Page 1 November 2017

Volume LVIII Issue 2 The Student Newspaper of Passaic County Community College, Paterson, NJ November 2017

Mayor Hector Lora visits PCCC

SGA Town Hall Meeting Are Americans Abusing Their Right to Free Speech?

VISIONS By Erica Russelman

By Stephany Ayala

By Katie Lee

P C C C ’ s

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On Wednesday October 25th, dozens of students and faculty came out to see the Mayor of Passa-ic, Hector Lora, speak at the Pater-son campus theater as a part of The Distinguished Lecturer Series. Initially, few knew about Mayor Lora and his path into gov-ernment. It was a surprise to many that he is an alumnus of PCCC. By the end, many were moved and im-pressed by Mayor Lora’s story, com-passion, and leadership. “This is my chance to re-ally make it further,” Mayor Lora recalled saying when he attended PCCC. “It was hard journey.” Mayor Lora is the son of two immigrants who dreamt the Ameri-can Dream. His father worked a fac-

tory job, hoping only to provide for his family. It wasn’t until Mayor Lora’s sophomore year in high school that he considered further education. Although he was accepted into Seton Hall, Mayor Lora felt that PCCC was the right place for him. “I was actually accepted into Seton Hall University...I’ll share one quick story of riding around with this one kid. His name was Ted…He was driving around this brand new BMW. We’re driving through Newark to this frat party, and Ted pulls out a beer while he’s driving, to which I immediately said, ‘Hey Ted, what are you doing? Stop. I don’t want to go to jail,’ and

On October 19, 2017 about 18 people turned out at the first Town Hall meeting of the semester in order to voice their concerns. The meeting was called at 1:25 pm in the Theater on the main campus of PCCC in Paterson. Unfortunately, they were unable to connect with the Wana-que campus due to technical diffi-culties but successfully did with the Passaic campus, which was held in the conference room in the second floor. Ase Awari kicked off the event by welcoming everyone and

conducting a proper roll call of the executive student board and senate.SGA (Student Government Associ-ation) goals for this semester were discussed, such as raising five hun-dred dollars for the SGA scholar-ship and promoting civic engage-ment to student body. Current facility projects un-derway were reviewed involving the planned game room grand open-ing this coming spring semester and the frosted windows for the Fitness Center at the Wanaque Campus.

What do China, Russia and Turkey have in common? They are few among the many countries that have implement-ed strict censorship policies and use state-controlled media to in-hibit freedom of speech. In these countries, political or religious dissenters can face a lifetime in prison or intensive labor camps or even risk being killed for ex-pressing their views publicly. I don’t know about you but the last thing I want to do is to get on Putin or Erdogan’s bad side. Having freedom of speech as the very first fundamen-tal right outlined in the American Constitution with numerous Supreme Court cases ruled in its favor has proven that it has been highly valued since birth of our nation. Freedom of speech has become a defining part

of American culture made clear by the willing nature of Ameri-cans to share their political and religious views, though individ-uals in a myriad of other coun-tries who choose to speak their mind are harshly reprimanded or forced into silence. We are not taking advantage of the pow-er we have in America to freely voice our thoughts and to openly advocate for what we believe in. Instead a number of Americans are focusing on the the fear of offending or triggering people

In This Issue News..............................Pages 1-4 Profile............................Pages 3;5 Feature...........................Page 6 Fiction Corner...............Page 7 Opinion..........................Pages 2;8

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Page 2 November 2017News/Opinion

Are Americans Abusing Their Right to Free Speech?while others are irrationally target-ing minorities with hateful speech and actions. The increasing number of Americans who continue to abuse their right to free speech by pro-testing and rioting for unreason-able causes is very alarming. Some have been using “free speech” as a guise for their hateful actions and violence as seen recently in Char-lottesville. White American Nation-alists have expressed their fears and insecurities by trying to blame sev-eral minority ethnic groups for their problems and showcasing their ig-norance and barbarity. These kinds of actions are used as an example to facilitate the passage of strict speech-control laws by authoritari-an governments. Also, protests as a result of exposure to differing opinions or political views have been plaguing our nation. Conservative speakers such as Milo Yiannopoulos and Steve Bannon were faced with massive crowds of angry protest-ers after being arranged to speak at a “Free Speech Week” at liberal California university, UC Berkeley. Being presented with ideas that are controversial and different from your own should not be a reason to riot. Similarly, “Not My Presi-

dent” protests ensued following the election of President Donald Trump where massive crowds gathered nationwide to protest the results of a democratic election. It is quite embarrassing to me as a first- gen-eration American to see millions of people come out to protest an elec-tion which voters had full control over, while much of my family still does not have the right to be able to select or express their discontent about their nation’s leader. Being able to vote for our government is something that many people around the world will never experience in their lifetimes with the existence of dictatorships and fraudulent elections. Even publicly speak-ing against a head of state can be punishable by law in over a dozen countries worldwide and surely if you protested them you would be jailed or murdered in some of these countries. Former United States At-torney General Jeff Sessions has recently claimed “Freedom of thought and speech on the Ameri-can campus are under attack,” in-forming that universities across the country such as Boise State Univer-sity in Idaho and Clemson Univer-sity in South Carolina have creat-ed policies which ban individuals

