The Forge Vol. 107 No. 4

Costly Window Repairs p. 3 | Princess Diana p. 4 | Derek Chauvin’s Trial p. 5 | Frida Kahlo Cultural Appropriation p. 10

Vol. 107 No. 4

SANTA BARBARA HIGH SCHOOL - FRIDAY, MAY 28, 2021 The Cultural Importance of the Ortega Park Murals

Wellness Center Grand Opening Room 210A is transformed into a place for students and teachers to reset | p. 3

Our opinion writer calls for their protection | p. 10

Est. 1914 Boys Basketball Dons finally get their season and bring their best | p. 12

A Long Road ASB President Izzy Kamin reflects on four years of determination, persistence, and spirit from the Class of 2021 | pg. 4 FEATURE

The Academies Respond to the Pandemic MAD, VADA, and CS all adapted to the challenges of distance learning and expanded their programs in bold new ways | p. 8-9

VIDEO STORY

Living on the Streets A police lieutenant and a director of homeless services reflect on the state of homelessness in SB | p. 5

Talitha Gabrielle Shows

SBHSFORGE.COM

Her Soulful Side

Raíces Art Show

SBHS Theatre’s Technical Director is also a talented multi-genre singer-songwriter with a new EP out now | p. 7

SBHS’s club seeks to showcase the work and cultures of people of color | p. 6

Senior Portraits by Lia Elena Garcia

2 | NEWS

THE FORGE STAFF

2021-2022 Plans Unclear

700 East Anapamu Street Santa Barbara, CA 93103 sbhsforge.com admin@sbhsforge.com

EDITORS EDITORS-IN-CHIEF

LAYOUT EDITOR Emerson Steady

LIFESTYLE EDITOR Viviana Trujillo

SPORTS EDITOR Andre Battle

STAFF REPORTERS Alexa Cobian Simon Sabrina Cruz Yuliana De La Luz Catherine Harlow Charlie Hess Mia Huerta Zoe Husted Emma King Harper Locatelli Carlo Maguire Marko Mendoza Gabriela Miranda Barreto Valeria Polanco Lujan Charley Raymond Jesus Reynoso Sebastian Salcido Mia Talaugon Miguel Unzueta Deva Villa-Salcedo

ADVISOR

Joanne Cloutier

SB Unified

BY CHARLEY RAYMOND What next year will look like is still unclear as many things really depend on the status of vaccines and COVID by fall. However, as COVID seems to be getting better in the county and all students in high school have the option to get the vaccine, we are hoping that next school year will be as normal as possible.

This school year is coming to an end and graduation for class of 2021 is Wednesday. The school has also found a way to honor the class of 2020 who did not receive a graduation due to COVID last year. On Saturday the school will hold a graduation for all classes of 2020 who can attend. This is just one way the school is working to bring some normalcy back to students’ lives.

We will be continuing the block schedule with four classes each semester. This will allow for students to gain more credits in a year from up to eight classes rather than the usual six.

We have yet to see how this will affect students academically as this year has been different in many ways and a lot of the change in students is due to COVID. Counselors are working hard to fit everyone’s electives and required classes into this new schedule.

With this new schedule we will most likely see more early graduates as students can complete their academic requirement sooner with more room in their schedule. The bell schedule is still being approved so the majority of students won’t know until fall.

For the incoming freshman, academies all across the district will no longer require an application process.

Incoming freshmen just have to sign up for the 9th grade classes in the academy and it will work on a first come first serve basis as to who can get in. The change is to help reach more students who are interested in the academy but who might not have as much experience. It will be interesting to see how this affects the academy’s student body and academic experience.

The policy for lunch next year has not been decided on. In past years all grades had open campus, this year was supposed to change to only upperclassmen having open campus but due to COVID this never happened.

As we started going back on campus, no one was allowed off campus at any time if they were coming back on campus later in hopes to prevent the spread of COVID in school. However, if things are looking better by next year we may see a change in this rule and lunch may look more like how it has in past years.

As you can see, very little is known about next year not just for the students but administration as well. Sadly, none of us have much control over what next school year will look like as it really comes down to how COVID is looking. We as students can however help by getting vaccinated and keeping safe to help the spread of COVID. We are all hoping for a more normal and safe next school year.

A Letter from the Editor

Karissa Fields

Can Vaccines be Required?

BY SABRINA CRUZ

Spring 2021

Karissa Fields Emerson Steady

MAY 28, 2021

Hello Dons!

As a member of the class of 2021, this is the last issue of the Forge I’ll have the pleasure of working on. Despite this hectic year, I’m so proud of this year’s Forge team for covering the chaos and being flexible in these ever-changing times.

This year has been challenging but the writers remained stoic and produced some of the best work The Forge has ever seen. We collaborated in elevating the paper as a whole with the use of our online platform and producing more articles weekly. I’ve had the opportunity to work on this paper for the past two years, and this year I had the honor of co-leading it. I hope to continue working in journalism in the next chapter of my life, at college. I’m so excited to see what becomes of the Forge next year.

Thank you, Emerson, Mrs.Cloutier, and all the talented writers for your support, creativity, and hard work.

Sincerely, Karissa Fields Editor-in-Chief

For the past eighteen months we have been no stranger to the effects of a worldwide pandemic. Schools, local businesses and our social lives were put at a massive halt and plans to find a cure or vaccine were put in the works. This isn’t the world’s first stint when it comes to pandemics so the government is always alert and prepared to fight and control the spread with many ways to try to contain or eradicate the disease completely.

Many medical technologies have been developed over the course of human history. For example, in the 16th century early attempts at controlling the spread of smallpox resulted in developing a technique called variolation. People who had never gotten smallpox were exposed to sores (pustules) by scratching a person already infected by the disease and putting the material on their arms or inhaling it. After this process, people usually developed the symptoms associated with the disease. However, from this practice fewer people died than if they had contracted the disease naturally and from there the work they did with variolation was used as a basis for vaccination development.. Eventually in the 1800’s after research on vaccines was released smallpox vaccines were widely accepted and replaced variolation entirely. However, in 1959 the World Health Organization (WHO) launched a plan to eradicate the disease completely and because the disease was only transmitted from human to human it was possible. After the effectiveness of the vaccine was displayed with the complete eradication of smallpox efforts to mandate vaccines in schools after more diseases appeared like measles in the 1970’s “data from 6 states strictly enforcing comprehensive school laws were compared to data from states without enforcement’. In the

first year, strictly enforcing states had measles rates 50 percent lower than non-enforcers.” Says the AMA Journal of Ethics ‘parents are legally allowed to avoid vaccinating their children but only if their personal exemptions are medical, religious, and/or philosophical’.

With the COVID-19 pandemic many of the same conversations are being made .Whether or not to mandate COVID vaccines to go back to school next fall and some colleges and universities have already made the COVID -19 mandatory to return to the fall.With the law this could be tricky as the COVID-19 vaccine is only approved for emergency use only and states with not uphold a mandate for a vaccine that is not fully approved by the FDA . Research has said that this virus will likely not be eradicated because it does transmit from animals to humans and more likely be like the flu where it comes and goes seasonally but vaccines would establish herd immunity and stop the spread of COVID. If you are interested in Vaccination, Santa Barbara County Public Health Department will be holding a vaccination clinic for students ages 12 and older to receive the COVID-19 Pfizer vaccine on campus. Clinics will be held on Tuesday, June 15, Wednesday, June 16, and Thursday June 17.

If you are interested in having your child receive a vaccination, appointments can be scheduled through MyTurn at https://myturn.ca.gov/ or by calling the CA COVID-19 Hotline at 1-833-4224255 Mon-Fri 8am-8pm, Sat-Sun 8am-5pm.

Individuals needing registration support in Mixteco can call Herencia Indigena: 805-363-0888 or MICOP: 805-252-0702 for free registration support in multiple variants.

Walk Ups: We will also accept walk ups, No appointment is required.

Participants will receive a separate email with the date of their second shot.

On the Cover:

Class of 2021 Top Dons Gennevieve Paddelford......................................................Academy for Success Joseph Urrutia.....................................................................Academy for Success Gisselle Olea Rayo.............................................................................................Art Isabelle Kamin.................................................................................................ASB Cielo Said..........................................................................................................ASB Mercedes Perez Perez...................................................................................AVID Karleigh Dehlsen....................................................Computer Science Academy Elexus Mora..................................................................................................Dance Aria Jimenez.................................................................................................Dance Jose Miguel Arroyo...........................................Emerging Multilingual Learner Joshua Cruz Soriano.........................................Emerging Multilingual Learner Mila Speer...................................................................................................English Karissa Fields.................................................................................................Forge Vivianna Trujillo...........................................................................................Forge Joy Patterson..........................................................................Instrumental Music Nikhita Rao....................................................................................................MAD Santiago Bailey Musacchio...........................................................................MAD Natalie Brewer................................................................................................Math Sofia Tognotti.............................................................................................Science Hayden Randolph...........................................................................Social Studies Aiden Hatsuo Conner..............................................................Special Education Cassandra Stewart......................................................................Sports Medicine Maria Munoz Prudencio............................................................Sports Medicine Adelia Hubbard..........................................................................................Theatre Raven O’Donnell.........................................................................................VADA Daniel Sabraw.....................................................................................Vocal Music Emelia Aragon...................................................................................Vocal Music Dulce Cobian Flores.................................................................World Languages Estrella Rico...............................................................................World Languages Leah Galvan.............................................................................................Yearbook

NEWS | 3

MAY 28, 2021

$1.26 Million Window Replacement

Ms Wagner Retiring

BY VALERIA POLANCO LUJAN

NoozHawk

BY MARKO MENDOZA The Santa Barbara Unified School District is debating whether to replace all the windows on the Santa Barbara High School campus or restore them. The district has been looking to see how much money it will take to proceed with the project, and came up with an estimate of around $1.26 Million dollars to replace all of the windows. But even then, it’s also going to cost more be-

cause they are going to have to replace the wooden window frames too and make sure they can match the way they were before. While they have contacted and talked to architects who have experience working with historical buildings and a private contractor that specializes in the restoration of historical objects, they have gotten responses from all saying that replacing them will be more cost-effective than restoring them.

