THE UNIVERSITY’S STUDENT RUN NEWSPAPER APRIL 5 - APRIL 11, 2016VOLUME 76 // ISSUE 8

SINCE 1979

In this issue:

Opinion: Sonoma County raising cigarette prices, Effective or not? Pg. 3

Sports: Baseball team wins 2 of 3 in Los Angeles. Pg. 10

Follow The STAR: @sonomastatestar @sonomastatestar /sonomastatestar Visit: sonomastatestar.com

A&E: Spring DanceConcertreview.Pg. 6

Student Life: Seawolves BITE! A series of local restaurant reviews. Pg. 8

University locked in lawsuit regarding potential health risk of asbestos

Edgar SanchEz

Staff Writer

A controversy on campus about the potential health risks of asbestos in some of Sonoma State Univer-

sity’s older buildings is rooted in a lawsuit filed by a former environmental health and safety inspector who resigned in July 2015 after raising concerns about asbestos and other issues on campus.

The specialist, Thomas Sargent, who

is a “certified asbestos consultant,” filed a lawsuit in November against the Board of Trustees of the California State Univer-sity and his former supervisor, Director of Energy and Environmental Health and Safety Craig Dawson.

In his allegations, Sargent claims to have been a victim of retaliation for being a whistleblower to the mishandling of ma-terial, including lead paint chips, that may have put student and faculty health at risk. His lawsuit is scheduled to go to trial in

July. Sargent has declined to comment on the lawsuit or the controversy over the as-bestos testing. His attorney also declined to comment as well, referring the reporter to the lawsuit itself.

The lawsuit contends the problems began on May 18, 2012 when Sargent de-tected a “chalky substance” on the roof of the Physical Education building. His suspicions the substance may have con-tained lead paint were confirmed when he had the sample analyzed. According

to the lawsuit, when he raised concerns about the contaminated paint on the roof of the building chipping and flaking and said that it needed to be handled with skill during plans to reroof the building, he was told by Dawson, “you caused too much alarm with your regulatory email . . . it will kill the project with costs.”

According to the lawsuit, Sargent suggested the removal of the substance

See LAWSUIT on Pg. 4

Alpha Xi Delta hosts ‘Step It Up’ Color Run

See the full story on page 9.

STAR // Brandon Stachnik

Sonoma State University students gathered for Alpha Xi Delta’s fourth annual “Step It Up” Color Run on Sunday, benefiting autism awareness.

Model United Nations wins awards

in New York CityKayla E. galloway

News Editor

A group of Sonoma State University students trav-elled to New York City

last week for the National Model United Nations Conference, a pro-gram where students from across the globe participate in a series of hands-on simulations of the UN tackling world issues ranging from terrorism to human rights. By the end of the conference, this year’s Model UN delegation from Sonoma State took home two awards, marking the 12th award the university has won in the last six years.

“Given that Sonoma State’s delegation consists each year of al-most an entirely new group of stu-dents, our success in the face of this kind of international competition is remarkable, and I’m extremely proud of us,” said the program’s Faculty Adviser Cynthia Boaz.

Sonoma State’s delegation won an Outstanding Delegate Award and Honorable Mention Award, continuing the program’s long-standing history of success at the university.

The group of 22 students in this year’s delegation came from a range of majors, each bringing a unique skillset to the program. Representing the nation of Ireland, each student was assigned a com-mittee in the United Nations and within that committee, had to por-tray their nation in solving world issues.

During the trip, students were also able to see the United Nations headquarters, something that Mod-el UN Club President Valeria Quin-tana sees as the highlight of the trip.

“I aspire to work for the UN in the future, so being able to be at that location was a blessing and an honor,” said Quintana.

Sonoma State’s delegation be-gan preparing for last week’s con-ference in January, and in a matter of two months, students became experts on how the UN operates and the role of Ireland on the world stage.

The conference draws stu-dents from all across the world — some of whom have spent the past year preparing, making the compe-tition aspect of the conference a bit daunting.

“We had the best experience possible,” said Quintana. “Even though we only had two months to prepare, I believe Sonoma State was up there in the ranks with the

schools that had years to prepare.” Edward Goquingco, senior

political science major and one of the program’s head delegates, is proud of the relationships that were built during the trip and believes the true benefit of Model UN can be seen in the friendships that were developed between the delegates.

“Everyone did great. I am proud of the relationships and camaraderie we shared [during the trip],” said Goquingco. “Be-ing friends with [the delegation] is more important to me than being head delegate.”

Model UN is both a political science class and club at Sonoma State, though Boaz believes stu-dents of any major can benefit from participating and can bring a di-verse viewpoint to the program.

During the conference, stu-dents spoke numerous times in front of audiences on how they be-lieve an issue should be solved from the stance of the nation they’re rep-resenting — making public speak-ing and persuasion skills essential to a delegation’s success.

“I have seen several students who were too shy to speak up in classes when they joined Model UN, and by the time they finished the program, they were some of the most confident and outspoken stu-dents in their courses,” said Boaz. “Students build skills in writing, researching, analysis and more. But perhaps the most important thing all MUN students gain is a boost in their self-confidence as scholars and citizens.”

In the last few years, Sonoma State has represented nations like Cuba, Venezuela and Nigeria — some of which presented contro-versy because of world events at the time. The choice to represent Ireland was influenced by Boaz, who spent the fall semester on sab-batical in the nation. Having Boaz’ knowledge from living in Ireland for a period of time, proved to be beneficial to the delegation. Stu-dents were able to gain insight on the politics and culture of Ireland and were able to more accurately portray that nation at the confer-ence — something every univer-sity aims to do.

Model United Nations is a pro-gram offered in the spring semester of every academic year and those interested in participating in the program are encouraged to contact Boaz at boazc@sonoma.edu

Kayla E. Galloway is a mem-ber of this year’s Model United Na-tions Program.

Associated Students candidates face off in debate

Voting period ends tomorrownatE galvan

Staff Writer

Voting in this year’s As-sociated Students elec-tions began on Monday

and will continue until Wednes-day. With voting booths set up in the Seawolf Plaza. Last week, as the campaigning reached the home stretch, students filled almost every seat of Ballroom B in the Student Center to see potential Associated Students presidents, Kate Chavez and Emily Hinton, discuss their plat-forms, beliefs and reasons why they deserve to be at the highest level of student representation at Sonoma State University.

A point of disagreement between the two candidates in the debate, concerned the up-

coming faculty strike. Noting that 60 percent of faculty are part-time lecturers and only 20 percent of the school budget goes towards instruction, Hin-ton explained a faculty strike is appropriate based on how small the school budget has allocated for instruction.

In a change of pace, Chavez explained her disagree-ment with Hinton’s stance.

“While I do support the faculty in getting a 5 per-cent raise if they want,” said Chavez, “I want to make sure that the raise they get doesn’t come from students because that’s what we have seen in the past as our tuition and fees have gone up to pay for faculty and we already know we pay high enough fees.”

During their opening state-ments, Chavez and Hinton ap-peared eager to share their backgrounds and how they will help them if elected.

Hinton, a second year phi-losophy student with a concen-tration in pre-law and applied ethics, said she wants to attend law school and believes this a necessary step. The focus of her statement, as well as cam-paign, she said, was to close the gap between administration and students by returning Sonoma State to an institution of aca-demia rather than a business corporation, which she believes the university currently is.

“Our four-year graduation rate is incredibly low, as only

See ELECTION on Pg. 4

Editorial April 5 - April 11, 2016pAge

sonomAstAtestAr.com2

Editorial Policy: The commentary expressed in the unsigned editorial represents a majority

opinion of the STAR Editorial Board on a topic facing the campus community in keeping with journalistic precedents of other major newspapers, and may not be shared by all staff writers. The board encourages readers to write letters to the edi-

tor about all topics, including the editorial.

Nichols Hall 323, 1801 East Cotati Ave

Rohnert Park, CA 94928

Telephone: 707-664-2776

Business & General Inquiries:

sonomastatestar@gmail.com

Corrections and News Tips: star@sonoma.edu

THE STAREditorial Board

This week’s can’t miss article:

Editor’s Pick

PublicationThe STAR is published every Tuesday during the fall and spring

semesters. Printing is done by Sonoma Media Group. The weekly

publication of the STAR is made possible by Instructionally Related

Activities Funding.Opinions

Opinions expressed in the STAR are those of the writer and not necessarily those of the STAR or SSU. The editorial reflects the views of the STAR Editorial Board on issues it considers to be of particular relevance to the campus community.

Letters to the EditorLetter writers may expect prompt publication in the newspa-

per’s op-ed section, as space is available. Letters of up to 400 words will be allowed and must be submitted no later than the Friday before the publication date. Published letters must be free of libel, since the publication is held legally accountable for all content. Although personal controversy will be tolerated, it is the responsibility of the editor to check statements purporting the facts. The STAR reserves the right to refuse publication to any let-ter and to edit for length. Letters must sign all contributions and the editor must verify the signer and the writer are one in the same through personal conference. To send a letter to the editor, email star@sonoma.edu.

Brandon Stachnik, Editor-in-ChiefPeter Njoroge, Executive EditorKayla E. Galloway, News Editor

Joseph Encinas, Asst. News EditorJenna Fischer, Opinion Editor

Ashley Mar tin, Ar ts & Enter tainment EditorShannon Brown, Student Life Editor

Thomas Call III, Spor ts EditorAubrie Tolliver, Asst. Spor ts Editor

Brennan Chin, Photo EditorKaila Sanders, Asst. Photo EditorKimber ley Baptista, Copy Editor

Kyler Khan, Copy EditorJulia Albo, Editorial Car toonist

Cassandra Owens, Adver tising DirectorConnor Gibson, Distribution Director

Paul Gullixson, Faculty Adviser

The baseball team at Sonoma State University reached 14 innings in its first game against CSULA. Staff Writer Hailee

Zastrow spoke with players from the team and wrote a compelling story about the Seawolves’ 3-game series.

Read the story on page 10

Staff Writers

Photographers

Audrey Altman, Diana Arroyo, Shane BickfordNikki Bridges, Josephine Clements, Sean Curzon Rene De Amaral, Nicole Detmers, Emilie DevittChristine Edwards, Noe Felix, Sarah Fishback

Nathanael Galvan, Nicholas Gray, Florencia HassonEthan Helms, Michele Herber t, Naaman Hightower

Olivia Hunt, Allison Kelley, Vasilios Loufas Rachel McCloskey, Katelyn Quinn, Kathryn Reidy

Blake Robinson, Carly Saber, Bianca SanbornEdgar Sanchez, Andrea Serles, Nathan ShapiroJessica Shipma, Kristen Spear, Hailee Zastrow

Megan Corcoran, Sara Wildman, Shane Bickford

Corrections/ClarificationsIn a story titled “Asbestos presents a potential

health hazard in Stevenson Hall,” published March 9, it’s written Thomas Sargent was allegedly fired from his position on campus. Sergeant was not fired, he resigned from his position on July 31, 2015.

