvement in production quality in the past two years, as well as the larger scope their studio covers.

“If you look back at five years ago, it was very poorly produced, always awful audio, and it didn’t make any sense,” Henson said.

“Unfortunately, I think, that there are still some areas where we can improve, but our overall organization has changed quite a bit.

We’re doing a lot of legitimate news topics now.”

He also added that Newscast had been given the potential to make a story that could be broadcasted to millions of people through PBS. “It’s a rare opportunity and an opportunity that a lot of people should take advantage of if they’re interested in journalism because not a lot of other schools have this,” he said.

Stannard is considering minoring in broadcast journalism when she enters college, stating that the experience of working with PBS helped her decide.

“I wasn’t thinking about it before,” Stannard said. “I think after being exposed to the atmosphere and what [broadcast journalism] is really like instead of just doing the small stuff, I grew to like it.”

Unity Day provides sophomores space to discuss struggles, celebrate diversity Zara Irshad Staff Writer

Every fall, ASB runs Unity Day for all sophomores on campus; it is a safe space for students to reflect on their struggles and experiences and to learn from others. The event took place during first and second period, Nov. 5 and 6, and included a variety of activities, from guest speakers to group games.

Although Unity Day is catered toward sophomores, they aren’t the only ones who participate. Juniors and seniors make up a crucial part of the experience.

Each year, ASB’s Culture Commissioners, a board currently made up by Paige Riza (12), Nava Mavandadi (10) and ASB advisor Shannon Parker, look for approximately 60 upperclassmen to facilitate the event.

Interested students fill out a short questionnaire to apply. Then, after a brief training process, facilitators are paired during Unity Day to engage groups of nine to 11 sophomores in activities, create a safe space for them to share their feelings, and act as positive and relatable role models.

For first-time facilitator Joshua Lin (11), it was his own impactful Unity Day experience that prompted him to participate.

“Unity Day was a great way for me to de-stress because I was able to talk about things that I’d been struggling with in sophomore year, especially be-

cause sophomore was the hardest year in high school for me both in and outside of school,” Lin said.

Similarly, Riza describes her own experience at Unity Day as one that “changed my life in high school.” She said that planning this year’s Unity Day was a lot of commitment but ultimately didn’t feel like work because she was aware of the extreme importance and impact of her efforts.

Both Riza and Lin said that it was important to them to assure that others had similar positive experiences with the program, a goal that was common among the other facilitators. All the facilitators underwent a five-hour training session the Sunday before Unity Day to assure that the sophomores similar positive, exciting, and helpful experiences. "[Training] is a day [for facilitators] to bond with their partners so everyone feels comfortable and confident throughout Unity Day," Riza said. "We provide them with advice on how to act or talk in their small groups, a bag full of supplies and information they will need the following day that talks them through the activities, and we provide them with a lunch."

During the training, the facilitators learned about the importance of staying true to themselves in order to create bonds with the sophomores. They did so through a variety of ice breakers and a brief speech from the event’s keynote speaker, Keith Hawkins.

Then, the facilitators ran through a few partner icebreakers and activities that the sophomores would

go through, which instilled a message of authenticity.

Riza said that the activities were focused on enabling the facilitators to connect with the sophomores emotionally and deal with all sorts of students, both quiet and talkative, during the training. This emphasis then allowed the Unity Day experience to be much more personalized for the sophomores and allowed it to appeal to many different types of personalities.

“I [didn’t] want to overstep my boundaries and force [the sophomores] to participate because that’s not a considerate thing to do,” Lin said. “Rather, I’d be patient and hope[d] that they muster up some confidence to be able to talk to the rest of the group.”

Lin said that he made sure to apply that level of patience during the actual Unity Day.The training concluded with some smaller group activities in preparation for the more personal portion of Unity Day. Although it requires a lot of time to learn how to best connect with the sophomores and a lot of patience to assure that everything runs smoothly, according to Lin, the end result is what makes it worthwhile. He said that watching the sophomores connect over their struggles, is rewarding and reminds him of his Unity Day experience.

“Unity Day is a great destresser from school,” Lin said. “It is one of the few moments in high school where you don’t feel pressured or ashamed to open up, and it is okay to talk about your personal problems.”

Itinerary:

Guest Speaker:

• Unity Day began with a powerful speech from international speaker, Keith Hawkins.

• He shared his own difficult past, showing the importance of being grateful for what you have.

Paper Ripping:

• Each student wrote down something that defined who they are, then shared out in small groups.

• Then they ripped their papers to emphasize that they are more than what they wrote down.

Standing Up:

• Finally, everyone sat in a circle as a facilitator asked them to stand if they experienced struggles.

• The goal was to having the students recognize that they are not facing their struggles alone.

Design by Zara Irshad

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Nov. 16 , 2018

Chin advocates body positivity, self-love

In My Feelings Growing Pains

From Elections, page 1 comparing yourself to other people,’ Chin said.

Chin had faced an overwhelming pressure in high school due to social media. She presumed that her body wasn’t worthy enough to be seen by others.

“I wouldn’t post [more revealing pictures] because I thought I was too curvy or not as skinny as the other models out there like Heidi Klum,” Chin said. “I thought ‘if [models] look like that, I want to look like that.’”

After years of struggling with her own image, Chin made major strides towards building herself up again.

She said she did this through exercising and utilizing therapy as a way to let go of the past anxiety she held in from bullying and receiving support from friends and family—people she knew truly loved her.

“I am happy where I’m at right now,” she said. “I want to be known for who I am.”

One of the ways she motivated herself was keeping up with fitness media accounts that focused on both their workout regimens and their stories of developing their own personal strength. Chin grew to admire one specific person, Sabrina H., who’s gained 10,000 followers through her content. Her account was geared towards erasing the perfect body stigma.

“I saw Sabrina’s page, a picture of her rock climbing and I was interested in her content,” Chin said. “I kept looking at her post and it motivated me to not surround yourself with negative people.”

Chin said she felt complete again through the positive reinforcement she received and through Sabrina’s account. When she soon realized that there were a lot of girls who struggled with the problems that she did, she became excited to share her journey.

“I wanted to share my story with other people and I liked relating to them so they wouldn’t feel alone,” Chin said.

One afternoon in August, as Chin scrolled through Instagram, she saw that Sabrina had started a Body Positivity project. Sabrina began by taking stock photos and promoting the project in events and festivals.

Inspired by Sabrina, Chin had joined the project in late Aug. and found even more comfort and security with the people involved.

“It was helpful to have a place where I can talk to Sabrina and just get help from older friends, brothers and sisters, who have dealt with the same things when they were my age that are there for me,” Chin said.

The project appealed mostly to women, but Chin emphasized how body positivity was much more than appreciating their appearance. The aim of the project was to not only embrace their scars and stretch marks but also learn to not listen to the little voice in their heads that told them otherwise. And that’s what made Chin look at body image in a different light.

“In the Body Positivity project, people forget the mental side of it and the fact that they are able to push past all the negativity,” Chin said. “I've been really inspired by that because you don't need be liked by everybody because everyone is different and that’s okay.”

Recognizing that social media was essential for the

Jessica Lin

Lindsay Chin (12) directs Rebecca Mendoza (12) for her athletic wear photoshoot, Nov. 11. She focused on personality traits as a part of the Body Positivity project. new project’s development, Chin used her own social media platforms to share her newfound passion to encourage others to take part in it. She posted the project’s stock photos on her account, Oct. 5. While Chin had been open about her journey by putting great through into her post’s captions, she didn’t expect the outpouring of personal stories from fellow students as they embarked on their own journeys.

“I know that it’s nice to have someone who’s in high school to really relate to,” Chin said. “It feels good to know that I’m helping someone else out because feeling alone and bullied is a hard thing.”

Chin appreciated these discussions with other Westview students, but she wanted to do something more impactful. On Nov. 11, Chin decided to organize a body positivity photoshoot in Canyonside Park. With two other photographers, she encouraged students to attend. Chin had 10 people interested and wanted the models to wear athletic outfits to show off their figures.

“Athletic wear symbolizes strength,” Chin said. “I want to slowly help [the girls] get comfortable with being vulnerable and understanding that it’s okay to be [vulnerable].”

But the mental side of the Body Positivity project is just as important and Chin wanted to showcase it and celebrate it.

“Everyone held up a poster with words that describe the characteristics that make them who they are,” Chin said.

These traits would be ones that the models’ aspired to be: strong, beautiful, intelligent. She felt elated that her event had encouraged those people to embrace themselves “I was surprised to see most of the girls expose themselves in their sports bra,” Chin said. “It went better than I expected.”

As Chin began to see the models' excitement through their bright smiles, she began to realize the extent of how impactful this project may be to others.

"I hope this campaign helps young women gain confidence to share their story," Chin said.

With the Body Positivity project, Chin said she began to realize how much progress she had made. She knew that happiness didn’t come from looking at the mirror or seeking validation through social media. It was what she thought of herself.

“I want to be happy with who I am as a person not being judged for trying to have someone else's character,” Chin said.

The lesson that she wants to showcase to everyone is what true beauty should be, one that she hopes begin to resonate throughout society today.

“Our character defines our beauty,” she said.

Lina Lew

My room is always in a state of chaos, and my closet is hands down the biggest offender. I’ve got clothes from middle school lying in the depths of my dresser, just waiting to be worn again.

But as I keep buying new clothes, the overwhelming weight of both the past and the present has become so persistent that I decided it’s finally time to air out my dirty laundry and do a little re-organizing.

After rummaging through my heaps of clothing, I was surprised at how many hidden relics I had forgotten about. I wasn’t sure why I still had my Sparta DIY muscle tee from sixth-grade olympics, but there it was, still faintly smudged with dirt from when I tripped during the 200m run. It was surprisingly bittersweet, reminiscing over middle school memories I hadn’t thought about in years, but since I didn’t want to feel like I was 11 anymore, it went into the donate pile.

As I continued my search, I began to question the reasoning behind why I ever decided to keep some of these in the first place. Despite how great these clothes and the memories they hold are, I’ve undoubtedly grown out of them. The colors are faded, the waist size too small, the fabric uncomfortable. The appeal of neon clothing, the spark of an old favorite sweater just aren’t there. The connection between me and my clothes was fraying thin, hanging on by a mere thread. Besides history, we had nothing more in common.

The realization is painful—it hurts to drift apart from something I once cherished so dearly. Understandably, people are uncomfortable with change, so they cling desperately to familiar items and familiar people and familiar experiences. Maybe we’re afraid of how the new shirt will feel, or how people will react to our new outfits, or how we might accidentally throw out the memories etched in the old shirt’s fabric. So we begin to rationalize with ourselves, pointing out the pros of keeping the shirt. Our emotional attachments persuade us to hold onto them for just a while longer, in case we ever miraculously decide to use them again.

But it’s undeniable that after wearing the same things over and over again, we begin to feel suffocated by the itchy fabric, yearning to feel something new on our skin. As we grow up, our style naturally changes, our preferences switch up, and the person we are now is entirely different from who we once were. And that's okay. To expect ourselves to remain in the same tight clothing, unable to move freely, would be cheating us out of reaching our potential.

As the donate pile became bigger and bigger, it became easier to part with clothes that used to be my go-to favorites. It didn’t happen overnight, but over the years, I’ve mentally moved on— by never wearing them, burying them to the bottom of the stack and forgetting about them altogether.

So this was the turning point, where piece by piece, I removed all the old clothes from my closet, accepting the fact that I had grown too big to fit, that my style has changed, and that it was okay. Change is scary, but it’s a natural part of life. I realized I didn’t have to feel guilty about throwing away things no longer meant for me.

So I bid a fond farewell to the old clothes that had served me well with no hard feelings, no strings attached. And I looked into the future with the newfound space in my closet, excited about the new, risky chances I could take, the unknown experiences I would make, and the person I know I’m inevitably going to grow into.

Self-deprecation triggers stress hormones, alters brain chemistry Sydney Alper Staff Writer

“I’m eating too much. I’m too fat.”

“I look so ugly in this outfit.”

“That awkward moment when you are Asian but you are not good at anything.”

“I think this college app is going to kill me.”

“Oh, I’m dying.” In response, “That’s me.”

These examples of self deprecation were all overheard throughout a school day.

Self-deprecation is a common occurrence, whether blatant or subtle, overly dramatic or casual. A snide comment here, an “I suck” there, but the feeling passes, or at least it should. Self-deprecation is the new normal.

It has wormed its way into our daily lives, becoming something we say or hear, yet think nothing of.

Loretta Breuning, founder of the Inner Mammal Institute, a research facility dedicated to understanding how the chemicals in our brains work, said that self-deprecation is caused by the threat chemical in our brains called cortisol. “[Cortisol] makes you feel like you are literally threatened even though you are perfectly safe,” Bruening said. “Anything that

made you feel bitten or shoved in your youth built a pathway [in your brain] that triggers your cortisol in similar future circumstances.

Thus, you are triggering it yourself, but you feel like others are doing it to you.”

By being self-deprecating, people allow themselves to feel threatened, Breuning said.

People feel the need attack themselves first before other people have the opportunity to.

It can be used as a defense or coping mechanism, but for some it’s simply just a way to deal with the pressure of life and from others.

Shira Griffith (12) said she uses self-deprecation as a confidence booster, but also to protect herself from people who could potentially want to say bad things about her.

She said she that if she can acknowledge bad things about herself, then if other people say them, then they don’t matter to her.

“If someone else says [something mean] to me it doesn’t really bother me,” Griffith said. “I’ll just turn it into a joke.”

Kevin Sun Chen (12) addresses self-deprecation with a slightly different approach, more as a matter of control.

“There’s a lot of pressures from all over, like internal pressure, pressure from parents, pressure from teachers,” Chen said.

“Self-deprecation is a way to take those pres-

sures and turn them into something you can control yourself.”

However, therapist Andrea Martel said the use of self-deprecation as a way to cope with outside pressure creates problems for a person. She said that self-deprecation is a communication method resulting from an inability to properly communicate one’s needs and wants.

“There is a very big push to be perfect through media, through social media, just through peer pressure at school,” she said.

“I think it’s very scary for teenagers as they grow and develop to figure out exactly what they want and what they need and to be able to communicate that.”

Martel also said that often times people don’t know how to react when faced with self-deprecation because the meaning of the self-deprecating words is muddled behind sarcasm. But both Griffith and Chen said they believe that self-deprecation and that brand of humor is an excellent way to make people laugh and connect with others.

“You want to be relatable to others,” Chen said. “You want to be more friendly seeming, and the ability to use yourself as a joke is a good way to bond.”

In a survey of 342 students, 292 of these

people said they used self deprecation and 144 of responders said they used self-deprecation because they find it funny.

Once started, using self-deprecating humor is hard to stop. Breuning links our biology with this inability to stop. She said it has become written in our brains as a way to defend ourselves from threats.

