Opinion:Breaking the Aura

&Legal System

pg. 8 & 9

This Issue:

West Hills High School Issue #5March 2010

A&E Dear John

v.Dear John

&LOST

pg.4 & 5

Sports:

O l y m p i c s 2010

&Cheer

Districtspg.3

Features:

R a c h e l ’ s Friends

Bracelets&

Mr. Peterson

pg. 10 & 11

Obama’s 2010 Budget Plan

When President Obama was elected, he promised change as well as financial security for many people in the nation. He recently proposed a $3.8 trillion budget for the rest of the 2010 year. This budget plan will raise tax-es on business owners and the up-per class by over $2 trillion over the next ten years, and coupled with that, a cut on the funds po-litical support groups will receive should turn a corner in the current economy. However, this plan will still leave the nation with a debt of $8.5 tril-lion added over the next decade. In order to make his plan work, he is also going to let George Bush’s

tax cuts on the upper class and business owners expire. This will in-c r e a s e t a x e s for them o n c e m o r e , but re-new the tax cuts on the m i d d l e class and b e l o w , in order to assure them fi-n a n c i a l security. The b u d g e t plan is subject to approval by congress and is unlikely to be passed without several major changes to it. However, despite

the president’s good intentions, the plan has caused uproar among

business owners and politicians around the country. “It tells you we’re in a lot worse shape than advertised,” said David

Walker, President of the Peter G. Peterson Foundation, a think-

group created to focus on budget reduction. Obama also wants to cancel future NASA projects, such as the newly announced mission to the moon. “The president’s pro-posed NASA bud-get begins the death march for the future of U.S. human space flight,” said Republi-can Senator Richard Shelby. While it’s too early to tell whether his plan will have a positive effect on the nation’s

economic problems, it’s becoming obvious

that without major changes to his proposal, it will not fix a thing. America’s future is worrisome.

Congress Courtesy of: letustalk.wordpress.com/

A killer whale killed a train-er one Wednesday afternoon at Sea World’s Shamu Stadium in Orlando, Florida, a public in-formation officer for the Orange County Sheriff’s Office said. The 40-year-old woman, identified by sheriff’s spokesman Jim Solo-mons as Dawn Brancheau, was in the whale holding area about 2 PM when “she apparently slipped or fell into the tank and was fatal-ly injured by one of the whales,” he said. A witness told that the whale approached the glass side of the 35-foot-deep tank at Shamu Sta-dium, jumped up and grabbed the trainer by the waist, shaking her so violently that her shoe came off. “One of our most experi-enced animal trainers drowned” in the accident, said Dan Brown,

Shamu: the Killer vice-president and general man-ager of Sea World Orlando. He said an investigation would be carried out. “We’ll make our findings known in due course,” he said. “We’ve never in the his-tory of our parks experienced an incident like this. All standard operating procedures will be re-viewed.” The incident occurred after a show called “Dine with Shamu,” said Paula Gillespie, who attended with her daughter. “During the show everything was perfectly fine,” she said. Af-terward, “we went down to look at his full body underneath the isolation tank,” she said. “Ev-erything seemed calm and OK. “Within five minutes, she was down in the tank, and we saw all the thrashing and the bubbles and him pushing her with his nose,” she said. “It was just so, so traumatic.” A woman who had watched the whales perform be-fore the incident said the trainers were having difficulties getting the whales to perform. “And the senior trainer actually came out onto the stage to let the crowd know... that the whales decided

they were having more fun splash-ing each other than splashing the crowd.” In 1999, Tilikum, the whale involved, was also blamed for the death of a 27-year-old man whose body was found floating in a tank at Sea World, the apparent victim of a whale’s “horseplay,” authori-ties said then. The Orange County Sheriff’s Office said the man ap-parently hid in the park until after it closed, then climbed into the tank. The 22-foot-long whale was “not accustomed to people being in his tank.” Because of Tilikum’s history, as well as his size, trainers did not get into the water with him, Tompkins told CNN. Specific pro-cedures were in place for working with him, he said, although “obvi-ously, we need to evaluate those protocols.” Fred Felleman, a ma-rine consultant in Seattle, Wash-ington, said keeping the social ani-mals in what amounts to isolation is bound to cause problems. “The fact is we don’t have the facilities to adequately accommodate not only the physical needs, but the psychological and social needs of these animals,” he told CNN af-

filiate KIRO-TV. “We respect li-ons and wolves and wild dogs as fantastic things, but we don’t go run into the Serengeti and try to jump on their back.” Jack Hanna, director emeritus of the Colum-bus Zoo and Aquarium in Ohio, said he knew Brancheau and that she would want her work to con-tinue. A spokesman for People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals called the death “a tragedy that didn’t have to happen.” Jaime Zalac said the organization had called on Sea World “to stop con-fining oceangoing mammals to an area that to them is like the size of a bathtub, and we have also been asking the park to stop forcing the animals to perform silly tricks over and over again. It’s not sur-prising when these huge, smart animals lash out.” Tilikum and two other whales were involved in the drowning of a trainer at a Victoria, British Columbia, ma-rine park in 1991. The trainer fell into the whale tank at the Sea Land Marine Park Victoria and was dragged underwater as park visitors watched.

2 NewsMarch 2010 Paw Prints

Addition to Space Station

Primates Going Extinct

On February 2nd, Polish sci-entists announced that they had made a significant discovery in the human biological field when they unearthed what looked like ancient human teeth in Stajna Cave, which is north of the Car-pathian Mountains in Poland. Af-ter some analysis, the scientists determined that the teeth could not belong to a human but instead linked them to an ancient relative: the Neanderthal. The Neanderthal was human-ity’s closest relative until they died out shortly after the Ice Age ended. Many scientists believe the teeth could link together hu-man development to the ancient Neanderthal race, as well as to help better understand what had caused the extinction of the race. The teeth were not the only thing found in the cave, howev-er. Scientists also found various

tools, such as a hammer made out of reindeer antler, various broken flint tools, and furs and bones of a an unknown species of cave bear. This furthers another theory sci-entists had believed about the Ne-anderthal: They were extremely adept hunters. “The cave bears were big, dangerous animals, and this supports the view the Nean-derthals were really efficient hunt-ers,” said Mikolaj Urbanowski, the project’s lead researcher and archaeologist with Szczecin Uni-versity. Scientists also believe that the cave was a primitive burial site for the Neanderthal, based upon the formation of tools around the teeth of the deceased hunter. If the cave was a burial site, then that points to a belief in the afterlife, further linking them with human-ity, an interesting concept to ex-plore. This discovery is important because it has established a popu-lation of Neanderthal in a place where there had been little to no evidence of them before, as well as potentially helping us under-stand their culture and history.

Teeth Found in

a Cave

According to the International Union for Conservation of Nature, almost half of the world’s primate species are dangerously close to extinction. The Switzerland-based conservation group, known for being one of the oldest global environmental organizations, re-leased a report on Wednesday, February 17, stating that of the world’s 634 different species of primates, about 48% are at the threat of extinction. Extinction risk numbers have increased since the last bi-annual report, which is very concerning to animal experts from around the world. After the report was released, adviser to the Swiss group Chris-toph Schwitzer stated, “Support and action to help save these species is vital if we are to avoid losing these wonderful animals forever.”

Some of the species only num-ber in the dozens. For instance, the golden-headed langur (found

on an island off the coast of Viet-nam) only has about 60-70 left in its population. Not to mention,

since the last report, there are now less than 100 northern sportive le-murs left on Madagascar.

What is the cause of these adorable crea-tures rapidly dy-ing? Some of the main problems include, and cer-tainly are not limited to, for-est destruction, u r b a n i z a t i o n , illegal wildlife trading, and bush meat hunting. Conservationists everywhere are quickly making steps to prevent these events from happening any longer. At least if these dealings can be limited, there is more hope for the crit-ters than before.

The world’s atten-tion must be drawn

to these conservation issues if we hope to maintain the biological diversity of our planet.

