VOL. 152, NO. 28 | THURSDAY, MARCH 28, 2019 | SINCE 1934
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Transgender visibility displayed
ILLUSTRATION BY MARCI SUELA
By Kael Austria
SENIOR STAFF WRITER
March 31 will signify the 10-year anniversar y of International Transgender Day of Visibility. Referred to as TDOV by the transgender and gender variant community, the day is dedicated to acknowledging the accomplishments and success of transgender and gender non-conforming people. As International Transgender Day
of Visibility approaches, several flags representing the transgender and/or gender expansive community have been hung from trees and buildings all over the San Jose State campus by sociology lecturer Soma de Bourbon and her class. These flags have piqued the curiosity of many, eliciting a variety of reactions from faculty and students. “I didn’t notice them at first, but once I did, I got a little teary-eyed,” said spatial arts senior Theodore Kazemi. “It’s really great to see students
supporting the community in the small ways that they can.” SJSU Pride Center director Bonnie Sugiyama and a group of students returned to campus this week after participating in T-Camp. T-Camp takes place in Santa Cruz and is a three-day long retreat dedicated to providing a safe place for people to explore gender and how it relates to their other intersecting identities such as race and sexual orientation. Sugiyama said students who returned
from the retreat expressed that they felt valid and seen when they realized how many pink, white and blue transgender flags were displayed around campus. “It was hard coming back to reality after a retreat, but some of the students were so happy to see the trans flags around campus,” said Sugiyama. “They felt supported when they saw people tabling and talking about TDOV.” While TDOV is not a well-known PRIDE | Page 2
SPOT NEWS
Public intoxication arrest At about 6:25 p.m. on Wednesday, university police arrest a man outside of the Martin Luther King Jr. Library under suspicion of public intoxication, according to Lieutenant Mike Santos. The man was initially asked to leave the library after staff allegedly saw him with an open container of alcohol. Police threw a “spit mask” over his head to prevent the man from spitting.
VICENTE VERA | SPARTAN DAILY
ICE presence rumor dispelled by SJSU By Adam Yoshikawa STAFF WRITER
At 8:02 p.m. Vice President of Administration and Finance, Charlie Faas, sent out a mass email to all students and faculty verifying that there were no U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officers on campus. In the email, Faas addresses the misinformation that was spread through email and social media
about ICE, stating, “SJSU Police Department has verified that there has been no ICE activity on campus.” Associated Students President Ariadna Manzo said friends were contacting her to warn of the potential ICE activity. “This false alarm caused a lot of anxiety within the undocumented community on campus,” Manzo said. “Students should check with UPD before posting [about ICE].” Faas advised that students and
A&E Pizza that your wallet will love Page A4
faculty of the California State University community who are approached by any federal, state, or local official claiming to be ICE to “immediately contact the University Police Department,” who will act as a liaison and the Office of General Counsel. The office will “provide guidance, references and resources as available.” Follow Adam on Instagram @yoshi_kawa_
Editor’s Note: The Spartan Daily will resume publication on April 8 when the university’s spring break is over.
KUNAL MEHTA | SPARTAN DAILY
The infected traveler visited the New Sa By Thai restaurant on South Second Street on March 19.
Measles breaks out in Silicon Valley By Kunal Mehta and Mauricio La Plante STAFF WRITERS
An international traveler visiting the Silicon Valley has been confirmed to have measles, according to the Santa Clara County Public Health Department. The department released a list of places the traveler visited between March 16 and March 23, which included the Apple headquarters, Valley Fair Mall, and Great Mall in addition to multiple other locations. One of the visited places is the New Sa By Thai restaurant, located on South 2nd Street, two blocks from the San Jose State campus. “Our customers say they
have the vaccine and aren’t afraid,” said Sirin Inklai, manager of the restaurant. She said that two employees, who worked the day the infected traveler visited, went to the hospital and were told by doctors that they were in the clear. Most people in Santa Clara County have been vaccinated, and are protected from contracting the disease, the department said. “Two doses of the MMR vaccine is the best protection against the measles,” said Marianna Moles, the health department’s public communications specialist. The MMR vaccine protects against measles, mumps and
Sports Mental health counselors coming for athletes Page A6
VACCINES | Page 2
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NEWS
THURSDAY, MARCH 28, 2019
César Chávez remembered By Javier Velez STAFF WRITER
EXECUTIVE EDITOR NICHOLAS ZAMORA MANAGING EDITOR JANA KADAH EXECUTIVE PRODUCER KAYLA FLORES
César Chávez Day is this Sunday, as it is always celebrated on his birthday, March 31. Chávez was a civil rights activist before he died at the age of 66. “Having some people like [Chávez] in the past teaches you the value of standing up for your community and using your
voice to create change, using your privileges to create change,” said social work junior Paola Quintanilla. “It just influences us to want to create change and fight against what’s being opposed on us.” A major turning point in the Chávez movement occurred in September 1965, when the fledgling National Farm Workers Association voted to join
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a strike that had been initiated by Filipino farm workers in Delano’s grape fields, according to the History Channel. “Chávez was a part of a hunger strike and he really put his own body through physical pain for his people that he was trying to fight for,” said Elisa Aquino, program coordinator of the San Jose State Chicanx/Latinx Student Success Center. “To see that extent that he went for his community is quite remarkable in my opinion.” Chávez and Dolores Huerta, who is also a civil rights activist, were able to organize the movement together and make their passion into a reality. “Just the fact that [Chávez] had a woman fighting with him, I think that empowers a lot of women today and even back then. It just brings
that sense of solidarity,” said Quintanilla. Despite ethnic and gender biases, Huerta helped organize the 1965 Delano grape strike of 5,000 grape workers that led to a negotiation in the workers’ contract, according to the National Women’s History Museum. Throughout her work with the United Farm Workers Union (UFW), Huerta organized workers, negotiated contracts and advocated for safer working conditions, including the elimination of harmful pesticides, according to the National Women’s History Museum. “A lot of the work the Filipino community had already done prior to the movement. So I think it is also important to highlight other people other than just César Chávez,” Aquino said. In the 1920s and 1930s, Filipino immigrants arrived in the United States to seek
To see that extent that he went for his community is quite remarkable in my opinion. Elisa Aquino program coordinator of SJSU Chicanx/Latinx Student Success Center
fortune. But the immigrants faced discrimination as they worked in the vast agricultural fields of the West. “I think it is very important to understand and get to know different cultures, different ways to do things, different perspectives,” said undeclared freshman Erick Vazquez. Follow Javier on Twitter @JavyALVZ408
PRIDE Continued from page 1 or celebrated date, it provides the transgender and/or gender non-conforming community with a platform to share their experiences and achievements. International Transgender Day of Visibility was founded and organized in 2009 by Rachel Crandall Crocker, the director of the organization known as Transgender Michigan. The day was created as a result of lack of transgender recognition, as well as to add to the short list of significant LGBTQ dates. Prior to establishing TDOV, the transgender and/or gender nonconforming community had only one day of recognition. Nov. 20, the Transgender Day of Remembrance, serves as a day to mourn and memorialize the number of transgender people who have been murdered. Digital media arts lecturer Lark Alder shared their feelings toward TDOV, elaborating on the concept of visibility and why it is important to have representation within the community. Alder serves as the adviser and organizer of SJSU’s Queer Arts meetup called QuArtz, and is also a faculty fellow for the Pride Center. “I think that Transgender Day of Visibility makes people think about different kinds of
KAEL AUSTRIA | SPARTAN DAILY
Transgender pride flags were wrapped around trees all over campus to symbolize transgender visibility.
I think that Transgender Day of Visibility makes people think about different kinds of visibility Lark Alder digital media arts lecturer
visibility,” said Alder. “What kind of visibility and representation do we want to bring to the table, and what kinds of visibility do we want to question?” They explained that transgender and/or gender non-conforming
people of color do not get the same amount of visibility as white transgender people. “Transgender Day of Visibility is a day for friends and family to step up and participate in bringing the work, struggles and
accomplishments of trans people to the forefront.” said Alder. The Billy DeFrank LGBTQ+ Community Center will host an event in celebration of TDOV on March 31. The series of workshops and activities will take place at San Jose City Hall Rotunda from noon to 6:30 p.m. The nighttime 21-and-over TDOV celebration will take place from 8 p.m. to 10 p.m. at Renegades Bar.
VACCINES Continued from page 1 rubella, and is typically administered to children, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Moles described measles as a “highly contagious respiratory disease.” It is normally passed through direct contact and through the air, according to the World Health Organization measles fact sheet. “Nintey percent of those who are not immune will come down with measles,” said Moles. Vaccines are administered at the SJSU Student Health Center, Dr. Barbara Fu, the medical chief of staff of the Student Health Center said in an email. “The vaccine is protective in 10 days to 2 weeks after it has been given,” she said. On campus, some students had immediate knowledge of their most recent vaccinations and others admitted they didn’t
SOURCE: SANTA CLARA COUNTY PUBLIC HEALTH DEPARTMENT, INFOGRAPHIC BY KUNAL MEHTA
A map of locations where the measles-infected international traveler visited.
know whether they were immunized to protect against measles. “Every season for the flu, I make sure and go get the flu shot,” said public health junior Momoko Ueda. “I don’t know how I heard about, like, getting the measles, but then I [heard] about it somewhere, so I went to the Stanford Healthcare Center and got vaccinated just in case.” Moles, from the Public
Health Department, recommended to watch out for the symptoms of measles: fever, cough, red eyes, runny nose and a rash that starts on the face. Anyone with those signs should contact their doctor immediately, she said. “If a person calls their doctor before going to the clinic, the medical facility can take precautions to protect other patients and visitors before the person
comes,” Dr. Fu said. One student said she had little time to get vaccinations, and checking on her most recent shots had not been her biggest priority. “I’m not anti-vaccination. I just haven’t had the time for it, I have work and school, so I’ve just been busy,” said business senior Rachel Pena. “We do care, but it’s not the top of our priority so we have other things in mind.”
