the eye mar 22, 2007

theSingapore American High School March 22, 2007/vol. 26 no. 6

Permit # MICA (P) 234/10/2005

eyeeye Singapore American High School

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/vol. 26 noSingapore American High School March 22, 2007/vol. 26 noeyyMarch 22, 2007yMarch 22, 2007

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by Megan Anderson They were sworn to secrecy,

bound by a scandalous secret. Nothing could be disclosed. They were six female seniors on the Italy interim trip.

The six were caught violating curfew regulations on the Italy: Rome and Sorrento Art, Architecture & Culture interim semester trip. The group of 20 SAS students stopped over in the city of Florence and stayed at the Hotel Olympia when six female seniors decided to explore the city after dark. Those suspected did not all sneak out together and came back to the hotel at different times.

English teacher Joe Thomas, one of the trips’ sponsors, was warned that one of the students was missing and checked all the rooms.

“Apparently he kept banging on the door until someone woke up,” senior Vanessa Tan said. “The doors were pretty solid so the door was like coming off of its hinges.”

Upon return to Singapore the group of girls made a pact not to discuss the happenings on their trip with other students or teachers. They refused to talk about it to their friends.

“The Italy girls took an oath to each other not to talk about it or

something,” one friend said. The six seniors received several

consequences for their offense. Those people that are involved lose their senior privilege and must write letters of apology to the sponsors and others on the trip, Deputy Principal Doug Neihart said. They have to write a letter to the SAS administration from the parental perspective asking how their daughter could have been abducted and what it means for the parents not to know of their whereabouts.

In addition, the students have to log in twenty hours of charitable service. Neihart said consequences

for curfew violations are not written in stone and depend on certain circumstances.

“We look at these situations on a case by case basis. We don’t want anybody to think that the consequences this year will be the same in another year,” Neihart said.

Incidences like these have changed the opinions of many teachers on interim semester and could have a detrimental effect on the future of interim semester trips.

“It could have a ripple effect on the continuation of interim semester,” Neihart said.

The concerns regarding

disciplinary some trips lacking education have caused teachers to question some of the trips available to SAS students.

“I think we should end the cultural trips that are essentially city tours,” one teacher commented in an Eye interim survey. “We should end all Europe trips. Though seniors feel they are ‘owed’ Europe, that is not why these trips were created. If the students want to go on a senior trip to a city where they drink, party and enjoy the city at their leisure they should set these post-graduation trips up without the need of an adult sponsor/policeman.”

Girls vow what happened in Italy, stays in Italy

An Eye survey found that 43.2 percent of high school students have copied off the Internet for school work. 31.7 percent of high school students think that half of the school cheats on a regular basis.

English teacher Nanette Ruhter caught a junior throwing a furtive glance at a nearby paper. Those wandering eyes booked that student a date with Deputy Pricipal Doug Neihart.

In homebase tomorrow, seventy-seven percent of the people you see will have cheated on their homework, and half of your classmates will have let their eyes stray on tests. If it bothers you that your friends cheat, count yourself among half of the student body.

“People obviously cheat for better grades,” junior Thomas Whalen-Bridge said. Honesty may be one of SAS’ cornerstones, but junior Miguel Santos says that this alone will not

deter determined recalcitrants. Both Santos and Whalen-Bridge say that teachers need to be more vigilant in their monitoring.

“Outsiders” author S.E. Hinton coined the phrase “rat race for success,” and in the scramble for good grades and better c o l l e g e s , many students are led astray.

“ T h e people who cheat are generally the people who have the most pressure to do well,” senior Abhinav Kaul said.

“They’re the ones who are most driven to get the grades,” added senior Rachel Witt.

“The interesting question is not why people cheat but how come so many get away with it,” Santos said.

Kaul believes the school policy

is conducive to cheating. Neihart, however, says that SAS does what it can to limit the problem.

“Cheating is ubiquitous; every educational institution has that problem,” he said. “But here at SAS we try to show students that their

actions will have consequences . ” He added that “we all reap what we sow” and students who cheat now will suffer in college.

Witt thinks that many students are oblivious to long-term consequences, and the school

needs to talk to teachers about cheating. Witt claimed that teachers never catch students cheating.

While Whalen-Bridge says this is an exaggeration, he believes that “a lot more can be done by teachers” to curb cheating. He pointed to the example of a teacher who sat at the back of the classroom to observe his

HOW THEY CHEAT• Cheat sheets • Looking up information when “go ing to the bathroom”• Passing papers• Looking at other students’ tests• Talking when the teacher leaves the room

students without them knowing if he was looking at them.

Santos said that something as simple as making students leave their bags in the front of the class and allowing students only a pencil case would be an effective deterrent. Neihart added that deterrence on the part of teachers comes down to “proximity [to students] and attention.” Santos thinks that having the school publish a set of guidelines for teachers to follow when giving tests would greatly reduce the problem.

“Some teachers might get offended if the offi ce were to send them a sheet of guidelines,” said Neihart, adding that he values the “autonomy of each individual teacher.”

Ruhter said that she is constantly alert to ensure that students don’t cheat, because it is “unfair” to those who bother to study. If Santos, Whalen-Bridge, and 50 percent of SAS students get their wish, other teachers will be equally vigilant.

Teachers help critical in stopping cheating

“The interesting question is not why

people cheat but how come so many get away with it.”

junior Miguel Santos

HOW THEY CHEAT

by Ravi Shanmugan

Eye in Focus:Stories, surveys and

questions about future of students

favorite time of yearon pages 6 - 7

Junior Patricia Mar plays with children at Bridgman Center, Soweto. Photo by Julia Knight

HOW TO STOP IT• Students may only have a pencil case with them during tests• Teachers sit at the back of the classroom to observe the students without their knowledge• Have different forms of the test• No bathroom breaks during tests• Immediately fail students caught cheating

2 March 22, 2007 ❁ the Eyenews

by Sam LloydWhen social studies teacher

Jason Adkison visits YouTube, it’s not to idly browse the newest featured videos. It’s to grade assignments.

Students in his class have had such assignments as filming, editing, and uploading human rights videos, or collaborating online via “wikis” resembling Wikipedia. If the plans of the new Wireless Steering Committee come to fruition, this kind of in-class work could become more common.

A laptop for every SAS student, and a WAP (Wireless Access Point) for every square foot of the library. That’s what the committee, a group of faculty and administrators organized to discuss wireless Internet access in SAS, has been considering.

According to committee member and Library Media Specialist John Johnson, they are “90 percent sure” they will implement such a system, with next year designated a pilot year where the committee’s considerations will be tested on a smaller scale.

“The library would be wireless, and laptops could be checked out, but not for the whole day,” he said. “We’re pretty sure that’ll happen. We’re also hoping to make the café area (outside the library) and the cafeteria hotspots.”

The science and modern language classrooms could become wireless too. Currently the system implemented there is that laptops are taken to classrooms when needed, on a cart with a WAP attached that transmits the wireless Internet.

Johnson said that, at present, “no decisions have been made.”

Member of the committee and social studies teacher Jason Adkison believes that the school cannot resist such change, whatever the short-term decisions.

“That’s the way education is going; we’re tech-savvy,” he said. “Everybody will have to have it. It’s just a matter of time.”

“A lot of people are saying we’re missing the boat,” Member and IT Director Ed Gilbreath said of the school’s lack of wireless access.

“If we provide [students] with Internet access, a way to collaborate in a team and produce a product, it should be moving them in a direction that will help them in their future,” he said.

When several classes without access to the WAP carts need Internet access at the same time, it puts a

strain on space in the computer labs. Yet, Gilbreath said there is not enough space for new labs.

He acknowledged that there are complex issues involved in laptop and wireless distribution.

Parents are concerned about the weight of laptops added to students’ school bags, Gilbreath said. He said a possible solution to this is using “electronically-based” textbooks, though some parents still prefer real books.

“It’s fine the way it is,” Junior Michael Howard said. Laptops “would just be more of a hassle” and although they are “definitely good for notetaking...they’re just gonna get lost and stolen.”

This raises another issue: security, both physical and informational. Laptop theft is already an issue at many American universities. And when New York Times technology

columnist David Pogue set out to test the security of a coffee shop’s wireless network, he found that it was easy for a computer to intercept emails and see what sites another computer using the network was visiting.

“None of this took any particular effort, hacker skill or fancy software. Anyone could do it. You could do it,” he concluded.

He did note, however, that there are security measures that can impede this. Johnson also noted, “It’s not going to be like Starbucks where you just walk in and get online.”

According to Johnson, the committee is still uncertain of whether to supply students with laptops or to require them to purchase one themselves, as the local school Republic Polytechnic has done.

Wireless networks next year may be followed by student laptops “An advantage [to providing

laptops] is that you only have one kind of laptops, but a drawback is that you’d have to make repairs available; you’d have to hire a whole new staff for those hundreds of laptops,” Johnson said.

Gilbreath pointed out that some universities have withdrawn laptop requirements because they consider the devices a distraction in class when students engage in instant messaging or browse unrelated websites instead of listening to the instructor.

“That’s going to happen unless you’re engaging with the students,” Adkison said, so teachers need to be educated about how to control such situations. “You’ll be able to tell if a kid is playing games in your class.”

The school could also filter out such services and websites, as it does on its current networks. However, the committee is considering doing away with filters altogether. Johnson cited the labor involved in enforcing the filter, and said an alternative could be to collect data about, but not limit, students’ Internet use.

Other issues include bandwidth and battery limitations, distribution of and types of wireless, and the cost and time associated with implementing the system.

Concerning time, Adkison predicted a long transition due to the size of the school and the need to instruct teachers on how to incorporate the technology into their classes.

“It’s more of changing the style of teaching, the methodology,” than of changing actual curriculums, he said.

The Wireless Steering Committee is discussing whether and how to integrate laptop use for every student and widespread wireless Internet access into the high school. Staged photo by Mark Clemens.

by Cat WardA 3 million dollar gift from

Stephen Riady will convert the space between the Drama Theater and Auditorium into an air-conditioned, enclosed reception area. The generous donation will allow for the construction of a foyer, the renovation of the SAS Memory Garden and a possible revamping of the bridge that connects the Middle School to the foyer.

“We want to do something so we can enclose [the area],” Superintendant Bob Gross said.

