The ReMarker | March 2021 by St. Mark's School of Texas

The ReMarker

Dallas, TX • Volume 67, Number 5 • March 11, 2021 • St. Mark’s School of Texas

The ReMarker profiled the state of mental health on campus. Real problems emerged — resources were thin, students felt overwhelmed and some thought they weren’t being heard at all. ONE YEAR AGO,

we’re examining what’s changed since then — and what hasn’t. We've seen improvement, but it's time for us to start to figure out what's... ONE YEAR LATER,

The next

step

STORY Robert Pou, Henry McElhaney, Luke Piazza, Jamie Mahowald PHOTO Collin Katz

Inside

GameStop debacle

Conversations on what happened to the GameStop stock — and what it means for you. Page 3

Katy Rubarth

Remembering a beloved administrator, community member and mother. Page 9

NCAA football returns The sports world welcomes the return of an iconic football video game franchise. Page 26

Essentials

The ReMarker • March 11, 2021

What's INSIDE

Issues Looking into the clash between a subreddit and Wall Street over the inflation of GameStop stock. 3 Talking with the counselors about the state of college applications and standardized tests. 4 Procrastination: Why do we have such a tendency to put things off until the very last minute? 5 The reasons reading outside of English classes is beneficial for students of all grades. 6

Discoveries Alan Stern ’75 will become the first scientist to fly commercially into space on Virgin Galactic. 7 Alex Rothkrug ’12 , Scientific Marksman founder, discusses the creation of his passion project. 8

10600 After battles with cancer, Katy Rubarth passed Feb. 4, leaving a “titanic” legacy behind. 9 The annually held Alumni Weekend has been changed and postponed until next fall. 10

Behind the Column Episode 5 airs today:

Freshman Ben Foster led a toy and goodie bag drive benefiting child cancer patients. 12

14 Comments overheard around campus.

Paul Mlakar Director of Academic Information Systems

I saved parabolas for last because they’re stupid. While teaching parametric equations

Members of the Editorial Board, Thirunagari, Alidina and Pou, comment on their love for music and the artists who make it. 17 Editorials: Diversity Committee should engage more with the student body; teachers should be more available for office hours. 18 Editorial: Everyone must follow CDC guidelines on the vaccine; those who travel over Spring Break should take steps to stay safe. 19

Culture What does it take for a high schooler’s painting to be sold for $2,000 at an art gallery exhibit? 20 How Sam Yonack ‘12 created his own path through Hollywood. Not in acting. In marketing. 21 Buzz: Reviews of hot chicken restaurants around Dallas; a review of the movie The Little Things. 22

Sports Sitting down with a senior and two juniors to discuss their experiences hunting and fishing. 23

Eighth grader Jaden Ouyang put his musical skills to the service of the community in a concert. 11

Photostory: McDonald’s Week, which happened exclusively on campus again this year. 13

Say what?

Piazza: The daily battle of an average Marksman. 16

Senior Cooper Ribman and Tucker Ribman ’18 will be teammates once again at Harvard wrestling. 24

Instagram: @remarkernewspaper Podcast: In-depth conversations concerning all sorts of topics Focal Point on Spotify, Apple Music and Soundcloud

PERSONAL COLUMN

Centerspread One year after our previous coverage of mental health on campus, we revisit the issue with old and new faces to see how we have changed. 14-15

Opinions Editorial: What has and has not improved regarding mental health on campus.

After the COVID-19 outbreak in the weight room, a look at athletes’ experience in return to play. 25 Students around campus give their opinions of NCAA Football and its upcoming return. 26 As the spring season kicks off, a recap of the swimming, basketball, wrestling and soccer seasons. 27

Backpage Freshman Baxter Perry-Miller will become the 115th scout to ever receive the Distinguished Conservation Service Award. 28

This year, students are more aware of the fact that we have three counselors, Lower, Middle and Upper School, and that they can reach out however they need to. Jake*, anonymous senior

Shane May Thomas B. Walker III ’73 Mathematics Department Chair

Cristian [Pereira] is the class drama queen. While Cristian was sprawled on another student’s desk.

ON THE COURT Junior Corvin Oprea and senior Sarbik Saha walk back to the bench during warmups before the team’s game against Waxahachie High School. The Lions lost 62-65.

Put on the elf shoes, they’ll be worth your while

t’s a V3, easy send, got a few bad crimps but my buddy campused it and he projects V5s so you should be able to flash this. At the start of last summer, if someone had said that to me, I’d have thought they were speaking a different language. Well, not really. But you know what I mean. When the world shut down last March, one of the hardest changes was the loss of a quick and easy way to get exercise. With track season pulverized quicker than T’Challa in Avengers: Infinity War and a weight room whose doors were locked so tight that not even Coach Dilworth’s motivational yells could be heard within, I was left to my own devices. The Northaven Trail was welcoming. With pleasant scenery, it’s a good place to go on a run. So that’s what I did. I’d run three times a week, three miles. It felt good — I slowly noticed that I was getting skinnier. Except, I was losing too much weight. If you’ve never seen me, I look like Slenderman. I did not need to be losing weight. I needed to break up my running and find an outlet that would let me get exercise but wouldn’t slowly steal the small amount of muscle I had worked years to build up. Sarah Kate Ashton is an insane rock climber. Like, world-championships, newspaper -overs and gettingsponsored insane. She’s also a close friend of mine. I decided to go out on a limb and ask her to take me climbing. I was nervous when I entered the gym. I felt like everyone was vigilantly watching me — I was a trespasser who had entered their sacred climbing space without permission. The guy at the front desk handed me rental shoes that looked like something an elf would wear, forcing me to don a shameful symbol of my ignorance and inexperience. Amateur Cristian rock climbers, I’d soon Pereira Senior be told, are called Editor “gumbies.” I was a gumby. After my orientation, Sarah Kate walks over to the bouldering section of the gym — a boulder is a small rock wall with a crash pad at the bottom that’s safe to be climbed without ropes. “Try this one.” She points to a route with white handholds and footholds. Excited, I start to climb. I reach the top — on my first try! I knew I was cut out for rock climbing. It was the easiest route in the gym. But, looking back now, it was a start. A start that would spark a surprise love for the unique sport and a desire to get better. Soon, I was going two, three times a week. I got a Summit gym membership (it’s an absolute steal, by the way — it’s such a good value) and now I’ve even graduated from the rental elf shoes to my own personal elf shoes. My hands are callused up, and I’ve fallen hundreds of times, but I found something that I loved by chance. I don’t consider myself a good climber. But I do consider myself a climber. I go twice a week, I speak the tongue, and when people ask me what my interests are, climbing is on the list. I doubted myself walking into that gym. I thought I’d be awful and make a fool out of myself. And both of those things happened. But none of them ended up mattering. What mattered is that I, because I silenced my doubt, tried something new and discovered a hobby. The world is a judgmental place. But sometimes, you need to take a deep breath and slip on the elf shoes. I promise it’ll be worth it.

Economy

Taking on Wall Street

In late January, GameStop stock value suddenly skyrocked, dealing crushing blows to hedge fund corporations and yielding massive gains to investors. Behind this enormous surge? A vigilante investment group on Reddit.

the investing experience I’ve developed with the behavioral long-term process of helping people make better decisions.” Despite thinking of the situation as lacking societal benefit, he understands why people would be so attracted to it. “If you really want to invest in things like GameStop, the Betterment approach would be to do so with five or at most 10 percent of your money,” Stein said. “Look at it as a small, fun bet to do on the side — don’t do it with the majority of your savings.” For junior James Singhal, investing has been just that — a hobby on the side. Fortunately, he stumbled across the infamous Reddit stock-trading subreddit (group) that started the GameStop craze: r/WallStreetBets. “I looked at [GameStop], and I thought, ‘Well, this is really undervalued, and they have the ability to go pretty high,’” Singhal said. Wary of the fluctuating stock values, Singhal invested a small amount. “I didn’t put much money into it,” Singhal said. “I thought it was pretty risky, given their retail, COVID and the fact that they had just gone under, but they were paying off a lot of their debt, so I thought it was a good bet, and I went in with about $14. Not that much, but it ended up paying off well.” According to AP economics instructor Bryan Boucher, GameStop’s business model is a dated one. “I think, just from an investment standpoint, the company is not very good,” Boucher said. “It’s a brick-andmortar store. Many of them are in malls. No one really goes to malls anymore, especially not in a pandemic. No one really buys physical video game cartridges anymore because a lot of that is virtual. It’s a classic example of a business that’s been outpaced by technology.” Yet, fortunately for the

company, in early 2021, salvation arrived from r/WallStreetBets. “The Reddit group — full of amateur investors — had seen that a lot of hedge funds had ‘shorted’ GameStop and said, ‘Let’s mess with it,’” Boucher said. “And so, in a weird way, it became a populist movement of random people interested in the stock market who were also a little bit angry at big hedge fund investors.” The subreddit helped the stock’s value increase by dramatic proportions. In January, $GME’s value increased by 1500 percent in only two weeks. For Boucher, the economic explanation behind this enormous increase begins with short sales. “If I’m an investor and I think a stock is going to lose value in the future, what I’m going to do is borrow that stock from someone who owns it and sell it for cash,” Boucher said. “After the stock falls, I’m going to rebuy it for a lower price and return what I borrowed.”

When you see people making a lot of money, everyone wants to get in on it. Jonathan Stein ‘97, Betterment CEO

Big investors on Wall Street, anticipating the decreasing value of GameStop, poured their money into these short sales. “A lot of larger investors — what we refer to as hedge fund investors who do this for a living — had taken out a lot of stock equity in GameStop with the expectation that that stock was going to fall and that they would make money by shorting,” Boucher said. But r/WallStreetBets investors bought GameStop stock and held it, leading to GameStop’s value rising while Wall Street investors’ short sales cost them millions in a process called a short squeeze. “It was a $40 stock that was

then suddenly trading for like $300 a share,” Boucher said. “So again, if I have shorted that stock, that’s a real problem for me because I’m hoping that stock will go to $20. I borrowed your stock for $40, and I still owe you your stock for $40. But now, for me to buy back GameStop, it’s gonna cost me $340. That’s all generated by these Reddit users.” Boucher believes this highly publicized economic frenzy has implications for investment strategy in the future. “I do think that this could change how we look at the stock market and how we look at larger hedge fund investors who often are doing things that manipulate the market,” Boucher said. “That’s exactly what these Reddit users were doing. At the end of the day, the company GameStop isn’t any more valuable than it was before all this happened. It’s still kind of a dying company, but its stock was trading. If you just looked at stock prices, you would have thought it was the most profitable company in the world.” As a teacher, Boucher wants this clash between Wall Street and r/WallStreetBets to provide a more clear understanding of the relationship between stock prices and the economy as a whole. “I hope it leads to people thinking a little bit more practically about their investments,” Boucher said. “From an economics teacher’s perspective, I hope it teaches the lesson that the stock market is not an indicator of our economy. In some ways, it’s a form of gambling. You’re betting on the futures of companies, and sometimes the value of a company is fabricated based on stock trading. So I think this brought to light a lot of challenges with how we view stocks.” STORY Toby Barrett, Austin Williams ARTWORK Jonathan Yin

The ReMarker • March 11, 2021

all Street was witnessing history. Right in front of them, GameStop stock value went up, and up, and up and up — and they could do little to stop it. They had never before seen growth of this magnitude in the history of the market. The massive 1500 percent increase in the value of the stock shocked the nation and struck a crushing blow to Wall Street. Betterment Bryan Founder and Boucher Economics CEO Jonathan instructor Stein ‘97 heard about the situation much like other Americans did — through its booming media coverage. “It’s like seeing an ad on late-night television or the internet that says, ‘Here’s how you can get rich in five simple steps,’” Stein said. “People are suckers for that stuff, myself included.” While he initially attempted to short the stock at its peak, Stein is happy he avoided the entire situation. “I just don’t think that’s what we want out of our capital markets,” Stein said. “The reason that we have the stock market is so that companies, people or stores that want to make investments in technology can raise money to do that. It exists to allocate capital. Things like this GameStop debacle don’t improve that at all.” Betterment, Stein’s company, is one of the pioneers in the robo-advisor industry. Its website reads, “Make your financial goals real.” “I founded Betterment to help every American have the best tools to make the most of their money,” Stein said. “Betterment is unlike most investment apps out there today that encourage you to trade, gamble and do foolish things that are fun but shortsighted. Ultimately, I combined

FAST TRACK The subreddit group r/ WallStreetBets bought and held GameStop stocks, driving prices up by large margins and hurting investors who shorted the stock.

Issues

GameStop Game Stop

$GME + 690 — 124

College

An update on standardized testing and the college admissions process. Page 4

Work Ethic

Tips and tricks to kick disruptive procrastination habits. Page 5

Reading

A look at the benefits of pleasure reading. Page 6

In brief PRODUCE DRIVE Both middle schoolers and lower schoolers had the opportunity to experience Zoom tours of CitySquare’s Food Pantry, led by Food Operations Manager Meredith Parrott. Parrott walked students through the pantry’s operations. To donate food to City Square, the Lower School and Middle School have begun collecting bags of produce. The Middle School collection area is located on the walkway under the choir room. Currently, the Lower School is collecting in their lobby. Additional service projects in relation to City Square may be explored in the future. NEW TESTING DATES The SAT and ACT will be held on campus in the coming months. The SAT will be offered to juniors only on April 13 starting at 8:35 a.m. College counseling will send a registration email. The ACT, available for both sophomores and juniors, will be on April 17 and June 12. Students should contact college counseling to get a unique test code which they’ll use on myact. org to register. SERVICE HOUR DEADLINE There is now only one deadline on April 5 for community service hours to be turned in. At this date, all 15 required hours for the year must be submitted. While the previous ten hour deadline in January was pushed back due to COVID-19, the number of hours due at the end of the year has not changed. DROPPING TESTS College counseling seminars for juniors have commenced and are taking place in the Science Lecture Hall for six weeks. Seminar topics consist of six college counseling-related themes, ranging from transcripts and résumés to letters of recommendation and essays. After the seminars conclude, the college counseling staff will have individual family conferences to talk about future goals for college and will then meet individually with juniors for the next 18 months of the college process.

ON THE CLOCK Students must contend with new changes in the college application process as collegerelated tasks begin to mount.

COLLEGE

Rethinking the rules

After cancelled SAT writing and subject tests, there are many questions as to what college admissions will look like in the future.

March 11, 2021

Issues

The ReMarker

his past year has played host to a number of historic changes in the college application and admissions process. With quick, sweeping changes continuing to be put in place, the college admissions landscape has become much more complex. For one, colleges have seen a large spike in the number of applications they receive. College Counseling Director Veronica Pulido sees this surge in applicants as a new factor for college admissions offices to consider in acceptance decisions. “More students are applying to colleges and the numbers of applications have risen tremendously for this admission cycle,” Pulido said. “The applications are definitely rising in a lot of institutions. So, it will be an interesting piece of the puzzle to figure out how the colleges have pivoted to not looking at test scores or considering them depending on how they’re doing to figure out who they’re going to admit, especially in the regular decision group, when the applications have risen tremendously.” Moreover, the College Board recently eliminated SAT writing and cancelled SAT subject tests. Pulido credits this decision to the College Board’s wish for more practical assessment. “They’ve eliminated the writing section of the SAT,” Pulido said. “They figured that colleges did not find that information or that metric useful in the process, or also to accessibility for tests in general.” College Counseling Associate Director Phoebe Kingsak believes these changes may create obstacles for students’ applications to STEM-oriented colleges, but will ultimately lead to increased availability for students. “It’s put up some roadblocks for students who wanted to apply to colleges such as Georgetown or MIT because they strongly recommended subject tests,” Kingsak said. “Now, there is no such thing. I think that it is going to be a lot more accessible to all students and Marksmen to apply with the SAT changes.” However, Kingsak does not forecast great differences in college admission from the past. “We’ve had pretty similar acceptances from schools that St. Mark’s boys are usually admitted to

Facts and 10 FIGURES College process

with the same profile, so not too much has changed,” Kingsak said. In light of current conditions, almost two-thirds of all colleges have announced they will be going temporarily test-optional. Kingsak thinks this new policy will modify the process by which colleges differentiate applications. “Colleges started announcing that they were going test-optional throughout last summer,” Kingsak said. “It was really like pulling teeth, because colleges like having that number because they don’t have to read through every application. With a 1560 and a 1390, they are probably just going to take the 1560. Take away those numbers, and now they have to figure out how to compare those two applications.” While tests are now optional, Pulido recognizes the large role scores still play in the admission process. “I do think that over the next five to 10 years that standardized testing is going to be something that’s eliminated from the process altogether,” Pulido said. “But for the current term, even in the next two, three, four, five years, I do think that it’s still going to be a piece of the puzzle, because so many things have been tied to standardized testing, such as US News and World Rankings, in addition to just anything that trustees care about or that the colleges really want to emphasize to show who is on their campus.” However, Kingsak’s advice to Marksmen who will be entering the college scene is to attempt the SAT and rival ACT at least once. “We here at St. Mark’s definitely say to take both the SAT and ACT once just to have a base score, and you can dictate the future from there,” Kingsak said. “If the score is not within the college threshold’s fifty

percent increase in overall applications

9 21.3 6.1

percent increase in application to applicant ratio

percent increase in Southwest state applications

percent increase in Mid-Atlantic state applications Sources: Inside Highered Ed, Ingenius Prep

percent, then you can choose not to send it. If it is in that threshold, then you are welcome to send it or try to improve upon that score.” Veronica Another factor in entering Pulido the college scene is college College Counseling visits, which were virtual. Director Most colleges are hosting informative webinars and meet and greets to get to know admission officers and professors. Pulido recommends taking advantage of these opportunities. “It’s never too early to start visiting, but because of the virtual potential or ability at this point, we highly encourage freshmen, sophomores, juniors to take advantage of virtual programs at your own time at your own pace,” Pulido said. “Ultimately many of these are recorded and so it’s just like a podcast, you can listen to it, you can find it when you have time and you can fast forward if you really don’t want to hear the whole thing.” STORY Toby Barrett, Shreyan Daulat GRAPHIC Jonathan Yin

SLIPPERY SLOPE A computer is full of easy ways to ignore a mounting pile of assignments. Try closing all tabs before beginning homework to increase productivity.

Calculus BC AP Microeconomics LOST MARBLES FOUND

Chemistry for Idiots I love English!

Generic Book Title

PROCRASTINATION

Due date or do-date?

If you don’t know how to properly resize graphics, don’t even try, just text me. 469 688 2858. I will hunt you down if you up. of up, especially when youfuck haveitplenty

For people of all ages, Damour traces the psychological aspect of procrastination to avoidance. “We avoid something because it makes us anxious, whether it feels like a big project or a difficult project,” Damour said. “What's so tricky is that, in the short term, avoidance alleviates anxiety because you get an immediate relief. Your brain tells you, ‘Hah! It went away!’” That short-term relief is a fraud. Putting something off gives it time to grow in your mind, becoming larger and scarier. “I think you’d find if you opened an assignment

STORY Austin Williams, Keshav Krishna GRAPHIC Jonathan Yin

Chinese New Year celebrations go forward as previously planned by Myles Lowenberg ith events in classes and a paper cutting competition, the Chinese New Year celebrations on campus continued despite problems caused by both the COVID-19 pandemic and blackouts owing to the winter storm. The President of the Chinese club, senior Matthew Ho, helped organize the festivities. “The first [activity] was for the entire school, which was the paper cutting competition,” Ho said. “Our second competition was only for the current Marksmen taking Chinese in Upper School and Middle School. We

created this fun trivia Google Forms competition, and we chose a couple winners and had some prizes we gave out to them.” When he was planning the celebrations, Ho couldn’t have one of the main traditions for Chinese New Year happen at school. “With the pandemic, we had to really think about going away from our normal way of celebrating, which is usually with food.” Ho said. “But we’re not exactly able to share and give out food.” Senior Shiv Yajnik was the winner of the paper cutting competition, a prominent form of art in Chinese

culture. “I would compare [paper cutting] to calligraphy, because it’s something that is very easily accessible. The materials for it are not hard to afford,” Yajnik said. “Of course, actually doing paper cutting is another thing.” Yajnik had no previous experience with Chinese paper cutting, but he was still able to make his winning design in the form of a dragon. “I cut out a dragon, and then in the middle of it, towards the head, I cut out a character which is supposed to represent the appearance of a dragon in flight,” Yajnik said. “I also inserted a character that means a roar of thunder.

Dragons in Chinese culture are often responsible for bringing rain.” Chinese instructor Janet Lin was one of the judges in the Chinese papercutting competition. “[Yajnik] put in a lot of effort and a lot of details," Lin said. "Paper cutting can become very time consuming, and I think he crafted it in very good detail.” In the end, the celebrations went on here despite the difficulties. “It’s pretty tough because Chinese people would like to get together and have fun,” Lin said. “But with the pandemic, we just have to do what we can.”

5 March 11, 2021

To Julie Pechersky, coordinator of academic support, procrastination is a problem some Marksmen face that can ultimately lead to bigger issues as it relates to their health and well-being. By the that procrastination numbers exists“Iinfeelevery school and work environment to some extent,” Pechersky said. “Our school is rigorous and has a consistent percent of upper nightly load of homework, school students which can make procrastination think they have a serious problem more of an issue for some boys." with procrastiWaiting until the last nation minute affects more than just academic performance. "Procrastination leads to stress and anxiety, staying up too late and not getting the sleep you need," Pechesky said. "It can become a vicious cycle that can take a long-term toll on a person's ability to get through the day mentally.”

