Informer 2011-2012 T3 - USD 306 Southeast of Saline

The
Junior High Informer
Southeast of Saline, 5056 E. K-4 Highway, Gypsum, KS 67448
See The Informer on-line and in color! http://www.usd306.k12.ks.us/secondary/
May 22, 2012
Issue 3
Walking is overrated
By: Abbey Sorenson
On May 9th, junior high and high
school students had an assembly in
the lower gym, where they met
Matt Glowacki, who talked about
accepting people for who they are.
Matt Glowacki was born with no
legs. Throughout the whole assembly he would stop and wiggle his
legs, embracing the fact he doesn’t
have any. He even
says, “Walking is
overrated.”
Matt talked about
his childhood, one of
his most embarrassing moments, about
some of the many
places he traveled,
and how he never let
his disability hold
him back.
Matt hates the
words disability, stupid, and retarded.
When people call him
“guy in the wheel
chair” or ask him
what they should call
him he just replies,
“Call me Matt.” He
believes that if you’re
going to call someone
a name, call them by
their own.
He explained the rules of wheelchair basketball to Mr. Ptacek before playing 1 on 1 at the end of his
presentation. He demonstrated how
you should dribble the ball while in
a wheelchair, and certain fouls you
can get while playing.
He made everyone laugh while
he played against Mr. Ptacek in
wheel chair basketball, and was
surprised that Mr. Ptacek actually
beat him!
After the assembly everyone
was talking about it. It seemed like
all people could say was, “Best assembly ever!”
Matt Glowacki makes Mr. Ptacek laugh while he explains the rules of wheelchair basketball. Junior
high students got to listen to his story during the morning of May 9th. Photo by Mrs. Schoenfeld.
Editorials
The Junior High Informer
Page 2
Spend money on something useful!
By: Bryce Banks
According to www.latimes.com you have a 1
in 175,711,536 chance of picking the winning
numbers, and scoring a record
$540 million jackpot, through
playing Mega Millions lottery.
If I was one of the lucky
ones to win the lottery, this is
the way I would spend it. If I
won, I would invest 25% of
my money. This way if the
investment goes wrong, I
won’t lose all of my money.
Investing is a smart thing to do because you
can earn money once you win the lottery so you
keep getting more. It will also help you save money and not spend so much of it on things you want
rather than need. Once you get into investing your
winnings will start to grow .
The lucky ones that win the lottery sometimes
waste their money on things they don’t need or just
go gamble and try to win more money because it is
not enough for them. If I won the lottery I would
spend it on something useful. For example, if I had
leftover money I would either donate it or give it to
a family in need.
When people waste their money, it is just plain
stupid. I really don’t think very highly of people
who win millions of dollars and just let it go to
waste. I know it’s not my business, or my money,
but why wouldn’t you keep your money safe, or
save it for your children? Or donate it if you’re just
going to get rid of quickly?
I think that the people who run the lottery
should make a rule that if you win you can only
get a certain amount to spend at a time.
It is just so surprising about
how so many people blow all
of their money on things that
are not needed. So if you ever
win the lottery be smart with
your money and invest or donate.
Junior High Informer Staff
Editor in chiefs……Kendall Schlesner, Delani White, and Caden Kubat‐Smith Feature Editor………Jess Koehn, and Katy Jackson Copy Editor…………Abbey Sorenson, and Tovah Plumer Layout Editor………Bryce Banks, and Kyleigh Forsberg Sports Editor………Clayton Oderma , and Kylee Thaxton Photo Editor………Mary Winship, and James Green Reporters……………Larz Eus ce, Jack‐
son Montgomery, Aaron Butler, Sam Hines Advisor…………...Alycia Schoenfeld The Informer is a publica on produced
by the Informer class. This issue was
produced by the third trimester class.
Students in the class have wri en all of
the stories and chosen their own top‐
ics. Editorials in this issue do not neces‐
sarily reflect the opinion of the en re
editorials
The Junior High Informer
How to handle tornadoes
On Saturday,
April 14th it was
reported that there
were 118 tornados
happening in the
U.S., and most of
them were in Kansas. Some people may not know
what to do when they find out they
are in a tornado warning or how to
prepare for it.
One day while getting ready for
school I was listening to the radio.
The radio hosts were talking about
how there was supposed to be a lot
of storms coming up, and what
everybody should have in their
emergency kits.
You should have a battery powered radio, medical supplies in
case of injuries, food and water,
and a pair of shoes that way you
Page 3
By: Abbey Sorenson
danger and you may be blocking
wouldn’t have to walk barefoot
rescue teams from getting to peothrough any rubble.
I was staying the night at my
ple who need their help.
cousins house in New Cambria
and a bunch of tornados were
slowly moving towards us.
While the storm was going
on, I made a mental checklist
of everything I should have
By: Katy Jackson
with me.
We had a medical kit in
What state do we
the restroom, a radio, and
some food and water, but we live in? Oh yeah,
Kansas, the home of
forgot our shoes.
the deadly tornados.
