Volume 102, Issue 3 of Santa Barbara High School's The Forge.
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Vol. 102 No. 3 SANTA BARBARA HIGH SCHOOL - FRIDAY, OCTOBER 23, 2015 Est. 1914 THE FORGE NEW YORK A NIGHT ON THE TOWN Music in the Meadow An evening under the stars with the stars of SBHS Choir | p. 11 Editorials: Homecoming Voting Controversy erupts over the voting procedure for Homecoming Princesses -- we invite both sides to chime in. | p. 9 Pippin Preview Layman’s 20th Season at SBHS Theatre opens with the magic of Pippin | p. 10 Sports Dons prep for Homecoming game after dominant victory over Dos Pueblos p. 12 The Many Faces of ASB Meet the students that make it happen here at SBHS | p. 5 The SAT Gets a Makeover p. 3 | Gracie is Back! p. 3 | John Campilio: Forge Angel p. 2 | ‘Tooning in: Kieran Meaney p. 5 e Homecoming Court in front of the Arlington eatre. | Photo Courtesy of Beau Lettieri “quo vaca?”
Transcript
Vol. 102 No. 3 SANTA BARBARA HIGH SCHOOL - FRIDAY, OCTOBER 23, 2015 Est. 1914
THE FORGE
NEW YORK:::;A NIGHT ON THE TOWN
Music in the MeadowAn evening under the stars with the stars of SBHS Choir | p. 11
Editorials: Homecoming VotingControversy erupts over the voting procedure for Homecoming Princesses -- we invite both sides to chime in. | p. 9
Pippin PreviewLayman’s 20th Season at SBHS Theatre opens with the magic of Pippin | p. 10
SportsDons prep for Homecoming game after dominant victory over Dos Pueblos
p. 12
The Many Faces of ASBMeet the students that make it happen here at SBHS | p. 5
The SAT Gets a Makeover p. 3 | Gracie is Back! p. 3 | John Campilio: Forge Angel p. 2 | ‘Tooning in: Kieran Meaney p. 5
The Homecoming Court in front of the Arlington Theatre. | Photo Courtesy of Beau Lettieri
“quo vaca?”
2 | NEWS THE FORGE OCTOBER 23, 2015 OCTOBER 23, 2015 THE FORGE NEWS | 3
Sign of the Times: 2015’s Legacy Gift
BY THE FORGE STAFFAfter four years of planning (mostly due to hold ups at the city approval stages) a stone sign
identifying SBHS has finally been placed at the Canon Perdido en-trance. The sign is similar the one that stands on Anapamu street and is a gift from the Alumni Asso-ciation and the class of 2015. Mr. Becchio inquired about installing a sign on Canon Perdido when he first arrived at SBHS in 2011. Keith Wright (Class of ’73), and Laura Wilson (Class of ’67) were instrumental in the planning of the sign, and Jed Hendrickson from SB Monumental and an alumnus did the artwork and engraving. Senior Class gifts are legacy gifts: from paintings and murals to markers and signs, each senior class seeks to leave their mark for SBHS. What will the gift of 2016 be?
THE FORGESTAFF
2015 - 2016700 East Anapamu StreetSanta Barbara, CA 93103(805) 966-9101 ex. 5031
grained into SBHS students from the day they walk through the historic front facade, until the day they walk down the hill at graduation. If ever there was a living exemplar of what it means to be a Don, that would be Mr. John Campilio. Although he graduat-ed over sixty years ago, he has never forgotten the school that he left such an impression on during his teenage years.
A natural leader, Campilio was elected ASB president during his senior year in 1953. He also took part in ROTC which earned him the Naval ROTC Scholarship, allowing him to attended Notre Dame from 1953 to 1957. After graduating Notre Dame, Campilio served his country for three years in the US Navy. Af-ter returning to Santa Barbara, he attended UCSB, where he received a Masters in English and his Second-ary Teaching credential. In the fall of 1963 Campilio went to work at a lo-cal Santa Barbara high school — the recently opened San Marcos High School — in the English Department.
After teaching at SMHS for a num-ber of years, Campilio transferred to Dos Pueblos High School, where he remained until 1978 when he retired.
In retirement, Campilio could not stay away from his alma mater. After leaving DPHS he became the President of the Santa Barbara High School Alumni Associa-tion. While he is no lon-ger serving in that capac-ity, he continues to make an enormous impact on the school. Campilio can be seen at almost every sports event held on cam-pus, most notably the home football and basketball games and for many years has been a member of the Ye Ole Gang Dons Athletic Boosters. Additionally, as a former Forge staff member, Mr. Campilio has been the Forge’s biggest supporter, playing an integral role in keeping the one hun-dred and one year-old paper alive and in print. The current Forge Staff is incredibly thankful for his support over the years.
Beyond his active role on campus, Campilio has left his mark in a big
way in recent years. In addition to working to install the SBHS Veterans Memorial here on campus, Campil-io was instrumental in obtaining the Historical Landmark status for SBHS,
ensuring the school will live on for generations to come. After helping cement SBHS into Santa Barbara’s future, begin-ning in 2010 Campilio worked closely with Mr. Jack Hufford on the res-toration of the school’s famous facades. Hufford and Campilio worked tirelessly to raise the
funds to restore the facades to their glory days, so that both alumni and the current students and faculty can celebrate the beauty of their campus. Their dream became reality when in 2013 the project was completed.
Mr. Campilio’s work has not been unnoticed. In 2014 he was inducted into the Santa Barbara High School Hall of Fame for his outstanding sup-port of Santa Barbara High School, its students, staff, and alumni for over six decades.
Weekend: Theft and Vandalism Strike SBHS
BY THE FORGE STAFF
This past weekend Santa Barbara High School was plagued with a se-ries of break-ins, thefts, and vandal-isms over the course of a weekend. The first occurrence happened some-time Friday or Saturday night, when an unknown number of unidentified suspects came onto campus using blue and green spray paint to write “DP or SM” on a exterior wall near room 21. The suspects then tagged a section of the newly painted lock-ers, and vandalized a car in the staff lot that belonged to a staff member — also with the same phrase “DP or SM” written in spray paint. The vandals then climbed up to the cow on the corner of Milpas and Cannon Perdido, managing to write “SM” on the side of the cow in similar spray paint to that used on campus. While Old Bossie is in need of a paint job, this is not the paint job many hoped for.
In a seemly unrelated event, the Theatre was broken into early Sat-urday morning by a man with a flashlight who went on to steal a Macintosh computer from the Bal-cony. The man entered into the the-atre presumably from the main hall, then walked through the house of the theatre, onto the stage, where he took a ladder from backstage. The perpetrator took the ladder into the house, setting it up near the edge of the balcony and using it to climb up. He went onto rummage through the tech booth, finally coming to the Mac Mini that is used to run pro-ductions and assemblies, yanking it from where it was connected and fi-nally stealing the wireless mouse and keyboard from a nearby drawer. In all, the man remained in the theatre for between twenty and twenty-five minutes before exiting the balcony through the side door, leaving the tech booth in disarray and the ladder in the aisle. When the mess was dis-
covered Monday morning by Tech-nical Director Jonathan Mitchell, the security footage was run back reveal-ing all of the actions of the unknown man. Currently the break-in is being investigated.
Finally, early Monday morning thirteen chickens were stolen from Jose Caballero’s chicken coop and released in the main hall, as well as in Mr. Becchio’s office. Food for the chickens was also left in the hall. When the custodial staff arrived at 6am, a another staff member report-ed the now “free range” chickens. The custodians managed to catch all thirteen chickens and return them to their coop before students arrived on campus for early bird classes After further investigation it was discov-ered that in fact these chickens had come from Cabllero’s coop, as the lock was broken. All three events are currently under
investigation.
ASB, 1953. Campilio as the ASB President sits center during his senior year.John Campilio, 2014
John Campilio, 1953
Photo courtesy of Hannah Scribner
Have you seen this man?
The new sign was installed during the morning of Tuesday, October 20 by SBHS Alumni
The heavy sign was hoisted to its current location by a small crane.
Farewell Peabody Stadium Barbecue Tomorrow BY SARINA WASSERMAN
This Saturday, October 24 Santa Barbara High School will bid adieu to our beloved Peabody Stadium with a “Farewell Peabody Stadium” Barbecue hosted by the SBHS Alum-ni Association. The Barbecue will take place on the field house side of the Stadium between 4pm and 8pm.
The price of tickets is $25 with 100% of the proceeds going towards the stadium renovation. Tickets for chil-dren under ten years old are $10.The event was put together by our very own Alumni Association and the Tenoso Family. Mary Moore Tenoso, who comes from a family of Dons — in fact her sons are fourth generation Dons — came forward with the idea for the event earlier this year and was integral in its organization. At the event there will be Barbecued food, live music, as well as a DJ. Come out to say farewell to over ninety years of Football Games, Pep Rallies, and oth-er sporting events.