Mouse Lemur Courtesy of: graphics8.nytimes.com

Astronauts aboard the Earth-orbiting space shuttle Endeavour recently made an addition to the International Space Station: an extra window. This connected module serves as “sort of an or-biting sun porch” for the station’s crew to use for both security and enjoyment. It is now the largest window in the station and is big enough to be used as an extra room for the crew’s life support systems as well as provide an spectacular view of Earth (which lies about 250 miles below the orbiting space station) and other magnifi-cent objects wandering space. An-

other main objective for the 31.5 inch window was to now allow crew members to monitor their

colleagues working on their exte-rior activities including research and spacewalks.

On Wednes-day morning, February 17th, P r e s i d e n t Obama even called the or-biting habi-tat from the White House. The President wanted to congratulate the celestial navigators of the Endeavour on their feat of installing the station’s new-est window and their on-going research mission.

After speaking with

the crew, our nation’s leader turned the telephone over to vis-

iting middle school students so they could ask the astronauts

questions. The space station itself is

a c t u a l l y only 90% completed at the mo-ment and is expected to be finished sometime next year. With a n o t h e r tenth of the ISS still in progress , we are sure to see even more re-markab le advances in the space pro-gram in the

very near future. Best of luck to the working crew!Space Shuttle Endeavour Courtesy of: .dailygalaxy.com

Space Station Window Courtesy of: google.com

3 Sports Paw Prints March 2010

Kurt Warner, quarterback for the Arizona Cardinals, has called it quits after 12 years in the league. The first time that he tried to enter the NFL, they re-jected him, and he went on to be an un-drafted free agent with no team to go to. So, with the time that he had, he bagged groceries at a grocery store. Well, he went from being a bag boy to being a starting quar-terback in the NFL and led the St. Louis Rams to two Super Bowls, with one of them being a victory for him, and he also helped lead the Arizona Cardi-nals to a Super Bowl for the first time in franchise history. In his 12-year career, he won the NFL MVP, when he helped lead the playoff-less Cardinals to Super Bowl XLLL. Kurt Warner’s career is one of the most uplifting stories in all of the NFL. Now to the big ques-tion: Is he worthy of getting into the NFL Hall of Fame in Canton,

Ohio? With the numbers that Kurt Warner has put up in his career, he is worthy of getting into the Hall of Fame. For him to get into the Hall of Fame, a board of vot-ers vote on who is worthy, but

Kurt Warner has to wait 10 years

before he could get on the ballot. To get inaugurated, he has to get 75% of the votes from the board. One of the many reasons that he decided to retire was that he

has re-c e i v e d two con-cussions in the last four years. He d e c i d e d he did not want to get p e r m a -nent brain damage , so he made a decis ion to hang up the jersey, and he q u o t e d , “ I thank God and my fam-ily for support-ing my decis ion to retire,

and I thank all of them.” Happy retirement, Kurt.

Even though the Winter X-Games are easily confused with the Winter Olympics, there is a big difference. The difference is that the Olym-pics happen every four years, and the X-Games occur every year, twice a year. Plus, the Olympics are often considered more important. There are different sports in the Olympics, such as alpine ski-ing, curling, the bi-athlon, bobsleigh, cross-country ski-ing, figure skating, freestyle skiing, ice hockey, luge, Nordic combined short track, speed skating, regular speed skating and skeleton, ski jumping, and snow-boarding. As of February 21st, the US was in the lead with not only bronze medals but the most med-als in total too. (9 gold, 15 silver and 13 bronze). Speaking of med-als, the Vancouver Olympic med-als are among the heaviest medals in Olympic and Paralympic his-

tory, weighing on between 500-576 grams. In fact there is 2.05 kg of gold in the gold medal, 903 kg of copper used in the bronze and 1950kg of silver used in the silver medal! The gold medals were ac-cepted gladly by Bode Miller for alpine skiing-- men’s super com-

bined, Evan Lysacek for figure skating, “The Flying Tomato” Shaun White for men’s half pipe for snowboarding, Lindsey Vonn for alpine skiing, Seth Wescott for snowboarding, and (men’s snowboard cross) Hannah Kear-ney for ladies’ moguls– freestyle skiing. As for silver, it may not be gold, but second place isn’t that

bad considering that Shani Davis got two, one for the 1500m and 1000m speed skating, Bode Mill-er for men’s super-g alpine skiing, Hannah Teter for ladies’ super combined-alpine skiing and ladies downhill alpine skiing, and John-ny Spillane for Nordic combined and Apolo Ohno for short track.

B r o n z e w a s a w a r d e d to Apolo Ohno for the short track in the men’s 1 0 0 0 m , as well as L i n d s e y Vonn, who rece ived it for the l a d i e s ’ s u p e r - g in alpine s k i i n g , A n d r e w Weibrecht for the m e n ’ s s u p e r - g , K e l l y C l a r k for the

halfpipe in snowboarding, Chad Hendrick for the men’s 1000m in speed skating, Bode Miller again for the men’s downhill alpine skiing, Bryon Wilson for mens’ moguls in freestyle skiing, Shan-non Bahrke for Ladies’ moguls in freestyle skiing, and last but cer-tainly not least, JR. Celski for the mens’ 1500m in short track speed skating. Go Team USA!

Districts is one of the larg-est cheer competitions in the Grossmont District. Every cheer team within the district attends

this competition. For the first time in several years, Districts was held at a high school campus. West Hills was lucky enough to host the competition in our very own gym on March 1st. The competition began at 7 PM, but the foyer and gym were packed well before then. There were so many people that it was difficult to move around. At one point it was said that there were around 1800 spectators in the gym, not including the cheerlead-ers and coaches. There were so many people inside the doors that people who arrived without pre-paid tickets were told they were not allowed to enter the competi-tion. The competition was broken into two sections, and within those

sections were subsections. Each section was a division. There was JV small, JV large, Varsity small, and Varsity large. West Hills’ JV was against two other teams. They gave an amazing performance where they showed off their tumbling skills, dance moves, and their ability to throw girls in the air. When the award ceremony came, West Hills JV took first in their division; last year they took second only by a small margin.

West Hills’ Varsity competed against four other teams. They had their best performance the crowd has seen. They, too, show-cased their tumbling, stunting, and dancing skills. However, Granite Hills High School and Valhalla High School placed ahead of West Hills. Granite’s cheer team has amazing tumblers. Because they have more tumbling skill than the Wolfpack, they received more points in 15% of their score. Even though West Hills was thought to have given a better performance than the second place Valhalla, they still were given third place. Overall, West Hills gave a great performance for all of those who came to show their support, and both JV and Varsity ended their seasons on a good note.

Kurt Warner courtesy of seasonsofdiscontent.com

Olympic Medals courtesy of govancover.about.com

“Who dat sey dey gonna beat dem Saints? Who dat? Who dat?”. This cheerful lit-tle chant, always known to belong to the New Or-leans football team, is now be-ing claimed by the NFL. This has the city of New Orleans stressed, yet again, after being uplifted from the still tragic ef-fects of Hurricane Katrina by having the Saints go to their very first Super Bowl. In early February, the NFL felt the need to open a cease-and-desist court order on the Saints, and ban all vending of memora-bilia and souvenirs displaying a phrase of or the whole slogan, as it may “confuse the public into believing” that the NFL is spon-soring those items. The city of New Orleans is outraged by this, especially since this is directly

after they won the Super Bowl. They feel that the NFL is only doing this to make a little more money, because, they believe, the NFL did not care at all about this slogan before, even after decades of the Saints using it. Many residents of New Or-leans have shared their opinions about this issue; one man made a prediction that the NFL will start

charging those who chant it at games, but the coach says that no one should own “Who dat, ” e s p e c i a l l y since it “did not originate

from the NFL or the Saints,” St. Augustine Catholic Boys School claims. They say that they started the chant about their team, the Knights. New Orlean fans claim the chant is the outcry of the city. As it is said at various times anywhere in the city, anyone living there will know what it means. It cre-ates a sense of neighborly bond-ing with any resident to one an-other, and taking this away from them would be devastating to any New Orleanian, as it is one of the things that keeps the city going.

