Boys socceoff on the see page 6

Well Said:

March Mad-dd

ness is the sickest,

coolest, baddest

event of the year. It’s

full of miracles and

splendors and magi-

cal what-ifs of all

kind!

Said by senior, Nathan Aa-gard about the NCAA March Madness tournament.

“

ness isness is

”s of alls of all

Contents A & E................9 Crossword.........10 Features.............5 News..................1 Sports................6 Opinion.............4

Upcoming events:

Today: Region drama @

Emery

Parent teacher conference

6:00-8:30 p.m.

Cheer tryouts

4:00-6:00 p.m.

Thursday: Parent teacher

conference 6:00-8:30 p.m.

Boys tennis NS @ Wasatch

Softball NS @ Delta

Boys soccer NS @ Maple

Mountain

Cheer red and white night

7:00p.m.

Friday: JV softball tourna-

ment NS @ Payson

Track NS @ Pineview

State Jazz Festival

Baseball NS @ Delta

Saturday: Track NS @

Pineview

JV Softball tournament NS @

Payson

By the Numbers:

Final score of the boys soccer game against Gunnison.

Ending with a NS vicotry.

Number of years Courtney Syme has served in the NS

School District

Score the NS jazz band received from every judge at region which is the best score

achievable.

I

34

3-2

S jazz band excells t region, prepares for statesee page 9

V o i c e o f t h e M i g h t y H a w k s

BY SY ADIE IVIE

With the school year wellon its way to the finish, se-niors are feeling the pressures and stress of making their fi-nal college decisions. Many are still undecided about where they are attending col-lege, how they are going to pay for it and where they are going to live.

“I’m either going to We-ber State or Snow,” said se-nior Carissa Lynn Garff. “I’m ffffnot sure yet.”

A lot of planning and thinking goes into making these decisions, and the task may seem very daunting to some. However, many fac-

tors may help seniors make their final choice. Things like cost, location and friendsmay just be the thing that persuades a senior to choose one school over the next.

After a recent survey tak-kken at NS, cost was ranked as the most important factor in making college choices fol-lowed by programs offered, fffffamily, friends, recreational and social activities, atmo-sphere, size, location, reputa-tion and finally, appearance.

With the economy still in recession, the cost of a col-lege education rising andmany people losing their jobs, it is not surprising that cost was ranked highest. Ac-

cording to collegeboard.com students can expect to pay anywhere from $172 to $1,096 more for college than last year’s students.

“Money was a big part in deciding to go to Snow,” said senior Lincoln Olmstead.

Many students are find-ing a solution to the problem of cost through scholarships and grants. There are many opportunities to get free schooling out there and se-niors are on the search to get as much money as they can.

“My decision now de-pends on what scholarships I

BY BY RANDI PEAHL

After 34 years of servicein the North Sanpete School District, Superintendent Courtney D. Syme will retire on June 30, 2010.

Syme has been superin-tendent in the NS School District for 10 years. He has put 25 out of his 34 years into administration, much longer than most.

“It’s time,” Syme said, “Thirty-four years is a long time in education of any en-deavor.”

Syme attended sever-al colleges before obtaining his associate degree from Snow College with honors. He then attended Brigham Young University, with an ac-ademic scholarship, where he majored in elementary edu-cation. He later obtained his Master of Education Degree in Public School Adminis-tration from Brigham Young University.

“I felt that [education] was something I wanted to do, and was a worthy endeav-or,” Syme said.

Syme began his teaching career at Fairview Elemen-tary School in 1976. He has stayed in the district ever since. He taught at Mount Pleasant Elementary and Spring City Elementary un-til he switched to administra-

BY CY ARLY CY HAPMAN

The Utah Basic Skills Competen-cy Test has been completed by un-enthusiastic tenth graders for over a decade. Now, the test comes to a standstill and perhaps to its demise.

The UBSCT has been suspended for two years, which means students in grades eight through eleven are ex-cused from the test. But before stu-dents get too excited about this elim-ination, they must be informed of the plans our school district has on fu-ture testing.

“I really would be surprised if we went back to the UBSCT,” said Les-lie Keisel, Assistant Superintendent. She advocates a new system of testing sanctioned by the Blue Ribbon Com-mission of Testing and Accountabil-ity that couples a system of adaptive testing and another trio of national tests ending with the ACT.

Adaptive testing is a computerized test taken three times a year in math, science, and English.

“It’s more testing…but you have better data,” said Keisel. “It really ze-roes in on your…grade level of per-formance.”

Adaptive testing monitors stu-dents’ progress throughout the year instead of one comprehensive exit exam, like the UBSCT. Keisel said itgives teachers a clearer picture of stu-dents. Teachers would be responsible for interpreting the results and mod-ifying lesson plans to cater to stu-dents’ educational needs.

“The teachers here teach becausethey want you to learn,” said Jason Strate, vice principal.

The second part of the proposed new testing system includes the ACT trio of tests: Explore, taken in the eighth or ninth grade; Plan, taken in

tenth grade; and the ACT, taken as an upperclassmen.

Whereas the UBSCT simply tests students on the Utah core curricu-lum, the ACT would test students on a national level.

Strate predicts that the require-ment of taking this test would en-courage more students to go to col-lege. The ACT would serve as an entrance exam to college as well as an exit exam for high school, free of charge to the student body.

The success of this new testing plan waits on a current study prov-

tion in 1985. He was the vice-princi-

pal and principal at North Sanpete Middle School forfive years. It was about this time that Assistant Superin-tendent Leslie Keisel began teaching at NSMS. She has looked up to him for many reasons since then.

“I respect him as a leader,” Keisel said. “He shows a lot of respect for his administra-tors under him.”

These leadership qualitieshelped him to be a principal at NSH for ten years, longerthan most people in his posi-tion. After his time as princi-pal at NSH, he moved up to the position of superinten-dent.

During his time as an ad-ministrator, Syme has re-ceived awards for his ded-ication and excellence inthe district. He received the award for Outstanding Mid-dle School Principal in 1989-1990 from the Utah Rural School Association. Among others, he also received an Award for Excellence in 1994 from the North Sanpete Board of Education. He has also served and participated in outside educational activi-ties such as positions on state and local committees.

“[Syme] is a pillar of

UBSCT postponed, new testing proposed

By By randi PeahlCourtney Syme, Superintendent of the NS School District, has decided to retire after many years of service. Syme has spent 34 years working in the NS school district and 10 of those years as Superintendent.

SEE PAGEPP 3, SYME RETIRING

Super retires after years of service

SEE PAGEPP 2, UBSCT

SEE PAGEPP 3, COLLEGEDECISIONS

Top College Decision influencesThe Times recently polled of NS to find out what factors

went into their decisions about which college to attend.

These are their responses in order of most important to

least important.

Cost

Programs

Family

Friends

Rec/Soc activites

Atmosphere

Size

Location

Reputation

Appearance

this method’s effectiveness. If results are satffff -isfactory, our district may be able to eliminate all other CRTs (Criterion-Referenced Tests) if in compliance with the No Child Left Be-hind Act of 2001.

While approximately $1.5 million will be saved a year by suspending the UBSCT, this funding will not be allotted. Consequently, the reality of this new system of testing relies on the funding our district is able to receive.

Keisel said a grant has been written to cover the costs of the new testing system for four years, but to get the money is a com-petitive process. If funds are not acquired through this grant, Keisel said the district will find another way to pay for the testing expenses.

Approximately 91 percent of this year’s senior class passed the UBSCT, leaving only eighteen seniors struggling to take the test again before graduation. Strate said that most of these eighteen are just below pass-ing in one of the sections (math, reading and writing). During retakes students are taken out of class, missing schoolwork and getting further behind in their current academic

studies. The UBSCT tests eighth-grade-level material to determine whether seniors are competent for graduation. Even if students do not pass one or more sections of the UBSCT, they canstill graduate, minus a little dignity.

2

BY KY IMBERLY LARSENLL

On March 16 nerves ran high and hearts raced for the Sterling Scholars in the central Utah region. After much hard work and dedica-tion, 134 students gathered at Snow College-Richfield to see who would be chosen from each category as the Central Utah Sterling Scholar winners.