“Seawolves outshine the Golden Eagles in Los Angeles”

The mission statement of Sonoma State University states a clear objective to

“prepare students to be learned persons who have a broad cul-tural perspective.”

There are many ways to nurture a broad cultural per-spective: Teaching students in the classroom, encouraging outside research and facilitat-ing functions which promote an education in different cul-tures.

One tradition viable for the promotion of such cul-tural education at Sonoma State, the Festival of Colors, was canceled this year despite much anticipation by the stu-dent body. Associated Student Productions announced the cancellation of the event via Facebook the day before it was scheduled to occur, March 23.

After a careful read of the post, it can be deduced the cancellation was a result of the fear of further appropriat-ing the Indian and Nepalese cultures. India is where the an-cient Holi festival, the celebra-tion of the beginning of spring, was originated.

In preparation for Holi, it’s tradition in India to light a bonfire and burn an effigy of a demon spirit to symbolize the triumph of good over evil. The day of the burning is called Holika Dahan and it occurs on the eve of Dhuleti, the day of the playing of colors.

It’s on Dhuleti where Indi-ans spray color water and pow-der on each other in celebra-

tion. On Dhuleti, also called Rangwali Holi, streets are filled with people sharing the joy, playing instruments and eating delicacies like gujiya, mathri and malpuas.

Per the Facebook post made by ASP, it claims “it is important to recognize how we create spaces that can be either inclusive or cause marginaliza-tion and harm.”

This is admirable, espe-cially in this age, where hate and ignorance is found (and contested) on college campus-es across the country. Only those who represent the Indian and Nepalese culture can truly determine whether Sonoma State’s rendition of the festival is harmful or disrespectful.

The school’s production of this event in the past may have qualified as cultural appro-priation. This might explain this year’s last-minute cancel-lation, but more steps are nec-essary than simply abandoning the event.

If we, as young adults, want to continue to thrive and learn about each other, we should not shy away from holding functions intended to celebrate cultural differences, especially on a campus t con-sistently accused of lacking diversity.

Instead, we should learn how to communicate and reach out to those who come from these backgrounds to create a friendlier, more enlightening experience. ASP declined to comment on whether the event

will be revisited before the se-mester is over or next spring. The organization has only dis-closed it feels “it is best to not continue with the Festival of Colors event.”

Last year’s festival played host to traditional Indian danc-ers who performed before the event began. Afterwards, anx-ious attendees were quick to toss the synthetic powder on each other in celebration.

What was missing from last year’s festival were tradi-tional prayers of rejuvenation, or the drinking of Indian chai. There were no stories from the Hindu scripture or sharing of sweet gifts.

What was present, how-ever, was the acknowledge-ment the festivities about to ensue were derived from cen-turies of Hindu tradition.

But we tweaked the cel-ebration to fit our needs and decided to neglect portions that might not have been as “fun.”

That’s not the proper way to share cultures. What was the point of acknowledging the Hindu customs if we don’t even celebrate them right?

Canceling this year’s Fes-tival of Colors might have been the right move for ASP in the moment.

Nonetheless, it’s important to understand this campus needs a continuous lesson on diversity and maybe planning a traditional Holi festival with-out cutting corners is one way to get the ball rolling.

Celebration with educationSTAR // Julia Albo

OpinionApril 5- April 11, 2016 3sonomAstAtestAr.com

pAge

Diana arroyo

Staff Writer

Students and faculty should be able to feel comfortable everywhere on our school

campus, especially the lecture halls.

Stevenson Hall, one of the oldest and biggest buildings on campus, has been identified to contain asbestos, a set of danger-ous fibrous minerals which was used in the construction of build-ings before the 1980’s. Even with the released, not much has been done about this.

Not to mention, many stu-dents are not aware of this po-tential danger they’re exposed to when they have class in Stevenson hall.

Thomas Sargent, an environ-mental health and safety specialist and a former employee of Sonoma State University, had discovered suspicious powder coming from the roof of the main P.E. building in 2012.

After allegations of mishan-dling the cleaning of the powder were made to the administration, he alleged in the lawsuit that he was threatened to have his Certi-fied Asbestos Consultant creden-tial taken away for causing an argument. Sonoma State’s Board of Trustees defendant, Dawson, allegedly ignored the warnings of asbestos.

By 2013, according to the law-suit Sargent had tested a window-

sill in Stevenson Hall which con-tained over 34,000 asbestos struc-tures itself.

Soon later, test results re-ceived mid-2015 confirmed the presence of these same fibers in the ventilation system in Steven-son, indicating that all employees working in the affected faculty of-fices had breathed in asbestos fi-bers for years.

Dawson, who allegedly sup-pressed Sargent’s concerns, ap-pears to have dismissed nearly everything in Sargent’s research.

After recent testings done by Sonoma State University Admin-istration, no existing asbestos samples were found.

Faculty were immediately an-gered about this, saying the uni-versity was looking in the wrong places.

Once tested in other places by the firm called Millennium Envi-ronmental, confirming there was a high level of asbestos.

Why would the school want to hide this? Who knows. But for whatever reason, it’s not a good thing to keep this from students and faculty at their risk of getting a disease.

Darwin Hall was also known to have asbestos, yet it was com-pletely refurbished. Why wasn’t Stevenson as well?

Professors say they barely go into their own office because of the fear of breathing in the asbes-tos, which could potentially cause diseases such as cancer. Instead, they hold their office hours else-where.

How has this been going on for years without gaining atten-tion? The school should want the absolute best for their faculty no matter what.

An unpleasant workplace will only serve for trouble.

A similar situation occurred at the University of California, Davis, in one of their oldest build-

ings, Wellman Hall that stood for 46 years.

The incident occurred when a few of the employees were re-quired to install and remove video and audio equipment around cam-pus, and had to drill holes around the building, even though their bosses knew there could have been asbestos in the walls.

The result found a large amount of asbestos and as the drilling occurred it only made it worse, exposing and producing contaminated air to the workers and students.

“I took it home with me on my clothes. I could have exposed my children too,” said Trevor Wil-liams, one of the employees.

It has been said that even a simple disruption, such as simply rolling a chair on contaminated tile, can occur very easily and cause the creation of contaminat-ed dust.

What if tomorrow there’s a powerful earthquake, strong enough to disrupt the asbestos in the building? Then what? The air all around Stevenson could cause unhealthy and unpleasant results.

Faculty should be evacuated from the hall. Stevenson Hall should be completely asbestos free or no one should be allowed inside.

Sealing up a dangerous mess is not a solution. It’s just covering it up. Action needs to happen now before it gets out of control. The word needs to spread as well.

The university’s funds need to be used for instances like this, where the health of students and faculty is threatened.

For right now, it’s not a safe place on campus.

______________

Read our coverage of the lawsuit on page 1.

Asbestos: Hushing a serious risk

Sonoma County policy to spike

cigarette prices

Shane Welch

Staff Writer

Sonoma County has approved new regulations for the sale of tobacco products aimed at mak-ing tobacco more difficult for minors to obtain.

One of the measures of the implementation of new rules is that cigarettes will cost over $7 a pack, making Sonoma the first county in California to set prices on a pack of cigarettes. While the need to lower tobacco usage among youth gets a thumbs up, some parts of the overall policy fall short.

Raising the price of a pack of cigarettes to over $7 does help address use among minors.

An editorial by the Press Democrat titled “Thumbs up: Cigarettes at seven dollars a pack?” cites over 90 percent of people who smoke started before the age of 18 and almost 99 percent started before the age of 26.

It’s clear deterring minors is an important strategy for reducing health problems related to smoking. According to the Campaign For Tobacco Free Kids, raising prices for cigarettes by 10 per-cent lowers youth smoking by seven percent.

However, there are complications, chief among them is consumers can just buy cigarettes elsewhere outside the county, which hurts busi-ness.

Another part of the new policy is no new li-censes will be granted for retailers within 1000 feet of a school and bans licenses for any new to-bacco retailer whose primary market is to sell to-bacco in Sonoma County.

Although restricting licenses for retailers near schools is a good policy, restricting licenses for new businesses whose primary product is to-bacco gives existing retailers a competitive edge over new retailers who may not be selling ciga-rettes at all. Businesses such as vape shops would be considered a tobacco retailer once the policy is in effect.

The new policy addresses electronic ciga-rettes and cites the need to regulate them. While the guide for Sonoma County’s new Tobacco Re-tailer License policy demonstrates teen usage of e-cigs has tripled, increased vaping among teens coincides with a longer overall trend of declining youth tobacco smoking rates.

According to a Chicago Tribune editorial ti-tled, “Winning the war against teen smoking,” teen smoking has declined by half nationally in five years from 10.7 percent in 2010 to 5.5 percent in 2015 with a rise in vaping among the age group.

Even though vaping is up, the goal of reducing youth smoking rates is a resounding success. Re-ducing access of e-cigarette products to minors is a reasonable goal, however the policy doesn’t explicitly state how it intends to reduce vaping among teens in Sonoma County aside from estab-lishing them as a tobacco product, even though the sale of e-cigarettes to minors are already re-stricted.

One of the biggest ways to reduce tobacco us-age among youth might well be under way, Cali-fornia Senate Bill S.BX 27 which raises the mini-mum age to smoke to 21 received approval by the Senate in a 26-10 vote and awaits the Governor’s signature.

If California decides to raise the smoking age to 21 then that would have an overall positive ef-fect on lowering teenage rates of smoking with-out having to implement measures within Sonoma County.

Sonoma County’s new policy does step in the right direction, with some measures falling short of a comprehensive health strategy for reducing smoking rates for minors.

Increasing the price of a pack of cigarettes to seven dollars and limiting licenses to retailers near 1000 feet of a school will help to lower youth smoking in Sonoma County.

Potential concerns about the policy lie in how Sonoma County intends to address the sale of vap-ing products to minors as well as concerns over how the retail license scheme addresses business, who will be directly affected by the new policies.

