Severna Park High School

• Secretary of transportation announces plans to address drunk driving
• MTV's 'The Paper' a new kind of reality TV show
• Student board member reflects on term
• Taking a detour from simply the ordinary

Courtesy Photo Sue Hannahs, left, and Dr. Barb Segnatelli recently received National Board Certification.

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The number of highway deaths from car accidents annually amounts to a Boeing 747 crashing every day. Summer is just around the corner and, according to Secretary of Transportation, Mary Peters, this is the most dangerous time for teen drivers to hit the road. To discuss the importance of making smart decisions around prom and graduation, the Department of Transportation and Severna Park High School's Students Against Drunk Driving program held a small group discussion and press conference in the media center on May 13.

Severna Park students, primarily from SADD and the Student Government Association, met Ms. Peters and principal Jason Dykstra during fourth period, where the topics of road safety and decision making were addressed. An open forum for the students was held so that they could voice their opinions and ideas in order to help the committee to better reach out and connect with the teens of today.

According to Ms. Peters, teen drivers make up the majority of people involved in accidents per year.

'Teenage drivers are failing at twice the rate of the rest of the population,' she said. 'Losing someone so young is preventable.'

To help prevent these crashes, Ms. Peters asked students the best ways to reach people of their age group. In the press conference following the discussion, she announced an upcoming contest asking teens to designs ads to promote safe road behaviors. These ads will help figure out the best way to encourage good decisions and discourage drunk driving.

The contest winners will be from two different states for their innovative and effective approach to encourage an increased use of seat belts, particularly one that will concentrate on teenagers. These two states will be awarded $300,000 for their campaign to go into effect.

Two other states will be awarded $100,000 for their campaign to combat drunk driving through the use of new technologies for drivers who are impaired while driving. An initiative for this program is to rethink our government's approach to safety, especially when it involves the young generations and their safety.

Ms. Peters wants to be able to fight at the source by getting her ideas and campaigns from other teenagers. This will show how best to relate and encourage their peers to make good decisions.

Love, hate, pressure, drama and scandal are words that describe a new, original MTV reality television show.

Cypress Bay High School is the featured high school of 'The Paper.' Located in Weston, Fla., Cypress Bay has a student body of 5,500. Out of those students, 60 talented writers make up the high school's newspaper staff.

The paper, known as The Circuit, has an average of 30 pages per issue.

The Circuit 's advertising manager, Adam Brock, has ambitions to break all previous records for ad sales of the newspaper. The Circuit is currently in its sixth volume, and this is a significant year of distribution.

Adam's passion for the paper is on fire and the fire never dies. His position is both a blessing and nuisance for the staff. He has been heard yelling across the newsroom: 'I want $1,000, people!'

When The Circuit is in need of desperate PDF help, Alex Angert, managing editor, calls his dependable advertising manager on his night out. Even aside from all of the dramatic scenes, it is hard to forget The Circuit's editor in chief. Amanda Lorber takes her job seriously and acts professionally 100 percent of the time. If there is a mistake hidden in a 600-word article, she is the first to fix it.

Despite Amanda's passion for the paper and her free-spirited attitude, many staff writers are not accepting. At a boys outing to lunch, The Circuit staff members said that they would not trust Amanda with the front page of the paper. The stress drives Amanda to run out of the room into the girl's bathroom, a comfortable environment to edit articles.

While editing in the bathroom, a staff member comments, 'Someone really needs to tell Amanda that she needs to step it up and watch her back because I think Alex wants to take over her position as editor in chief.'

Throughout the season, Amanda will attempt to earn the staff members' respect and friendship, while also maintaining her leadership position of the paper. In the middle of all the drama is the quiet adviser, Mrs. Rhonda Weiss. According to mtv.com, Mrs. Weiss' students 'always pay close attention to her facial expressions, which serve as a visual meter of how things are going.'

If you are craving an intellectual, dramatic reality television show, tune in to MTV on Mondays at 10:30 p.m. to catch the end of The Paper's season.

In March, Chesapeake High School junior Colin Wojciechowski was elected by the Chesapeake Regional Association of Student Councils to be the student member of the Board of Education next school year, representing the students in the county's public school system. As her term nears its end on July 1, the current representative, senior Sage Snider, shares some of her thoughts on her experience.

What was your motivation for running?

