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westerngazette.caTHURSDAY, MARCH 10, 2016 • WESTERN UNIVERSITY’S STUDENT NEWSPAPER • VOLUME 109 ISSUE 44

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The cost of pink

Women are being charged more for the exact same product thanks to a ‘pink tax.’READ THE STORY ON PAGE 7

JORDAN MCGAVIN GAZETTE

2 • THURSDAY, MARCH 10, 2016 www.westerngazette.ca •

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KNOWTackling mental health with photography

Two Western students are amongst a group who went to an Inuit community in Northern Quebec, working to improve youth mental health with education and photography. PG 4

INSIGHT Q&A with Marianas Trench

The Canadian rock band is cur-rently on tour across Canada pro-moting their new album, Astoria, alongside Walk Off the Earth and will be playing in London next week. PG 7

EXPERIENCE Shooting hoops for Rwanda

Rebuilding Health in Rwanda is holding a basketball tournament in hopes of raising money to sponsor a graduate student pur-suing health care in Rwanda.

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MMany may know Nick Vanin from watching his jersey number, 24, from the stands of TD Stadium. Others may know him from their lab together, as they inject mice with steroids in tandem.This year marks his third on the varsity football team at Western and also his third year in an honours specialization in interdisciplinary medical sciences, with a major in physiology.

Nick began playing football in grade nine and now plays linebacker for Western’s varsity team. His repertoire of injuries consists of a couple of meniscus tears and two concussions in high school, but that hasn’t stopped him from trying to be the best football player he can be.

He likes playing linebacker because he’s in control of the outcome of the game, which allows him to have a direct influence on the outcome.

“It’s a mix between a couple of different positions. I get a hand in everything that goes on the field and I’m never too far away from the action,” he says.

When he isn’t in school or playing football, Nick is hanging out with friends and family, coaching a youth football in London, or watching his favourite series, Game of Thrones.

Nick was recruited by most universities in Ontario and by McGill University while he was in high school. He chose to attend Western because he wanted to stay home with his family.

“Staying in London is such a big thing [to me],” he says. “Some people are so determined on leaving home but I feel like I’m so much closer to my brother than perhaps other people are to their siblings.”

He was attracted to Western’s football team because of

the combination of the university’s academic and football program.

“Growing up in London, I saw the Mustangs play all the time and the effect they had on the community,” he says.

His most memorable game was earlier this year, when the Mustangs played Laurier’s Golden Hawks.

“It was the first game that I was able to make a couple of plays, the first game where I felt I started going in the right direction as a football player at this level,” he says.

When he was quickly on the path to finishing high school, Nick narrowed his career choices down to becoming a doctor — a sports orthopedic surgeon, to be specific.

“I had a couple of knee surgeries in high school,” Nick says. “The fact that they helped me get back to the field and if I can help out someone in my position when I grow up and inspire them in the same way they did, that’d be pretty cool.”

Trying to find a balance between football, school work, family and friends has been critical for Nick in university.

“The key is very understanding friends,” he says with a chuckle.

Going into next season, Nick is excited to build with the team, getting even more comfortable in his position and getting better. And in a few years, Nick hopes to be in medical school while still coaching youth football during the summer.

It’s a lot of work, but Nick’s motivated by his parents, who moved with him to London from Columbia when he was nine years old.

“They made many sacrifices. I feel like the least I could do is work towards reaching the best I can be,” he says.

■DRISHTI KATARIA

PROFILE NICK VANIN

TAYLOR LASOTA GAZETTE

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GRACE TO GAZETTE STAFF@NEWSATGAZETTE

A research study at Western University revealed urban sounds have the potential to negatively affect reproduction of songbirds.

Conducted by Scott MacDougall-Shackleton, director of the Advanced Facility for Avian Research, whose work primarily focuses on a variety of different aspects of bird behav-iour, including communication and how their behaviour changes seasonally.

“For this study, we were curi-ous if noise would actually directly affect reproduction,” MacDougall-Shackleton said. “Previously, it’s been observed in the wild that many species of birds do have fewer off-spring in cities as opposed to the country, but we don’t know if that’s because there are different preda-tors [or] different food.”

Although the results of the study show that noise from the urban environment does have an impact on reproduction, the exact agent is still unclear — traffic noise could be startling the birds off of their nests or there could be a loss in communi-cation between the parents due to the loud noises in the environment.

“What we found was that in the noise condition, birds were less likely to hatch their eggs,” explained MacDougall-Shackleton. “They laid the same number of eggs and the eggs were fertile, but they didn’t hatch. So that suggests that their incubation behaviour was interrupted.”

His team studied zebra finches, native to Central Australia. The birds are also common in pet stores and are able to breed in captivity, whereas most wild birds are not able to breed in a cage.

“[Zebra finches] are kind of like the white rat of the bird world,” said MacDougall-Shackleton. “We use them as a representative of the wild birds because they’re very sim-ilar but they’re not actually native to Canada.”

MacDougall-Shackleton suggests

the London community to take into consideration that loud noises could disturb endangered or threatened species in local construction areas.

“As we look at suburban sprawl and new roads going in the country-side, increased traffic would be one thing to be aware of, ” said MacDougall-Shackleton. “Not only are we directly affecting the environ-ment when we pave and put in a new road, but there is going to be other by-products, like noise, that could be affecting native species.” ■

Chicks not loving the city

COURTESY OF TONY HAMMOUD

Wellness education centre opensSABRINA FRACASSI GAZETTE STAFF@NEWSATGAZETTE

Many of us have probably walked by the new purple room downstairs in the UCC and thought, “Where did that come from?” Initial curiosity is usually sidetracked by our hectic run to class or attempt to get in line before Tims shuts down for the day, with no second thought is given.

That new purple room is actually the Wellness Education Centre, which officially opened Feb. 23. The centre’s main purpose is to offer an area where Western stu-dents can ask questions and learn about the health resources that are available to them, both on-campus and off-campus.

“The reason why this centre exists is because Western actually has a lot of resources for students, but it can be kind of confusing and intimidating to know where to start,” said Melanie Atkins, the centre’s wellness coordinator.

The Wellness Centre is a collab-orative effort amongst several par-ties including a private donor, the student experience portfolio, the University Students’ Council and Health Services.

Jana Luker, associate vice-presi-dent of student experience, acted as an administrator and helped with the organization of the project. Her goal was to incorporate the perspectives of both the partners and the students into the Wellness Centre.

“I’m really optimistic about the extended resources for people when they don’t know where to go,” Luker said. “We hear a lot from students that they don’t know how to access

resources, even though they are all over campus. We’re just trying to put everything in one place.”

