3330

LOWDOWN APRIL 2020 DECEMBER 2020 THE LOWDOWN PROTOTYPE #1 THE LOWDOWN EDITION #1 1 THE LOWDOWN - JUNE EDITION #3 Contents 01 Cover 03 Table of Contents 05 Leadership: A Covid-19 Perspective 12 Leadership In Technology: Spaceflight And Artificial Intelligence 18 What Leadership Means For Students 24 Student Spotlight 27 Credits 3 3 CURRENT EVENTS COVID-19 OPINION Leadership: A COVID-19 Perspective 2020 BY JOSEPH KIM An in-depth analysis of various countries' response to COVID-19 due to the rampant inactivity of governments, the World Health Organization declared the novel coronavirus as For the past few months, COVID-19 has a pandemic, rousing world leaders into ravaged across the world, attacking the action. health of millions of people and damaging the economies of countless naPresently, the United States of Amertions. Most would agree in saying that ica holds the highest number of conthis coronavirus is one of the worst, if firmed COVID cases, passing 4 million not the worst crisis since World War confirmed cases. But how did America II. However, the extent of damage that get to such a state? Before looking at has been done to each country differs America's response, let's take a look at based on the country's government re- some responses that are respected besponse to the crisis and how they have cause of their successes in containing acted upon it. Because of this reliance the virus and their efficiency. on world leaders, the number of cases in a single country varies from less Role Model Countries than ten confirmed cases to upwards of Today, the country of Taiwan is widely four million confirmed cases. But just recognized as having the best response how different have countries' responses to the pandemic crisis, as although they been for the gamut of confirmed casare very close in distance to mainland es to be so different for each country? China, they were able to keep their toBefore we explore those responses, we tal number of confirmed cases below must make sure we know the history of 500 and the total number of deaths at 7, the virus. a very impressive number. But how did COVID-19: A Beginning The 2019 coronavirus was discovered on December 31, 2019, in the city of Wuhan, the capital of central China's Hubei Province. A cluster of pneumonia cases had been noticed and was soon identified as the novel coronavirus. Less than a month later, the first case of COVID outside of China was identified and confirmed in Thailand. As time passed, we learned that the virus spread at an alarming rate with varying levels of severity in its victims, and they accomplish this? Well, in contrast to the responses of many other countries, Taiwan chose not to shut down its economy by issuing lockdowns and keeping everyone away from each other, but instead quickly closed the country's borders to halt international travel and banned the export of surgical masks to ensure that the country would have enough to sustain their citizens. The government then used contact tracing and mobile SIM-tracking to verify that those in 5 quarantine were abiding by the rules. Businesses were kept open thanks to aggressive precautionary measures such as taking temperatures and providing hand sanitizers to patrons before they could enter the building. Although the use of SIMtracking has led to some legitimate concerns for privacy, no one can deny that Taiwan's tactical response to the crisis ranks among the best in the world. ment of COVID by attacking the virus aggressively. In the early days of the pandemic, South Korea began developing COVID-19 tests and scaling up its production to thousands per day, being able to provide bountiful amounts of tests for its citizens. And instead of banning exports of medical supplies like Taiwan, South Korea produced enough supplies to be able to export tests and medical supplies abroad to countries in need before its toll passed Another country that has been praised one hundred. South Korea continued for its effective measures taken against to remain vigilant through the months, the pandemic is the country of South exercising extensive testing and conKorea. South Korea has managed to tact tracing, as well as isolation, and keep its total number of confirmed cas- now stands as a model for other counes below 14,000 and its death toll below tries to follow. 300, which is still an impressive number relative to other countries and to Going South its own population. Impressively, they An example of a country's actions that have also slowed the spread of the virus failed to effectively gain control over within the country to less than 50 per and contain COVID was Italy's reday. sponse. The Italian government's first Similarly to Taiwan, the Korean government accomplished this contain- procedure fighting against COVID-19 was banning all flights to China and declaring a national emergency after seeing Italy's first confirmed coronavirus cases on January 31, 2020. About a month later, a man in Lombardy, a region in Northern Italy, tested positive for the novel coronavirus after previously leaving the hospital without a test. He is believed to have spread the virus to many people before he began developing severe symptoms. A few days later, several small towns that were hit by the outbreak were placed under quarantine, and carnival celebrations as well as some soccer matches were cancelled. At the time, there were only 150 confirmed. A few weeks later, during the first week of March, the number of confirmed cases in Italy had surpassed 3,000, which led the Italian government to close down schools and universities. Within just four days, the number of confirmed cases increased by more than double, surpassing 7,000 cases. Well, that's because Italy was among the first to take hits from the outbreak in Europe. The Italian government did a poor job of containing the spread of the virus, allowing it to travel through Northern Italy and eventually affecting the whole of the country. The mistake that the Italian officials made was not attacking the virus aggressively from the start. At this point, much of Northern Italy was placed under lockdown. One day later, the whole of Italy was placed under lockdown, as the number of confirmed cases had reached 9,000. However, restaurants and bars were not closed until two days later, till on March 11, when the number of confirmed cases had reached 12,000. Eleven days later, the number of cases increased