Philip McCormickEditor-In-Chief

The three candidates vying for the vacant presidents seat at PCC addressed the commu-nity at open forums held in the Westerbeck Recital Hall this week where the public was able to submit feedback to the Board of Trustees on each candidate.

According to Board Presi-dent Berlinda Brown, this will help the board make a decision on who will be selected for the position.

We encourage the public to submit feedback, Brown told attendees at one of candidate Rajen Vurdiens open forum on Monday. This forum is part of the selection process for the board for picking the next

president.Attendees were able to submit

questions before each forum and a moderator presented each question to each candidate. The most prominent question asked in the forums seemed to be about shared governance and how the three candidates would deal with the tension between the faculty, administration and board.

One of the reasons I was appointed interim president of

Sacramento State College is be-cause I was able to work among groups of very divergent opin-ions and bring them together, said Patricia Hsieh, president of San Diego Miramar College, on Tuesday.

When similar questions were asked to Vurdien, Fullerton Col-leges president, he said that he had dealt with similar problems when he first arrived to Fuller-ton.

Matthew KiewietStaff Writer

Talks of PCC offering bache-lors degrees by way of state law SB 850the law passed by the State Senate and signed by Gov-ernor Jerry Brown last May that would allow community colleges to offer four year degrees in cer-tain fieldshave resumed over the past week, and a proposal for such a degree at PCC was recently sent to the Chancellors Office, a school official said.

Good fortune has smiled upon us, said Associate Vice President of Strategic Planning & Innovation Ryan Cornner to the Academic Senate on April 6, in reference to the fact that the college would have another opportunity to offer BA degrees.

Cornner, Dr. Julie Kiotas, Robert Randal, and Bakhtawar Bhadha have been developing a curriculum for PCC to off a degree in Applied Research and Data Analytics.

A Bachelors degree in Applied Research and Data Analytics will equip students for careers in managing research in a variety of fields including business, healthcare, marketing, education and social science fields, Kiotas wrote in an email.

There is a growing need in the business and industry sectors for well-qualified employees that use data and research to make informed business decisions, Cornner said.

There are 30,306 jobs in Los

VOLUME 111 ISSUE 10 ONLINE EXCLUSIVES AT PCCCOURIER.COM April 16, 2015

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PAGE 3 >>

PAGES 4 & 5>> PAGE 6>>

DRAGON DANCE

NOONTIME SPEAK OUT!Should California pass a law approving physician-assisted deaths for the terminally ill?

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PCC and PCC Global Club host Chinese

culture day

PAGE 6 >>

Abstract painter talks about her artistic journey

PAGE 7 >> Vote atPccCourier.com

Lancers slide into 3-game winning streak Matthew KiewietNews Editor

PCC womens softball team dominated their third game in a row by beating the LA Harbor College Seahawks 7-2 at Robin-son Park on Tuesday afternoon as they make a late push for a playoff bid.

Our team is determined and they realize that we can still make some noise in confer-ence, said head coach Monica Tantlinger. I hope they under-stand what they have done so far and that finishing these last two games is huge for us.

The Lancers scored first in the bottom of the first with a lead-off single to center by sophomore second baseman Justine Zavala, followed by a triple by freshman outfielder Mariah Quintana and a double from freshman catcher Holly Riker-Sloan.

I am excited for the next two games, said Quintana, who went 3-for-4 on the day. If we continue playing like we have been, we will accomplish what we want. We are hoping to get a

SOFTBALL page 8

4 YEAR page 2FORUMS page 2

Presidential candidates address questions at three open forums

Discussion resumes on bachelors degrees

Erica Hong/Courier Lancer Alejandra Grimaldo (freshman) slides safely into home past LA Harbor catcher Cassandra Sorto in the fifth inning at Rob-inson Park in Pasadena, Calif. on Tuesday, April 14. The Lancers beat LA Harbor Seahawks 7-2.