“It’s hard to stop [self-deprecating] because your mammal brain rewards you with a good feeling when you compare [yourself with others] and come out on top,” she said.

Similarly, Chen and Griffith have said that they won’t be changing their ways and do not feel like it’s personally a problem for them.

“It’s not going to stop me from being self-deprecating because I’ve just become accustomed to it and I personally don’t feel like it’s damaging me,” Griffith said.

Chen and Griffith argued that they know themselves best and know how far they can take their jokes before they become harmful.

But for others, this distinction is not so clear. “[Self-deprecation] harms [people] in that they feel even worse about themselves because they keep perpetuating a negative stereotype that they feel about themselves or that people have about them,” Martel said.

Martel and Chen emphasized the impor-

tance of maintaining a separation between self-deprecation and mental health issues.

Martel said that self-deprecation can often be linked to depression, insecurity, and other mental issues, but one does not necessarily equate the other. Chen said he understands the importance of this distinction.

“I know that there’s a clear line between my personal, deep-rooted insecurities and the problems that I have versus the things that I joke about myself on,” Chen said.

“It’s very clear to not mix up [anxiety and self-deprecation] and say they’re the same problem because then it’s muddling the actual problem of anxiety of how it can be helped and treated.”

Martel said that some alternatives to self-deprecation are to be more clear about one’s wants and needs, clearly indicating what one feels. “[Stopping self-deprecation] will improve your self-worth and the people around will also respond to you more positively,” Martel said. “It’s a win-win [situation].”

Even Griffith recognizes that eliminating self-deprecation from our daily humor would not be a bad thing.

“If we could stop people from feeling like trash about themselves, why not?” she said.

Mid-Autumn Festival, Day of the Dead, Diwali bring families together Isabelle Ritter Staff Writer

For many Americans, the annual onset of the fall season is permeated with the usual imagery: Halloween skeletons and jack o’ lanterns everywhere as early as August, makeshift Thanksgiving turkeys and canned cranberry sauces on the shelves as soon as the clock strikes midnight on Oct. 31.

However, across the globe, many cultures have their own ways of celebrating the changing of the seasons.

From the Mid-Autumn Festival in China and Taiwan, to Diwali in India, and Dia de los Muertos in many Latin American countries, there are many ways people celebrate the turn of the season.

One common thread amongst these fall celebrations is coming together with family and giving thanks for the good in our lives.

As the seasons change, it seems many cultures across the globe find it’s important to come back to what stays the same: family.

Caleigh Lorimer (12) comes together with family every year to celebrate Dia de los Muertos, or the Day of the Dead, Nov. 1.

“Day of the Dead is a holiday that honors the lives of loved ones who have passed,” she said. “You get to celebrate the lives they’ve lived and it’s believed that their spirits come back to be with you during this holiday.”

Day of the Dead is widely celebrated in Latin American countries, primarily Mexico, where Lorimer’s family is from. It’s a holiday to gather and remember the importance of family, both living and deceased.

“Every year, we set up an altar and my grandma cooks

a traditional Mexican meal and we eat and share memo- Indian-American families, celebrates during Diwali, also ries about our ancestors,” she said. “Day of the Dead is known as the festival of lights. very important to my family because it means that our “During Diwali, we light different candles in front loved ones are always with us, even when they can’t be of our front door and create what is known as ‘rangoli there physically. We get to cherish and celebrate instead art’ which is patterns on the floor or the ground using of mourn.” materials such as colored rice, dry flour, colored sand or Lorimer said that Day of the Dead is something she flower petals,” she said. “The designs we used are passed looks forward to every year, and special time she gets to down from generations and allows us to keep the tradispend with her family no matter what else is going on in tion alive.” her life.

Diwali is a Hindu festival of lights, “Every year when we’re gathered which is celebrated every autumn in around the altar, we go through and the northern hemisphere, and every We always end up share stories and things we loved spring in the southern hemisphere. about each one of our relatives who crying and laughing, and the As one of the most popular festihas passed,” she said. “We always amount of love in the room vals of Hinduism, Diwali symbolizend up crying and laughing, and the es the spiritual victory of light over amount of love in the room cannot cannot be compared.” darkness, good over evil and knowlbe compared.” edge over ignorance.

—Caleigh Lorimer (12) During the celebration, temples, Although the holiday shares much with other autumn celebrations, homes, shops and office buildings such as the aspect of family reunion and appreciation, are filled with as much light as possible, including string Lorimer said the uniquely Mexican parts of the holiday lights usually displayed during Christmas. are what she appreciates most.

Yedulapuram said Diwali provides an opportunity for “My favorite thing about this holiday would have to her to celebrate her heritage and connection to her family. be the altar,” she said. “The altar is filled with photos of “My favorite memory has to be doing the rangoli art our loved ones, their favorite foods, their favorite objects outside my front door with my mom every year and lightlike jewelry, cigars, beer, books, whatever it may be, pan ing the candles,” she said. “It is just a tradition we have de muerto, skeletons that represent an individual, mari- every year and it is a lot of fun.” golds, and other cultural decorations. It’s so beautiful and Mingda He (12), like Yedulapuram, finds identity and makes me feel so much pride and love for my family and familial love in the Chinese holiday of the Mid-Autumn culture.”

Festival, or Moon Festival, Sep. 13.

Shivali Yedulapuram (12) shares that same love for “We try to get everyone in our family together and her family and her culture, which she, like many other make a ton of traditional Chinese food during the festi-

“

val,” He said. “We always have to eat fish, which, in Chinese, has the same sound as excess, [which is] important since it was very hard to have enough to eat back home [in China], and having an excess of food would be a kind of good luck thing in the hopes that a family would have an excess over the next year as well.”

He said his family has many traditions in how they celebrate the holiday, from eating bamboo root, which is symbolic of personal growth, to making dumplings, which is symbolic of money that was used in ancient China.

Usually, He’s family makes eight different dishes, because eight is a lucky number in China.

He said that as a second-generation immigrant, he has found it hard to find a single holiday to identify with.

“As a kid, I remember having to talk about family traditions [in school], and feeling out of place from everyone else since we didn’t really have one,” he said.

“Family traditions give families a sense of identity and character, and it just feels really nice to have something like that.”

He said he has found solace in the Mid-Autumn Festival, which provided a platform for him to bond with family members with whom he felt he couldn’t easily relate.

“My favorite thing about the holiday is probably being able to spend a nice day celebrating something with my family,” he said. “It’s something I share even with the relatives I have who have lived in China their whole lives.”

Through all cultures and religions, the changing of the seasons is a time for family to come together and give thanks for not only what changes, but for what stays the same: our love for one another.

Nexus

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Nov. 16, 2018

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Review

NOT ALL HEROES WEAR CAPES Album

7

Michelle Wang

Above: Xochitl Shine (10) steadies herself to prepare for the opposing team’s approaching jammer, a position that is responsible for lapping other players.

Right: Shine and her teammate skate to catch up with the rest of the pack, making sure they stay close to other blockers to avoid a penalty.

Photos by Jessica Lin

Shine finds niche in roller derby From Roller Derby, page 1

close to someone else’s space.”

Roller derby is a chaotic, co-ed jumble of players skating repeatedly around a track, with a complex set of rules that Shine had to learn when she decided to join the team.

“Each team has four blockers on a track so that’s eight people,” she said.

“They have one jammer per team. The jammer’s job is to skate as many laps as they can, but the blockers have to block the opposing team’s jammers, and that’s basically it.”

After trying out the different positions, Shine found her niche as a blocker, a simultaneously offensive and defensive player who aids the jammer in their quest for the most laps around the track.

It didn’t take long for Shine to get the hang of the sport, and it soon became a central part of her life.

“I’m one of those obsessive derby girls now, like you ask me about derby and I could sit here for a day and just talk about everything,” she said.

Shine is a relatively small and unassuming person, standing at a height of only 5’3”.

This is something she said she loves to use to her advantage during derby games, or bouts as they’re officially called.

“I’m just a very happy person and there are definitely teams who walk in and they don’t smile and look intimidating, so they look at me and they’re like ‘Oh, she’s easy, we’re gonna murder her out there,’” she said. “Then they get out there and they don’t murder me and they think ‘Oh, she’s good.’”

Shine said that she isn't bothered by other's pre-judgements of her, and rather, she finds the positive in it.

“I kind of like being underestimated so that when I’m out there I can see them thinking, ‘I did not see this coming,’” she said. “I think that’s my favorite part.”

Shine said she holds her own in the rink despite her stature, which can be difficult in a co-ed sport like roller derby.

“We will be playing like 17-yearold boys who are [around] 6 foot, 200

pounds and they walk in the door and it doesn’t matter if they are smiling or not, they are still intimidating,” she said.

“So, sometimes we go to LA and we’re just like ‘Oh, we are really going to die.’

The No. 1 team in the nation right now is the Diamond City Miners and they definitely have some guys on their team like that.”

As players vie for the most rounds around the rink, blockers try to knock one another over. Many times, players will fall on one another.

“Pile-ups happen all the time,” she said. “One person will fall and sometimes the person behind them will fall and then sometimes the person on top of them will just take forever to get up so that person is lying there and someone is lying on top of them and someone trips on them and they fall and then just everyone in the pack is just falling.”

Although the aggressive nature of the sport might be intimidating to some, Shine said that injuries are rare due to precautions taken by the players.

“It’s actually really, really, really vio-

lent,” she said. “But, they teach you all these safety things, like they teach you how to fall, so I would say it’s violent but like a safe violent.”

At the end of the day, Shine said that she feels the sport is about more than just knocking people over and getting aggression out.

“It definitely has influenced my life in a good way because it's a very family and friend-oriented sport,” she said.

“Probably because if you look at people just on the track like in the game, you think, ‘Oh, yeah, they’re killing each other’ so after the game you have to make sure to be really nice. I would just say it’s taught me the importance of making new friends and of being nice to everyone.”

All things considered, and after all the time looking for the right sport, and all the difficulties walking onto a sport of which she had no experience, Shine said she knows she’s finally found her fit.

“It’s just the sport for me,” she said.

“I'm just kind of like an all-around derby girl now.”

10

For as long as I’ve been listening to rap, Metro Boomin has been a constant.

I got a chance to watch his set last year at a festival and yes, the producer’s performance consisted of a mix of his current tracks: songs that were already overplayed from other artists’ sets. I guess I can’t blame him. Metro Boomin’s name somehow always finds its way onto rap radio hits.

But as much as Metro Boomin’s famous tagline sometimes serves as a cue to change the radio station, his yearlong hiatus from rap was odd. Regardless of whether Metro Boomin was afraid of oversaturation or repetition, I’m glad this rap regular is back with “NOT ALL HEROES WEAR CAPES.” This 13-track album is produced solely by Metro and features artists he’s previously collaborated with like Gucci Mane, Travis Scott, and Offset. But the artist that always seems to be at his best when working with Metro is 21 Savage, who’s undoubtedly the star of this album.

The track “Don’t Come Out The House” features 21 Savage and his uncomfortably violent whisper that’s only intensified by Metro’s stripped down beats. This track is the perfect example of producer and artist collaboration. When Metro’s in control of the production, 21 Savage manages to be his most engaging. And on “10 Freaky Girls,” 21 Savage unsurprisingly flaunts his wealth and fame, but pulls off humor in the midst of it. To end his verse, he jokingly recalls running into a man he once previously robbed.

“He was happy to see me,” 21 Savage says.

On this track, Metro somehow seamlessly weaves movie scores into a workable trap beat. The song has a closing comparable to any Star Wars anthem, giving the album the cinematic effect that’s apparent in the album’s cover art, which depicts a dark figure flung into the air by an explosion.

Metro’s control of samples across the album is one of his more impressive feats. On “Overdue,” he samples “Anthonio (Berlin Breakdown Version)” from the horror movie The Guest. Travis Scott features on this track, reflecting on his tiresome nights at the studio producing new music. Fittingly, Scott describes himself as “way too cold under this flesh,” paralleling the sample’s haunting “Do you ever feel ashamed? Do you ever feel a thing?”

While there’s a lot of good in this album, there is almost always a bad that follows it. When Metro takes his shot at slower, more vocal-based tracks, the artist usually falls flat.

“Dreamcatcher” and “Borrowed Love” feel tired and one of the featured artists, Swae Lee sounds genuinely bored. Besides the few hits, the majority of the album is mediocre and practically skippable.

If you’re still enthralled by Metro’s old music, this album is a solid reunion of characters from his past. But if you were expecting something more visionary from the producer, this album still offers a few gems that hopefully reflect what Metro has in store.

“NOT ALL HEROES WEAR CAPES” is an accurate display of Metro’s capabilities as a producer, but by no means is the album much more innovative or ambitious than his last.

Inspired by grandmother, Okolo founds Foster Friends, helps orphans Julie Zhu Staff Writer

Nene Okolo (12) painted the face of a six-yearold girl who beamed with happiness as she tried to play with the face paints and paint other childrens’ faces just like Okolo was doing. The girl is just one of the many foster children whom Okolo has worked with through the club she started, Foster Friends.

Okolo was inspired to begin helping foster children after a trip to Nigeria two years ago after her grandmother’s death.

Okolo remembered her most for the amount of time and dedication she spent helping orphans in her home city of Lagos, Nigeria.

“I remember hearing stories from my dad who was talking about her after she passed,” Okolo said.

“He talked about how she lived a life of giving and how she really liked helping orphans.”

In Nigeria, Okolo honored her grandmother by giving donations to local orphanages and visiting the orphans there. Upon returning to San Diego, Okolo wanted to continue helping orphans and carrying on her grandmother’s work in her community.

“I thought I didn’t want to just stop giving on this trip, I thought it was a good idea to keep going, so that’s why I came back to San Diego and I decided to start the club Foster Friends,” Okolo said. “I thought it would be nice to help people in my community, not just across the world, so that's

what made me start, because I felt inspired by my grandmother.”

Since the club began operating a little more than a year ago, they’ve made a large impact on foster children in San Diego.

The club has helped with foster care events, wrapped and sent presents to more than 100 foster children, assisted adult foster children in moving into their own houses, and even created a website to better work with foster care organizations.

“Basically, we set up this little program on a web application where we accept gift requests for the kids...and we give them the gifts through the club funds that we have,” she said. “It personalizes it because they can say their age and their interests so we get them a specific gift, not something generic, but something that is catered to their interests.”

In working with foster children specifically, the identities and information of many children are blocked for privacy reasons, which can make it hard to work closely with organizations and children. So far Okolo has only been able to meet former foster children, and a few younger children in-person.

“We’re not allowed to meet the kids often,” she said. “The little kids we have met were because we’d already been working with the organization for a year and then they finally allowed us to meet them. ” Although Okolo is looking to work more intimately with foster children through initiatives such as tutoring programs, she is first aiming to build

trusting relationships with organizations like Voices for Children and Angels Foster Family Network in order to widen the club’s range of abilities.

