In the summer of 2022, the Wisconsin Supreme Court ended the Free School Lunch program. This received heavy backlash as many parents and students were left on their own for their child’s breakfast and lunch. The program had previously funded a school’s ability to provide free lunch and breakfast to every student. This was something many low-income and poverty stricken families could rely on. The ending of this program had heavy repercussions on many Wisconsin schools and communities. “The Free Lunch Program ending has affected the students enormously.” Said Principal Reuth of the Portage School District when interviewed by this reporter. “Over the last two school years the majority of our students ate lunch every day and more people ate breakfast than ever before.” He said regarding change in the school as an effect of the ending of the program. “With it coming to an end our afternoons have become much less calm.” Many studies have been found to not only link behavioral issues to hunger but also educational ones. In an article done by Feeding America by Allison Weber, “Sadly, hunger may impact a child’s school performance. Research demonstrates that children from families who are not sure where their next meal may come from are more likely to have lower math scores and repeat a grade, among other challenges.” For many school is the only place they are able to get a nutritious meal. Although government is providing application for free and reduced meals for some low income families, the registration process is quite vigorous. This can cause some families to shy away from applying due to the time taking applications that must be filled out. Plus, for many their is now a surrounding stigma around having to apply for free lunch. To add onto that an article done by Resilient Educator: Hunger Pains: Teaching Hungry Students by Jennifer Gunn reports that “74% of educators have students who regularly come to school hungry.” Educator and Director of the “Market” Program, Mrs. Carlson, was interviewed and shared similar views when it came to the ending of the free lunch program. “The environment (of the school) has changed because people are coming to school without breakfast and lunch and they are coming to school hangry. When you haven’t eaten breakfast you have shorter fuse and people aren’t able to focus on school work. Many people don’t get lunch and breakfast at home and rely on school to have these meals and they aren’t able to focus on school if they’re hungry.” She says. “If were required to be here at school, which we all are, we should be given free meals while were here.” For many, sending a hungry child to school is like sending a soldier to war with no armor and weapons. Many schools are coming up with their own ways to tackle this new dilemma including providing afternoon and morning snacks or offering dinners or food pantries. This is something that affects more than just students as many educators have to deal with hungry children. The ending of this program is helping to bring communities together to support those in need.
I love where you used an active voice and you wrote, "Educator and Director of the “Market” Program, Mrs. Carlson, was interviewed and shared similar views when it came to the ending of the free lunch program."
Teachers have been starting to grade differently from the ABCDF scale. Instead of using letter grades for assignments, they’ve started to use standards based grading. Standards based grading or SBG for short doesn’t use letters, but they use numbers. One school located in Portage has had difficulties concerning the program. Students can get wrong grades and it’s calculated in a way that upsets students.
Standards Based Grading
The system has homework and other assignments (including tests and quizzes) being graded on a 0-4 scale. A zero means you did not do the assignment and/or very minimally did any work. A one means you have an understanding of the basic concepts. A two is you partly understand the whole idea, a three you properly understand the idea, and a four means you know extra information you applied and know about the topic.
This on paper is a very ideal way to grade students; it doesn’t just grade them based on how many things they got wrong but it’s based on how well they understand.
The issues students and teachers have is with Infinite Campus. IC doesn’t grade through a 0-4 system, but is instead using a letter grade system. When grading, the computer behind it has to grade from 0-4 and turn that into a letter. IC was never meant to grade however from 0-4, so some students have problems with their grade. The numbers don’t have a specific translation into %s; which is then turned into letters. A 3 for instance, is not a 100% even if the student did all their work assigned because a 4 is the highest grade they can get. A 4 may not even be possible in some circumstances because it relies on being able to show advanced skill; like extra credit on a test. This upsets some students because even if they completed all assignments and extra credit they may only have an A depending on how many assignments were able to be graded a 4.
The fact that SBG was also not supposed to be converted into letter grades doesn’t help. Because of that the system can glitch and bug. “It’s designed to do very specific things,” says the principal of the school. Working with numbers into letters wasn’t one of those things. So while the program may help students, it wasn’t designed for how the school uses it.
The System Behind it
PowerLaw is the system this school uses to calculate number grades. It’s also what predicts your grade; so an example is if you get consistent 3s you’ll be predicted to earn a 3. Teachers have reported that this can be glitchy when it comes to putting it into letter grades.
A report from a teacher states, “I've had students who had about a C improve a grade from a 2 to 3 and the grade turn to an F and so that's a bug that we've got to work out.” The opposite also happens where someone may have 0s or 1s but has an A is also present as a glitch.
In about a couple years the principal reported that the middle and high school will only use SBG and no longer use letter grades. With this switch glitches are estimated to be less prevalent due to many of the bugs being from the transition of letter grades and SBG.
Same Expectations? Should the expectations be the same for men and women? We asked people questions about stereotypes and if we should all be seen as equal. Many answered yes with a few saying no. Many of the people we asked said that the only expectations that we should have were that we should all just be nice to each other. We also asked questions that are stereotypically going against gender roles such as a man showing emotion and a woman being stronger than a man. Children's Gender roles Gender stereotypes start before a child is born saying things like “mud or makeup, blue or pink, tractor or tiara, king or queen, mammas boy or daddys girl” and other silly things like that. If we didn’t raise children with gender stereotypes what would the world be like? What would happen if we let kids choose who they were? Would we be more accepting of kids who came out as genderfluid and non binary?
Male Gender Roles Will we be able to change for the better if we still treat people as less than they are because we can't see past what they look like? Many people feel like Men and women should be treated the same. They also feel like colors, makeup, emotions, and accessories don’t have a gender so why do we treat everyone differently based on looks? The women that we asked what they thought was a male gender role many responded that they thought of a strong man of the house, kind of guy who makes more money than them This upset the men we asked, they said they wanted to be seen as a caring guy not some robot. . Female Gender Roles Women were disappointed that they have missed out on opportunities because they were women, and because they were the “weaker gender” We also asked the men what they thought about a female gender role and they said that she should stay home, cook, and clean/ They also said that the had to be pretty, like kids and be caring Many men answered that women have to have kids otherwise it's a waste of a woman but many women said that women don’t need to have kids if they aren't ready, or if they just don’t want to. The women were saying that they don’t need to have kids and claimed that it was their choice not the man’s choice because it was their bodies. . World Change To build progress for mankind most people think that in order to move forward and. we need to be less controlling. Most people agree that things should be equal and that emotions and health are more important than being a boy or girl. That's why so many people think we need to change things to match the new times., to be equal, these new rules are trying to control many women's bodies through us back years.
I liked how you make the reading think about things by adding questions. Another thing you did well was adding facts yet I didn't feel that there was much of any bias.
Mental health issues Mental health issues are a serious barrier for a lot of people. It would be good to have classes about mental health, so if a student develops a mental health issue they can understand it better and maybe share with other kids what they are going through.. Some other things that they do is educate people about different mental health issues and help families get help with different therapies and resources because you never know if someone else is experiencing it and it is important to trust them. We often think that people are ok when they are not. -Mr. Wyman. five things that you can do that will improve your mental health. One, avoid criticism and treat yourself with respect. two take care of your body don’t smoke, don’t vape, drink lots of water, and get enough sleep. Three you should surround yourself with good people and not people who will end up hurting you.. Four, quiet your mind, and meditate also just have a good mind set about things.Five, you should try to learn how to deal with stress. Some things that people go through Mental illness can feel like a life sentence in prison because you might feel trapped inside your own mind and think you’ll be stuck there forever. Most people don’t take their mental health seriously. Sometimes it gets so bad it makes people do things that they didn't really want to. Most people feel that the pills that they get for mental health issues will fix everything but the truth is, treatments like counseling are just as important. Not all mental health issues need medication to help resolve them. It is important to take your mental health seriously, just as seriously as your physical health. Maybe, even more important. It is easy to deny a problem if it can’t be seen, and mental illness can get bad very fast. Some more facts According to Kate rix from the U.S news. 70% of children in the U.S receive mental health support at school. Also some schools can't keep up with the demand even with the tripled workforce and that psychology people are foremost the important workforce development. In 2021 the association of school psychologists recommended one psychologist for every 500 students in some states the ratio is as high as 1 to 5,000.. On a negative note Did you know that about 1.4% of all people die of mental health issues that makes them commit suicide. This could be prevented if those people went to therapy and got help.
School grades are something that helps you see what you got on our your assignment and once your teacher looks over you assignment they would put a grade on it and the lowest grade is a F and the highest is a A and sometimes it hard to stay up on top of your grade just like it hard for me because i forget to turn in assignment sometime and if you want to be successful and play sports and you have to stay on top of your grades just like i am am i play alot of sports so i try to stay on top of my grades so i can play the sports that i like to play.
Why Might bullying happen to people? Bullying happens a lot during middle school through 6th and 8th grade. Many people are getting picked on for being different or they are new to the school, many bullies come up with new ways to be rude to someone. Later in the year, sometimes students' friends will change because they might meet someone new who is rude. To others and then that student friends will start to think being rude is funny. What do students do when they get bullied? When that happen students go and tell a teacher about what is going on and when the. Student can;’t tell a teacher, they stand up to the bully, like this website that. Share people that stand up to bullies “NoPlace4hate is a website that shares stories about kids that get bullied like” “Sierra” “who got bullied because. The new girl didn’t like her for some reason, in the end, she decided to ignore and wait for the bully to get in trouble”. Why should you tell a teacher? Sometimes when students get bullied by others they try to hide away and do certain actions that lead to harm, and. Anger that has the teacher confused about who does the bullying, at schools many students. Notice bullying happening at parts of schools but students still do not ask for help when. These actions happen when teachers sometimes need help to know what is going on in the. School since they are busy getting class ready, telling a teacher helps the know what is happening,
The recipients of dress code violations are most often female students. As a result those who get dress coded are most often girls. Because of the punishments these girls may react differently because of the consequences. Consequences may be greater than just a simple dress code violation. It could be something like a lunch detention for some students, it could be as big as a suspension for others.
43.3% of students at Bartels Middle School feel that the dress code should change because students don’t think that it is fair. Also, Bartels Middle School students feel that the dress code has affected the way that they dress such as the pants they choose to wear or the shirts they wear. 25.8% of students feel that there is a huge difference between the way boys dress versus the way girls dress. On the other hand 11.7% of students feel that the dress code doesn't need to be changed because it doesn’t affect them.
