Vol. CXXXIV NO.2

Pomona dining staff may vote to strike

Amid contract negotation talks, workers call for wages that reflect Los Angeles County’s soaring cost of living

Despite widespread faculty support, CMC’s Racial-Ethnic GE in flux

CAELAN REEVES SAJAH ALI & MAYA OLSON

Professors at Claremont McKenna College began working on a Racial-Ethnic General Education (GE) proposal following George Floyd’s murder and the subsequent nationwide Black Lives Matter protests in 2020. But, two years later, the fate of whether the GE will be implemented remains uncertain.

CMC faculty voted April 14 to approve the GE, after which the proposal should have been sent to the Board of Trustees to be voted on, according to faculty bylaws. However, CMC president Hiram Chodosh did not recommend the proposal to the board. Instead, he sent it back to the faculty with proposed edits, with a suggested Oct. 15 deadline.

During a Monday meeting, an ASCMC representative shared that the Faculty Diversity Committee voted Sept. 16 to “recommend that the original

proposal that passed be sent to the Board of Trustees,” without the edits.

Chodosh’s decision came as a shock to some faculty, particularly CMC professors Gaston Espinosa of religious studies and Daniel Livesay of history, who proposed the GE. In an Aug. 8 email to students, both professors expressed disappointment with the president’s response in a joint-statement, after what Livesay called a “historic” consensus among faculty.

“It’s unprecedented for a president not to take a faculty-approved proposal to the board for a vote,” Espinosa said.

In a statement sent to TSL, Michelle Chamberlain, the vice president for advancement and dean of the Robert Day Scholars program, said the Board of Trustees’ “overarching concern” with the proposal was the high number of GEs already required at the college.

Chodosh handed the proposal back to faculty with instructions to “develop a full set of parallel,

After Tuesday’s contract negotiation meeting between Pomona College administration and the college’s dining hall union, workers told TSL they are willing to hold a strike vote if the next negotiation meeting does not result in an agreement.

Over the past three weeks, members of Pomona’s dining hall staff organized a series of demonstrations prompted by an Aug. 17 contract negotiation meeting.

Represented by UNITE HERE: LOCAL 11, workers requested a $9.40 raise this year — amounting to a $28 minimum wage — which the college countered with a $2.80 raise split over the next three years.

“At this point, we feel that they’re not taking us seriously,” Edward Mac, a Pomona cook and member

of the union’s negotiation team, told TSL. “We’re very serious about these negotiations, and we’re very serious about what we want, [so] we’re looking at further action… we’re looking at a possible strike vote and then also going on strike.”

In response to the counter offer, hundreds marched in support of the workers’ union at a Labor Day rally. Dozens of workers and students marched to Pomona President G. Gabrielle Starr’s office two Tuesdays in a row to press the issue.

The weekend after the first Tuesday delegation, Pomona held a contract negotiation meeting Sept. 20 that lasted over four hours.

Pomona’s delegation at the meeting was headed by the college’s new treasurer Jeff Roth, according to dining hall staff member Rolando Araiza. Roth started his job at Pomona two

Scripps College receives $15 million grant to boost financial aid efforts

QUINTEN CARNEY

In an era of rising college costs, Scripps College announced Sept.14 that it had been selected to receive a $15 million grant from the Schuler Education Foundation (SEF), which will be matched by donors over the next decade to bolster the college’s financial aid efforts.

Scripps is one of five colleges to partner with the Schuler Access Initiative this year, aiming to increase the enrollment of high-achieving students who are Pell Grant eligible or undocumented and therefore unable to receive federal aid.

The SEF’s mission is to “further the success of individuals and communities by investing in high-achieving underrepresented students and top-tier liberal arts colleges.”

Scripps will receive up to $15 million in matching funds from donors over the next 10 years, for a total of $30 million in scholarship aid.

“Not only will the Schuler Access Initiative significantly scale our progress toward making the College

more inclusive of students from varied backgrounds, it’s also a rare chance for us to help break a longstanding barrier that has excluded them from experiencing all higher education has to offer,” Scripps president Suzanne Keen said in a press release.

To qualify for selection by the SEF, colleges must meet 80 percent of students’ financial need and have a donor base committed to investing in college access.

Since Scripps is needaware during its admissions process, unlike need-blind Pomona College, Claremont McKenna College and Harvey Mudd College, Scripps’ ability to admit more Pell-eligible or undocumented students has been limited. Currently, Pell-eligible and undocumented students comprise 11 percent of Scripps’ total student population.

Over the grant’s 10-year lifetime, the school aims to increase that number to 24

weeks leading up to the meeting.

Araiza told TSL the offer Roth presented on Tuesday was a $4.80 wage increase split over a four year contract with a onetime bonus of $1000. The original proposal in August was a $2.80 increase over three years.

This proposal mirrored a 2019 wage increase, which expired this July, Araiza added.

“We didn’t really see any change, to be honest,” Araiza told TSL.

Roth said via email that the administration’s new proposal was “significantly higher” than the Aug. 17 meeting’s initial offer, showing how “seriously the administration is taking these negotiations.”

“We believe the previous dining contract was a significant

WORKERS on page 2

As COVID-19 policies re lax across the 5Cs, this year’s

student body presidents are more focused than ever on cre ating community and fostering wellness.

While each president has

specific goals for their school, one common theme echoes through out their platforms: rebuilding

SERENA LI & SARA CAWLEY

SENATE

A frustrating loss left the Athenas hungry for more going into the rest of the season when the wom en’s soccer team fell to the Red land Bulldogs 2-1 on Wednesday. Read more on page 9.

MARIANA DURAN & SIENA SWIFT

FLOReNCe pUN • tHe StUDeNt LIFe

this year’s student presidents are ready to tackle issues concerning the 5C community.

mARIANA DURAN • tHe StUDeNt LIFe

talks between pomona’s dining hall union and college administration have been underway since the summer.

CmC is one of the two Claremont Colleges to lack a race and ethnicity general education requirement.

JONAtHAN Ke • tHe StUDeNt LIFe

Fall flu shots mandatory for 5C students

GRANT: Increasing accessibility at the forefront of donormatched campaign

Continued from page 1 percent, Scripps spokesperson Rachael Warecki told TSL in a press release.

Scripps students see this grant as one of the steps that Scripps can take to become more equitable.

“I think it’s definitely a step in the right direction, and I’m excited that there are going to be more funds for Pell-grant eligible students,” Quinn Katayama-Stall SC ’26 said. “But it’s the first step of many, in my opinion.”

The SEF’s new scholarship is one of many Scripps has introduced over the past decades to focus on equity, including the 2016 IDEA Initiative and the 2017 Presidential Scholarship Initiative.

experience remains unaffordable and therefore out of reach for some.”

Carson McVay SC ’23 said she has experienced the difficulty of paying for college first-hand and took last semester off in order to save money for school.

“I think anytime you can get more perspectives and more diverse backgrounds into a place — especially one like Scripps, where it’s not particularly diverse — that’s a really positive thing,” McVay said. “When perspectives increase, there is an increase in ideas, and that’s a really positive thing to have in a community.”

McVay added that Scripps still has room for improvement within its financial aid offerings.

MARCELLA TODD

As the Claremont trees begin to drop their leaves, 5C students will once again need to roll up their sleeves for a flu shot.

The 5Cs are requiring students to be vaccinated against the flu by Oct. 31, The Claremont Colleges Services spokesperson Laura Muna-Landa told TSL via email. The deadline to receive the shot is a month later than it was last year.

For graduate students at Keck Graduate Institute and Claremont Graduate University, the flu shot is not required. However, MunaLanda said it is recommended.

Student Health Services will host flu shot clinics at each of the 5Cs in late October. 5C students enrolled in the Student Health Insurance Plan (SHIP) will not have to pay for a vaccine at any SHSaffiliated appointment or event, Muna-Landa confirmed.

Outside of the upcoming clinics, students can request flu shot appointments at SHS by calling (909) 621-8222.

SHS recently hosted a 7C-wide flu vaccination event at TCCS’ Back

to Your Future block party on Sept. 15, where they administered around 300 vaccines in partnership with CVS Pharmacies.

CVS bills students’ insurance companies, most of which cover the flu shot without a copay, Muna-Landa said. If necessary, students can pay any fees directly to CVS with cash.

Since SHS does not bill private insurance plans, students who are not on SHIP are charged $25 to their student account after a flu shot appointment. If students are unable to file a claim with their own insurance company, each 5C will provide a $10 subsidy to its students. The graduate schools, however, are not subsidizing the vaccine.

The CDC recommends vaccination for the flu by the end of October, since the illness’ activity often peaks in February but can continue until May. Flu shots take two weeks to become effective and generally last six months, although their provided immunity tends to wane over that period, according to data provided by the CDC.

SASHA mAttHeWS • tHe StUDeNt LIFe

Students also planning on receiving their COVID-19 bivalent boosters from SHS can do so without worry, as the CDC confirmed that it is safe to get a flu shot at the same time as receiving a COVID-19 booster or vaccine.

Social distancing, mask wearing and other preventative measures kept the 2021-2022 flu season milder when compared to pre-pandemic trends. But experts warn that due to relaxed COVID-19 guidelines, flu shots are as important as ever this fall.

“TCC undergraduate students reside in a congregate living setting (dormitories), making it paramount to have mass immunity to decrease the likelihood of an outbreak which could jeopardize the health of many individuals, not to mention the disruption to their academic success,” Muna-Landa said. “The combination of stress, lack of getting enough sleep and being around lots of people in a residential dorm setting can result in more frequent illnesses like the flu.”

“Scripps’ history as a women’s college is rooted in extending higher education to underrepresented students,” Keen said. “But the Scripps

“I think cost is really inhibitory for a lot of people coming to Scripps, and I think the fact that Scripps isn’t need-blind is not great because that means fewer deserving people who can’t pay full price have access to Scripps,” she said.

WORKERS: Citing high living costs, workers say current pay isn’t enough

from page 1

step forward, offering real progress in addressing the cost-of-living pressures employees face, and now we are seeking to strongly build on those gains for our dining and catering teams in the next contract,” Roth said.

With LA County’s consumer price index increasing by 7.6 percent in the past 12 months, some dining workers say previous wages are not enough to make ends meet.

“Everything’s going up, but our pay is just plateauing,” Aaron Archer, a worker at Café 47, told TSL. “But that doesn’t stop our rent from going up. That’s not stopping groceries from going up. That’s not stopping the cost of living from going up.”

Mac said that in order to live in La Verne, which allows him to bike to Claremont for work, he has to work two and a half jobs that span both weekdays and weekends.

“I have a mom that has cancer. I live with my family and I help support them,” Mac said. “And it’s very hard because one day, I want to be able to move and buy a house … and it’s very hard to be able to afford these things.”

At the negotiation, union representatives demonstrated with a cost-of-living calculator that higher wages were necessary for Pomona dining hall workers to support themselves given the steep cost of living in Los Angeles County, according to Jessica Shen-Wachter SC ’24, who was present at the meeting.

“I’m not the only one that works like that,” Mac told TSL. “We have many employees that do double shifts. They work six days a week, five days a week, they work over 12 hours a day, just to make ends meet, just to make enough money so they can pay their rent, send their kids to school.”

A possible escalation in tactics to achieve the union’s goal depends on the outcome of the next negotiation meeting set for Thursday, Araiza told TSL.

For Claremont Student Workers Alliance’s Shen-Wachter, the meeting reinforced that contracts are won through workplace organizing and not just negotiation.

“Pomona is never going to…come back with a satisfactory proposal unless they are significantly pushed. It’s just not in their material interests to do so,” Shen-Wachter said.

Mac said it’s not just about the money for him — he wants workers to be treated with dignity.

“I want the college to respect us and respect our work,” Mac said. “The work that we do is skilled work.”

Roth told TSL that the college respects and appreciates the dining and catering team.

“We all share the goal of providing excellent wages paired with an exceptional package of benefits to support employees and their families,” Roth said.

Mac said the administration’s failure to meet workers’ monetary needs attests to a lack of understanding.

“I would like to have anyone from the administration come and do my job one day. Come in at 6 o’clock in the morning, make coffee for the students, make breakfast burritos at 7, make açai bowls a little bit later and then go and take a break on time,” Mac said.

“Take 30 minutes before your fifth hour, come back and do your lunch prep. And know how much chicken you’re supposed to defrost or how much fish you need to cut for the day and make sure that you have enough… And then do a lunch service with the students, go and do another shift, [wash] thousands of plates. And then after that, go to sleep for six, seven hours, and do it all over again.”