Out of the thirteen categories that NS participated in, three NS students were chosen for the top

three in their categories. MichaelEdmunds was the finalist in Foreign Language, Alexis Fryer was chosen for a runner up in Visual Arts and Amy Bangerter was also a runner up in the English and Literature category.

This year’s Sterling Scholars forNS were Alexis Fryer for Visual Arts, Travis Christensen for Trade and Technical Education, Kody Kleven for Business and Market-ing Education, Raberta Garlick for Family and Consumer Science,Bradley Holman for Dance, Bran-

di Peahl for Social Science, Amy Bangerter for English and Litera-ture, Michael Edmunds for Foreign Language, Brooke Seely for Math-ematics, Brandon Mabey for Sci-ence, Dominick Kiefer for Speech and Drama, Devin Shelley for Mu-sic and Elisabeth Fullmer for Gen-eral Scholarship.

“It was hard, but it was a neat ex-perience,” said Bangerter.

The finalists were chosen based on their leadership, work complet-ed in their category, citizenship and service done and also academic

achievements. Each Sterling Schol-ar completed a portfolio based on the above four categories.

Nan Ault, the Sterling Scholar advisor and librarian at NS, was oneof the many people who helped the students put together their portfo-lios and prepare for competition. She has been working with the Ster-ling Scholars at NS since 2003-04 and knows how this program can benefit those who participate.

“It pays off beyond anything they ffcan imagine,” said Ault.

The Sterling Scholar judging was

held on March 9 in Richfield at an LDS chapel. The contestants were interviewed by a board of judg-es who where specific to their cat-egory. The contestants were askedquestions about various things such as their portfolio and projects that they completed. The judges chose the winners based upon the inter-views and portfolios.

The judges saw and read through the portfolios prior to the inter-views to acquaint them with the candidates.

Although the majority of the NS Sterling Scholars weren’t chosen by these judges to be in the top three for their categories, they all worked very hard and long on this project.

“It taught me to be dedicatedand to take responsibility,” Bangert-er said.

Their dedication showedthrough not only to their fellow se-niors but also to those younger than them in high school.

“I look up to them,” said Kay-lee Holgreen, a sophomore at NS. “They have put in so much effort.”ffff

Holgreen isn’t the only one who sees the sterling scholars this way. Many other students see them as examples. David Kling, a junior atNS, is one of them.

“They show that it’s possible that you can become Sterling Scholar and get scholarships,” Kling said.

The Sterling Scholar program is one of many scholarship oppor-tunities that high school studentshave.

“It’s all worth it,” said Ault.

NS sterling scholars receive top awards

BY ALYSSA HA ALL

If you ever find yourself wandering the halls of NS between the hours of 3 and 11, you might expect to find the hallways barren and quiet. However, onsome nights you may hear singing com-ing from the classrooms. In this case you can nearly bet Thom Stimpson is on the job.

For Stimson singing isn’t just a way for him to entertain himself as he per-forms his custodial duties, it is a way of life.

“I enjoy and take pride in my work and seeing that it gets done right,” said Stimpson regarding his work at NS, “but my passion isn’t custodial work, it’s singing and being on stage.”

Since age four Stimpson has been developing his singing voice. He sure-ly hasn’t let his talents go to waste. On more than one occasion he has used his abilities to help those in need and now, at the age of forty-six, he has been sing-

ing professionally for seven years.Stimpson has spent nine years work-kk

ing as a school janitor. Eight of those years were spent in Idaho, but since De-cember of this year NS has had the plea-sure of having his work dedicated to them.

While he was working in Idaho, Stimpson became very involved with helping the community around him. He has made six CDs and put the proceed-ings towards charitable organizations. He also put on eight benefit concertsthat he organized for different causes. ffff

One of the fundraisers was to raise money for fireworks for the city. Anoth-er was to raise enough money for the drill team to be able to travel to Florida to perform at the Gator Bowl.

A Toys for Tots organization in Or-egon also once received the donations from one of the concerts. As a mem-ber of the Relay for Life council Stimp-son also held a concert to bring in do-nations for those suffering with cancer. ffff

Concerts were also put on for the city’s Christmas Council.

The remaining concerts were held for two individuals in need of medical treat-ments. At the school where Stimpson was working in Idaho, there was a boy who got in a car accident three weeks af-ffter graduation, paralyzing him from the waste down.

A fifteen-year-old girl from the same school was diagnosed with cancer. The medical bills the students had to pay were helped along by the contributions from Stimpson’s benefit concerts.

The concerts were an obvious suc-cess bringing in $11,000 between the charities in Idaho and the one in Ore-gon. This accomplishment should be no surprise when you realize the talentThom has.

His professional career has allowed him to participate in the Utah State Fair, sing the national anthem in 2007 in Dodgers Stadium and open for Joe Nichols in Kansas in 2008. This year he

will be opening for John Mi-chael Montgomery in Kan-sas on July 1.

SEE PAGE 3, SINGINGCUSTODIAN

High school custodian reveals hidden talent

UBSCT, continued from page 1

Photo by Ky im Larsen

3

In 2009, Stimpson had the oppor-tunity to audition for America’s Got Talent. His trip to Seattle was noteasy.

According to Stimpson the week-kkend was filled with many delays and setbacks.

His hotel reservations didn’t pan out, his credit card wouldn’t work,his car got hit while it was parked at the motel he was staying at, and inthe end he did not advance into fur-ther rounds of the competition.

“I personally try not to live with what-ifs,” said Stimpson. “You neverknow until you try.”

He kept this attitude even though in the end nothing came from the competition. He didn’t regret it, andstated that it was fun so it was worth it.

Stimpson missed the 2010 com-petition of America’s Got Talent be-

cause he was misinformed of the au-dition dates. He is sure however that he will be auditioning again next year.

“I don’t give up that easy!” Stimp-son said.

“It doesn’t matter how old you are,” said Stimpson. “If you’ve got a dream you can achieve it if you put your mind to it and do whatever it takes to get there. That’s what I’ve done.”

It’s obvious that Stimpson has followed his own advice. Being the night custodians at NS is just one of Stimpson’s four jobs. He enjoys this job, but would like to get to know more students. He urges that the stu-dents don’t hesitate to say hi.

Thom is living proof that if you have a dream and work towards it you can achieve it no matter your cir-cumstances.

Singing custodian, continued from page 2

BY CY HRIS LARSENLL

The Utah State High School Chess Champion-ship was sponsored by West Jordan high school on Feb-ruary 26 and 27.

The NS chess team de-parted Friday after lunch for West Jordan high. Once they arrived at the high school they waited around for about an hour and then signed in to the champion-ship.

Next the official’s an-nounced the rules, being

that there was no talking during the matches, and that you were only to move your chess pieces with one hand. Then the first matches were announced to be individual games.

“Individual matches last around 30 minutes,” said Trevor Black the chess team captain.

Then the second round match was announced to be a blitz chess match, which is a very fast moving game were you win by taking your opponents king, meaning

there is no check or check mate.

Black and teammates bat-tled through chess match-es until 8 p.m. and then re-turned to their motel for the night. Black admits that his team didn’t do well during their matches on Friday.

The chess team then re-turned back to the cham-pionship Saturday morn-ing to compete in the rest of their matches. They arrived about 8:00 am. and waited around till 9:00 am. for the announcement of the fourth

round. “My teammates and I did

great on Saturday, and we won most of our matches,” said Black.

With the addition of points from Saturday the chess team ended up tying for third place with Wasatch Academy. The decision for third place came down to a computer analysis of the teams and our chess team ended up taking fourth place.

“If we would have had only had one more point

throughout the champion-ship we would have takensecond place,” said Black.

Despite the outcome Black and his teammates are still happy with what came out of the championship they fill it’s a great start and they only hope to get better.

The chess team hopes toprepare and compete in the next chess championshipduring the summer.

The chess team would also like to invite everyone to come and have fun, and join the chess team.

NS chess team exceeds expectations, takes fourth

College decisions, continued from page 1

can get,” said Garff.ffffWhile some remain un-

decided because of financial considerations, others have already made choices based largely on finances.