From a young age, children have experienced sexualization from our society. Sometimes you may not even notice if this is happening. Such as when we look at baby clothes. Many asked, “Why do we feel a need to make comments about how a child is dressing?” And “Why is it all right to put sexual meanings on their clothes?”
Inappropriate Jokes
When shopping for baby clothes, you can find many different designs, colors, and even funny jokes. Some of these jokes have caught people's attention, such as breastfeeding. You can find clothes saying things about ‘how many boobs they suck on’ and other types of uncomfortable humor. In the U.S., over 80% of mothers begin breastfeeding their babies. Countless parents and others wonder why something that is so common should be sexualized? One teenager even said that they had witnessed a mother getting told to not breastfeed in public because it was ‘disgusting.’
Who’s Getting Sexualized More?
When looking for boy and girl clothes for any age, you will find some different results. For example, when looking at boy clothes you can find things such as pants and sweatshirts. When looking for girls clothing, you almost immediately get tank tops, short skirts, and even shorter dresses. This type of attire can show young girls that they should show their bodies. The clothing that is provided for our children continues to bring unwanted thoughts that tell them it’s okay if they are getting sexualized even if they’re not comfortable. In a world of hate and offense, people continue to make a more dangerous setting for our future generations. It’s time to put this to an end. When seeing inappropriate gestures, will you be the one to speak out?
I like how you included facts about the topic over all, you also organized it into separate topics that made it easy to understand what you were getting at good job👍
Is Your Dress Code Out Of Date? Wrote by: Courtney Hernkind
Picture this, a girl in art class was just minding her business and trying to get some color pencils when an aid come up to her and asked her to pull up her shirt because she had a little bit of her shoulder showing. By the way, she said it in a snarky tone as well.
She did as the aid asked but she wasn’t happy about it. When she was talking to another classmate about it they said that the same aid made a comment like that to her. Why would an aid care about that? It was affecting no one but the girl herself.
Bartels Middle School Survey Results
According to the BMS Middle School survey results, 50% of the school feels that the dress code should be changed. Would you say that 50% is a lot? That’s only then 150 that disagree then. You also have to think that the dress code isn’t just looking at the body though, it’s looking the items you have as well.
Coming from the BMS principal, “The least important thing that I really worry about is the dress code. Most of the recent changes made to the dress code were made for safety reasons, which deal more like backpacks and handheld bags.” Some people change for safety reasons and some don’t.
Other People’s Stories
In Florida High School this is what some people had to say, “Other girls approached her and said the alterations made them feel sexualized and exposed.”
After hearing this how do you feel? Doesn’t it make you feel uncomfortable knowing that there are schools that are having this happen.
Some would say you are lucky, or do they just have it bad?
“They insisted that she was violating the school dress code. (The 2017-2018 Code of Student Conduct does not say bras must be worn by female students.)” This was quoted from New York Times. She had gotten a sunburn and her bra was too uncomfortable for her. She didn’t wear it but she somehow got in trouble?
After hearing about all of this, is the dress code really up to date or does it need a reality check?
There are some things that we like to compare to see any differences we might have never noticed.Believe it or not you can learn a lot when you compare two topics.For example, we may never think to compare certain topics because of how different they seem.Although sometimes the more differences they have the more you will find.Something that is not talked about often is bullying.An odd comparison we can make is with bullying and the flu.Although they seem to have absolutely nothing in common, they have one thing in common.They will never go away.But, we have adapted to the point where we don’t worry about the flu because we know its coming at some point. When it comes to bullying we can’t be ready.We know its out there but its something we can never truly be ready for.Many people would like to argue that bullying is not a greater problem in schools.Many don’t realize how bad it really is until greater consequences occur.There are lots of cases where students report the bullying but, the adults don’t intervene.When a student tells you about their experience with bullying they are expecting someone to do something about it.Will it ever be of any use if no one cares enough to do something?
Stories on Bullying There are many stories out there of kids who have experienced bullying, and although bullying is a topic many would rather not hear about it is important to do so.Most of these stories have horrible events that happened to these kids at a young age.All of these stories show that there will always be people who try and erase who you really are.But, these stories show that you should never let events like these stop you. This small story is written by Corina.In her story Corina states, “It feels weird that something so small can affect you so greatly. I have had a pretty good life by economic standards, but when it comes to emotional I had it bad. I think it all started in second grade.At first it was little mean things, taking my lunch because "your too fat to eat" or the constant cries of "ewwwww" and "fat lard" in P.E. I was only in second grade! Things got worse as the year went along. I had no friends. None. The kids played a game called "get away" it involved them trying to get as far away from me as possible. Then the worst thing happened, I was physically pushed and shoved back and forth while changing for P.E. By this time I was in fourth grade and i understood that this was not right, but how could I stand up for myself? I convinced myself it was nothing and carried on with my life. I am now at a new school, and I love it, I have learned to brush off the occasional "chipmunk cheek" and other mean things.” This short story is an example of how it can be for some kids when they leave their home.Some kids are afraid of going to school because of how they are treated.Sometimes a simple thing can change a kids life, either for the better or for the worst.
Statistics and Evidence According to the the article https://www.educationcorner.com bullying starts at a very young age.It states that 90% of students in grades 4-8 have been bullied or harassed during their school experience.This could mean that there is at least one kid being bullied at every school.According to the National Education Association, over 160,000 kids refuse to go to school due to fear of being bullied.Sometimes kids/students start to bully other classmates because of their own family problems.In fact according to this article https://www.washington.edu 97% percent of bullies claim to have had issues at home leading them to bully others. Without further explanation do you think bullying is a problem or not?Is it a simple story or something more?Will it change a student’s life or will it be another simple phase that will eventually go away?
Part 1 Homework as we know has gotten harder as we’ve gotten older. This is because school’s are trying to get you ready for the future. Especially high school, getting you ready for college. Homework may take away from freetime we have at home. Many kids may forget about some assignments they have, especially if they’ve been doing chores or other homework. Some kids may have earlier bedtimes than others, this may be one reason for kids not getting their homework done in time, sports and extracurricular activities may be another. Personal Thoughts and Experiences with Homework. “Me personally I don’t like homework, it’s hard, I don’t choose to do homework.” Says 8th grade student Kaiden Kern at BMS. “I only get 15 or 20 minutes at home to do homework, I usually have 7 assignments to do.” Could you imagine having 7 assignments and only 15-20 minutes to do these assignments? Have you ever wondered what teachers have to go through? “Over the last 26 years homework has decreased significantly, when I first started teaching we gave a lot of homework. So we used to give a lot of homework and now it is if someone didn’t finish something in class. Usually there is only one night of homework per unit. I usually have three or four hours of homework per week for just grading, and then probably 4 more for planning, so about 8 or 9 hours per week. We are trying really hard to make sure there is not much homework, I do see an issue with kids not using their class time wisely though. It could be that class time use is interfering with teachers' ideas with how much homework students really have.” Explains 8th grade teacher Ms DeVries at BMS. Since teachers have that much homework to do, students probably have roughly the same amount of homework as teachers, this is only the case because teachers have to grade the assignments students are given. Do Children from around the World have too much Homework? The Washington Post shares the story of a mother who was done with the mass amounts of homework her child was given, “‘I looked at him and said, ‘Do you want to do this?’ He said no, and I said, ‘I don’t either.’“ And that was the end of homework for her 6-year-old.” This mother may have her reasons for why she did what she did. “‘If there’s something our son is struggling in, we’ll absolutely do the work. But after eight hours at a desk, to make him sit down and do more seems silly.’” This mother is doing what she can to reduce the strain on this poor 6-year-old’s life. According to the same article in The Washington Post other parents are also angry about the amount of work being sent home. “Other parents stop all homework if it takes longer than 10 or 15 minutes, believing the assignments should be a simple review of what was learned in school, not an hours-long process to struggle through.”
Part 2 A Story from a Student at BMS. One student who was in Volleyball earlier this year had some homework she had to do. It was one of the days that she had a Volleyball game. She knew that she had homework to do, knowing she wouldn’t get it done in time, she did not do as well at the game, making her even more mad at herself. This game went till very late around 7:30, she wasn’t allowed to do her homework while waiting for the other team to finish. So by the time she was done eating dinner it was around 8:25. When she was done she had to go shower, by the time she was done it was almost 9:00. After all that time passed, she could finally do her homework. Since this girl had to go to bed at around 9:30 this only left her about 30 minutes to do homework. Which isn’t nearly enough time to finish 4-5 pages of math homework, making her have to rush to get it finished. How would you feel if this were you? What can We do to Fix this Problem?
WISCONSIN - Students and teachers at Bartels Middle School are divided after a new grading system get implemented. People are confused, wanting to know the reasons for this sudden change.
Differences in the systems
The new system measures what the students perceive, or how much they understand about the topics they are learning. Unlike the original system, grading all things completed by the students regardless of their level of understanding or improvement. Standards-Based Grading helps display the students more accurately, “but it doesn’t easily fit into the GPA system.” notes Principal Rueth, “ We also don’t know how to fit this into college admissions for high school students.” This poses problems for students going into college where they aren’t easily able to show their grades in their resumes.
Power Law
Some students are experiencing many more fluctuations in their grades for classes that have the standards-based grading system implemented. This is due to Power Law, a system that values grades inputted based off when they are put into the grade book instead of averaging them. Students are now encouraged to focus on recent grades rather than older ones. Power Law measures the change between the first grade and how grades improve or worsen over time. An improvement results in higher grades while non improving grades show as lower grades.
Other thoughts
Some people during class have noticed that some classmates are against changes to their grading system. These are commonly students that are on the “principal’s list” or kids that get A or A+ grades. Noticing that their grades are now changing a lot. “Lots of other schools have changed to Standards-Based Grading,” adds Mr. Reuth. While there are currently pros and cons of changing to Standards-Based, staff are hopeful that tweaking some things in Power Law can improve the system for students.