When there’s a storm
On Saturday, April
nearby, you should always be 14th, Kansans were
prepared, and in a safe place. ‘terrorized’ by these
Stay in the basement if you
deadly storms.
have one, and don’t go outIn Kansas more
side to watch the tornados, or than 100 tornados
storm chase, because you
tore through the
secure room or a
basement. If you
would be putting yourself in land. Most people
Stay safe during
tornadoes!
were terrified, and
took cover immediately, but there were
a few that were stupidly underestimating the great power
of these storms.
When I went to
my designated storm
shelter, I took a
glance out a window
and saw neighbors
gawking at the
storm. All I wanted
to do was scream.
We live in a state
where tornados are
not to be taken lightly. People should
not underestimate
the sheer power of
these storms.
When a tornado
siren goes off, make
sure you are in a
have a weather radio, take that with
you. Just make sure
you are away from
windows, as tornados can rip them off
the sides of the
house.
When a storm is
only miles from
your home, make
sure you are safe.
Don’t go outside
and don’t chase the
storm. If a tornado
producing storm
comes too close,
you are a goner.
Tornados can demolish towns in a
matter of minutes.
Don’t underestimate
these forces of nature.
FEATURE
The Junior High Informer
Page 4
An unforgettable trip By: Abbey Sorenson
Brooke Albright knew one hundred percent someday she would
go to New York. What she didn’t
know was that someday was just
around the corner.
Over Spring Break, Brooke
took a trip to New York with her
mother, four people she takes
dance with, four dance teachers,
and two other parents. “My dance
company takes a trip there every
few years to take classes at Broadway Dance Center, and see some
shows,” said Brooke, an eighth
grader.
Even though it was Spring
Break and she was in New York,
Brooke had a very tight schedule.
She had to take three dance classes
while she was there; Broadway
jazz, theater dance, and tap dance.
She also got to see four Broadway
shows; first, she saw How to Suc-
ceed in Business without Even
Trying, with Nick Jonas as the
lead. Second, she watched Anything Goes, with lead Stephanie J.
Block. Third, she saw the
show Chicago. And last but
not least, she got to see
Memphis.
When Brooke did
have free time, she
did a lot of sightseeing, and shopping. Her favorite
places she went to
was Central Park and
Time square. She said
that just walking
around the parks
was one of her favorite experiences.
“There were some funny times
in New York, like the jokes that
only my dance friends and I would
understand,” Brooke said “Just
watching people on St. Patrick’s
Day was pretty funny.”
Five days was all it took for her
to fall in love with New York and
when they were over she couldn’t
wait for her next trip. “Fingers
crossed, I really want to go back,
but I don’t have any plans to go
back yet, “she said.
8th grade twins take a cruise By: Kyleigh Forsberg
The ocean is a huge place! It would be very easy
to get lost, unless of course you were on a giant
cruise ship. Easton and Erica Montgomery were on a
cruise this last spring break.
The cruise ship Easton and Erica were on, was
called Carnival Dream. On their trip, they stopped at
Cozumel, Belize, and Bhagini Bay. There was one
other place they were going to stop at, Costami, but
the waves
were to
big. They
went with
their family friends,
the Wells
family,
Calli Calahan, and
Collin Sexton.
The cruise ship left from Florida. To get to Florida, they flew out of Kansas City. The whole trip lasted ten days. Seven of those days were on the boat.
A cruise ship is huge, so of course there are tons of
things to do. When Easton and Erica went on their
cruise they did things like went swimming, went to a
Broadway show, went to a captain’s dinner, laid out
in the sun, and went to a teen’s club.
They also went snorkeling in the ocean and they
both said that was a lot of fun! They asked the instructor if there were sharks. He told them if they
went past the coral, they were done for!
The twins say they had a good time and would
love to go on a cruise to somewhere new again
someday!
FEATURE
The Junior High Informer
Dirty jobs of SES
If you think about it,
janitors and lunch ladies
have to do a lot of jobs
around the school. Usually, they aren’t very clean
jobs and they are usually
our messes.
One of the dirty jobs at
SES would have to be
getting gum off desks.
But from the janitors
opinion, they say it’s minor.
The janitors usually
clean the gum off the
desks in the summer, but
there are no more student
aide janitors hired in the
summer like they used to
have. If you realize how
many desks there are
compared to janitors,
there are way more desks.
This is a time consuming
job and gross.
The giant slop bucket
is pretty gross, too! All
that half eaten food is just
Page 5
By: Jackson Montgomery
a load of germs. The janitors dump it in the dumpster and then hose it out
so it’s clean, but only to
get dirty again. People
think that this is a gross
job, but the janitors don’t
find it that gross.
According to the ones
I talked to, “Bathrooms
and locker rooms are the
gross jobs.” When they
do these jobs, they usually wear gloves. Janitors
say," Gross jobs only
happen about 2 to 3 times
a week.”
Most of the time their
jobs don’t bother them.
“Someone’s got to do it!”
they said. They take certain parts of the building.
Each day is the same.
One has upstairs and the
other has downstairs.
They do a great job keeping our school in shape!