The opening of the Wellness Centre is accompanied by an online wellness guide that all students can access via OWL. Students can down-load the resource guide online by going into OWL’s membership tab and selecting “joinable sites.”

According to USC vice-presi-dent internal Alex Benac, the idea for a guide came about a couple of years ago when Western’s students’ council visited Cornell University. Cornell had their own guide that was accessible to students and Western has been creating their own guide since then.

“What we’ve got now is a guide that will allow everyone on campus — staff, faculty, students or other-wise — to have a resource that the University put together and is con-stantly reassessing,” said Benac.

The Wellness Centre also employs two other specialized workers. Angela Treglia is the sex-ual violence prevention education coordinator at Western and focuses specifically on cases of sexual assault and violence. She strives to help students who are looking for someone to talk to.

There is also a registered diet-ician, Samantha Gianotti, who is available to meet with students and discuss dietary and nutritional needs. Gianotti has worked here for four years, but her services have not been adequately sought out by stu-dents yet.

“I think that close to 50 per cent of the students I see have problems with stress affecting their sleep and appetite and maybe their weight or

some health issues,” said Gianotti. “I see a number of students who may be struggling with depression, anxiety or distorted eating and that goes hand-in-hand with nutrition and taking care of yourself and your mental health.”

Some of the services offered include nutrition counselling, meal planning, recipes, weight manage-ment and working with one-on-one individual-specific goals. They also work with athletes to increase per-formance and decrease body fat. Students with the undergraduate health plan are eligible for five free dietary appointments per year.

“I think that it is a really positive idea that has been a long time com-ing,” Gianotti said. “I really hope that [students] take advantage of

it. It’s going to be a great opportun-ity for everyone and everyone can find something that is going to help them out of this centre.”

The Wellness Centre offers jobs for students, too, as there are five work-study positions posted in both the summer and fall sessions. Danielle Bristow, a second-year health sciences student, works as a wellness peer educator in the Wellness Education Centre.

“I think this is a really great resource in being able to connect students so that they can receive the help that they deserve,” Bristow said.

The Wellness Centre offers classes free of charge for students in order to help them with their men-tal health and physical wellness. A

TAYLOR LASOTA GAZETTE

bookable space is available to stu-dents who are interested in holding their own wellness group activities as well. Open 24 hours, any student can reach out to the centre and book the room for their personal use.

You can visit the Wellness Centre in the basement of the UCC or you can reach out to them at 519-661-2111 x87127.

Gianotti is available Tuesdays and Fridays between 9 a.m. and 4 p.m. If you would like to book an appointment you can email her at [email protected] or give her a call at 519-850-2994 x82994. ■


know

Tackling mental health with photography

AMY O’KRUK NEWS EDITOR@AMYATGAZETTE

Wind and snow buffet a 19-seat plane as it swoops over the arctic tun-dra in Northern Quebec. Gabrielle

Foss marvels at the pilot’s skill — he’s landing on an invisible runway. Following months of preparation, the first-year Western Faculty of Health Sciences student is finally arriving at the Kangiqsujuaq airport. Despite 90 km/hr winds and freezing temperatures, Foss and her three companions are greeted with warmth.

“Madeline and Marion were there waiting for us, and they knew everyone there in the airport,” Foss said. “We all started to get along really quickly.”

Madeline and Marion Yaaka live in Kangiqsujuaq, a tiny village on the upper tip of Quebec. While the close to 700 person settlement offers stunning views of Wakeham Bay, Foss’ mid-February trip is no Reading Week vacation. She’s with fellow first-year Western student Patrick Hickey, Eva Wu — a freshman at McGill — and her dad, and they have a project: they want to improve youth’s mental health using photography, particularly by working with young people in Inuit communities.

“We called it Northern Lights because mental illnesses, like depression, can often

be referred to as darkness,” Foss said. “The northern lights are something so beautiful that light up the sky, so we wanted the men-tal health and photography workshops to … sort of light up any darkness that might be existing.”

The project started under the umbrella of Art With Heart, a social wellness organ-ization Foss and Wu created in high school after they both participated in Students On Ice — a foundation that conducts educa-tional expeditions to the Antarctic and the Arctic. When Foss connected with 15-year-old Madeline on her arctic expedition the summer before university, AWH decided to set its sites on Kangiqsujuaq. For over six months, Foss and the others organized the project with Madeline’s mom, Marion, before finally meeting in the airport last Feb. 13.

“You really have to be working very closely with people in the community because you can’t just go up to a community as a person from the south and expect that everyone will fall into place,” Foss said. “There’s a lot that has to be done on the other end.”

It was a partnership that proved vital. The groups collaborated to raise over $18,000 for Ross, her dad, Hickey and Wu to fund Northern Light’s workshops and its donation of several DSLR cameras for the commun-ity. In addition to provincial grants, Western pitched in with the Health Sciences Students’

Council and Social Sciences Students’ Council both donating money.

After all, it took a bus ride, train travel and two flights to reach the village. Arriving just before a blizzard, AWH got to work the next day, interacting with a small group of 12 to 18-year-olds from the village’s solitary school.

“We would teach the basic concept of mental health and then the basic concepts of photography,” Foss said, describing one of the initial workshops. “Then we would use what we learned in the photography activities to create campaigns to decrease stigma in the community.”

Suicide and self-inflicted injuries are the leading causes of death for First Nations youth and adults up to 44 years of age. Further, suicide rates for Inuit youth are among the highest in the world, at 11 times the national average. Foss said when Hickey asked the kids if they knew someone with a mental illness, everyone in the room put up their hands.

“The last question he asked was ‘do you have mental health?’ And none of the stu-dents put their hands up,” Foss said. “We used that as a conversation starter.... There’s a stat that says one in five have a mental illness but five in five have mental health and I don’t think a lot of people realize that.”

Still, amidst language barriers — although the children spoke Inuktitut, French and

some English — the community welcomed the group. Toward the end of the week-long project, a local showed the university stu-dents how to make a traditional Inuit fry-bread called Bannock. Madeline and her brother were also often with Foss, Hickey and Wu, where they were staying in the school’s teachers’ dorms.

“Our goodbyes at the end of the trip were very long hugs, we all grew very close over the course of the week,” Foss said. “A lot of the time when people come up from the South, they’re there for a week and nothing happens afterwards. We want to ... ensure that that doesn’t happen.”

Foss said Wu is working on turning the workshops’ photographs of the students holding up anti-stigma messages about mental health into posters to be distributed in communities across Northern Quebec.

“We really believe that if you can go through life looking through the eyes of a photographer, then you tend to pick out the beauty in everyday life versus looking at the negative side,” Foss said. “For anyone, whether you’re struggling with a mental ill-ness or not, you can learn skills to be able to see the positivity and brightness in life.”