Introduction: Many stories have been created about homework. But has anybody talked about homework from a student’s point of view? In Portage Wisconsin a young reporter records down interviews taken with two thirteen years old girls that have extracurriculars and study halls. These girls talk about how the transition with homework from seventh grade to eighth grade can be a tough and a hard transition. Middle: The first girl named Emily exclaimed, “...I have an average of 3 assignments per class…” She had said that this year was really complicated and time consuming compared to last year as well as the academic standards of many core classes such as math, English/ELA, and History/Geography. Duke professor Harris Cooper clearly stated in his article about homework that there is a 10 minute rule that each grade should follow and each grade adds 10 more minutes starting with 10 minutes in first grade. In eighth grade each student should get up to one hour and 20 minutes of homework each day. I asked Emily and Carley how much homework they got each day? Emily said, “3 and a half hours depends on the day.” This is an example of how much homework she got compared to how much time these students should spend on their homework in Professor Harris’s study’s. When talking about her homework, Carley then stated, “2 or 3 hours depending on which classes I have.” This is also another example of how much time Carley got to spend on her homework versus Emily and Professor Harris’s study on the students he interviewed. End: In some more of Harris’s study he found, “Cooper also found that some research showed that homework causes physical and emotional stress, and created negative attitudes about learning.” This shows that Homework in eighth grade can be stressful and bring negativity into the classrooms in which people have a hard time doing their homework during class. I wonder if anybody really knew how much this affected kids and their grades?
Positives of group work Group work helps students with not being afraid of talking to other students. It can also help people with their social skills.. Sometimes people don’t understand that teamwork is helpful for students because they don’t have to work alone in the quiet, they can engage in learning and they are doing something were they can ask their group mates a question if the teacher can’t make it to them right away. Group mates can also be a reliable source if the teacher can’t give to the answer. Sometimes on tests the teacher says that he/she can give you the answer so then if it is a group assignment you can ask them for help. It also helps with students making new friends and sometimes kids need other students to talk to because they don’t feel safe talking to adults, so it makes students comfortable to talk to other students. STORY On EdWeek.org a student, Yun F. Zheng, reported his own experience with group work. Yun is a high school senior attending a magnet school in philadelphia. He says that out of 2,400 students at his school he has worked with a large number of them. He also says that only some of them actually work on their part of the assignment. He says that he can trust the one that actually have good grades.. INTERVIEW An interviewed principle from Bartels Middle School says that group work is good for students because it gets the kids ready for the outside world. He also exclames that all most all jobs require you to work with others. Some students don’t like group work but you can get more chances at jobs by working with others. You may also be able to rely on others because not everyone knows everything but you are also accountable for being there for you team mate like they were for you. Teamwork is like a big assignment being lifted off of your chest.
Bullying affects many students, especially middle schoolers. About 20% of students between the ages of 12 through 18 experience bullying, according to https://stopbullying.gov, studies also show that people who experience bullying, usually end up bullying people as well. Half of the people who bully have ‘social influence’ which makes them seem more powerful.
According to the UNESCO Institute of Statistics, one third of the global population is a victim to bullying. Some people who get bullied end up harming themselves, or committing suicide.
Why Does Bullying Peak in Middle School? According to https://ms.durand.k12.mi.us/, bullying peaks in middle school due to the “developmental stages students are going through.” Those stages are Establishing a personal identity, Developing independence, and Expanding personal relationships. Due to these hormonal changes, and the social pressure that starts building up when you hit middle school, bullying increases heavily. Since students are trying to figure out how to fit in, they will enable and participate in bullying, even if it’s not something they actually believe in.
Bullying and Mental Health Does bullying impact students' mental health? Well, according to https://med.uth.edu/, “Bullying can cause feelings of rejection, exclusion, isolation, low self-esteem, and some individuals can develop depression and anxiety as a result. In some cases it can even develop into Acute Stress Disorder or Post Traumatic Stress Disorder.”
An example with this is an interview that took place a couple days ago with an 8th grade student from Portage.
“At my old school, there was this kid. He was often bullied by kids at said school, and honestly, I was pressured to say rude stuff to him too. One day, he just stops showing up to school, and we’re informed he’s in the hospital. Why? The bullying got to his head and he tried to commit suicide. I felt so awful, I regretted everything I had ever said to him. He’s now paralyzed from, I believe, the neck down.”
Bullying affects many students, and even adults at their workplace. It truly is an issue, especially in middle schools. It is something that should be taken seriously.
Some people don’t pay enough attention to people who suffer with mental health issues. Those who need the help they don’t get it. People don’t understand some people suffer with so many issues because they can’t get the help they need. Others don’t realize that people have those issues because the kids with the issues need more help. Some people can’t talk to people about those issues because they don't know who to trust. Just because the person acts like they’re fine doesn't mean that they actually are fine. The people who have those issues maybe they have no one to talk to them about their problems because they have trust issues so they can’t talk to anyone. Just because of those issues it causes them to not be able to get the help they need because they don’t know who they can truly trust. Like what if they have health issues but they can’t tell anyone because of they’re mental health issues causing them to not be able to. Counselors are trying to make kids feel safer with them outside of their classrooms to try and make the kids trust them more so that way the kids can come talk when they need to without being scared. Asked a counselor “ Do you feel like you see everyone who needs to be seen? And she said “I try to make ourselves as available as possible there are some people we might miss but we try not to”meaning most the time that it's not the counselors fault that people need help it's the kids for not talking bout it. “More than 1 in 3 high school students had experienced persistent feelings of sadness or hopelessness in 2019, a 40 percent increase since 2009.” “In 2019, approximately 1 in 6 youth reported making a suicide plan in the past year, a 44% increase since 2009.” Point is just go ahead and talk about your issues with someone because it ain't gong to anyone else so it's ok to talk it all.
Online bullies are more common now than ever. It happens mainly on social media like Instagram, tik tok, and snapchat. It’s also considered harassment and this type of harassment is more common in middle school and high school. With this more common nowadays over half of the kids in the U.S. are being bullied online by their classmates. Over 60% of students say they don’t feel welcome or safe going to school. With online bullies they threaten by spreading false rumors and by making physical threats towards your family if you were to tell anyone. With some of the threats being they tell them to go kill themself and how ugly they are. When they go through this it tends to lead to depression, anxiety, and suicidal thoughts. Self harm is also a common thing with online bullying. Teenage suicides have increased over the decade. With online bullies it is easier for the bullies to say it online than to their victims face to face in a classroom. You can hurt someone just by saying a couple words to someone. Even that can lead up to the different side effects. Even if all of this happens online it can still makes students feel unwelcome in their own school. Things you can do if you are being bullied online are, take a break from your phone, block or unfriend, check your privacy settings, report it and tell an adult that you trust. If you or anyone you know is being bullied please contact “Stop Bullying Now Hotline” (USA) at 1-800-273-8255.
The way mental health changes tromenisly from being a kid into being a teenager. Guidance counselor at Wayne Bartels middle understands that other districts have enough resources to have therapists come in and talk to students. But the Portage community school district does not have a budget to hire mental health therapists. According to Mr. Wyman at Bartels, what he wants to do is to better educate students so they understand more in school and don’t struggle to get work done.
A decent amount of students at bartels deal with some type of mental issues, and there are even more that teachers don’t know about. According to Dr. Carl Fleisher fro UCLA health suicide is the second leading cause death among ages 15-24 in the U.S. 20% of high school students in the U.S have thought of suicide and, 9% out of that 20% have tried/Maid and attempt, According to the National Alliance on Mental Illness.
Leukemia is a cancer that a lot of kid can get and it can kill you fast.. Leukemia is a blood cancer. Leukemia can be curable 90% of cases are complete remission. You can have bone or joint pain. It take day or week for leukemia to spread. Leukemia can kill you by having a loss of blood and a stroke. Leukemia is caused by blood cells acquire changes. Leukemia is a rare cancer it affect fewer than 200,000 people a year.Leukemia can get diagnosis by analyzing a person blood sample. You can live 5 year or more after diagnosis. The high chance of getting leukemia cancer is 85-89 year old. Leukemia cause run throw you family genes. You change of getting leukemia is 1.5%.men are more likely to get leukemia cancer. It take 4 to 6 week to recover from leukemia cancer.Leukemia can spread to the lymph nodes, spleen and the liver and also the central nervous system and other organs.Leukemia can start suddenly it happened often. If leukemia can be cured early if it is caught fast enough. You need 4 cycle of intensive chemotherapy.
Timing is for a lot of things outside and inside r for. Than waned it’s cold the tempers drop to -15 and some time in the summertime it’s goes to 54 dreg some goes fate they on nose some time in the summer gone solde outside the hot ogerbir up and time fly time goes fate and goes sold we have time is to no that is morning and night wende and the moths goes places on time and for 24 hour per day and one a head in some places is diffiet. In the mornings 12:00 am - 12:00 pm and the day ster aging and your spelling feel like it going fate but it sold i side and the summer it is oppes of going fate to sold and sold to fate. The cornerstone of better time management is having a to do list and think of when you try to keep a list in your head of what you need to do for the day. Garvin Says without writing it down you also may tend to forget some things you need to finish and you also can use note-taking apps on your phone or stick notes if you need to jot down a to do item on the go and if you make a plan for your future goal something else you can do with to do lists you’re more likely to reach your goals.
People all over the world are in schools. It’s a fact we can’t deny millions of kids go to school for 6-8 hours a day and a part of that day is lunch time. Lunches in schools are a part that not everyone gets to experience.
Some people can’t afford school lunches everyday. Due to the increase price in everything at the moment schools are struggling to do free lunches and are having to make people pay for the food. But some families can’t afford it and sign up for free school meals. This may make you think this will solve the problem. But this system is not perfect One family was 100$ over the wage limit for free lunches and where denied because of it. This reporter feels that everybody shouldn’t have to pay for the lunches because some people are struggling to afford them or they just can’t afford to pack a cold lunch every day. With cold lunches teachers have seen people with nothing but a small snack in a box or a sandwich with moldy bread or some students come to school with nothing at all and ask their friends for a part of their lunch.
That doesn’t feel right watching a kid beg for his friends to give him a part of their lunch We should be able to give kids who are starving during the day food to make sure they have the energy to work hard in school and make it through the day.4
Bullying is for people who have something going on deep down, but they take it out on others to make them feel better. Insecurities often grow on people because of bullying.. Bullies can put this thought into your head about “wow maybe I am just that ugly” or “ew my nose is so big”. People think they need to look like celebrities or models, so they put on pounds of makeup or get plastic surgery to make themselves look “prettier” and “better”. But they do not know the consequences of these actions.
