Volume 61 Issue 07

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WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 7, 2012

NEWS

ELECTION RESULTS ON PAGE 4

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President Obama re-elected for second term

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UCR students react to news of President Obama’s re-election at the Election Night Party in HUB 302.

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Supporters celebrate at Obama’s re-election in Chicago, Illinois.

TIME

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AP P h o t o /C h r i s C a r l s o n

President Barack Obama, Michelle Obama, and Joe and Jill Biden on election night.

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Volume 61

Issue 07

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NEWS

WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 7, 2012

HIGHLANDER

University of California transitions employees to biweekly pay A r o o b a C h a u d h ry CONTRIBUTING WRITER

With over 180,000 employees, the University of California is undergoing a big change in its payroll system come February 2013. Non-exempt employees will be paid through a biweekly payment cycle. If an employee is salaried and not overtime eligible, he or she is considered exempt and will remain on a monthly paycheck.

Launched by the University of California Payroll, Academic Personnel, Timekeeping and Human Resources (UC Path), the project will streamline administrative processes to increase overall efficiency. UC Path will, with its main headquarters in the city of Riverside, begin its new operations in July 2013.

All 10 UC campuses currently have four types of payroll schedules: monthly, biweekly, monthly in arrears and weekly in arrears. The UC system is now switching to just two major payroll methods: a biweekly and monthly payroll system. If an employee is overtime eligible and is paid by the hour, they are considered “non-exempt” and will therefore be switched to the new biweekly pay system.

Interim Vice Chancellor of Finance and Business Operations Charles Rowley said, “I think that in many cases, employees

will be happier with biweekly pay because they get their money quicker and if they are working overtime they get that money quicker.” Non-exempt employees will now receive a total of 26 paychecks per year, in the distribution of two paychecks for 10 months and three paychecks for two months, due to irregular payment cycles.

A single, consistent UC payroll is an efficient alternative, in which Rowley claimed, “You [then] have to have more people who can answer questions, who can provide support, who can interpret policies, and who can interpret and solve problems.”

Productivity will also increase because employees will now switch from writing on timecards to inputting their times electronically. Also, vacation and sick leave will be accrued every four weeks rather than once a month.

Rowley stated that the biggest challenge will be the switch to bi-weekly payrolls. During the transition, non-exempt employees will have to go through about a two-week delay to accompany the synchronization of the prior payment system. Therefore, non-exempt employees will face a prolonged pay period, but it will not affect their overall earned income. The biweekly pay cycle will run from Sunday

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UC P at h

Located in the city of Riverside, the UC Path Center will be built by July 2013.

dent Isabelle Diep, who works at the Raymond L. Orbach science library. “This would be a lot better because you can structure out how much you’re spending and everything. I’m very happy about about it,” she said.

UCR will also provide a financial cushion for campus-affiliated employees who are in need of assistance during the payroll shift. Through the transition assistance programs, employees can take a no-interest loan for up to a $1,000 that can be repaid in six months. Also, employees can

to the Saturday at the end of every two weeks. This transition period leaves many employees with the opportunity to reanalyze their personal budget situation in terms of automatic bill payments and basic living expenses.

“I think it was long overdue it’s really hard getting paid on the first of the month because by the middle of the month after you pay your bills, you’re out of money. I remember every month I would be out of money by the second or third week of that month,” stated third-year stu-

cash out up to 80 hours of vacation time.

Among efforts to bring about efficiency within the UC payroll system, Rowley said, “My hope and expectation is that this will be the last and only change that directly impacts an employee’s paycheck.”

Employees can visit ucpath. ucr.edu/biweekly for more information. The site includes a bi-weekly payroll calendar for 2013 and employees can confirm whether they are exempt or nonexempt.

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November

UPCOMING EVENTS Sunday

Monday

Tuesday

Wednesday

Thursday

Friday

Saturday

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Fundamentals of Early Childhood Education Training: Pediatric First Aid/ CPR Training 8:30 a.m. – 5:30 p.m.

UC Riverside Extension Center

Sophomores: Your Career Game Plan 10 a.m. – 11 a.m.

HUB 268 Law School Admissions Panel 2 p.m. – 3 p.m.

HUB 268

Careers for Social Science Majors Noon -1:30 p.m.

HUB 367 Law School Information Day 10 a.m. - 2 p.m.

Rivera Library,

Basic Elements of Public Speaking: How to Prepare and Perform a Successful Oral Presentation 3:10 p.m. - 4:30 p.m.

Rivera Library

3rd Annual Creative Coexistence 7 p.m. - 10 p.m.

The Barn ASUCR Meeting 5 p.m.

Senate Chambers

Women’s Basketball vs. Gonzaga 7 p.m. – 9 p.m.

SRC Arena

SMI InformationAdvising Session 1:10 p.m. – 2 p.m.

Pierce Hall 315

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Veteran’s Day

Mission Inn Fun Run 7 a.m. - 8:30 a.m.

5th & Market Street, Riverside

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Transgender Remembrance Display 8 a.m. - 8 p.m.

Exhibition

Ari Shapiro: Inside the 2012 Election 7 p.m. - 8 p.m.

HUB 302

Keck Graduate Institute Information Table 10 a.m. - 2 p.m.

HUB Mall

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Smoking Cessation: Healthy Living 3:30 p.m. - 4:30 p.m.

Health Service Building

Tuesday Talks Family Talk 5 p.m. - 6 p.m.

Costo Hall

The Invisible War: Human Rights Talk Rape in the Military 3:30 p.m. – 4:30 p.m.

6 p.m. – 8 p.m.

CHASS INTS 1113 HUB 255 The Metal Children, a Men’s Basketball vs. play by Adam Rapp Fresno State 8 p.m. - 9:30 p.m.

7 p.m. – 9 p.m.

Arts Building Studio SRC Arena Theatre, ARTS 113 Meditation and Relaxation Class 12:15 p.m. - 1 p.m.

Student Recreation Center

Thanksgiving LGBTQ Grad Student Hours 2 p.m. - 3 p.m.

Costo Hall 245 LGBT Resource Center

Men’s Volleyball vs.

Cal Poly 7 p.m. – 9:30 p.m.

SRC Arena

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Women’s Basketball vs. Princeton 7 p.m. – 9 p.m.

SRC Arena

Scan this QR code and visit us at www.highlandernews.org

8th Annual Tuskegee Airmen Celebration 2 p.m. – 5 p.m.

Orbach Science Library

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NEWS

WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 7, 2012

HIGHLANDER

ELECTION RESULTS Voters across California faced an array of local and statewide issues in the 2012 election. California’s 41st Congressional District elections featured Democrat Mark Takano defeating Republican opponent John Tavaglione. In the race for Riverside’s mayoral office, businessman Ed Adkison lost to Riverside Councilman William “Rusty” Bailey. Beyond the realms of the Inland Empire, California voters determined the outcomes of propositions that dealt with income taxes, education, the state budget and the death penalty. *Projected results as of press time

LOCAL RESULTS CONGRESSIONAL

DEMOCRAT TOTAL: 56.5% (55,618) MARK TAKANO

CO

MAYORAL

CA

TOTAL: 56.96% (22,442)

O: 50.57% R: 47.3%

O: 56.3% R: 41.5%

RUSTY BAILEY

PROPOSITIONS PROP 30 YES

Schools and Local Public Safety Protection Act: A tax measure that increases personal income taxes for earners of over $250,000 for the duration of seven years. Sales tax will also increase by one-quarter cent for four years to fund public education and safety. This will halt $6 billion trigger cuts to public education for the 2012-2013 academic year.

Three Strikes LAW. Repeat Felony Offenders, Penalties Initiative Statute: Revises the three strikes law to impose life sentence to criminal offenders with two prior serious or violent felony charges. There will be ongoing state correctional savings of about $70 million annually.

PROP 36 YES

PROP 31 NO

Two-Year Budget Cycle: California will continue to have a one-year cycle for the state budget. Additional sales tax revenue will not shift from the state to local government. The fiscal authority of the state governor will not change.

Mandatory Labeling of Genetically Engineered Food: Genetically engineered foods sold in the state of California will remain unlabeled. Such foods, or other processed foods will still be allowed to be marketed at “natural.” The vote against the measure prevents an increase in annual state costs from a few hundred thousand dollars to over $1 million.

PROP 37 NO

PROP 32 NO

Political Contributions By Payroll Deduction: State and local candidates may continue to accept corporate and union contributions. This measure maintains the existing laws for automatic deductions from employee wages, which may be applicable to political activism.

PROP 33 NO

Automobile Insurance Persistency Discounts: Car insurance companies can continue to offer “persistent discounts” to their loyal customers, but not to new drivers, with prior long-term coverage of five-years. This will prevent companies from penalizing drivers who are inconsistent when paying for car insurance.

PROP 34 NO

Death Penalty Repeal: Death penalty will remain in place and current inmates with the death sentence will not be resentenced to life imprisonment. The state will not provide any additional funding to local law enforcement agencies.

PROP 35 YES

Ban on Human Trafficking and Sex Slavery Prison sentences are lengthened and fines are increase for those convicted of human trafficking. The measure requires convicted human traffickers to register as sex offenders and to disclose internet activities.

State Income Tax Increase to Support Education: State income tax will not increase for Californians earning $17,346 or more per year. This will impede additional revenue for public schools, childcare and state debt payment.

Income Tax Increase for Multistate Businesses to Fund Clean Energy: Multistate businesses will no longer be able to choose from one of two methods to determine the state taxable income that is most advantageous for them. Some multistate businesses will see an increase in their corporate income taxes. About half of the tax revenues collected would be used to support alternative energy projects over the next five years.

Referendum on the State Senate Redistricting Plan: Certified by the voter-approved Independent Citizens Redistricting Commission, tthe state Senate district boundaries will be upheld. California voters approved Proposition 11 (2008), which created this commission and assigned them the task of redrawing congressional district boundaries through Proposition 20 (2010).

PROP 38 NO PROP 39 YES

PROP 40 YES

NEWS

HIGHLANDER

WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 7, 2012

ELECTION RESULTS The 2012 presidential election results highlighted the victory of President Barack Obama, who dominated the electoral college vote. Ultimately, six battleground states proved to be the deciding factors for each political party. Amidst the political anticipation, UCR students gathered for a Nov.6 post-election event hosted by ASPB, ASUCR, and many other organizations, where scores of screen projectors were displayed around HUB 302. Amongst the viewing audience, the Highlander recorded the reactions of UCR students, just moments after the results were released.

BATTLEGROUND STATES AND CALIFORNIA WI IA

O: 52.0% R: 46.9%

O: 52.2% R: 46.4%

OH

O: 50.1% R: 48.2%

WV

R: 62.2% O: 35.7%

FL O: 49.9% R: 49.3%

STUDENTS WEIGH IN ON THE RESULTS

LIAM DOW

“I’m very happy to see all the students who were involved. I think we got a great turnout for the students...

This is a very big step. The most important thing to take away from this is that UCR stepped in the right direction in being more involved politically.”

-Liam Dow (ASUCR President)

ALMA PAEZ

-Rebecca Grosch (English, CALPIRG New Voters Project Coordinator)

-Alma Paez (Liberal Studies, Spanish Lit) “We’re all so excited that the Democrats have won the Senate. So we’re just like, we got the president and we got the Senate. We’re just like, we’re good... But overall, I think it was a great experience... It was just great to see the diversity, also the excitement that we all get with these elections as well. I mean, we have our voices.”

“What I’m most excited about though is how many students got out to the polls today. I know that everyone at CALPIRG and ASUCR [worked] hard with like voter registration and GOTV (Get Out The Vote). We actually collected over 4,000 voter registrations. We were able to get a lot of students out to vote.”

REBECCA GROSCH

“I’m very excited. I was supporting [Obama]. That was where my vote was... With the results, so far, I’m really happy. We had a good turnout. I was really surprised to see so many big groups of students come and go.

Everybody was very engaged in it, too. I really appreciated seeing my university engaged in something so important.”

EDWIN SIGÜENZA

-Edwin Sigüenza (Dance, Theatre Major, minor in Spanish)

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NEWS

WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 7, 2012

HIGHLANDER

ASUCR update: senators motion to remove stipend limit S a n dy V a n

SENIOR STAFF WRITER

On Oct. 29, the ASUCR Senate meeting brought forth a series of reports, which involved increased officer stipends, the movement in GCAP committee funds and voting ballot initiatives.

Under Chapter VII of the Stipends and Regulations bylaws, section five, item d was specifically addressed. With a current maximum for all senator stipends, ASUCR President Liam Dow successfully motioned to temporarily suspend section five, item d, which states: “Under no circumstances may the maximum stipend level for the Officers of the Associated Students exceed six thousand dollars ($6,000.00).” President Dow argues that the line item, which has not been reviewed for over 10 years, is outdated.

