Volume 28, Edition 4

Dear Community,

On Friday, Jan. 27, 3,000 people gathered at the Al Glick Field House on the U of M campus to hear President Obama speak about the rising price of college. He stressed that for the first time in the nation’s history, national college debt, a startling figure of $1 trillion, exceeded the national average credit card debt. On average, college students owe $24,000 in college debt, and the state of Michigan is not making this easier on students. Last year, Governor Rick Snyder cut state funding for education by 15 percent and threatened to cut schools’ funding even more if they raised the cost of tuition more than seven percent. Michigan is among forty other states that cut funding for higher education last year. If the cost of college continues to rise, higher education will be limited to a select, elite few, denying opportunity to those who cannot afford it. At his speech on Friday, Obama said, “We should push colleges to do better...We should hold them accountable if they don’t.” He called on public universi-ties to decrease the rate of tuition increases and highlighted a merit-based plan that would require more federal funding for colleges and universities. Despite the dire situation, there are alternative ways to pay for college. Scholarships, student loans, federal funding, and community colleges are all ways to lessen the cost of an edu-cation. After all, the President faced the same struggle as we do now. “I am only standing here today because scholarships and student loans gave me a shot at a decent education,” he said. We as students must continue calling for affordable higher education. Otherwise, the educational gap between the “haves” and “have-nots” in our society will continue getting wider.

Sincerely,Jordan Siden, Mari Cohen, Julia Kortberg, Kerryann Fingerle

Co-Editors-in-Chief

02 the communicator table of contents

Editors-In-Chief Mari CohenKerry FingerleJulia KortbergJordan Siden

Art DirectorColleen O’Brien

Photo DirectorCooper DePriest

Constants EditorEli Sugerman

A&E EditorCharlotte Steele

Sports EditorZach Shaw

Production CoordinatorJulia DeVarti

Mailing CoordinatorsRuthie GraffAbby Kleinheksel

StaffKelly Arnold Stephen ChangRachel JacobiHannah KingJack KoziczErez LevinCasey MacDonaldJames MackinNick MargolisSacha Moravy-PenchanskyBrienne O’Donnell

Merrick PerpichLeon PescadorNate PorterGabriela RosalesRyan SheaJeremy SimonCharlotte SteeleEliza SteinGabby ThompsonLukas TrierweilerMargaret Whittier-Ferguson

AdviserTracy Anderson

Cover ArtColleen O’Brien

Back Cover IllustrationJames Mackin

letter from the editors

ON THE COVER: TEN miNuTE lOVE sTORiEs 16

a&E 20

A profile of Joris Von Moltke, who spoke three languages before most children could barely speak one.

3 300 wORds: jORis VON mOlTkE

TOCCONTENTS

spORTs 24

OpiNiON 26 COlumNs 28 sHORTs 29

CHS counselors and students educate eighth graders about their choices for high school.

4 zEbRa fiT

A review of the recent Dance Body show, and a look into Dance Body’s future with new teacher Michelle Briscoe.

6 lEapiNg, pRaNCiNg, TEaCHiNg

The unique CHS English program gives students the free-dom to choose their own classes.

8 laNguagE, liTERaTuRE aNd lEaRNiNg

Social Studies teachers Chloe Root and Sarah Roldan talk about their moves from Huron to CHS.

10 big sCHOOl, liTTlE sCHOOl

CHS counselors recommend that students make college visits a prority.

11 a lasTiNg impREssiON

CHS students and psychotherapist Sally Wisotzkey discuss sibling relationships.

12 family dyNamiCs: CHaRaCTER maTTERs

Al Gallup tells the story of how ‘The Rock’ came to be at Hill and Washtenaw.

14 THE HisTORy Of THE ROCk

A look inside CHS students’ exercise patterns and the im-portance of exercise to teenage health.

18 TEENagERs aNd ExERCisE

CHS students’ views of the United States are affected by cultural experiences.

11 pERspECTiVEs Of amERiCa

Four CHS Seniors share their feelings about applying to college.

5 lETTERs fROm COllEgE

In the spirit of Valentine’s Day, James Mackin offers options for finding that dream date.

19 HOw TO gET a daTE

the communicator staff

03infographic & 300 words the communicator

Back and forth. Back and forth. That has been the familiar path for CHS junior Joris Von Moltke. While most students grow up attending one el-ementary, middle and high school. Von Moltke has had the rare opportunity to attend all three stages of school not only in Ann Arbor, but also in Berlin, Germany. Born in Berlin, Von Moltke lived there for three years while attend-ing a Turkish preschool. While most toddlers can hardly understand one language, Von Moltke could understand two before he was even four years old. When his dad accepted a job at the University of Michigan in 1998, he could already understand both German

chs & caffeine

and Turkish. Two years is all it took him to pick up English, his third language. As he at-tended the equivalent of Kindergarten, but in Germany, Von Moltke lost his ability to understand Turkish, but kept learning German and English, keeping in mind that a return to Ann Arbor was imminent. A year later his family returned to Michigan and Von Moltke enrolled at Ann Arbor Open until fourth grade. The leap across the pond to Germany has become second nature to Joris, be-cause his parents use any excuse from work to sabbaticals, to head back home to Berlin. Sophomore year was the last time Von Moltke spent a semester in

Germany. “Traveling is one of the best ways to learn about different cultures, and being immersed in several has been really great because I love trying to under-stand and pick up different languages,” explained Von Molke. Von Moltke, A Spanish IV student who is fluent in English, German and once Turkish, explains a quote he resonates with deeply. “A person finds their best education by traveling.” He is modest to say that he has been edu-cated by his personal travels, but you can’t disagree with a quad-lingual.

lukas trierweiler & jeremy simon researchsacha moravy-penchansky illustration

by eli sugermen

about 300 words

Brady Dennis, a “night cops” reporter in the Tampa bureau of Poynter’s St. Petersburg (Fla.) Times, started writing ‘300 Words’ in 2004. ‘300 Words’ is a series of short stories about ordinary people. The Comminicator began publishing our own ‘300 Words’ in 2010. If you have an extraordinary story about an ordinary person that you wish to share, send it to:

[email protected]

CAUTION: CONTENTS EXTREMELY HOT

Sometime s51 students

42.5%

Never34 students

28.3%

Oft en (1 or more cups a day)35 students

29.2%

COMMUNITY HIGH WEIGHS IN ON CAFFEINE CONSUMPTION

“I drink coffee before I have something

difficult coming up, usually before crew

practice.” - gabe schat, sophomore

“I don’t drink coffee because it makes

your mind feel awake and not your

body. It creates an imbalance.”

- isaac fink, senior“I drink coffee sometimes on

weekends; it is good with

doughnuts.” - quinn strassel, Teacher

300 words: joris von moltke

04 the communicator school news

Every year when Winter Break ends, the CHS Middle School Outreach Program begins. This program allows CHS

counselors John Boshoven and Diane Grant, along with a group of CHS students, to make several visits to the middle schools in the district, as well as private schools Emerson and Honey Creek. “Part of what we want to do is educate the fact that they have an op-tion for high school, talk about the fit of Community High and dispel myths that maybe propagated by their parents or by older generations,” explained Boshoven. Before the middle school visits start, CHS club advisors and forum leaders recommend students that best represent the physical and educational diversity at CHS. After these students are chosen, Bo-shoven and Grant, along with Dean Jen Hein, and Lead Teacher Marci Tuzinsky ,train these students to give informa-tion about CHS. After the training, the students sign up for times and schools they are able to attend. During the school day, CHS counsel-ors and the selected students drive over to the middle schools and present to a class of students. “We go to the middle school and divide ourselves into diverse groups between race, gender, and what our extracurriculars are,” explained senior and CHS representative Leah Penner. “Then in the classroom, one of the counselors explains the on-paper ver-

sion of Community.” A CHS counselor leads the discus-sion, but ultimately, CHS students are the ones telling the middle school students about how unique CHS is compared to the other Ann Arbor High schools. “After, [CHS students] get an op-portunity to talk about ourselves and our experiences,” said junior Joris Von Moltke, CHS representative. “Most of the students already know a bit about Community, but we are the best ones who can tell the kids what our experi-ences are.” The students explain that CHS has block scheduling, call teachers by their first name, and have off campus lunch-es. Students also talk about how Forum works and the fun activities Forums do as a group, such as Forum Day, Multi Culti, and Field Day. The middle school students are also informed about having the ability to duel at the other high schools and take Community Resource classes, indepen-dent studies, and college classes. Boshoven explained that CHS is not the right fit for every student. Even though CHS does offer students the opportunity to take actual college classes, some students prefer to have AP classes, which CHS does not offer. CHS is also not right for students who cannot handle the responsibil-ity that CHS students have. Attending a school that has off campus school might tempt a student to abuse it. “Teachers give a lot of trust to students and students who would take

advantage of that trust won’t do very well at Community,” said Penner. There are many rumors about CHS. “Yesterday we were at Slauson and at the end of one presentation, a girl came up to Diane and said, ‘Here I need to give you your brochure back,’” said Penner. “Diane said, ‘Oh why?’ She said, ‘Well my mother said you’re not a real school so I won’t be going there.’ So again, myths prevail and it’s not like we’re going to bust all the myths, but we certainly want the opportunity to have new fresher information.” At the end of the presentation, the CHS students send all of the adults out of the room. This gives the middle school students an opportunity to ask questions that they really want to know. “There is always ‘does everyone at Community do drugs?’ kind of ques-tions,” said Penner. “But they mostly want to know about the classes, duel-ing, and the open campus.” Penner explained that at the pre-sentation, a CHS counselor gives the middle school students a brochure that includes the lottery to get into Com-munity. Once again, Boshoven only encourages students to apply for lottery if CHS might be the right fit. “I tell the students that I present to, ‘I’m not here to recruit you’because man do we turn down far too many kids for my taste. So I don’twant more to apply because we got them all psyched out. We really wantthe right kid to apply that feels like a place that I can really thrive.” C

zebra fitCOUNSElOrS ANd STUdENTS EdUCATE EIGHTH GrAdErS AbOUT CHSgabriela rosales

cooper depriest & gabriela rosales photos

as Of fEb. 9, 350 NiNTH gRadE

appliCaTiONs HaVE bEEN

sumbiTTEd TO THE CHs lOTTERy.

QUINTEN FARO, SOPHOMOrE

JUlIA KARR, JUNIOr

“It’s easy to get to know people in other grades. I am also close to the teachers, especially Judith: I am her T.A. this semester. Of course I love the location, it’s great to have businesses nearby. I also take advantage of how close U of M is by taking classes through the CR department. I have had a positive experience at CHS; I love it here.”

“The free blocks allow me to get to my sport on time and also the Jazzprogram is a good fit for me because it is more of my style of music more than orchestra or band.”

“I like being able to do my own way rather than having a bunch ofteachers telling me, ‘This is how you do it, you have no freedom.’ It’sa lot better for my work ethic. My way of doing work is relax andfocus.”

“Community is a smaller school compared to other high schools and it’s more intimate. There is also a mutual respect between teachers and students. Unlike some schools, teachers here genuinely care about their students and subject.”

why is Community a

good fit for you?

JESSICA SHApiRO, SENIOr

brIANA O’NEAL, SOPHOMOrE

QUINTEN FARO, SOPHOMOrE

JUlIA KARR, JUNIOr

letters from collegeFOUr CHS SENIOrS SHArE THEIr FEElINGS AbOUT TO APPlYING TO COllEGEsacha moravy-penchansky

sacha moravy-penchansky illustration

For Community High seniors Gabby Watts, Jake Levine, Colin Leach and Cassidy Moravy-Penchansky, college

is just around the corner, and stress is building up. “I’m really nervous about which colleges are going to accept me,” said Moravy-Penchansky. Going to college is an adventure that these four seniors are preparing to embark upon. Watts, who aspires to one day become a hair stylist, has her college plans laid out in front of her. She has been accepted to and will be attending Scholar’s Cosmetology School right here in Ann Arbor. “I went to Huron Valley Beauty Academy earlier in high school but i dropped that and now I’m going to pick it up again in July at Scholar’s.” Watts is quite excited to start anew in her career in cosmetology. “I’m going to get a degree in cosme-tology which is basically a little bit of everything... I’m going to try and be a hair stylist.” Though her plans may seem set in stone, Watts still has a ways to go before she can run her own salon. “I think it usually takes about a year or two, It depends because it’s different from the high school beauty school [which is] full time,” she said. Another senior at Community High, Jake Levine, has already been accepted

to five out of the six colleges that he applied to. “I’m still waiting to hear back from [Boston University].” At this point, Levine’s biggest dilemma is trying to decide which school he will pledge his loyalties with, and what he plans on majoring in. “I think I want to major in American Studies,” said Levine. There is not a

whole lot of worry in his mind, he still has time to figure out the details. Leach is unfortunately still stuck on step one with his college applications. “I’m finishing and submitting my [Uni-versity of] Michigan application tomor-row. I am still applying to SAIC (School of the Art Institute of Chicago), CCS (College for Creative Studies), Kendall and the major state schools.” In college,

Leach wants to get his degree in art and either math or science. “I really want to stay with my interests. Art will be my main focus, but having a wider education is very important for future careers. With an art and math degree I could become an architect, and with an art and science degree I could illustrate text books.” Leach finds himself pondering life after college and what he can do to be suc-cessful then. Moravy-Penchansky is stuck a similar situation as Leach. She has not quite finished applying to all the schools she wants to. “I’m not even fully done applying so I haven’t heard back from any of them,” Moravy-Penchansky said with a hint of disappointment. The 17 year old is looking forward to study-ing art and possibly art education in college. She considers herself to be a skilled photographer who hopes to one day have her own high school art class where she can share her skill with tomorrow’s youth. Coming up on their last semester of high school, these four seniors are itch-ing with excitement for college. Filling out their final applications and finish-ing up their high school credits, Watts, Levine, Leech and Moravy-Penchansky are finally realizing that college is right under their noses. C

james mackin photos

GIllIAN TEALLMArY SALiSbuRy SHAdI AHmAdmEHRbi

Accepted to:“I did not apply”

Accepted to:DePaul University

Accepted to:- University of Michigan - Case Western Reserve University

“I plan on applying to culinary school in a couple years.”