In the future, AWH is hoping to conduct a similar project in Newfoundland and Labrador’s Inuit region of Nunatsiavut in a community called Nain. ■

COURTESY OF GABRIELLE FOSS

COURTESY OF GABRIELLE FOSS

SOME OF THE PHOTOS TAKEN BY STUDENTS WHO WERE A PART OF THE NORTHERN LIGHTS PROJECT.

By Levin C. Handy (per http://hdl.loc.gov/loc.pnp/cw

pbh.04326) [Public domain], via W

ikimedia Com

mons

open. online. everywhere.go.athabascau.ca/online-courses

You don’t have to sit in school to stand among greatness.

› Thomas Edison:

The world’s most extraordinary failure never gave up. Thank goodness.

knowsports • www.westerngazette.ca THURSDAY, MARCH 10, 2016 • 5

SERENA QUINN SPORTS EDITOR@SERENAATGAZETTE

Representing Canada at the Olympic Games is an accomplishment only the best of the best Canadian athletes have the opportunity to experience.

Did you know that many Mustang athletes went on to com-pete in the Olympics for Canada? Over 100 former Mustangs com-peted in the Olympic Games over the last 108 years.

Here’s a look at three Olympic sports where numerous former Mustangs have competed in.

ROWINGRowing is the Olympic sport where the majority of our Mustangs have competed in. With 44 former Mustangs representing Canada in rowing, it is not surprising that some of the big medal winners over the years have been Western alumnus.

One notable Mustang name in Olympic rowing is Silken Laumann. Laumann entered the sport of row-ing at the age of 17 alongside her sis-ter Danièle and the pair advanced to the Canadian national team. The Laumann sisters represented Canada in the 1984 Olympic games in Los Angeles in the double sculls category were they captured a bronze medal.

Later Laumann went on to com-pete alone in the single sculls cat-egory and meddled in a number of World Championships and Pan-American Games. She made her second Olympic appearance in 1988 when she placed seventh in Seoul with sculls partner Kay Worthington.

Despite her many great accom-plishments on the international stage, it was her appearance in the 1992 Olympic Games in Barcelona that cemented her name in the memories of Canadians. Just 10 weeks before Laumann was set to compete, she suffered a potential career-ending injury. While train-ing for the games in Germany in May, Laumann’s shell collided with another shell and a piece of splash-board was lodged into her leg upon impact. Laumann underwent a number of operations to repair her tibia and nerve damage, and she pushed herself into rehab with hopes of keeping her Olympic gold medal dream alive.

To the surprise of many, Laumann competed in Barcelona just 10 weeks after her injury and won the bronze medal in the women’s single sculls competition.

TRACK AND FIELDTwenty former Mustangs having competed in the Olympic Games in track and field, making it the

second largest sport that Mustangs have made their mark on. The first Mustang to compete in the Olympics for track and field was Mel Brock who finished fourth in the 800-metre competition in the 1912 Olympic Games in Stockholm, Sweden.

BASKETBALLAnother sport that former Mustangs athletes have been well represented in the Olympic Games is basket-ball. Eleven former Mustang ath-letes have represented Canada in the Olympics with the first set of Mustangs competing in the sport in the 1952 Olympic Games in Helsinki, Finland.

Seven Mustangs were present on Team Canada’s Roster in Finland including Chuck Dalton, Bill Pataky, Glen Pettinger, Bob Phibbs, Harry Wade and George Wearring, along with Western coach Paul Thomas. Both Patarky and Pettinger were cur-rent members of the Mustangs men’s basketball team in 1952 and joined the other five former Mustangs for their debut on the Olympic stage.

Despite beating teams such as Italy, Romania and Egypt in the first round, the 1952 Canadian basket-ball was kept out of the semifinal round due to narrow defeats at the hands of Brazil, Argentina and the Philippines. ■

Olympic sports filled with Mustangs

#14 Kelsey VeltmanThe Brampton, Ont., native was named OUA west player of the year for the second straight season, as well as an OUA first-team all-star for the second straight season. Last season she was named OUA rookie of the year as well.

#18 Aja GyimahA second-year nutrition student at Brescia, Gyimah was named an OUA first-team all-star, the first award in her Mustang career. Gyimah was named Western's player of the game in both the semifinal and bronze medal matches this past weekend.

#12 Serena SmithWestern's only fi�h-year player was named an OUA second-team all-star for the first time in her career.

#9 Caroline WolynskiWolynski came back for a fi�h season and was rewarded with a second-team all-star nod. It was the second straight year she has received this award and led the OUA in minutes played with 33.9.

#9 Kat TsiofasTsiofas was Western's lone setter for much of the year and she stepped up big time, leading the conference with 686 assists. For her e�orts, she was named an OUA first-team all-star.

#11 Mackenzie PukliczThe third-year guard was named an OUA first-team all-star for the first time in her career, a�er leading the OUA in points-per-game with 18.6.

#7 Julia CurranCurran's freshman season was a huge success, as she was named the OUA rookie of the year a�er posting 6.8 points-per-game and 7.5 rebounds per game. The Waterloo, Ont., native is the seventh Mustang player since 1988-89 to win the award.

#12 Greg MorrowNot surprisingly, Western's all-time leading scorer was named an OUA first-team all-star. This season he averaged 24 points-per-game, which led the OUA. He has been named a first-team all-star three times in his five-year career.

#16 Mike ChojaThe fourth-year King's University College student led Western with 210 points this season and was named an OUA sec-ond-team all-star for his e�orts.

Western Mustangs 2016 All-Stars

JORDAN MCGAVIN GAZETTE


knowsports

COURTESY OF MAXINE GRAVINA

From rock bottom to challenging his idolsHALA GHONAIM SPORTS EDITOR@HALAATGAZETTE

Last year, Jack Sheffar was unable to run for the track team at Western.

This year, he’s been one of the top track stars in Canadian Interuniversity Sport.

The second-year cross coun-try and track and field athlete was committed to being a Mustang at a young age by getting spotted in his senior year of high school by Western coaches.

At first, transitioning from high school to university was very chal-lenging. He went from usually being one of the top three finishers in cross country races in high school to struggling to crack the top 20 in university races. Sheffar also had to overcome balancing training with academics.

But there were bigger challenges ahead.

He was one of the top runners at Western in cross country tryouts in his first season in August. But by the end of September, his rank-ing dropped to the rock bottom of Western’s cross country roster.

Sheffar would regularly run year-round in cross country from September to November and in track and field from December to March with a two-week break in between. However, he couldn’t even finish his cross country season in his first year.

It all began when his coaches noticed something wasn’t adding up in his performance, which was nor-mally highly praised. His coaches, teammates and family encouraged him to get checked and to their sur-prise, he had abnormally low iron levels.