“A lot of it was building trust,” Okolo said. “We really wanted to have a direct impact on the kids, but at the same time we understand the privacy policies, and that was one of the biggest struggles.”

Since the club has only been operating for one year, many organizations are wary of working with them. Okolo knows building trust with the organizations will take time and patience, a process that will continue after Okolo leaves for college.

Even though Okolo doesn’t get to meet the foster children very often, the few she has met, including the girl she face-painted, remind her of the real and positive impact the club makes on them. “[The girl] was just having a lot of fun, and I feel like that impacted me because a lot of people think of foster kids as sad children,” Okolo said. “They do go through hardships, but in the end they’re just like the rest of us and they all want love and care.”

Through starting foster work in her own community, Okolo has gained a deeper understanding and respect for her grandmother.

“I’ve known that [my grandmother] has given back to people but I didn’t quite understand why,” Okolo said. “I now understand the feeling of giving back to others is greater than any of the struggles you face in life. It shows a lot about [my grandmother] and who she was as a person; that’s how I hope to be too.”

Courtesy of Anne Le

Nene Okolo (12) mixes face paints together for a charity event, Oct. 27. The event was for her club, Foster Friends.

A-MEER ANALYSIS

The Sisterhood of the Traveling Kanye Shirts Last week I stood on the edge of the front row of the bleachers, sandwiched between nine people dressed just like me, waiting for a drone flying overhead to capture a picture that will forever immortalize the class of 2019.

My friends had decided, in the spirit of solidarity, that we would all wear the same thing: light wash jeans, and on top, short-sleeved white t-shirts, custom-printed with the cover art of Kanye West’s 2011 album, “Graduation.”

As we stood in a line, watching the rest of our class— in their matching shirts—file into their places, the shirts felt like a label, a self-imposed kind of branding, something that seemed to scream to the rest of the world, I’m with them.

I thought about the people I was standing next to, thought about how I’ve slept in the same bed as them, cooked with them, cried with them, travelled across the state and tempted fate with them. I thought about how attached to them I was, how attached I was to the idea of a friend group as close as ours.

Our sense of security, place, belonging in the world,

comes from our involvement in groups.

A 2014 study published in the Journal of Consumer Research shows that friend groups provide moral support when making decisions.

Friend groups, with their insatiable thirst for photographs, neverending sleepovers, and even their matching Kanye shirts, make us feel supported and valued.

For teenagers, uncertain and unpredictable by definition, friend groups also help us to establish an identity for ourselves.

But, as I thought to myself on those bleachers, when contact becomes excessive, is it possible for a friend group to navigate the line between “close” and “cultish”?

Friends can begin to dictate lifestyle choices.

In any given week, my friends dictate my diet. On Tuesdays, it’ll be sushi or ramen or something else that requires me to demonstrate my abysmal use of chopsticks.

Throughout the week I’ll start my mornings with kombucha, almond milk coffee, or recently, Yerba Mate. We’ll close out the week with Board and Brew

for lunch on Friday, Chick-fil-A fries at night, and maybe Ding Tea on Saturdays.

And, while we’re all eating the same food, we’ll be dressed in similar ways too—dark green crewnecks, slip-on vans, overpriced scrunchies and nearly identical glasses.

We’ll be in the same place too, always, the tensquare foot corner of the hallway that’s connected to L-104, one of us sprawled across the floor, while the rest crowd around, before school, during Wolverine Time, at lunch.

But influencing where and what you eat and what you look like is one thing.

Friends change the way we look at the world, what we choose to believe, who and what we worship. And the effect, that dictatorial power over our minds, only multiplies in groups. My friends all quote Kanye and Harry Potter like it’s scripture, affirm that Sheck Wes, at least for a time, is a musical genius, and that John Denver’s “Take Me Home, Country Roads,” is a work of art.

We unconsciously exclude people who just aren’t

Ameera Kumar like us, people who aren’t in the same classes, extracurriculars, or who can’t comprehend the shortcomings of low-rise jeans, and in the process, isolate ourselves even further.

We become so insular that it becomes easy to forget that there’s an entire school, an entire world out there outside of just us.

If I can so easily recognize all the bad parts, all the darker sides of having a parochial family that borders on controlling and masquerades as a friend group, why do I, why do all of us, stay with them?

I think the defining characteristic, between group or gang, clique or cult, is whether the good outweighs the bad. Whether you let your friends influence your tastes, or allow them to define you completely. Whether you spend every waking moment with them by choice or by obligation.

Because at the end of the day, we need them.

Because when the world comes crumbling down around us and we’re left wading through the rubble, they alone are there for us, boba and waffle fries in hand.

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6 Features

Nov. 16, 2018

A look at parkour: the art of movement Nathan Holden (11) performs parkour moves: the side-flip, the wall-run, and the concrete step handspring.

Tiffany Le

Editor in Chief

The Side-Flip

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1. Holden runs and gather steps for the side-flip. One foot faces for ward and the other sideways, so he can effectively run forward while increasing the sideflip rotation.

2. He launches himself up and out ward.

3. Bringing his legs in closer to chest, he brings himself into a tucking position.

4. After rotating around, Holden lands on his legs.

4

1

The Wall-Run 1. Holden begins by running full speed a far distance from the wall.

2. He proceeds to take a big step and kick up the wall, a cruicial step in giving height to the run.

3. On the wall, Holden pushes his body towards the direction of the wall, mak ing sure that his feet push out. This combination gives him more power and steps, allowing him to reach a greater height on the wall.

4. Holden lands on the ground with bent knees.

2 3

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The Concrete Step Handspring

1 2

3 4

1. Planting his hands on the ledge, Holden executes a forward front handspring.

2. Landing on the ledge, he prepares to jump of the ledge by bending his arms.

3. Using his upper body strength to get himself over, he uses a fling ing motion to create forward rotation.

Nathan Holden (11) always wanted to fly. And so, after months and months of practice, he did.

In the short moments he is off the ground while he performs parkour flips, Holden said he can feel his body simultaneously gliding and moving with and against the air.

“After a while, you get used to twisting,” he said. “You get used to feeling almost like you’re outside of yourself for a few seconds.”

Holden’s interest in parkour began in elementary school when he was playing tag.

As he ran towards a bench and sprang off it, he noticed his ability to jump higher and farther than others. Holden described the experience of being in the air for a few seconds similar to what he believes flying would feel like.

“You can see the world around you rotating and you can feel a lot more wind around you,” Holden said. “You feel like you’re twisting, like you’re spinning, like you’re almost not present for a few seconds.”

His freshman year, Holden decided to pursue amateur parkouring after stumbling across parkour stunting videos on YouTube.

Mesmerized, Holden kept clicking on clip after clip, watching people accomplish flips off ledges, over pools, and past rows of recycle bins lined up side by side. Holden said he noticed how some of the videos had millions of views, reassuring Holden that parkour was something worthwhile to learn because of the community behind it.

“Just the way they maneuvered and the way their costumes looked with [their tricks],” Holden said. “It looked very fashionable, but it also looked really cool. It was almost like an art form in a video.”

Inspired by this, Holden bought a red superhero costume and began wearing it to school last year and attempted to perform parkour moves on campus.

Though Holden said he is not a professional at what he does, his accomplishments are still a great feat.

“I was always in some ways the laughing stock,” Holden said.

“At first, I started off as the joke, the person who couldn’t land a front flip or landed on my behind, the person who started off as that cringy kid. But I got good enough to where other people weren’t making fun of me anymore. They realized this kid actually can do stuff, maybe not professionally but most people aren’t going to go around and do a front flip.”

Despite how much or how little Holden was teased for his performances, he kept at it.

Through trial and error, Holden slowly but surely began learning more and more tricks. Three tricks he commonly implements into his runs include front-flips, side-flips and wall-runs. So far, he said he believes that the a wall-run has been the most difficult trick he’s mastered.

“Wall-running wasn’t natural to do,” he said. “Eventually, I learned how to do [it] in multiple steps. I would literally take three steps up [the wall], and I would run.”

Holden also accredited shoewear as one of the factors that contribute to successfully completing a wall-run. Rather than wearing vans or flats or boots, Holden recommends running shoes as they provide the most traction on the sole.

“I had to apply technique [to each trick], and there were so many things involved: physics, gravity, traction,” he said.

And because everything that goes up must come down, Holden is no stranger to the ground.

Landing a trick every time is nearly impossible, but Holden has been cautious about never putting himself in scenarios were he could seriously injure himself.

“People need to understand their pain tolerance level,” Holden said. “There’s fear and there’s a lot of second-guessing. You don’t want to second guess something you know you can do.”

Overcoming physical barriers is only half of the battle, however.

Holden said that parkour helped him overcome mental obstacles and change his perspective on anything and everything he does in his day to day life.

“A lot of [parkour is] relevant not only to my fitness, but to my mental stability,” he said. “It changed the way I saw the world and my surroundings.”

Holden said parkour has helped him overcome fear in general and learn how to fully commit to anything he decides to put his mind to.

“I don't like the idea of how gravity has limited people,” he said.

“In parkour, I can take that and turn it into defying gravity.I can take all of these powers, skills, and apply them to really doing something that you wouldn’t think should be possible.”

Design by Julie Zhu , Photos by Rohin Awasthi

Junaid learns new languages, adapts to foreign countries From Refugee, page 1

Shortly after arriving, Junaid’s dad had a second heart attack and was unable to continue working for the family.

“He wanted to work but I wouldn’t let him,” Junaid said. “I told him, ‘That’s enough, you work too hard.

It’s my turn.’”

While his father rested, Junaid and his mom worked 14 grueling hours every day, stitching clothes. According to Junaid, the Turkish owners were also generally hostile towards Syrian immigrants.

“Some Turkish people didn’t treat Syrian refugees very well,” Junaid said. “The Turkish people said things like, ‘They are taking our job[s],’ and stuff like that.”

On one particular day at work, Junaid severely burned himself on

his back after falling onto an ironing board.

“I dropped something and when I went to pick it up, I stood up and hit my back against the board,” Junaid said. “It was so painful.”

Instead of sending him to the hospital or providing any sort of treatment for his burns, he was given ice and allowed to take an hour nap.

After months of working in Turkey, Junaid began to adapt to the way of life there. He started learning the language from reading signs and talking to the other workers in the factory. Pretty soon, he was completely fluent in Turkish.

“After two years, I learned the Turkish language really well,” Junaid said. “To this day, I still know how to read and write in Turkish. I never went to school to learn it but I guess picked it up by speaking to

the other people and seeing writing “We wrote our name on the list,” everywhere.”

Junaid said. “Within that year, they After three years and becoming called us three times just to talk to us more familiar with the Turkish lan- about our situation.” guage, Junaid went out searching for Then, in 2016, Junaid’s dad had a a job, one with a less dangerous work third heart attack, and it appeared as environment. though he would need surgery.

He found a new clothing facto“My dad had another heart attack ry for his mom and him to work at back in Syria," Junaid said. “He went where the pay was better and the to the hospital and all my neighbors ownes were friendly. came to the Hospital, and my mom “I found a was so upset. new factory We cried. My owner who told mom didn’t eat I’ve had bad things me to come for three days.” work for him,” happen to me in the past but Junaid’s famJunaid said. I’m here and I’m moving on.” ily called the “He was so program again, good to me and —Junaid* asking whethmy mom. All er they should of the workers wait for help or there were like have the surgery family. I finally felt welcomed.” done there. As they held their breath, While life for Junaid started to be- they finallygot a call two weeks later. come more normal, it was still dif- They were told that they had a plane ficult: long hours of work with little to the U.S. waiting for them. pay. The only thing Junaid wanted The next morning, Junaid and his was to be able to go back to school family walked out the door of their and learn again. home and left their lives behind.

Then, one day, Junaid received “We were all so happy,” Junaid amazing news. Junaid’s uncle called said. “I can’t even describe how hapexplaining that there was a group py we felt.” that was helping to send people in Junaid and his family arrived in need of help to the United States. Ju- El Cajon in 2016. He and his faminaid and his family registered to be ly have adjusted well to the cultural flown to the U.S. transition.

However, it took a long time beJunaid had been learning English fore anything came of it. ever since he was 5 and found him-

“

self becoming more adjusted to life in San Diego.

After everything started to become more normal, he grew interested in new activities such as volleyball.

He joined the team at his local high school in El Cajon.His family moved down to the PQ area and he transferred to Westview last year as a junior.

However, he still misses the life he led back in his hometown of Afrin.

In January 2018, Junaid received unsettling news. Turkey had invaded Afrin, killing thousands of Kurdish people, including children.

“They just took Afrin,” Junaid said. “They killed a bunch of people and kids and then just took our home.”

Junaid and his family joined a protest group in Los Angeles that protested Turkey’s actions in Syria.

Kurdish people around the world condemned Turkey’s actions. However, the city remains in Turkish control today, and the Kurdish people living there are under constant threat.

“We wanted to send a message to Turkey as well as the people in the U.S. about about what Turkey is doing in Afrin and how we can help them,” Junaid said.

In order to help his extended family and the people of Syria, Junaid continues to send money to his relatives who are still living in Syria to provide aid to them and the people.

“We send money to my aunts and uncles there in order for them to buy medicine for the people in their area and help get people out of Afrin,” Junaid said. “My grandparents and family moved to Aleppo, which isn’t the safest place but it’s much better than Afrin right now.”

While his family remains in a precarious situation, life for Junaid is starting to return to normal.

He said that the most important thing for his sisters and him right now is to focus on studying and learning, something they haven't done in over five years.

“First thing to think about is the future of me and my sisters,” Junaid said. “First thing we are going to do is study and do our work. That’s all.

And just live. Maybe one day we will go back, but I don’t know if we ever will be able to. My Grandad, my aunt, they are all still there. It’s too hard to get them out of there. It’s impossible. But we are sending money for them and talking to them every week.”

While he has lost the place he calls home, Junaid now hopes to find a new one in San Diego. He wants to move on from his past and simply live again.

“I’ve had bad things happen to me in the past but I’m here and I’m moving on,” he said. * Name has been changed

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Editors in Chief Andrea Chen* Tiffany Le* News Editor Kevin Lu* Features Editor Lydia Zhang* Opinions Editor Lina Lew* Sports Editor Mark Troftgruben Final Focus Editor Devanshi Tomar* Photo Editor Jessica Lin Managing Editor Evan Buckland* Staff Writers Sydney Alper Rohin Awasthi Alice Chen Alec Felderman Zara Irshad Rhea Jogadhenu Grace Kim* Ameera Kumar* Jocelyn Mi Kevin Pert* Isabelle Ritter* Alyssa Van Waas Michelle Wang* Deepali Yedulapuram Julie Zhu Adviser Jeff Wenger Assistant Adviser Stephanie Tanaka

To advertise in The Nexus, please call (858)-7802000, ext.3180 or email us at thewvnexus@gmail. com *Member of the Editorial Board

Staff Editorial

Nov. 16, 2018

Slang highkey defines generations, y’all

Tiffany Le

Editor In Chief What’s up fam, Did any of y’all ever realize that even though we all live in the same country, we don’t all speak the same language? And nah, I don’t mean that some of us speak English while others speak Spanish or Mandarin or Russian or whateva. Not on the same wavelength as me? Just spare me a quick sec and I’ll spill the tea for you.

