One of the many clubs our school has for students of all grade levels. Not requiring much to join other than a bit of time to help out in our community.
The Leos Club is sponsored and run by Yesenia Torres stating, “The Leo’s club is a program where young people serve as positive agents of change for their community.” She was more than willing to share more information about the club so that more students got the idea of what this club was about.
Students are encouraged to join the club, so that they may help out within their community.
Why should students join the Leos club one might ask, well it is like Mark Islas said, “you get to put smiles on people’s faces.” Islas, a three-year veteran in The Leo’s club is no stranger to helping in making a change.
It is known that change cannot happen without one person doing something. Islas said he has learned to serve his community in many different aspects and it not only involved himself but others as well.
Besides helping out the community, students are able to earn community service hours.
Student Pedro Rodriguez mentioned one of the reasons for joining the club was to earn community service, while helping out the community. It was a win-win situation: helping out his community and earning hours for school.
Like Torres said, “Besides the students getting volunteer hours they get to serve their community, get to know what is going on in the city, and make change in their community.” Being informed about what is happening within your community and city will always be the Leos club mission.
Change is the Leo’s Club mission and by having students volunteer it makes it easier to do so.
Like Rodrigues said, “I have achieved a better understanding with helping and I am more social with people than before.”
Becoming a Leo opens opportunities for students to show their leadership skills while having fun helping out in their community.
The class of 2023 at jimmy carter early college has been affected by online classes. Their academic grades had been lowered to a great extent in the past 2 years.
Students had many disruptions at home that might have been the cause for them to have a downfall in grades, they wouldn’t just focus on schoolwork because they had a different surrounding that could have been distracting.
“For example, my grades went down for the cause that I couldn’t focus at home”, Alysha stated.
Consequences during virtual classes were dissimilar to the ones we have now that we are back to face-to-face classes. Juniors felt like administrators wouldn’t do anything to them that would affect them.
“I feel like I did a little bit worse because I felt like I didn’t get consequences if I didn’t show up to class, so I wouldn’t go as much”, Alondra stated.
Students’ grades had been affected for many reasons; for the condition, we are in and not having proper teaching.
“Due to the condition we are in, my grades did go down, not badly but they did go down to what I didn’t expect”, Rubie said, also alysha stated, “ yes because I didn’t have the proper teaching, do to online classes”.
Procrastinating during online classes was easy for the majority of the junior students, but do they blame themselves or virtual classes?
“I blame myself because teachers tried to give me as many resources as they could and I couldn’t take advantage of it”, “ I blame virtual classes because I personally need to get taught face-to-face to understand the criteria”, “ It’s a 50/50 because I feel like in my part I should have done more and in their part, I think they were already doing the most they could”, junior students stated.
Virtual classes for almost 2 years were a difficult procedure for us the junior class and it could have been for the other students at Jimmy Carter as well.
As UIL season kicks off, students are “Eager to participate” in the events, according to a member of the Ready Writing team Mia ‘Onyx’ Mendoza.
Each Monday and Tuesday, the school cafeteria holds a few dozen students waiting for their meetings to begin despite the first meet being weeks away.
Junior student Dominique Brown calls UIL a “Nice opportunity for children to get together and have a friendly competition between each other and also work on their skills.” She also said that because competitions won’t be face-to-face, students will be more relaxed when competing.
A Mission Veterans Memorial High School student says that the current pandemic should not keep people from enjoying a competition between schools. He also said that everything would be fine as long as students and faculty follow the rules set forward by school districts.
Jesus Menchaca, a sophomore student, says that he hopes to accomplish the goal he set for himself. He also hopes to make his teachers proud with everything he does.
Member of the debate and science team Luis Martinez believes that the year is good. He also says he enjoys how the year is going.
“I think that UIL is a different way for kids to learn sportsmanship,” Freshman student Janet Gomez said, “I’ve been doing science UIL all my middle school years, I was able to learn things that I would later acquire in the future.”
