By: Dresden Wilson @dreswilson22

The Boone Booster Club voted this past week on the conflict of keeping the Powder Puff game or not. It is official the 2016 homecoming festivities will include the powder puff game next year.
    “Everyone really enjoyed it, parent’s and other people weren’t really concerned about injuries. It was also a good experience last year because everyone was positive, everybody celebrated, ” said Boone High School Principal Kris Byam.
    Look forward to seeing all the girls tearing up the field, and all the guys wearing tights next year.​

By: Libby Penick @lmpenick

By: Katelyn Williams @katelynann228

By: Emma Toms @tomse98

Everybody is always complaining about how hard math is. What if there was a way to make it easier? Common core math is the new policy on how math is to be taught. It’s suppose to make it easier and clearer to understand, but is it actually easier to understand?
    Common core math follows the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics (NCTM) standards for math. Common core focuses more on the problem solving and real world math. Mrs. Bass said "For math, it made what we teach more rigorous, and I'm ok with that. The Core makes it more clear as to what topics must be covered in each course.“ 
The biggest changes for common core math have been in the elementary schools. Mrs. Bass gave an example with long division. It used to be step after step, now they are hoping that the kids will understand why you have to use those steps.
By starting the common core in elementary, it should make it simpler for the kids when they get to high school. They would have been going through the different phases of common core math from the beginning. When common core was started, the freshmen had a hard time, since they were getting taught a new way.
Boone High School hasn’t made many changes to follow the common core standards, but they have made changes that fit the standards. The chromebooks help them cover the new standards, through the utilization of apps like GeoGebra, which allows students to see how finding the area for shapes and other math equations. They also pursue the common core by having calculators in every math class. The calculators are there to fit the student’s needs by being able to graph and doing complex equations.
One of the issues with common core is getting the parents involved with helping their kids with their math. Mrs. Bass says that "The Core has changed how some concepts are taught in elementary. It might be hard for parents to understand the new ways or methods that students are learning - it is not just old school math anymore. There is a stronger emphasis on thinking and problem solving at all levels.”
Some ideas that she gave to help the parents understand the common core math is by the teachers putting up videos explaining it. A second concern with the common core math is that the schools will have to pay for new textbooks and technology to fit the standards.
There are a lot of pros and cons to go into common core math. Nobody knows what the outcome will be when the new system is established in every school. ​

By: Nikki Elliott 

By: Lance Losh @Losh65

The annual Homecoming Coronation took place this afternoon in the gym. Parents, former kings and queens, and the student body gathered to see who would win this year’s honors. The queen candidates were Kennedey Bass, Erin Kinne, Sarah Heiller, Claire Moline, and Carlie Romig. The King candidates were Daniel Anderson, Cade Burma, Brigham Campbell, Jackson Hull, and Nolan Newcomb.

Former king, Jeff Dighton, was in attendance to crown the new queen. Last year’s king, Paul Solomon, was unable to attend because he is a part of the Naval Academy in Annapolis, Maryland. Parents and students were on the edge of their seats as Dighton hovered the tiara over top of the queen candidates. After all the anticipation, Kennedey Bass was crowned 2015 Homecoming queen. She was very emotional when asked about how she felt about receiving such an honor.

“I was just looking at my parents the whole time” said Bass, “I honestly thought they had already crowned it, but then I felt it on my head and I burst into tears. I was just so happy.”

Former queen, Ellen Titman, had the honors of crowning this year’s king. Last year’s recipient Titman held the crown above the candidates and finally rested it on the head of 2015 Homecoming king Nolan Newcomb.

Newcomb was nervous prior to being crowned. “I was very nervous, but the nerves went away once I was crowned and it was pretty cool.” said Newcomb.

The other candidates all hugged Newcomb and Bass and congratulated them. Although they may have been disappointed, they smiled and were thankful they were selected for the court.

The rest of the assembly featured a dance battle between the parents and staff of BHS, and students.  There was also a performance by the drill team, cheerleaders, and the powderpuff cheerleaders.  The assembly concluded with the premiere of the 2015 Dance Dub Video.​

By: Amanda Bryant @18bryana

There comes that time of year where the girls find the prettiest dresses they can and guys get the courage to ask girls to the dance. The time is Homecoming, the time where students get school spirit and dress up the week before the big dance. Each day students dress up and get their picture taken to see who is the winner of that day with the theme given on Facebook.

 Merica Day started of the week with people dressed in red, white, and blue. Some dressed as what they see as America, cowboys, bandanas for that country feel, and other sporting the logo of Captain America. After all the pictures taken and hard work people put into their outfits two winners came out of the bunch. Sophomores, Taleah Newman and Gabie Osborn won with 35 likes.