“I’m going to Snow be-cause I got a full tuition scholarship there,” said Der-ek Erickson, senior.

Although money may be the most important factor,

programs and degrees offered ffffare also high on the list.

“I’m going to Snow be-cause of the pre-engineer-ing program,” said Olmstead. “It’s supposed to be really good there.”

The college you choose toattend today can affect your ffffcareer in the future. If some-one were studying nursing they would never want to at-

tend a school that didn’t offer ffffa nursing program.

To get the most out of their time and money, students are searching for schools that of-fffer the best programs for their field of interest.

“Both Weber and Snow have really good photogra-phy and arts programs, so it just depends on the cost,” said Garff.ffff

Editor-in-ChiefChana Thompson

Managing EditorsBrandi Peahl

Sadie Ivie

AdvisorBen Cox

NewsBrandi Peahl, editor

Hannah AldridgeWhitney Nafus

Chris LarsenSadie Ivie

FeaturesJesse Richmond, editor

Kim LarsenAlyssa Hall

Austin SandersAlexis Fryer

A&ECarly Chapman, editor

Amanda JohansenKim Larsen

SportsAmy Bangerter, editor

Paul CookAmanda Clark

LayoutSadie Ivie, editor

Chana ThompsonBrandi Peahl

PhotographyHannah Aldridge, editor

NS Times Staff

Photo by Ay lyssa Hall

Syme retiring, conitued from page 1

strength in or district,” Kei-sel said.

Syme has enjoyed his time in the district, especially the time he has spent working with people.

“[The best part of the job] is the good people we work within schools. People who are dedicated, caring indi-viduals who really care about kids,” Syme said.

For his retirement Syme has simple plans: hunting, fishing and playing golf. He also wants to get caught up with house chores and spend time with his family. Syme plans on remodeling his home himself, because of the experience he has received in the construction field.

“You get to a point [where you have] a lot of life behind you and not much in front,” Syme said.

With Syme leaving, others will have the chance to take over. Some such as Keisel plan on applying for the new position. Others, such as Jim Bowles, the principal at NSH, do not plan on applying for the position. Instead Bowles has already asked Syme if he can call him if there are any problems.

“I’ll miss his wisdom. I’ll miss his friendship. I’ll miss his leadership,” Bowles said.

Syme has earned much re-spect throughout the years. He has influenced the lives of many people of all ages. He has even had four of his children continue in his foot-steps into the field of educa-tion.

“I respect everything Mr. Syme does and stands for,” Bowles said. “He’s an awe-some guy.”

The Board of Education will not begin to fill the open position. Applicants will have about 30 days from the

time the application is re-leased to submit their appli-cations. These applicants can come from outside or within the district.

Interviews will then take place and the new superin-tendent will be announced in a board meeting in April and May.

“[The Board of Education] should look for the very best candidate to move our dis-trict forward,” Syme said.

What happens in our dis-trict in the following years will depend on who sits in that chair, according to Kei-sel.

While walking down the halls at the school, you hear some bizarre things that make no sense when taken out of context. Here are a few of the funniest ones we’ve heard.

HeardHalls

IN THE

4

BY CY HANA TA HOMPSON

A major issue plagues Utah right now and lawmak-kkers worked this past legisla-tive session to find the an-swer. The problem: money. The economical impact of the recession has taken a toll on how Utah’s education sys-tem is working.

Most Utahns are familiar with the UBSCT test. This test is taken in grades 2 and 10. In high school it is cur-rently required that sopho-mores pass the test to gradu-ate.

Lawmakers approved HB 166, which would suspend UBSCT for 2 years, and stu-dents in grades 8-11 would not take the test in order to graduate.

In its place computer-

adaptive tests that adapt in difficulty would be given.

This bill most likely will be effective in the near fuffff -ture and the money put to-wards restoring funding to other education programs facing cuts this year. And it would also be put towards implementing the comput-er-adaptive tests.

In my opinion I believe eliminating this test has its ups and downs. One posi-tive factor of eliminating this test is that it will save money. But is it worth it? I believe that the UBSCT test is an ef-fffective way to prepare stu-dents’ for the ACT and oth-er tests they will need to take that change their future.

If this test is taken away, students’ may lack confi-dence when preparing to

take bigger tests. Of course the UBSCT is a test that is at a lower level than the knowl-edge 10th graders are taught, but I believe it truly helps them see what level they are currently at and if their knowledge is not sufficient to pass it, then they realize that they have to work hard-er.

In my mind the UBSCT is like a checkpoint in life. Like on the Wii game Super Mario Brothers when you reach half waypoint and get the flag so if you die you can start where it was. I know that is a stupid metaphor but I think it relates to this situa-tion.

Taking away the UBSCT is not a good idea. It may be good for funding and peo-ple may think that this test

is pointless anyways. But I think that requiring previ-ous generations to take this test and then not requiring present generations, is a lit-tle unfair and also offers a ffffdisadvantage to this decades youth.

I don’t like the idea of let-ting students’ feel the relief of not having to pass a test that essentially determines whether or not they should graduate unless they meet all other graduation require-ments.

It just makes it all too easy. Students’ should feel the pressure of passing or not passing this test. It teaches important life lessons. Life is not easy and if they get out of taking this test just by the legislature eliminating it for money purposes, I think

they might get the idea that they can get out of other sit-uations.

Call me a hippie but I believe life lessons are ex-tremely important and even though I have already tak-kken the UBSCT, and hated it all three days, and even fell asleep one day. I am grate-ful that I got it over with and took it like a man. I feel like it helped me to overcome my nerves for other times in my life where I needed to per-form well, the “checkpoints” I have had to face along the way.

Do you see what I am say-ing? Even though the UB-SCT is a simple test, it takes away learning opportunities that students’ need to ex-perience before they go out into the world.

But I am not totally op-posed to the idea if legis-lators and educators could find another way to maintain a less expensive test that re-sembles the UBSCT and is possibly shorter and takes up less time. It could work.

A little extra funding for other programs never hurt anyone, and neither does finding another way to get some cash. I just don’t be-lieve getting rid of the UB-SCT is the way to do it.

Students’ need to experi-ence the challenge the UB-SCT offers. For those who ffffcare it can be scary, but for those who don’t care, they are forced too. If they care about graduating they have to care about their perfor-mance on this test.

UBSCT testing provided important feedback for students

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Brent Watson: “Yes. If you’re in the job force and someone was trying to get a job with the UBSCT, they would be cho-sen over a person who didn’t. It’s kind of nice not to have to worry about it.”

Casie Durrant: “ I think that the UBSCT test did serve a pur-pose, it made you think and prepare for something, and I be-lieve it will help a lot for our future.

Christina Coates: “Yes, it helps the state to decide what we need to learn. Also it gives us the opportunity to go farther in out future.”

Kallie McCulloch: “I think it did serve a purpose because it let’s us know what we have learned, and what we as a school need to work on. So it did serve a purpose.”

Sarah Healey: “I think it’s good they cut it. That way students have more time for their education. They make us take the ASVAB and core testing. Making us to all these big required test puts a strain on students education.”

BY WY HITNEY NAFUSNN

Nan: “I think it was worth it as a school, it showed us our weak points and were we should focus our direction.”

Do you think the UBSCT served a purpose?

5

BY AY LYSSA HA ALL

The word muffin was first introduced to print in the 1800s. This was a time when muffin-men were known in more than just nursery rhymes. In fact laws had to be made to keep these muffin men in line and under control. In the 1840s a parliamentary law was based prohibiting the use of the muffin-man’s bell at tea time because of townspeo-ple objections. Muffins seemed to gaintheir greatest popularity in the 19th cen-tury. This muffin craze caused the pro-hibition of the muffin-man’s bell to be-come ineffective. ffff

Although you don’t often find muf-fffin-men ringing bells in the streets these

days there is still something to be said about the love and popularity of the muffin. In fact, in NS alone 88.5% of students enjoy being able to indulge ina muffin from time to time.

As the years have come and passedthe muffin has evolved in numera-ble ways. What was once just left over bread dough has now been mixed withso many ingredients and baking meth-ods it has, in many instances, claimed the title of being gourmet.

