Verde Volume 15 Issue 2

V.

VERDE MAGAZINE • VOLUME 15, ISSUE 2 • NOVEMBER 2013

INDEX SHORT STUFF The Launch News

7 12

FEATURES Gender Gap in AP Classes Winter Lodge Alternative Schooling Sleep Deprivation

18 20 22 24

COVER Cannabis Controversy

26

PROFILES Shirley Zimmerman Gabe Galang Paly’s Newest New Yorker Paly’s EDM DJ’s Irish Dancers

38 42 44 45 46

PERSPECTIVES 50 52 54 55

Confidence SAT-Prep Madness AP Problems NSA

CULTURE Veggie Tales The Scoop on Scoop (B)east Coast Rap Got Gott’s?

Stanford Theater Jamie’s Jams Toffee Recipe This Land(e) is Your Land(e)

58 60 63 64 66 68 69 70

Ana Sofia Amieva Wang Ana Sofia Amieva-Wang

JAM OUT Paly Rocks president junior Gabe Galang riffs and picks on his acoustic guitar. Read more about Galang’s passion for music on p. 42.

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EDITORIALS GIVE NEW CALENDAR A FIGHTING CHANCE

O

n Nov. 19, the Palo Alto Board of Education will decide whether to have pre-winter break finals for the next two years.

In surveys by the district, parents largely cite their main concerns about early endings to summer vacations and the stress their children feel when finals precede winter break, with senior parents pointing out an uncomfortable overlap with college applications. While we appreciate the concern for students’ wellbeing and stress reduction, this new schedule was implemented only last year — seeking change seems hurried. The Verde staff believes more time should be put into refining the current calendar rather than discarding it completely.

Before deciding to abandon the present system, the district should realize that, although the first year may not have gone as smoothly as planned, most students still prefer pre-break to postbreak finals.

Changing the calendar will place an unnecessary burden on teachers and students alike. With new implementations, teachers must deal with balancing and readjusting their course units to fit the new calendar. This is would be especially difficult for AP teachers, who must tailor their syllabi to guidelines set by the College

THE COVER

Board.

When Paly crossed over to block scheduled periods, there were some complaints. Then, like now, the majority of the student body preferred the new system, according to the administration’s poll. While there was a period of adjustment for teachers as well as for students, the adjustment period soon passed and we are left with the current, well-organized system. We should handle our school calendar just as we handled class block periods.

While the proposal to have an extended first semester lasting two weeks after finals and winter break has its benefits, when it comes to education, some amount of consistency is key. We shouldn’t put change on the table until we know that the system is broken. Only then, if our district and students believe they are not fully satisfied with the system, should we change to a new schedule.

Constantly changing and rearranging the schedule will produce more harm than good. Consistency in a schedule gives students the assurance that the their only worry is learning the information in the course, not stressing over changing schedules.

Furthermore, when changes are proposed, people will have to accept that compromise will have to be part of a solution, because ultimately the student’s well being is most important.

THE STAFF

Photography by Jack Brook This issue, Verde’s cover story tells the complex tale of medical marijuana. Its use and abuse by teens and adults alike has long been a topic of controversy in the political sphere. But now, things are changing. With recreational marijuana legalized in Colorado and Washington and voter initiatives in the pipeline in at least three other states, we can practically see the smoke signals.

See p. 26 for more.

Volume 15 • Issue 2 • November 2013 Editors-in-chief Hollis Kool Noam Shemtov Managing Editor Jamie Allendorf Design Editor Daniela Ivey Section Editors Samantha Dewees, Features & Profiles Will Queen, Perspectives Lande Watson, Culture Alyssa Takahashi, The Launch News Editor Bryan Wong Business Manager Angela Xu

Art Director Anthony Liu Photo Director Ana Sofia Amieva-Wang Staff Writers Eliza Ackroyd Zofia Ahmad Jack Brook Lucy Fox Brigid Godfrey Alexandra Hsieh Jasper McEvoy Madison Mignola Tira Oskoui Paul Promthong Claire Priestley Anand Srinivasan Adviser Paul Kandell

CONTACT US VERDE MAGAZINE

Noam Shemtov

AFFORDABLE HOUSING MUST STAY

T

he Buena Vista mobile home park has been a source of socioeconomic diversity in Palo Alto since its establishment in the 1950s, but as of November of last year, the park has been slated to close.

Apartment buildings will replace it.

Verde believes that the park owners’ decision will not only negatively impact the people and families living in the park’s 104 mobile homes, but also upset Palo Alto’s economic diversity — especially in schools. In the future, the city must implement solutions to provide alternative affordable housing opportunities to support Palo Alto’s low-income residents.

As an affluent city, Palo Alto tends to attract and support the wealthy. However, 17.4 percent of our city’s population lives with an income below $40,000. According to National Public Radio, Buena Vista residents pay an average monthly rent of $700, significantly less than Palo Alto’s average of $2,600, according to the Silicon Valley Business Journal.

According to the San Jose Mercury News, the Jissers are offering park residents $11,000 as relocation assistance and $21,000 if the residents’ homes cannot be relocated.

The residents of the park, some of whom have lived there since the early 90s, have created permanent homes. The majority of Buena Vista residents Verde interviewed said they did not

know what they would do after the park’s closure.

Few neighboring districts with reasonably priced housing offer education comparable to Palo Alto’s.

The children of the park all currently attend Palo Alto schools. After families are forced to leave Buena Vista, their children will almost definitely have to leave our district’s schools. Our schools benefit from the little socioeconomic and racial diversity they have. Diversity fosters open-mindedness and non-judgemental behavior, allowing our schools’ students to create relationships with those outside their personal scopes.

The city must work to make it easier to legally secure low-income housing in efforts to prevent easy closure of communities like Buena Vista.

The city should ensure the security of current and future low-income housing arrangements in a way that would make the eviction of the residents difficult. Laws should bind privately-owned property to protect affordable housing from being sold or re-priced exclusively by the private owner’s whim.

It is the city’s responsibility to accommodate those the park’s closure will displace, either by creating other low-income housing opportunities or by increasing the level of assistance given to Palo Alto’s lower-income families. The city must also work to make it easier for low-income housing to be arranged and secured legally to prevent easy closure of affordable housing like Buena Vista.

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@VERDEMAGAZINE Publication Policy Verde, a feature magazine published by the students in Palo Alto High School’s Magazine Journalism class, is a designated open forum for student expression and the discussion of issues of concern to its readership.

Verde is distributed to its readers and the student body at no cost.

Letters to the Editors The staff welcomes letters to the editors but reserves the right to edit all submissions for length, grammar, potential libel, invasion of privacy and obscenity. Send all letters to verde-eics-13-14@googlegroups. com or to 50 Embarcadero Road Palo Alto, CA 94301. All Verde stories are posted online and available for commenting at http://verdemagazine. com Advertising The staff publishes advertisements with signed contracts providing they are not deemed by the staff inappropriate for the magazine’s audience.

For more information about advertising with Verde, please contact the Verde business manager Angela Xu at 650-796-2358 for more information.

Printing & Distribution Services Verde is printed five times a year in October, November, February, April and May, by Fricke-Parks Press in Fremont, Calif. The Paly PTSA mails Verde to every student’s home. All Verde work is available at http://verdemagazine.com

COMMENT ON STORIES AT verdemagazine.com • Let us know what you think of our magazine.

• Discuss topics with other readers.

• Critique our coverage of events and news.

• Help us serve the community with up-to-date facts and insights.

• Help support our program with your donation at the Palo Alto High School webstore.

CLINICAL CANNABIS Dispensaries are often criticized for their lax restrictions on medical marijuana cards and sales. Read further in “Cannabis Controversy” (p. 26).

EDITORS’ LETTER “Marijuana may be reaching next for your son or daughter… or yours… or YOURS!” And now it’s reaching for your state. It saturates the air in Santa Cruz and the street in Venice Beach, hangs heavy in the hands of law enforcement and light in the lungs of cancer and glaucoma patients.

Sheriffs in Northern California’s growing region routinely deal with complaints of its stench; teens in Golden Gate Park praise its redolence. In short, marijuana is everywhere — and it’s nothing new. The legalization of its recreational use is well underway in Colorado and Washington, with voter initiatives in process in at least three other states.

But this is not the same five-leafed demon of “Reefer Madness.” Cheech and Chong have become more worn than witty and “Superbad” star Jonah Hill was nominated for a 2012 Oscar. In short, the way we think about the drug is changing as it becomes a more and more accepted character in our cultural narrative.

A wealthy class of marijuana capitalists is emerging from the woodwork. Politicians, doctors and economists have conceded to identify regulated, licensed and taxed marijuana as a potential and virtually untapped industry. Use among teens has seen little to no growth since California doctors started writing prescriptions for medical marijuana in 1996, and Lt. Gov. Gavin Newsom has come out in support of further legalization.

San Francisco Assembly member Tom Ammiano introduced a bill that would place regulations on California’s vaguely checked medical marijuana industry, notorious and oft-criticized for its easy access. In 2012, Palo Alto voters opted to ban dispensaries within city limits. Other communities who have made similar moves face under-regulated medical marijuana deliveries, teen abuse and the illegal and often dangerous street market. In his story, “Cannabis Controversy” (p. 26) staff writer Jack Brook explores the complicated and dynamic role of medical marijuana in our community and others like it. The main players are three normal Palo Alto High School teens — no dramas, addictions or estrangements — interacting with marijuana in medical and recreational contexts. Doctors, parents and policy makers figure prominently alongside them, together deconstructing the complex relationship between medical and recreational pot use among teens and beyond.

We often talk about recreational marijuana as the “gateway drug” — the key to a Pandora’s box of black market addictions, personal crises and wrong boyfriends. But our city, country and state are at a bigger gateway, asking bigger questions, and we look to medical marijuana for answers. The floogates are waiting to burst, and whatever is waiting behind them is clouded by smoke.

— Hollis and Noam

– 21 – Ana Sofia Amieva-Wang

THE

Launch

Compiled by ALYSSA TAKAHASHI Photography by ANA SOFIA AMIEVA-WANG

Learn all about new teachers and clubs on pages 8 - 11 >>

#PALYTWEETS

3

My dog doesn’t want me to finish grading your tests…but I’m almost done! @palystat

Questions with

Ms. Durquet

Interview and design by JAMIE ALLENDORF Photography by ANA SOFIA AMIEVA-WANG

Meet Paly’s newest art history teacher, Marie Durquet. Born in France, Durquet has traveled the world — from Botswana to Paris — and taught at the University of California Berkeley and, most recently, at the Lycée Français in San Francisco.

Verde Magazine: Are you working on any significant outside projects?

Marie Durquet: I have a project I’ve been working on for five or six years, taking pictures of different women in three different cities: New York, Paris, and Bilbao [Spain]. They’re like women in the streets, just walking in the streets.

VM: Where did you start teaching?

MD: After I got my teacher’s credential, my first job was in the Peace Corps in Botswana, Africa. I taught there for three years. I taught art, art history... I taught every medium basically. I came back to the states, and I got my master’s and then I taught at the college level for nine years.

VM: What’s the most exciting place you’ve been?

MD: Probably Haiti. I don’t know if exciting is the right word, but it really made a huge impression on me ... I was hired to do a photo documentary project at a hospital there ... I also love Haitian art, I’ve bought and collected a lot of Haitian art from different trips. They have a super interesting artistic tradition there; despite people being so poor, they are extremely creative and artistic — it’s an inspiring place.

Verbatim:

ABOVE Selections from Durquet’s photography project.

Photos by MARIE DURQUET

“Being with my family in front of the fire roasting marshmallows”

“My Birthday!”

Mads McCluskey, freshman

Mikayla Spaizman, sophomore

What comes to mind when you think about Autumn?

Interview and photography by BRIGID GODFREY

“If you aren’t watching Breaking Bad, you get an F in my class” @mrbrola22

November Crossword Crossword puzzle by PAUL PHROMTHONG

ClubCheck-in : Best Buddies Interview and photo by ANAND SRINIVASAN

ACROSS 3. The shopping event that takes place after Thanksgiving 4. A winter vegetable.

5. One of November’s most celebrated American holidays 7. A holiday that honors U.S. soldiers and victims of war 8. A big event that takes place every four years in November

DOWN

1. A Thanksgiving cartoon special based on the popular comic strip Peanuts 2. Starbuck’s popular November beverage 6. Turn brown and are abundant during the fall

“Best Buddies is a friendship club...

We have club meetings at school every second and fourth Tuesday during lunch. Our next monthly event is a parent potluck, so you bring your parents, and your buddy brings their parents, and every parent gets to meet with and help foster a relationship.”

— Special Education teacher Erika Magagna

KEY 1.Charlie Brown 2.Pumpkin Spice Latte 3.Black Friday 4.Butternut Squash 5.Thanksgiving 6.Leaves 7.Veteran’s Day 8.Election

“When the leaves turn red and fall on the ground and it’s lots of fun to run through them.”

“When all the leaves fall and the weather starts to get cold and ski season begins.”

“Saturday mornings, nice and cool, read the paper, drink coffee and do stuff with my kids.”

Lizzy McCole, junior

Parker Devine, senior

Jeff Willner, band teacher

Turkey Trot

Interview and Desig n by JASPER MCEV OY Photo by TIRA OS KOUI Art by ANTHONY LIU

Thank you to Palo Alto High School’s PTSA for many Thanksgiving feasts since 2005.

1512 Rolls

125 Baked Potatoes

Information and numbers from 2012 trot, courtesy of Co-organizer Melissa Anderson

145 Pies

75 Turkeys

Tens of thousands of easy Chinese books, audio books, and Mandarin cartoon videos!

Books and Me

Free membership for PALY families!

Children’s Chinese Library

Largest collection of entry level Chinese books and media in North California!

4600 El Camino Real, Suite 205 Los Altos, CA 94022 www.booksandme.org

Hey AP Chem kids, I know I’m old-fashioned but isn’t old-fashioned the new cool? I am sure you are prepping for the exam and that is #socool @csylvestri

Cartoon

By ANTHONY LIU

ASBAnswers :

How was the outcome of this year’s Homecoming?

“We got around 750 people to come to the dance. I think the last time we had that many people come to a dance was a decade ago or even more.”

— ASB Multicultural Commissioner ELLEN SHAUN

Interview and photo by BRYAN WONG

Borderline B(ee)’s

Have a question for ASB? E-mail your question to verdelaunch@gmail.com and see if it gets picked to be in the next issue of Verde! Questions may be anonymous.

Post-it Art:

Joyce Chang, senior

What reminds you of November?

Compiled by CLAIRE PRIESTLEY

Ella Mernyk, junior

Lizzie Rivette, junior

News

‘yes on D’ no more Supporters of ‘Yes on D’ the campaign to pass Measure D at the post-vote party on Nov. 5. The plan for relocation of senior housing comes to a complete halt after a 56 percent vote against Measure D. Photo by Anand Srinivasan

Measure D rejected: What next?

Opponents of Measure D — the ballot measure that would have allowed senior citizens to have access to affordable housing under the Palo Alto Housing Corporation — are rejoicing after politically active Palo Alto citizens voted it down last Tuesday.

The final count had 56 percent of the votes going to defeat the measure, according to the Santa Clara County Registrar of Voters.

“I’m super happy, but I’m sad that an affordable housing project that had good intentions went wrong,” said Pattie Barco, supporter of the No on D campaign. “I’m sad because I do support affordable housing.”

Measure D had been unanimously agreed upon by the City Council last year, and so the “Yes on D” party was disappointed, yet they still remain hopeful.

“This was a tough, tough race,” said Candice Gonzalez, spokesperson for Yes on D. “For tonight let’s try and get some rest, and we’ll see what happens. We’re

hopeful that we’re going to continue to try and support affordable housing for the city.”

Measure D, which involves providing senior citizens with affordable housing, was, at the time it was agreed upon by City Council, not seen as such an important development as it is now.