Community High

Dream School:University of

Michigan

Dream School:

Dream School:

ElIzAbETH CALdwELL

Accepted to:- James Madison College- University of Michigan’s Residential College- College of Wooster

St. Olaf College Dream School:

05feature the communicator

mOsT COllEgEs REquiRE sTudENTs TO COmmiT aNd sENd a dEpOsiT by may 1.

06 the communicator feature

The curtains are drawn open, the lights dim, and a cast of darkened figures takes the stage. The audience is kept on

pins and needles as a girl with a boom-box prances from the wing and presses a button, triggering the beginning of the Winter 2012 Dance Body Concert. As music begins surging through the sound system, members of Community High School’s dance company are lit up and the crowd is given their first view of the dancers. From the perspective of the audience, this is the beginning of the performance, but the dancers know the show began long before their fans filled the auditorium. “We start preparing for the concert really early,” said Clare Jacobson, a senior at Community and third-year member of Dance Body. “Right when school starts we make an announce-ment saying, ‘Hey everybody, if you’re new to Dance Body here’s a heads up: we all choreograph our own pieces so start thinking about music, start think-ing about what you want to do.’” Dance Body is a class that meets during fifth block every other day at Community, and each student’s dance is rehearsed once a week in a half-hour long period outside of class. Dancers

can choreograph in any style for a small group, just themselves, or for the entire company, but every member is expect-ed to complete a piece by semester’s end. “Once we have our music, we’ll start choreographing our dances and teach-ing them to our dancers. We pretty much do that all fall and all winter,” said Jacobson. “Being up on stage is probably the best part because we’re working all semester to get to that

point.” The idea that students as young as 13 are leading other dancers in their chore-ography is surprising to many newcom-ers. Most dance studios are lead by a teacher or group of teachers that con-trol and direct the classes and recitals. The program embodies the Community High School spirit of giving students the freedom to pursue their own goals through teamwork and responsibility. This freedom gives dancers a much

more defined sense of ownership and pride in the company. “[Choreography] is by far the best and my favorite part of Dance Body. It is so rare that any dancer, especially of our age, has a group of people willing to learn and work on your choreog-raphy. We actually have after school rehearsal time to work with just the students and so there’s no teacher there giving corrections or pressure so you’re able to be creative and have whatever

ideas you want,” said Ellen Wolgat, a third-year member of Dance Body and senior at Skyline. “Having the older students showing me their techniques for choreographing and dance or all of these different ideas I had never seen before totally changed my world of dance.” This focus on choreography was originally instilled by Deborah Sipos-Roe, the founder and long-time teacher of Dance Body. Unfortunately, during

the 2010-2011 school year Deborah retired, leaving the class without a quali-fied replacement. “We had a bunch of substitute teach-ers come in for a little while, and even Connie who was here for a year, that had different ideas of what they wanted dance body to be,” said Wolgat. “They didn’t really honor Deborah.” At the beginning of this school year, the dancers found Marley Speiser-Sch-neider to informally take over teaching responsibilities for the class. “[Marley] actually used to be in Dance Body when Deborah was here; she danced with my sister,” said Wolgat. “It’s really nice to bring back some of the old styles and ideas that Deborah used to have. I was always looking forward to that.” Speiser-Schneider’s term as the latest teacher for Dance Body, however, will be short lived. Jacobson said, “We love Marley, but unfortunately she doesn’t have a teaching certificate and she’s also part of a company in Vermont. It’s in the off season right now, but once it starts back up she’s going to have to go out there to be in the company and work there full-time, so she’s leaving right at the end of this semester.” Knowing that Speiser-Schneider was

“being up on stage is probably the best part because we’re working all semester to get to that point. ”

leaping, prancing, teachingbEHINd THE SCENES OF THE COMMUNITY HIGH SCHOOl dANCE bOdY CONCErTryan shea

cooper depriest photos

sENiORs wHO HaVE bEEN

mEmbERs siNCE 2008 HaVE Had TEN diffERENT

daNCE bOdy TEaCHERs.


leaping, prancing, teaching

only a temporary solution, a formal request for a teacher was posted in mid-October. The students narrowed the qualified applicants down to two that they were very excited to work with. In an effort to see their teaching styles, they had each applicant lead one class. Michelle Briscoe was ultimately chosen for the job. “I haven’t worked that hard in a really long time, but she was also good at giving us a full enough warm-up that it wasn’t dangerous,” said Wolgat. “Michelle seems really interested in the kids and she’s really friendly. She actually remembers things about everyone so she can be person-ally involved in helping students with choreography and feedback, things like that.” With a new teacher and talented young members, the dancers have a bright vision for the future. Skyline High School senior and fourth-year member of Dance Body Hailey Keen said, “Right now we are in a really good place, with an accomplished, perma-nent teacher and lots of excited young dancers. It’s going to be fun to watch them grow while I’m here and after I’m gone. I’m excited to see where Dance Body can go.” C

TOP Dance Body members perform a dance choreographed by Ellen Wolgat. MIDDLE LEFT Hailey Keen, Melissa Kreinke and Ellen Wolgat donning Zentai Catsuits.

MIDDLE RIGHT Sophia Fall and Vittoria Meloni link up. BOTTOM LEFT Dancers from the company raise their arms. BOTTOM RIGHT Emma Share reaches towards the audience through a group of dancers.


Several years ago, Community High English teacher Judith DeWoskin was asked to teach another class and needed

to choose a topic. She went down to the book room and looked through a mountain of titles that no one was using. DeWoskin noticed a common factor in the books: all of them had extremely depressing themes. She used this idea to design her course. “I taught this funny course called Search for Self and it was just one de-pressing book after the next,” she said, laughing. “It was the most depressing thing I’ve ever taught…it was hideous.” This kind of originally-designed course on a unique topic may seem strange in a high school setting, but such innovation is expected at CHS. If the school’s defining principles are its emphasis on independence and its unique programming, this is dem-onstrated nowhere more than in the English program, where teachers are encouraged to focus courses around subjects that interest them and students have the freedom to choose from a wide menu of courses. Though the gloomy Search for Self class is no longer taught, a myriad of unique English courses remain at CHS. DeWoskin, who chairs the English department, explained that there are currently around 30 courses that the English faculty teaches on a rotating basis; approximately 15 different classes are taught per semester. Many are literature courses, while others focus on creative writing or journalism. During their freshman year, students are required to take a semester of Intro to Literature, which introduces them to a wide variety of texts, including short stories, novels, and plays, and teaches analytical essay writing and literary terms. After that, students can shape their own English education based on which courses interest them. The only restriction is that students must have at

least one semester of a literature class besides Intro to Literature, and they must take four years of English total. “The main goal here, or the gift, is that teachers teach what they’re good at and what they’re really interested in, so long as every class has its major com-ponent of writing and each class reads a certain number of books,” explained DeWoskin. “I think when teachers teach what they’re really interested in, they’re much more interesting people…it’s better for students, it’s better for teachers,” she added. “But also...if you shape a class

around a common theme, or a certain genre, I think you get a much more intense look. It’s the specificity I think that makes for very interesting cours-es.” Though the CHS English pro-gram structure is different than more sequence-based English programs in many other high schools, including the other three Ann Arbor high schools, it is still able to comply with the state requirements. According to CHS Dean Jen Hein, the teaching of English at CHS incorporates all of the content expectations from the Michigan Merit Curriculum. “We have different titles, but the way the Michigan Merit Curriculum was planned was it’s not about the title of the class; what it’s really about is read-ing and writing and it’s a practice that they call recursive, which means that the same emphasis in every English class is there. So in every English class, it’s reading and writing, reading and writing,” Hein explained. CHS junior Rose Henkin has found

that the diversity of courses makes for an enjoyable high school English experience. “I like that you are able to tailor your English education to what you like to do because I think there are classes for mainly everyone,” she said. “Whichever English class I’m taking, I know I’m going to like it, I know I’m going to enjoy it.” In addition to Intro to Literature, Henkin has taken Philosophy Litera-ture, American Literature, and Creative Writing. She is now taking Short Story Writing and is an editor of the school’s literary magazine, Free Verse, which is

staffed by students in the Creative Writ-ing and Short Story Writing classes. One of the possible risks of the program structure is that students are entirely responsible for putting together their English education, so they can miss out on important books and themes if they don’t take certain classes. But DeWoskin does not consider this as a big problem at CHS. “I would like to think that everybody should have American Lit and World Lit, because I just feel like that’s your sort of core knowledge that everyone needs,” she said. “But one of the be-liefs in this school is that we respect the differences of students in this school and we give you choices, and we respect your right to say, ‘I’m not ready for this right now’ or ‘Right now in my life I’m not interested in this’ or ‘I’m afraid of this.’” DeWoskin thinks that there are multi-ple routes to form a good English edu-cation at Community. “It has to be okay for students to take Sci Fi [Lit], Fantasy Lit, Chinese Lit, Harlem Renaissance

Lit, and never take World Lit and maybe take Pop Lit and in Pop Lit read some American Lit and some World Lit but never take American Lit,” she said. “I have to believe that. And part of it’s because I believe in my colleagues, and I believe that my colleagues are deliver-ing rigorous, interesting classes. And so kids will just come out a little different. That’s okay.” DeWoskin also noted that CHS students tend to be strong students that choose to take a lot of English credits and take more than the re-quired amount of literature classes. She estimated that about 75 percent end up opting to take either American Literature, which she herself teaches, or World Literature, which is taught by Ken McGraw, or both classes. Besides its unique structure, another defining feature of the CHS English program is its focus on writing and its effectiveness in preparing students for college. Alumna Kayla Stoler, who is a sopho-more at Wesleyan University in Con-necticut, can attest to the impact of the department on her writing skills. Stoler took at least eight different English courses during her time at CHS, and credits the CHS English program with giving her confidence when approach-ing challenging college assignments. Stoler is in the rigorous College of Social Studies at Wesleyan, in which weekly reading assignments can reach up to 1,500 pages, and every Friday Stoler must complete a five to seven page paper analyzing the material. She said that the reading and writing skills she learned from CHS helped give her the courage to enter the program. “Most public high school students do not learn how to write a standard five-paragraph analytical essay. At Com-munity, this framework is ingrained into every student by the time they cross the floor of Rackham [for graduation.] Learning to read and write analytically

“If you shape a class around a common theme, or a certain genre, I think you get a much more intense look. ”

language, literatureTHE UNIQUE CHS ENGlISH PrOGrAM GIvES STUdENTS FrEEdOM TO CHOOSE THEIr ClASSES mari cohen

hannah king photos

fOR THE Class Of 2010, THE CHs

aVERagE CRiTiCal REadiNg saT

sCORE was 26 pOiNTs HigHER

THaN THE disTRiCT aVERagE aNd

123 pOiNTs HigHER THaN

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is an invaluable skill for every single student,” said Stoler. Both DeWoskin and Hein agree that the English program’s focus on analyti-cal writing is the main reason it is so successful in college preparation. “I’d like to think it’s all about writ-ing. It’s all about reading and writing. There’s just nothing mysterious about it,” said DeWoskin. “It’s about reading books that students are interested in. Or if they think they’re not interested in them, just because they read them in class and because they discuss them in class, they become interested and they have some sense of them and they write and they write and they write.” Students often come back and tell DeWoskin that they have excelled in their freshman English classes and impressed their professors with skills in analytical writing. DeWoskin said that as long as she has been teaching, she has taught students to write analytical papers in strict, col-lege-level format. Other teachers at Community do the same. DeWoskin, McGraw, Tracy Anderson, and Janelle Johnson all use similar criteria sheets for analytical papers. Students become more accustomed to the analytical paper format as they progress through literature classes. Henkin feels that she has already ben-efited from the emphasis on analytical writing. “Just writing essays over, over and over again and just getting better grades on them each time has made me want to get better, so I keep it up,” she said. Of course, CHS does not contain the only strong English classes in Ann Arbor. Senior Alon Samuel’s home school is Pioneer High School, but he takes classes at CHS, and he has taken English in both buildings: English 9, English 10 and a semester of British Literature at Pioneer, and a semester of World Literature at Community. He thinks that there are advantages to both programs. “I think it just depends on the teach-er,” he said. He said that his English 10 class at Pioneer sophomore year was the most writing intensive class he has

had so far. DeWoskin agrees that the teacher is the most important factor; her teach-ing style has not changed based on the building she teaches in. “When I taught for a couple months at Pioneer as a sub, I did exactly what I’m doing here. And I taught at Huron too for a semester and did pretty much what I’m doing now,” she said. Samuel also noted that while students at Pioneer are required to complete English 9 and English 10 during the first two years of high school, they have a good amount of choices for English classes starting in junior year. “When it comes to junior year, there’s about as much choice [as there is at CHS], I’d say,” he said. However, Samuel does think that he would have liked to have

