The Band has undergone many changes in the past year. First and foremost, Mr. Harden is the Band’s new director. He was hired in early July so that the Band would be able to get going in time for summer Band Camp. Before coming to Hanover, Mr. Harden was the Music Department Head at Rockland High School and directed their high school and middle school bands.

Their first major event of the year was Band Camp, which took place August 18-22 at Camp Wind in the Pines in Plymouth. During Band Camp, the Band begins the process of learning the halftime show that they perform during every home football game. This year, the show is based on songs by Earth, Wind, and Fire. The opener is “In The Stone,” the ballad is “After the Love is Gone,” and the closer is a mashup of “Getaway” and “September.” The Band has been working diligently on their show and will be ready to perform for the first home football game on October 3rd. You won’t want to miss it.

At the same time, the Band has been out performing in some new gigs. The Band performed the National Anthem at the varsity boys soccer game against Middleboro on September 9. They also played our school’s fight song during the first few minutes of the game.

On September 19, the Band traveled with the football team to an away game and performed as a pep band during the game. Many people commented that it was nice to be able to hear the band play at away football games as well. Everyone in Band hopes that away game performances become a regular thing.

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On Thursday May 29, a new tradition was started here at Hanover High School. The Literary Magazine (www.hanoverlitmag.com) sponsored a night of poetry in the Multipurpose Room.  Over 100 students attended this event. The fact that the English Department offered extra credit for attendance certainly helped in achieving that goal. The MC of the night was senior Joe DeFerrari.

Starting off the night were performances from two of the English teachers here at HHS: Mr. Hopkins and Mrs. Hughes. Both of them presented original poems and were met with rave reviews.

After Mr. Hopkins shared his performance, Jamele Adams took the floor with great gusto. Jamele’s day job is the Dean of Students at Brandeis University but by night he is a slam poet. Everybody loved Jamele’s performance. All of his poems centered around a theme of equality. In today’s world it was truly refreshing to hear those uplifting pieces. Mere summary cannot do justice to the impact of Jamele’s performance.

After Jamele’s performance was an open mic session. Several students shared their own original works of poetry for everyone to enjoy. It was truly amazing the talent of many of the students right here at HHS.

Litmag wants to thank the Classes of 2015 and 2016, National Honor Society, and Hanover House of Pizza for helping to sponsor this event.

Hanover High students got a taste of ancient Rome on May 16 when engineering classes built and raced chariots and competed in other ancient games. Spectators, happy to be out of class on a beautiful day, surrounded the field in front of the school. The teams of students competed in several events, including driving a chariot blindfolded, guided only by the passenger’s instructions, and using student-made catapults and slingshots to hit a target.  Doc DeFranzo played the part of Caesar, dressed in full Roman toga, crown and sandals. The HHS band played rousing music to accompany the games.
As Engineering teacher Mr. Faria said in announcing the event, “Rome has not seen excitement at this level since the last invasion of the barbarian hordes.”

Every year, the Hanover High Sophomores put together an auction to raise money for their collective class funds, and 2014 marked the start yet another auction endeavor. It was the Class of 2016’s turn to step up to the plate and plan an auction of its own. The respective class always does their best to put new twists on the auction to make it their own, and this year, the current sophomores decided to take a step in a new direction and hold a silent auction at the Hanover Mall for the first time ever. The auction was held in the center of the mall on April 12th, and in addition to the silent auction, the class also designed an auction website, where their auction items were available for bidding online from April 5th-12th.

On April 12th, all of the Class of 2016’s dedicated student council members gathered at the Mall and proudly displayed all of the items they had collected to auction. All afternoon, they greeted bidders, showcased items, and walked the entire length of the mall distributing flyers. The most popular aspect of the auction was a special wheel borrowed from the mall’s event department- the wheel was labeled with many different kinds of candy and gum, and for a dollar, someone could spin the wheel and win the coordinating prize! Class members even spent their own time creating custom Easter baskets filled with candy and stuffed bunnies, placing them in a raffle where tickets only cost one dollar. The auction ran from 12 until 7 pm, and caught the attention of many of Hanover’s citizens and mall employees. The afternoon proved to be both successful and fun, for the class’s members took great enthusiasm in encouraging mall customers to visit the auction, even writing out advertisements and placing them in plastic eggs to scatter around the mall, luring both children and adults alike to the auction site. The class advisor, Diane Turner, joined in the fun, calling out to all of the passing families and directing them to the auction tables and “Candy Wheel of Wonder.”