“This parcel has been owned by a private family for decades,” said Marc Berman, City Council Member. “They wanted to sell the land last year, presumably to avoid tax hikes that went into effect in 2013. PAHC bid against numerous private developers and was able to purchase the land, which is one of the last vacant pieces of land in Palo Alto that is this big and zoned for housing.”

Berman had the following to say about Measure D. “I support Measure D,” Berman said.

“This project will provide desperately needed affordable housing for our senior citizens, allowing them to continue to live near family and friends in the community

– 12 –

they know and love. At the same time, it will create less of an impact on the surrounding community — safer for students walking and biking to school, less new students added to our crowded schools — than a project that could be built by a forprofit developer under existing zoning.”

However, resident of the Barron Park neighborhood, Lydia Kou, has differing opinions.

“I voted No because it is unacceptable for the City Council to breach fiduciary duties they swore to uphold to their voters,” Kou says. “This whole re-zoning process by the City was not transparent nor accountable given the City Council approved a city loan to PAHC to purchase the land and knowing full well that in order for PAHC to build what they need, the City must approve and grant a re-zone to a higher density, in this case, Planned Community.”

Text by Anand Srinivasan

News

Low funds threaten PTSA programs The Parent Teacher Student Association is aiming for increased donations after sending out a letter in response to a fundraising flop at the start of school.

According to PTSA President Rebecca Fox, the $175,000 budget is usually met by September. However, as of Oct. 16, only two-thirds of the funding had been met.

If donations do not come in, the repercussions could affect programs important to the school, including Viking grants, which provide the opportunity for teachers to try interesting and innovative programs in the classroom. Some teacher requests have already been delayed due to the lack of funds.

According to Fox, the PTSA meets its annual budget through parent donations, which are collected from the backto-school packet. This year, however, the packet was not sent out but was instead made available online.

“This change in distribution actually increased the electronic donations through the Paly Web Store, but the amount of mailed-in checks dropped considerably,” Fox said.

In an effort to avoid making cuts, the PTSA sent a follow-up letter to parents on Oct. 23, attached with a donation form.

According to Fox, this is standard procedure for cross-town counterpart Gunn High School.

“Gunn always does a follow-up,” Fox said. “I guess we’ve been lucky thus far with our donations.”

Despite the deficit, Fox remains confident that, with the follow-up letter, PTSA will reach its budget.

“I feel like the parents will pull through,” Fox said. “I think they just needed a reminder.”

Text by Jasper McEvoy

Halloween blood drive Senior Andrea Clerici-Hermandinger lies down while giving blood at the campus blood drive on Oct. 31.The drive was successful, getting 40 units of blood over the course of the day. Photo by Hillel Zand

STAR Testing Canceled Palo Alto High School Students can look forward to a new standardized tests this spring instead of the previous STAR test.

California just passed AB 484, abolishing the Standardized Testing And Reporting tests that students have taken each spring since 1999, and implemented the new Common Core State Standards in their stead. The Smarter Balanced Assessment Consortium is creating assessments that adhere to the new state testing standards.

Students throughout California will take a field test this spring for the new assessment. This will help the test developers calibrate the test; that is, how well students

– 13 –

do on the field test will indicate what grade level questions are appropriate for.

Most likely all juniors will take the test in the spring, assistant principal Kathleen Laurence says.

The test is taken entirely on computers.

Once implemented in the spring of 2015, the test will be adaptive, meaning that if a student answers a question correctly, the next question is harder, and if a student answers a question incorrectly, the next question is easier. The field test in the spring of 2014 will not be adaptive.

Where the STAR test focused on fact retention, the Smarter Balanced Assessment will focus on synthesis and analysis.

Text by Lucy Fox

News

The “Facebook for your town” The Palo Alto Police Department is promoting the use of the social network Nextdoor as a way to keep the town updated on suspicious sightings and to stay connected. “[Nextdoor can] share information, if there are suspicious people in town,” Lt. Zach Perron said. Perron recommends this social network for “information exchange, especially for parents.”

According to Perron, 5,000 people in Palo Alto have already signed up for Nextdoor. The main idea of this network is that it is exclusively for people of a certain town. “[It is] primarily one way communication,” Perron said. “The police are not able to see what people write.”

Text by Zoe Lung

home-town fame Franco looks to cast Palo Alto students for his upcoming films. Photo by Jason Kempin

Franco to produce film based on “Palo Alto”

Production is under way in Palo Alto for James Franco’s three upcoming short films: “Memoria,” “Killing Animals” and “Yosemite,” all based off of his book, “Palo Alto”.

As the three films are based off of Palo Alto, Franco has chosen to cast students from the area. Palo Alto High School’s Sophie Swezey and Foothill Middle College’s Finn Mayer both played parts and filmed through and around Halloween.

“It was really exciting to get cast in ‘Yosemite’,” Swezey said. “Everyone working on the film is really nice and I’m so grateful to have had the opportunity to work with them.”

The films are funded through Franco’s online campaign through Indiegogo, a crowd-funding platform.

A release date for all three movies has yet to be determined, however, on his website Franco estimates the date to fall in 2014.

Text by Daniela Ivey

By the

NUMBERS

HArd at work Paly student Nathan Kau participates in the 2012 Hackathon at Palo Alto High School. Photo by Max Bernstein

Students to host Palo Alto Hackathon The second Palo Alto Student Hackathon will occur on Saturday at Palo Alto High School.

Hosted by Paly seniors Max Bernstein and Trevor Nielson, the Palo Alto Hackathon is a 12-hour event that allows participants to collaborate on a computer-based project. To obtain the theme for this year, participants are required to solve a puzzle, or wait until the day of the competition when the theme is announced to the public.

“The goal [of the hackathon] is to bring together hardware engineers, and basically anyone interested, and for them to bring their ideas to the table to build whatever they want to build for the theme,” Bernstein said.

There will be a guest speaker in the SSRC from GitHub. Also sponsoring the Hackathon is a New York based site called Digital Ocean, which will be donating server space to those participating.

Text by Eliza Ackroyd

47.3

Percent of students consider themselves sleep-deprived p. 24

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5

Minutes it takes for Scoop to make ice cream from liquid nitrogen p. 60

News

Store, Library to join in fundrasing The Palo Alto High School library will host a fundraiser at Books Inc. at Town and Country on Thursday, Nov. 21.

According to Rachel Kellerman, the Paly librarian, from 5 p.m. to 8 p.m. in the evening, 20 percent of all profits in the store will go to supporting the Paly library, regardless of the customer’s relation with Paly.

Books Inc. annually hosts these fundraisers in support of several schools, in-

cluding Addison Elementary and Jordan Middle School. This will mark the third year Paly has been involved in the event.

“Every year we go and raise between $700 to $1000,” Rachel Kellerman said.

According to Kellerman, most of the funds are given to the library in the form of credit, and students are allowed to purchase books with the credit.

Text by Will Queen

bring back the paperback The joint fundrasier between Paly and Books Inc will be on Nov. 21

School board to vote on possible new calendar The Palo Alto School Board will look to vote on a final school calendar on Nov. 19.

The general consensus amongst board members is to have an August start date as late as teachers find acceptable, as Palo Alto Unified School District teachers prefer two semesters that are even in length.

While a final proposal has not been finalized yet, according to Camille Townsend, more than 88 percent of Palo Alto high school students preferred firstsemester finals before winter break.

Palo Alto Online reported Board members are aware of the calendar’s effect on seniors and the timing with college applications and look to mitigate such problems.

Senior Addie McNamara, student representative to the Board, stated her personal preferences, saying that the schedule of finals before winter break helped her structure her college application process.

“Having that one definitive end date and that one three-week period of stress rather than one two-month period of stress is just better.”

Text by Alex Hsieh

1925

The year in which Stanford Theater opened. p. 66

Delegates in session The SMUNC will be held the weekend of Nov. 15 and invites a diverse group of high school students. Photo provided by Best Delegates

MUN club to attend Stanford Conference Palo Alto High School’s Model United Nations Club will attend the upcoming Stanford Model United Nations Conference on Nov. 15 at Stanford.

According to Leslie Wan, co-president of Paly’s MUN club, club members are looking forward to the participating since they were unable to attend last year.

The SMUNC draws 600 to 900 participants and they aim to educate students about current events, international relations and world diplomacy.

According to Wan, SMUNC is unique due to a crisis simulation where “terrorists” come in during the middle of a discussion and take away delegates.

“During these conferences you meet a lot of new and unique people from all over, like New York and Hong Kong,” Wan said.

“It’s really amazing when you meet people who are just as passionate as you are about creating solutions for the world.”

Percent of students from Class of ‘13 who have passed at least one AP class. p. 54

Percent of students who consider homework as their main source of sleep deprivation

67

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Text by Paul Phromthong

43.7

p. 24

¡Bring this issue of Verde in and buy a super burrito to get 1 chico burrito FREE!* *offer valid from 3-5pm until Dec. 17; limit 1 per student

enjoy burrito.

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Now open in downtown Palo Alto, Sam’s chowder House offers a casual and authentic seafood experience reminiscent of a New England style seafood house.

The menu includes daily fresh fish, live Maine lobster, fresh local crab, clam chowder, Sam’s famous Lobster Rolls, fish and chips, and Oyster Bar and more. Serving lunch and dinner, seven days a week.

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AP GENDER GAP WINTER LODGE ALTERNATIVE SCHOOLS SLEEP DEPRIVATION

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FEATURES | NOV 2013 Photo by TIRA OSKOUI

GENDER G(AP) WHAT IS THE GENDER BALANCE OF ADVANCED PLACEMENT COURSES? Text by BRYAN WONG Art by ANTHONY LIU

P

ALO ALTO HIGH SCHOOL IS KNOWN FOR its academic excellence, but also for its forward-thinking student body. College-level courses are in subjects often split into predominantly male or female college majors or even careers. The gender makeup of Advanced Placement (AP) courses provides an insight into possible gender roles that exist on Paly’s campus. So, is there a significant difference between the gender makeup of certain classes and subjects?

Verde looked to explore the gender differences in the AP classes of the 20132014 academic year. v

Outdoor Ice Skating in Palo Alto is

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962 Male AP Students

74%

54% 54% of AP language students are female

74% of AP Computer Science students are male

61% 61% of AP Art students are female

58% 58% of AP math students are male

71% 71% of AP English students are female

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56% 56% of AP science students are male – 20 –

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FEATURES | NOV 2013

The

r e t Win e g d Lo

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PALO ALTO’S ICE SKATING RINK PRESERVES WINTER TRADITIONS Text by TIRA OSKOUI and ELIZA ACKROYD Photography by TIRA OSKOUI 4

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CE SKATING AT THE WINTER LODGE evokes memories of winters past, of stumbling around the large rectangular outdoor rink, struggling to stay upright. Friends and classmates laugh and play as they share in the innocent winter fun that the rink delivers. Everything about the lodge — the fake snow, holiday music, hot cocoa, warm fireplace and most obviously the ice rink — transports skaters from Palo Alto to a cozy winter wonderland.

Located at 3009 Middlefield Road in midtown and established in 1956, the Winter Lodge offers both recreational and formal skating opportunities for both children and adults. It is the first and only permanent outdoor ice skating rink west of the Sierra Nevadas.

Maya Ben-Efraim, a Palo Alto High School junior who has skated at the Winter Lodge for 12 years, enjoys the supportive community that the Winter Lodge fosters.

“I love how friendly and welcoming everyone is,” Ben-Efraim says. “All the coaches really just encourage you to be your best. It’s not about beating anyone else at the rink.”

Paly junior Sabrina Goyal also skates at the Winter Lodge and echoes Ben-Efraim’s sentiments.

“Ice skating has a reputation for being very [catty],” Goyal says. “It [the skating world] can get very intense, but here at the Winter Lodge, since it’s a non-competitive rink, you can still skate

[at an advanced level], but the atmosphere is completely different. At practice we help each other out instead of glaring at each other.”

Eighteen girls, including Ben-Efraim, Goyal and several other Paly students, make up the Winter Lodge’s elite drill team, the Icettes. They practice and perform together, and since most have been part of the team since elementary school, they have grown up together. They have two performances each skating season, which lasts from September to April.

As the diverse group of skaters twirls and jumps on the glistening ice with flushed cheeks and wide smiles, it becomes apparent that the rink is a second home to its dedicated skaters.

“Everyone there really cares so much for everybody else and for their improvement and enjoyment of the sport,” Ben-Efraim says. “It really gives us a true winter that we would otherwise not have.”

Ben-Efraim is one of the rink’s most established skaters, as she is currently the only skater at the rink to compete in the International Skating Institute-administered freestyle test. The ISI is a nonprofit organization that aims to encourage recreational participation in ice skating by not judging skaters in competition with each other.

This non-competitive system fits with the mission of the Winter Lodge to create a welcoming environment for skaters of

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FEATURES | NOV 2013

7

8

9

11 all ages and skill levels.

Many of the Icettes have put their skating talent to good use by teaching and working at the Winter Lodge.

“Everybody working there has affected me so much and helped me so much over the years that I was excited to pay back the favor,” says Ben-Efraim, who began working three years ago.

“I can still remember when I was five or six and my class assistant was such a role model to me, so I was excited to be a role model to little girls learning to skate now.”

Junior Jose Llanes is now in his second season working at the rink. Unlike Ben-Efraim and Goyal, Llanes works without any previous experience in skating.

“It’s not that hard of a first job, but it shows you responsibility and time management,” Llanes says, whose duties include general housekeeping, skate rental and organization.

Matthew McCoy, a manager at the Winter Lodge and Paly alum, has worked at the lodge for 14 years. He sees the old-style rink as a tradition that brings the Palo Alto community together and serves as a static organization in the otherwise rapidly evolving Silicon Valley. McCoy began working at the rink when he was 15 years old, and now his own children take skating lessons.

“It’s old Palo Alto,” McCoy says. “It’s like a landmark. Not a lot has changed, and we like to keep it that way. It just kind of fits.” v

10

12

1. ARABESQUE Junior Maya Ben-Efraim performs an arabesque on the outdoor ice skating rink at the Winter Lodge.

2. HARD AT WORK Junior Sabrina Goyal cleans up after the Winter Lodge closes to the public.

3. ZAMBONI Manager Matthew McCoy polishes the ice with the Zamboni.

4. LEARNING Ben-Efraim learns a solo routine from her coach to perform in the winter performance.

5. TEAMWORK Senior Angela Pomeroy and BenEfraim practice a group routine together.

6. OLD FRIENDS Pomeroy and Ben-Efraim laugh and embrace upon seeing each other at the rink for Sunday night practice.

7. OUTDOOR RINK The Winter Lodge is the first and only permanent outdoor ice skating rink west of the Sierra Nevadas.

8-10. TRICKS Ben-Efraim practices jumps and spins on the ice.

11. ZOOM Junior Heather Shaw flies across the ice.

12. FOCUS Ben-Efraim focuses on executing her skating routine.

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FEATURES | NOV 2013

ALTERNATIVES

Text by MADISON MIGNOLA Art by ANTHONY LIU Photography by ALONDRA ARIAS, JOANIE KING, and SALLY WANG

A PEEK-A-BOO Sally Wang snaps a Halloween selfie with her friends from Lydian Academy.

TANGLED Carly King (far right) untangles herself during a team building activity.

“It really is like going to college,” T 8:15 A.M., students in the Palo Krohn says. “The only high school classes Alto Unified School you take are English and history.”

For King, the difference between high District slouch into their desks and pre- school classes and college courses and bepare for the school day. Some students, ing surrounded by new people on a comhowever, begin the day on a completely dif- pletely different campus seemed scary at first. ferent note.

“The transition was definitely a little At noon, senior Carly King, and junior Jesse Krohn, make their way to their first bit stressful,” King says.

