On Tuesday, Feb. 7, I went to the Patriots Super Bowl Parade along with hundreds of other Hanover High School students and thousands of area fans. I woke up at 6:30 am just like any other school day, but instead of getting ready for school, I bundled up and put on my Gronk jersey. It definitely was not the greatest weather -freezing icy rain and howling wind – but it was certainly a day I will never forget. There was no better feeling than arriving at the Braintree T station to see hundreds of devoted Patriots fans in their gear, ready to watch the greatest football team of all time cruise by on the Duck Boats.

When my friends and I got to Boston, we decided to head to City Hall Plaza, which is where Tom Brady and the rest of the Pats would finish the parade and say a few words to the fans. As thousands of people packed Tremont Street, we saw some pretty interesting stuff. I had to have seen around a hundred signs making fun of NFL Commissioner, Roger Goodell, hundreds of  “Roger That” and “Drive for 5” posters, fans who may have had a little too much fun, and even two moms getting into a fistfight. I’m going to have to say seeing Gronkowski hanging off the side of a duck boat, shirtless, with the Lombardi trophy in one hand, was one of the top 5 coolest things I’ve ever seen in my life.  

The weather made it a little tough to enjoy the parade but we made the best of it. New England fans are tough and that wasn’t going to stop us from spending the day celebrating the greatest Super Bowl comeback of all time. Being 5’2” made seeing over the crowd a little difficult, but I found a way.

Once the parade was over, we headed home. Trying to get on the train was one of the most difficult things I’ve ever had to do. Cold and soaking wet, we waited on the Downtown Crossing platform and had to let four trains pass because they were too crowded. Finally, we found a way to squeeze on. The train smelled awful and I think everyone at that point just wanted to get home.

Spending my day in Boston watching the parade was a great experience. Being a Boston sports fan is something I definitely do not hate. Tom Brady is a savage and I wish Robert Kraft was my grandpa.

 

As technology has rapidly evolved in recent years, some districts have begun to provide their students with laptops to facilitate the learning process. This program is called a 1–to-1 laptop program, and it grants each student a laptop to be used in the classroom and for homework for the entire school year.

Based on my experience over the past few years at Hanover High, computers are crucial tools to many teachers’ class plans. Whether needed for a project, webquest, research assignment, or study period, computers are often in demand. The school currently uses Chromebook carts or the computer labs when typing or using the Internet is required. Though I find this system is useful and effective, I do think that if each student had their own laptop there would be less energy spent on tracking down and organizing the Chromebook carts and relocating to the computer labs. This might be one helpful benefit of developing such a laptop program here in Hanover.

Using this program might also help teachers assign work to students. Currently, teachers cannot completely assume that each student has access to a home computer, and they therefore might be hesitant to give out assignments predominantly online through a program like Google Classroom. If each student had their own school-distributed laptop, however, the teacher could feel confident that the student would have the resources at home to complete their work without having to go to extra efforts like using a computer at the town library.

If I were in charge of deciding whether or not this school should take up the program, I would probably be ambivalent about just how much more smooth the laptops would make learning. Though they would surely provide quick access to an infinite amount of learning materials right in the classroom, a weak Wi-Fi connection can make the learning process take double or triple the amount of time it normally would. I have experienced poor network connections in school with the Chromebooks, making my projects take longer than they would using a physical textbook, so I would be worried about technological mishaps like this if the school were to develop the program.

One high school teacher in La Junta, Colorado, tried out this laptop program and had interesting things to say about it to the George Lucas Educational Foundation (Edutopia). The teacher, Chris Ludwig, said that the program was helpful to teacher-student communication because it allowed for his students to get in touch with and submit work to him whenever they needed. Ludwig also stated that the laptops allowed the students to participate in the collective classroom learning experience by introducing information or resources they found online to others in the class. Moreover, he found that students getting distracted with other websites and programs on the computer while they were supposed to be working was not a major issue: Ludwig could use Apple Remote Desktop to regulate what the students were doing, and he could lock each student computer when he needed to.