Dr. Rajen Vurdien Dr. Patricia Hsieh Dr. Robert Miller

Angeles within the fields of social

science research, survey research, and

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require a BA degree, according to EMSI

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They pay an average of $29.86 per hour

and there is an expected 23 percent

increase in these jobs over the next 10

years,

Kiotas said that it seems unlikely that

the state Chancellors Office will ap-prove the proposal, but if it is in fact

approved they will immediately get to

work planning courses and recruiting

students to participate in the program.

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The person who gets this job has to make sure that he or she can work with all the constituent groups to create a climate that will promote student success, he said. Through transparency, I was able to improve the climate at Fullerton I feel that at PCC, I could do the same by being just as transparent.

Interim President Robert Miller, who was appointed to his position after Mark Rocha retired last August, said that with accreditation pending, it was up to the entire schoolhimself includedto try and work on the climate.

Its the collective responsibility that we all have to work on this and its only if we trust each other and respect each other that we begin to move forward, Miller

said at his open forum on Wednesday afternoon. It was said that we were the most functional/dysfunctional college the accreditation team had seen Our issues are significant but very solvable if we just choose to work better with each other.

According to Brown, the board hopes to make its decision by the end of April.

Hsieh is in her tenth year as school president for Miramar College. She also serves on many local and national boards, including the San Diego Maritime Museum Board, the Community Col-lege Baccalaureate Association (CCBA), the National Coalition of Certification Centers, and the National Asian Pacific Islanders Council.

Vurdien has been the president at Fullerton College since 2010 and before that was vice president of instruction at Saddleback College for six years. He also

currently sits on the executive board of

the California State University Fullerton

Doctor in Education Leadership pro-gram.

Before being selected as the interim

president of PCC, Miller was the senior

vice president of Business and College

Services. He is also a PCC alum.

Upward Bound program receives $33kKeely DamaraStaff Writer

PCCs TRIO Upward Bound programs recently received a two-year grant in the amount of $330,000 from the Los Angeles Scholars Investment Fund. The grant money funds both the Math/Sci-ence Upward Bound and classic Upward Bound scholarships for graduating high school seniors from Pasadena-area high schools.

The Upward Bound scholarships pro-vide low income and first generation col-lege-bound students with awards ranging from $500 to $5,000 depending on their expected family contribution to college tuition and the cost of attendance. The maximum two-year award for students attending PCC is $1,000.

Upward Bound Director Angela Sotelo said that often with these students the hurdle isnt being accepted to schools, but paying for them.

Working with first generation, low income studentsone of the barriers is financial need, said Sotelo. Yes, you got into UCLA, you got into Berkeley, you got into all these institutionsbut then when they see their financial aid awards, it doesnt cover 100 percent of the costs.

The scholarships are highly sought after and competitive. Of the 96 high school seniors in the programs, only 47 will be getting the scholarships. In order to qualify students must have at least a 2.5 GPA, be enrolled at a community college or 4year institution this fall and be eligi-ble for the Pell Grant and Cal Grant. In addition, this year Math/Science Upward

Bound Director Juan Carreon said they are giving higher priority to students who have participated more in the programs.

One thing thats different this year for this class is that we included involvement in the program because we might have had a student thats been in our program for four years and theyre not as active, Carreon said. Then you have those stu-dents that have been in the program for maybe two years and they are really active, coming to every Saturday workshop we have, summer programs and field trips.

Karla Zelaya is a 22-year-old PCC stu-dent who received a Math/Science Up-ward Bound scholarship after graduating from John Muir High School in 2011. Ze-laya first attended UCSD for Biology for a year and then transferred to PCC where she has spent the last two years study-

ing biology and working for the TRIO

services that have helped her navigate the

financial and educational hardships that

accompany higher education.

You have to participate in the pro-gram in order to receive it and thats why

Im giving back to the program because

they helped me so muchwith the

scholarship, helping me get into college,

they helped me with my ACT and SAT

testingthey just provided a lot of help

for me as a first generation student and

low income, Zelaya said.

High school seniors involved in the

programs and attending the Pasadena

Unified and El Monte Unified School

Districts have until May 1 to apply for the

scholarships. Winners will be announced

on May 23 and May 29.

