The ECHO, May 2024

ECHOEast’s student-run news source

May 2024 Volume XXI, Issue 5

By Graysie Casey & Cornelia

Nisbet

Staff Writers

As graduation rolls around at

the end of each year, seniors are

sent off into a new world beyond

high school. Some choose to leave

behind embarrassing memories,

piles of homework and not-so

astounding grades. Many seniors

will also hang up their jerseys,

stepping away from their high

school sport that they've given so

much time to.

“I never thought that I would

be in the same position as the

seniors that I always saw on Senior

Night. I always thought I would

be wearing the ‘I heart our seniors

shirt.’ It made me really thankful

By William Helser & Graham

Jones

Staff Writer & Co-Editor-in-

Chief

Our freshman year was infamous

for screens filled with faceless

initials, class in bed, breakout

rooms and gym classes that none

of us did. A lot of us can’t even

name five people in our freshman

history class, let alone anything

Seniors reflect on their athletic careers

for how far the team has come and

being able to play with everybody

for another game,” senior Naimh

Malin said.

Knowing it’s their last season

makes each moment that much

more special, whether it’s a

big event like Senior Night or

something small at practice. Things

that seemed routine for the past

four years now take on a special

significance, even if it’s something

as small as playing Sharks and

Minnows in the pool after practice.

“I’ll miss laughing on the bus

and during warm ups, getting cards

from refs, playing with friends

straight out of school, and getting

boba after practice,” Malin said.

What their sport has brought

them is something that many senior

we learned in said class. Not due

to our teachers, of course, but due

to the fact that we had to learn

through a screen.

We started our sophomore year

with the same amount of high

school experience as that year’s

freshmen, except we were better

because they were freshmen. So

as the end of the year approaches

and the last batch of COVID-19

high schoolers is getting ready

East’s varsity volleyball team posing for a team picture Courtesy of Phil Stapleton

athletes will cherish forever, from have fun,” senior Will Breaden said.

relationships and connections, to Despite the love for their sport,

balanced and healthy lifestyles. some senior athletes decide to

“I’ve made a lot of connections prioritize other aspects of their life

with people I wouldn't know once they leave for college.

otherwise. And I've been able to go

out there, be active, be healthy and Continued on page 12

Last group of COVID high schoolers: Looking back as seniors

“As freshmen we were all pretending we didn’t exist”

Courtesy of Pie on a Plate Productions

Accurate depiction of the authors on a Google Meet, circa 2021.

to graduate, we have just one

question: Are we okay?

“I think a lot of kids were

shocked about having expectations

put on them that haven’t been

there [during lockdown]. You

had to learn how to handle those

expectations in a very short

amount of time,” Earth science

teacher Erin Shindledecker said.

“I’ve heard [other seniors] reflect

this to me; that the biggest shock

to the system was sophomore

year. Students really hadn’t had

the ‘high school experience,’”

social studies teacher Brian Link

said. “I’ve heard some students

say that sophomore year was

harder than junior year. Not for

the actual content itself necessarily

being more difficult, or they were

being asked to do more things, it’s

that they didn’t have the actual

experience.”

We certainly did not have the

“high school experience;” an

experience was had, but high

school it was not.

“I didn’t even learn anything.

I just turned on my computer, put

on my voice recorder and left the

class when it was over,” senior

Ayden Farmer said. “I think when

it comes to our [cohort] and the

classes we took in

freshman year, we

didn’t learn any of

that, we just didn’t

do it.”

Farmer’s sentiment

is a common one.

The experience

of learning online while being

isolated from a world that was

rapidly changing, was challenging

for many of the current seniors.

While some of us took advantage

of the period to boost their

academics (“I got almost all 100s

in all my classes. All you needed to

do was be present in class and all

the tests were open notes,” senior

Michael Kang said), there were

many of us for whom just being

“present in class” was a struggle;

adopting some combination of

apathy, dissociation and a general

lack of motivation to do anything

“‘It gets better.’ That’s

probably the only

thing I could say, and

it did get better, still a

little rough, but it got

better.”

East

Chapel Hill

Observer

Featured this

issue...

“The age of meticulously

planned albums like ‘Folklore’

and ‘Evermore’ feels distant.” -

An honest review of Swift's “The

Tortured Poets Department,”

page 8

“It’s sad, but when

the budget gets tight, you have

to lose something,” - Chapel

Hill-Carrboro schools begin to

suffer implications of declining

enrollment, page 5

“The feeling mayo gives me

is similar to the feeling of

wanting to terrorize a family

of four.” - Advice, page 3

in the wake of online high school.

“There wasn’t really a reason

to do anything…. If you weren’t

someone who cared about grades,

you didn’t have your teachers

calling you out on it,

so it felt like you had

less accountability,”

senior Dylan

Freedland said. “As

freshmen we were

all pretending we

didn’t exist.”

Feeling like there was no

reason to get out of bed, to try at

all, to reach out to people, a lot

of us sort of just shut down, not

only academically, but socially as

well. Freshman year is the year

that we’re all supposed to make

new friends, connect with our

teachers and get used to what the

next four years of our lives will be

like. Instead we got accustomed to

“Wellness Wednesdays,” hanging

out with our parents, and gosh

dang Edpuzzles.

Continued on page 5

Find us online!

echhsechoonline.com

@echhsecho

tinyurl.com/2r3ps8dw

“I’ve also gotten a lot of hate for this idea from the lactose intolerant

crowd (Hannah Wright) which is dumb.”

- Read this story on page 8

Opinions..............................................2

Features...............................................4

Arts & Culture......................................7

Satire..................................................11

Sports.................................................12

OPINIONS

ECHO

Our Staff

Co-Editors-in-Chief

Graham Jones

Avery Tortora

Staff Writers

Juman Alyousif

Samantha Benton

Grayson Casey

Gabe Deel

Mischa Dorn

Evan Elk

Suna Erdim

William Helser

Jordan Huang

Linda Li

Camden Lauver

Keira McArthur

Clara Mast

Cornelia Nisbet

Elise Owre

Jackson Polish

Clara Wolfe

Hannah Wright

Adviser

Neal Morgan

ntmorgan@chccs.k12.nc.us

Our Address

500 Weaver Dairy Road

Chapel Hill, NC 27514

919-969-2482 ext. 27260

The ECHO is a forum for

student debate. We invite you

to submit any opinions, op-ed

pieces or responses to anything

published in the ECHO. Please

send letters or comments to

echhsecho@gmail.com.

View our full op-ed policy:

The ECHO is published by the

students at East Chapel Hill

High School for the student

body and is supported by the

school. Letters are encouraged

but must be signed by the writer

to be considered for publication.

Names may be withheld

from publication upon request.

The ECHO staff reserves the

right to edit letters for length,

clarity and for other ethical and

legal considerations.

East Academic Culture: It’s time to talk about what we’ve created

By Suna Erdim

Staff Writer

Like many of my classmates,

I can safely say that my

senioritis goes way back—

maybe even as far as the end

of junior year. But I would

argue it doesn’t stem from a

lack of academic motivation.

If anything, looking ahead at

college and the multitude of

courses and pathways it has to

offer has only gotten me more

excited about the subjects I

enjoy. But that doesn’t erase

the fact that I’ve found my drive

to engage and perform for this

school increasingly depreciated

and almost at a breaking point.

I must confess that my

senioritis is East-specific, and

I’d like to use the platform of my

last-ever column for the ECHO

to deconstruct why.

It’s with a complex range

of emotions that I begin this

narrative, because I have many

reasons to remember this school

fondly and to be energized by the

opportunities I’ve encountered

here. This was the place where

By Clara Mast

Staff Writer

If I were to pick a song to

represent my childhood, it

would be a song about killing

a duck and cooking it for

dinner.

My grandmother—my

mother’s mother—sang the

song to my sisters and me

before bed, while combing

out our hair or washing the

dishes. At the time, I knew

very little about what the song

meant; though I could mimic

the Indonesian words easily,

I contributed to the production

of a literary magazine for four

years, where I discovered

“Crime and Punishment” by

accident through a criminal

justice project for Lang, where

I made a graphic novel poster

for another one of my favorite

books that I have hanging up in

my bedroom.

But I want to travel back

in time to the online school

scene at the beginning of my

freshman year, when I was in

the process of moving to Chapel

Hill from the

Wake County

Public School

System in

Raleigh. East’s

notoriously

competitive

culture was

foreign and unknown to me

from behind a screen. I was

lucky enough not to have

parents or other adults in my

life pushing me to think about

college when I was 14, so it

was one of the last things on

my mind. Instead, I was writing

plays for my friends and I. I was

dipping my feet in languages on

Duolingo and trying to figure

out three-octave scales on the

violin.

I was excited about the

prospect of high school courses,

but at the same time, I also

didn’t know there was a course

book online. I didn’t know that

East was an AP school and not

I couldn't understand them.

My grandmother lived in our

downstairs bedroom, keeping

it filled with orange Tic Tacs

and colorful Indonesian

books. As I watched my

grandmother age and move

away from my house, I took it

upon myself to keep the song

alive. My family would sing it

to her over the phone for every

holiday. I would make my

mom sing it to me before bed.

To me, the song represented

the gentle and sugared way

my grandmother taught me

to see the world, and how she

encouraged me to be kind,

empathetic and thoughtful.

I was shocked when I later

found out the true meaning

of the lyrics—they were so

different from how the song

made me feel. My lack of

understanding emphasized

my disconnection to my

“My peers’ unyielding

fixation on each other’s

stats has given rise to a

near-death of any relevance

to academic material in the

classroom” and beyond.”

an IB school, like the one I

would’ve attended in Raleigh.

All I got at the beginning of

the year was a brief phone

call with my counselor, who

walked me through most of

the ordinary freshman courses

and registered me accordingly.

I wasn’t presented with any of

that information until the time

of junior year registration, and

it was not presented through

administration, but through my

classmates.

I never fully understood what

was meant by

“East academic

culture” until I

saw, over and

over again, my

peers comparing

their course

loads, reciting

their standardized test scores,

and talking about the Common

App as early as freshman year.

I came from a world where you

didn’t talk about your grades or

scores. Those things constituted

a private world between me,

my parents and my computer

screen. My elementary and

middle school experiences were

anything but utopian, but for

the most part, I could count on

the fact that if my friends and I

were going to talk about a class,

we discussed only the material.

My peers’ unyielding fixation

on each other’s stats has given

rise to a near-death of any

relevance to academic material

My Grandmothers’ cultures

family’s culture. I was satiated

with the comfort and safety

my grandmother provided,

never feeling the need to go

deeper. I regret not asking her

about her life in Indonesia or

ever becoming fluent in her

language. I struggled for a

long time to find the courage

to explore this part of my

life, although now I want

to. I’m trying in small ways,

like using my grandmother's

recipe to bake spekkoek—an

Indonesian cake she always

made for my mom’s birthday.