“Who dat? Who dat? Who dat say dey gon-na beat dem Saints?”-New Orleans Saints

“Districts is one of the largest cheer competitions in the Grossmont districts.”

Paw Prints March 20104 A&E

Due to the decreased amount of viewers in the past two seasons, ABC’s Ugly Betty has been can-celed, left to finish out its current season in 20 epi-sodes. Origi-nally, the s e a s o n had 22 episodes left, but now with less time to tie up the series, producers are racing to finalize four years worth of storyline for the few view-ers that are left. For the closing of the series, there are various issues on the table like, for instance, Betty’s teeth. Silvio Horta, the se-

ries creator, reveals, “The braces are coming off,” for the March episode. “There’s a big fantasy element to it. We’ll ask the ques-tion, ‘What if Betty had perfect teeth?’” Another change will be a new job opportunity for Betty. Horta comments, “We’re going to see how that impacts the people she works with as well as her fam-

ily.” Pertaining to Betty’s love-life, co-star Michael Urie, who plays

Courtney Geilenfeldt (‘11) is a junior here at West Hills with some serious talent. Although many people do not know about her extra-curricular activities, she is an extremely gifted artist. She has been playing the bass for six years and the gui-tar for two years. She has played in the youth group band at her church Fletcher Hills Presbyte-rian for one year. Next year she looks forward to leading the youth group as well as playing guitar and singing. One of her greatest goals in life is to reach people through the pow-er of inspirational music. Geilenfeldt is also in first year pho-tography class here at West Hills. She has been doing photography

Lately it seems more and more books are being made into mov-ies. So, the question is, which is better, the book or the movie? Should you read the book first, or should you watch the movie first? Can books be given all the credit they deserve by being made into movies? For the purposes of this article, let’s focus on one book-turned-movie: Dear John. Originally a book by Nicholas Sparks, it was made into a major motion picture that came out on February 5th. Personally, I liked the book and the movie. By seeing the movie before reading the book, I was unable to compare the movie to anything and, thus, thoroughly enjoyed it. Friends of mine who had read the book before seeing the movie were very disappoint-ed. After hearing them tell me the differences, I was a little disap-pointed myself; I’ve realized that although the movie had some

inconsistencies in comparison to the book, it was not a bad movie. The book was very good and so was the movie, although not as parallels of each other. From experience, I can tell you that if you don’t want to be disap-pointed by the movie n o t

liv-i n g u p t o your e x -p e c -t a tions, don’t read

the book first, then you won’t be look-ing for things that are differ-ent and instead will be able to

enjoy the m o v i e . If you would ra th-e r

k n o w the true version that the author wanted you to read

first, read the book. Ei-ther way, do not expect the movie to be exactly like the book. I think

that a book can definitely be given the amount of credit that it

deserves, even if it is made into a movie be-

c a u s e

i t had to have been good to have even been considered being made into a movie. Obviously, books will

always be better than their movie counterparts because there are just some things that cannot be put on the screen and can only be expressed in writing. If you have not read the book

Dear John by Nicholas Sparks, I urge

you to do so. If

you have not seen the movie

either, I rec-ommend it.

Other books by Nicholas

Sparks include The Notebook

starring Ryan Gosling, Tim Ivey, and Ra-

chel McAdams, which is already

a movie, and The Last Song starring

Miley Cyrus, Greg Kinnear, and Bobby

Coleman, which is coming soon to the-aters. I urge everyone

to experience the thrill and drama of his books

and movies. You will be touched by his words.

for a year now, but recently it has become more serious to her, with people asking her to do photo shoots for them. She is also going to be a pho-tographer at a wedding this com-ing May. A friend that was photo-graphed by Geilenfeldt expressed to me how much fun she had with the informal aura that Geilenfeldt brought to the shoot, and she was absolutely ecstatic with the

resulting pic-tures. To see the amazing photography for yourself, follow Geilen-feldt’s group on Facebook: CourtneyDar-lenePhotog-raphy. If that wasn’t enough, she also en-joys painting. Her painting is nothing se-rious, merely something she does to relax and have fun. Her love of all things “artsy” helps

her see the beauty in the world, and Geilenfeldt defi-nitely deserves to be this issue’s Artist of the Issue.

Dear John http://pds12.egloos.com/

Deat John http://images2.fanpop.com/

UGLY Courtesy of: http://www.impawards.com/

Mark St. James, offers, “I don’t think the right guy has come along for Betty.” Thinking of the fans, he adds, “Besides, I don’t think [fans] would be truly satisfied if she ended up with anybody.” A spoiler alert was released about the character Justin’s (Mark Indelicato) sexuality; it turns out that he is, in fact, gay. Also, Wilhelmina’s (Vanessa

Wi l l i ams ) first love will resur-face, and, as previously reported, a major char-acter will be getting mar-ried. Ugly Betty’s se-ries finale is scheduled for April. Horta and president of ABC Steve McPherson issued a statement: “We are an-n o u n c i n g now as we

want to allow the show ample time to write a satisfying conclusion.” The show is now on Friday nights at 10 PM.

Courtney Courtesy Of Melissa Reed

March 20105 A&E Paw Prints

The sixth and final season of ABC’s Lost had its two-hour pre-miere on February 2nd, as execu-tive producers Damon Lindelof and Carlton Cuse went into what they called, “ a n s w e r mode.” The in-tricate and c o n f u s -ing story line has left view-ers every-where with all kinds of ques-tions about the differ-ent char-acters and d i f f e r e n t r e a l i t i e s . Lindelof and Cuse used a “new narrative device” in the season premiere where they showed two

different time lines happening: one with all the characters who were on the Oceanic flight landing safely in L. A. Without so much as turbulence and the other with v a r i o u s characters still on the island, where Ja-

cob’s death had just occurred. In the Oce-anic flight time line, all those characters were going about what seemed to them as their everyday

lives. Jack (Matthew Fox) was taking his father’s body to L. A., Kate (Evangeline Lilly) was still

in hand-cuffs, Rose (L. Scott Caldwell) and Bernard (Sam Anderson) were in love, Charlie

(Dominic Monaghan) was on drugs, his sui-cide attempt foiled by Jack, and John Locke (Terry O’Quinn) was still paralyzed, hav-ing needed assistance when disembarking from the plane. The only peculiar occurrence was Desmond (Henry Ian Cusick): at one minute he was a passenger sitting next to Jack while the next

he’s gone. In the island timeline, it was revealed that John Locke, who was still in the newly discov-ered temple, is the Smoke Mon-ster that has made random appearances t h r o u g h o u t the past five seasons. Ben realizes that he had been manipulated by John Locke into killing Jacob. During the season five finale, Sayid (Naveen An-

d r e w s ) had been shot, and Ju-liet (Eliza-beth Mitch-ell) made the bomb go off that was sup-posed to send everyone back home. In the season six pre-miere, Jacob’s

(Mark Pellegrino) ghost tells Hur-ley (Jorge Garcia) to take Sayid to a temple, of which Jin knew the whereabouts, so that he can save

him. Hurley ends up convincing ev-eryone that if Jin takes them to the temple, he can save Sayid, who

wakes up right when the episode ends. Also, after the bomb went off, Juliet was buried underneath all the bits and pieces of the tower, and Sawyer (Josh Hol-

loway ), Jack, Kate, Miles, and Hurley all try to get her out. Sawyer, who is in love with Juliet, worked frantically to move things out of the way to get to her, and when he finally did, she said, “I have something very important to tell you.” And right before she tells him, she dies. Sawyer, who had told Kate that he would kill Jack if Juliet died, blames Jack for what happened to Juliet; thus, Sawyer’s hatred for Jack in-creased ever so much more. Tune in Tuesdays at 8/7 central to see what the rest of the season holds.