Though using a 1-to-1 laptop program would be a big shift from the paper-based learning style that largely still exists at Hanover High School, I think that it could solve many problems at the school involving efficiency of attaining online resources and ease of assigning Internet work. Technology can be less reliable at times due to issues like poor wireless connections or computer malfunctions, but the world at large is increasingly relying on materials online for information. It might, in fact, prepare students well for future jobs or daily life if schools adopted a computer-based curriculum.

So, it’s February, we are halfway through the year, third term has started and we have not had one snow day. Not one! I don’t know about you, but I’m bummed. Not only am I annoyed because in years past we’ve had massive amounts of snow, but this is the one year I wouldn’t have to make up any snow days. It’s my senior year and whether we have no snow days or 20, my last day of school will be May 19 either way. 

I don’t care how much you hate shoveling your driveway; EVERYONE loves a day off from school to play in the snow. There is nothing more satisfying than sleeping in, then getting wrapped up in a nice fuzzy blanket with a cup of hot chocolate and a going on a nice Netflix binge. If you’re lucky, maybe you can even get together with your buds and get snowed in before the roads are too rough to drive on.

Some may think the opposite though. I know lots of kids that hop right in their cars when they find out snow’s coming and head out to do donuts in as many parking lots as they can. Of course, if you do choose to spend your snow day in a car, ALWAYS make sure you buckle up because roads do tend to get really icy. This has been my first winter with my license and I will say it is not easy driving when the roads get icy.

Another fun way to spend a snow day is to hit the slopes. I never got the chance to learn how to ski or snowboard, but I wish I had when I was younger so that I could go now. I like going tubing and sledding though!

So if and when we FINALLY get a snow day this winter, make the best of it and be sure to enjoy it. Come the end of June, when seniors are long gone but the rest of HHS is facing makeup days, you’re going to be wishing you had.

 I believe that technology has altered the way our generation works. Today, you see almost everyone on their phones, no matter what age they are. With kids in our generation, it’s  hard to find someone sitting down and enjoying a good book. Nowadays, you rarely see kids playing outside and enjoying their surroundings. Technology has changed the way our generation views life.

Personally, I am always on my phone and I know it’s bad, but it’s an addiction. Sometimes I look at my phone for the time and I end up looking to see if I have any notifications and have to look again because I paid no attention to the actual time. If I am not doing anything, I am absolutely glued to my phone. The only time I am off my phone is when I am driving. Besides that, sadly, I am almost always on my phone and I hate myself for it.

I even have a niece that is almost five years old who quickly learned how to use an iPhone when she was two or three. Today, she has her very own iPad and knows exactly how to use it. She is able to FaceTime with her mom when they are apart. I can see how that could be good for her mental development, but back in the day, you didn’t see five year olds with a phone in their hand. Now, I’m not saying she doesn’t go outside at all, because I would be lying — she goes outside a lot and runs around in the yard when it’s nice out –but it’s strange to see how the generations have changed over the years.

I still like to go on walks and sit outside and take photographs, but for the most part, I’d rather be inside watching Grey’s Anatomy on Netflix. Photography is my ticket to being outside and enjoying nature. It’s a way for me to communicate with other people. While looking at pictures, everyone has a different way of viewing. Say you’re looking at a picture of a sunset, some people take a long look at it and start to think about what nature means to them, and others might just admire the beauty of it. For me, photography brings out the side of me that loves the nature and seeing the true beauty behind this world. When I’m not enjoying my photography, I am again, glued to my phone and I miss out on what is right there in front of me.

It truly makes me sad that technology has taken over our creative minds. Even in school, we rely too much on technology. For projects, instead of making eye-catching posters and having fun being creative, we spend time making PowerPoints that no one wants to look at. Creativity is a part of our lives that should be prominent, but it’s not. We should use our creativity to express ourselves instead of hiding behind a computer screen. I believe that our creativity is suppressed by the dominance of phones and computers.

The internet has ruined our society. It has destroyed our self images. Many people, females and males, feel low self-esteem because of the way the internet perceives the “perfect” human. There is no such thing as a “perfect” human, but because of the internet, everyone looks at these images of what we are  supposed to be and we compare ourselves to them. The internet has made it difficult to love ourselves for who we are.

