Category: School Happenings

Rows and rows of trophies sit gleaming by our East Gym.

We’ve all seen them. Glittering against the cement in such a fashion you can’t help but do a double-take at the mementos of past athletic victories. But that’s just it: athletic achievements. Does our school really value brawn over brains?

To combat this perception, the librarian at Penn Manor High School, Sue Hostetter, petitioned for our brain bank to have a nook of their own. Upon entering the library, but right before passing through the unchecked book alarm, immediately to the left, there is a new trophy case.

“I just wanted a place for our academic achievements to be seen and recognized,” said Hostetter.  “It took almost a year for the new display to get installed. It was very nice because in the beginning I thought I was going to have to dip into my own pocket or somehow set up a fundraiser for it.”

Unfortunately, as soon as it went up, the case was nearly full.

“It would be really nice to have the long display cases in between the library entrance and the water fountains by the gym to also be renovated to be used for academic trophies,” she noted.

In the trophy case itself sits just under 10 trophies, each one its own symbol of brainy excellence. The trophies, range from an individual awards to national awards to quiz bowl trophies.

Hostetter’s goal is to have academic awards displayed next to athletic ones, to  show how our student body differs in interests, boost morale of students and Comets fans, and to have a collective area for all student achievements.

By Ben Embry

It was the little strummer boys…and some girls too.

The Penn Manor guitar class was preforming at all three lunches on Dec 23, 2010 for a little entertainment.

“Slappin da bass mon,” said senior Mike Gebby.

Gebby was playing the bass guitar having the most important part in the whole show.

Rebecka Eckman was singing Christmas carols while the guitarists were playing.

The conductor Skip Reddig, also the teach for the guitar class, taught the students a great number of music pieces so they would not have to repeat anything over each lunch period.

Students at lunch enjoyed all of the background music during their lunch period.

“I have more Christmas spirit now that I have heard these songs,” said Thomas Embry.

By Kyle Hallett

Wondering what Dr. Janice Mindish has been up to since her retirement in 2008? The former principal of the year has been staying busy over the past two years and does not seem to be slowing down.

The Lancaster County Academy, Penn Manor’s Twilight program, the district’s Education Foundation, Lancaster Museum of Art and the Millersville Woman’s club are all part of Mindish’s busy schedule.

Once a week for three hours, one hour in the morning and two hours in the afternoon, Mindish talks to teens at the Lancaster County Academy who are nearing graduation about their plans after graduating. She helps out the math, science and social studies teachers. But mainly helps students with their writing.

“I can help in any area, but I mostly help with writing,” said Dr. Mindish, “this past week I was helping former Penn Manor students who are writing their thesis.”

Twice a week, on Tuesdays and Fridays,  Mindish’s time is spent with the Twilight program, the alternative education program at Penn Manor.

“Being the principal, sometimes you only get to see the bad side of kids who are struggling.  At Twilight you actually get to know them and your perspective changes,” said Mindish.

Within the Education Foundation the former principal is on three committees; the marketing committee, the development committee, and the education committee. This requires Mindish to attend about three meetings a month for this volunteer work.

Mindish is also on the Board of the Lancaster Museum of Art as well. Currently, she is helping out with the Trees Galore project, this involves local students and artists who have done art work and are contributing their work to the museum’s fund raising efforts. The next activity she will be involved in is the Scholastic Art Awards show.

Dr. Mindish is also a member of the Millersville’s Woman’s Club. One of the club’s main goals is to support education. Mindish keeps them involved in education by getting the women in the club interested in some of Penn Manor’s projects and extracurricular activities. The women help students out with their graduation projects as well as helping out with Quiz Bowl.

On top of everything else this multi-tasker is also teaching a psychology class at York College.

“I love, love, love it!” Mindish exclaimed.

And luckily for the Penn Points Staff, Mindish comes in once a week to help young reporters develop their photojournalism skills, since she was once a photography teacher.