Mr. Couchman was
open to
answering a
few
questions I
had for
him. He
thinks
that the
dirtiest
jobs
The dumpster at lunch is filled with scraps after
would
students eat what they want for the day. For
be mow- many, emptying it would be considered a “”Dirty
ing the Job”. Picture by Sam Hines.
huge
school yard in the heat of ty would be bad and the
summer, replacing filters bathrooms would be hard
in the HVAC system, and to use when needed,” he
said.
parts of the plumbing
Overall we should all
process.
However, he knows be thankful for our janithey are important jobs. tors. I know I wouldn’t
want to do all of these
“If they didn’t do these
jobs that they do. They
jobs though, the grass
would be overgrown with are right; someone has to
weeds, the school would do it –even if it is a dirty
be dusty and the air quali- job!
7th Graders in the spotlight! By: Mary Winship
Khendal Summers,
Gracie Stutterheim and
Madison Roths all have
been in many plays so far
in their performing careers, and now they can
add to that list Cinderella. Cinderella will be performed at the Salina community theatre this summer.
Tryouts were on April
st
21 . Madison tried out
for one of the ugly step
sisters. Gracie and
Khendal were both just
trying for any girl lead.
For these three girls,
performing arts are part
of their lifestyle, along
with other hobbies. Some
of Khendal’s hobbies,
besides singing, are
drawing, and writing.
Some of Gracie’s hobbies
are piano, and dance.
Madison likes to read.
Gracie has been in
plays such as the Sound
of music, the Miracle
Worker, Annie, Sussical
Jr., and the Spring Thing.
Khendall has been in the
King and I, Willy Wonka
Jr., and the Wizard of Oz.
Madison has also been in
many plays like the Lion
King, the Wizard of Oz,
and CTA center stage.
Braydon Boyer and
Brooke Albright also
tried out for Cinderella.
Everyone
from our
school that
tried out
made it.
They still
have to have
another audition to see
what part they will get.
As you can see we have
very many talented singers and performers in our
school.
feature
Spatula Joe makes display
You might be surprised to learn that one of
our very own students
contracted the drawing
fever! It is an uncontrollable disease that causes
you to draw constantly
every second of the day
without stopping. Cedar
VanTassel is responsible
for creating all these
characters and wacky stories.
Cedar VanTassel, a
seventh grader, started
drawing comics in fifth
grade. He would draw
them in class and sometimes at home. I asked
Page 6
The Junior High Informer
him what got him started
on drawing these comics
and characters and he
said, “I mainly started
drawing because I was
bored and had nothing
else to do.” One of the
posters Cedar made for a
project ended up on Mr.
Garretson’s board in his
room. On the poster there
were many characters.
Cedar has created several, but in the middle is the
famous spatula Joe.
When he makes these
drawings they usually
take place in Russia, the
West Indies, and the At-
By Bryce Banks
lantic Ocean. The names
of the characters he
makes are Spatula Joe,
Midget Whale, Vladimir
the bodiless Russian, and
Rocket Fish. “Aspen
helps me brainstorm these ideas and think of new
characters,” said Cedar.
The biggest cartoon
Cedar has made was an 8
page Spatula Joe story, he
worked on it at home and
at school. He is in the
process of making another one right now but
won’t reveal what it is
about. I asked Cedar if he
plans to do this as a job
someday. He said he
would like to because he
enjoys drawing and
thinks he could go far
with these stories. “I
would like to make my
own comic book series
and get it published so
that people could buy it,”
said Cedar.
Cedar said he is going
to keep practicing and
making new stories in
hope to make a living out
of it when he gets older.
We don’t know if he will
ever be free of his drawing fever.
Students who are fans of the popular novel The Hunger Games, will appreciate Cedar’s work above, as the movie premiered this
March and was very popular among our JH students. For another cartoon by Cedar, see page 3.
Feature
The Junior High Informer
Fiest catches fishing fever
There are so many things people do
for fun, like hanging out with friends,
spending time on Facebook, playing
sports, and many other things. Well, in
the spring, Zach Fiest likes to fish with
his spare time along with doing track.
Zach has several favorite fishing
spots. He likes to go to his friend’s
pond, (where he once caught a 6 1/2
lbs. largemouth bass) and he also goes
to Kanopolis Lake. He likes to fish at Kanopolis because it has lots of different fish in it.
Kody plays baseball
Page 7
By: Clayton Odermatt
The biggest fish that Zach has ever
caught was a 9.3 lbs largemouth bass
that he caught just this year in Jess and
Landon Koehn`s farm pond near their
house. “I thought my pole was going to
snap in half!” said Zach. The smallest
fish he has ever caught was a 1/4 lbs.
crappie at Kanopolis.
Zach has been fishing since he was 3
and loves to fish with his dad and his
brother. He has already started on this year’s season!
By: Aaron Butler
What`s your favorite part about baseball? Well,
Kody`s favorite part is hitting the ball. Kody Berry,
an 8th grader, is excited for playing this season, by
being a member of the Vipers.
Kody has played since he was about six years
old. He plays second and third base, shortstop, center
field, pitcher, and catcher.
Kody`s favorite team to play on is the Vipers. The
Vipers have made it to
fifth place since he has
played.