Pechersky gives a wide variety of causes for procrastination — poor organizational skills, inability to focus, fatigue, lack of motivation and a lack of understanding of the material can all lead to putting off work until the last minute. “We as a school try to establish some organizational study skills over time,” Pechersky said. “Our teachers are aware of what our kids are capable of doing developmentally. They wouldn’t ask a fifth-grader to write a research paper without breaking it down into manageable steps and giving them reasonable timelines. Learning these types of skills early allows a student to be better prepared later to take on a larger project more independently.” ‘Senioritis,’ as it’s referred to around campus, is the phenomenon of seniors relaxing their standards for schoolwork after the first semester and college applications come to a close. “It’s easy to want to take a breath and just enjoy life when you finally get that college acceptance — which I very much appreciate — but seniors have to find ways to keep themselves motivated,” Pechersky said. “An easy way is to stick to the nightly routine that they’ve established. Hopefully, they’ve selected classes they have a genuine interest in because seniors have the opportunity for a more personalized schedule.”

Issues

heck. Clinical psychologist Dr. Lisa Damour slices her black ballpoint pen through a drawing of a little red tomato on her calendar. Just a few weeks ago, she discovered a new strategy to avoid procrastination — the Pomodoro technique, named after the Italian word for "tomato." The base model is simple: 25 minutes of focus and a five-minute break. Stack six of these in a single day,. and you’ve got almost three hours of uninterrupted work. Next time you sit down to do your homework, open the clock app on your phone. Navigate to the timer section. Set a timer. Maybe it’s an hour. Maybe it’s ten minutes. The key is to give work your undivided attention — you’d be surprised how fast a daunting task turns into an easy one.

The ReMarker

time to deal with it, there’s a good chance you decide, ‘I can totally do this.’” Damour said. “Other times, the only way we're really going to accomplish something is if we have time pressure — that’s where the Pomodoro technique comes into play.” Junior Nicholas Koch has been timesegmenting his homework since eighth grade, without even knowing the strategy had a name. “I use an app called Forest,” Koch said. “It sounds stupid, but it’s worked really well for me. Each time you need to focus, you plant a tree and set a timer. If you stay in the app, your tree will grow. If you leave the app in the middle of a session, it’ll die.” Koch and Damour both find motivation by watching the clock tick down. “Your job is just to put your nose to the grindstone for 25 minutes,” Damour said. “Don’t look at anything else — just do the thing. When I have that moment of ‘I hate this,’ I look at the phone. I see those ten minutes and 38 seconds, and I tell myself to keep going because it’s really not that long.” Outside of time pressure, another way students can avoid procrastination is to think very carefully about how they approach their work. “Some people use the ‘swallow the frog’ approach,” Damour said. “It’s where you tackle the hardest things first and leave the easier, more enjoyable tasks for the end of the night. I like to start with the easier tasks simply so I can thin down my to-do list. In the end, it all comes down to preference.” Cutting out procrastination can help pave the road to an easier, more relaxed life. Better time management skills come with a multitude of advantages. “I think the biggest plus is that it helps people feel in control,” Damour said. “On the days when I’m hitting the Pomodoros that I need to, just crossing them off, I feel like I'm in charge of my attention. That [control is] the piece doesn't get discussed nearly enough.”

Delete this before importing by the way While it may be nicknamed "The Marksman way" by students, putting assignments off can only lead to negative consequences in the future. It's time for students to learn to prioritize work and to avoid the easy trap of pushing things off until tomorrow.

Junior Class hosts chess tournament

PLEASURE READING

Back to the books

As technology plays an increasing presence in everyday life, students are slowly dropping the habit of reading for pleasure.

aking a break from homework, junior Tomek Marczcewski savors his increasingly scarce free time. But unlike many Marksmen, he’s not playing video games, watching television or surfing through social media. He’s reading a book. It wasn’t assigned to him by his English teacher, either. Marczewski chose this book independently to read purely for his own enjoyment. And in this day and age, that’s an anomaly.

March 11, 2021

Issues

The ReMarker

English Department Chair Michael Morris strongly believes in the importance of pleasure reading and pushes his students to read novels aside from those assigned for class. “I encourage my students to read for pleasure over the extended breaks and certainly over the summer, too,” Morris said. “I emphasize that those should be books that haven’t been assigned and that students don’t feel like they need to annotate necessarily, but that they just want to read. In some ways, the greatest goal we have as English teachers is to make reading for pleasure a part of living.” As a boy living in a time when people weren’t glued to screens, Morris read for pleasure as a form of entertainment. Many of the books he read have positively influenced his life. One such book is Look Homeward, Angel, a coming-of-age tale by Thomas Wolfe. “It’s a book that I don’t think I would ever try to or want to teach,” Morris said. “It’s so personal to me. I’ve memorized large passages from the book, and it’s a part of who I am. I would never get rid of my books, but if I did and could only keep one, that would be one that I would be sorely tempted to keep.” With many distractions such as social media and TikTok that have become increasingly popular with teens, fewer students have been checking out books from the library or physically turning the pages of a novel. Morris, however, views pleasure reading as a better alternative when taking a break. “Obviously, technology has lots of advantages,” Morris said. “You can read a lot on your devices, but I do think that technology, especially when it’s driven by social media, has an immediacy to it and a sense of stress level attached that you can escape by reading a book.” To cultivate a habit of reading, director of libraries and information services Tinsley Silcox encourages

AN UNUSUAL SIGHT Fewer and fewer Marksmen are seen pleasure reading in the library — it’s become a space of silent study instead of novel exploration.

students to read inside of topics that already interest them. “One of the things I try to do is talk to students about what their interests are when they are not on their screens,” Silcox said. “If you play a musical instrument, maybe you would want to read a book on composers or composing. If you are really geeked out on computers, read Steve Jobs biography, or if you are really looking for pleasure reading, there are lots of murder mysteries and sci-fi adventures. You have to find the spark in yourself to make you want to read something rather than just playing video games.” While technology has made students move away from pleasure reading, Silcox realizes that technology has also made books more accessible. “Technology makes the ability to read anything anytime anywhere a lot easier,” Silcox said. “It’s one thing to go to a library, pick out a book, stick it in your backpack and remember to take it with you, but you always have your phone with you. With most of the current apps and ebooks, you can just pick up your phone and start reading.” Silcox cites pleasure reading as a way to cope with the everyday stresses of life. “I think pleasure reading is one of the best things you can do,” Silcox said. “If you are reading a book for pleasure, you are not thinking about the next grade or homework assignment. You Tomek are just immersing yourself Marczewski in something that lets you junior escape. Books are one of the greatest escapes you can ever have. You can go anywhere. You can go to a different galaxy or back in time, all from a comfortable chair in your room.” For Marczewski, many of the benefits Morris and Silcox describe, like reading genres he enjoys and the ability to have a break from his daily routine, are what began his passion for pleasure reading. “My favorite reading genre is epic fantasy,” Marczewski said. “It’s definitely not everyone’s cup of tea. But I really enjoy it because you get these really in-depth, well-thought-out stories. There’s a kind of escapism where you can sit down and get lost in another world for an evening. Some people find that in TV shows, some people find it in video games, and I do too, but

reading is just another form of that; one that’s slightly underappreciated because it takes a bit more effort to get into.” Marczewski does not enjoy books assigned in English class nearly as much as the ones he reads on his own. He believes annotating and reading older literature dissuades many of his classmates from picking up a book outside of class. “Most students associate reading with school reading, which is understandable considering they don’t really have any other kind of reading to compare it to,” Marczewski said. “Being forced to read something that you don’t want to is a great way to ensure that a lot of people never become avid readers in their free time because they just have a negative association with reading.” Morris Michael acknowledges many Morris students may not be English as willing to read on instructor their own but still hopes they take up pleasure reading. “We certainly hope students enjoy the books they read in English class, but we’re more concerned with students appreciating the books they read for their artistry, writing and insight,” Morris said. “Annotations are really helpful if we’re discussing a text in class. It’s unfortunate that students automatically associate reading a book with homework. I get the reluctance students have since they think it’s academic, but students can read books on many topics that interest them. It’s why I recommend pleasure reading.” Like playing video games or watching television, Marczewski believes pleasure reading is just another form of recreation; one he hopes students will be more open to in the future. “I’ve accepted that many people will not pick up reading,” Marczewski said. “I hope they don’t conflate reading in English class with pleasure reading. Pleasure reading is a pastime. It’s fun, and that’s all that pleasure reading is about. There’s a book out there for everyone, and I encourage people to give it a try.” STORY Shreyan Daulat, Keshav Krishna PHOTO Owen Simon

In my opinion:

Aadi Khasgiwala Sophomore

“It’s really sad to see this hobby become more rare as technology takes over.

“I read to increase my knowledge and listen to successful people who have already done things I want to accomplish.”

Harrison Ingram Senior

Jason Lange Assistant Head of Middle School

Joe Milliet Math instructor

by Grant Jackson he Junior Class hosted a chess tournament that featured a large bracket and a live-streamed final performance during an assembly Jan. 29th. The Junior Class chess tournament, organized by juniors Alex Geng, Thomas Philip and Enoch Ellis, created an “enjoyable” experience during a rather “rough” week of remote learning, according to Geng. “My friend Thomas Philip and I wanted to organize something for the grade because we knew we were going remote for a whole week,” Geng said. “Since a lot of people were playing chess, we decided creating a chess tournament would help bring the grade closer together and allow us to have some fun at home.” Finalists, junior Adam Lai and junior Max Chuang, made their way through a bracket of competitors. After defeating the rest of their opponents, finalists competed in the championship match that was streamed on a Teams assembly broadcasted to the Upper School. During the assembly, they played a round of online chess via the website Chess.com. Lai, who had been introduced to chess at the age of six by his father, enjoyed playing chess during the assembly after quitting chess competitions multiple years ago. “After I played at a club for a couple years, I ended up quitting until last summer,” Adam said. “My passion was rekindled by the exploding popularity of chess on Twitch and YouTube.” After winning the tournament, Adam reflected on the game. “Performing at assembly was a bit nerveracking especially with the technical difficulties,” Adam said. “But overall, it was a pretty good experience along with the rest of the tournament.” Lai’s opponent, Chuang, was introduced to chess in First Grade Chess Club. Learning from Grand Master Babkuli Annakov, Chuang found himself hooked on the game of chess. After his performance, Max reflects on his gameplay. “I don’t think it was my best performance,” Chuang said. “Because there was no prize, I did not really prepare.” Despite expressing his feelings about his own performance during the live streamed event, Chuang enjoyed performing in the assembly very much. “It was fun bonding with my friends over chess,” Chuang said. “I would definitely participate in future school chess tournaments.”

“It’s a great way to unwind when life gets stressful, and to build reading stamina.

“I always read from a physical book, never on screen. That’s part of the pleasure – reducing my screen time.

Space

Alan Stern ‘75 takes his next step into the realm of space exploration: a NASAsponsored commerical flight to the edge of space with Virgin Galactic.

After completing his bachelor’s two degrees in physics and astronomy at the University of Texas, as well as his master’s degrees in aerospace engineering and planetary science at the University of Colorado, Stern went straight to NASA for an internship. “It was the place to be,” Stern said. “The first summer, I worked in Mission Control, and I got to fly with some experiments on zero-gravity flights. The second summer, I worked on spacewalk procedures.” He quickly moved up in the ranks, becoming the principal investigator on NASA’s New Horizons mission that started in the year 2000. “At its peak, there were 2,500 men and women involved,” Stern said. “It was the fastest spacecraft ever launched, and it’s now almost twice as far away as Pluto. It’s still operating perfectly, and still churning out scientific results.” The team has shrunk to only 200 people, largely because the mission has been so successful. “Everything we aimed to do was either met or exceeded,” Stern said. “The flyby of Pluto took place on July 14, 2015, and the flyby of the Kuiper Belt Object Arrokoth was on Jan. 1, 2019. We left earth in 2006. It took nine and a half years to cross the solar system — going super fast. We got to the orbit of the Moon in nine hours. We literally launched at two in the afternoon and were on the 11 o’clock news.” Stern began his efforts to convince NASA to fund something like this as early as the end of the 80s. “It took over 14 years to even raise the money, another five years to build it and nine and a half years to fly it to Pluto,” Stern said. In October 2020, Stern was selected as the first NASA-funded commercial space crew member aboard a Virgin Galactic mission. “It’s been a life goal since way before I went to St. Mark’s,” Stern said. “I’ve gotten close a couple of times but never succeeded. But now I’m the first scientist that was ever chosen and funded by NASA to do this — on the planet, in the universe, ever! That’s just an amazing honor and a high responsibility.” Virgin Galactic has received much media attention in the past decade owing to its proposal of tourist flights to space. Stern’s trip is unique because NASA, a federal agency, is

Right now, SpaceShipTwo is still in flight-test, but he expects it to be ready in the next six months. “The mission’s main objective is twofold,” Stern said. “The first is determining how well the vehicle can be used for future research, and the second is a spaceflight physiology experiment. I’m bringing along a sophisticated camera system called an image-intensified camera that can see extremely faint things when you point it at the sky. I’ve done this experiment many times on F/A-18 Hornet [jets], with myself as the operator.” His instruments have also had the chance to fly on the famed Space Shuttle, operated by NASA astronauts. “Essentially, we have data from the Space Shuttle and the F/A-18 flights, and we want to find out how looking through the Virgin Galactic windows compares,” Stern said. “The quality of the windows and the way that light glints off the wing, for example, can limit your ability to do real, hardnosed experiments.” In addition, Stern will be sporting hightech gear to monitor his vitals. “Think of the gear for the spaceflight physiology experiment as a vest that measures my pulse rate, my respiration rate and my blood pressure to try and get physiological data about what it’s like for an experimenter flying on these flights,” Stern said. “On the way up, I’ll be experiencing over five Gs of acceleration.

Tom Hanks

Celebrity FLYERS Several famous figures spent their Christmas money in 2013 on a joyride to space with Virgin Galactic. Here are those faces:

sponsoring his research. “Private space companies and the government together can accomplish a lot more than either can alone,” Stern said. “Imagine if everything that we did in the sky was only the result of the U.S. Air Force. Without commercial operators, we wouldn’t have airlines, we wouldn’t have FedEx, we wouldn’t have a lot of things that make the economy go today. In that vein, the new developments in commercial spaceflight are creating a whole new space economy that we can hardly imagine today.”

Katy Perry

Then you’re in microgravity, meaning you’re basically weightless for five minutes, and on the way down it’s six Gs of deceleration.” Six Gs of force can be equated to the feeling of six times one’s body weight. Stern is comfortable with the experiment, but it’s not something that he’s ever experienced before. “I’ve worn this same system on jet fighters pulling similar trajectories but not to that kind of altitude level,” Stern said. “The plan is to characterize what other experimenters might expect to experience, essentially with me as a guinea pig.” The sheer height Stern will reach is mindboggling. An airplane typically flies at around 35,000 feet. Stern will reach 350,000. “If you’re standing straight up, and the altitude I’ll reach on SpaceShipTwo is around your eye-level, the highest normal commercial airline flights would be halfway between your knees and your feet,” Stern said. “Ten times lower down.” Stern sees a future with a lot more space-flight — NASA sending people to the moon, or even Mars, as well as orbital space lines. “It’s just going to be this outward expanding wave,” Stern said. “I think people will look back in a century, at the time we’re living in and probably say, ‘Back then, in the teens and twenties, that’s when Star Trek began.’ So these are truly pioneering days, and it’s cool to be a part of it. It’s a big honor

and also quite a responsibility.” On the topic of the advancement of space travel, Stern’s friend and Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk is probably the first name that comes to mind. Stern is an avid supporter. “About Elon, I’ve got to tell you that I’m biased because I’m a Tesla owner, but I think what he’s doing is unbelievably historic,” Stern said. “He’s the key change agent of both the electric car industry and the space flight industry. Either one of those things would be an amazing place to be in history. He’s a nine-sigma in terms of what he’s been able to accomplish. If that’s not sci-fi, what the hell is?” As for what’s next in his career, Stern sees his palette of activities revolving entirely around the space industry. “I’m still running New Horizons, and I’m on a couple of NASA science mission teams where I play a supporting role,” Stern said. “I’m also pretty involved in a couple of companies that are startups and a couple of boards. But if I could do anything next — my dream would be to do research on the International Space Station or on the moon.” STORY Austin Williams, Toby Barrett GRAPHIC Morgan Chow, Creative Commons

Sci-Mark

A chat with the founder of the science-focused school publication and its sponsor this year. Page 8

In brief BIOLOGY OLYMPIAD Senior Matthew Ho and junior Sampath Rapuri advanced to the semi-finals stage of the US Biology Olympiad, as was announced March 5. Twenty-five students took the test Feb. 11 after school, and only the top 10 percent of over 5,000 testers will compete again in mid April. This is Ho’s fourth semi-finalist achievement and Rapuri’s second. The test covered a wide range of topics from ecology to genetics, requiring participants to review outside of the classroom. HARVARD-MIT TOURNAMENT Eight members of the Math Team competed in the Harvard-MIT Mathematics Tournament (HMMT) March 5. Selected students spent the weeks leading up to the competition practicing with each other as the pool of candidates narrowed. HMMT is entirely studentorganized, and each tournament has nearly 1000 students from around that world that participate. The contest consists of several different rounds focused on algebra, geometry, and combinatorics, a Team Round focused on proofs, and a Guts Round requiring teams to complete 36 math problems divided into sets of four.

Ashton Kutcher

Brad Pitt

Justin Bieber

The ReMarker • March 11, 2021

aying $200,000 apiece for a joyride into space, celebrities like Brad Pitt, Katy Perry and Justin Bieber can certainly afford the ticket. Planetary scientist Alan Stern ‘75 is a celebrity in his own right, but his ticket fee is being waived by NASA. Why? He’s not taking a joyride — he’s doing research.

Discoveries

A sci-fi reality

NEW HORIZONS Principal Investigator Alan Stern ‘75 during a press conference after receiving confirmation that the spacecraft completed the flyby of Pluto. The craft took nine and a half years to reach this goal.

Angelina Jolie

Source: Entrepreneur.com

SCI-MARK

FIRST OF ITS KIND Covers of the first (left) and second (right) issues of the Scientific Marksman. Rothkrug wanted to be able to share his passion for science with others.

A scientific Marksman Seeing an interest in and need for a science-based student publication, Alex Rothkrug ‘12 decided to create his own.

March 11, 2021

The ReMarker

Discoveries

he ReMarker student newspaper was founded in 1933. Marksmen yearbook began in 1959. The Marque got its start in 1962. For decades, student publications have been a major facet of school life. So, to Alex Rothkrug ‘12, it was astonishing that despite the school’s focus on a diversity of academic subjects, the school did not produce a sciencecentered student publication. In 2010, he decided to start his own — and the Scientific Marksman was born. When he was in high school, Rothkrug spent his afternoons at Barnes and Noble reading up on the latest publications. “I would always enjoy reading weekly science news, science journals and other science publications,” Rothkrug said. “I realized pretty early during high school that I wanted to be a medical doctor, so I was pretty passionate about science and especially biology.” He knew that other publications on campus already had a solid track record of national recognition, including the ReMarker and the Marque. He knew he didn’t have the experience in design or journalistic writing that his peers had, so he was hesitant. “Admittedly, I never thought of myself as having an interest in or an innate talent for the subjective literary arts, but science was objective and made sense to me,” Rothkrug said. “I still believed there was a special place for something that would create a platform for exchanging knowledge and inspiration

that would connect with and engage science nerds like me and others who eventually helped create the first edition of the SciMark.” Having researched topics and looked into designs, Rothkrug started a staff. “Funnily enough, several people who initially doubted the SciMark eventually became writers and editors for it,” he said. “If you have enough conviction in Rothkrug and confidence in your ability to create and execute, and you put in the work upfront, others will eventually be excited about it too.” Once he decided on a timeframe and recruited a few prospective members, Rothkrug needed a faculty sponsor. For him, former Science Department Chair Stephanie Barta was an obvious choice. “Her devotion to science education, in my opinion, was unparalleled,” he said. “She always inspired me as a learner. Her face lit up with excitement when I first told her about my idea, and she was instantly all-in.” Even with a promising goal and committed members to back it up, Rothkrug was met with a few difficulties in balancing the time, experience and capabilities the team shared. “As you might imagine, communication pitfalls, staffing, deadlines and funding all presented challenges to the process,” Rothkrug said. “I believed very strongly that it was

$500 off *Bring this offer in with you to the ﬁrst appointment to be eligible. Must start treatment before December 31st, 2020. This offer cannot be used in conjuction with any other offers.

important to create a special science publication for future Marksmen that would endure long after I graduated.” This year’s Scientific Marksman faculty sponsor Bonnie Flint notes how the publication has changed since its inception. She now realizes the value in letting the students develop it more individually. “There are not a lot of large, nonacademic projects at St. Mark’s that teachers can allow students to fail at,” Flint said. “For SciMark, if they don’t take on the responsibility, then we won’t publish the magazine. I will let that failure happen. I think it’s a low-risk, high-reward endeavor where students really get to experience that pressure and pride of making something happen in a team all on their own.” As for Rothkrug, he’s eager to see where Scientific Marksman goes. “If you told me in 2010 that the SciMark would go on to win multiple Columbia Gold Crown awards, I might not have agreed out loud, but I certainly believed that it would,” Rothkrug said. “I can’t wait to see what’s next.” STORY Han Zhang, Nikhil Dattatreya PHOTOS Courtesy Alex Rothkrug

Alex Rothkrug SciMark founder

9 School mourns campus hero

n Feb. 4, a titanic void opened in the community when Katy Booras Rubarth lost her battle with cancer. Having forged connections with nearly every person in the school community as both a mother of three Marksmen — two alumni and a current eighth grader — and the director of communications since 2009, those closest to Rubarth remember her for her dogged work ethic, unparalleled commitment and unselfish nature.