Trabajadores de cocina de Pomona consideran votar a la huelga, dependiendo de las próximas negociaciones contractuales

Después de una junta de negociación contractual este martes entre la administración de Pomona College y representantes del sindicato de cocina de Pomona, algunos miembros del sindicato le dijeron a TSL que si no se llega a un acuerdo en la próxima junta, es posible que lleven a cabo un voto de huelga.

“A este punto, sentimos que no nos están tomando en serio” dijo Edward Mac, quien es cocinero en Pomona y parte del equipo de negociadores del sindicato. “Y lo que pasa es que nosotros tomamos seriamente estas negociaciones, así que estamos considerando medidas adicionales”.

En las pasadas tres semanas, los trabajadores de cocina de Pomona organizaron una serie de

demostraciones impulsadas por la primera junta para negociar su nuevo contrato que ocurrió el 17 de agosto. En la junta, los trabajadores pidieron un aumento de $9.40 este año– que sumaría a un salario mínimo de $20– y Pomona originalmente ofreció una contraoferta de $2.80 dividida en los siguientes tres años.

Respondiendo a la contraoferta, cientos marcharon para apoyar al sindicato de trabajadores en una demostración del día del trabajo, y luego, por dos martes seguidos, docenas de estudiantes y trabajadores marcharon a la oficina de la presidenta de Pomona G. Gabrielle Starr para abogar por la cuestión.

El fin de semana después de la primera delegación que fue enviada el martes, Pomona decidió poner una junta de negociación contractual para el 20 de septiembre. La junta se llevó a cabo en un edificio administrativo propiedad del departamento de servicios de los Claremont Colleges y duró más de cuatro horas.

Durante la junta, la delegación de Pomona fue liderada por el nuevo tesorero Jeff Roth, según Rolando Araiza, un trabajador de cocina presente. Roth comenzó a trabajar en Pomona dos semanas antes de esta junta de negociación contractual.

Araiza le dijo a TSL que la propuesta presentada por Roth fue un aumento total de $4.80 dividido en un contrato de cuatro años con un bono de $1000 para el primer año. La propuesta original de agosto fue un aumento de $2.80 dividido por tres años.

“Esta nueva propuesta incluye prácticamente el mismo aumento que se negoció para el pasado contrato en 2019. Este previo contrato se venció en julio”, añadió Araiza.

“No vimos ningún cambio, para ser honestos,” Araiza le dijo a TSL.

En un correo a TSL, Roth dijo que la nueva propuesta por parte de la administración de Pomona fue “significativamente más alta que la oferta inicial” presentada en la junta del 17 de agosto, y que mostraba “que tan en serio la administración se está tomando estas negociaciones.”

“Creemos que el anterior contrato de cocina fue un paso adelante significante, que ofrecería

verdadero progreso en abordar las presiones del costo de vivienda a las que nuestros trabajadores se enfrentan, y ahora buscamos sumar a estos logros para nuestros equipos de dining y catering con nuestro próximo contrato,” Roth le dijo a TSL mediante un correo.

En los pasados 12 meses, el índice de precios al consumidor subió un 7.6 por ciento, y algunos trabajadores de cocina aseguran que ahora, los salarios establecidos en su anterior contrato no son suficientes para poder cubrir sus gastos.

“El costo de todo está subiendo, pero nuestra paga está estancada,” dijo Aaron Archer, un trabajador de Café 47. “Y eso no impide que suba nuestra renta. Eso no impide que nuestras compras del supermercado suban de precio. No impide que suba el costo de vivienda.”

Mac dijo que para poder vivir en La Verne, de donde se viene a trabajar a Claremont en bicicleta, tiene dos trabajos y medio, que abarcan todos los días de la semana.

“Tengo una mamá que tiene cáncer, vivo con mi familia y yo ayudo a mantenerlos,” dijo Mac. “Y es muy difícil porque algún día quiero poder mudarme y comprar una casa… y va a ser muy difícil poder pagar estas cosas.”

En la negociación más reciente, los representantes del sindicato mostraron una calculadora del costo de vivienda creada por MIT que demostraba que los trabajadores de Pomona requerían salarios más altos para poder cubrir sus gastos debido al alto costo de vivienda en el condado de Los Ángeles, según Jessica Shen-Wachter SC ’24, quien estuvo presente en la junta.

“No soy el único que trabaja tanto,” Mac le dijo a TSL. “Hay muchos otros empleados que trabajan doble turno, que trabajan seis o cinco días a la semana, que trabajan más de 12 horas al día solo para poder llegar a fin de mes, para tener suficiente dinero para pagar su renta y mandar a sus hijos a la escuela.”

Dependiendo de los resultados de la siguiente junta de negociación contractual, que está agendada para el 29 de septiembre, existe la posibilidad de que se tomen medidas adicionales para lograr las metas del sindicato.

Shen-Wachter, una de las líderes de la Alianza entre los estudiantes y trabajadores de Claremont (CSWA), nos compartió como la junta recalcó que los contratos no solo se ganan en las negociaciones, sino también en la organización laboral.

“Por su propia voluntad, Pomona nunca va a regresar con una propuesta satisfactoria, al menos de que los presionen considerablemente. Simplemente, no está en sus intereses materiales,” dijo Shen-Wachter. “Para que los trabajadores aquí consigan los aumentos que quieren, merecen y necesitan, van a tener que tomarlo. No va a ser algo que Pomona nada más les dé.

Mac dijo que además de la paga, es muy importante para él que a los trabajadores se les trate con dignidad.

“Quiero que Pomona nos respete y respete nuestro trabajo,” dijo Mac. “El trabajo que hacemos es uno especializado.”

Roth le dijo a TSL que Pomona respeta y aprecia al equipo de cocina y catering.

“Todos compartimos la meta de proveer sueldos excelentes combinados con un paquete excepcional de beneficios para apoyar a nuestros trabajadores y a sus familias,” dijo Roth.

Sin embargo, Mac dijo que el hecho que la administración no logre cumplir las necesidades monetarias de los trabajadores demuestra que no logran entender qué significa trabajar en la cocina de Pomona cada día.

Me gustaría que alguien de la administración viniera e hiciera mi trabajo por un día. Que vinieran a las seis de la mañana, le prepararan café a los estudiantes, hicieran los burritos a las siete, hicieran los bowls de açai un poco más tarde y luego tomaran su descanso a tiempo,” dijo Mac.

“Que se tomaran 30 minutos antes de su quinta hora, que regresaran y prepararan el almuerzo, que supieran cuánto pollo se debe descongelar o cuanto pescado se debe cortar al día para asegurarse que haya suficiente, que no se pasen, y que luego hicieran el servicio del almuerzo para los estudiantes. Y después de todo eso, que entraran a su siguiente turno y lavaran miles de platos. Y luego de eso que se fueran a dormir por seis o siete horas, solo para volver a hacerlo todo otra vez el siguiente día.”

HUXLeYANN HUeFNeR • tHe StUDeNt LIFe

Scripps College aims to make education more accessible to students through the SeF grant.

SENATE: Interconectivity, wellness and joy — this year’s presidents focus on rebuilding

Continued from page 1

connections and support systems at the 5Cs after several years of social isolation.

Vera Berger PO ’23

Vera Berger PO ’23 has already improved Pomona College’s dis ciplinary process and sustain ability initiatives. As president, she’s turning her attention to the individual student.

Berger wants to rework Pomo na’s credit system to help students succeed. Her main goals are to implement a pass/fail grading policy for first years similar to Harvey Mudd College’s and to en sure students enrolled in science classes receive lab credits.

Another tenet of Berger’s plat form is environmentalism, which includes advancing Pomona’s sustainability efforts and bring ing the school closer to carbon neutrality.

“We’re just starting to imple ment a carbon offset pilot pro gram,” Berger said. “I’m interest ed in getting a solar farm. I think there are a lot of sustainability initiatives that we can work on while trying to divest [from fossil fuels].”

When it comes to wellness, Berger wants to make mental and reproductive health resources more available, starting with promoting the Health Education Outreach Office. Currently, the HEOO offers safe sex supplies, a relaxation room, a wellness garden, pregnancy testing and accessible counseling for the 7Cs.

“I think that [the HEOO] is another thing that we need to advertise to students because that’s a super awesome resource that people don’t know about,” Berger said.

At her platform’s core is the need to focus ASPC initiatives on students — to bring campus life and Pomona’s traditions like

4/7 day and Nochella back in full force.

“The last two years, ASPC has provided care packages to students,” Berger said. “I think that’s a really great way to make an impact.”

Megan Chow SC ’23 (she/her)

Megan Chow SC ’23 is ap proaching her role as Scripps Associated Students president with a mindset of giving back.

“I want to be someone who students can easily approach and rely on to advocate for them, and to be a resource and support system for them, just as the Scripps community has been for me,” Chow told TSL via email.

Chow is focused on ensuring students feel empowered to participate in decision-making processes on campus.

“My main goal is to further connect with the Scripps com munity and listen to individual stories so that I can better ad vocate for students,” Chow said via email.

Aiming to promote inclu sivity at Scripps College, Chow plans to include a range of voic es and perspectives in her work, particularly from students of marginalized backgrounds.

“As a representative of the entire student body, I want to ensure that a diverse set of stu dent voices are being heard,” she said via email. “I want to uplift, highlight and protect students from underrepresented backgrounds.”

With a focus on bringing awareness to pressing issues, Chow hopes to hold those in power at Scripps accountable while increasing opportunities for students and administrators to interact.

“I want to see more trans parency and a smoother line of communication between stu

dents and the administration,” Chow said via email. “I want to see the administration and Board of Trustees prioritizing students and treating us with respect, thought and care.”

Josh Nagra CM ’23

Though new to ASCMC, Josh Nagra CM ’23 is working to reform Claremont McKenna College with his experience at The Trevor Project and as a mental health and wellness officer at CMC.

“It was a really big transition to become president because all these other people had institu tional knowledge that I didn’t have,” Nagra said. “I think my inexperience forced me to work as a team with the people that I’m around, which has forced me to become experienced.”

At the heart of his campaign is creating a “community of care” — a term Nagra uses to represent his hopes for CMC’s students. He encourages stu dents to connect through re treats, and he proposes the opening of CMC buildings as relaxation spaces and meeting places for affinity groups.

Another priority of Nagra’s is shifting towards a less heter onormative and more accepting culture at CMC, including facul ty members asking students for, and respecting, their pronouns.

“We can have a bunch of tiny, minute changes on campus that individually are positive,” Nagra said. “But if we’re not able to somehow cohesively connect those into a way to make those initiatives support one another and stay in CMC’s structure for a long time, these changes are not as valuable.”

Looking to the future, Nagra is excited to utilize the wealth of resources that the 5C’s have to offer, including the input of

Yuqing Melanie wu brings love of problem-solving to new position

KITTY GRANT & MAXINE DAVEY

As of July 1, Pomona College has a new dean of the college: computer science professor Yuqing Melanie Wu. She succeeds geology professor Robert Gaines, who had most recently served in the role beginning in 2019.

In her new role, Wu oversees academic departments, programs and units, with an overall focus on improving student educational experiences.

Pomona President G. Gabrielle Starr expressed excitement when announcing the appointment in a May 16 email to students.

“Throughout the search process, I was struck by her openness, transparency and eagerness to get input from across the College,” Starr said. “I know Melanie will be a key partner in supporting our talented faculty, promoting a compelling liberal arts curriculum for our students and elevating Pomona’s unique role in creating opportunity in American higher education.”

A Wig Award recipient and a member of the Global Pomona Project Steering Committee, Wu has written over 70 journal articles about her research on data representation and management, focusing on query languages, indexing and query optimization.

Wu taught computer science for over eight years at Pomona, chairing the department from 2017 until 2020.

“In my new role as dean, the nature of the work may have changed, but the core mission stays the same,” Wu told TSL via email. “It is still about delivering the best education we can provide to Pomona students by building programs and recruiting and developing outstanding faculty and staff.”

Wu said that one of her main priorities is to bring transparency and efficiency to the role when supporting academic programs, faculty, staff and students.

She also plans to help students better understand information regarding courses, programs and services offered at the college.

“One of the things I look forward to the most is problemsolving,” said Wu. “Every day,

I wake up and look forward to working with my wonderful staff to solve problems for programs, departments and members of our community.”

Emily Tomz PO ’23 has taken two of Wu’s classes: Discrete Math and Functional Programming (CS 54) and Introduction to Languages and Theory (CS 101).

Tomz described Wu as one of her favorite professors, extremely passionate and always willing to help.

“Professor Wu is a very curious person,” Tomz said. “I think she’ll bring that energy to the table as dean.”

Summer Hasama PO ’24, who took Intro to Python in fall

2020, described Wu as “a great lecturer” who “strived to create a community within Zoom classes.”