What to know about makeup and plastic surgery
Plastic surgery can have physical and physiological complications. Some ingredients in makeup can irritate the skin and cause rashes, acne, and premature aging. Decreasing the amount of makeup you wear can help decrease acne, oiliness, and clogged pores. Most people will generally be insecure of themselves during some point in their lives. Bullying has become a bigger issue since school and social media became bigger. About 1 out of 5 students in US schools report being bullied throughout the school year. 60% of students have experienced cyberbullying on social media, but only about 37% of students have reported it. Most people generally get bullied because of their appearance or intelligence.
What to do in case of a bully
When you receive a negative text from a cyber bully you shouldn’t text back with a mean text or take the text personally, but you should take a screenshot for proof and then block the person. After doing that you might want to take a break from social media and try to get your mental health better. When you are bullied in person you should say nothing and walk away, tell a trusted adult about the situation, spend more time with people who make you happy, and avoid the spots where the bullying usually occurs- if it is by the slide at recess then you should avoid the slide.
Bartels Middle School
From a recent survey given out to the students at Bartels Middle School we have seen some of the answers to questions about bullying. 10% of students at Bartels Middle School report being bullied everyday. While 24.9% of students report that they never get bullied at school. Most students think the school is ok at dealing with bullying, but they could be better. 16.5% of students report witnessing bullying happen tons of times in our school. 19% say they have never witnessed bullying happen in our school. 65.3% say that they have never used the bullying form the principal has to report bullying. Only 10 out of 242 people say they have used the bullying form.
The most common responses for what the school can do differently to stop bullying from happening is “give the bullies a different type of punishment rather than just a talk or lunch detention” and “talk to both students to get both sides of the story. A lot of students also say that the school should have more assemblies and days to talk to all the kids about bullying to get a better understanding. Some people believe that teachers should watch the students more to catch when bullying happens. But one person said something that really relates to the world today, “Not sure, I think it is almost impossible to stop bullying”. In the world today there is so much bullying happening that it becomes so hard to try and stop all of it.
A student went and interviewed the principal and one of the counselors at our school questions about bullying. She has gathered a bunch of information from these interviews. Our principal Mr. Rueth has told us that “We have a policy at the school where Mr. Kibby (the dean of students) and I will deal with all bullying cases that are reported to us. But most times the cases aren’t reported. There is an online bullying form, but only about 10-20 people have used the form this year! Last year we had much more people use the form. We talk to the students that were involved in the case and punish them only if needed. I think we should define bullying to all the students to make sure they know what bullying really is and what it is not. We should make sure the kids have at least one trusted adult in the school they feel comfortable to talk to. Too many kids think that bullying is normal and okay to do and that they’re ‘just kidding’. Parents often allow the bullying to continue without knowing the whole story.“
One of the counselors, Mr Wyman, says that “Really everyone in the office has a different approach to deal with bullying. We should have more meetings with the kids instead of giving them detentions to talk it out and make sure they know what they did. A lot of times when confronting a bully they will cover up and not tell the truth. Maybe students don’t understand what bullying is. They could think they are just friends goofing around. But sometimes it’s not fun for the other person. Bullies tend to find ways to bully others without adults knowing. As a counselor, I ask the victim all the information like how long has this been going on, who has been doing it, what should I do to help, those kinds of questions. I ask if I should talk to the other person or not. If I know what happened or saw what happened I would tell Mr. Rueth. I would also ask the bully why they are doing the things they are doing.”
In Portage Wisconsin there is a school named Bartels Middle School. In this school there is a lot of drama like every other school but this reporter surveyed the students and Staff about the LGBTQIA+ Community. She interviewed a few students as well and this is what she found.
In BMS most of the students have heard of LGBTQIA+ before, and support it. There is only a very small number of students who don't know what LGBTQIA+ is. Others say they do not support it at all and may be homophobic. Homophobia is hate seen all around us going towards people in the LGBTQIA+ community. Around 54% of students say they have witnessed homophobia. Some students do say that they see homophobia online more than while at school. About 27% of students that took the survey said they do not support LGBTQIA+ and around 60% of the students support it 20% of those students are apart of the communitie.
One student at BMS was asked by one of their classmates, “Are you straight?” When the student answered, “I don’t know.” Their classmate answered back, “You better be.” This is one example of homophobia seen around the school. Another student, Says that the use of dead names is seen in the community, Some students around the school have preferred names and their birth names are referred to as dead names. The use of dead names is very common and it sometimes offends the student whose dead name is used. Most students are understanding if the person using it doesn’t know about the name they prefer, but other times the person using the dead name does it on purpose to offend the other person.
After interviewing and surveying the students and staff this reported has found the most of the school supports or is apart of the LGBTQIA+ Community, and only a small percentage of the students do not. The students see homophobia sometimes at school but mostly online on social media with negative comments.
Halloween’s cancelled This afternoon the portage school district staged the the canceling of halloween. During the 8/9 hour of the day in Ms.DeVries classroom Mr.Podoll came into the classroom with important information. He showed the class a letter about halloween had been canceled for grades 6-8 due to too many cases of vandalism and inappropriate pranks. “This is not a decision that has been taken lightly but is a decision we must take.” Halloween not cancelled? When Mr.Podoll had left the classroom with the devastating news the kids could not contain themselves. There was an outrage of weather it was real or fake, but when some of the kids in the class had seen that there were now watermarks and that there was no contact information they had figured out pretty quick that it was fake. Halloween in other places While this instance was just a joke to prank the students some cities have banned halloween for older kids. In chesapeake, va had a law from the 1970’s that banned all teens over the age of 14 to go trick or treating, and a violation of this law could land you over 6 months in jail. Now this law isn't a thing now but it was for a very long time.
The Usual Wedding For ‘normal’ weddings, people have vows, a legal priest, rings, dances, etcetera. The people getting married would have set up tables and a plentiful amount of food. There would be music, speeches, and numerous people. In this case; however, there were only a few people, no legal priest, no rings, or dancing. In Paquette Park, people had done a wedding ceremony quite differently from the usual.
A not so Typical Halloween Party On a Halloween night, two people got married. Their costumes were mustard and ketchup - Riley as mustard, and Sofie as ketchup. Most marriages are official, however with the people getting ‘married’ being middle schoolers, it was not conclusive. Three pairs of people were lined up on the bridge nearest to the tables at Paquette Park. Two pairs being the audience, the other being the ‘dad’ and soon to be ‘wife’. There was some confusion as the wedding had started. For example, one person said,”Is this where we go?” and,”Oh we’re starting already?!”
Chaos The first people to walk across the bridge were Jazmin and Danica - better recognized as the best man and groom. There were no chairs since it wasn’t a formal wedding. At first they went to either side of Katie, both thinking that was were they were supposed to stand. They finally - one minute later - made it to their ‘seats’ by the pond. Then, the other two pairs, and the flower girl, Betty walked across the bridge and pathway. When Talon, Sadie, and Kylie made it across, there was a lot of pushing, nudging, and screaming. With all the commotion, no one will ever know how they didn’t get yelled at. Sofie finally walked to Riley and Katie, the ‘priest’. With this marriage, there was only a commerce of words from the ‘priest’ and no rings. As Katie talked, not a singular ear seemed to listen. If you ask anyone there about their vows, they won’t know what you’re talking about.
Night Time Fright Early this morning a little elderly lady had a big fright. Around 12:30 in the morning she was awoken by an ear splitting scream. But it wasn't a human scream, it was a cat screaming. In a panic she rushed to go out on the porch of her house and call for her stray cat she had been taking care of for weeks. After minutes that felt like hours of calling for him she gave up, and went to tell her niece that kitty was most likely gone. Of Course her niece started freaking out and wanted to go outside and search. She didn't want to wait if they could do something to help.
Sadly her aunt had already given up. A while later around one in the morning they finally went outside to look for their beloved cat named prince harry. At first they couldn't find anything because it was completely dark out. Still upset, but not wanting to give up, her niece grabbed a head lamp. Thinking quickly she started checking the dark bushes for eyes reflecting in the light of the headlamp.
But as she looked something caught her eye. something she never anticipated. Not one but 2 pairs of eyes were staring back at her from the dark… Just as fast as she saw the eyes, the cat in front jumped out of the bush. It was not kitty . Instead she saw an adult ginger cat which they assumed was a tom cat. But behind him there was still another pair of eyes. In a rush her aunt and her went over to the bush, and pleasantly the second pair of eyes was their precious prince harry. Who is no longer allowed to stay outside during the night.
If you are ever taking care of a stray cat especially if it's a tom cat u should do your research on how to care for them. Along with if you have to neutering them for their own safety. If you do plan to neuter them you will most likely have to keep them inside a lot more often if you don't already. Tom cats fight over territory. So if multiple cats including the one you're caring for are fighting for the same land you will have to take precautions for the cat's safety.
In the summer of 2022, the Wisconsin Supreme Court ended the Free School Lunch program. This received heavy backlash as many parents and students were left on their own for their child’s breakfast and lunch. The program had previously funded a school’s ability to provide free lunch and breakfast to every student. This was something many low-income and poverty stricken families could rely on. The ending of this program had heavy repercussions on many Wisconsin schools and communities.
ReplyDelete“The Free Lunch Program ending has affected the students enormously.” Said Principal Reuth of the Portage School District when interviewed by this reporter. “Over the last two school years the majority of our students ate lunch every day and more people ate breakfast than ever before.” He said regarding change in the school as an effect of the ending of the program. “With it coming to an end our afternoons have become much less calm.”
Many studies have been found to not only link behavioral issues to hunger but also educational ones. In an article done by Feeding America by Allison Weber, “Sadly, hunger may impact a child’s school performance. Research demonstrates that children from families who are not sure where their next meal may come from are more likely to have lower math scores and repeat a grade, among other challenges.”
For many school is the only place they are able to get a nutritious meal. Although government is providing application for free and reduced meals for some low income families, the registration process is quite vigorous. This can cause some families to shy away from applying due to the time taking applications that must be filled out. Plus, for many their is now a surrounding stigma around having to apply for free lunch. To add onto that an article done by Resilient Educator: Hunger Pains: Teaching Hungry Students by Jennifer Gunn reports that “74% of educators have students who regularly come to school hungry.”
