November 26, 2014

The SIS Herald Free for all Geckoes!!

Issue 3, volume 1

SIS International Feast

The SIS Thanksgiving Feast

is coming up on the 26th of Novem-

ber and many people of the SIS com-

munity are trying to find out what to

make for the feast. SIS plans to have many kiosks set up sepa-

rately by nationality, and expects most of the food to be from

Asian cultures. This Thanksgiving, just like any Thanksgiving,

it's important to know what you're thankful for. This is exactly

what I asked our headmaster Mr. Bray. He responded as fast as

I finished the question answering, “I'm thankful for the parents’

support we have here at SIS because without them, we’d have a

very hard time getting by.” When questioned about the reason-

ing behind having this SIS feast, Mr. Bray responded,

“Everyone will celebrate their different ethnicities that make up

SIS. We plan to have many ethnic groups present from different

nationalities, and maybe some costumes.” The purpose of the

SIS Thanksgiving festival is to celebrate the different ethnicities

that make up the SIS community and to give thanks to anything

you have in life, such as family and friends. Although Thanks-

giving may not be a holiday in most countries outside the US,

SIS connects its students to this important holiday. No matter

what country you're from, you should always be thankful for

what you have in your life. -By John Stewart

Turkey Raffle!

If fruit comes from a fruit tree, where does a turkey

come from? A poul-tree. In the SIS annual turkey raffle, you

could win a turkey. Every year SIS holds a raffle, giving each

student coupons for them to sell for one dollar. The winner of

the raffle is almost never the person who sells the most. I re-

member a student selling about 120 dollars worth of coupons

and we all anticipated a victory for him. The number drawn was

nowhere near his coupon number. The person who ended win-

ning that raffle only sold 1 coupon. That day we all knew that

this was our favorite raffle of the year.

Just, don't let that stop you from selling

coupons! I advise you to sell as many

as you can, not for the sake of winning

the turkey, but to help raise money for

future events. The turkey is just a bonus

if you win! I mean, who doesn’t want a

delicious turkey? You know what they

say; turkeys are musical and the most

musical part of them? The drumstick.

-By Allen Cepeda

Fall Bash

The SIS high school student council hosted

an event called the “fall bash” on Friday, No-

vember 14. The fall bash is a dance designed to

let high school students interact and let go of

their stress for the night. The bash was origi-

nally scheduled for November 7, but got can-

celled due to the SAT

preparations. The ticket

was 5 dollars each and a

5 dollar late fee was

charged if the student

didn’t get picked up on

time. The bash included

finger food like lumpia, barbeque sticks, and

cookies. It also included a movie and a dance

floor. The movie, About Time, played in Ms.

Hampel’s room while the dance floor was in the

library. There were also three supervisors: Ms.

Andrews, Ms. Peterson, and Ms. Hampel.

The student council hoped to see at least 30

students at the bash and hoped to raise $200. In

fact, 45

students

went to the

bash and

$280 were

raised.

This fund-

raiser also

helped

stucco raise enough money for big future events

like the annual prance (prom-dance). The high

school student council advisor, Mrs. Bray, is

very proud of the outcome of the bash. The stu-

dent council

worked very hard

and got every-

thing completed

on time. The bash

turned out to be a

great success.

-By Jennifer Tan

2

The SIS Herald

Knights overcome

Geckos Last Friday, our SIS jun-

ior varsity volleyball team was

in the finals against MCS and it

was a very close game. The first

set started off slow, but when AJ

Hudkins got his power serves in

while MCS had game point (24),

they finally caught up to them.

However, SIS ended up losing

the first set 24-26. They would

also go on to lose the second set

14-25. Captain AJ says, "It was a real good experi-

ence to play with this amazing group. My favorite

part of being on the team is having all the good

laughs we had, and everything that we accom-

plished together. We did well and second place is

actually pretty good." AJ Hudkins and Grace Choi

received an all star award for the SIS White team.

On SIS Blue, Jun Bum Huh and Cindy received the

same. Both teams have improved since the begin-

ning of the season and both have learned a lot.