Vice President of Internal Affairs Kevin Jo delivered his GCAP report, which requested the internal rollover of $30,000

in GCAP club revenue to the solar panel fund. The shift in funds will be used as part of a oneyear funding commitment to finance the Lot 30 solar-powered canopies. Current sustainability plans by GCAP will be complementary to UCR’s 6.8 acre solar-powered farm initiative.

With a greater push for the “Get Out the Vote” initiative this week, ASUCR senators have been tabling at the Bell Tower and in front of the former Exchange store. Vice President of External Affairs Lazaro Cardenas suggested the possibility of distributing a general map of nearby polling precincts around UCR. On Nov.5, the voting rally also consisted of face painting, voter floats and the distribution of other celebratory items.

Lastly, a brief UCR studentmade video was shown at the end of the meeting, which included an empowering speech

by Governor Jerry Brown who pushed for support of Proposition 30 and education in California.

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B ryan T u t t l e /HIGHLANDER President Liam Dow addresses the senate.

Top 10 Senate Highlights: 1. ASPB cancelled part three of the “Meet the Ballot Political Speakers Series: Debate on Gay Marriage,” due to Hurricane Sandy.

On Oct. 27, Governor Deval Patrick declared a state of emergency for Massachusetts, therefore halting many out-of-state flights—including one with the expected speakers. former Senator Cheryl Jacques (D-MA) and Congressman John H. Rogers (D-MA), as confirmed by ASPB vice chairperson Lacy Bruins.

2. With the collaborative efforts of ASUCR and CALPIRG, over 4,125 individuals were registered to vote for the 2012 election.

3. On Nov. 8, the UC student regents will visit UCR. An informal meeting consisting of raffles and prizes will take place at the HUB Plaza from 12 to 1 p.m., followed by a formal presentation on Proposition 30 at 6 p.m. in HUB 379.

4. On Nov. 9-11, UCR will host the 24th annual Student of Color Conference, with an expected attendance of over 1,300 students—the largest turnout in the event’s history.

5. As one of many outreach events, UCR’s sixth annual “Dream the Impossible Native

Youth Conference” took place on Oct. 23 at 3 p.m.

6. As part of the “Stuff the Bus” initiative, ASUCR will be collecting donations for Operation Safehouse, an at-risk youth shelter in Riverside County.

7. Personnel Chair Director Marianne Melleka will be assembling a sexual harassment committee, which will fall under the ASUCR Outreach General Committee.

8. Due to insufficient supply, the criteria requirements for supplemental instruction (SI) tutors are being reviewed.

9. Vice Chief Justice Mark Orland was unable to establish a Judicial Review Board, due to a conflict of interest in reviewing passed legislation by ASUCR senators.

10. Second-year UCR undergraduate Christopher Sanchez was bestowed a parliamentary appointment by ASUCR Vice President of Internal Affairs Armando Saldana. The position entails monitoring the legal proceedings of ASUCR in accordance with Robert’s Rules of Order—the most widely-used constitutional template in the United States.

UCR researcher to market color-changing nanocrystal technology Michael Rios SENIOR STAFF WRITER

In 2007, UC Riverside associate professor of chemistry and nanotechnologist Yadong Yin discovered a way to use magnets to change the color of iron oxide solution. By adjusting the strength of a magnetic field near the mixture, he and his research team discovered that the structure of the solution will change and its color will be altered.

Five years after his discovery, Yin’s work will finally be put to practical use.

Announced on Oct. 26, UCR granted exclusive license to The Idea Zoo Inc., a company that specializes in marketing scientific innovations made by university professors. The company’s mission will be to find practical applications for Yin’s color-changing technology.

The basis of Yin’s research was to find a way to organize the structure of the iron oxide nanoparticles so that they would self-assemble into colloidal crystals to form a magnetic field.

Once that was achieved, the crystals would be able to diffract visible light, producing a spectrum of colors.

“In the end we can actually use the magnetic field to control the color of the material,” Yin explained in an in-

terview with the Highlander.

For the past few years, UCR and The Idea Zoo, Inc. have been working together to market the discovery.

“We have been working together for about three years. They do realize how much is it valued and they’re trying to push the technology through the market. It’s a dream that every researcher wants.”

As Yin put it, the research can be applied to a wide variety of color-dependent products. Since his discovery, Yin has been contacted by various industries including companies that make toys, tablets and televisions screens. “[The technology] could be used for a lot of color related applications,” he said, voicing his excitement for the potential applications of the technology.

“For example, they could be used for displays. For example, Amazon Kindle or eBook. And that’s a black and white version. If you use the photonic crystals inside, it’ll be a color version and, at the same time, you can save energy.

It’s different from the LCD display because the LCD display has to constantly consume energy.”

Aside from energy saving, Yin also pointed out other improvements the technology could potentially bring.

“They are based on refraction. So the advantage is that on the sunlight, they look really shiny. It’s different

D amin g Y e /HIGHLANDER Professor Yin supervises a student working on an experiment.

from the LCD. That kind of display, when you bring it out to the sunlight, you don’t see anything. With this thing, the more sunlight, the better the contrast.”

UCR will receive royalties and equity from the products that will be developed through The Idea Zoo, Inc.

“I’m really excited,” Yin stated, “It’s amazing to see that the stuff from the lab can go to the industry.”

Yin’s contributions to his field have earned him numerous accolades and national recognition. In 2011, he was ranked one of the top 100 chemists of ■H the decade.

NEWS

HIGHLANDER

WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 7, 2012

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Professor López named latest Tomás Rivera Chair Dean Mayorga STAFF WRITER

Professor of theatre Tiffany Ana López has been named the Tomás Rivera Endowed Chair—a title named in honor of UCR’s first Latino chancellor. López shares a similar background to Rivera’s in that they are both descendants of migrant farm workers, and went on to achieve reputations as prominent scholars.

As the newly-elected endowed chair, Lopez will financially assist a senior faculty member, while spearheading the annual Tomás Rivera Conference. Lopez cites the latter as the important characteristic that separates the Tomás Rivera chair from any other. In addition to this distinction, López has plans to further commemorate the Rivera legacy by hosting “preconference events, including public readings of Rivera’s works,” López stated.

She is also currently working to develop a new undergraduate seminar on the writing and life work of Tomás Rivera. “Students from the course would have the opportunity to become involved in organizing the Tomás Rivera Conference the year of taking the course,” said López.

Furthermore, she hopes to oversee the digitization of the

Tomás Rivera archives.

This is the second time the Tomás Rivera chair will be occupied. The first holder of the position was current California Poet Laureate Juan Felipe Herrera.

López spoke about the connection that was made through the endowed chair between her and Herrera, and what it means for the university. “It’s an incredible marker of distinction nation-wide and internationally that UCR has two such faculty holding these kinds of positions,” she stated. “I think [Herrera and I] produce our work from thinking about our personal histories. For me, the most profound thing is thinking about how my life and the life of the younger people who come after me and my family—that life path has been incredibly transformed by higher education.”

With the financial support Lopez receives from holding the position, she hopes to advance the research behind her two unfinished books; one is entitled “The Alchemy of Blood,” which deals with the issues of violence and trauma.

The other is a biography on muralist Barbara Carrasco, who is actually collaborating with López to complete it.

López also spoke about Chicana/o’s today, within art

C o u rt e s y UCR professor of theatre Tiffany Ana López is the second to recieve the honor of Tomás Rivera Chair.

and in the country in general.

“Latinos are everywhere. The interesting thing to me as an educator is looking at where Latino books are banned, including my book, “Growing Up Chicana/o”—the anthology I edited. Not only is it banned in Arizona, it’s banned in Virginia. To me, looking at where our books are banned is a litmus test of where there [are] real cultural struggles

taking place in communities over resources, [and] struggles over understanding shifts in the cultures demographics.”

However, she explained her respect for UCR’s diversity and tolerance as an institution.

“I’ve been at UCR since 1995 for very important reasons, [one of] which is because of our student populations...We are one of the three most diverse college campuses in the

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UCR T o day

U.S. and I think the kind of conversations we have at UCR that allow us to talk about the specificity of Chicanos and our culture and our arts—but also talking about how that work is so important in terms of thinking about what’s happening in the arts and letters and the cultural experience in California—to me that’s a powerful part of my life at ■H UCR.”

UC Online brings lectures, coursework to students’ computers S a n dy V a n SENIOR STAFF WRITER

Michael Rios SENIOR STAFF WRITER

To alleviate increasing demand for classes, UC Online has created a technological gateway to higher education. On Oct. 31, Interim Director of UC Online Keith Williams adjoined a Q&A conference call among the UC campus newspapers for an exclusive virtual tour of the online module. Initially reserved for UCenrolled students, course offerings became available to the public in early October.

“We’re trying to replicate the quality of [the UC] educational experience that might come in the classroom but by doing it in a way that’s particularly conducive to doing it online,” stated Williams. “So I think the goal is to use the innovative technology that’s available and allow those to be effectively changing the way it is done, but still getting the same type of things acro ss.”

Branching out beyond the traditional UC learning experience, Williams said the introduction of online courses will expand accessibility for both UC and non-UC students. University online classes are aimed at alleviating high demand, yet Williams referred to the gradual inclusion of online upper division courses. The program currently offers 14 courses, with a total of 35 in development for the UC system.

Starting spring 2013, two additional classes will be included in UC Riverside’s online course listing. Introduction to Latin American History and Introduction to Computer Science will be joining Dance: Cultures and Contexts—the current fall 2012 online course taught by dance professor Jacklynn Shea Murphy.

Through systemwide collaborations,

UC Online will allow enrolled students to take multiple courses on a multi-campus level. “One of the benefits that I think that has come from this systemwide effort is that there is now a group of people involved in technology...that get together in a [discussion] meeting and talk about things that are working well and things that are not. I think it’s helping to create people on the campuses that have experts that they didn’t have before.”

In an online class, faculty members engineer an independent online module, which caters to their own course-specific material. Students are periodically challenged throughout the lectures with multiple choice questions or opinionated polling, similar to the use of clickers commonly used in classrooms. Course feedback will be beneficial for both the instructor and the student to monitor the overall pace and effectiveness.

Live discussion sessions encourage student participation in an interactive learning environment within a virtual classroom.

Student-course responsiveness is measured through course-long surveys and collaborative work. Mandatory attendance will be monitored by the teaching assistants.

Course tabs are labeled along the side of each course to facilitate online navigation.

Students can use the side tabs to check their class schedules, review the course syllabus, post assignments and participate in discussion sections synchronously.h Through the Adobe Connect system, office hours and discussions will involve interactive tools such as a live chat session, document sharing, a whiteboard for writing and drawing, and a separate box for downloading files. Application features such as the etherpad will enable students to create interactive online study groups through a shared document, similar to a

C o u rt e s y UC O n l in e Taught by UCR dance professor Jacqueline Shea Murphy, Dance 7 has been offered for fall 2012.

Google document. Due to limited bandwidth, the Adobe program currently limits the entry of about 20 students in live discussion sessions.

“Online gives them a little different opportunity for assessment of a students’ work than in the traditional day of doing classes [and] instead of having two midterms and a final, there are typically a lot more assignments that are smaller,” Williams said. To counteract plagiarism or cheating, Williams noted that each examination period is unique to the designs of the instructor. Possible options may include online web proctoring or the creation of in-person proctoring centers. For currently-enrolled UC students, identity verification is confirmed as part of each campus database, while online programs are often utilized to detect plagiarized work.

According to Williams, UC Online

obtained an initial start-up loan of $6.9 million from the University Office of the President (UCOP), which funds self-sustaining education enterprises and collects percentage on all earned revenue. Thus far, only about $5 million has been spent on the UC Online module. The initial loan will be paid back over a seven-year period.

Additional funding came from the Next Generation Learning Challenge (NGLC) and the Gates Foundation, which provided the program with a $770,000 grant.

The program hopes to acquire more funds from the enrollment of non-matriculated students and by applying for additional grants through the National Science Foundation.

“This project is based on a fundamental UC ONLINE CONT’D ON PAGE 8

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NEWS

WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 7, 2012

NEWS IN BRIEF

COMPILED BY MELISA BIVIAN,

TWO UC RESEARCHERS TO RECEIVE 2012 NOBEL PRIZE On Oct. 15, Lloyd S. Shapley, a UCLA professor of mathematics and economics, and Shinya Yamanaka, a senior investigator at UCSF, were honored with the 2012 Nobel Prize. Each award is shared with two previously-recognized researchers: John B. Gurdon of the Gurdon Institute in Cambridge and Alvin E. Roth from Harvard University, in their respected fields.

Shapley won the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences for the “theory of stable allocations and the practices of market design,” as announced by the Nobel Prize committee. Since joining the UCLA faculty in 1981 and retiring in 2000, Shapley studied non-cooperative

market models, political games, cost allocation and organization theory.

