By: Emily Headley

Brian Bloem, Boone High School’s newest counselor, has decided to take over Peer Helpers in place of Erica Wood­schmitz. He’s excited to get this year started off and to see that twenty­two students are ready to take action and help those around them. “Our biggest goal this year is to have a few students equipped to help their peers by tutoring, helping with conflicts, or volunteering for events.” He spoke of how in the past all Peer Helpers really did was put up a few signs and volunteer for the annual basketball game auction in March. He wanted to change that and really get the Peer Helpers working.

This year, Bloem plans on having tutors set up in TLC to help students who are struggling with their school work. He also wants students to be more active in the orientation for the 8th graders coming to high school the next year. He plans to start teachings for Peer Helpers to go to, and help get them ready for the things they may be handling, the week of December 15th. Bloem will be meeting up with each member individually to see when would be the best time of the month to have these classes, and whether it would be best to have it before or after school. Bloem also still plans on doing the teachers vs teachers basketball game in March with the annual baked goods auction at halftime.

Bloem actually came from a school in Indiana where students had a group a lot like this. The students there would meet up in advisees to tutor or go to Freshman advisees to help them get more accustomed to high school life. He talked about how he wasn’t really involved in this group at this other school, but he is excited to be a part of it now.

If you still wish to be a part of Peer Helpers, or just want to hear more about what they’re doing, you can visit Brian Bloem in his office on the second floor of the “new” building.

By: David Ward

When people think of war the things that come to their minds is guns, violence, and hatred. That is it to those who haven’t lived through war. Fury is a movie that brings to life the hellish spectrum of war

Fury takes place during the final stages of the European front in World War two. The once thought unstoppable German army is on the retreat. Hitler has declared total war and orders that every man, woman, and child is to do his or her part to drive back the allies. The only advantage the Germans appear to have is their superior technology. The average allied tank is torn to shreds by the superior German panzer 4’s. This is where the movie takes its role on the inside of an allied tank called Fury.

The first two scenes introduce the main characters in this film. Wardaddy played by Brad Pitt, the tank commander. Norman, the new guy played by Logan Lerman, the assistant driver. Gordo played by Michael Pena, the Hispanic tank driver. Grady, played by John Bernthal, the tank’s engineer. Lastly, Bible played by Shia LaBeouf, the religious gunner of the group. These men are different in their own ways, but by the end of the movie they will all be the same in one way.

The movie’s main protagonist is Norman. His job is to operate a .30 machine gun on the front end of the tank. He gets plunged into a war he joined, but he didn’t want to see. He tells Wardaddy that he hadn’t been to tank school or even seen the inside of a tank. He went on to say that he had been trained to type 60 words a minute. This movie is the story of Norman’s tour of duty and what can happen to people that go to war.

This isn’t the standard war movie with fake gun sounds, over dramatic explosions, and a mindless enemy. The sound of shells flying past the tanks with the distinct whistling sound. Guns make realistic sounds and actually hit their targets with realism. The enemy in this movie is kind of standard, meaning the regular German wehrmacht foot soldiers were average, but the SS in this movie are the real enemy. If those who don’t know who the SS are here is a quick history lesson. The SS were the best and most experienced of the German army. Before the war broke out they were Hitler’s personal bodyguard, but grew extensively by the time the war started. These men are Nazi elite. They are unquestionable with all orders that are given to them by their superiors and by Hitler himself. They helped the Gestapo, secret police, to apprehend Jews and the SS also ran the concentration, labor, and death camps. Wardaddy tells Norman to kill every SS that he comes across, and now you know why.

This movie is for adults unless graphic depictions of war don’t faze you. This movie has people hanging from telephone poles, a man’s head gets taken off by an AP [Armor Piercing] round from a tank, an allied tank operator is on fire and then shoots himself, two members of the Hitler Youth, the Nazi version of the boy scouts, get shot by Wardaddy, soldiers both allied and German get lit up by guns, and other gruesome death. This movie is about on par with “Saving Private Ryan” on gruesomeness.

This movie was very immersive, and felt very realistic. Though the severity of World War two seemed overdone and seemed a little too dramatic. The movie made it seem like the allies weren’t going to make it Berlin without being torn to shreds by the level of resistance that the German army, which was on the full retreat on a historical level. Besides this and a dinner scene that was used as filler where the only two things in this movie that brought it done.

This movie is a very accurate depiction of war with graphic death, bullets that actually deal damage, and the soldiers act and feel like soldiers, not super soldiers or super humans. If you are a fan of war films that try to be graphic, have lots of foul language, and that uses physics this is the movie for you.

By: Libby Penick

On November 15th, UNI held their annual Thespian Festival. It was a two day event, lasting Friday and Saturday where thespians of Iowan schools performed, watched performances and competed in technical challenges. 
On Friday, they watched two main stages. Those two plays were “Bob in Five Acts” and “Our Town”. Then, they did their individual events and technical challenges. Boone students competed in individual events such as Improv, Musical Theater, and Monolouge. Other students compete in the technical challenges, where they aimed lights, set up scenes in the dark, and more. 
Michael Foley, sophomore, attended both days of ThesFest. Michael’s favorite part was the lunch, because UNI had an all day, all you can eat buffett. He says “I enjoyed the weekend and can’t wait to return next year.” 

By: Emily Headley

Boone High School’s large group speech team had their first official practices the week of December 1st, 2014. Mr. Wells, the large group speech team leader of ten years, expressed how excited he is for this year’s teams. Mrs. Anderson, co­leader of large group speech team, spoke of how great everything seems to be coming along for her teams. Students had fun at their practices playing speech games like Press Conference. “You should look forward to the fun of Contest, yet realize that speech is all about the journey and the fun you have along the way, not the destination,” Wells said.

Wells spoke of how hard it was for him to choose who got to be a part of speech, “The biggest dilemma of large group speech team is that so many kids want to be a part of it, which don’t get me wrong is a wonderful thing, but sadly we can’t send 100 kids to Contest.”

Because of the team had so many students signed up, Wells fought the administration for a third coach. Having over seventy kids involved, he and Anderson knew they couldn’t coach all the kids as well as they’d like to. This year, they finally granted his wish, and Ms. Thieben agreed to be the new coach. She is now going between the two classrooms helping where she is needed at practices. She’s also been helping those participating in Mime while Wells is busy coaching those in Improv.

There are speech practices every day either in Wells’s room or in Anderson’s from 3:30 p.m. to 5. Anyone is welcome to come in and watch.