The Observer, Fall 2022 - Issue 2

Burgstock shines a light on up and coming talent

Performers and attendees reflect on experiences

Shooting in Seattle U-District leaves four UW students injured

A shooting incident occurred in the vicinity of 43rd Street and University Way near the Univer sity of Washington (UW) Seattle campus that left four students injured, according to a UW Alert system notification sent out early on the morning of Oct. 2.

The four injured students were transported to Harborview Medical Center for “non-life threatening-injuries,” according to a UW News release.

UW President Ana Mari Cauce issued a statement in response to the tragedy which stated, “We are grateful the students’ inju ries were not life-threatening … Regardless of the severity of the physical injuries, events like this are life-changing and rever berate both in the lives of those most immediately affected and our entire community.”

Dozens of parked cars lined N. Alder Street as the electric sound of local bands and the illumination of rainbow stage lights permeated the night air on Oct. 1 during a free community event titled Burgstock.

The event included a culmina tion of several blossoming mu sic acts and music department students who came together to create an immersive experience for the town.

Acts included the following groups: Melancholyrh, Plantfood,

House of Ash, Tinted Red, Fluke Brothers and Cigman Fraud.

Event planning was spearhead ed by Ellensburg High School (EHS) and running start students Corgan Smith and Elian Calderon who make up the group Fluke Brothers, a rock duo. The pair said having live music in the park was their focus.

“We just wanted to invite tons of people, especially with college coming into town,” Cal deron said. “We wanted to get some exposure.”

According to Smith, the sense of community that was built

through the event was a highlight. “We enjoyed getting to know all the bands,” Smith said.

While Fluke Brothers are only brothers in concept, Plantfood is a local duo made up of Gus and Milo Crane, two brothers and EHS students who had an ex perimental, improvisational ap proach to their set.

“It was fun to really let loose, especially because we couldn’t see the audience,” Gus said. “I didn’t feel as much pressure.”

Milo said their performance was an emotional release that allowed them to express their feelings.

“The connection with the audi ence was almost stronger, because people were just moving and vib ing,” Milo said. “I could see glow sticks going on and I thought that was really exhilarating.”

According to Andrew Parker, Cigman Fraud frontman and se nior in the Theatre Department, this was the most intimacy he had ever felt with an audience. He said a lot of behind-the-scenes preparation went into it that the audience wasn’t able to see.

APOYO struggles to find food donations

Allied People Offering YearRound Outreach (APOYO), a local food bank, is struggling to find meat donations.

“Northwest Harvest hasn’t been sending the usual chicken that we usually get on our Wednesday deliveries,” Jesús Erasto-García, an administrative assistant at APOYO, said.

According to Erasto-García, a board member has been buying “chicken for some of our commit ted volunteers,” along with over $200 in hamburger meat.

Erasto-García said APOYO serves approximately 250-300 fam

ilies monthly, so food donations are vital to them.

“People can donate food at our of fice during our office hours, which is Monday through Friday 10 a.m. to 3 p.m.,” Erasto-García said.

Hope Amason, APOYO board member, director of the Museum of Culture and Environment and associate professor of Anthropolo gy, said students at CWU can help with this food donation shortage.

“We really need students to in tern [for APOYO] and they can find that internship on the Wildcat Career Network,” Amason said.

Amason said they are also looking for volunteers. Some of the work involves unloading their shipments, organizing and

taking inventory and making sure the food is stored at the right temperatures.

To help out APOYO, people can also make monetary donations.

“Food is a human right,” Ama son said. “Nobody should ever have to go hungry.”

Amason said while some peo ple may have enough money for food, they might not have enough for other bills; food banks help people reserve their money for other things.

“Maybe it allows you to get your cell phone turned back on, or maybe allows you to make sure that you can pay your in ternet bill so that you can do online school,” Amason said.

Amason said besides food dona tions they are hoping to expand APOYO off of CWU’s campus due to limited space.

To help do this they are holding a fundraising event called Fiesta Latina. This event will take place on Oct. 8 from 6-9 p.m. at the Kittitas Valley Event Center.

“We need to raise about $700,000. We’ve raised about $300,000 or so now but we’ve got $400,000 more to go,” Amason said. “It’s really intimidating.”

Additional volunteering in formation can be found by emailing Hope Amason at Hope. [email protected] and dona tion information can be found at apoyo-community.org

According to a report by Se attle police outlined by UW spokesperson Victor Balta, wit nesses reported two men having a fight outside a bar at approxi mately 1 a.m. which led one man to fire three to five gunshots. The Seattle police department is still investigating the incident.

In response to this scenar io, Assistant Chief of CWU Police Eric Twaites gave his perspective on the matter and what precautions CWU takes against shootings. When asked if he was worried about a sim ilar situation happening here, Twaites said, “absolutely not.”

“It’s always a risk and a concern that we don’t take for granted, so we train and prepare ourselves in case something like that does happen on campus,” Twaites said. “However we don’t have any indication or insight that something like that would hap pen on or around campus.”

According to Twaites, cam pus police collaborated with the Ellensburg Police Department, the Kittitas County Sheriff’s of fice and the Washington State Patrol to hold a Mass Casualty Incident drill at Brooks Library. He said the drill simulated a shooting by involving library staff and faculty while campus police practiced responding to the shooter and victims.

Beyond Our Coverage

Local

The Seattle Mariners have broken their 21 year playoff drought this week after a walk-off homerun by catcher Cal Raleigh at the bottom of the ninth against the Oakland A’s, according to mlb.com.

