February 2023
Amidst a recent spurt of intense weather and rain showers, Elisa Cobb covers the impact the storms had on Boliinas and Stinson residents and their commutes. The Tamalpais High School Gay Straight Alliance explains it’s recent endeavors and goals for the coming months and years, as told by Caden Bernstein-Lawler. Claire Lawson tells the story of a few of Tam’s many clubs.
Patty Parnow, a beloved secretary at Tam, is retiring after nine years with the school. Hillary Betz discussed her retirement and plans for the future with her. Savy Behr profiles Gabby Brandt, a senior at Tam who is taking matters into her own hands when it comes to action against sexual assault and the culture and stigma around it in the community.
In this issue’s first feature, Elisa Cobb addresses the emergency preparedness of Tam and the ways we, as a school, can better prepare ourselves in case disaster strikes.
Our secong feature article this month looks into the effects of catastrophic effects that opioids have on the teenage population in and around our community. It is with immense gratitude that we give you our February issues of The Tam News. Thank you for reading.
Editors in Chief
Fiona Matney • Juliette Lunder
Managing Editors
Dylan Boon •Tyler Rothwell
News
Catherine Stauffer • Colette Hale
Carley Lehman
Lifestyles
Wesley Slavin • Kelsey Cook
Emma Pearson • Dola Tibbs
Features
Lauren Felder • Anika Kapan
Jack McIntire
Opinion
Kayla Boon • Shaina Mandala
Sophie Weinberg
Cover
Zachary Breindel
Advisor
SJ Black
Printer
WIGT Printing
Reporters
Caden Bernstein-Lawler • Hillary Betz
Savannah Behr • Hannah Bringard
Zachary Breindel • Chloe Bowman
Tyler Byrne • Samuel Catrini Abdullah
Elisa Cobb • Dylan Collister
Asher Goldblatt • Griffin Gustafson
Violet Howard • Anika Kapan
Siobhan King • Claire Lawson
Asa Moore • Ana Murguia
Jude Paine • Nathan Robinson
Luella Searson • Anne Shine
Flynn Stuart • Ashley Townsend
Railay Turner • Zane Yarnold
San Quentin State Prison, California’s oldest prison, opened in 1852 just miles from San Francisco, in the largely unsettled county of Marin. Now, as modernization and industrialization have transformed the prison’s surroundings in the last 150 years, a small, independent liberal arts university called Mount Tamalpais College (MTC) is working to improve the lives of its incarcerated residents.
“We, in Marin County, often see San Quentin, but we don’t think about what that means,” Tara Seekins, English teacher at Tamalpais High School and MTC volunteer, said. San Quentin is located on the highway coming off the
year-old nephew, who questioned what the building was. “How do I explain to him that this is a place where people get put in cages?” she questioned at the time.
MTC has been educating incarcerated students in San Quentin for nearly 25 years. Founded in 1996 as the Prison University Project, MTC was originally an offshoot program of the nearby Patten University seeking to combat low education rates within the U.S. prison system. The program’s first Associate of Arts (AA) degree was granted three years after its founding, in 1999.
“We believe all people should have access to affordable higher education, and the opportunity to develop their human potential,” MTC’s website states. “Excellent academic preparation is vital to accessing the forms of social, political, economic, and cultural capital from which many have historically been excluded.”
life,” Seekins said.
Seekins has been teaching, tutoring, and volunteering for MTC since 2009, when she was attending graduate school at University of California, Berkeley.
“But in a classroom? Students really are free; [they have] freedom of expression, freedom to defend a position with a text, freedom to explore worldviews, literature or art, or political theory. [Education] is an opportunity to transcend that boundary.”
Following the 1994 passage of the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act, which banned prisoners from receiving federal student aid Pell Grants, higher education within the U.S. prison system dried up. According to MTC’s website, around 350 programs around the nation shut down as a result. What followed, MTC said, was “a crisis.”
Richmond bridge into Larkspur, and, for many Marin County residents, has become a normal part of their daily commute.
Seekins remembered a time she had driven past the prison with her five-
For its first 20 years, MTC was the only on-site degree-granting program in California’s prison system. It was awarded initial accreditation by the Accrediting Commission for Community and Junior Colleges in January 2022.
“There’s so much about life for people who are incarcerated that is not creative. There are a lot of places that, just by definition, freedom isn’t in [their]
Now, MTC offers around 60 courses and has served 3,731 students over the past 25 years. It has also been recognized nationwide: in 2015, the college was awarded the National Humanities Medal by former President Barack Obama.
Enrollment in MTC is non-selective, meaning that it accepts students regardless of academic aptitude. Academic aptitude is only considered when placing students in classes: if, for example, a student doesn’t qualify for an English 101 class, they can take lower English courses offered by MTC before moving up in the program. However, students do have to qualify for the pro-
I’m so full of freedom.
gram in accordance with San Quentin’s policies, meaning that disciplinary records are taken into consideration.
“I’m so full of freedom. I’m staying in school, away from my cell, and dedicating my time to studying hard and helping my community,” MTC student Julio M. Martinez wrote in his personal essay. “I feel I have succeeded and this has made me a better man and a better friend. That is the lesson I have learned. I want to be seen as аn example in my Hispanic community.”
