Tag: Issue 25 Volume 18

Student’s team competes in lego robotics world championship

cnmchronicleLeave a comment

By: Rene Thompson, Staff Reporter | Photo By: Rene Thompson

Team Dutch 200 won the Inspire Award in the regional competition with their robot Hal (left) placing tenth.
Team Dutch 200 won the Inspire Award in the regional competition with their robot Hal (left) placing tenth.

A New Mexico chap­ter of the First Tech Challenge Lego Robotics program is raising money to compete in the FTC World Championship next month, dual credit CNM student and team leader Haley Hanson said.

Hanson’s team, Dutch 200, which competes against other teams using Lego Robot kits, has won a spot in the FTC World Championship on April 24-27 in St. Louis Mo., but must raise a $1,000 entry fee first, she said.

“The team is really happy about going to the championship,” team chaperone and Haley Hanson’s mom, Lori Hanson, said.

Dutch 200 was invited to the world championship after winning the Inspire Award in the regional competition on March 16, said Lori Hanson. The team’s robot, Hal, won tenth place in the robot competition, she said.

The team does not yet know what they will do to raise the entry fee, but will post the details and how others can help on their Facebook page at facebook. com/ftcteam5666, Lori Hanson said.

Haley Hanson said she learned about robotics when she was 11 when she and her brother joined a team in the junior league of the same organization.

“We build our robots to complete a certain challenge each year that is released in September, and challenges consist of game like competitions for children to better under­stand, such as this year’s form of a three-dimen­sional vertical Tic-Tac- Toe, taking objects from one point to another in a specific pattern,” she said.

The FTC and the FIRST (For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology) organization work to get kids from Kindergarten through grade 12 inter­ested in learning about science and technol­ogy through robotics challenges, she said.

“It is a fun way to learn about new technolo­gies, as well as teamwork and strategy, with a very unique sports model,” she said. It also teaches gra­cious and ethical profes­sionalism at an early age,” Haley Hanson said.

Dutch 200 works with several chil­dren’s organizations and schools, such as the Albuquerque Sign Language Academy, the Albuquerque School of Excellence, and the Pruitt Reservation, teaching students about Lego robotics, she said.

“Our team has mentored over 60 First Lego League and First Tech Challenge teams in our five plus years with the FIRST organization,” she said.

For more informa­tion on Lego robotics and competitions visit usfirst.org.

Active Shooter training offered on Montoya, Westside campuses

cnmchronicleLeave a comment

By: Daniel Johnson, Investigative Reporter | Photo By: Daniel Johnson

APD Patrolmen First Class James Vautier lectures faculty and staff in the Smith Brasher auditorium on what to do in the event of an active shooter on campus.
APD Patrolmen First Class James Vautier lectures faculty and staff in the Smith Brasher auditorium on what
to do in the event of an active shooter on campus.

Training will be provided on multiple campuses to teach fac­ulty and staff what to do if an active shooter situation should happen on campus.

Montoya and Westside campuses will each host two training sessions which will be similar to the two ses­sions recently completed on Main campus, APD Patrolmen First Class James Vautier said.

“I loved the turnout for our first session, I was surprised at how many people attended,” he said.

The training pro­vided by Vautier was created using data col­lected from the NYPD, the Virginia Tech mas­sacre, APD psycholo­gists and mental health case studies from past shootings, he said.

Vautier’s tech­nique is similar to the Run, Hide, Fight technique, but focuses more on what a person can do to prevent a shooting, Vautier said.

Vautier believes that getting people to be aware without being paranoid is the best way to ensure that someone will spot a shooter before anyone gets hurt, he said.

“I want people to have an idea of what to look for with a person who may need help, but I also want them to know what to do in case an active shooter event was to occur on campus,” he said.

Deaf Services Coordinator Faith Timm, who attended the Main campus session, said the training could have been more focused specifically on active shooters on col­lege campuses, but still felt it was helpful.

“I thought the training was good and worth my time and I would recom­mend that all staff and faculty make it to the training if they can,” she said.

