Opinion - Boone TV

The Need to Recycle

1/21/2016

By: Emma Toms @tomse98

This year, I have noticed that we have tons of garbage cans around the new school. Granted, they keep the the school clean and nice, but what about helping out the environment? We have ten trash cans in one hallway, yet we can't recycle paper. We haven't recycled paper in two years. It doesn't seem like a big deal now that everything is online with our Chromebooks, but some teachers still use paper everyday and they use a lot of it.

I believe that we should make or have an exciting organization/class start recycling bins for paper. We have some for pop cans and other bottles that can be recycled. The only problem is we use more paper than we do any other recyclable product. So why don’t we have recycling for paper? Principal Kris Byam said, “In the schools that I have been at prior to Boone, the environmental science classes or a student group has done that. I definitely think we need to look into it!

I believe that we should have a student organization start a recycling program. They could get the boxes that we would put the recycling in or get recycling bins, and then one day of the week go around and collect. After that, they can take it to the recycling center here in Boone. We should try and help our environment as best as we can. Every little bit counts, so let us put our little bit in.

Out of a lump of clay

1/21/2016

By: Inga Wegger

Pottery is an intriguing art form that has been an optional art class here at Boone High School for many years. It is a class that allows students to plan and create their own works of art and reflect on why and how they created it. The problem solving skills that students earn by taking this class taught in the visual arts can potentially provide high transfer value for later on in their life. But pottery class is much more than simply using your hands. By taking a pottery class, you will also go in depth on extensive pottery history, as well as learn intriguing facts about this riveting subject. There are a variety of both physical and mental benefits to be had from creating art, expressing yourself in a tangible way, and sharing something personal with the world.

Sarah Statz, a successful senior here at Boone High School, has taken pottery every semester since sophomore year. She recently started to further her pottery education by beginning her second semester of senior year with the school’s independent pottery study.

“I enjoy pottery because it’s a relaxing class. I find it stress relieving and I enjoy enjoy creating things out of clay. I feel like I have gotten the hang of the basics in pottery after the amount of classes I have taken. Even so, I still find challenges and I would say the most challenging part about pottery is the potter's wheel. I just haven’t gotten the hang of working it yet. In the future, if I have free time, I would love to take it in college.”

Find your inner artist by taking pottery for a semester, a relaxing, fun class that allows you to take a break from all the theoretical subjects.

Keep it Crazy, Shout Out to the Kate Shelley Krazies

12/18/2015

Before a recent call to action by one of Boone TV’s reporters, the student section for Boone High School sports events had been weak. But in the first couple of weeks of the basketball season, the student section has really outdone itself. Keep up the good work and keep supporting your Toreador Athletics.

“The Krazies have been on point this year, attendance has been great, and they have had some creative chants,” said junior basketball player Lance Losh.

After traveling to both Norwalk and Marshalltown, we feel that Boone’s student section is at a very strong point in the year. While in Norwalk, the student section was large but they were not interactive with the game. It was the opposite in Marshalltown, they were interactive but they were yelling nonsense and their section was small. Compared to the other schools that Boone has played at, our student section is by far the best.

“I think the overall positive energy of the students has improved since football season. I am looking to improve the turnout of our section by making the themes more fun, and having a good time in the student section,” said senior leader Nolan Newcomb.

Keep attending and keep up the raucous all you Krazies. The Toreador boys and girls return home on Tuesday, December 22, to face Greene County.

Art Helps Round Out Students

12/14/2015

By Tessah Boggess

For many students, art class is the best part of their day. This is because they get to express themselves in a new and creative way. For others, it’s just an “easy A.” Art education is an important subject, and Boone High’s 2D art teacher Mary Howe agrees.

Howe teaches high school art because she loves art and students. According to Howe, “It’s the best of both worlds. I love the fact that there is no right or wrong only lots and lots of choices.” She likes being able to teach visual arts to students because she believes a student who creates art is more rounded overall.

Art helps shape students by teaching them that the world around them is all about color and design. People that are more inspired are more involved with art and can come up with creative ideas more easily. They gain important skills from art that can follow them after high school and into life and when joining the workforce. Art classes can help students gain footing in their own personal style and it can give them a sense of identity that they may not have had before. They also develop a good use of composition and design.

The most important tool Howe thinks a student gains from art is visual literacy. She thinks that being able to learn things visually is important because most people start learning this way before any other type of learning.