Not only are students learning on a class on the Foothill Community College Campus At 9 a.m., junior Sally Wang sits large college campus, but they are also takin her chair at Lydian Academy, waiting for ing classes with college students and professors.

Both her tutor to arrive.

King and Krohn Each of these enjoy the learnformer Paly students “It’s so funny because ing system at found an alternative Middle College. schooling option that you walk in and walk “It’s actually fits their needs. past and there’s all refreshing to be Around the counthese different people taught by a proty, PAUSD included, learning different fessor,” Krohn the Middle College things at the same says. program has become Krohn feels one of the most poputime.” as if the teachlar educational options ­— Sally Wang, junior at ers and students offered to students.

Lydian Academy are all on the The program is availsame level as far able at multiple collegas learning goes. es around the country.

The locations closest to Palo Alto are based He feels as if everyone is there to learn. at Foothill Community College in Los Al- When he asks a question during class, he is tos Hills and Cañada Community College no longer intimidated by his teacher. Midin Redwood City. The Middle College pro- dle College has increased his confidence in gram integrates high school students into the classroom.

King feels as if the Middle College various college courses.

The day begins with two Middle Col- students and staff are like family. She says lege classes. In those two classes, students she is completely comfortable talking to a in the program are being taught by a Mid- friend or staff member about a problem.

For Wang, her transition to Lydian dle College professor. For an hour in each Middle College class, the students are only Academy was very sudden. Just two days learning with other students enrolled in the after telling her parents she wanted to leave program. Other than those two classes, stu- Paly, Wang started her first day at Lydian dents have the flexibility to chose which, if Academy.

“I started with one or two classes to any, college courses they would like to take.

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FEATURES | NOV 2013

FORMER PALY STUDENTS SEEK DIFFERENT SCHOOLING OPTIONS

ease myself in and then I did all my classes there,” Wang says.

Unlike Middle College, Lydian caters to the needs of individual students through one-on-one tutoring sessions.

“Lydian is a one-on-one school where you’re just with one teacher for one subject and you have that class for as many times as you want a week,” Wang says.

At Paly, students find themselves in a classroom with a teacher-student ratio of about one to 30. As a student sits at their desk, there is usually a teacher scrambling around the room, jumping from one student to another while trying to answer every question. At Lydian, the more individualized learning system has helped Wang focus solely on her schoolwork.

Calling her tutors by their first names, Wang feels more comfortable at Lydian Academy. At Lydian, each student is working with their tutor in their own private cubicle.

“It’s so funny because you walk in and it’s like you walk past and there’s all these

“The people at Middle College are remarkable; it’s overwhelming how great the vibe is.” ­— Jesse Krohn, junior enrolled in the Middle College program. different people learning different things at the same time,” Wang says.

Although the system is more individualized, the social aspect seems to be re-

duced. Wang mentions how the only time she gets to see her friends is during the 30minute period the students have for lunch..

The social aspect at Middle College is different from both Lydian and Paly. The students in the program come from different places from all around the area. Not only are they meeting various kinds of students their age, but they are also learning and communicating with much older peers.

“The people at Middle College are remarkable,” Krohn says. “It’s overwhelming how great the vibe is. The diversity of the manner in which people think and come to conclusions is in itself remarkable.”

Coming into the program, each student knows that they have one thing in common with all of the other students: something wasn’t working for them so they transferred. King and Krohn feel more comfortable at Middle College than they felt at Paly.

“Everyone came for their own reasons so they’re accepting of yours,” King says.

So what is Paly missing?

Rhonda Racine, founder of Lydian Academy, says that it is not about what Paly is missing, but more of the fact that some students may find themselves having a harder time finding a place where they are comfortable.

“We’re dealing with human variation, it’s not going to be easy,” Racine says.

According to Racine, these programs are in place to help students gain a better education in ways that suit them, whether that means sitting in a lecture hall with 400 students or sitting one-on-one with a private tutor. The options these former Paly students have chosen are vastly different than the regular Paly experience.

“We serve students who need something different to find their spot,” Racine says. v

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HIKING Carly King (center) stands with a friend during a class trip to Yosemite.

ONE, TWO, THREE POSE! Jesse Krohn (2nd from left) poses with his friends on the Foothill campus.

FEATURES | NOV 2013

SLEEP DEPRIVATION STUDENTS SUFFER FROM LACK OF SLEEP Text by MADISON MIGNOLA and ZOFIA AHMAD Art by ANTHONY LIU “I’m sooo tired” would definitely win first in a Paly’s-most-common-phrase contest. “Wow, I got such a good sleep last night” would probably be last.

According to sleepfoundation.org, the average teenager is supposed to sleep 9.25 hours each night. For students taking AP U.S. History or other classes of renowned rigor, that number may seem laughably unrealistic. Sleep deprivation can cause severe effects on a student’s physical and mental health.

Not only can sleep deprivation lead to unhealthy eating habits, but it can also lead to aggressive and inappropriate behavior, according to sleepdeprivation.org. Without enough sleep, the

immune system can weaken, leaving one feeling even more fatigued and susceptible to disease than before. Verde administered a survey to 320 Paly students to see the effect that sleep deprivation has on our student population.

The survey showed that the leading cause of sleep loss amongst Paly students is homework (47.3 percent), the second being extracurricular activities (18 percent). Our data shows that many students are losing sleep largely due to school-based activities (16.9 percent) of students identify athletics as the main reason they do not get enough sleep. Only 17.2 % of students lose sleep because of socializing or other reasons. v

43.7% 58.8% 47.3% of Paly students consider themselves sleep deprived

of Paly students get an average of 6-8 hours of sleep per night – 24 –

of students’ main cause of sleep deprivation is homework

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COVER | NOV 2013

annabis

controversy California ablaze over medical, recreational pot Text by JACK BROOK Photography by JACK BROOK and ANA SOFIA AMIEVA-WANG

E

MMA ENTERS HER daughter’s room holding two sandwich bags, each bearing five grams of marijuana in dime-sized green buds.

She hands one bag to her daughter, Liz, a former Palo Alto high school student whose name has been changed along with others in this story to protect her identity. The other goes to Liz’s friend Pete.

“This is strong stuff, so you guys need to be conservative,” Emma says.

Pete considers his share skeptically and asks loudly for a little more. Emma gives him a sharp look, putting one finger over her lips.

“The neighbors,” she whispers.

“Besides, you gave me $60 and this is what you’re getting.”

Liz rolls her eyes, and Pete sniffs a handful of his marijuana before placing

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it in his backpack.

“Careful,” Emma says. “Your mom isn’t going to smell it on you, or anything?”

Peter shakes his head and walks outside.

Emma takes a pinch of marijuana out of Liz’s bag, placing it on the table.

After a moment’s hesitation, she puts another pinch down.

“Thanks Mom,” says Liz, “That’s all you need,” Emma says, and exits the room, taking Liz’s bag.

Liz places the marijuana in her pipe and lights up, breathing in deeply and exhaling a stream of smoke.

Though she is still a minor, Liz relies on marijuana for holistic medication, which helps her combat stress, depression and a sleeping disorder. In the past, Liz often bought off the street illegally.

Since then, her mother convinced a doc-

BRI WELLES examines one of 36 flavors of Cannabis at Natural Herbal Pain Relief, in San Jose. Welles, 45, suffers from arthritis and neuropathy, causing her to experience intense pain in her feet, preventing her from standing for long periods of time.

ROLLING A JOINT Natural Herbal Pain Relief provides a free joint to patients with every purchase.

NHPR employee measures out marijuana for dispensary clients.

tor to provide her with a medical card for stress and sleep deprivation. With it, Laura is able to illegally supply her daughter with legally bought marijuana.

She is also able to fuel the habit of Pete, an underage marijuana user.

In the two bags of weed lies the dilemma inherent to medical marijuana: How can marijuana be channeled to people like Liz, who has genuine health problems, without being open to abuse from those like Pete, who use it purely for recreation?

Jerry Berkson, assistant principal at Palo Alto High School, says that if a student is caught with marijuana they will be suspended for five days, and have the option of going through a rehabilitative program. However, Berkson is not against medical marijuana.

On Oct. 31, Verde conducted a survey in 11 Paly English classes collecting data and opinions about marijuana use and legislation in Palo Alto.

Here are the results.

“If pot is legitimately diagnosed by a doctor, and not one of those guys who sells a card for 50 bucks, then it should be allowed,” Berkson says. “My hope is that the doctor will look to other avenues of treatment, rather than just giving a kid the green light to get high all the time.”

Marijuana Legalization Under the Compassionate Use Act of 1996, California physicians can legally prescribe marijuana as a recommended medication for certain patients. Nineteen other states and the District of Columbia have passed similar bills.

Advocacy of legalizing medical and recreational marijuana has been gaining momentum; enough, it seems, that California, and perhaps the rest of the nation,

may be poised to pass laws legalizing recreational pot sometime in the next decade.

Colorado and Washington already have.

Since early February, two bills, the Ending Federal Marijuana Prohibition Act and the Marijuana Tax Act, have been awaiting approval from Congress. Together, in addition to decriminalizing pot, the two bills would effectively allow both state and federal governments to rake in revenue from the virtually untapped marijuana industry, worth upwards of $6 billion dollars, according to Harvard economist Jeffrey Miron, who also estimates that the federal government would save almost $8 billion dollars in marijuana enforcement costs.

While California’s 2010 proposed marijuana measure, the Regulate, Con-

11 74 percent use marijuana once a day.

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percent believe medical marijuana should be legalized in California.

trol & Tax Cannabis Act, did not pass, a Tulchin Research survey found that nearly two-thirds of California voters (65 percent) support a proposal to legalize, regulate and tax marijuana in California for adults. Nearly half of voters (46 percent) strongly support legalization.

Palo Alto, along with over 180 other cities in California, bans cannabis dispensaries. However, the ban has not prevented many citizens, including students, from obtaining marijuana, both for medical and recreational purposes from nearby cities.

Liz Liz started smoking marijuana around the age of 12, and although she used it recreationally at first, she says she now consumes it mostly for medical purposes.

Her illness, recurrent isolated sleep paralysis, a result of misfiring neurons, disrupts REM sleep and causes victims to lose muscle control while sleeping, essentially paralyzing them. Other symptoms include vivid and often frightening hallucinations, which can last for over an hour.

“It feels like a switch, where you are pushed down on your chest and you start hearing crazy things,” says Liz, who remembers first experiencing RISP at age four. “It’s like in a horror movie where there is this deep voice, a medium voice and a high voice, and they’re all whispering at the same time. It feels like my hands are stuck in concrete and my ears are stuffed with cotton, and I am slowly sinking under water.”

Small doses of antidepressants Zoloft and Selective Serotonin Reuptake Inhibitor usually treat RISP, but severe cases like Liz’s require a higher dosage, which heightens the drug’s negative side effects.

“The pills make me slower, and I feel gross and groggy and tired,” Liz says. “It’s so bad that the next day I won’t want to

get out of bed. The only time I have been able to evade the effects of RISP is when I smoke.”

Liz smokes daily to fight regular nausea and vomiting. Unable to obtain medical marijuana legally as a minor, Liz receives marijuana illegally from her mother twice a week, sometimes bought from the street, other times from a dispensary.

“My mom advocates for me to get a card,” Liz says. “She believes it is a medication, and she doesn’t approve of other drugs.”

Liz is working to get a medical card, despite the fact that she is only 17 years old. With her mother’s permission, she will go through a series of evaluations to determine if her disorders can be treated legally by marijuana and, if so, what cannabis strains would be best for her.

Marijuana as Medicine?

This October, California Lt. Gov. Gavin Newsom announced that he would head an American Civil Liberties Union Committee to monitor the effect of recreational marijuana legalization in Colorado and Washington. The committee will publish a series of research papers, designed to provide policy makers with a clear understanding of how to implement potential marijuana legislation.

Nevertheless, the sale or prescription of marijuana remains prohibited under the federal Controlled Substances Act of 1970, which classifies drugs on a scale of five schedules. Along with LSD and heroin, Marijuana is a Schedule I drug — considered the most dangerous and likely to be abused.

The DEA defines Schedule I drugs as having “no currently accepted medical use in treatment in the United States.”

In contrast, cocaine, methamphetamine, opium and morphine are classified

41 18 percent believe alcohol use is worse than marijuana use.

percent have a friend or relative with a medical marijuana card.

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as Schedule II drugs — less harmful than 9 percent addictive marijuana in the eyes of the DEA — giving rise to accusations that the federal government is too stringent in its regulation of marijuana.

Some research — not all conclusive — has demonstrated marijuana’s potential as a source ameliorative care for those suffering everything from neuropathic disorders to intense pain. Others have found a correlation between long-term marijuana use and a decrease in professional motivation, impeded judgment and impaired brain development in adolescents users.

“People say it’s a victimless crime,” says Mike Rogers, a Republican Congressman from Michigan and Paly parent. “But if you jump in a car impaired and cause an accident, or become less productive in your work, those actions have very tangible effects on others around you.”

Rogers says that for everything, there is a consequence, and that for marijuana in particular, the consequences are yet to be fully realized.

“Once legal, people will try and sell it to you, to encourage you to use marijuana — it’s a business,” Rogers says. “THC levels will go up and, as they get higher, so will the impact marijuana has on the human brain.”

Natural Herbal Pain Relief The room is replete with marijuana in glass jars; edibles fill the racks, and the hum of rap music hangs in the air mingling with the smell of weed. Rows of cannabis products of all colors and types line the counters.

This is no Seth Rogen fantasyland; it’s the Natural Herbal Pain Relief clinic, a medical marijuana dispensary at 10th and Parrot Street in San Jose, one of more than 100 cannabis clinics in the city. Inside the lobby, a television plays a documentary de-

44

percent that believe Palo Alto should permit licensed dispensaries.

NATURAL HERBAL PAIN RELIEF PATIENT Anne, shown left, a 36-year-old nurse who provides only her first name, is one of the growing number of professionals who have turned to marijuana to alleviate jobrelated stress and anxiety.

“Compared to other medications, marijuana provides me with instant relief and results,” Anne says. “I can control the effects it has on me; it can let me know whether I want more or less.”

In her youth, before medical marijuana was legalized, Anne smoked recreationally. Now, Anne uses marijuana as a way to palliate the stress of the many responsibilities in her life.

“It’s not really accepted for most older professionals,” Anne says. “Most people keep it hidden. I see people on break with cigarettes, and I wish I could do that with marijuana, and then go back in and work again.”

Anne has been coming to Natural Herbal Pain Relief for over two years now, spending roughly $160 a month on marijuana and cannabis products.

“I see it as a glass of wine, but better,” Anne says.

“Alcohol and medicine give me a hangover versus when I smoke, it’s natural and has all these different benefits, which I would normally need to take several medications to receive.” tailing the history of medical marijuana in mildly euphemistic terms.

Medicine lies in jam pots stamped with titles like “Dream Queen,” “Trainwreck,” “Fruity Pebbles” and “L.A. Confidential” — donations from the clinic’s patients.

“We are a collective community,” says manager Reyna Burns, 34, who first came to NHPR as a client four years ago. “Patients grow their own medication, and give us their surplus; it’s a symbiotic relationship.”

Burns has worked in the medical marijuana industry since 2010. Suffering from Attention Deficit Disorder and insomnia, Burns and has been prescribed a variety of medications. Four years ago, she obtained her marijuana card and felt an immediate improvement.

Burns estimates that most of NHPR’s patients with significant health problems try 10 or 15 different medications before lowering their dosages to five or six pills with cannabis.

Although marijuana has often been considered a gateway drug, Burns says that as long as people use marijuana for medical purposes, it will not open doors to more serious addictions.

“I believe in legalizing marijuana com-

pletely,” Burns says. “It will be a gateway drug as long as it’s in the same category as crystal meth, cocaine and LSD. If you take it out of the characteristic of other drugs and classify it as a medicine, then it will lose its allure. It’s not as much fun for people seeking illicit activities.”