On the other side of my

family, there’s my Oma—my

father’s mother—sitting at

the kitchen table with a cup

of lemon tea, a dingy egg

timer and an old wooden

chess board. She would tell

me about her father, who

was a chess grandmaster.

After dinner, she would wait

for me, lips shining with

meticulously applied lipstick,

fingers adorned with chunky

rings, and a plate of sugar

cookies set out beside the

board.

I’d sit down at the table and

proceed to lose every game of

chess we ever played. Being

immensely competitive, my

younger self was extremely

disgruntled at the endless

losses. I stopped wanting to

play—I didn’t see a point if

I knew I was going to fail.

But my parents would give

me a firm nudge, and I would

sullenly make my way back

for yet another game. Now, I

realize that my Oma was able

to show me the value in failure

and the beauty in practicality.

Though the concept of

optimizing failure was hard

to grasp for an 11-year-old

perfectionist, little by little

in the classroom and beyond. I

was amazed, and continue to be

amazed, with the way I’ve seen it

affect clubs and extracurriculars.

If an activity isn’t something

that offers service hours, state

and national contests, or some

other quantification of academic

rigor, the engagement will

tumble by incredible margins.

And this goes for classes, too, no

matter how they’re weighted. I

almost never hear conversations

about my AP classes that have to

do with whichever topics we’re

covering in them, be it “Hamlet”

or confidence intervals. I mostly

hear ones about the FRQ or

essay rubric and how to most

efficiently knock out our current

assignment, often at the expense

of blurring the lines around

academic integrity.

And in the midst of this

sea of striving, struggle

and comparison, seldom

does anyone pause and ask

themselves: why is it that I find

myself in a position to take

these classes, some of which

may interest me genuinely, and

some of which I’m taking for

the sake of their appearance on

my transcript? What does that

say about my priorities and the

priorities of those who I allow

to influence me? And most

crucially, what does that say

about my privileges?

Instead, we allow our social

environment to perpetuate a

very typical American, pioneerlike

illusion of a meritocracy,

knowing full well that this

school and this district faces an

opportunity gap so large that

it’s comparable to segregation.

Instead of looking at those

statistics and acknowledging

that the courses and activities we

find ourselves involved in are, at

least to some extent, a reflection

of our degree of affluence and

establishment, we look the other

way and continue to be absorbed

in the dominant culture of our

social strata. If this is the case

and we know it is the case,

why do we still give so much

weight to these numbers tied to

our names?

It’s this ongoing dynamic that

lies at the root of my waning

energy for East and its academic

climate. I want to make it

abundantly clear that this is

not a preaching attempt. If it

were, it would be one founded

in hypocrisy, because I’ve

plummeted down many of the

social pitfalls I’ve just described

from sheer desperation,

insecurity and pressure over

the years. Those pitfalls and the

impression of their necessity

have taken their toll on me as I

know they have on others. I end

this column in hopes that it will

ignite something, somewhere,

in someone and through that, I

will be able to pass on a torch of

awareness, understanding and

capacity for action towards the

future of this school.

she was able to teach me not

just how to accept setbacks,

but how to turn them into a

reason to try again.

Both of my grandmothers

created little worlds for

me. They were somewhat

removed from reality, full

of songs with tragic lyrics,

endless rows of chess figures

and the scent of sugar cookies,

but the lessons from both

women have migrated from

the pages of my childhood to

who I am today.

The more I think about it, the

less morbid the song becomes.

It’s not just about killing a

duck, but how the action

of doing so brings family

together around a dining table.

The song connects my two

grandmothers in my mind,

uniting their separate cultures

and lessons for me to carry

throughout my life.

May 2024

A letter from the ECHO’s seniors

Thank you for reading our last issue of our high school careers. We’ve

had a lot of fun making the ECHO this year and we hope that everyone

who picked up and read an ECHO this year felt the commitment, effort

and lack of Oxford commas we put in our newspapers.

The future of the ECHO now lies in the hands of our underclassmen

staff writers. If the ECHO is bad next year, we take no responsibility for

their potentially poor performance.

We would also like to thank our teacher, advisor, mentor and bully

Mr. Morgan. You're a great teacher, a father and a pretty decent guy. We

apologize for the strife that we may or may not have inflicted upon you

this school year; we all got the bird flu and couldn't come to class, sorry

we couldn't tell you sooner :(

Sincerly: Gabe Deel, Evan Elk, Suna Erdim, William Helser, Jordan

Huang, Graham Jones, Linda Li, Camden Lauver, Keira McArthur, Clara

Mast, Elise Owre, Jackson Polish, Avery Tortora and Hannah Wright.

Understanding myself

By Graham

Jones

Co-Editor-in-

Chief

I don't remember

much of my

childhood, or at

least, I don’t have

a lot of memories that I look back on with

fondness. I don’t have that nostalgia that a lot

of other people seem to have for their younger

years. I hear people often say that their childhood

was a “simpler time,” one that they would love

to return to. When I think back on my childhood,

of the limited memories I have, I never recall it

being simple, because quite plainly it never was.

Meltdowns and anxiety attacks were common.

Too often for my liking, I would have an entire

class staring at me having a meltdown, which

isn’t super fun.

Having no understanding of your emotions

and how to control them is overwhelming, which

is ironic because you can’t even identify when

you're overwhelmed. Everything feels out of

your control, yet somehow it's your fault. Even

now, at 18, I still find myself faced with the

internalized guilt I carry from my childhood. With

all that being said, I would like to go back to my

childhood, not as a child, but as I am now.

I had very few adults in my childhood who

understood me or autism in general. It wasn’t

until I got diagnosed at age seven with Autism

Spectrum Disorder (ASD), that I started meeting

with people who understood me. Not to sound

OPINIONS

like a cheeseball, but it is life changing to talk

to someone who listens, who understands, and

who can give you the ability to better understand

yourself. I wish I met those people sooner, I wish

I could’ve been those people for my younger self.

For the past two summers I have been working

as a camp counselor, specifically with those on

the autism spectrum. I initially took the job just

to have something to do, to pass the summer

by. I really didn’t expect it to turn into a healing

experience. I was able to be the person that

understood those kids, I was able to be the person

who communicated with those kids, I was able

to be the person who I wish was there for me at

their age.

While working with the kids I found myself

reflecting more and more on my childhood. There

was a time in my life when I hated my younger

self. I hated him for every mistake he made, every

person he hurt and every friend he lost. I stopped

hating him after a while, probably around the 8th

grade, but the feelings didn’t become positive. I

just ignored my past, becoming apathetic to the

first 11 years of my life. When I started working

with the campers I came to realize something,

the kindness, patience, and grace that I give my

campers I wasn’t giving to my younger self. I

never treated him like someone who is worthy of

forgiveness, someone who should be loved despite

his flaws. I can’t ignore my own experiences

when I am helping people who are going through

something similar. Leaving high school I still have

reservations accepting my younger self in my

entirety; I don’t know if I’ll ever get there, but I’ll

definitely be moving forward.

Advice: A farewell to Fluffy Cheeks

By Avery Tortora

Co-Editor-in-Chief

“Do you prefer ranch or

mayo?”

Whoever likes mayo

deserves to be jailed. It ruins

every food it’s added to and

I can’t stand the stupid offwhite

yellowish color that

coats all my hamburger buns.

The feeling mayo gives me

is similar to the feeling of

wanting to terrorize a family

of four. Or similar to the

feeling I get when watching

“Sharkenstein” directed by

Mark Polonia. “Sharkenstein”

is about a weaponized shark

machine that destroys a quaint

ocean town after World War II.

Anyways, I will advocate for

the end of mayo ‘till the day I

die. Ranch is okay. Good with

carrots and other veggies.

“I dislocated my knee doing

the Jojo Siwa ‘Karma’ dance.

How do I avoid risks like this

in the future?”

With the chokehold that Jojo

Siwa currently has over Gen Z,

I’m not surprised her music has

led to the demise of your knee,

and you know, I can’t blame a

guy or gal for giving a go at

the dance since it’s all over

TikTok. With proper care like

a simple knee brace which can

be found at most drug stores,

frequent icing and laying low

on the dancing, it should be

better in no time. But the last

thing I’ll do is sit idly by as

this song climbs the charts,

so if you listening to the song

contributes to that, I guess you

could say it’s karma that your

knee dislocated.

“How is Fluffy Cheeks doing

now?”

By Clara

Wolfe

Staff Writer

Our family

would gather

for dinner at my

grandparents’

table every

Wednesday. My Papa would spend the whole

morning crafting a complicated menu and going

to 10 different stores to find all of the ingredients

for the best price. He would always cook three

times what we could eat, because it was his way

of showing us how much he loved us. There were

always at least three sides on the table, along with

a main, a vegetarian option that he would always

make for me despite his Southern roots and a

dessert. We would gather around the table, talking

about our weeks and laughing as a family. When

my brother and I were finished eating, we would

always kiss Mimi and Papa on the cheek and thank

them for the meal. Those Wednesdays created

some of the fondest memories of my childhood.

My Papa was the person who taught me how

to bake. We would make apple roses together,

rolling the thin slices of fruit up in fluffy pastry

dough. When I baked my first cake, he was the

one who helped me.

I would step up on my ladybug painted stool

whenever I could, eager to cook with him, to learn

his secrets. My Papa was like a second father to

me. My mom was a single parent and a resident

when I was little, so my grandparents were always

present in my life. They would pick my brother

It’s funny you ask, I wonder

that myself sometimes, too.

When I go on leisurely walks,

or when it’s a gloomy day out

and I’m sipping on my piping

hot tea, I often think to myself,

“I wonder how Fluffy Cheeks

is.” Whoever this person is,

they are a mystery to me, and

although I’ve heard people

claiming to be them, I will

never know for certain. If

you’re out there, Fluffy Cheeks,

this is my last advice column

ever, so I will no longer be able

to communicate with you via

our high school newspaper. I

hope you have a good life.

Sincerely, ECHO advice

columnist

The love language of baking

3

Courtesy of Wild Eye Releasing

and me up from school, and we would go to the

pool in their neighborhood. Every day, my Papa

would greet us with a smile and a Ziploc baggie

of snacks for both of us.

When he passed away in 2020 due to

complications from spine and stomach cancer,

I spent weeks in shock. Though his passing was

somewhat expected, the loss of our family’s

patriarch was jarring. Overnight, I lost one of the

most important figures in my life. It was hard

to cope with the fact that he was gone- that he

wouldn’t be at my graduation, wouldn’t be there

to dance with me at my wedding, and wouldn’t

be there to spoil my kids as he had spoiled me.