As an affiliated researcher at the Gladstone Institutes, Yamanaka was honored for his stem cell discovery. After a sixyear journey, Yamanaka discovered how to induce regular adult skin cells with multi-functional attributes—capable of developing into any cell in the human body.

The Nobel Prize is an international award administered by the Nobel Foundation in Stockholm, Sweden. The University of California is honored to have 59 researchers with 60 Nobel prizes. The 2012 Nobel Prizes totalled to 1.2 million dollars.

HIGHLANDER

contributing writer

& SHADI VALENZUELA,

contributing writer

UNIVERSITY STUDENTS CONNECT THROUGH UCMETALK An online launch party took place on Oct.29 to promote UCMeTalk, a live social network founded by Nazir Katabi, Purdue University graduate, and Anthony Liu, UC Irvine informatics major.

The website connects the 10 UC campuses, in which students and faculty must register with their school email.

According to Katbi, UCMeTalk isn’t just any chat site; he wanted to create a page for like-minded individuals to interact with one another. Users are randomly connected with another student of similar interest through a one-on-one

video chat feed. The website also allows you to filter out other students by name, major or college.

Another feature available to a user are “shout-outs,” which is similar to a tweet or status update, yet is limited to one per day. A user ’s page can also receive approval ratings by other registered members.v Overall development of the site took eight months, with the total cost of $10,000, Katbi and Liu will expand the UC network by including features such a virtual debate room or “mixers,” where users may log-in to discuss about a specific topic.

Anderson School of Management receives $200,000 donation from SolarMax Lauren Green CONTRIBUTING WRITER

On Nov. 5, UCR’s School of Business Administration (SoBA) received a $200,000 donation from SolarMax Technology Inc. Dedicated to the A. Gary Anderson School of Management, this gift will create a fellowship fund for graduates that are in need of financial aid. Taking the form of an investment fund, the interest accrued on the endowment will seek to fill the fellowship reserve.

SolarMax Technology, an environmentally-friendlycompany, handles the installation and maintenance of solar power systems in residential and commercial markets, according to UCR Today. In early August, the company decided to relocate its main headquarters to the city of Riverside, bringing with it 1,600 jobs. Through the fellowship fund, the company sought to strengthen local relationships within the community.

A board of faculty appointed by SoBA’s director of development, Jeff Kaatz will then disperse the fellowships to eligible candidates.

As a new relationship between the company and the university develops, the echoing effects will also be visible in the Riverside community. “I think it’s a comUC ONLINE FROM PAGE 7

assumption that we will be able to enroll students who are not currently UC students, and they will be paying fees that are comparable to the tuition that UC students take...for the courses that are there,” he said.

Though financial aid is currently unavailable to non-UC students, Williams and other administrators will attempt to obtain funding from sources such as the UC Online Academy funding programs for high school students.

Also, UC-enrolled students may take online classes under their current tuition. Still considered a new program, the UC Academic Senate will most likely discuss the limitations of overall course enrollment.

From a marketing perspective, the UC Online module may need to rival the introduction of massive open online courses (MOOCs), free online classes with unlimited scalability in terms of studentteacher ratio. With “pure interac-

pany that appreciates and really respects what goes on here at the university in terms of research and community support,” said Kaatz.

“I think they’re just being a good partner and neighbor for us too.”

In the same spirit, SolarMax Technology Executive Vice President Ching Liu said, “We’re proud to be part of a community that is also home to the University of California, Riverside. We plan to continue our relationship with UCR... [and] the university’s business school,” in a UCR Today article. In addition, the company plans to renovate its central headquarters, an old historic building located in the city of Riverside.

Through environmentally-friendly initiatives such as the installation of solar panels, the company hopes to increase the community’s green energy technology.

Kaatz works closely with an advisory council that helps the dean of SoBA, Yunzeng Wang, foster relationships with alumni and community business leaders in Riverside. Together, they help to facilitate relationships with businesses in the community.

“The type of relationship we have with SolarMax is very supportive.

They’re supportive of what we do, and they open doors for us too,” stated Kaatz. tion, but no authoritative figure” in a professional sense, Williams referred to the MOOCs as noncompetitive, due to the differences in direction.

“We’re using a group at UCSB with those educational evaluations as a research focus and they’re doing a two year study of the courses that we’re offering,” stated Keith who emphasized an involved evaluation process. Student participation in surveys and focus groups will provide greater insight for areas of improvement and encourages more expedited course modifications.

According to a preliminary report conducted on the first six classes offered by UC Online, 70 percent of the students who were enrolled in the courses gave the program favorable reviews.

“The students thought that they were getting a good learning experience,” explained Williams.

“They liked the type of courses ■H that were there.”

The next steps for the fellowship includes the creation of an endowment fund, which will be invested to sustain funding for graduate students, due to the need for an initial stream of funding.

As a new endowment, Kaatz expects that it may take a year before SoBA can present the award to a student. Yet, she stated that the fellowship will be beneficial for both UCR and SolarMax as a long-term opportunity.

“This will allow the business school to recruit and retain the most qualified students we possibly can get. Because if we can get them some assistance, and help them defray some of the costs, then that allows us to get more and better students. That helps raise the level of prestige of the school and the university...it’s a common H goal we all have,” stated Kaatz. ■

L e e na B u t t /HIGHLANDER The South Building of Anderson Hall houses the offices for the MBA program.

. OPINIONS .

HIGHLANDER

WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 7, 2012

9

On June 6th, the Supreme Court refused to strike down a California law that offers state residents reduced tuition rates at California colleges.

The law’s opponents argue that the bill, which does not distinguish between lawful residents and illegal immigrants, violates a federal law that prohibits states from giving college benefits to illegal aliens on the basis of residence within a state. Unfortunately for the law’s detractors, the Supreme Court wouldn’t even hear their challenge.

Lawyers for a conservative immigration-law group that backed the appeal claim that the law is patently unfair to the thousands of full-bred American high school graduates who apply to California colleges from other states each year. These students will have to pay as much as $20,00 more for college tuition than the illegal immigrants (and many other California residents) that the bill aids. Others have argued that the bill gives preferential treatment to illegal immigrants - it is just one more derivative of affirmative action, bent on taking positions away from the hard working, middleclass Caucasians who really deserve http://ulife.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/02/rick-santorum-660x320.jpg

HIGHLANDER EDITORIAL

C o u rt e s y

Google altered its homepage in protest of the 2011 Stop Online Piracy Act, part of a larger debate over the role of government in regulating the Internet.

o f di g i ta lt r e nd s . c o m

THE NEXT BIG ISSUE: THE INTERNET As a nation, we have all just collectively survived the masses of shrapnel from one of the most competitive and contentious presidential elections in history. One would expect that vociferous arguments over unemployment, the 47 percent, rape and creeping socialism would result in a constructive debate about the route this country needs to take in the years to come. But this election is notable not for the presence of new ideas, but for the lack of them. Some of the most pressing issues that must be addressed have been ducked, dodged, avoided and ignored in the name of winning 270 electoral votes. Of these, the most radioactive is what to do about a power that is growing stronger, more populated and more influential with every passing year: the Internet.

It’s hard to imagine now, but use of the Internet by the mass public is a new phenomenon. And a phenomenon it is. According to the Wall Street Journal, there are more than 2.5 billion people on the Internet, a population equal to the combined populations of China and India, the two most populous countries in the world. Facebook alone boasts users numbering more than 1 billion, and this number will grow as it expands into China and Russia. A report by A.T. Kearney places the amount of revenue generated by the In-

ternet in 2008 at nearly $2 trillion—more than the GDP of Egypt, Argentina and Taiwan combined. And we all saw the integral role the Internet played in the Arab Spring as demonstrators utilized social networking sites to overcome government crackdowns and overthrow entrenched ruling dictatorships.

The Internet has become even more closely intertwined with students’ lives than most. Nearly everybody has an e-mail account; this is especially true for college students at UCR, as all of us are automatically provided one at our admittance. We store our data online and many classes require submission of documents through the iLearn system. Math and science classes regularly assign homework through online websites. And nobody can count the hours that we have logged on sites like YouTube or Facebook.

All these services have organically grown as the Internet has grown.

With the Internet’s expanded reach and influence, governments are struggling to figure out how to cope with a power that doesn’t have physical boundaries, transcends political governments and exerts its power without a military. Different countries have tried different methods to grapple with this new world where the Internet reigns supreme. China has simply built

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a concrete wall between its population and the Internet, allowing access through only a pinhole to a scant collection of governmentally preapproved websites. Dictatorships that have no concern over individuals’ rights can take such actions without fear of repercussion. But democracies like the United States have had to attempt a more nuanced approach. One such attempt came in 2011 when the United States House of Representatives introduced the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA). The bill would have effectively censored large parts of the Internet and shut down a variety of popular Internet sites in an attempt intended to preserve intellectual copyrights. Due to a firestorm of public outcry that culminated in a Google-sponsored petition signed by over 7,000 people and a blackout of major websites (like Wikipedia), the bill was incinerated.

But the issue over Internet regulation will certainly rise from the ashes out of sheer necessity. The issue that SOPA tried to address, the debate over copyright in the age of the Internet, has not been conclusively settled.

Copyright gives a powerful incentive to spur innovation, and people who create new apps and generate new ideas should be recognized for their work; our society would certainly be poorer both techno-

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logically and culturally without the existence of copyright laws. But the entire premise of copyright is predicated on a society with private ownership of commodities, and the Internet may very well be a public good. Once you post your relationship status on Facebook, or make a comment on an online forum, you have put forth information into a realm where it is accessible by anyone—the very definition of public. Nonetheless, not everyone has access to the Internet. It’s easy to forget that the majority of the world’s population has never used the Internet in their life.

So can the Internet really be considered a public commodity, even with videos, articles and music uploaded to be viewed by a mass audience?

Where is the line drawn between private ownership and public use? Is the Internet a public good or not? Is it a right? Do governments have the power to control what sites are launched and what content is posted? Does the right to privacy exist in the age of the Internet, and if it does, who decides what to protect and how? How do we deal with cyber-attacks and other forms of online terrorism? We as a global society (itself only possible because of the Internet) have not yet come to grips with these questions.

These questions directly

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affect all of us. It’s the difference between an employer having the right to use your Facebook page in a job application. It’s the difference between being able to view videos on YouTube or read news articles for free or being charged. It’s the difference between developers creating the next Angry Birds or a cyber-wasteland devoid of innovation. All of them are difficult questions to answer and no one of us has all the answers. But as the Internet becomes ever more integrated into our lives, they are going to need to be answered. Each of them reflects a conflict of interests between any number of individuals that will be brought to the government to settle, whether in the courts or in Congress. Ultimately, only those with the strongest, most consistent voices will have their ideas for the future of the Internet carved into the legal code. If you want to see your vision for the future of the Internet prevail, the way to advance it is to force government to think about it.

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Electronic tabulation of vote could decide the presidency T i m R. A g u i l a r STAFF WRITER

Between the hours of 12:20 and 2:00 am, on election night in 2004, an electronic swing of more than 300,000 votes switched Ohio’s electoral votes from John Kerry to George W. Bush, and nothing could be done. A federal injunction was issued, but 56 of Ohio’s 88 counties had destroyed election records, making a recount impossible.

It should be noted that Ohio’s Secretary of State, responsible for administering the vote, and the Governor were both Republicans, as are the governors and secretaries of state in nine swing states this election year.

In 2004, long-time friend and supporter of Bush, Walden O’Dell, vowed to deliver Ohio’s electoral votes to George W. Bush. O’Dell’s company, Diebold, owned the software used to tabulate Ohio’s electronic votes.

Ohio’s Secretary of State, Ken Blackwell, awarded the contract for e-vote tabulation to IT engineer and long-time Bush family affiliate Michael Connell, owner of the Ohiobased company GovTech.

Ohio’s votes were housed on servers in the Old Pioneer Bank Building in Chattanooga, Tennessee, which also carried e-mail for Karl Rove and the national Republican Party.

Connell was observed installing “software patches” in voting machines just prior to the election. Unfortunately, Connell died before he could answer to a federal lawsuit regarding his part in the 2004 presidential election, so we may never know what happened, if anything. You might say it’s only cause for speculation; possibly a great screenplay or the product of a wild imagination. But consider one more tidbit of information: no Republican Presidential candidate has ever won the White House without Ohio.

Today the e-voting controversy is back with a vengeance in Ohio. It seems Presidential Candidate Mitt Romney and his family is connected to Hart InterCivic, the company that records and tabulates the vote in Ohio.

Solamere Capital, a company founded by Romney’s son, Tagg, with seed money from his father and invest-

ments from his mother Anne and uncle Scott, is partners with H.I.G Capital. H.I.G. purchased Hart InterCivic, the nation’s third largest voting machine company, last year. Of Hart Intercivic’s five member board of directors, two are H.I.G. employees and a third is appointed

by H.I.G., assigning firm control of Hart InterCivic to H.I.G. Capital. The Washington Post and Forbes have confirmed this relationship. I must add that Solamere Capital did not deny its relationship with H.I.G. Capital, but made clear that their investments in H.I.G. are not directed at any specific funds, including Hart InterCivic.