from making statements that could be considered offensive. Sessions feels strongly against the “homog-enous thought” which is prevalent on college campuses including here at PCCC. While it is import-ant to consider the possible impact your words may have on others, it shouldn’t be prohibited to voice your ideas on college campuses if they are controversial because of the fear that someone could take offense if they disagree. Being on a college campus is different from being at a family gathering or work-place where debates are not typi-cally welcomed. Colleges should be utilized as a space for learning and sharing ideas, but it is impos-sible when students are often only exposed to one kind of thinking. In-dividuals at colleges should be open to differing opinions rather than in-criminating anyone who does not follow the majority view. By avoid-ing uncomfortable or challenging ideas people will lose the ability to think for themselves and become like sheep. By not exercising this privilege of freedom of speech that exists in America to address unjust actions and attempt to incite change and instead using it to protest when upset is simply inexcusable.

Editor-in-ChiefKatherine Tapia

Associate EditorStephany Heilbron

Managing EditorStephany Ayala Waad Mustafa

Copy EditorsKatie LeeErica Russelman

SecretaryReema Akash

TreasurerHussam Qaqish

Staff WritersStephany AyalaMartina FrascaMarialys GonzalezKatie LeeMiguel RomeroErica Russelman

Contributing WritersBiannett ChevalierKayla FluhrEman OdehApril Zielinski

LayoutAlbert Bustos

Faculty AdvisorDr. Christine Redman-Waldeyer

Contact us at:visions@pccc.edu

Page 3 November 2017News/Profile

On September 30, 2017, from 8:00 - 3:00 p.m. at the public school NO. 15 on 98 oak street, Paterson hundreds of community volunteers joined forces to build a playground for the community kids. This event was designed to give area kids the childhood they deserve by building a new playground. The event started with the opening ceremony to successfully ending with the ribbon ceremony.

Several members of the Passaic County College (PCCC) chapter of Phi Theta Kappa, the Honors Society for two-year colleges also participated in the event. Erica Russelman, a PCCC English major and provisional member of PTK said it is important to volun-teer in such events because “it benefits our community…it brings us together to give back and better where we live.”

Success is relative—this is com-mon knowledge. While one may de-scribe success as living in riches and abundance, another can describe it as being famous, and yet another can de-scribe success as simply being happy and having just enough to get by. For Passaic County Community College Professor Anna Corrina Sinocchi, suc-cess comes from living what she calls an “authentic life” as a visual artist and from having her art represented in a commercial art gallery. Professor Sinocchi’s life goal has always been to have exposure as a visual artist in the art world. She has consistently dreamed of generating sales to art collectors and receiving recognition throughout the art industry while remaining true to herself, but this has not always been an easy task. Professor Sinocchi has had her art work exhibited in various group shows and solo exhibits in the Tri-State New York City area and has even sold some of her work to public and pri-

vate collectors. She has achieved this through her relentlessly perusing her goal of having her art displayed and recognized. There were various steps in reaching her level of success but she believes that the first step is always to believe in yourself and in your ability to create art. Any single person can cre-ate art, but believing in oneself and that you are deserving of the success you want is another story. Next, one must be unwilling to stop until they are where they want to be. Professor Sinocchi achieved this by frequenting cities, both nationally and internationally and visited countless art galleries. She also networked with those in the art industry and attended countless art exhibit receptions. Professor Sinocchi put together what she considered a strong body of work, photo documented it, created a written artist statement and a biogra-phy. Finally, she would take said pho-to docu-

Attending college after high school and acquiring a degree is not something everyone is privileged to have. For some, it may be their lack of interest in furthering their education and evolving. For others, it may be life hardships and financial difficulties that prevent them from obtaining what they dream about the most.

In this case, young Jennifer had stumbled upon obstacles that limited her from continuing her education and obtaining a bachelor’s degree at a young age. According to her profile on the PCCC webpage, Professor Jennifer Gasparino attend-ed the University of North Carolina after gradu-ating high school but unfortunately had to drop out after only two semesters. She moved back to New Jersey and held the responsibility of be-ing a single mother working a full time job to support herself and her child. However, Prof. Gasparino was discontent with her situation and decided to go back to college and push her lim-itations. Prof. Gasparino applied to Rutgers Uni-versity at first but received a letter informing her of being rejected. After listening to her friend’s suggestion, Prof. Gasparino began the path to her future after enrolling in Passaic County Community College (PCCC). Prof. Gasparino attended Passaic Coun-ty Community College and graduated in 2007 with an Associate in Science Human Services. While completing her fieldwork for her Human Services major requirements, Prof. Gasparino was fortunate enough to be offered a job as a so-cial worker in Passaic because of her high per-

