Harker Aquila, 500 Saratoga Avenue, San Jose, CA (2025)

09/13/2025

We’re back with episode three of Friday Fit-checks! This week, join us as we explore looks that feature everything from heirloom pieces to travel finds.

Reporting and Videography by Lily Shi and Eva Cheng
Editing by Eva Cheng

09/12/2025

Clothing brand American Eagle released an ad on July 23 where actress Sydney Sweeney crossed out the word “genes” in a billboard saying “Sydney Sweeney has great genes” and replaced it with “jeans.”

Many progressive internet users felt that this ad could be a dog whistle for white supremacist ideology. This belief stemmed from the emphasis on genetics as well as Sweeney’s resemblance to an A***n ideal of beauty with her blond hair and blue eyes. Conversely, other netizens supported the ad campaign and opposed critics, leading to an increase in American Eagle’s social media following and stock price.

“The marketing perspective is that it doesn’t actually matter if they agree with what is being said — all that is important is it creates an emotional response,” DEI director Patricia Burrows said. “They want to create the largest emotional response regardless of the impact it has on society. That’s really dangerous; not so much the actual marketing message, but the why behind it.”

Full article: https://harkeraquila.com/90267/features/american-eagle-uses-outrage-farming-to-drive-engagement/

Reporters: Suhani Gupta and Janam Chahal
Illustrator: Emma Li

09/11/2025

This year’s upper school tuition for Harker students is $64,800. Behind this number lies an often overlooked reality: around 10% of all students K-12 receive some form of financial aid. With strict rules on conversations around aid, recipients grapple with a complicated question: should they openly discuss the aid that they receive?

Harker grants need-based aid to students in a separate, confidential application form, keeping the application to Harker largely need-blind. However, according to the email sent to recipients, students on aid who share the terms of their agreement risk losing it completely.

An anonymous financial aid recipient recalled volunteering at an Open House and struggling to answer when asked about financial aid.

“The biggest question was financial aid and a lot of the families kept asking us in Spanish, ‘Well, how much do you pay?’” they said. “‘It’s 65K. I can’t pay that. How much did they take off?’ And we weren’t by contract allowed to say anything. That harms how many people Harker can accept because that could have been an amazing kid to have in our program, and we weren’t able to give that kid an opportunity because they didn’t know what resources were available.”

Full article: https://harkeraquila.com/90303/features/navigating-conversations-about-wealth-financial-aid-and-socioeconomic-diversity-at-harker/  Reporters: Mendy Mao and Leah Krupnik
Illustrator: Elizabeth Zhang

09/10/2025

Pop Mart’s strangely endearing creations push teenagers and adults alike to spend thousands on everything from miniature figurines to phone cases in the past year and a half. Between resellers and passionate fans, consumerism has resurged as a core part of another trend.

The current most popular of these creations is Kasing Lung’s Labubu, a furry rabbit-like creature with a toothy grin created in 2015 and turned into a Pop Mart product in 2019. Though people on the internet disagree over whether the Labubu’s quirky, cute appeal wins out over its perhaps unnerving appearance, celebrities and civilians alike have clamored to buy the plush toys and other featured characters, a craze manifesting as long lines and out of stock Labubus.

Fear of missing out, a characteristic of consumerism, often fuels these spending sprees. Additionally, customers derive happiness from spending. Senior Helen Gu pointed out that buying the trendiest item often serves as an entrance ticket into social groups in person and online.

Full article: https://harkeraquila.com/90356/arts-entertainment-lifestyle/pop-mart-encourages-consumerism-through-social-media-trends-and-cute-designs/

Reporter: Lindsay Li
Photographer: Ashley Mo

09/08/2025

AI frontrunner OpenAI released its new flagship large language model GPT-5 on Aug. 7 and generated a mixed reception from users.

ChatGPT-5 improves upon previous OpenAI models in benchmarks, including expert-level questions in math, science, coding and problem-solving. It also features upgrades in employing external tools like Python.

“It’s definitely a lot more accurate than previous models,” Stanford computer science Ph.D. student Nathan Hu said. “And it’s a bit smarter about seamlessly using tools like Google search behind the scenes.”

As OpenAI’s latest advancement was modest compared to the leaps between earlier releases, GPT-5 fell short of the AI community’s expectations.

“The difference between GPT-2 and GPT-3 was pretty radical in terms of how coherently you could complete text, and the difference between GPT-3 and GPT-4 was this whole new paradigm of training them to be human assistants rather than just completing text,” Hu said. “It feels like 5 is an incremental improvement rather than radically different, as was implicitly promised.”