It should also be noted that H.I.G. Capital employee Brian Schwartz made a $50,000 contribution to the Romney Victory PAC on May 1, as did employee Douglas Berman on May 15. Coincidentally, the price of admission to Romney’s fundraiser in Boca Raton, held in May of this year, was $50,000 payable to the Romney Victory PAC. Boca Raton is none other than where Romney’s infamous 47 percent speech took place.

What does this all mean?

Absolutely nothing, unless you feel the appearance of impropriety matters; that a conflict of interest matters.

Apparently, Hart InterCivic believes it does matter; otherwise they would have never released a response defending themselves. Their statement reads: “Hart InterCivic has a long track record of sup-

porting a fair and open democratic process. Any suggestions that the Company might try to influence the outcome of election results are unfounded.” Hart InterCivic’s statement is accurate and there is absolutely no known evidence to suggest that the results of this election will somehow be manufactured or VOTE CONT’D ON PAGE 11

Campaign financing and Super PACs: more money, more problems Sean Frede STAFF WRITER

Political consulting got its start back in 1933 when Clem Whitaker and Leone Baxter founded Campaigns, Inc. Campaigns, Inc. started out running campaigns for businesses and monopolies like Standard Oil. Their big debut was working against Upton Sinclair, controversial author of the novel “The Jungle”, in his 1934 bid for governor of California. Sinclair was on the California ticket as a Democrat; Whitaker and Baxter were Republicans and disgusted over the fact that a fiction writer would want to run for governor. Whitaker and Baxter were able to use Sinclair’s own fictional works to scare voters into voting Republican. Relying on catchy slogans, attack ads, and putting on a fun show, they used quotes from his, I must remind you, fictional books to convince voters that he was a “bad person.” They believed that a wall goes up when you try to get Americans to think. Then TV came into play in 1952 and Campaigns, Inc. really started raking in money with the Republicans spending $1.5 million on television advertising that year. Fast-forward to the 2012 presidential race: both the Democrats and Republicans raised over $900 million and Americans still seem to enjoy not having to think. Who is behind trying to keep us from thinking for ourselves?

Who doesn’t want us to make a choice for who we want for president?

Turn on the television and whether it is the presidential race or any local races you will be bombarded with negative advertising. If you want to fit in with the stereotype of the uninformed voter that political consulting firms exploit, then believe these negative ads that are fueled by greed. Do what they say, sit back, and enjoy the ride. What’s the worst that could happen when multi-million dollar companies are free to spend as much

money as possible so that they are the only voice when it comes to our government? You know—that whole “for the people, by the people” thing?

With the introduction of Super PACs, campaign financing was forever changed.

Super PACs are political committees whose main goal is to take unlimited donations from corporations, unions, or wealthy individuals and then use that money to fund advertising for the candidate of their choice. For the first time in history, neither presidential candidate has accepted public funds from donors due to the restrictions that come with the money they can accept. Instead, Super PACs have created a way for candidates to bypass the regulations placed on campaigns to prevent them from coordinating with independent groups by steering rich donors towards so-called independent Super PACs who seem to be working as adjuncts to the campaign itself. The candidate doesn’t get in trouble and the money flows unrestricted.

This has created a loophole in our system that is trying to regulate the amount of money that goes into campaigns. Because of the 2010 ruling of the Supreme Court in the Citizens United case, independent organizations do not have a cap on the money they can raise. So these Super PACs are able to raise as much as possible and are able to use this money to hire political consultants to create advertising for who they support. Many of these consultants rely on negative messages that are oftentimes not true, a form of political manipulation that Campaigns, Inc. started the trend for and is becoming the deciding factor for undecided voters during this year’s presidential race.

Super PACs have not only infiltrated advertising for the presidential race, they are also prevalent among Senate and House races. According to the New York Times, for the month of October, Super

PACs reported at least $38.5 million in independent spending, nearly seven times as much as they spent during the same period in 2010. This money is floating around from the presidential race and now down to the House and Senate. House races which rarely used to be linked with large money are now being overcome

by Super PACs. In Utah and Georgia, a group known as Center Forward spent $1 million in attacking Republican candidates, and Now or Never PAC, based out of Missouri, spent more than $900,000 to aid a Republican in Illinois. These PACs are funding out-of-state Republicans and Democrats that they don’t fully know and this money is getting them seats in the House and Senate. Like Campaigns, Inc., the sole purpose of Super PACs is to feed whoever will be on their side, regardless of whether they are the best choice to run our country or not.

What is all this money going towards?

I’d love to think it’s being spent on charities or non-profit organizations that their candidate supports. But come on, it’s politics, and it’s a dirty game. This unrestricted money is being pumped into advertising to keep Americans from making their own decision on who they want to vote for. It is doing what Campaigns, Inc. started: it is keeping Americans from thinking and telling us to sit back and let these false ads choose for us.

According to a recent CBS News article, a negative ad against Mitt Romney states that a man was laid off because of Bain Capital, a financing company that Romney is a co-founder of, lost his health insurance, and 22 days later his wife died of cancer. There was nothing that this poor, poor man could do. The only problem is that this ad failed to state that his wife died five years after he had gotten laid off and it turned out she had health insurance for part of the time.

These are the ads that are getting con-

stantly thrown at us from both sides and are being funded by Super PACs. They are made to keep us from thinking and wanting us to just step in line and do exactly what they want. They are the ones in control because of their unrestricted spending.

The Washington Times states that 915,000 presidential campaign ads from June 1st to the end of October aired.

That’s a 44.5 percent increase from the 637,000 ads ran way, way back in that presidential race in 2008. In just four years, campaign television advertising has gone up nearly 50 percent. What has caused this big change? Could it be linked to the origin of Super PACs in 2010 with their unrestricted accumulation of millions? The connections are all there. Super PACs are flooding our airwaves with false, negative advertising that is leading to voters not knowing the truth when it comes time for them to go to their polling place.

Leone Baxter was interviewed in the 1960s regarding the legitimacy of her company, Campaigns, Inc., and political consulting. She stated that political consulting must be in the hands or ethical and principled people, “People with real concern for the world around them, for people around them.” She felt that if this didn’t exist then it could turn into a very destructive thing involving people who have no regard for the world around them.

In this new era of Super PACs and unrestricted spending on negative advertising, I have to wonder: has this already happened? Did Baxter predict what is going on in this campaign now? I have to say yes. This destructive power is in full force and it is up to us to start thinking. It is time to turn off the advertising and to make choices for ourselves. Let’s make a change to the way campaigns and our country is run.

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OPINIONS

HIGHLANDER

WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 7, 2012

11

Te s t i n g c o n f l i c t s w i t h e d u c a t i o n a l r e f o r m J o s h ua W a g o n b l as t STAFF WRITER

Remember STAR testing? If you’re unfamiliar with the subject, just know that there is no true incentive for a student to perform well on the exam. When I was in high school, fellow students would bubble in letters that would coincide to make pictures of smiley faces, drug references, et cetera. One of the purposes of this type of test is to determine how statistically well the students are functioning in various subjects, such as math, English and science. But the larger goal is to try and effectively judge if the teachers are accurately edifying young minds in accordance with selective curriculum. One may ask, “is this an appropriate way to verify a teacher’s skill in the classroom?” Hell no. With students differing in personal aptitude across the board and tests ranging in difficulty, it is hard to say if tests are an accurate measure of a teacher’s real ability.

Students are gifted in various areas and the learning process is complicated; basing their evaluations primarily on test scores comes with many consequences.

Put yourself in a situation where you have been frequently attending an unenjoyable class.

This lack of interest is not based on the teacher, but solely revolves around the content of the class. Let’s say you find ecology unfulfilling and dull, despite how hard the teacher works to apply the subject matter to reallife situations using fun activities and examples. The effect of being so disinterested with the gist of your ecology class is less studying, a lessened understanding of the material, and ultimately poor performance in the classroom. This is hardly uncommon.

Some students simply operate better in different areas of learning. Someone may be better at a certain trade skill, but because of the stress placed on scoring well on these standardized tests, his talents go unnoticed and are refocused on subjects he may not be good at or interested in. The point here is that test scores are going to fluctuate year by year, no matter how hard we shoot for

Questions continue to be raised about the efficacy of standardized testing in evaluating student and teacher performance.

the bell curve. One year a class full of students may perform better on the same exam that is given the next year, when a large majority ends up not passing. So is it fair to put an educator’s profession on the chopping block because of unpredictable circumstance? Hardly.

Do you recall President Obama’s Race to the Top program? There was an emphasis on improving the classroom, which, aside from handing out grants, involved a new evaluation of our teachers. This had received several unfavorable reviews and responses from many California unions, such as the California Teacher’s Union.

The program was a billion dollar investment that was said to prepare students for a new age of competitive education. There was plenty to boast about in the plan for better schooling, but why were the educators so worried? This is because of the previously mentioned test score debate, in which the teachers felt it was unfair to be judged based on student test scores. There has even been a legal quarrel between the United Teachers Los Angeles union and the Los An-

VOTE FROM PAGE 10

manipulated. The reality is that any mysterious deviation in the vote will have to contend with lawyers lined up, in each camp, ready to attack any anomaly that does not favor their candidate.

However, there is little doubt that this election highlights a process riddled with contentious and malicious rhetoric and mysterious undisclosed campaign financing, the product of the Supreme Court’s ruling in the Citizens United case. The people of this country certainly do not need another concern piled on the heap of refuse that will linger well past the election.

The appearance of impropriety and conflict of interest should matter to all of us, every day. If every night,

geles Unified School District as a result of the outrage. The fortyfive thousand person union may have some good reasons for their disgruntlement, seeing as this ongoing battle has also spawned strikes, including one in Chicago recently. Yet this hasn’t stopped Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa from believing that teachers should be held accountable for the performance of their students, as he said at September’s Conference of Mayors. Of course, I do not entirely disagree.

I do think that “student growth over time [should be used] as a measurement in teachers,” as Villaraigosa said. The only problem is that student growth cannot purely be determined by a few tests, even though it is one factor.

A long-dormant bill, AB 5, has been used as a rope in the tug-of-war game persisting between teachers and our legislative system. What does the bill advocate and why do teacher associations have such animosity towards it? The Los Angeles Times sums up the bill as making several changes “to teacher evaluations, including requiring more frequent performance re-

on your way home from work, you spotted your congregation’s minister exiting a strip joint and zigzagging through the streets, you may have cause for concern. When you question the minister he explains that he is attempting to save souls and drinks only so that he can relate to sinners and they to him. His response is creative at best, but it does not silence the appearance of impropriety or conflict of interest. This may seem rather straightforward, but regardless of how it is wrapped and how sophisticated the presentation may appear, there are basic undeniable principles that should never come into play when something so important is at stake: our democracy. Why tempt it?

Why place our vote in harm’s way?

Our vote represents our freedom,

views, more training for evaluators and the use of multiple measures of student academic progress – which could include test scores but would not require them, as current state law does.”

The bill has been thrown around for years, incurring complaints from teachers who support a collectively bargained evaluation system rather than the current one and criticism, including that of Los Angeles Superintendent John Deasy, who says that the district is within its right to impose regulations without negotiation. According to its detractors, the bill will weaken the progression that the educational system has been making.

I certainly disagree. If the bill was implemented, the evaluation system could be based on the following criteria: “student achievement [will] account for 45 percent of a teacher’s evaluation – half based on standardized test scores and half on some other measure of student achievement. Another 40 percent will be based on observations of teacher practice, 10 percent on parent or peer feedback and 5 percent on school performance or student feedback,” states the Norwalk

our democracy, and our way of living. At no time in our history should we jeopardize or place our vote in the hands of those with a vested interest in its outcome. Steadily, government has contracted out its responsibilities, sometimes successfully, sometimes disastrously. Arguments can be made regarding the prison industry on both sides of this equation, but the election of our nation’s leaders is not like any other government responsibility.

Our vote is guaranteed by our constitution and this administrative responsibility is assigned by the people to government, not to Romney supporters or Obama supporters.

In certain cases where e-voting is implemented, local government does not have the authority or means to examine or scrutinize the tabulation of

C o u rt e s y

of blogs.kqed.org

Citizen. AB 5 was unfortunately abandoned in early September but is not long forgotten and is sure to be seen again.

This grueling process of determining how our educators should be evaluated has been deliberated upon for much too long. The debate is infringing on the possibility for a better student future. Why base all decisions mostly on student test scores? I say we let the students voice their own opinions by having a greater influence on teacher evaluations. Student test scores should not contribute momentously to teacher assessment. Instead, there should be more of a focus on observational feedback. The lowest scoring students should be put under evaluations as well, seeing what works for them and what doesn’t, modeling a classroom experience on the method of learning that most benefits them. Isn’t this supposed to be the point anyhow? Testing just isn’t sufficient enough to judge an overall learning experience; it only trifles with specifics, which is a substantial weakness. It’s time for a change in our academic goals.