Some of the windows in question

at Santa Barbara High School are really old, and the paint is falling off of them. Some of the windows can’t even open or close anymore. Replacing the windows would also make the ventilation in the rooms more flexible with different types of weather and the windows would be able to actually block out sound., Furthermore, a student at Santa Barbara High School recounted how, one time in math class, their teacher was trying to open a window when the whole

window fell off the second story down to the ground because of how old it was. It’s not the first time this has happened and after interviewing some students, many of them also think that the windows should be repaired and renewed. Currently, the window repairs are on pause until further assessments are available according to Fred Razo, the facilitator of the school.

The Wellness Center Grand Opening

Catherine Harlow

BY CATHERINE HARLOW While lockdown has put stress on a lot of students recently, a new therapy and hangout area has been established in our school called the Wellness Center. This is a place to go if you are feeling stressed, upset, having a mental crisis, or just need somebody to talk to. The program is being run by Jessica Zacarias, who I recently interviewed to get some insight into how it works.

When Jessica was in Grad School at Cal Poly, she worked at a high school nearby for a part of her training, and they had a Wellness Center there. It was a very unique space to work in because it was what she would’ve wanted for herself in high school, where anyone could go and not feel the pressures of being judged.

Some of the students who would go might have really poor grades or a bad home situation, and the Wellness Center would be a place they could go

and feel welcomed and listened to.

The point of the Wellness Center is to be an accessible space for any sort of mental health intervention. The Wellness Center is a place for someone to either be able to chill and hang out by themselves or for someone who is having a mental breakdown and needs a safe, comfortable space to go and calm down. The Wellness Center gives students the opportunity to come in whenever they need to, and not disrupt their own class. It

is open to everyone, including staff, if they need somewhere to go to just relax their mind.

Inside the Wellness Center are places to sit and relax, and all new furniture was set up in the space to create a clean and welcoming environment. They have donated activities, along with snacks, although, with COVID-19 there are limits to food and drinks within the room.

The Wellness Center is a walk-in deal, where you are allowed to come in whenever you need to and do not need to sign up in advance. Students are allowed to hang out in the room during lunch and during class hours, depending on how many people are present in the room at that time. Jessica, who is usually the person running the Wellness Center area, also helps with therapy-type conversations, for anyone who might need somebody to talk to or listen to if they are having a hard time.

At the moment, only 3 students are allowed inside the Wellness Center at a time, although they do have switching times where students can come for a little bit and then give room for the next student. The Wellness Center is open from 8:45 till 12:40pm on Mondays, Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Fridays and is located in room 210A by the Senior Lawn. The requirement is to wear masks at all times, in order to keep you and everybody else in the space safe.

With this year coming to an end, we have a few teachers and staff retiring. One of them is Ms Wagner who has been teaching for over thirty years. Ms. Wagner has been working at Santa Barbara High school for 13 years but previously taught at La Cumbre Junior High School and Dos Pueblos High School where she actually had a couple of students that are now working here as well including the college and career counselor Mr. Barr and English teacher Ms Vascarra.

Ms Wagner’s current position here at SBHS is a teacher of Emergent Multilingual Learners or EML students, so she teaches a class called English Support but has also been a Literacy coach on campus. “I’ve supported my colleagues in instructional literacy practices over the last two or three years, so part of my job is teaching and part of my job is supporting my colleagues,” she added.

After so many years of being in education and teaching for Santa Barbara High school, it’s obvious that there is a lot she’s going to miss. “I’m definitely going to miss the connection with students. I told my students this year that I’m retiring and I feel like we’re connecting more… we went through the pandemic together and a lot of my students also had me last year so we’ve all been through a lot together. I’ve been making time to connect individually with each student and tell them what I appreciate about them and it’s been pretty emotional.” Ms Wagner continued, saying she’s also going to miss the connection with her colleagues: “A lot of my colleagues and peers have trusted me to support them and that feels like the biggest honor, to have earned the trust of my colleagues.”

Since Ms Wagner has been teaching for so many years, I imagine her life was very busy and stressful at times so I was very curious to ask what she plans on doing after she retires.

“Honestly I have no plans and that’s by design, teaching can be an all-consuming profesión and I want to experience the open space for a while and not fill it up with lots of busyness.” Wanting time for herself after putting her energy into her job for so long makes sense. “ I feel like it’s going to be a process of getting to know myself again and knowing what my interests are and what I like, and I just want whatever comes to me to be emergent and not for me to have to plan it all out.” Ms Wagner finished by adding that she is looking forward to having more connection with family. Ms Wagner has three grown children, one of whom is getting married soon, and the other two are graduating from college, “I am looking forward to spending more time with my kids and hopefully in the next few years, grandchildren.” We hope that Ms Wagner has a wonderful retirement and I’m sure she will be missed here at the SBHS campus.

4 | NEWS

MAY 28, 2021

ASB President Izzy Kamin’s Legacy of School Spirit

BY EMERSON STEADY Isabelle Kamin has had to lead her student body through perhaps the strangest year in Santa Barbara High School’s history. As Associated Student Body President during a pandemic, Izzy has been responsible for trying to create a sense of community among Dons throughout distance learning and global strife. But like everyone else, this isn’t what she planned. Way back in March of 2020, her and her friend’s initial excitement of having “three weeks off of school” took some time to turn into a much more difficult realization. “It really started to hit us as a senior class and we realized we weren’t coming back, we just lost our senior year,” she said.

For Kamin, having the chance to celebrate as a senior was something that she had looked forward to for a long time. She had a whole list of hopes that now seemed dashed: “that’s what we work for these whole four years of high school is to celebrate and celebrate our college applications and our prom and our last football season and homecoming.” Instead, she had to embark on a different sort of journey for her final year at SBHS. Under the guidance of ASB’s new advisor, Kelly Ball, she began the process of fundamentally transforming ASB’s role at the school.

After years of serving to represent the students of SBHS, Kamin was elected to her current position right

as the pandemic was starting last Spring. As the leaders of the school, ASB has faced its ups and downs, especially during this last year. The first past of the year was filled with uncertainty for ASB as with everyone, and Kamin said “It was really disappointing when we didn’t know when we were gonna be able to come back.” However, the strength of their community allowed them to endure.

Kamin particularly credits the strong support of Ball who is in her first year as the advisor to ASB. Ball specifically wanted to establish ASB’s presence on campus in a way that people would know that it’s more than just ”putting up posters.” Now that they are back on campus in-person, Kamin said she feels like they’ve been given a “fresh start.” To remedy what Kamin has viewed as a lack of school spirit over the past few years, ASB hit the ground running as soon as they were back in-person, and Kamin was amazed at the response. Beginning with senior sunrise, a chance for their class to connect after being apart for over a year, Kamin observed that “Everyone was there celebrating, really happy to be back.” For Homecoming, ASB coordinated a virtual nomination and crowning of a court. Prom has been a big question this year, given the logistical challenge of having such a large gathering with food and drinks, but in the last few weeks of school, ASB was given the go-ahead to create a carnival-like celebration in

the stadium. They pulled out all the stops to create a seniors-only night to remember, only with some pandemic-era safety measures like masks and testing. They have also introduced more novel events for the first time like the Sophomore Class Game Night, all in the hopes of creating a stronger bond among students.

Kamin was initially drawn to the ASB class, which was under the guidance of Ms Roesch, when she met some of its leaders at Dons’ Derby her freshman year. Leadership is always a people-focused endeavor and Kamin said she specifically joined because of how “friendly and optimistic these people were.” The excitement of the people in ASB inspired her to run for and successfully be elected as Sophomore Class President. Despite being the only sophomore in Leadership, the older students took her in and ASB quickly grew into a “second family” for her. Although joining ASB was a leap of faith in many ways, Kamin has no regrets. She said that the experience of joining ASB taught her the importance of stepping outside of her comfort zone and has only propelled her further into an understanding of what matters to her. Another part of what has made Kamin so successful in Leadership is her unquenchable curiosity. She believes that there are “no stupid questions” and that wisdom can come from anywhere so it is important to listen to everyone, an integral skill in a leader.

With most students now back in classrooms and the end of the pandemic in sight, Kamin said that she feels that the Dons are “Coming back in full force.” She described the moment when she first showed up back on campus and realized how excited people were to be back in-person with their community. She was specifically excited by how many cars she saw in the senior parking lot, knowing that she had been given a chance to reconnect with many of the people in her class who she has gone through so much with. Her particular reason for wanting to return to campus was her ASB community, but she was excited to see that so many other students in her class had also found their reasons for wanting to return. She said this class has truly proven how “resilient” they are, given all of the trials of the past year, and she thinks this is a very special class to be a part of.

With graduation only days away though, it is definitely a bittersweet moment. Kamin said that the dominant feeling of these final weeks has been nostalgia as she reflects on four years of memories within Santa Barbara High School’s historic walls.

She can hardly believe how quickly the time has gone, but also how many memories she has made along the way, particularly in ASB. Kamin is now off to study Communication and Information at the CU Boulder College of Media where she hopes

Izzy Kamin to focus on photography and film.

She’s excited to pursue her passions and follow in the artistic footsteps of her idol, photographer Tyler Shields, but there is a lot she’s going to miss.

The class of 2021 has been her family for a long time. In fact, she’s attended school with the majority of her ASB Executive Cabinet since their elementary days. What is clear though is that the spirit of the Dons will always flow in her blood. Santa Barbara High School has been her home and family, and she has been honored to have been tasked with leading this community through such trying times. She is ready to move on, but as is the tradition, she will always be a Don.

Reflecting on Princess Diana’s Life

Los Angeles Times

BY EMMA KING The Royal Family, a crucible of glamour, scandal, and power. Diana was just a pawn in their game of chess. A beautiful light in the middle of darkness. She brought so much kindness and joy into the royal family. Her death was tragic and arguably what people most remember about her along with the shocking way it happened. The loss of her will be forever felt in the United Kingdom.