You’ve probably already noticed that the language of this article is p colloquial compared to that of a typical article you’d see in a newspaper. If you’re a Generation Z (1995-2012) kid like me, it’s likely you had little to no trouble reading the first paragraph; you probably just grazed over my use of the words “fam,” “y’all,” “nah,” “wavelength,” “tea,” and “p.” But it’s probable that people in a generation different from ours had a harder time processing the same paragraph. Yeah, I used English, but some of the aforementioned words are not universally well-known. While the slang I’ve used thus far is quite self-explanatory, much of our “teen dictionary” is not. One search of “teen slang” on Google will result in pages and pages of links to “complete guides” and infographics on slang, “decoders” for parents, and “must know” phrases and words of Generation Z. Fascinated, I clicked on a couple of these sites and expectedly, they were just as cringe as their titles. Pages such as “Teen Speak Decoded: What Does ‘I’m Finna Dip Mean?’” and “Hey Bae! 10 Teen Slang Phrases That Are Super Popular” ofc are guides not made by actual teenagers, as so many of them lack accuracy. Netinsanity.net’s article, “Decoding Teen Slang,” for example, claims that “savage” is our generation’s “cool way to say cool.” This is highkey wrong, lol. They also state that “thicc” means “looking good in your skin no matter your size or shape.” Sorry to break it to you parents, but teenagers are not that wholesome, and instead pretty immature for that matter.

Truth is, most of our slang is either vulgar, inappropriate, or a noise we’ve managed to turn into a common word (such as “reee,” “yuuuh,” or “skrt skrt”). Other words or phrases (such as lowkey, straight fire, and lit) can serve the purpose of aiding us in expressing an emotion more emphatically.

We have the ability to create completely new

words or even recycle existing words but establish alternate definitions for them. However, for the most part, the majority of the words and phrases of our generation are used in a loose manner—frequently in an ironic sense. Obviously, whenever I say “kys” after my friend teases me, I don’t literally want that person to kill themselves. And contrary to the plethora of parent guides who believe that when I say “I’d smash” it means that I “want to have casual sex” with someone, I instead use that phrase as a way to emphasize whether or not I simply think someone is attractive.

Besides allowing us to be extra in our everyday conversations, slang serves as a way for us to communicate a concept or feeling in less words. It also gives us a way to establish a more chill and lax atmosphere that isn’t so rigid and formal like the accepted definitions of words in the English dictionary. Slang is a symbol of what is currently occurring in society. For example, the common use of the phrase “I’m ded” is representative of sarcastic and hyperbolic culture amongst teens.

In a scenario where I’m meeting another person of similar age, I’m more inclined to introduce myself with a “what’s up fam” and a casual fist bump as opposed to a “hello, my name is Tiffany; pleasure to meet you,” followed by a firm handshake.

This casual greeting immediately breaks down a wall of intimidation, and on a subconscious level, it helps form a friendlier relationship and a more comfortable environment.

Greetings are just one of the many parts of our everyday interactions that have been impacted by the evolution of slang. According to Oxford English Dictionary, slang is defined as “a type of language consisting of words and phrases that are regarded as very informal, are more common in speech than writing, and are typically restricted to a particular context or group of people.”

In society, people are grouped by time periods.

Each of these generations—the Baby Boomers, Generation X, Millennials—all have their own slang and catchphrases from their respective times.

The ’50s slang consisted of words such as “boss” (great) and “frosted” (angry) and the ’90s had “mad” (very) and “phat” (exceptional).

Interestingly enough, some phrases that the current youth use are borrowed from previous generations. For one, “let’s get this bread” rose in popularity last month. The general definition of this phrase

is to succeed. During the ’50s, the word “bread” was similarly a slang word meaning money. But the current use of the word has a much looser for interpretation. I could use the phrase “let’s get this bread” as I host a fundraiser, as I am cheering for a team at a sports game, or even before I take a test.

Luckily, journalist and nonfiction novelist Max Decharne comes in clutch in regards to the explainging the psychology behind slang. In his book, “Vulgar Tongues: An Alternative History of English Slang,” Decharne wrote, “much slang starts out as a kind of low-level guerilla warfare directed at straight society, designed to keep out the squares, or annoy them, or both, and is then abandoned by the group which originated it once the words have become common currency.”

Simply put, Decharne is saying that slang is developed within each generation when individuals foster a desire to separate themselves from the mainstream. Just as this generation’s music tastes, clothing styles, and lifestyles are unique compared to previous decades, so is the language we speak.

Language is not stagnant. It is edited, created, and experimented with. Slang plays a major role in identifying one generation from another. It’s an opportunity for individuals to recreate the way we communicate with one another. Idk about you guys, but tbh I think that’s pretty woke. So continue using “bougie” and “yeet” and “Gucci”! Our slang should unapologetically be a part of us.

I’m finna dip.

Your sis, Tiff :’) P.S. If you managed to read all the way to this point of my article, you’re the GOAT.

California’s new sex-ed curriculum proves lacking, requires Improved music copyright laws benefit artists continued reform Alec Felderman Staff Writer

In 2015, California passed legislation reforming the sexual education curriculum taught in public schools. The California Healthy Youth Act, which took effect Jan. 1, 2016, required schools to implement a more comprehensive, accurate sex-ed ranging from a more thorough conversation of contraceptive methods to unintended pregnancy, as well as discussion of HIV and the prevention of other STDS. It’s commendable that California has taken strides to improve a once vague, and frankly, lacking, sex-ed curriculum. California was one of the first to disband an outdated abstinence-only sex-ed in favor of the curriculum currently mandated by the California Healthy Youth Act. It’s also one of only eight states that requires mentioning of consent or sexual assault and one of only 24 states that even requires sex-ed in public schools at all.

By law, the Poway Unified School District must abide by the education standards set forth in the California Healthy Youth Act, and it has. Positive Prevention PLUS is a curriculum written in compliance with such state standards, and it’s currently being taught in the health segment of freshman ENS 1-2 classes.

But in an era where the #MeToo movement and other events prompting discussion on appropriate sexual behavior exist, even the most up to date sex-ed reform isn’t adequate enough to abide by standards of sexual behavior set by our society. In order to effectively discourage the sexual violence committed by adults that the #MeToo movement addresses, we need to start at the root of the issue: sexual education.

In seventh grade, sex-ed is introduced as part of the unit on the reproductive system in the life science course where students are taught the basics about puberty and sexual intercourse. Then in high school, specifically at Westview, sex-ed is taught freshman year, and only freshman year. According to research done by the Center for Disease Control and Prevention, 46 percent of 12th-graders reported to being sexually active compared to a 15.7 percent of ninth-graders.

In light of these statistics, students would benefit from being taught an additional updated and in-depth curriculum senior year when the material is more relevant and applicable.

The amount of topics currently discussed in the classroom should also be broadened. The sex-ed curriculum should be more inclusive to non-heterosexual groups. Without being properly informed, non-heterosexual students could be left in the dark about the potential risks of their own sexual activity.

Topics such as sexualtiy, sexual harassment, and the promotion of healthy sexual relationships should also be added to the curriculum. In addition, far more extensive teachings on consent and sexual abuse should be taught starting from an early age and continuing throughout middle and high school, mirroring consent courses that are taught on college campuses. The education would be tailored appropriately to its corresponding age group, but would ensure that the fundamental values regarding these issues are reinforced across all age groups.

Adolescents can gain information on these topics from a variety of sources: family, friends, media, medical professionals, the internet, but this information isn’t always accurate. The most accessible and most effective way to educate students would be through the public school system.

Sex-ed needs to be addressed at an earlier age, continually addressed into older adolescence, and overall should be presented in a more extensive, thorough manner in order to properly combat the sexual misconduct and behavior issues that occur in our society.

The Nexus Mission Statement The Nexus is an open forum for student expression that aims to provide information to the public, following ethical standards of accuracy, truthfulness, and professionalism. The Nexus aspires to be a source of news, opinions and entertainment for its readers while showing enthusiasm through in depth coverage. In reporting information, writers strive for impartiality by presenting multiple viewpoints on issues.

When opinions of an individual are expressed, they are labeled accordingly. Members of the editorial board write and select the staff editorial.

The Nexus is published by Journalism 2 students, and as the official student newspaper of Westview High School, it strives to maintain the open flow of communication fostered at school. All editorial decisions are made by members of staff, with guidance of advisor Jeff Wenger. The opinions published in The Nexus do not necessary represent those of Westview administration, Westview staff, or PUSD school board. Letters to the editor must be signed, as they represent the opinion of the individual. The editors select submissions for print based on relevancy to readers, and they may be edited for space or content reasons.

A great improvement occurred in the music industry when President Trump signed the Modernization of Music Act into law, Oct. 11. The act brings in a few key changes to the copyright laws previously established for the music industry, making songwriting and performing music an easier job for people to pursue.

The music industry has changed very little since the first copyright laws more than 100 years ago, but with the rise of streaming companies, artists have struggled in the face of an outdated policy.

One of the effects of not updating the copyright laws is dealing with a process called Bulk Notice of Intent (NOI). A NOI is a process artists or publishers go through when they want to distribute or record a songwriter’s work. This is important because it is required by law that the publisher or artist obtain a mechanical license, which allows for the license holder to publish copyrighted music from the original rights holder—in this case the songwriter.

However, a loophole exists in the NOI process where all a publisher has to do is to send in an NOI to obtain a “compulsory” mechanical license, which in turn allows the publisher to use the songwriter’s work without

their consent. With the license, the company or publisher pays a royalty fee around nine cents, which goes to the songwriter or owner of the work.

To make sure the money is sent to the correct person, the publisher or company searches for the ownership information, but this is where things usually go south for the songwriter.

The law states that a company must look for the information, not find it. This leads to companies sending in “address unknown forms” to the copyright office. When this happens, companies can still take full advantage of the copyrighted music without paying the songwriter, all because they “couldn’t find them.”

On top of this, artists and songwriters who created music before 1972 are no longer paid royalties due to them not being under the federal copyright protection. In both of these cases, songwriters and artists are being cheated out of lots of money.

Typically, each mechanical royalty is worth 9.1 cents per copy. It doesn’t seem like a lot, but it compounds exponentially when multiple companies publish millions of copies of the work, resulting in thousands or millions of dollars.

When companies “look” for song ownership information and claim that there isn’t any information, it is not only dishonest and greedy, but also exacerbates the challenges artists al-

ready battle in trying to earn a living at their craft. If the songwriter or artist can’t get paid regularly for their work, paying for basic living expenses becomes increasingly difficult until they are forced to take on another job to make enough money to live or give up to find a more stable career.

This economic pressure can affect artists and songwriters by influencing them to go more for quantity rather than quality, promoting the mindset that if they get enough works published, they can at least land enough to make a living. This should not have to be what artists and songwriters deal with, and thankfully the Modernization of Music Act helps address these issues.

The act sets up three key components to making sure artists get paid.

First, a database funded by the government and streaming companies (Spotify, Pandora, Apple Music, etc.), will be created to centralize all of the available songwriting ownership information. This will allow companies to know exactly who should be getting paid for what. It also prevents companies from saying they “couldn’t find an owner” to a work, because it’s all in one place.

The act also sets up a Mechanical Licensing Collective, which is in charge of building and maintaining the database, along with distributing royalties and identifying rights

holders. Once the database is created, the collective will then open it to the public, allowing for discrepancies in the ownership information to be found by users and later addressed by the collective.

Finally, the act completely eliminates the NOI process and restores royalty payments to artists who created music before 1972, ensuring that artists who were not getting paid beforehand will be rightfully paid now.

The MMA is great for the entire music industry. Updating the copyright laws will create a more protected environment for song writers and artists to create music, especially new individuals entering the field. This should encourage a greater influx of artists, which will stimulate further variety in the industry. Some may argue that creativity will be limited, as artists will have to pay royalties if they want to use beats from songs before 1972, as seen in various rap songs. But if anything, preventing artists from using those beats without a fee should promote more creativity, influencing artists to create their own beats for their songs.

With the Modernization of Music Act passing into law, the changes to the copyright laws and the streamlining of ownership information should provide a better environment for new and veteran artists alike to continue their craft.

Hello darkness, my old friend: why stars and galaxies must outshine our artificially lit world Lydia Zhang Features Editor

Big urban cities like New York, Chicago, and L.A. are romanticized in the hearts of dreamers across the country. The skylines ablaze with fluorescent city lights and bustling, never-ending nightlife are magnetizing attractions. It’s an appealing picture, but a deeper issue lies underneath.

In a world constantly illuminated by light—both natural and artificial—light itself blinds us to the natural beauty that is the dark, starry, night sky.

For thousands of years, humans have used the sun as a measure of time—they awakened as the sun rose, and slept as the sun set. The discovery of fire caused a dramatic shift in human lifestyle, as it allowed our ancestors to cook food, stay warm, hunt more efficiently—and harness light.

As we’ve advanced technologically, we’ve found more efficient, more innovative ways to control light ranging from torches and candles to Edison’s electric light bulb in 1897, incandescent bulbs in 1904, and finally the LED light in the 1960s, which is what is most commonly used today. This has allowed us to be more productive and work longer.

The invention of the LED light has made it easier and more cost-effective than ever for countries to illuminate their nations. LED lights are much brighter than incandescent bulbs and require less energy, which allows for cheaper full illumination.

But as we continue urban expansion into formerly barren countryside, light pollution—the artificial brightening of the night sky through manmade light sources—spreads with it. NASA satellite photos from 2016 show a world seemingly covered

by a blanket of light that only continues to spread in brightness as a result of a 2.2 percent worldly annual increase in artificial light.

The harnessing of artificial light is a recent phenomenon in the grand scheme of things, but it’s already drastically affected our circadian rhythms.

Life is genetically coded to follow the cycle of day and night, but we’ve disrupted the natural balance by clogging up the night sky with artificial lighting.

According to National Geographic, nature is suffering the consequences. Nocturnal animals are especially struggling. Artificial light can cause birds that migrate or hunt during the dark hours of the night to veer off course and dangerously collide with buildings and other hazardous obstacles.

Millions of turtle hatchlings die every year from because they follow the lights from civilization instead of following the light of the ocean horizon that’s naturally supposed to guide them back to the sea.

Galileo, a pioneer astronomer, first observed that the Milky Way Galaxy was comprised of individual stars, and not the “milky” substance that people assumed at the time. Over the centuries, the galaxy has become ubiquitous with star-gazing in our culture.