more choices his freshman and sopho-more years. Because Community’s English cur-riculum does not have students taking courses like English 9 and English 10, it requires more explanation of the curriculum to colleges so that colleges can accurately evaluate students’ ap-plications. CHS counselor Diane Grant said that the unique structure “hasn’t been an issue in the college admissions process.” “Every college gets a profile [of CHS], so they know that we offer unique English classes and they’re on a rotating basis,” said Grant. “So they’re aware of that. We do a lot of explana-tion when they come to visit.” The unique courses can actually be an advantage in college admissions. “I think they look upon it favorably too, because it’s more descriptive to have a title that describes what you’re learning, like Chinese Literature versus English 11,” said Grant. Grant noted that all classes, except for Intro to Literature, are presented to

colleges as mixed-grade classes; none are considered to be higher level than others. This mixed-grade nature of CHS English classes is a natural consequence of students’ freedom to choose classes. Though DeWoskin thinks this requires teachers to be alert and aware of the grade level of the writing they are reading, she also thinks it is a great advantage to the school that younger students can learn from older students in a classroom setting, and that there can be, in discussions, “a huge variety of responses that are based on experi-ence.” “I think it gives people in this build-ing a sense of community that extends beyond their own grade level...it helps develop a sense of respect for all the

different grades,” she said. Henkin is also glad that the classes are mixed-grade, and thinks that this has the most benefit in Creative Writ-ing, where students often share their work. “I think the main benefit for me with the mixed grade classes is getting advice and influence from older writers, and being able to help out younger writers,” she said. “I think under-classmen can also learn to feel more confident with their writing if they are encouraged by upperclassmen to read aloud. Getting praise from a more ex-perienced writer is very encouraging.” Luckily, the English program has not had to sacrifice its many successes due to state-wide budget cuts. So far, no English courses have had to be cut, ac-cording to Hein. “It hasn’t really hit the English department in any major way yet,” said DeWoskin. “You know, once in a while [Dean] Jen will have to say no to ordering a textbook, but there are ways

around that. Katy, our secretary, can borrow books from other buildings. When we want to get new books, we have to go to [Dean] Jen. She’s pretty generous and she knows how impor-tant it is for us to be teaching books that we love. But budget cuts could really hurt that.” However, disregarding future budget cuts, CHS’s English program seems poised to preserve its structure for years to come. Hein explained that requirements will not be an obstacle: “The high school content expectations are now actually reflected in the com-mon core state standards, which are actually national standards for Eng-lish/Language Arts, and the focus of the common core standards are reading and writing. So we’re going to be able to continue to offer the variety of excit-ing classes that we have, but still keep a very high standard for requirements.” DeWoskin explained that the changes in the program depend on the flow of teachers in and out of the school as teachers come in and establish classes related to their interests. However, she thinks that the broader courses of American Lit and World Lit will always remain constants in the program, even as the staff changes. Overall, the CHS English program is a magnet for praise from parents and students alike. “It is extremely well respected by students. It is very well respected by the district. It is very well respected by parents and by local universities,” said Hein. DeWoskin said that she has never received negative feedback about the structure of the program. But for DeWoskin, the most reward-ing aspect of all is getting to spend time with students. “It’s being involved with the budding, growing minds of kids from 14 to 17 every day five days a week,” she said. “In conversation, in dialogue with your papers, and seeing you go from that 14 to 17, seeing you go from these little puppies in ninth grade and graduate as these stunning young people.” C

“There’s just nothing mysterious about it. It’s about reading books that stu-dents are interested in.”

and learning

THE ENglisH TEaCHER THaT dEwOskiN Had HER sENiOR yEaR iN HigH sCHOOl iNspiREd HER TO puRsuE TEaCHiNg.

mCgRaw gOT His sTaRT aT COmmuNiTy as dEwOskiN’s sTudENT TEaCHER.

CHS teachers Chloe Root and Sarah Roldan share more than just the same subject, social studies. Both

used to teach at the much larger Huron High School in Ann Arbor. This is Roldan’s first semester teach-ing at Community High School. She’s currently teaching two world history classes at Community and one AP U.S. history class at Huron. She says she loves Community so far, but she also misses teaching more AP U.S. History classes at Huron, which she did for

the past few years. “Sure it was a little tough getting used to Community’s policies; for instance, I wasn’t too crazy about the first name basis thing. But as time progressed I got more and more used to it along with everything else that was different here,” she said. One major difference she noticed was the level of connection between staff members at Community. “[Com-munity is] a smaller school so you seem to recognize most people and you also have closer relationships with the rest of the staff.” She also said that there was more “one-on-one attention” between students and teachers here

and that students here had a lot more freedom and responsibility. “Something here that they definitely didn’t allow at Huron was giving students access to leave in the middle of class.” At first she thought it was weird having stu-dents randomly leave, but after a while she got used to it and can tolerate it as long as students don’t skip. She thinks the student behavior here is also very different from that at Hu-ron. “At Huron I’ve been sworn at and I’ve had to kick kids out of my class. The kids here appear to be a lot more

engaged in class discussions and more respectful.” She is flexible about her future teach-ing schedule. “As for next year I’m will-ing to teach anywhere but I am content and happy here at Community,” she said. Social studies teacher Chloe Root started teaching here at the beginning of last year. “My experience here so far has been a great one,” She noticed a difference in the student-teacher re-lationships at Community: “Here I feel like you walk into a class and you’re pretty familiar with everyone so you feel a bit more comfortable, whereas

at Huron, since classes are a lot bigger, you’re not so familiar with everyone.” Root attended CHS when she was a kid; therefore she already was familiar with many of the traditions here, and most of the staff. “It was probably the best welcome I have ever had; it felt like I was coming home.” However, Root’s favorite thing about CHS is the responsibility level of the students. “I love not having to deal with all the dumb stuff like signing hall passes for people, or follow them around like cops. I just hate all the disciplinary stuff that I think is a waste of time, because people here do what they’re supposed to do, which most of them do, you can learn and do really cool stuff, but if you’re not, that’s your problem and you suffer the conse-quences.” She says that Community as a whole is one of the best public schools in Michigan because students have the freedom to progress as much as they’d like without limitation and most of the students here are smart enough to not abuse this privilege. Both teachers think Huron is a good school and the staff and students there are great. However, they prefer the policies at Community, and since it’s smaller. everyone seems more comfortable around each other. Their transitions haven’t been too difficult and both have enjoyed teaching here at Community so far. C


TWO COMMUNITY HIGH SCHOOl TEACHErS TAlk AbOUT THEIr TrANSITIONS FrOM HUrON TO COMMUNITY

nate porter & casey macdonald

hannah king & casey macdonald photos

little school

big school

Chloe Root teaches U.S. History, Mock Trial, Real World Civics and

Economics I, Gender Studies, and Forum at Community. She taught

Government, U.S. History and World History at Huron.

Sarah Roldan teaches World History at Community. She taught World History,

U.S. History, AP U.S. history, and AP European History at Huron.

“It was probably the best welcome I have ever had, it felt like I was coming home.”

CHs ENglisH TEaCHER quiNN sTRassEl alsO

TaugHT aT HuRON bEfORE COmiNg TO

CHs full TimE.

it for 24 hours. Poom Boonsin, a senior at Com-munity High, benefited from a college visit. He was offered a scholarship to play lacrosse at Alma College in Alma, Michigan. Never having been to Alma before, he went with a friend to check it out. Alma College is in a rural setting, but Boonsin felt comfortable, and did not mind. Drake Johnson, another senior at Community High, was debating whether to go to University of Michi-gan in the fall. Although visiting college wasn’t a big deal for Johnson, he still had a lot of fun. “I went to dinner with the players and I tried to go into a club, but I was too young. The next morning, I went to breakfast and talked with the coaches about football,” Johnson said. Due to the positive experience that he had when visiting Michigan, Johnson accepted a scholarship to play football next fall. No matter where you are in the col-lege process, Community High School’s counselors strongly believe that visiting colleges is very important. After all, as Boshoven said, “How do you know how a place feels until you’ve felt it?”


little school

It’s that time again. Seniors are hoping to get into their dream col-lege, and juniors are just beginning the tedious college process. Whether having already applied to schools or not, students are faced with a choice: should they visit the place that could be their home for the next four years, or commit to a school without ever having been there? Diane Grant, Community High school counselor, is a strong advocate for visiting schools. She recommends choosing three local schools that are very different (for example, Kalamazoo College, Michigan State, and Eastern Michigan University) and visiting them, just to try and figure out what aspects you like and don’t like about a college. Despite the fact that college visits consume both time and money, Grant still suggests that students should visit the schools they are interested in at least once before committing. John Boshoven, also a guidance counselor at Community, recommends making a trip out of it; get a group of friends together interested in either the same schools, or schools, near each other and share a ride and a room. Not only will this decrease cost, but having the opinions of the people you trust, like

friends and family, is extremely impor-tant when choosing a college. For some students, the idea of an ur-ban college is appealing. Others prefer peace and quiet. Visiting schools in a variety of locations will be a important factor when you are deciding what set-ting you want to be in. Before you visit, do some research; see what the weather is like during the school term. Be sure to ask your guide questions about the surroundings of the school. What kind of activities are available? Do students feel isolated? Or are they distracted by the opportunities around them? Questions like these will help you get a better idea about where you want to be in school. Grant also reminds students to visit schools when they are in session; it won’t help you to wander around an empty campus in the middle of the summer. By just asking students on campus what classes they like, or what they are disappointed with, you can get a better idea about whether or not you would like to make that particular school your home for the next four years. According to Boshoven, “...We all love to have our opinions heard...” Don’t feel weird asking students their opinions, because those students could

be your peers, and are certainly the most direct way to learn about a school. When asked what question she thought was most important to ask when on a college visit, Grant replied: “Tell me one thing you really didn’t like and didn’t expect.” Take their answer into consideration when picking a school. Boshoven recommends asking the campus tour guide “What’s one place you wish you could take me on the tour?” Boshoven also said to make sure and do the “unofficial visit,” and just wander around. While wandering campus is a great way to picture yourself at a school, official tours can teach you about the history and the culture of a college. At Northwestern University, campus tour guides tell perspective students the story of the “Rock.” According to legend, four freshman boys sneaked out at night to paint a giant rock located in the center of the campus. When some seniors discovered what the freshmen had done, they made the four boys scrap the paint off with the rock with toothbrushes. Three years later, when the boys were finally seniors, they decided to paint the rock again. To this day, the tradition at Northwestern is if you paint the rock, you must then guard

CHS COUNSElOrS STrESS THAT STUdENTS SHOUld MAkE COllEGE vISITS A PrIOrITY

C

CHS STUdENTS’ vIEWPOINTS ArE AFFECTEd bY CUlTUrAl ExPErIENCES

First, it was his grandmother. Then, little by little the rest of his family began to come. And when Nattapat Sayabovorn finally reached America, he had three words to characterize it: “It’s so cool.” Sayabovorn, who is at CHS as a foreign exchange student from Thailand, believes that America is the greatest country in the world. To him, the United States is a place where “you have the freedom to say anything.” “I’ve heard a lot of things about the U.S.A. because I had relatives liv-ing here,” Sayabovorn, a sophomore, added. He recalls how his relatives told him about this school and the weather. And now that he’s here, Say-abovorn said that the U.S. fulfilled his expectations. But not everyone shares Sayabovorn’s impression of what the United States is like. CHS junior Sarah Zimmerman, who

recently went to Panama as part of another foreign exchange program, changed her impression of the U.S. after her trip. “In Panama, more than half the people are way happier than anyone here in the U.S.,” said Zimmerman. She noticed how people she met there lived on lower salaries and the things that they had “were just the basic necessi-ties that anyone needs.” For example, all of her showers were cold water, and her bed was just “a mattress and some cardboard underneath.” Zimmerman admired that Panamani-ans were happier with fewer things than Americans. “You don’t need all this extra money,” she said. To Zimmer-man, the possessions they had were “all you need.” The Panamanians that Sarah met also had interesting view of the U.S. “They

think that we’re pretty rich,” said Zim-merman. She said that Panamanians called Americans “gringos”, a stereo-typical word for a white person. Even with that, Zimmerman commented that “they look up to us. They think we’re just rich and well-educated people.” However, despite their unique view of Americans, in Zimmerman’s experi-ence, Panamanians don’t necessarily as-pire to live in the U.S. “I don’t think any of them want to live here,” she said, “they’re content with their lives there.” The Panama life is very family-based, and Zimmerman said that Panamanians want to stay close to their families. Zimmerman can understand their feeling. Because of her experience, she can now say, “I definitely think that the U.S. is not the greatest country in the world.” Of course, this differs greatly from

Sayabovorn’s view. The Thai govern-ment has recently begun suppressing free speech rights and he noted “the right to speak” as a strong reason that he believes the United States is the greatest country in the world. Sayabovorn’s and Zimmerman’s at-titudes toward America that have been shaped by their exposure to dif-ferent cultures. Their views may contrast, but their stances were molded by their everyday lives. Whether it was Zim-merman’s cold showers in Panama or the new liberties Sayabovorn was guaranteed in America, their stances were defined by time here and abroad.

stephen chang & margaret whittier-ferguson

leon pescador

charlotte steele illustration

C

uNiVERsiTiEs suCH as THE u-m HOsT ‘Campus days’ fOR admiTTEd sTudENTs iN addiTiON TO VisiTs TO ExpERiENCE sTudENT lifE.

a lasting impression

perspectives of america


One crawled first, then the other. One walked first, then the other. Twins Jacob and Ruthie Graff, juniors

at Skyline and Community respectively, have been competing with each other since birth. Their competitive spirit has appeared in everything from knowing NCAA rules and regulations to aca-demics. Ruthie feels she has a greater disadvantage in being a girl. “I feel like I have more to prove than he does. Just because I’m a girl. I feel like he does really well in baseball but I have to do even better in softball because it’s not the same,” said Ruthie. Although Ruthie and Jacob are very competitive with each other, their parents have never fueled the competi-tion. “If they were more competitive it would put more pressure on us and

I think that’s the last thing we need - especially right now, going through the ACT, SAT, high school sports,” said Jacob. Even though their parents never supported the competition, sometimes the teachers would. One teacher would always say “twin versus twin” when handing back tests to Jacob and Ruthie. Ruthie still holds this resentment today. “I didn’t like that. I hated her. And I didn’t like science in middle school so I generally did worse so I didn’t like that she’d always say, ‘Oh Ruthie, do better to keep up with Jacob’”. Although Ruthie still has harsh feelings for the class, Jacob’s differ. “[I liked it] because I was winning. And just that competi-tive nature; I wanted to win. I was mad if she got a better score than I did, which rarely happened in science.”