Coach Mili says, "I hope the players that played this

year will return next season and I hope the eighth

graders play on the MISO teams in High School.

I'm very glad to say that I loved watching them im-

prove since the beginning of the season and will like

to see them play outside of school for the love of

volleyball! Till' next season!"

-By Adele Hudkins

Boy’s Varsity Volleyball

They say winning comes from hard work

and dedication.

To put forth

blood, sweat, and

tears into every

action on and off

the court deter-

mines a team's

success. Famous

athletes could go

on about work ethic and other trivial things, but

what they always forget is team chemistry.

Tommy Choi, a hitter for the undefeated MISO

boys varsity team here at Saipan International

School said, “Team chemistry is what brings us

together and is how we pull off tough wins. We

are critiqued by each other in a way that helps us

do better, rather than bringing the team down.”

Choi’s opinion definitely is true. With a 14-0 re-

cord, advice from this guy is effective and

backed by the raw data. I also know this is true

because I am on the team as well and I’ve known

Tommy for years. As I was wrapping things up

with Tommy, I asked him one last question.

“What is volleyball to you?” He said,

“Volleyball to me is a team sport which requires

each individual player’s effort to strive. This is a

game that brings players together and builds

stronger bonds within not only the team, but the

family."

-By Allen Cepeda

The SIS Herald

Swimming Competition in Qatar Two Swimmers, Takumi and Victoria, from SIS will go to

Qatar for a swimming competition. The competition begins on De-

cember 3, 2014. It will last for 5 days. “My personal best is what I’m

going for and I will try to leave a score that will stay in my record”

said Takumi about his expectations of the competition. This competi-

tion is open to the top swimmers from around the world. They devote

their whole lives to the sport. It’s an opportunity to these two swim-

mers, Takumi and Victoria, into a worldwide competition. Victoria

said, “I feel nervous competing with top swimmers, but I’m so proud

that I can represent myself and my islands in big competitions. I also

hope to make CNMI proud and bring back new techniques that I learn

from the big competitions.” These two

swimmers will represent the CNMI in

the competition. We wish them good

luck and hope they bring back some

good news from the competition.

-By Lu Song

3

MISO Girls Volleyball is Underway!

High school volleyball season will be starting up in

January and practices will begin on the 24th. Non-mandatory

practices are 3 times a week: Monday, Tuesday, and Thurs-

day. 36 girls are trying out for the teams. There will also be

some practices during Christmas Break to help the players

get back into shape. Ms. Athena Andrews will be our head

volleyball coach this season. She, along with coach John, will

run the practices and Mrs. Mili will also help coach during

games if she is needed. Once January comes along, there will

be 2 practices on Monday and

Wednesday and games will be on Tuesday and Thursday.

There will be 2 teams: varsity, which is more focused on the experi-

enced players and improving their skills for competitive playing, and junior

varsity, focused more on getting newer players more play time while teach-

ing them how to improve. Mrs. Andrews has also said "We ultimately want

to win, but have fun at the same time." Each team will consist of 12 players

but if we add more the maximum would be 15. When asked about what she

wanted to overcome by the end of the season, Mrs. Andrews answered, "A

group of girls that work well together and can overcome obstacles and have a

positive attitude over all. I hope we have a great season ladies!"

-By Adele Hudkins

4

The SIS Herald

Q & A About Mathcourt with Mrs.Ayeras

-By Minjin Jang

What is Math Court?

an annual competition that promotes mathematical skills in the

CNMI. The participants have to go through a rigorous series of

test which they have to answer correctly in a short period of time.

How many students joined this year?

Originally, we have 75 students, middle school and high school

combined but due to some reasons, the SIS team has trimmed down

to 68 students which is still the highest number of participants we

have ever.

Are you satisfied with the result?

Very proud indeed! I understand that all of our SIS students have

more than two activities going on after school, but we still manage

to have a positive turnout this year.

What do you want students to do?

Come to practices more, be on time for the competition, and follow

through their commitment to excel in math.

Are there any improvements from the past year?

Students become more proactive in math. They see to it that joining

the competition is not only to get CAS hours but to bring honor to

our school, as well.

Do you want to say anything to the students?