Educator and Director of the “Market” Program, Mrs. Carlson, was interviewed and shared similar views when it came to the ending of the free lunch program. “The environment (of the school) has changed because people are coming to school without breakfast and lunch and they are coming to school hangry. When you haven’t eaten breakfast you have shorter fuse and people aren’t able to focus on school work. Many people don’t get lunch and breakfast at home and rely on school to have these meals and they aren’t able to focus on school if they’re hungry.” She says. “If were required to be here at school, which we all are, we should be given free meals while were here.”
For many, sending a hungry child to school is like sending a soldier to war with no armor and weapons. Many schools are coming up with their own ways to tackle this new dilemma including providing afternoon and morning snacks or offering dinners or food pantries. This is something that affects more than just students as many educators have to deal with hungry children. The ending of this program is helping to bring communities together to support those in need.
The information that was in this article let me see what angle you were going for, Good job👍
DeleteAll of the quotes gave lots of information and made your angle clear.
Deletei love the length of the article and your angle was so clear.
DeleteThis was really good, I easily understood the angle you went for and the amount of information was really good.
DeleteI really love the detail
DeleteI love where you used an active voice and you wrote, "Educator and Director of the “Market” Program, Mrs. Carlson, was interviewed and shared similar views when it came to the ending of the free lunch program."
DeleteTeachers have been starting to grade differently from the ABCDF scale. Instead of using letter grades for assignments, they’ve started to use standards based grading. Standards based grading or SBG for short doesn’t use letters, but they use numbers. One school located in Portage has had difficulties concerning the program. Students can get wrong grades and it’s calculated in a way that upsets students.
ReplyDeleteStandards Based Grading
The system has homework and other assignments (including tests and quizzes) being graded on a 0-4 scale. A zero means you did not do the assignment and/or very minimally did any work. A one means you have an understanding of the basic concepts. A two is you partly understand the whole idea, a three you properly understand the idea, and a four means you know extra information you applied and know about the topic.
This on paper is a very ideal way to grade students; it doesn’t just grade them based on how many things they got wrong but it’s based on how well they understand.
The issues students and teachers have is with Infinite Campus. IC doesn’t grade through a 0-4 system, but is instead using a letter grade system. When grading, the computer behind it has to grade from 0-4 and turn that into a letter. IC was never meant to grade however from 0-4, so some students have problems with their grade. The numbers don’t have a specific translation into %s; which is then turned into letters. A 3 for instance, is not a 100% even if the student did all their work assigned because a 4 is the highest grade they can get. A 4 may not even be possible in some circumstances because it relies on being able to show advanced skill; like extra credit on a test. This upsets some students because even if they completed all assignments and extra credit they may only have an A depending on how many assignments were able to be graded a 4.
The fact that SBG was also not supposed to be converted into letter grades doesn’t help. Because of that the system can glitch and bug. “It’s designed to do very specific things,” says the principal of the school. Working with numbers into letters wasn’t one of those things. So while the program may help students, it wasn’t designed for how the school uses it.
The System Behind it
PowerLaw is the system this school uses to calculate number grades. It’s also what predicts your grade; so an example is if you get consistent 3s you’ll be predicted to earn a 3. Teachers have reported that this can be glitchy when it comes to putting it into letter grades.
A report from a teacher states, “I've had students who had about a C improve a grade from a 2 to 3 and the grade turn to an F and so that's a bug that we've got to work out.” The opposite also happens where someone may have 0s or 1s but has an A is also present as a glitch.
In about a couple years the principal reported that the middle and high school will only use SBG and no longer use letter grades. With this switch glitches are estimated to be less prevalent due to many of the bugs being from the transition of letter grades and SBG.
You gave a lot of information that let me see the issue
DeleteYou organized the information very well and I was able to really understand the situation which I hadn't before.
Deletegreat paragraphs overall I found lots of detail in all of them
DeleteI learned a lot of new information and I now have a better understanding of the topic.
DeleteSame Expectations?
ReplyDeleteShould the expectations be the same for men and women? We asked people questions about stereotypes and if we should all be seen as equal. Many answered yes with a few saying no. Many of the people we asked said that the only expectations that we should have were that we should all just be nice to each other. We also asked questions that are stereotypically going against gender roles such as a man showing emotion and a woman being stronger than a man.
Children's Gender roles
Gender stereotypes start before a child is born saying things like “mud or makeup, blue or pink, tractor or tiara, king or queen, mammas boy or daddys girl” and other silly things like that. If we didn’t raise children with gender stereotypes what would the world be like? What would happen if we let kids choose who they were? Would we be more accepting of kids who came out as genderfluid and non binary?
Male Gender Roles
Will we be able to change for the better if we still treat people as less than they are because we can't see past what they look like? Many people feel like Men and women should be treated the same. They also feel like colors, makeup, emotions, and accessories don’t have a gender so why do we treat everyone differently based on looks? The women that we asked what they thought was a male gender role many responded that they thought of a strong man of the house, kind of guy who makes more money than them This upset the men we asked, they said they wanted to be seen as a caring guy not some robot. .
Female Gender Roles
Women were disappointed that they have missed out on opportunities because they were women, and because they were the “weaker gender” We also asked the men what they thought about a female gender role and they said that she should stay home, cook, and clean/ They also said that the had to be pretty, like kids and be caring Many men answered that women have to have kids otherwise it's a waste of a woman but many women said that women don’t need to have kids if they aren't ready, or if they just don’t want to. The women were saying that they don’t need to have kids and claimed that it was their choice not the man’s choice because it was their bodies.
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World Change
To build progress for mankind most people think that in order to move forward and. we need to be less controlling. Most people agree that things should be equal and that emotions and health are more important than being a boy or girl. That's why so many people think we need to change things to match the new times., to be equal, these new rules are trying to control many women's bodies through us back years.
I liked how you make the reading think about things by adding questions. Another thing you did well was adding facts yet I didn't feel that there was much of any bias.
DeleteI liked how there was no bias but how influencing your article was.
DeleteMental health issues
ReplyDeleteMental health issues are a serious barrier for a lot of people. It would be good to have classes about mental health, so if a student develops a mental health issue they can understand it better and maybe share with other kids what they are going through.. Some other things that they do is educate people about different mental health issues and help families get help with different therapies and resources because you never know if someone else is experiencing it and it is important to trust them. We often think that people are ok when they are not. -Mr. Wyman.
five things that you can do that will improve your mental health.
One, avoid criticism and treat yourself with respect. two take care of your body don’t smoke, don’t vape, drink lots of water, and get enough sleep. Three you should surround yourself with good people and not people who will end up hurting you.. Four, quiet your mind, and meditate also just have a good mind set about things.Five, you should try to learn how to deal with stress.
Some things that people go through
Mental illness can feel like a life sentence in prison because you might feel trapped inside your own mind and think you’ll be stuck there forever. Most people don’t take their mental health seriously. Sometimes it gets so bad it makes people do things that they didn't really want to. Most people feel that the pills that they get for mental health issues will fix everything but the truth is, treatments like counseling are just as important. Not all mental health issues need medication to help resolve them. It is important to take your mental health seriously, just as seriously as your physical health. Maybe, even more important. It is easy to deny a problem if it can’t be seen, and mental illness can get bad very fast.
Some more facts
According to Kate rix from the U.S news. 70% of children in the U.S receive mental health support at school. Also some schools can't keep up with the demand even with the tripled workforce and that psychology people are foremost the important workforce development. In 2021 the association of school psychologists recommended one psychologist for every 500 students in some states the ratio is as high as 1 to 5,000..
On a negative note
Did you know that about 1.4% of all people die of mental health issues that makes them commit suicide. This could be prevented if those people went to therapy and got help.
This article had really good Facts and example that show how bad Mental illness is, Good Job👍
DeleteSchool grades are something that helps you see what you got on our your assignment and once your teacher looks over you assignment they would put a grade on it and the lowest grade is a F and the highest is a A and sometimes it hard to stay up on top of your grade just like it hard for me because i forget to turn in assignment sometime and if you want to be successful and play sports and you have to stay on top of your grades just like i am am i play alot of sports so i try to stay on top of my grades so i can play the sports that i like to play.
ReplyDeleteWhy Might bullying happen to people?
ReplyDeleteBullying happens a lot during middle school through 6th and 8th grade. Many people are getting picked on for being different or they are new to the school, many bullies come up with new ways to be rude to someone. Later in the year, sometimes students' friends will change because they might meet someone new who is rude. To others and then that student friends will start to think being rude is funny.
What do students do when they get bullied?
When that happen students go and tell a teacher about what is going on and when the. Student can;’t tell a teacher, they stand up to the bully, like this website that. Share people that stand up to bullies “NoPlace4hate is a website that shares stories about kids that get bullied like” “Sierra” “who got bullied because. The new girl didn’t like her for some reason, in the end, she decided to ignore and wait for the bully to get in trouble”.
Why should you tell a teacher?
Sometimes when students get bullied by others they try to hide away and do certain actions that lead to harm, and. Anger that has the teacher confused about who does the bullying, at schools many students. Notice bullying happening at parts of schools but students still do not ask for help when. These actions happen when teachers sometimes need help to know what is going on in the. School since they are busy getting class ready, telling a teacher helps the know what is happening,
I like the intro and conclusion of your writing
DeleteI like the intro and conclusion of your writing.
DeleteThis comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
ReplyDeleteThe recipients of dress code violations are most often female students. As a result those who get dress coded are most often girls. Because of the punishments these girls may react differently because of the consequences. Consequences may be greater than just a simple dress code violation. It could be something like a lunch detention for some students, it could be as big as a suspension for others.
ReplyDelete43.3% of students at Bartels Middle School feel that the dress code should change because students don’t think that it is fair. Also, Bartels Middle School students feel that the dress code has affected the way that they dress such as the pants they choose to wear or the shirts they wear. 25.8% of students feel that there is a huge difference between the way boys dress versus the way girls dress. On the other hand 11.7% of students feel that the dress code doesn't need to be changed because it doesn’t affect them.