However, Rachna Singh, a doctor at San Jose medical marijuana evaluation center Greenway Compassionate Relief, says marijuana use should only be legalized as a medicine, and not a recreational drug.

“Doctors must be the regulators— otherwise anyone will be able to walk in to a dispensary and buy pot,” says Singh, who has never smoked pot. “A free-for-all would be like the 60s or 70s, where marijuana would be used and abused. If it is legalized completely then dispensaries will lower their standards because they will not have to follow as strict rules to keep their license [and] will have to face stiffer competition from the streets, providing yet another incentive to lower their standards.”

Singh says patients can access legally purchased marijuana if the doctor feels they are telling the truth.

“If someone comes to us and says, ‘I cannot sleep,’ we can’t tell if they are lying,”

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Singh says. “People need to bring records, showing documentation of their problems.”

“We make them fill out a history form with all the conditions they have and how they feel that marijuana will help,” says Singh, who sees about 20 patients a day.

“Then we check their social history and their family history; can it be confirmed that this patient has legitimate health problems?”

Not all receive a card, either because they fail to bring the necessary materials or, more likely, because their records reveal high potential for drug abuse.

Congressman Rogers points to alternative pills such as MARINOL, which contains THC extracts, and CB1 activators, which activates the same brain receptors as THC in marijuana.

“What people don’t realize is they can get the THC component, as well as any other chemical compound found in marijuana, in pill form,” Rogers says. “So you don’t really need to prescribe medical marijuana. In fact, I think the issue goes well beyond the notion of medical marijuana.

I think that most people who push medical marijuana just want to smoke whenever and wherever they want.”

TOP SHELF A client sniffs marijuana at Natural Herbal Pain Relief, one of over 100 marijuana dispensaries in San Jose.

However, at least in Singh’s opinion not all patients appear to be those who simply want to get “high.”

Singh describes most of her patients as men between their mid-20s and 40s, educated professionals coming from “megacompanies” in Silicon Valley who suffer from high levels of stress in their professional lives.

Still, the guidelines set in place have not prevented Paly students from obtaining medical marijuana, whether by purchasing cards or through friends.

Jacob Jacob, a Paly student, used to get his marijuana from “Dirty Van Dan,” a smalltime dealer who sells weed out of his truck in East Palo Alto.

Then, on his 18th birthday, Jacob received his medical marijuana card. He says he uses marijuana to soothe pain from a herniated disc, the result of a sports injury from which Jacob never fully recovered.

Though he says he uses his card for legitimate health reasons, Jacob confesses that he would have applied to get one even if he didn’t need it for medical purposes.

He also contends that, while one or two students a week approach him asking him

to buy them marijuana, he hasn’t sold it to anyone outside his friend group since getting a card.

“If I am with a group, then I let them use it [his marijuana],” says Jacob, who reports spending $60 to $80 a month on marijuana and related products. “But otherwise, it’s not worth giving it to people.”

He admits that at first his parents were “pissed” when they learned he was getting a card but, in the end, Jacob knew that they couldn’t legally do anything about it.

“Eventually, my parents just gave up,” Jacob says. “I have great grades and I know I am going to get into a good college. Really, there is no proof that marijuana has been affecting my life in a negative way.”

However, not everyone is able to balance marijuana well with the rest of their life.

“I had buddies from high school who smoked a lot of pot and later went to rehab for harder drugs,” Berkson says. “But some went on to become doctors.”

One of Berkson’s friends ended up with a cocaine addiction.

“I can’t guarantee marijuana was a gateway, but it’s such a stepping stone — most people are no going to just walk up and try cocaine.”

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Jacob feels that marijuana faces an undeserved stigma in society, from parents in particular. He says that while most parents believe cigarettes to be worse than marijuana, they still view alcohol as a lesser offense.

“The irony [of alcohol and cigarettes being legal] is that alcohol and cigarettes are much more dangerous,” Jacob says.

“But because they have always been socially acceptable in the past, they have less of a negative connotation than marijuana.”

Marlon Marlon Jackson, 52, is a half-Klamath Modoc Native American, with a long, black, braided ponytail and white sideburns. His voice is hoarse — he attended a “Big Lebowski” festival the night before talking with Verde.

Raised in Humboldt County, “ground zero” for marijuana growing in the 70s and 80s, Jackson was soon sucked into the growing culture, starting a marijuana growoperation with a few friends to supply them with enough marijuana to smoke all year.

From 1979 to 1986, Jackson would spend a week at a time in the remote campsite, caring for his marijuana plants.

The most Jackson and his friends ever

grew was 40 plants — enough for themselves, and other friends, and even to pay rent. Compared to other growers’, Jackson’s camp was a small operation, but it still attracted the attention of authorities Spotter helicopters frequently scoured Humboldt County, looking for grow-ops.

Jackson recalls a close brush with a helicopter in his own camp.

“I tried to run away through the trees,” Jackson says. “But it was so bare that they were able to follow me. Eventually, I just sat down, like, ‘Okay, you got me.’ But then the helicopter went away, and never came back.”

Eventually, Jackson finished college and began a career as an engineer. He thought he’d put his marijuana days behind him. But in the late 1990s, his wife, Sonnie, started having severe stomach problems, the result of an early gastric-bypass surgery.

“They would cut almost all of your stomach lining out,” Jackson says.

She lost almost 75 percent of her body mass, and was no longer wanting food. She was slowly starving herself, Jackson says Doctor’s prescribed Sonnie powerful, “chemotherapy level” anti-nausea pills, such as Zofran, but Jackson says they were “ridiculously expensive” and had terrible side effects. Desperate, Sonnie tried pot.

“We were skeptical at the start,” Jackson says. “But then she started eating. After a few months, we were able to get her off of those pills. When she took the anti-nau-

sea pills, she was getting headaches, so they would give her Imitrex for the headaches.

And then her Imitrex was causing her not to sleep, so they would give her Ambien to make her sleep — she was taking over 10 pills a day. All of that went away by switching her over to medical marijuana.”

After receiving a prescription from a doctor in 1997, Jackson and his wife now grow a few plants each year in their backyard, enough for whenever Sonnie’s nausea flares up.

Jackson says that if he were to guess, he would say that 80 percent of those with a medical marijuana card do not have medical needs, or at least enough to warrant a card.

“Yeah, a lot of people are abusing the system,” Jackson says. “But to have it illegal to start with is sort of silly. It’s virtually legal right now — having it fully legalized would probably not lead to much of an increase in users, just eliminate a lot of the bureaucracy involved.”

Congressman Rogers, on the other hand, says that before society embraces marijuana completely, they must look to the host of unforeseen consequences. “[Marijuana] is not what’s made America a prosperous country,” Rogers says.

“Going away from hard work and personal responsibility — it’s disconcerting.”

Rogers says that if marijuana were to become largely legal, people would find a way around the regulations set in place,

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leading to a widespread abuse.

“There will be a slowly and steadily rising social cost — that’s what happens in drug cultures,” Rogers says. “Of course, dosage will increase over time. Communities will have to decide if that’s who they want to be. At some point, the pendulum will need to swing back.”

Like Rogers, Jackson foresees serious problems in regulating marijuana.

“If you take a blood test, you are unable to tell if someone is so high that they can’t drive, having just smoked a bunch of marijuana, or if they haven’t smoked any but it’s still in their system,” Jackson says.

“It’s going to be hard to tell with things like driving under the influence.”

Ultimately, Jackson sees marijuana as serving a social function, similar to alcohol.

“I would like to see marijuana, at least as far as recreational use among adults, as something where you can come home from work and vaporize a little bit of marijuana — that would be the same as having a glass of wine,” Jackson says. “And just like light, social drinking, adults should be able to enjoy light, social marijuana use.”

Regardless of what it is used for, marijuana will always be readly available to those who seek it.

“People are always going to want substances that they can’t have,” Liz says. “And if there is a way for them to get it legally, safely, we might as well go with it, since it is better than the alternative.” v

FOR CLOSURE A LOOK INTO BUENA VISTA MOBILE PARK

Text and photography by ANA SOFIA AMIEVA-WANG

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PHOTO ESSAY | NOV 2013

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PHOTO ESSAY | NOV 2013

O

N A DAILY BASIS, EL CAMINO commuters pass by the community hidden behind the popularly visited Jamba Juice and Baja Fresh. The Buena Vista trailer park, located at 3980 El Camino Real, has fostered a close-knit community for decades. However, last November, owners Joe and Tim Jisser submitted an application to the City of Palo Alto to transform the park into condominiums, eliminating the low-income housing trailers.

Since the opening of the park, many Palo Alto students have called these brightly colored trailers home. Their families rely on the low-income housing, the only property they can afford in Palo Alto.

Ten-year-old José Lopez (pictured below), currently attends Barron Park Elementary, and has always planned to continue on to Terman Middle School and subsequently Gunn High School alongside his friends. However, the park’s closing will force his family to relocate, and they almost certainly will be cut off from access to Palo Alto’s schools. The Ruiz family, residents for over a generation, feel the impact as well. Lourdes Ruiz, the mother of two, found out last year about the move.

After meeting and photographing this community, I realized I had never noticed the trailer park even after living in Palo Alto my whole life. It bothered me to think that I was raised in a community that appreciated and advertised its diversity, yet failed to support students and families that are an important part of Palo Alto’s cultural fabric.

– 35 –

PHOTO ESSAY | NOV 2013

– 36 –

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NOV 2013|PROFILES 38 42 44 45 46

SHIRLEY ZIMMERMAN GABE GALANG NEWEST NEW YORKER EDM DJ’S IRISH DANCERS

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PROFILES | NOV 2013

Star of Jordan Middle School

Shirley Zimmerman: Longest serving teacher in the PAUSD

Text by ANAND SRINIVASAN Photography by ANA SOFIA AMEIVA-WANG

P

ARKED OUTSIDE OF JORDAN teacher that I’ve ever known has done that over the years to the Middle School on California Avenue, a 1968 green degree that she has.”

Last year, Zimmerman officially became the longest-serving Ford Mustang sits in the shade of a tree, protected from the sun. The car, dented here and there with teacher in the PAUSD, with a whopping 48 years at the job. Zimscratches scattered liberally, provides clear evi- merman retired at the end of the 2011-2012 school year and then dence of decades of use. The windows are rolled down, and the returned for a part-time contract last year.

Zimmerman’s influence continues even after her retirement door is unlocked.

This humble, reliable vehicle belongs to Shirley Zimmerman, from a full-time teaching position.

“She’s an institution in herself,” says Josh Spira, former stuformer eighth grade English teacher of Jordan Middle School, purveyor of grammar to several thousand Palo Alto youngsters, dent and current teacher at Jordan. “I consider myself very lucky to have been able to be exposed to someand one of the literary grand dames of the one like that, that often and to get closer to Palo Alto Unified School District. Zimher, and to have a little bit of her wisdom merman’s car, according to her friends and rub off on me.” colleagues consistently seen parked outside “I do want to mush a Former student of Zimmerman and the Jordan campus has come to symbolize team of huskies.” current Palo Alto High School Senior, Vivher commitment and dedication to her job. ­— Shirley Zimmerman, ian Laurence, praises Zimmerman.

“When somebody says ‘Mrs. Zim“Mrs. Zimmerman was one of the merman’ they associate her with her little PAUSD teacher most kind-hearted teachers I’ve ever had,” green Mustang,” says Robert French, one Laurence says. “She dedicates so much of of Zimmerman’s closest friends, former co-teacher and Palo Alto historian. “It [her Mustang] was often her time and energy to her students; it’s truly remarkable.”

Zimmerman’s story begins in Jackson, Miss., in the 1930s. there on Saturdays and Sundays after church. What was she doing? Grading papers. Correcting things. Spending time. No other Zimmerman was raised as an only child; her mother and father

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PROFILES | NOV 2013 were the most significant influences in her life, she told Verde in a “I think it takes two different skills, and I want to be with the sturecent interview. Both educators, Zimmerman’s parents provided dents. I do know about the business life. I think it’s important for her with words of wisdom related to the art of teaching. anyone in education to know what’s happening in the real world.

“My parents gave me a lot of good advice,” Zimmerman says. In the 80s I ended up at Hewlett Packard and worked as pool sec“They told me to never put a kid in a corner — always allow the retary in corporate communications. At the end of summer I was kid a way out. You always have respect for the student. It’s okay offered a full-time job as technical writer, and it was exciting to tell for the student to enter your space, but don’t enter the space of a them, ‘No.’” teenager.”

After 48 years of teaching at Jordan, Zimmerman’s service Zimmerman entered the world of education teaching 6th came to an end in 2011. According to French, Zimmerman’s ofgrade in a junior college district in Meridian, Miss. She then went ficial retirement ceremony was yet another testament to her hard overseas and taught in Germany, traveling across Europe, the Mid- work and dedication. dle East and Russia.

“When Dr. Skelly, the [PAUSD] superintendent when she “I was there [Russia] when the Berlin Wall was built, and dur- retired, honored her [Zimmerman] at the meeting where he has ing the time the Iron Curtain came into being,” Zimmerman says. all the staff [at Gunn], he said, ‘Would everybody stand whoever “We were in Czechoslovakia, so it was interesting to be in the mid- had Mrs. Zimmerman,’ and people all over stood up,” French says. dle of things as they happened.”

“That must have been thrilling to her, because she’s very humble.”

While in Germany, Zimmerman also took an interest in race In fact, former student of Zimmerman and current Paly parcar driving. ent Todd Laurence, has had all three of his children learn under “I was teaching in Germany and a couple of us went up to Zimmerman as a teacher. watch the track,” Zimmerman says. “I was a speed demon anyway, “When I attended my daughter’s [Vivian’s] Back to School and they [her fellow teachers] said, ‘Hey! Wanna race some of the night, I was amazed,” Laurence says. “Not only did she [Zimmerguys?’ Well, I did okay! So they invited me to come back on week- man] remember me, but she instantly pulled out two essays I had ends as the pace car — it was nothing serious.” long forgotten from when I was in her class.”

When Zimmerman came to Palo Alto in 1974 Jim Ernst, JorAccording to Zimmerman, she never ‘decided’ to retire, but dan’s principal, recruited her to teach 8th grade after teaching at that is what ended up happening in the end. In fact, the fun is only Garland Elementary School. Zimmerman says that the students just beginning. are still the same, despite decades of passed time.

“My mantra has always been: ‘I still don’t know what I’m go“I think kids are still curious,” Zimmerman says. “I think stu- ing to do when I grow up,’” Zimmerman says. “I just think there’s dents still want to learn. They want to be good at what they do. I something and I’m not sure what it is. I just don’t know what’s think sometimes they reflect the world around them. I want my next, I just really don’t know. I do want to mush a team of husstudents, years from now, to be kies.” able to run the country, and be Despite retiring, Zimmerable to solve all those problems man returned to Jordan in 2012, that are going on in Washington because she says it was hard for right now. At some point they are her to let go: going to become our leaders, and “I think that people were that’s always held true.” kind enough to realize that it was In fact, Zimmerman had spehard for me to stop cold turkey cifically asked to teach only 8th and not teach anymore,” Zimgrade for the past 48 years, bemerman says. “After I retired, cause it was the transitional year. they offered me the opportu“I would not choose another nity to come back and teach two grade but 8th, because you have classes, which I appreciated... to make sure that they have the They allowed me to go out more basics under their belts, before easily.” they go to high school,” ZimmerSpira had more than a couple man says. “I like doing that, and... words to say about Zimmerman.

I like that students have the basic “It was wonderful [teachfoundations in grammar, writing, ing across the hallway from Mrs. vocabulary… before they go off Zimmerman],” Spira says. “I into the big world.” would see her four or five times Unlike many teachers who a day, between periods, standing chose to pursue administrative out in the hallways. I had already positions after gaining teaching known her, but we got to know experience, Zimmerman vehe- HALLOWEEN Zimmerman sports a pair of fork each other pretty well. She’s a part glasses, as she has done every Halloween since she started of the fabric of Jordan Middle mently decided not to.