At the end of the day, the sophomores packed up their supplies with satisfaction, for they had rounded up over $2,000 in winning bids and had put smiles on the faces of dozens of children, parents, bidders, and even simple bystanders throughout the day.
But it took intensive planning to pull off such an event, and student council spent an extensive amount of time designing flyers, writing letters, planning details, designing the website, meeting with a Hanover Mall event coordinator, and even visiting, emailing, and calling countless businesses on their own time outside of school. The members of the Class of 2016’s StuCo worked extremely hard to get their items donated from some of Hanover’s generous businesses, and even some of the students and families. A few of the Class’s proudest accumulations was a Fender Guitar, donated by Crossroads Music, Celtics and Red Sox Tickets, acquired by John Carroll, and a round of Golf at Harmon and a Calloway Golf Bag, both donated by Austin Beringer. And these are only a few of the generous donations acquired by the class! Not only were the donators of the auction items very generous, but the bidders were, as well. All of those who bid were clear supporters of Hanover High and it’s Class of 2016, sometimes placing bids even higher than the item’s initial value.

Sunday May 4th dawned sunny and mild, perfect weather for for a dedicated group of Hanover High School students planning to complete Project Bread’s Walk for Hunger. After meeting at the Braintree train station at 7 o’clock sharp, the various student council and National Honors Society members participating wiped any remaining drowsiness from their eyes and boarded the train which would carry them to Boston Common, the starting and ending location of the walk. The route itself was 20 miles and wound through the surrounding towns of Boston, Newton, Watertown, Brookline, and Cambridge. This year was the 46th annual Walk for Hunger, and an astonishing 43,000 people came together to participate. Project Bread’s aim in the walk is to raise awareness for the issue of hunger in Massachusetts and raise funds for their continuing anti-hunger work in the state. Shockingly, the food insecurity rate in Massachusetts rose 80 percent from what it was in 2000, and there are 200,000 children in the state who have parents earning less than $11 an hour, making it hard for many families to sustain a healthy lifestyle. Thankfully, this year’s fundraiser raised hundreds of thousands of dollars, including $450 contributed by the Hanover High School team. That money will be put toward educating local students about healthy choices, providing reduced-price school lunches to children of struggling families, staffing school kitchens with nutritionists and health-conscious chefs, and connecting local farmers with school lunchrooms.

This was my first time participating in the Walk for Hunger, and I really enjoyed being part of something so significant. People had traveled from all over the state to participate, and many walkers sported stickers proudly labeling them as veterans of 20 or even 30 walks. It was really interesting to read the signs posted along the way bearing information about hunger in Massachusetts, most of which came as a huge surprise to me. Walking through the suburbs of Boston gave me a chance to see a part of the city I had never visited, and the Boston College and Harvard University campuses provided a beautiful backdrop to portions of the route. Project Bread’s volunteers cheered for walkers at street corners all along the way, and helped keep me motivated with their megaphones, signs, and catchy songs. I considered myself to be in pretty good shape being in the midst of track and field season, however, in all honesty I was feeling pretty exhausted by mile 19. Thankfully, the sun broke through the clouds and everyone’s mood lifted when we saw the balloon arch finish line in the distance. I picked up the pace and when my feet crossed the finish line I was filled with personal pride. We had walked almost an entire marathon and in the process raised awareness and funds for an important cause. That night, as I rested my aching limbs, I knew I would be returning for my second walk for hunger next year.

Every student knows that YouTube is one of the most popular websites on the Internet today. It contains a wealth of videos about a wide array of topics. There is truly something for everyone on the world’s largest user content site. Many teachers frequently access YouTube in order to show  videos relevant to their lessons. I would bet that the average student would be hard pressed to go an entire day without watching at least one YouTube video as a part of class.

In spite of the educational benefits, YouTube has been blocked for student access for as long as anyone can remember. After all, with the great power of educational videos comes the opportunity to waste time watching the infamous 10-hour Nyan Cat video or perhaps even worse things.

Within the coming weeks, all students will have the ability to access Youtube. “Students will be able to sign onto the Sonicwall and gain access to YouTube on any school owned iMac computer,” said Mr. Ciccolo, the Hanover School District Director of Technology.  It is important to note that students will not have access to YouTube through the HHS-Guest wireless network. According to Mr. Ciccolo, this is both for reasons of network limitations and personal accountability. Simply put, the existing school wifi infrastructure cannot handle the additional traffic. Already, according to Ciccolo, “75+ devices” are connected to any one access point at a time, which is way over the recommended capacity.  Also, by limiting YouTube access to school-owned computers, teachers will be able to monitor which video students watch. Inappropriate usage would result in discipline according to both the teacher’s classroom rules and the district’s Digital Technology Acceptable Use Policy.

Mr. Patch’s Advanced Digital Media class served as the pilot group of students for this school-wide initiative.