“Many people were incarcerated [at San Quentin] because they were participating in underground economies, because they didn’t have access to mainstream economy because of opportunity gaps, because of structural racism,” Seekins said. “And so [MTC] is kind of an interesting bridge, and that’s one of the reasons why it’s controversial, too. Because some people say ‘why can’t my kids get free college, why should they get free college, when they’ve committed crimes?’ And there is that pushback and we just have to understand that.”
Because MTC was recently awarded initial accreditation, the AA degree students earn is transferable to a fouryear college or university just as a degree earned at the College of Marin or the City College of San Francisco would be. If a student qualifies for parole and wants to seek out a higher education, they could enroll at a California State University or a UC as a junior.
“I think that not sensationalizing [MTC] is really important,” Seekins said, when asked about MTC’s humanitari-
an aspects. “Really, it’s just a college. That’s the idea.”
Although it isn’t charity, MTC’s educational work is a vital part of the rehabilitation process. A 2016 report by the Research and Development (RAND) Corporation, an acclaimed research nonprofit, found that inmates that participate in any educational programs while in prison are 43 percent less likely to be reincarcerated.
“We [the educators] don’t really do it for the admiration,” Seekins said. “We think it’s going to make the world better. To make people’s lives better.”
Just like teaching any other level of education, MTC’s end goal is fundamentally to provide students the tools they need to better their lives through higher education. To Seekins, these students just happen to be incarcerated people.
“The name of [Mount Tamalpais College] is intentional,” Seekins pointed out. MTC changed its name from the Prison University Project to Mount Tamalpais College in 2020. “They wanted to focus more on higher education and less on the fact that students are incarcerated.”
But the pursuit of higher education hasn’t been easy for the students at San Quentin. When the COVID pandemic hit, the prison shut down classes completely to prevent covid transmissions.
“During the pandemic, everything closed, and the prison was locked in,” Seekins said. “The students weren’t able to get out very much at all. They were in their cells for most of the pandemic.”
In the summer of 2020, over 2,600 inmates and staff were infected with
COVID-19 in what became one of the worst outbreaks in the country. The outbreak started when the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitations (CDCR) transferred 121 inmates into San Quentin from the California Institution for Men (which had the highest infection rate in the state), without testing or quarantine procedures. Twenty-nine people, both staff and inmates, died as a result of the outbreak.
“The students are very traumatized by that experience,” Seekins said. “A lot of students wanted to talk about that after classes, and a lot of them were writing about it in their essays … it was a very challenging experience.”
On Nov. 16, 2021, Marin County Superior Court Judge Geoffrey Howard ruled that the CDCR had inflicted cruel and unusual punishment on San Quentin inmates.
In-person classes resumed at San Quentin around fall 2021. Now, after COVID, Mount Tamalpais College is continuing to expand the movement for education within the U.S.’s booming prison system.
“There is an aspect of this work where—it is a college, but it’s a college operating in an extremely violent, absurd system [that exists] because we haven’t found a better solution,” Seekins said. “That’s the challenge. That’s what future generations are going to have to keep pushing toward: a more just way to have a peaceful society.” ♦
Commuters from Bolinas and Stinson Beach have been facing unprecedented travel times due to the coastal California storm, heavily affecting students at Tamalpais High School. Both Stinson Beach and Bolinas are located off Shoreline Highway, right on the Northern California coastline. Along with its popular surfing, unique art, and close-knit community, it has been heavily impacted by January’s challenging weather conditions.
Stinson Beach’s elevation is 26 feet and Bolinas’s 36 feet. High elevation can speed up future flooding issues.
“There are 129 properties in Bolinas that have greater than a 26 percent chance of being severely affected by flooding over the next 30 years,” according to RiskFactor, a website holding projections of past, present, and future climate risks.
On Jan. 5, an almost 25-foot wave crashed into Stinson Beach properties along the coast. This hard hit to the community left locals and residents needing support from the impacts of
the wave. Locals and residents were left to deal with current flooding, and the future storm possibilities. After severe damage to the towns and roads, commuters experienced the danger first hand.
“We have seen huge trees fully cover roads from being knocked down by the storm. It can be very scary,” Tam sophomore Emely Garcia said.
The Bolinas and Stinson Beach school bus departs from its first stop, Bolinas School at 7:10 a.m.; moving through it’s other stops, Popular & Outlook, Elm Dodgewood, Fern, and Iris, Bolinas Center, Elm and Birch, Ocean Parkway and Terrace, Whark & Brighton, Nursery, Shoreline Highway, Stinson Bus Stop and Sequoia Valley, ending its route at Tam at 8:15 a.m.
Due to the storm, the usual routes that commuters take have not been safe enough to where the bus can travel its usual route without any risks.
Students on the bus have faced many issues while taking the commute to Tam, such as flooding knocked down
trees, which have resulted in having to re-route their way to school.
“The obstacles that we face during a storm are electrical wires and trees laying out in the middle of the road. The bus driver is then not capable of picking us up at our stops. Therefore, we have to communicate with others to figure out where the bus is located,” Tam junior Mireili Garcia said.
Students have been late to class because of the bus having to figure out different routes to school while avoiding weather conditions. “It usually ends up with us being late. For instance, we have been 20 minutes late to school because we had to take a different route because the roads are either closed or too flooded,” Garcia said.
Garcia recalls the stress and amount of time it took to get Stinson Beach and Bolinas students all on the bus, “Last time we faced these conditions, it took about 20 minutes to get everyone on the bus,” Garcia said. ♦
Tamalpais High School’s Gender and Sexuality Alliance (GSA) is attempting to become a more proactive advocacy club. Its plans for the future include bake sales and events for significant dates such as Pride Month or awareness days.