Sammy WuStaff Writer

Although freedom of speech appears to be a straightforward and agreeable issue on the surface, it has been proven to be a great conundrum for both the government and private citizens. The most recent complication comes from the Sons of Con-federate Veterans (SOCV), who wanted to finance and support a Texas license plate carrying a picture of the Confederate flag. The United States Supreme Court presided over the lawsuit last week in which the Texas SOCV sued for the right to display the flag.

The case started when the SOCV communicated to the Texas Department of Motor Vehicles their desire to possess a specialty license plate decorated

with the Confederate flag. In re-sponse, the Texas DMV denied their request on the grounds of offensiveness associated with the symbol, causing the SOCV to challenge the DMVs refusal as an infringement on their First Amendment rights.

Without knowing much about the freedom of speech and its various complexities, one may be convinced that the SOCV is right in this legal battle. If the group purchased the license plates out of their own pockets, there should be no reason why they would be denied what they want .Yes, the message may be controversial and offensive, but who are we or the Texas DMV to decide what can and cannot be put on a private citizens car, or property for that matter?

The First Amendment really was designed to protect a debate

at the fringes, said American Civil Liberties Union Legal Di-rector Steven Shapiro in an inter-view with NPR. You dont need the courts to protect speech that everybody agrees with, because that speech will be tolerated. You need a First Amendment to protect speech that people re-gard as intolerable or outrageous or offensive because that is when the majority will wield its power to censor or suppress, and we have a First Amendment to prevent the government from doing that.

Toni Massaro of the James E. Rogers College of Law built on Shapiros argument.

Free speech doctrine is espe-cially concerned about view-point discrimination, Massaro said. So, if the state allows one message, it cannot deny access to another on the same subject matter that expresses a different viewpoint.

However, if the government is producing the speech, there are specific rules that are legally permitted to be at play. This comes from the difference between public forum speech, which is seldom regulated and produced by private individu-als or institutions, and limited forum or government speech which is made by the govern-ment and follows a different set of guidelines.

Speech shown on license plates is still seen as sanctioned by the government. The gov-ernment is also handing out the license plates, so any messages on the plates are considered to be government sponsored. The Supreme Court must consider the distinction between govern-ment speech and public forum speech.

The Confederate flag contains

a racist implication understood by many Americans. It stands for an organization that condoned slavery of African Americans and espoused the doctrines of racial hierarchy in society.

All governments, including the state of Texas, has a responsibili-ty to their citizens not to support any message that communicates racism, sexism, homophobia, and hatred in general. If the Su-preme Court declares the SOCV the victor, then any hateful, extremist group, such as neo-Na-zis and the Ku Klux Klan, can legally draft their own license plates if they have the money to do so.

The First Amendment does entitle these groups to their own hateful viewpoints, but the government must also refuse putting these opinions on official state speech. Doing so is not just a mark on the government, but it is also offensive to citizens, whom it is the governments job to protect.

It is not a question of free speech. It is offensive speech, said Houston Congresswoman Sheila Jackson. It is a state-is-sued license that honors my oppression.

This is without a doubt a complicated predicament. On the one hand, the government should not monitor speech, since it is protected under the First Amendment of the Constitu-tion. Yet, it is inappropriate and unjust for the government to put hateful messages on official forums.

Our constitutional val-ues here collide, said Jackson Wright, a law professor at Harvard Law School. We care deeply about free speech, but we also understand it is not absolute in all contexts.

OPINION COURIERApril 16, 2015

ONLINE POLL RESULTSOnline, we asked: Which presidential candidate would be the best choice?

Results as of 5 p.m. Wednesday: Dr. Patricia Hsieh (38 votes, 55%)Dr. Robert B. Miller (22 votes, 31%)Dr. Rajen Vurdien (9 votes, 13%)

Vote at PccCourier.com

3

Which presidential

candidate would be the best choice?