Aidan Tank, a junior at Community High School, is the oldest of four children: Tank, a 13 year old brother, an eight year old sister, and a two year old sister. The age gap in between Tank and his youngest sister is 14 years. Both of his parents work. As the oldest sibling Tank often has more responsibility, “I feel like I’m the one who always has to clean up, my parents are working all the time. I guess that I’m the one who has to lay down the rules,” said Tank. Even though Tank has to lay down the law for his little siblings, as the oldest he has much more freedom. “I hear stories about other siblings and you always hear how [younger siblings]

ONE of the commonly held beliefs about children and birth order is that the

oldest child is usually the more high achieving, and responsible

family dynamics: character matters

The giRl will have a verbal ad-vantage. she will use her tongue to put down and criticize her sibling with words because she is

smarter and wittier and faster with words. The bROTHER may use his physicality to fight her.

a person’s personality, nature, temperament that they are born with has more of an IMPACT on how sib-lings get along or don’t get along.

brienne o’donnell illustration

cooper depriest & brienne o’donnell


try to follow the older sibling, or live up to them. It’s nice being the oldest and having control. [It’s] nice that I get to do what I want in the house because I’m the oldest,” explained Tank. Tank understands that having a large family with two working parents is difficult. “Having more children is tougher for parents so they have to put in additional rules that typically only one child wouldn’t have to,” said Tank. But even through the adversity, Tank maintains a good relationship with his siblings. “I feel like our family works really well together,” said Tank.

when you have 4 or 5 years between siblings, the OldER sibliNg is old enough where it cuts down on the competition.

WHO we are as siblings affects who we are. They are our PEERS growing up; they will affect the experiences that we have.

In families we often learn to be more of who we really are at HOmE more than outside of our homes. If we are in a bad mood then we act like we are in a bad mood. If we are feeling all lovey and kissy then we act like that.

Siblings compete for

attention,to be better than the other one, they n a t u r a l l y

COmpETE aNd COmpaRE

themselves with each other.

**sally wisotzkey has her own private practice as a psychotherapist and received her bachelor degree in social work from University of Michigan. The statements in the boxes are all from sally wisotzkey**

“It’s a middle child thing,” said Sofia Fall, a sophomore at Community High School. Fall is the middle of her three sisters: Eva, age 16, Gloria, age 13, and Sabina, age 11. While some find that being the middle child is difficult, Fall likes it. She is able to have a close relationship with her older and younger sisters. Although Fall is close with all of her siblings, her family believes she is especially close with Gloria. “A lot of my family says that Gloria (the other middle sister) and I are clique-y and I think it is just because we get along well and like to do the same things,” com-mented Fall.

Stereotypically, the eldest child takes on the most responsibility, but Fall does not think that is true with her family. “I feel like I have a lot more responsibility over my siblings than my older sister. I think it has a lot to do with me and my personality as well as Eva and hers,” said Fall. “I have always been more uptight than my older sister, but I think that we are good together.” Even though Fall believes she takes on more responsibility than her older sister, she still thinks that their relation-ship is good. “Eva is more impulsive and I am more reserved so we balance each other out well,” Fall explained. C

a gOOd relationship between siblings is one where siblings are toler-ant of each other and respectful of each other’s differences.


the rock


He liked rocks. Somewhere in the middle of Olson Park in Ann Arbor, in a sunken gravel pit, he found a

14,000 year old rock. He was fascinated by the streaks left from the glacier that brought it here all the way from Can-ada so many years ago. He wanted to preserve it, and that is just what he did. Today, this famous rock sits right in the middle of downtown Ann Arbor, on

the corner of Hill and Washtenaw. It is referred to as “The Rock.” Eli Gallup was the man who made this happen. Not only did he establish the rock, but he was the superinten-dent of the Ann Arbor City Parks, the city forester and manager of the city airport. Gallup was also a part of the Works Project Adminstration (WPA) which hired people to do community service during the Great Depression. Gallup had a close relationship with

the Edison Company and the Michigan Central Railroad, who helped to pursue his idea of The Rock. In the winter of 1932, Eli Gallup administered the proj-ect to move The Rock with the help of a few men from the WPA. The men dug around the rock, put it on rails, jacked it up and put it up on a trailer with ropes. “They went out there in 1931, and these guys weren’t used to going outside and digging up holes and

it’s all manual labor and they didn’t have high tech clothes,” said Al Gallup, Eli Gallup’s son. Even with all the hard work, the city council had to approve the idea. “I guess to convince them that this should happen, he decided to contrib-ute it to the 200th birthday of George Washington,” said Al. The city council quickly approved the proposal, but gave him only 15 dollars to help finance the project.

the rock

“It is supposed to show the idea of the glacier coming down. Now it has its own glacier sliding down its sides.”

To honor George Washington, Eli placed a plaque on the rock. “There were a lot of dumps in Ann Arbor. Riverside Park was a dump. Hunt Park, Virginia Park was a dump. My father personally went around to all the dumps and gathered copper, bronzes, and brass for the plaque,” said Al. “My brother and others at his high school made a form in a shop class to also help out.” The plaque was stolen. A group of fraternity boys took it and it was gone. Years later it was found in a fraternity basement and given back. Though it returned to its home, it soon wasn’t vis-ible. “The Ann Arbor News a number of years ago wanted to talk about [The Rock], so they had me meet them at 10:30 at the rock to take a picture and do that. They sent somebody up to cut through the paint and clean it off to get a picture. By the time I got there, at 10:30, it had already been repainted,” said Al. It still sits on the rock today, just under thousands of layers. People have been painting the rock since the mid 1950s. The layers of paint grew slowly until the rock was completely covered. Since paint used to be petroleum based, the paint could be

kept to a minimum.“They used to burn the rock periodically, just set fire to it,” said Al Gallup. The meaning of the rock has com-pletely changed since it was put there in 1932. “It is supposed to show the idea of the glacier coming down. Now it has its own glacier of paint sliding down its sides,”said Al. Today The Rock stands painted with a new design almost every day. The rock flashes wedding proposals, welcome home signs, and messages for causes. “Well, everybody paints it. People bring their preschool classes up to paint it, birthdays and it’s saved a lot of university buildings by bringing awareness to them,” said Al. Though the community enjoys paint-ing the rock, Al would never paint it. “That’d be offensive, but people think about it a lot, and mention it to me. Some say ‘Oh that’s terrible,’ you know, defacing the town. But I think it’s a good thing. It gives people a place to express themselves.” Eli was into rocks. His original rock still sits under thousands of coats of paint today. “The Rock” holds history underneath all of those layers.

Al GAllUP TEllS THE STOrY OF HOW THE rOCk CAME TO bE AT HIll ANd WASHTENAWeliza stein & abby kleinheksel

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THE ROCk is CuRRENTly siTTiNg ON a pEdEsTal, buT iT CaNNOT bE sEEN bECausE iT is COVEREd iN paiNT.

TOP LEFT WPA workers lift The Rock onto a cart with railroad jacks BOTTOM LEFT WPA workers push the cart in order to move The Rock to its current locationTOP RIGHT The Rock sits on a pedestal just after it was moved to Hill and Washtenaw in 1932

cooper depriest photo

16 the communicator center spread

CHS STUdENTS ANd TEACHErS TAkE 10 MINUTES TO SHArE THEIr lOvE STOrIES

When asked who she loves, CHS junior Tressa Stapleton can’t decide who to choose. “As far as parents go, [mine] are absolutely perfect. They love [my siblings and me] so much, completely uncondi-tionally,” she said. And the bond she shares with her two older brothers, Joe (23) and Drew (21) is strong. “I feel re-ally close to both; I don’t think I can pick one.” She chose to tell about her love for all four of her family members. Stapleton considers her mom, Robbie Stapleton, to be her best friend. “She’s great for counseling and advice and everything. I feel like I could talk to her about anything… We have a similar sense of hu-mor so it’s easy to make jokes and laugh with her… she’s just like a girlfriend, even with my friends around.” The love for her father, Bill Stapleton, is strongly con-nected to her respect for him. “I have a deep, deep, respect for my dad, and I think that’s tied into the love because he is so smart and in terms of a great guy, and great husband and a great father, he is the perfect model… really good men are hard to come by, and he’s definitely one of him.” The love for her brothers comes from their passion to protect her. “They care so deeply about me. It’s some-thing that’s never been stated, and it’s never obvious, but I can see it in the way they talk to me, the way they treat me, the way they react to certain things I do, certain people in my life or sometimes how strongly they react. That kind of passion that I see lets me know how deeply they care about me. It makes me feel safe.” Stapleton believes that from the outside, her family looks like a typical American family; however, as you look closer, the quirks and traits that define them are apparent. “My family is really fun and loving. I have the most fun when we’re all together.”

CHS Junior Sarah Zimmerman had no idea that her fifth grade enemy, the new girl, would later become her closest friend. This new girl never did anything in par-ticular to Zimmerman. However, her group of friends, “the cool kids who had already taken over the school,” at Burns Park Elementary School disliked the new girl, so like any fifth grader would, Zimmerman decided to dislike her too. Their mutual angst continued into sixth and seventh grade; however, eighth grade year, they found them-selves in the same group of mutual friends. As fresh-man year came around, the group of mutual friends broke apart. People went to different schools, one had a boyfriend, the other did sports. “We were kind of left to hang with each other,” said Zimmerman. Hannah Schapiro and Sarah Zimmerman became fast friends. To Zimmerman, the true test of friendship was when she did a six month exchange program in Panama her first semester sophomore year. Schapiro was the only friend she skyped, and they skyped frequently. “I went away for six months and when I came back, it was very apparent who were my true friends and who weren’t,” said Zimmerman. The connection she’s developed with Schapiro is deep. Zimmerman is confident that no matter what separates them in the future, their friendship will re-main. “I know we’re best friends because we talk about it. She tells me, I’m her best friend. I tell her, I’m her best friend.” Looking back on her Burns Park days, Zimmerman would have been shocked to know that her fifth grade enemy would become her closest friend. That she would spend entire weekends at her house, for no other reason than to spend time with “the new girl,” —her best friend.

CHS Senior Alisa Iannelli wanted to see if the boy in her neighborhood, the one she rode the bus with, the one she’d been texting and having a non-exclusive realtinship with for months now, liked her. So she stopped talking to him. However, not only did her plan prove his feelings for her, it opened her eyes to her feelings for him. “I realized I really, really, missed him and that he was a big part of my life,” she said. Trey Sarmento and Alisa Iannelli have been dating for over a year now. He is different from the other boys she’s dated. She can be herself around him. “He’s my best friend and I really like him, so it feels like love I guess.” Their relationship is much deeper than her previous ones. Trust is the big-gest factor. “It’s not that I didn’t have trust with [my previous boyfriends], it’s just another level of it. I trust him with deeper secrets.” And with bigger decisions. Iannelli confides in Sarmento and trusts his opinions. “When I’m making decisions to do

something that could change my life in someway, I ask him.” For instance, she asked him for his advice on her decision to become a police officer. He supports her, but he tells her the truth: it’s dangerous, and it might be hard to get a job. Unlike her other relationships, she finds herself wanting to do things for Sarmento: favors, giving gifts– any-thing to make him smile. “I want to make him happy and smile, I like his smile. So I like to do things to make him smile.” In fact, she can’t imagine her life without his smile. She doesn’t take their love for granted. And when she graduates this year, they plan to stay together. She will attend Washtenaw, while he finishes his last two years at CHS. Although this means they will spend less time to-gether, Iannelli focuses on the positive. “I think of it like I’m going towards my dream, and he’s still working at it and supporting me with it.”