This issue, which was not eas-ily detectable, affected his mood, strength and ability to stay motiv-ated. Working harder and running for longer doesn’t help combat low iron levels, but worsens them.

The first-year health sciences student at the time couldn’t bear the mental pain of quitting running for three whole months, something he would have to do to solve his iron deficiency.

“There is something about run-ning that if you work really hard you can be pretty successful at it,” Sheffar said. “It’s nice to know that the work you put in you can actually see results. The self-fulfilment is a big thing.”

Sheffar debated whether he wanted to quit altogether or not. When he stopped running, every-thing else suffered, including his personal life and academics. He thought dropping out of athletics and focusing on school would be more beneficial than holding onto the hope of ever running again. That thought process was the beginning of one of the most mentally challen-ging periods of his life.

“It wasn’t fun watching people who I had been beating and run-ning with having success,” he said. “I mean, I want my teammates to do well but you would like to be with them doing the activity. It was really disheartening.”

But one person in particular motivated him to get to where he is today: his previous high school track coach — his mother.

“In her second year, she got injured at Western when she was running for the team and so she quit running altogether for a really long time,” Sheffar said. “She said it’s one of her biggest regrets that she didn’t persevere.”

Through numerous phone calls and visits, his mother, along with his family, friends and coaches motiv-ated him to work harder for his goal.

From November to February of last year, Sheffar was planning his comeback. His lean 5-foot-11 figure wouldn’t allow him to do any other sport. He knew success wasn’t going to happen overnight.

He began by taking iron supple-ments, which weren’t keeping up with his body; therefore, he had to switch to iron injections.

Sheffar was finally healthy enough to start physically training again.

His workouts consisted of run-ning at least a 16-mile run every Sunday, doing a short tempo and a longer interval workout on Mondays, double easy runs on Tuesdays, track intervals ranging from 200 to 800 metres on Wednesdays, running 10 miles on Fridays and usually racing or doing a long tempo on Saturdays.

He was running more mileage per week than ever before and doing double runs in a day to keep up with his teammates. Throughout his comeback, Sheffar was trying to develop a high pain tolerance that would push him harder in the com-ing months. And it worked.

“I went from not even being able to race on the track at all to fifth [in the CIS],” he said.

That in itself was the best reward he could ever achieve coming off his last season.

Today, he ranks fifth in the Canadian Interuniversity Sport in the 3,000-metre for track and first among his team at Western in the event. His time of eight minutes and 14 seconds also puts him less than a second off of the Western record for the 3,000-metre.

The future is bright.“At first, no one really knew who

I was,” he said. “People who I would look up to in high school, now I am bumping shoulders with in races.”

Although the attention is rela-tively new for Sheffar, those top runners in the CIS are the same guys that he hopes to compete with after university.

But he has to take it one step at a time.

If it wasn’t for his sacrifice and strength, he wouldn’t have qualified for the selective 12-man field in the 3,000 metre in the upcoming CIS championship hosted in Toronto this weekend.

“It comes down to whether you like it enough or love it to deal with some adversity. There’s no point in quitting something you love. Eventually, if you work hard enough, good things will come to you.” n

“It comes down to whether you like it enough or love it to deal with some adversity. There’s no point in quitting something you love. Eventually, if you work hard enough, good things will come to you.”JACK SHEFFARWESTERN TRACK ATHLETE

COURTESY OF MAXINE GRAVINA

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insight

ROBERT NANNI ARTS & LIFE EDITOR@ROBERTATGAZETTE

Matt Webb, Vancouver-born guitar-ist for Marianas Trench, talked with The Gazette about the band’s current Canadian tour “Never Say Die.”

SO WHO DOES WHAT IN THE BAND?My name is Matt Webb, I play

guitar and do some singing. Ian Casselman plays the drums and also does some singing. Mike Ayley plays bass and also does some sing-ing. Our lead singer is Josh Ramsay and he also plays the guitar.WHAT’S THE WRITING PROCESS LIKE WHEN YOU GUYS START TO COME UP WITH SONGS?

Josh is a singer-songwriter, he’s the creative force in the band. Usually what happens is he’ll sort of map out ideas in the studio and the rest of the guys will come in and say, “this is crap, this is good, this needs work.” Then we put a song together, it’s pretty simple.WHAT’S YOUR BIGGEST INFLUENCE WHEN IT COMES TO THIS CREATIVE PROCESS?

The new record is called Astoria, and we really try to channel a lot of 80’s influence into it. A lot of people have been doing that 80’s throw-back, using synth sound and stuff, but nobody had been doing the Kenny Loggins or the Huey Lewis — the fun 80s, you know? We wanted to try and incorporate that in the new record. You’ll hear influences from all of our favourite 80’s bands: the ones I just mentioned, The Police, Eurhythmics. We tried to draw from all that stuff, use vintage 80’s gear and really live and breathe 80s in the studio and in a live setting. As far as the rock star decade, I don’t think anything really tops the 1980’s.THAT DEFINITELY COMES THROUGH. SO YOUR U.S. ASTORIA TOUR IS OVER AND NOW

YOU’RE ON YOUR WAY THROUGH CANADA?We just got back, we did about

five weeks in the United States. We took a few days to recuperate, rest the body a bit and then we got right back at it in the beginning of March, starting our Canadian tour in Kingston, Ontario. In the U.S. we toured with a band called Mainland, from Brooklyn. They opened for us on our U.S. tour and they were — excuse my French — just a fucking awesome group of guys. It’s always so nice when you have an amaz-ing band playing with you. It just pumps you up — there’s a sense of camaraderie and there’s a sense of competition. You’re not trying to kill each other, but you’re inspired to do better. If they’re out there killing it, you just want to go out there and one-up them every night. They were awesome, they really pushed us to kick some ass.WHO’S BEEN YOUR FAVOURITE ACT TO TOUR WITH?

We’ve had the pleasure of tour-ing with some fantastic acts over the years. Our first big tour ever we opened for Theory of a Deadman and then we did a run with Simple Plan, which was our first arena tour. Those guys were amazing because they taught us how to be an arena band and how to treat our fans, our crew and other bands on tour. They were constant professionals, the nicest guys in the world and it’s easy to see why they’ve had such a wonderful career.IN A PERFECT WORLD, WHO WOULD YOU GUYS TOUR WITH?

If it was a career move, to enhance our career, it would be Taylor Swift or Katy Perry, that would be awesome. But as far as my personal favourites, I’m a huge Sting fan, or I’d love to go out with the Foo Fighters. Some cool

bands that we would play our set with and then I’d watch them every night and my jaw would drop open. I really enjoy getting my ass kicked at a show every night.WALK OFF THE EARTH IS OPENING FOR YOUR CANADIAN TOUR, HAVE YOU TOURED WITH THEM BEFORE?