After he died, I started baking and cooking

more than ever. With every chop of the knife and

sizzle of the pan, memories of my grandfather

flooded back to me. My Papa, no doubt a food

hoarder, had an extra freezer in the garage, jam

packed with food he had made. That food lasted

us probably a year, and every time we would eat

something he cooked, it was like he was there

again, smiling with pride and love as we gathered

around the table, scooping chicken and dumplings

into our mouths.

I am now the baker in my family, the one who

makes every birthday cake and brings cookies

to school for random occasions. Though I make

more brownies than apple roses, I can still feel

the spirit of my Papa with me every time I cook.

As I dust my hands with flour and roll out cookie

dough, I find comfort in the recollection of my

grandparents' kitchen, knowing that my Papa’s

memory lives on through my simple act of

cooking.

FEATURES

Carrboro amends mid-year final exam mandate in response to petition

By Jordan Huang

Staff Writer

“I highly respect our Carrboro High

staff, but I am downright ashamed.”

“Announcing a change like this in the

middle of the year without notice is not

only ridiculous but unprofessional.”

“The implementation and

communication of this policy were a

complete failure.”

These are just a few of the reactions

from disgruntled Carrboro High School

community members who signed

the “Rescind the Belated Final Exam

Policy” petition. The initiative was

launched in February in response to

school administration announcing that

final exams would be mandatory and

worth 20 percent of students’ overall

class grades, effective immediately.

That change would have replaced

Carrboro’s previously nonexistent

final exam requirement and aligned

their policy with the other Chapel Hill-

Carrboro City high schools, had it not

been amended.

Seven weeks and 700 petition

signatures after the initial policy

update, school administration yielded.

In an email to all Carrboro High

School parents, teachers and students,

Principal Helena Thomas thanked the

community for their feedback and

announced, “Students will be held

harmless for the 2023-2024 school year,

meaning their overall grade can only

By Linda Li

Staff Writer

Every Saturday at dawn in Chapel

Hill’s Umstead Park, a group of

dedicated runners gather for the

parkrun event. Starting in England

in 2004, parkrun is a non-profit

organization that has spread

worldwide. It is a free community

event where people can walk, jog,

run or even just watch. The run is

a 5K and happens every Saturday

morning in local communities across

the world.

Umstead Park Parkrun recently

celebrated its one-year anniversary

on Mar. 23 with over 100 participants,

undeterred by the rainy weather. The

presence of notable figures including

Chapel Hill Mayor Jessica Anderson

and Director of Parks and Recreation

Atuya Cornwell highlighted the

significance of the youth-led event

in promoting community wellness

and unity.

Chapel Hill was organized by East

increase, not decrease, due to taking

a required teacher-made final exam.”

Carrboro junior, Alexander Kwok,

and his mother, Melinda Manning,

who created the petition, said they

were surprised by how much support

they received.

“We didn’t know what to expect.

People seem to have a very short

attention span nowadays. They get

upset about things, but that can fizzle

quickly. But, when so many people

started signing so quickly, and not just

signatures, but comments too, we knew

we touched a nerve,” Manning said.

With an enrollment of fewer than

900 students, Carrboro is the smallest

school in CHHCS – making the flurry

of comments and 700 signatures even

more impressive.

“It’s one thing just making a petition,

but having hundreds of people sign is

huge,” Kwok said. “We created the

platform, but change only happened

because of the people.”

Although both Manning and Kwok

consider the recent policy update to be

a “fair compromise,” achieving it was

not entirely straightforward. Kwok, a

member of the CHCCS Student Equity

and Empathy Ambassadors, initially

tried to broach the subject at their

monthly meeting.

“[Carrboro’s] principal, Dr. Thomas,

came to our meeting, but when I tried

to discuss final exams with her, I didn’t

receive any concrete feedback. They

didn’t choose to comment on the topic;

they just avoided my question, which

made me pretty upset at the time,”

Kwok said.

However, when he took the issue

home, his mother’s law background

proved to be a valuable asset in

developing his argument.

“The process of getting a law degree

really changes your thinking and

how you analyze issues,” Manning

said. “When Alex came home and

got into the policy change, my mind

immediately jumped to the idea

that, although a syllabus isn’t a legal

contract, [Carrboro High School] was

basically violating an agreement with

their students.”

In the reasoning for their petition,

Manning and Kwok argue that “late

changes to syllabi that are punitive to

students go against the concept of a

syllabus as a good faith agreement,”

and reference the grading policy

listed in Carrboro’s 2023-2024 school

handbook. Manning says that she

wouldn’t have been prepared to make

the petition if she had a different

background.

Christian Cabrera, Carrboro’s student

body president, saw that many students

and teachers were unhappy when final

exams were made a requirement, but

he personally believes that it was a

necessary change.

“Now, people are just going to go

and guess on the whole exam because

it can’t hurt your grade. People are

definitely going to get a little bit lazy,”

Cabrera said.

Despite his opinion, Cabrera still

signed the petition, because he “felt

it was most representative of the

students.”

Andrew Chin,

a junior at East

Chapel Hill High

School, also favors

a standardized

final exam policy

for all schools in

the district.

“Depending

on the class

and final exam

requirements, I

may study for up

to 10 hours leading

up to a final. It is a

little frustrating

that Carrboro’s

students won’t

have to put in as

much work to get

the same grade as

me,” Chin said.

“Softening the

policy was well-intentioned, but it

doesn’t translate to the real world. You

won’t get rewarded for not trying.”

However, despite their focus on

rescinding this year’s final exam

requirement, Kwok said that he

“personally wouldn’t mind having

tests in future years,” which Manning

agrees with. Her only suggestion would

be to withhold end-of-year exams for

Advanced Placement classes because

they “already have a built-in final test.”

Going forward, the pair aims to hold

school administration accountable.

“The bigger, ongoing issue is the

lack of communication. The first

Senior celebrates anniversary of weekly parkrun

senior Stephen Chen, who serves

as the director, coordinator and

announcer for Umstead Parkrun.

“Chapel Hill is a small, positive

college town, and we just wanted to

have a place where people can gather

and spread positivity while engaging

in a beneficial sport,” Chen said.

Parkrun is what you make of

it. People can run hard and push

themselves for their own personal

best, or just go on a morning nature

walk and make new friends. Parkrun’s

most important aspect is bringing

people together into a community.

“When people come they usually

leave happier than what they came

with. And I've seen a lot of people

become more fit and healthier,” Chen

said. “Parkrun itself is an exercise,

so it encourages people to run, to

practice, to get better mentally and

physically.

In recognition of its impact, the

North Carolina Asian American

Alliance honored parkrun

youth volunteers with the Youth

Volunteer Star Award, providing

further encouragement to the youth

leadership groups involved.

However, Chen's journey in

establishing the Umstead Parkrun

has not been without its challenges.

“The biggest challenge was

communicating with the local

government to get permission to run

the parkrun in the beginning,” Chen

said. “And it’s weekly, so I do have

to be consistent, but I am generally

consistent on doing it every week…

even if there is a conflict with my

schedule, there are always people

to help.”

During the more than 50 parkruns

in the past year, parkrun has been

special to its participants in their own

different ways. No matter your age or

how fast you run, parkrun is about

everyone joining together and doing

the same exercise regularly.

“Every parkrun is a special

memory in itself. But I think the most

memorable parts are the kids and the

elderly. There was a couple, one of

Courtesy of Alexander Kwok

Alexander Kwok and Melinda Manning started their petition stating that

the school was violating an agreement with Carrboro studentry. Over 700

people signed.

them is handicapped and the other just

pushed her through the whole 5k, and

it was encouraging to see,” Chen said.

Parkrun also couldn’t have

happened without the group of

volunteers behind the scene to ensure

the whole thing goes smoothly. They

wake up much earlier before the

parkrunners arrive to set up the scene

and wait until the very last person to

finish before they clean up and take

down everything.

“I think volunteering is the core

part that runs the entire event. We

couldn't have done this without

volunteers. It's definitely not a solo

venture,” Chen said. “They help

with handing out tokens for people

who are finishing, scanning them,

recording their time, and volunteers

are definitely very important to us to

keep things working.”

According to Chen, volunteering

at Umstead Parkrun has been a

transformative journey of personal

growth and responsibility. From the

beginning of seeking permission from

[final exam] policy change was only

announced in an assembly, and the

information felt almost hidden from

parents,” Kwok said.

Manning added to his statement.

“There needs to be more transparency.

The administration obviously has to

make big decisions, but they should

be taking input. I mean, effective

communication is a two-way street,”

she said.

Whether or not Carrboro maintains

their current final exam policy in

future years remains to be seen. When

reached to request clarification, the

school’s administration declined to

comment.

the town government, to becoming

the leader of the whole event, it has

been a journey of self-discovery and

growth.

“In general, I became a lot more

open to talk to people. I feel like

it's more natural for me to speak

in front of more people. It is also a

commitment in itself that makes me

more responsible,” Chen said.

With over 2,000 locations in 22

countries across five continents,

parkrun’s footprint is still expanding.

In addition to North Carolina, it is also

organized by the youngest person.

Chen is going to Duke University

in fall 2024, and he promised that

you will still see him every Saturday

morning. There is still a long future

in front of Umstead Parkrun.

“I want parkrun to be left as a

legacy to the community. Even if

I will not be there in the future, I

hope someone will continue to work

for me, and I think that's definitely

possible. I hope it'll run indefinitely,”

Chen said.

May 2024 FEATURES 5

Chapel Hill-Carrboro schools begin to suffer implications of declining enrollment

By Jordan Huang

Staff Writer

Enrollment within the Chapel Hill-

Carrboro City Schools district has

decreased by nearly 1,000 students

since the 2019-2020 academic year,

according to the Board of Education’s

2023-24 executive enrollment

summary. This downturn, representing

an overall decrease of 8.5 percent, has

also significantly impacted funding.

District officials were already forced to

pass a series of planned budget cuts in

February of this year, and enrollment

forecasts remain bleak.

“Based on our projected enrollment

trends, it is almost certain the district

will be facing year-over-year

reductions for the foreseeable future,”

said Johnathan Scott, the CHCCS

Chief Financial

Officer.

The district’s

struggles serve

as a microcosm

for larger trends,

reflecting the

ongoing tug-ofwar

over student

enrollment

between public

and alternative

schooling

options. Ten

years ago, 85

percent of North Carolina students

attended a K-12 public school, but

that number has since dropped to

76.6 percent, according to Census

Bureau data. Meanwhile, home,

private and charter schooling options

have seen substantial gains in the same

timeframe.

