Daily Bruin – Page 190

Baseball to face Michigan, Oklahoma State, USC in Dodger Stadium classic

It has been almost two years since the Bruins won a game in the Dodger Stadium College Baseball Classic.

No. 2 UCLA baseball (9-2) will play a three-game series against No. 16 Michigan (8-2) and Oklahoma State (7-4) at Jackie Robinson Stadium, before going to Dodger Stadium to take on crosstown rival USC (4-7). The Bruins will be without their everyday leadoff hitter, junior outfielder Jeremy Ydens, who has a broken finger and will be out for the next six weeks.

In the third inning of the Bruins’ win over Sacramento State (4-7) on Friday, Ydens was hit by a pitch during a bunt attempt. After talking with the training staff, he continued the at-bat and played one more inning before being replaced by senior outfielder Jake Pries. Since injuring his hand, he has yet to appear in a game for UCLA and Pries has taken his spot in the lineup.

“Whenever you lose a guy like (Ydens), it’s always a bummer,” Pries said. “I’ve been keeping up with him and we’re all excited to have him back at some point.”

Pries has started both games since Ydens’ injury, batting cleanup for the Bruins, going 4-for-7 with a home run. So far this season, Pries’ .455 batting average, seven RBI and .697 slugging percentage are all-team highs.

“He’s been very, very good,” said coach John Savage. “He’s hit the ball all over the park. He’s an experienced guy and has seen a lot at this level. It feels good to have a guy like that and to be ready to be productive.”

Freshman right-hander Jesse Bergin is the projected starter for the Sunday afternoon game against USC. The game marks Bergin’s first career start at a major league stadium and his second start away from Westwood. In his only other away start, he notched a win against Georgia Tech pitching six innings without allowing an earned run.

“Who wouldn’t be excited to play against ‘SC at Dodger Stadium?” Bergin said. “I’m super excited and ready to go.”

Bergin’s 0.51 ERA is fifth best nationwide among freshman pitchers. Despite his ERA he is focused on maintaining his consistency for Sunday’s start.

“Going into every start, I have the same routine every week and do the same thing mentally,” Bergin said. “So, nothing changes with that.”

Last year, the Bruins lost to the Trojans 3-2 at Dodger Stadium after allowing a late comeback. Then-freshman right-hander Zach Pettway threw seven strikeouts in 6 1/3 innings of relief after then-junior right-hander Jon Olsen was hit in the face by a line drive and left the game.

“I mean that moment with (Olsen) still crosses my mind because he’s a good buddy of mine,” Pries said. “I think Pettway stepped up last year, you know, and he’s obviously done a good job for us this year, too.”

Michigan enters this series ranked 16th in the country – the highest-ranked team the Bruins have faced so far this season. In 2017, the Wolverines were part of the Dodger Stadium College Baseball Classic, at which they lost to UCLA 1-0 after a throwing error scored the game-winning run in the ninth. Oklahoma State will face UCLA on Saturday. The Bruins will be the first ranked opponent the Cowboys have played this year.

“It’s a big weekend for us,” Savage said. “A lot of good players and a lot of good teams. It’ll give us a good opportunity to get into a competitive weekend before we get into conference (play) next weekend.”

UCLA will begin the classic Friday at 6 p.m. against Michigan at Jackie Robinson Stadium.

Football will rush into spring with new faces, younger lineup on field

UCLA has a number of familiar faces returning for the 2019 season, but coach Chip Kelly said he is looking forward to seeing what some of the new guys can offer this spring.

“There are going to be a lot of new faces out there, a lot of young guys that will get an opportunity to go play now,” Kelly said. “I think they were all excited about what the future is.”

One of the newly opened positions on the offensive end of the football for UCLA is at left tackle, which was left void by Andre James after he declared for the NFL Draft in December.

His expected replacement, freshman Alec Anderson, has already begun familiarizing himself with the returning starters and said he feels good with where the group’s comfort level together stands.

“Everybody is intertwined and we have a really good flow on the offensive line,” Anderson said. “We’re always in our offensive line room together if we’re not at class, so it’s really good because we have a great bond with each other on and off the field.”