Two are dead after a Utility Terrain Ve hicle (UTV) flipped and crashed in Ya kima. According to the Yakima Herald-Re public, The UTV was spotted racing another vehicle by police who pursued the UTV.

After a settlement with three major opi oid distributors, Washington will be allocat ing $518 million to: King, Pierce, Snohomish, Spokane and Clark Counties, according to King5news.com.

The Observer Staff

Lead Editor

Katherine Camarata

News Editor

Evan Couch

Scene Editor

Morgana Carroll

Sports Editors

Jaceueline Hixssen

Isaac Hinson

Katlyn White

Designers

Staff Reporters

Faculty Adviser Jennifer Green

The Department of the Interior created a new policy on Oct. 3 that requires law en forcement officers from the Interior Depart ment, Bureau of Indian Affairs and Land Man agement, the US Fish and Wildlife Service and the National Park services to wear body cams and release footage according to Associated Press.

More than 200 people were infected with acute gastroenteritis while traveling through the Grand Canyon National Park, according to the Center for Disease Control.

Hurricane Ian’s death toll has risen to 101, while the current rescue count is at over 1,600 according to CNN.

The Brazilian Elections took place on Oct. 2. Neither of the top two candidates, former President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva and Presi dent Jair Bolsanaro, got enough votes to secure the election according to Associated Press.

Joe Biden and his administration pledge $60 million to Puerto Rico for storm relief after Hurricane Fiona hit last month, according to The Guardian.

At least 125 people are dead after a stam pede broke out at an Indonesian soccer match. Following the loss of Arema FC at Kanjuruhan stadium in Melang, the crowd broke into violence. Cops fired tear gas into the crowds in an effort to stop the violence, according to ESPN.

Letter from the Editor

Salutations CWU,

We hope all you new students are staying afloat, enjoying life on or around campus and settling into the ebb and flow of existence as we know it. This week, we covered events ranging from the 5k marathon (see pg. 5) to Burgstock (see pg. 4) to campus art and museum shows (see pg. 6/7), to Hurricane Fiona’s effect on Puerto Rico (pg. 11).

As we traverse the pages of this week’s issue together, we hope you’ll keep a few things on your heart and mind. Consider what Ellensburg or CWU culture you are involved with, what identities you claim in your life, and how these two things tie to gether. Are you able to be the fullest version of yourself? If not, how can you go about activating what you believe to be your truest self? How can you become the person you hope to be?

Take care and drink more water, Katherine Camarata

Sharing perspectives

awareness

CWU welcomes BIPOC students to campus

The Diversity and Equity Center (DEC) hosted a BIPOC student welcome event on the President’s lawn.

DEC Student Coordinator, Paige Hall, assisted in the planning of the welcome event.

“When I first got here, we didn’t have a BIPOC welcome event,” Hall said. “We didn’t have last week’s LGBTQ welcome event. If we had had them when I got here then I would’ve been able to acclimate a little bit easier. If I had been exposed to people who were similar to me and experiencing the same transitional worries that I was at the time.”

President Jim Wohlpart who was in attendance said, “Events like this help follow that culture of belonging.”

Students were able to participate in a variety of lawn games like cornhole and ladder toss and an extra large game of Jenga.

Another activity available for attendees was a “get to know you” game styled as a bingo card. The card was filled with icebreaking questions that promoted discussions and debates, such as whether they prefer dogs or cats.

The event was catered by CWU Dining Service and featured an assortment of various chips, sandwiches, egg rolls and other food options.

Several related organizations made appearances and provided speakers during the event, including but not limited to the Black Student Union, the Wildcat Pantry and the First Generation Student Organization.

DEC Program Manager, Justin Santoli, said he wanted students to know that there are people at CWU who understand the challenges that BIPOC students face coming into a new environment.

“Through places like the DEC, we try really hard to build those bridges,” Santoli said. “There is a community here, and the DEC is committed to helping students find that community.”

“It was really nice to get to meet some new people that are involved in creating diversity at the school,”

freshman Karissa Hanzy said. “It’s important to help branch out and make sure that people who are in those communities, like the LGBTQ community from last week and BIPOC … feel welcome and know that there is people like them.”

According to Andrew Parker, Cigman Fraud frontman and senior in the Theatre Department, this was the most intimacy he had ever felt with an audience. He said a lot of behind-the-scenes preparation went into it that the audience wasn’t able to see.

“People don’t understand the amount of coordination that goes into this,” Parker said. “We reached out to Chris Edgars and Soren Lundquist from the Theatre Department. Without those two, Burgstock would have never happened.”

Edgars is a music student at CWU and served as the stage manager, while Lundquist is also a music student and was the sound tech and board operator for the show.

Parker said seeing all the local artists perform and “pour their heart and soul out into music in front of a live audience” was inspiring.

Wyatt Martin, rhythm guitarist of Cigman Fraud and CWU alumni, said the music scene in Ellensburg can be limited which is why events like this are necessary.

“In Ellensburg, there’s not a lot of places to play,” Martin said. “Old Skool’s [record store] is the place to play, so as much as we can expand on that, the better.”

Parker mentioned stories he heard of the Ellensburg music scene 15-20 years ago and how local bands like The Screaming Trees helped pioneer a worldwide grunge movement with a legacy that still lives on.

“The Screaming Trees, easily one of the top ten grunge bands of all time … They came from Ellensburg, they came from this town, so why can’t we do the same?” Parker said.

Shaun Howard, Cigman Fraud guitarist and psychology student, said he hopes concerts like Burgstock encourage other people in Ellensburg to express themselves through music.