“We help people get involved in the LGBTQ+ community in Marin by spreading word about LGBTQ events,” club Co-President Jess Lester said.
GSA’s most recent activity has included a bake sale supporting the Spahr Center, a Marin-based LGBTQ+ advocacy group. GSA organized the club members to bake treats and sell them at the Mill Valley Depot to produce funds for the cause.
“They have a lot of awareness for the LGBTQ community like queer advocacy and they have fun events like Queer Prom and Queer Homecoming,” Co-President Zoe Neal said about the choice to support the Spahr Center.
The club aims for an open and safe environment, club presidents said. GSA meetings will often include watching
movies or TV shows featuring LGBTQ representation. In the past, the club acted as a place for members of the LGBTQ+ community at Tam High to meet each other. However, the current co-presidents have expanded the club to act as an advocacy group in addition to a safe space.
In addition to fundraising and advocacy, GSA provides a safe space for members of the LGBTQ+ community.
“It’s nice because people can feel like themselves there, they don’t feel like hiding this part of their identity, and it’s a way for people to just open up and feel secure that they’re not going to be judged,” Neal said.
New members of GSA find it to be a welcoming community at Tam High.
“GSA is a safe space because everyone has had their own personal journey to get there [in the LGBTQ community] and it makes it a really understanding community,” freshman GSA member Liana Eliasoph said.
In the future, GSA plans to raise awareness, especially on specific days
with significance to the LGBTQ+ community or during Pride Month in June.
“We want to put up posters around the school and because there’s a lot of visibility (awareness) days, like Lesbian Visibility Day is in April, and there are all these different visibility dates that are super important because we can raise awareness about the LGBTQ community, so there can be less misinformation about what it means to be LGBTQ,” Neal said.
Currently, the GSA co-presidents are in communication with Tam High Vice Principal Andy Lieberman about non-binary changing rooms. As locker rooms are divided between two genders, those who identify as neither do not have a designated changing room. This is an example of the role of GSA on campus, they said, as a more proactive club focused on advocating for LGBTQ+ students at Tam High.
GSA meets weekly on Wednesdays during lunch. Meetings are held in Room 303 in Barrow Hall. ♦
TheInteract Club at Tamalpais High School is hosting a series of events to make Valentine’s Day cards for senior citizens living at The Redwoods retirement home.
Interact, which is a community-service based club, is hoping to make at least 100 cards for The Redwoods, which houses over 300 seniors.
“The cards don’t have to be anything fancy, just a nice design and a short, sweet message,” co-president of Interact Eleanor Octavio said. The cards will be mixed in with cards made by students throughout the Mill Valley School District, and delivered to the Redwoods on Feb. 14.
“Seniors at the Redwoods don’t always get Valentine’s Day cards, so we are making them from the Tam community so they know they are seen and appreciated by Tam High,” Octavio said.
Interact will be hosting meetings every week up until Valentine’s Day to make cards. ♦
Music Together is a club at Tamalpais High School that consists of around 20 students, a blend of Michael Lovejoy’s special education class and other Tam students. The club is preparing to perform at Tamalpais High School’s upcoming neon rally on Jan. 27.
TheMake a Splash Club at Tamalpais High School has started selling swim caps and bracelets to raise money for free swim lessons for underprivileged kids. The club fundraises for its parent program, also named Make a Splash, which is a water safety initiative created by the USA Swimming Foundation. It offers swim lessons to kids that can not afford them otherwise, and aims to prevent drowning deaths throughout the country.
“As we’ve been doing the past few years, we’re selling merchandise with the Make a Splash logo on them, this year being caps and bracelets, to both raise money and bring awareness to the organization,” co-president of Make a Splash, Teddy Chin, said.
Since the club’s inception three years ago, the club has raised over $2,000, paying for over 50 swim lessons for kids within the community. This year, the club hopes to raise $500.
“Learning to swim is so important, it could save someone’s life, and there are so many kids who don’t have the resources to be able to get lessons,” Chin said. “By raising money for [Make a Splash], I feel like we’re making a difference.” ♦
TheJunior Ambassadors Club at Tamalpais High School will be hosting a Valentine’s Day bake sale to raise money for the UCSF Benioff Children’s Hospital. The club raises money to provide support for all non-medical related services at the hospital.
“So all funding goes to anything that isn’t involved in the actual treatment for patients. Some examples are the teen lounge and art and music therapy,” co-president of Junior Ambassadors, Alexa Wong, said.
“We do our Valentine’s bake sale every year, and it always does pretty
well,” she said. “Club members bake all their own goods and then work shifts at the actual bake sale, all for community service hours.”
On top of bake sales, the club has created supply-drives to help bring necessary materials to the hospital. The bake sale will take place Valentine’s Day weekend at The Depot in Downtown Mill Valley. ♦
They meet every Tuesday during lunch to eat, play games, and most importantly, learn songs, which they often perform at school rallies.
“Some people play instruments, and everyone sings along to the song that we’ve chosen.” co-president of Music Together, Ella Emison, said. Most recently, they are planning on
performing at Tam’s upcoming neon rally, which took place on Jan. 27.