The Bruins will return their other four starters on the offensive line, including freshman guard Christaphany Murray, redshirt sophomore guard Michael Alves, redshirt sophomore tackle Jake Burton and junior center Boss Tagaloa.

Anderson said while he’s excited about the opportunity to earn the starting nod at left tackle, he was also surprised to hear of James’ decision to leave the program.

“It was kind of a shock to me because I thought he was going to come back and I thought we were going to have more of a competition trying to see who would be at either left or right tackle,” Anderson said. “It was shocking, but then again there was a little bit of comfort because then I knew that I could have a better chance at playing this year.”

Alves – who started all 12 games at left guard next to James last season – said it was tough to see his teammate leave but added that he has been impressed with what he’s seen from Anderson so far on the practice field.

“Well, it’s hard when you lose a good player like (James). He was really technically sound, he knew all the plays,” Alves said. “But (Anderson’s) coming pretty far from when he got here. He still has a lot of work to do, just like the rest of our guys. But I think he’ll be just as good as (James), if not better, the next year or two.”

Should Anderson claim the starting spot out of camp, he would become the team’s third different opening day left tackle in as many years.

Matt Lynch makes the move outside

In an unexpected move, redshirt sophomore quarterback Matt Lynch has begun exploring his options at different positions.

Lynch was expected to compete with redshirt freshman Austin Burton and incoming freshman Chase Griffin for the backup quarterback spot.

Kelly said while switching positions was all Lynch’s idea, he is open to seeing what the quarterback can provide in other areas.

“(Lynch) came in, said he would like to play another position and see if he can get on the field,” Kelly said. “So, if he can contribute as a tight end or a receiver or special teams, we’ll see whatever we can do to accommodate him. But I thought he handled it really well the first day.”

Trump’s emergency declaration spurs dialogue regarding implications for UC

UCLA student leaders said they oppose President Donald Trump’s national emergency declaration and promised to stand by minority groups.

Trump announced a national emergency Feb. 15 at the U.S.-Mexico border to access the billions of dollars for a border wall that Congress denied him. The partial government shutdown began in December after Congress and Trump failed to agree on a budget due to the border wall dispute.

A coalition of 16 states, including California, filed a lawsuit against the Trump administration Feb. 18, challenging the president over the scope of his ability to declare a national emergency and the constitutionality of diverting funds for a wall.

Claire Fieldman, president of the Undergraduate Students Association Council, said she thinks the declaration is an intolerable tactic that shows the administration’s xenophobia.

“Campus politics is a microcosm of and very connected to the national climate, and national politics informs the concerns of students, especially those from marginalized backgrounds,” said Fieldman. “It’s been my role to use my platform to elevate them and provide the resources and access.”

Cynthia Lebow, a political science professor, said the legal proceedings surrounding the national emergency declaration will take time, even if the Trump administration asks for the process to be expedited.

She said the attorneys general of the 16 states, with California Attorney General Xavier Becerra taking the lead, will file a suit to halt the allocation of money to the wall. If granted, which she said is likely, the hold would stop funds from being diverted. Lebow added the case could go all the way to the Supreme Court, as Trump’s travel ban on individuals from Muslim-majority countries did.

“Usually emergencies have to do with foreign relations or viruses like Ebola a few years back, this is different since the president is trying to move money from different accounts, like military construction accounts,” she said.

Lebow added the suit was filed in federal court in the Northern District of California, which has heard suits against the Trump administration before. She said the case will deal mostly with defining an emergency and whether Trump has the constitutional authority to appropriate money, a responsibility that usually belongs to Congress.

“(The president) is claiming the national emergency under the National Emergencies Act of 1976, but Congress didn’t define what an emergency is when they passed that law,” she said.

Jamie Kennerk, USAC external vice president, said she thinks California and the UC will continue to support its undocumented students despite the federal government’s acts. However, she said the UC needs to do more for these students, such as hire a full-time immigration attorney on all of its nine campuses.

Fieldman agreed that all campuses should hire a full-time staff member to help undocumented students. She added UC Merced, which has a large undocumented student population, does not have an immigration attorney on staff.

“I know (UC) President Napolitano is committed to giving this funding, but it is contingent on Gov. Newsom’s continued commitment,” she said. “It does scare me that this comes out of student funding because there should be institutional support for it.”