Sarah

Zimmerman

A l i s a I a n n e l l i

Tressa

Stapleton

L O V E

17center spread the communicator

CHS STUdENTS ANd TEACHErS TAkE 10 MINUTES TO SHArE THEIr lOvE STOrIES

For CHS senior Jeremy Lazare, the love for his sister, Sasha stems from the foundation they’ve built growing up together. “We’ve been around each other all our lives, we have the same shared experiences,” he said. In fact, despite their three and a half year age difference, they’ve always been close. “We went to the same elementary school, so she would have to get me to take the bus and take care of me at school,” he said. They bond over their family’s “abnormali-ties.” They crack jokes about their lives, the quirks of their parents and the big trips they take. “I mess with her a lot. I poke fun at her, but lovingly. I’d like to say that we offer each other constructive criticism, but were mostly messing with each other.” And they are supportive of each other. “I’m supportive of the things that actually matter. I’m just someone who’s there for her, anytime she has a problem or as far as our family goes, or if there’s something she wants to talk about, I’m there for her.” Three years ago, Sasha moved to New York City to attend college, but Lazare believes they remain close. “Our relationship is pretty good; distance is always hard for all siblings and clearly we are both growing up and we’re different people and we have different experi-ences now, but I think that we had a good enough foundation in our relationship that we still care about each other a lot and love each other a lot...We have a level of understanding that we don’t have with other people. We sort of communicate non-verbally, like a sibling connection.”

They bonded over Jane Eyre at choir camp. Austin had just finished reading it; Kate Markey was reading it. That was their first connection. During choir camp, and then school, their friendship continued to develop. “We sort of just kept talking about different things and realized we had more and more in common than we thought,” said Austin. These common interests are the activities they do together today, such as watching “30 Rock” and “Down-ton Abbey” together, going to Huron music events randomly, and going to see the Russian choir Austin got tickets to go to from his Aunt. “We’re really good at commenting to each other. Like after a piece is done, we ask, ‘What do you think of that piece?’ Like this piece was kind of bad, and this was kind of great, but the glow sticks were awesome.” Markey is one of the only people Austin feels totally himself around. “That’s really it,” he says, “And when I’m with her, I never want to leave.” One time, Aus-tin was watching an episode of “30 Rock” at Markey’s house and once it ended, they continued talking. His curfew was 11:30, but Austin didn’t arrive home until 3a.m. “We just talked forever and I got home at three in the morning and it was totally worth it,” he said. “Like I would have done it again, just because it was so much fun, I didn’t want to leave ever.” Austin and Markey are best friends. “Our love is just the joy of doing things together. Just totally experiencing the same things and enjoying each other’s company,” he said.

When CHS math teacher Ed Kulka thinks about who he loves, he thinks about who he misses most—his younger sister Justine, or Muffy as she was known in her family. Justine, just 15 months younger than Kulka, passed away a year and half ago due to cancer . She was the only girl out of six children. Justine and Kulka were the middle children in the family. They went to school together, watched TV shows together—in Kulka’s words, “typical stuff.” “She’d go to my track meets, I’d go to her field hockey games,” he said. She attended Michigan State; he attended the University of Michigan and they’d visit each other regularly. She had a wide variety of jobs and in 1995, she moved to Las Vegas Nevada, to be the Associate Director of the Super Computer Facility at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas. Even after she moved, they contin-ued to visit each other; they always got along well. One interest they shared was their love of books. “We used to read a lot so we would com-pare authors... I could pick up any book and read it, but she’d always have to start with the first thing and read it all the way through.” When she passed away, Kulka closed down her house. “I grabbed off all the books from her shelf and I’ve gone through and read all those books.” Kulka describes her as, “ very attractive, energetic, very compe-tent, very accomplished and fun to be with...Whenever we would get together, we’d always kind of rassle each other about stuff.” For instance, she loved to eat off paper plates because she hated to do the dishes. “So the first Thanksgiving after she passed away we ate off paper plates,” Kulka said. One Sunday afternoon in Febru-ary, while Justine was sick, Kulka and his brother Bob decided to surprise her at the hospital. “She didn’t want us to come at all...[so] she was upset, but really she was happy.” From that day on, Kulka and Bob would trade off spending two weeks at a time with Justine. There they would watch football games from 9a.m to 9p.m, bet on the games at the casino the day before, and walk her dogs together. On June 23, 2010 she passed away. “You don’t know what you got till it’s gone,” said Kulka, “Not too many days go by where I don’t think of her.”

M u r p h y A u s t i n

Ed

Kulka

Jeremy

Lazare

L O V E

RECENT sTudiEs sHOw

THaT ONly 38 pERCENT Of TEENagERs

gET THE RECOmmENdEd

amOuNT Of daily

ExERCisE.


There are many different ways for teenagers to get the exercise that they need to stay healthy. Some choose to

participate in sports; others work out on their own time. However, a large contingent of today’s teens is struggling to incorporate physical fitness into their routines and lives. One Community High senior and student athlete engages in physical activity regularly. “For me, exercise is very important,” said Keely O’Donnell. “If I don’t exercise, I don’t feel right. Sports and exercise have become part of who I am.” O’Donnell exercises every day. “I think playing sports and running around is something I always did when I was growing up, so it doesn’t feel weird or hard to me to do something every day,” she said. O’Donnell plays both varsity field hockey and lacrosse for Huron and said that while the con-ditioning and running are a little much at times, it all pays off in the end. “To be able to win a state championship is really great. But what I think is really important that I got from those experi-ences is that now I really know what my body is capable of. I know how to push myself to my limits in terms of fitness,” she said. But for CHS junior Daniel Chapman, sports are not necessary for staying fit and healthy. “I am taking weight-train-ing here at Community for the fifth time, and that is really the main thing I do to stay healthy. I know that if I did not take weight-training as part of school, it wouldn’t really be something that I would be motivated to do own my own,” he said. Taking advantage of the Physical Ed-ucation classes offered at CHS has had a dramatic impact on Chapman’s physi-

cal fitness. “I am definitely in much better shape now than I was when I was a freshman, and I think taking weight-training here has really helped me learn how to work out. People who don’t start getting in shape when they are young can have a lot more health problems later in their lives, and I didn’t want that to happen to me,” he said. In high school, as well as middle school, there tends to be less emphasis on physical education and more on aca-demics. This transition was especially hard for Chapman. “In elementary school I had gym class every day, but in high school and in middle school you have to take a lot more initiative and sacrifice other classes in order to take PE classes,” he said. CHS Junior Hank Miller is similar to Chapman in that he does not partici-pate in organized sports: he has trouble finding the kind of motivation that Chapman has. “I don’t [exercise] as much as I should. I was pretty good about it earlier this year because we had to for health. We had to do a four-week well-ness project for health and I choose physical wellness. So I went to the Y like three times a week. But I haven’t done that since I’ve done Future Stars (Local high school talent show) I haven’t had time for that,” said Miller. Miller participates in Pioneer Theater Guild, taking up a significant amount of his time out of school. “The extra-curricular activities that involve exercise are sports and that sort of thing, I’ve never been into that. And I just really love theater, so even though I know that it might be like more beneficial to my health to be doing something where I’d be running around, getting like the hour a day you’re supposed to get of

cardio exercise, it wouldn’t be as fun for me, and I’d rather pursue my passion than something that I know it would be healthier for me but I wouldn’t enjoy it as much,” Miller said. The hour of exercise Miller is refer-ring to stems from a requirement by the Department of Health and Human Services, as seen on their website. In 2008, Physical Activity Guidelines for Americans were suggested, including that adolescents ages six to 17 get 60 minutes or more of physical activity daily. The allotted exercise time should involve mostly aerobic exercise, and also incorporate muscle-strengthening and bone-strengthening exercise. CHS health and personal fitness teacher Robbie Stapleton believes part of the reason the recommended time for children and adolescence consists of 60 minutes is a hope it will affect policies, such as school district policies. “If kids need an hour of exercise a day maybe if you require it or put it into the curriculum, theoretically kids have the time to do it...” she said. Stapleton has her own views on why teenagers should exercise. “I think [teenagers] need to exercise for the same reason adults need to exercise: to keep their bodies healthy, and by body, I’m including their minds,” she said. In fact, as Stapleton explained, and as a part of her curriculum in her Health and Wellness class teaches exercise im-proves the body’s functions. One aspect in particular is the VO2 Max, or the maximum rate at which your body can take in, extract, and use oxygen for fuel. When your VO2 Max improves, your blood vessels become more flexible. Your muscles build bigger and more mitochondria, and your heart becomes more efficient at delivering blood to the body. It takes less energy to pump

blood, and your body can therefore pump more, and work less. Inside muscle cells, the metabolism of fuel becomes more efficient, which allows muscles to get better at contracting and relaxing with less fuel, and more effec-tively with the fuel they have. Exercise is also believed to ma-nipulate the hormones in your brain, removing the stress hormones cortisol and epinephrine. “All of those dissipate and are ab-sorbed by the body when you exercise. It makes you feel good,” said Stapleton. Also, when exercising, tiny tears occur in your muscles, which sends a signal to your brain to release endorphins to rid your body of the stress it’s feel-ing. “Any time you have any type of injury, endorphins are released by your body, to relieve the pain. So exercise releases endorphins. So it’s sort of a double whammy–you get rid of the bad hormones and you get the good hormones,” she said. Despite the obvious positive effects, some teenagers don’t integrate exercise into their high school routines. They may be daunted by the idea of running, breathless for an hour, or find them-selves unmotivated or with little time to spare. However, Stapleton encourages teens to start out smaller, and build up their exercise regime. Stapleton also thinks that as more extra-curriculars and activities come into teenagers lives, the less they think about exercise and their own personal health. “As teenagers lives get more com-plicated, exercise is put on the back burner. It is important in this day and age for teens to realized how important their physical as well as mental health is,” she concluded. C

ruthie graff & clare lauer

THE ExErCISE PATTErNS OF CHS STUdENTS

aCCORdiNg TO THE CdC THE pERCENTagE

Of ObEsiTy iN adOlECENTs

agE 12 -19 jumpEd fROm 5% iN 1980 TO

18% iN 2008.

teenagers and exercisecolleen o’brien photo

james mackin illustrations

19how to the communicator

how

You unlock this door with the key of imagination. Beyond it is another dimension: a dimension of sound, a dimension of sight, a dimension of mind. You’re moving into a land of both shadow and substance of things and of ideas. You’ve just crossed over into the Friend Zone.

There’s a baby with wings that shoots people with a bow an arrow and makes them fall in love. If only you had that bow and could shoot your person of choice with it. Get my drift? Yeah, me neither.

Mix some frog legs, an anteater snout, one cup of sugar and any small ani-mal heart. Let it condense for the sum of two days and you’ve got yourself a love potion. I learned it in FOS.

It may sound a little fairytale-ish. It’s true though; just for the price of $29.99, your voo-doo doll can arrive at your house within the week. Just wrap 22 strands of your loved one’s hair around it and abracadabra, instant love. I’d like to see you get the hair.

to get a date

james mackin

alove potion

THE FRIEND ZONE

steal the bow

VOODOO LOVE

20 the communicator arts & entertainment

a&e The top-hat sporting, baritone uku-lele strumming, beard-scruff adorn-ing teenager on the second floor has been providing the Community High hallways with melody and a smile since he first arrived here two years ago. He is always ready to take out his ukulele and start making music, no matter the situation. The junior is a poet and a musician, but above all a gentleman. His name is Sam Gilles. “My parents raised me on the princi-ple that music is… good. So ever since I was a little kid, I had melodies run-ning around in my head, and there was no way to get them out,” said Gilles,

“except for finding ways of writing them down, which started on piano, and moved to [the music program-ming software] FL Studio.” After experimenting with elec-tronic music with FL Studio for years, he discovered the ukulele through his girlfriend at the time. “I immediately devoted myself to it,” said Gilles, “so much that both my parents noticed it and bought me the baritone ukulele for my birthday.” He immediately began to play it anywhere and everywhere. “He was just sitting in the hallway with a ukulele, making this beautiful music in the middle of the school day,” recounts CHS freshman Em-

ily Brod. “It was a great first impression.” Gilles is a superb folk song-writer. His music features not only fine melodies and beautiful chord progressions but excellent lyrics as well. “I focus mostly on the poetry, and the melodies come afterwards,” he said. “I love playing this instrument in particular because it’s easy for me to find the chords I want, ones that ring nicely with the words. I try to look for a meaning deeper than what’s on the surface in

my folk music.” “After years of seeing Sam play music, I can say that he says what

we all want to say but don’t know how, so he says it with his music,” said CHS junior Joris von Moltke. Music is no passing fancy for Gilles, not some childhood memory-to-be. “I hope to be a writer of music in some form, but if that opportunity does not arise, then I can easily see myself as a studio engineer,” he said.

Gilles recently wrote music for a Shakespearean sonnet called ‘A Lover and His Lass,’ for the Community Ensemble Theater (CET) production of Shake-speare’s As You Like It. “I asked him to come up with

music for ‘A Lover and His Lass,’” said Quinn Strassel, director of the play. “In just a couple of days, he came

back with something really beautiful and of professional quality.” “It was one of the first times I performed on a proper stage,” Gilles said. “I+t really helped shift me in the direction of being a performer, as most of my music writing in the past has been more personal.” With his poetic lyricism, his optimism, and the essential top-hat, Gilles will inevitably be a bril-liant performer. C

erez levin

artist profile

“He says what we all want to say but don’t know how, so he says it with his music.”