“It [Music Together] is a really great way to interact with people you wouldn’t usually interact with,” Emison said. “We make connections, and it’s really fun and I recommend coming if you have the chance.” ♦
By: Hillery Betz
After nine years of working at Tamalpais High School as the assistant principal’s secretary, Patty Parnow is retiring to pursue her interests in travel and, more importantly, help out her family as they need.
Parnow is the friendly face you meet at the front desk the second you step into the Administration Office at Tam. She is the person who answers most questions from students and visitors and helps out the assistant principals with a variety of things. Parnow takes care of everyone and always does it with a smile on her face.
When Suzanne Garcia, science teacher of six years, first walked into the front office at Tam for her interview, Parnow was one of the first faces she saw.
“I first noticed how warm, welcoming, and friendly Patty was with everyone and it was such a positive environment she created,” Garcia said. “Patty being there creating such a warm and welcoming feeling ultimately was one of the deciding factors on me taking the job.”
Before working at Tam, Parnow worked at Archie Williams part-time in the athletics field for seven years. Eventually, she was offered a full-time position at Tam and had a difficult time deciding if she wanted to take the gig due to the 30-plus-minute commute it requires, but she chose to go for it and has no regrets about that decision.
“I love coming to work every day, I
am going to miss it,” Parnow said. Parnow has made a major impact in the Tam community with all the things, big and small, she has done. There have been lots of memories and positive moments in her career at Tam and there is definitely more to come this semester, but Parnow will deeply miss the students and environment at Tam.
“Dealing with the students is for sure my highlight, I love seeing how much the students mature from their freshmen year to their senior year,” Parnow said.
A cherished memory Parnow will never forget is the 2020 senior graduation. This day stood out to her because she got to participate and see the event so upclose in person even though it was during the COVID pandemic. She was a volunteer there and her job was to direct traffic. While she was doing this she got to high-five and congratulate all the seniors.
Even though it was during COVID-19 she still considered that day to be a highlight at Tam. Patty described it to be a day of amazing memories and festive energy.
Another thing that Parnow said she will miss is Tam Unity days. It
was a great thing for her to watch all the students coming together and it brought her lots of joy to see the Tam community on full display, she said. Parrow expressed how Tam Unity is a great new initiative and that she thinks it’s a great event that brings everyone together.
Working at Tam with the community around her has changed her life in several ways. Every day she sees how hard her coworkers around her work with the students, holding them in very high esteem.
“I hope that I impacted the students’ lives by being here and being kind to everyone,” Parnow said.
Once she retires, Parnow is planning to help take care of her five grandchildren, who are all under the age of five. Outside of work, Parnow especially enjoys hiking and spending time with her family, and hopefully, there will now be plenty of time for her to follow her other interests.
Parnow has made a positive impact in the community and she will be missed by all at Tam deeply.
“She is at the heart of what makes Tam a welcoming and warm community,” junior class Vice President Emma Friedman Lowenthal said. ♦
Parnow is the friendly face you meet at the front desk the second you step into the Administration Office at Tam.
Gabrielle
Brandt takes change into her own hands.
“If we use our voice to actually speak to administration about the changes we want to see, if we just stay determined about the things we want to see, [these changes] can actually happen,” Brandt said.
The 17-year-old Tamalpais High School senior realized early on that the Tamalpais Unified School District (TUHSD), which includes her own school, was experiencing a sexual assault and harassment crisis. This crisis is ongoing, with distinct recent events, including “The List” and the anonymous @metooattam Instagram account among others.
“The list” was a poster plastered by students on the Wood Hall girls’ bathroom wall containing a list of names of alleged sexual assaulters at Tam. This event and TUHSD administration’s response inspired Brandt to take action beyond a passive approach. She said she was outraged by administration’s response. Brandt joined the Sexual Assault Task Force in November, although she’d been taking action such as reaching out about administration meetings prior to officially joining the task force.
The task force was created in October 2020, when Brandt was a sophomore. The group disbanded for a while, labeled as a hiatus by Principal J.C. Farr Ed.D.
According to Yvonne Milham, Tam High’s Wellness Coordinator, the group disbanded because attendance became sporadic and there were disagreements over whether the task force could indeed be an official task force without
requiring mandatory police reports.
In her time on the task force, Brandt and the task force succeeded in convincing the district to have put Rape, Abuse & Incest National Network’s (RAINN) National Sexual Assault Hot Line on the backs of student identification cards, which will soon become fourth hotline on the card.
The task force plans to grow next year, with things like more detailed informational posters and, eventually, creating a new, comprehensive, effective consent curriculum for each grade of high school.
While Brandt’s community respects her political work, she’s known by her friends for much more than her persistent attitude and passion. Brandt is known for being funny, kind, bold, intelligent, and perceptive. She has a tattoo of wildflowers, reflecting her own free-spirit.
Brandt can be seen in fashionable and slightly eccentric outfits around campus; one of her frequent looks being an all-white, snow-fairy-inspired skirt, blouse, and furry boots. While her work with the task force is serious,
draining, and comes with high stakes, Brandt isn’t stoic, she’s passionate.
Brandt’s fellow students and friends recognize her passion.
”She presented to our entire class a whole lesson on our rights versus the cops’ rights when it comes to traffic stops and home searches and stuff like that. It was so cool to see almost everyone in our class learn something. The whole class was super engaged, asked her tons of questions that she was able to answer,” Nina Miloslavich, Tam senior and friend of Brandt said. “She knew what people needed to know.”