Kody wants to play
as long as he can.
With summer approaching, he is excited for baseball
season.
Tovah
‘Jazzie Fizzle’ and her hip hop dancing By:
Plumer
Do you
ever dance
‘till you drop?
Well Jasmine
Merrill, 8th
grader, has,
when she
twisted her
ankle doing a pirouette,
which is a type of turn, in
ballet. But she hasn’t
stopped yet! She’s been
doing dance for ten years
and counting, and has
done very well at recent
competitions.
Many people do dance
these days, but Jasmine
does four kinds! Of
course the usual
kinds are ballet,
tap, and jazz. But
she also does hiphop! “Hip-hop is
my favorite, because it has more
energy to it, plus
it brings the ‘Jazziefizzle’ out of me!” said
Jasmine.
In recent competitions,
Jasmine and the people in
her class have gotten two
first places and only one
third place. Before she
begins her competitions,
she feels nervous and excited. She takes dance
lessons at a place called
Stepz which is a very nice
dance place.
Jasmine first knew that
she wanted to do dance
when she was four. Her
mother had put her in
dance classes and inspired
her because she too had
once been a dancer. Jasmine says that her family
feels happy and excited
that she is doing dance,
and she wants to continue
until she is at least 30
years old.
Once when Jasmine
was in ballet she accidentally hurt herself. She
was
doing a pirouette and
twisted her ankle! Once
she recovered she was
fine and continued dancing. She practices every
Wednesday from 6:30 –
9:00 p.m. and every Saturday from 1:00 – 3:30, at
Stepz.
Even though Jasmine’s
been dancing for ten
years, she still really enjoys it, because it is her
passion and is the one
thing she loves to do.
“Dance like no one is
watching!” says Jasmine.
Sports/Editorial
Page 8
The Junior High Informer
Sportsmanship: shake hands and be nice
By: Delani White
Have you ever helped someone up in a sport if they
fell or didn’t brag if you are winning, in the game? If so,
has anyone ever helped you up? These would be good
examples of sportsmanship.
When you are in a basketball game and someone hits
you or blocks you out and you fall over, would you want
them to come and help you up or just walk away? I know
I wouldn’t just want them to walk away after they hit me.
The thoughts might cross my mind, “Like for real?
You’re just going to walk away after you hit me and I’m
on the ground? Come on and have some sportsmanship!
It’s not going to hurt you if you help someone up!”
Another great spot to show sportsmanship is when you
are shaking hands at the end of the game. Actually hit
their hand on your way through the line, and don’t punch
it or miss it on purpose because that’s rude. It shows people that you don’t have class or sportsmanship. It’s not
going to hurt you by shaking someone’s hands if you lose
or win. Be a good sport and don’t be rude while you are
playing a game.
So, when you are playing against any sort of game,
shake their hands and if someone falls down help them
up, it’s the nice thing to do.
Prospects basketball invited to Tulsa
By Kendall Schlesener
Only about thirty teams get into
The Big Event, a basketball tournament in Tulsa, OK and they come
from the Midwest area of the United
States. The Prospects basketball team
from Salina was good enough to be
invited to this tournament. Ben Murray, Jess Koehn, and Jackson Montgomery were players on the Prospects
from SES.
“We were invited by Doug Finch,”
Ben said. Doug Finch is the head
coach of the Salina Central High
School basketball team. He also
coached the Prospects when they
went to Tulsa.
“We went 1-2 for the tournament,
but we still played well,” Jess said.
They lost the first game 30-35 to a
good Oklahoma team. They won the
next 52-26 to a different Oklahoma
team. The last game they lost 47-62
to a very good team from Texas.
The Prospects team includes other
people from other schools. They are
Hunter Budke, Caydren Cox, Brayden
Neuschafer, and Dylan Wentzel.
Wresting season finishes up
Southeast of Saline junior high wrestlers started
wresting in the middle of
January and ended on the
second of March after doing
really well in the league
meet. They had seven total
meets; two of those were
home meets.
Mr. Krehbiel, the Southeast wrestling coach, was
very pleased with the season’s out
come. He was very happy
with how many wrestlers
went out and that they had
their first girl wrestler,
eighth grader Angelica
Hurst, in twelve years.
The best individual record by a wrestler this year
was 15-2 and it was held by
Bryce Banks. There were
many league winners and
several second places, the
exact stats were recorded
They were all from other Salina
schools.
“It’s exciting to see how good you
are against better teams,” all of the
players agreed. Playing in Tulsa was
a new experience for the team. In
their words, the teams were “bigger
and more athletic” than what they are
used to.
The basketball tournament was a
good experience and they would do it
all again because it made them better.
By: Bryce Banks
but were lost.
Next year Mr. Krehbiel
would like to teach more
leg wrestling and would
like to get more 7th graders
to come out. To upcoming
junior high students, he
says, “Give wrestling a try.
You never know how good
you could end up being,”
said Mr. Krehbiel.
Wrestling lasted 8 weeks
total, and ended right before
track. Mr. Krehbiel expects
lots of kids to come out and
work very hard next year.