“Having access to YouTube is extremely useful when trying to create videos,” said Maya Collins, a student in the class. “A lot of the time we use references of videos we’ve seen online while filming. Being able to access this helps in constructing ideas  as well as viewing our own videos, which are uploaded to the school’s YouTube channel.”

Seeing the benefits, the school administration gave the green light for everyone else to have access.

Social media websites, including Facebook and Twitter, will be still be blocked for students on school-owned computers and the guest wifi.

Please remember that with the power to access Youtube comes great responsibly. The school tech staff certainly have the option to block YouTube once again if usage gets out of hand.

Much like any other high school student who obsessively checks their grades every twenty minutes, I am frequently on the Hanover Schools website.  Needless to say, I was utterly surprised one day in February to see that the website had been hacked.  Not only surprised, I was spooked by the message left on the website.  It informed its readers that, “We do not forgive, we do not forget.”  It also assured us that they will be back, which they were, less than a month later.  That time, a red screen appeared showing a Turkish flag and words in a foreign language.
Each time, the hacker’s page was taken down by Hanover technology officials fairly quickly.

According to district Director of Technology Brian Ciccolo, the school’s confidential files and students’ private information was never at risk. Although hanoverschools.org is hosted at the Salmond School, the district’s Aspen site, which contains student grades and personal information, is hosted by Follett Corporation at a separate facility and was never in danger of being breached. The district technology team has since reviewed and updated security for the hanoverschools.org website to prevent future hacks.

The website hacker claimed to be Anonymous Jordan, who has tackled some other websites in its conquests as well. Anonymous Jordan can be found on Facebook and Twitter, wearing the mask from the movie V for Vendetta in each profile picture.  This “Jordan” appears to be based out of the country Jordan.  However, because this hacker tackles things quite a bit bigger than the Hanover Schools website, I think it can be assumed that our “Jordan” is some sort of a copycat.  The original Anonymous Jordan is a kind of vigilante.  For example, recently he hacked the website of the United Nations for ignoring Palestinian hunger strikes.  “Jordan” did this in order to draw attention toward the fate of these hunger strikers, several of whom are dying.  After this major takeover, the Anonymous Jordan twitter page vindicated its actions and posted, “because ignorance is not bliss.”  Additionally, they hacked the official website of Jordan’s prime minister.  On this page, they left a message reading, “Hi uncle, how are you? We are sorry, we hacked your website. Are you upset? We feel much worse when you raise prices. The people know this feeling but you do not.”  It seems as if this hacking group is providing a voice to those under persecution.

It is fair to assume that we have not been hacked by the original Anonymous Jordan.  Perhaps this was an average teenager who lives in town, who has an above average ability in computer sciences and felt that he could make his day more interesting by hacking the school’s website, or perhaps it was something more.  Perhaps, much like the original Anonymous Jordan, this hacker had other intentions.  Maybe he had a purpose in stirring up trouble.  Yet, it seems that all we will know is that these goals remain anonymous.

What is MASC? Four letters could mean a combination of so many things, but in this case, stand for the Massachusetts Association of Student Councils. But MASC is so much more than its acronym. It is a collection of student councils from all over the state that operates under an executive board composed of a select few of these same students. Every year, MASC holds a conference in the spring that is packed with events, workshops, and activities that keep all of Massachusetts’ student leaders busy and excited. During the three- day conference, you are able to meet tons of new friends from all over the state, learn all about different events and fundraisers held at other schools, take part in many fun projects and activities, and hear from a handful of student leaders and inspiring motivational speakers. It is a fantastic experience that every student council member would be fortunate to attend!

All of the HHS students who were a part of this year’s MASC spring conference would definitely agree with me when I say that the MASC experience is one that is too incredible to be described in a few paragraphs. This year, Hanover was represented by 10 students: Brian Meehan, Mikayla Matheson, Emma Stone, Matt Jillett, Emily Teidke, Haley Martin, Maya Collins, Lauren Murray, Dante Nicotera, and myself, along with Hanover’s two student council advisors, Mr. Hegarty and Mr. Centorino. As the conference was at the Hyannis Resort and Conference Center, we lodged in the Cape Codder Resort during the two nights spent away from home.