 Twin Day is the day where people can do their ‘twinning’ with their best friend or girlfriend/boyfriend. Most of the twins were creative and eye catching, not many participated but two girls won the contest of that day. Seniors, Jade Myers and Shay Steffen won with 94 likes.

 Wacky Wednesday made all sorts of people come out looking their best with wigs, costumes, and makeup. Senior, Kennedy Bass was chosen out of 27 entries, winning with 48 likes.

 Decade day is the final day to dress up wacky and weird for this week, with the exception of Friday’s spirit day. Students dressed up from many different decades, starting from colonial times and earlier, all the way to the crazy eighties and their neon tights. The winners of decade day contests was Seniors, Dylan Appenzeller, Kevin Kiesel, Ethan Patterson, Drew Wilber, and Noah Woolston with 91 likes.

Finally, the week drew to a conclusion with spirit day. The day where student dressed up and wrap up in school pride, only to end up at one of the most anticipated high school football games of the year. The build up of the busy week only makes this day all the more fun, and without the stress of contests, the day always ends up to be one of the most calm. ​

By: Liz Pfannes @lilliz121

How many days are students late to school due to being unable to find parking at Boone High? The student front lot has been cut down to half of what it used to be. The new lot right next to the school, as well as the triangle lot to the North of the school, and half of the big lot in front of the school has been for the teachers. What is left for the students to park is a fair distance away due to all the doors being locked except for the office ones. With the fact that many students are in sports and extracurricular activities, carrying bags needed for those activities on a long walk just to get to the school is not reasonable.

There are 737 students enrolled in Boone High, and just over 100 staff members, yet they have more parking than they can use. Often the teacher parking is partially empty, while the student backlot is packed full, and students are parking in spots without lines just to make it to class on time.

When it’s zero degrees out, 100 degrees, pouring rain, snowing, backpack full of books, a chromebook, a gym bag, students still have to walk from the back lot. We are subjected to this everyday. Principal Byam joins the students for football games in the student section, and post games, yet when it comes to parking, we are supposed to remember that the staff are more important. Before the new school was built, the problems with parking were next to none.

Teachers have a total of 134 parking stalls. During third hour, the count for used stalls on September 28 was 84. That is 62% of the teacher parking being used. Some teachers carpool and some walk. The lot closest to the school doors on the west side was only 85% full at the time of third hour. At this same time students have 234 parking stalls for over 700 students, and every single stall was full as well as places that are not even parking stalls. There are about seven times as many students as staff. Taking into account that many Freshman don’t drive or that some students may carpool, there are still about five times as many students driving to the number of teachers driving. The parking lots for teachers sit there partially empty, this is a waste of those spots.

“I see students parked in spaces that are not even actual spaces. Students park in grassy areas behind the lot, too. It is a little ridiculous that Boone High’s parking lots have turned into battle zones for students.” said Junior Libby Penick.  By 7:30am, every lot besides the back lot is usually full, and some students who live in the country or a good distance from the school, or have younger siblings to drop off, cannot make it to the school early enough to get a parking spot. This causes many students to be late.

It is understandable that the triangle parking lot was taken away as a punishment for not parking correctly, but if we had a fair amount of parking for the amount of students within a reasonable distance from the school, students would not be parking like that. There are 32 parking spots in the triangle lot, with only 15 of them being used, those spots should be used or given back to the students.

Senior Nathanial Brown says “Freshman and Sophomores are here all day and do not have open campus, it would be a good solution to designate them to park in the back lot and Upper Classmen who have open campus get the closer lots. That would fix the problem of being late as well as never being able to find a spot.” We spend eight hours a day here, this is what shapes us, and the administration should remember that being treated as equals will shape us for the better. Students and teachers should have equal parking rights. Students and staff alike are all here all day.

A solution for the entire problem would be to give students either the entire front lot back or the triangle lot. The teacher’s side of the front lot has 66 stalls, with only 38 of them being used.  Another fair solution would be to return to the way it was before when all the teachers parked in the west lot. There is a total of 91 parking stalls when all cars are parked only within the lines. When only 84 of the parking stalls the teachers are allotted are being used, this would be sufficient to hold the staff, and then allow for any extra. The other lots could be given to the students. If need be, the lot right by the school as well could still be used for staff. There are a total of 34 stalls in that lot, those two lots together would provide enough for the teachers. The students could have the triangle lot, the front lot, and the back lot, giving them a total of 241 parking stalls, which though only being a small difference in the amount, the distance is more reasonable.

Each student would like to be heard and understood on this issue, and a change needs to be made. We ask only for a fair and reasonable handling of the situation, which has not been addressed properly. The only thing that has been addressed to this point is the fact of students parking incorrectly, or in teacher parking. The issue is still at hand that there is not enough parking for the number of students who drive.