Follow Kael on Twitter @kaelelliot
However, the spots tainted by measles around San Jose was a shock to some students, and they were not pleased that the pathogen may have been in the air at certain restaurants. “It was like IHOP bro,” said business sophomore Annelisa Andrada. The MMR vaccine has been falsely claimed to cause autism after a now-retracted 1998 research paper in the United Kingdom claimed a link between the two, according to the British Medical Journal. The CDC, U.S. National Academy of Sciences and the U.K. National Health Service have all done independent research and found no evidence of a link between the MMR vaccine and autism. Moles recommended that students planning to travel over spring break ensure all of their vaccines are up to date beforehand. Follow Kunal and Mauricio on Twitter @legoktm and @mslaplantenews
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OPINION
THURSDAY, MARCH 28, 2019
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Security sometimes costs privacy Jozy Prabhu STAFF WRITER
It has often been said privacy and security do not mix well together. While privacy is well liked, if security is forgotten, everyone suffers. With the latest 2017 crime data from Neighborhood Scout, San Jose is ranked 18 out of 100 on the crime index, with No. 1 being the most dangerous.
San Jose wants to implement more measures for safety. Because while privacy continues to be the public’s main concern, security has often taken a backseat in public debate. In order to keep the balance of privacy and security in San Jose, the San Jose Police Depart-
There is nothing inherently wrong with local law enforcement being able to access our home and business security cameras. The data also shows that there is an average of 168 crimes per square mile of San Jose, with the total number of violent and property crimes standing at 30,085. The San Jose Police Department’s annual crime data from 2017 to 2018 shows there has been a 2.32 percent increase in crime. It is important to remember these statistics when viewing announcements from the police department that
ment has a voluntary Camera Registry Program (CRP) in place. This allows citizens and businesses to register their security cameras for police use. According to the SJPD, “Police will be able to identify the locations of nearby video cameras and enlist the assistance of the community to help officers collect video evidence.” In the case of a shooting near a San Jose elementary school in 2017, the gunman shot and
dislodged a security camera, and got away. An arrest was made, but only on the grounds of suspicion. Had there been security cameras in the area registered under the CRP, it likely would have been much easier to capture the gunman. Of course, this solution seems like an unreasonable invasion of privacy. I would like to take into consideration the current state of privacy in the online era. A huge intruder of privacy is Facebook. It has had multiple cases of privacy invasion in the past decade. Incidents such as the Cambridge Analytica data breach in March 2018 have bolstered the public’s growing distrust of social media giants such as Twitter and Snapchat. According to Tech Republic, “On March 17, 2018, an exposé was published by The Guardian and The New York Times, initially reporting that 50 million Facebook profiles were harvested by Cambridge Analytica [a political data company].” This number was later changed to 87 million. With such a privacy scandal, however, Facebook has remained a giant in the social media industry. The late Google Glass,
INFOGRAPHIC BY HUGO VERA AND MARCI SUELA | SPARTAN DAILY
a wearable pair of smart glasses that could take photos and search the internet, is also an example of how privacy concerns have dominated conversation. The Google Glass project was discontinued after worries about privacy rights in many places, including movie theaters. According to the website How to Geek, “There was no way to tell when somebody was using their Glass to record video or take photos, so people assumed that Glass users were recording everything.” People began to worry about being filmed in
bathrooms, or for moments when they didn’t want to be filmed or photographed. And so privacy won again, with fair reasoning. But what if national security concerns dominated the conversation? If privacy is a gem that people are constantly panicking over, maybe the debate over security is a much more well needed conversation. The public needs to ask itself at what point does the quest for better security merit an all-out invasion of privacy, if ever. With more security cameras, more privacy policies will be required. Perhaps the best solu-
tion to this debate, as with many others, is compromise. There is nothing inherently wrong with local law enforcement being able to access our home and business security cameras. With that being said, the government’s access to our private security footage is something that needs to be constantly regulated and disclosed to the public once investigations are complete. So while privacy can be a more demanding issue, security might actually solve it all. Follow Jozy on Twitter @PrabhuJoanna
Yes, money does actually buy happiness Javier Velez STAFF WRITER
“Money can’t buy happiness.” Try telling that to your landlord and see how quickly they kick your ass out on the streets. The way you spend money is how you can quite literally purchase happiness. True happiness doesn’t require lavish clothes or sports cars. But you physically cannot experience happiness if you
which is still considered a “fair market” price. For someone trying to survive on the city’s $15-an-hour minimum wage, that would mean working three full-time jobs, or more than 128 hours a week. It is a shame when people take the words “money does buy happiness” grossly out of context. When we hear the phrase “money can buy
So yes, in a logistical sense money buys happiness because money buys survival. are dead. In this increasingly expensive world we live in, you need money in order to survive. According to a recent study by the National Low Income Housing Coalition, you would have to earn at least $99,960 a year to afford an apartment in San Francisco. The typical rate for a one-bedroom apartment in San Francisco is around $2,500 a month,
happiness,” people tend to think of this person as selfish, arrogant and straight-up full of themselves. Some may also believe that said person thinks ideas such as “money buys materialistic things that make me happy.” I am a strong believer that one should not hesitate to spend money to have a good time. The memories made with this money will last longer than any income
I’ll make in my lifetime. My most popular hobby is to travel. My ultimate goal is to travel to Brazil, Puerto Rico, Colombia and Italy though I frequently visit Mexico. Poverty is a constant problem throughout all of Mexico. Some areas of Mexico are worse than others, but the wage gap in the country is more obvious than it is in the United States, according to Business Insider. However, Mexican citizens are some of the happiest people I have been around and their hospitality is through the roof each time I return. I find myself often giving a higher gratuity in a third-world country because of the hospitality and because I know it will matter more there. What you do with your money can affect others happiness and transition into your own. There was a time in a restaurant in Mexico where I tipped 1,000 pesos, the equivalent of $53 in USD, and people in the restaurant looked at me with shocked faces. My server that day told me that she was facing a hard living situation and how she was struggling to support her children. Overcome with sympathy, I gave her a hefty tip because I know it was going toward her family’s survival and not lavish clothes or jewelry.
ILLUSTRATION BY MELODY DEL RIO | SPARTAN DAILY
While traveling different parts of the world may not be the cheapest option, it certainly puts concepts of money and the everlasting pursuit of happiness into context. For example, every time I vacation to Mexico, it opens my eyes to show how fortunate I am to be a U.S. Citizen. Also, vacationing in Mexico does exactly what a vacation is supposed to do. It takes the focus off of the things that stress out college stu-
dents on a daily basis like midterms, rent and family drama. When I know I have a big day and/or week, I always get a deep-tissue massage with relaxing music the night before as I prepare for the big event. Paying for such a massage is an investment into my psychical and emotional well-being and not just an extravagant “splurge.” We often look at purchases of items such as Apple MacBooks as unnecessary indul-
gences. False. In today’s world, items such as MacBooks have gone from luxury technological devices to practical and utilitarian tools. In order to stay alive, you NEED a certain amount of money to pay for the necessities such as food, water, gas, electricity and shelter. So yes, in a logistical sense money buys happiness because money buys survival. Follow Javier on Twitter @JavyALVZ408
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ARTS & ENTERTAINMENT
THURSDAY, MARCH 28, 2019
Milano Pizza: Small pizza, small price food review “Milano Pizza” Rating:
Cuisine: Pizza Location: 518 S. 10th Street San Jose, CA Price: $
By Adam Yoshikawa STAFF WRITER
Located near the corner of 10th and William streets, immediately to the right of S&S Super Market, a new pizza place has set itself apart with its low priced deal on a small pie. At Milano Pizza, if you decide to purchase a small cheese or pepperoni pie for $5.49 total, you won’t be wowed, but you won’t be disappointed. Depending on who is slicing your pizza, you might end up with either six or eight slices, but even though the amount of slices you receive may be inconsistent, the taste will be. With light tomato sauce and a small handful of mozzarel-
ADAM YOSHIKAWA | SPARTAN DAILY
While the pizza is nothing special, Milano Pizza offers affordable prices that easily challenge competitors, which will draw in students.
la, for the price of the pizza, it’s well worth the single block walk from campus. Milano Pizza’s closest competitor is Sammy G’s Pizzeria, which is only a block and a half down 10th Street. Sammy G’s small cheese pizza of the same size costs you $12.10 and a pepperoni costs you $14.20 out the door. You’re better off going to Milano Pizza if you want more bang for your buck. Run by the same own-
er of San Carlos Italian Pizza, Milano Pizza offers decent grub for a good price. Kebabs and gyros are also served alongside other pizzeria staples such as garlic bread twists and chicken wings. The building was previously a water refilling station, so the owner, who goes by Hadi and his nephew, who goes by the name Aziz, had to fully furnish the internals of the establishment from scratch. The pizzeria has
new electric lines, tiles and a fully operational kitchen. But one large pizza oven dominates the space in the work area. With only five tables inside the newly furnished restaurant, Milano Pizza is more of a ‘take your pizza to go’ spot. Three televisions hang on naked white walls, alongside long mirrors that give the impression of a large environment. The mirrors also give you the option to look
at yourself as you devour your meal. Aziz said, “We are in a soft opening as of now but we are waiting for certain paperwork from the city so that we may finally fully open.” Being in a very busy area surrounded by many other food businesses, Milano Pizza will have to do more than just have low prices to stay above its competition. Milano Pizza is looking to fully open in the
next few weeks, with employees already rolling out the dough behind the counter. They have already begun expanding their menu by adding gyros and kebabs. Milano Pizza’s low price on their small pies might be what keeps you coming back for more. But for what you pay for, it’s worth the price.