FBI unethically hacks iPhone

noe Felix

Staff Writer

Former Supreme Court Jus-tice Potter Stewart once said, “Ethics is knowing

what you have the right to do and what is right to do.”

It’s about doing things in an honorable way and not finding loop-holes to get what you want.

That’s the exact opposite of what the FBI did to Apple, with the help of a third party, when they found a way to hack into one of the San Bernardino shooters, Syed Riz-wan Farook’s iPhone.

The FBI ordered Apple to cre-ate a software encryption to ac-cess the shooters iPhone, one that would solely work on Farook’s phone.

However, Apple denied the order claiming it would be the start of something dangerous.

Creating such an encryption could have the potential to open millions of iPhones. Apple felt the privacy and security of its us-ers was of the utmost priority.

On the other hand, the FBI felt this was a matter of national security and it was Apple’s duty to help shed more light on the atroc-ity that happened.

Earlier this week, the Justice Department said it found a way to unlock an iPhone without Ap-ple’s help, pulling its legal efforts to persuade the company to help them in the investigation.

This is a huge cause for con-cern because now we have to be

worried about the strength of Ap-ple’s security measures. I, like ev-eryone I’m sure, like my privacy.

What’s on my phone, whether it’s conversations or other things of that nature, is my business. It should be up to me if I wish to dis-close any of that information.

I’m disgusted by the FBI’s un-ethical dealings because of the fact they totally disregarded the privacy of millions of people.

Apple had a valid reason for not wanting to comply with them, yet they felt they could do what-ever they wanted.

Furthermore, the FBI never had any hard evidence that indi-cated valuable information was on the phone.

This makes one wonder why they were so hell bent on cracking the device.

According to the New York Times, a tip from an anonymous senior federal law enforcement said it was possible there might not be any crucial information on the phone.

Putting millions of people’s private lives at risk for a 10 per-cent chance to find information doesn’t seem worth it.

When Apple declared they wouldn’t assist the FBI in hack-ing the iPhone, Apple CEO Tim Cook said, “Smartphones, led by iPhone, have become an essential part of our lives. People use them to store an incredible amount of personal information, from our private conversations to our pho-tos, our music, our notes, our cal-endars and contacts, our financial

information and health data, even where we have been and where we are going.”

Cook added, “All that infor-mation needs to be protected from hackers and criminals who want to access it, steal it, and use it without our knowledge or permis-sion.”

The FBI doesn’t realize our phones are an extension of our lives, it’s a part of us.

We heavily rely on these de-vices to get through our day and carry information we may not feel comfortable sharing with oth-ers.

Do I have to be afraid or be careful about what I send, say or do on my phone now?

What’s worse is the FBI hasn’t informed Apple on how ex-actly they hacked into the phone. This means Apple can’t improve its security in order to protect our information.

Not only did they go behind Apple’s back, but now they won’t disclose the way they got into the device?

What kind of democracy do we live in if we let these types of things happen?

What happened in San Ber-nardino was a tragedy, one that affected everyone in California.

However, I don’t feel that put-ting the privacy of people on a global scale at risk is worth it.

STAR // Brandon Stachnik

What kind of democracy do we live in if we

let these types of things happen?

forbes.com

Apple CEO Time Cook.

News April 5 - April 11, 2016Page

sonomAstAtestAr.com4

STAR // Gustavo Vasquez

Despite living in a hub for healthy living and abundant agriculture, citizens and students in Sonoma County continue to struggle with food insecurity.

Issue of food insecurity presses on in Sonoma County

Ethan hElms

Staff Writer

Despite Sonoma State University’s location in Sonoma County where food is in high production, hun-

ger is still an issue for many citizens. The Sonoma State STAR published an article last month, highlighting the effort of the California State University’s research on campus-hunger, but the issue is much more widespread.

The estimated 70,000 local house-holds account for 36 percent of the county and these households missed 34 million meals last year according to the 2015 Sonoma County Hunger Index. The Hun-ger Index explained many families are finding it hard to pay for their meals while living on low-income and government aid. The rising cost of food is only creating more issues for low-income households struggling to find meals.

“I think there are definitely some re-sources that are underutilized. At the same time, there are also non traditional things,” George Malachowski said. “There’s an or-ganization in Petaluma called ‘Petaluma Bounty’ that works with folks, and other business organizations that do their own gardens. And so I think part of it is know-ing your resources.”

Malachowski works for the Sonoma County Human Services Department and played a vital role in analyzing the data for the index.

“The larger problem is even if you were to get full participation in some these [government aid] programs it still wouldn’t close the missing meal gap com-pletely. How do you make families more sustaining for themselves?” said Mala-chowski.

For many families who have tried to find aid, the rising cost of food is still too much to overcome. Even at the local level, growing food is not as cheap as many ex-pect.

“If you look at the economic recovery in Sonoma County, in particular the last few years, the people at the higher end of the income have improved much more rap-idly than at the lower end,” Malachowski said.

The rising cost of food compounded on the low incomes of some of the affected families, leaves many without food.

The vicious cycle of rising prices and stagnant wages forces more and more families to miss meals.

Oscar Chavez, Sonoma County’s as-sistant director of human services, spoke to the Press Democrat in February 2015 about the issue.

“Despite the improvement, the meal gap is still unacceptably high. We know that we still have a lot of struggling fami-lies who are not able to make ends meet and continue to be in low-wage jobs,” Chavez said in the story.

The irony behind this issue, is that ag-riculture is a driving economic force for Sonoma County and that doesn’t seem to change.

“Very little of the food that’s pro-duced in Sonoma County is actually con-sumed in Sonoma County. And that’s one thing that we really need to work better on,” Malachowski said.

Although simply raising awareness can help, there are other measures that can be taken to help those in need of food.

“One thing is advocating at the com-munity level, and with local governments, to use unused land to create gardens. I also think it’s individuals growing food in their backyard and donating it to pantries or food banks, or go through their churches,” Malachowski said. “The other part of it is thinking about the actual cost of your food.”

Currently, government programs are available to provide assistance in access-ing food. The local Redwood Empire Food Bank is run on donations and is open to anyone in need.

STAR // Shane Bickford

Candidates for Associated Students President, Kate Chavez and Em-ily Hinton, debated last Tuesday on the issues they believe matter to students. Voting started Monday and ends tomorrow.

ELECTION: Voting period ends tomorrow

Continued from Pg. 1

19 percent of students graduate in four years,” said Hinton, “especially since we are one of the smallest CSUs and we are accept-ing so many new students.”

Chavez, a third-year political science major and current Associated Students ex-ecutive vice president, was quick to mention how her current position within the organi-zation will provide her with the experience she needs when dealing with many issues.

Her time with Lobby Corps., a group of students who visit the state capitol and talk with congressmen about concerns with Sonoma State, as well as the three commit-tees she is currently sitting on, including Academic Senate, all contributed to her opinion that she already understands about issues concerning Sonoma State.

The candidates were asked to respond to matters dealing with student involve-ment with Associated Students and how they would represent the student body as a whole. Both candidates expressed their will-ingness to reach out to student-run organi-zations and how their passion for wanting to be the next president of Associated Students would help their efforts in connecting with student needs.

Throughout the debate, the amount of actual debating was somewhat absent as candidates agreed with almost every an-swer that was given by their opponent, only adding a few clarifying statements here and there.

However, this theme was changed dur-ing the last question of the debate, which was asked by Mercer. He asked how the candidates would serve as an advocate for students about getting unbiased information involving the faculty strike.

Both candidates are first-generation college students, have background in lead-ership roles and are passionate about head-ing the role of Associated Students.

Vice President of Finance candidates,

senior Ricky Albanese and sophomore Franchesca Galletti, also demonstrated to students their knowledge of money-related topics at Sonoma State.

The two were asked questions involv-ing, as the position implies, finances on campus, how students will be informed of where their money is going and how they’ll handle their new found responsibilities.

When asked about obstacles that were overcame in her life that would help her if she were to get elected, Galletti opened up with share a personal story.

“Two and a half years ago I was diag-nosed with a brain tumor, and it made me put off college for a year to get it removed, “ said Galletti. “But without that, I would have never attended Sonoma State and gained experience in this field. Everything happens for a reason and this gave me the confidence and strength to do this job.”

After the closing statements of Alba-nese and Galletti, the executive vice presi-dent candidates were brought to the stage. Ana Tongilava, a sophomore math major, and Rachel McCloskey, a junior commu-nications major, have both been part of AS during their time at Sonoma State. Keeping in theme of the debate, the two candidates were asked questions that mainly involved student outreach and the ways they would connect with students.

“I want to be an advocate for students and not being afraid to say what the students want to be said,” said McCloskey in response to how she will be a medium between stu-dents and faculty. “Those meetings [with the academic senate] have a lot of older big men in suits which can be intimidating, but we need to be that liaison between faculty and students and even though it’s a lot of re-sponsibility we signed up for it.”

Voting began Monday. Students are encouraged to vote between April 4 - 6 by the electronic ballot emailed to students on Monday or by visiting voting booths in the Seawolf Plaza.

Faculty publish letter regarding pending strike

Dear Sonoma State Faculty and Stu-dents,As department chairs, we support the

CFA’s fight for a 5 percent salary increase and re-instituting salary step increases (SSIs). Every faculty member on our cam-pus deserves a fair salary.

As chairs, we have seen the dramatic negative effects on faculty of no meaning-ful salary increase for almost ten years.

We have seen: Talented faculty leave our University because of stagnant pay and deteriorating working conditions; Top tier candidates choose to go elsewhere because we can’t offer adequate starting salaries; Associate and full professors making less than new assistant professors; Lecturers un-able to move upward through promotion by range elevation; Many faculty at all ranks forced to take on multiple jobs to make ends meet; Larger classes and increased work-load with no pay increase, and in turn a decrease in the quality of education at SSU.

The list could go on and on.Faculty play the pivotal role in the

University’s core mission to provide a high-quality education to meet the diverse needs of California. Yet, while faculty continue to invest their time and energy to promote stu-dent success, they struggle to support their families.

By comparison, last year alone 34 per-cent of CSU administrators got more than a 5 percent raise and 18 percent of CSU ad-ministrators got an increase of 10 percent or more.

Even as the number of administra-tors and their salaries continue to grow, the Chancellor tells us while we deserve to be

paid more there is not enough money in the CSU budget.