“I believe she can foster a supportive community at school. She’s very approachable and open to chat, so I think she will do a great job at listening to the student body,” Hasama said.

For students who enjoyed Wu’s computer science classes, Wu’s appointment is bittersweet.

“While we’re disappointed that she might not be teaching as many computer science classes over the next few years, we’re so stoked for her and really proud,” Tomz said.

Corrections

other student body presidents.

“Maybe there’s something that Scripps does really well that CMC could use,” Nagra said. “Being able to talk to the SAS president and asking them like, ‘How do you do that? How would you implement it?’”

Mavis Stone HM ’23

As a past sustainability rep resentative and wellness com mittee director, Mavis Stone has a strong grasp on the issues they want to focus on as president.

One of their main pillars is creating a campus atmosphere more rooted in community en gagement and political aware ness.

To foster a political climate, Stone thinks Mudd should pro vide students with subsidized or free subscriptions to news publications, as well as host community-oriented speakers on campus.

Stone’s top priority is pre serving student wellbeing in Mudd’s rigorous academic envi ronment. They believe creating a community garden would create a more well-rounded experience for students.

“I think being able to bring people together around food and cooking promotes organic conversation,” Stone said. “It gives you relationships you wouldn’t have formed in the classroom or at your dorm.”

While improving the acces sibility of therapy for students may be difficult, Stone doesn’t shy away from trying. For a short period of time during the 2017-2018 academic year, Mudd did provide its own therapy, but the service was disbanded after mixed reviews from students.

“I think what the Depart ment of Student Affairs didn’t recognize was that finding the right therapist takes time,”

Stone said. “They needed to think of a more flexible way to help ac commodate everyone rather than completely eliminating one of the largest resources Mudders had.”

Michelle Muturi PZ ’23

Pitzer Student Senate president Michelle Muturi was busy study ing abroad in London during last spring’s election season, so she had to find creative ways to intro duce herself to the student body.

Muturi focused her platform on connections built with peers in previous years at Pitzer College, fitting for her goals of rebuilding social networks and student joy. For each of her goals, Muturi stressed the importance of lon gevity, care and sustainability over short-term accomplishments.

“Are we fostering a commu nity where students feel open to talk to the people that work so hard to be of service to them?” Muturi said. “That coherence is my biggest priority.”

After Pitzer’s online social network, Student Talk, was tem porarily shut down last spring due to multiple instances of ha rassment and bullying, Muturi took the lead on defining the role the platform will play in future academic years.

“We worked with Student Talk, which was always an optout thing, and now it’s become opt-in,” Muturi stated.

Muturi wants to emphasize the benefits of the consortium by holding more cross-campus events, since student interactions have been limited over the last several years.

“Coming into the school, I didn’t understand what a consor tium was coming from a country, [Kenya], where that doesn’t exist … that opportunity is different,” Muturi said. “How we are nurtur ing that difference within the 5Cs is something I [want to] look at.”

GE: Professors say Chodosh’s revisions ‘kill this proposal’

alternative and non-exclusive recommendations” for the curriculum without increasing the number of GEs.

Continued from page 1 Espinosa and Livesay’s email. Over 60 people were involved in shaping the proposal, which was met with “faculty support from across the ideological spectrum,” Livesay said.

The proposed GE would be an overlay course, meaning it could count towards multiple GE credits. In order for a course to satisfy this requirement, it would need four to five weeks of instruction time discussing racism, the social construction of race and ethnicity and/or the intellectual contributions of racialethnic minorities.

CMC requires students to take nine to 14 GE courses, not including overlays while also depending on students’ major. Scripps College requires 10 to 13 courses; Pitzer College requires 11; Pomona College requires seven to 10 and Harvey Mudd College requires 10.

Currently, CMC and Harvey Mudd are the only two 5Cs without a racial and cultural understanding requirement.

“We’re sort of behind most of our peer institutions that have this requirement already,” Livesay said.

The GE went through two years of development, including nine faculty meetings and three student meetings, according to

The proposal also would not disrupt the graduation track for students currently enrolled at CMC. Only students that enter CMC after the proposal is finalized would be subject to the new requirement, Livesay said.

Espinosa and Livesay said in their email that Chodosh’s proposed changes served to “dilute the exclusive focus of this GE on raceethnicity and ultimately kill this proposal by not recommending to the Board that it vote on it.”

Chamberlain said that Chodosh “looks forward to working with the faculty, student body and the Board of Trustees to find ways to meet the important objectives of the proposal and respond to expressed concerns.”

Next week, ASCMC is hosting two forums with Chodosh, Espinosa and Livesay that will include prewritten questions presented by student representatives along with an open forum.

Livesay and Espinosa both said the next step is to present the GE proposal to the Board of Trustees directly. According to ASCMC, the Board of Trustees is set to discuss the proposal sometime in the next two weeks.

TSL regrets the error.

In Issue 1, an article on a talk held at the Marian Miner Cook Athenaeum incorrectly quoted Sahil Kapur CM ’09 as saying he writes “hit pieces.” It has been updated to reflect that he said “critical pieces.” The article also incorrectly referred to Elise Viebeck CM ’10 in later mentions as “Vibeck.” Additionally, the article incorrectly stated that only Kapur was in Washington, D.C. on Jan. 6; all three panelists were in Washington, D.C. on the morning of Jan. 6, but only Kapur was near the Capitol, according to Viebeck.

COURteSY: pOmONA COLLeGe

professor Yuqing melanie Wu previously served as a computer science pro fessor before her appointment as dean of the college.

CHRIS NARDI • tHe StUDeNt LIFe

Faculty and admin have gone back-and-forth over a potential course re quirement that would incorporate conversations about race and ethnicity.

Arts

Culture

When Jack Antonoff and Minions collide

BECKY ZHANG

Many roads lead to “Minions: The Rise of Gru”: viral memes, suited-up teens, loyalty to the “Despicable Me” franchise, Michelle Yeoh, an unchecked obsession with asinine yellow pill-shaped creatures — the list goes on. The one that led me to watch the animated film that grossed over $900 million globally this past summer was the fact that Jack Antonoff had produced for it a star-studded soundtrack.

I wondered how his cavalcade of beloved contemporary musicians — Caroline Polachek, Tierra Whack, Thundercat and St. Vincent, to name a few — would sound covering ’70s funk hits under his direction. Here was the man behind indie rock band Bleachers, the recent Grammy-winning producer of pop darlings Lana Del Rey, Lorde and Taylor Swift and the member of the bright 2010s band fun. And he was going “hard” on a special new project.

Plus, I’ll admit, I was kind of excited to revisit those stupid, banana-loving round boys on the big screen.

Though the “despicable” in “Despicable Me” refers to its wannabe-villain protagonist Gru, the word has come to better suit his army of henchmen in the wake of their absolute invasion of popular culture — an invasion that has paralleled, if more suddenly, Jack Antonoff’s own movement from fronting his own solo project to producing for some of the biggest names in mainstream pop. As the grinning googley-eyed faces have come to adorn key chains, Uniqlo tees, HelloFresh coupons, IHOP specials and more, Antonoff’s name has come to grace the production credits of popular albums like “Melodrama,” “Norman Fucking Rockwell!”, “folklore” and so on.

I’ll spare readers an in-depth review of Antonoff’s soundtrack, whose 19 songs turned out to be largely forgettable, save for a couple songs, including Weyes Blood’s vigorous cover of Linda Rondstadt’s “You’re No Good” and G.E.M.’s spin, in Mandarin,

on Nancy Sinatra’s “Bang Bang.”

The sole original song, “Turn Up the Sunshine,” co-written by Antonoff and featuring music giants Diana Ross and Tame Impala, didn’t hit the way Pharrell’s snarky “Despicable Me” did back in 2010.

But all this hardly ended up mattering, for only a handful of Antonoff’s songs were actually featured in the movie itself, each for what felt like fleeting seconds. The remaining covers were either wedged into the credits or not played at all. What’s more, many of the songs that did appear in the film were actually — and possibly for the better — the original versions, from Lipps Inc.’s “Funkytown” to the Carpenters’ “Goodbye to Love” — no Phoebe Bridgers is heard in the movie itself. The jam-packed soundtrack was thus more of an addendum to “Minions: The Rise of Gru” than a true part of it.

Yet even though the soundtrack wasn’t central to the film, nor groundbreaking on its own, Antonoff’s presence was still inescapable — a label quite frequently also used to describe the perhaps even more omnipresent Minions. Like the Minions, Antonoff is relentless in his earnestness and optimism, traits that have been met with equal parts suspicion, affection and memeification. Though Minions appear cute and cuddly, they’re also frustrating and predictable. They are also, questionably, predisposed to kowtow to evildoers.

Theories likewise abound regarding Antonoff’s true nature and his worth as a musician: Is he really so well-meaning as the New Jersey boy-nextdoor? What gives rise, then, to his lingering “Dan Humphrey aura,” in the words of Quinn Moreland? Why does Bleachers’ music pale in comparison to his collaborations with other singers, while the band themselves track as increasingly unambitious?

Some fans have grown attached to the goofiness and sweetness of the Minions, just as others have endeared themselves to Antonoff’s

apparent and self-proclaimed caring and compassionate disposition— the supposed antithesis of problematic music figures like Dr. Luke.

But for all their ubiquity, both the Minions and Antonoff have also been trivialized, commodified and memeified to the point of becoming cultural playthings and even scapegoats for others’ insecurities. Perhaps it’s no coincidence that “inescapable” and “despicable” are nearanagrams, for the Minions, and Antonoff have certainly become as inescapable as they are despicable to the public eye.

It’s not easy to stay relevant in today’s hyper-mercurial zeitgeist, and it’s even harder to do so without public reception souring into boredom or distaste. In this regard, the Minions and Jack Antonoff have endured conspicuously.

How, then, have the two persisted as both objects of disdain and major cultural fixtures? For one, they share the thick, round eyewear and modest denim of passé hipsters from the aughts. But perhaps their endurance reveals more about the public’s increasingly strained relationship to the popular. The more we despise something, the more we cannot avoid it, with marketing, algorithms and online discourse ensnaring us in a cycle of maddening and polarizing trends, our attention and mockery fuel to the fire. We resent the Minions and Jack Antonoff because they’re everywhere; they’re everywhere because they so tickle our frustration.

When controversy and cynicism trump inspiration and satisfaction, we can no longer determine our own heroes. It matters not if we swoon or sigh, if the soundtrack of “Minions: The Rise of Gru” is great or banal, for we have no choice but to listen to the music.

Becky Zhang PO ’22.5 likes listening to music, especially while in a moving vehicle.

How publishing chooses your reads

Imagine this: You’re an au thor who’s done the difficult and grueling work of writing, editing and finally publishing a book that you love. For the first couple of weeks it sells fine, but then suddenly it absolutely blows up. Retailers cannot sell it fast enough and within weeks it has hit The New York Times Best Seller list. You soon find out the culprit of this overwhelming suc cess – BookTok.

BookTok refers to a group ing of TikTok videos pertaining to all things literary, created by and aimed toward bibliophiles. With the nature of endless short video content on Tiktok and the everyday user averaging about an hour of use on the app, vid eos go viral very quickly — so it’s no wonder that this viral for mula might also apply to books. Thus, the term “BookTok book” — books that go viral on TikTok — was born.

The above has been the story of many BookTok books includ ing “The Atlas Six,” “A Court of Thorns and Roses” and “The Sev en Husbands of Evelyn Hugo.” It has also led to many authors join ing the platform in hopes of fur ther promoting their works and garnering a bigger audience. As a result, TikTok followers have become a currency recognized by the publishing industry. It is in this climate that Alex Aster and her newly released fantasy young adult novel, “Lightlark,” first made an appearance.

With a follower count nearing 1 million on TikTok, Aster has been able to amass an awful lot of interest and excitement for her newest novel “Lightlark” from authors and readers alike. For readers, she makes videos de scribing scenes from the book, marketing it as a novel complete with diverse character represen tation, popular book tropes and an amalgamation of aspects from other well-known book series.

For authors, she regularly speaks about how she had been writing for over a decade before even tually gaining her current main stream success.

Prior to its release,“Lightlark” has even been able to generate a movie deal with Universal Studios and the producers of “Twilight.” Aster maintains that she had no connections to the publishing industry and gained agent representation the way most authors do – through cold emailing.

So why the recent controver sy over this seemingly fortunate and deserving author? A few weeks before the book’s release, reviewers with access to ad vanced reader copies began to complain about “Lightlark.” The

main claims have been that the ac tual issues of racial and LGBTQIA+ diversity in the book were not accu rately portrayed in marketing and that many scenes and quotes used in marketing the book online were not even included in the print edition of the novel. The online discourse was almost instantaneous as her TikTok community grew quickly upset, with many people on the in ternet publicly condemning not just “Lightlark” but also Aster for falsely advertising her book.