After first meeting Rubarth through their sons’ connection in the Class of 2020, Kathy Mallick, Lower School administrative assistant, accompanied her on many trips to the doctor through each battle with cancer. From regular chemotherapy sessions to late-night emergency room trips, Mallick was there every step of the way. “There were times people didn’t even know about,” Mallick said. “There’s a cancer emergency hospital that we would go to from time to time. It didn’t open till 7 p.m., so we would go there and get treated. And she might get back on campus the next morning, and nobody would have any idea that she had been fighting something significant the night before.” Even when Rubarth was named last year’s Marksmen yearbook dedicatee, Mallick remembers Rubarth fighting through one of her worst days. “She felt so honored and so humbled,” Mallick said. “I think she was pretty sick that day, and I don’t think anybody really realized that she wasn’t feeling great at that moment in time, but she was so honored and humbled. It was extremely meaningful to her.” One of Mallick’s fondest memories [Katy Rubarth is] integral to the success of the school. She’s a doting mom who has faced death and fought it tooth and nail. Because of her indomitable sprit and the strong examples she has set for all of us, Katy Rubarth is the recipient of the 2020 Marksmen yearbook dedication. Marksmen yearbook dedication, 2020

of Rubarth came on former third grade instructor Frank Jordan’s annual trip to Yellowstone National Park. On a hike, they encountered a Marksman who didn’t think he could make it to the top with his blistered feet. Rubarth knelt with the boy, bandaged his feet and convinced him to keep going. “The whole time, she said, ‘You’re gonna be able to do this,’” Mallick said. “‘We’re gonna do this with you. We’re gonna make it to the top. We’re gonna help you do this. All we have to do is get your foot squared away, and then you’re gonna be able to do it.’ She was so loving and caring and didn’t think twice about it. Just immediately dropped to her knees and started taking care of him and telling him he could do it. And by golly, he did. They got to the top.” Mallick said that — even in her own uphill battles — Rubarth didn’t want any more attention than the next person, equating her cancer to the obstacles that nag all people. “She didn’t like it when people would say, ‘You’re a fighter. You’re our example. You’re our hero,’” Mallick said. “She’d

be like, ‘No, I’m just going step by step, trying to keep going. This is what I’ve been handed, so I’m going to deal with it.’ She just was always getting back up and getting back in the ring, no matter the opponent.” With two alumni and another in the eighth grade here, former director of communications Katy Rubarth formed an extreme connection with the school and the entire community. “She had such a love and appreciation for the people here: students, teachers, colleagues, parents, alums,” Headmaster David Dini said. “The genuineness and the authenticity of her care for and love for others, it was really special. I feel really lucky to have been her colleague and friend for all that time, and I wish it could have been for a lot longer.” Dini first met Rubarth when she was just a parent at 10600 Preston Rd. They had a few informal conversations, but their relationship would not deeply form until she joined the staff. “My first meaningful interaction with her was when she applied for the Director of Communications job,” Dini said. “We got a chance to sit and spend a lot of time together, like we do with any candidate, and talk through her background and experience to learn things about her that I didn’t know.” Because of the two’s proximity, Dini and Rubarth became extremely close. “I was still working in Nearburg at the time before I was headmaster,” Dini said. “I was obviously involved in hiring her and then working very, very closely with her throughout her tenure [beginning] right at the very outset of her taking on the director of communications role” Dini and Rubarth became so close that they’d have small inside jokes from drafting countless notes to faculty, students and parents through the 2019 tornado and COVID-19. “One of the things that I’m inclined to say and I’ll put in letters is using the term ‘most importantly,’” Dini said. “Mrs. Rubarth would always say, ‘No, it’s not ‘most importantly,’ it’s ‘most important.’’ So we would jabbed back and forth about a lot of other grammatical things.” Their inside jokes and quirks, which Dini included in his email to the community as tributes to Rubarth, were

small, but to Dini, they were important. Even the word “wicked” held a special connection to her. “‘Wicked’ is not a term you hear in Texas,” Dini said, “but it’s a term you hear in the North a lot, right? And she had that nature to her, an intensity to her that was fun. There was great energy there.” Not only did Rubarth do everything she could to support her community, but her community returned the favor, filling in for her when she was absent. “She was in a significant amount of pain, yet she’d show up with a smile and optimism and never complained about being sick or wanted to burden anybody else,” Dini said. “It speaks volumes about this community that so many people rallied around her, including her team and the communications team, the advancement team. People stepped in when she needed to be away and tried to smooth that because of the care they had for her and appreciation for her.” Rubarth was known for her strength: to smile and be there for the boys no matter the pain or struggle she was experiencing. She always strived to do everything she could for her community. “There were so many examples over time, where, dealing with illness on and off for so many years, she just exhibited incredible grace and determination, even when she was struggling mightily physically,” Dini said. “Up until even last year, there were times when we were dealing with tough issues, like on the front end at COVID, when she felt the need to be here. And that was true over many years, where she was going through significant medical challenges and personal struggle and pain, even, where she was here at events at night, and I’d say, ‘Go home. It’s okay. We got it. Go take care of yourself.’ [I remember her] even saying, ‘I was supposed to have treatment this afternoon, but I’ll move into Monday because we have got to get this done.’ And I say, ‘No, absolutely not.’” One thing is for sure: she was a titan who’s mark on campus will last. “She was a special, special person, and did a lot of great, good things for St. Mark’s,” Dini said, “which I’ll always be indebted to her for.” STORY Siddhartha Sinha, Jack Davis PHOTOS Courtesy Dave Carden

The ReMarker • March 11, 2021

10600

Katy Rubarth

Alumni

Alumni Weekend officially postponed, marking second year without annual staple. Page 10

Fundraiser

Eighth grader Jaden Ouyang put his musical talents to good use. Page 11

Charity

Inspired by loss, freshman Ben Foster dedicated himself to a cause close to his heart. Page 12

Ghostbusters Looking back at photos from this year’s Ghostbusters-themed McDonald’s Week. Page 13

In brief TIB TALKS, TELOS TO RETURN Dr. Martin Stegemoeller, leader of the Ethos leadership program, has expressed that TIB Talks, due to current conditions, can now be prerecorded by anyone who wishes to present one. In addition, the transition from in-person to online school has made the Telos program difficult to maintain. During online school, the Telos program was placed on hold, but with a return to in-person schooling, the Telos program is planning on returning to normal with sixth and eighth graders. FIRST GRADE PLAY The first graders will be performing the musical Going Buggy for their parents and siblings tomorrow night. After a month and a half of learning scripts and songs and rehearsing, the six and seven-yearolds are ready to display their talents. The students are led by Lower School music teacher Mary Ann Livengood, Lower School drama teacher Shannon Schnaible and Lower School art teacher Suzuko Davis.

LEGACY Whether it was as a parent (right) — pictured with two of her sons, Charlie ‘20 and eighth grader Oliver — or as an administrator (far right) — seen embracing first grade teacher Teri Broom and Lower School Head Sherri Darver — Katy Rubarth’s impact on the school community came in a number of forms.

MODEL UNITED NATIONS CONFERENCE One senior, three juniors and a sophomore received special recognition at the Harvard Model United Nations Jan. 28-31. Senior Max Palys received Best Delegate in the Native American Tribal Conference. Juniors Pranay Sinkre and Ekansh Tambe received Honorable Mention in the United States Constitutional Convention. Junior Tomek Marczewski was awarded Outstanding Delegate for the International Children’s Fund. Sophomore Bijaan Noormohamed earned Diplomatic Commendation in the UN HIgh Commission for Refugees. SENIOR AUCTION While a firm date has not been set, seniors are still in the process of planning the online Senior Auction, which will take place after Spring Break. Due to COVID-19 restrictions, the Auction will be held online through Murad, a service for hosting online events. The format for the auction has not been finalized yet; however, the auction co-chairs will send out an email with final details before the event.

ALUMNI

Coming home Amid a frenzy of unprecedented circumstances, the Alumni Assocation has made the equally unprecedented decision to have Homecoming and Alumni Weekend simultaneously.

irst, a tornado. Then, a pandemic. When Paul Genender ‘87 began his two-year term as the Alumni Association president on the first day of July 2019, nothing could have prepared him for the misfortune waiting in front of him. But by adapting to the circumstances placed upon him, Genender has carried through his term, following the many Alumni Association presidents before him. And a year and a half later, as Genender’s term nears its end, Genender and his team have continued striving for success despite all the adversity.

March 11, 2021

The ReMarker

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Now, nearly a full year since students were sent online, the COVID-19 pandemic is still going strong. For Alumni Weekend, Upper School Head Colin Igoe decided that LASER LIGHTS Upper School students dance and celebrate to music accompanied by a postponing it might help to preserve some light show at the 2019 Homecoming party. Now, with worries about health and safety, the administration has decided that events as crowded as this ought to be postponed or cancelled. of its traditional events. “Ideally, for as school year. With a son, Jack Genender, in this year’s many events as we can, we reimagine them, or if Senior Class, Paul Genender hopes that the tradition there are events that aren't on a specific timeline, we will go differently this time around. can postpone them until conditions improve,” Igoe “The Alumni Board president gets to address When a tornado blew through Preston Hollow and said. “A good example is the [All-School] Christmas the seniors right before graduation and officially devastated parts of the campus in October 2019, Party. That was reimagined, where the seniors and welcome them to the Alumni Association, so I didn't many of the Alumni Association’s operations were their buddies were outside, and other people could get to do that last year,” Paul Genender ‘87 Genender said. “That was greatly compromised. Once things were finally livestream the event.” Alumni getting back to normal, the Alumni Association was On account of various injuries to the community, a letdown. I'm hoping very Association hit with a second crisis. Genender thought it would be wise to give the much that I get to do those president “It was kind of the second big whammy because Alumni Association some time to reorganize two things this year in we thought we had recovered from the tornado that themselves. person, given that this is a was in October of 2019,” Genender said. “The school “We knew that there were a lot of people in the particularly special Senior obviously reopened quickly after that and events got St. Mark's community who were really hurt, whether Class for me.” back to normal and all that, but then, when COVID medically or economically, by the pandemic,” Although Genender found some benefits as a happened, everything went remote.” Genender said. “So it was just a confluence of things, result of a shift to virtual meetings, he missed out and we had to recalibrate a lot of our efforts.” on a part he used to enjoy with the members of his The postponement of Alumni Weekend team. DINING IN A large crowd of alumni packed into the Great Hall eat together at the 2019 Alumni Weekend. The inability to to the fall placed it on the same weekend as “The meetings are great, but it's the 15 minutes hold events like these has caused the administration to delay Homecoming. Igoe thinks this occurrence, before and the 15 minutes after when we're all kind rather than cancel Alumni Weekend. though unconventional, could be a uniquely of hanging out where the camaraderie is great,” cheerful event. Genender said. “It will probably just make a more joyful, Adapting to the circumstances has been a major proud event for our community,” Igoe said. part of Genender and his team’s success, something “It’d be fun to think about having alumni back, that they were quickly forced to get used to. going through our usual rituals and traditions of “We focused on what's going on around, the that weekend but having all the more passion, positives at the school and not the fact that it's excitement and school pride.” virtual,” Genender said. “We're all shifting in so One of the biggest events of Alumni many different ways; this is just another one of them, Weekend is the Spring Alumni Dinner, where and we all roll with it.” award-winners from the year are announced. Though the Alumni Association and the school “We've got a whole closet full of awards have repeatedly faced difficult circumstances, we’ve got to give out,” Genender said. “We Genender chooses to do whatever he can to help the announced the award winners last year, but community make it out on top. we didn't get to give them out, and we have “You have a choice,” Genender said. “You can decided the award winners for this year, but make the best of it, or you can complain about it. As those will be given out in the fall as well.” an Alumni Association, we've chosen to make the Among with many other moments such best of it.” as speaker events, Alumni Board meetings, committee meetings, the Day of Service and STORY Will Pechersky, Will Spencer Holiday Luncheon, Genender missed out on yet PHOTOS Ekansh Tambe, Courtesy Dave Carden another meaningful tradition at the end of last GRAPHIC Will Spencer

Old

Homecoming Week Begins

Mum Pick-Up

Football Game and Spirit Party

Homecoming Party at Venue

Monday

Wednesday

Friday

Saturday

Alumni Weekend Begins; Alumni Golf Tournament

Alumni Classes on Campus and Alumni Dinner

Family Cookout and Class Reunion Parties

Thursday

Friday

Saturday

Homecoming Football Game

Homecoming Party at Venue

Friday

Saturday

Alumni Weekend Begins; Alumni Golf Tournament

Alumni Classes on Campus and Class Reunion Parties

Family Cookout and Alumni Dinner

Thursday

Friday

Saturday

From Oct. 26:

Themed Homecoming Days Monday-Friday

From April 19:

Monday

New

As of March 4

Jeffrey S. Genecov, ‘77, DDS, MSD

Diplomate, American Board of Orthodonotics Member, AmericanAssociation of Orthodontists

Homecoming Week Begins

From Oct. 18:

Monday

Now in Preston Hollow for your convenience! 11611 Preston Road #106 5926 W. Parker Road #300 5410 Alpha Road Dallas, Tx 75230 Plano, Tx. 75093 Dallas, Tx. 75240

972-387-9770 genecovorthodontics.com

Themed Homecoming Days Monday-Friday

FUNDRAISER

Musical service

Eighth grader Jaden Ouyang and his family found a creative way to fundraise for their community by putting on an online concert and collecting donations.

PLAYING ALONG Jaden Ouyang and his sister perform for their charity recital (above). Both Ouyangs performed on their live stream that benefitted Vogal Alcove. Jaden poses with his cello (right).

ighth grader Jaden Ouyang has always wanted to serve. In a world restricted by a pandemic, opportunities to do so can be hard to come by. However, Ouyang and his family can make music. And they’ll find a way to make that work.

John Perryman named Director of Civic Responsibility by Eric Yoo nglish and history instructor Dr. John Perryman has received an additional title, director of civic responsibility. His new role have him teach and oversee a civics class that involves both the leadership and ethics program and the community service program. “It touches on some elements of those here” Perryman said, “but it is to try to find ways our student body in the entire school might more directly engage in civic institutions and structures around town.” Perryman plans to offer an elective next school year that covers how a major city functions. He believes this elective will be important for students who want to engage in civic activity. “We will be going to some city council meetings and seeing various politicians and civic leaders in

the North Texas area,” Perryman said. “We will learn about many aspects of a city, whether it’s utility and program delivery, infrastructure, or how city council actually operates. I want to better equip our students for meaningful civic engagement in high school and immediately afterwards.” Perryman hopes to take eighth, ninth, and tenth grade students on a field trip to Dallas’ CitySquare, which is one of the city’s most successful and prominent non-profit organizations. They have a food pantry and health clinic, and they offer a selection of job skills and training opportunities. “They run groups of teenagers through a poverty simulation exercise,” Perryman said. “It’s an activity where four students sit around a board and play different cards to see how it would affect the city, and it helps them better understand the causes of poverty. It is a really eye-opening experience.”

STORY Cooper Ribman, Morgan Chow PHOTOS Courtesy Jaden Ouyang

He would also be interested in a field trip to the George W. Bush Presidential Center to talk with their global health experts. After seeing many issues from around the world, he would challenge students to create a class project that addresses one of these problems. Perryman’s role will allow him to share knowledge with students about issues that face our communities today, with the hope that they can begin thinking about the problems and maybe even come up with a solution to help in the future. “I think one of the greatest insights and sense of awareness we can provide for young students is realizing whether it is this school, this city or this country, we are a community through time,” Perryman said. “We need to be good stewards of this community to pass it along in a better shape to future communities.”

The ReMarker

Jaden Ouyang, eighth grader

The recording itself was done in the middle of November 2020 with many takes and repeats. For Jaden, it was a tedious process and even a bit irritating. “One thing I’ve been told is that I’m not a very technically consistent person when it comes to playing the cello,” Jaden said. “That’s a huge problem for recording because that means I miss a whole lot more, and I have to start over multiple times. If I messed up big time, like forgetting a whole passage, we would just stop recording and start over. If I screwed up too many times, it got a little bit frustrating.” Jaden used to play for the orchestra during his first years in Middle School, but he is currently pursuing other fine art programs to explore new interests. “I was in the orchestra back when Dr. Fray was here, and I stayed there with Ms. Choi for one more year, but I just wanted to branch out and try new fine arts,” Jaden said. “But now, I’m doing ceramics, 3D Design and Design and Publishing. I was planning on coming back [to orchestra] for Upper School.” Since he was two years old, Jaden has been learning how to play instruments, particularly the

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I wanted to use my musical skills for a good cause. During the pandemic, we got a lot of time to practice.... we decided to broadcast it to raise money.

piano and cello. His piano lessons started when he was a toddler, while his cello education began when he was in third grade. Once he reached fifth grade, Jaden decided to drop piano tutorings to focus his time on playing the cello. However, Jaden is slightly concerned about the future and has plans if he can no longer spend as much time on his instrument. “I want to get as good as I can with it until I just possibly can’t have any time to work on it anymore,” Jaden said. “I just hope that I can get really good in the limited amount of time that I have. I want to keep doing cello because it’s fun. The funny thing is, I quit piano for cello. It was a hard decision because I was so much better at the piano, but I just enjoy cello so much more, and I just want to continue playing it for the foreseeable future.” Jaden’s proficiency with the stringed instrument has led him to be quite comfortable performing for an audience, and his virtual performance was no different. Of course, there is always room for improvement, and Jaden keeps himself accountable for any mistakes. “I thought the performance was successful,” Jaden said. “Everyone seemed to like it, but I can’t help but listen closely to the live stream and say, ‘Oh my gosh, I messed up, I played this note out-oftune!’” Melody believes that the live stream will foster positive values in her children, and events like these will teach them practical ways to help their community. “They learn how to give back to the community,” Melody said. “A lot of times, it really doesn’t take a lot. They were gonna have this concert anyway, so finding a cause to raise money and give back to with it is a win-win situation. A lot of times it just takes some creativity to set up something and to try to give back to the community.” After the success of the event, Jaden is keen on performing in a similar event later on. “Gosh, I hope this kind of thing happens in the future,” Jaden said. “It was fun, so I want to do it again.”

March 11, 2021

“I wanted to use my musical skills for a good cause,” Ouyang said. “During the pandemic, we got a lot of time to practice, so my sister and I put together a program with the intention of recording it. But then, instead of just showing it to our close friends and family members, we decided to broadcast it to raise money.” Jaden live streamed the event Jan. 2 over YouTube as he believed it was an excellent way to begin the new year. Originally, Jaden had only wanted to record a virtual concert for his family and friends before ultimately deciding to help the community with his talent. “I just thought that was the most convenient time to do it,” Jaden said. “It was right after New Year’s, so it was a good reason to have a performance to start the year off strong. At first, we just wanted to record it, but then we decided, ‘Hey, wouldn’t it be fun to broadcast it to a bunch of people and have them raise money for a good cause?’ I recorded it late last year, and I came up with the idea of the live stream a month or two before that.” To get the word out about the performance, Jaden sent messages to as many people as he could about the upcoming virtual concert. “I had a directory book, so I put down everyone’s emails and their parent’s emails onto a list,” Jaden said. “Then, I just wrote invitations to everyone. There were also some close friends [from outside the school] that I emailed and invited to join as well.” The event benefited the charity organization Vogel Alcove, chosen by Jaden because of his history with them. His initial plan was to raise a modest amount of money to donate, but – to his surprise – he raised more than three times his set goal. Jaden’s mother, Melody Ouyang, contacted the charity group through Facebook and arranged how the

donations would be transferred to them. “We’ve donated food or clothing to them before, so it’s a cause that we really care about in our family,” Melody said. “It’s an organization that provides daycare to underprivileged children and also homeless children. During the holidays, I reached out to them and told them we wanted to do this and see how much money we could raise, so they basically just provided a link for donation and asked us what the goal was. Initially, our goal was $1000, but because of the generosity of the community, our family and friends and St. Mark’s, we were able to exceed that threefold.”

CHARITY FOR CHILDREN

Honoring a friend In memory of one of his childhood best friends, freshman Ben Foster led a toy drive in December and delivered goodie bags in February to cancer patients at Children’s Medical Center and Cook Children’s hospitals.

TEAM MICHAEL Cancer patient Michael Malone (left) and freshman Ben Foster (right) attend a marathon in kindergarten to raise funds for the Team Michael nonprofit. (Far right) Foster delivers Valentine’s goodie bags to Children’s Medical Center.

