2.17.11_issue

• NEWS 1, 2, 3 • SPORTS 6 • OPINIONS 5 • EDITORIAL 5 • ENTERTAINMENT 4 • CAMPUS BUZZ 5 • CALENDER 2 • POLICE BEAT 2 • STAFF INFORMATION 5 •

Two former DVC track and tennis coaches are suing the district since, in their opinion they lost their jobs for exposing illegal gender discrimination in sports programs at DVC.

“I was told it was because of financial and budget issues,” said Peter Benko in a phone interview, on why the school chose not to rehire him.

Hunter Pyle, the lawyer of Peter Benko and Dan-iel Cruz, tells a different story in his press release: “It appears that DVC was motivated by a desire to punish those who spoke out, and to frighten others from speaking out in the future.”

Athletic Director Christine Worsley, cited in the lawsuit as the person who terminated the coaches’ employment, declined to comment on the matter.

The district filed a response to the charges on Jan. 28, denying all claims. Repeated attempts to contact the district’s attorneys have gone unanswered.

Benko and Cruz filed the federal lawsuit with the Contra Costa Community College District for wrongful termination they say was retaliation against them for the complaint they filed against the college.

“It is clear from the school district’s actions that we were treated adversely after bringing to their at-

MIKE ALFIERICopy editor

New project addresses achievementgap, studentstereotypes

Speakingout costsjobs, coachesclaim

COACHES, Page 2

The negative effect stereotypes may have on aca-demic ability is brought to the spotlight this semes-ter in the “Whistling Vivaldi” project.

The program, organized by Lisa Orta, staff development coordinator, seeks to address the achievement gap at DVC through presentations, discussions, college events and film showings.

She came up with the idea after hearing a radio interview with Dr. Claude Steele, the author of the book for which the program is named. In it, Steele discussed how people internalize stereotypes about their identity and can later be affected by them.

“Whistling Vivaldi” was a technique black jour-nalist Brent Staples used to defuse the perception that he might be a mugger while walking down the street at night. Whistling classical music helped him break the stereotype.

One example Steele used in his book involved an experiment in which questionnaires were given to three groups of Asian women just before a math

VIVALDI, Page 3

KEVIN HAYESCopy editor

How to Heal:Mediocre gladiators: Editor-in-chief Julius Rea and Managing editor Troy Patton

review the new film, “The Eagle.” See page 4.

Education sees red: Inquirer Editorial Board discusses cuts to education and the

lack of perceived value it impliesby the state. See page 5.

Take a look into DVC’s sports medicine program. See page 6.

Volume 78 No. 1 Copyright © 2010 The Inquirer - Diablo Valley College www.TheInquirerOnline.com Thursday, Februrary 17, 2011

TheINQUIRER

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Marching Band Techniques • Introduction to Music Skills • Introduction to Drawing, Color, and Two Dimensional Design • Introduction the Music Industry • Introduction to Reason and ACID • Introduction to Color Drawing and Composition • Figure Drawing • Printmaking: Mono-type • Animation and Interactivity • Fundamentals of Stage Production • DVC Philharmonic Orchestra •Intro-duction to Printmaking •Watercolor • Introduction to Technical Theater • Introduction to Engineering •Begin-ning Guitar • Watercolor Workshop • Oil/Acrylic Paint-ing • Technical Draw- ing • Horticulture • Color Theory and its Application to 2-D Me-dia • Basic Principles of Acting • Nursery Skills and Practices • Introduction to Sculpture and 3-D Design• Piano Ensem-ble Symphonic Band • Pedagogy for Music Teachers • Night Jazz • Energy, Society, and the Environment • Landscape Design • Metal Art • Basic Principles of Acting • Advanced Styles in Scene Study • The Brit-ish Blues Invasion • In- troduction to Pro Tools • Directing Proj- ects • Applied Voice Training • Introduc- tion to Electronic Music • Introduction to Digital Video • 3D Modeling and Anima- tion • Plant Propaga-tion • From Be Bop to Trip Hop: Fifty Years of Small Ensemble Jazz •Metalsmithing and Jewelry • Figura- tive Concepts • Typog-raphy • Percussion Ensemble • Introduc-tion to Music Litera- ture • Stage Makeup • Wheel Thrown Ce- ramic Art • Marching Band Techniques • In- troduction to Music Skills • Introduction to Music Literature • Stencil and Screen Print Relief • Intro-duction to Circuits and Devices • Print-making: Wood Block Hand-Built • Chamber Singers • Brass En- semble • Ceramic Art • Jazz Combos • Vocal Jazz Ensemble • Black and White Photog- raphy • Digital Illus-tration • Introduc- tion to Digital Au-dio • Major Produc- tion • Concert Choir • Beginning Piano • Woodwind Ensemble • Properties of Engi- neering Materials • Advanced Photogra- phy Workshop • Digi-tal Imaging Process and Technique • De-sign, Advanced Con- cepts Programming for Scientists and Engineers • Comput-er Aided Drafting • Band English Choral • Music Concerto for Multiple Solo Instru-ments • Digital Illus- tration • Engineer-ing Drawing • Applied Projects in Music Industry Studies • Alan Hovhaness: Maximum Minimalism • Introduction to Digital Audio • Introduction to DigitAl Photography

Continuing budget prob-lems for the Contra Cos-

ta Community College District and DVC have forced the school’s ad-ministration to propose a reduced course sched-ule for next year, heavily damaging many depart-ments across the campus, including art, drama, hor-ticulture, and engineering.