Follow Adam on Instagram @yoshi_kawa
5RCTVCP &CKN[ GFKVQTU’ HCXQTKVG 5RCTVCP &CKN[ GFKVQTU’ HGOCNG GORQYGTOGPV UQPIU HEY GIRL Lady Gaga ft. Florence Welch selected by Lindsey Boyd
DREAMS Fleetwood Mac selected by Nick Zamora I WILL SURVIVE Gloria Gaynor selected by Jana Kadah
BITCH BETTER HAVE MY MONEY Rihanna selected by Johanna Martin
CELEBRITY SKIN Hole selected by Kayla Flores
ICY GRL Saweetie ft. Kehlani selected by Kelsey Valle
PEDESTRIAN AT BEST Courtney Bartnett selected by Vicente Vera
FIGHT SONG Rachel Platten selected by Myla La Bine
Wings of My Words (你曾是少年) S.H.E selected by Huan Xun Chan
I Taeyeon selected by Winona Rajamohan
GIRLS JUST WANNA HAVE FUN Cyndi Lauper selected by Eduardo Teixeira
Fighter Christina Aguilera selected by Jessica Ballardo
MONEY BAG Cardi B selected by Hugo Vera
CASTLE Halsey selected by Melody Del Rio
VOLCANO GIRLS Veruca Salt selected by Mike Corpos
Listen to this playlist on Spotify:
https://spoti.fi/2POfuWY
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ARTS & ENTERTAINMENT
THURSDAY, MARCH 28, 2019
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TECH COLUMN
Google+’s decline is a wake-up call Kunal Mehta STAFF WRITER
I consider myself to be a child of the internet. Ever since middle school, I’ve been surfing the web, whether it be for school, entertainment or no reason at all. But that internet doesn’t really exist anymore – at least not the same internet. New websites pop up, while others fade away and disappear forever. Boing Boing, a group blogging website, reported last week that Myspace lost all of the music its users had uploaded before 2016. Effectively, an entire generation of indie garage bands’ music – all gone. Incidents like these remind us that the internet isn’t a magical cloud where all data exists forever, it’s just computers run by other people. And no matter how big or old a company is, we can’t rely on it to hold onto our data forever. Next week, Google is shutting down its latest try at creating a social network, Google+. Whatever data you might have uploaded there – it’ll be gone too. You’re probably think-
ing “Did anyone ever use Google+?” It certainly never reached a critical mass of users to rival Facebook, but it had its users. One of the video games I used to play, “Ingress,” organized its communities on Google+. Originally it was because the video game was owned by Google itself, but even after being split into a separate company, the communities stayed on Google+. There are thousands of posts, photos and events all hosted in our Google+ community that are going to disappear next week. And that’s just a tiny piece of the whole network. A group of internet archivists dubbed the Archive Team is working on backing up all of the publicly available Google+ content. So far its members have downloaded more than 800 terabytes of data. To put that into perspective, we’re talking about more than 170,000 DVDs of data. The group is sending the data to the
PHOTO COURTESY OF WIKIMEDIA COMMONS
I’ve started helping the Archive Team out, saving more than 300 gigabytes of data from Google+, after seeing other websites I cared about disappear. Last year, a Taylor Swift fan website I frequented disappeared, likely because the owner didn’t pay the bill on time. I was able to recover most of the content through the nonprofit Internet Archive including ones that have Internet Archive’s backups, in San Francisco. disappeared off the inter- ensuring it wouldn’t be Known best for the net entirely. lost forever. Wayback Machine, the InThe team is also arIt would be a significant ternet Archive allows any- chiving other con- exaggeration to compare one to look back at histor- tent like tweets, videos it to the decline of the ical versions of web pages, and software. Library of Alexandria, but
If we don’t safeguard our new institutions of knowledge, we could end up in a similar state as the Library of Alexandria.
CLASSIFIEDS CROSSWORD PUZZLE
SUDOKU PUZZLE Complete the grid so that every row, column and 3x3 box contains every digit from 1 to 9 inclusively.
there’s still an important lesson to be learned. Most of our modern history is available online, scattered across the internet on different websites. If we don’t safeguard our new institutions of knowledge, we could end up in a similar state as the Library of Alexandria. It won’t be burned in one shot like the legend says, but slowly degrade over time into nothingness.
Follow Kunal on Twitter @legoktm
JOKIN’ AROUND Why should you not marry a tennis player?
Because love means nothing to them.
SOLUTIONS
ACROSS 1. As a result 5. Satisfies 10. Cod or halibut 14. Length of yarn 15. Long stories 16. Ancient Peruvian 17. Squadron 19. Russian emperor 20. Faster than light 21. Busybody 22. Ere 23. Swarming 25. Tycoon 27. Half of a pair 28. Shoulder boards 31. Confuse 34. Adhesive 35. Prefix meaning “Modern” 36. Reclined 37. City in France 38. Leave in a hurry 39. American Sign Language 40. Clique 41. Periods of seven days 42. A flower of the lily family 44. Tavern 45. Devilfish
46. Sasquatch 50. Office worker 52. Not tight 54. Mineral rock 55. Sharpen 56. Fellow citizen 58. Does something 59. Show-off 60. Chooses 61. Throw 62. Foreword 63. “Whoopee!” DOWN 1. Larceny 2. Urgency 3. Parental brother 4. Calypso offshoot 5. Calm 6. Mimicking 7. Lean 8. Toxemia of pregnancy 9. South southeast 10. Off-and-on 11. Impertinence 12. Stigma 13. Rabbit 18. Slowly losing life
22. Chills and fever 24. Natural satellite 26. Horse feed 28. Our planet 29. Heavy, durable furniture wood 30. Drunkards 31. Ho-hum 32. Not difficult 33. Thin wires 34. Trouser 37. Kick 38. Slave 40. To move quickly 41. Bet 43. Gentle stroke 44. Casual eatery 46. Silly mistake 47. Dynamism 48. Give a speech 49. Anxious 50. Gossip 51. Mentally irregular (slang) 53. Dethrone 56. Consumer Price Index 57. Ouch!
03/27/2019
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SPORTS
THURSDAY, MARCH 28, 2019
Tackling mental health for SJSU athletes By Cindy Cuellar STAFF WRITER
Football student-athletes balance their academic, personal and their athletic lives on a daily basis. But, their mental wellbeing is not always their top priority when ranked against winning a game or breaking records. San Jose State athletic director Marie Tuite said she is now making sure to direct her attention toward mental health for all of the athletes on campus. She said the process begins with mental health training for all of her staff. “Thirty percent of student athletes in a calendar year may have suicidal thoughts. Of the 543 student-athletes I have, over a hundred of them are football so just by the nature of the percentages brings me to worry,” said Tuite. She continued to explain that she worries about the mental health of all 543 of them, regardless of their gender or sport, because mental health issues can manifest in many different ways. Academic support coordinator Jen Jurgensen, who is SJSU’s liaison between athletes and the athletic department, said athletes began to ask for mental health help back in December. She attends meetings with student athletes and according to one of the meeting notes, the Mountain West Conference is also taking measures to make mental health care more accessible to student-athletes.
One idea is to hire a mental health counselor exclusively for just student-athletes so they don’t have to go off campus for mental health. Football has two sports psychology interns that focus specifically on clinical sports psychology since the fall of 2018. Both sportspsychologists focus on individual and team improvement, creating another support system. Alexandra Simmons, one of the sports psychologist interns, mentioned how important it is to bring awareness to what athletes are going through mentally in order to optimize performance both in daily life activities and in sports “Any personal issues they are feeling that is impacting either performance, school or life in general, could be addressed in a confidential setting,” Simmons said. “Mental health can be intimidating or off-putting for people, which is why bringing awareness normalizes, validates and helps us realize we’re all experiencing similar things.” Bruce Ogilvie and Thomas Tutko were both psychology professors who played pivotal roles in sports psychology at SJSU. According to the sports psychology program on the San Jose State website, Ogilvie is often referred to as the “grandfather of North American Sport Psychology.” A n d r e w Jenkins, a firstyear football player for SJSU, has been an
athlete for the majority of his life and has experienced the mental game needed to be a high performing athlete and student. “It’s physically and mentally demanding but if you really love the sport it’s not that hard to fathom you have to do all of this stuff. [Football players] are here because we play football, we’re here because we want a degree so if you can get that under your belt then you
should know it’s alright,” said Jenkins. Jenkins continued to explain how important it is to take advantage of his role as an athlete to address problems occurring worldwide and locally. “Being in sports creates a platform for athletes and I think mental illness should be something we all promote. p pr om m ote. With
everything that’s going on in the NFL like concussions and mental illness, I think it is important to acknowledge the problems,” said Jenkins. According to the NCAA, depression is more common in professional football players, especially with players who have suffered from multiple concussions in their athletic career. Head football coach Brent Brennan said the demand for assistance in the mental health has been higher than it’s ever been. He added that it is an urgent matter.