formance. She continued her journey to transfer to Farleigh Dickinson University and graduate with a bachelor’s degree in Psychology and So-cial Work. Being a member of the Phi Theta Kap-pa honor society granted Prof. Gasparino the opportunity to obtain a M.S.W in Social Work

from New York University. Then, she was of-fered a job as an adjunct professor at Passaic County Community College for three years un-til she got her current position as a full-time in-structor of Human Services. Prof. Gasparino is currently enrolled in Rowan University for a Doctorate in Higher Education and works full-time as an instructor at the PCCC Human Services Program. As mentioned in her Profile on the PCCC web-page, Prof. Gasparino also has a side job as a social worker at a private clinic in Jersey City. She specializes in trauma and substance abuse counseling, specifically with adolescents and families. Prof. Gasparino plans to stay as long as she can at PCCC and provide for her students what was once given to her. She wishes to see the Human Services Program at Passaic County Community College grow and be a part of its success. As for her current goal, Prof. Gaspari-no hopes to engage in Administration roles as a faculty member in PCCC. It was not an easy journey that Prof. Gasparino had to go through to get to where she is today. Being a non-traditional student was exceptionally challenging for Prof. Gasparino during her time at PCCC and Fairleigh-Dickin-

son University (FDU). Also, being a single mother and raising her young daughter alone forced Prof. Gaspari-no to manage having a full-time job, attending school, and taking care of her family. Prof. Gasparino always had unlimited aspirations and dreams to make something big

of herself. She considers being a professor the greatest achievement she had yet achieved. In addition to her position as a professor, Professor Gasparino is also an advisor of the Alpha Eta Chi chapter of Phi Theta Kappa Honor Society at PCCC. Being an advisor for PTK means very much to Prof. Gasparino, especially that she was once just a member of the honor society and never had she expected to become an advi-sor one day. Not only is Prof. Gasparino a successful faculty member of PCCC, but she is one of the most admired ones. According to her ratings on ratemyprofessors.com, students who have tak-en one of Prof. Gasparino’s courses always had pleasant things to say. Students of PCCC describe Prof. Gas-parino as an essential asset to the Human Ser-vices Program at PCCC. Students also explain how caring and supportive she is to her students especially when it comes to issues regarding ac-ademics. Some students have even started call-ing Prof. Gasparino their role model because of their unforgettable experience with her.

Professor Jennifer Gasparino: An Inspiring Story of Courage

By Reema Akash

By Biannett Chevalier

By Eman Odeh

PTK Members Build Playground for Community Children

“It feels really amazing to be able to give back to the college that helped me be where I am today and to give students what was once given to me.”

Success in the Arts:Speaking with Professor Anna Corrina Sinocchi

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Page 4 November 2017

Ted opens up the glove compart-ment...and he pulls out a badge and says, ‘my grandfather is a di-rector of the FBI. I do whatever I want,’ as he’s driving around this brand new BMW that he received his first year in college, and I was like, ‘I’m glad you do whatever you want, but I can’t, and I don’t want to get in trouble.’” Even though he was get-ting good grades in school, Mayor Lora’s family circumstances pres-sured him to leave Seton Hall and get a full-time job. With the help of the Educational Opportunity Fund, Mayor Lora found his way to PCCC. Our college was dif-ferent; people don’t come here to party. Passaic County Communi-ty College students are here to do what they can to become success-ful, and Mayor Lora felt comfort-able that he was finally surrounded by people who shared similar situ-ations. “I’m going to turn every-

thing around and do my very best,” Mayor Hector Lora said about ed-ucation. He believes compassion, participation in school activities, and above all, discipline, are key components in success as a stu-dent. “Time to rest can come lat-er. You want to be good at some-thing? Discipline.” Mayor Lora revealed that the most important

lesson in achieving your goals is to never give up, even when times get rough. When asked what ad-vice Mayor Lora had for all of us at Passaic County Community College, Mayor Lora said the fol-lowing: “One of the biggest lies that is often told to people is that, you know, you have to feel it. The truth is, is that most days you’re

not going to feel it, because life is real and you have challenges. Some days are going to be tough--most days will be. Some days you’re going to be dealing with issues with family, work, person-al. Some days you’re just going to get up and say, ‘I don’t want to.’ You can’t make your commitment to education and desire to finish contingent on everything going well because that’s not going to happen...when it comes to things like education, it’s so easy to fall to the wayside and say, ‘I don’t have the help. I don’t have the support.’ You need to just determine inside of you [and say,] ‘I’m going to fin-ish what I start.’” The event was held in the theater and sponsored by The Dis-tinguished Lecturer Series Com-mittee: Professors Caffie Risher, Public Speaking; Dr. Christine Redman-Waldeyer; English; Wal-ter Behr, Communications and Er-ica Williams-Woodley, Nursing.