“No way,” Zimmerman says. teaching at Jordan Middle School.

School.” v

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PROFILES | NOV 2013

10 Questions with...

Gabe Galang Text by ANAND SRINIVASAN Photo Illustration by ANA SOFIA AMEIVA-WANG and ANTHONY LIU

O

UTSIDE OF THE BAND’S practice room, in the 300 building at Palo Alto High School, the sounds of drums and guitars beat faintly. Gabe Galang bursts out of the cavelike practice studio, the before-muffled sounds of rock and roll instruments pour through the doorway for a brief moment. Galang clutches his bass guitar tightly in his left hand by the neck, and in his right, a pair of string clippers.

Galang mainly plays lead guitar and, on occasion, rhythm guitar for the club, “Paly Rocks.” He also sings from time to time.

Galang prunes his instrument’s strings, sitting nonchalantly on the edge of the lunch bench, every so often swooping his long black hair. Suddenly the door to the cave opens and one of Galang’s band mates summons him from inside. Galang hops lithely off the bench, and rushes towards the door, his mane of hair bobbing up and down with each step. v 1. What band are you a part of ?

I run Paly Rocks and I help out with a lot of the more downright bands at Paly like the Bad Neighbors, run by Edward Kwiatkowski, a great blues band, plus Palpitar — a senior band I help out when they do their open mics and I help coordinate their rehearsals.

2. What fuels your passion?

Well, music was the one thing I found out I am good at, actually.

Education never ever came to me as a huge priority growing up; I never found any other extra curricular activities. Mainly just being on the stage and playing with people.

3. What is your philosophy on life?

People should take it less seriously. Your life is short and you’re going to spend a lot of it worrying about tiny things. I think you should enjoy it while you can, because you don’t know how long you’ll get it.

4. Where does your inspiration for music come from?

A lot of the problems I’ve had over the years, basically. I grew up in a generally bad neighborhood in Las Vegas. I saw a lot of stuff back then, drug and violence related. Big one: my dad walked out on me when I was a little kid. I think of these problems which I grew up with as a sort of well I can draw from in music. The best inspiration for most forms of music are your experiences, the emotions you feel during those experiences, and just generally just

how life weathers you and changes you over the years.

5. What’s the craziest performance experience you have ever had?

The thing I did back in Vegas, when I lived there during Middle School. We went to Coronado High School [for a Prom] and I remember that a lot of the seniors there were really, really wasted. I had a bottle thrown at me, and I was pretty young — I was in the seventh grade. The worst ordeal was that my drummer did get into a fight — he was also in the 7th grade — and we were thrown out of Coronado because he hit someone with a bass. My ex-girlfriend also hit someone with a bass.

6. What are the most important things in life?

My friends and my family obviously, my musicians — they are great people, they’re like family to me too — and playing music.

7. Religious views?

I grew up in a semi-religious household, it never really caught onto me, so I guess I’m agnostic. I don’t really know what’s out there, and I think if there is something out there then they’re doing a bad job with helping us out.

8. Which historical figure do you look up to?

Blackbeard was a super cool dude. Pirates man. They’re really rock n’ roll.

9. What is a topic that interests you?

Aside from music, photography is really interesting.

Getting gigs, preparing for gigs, talking to people about gigs, performing more, the rehearsals, the practice, the hours of arguing with all of my musicians because they’re really hard people to work with. I’m a huge L.A. Lakers fan, so anything about that. Anything from Vegas, my hometown.

10. Why do you wear your hair so long?

Looks great. Stage presence man, stage presence. V

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PROFILES | NOV 2013

Le

rs

Ramones

Gun

Aero

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Gabe’s Top 10 Bands

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PROFILES | NOV 2013

OUR NEWEST NEW YORKER

GRAD ACHIEVES PRESTIGIOUS JOURNALISM POSITION

S

ilvia Killingsworth managing editor of New Yorker Magazine and Palo Alto High Graduate class of 2003, says, “The only ‘job track’ I ever seriously considered was also the only one I’d ever considered, and that was becoming a doctor. I was never bitten by the journalism bug.”

The summer following her sophomore year in college, Killingsworth began working for the Harvard student-run travel guide company, Let’s Go and eventually became editor in chief.

After graduation, Killingsworth moved to New York, where she got a job working as an assistant to the editor-inchief at a business magazine.

“I got a bird’s-eye view of how everything worked, and discovered by working closely with the managing editor that I was hugely interested in his duties,” Killingsworth says. The managing editor had also worked at the New Yorker for many years and was able to get Killingsworth a job working there as an assistant to the managing editor. June of this year Killingsworth was promoted to managing editor.

In a recent e-mail conversation with Verde, Killingsworth gave her thoughts about her life as a Paly student and now.

Text by BRIGID GODFREY Art by ANTHONY LIU ed the Paly Dance Team, which was tremendously fun. I could not be forced to pick a single favorite teacher at Paly, but Barry Bergstrom gets special mention for teaching me how to write the perfect essay.

What do you believe is the most important part and type of journalism? What’s your favorite?

That’s hard for me, because I’m an equalopportunity fan of all kinds of journalism!

There are so many categories, and each person has different preferences, but I think what makes magazines like The New Yorker so great is that “signature mix” of politics, humor, reporting, commentary, criticism

and, yes, even cartoons! I think my favorite “part” of journalism is excellent writing. I will read an article about pretty much anything if it’s phenomenally well-written — I would read eight thousand words about dirt, for all I care. Good writing can take you pretty much anywhere.

Do you think print journalism is dying at the hands of digital?

I don’t think print and digital are at odds with one another. Journalism, and our appetite for it, is as strong as ever. The business model for the vehicle with which it’s delivered is evolving. It will take some time until the advertising world figures out how to adapt to the Internet and mobile devices, but we’re still very much in the inbetween stages.

Why do you think so many news sources spent so much time covering Miley Cyrus’s VMA performance?

I think we’re living in a world that is very addicted to the instantaneous nature of news as enabled by 24-hour connectedness to the Internet — Facebook, and Twitter — among other sources. If you think about being constantly inundated with information, the items that are likely to spike attention are probably highly controversial, related to the culture of celebrity, or some combination of the two. We’re sort of living in a tabloid era on steroids, so it’s important to provide balance to the gossip and opinions with long investigative pieces that make you stop and think about humanity, the world, or yes, even the composition of dirt.” v

What piece of advice would you give your 15-year-old self?

Don’t do anything because you think you’re ‘supposed’ to!

Do what makes you happy.

What activities were you involved and who was your favorite teacher?

While I attended Paly my main extracurricular activity was dancing at Dance Connection, a studio in Palo Alto. My junior year, some of my classmates and I found-

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PROFILES | NOV 2013

ELECTRONIC D A N C E M • U • S • I • C text and photography by

ELIZA ACKROYD

Three students from Palo Alto High School are part of an emerging group of musicians whose instruments are their computers. Electronic music has been growing in popularity in these past years, with the rise of artists like Lemaitre and The M Machine. v

U V A

Junior Luke Schroder is a DJ who remixes and produces music under the pseudonym Ultra Violet Astronauts (UVA).

Schroder has performed at several venues, ranging from small birthday parties to a club in San Francisco.

“I really like when I’m doing a live mix and seeing everyone jumping with that song and seeing them react to my music,” Schroder says. “It’s really cool to be in charge of that.”

Whenever inspiration strikes, Schroder begins his song, usually by sitting at his keyboard, playing out a lead, and working from there.

Schroder competed in a mixing competition, going against around a hundred other artists.

He won, and received money and a release with Cupat Records, a Brazilian record company.

Currently, Schroder is part of a talent pool, a group of musicians vying for a contract with the record label Monster Cat. If he secures a spot, he could be going on tour with the label next summer.

Junior Fabo Junior Will Kast W W Garduño is the composes elecI H man behind tronic music White Noise under the stage L I Symphony, his name William L T one-man band III. that makes both covers of songs With the versatility the elecI tronic genre presents, Kast can E and original compositions.

A create a wide range of music.

After Garduño found his passion for music, it quickly became “There’s a lot of really diM verse stuff out there and I really N a major part of his life. Along O with mixing, he plays the piano, enjoy it,” Kast says. drums.

After taking lessons, he III learned I guitar“I and eat, sleep, go to school and the basics of mixing and S make music,” Garduño says. synthesizing, using a computer Garduño begins a song with program called Logic Pro and a E a melody or a chord progression, mixing board, along with other tools. From there, he applied his skills to his first EP, “Saltus.”

When Kast begins a song, he creates a simple, basic foundation using one element, such as a snare drum. With this beat as his base, he’ll add in instruments, baselines and other sounds he makes from scratch using synthesizers.

Kast plans on continuing to produce music after high school.

“I’ve never considered stopping making music, because it’s just always something that’s on my mind even when I’m not doing it,” Kast says.

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and then goes from there. He inlyrics into most of his S corporates music and invites local artists or Y friends to sing for his tracks.

Kast, Garduño relies on M LogicLike Pro to make his music.

P “I try to blend in acoustic instruments with electronic stuff so H there’s a good mix of both,” GarO duño says. came out with his first alN bum,He“Momentum,” after a year Y and a half of work. The album is published on Soundcloud.

“I want to make a living out of it,” Garduño says. “That’s why I take it all so seriously.”

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PROFILES | NOV 2013

A LITTLE BIT OF IRELAND IRISH DANCERS KRISTEN CAREY AND LARKIN MCDERMOTT DIP INTO THE UNCONVENTIONAL Text and photo illustration by SAMANTHA DEWEES Photo courtesy of KRISTEN CAREY

T

HE TAPPING OF THE DANCers’ feet against the wooden floor echoes about the room, reverberating off the walls and bouncing every which way. Traditional Irish reel-style music hums lively from speakers against the wall, emanating a quick, steady beat and setting the pace for the dancers. The sound increases as Palo Alto High School sophomore Larkin McDermott flies by, springing athletically off the hard floor. Other dancers, including junior Kristen Carey, glide across the long black mat lining the floor, arms at their sides, moving only their legs and feet to the steady rhythm of the music.

A golden glow spills through the open windows and into the cool night as the girls practice, floating across the floor with skill and concentration.

McDermott and Carey have been involved in Irish dancing for more than half of their childhood, and continue to dance at a highly competitive level, practicing at the Greene-Comerford School of Irish Dance in San Jose.

Irish dance, age-old in origin and popularized across the globe in 1994 by the famed show Riverdance, combines a diverse mix of complex steps, performed solely by the lower body. Arms are generally held still at the sides of the body, allowing the dancer to focus on precise foot movements, wearing either soft or hard shoes.

According to Carey, this contained lower body movement is what differentiates Irish dance so clearly from other styles of dance.

“Having your arms completely still as well as your entire body is something that judges look for,” she says.

“Carriage is a major factor in Irish dancing that a person watching might not realize the difficulty of.”

When performing in hard shoes, which feature heavy tips and heels made of fiberglass, Carey compares the rhythm and sound to that of tap dance.

“The rhythm is similar to that of tap, but in many ways it’s completely different,” she explains. “An Irish dancer has to focus on crossing over and turning out their feet along with about a million other things as well.”

Carey and McDermott, along with former Irish dancer, junior Maeve Lavelle, were influenced by their families and friends to take up Irish dance.

“All my family is from Ireland and still lives there,” Lavelle says. “My mom [danced], and I think I saw Riverdance or something and was like, look how cool that is, and so that probably got me into it as well.”

The three have all competed at the national level in the North American Irish Dance Championships, some more than once.

“The [championships] this past year, I was the only one who went,” Carey says, “but the year before that, the three of us went, and we were all on the same team.”

Dances are practiced and performed to traditional Irish reel-style music, combining an eclectic mix of Celtic instruments, including a variety of pipes, flutes, and light percussion beats. Carey says for each dance in a competition, the judges choose the music ahead of time, to which the dancers then prepare and practice.

“Unlike some other dance styles, we don’t chose the music we dance to,” Carey says. “We are assigned different dances depending on our age.”

Competitions feature a live musician who accompanies the different dances.

To keep pace with the music, Irish dancing combines a myriad of unusual steps, requiring considerable precision and accuracy of movement. Carey says one of the most difficult aspects of Irish dancing is putting the moves and steps together to create a fluid, seamless dance.

“One move that is hard for me is called a ‘rock,’ which is where one locks their ankles and literally rocks back and forth, shifting the weight from one ankle to the other,” Carey says. “It looks like a simple move but it destroys your ankles.”

To keep up their skills and prepare for competitions, McDermott and Carey practice four to five days a week at Greene-Comerford. In addition to numerous team practices, the two both make time to train independently.

“If we don’t have class, I’m either working out to build stamina or I’m practicing,” McDermott says.

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PROFILES | NOV 2013

According to McDermott and Carey, practice time is crucial, you see it on stage, it looks normal,” McDermott explains. as missing even one day could offset a dancer’s timing and skills.

Dancers are also required to get spray tans for solo perfor“If you take a day off, you set yourself back stamina-wise mances, another technique used to make dancers more visible in because it takes so much stamina to be able to get through every- the bright stage lighting. Carey finds the fake tan amusing, as it thing,” Carey says. “You still have to do something, even if it’s just doesn’t reflect traditional Irish culture. stretching or you know, doing some ab work.”

“We have to get fake spray tans on our legs and put loads of Because dancing requires such dedication, Carey devotes all bronzer on our face even though the typical Irish person is light of her after school time to dancing and school work. skinned with freckles,” Carey says. “But it’s an aspect of the sport “I basically don’t do anything else,” she says. “My day consists that’s evolved and we have to do it to stay modern.” of waking up, going to school, going back, doing my homework While Carey and McDermott enjoy competing in Irish dance, on the way to dance. Sometimes I’ll wake up early before I come they find some aspects of the competition environment vexing. to school to get an extra practice in.”

“For me, you put in countless hours for months leading up According to McDermott, one of the perks of Irish danc- to [the competition], and you get two minutes on stage to show ing is getting to wear elaborate costumes and makeup for perfor- everything that you’ve done,” Carey says. “You could get up and mances. fall, you can be off time, and you’re “I love dressing up,” she says. “I completely tossed aside and all those love the wigs, I love the makeup, I months were for nothing. That’s the “It’s an entire world that the love the costumes.” part for me that’s the most nervemajority of people don’t know Since the development of Irish wracking, when it’s like every second exists.’” step dancing in the mid-1700s, Irish counts, and you can’t mess up or else dancewear has deviated considerably ­— Kristen Carey, junior you’re [finished].” from the traditional attire, which ofHowever, Carey explains that ten featured plain skirts, blouses and these complications have encoursashes. Although women’s Irish dance costumes still incorporate aged her to work harder to improve her dancing and skills. traditionally Irish elements, such as Celtic embroidery and lace, “It’s a lot of work, it’s not easy,” she says. “But when you’re at today’s Irish dance dresses are replete with modern flair, often in a competition, and it goes the way that you want it, that feeling is flashy colors with sequins, jewels, and fringe. Today’s dancers are like, you can’t even, I don’t even know how to describe it, It’s like, even required to wear abundantly curly wigs, a lasting product of I mean I was like crying out of happiness.” the big-haired 1980s.

McDermott agrees.

Carey explains that a unique costume is something that judges “It makes you feel like you’re on top of the world,” McDernotice, as it makes a dancer stand out from the rest of the group. mott says. “You don’t have to win, but if you do the way you want“You can walk on stage, and you have to look the part,” Carey ed to or better, then you just, you feel so good.” says. “You have to be the part, that’s what our teacher tells us; you According to Carey and McDermott, those who have not have to present yourself. The way you walk on stage before the heard of Irish dancing before may be surprised by how many peomusic even starts [is important].” ple actually participate in this unique sport.