“We want to turn people into Cigman Frauds,” Howard said.

Del Pollock, an Ellensburg local and EHS grad, said they were excited about the turn-out as people scattered across the expanse of grass in front of the covered area in Alder St. Park. They said they hope this event becomes an annual occasion.

“I’m really proud of all these newer musicians and bands banding together and creating a community,” Pollock said. “It’s nice to see a bunch of friendly and familiar faces.”

Pollock said she is an aspiring musician and enjoys watching other bands play.

“I’m kind of shy and I want to start my own band at some point, so it’s kind of nice to watch it and see it,” Pollock said.

According to Martin, the combination of each individual Ellensburg voice at the event created a wave of voices.

“A big crowd of a lot of voices with a lot of music going on is something that we’re down for,” Martin said. “That’s what Burgstock is about.”

Run for the Brave 5k fundraises for veterans

Organizers hope to provide support for those in need

Staff Reporters

Runners, joggers and walkers alike filled the Ellensburg Rotary Park for the ninth annual Run for the Brave 5k for the first time since 2019. The five kilometer run around the park on Oct. 1 served as a fundraiser for the Kittitas County Veterans Coalition.

Runners of all ages participated in the race; children to adults and everything in between showed up to show their support for local veterans. Veterans from the county coalition came out to cheer on participants.

“This demonstrates the strength of the community, people getting together working collectively toward projects,” said veteran John Swords.

Swords, a member of the coalition, said proceeds from the tickets sold at the event go to help the coalition provide food and fuel vouchers for veterans in need. Swords said events like this also benefit them in raising awareness for veterans in need everywhere.

This year was the first time the event was hosted by the Ellensburg Area Swim Team (EAST). EAST Vice President Jaymi Williams said

she was offered the opportunity to host this year and immediately jumped on it.

The event was previously hosted by Elise Hermann and her daughter for a few years until the swim team took over.

“Elise came to us and said ‘Hey, would you like this opportunity to take it over and also be able to raise money for the youth center in the valley?’ We were like absolutely,” Williams said. “We want to serve both causes.”

This year, the event doubled as a fundraiser for both the veterans coalition and local youth swimmers.

Williams said the funds will help the team keep going by covering costs such as pool fees, paying coaches and other overhead costs.

The event closed out with several prize giveaways that were raffled off after the run, including shirts, mugs, hats, a skateboard and much more.

EAST Board President and event organizer Kelly Pritchett said her favorite part about the race was just seeing everyone together for each other.

“It’s an amazing group effort for this type of event,” Pritchett said. “I’m just amazed at how the community comes together for something like this.”

Sarah Spurgeon Art Gallery hosts first SOIL Art Collective exhibit

The Sarah Spurgeon Art Gal lery in Randall Hall has officially opened the first exhibit of the new quarter, featuring art from the SOIL Collective. The multi-artist exhibit entitled “Tangents…I was thinking about the stars” will be on display until Oct. 22.

SOIL is known for pushing the boundaries of what is perceived as art. Founded in 1995, SOIL has become a mainstay in the Seattle art scene. They have displayed ev erything from painting, sculpture, mixed media installations and ex periential art in their Seattle gallery.

As a nonprofit collective and gallery, SOIL focuses on bringing fringe and experimental art into a gallery environment. Their gallery in Pioneer Square even reserves the front-facing space for submission exhibits in an at tempt to encourage lesser-seen artists and art styles.

The SOIL website said just about any work can be dis played, “provided it is accepted by the membership.”

The exhibit focuses on a sense of interconnectedness in the “Tangents…I was thinking about the stars.” According to the art ist’s talk before the opening of the exhibit, SOIL derived the title from the idea that humans naturally create patterns, like when mankind first looked upon the stars and instinctively started connecting dots to create con stellations.

At the opening on Sept. 29, Gallery Manager Heather Horn Johnson said one of the driving factors in booking SOIL was

their connection to the CWU community. Philippe Hyojung

Kim received his bachelor’s de gree in fine arts from CWU in 2016. Johnson said she hopes this connection combined with the longevity of the SOIL Collective will help to create a sense that young artists can be successful, even with non-traditional media.

SOIL artist Colleen RJC Bratton said her process was very fluid.

“I start with an idea,” Bratton said. “Then I experiment and see what material suits the subject.”

The exhibit features pieces from 22 members of SOIL, including Kim. As a CWU alumna, one of his goals in organizing the ex hibit was to encourage art stu dents to form a support system of artists.

“Family is not what you’re born into,” Kim said. “It’s the connec tions you make.”

Kim attributes his success to the support system he found in his cohort while at school and now within the SOIL collective.

Kim’s beliefs struck a chord with students in attendance.

Junior fine arts student Ty ler Raymundo said he had not deeply considered the effect of his fellow art students upon his work before attending the opening. Raymundo said com munity was an essential part of what separates good art from meaningful art.

“Tangents…I was thinking about the stars” will be on display in the Sarah Spurgeon Gallery in Randall Hall until Oct. 22. The gallery is open Monday through Friday from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. and Saturdays from 1-5 p.m. and ad mission is free.

Eighth annual museum archive crawl takes attendees on a trip through time

History and artifact enthusi asts gathered in the Brooks Li brary parking lot on the morning of Oct. 1 for the eighth annual Archive Crawl. This event of fers a tour of the archives and museums in Ellensburg while attendees listen to archivists and curators share their collections.

The event was sponsored by CWU libraries, the Muse um of Culture & Environment (MCE), the Central Branch of Washington State Archives, the Kittitas County Historical Museum, and the Ellensburg Public Library & Archives. The tour included all of the spon sors and ended with a visit to the MCE.