While planning the next year’s budget, the CCCD came up with three sce-narios taking into account the possibility of Gov. Jerry Brown’s tax increase either passing or not, and whether Proposition 98 – which dedicates at least 40 percent of the state bud-get to K-14 education – will be suspended or not.

Chancellor Helen Ben-jamin said the district had chosen the in-between scenario assuming that the tax increase would fail but Proposition 98 would not be suspended, and the district would take a $15.8 million reduction.

To offset this budget cut, which is roughly equal to the losses of the last two years combined, the district’s plans involve re-ducing workforce, course schedules, and operating budgets, as well as con-solidating and eliminating programs and services.

At DVC, this calcula-tion means that for the school to reach its low-ered budget it will have to make a 6.2 percent

GOODBYEDrastic budget cuts enrage

hardest-hit departmentsSCOTT BABAFeatures editor

BUDGET, Page 2

?

2 Thursday, February 17, 2011The Inquirer - Diablo Valley College

NewsCALENDAR

POLICE BEAT

Feb. 9, 2011 DVC lot 4: Student admitted to keying another students ve-hicle because she took a park-ing space he was waiting for.

Feb. 7, 2011DVC Library Men’s Restroom: Civil Rights, Interfere with, Property Damage , Unknown subject(s) wrote “Hate” graffiti on the restroom walls.

Feb. 6, 2011DVC Math Building: Unknown subject(s) spray painted graffiti on the math building.

Feb.5, 2011DVC Performing Arts: An adult female fell in the PAC and injured her neck. Fire and AMR responded; however, the victim refused medical treat-ment or transportation.

Feb. 3, 2011DVC Performing Arts Center: Unknown person(s) had been sleeping in the PAC. One non-student was found in the building without any explana-tion for being in there.

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INFORMATION

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For more information call 925.685.1230 ext 2313 or stop by The Inquirer office.

COACHESfrom Pg. 1

Contact Mike Alfieri at [email protected]

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Thursday, Feb. 17Last Day to Drop a Full-Term Class Without a “W” First Inter Club Council (ICC) MeetingStudent Life Conference Room3:30-5 p.m. Tuesday, Feb. 22Academy of Art Campus Representative DVC Quad 10:30-1 p.m. Whistling Vivaldi ProjectThe Angry Eye with Jane Elliott Meets in BFL-CCC12:30 p.m. College Success WorkshopStudent Life Conference Room 5:30-6:45 p.m. Wednesday, Feb. 23UC Berkeley Representative Counseling Building 9:30-3 p.m. DVC Athletic Hall of Fame Ceremony Tickets are $40 each Norsemen 6 p.m. Thursday, Feb. 24SF State International Rep Counseling Building 10 a.m. - 12 p.m. Friday, Feb. 25Focus The NationClean Energy ForumPerforming Arts Center11 - 5 p.m.

Monday, Feb. 28College CouncilCommunity Conference Room 2 - 3:30 p.m. Tuesday, March 1Drama-AuditionsThe Last Days of Judas Iscariot 6-10 p.m. Wednesday, March 2Walk Like An EgyptianStudent, community, facultyassembly & marchDVC Quad 12:30 p.m. Whistling Vivaldi ProjectUnderstanding Learning Disabilities BFL-CCC2 p.m.

Thursday, March 3Saint Mary’s College Campus RepresentativeTransfer Center10-12 p.m.

BUDGETfrom Pg. 1

Chris St. Pierre and Fiona Daniel create a sculpture in their 3D art class, part of the art program which is taking a heavy hit.

KATE VAASILYEVA / The Inquirer

Contact SCOTT BABA at [email protected]

DVC is one of 18 college cam-puses across the nation hosting a Clean Energy Forum this month on Feb. 25 at the Pleasant Hill campus.

The Clean Energy Forum is sponsored by a non-profit orga-nization called Focus the Nation which strives to "empower a gen-eration to power a nation."

Architecture major and student coordinator Carla Bernal hopes that attendees will enjoy them-selves, but she is more concerned that each person leaves with a better understanding of what the future holds.

"I want the event to spark en-

thusiasm," said Bernal. "Green energy is the future and it's some-thing we should keep in mind."

Registration is free and will begin at 10:30 a.m. in the PAC Theater Area. Members of the community, as well as students, are invited to attend.

Fabiola Ramirez, DVC's Focus the Na-tion representative and lead coordina-tor of the event, has been planning the forum with a small group of DVC stu-dents and engineering professor Joe Valdez since October 2010.

The event will consist of three

informational sessions and a pan-el discussion in the PAC Theater.

Each session will include a 45 minute moderated conversation with guest speakers and a 10 min-ute question-and-answer period.

Confirmed speakers include Stanford student Teryn Norris, Director of Americans for En-

ergy Leadership.The final event

of the day will be a 70 minute panel discussion which will consist of local government offi-cials. Both State Sen. Mark DeSaulnier and Rep. George Miller have both been approached to participate in the panel but neither

have confirmed they will attend.Attendees will have the oppor-

tunity to place their questions in

a designated box throughout the day, and selected questions will be asked.

"The goal is to come up with solutions for our current road-blocks," said Ramirez.