To be honest with you, I’ve never actually seen them play. I’ve heard amazing things and I know they’re very talented musicians. They’ve got some amazing songs: their covers are incredible, but they’ve got such great original songs too. We’re look-ing forward to it, I can’t wait to spend some time to get to know them and get drunk on tour together.SO WHAT’S THE PLAN FOR MARIANAS TRENCH MOVING FORWARD?

We’ve got five weeks in Canada and then we’re gonna take probably a month off. At that point we’ll have been on the road for the last 12 of 14 weeks and that’s a lot. Summer time is always busy with us because we do a lot of festivals here and in the States. There’s some talk of us coming to Europe and perhaps Australia and Asia in the fall, so we’re just going to keep grinding. We love to play and I’m sure we’ll be back in the United States soon, and maybe more Canadian shows toward the end of the year. WHAT’S SOMETHING EVEN THE BIGGEST MARIANAS TRENCH FAN WOULDN’T KNOW ABOUT YOU GUYS?

Well on this last tour, we had a lovely fan make us all of these awe-some Marianas Trench jean vests. We cannot wear clothes that say Marianas Tench on them because that’s just lame, but our crew can. So we gave these vests to our crew and made it the crew uniform for the tour. To top it off, they started raid-ing our wardrobe cases and trying

Mariana’s Trench talks tour and leatherto find the shiniest, leatheriest pants they could find and wear those at the same time. So you would see our crew walking around looking better dressed than we were. For some rea-son it made me laugh every night and I just think the world should know that.

Marianas Trench will be coming to Budweiser Gardens with opener Walk Off The Earth on March 16th at 7:00 PM. Tickets start at $35 on the venue’s website.

Read the full interview online at westerngazette.ca. n

Paying more for pinkSALLY EUNYOUNG SEO GAZETTE STAFF@GAZETTECULTURE

Beware, ladies: the “pink tax” is real. In fact, it’s more common than you think.

For those unfamiliar with this term, it refers to the unofficial extra charge intentionally marketed towards women’s products and ser-vices, although they’re marketed to men at a lower cost.

Through the vast commentary on social media and television, this issue has been a popular topic in recent years. Ellen DeGeneres aired a spoof commercial satirically criti-cizing the gendered price discrep-ancy in Bic’s “For Her” pens.

Bic’s “For Her” pens are the same in quality as other Bic pens, but the only difference is the femin-ine colours they come in. Yet, they are twice as much as Bic’s average pens.

June Cotte, professor in mar-keting at the Richard Ivey School of Business, says this common occurrence comes from “classic marketing.”

“They’re targeting a group and that group is willing to pay a higher price because it seems fit for them,” she says.

Cotte adds this gendered pricing comes in all forms, from haircuts to toys, even to dry-cleaning.

“If a woman and a man go in to a salon and both have short hair, they should both have the same price for hair cuts, but they don’t,” Cotte says.

Many companies have easy to find instances of pink taxing. At Wal-Mart, the Lady’s Power Speed Stick and the male Power Speed Stick sell for $2.57, although the male merchandise actually con-tains 20 grams more of product.

Pink taxing can even be seen on-campus at Western’s pharmacy.

A pack of women’s razor heads from Gillette Venus costs $29.99, while the men’s version of this product from Gillette Fusion costs $26.99. The products were essen-tially the same besides their names — both five bladed and came in a pack of four.

There was even more of a price gap for moisturizers. Neutrogina’s face lotion for men with 20 SPF retails for $8.99, whereas the same brand’s facial moisturizer for women with 15 SPF was $16.99.

“Facial moisturizer” seems to be a fancier way of saying “face lotion” because both these products have the same written function to “soothe” and “protect” the skin.

Western pharmacist Shafeek Roberts explains that this price differentiation is a product of the base price set by the wholesaler and beyond his control.

“It’s just acquisition costs,” Roberts says. “That is not some-thing we decide on, saying ‘a male product should be higher than a female product.’ It all depends on what we pay for and that’s deter-mined by the wholesaler, who then buys it from the manufacturer.”

Roberts assures that the

pharmacy’s pricing is purely based on how expensive the product is instead of internal decisions at the University.

In addition, Karen Hu, a fourth-year HBA Ivey student says, “companies typically market more premium lines for women through mostly packaging, even though male and female products are usually manufactured the same way.”

Cotte explains the reason for such public outrage about the “pink tax” is because many people see this as unfair pricing that is linked to stereotypes of women.

“Companies know that women will pay more and so they’re taking advantage of that, and that’s where there’s been a lot of the backlash,” says Cotte.

She adds that the visibility of the pink tax is often criticized and that women should familiarize them-selves with the retail landscape.

“If you’re only shopping at the women’s section, or the girls’ sec-tion of a toy store, you might not be aware that there is this differential pricing.”

However, Cotte notes there are women who are willing to pay the price premium on gendered products.

Alice Tam, a medical science student at Western, is among those women.

“The difference in price doesn’t really affect my spending on things,” says Tam.

If you’re looking to beat the pink

tax, awareness is key and it may be beneficial to look at the quality over the fluorescent pink packaging of products.

With files from Samah Ali. n

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JENNIFER FELDMAN GAZETTE


insightopinions

Editorials are decided by a majority of the editorial board and are written by a member of the editorial board but are not necessarily the expressed opinion of each editorial board member. All other opinions are strictly those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of the USC, The Gazette, its editors or staff. To submit a letter, go to westerngazette.ca and click on “Contact.”

Western loves awareness but stops there

ROBERT NANNI ARTS & LIFE EDITOR@ROBERTATGAZETTE

As a school that prides itself on its mental illness advocacy efforts, Western took the appropriate next step one month ago with Eating Disorder Awareness week.

Like “awareness weeks” that we have seen before and will continue to see, for the first seven days of February, Facebook was flooded with photos of residence staff holding signs with eating disorder facts and captions that express their deepest concerns for your well-be-ing, pleading that you reach out to them if needed.

To be blunt, I hated this campaign.

At first, I was annoyed with it, but as the weeks went on I noticed that nothing about the campaign was lasting. Students may have talked about the issue for 30 seconds but they quickly moved on. It often feels as though Western spins a wheel of mental illnesses and says, “Hmm, which personal issue are we going to profile picture this time?”

I can appreciate the underlying goal of this and other campaigns — to “break the stigma of mental health” — but we’re simply not there yet. We’re not equipped with the resources, both individually and as an institution, to handle these sorts of issues.