■H

votes because of proprietary software license restrictions. Venture capitalist and investment firms like H.I.G. Capital and Bain Capital will argue that these lucrative government contracts create private sector jobs and grow the economy. But according to Romney, government doesn’t create jobs. Is it worth the inherent risk that accompanies this position?

I would not, unlike Vice President Cheney, hire the private sector to fight our wars for profit and I do not agree that our vote should be assigned to the private sector. There are certain responsibilities that should never fall into the hands of profiteers: our military means to defend this nation, our public education system, and most importantly, our vote, because it is ■H our vote that governs the rest.

The opinions expressed in the Opinions section belong solely to their authors and do not represent the Highlander Editorial Board or the University of California, Riverside.

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WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 7, 2012

R adar ARTS & ENTERTAINMENT

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WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 7, 2012

ARTS & ENTERTAINMENT

HIGHLANDER

Omar Rodriguez-Lopez Group at The Barn

Teresa Suarez leading the Omar Rodriguez Lopez Group.

Written by Colette King , CONTRIBUTING WRITER // Photos by Cameron Yong Performing with a unique fusion of metal and rock, the Omar Rodriguez-Lopez Group played on Oct. 31 in the Barn. Tickets were sold out for this highly anticipated performance with people already waiting to enter at 7 p.m. Once the doors opened, the Barn was filled with individuals dressed up in various costumes from a man dressed as a nun to people in kings and queens attire.

The show began with dubstep artist, MONO/ POLY, whose mixes contrasted but created an interesting prelude for the music performed by the Omar Rodriguez-Lopez group. The audience patiently awaited for the artists after MONO/POLY concluded his last few mixes that included creative twists to past songs.

Once the group appeared on stage, the crowd squeezed together, trying to catch a glimpse of the performance. Teresa Suarez, a.k.a. Teri Gender Bender, of Le Butcherettes, a new addition to the Omar Rodriguez-Lopez Group, was the lead singer for the night. Suarez passionately sang from the start, using the entire stage as her dance floor as she moved her entire body and tossed her hair in unusual ways in front of the audience. Rodriguez-Lopez jolted along with her on his guitar. The performance created an

enthusiastic crowd that expressed their affection for Suarez and the band.

The Omar Rodriguez-Lopez group brought much more than the experimental rock music promised but definitely took in consideration of the visual effects of the show. The artists had very specific plans on how they wanted their performance to play out in that they even provided their very own lighting and sound board. The Omar Rodriguez-Lopez Group definitely wanted to define the “Wow Factor” which they successfully pulled off with the cascading light effects and sound alterations that they blended in with the music. Each song had a similar tempo that began with Suarez singing softly or chanting, which eventually transformed into an upbeat symphony and the audience was able to dance along.

A manager that has worked at the Barn for 3 years stated that of all the nights that she has seen performers, this crowd seemed to be the most in love with the artists. This was very believable in that at the end of the show the audience begged for an encore. However, due to time, it was denied. Despite this, the Omar Rodriguez-Lopez group definitely took the Halloween night and made it into an event that ■H people truly wanted to see and hear again.

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WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 7, 2012

VIDEO GAME REVIEWS ASSASSIN’S CREED 3 RATING: ★★★★☆

BY: ALEX SUFFOLK, STAFF WRITER

While actually the fifth in the series, “Assassin’s Creed 3” puts an end to the tale of men running around historical settings in white bed sheets. In this final chapter of bed sheet men, we take on the role of Connor, a half-Mohawk, half-Brit caught in his personal struggle amidst the American Revolution.

However, I am not joking when I tell you it takes four hours to play.

The intro sequence of the game considerably drags on and the payoff is just one plot twist. A significant twist, mind you, but not worth postponing the core of the gameplay for such a long time. From there the story continues to be a little less stellar than I think most people were anticipating it to be. It’s not that the writing is bad, it’s that everything is just too thinly spread out. For those who aren’t familiar with the “Assassin’s Creed” series, it’s about a modern assassin named Desmond Miles who uses a machine powered by suspension of disbelief to allow him to relive the memories of his lethal ancestors. He does this to find valuable information related to an advanced civilization of people that preceded humanity. So AC3 tries to tie up Desmond’s character arc, tie up the first civilization arc, and then introduce and tie up the arc of Connor during the Revolution all in one game. As a result, all three seem a little unrefined and two-dimensional, paling them in comparison to the rich amount of depth put into Ezio and renaissance Italy from “Assassin’s Creed 2.”

It’s also worth noting that often the story missions can get tedious.

Each one comes with a handful of strict secondary objectives that are easy to fail with a slight misstep, which seems to give the impression that designers wanted players to do things in a very specific way. Now it’s not terrible to want players to follow a specific path, but it really does seem to clash with AC3’s open world and variety of techniques.

However, if you really fancy American history, you will definitely get a kick out of a lot of these missions. You will witness the Boston Massacre, take part in the Boston Tea Party, ride with Paul Revere, and even command troops at Lexington and Concord. It’s like an interactive 11th grade textbook.

But while the actual story and main missions can be bothersome, the gameplay itself is just tremendous fun. The sadistic glee of carefully stalking your prey and delivering a surgical strike is still very much present. It’s also nice that the combat has been overhauled to be much more quick and visceral. It takes awhile to get out of the previous AC tactic of mashing counter attack and instantly winning, but once you do, you will find chopping up redcoats with your tomahawk to be much more engaging and requiring of skill. Although sometimes the speed of enemy attacks and wacky camera angles will make you want to scream.

The movement has been cleaned up too. No longer must you constantly switch between walking, running and sprinting modes to get around.

Now you just hold down a button and move the analog stick to make Connor smoothly run and leap through trees, cliff sides and buildings.

The game world is also much larger than before, giving you oodles

Courtesy of Ubisoft Montreal

of options and side quests to fill your time. You can parkour through the frontier and hunt a variety of wildlife. You can take down enemy forts and pick fights with British troops in order to give Boston and New York over to the patriots. You can find and train fellow assassins to aid you in battle. There is even an added naval warfare aspect where you navigate your ship and bombard your enemies with broadside cannons, which was actually some of the most fun I had in the entire game. Take my advice and really enjoy and immerse yourself into the game world, even if a lot of it can seem just optional and pointless. Because if you just try to rush through the story, you might end up a little unsatisfied.

If you have been sticking with “Assassin’s Creed” because of its riveting story and were hoping this would be the stellar climax, I’m sorry to say that you will probably be a bit disappointed. But if you are just craving a bit of acrobatics and violence, “Assassin’s Creed 3” has you covered.

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BOOK REVIEWS THE CASUAL VACANCY // J.K. ROWLING RATING: ★★★☆☆

BY: REBECCA PAREDES, STAFF WRITER

When news hit that J.K. Rowling was writing a new novel, her fan base anticipated literary magic. But Rowling, eager to explore her capacities beyond children’s fiction, set out to distance herself from Harry Potter; she insisted that her new book was written for an adult audience, not Potterheads. In that respect, she succeeded. “The Casual Vacancy” is not Harry Potter. It is raw, gritty and grounded firmly in realism. It is also pretty darn depressing.

Once parish councilor Barry Fairbrother suddenly dies of an aneurysm, the suburban town of Pragford is turned upside-down. The novel follows the subsequent aftermath of Fairbrother’s death, which causes a volatile election within the town’s local government and a slow breakdown of the tenuous relationships among the townspeople. The narrative flips between the perspectives of countless major characters: Howard, a morbidly obese deli owner; Gavin, Fairbrother’s miserable best friend; Kay, an oblivious social worker; Krystal, who would be described as “ratchet” by American teens; Fats, a self-interested adolescent; Andrew, an abused teenager and a smattering of gossiping wives.

“The Casual Vacancy” is classified as a tragicomedy, and with good

reason. While Rowling’s dry humor brightens up the narrative at certain points, the book is largely about the tragically self-destructive nature of secrets, lies and miscommunication.

It lacks a central conflict; the town’s election to fill Fairbrother’s seat on the council moves the story along, but the reader’s attention is primarily focused on the nefarious actions of the townspeople and their inability to act like decent human beings.

And really, only three characters inspire any sort of sympathy: Krystal, whose isolation and surly attitude come from her toxic home life and heroin addict of a mother; Andrew, who is regularly beaten by his tyrannical father; and Sukhvinder, a shy girl who is constantly berated for her shortcomings. Their problems are caused by their environments, which are overrun by selfish parents and drama-seeking townspeople.

Rowling’s prose paints a perfect picture of life in Pradford, but few things are worth celebrating by the novel’s final page. And while some may argue that Rowling’s attention to realism sought to expose issues of individual responsibility and the deadly effects of secrets in a small town, the story is ineffective because the reader is pushed to dislike everyone in Pradford. When the story’s

slow-moving plot is factored into the picture, “The Casual Vacancy” feels like it is missing something important: someone to root for.

We know that the world is a dark and scary place. But what keeps us going is the hope that things will get better. We want to see a hero become a better person after enduring untold obstacles because, by having someone to root for, we realize that things can be solved and people can laugh once more. However, “The Casual Vacancy” lacks a hero. Sukhvinder is the only character that experiences any quantifiable character development, and even then, she merely seems like a lucky supporting character. If anything, Barry is the novel’s hero because of his previous position as councilor, but he is dead and gives us nothing to hope for (sorry, Barry).

By the end of the book, things feel unfinished and empty because almost everyone loses. It is very much a tragic ending, but it lacks a solid purpose. For J.K. Rowling’s first venture into a world beyond Harry Potter, the book shines at some points but feels largely unfinished by its end. If you enjoy tragedies, give it a read. If not, wait for H J.K. Rowling’s next big thing. ■

Courtesy of Little, Brown and Company

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MOVIE REVIEWS SKYFALL LINCOLN THE COMEDY A ROYAL AFFAIR NATURE CALLS ALSO THIS WEEK:

FLIGHT

RATING: ★★★☆☆

BY: DIANA S. HUANG, STAFF WRITER

It’s been a few years since director Robert Zemeckis created such a buzz with a work of his, and with Denzel Washington heading the bill along with what appears to be a solid story, “Flight” looked ready for take off and success.

There’s no denying that “Flight” deals with some pretty heavy issues, such as alcoholism and addiction, but multiple times through the film it feels as though these problems are being shoved down our throats. That coupled with repeated religious references such as keeping faith and believing in miracles muddles the overall message and tone of the film.

It’s emotionally confusing to follow Captain Whip Whitaker (Washington) in the events following the incident in which he landed a plane that was doomed to crash while drunk and high off of cocaine. The beginning of “Flight” showed enormous potential and really illuminated Washington’s ability to command the screen. The moments leading up to the plane malfunction and Whitaker’s attempts to land the aircraft were riveting. Unfortunately, everything after that gets mediocre.

Whitaker wakes up in a hospital bed a hero, but his days of glory are cut short as his blood test shows that he has cocaine in his system and a blood alcohol content about three times over the legal limit permitted to operate a car. Whitaker’s story is intercut and intertwined with that of severely drug-addicted Nicole (Kelly

Courtesy of Paramount Pictures

Reilly). The two meet at the hospital, and Whitaker spontaneously visits her to escape the fact that he can potentially serve life in prison for the four passengers and two airline members that lost their lives during the landing.

There are many elements to “Flight” that makes it a good movie such as the actors and the story, but the delivery fell flat and halfway through the film it becomes pretty clear that there’s no satisfying way to end the movie. Zemeckis aimed for a thought-provoking film that highlights the ambiguity of human morality, but the movie wore itself out within the hour as Whitaker repeatedly plays tug-a-war with his addiction and there’s no solution in sight.

When Whitaker finally makes the right decision, it feels long overdue and misses the sense of accomplishment that usually occurs when the protagonist of a film finally conquers his foe. “Flight” is a film that will make audiences feel a wide range of emotions, from laughter to profound sadness to outright rage and frustration, but it doesn’t exactly reward us for sitting through it, either. The end is fitting, but lackluster and stuffed with clichés and lines that some audiences were whispering under their breath before it was spoken out loud.

It’s hard to label “Flight” as a “good” or “bad” movie. It’s a film of grey areas and ambiguity, and many will certainly ■H like it more than others.

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HIGHLANDER

WRECK IT RALPH RATING: ★★★☆☆

Director Rich Moore (“The Simpsons,” “Futurama”) made his theatrical debut this weekend, but did he succeed in making “Wreck-It Ralph” a knockout? Yes and no. Walt Disney Animation Studios’ latest feature film boasts its usual top notch visual effects, and Moore definitely hit the mark with fast-paced direction that bombards the audience with a roller coaster marriage of classic low-res and highly-detailed 3-D animation.