In her short lifespan, she was able to touch the lives of thousands forever.

The realization that she was flawed and went through struggles, hopefully should be a reminder that she was more human than we thought, not a perfect figurehead, a person who just smiled and waved for the cameras, plastering a fake smile across her face. This is an exploration of her struggles, hardships, and her demise.

Diana Spencer was born on July 1, 1961 to John Spencer and Frances Shand Kydd. When she was a kid she showed interest in music and dancing. She gained the title Lady Diana Spencer in 1975 after her father inherited the title Earl Spencer. After attending finishing school at an institute in Switzerland, she moved to London and started working with children, becoming an assistant in

a kindergarten class. Prince Charles and Diana began dating in 1977.

On February 6, 1981 Prince Charles proposed to Diana, only six months after they started their relationship.

On July 29, 1981 they were officially married in a wedding ceremony at St. Paul’s Cathedral. The wedding was broadcast across the globe and nearly one billion people from seventy-four countries tuned into the wedding of the century.

However, it turns out that the marriage between the two was less than glamorous. Diana, such a kind-hearted person, was met with distaste and rejection from Charles throughout the marriage. Before Diana’s marriage to Charles, she expressed doubts because she had found a bracelet Charles made for past girlfriend Camila Parker Bowles. Bowles was a past girlfriend Charles had after first meeting her in 1970. During Diana and Charles’s relationship it was rumored that the two were still in contact with one another. Diana gave many statements during and after her marriage to Charles alluding to his possible affair with Camila. She gave a statement in an interview with BBC where she famously stated, “There were three of us in this marriage, so it was a bit crowded,” referring to Camilla Parker Bowles, in 1995.

After giving birth to Prince William in 1982, her mental health started to take a turn for the worst. She started to suffer from postpartum depression. In an interview with BBC in 1995 she stated, “you’d wake up in the morning feeling you didn’t want to get out of bed, you felt misunderstood, and just very, very low in yourself.” In 1984, they welcomed their second child Harry.

During her marriage to Charles, she suffered from bulimia. In an interview with Andrew Morton in 1992 she spoke on her eating disorder and stated, “The bulimia started the week after we got engaged and would take nearly a decade to overcome.” The princess recorded herself saying, “My husband put his hand on my waistline and said: ‘Oh, a bit chubby here, aren’t we?’ and that triggered off something in me—and the Camilla thing.” She also struggled with depression and anxiety while living in the palace. She was bored and lonely most of the time with nowhere to go because of the tabloids that would follow her every move. Her husband being distant and dismissive could also be a contributing factor to her declining mental health.

Charles and Diana’s marriage finally came to an end in December of 1992. Prime Minister John Major an-

nounced to the House of Commons that the Prince and Princess of Wales were separating, saying, “This decision has been reached amicably and they will both continue to participate fully in the upbringing of their children.” In an interview with the BBC three years after their divorce, Diana stated, “we had struggled to keep it going, but obviously we’d both run out of steam.” Currently, Charles is married to Camila. They got married five years after Diana’s death.

Only a year after her divorce, she met her tragic end in 1997. Her death hit citizens hard because Diana was so beloved and well respected across the United Kingdom. On August 31, 1997, Diana got in a Mercedes to go from the Ritz in Paris to a 10-day getaway on the French Riviera with her then-boyfriend Emad “Dodi” Fayed. In the car was their driver Henri Paul and her bodyguard Trevor Rees-Jones, who was the only survivor of the fatal car crash. While on the way to this getaway, Henri Paul was over the legal alcohol limit and crashed the car in the Alma tunnel in Paris. Princess Diana was declared dead less than four hours later at the University Hospitals Pitié Salpêtrière - Charles Foix. Her boyfriend Dodi was pronounced dead at the crash site as well as the driver Henri Paul.

With such a publicized death, the general public had multiple conspiracies around her demise and who might be the real culprit behind it.

Even the father of Emad “Dodi” Fayed was quick to question if the car crash was really an accident. The reason that so many are quick to call out that there may have been foul play involved in her death is because of the manner in which her medical attention was given care of after the crash occurred. For example, instead of her being treated at the Pitie-Salpetriere hospital where she died, Diana could have been treated at the Hotel-Dieu, which the ambulance passed on the

way. The onboard doctor on the ambulance, Jean-Marc Martino also treated Diana for forty minutes on the scene of the crash before setting off to a hospital.

One of the most famous conspiracies includes Charles deliberately trying to get Diana out of the picture so he could marry Camila. After separating with Charles, Diana sent a note to her butler stating, “I am sitting here at my desk today in October, longing for someone to hug me and encourage me to keep strong and hold my head high. This particular phase in my life is the most dangerous—[someone] is planning ‘an accident’ in my car, brake failure and serious head injury in order to make the path clear for him to marry,” she wrote. Is it scary that she accurately predicted her death? Yes, absolutely.

There were so many theories on what or who could have been behind her death, that London’s Metropolitan Police did a full investigation into the claims and published their findings in Operation Paget. They found no subsequent evidence to put behind these claims, so the case is still ruled as an accident to this day.

We know that Diana Spencer’s life was not always a walk in the park.

Maybe that is why the people of the United Kingdom loved her so much.

She was a regular human being. She was real, authentic, and struggled like every single human being inevitably does. During her life, she contributed so much of her time to charitable causes. When AIDS and HIV reached it’s lethal peak in the United Kingdom, Diana shook a HIV patient’s hand without gloves. This helped dispel the misconception that HIV could be passed through touch.

She broke the stigma around mental health by giving interviews opening about her own struggles while being in the royal family. Although her death remains tragic, her legacy will remain forever.

NEWS | 5

MAY 28, 2021

Living on the Streets: Part One How Santa Barbara Is Dealing With Homelessness

Carlo Maguire

BY CARLO MAGUIRE In the United States, there are 168 homeless people per 100,000 people.

In Santa Barbara County, there are 490 homeless people per 100,000 which puts Santa Barbara’s rate 192%

above the national average. Since homelessness is so high here in Santa Barbara, I wanted to hear from some of the local groups who work directly with the homeless population. I reached out to the Santa Barbara Police Department, and got the op-

portunity to speak with Lieutenant Kenneth Kushner who oversees several departments that interact directly with the homeless.

How does the police department interact with the homeless population?

“The police department has a lot of involvement with people in the community that are experiencing homelessness. The first way that there could be involvement is through enforcement. Like any other portion of the population, there are times when crimes are committed.

There’s a lot of other ways that police are involved, like one key role is helping facilitate services from service providers. Different service providers offer services but they’ll want a presence there to look out for everybody’s safety that would be the role of a police officer.

We also have a correspondence officer who is partnered with a mental health clinician so that’s another way we interact with the homeless.”

How have the police department’s interactions with homeless people changed due to the COVID pan-

demic?

“We did go into a period of time where we were limiting our interaction (with the homeless people) so that we weren’t spreading or getting COVID. A lot of community members have made observations and there seems to be more homeless encampments on the side of the freeway, and really everywhere” Why do you think Santa Barbara’s homelessness rate is so high?

“One thing that is certainly different than many other states is our weather which allows someone to sleep outside. Also Santa Barbara is a tourist destination so I’ve observed people who panhandle, and seem to do it pretty successfully. Those are things that jump out of my mind but by no means are definitive answers based on anything other than my own opinion.”

What do you see as some solutions to the homelessness problem here in Santa Barbara?

Homelessness isn’t an issue that we’re going to police our way out of.

We’re not going to go out and write

tickets and arrest people and end homelessness that way.

Some solutions that I’ve observed are: building trust first, recognizing what people want and what they need, and really increasing the services that are being provided.

Finally, there needs to be a significant amount of availability for diversion or anybody that is needing any type of program whether it’s substance abuse, alcohol, mental illness.

And then the bottom line is housing”.

To learn more about this topic, I paid a visit to the Santa Barbara Rescue Mission, a local organization that helps homeless people along with many other services to the community. I got the chance to speak with Kevin Carroll who is the Director of homeless guest services. Be sure to visit the Forge website to watch our video-story on homelessness in Santa Barbara, which includes this exclusive interview with Kevin Carroll.

Watch the full video story on The Forge’s website: sbhsforge.com/streets

The Derek Chauvin Trial

BY MIA TALAUGON On May 25th 2020, 46 year old George Floyd was murder by a cop after being put under initial arrest for an alleged counterfeit 20 dollar bill outside a Cup Foods, a grocery store in Minneapolis, Minnesota.

According to BBC News at 8:01 p.m the employee ringing up Floyd made a call to 911 and at 8:08 two police officers arrived. Mr Floyd was with two other people sitting in a car that was parked around the corner. One of the officers, Thomas Lane, pulled his gun out after approaching the car and ordered Floyd to show his hands. Prosecutors said that Thomas Lane “put his hands on Mr Floyd, and pulled him out of the car.” They also stated that Floyd “actively resisted being handcuffed.” Court transcripts from police body cameras show that George Floyd appeared to be cooperative at the beginning of his arrest and repeatedly apologized to the officers after they approached his car.

According to the repost at 8:14, Floyd “stiffened up, fell to the ground, and told the officers he was claustrophobic.” Derek Chauvin then arrived at the scene and while attempting to put Floyd in the police car with other officers, Chavin pulled Floyd away from the passenger side which caused him to fall to the ground. He laid on the ground, in handcuffs, and face down. While Floyd was restrained by officers, Derek Chauvin placed his knee in between his head and neck. He kept his knee there for more than nine minutes. Body cam footage from Thomas Lane and J Alexander Kueng show that Floyd said that he could not breathe more than 20 times that he could not breathe as well as begging “please, please, please”. At one point while he was restrained George Floyd gasps “You’re going to kill me, man.” Chavin kept his knee where it was and replied to Floyd “Then stop talking, stop yelling. It takes a heck of a lot of oxygen

to talk.” Floyd then said “Can’t believe this, man. Mom, love you. Love you.

Tell my kids I love them. I’m dead.”