The issue at hand, though am plified by “Lightlark,” extends far beyond the book. Authors and publishers have taken advantage of the idea that there is a reliable, for mulaic way to interest readers, who want elements like diverse represen tation and specific book tropes. This creates a situation where books can generate mass amounts of media attention and success without ever even being read. The key is in the marketing, and publishers are learn ing that by monitoring and replicat ing social trends, you can sell a book more easily than by marketing the actual content of the pre-existing book.

One might argue that books have always been marketed through the monitoring of social trends. Through the 2000s, supernatural media was in vogue, spawning lit erature like “Twilight” and “The Vampire Diaries.” This was quickly followed by the rise of the dystopian genre with popular examples such as “The Hunger Games” and “The Maze Runner” series.

Overall, the question is no longer “how are publishers choosing what they market?” It’s “how much au tonomy do readers have over choos ing our favorite books?” Were you a “Twilight” fan because you were really interested in Bella’s choice be tween Edward and Jacob or was it because that was what the publish ing industry was offering you?

Whether it’s “Lightlark” or “Twi light,” the publishing industry con tinues to figure out the formula to engage us the most. And while we might genuinely enjoy vampires, dystopia or fantasy, it is important to remember that there is a whole industry dedicated to understand ing the psychology of how to best market the genre of the decade to us.

So when you pick up your next read, ask yourself: why this book? Was it recommended by a friend or book influencer or did the cov er stand out to you on bookstore stands? Because while indulging in these marketing systems is by no means wrong, it is important to rec ognise the forces swaying us in each direction.

Tomi Oyedeji-Olaniyan CM ‘23 is a dual Neuroscience and Literature major. If you need her, say her name in the mir ror three times, and legend says she will appear to give you a book recommenda tion.

Historian Jared Diamond delivers Ath talk on ‘what’s next’ for our generation

The past two years have marked a period of international commotion, with the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, the United States’ withdrawal from Afghan istan and the Russian invasion of Ukraine. As we learn to adjust to a new reality in a historical moment where the future seems uncertain, what’s next for young people?

This question was at the heart of historian Jared Diamond’s Sept. 14 talk at Claremont McKenna College’s Athenaeum. The Pulitzer Prize winning author, geologist and ornithologist discussed the many crises the world faces today, including nuclear war, climate change, depletion of natural re sources and global inequality.

“Today, it seems as if we’ve got the worst problems in human his tory,” Diamond said. “It may seem as if this is the most challenging, the most depressing time in history. But when I looked back on my own life, I realized that each decade of my life seemed at the time to have the worst problems in human his tory.”

Diamond then recounted the many crises the world witnessed during his lifetime, from World War II and the Holocaust to the Cu ban Missile Crisis and the Vietnam War.

The subject of Diamond’s talk,

and much of his academic work, deals with the many issues facing humanity, including his books “Guns, Germs, and Steel” and “Upheaval: How Nations Cope with Crisis and Change.” Never theless, Diamond emphasized his intention to inspire hope.

“It’s easy to feel depressed and hopeless, and I’m going to spend some time this evening talking about some of these depressing, seemingly hopeless problems,” Diamond said. “But there’s noth ing worse than hearing a talk about depressing problems. That doesn’t give you any ground for hope. If there is no hope, why even attempt to solve the prob lems?”

Diamond continued on to dis cuss the instances in which inter national compromise vanquished dire problems. He cited the glob al effort to successfully eradicate smallpox, the international ban on fluorocarbons and the suspen sion of seabed mining in the Law of the Sea Agreement of 1994. He emphasized the need for global compromise in tackling some of the biggest crises humanity faces.

Diamond also addressed the ways young people can make the world a better place for their chil dren, starting by implementing such change now.

“What are the things you can do to make a better world so

that come 2050, you’re living in a world worth living in rather than a miserable world where you can’t have children?” Diamond said. “The cheapest and easiest thing you can do is vote.”

Alongside voting, Diamond advocated for protesting and pur suing a career that “does good for the world.”

“To some people protesting is uncomfortable, but if you’re comfortable with protesting, then protest and demand change,” he said. “But you gotta figure out how to protest effectively.”

Diamond’s encouraging words resonated with students who at tended his talk, including interna tional relations major Kai Gund lach CM ’24.

“I think he proposed a lot of interesting solutions to problems and he went in depth into how people are solving it,” Gundlach said.

However, Gundlach found Di amond’s talk didn’t go in depth regarding the nuances of societal problems.

“I think he didn’t really ex plore all of the avenues of how things could be fixed,” Gundlach said.

Another attendee, Lane Moore PZ ’25, found Diamond’s talk failed to answer some of the more difficult questions about the world’s problems.

“I think a lot of the issues that he raised are underpinned by things like global capitalism, issues that he never really ad dressed while kind of leaning more towards superficial ques tions,” Moore said. “But I think that there are a lot of greater glob al systems at work that caused these issues that he raised and never quite addressed because they are quite controversial.”

CMC professor Terril Jones found Diamond’s message inspir ing for students, though a bit broad.

“He was talking to young peo ple in general, not necessarily ex tensively educated young people, since a lot of people are in their first or second year,” Jones said. “So it was a little generic in that sense, but you can see how it can be inspiring and motivate people to say, ‘yeah, that’s what I want to do.’”

TANIA AZHANG

TOMI OYEDEJI-OLANIYAN

COUrtESY:

KAtHErINE

CLArE mArtIN

StUDENt

Pulitzer-Prize-winning

historian Jared Diamond

Baz Luhrmann’s ‘Elvis’ biopic corrects a legacy

Elvis Presley is one of the most iconic American figures of the 20th century. He will forever be known as the “King of Rock and Roll” because of his abili ty to blend country music with rhythm and blues. However, Baz Luhrmann’s new biopic “Elvis” complicates the singer’s lega cy and shines light on a lesser known part of Elvis’ career: the work he stole from Black people.

I did not know much about El vis before watching this film oth er than him having been brought up on “Lilo & Stitch” growing up, and I knew only a few classic Elvis songs like “Can’t Help Fall ing in Love.” Growing up in East New York, Elvis was never really spoken about fondly but instead hated for all the work he stole.

Public Enemy’s Chuck D – an other fellow Brooklynite – even wrote his iconic dis to Elvis in his rap in “Fight the Power” when he said: “Elvis was a hero to most, but he/ Never meant shit to me, you see, straight out/ Racist — that sucker was simple and plain/ Mother-f him and John Wayne!”

However, if we look at Black artists of the time, like James Brown, the unofficial “Godfather of Soul,” we see the deep connec tions Elvis had within the Black community and with Black art ists. In Brown’s memoir “I Feel Good,” he is quoted saying, “I wasn’t just a fan, I was his broth er. Last time I saw Elvis alive was at Graceland. We sang ‘Old Blind Barnabus’ together, a Gospel song. I love him and hope to see him in heaven. There’ll never be

another like that soul brother.”

In Luhrmann’s “Elvis,” he even portrays Elvis as wanting to speak out about civil rights issues but not being able to be cause of his promoter, Colonel Tom Parker. At one point in the film, Elvis sneaks to Beale Street to party with Blues legend B.B. King and takes a photo that makes headlines around the country the next day. While El vis is fine with the picture, the Colonel is not because he wants Elvis to have a “squeaky clean” image for investors. Squeaky clean, in this case, means stay ing away from Black people.

Luhrmann takes a unique ap proach to his “Elvis” biopic by making the film from the Col onel’s perspective rather than Elvis’. In the Colonel’s commen tary we see how manipulative he was to Elvis, taking credit for Elvis’s ideas, lying to Elvis about business opportunities and so much more.

However, the question re mains: Did Elvis support civil rights and integration despite not speaking outright about it? The answer seems to be yes, and Luhrmann even showcases this in the film when Elvis ignores the Colonel’s request to sing “Here Comes Santa Claus” for his Christmas special to instead sing “If I Can Dream.”

So, why is Elvis so contro versial in the Black community? Simply put, he stole music.

Elvis’ hit song that started his career was “Hound Dog,” a song originally meant to em brace Black female empower ment. The song was written by

CMC student KyraVarivaya’s summer ofmusic

In her song “In the Trenches,” songwriter and artist Kyra Variva ya CM ’25 asks: What would you construct if “you were the architect of the blueprint of your mind and dreams?” For Varivaya, she would construct a world where the love of exploring music prevails. After spending the summer visiting 10 European cities as inspiration for her E.P. album, “Sonic Skyline,” Varivaya understands how music serves as an outlet to tell stories of the world through her experiences.

Varivaya was five when she wrote her first song, “Survivor,” with her dad. 13 years later, she acknowledges how this early en counter has been one of her most prominent experiences.

“The first time I performed that song, and honestly where I was recognized as an artist, was in grade three,” Varivaya said. “My teacher asked me what I was writ ing, and I said it was an expansion of a song that my dad and I have been working on. She invited my dad to class literally in the middle of school, and he came with his guitar, and we just sang a song, and that’s when people started re alizing my talent.”

Varivaya believes that the ap preciation of music cannot be quantified in letter grades or num bers.

“Aside from songwriting, I’ve been playing the piano for the last 10 years and the guitar for nine years,” Varivaya said. “But I nev er took any exams, because I’m a huge believer that music should be something that you can never be tested on. You can only feel mu sic.”

A member of the 5C acapella group Mood Swing, Varivaya at tributes significant growth in her journey as an artist to her college life.

“Another important place for my musical expression is the Marks music room,” she said. “It is one of my favorite places on campus. Marks was my freshman dorm, and it had a little piano and a little room that I always had … access to. It is one of my favorite pockets of music on campus.”

Over the course of this summer, Varivaya found other pockets of music far away from the 5C cam puses as she traveled to several in ternational cities. Composing, pro ducing and writing lyrics for her album “Sonic Skyline,” Varivaya found inspiration for her music in the different cities’ skylines.

“Music has the ability to tran scend a moment in time and leave you with a tangible memory,” she said. “To me, my music is a store house of the collection of stories and experiences I pick up along the way … Gathering different sounds and stories, these songs capture lost moments in time of people, paintings and places in hopes of finding them a small space in our future history.”

As a recipient of the Appel Scholarship, Varivaya used her grant to travel around Europe. She mainly traveled in Austria and It aly because she wanted to experi ence the places she knows through music for herself.

“For me, experiences guide

the melody,” Varivaya said. ”I chose Austria because I want ed to see the places where all of my favorite classical artists have composed their music. May it be George Schubert or Mozart — their music came from Austria. As cheesy as it sounds, ‘Vienna’ by Billy Joel is my favorite song, and it was one of my biggest reasons why I wanted to go. Once I was in Vi enna, music came to life and the world made sense.”

Varivaya also highlighted the unexpected lessons she learned through her project and travels.

“Traveling by yourself is a huge deal,” she said. “I was apprehensive of being judged for sitting alone in dining halls before. But after this trip, where all my meals were by myself, I realized the importance of spending time with myself.”

The experiences that Variva ya recalls most fondly are not only limited to sightseeing, but also to meeting people.

“I was sitting at a restaurant one night, and the bartender and I started talking, and he told me that he also took a sim ilar trip,” she said. “He gave me some advice that will stick with me for life. He told me that ‘90 percent of the time, people would want to help you. And you should try and find those people. If not, they will find you.’”

“Sonic Skylines” has helped Kyra define what music means to her identity.

“Not only did the skyline help me gain a baseline for the melody, but it was also a great inspiration behind the lyrics of the song,” she said.

To her, music is not only an escape from reality, but also a marker of history and a docu mentation of experiences.

“Music isn’t only meant to capture you at your best –– in your moments of victory, pride, or confidence,” Varivaya said. “I find that it is best captured in your moments of self-doubt, unacknowledged efforts, anx iousness, and disappointment, alongside its reassuring pres ence that things work out the way they are meant to.”

Big Mama Thornton and Jerry Leiber, but the meaning behind the song changed when Elvis released his version. Instead of an uplifting song about Black female empowerment, likeBe yonce’s “Brown Skin Girl” be fore Beyonce, it became simply a catchy tune; that is, until “El vis.”

In the film, Luhrmann in cludes a scene in the film of Big Mama Thornton — played by Shonka Dukureh, RIP — sing ing “Hound Dog,” and he re leased the full version of the song on the film’s album. Luhr mann’s film, unlike many other

biographical films, sheds light on parts of Elvis’ legacy that most want to forget.

While Elvis is an influential figure in American history, his name would not be known if not for the songs he stole from Black artists at the time. Luhr mann even makes this point at the very start of the film when the Colonel becomes obsessed with Elvis after hearing him sing on the radio. At first the Colonel did not care about Elvis since he assumed he was Black, but once he found out he was white, all the Colonel could see was green.