According to Scott, the district is

already “navigating the challenges of

having less money while still providing

students with a quality education,” and

he anticipates further “significant

impacts on various areas of operations

and educational programming.”

“It's really important for us to

keep talking to everyone involved—

teachers, parents, students, and people

in the community—so we can make

good decisions that match what we

Photo courtesy of Unsplash/Feliphe Schiarolli

want for our schools,” Scott said.

“By working together and thinking

carefully, we can deal with the

challenges of having less money while

still giving students a great education.”

Theodore Nollert, a Chapel Hill

Town Council member, attributed the

enrollment decline to rising living costs

and expressed concerns regarding

Chapel Hill’s loss of diversity.

“We are losing low-income families,

and there is a lot of overlap between

race and wealth in America,” Nollert

said. “Generally speaking, wealthy

places can provide a higher level

of services, but if we get wealthier

by pushing out folks with lower

incomes, that produces a kind of

income inequality

and potentially, racial

[division].”

Nollert referenced

studies mapping Chapel

Hill’s shrinking Black

population and stated

that “both the housing displacement

and the decline in student enrollment

are primarily observed among

marginalized communities.”

However, despite a 32 percent

decrease in Black homeownership

in Chapel Hill since 2010, CHCCS

minority enrollment has not

particularly suffered. Compared to

White and Asian enrollment, which

Last group of COVID high schoolers

Continued from page 1

“Freshman year was especially

difficult because I just moved here

and it made making any sort of

connection pretty much impossible,”

senior Jake Donovan said. “It made

it hard to participate in school—I

still did because it was kinda my

only lifeline. It set me up in high

school to have a rough time with

grades especially, and the social

aspect which I was stunted in.”

When we finally came to East it

was kind of strange. Academically

it wasn’t too dissimilar from online

school with policies like the 50-floor

and mandatory late work acceptance

following us to in-person school. But

socially it was a little cattywampus.

For those who were able to sustain

friendships over lockdown or even

were able to make new friends had

an easier transition into sophomore

year.

“I did the hybrid learning at the

end of my freshman year and there

was almost nobody there,” senior

Cash Tzoumas said. “But the friends

that I did have in my classes and

the people who I knew from middle

school I was really tight with, so

those are the people that I stuck

with.”

But for the rest of us, lockdown

was a limbo of sorts where it was

almost impossible to make new

friends, online or otherwise, but all

too easy to lose the friends that went

into lockdown with you.

“In my experience it was very hard

to maintain friendships and just any

relationships through it all. It took

me some time when coming back

to readjust and navigate socially,”

senior Elijah Barr said.

Speaking from the authors’

personal experiences, we both relate

to what Barr describes above. We

both lost connection with friends

over the pandemic. It’s hard to

describe the feeling of seeing those

people again, not as friends but as

someone who is now more of an

acquaintance. Someone who you

could probably still be friends with

if you just reached out, if you tried

to start where you guys left off.

But the possibility they could be

someone who might have moved on,

who may not be all that interested in

revisiting where you left off, is kind

of paralyzing.

Neither of us ever reconnected

to those people. We wish we could

tell our freshman selves to just

reach out.

Wanting to correct your past

mistakes isn’t an uncommon feeling;

living with regrets just means you’re

growing as a person. The class

of 2024 isn’t special, we’re just a

group of seniors who happen to have

had less time at our high school.

We aren’t unique or extraordinary.

We probably aren’t going to be

facing long-term consequences

over missing freshman year. At

the end of the day, we are normal

kids who were put under unique

circumstances… but we did good

for ourselves. We may not all be

at the same place whether it be

socially, academically or whatever

other category we feel the need to

compare each other with, but we

did a lot in the three years we were

at East. We made friends, competed

in national competitions, wrote

in the newspaper, got accepted to

colleges, got jobs, played assassins,

disappeared for days at a time and

still never did gym. We should

celebrate ourselves for just making

it to the end of our “high school

experience,” COVID and all.

Celebrate ourselves for making it to

the beginning of the rest of our lives.

“I think the senior class is a

fabulous senior class,” Link said.

“You guys are a great, talented

bunch of kids who are also very

caring and empathetic—just decent

human beings.”

“It’s sad, but when

the budget gets

tight, you have

to make tough

decisions.”

have decreased by 14.6 percent and

11.2 percent, respectively, since

2019-20, Black enrollment declined

by only 3.1 percent, while Latinx

enrollment decreased by only 1.5

percent. Additionally, multiracial

enrollment has actually increased by

nearly 3 percent, according to the

CHCCS Office of Assessment and

Research.

This year’s budget cuts focused

on reducing P.E. teacher and teacher

assistant positions within elementary

schools and the virtual learning

academy. In response to the change,

a petition was created by Morris

Grove Elementary Instructional Coach

Kelli Smith, which received over

450 signatures from

CHCCS educators.

“We talk a lot

about maximizing the

return on academic

investment, and there

isn’t much higher

return on investment than studentfacing

educators,” Smith wrote. Other

concerns about the proposed personnel

cuts include the loss of face-to-face

instructional time and reduced staff

morale.

If additional operating funds are not

approved by the Orange County Board

of Commissioners in November,

middle and high schools will soon

“Even if you are afraid…

you just need to put

yourself out there and do it

anyway. Even though the

pandemic has made you

a lot more anxious, you

need to make memories

and friends. You’re

gonna regret not making

relationships in freshman

year.”- Rebecca Conway

“Try to plan more events

and get people together.

I’m sure everyone was

down but it was just hard.”

- Cash Tzoumas

“It’s important to have a

routine because it can be

hard to feel like you’re in

control of your life.”

- Elijah Barr

“Just because it’s

quarantine, don’t make

school your entire life.

Try to get out during those

times.” - Walt Reuning

“Be friends with everyone.

Have a conversation with

everyone.” - Sam Ashley

feel the impact of budget reductions

as well.

“Budget reductions will have the

biggest effect on which positions

we keep. If we lose 150 students,

that’s a teacher position that we can’t

maintain,” Principal Jesse Casey

said. “One position requires paying

someone a full salary, on top of

insurance, retirements, and other

benefits. The number of teachers

we hire entirely depends upon

enrollment.”

Going forward, Casey said that East

would need to be “more creative about

money” and mentioned “utilizing

more digital options in place of

physical learning materials” as an

example.

An hour away, in Franklin County

N.C., the school board has already

adopted a budget plan which eliminates

all certified School Librarian positions

as a cost-cutting measure.

“I don’t agree with what [Franklin

County] is doing at all, but it's what

they deemed necessary. In my old

school system, they were talking

about cutting middle school athletics,

because of what could be saved by

not paying for equipment, trainers,

coaches, and transportation. It’s sad,

but when the budget gets tight, you

have to make tough decisions,” Casey

said.

The ECHO asked seniors what advice

would say to their freshmen selves.

These were some responses...

“‘It gets better.’ That’s

probably the only thing I

could say, and it did get

better, still a little rough,

but it got better.”- Jake

Donovan

“Do better.”- Ayden

Farmer

“Always try to make

friends.”- Henry Spencer

“Take more AP classes.”

- Michael Kang

“Even if you don’t see the

point you should still try.

Because now, senior year

with college applications,

I am kinda regretting

not having tried more

freshman and sophomore

year.”- Dylan Freedland.

Freedland is now facing

the consequences of his

actions, being Co-Editorin-Chief

Graham Jones’

college roommate at App

State. A fate worse than

death :)

6 FEATURES echhsechoonline.com

Absenteeism reaches new highs since COVID-19

By Avery Tortora

Co-Editor-in-Chief

Despite COVID-19 recently passing

its fourth anniversary since being

declared a national emergency, many

schools are still facing the repercussions

of changes made during the remote

learning period. One of the largest

being students’ willingness to attend

school.

According to an ABC 11 report, a

third of North Carolina students were

chronically absent during the 2021-22

school year, unlike before the pandemic

where only 15 percent were chronically

absent during the 2018-19 school year.

A student becomes chronically absent

when they miss at least 10 percent of

their total school days.

From 2019 to 2023, chronic

absenteeism across the nation has

risen from 16 to 23 percent according to

the American Enterprise Institute. East

Chapel Hill is just one of many other

schools across the country attempting to

combat soaring absence numbers, with

28.69 percent of East students being

chronically absent, compared to the

district’s overall rate of 20.76 percent

according to North Carolina School

Report Cards.

English teacher Jennifer Martin, who

has been teaching at East for the past 19

years, noticed the visible shift in student

attendance.

“I know COVID had a big impact….

[attendance] was definitely better

around 10 years ago,” Martin said.

Martin also noted that students,

especially seniors, have begun missing

school earlier in the year.

“Seeing absenteeism in seniors

is not new. It used to be after winter

break you’d start to see a lot of kids

By Avery Tortora

Co-Editor-in-Chief

East 4-H Club

With nearly 6 million members

worldwide, 4-H is America’s biggest

youth development organization,

and freshman Nitya Sharma has been

determined to bring it to East.

Sharma described how the club

and organization as a whole “help

kids reach their full potential”

through what the 4-H website

describes as, having kids engage in

discussing “critical societal issues…

civil discourse and advocating for

equity and inclusion for all.”

Since this club is a recent addition

to East, this being its first year, the

club is still focusing on recruiting

members but still has many goals

for the future.

“We are planning on helping the

special-education program at East

30

25

20

15

10

5

0

13%

15 15

13%

Graph of percentage of chronic absenteeism Series in 1 U.S.

28%

26%

2016-17 2017-18 2018-19 2019-20 2020-21 2021-22 2022-23

not show up, but now it’s in October.

That’s frustrating for me because that’s

really early in the school year,” Martin

said.

But East’s attendance numbers

seem to stand out among other schools

in the district, and an anonymous

junior expressed how the culture and

policies surrounding attendance could

contribute to this growing problem.

“I think it has to do with there being

no punishment policy for skipping….

The culture in this school just doesn’t

prioritize attendance,” the junior said.

Many may speculate what the main

factor is in causing such new highs

for student absences, but they span a

multitude of reasons. Some factors

were present before the pandemic,

while others arose due to students’

experience during the pandemic.

The junior highlighted how the

shift to online-centric lessons and

assignments has made skipping and

still keeping up with school a more

viable option.

with fundraising and volunteering,”

Sharma said.

Aside from their philanthropic

goals, Sharma noted how the travel

opportunities the organization

provides for teens to places like

Chicago and DC are one of the

largest perks, and that being in the

club has really “helped [her] learn

what [her] strengths and weaknesses

are.”

To join, you can reach out to

nsharma1@students.chccs.k12.

nc.us.