“With football players, they grow up their whole life and they’re supposed to be tough and they’re supposed to be competitive,” Brennan said. “There’s definitely generalizations that the game of football and growing up as men create but everyone needs someone to talk to.” Brennan mentioned that creating a safe space for the football players to share what they are going through to someone other than a coach or a teacher has been valuable. He said the sports psychologists have helped players both academically and athletically. Follow Cindy on Twitterr @eredetii
ILLUSTRATION BY MELODY DEL RIO
Roller derby girls skate through Silicon Valley By Roman Contreras STAFF WRITER
Silicon Valley and roller derby. These two things could not be more opposite, but the unlikely pairing came together to create something great. “My best friend and I opened a Metro magazine and saw an ad for Bay Area derby girls,” said Amy Hewett, or better known to her fellow derby teammates as Aim DeKill. “They were having an exhibition match at the San Jose Civic [Center]. So we went, saw it was amazing and found out there was a local team, and started practicing with them the next month,” DeKill continued. The Silicon Valley Roller Girls (SVRG) started out of a desire to try roller derby after seeing it on A&E’s television program, “Rollergirls.” With a surge of curiosity, Lauren Hulten, a.k.a. Lindsay Lohanded, began the search for a local team with her best friend Jaime Shirley. After discovering the closest option was in San Francisco, they decided to start their own league. After gathering a team through a series of Craigslist postings in 2007, the Silicon Valley Roller Girls was born. There are not many requirements or qualifications to join. The league has made it a point to
ROMAN CONTRERAS | SPARTAN DAILY
Members of the Silicon Valley Roller Girls group together dressed in roller skates and helmets during practice.
do its best to accommodate all skill levels and help people who want to join the team prepare for their entrance test. The test is simple. Skate 27 laps in five minutes and you’ve got a spot on the team. The SVRG is not the roller derby group that you often see in movies and television. The group ranges in all aspects from age to ethnicity, and most recently, gender. Former Intel employee Andy “Evil Twin” Despres is one of the first male
I like the physicality of it. For me, joining was about finding a new group and meeting new people that I’ve known for 10 years now.
Megan Newman Member of Silicon Valley Roller Girls
members of the SVRG. Despres found himself at the sports complex on a Friday night, where the derby girls were practicing. He asked if the league was female only. To his surprise, they had
just began opening up their team to males. “My favorite thing about derby is partly the community. It’s cool being on a team without the crazy things that happen [on traditional sports
their grades went up, their confidence went up, and they spoke out for kids that might’ve been bullied,” said Caralynn “Battery Davis” Newman. Newman felt it changed the kids because they learned that they could do something positive as a group. Newman has been skating for the past 40 years as a street skater with her 90-pound dog. Seeing her daughter Megan find joy in the same thing that brought her happiness, led her to become the SVRG’s version of a team mom. “I like the physicality of it. For me, joining was about finding a new group and meeting new people that I’ve known for 10 years now,” said this season’s head trainer Megan “Belle Wringer” Newman. Megan Ne wman was present at the first bootcamp the SVRG held 10 years ago at the Silver Creek Sportsplex in San Jose. Since then, she has fallen in love with roller derby and even brought her mother into the rink to join in on the sport. The SVRG has made it its personal mission to create a safe space, where members can express themselves freely and discover themselves in the process.
teams],” said Despres. Many of the league members have felt they’ve found a second home among their teammates. They’ve seen many members come out of their shells and find comfort in the sport. Being a non-profit organization, the team does a lot of community outreach. From beer walks to blood drives, the SVRG tries to be an active part of the community. “They had junior derby, and the kids were Follow Roman on Instagram @roaminroman_52 brought to attention that
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Thursday, March 28, 2019 • Section B
WOMEN ARE
EDITOR’S NOTE This special section is in honor of Women’s History Month. As we developed this section, we turned to the Spartan Daily archives to find some inspiration. To our disappointment, we found very little coverage of the accomplishments and lives of significant women at San Jose State University. To put this in perspective, we found more than 100 articles relating to the African-American Studies Department since its launch
in 1969, but fewer than 30 for the Women’s Studies Program since its founding in 1972. So we have made it our priority to find and write about women on our campus from our past and our present. This is reminiscent of The New York Times’ 2018 spotlight called “Overlooked,” in which the Times added obituaries of exceptional figures who were never given the space in the paper that they deserved. Many of them
were women. During SJSU’s 162-year history, Spartan women have excelled as athletes, scientists, activists, innovators, educators and so much more. Sometimes these roles are added on top of mother and breadwinner. Women are excelling and essential in every facet of our campus and society. The next few pages share the stories of some of the many remarkable women at SJSU.
We hope our section is the start of a legacy and commitment to write the history of Spartan women who deserve recognition and show not only that women can, but WOMEN ARE.
Jana Kadah Managing Editor ILLUSTRATION BY MELODY DEL RIO | SPARTAN DAILY
Activism
Technology
Motherhood
Student advocate saves VTA bus routes
Women take over STEM field
SJSU moms balance work and kids
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PAGE B4 & B5
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AWARENESS
THURSDAY, MARCH 28, 2019
WOMEN ARE Women are superheroes because every women that has been in my life has changed me in every way imaginable.
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Women are strong. They live in an unfair environment but no matter what, they try to do their best and just try to be the best, they can be no matter what [they want to be].
— business administration junior Ruben Mancilla
Women are
powerful.
— biomedical engineering freshman Jazmine Cisneros
Women are
creators of the future and I mean that in two ways. One, they are mainly responsible for the nurturing and upbringing of the future generation. And two, seeing how the trend is, theyʼre the ones developing the workforce in the STEM field and business.
Women are not just one form. You know, not all women have vaginas, so womenʼs femininity is not just all the same.
There is no one that I have met that is emotionally and physically strong like my mom and she inspires me and shows me how powerful women can be. And that one day or even now, Iʼm just as powerful as her. — psychology sophomore Lesly Rios
— biomedical engineering junior Arturo Chavez
— global studies senior Jennifer Guzman
Women are everything. They gave us life, they continue to support us, they are everyone and everything in this world. Without them, we would really be nothing and that includes trans women and anybody who might not identify or who do. — sociology junior Kate Bacher
Women are smart and theyʼre definitely the hardest workers in every class that Iʼve been in. Every time I get in a group itʼs always the women thatʼs going to take the lead and designate the roles to everyone else and make sure everyone is up to date.
I know so many women around me that I look up to and they are role models to me. For instance, Dolores Huerta, my mother, Michelle Obama. They are truly inspiring women that just got us to keep building up the next generation of inspiring diverse professionals and thatʼs who I look up to myself. — accounting senior Mirella Maldonado
— industrial systems engineering senior Colt Stewart
REPORTING BY VICTORIA FRANCO, MAURICIO LA PLANTE, KELSEY VALLE, CINDY CUELLAR, DESIGN BY HUAN XUN CHAN
A look at the history of Women’s Studies at SJSU
San Jose State Women’s Studies Courses WOMS 005Q Gender, Race & Sexuality in Media WOMS 010 Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies WOMS 020 Women of Color in the US WOMS 101 The Study of Women WOMS 102 The Global Study of Women
ILLUSTRATION FROM A 1981 SJSU WOMEN’S STUDIES PROGRAM NEWSLETTER
By Jonathan Austin and Olivia Wray STAFF WRITERS
San Jose State has had its fair share of activism. Women were finally able to display their voice in academia with the establishment of one of the nation’s first women’s studies programs in 1972. During the civil rights movements of the ’60s and ’70s, the second wave of feminism emerged, and women all over college campuses were demanding changes in the way history was taught. Academic Vice President Hobert Burns officially established the Women’s Studies Program. However, many of the courses were taught by unpaid graduate students who believed in the fledgling program. “They volunteered themselves without pay to teach classes like women in literature, women in history, or psychology of women – things like that,” said Dr. Tanya Bakhru, associate professor and advisor in the current Women, Gender and Sexuality Studies Program (WGS).