Reporting by: Ashley Park Photos by: Kristen Luna

Courier2014 JACC

General Excellence Award-Winner

Editor-in-ChiefPhilip McCormickManaging EditorKristen LunaNews EditorMatthew KiewietOnline EditorJustin Clay and Mick Donovan

Opinion EditorHannah Gonzales

Features EditorMick DonovanA&E EditorAnthony Martinez

Lifestyle EditorAshley Park

Sports EditorDaron GrandberryAsst. Sports EditorDavid OConnor

Photo EditorNagisa Mihara

Online Photo and Graphics EditorDaniel ValenciaAsst. Online Photo EditorTraece Craig

Scene EditorKeely Damara

Design EditorSamantha Molina

Staff Writers: Ahmad Akkaoui, Daniel Axume, Nataly Chavez, Alex Chhuon, Keely Damara, Alan Flores, Monique LeBleu, Samantha Molina, Neil Protacio, Luis Rodriguez, Sammy Wu

Staff Photographers: Traece Craig, Victoria De La Torre, Mick Donovan, Shaunee Edwards, Michelle Gonzalez, Eric Haynes, Erica Hong, Kristen Luna, Mary Nurrenbern, Michael Osborne, Scott Spencer, Daniel Valencia, Tiffany Yip, Max Zeronian

Faculty AdviserNathan McIntire

Photo AdviserTim Berger

Advertising ManagerDaniel Nerio

The Courier is published weekly by the Pasadena City College Journalism Department and is a free-speech forum. Editorials and comments are those of the authors and do not necessarily represent the position of the institution and its administration, student government or that of the Pasadena Area Community College District.

The Courier is written and produced as a learning experience for student writers, photographers and editors in the Journalism Department.

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Shared governance fumbles Brown ActAfter debates and confusion,

it has been decided that the Academic Senate and shared governance leaders will partici-pate in training sessions to clarify which bodies are subject to the California Brown Act. Although this is a step in the right direc-tion, it also exposes how little administration and shared gover-nance bodies understand about the Brown Act.

The training sessions, held by lawyer Todd Goluba this month, will clear up which PCC govern-ing bodies need to be regulated by the Brown Act. However, this issue should have been resolved when it became apparent that not all shared governance leaders fully understood the Brown Act.

The topic came to a head when, last month, a heated dispute occurred after senate member Sarah Barker said she was not allowed to defend a decision she had made about a Lancer Radio program during a senate meeting.

The Academic Senates function is to make recom-mendations on academic and professional matters. Although this means that they are advisory, it is also given that they are the voice of the faculty at PCC and should thus conduct themselves in a manner befitting someone who has been entrusted to do whats best for the campus as a whole while also make sure that students have all the tools they

need for success.This means looking over grad-

ing policies, making sure that degree requirements are up to standards, and other matters that affect student life at PCC. This, however, cannot be achieved if governance bodies cannot even agree on whether or not they are subject to the Brown Act.

Bickering causes nothing but frustration and only adds to the confusion. It leads to problems that could have otherwise been avoided, such as the lawsuit filed last year by Californians Aware, and diverts attention and energy away from other important topics.

The training sessions will be a test to see if shared governance

leaders can cooperate and ef-fectively communicate with one another so that everyone comes away with a better understanding of the Brown Act.

It is also a challenge for shared governance to be more open about their meetings. This means publically posting meeting dates, agendas and minutessome-thing that many senate commit-tees have been accused of not adhering to.

Whether this causes more conflict among members or re-solves issues, this is a chance for all shared governance bodies to learn from past mistakes so that they can better serve the school and students in the future.

I think Dr. Patricia Hsieh would be the best candidate to encourage students to work harder

and achieve their academ-ic goals. She has a lot of

experience.Cindy Zhang, English

Dr. Rajen Vurdien is the best candidate

because he has enough experience. I think he will

be the most proactive candidate who will still be enthusiastic to encourage

change.Fatema Ghafarshad,

paralegal

VOICES:

Freedom of speech is not entirely absolute

I think Dr. Robert Miller is the ideal

candidate because he has experience within PCC.