“It’s a pageant,” McDermott adds. “You have to look confi“I think people are sometimes surprised with how big the dent with your head up, smiling.” sport actually is,” Carey says. “It’s an entire world that the majority Another aspect of performances is the stage makeup dancers of people don’t know exists.” are required to wear, often consisting of heavy foundation, blush However, when people do discover the world of Irish dancand eye shadow. Carey remembers waking up at 5 a.m. on competi- ing, they can’t help but feel captivated by it. tion days to apply her makeup, which she then had to wear until “It’s just so fun to be able to tell people I do Irish dancing and midnight that day. to hear their reaction be so surprised and just say ‘wow,’” McDer“Up close, you feel like you are wearing a lot of makeup, but if mott says. “It’s such a unique sport.” v

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PERSPECTIVES | NOV 2013

CONFIDENCE VS. ARROGANCE SAT PREP AP CLASSES NSA

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50 52 54 55

PERSPECTIVES | NOV 2013

Self-Centered.

Where do we draw the line between Text By Brigid Godfrey Confidence and Arrogance? Photo Illustration By Ana Sofia Amieva-Wang

I

’d like to think I work hard fOR everything I get — but I’m not sure if that’s entirely true. I study for tests, I go to swim practice, I do my chores but I also skip out on homework for TV and am a gold-medalist in procrastination. Where does the ability to do that come from? Some would say arrogance, but I say confidence. The question is: are they opposites or interchangeable?

Drawing a line between the two is a long and complicated process. I have always felt they were simply manifestations of each other but as I began to think more about it I wondered if that could be true.

Why is confi-

dence so valued and arrogance considered so worthless?

To begin, I conducted an admittedly unscientific Facebook survey asking two questions: “Do you consider yourself arrogant?” and “Do you know someone who you would consider arrogant?”

I found that less that 30 percent of the Palo Alto High School students believes they are arrogant while 99 percent believes they know someone who is. To be honest, this is not what I was expecting. Thirty percent more people believe they are arrogant than I anticipated.

I turned to the Internet to answer my question and found an abundance of blog post and articles from psychology magazines and stay-at-home-moms alike.

Leisa A. Bailey posted a article in 2012 entitled “The Difference Between Confidence and Arrogance.” After explaining the importance of self confidence and the separation of confident people and arrogant people, Bailey writes: “Confidence and arrogance come from different sources. Arrogance is rooted in insecurity — a defense from feelings of weakness that are unacceptable and unclaimed.”

Bailey goes on to explain her view that an arrogant person generally has a skewed view of the world and a warped understanding of themselves. A confident person can accept their weaknesses or faults with grace, even though they may not like them.

The idea that arrogance and confidence come from different sources occurred to me,

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PERSPECTIVES | NOV 2013

“Arrogance repels. Confidence, on the other hand, attracts. Like a fulcrum centered between two distasteful extremes, confidence keeps a person grounded and draws other people in. It provides a sense of safety, for self and others. It inspires, encourages, challenges, and leads.” –Michele Cushatt but it never made much of an impression. How could two things so similar stem from different foundations?

I kept looking and found the blog of professional keynote speaker and emcee, Michele Cushatt, who uses her blog to reflect on her life and her family. Cushatt concludes: “Arrogance repels. Confidence, on the other hand, attracts. Like a fulcrum centered between two distasteful extremes, confidence keeps a person grounded and draws other people in. It provides a sense of safety, for self and others.

It inspires, encourages, challenges, and leads.”

While this post speaks to the philosophical grandmother in me – what’s a leader without arrogance? How can a person truly see themselves as capable of leading and accomplishing without a bit of arrogance, or at least the idea that they belong in a rank above others? By the definition of arrogance that I had been operating under ­— snarky, cocky, overly confident — I didn’t understand. It occurred to be that didn’t really know what other people thought arrogance was.

In the midst of research citations and words longer than I had ever seen, one sentence stuck out at me: “Recent studies have found that trait authentic pride is uniquely associated with the attainment of skill-based status, prestige, whereas trait hubristic pride is uniquely associated with the attainment of the farce-based status, dominance,” said Jessica L. Tracy and Christine Prehn in their 2012 paper “Arrogant or self-confident? The use of contextual knowledge to differentiate hubristic and authentic pride from a single nonverbal expression.”

That was the definition I was looking for. Precise and scientific version of what numerous psychologists and stayat-home moms had been trying to tell me from the start.

I found the answer. Now all I had to do was figure out what it meant. I kept reading and started thinking about why we need confidence.

“Self-confidence is a wonderful asset. It allows us to get past fears and doubts and take control of life and decisions,” self-confidence life coach Suzanne Fetting said. “Confidence is the foundation for everything in life and it is our confidence, or lack of, that directly affects how we do everything in life. When we know and appreciate who we are, we feel great about ourselves and we make better choices and better decisions.”

This explains why everyone is arrogant in the eyes of everyone else as indicated by my survey.

– 51–

I’ve finally come to the conclusion: We all need confidence and we don’t need arrogance. It’s hard to tell them apart, and in all honesty, that’s okay. We need confidence every day, and sometimes that’s arrogance but usually it’s confidence. We need confidence to give a presentation or take a test, we need it to perform in a recital or play in a game.

If you take anything from this article, take what Experience project (a free social networking website of online communities premised on connecting people through shared life experiences) member under the screen name “Sergs” posted on Feb. 19: “With self confidence you just do. With arrogance you do and then you talk about it talk about it talk about it talk about it talk about it.” V

PERSPECTIVES | NOV 2013

SAT: Sickening and Abominable Torture REASONS WHY IT SHOULDN’T BE A MAJOR PART OF ADMISSIONS Text by ALEXANDRA HSIEH Art by ANTHONY LIU

W

E ARE CONSTANTLY TOLD reer Readiness,” which reveals that only 43 percent of SAT takers that we’re wonderful people with the in the Class of 2012 graduated from high school with the level of potential to make the world a better place. academic preparedness associated with a high likelihood of college Every single one of us has something that success. elevates us above our peers, a special skill I’ve always thought SAT should stand for Sickening and that will help our community and colleges claim they will help us Abominable Torture. Sure, one in favor of the SAT would say that hone. But there’s one thing I don’t understand: If a college’s goal it measures standard intelligence and is necessary as a way for stuis to help us figure out what we want to do in life, why is one of dents to demonstrate their readiness for college coursework, but its main standards of measure a test that simply evaluates us on since when do eighth grade level math and a whole load of 19th how well we can take a test? century literary passages reveal anything? Even Gavin Witteje, a The first school aptitude test was a psychological experiment tutor who has worked at Best SAT Review in San Jose for over ten administered way back in 1901. In that year, fewer than half of years, agrees with me.

Palo Alto High School’s popula“It tests your test-taking abilition took the test. But in the years ties, which can be natural abilities...But since then, the SAT is taken by there’s an unfair edge that kids can get around 1.75 million students due from taking prep courses,” Witteje says. to the inflation of scores. Because “If you’ve got that edge and if your parapplying to college for students ents have got that eagerness for you to now is an extremely competitive learn, and if you put forth the money process, students are all under to pay for those resources, than also it major pressure to outperform teaches foundational skills. The best in“The best indicator of someour peers. Even the PSAT, which dicator of someone’s success in college one’s success in college and should be implemented to show and someone’s likelihood to succeed afsomeone’s likelihood to suchow well we will do on the SAT, terwards is their passion and drive.” has created vicious competition ceed afterwards is their pasTo add to the ever-growing list of over time for the coveted merit things that are wrong with the SAT, it’s sion.” scholarship. biased because people who can afford Gavin Witteje, SAT Tutor Palo Alto furthers that presSAT tutoring have an unbalanced edge.

sure by setting a high standard: This bias has been noted through statisan average SAT score of 1922 tics: a strong correlation between family for Palo Alto High and 1955 for income and scores, with higher incomes Gunn in 2012. Here in Palo Alto, as long as the desirable colleges yielding higher test scores. continue to place emphasis on a standardized test, students will go This isn’t surprising at all, as a family with a higher income through the four hours of timed, and possibly years of, long-term can afford more resource-rich educational environments, and of pressure. The consequences? Let’s just say it’s not surprising that course, expensive, specialized SAT tutoring. Any one of these prep people like Sam Eshaghoff, a student in New York who excels at courses is guided learning and there’s a structure in the learning taking SAT exams, has told newspapers like Huffington Post his that makes the acquisition of the necessary skills a lot more efcheating escapades. Many other methods of cheating include de- ficient and easy. Most importantly of all, it teaches people the Colliberate schemes to submit one’s social security number off by one legeBoard’s patterns in question structure the best techniques to digit to consulting test answers in bathrooms during breaks. approach it. In fact, based on the students that go to the SAT However, the sad truth is, colleges place so much emphasis centers I prepare at, I ultimately think the SAT boils down to this: on a test that doesn’t necessarily represent our viability after high Parents can buy their kids a high SAT score. school. This is shown through The SAT Report on College & CaI know that there are a billion different articles on how much

Keep In Mind

– 52 –

PERSPECTIVES | NOV 2013 people hate the SAT. But as times change, so do the opinions of the dissenters and the dissented. If I were talking about this two years ago, the SAT would have still remained the Sickening Abominable Torture that was largely immovable. Alternatives like the ACT were coming up, but none of them were nearly as popular as the SAT, which colleges continued to see as the big factor in their standard of measure.

But it’s 2013, and surprisingly, many colleges are starting to feel the same way I do about these tests.

The list of test-optional schools (found at FairTest. com) is growing every year, with more than 800 colleges not requiring the SAT in 2012, including all of the schools in the University of California system. The number of test-optional institutions has been growing due to the so-called “incompetence,” as stated by Fairtest board members, of the SAT. “We expect the ACT/SAT optional list to continue growing as more institutions recognize that the tests remain biased, coachable, educationally damaging and irrelevant to sound admissions practices,” says Bob Schaeffer, the public education director of FairTest in a recent interview with Huffington Post.

Meanwhile, the ACT provides a more curriculumlinked experience. Originally acting as an alternative to the SAT in 1959, The National Center for Fair and Open Testing has noted an increasing number of ACT takers. For the first time ever in 2013, the ACT with 1,666,017 test takers was more popthe community around them.

“An improved SAT will strongly ular among test takers than the SAT, They even ask students to write an with 1,664,479 test takers—by a naressay that pertains to their personal focus on the core knowledge row margin of less than 2,000 testphilosophy or sense of identity. and skills that evidence shows takers. According to Inside Higher Through this process, colleges are most important to prepare Ed, increased competition with the capture factors that contribute to ACT led the SAT to redesign its forsuccess in the future: personality, students for the rigors of college mat. motivation and discipline. With so and career.”

In a letter sent to College Board much detailed speculation behind David Coleman, College Board President members, David Coleman, the the application to put everyone on a board’s new president, said: “We will level playing field, the SAT shouldn’t develop an assessment that mirrors have so much emphasis placed on it the work that students will do in colbecause it doesn’t even fulfill its purlege so that they will practice the work they need to do to complete pose of predicting one’s viability after high school. college. An improved SAT will strongly focus on the core knowlAlthough the ever-growing popularity of SAT alternatives edge and skills that evidence shows are most important to prepare will hopefully lead to a much more curriculum and knowledgestudents for the rigors of college and career.” oriented SAT, neither will ever be a perfect standard of measure.

It’s understandable that colleges need a nationwide standard- Because it doesn’t and probably will never represent our capabilized measure, and that if it weren’t the SAT, it would be another ity to succeed, no matter how many major changes the SAT is flawed system centered on efficiency. However, colleges go through going through, any standardized test, whether it be the Sickening the trouble to measure the rigor of a student’s classes within their and Abominable Torture or the Atrocious and Callous Torment, district, to see if a student has pushed his or herself to the highest should not play a major part in college admissions. The difference point of their academic capability. They look at a student’s extra- between a successful person and others is not a lack of knowledge, curricular activities in order to ensure that they have influenced but rather a lack of will. v

Keep In Mind

– 53 –

Problems

PERSPECTIVES | NOV 2013

Advanced Placement Text by ZOFIA AHMAD Art by ANTHONY LIU

1

ST PERIOD: AP Underwater Basket-weaving.

2nd period: AP Candy Cane making. 3rd period: AP Twerking. 4th Period: AP Meditating.

5th Period: AP Beard Growing. 6th Period: AP Instagram Composition. 7th Period: AP How to Cook Meat for Vegetarians.

Sound like a pointless schedule? Well, for many students loading up their schedules with AP’s, the subject matter of the course holds little significance because the students are only looking for the label the AP course provides, and that’s a problem.

It is common for students, especially those here at Paly, to take challenging courses. Over the past six years, the amount of students taking AP courses has risen by 25%, according to Diana Wilmot, director of data assessment at the Palo Alto Unified School District.

The rise in popularity of AP courses is due to many factors, but the most common reasons by far are, at root, college-based.

AP classes boost students academic transcripts, and also provide benefits later on during college. Many people believe that the more AP’s, the higher one’s chances of getting into a competitive college. This belief is facilitated by the extra weight placed on AP courses by admissions officers at colleges who continue to value AP classes for the extra challenge that they provide to students and give college credit for those who pass AP courses.

If a student scores high enough on the AP exam, he or she may be permitted to place out of a required course at college.

This thought process leads to many stressincreasing trends that should be cause for concern. Students are taking an increasing amount of AP courses, often more than three to four, which is the average amount of courses that college students are expected to take.

If high school AP courses truly are college level in their instruction and outside requirements, then students who take three or more AP courses a year in addi-

tion to their other courses and extracurricular activities are under a crazy burden far harsher than students taking the three to four college-level classes AP’s are based off of.

Furthermore, colleges are increasingly upping their standards for placing out, now sometimes requiring fives on the AP test (a three is regarded as a passing grade by the College Board) for students to receive college credit, or not giving the credit at all.

These ever-present college concerns have only served to tarnish the goal of the AP courses. AP classes are, according to College Board, supposed to provide “college-level course work and expectations,” which indicates that only those students who are truly ready for college in both maturity and skill level should be able to succeed in these classes.

However, two thirds of Paly’s Class of 2013 have taken (and passed) at least one AP exam, according to Wilmot, . The majority of these students are taking these courses to strengthen their transcript or gain college credit, not for the value of the course.

This practice of using the AP classes for material gain and not for the unique learning opportunity that they provide takes away from the experience of students who are truly interested in the subject. Instead of providing passionate students with a chance to explore the subjects they find interesting, AP’s are filled with students motivated by other objectives other than learning.

– 54 –

The standardized curriculum of AP courses further stamps out creative opportunities that a college- level course would otherwise provide. With so much material to cover, and consequences for the student, teacher and school district for low scores, no time is left for teachers to explore areas of interest and branch off from the standardized curriculum.

As John Tierney writes in the Atlantic, “The AP classroom is where intellectual curiosity goes to die.”

Although AP courses do an excellent job of teaching the material itself, and critical writing skills as well (for most subjects aside from the science and math) AP classes fail to teach students the broader skills that will help them in college and beyond.

AP courses inhibit students’ natural curiosity and do not sufficiently teach creative problem solving skills.

To solve these problems, AP courses should have a looser curriculum allowing for more intellectual exploration and a revitalized course structure in which class time is spent more on creative problem-solving and analysis instead of repetition of the facts and theories that currently dominate AP courses. Administering these changes will help our education system create a population prepared to confront the world’s problems with meaningful, creative solutions. v

PERSPECTIVES | NOV 2013

r u gO

S

n i r ecu

Freedom PRIVACY MUST NOT BE ABANDONED AS TECHNOLOGY ADVANCES Text by TIRA OSKOUI Art by ANTHONY LIU

– 55 –

PERSPECTIVES | NOV 2013

A

These companies turn personal inforMERICAN CITIZENS Rapaport, a Palo Alto High School U.S. mation into profit through advertisements trusted the National Security History teacher.