by almost five times, hitting just shy of 60,000 cases. At this point, all factories were closed down and all nonessential production was halted, however, it was too late to stop the flow of the virus as the number of confirmed cases had now surpassed 240,000. Allowing citizens to do so allowed for the virus to spread through those travellers, affecting the Southern regions. Under other circumstances, for example, if there was a virus that was not as contagious as COVID-19, then Italy's strategy of acting only on areas already affected may have worked out. However, due to the inconsistent and exponential increase rate of cases, the only way to properly prevent the virus was to completely block off the virus from those not yet affected and take measures to ensure that citizens were doing their part in reducing the spread. In the present day, the spread of the virus in Italy has drastically slowed down. Nonetheless, we can learn several lessons from Italy's response and the outcome that that response brought. Now, this number is not very big in comparison to the countries that are leading in coronavirus cases, so why is Italy considered to have failed in the fight against COVID-19? When the virus first reached Italy, the government could have chosen to limit contact between citizens and make sure that those who were confirmed to have the novel coronavirus or had been in contact with a patient were self-isolating, as to prevent the spread. And when Northern Italy got to the point where a lockdown was issued, the government could have prevented citizens in Northern Italy from travelling to Southern Italy. Today, one country that seems to be having a difficult time with the novel coronavirus is the United States of 7 America. But what kind of procedures did America take to reduce the spread of the novel coronavirus, or what lack of procedures allowed for COVID-19 to spread rampant and affect so many U.S. citizens? lack of ventilators. The next adequate thing they did was provide sufficient hospital capacity. On March 18, the governor of New York issued a severe warning, saying that within 45 days, worst-case sceThe Land of Opportunity nario, they would need 110,000 hospital beds, but the state only had 53,000 The United States of America, which available. In response, President Trump goes by several nicknames such as Undispatched the hospital ship Comfort to cle Sam or the Land of Opportunity, New York to increase capacity, and the has had it rough in the fight against state converted the Javitz Convention COVID-19. Over the past few months, Center into a 2,000-bed medical centhe number of confirmed cases has inter. In the end, on April 12, New York hit creased so rapidly that the total number has well surpassed 3 million, and is a peak of 18,825 patients, safely below on its way to 4.5 million, currently be- the estimated worst-case scenario and ing over 4 million. This puts the number leaving many beds to spare. Since this peak, the numbers have declined. of coronavirus cases in the U.S. miles ahead of any other country, with BraThe last thing that the American govzil being the closest,nearing 2.5 million. ernment did an admirable job of and is The Land of Opportunity is increasingstill working well on is proactively dely losing opportunities because of the veloping vaccines and treatments for coronavirus. So let's look at America's COVID-19. Clinical trials on humans for response to the virus outbreak, what they did well and what they could have multiple coronavirus vaccines have already begun, with more than 100 posdone better. sible vaccines in various stages of development around the world according Jobs Well Done to the World Health Organization. The There are three positive points that I U.S. is doing its part in vaccine develwant to mention about America's reopment, with many groups of researchsponse to the coronavirus. The first ers working to find possible vaccines. commendable action was that the However, it will still be a while until said American government spent billions vaccines will be ready for public use, of dollars on new contracts to bring the estimated and hoped-for date being in more ventilators. This was to ensometime in early 2021. sure that there would be enough supply for the possible demand. The Presi- Until then, the best way for governdent also utilized a 70-year-old law "to ments to fight against the coronaviprod auto manufacturer General Morus is to continue to limit its spread tors to switch to ventilator production and keep the vulnerable safe, whether and streamline supply-chain issues for it be through rigorous testing, aggresother manufacturers." This meant that sive lockdown procedures, or, although America had plenty of ventilators, enit may lead to concerns from American suring that no one in the U.S died for citizens valuing their privacy over their safety, contact tracing or SIM-tracking. However, for the United States of America to be in such a bad state right now, with over 4 million confirmed cases, there must have been several shortcomings as well on the government's end. from the virus. The problem in the U.S. was that there was not enough PPE in circulation for healthcare workers to use. For months, frontline workers were forced to work without proper protective clothing or were forced to reuse used supplies. Poor Performance Healthcare workers were forced to use household items such as scarves and There are three negative points in coffee filters to protect themselves. America's response that I want to mention. These costly failures include a lack of PPE production and supply, not In Chicago, Illinois, a pizza parlour enough testing, and inefficiency in ecostarted producing masks using the piznomic aid. za oven to alter the shape of acrylic face shields and attaching them to foam Personal Protective Equipment, abstrips in an effort to help the city's breviated as PPE, is vital in reducing frontline workers. Although the dothe spread of germs and keeping peomestic production of protective gear ple safe. PPE includes equipment such has increased in recent weeks, the netas face masks, gloves, and gowns. Havwork for distributing equipment may ing proper PPE is vital to keeping those still be unstable and might not be able working on the front lines (such as to get to healthcare workers quickly doctors, nurses, and pharmacists) safe enough. 