Student coordinator Keith Montes also hopes to reach out to other clubs for endorsements and volunteers. "Students need to recognize the power of coming together and bringing about real change," he said.

The event will include work-shops in PAC rooms 101, 102, and 106. Topics covered in these smaller seminars include healthy eating and recycling. There will also be a farmers market set up in the Student Union Quad from 12-4 p.m. To register online for the event visit, www.focusthen-ation.org/forums.

DVC hosts clean energy eventEvent hopes to increase green energy awareness on campus

LINA PERVEZSenior writer

Contact Lina Pervez at [email protected]

FABIOLA RAMIREZ

tention that their planned ac-tions violated federal law,” Benko said in the release.

Last year, the Inquirer re-ported about the suspension of track, tennis and cross-country. After a Title IX complaint filed by then tennis coach Benko and track coach Cruz, the college has reinstat-ed the programs but assigned new coaches.

Cruz and Benko filed com-plaint with both the college district and the U.S. Depart-ment of Education Office of Civil Rights on April 22. Jim Bradshaw at the Department of Education press office said the complaint filed in April alleged that “Contra Costa Community College District discriminates against female athletes based on sex at all three college campuses.”

According to the coaches, elimination of the programs would have created unequal gender opportunities among the sports programs and vio-late Title IX. Title IX requires schools that receive federal funding to provide compa-rable athletic opportunities for men and women. The Office of Civil Rights found grounds for an investigation on all dis-trict campuses.

“DVC wasn’t comfortable with an investigation,” said Benko in a phone interview. DVC reinstated the programs in June 2010 in order to com-ply with Title IX.

In July, the Athletic De-partment terminated the em-ployment of Cruz and Benko from their coaching positions. The Athletic Department filled the positions with full-time employees from within the department.

The lawsuit, filed on Nov. 1, also states that the coach’s First Amendment rights were violated and their reputations defamed.

It claims the coaches were told directly by Worsley there would be negative conse-quences for filing a complaint and that the coaches tried to provide other solutions, such as working without pay. Benko and Cruz are seeking unspecified compensation for emotional distress, humilia-tion and other damages.

One expert thinks the coaches may have a hard time winning their case. “Proving that they suffered adverse em-ployment consequences -- in this case, not being rehired -- as a result is a little trickier be-cause usually there is no direct evidence that that is the case” said Erin Buzuvis, an associate professor of law at Western New England College School of Law who specializes in Title IX cases. “But courts will accept circumstantial evi-dence of retaliatory motive in circumstances where the plaintiff can prove that the employer’s stated reason is ac-tually a pretext, a cover up for the real reason.”

On Feb. 9, both parties agreed to mediation within 120 days, though Benko and Cruz will get a chance to prove their case in front of judge and jury if no agreement is met.

“We will not let them get away with this type of retalia-tion,” Hunter Pyle said.

Even with the school’s co-operation with Title IX com-pliance training through 2013, no sports programs are safe from cuts, said Tim Leong, di-rector of community relations at CCCD.

“When evaluating the bud-get and with more expected cuts, nothing is off the table,” he said.

time equivalent faculty, which is the amount of faculty work-hours the school is capable of paying for.

The first attempt to address the 2011-2012 course schedule has left some programs out in the cold.

At Feb. 8 Faculty Senate meet-ing, several department heads ex-pressed their concern at the choic-es the administration has made.

Among the programs at risk, department representatives re-ported that art would lose ap-proximately 25 percent of their classes and drama 32 percent; horticulture would take a 50 per-cent reduction, and the choices of class cuts in engineering would effectively eliminate the engineering transfer program.

Horticulture instructor Stew-art Winchester pointed out that all the at-risk classes in the hor-ticulture program were classes required to complete certificates.

The drama department would also be taking a hard hit with the proposed schedule, losing basic acting and directing classes. “We will cease to function as a de-partment,” said Beth McBrien, drama instructor and depart-ment chair for the performing arts. “With the level of cuts [it has received], the drama depart-ment will die within the year.”

Michele Krup, art instruc-tor and department chair for art and photography,, said that the proposed cuts would completely eliminate the photography and print-making programs, and that all the classes in the art program in general work towards a cer-tificate or degree. “This will no longer be the art department you know at DVC,” said Krup.

The Faculty Senate passed a

resolution for more faculty in-volvement in the scheduling deci-sions, by splitting the 6.2 percent reductions in two, letting every de-partment take a 3 percent across-the-board reduction and creating a scheduling task force drawn from both faculty and academic management to resolve where the rest of the reductions should go.

Peter Garcia, interim Presi-dent of DVC, praised the

resolution but also indicated that some of the conversa-tions were naive and premature.

“You make assumptions on how to fix the schedule if the cuts aren’t as bad as they seem,” said Garcia at the close of the meet-ing, “but you have nothing there assuming things won’t get better.”

News 3The Inquirer - Diablo Valley CollegeThursday, February 17, 2011

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VIVALDIfrom Pg. 1 Family starts

memorial scholarship

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The family of John Spanger, a former DVC English professor who died on Nov. 18, started a scholarship in his honor.

The scholarship is intended to continue to spread his passion for English at the same place he taught. The $500 scholarship would go to a DVC student planning on transferring with an interest in obtaining an English degree. The student must have maintained a 3.0 GPA, among other criteria.

The scholarship will be avail-able in Fall 2011. More infor-mation will be provided by the scholarship office.