Admittedly, I’ve never had the chance to see the Milky Way; it’s but a cosmic myth to 80 percent of Americans and one-third of humans. The widespread inability to see it isn’t

because the stars are less bright than they were in Galileo's time, but instead due to the vast amount of artificial light blocking the galaxy’s visibility.

This is a reflection of the drastic impact artificial light has made on the stars and constellations that have been a characterization of the night sky that life has known for millennia.

A potential reasoning for our compulsive need for constant illumination stems from our inherent fear of the dark. We switch our lights instantly as soon as the sun sets like it’s instinct, we bask in the light of our monitors. We villainize darkness in music, literature, film, we hide underneath our covers in fear of the monsters that lurk in the dark as children (and even as adults).

But in a world distinguished by constant noise, the peace, tranquility and quiet that comes with darkness is something to be cherished.

Nexus

Opinions 9

the

Nov. 16, 2018

Every breath you take, every hill you hike, I'll be eavesdropping (but not creepily!)

Grace Kim Staff Writer

The hill is not just any hill. It’s the hill I walk up every day after school, my back aching and legs struggling to overcome the last yellow speed bump.

It’s the hill that seems like a terrible hike I am forced to trudge up to reach the comforts of my bed. Compared to the other hills near Westview, it’s arguably the worst.

One hand carries my Hydro Flask, which continuously bangs against my leg while my other hand holds my Calculus textbook, slowly slipping from my grasp.

Ignoring the daily sweat and pain on the way home, I distract myself with the dozens of other students around me. In other words, strangers.

I notice the blond, curly-haired boy with glasses on the tip of his nose, wearing a pair of brown and blue checkered shorts.

In front of me, a girl’s $5.50 plush keychain, which I’m pretty sure is from Tokyo Central, swings to the rhythm of her steps.

When I begin to notice the people around me, I find myself settling into the routine of this hike. It’s as if I know what time it is without needing to look

down at my phone because the same people always walk together around the same time every day.

I don’t mean to eavesdrop on their conversations, but I can’t help it because the only other thing I can hear is my wheezing.

So, I focus on their words. It’s almost as if I’m walking beside a radio. Sometimes their conversations entertain me, and I quickly stifle a chuckle before I get a stare. Other times I stay quiet, sympathizing with them and refraining blurting out advice. Though they may not know it, I too am their audience.

One day, I was walking up the hill and found myself behind a daughter and her mom, gray hair wrapped in a bun.

I quickly picked up on their language: Korean.

Fighting through the heat, the mom tried to engage her daughter in a conversation, but was only replied to with a heavy “yeah.”

“Isn’t it hot today?”

“Yeah.”

“Aren’t your pants too long on you?”

“Yeah.”

Hopeless, the mom stopped talking and they walked up in silence with their steps in sync.

Walking behind them, I secretly wished the mom would bring up another topic and start talking again.

But there was only the quiet crunch of their shoes on the gravel. I sighed and wondered if I too, seemed so detached during my conversations with my mom.

The next day I was surprised and delighted to come upon the daughter and the mom from the day before. Once again, the mom’s hair was tied in a bun. This time, I was in front of them, but in my mind I was counting my steps so I wouldn’t be too ahead.

Even though the previous day yielded little, I still felt drawn to their conversation.

“So today I taught these kids fractions, and they just couldn’t understand it!” the mom exclaimed.

“Really?”

“I didn’t even know what to say, how do you explain fractions?”

“I don’t know, fractions are fractions.”

I was happy to hear something more than “yeahs” from the daughter. They were engaging in a real conversation now. I looked forward to what they would talk about the next day.

In a sense, listening to people talking makes me feel like a part of something. It’s something secretive and special, which makes it all the more fun to listen to.

This feeling of anticipation is what drives other people to eavesdrop because they know they will be greeted with interesting information. John Locke, a professor of language science, says that eavesdropping allows eavesdroppers to behave accordingly depending on their surroundings and what they hear.

On days when I don’t see the daughter and her mom with the gray hair tied in a bun walking together, I turn my attention to a teenage couple who always walk up the hill together.

They both usually wear dark jackets and carry their lunch bags.

I’ve noticed that most of their conversation seems to revolve around grades. I walk alongside them a few days a week but as I do, I have come to realize that I felt their stress.

Their conversations about being only 0.4 away from an A caused a shiver to run through my body.

Wasn’t that basically me? I was someone who could relate to the their feelings in those situations.

After days of listening to other people and thinking on my own, I’ve realized that walking up the hill isn’t so tedious after all.

My eyes—and my ears—opened up to the people around me and their conversations. As I hear snippets of conversation, I feel like I’m getting to know these people who hike the hike I hike.

When I see someone at school whom I’ve listened to as they walk up the hill, I feel compelled to ask about what happened to their project or if they made up and were friends again, or to say just a simple “hi.”

But then I remember that I’ve never really talked to this person before, and I force myself to walk away.

Some find it creepy and kind of concerning that other people like me might be listening to their conversations.

But from my days on the hill I’ve learned that we humans have all eavesdropped on conversations before, intentionally or unintentionally.

Drug addicts deserve empathy, support instead of villainization Lina Lew

Opinions Editor I recently watched A Beautiful Boy, a painfully realistic portrayal of an 18-year-old battling a serious meth addiction. Not only was the movie raw and captivating, but it also made me consider an unjust, almost ironic side of drug use—that is, while drug use is often glorified in teen culture, heavy drug users themselves are judged by society instead of receiving the sympathy and support they need to overcome their addiction.

Some teenagers are willing to try drugs for the first time to relish in the anticipated highs of illegal experimentation and brief ecstasy. Too often, they aren’t looked down upon for using drugs. Instead, they are encouraged by their drug-friendly peers and reinforced by the media and many popular rap songs that normalize the use of drugs.

Others are drawn to drugs as a coping mechanism, a way to numb themselves from reality.

But no matter the reason, drug use can easily become a slippery slope, turning into an uncontrollable and ruinous addiction.

A popular misconception about drug use is that the user willingly takes them every time due to sheer lack of willpower. But most also fail to acknowledge that when it becomes a habit, it’s no longer a choice—drug addiction is a neurological disorder that takes control of its user and physically alters the way their brain makes judgements. The addictive qualities of drugs are rooted in a dependence for dopamine production, which reinforces the connection between the consumption of the drug

and the resulting surge of euphoria.

Drug users are dominated every day by an overwhelming biological need to reinforce their drug use in exponentially greater doses, forcing them into a toxic drug-use cycle which is inescapable through mere willpower. And sadly, this cycle inevitably beats the 70,000 people who die of overdose every year, according to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention.

This epidemic is still treatable, however. The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services has proven that drug treatment works, is affordable, and can help end the vicious cycle of drug abuse.

Yet, despite our national attempt to fight the war on drugs, the 20 million Americans currently suffering from substance abuse disorders are still widely judged by the public, whose attitude toward drug users proves to be dismissive and unforgiving.

According to surveys by the Johns Hopkins University Department of Public Health, the general public opposes policies that support insurance, housing and employment of drug users.

The criminal justice system follows suit by focusing on funding direct punishment as opposed to reformative programs for drug users. According to the National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse, out of 2.3 million people currently incarcerated, 65 percent have a substance abuse disorder, but only a mere 11 percent received treatment.

Whether it’s because of lack of effort or knowledge, the funding of treatment programs fall short because the public mischaracterizes addiction as a lack of moral principle or lack of will, or believe it’s simply not worth the time and

money it takes to save these immoral lost causes.

These are victims of a neurological disorder, and yet most people are indifferent toward these ‘junkies’ and ‘crackheads’ because they believe that addicts are to blame for their own ‘self-imposed’ downfall.

But most people don’t realize that addicts are not inherently bad people.

The resulting addiction has nothing to do with morals or character—it is a purely physical disease that takes over people’s judgement and decision-making abilities, rendering them helpless against the powers of drugs.

If addicts had the choice, they would not deliberately choose to suffer every day from the physical and emotional demands of drugs. It's not the addict’s fault when their lives are debilitated and their minds are incapable of thinking reasonably, and they shouldn't be blamed for such uncontrollable consequences.

Drug addiction is scary, but we can’t forget that these are real people who’ve fallen down the wrong path and need help from a substance that has taken over their lives.

Overcoming drug abuse is an ongoing, complex and mentally draining journey that requires patience, endurance, and most importantly, support from family, friends, and the general public.

So in order to start effectively helping these people who can’t help themselves, we need to put aside our judgments and approach them with acceptance and sympathy.

We need to remember that we’re fighting the war on drugs, not the war on drug users.

Made in Ameerica by Ameera Kumar

One day Rita’s was there, and the next, it wasn’t. I, and the rest of PQ, got ghosted.

-Lydia Zhang Senior shirts really show you where people’s loyalties lie. I’ve never seen people so offended that their friend wore matching hot pink shirts with someone else.

-Michelle Wang You may wonder what Indians do on Thanksgiving. Sometimes I do too.

-Devanshi Tomar This Thanksgiving season, I’m grateful for FAFSA’s generous zero-dollar donation. It feels so nice to be spoiled!

-Lina Lew Black Friday: the day when my mom wakes me up at 6 a.m. to go towel shopping at Kohl’s.

-Zara Irshad To submit a Praise or Folly, message us through Twitter, log onto our website at www.wvnexus.org, or drop your submission off in room L-104. Include your name, grade level, and phone number. The Nexus will decide which submissions to print based on quality of writing and value to readers. They may be edited for space or content reasons.

"Pink Wave" of women joining Congress, state legislature: more like a ripple than a tsunami Devanshi Tomar

cy-making body,” she said.

If the women who hold office today hope to make Final Focus Editor change for the underrepresented, further glass ceilAbout 500 women ran for government positions ings must be broken. This change has begun with in this month’s midterm elections, setting records for what Forbes refers to as a “shift in the paradigm females in politics, and signifies a step in the right of a typical political candidate”—white and male. direction for equal representation in our nation’s gov- Some of this year’s new and returning members of ernment.

Congress, senators, and representatives represent a Many attribute the surge in female candidates, broad range of Americans: females, people of color, which many refer to as the “pink wave”, to disap- LGBTQ, and more. But even with the newly elected pointment with the elections in 2016 and the hearings representatives, 97 percent of Republican officials of Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh, whose and 79 percent of Democratic officials in all branches views on women’s health and rights invokes concern of our government are still male and white. and fear for many. The women currently occupying Only 31 percent of Americans are white males, seats in Congress indicate transformative leadership according to the Reflective Democracy Campaign, for the country’s future and can however, the men of this deinstigate faster reform to outdated mographic still occupy the malaws.

While this year’s mid- jority of positions of power in While this year’s midterm eleclegislature and justice. tions are indicative of progress, term elections are indicative According to the Women room for improvement remains of progress, room for improve- Donors Network, an organizafor the diversity of our represention that provides funding to ment remains for the diversity candidates who can increase tatives and senators.

In 1992, a similar “pink wave” of our representatives. diversity in politics, the lack of of women in office occurred, and diversity in politics can be asthat year’s midterm elections cribed to the status quo, but the sparked the term, “Year of The Woman,” after 24 problem is also systematic, and can only be changed women won election to the House of Representa- by a reform to campaign fund distribution. tives.

Many of the institutions who provide funding for But even then, only 10 percent of the Senate con- campaigns don’t recruit female candidates or those sisted of females, a marginal representation for 50 of color, making it all the more difficult to produce an percent of American citizens. Today, what has been effective campaign to compete with candidates who referred to as the “pink wave” by many has led to are more affluent or already have incumbency. more Senate seats occupied by women—but this is So, yes, if we wish for a truly equal government, still only 20 percent. Kelly Ditmar, political science and an equally represented America, there is work professor at Rutgers University, is unimpressed by yet to be done. We are making small steps toward this statistic in her tracking of this year’s elections. this goal. As more and more diverse candidates— “It should be seen as a problem, by any citizen in both male and female—campaign for positions in this country, that over 50 percent of the population our government, others will be inspired and progress is only holding 20 percent of seats in its major poli- towards equality will be reached.

“

Big Wang Theory by Michelle Wang

the

10 Opinions Nexus Nov. 16, 2018 Poll workers gain worthwhile insight on voting process Lina Lew

Lydia Zhang

Opinions Editor

Tiffany Le

Features Editor

As my day spanned 5:30 a.m. to 9 p.m., I gave out more than 400 ballots—a high voter turnout for a precinct buried in the depths of suburban San Diego. I wasn’t expecting a crowd of 15 people at 6:45 a.m., cameras ready to record the poll workers’ famous “Here ye! Here ye! The polls are now open!” chant, but the suburbs can surprise you. (I was later informed that the video was posted on Facebook.)

At 7 a.m. sharp, I was eager to start. I passed out many ballots to veteran voters who were familiar with the process, but I also met many newly minted voters, excited to finally participate in our democracy.

Initially, we had no issues, but soon both new and old voters encountered problems with the Vote by Mail system. Some couldn’t recall registering to be a mail voter, and others said they had never received the ballot in the mail. These people had to cast special provisional votes, which are not immediately counted that night, but further investigated by the Registrar of Voters, which could take weeks.

Almost everybody given a provisional ballot was skeptical about the process. Even after receiving her provisional ballot, a woman was so insistent on having her vote count that day that she left the precinct to try and find her mail-in ballot at home.

For her and many others, provisional ballots felt like an unimpactful way of voting, as most election results are announced the day after, even as provisional votes are still being counted.

Voters who were excited to have their voices matter asked questions about when, why, and how provisional ballots work.

The other poll workers and I looked at each other, our minds searching for an answer, but nothing came up. After all, our training only went over the process of pink provisional envelopes, not the specifics. So we could only give voters a vague and partial answer, telling them they could call the hotline after 30 days to see if their vote counted.

After many voters walked away, confused with their provisional votes, my precinct inspector told us it’s all about phrasing. We needed to start putting a positive spin on an otherwise concerning voting process. So, around noon, we stopped explaining the small details of provisional voting, and instead told them that all they had to do was sign this extra form and place their ballot into a special pink envelope.

For the most part, it worked. The voters didn’t ask questions, but the shortened explanation of provisional votes left a weird taste in my mouth, as if this shortcut was more for our benefit than the voters’. Despite five hours of training, I still felt that some of the information I should’ve known wasn’t there, and the questions people asked, and deserved to know, were left unanswered. From both my end and the voters’, there’s no telling if their efforts to vote made a difference in the election. Though many people got a chance to vote for the first time, others only got a partial taste when their votes were put aside in a provisional ballot envelope.

The experience was eye-opening, and something I’d love to do again, but I want to do the voters justice, equipped with the proper information. To know I volunteered my time to help others get a chance to vote is great, but to know that I wholly explained the provisional voting process, ensuring them an authentic voting experience, would be even greater.