9 Testing for the coronavirus is another area that the U.S. has fallen behind in. 2 months ago, President Donald Trump declared that "America leads the world on testing" and that "we have met the moment, and we have prevailed." Although Trump has boasted that the U.S. surpassed South Korea in testing, the harsh reality is that South Korea ramped up their testing early on, in February and March. Even though the U.S. has caught up, the virus has already claimed over 4 million victims and even with the increase of testing rate per week and the opening of some drive-thru testing stations, America has only managed to test around 16% of its population, leaving much room for improvement for the American government. Finally, inefficiency in economic aid. Perhaps the largest impact that COVID-19 has had on countries, apart from the spread of the virus itself and the threat to the health of citizens, is that it destabilizes economies. Because of the virus' contagious nature, governments are forced to issue lockdowns, and non-essential businesses are forced to temporarily close down. This causes many people to lose their jobs, as smaller businesses lay off their workers to keep from going bankrupt. Due to these financial crises, many people in countries all over the world have needed to apply for Employment Insurance, abbreviated as EI. In an attempt to soften the blow for American citizens, the U.S. government authorized the expenditures of hundreds of billions of dollars, in the form of low-interest loans to businesses that can be forgiven as long as they don't lay off workers, direct cash payments to Americans, and more support for the unemployed. Authorizing these expenditures was shown to be the easy part. Getting the cash to the intended destinations has proven to be more difficult, as there was much confusion and many delays from both the private banks authorized to make these loans and the applicant businesses. There were also questions about why large corporations, restaurant chains, and wealthy universities received funds, as they would not receive as much of a blow than smaller businesses. Overall, the government's economic aid to U.S. citizens to soften the blow of the crisis leaves much room for improvement, being disorganized and inefficient. From Now On These aspects of the American government's response, both the good and the bad, still have long ways to go. COVID-19 has been roaming rampant across the world for over half of a year now, and will likely not be fully subdued until some time next year, in 2021. The best way to combat the virus before a cure is discovered and refined to perfection is to exercise proper safety measures. Properly social distancing and wearing masks whenever you go outside your home has proven to be effective, as it has flattened the curve greatly in British Columbia, Canada. Following these protocols assiduously keeps us and those around us safe from the virus. As we continue to live through the damage the novel coronavirus is causing, we should stay resilient and do our part in protecting ourselves, our loved ones, and all of our fellow citizens. 11 1. Internal Leadership. One of the best ways to be a student leader at your school is to get more involved in your school activities. Whether it be through student council, athletic council, or various clubs, internal leadership is one of the easiest ways to get into student leadership! CHARITY BRIGHOUSE HOT POTATO INITIATIVE S.U.C.E.S.S External Leadership. 2. There are many ways you can be a leader outside of schoo l! With opportunities like volunteering and tea m organizing, taking a role outside of your sch ool can direct you to meet a diverse set of people and improve both your leadership and communication skills! Active Particpation. 3. Role Modeling 4. Participate in community events, offer technical or labor help for the school, or contribute ideas for student activities. These are things that you can do to actively engage yourself in the community. Not only do you get closer with other people, you may also feel a sense of belonging or pride, all via taking responsibility. One of the more direct ways you can be a student leader is to become a role model for younger or fellow students. Whether it is through tutoring, mentoring, or even actively participating, you can lead others through example. 13 CURRENT EVENTS SECOND CATEGORY Leadership In Tech: Space Flight + AI 2020 BY JIMMY WANG What Spaceflight and AI Show Us About the Tech Market ing the private market that America has long endorsed, and a national agency that led the world in space discovery We are consumers of technological ad- was truly worthy of the vast attention vancements, we are the users of scien- of the news. tific discovery-backed products, and we are the public that decides which Spaceflight and Privatization things to invest our pocket money in. Spaceflight came into the world's spotThe public is witnessing more growth light half a century ago, and almost imin the market than ever, with the ease mediately the public was fascinated by of online purchasing, consumers are this new piece of technology that algiving helping hands to certain big or lowed humans to break free of Earth's small companies in competition. Walk- barrier. Some of these theoretical and ing at the front ends of research and practical breakthroughs were led by development, big companies are lead- Konstantin Tsiolkovsky and Robert H. ing the market and business models of Goddard, who were both from the Somany startups, often shaping their new viet Union. They were the first explorwaves and their directions as well. This ers of space, launching the first satellite huge phenomenon brings out the ques- and the first humans into orbit. Other tions of, what is happening in the fields countries were captivated by the idea of technology? How are the products of going to space, and nowadays the designed? How do private enterprises competition aspect of the 20th centufunction? ry's spaceflight development is referred Certain technological advancements are often broadcasted by news channels and radios and often tend to receive a wide audience. These include spaceflight, architecture, premium consumer items, medical innovation, etc. For example, written by big news companies was the launch of NASA/ SpaceX spacecraft, a mission transporting American astronauts to the ISS that was carried out a month ago. Space and air-related innovation are often seen as the flagship of the performance of a country's research & development. In this case, having a collaboration between a private company, represent- to as the "Space Race". Following the path of the Soviet Union, the United States also poured money and effort into spaceflight programs, with the most famous of which being named the "Apollo Program", the third human spaceflight program carried out by NASA. The mission's significance lies within the length of its journey: Apollo 8 was the first human spaceflight to leave earth orbit and orbit the Moon on December 21, 1968, and Apollo 10 was the first crewed mission carrying Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin to set mankind's first footprint on the Moon, on July 11, 1979. 