Spanger transferred from DVC to Chico State University to receive his degree in English.

When he started teaching, DVC was his top choice and he worked for the Contra Costa Community College District for over 40 years. In 2001, Spanger retired from Diablo Valley Col-lege where he had been an Eng-lish professor since 1969.

He taught courses including developmental reading and writ-ing, transfer composition, and literature. Spanger also served on many English committees and was the chair of the English

division for two semesters. “As division chair, he was fair,

organized and a voice of reason,” English instructor Irene Men-egas said. “What I remember most about him was his won-derful sense of hu-mor; he al-ways left me laughing.”

Surrounded by his family, he died in his Sonoma home. He was 74.

“People really miss him and remember him very fondly,” Dean of English Ellen Kruse said.

Donations to honor and re-member Spanger can be sent to: The John Spanger Memorial Scholarship fund, Diablo Valley College, 321 Golf Club Road, Pleasant Hill, CA, 94523.

Inquirer copy editor Mike Alfieri contributed to this ar-ticle.

SCOTT ANNISStaff writer

JOHN SPANGER

Contact Scott Annis at [email protected]

Contact Kevin Hayes at [email protected]

Lisa Orta, staff development coordinator, discusses the achievement gap during a “Whistling Vivaldi” presentation on Feb. 10 in the BFL conference room.

KATE VASILYEVA / The Inquirer

Upcoming “Whistling Vivaldi” Events

PRESENTATIONS / DISCUSSIONS: THE ANGRY EYECOLLECTING WISDOM: FACULTY ROUND TABLECOLLECTING WISDOM: STUDENT SERVICE PROVIDERS ROUND TABLECOLLECTING WISDOM: STUDENT ROUND TABLE

FILMS / VIDEOS: HOW DIFFICULT CAN THIS BE?SMALL ISLANDCRASHTHE BUTCH FACTOR

Presentations and discussions are held Tuesdays from 12:30 - 1:30 p.m. in the BFL CCC. Films and videos are shown Wednesdays from 2 - 4 p.m. in the BFL CCC.

test. One reminded them of their ethnic identity, another reminded them of their gender and the last did neither.

The goal was to see if the stereotypes “Asians are good at math” and “women are bad at math” would affect test scores.

The women reminded of their ethnicity performed noticeably better than the women reminded of their gender. The term Steele used to describe this is “stereo-type threat.”

The achievement gap in terms of race at DVC shows Asians and whites outperforming Lati-nos and blacks.

Fixing the gap is especially important in California where Latinos will constitute half the working-age population in 2040, according to an Institute for Higher Education Leadership and Policy study done in October 2010.

Emily Stone of the College Success Inquiry Project feels ste-reotype threat is a contributor to the gap but that other factors

play a role as well. These include things such as

inequality in public K-12 school-ing, language barriers and low-income students often having to spend more time outside of

school earning money than oth-ers.

Even if stereotype threat isn’t the whole answer, Stone thinks it can be helpful to address it. “If there’s something we can do in just our way of thinking about students and interacting with students and thinking about our own selves… then that’s pretty powerful, that’s part of how you make change,” Stone said.

Douglas Phenix, a black stu-dent and member of the CSIP, didn’t like to hear that he could succeed at school but still feel forced into those numbers.

“I went to two junior colleges before coming to DVC and I was pretty much in those numbers. I wasn’t succeeding, I wasn’t in-terested in class, I kind of knew what I wanted to maybe do, but I didn’t have no goal or direction,

no influence, no advice from no-body…,” said Phenix.

He changed his mind mainly because of EOPS (Extended Opportunities Programs and Services) as well as support from Student Life.

“It’s the support that they ac-tually care about your education and that makes me care more about my education… some-body’s caring about something I’m trying to do so it brings a bigger value to it. That was the biggest thing that changed for me, support and just my mind frame,” said Phenix.

For much more information, visit the Whistling Vivaldi website at: http://www.dvc.edu/events/events/whistlingvivaldi.htm

Visit

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As they wind down after the third Aspiring Mind Film Festival, edit new projects, and search for a distributor for their film “Marbles,” the DVC Film Club stays busy as they look for more members in the new semester. Despite his active schedule, club organizer David Sherr took some time to sit down with The Inquirer to talk about film production, inspiration, and the club’s future.

I: How was the DVC film Club founded?DS: It was founded three semesters ago by Seth Craven. They produced two movies, “The Last Lonely Saturday” and “Marbles.”

I: Is your focus on short film only, or do you do longer features as well?DS: To us, a long feature . . . is like 12 minutes. A four minute video basically will take a day of planning, a half day to shoot, and a day and a half to edit. It then needs to be compressed to be af-fordable. So a day of planning, a day to shoot, a day of editing.

I: How is the club related to the Aspiring Minds Film Festival?DS: It’s our own film festival; we just had our third one. We’re . . . into putting on the festival. The real value of the schools is not the algebra or films, but the networking and commodity knowledge. The club provides those social networks, not Fa-cebook… but, you know, “Realbook.” Real life social networks where the club becomes a focal point and it grows.

I: Were your films received well at the festi-val? DS: Yeah, we’ve been very successful. What’s funding us now is the $3 per head we charge, and we showed 16 films last time.

I: What standard equipment do film club members use to shoot on?DS: Some of us use really dynamite cameras – some of the guys bring their own. We use Canon HDs and Sony Excels, but they’re not HD, they’re standard definition DVs.