Editor in Chief

The polling station I worked at was at an elementary school, smack in the epicenter of a high-income, Republican-dominated suburb, so these voters most likely voted red. In blue-dominated California, they were well aware of the little impact their votes would have on results. One man remarked as he handed in his ballot, “here’s my ballot, even if it won’t mean much.” The likelihood of any Republican candidate—including John Cox, the Republic candidate for governor from Rancho Santa Fe, which is near the precinct I worked for—was slim, but the residents presumably wanted their likely loss to be as close as possible; they weren’t going to simply surrender to the Democrats.

These elections instigated a clashing of tides, the fervor of the Republicans and the pushback from the Democrats. By being such a polarizing figure, President Trump has energized both parties (his supporters passionately supporting him and his opposers passionately opposing him) towards renewed participation in democracy. When the results were announced, both sides decisively came to the same conclusion: their respective party won the midterm elections. These midterms saw unprecedented turnout— this was the highest voter turnout the country has seen in the past 50 years.

This was noticeable. My precinct inspector even noted that our precinct probably had the highest voter turnout she had seen in years. I worked in one of many polling stations within a few-mile radius; the nearby high school also housed one, and there was even one in someone’s garage. I saw a general enthusiasm in the atmosphere: voters happily stuck on “I Voted” stickers, one lady kissed her ballot for good luck before putting it in the box, and a mom eagerly watched as her son casted his first ballot. As many voters excitedly told us, it was their first time voting in an election—some were driven by the tense political atmosphere, some had just turned 18 and were taking advantage of their newfound civic privileges, and one gentleman had recently become a U.S. citizen and was participating in our democratic elections for the first time.

Judging by Congress alone, there will most likely be even more friction between the two parties than there was before these midterms. But regardless, the passion fueling both parties has encouraged democratic participation in America that most generations haven’t seen before. It’s inspiring knowing that I was part of a precinct—a poll worker team comprised of two seniors originally there for an AP Gov requirement, an enthusiastic mom and her son who was just as enthusiastic, and an elderly gentleman working on his 20+ election—that witnessed a revival of American democracy.

My contribution was small. I collected ballots, handed out “I Voted” stickers, smiled and wished voters a nice day as they left. My precinct was one of many in the area, one of hundreds in San Diego, and one of tens of thousands in California; so yes, it was small in the grand scheme, but it was also an integral part of the democratic elections that make us who we are. Because, the beauty of democracy is that America is, essentially, just a couple of precincts added up together to make us whole.

School bathrooms: students’ worst nightmare, creepy crawlers’ dream Zara Irshad Staff Writer

Let’s get real: bathroom quality matters. It’s the one place that everyone has to go—and according to bladderandbowel.org, most of us go the bathroom up to seven times a day.

If we have to devote so much time in our lives to bathrooms, then they should at the very least be sanitary.

Sadly, over the course of my four years at Westview, I have found that this is not the case.

For the entirety of my freshman year, I refused to use the L-building and G-building bathrooms, disturbed by the extreme lack of toilet seat covers and bad plumbing.

Every day during lunch, I would trek up the stairs of the library just to use its bathroom. I eventually grew tired of this—after all, what was one to do when they needed to use the bathroom during class?

Having to walk all the way across campus just to use the bathroom was way too inconvenient.

Not to mention that teachers wouldn’t be happy with the amount of class time this would waste.

Now, I’m forced to brave the L-building bath-

room daily, as I lack the time and patience to trek across campus.

Every time I reach out and push open the bacteria-ridden door handle to get into the bathroom, I am immediately met with a gust of humidity and the stench of broken plumbing.

As I wait in line, my attention averts to the dull flickering overhead lighting fixtures, many of which are coated with dead insects. To my horror, when I attempt to walk into an empty stall, I discover that the toilet is extremely clogged; I then proceed to re-join the line.

After an eternity of waiting for one of the three functional stalls, it’s finally my turn. As I walk toward the stall, I make an effort to avoid the mysterious puddles on the floor, keeping in mind the student who dislocated her knee by slipping in them.

Upon entering the stall, I spot a few stray ants on the toilet seat, and shoo them away with a piece of rough, ultra-thin toilet paper. I then line the toilet seat copiously with the paper, making sure to cover every inch of the peeling and scratched plastic.

When I try to flush the toilet, it takes about a minute of slamming on the handle for it to work.

If I’m lucky, the water squirting from the toilet will miss.

Attempting to wash my hands, I find that the sink is clogged with trash and the soap dispenser is empty. Feeling rather defeated (and disgusted), I walk out of the bathroom with my head hung low, making a mental note to hold it until I get home next time.

Surely, if district officials have the time to search for people juuling in the bathrooms, they could recognize the importance of taking care of the bathrooms.

At this point, even the students in desperate need of their juuling fix are willing to take their chances elsewhere, too disgusted to continue juuling in the bathrooms.

To my surprise, whenever I’ve visited a neighboring high school, like Mt. Carmel or Rancho Bernardo, I have been pleasantly surprised by the

state of their bathrooms; with an abundance of working stalls and no bugs to be seen, I realized that it was Westview in particular that had gross bathrooms.

I understand that students aren’t always kind to the bathrooms; clogging the toilets with paper and leaving trash everywhere is bound to come with repercussions. There comes a point where the custodians can only do so much to mitigate the damage.

The broken appliances may be products of student negligence, but regardless, they need to be fixed. Hundreds of students circulate through the L-building and G-building bathrooms daily, especially since they are the closest bathrooms to most classrooms.

What we need is a larger budget for bathroom maintenance, and less vandalism in the facilities. Custodial cleaning is merely a tiny band-aid used to cover the disaster that is our L-building and G-building bathrooms—we need to take more action.

According to custodian Art Wolfe, around 10 years ago the state of California provided at least a million dollars to each district to cover maintenance costs.

However, in recent years due to education cuts, that number has dropped to anywhere between $10,000 and $20,000.

As a result, those who work in the district are forced to prioritize certain repairs over others, and usually overlook the need for bathroom maintenance.

With only two plumbers in the entire Poway Unified School District, Wolfe has to send the district work orders requesting supplies, repair money, and even services for bathroom maintenance.

He said that usually, simple things like a leaking sink or toilet handle can be fixed with a single part, but the process from request to repair can take up to three months.

Seeing as several broken facilities in the bathrooms can be traced back to student negligence, the district actually makes the school pay for the repairs themselves, forcing them to draw money from other programs if they want to fix a faulty toilet or broken sink.

Because of that, the school can’t afford to repair the bathroom every time someone decides to wreck it.

Not only does the state of California need to provide more maintenance funding to the school districts, but students need to learn to respect the bathrooms on campus as if they were their own, especially since repairing facilities is such a drawn-out process.

If we can at least accomplish that, then maybe, just maybe, we can go two weeks without a squirting toilet or blocked sink.

The night of Nov. 5, I went to sleep at 2:30 a.m., only to be startled by my alarm a mere two hours later.

I rolled over and laid still in my bed, allowing the ringing to pierce my ears for just a moment longer.

All I could feel in that moment was hatred, extreme hatred for my past self, for the one who decided this would be a good way to spend election day. It seemed like a good decision about a month and a half ago: signing up to work at a polling station meant getting to miss a school day, and getting volunteering hours with a stipend. Granted, it’d only be $115 for a 12-hour work day (which ended up being 16 hours because of set-up and clean-up), but hey, anything seems good to a high school kid like me without a job.

With a long exhale, I rolled myself out of bed and brushed my teeth. I put on some jeans and a sweater, and was out the door by 5 a.m.

I arrived at UCSD Revelle Conference Room C about 30 minutes later, and after setting up, I settled myself in the far-right seat of the worker’s table, and propped up a small paper-tent indicating I was the clerk. Out of the four poll working jobs, I arguably had the best one: I was the person who gave out the “I voted” stickers. But of course that couldn’t be my only purpose there—I also had to check and sign off each ballot before putting them into their correct ballot box, while also taking over other precinct positions when one of the other three workers were on break.

The flow of college students and the occasional adult steadily increased as the seconds ticked by, and in a matter of minutes after opening, the entire room was packed with voters. About one hour in, a line of people interested in casting a ballot extended out the door. Two hours into the day, people began voting not just at the three polling stations, but also at the side tables, at the couches, and even across the floor of the conference room. Three hours into the day, we began running out of supplies—all our felt-tip voting pens were in use, the ballot boxes were filled to the brim, and there were still nine hours left. I repeatedly called into the voting hotline for more materials, at one point having to explain that we were now having to resort to giving voters ballots in other languages along with a facsimile translation sheet because we ran out of English ballots. By the end of the day, we managed to fill three duffle-sized bags of mail-in ballots, and three boxes of provisional and official ballots.

But it was chaos in the best way possible. Waking up at 4:30 a.m. wasn’t so bad any more. Spending my day seeing all these young faces come out, participate in our country’s democracy, and be excited about it made me excited as well.

For a great majority of the people I met that day, it was their first time voting. And though they probably won’t remember me, I’ll remember the way their faces lit up when I put their ballot in the official box and the way they’d reply with a “wait, that’s it?” I’ll remember the way I’d laugh as I said yes, and asked them if they wanted an “I voted” sticker. And I’ll remember the way so many of them would either confidently reply with a “duh” or bashfully with a “yes please,” and how after I handed it to them, they’d place it on their shirt, proud that they’d done their civic duty that day.

In defense of albums: singles lack context, full music experience Kevin Pert Staff Writer

We live in the age of music streaming. In many ways this is great—it makes it easier to discover new artists and music, gives us the convenience of listening to nearly any artist or song we want, and means we don’t have to drive to a record store just to hear “Sweet Caroline” by Neil Diamond. But despite all the conveniences that streaming has produced, it’s killing an even more important aspect of music: albums.

This is not to say that albums are dead. After all, artists are still releasing them, critics are still reviewing them, and a good portion of people still listen to them. But in the sea of curated playlists, saved songs, and recommended singles, albums are slowly withering.

There’s nothing inherently wrong with only listening to singles. You’ll be hard-pressed to find a Spotify or Apple Music subscriber who hasn’t relentlessly replayed one of their saved songs, and this is something that nobody should be ashamed of; we listen to music for our own enjoyment.

On the flip side, this emphasis on singles has removed many listeners from the complete album experience, which is often far more immersive and meaningful than listening to individual tracks.

I learned this early on. Although I’ve always been a music fan, I was not necessarily an album fan. Because of this, I gravitated towards the most sonically accessible music, the easiest to digest, and often times the most bland.

Then Yeezus came along.

Kanye’s sixth album was abrasive, not very accessible, and to 11-year-old me, it was mostly terrible. Sure, I liked a couple of songs, but as a whole I couldn’t understand the appeal.

Yet with more and more listens, I found it wasn’t terrible; in fact, it was great. This album grew on me like no other, and it was an experience that shaped much of my musical taste today. On first listen, there were a couple of songs that Iliked, and I could’ve just saved them without ever listening to the rest of the album again. However, listening through the whole album taught me an important lesson: first impressions aren’t always good impressions.

Spotify is now heavily influenced by autoplay and Spotify-made playlists.

Although these are convenient and introduce us to music within our niche, they can cause us to only find tracks within the hyper-specific genres that we already like, thus never expanding our music taste. Albums, however, can teach us to branch out and introduce us to new music.

Without listening to albums, many people never get to learn this lesson.

They’ll never get to experience the feeling of a song that they first hated becoming one of their favorites and they’ll never get to experience the stories that albums can tell.

These stories shouldn’t be overlooked. Individual songs can tell stories to some extent, but one of the largest disparities between songs and albums is their storytelling abilities.

Take Kendrick Lamar’s 2016 album “good kid, m.A.A.d city,” for example. It’s an immersive narrative that tells the story of Lamar’s life in Compton and showcases his renowned storytelling ability.

Interestingly, this album's singles were successful on their own despite being a small part of a larger tale. This creates a strange phenomenon; “good kid, m.A.A.d city” could be considered Lamar’s autobiography, yet many listeners only listen to particular chapters of it. As great as its tracks are on their own, they don’t accurately convey his larger message when songs are listened to in isolation. If you were to listen to “Backseat Freestyle,” you might assume Lamar was a violent, aggressive artist lacking empathy; this is far from his actual (often anti-violence) nuanced message.

For someone who loves music as much as I do, only listening to singles feels like missing out. Sure, songs on their own are great, but in many cases they’re just one part of a larger picture. Albums tell stories, give context to songs, and reward the listener by opening up unexpected musical discoveries.

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12 Sports

Nov. 16, 2018

SCOREBOARD Analyzing Athletes: Sports and Ethnicity The graphs below show the first sport played by students prior to high school. The pie charts are organized by ethnicities and the information was compiled through a 228-person survey.

Boys Cross Country 10/26: Palomar League Cluster 2 11/10: NCC Championships

Hispanic/Latinx Americans

Middle Eastern Americans

Next Meet: Tomorrow: San Diego CIF XC Championships

Football Lacrosse (4.8%) (4.8%)

Cheer (6.7%) Lacrosse (6.7%)

Girls Cross Country 10/26: Palomar League Cluster 2 11/10: NCC Championships

Gymnastics (6.7%)

Martial arts (4.8%)

10/26: Loss vs. Mt. Carmel, 21-14 11/2: Loss vs. Lincoln, 52-14 Next Game: N/A

Badminton (1.2%) Gymnastics (8.6%)

6-9

Gymnastics (8.3%) Wrestling (8.3%) Dance (8.3%)

Mark Troftgruben If you’ve ever gone down to meet the football team after a game, if you’ve ever actually seen the faces inside those helmets that clash on Friday nights, you will notice that Yang Song (12) and Jason Wu (12) stand out from the rest of their teammates—they stand out because they are Asian American. On a team that consists of 60.5 percent Caucasians, 18.4 percent African Americans, 7.9 percent Pacific Islander Americans, 5.3 percent Middle Eastern Americans and 2.6 percent Hispanic Americans, Asian Americans are underrepresented, especially at a school where Asian Americans make up around 40 percent of the student population, according to PrepScholar.

In fact, Song and Wu are the only Asian Americans on the team. The case of Song and Wu, where we see underrepresented ethnicities in certain sports, is not unusual. The badminton team, for instance, consists of 68.9 percent Asian Americans. The girls tennis program was no different last year with Indian Americans making up 65.7 percent of the program. This contrasts varsity boys lacrosse where white players made up around 70 percent of the program last year. We also see this in professional sports where in the NBA, 74.4 percent of players are African American and less than one percent of NHL players are African American, according to The Atlas. It’s clear there are disparities between different ethnicities in the world of sports from the big leagues down to our own high school programs.