Riady, the parent of junior Brian, Jessica ’06 and Jennifer ’04, was approached by Gross less than two months ago about the donation.

“I was approached by Mr. Bob Gross,” Riady said. “He called me then I invited him to my office and that’s where the conversation started.”

Riady is a Deputy Chairman of the Lippo Group, a group which son Brian describes as a “family business that started from zero.”

Gross described the project that he had in mind to Riady and then Riady came up with the

donation amount.“It was really something that

he decided,” Gross said. Riady said that he came up with

the figure out of the conversation that he had with Gross and that he has a policy of giving back to society.

“We have a policy, a philosophy, that we should contribute back to society so we have been doing that

actively for the past ten years,” Riady said. “We’ve been doing that in the U.S. (in New York), in a university in Hong Kong. Particularly in Indonesia we’ve done quite a bit there.

Riady said he had been thinking about doing something for SAS when Gross contacted him.

Gross said that he wanted the

Parent donates 3 million for foyer, Memory Gardenfoyer to be conducive for use during intermissions from shows. Gross, the Board of Directors, and the architect have just started the project, and are not sure of the final design.

“The architect is currently looking at a rendering and what possibilities he sees,” Gross said.

While renovations for the foyer include a possible enclosing

device in the roof and an air-conditioning unit, the Memory Garden project includes a memory wall and a seating area.

Gross said that the Memory Garden would be especially for alumni, who could come back and read the history of the Woodlands campus at the site. He hopes that the Memory Garden will be a place where alumni can remember the relationship that they had with the school.

As the superintendent, Gross is responsible for approaching people for school donations.

“If it appears that their children have had a good experience and they have a kind of reputation of donating to other organization then maybe they’d be interested in donating to SAS,” said Gross.

The Memory Garden project might occur as early as this summer and the renovation of the foyer would most likely happen in the summer of 2008. Gross is hopeful that any construction would help to make the area more attractive and more useful.

“It’s to make that area just look a bit more special.”Shincee Riady, Jennifer Riady ‘04, Stephen Riady, Jessica Riady ‘06 and junior Brian Riady. Stephen Riady is contributing 3 million dollars to

renovate the area around the Drama Theater and Auditorium. Photo courtesy of the Riady family

3the Eye ❁ March 22, 2007 news

by Amanda TsaoA sea of green paddles rose to

show agreement.“When we ask you how many of

you blog about your teachers, all of you put up the green paddles,” host The Flying Dutchman said during the making of the show’s trailer. However, in the taping session, even students who did not own a blog were made to put up the green side of their paddles.

Ten high school students were invited to the discussion on Feb. 1, by Channel News Asia as a part of a series of discussions called BlogTV, a show aimed at throwing light on the subject of teachers and students using blogs. Hosted by local celebrity The Flying Dutchman and news anchor Cheryl Fox, they were joined by about twenty students aged 13-16 from Canberra Secondary School and Amad Ibrahim Secondary School. The show aired Feb. 8, on Channel News Asia.

Students and teachers who were present expressed opinions on the topic of students blogging about teachers, and teachers about students.

A webpage that promoted the show said the panel would address the topic of “should students be allowed to blog about their teachers? Should teachers be allowed to blog about their students? How does blogging enhance teacher-student relationships?”

Each participant was given a paddle with a green side and

a red side to agree or disagree. Occasionally the hosts questioned the audience, picking a few audience members to explain why they disagreed or agreed. Among the myriad of concerns brought up was

the question of whether students had blogged about their teachers knowing that the teachers could not respond in a similar form.

Senior Azhani Amiruddin said that she had blogged about a teacher in the past because she was emotionally hurt by him.

“It’s not to show that I’m popular but it’s just that I had a lot of support,” Amiruddin said, “I tried to

get back at that teacher in a way, but he couldn’t really do anything about it. Once I posted on the blog what he had done to me, I knew that the students would support me.”

Recently on an online discussion group, SAS alumni commented on former teachers. As the administration has no authority over them, it would be difficult to close the group down. Upon the discovery of the site, one concerned SAS high school student complained at the site’s administrators, but no action was taken.

“They said they would get back [to me] in 48 hours but they never did,” the student said, “I didn’t write to the people actually involved in the group. They might just think I’m in high school and that it’s ridiculous.”

At the BlogTV discussion some teachers said they had blogs but none said that they had written about their students.

“Most teachers who blog have opted to do so underground — refusing to cite their names, workplaces or other identifying details — to avoid potential professional pitfalls,” Jennifer Radcliffe wrote in a Houston Chronicle newspaper issue last January.

She referred to “Mike from Texas,” a teacher with a blogspot account, who does not write about his students, but is open about his opinions on faculty.

“We have a VERY young teacher on our campus, to me she looks like she’s about 15,” Mike writes on,

“Needless to say she is in her first year of teaching and a little on the, well let’s just say, different side. On Valentine’s Day she wore an absolutely hideous outfit. Imagine somewhere out there a bridezilla who wanted to get married on Valentine’s Day and wanted to make SURE the bridesmaids were not prettier than her. THAT’s the dress she was wearing.”

Another blogger, “Ms. H,” does not give the actual names of her students but uses nicknames when writing about them.

“I have a brilliant kid, Chatterbox, who CAN NOT SHUT UP. He is constantly talking to someone. And yes, I’ve moved him. But, each time, he MAKES NEW FRIENDS. And, given that my room is roughly the size of a soup can...I’m out of options. He’s always got a reason why he needs to be talking. I can’t seem to get him to realize that I DON’T CARE WHAT YOU WERE ‘JUST’ DOING. I don’t care if you were discussing my nomination for Teacher of the Century. When I start to speak, SHUT UP.”

Math teacher Siva Ganesh from Canberra Secondary School said that some of his students visited his site and even left comments. He once received personal attacks through his site. The student was found, his parents were called in, and the student was punished accordingly.

The hosts of the BlogTV discussion, Cheryl Fox and the Flying Dutchman, told an anecdote

about a student who was expelled for blogging about another student. They then asked the panel of teachers whether the school’s decision was right or not.

SAS math teacher Edwin Bywater said he disagreed with the school’s decision.

“The school wasn’t right. Getting expelled...that’s huge. [Singapore American School] doesn’t have any guidelines at all. [There was] no right to expel a student for that,” Bywater said.

Earlier this year an SAS student was suspended for offensive comments on another student’s blog. However, no students have been expelled for offensive blogging.

Some SAS student panelists present at the discussion questioned the journalistic integrity of the Channel News Asia team. Most with when the team was filming the trailer for the show. Students were made to put up green paddles representing their agreement even if they were opposed. Junior Belal Hakim, a student who did not own a blog, felt that he should not have been forced to give false opinion.

“I felt the show was not presented in a professional way at all. It was more about the teachers versus the students [aspect of the show,]” Hakim said.

Further discussions on the subject can be found on the website: www.blogtv.com .sg.

A book about how the blogosphere is revolutionizing how we communicate and write in the world today. Photo from amazon.com

SAS students participate in Channel News Asia blogging forum

by Rhoda SeverinoThe 34 delegates waited with

tense anticipation as advisor Paula Silverman opened the envelope containing the candidate numbers of the delegates who would go on to the finals. When Silverman read out the number of the SAS debate B-team, the room erupted in cheers. This happened again and again as five out of nine forensics contestants qualified for the finals and both debate teams reached the semi-finals in this year’s IASAS Cultural Convention hosted by Jakarta International School.

Senior Julia Knight won first place in the impromptu category, the event in which contestants must make a speech from a prompt such as “veil” or “The path is the obstacle” with only one minute to prepare.

“I did not expect that,” she said. “It was just something I enjoyed doing. I did not expect the gold medal.”

Knight also reached the finals for Original Oratory (OO), where she wrote and delivered a persuasive speech on the pros and cons of celebrity activism.

“I was slightly disappointed with not placing but I was happy with my performance,” Knight said. “I thought the competition was very intense. There were some wonderful OO speeches, some of which should have made the finals.”

Senior Simi Oberoi won the silver medal in the OO category for

her speech about rap, finishing her speech by actually rapping. Though she is happy about her overall performance, Oberoi questions the objectivity of the judges.

“I felt confident but being judged is such a subjective thing and you have to deal with biases from the host school so you can never go in with too many expectations,” she said.

Oberoi added that there were candidates who reached the finals who she thought did not deserve to and others who did not but should have.

Senior Abhinav Kaul won the bronze medal in the extemporaneous category for his speech on the war in Iraq. He only had 30 minutes to prepare.

“I was pretty happy with how I did,” he said. “I knew I could’ve done better on a couple of speeches but I was pretty happy.”

Senior Brittany Balcom also made the extemporaneous finals and delivered a speech on how to reverse Zimbabwe’s economic slide.

Senior Sean McCabe won second place in the oral interpretation (OI) category, dramatically reading an excerpt from the short story “Skin” by Roald Dahl. McCabe also reached the finals for impromptu.

“Gold is always preferable, but I didn’t feel bad for losing to Paul Heath (from the International School of Bangkok) who has been second for

two years. This was his opportunity to get gold, and I’m happy for him,” he said.

OI coach John Hurst said he was pleased with his three contestants’ performances and found that this year’s competition was mixed.

“There were some very, very good OI’s then there was a group

Singapore delegates win medals in all categories

of really, really poor ones,” he said. “Half really strong competition, half really weak competition.”

Both the SAS debate A-team and B-team won bronze medals after they were defeated in the semi-finals by the International School of Kuala Lumpur (ISKL) debate teams. This year’s debate topic was whether a just government is required to

provide healthcare to its citizens.B-team member senior Brian

Leung said that he did not expect to get as far as the semi-finals.

“This is my first year and other people make it sound very intimidating but I made it through,” Leung said. “I had no expectations when I went there.”

Junior Vysak Venkateswaran and senior Brian Leung debate against the TAS B-team. They won three preliminary rounds and lost two to go on to the semi-finals. Photo by Jessica Lin

4 March 22, 2007 ❁ the Eyenews

by Nicole Schmitz“One time,” a confession on

a torn slip of paper began, “I sneaked into a nightclub with my friends. One of them got high and a little overdosed. Her eyes turned white and she started to shake her head crazily. Someone called the ambulance and she got kicked out of the country.”

Another one read: “I witnessed my friend peeing in the middle of the road while she was under the infl uence.”