I: Which films and directors do you take in-spiration from?DS: It all depends; we all have our own muses. Stanley Kubrick, Coppola. I pay homage to all the masters. I used those birds in the end of my film, like Hitchcock’s “The Birds.”

I: Which genres do you want to work with in the future?DS: We do lots of different stuff. We have music videos in mind. Natalie’s going to play the Lily of the West, I’m going to sing it. It’s a story, we’ll take the shots, it will be like “Repulsive Bastards.”

I: What future projects should we look for-ward to seeing next?DS: I would say that you’ll have to stay tuned, be-cause the runaway winner of the second Aspiring Minds [Film Festival, Mitchell Kell, who was the critical and mass winner of that show, is going to basically head up the club as presidential chair and potential director. He’ll have a major impact.

DVC Film Club continues to grow

COLBY CARTERStaff writer

Two out of two Inquirer editors think that they might have preferred watching a different movie.

Contact Colby Carter at [email protected]

In 140 AD, Roman legionnaire Marcus Flavius Aquila (Channing Tatum), accompanied by his British slave Esca (Jamie Bell), tries to find the truth about his father’s apparent death while searching for a sought-after relic, the Golden Eagle. The story follows Aquila as he commands a fort of the Legion’s outcasts, recovers from a battle and meets Esca.

I have one word to say about the new gladiator thriller, “The Eagle”: meh.

After seeing the trailer I was somewhat excited, but thought it would be just another movie with a whole bunch of killing and the possibility of a deep story line.

Unfortunately, after watching “The Eagle,” I thought, “That was decent.” Ultimately, this was the movie’s down-fall.

There were about four peaks of action throughout that were thrilling enough. I was waiting for a bloody-mcblooderton kill-fest. But no.

I didn’t think that Channing Tatum could top his previ-ous blockbusters, like “Dear John” and “Step Up,” but he was surprisingly good. However, some of the other actors tendency towards speaking as if they were in a 1980’s of-fice ruined it for me.

While Tatum and his costar, Jamie Bell, are travelling through the open terrain, some spots were interesting and beautiful and some were ugly and dead enough to fit the mood.

There was a decent story, a decent amount of fights between gladiators and barbarians, a decent score and a decent amount of homoerotic tension, which adds up to a wholly decent film.

Throughout the film, there was nothing spectacularly bad or good. Everything - from the acting to the back-drops to the music to the makeup - was disappointingly average.

All in all, “The Eagle” was so average it was boring and forgettable.

When the credits started rolling, someone started to clap. I would have slapped him if I wasn’t two seconds from a boredom-induced coma.

My opinion of Focus Feature’s “The Eagle” can be summed up in the sentence, “Yup, that was a movie.”

Everything in the film is done well enough that I wasn’t offended by its mere existence, but, on the other hand, I won’t be paying to see this movie again anytime soon. It was fun for the 114 minutes it lasted, but I don’t want to turn my experience with “The Eagle” into a 228 minute one.

The film has everything checked off on the list of successful action movie techniques; the acting is decent, the soundtrack sets the tone for each scene well, and the cinematography uses that surefire trick of making ac-tion scenes interesting by strapping the camera to a paint shaker.

At the same time, this isn’t a soundtrack that will be mentioned in the same sentence as a John Williams score, and Channing Tatum isn’t going to win any awards for his portrayal of Marcus Flavius Aquila.

Aside from an oddly placed and mood breaking “bro-ment” to close out the film, I don’t really have anything in particular that I can point to and say, “This is the reason why I didn’t love this movie.”

“The Eagle” was competent. Nothing more, nothing less.

But that raises the question; does every movie need to be an amazing billion dollar box office hit and win 10 Oscars for it to be worth watching? In the end, there are many movies that deserve to be erased from existence that have made more money at the box office than “The Eagle” ever will. The “Scary Movie” series says hi.

JULIUS REAEditor in chief

TROY PATTONManaging editor

Are you a writer? An artist? A photographer? Do you have any interest in investigative journalism, web design, page layout or editing? Are you amazing? Or at least kind of awesome?

If any of the above applies to you, maybe you should think about joining

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Journalism 126 is an open enrollment class available to join any time during the semester. Meets every Monday, Tuesday, and Thursday 12:30-2:20 in H-102.

SENIOR STAFF WRITERS Brian Donovan, Taliah Mirmalek, Lina PervezSTAFF WRITERS Scott Annis, Pablo Caballero, Colby Carter, Lisa Diaz, Brittney Griffin Stephen Langsam, Alaiyan Violetta, Mark RyabstevPHOTOGRAPHERS Izzy Bajalia, Stevie Chow, Mari-ana Ramos, Kate VasilyevaDESIGNERS & CARTOONISTS Yaeko Takada, Niki HicksINSTRUCTIONAL LAB COORDINATOR Ann StenmarkADVISER Mary Mazzocco

EDITOR IN CHIEF Julius ReaMANAGING EDITOR Troy PattonNEWS EDITOR Favio DelgadilloFEAUTRES EDITOR Scott BabaOPINIONS EDITOR Sean WilkeySPORTS EDITOR Gerardo RecinosPHOTO CHIEF Alec GrahamCOPY EDITOR Mike Alfieri Kevin Hayes

Opinions 5The Inquirer - Diablo Valley CollegeThursday, February 17, 2011

Editorial Board Staff

• Phone: 925.685.1230 ext. 2313 • Fax: 925.681.3045 • Email: [email protected] • Website: www.TheInquirerOnline.com • Printed Every Two Weeks •

Do you think that DVC has a problem with stereotyping?