I implore you, dear reader, to check out “Elvis” on HBO Max and in theaters, in addition to the documentary “Elvis Presley: The Searcher” on HBO Max as well. Luhrmann uses “Elvis” to high light the legacy the singer could have had compared to the one he ultimately did, while subtly giv ing credit to artists Elvis never did.

Giana Gerardino CM ‘24 is one of TSL’s film columnists. She’s a Me dia Studies major with a sequence in data science and loves thriller mov ies, Harry Styles and Vice documen taries.

Beyond the dining hall: Get to know three members of Pomona’s staff

BELA DE JESÚS

When Labor Day rolled around this year, members of the 5Cs’ community rallied in support of Pomona College dining hall workers in their fight to gain higher wages.

In a show of solidarity for the workers, hundreds of stu dents, as well as staff members from Pitzer College, gathered at Bixby Plaza where they highlighted the contributions dining hall staff bring to the 5Cs.

TSL sat down with Pomona workers to learn about their lives beyond the meals they cook in Claremont. Here are three of those people to know.

Olga Valdez

If you have ever stepped foot in Frank Dining Hall, you have probably seen Olga Val dez. When she’s working, she can be found cleaning tables, helping out other staff and brightening students’ days with a smile that can be felt miles away.

Valdez was born in Baja California, Mexico, and cur rently lives in Fontana, which is a half-hour drive from Cla remont. Her family is her pride and joy — she has been married for 42 years, has three sons and one grandson.

In her free time, she said she enjoys cooking for her family as well as relaxing with them. Valdez is passionate about coming up with recipes based on the ingredients in her kitchen.

In the ten years she has been at the college, Valdez has also worked with the cleaning staff where she had her first job at the college.

“When I started to work [at Pomona], I was a bit shy. Now that I am with you all, the shy ness has gone away,” Valdez said.

While working at all three of the college’s dining halls, Valdez said one of the best parts has been forming con nections with students.

“I feel like [the students] all are part of my family,” Valdez

said. “It makes me happy that they view me as family.”

One of her favorite things is when students come back to visit, and she gets to keep in contact with alumni over the years.

Valdez is the primary staff member assigned to keeping Frank clean and runs back and forth each day between tasks in order to help out anyone she can. An integral part of Pomona, she loves to connect with students, faculty and staff alike.

“I love being here with you all a lot,” she said.

Jesus Manuel Landa Jesus Manuel Landa is an other member of the dining hall staff at Frank. He told TSL that he is passionate about connect ing with others and making the Claremont Colleges’ communi ty happy through the power of food.

Landa was born in Nostic, Jalisco, Mexico. He has been in the United States since 1983 and now lives in Ontario. He and his wife Sonia have two kids, both of whom also work at the col lege’s dining halls.

This year marks the begin ning of his second year working at Frank after working at Frary for 10 years.

In his free time, Landa likes to take walks to relax. His ulti mate passion, however, is writ ing. He just finished writing his book “La Raya” (“The Line”) about the immigrant experi ence.

“It talks about how we came to this place, how we will go, the achievements that we have [and] the experiences,” he said.

Landa recognizes that so many do not understand the re ality behind why people immi grate to the United States, so he hopes to educate readers about these motivations through his book.

He says that, as someone who did not get the chance to pursue higher education, it is amazing to see so many stu dents getting that chance. How ever, he reiterates that students must take advantage of a place

with so much privilege.

“You all as students, for you there are so many opportunities,” he said, “and I want you to take advantage of them all.”

When asked what his favorite part of the job was, he initially joked that it’s “getting the check.”

“But, seriously, it is getting to share experiences with the stu dents and learn what their goals and achievements are,” Landa said.

Teo Ibarra One of Landa’s fellow staff members is Teodulo Ibarra, who is better known among students as Teo. It is hard to miss his infec tious personality if you step out onto the Frank patio where he’s likely making omelets for a long line of hungry students — all the while managing three different omelets at the same time.

Ibarra makes the outdoor space his own, with an impecca ble music taste and friendly ban ter that can make anyone laugh.

Ibarra was born in Tepic, Nayarit, Mexico. He moved to the United States in 1985 and now lives in Montclair. He has three children and has been working at Pomona College for ten years. He worked at Oldenborg as a cook for six years and has taken over the omelet station in Frank for the past four years.

In his free time, Ibarra loves to exercise. Whether that be go ing to the gym, taking a walk or going for a jog, he finds solace in moving his body. He also has a passion for cooking. His favorite part of his job is the interactions with students and his co-work ers.

“I get to meet new people from different cultures, different ethnicities, you name it,” Ibarra said.

He says that he will always have the students’ backs and support them however he can, as they have had his back. He urg es his co-workers to get food that students want or to help them out, as he feels there is a kind of symbiotic relationship between the two groups.

“It is like unconditional love, you guys are there for us all the time,” Ibara said.

VIDUSSHI HINGAD

CHArLES bECKEr AND bELLA PEttENGILL • tHE StUDENt LIFE

COUrtESY: KYrA VArIYAVA

Kyra Varivaya Cm ’25 spent the summer visiting 10 European cities as inspiration for her E.P. album, “Sonic Skyline,” thanks to an Appel Scholarship

Left: teo Ibarra has worked at Pomona for 10 years and enjoys working out in his spare time. Center: When she’s not working, Olga Valdez likes cooking and coming up with recipes from the ingredients she has in her kitchen.

Right: Jesus Manuel Landa has a passion for writing and just finished writing his book “La Raya” about the immigrant experience.

Kameela Janan Rasheed’s new exhibit at the Benton explores knowledge through perception

LILA GAMBLE

The way humans interpret me dia is an ever-evolving process. In her new exhibit at the Benton Mu seum of Art at Pomona College, Kameelah Janan Rasheed PO ’06 has decided to challenge our com mon modes of interpretation.

Rasheed designed “Worship ing the Altar of Certainty: 1985” to play with concepts of language and pedagogy. The exhibition was initially developed by Rasheed and a few graduate students at Williams College, who then adjust ed the exhibit specifically for the Benton.

The exhibit itself is directed at challenging the ways we perceive information. What makes it per sonal to Rasheed is that the works are being shown in the context of an academic institution. Inspired by thinkers like Saidiya Hartman and Ashon Crawley, Rasheed plays with the traditional concep tions of absorbing information as an homage to the undergraduate institution that shaped her con sciousness.

The main feature of the exhibit is a video that includes footage of various mixed-media techniques. The video plays on a loop, and the first statement spelled out in hap hazard, typographic form reads, “we speculate that everyone will be saved through the algebra” with the artist narrating various statements throughout the video. The video uses painted-over 35mm film, stop motion and videos su perimposed over black and white patterns.

The exhibit’s theme focuses on alternative means of digesting in formation. It is meant to challenge the viewers to move through the exhibit in a way that requires read ing and re-reading. It is purpose fully designed so that the closer

the viewer looks, the more writ ing they are able to see. There are fragments of text that frame larg er reflective diagrammatic prints.

Nicolas Orozco-Valdivia PO ’17, one of the curatorial assis tants at the Benton, collaborated with the artist in installing this exhibit. He was moved by the ways in which the installation echoed his experience as a stu dent and beyond.

“By the time I had jumped in, the show was already pretty well developed,” Orozco-Valdivia said. “I wanted to make sure the show reflected Kameelah’s time as a student here.”

He is particularly inspired by the way the artist’s work allowed him to reflect on what it means to be a student.

“It’s a lot less about having the right answers, or trying to be clever,” he said.

When Orozco-Valdivia thought back on his previous conceptions of a good student, he said, “Oftentimes it’s not about you, and more about just trying to be impressive.”

This exhibit is focused on un doing some of the ego we may initially associate with academic learning. What makes it so topi cal is that a lot of the themes ex plored in this exhibit are inspired by Rasheed’s time at Pomona. A public policy major, Rasheed uses her experiences in the world of academia as a catalyst for her fascination with open-ended knowledge-building. Her fasci nation with language goes handin-hand with her commitment to learning.

Orozco-Valdivia noticed this influence on the exhibit’s video portion.

“You get the feel of the mixing up of the world in it,” he said.

“Where she’s using texts and

writing and re-working, since the video uses a lot of found footage, as well as animated portions of work she has made before. I think it’s a very dynamic and immer sive entry point into her world.”

In a documentary screened by the Benton on Sept. 15, titled “The Edge of Legibility,” directed and produced by Carrie Hawks, Ra sheed speaks of the importance of leaving things out of context. The documentary is an insight into the motivations behind the exhibit, and she explains how her fascination with the written word has led her to create her art.

In the documentary, the artist describes the exhibit as “an invi tation to come think with me.” Her artistic process is focused on playing with light, cutting and

Choosing your flavors wisely

As a young girl, nothing cap tivated me more than the neigh borhood Yogurtland. I was mes merized by the dozens of frozen yogurt flavor options, the glorious array of toppings and, ultimately, the endless possibilities.

I remember one day I filled my cup with as many flavors as possi ble, starting with toasted coconut and cookies and cream, and then swirling pistachio, blueberry and chocolate milkshake into a dec adent top layer. Even when my cup did not seem to fit any more, I added a squirt of butterscotch and rocket pop sorbet in the crevices, including the latter solely because it made me nostalgic for summer.

Already I had quite the com bination of flavors in my cup, but this was just the beginning.

At the toppings station, I assert ed mango popping boba to be an absolute necessity, followed by graham cracker bits, kiwi — “for health!” I said — and rainbow sprinkles. When the yogurt was in my hands, I held it with utmost excitement.

“I have a little bit of every thing,” I declared, eyes glistening and mouth salivating. “This is the best yogurt ever.”

My parents chuckled at me, shaking their heads at the myriad of flavors and textures in my cup. “Take a bite,” my mom prodded. “How does it taste?”

I dipped my spoon in lightly, grabbing one flavor at a time out of the top layer. With the top pings, there was already quite the explosion in my mouth — literal ly, due to the popping boba.

But, I was satisfied. Each yo gurt flavor — the nutty pista chio, the tart blueberry — shone through strongly enough to bring the otherwise disparate toppings

together.

Digging deeper into the cup, however, is where things got in teresting. I plunged my spoon in and scooped up a couple fla vors at once, and while at times they worked surprisingly well together, like cookies and cream and chocolate milkshake, most of the time they did not, like co conut and rocket pop.

In these cases, because my taste buds were already jolted by the rather unsettling combi nation of flavors, the incohesive toppings put them in even more of a frenzy. I became hyperaware of how the sprinkles clashed with the artificial blue raspberry; I felt mango popping boba unin vitingly seep into the graham cracker chunks in my mouth.

I was overwhelmed, to say the least, and so to regain com posure of my taste buds, I end ed up individually scraping out only my favorite flavors from what was left and leaving the rest of the soupy abyss behind.

When my dad saw what re mained of my cup, he smiled.

“Why don’t you pick just a few of your favorites the next time around?” he suggested.

“That way you can enjoy it all.”

I nodded understandingly in response, but as an elementary schooler, picking only a handful of yogurt flavors and toppings seemed so difficult. With time, though, I grew and learned; as I got older, my yogurt cup became more manageable in terms of fla vor and, consequently, more de lectable.

In high school, I gradually realized the relevance of this frozen yogurt wisdom to other areas of my life, and I tried to not overpack my schedule to the point of it overflowing. It was difficult, especially as some

one who has a hard time say ing “no” to things. But I can truly say that because of my more balanced schedule — or, my comfortably full cup — pre-pandemic senior year was sweet.

Now, in college, I am re flecting on my dad’s words yet again. Sometimes, I feel like college is another Yogurtland. We are presented with so many options to fill our cups for the semester, and though they may seem individually appealing, how they interact together is another story.

I’m not saying that the ac tivities themselves that you choose have to be cohesive, or that the flavors in your cup have to necessarily blend to gether perfectly. For me, writ ing about food for TSL is fairly unrelated to my involvement in a 5C Christian club on cam pus, yet I love both!

Blueberry tart and pistachio don’t necessarily go together, yet they are my two favorite flavors at Yogurtland! You can still enjoy very different activ ities, just like the strong, sep arate flavors at the top of the cup — but just be careful that you don’t pile on so many that you are left with yogurt soup.

As fall semester trudges on, I encourage you to reflect on the interests and hobbies that you truly enjoy. I ask that you simply be mindful of all that is on your plate — or in this case, what’s in your cup — and that way, you can thoroughly savor it all.

Emily Kim PO ’25 is a banana bread enthusiast from Irvine, Cal ifornia. You will always catch her with a scrunchie on her wrist and napping in Lincoln Hall.

pasting and using found objects.