OCTOBER 23, 2015 THE FORGE NEWS | 3
Gracie Fisher is Back in Town!
BY LIZZIE SAUNDERS
Last December one of our fellow Dons, Gracie Fisher was unexpect-edly paralyzed during her birthday celebration by a mysterious and rare virus called Acute Flaccid Myelitis (AFM). At that time, she was only the 101st person to be hit by the very serious virus. After spending over a month at Cottage Hospital and going through a countless num-bers of tests and treatments, doctors referred Grace to Craig Hospital in Denver, Colorado, which specializes in spinal cord injuries. The goal of this trip was to bring back as much feeling and movement as possible and to help Gracie become less re-liant on her respiratory vent. Gracie, being the congenial girl we know, made friends with all of her doctors, nurses, and hospital staff who were helping her get better. Every day at Craig consisted of hours of physical therapy and practice weaning off her vent. Gracie also was introduced to other teenagers with spinal injuries whom she could relate and social-ize with. Not only did she make new friends at Craig, but many of her hometown friends came to vis-it her during her stay. After seven months of hard work, the doctors at Craig decided that Gracie could come back to Santa Barbara. She is now back in the comfort of her own
home and being assisted by her fam-ily as well as part time nurses. Gracie is happy to be back in Santa Barba-ra and loves driving around town in her new wheelchair accessible van, which she was able to get through the Santa Barbara fundraiser, “Race with Grace” last year. The charity event was sponsored by Santa Bar-bara Firefighters Association Charity Fund and many other local business-es and raised an incredible $109,620 intended to finance Gracie’s new car, wheelchair, and equipment they need at home. Although Gracie is grateful that she can now be visited by her old friends, she misses the friends she
made in Colorado. Recently, howev-er, some Craig nurses came to visit her, which was very heartwarming. Gracie still has physical therapy every other day, and is also very indepen-dent and motivated to get better on her own. She has shown tremendous courage and joy throughout this long journey and is sure she wants to help other kids with rare neurological dis-eases or disorders in the future. The Fisher family has had to adapt to an enormous amount of change recent-ly, but the obstacles they have faced have only made them stronger as a family and has made the community stronger as well.
The SAT Gets a Makeover BY SOPHIA FISCHER
Recently, the College Board, de-veloper of the SAT (Scholastic Ap-titude Test) and SAT Subject Tests, has decided to administer a new version of the SAT, offering mul-tiple changes that can be seen as either beneficial or detrimental to students. These changes will take effect in March of 2016, with the final version of the old SAT being conducted in January of 2016. The biggest change will be the way the test is scored. The current SAT is based on a score between 600-2400, the highest score possible being 800 in each section of critical reading, writing, and math. The new test will be scored between 400-1600, based on scores in only two sec-tions, evidence-based reading and writing, as well as math. In addition to the scoring, the guessing penalty will be altered as well. Similarly to the ACT (American College Test), the updated SAT will have a no guessing penalty, meaning that if a test taker gets a question wrong they will receive no punishment as opposed to the one-fourth guess-ing penalty that was in place in the older version. Another change includes the removal of the fifth an-swer choice, thus making the newer SAT more like the ACT with only four answers to choose from. This new test will focus not so much on the individual’s strategy in answer-ing tricky questions, but rather on the individual’s knowledge of a par-ticular subject.
Previously, SAT writing section opened with a daunting two page essay that was to be written in twenty five minutes; that will now be replaced with an optional fifty minute essay instead. Rather than having to write a persuasive es-say backed up with historical and literary examples, students must determine the rhetorical strategies used by the author in a given ex-cerpt. The student will have to cite evidence in this excerpt in order to validate their claims. This essay is graded by two separate readers and given a score of 1-4, the high-est attainable score being an eight compared to the original twelve. This will give colleges a better un-derstanding of how well the student
is prepared for college and higher level learning. Additionally the ob-scure vocabulary words seen on the old test will also be omitted and re-placed with less complicated words, where students will have to demon-strate an understanding of a word the in context. The math section is getting a makeover as well, with the implementation of a no calculator section. Students will have twenty five minutes to answer twenty math questions without the aid of a calcu-lator, geared toward students who have learned through Common Core. The math section will focus on linear equations and functions, complex equations, geometry, and will continue to include charts and graphs. Fifteen percent of the ques-tions will have a scientific theme, and another fifteen percent will have a social studies theme. There will also be an “Extended Thinking Question” worth four points, which will be included within the grid-in math section. The reading section, which is now scored alongside the writing section, will also include graphs that students will need to interpret. The reading passages are now determined beforehand, so students will have an understand-ing of what they need to prepare for before taking the test, as opposed to prior students who were kept in the dark about the passages. There will be one passage about United States and World Literature, two passages about History and/or Social Stud-ies, and two passages about Sci-ence. However, students will need to have no previous knowledge of any of these topics, they simply must be able to explicate each pas-sage.
Although the new SAT may sound less difficult in foresight, many tutors recommended against it. The Class of 2017 will have three options in regards to standardized testing for college: they may either take the new SAT, the old SAT, or the ACT. Tutors advocate either taking the older version of the SAT or the ACT. These tests have a foolproof system for scoring and have not changed in the past years, while the new SAT will have major complications that will need to be worked out before it can be deemed a reliable testing option.
Takin’ it to the Streets: ‘Pianos on State’
BY CHLOE BALLESTEROS-PEREZ
You may have noticed that Santa Barbara has been a bit more musical lately. Now in its sixth year, the an-nual “Pianos On State Street” event was brought back once again to Santa Barbara on October 8th. This event, funded by a variety of local organi-zations, created enjoyment for the whole community this past week. As a collaborative musical experience,
“Pianos On State Street” allowed amateur and professional musicians the unique opportunity to perform on the busy streets of Santa Barbara. When a scheduled musician was not playing, anyone was welcome to sit down and play. These pianos, which lined the downtown area, were deco-rated by a variety of local artists who created a unique look for each one. This year, “Pianos On State Street” was funded by the Santa Barbara Ed-
ucation Foundation, the Downtown Organization, New Noise, the Santa Barbara Bowl, Santa Barbara Arts Collective and the Santa Barbara County Arts Commission. Keep an eye out next year for this Santa Bar-bara tradition!
Halloween Grams Now on SaleBY CHLOE SHARR
It’s that time of year again, the time when you can dress up in em-barrassing costumes and stock up on free candy. At last, it’s Hallow-een! With Halloween comes many traditions. At SBHS, the traditional ‘Halloween gram’ has been around for years now. Halloween grams are small, inexpensive items you can buy and have sent out to a friend, boyfriend, girlfriend, teacher, or whoever you want. This year one of the items being sold is a small Halloween-themed bear for $3
each. The bigger item is a Hallow-een themed stuffed animals for $5 each. They will be sold on October 19th through 27th, and you can buy them at lunch in the quad or the main hall. All grams will be de-livered on Friday October 30th. All proceeds will go to the junior class and with that money they will plan Winter Formal. Later in the year seniors will be in charge of Christ-mas grams and sophomores will be in charge of Valentine Day grams. Pick up your Halloween Gram to-day!
Gracie and her new car. Her new specially equipped car was funded completely by last spring’s “Race with Grace” event.
While Gracie was in Denver she was nominated Prom Princess by the senior class. Above is a shot from her talent video.
4 | NEWS THE FORGE OCTOBER 23, 2015 OCTOBER 23, 2015 THE FORGE NEWS | 5
The Many Faces of ASBBY HUGH COOK
This year ASB has a new face, a new advisor, and a new message. That face is president Sean Babcock, the advi-sor is Rachel Roesch. The message is inclusivity, positive energy, and of course hype for all things SBHS, whether that be sports, spirit days, or just supporting the student body. ASB is responsible for almost every social event here at SBHS: ranging from prom to pep they create, or-ganize, and execute your favorite events. “Outwardly ASB is really just about putting on events, fun things for students to do that make school more fun. Behind the scenes we work hard to create an inclusive communi-ty and make everyone feel welcome at SBHS,” is how Alice Upton, Logistics Commissioner and 4 year veteran, described the general responsibil-ities of ASB. “It’s because we know
that as people get involved, being involved makes everything more fun. makes everything more excit-ing, and you meet new people. It can create a domino effect of the success you experience at high school, and how memorable it is.” ASB is chang-ing up their routine, and going out of their way to support the student body more than ever. They are offer-ing myriad spirit days, pep rallies, a huge scream team, all of which they believe every student should partake in. For Sean Babcock, president of ASB, “it can range anywhere from dances to pep rallies to even little lunch time activities, Halloween car-nivals, Quad Grubs, representing at the games, and showing support for our students whether that be through games, or theatrical performances. Overall, just supporting the student body.”