Brandt has and continues to work hard toward improving the sexual assault culture, curriculum, and response within the school because, as she puts it, “Clearly, nobody was caring enough. And I didn’t want to leave the school in the state that it was in.”
Not many stand by Brandt when
“Why are we working within a system that’s clearly not working?”
the time comes for the real work. The sexual assault task force has four members including Brandt.
“It’s enough people where we can have multiple perspectives … we can actually like, get somewhere and like get stuff done and really get down to it. So it’s kind of bittersweet in that way. But I do wish more people just worked with us in general.”
While a four-person task force will never have too many cooks in the kitchen, Brandt expressed that outside student engagement is lacking.
Brandt’s Social and Environmental Justice Academy (SEJA) class teachers inspire her to make change and mentor her in her work. Tessa Altshuler, also known as Ms. A, is Brandts’ current english teacher within the SEJA program, and was the first person to really show Brandt she was capable of creating change, Brandt said.
“All I did was provide a space and facilitate a conversation,” Altschuler said. “Gabby ran with it. It had to be Gabby, because Gabby is a Changemaker. And Gabby has the passion and the fire and the intensity within her that she doesn’t need to be prompted. She doesn’t need parameters. She sees something that isn’t working and wants to change it.”
SEJA focuses on empowering students and giving them the tools to succeed in social justice.
“Gabby brought to my attention that [the list] hadn’t been brought up in classrooms after it happened, asking me, ‘Why aren’t teachers addressing it?’ And we were able to have a really beautiful and intense conversation in our class about it. And I think that from that, she really thought about, ‘Okay, what’s happening within our classrooms? How can I be an agent of change? And how can I build this into the curriculum at Tam?’” Altshuler said.
Brandt worries about the task force
group’s future after the three seniors, herself included, graduate.
“They’re willing to stick by the same rules but change different things [within the bounds of current rules]. Why are we working within a system that’s clearly not working? I hope that more people get involved so that it can continue to be that way, even after we’ve graduated.”
Open, vulnerable discussions can work to refine ideas and bring awareness and understanding to people, and in Brandt’s experience, may be the key to creating change, she said.
Members of the district administration share a different perspective. According to Farr and Dean of Student Services Nathan Bernstein, a productive dialogue would not have been possible given the circumstances.
“I think to have a genuine discussion about the list in that setting would not have been productive. That needs to be a dialogue and that day turned into a lecture.”
Brandt disagrees, her own experiences tell her students are indeed capable of dialogue.
Discussions in her SEJA class on the same topic have been productive and inspiring for Brandt.
“We had [a discussion] after the list came out, we had a discussion after the meeting that Mr. Farr hosted about the CVS incident. They’ve been very constructive,” she said. “I actually think that the discussion we had about the list was one of our most enlightening ones. That’s what sparked my interest-seeing so many people who cared
about this issue, who had such good ideas, and who weren’t going to administration with them.”
While not everyone’s views are identical to hers, she got enough out of it to vouch for this method as a solution to the problem.
“I think that is one of the most important forms of learning that we kind of skip over, like we don’t take advantage of enough: just actually sitting in a circle, and letting people wait until they’re comfortable to speak. And then once one person speaks, like more people started speaking and then you have a constructive discussion, like that’s very overlooked and like, not taken advantage of.”
It may be a risk, but Brandt believes that these risks are worth taking. She points to her ability to sit through uncomfortable conversations as a benefit in her discussions with administration. She said she sees a tendency of administration and our greater community to avoid discussions of painful topics.
“Unless you’re persistent in calling it out, I found out pretty much immediately from talking to [district administration] is that they didn’t really have any plans to do anything about it.”
Brandt does believe it takes a village. However, when it comes to administrative change, the lack of a village shouldn’t hold people back.
“You, as an individual, have the ability to affect the world around you,” Brandt said. “Students have a lot more power in their voice than we think we do.” ♦
“You, as an individual, have the ability to affect the world around you”
“Students have a lot more power in their voice than we think we do.”
The Tamalpais High School front desk received a phone call issuing a bomb threat on Nov. 30, 2022. Students were directed to evacuate to the football field to receive further instruction.“I was kind of scared. I called my mom and told her what was happening. Personally, I did feel ready to evacuate. I was surrounded by my friends and it seemed like there were no complications from my point of view,” sophomore Selby Orlanski said.
Students and staff were then evacuated to the Mill Valley Recreation where they could be picked up by parents and be dismissed from there. There have been 51 school shoot-
ings in the United States in 2022 alone. Since 2018, there has been a total of 129; within these shootings, 110 people were injured and 30 were killed; 27 of these deaths were students and three were school staff. California wildfires have surpassed the five-year average of 6,650 fires by a colossal 6,739 wildfires, causing delaying starts to the school year for many students, and the National Earthquake Information Center now estimates that 20,000 earthquakes occur yearly, about 55 per day. With these statistics and the growing crisis that threaten education, it is more important than ever
to be prepared for what could happen. Living in Mill Valley, where natural disasters and emergencies are mostly uncommon, it could be easy for locals and residents to not see the risks that come with wherever you live.
One way that Tam High is implementing emergency readiness into its community is the Share 911 app. Share 911 is an app, preferably used on a cell phone, that will eventual-
ly alert students, parents, and staff of an emergency within the campus that could jeopardize campus safety. Currently, the app is used only by staff, but is meant to be eventually expanded to students and parents. It is meant to keep the school in contact with the administration and any other useful resources in the event of an emergency.