‘Leonardo Literary Magazine’ release party announced

cnmchronicleLeave a comment

By: Adriana Avila, Managing Editor | Photo Illustration By: Jonathan Gamboa, Production Manager

Previous issues of the “Leonardo Literary Magazine.”
Previous issues of the “Leonardo Literary Magazine.”

The 2013 edition of “Leonardo Literary Magazine” is scheduled to be released next month, said “Leonardo” adviser and Full-time Creative Writing instructor Patrick Houlihan.

The release party for this year’s edition will be held at the Main campus Student Resource Center on April 5 where stu­dents will have the opportunity to share their works during the festivities, he said.

“It’s a celebration of what’s in it. Anyone who is published in it can stand up and read their stuff and pick up copies, share them with friends,” he said.

“Leonardo” is funded by through student activ­ity fees and prints only 250 copies of each edition, which are free, he said.

With the increase of student interest, “Leonardo” has grown from tabloid size to an actual magazine length, he said.

“It’s grown and sta­bilized over the years to where it’s now a 50 or 60 page magazine full color and student activities has been great at funding the increase costs. Paper and ink took a huge jump about five or seven years ago,” he said.

Being published is a big step for people and it helps a great deal to write it on resumes, he said.

“It’s a wonderful resume line to say ‘I’m a published author or artist selected,’” Houlihan said.

English major and “Leonardo” editor Shaya Rogers said it is a privilege to review student works because this year’s submis­sions were impressive.

“Giving students the opportunity to share their creative work is a positive aspect of the CNM community and I am so happy to support that,” Rogers said.

Rogers, who also works as the features reporter for the CNM Chronicle, has three nature photos and two poems featured in the magazine: one about her challenges with monog­amy and the other an ode to her sister who commit­ted suicide when she was a teenager, she said.

Business and Communications major and layout designer Jonathan Gamboa, who also works at the produc­tion manager for the CNM Chronicle, said he enjoys designing the magazine because it gives him the opportunity be creative.

“I think it’s fun. Since I am the only one designing, it allows me to have more freedom in producing the magazine,” Gamboa said.

This is Gamboa’s second design year and his role for “Leonardo” extends further profes­sionally from the mouse and screen, he said.

“I really did get pro­fessional experience doing it the first year because I was having to stay in touch with the printers and coordinat­ing the release party with the editors, along with setting my own deadlines to finish the magazine,” he said.

Houlihan said “Leonardo” used to be a semester project for the Business and Graphics department, but the magazine became the work of volunteer stu­dents after the pro­gram was cut a couple of years ago.

Submissions for “Leonardo” for 2014 are now being accepted and deadline for works will probably be in early January 2014, he said.

Houlihan hopes to continue the works of “Leonardo” because of the community’s great reviews and the benefits students receive when published, he said.

“It’s a nice repre­sentation of us to the community and I’d hate for it to disappear,” Houlihan said.

Vortex gets that Motherf**ker with the hat

cnmchronicleLeave a comment

Photo Provided By: The Vortex Theatre

Actors Ed Chavez and Alicia Lueras Maldonado share an intimate scene during the rehersal shoot.
Actors Ed Chavez and Alicia Lueras Maldonado share an intimate scene during the rehersal shoot.

The gleefully foul-mouthed play, “The Motherf**ker with the Hat,” is coming to Albuquerque for the first time later this month.

“Motherf**ker” will open on March 22 at the Vortex theatre and run for three weekends.

“The play is a chal­lenging, well-writ­ten and very funny examination of the choices we make about love. In many ways a coming of age story, the play is raw, yet deeply familiar and human,” Director Leslee Richards said.

The play is set in a blue-collar Puerto Rican community in New York City and is an intense verbal cage match about love, fidelity and a mis­placed hat, she said.

Elliot Stenzel, who plays antagonist Ralph, said the life-like char­acters struggle with problems that are familiar to most people.

“We all have flaws in our personality and how you manage those throughout life can dictate how well you do,” he said.

The off-putting title and the show itself is a reflection of modern American life, he said.

Efrain Villa, who plays supporting char­acter Julio, said the play will strike a differ­ent chord for everyone because it touches on many topics like fear, loneliness and addiction.