According to University Ar chivist Julia Stringfellow, while the difference between an ar chive can vary, the main dif ference is typical in the type of artifacts they have in their collections. Archives usually consist of paper documents and correspondences, while muse ums usually have more three-di mensional displays and artifacts.

Stringfellow said that there are some notable exceptions, such as larger museums like the Smithsonian having their own archive section.

Megan Stanley, sophomore in health management, said that she went on the crawl because she has an interest in history. Most of the students who went on the trip were in museum studies.

Museum Collections Manag er Lynn Bethke said one of the goals of the crawl was to raise awareness for the museums and archives in town during Ameri can Archives Month.

“The importance is about rais ing awareness of all these dif ferent organizations that have similar goals, preserving history and sharing stories of the past

and the present,” Bethke said.

Stanley said that she didn’t know about most of the orga nizations, so she was glad that she had seen them on this trip.

“I’ve been to the County Historical Museum before but that was it. I’d never been in the back room of the museum of culture. I’ve never been to the Seattle Archives. I’d never

been to the Washington State Archives that were just across the street,” Stanley said.

Bethke said that she enjoys getting to see the attendees ex perience the in-depth look.

“My favorite part of the crawl is seeing people’s reactions,” Bethke said. “When people get to go behind the scenes of a mu seum it’s a different experience.”

Stringfellow said that her fa vorite part of the crawl was see ing the public library’s collection of Manastash Ridge journals.

“If you climb up the Man astash Ridge there’s a book on the top that you can sign,” Stringfellow said. “The public library has all of those, going back to the ‘70s.”

Stanley said that for her, the most memorable part was a sto ry she heard at the County His torical Museum about a woman who became an urban legend.

“They went off about this woman who lived in this house and she went crazy and killed her husband and went to the asylum and then she escaped and no one ever saw her again. If you see her on the side of the road don’t pick her up, she’s a ghost or something like that.”

Stringfellow said the most memorable part for her was, “One thing people like to do is, across the street at the Washing ton State Archives they have jail records, so they’ll ask can you go through the records to see if my family member was here.”

Stanley said her favorite part of the crawl was getting to see the unique history that Kittitas Coun ty has and seeing how passionate the curators and archivists were when they talked about the history behind their collections.

“It’s important because it’s knowledge we take for granted because we can find this infor mation pretty easily,” Stanley said. “How did places like An cestry.com get a hold of those records? Because places like this keep track of them.”

Kitty and Kandy: Ask the Nieces

How do youcombat those fall to winter blues?

BSERVED

Variety is missing at the movies

-Seasonally Sad Isaac Hinson Columnist

Greetings! We are the nieces, Kitty and Kandy, The Observ er’s new advice columnists. Our aunties, Edith and Ethel, graduated last quarter so we’re taking over!

Kitty: As two college students without a degree yet, we may not be the most qualified people to respond to this question, so stop reading now and go see a thera pist ASAP. Seriously, it works for some people. But I know you are here for some easy hacks, so we’ll give it a try.

Kandy: Many of us deal with this, so you’re not alone and you’re strong for wanting to improve. Set yourself up with support. CWU provides a free service through the WildcatCare365 app that offers free therapy sessions, either imme diately or pre-scheduled. I’ve used it a few times and it helps.

Kitty: One of my favorite things to do when I am feeling low is something I love, like reading. Curling up with a good book and a hot beverage warms my soul. Whatever your favorite thing to do is, reading, gaming or dancing, carve out a solid hour or two to do something you enjoy each week.

Kandy: Another useful tool is light therapy! You can check out light therapy boxes from Brooks Library for up to four hours to soak up some Vitamin D, or you can buy one for your home. Drink ing lots of water, journaling about what you’re grateful for and taking a really cold or hot shower can work.

Kitty: Eating healthy, going to bed on time, doing some exercise and having a routine really helps. I struggled a lot last year, but I feel refreshed going into this winter because I have gotten on a regular schedule with good sleep. Differ ent approaches work for different people; this is what worked for me.

Kandy: The helpful thing about seasonal sadness is that you can prepare because you’ll know it’s coming. As the sun starts to fade earlier, do your best to get outside before nightfall for at least 15 min utes a day. Take a walk in the Jap anese garden or jog through Alder Street Park.

The state of the film industry has left me wondering, what happened to the way things used to be? What happened to going to the cinema on a Saturday night and struggling to choose between the five new movies that were released that weekend, all from different film makers, studios, actors, all in dif ferent genres?

Nowadays, the landscape is total ly different. Per Box Office Mojo, in 2009 the 10 highest grossing movies at the domestic box office featured five original films, and five films based on an existing In tellectual Property (IP). Nine films in the current top 10 are based on existing IP, and the only one that isn’t is a bio-pic about arguably the most famous musician of all time. Gone is the balance of hav ing “Up,” “The Hangover” and “The Hurt Locker,” three origi nal films of completely different genres in theaters at the same time. Now, we must go to the theater and choose between the newest Marvel Cinematic Uni verse (MCU) film, the MCU film released 2 months ago, and the third Harry Potter prequel. Love it or hate it, the MCU is sued out the art of film being consumed on a mass scale, in fa vor of the product of film.

I enjoy many of the MCU films, as I enjoy many of the films at the top of the box office this year. But for every “Top Gun: Maverick” or “The Batman,” films that are franchised but well written and grounded in traditional filmmaking techniques, there’s a “Jurassic World Domin ion” or “Thor: Love and Thunder,” films that are made on studio lots in front of green screens, and are more concerned with leaving the door open for a sequel rather than telling a full story.