About six minutes into the period George Floyd had become non-responsive, bystanders urged the officers to check his pulse and when Officer Kueng checked Floyd’s right wrist he could not find one; however, the other officers did not move. It was not until 8:27 Chauvin removed his knee from Floyd’s neck. Floyd was put onto a gurney and taken to Hennepin County Medical Center in an ambulance. George Floyd was pronounced dead an hour later.

The trial took place on April 20, 2021. The whole trial took 3 weeks and over those weeks dozens of witnesses testified, hours of George Floyd’s arrest were played over and over again.

Through the witnesses that testified in the first week the jury got all of the most crucial points of the arrest, such as if any drugs were a part of Floyd’s death and what kind of impact the arrest had on the witnesses. Multiple witnesses cried as they recollected the arrest. Some witnesses told the jury they felt guilt for not intervening. Charles McMillian was a witness.

He talked with Floyd as he was being pinned to the ground by Chauvin and encouraged him to get up and get in the police car. While testifying he said “Once the police get the cuffs on you, you can’t win.” Derek Smith was one of the paramedics who was called to the scene. He testified that he looked for Floyd’s pulse as soon as he arrived but did not find one. He said that in efforts to save Floyd’s life on the way to the hospital he used a defibrillator and a machine that provides chest compressions, despite his efforts he could not revive Floyd.

George Floyd’s girlfriend Courteney Ross gave the public a glimpse into their relationship and life together.

Ross also talked about a primary issue that was in the case which was Floyd’s drug use. She told the jury that they both struggled with an opi-

oid addiction, she said that their drug use began with legal prescriptions for chronic pain. She told the jury “We got addicted, and we tried really hard to break that addiction many times.”

Acting police chief of the Minneapolis Police Department, Chief Medaria Arredondo testified as well and told the jury that Chauvin violated police policy when he knelt on Floyd’s neck for more than nine minutes. He said “Once Mr. Floyd had stopped resisting, and certainly once he was in distress and trying to verbalize that, that should have stopped.” He also said Chauvin violated police policy by not providing medical aid to Floyd when he became unresponsive. Pulmonologist Dr. Martin J. Tobin testified that George Floyd died from a “low level of oxygen.” He told the jury he did not see any evidence of an overdose.

He stated that he had counted Floyd’s breaths and said that he was breathing at a regular rate in the minutes before he died, Dr. Tobin said that if Floyd had been suffering from an overdose the rate of the breath should have slowed.” Eric Nelson was the attorney leading Derek Chavin’s defense and he has argued that drug use and an underlying heart condition led to Floyd’s death. However every witness that was called by the prosecution denied that claim. Dr. David Fowler was a witness who was called by the defense, testified the opposite of every other witness. Dr. Fowler is the former chief medical examiner for the state of Maryland and he said he saw no evidence that Chauvin’s knee did not harm Floyd in any way.

Barry Brodd, a former police officer, said that Chauvin’s restraint did not qualify as a “use of force” but eventually said that, under the policies of the Minneapolis Police Department, it did. He agreed when the prosecutors asked whether the level of force should change depending on how much a suspect is resisting.

Dr. Fowler and Brodd were the only witnesses who offered to support

Chauvin. When Thursday came Derek Chavin said he would invoke his Fifth Amendment right not to testify.

His action set off a nation reckoning over race and policing but the public has not heard much from Chauvin.

After all of the witnesses testified the themes became crystal clear almost immediately to the jury. This trial and the verdict attracted more attention than almost any other criminal proceeding in decades.

There were 12 jurors that were in the trial. When the time came all they wrote down a letter on a piece of paper of their decision. When the jury formed tallied the votes, there were 11 papers written with a “G”for guilty and one paper with a “U “for unsure. The New York Times interviewed Brandon Mitchell, who was juror number 52 and he spoke about how there were four black jurors, including himself, six white jurors and two multiracial jurors. Their ages ranged from their 20s to their 60s. In the interview Mitchell talked about how after closing arguments in the trial on April 19th, all 12 jurors gathered in a conference room at a hotel where they were secluded and they surrendered their phones for deliberations. They first considered second degree manslaughter which was the most serious charge that Derek Chauvin was facing. The jurors took turns speaking their minds but ended up deciding to wait until the second day of deliberations to talk about the murder charges. On the second day of deliberations they were woken up at 6:45. Mr. Mitchell said that they focused at one point on the exact cause of Floyd’s death. After several hours of discussions over a third-degree murder charge, the jurors had a favored conviction and after another half and hour, they all agreed on a second-degree murder convection. Mitchell talked about how the jurors did not want to rush.

He said “We took a pause to soak it in and say, ‘This is what we’re about

to do.’” They all decided to wait until after lunch to fill out the forms that make their decision official. At 2 p.m. they told the deputies that they had reached a verdict and they were taken to the courtroom where Judge Peter A. Cahill would read the verdict.

Many people were outside the Hennepin County Government Center watching the trial on their phones waiting for the verdict. Judge Peter A. Cahill then announced that Derek Chauvin has been found guilty on all three counts. Second and third-degree murder, and second-degree man slaughter. As the judge read the verdict Chauvin’s eyes wandered around the room left and right but he showed no signs of emotion. Judge Cahill then revoked Chauvin’s bail while he was being handcuffed and then was led out of the courtroom.

Eric Nelson then followed Chauvin out of the courtroom both without any comments. The citizens around the courthouse shouted out with joy yelling “All three counts! All three counts!”. Many citizens described it to the LA Times as a weight lifted off their shoulders and multiple citizens spoke about if the verdict may have been different the reaction could have been catastrophic. Chauvin was booked into the Oak Park Heights state prison at 4:55 p.m.

Derek Chauvin now faces up to 40 years in prison for second-degree murder, 25 years for third-degree murder, and up to 10 years for second-degree manslaughter. He will be sentenced in about two months for the case that changed the world.

The case that sparked worldwide protests against police brutality, racial injustice, and prompted demands for a change in how police officers are trained. People from all over the world are relieved about the verdict, but many have said that this is only the beginning.

6 | MAGAZINE

MAY 28, 2021

Raíces Club Art Show

Jeremy Rosales

Veronica Sanchez

BY VALERIA POLANCO LUJAN We all want a diverse community, where everyone’s culture is appreciated and represented, but it’s up to all of us to create that. The SB Raíces club is exactly that, a club that represents artists of color.

The SB Raices club was initially only an idea by a group of students who wanted to see more representation of artists of color and their culture. “Because of the pandemic, the public art exhibition they had planned at the Eastside Community Center was shelved in favor of an online website” according to Joseph Velasco, an English teacher and AVID site coordinator here at Santa Barbara High School. The website, raicessb805.wixsite.com, was created

by Veronica Sanchez, a graduate from SBHS, and her team.

Since Veronica graduated last year, two current seniors, Genesis Zarate and Michelle Alva, have continued this idea and created an official club.

Social distancing made it difficult to have an in-person show so they held an online art exhibit just last week.

As the COVID restrictions begin to loosen, they are hoping to be able to have art shows where people can come in person.

I reached out to Genesis and Michelle and we held an interview over zoom. I was very curious to

know more about the reason and importance of this club, so I began by asking them why this club was important to them specifically. They responded saying they wanted to create a safe space for people on campus so everyone felt included: “We think it’s important because it specifically included [Person of Color] artists, because most mainstream artists are white. We thought it was important to have a space for students to openly express themselves and be comfortable, not feel excluded or unrepresented.” I also asked them about their main goal for this club to which they responded by saying that they just wanted everyone to have the opportunity to be appreciated for their art and to feel included: “Since we are seniors and both graduating this year, we hope more people are able to join and continue expressing themselves through the club we are leaving behind.” They continued to explain that they are planning to leave the club to a junior who is a part of the club as well. “She’s seeing how we run our meeting and the planning behind ‘Celebracion de la Cultura’ and some of us are still gonna be in town next year so she has the foundation, and we hope she continues to recruit people and we continue being a club next year and the years to come.”

I asked about the reactions of people who are hearing about this club

and they answered, saying that the feedback has been really positive and overwhelming. “We’ve received so much help from the community.

We work along with the Ethnic Studies group so it’s all mutual support.”

Since last year the club has definitely grown a lot and has been seeing

so much support and so many more eyes on them which brings them lots of joy, and they’re hoping to have more people be a part of this club.

SB Raices club is a very easy club to join. If you are interested, you can search them up on Instagram, @ raices_sb, where they post informa-

tion about when the meetings are.

All you have to do is show up to the meetings and you are automatically a part of the club. The meetings are usually held in Mr. Velasco’s classroom which is room 22 on campus.

Mischelle Cercamo

Dear Zombie Apocalypse, Can You Raise My Kids for Me? The Finale of the Zombie Apocalypse Saga

BY ZOE HUSTED As she’s filling out her Bumble profile she begins writing her bio. In it she writes “I’m 43. I have two kids.

One’s 21 and the other’s 14. They’re both idiots who love Minecraft. I’m an alchemist and a goth kid. I’ve been like this since the nineties. I love it. Oh, a random fact about me is that my son said I’m a very attractive mom.” For her profile picture, she put a picture of herself with her kids.

“Mom let me look at this. Let me see,” the mom, Freya, gives her laptop to her daughter Selene, so she could look it over. “Mom. This

doesn’t work. WE NEED TO GET RID OF IT ALL.” As she begins to erase, her mom protests. “Selene no. How will they know it’s me if you’re writing it all?”

Selene takes a pause from rewriting and tells her mom “because mom, I know you. Like really well.

So trust me, mom.”

Five minutes later, after a lot of editing, Selene asks her mom to read it.

The Bumble bio reads “Hi my name is Freya. I’m a 43-year-old divorcee as well as a mother of two who is ready to get back in the dating game again. A fun fact about me is that I’m a pagan goth and have been since I was in high school.”

“Mom. Is this version okay? I can remake it again if you don’t like it.” Selene asked with a tone of this should work right?

“Yeah, this works.” said the mom as she pressed the submit button and her profile was uploaded and now in “the game”.