LOST Courtesy of: http://z.about.com

LOST Courtesy of: http://www.drafthouse.com/

LOST Courtesy of http://www.boston.com/

LOST http://www.yorkblog.com/faith/lost.jpg

Unless you have spent the past few years away in the Sierras with no technology or simply live un-der a rock that shades you from p o p culture, t h e n y o u h a v e h e a r d a b o u t A m e r -i c a ’ s l a t e s t “Super group” k n o w n as Isles & Gla-c i e r s . T h i s band is e s p e -c i a l l y w o n -d e r f u l because it fea-tures hometown musical genius-es like Jonny Craig of Emarosa, Vic and Mike Fuentes of Pierce

the Veil, and Nick Martin of Un-derminded. This band also fea-tures the talented Brian Southhall of Boys’ Night Out, and Craig Owens and Matt Goddard, both of Chiodos. Re-cently, as in March 9, 2010, their EP entitled The Hearts

of Lonely People was released to be sold exclusively through Hot Topic stores, iTunes, and online through MERCH-NOW. The CD con-sists of seven songs containing the beau-

tiful voices of Jonny Craig, Craig Owens, Vic Fuentes, and Nick Martin.

The EP is a very well-integrated sound of all seven member’s oth-er bands. Within each song you can hear influences from each member.

If you have yet to hear “The Hearts of the Lone-ly,” then you should look up Isles & Glaciers on iTunes, MySpace,Purevolume, or the mu-sic listening site of your choice. Currently, there is no post regarding tour dates, but I doubt that there

won’t be one. There is, however, one date in Austin, Texas, at Alternative P r e s s ’ s “ K i c k Up your S p u r s ”

event on March 21, 2010. If you can’t make it all the way there, you’ll just have to wait until they announce show dates. If you do get a chance to go, send pictures to Paw Prints’ Arts

and Entertainment section (aneha-ley@gmail.com) with the names of people in the pictures, and you

might be fea-t u r e d n e x t issue! P a w Prints’ A r t s a n d Enter-t a i n -m e n t s e c -t i o n

is very serious about helping highlight up and coming bands, featuring them in our issues and informing our student body of relevant music they should know about.

Haley NealA&E Editor

Pierce the Veil Courtesy of Haley Neal

Jonny Craig+Craig OwensCourtesy of ak.last.fm

Craig Owens Cortesy of Nataliabalccrska.com

March 2010 6 CenterspreadPaw Prints

Julie Hattaway is a senior this year and has a lot on her plate. Julie is the 2010 ASB president, varsity cheerleader, varsity track member, HOWL leader, member of Class of 2010, and spirited West Hills student. Ever since Ju-lie was in junior high, she had a love to keep herself busy. When she was a sophomore at WHHS, she entered her first year in ASB and fell in love. Since her sopho-more year, she has kept herself involved with ASB. By the time her senior year came about, she knew ASB president was the po-sition for her. As ASB president, Julie has led the way in completing welcome back week, homecoming, assem-blies, and so much more. Julie

(’10) says, “we have been work-ing hard to find ways to get more people involved and to do things that everyone can enjoy and will want to participate in.” Julie tries to do her best to set a good example all of the time because she knows her actions in and outside of school reflect on how people look at West Hills’ campus.

Outside of school, Julie loves to go to the des-ert. She also helps host desert races and other

events. She also enjoys attending Charger games and cooking. Julie (’10) says, “I have worked extremely hard to get to the place I am at, and, though there have been difficulties, I have learned that things will always work out.” Julie strongly believes in waking up with a smile on your face and forgiving and forgetting. Julie Hattaway is definitely a role model for everyone at West Hills High School. Her presence will be missed after graduation!

Student Stories:

“Julie tries her best to set a good example all of the time because she knows her actions in and

outside of school reflect on how people look at West Hills’ campus.”

Saint Patrick’s Day, although originating in Ireland, is celebrat-ed throughout the world. Because we as Americans are a part of the “melting pot” of the USA, many cultures are a part of daily lives, and the Irish culture is celebrated on Saint Patrick’s Day. I believe that the perfect way to celebrate this Saint Patrick’s

Day is by making typical Irish food. Three food products would include Irish Soda Bread, Beer-Baked Irish Beef, and, of course, Corn Beef and Cabbage. Irish Soda Bread: Ingredients * 4 cups all-purpose flour * 4 tablespoons white sugar * 1 teaspoon baking soda * 1 tablespoon baking powder * 1/2 teaspoon salt * 1/2 cup margarine, softened * 1 cup buttermilk * 1 egg * 1/4 cup butter, melted * 1/4 cup buttermilkDirections 1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees F (190 degrees C). Lightly grease a large baking sheet. 2. In a large bowl, mix together

flour, sugar, baking soda, baking powder, salt and margarine. Stir in 1 cup of but-termilk and egg. Turn dough out onto a lightly floured surface and knead slightly. Form dough into a round and place on prepared bak-ing sheet. In a small bowl, com-bine melted butter with 1/4 cup buttermilk; brush loaf with this mixture. Use a sharp knife to cut an ‘X’ into the top of the loaf. 3. Bake in preheated oven for 45 to 50 minutes, or until a tooth-pick inserted into the center of the loaf comes out clean, about 30 to 50 minutes. You may continue to brush the loaf with the butter mix-

ture while it bakes.Beer-Baked Irish Beef:Ingredients * 6 slices bacon, diced * 1/3 cup all-purpose flour * 1 teaspoon salt * 1/2 teaspoon ground black pepper * 1 teaspoon ground allspice * 2 1/2 pounds cubed beef

stew meat * 4 carrots, peeled and cut diagonally into 1-inch pieces * 4 large onions, cut into eighths * 2 cloves garlic, chopped * 1/4 cup minced fresh parsley * 1 teaspoon dried rosemary, crushed * 1 teaspoon dried marjoram * 1 bay leaf * 1 (12 fluid ounce) can or bottle Irish stout beerDirections 1. Place the bacon in a large non-stick skillet, and cook over me-dium heat until crisp and brown. Remove the bacon pieces and set aside, leaving the drippings in the skillet. 2. Place the flour, salt, black pep-per, and allspice in a large plastic zipper bag, and shake a few times

to combine. Place the beef stew meat into the bag, and shake to coat the meat with flour mixture. Place the meat pieces in the skil-let with the bacon drippings, and cook the meat until brown on all sides. 3. Remove the browned meat to a slow cooker, and add the car-rots, onions, garlic, parsley, rose-mary, marjoram, and bay leaf to the cooker. 4. Pour the beer into the skillet, and bring to a boil over medium-low heat, scraping all the browned bits of flavor from the bottom of the skillet. Pour the beer into the slow cooker, over the meat and vegetables. Cover, and cook on Medium setting until the meat is very tender, 4 to 5 hours. 5. Before serving, remove the bay leaf, and sprinkle the stew with the reserved bacon pieces.Corn Beef and Cabbage:Ingredients * 1 medium onion, cut into wedges * 4 medium potatoes, peeled and quartered * 1 pound baby carrots * 3 cups water * 3 garlic cloves, minced * 1 bay leaf * 2 tablespoons sugar * 2 tablespoons cider vinegar * 1/2 teaspoon pepper * 1 (3 pound) corned beef bris ket with spice packet, cut in half * 1 small head cabbage, cut into wedgesDirectionsPlace the onion, potatoes and carrots in a 5-qt. slow cooker. Combine water, garlic, bay leaf, sugar, vinegar, pepper and con-tents of spice packet; pour over vegetables. Top with brisket and cabbage. Cover and cook on low for 8-9 hours or until meat and vegetables are tender. Remove bay leaf before serving.Recipes courtesy of: http://allrec-ipes.com/Recipes/Holidays-and-Events/St-Patricks-Day/ViewAll.aspx

You may have seen this girl all over campus for the past four years, but you may not even know her name. She’s down on the football field for every home game, but people in the stands are more concerned with buying their nachos during halftime. Be-sides around campus, you may have seen her at Rio Seco School as your classmate (she attended this school since kindergarten) or even today when she picks up her

seven-year-old brother from his second grade class. Even outside Santee, she has worked at Sea World for the past two years. Her name is Rachel Hopwood (17), and she is all over San Di-ego county. Hopwood has lived in Santee her entire life. A few quick background notes is that her favorite color is hot pink, her favorite subject is history, and her favorite band is A Day To Reme-meber. Hopwood’s life is very busy. She spends the majority of her time performing for the West

