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Homestead High School 21370 Homestead Rd, Cupertino, CA 95014 · Volume 60 · Issue 4 · February 10, 2023
SOUND THE ALARM
Series of fire alarms disrupt class time, cause inconvenience for first responders By Zeinab Rakhshandehroo, Hope Saena and Harshitha Vijayakumar
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By Ella Chan, Helen Tam and Annabelle Yip With high inflation persisting since the end of the pandemic, many members of the school community have had to adapt to increased gas, food and utility prices, history teacher Marc Gonzales said. In 2022, all items increased in price over a 12-month span by 4.9% in the Bay Area, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. This wave of inflation has made it increasingly more difficult to live in this area, Gonzales said, as inflation decreases the amount of money families can save per month. Currently, the annual national rate of inflation is about 6.5%, which is 4.5% higher than the ideal inflation rate of 2%, according to the Federal Reserve. This results in quickly rising prices, ultimately reducing the purchasing power of consumers in the future. Meanwhile, global factors such as the war in Ukraine continue to affect the supply of goods, Gonzales said. In terms of combating inflation, Gonzales said minimum wage increases such as
Sunnyvale’s may not solve all inflation woes. “Take restaurants for example. If eggs are more expensive, restaurants may have to raise prices to cover the cost of their inputs,” Gonzales said. “If they also have to pay their workers more, they would have to raise their prices even more. The combined effect this may have is that people may decide it is not economical to eat out, which may result in businesses closing.”
Dance studio undergoes changes
Space to be used as multipurpose classroom
By Zeinab Rakhshandehroo and Hope Saena
Hidden among the hallways near the girls locker room, HHS’ dance studio is being transformed. Although the room will still serve as a dance studio, it will be a flexible classroom meant to accommodate 40 to 50 kids during the day, principal Greg Giglio said. The changes being made to the dance studio allow it to transition easily from being a dance room to a classroom, and vice versa, Giglio said. “We brought in desks and tables and we put curtains up to cover the mirror,” Giglio said. “So when somebody needs to use it as a dance room, they can open the curtains, pull the furniture out and it’s a dance room again.” The classroom will primarily serve PE classes, Giglio said. It is specifically geared toward providing a classroom environment for the freshman PE classes during their Jobs like senior Katherine Alvarez’s job in the caf- health and safety unit. “The current PE classroom is too small, eteria provide students with income in the midst and the HVAC system is not able to hanof rising prices. (Photo by Helen Tam)
See Inflation, page 2
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Effects of inflation continue despite economy improving
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Inflation impacts HHS community
grateful that our staff is doing what they’re supposed to in these situations, because we have to treat it like a real fire. I really want to commend all the students and staff that are doing what they’re supposed to be doing [during a n emergency].”
by Photo
hree consecutive fire alarms went off at HHS during the week of Jan. 23. In all three instances, students vaping in the bathrooms set off the smoke sensors, triggering the alarms, dean Anthony Nguyen said. When a fire alarm goes off, there are several steps that go into ensuring the safety of all staff and students. Administrators and other staff members perform specific tasks to ensure safety, Nguyen said. “Student safety is of our utmost concern,” Nguyen said. “Administrators are responsible for checking certain buildings to make sure that they’re completely empty of people, just in case someone trips and can’t get up.” While administrators check their assigned buildings for any students left behind, facilities manager Elder Fagundes checks the panels to see which sensor is activated, Nguyen said. Once the location is identified, staff check for smoke, fix the sensor and reset it. After the buildings are clear and all students are on the field, everyone can return to classrooms. “It’s all a team effort,” Nguyen said. “I can’t do this by myself.” Nguyen said he encourages students to report misbehavior they see in the restrooms to an administrator to prevent large-scale disruptions. “We want students to feel safe on campus, to use the restrooms as they’re intended and to report to us [since] everything stays confidential,” Nguyen said. “It’s not about getting in trouble. It’s about respecting educational time.” The fire department also goes through an extensive process when an alarm goes off at a school, fire captain for the Santa Clara County Fire Department Colin Mulloy said. Since schools have a large number of occupants, they are considered target hazards. The fire department has pre-planned binders for such locations, which contain a map of the location, exit routes and the location of alarm panels, Mulloy said, allowing the fire department to offer assistance efficiently during an emergency. In the event of a false alarm, however, Mulloy said the fire department’s resources are wasted, leaving the rest of the community potentially more vulnerable. “In a false alarm, a fire engine is responding to the high school,” Mulloy said. “That means they can’t respond to other emergencies. If we’re on scene trying to
find out what’s going on at the high school and someone has a medical emergency close to our station, the next fire apparatus that’s going to respond to that is going to be coming from farther away.” In addition to the impacts on administration and the community, the false alarms greatly impact students and teachers, math teacher Katie Heaney said. Heaney, whose AP statistics class had a test during fourth period Jan. 25, said both she and her students were concerned about how to handle the disruption. “I usually give a full class period for tests, and that day we were out on the field for about half an hour, which is a significant amount of time to lose from the class,” Heaney said. “It was stressful for my students, who weren’t really sure what was going to happen, and it was stressful for me to figure out how we were still going to do the test but disrupt the class as little as possible. It puts a lot of stress on the staff and students to make up that time.” Though she understands the importance of smoke sensors working effectively, Heaney said the false alarms are frustrating for teachers. “If somebody’s smoking or vaping in the bathroom, there should be consequences for that,” Heaney said. “We all have to walk out and evacuate and be stressed out just because of the actions of a few students.” While the false alarms impede class time, AP environmental science teacher Jessica Wakefield said they also affect students outside of the classroom. “It’s super unfortunate that the alarms were set off in the gender neutral restrooms, limiting the availability of those for students that use them for what they’re intended for,” Wakefield said. “What we need to do is figure out a way to curb the behavior that is setting off the alarms, because students are smoking in the bathrooms.” Though the procedure for dealing with the alarms can be tedious, Nguyen said he appreciates students and staff for taking them seriously. “I’m deeply sorry for the missing class time,” Nguyen said. “But I’m very
dle the amount of bodies that need to be in there,” Giglio said. “[The other option for] where they’re going is the field house, which is humongous and doesn’t have adequate places to write. So really, this is just a compromise.” PE 9 teacher Shawn Hook said that many of his previous classes have struggled with using the old PE classroom due to its small size.
See Dance studio, page 2
Now that the dance studio is a classroom, students need to push desks and chairs aside in order to use it. (Photo by Zeinab Rakhshandehroo)
PAGE DESIGN BY HARSHITHA VIJAYAKUMAR AND EMMA YU