Share 911 has already been introduced to Tam’s staff in the beginning of October.
“If there is any natural disaster or active shooter situation, you will be able to get alerted on your phone. It’s in its testing phases right now where only the staff have it. Then, eventually, students will have it and then eventually parents will have it,” campus supervisor Lynette Engleauf said.
So far, the app has had no major negative impacts or complications. Tara Ranzy, Tam High’s new assistant principal, is head of safety at Tam and believes, like most staff, that Share 911 is a step in the right direction for Tam’s emergency and
natural disaster readiness but also understands that we need to see the full effects of it all the way through.
“The way I judge a system or program is based on its effectiveness,” Ranzy said.
Another vital part of being ready for an emergency or natural disaster is communication. By implementing Share 911 into the school, it is important that the system works for everyone. “One thing about this community and my impression of leadership is that they are open to feedback,” Ranzy said, responding to how the future response of the app will impact the Tam community.
Something that makes Share 911 different from other resources for emergencies is the “two-way communication feature.” This feature allows staff to account for students whether that means the students are in danger, need help, or are safe. This is confirmed to other staff by tap-
ping the “check-in” button. Share 911 also will send out multiple notifications communicating with staff what the emergency or natural disaster is.
“It’s a great tool for everybody to get information quickly if they have to and stay away from somewhere. It would be hard for me to miss a message,” Tam’s health specialist Lisa Callaghan said.
Share 911 is one beneficial way to upgrade readiness, however, Tam also performs in other ways for each part of its community to make sure it is efficiently prepared.
Forty-two states require schools to conduct safety or security drills. Teachers recommend that schools perform safety drills at least once a month.
Things like walk-throughs, ensuring Tam has the necessary equipment, and earthquake, fire, and lockdown drills are meant to benefit Tam’s staff and students in the event of an emergency.
Ranzy has big goals for Tam to take strong steps to be prepared. One of Ranzy’s main goals for this year is to perform a “full-out evacuation,” which was done in fall semester. A fullout evacuation entailed all of the school practicing evacuating to a main destination as fast and efficiently as possible. If Tam were to execute this drill, it could advance its readiness for an emergency or disaster.
“I would want to do a fullout evacuation, huge accomplishment. That will be a big deal if ... [when] I do that,” Ranzy said.
Tam also participates in monthly leadership meetings with other districts to continue to implement ways to make our campus even more ready. Ranzy and other administrators will also be partaking on “walk-throughs.” These “walk-throughs” are to make sure that each classroom has the correct and necessary supplies in the event of an emergency or natural disaster.
The supplies that are distributed to each classroom are in a 1-by-12-gallon black box with a yellow cover. These boxes are called “Classroom Emergency Kits.” The emergency bin is filled with 17 2400-calorie food bars, 34 packets of water, one first aid kit, one LED flashlight, three emergency blankets, and 35 white reusable face masks. These bins also include an emergency toilet.
Tam’s teachers are also expected to be prepared for emergencies and natural disasters. “Teachers receive training at different times, or beginning of [the] year,” Tam world language teacher Susan Malanche said.
Malanche has been a teacher at Tam since 2011, minus two years abroad, and participated in Tam’s protocols
February 2023 13
“Safety [at Tam] is going to look different from a traditional campus.”
and drills for an extensive pe riod. “I feel prepared as a teach er. I follow all directions from the district,” Malanche said.
Like many teachers, Malanche participates in preparing with regular communication, staff meetings, and new updated procedures. While Tam does practice emergency readiness, students feel less ready and prepared.
“From what I see, we [students] don’t pay attention during our drills or any sort of practice for emergencies or natural disasters,” Orlanski said.
“Teachers have a unique op portunity and an obligation to im part their emergency preparedness knowledge onto their students, par ticularly in areas where disasters are common, so they can take appropri ate and potentially life-saving action during a disaster, even if their par ent is not present,” Emergency Es sentials, a website centered around emergency preparedness stated.
Callaghan has the responsi bility of relaying medications to students that need them and pro viding health kits in the event of an emergency or natural disaster.
“I’m responsible for bringing res cue meds for students that need them. In case anyone has a cut or something like that, I have a kit for that, and then I also have a first aid kit that I take before leaving the building,” Callaghan said.
Other parts of being well prepared for these events are participating in drills with the whole school, and col laborating with other specialists in her field. As part of collaborating and dis cussing new important emergency and natural disaster matters, Callaghan will collaborate and train with ad ministrative assistant, Nancy Parnow.
When it comes to students, it is mainly a given to partici pate in drills and practice proto col in the event of an emergency.
“We are doing our drills and going over everything and when we have had an episode where we thought there was an active shooter, everybody locked down and it went really well,” Callaghan said in response to Tam’s efficiency.
Engelauf, who is a Tam alumni, has participated in emergency preparedness as a student and now as a staff member.
“When I did go here, I would say that we were prepared for any natural
they go around to check their zones. Each supervisor is assigned a certain section of the school. The sec-
and administrators assistants, just checking their own zones, and then we go hide ourselves,” Engleauf said.
“We have grown up in a world where we all jump when a balloon pops. In a world where we have to scan every single exit and the movements of our classmates at school,” CSU(California State University) student
[an] idea of what to do; you’re not just shell shocked,” Engleauf said.
ing what to do, it seems like everyone is paying attention to the important things,” sophomore Annica Harris said.
