Social justice clubs act as distributors of information
By Dexter Tatsukawa
September 30, 2019
Social justice clubs are an important part of bringing attention to the inequality in the world and the specific groups of students facing challenges in their lives especially when such students may be lacking available resources. Even those not experiencing inequality are aided by these clubs as they pro...
Pushed versus motivated: standards of academic success demotivate students
By Nika Bondar, Anika Karody, Andrea Sun, and Yukari E. Zapata
September 26, 2019
Although our teachers try hard to make essays and formulas more exciting, if you listen closely, you can still hear the echo of the student body bouncing around in the hallways: “Why exactly do we need to know this?” According to Valerie Strauss from the Washington Post, if you carefully ...
Protect the Parks: food for thought
By Jane Park
September 23, 2019
In February, I went beef-free out of environmental awareness. I have always cared about the environment, so I decided to make a change. People ask why I don’t go fully vegetarian, because if I cared so much about the earth why wouldn’t I go to extreme lengths to save it? We all associate v...
College standards, high school pressure have fostered a culture of academic dishonesty
By Patrick Yu
June 5, 2019
59 percent of the 43,000 high school students surveyed admitted to cheating on a test in 2017, according to a poll conducted by the Josephson Institute Center for Youth Ethics. 34 percent of the same students surveyed admitted to cheating on multiple occasions. One-third of the sample also...
High school is preparation for life
By Yukari E. Zapata
June 1, 2019
According to The 74, 46 percent of high schoolers think that what they are learning about is useful for life. That leaves 54 percent of high school students thinking that high school is not relevant to modern life. For many students, high school feels like a complete waste of time — claiming that t...
The Impatient Patient: The line between a social media binge and cleanse
By Renee Wang
May 30, 2019
In my freshman year, I bade goodbye to “likes” and dog filters as I deleted first my Instagram, and later my Snapchat account. For the next year or so, I likened myself to living off the grid — the social media grid that is. My motivations for such a social media cleanse were simple: I thoug...
The Ripple Effect: Nothing is futile, so long as we embrace the ugliness
By Aishwarya Jayadeep
May 22, 2019
Here’s a glimpse into the past: around two and a half years ago, I’m sitting at my computer, wracking my brain for a column idea, with half-baked concepts scribbled down on a piece of paper next to me. When one idea finally, feebly pops into my head, I immediately dash off an email to my opinion...
The Denome’s Advocate: A final rant on politics
By Thomas Denome
May 5, 2019
Three years and about 30,000 words or so after I was bequeathed with a column, I am now sitting here, at my computer, writing my last little diatribe about something, anything political that captures my interest. In a month, I’ll graduate high school; I’ll head off to college in August; some unde...
Everything is better in moderation, even mobile devices
By Katelynn Ngo
May 1, 2019
Our phones are a central part of a lot of our lives: so much so that sometimes we feel our phones vibrate in our pockets even when they aren’t there. This phenomenon is known as the Phantom Vibration Syndrome, and scientists speculate that it is caused by too much cell phone usage. I’ll admit, I ...
The rebellion against the ban on bump stocks
By Sahil Venkatesan
April 25, 2019
A utomatic firearms have been banned in the US since the 1934 National Firearms Act — however a simple modification, a bump stock, can transform a semi-automatic firearm into a fully automatic firearm. Following the Las Vegas Massacre, thousands of people called for an investigation into whether bump stocks were ...
The Impatient Patient: Mental health days are just as valid
By Renee Wang
April 3, 2019
H ow does the most universally hated phrase by parents — "I don't want to go to school today" — come to be? It starts off when you are funneled from back-to-back extracurriculars, SAT prep and 2 a.m. study sessions. It build when you straddle the line between awake and asleep, when you down a cup...
The Melodic Line: Running as an antidote to academic stress
By Melody Chen
March 22, 2019
The minute I arrive home from school, I rush upstairs, change into my running clothes, snatch my sneakers and head outdoors. The air buzzes with undiminished energy. The sun bobs up and down, mimicking my rhythm. The tension from late night studying and back-to-back extracurriculars seems to wash away as I focus on my advancing treads. For once, I f...