There are hundreds of thousands of recipes for making countless flavors of muffins. Adding condiments such as butter, cream cheese, or honey can also make a huge difference for theffff fla-vor of your muffin. For some individu-

als at NS the condiments on the muffin are just as, or more important, than the original flavor of the muffin itself.

Some of the NS student body’s fa-vorite muffins happen to come from Mt. Pleasant’s own Casey’s Café. However, blueberry muffins are by far the majori-ty of NS student’s favorite flavor of muf-fffin.

Perhaps muffin-men are a trend that should come back in style. Do you know the muffin-man? Based upon the general love for muffins at NS, to have a connection with a muffin-man when asked this question could be quite anadvantage

BY JY ESSE RICHMOND

Before 2006, movie rent-al stores such as Clean Flicks offered popular movies with ffffoffensive content removed. ffffThis brought previously re-stricted films to a tamer rat-ing, giving more people the opportunity to watch the lat-est epic without the stuff they ffdidn’t want to see.

Then, on July 6, selling ed-ited movies was deemed ille-gal, and many films were out of reach. However, another way to watch movies without the unwanted content still exists: ClearPlay.

ClearPlay DVD players edit movies through the use of downloadable filters. The filters, made by a special team of developers, tell the play-er to skip over certain scenes based on whether or not they contain undesirable content, ranging from crude humor to images of nudity or extreme violence.

The filters can also edit

things out by degrees. The twelve different categories fffffor filtering can be filtered out on four different stages ffffof severity: none, implied, explicit and graphic.

The ClearPlay enabled DVD player costs $119.99, and comes with 250 free fil-ters. The filters are download-ed onto a USB drive called a Filter-S t i k ,whicht h e n p l u g s i n t othe front of the player so that the movies (or television shows on DVD) can be fil-tered.

After the initial 250 filters, a subscription to the service is either $7.95/month or $79.50/year, which gives you unlimited filters. Alternative-ly, filters for new releases can be downloaded for $2.95 permovie.

Mitchell McClellan, a ju-nior from Mt. Pleasant, said that he enjoys having a Clear-

Play because it broadens his selection of available movies to watch.

“I can watch all sorts of movies that usually I wouldn’t want to watch,” McClel-lan said. McClellan names Shaun of the Dead, Pan’s Lab-yrinth, and The Matrix trilo-gy as some of the movies that ClearPlay has allowed him to

watch.

McClel-lan said t h a t , while the

player often does skip things, the storylines of the movies are comprehensible none-theless.

Fountain Green sopho-more Charity Henderson also found movies under-standable with the ClearPlay. Though she says her player doesn’t work anymore, she liked watching movies with-out things like cussing or vio-lence.

Slade Roundy, anothersophomore from Fountain

Green, doesn’t hold the play-er in as high esteem.

Roundy says that, while the player was useful for ed-iting out blood, guts, and gory scenes, it did have its faults. On occasion, the play-er wouldn’t be able to keep pace, censoring inoffensive ffffwords while curses went un-bleeped.

“[The player] mess-es things up,” said Roundy. Roundy said that, while the player was convenient, he could’ve just as easily used the remote to skip over the offensive scenes, and he ffffwouldn’t consider paying for such a service.

So, it is still possible to watch a movie without all the offensive content that comes ffffwith it. The ClearPlay system is allowed to exist because, unlike the rental services, the player doesn’t cut out sec-tions of the movie, but rather skips or mutes them. It’s one more step towards a cleaner world.

ClearPlay provides a cleaner viewing experience

BY CHRIS LARLL SEN

This year NS offers new ffffclasses, but students ar-gue there is still not enough class choice. Some students are disappointed with this year’s class choice, while oth-ers haven’t had any problems with this year’s selection of classes.

This year a total of 115 classes have been made avail-able to students, 109 classes coming from the first semes-ter and 111 in the second.

Although some classes have been accepted some have been rejected such as As-tronomy, which was thrown out by a process called reme-diation by the school board.

“The school has limited teachers and students, and we must cover core classes,” said Dax Higgins who was

hoping to teach Astronomy.Despite some of the rejec-

tions, many new classes have started up this year, including word processing, in which students manage an on-line business; sport sewing in which students make athlet-ic stuff; student government fffor the student body officers, drama two, an advanced dra-ma class; pre-algebra for the special education students; calculus, which gives stu-dents college credit; UBSCT prep class; and a credit recov-ery class.

“This years’ class selection is better than from previous years,” said O’Dee Hansen, NS Counselor.

Although there are more, students are having problems with their class choices.

“Our class choice is crap-py, and I wish there were

more electives,” said Kenyon Anderson, a junior from Spring City.

Anderson would like to see classes be more spread out among periods and would also like to see more classes be offered such as a ffffbass guitar class.

Another student, EddieMoroney, a freshman from Mount Pleasant, thinks most classes are pointless and only some classes help for the fu-ture.

Moroney enjoys wood shop and would like to see an advisory class at the end of the school day similar too what the Middle school had a few years ago.

“It would be great if I could take weights becausethen I wouldn’t have to come to school early to go to the weight room,” Moroney said.

Moroney feels freshman should be given the chance to take weights.

While some have con-flicts with the current class-es offered, others don’t have ffffproblems with the classes.

“I am just fine with my class choice,” said Braden Parish, a sophomore from Mount Pleasant.

Parish stated that he has small diversity in his class-es, but he is happy with the classes he has taken.

While Parish wishes he could have enrolled in some other classes such as Foods 2 and History, he feels that hav-ing certain classes only avail-able at certain times is good, and it doesn’t bother him.

Although some have prob-lems with the current classes offered, othersffff find the class-es offered are ffff fine.

BY AY USTINAA SANDEAA RS

On March 3, the NSspeech and debate team competed in the region tournament held at Emery High.

Two debaters from NS did well at region and were able to go on to the state competition which washeld on March 12 at Carbon High School.

Junior Cody Case and se-nior Joya Fontaine placed third in Public Forum (PF).

Tanya Roundy, the speech and debate coach has brought the students of NS to the point they are at now.

“Our team is doing well but we still need to work with them and get more people excited about speech and debate,” Roundy said.

Many of the debaters en-joy having Roundy as the coach for several reasons.

“She has been right the whole time,” Case said. “She teaches you how to de-bate and how to make your-self seem intelligent.”

The speech and debate team competed at state in many events. Though much preparation was made, the team did not do as well as they had anticipated. No-body placed but the teamis looking forward to future competitions.

The president of speech and debate this year was Trevor Carter. He had many responsibilities but his main one was to keep the team fo-cused.

The team is looking for-ward to next year because they will be more experi-enced. They had very few senior debaters this year, but they are hoping that the team will be stronger next year.

Students and staff divided on class choicesff

Speech and Debate competes at region and state contests

NS students sound off about muff ffins

Ten Ways to Pass a Test BY WY HITNEY NANN FUS

A major portion of student’s high school career is taking tests. Students at NS are often tested to see wherethere are at and what they’ve learned. The issue that most students suffer with isffff finding the right method of studying. Students were asked to share how they prepare themselves for a test. Here are the top ten:

Study by using different methods: ffffflashcards, using a study guide, reading the chapter, or review out loud.Teach someone else.Don’t procrastinate.Pay attention in class and take good notes.Study a little bit each day.Have a cram night.Get a tutor.Ask questions and seek help.Get a full nights sleep.Have a good breakfast.

eaeaadadd PanPannn s Las Laaa mabab

Senior competes at state Poetry Out Loud contest

Photo Provided By Jy enny Cy ox

6

Boys soccer overcomes weather issues, plays hard BY CY HANA TA HOMPSON

The 2010 boys’ soccer sea-son starts with bad weather but good intentions. So far two games have been can-celed due to weather but the team feels that they will do well this season.

The first game was on March 4 in Delta. The game was not a very good start for the season, with varsity los-ing 8-1.

“At the first game I learned a lot about the team,” said Head Coach Mauricio Mon-tano from Moroni. “They need to break the barrier of when a game starts because they forget what they did at practice.”

According to Alan Mon-tano a junior from Moroni, the team was just fine dur-ing the warm up but as soon as the whistle blew everyone panicked.

