NAMED BEST CAMPUS NEWSPAPER IN CALIFORNIA FOR 2022 BY THE CALIFORNIA COLLEGE MEDIA ASSOCIATION
Tuesday, April 11, 2023
Volume 160 No. 29 SERVING SAN JOSE STATE UNIVERSITY SINCE 1934
WWW.SJSUNEWS.COM/SPARTAN_DAILY
Debates kick off A.S. elections By Matthew Gonzalez STAFF WRITER
Debates for the 2023-2024 Associated Students Board of Directors election were held in the Student Union on Monday afternoon. Candidates were allowed to briefly introduce themselves and answer questions asked by those in attendance. Twelve positions were debated on, with five only having one candidate present. Voting began on Monday at 3 p.m. and end Thursday at 8 a.m. Students can vote online using their SJSU ONE login. Voting booths will be open outside Clark Hall, on 7th Street Plaza and in the housing quad on Tuesday and Wednesday from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.
President Dominic Treseler, political science junior and current A.S. director of legislative affairs, said his experience working with departing A.S. President Nina Chuang has allowed him to be a part of tangible change at SJSU. “Just to note, I’ve kind of been Nina’s right hand man on all of these initiatives,” he said. “When we learned that Title IX had not engaged with our students, we meet and really push on a system level to make sure that these new Title IX implementations were being spoken to throughout the CSU.” Treseler also said there are subtle systemic affronts to Native American culture at SJSU that he wants to address if elected. “The fact that we use chief so often linguistically, like, even our own chief electoral officer, this is something that is probably a little problematic,” he said. “It’s just something that people don’t think about, so I’m looking into those uncommon, deeply structural
MATTHEW GONZALEZ | SPARTAN DAILY
DEBATE | Page 2
A.S. director of legislative affairs Dominic Treseler speaks during the debate for the upcoming A.S. Board of Director’s election on Monday. Treseler is running for the position of A.S. president.
SJSU expands online learning opportunities By Alina Ta
STAFF WRITER
San Jose State is expanding its fully online program that launched last August. Educational and community leadership senior Christopher Padua said he is grateful he doesn’t have to walk on to SJSU’s campus. “I do find myself being really grateful that I may never have to step a single foot on campus if I genuinely never wanted to,” he said. Padua said although he lives 15 minutes away from campus, he doesn’t have to attend in-person classes because he attends classes online. “Regardless of whether I lived in San Jose or not, SJSU Online affords me so much flexibility that I otherwise may not have had,” he said. Sarah Gordon, managing director for the SJSU Online Student Success, said SJSU Online is an initiative to expand access to higher education through online schooling. She said the program is targeted toward students who are considered “non-traditional” or “adult learners students.” Gordon said there are many students who have completed college courses in the past, but were unable to complete their degrees because of unforeseen life circumstances. She said many of these students are working full-time and may also be providing for their own families. “It’s just, you know, a way for students to fit in, you know, the
coursework and the learning into their already busy lives,” she said. Gordon said because of the way the classes are designed, students are able to complete their course load on their own time instead of at designated times of the day. Padua said he prefers the modality because it allows him to balance time between having two jobs and a social life. “Whether I’m at home or outside just constantly thinking of, you know, when my homework is due and when I [get it] done, as well as when I need my work to be done,” he said. Padua said the classes he is taking through SJSU Online are different from the courses he took during the COVID-19 restrictions. “In contrast to my regular classes from when we were online during the pandemic . . . my teachers have a [much] firmer grip on using Zoom,” he said. Ronald Rogers, vice provost for academic innovation and institutional effectiveness, said it’s important to distinguish between what happened during the COVID-19 restrictions and what SJSU Online is attempting to achieve. Rogers said during the coronavirus pandemic, the online classes were built quickly, in a reactionary state, because the university was forced to shut down campus. “[We were] kind of forced to get professional development to try to figure it out,” he said. Rogers said at the beginning of the pandemic, many professors SJSU ONLINE | Page 2
ALINA TA | SPARTAN DAILY
A protester from the Freedom Road Socialist Society chants and throws her fist in the air during a rally for reproductive rights in front of San Jose City Hall on Sunday afternoon.
Protesters rally against nationwide abortion pill halt By Mat Bejarano STAFF WRITER
Community organizers gathered outside of San Jose’s City Hall on Sunday to protest the recent halt in Texas of a drug used for abortion. On April 7, U.S. District Court Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk challenged the Food and Drugs Administrations approval of the drug mifepristone, according to a Monday NPR article. Mifepristone is the first of two oral medications that are used in a medical abortion and was approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration in 2000, according to a Planned Parenthood article. Mike Paradela, a community organizer for the Freedom Road Socialist Organization, said he’s concerned with the current state of reproductive rights in the country. The Freedom Road Socialist Organization is a group that fights for socialism in America,
according to its website frso.org. “I’m here because even though I can’t have a kid or I can’t be the one to carry it, that does not mean that people I don’t know can or will be affected by this,” Paradela said. Medical abortions made up 53% of all facilitybased abortions in the U.S. in 2020, according to a Feb. 24, 2022 Guttmacher Institute study. Paradela said he doesn’t want a future where people are forced to have children they may neglect. “Everyone who can have a kid is affected by this and I’m here because I care about these issues because attacks on one person and one community is just a way to attack another community,” Paradela said. The drug is still available in Texas as Judge Kasmaryk gave the Food and Drug Administration seven days to appeal, according to a Sunday PBS article. PROTEST | Page 2