The Leaders of ASB: Madeline Schmidt, Kylie Transki, Jada Howard, Porter Rees, Will Beightol, Sean Babcock, Connor Egan, Alice Upton, and Lily McIntyre | Photo Courtesy of Beau Lettieri
Sean Babcock is the president of ASB, and the physical embodiment of their attitude toward this beloved school. As a positive, fun-loving per-son who is incredibly involved in this school, and ASB, Sean says, “ I basi-cally oversee every event that hap-pens. So essentially I lead the class and make sure that everything is go-ing smoothly, make sure that people leading the committees and groups are on task, providing support where I can. I guess you could say I’m the face of ASB.” He has a multitude of responsibilities, especially this year with a new ASB Advisor, and a new, inexperienced executive committee, Overall he described the transition as “fairly smooth with a few minor hic-cups about communication in the be-ginning.” Sean joined ASB to change its attitude: “I wanted to change the way students in ASB feel, making them feel more comfortable reaching out to the average student, encourag-ing them to go to the play, the game, the lunch activities, to get involved with the great school that we go to.”
Porter Rees is the Vice President of ASB, and is responsible for “back-ing up the president, helping control the ASB class, assigning people to do different things. Also doing small logistical things, anything from mak-ing schedules to assigning people to jobs at an event, or coming up with different things we need to do.” Each month he holds a meeting where kids from outside of ASB can present their opinion on how ASB is doing. He emphasizes this, “We need more student involvement, more people loving our school.” A new ASB ad-visor with less experience has forced him to take on more, “It was kind of tough not having Wooster because she’s done it for so long and she knew everything, so we kind of had to step up and take a lot of responsibility on our own. Executives had to step into the supervisor role.” This also offers more opportunity: “Having a new advisor was kind of an opportunity to start doing things on our own, we have room to do what we want and make ASB what we want, and what the students want.”
Jada Howard, the current ASB sec-retary, is responsible for everything organizational: “I’m in charge of keeping everything in ASB in order, by taking notes. Basically keeping everything efficient and orderly, easy to view and easy to access. I’m also in charge of recording our minutes when we plan our events.” She knows what students want this year, and she, along with the rest of ASB, is work-ing to achieve that. “ASB is planning more events where students can be involved. We want more student par-ticipation in things like school spirit days, and dances (Homecoming and Winter Formal.) We just want to make this year super fun for all stu-dents on campus.” She participates in ASB because she loves this school and wants everyone to know why it is so amazing, “our school has been around for over a century, we are like an extended family, we have years of tradition that other schools don’t have. We have a beautiful campus, heritage, and history. ASB is the best decision I’ve ever made.”
Madeline Schmidt, ASB treasur-er heads all fundraising, budgeting, and coordinating of money for ASB events. With three years of expe-rience, she has had roles spanning from “junior class secretary and sophomore class vice president”. She was confident and happy about the transition to a new ASB advisor, say-ing “Roesch still learning the ropes, figuring out the stuff it took Wooster five years to figure out, but I really like Ms. Roesch and I think she’s go-ing to be an amazing advisor.” Made-line recommends you look forward to Homecoming, Winter Formal, and Prom, “We’ve got some really cool stuff going on with that — it’s going to be awesome.” She’s put her energy into spearheading efforts to increase school spirit, “ASB’s whole goal is just to have people excited to be here at SBHS.” A true don, she knows that “we have so much spirit and love for our school.”
Connor Egan and Will Beightol ran unopposed for Pep and Rally. According to Will, “The job descrip-tion for pep and rally is to be the face of ASB, we commentate, lead the scream team, get people ready to go. We also do most of the upfront con-versations for ASB itself. Our respon-sibilities are basically to do all things MC, scream team, pep rallies, assem-blies, etc.” However, Connor added that because they are on the executive counsel, they help oversee many oth-er things as well such as getting ready for the Homecoming assembly. They commented on the transition with a different story, emphasizing the difficulties of having a new advisor. “Not gonna lie, kinda rough, it’s just cause being a new teacher she’s prob-ably not used to having a student run class,” said Connor. They have been pushing the limits in ASB, with the goal of making sure the students have the best year possible. A true man of the people, Connor is “pushing things to the extreme in the name of the students.”
SEAN BABCOCKASB PRESIDENT
PORTER REESVICE PRESIDENT
JADA HOWARDSECRETARY
MADELINE SCHMIDTTREASURER
CONNOR EGAN & WILL BEIGHTOL PEP & RALLY
ALICE UPTONLOGISTICS COMMISSIONER
Alice Upton is the Logistics Com-missioner for ASB, which means she is “ in charge of the timing and the details of every event.” Alice sees only opportunity with the arrival of a new advisor, saying “a new advisor is fun and exciting; we obviously liked our former advisor but it’s good to get a new face. It’s fun because it’s a new perspective. Ms. Roesch was an ASB advisor at a middle school, so it’s a little bit different–but she knows what she’s doing.” Alice described what ASB was working on, a plethora of events that follow a difficult time line, and an even more difficult task
of organizing the venues, DJ’s, and everything else to ensure that a good time is had by all. ASB is working on the Homecoming dance, which will take place tomorrow night, but she also said that ASB is already work-ing on Prom, because that event re-quires such a huge amount of time, effort and planning. “I’ve been in ASB since I was a freshman, I’ve seen every crew for the past 4 years, and this one is special because there are a lot more people that are working to make it really fun and really exciting. New year, new things, the ‘Don’ of a new era.”
Kylie Transki is the ASB Activities Director this year. “I oversee many of events, like Homecoming and events in the Quad. I look at the layout and design of the games we play.” She works closely with the current Lo-gistics Commissioner, and has pre-viously held that position. Kylie said that ASB is targeting a few specific as-pects of the school this year, such as “boosting school spirit, which I know we say we are every year; but I’ve no-ticed an increase in attendance of the scream team, at the games, more par-ticipation in spirit days. more peo-ple getting involved and getting the whole school on the same page.”KYLIE TRANSKI
ACTIVITIES DIRECTOR
OCTOBER 23, 2015 THE FORGE NEWS | 5
‘Tooning In: The Art of Kieran Meaney
BY BEAU LETTIERI
If you are a regular reader of The Forge, you may recognize the work of SBHS artist and cartoonist, Kier-an Meaney. Kieran has been an artist practically her entire life, beginning drawing at age three. She has always told stories trough her art: using her
act ive
imagina-tion, to give
life to the characters she illustrates. By the age of eight, Kieran was authoring multiple cell comics. Some of these early comics
she drew for her friends — the most notable being a spin off of Star Wars called Pet Wars. “The kids loved it,” she shared, starting her publishing career when other wanted copies of her Pet Wars comic. She continued to draw and even had a series of self published comics sold at Chaucer’s Bookstore by the time she was eleven.
Today, Kieran is a sophomore in the Visual Arts and Design Academy (VADA), and draws any chance she can get, whether that be during art class or in the margins of her do-nows at the start of class. “My older sisters and my dad attended San Marcos High School, but I chose SBHS spe-cifically for the VADA program — it was the right choice for me — VADA is fantastic!” Kieran explained.
Kieran is not the only artist in her family; her father has been an artist for over thirty five years. For the past twenty-eight years Kieran’s father, Tom Meaney (a Santa Barbara na-tive), has been an artist at I Madon-nari, Santa Barbara’s Italian street
painting festival. Since Kieran was seven years old, she has taken part in the festival, beginning with a four
foot by six foot plot. In recent years she has illustrated a full size eight by eight foot plot, just as her father does.
“Cartoony” is how Kieran de-scribes her style. When creating her works, Kieran uses a wide variety of mediums, each of which have differ-
ent advantage in her eyes.Outside of drawing, Kieran loves
to perform, act, and sing. “I think acting helps me to be a better anima-tor [another of Kieran’s interests] and character artist.” Kieran said. “Facial expressions and body language are a huge part of the field of animation and character design, which is what I want to pursue as a career.”
She is also an active member of Santa Barbara High School Theatre’s technical crew and has contributed to the scenic art on multiple produc-tions. Last Spring, Kieran along with a few other VADA students assisted local artist and photographer Isaac Hernandez in painting the backdrops for The Mystery of Edwin Drood. Currently, she is working on painting the set for the upcoming production of Pippin.
An artist since birth, Kieran does not plan to quit any time soon as her artistic eye develops and as her already colorful career advances. Keep your eyes peeled for more of
Kieran’s work in future issues of The Forge.