Mock Trial Club

15%

15%

Order in the court! The Mock

Trial Club at East offers a unique

opportunity for students to simulate a

realistic court case experience; from

eyewitness testimonies to crossexaminations,

students are able to

learn the ins and outs of what a court

trial looks like.

0% 0

Avery Tortora/The ECHO

“Most of the work we have is online,

so when I stay home I get a lot more

work done than I do when I’m actually

in class,” the junior said. “We don’t

really do much in class, they just give

us an assignment on the computer, so

what is the point of being in class when

I could be doing it from my own bed….

At home I can be on my own schedule.”

The lack of punishment for students

who miss school is also a possible factor

as to why students are so lenient with

their attendance, and as these students

become seniors who have already

committed to a college or university,

school attendance becomes less and

less important.

Senior Ben Johnson noted how

“senioritis” and sports have affected

his attendance and contributed to his

absences.

“I used to be very on top of my top

of my attendance, but now that I’m a

senior and I’m already in college I don’t

care about it much anymore…. I also

miss classes because of baseball which

Co-president and senior Andrea

Wang stated how the members “play

out a trial, and at the end, there’s a

competition where [the club] goes

to the site [they’re] assigned to, like

Raleigh, Hillsboro or Fayetteville,

and goes to a physical court,” said

Wang, the experience is also made

possible by the attorney and judge

volunteers that play the role of a

meta-chart.com

Club Spotlight: East 4-H and Mock Trial Club

Left to Right: East 4-H Club, Mock Trial Club

have to be dismissed in the

middle of a period, so I just

won’t show up for the whole

period so I can take my time

and get to the field,” Johnson

said.

The junior shared how

the skipping culture at East,

mainly set by seniors, is what

validates her reasons to skip

as well.

“I do see a lot of people

skipping and it does normalize

it,” the junior said. “My best

friend who’s a senior skips a

lot, so when she doesn’t go to

school I don’t really want to

go either.”

As skipping becomes more prevalent

toward the end of the year, students are

more relaxed with their attendance,

making constant absences a normal

part of their schedule.

“At first I felt guilty for skipping, but

now it’s kind of a lifestyle,” Johnson

said.

The leniency that schools had to

exercise during the pandemic has

spilled over into the past few years

of normal, in-person schooling, and

many students have taken advantage

of the ability to skip school without

consequences.

“We had to be more understanding

about absences during the remote

learning period and it shifted

expectations. Now that we are back

to a more normal routine of going

to school, we are seeing the effect of

those expectations,” principal Jesse

Casey said.

The 50 percent floor, a controversial

policy enacted during the pandemic, is

another rule that has stayed since then

judge in the competition.

Although the club didn’t make it

to the national competition this year,

they’re focusing on brushing up their

skills and preparing for the years to

come and the future of Mock Trial.

“We’re also working on the

different skill sets we need too, like

acting and improv skills,” Wang

said.

and is a possible contributing factor to

students’ attendance choices even long

after remote learning ended.

Casey stated that the grading floor

“may be a factor, but not the main

factor,” in student absences. Martin

shared similar sentiments, saying that

“the students are smart kids, they’ve

done the math and calculated that

they can slack off here, and still get

this grade…[the 50 percent floor] is

one piece of helping a kid make the

decision not to come to school.”

The shifted expectations include

little to no remediation for chronic

absenteeism, and Martin highlighted

the precautions she believes would

help.

“Before we had state testing, we

had a senior exam exemption policy,

which is where if you have less than

‘X’ amount of absences, you get to opt

out of the final exam.… You can talk

to other teachers here, it worked… to

not know why we can’t do something

like that again is frustrating. I’m going

to continue to fight for it,” Martin said.

A 2011 study conducted in the

Northwest Independent School

District in Texas found that “the

average number of absences decreased

significantly after an exam exemption

policy was implemented,” proving that

the policy can effectively deter chronic

absenteeism.

There are only so many steps a

school can take to combat a nationwide

trend, and Martin highlighted the

struggle of constantly “fighting against

cellphones, laptops, warm weather and

the year ending.”

Casey hopes to work on relieving

this problem from a more communal

standpoint.

Courtesy of Nitya Sharma & Andrea Wang

Wang also noted the many skills

that the club offers aside from acting

and improv, like the law and policy

expertise you can gather from the

experience that can be especially

helpful to students looking to go into

law, politics, public policy and many

other fields.

To join, you can reach out to

awang1@students.chccs.k12.nc.us.

ARTS & CULTURE

Gallery: The best of East’s spring activities

Featuring photos from the solar shower, pep rally, Asian Night and prom

Avery Tortora, Evan Elk/The ECHO; Bella Adjei-Dapaah, Zoey He, Jasmine Ji

The vibrant journey of East dance ensemble

By Clara Mast & Elise Owre

Staff Writers

From the precise, modern

moves of K-pop dancers to the

elegant, classical ballerinas, East

Dance Ensemble has it all. For

many years now, the dance club

has been a community within

East Chapel Hill.

The members meet once a

week during lunch to carefully

curate music selection,

choreography and style. The

dancers are working toward a

performance that happens twice

a year in the auditorium for the

East community to see.

“It's nerve racking at first,”

said Paulina Martinez-Leal, a

senior dancer of the ensemble,

“but once you’re on stage with

your peers you become more

confident and it’s satisfying

afterwards”.

The group creates a space for

every member to showcase their

talents and grow together.

Senior Rebecca Shank fell

in love with dance when she

was four years old sitting in

the Chapel Hill High School

Auditorium, watching her older

sister dance as a gingerbread

man in “The Nutcracker.”

Today, as president of the

club, Shank sees the ensemble as

a learning opportunity, not just

for the club members, but for all

of East.

“I think our school is very

academic and sports focused,

and it doesn’t really go beyond

that,” Shank said. “People don’t

really understand what dance

is. We put it on as a learning

opportunity for our fellow

classmates.”

The club is about more than

just performing. It also provides

an atmosphere for members to

socialize and learn from each

other.

“It’s not just about dance,”

said Martinez Leal. “It’s about

meeting people and learning

their stories behind the art.”

The gathering of like-minded

people creates opportunities to

form unlikely connections to

learn and grow together.

“Dance is my community in

and out of school. A lot of my

deepest friendships and mentors

have come from dance—It’s the

easiest way for me to express

myself and connect with

people,” Shank said.

One of the main goals of

the club is to foster a love of

dancing in the audience as well

as the performers. With the art

on stage, Shank hopes to inspire

people to join the club.

“It’s very low stress, if you

know how to dance, enjoy it and

are willing to dedicate your time

to the club, it’s definitely worth

it,” Shank said.

East Dance Ensemble’s next

performance will take place in

late April, its theme is life in

color. Shank chose the theme

Elise Owre/The ECHO

inspired by a song that has

helped her a lot in the past year,

“Life in Color” by OneRepublic.

“The idea behind it is, as

seniors, this is our life in color,”

she said. “We’re going to have

fun moving on and we’re also

going to have fun right now.”

8 ARTS & CULTURE echhsechoonline.com

Why you need a point-and-shoot camera My new love:

The beauty of crilk

By Jordan Huang

Staff Writer

I was in Malibu when I was

first introduced to the world of

early-2000s point-and-shoot

cameras.

It was 2021. I’d made a new

friend, Tony, within the first few

hours of my political journalism

summer camp. We were into

the same things: fashion, stocks

and talking big. One day while

we were walking back from our

afternoon class, Tony told me to

stop and pulled out a battered

Powershot A20. He raised the

camera to his face, peering

through the viewfinder to snap

a quick photo of me against the

California sunset. I took one

look at the picture he’d taken

and knew that I, too, wanted to

own a crappy digital camera.

Later that evening, we

ventured back out into the arid

summer night to take more

photos, where I discovered the

true pinnacle of low-resolution

digital photography: flash

pictures. Older digital cameras

have a very limited dynamic

range compared to modern

devices. In bright daylight, this

limitation becomes particularly

evident: bright areas become

overexposed, while darker areas

become murky. However, flash

pictures don’t suffer from that

issue whatsoever. Harsh lighting,

unique color saturation and a

sprinkle of grain combine for

By Avery Tortora

Co-Editor-in-Chief

The dynamic duo of “Black Swan” and

“Whiplash”

If you’ve ever seen either

“Whiplash,” directed by Damien

Chazelle, or “Black Swan,”

directed by Darren Aronofsky, I

highly recommend watching its

girl/boy counterpart.

“Whiplash,” the 2014 film

starring Miles Teller, follows

Andrew Neiman, a student

studying jazz drumming

at the prestigious Shaffer

Conservatory, where he is

discovered by jazz instructor

Terence Fletcher, played by

J.K. Simmons. Fletcher pushes

Neiman to extreme lengths

to acquire perfection from

him, morphing his passion for

drumming into an obsession

that disrupts all aspects of his

life. With an excellent score and

perfect, Y2K aesthetic photos

– the lazy man’s method of

obtaining the tactile, “livedin”

quality reminiscent of film

photography (Walmart edition).

And the best part of all this?

You don’t have to know anything

about how cameras work to use a

point-and-shoot. The name says

it all: automatic settings and

portability allow users to quickly

take photos without worrying

about manual adjustments. This

simplicity is a hallmark of such

cameras, and the only thing

you need to do to acquire this

power is search “digital camera”

on your favorite e-commerce

platform. There used to be a

blind spot in my narcissism, as I

was unaware of how photogenic

I could be. Editing is completely

unnecessary when you’re taking

pictures on an old digital. The

low-resolution and stark textures

unforgettable performances from

Teller and Simmons, “Whiplash”

is a passion-turned-obsession

story for the books.

Its “girl-counterpart,”

in my opinion, is the 2010

psychological thriller “Black

Swan,” starring Natalie Portman.

Portman plays Nina Sayers, a

young, ambitious dance student

at the New York City Ballet.

Sayers is chosen as the lead in

her company’s performance of

“Swan Lake,” which stars an

elegant white swan, Odette,

who is cursed by a sorcerer and

emerges into the evil version of

herself, Odile. The good-turnedevil

swan is played by the same

dancer in every production, and

Sayers is pushed to her limits,

expecting nothing less than

perfection while attempting to

take on this role. Her obsession

Jordan Huang/The ECHO

airbrush your photos, wiping

away your imperfections and

giving your face a chiseled look.

In flash photos, subjects stand

out dramatically against their

backgrounds, main-character

style.