Although the team had a rough beginning, the players feel that they will play well enough to go to region and possibly even the first rounds at state.

“We only have one chal-lenge,” said Alan Montano. “[And that is] beating Delta; since I’ve played on this team we haven’t beat them.

They’re not invincible, but we get “Deltitis” and we’re scared to play them.”

Despite the fact that the team has had trouble with

Delta, Mauricio Montano said that the team is full of talent and there are also nine returning varsity players.

Some of the strengths that the boys’ have are passing the ball with remarkable skill and all of the players know each other well.

But where there is strength there is also weakness.

“Sometimes they don’t talk as much as they should,”said Mauricio Montano. “They don’t see with theireyes, they think their teamwill be there.”

The athletes choose to stay positive and to improve upon the things that they can already do.

“We’ve gotten a lot bet-ter,” said senior Bradley Hol-man from Moroni. “We’ve learned to play as a team and we motivate each other to get better. We find our mistakes and we fix them.”

Not only does Holman feel that the team contrib-utes to improvement but he feels that the coaches help immensely.

“We have good coaches that know what they’re talk-kking about,” said Holman.

The coaches have been preparing the boys in a vari-ety of ways for this season.

“The coaches teach a lotof footwork within our drills, and we do a lot of condition-ing,” said Alan Montano. “They teach us mental strat-

egies through motivational speeches.”

Six weeks prior to the sea-son coaches encouraged car-dio, ab, and lower back work-kkouts along with running as optional conditioning.

Also many team mem-bers played indoor soccerthroughout the winter.

But as soon as tryouts ended on February 22, theteam jumped right into play-ing games.

On March 13 they played

Photo by Cy hana ThompsonTT

Hurrricane and lost 0-2.The team played the Man-

ti Templars last Wednes-day and were victorious 4-2. They were very happy for the first win of the season against their rivals.

Last Friday NS played Gunnison. The Hawks won the game 3-2.

As the season warms up, the snow melts and it reduc-es the amount of challeng-es that NS boys’ soccer team faces. Already the team has

had to clean snow from the field four times to be able to practice on it.

Besides the weather many difficulties have already been endured this season.

Eligibility has been an is-sue; many athletes have had a rough time keeping theirgrades up.

“It’s too bad [they can’t keep their grades up] because we’d love to have them play,” said Mauricio Montano.

Another problem the team

faces, that takes players away from the field, is sickness.

“It’s hard to play an 80 minute half when you can’t breathe,” said Mauricio Mon-tano.

But even when the team faces challenges, MauricioMontano helps them to re-member that it is better to win by playing well then tolose by playing bad.

“They should strive to play well every minute,” said Mauricio Montano.

NS girls’ golf prepares for the upcoming season

BY AMYAA BY ANGERTER

Though inches of snow continue tocover the Skyline golf course, the NS girls’ golf team has found alternate plac-es to practice. Although it is just the be-ginning of the season, the team is look-kking forward to developing their talentsand the younger players are looking to the four returnees for their experience.

“They’re really supportive and they really help me a lot,” said sophomore Sara Fowles. “They’re fun to be around, they tell me rules, and give me advice.”

Those returning from last year are se-nior Raberta Garlick, junior Heidi Shel-ley, sophomore Annie Johnson, and sophomore Kallie McCulloch. The rest of the team is made up of new, young athletes and their coach, Todd Hansen, believes this year will be full of new ex-periences.

“We’re just going to be kind of pro-gressing this year and learning,” Hansen said.

The team had its first pre-season match in Delta on Tuesday, March 16. Though they were beaten by Delta and Carbon, they showed promising talent.

“Delta was a learning experience,” Hansen said.

A couple younger players stepped up to take the place of two key members of the team, Garlick and Shelley, who were unable to golf .

Annie Johnson received a final score

of 18, Kallie McCulloch an 11, andShannon Davidson a seven.

With the new scoring system, a par is worth five points. Every stroke over par causes one point to be deducted. A birdie is six points and a bogey is four points. After nine holes, the points are added together and the highest score wins.

There have been challenges with the weather but the team has been practic-ing at the high school putting, chipping, and hitting balls against Dax Higgin’s trailer.

According to Hansen, once the teamstarts practicing it will be up to the girls how fast and how much they want to learn.

“I’m not really saying where they’re going to be,” Hansen said, “because we haven’t had the chance to practice.”

Garlick started playing golf her soph-omore year, the teams’ first year at NS.Younger players look up to Garlick and her coach feels she is an important play-er.

“Raberta Garlick is our only senior,” Hansen said. “The girl is the most expe-rienced.”

Garlick injured her collarbone in a snowboarding accident and the team is hoping it will not affect her game. Alffff -though the injury may prove to be a set-back, Garlick is hoping for a successful season.

“My goal is to take state this year,”

Garlick said. “Hopefully I’ll make it in the top ten. I’ve been in the top ten the past two years and I plan on being one of the top ones in the top ten.”

The team as a whole is shooting for state, and that will depend on the drive they have.

“The talent is there,” said Hansen. “If the desire is there they will definitely be able to work their way into the state playoffs.”ffff

According to Hansen, the region competition will be tough due to the experience of the Delta and Richfield players. Delta lost a lot of seniors, butthey have younger players who will like-ly place well. He is hoping the girls will be in the top three teams in region so that they can go to state.

“Hopefully we make it to state as a team this year,” Garlick said. “We haven’t done it in the past, but hopeful-ly this year we can.”

With the entire season ahead of them, the girls are continuing to work towards their state goal and get past the obsta-cles of a young team and a late start.

“It’s going to be a tough, uphill battle this year,” Hansen said.

According to Garlick one of the chal-lenges may be overcoming the age of the team, but she feels the beginners will help the team as much as they can and that they will be good in the future.

“I’m just learning--just trying to get a feel for things,” said Fowles.

Photo by AAy my By angerter

Team faces tough competition at St. George

BY AMANDAAA CA LARK

Although boys’ tennis struggles to get on their feet this season due to the lack of seniority and young ath-letes, they have high hopes for a successful outcome.

The first tournament preparing the team for the coming season was held on March 12 at Lehi High School. Assistant coachBrad Bentley notes that the team was fairly successful.

“We did surprisingly well,” Bentley said. “It was the first varsity match for many of the players -- they were still learning.”

The team took second overall, losing only to Lehi but beating Salem Hills. Since it was the first tour-nament, the team was ableto see how they will be throughout the year, and how not only the team buteach individual can im-prove.

“We will do pretty good,”Derek Erickson, senior of Mt. Pleasant said. “We have a lot of young players but they’re all pretty good.”

The majority of the team this year consists of young-er players. There are only two seniors on the team. And the team has lost sever-al of athletes that played last year.

Although the team is

young, many of the athletes believe they will succeed.

“I think we should all do good during the season,”said Dallas Gardener, soph-omore.

As one of the younger players, Gardener started tennis this year, only recent-ly began playing, but made the traveling team. He was amazed at how much he en-joys tennis.

“It’s really fun, and I didn’t expect it,” Gardener said. “It always seemed like a sport for nerds.”

The fun tennis is whatseems to draw new players into the sport and challenge them to pursue their talent.

Although the young play-ers are excelling, the older players are not exempt.

Bentley believes that ju-nior Hunter Erickson is an excellent tennis player who will do very well during theseason.

A ladder tournament was held between the players de-ciding the rank of each team member landing Hunter Er-ickson on top, playing as number one singles.

The team has high hopesfor not only the present sea-son but the following sea-sons to come.

“We are young,” Bentley said, “but if they stick to it we will have a good team for the future.”

BY AMANDAAA CA LARK

This past weekend the NS boys’ tennis team had the opportunity to travel south for a tournament held in St. George.

According to assistant coach Bentley the team did sur-prisingly well for such a young team. There was a definite improvement in just a small amount of time, as the team played better on Saturday than on Friday. The coaches were thoroughly impressed with the way the younger players took the opportunity to grow.

The team placed 11th out of 16 teams altogether.