For all our “Mathletes”, you are doing an excellent job for Math

Court. I admire your persistence and commitment to aspire for

excellence in the field of Mathematics. Know that, your SIS family

is beaming with pride for all the worked you have done. Good luck!

SIS Starts

Mock Trial Club Mr. Bray is starting a new club in SIS,

the Mock Trial club. Mock Trial is a competi-

tion where groups of students simulate a real

courtroom experience. It works exactly like

the court system. Each team is made up of stu-

dent lawyers and witnesses. The lawyers try to

draw information out of witnesses from the

opposing team in order to prove their case.

The case changes each year. There are various

questioning techniques and rules of evidence

the students will need to learn. The witnesses

are mostly there to act, but they also play an

important role. They need to be able to answer

the opposing lawyer's questions without dam-

aging their side's case. The competition is held

in the actual courthouse where the team from

SIS will go against different teams from other

schools each round. The CNMI Bar Associa-

tion assigns an attorney to the case. Who the

lawyer is will be revealed closer to the compe-

tition. However, lawyers can always request to

work with a team, so it could be someone fa-

miliar to the school community. The competi-

tion is usually held in March or April of each

year. We will begin practices after school once

the case is published and we are assigned a

lawyer. Mock Trial is an exciting opportunity

to learn about how our justice system works

and to learn what a courtroom attorney does

on the job. For student lawyers, they get a

chance to see what it is actually like standing

in a real court room and to speak in front of

judges. For witnesses, it is a chance to learn

and develop acting skills. Join us in Mock

Trial! It will be a fun event.

-By Yeeno Marshall

The SIS Herald 5

English & Literature Project When walking through

the high school building, one can

see many posters hanging out on

the wall. Those posters were made

by the juniors and seniors for the

term project they did for Mr.

Lee’s classes. The purpose of cre-

ating these posters is for students

to get familiar with the AP terms.

The terms are the same for each

poster. Why? Because every student from the class was assigned

the same terms. However, there is a stark difference between the

terms on the juniors’ posters and the terms on the and seniors’

posters. The juniors did English language terms but the seniors

did the literature poetry terms. Both classes have some terms in

common because they’re really important for both AP courses

and will probably be on the AP exams in May. Since everyone

in the class was doing the same terms, the teacher graded this

project with respect to the neatness, structure, organization, and

readability of the poster. Mr. Lee thought Daniel Lim’s group

did really well on their poster. He suggested that the students

should make the words bigger on the posters so that they will be

coherent, which will help improve their grades. The terms that

appeared in this project cover 10 to 20 percent of the terms a

student needs to know for the AP course. It is recommended that

everyone, especially sophomores, look at those terms. They’ll be

helpful for your future AP courses

-By Emma Zhang

Second Language in SIS Mandarin Chinese is the most

prominently spoken foreign language.

Chinese classes have the highest number

of students out of all of the other lan-

guages. SIS has Chinese teachers that

teach students Chinese. However, there

are also other languages are taken by stu-

dents through an online program called Rosetta Stone (Japanese,

Korean, Italian, Tagalog, Portuguese, predominately Spanish,

and many others). Students who take Chinese classes study with

a Chinese teacher while other students study Rosetta Stone. Stu-

dents taking Rosetta Stone class have to finish two units each

quarter and every lesson should have above a 90% to be consid-

ered a "pass." Rosetta Stone class is a self-study class. However,

some students have run into problems. Jier, a sophomore here at

SIS, said, “Sometimes I cannot understand what the words really

mean because the program only shows pictures.” Jier, along

with some other students at SIS, are having trouble completing

the assignments due to the difficulties the program exhibits.

Hopefully, SIS can pay more attention to some of these prob-

lems in the second language program, and bring new ideas for

the next year. -By Lu Song

6

The SIS Herald

Come to Wonderful SIS,

Little Geckos! Have you ever seen an advertisement

about the little gecko program in Saipan In-

ternational School? For starters, the little

gecko program is an education program for

very young children between the ages of 3

and 4 years old. It was designed to benefit

some faculty members like Mrs. Ruszala.