For all of the franchise fare, there is only one “Nope,” or “Everything Everywhere All At Once,” films that are entirely original, while being made and released on a large budget.

Now, this would not be as un bearable if you could escape at home, but streaming television is slowly being consumed by the need for franchises to carry their platform as well.

Disney+ originals nearly exclu sively deal in the MCU and Star Wars realm, with the rare excep tion of a “High School Musical” or “Mighty Ducks” reboot. Amazon has a “Lord of the Rings” show (which is actually good, albeit with some glaring pacing issues) or dered for at least two seasons, with a plan for five. As well as trying to appeal to older audiences, with both a “Jack Reacher” show and a “Jack Ryan” show, both franchis

es which aren’t even 10 years re moved from their last attempts.

The streaming material that actually is good, either should’ve been a movie or shouldn’t have been on streaming in the first place. “Andor” is great, but one has to wonder how good it would’ve been as a tight two-hour spy thriller. “Prey” was good, but why on earth was it dumped on streaming? Especially in the time frame it was!

When “Prey” was released, the top three films at the box office were “Bullet Train,” “DC League of Superpets” and “Nope,” which was in its third week. You’re telling me a new Predator mov ie wouldn’t have cleaned house?

Don’t even get me started on

the disappointment “Obi-Wan Kenobi” was as a TV show, and the potential it had as a movie. Which is ironic, as it was orig inally pitched as a movie, but converted to a TV series after the box office failure of “Solo: A Star Wars Story,” which Disney only has themselves to blame for after not marketing the movie until 2 months before release.

The point is, I wish we could go back to a time of variety, when actors weren’t filming their scenes all in seperate green screen rooms. Where they weren’t dedicating 10+ years of their careers to fran chises that they wish they could’ve left halfway through the deal. I wish we could have the 1990s2000s era of movies back.

Discussion boards aren’t discussing anything

Discussion boards are some of the easiest assignments to com plete for some people. So why at the mention of the two words an eye roll and a deep, exasperated sigh are the only things that come to mind? It is because discussion boards are not contributing to online learning, rather they are only contributing to the fall of genuine student engagement.

Let’s be real here, students have a lot going on in their everyday lives. We have jobs off campus, a dorm and some roommates to interact with, several other class es and assignments and other young adult natural stressors. So, a simple response to a classmate shouldn’t be so hard, right?

Granted, the online tool of being able to engage with class mates has dramatically enhanced the amount of conversation in academic discussion boards, with a special thanks to the few years of strictly online learning and hibernation that the COVID-19 pandemic so gracefully gave us.

Online activity has one of the easiest tools for discussion. These

Photo courtesy of pexels.com

discussion boards are where stu dents are asked to engage with a topic and/or question, as well as respond to two or more class mates for active participation in the course.

Discussion boards can offer a change of perspective, quick feed back and even the start of new rela tionships within virtual classrooms. Regardless of how great that may sound, the design is at fault.

According to Morton Ann Gernsbacher from the Associa

tion for Psychological Science, many instructors just throw all their students, sometimes 100 or more, into one discussion group without any kind of fil tering. This can make the on line structure overwhelming and crowded with information, making this more of a chore than it is intended to be.

Often, these responses don’t even come out to be responses. I have found that often most of the time I just have different in

formation being shared with me, and we aren’t discussing what the main idea of the post is at all, making not only the initial ques tion irrelevant to the rest of the discussion, but also vise versa.

This could all result simply from the fact that online learn ing restricts students with the limited freedom to go about their learning in their own unique way. Teachers ask the student to read certain ma terial, a fixed amount of that material, maybe a few lectures and some extra links to engage with as well, all of which can be very overpowering when in a class with more than 50100 students. Now, students not only have to filter through the academic material, but also through information than can take away from the assign ment’s production and overall learning outcome.

Undoubtedly, we’re all making the adjustments we need as we feel this time through. Coming back to in-person learning and engagement will be a challenge, but it is possible. Take the time to be involved, it’ll go a lot fur ther than you think.

Volleyball team enjoys return home after 11 game road trip

The SURC was booming, cheers could be heard as you entered the building. A red carpet led the way to courts 3 & 4 in the Recre ation Center as both courts and the walkway above were filled to the brim with fans to see the volleyball team.

This game on Sep. 22 was the home opener against the Mon tana State University (MSU) Billings Yellowjackets.

“It was just awesome,” junior setter/outside hitter Tia Andaya said. “We were feeding off the energy. When we play in the SURC it feels more full, like it’s packed every night.”

CWU secured the 3-1 win against MSU Billings, only los ing the second set by two points.

“Last weekend was our first home weekend of the season,” Andaya said. “Being able to wake up in my own bed and get my routine down was so nice. You get to come in clear-minded without a bunch of other dis tractions, things like ‘You have to get on the bus at this time,

where are we getting the pregame snack.’”

The benefits of playing at home don’t only extend to sleep and food. For the players, playing in front of the Wildcat faithful is a welcomed change.

“Playing in front of Central students and fans is just on an other level,” said Andaya. “The energy they bring, you can feel it. You’re playing in front of the people who are rooting for you, so you’re trying to make them proud.”

“It’s relieving,” middle-blocker sophomore Daoud-Hebert said. “It’s great being able to come home from a road trip and see people from the community come out to watch you play.” Andaya said she tries to not let the excitement get to her, as she finds that it can make her not have full control of her play.