He already knows whats going on around the cam-pus, and he can put more useful input into school

issues.Joshua Vega, English

Id say Dr. Patricia Hsieh. It could be nice and dif-

ferent to have a womans perspective.

Wilbert Romero, engineering

COURIER4 SCENE

Stroll at

Michael Osborne/CourierParticipants scramble for the prized golden egg at the first annual Egg Bowl at the Pasadena Rose Bowl on Saturday, April 4.

Erica Hong/CourierMaggie Moran walks her dog Honey Girl with Liz Hamada on Tuesday, March 31.

Erica Hong/CourierA Boston Terrier scampers through the grass on Tuesday, March 31.

SCENE 5 April 16, 2015

Bowl

Erica Hong/CourierA large group of cyclists bike together on Tuesday, March 31.

at

Erica Hong/CourierA Boston Terrier scampers through the grass on Tuesday, March 31. Max Zeronian/Courier

Car enthusiast Hugo Ramirez displays his 1966 Chevrolet Stepside next to a 66 Baja Bug on Sunday, March 29. Ramirez has been working on the truck for over a year.

Erica Hong/CourierA remote kit plane takes flight on Tuesday, March 31.

Max Zeronian/CourierHobbyist Tim Gostony flies his powered glider on Sunday, March 29.

the

Mick DonovanFeatures Editor

Lions danced, dragons soared and drummers pounded to their own ethnic beat in the warm spring air as crowds gathered in a circle to watch on Thursday in Galloway Plaza at Pasadena City College.

PCC and the PCC Global Club hosted Chinese Culture Day on campus and invited the Developing Virtue Boys Schools Lion and Dragon Dance and 24 Seasons Drumming clubs to perform and teach workshops for the fourth year in a row.

The festivities for the annual Chinese Culture Day included a lion dance, a dragon dance, 24 Seasons Drumming, a callig-raphy lesson, healthy lifestyle, eating and meditation demon-strations and a workshop on learning the lion and dragon dances.

The two dances were fantasti-cal and hinted at a bit of magic. The beautiful costume pieces are puppets and typically just called lion heads and dragons. Both are manned differently to bring these creatures to life.

The lion consisted of two performers, one for the head and another for the tail end, while the dragon requires nine performers.

The dances were eloquent and subtle with their movements. The lion itself slowly ap-proached the audience through a type of bowing gesture and near the end of the piece the dancing became more enthusiastic. At moments the performer in the head will jump onto the shoul-der of the tail-end performer to demonstrate the lion standing on its hind legs. This is a feat of great agility and core strength and the dancers were able to demonstrate it with ease and grace.

The dragon seemed to fly effortlessly through the sky in circles and fluid gestures and patterns, all while blowing a fireball forward in the air.

These dances, as well as the two featured animals, are iconic to Chinese culture and traditions that go back centuries.

Lion dance and dragon dance are both very celebratory dances and are iconic and beloved products of Chinese Culture,

wrote Riley Fong, a senior at Developing Virtue Boys School, in an e-mail. You will almost always see the lion dance at Chinese New Years celebration, while dragon dance is a bit more rare. You may see dragon dance at festivals where people want to call down rain, as dragons are in charge of rain in the heavens.

The drumming itself is a sepa-rate art form and a celebratory performance but it is performed in conjunction with the two dances by the school as the clubs travel and perform together as a unit. The drummers stacked the drums into a pyre and ended the number with three of the performers jumping up onto the drums and all finishing the piece on the single top drum and igniting confetti poppers from the top.

Though drumming itself has obviously been around for centuries and has always been a large part of Chinese culture, the specific form of drumming that we perform24 Seasons Drumming is a relatively nascent form that was created in Malaysia around a decade ago, Fong wrote.

This club featured 13 drum-mers and drums while a full team will have 24. Each drum represents one of the 24 Chi-nese farming seasons. The four main seasons, spring, summer, fall and winter, are each divided into six more.

The Developing Virtue Boys School is an all-boys boarding school in Ukiah, Calif. It isnt a large school but the students are dedicated and work hard to

bring these performances to life with vigor.