Contrariwise, the movie also carries the brand of more recent Pixar and Disney features: sacrificing character development for plot, and sacrificing plot for aesthetic appeal. I must admit, however, that the story team definitely kept accessibility for children in mind when they pieced this little adventure together.

“My name’s Ralph, and I’m a bad guy,” the villain (John C. Reilly) of third-gen arcade favorite “Fix-It Felix, Jr.” narrates as his 8-bit image rampages through a twodimensional Niceland. As windows shatter and tenants scatter, the town handyman Fix-It Felix (Jack McBrayer) hops in to save the day with his magic hammer (that’s right, a magic hammer). Once peace is restored, the gleeful Nicelanders proceed to fête their hero, while Ralph is chucked off the roof and into a muddy puddle. Such is the life of a video game villain.

Ralph’s friends at Bad-Anon (a support group for villains) have accepted their inherent coding with the motto: “One game at a time.” For Ralph, however, enough is enough… and being a bad guy just isn’t enough.

On the 30th anniversary of his game, Ralph decides to flee his junkyard and the interminable disdain of the Nicelanders in search of a shiny medal of his own. He

BY: GRACE KANG, STAFF WRITER Courtesy of Walt Disney Animation Studios sneaks his way into the new first-person shooter “Hero’s Duty,” and infiltrates the ranks of battle-hardened Sgt. Calhoun’s (Jane Lynch) platoon, fighting the Cy-Bugs— a species of viral insects that exist only to eat, destroy and spawn more Cy-Bugs— alongside the soldiers, until he seizes the opportunity break away from the pack and go after the coveted medal. Almost immediately after attaining said medal, Ralph is catapulted into “Sugar Rush,” a kart-racing game landscaped in sugary sweets and pastels. There he encounters snarky wild-child Vanellope von Schweetz (Sarah Silverman) who happens to be a fellow outcast, a glitch who, according to the maniacal King Candy (Alan Tudyk), never should have appeared to begin with.

Vanellope steals and uses Ralph’s medal to enter a daily race that, if won, would validate her existence as a character, and the two eventually strike up an unlikely alliance. Something to note (and up the stakes a bit) is that if a character dies in a game that isn’t their own, it’s game over. Permanently.

I couldn’t help but notice that Ralph bears a lot of similar qualities to Disney’s Quasimodo (“The Hunchback of Notre Dame”) and Pixar ’s Sulley (“Monsters, Inc.”); he’s the lonely behemoth whose job is to terrorize others regardless of his own wishes. In fact, it’s the overbearing influence of previous Disney/Pixar films that make “Wreck-It Ralph” relatively predictable; it also relies heavily on the mountain of nostalgic video game reference. Ironically enough, the movie spends more time making references to familiar food icons (e.g. Coca Cola and Mentos, Oreos, Nesquik, etc.) rather than the vast selection of histori-

cally popular video games that take the frontline in the trailers. Nevertheless, you’ll be able to catch glimpses of old favorites, like “Sonic the Hedgehog,” “Super Smash Bros.,” “Street Fighter” and “Pac-Man.” To be frank, once you peel off the flashy effects and retro-gamer nostalgia, “WreckIt Ralph” is a formulaic, rehashed ghost of Disney and Pixar ’s animated past. It is by no means groundbreaking, and it’s not a movie that you’ll want to sit through multiple times after it’s released on DVD. This movie does save itself simply by being likable, right down to the voice actor performances. Bottom line: it’ll be a fun, madcap trip to the theater for the kids, while managing to measure out minimal pain for chaperones.

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TELEVISION REVIEWS AMERICAN HORROR STORY: ASYLUM - “TRICK OR TREAT”/ “NOR’EASTER” RATING: ★★★☆☆

BY: DIANA S. HUANG, STAFF WRITER

Compared to episode one’s frantic and fast-paced season opener, “Trick or Treat” and “Nor’easter” are both less chaotic and much more focused and intense. Any doubts regarding “Asylum” is assuaged as the suspense and freakiness of the second and third episodes add tons to the mystery and madhouse that is Briarcliff.

Picking up seconds after the last episode, Teresa catches a glimpse of Bloody Face and makes a desperate attempt to save her one-armed husband Leo. It’s just too bad that Teresa fails at dragging her husband to safety, leaving Leo in the hands of the serial killer.

Back in 1964, we are introduced to Dr. Oliver Thredson (Zachary Quinto), a psychiatrist who is the only truly “normal” member on the show (so far).

Thredson is sent to evaluate Kit Walker. He’s appalled by the decrepit conditions of the asylum and disgusted by the kind of medieval practices that the staff still administers, such as electroshock therapy and exorcisms. It’s also revealed quite early on in the episode that the real Bloody Face is still out there, murdering women—his latest victim being Lana’s lesbian lover. This is enough to prove that Kit isn’t Bloody Face, but it seems as though word hasn’t reached anyone that they’ve got the wrong man. The alien allusion in the last episode is confirmed as Kit swears to Thredson that he’s sane, innocent, and that Alma is alive and taken by aliens. Scenes of the interview are intercut with Thredson writ-

Courtesy of 20th Century Fox Television

ing a report on the manipulative and unstable nature of Kit. As of the end of “Nor’easter,” the good doctor is still stuck at the asylum, waiting for the storm to end.

“American Horror Story” is also known for being provocative and sexy, and there are no shortages of bare-bottoms and seduction in these two episodes.

Lana and Grace spend some quality bath time together, plotting a way to escape the asylum. Grace wants to bring Kit, but Lana is adamant on leaving the serial killer behind. When eventually presented with an opportunity to escape, Kit wants to come and Lana is forced into going. In hindsight, Lana’s move was made for the greater good, but the result isn’t what she bargained for. Ever the sadist, Sister Jude rewards Lana by letting her pick out the canes that’ll be used to whip Grace and Kit’s bare-buttocks.

The biggest shocker of “Trick or Treat” has got to be the fact that Dr. Arden is even more insane and twisted than first let on.

The psychopath hires a call girl that resembles Sister Eunice, who Dr. Arden has a strange affinity for. Instead of having sex with the call girl, Dr. Arden has her dress up in nun robes. The unlucky woman eventually discovers a collection of black and white photos that suggest Dr. Arden is very closely tied with Bloody Face. He also gives away hints while interrogating Kit that he might have been a Nazi doctor.

Sister Jude also receives a new patient: a boy whom the parents claim is possessed by a demon.

An exorcist is called in, and while

Dr. Thredson objects, he agrees to sit in. There is an immediate dislike between Thredson and Sister Jude, as they represent opposing ends of science and religion. No matter how much the audience wants to side with Thredson, Sister Jude has the last laugh as the boy is indeed possessed by a demon—one that seems to specialize in spilling the dirty secrets of everyone around him. The demon shows flashbacks that reveal Sister Jude was no more than a town floozy, and she only became a nun within the recent months, after committing a heinous crime that should have landed her in jail.

In “Nor’easter” we see her being tortured and literally haunted by her past, and Sister Jude turns to the bottle and runs into something more creepy than herself in the asylum hallways—an alienlooking creature that proves Kit isn’t insane.

The boy being exorcised inevitably dies despite Monsignor Howard’s desperate attempt to drown out the demon with holy water, and nobody seems to notice or put two and two together as Sister Eunice gets knocked out the same time the demon “leaves” the boy. She later throws herself at Arden in the most raunchy, unnun-like way possible, causing Arden to show anger and, wait for it—helplessness at the sight of what he considered most pure to be corrupted by Briarcliff. The best part so far this season is seeing Sister Eunice’s transformation, and it’s clear the devil in her is going to wreak havoc in the asylum. Her possession by the devil seems playful at first, until

one of the patients sniffed out the devil in her and Sister Eunice had to take action herself, resulting in the first on-screen kill of the season, and a bloody one at that too.

“Nor’easter” also shows, in detail, the creatures that live outside Briarcliff: savage, undead monsters made of mismatched body parts with a voracious appetite for human flesh. Kit, Grace and Lana make another plot to escape during the storm of episode three, but after encountering several of the creatures in the woods, they have no choice but to run back to the asylum. It becomes pretty clear from then on that even if they do escape, they might end up losing their lives and limbs on the outside.

Shelley the nympho deserves an honorable mention as she spews out a surprisingly eloquent speech at Dr. Arden regarding gender inequality, how much she hates the word “slut,” and for her sacrifice to help the others escape, resulting in her “clipped wings.”

The story of “the lovers” comes to an end in “Nor’easter” as it is revealed that there’s a group pretending to be Bloody Face in the abandoned asylum, but what none of them realize is that the real Bloody Face is alive and amongst them. “Nor’easter” is more of a filler episode, answering some questions from “Trick or Treat” but creating more conflict and setting the scene for the upcoming episodes.

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MUSIC REVIEWS CEE LO’S MAGIC MOMENT // CEE LO GREEN RATING: ★★★ ☆☆

BY: JILLIAN RAUSA, CONTRIBUTING WRITER Courtesy of Elecktra Records

Less than 55 days until the beloved season of Christmas and Cee Lo Green releases an album loaded with 14 holiday classics. Besides his appearance as a coach on “The Voice,” Cee Lo’s last album was “Lady Killer,” which included the hit “Forget You.” This surprising Christmas album, “Cee Lo’s Magic Moment,” with horses pulling a red Cadillac sleigh on the cover, makes me nervous that Cee Lo will butcher the most wonderful time of the year.

An hour long album full of Christmas songs by a man who turns around in a chair with a cat or parrot? What am I supposed to expect? Green opens the album with “What Christmas Means to Me”—without any of his innovative, tech-

nologic twists—in its original tune debuted by Stevie Wonder. The progression of the album reveals a classic holiday album just as any other artist, but Green includes his quirks in subdued tones within each track.

Timeless Christmas tunes like “White Christmas” and “Baby It’s Cold Outside” remain true to the original tracks, with an added funky R&B twist. It is Cee Lo’s original “All I Need Is Love” featuring The Muppets that adds character and demonstrates the creativity he became known for with “Crazy” in his duo Gnarls Barkley just six years ago. However, Cee Lo loses me when collaborating with the a cappella group, Straight No Chaser, on “You’re A Mean One, Mr. Grinch.”

The vocals are pristine and sharp, covering all octaves for the Dr. Seuss classic, but the song is just too perfect; I do not want to hear the angelic, harmonious melodies of the 10 men and Cee Lo Green. That’s not what comes to mind when I picture the Grinch stealing Christmas.

“Cee Lo’s Magic Moment” compilation of holiday classics from the ‘70s to his original tracks stays true to Cee Lo Green and his quirks. Without a doubt, Green’s voice and funk shines a playful light on these beloved Christmas songs, which one can either love or hate. In my eyes, the moment was more a pleasant than magical experience as he did not ruin the holiday season as I expected.

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HIGHLANDER

. FEATURES .

WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 7, 2012

HEALING HIGHLANDERS

RAVEN MORRIS, Contributing Writer Photos courtesy of Healing Highlanders

A part of what makes UCR a comfortable space for students is the abundant amount of programming provided for a wide range of issues. From The Student Wellness Partners to UCR Active Minds, student groups have been remarkable in creating healthy environments for overall well-being.

A relatively new addition to campus, Healing Highlanders, is a collegiate recovery community aimed at providing a supportive safe-haven for students recovering from addiction. A student might be tempted to automatically think of addiction in the form of recovery groups such as Alcoholics Anonymous (A.A.) meetings. Alcoholism and drug abuse may be the only things that come to mind. Addiction recovery can encompass a number of different issues, much more than meets the eye. Essentially, any practice can turn into a dangerous habit. After speaking with Fabiola Escobedo, a

third-year psychology major and public relations officer for Healing Highlanders, it’s pretty clear that addiction comes in many shapes and sizes.

The club kicked off in 2011 by founder Mariel Bello and was named New Student Organization of the Year by the University of California, Riverside. Modeled after the collegiate recovery community of Texas Tech University, Healing Highlanders is focused on community service, general outreach and providing an outlet for those in need. The stigma surrounding addiction recovery can be seemingly narrowminded. Because they already have so much on their plate, college students are rarely conceived as those needing support networks for recovery from addiction. Because of this, students who may need those resources can become lost in the jumble of campus life. In spite of the stigma, awareness HEALING CONT’D ON PAGE 22

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Opposite page: The conference Left: UCR Healing Highlander Right: Meeting in Pentland Hills HEALING FROM PAGE 21

and outreach is growing rapidly among the UC system. The need for peer support is a main factor in the creation of clubs like Healing Highlanders. From video games and food, to love, sex and belonging, any form of addiction can be addressed in a recovery support groups. “We’re here to provide the resources to help you get through college. Sometimes addictions can be what prevents people from finishing their four years”, says Escobedo. Care for those in recovery is essential despite the form of addiction. With the growth from last year’s five members to now 40, Healing Highlanders provides weekly general meetings as well as weekly 12Step meetings with advisors to facilitate discussion. Those who attend are able to discuss their journeys of recovery and re-

ceive the comfort of belonging to a supportive atmosphere.