Hills Color Guard. She has par-ticipated in guard since her fresh-men year and has made her way to lieutenant this year. In color guard, you can either throw a rifle or a saber, and she hates the rifle. In fact, she hates the rifle so much that she told Coach Barbie that she never wants to throw the rifle again. Hopwood’s absolute favorite thing about guard are the friendships that go along with it. As friends leave high school, she still keeps in touch and visits them and will do the same for the un-derclassmen on the team, includ-

ing her best friend Taylor Surdock (‘11). Other perks to color guard are the weekend competitions, including their most recent trip to Six Flags. You may have noticed that guard is always wearing shiny outfits down on the football field. When asked what her least fa-vorite outfit was, she quickly described the bright pink and yel-low (“pink lemonade”) costumes of her freshmen year. Also, Hopwood works at Sea World for their merchandise de-partment. However, that is not

what Hopwood wants to continue doing at the amusement park; she would also like to take pho-tographs of people and shows. Her favorite show at Sea World is the Sea Lion and Otter Show. She says she does have to wear a dorky outfit, but she doesn’t have to wear a hat until the holidays. The hat is, “a Santa hat with a white tail hanging out the back of it.” Hopwood hopes to be accepted to FIDM for college and have a career in fashion. There is a lot of potential for this young lady.

St. Patrick’s Day Recipes

Irish Soda Bread Courtsey of http://nancysrecipes.files.wordpress.com/2009/03/soda-bread-cut-added.jpg

7 Centerspread March 2010Paw Prints

St. Patrick’s Day is a traditional Irish religious holiday that is now celebrated widely in different na-tions around the globe. With all of the hype about wearing green, eating corned beef with cabbage, and chasing little leprechauns, I have to wonder how many of these festivi-ties actually originated in Ireland and were not just more American-made ideas to get people spending their money. There’s nothing wrong with having a good time and getting into the spirit of celebrating some-thing, but you might as well do it right. One of these St. Patty’s Day myths I investigated was what finding a shamrock, known in the States as the “four-leaf clo-ver,” actually means to Irish folk. Most Americans are confused in thinking the words shamrock and four-leaf clover are interchange-able. In actuality, there is a world

of difference. While it is true that finding a four-leaf clover is a symbol of good luck, it does not make it a shamrock. To the Irish, a shamrock is a three-leaf clover that represents the holy trinity. The other myth I checked out was the “traditional” Irish meal: corned beef and cabbage. It seems that just about every restaurant, come the beginning of March, starts serving corned beef and cabbage in order to get people in the St. Patty’s Day spirit. If you

are one of the people partaking in these feasts, you are cor-rect in be-lieving you are dining on a tradi-tional meal; h o w e v e r , its origin

is English. The Irish city Dublin is known for its corned beef and cabbage. You probably did not kow that Dublin was taken over by the English in the late 1600’s, around the same time that English citizens started corning their beef. Corned beef became popular after it was being imported in cans dur-ing the World Wars.

St. Patty’s Day

Myths

St. Patrick’s Day, also called St. Patty’s Day, is an annual feast day celebrated on behalf of Saint Patrick. Saint Patrick is known as the most commonly recog-nized patron saints of Ireland. St. Patrick’s Day is celebrated on March 17, St. Patrick’s religious feast day, and the anniversary of his death in the fifth century. Ireland has referred to this day as a very religious day for more than a thousand years. In Ireland on St. Patty’s Day, Irish families will traditionally attend church in

the morning and celebrate in the afternoon. Their celebrations usu-ally include dancing, drinking, and an enormous feast on the traditional meal of Irish bacon and cabbage. Today, St. Patrick’s Day is celebrated by people of ev-ery background in the United States, Canada, and Australia. St. Patrick’s Day has also been celebrated in other locations far from Ireland, including Japan, Singapore, and Russia. Although St. Patrick’s Day has traditionally been an authentic religious affair, Irish law has authorized that all pubs were to be closed on March 17. How-ever, beginning in 1995, the Irish government started a national campaign to use St. Patrick’s Day

as a chance to surge tourism and showcase Ireland to the rest of the

world. Ireland’s St. Patrick’s Fes-tival in Dublin is a famous cel-

ebration, including huge parades, many concerts, a fireworks show,

a n d o u t -d o o r theater p r o -d u c -tions. Peo-p l e w e a r g r e e n i n m e m -ory of I r e -l a n d , t h e E m -

erald Isle, and wear shamrocks, more commonly known in the US

as the three-leaf clover. Tradition holds that on St. Patrick’s day, people who do not wear green are pinched as a reminder to wear green to honor the Emerald Isle. Every year in honor of St. Pat-rick’s Day, the Chicago River is dyed green. This tradition started in 1962, when the city pollution-control workers used dyes to trace illegal sewage discharges, then realized that the green dye might provide a unique way to celebrate this holiday. That year, workers released one hundred pounds of green vegetable dye into the river, which was enough dye to keep the river green for a week. In order to minimize environmental damage, today only forty pounds of dye are used, which turns the river green for only several hours.

St. Patrick’s Day http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/breaking/images/2009/0317/226421_1.jpg

Many students were affected emotionally by the “Every 15 Minutes” program that we participated in at West Hills High School last year. But drinking and driving, although a complete-ly avoidable epidemic that must be stopped, is not the main cause for teen-related au-tomobile deaths. In fact, while more than 40% of teens believe that alcohol is the reason for most crashes, the reali-ty is that only 25% of deadly teen crashes actually involve alcohol; distracted driving is a much more frequent problem. Distractions include, but are not limited to, these behaviors we all do: Play-ing with one’s iPod, changing the radio station, talking on the phone, talking to passengers, put-ting on makeup, and eating. But the biggest distraction for our generation is texting. Texting has taken the world by storm. It is a rare thing to see teenagers with-out a cell phone in front of their faces, frantically twittling their thumbs away to send messages to their friends. This is the largest problem. It seems as though teens can not wait until they are safely parked to send those few phrases to the person at the other end of line; however, your friend will understand if you wait until you get home safely to hit that ever so

distracting “Reply” button. Here are the facts: 82% of teens admit to using cell phones while driving, but only 41% actually believe that texting while driv-ing is extremely dangerous. It is time for a wake up call! No mat-ter how “good of a driver” you

think you are, being distracted while driving is deadly. An av-erage of 11 teen deaths occur on the road EVERY day. It is time to change that statistic. I know that our judgment as teenagers isn’t always the greatest, but when we get behind the wheel, we have an obligation to our community to drive defensively. Do not let yourself get distracted when you get into your car because you don’t want to be another statistic. For more information on the dan-gers of distracted driving, please visit www.KeeptheDrive.com This point was illustrated dra-matically for me when driving home from practice on Thursday, February 25, 2010: I saw an im-age that was very disturbing. When nearing my home, I saw red and blue flashing lights, and I knew something was wrong. As I turned the corner onto my street,

I saw that a car had gone through a block wall and was only a few yards from going right into my neighbor’s house. Several cinder blocks were, in fact, propelled by the force of the impact through the exterior wall and window of their house. Fortunately, no one was in

that room at the moment of the crash. All my neighbors were surrounding the am-bulance and police cars. Frantic looks were upon all of their faces. According to my neighbors Carlos and Carla Navarette, a 19-year- old girl was driving about 50 miles per hour in a 35 mile per hour zone. The driver was smoking (an-other common distraction) and had dropped her ciga-rette. Not slowing down,

she leaned over to grab it and took her eyes off the road. A few seconds later, without ever hit-ting her brakes, her car barreled into and through their block wall. The driver and her passenger, also 19-years-old, were lucky. They walked away from this accident with only minor injuries, but it could have turned out so much worse. So, let’s make a commitment to each other. When we get into our cars, we’ll keep our eyes on the road and our phones in back-packs. I think that if we are com-mitted to this, ten years down the road we will meet up again and won’t have to talk about how so-and-so died on the road one day because they were distracted by something. Remember that even when you are in your own car, the choices that you can impact the rest of your life.