Its very small and very inti-mate, and a large majority of the students are involved in these clubs. We rehearse, for all three clubs combined, about 5-6 hours a week, Fong wrote.

While these art forms are not widely done professionally in the U.S., they are far more common in Southeast Asia.

Justin ClayOnline Editor

Cigarette sales have been on the decline in the United States for the past few years. With cigarette taxes and ad campaigns designed to teach the dan-gers of smoking on television commercials, internet spots and billboards on the street, it is no wonder that more people have decided to pass on traditional smoking.

One of the reasons for tobaccos steady decline is the rising popularity of electronic cigarettes.

Electronic cigarettes, or e-cigs, are battery powered handheld vaporizers that heat up liquid nicotine and allow the user to breathe in the vapor without the tar and smoke associated with traditional smoking. They were designed as a safer alternative to traditional cigarettes.

Supporters of e-cigs say that they are much safer than con-ventional cigarettes and many former smokers say that the benefits of vaping is a vast im-

provement compared to regular smoking.

There are even some that have never smoked conventional cig-arettes, but have still used some form of nicotine vaporizer.

A recent survey conducted by Biomed Central Public Health found that one out of five teenagers had either purchased or tried some form of electronic cigarette, which has led some to fear that e-cigs could be a possi-ble gateway for future cigarette smokers.

A lot of people see smoking and it seems tempting, so some-times to break that temptation they might start vaping which might keep them from trying out an actual cigarette, said Ty White, an employee at Vapemas-taz, a vape shop located near campus. A lot of people see it and might think automatically that means that young people who start vaping initially is a bad idea, but technically the sensation of them wanting to try cigarettes, but they want to try vaping first in order to avoid cigarettes.

White himself uses a nicotine vaporizer even though he has never smoked a traditional cig-arette and he credits the vaping industry for him never picking up one.

Like traditional cigarettes, the sale to minors is prohibited in California. And many cities have restricted their use in public places where smoking is prohib-ited.

We strongly restrict that, if a customer looks young we will ask for I.D., said Rikk Alverez, a manager at Vapemastaz.

As a community we should treat this with responsibility, said Alverez.

Alverez is a former smoker

who says that before he started vaping, he smoked as many as four packs of cigarettes a day.

He says that before he discov-ered vaping, he tried a variety of methods to quit smoking, even hypnotism.

Another perk that might attract potential smokers is the fact that the nicotine used in e-cigs can come in a variety of different flavors, which many say is a vast improvement over the taste and lingering smell that is left behind from traditional cigarettes.

With traditional cigarettes, you only get a choice of two flavors, stale and super stale, said Alverez.

Alverez says that the employ-ees at Vapemastaz understand all of the chemicals that are con-tained in the e-liquids that they sell and that the staff is always willing to answer any questions that customers may have about the liquid and its contents.

We only deal with e-liquid dealers in California because California has some of the most strict chemical regulations, he said.

Alverez gets many different requests for flavors and modifi-cations from customers because there is no standard when it comes to how people prefer their vaping experience.

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Lions, dragons and drummers celebrate

Daniel Valencia/CourierThe Developing Virtue Dragon and Lion Dance club per-formed the dragon dance for Chinese Culture Day at the Galloway Plaza on Thursday April 2.

Tobacco use on decline as vaping culture grows

Matthew KiewietNews Editor

Despite a handful of unsatis-fied students, the Borders of Di-versity Student Conference host-ed by the Cross-Cultural Center, College Diversity Initiative, and the English Department was both moving and educational.

The seminar began with student panels and presenta-tions about the importance of unity and tolerance, which fit the theme of Crossing Boundaries: Finding Home.

I thought the Borders event overall was terrific, said English professor Roger Marheine. My colleagues worked hard to bring it all together and the student panel presentations are so inspir-ing.

The key note speaker was American author and soldier, Brian Turner.