When asked if there was an art class she would want to be mandatory for students to take, Howe said there wasn’t a specific course she would choose. However, if she could take parts of drawing, design, and painting and put them into one class, it would cover all the basics and be the class she would want to be mandatory.

Howe thinks that while for her and many students art is a fun way to express themselves, for others it’s “as hard as chemistry is for someone else." It all depends on the willingness of a student to go outside their comfort zone and try something new, without thinking they will fail or succeed. Howe says as a final quote, “we all learn and relate differently to the courses we are in."

Security Crack Down

11/24/2015

By: Elizabeth Pfannes @lilliz121

   Boone High School has cracked down on security in the 2015-2016 school year. Across the Boone Community School District, there are 216 camera’s in the schools of Boone. The high school alone has 100 that are always rolling. There are camera’s along each hallway, along with in the commons, the auditorium, and the library, as well as in all the other main hubs of Boone High. In addition to this, each door entering the school is locked after 8 am, and entrance is only permitted through the office doors from 8 am to any time after school as well. The old activities entrance doors are unlocked only when there are games, such as Volleyball, Swim Meets, or this past weekend, the Toreador play; The Hobbit.

   This security measure is meant to be there for the safety of the students so that people who enter the school can be monitored. The push for higher security came after the Columbine shooting. The shooting exposed the need for better protection for the students in public school.

   There are both positive and negatives to the new system of security. It has been a good way to keep track of students and keep them safe. Groundskeeper, Mark Ashby says, “ We can track intruders or students from start to finish when they enter the school grounds.” This is a prime way to keep track of students, both to keep them and their belongs safe.
However, one negative of this system is that students who are in after school activities can not alway get into the school building when it’s needed. A recent example would be during play practices, techies who come and go with props from the school have a hard time getting back in each time unless the advisor unlocks the entrance. While being safer for students, the security system remains inconvenient. There are doors all around the school that have become inconsequential to anyone but teachers. A solution could be to set up a system like at the middle school and the front office where we can buzz in, or use student ID’s.

Each teacher has an ID badge that allows them into the building, it would be possible to do the same with students. Each student receives a school ID every year, if it was possible, those could be used as a way to allow students into the building while still being able to keep track of each person who enters, as well as still keep intruders out. I believe this solution could settle a lot of the on going frustration throughout the student body, as they could then enter doors they are closest to. This would also make parking less of an issue, because a large part of the problem is the vicinity to the school build. Having access to other entrances to the school then allows each student to have closer access to the school without needing to add more parking. However, this solution could have a downfall of cost and possibly the need for someone to supervise door access requests, which is an understandable con that would need to be very highly considered.

School Making the Holidays Difficult

11/20/2015

By: Erin Peterson @Erin_18_Kathryn

Sales are starting to be advertised, Christmas music is blared on weekends, Christmas decorations and lights are all being hung on houses signaling that the Thanksgiving holiday is right around the corner. With many families leaving town for the long weekend, traffic is sure to be atrocious, and with the regular Wednesday dismissal time, three until late afternoon will most definitely be disastrous.

Families that plan to leave town early will have to deal with not only the stress of rushing to get everything done before or even during the long weekend, but driving through a sea of traffic. With kids leaving school and people leaving work, having students leave school a bit earlier than the original Wednesday's release time would probably have been a good idea.

Because of long distances that students and their families need to travel, the attendance may have a serious downfall on that day. If you were to travel several hundred miles after a full day of school, you would be sitting in a car for several hours in heavy traffic and be undeniably tired upon your arrival of wherever you’re staying.

Thanksgiving is a time for family, and honestly, I would prefer to be with my family over sitting at school clock-watching, waiting to get out and prepare for the weekend. Families like my own who have the family come to them have to start preparing for the day several hours before anyone even thinks about showing up. If students were allowed out earlier, we would have more family time, we’d have time for all of the homework that is guaranteed to be assigned over the long weekend, for those leaving time to pack, and for the families like mine, time to prepare and decorate.

Why wouldn’t you let students out earlier than normal on the day before a national holiday, especially when it’s a known fact that many students won’t make it to school the day before? With conditions worsening, it’s not surprising that students are eager to get out of school.