Kieran at the 2015 I Madonnari Festival | Photo Courtesy of Isaac Hernandez
Kieran’s most recent work at the I Madonnari Festival
Since she was seven years old Kieran has participated in the annual I Ma-donnari Festival
“The Merchant” 2014.
“Bonnie” 2015
Who You Gonna Call?BY LIZZIE SAUNDERS
Alright seniors, it’s getting to be that time of year when we all get stressed out. That’s right, I’m talking about applying to college. These few months will have us sleep deprived, emotionally un-stable, and overall on edge. Aside from deciding which schools to apply to, we have to send in transcripts, test scores, and most important- letters of recommen-dation. Now, the letters of rec-ommendations may seem like a small addition to the application but they couldan end up being the deciding factor in your admission to various colleges or universities of your choice. They are an oppor-tunity for someone who is credible to vouch on your part and give schools a little taste of your repu-tation. So, how might one come across a glowing letter of recom-mendation? Well my friend, that is up to your favorite teachers, men-tors, and guidance counselor. Just simply swing by their classroom or office, shine your most charming smile, and ask very politely if they will write you this very important letter. Because they are already writing dozens of letters per year, these teachers will undoubtedly agree to being your spokesperson – that is if you’ve made a good im-pression on them throughout the years. The next step to getting your teacher to write your letter is new this year and high tech! You need
to invite them to the online web-site, Naviance, which is linked with The Common Application and will end up being the database which acts as the “middle man” between teachers and colleges.
In a recent interview with Mr. Gamble, we got one teacher’s per-spective on the annual writing of letters of recommendation. Mr. Gamble admits that although he has never written a negative rec-ommendation, there have been a few incidents where he has en-couraged a student to ask another teacher who might be more suit-able for the task. He also confess-es that he dedicates hours on each recommendation.
Otto Layman is another passion-ate staff member who dishes out several letters of recommendations per year. “I always have at least 7 to 10 letters to write. It irks me when colleges separate “academic” letters of rec from “arts/others”, as if my recommendation was of less value because the arts are often thought of as ‘non-academic.’ In theatre we teach history, language arts, math, painting and design, and technol-ogy.” said Layman. He stresses the need to ask a teacher that knows you and to get a letter of rec from a teacher you have an established, personal relationship with-from the teachers you consider mentors; they know your strengths, and they have a sense of your character.
Wacky Weather Hits SBHS
This fall has not been very kind to Santa Barbara. A large variety of temperatures, an onslaught of high temperatures and sweltering con-ditions have hit the normally mild Santa Barbara, leaving SBHS hot,
bothered, and frustrated. Since the beginning of the school year SBHS has experienced many hot days, some with temperatures reaching into the high nineties. Additional-ly, high levels of humidity made the temperatures even more unbearable. Wind gusts also stirred up SBHS cre-ating tornados of dust in the front of the school. Because ‘dirt is the new green’ due to the drought, dirt has been freed and is easily kicked up.
With a ninety year old school, the majority of classrooms do not have air conditioning forcing students to try to concentrate boil in their ab-normally hot classrooms. Luckily, Dr. David Cash, Superintendent of the Santa Barbara Unified School District, provided a partial solution to the problems: fans to every teach-er on campus free of charge. Late last week hundreds of fans arrived in boxes, requiring the custodial staff to assemble each fan and store the finished fans in the theatre until stu-dents helped deliver them to teachers in need.
Birds gather in the shadow of the Cow, looking to cool down in the 95 degree weather this past week.
President Dr. Gina LaMonica has over 20 years of combined experience as a high school counselor, college professor, and university administrator.
Free 20 Minute Phone Consultation!
“Oh my god … Bagels are jewish!?”
“Can I borrow your phone?
Mine’s all the way in my pocket.”
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“So, Bridget... Homecoming?”
THINGS OVERHEARD IN THE HALLWAY
Nina Enholm is very invested in Santa Barbara High School, especially the M.A.D. Acade-my. For the past four years, she’s been seen on the dive team; she’s been in clubs such as JSA, Social Club, and Reinvent Con-sent. Not only is she very much tied into the school, but she also helps out families by nannying. When she was first nominated, she was extremely surprised and hopes that in the future, everyone in the senior class will be able to nominate princesses. Nina did express her concerns for being princess; she stated that being princess did entail certain tasks. Even though these tasks seemed daunting, she’s very happy that she is able to be a part of a group of amazing can-didates. Although she wants one of the other nominees to win, she feels that being queen will show that she has a tremendous amount of school spirit (or that people want to embarrass her). Nina really enjoys the theme chosen by ASB and agrees that there is always night life in New York, which makes the theme a great fit.
Alana Ochoa is the manager of the Madrigals choir and danc-es flamenco with the Kathy Cota Dance Studio. When she was first crowned princess, Alana says she was “really not expect-ing it and was really confused.” However now she is honored to be a princess and cannot wait to showcase herself as well as spend time with the other princesses. To Alana, being princess (or maybe queen) means embody-ing the school spirit, staying involved in SBHS activities, and being a positive influence on the rest of the school. When we asked Alana if she was the best candidate she told us that she doesn’t think she is. She went on to say that all of the girls are phenomenal and she thinks they are are equally worthy of the po-sition. Bound to look beautiful, Alana will be keeping her dress a surprise. Alana said, “The theme for this year’s homecoming is amazing! New York is a city full of fun and color and I think that is a lot of what Santa Barbara embodies: brightness, fun and, the arts.”
Talia Sanchez is on the cross country and track team here at Santa Barbara High. She is also involved with on campus clubs such as Peace Builders and JSA. Outside of school, Talia enjoys walking her dog at the beach. Talia says that her first reaction when being crowned was “is this a joke” however now, she is ex-cited for the process especially alongside such a great group of girls. Talia says that she is flat-tered by the opportunity to be a princess. Talia modestly says that the entire group of girls deserves to be crowned queen and she is happy about being nominated. She says that she is excited about the theme being a city which is more specific than the typical light themed dance. Talia says looking for a dress is like prom came a little too early, but does know what she will be wearing for the halftime cere-mony. She and Nina Enholm be performed their talent together at the Homecoming.
Amber Melgoza has been seen dedicated on and off the court, from being on the San-ta Barbara High School Girls Basketball team to A.S.B. Am-ber just recently committed to Washington University in Se-attle for basketball. When Pep and Rally and the band came in to nominate Amber, she was ex-tremely nervous, and her hands wouldn’t stop shaking. Now that she is nominated, she is excited and is happy to be alongside her various friends. She’s mostly ex-cited for the actual Homecom-ing game, where each princess will be escorted on the field; this will be one of the last times they will be able to be on the field before its renovation, which sparked her nostalgia. To Am-ber, she’s really glad that there is diversity in the candidates this year and she is honored to rep-resent her school in a positive way. She’s the best candidate for the position mostly because of the dancing skills she’s acquired throughout the week.
Kylie Transki, whom many have seen throughout A.S.B. over the years, is also a part of the Santa Barbara High School Varsity Cheer team; she also teaches and participates in dance and theater, and was just recently in SBHS’s Music of the Night. She has taught for the Adderley School and has assist-ed in various dance classes at Momentum Studio. When she was first nominated for princess, she was extremely confused: she was out of the classroom when the band went to find her and the ordeal was chaotic. Kylie is extremely happy to be nomi-nated, and did not expect her nomination whatsoever. Being a princess and possibly queen is an extreme honor to Kylie because she is able to represent the school and it’s a great mem-ory in her high school career. Kylie is the best candidate for queen because she is extremely involved in our school, and has put one hundred percent into everything she does for Santa Barbara High School.
Priscilla Nolasco participates in the Dons Net cafe where she enjoys selling food to the stu-dent body. She has spent time in the past dancing and now she takes cooking classes and exer-cises frequently. When Priscilla was initially crowned she was incredibly surprised and did not see it coming at all. When asked how she feels post nomination, Priscilla said, “ It hasn’t really hit me yet but I do definitely feel special. The whole process is just crazy and a lot of fun!” As princess she feels like a role model for the school since it was her classmates and peers who nominated her. Priscilla doesn’t necessarily think she is the best candidate but she is super nice and friendly to the students here at SBHS. Although Priscilla has yet to find a dress, we all know she will look amazing! To Pris-cilla the New York theme rep-resents elegance and fun and she hopes that will be reflected at the dance. As for her talent, Priscilla will be dancing with her best friend Carla Sandoval!
NEW YORKA NIGHT ON THE TOWNMEET THE PRINCESSES:: BY SABLE LAYMAN, LIZZIE SAUNDERS,
& SARINA WASSERMAN
Back to the Future: a look at Homecoming Through the Years
BY ANNINA GONZALEZ & ALYSSA CARDENAS
Homecoming — the traditional welcoming back of Alumni, students, and faculty after a long summer – has been celebrated for over a century here at Santa Barbara High School. Throughout the years Homecoming has consisted of many different ele-ments, including the Homecoming Football Game, a court of Homecom-ing Princesses, parades, pep rallies, spirit weeks, assemblies, and most importantly, a school-wide dance. While Homecoming has been a vital part of the morale of the students and staff of SBHS for a great deal of the school’s history, the way it has been celebrated has changed substantially over the years.