He is most famous for his poems Here, Bullet and The Hurt Locker. He read both of his poems and offered anec-dotes of his time in the army that related to each poem. He

explained how he arrived at the title of The Hurt Locker, which went on to become the title of a critically acclaimed film that depicts disarming bombs during the War in Iraq.

The phrase originated from one of his former sergeants at West Point, Turner explained. The sergeant meant to threaten the platoon with a hurt box, which meant they would be in a world of hurt if they did not complete a certain task. He misspoke and said, hurt locker instead.

The Hurt Locker was written in the summer of 2004, a time when it felt like for months we were being hunted. It constantly felt like him and his fellow soldiers were on the verge of being put in a hurt locker, Turner said.

It was complete boredom punctuated by significant chaos, remembers Turner.

Turner is also famous for his memoirs titled, My Life as a Foreign Country. In this book he tells brief stories about his deployment, along with his rea-

soning for joining the military in the first place.

He was personable and worked hard to connect with the students, said Marheine in an email. I do believe he represents a major current of what I have called American war culture which is to say that he expresses a genuine perplexity regarding wars root causes and his own participation in those wars. To that extent he raises questions and uses his literary voice to work out his own psy-chological ambiguity.

Several students in the audi-ence felt they needed to be clear that they were anti-war, demand-ing answers as to why he would fight for what they believed to be an unjustified cause.

Turner responded, seeming a tad disengaged with the ques-tion, that they made a valid point that should be discussed. Much to the students dismay at the time, he chose to abruptly move on to a different topic.

Overall the subject of war was not properly addressed, said psychology major Lindsey

Iniguez. Students need to know

whats going on, and a heart-felt

explanation was not given.

Turner had given out his

phone number to the audience

at the beginning of his lecture,

so Iniguez expressed her con-cerns in a text message.

She said that Turner got back

to her and explained that the

way he raises awareness is not

by telling people what to believe,

potentially offending those on

either side of the political spec-trum. Instead, he aims to urge a

person to ask questions, which

in turn makes them think.

Believe in imagination, said

Turner as he wrapped things up.

That is all we have.

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Students learn at lunch with influential LA-based abstract painterKeely DamaraStaff Writer

Mary Weatherford remembers her first and most influential ex-perience viewing art as the time she visited UC Santa Cruz at the ripe age of 5 and saw The Fruit Room. It was a student art exhibition in a vacant room underneath the dining hall that consisted of supermarket fruit advertisements pasted over every visible surface.

I saw it in 1968 when I was 5-years-old and it really stuck with me, said Weatherford. As young artists, there may be things you saw when you were 5-years-old that have stuck with you. You might think, well, they are insignificant for my work now, but for me its proved to be this is probably one of the most significant things Ive seen in my life in terms of what has come later.

Weatherford, a critically acclaimed abstract painter based in LA, detailed her evolution as an artist in the Center for the Arts building at Pasadena City College earlier this month as the last artist featured in a series of Noon-Time Artists Talks over the past year.

Weatherfords art spawns from a feminist viewpoint but has spanned many mediumspaint, pencil and mixed mediaas she doesnt like to limit her expres-sion as an artist. In a piece titled Girl Menace by Early Work, Weatherford pokes fun at this idea by incorporating her first critically acclaimed art titled Nagasaki, 1989 of a bulls-eye into a different piece.

The target paintings I had made were very, very popularcritically and with collectorsand I didnt want to be married

to a certain format, said Weath-erford. I thought that if Im an artist with some ideas, I get to use whatever means I want to make my idea concrete.

She spoke about her develop-ment as a young artist and how she felt pressured to find her unique style. She encouraged students to try creating in many different mediums.

When I was a young artist like you, I thought I had to figure out a style and stick with it. Well, I havent done that, said Weatherford.

In her latest work inspired by Arte Povera, an Italian modern art movement from the early 70s that literally translates to poor art, Weatherford incorporated repurposed neon light tubes into her pieces attached directly onto the canvas in a series titled The Bakersfield Project.

Weatherford was inspired to incorporate the lights into her paintings after salvaging neon tubes from the old Thrifty Mart T sign in Bakersfield. She chose to leave the electrical cords hanging bare, using them to add shape and connection to the painting.