After three weeks of swiping left and swiping right, she finally found someone she liked, a 45-year-old They/Them with one kid. They began talking online and getting to know each other. Eventually, their first date rolled around. They each got dressed in some more or less casual clothes.

As they met up in the car park be-

hind the film theatre, they decided which film they were going to watch: a horror film called “The Invisible Man”. They were both total horror film geeks.

After the film was over they began discussing where to go and eat. They eventually chose to just go to some Italian restaurant and call it a day.

They talked, and they ate, and ultimately, they had to go their separate ways.

Fast-forward to one year later.

“The Inmortuorum Virus is nearing a conclusion. The vaccine has been developed and currently, more than half the population in the world has been vaccinated, but it has not

been approved for those under the age of 8. The United Nations has decided that zombies will be killed, and their corpses cremated as a way to make sure that this virus won’t ever resurface. Of course, their cremated remains will be given back to families. If that isn’t possible they will be buried in a local cemetery. That’s all for today.” The reporter finished talking as the news segment ended.

The two lovebirds were cuddling on the couch. The kids sat on the floor disgusted by what was behind them.

MAY 28, 2021

MAGAZINE | 7

Talitha Gabrielle Shows Her Soulful Side

Talitha Blackwell

BY EMERSON STEADY Santa Barbara High School has long been known as a breeding ground for passionate artists of all kinds. Between the Visual Arts and Design Academy and the renowned performing arts departments, teachers and students have strived to create an environment where artistry is central to student’s experience. However, there is one particular artist who has been hiding in plain sight: Santa Barbara High School’s own Talitha Blackwell, the Technical Director of the Theatre Department. While many have had the chance to work with her in the Stagecraft elective

Talitha Blackwell

and the theatre department’s productions, as it turns out theatre is her day job. When she’s not teaching students how to use power tools and constructing impressive sets, she records original music and covers under the moniker Talitha Gabrielle. On her recordings, you’ll uncover a powerful but intimate voice backed by sensual acoustic guitar, impassioned drums, and layered harmonies. She sings about love and heartbreak, desire and loss, all in a richly stylized voice that’s reminiscent of the jazz age. Originally from a musical family in Hampton, Virginia, Blackwell’s pursuits in music and theatre brought her to Atlanta, Georgia and then out west

to Santa Barbara. While she works at Santa Barbara High School, she continues to write, record, and perform her music in the community.

As a child in Virginia, Blackwell was surrounded by music on both sides of her family. Her dad played the organ and her mother sang in their local church. With music “in [her] blood” Blackwell soon picked up the acoustic guitar. She was originally inspired by artists like Amy Winehouse whose stylized craft repopularized jazz singing. Specifically, Blackwell valued the emotional depth of Winehouse’s storytelling and knew that was something she wanted to accomplish in her music.

Jazmine Sullivan also heavily influenced Blackwell’s sense of vocal melody and what she described as her “vocal calisthenics.” Blackwell credits Lauryn Hill and India Arie as other major influences. Blackwell originally began writing neo-soul music, but over time her artistry on the acoustic guitar morphed her music into something more unique. All of these elements have combined to create a sound that is rhythmic, personal, funky, and new.

Blackwell’s music is intensely emotional but also feels joyous in its celebration of life and music. On “Eyes,” from her EP Little Bird, Blackwell sings, “Eyes like a starry night/ cover me with your shine.” Blackwell finds these beautiful moments in life and expands them into powerful emotional journeys. On “Remedy,” Blackwell howls, “said I’m looking for a good time.” While most of her music

Talitha Blackwell

focuses on love, Blackwell found that in particular “It’s a lot easier for [her] to write about heartbreak.” These feelings are expressed clearly through Blackwell’s music but never in a way that makes the audience feel weighed down. Instead, they feel empowered

by Blackwell’s persistence in the face of her struggles.

After writing and playing for four years in Atlanta, Georgia, Blackwell was finally brought out to California. Blackwell had supported herself as a set dresser, but political turmoil in Georgia caused much of the film industry there to shut down. Her sister told her about a job opening at the Pacific Conservatory of the Performing Arts up in Santa Maria, and Blackwell made the leap. While in college, Blackwell had been brought in as an audio engineer to work on musicals. That’s when she discovered her love for theatre. She’s always preferred live music to recordings, and theatre captured the essence of that feeling. She also found that she could apply many of her skills in sound design and music to the shows she worked on. When she brought her music to an open-mic night, she was exhilarated by the reception. She found an even more enthusiastic crowd in Southern California than in Atlanta and redoubled her focus on her craft. After gigging in Utah for a summer, she knew she had to return to California. That’s when she found out there was a job opening at Santa Barbara High School.

At first, Blackwell was somewhat apprehensive about working with students who were still in the process of self-realization, but she soon discovered her passion for helping young artists to grow, and she is constantly inspired by her students. Because of the timing of the pandemic, Blackwell is still establishing her roots in Santa Barbara. As restaurants and clubs are reopening, she is getting her setlist together and getting ready to show Santa Barbara what she’s all about. With her trusty guitar in hand and the emotional intensity of her lyrics, Blackwell is sure to make an impact. Talitha Gabrielle’s new EP, Pretty Bird, is out now and available on most streaming platforms.

8 | ACADEMIES

MAY 28, 2021

Visual Arts and Design

Orion Norris

BY CHARLEY RAYMOND With the school year coming to an end, school has reopened four days a week and is hoping to open fully in the fall. VADA along with other academies are still figuring out how next year will be for their staff and students as much is still undecided.

I interviewed a couple of staff members and students on the new changes and how they feel about it.

Through the pandemic, there have been many changes made to help students still feel the sense of community and keep everyone safe. For instance, the projection shows have been a new way to show off student art to the public. During normal times, VADA would hold small art exhibits so the community can see what students have been working on.

However, they could not continue this through COVID because of the close contact and indoor space. So as a solution, they hosted a projection show in which they projected student’s art onto the wall at the Lobero.

Not only was it a hit in the community, but students and teachers alike seem to love the concept and really enjoyed it. They hope to continue it even after the pandemic as it also brought in more foot traffic for the

Grace Wyman

academy than the art galleries did, and new visitors.

One really great thing that VADA was able to start doing during this school year was having guest speakers through Zoom. VADA normally has many field trips throughout the school year but due to COVID, they weren’t able to this school year. So, in place of that they started hosting guest speakers over Zoom so students could still hear from professionals in the field. The great thing about this is that they are able to host people from all over the world and learn from people outside of our small community in Santa Barbara. Prior to COVID, field trips normally had to be within a reasonable distance but they are now able to think outside of the box so students can experience artwork and artists in different parts of the world.

I asked some students in VADA, who would like to remain anonymous, how they have been doing through all of this. Students who join are already creative and interested in art and new forms of learning. But, for many students this is their introduction to the art forms VADA teaches and are still beginners. For those students, not having hand-on experience and having to learn through

Zoom has been a major struggle and they have had a hard time picking up some of the core techniques.

Other students have thankfully done art classes before, in junior high or past years in VADA, and are having an easier time learning through Zoom. However, for both students it has been difficult to feel the sense of community that VADA preaches about through COVID. Now that people are back in class, students who have already been part of the VADA community are grateful to be with their friends and create art together. But for new students, it’s been a struggle to connect with other students because of being at home for so long. Even so, now that students are back on campus, the VADA community is very lively as students work on artwork in-person, and overall students are glad to be back.

The teachers are also glad to be back and see their students faceto-face. While it’s still a struggle for them to teach the two groups of students, both in person and over Zoom, they are still happy to teach physical in-person students rather than what feels like a bunch of small boxes on a computer.

The district school board has decided that all academies across the district will no longer require applications. In past years, students joining VADA would have to fill out an application including basic information about them along with a portfolio of some past work. However, for the school year of 2021-2022, they will only require that you sign up for the “free-hand drawing class,” and you will be automatically enrolled into the English class as well. This means that anyone interested can now join VADA if they sign up soon enough, as it will now be on a first come first serve basis.

This new change is receiving mixed opinions from students as well as staff. For some students who were completely new to art when first joining VADA, they think this will allow for people who want to learn more about art but don’t have any more work opportunities to join programs like MAD. Meanwhile, other students find it unfair and are afraid that the program’s level of artistry will go down if they will now just accept anyone. Ms. Guss, Academic Director and English teacher for VADA, believes that this will help to open up VADA’s doors to even more students and allow opportunities for students of all different backgrounds. Mr Ter-

Mia Gomez

is, Art teacher at VADA, however is slightly worried that a good number of students who will sign up are only doing it out of curiosity and students who genuinely want to be in VADA may not be able to get a spot in time.

While even in normal years students come and go through VADA, a worry is that there will be even more students who will come through VADA and leave only a year or two later so students who had wanted to join since their 9th grade year will struggle to get in and end up missing some of the core classes from years past.

Even though everything is currently up in the air and little has been decided on for next year, VADA is excited to make a return hopefully fully on campus. They are currently working on making sure that next year students will have VADA classes for the entire year. We will be sticking with the block schedule next year and what that means is that some students will get all of their VADA classes in one semester and then the other semester, may not have any

Pearl Henry

VADA classes. VADA is very community-based so students only having classes in the academy for half of the year isn’t ideal. They are currently working with the counselors to make sure the classes are spread out for each student and are potentially considering adding more VADA classes to the schedule.

VADA is working hard to make sure that the transition back to campus and returning to school is as smooth as possible for students, along with making sure that they are providing the best experience for students next year. Even through the pandemic, they continued to work to keep the community aspect and students’ creativity alive. Hopefully by next year the kinks will be smoothed out and they will have a great 20212022 school year.

|

ACADEMIES 9

MAY 28, 2021

Computer Science

EdHat

BY EMERSON STEADY It may be tightly tucked away behind the library and underneath the theatre’s steps, but once you enter the doors of the Computer Science Academy, you will find yourself in a rich community of computer programmers, designers, and engineers.