Annually, Students come together for the Homecoming football game
to celebrate the new school year, and the Homecoming Princesses join to-gether on the track and are driven in classic cars provided by the Ca-maro Club. The evening after the big game the annual Homecoming dance brings together the student body with a DJ, photography to capture timeless moments, and decorations meant to embody the chosen theme. This year’s theme is “New York, a night on the town,” city lights and bustling streets, a never ending party.
Over the past century the Home-coming Dance, originally called “The Senior Dance,” (in the 1930’s later called the Pig Skin Prom) has also had a dynamic history. Girls had to be chaperoned by their mothers and each chaperone had to be kept entertained throughout the dance. When attend-ing the Homecoming Dance, students had to go straight to the dance and
go straight home after it was over. In recent years parent chaperones are rarely used as SBHS staff currently oversee the celebratory students, but this year is different, as there will be up to 30 parent volunteers. You may use the restroom as much as you need and jewelry and makeup is always allowed. The dress code has become more liberal over the years and the coat check service, while in the past used for checking men’s coats, is now primarily used to check cell phones, purses, and high heels. As for report-ing straight home after the dance… sorry parents, no promises.
During its long history, the Home-coming Dance has taken place in many different locations throughout Santa Barbara — both on and off campus. Previous venues have in-cluded the Gym, Girls Gym, and off campus venues such as The Cabrillo Pavilion and the Rockwood Country Club. Limited finances in recent years have forced the dance to take place on campus, in the Meadow where it will be held once again this year. The Meadow, previously a parking lot un-til it was converted into a park like setting area almost fifteen years ago, has proven to be both a cost-effective and pleasant location to celebrate the new school year.
The venue of the dance is not the only drastic change in Homecom-ing’s celebratory routine. During the 1940’s, 50’s, and 60’s, there were pa-rades that took place on State Street annually to celebrate SBHS’s Home-
coming, as SBHS was Santa Barbara’s sole high school- until the opening of San Marcos in 1958. Many groups on campus had floats in the parade (in-cluding The Forge), and the marching band performed. The tradition disap-peared during the 1960s, and was re-vived for a time in the mid 1990’s, but with an alternate course down Ana-pamu Street. Recently the tradition died out once again when the Parade become too costly and complicated.
Since the tradition began in the late 1940’s, before Homecoming between five and ten senior girls are nominat-ed for the Homecoming court, giving one the chance to be elected Home-coming Queen (or Football Queen as it was know for many years). The nomination process has changed over the years, primarily depending on the way ASB chooses to conduct the voting. For the most part, the Homecom-ing princesses were nomi-nated by the football team up until the late 1970’s. Then either the boys of the senior class, or during some years the entire student body, voted for the Queen. Since the late 1970’s the nomination has been done by the boys of the senior class. Today, the senior boys continue to nominate the princesses, however the en-tire senior class is allowed to vote for the Queen at the annual Homecoming As-
sembly. Currently, once a candidate is nominated for any court —whether that be Homecoming, Winter Formal, or Prom — they cannot be nominat-ed for any succeeding court again. Two weeks before Homecoming, the princesses are surprised in class with a crown and rose to notify them of their nominations. The night of the Homecoming football game during half time all princesses ride in on their “chariots” (classic cars). While in recent years the Queen has been announced at the Homecoming Foot-ball Game, over the years there have been instances where the Queen has been crowned at the Homecoming Dance. This year the Queen will once again be announced during the Fri-day football game during halftime.
BY SABLE LAYMAN, LIZZIE SAUNDERS, & SARINA WASSERMAN
The Homecoming Princesses, 1964 The “Pig Skin” Prom (as it was known) in 1955, at the Rockwood Country Club
The Homecoming Parade, 1958 -- an annual event that featured the many aspects of SBHS, and welcomed everyone to the new year.
Homecoming Princesses 1950 -- with the tradition dating back to the late 1940’s, these princesses were among the groups first to be nominated.
8 | NEWS THE FORGE OCTOBER 23, 2015 OCTOBER 23, 2015 THE FORGE NEWS | 9
The War on Choice
BY SARINA WASSERMAN
Recently, Americans across the country have been pressuring Con-gress to defund Planned Parenthood. Over the past few months, especially, overtures from a radical arm of the Republican party have increased, and more people in congress want the government to end its support of this organization. Numerous protests have taken place and representatives in Congress have spoken out about the many reasons (true and false) for why we should defund it. Planned Parenthood representatives, activ-ists, and every-day people have been doing what they can to support the organization and counter false accu-sations made against it, but people
don’t seem to care about the truth.This whole episode is not about
fetal tissue donation or the Hyde Amendment governing federal funds for abortion or even for Medicaid re-imbursements to physicians. It is the ideological opposition to a woman’s right to choose by politicians who think they know better about how to make women’s most personal, sensi-tive health care decisions. Republican members of Congress nearly unani-mously oppose abortion. Senator Marco Rubio of Florida, for example, supports banning abortion with no exemptions -- not even in cases of rape, incest or when the life of the woman is threatened. The underly-ing reason for these politicians’ base-less attack on Planned Parenthood
stems from their desire to take away a woman’s constitutional right to an abortion.
Abortions are only three percent of Planned Parenthood’s services so it is quite evident that the attack on Planned Parenthood is an assault on abortion itself. The majority of their services include STD/STI checkups and treatment for both women and men (35%) and contraception (35%). Other services include cancer screen-ing/prevention for women and men, and family planning, among other things. Planned Parenthood provides roughly 11.4 million medical services for 3 million people each year. All of which, by the way, are given to the patient free of charge or at a reduced rate! Yes, defunding Planned Parent-hood will have a dire impact abortion
services, but it will also eliminate many critical services for women and men living in America.
Teenagers, in particular, greatly benefit from these services, and even though government funding seems like an issue not relevant to teenagers like us, it is something we need to be aware of! Santa Barbara High School students as well as other local high schoolers and adults will be stripped of their right to use Planned Parent-hood if they need it or want it. We can’t let it happen!
There was a time in this country where thousands of women died from unsafe abortions, and taking this service away is a step backwards. America is an ever-growing and changing country full of innovators and creators who are here to contin-ue to improve and modernize soci-ety. Taking away the right to health care at this point is just archaic! We need to recognize this fight for what it is. It is about banning a woman’s right to choose, and it is being driven by politicians who think they have the right to impose their opinions on women’s most private health care de-cisions. It is time to stand for Planned Parenthood.
Protestors challenged Planned Parenthood’s local branch earlier this month.
Fear itself: How Safe is Our School?
BY WILLIAM BLONDELL
Less than one month ago, on Octo-ber 1st, a deadly shooting took place at Umpqua Community College in Roseburg, Oregon. Nine innocent students were killed, and another nine wounded. The shooter, Christo-pher Harper-Mercer, was described by the Los Angeles Times as a “hate filled individual with anti-govern-ment, anti-religous and white su-premacist leanings.” Since 2013, there have been at least 143 school shoot-ings in America, and these acts of ter-ror are becoming almost routine on national headlines.
Recently, Eastern Kentucky Uni-versity battened down the hatches after a threat written on a bathroom wall read “kill all by 10-8-15.” Because of recent events, schools have begun to take and more precautions towards threats, can never be too safe. “Kids are aware of what is going on and what threats are out there,” says Mr Meister, assistant principal at Santa Barbara High. “This is something that we definitely take very seriously, and we have at least two lockdown drills per year, with one scheduled for November twelfth.” With such
a big campus it is very important to respond in the right way if this happens at our school. This would mean remaining calm, and listening to teacher’s orders. As most students know, we constantly have school per-sonnel patrolling the campus on golf carts, as well as by foot. In addition, maintenance workers and grounds crew are trained to report anything suspicious to campus security. This means that any dangerous people will be spotted and reported.
These shootings have made it very clear that something needs to change. Some say more gun control, some say more guns. One of the possible future leaders of the United States, Jeb Bush, replied “stuff happens” in wake of the recent tragedy in Oregon. With hundreds of school shootings now recorded, tragic shootings such as Umpqua are not not just isolated incidents. It is very important that this issue is focused on, in a major way. Many people are now advocat-ing for teachers and admins to carry firearms to discourage shooters from entering campuses. While a logical proposal, it is common for shooters to commit suicide once they have killed. So if these people are plan-
ning on death anyway, would arm-ing teachers prevent shootings? Or would a school wide firefight result in more students’ deaths? The an-swer to these questions will hopefully be solved in the upcoming election. The United States government is so worried about acts of terror against its citizens overseas, with ISIS, that problems in the homeland are being overlooked. While school shootings may not have political ties, they are domestic terrorism of the most hei-nous sort.