The club recently hosted the California Unified Collegiate Recovery Conference at Pentland Hills from October 20-21. The two day conference incorporated a number of keynote speakers including Peter Gaumond, chief of the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy and Dr. Harry L. Haroutunian, physician director of The Betty Ford Center. The conference began with an Exhibitors Expo followed by group discussions, interest sessions, speaker presentations and 12-Step meetings. The conference also included a presentation from former Major League Baseball player Trevor Hoffman and a Natural High Dance Event held at the Student Recreation Center (SRC), featuring the band Cosmic SuckerPunch. Healing High-

landers has even teamed up with schools like UCSB to introduce the collegiate recovery community to the west coast.

Stacie Mathewson, founder of the Stacie Mathewson Foundation, was also in attendance for the conference. Mathewson’s foundation supports sobriety and recovery from addiction. With no idea of her plans, the club was in total shock when Mathewson presented Healing Highlanders with a $10,000 donation on the last day of the conference. The club was awarded the donation for their efforts in creating a successful recovery community and their dedication to the cause. Some of the plans for the donation include future conference funding and working toward making a space on campus for their organization.

With the success of their past confer-

ence and a gracious donation under their belt, Healing Highlanders is motivated to start working on new community service projects. The club will join the MFI Recovery Center in a new mentorship program for high school students who may be dealing with addiction or recovery. Some of the funds received in the donation will also go towards providing resources for the participants and field trips for them to enjoy.

Anyone can become apart of Healing Highlanders, whether they are in recovery or want to get involved with community service and outreach. General meetings and 12-Step meetings will begin on campus. Healing Highlanders is a new and shining example for student run organizations on campus, and they’ve got a $10,000 donation to prove it.

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FEATURES

Professor Emeritus Profile

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Grant Boughter, CONTRIBUTING WRITER PHOTO COURTESY OF THE John D. & Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation Uta Barth, a conceptual photographer and UCR’s own professor emeritus of art, has been named a 2012 MacArthur Fellow for her latest works, “white blind” (bright red) in 2002 and “...and to draw a bright, white line with light” (2011). This prestigious fellowship, nicknamed the “genius grant,” awarded Professor Barth a no-strings attached sum of $500s,000, to be dispersed over 5 years. In the words of the MacArthur Foundation, it’s an award for “individuals who have shown exceptional creativity in their work and promise to do more;” it’s “an investment in a person’s originality, insight and potential.”

The MacArthur fellowship is one of the nation’s most respected grants; since 1978, they’ve awarded funds totaling over $5 billion.

According to the foundation, Barth’s innovative use of “evocative, abstract photographs explore the nature of vision and the difference between how a human sees reality and how a camera records it” was reason enough for her fellowship.

Even more fascinating however, is her use of the mundane in her last two installments. Barth intentionally photographed the seemingly nondescript surroundings in her home to draw attention to the physical act of observing, to perception itself. She aims to challenge our perspective in life, through, according to Barth, the use of light as the medium in her work.

By manipulating shades and curtains in her home, Barth draws in natural sunlight and captures her images using the sunlight as the subject of each scene. The effect of which, according to the MacArthur foundation, is that each of her photos “evoke the subtle passage of time while also highlighting the visceral and intellectual pleasures of seeing.”

For UCR, Professor Barth’s fellowship carries it’s own meaning. In an interview last month with Bettye Miller, Barth said, “I plan to still teach, but on a very part-time basis. I learn much from teaching, I learn from students and I learn what I am thinking when forced to put language to it. I think it is a valuable thing to do.” Having such a prestigious member of the arts community on staff will undoubtedly be an invaluable resource for all of UCR’s shutter-bugs and you other photographically inclined members of our student body.

Professor Uta Barth’s work is represented in many public and private collections around the world, including local venues such as the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, the Museum of Contemporary Art, the Getty Museum and the Hammer Museum in Los Angeles to name a few. With an open mind, perceptions of reality, life, and our ■H interactions with the world are able to be challenged.

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. SPORTS .

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HIGHLANDER

UC Riverside women’s volleyball ends winning drought against Cal State Bakersfield Darren Bueno STAFF WRITER

November 2, 2012 Highlander 3 -- Roadrunners 1 The UC Riverside women’s volleyball team snapped an eleven match losing streak on Friday night Nov. 2 with a 25-11, 20-25, 25-22, 25-21 victory over nonconference opponent Cal State Bakersfield. Tyler Dorsey’s nine kills and team high eight blocks led the Highlanders (6-19, 0-11) to their first home win of the season in front of a spirited Riverside crowd.

UC Riverside bolted out to a 6-1 lead and led by as many as 13 points en route to a 25-11 set win. Powered by blistering kills and dominant serving, the Highlanders overwhelmed the opposing team as they hit an attack percentage of .300 compared to the Roadrunner’s attack percentage .103. The tandem of Jasmin White and Dorsey helped produce a 13-6 differential in total attacks for the opening set.

The second set saw the Highlander’s aggressive attacking backfire as the fantastic kills from the first set started to misfire.

Knotted at 4-4, the Roadrunners went on a 6-1 run to lead 11-5 before sprinting to a 25-20 set win. CSU Bakersfield’s Kelsee Sawyer drilled eight kills as UC Riverside’s sideout percentage dropped from 75% (9-12) to 41% (10-24).

The third set featured 11 tied scores and six lead changes as both teams jostled to lead in the vital period. The Highlanders battled to stay in the set early as they fell to a 14-16 deficit following four consecutive errors. A pair of kills by Amanda Vialpando and a service ace tied the score at 1818 before a string of four UCR points pushed the Highlanders to 22-19 advantage. Two successive UC Riverside errors cut the lead to within one point at 23-22 before a Ashley Cox kill and Roadrunner mistake sealed the competitive set, 25-22.

The fourth set saw UC Riverside fight to earn their first win in nearly two months, a span of eleven games. UCR, feeding off of crowd energy, jumped to a 1310 lead as the Roadrunners offense struggled with errors. UCR capitalized extending the lead to 21-17 before a surge by the opposing team pulled the set to within two points at 23-21. Following a timeout, Dorsey spurred the Highlanders and the Riverside crowd as her ninth kill gave UCR a match point, which was converted after a Roadrunner error, 25-21.

“She did a great job,” Highlanders coach Ron Larsen said of Dorsey. “She has been working really hard in the gym. Tyler’s excited to be out there, so it’s great to see.” Dorsey led UC Riverside with a team high eight blocks while Vialpando added 12 kills and 9 digs. Emily Borges recorded 36 assists helping the team to a nearly .200 attack percentage for the game.

Late quarter execution has plagued UC Riverside all season,

but the win tonight all came down to composure. “We’ve been talking about it all the time. You have to stay composed. You can’t have too many highs or lows, you have to be consistent.” Larsen stressed.

“The biggest thing [tonight] was that we really played every point, one point at a time; we didn’t get too caught with what’s going to happen next or what just happened. We did a great job of staying in the moment.”

Dorsey summed up the feelings of not only the team but also the animated crowd as she declared: “We finally did it! We finally got a W!” November 3, 2012 Titans 3 -- Highlanders 1 The UC Riverside women’s volleyball team, brimming with renewed confidence, squared off against their Big West conference adversary Cal State Fullerton on Saturday night Nov. 3 as they looked to gain their second consecutive win of the weekend at the Titan Gym in Fullerton.

Plagued by costly errors and inconsistent stretches of play, the Highlanders (6-20, 0-12) fell to the Titans (13-12, 7-5) in four tightly contested sets (26-24, 25-

19, 21-25, 25-22).

Amanda Vialpando led Riverside with 16 kills and 14 digs. Ashley Cox recorded a double-double tallying 11 kills and 10 digs while Emily Bourges added 33 assists and 17 digs. Bre Moreland steered the Titans with 15 kills and 19 digs.

The Highlanders opened the match defensively as the Titans, who have won fifteen straight matches against UCR, pelted an array of kills to lead 5-1. Backed by three Tyler Dorsey service aces, UCR recovered to even the score at 7-7 before pulling ahead 19-15 after two consecutive Dorsey kills.

UC Riverside then started to unravel as CSU Fullerton rallied to tie the score at 20-20 prompting a Highlanders timeout. The two teams alternated leads until 24-24 when a Titans kill and UCR error donated the set, 26-24.

After dropping the second set (25-19), the Highlanders opened the third period more assertive on offense as they progressed to a 20-15 advantage before eventually sealing the set behind a Cox putaway, 25-21. UCR’s attack percentage rose from .000 (set two) to .219 (set three) while the Titans produced double digit attacking errors (10).

The fourth set saw UC River-

T u s n g S u /HIGHLANDER Highlander Emily Borges waits for her teammate to serve the ball.

side trailing 5-12 as the Highlanders struggled to overcome errors that began to seep into play. Strong serving and timely kills aided the visiting team as UCR knotted the score at 18-18. The two teams then traded leads until 24-22 when a Ti-

WOMEN’S VOLLEYBALL STANDINGS BIG WEST GAMES Team Hawaii Cal State Northridge Long Beach State Cal State Fullerton UC Davis UC Santa Barbara Pacific UC Irvine Cal Poly UC Riverside

W

L

PCT.

14 9 8 7 7 6 6 5 2 0

0 5 5 5 6 6 7 8 10 12

1.000 .643 .615 .583 .545 .500 .462 .385 .167 .000

CLASSIFIEDS Advertising Information

ALL GAMES

tans kill sealed the match, 25-22.

The Highlanders continue their three game road trip against UC Irvine on Thursday, November 8 at ■H 7pm in Irvine, California.

W

L

PCT.

21 18 13 13 13 13 18 10 3 6

2 8 11 12 13 14 8 17 21 20

.913 .692 .542 .520 .500 .481 .692 .370 .125 .231

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SPORTS

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WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 7, 2012

25

Women’s golf finishes fourth at Lamkin Grip Cal Poly Invitational Matthew Guerrero CONTRIBUTING WRITER

KENDALL PETERSON

KENDALL’S FASTBALL NHL Lockout It is such a tragedy to see the National Hockey League become the next sport to go under another lockout because two sides can not come to an agreement. Sadly, this is not the first lockout that the NHL has gone through.

The last time the NHL has gone through a lockout was back in 2004. It was the first time since 1919 that the Stanley Cup was not won, and the first time a major professional sports league in North America canceled a complete season because of a labor dispute. The outcome was devastating. No one imagined the NHL would not have a season.

However, the NHL proved to be different, and this could be history repeating itself.

This past Friday, Nov. 2 proved that the season may be in jeopardy because the two sides were unable to bargain fairly and the Winter Classic was cancelled as a result. I hope that this does not happen again because fans deserve to watch their team compete in another season in the NHL. I mean it was just recently that the L.A. Kings won the Stanley Cup and they have the right to defend their title.

The ongoing labor dispute began on Sept.

15, 2012 when the expiration of the NHL’s collective bargaining agreement expired. It is like deja vu. It was just last year that the NBA’s collective bargaining agreement expired but at least the NBA still had a season. You can not say the same for the NHL. The NHL season is currently scheduled to begin on Dec. 1, 2012 with no more than 66 games to be played.

When the lockout started I knew to say goodby to the 82-game season and now I just hope that the NHL can come with an agreement and the season ■H can finally begin.

UC Riverside’s women’s golf team finished the first action Monday Oct. 29 with a score of 304, placing the Highlander ’s second out of 17 teams at the Lamkin Grip Cal Poly Invitational, and brought high hopes going into day two. However, on Tuesday Oct. 30 the Highlanders fell back three spots to finish the tournament in fourth place out of 17 teams.

In the first round, Highlander Savannah Vilaubi was tied for first with a score of 71 and UC Riverside finished second with a score of 304, just behind first place Northern Arizona.

UC Riverside hoped to take charge behind their individual leader Vilaubi, and two of their top twenty finishers in Amelia Ek, who shot a

75, and Hannah Lee, who shot a 76. Ek and Lee finished the first round in 10th and 16th respectively, showing the incredible level of competition among the athletes, as tenth and sixteenth place were separated by just one point.

Coach Riehle commented on his team’s performance, saying, “For the second tournament in a row we entered the final round with an opportunity to win the team title, this time at the Cal Poly Invitational.”

Riverside faced tough competition on day two.

The Highlanders finished in fourth place with a score of 315, behind first place Gonzaga that shot hot with a score of 297, Southern Utah managed to finish second firing a score of 304 and Northern Arizona finished third with a score of 314. Riverside did not lack effort in the tough

and fierce competition, as Savannah Vilaubi still managed to score an 80.

Vilaubi moved from a top individual performance to 11th with a combined score of 151.

Amelia Ek was consistent with her performance finishing 15th, firing a second round score of 77 and total of 152. Brittani Ferraro, Hannah Lee, and Tiffany Koyano all finished in the top 40 in individual performances when they tied for 38th place.