15 What does SpaceX mean in the advancement timeline of spaceflight technology? SpaceX marks the beginning of privatizing space exploration. Maintaining a company that enables private and commercial spaceflight is very difficult, since existing space programs in the United States are almost all overseen by NASA, including the mission that took place a month ago, which was a collaboration between NASA and SpaceX. Finding the weak points in an existing system and improving upon it is exactly what SpaceX did. From shut- tle design to recyclable rockets, the early actions of SpaceX to compete against NASA's national monopoly were unintentional. Instead, they hoped to establish a private space company as a dominant role in the market, when the market didn't really have any direct competition. SpaceX has sought to make improvements rather than competition. Because unlike other missions carried out by NASA, SpaceX's direction has been moving towards a recyclable chain of rockets that could drastically reduce the price of each mission. Carrying out missions that reflect national pride, NASA has received enough funding and support for the search of the unknown and the new. However, they are not putting as much attention into internal savings on cost. This is how SpaceX, without standing in the shadow of NASA, secured its position on the market that originally opened for governments, and commenced the move of privatization. Artificial Intelligence and Startup Acquisitions There are other fields of research that many companies have poured their assets into, in the hopes that they will ultimately be made into consumer items. For example, the use of artificial intelligence was first centered towards defense to recognize secret codes, but after demonstrating its capabilities, it was expanded into many aspects including voice recognition, image recognition, and other strategic algorithms. that could walk". A good example would be that of the tin man from the Wizard of Oz: he could walk and talk, he could perform tasks that humans could, but he "didn't have a heart". Personally I assume that the "heart" in the novel, or the general consensus that robots lacked "heart", represented the popular opinion at the time that robots would never be able to perceive or process human feelings and emotions, nor the idea of consciousness, which seemed to be only abstract ideas in their minds. Throughout the flourishing of computer science, famous individuals such as Alan Turing, John McCarthy, Allen Newell, Paul Werbos, contributed their studies into the AI journey, establishing milestones in the form of algorithms, theories, and AI system design. The broad topic of AI gradually branched into machine learning, neural network, natural language processing, and many more fields. These were all powered by heavy computer sciAs time went on, these progressed ence, mathematical research, and exinto what is now modern smart-asperiments. For example, it was discovsistants, video editors, grammar tools, ered that especially in neural networks even board game players (DeepMind/ (learning frameworks for machines), Google's AlphaGo made a big title when many types of calculus would be heavily it defeated Lee Sedol in its five-game used to "back-propagate", essentially to match of Go, demonstrating the amazanalyze errors from the input, bias, and ing capabilities of artificial intelligence outputs needed. in strategic games). After a brief decline between the 1970s The breadth of what AI could do was - 1980s along with some more breakincomprehensible, and they were just through discoveries, more and more scratching the surface. During the projects were carried out by companies 1950s, computers were incapable of and universities. However, they were performing high-volume tasks, unable facing two major problems: the lack of to store information, and lacked regucomputational power, and the lack of lation of its components. At the time, connections between machine code AI was simply a fantasy, usually charand real-world logic structures. In the acterized by novels with phrases like "robots" and "intelligent metal humans 21st century, these problems are still 17 being solved, albeit at a relatively fast pace. Perhaps in the future with even better hardware like quantum computers, there will once again come a time of extraordinarily and revolutionary breakthroughs. these already-monopolistic humongous companies. For example, Google has, since 2009, spent almost four billion dollars on acquiring thirty companies in total. Apple has bought eighteen companies, and Conclusion Microsoft and Facebook have bought twelve. In total, these four companies It seems like the market of applicahave spent six-and-a-half billion dollars tion-based AI is eerily similar to other on just buying startups and small-scale tech markets, of course with less of a companies. This general trend of a monational-level monopoly through entities like NASA, but more industrial mo- nopolized field has created another nopoly by huge enterprises like Google, barrier that decides whether startups succeed or fail. Apple, Facebook, Microsoft, etc. This is because of the amount of data entry In conclusion, whilst the nations of the and the financial capabilities of these world are led by governments, techcompanies. nological innovation is led by individual corporations. Although there are First, data has become one of the most so many more intricate details to add valuable resources in the 21st century. about technology and its markets, Facebook has been involved in data-rethese two factors are good examples lated scandals (Cambridge Analytica of leading Data Access, 2018), "If you don't innovate fast, disrupt your