On October 8, 2015, a fight broke out between students outside a dorm at Northern Arizona University. Ste-ven Jones, an 18 year old freshman, responded to a punch in the face by shooting fellow student Colin Brough, and wounding three others. In a span of a week, two fatal school shootings have been recorded. And just last Wednesday, at San Marcos High School, a series of unsettling videos posted on Instagram by a San Marcos student caused a school-wide panic, with hundreds of students staying home. After investigating the incident, the SB Unified School District and the Police Department assured parents that their children were not in any danger. While it is re-assuring that there is pro-active response on the part of authorities, the nonchalant lack of serious partic-ipation by students in drills meant to save lives doesn’t leave us feeling very confident that SBHS is prepared for the random, sudden nature of school violence. It is very important to give thought to your safety, and partici-pate fully in all of the lockdown drills at our school. Although teenagers be-lieve that they are invincible, they are not, and one can never take the safety of themselves or the safety of others too seriously. Be careful, be safe, and be alert.
Over the years San Marcos High School has had a number of shooting scares, one of which occurred earlier this week. | Photo Courtesy of Paul Wellman
Ninth Graders Accepted
Into MAD and VADABY LILY CISEK
Santa Barbara High School is very well known for its academies. We give our students many different ways to express themselves in ways they wouldn’t normally get. Our two largest academies are Media Arts and Design Academy (better known as MAD) and Visual Arts and Design Academy, or VADA. For over a de-cade, these programs were only open to tenth, eleventh and twelfth grad-ers. However, this year, for the first time, VADA and MAD have accept-ed freshman into their programs.
Many of the students at SBHS initially come to participate in these academies, so letting fresh-men into the program made our school that much more appealing to students coming into high school as ninth graders. MAD and VADA decided to let freshman into the pro-gram after SBHS becoming what we call an Alternative School of Choice. Being an ASC means our staff, teachers and other dis-trict workers make more choices for our school than the state. This be-came official a few years ago and Mr. Daniel Williams, head of MAD and Mr. Daniel Barnett, head of VADA, said in an interview that they simply added pre-MAD and pre-VADA into the academies themselves, so ninth graders could skip the pre-education
process and be immediately thrown into the mix of the academies.
In these programs they usually ac-cept fifty students, but because of the academies popularity, they bumped up the enrollment and acceptance numbers to seventy-five. The rea-son ninth graders weren’t original-ly allowed to enroll into MAD and
VADA is because, ever since 1996 when the programs
were started they were what are known as a
California Partner-ship Academy, or CPA, which ninth graders aren’t al-lowed to be en-
rolled in according to the state. But now,
since SBHS is an ASC, ninth graders can apply.
Freshmen are officially into MAD and will not need to reapply next year, contrary to previous belief. Tenth graders can still apply as their first year in the program as well.
Other than this big change in the programs, a few normal traditions remain for freshman and the upper classmen. Freshman still take classes with their fellow artists in the acad-
emies, and so do tenth, eleventh and twelve grad-ers. Although it is too early to see how this
decision will affect the dynamic and feel of the academies, it is obvious to see that our school thrives off of these academies, and many junior high students dream of being accept-ed into MAD and VADA. Allowing freshman opens many new doors to new experiences.
In the wake of recent shootings, what are we doing to be safe?
Will a vocal (and politically savy) minority bring Planned Parenthood down?
OCTOBER 23, 2015 THE FORGE NEWS | 9
Let the People Decide!BY ISABELLA MILANO
When I recently learned about the way we nominate our home-coming princesses and kings of hearts, I was appalled. For those of you who don’t know, only the boys can nominate girls for the crown and vise versa. This sparked a great deal of disappointment, emotion and discomfort between my friends and I, as well as other diverse groups we share our school with. Homecoming is a big deal at our school, it is a tradition, but some aspects of it really need to change.Placing a power like this in the hands of the opposite gender brings up a lot of controversy. First, it sub-tly implies that women’s worth is established by men. Considering how far we have come in the fight for equal rights, this seems like an outdated concept. Same goes for the men whose worth is placed in the hands of women. Because the system goes both ways, many see it as fair and argue for minimal or no change. But the problem here is not the fact that every student can nominate, the problem is the gender boundary drawn by the process. The gender roles in our society continue to negatively im-pact a variety of people everyday- not every person can fit themselves into the gender binaries of “man” or “woman”, and nobody should have to! Gender was created, and it does not have to define you. Our nomination process limits prog-
ress in this sensitive area from being made, especially when the process could be so easily changed. I would love to see our school be progressive, a tolerant advance with the times, and take measures that may go against “tradition” to establish a safe and welcoming en-vironment to all of the students. In my research, I couldn’t find an-other school that follows the same nomination process. By blindly following tradition and never stop-ping to question if what we’re doing is right or if there is a real reason we’re so scared to change, we are drawing a thick line that divides our student body and creates ani-mosity. We are the only ones hold-ing ourselves back from proper change. Much of the student body doesn’t agree, or at least the few that got to vote on whether or not the process would change. But for those in the LGBTQ community, this can be especially offensive and damaging. Someone who is gender fluid, meaning how they identify may feel different day to day, may not want to identify as either sex, or maybe as both, and we’re stop-ping them from that freedom and security when we divide the whole school like this. Sure, it may be a part of our school tradition, and traditions can be fun, but this one is outdated. We should be starting a new tradition, one where everyone is treated with equal respect and heard with equal empathy. Gender should have no correlation with worth, and if ev-
eryone can nominate equally, or even if nominations are left up to the teachers, nobody is categorized or hurt. It might seem like no big deal, it might seem like I am over stressing the subject. Truth be told, this whole thing is merely a popu-larity contest- and it’s totally enter-taining and fun- but a lot of that is being taken away if we put people in boxes like this. The reason I’ve brought this to so many people’s attention, damaged my reputation and dealt with the whispers in class is because silence does not speak louder than words in these cases. I truly care about those who feel un-comfortable or hurt by this policy, and I won’t help anything by stay-ing quiet. No change ever came from the ones who sat down and shut up, so I encourage everyone to propose changes we see neces-sary to the growth of our school. If everyone could consider there is no valid reason not to change our system in order to satisfy the whole student body, we could be a much more evolved school and add greater things to our legacy. Our dance isn’t going to change, you will still have an equal chance at getting nominated, and still be just as happy if your friend is a princess. It is simply for peace of mind and a gesture of goodwill. It doesn’t take the opposite gender to assign worth, and once our school acknowledges that, we can move onto the next.
Homecoming Vote ControversyBY PORTER REES, ASB VP AND THE ASB EXCEUTIVE COUNCIL
As an organization built to repre-sent the study body, ASB votes on many different issues throughout the year, big and small. The deci-sion process has always been the same and it follows simple democ-racy, majority rules, and no vote counts more than another. The entire process of changing a tradi-tion or discussing an issue usually goes like this: a member presents an issue or topic to the class and after debate and discussion the class is called to vote for an option. Whichever option has the most votes is the resultant decision.
On Thursday October 1st, during ASB 4th period, ASB brought up a concern heard by a members of the student body about the way that homecoming princesses are nominated, boys voting for girls. Students accused the nomination process of being “sexist,” “ho-mophobic,” and “misogynistic.” It was claimed that it was a popularity contest and that the whole process was unfair and unbalanced.
A meeting was called to or-der with the entire class to debate
whether ASB should change the nominating to be all genders vot-ing for girls (homecoming) and all genders voting for boys (winter formal) instead of only one gen-der voting for the other for each dance. After about 30 minutes of heavy debate, argument, discus-sion amongst the entire class, it was put to a vote and resulted in the nomination system being kept the same: senior boys would nominate homecoming princesses in the fall, senior girls would nominate winter formal princes in the winter, and all genders would get to nominate both prom kings and queens in the spring. The voting process would also be kept the same: all genders would vote for one of the nominees for the homecoming princess, win-ter formal prince, and prom king and queen.
Although there were strong points made on both sides of the discussion, ASB practiced fair de-mocracy in making this decision, with the entirety of ASB present, and with students representing both sides of the argument. .The ASB executive council stands be-hind this decision and believes it most accurately reflects what the student body wants.
EDITORIALSEditorial Policy: While we will do everything possible to grant the greatest range of free expression to our contributors, The Editorial Staff and Faculty reserve the right to edit for objectionable language and space constraints. The opinions expressed here are not those of the Forge or its staff as a whole.