Boys’ tennis faces a rocky start

ffor the season, hopes for success

7

NS baseball has high hopes for a success-

ful season, would like to go to region

Photo by Cy hana ThompsonTT

Hawk baseball takes 6th out of 8 at Gunnison tournament

BY CY HANA TA HOMPSON

On Thursday, March 18, NS boys’ baseball team played against the Gunni-son Bulldogs.

The game started offbadly with the Bulldogs up to bat. By the end of the first inning the Bulldogs led the game 7-0.

The Hawks’ were out of the tourney on Friday due to a loss on Thursday to the Bulldogs with a score of 8-1.

The tourney continued on Saturday and the Hawks played two games.

The first game was against American Leader-ship Academy. The Hawks won the game 9-7.

“I felt pretty good about the ALA game,” said Kaden Poulson, a freshman from Moroni. “We hit pretty good.”

The second game on Saturday wasn’t as good.

The game was played against Richfield and NS lost 6-1.

According to Poulsen the team could have im-proved the attitude they had towards their Richfield game.

“We didn’t have our heads in the game,” said Poulsen.

The team feels that they played well during the first half of the game but didn’t have a good finish during the second half.

The athletes look to the future and not on the past.

“I think we are doing okay this season, but being realistic I don’t think we’ll go to region or state,” said Garrett Jenkins, a junior from Fairview. “But there is always that chance.”

BY CY HANA TA HOMPSON

Baseball at NS started at the very beginning of Marchand has kicked off into the ffseason eight days after try-outs.

The teams’ first game was on March 9 against Ameri-can Leadership Academy. Unfortunately the game end-ed in a loss of 6-5.

“We lost because we made errors,” said Head Coach Lee R. Sorensen from Fairview. “We should have won.”

Senior Colbey Bentley from Mt. Pleasant agrees that the game should have ended with more positive results. He feels that the first inning is where most of NS errors came from.

But if you think that the first game will hold back thisteam, then you’re wrong.

The team has high hopes for this season and is very confident the results will be epic.

“We’ll take first or second in region and get far into the playoffs,” said Bentley. “We ffffhave a good team this year and our region [competi-

tion] isn’t too tough.”Hawk athletes realize the

great advantage they have this year with six returning seniors, four of whom are starters, and the new region situation will be a great con-tribution to the outcome of the season.

“We don’t have as tough as a region as we have in the past,” said Parker Christens-en, a junior from Fairview, “especially with the loss of Juan Diego and Carbon.”

Although the team is en-thusiastic with the results of the season, Sorensen said that Emery will be one of their most challenging teams to beat because they have many returning players.

Other members of the team agree that Emery will be a difficult team to beat.

“Emery has good pitch-ers and baseball runs in their veins,” said Christensen.

NS played their first re-gion game against Emery on Tuesday March 23; the re-sults could not be obtained before this edition was print-ed.

As the season has quick-kk

ly approached, the team will not be stepping onto the field blindfolded. They have put in many strenuous hours of practice and conditioning to prepare for this season.

“We’ve been throwing for a couple months,” said Sorensen. “We’ve been to camps and clinics. Several boys [also] played in the Mt. Pleasant summer baseball league.”

According to Christensen the players work hard, hustle and always do their best.

“We have done a lot of offseason work,” said Bentley.

All of the training will hopefully be enough to pull the Hawks through to a re-gion title.

“Baseball has never won region,” said Bentley. “We want to show everyone we can win, and that’s a big drive for me.”

With their eye on the goal the team still focuses on their strengths and weaknesses so that they can improve.

“Pitching and defense are [two of our] strengths but we still struggle on hitting,” said Sorensen. “We’re get-

ting there; we’re just trying to put everything together so we have our best nine on the field all the time.”

One thing Sorensen hopes to change this season is the

physical fitness of the boys. He said that they will be run-ning more than usual.

“The harder we work at practice, the better we play in our game,” said Sorensen.

Ladyhawk softball off to a good start for seasonff

Photo provided by My cKelle Anderson

NS softo ball team hopes to gain more experience with their offo ensive skills so ffffthat they may be able to compete in the state tournament this year.

BY PAULPP COOK

The Lady Hawk softball team is off to a ffgood start with a record of 2-1 while being ranked third in state. Coaches and players have set high goals for the season.

“We’re going to play hard every game,” said head coach Tyler Bailey. “We would like to win region and get a good seeding for state.”

NS fans have high expectations as well.

“I want them to win state,” said junior Carl Peckham.

And state is not out of the question with the amount of experience the Lady Hawks possess. The majority of starters are seniors, and all six of them started last season as well.

One problem the Hawks have had so far this season is struggling offensively. In the fffflast two games they scored a maximum of just two points.

“We haven’t done so well offensively,” said ffffBailey, “but that is partly because we haven’t had much time outside.

But they have made up the ground lost on offense with exceptional defense. In two of fffftheir last three games the Lady Hawks have

held their opponents to one point or less.“We’ve done way bad on offense the last ffff

couple games but our defense has been awe-some,” said senior pitcher Shelby Earl.

Their defense stood out in the first game of the season played in South Sevier. The Hawks shut the Rams out with a score of 10-0.

The following Tuesday the Lady Hawks faced the Union Cougars. The Hawks strug-gled both offensively and defensively losing ffffthe game 6-0.

“One of our biggest problems against Union were all of our errors in the field,” said Earl.

The next day the Hawks returned home to play the Grantsville Cowboys who are ranked

fifth in the state. The Hawks struggled offenffff -sively once again scoring two runs during the first inning and not again for the rest of the game. But their defense got the job done,holding the cowboys to just one point.

One obstacle the Lady Hawks will face on their path to a region championship is their rivals the Manti Templars, who are current-ly ranked second in the state just above the Hawks.

The Hawks hope to overcome this chal-lenge with their abundance of experience andoutstanding defense. But they still have a lot of ground to make up on offense if they want ffffto be major competitors in the state tourna-ment.

BY PAULPP COOKEvery year as March approaches, people all over the

country begin to get involved in the college basketball tour-nament known as March Madness. It is one of the biggest gambling events in the United States and the highlight of many sports fans’ year.

“[March Madness] is the sickest, coolest, baddest event of the year,” said senior Nathan Aagard, “It’s full of miracles and splendors and magical what-ifs of all kind.”

People can bet on the tournament in many ways. Some will simply pick one team to win, while others will enter a contest and have a team randomly selected for them. But the most common method of betting is by filling out tour-nament brackets in an attempt to get the most winners cor-rect.

“I love seeing unheard of teams upset the good teams,” said senior Austin McColluch.

And this year was no different than any other, with sevffff -eral upsets taking place in the first and second rounds.

A few of the most notable upsets were the victories of 14th ranked Ohio over number 3 Georgetown, and a little known University called Old Dominion over Notre Dame. In addition Vanderbilt suffered a loss to 13th ranked Murffff -ray. But the most surprising upset occurred in the second round when number 1, Kansas, lost to Northern Iowa.

“[March Madness] is where miracles happen,” said Chaz Jorgenson.

On the local level BYU was able to get past the first roundfor the first time since 1993. However they suffered a loss in ffffthe second round.

Kentucky is the favorite to win the tournament, but oth-er teams such as Syracuse, Duke, Ohio State, and West Vir-ginia will be tough competitors.

The tournament will continue with the Sweet 16 begin-ning on March 25th.

March madness tournament

8

Athletes at NS raise money to contribute to their fu-ture participation in sports.

BY AMYAA BY ANGERTER

The athletic department raised over $16,000 with the Bar-J Wranglers concert on February 24. The fund raiser was headed by Casey Jenson, Sharon Christensen, and Janet Ash-worth. The money will be divided amongst the students who sold tickets.

“Each athlete gets to split what they earned into each sport they play,” said secretary Brenda Aagard. “That’s the fairest we could do because the spring sports were not functioning at the time of the fund raiser.”

Some athletes raised over $400 and many were close be-hind. The potential profit from the concert was around $50,000 and nearly 1,500 tickets were not sold.

“It was fun,” said principal Jim Bowles, “but we didn’t make as much as we needed to.”

According to those associated with the fund raiser, onething that could have been better is the amount of sales made. Some student athletes did very well in selling tickets while there were some who did not participate at all.