Of course, they are not only about information and informa-tion traveling, but about power traveling, moving, said Weath-erford. And its always a closed circuit.

Students were encouraged to take part in a critique of how she created her art pieces. Weather-ford asked how her work would feel different if she had decided to hide the cords powering the neon lights behind the canvas.

There is a sense of con-nection with the outside world when you have the cords on the outside that you wouldnt have with the hidden cords, respond-

ed PCC art student Cindyroy Komoto.

Noon-Time Artists Talks is a new program created by Mary-rose Mendoza, the associate professor and drawing coordi-nator for the Visual, Media and Performing Arts Division. Men-

doza said she approached art faculty and asked them who they would suggest to invite to speak based on what their students are interested in.

What I tried to do is get a diverse group of artists from disciplines that are a part of our

visual arts department, Mendo-za said.

The talks this year have also included creative director Lisa Krohn, ceramics artist Julia Haft-Candell, entertainment designer Scott Robinson and conceptual artist Jennifer Moon.

Soldier and author speaks at Borders of Diversity

Nagisa Mihara/CourierStudents gather to listen to keynote speaker Brian Turner talk about his work for the Borders of DIversity annual student conference in the Creveling Lounge on Thursday, April 2.

8 SPORTSCOURIER April 16, 2015

Swimming primed to bring home title

Luis RodriguezStaff Writer

Coming off a perfect 8-0 dual conference title in the South Coast Conference, womens swimming is poised to make a run at the SCC Championship title this weekend at East Los Angeles College.

Their biggest competition is expected to be rivals Mt. SAC, which finished 7-1, losing only

to PCC.Head Coach Terry Stoddard is

tasked with preparing a success-

ful team to not let their winning streak affect their performance.

Were poised to be a con-tender. Without a doubt, said Stoddard after a Tuesday practice.

You have to focus on the turns and the finishes. I strive every day to make hard work normal, added Stoddard, which he uses as a motto.

In the sport of swimming, placing first and placing second comes down to fractions of a second. Ariahn Givens, who swims in the 50 and 100 free-style, understands this better

than anyone.Its all about technique, said

Givens. If you do one thing wrong, you could lose the race in a split second.

Givens even has something of a personal rivalry with someone at Rio Hondo College.

I hope I can pull it together and beat her at conference, said Givens. Shes at 24.90 and Im at 25.07.

Courtney Fukushima wasnt joking around after practice but she is more focused on improv-ing her personal best times over just focusing on winning the

conference title.Thatd be awesome, said

Fukushima. I dont know if

we will [win] but thatll be cool. Right now I think were main-ly focused on getting our best

times for conference and also trying to make state.

The mens swimming team, which has not had as good of a performance, are also preparing to compete for their own title.

The championships will be at ELAC this Thursday, Friday and

Saturday.

Shaunee Edwards/CourierSwimmer Courtney Fukushima swims in the South Coast Conference Pentathlon and Relays at Rio Hondo College on Feb. 13.

SOFTBALLContinued from page 1nod for a playoff spot.

PCC added another run in the bottom of the third on a sacrifice fly by freshman out-fielder Yecenia Cardenas, scoring

Quintana. That would be all the Lancers needed.

Our team did great and if we keep fighting this way we

should be able to win these last two games, said Cardenas, who also went 3-for-4 with three stolen bases. Its going to be an

interesting battle.They managed to tack on an-

other four runs in their half of the fifth as a result of four more

hits and three Seahawks errors.LA Harbor managed to get

on the scoreboard with a pair of unearned runs in the top of the sixth before the Lancers slammed the door shut.

Freshman pitcher Brianna

Lopez turned in a stellar per-formance, throwing a complete game where she only faced 28

batters, seven above the mini-mum.

The Lancers close out the season at East Los Angeles College this afternoon and host Compton in the season finale on

April 21. PCC has one win and

one loss against each team this season, and will need to win out in order to be considered for an at-large playoff bid.

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