Kennerk added the 2019 UCLA Common Book, “The Line Becomes a River,” was written by an ex-U.S. Border Patrol agent who was paid to speak on campus. The choice of common book was surrounded by controversy, as many students and faculty said they felt a border patrol agent should not profit off the stories of undocumented people.

Fieldman added she thinks some students felt unsafe seeing someone who worked on border security celebrated on campus. However, she said she thinks debate regarding these issues is important and salient.

Both Kennerk and Fieldman said other priorities for undocumented students include providing fellowships for students not covered under the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, and lobbying against a raise in nonresident tuition, which some undocumented students have to pay.

Kennerk said her office will also be organizing over the UC’s proposal to cap nonresident enrollment at 10 percent across the system. She added she thinks the cap would make the University inaccessible for undocumented students because it would be more difficult for them to be accepted.

Lebow added she thinks California leaders like Becerra, U.S. Sen. Kamala Harris and Gov. Gavin Newsom will continue to take the lead in fighting Trump initiatives.

Fieldman said she is proud to be a Californian because of the state’s leadership.

“As UC students we have the ability to be at the forefront of change in higher education, and to set the standard for what it means to be a student or an institution in 2019,” she said.

UCLA researchers help develop new, more durable aerogel insulator

UCLA researchers invented a new aerogel that that can withstand quick temperature changes, offering a better way to insulate spacecrafts traveling to planets with extreme conditions.

On planets like Mars, where the temperature fluctuates drastically between day and night, rovers and equipment sent to space require an insulator to keep temperatures constant. Current aerogels used in spacecrafts crack under extended exposure to high temperatures, requiring scientists to frequently replace the insulator or abandon the technology altogether.

Xiangfeng Duan, a chemistry professor, developed a new aerogel called hBN aerogel that can withstand quick temperature changes, high pressure and extreme heat. He published his invention in the academic journal Science last month.

Duan said the material is much lighter than other insulators and almost as light as water.

Yuan Hu, a graduate student and author on the paper, said the aerogel is one of the lightest aerogels to have been created.

“It’s very, very light. … It can almost float in air,” Hu said. “It’s about one centimeter thick and if you put a 1,000 degree flame underneath you wouldn’t feel the heat on top.

While heat usually makes materials expand, this material contracts when exposed to heat.

“For a typical material, when we compress in one direction, they expand in the other direction,” Duan said. “For this particular structure when you compress in the vertical direction, it contracts in the lateral direction.”

Menglong Hao, an engineering professor from UC Berkeley and an author on the paper, said the durability of the material also makes it a promising material for space insulators and clothing. Even when the insulator is compressed to 5 percent of its original volume, it is still able to spring back into its original shape without significant damage.

Hao said he modeled the hBN aerogel after a similar material called graphene aerogel, which fractures easily and burns at high temperatures.

Tim Fisher, the chair of the mechanical and aerospace engineering department, said the project’s main challenge was finding a better insulator than air, which has been long considered the most effective insulator.

For example, sweaters are designed to provide insulation by using air pockets between wool fibers to keep hot air in and cold air out.

“The (aerogel’s) value of thermal conductivity was lower than the air itself, which is really hard to do,” Fisher said.

Both Hu and Fisher said it was difficult to measure the transfer of heat through the material using traditional tools because it was too thin. They instead used an infrared camera to collect images of heat transferring through the aerogel, which they used to extract data, Fisher said.

Duan said he was surprised by how easily the material was damaged due to contamination while transporting the aerogel between labs.

Fisher said he does not know how the material holds up over time. He added he is worried that contamination could lead to the collapse of the structure in the long run.

Hao said the material could be used in the construction of insulated buildings and other high-end applications. However, he said the material must be produced on a larger scale before it can be used commercially.

Duan added researchers must find a cheaper way of producing the aerogel to make it more accessible to the general public.

“The materials are not exotic,” Fisher said. “Certainly there’s a path to making it economically viable, but it would have to be scaled up and the costs would directly correlate to that.”

Students with dependents explain daily challenges balancing college and parenthood

Kristen Payne had a 5-year-old daughter when she started school at UCLA. She said taking care of her daughter doubled her workload as a student.