8 Opinion March 2010Paw Prints

In case you haven't noticed, we are in the second semester of the 2010 school year; congratula-tions for making it this far. But have you noticed that we are in March telling you this? Doesn't that seem to be a little late? Well, that's because it is. This year's schedule is a difficult one to love. Let me rephrase that: No one on campus likes it. I have to admit that the week-long vaca-tion at Thanksgiving was a nice break, but was it worth butcher-ing the spring semester's break? This year, we have one week for Spring Break. I don't have a clue why this decision was made in the district, but it was not a very bright one. Similar to the fact that finals were after Winter Break (what a disas-ter), this plan was not thought out much. Now, don't get me wrong, one week is better than nothing, but why not two? I think I can speak for most people at West Hills and in the Grossmont Union

High School District (GUHSD) that the schedule we have had since Kindergarten needs to be enforced on next year's school calendar. It is difficult to comprehend this sad fact of a smaller break, but it’s something that the student body must deal with. However, it is not just the student body that has to deal with the shorter break: so do the teachers. It's hard to believe that teachers have lives outside of the glamor of the white walls we are forced into for six hours a day, but they do. In all honesty, I believe our teachers and staff feel the same way some-times. The problem of teachers being unhappy is that the class-room environment is poisoned, and, therefore, students wish to be outside of school even more. In all honesty, during the sec-ond semester, school does not have as many holidays, and we need to be able to have more days off in order to keep the student body sane. To whom it may con-cern: GUHSD must have a two week break in the Spring in order to keep sanity within the school system. We'll take the two days off during Thanksgiving if you give us our break back.

Putting a band together may seem like an easy task, but it sure isn’t. Breaking the Aura, a band formed by teens at West Hills, sure does seem like they have got-ten their stuff together very quickly, for a band that just started off in the beginning of summer. Their mixture of hard core music with the addition of a keyboard and synth re-ally show the unique style and talent of this trancecore band. The band is made up of Nick Schultz (‘11) doing vocals, Kyle Housley (’10) and Stuart Pollman (’11) playing guitar, Gabe Kasrawi (’10) playing keys/synth, Josh L’Heruex (’11) play-ing bass, and lastly David Ojeda (’11) playing drums. Breaking the Aura just recently played a show at Soma San Diego on January 2nd to ring in the New Year. They played with some of the best bands in the scene in my opinion; they opened up for Fear

is My Fate, another band that prospered out of West Hills stu-dents. As the band got ready to go on stage in front of nearly 400 people, you could tell their nerves were getting the best of them. As they walked on stage you could see they left their worries back stage. They started the New Year just right for their friends and family. Their set time was 25

minutes, but it seemed to fly by. The crowd seemed to enjoy their music; I know I did. When asked what is your fa-vorite part about being a band, Kyle Houlsey explained, “We don’t do it for the fame, we it do it for the love of the music. It’s just something about playing an instrument-- it gets my anger out;

it helps me say things words can’t say.” When asked what sets his band apart from others, he states, “I have been around this scene for a long time, and I have seen bands come and go. They break apart because of stupid arguments. We are not like that at all. Over the last few months we have created a brotherhood that can’t be broken. When we play, it all just comes

together.” Keep a look out for Breaking the Aura in the future. Mark my words, if they keep on the pace they’re going, it won’t take long for them to be big. For now, show your fellow classmates some love and drop by their mysapce www.myspace.com/untilblood isdrawn.

Breaking the Aura Courtesy of Steven Pollman

So the new Apple product has come out. It's called the iPad and is basically a gi-ant iPod Touch/iPhone. There have been many nega-tive reviews of the iPad. Many people have been saying that the name of the new Apple product reminds them of "girly products"; you get it, unless you're 12, which you're not. The lack of multi-tasking on the iPad has been cited as its biggestflaw. Just like the iPod touch or the iPhone, it is pretty muchimpossible to do more than two things at once. And this has been bugging people a lot. One can just buy a laptop for

the same price as an iPad and do all the multitasking they please. Another negative claim is that the iPad doesn't have a camera. But why would you want to try to take a picture with that giant hunk of whatever? The iPad also lacks a USB port. This makes it pretty difficult

totransfer your files. The iPad can run on either a wifi connection

or a plan from AT&T. The AT&T plan has people crying all over the place for their lack of service pretty much everywhere. Just like the iTouch and the iPhone, the iPad doesn't support Flash files. This means you can't stream videos from almost every website unless there is a mobile

version of the website. The iPad has been said to have a very short bat-tery life, and it’s gigantor. The price also has people with mixed feel-ings. "We want to put this in the hands of lots of people," said Steve Jobs of the iPad's price. Then why make it $500, Steve? So basically, if you're rich like Kyle Tonkyro ,go ahead and buy one of these

since $500 is probably nothing to you. Other than that, just buya laptop.

The iPad courtesy of google.com

9 Opinion Paw Prints March 2010

The government tries to make the legal system as fair as it can be-- or so it seems. Child Protec-tive Services is one of the widest known services acknowledged statewide. This service removes children from unsafe situations and helps to rebuild their fam-ily for reunification. This sounds picture-perfect, right? Well, that is what I thought as well, until I personally learned the truth. I was recently blessed to have had the opportunity to foster my cousin. She was forcibly re-moved from her family in March of 2009; she was only a month-and-a-half old. Her parents were addicted to crystal meth and liv-ing in a filthy house. Through the past year, I have learned that the system allows the parents to do the bare mini-mum requirements and still have their baby returned to live up to barely the minimum standards of the law. The court focuses on both parents at the same time when a baby is removed. However, they

both must succeed if they want to reunify as together as a family; otherwise, they need to succeed separately. During this period, the child is placed into foster care. The court initially says after that six-month period, that if there is no sign of improvement, the parents’

rights are terminated; if there is a little improvement, then the program is extended another six months; or finally, if there is 100% improvement, the parent re-

ceives custody of the baby back. But how do you determine the amount of improvement? Most often than not, the court grants an extension; this is where the par-ent receives another six months of services to get his or her act together. However, occasionally

the system chooses to return the baby after six months, even if a 100% recovery is not shown. The process is simple. The parent goes to rehab, gradu-ates, takes required classes, has supervised visits with the child, then unsupervised vis-its with the child, and takes random periodic drug tests. Once the parent completes all these steps to the bare minimum, they receive the baby back into their custody for a 60-day placement. Dur-ing this 60-day placement, Social Services are only le-gally allowed to drug test the parents one time a month. I find it funny that the parents are tested often while they are in a drug program, but once they are out they are given more trust. It is com-monly evidenced and every-

one knows people manipulate the drug-testing system so they do not get caught with illegal substances. Since meth only stays in the body for three days, a parent can work

The bulk of bullying is thought to be with boys, but girls are just as crazy. Being happy at school usually means learning the rules. I’m not talking about the school rules, which are the least of most students’ worries; I’m talking about the students’ rules of ac-ceptance. Acceptance can be one the most important assets in a student’s life. Kids want the se-curity and safety of others. The thought of facing life alone is absolutely terrifying. Starting on the first day of kindergarten, kids look for a circle of friends whom they feel safe around. That circle of safety is not al-ways safe, especially if you are a girl. Girls can be psychologically abusive and very impacting. Many girls set boundaries be-tween themselves and other girls in class or classes, a boundary that is not one to be crossed. It is set with mental “booby traps.” The foundation usually starts out nice and sweet. They will get along just fine on a minimal social ba-sis; however, judgment corrodes this bond, building blocks of loathing. A girl will identify each and every flaw, though many of them possess the same character-istics. That is the same basis of most relationships between girls, whether they are best friends or worst enemies. Once the corre-sponding girl makes a mistake,

anywhere from saying the wrong thing or liking the wrong boy, the bully will proceed to use each of those built up flaws to hurt the other and attempt to drive them to “surrender” and admit defeat. At this point, the girl is subjected to humiliation and belittles her-self, producing a low self-esteem that can last a life-time. Many

of these emotional scars last for years, causing a sense of self-ap-prehension and second-guessing. It doesn’t end there either. “Smart remarks” continue to humiliate the victim. Not even sufficient self-defense solves the problem; it makes it worse. The label stays for a very long time, and some girls