industry, areas in innovation Google has disrupt yourself, you'll be left behind." and busicontinually ness. had access - John to a large majority of the public's searching data, and Amazon has had access to billions of purchasing data and detailed receipts. Chambers, CEO of Cisco Recognizing the pattern of these two leading industries, we can see the attempts made by huge enterprises to build a monopoly, through strategic investments in Data analysis is key to training AI algo- new technology, and the acquisition rithms. It is a part of the learning pro- of smaller companies and startups. Although the future of technological cess that machines go through, which markets is unknown, looking at the patif not given, will not function. Unlike terns of present enterprises, it is evihuge enterprises, smaller companies dent that it grows from both innovation don't have this level of data acquisition. and market strategies. Second, smaller companies and startups are financially less powerful, often resulting in an acquisition of the company (big companies buying startups), therefore contributing to the size of 19 2020 LIFE + ADVICE OPINION What Leadership Means For Students BY AIDAN CHEUNG How the limits of the definition of Student Leadership prevents cils. If you want to be a leader in your student leaders school or recognized by your teachers, you are told to either focus on your acWhat is Student Leadership? Is it an ademics and achieve top marks, or go idea? A symbol of student empowerinto sports and excel there. Although it ment and excellence? A way for stumay not be evident as much in certain dents to step up and represent their schools, these three areas of focus are school? Or is it simply a group of ambi- highly pushed on students if they want tious students who could be more ac- to "succeed". curately described as party planners and over-achievers. The Definition of Leadership Well, simply put, it depends. Leadership is a hard concept to define even among a variety of fields. In business, it could refer to the leading company in a market, the CEO of a company, or an idea that sprouts large change in an industry. In politics, it can refer to a large group of people in power, it could refer to an individual or even a policy. The idea of leadership is polysemous, something that can span over multiple definitions, and yet, all humans understand it. Leadership can not truly be defined, as the world has all kinds of leaders: large and small, smart and not-sosmart, corrupt and righteous. The point is, leadership is not something that should be put in a box, it's something that should grow and adapt to the leader. But for many students, whether it be through student council or academics themselves, this doesn't seem like the case. For as long as schools have existed, so have student leaders. Sure, they may have not been as prevalent due to the values of the time, but schools have always been synonymous with student leadership. Since the first modern schools opened in Ancient Egypt, many things have changed in the education system. Even over the last century, schools have progressed in every sense; beginning to value growth over performance. Still, despite being present for numerous years, what is and what isn't recognized as student leadership by teachers and administrators, has stayed the same. If you don't excel in either academics, sports, or council, you will most likely struggle to be recognized by your teachers. Student leadership, like other forms of leadership, is something that spans over multiple definitions. To look for student leadership, however, we must first look at how leadership is defined. Nonetheless, this is no simple task. Across the world, the definition of a model student leader has remained stagnant: solely fitting under three cat- Leadership is something that is much egories: academics, sports, and couneasier to understand by its character- 21 istics than by its definition, but that doesn't stop dictionaries from trying to. Therefore, most of these dictionaries are purposefully vague or imprecise. Take Google's dictionary for example. A simple google search can lead you to a rabbit hole of unclear, loose, or downright fickle results that leave you with more questions than answers. Definitions like "the action of leading a group of people or an organization", "the state or position of being a leader", and "the leaders of an organization, country, etc." lead us to further questions like, "what is a leader?" and, "what is considered leading?" This theme isn't reserved solely for Google's dictionary; other more credible dictionaries seem to follow a similar tone. For instance, look at Merriam Webster's dictionary. Under their site, they define leadership as simply the "capacity to lead". According to `dictionary.com', the leading dictionary on the internet, leadership is purely the "ability to lead". Leadership is something that grows and adapts to the leader. And with the millions of diverse leaders in the world, it wouldn't be fair to impose restrictions on who they are. This trend that we find throughout these dictionaries' definitions of leadership, allows us to fill in what they leave out. It doesn't just include those in the limelight, but also includes those not seen as leaders by traditional standards; people leading behind the scenes who are seldom recognized. What is Student Leadership? Seeing how vague definitions of leadership seemed to be, it would make sense that "student leadership" should be similar. However, this is not the case. Among most of John Knox's upcoming Student Council, definitions seem to follow a single tone. For Kyrstal Herfst, the Vice-Team Leader of the upcoming student council, student leadership means " connecting with one's fellow students in order to create a unique and enjoyable year for everyone." Grace Schouten, the former Media Coordinator and current Secretary of the student council said that student leadership to her, "finds its roots in humility and an openness to working with the entire school, not just the student council." Although these answers are not surprising (those on the student council would define student leadership based on their experience in student council), it is noteworthy that even among student leaders, the idea of student leadership seems to fit solely under the council. well in academics, sports, and council should be recognized in their schools as