Following the success of the African-American Studies Program, SJSU students and faculty were able to, once again, spearhead academic change. This came just two years after the first Women’s Studies Program at San Diego State University. However, despite its inception in the fall, spring 1972 did not have women’s studies listed as an available course list. According to an article published in the Spartan Daily on Jan. 8, 1973, this was later rectified the following spring when eight new courses were added. The program comprised social science general education courses centered around women. As such, the available classes were not individually labeled as women’s studies courses until the fall 1985 semester. The actual course list for women’s studies would remain a collection of separate courses until fall 1988, when it became a more recognized specialization. The classes afterward would be labeled as WOMS, the same label as today. The courses were in a department under the name Interdisciplinary Social Science, which had an AsianAmerican Studies Program and a Social Science Teacher Preparation Program. In
2012, the Interdisciplinary Social Science Department merged with sociology. During the merger in 2012, the program changed its name from Women’s Studies to Women, Gender and Sexuality Studies. “This was a decision to be more inclusive of LGBTQ+ studies . . . However, we still wanted to keep women in the title to honor the history of the program and honor its link to the women’s movement,” Bakhru said on the name change. Bakhru said there are 35 students majoring in sociology with a concentration in WGS and 25 who are minoring in the program. “A lot of the women in engineering classes had to find a home in women’s studies as a minor because it’s a refreshing space from a male dominated space,” said Bakhru. Po-ying Chiang is a male senior sociology major with a concentration in WGS. “I was unsure what to do with sociology, but after I took a class with Dr. Bakhru I was inspired to get into WGS,” Chiang said. “I was criticized as a man for taking WGS courses but I am doing what I enjoy, so I don’t let it affect me.” Some WGS courses
are included as GE area requirements. Animation/ Illustration senior Amy Albus said she liked that because it gave her an opportunity to learn something that would not have been covered in her major courses. “It helps learn about more broad women’s problems that I otherwise would not have known about,” Albus said. Dr. Susana Gallardo, an SJSU religious studies professor, also enjoys teaching women’s studies because she feels she is always learning along with her students. She did a lot of work in women’s studies in graduate school in literature and cultural studies. Her personal goal is to see at least one women’s studies course and one ethnic studies course required for graduation from the CSU system. “I always tell my students that while I will teach theory and history, they are ultimately the experts on gender in the 21st century,” Gallardo added, “They live it, learn it, and unlearn it every day.” Follow Jonathan and Olivia on Twitter @AustinFound1 @bmo_liv
WOMS 107 Psychology of Women WOMS 112 Women in the Global Economy WOMS 114 Politics of Mothering and Reproduction WOMS 120 Special Topics in Women’s Studies WOMS 121 Philosophy and Feminism WOMS 122 Women in the Second Half of Life WOMS 131 Gender, Sexuality, and Religion WOMS 156 Black Women Writers: Race, Culture and Life Cycle in Cross-Cultural Perspective WOMS 160 Gender, Race, and Class WOMS 169 Sexualities and the Body WOMS 175 Sociology of Masculinities and Femininities WOMS 182 Women in Literature WOMS 187 Feminist Perspectives on Gender and Education in the U.S. WOMS 189 Islamic Perspectives on Gender
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ACTIVISM
THURSDAY, MARCH 28, 2019
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Public transportation activist fights to preserve VTA routes BY JOZY PRABHU, STAFF WRITER
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ublic relations junior Monica Mallon converses with her co-worker, expressing her frustration at the lack of student involvement in local politics. Mallon has strong opinions about this. Although she works at the San Jose State Transportation Solutions office on campus, she also is the multimedia director of the Public Relations Students Society of America and in her free time, she shoots videos for her own Youtube channel. On the outside she seems like any busy college student, but when taking a deeper look at Mallon’s life, it is clear that she’s one of the most influential women on campus. From the time she was in Woodside Priory private high school, Mallon said she witnessed discrimination happening toward the teachers. “Teachers were being discriminated for the things they said on their personal blogs and Facebooks and things that they did outside of the classroom, unaffiliated with the school,” she said. Mallon was irked at the discrimination against her teacher’s private opinions. “Teachers should have the same rights as anyone else,” said Mallon. In response, Mallon got involved in a Catholic Teachers Union in San Francisco, which then led her to discover the American Federation of Labor, a broader association union. “I do think that people should have the right to organize and if they need to go on a strike, if they need to protest to do that, then I think they should be allowed to do that,” said Mallon. At 18, Mallon then decided to run to be the District 5 Supervisor of Santa Clara County and became the youngest person in California to ever run for public office. Although she didn’t win, she said she hoped it would inspire her peers to believe they had a voice in their local government. “I was lucky to get involved in [local politics] at a very young age,” said Mallon. “I [couldn’t] go to Sacramento and speak at a hearing most of the time, but I [could] go to a lot of these community meetings.” Now at SJSU, she has been heavily involved in fighting for Transportation Solutions to make commuting conditions more convenient for her fellow students. “I’m involved in the Valley Transportation Authority union,” said Mallon. “I was helping organize the rally last night with them.” The midnight rally on March 6 started at the Eastridge Transit Center, where VTA union members and bus riders rode VTA’s 22 bus route in protest of the service being cut. “[The VTA union has] been trying to help riders and
SOURCE: MONICA MALLON, INFOGRAPHIC BY JOZY PRABHU
mother’s health insurance, Mallon was able to get a insurance plan to get her allergies treated. “I started immunotherapy [allergy shots] in August 2018,” said Mallon. “The shots have really helped me.” As involved as Mallon has been with the VTA union, she wishes more students would get involved. “I have mixed feelings on social media activism,” said Mallon. “Obviously I like to spread information on social media about when meetings are happening.” Pinned at the top of Mallon’s Twitter page is the next VTA meeting about the Diridon integrated station concept plan. Through her Twitter, she encourages her peers to be advocates too. “I think with something like VTA, if you want to save a route, you should go to a board meeting,” said Mallon. “You should go to community meetings so you can actually talk to these people in person.” But at the end of the day, Mallon knows the fruit of her efforts will probably take effect after she has graduated. “I’m definitely advocating for things that will not affect me personally and will not affect a lot of my friends that are here right now,” said Mallon. “But I think, you really have to think about other people have done things for you.”
trying to help SJSU students, even though students here don’t necessarily realize it,” said Mallon. “That’s why so many of them were out at midnight in the freezing cold when they could have been at home sleeping.” According to Mallon’s co-worker, Associated Students commute coordinator Carlos Escobar, 23 percent of people in SJSU use one mode of transportation without an Monica Mallon public relations senior alternative when travelling to campus. “I’m working about 10 times harder this time, because the situation is a little more dire,” said Mallon. Mallon is referring to the new 2019 VTA plan that will eliminate major routes for students. The plan was drafted last year, and had ad hoc committee meetings aimed to develop a better financial strategy for VTA. “I really should have stayed involved and at least gone to every other board meeting,” said Mallon. “[Other unions/ organizations] are there consistently and show up consistently and that’s how they get what they want.” During the time the 2019 plan was being developed, Mallon was facing a battle of her own. “I’m allergic to trees, pollens and grasses,” said Mallon. “I had a bad allergic reaction on my fingers last year.” Mallon’s mother had put her on an insurance plan with BHU PRA Mallon’s old last name and old address. Y Z JO BY Unsure about her insurance options, she feared the TOS O H P struggle of having to pay a $1200 fee. “I couldn’t afford a new allergy test,” said Mallon. “So I was experiencing really bad allergies from Mallon works at SJSU Transportation Solutions February or March of 2018 to July 2018.” because of her deep knowledge of the VTA system. Shortly after being dropped from her
Follow Jozy on Twitter @PrabhuJoanna
I think with something like VTA, if you want to save a route, you should go to a board meeting.
SJSU professor’s play on police brutality goes national By Roman Contreras STAFF WRITER
Born in Kumasi, Ghana, Nikki Yeboah migrated to Toronto, Canada for a better life at the age of six with her mother and siblings. While in Canada, Yeboah went through the public school system as an average child. After finishing grade school, Yeboah attended York University in Toronto, Canada. At York University in Toronto, she completed her bachelors and masters degrees in communication and media studies. Following her graduation, Yeboah moved to the United States to attend Northwestern University and obtained her doctorate in philosophy. After accepting a teaching job at San Jose State, Yeboah embarked on a journey to create a production that highlighted police brutality in the Bay Area. “Internationally, I think what scares people most are stories like this, stories of police violence,” said Yeboah. “And as a black woman moving here, it was a concern to me and a concern to my family members, a lot of them asked ‘Are you sure you want to live there?’ ” After learning about the high rates of incidents in the area, she set out to change the way people perceived police brutality. “California has the highest rates in the country of police-related deaths and actually Santa Clara county is fifth on the list of most deadliest in the nation,” said Yeboah.
Laurie Valdez, a mother who’s story is featured in the play. Valdez lost her partner, Antonio Guzman Lopez, after a San Jose State UPD officer fatally shot him in 2014. The officer received no serious repercussion, but Valdez was left to Yeboah’s play, “The (M)others,” tells raise her son, Josiah, without his father. the story of four women who have lost “The (M)others” is a documentary a loved one to police brutality. performance that evaluates the emotional and “It made that connection, that reality that physical toll that an experience like this leaves although we were affected by this very horrific on those left behind. tragedy, as mothers we still love and we still Yeboah has managed to create an impact wanna try to make a difference, and Nikki did with “The (M)others.” it in a very creative way using the arts,” said While assisting the women in her play with their activism, Yeboah took her play to Sacramento to present to lawmakers. “[The mothers] thought if I brought the play to Sacramento and lawmakers got to see it, they would see the human toll that the bill [Peace officers: release the records] that they’re passing has on people,” Yeboah began. “We started a GoFundMe and the [American Civil Liberties Union] co-sponsored it as well as other companies, ROMAN CONTRERAS | SPARTAN DAILY and that was the first Nikki Yeboah leads a panel known as a “talkback” after time we took the play a theatrical performance by a former student. outside of San Jose.”