Coach Riehle had this to say on his team’s second day finish, “This is a different experience from what the players on this team are accustomed to, and it is a learning process in trying to play a great round against three or four other teams who are also playing well.” UC Riverside’s women’s team did indeed fall off of their

incredibly competitive pace and Coach Riehele added, “I am very pleased just having our team in that situation and am confident that the next time we have a chance to win we will be able to close it out.”

UC Riverside doesn’t compete again until February, at the San Diego Championships, but Coach Riehle’s had some promising words concerning his team’s performance and the future. He said, “Overall I was very pleased with the team’s performance over our three fall season events. We played talented competition and finished each event with a Top5 finish and a combined head to head record of 379. Our goals will remain the same throughout the season; focusing on daily improvement and steady work on team and individual ■H weaknesses.”

SPORTS

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WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 7, 2012

27

Highlanders trounce UC irvine in overtime, get knocked out of Big West tournament by Fullerton C o dy N g u y e n STAFF WRITER

October 31, 2012 Highlanders 4 -- Anteaters 3 With the final Big West playoff spot on the line, the men’s soccer team entered Wednesday’s match against the UC Irvine Anteaters in need of a win. The Highlanders got the much needed win by beating the Anteaters 4-3.

To earn a postseason berth, the Highlanders must win the next game against Cal State Fullerton because Cal State Northridge defeated Fullerton on Wednesday Oct. 31 to give the Highlanders a shot at the postseason.

Five minutes into the match, led by Eric Gonzalez’s corner kick, Highlander Juan Valladolid found the back of the net on a header to take an early 1-0 lead. Riverside’s lead would evaporate 12 minutes later courtesy of Irvine’s Thom Moreira’s equalizing goal.

Four minutes later the Highlander received another free kick and Juan Mendoza found Humberto Santiago, who gave the Highlanders a 2-1 lead into halftime.

The Anteaters equalized in

the second half as Mitchell Alvarez found Christopher Santana in the 54th minute.

Contrary to the events of the first half, it would not be the Highlanders, but the Anteaters, who scored the next goal to take a 3-2 lead off the foot of Tarek Morad in the 58th.

The Highlanders would not go away. In the 64th minute, Highlander forward Richie Osborne took over the game and scored the tying goal to send the game into overtime.

In overtime Osborne scored yet another clutch goal to keep the Highlanders’ postseason aspirations intact defeating the Anteaters 4-3.

November 3, 2012 Titans 2 - HIghlanders 1 Winner takes all.

That statement was the driving force in Saturday’s pivotal matchup between the UC Riverside men’s soccer team and the Cal State Fullerton Titans, with the winner advancing to the Big West tournament, and the loser beginning early preparations for the 2013 season.

The Titans struck first, taking a 1-0 lead on Gerzon Blanco’s rebound goal off a blocked shot. The

Highlanders could not answer in the first half, and were outshot by the Titans 10-7.

An even deeper hole was dug for the Highlanders when Gerzon Blanco’s header towards the net never cleared the danger area near the UCR goal, allowing Jesse Escalante to extend the lead to 2-0 and score his eighth goal of the season.

Blanco was all over the field in a stellar performance against the Highlanders, accumulating a goal, an assist, and six of the team’s 14 shots in the contest.

Hope was inspired in the Highlanders when Aaron Long scored his sixth goal of the season with help from Ruben Valencia and Richie Osborne. That optimism would fade with every passing second until there was no time left on the clock, signaling the end of the game and the season for the UCR men’s soccer team as an ecstatic Fullerton crowd watched their team earn the final berth in the Big West conference tournament.

The Highlanders finish the season 10-8-0 overall, and 3-7-0 in conference play. Aaron Long led the team in scoring with six ■H goals and one assist.

MEN’S SOCCER STANDINGS BIG WEST GAMES Team Cal State Northridge UC Davis Cal Poly Sacramento State Cal State Fullerton UC Santa Barbara UC Riverside UC Irvine

W

L

T

PCT.

7 7 6 5 4 4 3 2

3 3 3 4 5 5 7 8

0 0 1 1 1 1 0 0

.700 .700 .667 .556 .444 .444 .300 .200

MEN’S SOCCER STANDINGS ALL GAMES Team Cal State Northride UC Davis Cal Poly Sacramento State Cal State Fullerton UC Santa Barbara UC Riverside UC Irvine

W

L

T

PCT.

13 9 11 8 8 10 10 5

6 6 6 8 11 6 8 14

0 4 1 2 1 3 0 1

.684 .579 .639 .500 .425 .605 .556 .275

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A r chi v e /HIGHLANDER Joseph O’Connor heads the ball to set up a teammate.

28

WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 7, 2012

SPORTS

HIGHLANDER

UCR men’s basketball defeats San Diego Christian for first win of the season Jayvee Valencia CONTRIBUTING WRITER

The UC Riverside Men’s basketball team pulled away with a win in their exhibition game vs.

NAIA Division 1 School San Diego Christian 83-72.

The Highlanders played through the post early, using excellent set plays and utilizing angles on their post entry passing. As a result, it led to easy buckets and fouls that resulted in free throws. Highlander Chris Patton scored nine points off of post entry passes in the perimeter. Josh Fox made his presence felt in the paint when he scored nine points and grabbed three offensive rebounds.

Attacking off the dribble drive was also key in the first half. Robert Smith created fouls off of his dribble penetration, shooting five of seven from the free throw line. As a team, the Highlanders shot 14-21 in the free throws for the first half.

San Diego Christian played a spread game using a lot of pick and rolls, drive and dish to three pointers in their offensive arsenal as well as creating off the dribble and making the mid range shots with their guards.

San Diego Christian’s Derrick Thompson led the way with 11 points and the team shot seven of 15 from three point range.

A 2-3 zone defense was employed late by San Diego Christian to negate the Highlander’s interior play. The Highlanders were rattled and caught off guard with a couple of turnovers. Playing through the post and dribble drives helped the Highlander’s entry passes inside to Chris Patton and the offensive rebounding gave them higher percentage

MICHAEL RIOS

RIO-SIDE Why Mike Brown should be fired

T s u n g S u /HIGHLANDER Highlander Robert Smith dribbles down the court on a fast break against San Diego Christian.

shots. Although they shot two of 11 from the three point range, Highlanders Austin Quick and Davin Guinn provided timely threes as both combined were two of four from three pointers.

UCR trailed 41-40 at the half. However, the second half was a different story. UC Riverside stymied San Diego Christian’s offense by forcing contested threes, mid-range shots, and contested dribble drives in the paint leading to 33% field goal shooting (11-33) and 25% three point shooting. Although Fox and Patton controlled the boards and scored in the paint, Highlander Chris Harriel came alive attacking with 10 points in the second half. He went three of seven from the field and three of four in the free throw line finishing with 12 points total.

The Highlanders used perimeter passing and drives to the rim to attack the gaps in the zone defense leading them to 11-22 free throws and pulling

away for an 83-72 victory. Patton led the team in scoring with 23 points. Fox led in rebounding with 11 and finished with a double-double adding 15 points while Quick led in assists with seven.

Coach Jim Wooldridge commented on the interior play of Chris Patton and Josh Fox, saying. “Those guys can produce more offense for us than anyone on our team, and then they’re the finish part of our defense… they got big and wide and created some misses by the offense.”

On the impact of the point guard play and leadership of Robert Smith for Saturday’s game and the future, he said, “We have to have him, 34 minutes tonight and we just didn’t feel comfortable getting him off the floor. He has a major role on this team, a significant importance, I shudder to think what we’d do without him right now because we are trying to develop a young man behind him that has not

been a point guard, so the more minutes Robert can claim and do it effectively, then we can bring this other young man on.”

Patton spoke on his first game as an NCAA division one player tonight saying “I was really excited, I really wasn’t nervous. I played in junior college for two years and the reason I went to junior college was to be a Division 1 basketball player. I was waiting for this for a long time, so I was ready to go.”

“This year we have a post presence so we can go inside a lot more than we did last year,” said Robert Smith on the differences between last year and this year’s team. “Last year we relied on our guards. That’s what we’re focused on this year, an inside-out game.”

The 2012-2013 season begins on Nov. 9 as the Highlanders travel to Chicago to face Depaul University from the ■H Big East Conference.

Riverside women’s basketball tops Cal Baptist in exhibition, 59-54 C o dy N g u y e n STAFF WRITER

The UC Riverside women’s basketball team entered Saturday’s exhibition match against crosstown opponent California Baptist University hoping to get a rolling start to their 2012 season.

The Highlanders have won their last seven against the Lancers, including a 75-43 thumping the last time the two teams met in 2001.

The first half saw both squads trade blows until the Highlanders pulled away midway through the first half with a 15-0 run led by guard Dynese Adams, who scored six straight points for the Highlanders en route to a 26-14 lead. The Lancers however were able to cut the lead to 31-24 by halftime thanks in part to a threepointer by Brittney Lewis in the waning seconds of the first half.

Cal Baptist opened up the second half with a Jasmine Beverly jump shot to further cut into the Highlander lead.

Tre’shonti Nottingham then halted the Lancers’ advance with a layup that turned into a three-point play thanks to a foul by Lesley Vodicska. Highlander Jasmine Beverly had a chance to answer with a three-point opportunity of

her own, but failed to convert on the and-one.

Much of the second half was a game of cat-and mouse between the two sides, with the Lancers cutting the Highlander lead to three and then two points in the second half. The most significant of these rallies occurred in the final minutes of regulation with the Highlanders leading 57-50 Down seven with 2:15 to play in the second half, Lancer Lesley Vodicska hit a jumper to cut the lead to 57-52. Tre’shonti Nottingham subsequently misfired on a three-point attempt, setting the Lancers up with an opportunity to pull within one possession of the Highlanders.

They did just that. A Natasha Hadley foul allowed Myriah Hicks to convert both of her attempts from the charity stripe, making the score 57-54 with a minute to play in regulation.

Tre’shonti Nottingham took the ensuing Highlander possession in search of her killer instinct, knowing that a score would in all likelihood ice the game for the Highlanders. Her search would find no answers, as she missed yet another jumper, giving the Lancers an opportunity to tie the game with a three-pointer.

Highlander forward Jamila

J in y o u n g K o /HIGHLANDER UC Riverside Brittany Crain tries to find an open teammate.

Williams would then foul Brittney Lewis, who fatally missed both of her free throws.

Lewis’ fatal misses left the Lancers desperate, as they fouled Tre’shonti Nottingham, sending her to the line. Nottingham stepped up to the charity stripe and found her misplaced killer instinct, nailing both attempts to seal the 59-54 Highlander victory.

Head coach John Margaritis called the game “a first step, an opportunity for us to see the floor,

win or lose.” Margaritis’ hopes for the players to “improve every day, and from game to game” and expects the fans to “help us fill this place (SRC Arena), especially the students.”

Asked about the Big West media poll picking the Highlanders to finish eighth in the conference, Coach Margaritis boldly stated, “That’s why you play the games.

If the media was [at] our practices every day and picked us to finish ■H eighth, I’d be worried.”

No NBA team has been under the spotlight more than the Los Angeles Lakers this year. Fans, coaches, managers and even players had incredibly high expectations for the super team this season.

Thus far, we’ve seen nothing close to the high-powered offense we were promised. And the man to blame for that is Head Coach Mike Brown.

Since his controversial arrival to LA over a year ago, the Lakers have seen disappointment after disappointment. The team’s offense is nothing compared to the beautifully executed system of Phil Jackson’s Triangle.

We’ve seen turnovers, shot clock violations and awkward offensive possessions from the team.

To top it all off, this is the second straight time the Lakers have started the season winless under Mike Brown’s reign.

They started 0-2 last year and they started 0-3 this season.

Something has to give.

Mike Brown’s era has been full of questionable choices and lackluster offensive schemes. In the midst of the panic, Brown has simply downplayed the situation and has failed to take blame for the struggles of the team. Recently, Brown even blamed Kobe Bryant’s scoring for the team’s struggles.

During a press conference, Brown was asked if Bryant’s 40 points during a game against the Clippers affected the rest of the team’s rhythm. Brown replied, “It can be harmful... There were some instances through the course of the game where we didn’t get it in great flow, which can be harmful to us down the road.”

Sorry, Mike Brown. The Kobe isn’t the “harmful” problem. After all, Bryant is the guy with five championship rings.

If a change doesn’t come to LA soon, the NBA will be left with an empty feeling. The super team that the league was promised will cease to exist.

The highly-anticipated Finals matchup between Kobe and LeBron will never be seen. It’s a terrible scenario. It’s not good for the sport.

Mike Brown’s reign has failed. It’s time to go. It’s time for a new coach. It’s time for the sport to profit from the Lakers.

Most importantly, it’s time for the the Los Angeles Lakers to ■H finally win some games.