The first day was filled with campaigning for elections to the 2014-2015 MASC executive board, which were held the following day. Hanover was fortunate to be represented in the election by Lauren Murray, who ran on a Disney-themed campaign for president, complete with fairy tale shirts, a larger-than-life campaign sign, and golden star beaded necklaces passed out to conference attendees before voting time. The first night also included a multitude of fun events, including a lip-synch contest in which towns competed against each other with creative dance moves and synchronized acts to popular songs. There was also a school spirit dance and karaoke available for participation, and earlier, a motivational speaker who was interactive, influential, and undoubtedly inspiring. The next day was filled with various workshops run by student council members statewide. Every workshop was brimming with new people to meet and fun games to play to get to know those around you and learn how to be a better leader. You truly are introduced to many new situations and experiences that change your perspectives on many things about leadership, and just life in general. After another session with a guest speaker, the second night was capped off with a banquet and a dance, where everyone dresses in formal wear, eats stuffed chicken, hears speeches from leaders and advisors alike, and finally, congregates on the dance floor under the pulsating lights of a DJ booth. Finally, the third and final day arrives as a bittersweet ending, bringing sad goodbyes from new friends and a chance to look back on all of the memories made before embarking on the long bus ride home.

And what fond memories they truly were… Although Lauren Murray did not win her election, I think she’d agree that MASC was a fantastic experience that we will never forget. All of the workshops, activities, events, speakers, and new faces left an impression on me that will never go away. I left MASC a better leader and happier individual, and it is definitely something I recommend attending in the future, and something that I will definitely be returning to in a year’s time.

As the days begin to grow longer and birds can be heard chirping in the trees, it is time once again for the annual spring sophomore class auction. The auction will be hosted this year by the student council members of the class of 2016, organized by President Andrea Bilton, Vice President John Carroll, Treasurer Sarah Ryan, and Secretary Emma Hardy. The class officers received additional help and guidance from the sophomore class adviser Mrs. Turner.

Every year, it is up to the tenth graders to appeal to local businesses for donations of gift cards, products, or services to be auctioned or raffled off. Hanover residents have been very generous with donations ranging from photography sessions to interior design consults, to an acoustic guitar!

“There will be an online auction running from April 5 -12, and a silent auction and raffle on April 12,” said Bilton.

The big ticket items will be auctioned off as they are expected to generate a larger revenue, while gift cards and small baskets can be won in the raffle. The silent auction and raffle will be held April 12 at the Hanover Mall. The other ongoing auction will take place on a website created by the officers and linked to the Hanover Public Schools website, allowing interested parties to place bids and receive notification if they can lay claim to the item being sold. Student council members are optimistic about this year’s auction and expect a good turnout.

“The money we raise will help our class pay for events such as prom and senior week,” explained treasurer Sarah Ryan.

By donating to or helping orchestrate the event, Hanover High School students are giving back to their class and helping to improve their own high school experience.

For more information or to donate, contact hhsstuco@gmail.com

By Cate Marchetti

Ask any Hanover High School student about their idea of the Caribbean, and they will assuredly gush about swimming with dolphins and giant sea turtles, laying in the sand at a world class resort, or horseback riding next to the gorgeous cerulean blue sea. Growing up in in a relatively affluent region of the world, our view of Latin America and the Caribbean Islands is jaded by the pristine and secure tourist destinations students in Hanover have visited on cruises or over February break, or have seen on television. Were we to venture outside of the perfectly trimmed and polished gated communities of the hotels, however, many people would be shocked by the poverty of the vast majority living in that area of the world. In Latin America, 57 million people live on less than one dollar a day, and in Guatemala only 48 percent of children are enrolled in primary schools as a result of having to work to help support their families.

In July 2014, a group of 10 Hanover High School Student Council members and chaperones will take part in a week-long service trip through the organization Mir Pace to the rural village of Tamahú, Guatemala. Indigenous Mayan families living in Tamahú are struggling to grow enough food just to nourish their own families, and, to make matters worse, were struck recently by the tropical storm Agatha, destroying much of the village’s food supply. Student Council members partaking in the trip will assist in home construction and repairs in addition to sanitation projects to help improve water quality and prevent diseases. A community garden project will help to feed people of the village during the off-harvest of the coffee season, when the risk for starvation is at its highest. In an educational respect, the students will interact with the children attending local schools. Through students’ efforts, the people of Tamahú will have a more comfortable and safer life.

This summer will mark the first service trip Hanover High School has participated in. Organized by the senior class vice president Emma Stone and Mr. Hegarty, HHS will join many surrounding towns such as Scituate and Hingham in their efforts to better the world at an international level. I became interested in the trip because it was something new and different. I love learning about new cultures, and being able to experience another part of the world in a safe and beneficial way sounded like the perfect opportunity. I can not wait to help the people of Tamahú and experience what it is like to live among them!

The total cost for the service project is $2,000 per student.To fund raise for the trip, Student Council members have hosted a successful soccer clinic at the Synergy Sports Complex and plan to take part in a “dough-raisers” campaign at Papa Gino’s Pizza and Uno’s Pizzeria on Tuesday, March 4th. The group had also started a page on gofundme.com and all profits collected will benefit the group as a whole.

If interested in donating or learning more about the organization, go to www.mirpace.org