Skyline View
The
The Voice of Skyline College, San Bruno, California
Volume XXXV- Issue 7
November 19, 2015
www.theskylineview.com
GoFund my education
Michelle Kelly/The Skyline View by Andrew Avilla TSV Staff Writer
Today, there are a few ways of getting financial aid, such as loans, grants or scholarships. Nowadays, millennial students are using crowd-funding sites to help pay for their education. Skyline College’s tuition is estimated by College Navigator to be an average of $5,342 between in and out-of-state students. Some students may find this to be too much to afford. For students who want to transfer to a four-year college, their families will have an even harder time affording
expensive tuition, even with help from financial aid. A student from the Bay Area was accepted to Manhattanville College, but her family is unable to pay the expensive $54,000 per year tuition by themselves, so they turned to a crowd-funding site called GoFundMe. Taisha Griffie, from Redwood City, was granted a very generous financial aid package, but there was still a $4,000 gap in tuition that still needed to be paid. This is when she turned to
a crowd-funding site called GoFundMe. “I applied to numerous outside scholarships, but didn’t win any of them,” she said. “I wrote letters to various people and companies, and then I decided that I would attend community college and then transfer. My step mom and her good friend then told me about a website called GoFundMe.” Griffie set up her account and wrote a biography describing her success throughout high school, her involvement with clubs, activities, work experi-
ence, aspirations for school and the help she needed. After a couple months and a little over $3,000 from friends, family and anonymous donors, she was able to begin her college career in New York. “People were so willing to help me because they know how ambitious I am and they know that I don’t come from a financially stable home,” Griffie said. “Education is very important and (in most cases) can open many doors for one’s future, and one’s financial circumstances shouldn’t hinder that, and I think
the people who helped me were aware of that notion.” Sociology professor Michael Moynihan said people would want to help a college student in this situation as a form of investing in the future and as a sense of feeling like they are doing something positive for someone. “Sociologically, it is like a big group hug,” he said. “I could see GoFundMe as a kind of shared economy where we’re saying ‘send me some money and I will help educate myself.’”
Lamps combat winter blues by Greg Ragaza TSV Staff Writer
Adjustments have been made in one of the campus buildings for those prone to more than just the typical winter blues. Skyline College Health and Safety Committee recently purchased two new lamps, located on the second floor of Building Six, designed to help students who may suffer from Seasonal
Andrew Avilla/The Skyline View A speciality lamp in Building 6 gives off sunlight-like rays.
Affective Disorder and its many symptoms. Seasonal Affective Disorder is a specific mood disorder where a person will feel symptoms, such as, being lazy, sleepy, tired, lethargic, and even gaining weight because of the darker and colder weather that winter may bring. According to the Mayo Clinic Organization website, a few of the risk factors include being female the disorder is diagnosed more often in women than in men, but men may have more-severe symptoms. Age is also a factor for people 18-30 have a higher risk of winter SAD, and winter SAD is less likely to occur in older adults. “During times where it’s low light and foggy people experi-
ence symptoms of depression,” a psychology teacher, Jennifer Merrill said. “Sometimes it’s called the winter blues or Seasonal Depression.” Merrill explains that the human brain has a suprachiasmatic nucleus in the hypothalamus, and it is the brains master clock. It tells the person when to wake up and when to sleep. To give this information to the brain, the suprachiasmatic nucleus relies heavily on light. When the weather is dark or foggy, the brain is not getting the information it needs to fully wake up. “The whole idea behind what is causing Seasonal Affective Disorder is the lack of light,” Merrill said. Since Skyline College frequently has foggy or overcast
weather, many of its student and faculty may not get that bright sunlight that triggers the brain to be more active. Julia Luna, a student at Skyline College, says that she always feels tired especially in the morning. However, she has observed that her friends want to stay in bed longer on foggy days. “When it’s foggy it seems that [my friends] would rather stay in bed under the sheets,” Luna said. Luna’s friends are not alone; plenty of other Skyline students have felt similar symptoms of Seasonal Affective Disorder when it is cold and foggy. Meiling Lu, another Skyline Student, said that she might be suffering from similar symptoms of Seasonal Affective Disorder, especially during the winter. She