Boone High School Expands Student Parking

11/20/2015

By: Jason Mui @JasonMui17

After several weeks, Boone High School has finished its renovations on the triangle lot. With the triangle lot being finished it allowed for more space allocated for both students and teachers within the high school. Since the triangle lots completion, it's been dedicated to teacher parking only which in turn has opened up more parking for students in the parking lot in front of the activity entrance.

With the triangle lot being finished, it has been a step in the right direction in improving the very controversial parking system that has been with Boone High School. This year we have seen an influx of students driving to school meaning that more and more parking space is being taken to hold all of the students. Some students even resort to parking in the dirt areas of the west lot which are not designated spots to shorten the distance from the parking lot to their class. Now with the triangle lot opening up and more space added in the parking lot in front of the activity entrance, less students are parking in undesignated spots which is a positive outcome.

The Boone High School parking situation has been a problem with the high school for many years. Many different solutions have been drawn up over the past couple of years but Boone high has yet to have a solid solution. Although some students might feel the parking in the high school is still an issue, the recent change has been a step in the right direction.

Third Times the Charm for Call of Duty: Black Ops

11/19/2015

By: Dresden Wilson @dreswilson22

With only $60 and a small amount of time, you could enjoy the newest addition to the “Call of Duty” series. The game is called “Call of Duty Black Ops 3,” and it was released for Xbox One, Playstation 4, PC, PS3, and Xbox 360.

The creators of the game, Treyarch, set the bar high with their last game “Black Ops 2,” but with the new game that was just released, the expectation was shattered.

There are multiple game modes, the normal campaign, multiplayer, and then zombies. But they created a new game mode called “free run,” which is basically a maze that you have to get through in the fastest amount of time.

The Campaign is good, it includes an NFL player Marshawn Lynch as one of the main villains.

In the multiplayer game mode, there are thirteen different maps, and many different guns. They have added a couple of effects where you can now swim underwater for a certain amount of time, and you can now run on walls.

The last game mode in “Call of Duty Black Ops 3” includes zombies. There are two maps so far, those are Shadows of Evil and Giant. The Shadows of Evil map is set in New York City in the 1950s. The characters are a championship boxer, a magician, a police officer, and a dancer. The other map, Giant, is throwing it all the way back to “Call of Duty’s World at War” map Der Reise.

All in all “Black Ops 3” is a good investment. It has great gameplay, a good storyline, and good graphics.

Have You Been Checking Your Phone Lately?

11/5/2015

By: Mackenzie Morris @18morrim1

Every year there’s a new generation entering the driving world, and every year more and more kids within their generations are becoming sucked further more into social media. When starting something new, like driving, having distractions such as phones can lead to many dangerous outcomes.

Today, texting isn’t our only issue that we have to worry about. When notifications pop up on a little screen, our most instinctive reaction is to pick up the phone and look at it. It’s almost like we feel a need to respond to whatever pops up on our screens.

Social media is another issue, like Instagram, Snapchat, and Facebook. It’s a very big distractions to nowaday teens. Some kids lives revolve around how many likes their photo gets, if their selfie looks good, and how many people shared their post. It’s becoming more of an addiction as the days go by.

I can understand checking your notifications while being at a stop sign when no cars are around, but it’s still not a habit we should be getting ourselves into. It’s dangerous to take your eyes off the road and onto your phone, it can cause accidents not only harming you but other people. Being on your phone while driving doesn’t only affect your safeness but others around you too.

Are You InstaFamous yet?

11/4/2015

By: Seth Thomas @Sethapthomas

All the cool kids are on instagram.

Instagram, the complete genius app that it is, provides unique filters people use to take their unappealing photos and turn them into something that’s shareable. Now, all you have to do is take a revolting photo in your gallery, and put it in one of the filters given by Instagram. With the 90% of 200 million people that are active on instagram, the users upload over 544 million photos a day.

With Instagram’s newest app, Instasize. Instagram just got easier to work with and very customizable. It has a surprisingly good amount of filters and allows you to have an equilateral photograph. For the people who cannot update Instagram for some reason, or for those of you who use flipagram, you should definitely get this app. Best part is, it’s free! Not only are they giving you filters, but they also give you a wide variety of borders to use for your photos. You can make collages, and crop them down to any size you want.

If you want to keep track of your lost/gained followers, and much more that come with it. The Followers app is all you’ll ever need, and it’s also free! Overall, this app is pretty decent and doesn’t require very much cellular data.

Is Instagram the new Facebook? If you like it or not, Instagram has risen to the level of twitter.