March 11, 2021

The ReMarker

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hen freshman Ben Foster met Michael Malone in kindergarten at Meadowbrook School, he knew they were going to be best friends. But he also knew that Michael was sick — neuroblastoma — and the doctors said he wasn’t going to live for much longer. But Ben was determined to make whatever time he had left with him the best it could possibly be. He would play with Michael, visit him whenever he was in the hospital and spend time with him at school. There were 15 boys in Ben’s kindergarten class, and his mother, Karen, recalls the Meadowbrook students’ positive dynamic. “They were very, very close, and they knew Michael had cancer,” Karen said. “It was more like a family situation, where all the kids were super in tune with whatever Michael needed. If he had had treatment, and his immune system was depleted, they would wear masks and hand-sanitize all the time. It’s literally like what we’re experiencing with COVID.” At a young age, Michael’s health outlook was grim, but everyone wanted to help make his life as fun as possible. “[Michael’s] parents knew and the doctors told him that he most likely wasn’t going to make it for that much longer,” Ben said. “They knew they had to make it the best couple years.” Michael looked forward to seeing his classmates every day, developing a close friendship with Ben. “Michael was the kind of kid that all he wanted to do was go to school,” Karen said. “He was being treated out at Cook Children’s in Fort Worth. He would have some kind of treatment done and insist on going straight to Meadowbrook after the treatment. Michael was a super spirited kid — he had a lot of energy.” His illness worsened, however, and he passed away in June, just days after he turned seven years

old.

“The boys didn’t really know that he was pretty sick — he was terminal by spring, so it was rough,” Karen said. “All the little boys sat together at Michael’s funeral right up in the front row. It was pretty dramatic for those kids and kind of surreal. I don’t think at the time they fully understood the gravity of the situation.” After Michael passed away, Ben was inspired to help other young children in the same situation as his friend. Ben and his family got involved with Team Michael, Karen an organization founded by Foster Parent Michael’s parents and associated with the non-profit Children’s Cancer Fund to collect toys for children cancer patients at Children’s Medical Center and Cook Children’s. “Seeing him pass away when I was seven, I just really wanted to get involved with Team Michael and Children’s Cancer Fund,” Ben said. “It was awesome to be able to know that I was giving back to kids who were in the hospital because I knew how it was for Michael. I saw that a lot of days because I would be in the hospital with him. It’s just good to know that I was giving the same happiness to some kids who were going through the same thing he was.” Along with assisting the annual Team Michael toy drive in June, Ben organized his own toy drive last December. He helped Team Michael collect more than 200 toys to be given to Dallas Children’s Medical Center, asking people to donate and assisting with collecting the toys, too. “I would send out emails to all my friends, friends’ parents and any family friends I was connected with, and I would tell them I’m having

Senior runs drone filming and editing business by Han Zhang ince the start of the school year, senior Gabe Bines has owned and operated his own drone filming and editing business. The business combines his interest in flying drones with his interest in entrepreneurship and is run entirely by Bines. “Flying drones has always been one of my hobbies,” Bines said. “Since fifth grade, I always had some flying toy. It took a long time to learn how to fly drones well and understand how they really work, but I always did it because I loved it. Around seventh or eighth grade, I started getting into drones that could film and I started to create family vacation videos and such, and that sparked my desire to create a business from my hobby.” Although the main part of his work comes from filming footage with his drones, Bines stresses that there are other integral parts of the business process, including scouting locations, editing film and communicating with clients. “My drone business works in all parts of the process,” Bines said. “I both film and edit the footage. I have to first plan out what type of video I am going to make, and that depends on what the customer wants to have documented. It generally either requires scouting beforehand or some

creation of a flight plan. After I film, I take all the video and edit it down to a video that I’ve discussed the outlines to with my customer.” Although Bines has plans to expand his business and social media presence in the future, he has decided to wait until his current projects and commissions are completed, giving him more time to focus on expansion. “I have definitely thought about pursuing a website or better marketing, but for right now, the business is small and still more of a hobby,” Bines said. “At the moment, I have a constant employer who I work with bimonthly, and beyond that, I’ve done two or three other projects. I plan to wait until I go to college to start to truly create a name for the business.” Even though Bines has experienced success with his business, he hopes that it will grow even larger in the future and be able to expand into different areas as more people come to realize the potential of drones. “While I’d like to say I’m flooded with work, drones are a new medium and not a lot of people know about it or think there’s easy access to the abilities of a drone,” Bines said. “I hope to take what I’ve learned from trying to create a drone business myself.”

a toy drive,” Ben said. “Mainly, it was just people dropping [toys] off, and then, we would get them all, put them in boxes and take them to the hospital.” Trying to think of more ways to assist the hospitals, Ben organized a project in February at his home. “He had Hockaday and St. Mark’s friends come to the house and bring candy,” Karen said. “They stuffed 16 goodie bags for Valentine’s Day for Children’s Cancer Fund and delivered them just before the snowstorm.” Ben has been involved with Team Michael for about ten years now, and his work there has given him a unique point of view. “[Team Michael] has given me a different perspective on how difficult a lot of kids’ lives are, and it’s really good to be able to know that I’m making an impact on them,” Ben said. “Because sometimes, coming from St. Marks, you’re in a bubble, and you don’t really see stuff outside of it, like kids going through these things.” Karen is proud that Ben plans to continue doing several projects for the Children’s Cancer Fund each year and will work on new ideas to further Team Michael’s mission. “The meaning for him is having ownership over a project and having it be so meaningful for him because it’s going to a place where he’s familiar,” Karen said. “He knows what happened to Michael and remembers being in the hospital, visiting him, so there’s more of a personal attachment to what he’s doing with this. What a parent wants for their kid is to know that they feel like they’ve achieved something. He really does feel like he’s achieving something with Children’s Cancer Fund and Team Michael.” STORY Myles Lowenberg, Sai Thirunagari PHOTOS Courtesy Ben Foster

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GHOSTBUSTERS

Four days for Austin Street

The Junior Class led a Ghostbusters-themed McDonald’s Week, the annual charity fundraiser for the Austin Street homeless shelter, on campus March 1-4 and raised more than $10,000. Although the event usually occurs at the Preston-Royal McDonald’s, the McDonald’s Week co-chairs and Junior Class sponsors adjusted the event for COVID-19 regulations.

DESIGN Sai Thirunagari PHOTOS Ekansh Tambe, Evan McGowan

MAD SCIENTIST Chemistry instructor Kenneth Owens performed his annual McDonald’s Week chemistry show, creating “elephant toothpaste,” freezing fruit with liquid air and making miniexplosions with various chemicals.

The ReMarker

RAISING MONEY Co-chair Sal Abbasi sells t-shirts in the morning. The juniors offered white and blue short-sleeve t-shirts and white longsleeve shirts in various sizes for $15 and $20, respectively. They sold out of t-shirts, and the sales went toward Austin Street Center.

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EATING OUT Juniors Axel Icazbalceta (left) and Tomek Marczewski (right) order food at Torchy’s Tacos for a Monday dinner night. Marksmen also attended dinner nights at Flower Child, Beck’s Prime and Goff’s Burgers, which donated a portion of their proceeds toward McDonald’s Week.

RELAY RACE The Wednesday morning competition between all four Upper School grades involved using a bat to spin five times, balancing an egg on a spoon, playing cornhole, hopping with both feet in a pillowcase, flipping a half-full water bottle and running back to tag the next teammate. The junior team emerged with the win.

March 11, 2021

TABLE TENNIS Sophomore Shreyan Daulat (above) faces off against senior Luke Annett and wins the final round of the McDonald’s Week ping-pong tournament Monday morning. Marksmen gathered in front of the Green Library to watch the event and collect donations for Austin Street.

COVER STORY | F

One yea

One year ago, The ReMarker told the story of three students’ struggles with the Counseling Department over the past year, we caught up with one old

Back on track

Finding techniques to combat his anxiety and depression over the last year, Jake* has found his own ways to make his turnaround a reality.

Perspectives

The ReMarker • March 11, 2021

14, 15

FALLING APART Students facing mental health struggles suffer in all parts of their life.

rowing up, Jake* never thought he exercise six days a week since the start of this had mental health problems. He year. He sees his physical health as being an never thought he would eventually be integral part of his self-confidence and just as diagnosed with anxiety, moderate depression important as mental health. and OCD. “While I’m exercising, it’s difficult, and Even freshman year after two instances sometimes I just hate it,” Jake said. “But once of self-harming and periods of Has the new schedule I’m done, I feel so much better. I feel feeling completely and totally positively affected your like I pushed myself, and I feel more overwhelmed, Jake moved on, mental health in anyway? confident about my abilities and never thinking much of his pushing myself mentally.” troubles. These workout sessions have It happened again the been greatly helped by the new 24% summer after sophomore year. schedule. Because of the 8:35 But still no acknowledgement a.m. start time, Jake has been No of a deeper issue. able to exercise each morning Yes, some And then junior year before school. And that’s not impact happened. Usually a the only way the new schedule Yes, drastic impact perfectionist, Jake wasn’t has helped Jake out. able to handle the extreme “Even though sometimes 17% workload and the constant it can be confusing, I feel like I 59% demands of school, athletics adjusted to the rotating schedule 1 177 and extracurriculars. Unable to within two weeks of school,” 24 meet his own high expectations Jake said. “It’s a nice change of pace for himself, he began to regress. Social instead of having the same thing every anxiety and self-loathing began to mount. It was single day. And the long free periods are so getting harder and harder to hide the scars, the beneficial.” stress, the emotion . . . until it all came to a head. While the new schedule has been a welcome Jake’s friend reported him to the Counseling change, the outbreak of a global pandemic most Office. certainly has not been. Jake is thankful for the 59close friends he is still able to talk to, but wishes At first, he was scared — scared of what his 59 parents would think, what the counselors would it wasn’t so hard to socialize with the rest of his think, but after he shared his struggles, he felt classmates. a massive weight lift off his chest. He started “I feel like I haven’t been able to connect talking with the counselors more and more with the rest of my grade the way I anticipated about balance and time management, attending I would,” Jake said. “Unfortunately, COVID has weekly therapy sessions and eventually physically and socially distanced everyone sharing his story with close friends 6% 2% 3% from each other.” and teachers. Jake believes that COVID-19 has As his support system grew, certainly contributed to mental so did his resolve to grow as a health problems among the 28% human being, to consistently student body but recognizes that work on his mental wellmental heaalth was an issue Much worse being and help others going long before the pandemic, one Slightly worse through the same thing. that may have flown under the About the same In March of his junior radar. Slightly better year, one year ago, Jake “At an environment like St. Much better shared his story with The Mark’s, there are so many kids ReMarker. Since then, he’s — I know so many kids — who made a lot of progress. He’s have mental health issues, and 61% not perfect, he’ll tell you, but he’s anxiety’s one of the most common more mature, more conscious of ones,” Jake said. “That’s just In your opinion, has St. his feelings and emotions. Mark’s improved its available evident in the way that the school One year later, Jake is still mental health resources for is built. We push ourselves, and fighting. finding balance is difficult.” students in the past year? For anyone dealing with 29 One of the most significant contributors to their own mental health struggles, Jake suggests Jake’s turnaround has been his increased focus getting help, regardless of how big or small one 6 on building deep, meaningful relationships. thinks their mental health problems are. “I started trying to be more social, meet new “For any student who’s seeking some sort people and make a lot of friends,” Jake said. of help, they just need to forgive themselves “I have met a lot of people at St. Mark’s and and try not to downplay whatever they’re going Hockaday, and I think that’s a great way for me through,” Jake said. “Don’t say, ‘I don’t need to to have balance. It’s an outlet for leisure and a see Dr. Bonsu,’ or ‘I can just get through this on relief on weekends when I get to spend time my 60 own.’ Go seek help if you have the slightest with friends. inclination to get it.” Jake has picked up the ability to Overall though, Jake believes the most compartmentalize different aspects of his life important thing is having a support network, over the past year, separating his feelings from and he’s thankful for the people in his own life his responsibilities and obligations. he has been able to lean on when he was going “It was very difficult, but I eventually through tough times. learned that I have to separate my emotions “The surprising thing that I noticed was from the things that I have to do,” Jake said. just how caring and supportive all of the people “Regardless of how I feel on a given day, there around me ended up being,” Jake said. “I are certain things that I have to do. And, yes, if realized how grateful I am for the people that I things get out of control, I can take a break. But have because I know that not everyone has such I have to know the boundary between taking a a strong and supportive social network. But I break just for leisure, for procrastination, versus was lucky to have a bunch of people who cared taking a break for balance.” about me, especially my family, but my friends Jake has also made a commitment to and teachers as well.” STORY Jamie Mahowald, Henry McElhaney, Robert Pou PHOTO Jack Davis

F RO M PAG E O N E

LIFE IN THE TIME OF COVID

ar later ...

h mental health. With several changes happening within face and one new one on how they’ve kept moving forward.

Resetting the norm At first, Arthur* saw his mental health issues an abnormal. But as he’s adjusted, he’s found out how normal — and manageable — they actually are.

e still wasn’t sold on the idea of therapy. But by far the most valuable insight he gained His first session seemed stuffy, a bit formal from his sessions was the idea that, no matter how — he felt like he was being examined for dark his individual thoughts became, it was always the flu or screened for cavities. the same person thinking them. “Lots of people go on to do great things,” the “It’s less of a this-isn't-me-thinking and more psychologist said. “Edgar Allan Poe, Vincent Van of an I-can-make-mistakes-in-my-thinking,” Arthur Gogh, Ernest Hemingway…” said. “But I’ve stopped separating Do you think we talk Arthur’s* stomach sunk. mental illness from myself, because enough about mental Everything in the room felt curated. A this is one of my life struggles, but health on campus? wide window overlooked a highway. everyone has 22%life struggles. That's just He sat on a couch several feet away how things are. This just happens to be from the therapist, and the room one of mine, 27% it's not a weird thing.” 22% 27 22 felt infinite and depersonalized. He struggled to speak. Arthur51% sees value in articulating No Talking with other kids was his ideas in a communicative, Yes already an unclimbable often literary way. Drawing on Yes, but there are mountain –– how could he past experiences –– rather than ways to improve expect to open up to a stranger? experiencing and expressing It didn’t feel normal. heavy emotions at the same time –– 27% allows him to get his ideas on paper 51 51% Arthur’s mental health issues without sustaining the thoughts that 12% began early on, as a child and soonbrought him grief in the first place. to-be teenager who found himself “You can think about that dark place 21.8% 44% terrified by the idea of large social events. without necessarily existing there,” Arthur said. Celebrate Seven, eighth grade mixers, freshmen “You can't be objective about it, but I think it can 9.8% dances –– each contributed to an idea of terror that help you be a bit more rational about it. You could he’d somehow mess something up, a familiar kind argue that there's truthfulness from writing it from 12% of social anxiety felt by millions of teenagers. the dark state, an authenticity that you can't capture “I’m out there, and I'm very worried about what unless you’re in it. But can say that while you may 44.4% impressions I'm making, what I'm saying, what I'm be feeling that way authentically, a lot of the things doing,” Arthur said. “I'm acutely aware of that. And that you’re portraying are unhelpful.” the ironic part is that people can tell you feel that But above all, having graduated from many way, which makes the problem even worse.” of his worst fears, Arthur recalls the seismic shift After trying a series of therapists, though, in mindset he’s felt over the last few years. If his he found one he could speak with candidly and ninth-grade self viewed mental health issues as comfortably. depersonalized medical problems, he now sees 30them as a manageable part of him –– a “The second person I talked to felt a lot more casual, more like a friend,” difficult part10% of him, but part of him Arthur said. “That does mirror the nonetheless. 10% 12% shift in mindset from seeing it as a “My22% first therapist was right: medical thing that should not be lots of people deal with this and 22% Very 12% happening to a normal thing that can still have fantastic lives,” harmful Somewhat I can deal with.” Arthur said. “It will help you harmful Doesn’t 44% with people. It will But as he progressed empathize affect it Somewhat in his therapy sessions and help you relate to people going helpful Very 12%similar issues.” understanding the way he made through helpful decisions, he began to realize “Once you realize that 12% that everyone –– even if they don't people sometimes do things for 44% have mental health struggles of reasons that may be beyond their their own –– acts in psychologically control,” Arthur said, “you can Do you believe that the definable patterns. explain to yourself the things they present environment here “There are people who are not have going on. That helps you be is helpful or harmful to easily explainable,” Arthur said, a better friend, and it helps you be students’ mental well-being? “but a lot of the time, their actions a better classmate, a more caring are. So once you come to that realization, it can be person. If I were my ninth-grade self. I would want really hard to dislike someone that you realize you to pick up a newspaper that told me that I was not could really empathize with.” alone. It’s normal.” • See also: “One year later” and “The daily battle of an average Marksman,” page 16. • Editor’s note: Jake and Arthur are pseudonyms for unnamed Marksmen who prefer to remain anonymous. Jake retains his pseudonym from the previous coverage in March 2020.

In their own words Dr. Gabby Reed, director of Counseling, and Dr. Mary Bonsu, Upper School counselor, on their daily goals in helping students. Dr. Gabby Reed Director of Counseling

Good counseling in a school is critical, because most of the time, if someone’s not doing well mentally, they’re also not doing well academically, and struggling academically is linked directly to struggling mentally and emotionally. For teenagers, there’s no way to separate school from mental health.”

Dr.Mary Bonsu Upper School Counselor

If they come through my door, it’s my job to try to help them feel comfortable, make them feel heard, make some kind of a connection — the practitioner term is ‘building rapport.’ You have to make sure in that 10 to 15 minutes he’ll find value in sitting in that chair.”

Mental health challenges heightened by pandemic

oss of time, experiences and life. They have become themes of the past year — a year marred by COVID-19. And it’s taken a toll on the mental health of teens and adults alike. Marksmen of all ages have spent the year isolated in some way; it’s difficult to come to terms with the fact that seniors never had their last homecoming, their last SPC tournament, their last in-person chapel. The pandemic complicated an already complex developmental period for adolescents. Now, they can view mental health from a new angle that psychiatrist Dr. Fred Gioia encounters with all his patients. “In general, the pandemic has been more of a catalyst for poking at things that have already been a struggle for people,” Gioia said. The emergence of underlying issues comes from the lack of social opportunity, among other pandemic-related lifestyle changes. “From what I’ve found in seeing people who were on different spectrums, a lot of people’s struggles have had to do with either feeling isolated and really struggling with the loss of social output, loss of activities or loss of ways of dealing with existing struggles that they’ve already had,” Gioia said. Everyone has felt the impact of the pandemic on their mental health, some more than others. To Gioia, even a small change in one’s mental well-being should be given attention during these delicate times, especially for adolescents. “The threshold for speaking to someone, a parent or a professional, should be pretty low,” Gioia said. “There’s so much more availability for telepsychiatry and teletherapy now. You can use your phone and have a video chat with someone. It’s not as if you have to go to someone’s office, especially now with the risks of COVID. Hopefully people are finding that it’s a little bit easier to reach out.” Of course, not everyone will be willing to speak about their mental health to someone outside of their close circle. But, if that close circle becomes distanced, through a lack of face-to-face time or isolation, seeking a professional’s advice may be the best option. “Social contacts, especially when teenagers are so habituated to being around certain people all the time, and that suddenly drops off — that's a major disruption,” Gioia said. “Developmentally, it’s so important for teenagers and adolescents to be with their peers, not just stuck at home with their families.” Social contact has sharply decreased to help prevent the spread of COVID-19, but, in doing so, teenagers have lost a large portion of their high school experience. “There’s nothing that’s going to replace the high school prom,” Gioia said, “and there has to be a kind of mourning of not having these things. Then, we must work through that mourning. That process is a little bit different for everybody.” It’s difficult to deal with an unfulfilling and frustrating year, but Gioia wants to turn lemons into lemonade. “These losses that we experience can be really profound avenues for growth, internally and interpersonally,” Gioia said. “The losses we experience can make us look into our lives in a more holistic manner.” When people cut out the accessory aspects of their lives, they can begin to focus on what’s truly important to them. But it’s certainly not easy. “Just like the folks who came out of the Great Depression in this country, they learned some very powerful lessons,” Gioia said. “Sometimes that caused certain behaviors that were maladaptive in the future, but sometimes it can provide a sense of great perseverance.”

76% 33% 42%

of surveyed students said that COVID-19 impacted their mental health. of adults nationaly showing symptoms of anxiety as of February 2021. of adults nationally showing symptoms of depression as of February 2021.

Source: CDC - National Center for Health, ReMarker poll

The ReMarker • March 11, 2021

Opinions

Resonance

Members of the editorial board discuss the songs and artists that have shaped their lives. Page 17

Diversity

Editorial board on the school’s efforts to promote diversity and cultural awareness. Page 18

Spring Break How and why students should remain vigilant to prvent the spread of COVID-19 over Spring Break. Page 19

A short SOLUTION The homework problem Lion Tracks states that homework should average between 35 and 45 minutes a night per class. But often, that doesn’t happen. Here’s our idea to fix that: Students should be able to anonymously submit a notification to their teacher through the school website, alerting them that the homework for a given night took longer than 45 minutes. This system could be similar to the system used for electing for class officers. If more than half the class said the assignment took too long, the teacher could take action. Ultimately, it would ensure that students are able to communicate with their teachers and that teachers would be encouraged to make changes to their class if they are not following the rules laid out in Lion Tracks.

