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Culture

Gong graduates after deep campus involvement

Miyawni Curtis | May 8

The University of New Mexico has 425 clubs — Giovanna Gong has played a prominent role in several during her time at UNM. Gong, a first generation college student, will graduate with a degree in international studies with a concentration in peacekeeping and diplomacy, as well as a minor in teaching English as a second language. She said the clubs and organizations on campus she was involved in were a highlight of her college experience, and provided her opportunities to meet new people at UNM.

Culture

UNM graduate celebrates culture through journalism

Maddie Pukite | May 8

“The biggest thing about being a journalist is staying true to who you are,” Junko Featherston, a graduating senior in the communications & journalism department, said. Featherston will graduate from the University of New Mexico with a 4.2 GPA and a degree in multimedia journalism with a minor in Japanese. While studying she also worked at New Mexico PBS, interning for producer Lou DiVizio.

Culture

Alex Maggs aces his senior year

Thomas Bulger | May 8

Four years ago Alex Maggs found himself in the desert 4,888 miles away from his home in Birmingham, England. Since then, Maggs has grown as a tennis player and a student. He finished the season on the all-conference team for his play in the doubles matches and is graduating with a GPA of 4.06. Maggs first picked up a tennis racket when he was five years old in an after-school program. He said he tried many different activities, but it was tennis that stuck with him.

Culture

Morales prepares for upcoming advocacy projects

Detroit Kallunki | May 8

Abrianna Morales has spent her time at the University of New Mexico lobbying for political change and advocating for survivors of sexual violence. She graduates with a double major in psychology and criminology, and she said she already has big things on the horizon. Morales plans to stay in the Albuquerque area and continue her advocacy work with the National Organization for Victim Assistance. She also plans to continue her advocacy with the organization she started, Sexual Assault Youth Support Network, as well as her relationship with UNM.

Culture

UNM senior leaves a legacy with student publications

Jordyn Bachmann | May 8

During his four years as an undergraduate, John Scott has played a large role in the beating heart that is UNM student publications. He served as editor-in-chief of the Daily Lobo, while he simultaneously worked as the digital editor of Scribendi, an editor of Limina: UNM Nonfiction Review and an artist and creator outside of his studies.

Culture

News editor dedicates college career to truth-seeking

Maddie Pukite | May 8

Attending the University of New Mexico as an international student from Juárez, Mexico, Annya Loya Orduno graduates as an award-winning reporter who has already played an active role and left an impact in New Mexico journalism. Loya Orduno served as the news editor for the Daily Lobo, interned at the Las Cruces Sun-News and will now go on to work as a journalist for the Deming Headlight through the New Mexico News Fund fellowship.

Culture

Zara Roy Graduates with a pen in hand

Annya Loya | May 8

Like millions of college students, Zara Roy began her first year of college during the COVID-19 pandemic back in 2020. For her, while the pandemic was life-changing, it was also the start of something bigger, or the realization of it. Roy, a psychology major, initially considered a career in clinical psychology until she realized that was not what she was meant to do. During her time at the University of New Mexico, she found that she already had something she loved but just hadn’t realized yet.

Sports

Spirit Squad chooses lucky Lobos to cheer for University

Addison Key | May 1

Jessie Truitt, the head coach of the University of New Mexico Spirit program, has been working on tryouts to fill the dance team, the co-ed cheer team and the all-girl cheer team. Over this past weekend, April 28 to 30, tryouts started. They included Spirit Squad veterans and rookies who made it through the video submission phase to compete to fill around 70 to 90 spots, Truitt said. Truitt will also be looking for new people to fill the Lobo Lucy and Lobo Louie costumes on May 4 to 5 in the SUB. “I like to say on the prowl … to build a mascot team. I'm hoping to expand because, like our athletes, they're required to go to almost all of the sporting events. It's a different beast putting on a 10-pound fur suit (and) to be in there and in that long,” Truitt said.