When first-year Robert was going 40 hours without food because he couldn’t stand the sight of him-self, who saw the signs and stood up? Who was going to the cafeteria with him and realizing he wasn’t eating? Who was noticing that the only things he’d consume without cringing were peppermint tea and water? Not my RA, not my Sophs, not any of the people holding those signs.

At the end of the day, we’re fight-ing stigmas we’re not equipped to handle. We promote awareness but not reparation. We like to make promises over Facebook statuses

and tweets. We use hashtags because we think #BellLetsTalk is the same as #BellLetsHelp.

If you want to support the cause, by all means do. But know that you will be doing nothing substantial if you preach without doing your research.

For those of you who have been fortunate enough to never deal with anorexia, let me inform you: feeling empty is the best feeling in the world. You worship the scale like it’s your only religion. You’d rather miss class because you’re too weak to move than grab a snack and keep going.

I don’t expect you to know this. I don’t expect anyone “raising aware-ness” to know this. But I do expect anyone who advocated for eating disorder awareness, that week or any, to do their research. Listen to lived experiences on YouTube, read about the signs for which you should be looking and pay attention to those around you. Comment on trends you notice and be an active member in the lives of those who matter to you.

It seems like we’re all just look-ing to support the world without managing our own circle of friends. Everyone has someone they trust; looking out for those people while being well-versed in various signs of mental illness is much more effect-ive than holding a sign and liking people’s posts.

Perhaps most important when it comes to these topics is paying attention to the weight of our words. We’re all first to proclaim our stance against mental illness, and yet the 27 comments on my Transformation Tuesday Instagram post all preach how proud and supportive my friends are of me.

In my opinion, we had a week where we advocated for another mental illness, and yet again did it injustice. A month later, the con-versation has not continued, the profile pictures were liked and the issue forgotten.

In future, hand out support, not facts. Knowing that “eating disorders have the highest mortality rate of all mental illnesses” will not help me, but having someone reach out to me when they notice I’m still in bed and it’s evening might just be what I need. ■

The Nanni Diaries

The importance of sports

SHANE ROBERTS SPORTS EDITOR@SHANEATGAZETTE

After almost every big playoff loss in sports, you will usually see at least one player from the losing team with tears rolling down their face. This was the case when the Mustangs men’s basketball season ended abruptly last week.

As the horn sounded to end the game you could see the emotions on many of the Mustangs after their roller coaster season came to a close. Their season started with so much promise and hope but unfortunately ended in another first-round playoff loss.

The team felt this moment of sadness on Wednesday and many others instances just like it. These moments matter because it shows that these athletes are extremely passionate about what they do.

Over the course of their ath-letic careers in their respective

sport, most athletes will dedicate thousands of hours practicing and trying to perfect their skills with the goal to be the best that they can be. When they fall short of their own expectations, it is heartbreaking because they have invested so much of their lives into their sport.

As an athlete myself, I can relate to these players and admit that I have cried multiple times after coming up short in a competition. It’s something you can’t control. It just happens.

But when I reflect back on these emotional moments I’ve come to realize that they’ve made me a stronger person. I think it’s a great thing that I wore my emotions on my sleeve and showed how much my sport means to me. It’s instan-ces likes these that make sports so important not just to the University but to the world.

Sports matter on a global level because playing sports at a com-petitive level brings passion and dedication into the lives of almost every athlete that competes. This drive is then usually reflected when they move on from athletics and into their adult lives. It is reflected in the workplace, relationships with their families and almost every

facet of their lives.Reflecting on all this makes me

think that sports really don’t get the recognition they deserve for build-ing character. Sports turn regular people into passionate people regardless of whether they’re watching or playing.

Sports also bring commun-ities of people together and can be a sense of pride. This is evident every two years when people from all around the world unite in watch-ing either the summer or winter Olympic Games.

The outstanding athletic achievements of a nation at the Olympics bring nations together and instills national pride. I don’t think Canadians have ever been as loud and proud to be Canadian as when we hosted the winter Olympics in Vancouver in 2010. When Sidney Crosby scored that goal in overtime in the gold medal game, the country erupted and we were all proud to be Canadian.

I love the passion I saw from the Mustangs basketball team last week. Their hard efforts and the dedication of all our athletes here at Western make me proud to be a Mustang. ■

Technology doesn’t make things easier

ARIEL VAISBORT DIRECTOR OF AUDIENCE ENGAGEMENT@ARIELATGAZETTE

Instagram. Twitter. Facebook. Snapchat. Slack. Email.

It’s 8:03 a.m. and I’m lying in bed, flipping through my apps and notifications. On Twitter, I’m logged into four accounts. Instagram, five.

Seven email accounts. I haven’t been awake for five

minutes and I am already stressed out by my day.

We’ve all read those articles, likely sent to us by carrier pigeon by our fogey parents who have a certain disdain for technology: “The Most Successful/Happy/Pretty People Don’t Check Their Phone Before Noon.”

All of these apps are sorted into neat little groups on my phone. On my computer, there are at least three windows with 12 tabs each open at any given time. More often than not my computer gives up try-ing to handle it all and freezes, the

ominous rainbow wheel spinning at me.

Technology is incredible. But does it do more harm than good? We don’t know when to stop, how to shut down or how to take a break. The technology gives us access to stay in touch with everyone no mat-ter where we are.

As an international student, I so appreciate the fact that I can FaceTime my grandparents or my friends anytime I want. But I don’t appreciate that my boss can send me an email at 10 p.m. and expect an immediate response.

The constant access to tech-nology makes everything seem so much more important. Everything needs to be instantaneous. “He hasn’t texted me back, so he must not like me.”

Before we had these magical devices in our pockets that gave us access to the world, people were

able to experience so much more. Instead of living their lives through a screen, they had these weird things called “conversations” and they were able to be present in their day-to-day lives.

People could sit and talk for hours without needing to respond to emails and without feeling the need to Instagram their meals to impress people they don’t know with an imaginary “like” currency.

When you had a question, you weren’t able to grab your little device and just Google what other movies Melissa McCarthy has been in or how to hard-boil eggs. You just had to wonder, figure it out or even — God forbid — go to the library and look it up.

Before you head to the comment section to tell me how amazing technology is, let me tell you, I agree. Almost all of my jobs rely primarily on technology: writing for online

magazines, running the social media for more than one organ-ization — including The Gazette — and networking across North America. I also have a food-dedi-cated Instagram account, so trust me, I am not hating on the ‘gram.

More than anything, I wish that technology did not create a culture where things needed to happen immediately. And I think that we have all gotten sucked into that cul-ture, whether we like it or not. I don’t know how much choice any of us really has when it comes to technol-ogy. If you don’t have a cellphone or Facebook, people will wonder why you haven’t conformed.

So, if you are reading this, try to look up from that tiny screen that all your friends live inside of.