Before even arriving home,

I’d already found another

Powershot on eBay for roughly

$20. I had just turned 16 when I

bought that camera. As of today,

I’m 18 years old, and I can say

with confidence that I never

looked back. Across two years of

parties, games, trips and photo

sessions, my camera has been a

mainstay. Through thousands of

photos and countless instances

of “Yo where’d you get your

camera?,” I learned that people

love having their picture taken,

just like I did that one summer

day. Shoutout Tony.

with perfection begins to take

a toll on her sanity, and a dark

side of her personality emerges,

reflecting her ballet role in her

real life.

Both films are structured

around the passionate

performer’s obsession that leads

to their downfall, and there’s

something very satisfying

yet startling about the way

their characters develop and

ultimately unravel. But the

reason for being each others’

boy and girl counter-films goes

beyond just the gender of the

main character. There’s a certain

atmosphere that comes along

with each main characters’

endeavors. With “Black Swan,”

the audience experiences a

fragile character who deals with

anorexia and struggles with not

succumbing to the pressures of

By Camden Lauver

Staff Writer

Ice cream and milk, otherwise

known as America’s mother and

father. The former: a sweet treat to

enjoy after a long day of hard work,

the latter, a hard worker in its own

right, there to support you whenever

you need to bolster your body’s

skeletal supports, giving you the

strength to face the day. It could not be

clearer that our society would cease to

exist without these two things, but the

question must be asked: could proper

utilization of milk and ice cream

(defenders of freedom, enemies of

brittle bones) elevate every aspect of

our day to day life? I think the answer

is yes.

Also known as crilk, this creamy

combo of nature’s finest offerings

has the potential to cure depression

in one sitting if prepared correctly. To

start: grab a large cup (pro tip: novelty

cups from football games are perfect

for this), fill said cup with as much

ice cream as you can reasonably fit,

then fill the cup about 2/3 full with

milk. That’s it. If it seems way too

simple, that’s because it is. Adding

milk to your ice cream forms a sort of

frozen shell surrounding each scoop,

her mother and dance director.

With “Whiplash,” there’s an

intense battering relationship

between Neiman and Fletcher,

and also a romantic aspect where

the main character navigates

rejecting and rejection because

of his obsession with drumming.

Ultimately, these films are

not only packed with interesting

character development, but

amazing cinematics. These

factors come together to create

two incredible masterpieces; if

you loved watching one, you

will certainly love watching the

other.

but makes each bite exponentially

creamier. Yum yum yum.

Haters will argue that crilk is

basically an unshaken milkshake,

which is unarguably the most stupid

thing I’ve heard in my entire life. They

may have the same main ingredients,

but the presentation, consumption and

experience of the dish is completely

different. A milkshake is a drink. You

put a straw in and slurp. Crilk, on the

other hand, IS A FOOD. You use a

spoon and eat scoops of ice cream just

like you always do, it’s just drowned

in milk. Muffins have the same basic

ingredients as cake, but you don’t

see anyone calling a muffin a cake

because they’re different in every

possible way.

I’ve also gotten a lot of hate for this

idea from the lactose intolerant crowd

(Hannah Wright) which is dumb.

First off, you’re lactose intolerant

so I’m not really sure why you

think you get to have an opinion on

anything. Secondly, this is obviously

not a dessert intended for you, so do

not come at me because you can’t

properly appreciate it. If you’re pissy

that you can’t eat ice cream without

crapping yourself, you can eat a

cookie or something and go cry in the

corner.

At the end of the day, you either

see the vision or you don’t, and if

you don’t feel like giving crilk a

chance, you can live in ignorance,

but I need people to stop calling me

weird for this because they’re upset

they didn’t come up with it first. Give

waterboarding your ice cream in milk

a chance, it might just change your

life.

Photos courtesy of Amazon

May 2024 ARTS & CULTURE 9

An honest review of Swift’s “The Tortured Poets Department”

By Mischa Dorn & Clara Wolfe

Staff Writers

Hot take: Taylor Swift’s new

album, “The Tortured Poet’s

Department,” is a flop. It’s messy

and unfiltered, and not in a good

way. All of the songs sound the

same, and the lyrics seem like

they were written by AI.

Before you hate us, we are

both proud Taylor Swift listeners.

We went to The Eras Tour

together in Pittsburgh and had the

time of our lives. We scream-sang

every song, including the entire

10-minute “All Too Well,” which

we both obviously know by heart.

Swift’s songs are in nearly all of

our playlists, and we’ve both been

listening to her since we were

little. We watched the Grammy’s

livestream, texting each other in

all caps when Taylor announced

the new album. Believe us, we

don't want to hate the “Tortured

Poet’s Department.”

Unfortunately, our high

expectations were greatly

disappointed. Upon first listen

on Friday morning, we couldn't

ignore the difference in quality

Courtesy of William Morrow

“Reamde” by Neal Stephenson,

Thriller

Neal Stephenson’s “Reamde”

is over 1,000 pages and host to a

huge detailed and amazingly well

executed story, the epic is one for

“No Exit” by Jean-Paul Sartre

- Drama

Some of us find ourselves

more anguished than others by the

sweltering summers of the South—

perhaps to the point where we feel

we’re watching our backdrop

grow vaguely infernal before

our eyes. Quite relevantly, “No

Exit” by Jean-Paul Sartre, a play

first performed in Paris in 1944,

follows three individuals, Garcin,

Inez and Estelle, as they reckon

with their entry into the afterlife

where, despite having never

previously known each other,

they are thrown together into a

mysterious room. As they begin to

between this album and her past

music. Her lyricism, which is

usually praised for its thoughtful

poetic nature, sounds brash and

lazy. For example, the random

Charlie Puth reference and her

dream of going back to the 1830s

“without all the racists” create an

odd listening experience. With

31 songs total, after a surprise

extended album, it’s no shock that

the writing sounds rushed. She

wrote “TTPD” in the past two

years, while juggling another new

album release, two re-recordings

and the famously long Eras

Tour.

Recently, Swift's brand has

become defined by this excess of

activity. It seems as if her new

strategy is to oversaturate the

market in an attempt to always

be the topic of discussion.

However, this “quantity over

quality” mentality has led to an

overabundance of subpar releases.

The age of meticulously planned

albums like “Folklore” and

“Evermore” feels distant.

Swift has faced countless

criticisms in the past describing

her music as repetitive and

the ages.

The premise of the novel is

centered around a computer virus

designed by Chinese hackers;

this alone does not seem like

it would result in much action,

until it infects the computer of

a Russian mobster and holds

valuable files for ransom, files

that the mobster’s boss, illiterate

in the ways of computers, needs

fast. This kicks off the action, and

it just keeps escalating, jumping

from twist to twist, building to a

climactic final.

And it is truly Epic. The story

spans the globe with characters

from Africa, China, Hungary,

interact and unfold their separate

pasts, they slowly find that they’re

part of an inevitable, engineered

plan to serve as psychological

unoriginal, and this is the first

time we agree. Listening to the

two-hour long album, all of the

songs blend into one. The only

distinction between songs is the

jarring switch between producers

Jack Antonoff and Aaron Desner’s

musical styles. Otherwise, the

music is relatively uninspiring and

stale.

The album is not a complete

loss, with a few bright spots in

an otherwise mediocre album.

Certain songs, such as “I Can Do

It With A Broken Heart” and “My

Boy Only Breaks His Favorite

Toys,” still contain that iconic

Taylor cadence. Individually,

the songs aren’t bad, but they

just sound incohesive when put

together

Because of the intense support

for Swift, anyone who critiques

her new album has been getting

flamed online, being called “antifeminist”

and “tasteless.” The

issue with such a huge, devoted

fan base is that people lose

the ability to freely voice their

opinions without great backlash.

To anyone who loves “TTPD,”

we’re not telling you to stop

Russia, Canada and more. Their

journeys take them to a myriad of

places, and the backstory spans a

central character’s entire career

from a marijuana smuggler to one

of the richest men on Earth and the

head of an online gaming empire,

god of the world he created.

For those looking for a casual

read, or a simple story, this is not

the book for you. But for those

looking for a long and engaging

read with constant action and

intricate characters, this might just

be your next great read.

— William Helser, Staff Writer

tormentors to one another for the

rest of time. Despite the extreme

circumstances at its center, this

play is so thematically universal

that I would recommend it far

and wide—even and especially

to those who are not already avid

fans of French existentialism.

Being entirely dialogue and stage

directions, it’s a fast-paced read,

and I would also advise reading

this play with some friends (or

better yet, some strangers or

mortal enemies) so that you have

the chance to act it out! — Suna

Erdim, Staff Writer

liking it. Music is a subjective

matter and everyone is free to

form their own opinions and

have their own musical taste.

However, in our opinions, the

album doesn’t match up to

Taylor’s past quality. It’s easy to

overlook the poor production in

ECHO staff summer reads

Courtesy of Vintage Publishing

“An Emotion of Great Delight” by

Tahereh Mafi - Historical Fiction

Tahereh Mafi’s “An Emotion of Great

Delight” is a story of identity and hope.

The story follows Shadi Nasreen, an

Iranian-American and hijabi Muslim

girl, who’s family is falling apart after

her brother Mehdi’s death. Shadi, who’s

name means joy, struggles to find that

joy in an otherwise hopeless time, a post

9/11 world. Topics like mental health,

self-harm and Islamophobia hover

over Shadi and her family as they try to

stay strong. Shadi is seen as suspicious

by officers and people around her. To

make matters worse, there’s a great

deal of miscommunication between

Shadi and her “best friend.” This book

is the perfect window into the life of

a typical Muslim family post 9/11,

“Me Before You” by Jojo Moyes -

Fiction

Heartbreakingly beautiful, Jojo

Moyes’ New York Times bestseller,

“Me Before You,” is a must read.

Moyes follows eccentric Lousia Clark,

a recently unemployed barista in a

quiet, boring town in South Wales. In

the midst of the 2008 recession, Lousia

quickly searches for a new job and finds

herself working as a personal caregiver

and companion to a quadriplegic.

Lousia expects to be wiping the butt

of an old man, yet finds herself with

Courtesy of Beth Garrabrant

the excitement of a new album

and constant “Swiftie” praise on

the internet, but it is important

that as fans, we hold our favorite

artists to high standards. Swift

still needs criticism, even as the

most famous artist in the world,

in order to maintain that title.

Courtesy of HarperCollins

ending on an optimistic and hopeful

note. If you’re looking for a historical

fiction story revolving around innerstrength,

identity and hope, then this is

the book for you.