Today, when you go out to dinner, a lot of the times you see people on their phones instead of talking with the people around them. Personally when I go out to dinner, I try to leave my phone in my bag and have conversations with whoever I’m with. For our generation, I find that it’s harder for people to communicate in person because we have gotten so used to hiding behind a screen. We’ve gotten so used to relying on technology that  we have forgotten how to live life in the real world. I believe that technology has changed us, and not entirely for the better.

A friend recently shared an article with me from the Huffington Post called “Are Today’s Parents Getting a Raw Deal?” Written by Rhonda Stephens, the article explored the idea that the current generation of children may not be getting the self-reliance and responsibility needed in life because their parents are too involved in their lives. Stephens argues that parents nowadays are spending too much money on their children, releasing them from important responsibilities like steady jobs, and solving too many of their problems, depriving them of forming their own problem-solving skills. As compared to the parenting style under which she was raised in the 1970s, Stephens believes that parents nowadays are far too absorbed in their kids lives and thereby setting them up for failure while simultaneously being burdened with a new, more self-sacrificing style of parenting.

Rhonda Stephens makes a valid point. Parents are, as a trend, more involved. I have seen parents of my classmates step in for their children to negotiate work and grades, and I have seen people in my town with cars that were bought by their parents. Personally, I have had my mom make some phone calls for me to my old driving school that, realistically, would have been valuable opportunities for me to gain adult skills.

Yet, despite the negative side effects of overly involved parenting, I think that parents becoming more invested in their children’s lives is an important step in the right direction from the disengaged parenting that Stephens talks of from the 1970s. Stephens mentioned that she was pretty sure that her father didn’t know when her birthday was until 10 years before the article was written, and she remarked that no parent paid attention to her mental health as a kid. I think that it is a parent’s duty as protector and nurturer of their child to pay attention to such things, and that emotional health is of equal or greater weight to being financially self-reliant.

It seems to me that, at least in Stephens’ experiences, parents in the 1970s may have been too checked out of their children’s lives, while today many parents are too involved. Perhaps parenting would reach its most effective state when parents become emotionally involved enough but also give their children freedom to solve their own problems and buy their own nonessentials.

Of course, it is too broad to say that all parents today are overly involved. For many kids, making their own money is necessary for their college education or clothing and school supplies. Likewise, not all parents in the 1970s were so uninvolved.

I hope that parenting for all families may, in the future, reach a happy equilibrium of kids getting enough connection and independence. Even though parenting can be imperfect today, I have faith in my generation and the skills their parents have taught them. I think that kids learn responsibility quickly through the greater demands of school these days and the extra-curricular obligations in which so many involve themselves. I think that this dedication, mixed with the greater importance given to mental health and emotional connections, will be sufficient for today’s young people to someday problem-solve, cope, and survive in the “real world.”

Featured photo from https://www.teenlife.com/blogs/helicopter-parenting-why-its-not-good-your-teen

As we all know, the arduous, straining journey of what was the 2016 Presidential election came to a close Tuesday night. Republican candidate Donald Trump pulled off a shocking upset, defeating Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton and causing an uproar from every corner of our nation, from people of all types. My personal opinion resides on the side of the negative. I was never a huge Hillary supporter; however, if I had the opportunity to vote, I would have voted her over Mr. Trump 1,000 times out of 1,000. Many people know this; as this election has become a popular topic of discussion these last few months, I have shared my opinion when asked, and only when asked. I do not believe in starting political debates with my peers and family, especially during this election; the only thing that creates is animosity, and one side always seems unable or unwilling to accept the other’s views. However, I have received great reactions for my stand as a Democrat:

“You’re white; why are you a Democrat?”

“I thought Democrats were only poor people?”

“How are you not a Republican when you live in Hanover?”

“Are you stupid or are you joking?”

Yes, these are real responses, from real students, that I have received for my opinion. I have been on the receiving end of mocking for my candidate’s loss, for my choice of the “wrong” Presidential nominee ever since the campaign began, and even more so since the election concluded. I have even heard teachers, at my own school, outwardly mocking those for choosing the losing candidate, ridiculing their opinion. I have seen family members, friends, and peers post awful things about Democrats and those who voted for Hillary, bullying those who don’t share their opinion. As a human being, I would like to say that these actions are embarrassing, disgusting, and despicable. Is this the beginning of your plan to “Make America Great Again”? Your inability to respect your peers, colleagues, and fellow Americans is deplorable.