consider taking their lives or run-ning away. Much of this bullying begins when girls begin to change and act differently, when boys stop being icky-- not yet cute, but not icky. Of course, not everyone changes at the same time, and once a girl singles out a person with a differ-ent way of doing things or a dif-

ferent lifestyle, she is subject to horri-ble mental humili-ation. Victims be-gin to believe that whatever changes they experience are wrong. It is worse in small schools because you know everything about each other-- where you used to live, who your friends were, what your parents were like-- everything is known to ev-eryone at anytime, and gossip is the fuel. We are taught that is wrong to gossip, and we tell ourselves that we don’t do it because we are merely stat-ing facts; but, it’s

not whether they are truths or lies it’s the way it is said, with either admiration or scorn. Usually, pure fear or a sure self-assurance fuels bullying. A student is either afraid that anoth-er, different student will ruin her world where she has put so much work, or she feels superior and

entitled to control the feelings of another. The rules to avoid being bullied are simple: voice prejudices and simple clichés and avoid thinking one’s own thoughts. But individual thoughts are what make life so exciting and new. We are all so different in so many different ways and that’s the way it was intended; otherwise, we wouldn’t be here, would we? It’s hard to be bullied. It’s hard to hang on and tell some-one because the victim starts second-guessing that maybe she is wrong, maybe she is the prob-lem, but that’s the secret to bul-lying: make oneself uncatchable. This is especially easy since the scars are not often seen but felt. Being heard is essential in end-ing the bullies’ reign. If telling one’s parents doesn’t make a difference, tell teachers, tell the principal, tell counselors, tell the police if you must; it is all very, very frightening, but it is a staple to happiness. One must under-stand that there is more strength in telling the truth than covering it. It may seem like suicide will solve the problem, but it does more damage than good; suicide is one more person giving what seems to be the easy answer, not to mention the void they leave in other people’s lives. No matter the feelings of being useless, it is important to realize that there is always someone that cares no matter where they are-- some-one cares. School only lasts a few years; life is very long, and there is a place in life where ev-ery person shines; ending it all so

soon deprives one of that unalien-able right we state so clearly in our own country to “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness” (U.S. Constitution). Bullying doesn’t get a person anywhere in the long run. It only hurts; bullying is a powerful drug that eats away at all bullies’ “turf.” Bullying is a false empire, mostly built on lies and cheats. It is hard to think that another person could be on the verge of taking her own life, but that’s what bullying does: It hurts everyone. It takes the joy out of life. For those being bullied, speaking out against bullies isn’t easy in the least, but they must find a way to communicate and must find the strength in themselves. It is not the victims that have the problem: It is the bullies. And to those watching bullies do their dark work, they are almost just as bad; fear is a dangerous thing and can keep many from doing the things in life they were meant to do. Instead of joining in the ha-rassment, one must find the leader in oneself and stand up for those who can not stand for themselves. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was one of the most brilliant men to live. He once said “We have inher-ited a large house, a great ‘world house’ in which we have to live together,” that “All inhabitants of the globe are now neighbors.” (Dr. Martin Luther King’s “The World House” Speech). That’s just it: We are neighbors, and we need to care for each other as neighbors should, with respect and care, con-veying the “truths we hold to be self-evident” (U.S. Constitution). We can’t allow bullies to rule.

Mean Girls Poster courtesy of google.com

it out to use on Wednes-day and know they will not be tested until Tuesday of the follow-ing week. If the parents know what days and times they are to be tested, how can it be ran-dom? One of every three people that is tested for drugs say that they have or on o c c a s i o n used drug kits to clean out their sys-tem before a test. This only elabo-rates on the fact that the parents do it, too. Howev-er, the court still finds a way to give the baby back to the parents, whether or not they are clean. Is this really what is right

for the baby? Is this pro-tecting the in-nocent baby? Too many children are given back to drug-addict-ed parents every day by the California legal system. They might as well not even take the child away if they are not going to fol-low through and protect the baby. The court says it is all about the baby, but why do they only focus on the well-being of the parents? A baby is born with a vast amount of opportunity; h o w e v e r , when they

are taken home by their parent, that is where their true opportunity begins. Parents have a lot of influ-ence on the potential of the child.

The Judicial System courtesy of google.com

California Department of Social Services

11 Features Paw Prints March 2010

There are a lot of students at West Hills who need peer media-tion but do not know how to do it or where to go. A new club on campus known as Pack Leaders has assembled to alleviate this problem. Pack Leaders meets with stu-dents who are having problems. The leaders of this club help the students through these issues by talking and mentoring, and mediates conflicts between two-three people. Pack Leaders also provides a program known as Insight, which gives students the opportunity to be apart of group environments. Pack Leaders plan to continue to help students through their is-sues and provide Insight. Jamie Dietrich (’10), president says, “We would hope to have more people step out of their comfort zone and choose to take advan-tage of the Pack Leaders.”

Pack Leaders have already had Insight sessions and have mediat-ed several students. Even though this is the first year Pack Leaders has been offered at West Hills, it is not too late to take advantage of it and use their resources. In order to consult with a Pack Leader, you must talk to your counselor and fill out a form that you can find in the counseling of-fice. If you would like to become a Pack Leader, you have to go through Insight training and test-ing prior to meeting with students. Pack Leaders attend a camp and work closely with Friday Night Live and Camp Lead. Pack Leaders give students the opportunity to work out issues and join in with group environ-ments. If you are interested in this outstanding club, you can contact Jamie Dietrich.

The Advanced Placement pro-gram offers high school students across the United States and Cana-da the opportunity to take college-level courses. In 2008, the most-taken AP exam was AP United States History, with 346,641 stu-dents, while the least taken was AP Italian Language and Culture with 1,930 students. AP tests are scored on a 5-4-3-2-1 numeric scale, 5 being the best and 1 being the worst. Grading the AP tests are a long, strenuous, and complicated process. Although the multiple-choice part of the exam is scored by a computer, the free response and essay portions are scored by talented, trained readers at the AP gathering each June. The scores of the different categories are weighted and com-bined into one composite score. The Chief Reader for each exam then decides what the grade cut-

offs for that specific year's exam will be. During the process, a number of reviews and statistical analyses are performed to ensure that the grading is reliable and fair for everyone. All of the AP exams are grad-ed each summer at a week-long "grading camp," where both high school AP teachers and uni-versity professors are invited to grade the exams, and these grad-ers are given about $1,500, free travel, and free room and board to spend seven long hours a day for six days in small groups of 6-10 readers who grade students' exams. Each table is headed by a more experienced grader, who periodically re-reads some ex-ams for quality control, so not one student is graded harder or easier than the last. Many colleges and universi-ties in the US grant credits or ad-vanced placement based on AP grades. Policies vary by institu-tion, but most schools require a score of 3 or higher on any given exam in order to be awarded col-lege credit for that class. Col-leges sometimes take AP grades into account when deciding which students to accept, though

this is not part of the official AP program. The 2010 AP Exams will be administered over two weeks in May: May 3 through 7 and May 10 through 14. The first week's tests include the following: Mon-day, May 3: United States Gov-ernment, Politics, Comparative Government and French Lan-guage. Tuesday, May 4: Comput-er Science A, Spanish Language and Statistics. Wednesday, May 5: Calculus AB, Calculus BC, and Chinese Language and Cul-ture. Thursday, May 6: English Literature, Composition German Language and Japanese Lan-guage and Culture. Friday, May 7: United States History and Eu-ropean History. The second week's tests are as follows: Monday, May 10: Biol-ogy, Music Theory Physics B, and Physics C: Mechanics. Tues-day, May 11: Chemistry, Envi-ronmental Science and Psychol-ogy. Wednesday, May 12: English Language and Composition, and Art History. Thursday, May 13: Macroeconomics and World His-tory. Friday, May 14: Human Ge-ography, Spanish Literature and Latin: Vergil

Many of you have seen knot bracelets around people’s wrists. Rachel’s Friends club is making these bracelets and selling them for $2 each. The money that is gained from this fundraiser is going to a ten-month-old baby who lives in Santee who was recently diagnosed with a rare form of liver cancer. This young boy’s family has a minimal amount of medical insurance, and their pocketbook will be tight. The money will go to pay for diapers, formula, clothes, toys, and other baby essentials. By providing the

family with these necessities, the family can focus on their ever-growing bills. There are all different colors available for the bracelets, as well as different patterns. The bracelets will be sold in the black circle April 19 through April 23. Come to the black circle during these dates, and support the young baby. Lexie Facto (’11), a member of Rachel’s Friends says,

“It is really re-warding know-ing you are do-ing something to benefit someone else.” This is one of many different community ser-vice events that Rachel’s Friends partakes in. Ra-chel’s Friends is in memory of Rachel Joy Scott, a victim in the Columbine

shooting on April 20, 1999. Their mission is to show simple acts of kindness to start a chain reaction. By purchasing a bracelet, you are just another link in the chain.