— Juman Alyousif, Staff Writer

sarcastic and witty Will Traynor. In the

following six months, Lousia attempts

to foster a relationship with Will, a

former adventurer and businessman,

and show him the joys of life. I picked

this book out of my mom’s collection of

old literary novels and self help books

out of sheer boredom. My extremely

low expectations were far exceeded

by “Me Before You,” the perfect quick

read for a good cry. — Mischa Dorn,

Staff Writer

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10

ARTS & CULTURE

By Avery Tortora

Co-Editor-in-Chief

ACROSS

1. “Dat ___” (jazz

tune)

5. Art movement

10. Professor Lupin's first

name, in the "Harry Potter"

books

11. Largest planet in the solar

system

13. Quitter's comment

14 Chopin, Liszt, Mozart, etc.

15. Apollo 11 destination

16. Fit to ___ (perfectly)

18. ___-mo

19. Unowned, free-ranging

pooch

21. Bedtime, for some

24. Spanish uncles

25. “Eureka!”

27. English essay format

28. Prayer ender

30. ___ tots

32. Caucasian wild goat

33. “Much ___ About Nothing”

34. You are here

35. Aliens, for short

36. Romanian currency

37. Diameter halves

38. Reverse

40. Golfer Ernie

41. “When will you be here?"

42. Thorny flower

45. Oozes or leaks

47. Set free

50. Addition to a bank acct.

51. He loved Lucy

52. ___ & turn, restless sleep

53. Plague

55. Second planet from the sun

57. 55 neighbor

58. Beethoven's "Für ___"

59. Put pen to paper

60. For old times' ___

DOWN

1. Interior design

2. Flow forth

3. Sprint

4. Spanish state

5. Place for a massage

6. Sheriff's badge

7. Functional/useful

8. Struck a chord

9. He played Clubber Lang in

“Rocky III”

10. Uprising

11. Computer image file format

12. Turnabout, in slang

15. Sent text abbr.

17. Deep-fried tortilla dish

20. ___ and yang

echhsechoonline.com

May Crossword: “Out of this world”

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9

10 11 12

13 14

15 16 17 18

19 20 21 22 23

24 25 26 27

28 29 30 31 32

33 34 35

36 37 38 39

40 41 42 43 44

45 46 47 48 49

50 51 52

53 54 55 56

57 58

59 60

28 "Rolling in the

Deep" and

"Hello" singer

29 Smallest of all

including hoofed line

"easy ___,"

mammals

31 Pura "Thank ___ U, Next"

singer, to fans

33 Pub orders

on

34 Consume

37 band Word spelled

out in Aretha

callFranklin hit

38 Take advantage

of

39 Slob's opposite

43 Martini

garnishes that

soilmay be stuffed

with pimientos

44 later?" Commercials

46 "The Last of Us"

star ___ Pascal

47 Depend (on)

Mini crossword #1 v1

ACROSS

1 Snitch

By Avery Tortora

4 Bubble tea

Co-Editor-in-Chief

5 Jackson 5 song

ACROSS

1. Snitch 6 Bracelet brand

4. Bubble tea

5. Jackson 7 Past lovers 5 song including line “easy ___,”

6. DOWN Bracelet brand Pura ___

7. Past 1 What lovers you drive

2 "Mamma Mia!"

DOWN

1. What

3 Tic-toe

you

filler

drive on

2. “Mamma 4 Possible Mia!” bingoband

3. Tic-toe filler

4. Possible 5 "___ Maria" bingo call

5. “___ Maria”

Mini crossword #2 v1

ACROSS

1 Was victorious

By 4 Avery Wear Tortora away, as

Co-Editor-in-Chief

7 Allow to enter

ACROSS 8 "___ anything

1. Was victorious

9 Distant

4. Wear away, as soil

7. Allow DOWNto enter

8. “___ 1 Fuse, anything as metal later?”

2 Black-and-white

9. Distant

cookie

3 Phone alert,

DOWN slangily

1. Fuse, 5 Meyer as metal of the

2. Black-and-white "Saw" moviescookie

3. Phone 6 MIT alert, grad, slangily often

5. Meyer of the “Saw” movies

6. MIT grad, often

ECHO mini crosswords

48 Drunk

49 Start of North

Carolina's

motto

51 Film

4

developer?:

Abbr.

53 5Mercedes

competitor

54 Point de ___:

6opinion, in Paris

56 Middle school

subject

7involving

writing (Abbr.)

1 2 3

1 2 3

4 5 6

7

8

9

“A modern femboy

would be considered

the most masculine

person in 18th

century Europe.”

“You know those

electric chairs you

sit on at the grocery

stores.”

“You basically just

kissed Mr. Link.”

“I personally don’t

believe in equality.”

Overheard at East

Various utterances caught in passing

“One v. one me in

Fortnite, I’m gonna

cream you.”

“Never go skiing,

Gywneth Paltrow is

out there.”

“You better be

looking at my

armpits during beach

week.”

“Genetic skill issue.”

22. Demoted planet

23. The Red Planet

25. Dresses or outfits

26. Sneaky chuckle laugh

28. “Rolling in the Deep” and

“Hello” singer

29. Smallest of all hoofed

mammals

31. “Thank U, Next” singer,

to fans

33. Pub orders

34. Consume

37. Word spelled out in Aretha

Franklin hit

38. Take advantage of

39. Slob's opposite

43. Martini garnishes that

may be stuffed with pimientos

44. Commercials

46. “The Last of Us”

star ___ Pascal

47. Depend (on)

48. Drunk

49. Start of North Carolina's

motto

51. Film developer?: Abbr.

53. Mercedes competitor

54. Point de ___: opinion, in

Paris

56. Middle school subject

involving writing (Abbr.)

“Its an ancient

tradition to eat

dogs.”

“You know those

guys on TikTok who

eat their placenta.”

“The problem with

wearing green is that

I always feel I'm

photosynthesizing.”

“Salt can't be the

only delicious rock.

I'm going to eat

The ECHO knows that not everyone has a yearbook to for their

friends to sign. The ECHO also knows that if you’re reading the

ECHO, you probably don’t have many friends. To let everyone in on

the signing fun, the ECHO presents...

Signing space for your two friends!

ECHO introduces meditation

By Graham Jones

Co-Editor-in-Chief

Sometimes it feels like

we have no control in our

lives; like we’re just going

about the world doing

predetermined things at

predetermined times. The

monotony of sitting in class

on our phones, the dullness

of a free education (which is

actually $20), even the daily

iced coffees and energy

drinks lose their luster.

Some thoughts manage to

pierce our mental daze:

Is anything worth it? Are

we just cogs in the ornate

grandfather clock that is

father time? What day is

it? While these thoughts

are completely valid they’re

also dumb and stupid.

We at the ECHO have

personally struggled with

this mentality, many of our

editors and writers have

taken many days off to work

on ourselves and figure out

productive ways to handle

our existentialism. We

have tried many forms of

self care such as positive

affirmations, urine therapy,

crystals and screaming.

That was when we

had the genius idea to

invent meditation. It’s

completely free, requires

almost no effort on your

part and you can do it in

the middle of class! You

won’t need anything for this

special exercise other than

your body, your breath and

a pair of eight-inch tungsten

By Suna Erdim

Staff Writer

To the FBI Agent with the distinct

honor of being assigned to my IP

Address,

Greetings, I hope this note finds you

well. I know we’ve done some indirect

“bonding” during the past few weeks

of your perusing through my browsing

history. I imagine you may have a

question or two regarding some recent

spikes in the nature of its content, and

I was hoping I could clear the air and

provide you with some answers to

your satisfaction.

Upon examining my recent

searches, I’m sure there have been

times when you’ve found the flow of

mundane, typical keywords such as

“seven-day forecast for Chapel Hill,”

steel slip-joint pliers that

you can set to the side for

now.

Let’s begin by taking a

deep, full breath in and a

long, relaxing exhale out.

Begin to gently close your

eyes, but don’t actually

because then you couldn’t

read the guide. Continue to

breathe in and out, slowing

your breathing each time

you fill and empty your

lungs. Scan your body for

tension. Start with your

neck and shoulders, and

make your way down to

your legs and feet.

It’s natural for the mind

to wander while doing

meditation; while our

thoughts may drift and

scatter, we only need to

notice our thoughts, not

pursue them. I like to

imagine each and every

thought as a cute little

duckling with a cute little

beak waddling into the

forest. I smile fondly and let

them go. I do not chase them

because I know they will be

eaten or murdered, and that

makes me sad.

After we are all relaxed

we bring attention to a new

location, the mouth. Open

your mouth like you're

going to do a big yawn or

are about to eat a long,

tasty submarine sandwich.

Don’t close it for the rest

of meditation. Take this

opportunity to put your

fingers in your mouth and

feel around. Feel all the

teeth that you have: some

or “how many ounces in a cup?”

permeated by some questions on the

less conventional end of the spectrum.

A couple examples may include ones

like, “How quickly does a cello stop

producing sound once lit on fire?”

“theater scandals throughout history”

and “Was whipped cream widespread

in the USSR?”

Now, I know you may have no

shortage of theories regarding all the

ominous things I could be planning,

given my pursuit of such questions.

My objective is to provide a concrete

resolution to your anxieties by telling

you that the thing that I am planning,

depending on who you ask, is either

marginally better or infinitely worse

than the most heinous products of your

imagination: I’m drafting a novel.

I know that, despite this explanation,

SATIRE*

sharp, some dull, some

brown, some chipped, all

unique except for the ones

that aren’t. Take your time

to pick a favorite tooth.

I am partial to the lower

right back molar. Once you

find your favorite tooth

you may notice that your

mouth suddenly feels very

crowded, that your favorite

tooth is far too close to all

your dirty, filthy, not as

favorite teeth. Oh no, this

won’t do at all.

To remedy this move to

grab your pair of eight-inch

tungsten steel slip-joint

pliers and carefully guide

them into the mouth until

you feel a firm, steady grip

on your favorite tooth. If

you have been continuing

your deep breathing from

earlier in the exercise, your

teeth should now all be dry

due to the air drying out

the moisture on the enamel.

Now take one last long, full

inhalation and while you

exhale summon all your

might to pull up and away

from your favorite tooth.

Repeat if necessary.

If done correctly, you

should now be able to

see your favorite tooth

decorated in glistening

crimson. It’s so perfect it

almost distracts you from

the unfamiliar, but potent

sensation of excruciating

pain. But let it be known

that it is all worth it in the

end because you probably

aren’t worrying about

global warming.

By Avery Tortora

Co-Editor-in-Chief

these questions in my history, in and

of themselves, may have led you to

certain conclusions regarding my

mental state, and that you might be a

bit worried for my physical condition

as well, given the amount of time

I’ve been spending on WebMD as

of late. I hope it puts you at ease to

know that I am simply striving to

become a more informed tormentor

to my fictional characters. For reasons

objectively related to the story’s

thematic development, a few have

become punching bags, quite literally.

But I do promise, rest assured, that

none of them are real—at least not

to you.