Currently, the Department of Defense and sales. Online advertisements are handAgency for more than 60 years to keep our nation secure and has full control over the NSA. Congress, tailored to fit each given customer’s likes protected. Now, after recent which ultimately represents the people, based on the user’s profile and internet discoveries, the media and public wonder needs to establish more regulation of the history, thereby generating the maximum revenue for the advertiser and the host whether privacy and control of our digital agency.

Unfortunately, the U.S. did not even site. Many corporations have been known lives are requisite sacrifices for security.

The NSA claims to use their high level have a functioning federal government un- to share and sell knowledge of their user’s of security for the purpose of preserving til about a month ago. Trusting Congress data to other companies and the governour rights, yet such intense security un- to be accountable for the NSA when it is ment. struggling to keep Extreme privacy violations like those dermines our basic itself upright would of the NSA and corporations do not have Fourth Amendbe misguided. to be inevitable. If Congress works to efment right to pri“We have swung the People are ficiently rebalance itself enough to address vacy. The NSA pendulum far too so busy worrying this issue now, larger problems in the future should protect the much in the direction about the privacy can be prevented.

American people of their oh-so-imOne solution would be to make certain with intel, but they of secrecy and away portant texts and practices involving intrusions on people’s must do so in a way from the openness selfies and blaming digital lives strictly illegal. This would work that defends the and transparency the government to eliminate all potential privacy violations, Constitution rather that is the lifeblood for spying that they but one must not disregard that some of than violates it. of this country.” are disregarding the the work of the NSA may actually serve to Americans question of how the increase safety and security. have fought in ­— David Rapaport, U.S. NSA should be regThis solution is not practical because courtrooms and History teacher ulated. The public’s the NSA serves legitimate functions in on battlefields for focus should not be monitoring hostile governments and tercenturies to protect immediate damage rorist organizations. If the NSA wants to the freedom that the constitution promises. In this age of control, it should be to find a solution that continue monitoring American citizens’ rapidly advancing technology, this fight for includes a long-term system for a balance lives, they must do so with probable cause of freedom, privacy and security. Without and within the confines of the Fourth freedom must not be lost.

Instead of focusing attention on the any restrictions, the NSA has nothing pre- Amendment.

If we want to see a change in the way specifics of the NSA’s invasions of privacy, venting it from continuing to snoop.

As social technology continues to the government treats the NSA, we must our concern should center on establishing speak out for ourcontrol on the agency’s currently unregulat- evolve and become selves and stay up to ed power. The NSA should not be allowed a larger part of our date. the open access to our digital lives that it lives, this issue of “An informed Assume that every now has, but in order to amend this, U.S. privacy becomes all citizenry is all that citizens must first avert their attention away the more relevant email, text, tweet we need … Only from safety concerns about their personal with access to perand post you make is then can students information and toward a solution to the sonal information being gathered and really play a role in much larger problem of how to secure our online becoming read by someone. easier to obtain. having their own freedom for years to come.

Students must important opinions Last spring, former NSA contracabout this issue take tor and CIA employee Edward Snowden stay aware anything precedence,” Raparevealed confidential information detail- they say or post can ing the billions of phone calls, texts and be accessed. Educators and parents have port says.

Unfortunately, solutions to issues as social media profiles that the NSA moni- preached this fact to us for years, but many tors. Snowden fled to Russia to avoid trial of us have not listened, shrugging off their large as this take time to implement, so for the charges on him for espionage and admonitions as old-fashioned cautions. intrusive behavior by the government and theft of government property. The star- With the recent NSA events, the reality of companies on our lives will likely not stop anytime soon. Assume that every email, tling knowledge he delivered to the public this message has become apparent.

Facebook, Google, and other internet call, text, tweet and post you make is being spread like wildfire.

“We have swung the pendulum far too entities are similar to the NSA in the sense gathered and read by someone. Stay calm much in the direction of secrecy and away that they also store information about and aware, and hope that Congress can pull from the openness and transparency that is people’s personal lives with neither explicit itself together enough to address this blatant violation of rights. v the lifeblood of this country,” says David permission nor complete transparency.

– 56 –

CULTURE | NOV 2013

CALAFIA’S CHARLIE AYERS SCOOP MICROCREAMERY THE BEAST COAST GOTT’S STANFORD THEATER MUSIC REVIEW TOFFEE RECIPE

58 60 63 64 66 68 69

CULTURE | NOV 2013

Veggie Tales CHARLIE AYERS REDEFINES GOURMET VEGETARIAN CUISINE Text and Photography by CLAIRE PRIESTLEY

CALAFIA Charlie Ayers prepares vegetarian pizzas in his open-kitchen restaurant in Palo Alto.

CULTURE | NOV 2013

A

CLOUD OF flour trails behind head chef Charlie Ayers. He swiftly slides three perfectly round pizzas into a red-hot wood-burning stove that emanates heat and Calafia’s customers prepare to indulge.

Standing out from his competitors, former Google head chef Ayers provides a dependable source of healthy, nutritious food at his restaurant, Calafia, located in Town and Country Village.

Ayers founded the restaurant in 2007 and uses only local, fresh and organic produce in his dishes. By founding Calafia, Ayers hopes to demonstrate the future possibility of locally sustainable, healthy and appetizing dishes.

Ayers created the restaurant to focus on his core values in food — that it be local and fresh — because he says none existed that met his needs.

“I opened a restaurant out of my own selfish need, because there was no restaurant near Palo Alto that meets my needs,” Ayers says.

Ayers disapproves of processed and inorganically farmed foods, advocating for more locally dependent restaurants. He only serves ingredients grown on local farms.

“When you can’t trust your government, you can’t trust your neighbor,” Ayers says. “The very least you want to be able to do is trust the person who provides the food for you.”

Ayers even welcomes customers to share their own homegrown produce with him and — from persimmons to lemons — they deliver.

The majority of his ingredients come from local farmers in the Bay Area, but he also receives mushrooms and other produce from towns surrounding Palo Alto.

“My mushroom forager goes into peo-

ple’s yards, Los Altos Hills and all around here to bring me my porcinis and my other exotic mushrooms,” Ayers says.

All of Calafia’s ingredients are fresh, with the exception of a few canned goods like diced tomatoes, tomato paste and apple sauce. Ayers makes his own pickles, hot sauce and ketchup.

As the years have gone by, Ayers continually strives to perfect his seasonally rotating menu and creates new ones every year.

“It’s kind of like the philosophy Thomas Jefferson had, where you eat meats in very small amounts and compliment it and garnish all your meals with vegetables.

— Charlie Ayers, Calafia Owner

The menu offers five daily specials including vegetarian and vegan options.

Calafia’s open kitchen allows chefs to perform and display their skills while guests look on and wait attentively for their meals.

“I have always had open kitchens in California; it lends itself to the ebb and flow of energy in a restaurant where it’s exciting for guests to see all the action,” Ayers says.

After he left Google, Ayers began to acquire investors in the Silicon Valley to fund Calafia. He saw a potential market for food that implemented healthy alternatives to the status quo of meaty entrees, including vegetarian and vegan dishes.

Ayers’s Dragon’s Breath Noodle Breath Bowl and the Vegan Love Plate are some of his most popular dishes.

– 59 –

“It’s kind of like the philosophy Thomas Jefferson had, where you eat meats in very small amounts and compliment it and garnish all your meals with vegetables,” Ayers says.

Soon after the inauguration of Calafia, Ayers gained a vegetarian following that seemed upset when they saw meat dishes alongside the restaurant’s vegetarian options on the menu.

“I was watching and reading the body language of the customers, and that told me right there they wanted to see a segregated, separate [vegetarian] menu,” Ayers says.

It was then that he created two separate menus to accommodate his customers at Calafia.

Creating a separate vegetarian menu was no challenge for Ayers, who had cooked vast volumes of diverse food while working at Google.

Alongside the restaurant, serving breakfast, lunch and dinner, the Calafia Market-A-Go-Go was created to fit “impatient lifestyles,” Ayers says, very much like his own.

“I am an impatient person and my life is important and costs me money,” Ayers says. “I am not the only person like that; when you’re stuck in a line trying to get out, it’s not reasonable to me and I don’t understand it.”

This section of the restaurant was also created to benefit people on tighter budgets.

“You shouldn’t have to be wealthy to eat healthy,” Ayers says. His philosophy is based on the belief that healthy and nutritious foods should be affordable and accessible to every diner who comes through the door.

“I provide what they know they can get day-in, day-out, seven days a week, multiple times a day, high-quality, locallysourced.” V

CULTURE | NOV 2013

HERE’S THE THE NEW ICE CREAM OF THE MODERN AGE Text by ANGELA XU Photography by ANA SOFIA AMIEVA-WANG

T

HE METALLIC PUMP HISSES AS IT pours fog into the mixing bowl. The overflowing white mist spills across the counter-top, covering the floor in thick, curling strands. This may sound like a scientific experiment gone awry, but it’s actually the final step in ice cream’s latest twist that can be found in downtown’s Scoop Microcreamery. As the mist parts, the mixer is lifted from the bowl, revealing creamy, white, liquid nitrogen-made ice cream, the featured product of Scoop.

On Friday, Sept. 27, Scoop, an ice cream shop specializing in liquid nitrogen-made ice cream, moved into University Avenue in the former Häagen-Dazs location across from Pizza My Heart.

Before Dave Somasunderams and his wife, Cindy Somasunderams, became co-owners of Scoop microcreamery in Palo Alto, they were owners of a frozen yogurt shop in Princeton, N.J. After moving to California, the Somasunderams encountered liquid nitrogen-made ice cream when Dave Somasunderams, who has been in the food industry for over 30 years, saw an episode of Shark Tank, a reality show about entrepreneurs who pitch ideas to a panel of possible investors called “sharks.”

“He saw these people in Utah making ice cream with liquid nitrogen and the sharks loved it and Dave thought, ‘We should do something like that,’” Cindy Somasunderams says. “We wanted to do it in small batches so people could taste the flavors before they bought it.”

The rapid freezing process of this liquid nitrogen technique creates Scoop’s distinctly smooth texture. According to Cindy Somasunderams, because the ice cream freezes so quickly, there is no time to pump air into it, as conventional ice cream makers do.

“By using the liquid nitrogen method, it [the ice cream] freezes instantly without forming large ice crystals as it goes from liquid to solid in less than five minutes,” Cindy Somasunderams says.

“People say that they love the texture, that it’s so smooth.”

Pretty soon, the Somasunderams were experimenting with small amounts of liquid nitrogen supplied by their scientist daughter. After successful test runs, Scoop Microcreamery — “micro” referring to the small batches of 32 scoops of ice cream made daily — was born.

The resulting ice cream parlor looks like any other, with the

CULTURE | NOV 2013

A SWEET TREAT LEFT: Dave Somasunderams pours liquid nitrogen into his pre-made mixture of maple bacon crunch ice cream.

ABOVE: Customers can choose from a multitude of toppings to add to the top of their ice cream. Each added toppings costs 75 cents. exception of twin vats of liquid nitrogen smack in its center.

Scoop uses liquid nitrogen at -321 degrees Fahrenheit to make its ice cream. The resulting texture is a combination of normal ice cream and soft serve, making for an incredibly rich treat.

Customers can enjoy their ice cream amid the hiss of the liquid nitrogen pipes and the sweet smells, reminiscent of a pastry shop, inside the store.

According to Cindy Somasunderams, the ice cream’s distinct flavor is the result of high quality natural ingredients.

“We’re starting with a really good cream from Straus Creamery,” Cindy Somasunderams says. “It’s very fresh; it’s very rich.”

Scoop aims to use the best ingredients in its ice cream, such as organic cream and eggs.

Cindy Somasunderams also makes her own vanilla bean extract, aged with Madagascar vanilla beans to achieve a deep taste.

She adds that, to ensure the best quality ice cream, the menu follows the changing seasons, incorporating only seasonally available ingredients.

Scoop’s current fall flavor is Pumpkin Ginger Strudel. The pumpkin-flavored ice cream is rich with bits of crispy crumbled strudel swirled in.

According to Cindy Somasunderams, she’s working on a ginger-flavored ice cream that will appear during December. She hopes to create a strawberry ice cream sometime during spring.

Scoop offers a variety of flavors like maple bacon crunch, one of the store’s most popular ice creams. Ironically, it was the Somasunderams’s vegetarian daughter who suggested the flavor.

“She wouldn’t eat it, I’m sure, but she thought that it would be a good idea,” Cindy Somasunderams says.

The maple bacon ice cream has a delicious savory flavor with a balance of salty bacon and sweet maple. The bacon lacks a crunch,

but even with this shortcoming, its roughness contrasts with the smooth consistency of the ice cream.

After public praise of Cindy Somasunderam’s bacon brittle bits, she decided to sell the brittle by the bag in post-it-sized slabs for $4.95.

Another popular ice cream is their bourbon vanilla with a salty caramel swirl. Reminiscent of the Bacon Maple Crunch, this flavor vacillates between complementary salty and sweet flavors.

Scoop’s recent debut, coffee ice cream, became a quick hit among customers, according to Cindy Somasunderams. The subtle hint of coffee is less powerful, richer and sweeter than traditional coffee ice cream, but the coffee flavor increases in strength after each spoonful.

The silky Mango Chili Sherbert gives a punch of tartness while the chili appears only as a brief aftertaste.

Scoop also serves milkshakes made with any of their ice cream selections. The chocolate milkshake has a thick, rich dark chocolate taste, however there were some small hard particles that threw off the consistency.

Scoop ice cream offers a distinctly rich flavor along with a denser ice cream. As a result, a bowl of Scoop’s ice cream satisfies any sweet tooth at the affordable price of $4.50 for one scoop of ice cream, $4.95 for two scoops or $5.75 for three scoops.

Scoop is environmentally conscious, offering a dollar off for bringing in a mason jar to take home a pint of ice cream. Each pint holds up to two flavors for $9.95. Similarly, if a customer brings a bowl for their ice cream they get 25 cents off their purchase.

“We are focused on basically making the best ice cream possible along with the best ingredients,” Cindy Somasunderams says.

“It’s a lot of fun and we just love making people happy with our ice cream.” v

– 61 –

Celebrate Your Paly spirit During the Holidays NEW SWEATER? CHECK FRUITCAKE? CHECK A PERSONALIZEDGIFT OF ... ... CONCRETE?

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— Verde

CULTURE | NOV 2013

THE BEAST COAST AWAKENS A GROUP OF BROOKLYN NATIVES ARE TAKING RAP BY STORM

Text by WILL QUEEN and ALYSSA TAKAHASHI Photo Illustration by ANA SOFIA AMIEVA-WANG

Quickly emerging onto the music scene, the Beast Coast movement is creating shockwaves with its controversial content and youthful rebelliousness, in a modern twist on traditional Tupac-era rap. The Beast Coast movement is shifting the focus of many rap listeners from the West Coast, the home of acts such as Kendrick Lamar’s rap supergroup Black Hippy, to the East Coast.

The Beast Coast comprises groups from the Flatbush neighborhood of Brooklyn: Flatbush Zombies, the Underachievers and Joey Bada$$’s Progressive Era collective. Despite growing up together in Flatbush and sharing similarities in their music, each group brings its own distinct sound to the table.

The Beast Coast’s organic sound, filled with choppy, irregular vocals, is the product of long hours spent together developing their artistic minds. v

THE UNDERACHIEVERS

“The Lords of Flatbush,” “Indigoism”

The name of Issa Dash and AK’s rap duo “The Underachievers” captures the hard-partying nature of the Beast Coast as a whole. They’re very honest about doing little but sitting around, engaging in questionable behavior and promoting their movement.

The two are obsessed with the concept of enlightenment (even though they have yet to express any enlightened thought, which is one of their main criticisms). Much of their music carries an easy going message about living a good life. Staying true to the Beast Coast approach to music, their lyrics discussing marijuana, the importance of thought and loyalty to fellow Flatbush rappers fill the majority of their songs.