The CSA, with Sky Adams as its new director, has worked hard to keep this community active during the pandemic. Although Computer Science is primarily a digital endeavor, remote learning presented serious challenges for the academy. For one, Adams described the challenge of helping students with their code.

Programming can be a very collaborative endeavor, but with online learning, Adams lacked the ability to look over student’s shoulders and directly help them debug. It also made it harder for students to work together on tasks and projects. Even

back in-person, distancing requirements still make collaboration difficult. However, Adams worked hard during the pandemic to bring in exciting new speakers who work out in the field to give talks over Zoom, and sent out recurring newsletters on all of the latest and greatest going on in the CSA.

One notable feature of the Computer Science Academy is its status as an “open” academy. This means that any student at Santa Barbara High School can take classes with the CSA, join clubs, and even earn CTE Pathway certificates. Adams encourages all students to join. Her main message is for students to not “be afraid to try it.” Dispelling a common misconception, she also emphasizes that students who struggle in math should not feel like they can’t succeed in computer science, because language skills actually tend to play a larger role. The CSA’s intro courses

are aimed at students with no prior experience. Adams recommends that students who are interested take either Exploring Computer Science or Computational Art. If they’re still interested in furthering their computer science education, they can talk with their teacher to determine what higher level courses they may want to take.

Like other academies and clubs on campus, the CSA also engages in numerous field trips to supplement their student’s education and give them insight into possible career paths. For obvious reasons, they were unable to take these trips this year, and while much remains up in the air, the academy is planning to resume them in the 2021-2022 school year. On these trips, students usually have the opportunity to visit tech companies and startups in places like Silicon Valley and “Silicon Beach” down in LA. Karleigh Dehlsen, who is this year’s

Top Don for the Computer Science Academy, has attended the CSA for all four years of high school. She first found out about the program through the junior high showcase at Earl Warren Showgrounds. She had no idea computer science would be such a passion for her, but once she realized the creative potential in the field, she became deeply invested.

Some of her best memories of the program involve its field trips, and particularly getting to see the Mars Rover under construction. She is also the President of the Maker’s Club, successor to the Robotics Club.

While the club does still compete at the BotBall competition every year, they’ve also expanded into mechanical design and electrical engineering.

This has meant exciting new equipment for the students to work with, including a laser cutter, a miter saw, and 3D printers. Dehlsen is very grateful that she took advantage of all

of the opportunities that the academy offered during her time at SBHS and is now looking to study Cognitive Science at UC Berkeley.

This year, Computer Science Academy enrollment increased significantly, and next year, the CSA is looking at an even larger enrollment boost. Adams attributes this to the new block schedule allowing students to take more classes and more outreach to junior high students. She also thinks that because computer science is becoming such an important skill in the modern economy, more students are taking an interest in it. Additionally, computer science classes are open to all students at Santa Barbara High School, and the program is always looking for new and excited students.

many more things. A lot of students have said that MAD has changed their views on film and photography and made them much more interested in these topics. Being in an academy also looks really good on college applications especially if you are going to an art or film school.

Students in MAD have said that it is extremely fun and also a good way to make friends. One student Izzy Garofalo says “MAD academy is one of the best classes at SBHS and is such a good way to make new friends and also get a good education in filmmaking and arts.” She also says that “the teachers are great and make the class more fun and impactful.”

The first year of MAD is Photoshop and Videoshop. You make things like album covers and funky art with lots of colors and pictures. One project was to make a picture of a celebrity out of everyday objects, for example using grass for eyebrows and other fun things like that. For the 2nd year you do coding. You can learn how to code your own games and fun things like that. If you are interested in any of those kinds of activities, MAD is definitely for you and you would have

a lot of fun. Also if you decide to join MAD but it isn’t really your thing then you can drop it at any time.

You also can join it any year. You only have to have an interview with the MAD director and you will most likely get into the program. This year, with COVID, kids haven’t had the full MAD experience but kids that will get that chance will have such a great time in the class. Students even say that it doesn’t even feel like class and it is more of a fun activity.

MAD is a great academy and can get you far in your film and photography interests. It is also great on college applications for film schools. It is definitely great for artistic people that love to be creative and do things with art. If you are interested in applying, email your counselor to be enrolled in the class and then get your interview with the MAD director. All you have to do is have fun and be open minded because even if you think MAD is not for you, it could be and you might love it!

Multimedia Arts and Design

MAD

BY HARPER LOCATELLI MAD stands for Multimedia Arts

and Design. It is an academy that is offered for all 4 years at Santa Barbara High School. MAD is a great op-

portunity for kids that are interested in film and photography. You learn photoshop, videography, coding and

10 | OPINION

MAY 28, 2021

Saving History in Ortega Park

EdHat

BY MIGUEL UNZUETA For the past six months, the city of Santa Barbara has been planning on renovating Ortega Park. The redesign will feature new pools, soccer fields, a skatepark, playgrounds, a community plaza, and a brand new basketball court with other features. Ortega Park has been around for nearly 91 years, first starting back in the 1930’s.

Many things have changed over the years for this park and for the community all around. Today there’s soccer fields, one softball field, a basketball court, and swimming pools.

Although there are many fantastic features to this park, there’s one in particular that is the most noticeable: the murals. There are a total of eight murals in the park which contain histories of the cultural backgrounds of Mexico and depictions of sports. Many say these murals are “the highlight” of the park. Although they are the highlight of Ortega Park, there has been a lot of commotion as to whether the murals will be taken down because of the new renovation plans. The director and organizer for these murals at Ortega Park is the well known Santa Barbara artist, Manuel Unzueta. It has been a back and forth argument on whether or not to keep the murals up, considering not only the hard work it took to get them done, but the true meanings behind them that should never be forgotten. Manuel Unzueta, the creator of the murals, is not giving up yet and will keep fighting for the

future generations to see.

Manuel Unzueta was born and raised in Juarez, Mexico and moved to Santa Barbara when he was only six years old. He participated in many things as a child, and always wanted to be involved in trying something new, such as sports and music. Over time, Manuel discovered that art was his true passion. “I knew I felt it, I really felt it in my heart”, Unzueta says.

“I chose art because people gave me respect, and people gave me a chance to be somebody,” said Unzueta. As his steps in life continued, he continued art and never stopped or settled with it. He graduated from Santa Barbara High School in 1968 and stayed close to home, attending Santa Barbara City College. He then moved on to the University of California at Santa Barbara where he received his Masters in Fine Arts. Manuel Unzueta then went to places that he never thought he would go. He started painting murals, mainly on the West Coast, for some time. He’s created a total of 52 murals across different states. They can be found at the University of Iowa, Mexico, El Paso, Texas, New Mexico, and Los Angeles.

Eventually, Manuel ended up making his way back up to Santa Barbara after painting murals in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico. He was then asked to paint several murals at Ortega Park with a couple of other muralists also from Puerto Vallarta. Starting in the summer of 1979, the murals were created to illuminate the park’s dark atmosphere.

In the summer of 1980, the murals of Ortega Park were finally finished.

Three of the murals are located on the walls of the bathroom and near the swimming pool. The majority of the murals in the park contain the background and culture of Mexico.

A famous mural created collectively, directed by Manuel Unzueta, is based on Chicanos. He calls this, “a Chicano Mural”. This contains three farm workers working out on the fields in the United States. He also said “this mural is to represent the Mexican-Americans fighting for their political rights, so farm workers can have a better pay.” There are murals that are similar to this in Ortega Park as well. Near the swimming pool area, inside and outside of the walls, are murals which represent the roots of where Mexico began. Aztec, Toltec, and Mayan art can be found on these murals. There are paintings of Toltec and Aztec sculptures such as those you would find in Mexico, the timeline and different parts of the Aztec history, and the famously known Mayan Pyramid. There is another mural which depicts kids playing sports. The sports that are included in this mural are soccer, baseball, basketball, and skating. Right around the corner is a mural representing the kids and young adults as farmers that work in the fields of Mexico.

The reason why Manuel Unzueta, his daughter and son, his students, and other artists such as Miguel Rodriguez, Miguel Gonzales, and Amando Rascon created these murals was because they wanted to show people their Mexican background and know more about their culture.

He also mentioned that “Murals are photographs of history, murals are statements of people, murals are contemporary reminders that society doesn’t change”. Manuel does not want people to forget the history of not only the art itself and how much time they took, but the history behind those murals. They send strong messages about the cultural backgrounds of many people and remind us that we are a part of history too.

The city of Santa Barbara is still set on their plan of renovating Ortega Park and taking down the murals forever. Manuel Unzueta and his community are still fighting back to keep the murals there as they have always been. Manuel still plans on the murals to be in a different spot in the park if the renovation is ever to be done. But to this day, Manuel Unzueta has not given up and plans on not giving up on what he believes is true for his collective murals for the community of Santa Barbara. Unzueta said that he would tell Santa Barbara’s government that what really matters is that they, “Let art consolidate, put the politics aside, put the administration aside, put the differences aside, but don’t let art be modeled or destroyed by opinions. Never. Let art be respected. Respect the concept of art because art gives us spirituality and Identity, and that’s universal.”

As a nephew of Manuel Unzueta, it is an honor to say I am very proud of the way he has not given up on one of his biggest accomplishments ever. He has changed the community in many ways, to where even the community is involved trying to help him out. He’s been a great example of being humble, and having great character. Putting his love for family and art first before anything else. “I don’t care about the money, the fame or the status, this is for the community to remember who they are”, says Manuel. He deserves a lot for the things he’s done from not only teaching others about his passion, but always remembering who you are, and who you do it for most importantly. It’s had an impact on me, and if I want to be great in doing something one day, I always have to remember to remain humble. Be an example for others to make a difference in not only the community, but the world. If Manuel has had a huge impact on everyone, he deserves to keep his collective murals up. To remember that the hard work you put into your passion can change lives someday.

Did Frida Kahlo Culturally Appropriate?

Remezcla

BY ALEXA COBIAN SIMON Who was Frida Kahlo? Frida Kahlo was a Mexican painter who lived during the early 20th century and was well known for her “uncompromising and brilliantly colored self-portraits”, according to Britannica. But most people would immediately recognize Kahlo by her signature mustache and unibrow.