The fi rst “confession” is false and the second one is true. These are sample scenarios by some of the incoming freshmen.

On four days of the week of March 12 – 16, members of Freedom from Chemical Dependency (FCD), a nonprofi t substance abuse prevention organization, spoke to students at SAS, concentrating on mandatory classes for freshmen and information sessions for Peer Supporters. With the mission of raising awareness and educating students on addiction and chemical dependency, the FCD speakers, who

are all former addicts in long-term recovery, share their personal stories with addiction to connect with their audience.

Former drug addict Diane Wilson spoke to the students.

A druggie at 15 and sober at 30, Wilson wants to prevent students from going down the same path. She cautioned students on psychological addictions and said that the drive to smoke still haunts her.

“Marijuana was much more readily available in California where I was growing up,” explained Wilson. “People are especially vulnerable at a young age.”

It is Connie Kim’s fi rst year as a FCD educator. A recovering heroin addict, she and other speakers talk about what substance abuse and addiction was like, [and] their experience as addicts.

“We keep it simple, but graphic too,” Kim said. “There’s something really powerful about a personal narrative.”

“Hopefully, they can connect with us,” Wilson said.

Wilson ran the four-day program

that taught how drugs affect relationships with school, family, friends and society. Students were also taught the physiological facts of addiction, how to get a “natural high” through activities such as sports, and how to handle mixed messages the from media. They also learned the difference between “helping” and “enabling” addicted friends.

Guidance counselor Beth Kramer was in charge of getting the FCD to hold workshops at SAS.

“‘Enabling’ is cleaning up your friend’s vomit,” Kramer said.

The four-day workshop was compressed into two days.

Ninth graders played “Truth or Dare: Eyewitness” where students anonymously submit accounts of alcohol and other drugs. The class has to decide if the situation is true or not.

“Kids are unusually shy, especially around us. They think they’ll get in trouble,” Wilson said. “It gives us an idea what kids have witnessed anonymously and gives open discussion on a subject. It

gives people a voice.”At the end of the course, the

students submitted anonymous evaluations.

“Most found it useful,” Wilson said. “They feel it’s going to help in the future.”

Kramer hopes that FCD will return to SAS and work with the seniors.

“Kids get comfortable here, but when they get to college, they might feel as if they have to ‘prove’ themselves,” Kramer said. “There will suddenly be drugs far more available and a new set of decisions.”

Junior Jack Pitfi eld, a Peer Supporter, went to one of the after school lectures.

“It was benefi cial,” he said. “I was disappointed that we didn’t get enough time to talk to them. Thirty minutes wasn’t enough.”

He said that they were easy to contact and talk to and were available after school as well.

“I was surprised by some of the facts. With a drug addiction, you can stop cold turkey, but with

Freshmen, Peer Supporters learn how to be drug-free

alcohol, if you stop cold turkey, there’s a good chance that you’ll die,” Pitfi eld said.

SAS parent Mary Gruman was instrumental in bringing FCD to SAS. She asked parents what the main issues facing teens were and they decided that it was alcohol.

“They left the fl oor open,” Pitfi eld said. “They were able to shift the focus from hard drugs to drinking and smoking, which is more relevant in this school.”

Some remain skeptical.Senior Azhani Amiruddin is a

Peer Supporter who did not attend the workshops.

“A few words won’t stop anyone,” Amiruddin said.

At the bell signaling the end of the school day, a senior male joins other SAS students to go for a smoke off campus. After they have fi nished, they remove the school shirts that have absorbed the smoke, wearing a shirt underneath for when they go home to see their parents.

According to the World Health Organization (WHO), approximately 1.3 billion people worldwide smoke cigarettes or other tobacco-related products. Though the number of tobacco users has decreased in developed countries, it remains a signifi cant problem in developing countries. Globally, of the people who smoke, 84 percent live in developing and ‘transitional economy’ countries. Cigarettes continue to sell, though the cost of one pack of Marlboro Red cigarettes would buy a poor family six kilograms of rice in Bangladesh.

An international Kick Butts Day created by the Campaign for Tobacco Free Youth, takes place on March 28. Because this is over spring break, Kick Butts Day activities took place over the week of March 12-16 to make students aware of the tobacco problem around the world, as well as the danger of it in students’ daily

lives. Activities in the middle school included demonstrations showing the effects of smoking on lungs, as well as a wall of pledges made by eighth graders who promised not to smoke.

Project 1200 involves the display of donated shoes hanging in the hallway leading to the h igh school drama room. These 600 pairs of shoes represent the 1200 smoking-related deaths within the U.S. per day.

At the high school, Freedom from Chemical Dependency (FCD), a nonprofi t organization that provides substance education and prevention programs for schools in the U.S. and abroad, visited from March 12-15, talking to students about drug, alcohol, and tobacco problems.

“Kids are being targeted and marketed by cigarette companies already,” Alex of FCD said. “Diseases are so far away for kids. [We] tell them smoking decreases lung capacity for students who are athletes.”

According to FCD, tobacco is directly responsible for over 435,000 deaths per year in the U.S., more than alcohol, car accidents, AIDS,

suicide, homicide, fi res, cocaine/crack and heroin combined.

An FCD brochure said that 59 percent of surveyed tobacco-related advertising executives believed that a goal of tobacco advertising is to infl uence teens who do not already smoke.

Teenagers often say they are not addicted to cigarette smoking, and that they can stop anytime they want. Alex said that while smoking may not become a problem immediately, it becomes part of a person’s life.

“Addiction can happen pretty quickly, but there’s a difference between psychological and physical addiction. If someone only smokes when they drink, then it becomes a habit to do one with the other [for the rest of their lives].”

An Eye survey determined that approximately 19 percent of SAS high school students use tobacco products, including cigarettes, cigars, shisha, bidis, pipe tobacco and chewing tobacco. The majority who do use tobacco attribute their use to social situations and stress.

“I smoke because I can’t sleep if I don’t,” a junior male said.

Other students described

smoking as an enjoyable rather than a necessary activity for them.

“I smoke because I like the feeling of blowing smoke out of my mouth and the buzz and the taste,” another junior male said.

Some high school students said that they only smoke when they are drinking.

“I smoke when I’m drunk,” a senior male said.

The majority of those in the survey who said they smoke started at the age of 14 to 16. One senior male shared his experience of how he started smoking in the 9th grade.

“Because I’m Muslim, I didn’t drink, so I decided to smoke at parties.”

A junior female said she started smoking because of peer pressure as everyone around her smoked, and that she now continues because it has become a source of comfort for her.

One junior female began smoking by herself at the end of 7th grade.

“I think it was partially my dad’s infl uence, because he was a smoker,” she said. “I watched him smoke. He quit when he found out that I smoked. But it’s a mental habit. I have one fi rst thing in the morning, after school – whenever I get the chance. I’ve never tried to quit.”

Alex agreed that there is a much higher risk of a teenager smoking if parents or older siblings smoke.

“They’re role models,” he saidAccording to the survey the

most popular form of tobacco use is shisha. Shisha is fl avored tobacco smoked through a hookah, and is very popular with teenagers in Singapore. Some students believe that smoking shisha is better than smoking cigarettes because the hookah fi lters the tobacco through water fi rst and then through a long pipe.

“I think shisha’s a lot cleaner and nicer, and shisha is a much better alternative to smoking,” a junior

male said. “Smoking [cigarettes] is disgusting.”

Shisha has become viewed as so separate from activities that involve alcohol or cigarettes that one senior male does not smoke cigarettes or drink alcohol, but smokes shisha.

“I think that shisha, while it’s bad for you, is not as bad as smoking cigarettes because you don’t do it as much as cigarettes,” the senior male said. “I don’t drink or smoke because I don’t want to die.”

According to a WHO advisory, a one-hour session of smoking shisha exposes the user to 100-200 times the volume of smoke inhaled from a single cigarette.

“My mom smokes, so she can’t smell it on me when I go home after smoking or when I’m smoking at home,” a junior female said.

A sophomore female said she smokes out her bathroom window after her parents have gone to sleep.

Some parents do know about their child’s smoking, and either do not care or have given up trying to make them quit.

“My parents know I smoke. I’ve smoked with [my dad] once,” a senior male said. “My mom started crying when she found out that I smoke. They think I have like, three cigarettes a day, but I actually smoke a pack a day.”

Many students at SAS have attempted to quit at least once. Others say they plan to quit in the future.

“I plan to quit before I get to college,” said a junior male who currently smokes a pack of cigarettes a day.

Despite plans, however, statistics seem to stand against them.

“It takes an average of fi ve to eight times for adults to quit forever,” Alex said.

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services states that more than 90 percent of smokers start before they are 18.

Middle schoolers make tobacco pledge with shoes by Amber Bang

Photo by Mark Clemens

5the Eye ❁ March 22, 2007 op/edstaff editorial

eyethe

The Eye is the student newspaper of the Singapore Ameri-can School. All opinions stated within these pages are those of their respective writers and do not necessarily refl ect the opinions of the Singapore American School, its board of governors, PTA, faculty or administration. Comments and suggestions can be sent to the Eye via the Internet at [email protected]. At the authorʼs request, names can be withheld from publication. Letters will be printed as completely as possible. The Eye reserves the right to edit letters for reasons of taste and space.

NS duty kills creativityThe supremacy of country over

self is drummed into every child from the moment he starts school, the old lie over and over till it becomes an unquestionable truth.

Which child can fail to be inspired by spotless uniformed bands, marching in step to martial music? That picture of dedicated effi ciency is all he is privy to. He does not see the driving rain lashing unprotected faces, the strict discipline, the burning sun boring down on lightly clad backs, or the hours it takes to polish gleaming bayonets.

“Dulce et decorum est pro patria mori.” It is a sweet and seemly thing to die for one’s country. These patriotic words adorn the coffi n of every soldier butchered in his country’s defense. Every country has times when it requires its citizens to take up the mantle and raise arms in its defense. It would be expedient if that citizenry, which forms the army, is trained.

For countries that cannot maintain a large standing army, like Singapore, Israel, and South Korea, compulsory national service (NS) fi lls that void. More than 10 percent of SAS students will have to serve NS. For two years, largely unwilling Singaporeans and Koreans slog through muddy fi elds, fi ghting of ticks, lice, and bedbugs in preparation to fi ght a future foe. Heavy bags and heavier rifl es are borne aloft in the name of patriotism, as every step, a renewed effort, brings the individual closer to a fi ghting machine.