leaders. This underlying agreement forces pressure onto students to allocate their time into things they may not be skilled or interested in, taking time away from the things they are truly passionate about. With continual pressure for students to academically or athletically succeed, students who want to be leaders have to abandon their other interests if they want to be in the limelight. What Student Leadership Could Be Let's imagine for a second that you are a 9th-grade student. You're halfway through your school year and the night before classes start again you spend hours and hours sewing clothes for your own fashion brand that you've been working on for months. After a long weekend of sewing and snipping, you decide that you want to show your final product to your favourite teacher. The next day, you bring your final product to them with high hopes, struggling to keep your excitement under control. But just as the moment leading up to it passes, your excitement is met with "oh that's cool, it would be great if you'd apply that effort towards your school work", as your teacher walks away to talk to someone more in line with their idea of "student leadership". Although this scenario may not apply for all students across the country, change a few things in the story and for many students, this story really sinks in. For the longest time, the model stuHowever seemingly insignificant, dedent leader in the eyes of teachers and fining student leadership solely under other administrators have belonged to the guise of the student council is dam- one or more of these three categories: aging to students. It creates a narrative academics, athletics, or council. Excelthat only those who do exceptionally ling even one of these focus points can 23 lead you to large-found success in high school. However, excelling in one category can lead to detrimental effects on others. In a study by the University of Albany, New York, they found that student-athletes achieved, on average, 8% worse in terms of GPA (2.379 GPA for student-athletes vs. 2.681 GPA for regular students, on average). If they want to be recognized as leaders, not only do students have pressure to abandon passions outside of these categories but those inside these categories in order to maintain excellence in just one. their own baked goods stand; excellence in these areas should also be seen as it truly is: leadership. Lead on! As a new generation of starry-eyed students enters the new and exciting world of high school, it is our only hope that these new groups of student leaders will not be restricted to certain categories of excellence. Instead, it is up to us to realize an environment where excellence of any kind can finally be recognized as leadership. So what can we do? It's simple. We apply the same standards of other forms To the teachers, administrators and those involved behind the scenes, it is of leadership on student leadership. your duty to make sure that it is known Modern dictionaries tell us that leaderto students that leadership will not be ship is something that can't truly be derestricted to the commonly expected fined. Sure, you can try to, using vague categories or impre"The concept of student leadership stands as one of athletcise voics, acacabulary. of the most valuable characteristics that one could demics, or However, demonstrate as youth within our community. The once again, ability to manage and direct people and information student counleadership for a positive result is the common understanding cil. To the is someof a leader; however, in actuality, true and matured students, thing that student leadership stands beyond the basic princi- classgrows and mates, and adapts to ples of the depicted job and its formalities." current the leader. leaders - Samuel Tso, Team Leader who do It's time happen to for reform. To rethink how we encourage students follow under these categories of leadto be leaders. Instead of pressuring stu- ership, it is your responsibility to use the power you have now, to vindicate dents to focus on traditional leaderthose not easily seen. ship roles, let them pursue their passions. This is not to discourage leaders whose passions do follow under these categories, but to treat all distinction as the same. Whether they're passionate about business and starting their own fashion brand, music and producing their own beats, or baking and starting Finally to the student leader who doesn't feel seen, to the kid who's mixing and producing their own beats, starting their own clothing business or even the kid volunteering at their local church/NPO: your time in the limelight will come, lead on. 25 JUNE STUDENT SPOTLIGHT 2020 Student Spotlight Photo Credits: Emma Hwang STUDENT SPOTLIGHT LIFE AT JOHN KNOX Samuel Tso Afterwards I went for the secretary, and I got that one and I just kept them going. I thought, God, I feel like you've given me these gifts and these talents and abilities to work with my friends and to work for the school. So it would be a waste to not use it for your purpose, you know, and really, my purpose was just to glorify God and to bring more spiritual leaders like to school. But I think that was really the first step I took. 02 What originally drew you to the student council? My first step into student council was in grade nine with our class rep. So that case, what really drove me like that, I guess you could say at that time I had this like, sort of a wake up call, like it was more of like a spiritual reason for God. So I was thinking more like, okay, God, if you want me to do something with this school, if you want me to work, then give me this position. If you don't, it doesn't matter then since I don't have anything to lose. 03 01 Samuel Tso, the former Vice Team Leader and current Student Council Team Leader. For those of you who don't know Sam, you may be left with many questions following the election. Who is he, and why was he elected to the esteemed student council? What is his vision of John Knox, and how will he nurture a welcoming environment among the student body amidst COVID-19? What does he see as the largest dilemma facing the student body today? We talked to Samuel Tso about his initial reasons to run for the student council, his goals for the student council, and visions for the John Knox community. To read the full interview see the QR code on the top right. Your brother, who was on the student council at the