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THE INQUIRER

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The Inquirer is published Thursday mornings during the school year by the journalism students of Diablo Valley College. All unsigned articles appearing on the opinions page are editorials and reflect a two-thirds majority opinion of the editorial staff. All signed columns and cartoons are the opinions of the writer or artists and not necessarily those of The Inquirer, Diablo Valley College or Contra Costa Community College District

Interviewer: Brittney GriffinPhotographer: Mariana Ramos

“I don’t think it’s an issue, because there is a variety of

people in all shapes and sizes. I think everyone is accepting,

because we all come from many different places.”

JEMMA DAVIES, 17Nursing

“I don’t really think it is a big

deal. If anything, people are having

difficulty opening up.”

MEGAN MALMGREN, 20English

“No, I don’t think it’s an issue, because I don’t get it from faculty or anyone. I

have friends from many races and cultures.”

OSIRIS HERNANDEZ, 21 Mechanical Engineering

“[Yes]. As an adult student, there are times when I’m

perceived as different. People assume I am here for extra-

curricular activities.”

ALAN KINGSLEY, 57Music

“No, I don’t think so. I do not see cliques or anything, and everything seems di-

verse.”

SOPHIA TANG, 18Undeclared

Opinions

Why are white people afraid to talk to black people?

While killing time to see “Black Swan,” my aunt and I re-cently discussed how white people acted when talking to black people about sensitive subjects. Of course, we had no definite an-swers.

While ironically eat-ing a “Black and White” sundae in a restaurant, we decided to ask our waiter some of our race re-lated questions.

I asked him why some white people feel uncomfortable say-ing certain words or phrases like

the term “black.” His response: White people

don’t want to make a situation worse by talking about some-

thing taboo.Surprisingly, this was an hon-

est, interesting point that made me think.

In the midst of Black History Month and DVC’s “Whistling Vivaldi” project, I’m asking my-

self, does talking about an issue make it worse?

The Inquirer published an ar-ticle last fall about the achieve-

ment gap between black and white students.

Now, we’re covering the “Whistling Vival-di” project, which is making a point

that students will act like the ste-reotypes projected onto them.

I’m wondering if the combi-nation of endorsing that article, making sure that the Whistling Vivaldi project is covered and writing this column is making

the black achievement gap a big-ger problem.

Actually, this reminds me of the suicides of gay teenagers last year.

In an Associated Press article about Tyler Clementi, experts said that his highly publicized

suicide may have persuaded oth-ers to take their own lives.

The more the death was dis-cussed, the more acceptable sui-cide may have seemed.

Is the DVC community solidi-fying the stereotypes that should be solved by addressing them more often?

It’s not my intent to disap-prove of the “Whistling Viv-aldi” project, The Inquirer or the achievement gap’s significance.

But, as a black student jour-nalist, I question if I am helping the problem or exacerbating it.

“kAbOrin9 ..!!! miS oLL d hApi timES..!! mZ. LoneLy gUrL.. :-( :-( niD sUm eLp”

If you had a problem under-standing the previous sentence, fear not.

Through a loose understanding of ancient Egyptian hieroglyphics and my trusty code wheel, I’ve man-aged to decipher it.

It roughly reads, “The mur-der of the English language,” or something about being sad; my code wheel doesn’t have a trans-lation for emoticons.

And yes, that is an actual sen-

tence I found on the Internet written by what I would assume is a human being. Then again, all bets are off when your sentences look like a cokehead was practic-

ing his craft by making lines out of alphabet soup.

The longer you spend on the Internet the more familiar you may be with the type of system-atic “character” assassination that seems to be more and more

commonplace.What current Internet speech

has devolved into makes me shudder and, at the same time, fearful for what the world would

be like if this type of speech became the norm.

Simple things like using the word “r” instead of “are” and forgetting to

capitalize the word “i” can be at-tributed to pure laziness, because reaching that shift key obviously requires a momentous effort.

However, egregious misspell-ing and complete disregard for capitalization or punctuation

make me wonder how one could type like this without deliberate effort.

How does a person decide to capitalize both L’s in the word “LoneLy?”

That takes effort. That takes conscious thought. Someone has

to say, “You know what, I’m to-tally going to capitalize these two letters for absolutely no reason.”

While I’m well aware that this rant makes me sounds like a crotchety old man, the English language has been honed and de-veloped over hundreds of years and any changes have been slow and methodical.

But if the English language is devolving into this form we see above, I want to get off the world now. I don’t belong here anymore. Also, you kids get off of my lawn.

Away with words: The Web is killing English

TROY PATTONManaging editor

But if the English language is devolving into this form we see

above, I want to get off the world now. I don’t belong here anymore.

“

”

JULIUS REAEditor-in-chief

How do we talk about this?

But, as a black student journalist, I question if I am

helping the problem or exacerbating it.

“

”

Contact Julius Rea at [email protected]

Contact Troy Patton at [email protected]

Budget cuts bleed education dryMassive budget cuts and new

class schedules over the past few weeks have kept the DVC administration busy, and several “extra-curricular” courses are suffering for it.