Mayor Hector Lora visits PCCC(Continued from page 1)

Eric Mendoza, a PCCC Biology major and provisional member of PTK said by building the playground “we are allowing Paterson kids to thrive educationally.” Mendoza added that “a playground can allow a child to enjoy being at school and grow mentally and physically.” Students will look forward to coming. They will be able to learn, knowing a playground that the communi-ty built for them will be waiting.

A playground is more than a play-ground for the chil-dren to play in. The playground will be a motivation for stu-dents to return after completing their ed-ucation to give back to their communi-ty that once helped build their child-hood.

PTK Members Build Playground for Community Children(Continued from page 3)

News

The Meditation room has been offi-cially opened in the Hamilton Hall basement. The Vice President touched on Student Re-sources available such as the Office of Stu-dent Activities, Student Government Associ-ation, Student Program Committee, Phi Theta Kappa, Education Opportunity Fund, and 15 clubs offered at Passaic County Community College. It was also mentioned if any student would like to reactivate or create a club they would have to contact the Vice President of the SGA Executive Board, Tah-teanna R. Steadman. The open Treasurer position for the SGA was also announced. Any student inter-ested in being recruited should have a GPA of a 3.0 or higher, have at least 12 credits com-pleted, abide to two weekly office hours and “be super cool and awesome” as stated by Ase Awari, the speaker of SGA. Soon after, students present at the meeting were asked to provide any questions or concerns. One of them was solely about the computers in

SGA TOWN HALL MEETING

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• Who was involved? • What happened? • Where did it take place?

• When did it take place? • Why did it happen?• How did it happen?

Professor Caffie Rischer and Mayor Hector Lora debate ideas

Page 5 November 2017

A mother and a father are waiting on life changing results from a doctor. Little do they know, the results that are to come is the arrival of an infant. Nick Jordan was born pre-mature on January 6, 1997. Life had several challenges for Jordan at an early age. Jordan had a learning dis-ability. He did not start learning how to speak until the age of five. As Jordan’s brain devel-oped, his learning disabilities di-minished. His mother was aware of this and decided to give him books to read. In effort to expand his vo-cabulary, she introduced him to several different books at once and Jordan enjoyed reading the books that were given to him. However, Jordan had an undeveloped talent that he was unaware about. Jordan was a nat-ural artist. At an early age, his par-ents bought him a drawing board, and he was immediately intrigued by it. He was drawing pictures of everything he could see.

As time passed, Jordan took his drawing abilities more seriously. He decided to learn as much as he could from others around him. He constantly kept drawing and improving his talents and was able to get his artwork displayed in high schools and middle schools exhibitions. Sometime later, Jordan

was intrigued by graphic de-signing. He spent many hours improving his skills in graphic design. When Jordan was 17, he started designing tattoos for people. The people that were buying his services or products made it known that Jordan was the artist. Jordan then was off to col-lege to major in graphic design. Understanding the competition he has to go against, Jordan’s ultimate goal is to become the best artist he can be. Jordan plans to move for-ward in his major. He has decid-ed to further his education at a four year school after he gradu-ates from PCCC and learn from many more artists throughout

his life. Jordan is familiar with the PCCC’s graphic design depart-ment. He tries to learn everything he can from the professors he associates with. “I often discuss with my teachers after class, for that is where the true learning is done,” said Jordan. Jordan likes to familiarize himself with his professors, who often inform him of potential op-portunities. Jordan usually bene-fits from their information. “Pro-fessors do not waste their breath for nothing,” said Jordan Jordan even thought about becoming a professor himself one day. However, he is very focused on the foreseeable future and not too far ahead. Jordan is currently work-ing on multiple pieces right now. He never thought that he would sell any of his work; he mainly did it for practice. However, circum-stances have changed. “Why should I ever not charge for something that I am good at. I believe that a person must think like this in order to survive,” said Jordan.

He believes in the ideolo-gy of survival of the fittest. How-ever, he often tries to help people, when he has time, usually by in-forming his fellow scholars about the complex ideas in the graphic design field. “Photoshopping pictures for a real life scenario is much more complicated than people re-alize. The designs have to be spot on perfect and there is no room for mistake,” said Jordan. Jordan has been a speaker in multiple events. He worries that people do not understand the dif-ference between a classroom and a conference room. Jordan usually ends his speeches in the same manner. He often discusses how failing may lead to a person’s success. Jordan’s designs have won awards and have been used by a number of celebrities and organi-zations including Fetty Wap, The Harlem Globetrotters, Tiffany Perez, Salice Rosa, Sharie Marie, Ball is Life, Rob the Original, and the PCCC Graphic Design Department.