As politicians spew out patriotic

words, young men fall in step and march to music. Pristinely clad offi cers direct them hither and thither, breaking any rebellious spirit and rewarding conformity.

“Two pages torn out of the climax of a novel.” That is what one Russian novelist likened time spent in the army to. NS is served by 18 year-old teenagers. Just when they are rebelling against the establishment, they are put in the

most hierarchical and regimented of institutions; they are made to conform just when they want to break free.

Henry James described it as a second youth, but instead of traipsing around Florence or seeing Versailles, for two years these young men become soldiers. They go where they are told, be it Taiwan,

Thailand or the Australian desert, to become cogs in a well-oiled war machine. They cease, in their 18th year, to be individuals and become a unit. It is a travesty to inhibit the idealistic sentiments and revolutionary passion of 18 year-olds. Having left school behind, these teenagers should be able to give vent to such inclinations.

“It is sweet to serve one’s country by deeds,” the philosopher Sallust said. Junior Thomas Whalen-Bridge disagrees. He said he would feel “angry” if America had an NS requirement. Many teenagers share Whalen-Bridge’s opinion. If George W. Bush were to force every 18 year-old American into the army, he would be committing political

suicide, and the same goes for Jacques Chirac of France, Angela Merkel of Germany, and almost every major world leader.

Korean sophomore In Woo Jung said he could see the “need for NS.” However, Jung admitted that if it were not compulsory, he “would not go.”

Senior Jaidev Subaiah, who will serve NS in Singapore, said he has “no qualms about going into NS.” Subaiah said that Singapore has given him a “good life” and that he has no problem with giving two years to the county. He expressed the view that NS “disciplines young men,” which he claimed stands them in good stead.

The point here, however, is that young men of 18 should not be so disciplined. They should be allowed to follow their passion, to become idealistic individuals. They should be allowed to follow the Marius Pontmercys and Hyacinth Robinsons of this world. They should be given the chance to become revolutionaries, to join student movements and enjoy the last of their teenage years.

In the long term, changing the enlistment age would benefi t the country. NS, by stifl ing individuality, stifl es creativity. A robotic citizenry is hardly ideal.

A country may be able to justify calling on its citizens in a time of need, but to force blossoming youth to sacrifi ce individuality is a crime. Cynical old men would be better recruits. Or even if the country says it needs young men, allowing them to serve after university would not hurt the country. The age at which people are drafted only creates resentment and detracts from the legitimacy of what may well be a necessary evil.

Ravi Shanmugam

A major literary analysis paper is returned to two English students who wrote on the same topic. One received an A+, the other a lower grade. The student with the lower grade was curious why she did not receive a similarly high mark for what she thought was quality work. She asked the teacher if she could read the other students’ paper. She could tell that passages had been taken verbatim from the Sparknotes website.

It happens too often: the student who plagiarizes outfl anks the student who spends hours preparing.

According to a February Eye survey on cheating, 11.6 percent more seniors than freshman believe that it’s okay to cheat. As students move up grade-by-grade in high school they are more likely to believe that it is acceptable to cheat.

According to the same survey, the older the student, the more likely he or she is to cheat and the less likely he or she is to feel guilty about it. Overall, 77.2 percent of students say they have cheated on homework.

In a previous Eye article about cheating, anxiety about getting good grades and getting into college were cited as reasons for the high incidence of cheating. Here are two more reasons: institutional attitude and teacher’s ineptitude at handling cheating.

“The school philosophy is just wrong,” senior Abhinav Kaul said. “It’s conducive to cheating.”

This institution, including the counseling offi ce, pressures students to take AP classes, not because of a students’ genuine interest in the subject, but because they believe that colleges value the label of an AP class more than the learning which occurs in non-honors courses.

Another aspect of the school attitude is the belief that getting bad grades will ultimately mean lifelong failure. Because of this, instead of going to a teacher for help, preparing with a friend, or making work schedules to avoid procrastination, students resort to cheating.

The desire to get good grades has trumped the desire to learn.

While the school attitude provides the mind-set which permits students to cheat, the inability of some teachers to police cheating provides students with the opportunity to cheat, and to be rewarded for it.

“The school needs to really talk to teachers about cheating. I don’t think teachers know how to handle cheating,” senior Rachel Witt said. “Teachers don’t catch students cheating. Ever.”

While some students are caught by attentive teachers, the great majority of those who cheat are not held responsible for their actions. The result is an immediate negative impact on all honest classmates.

Witt said that one teacher’s response to fi nding cheating in her classroom was to make the tests harder.

“It’s kind of backwards logic, because then you can’t really study for it. Then the people who cheat get the good grade [and those who study don’t],” Witt said.

Witt believes that teachers and the administration should be more focused on cheating.

The Honor Code Committee was a step, and the letter they are addressing to teachers at the end of the year with tips for catching and dealing with cheating is another step. However, it is essential that teachers and the administration start working together to handle cheating right now.

There are teachers who can handle cheating. Psychology teacher Dr. Dale Smith has his students turn 180 degrees with their backs to him during tests. This makes it easier for him to spot cheating. One student said that math and science teacher Brian Donalson “just knows” when people cheat.

While teachers may believe that students are honest, or at least that some students are, it might just be in the greater interest of everybody if teachers assumed that all students are dishonest.

Simple things like exchanging quizzes before grading them, making sure each student has returned a quiz before going over it in class and having students put all electronic papers through turnitin.com to eliminate the possibility of plagiarism will make a difference.

If the administration believes that the incidence of cheating at SAS is too high, then they should meet with teachers and discuss with them how to catch cheaters, how to make it harder for them to cheat, and how to penalize them. A universally enforced policy on cheating is the only solution.

Right now, students believe that the benefi ts of cheating outweigh the costs.

Editors-in-chief: Denise Hotta-Moung, Cat Ward News editor: Sam Lloyd, Rhoda Severino Op/Ed editor: Amanda Tsao, Vicky Cheng

Features editor: Jeff Hamilton, Nicole SchmitzEye In Focus editor: Katrina DeVaney

A&E editor: Arunima Kochhar, Kathy BordwellSports editor: Barbara Lodwick, Megan Anderson

Reporters: Megan Anderson, Alex Boothe, Kathy Bordwell,Vicky Cheng, Katrina DeVaney, Rohin Dewan, Jeff Hamilton, Denise Hotta-Moung, Arunima Koch-har, Michelle Lee, Sam Lloyd, Barbara Lodwick, Nicole Schmitz, Rhoda Severino, Ravi Shanmugam, Amanda

Tsao, Cat WardAdviser: Mark Clemens

Asst. advisers: Judy Agusti and Sridevi Lakshmanan

I Know What You Did Last InterimBy Amanda TsaoTSAOISM

To cheat or to learn?

6 March 22, 2007 ❁ the Eyefeatures

outgoing enough that we got to meet and hang out with locals. I know some trips are just a bunch of white-washed kids who

only eat McDonald’s and spaghetti. I want to punch

those kids in the face. It defeats the purpose

of interim semester.”

by Katrina DeVanyA week after interim, sophomore

Ali Schuster created a group on the popular social networking site Facebook, called “I miss Interim.” The group now has 174 members.

Good news to all that have ever doubted the popularity of interim. Sixty percent of SAS students interviewed in a recent Eye survey said they “loved their interim,” and 25 percent said they “liked their interim.”

“Before this year I hadn’t realized how important interim really was. It was a fun trip. Period,” a student on the Bhutan interim said. “But somewhere along the trip I realized that the experiences we have…really do give us things most of the rest of the world don’t get.”

Students were generous when they rated their interims on the Eye survey. Most students responded that they liked or loved their interim. In the Eye survey results and follow-up interviews, a few interims got less enthusiastic ratings. These interims were Malaysia: Scuba Diving Around Pulau Tiga, Greece: The Greek Odyssey and Philippines: Habitat for Humanity.

Some students complained that they had not gotten their money’s worth on the trip, or that they had too many assignments. Students on the Pulau Tiga trip said that they were assigned a four-paragraph essay for behavior a sponsor called “cruel”. Students on the Habitat for Humanity interim in Philippines said they felt that their community service work was too impersonal.

“ We never got to see the people who we were helping,” junior Vysak Venkateswaran said.

The in-Singapore photography course was the least liked interim of all. The majority of students said they “disliked their interim.” This was a double whammy for students, most of whom chose their course because the other options were prohibitively

expensive. None of the students who responded in the survey said

they believed that the cost of this interim was reasonable.

“I found the course…was badly planned and poorly handled,” one respondent said. “We didn’t go to all of the very few places we had been planning on going to, and that was disappointing. On top of that, the money we paid for the course was totally unreasonable for the activities we actually did, as well as for the under-qualifi ed instructor from out of school who didn’t do much more than run a few PowerPoints.”

Students were displeased with the timing of the Wednesday Parent Night.

“Friday, please. I was actually absent the day after cause I was just dead,” senior Miguel Meñez said.

Students on the Taiwan interim were not required to attend Parent Night.

“I think students have enough to do,” sponsor Ellen White said. “They have classes the next day. It gave us a chance as adults to talk about the trip.”

Bad scheduling aside, interviewed students all responded positively to the idea of Parent Night.

“I think parents really like to see what we did,” Meñez said. “Sometimes we don’t tell these things to our parents.”

In a teacher survey for the Eye, teachers complained of students getting sick after interim.

“I still doubt the benefi t of our interim when you weigh the costs of the effects on the classroom

performance (so many students sick afterwards),” teacher Cam McNicol

wrote. McNicol thinks that community service-based trips are more worthwhile.

According to the high school offi ce, 55 students were absent on Feb. 21, the fi rst school day after interim. This number is much greater than the usual 20 or so students who are absent.

“ [I think students get sick] because of the tight schedule of interim. Students don’t have enough sleep because they stay up with their friends at night,” senior Audrey Akman said.

A problem, especially for the Asian trips, was acclimatizing to the different cultural environments. On trips to India, Vietnam and Turkey, students reported being hassled by local

vendors to buy goods. Teacher Beth Kramer, who was on the Rajasthan Discovery interim, said that students should make their choices based more on what interim suits them, not on trying to accompany friends.