Like most schools, there will be rules that are bent and stretched. Although this can provide humor or entertainment for some, specifically students, past school emergencies have not been centered around entertainment.
With Tam holding one of the higher student populations in Marin County at 1,590 students and the campus being the size of some junior colleges, the responsibilities are not only higher, but need to be held by many more students.
“Safety is going to look different from a traditional campus, the larger the population the more challenging the communication,” Ranzy said. The campus is large and spread out, and in ways that could decrease the effectiveness of safety measures.
The top two most fatal U.S. school shootings all have an average of over a 1,000 student population. Columbine High School has an enrollment of 1,697 and the shooting resulted in 13 fatalities, and 24 injured. Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, also has an average of over 1,000 students, with their current student population at 3,333. During the shooting, there were 17 fatalities, and 17 injured.
“We are in charge of, what? Almost 1,200 kids are at this campus, so it’s very important that we are all on the same court and students know what we expect of them,” Engelauf said.
Tam’s growing student population only strengthens the hold on importance for people to care and understand what is at stake.
In the event of an emergency or natural disaster, staying calm and knowing your surroundings can put you even closer to safety.
“As individuals struggle to cope with these stressful situations, human interactions can often become strained and the need to support each other is stronger than ever,” the National Center on Safe Supportive Learning Environment stated on its website.
Students make up so much of the school, so it is vital that they have the mental strength to get through these events especially if a student is by themself. “Be willing to follow the lead of [a] teacher, but be ready to lead yourself,” Ranzy said.
It is more beneficial for the whole school when students can be very much present mentally, emotionally, and physically. Another source that Tam shows to its students is California State University’s Active Shooter Safety Training video. This video includes ways to be efficient and prioritize safety in the event of a school shooting.
Santiago Mayer, director of Voters of tomorrow said, while protesting gun violence and expressing what Generation Z has now had to normalize their lives around these events.
“Nothing is more important than your life. If some of us can remember we can guide the rest of the community in the right direction,” Ranzy said.
“If you practice it and go through the drill, when something bad does happen, you kinda have
Many Tam staff can agree with each other that expectations need to be followed not just by staff but by students. “There are ways that students can be aware of situations that are harmful, [the] goal is we don’t want them but we need to be prepared,” Malanche said.
“The students need to take it seriously,” Chavez said. In comparison, some students feel that the preparedness is a easier topic and not as complicated as they feel teachers see it to be, “Honestly, whenever I’ve been in a class and we are doing drills and learn-
“The video gave me a really different perspective on how I would have to protect myself if something like a school shooting happened at Tam. It made me remember to be aware of my surroundings,” Harris said.
“[Being prepared is important] so we are not running around trying to figure out what to do. So we can jump into action and have our plan set up,” Callaghan said.
February 2023 15
“Be willing to follow the lead of [a] teacher, but be ready to lead yourself.”
Opioid use in Marin County has become a dangerous and a life-threatening issue, more commonly to teens. The American Academy of Family Physicians (AAFP) estimates 769,000 children between the ages 12 to 17 have misused opioids. This is resulting in teens having more accessibility to drugs, which is creating an epidemic of opioid use, according to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.
In 2019, the number of drug overdose deaths in Marin was higher than it was in any past year, based on a document published by the Marin County Civil Grand Jury.
Acquiring opioids has become increasingly accessible over the years for teens in Marin County. Yvonne Milham, Tamalpais High School Wellness Coordinator, said there is a range of use of opioids among users.
“There are folks who maybe try something one time and then there are folks who are habitual users who have their body and brain telling them they need to take them in order to be okay,” she said.
According to the Tam’s Wellness Center, students can become reliant on this drug due to many reasons. These include taking prescribed opioids due to an injury or receiving opioids from unknown people through unprescribed means.
Having prescribed opioids does have a risk of addiction, which can, in some cases, result in death.
One such instance is Tamalpais High graduate and Sonoma State stu-
dent Trevor Leopold, who was found dead in his dorm room after buying and consuming counterfeit pills that were laced with fentanyl.
“I understand why a lot of people are quiet about their child dying from pills or drugs or addiction,” Michelle Leopold, his mother, said, “but I would rather save lives than protect myself from being embarrassed.”
An opioid is a class of drug used to relieve pain, according to the Cen
The fentanyl shown above is a lethal dose.
Violet
and Annie Shine graphics by Zachary Breindel
ter for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
“Prescription opioids can be prescribed by doctors to treat moderate to severe pain but can also have serious risks and side effects,” the CDC’s website reads. Common types of opioids include oxycodone (OxyContin), hydrocodone (Vicodin), morphine, and methadone.
Purchasing or obtaining opioids through unprescribed reasons can also cause serious issues, particularly if the opioid is laced with fentanyl. Opioid addiction in general can result in a serious impact on the ability to focus in school and participate in everyday activities.
“Opioids trigger and release endorphins which are the ‘feelgood’ neurotransmitters inside your brain,” according to the Mayo Clinic, a nonprofit organization operated by the Mayo Foundation for Medical Education and Research (MFMER).
The Mayo Clinic states that the main reason that opioid use is dangerous and comes with such risks is that it is highly addictive—with each dose a person takes, the more reliant they become on the drug. Opioids can also restrict breathing and the respiratory system when taken or when interfered with other medications.