I have always believed, as long as you have a real reason, the candidate you like is the candidate you like; opinions are never wrong, and your personal preferences belong to you. I will never denounce someone for their opinion, as that is their right as an American, and I applaud those who truly know what they are preaching and stand behind it fully. However, many people seem to have forgotten this common courtesy recently, in their comments about the “deplorable, non-educated white voters,” “criminal-supporting idiots,” “moon-bats,” and “lazy sacks of sh*t” that voted for Hillary Clinton. To those of you who have said something along these lines, be ashamed of yourselves. That is not having a strong opinion; that is being an ignorant, inconsiderate person, with no respect to your fellow Americans and, more importantly, fellow human beings. My father has worked 14 hour days as a teacher and coach quite often; he is one of millions like him, who proudly call themselves Democrats. I will stand for those blue collar Americans who hold this country on their backs until the day I die.

Now, to our future President, Donald J. Trump:

I could go on about how we do not see eye to eye on our political views and about how I don’t think your unrealistic plans for office suffice; I could list statistics about the uneducated people who voted for you. However, I will not. The election is in the past now, and nothing I say in this will change its results. Also, I cannot judge your ability to run this country; you will not run our country until January, so as of now I have no basis to judge your ability as President. However, I have plenty of basis to judge you as a man. You have made several disturbing comments about women; too many to include in this article. You have belittled many popular women in our society, such as Angelina Jolie, Rosie O’Donnell, Anne Hathaway, Cher, and Heidi Klum, using adjectives such as “fat,” “gold digger,” “Miss Piggy,” and “tramp.” In your description of how to treat women, in an interview with New York Magazine, you replied “You have to treat ’em like sh*t.” You have belittled the Miss USA and Miss Universe competition, making them parade in front of you so you can get rid of the unattractive ones. This makes sense for your control of the competitions, however, as you said about them, “If you’re looking for a rocket scientist, don’t tune in tonight.” You’ve even made comments about underage women, using sexual innuendo to describe 10, 12, 14, and 17 year olds. My youngest sister is 10, and will spend her middle school years with you in office.

You have made countless comments about how worthless and despicable Mexicans are, specifically those who reside in our country illegally, doing jobs that pay under a dollar an hour, which no American citizen would ever do. You have brushed off matters of minority inequalities, belittled the Black Lives Matter movement, and made clear your anti-Muslim sentiments, and how they will be banned from this country in your time in office. You have used words of hate to destroy both your political and social opponents, never accepting their arguments, only using the tactics of a middle-school-bully to deprecate their characters.

With these traits, you managed to win the Presidential election, with an ability to persuade people that is quite unparalleled, if I may say. Now, your idiosyncrasies are on full display to the public, and will be for the next four years. My nephew, with eyes full of innocence, is 2 years old. My cousin, with the energy of a puppy, turned 6 this October. My sister, with a smile and happiness that seems to radiate around her, will turn 11 later this month. Do I want my nephew to hear the awful words you see on TV, to destroy those who merely disagree with you, and have to hear his mother call you our leader? Do I want my cousin to hear the demeaning tone you use to refer to minorities, as he approaches his beginning years of schooling, no doubt with children of minorities? Do I want my sister, as she grows into the person she will become, as she experiences middle school, to hear our President speak on women with such disgusting and deplorable tones, forcing her to reconsider her worth in today’s society? As a human being, Mr. Trump, I can never respect you, unless I see a change. I truly hope you develop some level morals, respect, integrity, and many other necessary qualities in order to successfully run our country. Although I am nervous about it, I can do nothing but put my full faith in you to maintain the success of the United States of America.