Ferris Bueller said it best: “Life moves pretty fast. If you don’t stop and look around once in a while, you just might miss it.” ■

Advers-Ariel

No Shane No Gain

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experience

OREN WEISFELD GAZETTE STAFF@GAZETTECULTURE

The summer of 2016 is almost upon us and with it comes the stress of figuring out what to for the school break.

If staying home sounds too cliché, Western International offers a variety of volunteer and internship opportunities that can help students have new experiences, gain relevant skills and completely change their outlook on life.

One of Western International’s most exciting programs is Western Heads East, a collaboration between Western staff, students, faculty and international partners, using pro-biotic foods to contribute to health and sustainable development.

The program offers three-month long summer internships where stu-dents have the opportunity to work with partners in Kenya, Rwanda or Tanzania and acquire a course credit along the way.

What started as a response to the AIDS crisis in East Africa with one community kitchen in Mwanza, Tanzania, has developed into a large program that addresses HIV/AIDS, health, empowerment of women and economic development in highly under-serviced areas of Sub-Saharan Africa through probiotic yogurt social enterprises.

According to Robert Gough, director of international intern-ships and development at Western, Western Heads East does more than just bring probiotic foods that build immune response.

“[The] other part is the empower-ment of women’s groups,” Gough explains. “With this program, the female members of the group tend to have a fair bit of training on women’s advocacy and they

become a hub in the community. People come to them for informa-tion around health issues, violence in relationships and HIV infection.”

The Western Heads East intern-ship program, like most inter-national opportunities, is quite expensive, ranging from $4,000 to $5,000. The relationship between affluence and having an inter-national experience is a contro-versial one and Gough pointed out many people come to him with the question, “Why spend the money to go abroad when you can donate that money to some place to help?”

Third-year FIMS honours stu-dent Judy Stephenson is one of those skeptical students, ultimately deciding to pass on an international experience because she wasn’t con-vinced it was the best way to help.

“I feel like most people volunteer for themselves rather than for the people they’re helping,” Stephenson argues.

Interestingly, Gough believes Western Heads East is worth the money precisely because of how the experience changes students.

“Moral transformation is really about putting a face to an issue,” says Gough. “It’s not just that this issue is happening somewhere out in the world, but it’s ‘my friend Eric who is living in this context and without these resources’ and ‘how can we work to make change in that community.’ ”

Though the moral transforma-tion by itself might make the intern-ship worth the money, it is also important to consider the variety of grants and scholarships available to help underfunded students get an international experience.

Along with external loans, grants and scholarships, Western offers the International Learning Award of

$1,000 to all undergraduate students with a consecutive average of 80 per cent over their first two years and the Global Opportunities Award of $1,000 to $2,000 to selected students who apply.

“Western Heads East [has oppor-tunities] for students at virtually every faculty at Western,” says Gough. “There is a wide range of activities directed by our host on the ground. The agency the students have is to decide which project fits best with their academic program.”

Courtney Lynn Young, a third-year double major in accounting and religious studies, said she joined the program and worked as a finance intern at the Aga Khan University Hospital in Nairobi, Kenya where she assisted in creating an activity-based costing system for the hospital.

“My biggest takeaway is the com-plexity of international develop-ment,” explains Young. “There is no single answer or magical cure for international problems. It is com-plex and demands a high level of ‘on the ground’ knowledge.”

Additionally, Young admits, “Although it has definitely been a great résumé builder, my main reason for participating was to learn what it’s like to work and live in a completely different culture.”

Gough also says Western is increasing its efforts and resources to enable more students to have an international experience in the coming years, hoping eventually 100 per cent of students will have one.

Until then, having an inter-national experience remains a lux-ury, but with the summer of 2016 almost upon us, the possibility of building your résumé, experiencing a new culture and helping those in need remains. n

New experiences out East

MoWA promotes student art and charityROBERT NANNI ARTS & LIFE EDITOR@ROBERTATGAZETTE

Back for their second year, Museum of WesternU Artists takes the stage this month in the University Community Centre for all to see. The two-day event will take place on March 16 and the following week on March 23 in the Community Room.

MoWA, wordplay on New York’s well-known MoMA, is an initia-tive started by the Leadership and Academic Mentorship Program’s first-year committee, in association with Global China Connections. One of MoWA’s main goals is to highlight student artists.

“We wanted to make sure we brought in Western students who have any sort of passion for art from any faculty,” says Olivia Ghosh, LAMP first-year committee leader-ship chair. “We wanted to really connect students and the Western community through art.”

People can walk through the event and observe the art as spec-tators, or bid on the student artwork in a silent auction. Artwork will be hung on easels and specialized sheets for viewing.

The artwork will be primar-ily visual, including installations and sculptures. However, there isn’t exactly a restriction on the art MoWA will accept.

“We’re not going to narrow it down to any medium of art,” says Ghosh. “There are so many varia-tions of art and we’d like anyone to come out.”

Last year’s event hosted around

125 pieces, presenting MoWA with a struggle to put up all of the incoming artwork. Despite this, the organiz-ation really strives to publicize the artists that donate their pieces.

“We don’t just promote the event on Facebook, but we also feature artists and different pieces before and after the event to showcase them,” says LAMP leadership chair coordinator Jeremy Ho.

Second-year medical sciences student Marc Lawrence, who donated seven pieces from his photography portfolio to MoWA, really feels this student support.

“Seeing Western’s response to art made by fellow students from vari-ous programs and backgrounds was incredibly rewarding, especially for the hours and energy spent behind the scenes,” says Lawrence.

Lawrence’s work came about over several years and countries with no intention of being sold. One of the reasons he donated his work was because he felt it was an opportunity for student artists to get their work out and names noticed.

However, the event extends beyond student talent. Partnered with Art for AIDS International, MoWA seeks to incorporate a char-itable component.

“We like the student concept, but we also wanted to target people in the local community,” says Ho. “This is for local professionals and we’re hoping to target a demographic that has a disposable income.”

This additional event involves a night at The Wave on April 1, open to the London community. The

pieces will be different from the UCC event, larger and worth more money, appealing largely to an older demographic.

“Prior to the event last year, I had never placed a monetary value on my art,” says Lawrence. “I think the best part is knowing that the money raised through our art goes to sup-port a worthy cause like Art for Aids.”

MoWA’s three events over the next few weeks hope to promote student artists while supporting a necessary cause. Taking this dual approach to Western art, MoWA hopes to help those in the local and international community. n

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experience

Zootopia not typical kid flickBRADLEY METLIN OPINONS EDITOR@BRADATGAZETTE

Directors: Byron Howard and Rich MooreStarring: Ginnifer Goodwin, Jason Bateman, Idris Elba, Jenny Slate Rating: GGGGG

In a world where presidential can-didate Donald Trump is shooting high in the polls, fuelled in part by prejudiced attitudes, Zootopia is a film that kids — and everyone for that matter — should flock to.