Students Sebastian and Adilene review and talk about the recent movie adaption of the Broadway Musical Dear Evan Hansen. In the episode, we discuss the changes in the script and the characters’ personalities. This episode does contain spoilers for the musical. The topic of suicide is also mentioned heavily. All opinions stated in this episode […]
Students walk to class as others wait outside their classrooms.- Taken by Adilene Vasquez
“I want to begin by saying that Hillary and I are profoundly shocked and saddened by the tragedy today in Littleton” In 1999, Bill Clinton addressed the nation about events that happened earlier that day regarding two teenage boys in a small town in Colorado. The country didn’t know then that the perpetrator’s crimes would lead to changes in school safety.
On April 20th, 1999, a 17-year-old boy named Dylan Klebold and his 18-year-old friend Eric Harris entered Columbine high school with four different firearms and over four dozen different explosive devices. In less than an hour, 12 students, excluding the perpetrators, and one teacher would be dead, with over four others wounded. According to Alisha Bashore, a survivor of the massacre, many of the survivors and their families have “Wounds that won’t heal.” according to Alisha Bashore, a survivor of the massacre.
“Compassion is the greatest form of love humans have to offer,” said Darell Scott, father of Rachel Scott, one of the first victims of the Columbine Massacre. In the aftermath of their daughter’s death, Scott and his wife Sandy created Rachel’s Challenge. It is a non-profit, non-religious, non-political organization focused on reducing school-related violence. The two have traveled to different schools to speak to students about school violence, bullying, and suicide. They do this by showing footage and news reports from the shooting and its aftermath, in addition to excerpts from Rachel’s journal.
On the tenth anniversary of his daughter’s death, Scott would go on NBC’s Today Show to say, “We’ve seen a lot of lives changed from her story and our program. Rachel’s Challenge has touched 13 million lives over the past ten years.”
In those ten years, there have been over 60 reported school shootings in the United States alone. Because of how common these types of events have become, schools have implemented protocols for these situations.
“Schools were the hub of the neighborhood. They were an open place. They were supposed to be inviting.” Dr. Michael A. Wanko, the current superintendent of Bayonne Schools, said. Wanko called the different security measures’ ‘mind-boggling.’
School funding has been spent on the bulletproof glass on windows, hiring more security officers, adding CCTV cameras, and placing metal detectors in main entryways. Others have replaced doors with ones that lock automatically when closed. Wanko would call these ‘mind-boggling.’
“There’s never enough safety protocols. We can always do better, but I’m glad that we have been implementing them in the past few years,” Sophomore teacher Thania Robles said,” Even though it’s pretty sad that they have to be implemented.”
Lockdown and active shooter drills have become an everyday practice throughout the country. In places like Rolla, Missouri, these drills are required to happen at least once in the school year. They include armed officers strolling the halls, students running, and others pretending to be injured or dead.
During these drills, the school is placed on lockdown, something that has previously been practiced but has been occurring more and more often.
“I think that lockdowns are reasonable because it teaches kids about safety precautions and what they need to go through. They need to know how to, you know, stay safe.” Student Itzel Tovar said.
On occasion, schools are placed in lockdown due to a student or facility member making a threat. Many schools encourage students to report any violent or nonviolent threat they may overhear or have been told. The FBI recognizes that many shooters reveal their plans to their friends. This is known as leakage.
“I would definitely report them because they’re still a threat. If you report it, you could save lives. You could stop something from happening before it ever happens.” Student Mariana Castillo believes that even if somebody is close to someone, such as their friend or family member, they are still a threat if they say something threatening.
In 2007, Harrold Independent School District in Wilbarger County, Texas, began to arm its teachers and other faculty members with handguns. The selected employees must go through training, require a license before carrying, and pass psychological tests.
Junior Class President Winston Garza says that while it could be a good idea for teachers to carry, it’s not necessary. In his personal beliefs, he believes that teachers shouldn’t carry firearms because this is what we have security and police officers for. If they do their job correctly, there won’t be a need for any more safety precautions.
“The protocols should probably be reinforced since there is still a lot of school shootings monthly.” Mia ‘Onyx’ Mendoza said. “I think the protocols are a good thing because they can prevent a possible shooting and hopefully discourage students from doing those malevolent things.”