Mr. Todd Peterson of West Hills High School has won the 2010 Golden Apple award. The Golden Apple Award is an award given out every year to one West Hills teacher, and the winner is always selected by the students. This is the first time in Mr. Peter-son’s long career that he has won the award. When asked of his feelings after winning the award, Mr. Pe-terson replied, “Excited, honored, and humbled.” This year is Mr. Peterson’s 15th year of teaching and his 13th at West Hills High School. Before Mr. Peterson was a teacher, he was a volleyball coach, and he worked as a defense contractor while in college. Mr. Peterson is well-known around West Hills, not only as an English teacher but as a bright, enthusiastic, and funny teacher that inspires his students to strive

to learn. Mr. Peterson’s favorite thing about being a teacher is “Being a positive influence on the young people at West Hills High School and encouraging them to work hard and be enthu-siastic about their learning”. Mr. Peterson is one of many teachers at West Hills that have that same goal: to inspire students to want to learn. Although Mr. Pe-terson can be the only winner of t h e

Golden Apple Award this year, he is positive that his fellow col-leagues will strive to win the award next year, as there are many hard-working teachers at West Hills that also make it their goal to help the students here at West Hills fully understand what they are supposed to be learning. So the teachers will just have to wait until next year to pursue the award that Mr. Peterson has undoubtedly

earned.

10-month old baby who has a rare liver

cancer

Mr. Peterson Courtesy of Melissa Reed

Jamie Dietrich Courtesy of Melissa Reed

11 FeaturesMarch 2010 Paw Prints

Hey West Hills-- ever wonder who the people on campus with the walkie-talk-ies are? They are the West Hills campus supervisors, and they are often considered the security guards or “watchmen” of our campus. We have many of these campus supervisors working on our cam-pus, and they all have the same goal: to protect and serve the students here at West Hills High School. Sometimes people get the wrong percep-tion about the campus supervisors here at West Hills; people can get the idea that the

campus supervisors are just like babysitters when you are out of class. But the students need to realize that at West Hills we all strive to be the very best students, and the campus supervisors help everyone with that. The campus supervisors are not attempting to be jerks when they dress code you or give you a referral, they

are only trying to help you real-ize that those kind of things are

not acceptable here at West Hills High School. The campus supervisors also do a good job of protecting our fellow Wolf-pack members whenever a fight breaks out or a lockdown is in place; they are right on the job, always trying their best to en-sure the safety of the West Hills High School students.

So, the next time you get up-set at one of our campus supervi-sors, think about how they are only trying to do their job the very best that they can. Try to understand that even though they may come out sounding angry and pissed off, that they only want to succeed during your time at West Hills. Thank you, West Hills campus supervisors, for the job that you

do to try to make our campus have a safe atmosphere.

It’s spring break season and everyone is getting excited for their upcoming week of freedom! No matter if you’re young or old, there is something fun to do this break. If you have a passport, Cancun and Jamaica are explod-ing with Spring Break excite-ment. There is an online match-up program for people who are running low on cash and want a cheap alternative to pricey hotels; it’s called www.couchsurf-ing.com. You can look at

peo-ple in o ther c o u n -t r i e s ’ profiles, call and chat, and look at background checks to see if they are safe enough to crash on their couch

for a night or two. It’s a cool op-portunity to make new friends in other places and see the local sites from a real in-sider. If you w a n t to do s o m e -t h i n g m o r e than just tan and surf this year, try U n i t e d W a y S t o r m

Corps. You and a group of other high school students can go to places that have been hurt by hurricanes and flooding help with rebuild-ing and clean-ing. Making a difference in your country can help you

unde r s t and what giving a little of

your time can mean to people in need. How about the ever-popular road trip? Beaches in South Pa-

dre Island, Texas, are a popular spring break destination that is only a short road trip away. To

save money on road snacks, try buying a cooler from a Wal-Mart or Target and filling it with family-sized snacks to avoid e x p e n s i v e convenience stores. To save money on gas, try mapping out all the lo-cations you will need to get

gas ahead of time and find the cheapest stations in that area. Try making some mixed CD’s for the ride! This time is for hanging out with friends and having a good time, so make everything worth it. It is important to stay safe and not indulge in hard-core partying, drugs, or alcohol. Having fun without harmful substances relieves any worries that could ruin a great spring break experience. Make the most of it-- don’t ruin it with any bad decisions! Whatever you decide to do, share the time with family and friends to make the most of your time off!

Courtesy of http://farm1.static.flickr.com

Road Trip

Courtesy of http://tilt.colostate.edu/sl/students/civil_rights_

Rihanna and Chris Brown

Rihanna and Chris Brown

Courtesy of www.thewb.com

The controver-sy between C h r i s Brown and R i h a n n a has been in news-s t a n d s s i n c e J a n u a r y of 2009. Now after a nine-m o n t h h i a t u s , Rihanna and Chris Brown are beginning to make their comeback in the music world. Rihanna was the first to re-enter the Hol-lywood s c e n e a n d had no trouble getting to num-ber one w i t h her new s o n g , “ R u n t h i s Town.”S h e t o o k h o m e t w o G r a m -mies this past month and has a new album called Rated R.

Rihanna and Chris Brown Courtesy of nteract.stltoday.com

Rihanna and her new boyfriend L.A. Dodger Matt Kemp are mak-ing headlines as the cutest Holly-wood couple. Chris Brown on the other hand, is still single but try-ing to make a comeback with his new single, “I Love You” featur-ing Ester Dean. Insiders from Today Magazine say he is finally getting his career

on track af-ter multi-ple public a p o l o -gies and loss of endorse-m e n t s . C h r i s lost a lot of fans due to his a b u s i v e ways, but in their industry,

time is the healer of all scandals. All

endorsements and award shows are bringing Chris back and think

he has learned f r o m his mis-t a k e s . B o t h C h r i s a n d Rihan-na say t h e y w i s h the best for each o t h e r a n d h o p e t h e y have a w o n -d e r f u l ca ree r. So, after a long

year of chaos and turmoil, both parties are on speaking terms.

Chris and Rihanna Courtesty of www.etonline.com

Campus Supervisors Courtesy of Melissa Reed

12 Backpage March 2010Paw Prints

Paw Prints 2009-2010

Editorial Staff

Editor-In-ChiefAubrey Walford

Assistant Editor-In-Chief

Mallory Stratton

FeaturesApril Ball

OpinionBecky Hoffman

A&EHaley Neal

NewsLea Morgan

SportsKyle Tonkyro

PhotoMelissa Reed

Staff Writers:Camille Vernon

Chanel Yust Lauren Brown

Nick LaneRachel CairdRobby Hiatt

Wes FinnestadLindsey Baty

Roger DemshokAngelica Faulstich

AdvisorMr. Tedd Brent

Telephone:(619) 596-0514 Address: 8756 Mast Blvd.

Santee, CA 92071 Copyright 2007 All Rights Reserved

PAWPRINTS is published by the Journalism class at West Hills High

School. Views expressed in editorials and advertis-ing solicited in PawPrints are not in any way a

reflection of the opinions of either West Hills High School Administration or the Grossmont Union High School District. Unsigned editorials on the

Opinion pages are the expressed views of the edito-rial board of PawPrints.

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