He is really excited for next
season.
Sports
The Junior High Informer
Page 9
Track boys set records, work hard
By: Caden Kubat -Smith
The junior high boys track
team had an amazing season. They
set records and practiced hard to
achieve their goals. The junior
high track team had some really
tough opponents during the season, but found success in their
meets.
Mr. Lilly said, “With the
small number we had on our team,
they did pretty well.” He also said
that our biggest competitors during
the season would have had to have
been Beloit and Ellsworth.
Mr. Lilly said that boys did
a pretty good job in choosing
events for their own events. He
also said, ‘‘I had to persuade some
of them to sign up for some of the
events.’’
One person that had an interesting season was Jackson Montgomery, he is currently a seventh
grader here at our school and he
did have an interesting
season because Jackson was a sprinter for
the team at the beginning of the year . One
day Mr. Lilly decide to
put Jackson in the
1600 meter race which
is four laps around the
track, , because he kept
getting beat by Ben
Murray, also a seventh
grader at our school.
Jackson ended up doing pretty well in the
mile run.
During the season, many
records were set, included the
javelin record and it was set by
Easton Montgomery. This is the
first year for javelin in junior high
so anybody that threw the farthest
in each division would be setting
the records. For 8th graders, that
was Easton.
Therefore boys track has
had a good season this year. Mr.
Lilly also gave the boys some
advice for next year’s track
teams. He
said to just
stay competitive in what
you do and
try to be the
best.
From top picture, clockwise: Bryce Kelley high jumps. Zach Feist runs in a relay at a home
meet. The 8th grade boys practice by running some sprints early in the season. Seventh grader
Aaron Butler runs at a home meet.
Sports
The Junior High Informer
Page 10
New event added to list: Javelin
By: Kylee Thaxton
Track season started, and with it
came the addition of a new event,
javelin.
Javelin wasn’t a very popular
subject when some coaches from
other schools were requesting to add
javelin to the list of events. Beloit,
Russell and Republic County all
requested for schools to add javelin
to the list to make the meets more
like a high school meet.
Mr. Lilly wasn’t a very big supporter when it came down to this
decision. His biggest worry was that
somebody would hurt their arm for
their summer sports that they might
be participating in.
Mr. Peterson was the lucky one
who got to teach the entire junior
high throwers’ group, how to throw
a javelin. He said, “It’s easier to
teach them when they are young.
But it can also be more difficult because they can’t focus and listen as
much.” He also said, “It has also
added a lot more time, and there
isn’t much time left to do a workout
like the rest of the track kids do, or
work on the other throwing events.”
Javelin is a throwing event
where you basically throw a long
metal rod. You try to throw in between the designated area. There are
a million different ways to throw a
javelin. You can either just run and
throw, or do certain steps. You just
try to throw as far as you can without throwing it out of bounds.
Setting records has been on everybody’s mind this season. Every-
body
wants to
set the
next goal
or beat
the other person out of theirs. But,
there can only be one out of every
boy and girl in each grade to have
that goal. The record holders this
year for the SES javelin in junior
high are Jacob Wespe and Kylee
Thaxton from seventh grade, and
Jace Stephenson and Easton Montgomery from eighth grade.
Everybody kept improving at
every meet as the season finished
off. Maybe next year the record will
be broken by the new seventh and
eighth graders.
The JH high scholars’ team finishes strong
By: Jess Koehn
This year was a good year for
the junior high scholars’ bowl
team. The 2012 team had 9 meets
and did well at them, too.
The coach of the team was Mr.
McClure. He said, “The season
was good a one.” There was no
league meet this year because he
didn’t arrange one.
Several kids went out for scholars’ bowl. There were more 7th
graders than 8th, the amount of 7th
graders was 19 and the amount of
8th graders was 15. “The amount
of kids this year was very good,”
he said. However, he would like to
see more kids committing to it in
the future; the more kids that commit the better they will do.
“The 8th graders were awesome
because it was the first time they
th
placed all year.
and the 7 graders came along
great,” Mr. McClure said. He
thought this season had
about the same success
as last season.
Orion Perry, one of
the players, said the 8th
graders did really good
but the 7th graders didn’t
at times.
One of the tournaments at Ellsworth had
12 teams there and the
8th graders got 1st and the
7th graders got 2nd .That
was a really good day
Madison Roths, seventh grader, and Sydney Clements,
for both teams. This
also a seventh grader, help out their team at the home
tournament was a big
meet. Photo by Liberty Bell.
th
deal for the 7 graders
Sports
Page 11
The Junior High Informer
Girls’ track season finishes strong
The 2012 track season for junior high girls at SES has ended.
There were 28 girls out for track
this year, a few less than last year.
The eighth grade girls got second
in league and the seventh grade
girls got third in league.
“Over the whole season, the
girls did very well,” Mr. Lilly said.
The seventh grade girls finished in
the top three every meet. The
eighth grade girls won most of the
meets.
“This year was one of the best
years for weather, although Minneapolis’s meet was rescheduled,”
Mr. Lilly said. The first two track
meets were a little chilly, but then
the weather really warmed up.