“I try not to let emotions play that much into how I’m going through it,” said Andaya. “Neg ative emotions are obviously bad but even too many positive emotions are bad as well. It can just be too up-and-down. For me, staying very neutral, con

sistent and calm no matter what the situation is kind of helps me play the best and stay level.”

Andaya seems to have remained focused, as she registered a double-double of 12 points and 29 assists, while being just 4 digs short of a triple-double, and helped push the Wildcats to the win. Andaya remained humble about her performance.

“Pretty good,” Andaya said. “I mean, obviously, there is still a lot of room for improvement. There always is.”

The Wildcats currently sit at 9-6, they play University of Alaska Anchorage in the SURC on Oct 6. The Wildcats feel

good about the current state of the team.

“We have a lot of the same peo ple from last year,” said Andaya.

“So there wasn’t that rebuilding period. We could skip to ‘Okay, this is what we need to do right away’ and I think we did that at a very high level at the beginning of the season, and now we’re just putting pieces where they need to go. I think it’s come out really good so far.”

“I feel good,” said Daoud-He bert. “Mario [Andaya]’s whole mentality is ‘We’re playing to be ready to compete in November,’ and I think with where we are right now, we will be.”

Sports Shorts

Women’s Volleyball at Seattle Pacific Uni versity

Sep. 24

Loss 2-3

XC at Whitman College Invitational

Oct. 1 Men’s team: 4th Women’s team: 5th

Women’s Rugby at Victoria

Oct. 1 Loss 12 - 27

Women’s Soccer at Saint Martin’s Oct. 1 Win 2-1

Football at Eastern New Mexico Oct. 1 Win 45-17

Volleyball at Simon Fraser Oct. 1 Win 3-2

Soccer leaves for string of away games

The women’s soccer team hit the road Thursday, Sep. 29, for four straight away games.

Opponents and dates in clude: Western Oregon Uni versity (WOU) on Sept. 29, Saint Martin’s University (SMU) on Oct. 1, Seattle Pacif ic University (SPU) on Oct. 6, and Northwest Nazarene Uni versity (NNU) on 8.

According to Wildcat Sports,

CWU fell to three out of four of these teams the last time they faced off, winning against only one competitor, SMU.

The Sept. 29 game against WOU ended in a scoreless tie of 0-0.

CWU scored two goals against SMU on Oct. 1, only allowing one point against; ending with a final score of 2-1, CWU.

NNU is the only team out of these four that CWU has played already this year. NNU

and CWU went head to head during preseason, where NNU walked away from Tomlinson Stadium with a 2-0 win.

Peyton Vogel, senior center de fender, said, “For these next couple of games, we are really looking at getting better as a team.”

SPU seems to be the top competi tor out of the four teams, according to Jaxyn Farmen, senior defender.

Farmen said, “They’re [SPU] always very organized and they’re always strong. Every year it’s a battle.”

Vogel said she believes SPU will be their biggest challenge mentally, but there are other teams to look out for.

“Every college has been so dif ferent since my freshman year,” Vogel said. “SPU and Western Washington have typically been the teams that have been the hardest,” “NNU beat SPU this year, so it’s very up in the air.”

According to Vogel, there is one aspect that makes away games more difficult: field size fluctuation.

“Every field is different sized,” Vogel said. “Everyone has a dif ferent length and a different width because there is so much of a variety each school can have and each field can have, as long as they

According to the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA), in 1995 the Soccer Rule Book listed that a soccer field “‘shall be rectangular, with a length of 115-120 yards and a width of 7075 yards.’ However, soccer fields built before 1995 – when the only requirements were that they be

longer than they were wide – have been grandfathered in.”

“I genuinely feel like we play bet ter when we’re not on our home field,” Farmen said. “Going in with the mindset that we have noth ing to lose and that we’re playing for ourselves, because we don’t have any fans there, that definitely boosts us to play harder.”

According to Vogel, only 20 players out of their 30 person roster get to attend away games.

“It’s really hard on the mind if you’re not one of the girls who are traveling,” Vogel said.

During away games, Farmen said, “The energy level has al ways been great because we really want to make the girls at home proud.”

The soccer team has their focus on making it to the GNAC tour nament, according to Vogel.

“It’s all just up in the air and what the record is going to be and how we get to GNACs,” Vogel said.

The women’s soccer team re turns to Tomlinson Stadium Oct. 13, to take on SMU yet again, this time on their home turf.

Rocket League primes the esports season

The first esports event of the quarter, a Rocket League event, was held in the SURC Theater on Sep. 30.

Esports are a recent addi tion to intramural sports and a way to promote community, according to Samantha Wary, coordinator of Intramural Sports.

“By providing bigger enter tainment and bigger experienc es in the SURC Theater, we’re hoping that it helps build big ger social connections,” Wary said. “Instead of just knowing people you know by their gam er-tag, they are actually meet ing people face-to-face and hoping to grow friendships and social connections.”

Wary pointed out that intra mural esports have grown into an esports team, with different games being offered within the club team

“They are actually competing starting this quarter against oth er schools in national tourna ments,” Wary said.

Johnny Felty, intramural esports lead, comments that esports have changed the gaming community.

“A lot of people consider gam ing a hobby, and then that hob by turns into a passion because it ignites their competitive spirit and it feels like a regular sport

to me,” Felty said. “We do have a lot of more things happen ing this year and with different games being played each quar ter, there is going to be some

thing for everyone.”