Growing up among her 275 brothers and sisters, ambitious rabbit Judy Hopps (a sensational Ginnifer Goodwin) is reminded by her parents that, “if you don’t try anything new, you’ll never fail.” Ditching their advice, she becomes Zootopia’s first rabbit to enter the police force.

Her initial train ride into Zootopia reveals an incredibly rich animated world that is a delight to take in. The various artificially controlled climate districts from Sahara Square to Tundratown could be studied ten times more to appreciate the breadth of their detail.

Judy’s first day on her new job seems promising — 14 mammals have been reported missing — just the excitement she was looking for and a chance to make the world a better place. Her enthusiasm is quickly halted by Chief Bogo (a water buffalo voiced by Idris Elba) who assigns her to parking metre duty.

Bogo’s skepticism of Judy lies in the fact that she is a small bunny. In Zootopia’s world, everyone, predator and prey, live together in

supposedly perfect harmony. Yet, while 90 per cent of the population is prey, predators are in charge of the police force.

Zootopia plays with audiences’ expectations and our nature of stereotyping. Disney has managed to produce a film that has a power-ful message but doesn’t devolve to sounding preachy. Despite being geared towards children, Zootopia manages to have subversive mes-saging that really resonates. Judy describes a predator as “articu-late,” it’s noted that you shouldn’t touch the puff-like hair of a sheep without permission and Judy tells someone, “It’s okay for one bunny to call another bunny cute but if you do it…”

While giving out over 200 park-ing tickets before noon, Judy col-lides into scam-artist fox named Nick (Jason Bateman). Predictably enough, the two end up joining forces despite the precedent that foxes and rabbits shouldn’t get

along. After an ultimatum from Bogo, Judy guarantees that she will find one of the missing mammals within 48 hours or else she’ll quit her job. Nick and her set off to solve the crime.

Surprisingly, Zootopia is a pretty intelligent take on a police pro-cedural. At times, as the plot jerks along to unexpected territories, the film takes on the mould of a a thriller — albeit one for kids. The screenplay’s mix of dark moments and humour propel Zootopia from merely a straightforward children’s movie to a crowd pleaser for all.

Disney has been on a roll with its latest animated offerings; Wreck-It-Ralph, Frozen and Big Hero 6 have all been increasingly better. While Zootopia lacks its own Let it Go, (which really, is a relief for most people who have an aversion to toddlers’ affinity for the song repeat button) it is a top-notch story with a message that has never been more relevant. n

SAMAH ALI ARTS & LIFE EDITOR@SAMAHATGAZETTE

Among the various charity commit-tees under the University Students’ Council clubs bracket, nothing stood out to Elena Fornazzari more than Rebuilding Health in Rwanda.

What inspired her was their resilience to build up a commun-ity by sponsoring them financially instead of sending in external help. This less invasive influence was more impactful to her and now, a year later, she represents the charity as the director of communications.

RHR works towards a yearly goal of $2,000 to sponsor a different initiative each year. In the past, the group sponsored a computer lab, but upon further consideration, they decided to sponsor individuals to build up a community within the health care system.

This year’s goal is to spon-sor a scholarship to the National University of Rwanda for a graduate student pursuing health care.

“The effect is monumental,” says Fornazzari. “Even though it’s one person and it’s a quarter of their scholarship, they’ll affect so many other people and the ripple effect is insane. Even helping one per-son become a doctor or become a healthcare worker really helps thousands.”

One of the events the charity is putting on to achieve their goal is a three-on-three basketball tourna-ment on March 12. RHR is looking for groups of five to six people and it costs $15 per person. The tournament

also guarantees lunch catered by the Spoke and three games.

Fornazzari believes that what-ever money they can raise will be incredibly influential to their over-all goal. She encourages everyone to get involved, whether through donations or by participating in the basketball tournament.

“We’re not going in there or bringing supplies, it’s more like we’re facilitating Rwanda to rebuild itself,” she says.

For more information about the tournament or to get involved with Rebuilding Health in Rwanda, contact their Facebook page. Tickets for the basketball tourna-ment will be sold online through the registration team and partici-pants can contact [email protected] to sign their team up. n

SHACHAR DAHAN GAZETTE STAFF@GAZETTECULTURE

A computer crash can result in a devastating loss of files. Many students fail to back up their files during the school year, resulting in chaos if a crash occurs.

A few days ago, my friend’s com-puter crashed. Like many people, he had never taken the time to back up his system. There are plenty of options to back up your files, so to prevent this from happening to you, pick one to make sure you don’t lose anything important.

EXTERNAL HARD DRIVEExternal hard drives are the most common devices for system backup because they’re so simple to use. Just attach the drive via a USB and drag your files over. Most external drives even come with software, which will automatically perform a complete system backup when plugged in. Storage space for external hard drives generally begins at 500GB and doesn’t really cap off.

There are two types of external hard drives: hard disk drive (HDD), and solid-state drives (SSD). SSDs have no moving parts, making them better for travel, but HDDs are much less expensive. For 1TB of storage, you’ll pay about $80 for an HDD, while a 500GB SSD costs around $250. That translates into 8 cents per

gigabyte for the HDD and 50 cents per gigabyte for the SSD.

If you don’t plan to do a lot of traveling with your external hard drive, then get an HDD. It will most likely just be sitting on your desk, so there is no reason to worry about all those moving parts.

USBUSBs (also known as flash drives, thumb drives, jump drives and so on…) are great for people who only need to backup their most important documents. USBs are small, with no moving parts, mak-ing them extremely portable. They range from 512MB-512GB, but I wouldn’t recommend buying any-thing smaller than a 64GB. It’s easy to save money on a USB drive — buy one that’s on sale.

ONLINE CLOUD STORAGELastly, for those on a student budget, your best bet is to look to online cloud storage. Luckily, there are plenty of options to choose from — Dropbox, OneDrive, Google Drive, and iCloud, just to name a few. All of these web hosts provide free cloud storage, serving as great alternatives to the other methods.

VERDICTNo matter which method you pick, it’s impossible to go wrong, just so long as you back up your computer! n

We’re not going in there or bringing supplies, it’s more like we’re facilitating Rwanda to rebuild itself.ELENA FORNAZZARIREBUILDING HEALTH IN RWANDA DIRECTOR OF COMMUNICATIONS

Rebuilding health in Rwanda through basketball

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AARON MALLET GAZETTEGO LONG! First-year Economics student, Keith Chow, takes advantage of the warmer temperature with a game of frisbee on UC hill.

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thursday, march 10, 2016

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