Kahlo was more than just a Mexican painter though. She was an activist who was in support of communism alongside her husband Diego Rivera, but was often left in the shadows

of her husband. One example of her support and devotion for communism was when she offered asylum to Leon Trotsky at her very own house, Caza Azul. But why must Frida Kahlo be criticized?

The very dresses that Kahlo is widely recognized and known for are actually not hers to claim or wear. Her mother, Matilde Calderón y González, is the only one of her parents who is from Mexico with some indigenous ancestry, and even then, she is not from the region of Oaxaca where the colorful dresses originate from. Kahlo was from

Mexico City, almost 287 miles away from Oaxaca. Of course there would be no problem if she decided to wear indigenous clothing from the region where her family originated from. But it seems as though Kahlo probably picked these dresses to wear because they looked pretty, not recognizing that she appropriated someone else’s culture that has nothing to do with her.

One example of this would be Kahlo’s painting “Diego in My Thoughts”. She paints a self portrait of herself in a traditional Tehuana dress, usually worn by Tehuana women from Oaxaca. Another example of this is Kahlo’s everyday choice of wardrobe. She was constantly seen wearing a huipil, a type of blouse that is also from Oaxaca.

Again, if she decided to wear clothing from around the region where her family was originally from, there would be no problem.

It’s a bit tricky to identify where Kahlo’s family is from though, more specifically her mother’s side of the family. Her father, Guillermo Kahlo, immigrated to Mexico at the age of 19 from Pfrozheim, Germany as stated in DW news. Her mother on the other hand, is a bit more complicated because some sites and articles, like “Haute Fashion

Culture”, state that Kahlo’s mother was born in Oaxaca and others say that she was actually born in Mexico City. But even if Kahlo’s mother was born in Oaxaca, none of her parents are originally from there.

Her mother was of Spanish descent and her father was from Michoacán, even farther away than Mexico City was from Oaxaca. Was it still okay for Kahlo to appropriate cultures around Oaxaca even though her family wasn’t originally from there?

Frida Kahlo is an icon and will probably forever be one. She’ll always be plastered on clothes, mugs, books, and even masks. But it’s not fair that she’s widely recognized for her colorful and intricate dresses and probably profited from them.

Meanwhile, the Tehuana women and other indigenous groups from Oaxaca wear these clothes because it’s a part of their culture that has been passed down from generation to generation. To those women, this type of attire is sacred and it’s disrespectful to have anyone wear their clothing simply because they liked it or felt entitled to wear it because their mother was born there, but not from there. It’s not fair that Frida Kahlo made these dresses her own and essentially erased the history behind them.

22 Years

BY SEBASTIAN SALCIDO April 20, 2021, marked 22 years since the horrific massacre at Columbine high. Columbine was intended to be a bombing but their bomb failed to detonate.

As a result, they chose to improvise with their firearms. They killed fiftteen people. The nation was shocked, and people blamed many things for the tragedy, but I want to focus on guns.

The mass school shooting nightmare remains prevalent in America over 2 decades later.

Here in California, the majority of people aged 21 and higher have the right to purchase a firearm except for felons and narcotic addicts. State law usually prohibits people from carrying a gun out in the open. Assault rifles are banned in California and Conneticut.

Citizens and legal residents must be at least 18 years old to obtain shotguns, rifles, and ammunition. All other guns like handguns are not permitted to be obtained by anyone under 21.

Anyone deemed a danger to society, fugitives, and those who have been found guilty of illegally possessing or using controlled substances (such as marijuana) within the past 365 days are banned from buying guns. Dealers must be 21 or older. The must have a Federal Firearms Licenses and pass a background check.

The Sabika Sheikh Firearm Licensing and Registration Act was introduced in house back in early January. This bill would forbid the ownership of certain ammunition and large-capacity ammunition feeding devices. It would also establish a process for the licensing and registration of firearms. The person must be 21 or older, undergo a criminal background check and psychological evaluation, complete a certified training course, and have an insurance policy. Another act, called “Ethan’s Law” states that the storage of a portable gun resulting in the wounding or death of someone under the age of 18 is a crime and should result in prison for 5 years.

Semi-automatic weapons should be banned outside of the military and law enforcement. I believe you must be at least 25 years of age and go through a background check before you purchase any firearm. Here are the conditions where you shouldn’t be allowed to purchase a gun: if you have any mental illness, if you are revealed to be part of or have been a part of any group that holds hatred of any kind (ie racial, religious, etc), if you have any felony charges at all, if you have alcohol problems, if you have a history of threatening people, if you have issues with depression, suicidal thoughts, or homicidal behavior, if you are quick to anger, if you have ADHD, or if you have a history of violent behavior. Those who unconsciously sell guns to these people will be deprived of their license to sell and own firearms for life. Buyers who are part of a hate group, hold a history of threatening people, have felony charges, or have a history of violent behavior will be confined to prison for at least 5 years.

MAY 28, 2021

ARTS & ENTERTAINMENT | 11

Questions We Want Answered in F9

IMDB

BY CHARLIE HESS 2021 marks the 20th year since the creation of the Fast and Furious film series, and what a massive evolution they’ve had over time. The first movie followed a team of simple street racers and their attempts to rob truckers for their shipments of Panasonic DVD Players in souped-up Honda Civics. Since then, they’ve traveled the world stopping cyber terrorists and capturing weapons of mass destruction in vehicles like Bugattis and Lamborghinis. Throughout the eight total films, the team, or ‘the family’ as lead character Dom Toretto likes to call them, has seriously grown in size. But as their crew adopted more drivers into their mix to help them out on their high stakes missions, the number of villains grew as well.

So as more and more of these characters are introduced into the story, a slough of plot questions arises. Now as we enter the ninth installment of the Fast saga, I feel like the movie has a lot of ground to cover when it comes to resolving fractured storylines within the past films in the franchise. So here’s a list of burning questions that superfans like myself need to have answered in F9.

How is Han Alive?

As I watched the first trailer for the film, my jaw proceeded to drop to the floor when all of a sudden, fan-favorite character Han Lue made his return to the screen. Last we’d heard from him, Han had been aggressively T-Boned by the villain later turned hero, Deckard Shaw, who went on to blow up his mangled vehicle as Lue sat there injured and upside down in the driver’s seat. As his untimely death occurred at the end of Fast and Furious: Tokyo Drift, the events of Furious 7 closely followed Lue’s friends organizing a funeral for him and even going as far as attempting to catch his killer. So how is it possible that he survived that heinous crash?

And what has he been doing the past couple of movies?

It’s unlikely but possible that Han crawled out of his mutilated vehicle before the explosion occurred, then took time to heal from his injuries, before ultimately agreeing to drive with Dom and the team again.

But this doesn’t explain why they mourned his death and held a service to commemorate his life when a deceased body must have been evident at the scene of the incident.

Had he fallen into a coma? Was he announced dead for some time? Or were they potentially covering something up?

Another interesting theory surrounding Han’s temporary passing is that the crash was all a setup. What if Deckard Shaw was hired to ‘take out’ Han, but not actually kill him. Maybe Han had set up this intricate scene

to fake his death so he could cut ties with Takashi and the Yakuza? Maybe he informed Sean Boswell of his plan to get away so he can do who knows what? So when Dom made a cameo at the end of Tokyo Drift, Sean let him in on Han’s plan to disappear and told him to really ‘sell’ the fact that he was dead. This would ultimately explain why Torreto seemingly knew that Han was alive during the trailer for F9. That still doesn’t explain the prominent bad blood that Shaw and Toretto still seemed to have with one another throughout all of Furious 7 and even into Fate of the Furious.

In all honesty, this is a very complex storyline that can very easily open up even more plot holes in the Fast saga. But given that director Justin Lin is making his return to the series, I have faith that he’ll be able to piece together Han’s return in a sensible yet action-packed way.

How Will They Approach Brian’s Character?

Jordana Brewster, who portrayed Dom’s sister, Mia Toretto, has made her return in the trailer and fans are elated. Mia’s character played a pivotal role in many of the prior installments. But, in Furious 7 and Fate of the Furious the team made it clear that Mia and her husband Brian, portrayed by the late Paul Walker, were retired from being drivers on Dom’s high-risk team. This plot point was created because of cast member Paul Walker’s untimely death during the filming of the seventh movie in the series. They decided to address this real-life tragedy in the story by having Brian and Mia’s characters complete their final mission with the team and depart to become full-time parents to their two children, Jack and Gisele.

So now that we know Mia is back to ride alongside her brother, and the rest of their racing family, what will they say about Brian’s whereabouts?

It seemed like a satisfactory storyline to simply say that both Brian and Mia’s characters could no longer risk their lives on these high stakes missions because they have children they need to care for, full time. But now that the team is dealing with the issue regarding the sudden appearance of Dom’s (and seemingly also Mia’s) brother, Jakob, it makes sense why Mia would return to deal with her family drama. But what will they say regarding Brian’s assumed absence in this film? Will he just be babysitting the children while his wife goes off to settle her family disputes? Or will the writers not even mention his nonattendance in the story?

What Happened to Hobbs & Shaw?

Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson debuted in the franchise during ‘Fast Five’ as a powerhouse D.S.S. Agent

named Luke Hobbs, who was determined to take down Dom and his crew. But throughout the next few movies, he sided with Team Toretto, going so far as offering his family full pardons if they were to help him catch a dangerous criminal by the name of Owen Shaw. After that mission went successfully, they ended up waking the dragon in Deckard Shaw, portrayed by Jason Statham, who’s a former MI6 Agent, and Owen’s vengeful brother. But, fast forward to The Fate of the Furious, where Deckard ends up working alongside Hobbs and the team to take down a rogue Dom Toretto. It was here where the characters of Hobbs and Shaw proved they had serious chemistry in the Fast Films, so much so that when news broke of there being drama behind the scenes between cast members Vin Diesel and Dwayne Johnson, it only made sense to write The Rock and Statham their own spin-off. And so in the summer of 2019, Fast and Furious Presents: Hobbs & Shaw was released in theaters.