The Minneap-
olis track meet was rescheduled
because of rain.
The seventh grade girls’ best
meet was in Minneapolis, finishing in first place. The eighth grade
girls’ best meets were at Lyons,
Ellsworth, SES, and Council
Grove, finishing first place in every one of those meets, as a team.
Athletes from the seventh grade
girls division broke three records.
They broke the medley relay, by
two seconds. The team was Kylee
Thaxton, Taylor Wells, Kendall
Schlesener, and Sam Hines. Emily Wiles broke the 200 meter hurdles record. Kylee Thaxton broke
the javelin record; it was the first
year JH athletes could do the
event.
By Kendall Schlesener
Eighth grade athletes broke
four records. They broke the
4x400 meter relay. The team was
Allison Stutterheim, Kylee
Poague, Emme Roesner, and Delani White. Allison Stutterheim
broke two records this year, the
800 meter and the 1600 meter records. Jace Stephenson broke the
javelin record; it was the first year
to do the event in 8th grade as well.
This season for girls’ track
went very well. Mr.Lilly hopes
that all of the athletes consider
track next year as well. Next year
maybe the team can work even
harder and make a run at league
champs.
10
4
7
11
1.
2
1.
2.
3.
8
5
3
6
9
Anna Francis throws the discus;
Delani White jumps in long jump.
Mary Winship practices for relays
4. Kylee Thaxton jumps in triple
jump.
5. Taylor Wells runs in the 4x1.
6. Liberty Bell runs the 400 meter
dash.
7. Erica Montgomery starts for hurdles.
8. Kendall Schlesener jumps high in
triple jump.
9. Taylor Wells jumps in long jump.
10. Seventh grade girls run the 1600.
11. Sam Hines runs the 1600.
Photos by Allie Beaumont and Katy
Jackson.
News
Page 12
The Junior High Informer
7th graders study ecosystems
By: Mary Winship
Starting after State Assessments this spring, the
7th graders studied ecosystems in science class, at 2 of
the 3 spots Mrs. Clements
picked out for them.
Students marked a 1 meter by 1 meter area in our
ecosystem, gathered plants,
and also insects to research
and find out what they
were.
Madison Potts said she
liked this project because
we got to go outside. She
said it was fun to do something different. “It was a
very cool learning experi-
ence,” replied Katy Jackson
when asked what she
thought of the ecosystem
project.
Mrs. Clements said the
project was a success even
though we had to stop in the
middle of the project because of the rainy weather.
“The purpose of this unit
was to help the 7th graders
be more aware of the plants
and insects around them.
It’s amazing how people
don’t know that the big purple flower is called an iris.”
stated Mrs. Clements.
Seventh Grader’s find a bird in a tree. Photo by Mrs. Clements.
Mrs. Clements said that if
going outside, but not the
she did this unit again she
research part.
would change a few things.
Many of the students liked
May the odds be ever in your favor!
By: Tova Plumer
While most of us were in
vocal, those who weren’t
were in the hunger games!
Well, not the real hunger
games. They were really interested in the book so Mrs.
Schoenfeld decided to make
different competitions they
would enjoy.
One competition was
where they had to make costumes based on their district.
They had two class periods
to make them and had to
bring supplies from home.
Some took some time and
were hard, but others were
easy. Some other competitions were: creating a menu,
the casting call poster challenge, plant identification,
the 60 sec. recap, and they
had to make an original trailer or movie of the book.
First they were graded
individually for class credit.
Then the projects were sent
to anonymous judges in the
building who would rank
them. The results would
eliminate a district, or group,
each round if they were the
lowest in ranking. The students would find out by a
video played in class, similar
to the capitol’s message that
would project in the sky during the book.
They would then get tickets based on their rank as
well. The ’reaping’ tickets
were drawn from at the end
of the competition, and if the
‘odds’ were not in the
tribute’s favor, a consequence would be assigned.
The students in these
games were lucky enough to
pick their partner, but got to
draw a number to see what
their districts would be.
The ironic thing is that in
The multimedia class shares their district’s costumes. Photo by Mrs. Schoenfeld
these games District 12, Jordan Schoen and Anthony
Knight, happened to be the
first to be disqualified. In the
book, that is not the case.
The victors that stayed alive
in every round, were Caitlyn
Halpain and Amanda Dickerman. They received a dessert
feast and got to invite friends
to attend.
Editorial/Feature
The Junior High Informer
Page 13
Tighten security on the prisoners
By: Larz Eustice
As you know,
breakouts are literally happening all over the place!
Just this spring, a
breakout occurred in Minneapolis. Four men were
on the loose, and they used
clever tactics to escape
prison. This is likely to
happen again later in the
future.
On the front page of the
Salina Journal on April 19,
2012, the newspaper stated
that, on April 18, a
breakout had occurred in
the Ottawa County Detention Center in the town of
Minneapolis. One of the
escapees turned himself in
and one was captured, so
two remained to be caught
in the days following the
incident.
I was surprised when I
read the article because
breakouts usually happen
in bigger towns and cities
like Wichita and Topeka. I
was also surprised that the
four men urged their inmates to escape with them,
but the others simply refused to leave and remained in their own cells
instead. The four men then
decided to leave their inmates and escape on their
own.