Her kids go to Brilliant Star, because SIS has

no class for children under the age of 4. She

has to rush to Brilliant Star School after

school to pick up her kids everyday.

For this program to be successful, SIS

needs at least ten young kids; so far, there are

only 6. Their teacher will be Mrs. Basa, and

luckily, Mr.Bray knows some people who are

on Saipan with kids-educational license who

are currently not working. The teacher will

teach the students basic things like: how to

use a toilet, why students have to raise up

their hands when they have a question during

class, and many other activities as well.

Therefore, they can be educated enough to

arrive in kindergarten or elementary school

prepared. Little geckos will have class in the

pre-school room next to Mrs. Bray’s room. I

really hope that this program will be success-

ful so that SIS

can have more

fun with little

kids.

-By Minjin Jang

New Students This month, our school got four new students.

They are Christina Kim, Boomee Park, Watanabe Shion,

and Sophia Shi. All of them enjoy going to school at

SIS. They all think that learning at SIS is fun. Christina

Kim, one of the students who came in this month, has

gone to school here for the past 2 years. She went to

Whispering Palms School (WPS) at the beginning of

the semester and came back this month on November 1.

When asked why she came back, she said, “No offense,

but the classes are very easy there. I came back to chal-

lenge myself.”

Three out of the four students are non-native

English speakers. They found the courses they are tak-

ing to be a bit hard. The new girl in high school, Sophia

Shi, is Mrs. Jang's neice (Mrs. Jang teaches Mandarin

and Music here at SIS). She came to our school because

she heard that SIS was the best school on Saipan. Wan-

tanabe Shion, the new middle schooler, is a Japanese

girl who came here to learn English. She likes the edu-

cation here, but will only be with us this year. The

youngest among these four new students is Boomee

Park. She is a 3rd grader. She likes P.E. class and all the

sports they play in that class.

During the interviews with the new students,

one of them suggested that we should have a cooking

class for students so that we can gain experience not

only in academics and sports, but also in household

functions. When asked what they would change about

the school, 3 of them wanted a cafeteria with air condi-

tioning and one of them wanted a gym so that she

wouldn't get tanned. These suggestions about how SIS

should change are also shared among other students at

SIS.

There’s a picture of the new students provided

below. Don’t forget to say hi to them and wel-

come them to our school.

-By Emma Zhang

The SIS Herald 7

What Matters to You?

What matters to you? To some

people, that question could be very diffi-

cult to answer. However, for the 11th

grade class at SIS, it proved to be an

easy one; a question that didn’t have

very many different and long answers. I

asked the class as well as a few office

staff members what mattered to them

and, not surprisingly, many people had

similar answers. Out of the 25 people I

asked, 20 of them said both friends and

family mattered to them. Some people,

like Jennifer Tan, simply answered that

life matters. DongHee Im didn't include

family. He only said that eating, sleep-

ing, studying and socializing were the

only things that mattered to him. Mr.

and Mrs. Bray both had the same an-

swers. They both thought that the things

that matters to them were the school

community, friends, family, each other,

and their house in Turkey. "It’s obvious

that family and friends are the only

things keeping people together,"

preached Allen Cepeda. “I’m thankful

for life, my family and friends. Without

these things, I wouldn’t be where I am

to-

day.”

As

most

peo-

ple

see

the importance of family and friends,

it’s always good to be thankful for the

things that matter to you the most. After

all, without them, would you be the

same person you are today?

-By John Stewart

What am I Thankful for? -By Jennifer Tan

“ I’m thankful for my fam-

ily who brought me to

SIS.” Claire Park (3rd

Grade)

“I’m thankful for my

family, and friends.”

Prunella Pelligrino

(8th Grade)

“ I’m thankful for life.”

Minori Yoshida (12th

Grade)

“I’m thankful for my

class.”

Tony Kim (6th Grade)

“I’m thankful for every-

thing.”