Many students would agree that the cuts need to stop, and continued budget cuts look like they will affect future transfer rates.

Engineering, for example, bolsters the highest transfer rate of any other major at DVC, and with the new budget cuts for the 2011-2012 school year, it could be wiped out altogether.

The enrollment of interna-tional students, who net into the school over $1 million annu-ally to take courses such as en-gineering, could steadily decline or even enroll at other schools altogether.

Community college is not about what can be cut, but what can be offered.

Opportunity is found to be essential in our educational sys-tem, as clearly reflected in DVC’s mission statement: “DVC is pas-sionately committed to student learning through the intellectual, scientific, artistic, psychological, and ethical development of its diverse student body”.

DVC’s administration seems to be more adamantly commit-

ted to cutting classes in the arts, engineering, biology and physi-cal recreation department than preserving or expanding them.

DVC’s administration, while removing whole courses from the class roster, has removed the process to cut these classes all together. No evaluation. No grading process. Not even the faculty senate was given time to advise on this major academic change.

In a recent Faculty Senate meeting on Feb. 1st, discussed how prerequisite and placement courses, which originally helped fulfill degree and certificate re-quirements, are being cut.

A joint cut across all classes was proposed at the follow-ing faculty senate meeting last Tuesday.

The faculty agreed that a 3 percent cut from all departments and the creation of a new sched-uling task force could help allevi-ate the situation the administra-tion has put the student body in.

The new commission which would include Integration Coun-cil members, a united faculty rep. and a member of academic management would give teachers the representation in scheduling and budget meetings that, until recently ignored by the admin-istration, is entitled to them by

article 10+1 of the California Education Code.

In joining the student body in their struggle with the budget cuts, teachers at DVC are helping guide students and taking a stand against the cuts.

Though the Faculty Senate’s proposed changes should help DVC in the short term, students in the long term will suffer.

Their suffering originates in a core problem within how our school is run.

At its core, DVC should fos-ter a community of opportunity,

and in light of financial pressure, that opportunity has diminished in favor of an oppressive form of education.

This system of education is gradually manifesting in the ris-ing class prices and budget cuts, similar in many respects to an ac-counting process.

This banking form of educa-tion, as explained by Paulo Fri-ere, molds students to become “receiving objects” that are un-able to “grow or mature” beyond the limits given to them by their educational “banks”.

Our educational banks our bankrupt; as students, we need an alternative.

DVC’s administration has made their position on our school mission clear.

Their budget cuts have caused our student body and our fac-ulty to become divisive on what should be cut; how has now be-come a topic of debate.

To DVC students, education is not something to be debated nor divided. Education is essen-tial, and what is essential should be made available to everyone.

SEAN WILKEY / The Inquirer


Sports

Look above head athletic train-er Wendy Weber’s office in the training room. There are stickers from Oklahoma State, University of Utah, UCLA and Michigan State, among others.

Those aren’t her favorite schools and she didn’t attend any of them; her students did.

Those stickers represent DVC’s sports medicine students making their way to the college of their choice, looking for degrees in sports medicine, personal train-ing, coaching and sports manage-ment.

DVC’s sports medicine pro-gram started out very small and continues to expand. Mike Chisar, sports medicine program direc-tor, became the head trainer in 1995 when one sports medicine class was available.

By 2005, Weber took over his training duties because sports medicine classes become so pop-ular.

“In some cases we added 5 or

6 students over the maximum,” Chisar said.

There are currently 17 sports medicine courses, excluding pre-requisite or physical education courses.

Most students in the program are looking to pursue a career in one of the fields.

Some, however, are in it just to find out more about their injuries or to be better prepared in case of an accident.

Tim Beasley and Bryan Gima-Derrow are both students in the program and love it. They both started because they wanted to help people and stay involved in sports, and they turned it into a career path.

In fact, the sports medicine program’s main focus is to get students transferred and to help

start their careers. Some students have had in-

ternships with the Raiders and local doctors.

Also, previous students have become physical therapists, nurses, physician assistants, para-medics, ER technicians and even school teachers or trainers.

Four degrees are available at DVC through the program in

sports medicine, personal train-ing, coaching, and sports man-agement. Three certificates are available in personal training, coaching, and group training.

All sports medicine students start out in introductory classes. These classes cover basic medi-cal techniques and termwinology. They go over diseases and treat-ment of basic injuries.

Clinical classes, which cover first aid and rehab techniques, are offered for advanced students who want to go into the sports medicine field.

Students learn how to treat dif-ferent injuries in lecture courses and then get to apply the process-es in the training room.

Weber supervises these ad-vanced students, which is a de-manding task as she also cares for

around 350 athletes. Advanced students attend

home sporting events and away football games; they are also available for every practice and an hour before and an hour after every event.

Beasley said the worst injury he has seen during a game is “either a dislocated thumb or a dislocat-ed knee.” They aren’t the hardest to treat but they look the worst.

Students looking for a degree in a sports medicine-related of the fields related to sports medi-cine are at a major advantage. Sports medicine student Skylar Belsher said she wanted to “help people continue doing what they love.”

Sports med students cure what ails athletes

Ellis’ All-Star snub was all in the hands of fans

With the clock winding down and the team trailing by two points, the Warriors gave the ball to their All-Star, Monta Ellis.

He stands dribbling at the top of the key eyeing the shot clock above the basket. Ellis makes his move to the hoop and sinks the basket.