I like how you got straight to the point, it made it easy to see your angle.
DeleteVery good statistics and information
ReplyDeleteFrom a young age, children have experienced sexualization from our society. Sometimes you may not even notice if this is happening. Such as when we look at baby clothes. Many asked, “Why do we feel a need to make comments about how a child is dressing?” And “Why is it all right to put sexual meanings on their clothes?”
ReplyDeleteInappropriate Jokes
When shopping for baby clothes, you can find many different designs, colors, and even funny jokes. Some of these jokes have caught people's attention, such as breastfeeding. You can find clothes saying things about ‘how many boobs they suck on’ and other types of uncomfortable humor. In the U.S., over 80% of mothers begin breastfeeding their babies. Countless parents and others wonder why something that is so common should be sexualized? One teenager even said that they had witnessed a mother getting told to not breastfeed in public because it was ‘disgusting.’
Who’s Getting Sexualized More?
When looking for boy and girl clothes for any age, you will find some different results. For example, when looking at boy clothes you can find things such as pants and sweatshirts. When looking for girls clothing, you almost immediately get tank tops, short skirts, and even shorter dresses. This type of attire can show young girls that they should show their bodies. The clothing that is provided for our children continues to bring unwanted thoughts that tell them it’s okay if they are getting sexualized even if they’re not comfortable.
In a world of hate and offense, people continue to make a more dangerous setting for our future generations. It’s time to put this to an end. When seeing inappropriate gestures, will you be the one to speak out?
I like how you organized your information into different parts.
DeleteI like how you included facts about the topic over all, you also organized it into separate topics that made it easy to understand.
DeleteI liked how you added statical facts and all the detail
DeleteI like how you separated the topics and i really like the facts you gave and introduction and conclusion was very clear, good job 👍 👍
DeleteI liked how you included statistics, you educated me more on this topic.
DeleteI like how you included facts about the topic over all, you also organized it into separate topics that made it easy to understand what you were getting at good job👍
Delete
ReplyDeleteIs Your Dress Code Out Of Date?
Wrote by: Courtney Hernkind
Picture this, a girl in art class was just minding her business and trying to get some color pencils when an aid come up to her and asked her to pull up her shirt because she had a little bit of her shoulder showing. By the way, she said it in a snarky tone as well.
She did as the aid asked but she wasn’t happy about it. When she was talking to another classmate about it they said that the same aid made a comment like that to her. Why would an aid care about that? It was affecting no one but the girl herself.
Bartels Middle School Survey Results
According to the BMS Middle School survey results, 50% of the school feels that the dress code should be changed. Would you say that 50% is a lot? That’s only then 150 that disagree then. You also have to think that the dress code isn’t just looking at the body though, it’s looking the items you have as well.
Coming from the BMS principal, “The least important thing that I really worry about is the dress code. Most of the recent changes made to the dress code were made for safety reasons, which deal more like backpacks and handheld bags.” Some people change for safety reasons and some don’t.
Other People’s Stories
In Florida High School this is what some people had to say, “Other girls approached her and said the alterations made them feel sexualized and exposed.”
After hearing this how do you feel? Doesn’t it make you feel uncomfortable knowing that there are schools that are having this happen.
Some would say you are lucky, or do they just have it bad?
“They insisted that she was violating the school dress code. (The 2017-2018 Code of Student Conduct does not say bras must be worn by female students.)” This was quoted from New York Times. She had gotten a sunburn and her bra was too uncomfortable for her. She didn’t wear it but she somehow got in trouble?
After hearing about all of this, is the dress code really up to date or does it need a reality check?
You organized it in a way that made it easy to understand, you also stated facts that helped understand the severity.
DeleteI like how you put a title on it it makes it seem more like a real article.
DeleteIs bullying a problem?
ReplyDeleteInsight on Bullying
There are some things that we like to compare to see any differences we might have never noticed.Believe it or not you can learn a lot when you compare two topics.For example, we may never think to compare certain topics because of how different they seem.Although sometimes the more differences they have the more you will find.Something that is not talked about often is bullying.An odd comparison we can make is with bullying and the flu.Although they seem to have absolutely nothing in common, they have one thing in common.They will never go away.But, we have adapted to the point where we don’t worry about the flu because we know its coming at some point.
When it comes to bullying we can’t be ready.We know its out there but its something we can never truly be ready for.Many people would like to argue that bullying is not a greater problem in schools.Many don’t realize how bad it really is until greater consequences occur.There are lots of cases where students report the bullying but, the adults don’t intervene.When a student tells you about their experience with bullying they are expecting someone to do something about it.Will it ever be of any use if no one cares enough to do something?
Stories on Bullying
There are many stories out there of kids who have experienced bullying, and although bullying is a topic many would rather not hear about it is important to do so.Most of these stories have horrible events that happened to these kids at a young age.All of these stories show that there will always be people who try and erase who you really are.But, these stories show that you should never let events like these stop you.
This small story is written by Corina.In her story Corina states, “It feels weird that something so small can affect you so greatly. I have had a pretty good life by economic standards, but when it comes to emotional I had it bad. I think it all started in second grade.At first it was little mean things, taking my lunch because "your too fat to eat" or the constant cries of "ewwwww" and "fat lard" in P.E. I was only in second grade! Things got worse as the year went along. I had no friends. None. The kids played a game called "get away" it involved them trying to get as far away from me as possible. Then the worst thing happened, I was physically pushed and shoved back and forth while changing for P.E. By this time I was in fourth grade and i understood that this was not right, but how could I stand up for myself? I convinced myself it was nothing and carried on with my life. I am now at a new school, and I love it, I have learned to brush off the occasional "chipmunk cheek" and other mean things.”
This short story is an example of how it can be for some kids when they leave their home.Some kids are afraid of going to school because of how they are treated.Sometimes a simple thing can change a kids life, either for the better or for the worst.
Statistics and Evidence
According to the the article https://www.educationcorner.com bullying starts at a very young age.It states that 90% of students in grades 4-8 have been bullied or harassed during their school experience.This could mean that there is at least one kid being bullied at every school.According to the National Education Association, over 160,000 kids refuse to go to school due to fear of being bullied.Sometimes kids/students start to bully other classmates because of their own family problems.In fact according to this article https://www.washington.edu 97% percent of bullies claim to have had issues at home leading them to bully others.
Without further explanation do you think bullying is a problem or not?Is it a simple story or something more?Will it change a student’s life or will it be another simple phase that will eventually go away?
Part 1
ReplyDeleteHomework as we know has gotten harder as we’ve gotten older. This is because school’s are trying to get you ready for the future. Especially high school, getting you ready for college. Homework may take away from freetime we have at home. Many kids may forget about some assignments they have, especially if they’ve been doing chores or other homework. Some kids may have earlier bedtimes than others, this may be one reason for kids not getting their homework done in time, sports and extracurricular activities may be another.
Personal Thoughts and Experiences with Homework.
“Me personally I don’t like homework, it’s hard, I don’t choose to do homework.” Says 8th grade student Kaiden Kern at BMS. “I only get 15 or 20 minutes at home to do homework, I usually have 7 assignments to do.” Could you imagine having 7 assignments and only 15-20 minutes to do these assignments?
Have you ever wondered what teachers have to go through? “Over the last 26 years homework has decreased significantly, when I first started teaching we gave a lot of homework. So we used to give a lot of homework and now it is if someone didn’t finish something in class. Usually there is only one night of homework per unit. I usually have three or four hours of homework per week for just grading, and then probably 4 more for planning, so about 8 or 9 hours per week. We are trying really hard to make sure there is not much homework, I do see an issue with kids not using their class time wisely though. It could be that class time use is interfering with teachers' ideas with how much homework students really have.” Explains 8th grade teacher Ms DeVries at BMS. Since teachers have that much homework to do, students probably have roughly the same amount of homework as teachers, this is only the case because teachers have to grade the assignments students are given.
Do Children from around the World have too much Homework?
The Washington Post shares the story of a mother who was done with the mass amounts of homework her child was given, “‘I looked at him and said, ‘Do you want to do this?’ He said no, and I said, ‘I don’t either.’“ And that was the end of homework for her 6-year-old.” This mother may have her reasons for why she did what she did. “‘If there’s something our son is struggling in, we’ll absolutely do the work. But after eight hours at a desk, to make him sit down and do more seems silly.’” This mother is doing what she can to reduce the strain on this poor 6-year-old’s life.
According to the same article in The Washington Post other parents are also angry about the amount of work being sent home. “Other parents stop all homework if it takes longer than 10 or 15 minutes, believing the assignments should be a simple review of what was learned in school, not an hours-long process to struggle through.”
Part 2
ReplyDeleteA Story from a Student at BMS.
One student who was in Volleyball earlier this year had some homework she had to do. It was one of the days that she had a Volleyball game. She knew that she had homework to do, knowing she wouldn’t get it done in time, she did not do as well at the game, making her even more mad at herself. This game went till very late around 7:30, she wasn’t allowed to do her homework while waiting for the other team to finish. So by the time she was done eating dinner it was around 8:25. When she was done she had to go shower, by the time she was done it was almost 9:00. After all that time passed, she could finally do her homework.
Since this girl had to go to bed at around 9:30 this only left her about 30 minutes to do homework. Which isn’t nearly enough time to finish 4-5 pages of math homework, making her have to rush to get it finished. How would you feel if this were you?
What can We do to Fix this Problem?
WISCONSIN - Students and teachers at Bartels Middle School are divided after a new grading system get implemented. People are confused, wanting to know the reasons for this sudden change.
ReplyDeleteDifferences in the systems
The new system measures what the students perceive, or how much they understand about the topics they are learning. Unlike the original system, grading all things completed by the students regardless of their level of understanding or improvement.
Standards-Based Grading helps display the students more accurately, “but it doesn’t easily fit into the GPA system.” notes Principal Rueth, “ We also don’t know how to fit this into college admissions for high school students.”
This poses problems for students going into college where they aren’t easily able to show their grades in their resumes.
Power Law
Some students are experiencing many more fluctuations in their grades for classes that have the standards-based grading system implemented.
This is due to Power Law, a system that values grades inputted based off when they are put into the grade book instead of averaging them. Students are now encouraged to focus on recent grades rather than older ones.