The reason that I have
chosen to write on this
topic is because I might
have a solution to the
problem. I have a feeling
that we should tighten our
security even more OR we
should try to set a goal to
improve technology.
Nowadays, criminals try
to use sneaky tactics as a
way of escaping prison. If
we post more guards or
seal doors stuck shut with
a self-identifying scanner
or something similar to all
of that, it might help a little.
All that I am trying to
say is that we should either
improve our technology or
tighten our security so that
breakout issues will occur
less often or will stop altogether. That would probably discourage any
breakout plans of all crim-
Justin’s fight against a brain tumor
By: Jess Koehn
Just imagine that your
dad had cancer, and then
you find out that you
have a brain tumor. That
would be a tough situation to react to. What
would you do at that
point? Well, this happened to one of Southeast’s very own students
that most of us know.
Justin Jensen, seventh
grader, was faced with
this situation.
Justin’s was diagnosed with a brain tumor
at the end of the school
last year. This year there
was a fund raiser for the
Jensen family.
Justin missed two
months of school, and in
order to do his school
work; he was tutored one
on one in the hospital. He
did three to four pages of
homework daily, and
when he was in the hospital he took a couple of
tests for school also.
Justin’s family handled the situation with
courage. He just said that
his parents said, ‘Here we
go again.’
It took him 11 hours
to get to Memphis for his
visit there. He left to
Memphis on January 2nd
and came back on February 2nd. He stayed for a
month in the hospital. He
still goes there for checkups every once in a
while.
Justin is a strong person to go through all that
then come back to school
that same year.
Justin told me that he
was happy to come to
back to school. He said
that he was ready to come
and see his friends, and I
wouldn’t blame him. I
would like to see my
friends if I was gone that
long.
All in all, this was a
frightening moment for
his family, and a lot to
take over but, they stuck
together they got through
as a family.
News
Page 14
The Junior High Informer
Mr. Everhart will be missed!
Twenty years ago, our elementary
& junior high counselor, Mr. Everhart,
walked among the halls of SES for the
first time. Sadly, he is now retiring.
Lots of people are asking, “Why?!”
Well, I just happen to have the answer!
According to Mr. Everhart, every
teacher has something called a
“teaching license”, and Mr. Everhart knew his was going
to run out this year so he decided not to renew it, as he
was also ready to retire.
He started teaching and coaching at first. Then the
school he was at, in Lincoln KS, asked him to be their
high school counselor, so he went back to school to get
By: Kyleigh Forsberg
his masters so he could be their counselor. He always
knew he wanted to work closely with kids, and being the
school counselor took that to the next step.
I’m sure many of you will be happy to know Mr. Everhart will come back and visit for things like games and
plays at our school. He is excited to retire but says he
will miss his job. He says when he retires he will do
things like go fishing, farming, go camping, house work,
and whatever else he wants!
Mr. Everhart was a teacher and a coach for five years
and has been a counselor for 38! The thing he says he’ll
miss the most about his job is the student contact, but is
ready to be leaving after doing it for so long. We sure will
miss him!
Rita Johnson back to work again
Rita Johnson, secondary secretary
in the SES main office, had the
scare of her life on a Friday morning in March. “I woke up on Friday
morning and I had no feeling in my
left arm at all, ” said Rita. She was
terrified and didn’t know what to
do. Her husband drove her to the emergency room.
Rita had multiple tests done and they came to
the conclusion that she had a stroke and a blood clot
in her brain. “When I had the stroke it made the
blood clot in my brain burst. The blood clot that I
had was called Cerebral Vascular Accident. The clot
had come from my blood being so thick.”
She was in the hospital for a couple of days
and put on blood thinner, to keep her blood from get-
By: Sam Hines
ting so thick so she won’t have another blood clot or
stroke. “I go into the doctor’s office to see what my
blood levels are at, and if my levels get to low then
they have to put me on more medication to keep my
blood normal.”
Several friends, coworkers, and students
missed Rita in the office that week. “I’m confident
that Southeast did just fine without me. Mrs. Augustine and Mrs.Blaha took care of things in such a
great way. The substitutes that had been in the office
were familiar with it as well.”
“I am in full recovery now and have complete
control of my body again, it feels great.” Rita has
been doing some physical therapy for her body so it
can be at its best.
New sport for women hits Salina this year
By Kyleigh Forsberg
In Salina, there
are all
kinds of
collision
sports for
guys, like
football, rugby, lacrosse,
soccer, etc. What kind of
collision sports are there for
women? Well, there aren’t
very many, but now roller
derby has been added to
that list!
Some girls like to play
rough sports just as much as
guys. Some of those women, earlier on this year, decided it was time to add
one. They thought that
Wichita had a roller derby
team and it would be cool if
Salina one. Some ladies got
a team together and named
it Salina Sirens.
Their goal is to practice
for a year and then start a
(Continued on page 15)
News
Page 15
The Junior High Informer
Healthier school award for SES
Many people remember school
lunches as being gross. Even movies
portray lunches as being gross. People
seem to think that if they went back to
school, that lunch would be horrible.