“A student who can’t handle the standards of hygiene in a less developed country shouldn’t sign up for an India trip,” she wrote. “It can be embarrassing for SAS and fellow travelers if a student ‘looses it’ in a public area because conditions aren’t what she or he is accustomed to.”

Cultural trips drew criticism from both teachers and students. Social studies teacher Eric Burnett, who was on the new Vietnam interim after the cancellation of the original Sri Lankan trip, wrote that these trips were “essentially city tours” which contributed to “alcohol/curfew abuse,” and did not offer a better experience that a student would receive from going on a trip with their family or in a group of friends.

“First, due to the large size of the group, each student’s appreciation of the piece of architecture, art, object is based on the needs and knowledge of the group,” Burnett wrote. “If you go to the Louvre, you should be able to stay 10 minutes or 4 hours based on your individual preference. Second, students consistently compare these trips -accommodations, activities, meals - to the travel they would do with their family.”

Students complained about

- Survey response

I realized that the experiences we

have...really do give us things most of

the rest of the world don’t get.

“ “

e x c e s s i v e transportation t i m e , speci f ica l ly long bus rides, on cultural trips. Many students said that their interim was too ‘touristy,’ and while they saw many famous

sites, they did not absorb enough local fl avor.

“I don’t know how to explain it... it’s kind of like, if our school’s interim semester was a show on Discovery Travel and Living, it’d be the boring one that no one watches because it just hits the main spots of each country/city,” a student on the Spanish immersion interim wrote.

“The people on our trip were enthusiastic and


wrote. McNicol thinks that community service-based trips

According to the high school offi ce, 55 students were absent on Feb. 21, the fi rst school day after interim. This number is much greater than the usual 20 or so students

“ [I think students get sick] because of the tight schedule of interim. Students don’t have enough sleep because they stay up with their friends at night,” senior Audrey Akman said.

A problem, especially for the Asian trips, was acclimatizing to the different cultural environments. On trips to India, Vietnam and Turkey, students reported being hassled by local

vendors to buy goods. Teacher Beth Kramer, who was on the Rajasthan Discovery interim, said that students should make their choices based more on what interim suits them, not on trying

“A student who can’t handle the standards of hygiene in a less developed country shouldn’t sign up for an India trip,” she wrote. “It can be embarrassing for SAS and fellow travelers if a student ‘looses it’ in a public area because conditions aren’t what she or he is


“First, due to the large size of the group, each student’s appreciation of the piece of architecture, art, object is based on the needs and knowledge of the group,” Burnett wrote. “If you go to the Louvre, you should be able to stay 10 minutes or 4 hours based on your individual preference. Second, students consistently compare these trips -accommodations, activities, meals - to the travel they would do


outgoing enough that we got to meet and hang out with locals. I know some trips are just a bunch of white-washed kids who

only eat McDonald’s and spaghetti. I want to punch

those kids in the face. It defeats the purpose

of interim semester.”


wrote. McNicol thinks that community service-based trips

According to the high school offi ce, 55 students were absent on Feb. 21, the fi rst school day after interim. This number is much greater than the usual 20 or so students

“ [I think students get sick] because of the tight schedule of interim. Students don’t have enough sleep because they stay up with their friends at night,”

A problem, especially for the Asian trips, was acclimatizing to the different cultural environments. On

‘looses it’ in a public area because conditions aren’t what she or he is


“First, due to the large size of the group, each student’s appreciation of the piece of architecture, art, object is based on the needs and knowledge of the group,” Burnett wrote. “If you go to the Louvre, you should be able to stay 10 minutes or 4 hours based on your individual preference. Second, students consistently compare these trips -accommodations, activities, meals - to the travel they would do


e x c e s s i v e transportation t i m e , specif ica l ly long bus rides, on cultural trips. Many students said that their interim was too ‘touristy,’ and while they saw many famous

sites, they did not absorb enough local fl avor.

“I don’t know how to explain it... it’s kind of like, if our school’s interim semester was a show on Discovery Travel and Living, it’d be the boring one that no one watches because it just hits the main spots of each country/city,” a student on the Spanish immersion interim wrote.

“The people on our trip were enthusiastic and

the challenges facedthe price paidINTERIM:

eye in focus

7the Eye ❁ March 22, 2007 features

T h e

following statistics are results from

the February 26, 2007 survey created

by “The Eye.” 30 teachers and 205

students responded

by Vicky ChengSenior Casey DeFord stood

in the middle of the Himalayas. She was freezing and wet, but, curiously, at that moment, she thought of a little country called Singapore.

The Interim Semester program meant different things to everyone. For DeFord, it was chance to go trekking in Tibet, an opportunity she would have never been able to seize had it not been for Interim

Semester. Many thought it was strange since she was the only senior o n a predominantly junior-

fi lled trip when she had sixth choice

out of the entire school.

“Part of the reason of

In te r im is to

meet different people. I didn’t know 18 people on my trip when we began, but it was basically a spur-of-the-moment decision,” DeFord said. “All I knew was that I just know I did not want to go to Europe and sightsee, especially after having gone to Soweto,”

On the contrary, for senior Caitlin Hale, it was the last year- her golden year- to fi nally be able to travel on a Europe trip. While she did explain that she thinks it is the company that makes a trip good and not the

location, she did not consider any place other than Europe.

“Well, [the seniors] have waited like, three years to go

on a trip to Europe. I love winter, cold weather and the snow, and Greece was the only Europe

trip still available at my pick,” Hale said. “But I did

know basically all t h e people on my trip. If I knew all my friends were going, say, kayaking in Thailand as seniors, I’d pick that trip rather than doing something like skiing in Switzerland but by myself.”

“[Tibet and Soweto] were two completely different experiences, but they both impacted me in incredible ways. Soweto was just…heart-warming. And it made me want to

become a teacher,” DeFord said. “[Tibet] pushed

me outside my comfort zone, but

the timing was great, since it’s right before college and I’ve showed

myself that I can survive and adapt in an alien environment.”

DeFord has never let anyone sway her decision on what Interim to choose.

“Every year I have gone where I really want to go,” DeFord said. “Whether or not I go with friends, I still have an amazing time and meet a lot of people.”

For junior Siddhartha Chattopadhyay, this year’s Interim Semester was not a time he spent making friends or learning about himself; rather, it was a week of reinforcement spent in Study Hall, a consequence resulting from his previous year’s breach of Interim conduct.

“[The breach of conduct] defi nitely wasn’t worth it,” Chattopadhyay said. “Study hall was like a prison if you didn’t work.”

Junior Rachel Liou was learning completely different things on the interim trip she had chosen, surfi ng in Australia.

Liou acknowledged that it was a ridiculed trip, but defended the itinerary.

“It taught me to be really independent. Like…I learned how to live with girls my age, and it was amazing knowing that I could survive without my mom or my maid,” Liou said. “It’s more of a living experience than it is anything else. It’s not something you can learn in the books. I can’t cook or do laundry, but I made the beds!”

Meaningless or meaningful, snow or sand, skiing or service- Interim Semester will remain etched in their memories forever.

51% of students believe that the cost of interim is reasonable.

97% of teachers said they did not assign homework over interim.

73% of interims were paid for by parents.

64% of students believe that they got their their money’s worth.

58% of students said they were assigned homework over interim.

67% of teachers loved their interim.

Interim lessons that last a lifetimeby Vicky Cheng

Senior Casey DeFord stood in the middle of the Himalayas. She was freezing and wet, but, curiously, at that moment, she thought of a little country called

The Interim Semester program meant different things to everyone. For DeFord, it was chance to go trekking in Tibet, an opportunity she would have never been able to seize had it

Semester. Many thought it was strange since she was the only senior o n a predominantly junior-

fi lled trip when she had sixth choice

out of the entire school.

“Part of the reason of

In te r im is to

18 people on my trip when we began, but it was basically a spur-of-the-moment decision,” DeFord said. “All I knew was that I just know I did not want to go to Europe and sightsee, especially after having gone to Soweto,”

On the contrary, for senior Caitlin Hale, it was the last year- her golden year- to fi nally be able to travel on a Europe trip. While she did explain that she thinks it is the company that makes a trip good and not the

location, she did not consider any place other than Europe.

“Well, [the seniors] have waited like, three years to go

on a trip to Europe. I love winter, cold weather and the snow, and Greece was the only Europe

trip still available at my pick,” Hale said. “But I did

know basically all t h e people on my trip. If I knew all my friends were going, say, kayaking in Thailand as seniors, I’d pick that trip rather than doing something like skiing in Switzerland but by myself.”

“[Tibet and Soweto] were two completely different experiences, but they both impacted me in incredible ways. Soweto was just…heart-warming. And it made me want to

become a teachersaid. “[Tibet] pushed

me outside my comfort zone, but

the timing was great, since it’s right before

She was freezing and wet, but, curiously, at that moment, she thought of a little country called

The Interim Semester program meant different things to everyone. For DeFord, it was chance to go trekking in Tibet, an opportunity she would have never been able to seize had it not been for

She was freezing and wet, but, She was freezing and wet, but, curiously, at that moment, she thought of a little country called Singapore.

The Interim Semester program meant different things to everyone. For DeFord, it was chance to go trekking in Tibet, an opportunity she would have never been able to seize had it not been for Interim

Survey

by Arunima Kochhar With Interim Semester going

towards being only a “vacation for rich kids,” an Interim advisory committee has started to talk about returning to only Asian trips among other changes. Each year, over 50 different Interim Semester choices and an ever growing 1000 students in our high school, has brought on many complications since Interim began over 20 years ago.

Deputy Principal Doug Neihart created a committee of fi ve teachers to evaluate this years Interim and consider changes to the program.

“[The committee] and I discuss small things that can improve Interim as a whole,” Neihart says. “Topics ranging from how we pick interim to specifi c trips are discussed.”

Parent night in particular was an

issue this year. “Over 200 parents were

crowding in at the same time to get into school,” Neihart said. “There was a huge traffi c jam that we just can’t have in future years.”

The committee solicits suggestions from faculty members and bring them up at meetings. Proposals include bringing Interim Semester back to its roots as an exploration of asia have also been brought up.

Theater technician Paul Koebnick said that this change could be because of the steadily increasing cost of trips.

“We take over 200 kids to Europe each year,” Koebnick said. “With the increasing population of our school and the price to fl y, this just doesn’t seem as easy anymore.”