Shirley Qian (10th Grade)

Rampant SAT Cheating Affects SIS Students Back in October, a few students from SIS decided to

take the SAT, a test usually required for entry into American

colleges and distributed by the Collegeboard. These students

had been studying and devoting their time and effort toward

this test in order to do well. However, the test has had a his-

tory of cheating. Thanks to rampant cheating on this test by

many groups of people (Asians accounting for a considerable

number of cases), some students from SIS had their scores

delayed. Daniel Lim, one of these students said, "When I did-

n't get my scores back with the others students' scores, I was nervous. I visited

the Collegeboard website every single day. [They] noticed me two weeks after

the release date. That make about four weeks." Daniel Lim knew he had done

nothing wrong. "I was more worried that my scores would turn out to be worse

than I thought they would be." Later, Daniel did some research and found that

an increase in sore of 400 points or more could arouse suspicion from the Col-

legeboard, especially for international test-takers. Daniel's scores were released

eventually, but he was not entirely pleased with them, so he will take the test

again. However, one of the seniors at SIS, Bob Kim, has still not received the

scores from that test. Hopefully, the Collegeboard will release his scores soon

so he can use the score for his college applications.

-By Qunitin Ramsey

Destino Peru Garage Sale The Destino Peru members are having a garage

sale as a fundraiser for their Destino Peru trip. The garage

sale is going to be at SIS on December 6th or 13th (date

currently undetermined) from 6:00 AM to 10:00 AM. The

Destino Peru members need to be at school by 5:30 AM

to set up the booths. Members are going to bring things to

sell from their homes. In the past, previous trip members

usually brought books, toys, and clothes to the sale. Each

member of the Destino Peru team is expected to generate

around $60 to $100 in revenue from the sale. Some mem-

bers from the previous year had made over $200 from the

garage sale. The money each member makes will go to their spending for the

trip. That means if one member made $100 from the garage sale, it is $100 less

he or she needs to pay for the trip. The garage sale has been held at SIS for the

past 10 years and has always been quite popular. Everyone is invited to come to

the next garage sale and buy the products. If anyone wants to sell, please call/

contact SIS to reserve a space for $20. Please confirm it as soon as possible!

-By Yeeno Marshall

The SIS Herald 8

Does SIS

Really Want

a School

Uniform? The matter

has been brought up

to the student body

before, but what do

they actually want? A

recent survey of 40

high school students

revealed their opinion

on the issue. Out of

the 40 people sur-

veyed, 32 responded

with, "No" (all of the

seniors said no).

Their

rea-

sons

var-

ied

greatly from, "It's too

expensive," to "I take

joy in choosing my

clothes," to

"Uniforms kill indi-

viduality." Only 4

thought that uniforms

should be imple-

mented at school.

Clearly the student

body of SIS high

school is very much

against school uni-

forms. If the school

board or the student

council mentions the

issue, this statistic

should be considered

before any decisions

are made.

-By Quintin Ramsey

The SIS Herald

STAFF

Writers:

Allen Cepeda

Yeeno Marshall

Jennifer Tan

Quintin Ramsey

Emma Zhang

Minjin Jang

Adele Hudkins

John Stewart

Lu Song

Layout:

MinJin Jang

Editor:

Quintin M. Ramsey

Sources:

SIS SCOOP

SIS Facebook

Advisor:

Mrs.Aysem Bray

Saipan

International

School

P.O BOX.

503121, Saipan,

MP, 96950

Tel: 670 2889660

Headmaster:

tim.s.bray@gmail.

com

9

This month virtue was initiative.

Middle School

Virtue Award

Guy Yeon Kim (6th)

Hannah Chan (7th)

Jun Bum Huh (8th)

High School

Virtue Award

Tiana Ranjo (12th)

Jennifer Tan (11th)

Kerrian Callaghan

(10th)

Chenoa Bunts Ander-

son (9th)

This is SIS official face-

book page. There are lots of

information and pictures

about school events.

This is a video that was

made by Aysem Bray about

SIS. It is only about 2 min-

utes.

This is Mr. Bray’s youtube

page. You will be able to

find some videos about

ETC at SIS, students lunch-

time, etc.

Best Photo of this Month

Jaden Castro (3rd Grade)

won the Pacifica Art Contest

in age 6-11 category. He got

$200 in cash and gifts from

Pacifica Insurance Under-

writers Inc.