“You go through this routine of getting yourself ready, then getting them ready, making sure that everybody has everything they need,” Payne said. “It was like double everything.”

Payne, who graduated in 2016, was one of UCLA’s many students with dependents. While campus resources are available for these parenting students, many of them said they think these resources are not always accessible and that they still struggle with the financial and logistical challenges of being both parents and full-time students.

Payne said although she appreciates the resources available on campus, she found them more expensive than social services off campus.

“I appreciated that I could take care of myself on campus, but I couldn’t take care of my family, I couldn’t afford it,” Payne said.

Payne said she was able to sign up for the social services she needed as a full-time student with the support of UCLA’s students with dependents office.

Chelsea Krob, a fourth-year art student, said she received some support from the student with dependents office last year but found some programs could not accommodate her 3-year-old child.

“It’s just not helping me because my child is too young, she can’t do the after-school program in (the John Wooden Center) because she’s not potty trained,” Krob said. “It’s a good first step, but it’s not making it significantly easier.”

However, Krob said certain programs in the office, such as Little Bruin Wishes, have helped alleviate the pressure on her and her family. Little Bruin Wishes, run by the Students with Dependents Program, provides anonymous holiday gifts to students with dependents and their families.

“We couldn’t buy any gifts for our child so we got a $40 gift card for her through them,” she said.

Krob added she has also received support from the Community Programs Office.

“The CPO and their Christmas and Thanksgiving boxes are what literally fed us during the holidays,” Krob said. “I am eternally grateful to them.”

Jenneffer Vazquez Moran, a fourth-year human biology and society student, said it is not always easy to find resources for students with dependents on campus.

“When I first got here, my son had to live with my mom for the first six months because I couldn’t get him into a daycare that I could afford,” Vazquez Moran said.

However, she is now able to send her 3-year-old son to a UCLA Early Care and Education Center with financial assistance from UCLA.

Vazquez Moran added she has also learned to take advantage of the CPO Food Closet to provide snacks for her two children.

Students with dependents are also able to receive family housing through UCLA. However, students said they have often experienced issues with housing placements and requirements.

Vazquez Moran said she applied for university housing, but UCLA gave her housing that was more expensive than anticipated. She said she was able to afford housing without having to work because she received financial support from her partner, but said she would not have been able to if she were a single parent.

Krob also lives in university housing with her family. To receive university housing, she must enroll in at least 12 units as a full-time student, which Krob said has been taxing.

“There’s just so many things that you have to keep spinning, and it’s just really hard,” Krob said.

Students with dependents also often experience unavoidable scheduling conflicts.

Krob said she has to drop off her child at preschool at 8:30 a.m. every day and cannot arrive to campus before 9:30 a.m. As a result, she is unable to take morning classes that start at 8 a.m.

Payne, whose daughter has special needs, said that having a child with special needs requires her to spend more time taking her child to health care appointments.

“When your child needs to see a specialist, you have one opportunity at the appointment that they give you or you wait for another in suspense,” Payne said. “It made it a lot harder.”

Krob said her scheduling conflicts and financial concerns worsened when her child fell sick and was unable to go to school.

“(My child) was sick from week four to week six, right during midterms,” Krob said. “My partner had just gotten rehired at a different firm and we didn’t have insurance, so we were juggling our child being uninsured.”

Krob said that although she tried to take her child to classes with her, doing so prevented her from paying attention in class.

“I was just focusing on trying to keep her quiet and I actually had to drop a class during my midterms because I couldn’t be in class,” she said.

Krob said although some of her professors have been understanding, others have been markedly less so. She added she couldn’t take her sick child into art classrooms because they contained dangerous tools and chemicals.

“A lot of my faculty don’t have children, so they’re just like ‘Well, you should have your shit under control, you should have this taken care of’ and it’s the things that you can’t control, that you can’t plan for,” Krob said.

Krob said she wants to be more engaged with extracurricular activities on campus, but feels she does not have enough time due to her parenting responsibilities.

“Just assume that whatever your schedule is as a normal student, half it,” Krob said. “Half of your sleeping, half of your eating, it is all dedicated to something else.”

Krob said she thinks ultimately, students with dependents need to do what’s best for themselves and their families.