I felt that given all the complaining I had done during high school, I should attempt to actually fix the problems for myself. I was given the opportunity to have full voting privileges in the board to try and solve some of the problems in our school system.

In your opinion, what was the most important issue that came to the board's attention this year?

My main issue was always the middle school schedule because that's what got me involved in the first place. When I went on the board, I really wanted to fix this problem once and for all. It did not happen, but it did end up being one of my major issues, and I'm hoping it will be fixed next year, hopefully due to my efforts this year.

(Superintendent Kevin Maxwell) will, unfortunately, be changing science and social studies back to semesterized classes which was a change that was fixed this year. Dr. Maxwell has said we're still looking into this problem, and I know he's thinking about it a lot more than before.

Most proud accomplishment?

One of the things I'm most proud of is when I had this big fight with the legislature about giving the student member a salary. I got the board to take a vote formally declaring that the student member was an equal member and that they deserve equal pay for their work. And all seven members, excluding the president, deserved equal pay, which is really a great thing because the student member always has a lot of trouble with credibility when our county is the only one in the entire country that gives student members this much power.

You always know that people don't want you to have the full voting rights and that means you have to work even harder to prove to them that the students do deserve a voice and need to be taken seriously. And do a good job, so sometimes the student has to work even harder than the adults.

Most disappointing loss?

[The middle school schedule] was definitely the most frustrating, simply because it was so obvious to me and to all of the students that this was something that was not good for students; it was something that was good for teachers. I felt like the primary interest of our school system should be education and what's best for students. Sometimes students' interests are teachers' interests, but in this case, what was right for teachers was really not right for students.

Hardest part of being a student representative?

Probably missing so much school. It was really, really hard for me … It's just very different not being with my friends as much and not being, 'I'm a senior, this is my last year at school so I don't have to work as hard,' because I have so much work to do. And I have to do board work on top of schoolwork. I get huge stacks of papers every week and, if I didn't read them, I would be okay, but then I'd be a really bad board member, and I wouldn't know what I was doing. The more work I do, the harder it is for me, but the better it is for everyone else. I have to find that balance between my sacrifice and doing what's best for students.

How easy was it to be taken seriously as the student member?

It's sometimes difficult because you have different interests than the other board members. I find that on a lot of educational issues, which are the ones where I'm really the expert as opposed to budget issues where the other board members are, I'm often disagreeing with the other board members. That creates a little divide because the student member is very often in the minority, which means it's hard to be involved in the real changes.

Advice to future candidates? To the student body in general?

Try to communicate with the school board because they really need to hear from students. When you don't hear from students, you feel they're okay with the way things are or they must agree with whatever changes you're making, which is really wrong. And even as a student member, I do try to represent students, and I take votes with the (Chesapeake Regional Association of Student Councils) to have the students behind me.

You have to actually work, and you have to get out there and be willing to fail sometimes.

While many graduate high school with plans to attend either a two- or four-year college, other students seek an alternative route. Many of our own 2008 graduates are taking breaks from their American schooling and traveling abroad.

Thomas Kenny and Steve Everitt are traveling to Germany and will be enrolling in a 13th year, which is the highest grade level for school in most of Europe.

'My rationalization of it is that some people go to college for five years, so spending one year in Germany would be like doing the same thing,' said Thomas, who plans on returning to the United States two years from now to start college.

Taylor Binnix plans on traveling to Argentina for a 13th year, in order to gain a first-hand experience and understanding of the Spanish culture.

Justin VanEmmerik is going to China to teach English to young Chinese students. Once their school year is complete, he will be returning to the U.S. with hopes of attending college in California.

Although they will not have taken the traditional route, these students are sure to have given themselves the opportunities to learn and experience from many extraordinary places.

Courtesy photo The Talon newspaper staff.

The Talon, Severna Park High School's newspaper, was recently awarded first place in the American Scholastic Press Association's annual newspaper competition. The newspaper judge wrote in his evaluation: 'You have an excellent school newspaper, which shows the talent of your editors, reporters, writers, photographers, layout designers and adviser.'

The Talon was awarded 945 points out of a possible 1000. Categories judged were content coverage, page design, general plan, art/advertising/illustrations, editing and creativity. The 2007-08 Talon staff has 29 members who have published nine issues this school year. This year's editors-in-chief are Brittany Gendron, Emily Martin and Victoria Vidal.

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