EDITORIAL

One year later Exactly one year ago, The ReMarker ran a story on mental health at the school. Now, it’s time to examine what has changed since then — what administrators have done in response to our suggestions, what students have noticed in these changes and what the school’s attitude toward the issue of mental health has become.

What’s improved

We agree that our school is not an easy one –– the terms “competitive and serious,” used in last year’s coverage, hold as true now as they did then –– but in the span of a year, the school has offered a host of new resources for students to take advantage of, though these resources have gained modest attention. Although well over half of respondents to a ReMarker poll believed that resources had remained “about the same,” more than fourth recognized the improvement in available resources. But despite their apparent lack of publicity (it has been only a year, after all), we would like to commend several specific steps the Counseling Department has taken to grow their available resources. First, we believe that the recent hiring of Lower School counselor Bridget Redondo-Doan will help ingrain the normalcy of mental health conversations in the youngest Marksmen, so that when they reach emotionally vulnerable stages later in their time at the school, they will have a solid basis already built for them. Second, we commend the department’s focus on advertising its services to the student body. A student’s choice to seek the help of a counselor is entirely voluntary, so the department requires extensive publicity and exposure to operate well as an institution. The involvement of the counselors in classes goes a long way to affirm their legitimacy. Additionally, we cannot understate the role of the new schedule in the mental health of the student body. We have noticed a doctrine of busyness at this school that posits a student must be continually occupied to be continually productive, even though this consuming workload –– especially as we progress into the later years of high school –– engenders unnecessary stress or exacerbates existing stress on students. We are glad to see that the new schedule has eased students’ busyness without sacrificing that wanted feeling of productivity, with three fourths of students seeing positive changes from the increased flexibility and free time. Lastly, we would like to address the limit to what a school can realistically provide for a student. If a Marksman has a mental health issue serious enough to warrant long-term care or hospitalization, he must seek those resources outside of school, but he should also be aware that the counselors can help facilitate that care.

What needs to be improved

We recognize that one year is not enough time to overhaul an entire facet of school life. But despite the noted improvements above, we would like to offer concerns that we still wish to see addressed, acknowledging that the issues we bring up tend to be less clear than our commendations. More than half of students answered that the environment here is some degree of harmful to students’ mental health, so we would like to offer a few suggestions for why this is so, even considering the noted improvements: • Mental health is still a taboo subject. More than half students believe that we do not discuss mental health issues enough on campus, and though that number has improved massively from a similar question posed last year, the continued stigmatization of mental health issues leads student to believe that their problems –– many of which are shared by hundreds of their peers –– are abnormal. • COVID-19 threw a wrench in the system. The school’s available responses to this concern are limited, but the isolation of COVID-19 has restricted social interaction, especially for remote students. If (and only if) after-school events like sports games and arts can be held safely, the school should be aware of their significance to social interactions. • Students feel unheard by adults on campus. Three fourths of students answered that faculty and administrators still do not adequately “realize the severity of mental health struggles among students.” Teachers assigning work without students’ other responsibilities in mind and reacting skeptically towards mental health-related excuses are examples of this simple gap in understanding. Part of the responsibility for these issues does lie on the student body. For significant improvements to be seen in the stigma toward mental health, students must be more open to a –– whether casual or serious –– with their classmates on the subject. Students should also be aware that they do not need to suffer from serious mental health issues to see school counselors, who will listen to any day-today issue. But the other part of responsibility lies on the school itself, to continue publicizing these resources and teaching Marksmen from a young age that mental health issues aren’t abnormal.

Last year’s editorial board stated that, “no Marksman, no matter what he is going through, should ever be alone.” And though we have noticed marked improvements in the school’s available resources to reach that goal, it nevertheless remains ahead of us.

IN SESSION Dr. Mary Bonsu (above) and Dr. Gabby Reed (below) lead sessions with students. “It’s difficult for all the wrong reasons to access resources outside of school,” Reed said, “so we want to be a place that meets students wherever they are.”

The daily battle of an average Marksman

veryone knows that “I don’t wanna do it yet” feeling. But eventually, whether it’s 9 p.m. or 5 a.m., most people buckle down and finish up those last 10 math problems or knock out that conclusion paragraph. I don’t. Starting and finishing essays in the middle of Latin is the norm — sorry, Mr. Cox. Some students call that clever and efficient time management, but I call that a disaster. And while a disaster a week may be standard in a Marksman’s life, six disasters a day, every day, is a bit much. But what hurt me the most about my complete lack of self-control was that, contrary to popular belief, I used to be good at time management. So why did I fall apart at the beginning of senior year? Was it early-onset Senioritis? Did I get a call from my 6th cousin Vinny and join the Sicilian Mafia? Did I get addicted to chess? No, it was one seemingly innocent realization. “If I do my homework better at school than at home, why don’t I just do everything at school?” A smart idea, right? Luke What I didn’t expect was Piazza Perspectives how hard it would backfire. editor Because my brain, in its infinite wisdom, somehow managed to take “You work well at school” and turn it into “You can’t work at home.” And while only doing homework at school worked some days, it left me far behind other days. The stress of leftover assignments and my impending collapse piled up, and even though I knew I had a problem and knew exactly to do my work to avoid this, I just couldn’t. After failing to transcribe my two hours of interview audio for the seventh day in a row, I did the unspeakable, terrible, inconceivable thing: I spoke to a counselor. I felt like my problems were unsolvable, that there was no way to get back on track as the student I was just a few months ago. But Dr. Bonsu carefully listened to me as I rambled on and on and helped clarify the root of my issues and a few ways to try and deal with them. I’d love to say I walked out of that hour-long session a new man. But I didn’t, to no fault of Dr. Bonsu. Problems like these aren’t fixable in a day. They take months of consistent effort to build good habits, and in the case of severe issues like diagnosed anxiety or depression, sometimes they may never be fully erased. I still do a terrible job of finishing my work on time. I still have to finish four math assignments before my test. I’m writing this column four hours before it’s due. And I still haven’t responded to Dr. Bonsu’s follow-up email on how I’ve been after our session — I guess you can consider this my response. But that’s still six math assignments less than I had to do the night before the last math test, and that’s three days earlier than I submitted my last newspaper story, and I’m responding now instead of not at all. My newfound bad habits aren’t an uncommon issue. This is the life of the guy sitting to your left, to your right or even you. But just because it’s a common issue doesn’t mean you shouldn’t seek help right away, because that’s what the counseling department is here for. Not every Marksman is as fortunate as I am to be able to say that the worst of their issues is the need to blast “Eye of the Tiger” at max volume to hype themselves up enough to write an English essay at 2 a.m.. Some come to school with plasteredon smiles, some feel isolated from their friends and family, some question every day whether their life is worth living. These aren’t easy things to accept and talk about, nor should they be. But the first step to fixing the problem is talking about it, regardless of the issue’s size, not only so you can get advice on how to improve, but also to verbally acknowledge that you are willing and ready to make a change. Marksmen face issues of all shapes and sizes, and while students should strive to face challenges head on, nobody ever said you had to do it alone.

Songs and artists that’ve shaped us.

Why I listen to so much rock – and One Direction

Our columnists discuss the effect music — and the artists who make it — has on them.

Alam Alidina Opinions Editor

17 The ReMarker

Sai Thirunagari Assignments Editor

uring a persuasion seminar for a campaign I was working on last summer, we were asked a question: What would be your “walkout” song? It was supposed to be an icebreaker – so I searched some combination of my head and my Spotify playlist for a song that so aligned with every aspect of my personality that when played to an arena of thousands, they would know it was me next due to walk out on that stage. The only problem was that I could come up with nothing. I hadn’t ever heard a song that could sum up who I was – or even one that had come close. See, in all my time listening to music, I had never associated the songs with myself. Not the classical radio my mom would play on long commutes (in what I think was an attempt to make me smarter), or the haunting Andrea Bocelli and Andrew Lloyd Weber she interspersed it with. Not the pre-curated Spotify playlists I would play when I was up or down, or the “Blank Space” of my brief obsession with Taylor Swift. Not even a whole genre – country – that I’m sure was created for the express purpose of helping people find themselves (if you don’t believe me, go listen to “Three Wooden Crosses”). Music played above and around me in elevators and restaurants and theaters. Sometimes music played at me from computer speakers or car stereos or AirPods. But even during an orchestra performance or a live Broadway musical, I never felt that the music was (or could be) playing for me. That is until an errant Twitter thread led me to Leonard Cohen’s “Bird on a Wire.” Unlike one of Cohen’s more famous songs, like “Hallelujah” or “Suzanne,” there’s not much information on how Cohen conceived “Bird on the Wire.” But listen to it. It’s a bizarre mix of hymn and fever dream, the epitome of what a song can be: vivid, enthralling imagery set to music that brings it to life. The first verse, Like a bird on the wire, like a drunk in a midnight choir, I have tried, in my way, to be free – is iconic, setting up the classic image of the moment before the leap into something new. I remember the first time I heard it. Cohen’s slow croon eked out of a phone speaker, marred by a live band and a raucous crowd. It took a second listen – this time to a calmer studio version – before I fell in love. Admittedly, it’s not a great walkout song. It doesn’t inspire the fervored cheering of, say, Springsteen’s “We Take Care of Our Own.” But “Bird on the Wire” speaks to who, and where, I am right now. I’m a senior on the verge of going to college, feet planted firmly in the present, unsure of what’s to come. I have passions, but no idea how to put them to use – and, more worryingly, I’m afraid they aren’t quite strong enough to give me a sense of direction. “Bird on the Wire” gives voice to those fears. I’d like to think that Cohen – wildly successful, but terrified of losing his touch – experienced many of them himself. And maybe that’s the power of great music: not entertainment, but connection.

Opinions

PHOTO Collin Katz

March 11, 2021

ne hundred twenty-one thousand four hundred forty-three minutes. Two thousand twenty-four hours. Eighty-four days. That’s how much music I listened to on Spotify last year. Blasting my car’s speakers as I drive down Central Expressway, wearing my headphones as I practice golf and playing my Bluetooth speaker as I sing along to my favorite songs in the shower, I can’t stop. All I know is that I’m obsessed. I’ve listened to 129 entire albums, including the entire discography of Pink Floyd, Eagles, Led Zeppelin, The Clash, Nirvana, James Taylor and…One Direction. That’s right – the early 2010s boy-band pop phenom known as 1D. Spotify says I listened to 20,810 minutes (346 hours, or two weeks) of them in 2020, putting me in the top 0.01% of their listeners – that’s the top 2,400 fans in the world. Rock is still my number one genre, but I can’t deny how much I love listening to 1D. To simultaneously commemorate and taunt my craze, my friends have even gifted me two One Direction t-shirts and two posters (one is on my wall beside a Nirvana wall-hanging, and I’m contemplating taking the other unopened one to my college dorm next year). Although I can’t escape my friends’ constant banter about my 1D obsession, I doubt I’ll ever lose my admiration for the boy band. Hear me out. I concede their songs sound similar, their lyrics are simple and their music is overproduced. But it’s their voices. In a time when more and more pop and hip-hop artists rely on autotune to compensate for their lack of vibrato and limited vocal range, One Direction’s sheer singing talent stands out to me. They’re outstanding vocalists – no special effects needed. It’s endlessly entertaining to pay attention to a 1D song and pick apart the boys’ voices in each verse and chorus – Niall has a soft, gentler voice, Louis stands out as the most soothing and highly-pitched, Zayn is deepest but can hit high notes with his three-octave vocal range, Harry usually sings the chorus and has a rich, distinctive tone and Liam sounds American even though he speaks with a British accent. Although they collaborated with outside writers to produce their One Direction songs, they’re extremely gifted artists even on their own. Their solo albums offer new musical directions for all of the boys that make me excited to see what styles (pun intended) they explore next. Liam feeds off mainstream pop and hip-hop in LP1 to add to his growing catalog of upbeat dance songs. In Harry Styles and Fine Line, Harry draws on rock and psychedelic pop to offer a diverse array of songs. Zayn boldly opens himself up through pop and R&B in Mind of Mine and expresses his unfiltered frustration, sadness and confusion in Icarus Falls and Nobody Is Listening. Louis allows his vulnerability to show through with his endearing British accent and meaningful lyrics about romance and past struggles in Walls. And you can hear elements of Eagles and Fleetwood Mac in Niall’s folk-, country- and rock-influenced Flicker and poppy Heartbreak Weather. But nothing compares to their magic as a single band. Their upbeat rhythms, catchy lyrics and combined vocal prowess make nearly every 1D song feel like a pulsating ball of energy that’ll make you sing along and dance on your feet. There’s such a variety of sentiments in their songs: the throbbing “Stockholm Syndrome,” comforting “Don’t Forget Where You Belong,” mournful “If I Could Fly,” inspiringly defiant “They Don’t Know About Us,” ever victorious “Steal My Girl,” hopeful “You & I,” energizing “Drag Me Down” and – my favorite – soothing “Night Changes.” Especially in this turbulent past year, I can always turn to One Direction to add more positivity to my life – and so can you. For my generation, 1D takes us back to the carefree days of Lower and Middle School, hearing their poppy, catchy songs overplayed on the radio. Other bands and genres – especially Pink Floyd and Nirvana – often tackle serious themes in their music, using more intense instruments and profound lyrics to produce meaningful social commentaries and critiques. While I absolutely appreciate those songs and listen to them frequently, One Direction offers a chance to lighten up with a youthfully pure and benign outlook on the world. Don’t get me wrong – I’m not saying they’re better than my favorite rock bands – but there’s something so uplifting about One Direction that I’ve never found anywhere else. When I hear the gentle acoustic guitar speed up and allow bittersweet romantic passion to flood through the quintet’s voices in the angelic chorus at the end of “Story of My Life,” I experience an overwhelming surge of adrenaline that makes my chest swell like I’m soaring and washes a refreshing wave of unbridled bliss over me that no other artist can replicate. And that’s what makes 1D beautiful.

The uncanny beauty of ‘Bird on the Wire’

It’s not just celebrities – we’re all in the spotlight

he other day my favorite country artist made a terrible mistake. Morgan Wallen, whose songs I sing in the shower (I know I’m not the only one) and listen to every morning on the way to school, was caught on video using an inappropriate racial slur. Soon after, the incident was all over social media, his mistake broadcast out into the public arena for all to see. Just a few short weeks after releasing “Dangerous: the Double Album” which broke the all-time record for highest single-week streams for a country album, Wallen was suspended from his label, pulled from radio stations across the country and declared ineligible for the 2021 Academy of Country Music Awards. Just like that, he was canceled. Interestingly, the video was filmed by one of Wallen’s neighbors, someone who thought he’d catch his drunk celebrity neighbor doing something he’d regret. So, as a result, even on his own property, within the privacy of his home, Morgan was in the spotlight. Now the spotlight can provide wonderful benefits for those it shines down upon. It can bring massive popularity, celebrity, influence and fandom, but at what cost? As I was thinking this over in the wake of Wallen’s fall from grace, I brought it up with my journalism adviser, Mr. Westbrook, who everyone calls Ray. We talked about the ridiculously high expectations placed on superstars by the media and their fans. Then Ray brought up Justin Bieber and his song “Lonely” (yes, I was just as surprised as you are that Ray’s a Belieber). I’d heard the song before but went home and

started listening to it on repeat. The more I listened, the more I was struck by the raw emotion and longing in Justin’s voice, his call for someone – anyone – to listen. Everybody knows my name now, but somethin’ ‘bout it still feels strange – like lookin’ in a mirror, tryna steady yourself and seein’ somebody else. Bieber was only 14 when he signed with his first label, 16 when he released his first studio album. He was a teenage superstar, adored by millions. But despite – or perhaps because of – all his early success, he wasn’t fulfilled. He has since gone on record with his struggles with depression and loneliness. Justin “had everything, but no one [was] listening.” He had people “criticiz[ing] the things [he] did as an idiot kid.” The spotlight shone brightly upon both Wallen and Bieber, and it held them to an impossible standard. But what about everyday people – those who aren’t global icons? Does the spotlight shine on us? I think so. Our audience may not be the entire world, but our parents, teachers, coaches and friends are watching. The expectations, held by others and even ourselves, especially at a high-achieving school such as St. Mark’s, can sometimes feel just like the spotlight Wallen, Bieber and other stars experience. In my own life, I’ve found that real relationships are the key to surviving the pressures and the spotlight. The close friends I can share anything with, the ones I can call when I hit rock bottom, the ones who will drop everything if I need them to – those are the friends I want to surround myself with so I can survive when the spotlight shines bright.

Robert Pou Editor in Chief

EDITORIAL

Transparency vital to diversity efforts

March 11, 2021

The ReMarker

Opinions

ast year, following the Black Lives Matter protests over the summer and the broader outcry over the death of George Floyd, administrators made several changes to the way the school promotes diversity and inclusion. The most significant of these was a new Committee on Community, Inclusion and Diversity, which, as Headmaster David Dini outlined in a letter to the St. Mark’s community on Oct. 23, was formed out of a commitment to explore “additional opportunities to ensure that every Marksman is known, loved and valued equally.” That message is continued on the school website, where, in a new page, the goals of the committee are roughly outlined as a way to enhance the school’s efforts “to underpin a sense of belonging for everyone on campus.” In a conversation with Dini and Director of Inclusion, Diversity and Human Resources Lorre Allen, The ReMarker was able to obtain more specifics on these efforts and their potential impact on the community. The committee itself is made up of ten members, comprised of alumni, faculty, parents and trustees — giving it a depth and breadth of experience that allows it to interact with many facets of the community. It’s broken up into subcommittees, each of which looks for ways to maximize diversity in different areas: the curriculum, activities and events, recruitment, etc. Allen’s role is to align those various objectives and to facilitate interactions between the committee and student groups. Right now, it’s conducting a review (going back a decade) of the school’s previous efforts to increase diversity on campus. The committee’s mandate is broad: it’s looking to increase diversity and inclusion among the student body not only in race but also in religion, sexual orientation, socioeconomic status, geographic location and ability. And while the committee’s long-term goals are vague, it does aim to make specific curricular and programmatic changes — those should occur before the next school year. We applaud the committee’s formation — now more than ever, it’s vital for the school to make a concerted effort to increase diversity on campus. And we understand that the school’s approach to change is a slow and deliberate one. As is evident by the successful introduction of the new schedule, that approach results in effective and welcome innovation. But when the issues the committee is considering are as pressing as they are, it’s vital that — even if changes are slated to occur

over the long-term — the committee make every effort to be transparent in the present. To that end, we have three recommendations that we believe will result in a more vigorous and open process and further the committee’s goals: Publish regular updates on the committee’s progress It’s incredibly important that the student body remain up to date on what the committee’s current plans are — something the page on the website doesn’t accomplish. Even if updates are published once a semester, or even annually, doing so on a regular basis will keep the student body informed of and interested in the committee’s work, driving constructive discussion on how to make campus more inclusive. Appoint student leaders as ex officio members of the committee The president and vice president of the Student Council serve as the official, elected representatives of the student body. By virtue of their position, they should serve on the committee, giving it valuable input on how potential proposals may affect the attitude and perspective of the student body. Doing so would give students an informal way to communicate their concerns to the committee and would create further confidence in the committee’s suggestions. Hire diversity and inclusion consultants to conduct an external analysis Just as with the new schedule, when outside consultants were hired to conduct detailed surveys of the student body and provide a second opinion as to what changes should be made, the school should hire independent consultants to determine the state of diversity and inclusion efforts on campus. This won’t in any way undermine the work of the committee — rather, it should augment it, giving committee members new insight into current issues and potential solutions. We’re incredibly supportive of the work of the committee and hope to see it succeed. But work on a topic as important as diversity and inclusion should be done not in the shadows but with the full engagement of the student body. We believe these proposals will help the committee accomplish that and will ultimately ensure its work is more equitable and longlasting.

Teachers should follow availability guidelines

mong the most appreciated resources here is the availability of teachers when students have questions that can’t be answered in regular class time or have concerns they’d like to address directly with their teacher. Although the school has been on the right track to facilitate healthy, communicative relationships between students and teachers, we have still noticed issues in this dynamic that we can solve rather easily, so we would like to offer both students and teachers a reminder of policies and expectations already in place to make this communication as seamless as possible. First, office hours. Though classes begin at 8:35 a.m. each day for Upper School, faculty are expected to be available for office hours beginning at 8 a.m. In a random check conducted one morning by ReMarker staff, we found of 50 Upper School instructors (leaving out those who are not on campus for any reason, such as health, COVID-19 or travel), 21 were not in their offices at 8:10 a.m. School policy asks that teachers be available during those hours, so we encourage teachers to make themselves more accessible in the mornings. Doing so will foster conversations that ultimately make class time more efficient. To that end, it is unfair to expect teachers to

take time out of their day to make themselves available if students are not inclined to take advantage of their time. Students should be prudent when making appointments and using the resources available. Students should not waste time seeking help when they have nothing to discuss, for example, but at a school like ours, that is rarely ever the case. Therefore, of teachers we encourage students to use the unavailable resources they’ve been given. for morning Lastly, when in-person office hours appointments are not available, source: random we have noticed issues in the check of 50 faculty by ReMarker staff promptness with which several teachers respond to their emails. Again, school policy dictates that a teacher should get back to a student within no more than 24 hours, but students should also try to reciprocate that expectation when a teacher emails them. Holding everybody to high standards of dialogue keeps us all in a healthy degree of urgency, a must at a school as busy as ours, so we encourage students and faculty alike to follow these guidelines to facilitate efficient communication.