The fans at Oracle Arena jump to their feet as the War-riors beat (insert opposing team here). This has been the story many times this year.

“A Great Time Out,” the recent marketing campaign for the Golden State Warriors, is finally coming true.

In the off-season, the War-riors made key additions like David Lee and Dorrell Wright, the league’s leading three-point shooter.

Now, the floor has opened up more for one of the most amazing players the NBA has to offer.

So, why hasn’t Ellis received the nod to what should have been his first All-Star game in Los Angeles this year?

Is it because of high-flying dunk machine Blake Griffin or the consistent double-double stat sheet of Kevin Love?

No: the real culprits in this All-Star mess are the fans, who can vote as many times as possi-ble, in this case, for Yao Ming.

Yao, who had a season end-ing injury, led all Western Con-ference centers and forwards with over 990,000 votes. The only problem is he can’t play, but he still gets a roster spot for the All Star game.

So what gives? Maybe it is be-cause Ellis’ team has a losing re-cord, or maybe it is because he plays more minutes then almost any other player in the NBA, so his stats are exaggerated.

Either way, Ellis is having his best season of his career.

My suggestion is the NBA should change the way votes are tallied and give the in-stadi-um votes more weight then the votes turned in online.

In turn giving those players a better chance of going to the All-Star weekend in the future.

As for the rest of the season, Ellis needs a healthy chip on his shoulder and use the All-Star snub to light a fire to lead the Golden State Warriors back to the promise land, the playoffs.

Vikings sail into playoffs

‘Out of Bounds” is written by Sports editor Gerardo Recinos as well as staff writers Scott Annis and Stephen Langsam. It is updated biweekly on The Inquirer Online.

A win would mean that the Vi-kings would clinch a spot in the playoffs as well as a Big 8 Confer-ence championship.

Standing in their way, however, were the Consumes River Hawks, who came into Pleasant Hill Feb. 11 as the only team to hand the Vikings a loss in league play this season.

The Vikings started fast with an 8-2 run, draining two three-pointers and working their ball movement around the perimeter with crisp passes.

The Hawks mounted a run after a few good offensive series, causing Viking head coach Steve Coccimiglio to call a timeout and talk to his team.

Out of the timeout, the message seemed to be slow the game down because the Vikings slow methodi-cal ball move-ment help free up guardJordan Estrada for a three ball.

Estrada caught fire from downtown by hitting three after three.

With Coccimiglio barking in-structions, they continued shoot-ing the ball well from beyond the arc.

The Vikings started to build a lead in the midst of a 17-0 run that had the score at 27-9. With the Hawks struggling on the boards, DVC’s big men domi-nated with turnovers and blocked shots on the rare occasion that Consumes River penetrated.

Even when the Hawks were able to get a rebound and run with it, a trailing defender caught up and was able to set his feet and draw the charge.

Despite the Hawks’ solid run to end the half, the Vikings held a 43-27 point lead thanks in part to great shooting from guards Brian Goins and Jordan Estrada.

After the first half, Consumes came out shooting but, despite a few missed opportunities includ-ing a fast break that was cut off with an excellent block, they still trailed by double digits.

Five minutes in, Consumes River was pushing and pen-etrating with good strength and points in the paint, bringing the lead down to only six.

The Consumes defense blan-keted Jordan Estrada, not allowing him to get any open driving lanes or open shots.

“They had a guy staying on my jer-sey, coming off screens,” Estrada said, “but it leaves guys like Brian Goins open, and he had a great night. I don’t care how

much I score as long as we win.” A few costly turnovers by

Consumes slowed down the Hawks’ momentum and handed it to the Vikings.

Goins stepped up and hit a few key jumpers, including a stomach punching three ball that extended the lead back to nine after Con-sumes had cut it down to a two possession game.

That’s when Goins took over. With Estrada being double

teamed, Goins was able to step

up and hit jumper after jumper eventually giving the Vikings their conference championship with an 81-66 win.

After the game head coach Steve Coccimiglio said that he was very proud of his team’s ac-complishment, but that didn’t mean that his team would coast

through the two remaining games.

“The momentum is something you don’t ever want to give up,” Coccimiglio said. “We have a lot of room for improvement, and we gotta keep our foot on the gas pedal.”

Payne reiterated Coccimiglio’s

thoughts, saying “We want to fin-ish off strong and see what [play-off] seed we get. The goal is to head down to Ventura and get to the Final Four.”

“We want to finish off strong and see what [playoff] seed we get. The goal is to head to Ventura and get to the Final

Four.”

Zach PayneForward

“We want to help people continue doing what they

love.”

Skylar BesharSports Medicine student

Katie Baker directs sports medicine students in an emergency drill in the Sports Medicine Training class.

ALEC GRAHAM / THE INQUIRER

Rafael Carter blocks a layup while Brian Goins prepares to e the rebound in a Vikings 81-66 win.

DVC sports medicine program teaches real-lifekinesiologyand itsapplication

GERARDO RECINOSSports editor

STEPHEN LANGSAMStaff writer

SCOTT ANNISStaff writer

ALEC GRAHAM / THE INQUIRER

Contact SCOTT ANNIS at [email protected]

Contact GERARDO RECINOS at grecinos@TheInquirerOnline.

com

Contact STEPHEN LANGSAM at slangsam@TheInquirerOn-

line.com

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