After years of research, professor bases play on real accounts of police brutality
Since taking her play to Sacramento, Yeboah’s play has had performances in Los Angeles, Florida and there are now plans to take the production to Alabama. “It’s such a powerful play and concept,” said Destiny Montgomery, who portrayed Dionne Smith, in the original production. “Not everyone makes the news and I believe it’s important that more people see the production.” Smith is a mother whose story is featured in the production. Her son, James Rivera Jr. was shot 48 times by Stockton police in July of 2010. “The (M)others” is not Yeboah’s first step into the world of theatrical storytelling. In April of 2010, Yeboah performed her first production, “Of Small and Black Things,” about her mother’s migration from Ghana to Canada. The play centered around a bird, symbolized as Yeboah’s mother, who leaves its home in search of color, which represents opportunity in the story. Yeboah stumbled over words as she tried to construe what draws her to tell the stories of mothers. She said that there is a certain feminism in what women will face and endure for their children. “These women are talking about how they’re not doing this for their child who has passed away, they’re doing this for the children who have yet to be born,” Yeboah said. Follow Roman on Instagram @roaminroman_52
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TECHNOLOGY
THURSDAY, MARCH 28, 2019
THURSDAY, MARCH 28, 2019
NASA astronaut Sunita Williams, Expedition 14 flight engineer, worked on the International Space Station in a spacewalk that occured on Jan. 31, 2007.
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PHOTO COURTESY OF NASA
Astronaut Sunita Williams, Expedition 32 flight engineer, took a picture with the bright sun during her spacewalk on Sept. 5, 2012.
SJSU engineers shine in aerospace By Jackie Contreras, Victoria Franco, Cora Wilson and Adam Yoshikawa
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PHOTO COURTESY OF NASA
Women leap into new technology “80 percent of what’s being bought [into] the market today are being bought by women. Yet, there is not enough women on board and there is not enough women in senior positions in companies and product developments. There are men who develop the products to out targeting females. Do they really know us?”
Michelle Bockman Global head of 3D printing commercial expansion & development at HP Inc.
“Research in the biological sciences are being completely driven by women n now. I think two of the discoverers of CRISPER [genome editing technology], ], Jennifer Dounda and Emmanuelle Charpentier, theyy are women . . . So they are the tip of Ellen Greenberg the spear and thenn its every other othe Deputy director for sustainability ssustai ainability at Caltrans Ca altrans scie scientist.” ientist.”
Belen Verduzco Project superintendent at Turner Construction
“I had a son [after college] and I am a single mom. In my first five years, I was managing my time between work and my son . . . After five years, when my son was in preschool, I said ye now is the time to focus on my next steps in my n career . . . Right now, my son is a freshman in c high school, and I already told the company I h want to stay level with the position and I am not w interested in the next position because I want in to be a mom for the next four years. After that when he goes to college, I can focus on my w career again. c
Sonar T Thekdi Vice presi president of business s operation operations at Cisco; SJSU Class of 1996
Erica Lockheimer Senior director, software engineering and Women In Tech lead at LinkedIn; SJSU Class of 2000
REPORTING BY JANA KADAH AND HUAN XUN CHAN
“The numbers [of women in engineering] are not great. If you want to change something, you will have to talk about it. If you are going to do something different, you will have to invest it.”
“We have to make sure that women, especially girls in elementary schools, middle schools and high schools, have ave role models that they can lookk up to. I think back to when I was growing up, there weren’t even many women who worked and now the situation is changing, and n nd le to o when you see what is possible be empower girls to think about the fact that they can do o anything g they want in the world.” d.”
Mary Hoang Princ Principal of HydroSciience En Engineers Inc.; SJSU alu um alumna
“I was operations maintenance manager over a lot of men [who come from patriarchal cultures] who also were like ‘What? We are gonna take orders from you? No!’ . . . When you have to give them instructions and they are looking at you like ‘You’re a female, what do you know?’ But it is about respect . . . You’ve got to believe in yourself for other people to believe in you.”
PAGE DESIGN BY HUAN XUN CHAN
or many STEM (Science, Technology, am,” Guarneros-Luna said. “Education and Engineering and Mathematics) location gave me the opportunity to be students, reaching for the stars where I am.” means landing a job at NASA, and that’s According to the American Society for exactly what it meant for physics senior Engineering Education, out of the 19 perStephanie Striegel. cent of female students who earned a bach“As a kid you grow up hearing about elor’s degree in an engineering program in NASA and for someone who’s been inter- 2015, about 14 percent earned degrees in ested in astronomy for a long time, I always aerospace engineering. thought NASA would be where I end up at Before switching her major to biomedical the end of my career,” Striegel said. engineering, senior Angelina Villa was an Constantly seeking answers for the sci- aerospace engineering student, one of the entific world around her, Striegel’s spark for few women in her past major. science grew with time. Villa said that the aerospace engineering It wasn’t until her high school years that program had a low female demographic, she took a deeper interest in physics, begin- so much so that she only knew one other ning her to study it at San Jose State. female student. In college, Striegel wasn’t aware that She added that the men’s reactions to undergraduate students had opportu- her and the other female student in their nities to work with big industry compa- class were mixed and that she often felt nies to widen their experience beyond out of place. the classroom. “You can feel the difference when you’re “I didn’t realize that was a thing you could sitting in a classroom, where maybe those do as an undergraduate. Like you can go guys aren’t looking at you differently or work for NASA apparently,” Striegel said. aren’t looking at you like you aren’t just the Determination led her to apply for an girl in the room, but it feels like it,” Villa said. internship with According to the NASA Ames. SJSU Institutional Despite being Effectiveness and turned away twice Analytics, out of the for an internship with 93 students majoring NASA, Striegel knew in aerospace engithat this was a chance neering in Fall 2018, she was not going to 77 were men and 16 give up on easily. were women. After a third shot, While the demoStriegel was able to graphics are skewed, show the compaGuarneros-Luna ny who she was as added that women in an individual and aerospace is importmanaged to land ant and that the the internship. panoramic of what “I think in my aerospace is, needs successful applicato change. tion, I really made “We want to go to a point to say what Mars and we want the internship with to go to the moon,” NASA would really Guarneros-Luna said. mean to me.” Striegel “Having just men continued, “I can’t going up there isn’t say that’s what got me going to help us transAli Guarneros Luna the internship, but port humans into it’s what was differthese places. We need NASA Ames aerospace and ent from my previous the women expesystems engineer applications.” rience to be a part Striegel is not of that.” the first from SJSU to intern and work On Monday, NASA scrapped its all-fefor NASA. male spacewalk at the International Space Susan Snycerski, a psychology lec- Station scheduled for Friday because only turer, is the principle investigator of two one medium-size spacesuit was available cooperative agreements at the NASA Ames at the station. Research Center. This would have been the first spacewalk In 2018, Snycerski was awarded a coopera- led by an all-female crew, according to CNN. tive agreement at the Thermophysics Facilities The plan originally intended NASA Branch at NASA Ames Research Center. astronauts Anne McClain and Christina There, she applies the science of mac- Koch to carry out the historic mission as roergonomics, which attempts to improve part of the Expedition 59 crew. organizational processes to the research conKoch, who fits the spacesuit the best, will ducted in the Arc Jet Complex. be joined by Nick Hague to install lithiThe project allows her to collaborate on um-ion batteries for one pair of the station’s research with undergraduate and graduate solar arrays, continuing the work of the first students, NASA scientists and technicians. spacewalk outside the space station occured “Mentoring students in research, as well on March 22, according to NASA. as in academics, is fulfilling and makes me With NASA’s historic all-female spacehappy,” Snycerski said. “I have especially walk on hold, physics senior Stephanie tried to be a positive mentor for women Striegel still manages to find her own place in science.” in space through her internship. In addition to Snycerski, Ali GuarnerosIn the future, Striegel plans to explore and Luna, who earned her bachelor’s and mas- research extrasolar planets. ter’s degree in aerospace engineering at “Everything I am learning is directly San Jose State in 2010 and 2013, works applicable to my career path that I want to as an aerospace and systems engineer at take,” Striegel said. “I want to study astroNASA Ames. physics, so I am learning a lot of coding Guarneros-Luna first began working skills, [and] science necessary to do exowith NASA Ames as an intern during her planet science,” Striegel said. time at SJSU. Follow Spartan Daily on Twitter “It was very important for me to get a @SpartanDaily degree and I did not expect to be where I
Having just men going up there isn’t going to help us transport humans into these places. We need the women experience to be a part of that.
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INNOVATION
THURSDAY, MARCH 28, 2019
B6
ALYSON CHUYANG | SPARTAN DAILY
Meghan Negi tests her group’s Arduino board to see if the bluetooth module works. The wireless module is important for the project so that they can connect human subjects to a sensor and track their heart rates while in action.