With all of the drastic opinions put out after the elections, one that I simply cannot take part in is “I am embarrassed to be an American.” Please. The President of this country will never, NEVER, fully embody the true qualities of this country. You can be embarrassed about the decision, but this decision will never change the root values of our country. Hard work, perseverance, drive, and pride in who we are will always prevail, and those concepts are something we can never be embarrassed about, no matter who our leader is. Although there will be some who find our future President to be our leader, if you share my opinion, you cannot say the same, and this is a sad realization. However, keep this in all of your hearts: we may have elected Donald Trump as our President, but we have the ability to elect ourselves as our leader. Our President does not have to lead us. In the hazed fog of the future of our country, the light from the solutions to the issues facing us will not be with him. It is up to us as American citizens to shine the light and navigate ourselves through the cloudy state of our nation, and come together to find our way through hardship.

I ask us all, citizens of all political viewpoints, races, religions, and nationalities, to come together; we have been divided too much these past 6 months. How did we let two political candidates, hungry for power, destroy the love and connections we have as Americans? We cannot let an election of one of the many positions of power in our country destroy the bonds of the American people. We are not Democrats and Republicans at heart; we are human beings. We need to have morality, we need to have love, we need to have respect, and most of all, we need to have empathy. Mr. Trump, so far, has not shown empathy. I pray that he will develop this sense, in order to help us come together. So, I ask of all you, all Americans, to open a door for a Democrat, help a Republican with a problem, and overall, treat all Americans as what they are: human beings. If there is ever a time to come together, it is now, after what was the worst Presidential election to date. The United States of America stands for so much; it is time for us to fully embody it.

Sources: “Donald Trump Sexism Tracker.” The Telegraph. Telegraph Media Group, n.d. Web. 10 Nov. 2016.

 

This year’s presidential election has been one of the nastiest ever. What was once a comparison of candidates based on policies has turned into a mud-slinging bully session. Candidates are roasting other candidates. But the people who are really getting burned are the American people,  left to pick between “Crooked” Hillary Clinton and “Loose Cannon” Donald Trump. While you may not have decided who you’re rooting for in this election, here are 20 things about the campaign that you’ll never forget.

1. Trump calls Jeb Bush “low energy”

Donald Trump started to be grab attention with outrageous comments at the Republican primary debates. His first famous comment was calling Jeb Bush “low energy.” This started the downfall of Bush’s campaign. Many people thought he was certain to get the Republican nomination, but that all started to unravel when Trump went on the attack.

2. Trump’s “robot impression”

https://youtu.be/A28sFe_f8Kc?t=20m18s%20

Early in the campaign, Trump got a lot of attention for, well, just being weird. (Who even says ‘China’ like that anyway?). He got a lot of attention for his, apparent, robot impression. “You know what that is, right?” I don’t think anyone knew what that was. (See also: the many remixes of ‘bing bong’).

3. Marco Rubio is Dubbed “Little Marco”

Trump made up names for many of his opponents in the Republican primaries. “Little Marco” was his best work. The feud between the two later degenerating into a debate about “hand size.”  Trump’s attacks were said by many to be responsible for eliminating Rubio, Bush and eventually, “Lyin’” Ted Cruz.

4. Bernie Releases His First Ad

Something positive in the election had finally happened. Bernie Sanders aired his first commercial. For once, a political ad didn’t attack someone and try to use scare tactics. It had good values and just showed, well, America. Whether you liked Bernie Sanders or not, it’s hard to deny that this was definitely a feel-good kind of commercial.

5. Clinton Takes A Bathroom Break Mid-Debate

Defiantly proving she is just like the rest of us, Hillary made a dash for the bathroom during the commercial break of one debate against Bernie Sanders (and Martin O’Malley, but he didn’t get to say much). She didn’t make it back until after the show resumed. Luckily someone who was actually on the stage was asked the next question.

6. Jeb Bush Begs People to Clap

After Trump humiliated Bush at the Republican primary debates, Bush’s campaign was over. He definitely didn’t go out with a bang, begging his audience to clap for him at one of his campaign rallies. How sad. Just look at the audience’s faces.

7. Bernie is Tired of Hillary’s “Damn Emails”

Bernie and Hillary could both agree on one thing. They had heard enough about Clinton’s emails. Hillary seemed very glad to see someone move on from the touchy subject. Although with the recent scandal just a days before the polls open, Bernie may have spoken too soon.