The first ukulele was made in the 1880s by Portuguese cabinet makers from the Ma-deira Islands who emigrated to the Kingdom of Hawaii in 1879. The instrument was based on two small guitar-like instru-ments of Portuguese origin, the cavaquinho and the rajao, and quickly became popular in the Hawai’ian Islands. The ukulele was popularized in the continental U.S. during the Panama Pacific Interna-tional Exposition in 1915. A guitar and ukulele ensemble, George E. K. Awai and his Royal Hawaiian Quartet, showcased the instrument stateside for the first time. In Hawai’ian the word uku-lele can be roughly translated to mean “jumping flea” Ukuleles are most com-monly found in soprano, concert, tenor and baritone models, indicating the size and pitch of the instrument.

margaret whittier-ferguson photo

21arts & entertainment the communicator

reel talk: “carnage”you must listen to this

STAFF’S MONTHlY MUSIC PICkS

julia devarti

jORdaNsidEN

CHaRlOTTE sTEElE

RyaNsHEa

EREzlEViN

Laid backGregg Alllman

1973


The moon and AntarcticaModest Mouse

2000

Freestylin’Greyboy 1994

ThickfreaknessThe black keys

2003

The debut solo album of Gregg Allman, frontman for the Allman Brothers Band blues-rock powerhouse, is a remarkable journey down to the Georgia heat. Recorded in the Peach state itself, “Laid Back” is swampy, soulful, and southern, opening with a rootsy reworking of the “Brothers” own “Midnight Rider”. Allman takes us on a journey from the gospel church inspired “Will the Circle Be Unbroken”, to the pensive “Please Call Home” to the juke-joint rock n’ roll cover of “Don’t Mess Up a Good Thing”. Overall, a fantastic gem of an album.

The Black Keys’ second album was recorded in one night in Patrick Carney’s (drums) basement. The album comes right out of the gate with its title track roaring as loud as a guitar and drum set can, and mellows out a bit as Dan Auerbach (guitar, vocals) starts singing in his signature bluesman growl. With “Set You Free”, Carney and Auer-bach have created not just a great rock song, but one of the catchiest tunes I’ve heard in a while. “Thickfreakness” is a blues-rock masterpiece, both all-out and raw, as well as beautifully melodic.

At the time of “The Moon and Antarctica”, the last the world had seen of a momumental rock album was Radiohead’s “OK Computer”. This lag produced Modest Mouse’s masterpiece. With Moon’s fluttery and innocent opening track 3rd Planet, it establishes the record’s expe-dition through the human condition. The album is punc-tuated by occasionally violent guitar and vocals of Isaac Brock with heavy rock and roll gestures. “The Moon and Antarctica” explores deep space, spilt milk and salvation; an intoxicating hallmark in alternative rock.

When two children get in a school-yard fight, what happens next? In Roman Polanski’s new movie Carnage, their parents all get together for a cordial meeting to decide how to move forward. Only thing is, the parents aren’t as cordial as they’d like to think. Originally a play (entitled “God of Carnage,” written by Yasmina Reza, who also wrote the screenplay), Car-nage is an extremely entertaining look at the complex world of parenting. The movie opens silently on a scene in the park: a group of 11-year-old boys settling their differences the way most 11-year-old boys do: with violence. Cut now to the house of the Long-streets (Jodie Foster and John C. Reil-ly), where they are discussing with the Cowans (Kate Winslet and Christoph Waltz) the repercussions of their boys’ actions. What begins as a somewhat civilized conversation quickly regresses into a childlike argument, complete with yelling, screaming, and even a

little vomit. As more and more time passes, the characters get more and more insane, and their alliances seem to change almost every minute. All four actors gave incredibly strong performances, making each of their characters uniquely insane. Foster was particularly memorable as the high-strung, frighteningly intense Penelope Lancaster. Her scuffles with Waltz’s Alan Cowan were full of venom and vigor, mak-ing them enticing to watch. Reilly and Winslet’s characters were a little more forgettable, but it was simply a result of the writing, not their acting. The directing of the film was also quite clever. Though all 80 minutes of the film took place in the Longstreet home—a ritzy high-rise apartment—the movie made use of every part of the apartment, from the cramped kitchen to the overly decorated living room, and even to the hallway outside the door. The only pitfall of the movie was its lack of realism. The characters were such caricatures that it was often hard to believe that there was any chance that their squabbles could ever actually happen. Nevertheless, it was easy to get caught up in the humor of their fights. The movie could have perhaps been better in play form, as it was originally intended to be performed, but this rau-cous jaunt into the world of parenting is certainly worth seeing. C

In his first album, “Freestylin’”, Greyboy established his style of acid jazz with the help of a couple friends. Though Greyboy does lay down an infectious ground-work -- tightly constructed bass and breakbeat grooves -- it’s his co-conspirator, tenor saxophonist Karl Denson, who steals the show. Denson combines with Harold Todd’s flute and some intricate six-string displays from guitarist Marc Antoine to form an impressive cast of soloists. The jams featured in this album will energize and excite listeners.

sony pictures classic photo courtesy

22 the communicator arts and entertainment

Regardless of the direction people ultimately choose for themselves, the actions of their families often influence

their behaviors as they grow up. No ex-ception to this is the decision to begin the study of music. Whether a family is entirely composed of musicians, or just full of encouragement that spurs the trying of new things, family has a pro-found influence on young musicians. Sophomore Alexandra Cubero-Matos, a singer and pianist in the CHS jazz band, was musically compelled by her brother Danny, a 2011 graduate from Pioneer, who played jazz guitar. How-ever, the choice to take up piano and

singing was personal for her. “Singing has always been a part of me, but my mom got me into the guitar when I was four because my brother played it,” said Cubero-Matos. “When [Danny and I] were younger, we played duets on the guitar in concerts and we still sometimes play when we get the chance.” CHS Jazz Director Jack Wagner also experienced direct influence from his family to begin playing an instrument, which remained with him through adulthood. “My father played the saxophone and clarinet in marching band in high school, and he still had his instrument laying around [when I was growing up] and he’d pull it out once every few

months and play my mom’s favorite love songs,” said Wagner. “When I got to fourth grade, they asked me if I thought I’d like to do something like that...so that’s what led me to [the clarinet] and saxophone...but I didn’t get into studying all these other instru-ments until I started education.” The musical environment that Wagner experienced cultivated the seeds of jazz for him, which later reemerged after he transformed from a student of physics in Boston to a student of jazz and edu-cation outside New York City. “My uncle gave me a jazz cassette with Dexter Gordon on one side and Sonny Rollins on the other, around fifth or

sixth grade. I was also in an elementary jazz band at school, which was one of the few that even existed—I was very fortunate,” said Wagner. “[In college,] originally I was a physics major, but I was studying with this amazing tenor player in Boston, and he really turned me onto the heaviest, most artful jazz there was...so I transferred outside New York City and studied jazz and started getting into teaching, and I though that I could probably put these two things together.” CHS freshman Oren Levin, a jazz pianist and guitarist, also began with music at a young age. Like Cubero-Ma-tos, he too has a brother, Erez, in the jazz band. However, his introduction to music differs from Wagner in that

choosing to begin an instrument was an independent decision, though he credits his family’s musical climate for driving him to music. “My parents didn’t ‘pick’ either [instruments] for me. I remember I played whatever I felt like playing at the time, really. I grew up in a very musical environment. Music was always play-ing—Greek, Arabic, all kinds—it all really caught my attention and was fun to play.” Like any endeavor that a person chooses to concentrate on, music does require a certain amount of support from the family so that musicians can maintain their focus. “I get plenty of support from my family,” said Daniel Sagher, a junior who plays guitar in the jazz band and bass on the side. “Not just financially—like paying for lessons and camps—but they’re emotionally supportive, too.” Sagher’s parents also recognize the benefit of music education to a student and that the advantages of being a musician are clear. “[My parents] think playing music is helpful for academics and other life. Their support of me musically has helped me with discipline in other subjects,” said Sagher. “Not just in music, but like math, for example—if I practice it myself, I improve. They’ve never had to push me. Practice makes perfect, and I got that from music.” Cubero-Matos also recognized that the support of her family and musician brother was beneficial to her. “My mom is always pushing me forward when it gets tough. She’ll stay up late with me on weekends before [jazz] tests, helping me out on the

piano,” said Cubero-Matos. “In middle school, [Danny] would help me with talent shows and such by accompany-ing me. Danny was always a great help and made me want to keep going. He is how I grew up on jazz—almost everything I know about it is because of him.” Wagner also noticed that having musi-cians in a student’s family does affect students as musicians who come into the jazz program, some with a head-start with exposure to jazz. “[We] have some cool cases where kids will have parents who are really into jazz and are showing them some stuff ahead of time and that gets their interest going—they come in with higher skills than you would expect for a ninth grader,” explained Wagner. Whether one is a musician who is a product of a musical upbringing or just of an encouraging family, the experi-ence of being supported by those clos-est to him or her is an asset to success as a musician. “My parents are more music enthusi-asts than musicians, but they’ve always been supportive,” said Sagher. Levin added that maintaining his studies as he grew up was a worthwhile decision. “Music was always a way I’ve used to express myself since I was younger. I’m glad that I’ve continued with it—I’ve always wanted and want to learn more about it.” C

“Everything I know about [jazz] is be-cause of [my brother]. ”

heir guitar

STUdENTS IN CHS’S JAzz PrOGrAM ArE INFlUENCEd ANd SUPPOrTEd bY FAMIlY charlotte steele

charlotte steele illustration

HigH sCHOOl musiC sTudENTs

HaVE bEEN sHOwN TO HaVE HigHER gpas THaN NON-

musiCiaNs iN THE samE sCHOOl.

23arts and entertainment the communicator

On On Feb. 2, 2012, poet and Ann Arbor Public Schools graduate Coert Ambrosino visited Community High

School. Standing in front of a room of Poetry Club members, students, and staff, he seemed comfortable and open. With the notes in his hand and his poems in his heart, the poet proceeded to perform his work, ranging from comedic to serious, and shared his knowledge with his audience. Ambrosino said that his family valued reading and writing. Long before he began writing performance poetry, he wrote other types of poetry and listened to a lot of music, such as hip hop. He said, “I grew up listening to a lot of hip-hop and R&B. I grew up loving words and memorizing song… That rhythm of language and rhyme is something that I’ve always have loved and always will, and it’s something that comes through in my writing.” During his last years of high school, performance poetry became a way that he could share his poetry with others.

Ambrosino has participated in slams both on the youth and collegiate levels. He made it to Brave New Voices, a national poetry slam, his senior year of high school with the Ann Arbor Youth Poetry Slam team. He also represented the U of M at the National Collegiate Poetry Slam in both 2005 and 2007. The influences of Ambrosino’s early interest in hip hop seem clear in his writing style—there is an emphasis on the sound of the poems. His use of alliteration, rhyming, deliberate pauses and added melodies help express the meaning of the poem. When asked how he adapts his poetry to written media for his published collections, Ambrosino said that he sometimes publishes transcripts of his perfor-mance poetry and other times he writes specifically for on-paper poetry. He says that there are other ways to make poems express character specific to pa-per, including alignment of the words on the page. For example, in “Why i can’t take my eyes off of fireworks,” he aligned his poem in a balloon shape

the noise we makeby coert ambrosino

welcome one, welcome allwelcome mindful minds mindingwelcome common enemieswelcome mutual friends welcome to the open heartsthe broken hearts, the healingthose who’ve made mistakesand the forgiven in the end welcome to the womenthe married, the mistresseswelcome to the fellasthe lost boys, the mischievous welcome to the listenerswelcome to the talkerswelcome to the dog-eat-doggersand dog walkers welcome to the skinny kidsthe many kids young n’ restlesswelcome to them thick thangsbig boned n’ big breasted welcome to the country boysthe city boys n’ space cadetswelcome to out-of-towners whohaven’t even met their neighbors yet welcome to the believersto the dreamers and magicianswelcome to the hatersnaysayers of the system welcome to the preachersthe singers and the silentwelcome to the quiet kidpaintin’ pictures inside his eyelids welcome to the fathersthe brothers and the sonsthank you for passing onthis culture we are making

welcome to the mothersthe sisters and the daughterswelcome to the unbornwhose futures we are shaping

welcome to the business folkbankers and statisticianswelcome to the dancersand the painters and the poets

welcome to the journaliststeachers and politicianswelcome to the politicalthe personal, the moment

welcome to the time to speakwelcome to the time to praywelcome to the time for actionand the noise we make today.

coert holds courtPErFOrMANCE ANd PrINTEd POET COErT AMbrOSINO vISITS CHS

gabrielle vuylsteke & anna raschke communicator web staff

–it starts wide, gets wider, and finally trails into one word per line. This shape allows time to pause and consider the words. Ambrosino described his process as “stream of consciousness”—he is open to letting his writing flow without knowing for certain what they will become., including their length. While he said that he normally starts writing his poetry by hand, he also uses word processing to pull multiple unfinished pieces into a larger poem with more meaning. Sometimes, he finds that his poetry becomes more emotionally charged when he combines poems—he says that it comes out from “under-neath” the words. Ambrosino takes his inspiration from his environment. “It’s from noticing what’s going on around me.” Although he “has never been a daily writer,” Ambrosino encouraged young writers to make time for writing. Some days he can only “get to writing by pushing myself to do it,” and recommends that young poets do the same. C