Power Law measures the change between the first grade and how grades improve or worsen over time. An improvement results in higher grades while non improving grades show as lower grades.
Other thoughts
Some people during class have noticed that some classmates are against changes to their grading system. These are commonly students that are on the “principal’s list” or kids that get A or A+ grades. Noticing that their grades are now changing a lot. “Lots of other schools have changed to Standards-Based Grading,” adds Mr. Reuth.
While there are currently pros and cons of changing to Standards-Based, staff are hopeful that tweaking some things in Power Law can improve the system for students.
Introduction:
ReplyDeleteMany stories have been created about homework. But has anybody talked about homework from a student’s point of view? In Portage Wisconsin a young reporter records down interviews taken with two thirteen years old girls that have extracurriculars and study halls. These girls talk about how the transition with homework from seventh grade to eighth grade can be a tough and a hard transition.
Middle:
The first girl named Emily exclaimed, “...I have an average of 3 assignments per class…” She had said that this year was really complicated and time consuming compared to last year as well as the academic standards of many core classes such as math, English/ELA, and History/Geography.
Duke professor Harris Cooper clearly stated in his article about homework that there is a 10 minute rule that each grade should follow and each grade adds 10 more minutes starting with 10 minutes in first grade. In eighth grade each student should get up to one hour and 20 minutes of homework each day.
I asked Emily and Carley how much homework they got each day? Emily said, “3 and a half hours depends on the day.” This is an example of how much homework she got compared to how much time these students should spend on their homework in Professor Harris’s study’s.
When talking about her homework, Carley then stated, “2 or 3 hours depending on which classes I have.” This is also another example of how much time Carley got to spend on her homework versus Emily and Professor Harris’s study on the students he interviewed.
End:
In some more of Harris’s study he found, “Cooper also found that some research showed that homework causes physical and emotional stress, and created negative attitudes about learning.” This shows that Homework in eighth grade can be stressful and bring negativity into the classrooms in which people have a hard time doing their homework during class. I wonder if anybody really knew how much this affected kids and their grades?
Positives of group work
ReplyDeleteGroup work helps students with not being afraid of talking to other students. It can also help people with their social skills.. Sometimes people don’t understand that teamwork is helpful for students because they don’t have to work alone in the quiet, they can engage in learning and they are doing something were they can ask their group mates a question if the teacher can’t make it to them right away. Group mates can also be a reliable source if the teacher can’t give to the answer. Sometimes on tests the teacher says that he/she can give you the answer so then if it is a group assignment you can ask them for help. It also helps with students making new friends and sometimes kids need other students to talk to because they don’t feel safe talking to adults, so it makes students comfortable to talk to other students.
STORY
On EdWeek.org a student, Yun F. Zheng, reported his own experience with group work. Yun is a high school senior attending a magnet school in philadelphia. He says that out of 2,400 students at his school he has worked with a large number of them. He also says that only some of them actually work on their part of the assignment. He says that he can trust the one that actually have good grades..
INTERVIEW
An interviewed principle from Bartels Middle School says that group work is good for students because it gets the kids ready for the outside world. He also exclames that all most all jobs require you to work with others. Some students don’t like group work but you can get more chances at jobs by working with others. You may also be able to rely on others because not everyone knows everything but you are also accountable for being there for you team mate like they were for you. Teamwork is like a big assignment being lifted off of your chest.
Bullying affects many students, especially middle schoolers. About 20% of students between the ages of 12 through 18 experience bullying, according to https://stopbullying.gov, studies also show that people who experience bullying, usually end up bullying people as well. Half of the people who bully have ‘social influence’ which makes them seem more powerful.
ReplyDeleteAccording to the UNESCO Institute of Statistics, one third of the global population is a victim to bullying. Some people who get bullied end up harming themselves, or committing suicide.
Why Does Bullying Peak in Middle School?
According to https://ms.durand.k12.mi.us/, bullying peaks in middle school due to the “developmental stages students are going through.” Those stages are Establishing a personal identity, Developing independence, and Expanding personal relationships. Due to these hormonal changes, and the social pressure that starts building up when you hit middle school, bullying increases heavily. Since students are trying to figure out how to fit in, they will enable and participate in bullying, even if it’s not something they actually believe in.
Bullying and Mental Health
Does bullying impact students' mental health? Well, according to https://med.uth.edu/, “Bullying can cause feelings of rejection, exclusion, isolation, low self-esteem, and some individuals can develop depression and anxiety as a result. In some cases it can even develop into Acute Stress Disorder or Post Traumatic Stress Disorder.”
An example with this is an interview that took place a couple days ago with an 8th grade student from Portage.
“At my old school, there was this kid. He was often bullied by kids at said school, and honestly, I was pressured to say rude stuff to him too. One day, he just stops showing up to school, and we’re informed he’s in the hospital. Why? The bullying got to his head and he tried to commit suicide. I felt so awful, I regretted everything I had ever said to him. He’s now paralyzed from, I believe, the neck down.”
Bullying affects many students, and even adults at their workplace. It truly is an issue, especially in middle schools. It is something that should be taken seriously.
i like that you put in headings
DeleteSome people don’t pay enough attention to people who suffer with mental health issues. Those who need the help they don’t get it. People don’t understand some people suffer with so many issues because they can’t get the help they need. Others don’t realize that people have those issues because the kids with the issues need more help. Some people can’t talk to people about those issues because they don't know who to trust.
ReplyDeleteJust because the person acts like they’re fine doesn't mean that they actually are fine. The people who have those issues maybe they have no one to talk to them about their problems because they have trust issues so they can’t talk to anyone.
Just because of those issues it causes them to not be able to get the help they need because they don’t know who they can truly trust. Like what if they have health issues but they can’t tell anyone because of they’re mental health issues causing them to not be able to. Counselors are trying to make kids feel safer with them outside of their classrooms to try and make the kids trust them more so that way the kids can come talk when they need to without being scared.
Asked a counselor “ Do you feel like you see everyone who needs to be seen? And she said “I try to make ourselves as available as possible there are some people we might miss but we try not to”meaning most the time that it's not the counselors fault that people need help it's the kids for not talking bout it.
“More than 1 in 3 high school students had experienced persistent feelings of sadness or hopelessness in 2019, a 40 percent increase since 2009.” “In 2019, approximately 1 in 6 youth reported making a suicide plan in the past year, a 44% increase since 2009.”
Point is just go ahead and talk about your issues with someone because it ain't gong to anyone else so it's ok to talk it all.
Online bullies are more common now than ever. It happens mainly on social media like Instagram, tik tok, and snapchat. It’s also considered harassment and this type of harassment is more common in middle school and high school. With this more common nowadays over half of the kids in the U.S. are being bullied online by their classmates. Over 60% of students say they don’t feel welcome or safe going to school.
ReplyDeleteWith online bullies they threaten by spreading false rumors and by making physical threats towards your family if you were to tell anyone. With some of the threats being they tell them to go kill themself and how ugly they are. When they go through this it tends to lead to depression, anxiety, and suicidal thoughts. Self harm is also a common thing with online bullying. Teenage suicides have increased over the decade.
With online bullies it is easier for the bullies to say it online than to their victims face to face in a classroom. You can hurt someone just by saying a couple words to someone. Even that can lead up to the different side effects. Even if all of this happens online it can still makes students feel unwelcome in their own school. Things you can do if you are being bullied online are, take a break from your phone, block or unfriend, check your privacy settings, report it and tell an adult that you trust.
If you or anyone you know is being bullied please contact “Stop Bullying Now Hotline” (USA) at 1-800-273-8255.
The way mental health changes tromenisly from being a kid into being a teenager. Guidance counselor at Wayne Bartels middle understands that other districts have enough resources to have therapists come in and talk to students. But the Portage community school district does not have a budget to hire mental health therapists. According to Mr. Wyman at Bartels, what he wants to do is to better educate students so they understand more in school and don’t struggle to get work done.
ReplyDeleteA decent amount of students at bartels deal with some type of mental issues, and there are even more that teachers don’t know about. According to Dr. Carl Fleisher fro UCLA health suicide is the second leading cause death among ages 15-24 in the U.S. 20% of high school students in the U.S have thought of suicide and, 9% out of that 20% have tried/Maid and attempt, According to the National Alliance on Mental Illness.
Leukemia cancer
ReplyDeleteLeukemia is a cancer that a lot of kid can get and it can kill you fast.. Leukemia is a blood cancer. Leukemia can be curable 90% of cases are complete remission. You can have bone or joint pain. It take day or week for leukemia to spread. Leukemia can kill you by having a loss of blood and a stroke. Leukemia is caused by blood cells acquire changes. Leukemia is a rare cancer it affect fewer than 200,000 people a year.Leukemia can get diagnosis by analyzing a person blood sample. You can live 5 year or more after diagnosis. The high chance of getting leukemia cancer is 85-89 year old. Leukemia cause run throw you family genes. You change of getting leukemia is 1.5%.men are more likely to get leukemia cancer. It take 4 to 6 week to recover from leukemia cancer.Leukemia can spread to the lymph nodes, spleen and the liver and also the central nervous system and other organs.Leukemia can start suddenly it happened often. If leukemia can be cured early if it is caught fast enough. You need 4 cycle of intensive chemotherapy.
Timing is for a lot of things outside and inside r for. Than waned it’s cold the tempers drop to -15 and some time in the summertime it’s goes to 54 dreg some goes fate they on nose some time in the summer gone solde outside the hot ogerbir up and time fly time goes fate and goes sold we have time is to no that is morning and night wende and the moths goes places on time and for 24 hour per day and one a head in some places is diffiet. In the mornings 12:00 am - 12:00 pm and the day ster aging and your spelling feel like it going fate but it sold i side and the summer it is oppes of going fate to sold and sold to fate.
ReplyDeleteThe cornerstone of better time management is having a to do list and think of when you try to keep a list in your head of what you need to do for the day. Garvin Says without writing it down you also may tend to forget some things you need to finish and you also can use note-taking apps on your phone or stick notes if you need to jot down a to do item on the go and if you make a plan for your future goal something else you can do with to do lists you’re more likely to reach your goals.
People all over the world are in schools. It’s a fact we can’t deny millions of kids go to school for 6-8 hours a day and a part of that day is lunch time. Lunches in schools are a part that not everyone gets to experience.