The next esports events hap pening on campus will be for Mario Kart on Oct. 21, Call of Duty Nov. 4, and the Smash

Bros. Tournament will be on Nov. 18 in the SURC. To keep up-to-date with esport events, CWU Recreation has a discord for students.

Brookside Funeral Home got a new furry team member

Brookside Funeral Home got its newest team member, Beacon, a nine-month-old hypoallergenic labradoodle and newly certified therapy dog trained by Ultimate Canine dog training academy.

Jamin Mohler, owner of Bea con and Brookside Funeral Home, said Beacon is the first certified therapy dog to be used in a funeral home in Washing ton that he’s aware of. Mohler

said one of the reasons they got Beacon was for the grieving families they serve.

Mohler said Beacon will also be there to help out the staff, given how emotionally stressful the fu neral home can be for employees.

“For him to be able to be there for our staff on a daily basis is also therapeutic internally,”

Mohler said. Beacon will also be focusing on helping people within the community.

Mohler said Beacon will be able to help, “hospice patients, nurs

ing home residents, care facilities folks, school district crisis situa tions with the police department or fire department. He is trained to care for our community and outside of the walls of a funeral.”

Mohler said Beacon is the brightest and best Ultimate Canine brought through their system in years.

“They grade them and out of 200 points, Beacon got 197 which is nearly off the charts,” Mohler said.

Mohler said Beacon will do exactly what you want him to do when you tell him to do it.

“Knuckles, wave ‘hi’, sit, lay down, put his head in your lap or if you want him all the way up on your lap he will come all the way up,” Mohler said.

To get Beacon to this point he was trained by Julie Case, owner of Ultimate Canine.

“From day three of their life is when we start incorporating a special system,” Case said. “We gently expose them to dif ferent sounds. Feeling all be ing picked up and turned and placed on certain surfaces.”

As the puppies grow, they start increasing the simulation.

“By the time the puppies turn eight weeks old, they are high ly, highly neurologically de veloped and socially developed and stress resilient,” said Case.

At this time they begin a 20step test to see which dogs will be best suited for therapy dog train

ing. After all the training, they send the dogs off to their new homes, where they work with the dog’s handlers to become certified therapy dog handlers in a three-day training course.

Once they completed the train ing and undertook a test demon stration exhibiting their skills and knowledge to be able to ef fectively work with Beacon, Bea con was able to begin his therapy work at the funeral home.

While Beacon has only been with Brookside for a short amount of time, Mohler said he has already engaged and inter acted with different families.

“If he’s made this much differ ence in five business days, what is his impact going to be for the fam ilies we take care of throughout the next several years,” Mohler said.

To learn more about Beacon’s work, readers can follow his Ins tagram @beacon_thetherapydog.

According to Twaites, campus police collaborated with the El lensburg Police Department, the Kittitas County Sheriff’s office and the Washington State Patrol to hold a Mass Casualty Incident drill at Brooks Library. He said the drill simulated a shooting by involving library staff and faculty while cam pus police practiced responding to the shooter and victims.

“That was the first drill we did this year,” Twaites said. “We have done other ones at the SURC, we do that annually and do several tabletop exercises with staff, and we try to collaborate more and more with students … so they can see our response and see how they can help us.”

Twaites said there are a lot of new officers on campus that need ed to be exposed to expectations, and they received good feedback from the library staff.

According to Twaites, if stu dents see anything outside of the ordinary that makes them uncomfortable, they should re port it to the police.

CWU Alerts are sent out when any threats of violence or crime

occur on campus, as was the case in 2019 when a false report of an active shooter in Lind Hall was widely spread on social media.

Twaites said rumors can spread on social media and the public affairs department helps campus police keep in formation and press releases as accurate as possible to avoid spreading misinformation.

“We used that as an opportu nity to learn and grow so we can be better prepared for the future,” Twaites said.

Campus police have created re sources to help students with situ ations on campus, such as the You Tube video they made with public affairs in 2019 called Run, Hide, Fight and the walking buddies program that provides escorts for people on campus who feel unsafe.

Walking buddies are available from 7 p.m. - 12 a.m. seven days a week. Twaites said students and community members can call KIT COM if they ever need to be escort ed outside of the operating hours.

Walking buddies number: 509.963.2950

Run Fight Hide link: https://www.youtube.com/ watch?v=6Q3WZv5ByPE

Biden administration releases debt relief updates

The Biden administration an nounced they are scaling back the amount of people their student loan debt forgiveness plan will apply to on Sept. 29, over a month after first announcing the plan.

Borrowers whose federal student loans are guaranteed by the govern ment but held by private lenders do not fall under their requirements and are not eligible for the $20,000 or $10,000 debt relief.

Some private student loan com panies include College Ave student loans, Sallie Mae and Credible.

According to CNBC, there are still over 4 million students who use Federal Family Education Loan (FFEL) program loans al though the program ended back in 2010. That is roughly 7% of federal student debt or $113 million ac cording to studentaid.gov.

CNN reported that the Depart ment of Education said these types of loans, many of which were part of the FFEL program and the Fed eral Family Perkins Loan program,

initially met the requirements for debt relief. However, as of Sep 29, this has changed.

According to studentaid.gov, borrowers from private lenders who consolidated their loans before Sept. 29 are eligible for the onetime loan forgiveness. This means for those who failed to meet the deadline, there is nothing they can do as of now for loan forgiveness.

According to CNN, the De partment of Education said they are currently “assessing al ternative pathways” to provide relief for borrowers who were granted loans from the FFEL program and the Federal Family Perkins loan program.