“If you need to take more time, demand more time because if we’re not asking for it, we’re not going to get it,” Krob said.

Payne said balancing her academic and parenting responsibilities was always difficult.

“UCLA expects us to put our student status first, but when you’re a parent, your parenting status will always come first,” Payne said. “We want to put our student status first and we want to put our best foot forward and we want to be equal, but it’s really hard when you have this human being always, always trump and have to be first.”

Payne, whose daughter is turning 10 this year, went straight to graduate school after completing her degree at UCLA and will receive her master’s degree in counseling in May from California State University, Long Beach.

She said her experience as a parenting student at UCLA has taught her how to persist through hard times.

“It remains busy, and full, but UCLA helps build toughness and resilience. Even though things could be really complicated being a parenting student, it makes you strong,” Payne said. “We persevered, we did it.”

Metro amends subway extension budget to $3.2 billion

This post was updated March 11 at 4:40 p.m.

The Metro Board amended the budget of The LA Metro Purple Line Extension Project from $1.4 billion to $3.2 billion at its meeting Feb. 28. This budget amendment is to build the third section of the Purple Line Extension, which will pass through Westwood.

The Purple Line Extension Project is a nine-mile underground subway that will connect the Westside of Los Angeles to Downtown LA. It is designed to be a high-speed alternative transportation option for commuters, and is expected to be completed by 2026.

The extension will connect Wilshire/Western to Wilshire/La Cienega in the first section, and connect to both Beverly Hills and Century City in the second section. The third section of the project will link Beverly Hills and Century City to Westwood.

David Sotero, a Metro spokesperson, said in an email statement that the budget amendment is consistent with previous estimated fiscal increases for the project.

He added part of the new budget will fund construction outside of tunneling, like stations and tracks, and a $1.36 billion construction contract with Tutor Perini Corporation and O&G JV. Tutor Perini, one of the largest general contractors in the U.S., will take part in tunneling work for the project.

“We are now adding in another piece of the project, which is specifically for stations, trackwork, systems and testing,” Sotero said. “The $1.3 billion for this work is entirely consistent with previous financial assumptions for the project that have already been approved by the Metro Board.”

According to new plans for the project, an entrance to the subway will be built on the south side of Wilshire Boulevard, in addition to the two originally planned entrances on the north side.

Michael Skiles, president of the North Westwood Neighborhood Council, advocated for the south subway entrance, and said he thinks it will provide a safe means for people to access the Purple Line from all directions.

“We wanted to see the Purple Line work for Westwood and be accessible to workers and residents no matter what side of Westwood they lived in,” Skiles said.

Skiles added he thinks the subway will be crucial for UCLA commuters and Westwood residents working in various parts of LA.

“It’ll be an absolute game changer for students interning Downtown, and a complete and total miracle for any student who was commuting to and from (places like) Pasadena,” Skiles said. “Certainly trips that could easily take many hours in traffic could be more like a half-hour trip.”

Andrew Thomas, executive director of the Westwood Village Improvement Association, said he was also a proponent for the Purple Line extension into Westwood. Thomas said he thinks the line will result in more people working and shopping in Westwood.

“I think you (will) see a movement toward greater housing opportunities near transit stations and hubs,” Thomas said. “Say Downtown or Koreatown, they can live near (transit stations) and work in Westwood because they know it’s only a half-hour away by subway, rather than 1 1/2 hours by car.”

Thomas also advocated for the south entrance. Skiles and Thomas both said they think the entrance will be safer for the expected volume of pedestrians who will be accessing the Purple Line on Wilshire.

“We’re talking about thousands who would be crossing Wilshire, and we didn’t feel it would be safe for pedestrians or vehicular traffic without the southside portal,” Thomas said.

Belen Munoz, a second-year sociology student, said she thinks the Purple Line extension will be beneficial to students who live outside the Westwood area.

“I have friends and classmates who live off campus, and I know the commute to school can be a pain for them. Everyone knows LA traffic is a headache, so I think the extension could be a way for commuter students to avoid that,” Munoz said. “With a subway line, they won’t have to deal with traffic or bus schedules.”

Nathan Rice, a third-year psychology student, said he thinks the subway extension will provide a convenient method of traveling to new locations in LA.