24 the communicator sports

For most people, the first Wednesday of February is just another day. They will wake up, go to school or work, then

go home just like they did on Tuesday, or like they will on Thursday. But for a select group of high school seniors, the first Wednesday of February was a very special day: National Signing Day. National Signing Day is a day where student-athletes across the country can achieve their lifelong dreams of playing sports in college. To witness the excitement over

signing to play a sport in college, look no farther than Community High’s hallways. This year’s senior class boasts seven student-athletes who have signed to colleges. Among this talented group is senior Tori Westhead, who will be playing field hockey for St. Louis University next year. Westhead began playing field hockey ten years ago, and quickly fell in love with the sport. As the games got more serious through the years, Wes-thead enjoyed it even more, “I knew that field hockey is what I wanted to do [in the future],” said Westhead. “But I knew I had to step it up if I wanted to be good enough to play in college.” Westhead took this challenge head-on, training at camps all over the country, including in Ohio with the U.S. Olympic goalie. Eventually she pro-gressed enough to become the starting goalie for the Huron field hockey team, which won back-to-back state champi-

onships in 2010 and 2011. Another athlete who traveled across the country to improve her game and get noticed is CHS senior Ty Wel-lik. Wellik is a four-year varsity rower for Huron, and has signed to row for the University of Michigan. Since her freshman year, Wellik has travelled around the country attending camps, including the Junior National Rowing Camp her sophomore year. Wellik had always wanted to attend Michigan, but getting to row there took some work. Wellik had been in constant

contact with the team since her fresh-man year, sending them her times and schedules. Eventually they made an offer, and Wellik couldn’t pass it up. “I really liked Michigan’s team,” said Wel-lik. “They seemed nice and it seemed like a lot of fun and hard work too.” Despite her on-field success, West-head had a tough time getting herself noticed by colleges. “The recruiting process is actually really stressful,” Westhead said. “You get a lot of rejec-tion…I really had to be persistent.” One of Westhead’s biggest disadvan-tages was her playing in Michigan while the schools she was interested in were all out of state. This forced her to rely on tapes and camps for recruiting instead of live games, something many coaches don’t like. After all of the work and frustration, Westhead finally settled on Saint Louis University. “I did all my visits I fell in love with the campus, team, coaches

and overall atmosphere [at SLU] and I knew that that was where I wanted to be.” Westhead acknowledges that she suffered mentally, physically, emotion-ally, and financially in her efforts to play in college. Despite the difficulties, she believes it was all worth it for her to follow her dream, “It’s definitely worth it in the end,” she said. “I love field hockey and I can’t imagine not being married to the sport in college. I couldn’t be happier with my decision.” While Wellik is excited to row for Michigan next year, she admits that she still has nerves.” Crew’s hard in high school, but in college it gets really intense,” said Wellik. “It’s a lot of hard work, but the team atmosphere seems really fun. I’m looking forward to it.” Westhead and Wellik both accom-plished their goals and will continue their sports at the next level. But while they prepare to take their talents to the next level, many younger student-athletes are still simply trying to get noticed. Wellik knows it can be dif-ficult, and encourages high-schoolers to be more proactive in getting noticed. “Contact the colleges you’re interested in,” Wellik said. “A lot of people think that if a school doesn’t contact you, they’re not interested. But a lot of colleges want to see interest [from the athletes] first.” Westhead has respect for those still struggling with recruitment, and encourages them to hold on to their dreams, “Never give up or get discour-aged. Even if ten schools tell you no, that doesn’t mean you aren’t good enough to continue at the next level. You have to keep pushing and show them that you want it.” C

“The recruiting process is actually really stressful. You get a lot of rejection…I really

had to be persistent. ”

zach shaw

margaret whittier-ferguson photo

the next level: chs students take their athletic talents to college

Tori westheadfield Hockey saint louis university.

sophia kunselmanTrack

brown university

anjela galimbertifield HockeyCollege of Wooster

Ty wellikCrew

University of michigan

drake johnson footballUniversity of michigan

Nick margolis Golf

denison university

sabrina kunselmanTrackbrown university

hannah king photos

sportscommitted students

25sports the communicator

two minute drill: royal entrance

For the couple standing together in the athletic lobby of Huron High School, 3:15 often seems more like a closing gate than a time of day. 3:15 is when HHS freshman Eli Cohen, the boyfriend, has to go to swim practice. After goodbye hugs and kisses, the gate is suddenly closed, and Community High freshman Sarah McCurrach, the girlfriend, is left outside. The disappointment McCurrach feels is one thousands of young athletes across the country must feel when balancing a relationship and their sports. The time committment both require can be stressful, especially when you throw school and work into the mix. “It seems like I’m always either at school, at practice, at work, or with her,” said CHS senior Chris Upham, who plays lacrosse and wrestles for Pioneer and has been in a relationship for a year. “That really leaves no guy time to just chill.” While the lack of free time can be a strain, both Upham and McCur-rach prefer being in a relationship to not. “It’s nice to have her there at my games, on the sideline cheering for me,” said Upham. “It gives me a con-fidence boost to know that she’s there for me.” In addition to in-game confidence, a relationship can also serve as motiva-

zach shaw & jack koziczgabby thompson illustration

On Jan. 17th, news broke out that Tigers slugger Victor Martinez had torn his ACL and would miss the entire 2012 season. The news meant that the defending AL Central champs would spend an entire season without one of their top hitters, news that would be devastating for any team. While fans were in shock over the heartbreaking news, the Tigers front staff were busy finding a solution. On January 24th, they found it. In news

that shook the national sports world, the Detroit Tigers signed All-Star slugger Prince Fielder to a 9-year, $214 million contract. The signing has brought joy to many fans, but there are some who doubt the deal’s value or practicality. The Tigers already have one of the game’s top sluggers with Miguel Cabrera, and many skeptics see Fielder as a one-di-mensional player. Here’s what those in the CHS community think of the deal.

“it was a very expensive con-tract, especially since we don’t know how good he’ll play and how well he’ll fit in with the team.” —Elizabeth Caldwell, senior

“it’s awesome but the contract is too much money. what are you supposed to do with all that money?” —Chris Hicks, Secretary to the Dean

“it will supercharge the team. The city is excited, he’s a great hitter, we have the his-tory with Cecil Fielder. it is going to be fun to watch him play because he is so

big and so strong.” —Mike Monahan, Monahan’s owner

“it’s going to be good for the team because they need more power in their lineup since [Victor] martinez went down.”

—Carlos Jackson, junior

love games: students find balance between sports and relationships

tion during difficult practices. This is the case for McCurrach, who swims and plays water polo for Huron. “Swimming is a mental sport because all you do is go back and forth, back and forth. You can get bored easily and

then you start to slack off,” said Mc-Currach. “Thinking of Eli makes it easier to concentrate on getting faster.” Unlike many students in relationships, McCurrach and Cohen actually do the same sports. This connection is how

they met and serves as a strong bond between the two as they frequently share the frustrations and joys of the sports. “It was because of swimming that we went out,” McCurrach said. “It’s how we met and what we talked about.” According to McCurrach, being in the same sports does more than just bring the two together, it helps her with her swimming too. “[Cohen] teaches me different ways to swim, the different techniques and kicks,” she said. “[His advice] really helped me improve a lot, and catch up to some of the faster kids on the team. While Upham’s girlfriend doesn’t do the same sports as he does, Upham said that she can still be a benefit. “She’s always there after a bad game,” said Upham. “Letting me know that everything’s going to be okay.” The next day, 3:15 comes around, and once again McCurrach and Cohen are separated. While sad, McCurrach is not upset. She knows that dating an athlete requires sacrifice, but it has its benefits too. “I think [his sports] benefit our relationship in a good way,” McCurrach said. “He gets to channel his energy into something other than school. Even though Eli has to go to practice every-day, in the end it’s worthwhile.” C

ECONOmy

EqualiTy

26 the communicator opinion

MICHIGAN dOMESTIC PArTNEr bENEFITS bAN dENIES EQUAl rIGHTS

gOVERNOR CHRisTiNE gREgOiRE

is sigNiNg NEwly passEd

lEgislaTiON ON fEb. 13 TO lEgalizE gay maRRiagE iN wasHiNgTON.

letter to the editors

Dear Communicator,

The parameters of almost any socially constructed group can be debated. Thesociety we live in is obsessed with classifying people by what makes them different from others; this could be something like the color of your skin or hair, or it could be something more conceptual like religion. The Jewish community is different from manyothers in that its definition stretches across many socially constructed groups: religious, cultural and familial, and ethnic. In the past couple of weeks, I’ve been asked more than once to defendmy “Jewishness.” Many kids at CHS are heavily involved in the Jewish com-munity, and the “what” and “how” of being Jewish have developed, at least among those I’ve spoken with, very strict guidelines. This topic has come up in a lot of conversations. What does it mean to be Jewish if being Jewish can be so many different things? My definition of “Jewish” has always been slightly different from those around me. I’ve never gone to temple and I didn’t have a Bat Mitzvah. These details are usually what leads to the question I’ve heard multiple times over the past week, from Jewish andNon-Jewish friends alike: “So, you’re not, like, really Jewish?” People seemed surprised when I dis-agree: My grandparents escaped Poland during the Holocaust and worked as kibbutz doctors while they raised my mother, who was raised Jewish and served in the Israeli army. People seem eager to deny me the label: I’m notpracticing, never have, and I’m not completely Jewish—my father is Palestinian—along with the fact that I don’t support the State of Israel. Many people believe these things areintegral to being Jewish—and, obvious-ly, I respect that. Any label that spans such a vast group of people all over the world is bound to have a flexible definition. The most important thing is to ex-amine the true complexity of the labels which you choose to apply to yourself. There is no hierarchy of Jewishness, and, as is true with most religious, cul-tural, and ethnic groups, what the label means to each person is totally unique and personal.

Sincerely,Alia Persico-Shammas

The Communicator, being committed to the free exchange of ideas, is an open forum for expression of opinions. It is student-run; students make all content decisions. Letters to the editor are encouraged and can be sent to [email protected]. Signed articles will be accepted with no prior administrative review as space is available. The Communicator reserves the right to edit submissions. Furthermore, opinions expressed therein are those of the authors and not of this newspaper, Community High School, or Ann Arbor Public Schools. For our complete policy, please see www.the-communicator.org.

the communicator policy

mari cohen editorial cartoon

opinion “Governor Snyder, we need to talk.” “We guess you weren’t as tough of a nerd as we thought you would be.” These are quotes from a radio ad campaign that was launched in Michi-gan the first week of February. The campaign, created by the Equality Michigan Pride Political Action Com-mittee, charges Michigan governor Rick Snyder with failing to live up to his campaign promise to be “one tough nerd.” On Dec. 22, 2011, Snyder signed House Bill 4770 into law, which bans health care benefits for domestic part-ners of public employees; employees can now only extend health care bene-fits if they are married to their partners. This affects state and local employees, including public school teachers. Snyder and other legislators call it a “cost-cutting” measure. The law’s supporters estimated that it will cut $8 million a year in health care costs, within the context of a $46 billion state budget that Snyder signed in June. Though it may be important to cut costs, this method broaches worrying issues of inequality. Same-sex marriage is illegal in Michigan; this is spelled out in a 2004 amendment to the state constitution. Therefore, gay and lesbian state employees are completely unable

to extend benefits to partners, as they do not have the choice to get married. This is why the American Civil Liber-ties Union of Michigan announced on Jan. 5 its decision to challenge the law in court. The ACLU’s case is that the law deprives same-sex couples of their right to equal protection under the law. The Ann Arbor City Council unani-mously voted to support the ACLU in the case. At the forefront of the lawsuit are four couples, including former CHS Dean Peter Ways and his self-employed partner, Joe Breakey. According to the ACLU website, Ways and Breakey, who have a young daughter, are now consid-ering leaving Michigan since Breakey can no longer get benefits. This demonstrates that the law also has worrying economic implications. The last thing we want is to give people a reason to leave Michigan. This should not affect employees of University of Michigan and other public universities, since, according to Snyder, public uni-versities are granted autonomy by the Michigan Constitution and are exempt from the law. However, the removal of benefits could deprive our state workforce of valuable employees and our school systems of great teachers, like Ways. Driving people away from

Michigan will also lose taxpayer money. However, The Communicator is most concerned with the core of the issue: with the law in place, same-sex couples are denied equal rights. The Michigan government has offered an incen-tive that requires employees to jump through a certain hoop—marriage. However, by law, the government does not allow same-sex couples to make the jump. We consider this to be unfair. People may wonder why it is so important for gays and lesbians to have official marriage; why can’t a domestic partnership suffice? This benefits ban is exactly why. Until Michigan same-sex couples can affirm their commitment with marriage, the government will be able to deprive them of benefits and target them in other ways. Gay couples will not be guaranteed the full rights that straight couples have until they are also allowed the fundamental right of marriage. With House Bill 4770, Snyder had a chance to protect same-sex marriage couples, provide further incentive to stay in Michigan, and prove that really he can be “one tough nerd.” Instead, he denied gay and lesbian couples further rights, and demonstrated exactly why it is so important to legalize same-sex marriage in Michigan. C


communicator staff

one size does not fit all

27opinion the communicator

annabel weiner communicator web staff

We all buy clothes. We all come in different shapes and sizes, yet when we go shopping, we only see one type of mannequin. These plastic bodies set an impossible standard that assumes everyone wants to be tall and lean, and then we expect ourselves to be tall and lean. However, for the large majority of the population it is impossible to look like these “perfect” mannequins. In reality, mannequins are far from perfect. Many models who have the same body type as mannequins are malnourished and anorexic. Not all healthy people are skinny and not all skinny people are healthy. This is not to say that thin cannot be beautiful, but it is only one kind of beautiful. Most mannequins are far from what the average person looks like. Accord-ing to the National Health Statistics Report the average height and weight for women who are 20 years or older is 5’3” and 164.7 pounds. For men who are twenty years and older the average height is 5’8” and the average weight is 194.7 pounds. These proportions are not represent-ed in mannequins, but that is actually a good thing. Both of these averages are classified as overweight. I do not think that stores should promote obesity by making mannequins that display unhealthy, overweight bodies.