“We could have sold more tickets,” said Christensen, NS Athletic Director, “but I think the concert went well.”

Despite the fact that there were many empty seats, the con-cert was still successful due to several different components.ffff

“We got the support of the administration,” said Jenson, NS P.E. Teacher and football coach. “Essentially everyone in

a position of authority was behind it and that’s what made it so successful.”

The administration also credits the athletes and parents for the success.

“I think the students who got into it and went out and sold is what made it successful—and the parents,” said vice-prin-cipal Jason Strate. “I had a lot of comments from people that they liked this a lot better; they liked the idea of a one-time fund raiser.”

The idea of one large, school-wide fund raiser came about at the football banquet during Jenson’s first year at NS. Jenson thought it would be easier on businesses and could turn out to be a success.

Janet Ashworth, parent of NS athlete Quirt Ashworth, told Jenson she had connections with the Bar-J Wranglers and that is how the idea for the concert came about.

“It was nice for the Bar-J Wranglers because it got the el-derly out from the community,” Jenson said. “There wasn’t an age requirement; it was fun for all ages—the entire family.”

According to Strate, the school will likely do similar fund raisers in the future.

“I like the idea,” Strate said. “I think it’s a better public re-lations feel. People get hit so much with so many things, but this was something with some entertainment value.”

Not only was the concert beneficial because of the enter-tainment value, but also for the athletic accounts at NS.

“It’s definitely going to help the athletic accounts,” Aagardsaid. “There’s going to be enough profit.”

The administration and coaches are deciding if they want to do another large fund raiser next year, and there are several

factors that will play into the decision.“We’re just talking about that now, and we are undecided,”

Christensen said. “There are some coaches who did a lot of work and in the future they could do their own fund raiserand still raise a lot of money.”

According to Aagard, they are trying to compare if one big fund raiser will benefit more than individual clubs and orga-nizations doing their own fund raisers.

“The thing that we’re trying to do as a school is not raise the pay-to-plays so that it’s hard to participate,” Strate said.

Being able to help students with the costs of being involved in sports and organizations is something the administration and coaches want to accomplish.

“We understand that we live in an economically depressed area and we don’t want to price people out of being able to participate,” Strate said.

The support of the parents will also play into the decision. For the Bar-J Wranglers concert, a meeting was held at NS forthe parents of all the athletes to let them know what the fundraiser was for and what was required for it to be successful.

“At the parents meeting there were tons of parents who were opposed to selling the tickets,” Jenson said. “They thought it would be too hard.”

Although it is undecided whether or not a similar fund raiser will occur next year, the struggles and benefits from the Bar-J Wrangler concert are evident. Many are hoping to see apositive change no matter what the final decision is.

“All too often in this community new ideas are rejected be-cause people are afraid of change,” Jenson said. “Sometimes change is necessary in order to make progress.”

Athletics fund-raiser concert does not earn as much money as intended

NS sprinters work ethic drives her to seek third state title

BY AMANDAAA CA LARK

Shyanne Ison, a two time state and region champion, has recently begun her fourth sea-son of track.

Ison started the sport as a freshman be-cause she felt like she was a contribution to help out the team with her talent.

“I run track because I am fast and can be

a good representative for our school,” Ison said.

With three region championships and two state championships in the 4X4 relay, Ison has been represented NS well in the years she has been a member of the track team. Not only has she helped bring the team success but she has also succeeded individually. Ison received three individual region cham-

pionships and holds the school record in the 200M and 400M.

Ison along with her achievements, likes to have fun along the way. Her team mem-bers enjoy her fun loving attitude, and joking throughout practice.

“She is an amazing team member,” said Haley Ence, senior of Fairview. “She is also a fun dependable person.”

Coach Scott Butler notes that because of Ison’s great skill she is a good role model and teammate because she can mentor younger athletes.

“She is driven to be the best,” said Butler. “Her work ethic is really strong.”

Ison’s success not only comes from her ability to run fast, but also from the dedica-tion she has to train hard.

“[Track] requires very intense training, hard work and dedication,” Ison said, “and therefore it’s fun to reap the rewards of our efforts”ffff

Hard work, practice and increasing her skills are important but not all that is required to succeed. The runners also have to be able to work together as a team. Ison notes that one of the things she enjoys most about track is the athletes she gets to work with. She says that together they have brought track into the spotlight and helped people realize that it is a valuable sport.

“We work hard, and we win,” Ison said. “We love winning -- it’s the best.”

Ison’s number of successful winnings have not just stayed on the track, but have been inother aspects of her life.

Ison helped bring her team to win the state championship title in 3A volleyball earlier in the year, as well as being a member of the girlsbasketball team.

Ison also has kept up a high grade point average and enjoys doing things with friends and family. She loves to sew, read novels con-stantly, loves music and shopping for shoes, and refers to herself as a complete movie buff.ffff

Although Ison has achieved many of her goals in life, she continues to set goals and hopes to receive two to three more individ-ual region championships as well as a team championship in the season to come.

Photo by Cy hana ThompsonTT

9

BY JY ESSE RICHMOND

Halfway through the book Antsy Does Time by Neal Schusterman, Anthony Bo-nano (also known as Antsy) finds himself recreating the dust bowl, pouring ice water on a senator’s head, and be-coming the self-proclaimed The Master of Time.

While this may seem strange to some, Antsy is by no means a stranger to odd happenings. In The Schwa Was Here, Antsy helped an invisibleboy named Calvin Schwa with identity problems, kidnapped the richest man in his neigh-borhood, and blew up a crash test dummy named Manny.

When strange things hap-pen now, he takes it in stride.

The plot of Antsy Does Timepicks up quickly, and after 12 pages, Antsy has a new prob-

lem on his hands. A full year after The Schwa ran away, Gunnar Ümlaut, Antsy’s class-mate, informs Antsy he has a terminal disease and only has six months left to live.

Frustrated by Gunnar’s ac-ceptance of his fate, Antsy takes action, and he signs over one month of his life to help. Word of his donation spreads, and soon the entire school wants to donate a month. Ant-sy acts as the collector, the so called “Master of Time,” and the stage is set for the real con-flict to come into play.

Antsy Does Time is about much more than a kid with Pulmonary Monoxic Sys-temia. Just as helping Calvin Schwa made Antsy reevalu-ate his own identity, Gun-nar’s impending death brings about a discovery of what life is about.

As the events of the book unfold, Antsy narrates with a wit that I’ve never seen in any other character. Though his language is a tad juvenile, it never grates on my nerves, which is more than can be said for other fictional teens.

A few of the old charac-ters from Schwa return, like the darkly sarcastic Old Man Crawley and the oblivious Howie, but the new ones real-ly make the story shine.

These include Skaterdud, an almost sage-like burnout, Antsy’s meditative little sister Christina, and Gunnar with his constant misquotings. They all flesh out the story well, adding depth and heap-ing amounts of humor.

The book does stumble a bit, though. When Antsy be-gins trading months around like stocks, it reminded me of

a similar stunt in Schwa where he started a sort of Rent-the-Schwa service. The characters all seem to have matured af-ffter a year, and the month trad-ing didn’t seem like something the new Antsy would do.

As Antsy goes about col-lecting months for Gunnar, he tries to stay uninvolved as an observer. However, he soon must face the trials of life and death when his father collaps-es from a heart attack after do-nating two years to the cause.

Antsy Does Time is an ex-cellent book, both as a stand alone novel and a sequel. Though the book does drop a few references to The Schwa Was Here, new readers shouldbe able to enjoy the story without having read the origi-nal book. I fully recommend it to anyone looking for a good laugh.

BY AY LEXIS FRFF YER

The NS jazz band directed by Tim Kid-der is, once again, headed to state. At the competition held on the tenth of March, the band received the highest possible rating on each of their songs, winning re-gion for the third year in a row.

Each song is judged on a scale of 1-5, one being the best. The jazz band re-ceived straight 1s on their three songs: “Feel So Good” by Victor Lopez, “Good-bye Porkpie Hat” by Charles Mingus, and “Cliffs Riffff ff ” by Shelton Berg.