“In many ways this play is about how people can get stuck in really bad cycles and how difficult it is to pull yourself out of that cycle, he said.

The 2011 play was written by Stephen Adly Guirgis and was nominated for six Tony awards. It centers on Jackie, a former drug dealer out on parole, and his relationship with his long-time girlfriend Veronica. When Jackie finds another man’s hat in his girl­friend’s apartment, he is convinced she has been cheating and swears to find the motherf**ker who owns the hat.

There is a content advisory for the per­formance, which is for ages 18 and over.

“The Motherf**ker with the Hat”

Scheduled to run

  • March 22 to April 14,
  • 7:30 p.m. Fridays and Saturdays
  • 2 p.m. on Sundays.

General admission | $18

Student rush tickets five minutes before the curtain if seats are available | $10

Pay-What-You-Will | Sunday, March 24.

Audience Talkback | Sunday, April 7.

Instructor publishes book of poetry

cnmchronicleLeave a comment

By: Shaya Rogers, Features Reporter

English and Cultural Studies instructor Felecia Caton-Garcia will be reading poems from her newly pub­lished book at a local bookstore next month, she said.

Caton-Garcia will read a selection of poems from her book “Say That” on April 17 at Bookworks on Rio Grande in the North Valley. This is her first published book, she said.

“It’s really exciting, more exciting than I expected it to be, just to actually be able to hold the book in my hands,” she said.

Caton-Garcia said she had been working on the poems for many years with no intention of putting them together for a book, but it fell into place.

“I have written for most of my life and I’ve written seriously and for publication for 10 or 15 years, so you always sort of have an idea that you’re evolving some­thing,” she said.

The poems stem from personal experi­ences with death and family, including the death of her father and an uncle who died just weeks before she was born, she said.

Although her poems are based on real events, they show a fictional outsider perspective of these events, she said.

“I don’t feel ter­ribly tied to facts of a the book is a combinaparticular narrative so tion of autobiographi­cal work, but often even much of the auto­biographical work is imagined,” she said. ­

Publishing “Say That” prompted her to consider how to recognize the artis­tic growth that takes place between the writing process, during and after publi­cation, and the present moment, she said.

“I am choosing to see it as a snapshot of that particular time and place and who I was as a writer right then, and the next one will also not be who I am when it comes out,” she said.

She credits “Say That” with helping her evolve her writing and bringing her to where she is today, she said. She hopes that by reading her work, others will be inspired by the imagery or ideas in the story.

“Ideally, that’s what art does; art changes you. The act of making art changes you,” she said.

Caton-Garcia said she would like for readers to feel inspired by her work.

“Say That” is avail­able at the UNM bookstore through unmpress.com/books and can be ordered wherever books are sold for $17.95.

Bookworks is located at 4022 Rio Grande Blvd. NW, Caton-Garcia will be reading her poetry from 7 p.m. to 9 p.m. on Wednesday, April 17.

Math League gets its π on

cnmchronicleLeave a comment

After more than two years of dormancy, the Math League is available once again to students who love math, need help with their home­work or are just inter­ested in learning a little more about the often dreaded subject.

The chartered stu­dent organization meets every Saturday on Main campus and is open to students at any math level, said Engineering major and club President Myra Villalobos.

“It’s not a competitive group. You don’t have to be a math all-star; we just want you to come and do your math,” she said.

Studying at meet­ings has helped all group members improve their math skills, Villalobos said.

“We realized how dif­ferent each one of us is and how helpful it is to study together. We have different strengths and weaknesses,” she said.

The group re-formed during the fall 2012 term with four members and an adviser. The club now hosts about 20 stu­dents per meeting and a STEP-UP tutor is pres­ent to provide help if the group gets stuck, she said.

“We want to get people from the lower levels in math show up for help so they understand that it really is a process and that we all go through it,” she said.

The group’s home­work model has become popular, and is now being used for both a Physics and a Biology club, Villalobos said.

Math League

  • 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. Saturdays
  • Main campus
  • Jeanette Stromberg Hall JS-208