by Julia Ditto It was the first of July, and the thirty-first day in the Brooks Range for our team of five. The crew was led by Dr. Roman Dial, a professor and biologist at Alaska Pacific University. The three others and I were all undergraduates. Russel Wong, our mathematician, Duncan Wright, our musician, and I, the artist, were all students from APU. Ben Weissenbach, our writer and fourth undergraduate, was from Princeton University on an assignment to write an article about our adventurous scientific expedition. Little did we know, the next few hours were about to be the most adventurous of our entire six-week expedition. We departed camp as…
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The Village
by Julia Ditto On my return trip from the Brooks Range, while traveling through Arctic Village, Alaska, I witnessed the arrival of the mail plane. Such an event could be seen as mundane in the average twenty-first century society; for me it was anything but. It was July 12, the last morning of a 42-day expedition for our group of four undergrads. Our remote experience in the Brooks Range contrasted with the sudden commotion at the Arctic Village airstrip. It is a memory that will never leave me. “Alaska isn’t one place. It’s many places. You can’t really see all of Alaska,” our pilot Kirk Sweetser said, his voice cutting…
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Cancel Culture
By Lorien Kauffman In a speech last October, former president Barack Obama said, “I do get a sense sometimes now among certain young people…that the way of me making change is to be as judgmental as possible about other people and that’s enough.” Obama questioned the idea of being politically “woke”, referencing call-out or “cancel” culture, saying, “The world is messy, there are ambiguities.” Obama claimed to cancel or “throw stones” at someone “…is not activism, that is not bringing about change” (Guardian News, 2019). The top definition of “canceled” in Urban Dictionary is “to dismiss something/somebody. To reject and individual or an idea” (Flossy333, 2018). In modern times, to…
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On War and Justification
By Jonathan Martin Abstract This essay serves as both a review of contemporary justification for war, as well as an analysis of said theories and their application in today’s society. When reviewing theories of war examples of recent armed conflict involving the United States Military are utilized to illustrate the times when wars were and weren’t considered to be justified. After identifying the theories of war and their implications the essay transitions to the analysis portion. This section deals with relativity of theories of war and their implications into present day perspectives on war. Specifically, the analysis is aimed at explaining which theories of war are most accurate and/or most…
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Your Grass is A**
by Grace Schultz Every year millions of people participate in eco-tourism. This occurs in thousands of different ways: backpacking, packrafting, flying, swimming, drives, cruises etc. People go to experience nature in the raw. But then, often, they come back from their vacation to a concrete city and urbanized place: void of all natural qualities and filled with fast paced technologies. The warm sand and cool water become a distant memory. Away from that raw nature we easily hold connotations for the natural world as these far away fantasies where one can only visit. However, a natural world surrounds us if we open our eyes. This world could be more attainable…
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Eliminating Plastic Waste by Creating a Circular Plastic Economy
by Max Brown Plastic is undoubtedly the most widely used material on the planet, finding its way into practically every consumer product. In tandem with this global use is global pollution, and the problems of plastic pollution have risen to the forefront of issues facing humanity. Plastics are durable products, with an estimated lifespan of hundreds of thousands of years, translating into a worldwide issue of massive waste that poses an incomprehensible threat to the environment (Xanthos & Walker, 2017). It is estimated that by 2025, there will be one ton of ocean plastic for every three tons of fish (Forrest, Giacovazzi, Dunlop, Reisser, & Tickler, 2019). Additionally, the plastic…
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Diets Are Not Healthy!
By Renee Endicott Dieting is not healthy, unless it results in a balanced nutritious healthy eating lifestyle. It has many negative physical and psychological impacts. I have personal experience with on and off again dieting before I made the decision to make a life change. Of course, you cannot do a strict diet and then go back to eating the way you were without gaining back all the weight and sometimes more. Not only is dieting unhealthy, but it’s also a $61 billion dollar a year industry, yet people continue to struggle with weight loss and weight gain, never being able to maintain a healthy weight (SkyterraWellness). It has become…
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New School, New Ski Team, New Pandemic
By Garrett Butts As a newcomer to any team or group, you are not sure how things will unfold. Luckily for me, the APU Elite Ski Team has been nothing but joy to be a part of. As for most athletes at this current time, we are all experiencing a break from our normally scheduled race season due to the Covid-19 pandemic, but despite having the remainder of the 2019-2020 racing season come to an end, we have had numerous grand adventures and experiences, non the less. When I arrived in September, our training year was well advanced and we were fast approaching the race season. Having trained by myself…
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Falling a Little in Love with a Lot of People
by Zoe May Today I fell a little in love. Today I looked someone in the eyes, we laughed and I felt myself fall in love. I watched someone make a foolish joke and I fell in love. I was having a hard day and someone hugged me tight and I fell in love. Someone waiting outside the door for you to come out, a silly face put on simply to make someone smile, it all made me fall just a little in love. I fall for the sky, I fall for the stars, for a toddler staring in awe at the world around them, I fall for it all.…
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The Blue Mosque
By Steve Rubinstein Still awake and on fire at 4 a.m. we are insects buzzing in palace trees below Shadows crouched between lintel and sill dust settling, pollen on forgotten wine. We pause in silence rise to a clear morning wail beneath the Blue Mosque amid the old city atop a jumbled scaffold of saffron beams. Blue skates carve helium turns overhead. Dawn emerges ochre and steaming. The Bosporus is a widening shadow of freight.