time and grade when you're in grade nine, do you think he influenced you as well? Definitely. Because, you see your family members doing it, you can see that they're doing stuff for the school. And I mean, on top of that just the student council aspect is pretty cool, you see people putting up posters and stuff, although it is tedious to do all that small stuff, but back in like grade eight and nine, it looks super cool. Seeing my brother in a position like that and the events that's happening, this has definitely influenced me in a positive way. What does student leadership mean to you in both a Christian aspect and also in just the school aspect? Okay. Yeah. So I think the biggest thing about a leader is the aspect of making more leaders, because when you lead others, there's no point if there's no one to lead, right? And if the people behind you 27 aren't competent or able to do anything, you're not going to get anywhere, since that's the people you're leading, right? So the biggest thing as a leader, as a student leader is going to be going to those peers and friends, making those connections and relationships and being able to build them up, so they too can be on the same level as you. In the end, as a leader, I think a lot of times people think you're on like a higher level or something, but really you're on the same level as the students. You're the designated person to just guide and help, but I think a big part of it is just to be making it so that you're working with their strengths and their weaknesses. 04 And then you're making the strengths become more prominent. And building it up, I think that's an important aspect, especially in student council or student council that most members or these applicants don't realize is that you're not just hanging up posters. You're not just putting events, you're fostering a community, you're fostering an environment where the next generation of student leaders will have to grow and follow your footsteps. You are directly influencing what others do. What are some goals for the student council this next year? The school board isn't going to be making a decision until like the late August and that's. So, in terms of what we can actually do, I don't know. It's pretty limited right now, but, for things that we have planned, definitely winter formal wants now after hearing Krys- tal's speech which I give props to. Some other things, we really wanted to bring more of the spirit days and more events to the school. So at least maybe once per week or two weeks we get a new spirit day or another casual day. So we want more of that. I think it's definitely something on my list to get more involved with the community. So I want the reps and the other exec council members to mingle too, be bringing together a community. This year we were going to, um, I don't know if you know, but we were going to have a field day and then we're going to like many different small groups, quote unquote, from chapel in which you could, from all different grades and you would just mingle from there and that'd be your teams, but we couldn't have that. Maybe this year we can get one of those small groups going so that, you know, our school is small, we have the opportunity to connect everyone together. Right. And so we might as well try and do that. Uh, but yeah, stuff like that. Yeah, definitely. When you look towards a school, definitely the precursor to John Knox secondary school was Carver. And where you see a small school with a small area, you can see that people, everyone, every student knows every other student sits specifically because it's such a small school. And that Carver is such a community that is much closer to each other and must be much more comfortable with each other. And we can definitely see that passing on to John Knox, Christian secondary school, where I would say like most of my faith and most of my Christian part of my life comes from just my church and my family in general. Not to say that the school hasn't helped me foster my faith, but it doesn't play as big a part as my church, but for like in school, Bible classes that had us read the stories and analyze them, gave me a better knowledge of the history. And then as we went to senior year, deeper stuff came out, especially this year with Mrs. Diaz. We had a lot of nice and cool subjects that we were able to do deeper interfaith. When she made us do these essays on different topics, one of them was on science and faith, and I did it about miracles and what science says about it. What do you think is the biggest problem in our school? Generally there seems to be some sort of distance between other grades and in terms of mingling. I think that small groups might help that. Just getting them all together and bringing people together is definitely a top priority. But honestly, I think one of the other biggest problems we have is just the, the passion we need from the community. For instance the apathy, what we feel when we bring up events, it's really strong, it almost feels like no one really cares much. and of course I'm not trying to blame the school. Even if we can make a giant event the best winter formal ever, the students are not going to be willing to dance, you know, nothing's going to happen. So I would say our biggest problem right now is just, we have a somewhat lack of passion. Therefore I would think that a big part of this year would be trying to ignite that spark and bring people to be more, maybe step out of their comfort zone more, which is going to be difficult. But I think that's definitely something we need to work on. So how has John specifically fostered your faith? How do you plan to maintain it? As you said, that faith especially is really important to you and you lean into it, especially on big life experiences and choices. In terms of faith, I think this school has been able to help me really develop my leadership, you know, spiritual skills in that sense. And that really helped me, as we had to research and we had to dig deeper and see what scripture says, see what the real world says. It helps me just learn more about both perspectives and also helps you understand how to kind of. Put it out to the world and you know, how to articulate in a better way. 06 05 people still know each other. If you could describe this year's student council in one word, what would that be? I would say very exciting. At first, I was pretty