“[The songs] are a lot of fun,” said Erik Johansen, senior. “They help us show our strengths and we have a lot of fun playing them.”

Andrea Shelley, sophomore, said that she enjoyed the variety of styles shown in the song selection.

When rating the bands, judges consid-

er several areas of focus. These include: Improvisation, Style/Interpretation, Rhythm/Time, Ensemble, Intonation/Tone, Technique/Articulation, Rhythm Section and Choice of Selections.

“I thought we played some things bet-ter than we’d ever played before that day,” said Aaron Johnson, senior.

Several other band members as well as Kidder said they felt good about their performance.

“I thought it was a fair representation of where we are now,” Kidder said.

However well things went, there is al-ways room to improve. After the region performance the judges gave advice on how the band could develop their songs and what areas to work on.

“[The state competition] will be held to a higher level,” Kidder said.

“I look forward to going and watch-ing,” said Jason Strate, vice principal at NS. Strate attended the region perfor-

mance and was very impressed by the tal-ent shown in the jazz band. He also com-mented on the positive affects the band ffffhas on school spirit and the good feeling it brings to the high school in general.

“[The jazz band] was extraordinary,” Strate said.

The jazz students are hopeful for suc-cess at state this year and are prepared to work for that accomplishment.

“We need to work hard, but we can do it if we devote a lot of time to practice,” Jo-hansen said. The band rehearses togeth-er every morning and members practice on their own time. In addition, groups of students playing the same instrument meet in special practices called section-als.

“[The students] have worked hard and deserve the success,” Kidder said.

The state performance is to be held onMarch 26 or 27.

BY AY MAA AMM NDAA A JA OHAHH NSENAA

Movies are part of today’s culture; they are seen all over and by almost everyone. A stu-dent can walk through school, and at any mo-ment someone might strike up a conversa-tion with, “have you seen that movie?”

Students like to go out to watch new mov-ies with their friends; yet when inappropriate material appears on the screen the situation suddenly becomes unsettling.

Inappropriate material is found in all rat-ings of movies, insinuating the question: should I, or should I not laugh at the innuen-do, cuss word, or other awkward situation?

What society deems to be “okay” is not ex-actly what all people feel comfortable withwatching.

“Our society has become desensitized,” said Sarah Allan, sophomore.

This so-called ‘society’ is a full-time rat-ing board in Los Angeles, consisting of 10-13

people. These people are volunteers only required

to think critically and put themselves into the position of the “average American parent.” Members who view the films decide on what would be the best interests of parents and their children.

The decisions of the rating is then put to a vote and, what-ever the mu-tual decision, becomes the rating.

“I don’t be-lieve that they ever think about what parents want their kids to see,” said Sherene McClellan, Flix Co-Owner.

Movie ratings are based mainly on certain content such as language, violence, sexual content, under-age and regular drug/alcohol use.

“Now it’s as if R is for Ridiculous,” said an anonymous parent explaining that ratings are inconsistent.

McClellan has found many instances where she has been surprised as to what people will find acceptable. When she finished viewing a movie with a friend she had mentioned that the film had a PG-13 rating. Her friend was

rather shocked to dis-cover it wasn’t rated R.

“You look at one PG-13 movie, then look at another, and wonder how they got into the same category. It just goes to prove how irrel-

evant the rating system is,” McClellan said. Few people at NS agree with the rating

board and what they allow to be put into movies.

Senior, Mike Edmunds is one of those stu-dents who find that the difference between R ffff

and PG-13 ratings are switched around.“Violence is R, and sex is PG-13. Sex is

more demoralizing than violence,” said Ed-munds.

The values depicted in movies have dra-matically changed from the 1950s when fa-mous movies like Gone With the Wind and the Wizard of Oz first revealed themselves.

Few people know that Gone With the Windwas the first motion picture containing aswear word. In the modern day this would be overlooked; yet, in the 1950s, it was enough to cause controversy with many of the view-ers, and complaints were filed. Now the pub-lic is more lenient on what they allow them-selves to view on the silver screen.

As the population evolves, they think they are able to deal with comprehending risqué situations. One must stop and think aboutwhat society is willing to accept, and how far film-makers are willing to go to make “risqué” more acceptable.

Jazz band earns highest marks at region, prepares for state

Photo by Ay lexis Fryer

BY AY LEXIS FRFF YER

If anyone can successfully create a magical wonder-land of strange and impossible events, it is Tim Bur-ton. Burton’s latest film, Alice in Wonderland, is a vi-sually amazing, though its storyline lacks somewhat in strength.

Alice (Mia Wasikowska), now nineteen years old, re-members her first trip down the rabbit hole as only a dream. She is bored and confined by her current life-style. In addition, Alice discovers that a snobby Englishlord is planning to publicly ask for her hand in marriage. In a moment of pressure, Alice rushes away and finds herself following the very same White Rabbit down his rabbit hole.

The crazy world she finds is dark yet childish, a great representation considering the transition from a chil-dren’s cartoon. However, the environment seemed to rush by as if Alice, and the audience, would not have wanted to see more. Both untrue. Burton’s colors and visual focal points did a marvelous job of bringing a sur-real, fairytale feeling to the screen--perfect for Alice in Wonderland’s impossible events.

The storyline as I said, felt incomplete. Alice’s fate was foretold at the beginning of her journey, leaving it to crazy detours to lessen the dramatic predictability. The craziness was not necessarily a bad thing. The sto-ry of Wonderland is traditionally built upon weird sit-uations and mad characters. Perhaps it was the objec-tive described in the beginning that should have been removed.

Wonderland’s two rulers, rival sisters, are challenging each other for the crown. Alice must be convinced tobe champion for the White Queen (Anne Hathaway), a beautiful though tacky character, continually acting likeshe’s… well, acting. Opposing her, the Queen of Hearts, is a huge-headed, feisty individual brilliantly played by Helena Bonham-Carter.

Aiding Alice in her predicaments are several famil-iar characters including, the White Rabbit (Michael Sheen), the Cheshire Cat (Stephen Fry), Absolem the Blue Caterpillar (Alan Rickman), and the mad Hatter ( Johnny Depp). These and others were cast and creat-ed very well, fitting in with great energy to the magical world.

Through her journey Alice gains courage, finds her purpose and answers many question - though not all of them, for she still wonders: how is a raven like a writing desk?

Burton’sWonderland s

dazzles with visuals,

falls flat with storyflfl

Antsy Does Time delivers timely humor and insight

Movie ratings fail to reflect wishes, standards of many moviegoers

10

1. Break Your Heart (feat. Ludacris) - TaiocauzThis song is currently the most downloaded song on iTunes. It has also received outstand-ing reviews.Pop

2. Rude Boy - RihannaRihanna has yet again wowed audiences with her latest hit. This song, which debuted on her latest album entitled Rated R, quickly climbed Rto the top of the charts. Pop

3. Hey, Soul Sister - by TrainTrain has yet again impressed audiences by re-leasing this current hit. This song has a happy and upbeat tune that is sure to draw the listen-er in.Rock

4. Bad Romance - Lady GagaThis song has an electric and rhythmic beat. Lady Gaga continues to impress audiences.Pop

5. Need You Now - by Lady AntebellumThis harmonious country song has a mixture of passion and sincerity. Country

6. White Flag Warrior (feat. Tim Mcllrath) - FlobotsThis is a fasted-paced song that adds an entirely new level of alternative rock. Its passionatelyrics are worth listening to.Alternative

7. Nothin’ on You (feat. Bruno Mars) - B.o.BThis single is currently the second most down-loaded song on iTunes. It is done in a very unique and individual way.Hip Hop/ Rap

8. Welcome Home - by Coheed and CambriaThis is a raising rock ‘n roll band that knows how to capture an audience.Hard Rock

9. All The Right Moves - OneRepublicThis song moves away from the olderOne Republic style and into a new and re-freshed style.Alternative

10. Stay Together For The Kids - by Blink-182This is a great song it is on blink-182 Greatest Hits album. It tells you that even though life sucks it can get better. Listen to it, and you will not be disappointed. Alternative

Times’ Monthly JamsNS entertainment writers review and recom-mends several songs from a variety of artists.