Helping through heart and technology By Alyson Chuyang STAFF WRITER
Tucked in the corner of a sorority’s study lounge is biomedical engineering senior Meghna Negi, working on her abstract about photoplethysmography sensors for her senior project. What her sisters, as well as many of the students on campus, do not know
how accurate [the technology] is, so users can know and physicians can tell potential onset cardiac problems.” Negi entered San Jose State as a biology major, but was inspired to switch majors after meeting the chair of the biomedical engineering department, Guna Selvaduray, at Admitted Spartans Day, four years ago. “Sixty to 70 percent of students say that they choose this major because they feel that they can help other people, and that seems to be the driving force which we are happy to reinforce,” said Selvaduray. To keep it in the family, Negi is the third generation to study engineering at SJSU. Her grandfather graduated with a masters in mechanical engineering and her father graduated with a masters in software and computer engineering. PHOTO COURTESY OF MEGHNA NEGI “I do feel
is that she and her group are working on lightbased technology for wearable activity trackers like Apple watches and Fitbits, that monitor heart health. “[There’s an] increase in popularity of wearable technology for health purposes,” said Negi, “It is important to continuously monitor
proud that I am keeping up the legacy of engineering in my family, and I’m very proud of how they built their careers off the knowledge that they gained from SJSU’s engineering programs,” said Negi. Negi has definitely felt the pressure of her major in everything she commits herself to, but the excitement of her field has made other stressors in her life minimal. As a high school student, Negi volunteered at a hospital for four years. Through that, she found herself interested in how the medical industry uses technology to solve healthcare problems. “For me, [biomedical engineering] is the innovation and advancement of medical technology, and the overall focus of [biomedical engineering] is looking at human well-being and health,” said Negi, “I really wanted to contribute to the medical field and I decided I wanted to do that through the advancement of medical devices.”
While you’re aiming for medical innovation, you don’t want to unnecessarily put human lives at risk for whatever the device may be.
Meghna Negi Biomedical engineering senior
All biomedical engineering seniors must work on an year-long academic project. Negi is working alongside her two partners, Denise Gutierrez and Peter Lazari to further research on a project by Alessandro Bellofiore, a biomedical engineering assistant professor. The project entails how photoplethysmography sensors with an infrared light system is able to measure pulse data to help determine a person’s heart health. “One of my favorite parts is forcing myself to think outside the box when it came to the nitty gritty details,” said Gutierrez. Many senior projects vary in focus. No matter how imaginative and extraordinary they are, all projects still
need to be approved by the university’s institutional review board. The board works to measure safety both in the student-produced projects, as well as in the p r o f e s s i o n a l industry. “While you’re aiming for medical innovation, you don’t want to unnecessarily put human lives at risk for whatever the device may be,” said Negi. For Negi, the major is just as important as any other engineering major. “The more innovation and more advancements we have, the better quality of medical life and technology there will be available,” Negi said. Follow Alyson on Twitter @alysonchuyang
Professor helps breast cancer survivors By Olivia Wray STAFF WRITER
Breast cancer is the most aggressive cancer in women and the second most common cancer worldwide, according to the World Cancer Research Fund. Seeing that breast cancer is chronically threatening women’s health, Marcelle Dougan expressed her passion for public health by creating a lifestyle mobile application for breast cancer survivors. Dougan is an assistant professor in San Jose State’s Department of Health Science and Recreation. As an epidemiologist, Dougan is interested in digital health and researching how that can be used as a tool to help people in their lives. She emphasized the importance of accessing research outcomes and its operation. “What does that research mean and how can people that don’t know how to access journals – how can they use that for their everyday lives?” Dougan said. She said there are there are various health disparities, especially around poverty and around ethnicity, in many chronic diseases. “More specifically, in the disease of breast cancer, white women are more likely to develop it compared to black women,” Dougan explained. Black women are more likely to die from breast cancer and white women have a higher survival rate, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
In the mobile app, Dougan and her team plan to include information about diets, exercise, sleep and mindand-body connection for women who survived or have breast cancer. “Food is a very personal thing that’s really related to your ethnicity,” Dougan said. “But what you will find, is that a lot of the cancertype foods that have been developed, are developed primarily for a white population. Her goal is to include diets and foods that are suitable for different palates because most health information is not suitable to minority groups. “Ethnic minorities can’t really use a lot of these things and even if they do, the food is not appetizing, which then could potentially lead to differences in survival,” Dougan said. For the development and components of the app, Dougan asked SJSU media design assistant professor Tina Korani to work on the interface design. Korani said she is
always on the lookout to collaborate with faculty and professionals on mobile applications related to education, the environment and healthcare. “I immediately accepted to work with her on this project because it allows me to make an impact on breast cancer survivor’s lives through my contributions,” Korani said. Before packaging everything into an app, the first step was to recruit people to form a focus group. Archbishop Mitty High School senior Elina Xie was in charge of spreading the word through social media for the recruitment. Xie reached out to Dougan in June of last year in hopes of gaining research experience in public health. She is now a lab intern, proactively helping with the project. “I knew I wanted to study the people-aspect people-aspec of health, as a opposed to th the more technica technical, molecular aspec aspect of health, in college college,” Xie said.
She has previous experience researching antibiotics, antibiotic resistance and how the antibiotics affect different types of cancer therapies. Xie added, “I was specifically interested in examining health issues related to women, like breast cancer, endometriosis as well as how people with different socioeconomic backgrounds experience ‘health’ differently.” As she is graduating high school this year, Xie plans on pursuing a bachelor’s in health science or public health and eventually obtaining a master’s degree. Dougan has formed partnerships with local cancer care organizations in the Bay Area, ultimately improving her process and credibility for the app. “Currently, I am seeking Institutional Review Board (IRB) approval at the Santa Clara Valley Medical Center, which is the largest county public hospital because any research that you do, has to go through [IRB],” Dougan said. She explained that the IRB is made of different experts who look at the research in order to protect the human subject. Dougan has already gone through the IRB at SJSU, as well as the hospital. “I am passionate about making a difference in the community where I live and work and so Valley Medical Center provides a window into the community that it serves,” Dougan said. Follow Olivia on Twitter @bmo_liv
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MOTHERHOOD
THURSDAY, MARCH 28, 2019
B7
Campus group supports pregnant mothers By Adam Yoshikawa STAFF WRITERS
Being an expecting or current mother while being a college student is challenging. “Say goodbye to sleep,” said behavioral science junior Elizabeth Sanchez in an email. Sanchez is a single parent and said her 3-year-old son Damian is her daily motivation. “There’s a fear of being looked at when walking with a stroller or diaper bag on campus. I notice many parents hesitate to bring their children on campus because they fear they will be disruptive,” Sanchez said. According to CNN, unplanned pregnancies for women between the ages of 18 and 24 have risen. San Jose State students run a campus pregnancy support team, Spartan Mamas. The club has 24 members to help and support students who have any hardships that come with studying while raising a child. Of those 24 members, 10 of them are current students and the other 14 consist of alumni and other supporters. The Spartans Mamas
ADAM YOSHIKAWA | SPARTAN DAILY
Behavorial sciences junior Elizabeth Sanchez and her 3-year-old son Damian interact with the statues of Tommie Smith and John Carlos. Sanchez is a member of the Spartan Mamas, a campus organization composed of expecting and current mothers studying at San Jose State.
come together to support of one another through open conversations, eliminating any uncomfortable small talk that comes with the stigma of being pregnant at a young age. Seeing another mother bring her child to a professor’s office hours gave Sanchez a sense of relief. It was the relief that some professors are understanding and “cool” about students giving their children the attention that’s needed.
There’s a fear of being looked at when walking with a stroller or diaper bag on campus. I notice many parents hesitate to bring their children on campus. Elizabeth Sanchez Behavioral science junior, mother of 3-year-old son
Sanchez said she has always wanted to be able to give her son opportunities that weren’t offered
to her. Though she does find it tough to work on course assignments in the little free time that she
has, she never forgets to bring snacks where she goes, in case hunger strikes her son. A student parent pro tip from Sanchez is to “read lectures or books to your children as a bedtime story to help you succeed.” The Spartan Mamas helps out the new moms or expecting moms with resources and class scheduling. The Spartan Mamas have been on campus for
a long time and had just celebrated its 10-year anniversary this past month. HER Story was an event held on March 5 in the Student Union, where student mothers told their stories of college life as an expecting mother or a current mom. The Spartan Mamas also welcomes men and fathers to join and support the group as well. Follow Adam on Instagram @yoshi_kawa_
Professors juggle motherhood and career
ADAM YOSHIKAWA AND COURTNEY VASQUEZ | SPARTAN DAILY
San Jose State University professors Mary Currin-Percival (left), Laura Miller Conrad (center) and Katerina Potika (right) balance family responsibilities with academia.