Full article: https://harkeraquila.com/90270/science-and-technology/chatgpt-5-delivers-practical-progress-but-falls-short-of-expectations/

Reporters: Caden Ruan and Claire Tian
Photographer: Ashley Mo
Illustrator: Charlie Wang

09/06/2025

Welcome to the second installment of Friday Fit-checks, where we spotlight the style choices of Upper School students and the styles they are bringing to campus.

Reporting and Videography by Lily Shi and Eva Cheng
Editing by Eva Cheng

09/05/2025

HEYTEA’s newest Cupertino location provides instant relief on a hot summer day, the cool air flowing through the spacious cafe acting as a refreshing change from the heat outside. Sunlight streams through floor-to-ceiling windows and onto the wooden benches, while artificial trees add a touch of greenery. HEYTEA originated in China and garnered international popularity for its high-quality ingredients and visually appealing drinks, recently adding its newest branch in Cupertino. In our recent visit to the cafe, we tried five drinks to experience the variety of flavors on HEYTEA’s menu.

Full article: https://harkeraquila.com/90252/arts-entertainment-lifestyle/tasty-tidbits-heytea-reinvents-summer-drinks-with-fruity-flavors-and-fresh-ingredients/

Reporters: Chelsea Xie, Cynthia Xie and Lily Peng
Photographer: Chelsea Xie

09/04/2025

Nearby Bay Area school districts including San Jose Unified and San Ramon Valley Unified began enforcing stricter cellphone bans this fall. These sweeping bans reflect a growing trend of limiting technology usage across California high schools. In San Jose Unified, students must keep their phones out of reach for the entire school day. San Ramon Valley Unified restricted phone use to only during passing periods and breaks.

Reducing phone use during lessons could help students focus more deeply and engage more thoroughly with the material. Especially at Harker, where demanding coursework and extracurricular commitments often force students to multitask between assignments, limits on phone usage bring important benefits to high schoolers.

During the school day, many students use their phones to access social media platforms like Instagram or TikTok, a habit that has a strong correlation with higher levels of stress and anxiety and discourages face-to-face interaction. Partially restricting phone use would cut down on this distraction, helping students manage stress more productively and foster healthier social interactions on campus.

Full article: https://harkeraquila.com/90242/opinion/editorial/editorial-local-school-phone-ban-trend-highlights-trade-offs-for-learning-and-community/

Reporters: Editorial Board
Illustrator: Emma Li

09/03/2025

Junior Demi Zheng eagerly clicked into the President’s Volunteer Service Award (PVSA) application, already imagining the gold medal and certificate she would receive in the mail after logging over 100 hours of community service over the past year. Then, she read: “This form is no longer accepting submissions.” Her heart sank.

On May 27, the federal agency Americorps declared a temporary pause on applications and orders for the PVSA award through a post on their website. PVSA-certified organizations were not notified prior to the public post, and the announcement provided no explanation for the hiatus. However, the pause coincided with Americorps facing nearly $400 million in budget cuts and significant staffing reductions.

“When I first found out that PVSA was removed, I was extremely enraged,” Demi said. “I thought, ‘Is this the government’s way of telling us volunteering isn’t important?’ Removing it may cause people to have less of an incentive to volunteer, and that’s really bad.”
 Full article: https://harkeraquila.com/90264/features/presidents-volunteer-service-award-pause-prompts-student-to-reflect-on-volunteering-motivation/

Reporters: Risa Chokhawala and Chelsea Xie
Illustrator: Sarah Wang

09/02/2025

Members of the Class of 2026 gathered on Davis Field for the annual Senior Sunrise celebration at 6 a.m. on Monday.

As the first students back on campus, seniors cozied up with blankets, hot chocolate and donuts to watch the sunrise before the first day of school began.

“The sunrise is the start of the year, which I think is super cool, because at the end we have the Baccalaureate, which is our senior sunset,” senior student council representative Nikhil Sharma said. “To me, it’s just coming together as a class before school starts and celebrating the fact that we survived three years of high school.”

Full article: https://harkeraquila.com/90223/news/graduating-class-welcomes-new-dawn-with-senior-sunrise/

Reporters: Eva Cheng and Katie Tcheng
Photographer: Kairui Sun

08/30/2025

Join Harker Aquila as we check out what Upper School students are wearing this Friday!

Reporting and Videography by Lily Shi and Eva Cheng
Editing by Eva Cheng

Harker Aquila

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