But why are we seeing such disparities between eth-

3 - 10 - 1

11/6: CIF Individual Championships, 12-6 11/7, 11/8: CIF Championships, 11-7 Next Game: Today: State Regionals Championships

24- 18

11/3: Loss vs. Santa Fe Christian, 3-1 11/6: Loss vs. Quartz Hill, 3-1 Next Game: N/A

13 - 16

10/30: Win vs. University City, 15-7 11/3: Loss vs. Torrey Pines 7-1 Next Meet: N/A

Soccer (25.0%)

Baseball/Softball (19.1%) Basketball (11.8%)

Soccer (42.6%)

Soccer (23.5%)

Sports Editor

Boys Water Polo

Gymnastics (14.7%)

African Americans

Tennis, Badminton (8.3%)

Baseball/Softball (8.3%)

nicities within sports programs at Westview as well? In examining data compiled by The Nexus staff represented in the graphs above, we see that each of the main ethnicity groupings tends to have played specific sports for their first sport before high school. Our 228-person survey shows that the majority of students started playing their sports because of their parents, regardless of ethnicity.

Although there are many who wanted to try a sport purely out of their own interest, most of the students surveyed were too young at the time they started playing sports to make their own decisions. As a result, parents played a huge role in the introduction of their children to sports.

“A lot of the sports I started out with, I am passionate about today,” Adam Chang (12) said. “But the reason I started out with these sports is my parents, as they were really the ones who signed me up for everything. I am still grateful that they did what they did, but it definitely impacted my future with sports.”

So, why do parents tend to register their children for certain sports? To what degree does ethnicity affect the sports students initially gravitated towards? For practical purposes, we investigated just one the major ethnic groups at Westview. The reason so many Indian Americans at our school started out with tennis appears to be a result of mostly cultural/parental influences.

“Aside from cricket, tennis is a pretty popular sport in Indian schools and the matches are quite often televised there,” Vansh Vermani (’18) said. “When Indian parents move here, there is little to no opportunity to get their kids into cricket. I see a lot of them try and get their kids into other sports like baseball, basketball or soccer

Football (8.3%) Basketball (16.7%)

Ice Skating (1.2%)

Next Game: N/A

Girls Volleyball

Tennis (1.5%) Volleyball Football (2.9%) Lacrosse (2.9%) (2.9%) Dance (1.5%)

Golf (4.9%)

10/23: Team Playoff CIF Championships 10/31: Individual CIF Championships

Girls Tennis

Caucasian Americans

Baseball/Softball (1.2%) Tennis (1.2%) Lacrosse (1.2%) Track & Field (1.2%) Karate (1.2%) Table Tennis Dance (1.2%) (1.2%) Roller Hockey (2.5%) Cheer (1.2%) Basketball (7.4%) Football (1.2%) Swim/Dive Ice Hockey (1.2%) (35.8%) Volleyball (2.5%)

1 - 10

Girls Golf

Soccer (23.8%)

Dance (5.3%) Baseball/Softball (5.3%)

East/Southeast Asian Americans

Next Game: N/A

Tennis (42.1%)

Swim/Dive (10.5%)

Basketball (19.0%)

Taekwondo (6.7%) Swim/Dive (6.7%)

11/6: Win vs. San Dieguito, 3-2 11/13: Loss vs. Scripps Ranch, 0-4

Football

Baseball/Softball (14.3%)

Golf Soccer (15.8%) (10.5%)

Basketball (5.3%) Badminton (5.3%)

Figure Skating (6.7%)

19 - 4 - 1

Field Hockey

(4.8%)

Gymnastics (14.3%)

Soccer (46.7%)

Baseball/Softball (6.7%)

Next Meet: Tomorrow: San Diego CIF XC Championships

Water Polo (4.8%) Track and Field

Swim/Dive (4.8%)

Basketball (6.7%)

Indian Americans

Track & Field (8.3%)

but find those sports to be too intense and injury-prone.

When my parents got me into tennis, they found me enjoying it and that it was easier playing a more individual sport with good opportunities to improve since southern California has great tennis coaches and facilities.”

India has had a long history with tennis. After its introduction by the British Army in the 1880s, the sport’s popularity in India skyrocketed. Despite the high proportion of certain ethnicities joining certain sports, Wu believes that the effect of cultural and other influences should not matter as work ethic, in his opinion, is the most important factor in determining your success with a sport.

“I think that the idea of hard work gets cast aside because it has become cliche,” Wu said. “But I don’t think people understand just how important it is in determining your success with anything. If you truly want to achieve something, like really want it bad, you will figure out a way to get there.”

For Wu, it was difficult convincing his parents to allow him to play football. But, football was a sport that he was passionate about, so he pushed to play it.

“One of my goals was to be able to represent Westview on Friday nights playing a sport I have always enjoyed watching on Sundays,” he said. “My experience was nothing but positive. Yes, putting in almost 20 hours of your time a week into a sport not many people of your ethnicity plays or hardly understands is daunting.

But knowing that once you put on that jersey on Friday nights, you are just one of eleven people on the field working to win was far greater than any intimidations.”

Records as of Tuesday Compiled by the Sports Staff

Design by Mark Troftgruben and Kevin Lu

Chin faces competitive soccer tryouts, discovers camaraderie Alyssa Van Waas Staff Writer

Rhea Jogadhenu

Erin Chin (10) plays defense against Valeria Suarez (9) during soccer tryouts, Nov. 8, as Sydney Alper (10) looks on.

For many, trying out for a sports team is a dreadful process that creates anxiety and doubt. Because of the pressure on players to perform at their highest level and impress coaches they may not have met before in such a short time period, the process can be nerve-wracking.

Erin Chin (10) has played soccer since the age of six. Last year, 32 freshman tried out. One made varsity, six made junior varsity, and 22 made the freshman team. Three girls were cut. With three years of competitive soccer under her belt, Chin was able to make the highly competitive freshman team last year.

This year, however, she said making the junior varsity team was going to be much more of a challenge.

“The JV coach is different, so being with a different coach may make me a little more nervous, because they don’t know how I play,” she said. “It’s not just sophomores going for JV. Juniors might also be on the team, and I might differ in skills compared to them.”

The first week of tryouts took place from Nov. 5-9, with a one day break on that Wednesday. The remainder of tryouts were held this week.

Week one of tryouts began with stretching, warming up, and scrimmaging—all things that would test

Chin’s and the other players’ skills.

For the first day, everybody played together, regardless of grade level. Chin said this made her nervous because she would have to play alongside varsity players, who are older and more experienced.

However, she said she ended up enjoying the experience and felt as though it was beneficial for her.

“It was good because I got to watch them play and learn from them, so it helped me to see what I could work on to be a better player,” she said.

Day two was very similar to day one except everyone was now split up into smaller groups (varsity, junior varsity, and freshmen). This allowed her to play against players she was more likely to compete against. Throughout this experience, the aspect that helped her get through tryouts the most, she said, was the fact that her friends were always alongside her, grinding through the same drills and reassuring her whenever she made a mistake.

“I was not as nervous as before,” she said. “It’s nice trying out with some of my friends. I know they are going through the same thing and experiencing nervousness and anxiety as well. That made me feel not so alone.”

Day three was the hardest for Chin. She said that overthinking and making little mistakes led her to lose self-confidence.

“I think it’s just easy for anyone who’s trying out,

to get in their head, because you want to impress the coaches with what you can do,” she said. “It’s easy to do that, but I think this year I’m going to try not to do that as much and just do my best so that even if I don’t [make the team], I will be proud of what I put out there.”

Asking herself questions like how could I do this differently next time, and taking deep breaths when she felt most overwhelmed were some things that helped her stay positive and focused on doing her best.

The last day of the first week, Chin said, was a good one for her. Playing defense aggressively, holding good blocks and passing the ball frequently were all positive things for Chin. Relieved, Chin said she felt confident about ending out the first week.

With tryouts running longer than usual this year, players will likely not know who made each team until today.

This being said, Chin’s first week of tryouts was a success.

“There were good and bad moments—parts where I did well and others where I made mistakes,” she said. “Throughout the week I’ve learned from my mistakes and realized that I shouldn’t worry about them so much. I’m constantly learning. Overall, I’m grateful for the support I received from my family and friends; it was reassuring.”

Sumner overcomes scoliosis-induced stress fracture, returns to gymnastics Grace Kim Staff Writer

Sara Sumner (10) remembers the days where she would go straight to gymnastics practice after school with the friends she considered her family.

The gym was her home.

Ever since she was 5, this was routine day-in and dayout. But all of this changed in the seventh grade when Sumner was sitting in her doctor’s office, receiving the results from the X-ray that would determine her fate.

The doctor and her parents decided that she would not be able to go back to competitive gymnastics. She would no longer be able to compete and stand in the spotlight anymore. She would no longer feel a burning passion inside of her when she did gymnastics.

“I felt really disappointed in myself,” Sumner said. “[Gymnastics] was a big part of my life and I devoted every single day to it. It was something I thought I would stick with until college.”

Sumner was diagnosed with a stress fracture in her lower back due to pressure from scoliosis. Her back was strained from repeatedly bending back during her routines. Because of scoliosis, she had a bigger curve on the bottom half of her spine.

The first jab of pain came without notice: it was intense and excruciating, but Sumner ignored it. She thought it was normal—she didn’t want to believe it was anything serious.

“I didn’t really tell anyone about it because I really didn’t want to stop competing,” Sumner said. “I wanted to get better [at gymnastics].”

But the second jab came and then the third and fourth and on and on.

They kept coming until Sumner could not bear them anymore, until she had no choice but to quit competitive gymnastics.

The doctors told her that it was highly unlikely for her to go back to the same level of gymnastics she was at before.

At that time, the only way to improve her condition was to go through three months of physical therapy.

Sumner received massages and performed abdominal exercises.

“I wanted to get better because I knew that I was going up in levels,” Sumner said. “I thought, if I tried hard enough and did all my physical therapy, my back would get better and I would be able to compete again.”

Along with those activities, Sumner started to jog and walk more around the neighborhood to help straighten

her back.

After months, her stress fracture healed. Sumner saw this as a chance to get back into gymnastics. But after her first day back from her healing period, Sumner realized she was not the same gymnast.

“I had lost half my skills and I wasn’t nearly strong enough to do anything,” Sumner said.

Her back pain started to come back and her condition deteriorated. That’s when she decided enough was enough—she needed a break.

For an entire year, in eighth grade, Sumner stopped attending gymnastics practices. That’s when she began to see her personality and look towards life change.

“I wasn’t enthusiastic about anything,” Sumner said.

Sumner tried to distract her mind by turning to piano.

“Whenever I felt overwhelmed, I just sat down and practiced,” she said. “I was doing a lot better with the piano because I had way more time to practice again.”

She also looked to her close friends from her competitive gymnastics team to help cope with the situation.

“I talked to my friends from my competitive gymnastics team because we were all super close knit,” Sumner said. “They really supported me through the situation.”

However, no matter what she did to forget about the disappointment and pain she felt, Sumner said she knew

she wanted try again, get back into gymnastics, and bring back the feelings of accomplishment.

When Summer’s freshmen year approached, she realized she was really missing gymnastics. She decided to pick up gymnastics again. But this time, for the school’s team.

“I wanted to keep on doing gymnastics because it was the only sport I’ve ever really loved,” Sumner said.

However, a few weeks in, Summer’s fears came back.

Her back started to ache and Sumner found herself taking breaks in the middle of practice to rest.

Despite her varsity level skills, Sumner was placed on the JV team due to the limited mobility she had.

During her time on the JV team, Sumner was able to compete and win first place in competitions against other high schools and earn additional points for her team.

All this hard work led to the one day Sumner was looking forward to from the beginning of the season: the day the coaches called her in and asked her if she wanted to compete on varsity the next year.

With gymnastics season approaching, Sumner can now perform with the confidence and skill she once lost because of scoliosis.

For now, Sumner can perform like herself and forget about the pain.

Nexus

Sports 13

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Nov. 16, 2018

The Playoffs: Play by Play

SIG NIFICANT FIG URES

Girls volleyball loses in CIF championship match

1 goal

Isabelle Ritter Staff Writer

After battling through four long games, girls volleyball lost the San Diego Section CIF Championship match against Santa Fe Christian, 3-1, Nov. 3.

Santa Fe Christian outplayed Westview in blocking and setting, and more consistent techniques carrying their team through the chaotic final few points of the games.

The steadfast scrappiness of the passers on Santa Fe Christian also helped them remain in the game.

Westview was poised to make a comeback during game two, taking a 25-19 win.

They kept the lead thanks to three kills early on from outside hitter Sabrina Speratti (12).

That allowed Westview to build a seven-point lead halfway through the game, 19-12.

The final point came on a kill down the line from Speratti.

Speratti had eight kills in the match.

The third and fourth games were close with points going back and forth.

Tensions were high at the end of game three when Westview nearly took the win after Speratti scored the tool off the block, making the score 22-20.

However, Santa Fe Christian soon sided out and went on a four-point run, winning 25-23, cementing themselves as CIF champions.

As a result of prior injuries, Westview lost two critical players, libero Aliyana Shivji (12) and setter Hayley Hughes (11), which left a gap in the roster that was difficult to fill.

Despite this, back-up libero Laura Fernandez

Boys water polo was up with a six-onfive player advantage Nov. 3 after a player from Torrey Pines High School was ejected for a foul. The Wolverines set up their perimeter around the cage, and began moving the ball towards the goal to create an opening for a scoring opportunity.

When Jackson Fisher (11) got the ball, he flung it to Cooper Rasmus (12), who shot the ball into the nearside of the cage. The goalie was unable to block it, resulting in the team’s first and only goal of the season’s final game and a score of 7-1.

Rohin Awasthi

Setter Caitlin Sansone (12) (middle) bumps the ball, as middle blocker Abbie Meyer (12) begins her approach to the right, Nov. 3. The girls ended up losing to Santa Fe Christian High School, 3-1, Nov. 3.

(12) stepped in to make some vital passes and serves, keeping Westview in the game.

Standout performances from outside hitter Lauren Laundroche (12) with 12 kills and middle blockers Emilie Comer and Obi Anyanwu (12) with four blocks and six kills, respectively, gave Westview a fiery edge that made Santa Fe Christian fight hard for the win.

Three-year varsity players and identical twins Kayla de los Reyes (12) and Lauryn de los Reyes (12) played their final CIF match together during this game.

Outside hitter Kayla was awarded the CIF character award at the end of the game, with sister Lauryn cheering her on all the while.

The two have been playing volleyball together since elementary school, and so their senior season was bittersweet.

Despite the loss, the girls qualified for state championships, and traveled all the way to Lancaster, California, to compete in their final game against Quartz Hill.

They lost 3-1, but finished with a winning overall record of 24-18.

Courtesy of Jim Rasmus

1 goal

Girls tennis clinch CIF title in close doubles match Grace Kim Staff Writer

The score read 5-5. Girls tennis only needed to win five more matches against the Academy of Our Lady of Peace to win the San Diego Section Division I CIF Championship.

The air was tense as doubles players Julia Bennett (11) and Olivia Speir (11) stepped onto the court, determined to come home with a

win no matter what.