She elaborates in the documen tary, explaining how the act of reading is not passive, and that the crux of being able to retain information is to re-read some thing and search for a piece of truth that may not initially pres ent itself.

She creates poetry from word scraps, putting together sentenc es that are meant to make the reader do a double-take. Her aim with these is to make people slow down and to unpack what those words mean to them. The ab stract nature of these words are the heart of Rasheed’s work: ex ploring the way language defines perception.

The exhibit is an invitation for students across the Claremont

EmmA JENSEN • tHE StUDENt LIFE

Colleges to meditate on what it means to learn. The exhibit and its message invites a kind of learning beyond satisfying the ego. Instead of presenting information plain ly, the artist challenges the viewer to seek their own meaning from a seemingly haphazard arrange ment of paper cutouts and Xe rox-based installations.

“Her work reminds me to pay attention, to get a little more hands on with anything I’m doing,” Orozco-Valvidia said. The echoes of phrases are an invitation to look closer, to glean personal meaning from text that seems so imperson al.

The exhibit is on view at the Benton Museum of Art at Pomona College until Dec. 18, 2022.

‘The Rehearsal’ is Nathan Fielder’s dizzying magnum opus

In the second episode of co median Nathan Fielder’s new show “The Rehearsal,” Robbin Stone, a horny, sign-seeing love interest to Angela, an aroma therapy-obsessed Christian, explains the multiple vehicular accidents he’s gotten into. On top of crashing his Scion tC at 100 mph, he also had a brush with death during an ATV ac cident.

“I even saw the white light,” he explains. “I was ascending, going to heaven. And God pulled me out.”

But in the world of “The Re hearsal,” the real God is Nathan Fielder himself — armed with the HBO budget to build exact replicas of entire buildings and make it snow in the middle of summer.

This bizarre docu-reali ty show follows Fielder as he coaches people through big-budget simulations of un comfortable real-life situations, hiring actors and building elaborate sets to make these “rehearsals” as realistic as pos sible.

In the pilot episode, Fielder meets Kor, a middle-aged high school teacher who’s been ly ing to his trivia team for years about having a master’s degree. After Kor decides to confess his long-held secret to one of his trivia friends, Fielder hires a lookalike to play the part of the friend, gets the lookalike to se cretly interview the real friend to learn her mannerisms, builds an exact replica of the Brooklyn bar in which the confession is to take place and spends days practicing the conversation with Kor to help ensure that the real-life one isn’t a disaster.

At one point, Kor remarks, “It’s like you’re Willy Wonka in the Chocolate Factory and I’m Charlie Bucket.”

“Wasn’t he a bad guy?… I’m the bad guy in the story?” Field er asks.

“Well, but he’s a dream-mak er.”

But, as Fielder comes to learn, being a dream-maker is never quite so simple.

Throughout the show, he is forced to confront the murky ethics of his own project, in cluding the possibility that he’s exploiting the vulnerabilities of real people for laughs. Howev er, in moments when it seems that Fielder’s intention is to have the audience laugh at someone for acting strange, it never feels particularly mean-spirited. Any exploitation involved in “The Rehearsal” is the result of its relatively unfiltered look at the lives of real people. While the show doesn’t hold back in doc umenting the negative, it never contrives what isn’t there.

There’s not a lot that sepa rates Fielder’s show from other reality shows that place people who are drawn to being on tele

vision into heightened situations and then provoke real emotions out of them. “The Rehearsal” is just doing so in a way that very overtly raises questions about its own ethics.

Throughout the show, we are forced to question whether its events are real or whether they only exist to us within the simu lated world masterminded by the real-life Nathan Fielder, a man en tirely separate from the naive and timid character he plays on the show.

This divide between the char acter of Nathan Fielder and the real Nathan Fielder producing the show is often exposed when re al-Fielder orchestrates and acts out scenarios where his character must confront his own awareness of the show’s questionable ethics. But his character never actually learns from these realizations. Each time, instead of changing his behavior, he doubles down on what caused the problem in the first place.

In episode four, Fielder opens an acting school in Los Angeles where he can train actors with the hopes of actually hiring them for “The Rehearsal.” He asks his ac tors to follow a stranger, so they can learn how to become them, even arranging for them to work at their primary’s job. However, one actor named Thomas has obvious reservations.

Instead of trying to have an open and honest conversation with Thomas to ease his mind, Fielder turns Thomas into his primary, restaging the first acting class and hiring an actor to play himself. He then decides he must go so far as to live in Thomas’s home. He tells the real Thomas to live in a repli ca of his primary’s apartment with two actors hired to play his room mates. The whole time, Thomas is apparently oblivious to Fielder’s plans to move into his apartment.

This is played multiple times throughout the series as a joke. The real-life Nathan obviously under stands the lesson his character is failing to learn. Otherwise, real-life Nathan wouldn’t be able to use his character failing to learn that les son as a joke.

But as the line between the real and the manipulated blurs more and more, “The Rehearsal” no lon ger feels like a reality show. It feels like a show about a guy making a reality show and trying to feel em pathy for others in the process.

While Nathan’s own efforts are in vain — intentionally so — there still seem to be many genuine, unscripted moments in the show where people like Kor or Thomas uncover real emotions and we tru ly feel for them.

It’s in these moments that the line between reality and artifice no longer seems to matter, as the people on the show — and those watching it — are still experienc ing something real.

Hannah Eliot SC ’24 is from San Francisco, California. She likes to surf and is trying (and failing) to learn how to play the guitar.

EMILY KIM

HANNAH ELIOT

mOmENtS tO SAVOr

FILm FILES

In her exhibit currently on view at the benton museum, Kameelah Janan rasheed PO ’06 challenges our common modes of interpretation.

Teachers, please reconsider your sick policy

Theoretically, professors want what’s best for students — intel lectually, emotionally and phys ically. In reality, though, I’ve dis covered that this doesn’t always happen, especially when a stu dent falls extremely sick — unless that sickness is COVID-19.

Last year, my instructors made an effort to show high levels of empathy, care and compassion towards students who contract ed COVID-19. They created clear policies about Zoom, gave exten sions on exams and showed some sense of understanding and flex ibility as the student recovered from illness. However, I’ve found that when students get a cold, the flu or stomach troubles, they are met with much less understand ing.

When I moved into my resi dence hall in fall 2021 after a year of Zoom school, I had never lived in a congregate living environ ment before. For me, congregate living entailed camaraderie with peers, movie nights in my hall’s lounge — and debilitating colds and bronchitis. I came to college knowing that I had asthma and that even a cold could wipe me out for a week. There was little to no way to avoid getting sick; between friends, roommates and dining halls, there was constant exposure.

I initially thought that, with the way the world was so health-con scious due to the pandemic, the school would be understanding of any illness. I even went to my doctor to get medical notes each time I fell ill to send to my profes sors, but this didn’t help my case.

One professor told me if I couldn’t come to the exam, even though I had bronchitis, I’d have no other opportunity to take it. Another one told me that, even though they recorded their classes for

students in COVID-19 isolation, they wouldn’t do it for me since I didn’t have COVID-19, and I should just try and find notes from a peer. Beyond being illogi cal, this just felt cruel.

I can understand why teach ers feel frustrated. It’s incredibly difficult to come up with a cur riculum that covers all the learn ing material in the four months we have for a semester. Especial ly during COVID-19, many stu dents have used the current fear of illness as a way to avoid re sponsibilities and not go to class. This would make anyone feel taken advantage of and played. So, I get why they would require some sort of medical note or de tailed email. However, if the stu dent has these documents, we should treat them with the same respect and care that we do for COVID-19 cases.

When I contracted COVID-19 the first week of school this se mester, it was a wildly differ ent academic experience than my previous times being sick at CMC. I received a call from my college’s dean, who provided emotional support. My instruc tors tailored plans of how to best support me and keep me up to date. Most importantly, I felt re assured that I wouldn’t be penal ized for my medical situation. It was completely relieving, allow ing me to focus on my health and getting better. Ironically, after day four, COVID-19 felt much less debilitating than some of the sicknesses I’d had last year, but last year I was shown none of the care and concern when I was unwell.

This isn’t a phenomenon that only I’ve experienced. When I sat down for brunch at Collins, I asked my friends at the table how many of them had a bad cold or flu at CMC. Everyone laughed bitterly and listed the

nicknames for our yearly sick nesses: the “Claremont cold,” “frat flu,” and so on.

Almost everyone at the table had some horror story about a professor who was harsh about their sick policy. One friend had an instructor demand a paper submission and give no flexibil ity when they had a 102° fever. Another friend told me they were pressured to attend class even with stomach poisoning because the teacher had a strict two absence (excused or unex cused) policy. Then, when dis cussing when my friends had COVID-19, we all agreed we had been treated with respect, un

Spiraling while the açai melts into soup

I’m Not In Love by Kelsey Lu Take a deep breath. Let your heart rate slow to the beat of the song. Gaze around. Enjoy the people-watching. Let your thoughts wan der. You’re going to be here for a while. Might as well settle in and enjoy it. Oh, and don’t be alarmed when it gets to the bridge — those are not people whispering around you — it’s part of the song.

Do I Wanna Know?

by CHVRCHES You are not in a crowded dining hall. You are in a coming-of-age ’80s TV show, (or something like that). I know the song is not from the ’80s, but the synth makes it close enough, right? Embrace it. Bob your head. Look around wistfully.

Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds (feat. Miley Cyrus & Moby) by The Flaming Lips You are Lucy. You are in the sky. With dia monds. Let the euphoria take over as the beat drop and spaceship sounds blow out your headphones.

(I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction by Britney Spears By now your patience is probably running out. That’s okay. Britney’s here to commiser ate. She gets it. Your satisfaction is coming soon, in the form of food, hopefully.

criminal prosecution.

derstanding and care during our time in isolation.

So, I urge the professors at the 5Cs to reconsider and, hope fully, revise their sick policies. We have all lived through a pan demic and learned the emotion al and physical toll sickness can take on someone.

Especially in college, where we are stuck being sick in our rooms without parents or loved ones to take care of us, being sick sucks. It makes someone feel physically run down, aca demically behind and socially isolated. We need to learn to val ue students’ health and to come up with a more reasonable pol

icy. This could look like personal Zoom meetings to catch kids up, allowing excused absences or pro viding alternative test dates for students if they fall ill.

If teachers feel concerned about students exploiting their policies, then, by all means, ask for medical documentation. But we need uni versal cross-departmental action to be taken to ensure these poli cies become more realistic, caring and supportive for students. This would establish a safer, happier and healthier classroom dynamic.

Anna Tolkien CM ’24 is a literature and film dual major. She loves her pugs, creative writing and iced coffee.

No, Scripps classes aren’t easier

Where Is My Mind? by Tkay Maidza

At this point you’ve been waiting for roughly 20 minutes. You’ve been floating in and out of reality. You may even be questioning your sanity. Why, in your right mind, would you willingly wait this long for a meal? Too late to turn back now.

I’m Gonna Be (500 Miles) – Cusimo & Co. Radio Remix by Charlotte Summer, Some Stranger This is when the delirium sets in. Chaos, even. Dance around in your mind with this uplifting banger to remind you that your dedication will be worth it.

With a Little Help From My Friends by Shoshana Bean, Grace Potter You’re almost there. You can taste it. Not lit erally. Now is the time to lean on the people in front and behind you in line. Strike up a conversation. “Long line, huh?” will usually do the trick.

Dancing in the Dark by Faye Webster You’ve reached the front of the line. Final ly. It’s all a blur from there. Somehow you emerge, food on your plate. You look around for friends to sit with, but they are nowhere to be found. You manage to stagger to an open seat and start eating. It tastes good. But not as good as you remember. You gaze wist fully out the window as Faye Webster’s voice floats through your ears. Surely next time you wait 30 minutes for food it’ll be worth it, right? Right?!

ELIZA POWERS

September in Claremont: the season has brought new ille gal air-conditioning units, new Birkenstocks, new first-years and new COVID-19 protocols. Amid the newness, though, is an archaic, misogynistic sentiment some at the 5Cs have yet to shed: that Scripps College is the “eas iest” college, and, by extension, that Scripps classes are “easier.”

Campus is abuzz with fren zied PERM submissions and pleading emails to professors. We have first classes peppered with syllabi, wide-eyed first years and professors casually tossing out painful inquiries of favorite ice cream flavors and fun facts. Along with this chaos comes a tangled discourse pre cipitated by a single question: “What classes are you taking?”

Usually, we’re pretty gener ous with advice. That’s an easy A if you’re not an English major, but he’s really strict about discussion posts. Or, Only take it if you have a good study group. Here, Jack’s in the 9:35 section, I can give you his number. Or, Well, if you can’t get into the Intro class at Pomona, I heard there’s one open at Mudd.