Culture Shock: an Alumn Reports Back
BY EMMA CISEK
College is not what I thought it would be like. Not at all. I guess I should have expected that when you move to New York the people aren’t going to be as friendly as in Santa Barbara, but I thought that maybe college students would be different. They’re not. College students are so self centered and not at all interested in what you have to say besides the polite, “Where are you from? What’s your major?” conversation. At SBHS I was spoiled with great friends, so it was a big shock when I got to NYU and realized I wasn’t going to have that anymore. What I realized though is that you have to be patient; college isn’t going to be a great expe-rience for everyone on the very first day or even after the first month, but if you say yes to as many things as possible, you might find a few people that aren’t so bad.
When it comes to things like ac-ademics and the city my school is in, I’m in love. I’m lucky enough to
be in a program where there are no more than 30 students in each class and your professor is the one actu-ally teaching you every class instead of a TA. This makes it so much easier to learn because you’re motivated to actually do the work because your professor will find out if you don’t, and it makes it so much easier to get help with anything you’re struggling with. I definitely lucked out when I got placed in the program I’m in be-cause it seems very similar to high school classes, so instead of jump-ing right into a huge, 300 student lecture, I get to ease into that with two years of smaller, more familiar courses. However, it’s a truckload of reading, and if you don’t spend your time wisely it is so easy to fall be-hind. But also don’t spend all of your time cooped up in your dorm, espe-cially if your school is in a great city like New York. It has been so amaz-ing to be able to venture out into the city and explore different neighbor-hoods, restaurants, and museums, and most of the time I get to do it for
free. Many freshman dorms will host events exclusively for the students in that building where they get to go do a variety of cool things - often for no more than five dollars, and if your school does this, take advantage of it, because even if it sounds lame, you get to do stuff for free that ev-eryone else might pay $40 or more to do, plus if it’s something you’re in-terested in, it’s likely that you’ll meet people there with the same interest and you’ll make some new friends.
Overall, I think I made the right decision in going to NYU. Even though the people and the social scene are not what I thought they would be, I don’t think it would be very different anywhere else. High school definitely prepared me well for college, you have to be ready for big disappointments (like a gross roommate and having to do your own laundry) and you have to not take 8AM classes (trust me, it’s not the same as in high school). You’ll be okay.
Emma Cisek, Last Year’s Editor-in-Chief of “The Forge” | Photo Courtesy of Bill Wertz
The World According to Zevallos
Hey ya’ll. It’s me David back and better than ever. I am currently a “first-year”(freshman is considered a hazing word) at a small college (2,700 undergraduates) called Colgate Uni-versity. Before I arrived at school, I felt extremely unprepared, and I was unaware of the trials and tribulations that entering a top tier liberal arts
college would have in store for me. After starting college, which began with a grueling 4 day orientation pe-riod, I realized that SBHS had pre-pared me in the best way possible; how to manage academics, a social life (top ten party school in the na-tion), and be hyper-involved in every facet of college life that Colgate has to offer. Even as a “first year,” there are so many opportunities around campus to get involved. Whether its through Student Government, Cab-aret, or Club Ultimate Frisbee, the opportunities are endless in college. Although I hate to admit it, the class that prepared me most for college is APES. Almost every class I am in relates to environmental science. Its an incredible experience overall and I am very glad I chose Colgate for my school. I’ll check back with you throughout the year and let you know how it’s going maybe my expe-rience here can help you prepare for your college experience.
David Zevallos
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10 | ARTS & ENTERTAINMENT THE FORGE OCTOBER 23, 2015 OCTOBER 23, 2015 THE FORGE ARTS & ENTERTAINMENT | 11
Pippin Preview: We’ve Got Magic to Do!BY TYLER GREENWALD
High School is an intense laboratory of discovery, where children become adults right under your nose—the shy, frightened freshman, dropped
off by parents to a 40 acre mystery grows up to drive a car, carve out an identity, and shape shift right before our eyes. If you could film the life of a high school student and ramp up the speed of the film, you would see that
it really is a kind of magic. Students are asked to become: to explore all the opportunities that stretch out in front of them, academically, socially and personally. The journey they are on begins to take shape and tensions,
between what you believe yourself to be and what the world imposes upon you, begin to push and pull at you. Society, parents, and school all tell you that if you just will it and work hard, you can be extraordinary.
But what does it mean to live an extraordinary life? And who decides? This is the question at the heart of Pippin, the opening production of both the 2015-2016 theatre season at Santa Barbara School, and Otto Layman’s 20th year as the head of the Santa Barbara High School Theatre Department. Hired by J.R. Richards to turn around a department that had fallen on difficult times, Otto has forged a program that has garnered a national reputation as a model for p r o f e s s i o n a l l y produced high school theatre, and has sent many actors on to careers on a grander scale (Just this year Dana Musgrove Costello, class of 2002, made her Broadway debut in Finding Neverland opposite Kelsey Gramer and Mathew Morrison).
In Pippin, first produced in 1972 and directed by Bob Fosse, we fol-low Pippin, the shrouded in legend son of Charlemagne, the King of France who created a kingdom with his sword, and sowed the seed for a rising nationalism that would even-tually become Europe. Originally set in a timeless, circus-like milieu, Santa Barbara High’s Pippin is set in a circus of books, books of all siz-es, from standard volumes to books over sixteen feet high. There are life-size pop up books, a throne made of books, and steps and chairs made of books. Why books? “Pippin is a musical about storytelling,” explained Layman, who designed the set (with lights by longtime collaborator Mike Madden), “and we wanted to create a different kind of a circus—so with books as our metaphor for Pippin’s journey, we decided to surround him with those symbols. Of course we still have aerialists and acrobats!”
The Circus is led by the Leading
Player, a mysterious figure (Camille Umoff) who with her troupe of play-ers tries to steer Pippin to a perfect, tragic and theatrical ending. Filled with spectacular dance numbers (choreographed by UCSB dance Pro-fessor Christina McCarthy, who has worked with Mr. Layman for over 10 years) and the iconic music of Ste-phen Schwartz (Wicked, Children of Eden) directed by UCSB Professor
of Music Dr. Jon Nathan, Pippin is the ultimate the-atrical experience that will leave au-diences pondering the boundaries we cross for love.
Pippin show-cases the musi-cal talent that has earned SBHS their reputation as a first class theatre program: Pippin, our titular hero, is played by Senior Bradley DeVine;
his love interest, Senior Sable Lay-man; King Charlemagne is played by Quique Hernandez Black while his conniving wife Fastrada is played by Meredith LeMert, also a Senior. The doltish warrior son Lewis is played by Cooper Umoff, while Pippin’s grand-mother is played by Sarina Wasser-man.
Bonnie Thor is back as costume de-signer, and has created a rich palette of color and character, basing her de-sign on traditional circus, commedia del’ arte, and the Byzantine fashions of the 9th century.
Pippin opens November 6 at 7pm and plays November 7, 13, and 14 at 7pm, with matinees on November 14 at 1pm and November 15 at 2pm. Tickets are free with an ASB gold card. Regular ticket prices are $25.00 for orchestra, $15.00 for adult gener-al admission, and $10.00 for student general admission. The theatre de-partment encourages all students to experience our nationally recognized program—if you can get a group of at least ten students together, the the-atre department will offer you half price general admission tickets. Just contact Mr. Layman at [email protected].
The Royal Court of King Charlemagne | Photo courtesy of Isaac Hernandez
Love Songs and Pastoral Life: Bradley DeVine as Pippin, Lex Siegel as Theo, & Sable Layman as Catherine
Intrigue, Plots to Bring Disaster: The Coronation of King Pippin the First, after the murder of Charlemagne Photo courtesy of Isaac Hernandez
Charles the Great
OCTOBER 23, 2015 THE FORGE ARTS & ENTERTAINMENT | 11
Florence is a MachineBY SABLE LAYMAN
This past Tuesday, October 20, Florence and the Machine graced the stage at the Santa Barbara Bowl. This concert was by far one of the best concerts I’ve ever seen; it was also the most packed concert I have ever seen. When friends and I arrived around seven, there weren’t many peo-ple around; the people who were there, however, were not the aver-age concert-goers. Many of them were fairly older and much more hip than many people you see at the concert. Even though many people didn’t come see the open-ing act, that didn’t stop them from seeing the headliner. The opening act was a band I had never heard of before: Ghost of a Saber Tooth Tiger. They are a pretty new band (they began playing in 2008), and they are American, unlike Flor-ence and the Machine. I wasn’t particularly fond of their music. A lot of their songs sounded pri-marily the same and in general, I’m not really a fan of hard rock. Some songs they sang were “Ani-mals,” “Midnight Sun,” and “Moth to a Flame.” Even though their music wasn’t what I was fond of, their polychromatic lighting was very interesting and their band was also bigger than a “normal” band. During the half an hour of waiting for Florence to set up, a few friends and I went up to the top of the Bowl where we were able to see the lights of our beautiful city and examine the different types of people who came to the concert. Once again, we barely saw any young folk at the concert; it was a very much older crowd. After what seemed like an eternity, Florence finally came on stage. The crowd erupted and began to sing along to some well known songs, such as “Dog Days are Over” and “Shake it Off.” When Florence sang “Raise it Up,” the entire crowd at the Bowl stood up, which I had never seen before. I was very fond of how energetic and free-flowing she was; she even ran into the audi-ence and sang her heart out in the middle of thousands of people. Along with an amazing singer and band, the set was phenom-enal: they were equipped with six sets of backlights and a shiny backdrop. This was also the first concert where I saw they used the side projection screens for a live camera feed; this was great for the people like me who are blind and aren’t able to see the stage from their seats. Along with some well known songs, she also sang some newer songs such as “How Big How Blue How Beautiful,” and “Ship to Wreck.” Every song she sang was harmonious and full of energy and life. My favorite part of the night was when she made everyone put their cellphones away and just listen to the music. This showed how invested she was in her music rather than in publicity. Overall, this was a fan-tastic concert and Florence and the Machine definitely knew how to entertain and liven up a crowd. Not only did they do a great job, but the Bowl once again created an excellent atmosphere and a great experience for all ages.
