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AUGUST 20, 2026
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New buildings Best study spots planned for lower for incoming campus students
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VOL. 105, NO. 1
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AIDEN MEDINA | VIEWPOINTS
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A century of Tigers football celebrated
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Busting ‘ghost-students’
Pot shops end city’s New ID initiative aims to prevent financial aid fraud tolerance effective in its efforts so far, the break new implementation of these MARISSA LIEVANOS MANAGING EDITOR
California Community Colleges will now require future students to verify their identities prior to enrollment in order to qualify for registration. Implemented on Aug. 11, a link to ID.me and DMV Mobile Wallet has been added to the CCCApply, or application, website. The California State Chancellor’s Office passed the new initiative last year, after numerous post-COVID reports of “ghost students,” or fraudulent students who enroll at community colleges in order to collect financial aid money. Currently enrolled students are excluded from this new requirement and do not have to submit any of this information. In a spring 2025 CalMatters article, it reveals that 34% of community college applications were from fake students and that they had collected over $5 million in federal financial aid and over $1 million from the state. From January to March 2025, some districts, such as the
ID practices raises the question on efficiency and accessibility for students. At Riverside Community College District, students who are having trouble with online verification processes are being asked to come in person to straighten things out but what about disabled students who require assistance to get to and from school? The new initiative poses the risk of turning away students who already struggle with the steps of the existing application. AIDEN MEDINA | VIEWPOINTS It is already difficult for incoming Riverside City College students to Riverside City College Administrator assists student at Admissions and make counseling appointments, Records in the Student Services and Administration Building on Aug. 17. so what will happen if they are experiencing technical errors and Los Rios Community College also already begun to improve do not have time to make it to District reported that 64% of its application filtering process, in-person verification before the their applications were detected bringing numbers of successful registration window closes? as fake. fraudsters down. “For students needing extra Some colleges took to New monthly data reports assistance—including incoming addressing this problem early, with from the chancellor’s office show local high school students—our San Diego Community College that a majority of scammers are staff will be working directly District opting to manually go being caught and kicked out before with them to guide them through through applications and screen financial aid is issued to them. the process,” Dean of Enrollment them for fraud. CCCApply has However, while seemingly Services at RCC, Kyla Teufel said.
MAXWELL PORTER INTERIM LIFE EDITOR
After years of discussion and controversy, Riverside has officially decided to host regulated cannabis dispensaries inside the city limits. Following the passing of Prop 64 in 2016, Riverside officials took a strict stance on marajuana, only allowing delivery services from neighboring cities. However, in March of 2023, a major shift occurred when city council voted 5-2 in favor of cannabis sales, and dispensaries within Riverside. While an entire new industry is in the early stages of development in Riverside, challenges are still present for both those in favor and against. Originally, it was proposed that 14 dispensaries would receive permits to operate across the city, which would open the economic flood gates. However, after criticism from local council members, it was initially proposed the 14 dispensaries would be evenly distributed across the seven wards, but then that number was cut in half, resulting in only one per ward. Embarc, local cannabis dispensaries, are no stranger special elections for senators to California, opening over 15 and is looking to fill the open locations since statewide legal executive positions on her team sales began in 2018. Despite serving as the first legal dispensary in Riverside, Embarc faces
‘Reset and rise’: ASRCC plans to course correct CHELSEA SUGIMURA EDITOR-IN-CHIEF
After a failed impeachment attempt while serving as vice president for Associated Students of Riverside City College, Latiesha Williams now takes the helm as president. Williams and her running mate Aleida Hill won the majority by 71% in the election for the 20262027 school year. Megan Bottoms, ASRCC advisor, announced the election results in an email to Viewpoints on May 26. The pair ran on the slogan “reset and rise,” a motto Williams attributed to her experience with the impeachment attempt she said Hill was actually a part of. “I took that moment not to feel like people were attacking me,
but to see where I could grow,” Williams said. The impeachment attempt against Williams and former ASRCC President Myisha Jackson failed in November 2025 after the senate tied in an 8-8 vote, a Viewpoints article stated. The attempt came after accusations were made by ASRCC officers of an “uncomfortable work environment” and violations of the constitution and bylaws. Williams said Hill approached her about running together in the election towards the end of the school year and the two discussed how they would bounce back from the past. “We wanted to set a higher standard for the upcoming year and create an environment where everyone could move forward
together,” Hill said. “We wanted to ‘reset’ the challenges of the previous year, learn from those experiences rather than carry them with us and ‘rise’ into our new term with a stronger sense of purpose, leadership and unity.” One of the issues ASRCC faced in the last school year was consistency with adherence to the Ralph M. Brown Act, a law that promotes transparency within governing bodies and protects the public’s right to access to meetings. Under the Brown Act, student governments are required to post their agendas prior to all meetings and the minutes after the meetings which ASRCC failed to do numerous times, as found in a previous Viewpoints article. Williams said she has spent the summer preparing for the
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INDEX
AIDEN MEDINA | VIEWPOINTS ASRCC President Latiesha Williams takes a moment of idle at her desk on Aug. 18.
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