“I think an extension will give a lot of students an opportunity to go out and explore parts of the city they might not be comfortable going to right now. LA is a big place, and for the students who aren’t from here I think it can be pretty intimidating,” Rice said. “Maybe this will give students a way to get into the city that they feel comfortable actually using.”

UC opposes academic researchers union, cites lack of ‘community of interest’

University of California academic researchers applied for union representation, but the UC is objecting to the proposed unionization.

United Auto Workers Local 5810, a union representing over 6,500 postdoctoral researchers at the UC, submitted a petition to California Public Employment Relations Board in September to add academic researchers to the union under a separate bargaining unit called Academic Researchers United.

ARU represents a broad group of researchers, including nontenured faculty members who run labs and scientists who have been phased out of their temporary postdoctoral appointments. UC academic researchers hold a variety of titles, including project scientist, specialist, professional researcher and coordinator of public programs.

The union’s petition was signed by a majority of the 5,000 academic researchers at the UC.

However, the UC filed objections against the formation of the bargaining unit in December, according to ARU’s website.

The Higher Education Employer-Employee Relations Act states that workers must have a “community of interest,” which consists of similar working conditions, skills and job duties in order to bargain together as a unit.

The University argues certain academic researcher job titles, including professional researcher and coordinator of public programs,” do not have a community of interest with other proposed units members” and should therefore be excluded from the proposed unit, according to documents the University sent PERB in February.

In a 1982 ruling, PERB found that the academic researcher job titles mentioned above constituted an appropriate unit.

The University, however, argues the positions mentioned in the ruling have changed and serve different purposes than they did at the time of the ruling. Moreover, the University said it did not object to the findings then, but is choosing to do so now given changes in the positions.

Claire Doan, director of media relations for the UC Office of the President, said the UC is in discussions with both PERB and the union regarding the addition of the new unit.

“Once all of the issues regarding unit composition have been resolved, contract negotiations between UC and the union will begin,” Doan said.

Neal Sweeney, vice president of UAW 5810, said he believes academic researchers meet the standard of “community of interest” because they perform similar work.

“Everyone works in labs doing research that’s part of the university’s research mission,” Sweeney said. “They all have the same policies that govern their employment, so in many different ways, they meet this standard of ‘community of interest.’”

Sweeney added he thinks the University does not have evidence supporting its claims and thinks the University is wasting public money on legal battles instead of spending it elsewhere.

“Nothing has changed about these titles that would cause PERB to have a different ruling, so to us there’s no basis,” Sweeney said. “The University is just needlessly stalling the process by raising these objections.”

Nancy Skinner, a Democratic state senator representing the East Bay district, said in a letter to UC President Janet Napolitano she believes the University is misusing UC and PERB resources by refusing to recognize the new unit.

“I urge UC to recognize the union and begin collective bargaining with ARU/UAW 5810 as this is a prime opportunity to demonstrate productive and cooperative labor relations practices,” Skinner said in the letter.

Sweeney said like many academic researchers, he was bumped out of his postdoctoral position after five years before transitioning into an academic researcher title.

“I was basically doing the exact same job, I just had a different job title, but I lost all the rights and benefits (UAW 5810) had won in our (postdoctoral) union contract,” he said.

Sweeney said the academic researcher position came with a decreased salary and higher health care payments. In addition, he said academic researchers lose the protection of job security and can be disciplined at any moment without a valid reason.

“Under the postdoc contract, we have what’s called ‘just cause’ protections which means if the university wants to terminate you or even discipline you in various ways, you have a chance to defend yourself,” he said. “Academic researchers have none of these (security measures), so there’s no protections for being terminated without any good reason.”

Christina Priest, an assistant project scientist at UCLA, said she also faced consequences after phasing out of her postdoctoral position.

“I thought it was unfair my benefits were taken away and I wasn’t paid as much despite having more experience,” Priest said.

Priest said UC academic researchers have formed their bargaining committee and are in the process of ratifying their bargaining demands. She said they wish to address issues including compensation, job security, support for international researchers, health benefits and parental leave.

“We want to bargain with the University all together so we have a voice,” Priest said. “As individuals, we don’t have the power, but together we do.”

PERB is continuing to work with the University and the union to find a solution.