Originally, Interim Semester began as a way to educate a largely western student population in Asian culture. Interim used to be a way in which the SAS community could give back to South East Asia through purely service based trips.

As the population of students grew the trips began to expand to Australia and New Zealand and fi nally up towards Europe.

Junior Justin Hill said that it bringing Interim back to purely Asia would be limiting.

“Those of us that get a chance to visit Asia during holidays would be given the choice to revisit something we’ve already seen or, redo something we’ve already done,” said Hill.

There are also proposals on a change in the way each trip is

picked.However, students have

complained that there has been foul play in picking out of a hat.

A senior who wished to remain annoymous said that students would pick a number out of the hat and exchange it for a lower number.

“I saw this boy get the number 49,” she said. “So he put it in his pocket and grabbed another one which was 23.”

Problems such as these are discussed and sorted out in the advisary committee that meets every few months.

“We get to together to discuss these issues,” Neihart said. “But in the end, the fi nal decision is up to Mr. Norcott and myself so that we can make Interim run even smoother in upcoming years.”

Future of interim considered by committee

Results

eye in focus

8 March 22, 2007 ❁ the Eyefeatures

by Cat WardNormally students do not hear

their parents names mentioned in conversation at school. Normally students do not see their parents often in the hallways of SAS. Normally school is a place where parents and their children do not talk everyday. But none of these are true if your parent works at SAS.

Teenagers and their parents usually have a hard enough time keeping their relationship healthy. Imagine the extra quirks attending the same school that one or both of your parents work at would add to the relationship and what, if any, stress it might add.

A look at the relationship between English teacher Mark Guggisberg and his sophomore son Wyatt shows that despite certain oddities and awkward moments, students with teacher parents can manage to have normal relationships with their parents. Their relationship even shows how being a teacher and having a teenage son or daughter can benefi t their teaching.

Wyatt said that sometimes he gets help from Guggisberg for English, but that “on other classes I’m pretty much by myself.”

“I read his papers,” Guggisberg said. “I guess we discuss his readings and history, [especially] if it’s something we read or just discussed in my class.”

G u g g i s b e r g said that their relationship was honest and open.

“We talk about everything,” he said. “[Wyatt’s] reluctant to talk about girls with me, but we talk about sports.. school especially.. It’s a better relationship that I had with my dad. We talk more honestly with each other than I ever did with my dad.”

One of the peculiarities of such a relationship is the position that Guggisberg believes it puts Wyatt in.

“It’s a bad position because I’m sure I’ve pissed off a lot of students,” Guggisberg said. “Some students [might go up to him and say] ‘God, your dad’s such as as*****,’ so I don’t know how he feels. It’s a bad position to be put in.”

Wyatt described such situations as awkward, but not because fellow students insult his father in front of him. Wyatt said that his friends just say that his dad’s class is hard.

“It’s awkward if I hear people talking about him,” Wyatt said, but he added that in this kind of situation

it is not that people are slandering his dad, but that they are just saying his name: Mr. Guggisberg, and not ‘Wyatt’s dad.’

Wyatt said that while he and his dad get into arguments now and then, they always get solved.

One plus that Guggisberg has received from having a son in the high school is his newly attained knowledge concerning homework.

“I’ve defi nitely been made more cognoscente of the workloads of kids,” he added. “And I’ve toned it down considerably. I’m choosing my homework more carefully.”

“[Wyatt] works anywhere between 3 and 4 hours on homework a night, and I think that’s ridiculous,” Guggisberg said.

This situation differs greatly from when Guggisberg was in high school.

“ [ I n h i g h s c h o o l ] I didn’t do h o m e w o r k , ” Guggisberg said. “My friends might’ve. I didn’t do it. I went to school and worked.”

A n o t h e r oddity presented by having a teacher as a parent

is Guggisberg’s inability to confront teachers like other parents can.

“When we talk about teachers I don’t have the luxury of going to a teacher and complaining on behalf of my son because of professionalism,” Guggisberg said. “If I was a non-teacher I’d have no problem going in to talk to them about something that was unfair.”

Another aspect of their relationship which Guggisberg may think about more than the average parent is how to avoid the embarrassment of his child, a feat more easily managed when a parent is not in the same place as their son everyday.

“I think that his biggest fear about

having a father who teachers here or a mother is he just doesn’t want to be embarrassed,” Guggisberg said. “I hope he’s not embarrassed. I don’t go out of my way to embarrass him.”

Despite this Guggisberg thinks that it’s possible Wyatt is embarrassed sometimes since “a lot of his friends have me right now.”

Wyatt said that he is probably more embarrassed by his good friends being in his father’s class, and not by his father teaching at the school. Despite this, Wyatt does not want to be in a class taught by his dad.

“No, I don’t want to take my dad as a teacher,” he said. “He’d probably be really hard on me so I’d end up dying.”

Like most other students, Wyatt is given rules to follow from his parents.

Guggisberg said that there are “not many rules” at home, but some do exist. Such as a limit of one hour of television per week day and a suggestion that Wyatt “hang out” with the family on Sundays. Also, Wyatt is given one night per weekend where he can stay out late and “come back at one or so.”

Wyatt dismisses any major negative impact that his father being a teacher might have on him.

“When he’s outside of school he’s a dad,” he said.

English teacher Mark Guggisberg eats out of his son Wyatt’s lunch container. Afterwards, Wyatt jokingly tells his father that he now needs more money for food as Guggisberg took some of his lunch. Photo by Cat Ward

by Denise Hotta-Moung

They circle their child’s life like hawks, scrutinizing every decision and move. They are what Susan

Coll, in her article “Spiraling Out of Control” calls the “ h e l i c o p t e r p a r e n t s , ” the group of o v e r b e a r i n g , micromanaging, parents.

Stories of the dad who grounded his kid for getting an A -, or the mom who prepared her child for the SAT in 7th grade are frequent. On the other

end, there are parents who party with their children and parents who are unable to live in the same country as their kids.

“ T h e r e ’ s some of

everything,” high school counselor Dale Ford said. “We have 1100 students and over 2000 parents. You

can’t paint all the parents with the same brush.”

High school counselor Dawn Betts has had experience with many different types of parents.

“There’s everything from parents emailing with exclamation marks, you know saying “Urgent!” Parents who email on a regular basis,” she said. “On the other end are parents that don’t live here. Or, you know, dad is traveling and mom travels too.”

Senior Paul Charbonnet’s father has lived in Hong Kong for the past year because his term in Singapore ended at the U.S. embassy.

“We’ve always been really close, but I still talk to him on Skype every Sunday or so,” he said. “It’s defi nitely brought me closer to my mom though. She needs to rely on me to be the man of the house now.”

A senior girl, who wishes to remain anonymous, said that her dad’s traveling affects her relationship with him.

“When we go to dinner together, it’s like silence,” she said. “We don’t really have much to talk about.”

Senior Xenia Stafford shares a friendship with her mother, Sharlyn Stafford.

“It’s like I share a house, like she’s a roommate,” she said.

Sharlyn said that their good relationship is due to communication.

“We have our moments; you know ‘I want to kill her’ as I’m sure

she wants to kill me,” she said with a laugh. “But we get along great, we communicate well.”

Xenia said that her mother still gives her boundaries.

“She doesn’t hit that point of being too lenient, too much of a ‘cool mom.’ My mom still disciplines me,” she said.

Betts agreed that having

boundaries was necessary for a parent to have but that you needed to adjust your parenting style for each individual.

“The biggest key is to understand your child and fi gure out what the right balance is,” she said.

“If you’re too hard, they’ll always go behind your back. They may rebel when they leave home,” Sharlyn said. “But then at the same time, a child might feel unloved if they don’t have any boundaries.”

The anonymous senior girl said that if her relationship was better with her dad, she might rebel less.

“I think if I was scared of disappointing my dad, if I had respect for him I probably would not rebel as much,” a senior girl said.

Betts said rebellious acts such as drinking were important to discuss with children.

“Freedom from Chemical Dependency was saying that we should have conversations about

alcohol,” Betts said. “The key word is conversation. It’s not lectures, it’s more ‘let’s talk about how much is too much, instead of the lectures.’”

Bill Cain, junior Amanda Cain’s father, said that because drinking is so common, it is diffi cult to completely prevent it.

“We talk more about caution when drinking,” he said. “You can’t stop what goes on, but we do

talk about it. We talk openly and try to guide her the best way possible.”

Xenia calls her mother a “relatively young parent” but says their good relationship has little to do with age but more about her mom’s personality.

Betts agreed. “It doesn’t really have to do

anything with age, but more about communication and the relationship that you have,” Betts said.

For some senior students, dealing with parents during the college process can be diffi cult.

“It can be due to the whole empty nest syndrome, it’s not all

differs greatly from when Guggisberg was in high school.

h i g h s c h o o l ] I didn’t do h o m e w o r k , ” Guggisberg said. “My friends might’ve. I didn’t do it. I went to school and worked.”

English teacher Mark Guggisberg eats out of his son Wyatt’s lunch container. Afterwards,

catastrophic,” Ford said. “There may be some cultural infl uences where parents might see the name of the university as a refl ection of their parenting ability.”

Senior Valerie Mahillon said she is “really close” to her mother who she describes as “really protective.”

“[My mother] wanted to get a house in Boston right across from my college,” Mahillon said. “But my dad said ‘you have to let her go.’”

Other parents give their children i n d e p e n d e n c e when it comes to college applications.

“I just left [Xenia] to it,” Sharlyn said. “She bought all the books, she did all the research, she knows what she wants to do.”

“My mom says I could be a toilet cleaner,” Xenia said. “As long as you love what you do, then you should do it.”

Junior Amanda Cain with her father Bill at the Art Show Mar 17. “Our relationship is built with mutual trust and communication,” Bill said.

Communication key in parent-child relationship

Guggisberg boys: just your average father and son

9the Eye ❁ March 22, 2007 arts

by Kathy Bordwell“There’s just art oozing from her

pores,” art teacher Barbara Harvey said of AP Studio student Pony Weng.

Recently the oozing art was used to illustrate her mothers newly published novel.

“The editor found out I drew and asked if I wanted to do [illustrations for my mom’s book],” Weng said. “They just kept asking for more pictures and it ended up being the whole book.”

The drawings are of ordinary objects that Weng found and sketched based on what the editors asked for. Her favorite sketch is the cover illustration of ballerina shoes.