Well, not at our school. Our school
is one of few schools that get compliments about our food. Did you also
know that our school is one of the
schools in the nation that is healthy
for you too? When the current first
lady, Michelle Obama came into the
white house, she started the healthier
school lunch award. All you have to
do is meet the federal nutrition guide
lines.
Well believe it or not, it wasn’t
very hard to get this award because
our school has been doing this already
for years. All it takes is 6 people and
7 ½ hours a day to do this. Sounds
easy right? Not. Our lunch staff works
very hard to make amazing lunches
every day.
Sure, turkey sandwiches for lunch
aren’t the some of the kids’ favorite
thing on the menu but everyone needs
a break every now and then! If you
worked in the kitchen you might not
even last a second. There is no such
thing as laziness in the kitchen. It’s all
hard work.
The school was awarded an apple
trophy and a 1500 dollar check towards school lunches. This makes it
even better for the school because as
you might have been told our school
is on a tight budget.
Our school’s lunches are very nutritious and healthy for you. So congratulations to our lunch staff. You’re
the best possible lunch staff ever.
Thanks for all the good and healthy
lunches.
Pop-tab winners help big time
Have you ever been to a hospital
and seen a sick child? It touches your
heart. If you have ever seen a Ronald
Mc Donald House, that probably
would too. The Ronald Mc Donald
House is a place where the families of
sick children can stay close to their
sick family member.
To help raise money for the
Ronald Mc Donald House, people can
collect pop-tabs and turn them in to a
Ronald Mc Donald House. There they
can be recycled and money is made.
This money purchases necessities for
(Continued from page 14)
junior training team.
You have to be 18 to actually join the real derby
team, and were a lot of people who want to practice or
join or train the team but
couldn’t. The junior training
team would be for grade
school, JH, and high school
girls. The whole purpose of
this is to get the girls that
joined roller derby, to get
good at the sport. Then, as
soon as they turn 18, they
those families while they’re at that
hospital.
This year, Southeast of Saline Jr.
and Sr. High helped collect pop-tabs
for them. Allie Beaumont was one of
the students collecting those pop-tabs
for those families.
Allie Beaumont, and her family
have been collecting pop-tabs for
years now, and Allie was one of the
Jr. High students that collected the
most pop-tabs. “People were amazed
I could bring in so many pop-tabs.”
Allie said. “Every time I brought
can actually join the team
and be good and ready!
A lot of people I talk to
have never even heard of
roller derby before it hit Salina. The floor that the sport
is mainly played on is not a
normal, flat floor. It is
shaped like an
oval and embanked.
There is ONE
really important
player. She has a
star cap on her hel-
By: James Green
By: Katy Jackson
them in, people just looked at me with
shock.”
Allie collected 14-15 soda bottles
full of pop-tabs. “Collecting pop-tabs
was easy, because of all the years of
collecting them.” Allie said. Allie
collected the most pop-tabs in Jr.
High.
Allie and her family still collect
pop-tabs today. “It’s good to recycle.”
Allie said. She feels accomplished
that she helped all those families getting through their tough time at the
hospital.
met and she is the only person that can score points.
She will get a point every
time she passes the star
player on the other team.
The girls with the star caps
on are normally fast and
small (so they can squeeze
between people).
All of the other
players on the
team are
called blockers. Their job
is to make space
for the star player to get by.
They do this by bumping the
other girls or pushing them
away. The blockers are usually big girls.
Roller derby looks and
sounds like a lot of fun. Of
course I want to join the
junior training team, but a
lot of others might not because it’s very rough. If they
don’t, this means more playing time for me!
News / Extra
The Junior High Informer
Celebrating the end of
7th and 8th grade
By Delani White
SES Jr. High students end the 2011-2012 school year
with a Promotion Night and an End of the School Year
dance, on May 18th and 22nd.
Promotion Night is the night when 8th graders get
promoted to high school, and when 7th graders move on
to 8th grade. Students also get recognized for any activity
they participated in this school year, and any academic
achievements. Promotion Night is held in the High
School gym on May 22nd ,2012.
Jr. High Stucco was in charge of the dance. It was
held on Friday, May 18th 2012.
Geography Bee Takes
Place
By: Delani White
Seventh and eighth graders took a test for the
geography bee. Those who qualified, then participated in the bee, on May 17, in the tech lab.
The Geography Bee is just like the spelling bee
except for they don’t ask you spelling questions
they ask geography questions. There were questions
such as, ‘What is the largest city in the United
States?” or “What is the longest river in the United
States?”
“You don’t even have to study,” said Mr. Garretson. “It is just common knowledge.”
Mr. Garretson said, “It is just a fun learning experience.” This year’s winner was Bryce Kelly,
eighth grader. Runner up was Cole Leister.
Informer Summer Fun Puzzles
Beach
Boats
Bug spray
Cookouts
Fishing
Lemonade
Picnic
Popsicles
Sunglasses
Sunscreen
Heat
Friends
Vacation
Swimming
Flowers
Page 16