By Adam Yoshikawa and Courtney Vasquez STAFF WRITERS
Expecting her baby by the end of April, Laura Miller Conrad passes on knowledge to her students. She does so with the anticipation of a big change coming soon to her already busy life as a scientist and professor. Conrad is an assistant professor of chemical biology, organic chemistry and biochemistry. “No matter what’s going on, there’s always lots of things going on, so you just do your best,” said Conrad. “I try to prioritize and to fit everything in and the details will change clearly when the child is in the picture.” Much of Conrad’s identity revolves around her work as both a scientist and a professor. Her pregnancy only adds to her list of challenges. Many working par-
ents find it hard to balance the responsibilities of a job with raising their children. At San Jose State, there are 1,054 female faculty members out of 2,101 total as of fall 2018 per the university site. Among them, there are professors who have to balance their academic work and motherhood. In these cases, it makes their jobs a bit more difficult. Computer science assistant professor Katerina Potika is a mother of a 10-year-old daughter and teaches data structures/algorithms to undergraduates. Potika said she finds being a computer science professor to be very important for women who have a lack of confidence in the field. Being a mother and a professor, Potika expressed the sacrifices she has to make in order to have enough time for both work and her daughter. The computer science
professor also shared how she has to spend long hours on campus while her daughter spends even longer hours at an after-school program. During the summer, Potika spends her time with her daughter. Potika expressed she spends as much time as she can with her daughter
nical books instead of literature. In addition, Potika enjoys exercising, watching movies and just spending time with her daughter in general. Potika strives to be there for both her daughter and students. Potika represents women in a field that
No matter what’s going on, there’s always lots of things going on, so you just do your best. I try to prioritize and fit everything in. Laura Miller Conrad Assistant professor of chemical biology, organic chemistry, and biochemistry.
when she is not working because she is so busy during the school year. Potika said she sometimes brings her daughter to school with her, which her daughter enjoys very much. An avid reader, Potika prefers more tech-
doesn’t have very many female leaders. By being a professor, she hopes to encourage more women to follow in her footsteps. As a woman becomes a mother, she takes on a lifelong responsibility. As children grow older,
mothers face a unique set of obstacles. Political science assistant professor Mary Currin-Percival said she had challenges in the past with making enough time for her children’s extracurricular activities because of class interferences. “One of the challenges that parents face is you worry if they have events, like mock trial, plays or competitions, you won’t always be able to attend all of them,” Currin-Percival said. “You have papers to write or papers to grade, or you have your own students’ events.” Currin-Percival has two children, one who is still in high school and another who is living on his own. According to the political science professor, she shares most of the parental obligations with her husband, Garrick Percival, who is also a political science professor at SJSU. “We share all of our
parenting responsibilities,” Currin-Percival said. “I have a lot of male colleagues who have children and it’s as difficult for them, as it is for me.” Currin-Percival expressed how balancing teaching with being a parent is hard, but that there is also a positive aspect behind it. “I think I have a lot of privileges that some parents don’t have,” Currin-Percival said. “We have sick leave, if I have to take the day off because my son is sick, or if I have to take the day off because I’m sick. I don’t have to worry about losing my job.” With females making up half of the total SJSU faculty, there are many more inspirational stories that have yet to be told. Follow Adam and Courtney on Instagram @yoshi_kawa_ @courtneymegan_16
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SPORTS
THURSDAY, MARCH 28, 2019
JOHANNA MARTIN | SPARTAN DAILY
B8
Chan is the champ at SJSU By Courtney Vasquez STAFF WRITER
T
aylor Chan is nothing short of perfection. Literally. After three years on the San Jose State gymnastics team, the junior kinesiology major has proven time and time again that she’s No. 1 on the team. On Saturday, Chan snagged the all-around title for the Mountain Pacific Sports Federation (MPSF) championship with a careerbest score of 39.300. The win makes Chan the fourth SJSU gymnast in program history to win this title. Chan currently has a career-high score of 39.250 out of 40 for the all-around category in gymnastics, meaning she competes in every beam, vault, bars and floor event. And most of the time, she finishes with first place titles – 15 this season to be exact. According to gymnastics head coach Joanne Bowers, Chan has been an amazing leader on the team. “Everyone on the team, I think when they see it’s [Chan’s turn is] up, you just feel really confident,” Bowers said. “It’s like ‘oh we’ve
got a hit, it’s going to be a good routine.’ ” This season, Chan holds the best score for the all-around, has clenched 15 first places wins, and has had six 9.900 floor routines, which means she was nearly perfect. While Bowers and the team know how talented Chan is, Chan remained humble and expressed how challenging it can be for a gymnast to mentally maintain confidence in the sport. “Mentally, it’s very hard, this sport is, and that’s the number one thing we have to practice all the time,” Chan said. “We just have to remind ourselves that we know how to do the skills no matter what’s around us.” Chan is nationally ranked at No. 43 as an individual, according to Road to Nationals. However, she claims that she would rather have the whole team recognized for its accomplishments rather than just for her own. Chan said, “It would be more cool to see our team being recognized because I know we’ve won back-toback [championships].” Chan said the SJSU
COURTNEY VASQUEZ | SPARTAN DAILY
Taylor Chan winks and poses on the beam during a meet.
women’s sports teams are not getting the recognition they deserve from the school. “[Gymnastics], soccer and softball have won backto-back [conference championships], but none of the female teams are getting recognized for that,” Chan said. “It’s kind of like ‘Why not? We’re doing just as much as the other sports.’ ”
As head coach, Bowers expressed, the team is not all about attention, but instead, it is more about the accomplishments. “We are so not all about [the recognition.] To us, it’s all about us, like ‘are we getting better?’ ” Bowers said. “[Chan] is not this big, flashy ‘look at me, I won these awards’ and it’s nice.” Bowers went on to
explain how much of an impact Chan has had on the team with her skills on and off the mat. “She’s a part of the team and she’s part of our leadership of our upperclassmen that has really helped us in this short period of time,” Bowers said. Along with Bowers, Chan’s teammates have taken notice of the impact she has had on the team. Senior vault, beam and floor gymnast Josalyn Ray expressed how Chan makes the sport fun to be a part of, whether the two are in the practice gym or at a competition. “It’s always just nice to have someone in the gym that just makes gymnastics so easy and pushes you. She doesn’t really even have bad days ever,” Ray said. Similar to Ray, senior vault and bars gymnast Kaprece Nadonza shared how hard Chan has trained to perfect her skills in the gym. “[Chan] is very consistent in the gym and outside the gym on the competition field, so whenever she hits, she does it at practice, too,” Nadonza said. “It’s good to see that she’s a hard worker both
in the gym and on the competition floor.” Chan’s personality makes her easy to get along with, and her calm yet determined temperament can be felt throughout the gym. Sophomore vault and floor gymnast Trisha Raquel has only known Chan for about two seasons, but explained how it has felt longer because of their friendship. “She’s like a pick-me-up. Whenever I’m having a rough event or something, she’s always there, and she keeps my mind off of it,” Raquel said. Chan has definitely made her impact on SJSU, especially with her teammates and coaches. Even though she is one of the best athletes on campus, Chan still remains humble. “I think people appreciate her, and we appreciate her and it’s great, but I know that’s not why she does it,” Bowers said. “When [gymnasts] are grateful and they embrace every opportunity, that is the way to be.”
Follow Courtney on Twitter @courtney_megsss
Maddy’s got an arm and a swing By Melody Del Rio GRAPHICS EDITOR
S
enior pitcher Madison Aurin is positioning herself to finish her final season as a Spartan softball player on top, with keeping her batting average in the 300s. “Maddy is one of those people who you have to be very careful in pitching to,” said sophomore teammate Caroline Bowman. “Just because she’s so strong and she’s such a good hitter, she can touch almost everything, she rarely swings and misses . . . you have to be careful with how you place the ball because she knows how to read it and take the ball deep.” From the age of 10 until now, Aurin’s craft has been developed from the first time she picked up a bat. Aurin graduated in 2015 from Centennial H i g h School in
SARA BIELA | THE SPEAR
Bakersfield, Calif. as a four-year letter winner and three-time first-team All-Southwest Yosemite League selection. “I was always naturally talented in hitting. It was always something that came easy to me and I understood what was behind hitting,” Aurin said. “At a young age, I always understood that. She said her passion has always been hitting but pitching was something that she felt was necessary to master during her junior year in college. She was a pitcher in high school but knew her hitting ability was what would make her stand out at the collegiate level. During her first year at SJSU, Aurin thought she would spend her season on the bench, but she soon found that she could compete for the position and started at first base her freshman year. Bowman said Aurin sets the tone in practice by inspiring everyone tries to play in her level. “She taught me to play with a bunch of tenacity. To be fearless [on the field], be a competitor and give it my all,” Bowman said. According to the San Jose State Athletics website, during Aurin’s freshman year, she set the record for slugging (.648). She also set the sophomore record for
double plays turned and is also one of two players in the program’s history to have multiple double-digit home runs in the season. “She has good eye-hand coordination and she’s the best hitter on our team, and that’s something you can’t teach,” said head coach Peter Turner. “You either have that skill or you don’t.” Aurin tries to read past trends and keeps a book of her stats on her batting. She said if she can’t read her pitches well, the following practice she focuses on what to fix. “I was very intimidated when I first met her just ‘cause being a freshman, it’s a little scary and Maddy is really good. She’s very vocal, she knows what she’s doing,” Bowman said. “I have to keep up and stuff but getting to know her, she’s an amazing person and I love playing with her.” Though Aurin proves to be a competitor, she still searches for ways to improve. “I just want to be as consistent as I can. I want [pitchers] to not know what to pitch to me because I don’t have any weaknesses,” Aurin said. “I think I’m just focused on being the most consistent hitter across the board when it comes to hitting different pitches.” Follow Melody on Twitter @melodydelrio