A neutral, outside factfinder has con-firmed that the raises we are fighting for are affordable, reasonable, justified, and neces-sary. In her report, the factfinder told the CSU to change its priorities to reinvest in faculty and students. The report concludes that funding faculty raises “… is in the in-terest of students, who need caring faculty, and certainly in the public interest as our country needs a well-educated population.”

Our students deserve better than to be treated as a statistic on a graduation roster; and faculty deserve better than to be treated as disposable widgets.

We are willing to strike to alter this destructive pattern and reinvest in our Uni-versity system.

We are willing to strike to stop the de-cline in one of the nation’s best public higher education systems. We are willing to strike to provide our students, our communities, and our state with the kind of public educa-tion they deserve.

Students, join us! Let Chancellor Tim White know you support your faculty on strike by emailing him at twhite@calstate.edu. Tell your faculty you support them in class, and please join us on the picket line.

Faculty, join us! Pledge your support at calfac.org/sonoma-state-university.

Note: This letter was sent by a mem-ber of the California Faculty Association and does not necessarily reflect the views of the Sonoma State STAR. To view who signed the letter, read the full document at sonomastatestar.com.

News 5PageApril 5 - April 11, 2016

sonomAstAtestAr.com

LAWSUIT: Campus buildings allegedly remain contaminated with asbestos

Continued from Pg. 1

using a vacuum in order to en-sure the lead-contaminated chalk would not disperse to other areas. The suit contends San Francisco-based CPM En-vironmental gave the university a quote, saying it could clear the lead-contaminated chalk from the P.E. roof for $1,604.

The lawsuit asserts Dawson denied this approach and in-stead assigned a worker to use a leaf-blowing technique that allegedly dispersed the lead-containing material putting the health of students, faculty, day-care children and other visitors who regularly pass by the P.E. building in danger.

Dawson declined to com-ment when asked by the STAR about these accusations.

According to the allega-tions, when Sergeant became aware of Dawson’s actions, he contacted the California Department of Public Health Childhood Lead Poisoning Pre-vention Branch, CalOSHA and Sonoma Department of Emer-gency Services. The Califor-nia Division of Occupational Safety and Health cited Sonoma State for “violating its lead standards” on Nov. 20, 2012. In addition, the Department of Emergency Services fined the university and directed it to abate the problems created by the P.E. roof incident.

In his lawsuit, Sargent further alleged that Dawson ignored his warnings for over a decade, which resulted in dangerous levels of asbestos dust from abraded floor tiles

throughout the faculty office buildings in Stevenson Hall. After blowing the whistle about these issues, Sergeant said he endured almost two years of what the lawsuit describes as “harassment, discrimination, and retaliation,” from both the university and his supervisors and, for that, he is now seeking more than $2 million in dam-ages.

However, Sargent’s actions also opened a pandora’s box for Sonoma State’s administration.

His allegations include the potential knowledge of air contamination of six different buildings, including Stevenson Hall, with asbestos-containing dust traveling through the heat-ing, ventilation and air con-ditioning systems, as well the removal of asbestos-containing

tiles from the private bathroom of Sonoma State President Ru-ben Armiñana.

Sonoma State’s adminis-tration has publicly acknowl-edged the presence of asbestos in the following buildings: Art Department, Carson Hall, Chil-dren’s School, Commons, Fa-cilities Services, Food Servic-es, Ives Hall, Kinesiology/P.E. Building, Nichols Hall, Zinfan-del, Student Health Center, Stu-dent Union, among others.

This is no surprise, since, according to the United States Environmental Protection Agency, every building built before the late 1970s was con-structed with asbestos-contain-ing materials. However, in the case of Sonoma State’s build-ings, the question is whether the asbestos structures are being disrupted, and if they are pres-ent in the air students, faculty and staff breathe, as alleged in Sargent’s lawsuit.

“We have had an asbestos management program since at least the early 1990s,” said Dawson. “Managing asbestos in place is the main protocol until asbestos renovations and removal are performed in the buildings.”

According to the EPA, as-bestos disruptions can occur by the demolition, maintenance, repair or remodeling of an asbestos-containing building. However, asbestos in Stevenson Hall are found in a large major-ity on the tiles.

This means simply walking and chair rolling can potentially be releasing asbestos into the air. This possibility has been unsettling for some faculty and students, some of whom have opted not to use offices or class-rooms in Stevenson.

In order to protect people, Dawson says his department has installed a layer of epoxy-protective and highly durable plastic material on the tile, as well as plastic floor mats under rolling chairs.

Sonoma State’s website shows reports of asbestos test-ing since 2013, all of which was performed on the air, according to Dawson, “All hazard associ-ated to being exposed to asbes-tos happen from inhalation.” The Occupational Safety and Health Administration has an 8-hour asbestos exposure limit at 0.100 fibers per cubic centi-meter. The results from 2013 range from 0.062 fibers to less than 0.001 or “non-detectable amounts.”

Nevertheless, some faculty in Stevenson, including Soci-ology Professor Peter Phillips, have complained about high amounts of dust that, like the lawsuit alleged, “contain high levels of asbestos.”

Independent testing by Sacramento-based HB&T En-vironmental Incorporated was performed in different build-

ings including Stevenson, Car-son and Nichols in July of 2015.

According to the results, after testing the West Verti-cal Return Air Shaft of the third floor of Stevenson, up to 518,000 asbestos structures per square centimeter were found.

The Northeast Vertical Re-turn Air Shaft, also in the third floor of Stevenson is reported to contain 259,000 asbestos struc-tures per square centimeter, ac-cording to the independent test.

According to a representa-tive from an outside asbestos lab based in Sacramento, the reason these numbers differ is because of the different methods of test-ing used by each company.

The numbers published by HB&T are not only differ-ing to the reports conducted by the school’s administration, but also potentially alarming since levels above 100,000 structures per square cm are considered high, as stated by the indepen-dent report.

“Sonoma State testing claims the air is clean, but the independent reports say the intake ducts are covered with asbestos,” said Sonoma State Math Professor Sam Brannen, who also serves on the Academ-ic Senate. “You can’t get onto surfaces without going through the air first.”

In response to the lawsuit, the school’s administration has conducted monthly testing from June 2015 to March 2016. All of the air testing results have come back negative.

However, on June 19 of last year, five out of eight settled dust samples had detectable lev-els of asbestos.

Another allegation in Sar-gent’s lawsuit is that asbestos-containing tile was removed from Armiñana’s office in Ste-venson Hall. According to the lawsuit, Armiñana himself re-quested to have them removed

However, Armiñana con-tends the claims that he was putting concerns about his health above the interests of others as false.

“Not true,” said Armiñana, “the tiles were removed be-cause my toilet was replaced for a low-flow toilet due to water conservation purposes.”

“[The tiles in Armiñana’s office] were stained,” said As-sociate Director of Marketing and Communications Susan Kashack. “The facilities peo-ple did it, and they would have blocked off windows and have vents if asbestos were present.”

According to the lawsuit, “virtually all of the offices in the five remaining asbestos-contaminated buildings have not been cleaned.”

A series of motion hearings are scheduled to take place be-fore the lawuit goes to trial in July. The first of which is sched-uled for April 13 in Sonoma County Superior Court.

STAR // Brandon Stachnik

The controversy of asbestos in multiple buildings at Sonoma State University came to surface when former Sonoma State employee Thomas Sargent discovered a chalky substance containing lead in the physical education building, presenting a potential threat to students. Above is the timeline of events leading up to the cur-rent lawsuit, set to go to trial in July.

Source: Lawsuit, Superior Court of California, Sonoma County

N E W S I N B R I E FSacramento A bill allowing California women to obtain birth control from a pharmacist without a prescription was passed in 2013, but finally went into effect last Friday. Not actu-ally over-the-counter, women will still need to consult with a pharmacist and answer a 20-question survey about their health and medical history. It will be covered by insurance, but individuals without health

coverage will have to pay out-of-pocket. The law does not require pharmacies to offer birth control, rather indi-vidual businesses will decide whether or not to offer this service.

Burlingame Alaska Air and Virgin America are set to join forces in a merger deal valued at $2.6 billion, the airlines announced Monday. This union will strip

California of its only major airline. Based in Burlingame, Virgin America was launched in 2007 and is known for its mood lighting and ad-vanced in-flight entertain-ment systems.

This acquisition will enable Alaska Air Group to operate 280 aircraft and offer 1,200 flights a day. This transaction is the latest in a series of con-solidations within the airline industry.

Los Angeles

On Monday, Gov. Jerry Brown signed a bill that will raise California’s minimum wage to $15 an hour by the year 2022. The first raise will come next year, bringing the state minimum to $10.50 an hour, and $11 per hour by 2018. Each year, a $1 increase will come, reaching $15 an hour by 2022. The bill passed despite zero support from Republicans.

Arts April 5 - April 11, 2016Page

sonomAstAtestAr.com6

Spring Dance Concert 2016: A bit muddled, but soulful

A spotlight on lack of funding for student art

Sarah FiShback

Staff Writer

Commentary

Excitement was in the air as ushers made the call for audience members to take their seats at the Evert B. Person Theatre Friday.

As the show began, the spotlight was on student dancer Farrah McAdams. McAdams, a senior, who was also in Fall Dance this past semester was the first performer onstage in the Spring Dance Concert 2016, an annual event that featured 26 dancers this year.

This first performance, “In the Absence,” had a contemporary feel and was choreographed by Kristen Daley with the help of some of the dancers.

Unfortunately, the performance was challenging for viewers as it provided a storyline that was difficult to follow.

“The first and last dance [before intermission] were confusing, I couldn’t understand the stories that were being portrayed and the dances were all very in-tense,” said Vanessa Thoa, a freshman bio-chemistry major. “It was hard to grasp the concepts and meaning of those two dances.”

From the very beginning the dance was confus-ing. More specifically, there were too many dancers to follow in this piece making it a little overwhelming. Overall, it was beautiful to see the heights that these dancers could go to.

What made this dance stand out was the original music from composer Jesse Olsen Bay. His music was electronic and even space-like. The dancers were also on point with the music throughout this dance and seemed to hit every clink and pop of the music with moves that surprised the audience.

The second dance of the performance was called “Modus” and choreographed by Eric Handman. This dance felt modern and was one of the few dances where the costumes were saturated with color.

The music, which was played by Brandan Wolcott and Emil Abramyan, was upbeat and happy. There was nothing confusing about this piece since the sto-ryline was pretty clear.

“Modus” was a fun piece to watch, and it seemed as if the dancers were very proud of this dance based off the confidence that seemed to beam from the dancers’ faces.