However, stores should display a more diverse range of mannequins with healthy body types. Some stores promote an idealized body type not only through manne-quins but also through their employees. At Abercrombie & Fitch and Hollister, there are often buff shirtless, male greeters standing outside of the store to attract shoppers. Abercrombie & Fitch has a “look policy” that explains the guidelines em-ployees have to live up to if they want to work there. Abercrombie & Fitch advocates for diversity in race amongst their employees, but discourages other kinds of diversity. Samantha Elauf suc-cessfully sued the store in 2009, after they refused to hire her because her head scarf did not follow their “look policy.” Mannequins are supposed to be a tool to show people what clothes could look like on them. But our current mannequins are not doing the job. The majority of the population is just look-ing at what clothes would look like on someone skinnier than they are. At Macy’s, there are two different types of mannequins: tall, skinny ones and plus size ones. The mannequins wear the smallest sizes available, but even double zero’s don’t fit them. The clothes have to be pinned in the back

so that they fit snugly. The case is the same for the plus size mannequins. In 2004 Fox News published an article saying that stores would begin to include plus size mannequins in their displays. They said the mannequins would look like Beyoncé. When I think of plus size, Beyoncé does not come to mind. The Fox News articles idea of plus size is a limited one. It is good that plus size mannequins are represented in stores. However, in reality, there are not only plus sized people and very thin people. There are thousands of types in between. The in-between types are the most common and are usually the healthiest. Another issue at Macy’s is that plus size manne-quins are never in central displays. The big displays only feature pure white skinny mannequins. There is not a diverse range of ethnicities represent-ed by mannequins. In my local Macy’s the mannequins are either jet black or snow white. In the juniors department there, out of 27 mannequins, there is a single black one, and they are all the same size. This is not just a problem for women. Male mannequins are also homoge-neous. Women are generally more preoccupied with their body image than men are, and women are judged more based on their bodies than men are.

Nonetheless, a varied range of male mannequins should also be showcased.When larger mannequins have been displayed in stores, responses have not been all positive. Kelly Rowell wrote an article for the Philly Post called “Fat Mannequins… So Wrong.” The article is about how she is disgusted with the bigger mannequins displayed in a lin-gerie store. Rowell says that she is not skinny but she wants to be lured into a store with fantasy rather than reality. She says that clothes look better on thin mannequins. We are trained to value skinny bod-ies. People have a deep-set belief that once they achieve thinness, they will be beautiful. It is this mindset that needs revision. The representation of women in media needs a huge overhaul. If you open up a People magazine and look at who the best dressed are, they are almost all skinny and are wearing tight or short dresses. Television and magazines feature airbrushed and ideal-ized body types. It is not surprising that Rowell was repulsed by “fat” manne-quins. The problem will not be resolved by simply integrating a wider range of mannequins in stores, but including a more diverse display could be one small step toward shifting people’s ideas of beauty. C

THE wORd “maNNEquiN” COmEs fROm THE middlE duTCH wORd “maNNEkijN”, wHiCH mEaNs liTTlE figuRiNE.

CHS STUdENTS ANSWEr THE QUESTION: IS vAlENTINE’S dAY AN IMPOrTANT HOlIdAY?

“i think it is for people who are in relation-ships, but for people that aren’t, i think it sucks knowing, ‘Oh, everyone’s in love, and has a boyfriend

or a girlfriend’ when you

don’t.”

“it’s just dumb. i just kind of hate it. it just seems super

romanticized—but i guess that’s the

point—but it’s sappy and pointless,

and i just don’t like

it.”

“i think it might not be im-portant, but it can be fun if you were into it. i don’t think it’s a bad thing: it

dosen’t hurt anyone, and it’s fine as it is. It’s not something that you’re

forced to celebrate; it’s just there.”

“i think it’s fun, but i wouldn’t go out of my way to cel-ebrate it.”

“i think it’s important to show people that you love

them. i don’t think it’s exclu-sively limited to boyfriend

or girlfriend. i think you can tell your mom that you love her, or friends

or anything. it’s like a happy, positive

holiday.

“i guess it depends on whether or not you’re in a relationship. if not, you’re just going to feel bad or whatever. if you

are, it’s a good time to be together and

spend time with who you love.”

Samantha Timmer Freshman

Oby ugwuegbuFreshman

murphy AustinSenior

Sam SorscherSophomore

Tressa StapletonJunior

Robin SpethFreshman

students speak out

jordan siden photos

THE aVERagE maNNEquiN COsTs ROugHly $130.

\

A friend of mine once told me that she doesn’t like the term “gay mar-riage.” At first I was appalled, but then she explained what she meant. She said that marriage is marriage, no matter who the couple is. “It’s not like you call parking your car ‘gay parking’ if you’re homosexual,” she joked. But still, it seems as if the whole world has made them two separate things: marriage and same sex mar-riage. The only real difference I can find, though, is that only one of them is legal. On Feb. 7, however, the 9th District Court of Appeals ruled that California’s Proposition 8 — one that made same sex marriage illegal in the state — was unconstitutional. It’s likely that the proponents of Prop 8 will appeal to the Supreme Court, but still, I’d say this is cause for celebration. There are now seven states that allow same-sex mar-

riage, more than ever before. And while I certainly feel like celebrating, it also makes me wonder what’s with the other 43 states. Seven is an accomplishment, but that’s also a little sad, that such a small number means such a big thing. When I think about how many states there are in our country, I think about how far we still have to go. Take Michigan for an example. Right now our law states that “Marriage is in-herently a unique relationship between a man and a woman. As a matter of public policy, this state has a special interest in encouraging, supporting, and protecting … the stability and welfare of society and its children. A mar-riage contracted between individuals of the same sex is invalid in this state.” When I read this, I’m disappointed in our state. We live in a country that is supposed to guarantee equal rights, and here in Michigan we’re contradicting that. Honestly, it’s shameful. So, while I do believe that we should be happy for California, I think it is equally important that we fight for the same rights in our own home. It’s not a true victory until it’s a victory every-where. C

iN addiTiON TO TOm

jOHNsON aNd pHilip glass,

pROmiNENT COmpOsERs la mONTE yOuNg,

sTEVE REiCH, jOHN adams,

aNd TERRy RilEy idENTify wiTH

miNimalism.

columns

28 the communicator columns

julia devarti

If you google “celebrities without makeup,” you will get a bevy of results, showing photos of women in their natural state who were “caught” by the paparazzi. When did it become shame-ful in our culture for women to go out without makeup on? This addiction to perfection that the media in this coun-try fuels may be the cause. According to a recent Newsweek

article, young girls are being affected by this phenomenon. The statistics in the story suggest that the age girls are getting into makeup has fallen from 17 to just 13 in the last four years. If 13 seems young to you, as it did to me, consider this; a study done by the market-research firm Experian found that 43 percent of 6 to 9-year-olds are already using lipstick or lip gloss, 38 percent use hairstyling products, and 12 percent use other cosmetics. Much of this may come from the over-sexualiza-tion of teens and young girls in today’s media. Reality shows like Toddlers & Tiaras and Dance Moms show girls as young as four to five tanning, dying their hair, and wearing as much or more makeup than a grown woman. Reality shows,

and the publicity that they receive, make young girls think that wearing makeup is normal at their age. Young girls grow up bombarded with pop-cul-ture and the idea that everything can be upgraded. It’s been estimated that girls 11 to 14 are subjected to about 500 ad-vertisements a day—the majority of them nipped, tucked, and airbrushed to perfection. Based on a University of Minnesota study, staring at those airbrushed images for just one to three minutes can have a negative impact on girls’ self-esteem. What that means in the long-term is hours and money wasted on chas-ing ideal beauty. I should know: at 16 my daily maintenance routine takes at least half an hour and I own enough

products to fill a small closet. And I haven’t even started to look at anti-ag-ing products yet. That will become the future of 11 year-olds in this country— times ten. Unless something changes, girls will grow up thinking that the only way to look beautiful is by putting on makeup each and every morning. Decreasing the publicity that glamorizes and nor-malizes making up young girls is a start. It is important for girls to grow up understanding what beauty truly is, and appreciating the value of going natural. We as teenagers need to set an example, I am not opposed to wearing makeup, but I think it should be used sparingly. Just remember that young girls are looking up to us, studying and copying the things we do. C

ruthie graff

iN THE NOVEmbER

2011 issuE Of sEVENTEEN magaziNE, 44 OuT Of

150 pagEs HaVE TO dO

wiTH makEup.

setting it straight: no cover up

I recently saw Einstein on the Beach, an opera composed by Philip Glass, di-rected by Michael Riesman and choreo-graphed by Lucinda Childs. The opera was four hours and 30 minutes long. I am semi-obsessed with Philip Glass, which is the only reason I went; I didn’t know much about the opera. Philip Glass is one of the most acknowledged composers in the realm of minimalist music. After “Einstein on the Beach,” I realized that I previously had no idea what music can be used for, minimalist or otherwise. So, what is minimalist music? It’s con-troversial and seen as one of the most influential movements of the 20th cen-tury. In its beginning around the 1960s, it outraged audiences and baffled music critics. What is it past that? I don’t know. It would be easy to throw musi-cal terms at you (constant harmonies, reiterating the same musical phrases, a steady pulse or immobile drones, etc.).

kerry fingerle

But that isn’t what minimalist is. It is truly one of those things that is what you make of it. Minimalist music can be defined, but that’s your job. Composer Tom Johnson is said to have coined the term. The following is a quote from Tom Johnson on his view of minimalism: “[Minimalism] includes, by definition, any music that works with limited or minimal materials: pieces that use only a few notes, pieces that use only a few words of text, or pieces written for very limited instruments, such as antique cymbals, bicycle wheels, or whiskey glasses...It includes pieces made exclu-sively from recordings of rivers and streams...pieces that move in endless circles. It includes pieces that set up an unmoving wall of saxophone sound...pieces that permit all possible pitches, as long as they fall between C and D...pieces that slow the tempo down to two or three notes per minute.” Go home. Look up music from Philip Glass’s opera “Einstein on the Beach” and start from the beginning. Let it happen to you. The most important thing I can stress about approaching minimalist music is to clean your slate and to have no judgements about what you’re listening to. This music is for you and from you, because your interpreta-tions are individual to you.

not your grandma’s music, but it could be snap, crackle, pop: prop 8

Go ballroom dancing with

Judith

29shorts the communicator

shortsEver since T-Pain played my cousin Ethan’s Bar Mitzvah party, I’ve been haunted by visions of T-Pain turning off his spectacular auto-tune and trying to sing normally. This can not happen.Please console my teetering faith in humanity!Sincerely, Anxious but Classy About It

My Dearest Anxiously Classy,I will have to let you in on a secret: every time you hear his music, that robotronic auto-tuned sound is his actual voice. There are no studio effects on him whatsoever. It is crazy, I know, but true. He is physically unable to use his vocal chords at any frequency that doesn’t correspond exactly to the Western chromatic scale. It cer-tainly spices things up when he tries to do everyday, normal things like proposing marriage to Helen Mirren, or talking to his kids about being a man. However, he was not born with this gift. It was given to him by Thor Odin-son as a consequence of consuming magical bratwurst. On that note, I bid you a good afternoon. Yours as always, Dünbar

dear

A djembe drum was used by CHS teacher, Tracy Anderson, during her staff interview.

There are, 21murals on the first floor of Community High School.

A game of sporks at Brown University was won by CHS teacher and alum, Chloe Root.

There are 196 stairs in the four main stairwells at CHS.

Until 1965 Jones Elemen-tary School occupied the building that currently houses CHS. The building reopened as CHS in 1972.

miles Grofsorean, Senior“I would change the back lawn into a swimming pool.”

Stefan wanczyk, Junior“I would enforce a strict ‘shoes re-quired’ rule on the second floor.”

Jessiah Hall, Senior“Instead of math support and all that stuff, we should have a big study hall.”

if you could improve Community in one way, what would you change?

fastFACTS

paint a mural in the hallway

break onto the roof

Tell a dirty limer-ick at ‘poetry on

n the Ledge’

Call Kevin “Steve” for a week

topfive

thin

gs to d

o bef

ore yo

u gra

duate

1 23 4 5illustrations colleen o’brien

students speak out

sacha moravy-penchanksy illustration

think local & shop localthink local & shop local

C

Dance Body Prepares––New Mural in CR Office––President Obama Speaks to U of M Students––Poetry Night in Ann Arbor: Audio––

michele Norris discusses Race and activism––1000 words––ambition at Hill auditorium

THE COmmuNiCaTORC/O COmmuNiTy HigH sCHOOl401 N. diVisiON sT.aNN aRbOR, mi 48104

www.the-communicator.org • a student voice

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FEATURES

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OP-ED

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1000 WORDS

CALENDAR

COMMUNITY HIGH SCHOOL (ANN ARBOR, MICHIGAN)

Volume 28, Edition 4

Documents

Transcript of Volume 28, Edition 4