8. Trump Offers to Pay Legal Bills of People Who Take Out Rioters at His Rallies

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WzYv5foyAS8

After multiple incidents of violence at Trump events, the candidate told his supporters to “knock the crap” out of  protesters interrupting the rally. He even promised to pay their legal fees if there was any trouble, something which he later denied saying. Since then, it has been found that some protesters were paid by Hillary’s campaign disrupt the rallies.

9. Clinton Gets Pneumonia

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BtQVIcxq82E

After people started to wonder about both candidate’s health, Hillary was seen being carried into a van after leaving a 9/11 memorial. This only fueled the fire of critics who argued she was in poor health. A conspiracy theory that Clinton had seizures began to take hold. The theory, obviously, has never been proven correct.

10. Hispanic Woman Loves Trump

After Trump was repeatedly criticized for discriminating against Hispanics, this woman was called to stage at one of his rallies. Unfortunately for Trump, this woman who shows her love for the candidate seems to be a rare find . . . and actually comes off a little creepy.

11. Melania’s Familiar Speech

At the Republican National Convention, Trump’s wife Melania gave a speech that sounded a little too similar to one Michelle Obama had made eight years earlier. The speech was not plagiarized, but written by the same writer, who felt very badly about the incident and apologized.

12. Clinton Calls Trump Supporters “Deplorables”

At a campaign event, Hillary  said that Trump’s supporters could be put “in a basket of deplorables.” The comment sparked outrage from Trump’s camp. I won’t say any more, as I’m sure most people have heard it played a thousand times.

13. Trump Threatens to Put Clinton in Jail

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U30HXUy3R_w

Trump completely lost it at the second presidential debate, saying that when he is elected president, he would investigate Hillary’s emails to determine whether she should be in jail. This was definitely the most shocking moment of the debate.

14. Ken Bone is the Debate Hero America Needs

Ken Bone won his fame for seemingly no reason, with a question in the town hall-style debate about energy policy. The debate was hardly taken seriously, as the second most talked about moment was the fly that kept landing on Clinton’s face.

15. Singing Makes Everything Better

To distract people from the two horrible choices they had for president after the second debate, an Internet user created a hilarious lip sync of the two candidates. While they might have been having the “the time of their lives,” America was biting its nails trying to decide between the lesser of two evils.

16. Hillary is Very Proud of Herself for Saying “Trumped Up Trickle Down”

When comparing policies at the first presidential debate, Clinton seemed very proud of herself for coming up with the idea that Trump’s economic plan would be a “trumped-up trickle down.” Just the smile on her face when nobody was laughing was awkward enough. When she later repeated the term at the third debate, there was still no reaction from the audience. Oh well, Hillary, I guess you can’t land them all.

17. Trump warns Americans of the possible 400 pound man hacking our government

When talking about a Wikileaks release of Clinton campaign emails, Trump told people he had no idea where the attack originated from. Countering the Democrats’ theory that the Russian government was behind the leak, Trump argued that, for all he knows, it could have been done by a 400 pound man hacking the government from his bed. Odd choice of words.

18. Trump at the Third Debate

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IH9KKLzjBDc

Trump had a crazy third debate. He left the American people in suspense about whether he would accept the results if he lost the election, called Hillary a “nasty woman,” and warned the American people there are “bad hombres” coming over the border. He had sad himself earlier, “the shackles are off.”

19. Ted Cruz’s “Hotline Bling”

After Ted Cruz lost the Republican nomination, he eventually, reluctantly, supported Trump (after telling voters to ‘vote their conscience’). Here he can be seen campaigning for Trump, but very depressed.

20. Hilarity Ensues at Charity Dinner

At the Al Smith Charity Dinner, Trump and Clinton seemed to get along great, both of them poking fun at the other. It was nice to get a break from the usual cut-throat attitude that has characterized the rest of the race. It was definitely a great way to end the election as it will probably be the last time they are seen together in public.

The positive thing is the election is almost over. Election Day is Tuesday, Nov. 8th. Luckily, Hanover High School has the day off so we can all mourn the fate of the country no matter who wins.