Sports

Baseball: Lobos sweep series with a walk-off

Thomas Bulger | May 1

The Lobos swept the California State University, Fresno Bulldogs culminating in a Kyle Smith walk-off in the third game. In a critical series, the Lobos took control and passed Fresno in the standings and took the season tiebreaker over them. They are now 10-10 in conference play. UNM won by doing what they do best: hitting. Going into Sunday, April 30 the team had a batting average of .332, the third best in the nation. The team scored 39 runs on 49 hits in the series. Lobo, Reed Spenrath talked about the team's ability on offense. In the second game the Lobos went full offense getting as many hitters in the lineup as possible. This led to Spenrath playing his first collegiate game at right field and was proud his coaches trusted him to play both in the infield and outfield. After the interview his teammates were eager to debut his new nickname "The Tarp" because he covers the whole field.

Culture

UNM visiting artist uplifts BIPOC, queer stories

Detroit Kallunki | May 1

Each spring the painting and drawing department hosts an “Open Studio” event where the public can enter the campus studio and observe the work that a UNM visiting artist has created over the spring, according to Amanda Curreri, an associate professor in the UNM department of fine arts. This visiting artist program began six years ago, Curreri said, and this year’s artist is Lukaza Branfman-Verissimo. “My work is rooted in storytelling and telling stories about survival — primarily of black, brown, Indigenous, queer, trans, gender-nonconforming and two-spirit folks. It’s rooted in how we amplify and tell stories of marginalized bodies in different ways,” Branfman-Verissimo said.

News

LETTER: Concerning your piece on Cherry Reel

Paolo Serino | May 1

Hello, You don't know me; my name is Paolo Serino and I'm a film major at UNM. I'm emailing you because of your review of some of the student films in the article on Cherry Reel. Whether or not you choose to read what I have to say is up to you, but I found what you had to say about your fellow UNM student's films highly questionable. It's totally fine to have your opinions and to voice your criticisms, when necessary, but to publicly lambast other students' work (some of which is their first work to be presented in a public setting) felt very inappropriate.

News

LETTER: Cherry Reel review and what it means to critique

Aiyana Shuler | May 1

Dear Editor, I am about to graduate in two weeks. I transferred to the UNM film department from an art school. Over the course of the last four years I have been a part of probably hundreds of critiques. For drawing, for painting, for 2D art, multi-media art, digital and electronic art, essays, creative writing pieces, nonfiction writing, poetry, profiles, the basics of film, experimental film, narrative film, screenplays; from the smallest details worked out in classes like log lines to the broadest bare bones of a story. I was taught in my freshman year how a good critique is constructed.

Culture

UNM graduate inspires new photographers

Addison Key | May 1

University of New Mexico graduate student and photographer Emma Ressel spent her childhood in Bar Harbor, Maine searching for reptiles and amphibians. Her dad, a biology professor, would create his own photos of the animals he taught about in class. Her childhood was filled with lots of holding lizards and salamanders and staging them for her father’s photography. Ressel’s love for photography started with her trips into “the field” with her father but grew as she learned more about the process itself. “In high school I took a workshop over the summer … where I learned how to shoot black-and-white film and be in the dark room. I really fell in love with the dark room. I was kind of obsessed after that,” Ressel said.

Opinion

REVIEW: ‘Beau is Afraid’ of brevity

Zara Roy | May 1

Time to whip out your Ativan: auteur-at-large Ari Aster has returned for his third feature film, “Beau is Afraid.” Back at his old vices of troublesome familial dynamics and brutal weirdness, Aster now formats them into a hero’s journey with a darkly comic edge. “Beau is Afraid” is a valiant experiment diminished by its own bloated runtime and unsatisfying, loopy narrative structure. The film follows the titular Beau Wasserman (Joaquin Phoenix), an anxious and solitary man, as he attempts to return home for the burial of his overbearing mother Mona Wasserman. Along the way, he is plunged into a variety of surreal, tooth-pulling nightmare scenarios which serve to reaffirm Beau’s various Freudian neuroses.