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REMARKER student newspaper of ST. MARK’S SCHOOL OF TEXAS 10600 PRESTON ROAD DALLAS, TEXAS 75230 214.346.8000 Editorial Board editor in chief ROBERT POU assignments editor SAI THIRUNAGARI brand editor COOPER RIBMAN endzone editor WILLIAM ANIOL executive page editor JACK DAVIS head photographer COLLIN KATZ managing editors JAMIE MAHOWALD HENRY MCELHANEY SID SINHA opinions editor ALAM ALIDINA perspectives editor LUKE PIAZZA senior editor CRISTIAN PEREIRA

Section Editors 10600, culture AXEL ICAZBALCETA WILL PECHERSKY discoveries, issues TOBY BARRETT AUSTIN WILLIAMS deputy endzone SEMAJ MUSCO deputy focus ERIC YOO HAN ZHANG reviews specialist TREVOR CROSNOE sports LUKE NAYFA PETER ORSAK

Creative graphics director JONATHAN YIN artist COOPER COLE

Advertising business manager IAN MIZE

Writers

ETHAN BORGE, MORGAN CHOW, IAN DALRYMPLE, NIKHIL DATTATREYA, SHREYAN DAULAT, GRANT JACKSON, RAJAN JOSHI, ARJUN KHATTI, KESHAV KRISHNA, MYLES LOWENBERG, MATTHEW REED, WILL SPENCER, DILLON WYATT, DARREN XI

Photographers

BLAKE BROOM, ABE ECHT, PATRICK FLANAGAN, LUIS GARCIA, SAL HUSSAIN, EVAN LAI, EVAN MCGOWAN, HAYWARD METCALF, LARS OCHS, SKY PARK, HENRY PICCAGILI, DANIEL SANCHEZ, OWEN SIMON, EKANSH TAMBE, LUKE VOORHEIS, JERRY ZHAO

Adviser

RAY WESTBROOK

Headmaster DAVID W. DINI

audience The ReMarker is intended for the students, faculty, staff and alumni community of St. Mark’s School of Texas. Press run is 4,000 copies, with more than 2,600 of those mailed out to alumni around the world, courtesy of the school’s offices of External Affairs, Development and Alumni divisions. opinions and editorials Editorials represent the viewpoints of the newspaper’s Editorial Board and are not necessarily those of the Board of Trustees, administration, faculty or staff. All personal opinion columns, bylined with the writer’s name and photo, represent the views of that writer only and not necessarily those of The ReMarker, Board of Trustees, administration, faculty or staff. online viewing www.smtexas.org/remarker. reader involvement The ReMarker encourages reader input through guest columns and story ideas. Contact the appropriate editor for suggestions. letters to the editor Letters to the editor are welcome and encouraged. They must be typed, signed and not exceed 300 words. E-mail submissions are not accepted. advertising Contact the business staff at 214.346.8145. We reserve the right to refuse any advertisement. Inclusion of an ad does not represent an endorsement by the school’s administration, faculty, or staff or ReMarker staff members. membership The ReMarker maintains membership in the Columbia Scholastic Press Association, New York City, NY; National Scholastic Press Association, Minneapolis, MN; and the Interscholastic League Press Conference, Austin.

EDITORIAL

Students should stay safe if travelling over break or testing requirements after you arrive or before you leave. It is crucial students and their families comply with these guidelines in order to return to Dallas for classes March 22. 4. Know where nearby hospitals are located. In the event that someone gets sick, locate the nearest hospitals and clinics in the event that you need medical attention. 5. Quarantine for at least seven days after returning home. The school has asked that all students self quarantine for a week after their vacation and take another PCR test three to five days after returning to town to ensure students are healthy before arriving on campus. Students who do not travel will still attend in-person classes while students who travel and are in quarantine will attend classes virtually. Students need to follow these guidelines, among others mandated by the destinations they are travelling to, to ensure not only their own safety, but the safety of our community as a whole.

Students should try to avoid travelling as much as possible over Spring Break, as the CDC explained in their update Feb. 16. Cases remain high throughout the country, which yields a suboptimal time to vacation. However, we understand it is inevitable that some students will take vacations, as many already have set plans, so we have outlined specific steps students should take to ensure their safety while out of town and for their return to campus. 1. Get a PCR test one to three days before you travel. A fast yet reliable test allows students to ensure they are healthy before travelling. 2. Continue all the practices you normally do on campus. This includes remaining socially distanced as much as possible, always wearing a mask and sanitizing or washing your hands often. School nurse Julie Deorge also recommends wearing a second, higher level mask under a cloth mask, especially on planes. 3. Understand the requirements for returning to Dallas. Certain destinations have quarantine

Follow guidance, be proactive when getting vaccinated

Around the Quad

ANSWER OUR QUESTIONS

Q: How do you feel about Governor Abbott’s decision to rescind the mask mandate?

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I get that everyone needs to be re-elected but willingly putting election status over wellbeing is something that I can’t support. Beau Exall Senior

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We all know the ultimate goal is return to living without masks, but I feel like the decision was too soon.

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Arjun Agarwal Junior

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I think it's too soon to lift the mask mandate – we'll get too comfortable too fast.

Josh Shandera College Counselor

I think COVID-19 is going to start spreading again and we will eventually have to shut down. Rishab Siddamshetty Junior

Jake Bond Sophomore

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I think it’s irresponsible and pandering so that he can get re-elected and not take into account other people’s lives.

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We're definitely going to see a spike after the mandate is lifted, but I'm hopeful it's the right decision.

William Clarke Freshman

Throughout the last year and the beginning of this one, different types of capital-B Boys became well known across the country. The most infamous group is the Proud Boys, a male chauvinist group that’s uniquely 2020s. They originated in Canada and are designated a terrorist group there, but they are mostly known as far-right supporters of Donald Trump in America. This is different from the militia groups that existed at the time of Fight Club’s release. They had a general distrust of government, but the Proud Boys are supporters of Trump, a mainstream politician, to the extent that he told them to “stand back and stand by” on the national debate stage. These groups are real life fight clubs: All men, devoted to an extremist ideology, and ready to use violence, like storming the capitol, to impose their will on others. Speaking of storming the capitol, in a scenario that would be too unrealistic to get in a movie a few months ago, remember the guy in a Viking outfit who was walking on the Senate floor? According to the Anti-Defamation League, his Viking tattoos are often used by white supremacists and Nazi sympathizers — they see the Vikings as a primal, masculine race that exists to fight and conquer. Sounds familiar. Fight Club was made to be absurd, but many years later, this Gen X fantasy hits closer to home than any of its creators could have imagined. It’s a memory of a generation where these proto-facist groups only existed in movies, when today, plenty of real world events couldn’t be imagined by the most creative fiction. The hordes of extremists who stormed the capitol and caused violence around the country aren't nearly as cool as Brad Pitt’s Tyler Durden, but they just might be more dangerous. Welcome to the new fight club.

19 The ReMarker

STUDENTS AND FACULTY

Myles Lowenberg Staff Writer

Opinions

Compiled by Dillon Wyatt and Han Zhang

ight Club isn’t a modern movie anymore. Released in 1999, the plot and visuals have aged well, but the deeper themes feel off in the present day. Most noticeably aged is the movie’s most important theme: masculinity. One of the first scenes is about the feeling of losing masculinity — in the most literal sense. The unnamed protagonist visits a testicular cancer support group, where he meets a former bodybuilder named Bob, who lost his testicles and feels physically and mentally emasculated. The protagonist feels like he’s losing his masculinity in a much more figurative way. The target audience for Fight Club was Generation X men, who were in their 20s when the movie was released. The protagonist is supposed to embody their fears of a man growing “soft” in a capitalist world. Later, we realize that the protagonist is an unreliable narrator, but for now, we see a man who goes to support groups to cry, works an unexciting office job and defines himself by his IKEA furniture. This is portrayed as bad and weak, until his apartment mysteriously burns down and he meets the ultimate model of masculinity: Tyler Durden. He and Tyler start the fight club, where men marooned in white-collar jobs can finally feel alive by beating each other senseless. If the protagonist’s apartment — filled with generic furniture — represented weakness, the fight club in the basement of a bar was its primal polar opposite. He’s ready to reclaim his individuality in a world where everyone has the same mass-produced products by moving into a run-down old house with Tyler. But as the story progresses, Tyler creates Project Mayhem, a group separate from the fight club, whose members shave their heads, wear all black and lose their individuality by going to another extreme. They terrorize their city, and their go-to method of intimidation is castration, like when they threaten the city’s police chief in another literal example of emasculation. In the end, I don’t read as far into the movie as some others. It’s a dark comedy, and if it even has a moral, it would be somewhere between defining yourself by IKEA furniture and becoming a domestic terrorist. I know, really complicated. But fast forward to the present day, and it seems like some people didn’t get the second part.

March 11, 2021

the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine was 95% effective, the Moderna vaccine was 94.1% effective and the Johnson & Johnson vaccine was 85% effective at preventing laboratory-confirmed COVID-19 illness in people who received both doses without evidence of previous infection. All have received authourization from the Food and Drug Administration. Also bear in mind the following precautions and information from the CDC, as of Jan. 15: 1. Although there may be potential side effects from the first dose, they should subside after a few days. 2. Call your doctor if the side effects persist or worsen after several days. 3. Receive the second shot of the PfizerBioNTech vaccine 21 days after the first shot, or the second shot of the Moderna vaccine 28 days after the first shot. The Johnson & Johnson vaccine only requires a single dose to be fully effective. We urge our community to continue getting the vaccines to curb the spread and severity of COVID-19, and we must remain diligent in our daily efforts to keep the virus at bay. Remember, the vaccines may not protect you until a week or two after the second shot — and even then, you may still be a carrier for the virus. After receiving the vaccine, you should continue following the CDC’s recommendations to wear masks, socially distance, wash your hands and avoid crowds.

As the COVID-19 vaccine rollout in Dallas expands, we are pleased that members of our community have been able to steadily receive vaccine doses through various organizations. Furthermore, we urge all community members to register for a vaccine as soon as possible. Of course, the vaccine supply remains limited, and only individuals in the 1A and 1B priority groups are eligible to receive doses. Community members should keep an eye on state guidelines so they know when they become eligible. Some counties, including Dallas County (and other surrounding counties), have opened registration to individuals regardless of whether they qualify. Although individuals who fall outside of the 1A and 1B priority groups will not receive their doses for some time, we urge all community members to secure their place in line; proactivity in this early stage will pay dividends in the coming months. The sooner our community vaccinates, the sooner we can return to “normal.” According to the CDC, as of Feb. 3, none of the authorized and recommended COVID-19 vaccines contain the live virus, meaning that the vaccine cannot give you COVID-19. You should vaccinate even if you have already had COVID-19, as there is a possibility that you can be infected even after recovering from your first infection. We highly suggest the Pfizer-BioNTech, Moderna and Johnson & Johnson vaccines because, based on evidence from clinical trials,

Fight Club taking on a whole new meaning

Making the sale After his artwork had been on display at the Blue Print Gallery, senior Will Chance sold one of his paintings for $2,000

The ReMarker • March 11, 2021

Culture

Art

Film

When Sam Yonack ‘12 graduated from UT Austin, he didn’t know what he wanted to do. Now, he finds himself in the middle of the entertainment industry. Page 21

PAINTING Throughout his artistic career at the school, senior Will Chance has produced several pieces of professional art. Displayed above is “Cowboy,” his painting which sold for $2,000 after being on display at Blue Print Gallery. The buyer’s identity was kept anonymous and thus was not contacted for interview. Other examples of Chance’s artwork appear on this page. Clockwise from right: “Teton 2,” “Rocky Mountain” and “Giuliano and Giuliano Print.”

rs gratia artis. Art for the sake of art. Doing the work for the sake of doing the work. This love for artwork and culture impels Marksmen artists to work in their art classes, expecting no external compensation. But what about when you can make money from that passion?

Buzz

Reviews of meat-centered meals around Dallas and the film The Little Things. Page 22

In brief AREA C Upper School Classics Club members achieved first place in the advanced level of the Area C certamen competition Feb. 13. A Middle School team also participated in the intermediate division and finished in second place. The event was hosted online and organized primarily by Latin instructors David Cox and Claire Strange. Winning first place allows the advanced team to compete in the state certamen competition at the Texas State Junior Classical League (TSJCL) state convention held later in the year, which will also be held online. FILM FESTIVAL Senior Sarbik Saha and sophomore Sal Hussain won two awards of recognition for filmmakers under 17 years old in the IndieFEST Film Awards for their short films called Paradise and My Greatest Critic. IndieFEST is an international film festival established in 2008, and it released the award announcements in February. ENGLISH COURSES The English Department will offer 14 new courses, determined by a Junior Class interest survey, from 20 initial propositions for the 2021-22 school year with intentions to provide variety in senior year courses. Some will center on specific themes, but others will focus on certain genres. Although each course is distinctive in its emphasis, all will necessitate spoken and written literature that challenges students to apply skills nurtured in years prior. SPRING PLAY The Upper School Spring Play, Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stevenson, will be performed April 9-10 at 7:00 p.m. and April 11 at 2:00 p.m. for audiences of 16 people in the Black Box and will be livestreamed April 10. The actors will be performing in masks and will be safely isolated from the audience because of the play’s staging.

Senior Will Chance has kept art close to him since he was young. The hobby is something he picked up from his grandmother and is now his principal creative outlet. “I’ve been painting since I was a really little kid,” Chance said. “My grandma was a talented painter, and she painted my nursery when I was still in a crib before eventually teaching me how to paint. It’s been ongoing throughout my life, and it’s always just been something I feel like I can express my creativity through.” The week-long Young Artists Exhibition, hosted by the Blue Print Gallery Jan. 14, was Chance’s first opportunity to make a profit by expressing that creativity. Lauren Zogg, gallery curator, said the show was a great place for students to present their art to the real world. “We have schools from Fort Worth, South Lake and all over Dallas participating in this show,” Zogg said. “It’s mainly for AP art students. The school

curates the work, and while some of them have handled the art, the art teacher usually just chooses the top pieces.” Chance submitted and priced his art pieces in January along with seniors Daniel Wu and Antonio Quinones and junior Adam Wang. Art instructor Kate Wood assisted the artists in keeping the process efficient and straightforward. “With help from Mrs. Wood, we priced our works, but we felt that they were very ambitious,” Chance said. “I don’t think any of us set our hopes really high, but it was cool to learn how art is priced and how galleries can take cuts of it.” Chance’s expectations were exceeded when three buyers showed interest in the art piece. Ultimately, the woman who had first expressed interest purchased the work for a hefty sum. “Will’s piece was one of those pieces that had at least two holds on it,” Zogg said. “I do think we had a third hold on it as well. The first hold immediately fell in love with it the minute she saw it, and after she talked to her husband, they ended up purchasing it for $2,000.” After learning about the three holds, Chance was amazed that people were willing to pay the price he put on the piece. However, since the artwork’s sale would only be finalized after the end of the event, Chance eagerly waited for the day to come. “I was obviously surprised when I saw that my work was reserved, and I was even more surprised when Blue Print gave us the full sale price on it and didn’t take a gallery cut,” Chance said. “I had pretty much forgotten that it was for sale because I really didn’t expect it to sell at all. I saw that a few people had reserved it for the sale price, so I was super anxious for a few days while I waited until the exhibition was over to see whether it sold or not.”

The purchase of Chance’s work also left an impression on Zogg. She is delighted to see the senior’s artwork bought. “I think the ultimate prize is that there were three people out there who wanted to pay a significant amount of money for his artwork,” Zogg said. “We were really impressed with the work. I am so glad that it was sold.” Satisfied with Marksmen’s submissions, Zogg hopes the school will promote the art program and continue to be a part of the annual show. “I would really encourage St. Mark’s to keep doing what they’re doing as far as having students take art,” Zogg said. “The work that I’ve seen from your school is amazing and inspiring. The sale of Will’s art is just proof that what your teachers are doing is good, and it’s working. There’s no higher compliment than someone purchasing your art for their home.” Even though Chance was delighted to hear that someone had purchased his work, he felt some sorrow in parting with the work into which he had invested countless hours. “It was a little bittersweet because it’s definitely the biggest thing I’ve ever done,” Chance said. “It was ten feet by four feet, and I worked on it throughout quarantine, so it was a cool piece for me because it carried me through the lockdown and the end of last school year. It was so big that I don’t think it would have ever ended up in my house anyway, but to know it’s hanging in somebody else’s home and they’re happy to have it makes it all worth it.” STORY Will Spencer, Morgan Chow, Axel Icazbalceta PHOTOS Courtesy Will Chance

FILM

Taking off in the arts

A look at junior Paul Valois photography from his Instagram account, @paulvaloisphoto. In his own words:

My inspiration was the movie Scream because I wanted to get that unsettling, unsafe feel in your own home. That’s what I was trying to communicate with this because I chose my models to be these two little girl twins. I made some fake blood with corn syrup and red food dye, smushed it all over the window and in the concrete background. I told them to pretend like you’re looking around inside or trying to get inside, and I turned all the lights off inside, so it was completely about what was happening through the window.

STARTING OUT After working as a media analyst for a year at 20th Century Fox coming out of college, Sam Yonack ‘12 decided to shift jobs into a role more digitally focused in the film world.

promoting their movies, but I wanted to be a little bit more on the cutting edge of technology and getting to experiment with different ad platforms and technologies.” After moving on from his job at Fox and beginning a new one, Yonack has come to understand the slow process of starting a career in the arts. “I can really only speak to Hollywood and film and movie studios,” Yonack said, “but if you want to start a career in that world, you really do have to start off from the bottom, answering phones, occasionally picking up lunches or getting coffee, doing really administrative, bottom-of-the-barrel stuff. That’s how you earn a lot of the trust and respect in the industry.” With a few years of experience, Yonack has advice for highschool students who are interested in the arts, a position Yonack once found himself in a decade earlier. “Be willing to step out of your comfort zone,” Yonack said. “If you can, move somewhere where there’s a lot going on in the arts; I would say Los Angeles and New York, in particular. Get out of Texas, at least for a little while.” Yonack has found the importance of being flexible in an area with such a variety of opportunities. “The good thing about being fresh

out of college is you can experiment with different career paths, and if you don’t like it, you can move on,” Yonack said. “There’s a ton out there to do.”

Hussain gaining film experience

his process in the arts first began for sophomore Sal Hussain when he started working in the film industry. One of the most valuable skills Hussain learned was confidence. “Being young in the industry, you can’t be scared, you have to be really confident,” Hussain said. “You still can’t become overconfident, though. You shouldn’t commit to something you don’t fully understand. It’s really important to stay confident but ask questions so you know what you’re doing.” To create his best projects, Hussain has to know not only what he is doing, but also what his coworkers are doing. “It’s a lot more than just holding a camera, you have to work with them,” Hussain said. “It’s not just your vision, it’s their vision, so you have to collaborate a lot. That collaboration is hard if you’re not easy to work with.”

STORY Will Pechersky, Ian Dalrymple PHOTO Courtesy Sam Yonack ‘12

Headliners

From album drops to movie releases and everything in between, here’s what’s on tap in the coming weeks. Movies

Albums

Videogames

The Courier

Mar. 19

Green Blue, Coin

Mar. 12

R.B.I. Baseball 21

Mar. 16

Six Minutes to Midnight

Mar. 26

Mar. 19

Kaze and the Wild Masks

Mar. 26

Godzilla vs. Kong

Mar. 31

Chemtrails Over the Country Club, Lana Del Rey

Monster Hunter Rise

Mar. 26

Virus Shark

April 13

Today We’re The Greatest, Middle Kids

Mar. 19

Mozart Requiem

Mar. 30

Dim, SYML

April 16

21 The ReMarker

Like many others, Yonack didn’t have a concrete idea of where he wanted to start his career in the real world while in Upper School. “It wasn’t until I got into college and started experimenting with different classes and majors that I knew that I wanted to take up a career in advertising and marketing,” Yonack said. “I don’t think at St. Mark’s I really had much of an inkling of what I wanted to do. I always knew that I wanted to be a little bit creative in what I did.” For many, starting a career in the arts is the hardest part. Yonack was fortunate enough to have a childhood relationship that opened the door to his first job in this area: Executive Assistant at 20th Century Fox. “I was doing some networking and figured out that one of my buddies growing up had this connection to 20th Century Fox,” Yonack said. “He had worked closely with my would-be boss, so he connected us. I had a couple of interviews, and they offered me the role. It was pretty smooth and seamless.” But with this job, Yonack didn’t get to start out at the top. His first job in the arts industry, much of Yonack’s work consisted of completing administrative tasks. “Probably 50 percent of my time was answering calls, planning events, answering emails, taking notes, stuff like that,” Yonack said, “basically on behalf of my boss, who is the vice president of the in-theater marketing department at 20th Century Fox, and as well on behalf of the entire in-theater marketing group.” Taking a new step in his career, Yonack decided that it was time to move on from his job at Fox, earning the new position of media analyst at OMD where he works on digital marketing and advertising. “It was a great experience, but I think I really wanted to do something a little bit more digitally focused, something in digital and social media,” Yonack said. “I think with a big, old studio like Fox, they had a lot of tried-and-true methods for

Culture

This is one of my favorite shots that I’ve made this year. I shot them all in the same proportion of 16 by nine because I thought it was cool to shoot it like it’s a movie scene. In this one, I really tried to put a contrast between the light outside and the light in the car. There’s not really any room to put a strobe or anything to light her face, so what I did is I opened the sunshade a little just until the light turned on. I used that as the lighting on her face, and that top lighting shows really good emotion in the face.

s blockbusters hit the big screen and new personalities come into focus, the film industry can shoot actors to stardom and put directors in the spotlight. However, Sam Yonack ‘12 has taken a different path through the industry, making his way through the film world offscreen. Yonack’s job as a media analyst at OMD, a media communications company part of Omnicom group, trades scripts and direction for marketing and advertisements.