Music Under the StarsAn evening with the talented SBHS choir department
BY CHLOE SHARR
On Friday of October 9th, the vo-cal music department held its second annual fall concert “Music in the Meadow” under the direction of the newly appointed choir director, Ms. Mary La Face. The event was hosted by choir co-managers Irving Soto and Alana Ochoa, and consisted of a variety of songs from movies and musicals.
To start off the night, the mixed choir sang Singin’ in the Rain and Hawaiian Roller Coaster Ride from Disney’s Lilo and Stitch, setting the mood for a delightful evening. As the night progressed things began to heat up. Olivia Ochoa and Hailey Turner soulfully performed ‘Jolene’ by Dolly Parton, leaving the audience breathtaken. In addition, “Someone Like You” by Adele, performed by Nalanda Lamb, Meredith LeMert, Al-exandra Morgan, and Jewel Shrestha, left every girl in the audience either lip syncing or crying to the heartfelt tune. Later, Bradley DeVine, Quique Hernandez, Irving Soto, and Ben
Zevallos drove the beat back with “Sh-Boom” originally performed by The Chords, which had the crowd clapping to the beat of the song.
However, the singing was not the only thing that made the evening perfect. The venue, in our very own meadow, was quite beautiful! There were lights strung from tree to tree,
and the stage and singers were lit so beautifully that it created a magical effect. This is all thanks to the effects of Theatre technical director Jona-than Mitchell and a few members of the theatre tech crew.
If you want to catch these singers in action mark your calendars for the Winter Concert, which will take
place on December 11th and 12th, at 7:00 pm at Our Lady Mount Carm-el Church. And If you’d rather be on stage than in the audience, you can always join choir yourself-they look forward to welcoming you to being a part of this amazing group of per-formers.
The Madrigals Choir sing “Mad Hatter” from the musical “Wonderland” | Photo courtesy of Beau Lettieri
Hailey Turner sings ‘Jolene’ accom-panied by Olivia Ochoa
Thanks to the technical wizardry of SBHS Theatre, the meadow is transformed
Comic by Kieran Meaney
12 | SPORTS THE FORGE OCTOBER 23, 2015
“Come on Down to my Boat, Baby”SBHS sailors are athletes on the waterBY ANGEL CORONA
There is a wide variety of excellent athletes at SBHS, and thus choosing a single athlete is always a challenge. This month, our problem found a salty solution: the Santa Barbara Youth Sailing Foundation, a group that allows many from our commu-nity to participate in a sport that they otherwise may have never discov-ered. The group was founded in 1968, by members of the yacht club. Their stated goal is “to develop in young people, through the sport of sailing,
attributes of self-reliance, responsi-bility, teamwork and sportsmanship, together with a constant awareness of the requirements of safety.” This non-profit foundation offers a great opportunity to enthusiastic young sailors. Lauren Siegel, Evan Heffer-nan, Lucas Pierce, and Caden Schei-blaur make up the Santa Barbara High sailing team. The sport involves a lot of physical work and mental toughness, and the objective is to race against other sailing teams around a specific given course in a faster time than their opponent on a two person
boat. Our school team participates in five regattas a year, which are like two-day tournaments in which they compete against 30 different schools. The points obtained when partici-pating in a regatta count towards na-tionals. “We are planning on making it to nationals this year,” claims Lau-ren. The SBHS team practices twice a week alongside both the Dos Pueblos
sailing team and the Laguna Blanca sailing team. They are also coached by the same coach under the Santa Barbara Youth Sailing Foundation. There are six people on the team, four of which are on varsity and the other two alternates, meaning that during a race if someone isn’t doing well or gets injured an alternate takes his/her place in hope of improving. Lucas
Pierce and Caden Scheiblaur have al-ready qualified for single internation-als, and will be going to Virginia next weekend to compete for the title in single-handed boats under the Santa Barbara team banner.
Athletes in Action: Full sail ahead!
Dons Fight for Playoff Spot in Homecoming Game Against Buena
BY TYLER GREENWALD
Last week’s matchup for the San-ta Barbara High football team was a huge one, with it being senior night as well as a crosstown rivalry compe-tition; but what tonight has in store is all the more riveting.
Tonight’s home matchup against the Buena Bulldogs not only marks the annual Santa Barbara High School homecoming game, but is also the biggest Channel League meeting
of the season, as it holds huge playoff implications.
With a heartbreaking loss to Ven-tura followed by a gratifying victory over crosstown rival Dos Pueblos, the Dons remain in playoff contention as they prepare for their final two league games.
“We understand that if we win this game we will have a spot in the play-offs, and a CIF playoff berth has been our goal all season,” said quarterback Brent Peus. “This week’s preparation
is all based on our focus and our se-nior leadership. Our days of practice leading up to this game are going to determine the outcome. We know we have it in us, we just need to go out and execute.”
The Dons are going into this one with a lot of momentum, as they are fresh off of a decisive 35-14 victory over Dos Pueblos.
The Santa Barbara offense could not be stopped last Friday, specifically the passing connection between Peus and wide receiver Mason Bigelow. Bigelow hauled in 11 catches for 114 yards, finding the end zone twice in the process.
On the opening drive of the game, Peus utilized his speedy receivers as well as a solid running performance from Sean Babcock in the backfield to spark an 80-yard drive, which was capped off by a 22-yard completion to Bigelow on a backside post.
“When I first lined up, they put a linebacker over me with a corner stacked on top of him,” said Bigelow. “Before the snap I thought I wasn’t going to be open but the backers press didn’t throw me off and as soon as I broke on my post, I knew I was in the clear. Then it was just up to Brent and he delivered a perfect pass in stride.”
Linebacker and running back Ju-nior Garcia showed his versatility on the following two drives, as he re-trieved a fumble on the two-yard line and returned it to the 20. Garcia later converted his fumble into six points as he punched in a short scamper af-ter a long drive put Santa Barbara in the red zone.
The Chargers answered back with a
touchdown on the subsequent drive, but Peus found the end zone once again on the Dons’ third drive of the game, this time finding Tick Jellison in the middle, which Jellison turned into a 31-yard touchdown to increase the lead to 21-7 with under five min-utes remaining in the second quarter.
“Offensively we were very efficient,” said Peus. “The line was getting a good push all game which gave me time to throw and allowed us to run the ball effectively. We did not do anything special, we just took what the defense gave us and our guys were
able to make plays.”Next up it was 6’5 receiver Blake
Kelley reeling in a 17-yarder midway through the third quarter, and Bige-low tallied the final touchdown of the game on a beautiful 33-yard connec-tion. DP found its way in one final time but was unable to generate any sort of comeback as the game con-cluded at 35-14.
If the offensive performance is any-thing like it was last game, the Dons have a good a chance as any to secure the victory and a spot in the playoffs. The game is in Peabody Stadium to-night at 7 p.m.
Quarterback Brent Peus fires a dart to wide receiver Robert Tovar on a crossing route midway through the second quarter. Peus completed 23 of his 34 attempts on the day, with 259 yards and four touchdowns to show for it. Photo Courtesy of Mitch Klopp
Sailing requires agility, strength, and imagination.
Wide receiver Mason Bigelow snags the first touchdown of the game off the hands of quarterback Brent Peus. Bigelow had 11 catches for 114 yards and two touchdowns on the night. | Photo Courtesy of Presidio Sports