Profiles

mentation, artist statement and biography and mailed the pack-age to the art galleries/directors, curators, etc., and waited for hear back from them. In certain instances, she would follow up with them rather than wait for their reply. The hardest part of all of this was having to deal with art gallery/museum directors and art critics themselves. While Profes-sor Sinocchi had communication with important people in major locations such as New York City, California and even Italy and had positive reactions from them on her work, they often would not follow through on their word

and would not see the works in person or feature said works in commercial art galleries. Despite this, Professor Sinocchi still has had many of her works shown in galleries and has sold her work to art collec-tors which is a huge accomplish-ment. Her works have even re-ceived recognition by art critics and scholars. Her tenacious at-titude aided her in reaching the level of success and quality of life she has dreamed of. “The journey has not been easy at all and I am not ex-aggerating when I say this. Not only is there a lot of rejection to deal with but there are deceit-

ful games played. It takes a toll on your self-worth and you will doubt success or what you con-sider success to be,” said Profes-sor Sinocchi. The art industry is in-credibly competitive and can be difficult to “make it.” Luckily, Professor Sinocchi has “made it” on her own terms. Growing up, Sinocchi dreamed of living the life she lives now. She is living up to her own success and has even bigger goals for herself to achieve today. All in all, she wants those pursuing a career in a creative field to know that you can de-fine your own success. A mentor

once told her “to measure your own success by your own per-sonal creative evolution,” and she has made that her own man-tra. By defining her own success, she is living a life she is proud of and which is greatly admired. Professor Sinocchi is still creating art for the world to see. She has dabbled in many of the arts, including photography and painting with various mediums. Today, she works on her art and teaches art based courses such as Photography 101 and Ap-preciation of the Arts and many more as an adjunct in the Pater-son Campus of Passaic County Community College.

Success in the Arts: Speaking with Professor Anna Corrina Sinocchi

Nicholas Jordan: The Strength of Overcoming a Challenge

By Miguel Romero

Artwork by: Nicholas Jordan

Nicholas Jordan

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Page 6 November 2017Features

By Stephany Heilbron Mark Hillringhouse is a professor at Passaic County Com-munity College and has taught here for thirty-three years. Profes-sor Hillringhouse has taught many courses. Currently he’s teaching several courses this semester Mod-ern Poetry, Introduction to Photog-raphy, Introduction to Philosophy, Composition 1, Critical thinking, & Appreciation of Art. Aside from being a profes-sor, Professor Hillringhouse is a published poet and photographer who has been featured in the New York Times, The American Poet-ry Review, New Jersey Monthly, etc. The most recent award Profes-sor Hillringhouse has received is the Essex County Parks award in which he won first place for pho-tography. Mark Hillringhouse is a New Jersey native, born in Hack-ensack, whose love for poetry and photography dates back to his ear-ly teen years. At 14 years old, Hill-ringhouse began to write poetry, inspired by several poets including William Carlos Williams and Wal-lace Stevens. Photography was an art form that he began in his ear-ly twenties as a black and white photographer with a 35mm Single Lens Reflex (SLR) Camera which was given to him by his brother as a Christmas gift. Professor Hillringhouse fell in love with taking photo-graphs and developing them in the dark room. He stated, “It was like see-ing your unconscious become con-scious.” The mystery of photog-

raphy enchanted him and drew him into photography even more. There are several photographers whom influenced him; however, Professor. Hillringhouse considers George Tice as his mentor. Professor Hillringhouse discovered George Tice’s work in his early thirties; he wanted to write poems using Tice’s photo-graphs as his muse. He met Tice and then got work with him after some time. They helped each other as mentor and mentee— Profes-sor. Hillringhouse helped George Tice with a book and George Tice helped Professor Hillringhouse se-lect and pick out pictures for his book. Most recently George Tice emailed Professor Hillringhouse to let him know that he loved the photography in his new book with Maria Mazziotti Gillan called “Pa-terson Light and Shadow”—Tice wrote to him that the photographs were great. “Paterson Light and Shad-ow” is Professor Hillringhouse’s most recent work and is in collabo-ration with author Maria Mazziotti Gillan. It’s a book, which has po-etry which Mrs. Mazziotti Gillan, wrote about Paterson and pho-tographs that Professor Hillring-house has taken all over Paterson, which would give a visual to Mrs. Mazziotti Gillan’s poems. The project and collabo-ration between the two authors comes from their love of Paterson. Maria Mazziotti Gillan has written many poems about Paterson and Mark Hillringhouse has taken pho-tographs of Paterson for over thirty

years. Maria Mazziotti Gillan has written twenty books and in each book, there are poems she has writ-ten about Paterson. Hillringhouse and Mazziotti Gillan got together and went through all twenty books picking out which poems would work well with whichever pho-tograph Hillringhouse had taken over the thirty years he had been photographing Paterson. Both Hillringhouse and Mazziotti Gillan carefully placed each photograph with a poem. The book primarily con-sists of poetry and photography that is centered solely on Paterson. This particular project has been something that Professor Hillring-house has wanted to do with Maria Mazziotti Gillan for a long time as he has been following her works for many years. On November 30, 2017 there will be book party at the Hamilton Club that is open to the public from 3:00 PM - 5:00 PM. There will be poetry read-ing by Maria Mazziotti Gillan and Professor Hillringhouse’s photog-raphy will be hanging on the walls