March 11, 2021

On my website, I have what the song is for each one, but this one was The Star Room by Mac Miller. I wanted to take this photo as sort of an introspective look. It’s titled “Disappointment.” It’s kind of indescribable, but you’re disappointed and beating down on yourself and being trapped in a way. Using my bathroom lights was a good move for this one, and I really liked how it turned out.

While it isn’t the most common track to follow, some Marksmen pursue a more creative profession.

MOVIE REVIEW

‘The Little Things:’ Denzel Washington shines in riveting crime thriller

FOOD

The carnivore diet: meat in Dallas

If you’re in need of a meaty meal, look no further. We found great spots for all your cravings - BBQ, hot chicken, burgers and more. Reviews Trevor Crosnoe

L by Trevor Crosnoe he Little Things, starring Denzel Washington, Jared Leto and Rami Malek, is the newest star-studded crime thriller to hit the big screen. Released in both theaters and on HBO MAX, the film hoped to cash in on both viewers comfortable going back to the movies, and those viewers who’d still prefer to watch from their couches. The Little Things gets off to a quick start. The film opens on a dark highway in the middle of the night. We see a girl in a car driving casually, before a mysterious car blocks off the road in front of her. The woman swerves around the car and pulls into a gas station, where a man gets out of the car and pursues her. Although our nameless woman eventually escapes, the movie starts on a tense and uncomfortable note, one that prepares the audience for the rest of this gritty film. After the opening scene, The Little Things slows its pace and begins to introduce the main characters. Joe Deacon, played by Denzel Washington, is a deputy sheriff in Kern County. Sent to Los Angeles to collect some evidence from a recent murder, it immediately becomes clear that “Deke,” as they call him, isn’t new to LA. While he now works in Kern County, the movie suggests that at one point he worked in LA but was driven away by some sort of incident that’s hinted at constantly. Deke greets his former colleagues enthusiastically, but they either ignore him or regard his comments with mild disdain. Clearly, Deke has a history that’s still fresh in people’s minds. We quickly find out that Deke isn’t your average deputy. He has a dangerous habit of getting way too invested in his cases, as it’s revealed that Deke’s last case in Los Angeles left him with both a heart attack and a broken marriage. It becomes clear that Deke values justice above everything else in his life, something I really did respect about him. Another person who respects this aspect of Deke is Jim Baxter, played by Rami Malek. Baxter is a young detective with a fiery passion for justice that resembles Deke’s. They team up and find a suspect in no time. Their suspect is Albert Sparma, a greasy, long-haired creep played by Jared Leto. However, the notion eventually arises that Sparma is innocent and simply having fun with the cops, leading to an enjoyable but slightly anti-climactic cat-and-mouse game between the two groups. While it doesn’t have the actionpacked ending I expected, The Little Things is still a great movie, mostly because of the performances of Washington and Malek. Washington completely knocks it out of the park as Deke, perfectly portraying his role as the fervent yet damaged cop. Malek is the ideal sidekick as Baxter, countering Deke’s grim analysis with witty commentary. My main issue with “The Little Things” is Jared Leto’s performance. While he does a good job of being creepy, his acting is exaggerated at times and his character seems more like a character than an actual person. Other than this one concern, I really enjoyed The Little Things, and I’d recommend it to anyone in need of a movie to watch.

March 11, 2021

Buzz

The ReMarker

Grade: B+

Rathbun’s Curbside BBQ

B-

5200 W Lovers Lane

ocal restaurant owner and chef Kent Rathbun is no stranger to the Dallas culinary landscape. The founder of spots like Abacus and Hickory, the chef is now also a co-owner of Shinsei and Lovers Seafood. His newest project, however, is an entirely different beast. Rathbun’s Curbside BBQ, like its name suggests, isn’t a restaurant. It consists of three oak and hickory smokers in a parking lot. While the set-up may be slightly minimal, the demand for his barbeque is far from minimal. Taking both online and walk up orders, Rathbun had no shortage of customers for his new venture which opened in the fall of 2020. My family ordered a variety of food items, including pork ribs and chicken - both smoked - with a side of beans. The first thing we opened at home was the beans, which unfortunately did not work out well for us. The second we

almer’s, which also opened in the fall of 2020, offers about as many chicken dishes as one could possibly imagine. However, I came to Palmer’s with only one item in mind: their namesake hot chicken. Looking at the menu, I saw that they offered four heat levels for the chicken: naked, novice, Nashville, and napalm. I started off by ruling out napalm because I read the words “Carolina Reaper” in its description, referring to the world’s hottest pepper. Then, I made the easy decision of choosing the Nashville spice level, ignoring Palmer’s warning of potential “forehead sweat.” Frankly, I never even considered naked or novice because I hadn’t come to Palmer’s in the first place to review a mild piece of chicken. When my chicken arrived, its intense spice level was made obvious by its menacing red exterior - it looked like a piece

Maple & Motor

A+

4810 Maple Avenue

unpackaged them, we could tell they were rancid - the smell was awful, and it made us a bit hesitant to eat the rest of the food. It was undoubtedly a terrible start for Rathbun’s, but I still had faith that the meat would save the day. I began my meal with the chicken, which was good but not great. The smokey flavor was nice, but the meat was a bit too dry for my liking. There was nothing glaringly wrong with the chicken; it was just a bit boring. The meal really started to turn around when I got to the pork ribs. The honey and black pepper rub on the ribs was out of this world. When I finished, there was hardly any meat left on the bones, the sign of a delicious set of ribs. While my experience with Rathbun’s Curbside BBQ may have got off to a slow start, I’d still recommend it as long as you stick to the meat and stay away from the beans.

of fried chicken that had been drowned in hot sauce for way too long. I took a big first bite of chicken and was surprised that it wasn’t as spicy as I thought it would be; however, as it reached my throat, I realized I had misjudged the heat level, and the coughing began. After I recovered, I continued to eat the chicken and began to enjoy it more and more. The blend of spices used to create the hot flavor was truly delicious, and I’d recommend that anyone who goes to Palmer’s should try the Nashville heat level for this exact reason. In addition to the chicken, the meal usually comes with pickles which I decided against because I’m not a huge fan. I ordered sides of french fries, which were good but slightly soggy, and mac and cheese, which was tasty and super cheesy. Come for the chicken, but the sides are pretty stellar in their own right.

f it’s your first time going, you’ll probably miss the turn into Maple & Motor. The burger joint looks more like an old abandoned building than an actual functioning restaurant. The inside of Maple & Motor is comfortable but just as unremarkable as the outside. You wouldn’t think they’d have the best burger in Texas, according to The Daily Meal. Look at the photo of one of Maple & Motor’s burgers; you’ll see the bun resting awkwardly on top of some veggies and a patty. It doesn’t look bad by any means, but it doesn’t jump out at you either. This is a theme at Maple & Motor; although it has some aesthetic shortcomings, the quality of the food is all that truly matters to them and their customers. They encapsulate this sentiment on their website, describing Maple & Motor as “low-class cool.” I ordered a simple cheeseburger and was given a choice between cheddar,

Palmer’s Hot Chicken

6465 E Mockingbird Lane

American, and pepper jack cheese: I went with American. I was then asked if I would like the center of my burger to be “pink” or not, to which I responded affirmatively. I also ordered a side of fries. One of the only critiques I had with Maple & Motor was their drink selection. Instead of having normal sodas, they had Maine Root, which is basically an off-brand replacement to the best drinks. I was craving a Dr. Pepper with my meal, but I was forced to settle for a “Doppelganger” a.k.a. Maine Root’s Dr. Pepper replacement. My burger was absolutely delicious. When they asked if I wanted it pink, they really meant it. The entire inside of my burger was a lush, perfect pink color. The thought of it makes my mouth water as I write this. Maple & Motor is the perfect example of why you should never judge a book by its cover; try it for yourself because it may just be the best burger in Texas.

Outdoors

hilled by the cold winter air, senior Klyde Warren walked through the cornfields of East Texas to stalk a small group of wild hogs. Accompanied by a gun, knife and hunting guide, Warren gradually heard the sounds of footsteps pounding against the earth a few hundred feet in front of him. As these footsteps grew louder, sounds of shrieks and grunts came from the opposite direction. Warren knew he was in trouble. Quickly loading his gun and resting it between his palms, Warren prepared to fend off any threatening animals that might come his way. As he and his guide made their way through the long, dried cornfield, they were met on the other side by a herd of wild hogs. Surrounded, Warren picked the largest in the group, wedged the gun’s stock tightly against his right cheekbone and precisely aligned the scope’s red dot sight to just under the hog’s neck. He took the shot. Suddenly, the rest of the hogs aggressively charged in his direction. The corn was too thick to shoot through, as the hog was barreling toward him. The herd of 250-pound hogs were quickly within shooting distance of Warren. In a matter of seconds, the herd brushed by him, striking his left leg. Falling to the ground, Warren breathed a sigh of relief as he noticed the hogs no longer posed a threat while they scurried off into the cornfield. “It made for one of the most thrilling experiences of my life,” Warren said. For Warren, the sport of hunting started as a game his dad invented to keep him entertained and curious as an impatient six-year-old boy. “My dad taught me at a very young age, so that was always a great bonding experience for the two of us,” Warren said. “He came up with different stories about how creatures would show up to the deer stand, and it was my responsibility to look out for them and potentially shoot them. This forced me to familiarize myself with different animals and made it fun for me at an early age when I didn’t appreciate hunting.” Now, 12 years since his first kill, Warren still spends time hunting and exploring the outdoors as a means to grow closer with the world around him. “As I’ve gotten older, I have become more independent when I hunt,” Warren said, “Just sitting in the deer blind at 6:30 in morning just as the sun starts to come up is always really peaceful for me. I really enjoy being surrounded

POSTED UP Senior Klyde Warren and his hunting dog, Gage, sit in a pond at his ranch in Sulphur Bluff, TX after shooting down the bag limit for ducks. Warren and his father spend countless weekends enjoying the outdoors.

by wildlife. I think it is such a unique experience that everyone needs to have, and it gives you a great perspective on the world around you.” For the Fults family, hunting is a tradition passed down through the generations from father to son. Junior James Fults remembers the first buck he shot with his dad like it was yesterday. “When I was in third grade, I went deer hunting with my dad,” Fults said. “I missed my first two shots, but on the third I finally hit it. When a deer gets shot, it doesn’t just die; it normally starts running around. This was my first buck, so my dad and I waited around for an hour for it to die. When we went out there, there was a gigantic, three-foot-wide blood trail weaving and zigzagging straight to the deer. Then, I ate a little chunk of the heart for tradition.” While Fults mostly hunts and fishes in West Texas, two summers ago, he traveled to Argentina with his dad and his brother to explore the South American outdoors and landscapes. “That was definitely one of the most fun weeks of my life,” Fults said. “We got to go dove and duck hunting, as well as fishing for golden dorados. My dad shot over 4,000 doves in a day. The golden dorado fish, I think, are the prettiest fish in the world. That week was just unforgettable.” I think I fell in love with hunting and fishing because it goes hand in hand with what I love most –– being outdoors.

James Fults, junior

For junior Henry Piccagli, hunting is more than just killing an animal. After years of the sport, he has learned how to process the meat so that the animal doesn’t go to waste. “I’m really into cooking and gameprocessing whatever I kill,” Piccagli said. “I eat everything that I kill no matter what. I would never go to Africa to shoot a lion. I think that’s pointless. But when shooting deer, I’ve gotten to learn how to gut it, clean it and process all the meat. When you eat it, it’s super rewarding for all the hours you put into it.” After learning how to hunt and fish under his father’s guidance, Piccagli says the never-

ending thrill of breaking personal records is what keeps bringing him back for more. “There’s definitely a thrill involved with these activities,” Piccagli said. “My dad has been bass fishing his whole life, and catching a doubledigit pound fish is a big deal. He called me last weekend and sent me a photo of a ten-pound bass he caught — the first one he’s ever caught in all those hours of fishing. That’s the reason you do it. There’s always something bigger and better you can go for.” STORY Peter Orsak, Luke Nayfa, Arjun Khatti PHOTOS Evan McGowan, Courtesy Klyde Warren, Henry Piccagli, James Fults STALKING PREY Below, junior Henry Piccagli hunts down his prey with a crossbow in the woods.

The ReMarker • March 11, 2021

For many Marksmen, the sports of hunting and fishing are a tradition passed down through generations. Senior Klyde Warren and juniors Henry Piccagli and James Fults have made it their passions.

Sports

Catching game

Wrestling duo Brothers Tucker Ribman ‘18 and senior Cooper Ribman team up again for Harvard wrestling. Page 24

Return-to-play Looking at the school’s policies for COVID-19 in sports. Page 25

NCAA return Talking to gamers about the return of a college football video game. Page 26

In brief

SUPER BOWL LOSS Former President of the Board of Trustees Clark Hunt ‘83 and the Kansas City Chiefs lost to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers 31-9 in Super Bowl LV Feb. 3. Hunt ’83 serves as co-owner, CEO and chairman of the Chiefs. This year was the Chief’s second consecutive Super Bowl after capturing last year’s title. The team will look to retool in the offseason and make a third title run in the upcoming NFL season. NINJA WARRIOR Sophomore Christan Youst will compete for the title of “American Ninja Warrior” on the upcoming 13th season of the American Ninja Warrior television show on NBC. Youst will travel to Tacoma, WA Mar. 20 to compete in the regional qualifiers in hopes of moving on. Youst looks to prove that the youth competitors can be just as good as the adults, if not better. FRESHMAN STEPS UP In his first year of high school, freshman Nathan Davis made the Lions’ varsity basketball team. Playing for the 21st ranked team in the state according to MaxPreps, Davis has gotten to improve his skills learning from some of the top players in Texas. POLE VAULTER COMMITS Senior Michael Vanesko committed to Middlebury College for track and field to continue his pole-vaulting career Feb. 26. Vanesko’s highest official pole vault was recorded at a height of 12’6” in his junior season at the Arlington Bowie 25th Annual Volunteer Relays, but he aims to improve this number even more this season. Vanesko and the rest of the track and field squad hope to have competition this spring, COVID-19 permitting.

IN NATURE Above, juniors Henry Piccagli, James Fults, Mac McKenzie, Jodie Thompson and Henry’s brother Alex Piccagli ‘20 spend time hunting together in West Texas. This group, along with five other junior families, partake in an annual father-son dove hunt. Right, Fults reels in a rainbow trout while fly fishing this past summer in Colorado.

COLLEGE ALUMNI The COVID-19 pandemic has caused the fall and winter alumni athletes to lose their season; however, many of the spring athletes’ seasons have just started. Chase Honaker ’19 finished his redshirt freshman season at UCLA as a goalie of the water polo team. Jonathan Taylor ’19 opened his sophomore year at defense for Villanova University with a 16-1 loss against Georgetown but bounced back beating Marquette 16-14. John Gunnin ’18 began his junior year as back-up goalie for Colgate University with a 17-14 loss to Robert Morris and a 15-9 loss against Albany.

WRESTLING DUO

Brothers and teammates

Tucker Ribman ‘18 and senior Cooper Ribman served as co-captains of the Lions wrestling team three years ago. Now, with Cooper committing to compete in Division One wrestling at Harvard University, the duo will once again be teammates on the mat.

HEAD-TO-HEAD Tucker Ribman ‘18 (left) and senior Cooper Ribman (right) shake hands while lining up against each other for a sparring match on the Lions home mat. Tucker, who is in his junior season at Harvard University, won multiple SPC championships and prep-state championships during his time on campus, among many other accomplishments.

March 11, 2021

Sports

The ReMarker

rothers, best friends and –– now –– teammates once again. Growing up together, they found a common love for wrestling. Dedicating their lives to the sport and competing against each other, they strived to become the best they could be. These Lions became captains, broke records and won championships. Their dominance on the mat left a family legacy. But the three-year difference between them only allowed for their paths to cross for one season. The unbreakable bond they both have, however, was too strong to keep them apart. It almost felt like it was destined to happen. These brothers’ wrestling careers will collide again this fall, and the duo will compete together on the Division One stage. Senior Cooper Ribman committed Dec. 18 to continue his wrestling career and join his brother Tucker Ribman ‘18 at Harvard University. The dynamic duo will be teammates on the wrestling mat once again as they were three years ago at 10600 Preston Rd. Cooper decided to follow in his brother’s footsteps because of both Harvard’s longstanding wrestling program and its prestigious academics. “As much as I like the fantastic wrestling program at Harvard –– they have great coaches and a great team –– Harvard also has world-class academics, which I was really interested in,” Cooper said. “Having an older brother that goes there is certainly an upside, but I think I definitely would have been looking at Harvard even if Tucker wasn’t there.” Tucker, who has wrestled at Harvard for the past three years, says he has loved his experience and enjoyed being surrounded by other fully committed student-athletes. “Everyone there is 100 percent committed to getting better on the mat and to performing well in the classroom,” Tucker said. “Division One wrestling is definitely a massive jump up from high school wrestling. Everyone is a lot faster and a lot stronger. They’re on diet plans, and it’s just a whole different level of competition, but I really embrace it and look forward to getting on the mat each and every time.” While the pair has wrestled around the house for all of their lives, Tucker was the first in the family

to start wrestling. His background in martial arts as a five-time USA Taekwondo National Sparring Champion and third degree black belt helped inspire his decision to begin. “I started in seventh grade at St. Mark’s because I was never really interested in basketball or soccer or anything, so I just gave wrestling a shot,” Tucker said. “It turned out I really liked it. At the time, I was doing taekwondo, and it was just too much of a commitment to keep doing that outside of school, so I figured I’d try wrestling instead.” While Cooper has found his own love for the sport, he says he initially began wrestling because of his brother. “I definitely would not have started if it wasn’t for Tucker,” Cooper said. “When he was in seventh and eighth grade, he’d come home and teach me all the new wrestling moves that he learned that day, so I kind of had to learn to keep up with him. Then, once I got into Middle School, we had such a great program with [former wrestling head] coach [Justin] Turner, so I just started from there.” These brothers, being three years apart, overlapped for one year in Upper School with both serving as varsity team captains. Cooper has been a captain for four years now, while Tucker served as team captain starting his sophomore year. “We overlapped one year when I was a freshman, and he was a senior, and it was awesome,” Cooper said. “It worked out really well that we got to share one year –– that way Tucker could keep leading the team and teach me how to be captain. But then, once he left, I was in a good position to take over the leadership of the team. I was able to learn a lot from Tucker that one year.” Tucker, one of the winningest wrestlers in school history, is a member of the Lions Wrestling Hall of Fame. During his time here, Tucker won two SPC championships, two prep-state championships and was a prep-national All-American. Despite his accomplishments, Tucker says he has learned a lot from his younger brother. “It’s always important to throw your ego out the door a little bit and take what you can from everyone and learn,” Tucker said. “The sport of wrestling is always evolving, and you can never learn everything there is to learn. Cooper has taught me a lot because

everyone has a unique style of wrestling. He pushes me just as much as I push him.” Like Cooper, Tucker is excited to be reunited with his brother as teammates. “Just like St. Mark’s, Harvard has a longstanding wrestling culture,” Tucker said. “I’m just excited I get to share that with my brother now. There will definitely be challenges, but we will get to tackle those challenges together.” STORY Peter Orsak, Dillon Wyatt PHOTOS Ekansh Tambe, Courtesy Tipton Edits

TAKEDOWN Senior Cooper Ribman picks up and drops his older brother, Tucker Ribman ‘18, with a smile on his face.

Senior five-star basketball captain Harrison Ingram named McDonald’s All-American by Luke Nayfa enior basketball captain Harrison Ingram was granted high school basketball’s highest honor: McDonald’s All-American. Growing up, Ingram devoted himself to basketball at an early age. In Middle School, Ingram played AAU basketball and gained attention from recruiters across the nation. Going into his freshman year ranked in the top 100 players in his class, Ingram wanted to take his game to another level with help from his father Tyrous Ingram, his brother Will Ingram ‘17 and head basketball coach Greg Guiler. “Before my first year on varsity as a freshman, I sat down with my dad and Coach Guiler to talk over some of the goals I envisioned achieving at some

point in my high school career,” Ingram said. “The three goals were: win an SPC title, rank as a top 10 player in my class and become a McDonald’s All-American.”

ALL-AMERICAN Senior Harrison Ingram was named a McDonald’s All-American along with 23 other players nationwide.