This discourse is good –healthy, even. In this instance of choosing classes, conflict can be productive. For example, if your friend says that a biology class is easy, you should counter that it’s because she’s a STEM major, and you found the class impos sible. Yet we lose our footing when our academic negotiations become a barter economy for misogyny.

ine sentiments, and sexism inte grates into dining hall conversa tions.

There’s a distinction between stereotypes that encourage school pride, endorse healthy humor amongst schools and ad vocate for communal identity –and coded bias.

The jokes that a Claremont McKenna College economics class will be full of frat bros, that a Harvey Mudd College class will be in a basement dungeon somewhere, or that they’ll give you a CBD gummy at the be ginning of your compost class at Pitzer College, per say, don’t advance said coded bias. Each school has their own identi ty and that we can poke fun at each other as well as ourselves is a testament to culture creat ed through communal identity. When a Pitzer friend assumes that Pomona kids are all in the library on a Saturday night, I don’t argue.

But claiming that Scripps classes are easier because it’s a historically women’s college isn’t a “fun stereotype”; rather, it’s highly-sophisticated cod ed misogyny. By “easy,” do we mean more welcoming, warm er? Do we mean less serious? Do we mean smaller? Or do we mean predominantly female? Let’s prosecute these assump tions and investigate what we’re actually trying to say when we claim Scripps classes are “easi er.”

NEGUSU,

“I’m trying to get into French 33 at Scripps and not Pomona because I’m bad at French;” “Just take some random gender class at Scripps for the A”; “That’s a fluff class, it doesn’t count, it’s at Scripps” are all sentiments I’ve heard casually tossed around in conversation across all nonScripps campuses. These com ments advance misogyny and hide helpful negotiations and lived experiences. Assumptions become shrouded among genu

Next time you break down the intensity level of a class, fo cus on specifics: What was the professor’s teaching style like? Were the group projects helpful in understanding material or a total pain? Is this a good intro class for non-majors? Is the lec ture-style helpful? Then, and only then, can we focus on help ful academic advice and leave the sexist stuff behind.

Eliza Powers PO ’25 is from New Orleans, Louisiana. She loves reali ty TV, Phoebe Bridgers and search ing for the perfect avocado toast recipe.

LUCIA mArQUeZ-UppmAN• tHe StUDeNt LIFe

FLOreNCe

StUDeNt

e ver heard the trope that Scripps classes are easier?

not a

stereotype,” writes

misogyny.

Editorial Board

Senior Staff

PLAYLIST

Hannah

never-ending dining hall

Humanize, don’t idolize celebrities

Opini O ns

Orientation programs need adjustments for international students

VIVIAN WANG

Everyone transitioning to college life knows that it can be a lot. For international students, it’s even more: a new country, language, culture … every thing is different. The ideal new student orientation schedule would allow new international students, then, to ease into the transition and take it slowly; however, the Claremont McKen na College orientation schedule this year did not do that.

al students at CMC about their first year orientation, I wasn’t the only one who felt this way. Many other students confided that they also felt disoriented and over whelmed by the sheer amount of programming required of them. Some said they were “behind” –treading water, attempting to stay afloat in a new country (and new time zone!) as American class mates perceivably fell right into stride.

seemed to have neglected other crucial aspects of the international student experience during orien tation. Talking to Tendai Nyamur onda CM ’26, a fellow international student, we agreed that the school should set aside a day or two where they help book appointments with a local bank so that any interna tional students who want to open a bank account can all go at once.

When it comes to music, I am a Gen Z cliche. I’ll prove it to you: My two most-listened-to artists are Harry Styles and Tay lor Swift. So naturally, I know, as a fan and an observer, that some of their fans embrace obsession and forgo the healthier territory of love and appreciation.

I’m obsessed with “folklore.”

I off-handedly say I’m obsessed with Styles. But I ask myself the important questions: Are artists’ behavior and actions excusable because of their fame? Does what they signify to us personally mean they can do no wrong?

I find myself concerned with this generation’s unwavering dedication to celebrities. We ac tively uplift celebrities to the point that there are no boundar ies. Idolization is permission to exist without consequence — and that is a dangerous phenomenon to subscribe to.

The issue I see is that many of us see celebrities as untouch able. Artists are ordinary people who have been given a platform. Despite their overwhelming power over their audiences, they are still human. They can make grave mistakes, mislead others and be guilty of the same things as normal people. Their flaws are just conveniently masked by the privileges they have that we do not. So why should we excuse their errors?

Yet another sensation that I am well aware of is that fans have the potential to be dependent on celebrities — dependent on a constant stream of updates, on their whereabouts and on their well-being — to the point that their own is inextricably tied to their idols’. Worship becomes so instinctual that self-sufficiency is sometimes compromised. We lose our sense of identity to the emulation of a stranger’s life.

I can say confidently that ce lebrity worship is not healthy be cause we are admiring a fictional ized version of our idols. Putting someone on a pedestal means worshiping someone who is sup posedly perfect. We should just be loving someone imperfect.

Some of Swift’s fans have noted that the pop star used her documentary “Miss Americana”

to bring light to relevant issues, but then remained silent after the Roe v. Wade leak earlier this year.

To me, this is what supporting an artist should look like: the ami cable coexistence of productive criticism and appreciation.

One Reddit user shared their hot take, that Swift should have signed onto Planned Parent hood’s “Bans Off Our Bodies” campaign, receiving nearly 2,000 upvotes. At the end of their short opinion, they wrote, “I am not coming at this from a hateful POV [point-of-view] because I love Taylor and her work regard less.” I personally want to see more of this: supporters loving their idols by seeing them as real human beings.

This can also happen with Harry Styles, whose words about gay sex in his upcoming film “My Policeman” sparked debate among his fanbase. When talking about what he loved about the film, Styles said, “So much of gay sex in film is two guys going at it, and it kind of removes the ten derness from it,” noting that “My Policeman” does represent more “sensitive” sex between two men.

One article approached Styles’ comment with skepticism: “It was the suggestion that cine ma suffers from an abundance of ‘two guys going at it’ which provoked the most backlash, which is understandable – the claim doesn’t bear any scrutiny whatsoever … I’ve seen a lot of queer films over the last ten years and, barring a few exceptions, I wouldn’t say there has been a preponderance of explicit sex.”

Both Swift and Styles prove to be flawed in the eyes of their fans, in their inaction and in their words. Love your favorite artists, but try not to love them uncon ditionally. They are capable of being flawed, and they should be held accountable. It just happens to be really powerful when the ones holding celebrities respon sible are their fans. Appreciat ing idols means allowing them the space to be misguided while also guiding them to better them selves.

Shay Suresh CM ’24 is from San Jose, California. She loves literary fiction, indie music and browsing Pinterest.

This fall, as is tradition, CMC organized a wide range of orientation events to warmly receive its new first-year stu dents to their homes for the next four. This year, the orientation schedule included information sessions, tips for building an in clusive community, a two-anda-half day Welcome Orientation Adventure (WOA) and a variety of daily social events from Aug. 21 to 28. For international stu dent arrivals, the programming started as early as Aug. 18.

A thorough introduction to the basics of college life is nec essary for incoming students. Many orientation activities, such as information sessions about managing tech issues, academ ic course requirements and res idential life, were effective as they helped acquaint first-year students with their new residen tial and academic community. Thanks to these sessions, I had a clearer sense of what I’d be deal ing with in college.

However, the routine nightly CMC-sponsored social events that preceded these sessions seemed to have the opposite ef fect. Having arrived in the Unit ed States just two days before first-year orientation kicked into full swing, I struggled to keep up with the pace of social events. Orientation wasn’t “welcoming” — it was alienating. People joy fully chatted about their home towns and high school experi ences that were very different from mine.

Talking to fellow internation

“Everything was overwhelm ing from the weather to food to toilet hygiene, even the wide use of the iPhone,” said Mehrin Khan CM ’26, a first-year from Bangla desh.

Orientation’s failure to make international students feel “wel come” is not for a lack of resourc es; Every new CMC student pays $500 for the orientation fee. What’s more, in 2021-2022, CMC’s en dowment fund, the second-larg est of the 5Cs, grew 42 percent from $855 million to $1.22 billion. Judging by the numbers, it’s clear that the resources exist to conduct a genuinely welcoming and inclu sive orientation for all students — we just aren’t wielding them in the right ways.

In orientation planning, CMC needs to take into account the actual needs of international stu dents. One way to do this would be through individual in-person check-ins. Given that internation al students are generally dealing with a massive physical and cul tural transition, it would be com forting to be able to connect with other community members who relate to our discomfort. CMC could set up one-on-one meetings between every new international student and a CMC upperclass man with a similar background. These chats could be as short as fifteen minutes, happen only once or become a weekly occur rence depending on what the pair wants. Sometimes, all we need is to feel accepted as individuals rather than as a whole interna tional student community..

Another sentiment that I heard others echo is that the school

To amend this issue, CMC should connect with current inter national students to get a sense of what activities would be most use ful. In their planning, the orienta tion committee should speak with current international students to get a sense of what problems they frequently encounter in their first few weeks.

Easing the intensity of orienta tion to accommodate international students is mutualistic: American new students will benefit from changes too. Social exhaustion is not a feeling unique to interna tional students. A few of the other 5Cs have taken note of this general overwhelm and social exhaustion.

For example, although Pomo na College’s 2022 orientation also lasted over a week, Pomona stu dents had an off-day before classes began. This break proves helpful for students in many ways – both symbolically, in terms of easing pressure to constantly socialize, and also by just allowing students — international or otherwise — to be alone and explore their new sur roundings.

To build a genuinely close-knit community that makes everyone feel cared for, people of all back grounds need to be included in the planning. By consulting with current international students and designing an orientation schedule that takes the adjustment period into account, CMC can ensure that the international students of the class of 2027 receive the most wel coming and comforting orientation yet.

Vivian Wang CM ’26 is from Wu han, China. She loves binge-watching stand-up comedy, trying new foods and is a big fan of FC Bayern Munich.

SHAY SURESH

JONAtHAN

Serpents club field hockey cultivates community

Athenas soccer fights to the end against Redlands in SCIAC season opener

TESS MCHUGH

The Claremont-MuddScripps women’s soccer team fought tirelessly against the University of Redlands Bull dogs on Wednesday night but ultimately fell to a 2-1 loss. It was a gritty match for both sides at Pritzlaff Field, likely due to the pressure that came with it being both teams’ SCI AC season opener.

The home game for CMS intensified quickly when the Bulldogs scored in the first four minutes off of a cross into the box. Undeterred by this quick goal, the Athenas fired back with eight shots, all barely missing the frame or blocked by a stellar save from the Bulldog’s goalie.

Eleven minutes into the game, Laurel Ovenell SC ’24 took a corner kick headed by Emma Fogg SC ’25. The ball bobbled in the air near the goal but was cleared by a Redlands defender. The Athenas’ offense didn’t let up on the Bulldogs for the rest of the first half and fought relentlessly to force the ball toward their goal, ulti mately coming up empty.

panic to score. The Athenas at tempted to get on the scoreboard with two more corner kicks that ended up right on the doorstep of the goal, before being cleared by the Bulldogs’ defense.

Although CMS dominated possession time in the second half, they couldn’t break through until there were 11 minutes left in the game. Off a cross from Kait lyn Helfrich CM ’25, Riley Zitar CM ’26 scored her first career goal for the Athenas, changing the score to 2-1. Though the goal was reason for celebration, it was not enough to prevent a loss for CMS.

Despite the result, the team was satisfied with the way they played.

“I was really proud to see my team fight until the last minute,” Sam Ree CM ’23 said. “We did a great job at creating chances for ourselves in the attack and press ing hard when they had the ball.”

Nicole Oberlag CM ’23 echoed these sentiments, viewing the game as a learning experience.

A new era is coming to club field hockey at the Claremont Colleges. Led by captains Daniela Sechen HM ’23, Caroyln Coye PO ’25 and Emma Podhorsky PZ ’25, the Serpents are bringing a culture update that could make this sea son their best ever — both on and off the field.

This conversation has been lightly condensed and edited for clarity.

TSL: What are all of your back grounds with field hockey, and what brought you to the Ser pents?

Emma Podhorsky: I started playing field hockey at the begin ning of high school. I was actually thinking about playing Division 3 for a school at one point but de cided that wasn’t for me. So I was really happy to find out that Clare mont had a club team.

Carolyn Coye: My story is super similar. I’m from the East Coast, and it’s a big sport over there, especially within the re gion that I lived in. So I’ve played since middle school. I also thought about getting recruited to D3, but ultimately decided I was going to prioritize academics over athletics.