of the gallery in the Hamilton Club. There will prints of the photographs for sale and some of the money made from the prints will go towards a student scholar-ship at PCCC. Professor Hillringhouse is currently working on other proj-ects such as Verona Park in Essex County, designed by the same ar-chitect as Central Park in New York City. Hillringhouse has been photographing for Verona Park for some time and wishes to publish a book on the photographs that he’s taken of the park. The next big book that he has coming out is an interview book. Throughout his career he’s interviewed about thirty poets; it started in 1980 and continued for ten years. Professor Hillringhouse interviewed all of the New York Poets and took portraits of each of them during the interviews. The book will consist of the interviews he’s done, the black and white portraits, and essays that he’s written regarding each poet’s poems. The title of the book is “Talking all Night: Interviews with the New York School.”

Interviewing Professor Hillringhouse“Paterson Light and Shadow”

Hillringhouse Interview

Passaic County Community College of-fers its students a great opportunity to participate in a graphic design internship. The program is very beneficial because it gives students some real life work experience as an intern as well as adding work to their portfolios. Professor Cameron is the coordinator for the graphic design internship program. His feelings toward the internship program would be “apply your skills to real word problems.” That’s how to do great work and be successful in the graphic design field. The graphic design internship is available to students with a GPA of 3.0 or higher. They also require a recommendation from a full time professor in the major. Students should be reli-able, have strong interpersonal skills and show integrity in class. To apply for the internship, students are encouraged to reach out early, usually a semester before they wish to participate. The students can see Professor Cameron to see if they qualify for the internship program. The best time to participate in the intern-ship would be during one of the student’s last two semesters before graduation. By doing this, they make sure the students are prepared with the skills needed to take on the responsibility of the internship work.

Certain classes must be completed before participating in the internship like Advanced Graphic Design, Typography and Computer En-hanced Layout. They would also like students to have completed 30 or more college level credits and 12 credits from your major. The graphic design internship program is actually registered as a class, GD 294 and it earns 2 credits. During this time, students com-plete a resume, write weekly reports on progress and complete other assignments. Lastly, students show a final presentation to college staff. The internships are 90 hours total and span over an 8-10 week period. The companies look for daytime availability, between 9:00 AM-5:00 PM to ensure enough staff is on site to help and train. They work on a consistent schedule each week, so a steady schedule is needed from students looking to participate. Employers will interview the students who wish to intern at the company. Students are required to arrange their transportation to the lo-cation. Internships are rarely paid, but the expe-rience students gain is really worth a lot toward your future in the graphic design field. Many companies look for experience as well as edu-cation making the internship quite valuable to students.

There is also the possibility that the in-ternship could provide an opportunity for part time or full time employment. Companies often look at interns to potentially hire if they believe they would make a good fit in the company once the internship is over. In the internship program, students can expect to work on projects like logo design, web design, image editing, layout, and others de-pending on the company. According to Professor Cameron, the most recent companies offering internships to students include Nextwave Web, Manic Animat-ics, and Pix-L Graphx. They are all located in New Jersey, as PCCC tries to keep its graphic design internships local. The graphic design internship is a great way to make some contacts in your industry, and learn more about the field and how it works on hand. The internship program also looks great on your resume for future jobs. While working the internship program, students can get great experience dealing with customers, which may be the first time for some graphic design students to produce work for a client rather than their portfolio. Professor Cam-eron says that beginning to work with customer requests can be somewhat challenging for stu-dents at first,

Graphic Design Internship OpportunitiesBy Kayla Fluhr

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Page 7 November 2017Fiction Corner

My fifteen-year-old brother Jonah and I, along with my father, met Captain around 3:00 PM at the shore deck for our yearly boat trip. We were told to just call him Cap-tain because he doesn’t like giving out his name. He was a creepy old short man with grey hair and a scar on the bot-tom right cheek. “This boat is three hundred years old,” said Captain with his low hoarse voice as he opened the boat door, try-ing to impress us. The door screeched open as we stepped inside a small wooden room. The first thing I noticed was a human skull on the highest shelf in the front of the room. “Is that real?” I asked. Before I turned around, Captain slammed the door behind him as he left. The boat was small and had only one bench to sit on with just enough room for the three of us. The rest of the room was filled with dusty shelves filled with old books, cans of paint, tools, with spider webs in every corner. The back room was separated from the front, so we could not see Captain unless we stood on a little wood-en box in the front with a small window built into the wall. As the hours passed, Jonah and I looked around, touching everything we saw in sight while my father was