skeptical about this year of student council, because the personalities are just so diverse this time. But after some time I think that diversity really brought upon a bunch of different to like inputs and perspectives that really helped to grow. Um, I think that the student council was honestly, probably one of the best I've worked with. Because we went through a lot about 29 going to, you know, a school without a religion is that you can help, you can practice, you know, evangelizing, you can practice sharing your experiences of God. Uh, and so that's hopefully something I can do in the future. Thank you. Yeah. Yeah. I definitely think it's definitely important to realize that there are schools outside of the faith. There are schools that do not really focus on religion and that going there does not necessarily mean the end of your faith. It just means that you can find new experiences that you would never think of. If you just stayed in that one bubble. Like students, teachers and students mentioned this as well, that we are sort of in this Christian bubble, we stay there for the majority of high school life, especially at John Knox. How do you, how will you maintain your faith in an environment? Yeah, that's a good question. Um, so. Hopefully in the future. Like I know for me, I have the ability and just the blessing of being close to my church. Right. So, uh, even when I go into university, I still go to church. I can still hang out with like my youth group and whatever, and we can still continually develop our faith. But in terms of the school community, uh, I know for a fact that there are a lot of different Christian clubs at those schools. Literally right now, my brother is in a university Christian club right now doing a meeting. So I hope I could probably be part of those Christian clubs. I can, you know, meet different people who are. In all different levels of faith. Uh, those that can help me grow and find, I can find mentors, or I can find those who are maybe newer to the faith or just who are non theists and I can help them, you know? I think definitely one there's a pro to 08 07 what we went through in the beginning of the year, we had a rep that technically didn't qualify to be a rep, and there were a lot of things that happened that we had to deal with. We had an exec member drop out of their council, we had to plan an event one day before the teachers wanted us to, and then there was COVID-19. I think for this year, with the people we have now, we will be able to adapt so easily and just be able to multitask quickly. What kind of changes would you bring to the student council specifically? Like I said, I think we need to be examples, representing the student body. Ourselves, we need passion. We need the drive and we need to show it to the whole school body. Right. So I know like last year, our student reps had a problem in the beginning, where there was a little lack of care in like a lot of the things we did. So we had to talk to them, we had to step it up. And so this year, I think if we get a chance, I definitely want to talk to our reps, talk to just the exact council in general and talk to them about having this passion about this, this drive to really bring upon a new community to our school. So, yeah, I think we definitely want to try doing that. 01 02 04 06 09 11 14 16 19 22 25 Photo by Josh Calabrese Photo by Maria Noel Rabunal Photo by Vincent Ghilione Photo by `Morning Brew' Photo by Brian Mcgowan Photo by Mike Haupt Photo by `This Is Engineering' Photo by NASA Photo by Franck V. Photo by Matese Fields Photo by Juliana Kozoski Sources + Links Social Media: @thelowdown @thelowdown @thelowdown Contact: thelowdown@gmail.com for Student Spotlight nominations Credits 31 Base Idea The Lowdown. We are a student-led newspaper for the students that is focused on bringing current events that students want to see to the attention of the community. Through articles, infographics, creative writing, and more, the Lowdown aims to highlight community, and inspire students to take action. The Lowdown is a proud commodity of the Newspaper Club of John Knox Secondary School. A student-led newspaper/news source made for the students that explain modern/current events, or solve common misconceptions, etc. You might find that the Lowdown may seem redundant, with the "Times Newsletter". The times newsletter focuses on more of the events happening in the school, and other happenings, whilst the Lowdown covers news as a whole, tying current events with our school community. Aidan Cheung, Chief Editor Jimmy Wang, Chief Editor Lucy Peng, Media Coordinator 2020 Joseph Kim, Head Writer Join The Lowdown. Are you a student who is interested in current events? Are you a student who is well-versed in writing and storytelling through articles? Are you a student who is ambitious, hard-working, and works well with a team? If so, then consider joining the Lowdown team. The Lowdown, in the coming years, aims to create a legacy of quality and diversity. From comedy, to fashion, to the current social climate, the Lowdown aims to appeal to all forms of the student interest. If you want to be part of that process and at the same time hone your skills in writing and expression, join The Lowdon. 33 I run the same way that guys fall in love with me. slowly and then not at all. Does anyone else watch movies and wonder why no one's social distancing? If I keep stress-eating at this level, the buttons on my shirt will start socially distancing from each other. Pretty wild how we used to eat cake after someone had blown all over it. Me: Throws a bone for my dog. Everyone else at the graveyard: insert pikachu face Beauty lies in the LIES of the beholder. Let's Talk, JOHN KNOX Share your thoughts, shape the culture. So now everyone wants to know what introverts do for fun? If you try to fail and succeed instead, which have you done? A hotdog is a taco. #dontatme I wonder what it's like to be ugly for just one day. because being ugly every day sucks. Teacher: Gives an hour-long lecture. Everyone in the Zoom waiting room. A hotdog is a taco. #dontatme The legacy of Carver WIFI lives on through John Knox. Note to self: You can't see your reflection in Friesen's head, but that doesn't mean you can't try. "Would I rather be feared or loved? Easy. Both. I want people to be afraid of how much they love me" - Michael Scott JUNE 2020 - #3 LOWDOWN A JKCS Newspaper