“I just really like to draw. I have a lot of fun with it,” Weng said.

Weng, a junior, has always liked to draw and doodle, and became serious about art in her sophomore year.

“[Weng] is an exceptional

student,” Harvey said. “She’s probably one of the most humble students I’ve ever taught, and that’s one of the reasons she’s so successful.”

One of the things that surprised Harvey was not the quality or hard work involved in Weng’s work, but how she did it very quietly and ‘under the radar’ in six months of hard work.

“When I was rushing for deadlines, I worked for eight to ten hours a day,” Weng said. “If I wasn’t rushing it was about three [hours a day].”

Though the fi gure drawing was a long and diffi cult process, Weng found other factors of the work more diffi cult.

“Keeping consistency was the most diffi cult,” Weng said. “The technique was left up to me to decide. I really like fi gure drawing like that.”

Harvey already praises Weng’s

by Kathy BoardwellSharing a hearty laugh with the

group of teachers surrounding him, Chris Crutcher is interrupted by two middle school students seeking an autograph. With a cheerful “sure,” he signs their books and continues talking.

An author of many novels for kids, Crutcher visited the school on March 12 to 16 and talked to both middle school and high school students about his books and experiences.

Crutcher explained to the group of teachers why his books are so popular.

“I often say ‘kids, here’s a book you can read, because I don’t know many big words,” Crutcher said, before erupting into more laughter.

Crutcher’s controversial and sometimes censored novels are very popular with students who seem to believe he captures their slang very well.

“My ear is better than my eye,” Crutcher said. “[Kids] like it. You can’t use everyday slang though. It would change by the time you get published.”

He continues with this explanation of certain slang that authors of kid novels don’t use even though it’s common in speech.

“You can’t use ‘dude’ too much. On print it’s different,” Crutcher said. “You’d have an epic if it’s just dude, dude, dude.”

The inspiration for his novels comes from a long career as a child and family therapist. Crutcher said that topics came up from sessions and that he also takes topics from the news if it will fi t his characters.

“You see something and you start to fi ctionalize it,” Crutcher said.

Crutcher is also quick to explain the autobiographical nature of his books.

“In terms of events, not so much [an autobiography]. In terms of how characters see the world, it’s more autobiographical in what I’ve seen than what I’ve experienced,” Crutcher

said. As a child, Crutcher himself

wasn’t much of a reader, claiming that the only book he read was To Kill a Mockingbird. He jokes on his

beginnings as a writer and his sudden success in writing.

“I was out creating stories,” Crutcher said. “I could write later.”

This ‘later’ came when a friend of his, Terry Davis, was writing and Crutcher got to witness the process.

“Three quarters through [the process] I thought ‘he didn’t do anything I couldn’t do’,” Crutcher said. “He had an agent, called me after he read [my book] and said ‘I’ll call my agent, you send it.’”

“All of a sudden I wrote as many books as I’d read in high school,” Crutcher said.

Since his novels contain controversial topics like rape, incest and murder Crutcher is used to them being censored.

“It’s [usually] school people yelling bloody murder. I usually fi nd out when it’s happening…and someone calls and wants my comment,” he said.

As to how he answers the people calling for censorship, Crutcher returns to humor. He said he makes a point of visiting these schools.

“I like to go there and make myself obnoxious.”

Author fights to keep books on shelves

technique based on artwork that she has done for school assignments.

“She surprises me with every assignment she does.” Harvey said. “Regardless of the work she’s doing she stays true to her personal style, and that’s hard for a high school art student.”

Harvey is equally optimistic when looking at Weng’s future in art.

“She’s going to be one of those greats one day, who will sneak in under the radar,” Harvey said. “She’s true to herself personally and artistically.”

For now, Weng is thinking of a future in design, but said she has no big plans for art school. She does however, have more books in mind.

“They asked for a second book,” Weng said. “So I’m planning on [illustrating] a second book as well.”

Student illustrates fi rst book - her mom’s

Most describe the life of an artist as one of starvation, homelessness, and constant scavenging for shopping carts and a purpose in life. In contrast, visiting artist Arturo Correa is clear about his mission.

“My purpose in life is to portray it,” Correa said. A South American artist from Valencia, Venezuala, Correa studied art at University of Central Florida and New York University, and exhibits his work in individual and group shows

throughout North and South America. He is known for his

installations including the Quinta de Calle, a painted house which he designed and placed in the middle of the third International Art Festival in Valencia.

“I wanted my audience to literally be inside my art,” Correa said.

Over 3000 people walked through the Quinta de Calle and responded by writing messages inside with markers hanging on strings from the roof. Next year he plans to produce 80 canvases within less than a year, a project commissioned by the Ascaso gallery, which will be exhibited in its galleries in Caracas and Valencia.

Painted mostly in acrylic media, his paintings are bright and vibrant like the life he seeks to portray.

“I like to use thick layers, have fun with it. Sometimes I use my nails,” Correa said during

his Cultural Convention acrylic workshop. In the week following Cultural Convention, Correa worked with AP studio art students to help them with their acrylic boards for the Memory Garden, as well as presenting a slideshow of his work to several high school and middle school art classes.

During his slideshow, Correa said he wanted his paintings to stay rooted to his Venezualan culture. His painting, “La Novia,” (“The Bride”) was inspired by the importance of brides to his people.

“In Venezuala a bride is like an icon, everyone wants to see a wedding. If there’s a traffi c jam it’s probably a wedding because everyone comes out to see it,” Correa said.

After 9/11, he was so disturbed

that he was inspired to throw all of his paint onto a wall. The result purged his emotions and inspired him to keep painting.

“My art teacher always told me paint like you own the store, don’t worry about your materials,” he said. After a while the image of a fl ower emerged out of what seemed like a mess, which he developed into a painting of fl owers.

His series of carousel paintings also reveal a story beneath the canvas.

“If you go to see a carousel, there is always one child who wants that one horse, and as soon as the gate is opened he gets it,” he said.

Similarly, Correa stands out among the stereotype of lost artists, knowing exactly which horse he wants next.

Visiting artistbrings house down by Amanda Tsao

Author Chris Crutcher talks to high school studens about writing. Photo by Cat Ward.

Junior Pony weng working on an artwork for AP Studio Art.Photo by Megan Anderson.

Guest Artist Arturo Carrea from Venezuela gave advice to art delegates during cultural convention. Photo from artist.

Communication key in parent-child relationship

Guggisberg boys: just your average father and son

10 March 22, 2007 ❁ the Eyearts

by Denise Hotta-Moung“Kentucky Fried Eagles!” the

crowd of athletes chanted in unison at last year’s IASAS basketball tournament. Athletes from the five other IASAS schools had joined together against the SAS Eagles.

But at Cultural Convention in Jakarta this year, instead of jaunts, SAS dancers were welcomed with a personalized room that had pillows, mattresses and flowers.

“Apparently with sports it’s all rivalry,” junior Esha Parikh said. “But since we go to workshops we all just get to hang out and support each other.”

From Mar 7-10, 48 dancers from

the five IASAS schools gathered at the Jakarta International School (JIS) for Cultural Convention Dance, where they performed for each other. The dancers attended workshops together where they studied different styles with a guest artist and participated in critique sessions where they evaluated each school’s performance.

Senior Anna Allen and Parikh were particularly impressed with the TAS dance, which was themed “Fear.”

“TAS is always good. They really made you feel afraid,” Allen said. “You even felt uncomfortable watching it.”

“It was really cool. They took a risk in doing something really different and it worked,” Parikh said.

Although the dancers did not spend much time with other schools’ participants, Allen said there was never any rivalry between the groups.

“I never felt any animosity,” she said. “We didn’t really mix that much but it wasn’t negative. It’s more that we were all just shy and it was easier to stick to your own group.”

Cultural Convention dance is not a competition, which Parikh said allowed the dancers to appreciate each other’s work.

“I like that it’s not a competition. We get to just share with each other,” Parikh said. “Although, sometimes I wish we got medals. People always ask you how you did when you get back.”

Allen said she liked that Cultural Convention gave an opportunity for non-athletes. “If you don’t play sports, Cultural Convention is another way for schools to interact,” she said.

The SAS dance team was chosen _____ ago and usually rehearsed their routine ______. The team was careful not to practice too much, fearing that they would lose passion of the routine.

“When you over practice something, you don’t have that original rawness,” Parikh said. “Sometimes if we weren’t feeling it, we’d just stop and talk about what we could do.”

To conclude the event, the dancers all learnt a routine on Saturday which they performed at their final show.

Overall, Parikh was pleased with SAS’s performance. “I honestly think it was the best we’ve even done,” she said. “After it was done, we all felt really good.”

PLAY A HIT AT CULTURAL. IASAS audiences gave a standing ovation to the SAS performers. The Cultural Convention drama group in a post dress rehearsal pose: Jane Hurh, Sneh Shaw, Jeff Hamilton, Sean McCabe, JJ Subiah, Mariko Thomas, Chelsea Curto, Rachel Black and Christal Clower. Photo courtesy of Sean McCabe.

Actors asks: Isn’t it romantic?Dancer Jessica Lin during the Cultural Convention assembly. Photo by Brian Riady.

Dancers show the “Numb” world of teenages trhough their choeography.Photo by Tracy Van Der Linden.

Dancers’ reception stark contrast to athletes’

by Jeff Hamilton This year’s IASAS Cultural

drama production brought to life the trials and tribulations of a generation stuck between the “old” and the “new.” The audience was able to sit back, relax and enjoy a night at the theater courtesy of the SAS cultural drama ensemble. Oh, isn’t it romantic.

The nine-strong cast of SAS Cultural Drama brought to life the pages of Wendy Wasserstein’s play, “Isn’t It Romantic,” a story of two intelligent young women living in New York and their efforts to find a balance between work and play, romance and life. According to senior Sean McCabe, who played Marty Sterling, the “nice Jewish doctor,” one major change from last year was the type of play chosen by director Patricia Kuester.

“ In comparison to last year’s more cerebral production of Kafka’s “The Trial,” this was a more lighthearted piece.” McCabe said.

The lighthearted characteristic of the production is the more concrete themes of the play as opposed to the abstract characteristics of plays past. Actor, Sneh Shah who plays Simon

Blumberg said that choice of play was a good one.