One of the most enjoyable dances was the third dance of the night called “Cease.” This dance was choreographed by Jennifer Meek with the help of the dancers as well.

What was special about this piece were a lot of aspects such as lighting, sound, powerpoints and cos-tumes that made the piece come together beautifully. This number touched on difficult topics such as gun violence and drug and alcohol abuse, and the choreog-rapher knew exactly how to express these topics that our world faces everyday.

“My favorite dance of the night was ‘Cease,’” said Thoa. “The lighting went well with the dance and I was able to follow it.”

Spring Dance Concert performers Anjelica Mar-tinez and Katy Waechter expressed their thoughts on the the performance and their preparation for the show.

“Opening weekend is a crazy stressful time for all of us,” said Martinez, a senior double major in psy-chology and dance. “I feel relieved, but at the same time melancholy that opening weekend is already over. We put a ton of work into this show over the se-mester for a handful of performances that go by way too quickly, but I wouldn’t have it any other way.”

“The first show is always nerve-wracking and the end is always bittersweet. I feel accomplished to have completed one of many, and sad as that means it will be over so soon,” said Waechter, a junior double major in business marketing and theater arts. “It was a small but mighty crowd.”

Emma DEvitt

Staff Writer

Commentary

What does it mean to be a serious artist? Is it to make work that others will like? These are the questions buzzing through the minds of art majors here at Sonoma State University, and anyone can see from the 2016 Juried Student

Exhibition that they are achieving their goals.The Juried Student Exhibition is an annual event every spring to showcase student

artwork. The faculty is not involved in choosing what pieces go into the gallery. The pieces submitted to the show are chosen by two jurors, outside professionals who know nothing about the artists and choose based on the quality of the work they see. This year, 131 pieces were submitted and 48 were chosen for the exhibition.

The opening night of the gallery on March 30 was swarming with visitors to support the students. In the room was a feeling of excitement and warmth, watching artists stand by to explain their pieces to viewers. There wasn’t a common theme throughout the works. It was just simply each artist’s interpretations and ideas through mediums like paint, charcoal, wood, metal and photographs.

The Director of the gallery and professor of art history, Michael Schwager, believes that showcasing the students work is important for their future careers in the art industry.

“This step is critical for the students who plan to continue in the art world, to have their work evaluated by other professionals,” said Schwager. “I think the exhibit is a very important part of the educational process. It’s no different from any other department, going from learning theory to putting it into practice.”

Schwager is currently working on getting some of the student artwork into the Stu-dent Center where it can be viewed by others who might not know about the University Art Gallery.

A visitor to the gallery, Harry Rosenmayer, thinks the university should hold more student exhibitions instead of just twice a year.

“Just for the student artists to show their work, this is a really big step for them,” said Rosenmayer. “They’re trying to get jobs, to get out there and be recognized. They are a product of Sonoma State and we need to support our own.”

One of the most eye-catching pieces in the gallery was a bicycle attached to hair cutting shears. When the bike was pedaled, the shears would move and cut. The artist, James Blake, provided a video of the machine in use, titled “Free Haircut!”

Blake is in the Bachelors of Fine Arts program and loves having the opportunity to showcase his work in the gallery alongside his classmates. He had two other pieces in the show.

“I appreciate that [the gallery] is run by students. Even hanging these works, it was satisfying that my classmates were in here getting work experience, professionally hang-ing shows,” said Blake. “You hear a lot of jokes like ‘oh, you’re an artist, you’re gonna starve,’ but if you go into curatorial studies or gallery work, you may actually have a sustainable life.”

Artist Lorena Cruz agreed that curating shows should be taught more in the art department.

“Beyond showing our own work, it’s important to learn how to curate and other art world responsibilities,” said Cruz.

This event not only put incredible student artwork into the spotlight, but also brought up the issue of funding. Although the Art Gallery is a beautiful addition to the art build-ing and functions well to serve students as well as professional artists whose work is featured there, the rest of the art department is suffering.

Simon Gordon, a photographer in the BFA program, commented on the lack of

classes and instructors.“I’m a photography emphasis and we have one photo professor, full time. Shannon

Benine has to teach all of this different kind of media, all of this new technology that’s really important in art, and at the same time teach traditional photography stuff,” said Gordon. “Having more classes and more professors would be really helpful.”

“Our funding is slowly being funneled away,” said Blake. “The art department had to spend its own money on stools. We were using the hand-me-down stools from the biology department when they got new stuff. But the University wouldn’t provide new stuff for us when it was time. There’s equipment that we’re just not supported in getting.”

To see student artists’ concern with the lack of funding to the art department should raise questions about where funds are going around the university. The average student pays around $1,800 every year in fees, so where is it going?

Despite their lack of funding, the art students are producing incredible work. “Sonoma State isn’t a full blown art school,” said Houser, “but all of the students

here are creating art I haven’t seen anywhere else. It’s really cool to see artists make work I really appreciate.”

The Juried Student Exhibition will be open for visiting until April 24.

STAR // Brennan Chin

The Spring Dance Concert 2016 had opened on Friday night and and shows will continue through April 7 in Person Theatre. See the rest of the gallery on page 12.

STAR // Sara Wildman

The Juried Exhibition features Sonoma State University student art and will be on display through April 24 in the University Art Gallery.

Entertainment 7PageArpil 5 - April 11, 2016

sonomAstAtestAr.com

A big fat unwelcomed sequel

Fallout’s ‘Automatron’ falls flat

‘The Walking Dead’ airs frustrating finale, leaves fans hanging

Allison Kelley

Staff Writer

Review

Some movies are designed to stick strictly to their one original release and should avoid unnecessary se-

quels. “My Big Fat Greek Wedding 2” is a prime example of a disappointing and unneeded continuation of the initial film. “My Big Fat Greek Wedding 2” was re-leased on March 25 and made over $17 million in the box office during the open-ing weekend. It was assumed this movie would be just as good as the first “My Big Fat Greek Wedding,” which was released in 2002, but sadly, could not compare. Despite the efforts to re-create the be-loved romantic comedy, the sequel fell a bit short.

Right off the bat, audiences learn that “My Big Fat Greek Wedding 2” is cen-tered on family. Characters Gus and Ma-ria find out they haven’t officially been married for the past 50 years due to a missing signature from the priest on their wedding document. The two decide they want a special wedding they never had a chance to have while in Greece. Mean-while, their daughter, Toula, battles with her stubborn teenage daughter Paris, who is embarrassed of her family and wants to move far away to college. Toula also has to deal with her relationship with her husband which has lost its romance. The entire movie is focused on how the fam-ily works together to help plan the dream

wedding for their loved ones. This sequel was nothing but cliché and predictable throughout.

If you’re looking for a laugh out loud good time comedy, “My Big Fat Greek Wedding 2” is not the one to watch. Any-time the characters attempted to crack a joke, it only came out as dry and awkward. The anti-climatic and snooze fest-worthy one-liners left an uncomfortable vibe. The first half of the movie was slow and hard to invest interest in. It lacks plot twists. The audience only learned basic information, that quite frankly has no relevance to the story. Besides the main plot, we learn Gus wants to find his granddaughter, Paris, a husband. Gus also thinks he’s a descen-dent from Alexander the Great, and Paris gets accepted into NYU. Other than the marriage and ceremony at the end, noth-ing else exceptional happens in this film.

The acting was minimal and subpar. It’s difficult to feel a connection to the characters, let alone a connection between the characters. Usually in family dynamic movies, characters create a sense of hap-piness and overwhelming joy. The char-acters in this movie acted more along the lines of feeling annoyed, aggravated and troublesome. Not too sure if this was the tone the producers were going for or just how the actors personalities carried through, but I wasn’t too fond of the over-all feeling. For example, the Greek fam-ily consisted of at least 15 people, which in most scenes bombarded and bothered those around them. This made me just as irritated as the characters dealing with them were.

One aspect that impressed me from “My Big Fat Greek Wedding 2” was the creative cinematography and set layout. The opening and closing credits were written in a Greek font, which tied in the overall theme of the movie. The houses were designed with Greek architectural design and looked as though they could be in Greece. Even the mailboxes looked like fancy Greek buildings. The lighting on the characters faces were always bright and lit up whenever on screen.

“My Big Fat Greek Wedding 2” was an interesting but unnecessary addition to the movie audiences have come to know and love.

Rene De AmARAl

Staff Writer

Review

“Fallout 4” graced us with its pres-ence in Novem-

ber of last year and has been an exciting, emotional and a straight-up awesome roller coaster. From its compelling story, interesting and diverse characters and tons of cus-tomizable armor and weap-ons, the Sole Survivor’s trek through the Commonwealth is exciting at every turn. “Fallout 4” has won quite a few awards and was one of the most anticipated games of the year in 2015; which is why the new “Automatron” DLC is a bit of a letdown.

Before diving into its problems, let’s talk about ev-erything “Automatron” does right.

It’s a normal day in the post-apocalyptic waste-land of the Commonwealth for the Sole Survivor, fast traveling from destination to destination, collecting weapons, armor and items from the 21st century, before the United States and China unloaded their entire nuclear weapon banks on each oth-er. In the midst of being at-tacked by Raiders, bombed by Super Mutants, cannibal-ized by Feral Ghouls (and the Wasteland’s many other horrors), you are typically on the hunt for your kidnapped son and your spouse’s killer (unless you have beaten the main story line).

During all of this, a new quest notification pops up. You open your Vault-tec Pip-Boy and listen to a cara-van’s distress signal. After

listening to the whole thing, you follow the quest marker and find a swarm of robots attacking a small trading caravan. After finishing off all of the robots, you meet ADA, a customized robot that traveled with the now dead caravan. ADA is eager to avenge her fallen friends, as she feels responsible for their deaths. ADA is your first official new companion.

After a little bit of trav-eling and talking with ADA, plot points are established and the enemy is revealed, the creator of all these vola-tile robots is “The Mecha-nist” (clearly an homage to the The Mechanist from Fallout 3). Then begins the journey to defeat the das-tardly villain The Mecha-nist.

A new addition to the crafting system is the Ro-bot Workbench, which al-lows you to customize all of your robot companions and NPCs (such as Codsworth, pre-synth Curie, ADA and Jezebel), in addition to con-structing armies of new robots to take with you on your journey, or to protect your settlements. There are so many new features and parts to create and custom-ize the robots, such as giv-ing them blades instead of robotic arms, or changing their paint job to a bright and colorful pink to brighten up the desolate wasteland.