Playing their part in the Beast Coast Movement, Issa Dash and AK fill the niche for laid-back music that one can listen to without a worry in the world.

JOEY BADA$$ “Summer Knights,” “Ba.da.$$” Joey Bada$$ rose up in the rap community through his own collective rap group Pro Era. Freestyle interjections and verses of the rest of the crew support Bada$$’s dominant vocals, creating one fluid and diverse rhythm. The crew stresses the equality of each of its members, but Bada$$ remains the dominant vocal.

His humorously cynical lyrics set him apart from many mainstream rappers. Unlike many modern rap artists, Bada$$’s intricate lyrics add depth to his music. Each song contains a different personality that comes to life when played.

He stresses the importance of wordplay in rap. Bada$$’s goal to revive old-school hip-hop with his own music helps set him apart from his Beast Coast counterparts.

FLATBUSH ZOMBIES

“Drugs,” “BetterOffDead”

Looking into Meechy Darko’s alluring, vampiric grill offers a peek at the intimidating and eccentric personality he expresses through his music. Darko, one-half of the critically acclaimed Brooklyn duo Flatbush Zombies, is gathering a lot of influence in the rap community.

Meechy Darko and Zombie Juice pride themselves in being unconventional. Their lyrical versatility allows them to touch on topics that stray from the mainstream, such as racial inequality.

The two take advantage of the superb production of Erick Arc Elliot, using their unique voices in such a way as to enchant the listener. The purely chaotic nature of their performances adds to what they bring to the table within the Beast Coast movement. It should be noted that some of the material may be seen as offensive.

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American Cl

NAPA BASED RESTAURANT GOTT’S ROADSIDE GIVES PALO ALTANS A TASTE OF QUINTESSENTIAL AMERICAN CUISINE

O

N SEPT. 30, GOTT’S ROADSIDE, A NEW BURGER JOINT FROM THE RENOWNED gourmet chain based in St. Helena, opened in Town and Country Village. The branch started out as a burger stand in St. Helena, California, and is now making its mark on Palo Alto. The Palo Alto branch is the restaurant’s fourth opening and signifies its branching out across the Bay Area. Unadorned and clean decoration marks Gott’s dedication to the simple pleasure of a good burger. There are no gimmicks, what you see is what you get, and despite its less than humble origins in the Napa Valley, Gott’s provides a decent take on the classic American burger. It is one of those rare finds that, while bland in some spots, has the potential to be a truly great burger joint with time and patience. v Sweet Potato Fries Menu Description: Chili spice-dusted and served with house-made ranch.

Price: $3.99 While most of the sides served at Gott’s are like those you’d find at any other burger joint, the sweet potato fries, which were sweet and crunchy, impressed with both their bold flavors and crispy coating. The fries were handmade, thinly cut and sprinkled with a garlicky seasoning reminiscent of chili powder and served with a special ranch sauce. The ranch sauce, the highlight of the entire meal, had a tangy and sweet flavor that one can only assume was truly house-made, and not just falsely labeled as such. The fries are addicting to say the least and sharing is certainly not an option. If you’re with a group order two, or maybe even three, servings to keep everybody happy.

The sweet potato fries are a delectable starter and a must for any new Gott’s patron.

Onion Rings Menu Description: Thick and battered. Lightly salted.

Price: $3.99 While the sweet potato fries offered a delightful take on the modern diner classic, the onion rings were less impressive. Despite the satisfying crunch, they lacked a depth of flavor, relying solely on an overbearing presence of salt to carry the dish. Regardless of this, the onion rings were perfectly cooked, remaining delectably crispy on the outside while the onion within was neither raw nor overcooked.

Despite this, the onion rings brought nothing to the table that can’t be found at your average fast food chain restaurant. At best, they were ordinary and certainly not worth the money especially for its small portion size.

CULTURE | NOV 2013 Text by JAMIE ALLENDORF and PAUL PHROMTHONG Photography by ANA SOFIA AMIEVA-WANG

assic

Spring Salad Menu Description: Organic spring mix and spinach tossed with avocado, radishes, toasted pumpkin seeds and lemon-dijon vinaigrette Price: $6.99 Unlike many other typical burger joints, Gott’s provides veggie options for its customers. The Spring Salad at Gott’s, while acceptable in taste and seasoning, lacked the punch and flavor to make it a truly remarkable starter. One of the main components to making a good salad is an even balance between the vegetables and the dressing. Gott’s had an unbalanced salad, with 90 percent of the plate consisting of the mixed greens and 10 percent of it sorely lacking in dressing. The avocado and toasted pumpkin seeds were a nice touch, giving the salad texture, but besides that, the plate was under-seasoned and standard.

The dressing provided a tangy and acidic lemon flavor but unfortunately was masked by the overwhelming amount of greens making the dish an overall disappointment.

Cheeseburger Menu Description: American cheese, lettuce, tomatoes, pickles, and secret sauce on a toasted egg bun Price: $7.99 At Gott’s, while the classic cheeseburger boasted simplicity, the simplicity overtook the freshness and what was left was an average burger at best. The improperly cooked patty failed to dodge dryness, the meat was completely devoid of moistness and the flavors of the patty itself, overly salted. The lettuce and pickles were crisp enough to add some much desired brightness, but the burger’s “secret sauce” while secret, turned out to be anything but special or unique, with its flavor being practically nonexistent.

The highlight of the cheeseburger was the soft and fluffy toasted egg bun, giving the cheeseburger some semblance of memorability.

MODERN DINER Gott’s Spring Salad and Cheeseburger are only a small segment of the restaurants diverse menu options.

CULTURE | NOV 2013

BACK IN BLACK AND WHITE AT STANFORD THEATER, BOGART, GRANT LIVE ON Text and photography by LUCY FOX THIS IS YOUR DECK, MAKE

T

HE TONES OF ORGAN MUSIC IN the Stanford Theater transport moviegoers back to the early days of film. In the darkness, it takes a minute to identify the organ player: dressed in a suit jacket with short tails, he sits on the stage, framed by red velvet curtains.

The last song finishes with a flourish and applause ensues. The movie is scheduled to start at 7:30 p.m., and when

a brief history of

the curtain rises, the analog clock icon on my iPhone tells me it’s right on time. No previews. No blaring announcements about cell phone use.

The Stanford Theater is one of the only theaters in the country “and probably the world” where an original Wurlitzer organ plays every night before and after the main film feature, manager Cindy Mortensen says.

Part movie theater, part time machine and part movie

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CULTURE | NOV 2013

poster collection, the Stanford Theater is a cultural embodiment of the golden age of Hollywood. In the heart of downtown Palo Alto, it offers a diversion from the monotony of high-end restaurants, frozen yogurt stores and boutiques that are University Avenue’s typical options.

The year 2025 will mark the theater’s centennial anniversary. Even today, to walk through its doors is to step back into the Jazz Age, when it was Palo Alto’s premier movie house.

David Woodley Packard, son of HP cofounder David Packard, rented the theater out in 1987, upon Fred Astaire’s death, to hold a film festival in his honor. During the threeweek festival, the theater showed almost every Fred Astaire film ever made; it was sold out every night.

Taking this as a good indication that people would come out to see classic films, Woodley Packard restored the theater — its dazzling marquee and intricate painting — to its 1925 glory.

Following the restoration, Woodley Packard founded the

Stanford Theater Foundation. As president, he runs the theater to this day.

“He [Woodley Packard] sees classic film as the greatest 20th century art form, and he feels that we all have a responsibility to preserve that art form, and to make sure that it survives and that people can see it in perpetuity,” Mortensen says. “In a way this theater functions as a museum — when you come in you kind of go back in time.”

The moment moviegoers step over the threshold, they are transported back half a century.

The sounds from the bustling sidewalk outside die off, and the serenity of the lobby takes over. The smell of freshly buttered popcorn permeates as guests wait to buy tickets, guarded by a velvet rope.

“You can go anywhere else in the world and go see Tom Cruise or Ryan Gosling,” Mortensen says, “but you can’t just see [Humphrey] Bogart or Cary Grant. It’s a dying art form, and we keep it alive.” v

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CULTURE | NOV 2013

JAMIE’S

JAMS

VERDE TAKES A LOOK AT RECENT ALBUM AND EP RELEASES ARTIST: Arctic ALBUM: “AM”

Domino Records

Top

Tracks:

Monkeys

The Arctic Monkeys are back, sort of. In their fifth studio album, the Sheffield, England, quartet depart from their signature sound and style to explore a slicker side of rock n’ roll. Far from their 2006 debut “Whatever People Say I Am, That’s What I’m Not,” “AM” disregards the gritty, spastic chords of past efforts and embraces a more grandiose approach. Lead singer Alex Turner never fails to impress with sharp, biting lyrics on songs like “One For the Road,” but the softer accompanying guitars have an under whelming effect. The new direction is not all bad ­— for the most part, it’s actually quite good. “Mad Sounds” is an achingly sweet feel-good ballad with a dash of soul, while “R U Mine?” offers a taste of the old Monkeys and the signature power beat of drummer Matt Helders.

While they are far from where they started, the Arctic Monkeys are no where near the end. Although some fans may crave the Arctic Monkeys of the past, give “AM” a few listens before tossing it aside.

“Arabella”

ARTIST: Albert Hammond ALBUM: “AHJ” (EP)

Cult Records

Top

Tracks:

Text by JAMIE ALLENDORF

“No.1

Party

Anthem”

“Knee

Socks”

Jr.

After two full-length solo albums, Albert Hammond Jr., also the rhythm guitarist for The Strokes, has delivered a fast-paced EP that will quench the thirst of any ravenous Strokes fan craving the classic sounds reminiscent of The Strokes 2001 debut “Is This It.” “AHJ,” Hammond’s first attempt at solo work since 2008’s “¿Cómo Te Llama?” and two Strokes records, deals with his struggle with drug abuse. The issue is apparent on the urgent, dream-pop-inspired track “Strange Tidings.” Despite the often difficult content, Hammond provides listeners with his signature riff-laden style. Hammond seems to have finally found comfort in the idea of going solo. He embraces the role of frontman completely on “Cooker Ship,” reaching new levels vocally and disregarding all the self-consciousness that seemed to accompany his previous work. Along with his scratchy vocals, “AHJ” is worth a quick listen, after all, it is only 15 minutes long.

“St.

Justice”

“Carnal

Cruise”

ARTIST: Lorde ALBUM: “Pure Heroine”

Republic Records/Lava Records

No doubt about it, this girl is talented. At only 16 she has forged her way onto the American airwaves, but she has yet to discover how to apply her many talents in an interesting manner. In her debut album, Lorde, born Ella Yelich-O’Connor, gives the audience little to talk about, other than her uber-famous, if overplayed, single “Royals.” The New Zealand native offers some tastes of brilliance on tracks such as “Glory and Gore” and “Buzzcut Season,” but in the end, even these brief flirtations with greatness are shot down by repetitive and droning, sonar-like digital beats. Even O’Connor’s intriguingly drowsy voice can’t make up for the mess made on “Tennis Court,” a song that feels like a hipster version of Rebecca Black’s “Friday” with its monotonous lyrics and overuse of synth beats. O’Connor has a long way to go before proving herself worthy of the praise that she has received. Her debut is nothing more than just okay, if a bit boring. Make that extremely boring.

Top Tracks: “A World Alone” – 68 “Ribs” –

“White Teeth Teens”

CULTURE | NOV 2013

The English Toffee Bar THE EASIEST CHOCOLATE BAR EVER Text and photography by CLAIRE PRIESTLEY

A time-tested third-generation recipe, these warm, soft and crunchy English toffee bars are a quick delectable dessert.

Package them up for a homemade gift — if they make it out of your kitchen — or invite a couple friends over to enjoy with you and your family.

They are sure to brighten those family thanksgivings.

Ingredients

1 cup butter 1 cup brown sugar 1 egg yolk 1 tablespoon vanilla 2 cups flour 1 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips 1 cup chopped nuts (optional)

Recipe

1. Beat butter for 30 seconds with electric mixer; add brown sugar and beat until fluffy.

2. Add egg yolk and vanilla. Beat well.

3. Gradually add flour to mixture, beating constantly.

4. Use clean hands and press evenly in

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ungreased 15x10x1 baking pan. Bake at 350º for 15-18 minutes.

5. While warm, sprinkle with chocolate chips, and spread using spatula until melted and evenly distributed.

6. Sprinkle with chopped nuts (optional).

7. Cut into rectangular bars before cooled.

This Land(e) is Your Land(e) MY SUMMER SERVICE TRIP TO COSTAGUATAMEXIRICO Text by LANDE WATSON Photo Illustration by ANA-SOFIA AMEVA-WANG and ANTHONY LIU

W

ELCOME TO PALO ALTO High School, where our students regularly discover and eradicate fatal illnesses, single-handedly dig wells that service several small African countries and create multi-million-dollar non-profit organizations to provide iPhones for malnourished children — for every one you buy, little Tommy gets his own! And who needs clean water when you’ve got Temple Run? Did you know that the United States decided not to take military action in Syria solely because Paly students changed their profile pictures to peace signs in a show of support?

These students are great — don’t get me wrong — but they often forget that real issues exist in our own backyard.

Foreign community service programs are an option that many Paly students choose to take advantage of to fulfill either college requirements or personally felt obligations. However, the colonialist attitude, “We are white and we’re here to help,” that sometimes accompanies upper-middle class students when they drop into a country for a month and expect to affect major change — or turn into Mother Theresa — takes away the potential community service has to truly and positively impact a community.

Another negative aspect of these service projects comes through in a place dangerously inhabited by cliches and “important life lessons”: college application essays. These essays expose a common egocentric attitude that community service is essential beyond all else for personal growth.

Separate from the potential for condescending attitudes, shorter service projects make less logistical sense. Local service provides an opportunity for volunteers to do sustained service with a community they are either part of or familiar with. Volunteering at an after-school program or sorting cans at a food bank may seem less glamorous than painting condos in Barbados, but these activities have the potential to be much more impactful for the served community.

In fact, “service to others” is one of the 41 Developmental Assets that the Palo Alto Unified School District and other Palo Alto organizations use to help children aged 12-18 “grow up healthy, caring and responsible.” The initiative states the importance of young people serving their community one or more hours

a week. Service should be a steady feature in adolescents’ lives and flying to Kenya once a week might present some difficulties.

Besides the developmental importance of community service, what kind of service you choose to do and how you address it, might impact your college applications. Traditionally, summer trips to foreign countries have been viewed as viable options for students to demonstrate their commitment to service, while having ample amounts of fun with their American counterparts. However, in today’s climate of increasingly selective college admissions, admissions officers are suggesting more and more frequently that they put a lower value on these service trips, favoring more local extended service instead.

Rick Clark, an admissions officer at the Georgia Institute of Technology, was on an episode of NPR’s This American Life about college admissions in September, and spoke about what he called the overused “mission trip essay.”

“And [it’s] great to go on the mission trip and have a cultural experience but inevitably the way it reads is so predictable,” Clark said, “‘Over the course of my time there, I went expecting to help others, but in fact it was me who was changed.’ And even just when you first start reading that you’re like, ‘Ugh, here it comes again.’”

Legitimate admissions concerns are consistently magnified and sensationalized on the Internet — and there’s no difference when it comes to community service. College Confidential users regularly post horror stories about their rejections from Stanford, Princeton and Georgetown, an obvious result of the admission board’s failed recognition of their one week service trip to CostaGuataMexiRico to make piña coladas for destitute orphans.

So, next time you pull out your parents’ credit card to book a $5,000 trip to build sand castles for homeless people halfway across the world, think twice.

Look outside your window and realize: We have lots of work to do right here at home. v

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Palo Alto Unified School District Palo Alto High School 50 Embarcadero Road Palo Alto, CA 94301

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