snoring on the bench and talking in his sleep. It was 7:00 PM and we were starving. I nudged my father who was still half asleep and told him that we were hungry. “I will get the cooler in the front.” My

father groaned as he stood up an-noyed. He left as the door slammed behind him. We decided to sit on the bench until our father returned. After twenty minutes had gone by, Jonah reminded me how long our father had been gone. I walked to the door wondering why he was taking so long to come back, discovering that it was locked. “Now what?” I asked. Jonah went to stand on the wooden box to look through the window. Jonah stepped down and went to sit back on the bench like nothing was wrong, but I suspected something based on his nervous smile he gave. I grabbed the binoculars I spotted on a shelf

and looked through them carefully out the window At first I did not see anything, but then I noticed that the boat wheel turning by itself and spotted my father’s fishing hat floating above the waves. Waves

started to bang against the boat and I fell. I stood up and looked at Jo-nah knowing that we were alone. I started to cry while pacing back and forth trying not to let Jonah see me panic. My mind was racing as pictures came to my mind of what awful things might have happened to my father and Captain. I sat down next to Jonah as we both fell silent as we were too anxious to speak. The light hang-ing above us flickered and then it was pitch black. The only sounds we heard were the waves banging against the boat with the mix of the heavy rain downpour and the whistle of the wind. We decided to

wait out the storm before deciding on what to do next. After an hour of wait-ing with no electricity, the lights went on. We then spotted a shelf with a lantern on it, and wished

we had seen it earlier. “Too late now” I sighed. Jonah explained his thoughts of breaking the little window with a hammer he found beneath the bench but even if he did break it, there was no way we could fit through. All of a sudden the door flung open and pouring rain along with the waves start-ed flooding the boat. Jonah and I used all of our strength to keep the door shut but we couldn’t hold it for long. As the waves were rising, we had no choice but to swim out of boats way struggling to keep our heads above water until the storm calmed.

Graphic Design Internship Opportunities

By Martina FrascaThe Broken Voyage (Part I)

Artwork by: Nicholas Jordan

The article “Mary Shelley, Frankenstein and the Villa Diodati” by Greg Buzwell is hyp-notizing like the actual stories written by Mary Shelley. Buzwell describes the setting, condu-cive for Mary to write a groundbreaking novel, which is remade every generation within media. This young woman was all of 18 when she met her future husband and began travel-ing with him during her writing career. While staying overnight at the Villa Diodati mansion, Mary Shelley, Percy Shelley, Lord Byron, and Dr. John Polidori experienced quite an evening together. Lord Byron was also a writer and sug-gested that everyone write horror stories that night because it was cold outside and appeared bleak due to turbulent weather conditions. Lord

Byron felt this was the perfect breeding ground for creativity. During the 1800s the Gothic era was emerging among Aristocrats and other citizens alike. Life was difficult back then and Mary was no stranger to hardship. One could say that the author is often reflected in their work—this is a bio and historical literary interpretation. Au-diences could agree that she definitely received inspiration for this novel during her night at the Villa. One of the gentlemen there was John Polidori, who was a doctor and enamored with Mary. Despite not reciprocating his feelings she was inspired by the conversation of her peers who introduced her to galvanism, bodily anat-omy, and the creation of life and the power it

holds. Lord Byron was a poet and the catalyst in this evening endeavor at the Villa. He showed up in the night in a Napoleonic carriage with his physician and fellow author Dr. Polidori who is the author of Vampyre. A conversation between Lord Byron and Percy Shelley triggered an electric sense of purpose in Mary as she listened intently. Ready to sleep that evening she could not rest. “My imagination, unbidden, possessed and guided me, gifting the success of images that arose in my mind with a vividness far beyond the usu-al bounds of reverie.” It’s mind-boggling how one’s life experiences and environment could lay the seeds for a literary masterpiece.

Night at the VillaBy April Zielinski

as you must design what the customer wants rather than what student’s would like to see themselves. Graphic design is a competitive field. After the internship students can choose to go further and earn a bachelor’s degree in graphic design or apply for a job. It is easier to find part time contract based work at first, but

this can lead to a full-time position in that company or another company. Most of this information about the program can be found on the PCCC college website on the graphic design department page and more can be found by getting in touch with Professor Cameron, the coordinator of the graphic design internship himself.