In addition to robot cus-tomization, is a new raider group called the Rust Devils who scrap robots and use them to create their own armor and robot servants, which does provide a new challenge over the atypi-cal raider groups. On top of that, The Mechanists robots are extremely powerful, as they are loaded with a bunch of new upgrades that make

them more dangerous com-pared to their vanilla coun-terparts.

While the new crafting aspect offers tons of differ-ent options for designing ro-bots, “Automatron’s” story doesn’t live up to Fallout 4’s universe. The Mechanist is a cool character before the player meets them. The Mechanist is a mysterious bad guy, whose robots at-tack the innocent people of the Commonwealth. But once you actually meet The Mechanist, you’ll find that they are actually a very bland character, whose ro-bots misinterpreted their orders.

The fight leading up to confronting The Mechanist is fun, as it offers a bunch of new challenges, but The Mechanist himself is a very flat character. Upon defeat-ing the villain, the player does receive a nice set of legendary armor and a new settlement.

Overall, the entire “Au-tomatron” DLC story takes maybe 4 to 5 hours to finish, which in comparison to the rest of the game and future DLC plans, is very short and kind of disappointing. If you are planning on buying the DLC, the robot customiza-tion, new companion and new raider group is worth the $9.99 and make up for the overall lame story. If you don’t want to play the sto-ryline, you don’t have to. In-stead build an army of Fisto Sex-bots (a funny quest ro-bot from Fallout: New Ve-gas), or give Codsworth and Curie Assaultron legs and a pink paint job, so they can run across and lay waste to your enemies in the Com-monwealth with you, as that seems to be what most Fall-out 4 players are doing.

seAn CuRzon

Staff Writer

Review

This Sunday, “The Walking Dead” ended its sixth season. The popular series is an AMC show that follows Sheriff Rick Grimes (Andrew Lincoln) as he deals with life during the zombie apocalypse. The sixth season dealt with Rick and his group

settling down in the town of Alexandria. Things then go horribly wrong as they are war-rant to do in the apocalypse. Minor spoilers below.

This season was split into two different arches with eight episodes each, one airing in the fall of 2015 and the other airing in the winter. It’s been doing this since Scott M. Gimple took over as showrunner in the fourth season. The fall-half of the season dealt with Rick and the gang and a surprising appearance of a hoard of zombies near Alexan-dria. These episodes follow a single day as our leads are scattered.

The second half was more about the characters adjusting to life in Alexandria while a new group, called the “Saviors,” periodically attacks them. Unfortunately, the second half of the season lacks the focus of the first half and it just meanders around, waiting for the season finale. The focus switches more to Rick, Carol and Morgan.

The season finale more than makes up for it. A major theme for this season has been overconfidence. Rick has become convinced that he has seen it all and every decision he makes is brilliant and he can control any situation. But as more and more Saviors appear, Rick realizes that he has bitten off more than he can chew. The season finale makes sets up for the next season and turns it into a tense pay-off and a nice cap to a character arch.

The biggest issue of this season is the same issue the show has faced during its entire run: The sudden and pointless deaths. I won’t say who falls to this running theme, but say-ing there are deaths is not surprising. Saying characters die in “The Walking Dead” is like saying the sky is blue. The sudden deaths are meant to represent death in real life. Death in real life is often sudden and pointless. The problem is that this happens on the show so

often it loses its effect, becoming more of an annoyance than anything. And this season is hit hard by this annoyance. There are some nice character sendoffs mixed in though.

This season introduces an annoying new trope for “The Walking Dead.” A cliff hanger fake-out. Basically, it makes it look like a character has died at the end of episode, but it turns out fine in the following epsiode. It’s cheap and frustrating.

Where this season shines is in the acting, especially Melissa McBride and Lennie James. McBride plays the pragmatic Carol.

James plays Morgan, a man who believes that mankind can do better despite the hell he finds himself in. This season gives both of them plenty of time to shine particularly when they get to play off each other.

At the end of season four, Rick laughed maniacally as he declared that their enemies “Were messing with the wrong people.” Season six ended with Rick realizing that he was the one messing with the wrong people.

facebook.com/TheWalkingDeadAMC

The season six finale of “The Walking Dead” aired Sunday night, leaving fans, yet again, asking “Who was killed?”

facebook.com/Fallout

Fallout’s “Automatron” provides a few hours of entertainment, but a disappointing storyline.

Anytime the char-acters attempted to crack a joke, it only

came out as dry and awkward. The anti-climatic and

snooze fest-worthy one-liners left an un-

comfortable vibe.

facebook.com/MyBigFatGreekWeddingMovie

The sequel to “My Big Fat Greek Wedding” released Friday, earning $17 million during opening weekend.

Student Life April 5 - April 11, 2016pAge

sonomAstAtestAr.com8

Nicole Bridges

Staff Writer

Spring 2016 semester brought new changes including a possible strike, Associated Students elections and a new fraternity on campus. In the Fall, Interfraternity Council said how they wanted to extend its greek system by adding another or-

ganization to Sonoma State University. After discussing the option of three different fraternities, Sonoma State decided on Pi Kappa Phi to be welcomed as the new orga-nization.

Pi Kappa Phi has an extreme passion for wanting to create leaders on campus and they have a focus to promote diversity. The fraternity wants to see a change at Sonoma State as they want to improve the issue of diversity and strengthen IFC.

“The values we believe Pi Kappa Phi will bring to our campus as a whole as well as to fraternity and sorority life,” said Heather Martin, director of CSLIS. “Their ex-pansion process, resources and way in which they cultivate and support their newest chapters to insure success was very promising and exciting.”

Once Spring break ended, three Pi Kappa Phi leadership representatives came to Sonoma State to start their recruitment process. They explained they don’t want the men to feel interviewed or pressured, instead they want to have conversations about what this opportunity can bring them. The representatives will be here until the week of finals to continue this process. Pi Kappa Phi will then be able to recruit at the same time as the other fraternities in the Fall 2016 semester.

Representatives have been tabeling for the past two weeks as well as getting to know the posible new members over pizza, a BBQ and playing basketball. Pi Kappa Phi allows its men to wear their fraternity letters before initiation, which most fraterni-ties do not. This is because Pi Kappa Phi believes their recruits are as much brothers as active members and think it’s only fair to allow them to promote their name as well.

“We want men who show great leadership skills and who are open minded,” said James Maloney, director of expansion for Pi Kappa Phi. “We also start off with academ-ics as our priority making our GPA requirement 2.7, to set the bar for scholarly men.”

After two weeks, the representatives have extended 16 bids to men they find prom-ising leaders to carry on the chapter after they leave. If these men choose to initiate, they will be founding fathers of Pi Kappa Phi at Sonoma State. Once they finish extend-ing bids, they will send the two best men they feel have the greatest leadership skills to Austin, Tex. to the associate chapter institution. There they will learn what it means to lead a fraternity and will become the executive board of their chapter.

“We really like the men we’ve met so far, they’re all very promising leaders in my

opinion,” said Pi Kappa Phi representative Jimmy Hua. “I don’t feel nervous leaving them next semester to start this chapter because they have shown me they are ready for their future with this great opportunity.”

IFC is excited to expand and get to know the new organization. They believe hav-ing more leaders sitting in on their meetings and making big decisions will help make the changes more diverse. They want the newly Pi Kappa Phi members to express what they want to see changed in the IFC and greek life system.

“I think this is a great opportunity for more people to get involved in our greek life system and to make our campus stronger,” said sophomore and Alpha Delta Pi member Brittany Jepson.

facebook.com

Elijah Wood, a junior business major, accepts his bid to Pi Kappa Phi. Representatives are currently looking for potential brothers and leaders for their chapter.

Pi Kappa Phi introduces founding members

carly saBer

Staff Writer

Starbucks is not just a coffee house - it’s a way of life. Each Starbucks location serves, on average, over 500 customers per day. They’re located in over 40 countries and are currently the leading coffee retailer in the world. Starbucks lovers are dedicated and

loyal customers. The thing about Starbucks though, is it has taken “coffee shop” to a com-mercial level. If you’ve been in one Starbucks, you’ve been in them all. Of course there are varying degrees of customer service, drink taste and store décor but they’re all generally the same.

Coffee houses used to be a place where people would gather to meet new people and discuss politics and education, along with other current issues. They were a place for quiet, for an escape or to read a book. Each coffee house was unique and had it’s own special quirk. With Starbucks being such a dominating corporation, it’s lost the comfort and quaint-ness of a local coffee shop.

Here in Rohnert Park however, there are quite a few local coffee houses that do their best to embrace the old-timey coffee house feel. One of those places is Honey Badger Cof-fee House. It’s a small business located on Golf Course Drive. It’s a slightly farther drive from campus compared to the ever-convenient Starbucks across the street, but it’s worth the drive.

The smell of coffee beans fills the spacious store. The seating is a long bench with many tables and chairs. The benches and chairs all have floral cushions to keep your bum comfy while you work. The place is light and has plants throughout giving life to the inside. A guitar in the corner is available for anyone to play. They also have a small kids corner with children’s toys. An outdoor patio has a view of the golf course and some nice shade. It was quiet inside with only a few patrons chatting. The music is soft and calming - playing what has now become known as “coffee house music” which consists of indie and acoustic songs.

Inside of the Starbucks, the walls are dark which gives a less welcoming feeling. There are tons of tables and chairs, but good luck finding an open table. Laptops are out and

headphones are in. Not many people are socializing; it’s more about using the free Wi-Fi. The Wi-Fi is reliable though, and that’s important if you are going to get work done. Businessmen and women zoom in and out on their breaks. The energy of the Starbucks is more fast-paced and focused. Another important part about coffee houses, be-sides the coffee, are the snacks. At Star-bucks they have a variety of delicious baked goods to choose from – for a price.

They have prepackaged sandwiches, sal-ads, cheese, fruit and vegetable combos. The cake-pops are also a crowd favorite.

At Honey Badger, they have a much more limited selection of goodies, but they are all freshly made. They have bagels, breakfast sand-wiches, a Green Burrito and a ham and cheese croissant. Their prices however, are just as steep as Starbucks’.

Now as for the coffee, this topic is really to each their own. It’s all about preference.

When deciding which coffee house to go to, the most important question to keep in mind is the purpose. If students are going to get a quick coffee before class, or are just looking to get out of the house/dorm while they fin-ish that paper due tomorrow, even though it’s already 8 p.m., Starbucks is probably the more appropriate choice.

