Opinion Writing Ceccarini (JOU-3363)

  Courtney Ceccarini Q News  High Point University’s newest fine dining experience, Kazoku, has made its way to Panther Commons. A hibachi restaurant that holds 60 people at a time and offers 3 courses that include soup and salad, entree, and desert. As an effort to promote inclusion and unity the university named the restaurant Kazoku because of its origin meaning family.  While at Kazoku students are seated at a table of 10. Sitting at the table with other people not in your party is how the restaurant resembles families; however, this effort does not come off the way as intended.  Each time I have dined here the table is awkward and uncomfortable. No one talks to each other and it feels more like eating with strangers. Kazoku is everything you would expect a hibachi restaurant on a campus to be.  We ordered the chicken broth soup and the miso soup. While I thoroughly enjoyed the chicken broth soup the tofu in the miso soup was cold, which is not something you...

What started as a way of connecting people to one another has become a source of entertainment for many young people. As social media has evolved, the more it has been incorporated in everyday life, including the classroom.  Now, social media is not all bad. It has given us everything from recipes to makeup tutorials all at the tips of our fingers. With the rise of AI it is even capable of writing research papers. However, to a developing and impressionable mind this can be detrimental for a student and is no place for the classroom. Almost every teen has a smartphone, according to the International Journal of Advanced Information Technology, 78% of students will spend an average of 4-5 hours on their smartphones daily. It's hard to deny that checking Instagram or Snapchat during class cuts into these hours making it a tempting distraction.  According to a recent survey published in the Journal of Media Education, 71% of students admit to checking their socials during school h...

Courtney Ceccarini Q News When you’re five you don’t really think about it. You walk right into your vibrant kindergarten classroom with your hot pink Barbie backpack, turn to the person next to you and complement the scribbles they made with their freshly sharpened macaroni and cheese crayola crayon.  If you don’t know how to count to 100, odds are, you don’t know the pressures of social anxiety and the internal fears that come with striking up a conversation. At five, all it takes is for your swing to line up with someone else's at recess for you to become instant best friends.   On September 11, 2017, I wished I was five again. From kindergarten up until the middle of summer going into my sophomore year I was a student in the Sachem School District. It was the district my brother graduated from and the schools that filled its halls with students I knew almost every name of.  Unfortunately, sometime in middle school, I became tired of the typical middle school figh...

“Find Your Forever Home,” a common cliché posted online for all the bleached blonde, party seeking, college girls.  Now, this type of phrase is used very strategically and it's not over used, it's tactical.  It’s used as a way to draw enough attention to persuade freshmen girls, who are miles away from their real home, to feel like this is something they need to be a part of, but subtle enough that once they become seniors, they’re kicking themselves trying to remember what it was they found so appealing about this in the first place. At this point, if you didn’t attend college, or if you did but never cared about expanding your network by discussing different self tanning brands, you’re probably asking yourself what does this promising message pertain to?  However, if you did use your philanthropy as a way to flirt with all the Chads and Brads on your campus, you already know what this advertisement is referring to. But for those who graduated without the honor of knowin...

Title Courtney Ceccarini Q News An extraordinary school with extraordinary expansions. Since 2005, Dr. Nido Qubein, president of High Point University, has transformed the college campus into what some would call a resort. While these expansions have put the university on the map, it has, simultaneously, altered the way members of the community are living.  High Point University bought the College Village Shopping Center on Lexington Ave. in 2019. Since the purchase, the university has put in a request to rezone the 11- acres from retail to institutional. The retail stores that used to live there, including Dollar General and Auto Zone, have let their leases expire and left the premises.  The university is working on renovating the grounds to transform it into a more cohesive aesthetic to the rest of campus. They are working to add crosswalks, sidewalks and have added a new security gate. Through these renovations they have run into a small problem, not all of the businesses a...

  Soft Leads    Imagine making an effort to surpass your family’s legacy only to be met with the same outcome 100 years later.  A failed attempt to finish what his great-great uncle started lands a man in jail. Jesse James is caught after robbing The First Fidelity Bank this morning. While in possession of $20,000, police caught him backing out the door.    Record breaking high temperatures are causing the Midwest to ditch their winter garments and tune up their 10-speed bikes.  Temperatures hit as high as 88 degrees on March 22nd. Last year, on the same day temperatures were at 33 degrees. This shocking temperature led the midwest into a frenzy as they enjoyed a beach day in mid-March. C. Wouldn’t you love to swim in waters surrounded by angel fish as you sunbathe with iguanas? All of this can be a reality by taking a trip to Costa Rica, where you can explore the beaches and mountains or tour the Paos volcano. Come enjoy the beautiful flora and faun...