Finally, I would like to address the

point you’ve probably been wondering

most about, which is the notable

amount of time I’ve spent on baby

As the end of the year rolls around, the

infamous “Senior Assassin” game continues to

consume the lives of many seniors. Since the

beginning of the game April 15, there have been

over 100 spoon tags. However, some students

have lost more than just their spot in the game,

as the competitive nature of East has proven to

go far beyond just academics.

“Every day I pray that he’ll come home,” said

Mary Davis, the mother of senior Henry Davis,

who has been missing since just two days after

the game began.

Oliver Duncan, a close friend of Henry, shared

what he last heard from him before he went

missing.

“I remember him texting me something along

the lines of, ‘I love you, man, but I’m going away.

I need to win this. It’s for the best.’”

Duncan expressed his belief that Davis

might be camping out somewhere in the Rocky

Mountains, which Duncan knew to be a favorite

traveling destination for Davis.

Mary Davis has contacted the police for help,

but as of now, there has been no lead into the case.

“If anybody has any information as to where he

is, please, please reach out. I just want my baby

back,” Mary said.

But the Davis family are not the only ones

experiencing hardships from the game. Senior

Molly Pollock noted the distress the game has

caused her. The person targeting Molly as their

target has called the SWAT team to their private

residence multiple times in efforts to get her

outside in order to tag her.

“I have been swatted three times. Three times!

Was one not enough? My family is considering

moving to other countries at this time,” Pollock

said.

Her tagger has not yet been identified, and

Pollock described her frustration with getting

justice for her family.

“Since I don’t know what psycho is doing this,

I can’t give the police a name yet… I just have

An Open Letter to My FBI Agent

Senior Assassins,

more harm than fun

name websites. I do hope that by

now, it is no longer your assumption

that, based on the duration and range

of names I’ve scrolled through, I am

someone preparing to birth about

eight children at once. However, I

am merely pondering some potential

names for more of my beloved fictional

characters.

As I see it, the very least I can do,

considering how much they go through,

is give each of them first, middle and

last names that are no less than an

11/10, as far as my tasteful but humble

opinion is concerned. Otherwise, that

might be really crossing a line. If it

weren’t for

that balance

I’ve taken

the time to

implement,

Graham Jones/The ECHO

Innocent student being held at spoonpoint by a

senior assassin

to hope that I don’t get swatted again, it’s really

scary,” Pollock said.

For some contestants, the game has had a

serious effect on mental health, like senior Sienna

Romeo, who was recently admitted into a local

psychiatric hospital. Her mother, Melissa Romeo,

shared her thoughts on her daughter’s state.

“I remember her mumbling under her breath

the word ‘spoon’ over and over. She wouldn’t

sleep at night, and she blacked out all the

windows in the house,” the elder Romeo said.

“She would rarely ever eat and also shaved her

head, saying that she needed to maximize her

aerodynamics for running away from her tagger.

She would scream randomly and claim she was

being chased, even though we were in our own

house, and she threw away all of our spoons. I

can’t eat soup anymore.”

Romeo stated that she hasn’t gotten any news

on when her daughter will be released from the

hospital, but she hopes that her irrational fear of

spoons will subside once the game ends.

As of now, there are 10 contestants left in

the game, and according to the Senior Assassin

Instagram page, it's still planned to continue until

only one person is left, despite the harm caused.

then we truly may have a crisis on

our hands—a humanitarian crisis. But

lucky for us, I’ve thought this through.

I really do hope reading this letter

has proved worthwhile, and that my

explanations have given you some

peace of mind. I think in the end,

these experiences have truly brought

us closer together in a sense, and so,

if you have any further questions,

please do not hesitate to reach out to

me. I’m sure you will have no trouble

doing so.

All the best,

Suna Erdim

*The stories on this Satire page are works of fiction,

intended as commentary on events and issues at East.

The quotes and details are entirely made up.

SPORTS

East senior to compete for Team USA figure skating

By Keira McArthur &Cornelia

Nisbet

Staff Writers

East has had successful athletes

in many sports, and now, thanks to

senior Alicia Wang, synchronized

skating can be added to that list. Wang

has recently started training with the

Boston-based Haydenettes, who are

often chosen to be Team USA for

international synchronized skating

competitions.

“I saw this team at a competition

my sophomore year, and I saw them

skate and was like, ‘Oh my gosh, I

love them. I need to be on that team,’”

Wang said.

From that point on, Wang focused

all of her training on joining the

Haydenettes. She studied videos of

their routines and had her coaches

help her familiarize herself with their

skating style.

“I would try to find them at any

competitions that I was at to go

watch. And then I tried to train in a

way to skate more like them because

they have a really specific style that I

like and that I feel really matches my

skating style,” she said.

She first met the Haydenettes a

few months later, at a camp run by

the team in the summer of 2022.

The camp focused more on teaching

skills and technique than evaluating

potential new members, but head

coach Saga Krantz noticed Wang

and asked if she would be trying out.

Krantz mentioned that she’d even be

willing to take Wang as soon as the

next year.

Two years and a successful tryout

later, Wang is now busy splitting time

between Boston and Chapel Hill to

finish high school while trying to

attend as many Haydenette practices

as possible. To limit the amount of

juggling she has to do, Wang mostly

applied to colleges in the Boston area,

but she recognizes time management

will still be a challenge.

Many traditional college activities

will be set aside to make room

for figure skating, as well as time

consuming extracurriculars. For

example, she has decided not to join a

collegiate figure skating team, which

she says are “a lot less competitive,

and a giant time commitment.”

These sacrifices are nothing new for

her, as Wang has grown up making

time for figure skating since she

began skating at the age of seven.

Normal elementary school activities

such as after-school programs and

summer camps were replaced by

more practices and skating camps.

“I made the choice to give up a

lot of early mornings, late nights,

Seniors reflect on their athletic

careers

Continued from page 1

“I would love to play club [sports]

in college, but I think being a student

athlete would be too time consuming

when it comes to focusing on

academics as well,” Malin said.

Breaden opted to

prioritize academics

over athletics,

explaining he would

have likely ended

up at a smaller

Division III school

if he had tried to

get recruited, putting less focus on

his education. He still aims to play

lacrosse and hockey at as high a

level as possible.

“I am going to try and walk on

to the [lacrosse] team at UMass-

Amherst. It’ll be hard, but I can put

in the work,” he said.

Irene Essou, a senior on the

swim team, has decided to leave

swimming in high school to focus

on studying neuroscience. However,

Essou emphasizes that she’ll keep

referring back to the lessons she

learned from coaches, teammates

“I always thought I

would be wearing the

‘I heart our seniors’

shirt.”

and the sport as a whole.

“I learned a lot about myself, like

not giving up, trusting the process

and just being patient with yourself

because swimming is a hard sport,”

Essou said.

Good work ethics and morals

are products of

practicing any sport,

but staying committed

through one’s high

school years results

in leaders that many

underclassmen look

up to.

“I've had a bigger role with the

team as a senior. Everyone on the

team knows me and respects and

listens to me. I get [to make] more

decisions about what happens,

which is nice,” said Breaden, who’s

played lacrosse since his freshman

year.

Unlike previous seasons, this

season has meant something extra

to seniors, making the farewell

emotional.

“It was more of a bittersweet

moment. I'm not really sad, I'm just

happy that it happened,” Essou said.

summer breaks and school breaks. We

would have practice on Thanksgiving

break and on January 1 at 7 a.m.,”

she said.

Her practice schedule has been

made more complicated due to the

limited amount of ice nearby, meaning

practices are more often than not at

odd times or longer drives away.

“Sometimes it’s frustrating that

I live in an area in the south with

a smaller rink. It’s not the same

as training at a big, international,

well-known training center with

top coaches and all those resources.

There's just not as many people into

skating, and the resources aren’t as

good down here,” Wang said.

However, Wang has been able to

travel across the state and county to

train, including one memorable camp

at Miami University.

“The ballet teacher [at Miami

University] was kind of crazy. She

would hit people with pool noodles,”

she said.

The most influential person in her

skating career so far has been Jannika

Lilja, who started as her team coach

in 2021, and now also coaches her

personally.

“I love her. I owe my entire skating

career [to her], pretty much,” Wang

said. “I feel like she had a really

big impact on my skating journey

By Linda Li & Avery Tortora

Staff Writer & Co-Editor-in-Chief

As pickleball has become a viral

sport across the nation these past

few years, the fans are spreading

from professional tournaments all

the way to high school communities.

Recently, the PTSA and CHHS/

ECHHS Pickleball Clubs both

hosted separate tournaments for

anybody to play in.

“I went to the Habitat for

Humanity pickleball tournament

that UNC students hosted. There

and getting me

ready to try

out for Team

USA.”

W a n g ,

who began

competing

individually,

has reached the

highest level

in each of the

four skating

disciplines:

singles, pairs,

ice dancing and

synchronized

skating.

“In each

of those, you

can compete

and you can

also take tests

where you

will skate for

a panel of

judges, and

you have to do

certain skills,” Wang said.

Out of the four disciplines, Wang has

decided she most enjoys synchronized

skating, and now aims to compete

in the World Synchronized Skating

Championship in Finland next spring,

as there is no synchronized skating in

the Olympics.

I ran into Lindsey White, who’s

a student at East, and she said it

would be really fun to have one

with the high schools,” said PTSA

member and mom of East senior

Lauren Garber. “We’re trying to get

a few more social opportunities for

students and parents to do things

together.”

On April 14, parents, teachers,

high school students and pickleball

lovers across all age groups

gathered on the courts to have

some fun.

“It was great because [East] has

Photo courtesy of Alicia Wang

“I would much prefer to skate on

the teams I think it's more fun to train

and also to compete because I get

really bad competition anxiety, and

I find that helping or having other

people there with me really helps. And

I just love having that sort of bond

with being in a team sport.”

Pickleball sparks community engagement

Photo courtesy of Raghav Singh

a real reputation for being a very

intense school, so it’s nice for

people to see us having some fun,”

Garber said.

East and Chapel Hill High

School’s pickleball clubs organized

a pickleball tournament a week

after that, which mainly focused on

just high school students.

“Our main goal is trying to get

young people into pickleball, since

when you hear the word pickleball,

it's more like an old [people] sport

and the tournament is a great way

to bring in young folks,” said vice

president of East pickleball club

Larry Liu.

The tournament format featured

a bracket system with participants

contributing $5 each to the prize

pool, which encouraged more

students to learn about pickleball

and join the club.

“I think it has definitely influenced

many students,” Liu said. “At the

beginning of the year we didn't

really have many people attend

the pickleball club. But now, after

the tournament, more and more are

coming to the club to improve their

skills. We’ve increased at least 10

members.”

The ECHO, May 2024

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