(Continued from page 6)

Page 8 November 2017Opinion

In the entertainment industry, it been has widely known that aspiring actresses would take part in sexual favors with directors or producers to get a role in a movie. Those were choices by the women, but recently, stories of assault and harassment flooded the news. Harvey Weinstein, Hollywood film pro-ducer and co-founder of The Weinstein Compa-ny is involved in the most recent media capti-vating assault accusations this year. In October, The New York Times and The New Yorker astoundingly reported about how countless women that have been assaulted

were once affiliated with the Academy of Mo-tion Picture Arts and Science. These shocking and disturbing reports have led to other women and men of various careers to share their experiences of sexual ha-rassment and molestation. Well known actress-es such as Cara Delevingne, Angelina Jolie, and Gwyneth Paltrow have been driven to speak upon their own encounter with a sexual preda-tor. A campaign called “#MeToo” has launched on social media to bring complete awareness of the senseless actions of sexual assault to many

women, men, and children around the globe. Also, “#MeToo” allows others to share their personal and tragic struggles with non-consen-sual sexual events. From family members to doctors, everyone should be continuously cau-tious of the people they know and the locations they might visit. Those who have not fallen victims of sexual assault still display their antipathy about the news regarding Weinstein. No one should be feared into submission and silence. Speak your truth!

Philosophy and Literature act as a win-dow for a reader to look through to see how sit-uations, and ideas affect people. Society tends to venerate prominent archetypes and authors. Individuals such as Socrates, Henry David Thoreau, Anton Chek-hov, and Alice Walker, incorporate the notion of freedom into their work. These erudite philosophers and authors are cognizant of the aviary, which humans dwell in, until education and choices permit change. Certain people opt to flee and fly, while others shudder at the thought of unlocking the cage. In “Walking” by Henry David Thoreau, a person walks through history. The author em-phasizes that an individual needs to witness nature to reflect on inspiration from the sur-roundings. Thoreau expresses the necessity of literature in order to unite with one’s wild state of being and reach a higher state of awareness. For example, he writes, “In literature it is only the wild that attracts us. Dullness is another name for tameness.” He explains that good books are flawless like a wildflower in a meadow. When individuals are connected with nature and enlightened with education, they transform into the forerunners of genius, who then lead others. Conversely, not everyone is in a position to think for himself. Thoreau describes philosophy as the science known for some but not everyone. This includes soldiers in battle who fight for reasons articulated by political officials. The common

man is acknowledged as a sheep following the herd of society. Freedom is granted to educated men and others who rise above the status quo. According the video “Socrates on Self Confidence – Philosophy: Guide to Happiness” by Alain De Botton, “philosophy is an intel-lectual invitation to nonconformity.” Socrates encourages people of Athens to think for them-selves and follow their own principles when they discover them. He developed a technique called the So-cratic method, which encouraged self-reflection within an individual in order to free themselves from pre-conditioned modes of behavior. Soc-rates is considered an archetype because he ad-hered to his principles until his execution. This man sacrificed his freedom in order to eventual-ly cultivate a liberated state Alice Walker, author of “I am Blue,” is an activist for women and animal rights. The story begins describing a white horse, named Blue, which the author personifies as a charac-ter longing for happiness despite having acres to run free and ample food available. Blue is lonesome and desires compan-ionship. Later his owner gets another horse and the two become a couple: “Bringing his new friend with him, there was a different look in his eyes. A look of independence, of self-pos-session, and inalienable horseness.” However, circumstances change when Blue is separated from the other horse once she gets pregnant. As a result, he turns remorseful and irritable. Decisions and choices are integral

aspects of freedom. However, when the option is no longer granted, freedom disappears. In Anton Chekhov’s “Lady with a Pet Dog,” the main character is a 40-year-old man seek-ing freedom through fidelity. He feels trapped in the structured life he created. Dimitri is married with children and works at bank. He’s comfortable, yet finds his situation stale. He meets the young woman who was also married. For these characters, freedom is like a dream they wish to make reality. Yet neither one will sacrifice the life established already. The notion of the freedom entices the lovers, but circumstances hinder the affair. As the story goes, “and it was clear to both of them and was still far, far off, and not the most com-plicated and difficult part was just beginning.” The reader could conclude that the characters might commit to each other despite how this will destroy the lives they initially created for themselves. Freedom is in the choices they make. Henry David Thoreau, Alice Walker, Anton Chekhov, and Socrates all contribute crucial concepts about freedom. Factors such as circumstances, narrow-mindedness, and con-vention inhibit autonomy. Like an aviary, the birds within need to find a way to break free and fly. Education and choices dictate our paths to liberation. The work of these thinkers and writ-ers help assuage the mind and serve as keys to unlock the cage.

Speak your Truth

Unlocking the Aviary

By Marialys Gonzalez

By April Zielinski

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the PCCC library. A student voiced his concern on the limited number of comput-ers and small space during the rush hours of 10:00 AM -12:00 PM every day. In response, the SGA said they will gather feedback but for the meantime students should utilize the comput-er labs that are available on campus. Other students were

also able to state their con-cerns and get a reasonable re-sponse. The meeting was ad-journed promptly at 1:49 p.m. The next Town Hall Meeting will be on November 16, 2017 at 1:15 pm in the Pater-son Theater room and other campus locations to be an-nounced soon. Stay alert for any updates!

SGA TOWN HALL MEETING(Continued from page 4)