“It was a good change because it is nice when the entire audience can understand the play,” Shah said.

In past years, a preview show took place prior to Cultural. This year a post view of the show was performed instead on March 15, the Thursday following Cultural Convention. Kuester said the change in audience presented a challenge to the actors who were use to the overwhelming response from the Cultural Convention audience, a response that does not always occur outside of Cultural Convention.

“The performance in Jakarta was certainly stronger,” Custer said. “Actors felt more energized and were more focused because the audience response was so strong.”

SAS Cultural dancers sihouetted during their performance. Photo by Tracy Van Der Linden.

Cast: Rachel Black ( Janie Blumberg), Mariko Thomas (Harriet Cornwall), Sean McCabe (Marty Sterling), Jane Hurh (Tasha Blumberg), Sneh Shah (Simon Blumberg), Chelsea Curto (Lillian Cornwall), Jeff Hamilton (Paul Stuart) and JJ Subaiah (Kaplan Singleberry, Hart Farrell, Vladamir). By Wendy Wasserstein; direction by Patricia Kuester; assistant direction by Susan Murraysets and Lauren Helpern

11the Eye ❁ March 22, 2007 arts

by Megan AndersonDancing around to high-tempo

music and wildly beating exercise balls does not quite sound like a typical cultural convention activity, but that is because this year’s cultural convention held at SAS was far from ordinary.

To de-stress and blow off steam, the Cultural Convention music delegates congregated in the gym to participate in a Drums Alive session. Drums Alive is the latest in fi tness innovation. It is a unique combination of music, drums and aerobics that improves blood fl ow, fi tness and coordination.

“We have been doing Drums Alive in my fi tness class with Mrs.

Pong,” junior Devin Hardee said. “It is so fun you don’t even realize how much of a workout you are getting.”

Along with the fun and exciting came the nerve racking. All musicians each had to prepare a solo to perform in front of three judges. The judges then picked the best musicians and singers from each category to perform at the giant festival showcase on the last day. Arthur Meng was chosen to perform a trumpet solo, Catalina Huang was selected to play the violin and the SAS octet was chosen to sing.

Along with Drums Alive, participants were able to relax and have fun at the IASAS coffee house. Musicians and artists performed

everything from acoustics to A cappella to Korean Pop.

This years Cultural Convention, no matter how well it went still had its fare share of disciplinary issues.

“We had a slight problem on the very fi rst day,” said Azhani Amiruddin the student music convention director. “Two kids were sent home and one was pulled out of Cultural Convention because they were out after curfew.”

Despite this minor mishap Cultural Convention music ran very smoothly.

“It went very well,” said Amiruddin. “Compared to last year it felt more organized.”

SAS OCTET PERFORMS.Cultural Convention music delegates Juliana Kim, Corey Householder, Nora Yin, Ee Chien Chua, Alice Jeong, Hyeong Seok Oh, Renuka Agarwal, Tae Jin Son performing. Photo by Brian Riady.

SAS String delegates

Musicians warm up to beats of Drums Alive

From hanging to critiquing, from toy cameras to pinhole photography, or from printmaking to acrylic painting, this year’s IASAS Cultural Convention Art delegates got to engage in a variety of activities when they visited SAS from March 8 to 10. The largest activity that all worked on at once was the brainchild of visiting artist Arturo Correa: to make an easel out of a house.

As their fi rst activity, each school’s fi ve delegates painted their school’s own panel of a simple house-shaped structure, within two hours.

“Each place comes with its own background,” Correa said. “The artists represented what they thought was important about their country.”

One challenge for the artists was

painting the edges of their panels so that they would connect with those of other schools and unify the image on the house.

“Many different kids and countries being together made it one,” Correa said. “I think that little house symbolizes what Cultural Convention is. It’s about being different, and celebrating our differences, but coming together and working as one, celebrating our feeling of being one.”

When they were done painting, the artists joined SAS students in writing hundreds of comments such as “Keep writing, keep living” or “I am made of awesomeness” on the interior of the house. It is currently standing in the high school foyer.

Cultural artists under one roofby Sam Lloyd

South Ukrianian senior Robbie Rathavon plays for Jazz band. Photo by Chi Chi Lin.

QUINTA DE CALLE. Inspired by artist Arturo Correa’s piece in the International Art Festival in Valencia, Cultural art delegates bring the IASAS countries together by painting the six countries on six walls of a house. Photo by Megan Anderson.

SAS hosts singers and players in three-day celebration of talent

12 March 22, 2007 ❁ the Eyesports

SAS V JIS 12-18

SAS V ISKL 14-9

SAS V JIS9-2

GIRLS

SAS V JIS3-2

SAS V ISKL5-2

SAS V JIS14-4

BOYS

STAT BOX

by Alex BootheIn the fi nal minutes of practice

Senior Gonzo Carral went out for a header when his leg interlocked on a defender. When he landed he heard a pop- his right leg had snapped. That snap was Carral’s MCL.

SAS’s athletes have been in short demand this year. Some of our best athletes have been benched due to injuries sustained in games and practices. In two out of the three seasons that have been completed this school year over six SAS

students have taken major injuries due to sports.

Carral’s soccer injury occurred two weeks before IASAS which prevented him from participating his senior year.

“It felt like s--- because for the past two years I was gold scorer for IASAS

and I was captain since sophomore year.”

The boys’ soccer team went

to Bangkok w i t h o u t t h e i r

12 March 22, 2007sports

by Alex BootheIn the fi nal minutes of practice

Senior Gonzo Carral went out for a header when his leg interlocked on a defender. When he landed he heard a pop- his right leg had snapped. That snap was Carral’s MCL.

SAS’s athletes have been in short demand this year. Some of our best athletes have been benched due to injuries sustained in games and practices. In two out of the three seasons that have been completed this school year over six SAS

students have taken major injuries due to sports.

Carral’s soccer injury occurred two weeks before IASAS which prevented him from participating his senior year.

“It felt like s--- because for the past two years I was gold scorer for IASAS

and I was captain since sophomore year.”

The boys’ soccer team went

to Bangkok

by Barbara LodwickA bomb threat on the American

Embassy and heavy rains that fl ooded the homes of Jakarta International School (JIS) students did not stop the softball teams from making their way to the capital of Indonesia.

The softball teams traveled to Jakarta to compete against JIS and the International School of Kuala Lumpur (ISKL) on March 2.

The Eagle girls started the exchange on Saturday morning against JIS. It was close until the fi fth inning when the Dragons went on a two out rally, taking control of the game and eventually winning 18-12. Junior Alex Shaulis was named player of the game.

“Shaulis had a great tournament this weekend. We could count on

her to get on base, and she is an aggressive base runner,” senior captain Keri Dixon said.

Playing ISKL in the afternoon proved a good time to practice fi elding and hitting against an inconsistent pitcher. ISKL was at a disadvantage because six players could not attend the tournament due to the expense of the trip and other school trips. The ISKL shortstop stopped the Eagles from a high scoring game though, and the fi nal score was 14-9. Pitching for the fi rst time this year, Freshman Brittany Dawe got player of the game.

In the afternoon game, the Eagles girls faced JIS for the second time, and pulled out a win. The defense was tight and stopped JIS from hitting their way to a victory. The

“At this time, we feel that having a separate Athletic Trainer would be a luxury and is not required,” said Robert Connor, ISB’s Athletic Director. And although most of the other schools don’t have a trainer they do have some sort of doctor or nurse on staff to serve as an equivalent.

Activity and Athletic Directors, Mimi Mulchin and Brian Combes, as well as the coaches act as SAS’s trainers and offer assistance with injuries. During tournaments there is an ambulance on stand-by.

“Historically SAS has never had a trainer... however it has been taken into serious consideration in the last few years with an increase of injuries, which average one major injury a week,” said Combes.

Now after about fi ve years of documenting injuries and discussion, SAS has made the decision to hire a full-time trainer who would work with all school sports as well as SACAC.

The trainer chosen for the job is a former SAS student currently working as a trainer at another high school in San Diego.

Injuries deny Eagles key players in IASAS medal race

Softballers travel despite embassy threats and fl oods in Jakarta

BENCHED!captain and brought him home the silver.

“The soccer team was like my family” Carral said.

Second season Varsity basketball player David Small also had damage to his knee during a game, but he was at IASAS when the accident occurred. While in the second game of the tournament a player from ISB accidentally hit Small from behind causing his knee to bend inward, and tear in his ACL.

Small was taken to a local hospital for the next morning where he was told that he wouldn’t be able to play for the rest of the tournament.

The team made it to the championship game, but could not take the gold; they lost to ISB.

“It was a horrible feeling just watching the ‘big’ game that I was suppose to be in” Small said.

As far as immediate care both Carral and Small received ice and were told to keep off it.

Most schools in the US have a trainer; someone trained in sports medicine and proper stretching techniques. However, it is not so common in our IASAS community. IASAS athlete Tina Starky wears an ankle brace during hurdle practice. Many SAS athletes

choose to wear ankle braces to prevent ankle injuries. Photo by Linda Starkey

fi nal score was 9-2. This game was crucial in the Eagles season, and the coaches complimented Dixon with player of the game.

“The third game, we played as a team, and we hit,” coach Mark Swarstad said. “We had 11 hits that game, and they were timely hits.”

The boys’ team played consistently. Their schedule mirrored that of the girls playing JIS twice, and ISKL.

In the fi rst game the Eagle boys were rusty, handicapped by rained out practices and a lack of games. They won the game 3-2.

“This tournament is very early in the season for us, and we haven’t had much practice or games,” coach Will Norris said.

In the second game of the day

the Eagles faced the ISKL Panthers. They defeated a tough ISKL defense and won that game 5-2.

“KL has a good defense; their shortstop made some plays on hits that would have been base hits,” Norris said.

The games that day were low scoring compared to the runs the Eagles usually put on the scoreboard. In the afternoon game against JIS, the Eagles took it to them with a score of 14-4.

Softball assistant coach Kent Knipmeyer was not able to be in Jakarta this weekend due to a passport mix-up, putting added pressure on Norris.

“It had an impact on some of the base running, but the seniors and captains stepped up to help,” Norris said.

Senior Clay Crawford up to bat while fellow players Brandon Mulder and Mitch Sampson look on. Crawford and Sampson have been on Varsity for four years.

the eye mar 22, 2007

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