I thought the movie itself was a fresh take for the series, the film decided to focus more on the action and less on cars overall. But people did speculate that the arrival of the spin-off would mean that Deckard and Luke’s characters would be written out of the main franchise. And as of right now, I believe that’s true.

Fast 9 has not credited either actor as being a part of the cast for this movie, so does that mean The Fate of the Furious was the last main film in the franchise we’ll see them in? If that’s the case, then how will they approach their absence in the upcoming movie?

I would really like for the story to brush over why Hobbs and Shaw aren’t there to help out the team like they normally do. Will their disappearance be due to the fact that the events of F9 actually occur at the same time as Hobbs & Shaw’? And how will the reemergence of Han’s character affect the storyline, since it was Deckard Shaw who was originally responsible for his then death?

Also, will we ever get to see these two characters in future installments in the main films? Hobbs & Shaw are two kickass characters who will certainly be missed in the new movie, but let’s just hope their departure doesn’t lead to more plot holes in the story.

Why Have We Never Heard About Dom’s Brother?

Apart from Han Lue’s return, the other enormous shock in the trailer was the appearance of Dom Toretto’s blood brother, Jakob! That’s right, arguably cinema’s biggest family man apparently neglected to mention the fact that he has a younger brother! By the way, If you were on the verge of passing out from excitement when

news broke about this development in the story, I’m right there with you.

I truly don’t believe anyone saw this plot twist coming. Who would have guessed that through eight movies, there had been no mention from Mia or Dom (or Letty, apparently) of there being another high performance driving Toretto? I honestly think we have to take a minute to acknowledge the writers of the film for finding an interesting plot line that will create another villain to fuel the story and create a believable excuse to bring Mia Toretto’s character back into the mix.

But seriously, this is a huge turn of events in the series that’s going to lead to many more questions in the story. Are there other Toretto siblings we don’t know about? What about Dom, Mia, and Jakob’s mother? As far as I know there has been no mention of her in the story, while on the other hand, we were informed that their father was killed in a racing accident before the events of the first movie. I’d also like to know what the bad blood is between the brothers? Was there something else that happened in their lives that ignited their intense hatred for one another that isn’t related to Jakob’s jealousy of Dom? And last but not least, how did Cipher get in contact with Jakob? Or even discover that he exists?

I really look forward to watching how this pans out on the screen. Will Jakob actually have the guts to kill Dom if he gets the chance? Or will they squash the long lasting beef? I’m hoping they’re able to bury the hatchet, and induct Jakob as a new member of their team. I’m sure his impressive skill set will be an asset to their family on future missions, and I bet he’ll be even more thrilled to learn that he’ll be an uncle to Dom’s son, Brian, and Mia’s children, Jack and Gisele.

Where Did Mr. Nobody and Little Nobody Go? Kurt Russell and Scott Eastwood are another two actors whose names were missing from F9’s cast list, and fans are a little confused. With four pretty big characters not making an appearance in this upcoming film, I sadly have to admit we have reason to be a little concerned as to how well the movie will flow without them. As previously mentioned, Luke Hobbs and Deckard Shaw, two of the main team members from the last movie, will not pop up in F9. Now, we know for sure that Scott Eastwoods ‘Little Nobody’ character, who also served as a main team member won’t star in the upcoming film either. Along with Kurt Russells ‘Mr. Nobody’ character, who previously performed in a managerial role for the team. But without them in the film, who is going to supply the team with ultra fast cars, and technology to help subdue their enemies?

My guess is that Cipher and Jakob Toretto seek out Dom and his team, and essentially begin to be hunted down by them. Maybe because of how personal the feud is with both Jakob and Cipher, that Dom would prefer to keep what happens off the record. For instance, what if Dom and his team start to kill people?

Surely Mr. Nobody can’t let that slide, being a government employee and all. But that doesn’t explain the fact that Cipher is still a wanted cyberterrorist who definitely obtained nuclear weapons with intentions to use them against her enemies! I really can’t come to a logical conclusion as to why these two characters will not be present in the story, but I guess we’ll have to wait and see what happens in the movie!

What Role Will Sean, Twinkie, and Earl’s Characters Play in the Film?

The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift was a bit of a mystery at the time of it’s 2006 release. It featured a whole cast of characters we’d never seen before, in a whole different country, with a totally different approach to racing. Nonetheless, it’s now proved to be a greatly important installment in the series because it featured what we thought was the death of beloved racer, Han Lue. Now with the characters sudden reappearance into the saga, he’s brought along his fellow main and supporting characters with him to help out Dom’s crew! Sean Boswell, Twinkie, and Earl were seen clinking their Corona’s together in celebration in what looked to be Mia’s backyard during one of the scenes in the trailer. And while I’m more than thrilled to learn of their return to the story, I’m unclear as to what their jobs will be in the movie?

One hint we’re given in the second trailer is Earl and Sean’s involvement in the creation of what looks to be a Rocket Car. While it may just be a Pontiac Fiero with a ginormous engine strapped to its rear, this still proves that their mechanical and technological skills are being put to good use to overall benefit Dom and his team. There wasn’t any footage depicting what Twinkie was up to but I’m sure his fast talking attitude and business skills will come in handy.

Other than those couple of clips, we don’t have a defined answer as to what those three will be up to. I surely hope they get the chance to drive alongside Dom and his team, especially knowing that Sean has proved his racing talents in becoming the Drift King back in Tokyo. Speaking of, I wonder if we’ll ever learn who won that race at the end of Tokyo Drift, Dom or Sean? But like I stated earlier, I’m just glad to see the Fast Franchise recycle more of their great characters from previous movies, and I’m eager to see what they’ll bring to the team.

These six questions target some pretty major plot points in the story, and while I hope they get answered in this upcoming movie, I still know that F9 is going to be awesome. Every movie in it’s expansive series has brought the heat when it comes to memorable races, iconic one liners, or outer worldly action scenes. I am so excited to get back into theaters on June 25th to watch the next edition of one of my favorite film franchises of all time. I’m even more thrilled to find out what will happen next in the saga because it’s now been confirmed that Justin Lin has signed on to direct a tenth and eleventh installment in the Fast and Furious series.

So thankfully we can expect a lot more gear shifting and fight scenes in the near future with our favorite on screen family. Now, the question is ‘Are people excited for this movie right now?’ Do they have questions of their own that they want answered?

Are fans thinking ‘are they really going to space? Why is Magdalene Shaw’s character still relevant in the story? Will Cipher survive?’ So we’ll have to see if people are willing to go back into the cinemas to watch F9, or if COVID-19 concerns keep them at home? The movie industry has certainly changed in these past 14 months due to the pandemic. But hopefully it will be none other than the Fast Saga that safely brings families back together, with popcorn in their hands, into the movie theaters!

12 | SPORTS

MAY 28, 2021

Dons Boys Basketball Overview

Ixaka Craviotto-Velasco

BY ANDRE BATTLE It’s been over a year since the Dons played their last basketball game, and many thought that this year might be a no-go due to COVID-19. But as COVID-19 restrictions were lifted and things began to open up, a real basketball season became more and more of a possibility, and finally on April 10th, almost a year and a half since the last Dons basketball game,

the boys were able to suit up against St. Bonaventure High School.

The Dons boys varsity basketball teams have been practicing since March when school was able to return and were doing zoom calls every day since the beginning of the school year. All the student-athletes were hoping that they would get a chance to play, especially the Seniors, who worried that they would not be able to get their final season due to the

pandemic. But luckily, Covid cases continued to drop, and soon enough, all sports were able to return to play!

Although many sports were hit hard with tons of new rules and restrictions, basketball was hit almost the hardest of all sports. It is an inside and contact sport, which caused it to take the longest out of all the sports to return. Basketball players are required to test at least 2 times a week and are told to wear a mask in prac-

tice and on the bench during games.

Fans are also very limited in games: only two are allowed per player, and social distancing is a must. Another big cut was the season length, as there was no preseason, and most games are played within our Channel League. But, like all people, student-athletes, and coaches of the basketball program were able to adapt and make the best of what they had at the time.

The varsity athletes of the basketball program were extra excited about having a season, but with the new restrictions, everything felt different. One athlete I talked to said that “Without lots of fans at our game the energy feels so much different.

We have to bring new energy to the game and our bench has to be loud to replace the sound of screaming fans.”

Big games such as Santa Barbara Vs. San Marcos is a lot quieter than usual, but the energy is still expressed by the players on both teams, and the change in the season did not stop the Dons from trying any harder.

The Dons had a great regular season. They finished with a record of 8-5 and are 6-4 in league. Their losses have come from the very skilled St. Joseph High School, which is ranked very high in Central California, and against San Marcos, which was a very close game that went down to the wire, but eventually, the Royals were able to pull it together and beat

the Dons. For the second matchup, it was all San Marcos as they won easily over the Dons. And the Dons also went 0-2 against Cabrillo High School in their back-to-back matchup. As for players, Senior Center Andrew Douglas and Senior Forward Erik Strangeburg have played tremendously this season, and are hoping to end their high school sports career on a high note. With the 4 losses in league, the Dons finished the regular season with a third seed placement in CIF playoffs, meaning that they will be plying Agoura High School on May 26th, who was a number one seed for their league. It will be a tough battle for the Dons, as they will be without one of their top players, Andrew Douglas, who will be competing with the Santa Barbara High School volleyball program in the CIF playoffs as well.

During this whole season, The dons basketball program has been following the rules and trying to think positive. Although this season is different, the fact that it is going on is so good for all student-athletes.

Nobody thought we would be at the point we are, and that is all thanks to those who have stayed safe and done their roles in these troubling times. All of those who are involved in sports thank everyone who has followed the rules and stayed safe because it gave them their season!

Calling all writers, illustrators, photographers, videographers, etc.

The Forge is looking for staff for next year!

Ask your counselor to enroll you in

Journalism Class 2021-2022

Or join the brand new

Journalism Club If you have any questions, please email admin@sbhsforge.com