If they’re looking to go somewhere with friends where you can talk and enjoy a nice beverage in a friendly environment, then I would suggest heading over to Honey Badger’s.

A classic burger joint with a twistNathaN shapiro

Staff Writer

Review

In Cotati, off of Old Redwood Highway, is a local restaurant that truly lives up to its motto, “One mean burger.”With a four-star consumer rating, Mike’s

at the Crossroads is more than the average burger joint. However, it may not seem that way at first glance.

Entering the restaurant, it seems like any other. What makes the atmosphere so en-joyable though is its casual feel and love for sports, without throwing it in the customer’s face. Aside from the surfboard that hangs overhead, the love for the San Francisco Gi-ants is very apparent. The wall behind the bar includes baseball memorabilia such as bats, autographed baseballs and bobbleheads.

However, it’s not the ambience that sets Mike’s apart from other places. Mike’s offers specials for customers when they show their server a social media post. Additionally, the restaurant offers a two dollar beer special for every NFL game day. When it comes to the main course, Mike’s offers 17 delicious and unique burgers grilled to perfection.

One restaurant local, Mary-Lynn, de-scribed her burger as “one you pick up, but you don’t sett’er down.” Some of these cre-

ations include the Louisiana Pride burger pre-pared with blackened cajun spice and topped with freshly made spicy cilantro salsa. The P-Town burger is topped with a sunny side up egg while the Drunken Chili burger has a blend of beans, tomatoes and spices. The Krush burger with sauteed mushrooms, onion and garlic in a Zinfandel glaze jumps off the menu and the infamous Stinky Breath burger, topped with sweet rosted garlic leaves ones taste buds wanting more.

The Pesty Pesto burger topped with pes-to and served with swiss cheese, is always a crowd please and the famous Great Western Hickory topped with home-made BBQ sauce and bacon is a personal favorite.

Sophomore Jeremy Kichaven has been going to Mike’s at the Crossroads since his first day of freshman year.

“Any day of the week, any time of day, I know that I’ll walk out of Mike’s doors with a smile on my face,” said Kichaven.

Long-time Mike’s fan Michael Thomp-son, shared a similar view.

“I was looking around for a while to find somewhere where I could watch the Giants play and enjoy a meal,’ said Thompson. “I went to Mike’s during the World Series last year when they won and I thank the Pesty Pesto burger for making my night that much more memorable.”

Mike’s at the Crossroads is open every day of the week from 11:00 AM to 9:00 PM.

Yelp.com

Mike’s at the Crossroads, located off of Old Redwood Highway, has over 17 burger options for any palette to enjoy.

Local coffee spot beats Starbucks

Yelp.com

Jessica shipma

Staff Writer

Alpha Xi Delta hosted its fourth annual “Step It Up” philanthropy event on Sunday. The event was similar to “The Color Run” and participants were urged to wear white because of the chalk-

like paint would be thrown at them as they ran.The event was held at the Sonoma State University track

with different color stations set up at three locations. Partici-pants began by running through the blue station then yellow and finally pink. As people ran under the color coordinated balloon arches, members of Alpha Xi Delta threw pow-dered chalk on them while others cheered from the side-lines and ran the face painting station.

All proceeds from “Step It Up” are being donated to Autism Speaks, Alpha Xi Delta’s national philan-thropy which helps fund research into the causes, pre-vention, treatments and cure for autism.

“Step It Up” coordinators senior Katy Hoeksema and senior Natalie Leighton have been planning the event since January, when they were elected into their positions.

“We get our positions around January and at that point we knew the date, and from there we made a game plan. This is our fourth year doing it and we wanted to make sure we vamped it up. We’re seniors and we wanted to leave our mark,” said Hoeksema.

Aside from the actual run, the event also included Swirl Time, who offered to donate a percentage toward Autism Speaks for every purchase made. There was also complimen-tary Jimmy John’s, Monster energy drinks, Body Armor drinks and raffle prizes.

In order to make “Step It Up” more kid and community-friendly the event included a bounce house and face painting. One of Hoeksema and Leighton’s goals was to expand the event farther than just the Sonoma State community.

Hoeksema and Leighton had multiple ideas for getting Alpha Xi Delta’s name out to the community in order to spread the word about “Step It Up.”

“We made the Facebook event months in advance, we made all the flyers and had the LoboVision going. We really wanted everyone to go. We even attempted a Snapchat filter,” said Leighton.

Alpha Xi Delta was able to collect proceeds through raffles, ticket sales and an online donation page.

“Just from the online donation page alone we were able to raise about $1,400,” said Hoeksema.

Although Hoeksema and Leighton, along with their assistant Megan Lee, planned the event, they made it clear it required the participation of their whole sorority in order to make it successful.

“It takes a lot of delegating. We are co-chairs but there is no way we could do it without everybody. It physically could not be done,” said Hoeksema.

When asked why she chose to support Alpha Xi Delta’s philanthropy event, Jess Piel, senior and member of Alpha Gamma Delta said, “I love sup-porting other sororities and it was such a great event. They did an amazing job and I love the colors.”

Parents, stu-dents and community members visibly enjoyed “Step It Up” as their faces were in con-stant joy.

“The support of sisters is an amazing feeling, but I think what is more meaningful is when other Greek organizations support you. It creates a sense of community and makes me proud to be a mem-ber of greek life,” said Hoeksema.

Some participants were so excited throughout the event they even smiled while running through the color stations and ended up with powder in their teeth.

Even the dogs had powder in their fur. Luckily, the paint comes out with a little bit water.

Student Life 9Page

aPril 5 - aPril 11, 2016sonomastatestar.com

Ama-xi-ing color for a cause

STAR // Brandon Stachnik

Tuesday,April 5

The Clothesline

Project Display

11 a.m.

Seawolf Plaza

“In Plain Sight”

Stories of Hope and

Freedom

7 p.m.

Ives 101

Wednesday,April 6

My Monologues

5:30 p.m.

Student Center

Ballroom B

SSU Night Swim

6:30 p.m.

SSU Pool

The Will to Drag:

Makeup Tutorial

7 p.m.

The HUB

Spring Dance

Concert

7:30 p.m.

Person Theatre

Lobo’s Open Mic

Night

8 p.m.

Lobo’s

Thursday,April 7May I?

5 p.m.

The HUB

ASP Free “Egg Hunt”

Bowling Night

10 p.m.

Double Decker

Lanes

Rachel mccloskey

Staff Writer

Sonoma State University is bringing back a popular tradition this year. Associated Students Productions

and Queer Straight Alliance are teaming up to put on Gender Bender and Rainbow Prom. On April 28 at 9 p.m. in the Ball-room, students will be able to see their fel-low seawolves on stage dancing and lip-syncing the night away.

Gender Bender was a Sonoma State tradition a while back, but last year ASP and QSA brought back the event.

“We are building off the great event that happened last year and putting an even greater emphasis on the LGBTQA+ community while still keeping it a fun, entertaining event,” said Colin Chinn, sophomore and co-director of the cultural and current events committee working to plan this event. ASP and QSA are hoping to create a safe space for all students to ex-press themselves and have fun on stage.

Whether students want to have a rap battle, tap to a broadway tune or just dance it out with your friends, ASP and QSA

have made it clear that Gender Bender is a place where anyone is welcome. Students are able to sign up for Gender Bender by emailing asp.culturalcurrent@sonoma.edu.

QSA President Harper Tadross, a sophomore women’s and gender studies major, got involved with the event last year and is continuing to work with ASP and Chinn to organize the event.

“I heard about the event from other QSA members and they’ve said that the event has not happened in a few years, so I asked the cultural and current [commit-tee] and the event developed from there,” said Tadross.

This year, ASP and QSA are hoping to increase attendance and create aware-ness and understanding about the gender spectrum.

“This event allows people to be them-selves and to raise more understanding about how gender is more than just mas-culine and feminine,” said Tadross.

For more information on the event visit the Gender Bender and Rainbow Prom Facebook event hosted by the Sonoma State ASP page.

Gender bender to promote LGBTQA+ community

Kristen spear

Staff Writer

Sonoma State’s nationally-ranked No. 24 women’s tennis team kept racking up points this past weekend with back-to-back 9-0 shutouts against Notre Dame De Namur and Do-minican University.

The day began strong with three pairings as the Seawolves clinched the first two wins 8-0 a piece. The third win was won by default as NDNU made the risky decision to only travel five members of their squad.

The Seawolves were synchronized as all but one of their singles were won by an impres-sive score of 6-0, 6-0. Sonoma State continued to build their performance and achieve per-sonal records as junior Hillary Fazekas earned her 17th win of the season, sophomore Julie Rea carried on her winning streak to 10, consecutive singles wins and junior Karlee Budge secured her first top of the lineup collegiate match, winning 6-1, 6-0.

“Winning both doubles and singles was definitely a great feeling,” said Budge. “I attri-bute my wins to staying focused, having a positive attitude, and maintaining high energy even if I made a mistake.”

Katherine Long and Mariann Bukich contributed to the Seawolves win against the Argo-nauts in both singles and doubles.

It was déjà vu in their second match against Dominican as Sonoma State came out strong again with a 3-0 lead in their doubles. Both Long and Rea pushed their momentum forward with 6-0, 6-0 wins in singles and their teammates followed by securing a shutout victory against the Penguins.

Seawolves made history yet again with a perfect 24-0 record over Dominican, the first time since 1997.

“Our goals were doing everything we practiced on the court each week, making sure we are all present and active on the court,” said junior Jordyn Kearney. “In doubles we all strive to do a lot of crossing and activation with our partners to keep us going.”

Saturday’s game against Division I UC Davis ended the Seawolves shutout streak with a 6-1 defeat.

Sonoma State struggled to earn numbers for their team until sophomore Amanda Zuide-ma fought for her straight-set victory 6-2, 6-3 against her Aggie opponent at the No. 4 spot. This win was not enough to drive the Seawolves as they fell short each match afterwards.

“Playing a high level team like UC Davis is a great learning experience,” said Zuidema. “What we learned from this match can only help us next weekend and against stronger teams in our upcoming conference.”

Despite the loss, Sonoma State still battled, only allowing their opponent to beat them by a highest of three points in singles.

“Our team is built of fighters, which is something we pride ourselves on and that has led to many victories in the past,” said Budge. “Giving it all you got really does go a long way.”

The Seawolves go into their final regular season game with a record of 14-6. They hope to secure another win at home Saturday at 12 p.m. before heading to Surprise Ariz. the fol-lowing weekend to compete in the Pacific West Conference Championship April 14 through April 16.