Culture

Nizhoni Days Powwow celebrates 64th year of community-making

Mackenzie Schwartz | May 1

The Kiva Club hosted the Nizhoni Days Powwow on Sunday, April 30. It is the oldest Powwow in New Mexico, according to Demetrius Johnson (Diné) a former Kiva Club president from 2015 to 2017. “It does heal the community, and I think during COVID this Powwow was really missed,” Johnson said. “But the other purpose of this Powwow is to show that there is a powwow out there that is for the community, and it is free, and it is by Native people, for Native people.”

News

UNM faculty, staff bring attention to lack of capacity in Legislature

Maddie Pukite | May 1

The New Mexico State Legislature is currently the only U.S. state legislature to not pay its representatives. It has one of the shortest session lengths and smallest staffs. To modernize the Legislature could mean increasing all of the above, according to a Bureau of Business and Economic Research study. Last fall, Rose Elizabeth Rohrer, a researcher with BBER at UNM, interviewed 24 of the 112 state representatives and received surveys from 44.4% of the staff to hear their thoughts on the status of the Legislature. Of the responses, many said they would benefit from at least one half-time, individually assigned staffer, and at most two full-time staffers. 82.9% said they should be paid, and that the current per diem and travel compensation does not cover the costs of the job. 80.7% said that there was not enough time in the session to dedicate the amount of time to legislation that it deserves.

News

UNM partners with NOVA to support sexual assault victims

Annya Loya | May 1

The National Organization for Victim Assistance is preparing to launch the Youth Advocacy Corps pilot program in partnership with five colleges, including the University of New Mexico. The Youth Advocacy Corps program intends to aid marginalized youth in victim advocacy by providing student fellows with training, mentorship and a paid field placement in a local victim service organization, according to NOVA. On Monday, April 24, the University hosted a town hall where the program was introduced and panelists shared their experiences as sexual violence survivors. Abrianna Morales, a panelist and UNM student, is a NOVA youth program manager and looks forward to the impact the upcoming program will have on campus.

Culture

EDITORIAL: On the Cherry Reel review

The Daily Lobo Editorial Board | May 1

Recently, the Daily Lobo ran an unjustly harsh review of the Cherry Reel Film Festival. Implicit bias was shown in the review, and while not intentional, ultimately the majority of the films we labeled as “disappointments” were made by students of color. This is meant to serve as an explanation of what happened, why it was wrong and how we are working to prevent this from happening again. The film industry is a white-dominated field. In 2019, only 14.4% of the directors of theatrical films were people of color and 91% of studio heads were white, according to Variety. The University of New Mexico and the film and digital arts program are both majority-minority and Cherry Reel is predominantly run by white students.

Culture

Swing Night is back

Gillian Barkhurst | April 24

While the third anniversary of the COVID-19 lockdowns has come and gone, many communities are still searching for ways to reconnect. Some Burqueños are reconnecting through their love of swing dance. Swing Night, originally held at the Heights Community Center, was once an Albuquerque staple, but in 2020 COVID-19 put an end to its 30-year-long history. Now, organizers at Duke City Swing are reviving the event with a weekly dance at the Alley Kats Tap Studio. Founder and president of Duke City Swing Christin Oberman, said she stepped up because she “was just getting tired of not having dances around.”

News

UNM libraries evacuated due to anonymous threat

Lauren Lifke | April 24

On Sunday, April 16, the University of New Mexico library buildings on central campus were evacuated as a result of an anonymous threat which turned out to be a hoax, according to a statement shared on behalf of the University Libraries. A Lobo Alert informed students of police activity at Zimmerman, Centennial, Parish Libraries and George Pearl Hall at 4:34 p.m. A second alert was sent at 5:00 p.m. stating that police had cleared the area. Police notified the on-site staff at Zimmerman immediately, according to the statement. It was the only library that was open during this time, and it was closed for the remainder of the day after the evacuation.