Fentanyl is a category of opioids that is a synthetic opioid pain reliever, according to the CDC.
“It is many times more powerful than other opioids and is approved for treating severe pain, typically advanced cancer pain,” the CDC’s website reads, adding that illegally made and distributed fentanyl has been on the rise in several states.
Fentanyl is one such synthetic opioid being pressed into fake pills or other forms of drugs, which is referred to as fentanyl poisoning, and there is new research regarding this.
There has recently been an alarming strike in fentanyl overdoses resulting in death. According to the Marin County Civil Grand Jury, in 2020 an estimated 4,400 Marin County residents suffered from opioid use disorders, and between 2006 and 2019 over
400 people have died in Marin County due to drug overdose.
Half of those deaths were caused by opioids.
According to a report from the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) initiative One Pill Can Kill, the DEA seized more than 10.2 million fentanyl pills and approximately 980 pounds of fentanyl powder during the period of May through September this year.
According to the CDC, 75 percent of all drug overdose related deaths have been the result of opioid overdose in 2020. Of those opioid overdoses around 80 percent involved synthetic opioids.
Fentanyl is now in multiple different forms and can be accessed in the Bay Area, including Mill Valley, as reported by the DEA on its initiative’s website.
“Fake pills are made to look like OxyContin, Xanax, Adderall, and other pharmaceuticals. These fake pills contain no legitimate medicine,” the same report from One Pill Can Kill reads. These fake pills laced with fentanyl are being sold as rainbow-colored looking skittles, allegedly meant to attract younger audiences. According to the One Pill Can Kill website, this has become such a pressing issue because drug dealers in the U.S. realized how much more money they can make by mixing fentanyl with other, more expensive drugs.
Tam alumna, who will be referred to as Alice S, overdosed on opioids last summer after coming home from a rehabilitation center.
Alice S had graduated from Tam in the class of 2020 and continued her academic career at New York University (NYU), studying education and pursuing her passion to work with underprivileged children.
“She was so smart, she was so witty, so intuitive, and all of her friends would say the same thing,” Jessica, Alice S’s mom, said. “She never asked me for help with homework a day in her life. She was always just dedicated, diligent, and organized. She was a prolific writer, super organized but always had time for friends and fun.”
Jessica has seen drug use first-hand
“It’s hard, the truth is no one can get someone else sober, not even my daughter. The person really has to want to get sober for themselves and that’s a really hard thing to do, especially with opioids.”
in her household.
“I’ve had Tam High students and amazing kids from Marin just over the past couple decades come through my house and sleep over, so I’ve known for a while that it’s very easy to get drugs in Marin and certainly at Tam High,” she said.
Jessica always knew Alice S was hanging out with friends and going to house parties on the weekend, but she explained how she was never too worried about Alice S’s use with drugs because she was always a great student. “[I] didn’t want to be a helicopter parent,” Jessica said.
Shortly after she recognized how often Alice S was going out, that’s when she knew something had to be done. “I think junior year and senior year of high school is when I started to get wind that she had tried opioids, you know, pills like a percocet or something that someone had given her. So we talked about it and I asked who gave it to her and it was one of her friends’ boyfriends and that is how this came to life,” Jessica said.
Jessica quickly became more aware of the path Alice S was heading down and she knew what would come in the future if Alice S didn’t quit immediately. “We had a really serious conversation about how there’s only one thing that’s going to happen with using any kind of pills. ‘You’re going to get addicted. There’s no way about it. So you have to stop,’” Jessica told Alice S, who promised that she was going to.
While Alice S was at NYU her freshman year, she was on lock down
due to the pandemic. Jessica said Alice S had always experienced ups and downs with her mental health which mainly began when her birth mother passed away when she was five years old. Alice S was always an organized and hardworking high schooler; however, Alice S knew she needed to seek help regarding her drug abuse, and being in her dorm alone during this time of isolation did not help her situation.
“She left to come back to California for treatment and went to rehab and she did it. It’s hard, the truth is no one can get someone else sober, not even my daughter. The person really has to want to get sober for themselves and that’s a really hard thing to do, especially with opioids,” Jessica said.
prevalence of drugs, but she said “overdose prevention, not so much.”
“We have the resources to support students,” Sophia Kaufman, Wellness Outreach specialist at Tam High, said.
Tam Wellness will be having a campaign around fentanyl use in a couple of months and they also offer 24/7 substance counseling support for people who are struggling with any type of addiction. There are Wellness 101 classes along with informational presentations that both Milham and Kaufman.
Jessica overall wants to ensure students’ awareness of the damaging effects opioids not only have on yourself but also on your close friends and family.
“The truth is when something like this happens it is so fantastically damaging and destructive to an entire family. Not just the part about death, which is obviously the worst thing that can happen, just addiction is so damaging to a family dynamic: it hurts parents, it hurts grandparents, it hurts everybody and the addict doesn’t really see that ever … they think about themselves and their addiction.”
She continued: “The thing I would say to any Tam student is really think about how would your mom or dad or little brother or older sister feel if
Eventually, extreme pain killers took over Alice, resulting in her death, even with the support and love she was receiving from family, friends, and professionals.
Jessica explained how Tam always sent newsletters regarding alcohol abuse and informational emails about the
something bad happened to you, and you know some things are irreversible. This is one of those cases where it leaves a big hole in all of our hearts to not have Alice here.”◆
“It’s