April 5 - April 11, 2016pAge

sonomAstAtestAr.com10 Sports

Game 3: 4/03/16 R H ESonoma State (12-14): 010 100 213 8 13 1

CSULA (7-23): 000 030 000 3 5 2WP:Mitch Coombs (1-0) LP: Justin Davis (1-5) S: Cody Bennett (2)

Ryan O’Malley: 3-5, R; Matthew Richards: 2-4, HR, 2B, 2 RBI

Hailee Zastrow

Staff Writer

The Golden Eagles weren’t feeling so golden after being defeated by the Seawolves over the weekend.

The Sonoma State baseball team traveled to Los Angeles to play the Cal State LA Golden Eagles and left the city of angels with two victories in a 3-game series.

Both games in Saturday’s double header went into extra innings and ended the day with a split, winning the first game, 6-5, but falling just short in the second game, 4-3.

In game one, the Seawolves captured their first lead in the ninth inning when Ryan O’Malley hit a homerun on the first pitch he saw making it 5-4 but the Eagles answered right back in the bottom of the inning with a run of their own. Cal State LA and Sonoma State battled for over four hours until Matthew Richards singled home O’Malley to give them the lead in the 14th. Sophomore Cody Bennet took the mound in the bottom of the inning and preserved the save and the Sea-wolf win.

After a grueling and exhausting game one, the Golden Eagles handed the Seawolves their only loss of the weekend but they needed 10 innings to do so.

The Golden Eagles came back to tie it up twice before Dakota Hernandez singled up the middle giving them their winning run and the 4-3 victory.

Sunday morning’s rubber match sealed the series for the Seawolves with a 8-3 victory locking in the most important win of the weekend. Down 3-2 to start the seventh inning, the Seawolves got a momentum-changing, 2-out, 2-run homer by Matthew Richards, which started a huge 3-run inning that proved to be just what they needed to sail to victory.

The ninth inning put the nail in the coffin for the Golden Eagles. Richards reached on an error followed by a single by

Adam Manzer and Spencer Neve was walked to juice the bas-es. Then, Golden Eagle reliever Holden Berger balked on the mound and Richards was sent home. After a pitching change, Tyler Glenn’s single plated Manzer making it 7-3 and Neve capped off a big Seawolf inning by scoring on a wild pitch and getting the last run of the game.

Five players made their impact this weekend with multi-hit games. Ryan O’Malley was in the middle of Sonoma State’s power lineup, going 3-for-5. Daniel Caresio, Richards, Neve, and Glenn joined O’Malley each with two hits, with Richards and Glenn also each driving in two runs.

Richards had an impressive weekend scoring all four times he reached base in Sunday’s game and contributing five hits, including a double and a homer, four RBIs and four runs scored during the series.

O’Malley’s weekend was also noteworthy with six hits, including a double and a homer too. The senior continues to contribute to his team and is one worth watching.

“It feels great,” O’Malley said. “All I could ask for is to go out with a championship and I think we have an opportu-nity to do so.”

O’Malley leads all eligible CCAA hitters this season with a 1.239 OPS. The Seawolves improve to a 12-14 overall record and a 10-6 record in conference play. With only one day off, the Seawolves will hit Seawolf Diamond against San

Francisco State University in non-conference play today at 2 p.m.

“We’ve got a full day to rest so we’ll be ready to go on Tuesday,” O’Malley said after their long weekend. The Sea-wolves plan to bring their best game after a 6-1 loss against SFSU in February.

A special live broadcast of the game will be available through Sonoma State’s KSUN radio and can be heard at so-nomastateradio.com

Seawolves outshine the Golden Eagles in Los Angeles

“All I could ask for is to go out with a championship and I

think we have an opportunity to do so,” said senior third-

basemen Ryan O’Malley.

STAR // Megan Corcoran

Top: Catcher Spencer Neve frames up the pitch.Bottom: Brett Sesma races toward first after a base knock.

Women’s tennis team back on track

“Our team is built of fighters, which is something we pride ourselves on. Giv-

ing it all you got really does go a long way,” said Karlee Budge.

STAR // Megan Corcoran

Top Right: Jordan Kearney defedning with a backhand.Top Left: Jordan Kearney smashing home a serve.Bottom: Kearney and Jensyn Warren prepare for the opposing serve.

SEAWOLFSPORTS

Courtesy of sonomaseawolves.com

Sports 11Page

aPril 5- aPril 11, 2016sonomastatestar.com

Tuesday 4/5Baseball

Vs SF State2 p.m.

Seawolf DiamondWomen’s Golf

Sonoma State Inv.Foxtail Golf

Course Wednesday 4/6

Softball (DH)@ SF State

Noon & 2 p.m.Friday 4/9

Women’s Track @ Chico Distance

Carnival Saturday 4/10

Women’s Track@ Chico Distance

Carnival

Baseball (DH)Vs UC San Diego 11 a.m. & 2 p.m.

Seawold Diamond

Saturday 4/10 Women’s Tennis Vs UC Santa Cruz

Noon Women’s Water

Polo @ Cal State East

Bay Noon

Men’s Lacrosse @ Nevada

1 p.m. Sunday 4/11

BaseballVs UC San Diego

11 a.m.Monday 4/12 Men’s Golf

Stanislaus Inv.Softball (DH)

@ Humboldt State 1 p.m. & 3 p.m.Baseball (DH)

Vs CSU Monterey Bay

11 a.m. & 2 p.m.

AndreA SerleS

Staff Writer

The Sonoma State Seawolves ran their way to the top this weekend. With the competition heating up, the women’s track & field team

entered the San Francisco Distance Carnival race at Cox Stadium on the campus of San Francisco State University on Friday and Saturday.

The invite was designed so that each school competing was given unfa-miliar distances to run.

“Our coach has prepared us as well or better than any coach could for this weekend,” said junior Kelsey Lucas. “Now it’s up to us to let that hard work show.”

When all was said and done, freshman Analicia Garcia walked off the track having achieved one of the top 1500-meter times in school history. With her time of 4:49:72 she also cut seven seconds off her personal record.

Sophomore Angelique Lopez tied her personal record in the 100-meter dash, staying at a consistent time of 12.58. Then in her appearance in 200-me-ter dash, she cut a tenth of a second off her personal best, ending with a time of 25.76.

As for the rest of the team, junior Jasmine Rivera made a long-lasting impression this weekend. With a time of 59.36 in the 400-meter, she became only the second Sonoma State University student to break the minute mark.

Because of all the hard work and dedication that is put into the prepara-tion for these races, the women of the track and field team are seeing the outcomes they want, said Lopez.

“We also make sure to hydrate, eat healthy and get enough sleep prior to race day,” said sophomore Kelsey Lopez. “Mentally we will prepare by focus-ing on hitting our goal times.”

This tactic seemed to work for both sophomores Maria Hurtado and Christina Robinson. While competing in the 1500 this past weekend, Hurtado worked hard to earn a seasonal best of 5:07:91 while Robinson led the Sea-wolves with a 5:16:27 mile.

The women’s track and field team are scheduled to compete in the Chico State Distance Carnival Friday and Saturday in Chico.

Women’s track runs through records

sonomaseawolves.com

Track teammates dig out the final laps of the Distance Carnival.

BlAke roBinSon Staff Writer

What does it take to to play col-legiate lacrosse? At Sonoma State University you better

have a strong promise of commitment with an even larger capacity for ac-countability.

The players of the Sonoma State la-crosse team face off at more than just level of play. Each team member keeps one another responsible for their actions on and off the field.

“My best friends are on the team and these guys would do anything for me as I would for them,” said senior at-tacker Brad Bochesa.

Bochesa is a captain for the Sea-wolves with achievements as high as of-fensive player of the year to first-team all-conference attack.

“I came to Sonoma State for the purpose of playing lacrosse,” said Bochesa.

Recruiting starts well into high school for some players. Head Coach Panchito Ojeda gives potential pros-pects phone calls and emails throughout their high school seasons.

Ojeda remains active with players, keeps in contact with them, and helps the players make their final decision.

A new weapon was added to the la-crosse team’s arsenal this year. Mike Harris, or “Big Mike,” is a senior de-fender on the Sonoma State lacrosse team. This is Harris’ first year playing lacrosse.

“I have never seen someone pick up a stick as quickly as Big Mike,” said se-nior midfielder Justin Hong. “Big Mike holds a strong presence on the defensive side of the ball.”

Harris averaged nine points and three rebounds a game in his two years playing basketball for Sonoma State.

After his basketball playing days were over at Sonoma State, Harris decided to put down the basketball and pick up a lacrosse stick.

“Since I had a year of school left I thought that trying out for a club sport would be a fun way to finish up college,” said Harris.

The transition of sports may seem like a lot for some, but not for Harris. He not only learned the game of lacrosse, but also has found his way into the start-ing lineup.

There is a glaring theme of family amongst the teammates.

“Frankly, I hadn’t heard of the uni-versity other than the Lacrosse team being solid,” said Bochesa. “It’s a true family atmosphere with a lot of love for each other.”

Players participate in countless hours of community service in the North Bay, mainly participating in bet-tering youth sports.

Many players feel fortunate to have made the connections and bonds with their teammates, holding each other li-able for different tasks, like mandatory study halls weekly.

Coach Ojeda preaches a strong an-nunciation in the student portion of student-athlete. There is a minimum re-quirement of a 2.0 GPA to be an eligible participant.

“Being a part of this team has taught me values that formed my character,” said Hong. “These values such as lead-ership, respect, imagination, courage and selflessness are just few of the great traits that are used in this game.”

The players love to see the fans out on Saturdays lining the field with posi-tive energy.

The next game for the Sonoma la-crosse team is scheduled for April 16. They will take on the Stanford Cardinal at home that Saturday.

STAR // Connor Gibson

The men’s lacrosse club lost against UC Berkeley 12-11 this weekend

Family comes first The men’s lacrosse team is built on heart

and character.

Photo April 5 - April 11, 2016pAge

sonomAstAtestAr.com12

STAR // Brennan Chin

Sonoma State students perform at the annual Spring Dance Concert, directed by faculty members Kristen Daley and Christine Cali. Performanc-es continue through April 7. Read more about the concert on page 6.

STAR // Brandon Stachnik

Alpha Xi Delta sisters Katie Stensrud and Crystal Mendez ran during the sorority’s “Step It Up” color run. Read about the run on page 8.

Spring Dance Concert delivers striking performances

Student-choreographed show continues through April 7