Daniela Sechen: I started play ing in middle school, and then I was really considering playing D3 in college. But then I toured some schools, and I attended the classes. And I was like, ‘I don’t know, this level of engineering is not compa rable to Mudd.’ So I decided to do academics instead, but I was really glad that there was a club team, because if there wasn’t, I don’t think I would have attended [Har vey Mudd].

TSL: How was last year different for the team?

DS: I think the biggest differ ence wasn’t due to COVID, but prior to last season, we had never been competitive. We didn’t attract a lot of players, and people were pretty flaky. We were just getting

absolutely destroyed each game.

But, then last season, we got a lot of interested players. We were finally a competitive part of the league, rather than just a game everybody knew they could win.

TSL: What type of culture are you hoping to grow within the team this year?

EP: We went into the season really hoping to up the intensity and formed a solid team of good players who can work cohesive ly. But at the same time, we know that, especially this year, we have a lot of new players. So we do a lot of bonding outside of practic es, and making sure that every one has fun is really our number one priority.

CC: It’s definitely a balance between trying to be competitive and also being a really inclu sive club sport, especially with field hockey. Obviously, there’s equipment that you need, so we worked very hard to get funding so that anybody at the Claremont Colleges — regardless of if they can get equipment, or regardless of if they’ve ever played field hockey before — is welcome on to the team. We probably have over a dozen new players who have never played or touched a stick before. And it’s been really, really fun being able to integrate them into our hockey communi ty and sharing the love for the sport.

Hockey is such an interna tional sport. And I think some times that’s largely forgotten in the U.S. — how it’s held in such high regard and a lot of countries abroad. One thing that I really love about the team is that we do have a lot of players who played growing up in their home coun tries and are now going to school in Southern California. Yes, there’s players from the U.S., but there’s also people who played in countries abroad.

TSL: How does your previous

experience affect how you lead the Serpents?

EP: We play defense, and so from that aspect we work really well off of each other. Our team is very defense heavy; we real ly integrate that. We both also came from pretty competitive high schools for field hockey. And so now as captains, we also coach the team. We’ve brought a lot of those drills from high school and integrat ed them into our practice to re ally up the intensity.

CC: My field hockey team in high school was also always very focused on team culture. On the back of our shirts, we embroidered F.A.M.I.L.Y. (for get about me, I love you). So coming from that field hock ey community where I felt so close to my teammates in high school, I really wanted to sim ulate a similar vibe with the Serpents. I think my experience with what I did in high school regarding team bonding has translated into how I hope to lead the Serpents.

TSL: What would you say to someone considering becom ing a Serpent?

EP: Don’t hesitate, come join!

CC: It’s a lot of fun. Also, our team is coed. I think that’s real ly dope. It’s a great way to meet people. As a freshman, having field hockey in the fall was re ally vital toward feeling like I found a community and had made friends, not just at Pomo na but across the 5C’s.

DS: I’d like to really empha size that when we say we’re open to beginners, we are. We have all the equipment. We’d love to teach you. All three of us have coaching backgrounds. So we love having new players. And we do have sticks of all heights. We have most mouth guards and shin guards and so if you’re interested, just try it.

“That game was a tough one, but for most of the game you could see the drive and determination our team had to push forward and create opportunities,” Olivia Tuff li HM ’23 said. “We got more shots off than previous games, which is great, but now it’s about making sure that we can play well for the full 90 min utes.”

The Bulldogs started the second half similar to the first, scoring again within the first four minutes off of a break away. Their lead was boosted to 2-0, sending CMS into a

“It was an unfortunate loss, but I think we are excited and hungry to come back,” Oberlag said. “We definitely were the better team … We are going to improve on start ing the game out with control and finishing our chances.”

Following this loss, the Athe nas’ record dropped to 2-4, while Redlands’ record improved to 1-3. The Athenas went on to im prove their record to 3-4 with their win at La Verne on Satur day. CMS won 1-0 with Cate Lew inson’s HM ’26 first career goal in the 40th minute of the game. Sim ilar to the game against Redlands, the Athenas controlled the game offensively with 16 shots on goal and seven corner kicks. The Ath enas’ next home game is against Whittier College on Wednesday at 7 p.m.

Aiming high: treene shoots for a successful basketball season

Dribbling down the court, he fakes out his defender and swift ly moves to the right, leaving his opponent in the dust. He glances up and watches the ball leap from his fingers and slide effortlessly through the center of the net. He hears his teammates cheer for him as he is filled with the excitement of scoring for the first time as a Sagehen.

That’s the goal for Charlie Treene PO ’26 this year, one of the newest members of the Pomo na-Pitzer (P-P) men’s basketball team.

Hailing from Marin, Califor nia, Treene started playing orga nized basketball in first grade, continuing to hone his skills during elementary school while playing for his local youth league. After sixth grade, Treene took it to the next level by joining the travel team North Bay Basketball Asso ciation.

Treene said he has looked up to his grandfather throughout his basketball career.

“One inspiration around me is my grandpa, who played college basketball at Vermont,” Treene said. “I always thought that was cool … to have a family member who played basketball at a higher level.”

At Redwood High School, he was praised for his versatility.

“He’s tough — not many teams have a 6’7” [player] that can move and shoot and attack the rim very

well,” his high school coach said in an interview for the Red woork Bark. “We are able to put a lot of pressure on [opponents] teams, especially when they are undersized.”

As Treene grew older, he became more dedicated to the sport, with his sophomore year — his first year on the varsity team — being his most signifi cant period of growth.

“I started to think about

[college basketball] at the end of sophomore year, during COVID,” he said. “I started to figure out how I was going to start that process because previ ously it was always in my mind as something I wanted to do. In the fall of my junior year, I start ed reaching out to coaches.”

The beginning of the pan demic was an obstacle, he said, as it made it difficult for him to garner attention from colleges.

During the summer after his junior year, Treene visited Po mona while at a tournament for his club team. Treene recalled being taken aback by the beauty of the campus on his tour.

“I visited the campus … and I got a little tour from the coach, which was really cool,” Treene said. “Seeing the campus was an important aspect of really pic turing myself here.”

This season looks to be a

“To win as a team — that’s al ways the No. 1 goal,” Treene said.

“Winning the league and work ing toward going deeper into the NCAA tournament [is the goal].”

The Serpents pose for a group photo on the field. The team looks to add new players this fall.

BEN LAUREN

COUrteSY: CArOYLN COYe

COUrteSY: CHArLIe treeNe

ELIJAH WEISS

historic one for the Sagehens. They have most of their SCIAC division-winning team returning from last year with a few notable additions, including Treene. As Treene looks ahead at his career as a Sagehen, he has a team-ori ented attitude.

Charlie Treene PO ’26 shoots a free throw during a Redwood High School basketball game.

Cate Lewison HM ’26 chases down an opponent on Wednesday. The Ath enas fell to the Redland Bulldogs 2-1 in the SCIAC season opener.

COURTESY: JULIAN RIVERA-WILLIAMS

From virtual beginnings to in-person seminars, 5C taekwondo club joins forces to host ‘Camp Halfblood’

Two people who knew noth ing about each other, raised 1,400 miles apart, move perfect ly in sync as they practice their first-degree black belt form in taekwondo. That was the expe rience for Olivia DeAngelis PO ’23 and Cecilia Ransburg PO ’25, president and co-vice president of the 5C Taekwondo Club.

Both DeAngelis and Ransburg have been involved in martial arts from a young age.

With six years of taekwondo experience under her black belt, DeAngelis’s passion for martial arts started with her family, who has a strong background in the sport.

“Both of my parents are black belts in Seido Karate,” DeAngelis said. “I learned karate as a kid, and then I went into dance. When I left dance, I still wanted to move around … and so I did aikido and kendo for about a year, and then I started taekwondo.”

Ransburg has been practicing taekwondo for nine years, re ceiving her first- and second-de gree black belts in high school. Though she is passionate about participating in the sport, Rans burg said she enjoys teaching taekwondo even more.

“I love it,” she said. “It’s just so much fun for me.”

Soren Laskin PZ ’25, another co-vice president of the club, said their love of martial arts stemmed from an interest in sci-fi.

“I’ve always loved martial arts because growing up as a sci-fi kid, you see all the cool stunts,” they said. “I wanted to do that.”

While researching Pomona, Ransburg was surprised to find that there was no formal tae kwondo club.

“One of the only reasons that I was like, ‘Maybe I shouldn’t come to Pomona’ was that there was no taekwondo club,” she said. “But then I also thought, ‘You know what? I love every thing else about Pomona, so that’s not a good enough reason not to come here.’”

When DeAngelis found out that the 5Cs did not have a tae kwondo club, she took matters into her own hands.

“When I first came to Pomo na, I was shocked that there was no taekwondo club,” DeAngelis said. “There were actually no martial arts clubs that I knew about.”

DeAngelis founded the club

during the pandemic.

“During COVID is when I re ally started pushing to get a tae kwondo club,” DeAngelis said.

“I founded 5C taekwondo with the help of a few other students, and our first semester was en tirely virtual.”

Ransburg found out about the club during an in-person club fair and started regularly attending practices. Impressed with what Ransburg brought to the club, DeAngelis gave Rans burg the opportunity to teach during her first year as a mem ber.

“Cece [Ransburg] has such a wealth of knowledge, both with teaching taekwondo and self-defense,” DeAngelis said.

“So when she was like, ‘Hey, can I show you guys self-de fense?’ my eyes lit up. I was so excited because I actually hadn’t done self-defense before, I had just done taekwondo.”

According to DeAngelis, Ransburg was instrumental in last year’s highly successful self-defense seminar. The club plans to host another two this year, one in October and one in the spring. Seminars attendees have important conversations with the leaders in addition to practicing critical moves.

“At the self-defense seminar, we had a 30-minute conversa tion about attacker psychology and how to prevent a situation where you need to use self-de fense,” Ransburg said.

Laskin reflected on how self-defense has transformed them into a more confident in dividual.

“I feel a lot more confident now because I know I can take anyone in a fight,” they said. “I like teaching other people as well because I feel like [self-de fense] tools … are just always good to have and so easy to

learn!”

This year, the club plans to collaborate with the archery and fencing clubs to host a “Camp Halfblood” event where they will host club-specific seminars for people to try new activities with the guidance of the leaders. Aside from their planned special events, the club will hold practices on Mondays and Wednesdays at Roberts Pa vilion.

“It’s been a battle to get [in-person] martial arts clubs,” DeAngelis said. “It’s been hard because there’s this idea that martial arts are always contact, and it’s hard to clear the way for a contact sport.”

The club has found ways to minimize contact, however.

“[In practice] sometimes we’ll do forms or study-spar ring,” Ransburg said. “Spar ring is kind of intense, but study-sparring is the less-in

tense version of that, where you have a sparring partner, but you don’t actually hit them. You ei ther lightly touch them or not at all, but it’s just a practice of motions and the strategy of spar ring.”

Since both DeAngelis and Ransburg are first-degree black belts, when they practice their form — or “poomsae” -- together they find themselves doing the exact same routine, perfectly in sync.

All three leaders expressed their gratitude for the opportuni ty to lead such a tight-knit, wel coming club and hope to expand it more this year.

“It would give me peace of mind to know that it’s continu ing and has people in it when I leave,” DeAngelis said. “ … We want to get a lot of people com ing to the club and experiencing taekwondo because it’s really fun.”

Athletes of the Week

La Canada, CA Women’s Soccer Defender Charlotte Tapp PO ’23 had an impressive performance this week in Wednesday’s game against La Verne. The Sagehens womens’ soccer team earned their first SCIAC victory of the season with a 3-0 result against the Leop ards. Tapp scored the first two goals of the game, with one in the first five minutes of the match. In the next half, her second goal helped ensure a PP victory. Not only did she help the team offen sively, but she also blocked multi ple attempts by La Verne and was a key factor in keeping the oppo nents scoreless. The Sagehens are now 4-1-1 heading into next week.

Pomona-Pitzer

Claremont-Mudd-Scripps

Miles Christensen HMC ’23 Downers Grove, IL Cross Country

Charlotte Tapp PO ’23

This weekend, runner Miles Chris tensen HMC ’23 finished his race with the third fastest time in CMS history. Christensen ran the 8K with a 24:16:06 time, a full 18 seconds faster than his time at last year’s NCAA Championships. His time helped the Stags finish in 11th place of 30 teams at the meet. Christensen went into the weekend ranked seventh in CMS history and came out of it as a hero of the meet for the team. As a senior, Christensen serves as an inspiration for younger members of the team.

COUrteSY:

DeANGeLIS

Students listen to Cecilia Ransburg PO ‘25 as she explains a specific move during a Taekwondo session.