Throughout his varsity career, Ingram surged in the national rankings and is now ranked ninth in his class, according to Rivals.com. “I never worry about what people think of me as a player,” Ingram said. “I have had this mentality my whole career and this has really helped me keep my head down and focus on being the best player I can be. If I do this, all the ranking stuff will come on its own.” After the MCDAA committee released the announcement Feb. 23 on national television, Ingram couldn’t help reminiscing on his fourteenyear basketball career that led to this moment. “It’s any young basketball player’s dream to become a McDonald’s All-

American and to be a high-ranked player,” Ingram said. “For me to accomplish that with the help from my teammates, coaches and my whole inner circle really means the world to me.” Now, Ingram is focused on competing at the Divison One level. “The only thing on my mind now is winning a national championship with Stanford next year,” Ingram said.

Five notable MCDAA • • • • •

Magic Johnson, 1977 Michael Jordan, 1981 Shaquille O’Neal, 1989 Kobe Bryant, 1996 Lebron James, 2003

Kevin Dilworth starts podcast

RETURN-TO-PLAY

Back in action

The return-to-play protocol for athletes who test positive for COVID-19 along with updated weight-room protocols have allowed players to get back to training as soon as possible.

HEAVY LIFTING Sophomore Roome Becker gets back in the weight room in preparation for the beginning of his lacrosse season.

While the weight room remained open, a change in the health and safety protocols was made to provide the safest possible environment for athletes. “Now, only in-season athletes can lift,” Dilworth said. “If athletes do a team lift, there can only be ten athletes at a time that can come in, and they rotate in 30 minute training cycles. Regardless of whether an athlete is lifting individually or with his team, he will get 30 minutes to be in there.” As for the return-to-play and other policies regarding sports, the school will continue to revise them so that they stay in accordance with the most recent guidelines regarding COVID-19. “The return-to-play policy was being created before I even arrived at St. Mark’s,” Bumpas said. “It has been in place all year using current research, input from the CDC and county health departments and input from other schools. When new developments come to light in the research, we do our best to include that information into our policies.” With safety being the primary concern, Dilworth admits that operating in the weight room is a struggle at times. “The weight room is a building site for athletes to get stronger,” Dilworth said, “so at times it can be hard. Sure, it’s tough working out in a mask, but you just have to look past the ‘normal’ because nothing’s normal anymore. You have to adjust to the protocols while still trying to get the job done.” STORY Arjun Khatti, William Aniol PHOTOS Patrick Flanagan

25 The ReMarker

BACK IN SHAPE All wearing masks, members of the tennis team participate in various exercises with strength and conditioning coach Kevin Dilworth as they prepare for their spring season.

As a result of several winter sports teams’ quarantining, there was a possibility the weight room would shut down completely. Since many sports use this space to conduct workouts, a logical approach was needed. “When we came back to school [Jan. 25] after a week of remote learning, I fought to get the weight room back open,” Dilworth said. “It was going to be closed altogether, and there would have been no lifting whatsoever. But I presented the weight room as a classroom for my P.E. classes and sports teams. I needed a teaching element in the same way that a teacher needs the classroom.”

Sports

As a member of the Lions’ varsity basketball squad, senior Sarbik Saha contracted COVID-19 and developed serious symptoms the week of Jan. 18, forcing him to miss three days of practice. “On Friday of that week, I started feeling pretty tired,” Saha said. “That Saturday, I really started to feel bad; I woke up with major headaches. I also started feeling the

fever coming up in temperature, but the headache was the worst part for me. The cough didn’t come until the following Monday, and then, slowly, I started having congestion on Saturday and Sunday.” After a nearly week-long bout with COVID-19, Saha began the return-to-play process, knowing that his Senior Night was quickly approaching. The return-to-play process begins when school nurse Julie Doerge gives an athlete’s positive COVID-19 case to athletic trainer Natalie Bumpas. From there, each athlete is given specific instruction on the progressions to make each day. “The length and stages of the protocol really depend on the patient,” Bumpas said. “For a P.E. student, it takes around four days to complete, but for a student-athlete, it takes six days to complete. The progressions are individualized to each specific patient.” For Saha, his progression consisted of the shorter process so that he would be able to participate in Senior Night. With each completed stage, the level of his physical activity increased slightly. “Finally, that following Sunday or Monday, I was back to full form,” Saha said. “But when I first came back, the first step was extremely light jogging, and I tried getting into it. Then, I was cleared to come back right before Senior Night on Feb. 4 against Cistercian.”

March 11, 2021

verything in the weight room is flowing smoothly. Spring sports start their strength training as they gear up for the start of the season, and winter sports are fine-tuning their skills as they prepare for championship games. Lacrosse trains for a bit, and then swimming comes in and replaces them. Masks are being worn, weights are being wiped down after use and athletes are staying six feet apart. But just as the transition from winter to spring sports starts to click… Four swimmers come down with COVID-19. Basketball is already in quarantine. And then, lacrosse is sidelined. Finally, the heart of the weight room –– head strength and conditioning coach Kevin Dilworth –– learns he has tested positive for COVID-19. As the school transitions to remote learning the week of Jan. 25, the weight room sits vacant.

by Arjun Khatti ith extra time at home owing to setbacks from COVID-19, strength and conditioning coach Kevin Dilworth recently began recording podcasts on Spotify and on his new Instagram handle, @momentofpower74. Dilworth made the decision to change his Instagram handle so that his audience could better understand the message his account is trying to convey. “My whole movement is to make sure that there is development and change,” Dilworth said. “Changing the name was just part of that development for myself. The goal is always striving for something better. Every time you step into a space, that is your chance to seize the moment and take advantage of your opportunity. That is the moment of power.” Along with changing his Instagram name, Dilworth decided it would be a good time to start a podcast, something that many of his former athletes had encouraged him to do in the past. “A lot of athletes that left here wanted me to start a podcast,” Dilworth said. “But I could never really find the time. Some ideas they had were answering questions about training and motivation, as well as having Olympic athletes to talk about their experiences. I really love it when I get the chance to do these podcasts.” Another motivating factor in Dilworth’s plan to start a podcast came when he contracted COVID-19 in January. His latest podcast recording on his Instagram, posted Feb. 3, detailed his experience with the virus. “It wasn’t until around day 11 of my quarantine that I started feeling better,” Dilworth said. “Even after my 14-day quarantine, I tried getting back in the weight room, but my balance and control still wasn’t there, and I was even getting a little lightheaded.” Along with the symptoms of feeling weak and tired, Dilworth says that being isolated for several weeks was no easy task. “The isolation and having to be away from my family was the toughest part,” Dilworth said. “It felt like the virus playing mind games with me. I wanted to work out and do the things that I enjoy doing, but I just couldn’t understand why I was unable to. Normally, I’m a very energetic person, but I was just forced to sleep. I had to start giving myself the same motivation that I normally give out on Instagram. Once I dug deep and found a way to get out of that dark place, it was all positive from there.”

NCAA RETURN

Iconic video game returns In 1993, Electronic Arts released their first college football video game: Bill Walsh College Football. Thirty years later, EA Sports has decided to reboot the popular franchise. After last making a college football video game in 2013, the company’s announcement sparked enthusiasm for fans of the game. When did you first start playing NCAA? Connor Duffy: “When I was younger, I would always get the new Madden games for Christmas and on my birthdays. The first NCAA I got was NCAA12. When I bought this game, I had so much fun with it that I wanted to play this game from different years. I ended up getting every NCAA from 2006-2012. This is when I knew I found something I loved.” What do you like about the game? Charles Wilson: “The nostalgia of the game keeps me playing it. I have fond memories of playing the game on my PS3 with my dad as a kid, and I always want to keep playing. I enjoy the ability to play as the college teams as opposed to the professional teams. I love using the Dynasty mode, which is when you can create a head coach and lead your team through as many seasons as you want. You have to build your team using recruiting over the years, and that’s a super fun element to the game.” Alex Nadalini: “There is so much joy in battling one of your buddies head-to-head with your favorite college football teams. The competitive nature of the game combined with the simple, easy to use controls makes the game perfect for teenagers who have interests both in sports and in video games.”

March 11, 2021

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The ReMarker

CD: “I don’t know why, but I have always been fascinated by the ranking system in college sports, and specifically, college football. The game has such basic controls that the game is much more simple and entertaining. College football, in some ways, is more exciting than the NFL which in itself will make the game better than Madden. The game has so much variety with recruiting, coaching, and playing that there is never an opportunity to bore yourself.” Why are you excited about the new game? John Hubbard: “I’m excited because we’ll get to see updated teams and graphics. If they can make the game more current and immersive, that would be great. The fact that the game is college football makes it way more exciting. In Madden it’s always just the same teams, but in the NCAA it’s more exciting and unique.” CW: “I’m really excited because the one downfall of NCAA 14 is that it needs a big graphics overhaul and I hope that this happens with the new game. The old game is definitely aged and it can glitch out at times, so I’m excited for them to update the rosters and revamp the game. It’s just a change of pace from Madden, and I feel like a lot of people have stronger connections to their college teams and it makes the rivalries more intense.”

S BOX

CD: “Electronic Arts shut down servers which makes it impossible to play online with either your friends or other online players. I don’t want the game to change a ton honestly. Of course new technology will make for a more realistic and visually appealing game; however, I want the same feeling in the game as before.” What’s your favorite team to play as? JH: “My favorite team is the Texas Longhorns, but my favorite team to play as is the Florida Gators because they’re always one of the best teams in the game. When I play with my brother, we always choose the worst overall teams just to keep things interesting and experiment with new players.”

SM SPORTS

ST. MARK ’ S FOOTBA LL 2 1

CD: “What I like to do is take teams like East Carolina or Texas State and build them up to be dynasties in college football. It’s cool because in real life, there isn’t much opportunity for smaller LINED UP Junior wide receiver Conor Duffy stands tall at the line of scrimmage schools to prove themselves for the 2021 Lions rendition of an NCAA football video game cover. compared to schools like Alabama or Florida.” As varsity football players, how does the game compare to the real sport? JH: “It’s made me appreciate the play calling aspect a lot more. Instead of running the same couple of plays, I understand concepts better now and I can call a variety of different plays. When I joined the football team in the fall, I learned so many new offensive and defensive concepts that help me when choosing plays and coverages in NCAA.” CD: “The game allows me to create a false reality for myself. When I play Road to Glory, a specific mode in the game that allows you to play as a high school player, I’ll think about what fans and teammates would think about my performance. Also, the game allows you to fight for a position and earn your spot on the team which is something I relate with as a football player.”

Five stats to know • The last EA College Football game was released in 2013. • NCAA video games earned over 1.3 billion dollars. • 126 teams were included in NCAA 14. • The game will return with a new name: EA Sports College Football. • Former Michigan quarterback Denard Robinson was the game’s last cover-athlete.

STORY Luke Nayfa, Rajan Joshi GRAPHIC Jonathan Yin

Senior athletes Bajec, Hubbard and Puri try new fall, spring sports Puri had never touched a golf club a year ago, but over the summer he decided he wanted to learn to swing. “Golf can be a valuable thing to learn in life for meeting new people,” Puri said. “So I decided to learn now and be ahead of the curve.” It has been difficult at first, but Puri is confident he can improve his skills soon. “Some days, it’s really hard to just get the ball off the ground,” Puri said. “The more I practice, the more results I see, so I’m just going to keep grinding.” For Bajec, the choice was much easier, as he had competed in football back in Middle School. EMBRACING Seniors Colin Bajec and John Hubbard hug it “My parents out after defeating Greenhill 14-0 Nov. 6 this year. didn’t want me by Rajan Joshi hile many seniors use their school year to relax, seniors Aaryan Puri, Colin Bajec and John Hubbard chose to go out of their comfort zone and try a new sport.

playing football in high school because of head injuries and CTE,” Bajec said. “But they changed their minds this year and allowed me to play as a senior.” While he didn’t get much playing time, he’s glad he got to enjoy time with the team and form connections with the other seniors who had been playing football for a while. “The best part for me was definitely just talking to and becoming better friends with some of the players,” Bajec said. “Since I hadn’t played all four years, I didn’t get as much playing time as some of them, but the memories I made will stay with me forever.” Hubbard felt similarly about the team and had fun during his time as a player. “The team seemed to already be really close to each other, but by the end of the season, I was able to get super close with everyone,” Hubbard said. “It was really awesome to have a brotherhood like that for the whole season.” Hubbard had never played football before, so the fall was a

learning experience for him. “This was my first time playing tackle football,” Hubbard said. “I definitely had to adjust to the aggressiveness in practice and start to go hard every day to make myself better.” As a long snapper, Hubbard was able to see the field during some games, and going in was nerveracking for him. “I went in for field goals and extra points as the long snapper,” Hubbard said. “I was super nervous because I wanted to make sure I did everything correctly, and I ended up not messing up and being able to help the team out.” For all of these athletes, trying something new meant putting themselves in uncomfortable positions, but in the end, they felt more well rounded. “Stepping out of my comfort zone has always been something I strive to do,” Puri said.”I wanted to use this year to do things I’ve never done before.” PHOTO Courtesy Charles Wilson

Swim team wins back-to-back trophies 2019 SPC FINISH 1st 2019 RECORD 6-0

2019 SPC FINISH 1st 2019 RECORD 4-0

FIRST PLACE WINNERS IN FINAL MEET: Senior Leo Ohannessian swam the 100-meter freestyle in 47.10 seconds Senior Jack Palmer swam the 100-meter breaststroke in 59.35 seconds Senior David Yang swam the 200-meter individual medley in 2:.02 seconds SENIORS James Carr, Aayan Khasgiwala, Rishi Mohan, Leo Ohannessian, Jack Palmer, Ryan Park, Tim Weigman, Mason Westkaemper and Daniel Wu THEY SAID IT “I’m really proud of our team this season, and I know my fellow captains are as well. I think we had every reason to not be motivated, every reason to take this year as an off year, but we still gave it 100%. Every swimmer, from the seniors to the freshmen, worked their tails off, and that’s super important in preserving and passing down a winning culture. Ending by winning the North Zone, and then combining our times with the South Zone to find out we would’ve won the whole SPC was just a cherry on top of a hard but good season.” — senior Aayan Khasgiwala

BREATHING IN Senior David Yang gasps for air as he performs the backstroke in the North Zone Championship individual medley Feb. 24, followed by breaststroke, butterly and freestyle.

Soccer team finishes season victorious 2019 SPC FINISH 1st 2019 RECORD 14-6

2020 RECORD 11-1-1

Lions bounce back after first North Zone loss in three seasons 2019 SPC FINISH 1st 2019 RECORD 29-5

2020 SPC RECORD 4-1 2020 RECORD 9-2

NOTABLE For the last two weeks of the season, sophomores Arjun Khatti, Jack Jackson and Rapha Mitterer-Claudet played with the varsity squad. NOTABLE Junior Colin Smith has talked with several Division One colleges this year: Arkansas, Michigan, Stanford and Virginia, among others. SENIORS Luke Annett, Connor Gaffney, Harrison Ingram, Jake Laufenberg, Luke Nayfa and Sarbik Saha THEY SAID IT “Our team took advantage of all the practice time we could get and played every game like it could be our last. Everyone had to stay focused and ready to go every time we stepped on the court. I think our veteran squad was able to put in the work at home and away from the team necessary to win games this year. Although we were limited in our number of games, we are definitely grateful to have the chance to play at all.” — senior Luke Annett Editors Note: Due to COVID-19 health protocols, the 2020-2021 wrestling team has not performed in any competitive tournaments. The team continued to practice and train throughout the season. COMPILATIONS Luke Nayfa

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IN AND OUT Junior forward Colin Smith dribbles between his legs as he looks for an open shot in the 63-62 win versus Spring Creek Academy.

27 Sports

NOTABLE During Senior Night vs Oakridge, the Lions scored five unanswered goals to win 5-0. NOTABLE Senior Henry McElhaney plans to try out for the Dartmouth soccer team next year. NOTABLE The Lions averaged three goals per game throughout the season. SENIORS Eric Yoo, Knobel Hunt, Henry McElhaney, Luis Garcia, Cristian Pereira, Christian Shadle and Michael Anderson THEY SAID IT “Every practice and game were played like it could be our last. I’m so proud of all the seniors who stepped up and kept everyone motivated when we weren’t able to practice. The younger guys played a pivotal role on our team this year, and I know our team is in good hands for the future. I’m proud that us seniors went out with a ring.” — senior Christian Shadle

March 11, 2021

FAREWELL Senior striker Knobel Hunt celebrates the team’s 2-0 win versus Prestonwood Christian Academy with head coach Corindo Martin.

2020 SPC RECORD 3-1-1

BEST FRIEND Perry-Miller’s German shorthaired pointer, King, plays a key role in tracking quail at the Lake Lewisville Environmental Learning Area. “Pointer dogs are much better than humans at smelling quail,” PerryMiller said.

ReMarker ST. MARK’S SCHOOL OF TEXAS 10600 PRESTON RD. DALLAS, TX 75230

COMMUNITY SERVICE

Number one-hundred fifteen In the history of scouting, only 114 scouts have ever received the Distinguished Conservation Award for their leadership in the field ofconservation efforts. After nearly two years and thousands of hours, freshman Baxter Perry-Miller is steps away from becoming number 115.

March 11, 2021

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The ReMarker

Jonathan Yin: What exactly is the Distinguished Conservation Service Award, and what do you need to do in order to receive one? Baxter Perry-Miller: The Boy Scouts recently just came out with a new award that replaces the Hornaday award. The award is the exact same, just the name has changed. To receive a Distinguished Conservation Service Award, you have to orchestrate an environmental project — similar to an Eagle Scout project — and monitor it for four to six months. Each project must have a lasting impact on the environment after you’re done. I finished my second project, and right now, I’m working on both my third and fourth. JY: How did you get started doing conservation work, and what inspired you to pursue this award? BP: I’ve honestly just always grown up with conservation. When I met with my merit badge counselor for Scouts, he told me about the Hornaday Award. It’s really unique, because only 114 scouts had ever gotten the Hornaday Silver Medal, which you receive when you’ve done four Hornaday award projects. I was like, ‘That’s really cool. I think that’s something that I can do.” For me, it’s a way of giving back to the people that have encouraged and supported me. JY: Can you walk us through what you’ve done for your projects? BP: For my first project, I built four trash and recycling bins at the Trinity River Audubon Center and monitored those for six months, which helped reduce trash on the Trinity River trails and the surrounding ecosystem. My second project was a battery drive, in which I collected batteries from all across Dallas for five months and then donated them to the Dallas hazardous materials waste center, where they can handle them safely. Right now, I am finishing my third project, where I released and monitored 110 quail at the Lake Lewisville Environmental Learning Area (LLELA). They have an amazing 2600 acre conservation property. I’m using dogs to track the quail and see how well they’re surviving and how well they handle different conditions in their new habitat. I started this project Sept. 26, I believe, and I’m planning on finishing sometime in the beginning of this month. Once I’m done collecting the data, I’ll give it to the researchers over at LLELA. JY: What are the logistics for that? BP: I monitor the quail at LLELA every other week for about six hours at a time. We use pointing dogs such as my dog — a German shorthaired pointer — and he can smell the birds a lot easier than we can. If he flushes them, we can get a count of how many birds there are in a group. We’ve been counting the quail at

LLELA by transect. LLELA is huge, so we just measure a small area, and with the information we can figure out how many quail are in a larger area. JY: What’s your favorite project you’ve done out of the four? BP: My favorite project has probably been the Lake Lewisville Environmental Learning Area project with the quail release. It’s really nice to get outside of Dallas and it’s very relaxing to just get out there. JY: What’s in store for the future? BP: For my fourth project, I’m going to go down to Bonton Farms in south Dallas, which provides fresh fruits and vegetables to the food desert there. I’m planning on planting native Texas wildflowers and grasses, as well as setting up a bee apiary to help with cross pollination for their crops. Because that area is so demineralized, it’s very hard to grow things. Hopefully, this project will help bring back some of those minerals in the soil. JY: What would you say to those out there that might want to start helping out with the environment? BP: I would say that conservation is not only important to help the environment, but also to educate people about the effects that they have on the environment. If someone wanted to get into conservation, I would tell them to start with something that they are interested in, because if they start with something that they are interested in, then they will want to do it more and more and be more active and engaged. JY: How does it feel to be so close to number 115? BP: It’s so crazy because when I first started my process, I was like, ‘Wow, four projects is a lot of work.’ Looking back at it, two and a half years later, it’s so crazy to think of the person that I’ve become just because of the Hornaday Award and how much I’ve matured and how much I’ve grown through this experience. Through these [projects], I’ve really come to learn about leading people and helping the environment. According to the Boy Scouts of America website, the William T. Hornaday Award, awarded to scouts for leadership in conservation efforts, was replaced with the Distinguished Conservation Service Award Dec. 4.

STORY Jonathan Yin PHOTOS Courtesy Baxter Perry-Miller

In the span of two years, Perry-Miller has logged over 1400 conservation hours across three projects.

650 hours spent

489 hours spent

298 hours spent

Cleaning the Trinity Valley River ecosystem May ‘19 — October ‘19

Organizing battery disposal January ‘20 — June ‘20

Monitoring quail June ‘20 — March ‘21

SET FREE Perry-Miller has partnered with Park City Quail, a quail conservation group based in Dallas, to release over 100 birds into the wilderness.