ReplyDeleteSome people can’t afford school lunches everyday. Due to the increase price in everything at the moment schools are struggling to do free lunches and are having to make people pay for the food. But some families can’t afford it and sign up for free school meals. This may make you think this will solve the problem. But this system is not perfect One family was 100$ over the wage limit for free lunches and where denied because of it. This reporter feels that everybody shouldn’t have to pay for the lunches because some people are struggling to afford them or they just can’t afford to pack a cold lunch every day. With cold lunches teachers have seen people with nothing but a small snack in a box or a sandwich with moldy bread or some students come to school with nothing at all and ask their friends for a part of their lunch.
That doesn’t feel right watching a kid beg for his friends to give him a part of their lunch We should be able to give kids who are starving during the day food to make sure they have the energy to work hard in school and make it through the day.4
Bullying and insecurities pt 1
ReplyDeleteBullying is for people who have something going on deep down, but they take it out on others to make them feel better. Insecurities often grow on people because of bullying.. Bullies can put this thought into your head about “wow maybe I am just that ugly” or “ew my nose is so big”. People think they need to look like celebrities or models, so they put on pounds of makeup or get plastic surgery to make themselves look “prettier” and “better”. But they do not know the consequences of these actions.
What to know about makeup and plastic surgery
Plastic surgery can have physical and physiological complications. Some ingredients in makeup can irritate the skin and cause rashes, acne, and premature aging. Decreasing the amount of makeup you wear can help decrease acne, oiliness, and clogged pores. Most people will generally be insecure of themselves during some point in their lives. Bullying has become a bigger issue since school and social media became bigger. About 1 out of 5 students in US schools report being bullied throughout the school year. 60% of students have experienced cyberbullying on social media, but only about 37% of students have reported it. Most people generally get bullied because of their appearance or intelligence.
What to do in case of a bully
When you receive a negative text from a cyber bully you shouldn’t text back with a mean text or take the text personally, but you should take a screenshot for proof and then block the person. After doing that you might want to take a break from social media and try to get your mental health better. When you are bullied in person you should say nothing and walk away, tell a trusted adult about the situation, spend more time with people who make you happy, and avoid the spots where the bullying usually occurs- if it is by the slide at recess then you should avoid the slide.
Bartels Middle School
From a recent survey given out to the students at Bartels Middle School we have seen some of the answers to questions about bullying. 10% of students at Bartels Middle School report being bullied everyday. While 24.9% of students report that they never get bullied at school. Most students think the school is ok at dealing with bullying, but they could be better. 16.5% of students report witnessing bullying happen tons of times in our school. 19% say they have never witnessed bullying happen in our school. 65.3% say that they have never used the bullying form the principal has to report bullying. Only 10 out of 242 people say they have used the bullying form.
The most common responses for what the school can do differently to stop bullying from happening is “give the bullies a different type of punishment rather than just a talk or lunch detention” and “talk to both students to get both sides of the story. A lot of students also say that the school should have more assemblies and days to talk to all the kids about bullying to get a better understanding. Some people believe that teachers should watch the students more to catch when bullying happens. But one person said something that really relates to the world today, “Not sure, I think it is almost impossible to stop bullying”. In the world today there is so much bullying happening that it becomes so hard to try and stop all of it.
Bullying and insecurities pt 2
ReplyDeleteBartels Middle School lead representatives
A student went and interviewed the principal and one of the counselors at our school questions about bullying. She has gathered a bunch of information from these interviews.
Our principal Mr. Rueth has told us that “We have a policy at the school where Mr. Kibby (the dean of students) and I will deal with all bullying cases that are reported to us. But most times the cases aren’t reported. There is an online bullying form, but only about 10-20 people have used the form this year! Last year we had much more people use the form. We talk to the students that were involved in the case and punish them only if needed. I think we should define bullying to all the students to make sure they know what bullying really is and what it is not. We should make sure the kids have at least one trusted adult in the school they feel comfortable to talk to. Too many kids think that bullying is normal and okay to do and that they’re ‘just kidding’. Parents often allow the bullying to continue without knowing the whole story.“
One of the counselors, Mr Wyman, says that “Really everyone in the office has a different approach to deal with bullying. We should have more meetings with the kids instead of giving them detentions to talk it out and make sure they know what they did. A lot of times when confronting a bully they will cover up and not tell the truth. Maybe students don’t understand what bullying is. They could think they are just friends goofing around. But sometimes it’s not fun for the other person. Bullies tend to find ways to bully others without adults knowing. As a counselor, I ask the victim all the information like how long has this been going on, who has been doing it, what should I do to help, those kinds of questions. I ask if I should talk to the other person or not. If I know what happened or saw what happened I would tell Mr. Rueth. I would also ask the bully why they are doing the things they are doing.”
In Portage Wisconsin there is a school named Bartels Middle School. In this school there is a lot of drama like every other school but this reporter surveyed the students and Staff about the LGBTQIA+ Community. She interviewed a few students as well and this is what she found.
ReplyDeleteIn BMS most of the students have heard of LGBTQIA+ before, and support it. There is only a very small number of students who don't know what LGBTQIA+ is. Others say they do not support it at all and may be homophobic. Homophobia is hate seen all around us going towards people in the LGBTQIA+ community. Around 54% of students say they have witnessed homophobia. Some students do say that they see homophobia online more than while at school. About 27% of students that took the survey said they do not support LGBTQIA+ and around 60% of the students support it 20% of those students are apart of the communitie.
One student at BMS was asked by one of their classmates, “Are you straight?” When the student answered, “I don’t know.” Their classmate answered back, “You better be.” This is one example of homophobia seen around the school. Another student, Says that the use of dead names is seen in the community, Some students around the school have preferred names and their birth names are referred to as dead names. The use of dead names is very common and it sometimes offends the student whose dead name is used. Most students are understanding if the person using it doesn’t know about the name they prefer, but other times the person using the dead name does it on purpose to offend the other person.
After interviewing and surveying the students and staff this reported has found the most of the school supports or is apart of the LGBTQIA+ Community, and only a small percentage of the students do not. The students see homophobia sometimes at school but mostly online on social media with negative comments.
Halloween’s cancelled
ReplyDeleteThis afternoon the portage school district staged the the canceling of halloween. During the 8/9 hour of the day in Ms.DeVries classroom Mr.Podoll came into the classroom with important information. He showed the class a letter about halloween had been canceled for grades 6-8 due to too many cases of vandalism and inappropriate pranks. “This is not a decision that has been taken lightly but is a decision we must take.”
Halloween not cancelled?
When Mr.Podoll had left the classroom with the devastating news the kids could not contain themselves. There was an outrage of weather it was real or fake, but when some of the kids in the class had seen that there were now watermarks and that there was no contact information they had figured out pretty quick that it was fake.
Halloween in other places
While this instance was just a joke to prank the students some cities have banned halloween for older kids. In chesapeake, va had a law from the 1970’s that banned all teens over the age of 14 to go trick or treating, and a violation of this law could land you over 6 months in jail. Now this law isn't a thing now but it was for a very long time.
The Usual Wedding
ReplyDeleteFor ‘normal’ weddings, people have vows, a legal priest, rings, dances, etcetera. The people getting married would have set up tables and a plentiful amount of food. There would be music, speeches, and numerous people. In this case; however, there were only a few people, no legal priest, no rings, or dancing. In Paquette Park, people had done a wedding ceremony quite differently from the usual.
A not so Typical Halloween Party
On a Halloween night, two people got married. Their costumes were mustard and ketchup - Riley as mustard, and Sofie as ketchup. Most marriages are official, however with the people getting ‘married’ being middle schoolers, it was not conclusive. Three pairs of people were lined up on the bridge nearest to the tables at Paquette Park. Two pairs being the audience, the other being the ‘dad’ and soon to be ‘wife’. There was some confusion as the wedding had started. For example, one person said,”Is this where we go?” and,”Oh we’re starting already?!”
Chaos
The first people to walk across the bridge were Jazmin and Danica - better recognized as the best man and groom. There were no chairs since it wasn’t a formal wedding. At first they went to either side of Katie, both thinking that was were they were supposed to stand. They finally - one minute later - made it to their ‘seats’ by the pond. Then, the other two pairs, and the flower girl, Betty walked across the bridge and pathway. When Talon, Sadie, and Kylie made it across, there was a lot of pushing, nudging, and screaming. With all the commotion, no one will ever know how they didn’t get yelled at. Sofie finally walked to Riley and Katie, the ‘priest’. With this marriage, there was only a commerce of words from the ‘priest’ and no rings. As Katie talked, not a singular ear seemed to listen. If you ask anyone there about their vows, they won’t know what you’re talking about.
Night Time Fright
ReplyDeleteEarly this morning a little elderly lady had a big fright. Around 12:30 in the morning she was awoken by an ear splitting scream. But it wasn't a human scream, it was a cat screaming. In a panic she rushed to go out on the porch of her house and call for her stray cat she had been taking care of for weeks. After minutes that felt like hours of calling for him she gave up, and went to tell her niece that kitty was most likely gone. Of Course her niece started freaking out and wanted to go outside and search. She didn't want to wait if they could do something to help.
Sadly her aunt had already given up. A while later around one in the morning they finally went outside to look for their beloved cat named prince harry. At first they couldn't find anything because it was completely dark out. Still upset, but not wanting to give up, her niece grabbed a head lamp. Thinking quickly she started checking the dark bushes for eyes reflecting in the light of the headlamp.
But as she looked something caught her eye. something she never anticipated. Not one but 2 pairs of eyes were staring back at her from the dark… Just as fast as she saw the eyes, the cat in front jumped out of the bush. It was not kitty . Instead she saw an adult ginger cat which they assumed was a tom cat. But behind him there was still another pair of eyes. In a rush her aunt and her went over to the bush, and pleasantly the second pair of eyes was their precious prince harry. Who is no longer allowed to stay outside during the night.
If you are ever taking care of a stray cat especially if it's a tom cat u should do your research on how to care for them. Along with if you have to neutering them for their own safety. If you do plan to neuter them you will most likely have to keep them inside a lot more often if you don't already. Tom cats fight over territory. So if multiple cats including the one you're caring for are fighting for the same land you will have to take precautions for the cat's safety.