For the rest of student loan bor rowers who are eligible, the Biden Administration plan remains the same. According to studentaid. gov, those who are eligible for the debt relief can expect the applica tion for loan forgiveness to be on line sometime in October.

The due date for applications end on Dec. 31, the same date that the student loan payment pause ends.

Football adapts to Lonestar Conference

A new football season brings CWU into a new conference, the Lonestar Conference. The players are ready for these new rivals and have been preparing to do so.

Being in a new bracket and playing familiar teams, as well as new teams, the boys are eager

to make sure they are studying their teams to their best knowl edge according to coach Fisk.

Fisk said he is confident about seeing these familiar teams be cause he can see what skills to practice and knows what to ex pect from these competitors.

“Our boys have been work ing hard since last January to get ready to play in this confer ence,’’ Fisk said.

According to Fisk, trans ferring to another confer ence doesn’t mean they aren’t aware of what they are going up against; the Wildcats have crossed paths with a couple of these teams previously.

Fisk said all of the players, re turners and newcomers, all bring important values to this team.

“We’ve got talented young freshmen that are making

some news and we’ve got transfers that are doing a great job for us including a strong senior class,” Fisk said.

Combining all these talented players together this year Fisk is confident in what his team brings to the table after already playing a few of their competition last year.

Fisk said, “This is the type of group that you build through building a four-year program.”

Jones Act suspend ed in Puerto Rico after devestation of Hurricane Fiona

Hurricane Fiona swept through Puerto Rico as a Category 1 storm on Sep. 18 hitting the island with over 30 inches of rain, according to NPR.

According to news.yahoo. com, the majority of buildings were completely destroyed, and over 120,000 are still left with out electricity and basic supplies such as water.

The Department of Home land Security is suspending the Jones Act as of Wednesday, Sep. 28 in an effort to help people on the island receive supplies. According to marketplace.org, this will allow the Marshall-Is land flagged ship, which is car rying diesel fuel, to dock near the port of Ponce.

According to Puerto Rico Governor, Pedro Pierluisi, the suspension of the Jones Act is a “temporary waiver” in order to get fuel to the island to aid the generation of power.

According to maritime-ex ecutive.com, the ship carrying the fuel has been sitting idle off the port of Ponce since Sep. 25, as it waited for permission to dock and unload fuel.

According to law.cornell. edu,The Jones Act implement ed in 1917 and officially called the Merchant Marine Act of 1920, allows trade to be con ducted by only allowing exports from America to be transported to Puerto Rico on an American ship with American handlers.

Due to the hardships associat ed with this Act, President Joe Biden’s Administration allowed for the non-American ship to supply fuel to the residents of Puerto Rico during this time.

Democratic House Represen tative Nydia Velazquez said it is a serious situation and more needs to be done.

“This is a life and death situa tion,” said Velazquez via twitter. com. “I encourage the Adminis tration to take further steps to ensure that the people of Puer to Rico can fully recover from Hurricane Fiona.”

Velazquez, along with Senator Mike Lee, introduced the Puerto Rico Recovery Act. According to a press release on velazquez.house. gov, the bill requires the Depart ment of Homeland Security to waive the Jones Act for vessels that demonstrate their intention to help in the disaster relief of Puerto Rico.

“Too many times, the Jones Act has plagued recovery ef forts for certain areas of the United States that have been devastated by natural disas ters,” said Velázquez. “After Hurricane Maria, we saw the consequences the Jones Act had on Puerto Rico, which is why I introduced a bill that would put a 5-year moratorium on it.”

Q&A Q&A

Darci Showden Professor

What got you first involved with physics?

Even as a young child I was always interested in science, space sciences and astronomy. I took my first physics class in my junior year in high school and immediately liked it. I thought the concepts were in teresting and I truly enjoyed thinking through the problems. By the end of my junior year, I had figured out that I was going to major in physics in college. I was still interested in a career in the space sciences, but I had figured out that majoring in physics would be a good way to pursue that path.

What do you wish more people knew about physics?

That you don’t have to be a genius to be proficient at physics. Sure, there have been some famous physi cists that are geniuses, but there are also a lot of average physicists too. The world would be a better place if more people took physics, and less people were intimidated by it!

Do you have a fun fact about space that you love to tell?

Did you know that there are lakes on Saturn’s moon Titan that are filled with liquid methane? How cool is that!

What’s your favorite movie that correctly (or incorrectly) portrays space?

It is so hard to pick one, so I will pick three: Apollo 13, Contact and the Martian. Everyone should watch all of those movies. They are realistic in their depiction of space and space travel and I’m much more interested in that type of portrayal than Star Wars, for example. The film that inspired me to become a space scientist is a movie from 1986 called “Space Camp.” It has limited educational value but is still fun to watch.

What has been your favorite class to teach at CWU?

My favorite class to teach is “Gateway to Space.” Gateway is a project-based class where students build payloads for a high-altitude balloon that we launch at the end of the quarter. I always learn something from what the payloads the stu dents design and the balloon launch is always an adventure that takes me to a new part of the state. Hopefully, I can teach it again soon.

What’s one book you can’t stop recommending to people?

I would be lying to you if I pretended to spend my free time reading. However, I do drive a lot and often listen to books on tape. Lately, I have been recommending “Green Light” by Matthew McConaughey. I was skeptical at first, but he is a great storyteller and has some useful thoughts on life.

John W. Tr. ITAM Program

“The past couple of years I have been able to work as an actor for the Maris Farms haunted woods, and I’ve met quite a few friends from that.”

D.

Education

to go on field trips when I was a lot younger. We would always go to the cider mill where we would feed the animals and get doughnuts.”