“I knew before the match that it was going to be a close one, so I knew every win counted,” Speir said.

Although Bennett and Speir said they felt nervous before their match, they learned to calm down and stay concentrated by focusing on their techniques.

“We have a really good dynamic, so we’re able to focus in on each other and make each other calm,” Ben-

nett said.

Bennett and Speir were able to bring their match under control by changing their game plan.

“It was our goal to dominate every point,” Bennett said. “Olivia and I told each other to focus and to play our game and to not worry about the other team.”

Speir made sure to focus on her volleys and stepping into the shots. Bennett concentrated on hitting strong

serves and solid shots.

Bennett and Speir ended up winning all three of their matches, helping Westview secure the 10-8 victory and the CIF championship that came with it.

“It felt like all the work, tears and sweat we put into the season had finally paid off and that, for once, we finally got a break,” Bennett said.

Though they won, the Wolverines’ road to victory

was not a smooth journey. At the beginning of the new season, the team went through a period of rough transition.

“A lot of the team was new so we were going up against tougher competition than we expected so that equated to losses,” team captain Shivali Yedulapuram (12) said.

However, the team was able to create a new, strong bond that aided in the team's journey to dominate the finals at CIFs.

Kamille Phung (12) raced down the field, Nov. 2nd, at her senior night home game against Mt. Carmel. Using her speed, she got open for passes and shots on goal. With just three minutes left in the first quarter and the Wolverines down 0-1, Phung got control of the ball and made a goal, bringing the score to a tie. She brought out her competitive edge on the field, and helped the team to regain their energy through the second quarter. The Wolverines finished with a win, 2-1.

Boys water polo falls to Torrey Pines in CIF second round Alec Felderman Staff Writer

Boys water polo suffered a loss to Torrey Pines High School in the second round of the San Diego Division One CIF tournament, 7-1, removing them from CIF contention and ending their season, Nov. 3.

Westview had trouble taking advantage of opportunities such as open players on drives or missing open shots. The majority of the plays couldn’t be executed, and when they were, the shots were unable to be finished. Poor ball handling was also a factor that led to the loss.

“Two key components of water

SydneyWang Alper Michelle

polo are maintaining pressure on the defense and making accurate passes,” team captain Geo Fratian (12) said.

“Both of which which we did not have enough of to create a strong offensive presence.”

By lacking in these areas, it allowed for Torrey Pines to spend the majority of the game on offense or up on counter attacks. The Wolverines’ shots were also off this game, as the only goal scored was by Cooper Rasmus (12) late in the fourth quarter with 3:15 on the clock.

Even on defense, where Westview arguably performed its best, excessive ejections allowed for Torrey Pines to capitalize on Westview being a man

Grace Kim

down. Four of Torrey Pines’ seven goals occurred while Westview was a man down. Furthermore, penalties dug the Wolverines into a deeper hole as Torrey Pines added to its score with two five-meter shots.

“The pressure of the game increased their nerves and ultimately made overthink a little too much," Coach Garrett said.

Even though the team experienced a tough loss, they’re even more determined than before to make it back to CIF. “Next year we’re going to put in more off season effort and have a vengeance to beat the teams that beat us this year,” Schiering said.

Jessica Lin Rohin Awasthi

Benji Budic (10) leaps out of the water and prepares to shoot on cage.

Written by Tiffany Le and Grace Kim

BLACK & GOLD

Jocelyn Mi

Rohin Aswathi

OLESON

CAVENDISH

LAUNDROCHE

JOHNSON

WATER POLO, Guard

FIELD HOCKEY, Forward

VOLLEYBALL, Outside Hitter

FOOTBALL, Wide Receiver

Jaeger Oleson (11) stumbled and fell down a flight of stairs near the beginning of August. He broke his right metacarpal bone, preventing him from playing water polo for two months.

He said he adjusted by working on passing and shooting with his left hand. Despite his injury, Oleson averaged fives steals per game, and made 20 goals this season.

He has made a great impact on his teammate, impressing captain Joren Frazier.

“I think that Jaeger will be a leader on the team next year,” Frazier said. “He’s a hard worker and he has a lot of potential.”

Ellie Cavendish (12) is team captain and also one of the strongest hitters on the field hockey team.

Being a basketball and field hockey player, Cavendish makes sure to apply her skills onto the field.

“I play very physically and I’m not afraid to make contact when it comes to defense because I’m not scared to combat the ball or opponent,” Cavendish said.

Cavendish continues to use her strong passes and recovery defense skills when playing and works hard as team captain to maintain the team’s strong bond.

Freshman year, Lauren Laundroche (12) decided to try out for the volleyball team, not letting her lack of experience stop her.

“I didn’t really know anything about this sport at all when I started, and it was kind of hard to just catch on,” Laundroche said.

Fixed on improving, Laundroche found her drive through her teammates and got pulled up to varsity her sophomore year to play in the playoffs. Laundroche, now a varsity captain, used strategy to score more kills, which helped lead them to the CIF championships.

Although he’s been playing football since seventh grade, Elijah Johnson (11) still sees the field as a basketball court.

“I really think of it as basketball,” he said.

Catching slants like alley-oops and using his body like a center, this mentality has proved effective for Johnson who has been an important player for the Wolverines, amounting four touchdowns this year.

“I’m not really a vocal leader, so I try to do my best to lead by example,” Johnson said. “I try to play hard and with passion so that it translates to my teammates.”

Jocelyn Mi

Isabelle Ritter

WANG

UYEDA

TENNIS, Singles

GOLF

Jane Wang (11) started playing competitive tennis when she was 8, and hasn’t stopped swinging her racket since.

Wang said playing from a young age enabled her to perfect her technique as a tennis player, specifically the highball, or the “lob.”

“It’s what I’m known for,” she said. “But I want to change that, and start hitting harder [in addition to] being the ‘lob’ girl.”

Wang said she is a versatile player, happy to be thrown in any match.

“I prefer singles because the competition is better,” she said.

Being the only freshman on her team, Ensley Uyeda (9) never misses an opportunity to push herself and learn from her more experienced teammates.

“I have a lot of people to look up to and a lot of people who can teach me things that I need to know,” Uyeda said.“I just am constantly learning from them.”

Despite all the influence, Uyeda possesses personal skills that makes her stand out. “I’m a fast learner and I can adapt to the game, as quickly as I need to, and I know that if I need to change something in my swing before a tournament, I can get it done.”

14 Final Focus

the

Nexus

Nov. 16, 2018

reading between the lines High school curricula focused on STEM has de-emphasized English classes, depriving students of important, often overlooked, transferable skills taught in humanities classes

Isabelle Ritter Staff Writer

Westview’s Honors Humanities course description reads: “Humanities is the interrelation of all aspects of human experience.” At its very core, English classes attempt to teach us the essence of humanity. One would think this kind of higher learning would be prioritized, but in the last few decades, that hasn’t been the case.

In a world of incessant standardized testing and Advanced Placement hysteria, time to read is getting lost in the chaos. Westview’s class options exemplify this, as Westview offers far fewer English classes than STEM classes.

Much of the limitations of English classes come from an overreach of STEM classes. The STEM push in the US emerged shortly after the technology boom of the 1990s. The rise of the internet, and of internet billionaires, permeated the next two decades, all the way up until the Recession of 2008.

“Since the Great Recession, the number of STEM majors in bachelor’s degree-and-above programs has mushroomed, going from 388,000 graduates in 200910 to 550,000 in 2015-16—43 percent growth,” wrote Strada Education Network.

This is reflected on a smaller scale in high school curriculum, which has changed measurably since the recession and the rise of STEM. In fact, for incoming freshman and sophomores at Westview, there are only three different English class options, whereas underclassmen interested in STEM have more than 20 classes to choose from.

This imbalance of class options can dissuade students from taking a chance on those classes because they have no 5.0 grade boost or AP test to help them out if they struggle in the more challenging class.

Lily Pham (12) sees herself as a STEM-inclined student, and decided to opt out of the Honors English classes.

“I’m not really good with English,” Pham said. “I’ve always been better on the math side of subjects, so I’ve always taken the regular English classes.”

Pham said that she had a great experience in English 1-2 and 3-4, finding meaningful connections with her teachers.

“All my teachers have been very helpful to me when teaching me new methods in writing,” she said.

She said that after going through the ‘regular’ English track, she felt totally prepared to take on Honors American Literature (HAL) her junior year.

“When I figured I would try something new junior year, I took HAL instead of regular American Literature,” she said. “Although there was a little more busy work, I think I improved the most in writing in that class.”

When time came around to write college essays, Pham entrusted all her teachers equally to guide her in her writing.

“By senior year when I had to get my college essays

proofread and edited, I ended up giving them to all my English teachers from ninth to eleventh grade because I’ve built such a strong connection with them that I was able to trust them with my work,” she said.

According to Pham, the connections and the skills she gained through English classes are invaluable.

“It felt really rewarding when I receive such positive feedback on my writing and on myself,” she said.

“When [my past teachers] say how I grew personally and they also saw how my writing improved, I just feel really proud. It felt really rewarding, as if all that hard work in my English classes paid off, even if it was primarily regular English classes.”

However, Shane Strunk (12) was left wanting more from the English curriculum as an underclassmen.

“Coming from someone who isn’t the best at English, I feel like there is no good balance between the easy English classes and the honors or AP English classes,” he said. “The easy classes were way too easy [for me] and didn’t challenge me at all.”

Strunk said that even students not planning to pursue a career in the humanities should still be exposed to extensive English curriculum.

“A core class like English is something you need to be challenged in and learn in because everyone should be good readers and writers,” he said.

After taking Honors English freshman year and not doing as well as he would have liked, Strunk said he felt discouraged and dissuaded from attempting to take another difficult English class. However, after taking English 3-4, he felt not challenged enough.

“The way that the school separates the basic English classes from the AP and Honors English classes has too wide of a gap in the curriculum, and there either needs to be a remodeling of the curriculum of the basic classes or there needs to be an addition of a middle ground, because it’s hard to just jump into an AP class if you aren’t the best at English,” he said.

The current English system seems to either serve students like Pham, who find their niche within regular English classes, or fail students like Strunk, who are trapped between classes that he finds either too challenging or too easy.

The decrease of popularity of English classes led to less English electives being offered, resulting in a vast and varied topic to be compressed into a tell-all one semester class, such as English 1-2 or Honors English.

Hidden Benefits English teacher Bob McHeffey has taught for more than 30 years, and said he has seen the decline of English classes’ popularity.

He said he first saw the effects of the STEM push when his creative writing class, Writing Seminar, was discredited by the University of California system.

“As soon as [creative writing classes were discredited] and you couldn’t get college credit for taking classes like Writing Seminar as an English class, it became

less important [to most students],” he said.

The University of California organization stopped accepting Writing Seminar for credit after they established their A-G requirements, and instead began focusing on more quantifiable aspects of the humanities, such as expository writing.

“Expository [writing] is of huge value because it shows your ability to think logically, to present an argument, to break down somebody else’s argument whether that’s in a fiction piece or a nonfiction piece,” McHeffey said. “It is in some ways a quantifiable thing.

I can grade an essay on a rubric, but it’s a lot harder to grade a poem on a rubric.”

That non-quantifiable nature of English classes, in the sense that creativity or appreciation for literature cannot be measured on a standardized test, seems to be what makes it less desirable to organizations like the College Board and the UC system, McHeffey said.

“It’s like, ‘This is where the U.S. finishes in math’ but there’s no ‘Where does the U.S. finish in English’ because you can’t really do that,” he said.

McHeffey said the establishment of the A-G requirements limited the scope of English education, with creative aspects of the subject being suppressed.

“That [quantifiability] melds better with at least UC, which, though we have a great public educational system, is still really rigidly structured.”

Westview’s class options are, of course, a reflection of curriculum standards set by both the UC system and the College Board. College Board’s focus rests primarily on the analytical nature of English classes.

College Board’s Common Core standards, named “English Language Arts Standards for Reading and Literature”, divides English curriculum learning into four categories: Key Ideas and Details, Craft and Structure, Integration of Knowledge and Ideas, and Range of Reading and Text Complexity.

Although valid in content, these standards are not comprehensive. They are lacking in the intangible value of English classes: what they teach us about compassion, about diversity, and about each other.

Despite the limitations, students seeking an education in the literary arts have still been able find inspiration and merit in the existing classes. Yoon Yupar (12) said she fell in love with English classes after taking Honors English.

“In English classes everyone is different and all these different ideas and thoughts are being expressed and everyone’s different voices are so awesome,” she said.

Yupar said the main thing she liked about English classes was how they taught her about the world around her, and helped her to understand diversity.

“English classes seriously broaden my worldview and I honestly feel like I learn the most in those classes” she said. “It’s all important things about history and people and how the world works.”

Similarly, Ashley Bui (12) said the structure of English classes helped her to become a better student overall.

“I feel like the lack of traditional structure [in English classes] really helps me foster my appreciation for English,” she said. “I think I would be less successful if I had more of a boxed in structure.”

The freedom of structure in many English classes is something Yupar and Bui share appreciation for.

“Every year English is the only class I enjoy and I feel like other than art, it’s the only class we can be free in expression,” Yupar said.

Additionally, Yupar said the creative aspects of English classes offer an oasis from the stress of a STEMfocused majority of students.

“English is basically what made me the person I am today,” she said. “When I came to Westview I was just so lost because I didn’t know where I fit. Everyone else was so obsessed with AP [classes], grades and college.”

An Intangible Value Andrew Simmons, an English teacher who has published articles in The Atlantic and The New York Times, said the value of English classes lies beyond the tangible.

“I think of English class as an opportunity to become a healthier person,” he said. “Through stories and characters, people can become more empathetic and feel less alone.”

Simmons said the more intangible aspects of English are what he finds to be the most important. In other words, the life lessons literature presents students is most important, rather than the ability to analyse things like rhetorical devices or thesis structure. “[Stories and characters] can be therapeutic, it can give us models for behavior, and models for how not to behave,” he said. “So as a teacher, I am trying to get my kids to do rigorous academic work but also have opportunities to consider these lessons in works of literature.”

The emotional and cognitive benefits of reading are even beginning to be used in psychotherapy across the world. At the School of Life in London, a new kind of therapists, dubbed “bibliotherapists,” prescribe books to people who come to them for therapy. This method of therapy has been credited and promoted by big names and organizations, such as Psychology Today.

In an already STEM-focused world, encouraging students to pursue the literary arts is even more necessary as students miss out on critical reading and writing skills that help them later in life both in their careers and in their relationships.

Rudy Khanwale (12) said that although he appreciates the value of STEM, he feels the true benefit of humanities classes lie in the intangible—ethics, diversity, and compassion.

“STEM is important, but humanities teaches us how we can use science creatively rather than destructively,” he said. “Science allows us to improve the world, but humanities lets us know what it means to improve the world.”

Art by Alice Chen