“I decided when I retired that I didn’t miss actually being the one to run the school, I missed the kids a lot,” she remarked.

Just because Penn Manor’s former head principal is now retired does not mean she’s not doing many, many things. She is still keeping very busy and helping out with the community at the same time.

By Chassidy Sowersby and Robert Henry

Penn Manor students and teachers are making cards for Wyatt Tietz who has life threatening cancer, to try and brighten his holidays.

Tietz’s mother, Heather Tietz graduated from Penn Manor in 1994. The family lives in Colorado where Tietz is currently receiving treatment at Brent’s place in Aurora, Colorado.  He will be getting treatment every day for six weeks. The family returns to the area frequently to visit and even was here over the summer where they spent quality time with friends.

Tietz, at just 5-years-old, is battling cancer and his family is making an effort to make his holidays joyful. Along with his family, a few classes in Penn Manor have made an effort to make his holidays as happy as possible. Classes in Mr. Luft’s, Mr. McKnight’s and Mrs. Kroesen have made many cards so Tietz can have a card shower.

All students are encouraged to make cards so he can have a wonderful holiday season. Just see teachers Jen Kroesen or Denise Harris for more details on the matter.

By Brian Dunne

“All students are to report back to first block for enrichment period, again all students are to report back to first block during this time,” this is what Penn Manor students heard after second block and some of them cringed.

Why all this “enrichment?”  What is it supposed to accomplish?

According to principal Phil Gale, the enrichment activities called, adopt-an-anchor, are when students go back to first block, second block, third block and forth block on selected days.

The purpose of the enrichment is to focus the entire school on certain skills where improvement is needed.

What the students have learned were math problems, which some students struggled with in the past. The students learned how to do scatter plots, slope and best fit line. All in all this helped the students get a good grasp on things and help build their confidence.

As Penn Manor sets forth for another enrichment period, how did they do overall?

Was it worth it? Why and how long do we have to keep doing this?

These are just some questions Penn Manor students ponder day to day.

Although there were complaints before it started, when math was all said and done, many students believe it wasn’t as hard as they thought it would be.

“It was really easy,” said senior Jacklyn Schmalhofer.

Even for a junior, Joey Jackson, who helped tutor kids, the math directions were very clear.

“The way kids completed the math, it looked pretty easy,” said Jackson.

The schedule change made a big impression on staff and students in Penn Manor, shortened blocks every single day, many were not sure how and what to expect. But, they had to do it.

“No idea,” Gale said about how long the enrichment periods would go on throughout the year.

“We did very good overall, people got too worried and stressed out about this,” Gale said. ” It was needed, it was a good review and overall developed better skill.”

As students were worked up about this change, teachers were too. Some teachers haven’t done math since college and they were expected to learn it and teach it.

“Not something they’ve done in awhile, but I was very impressed with the teachers and students working hard,” Gale said.

Krista Cox, Penn Manor’s assistant principal was very impressed on how students helped other students and helped everyone understand things.

After four sessions on scatter plots and linear equations, it was time for the English department to circulate lessons on summarizing and main idea.  Same schedule but a few less complaints now that students were in the groove.

“(I learned) to pick out the main idea better in a story,” said senior Amanda Miley.

The question is still pondered, was it successful or not?

“Yes, it was successful, it helped kids understand the concepts, and this will help them do it on a test,” Gale said.

Some complaints were initially heard because the teachers were getting cut, on average, 14 minutes out of their prep periods each day for this new schedule change.

“Some teachers were complaining, but they’re not losing too much time,” Gale said.

Are students losing out on other academic instruction because of shorter blocks?

Are teachers going to try to rush teaching in order to try to complete the things that need to be taught by the end of the semester?

Some of these questions, are still up in the air and could not be answered at this time.

The PSSA test is soon going away and a new state test will be introduced, Keystone Exams.

” Were not gonna talk about that yet, maybe we’ll have to do another article on that,” Gale said.

By Tyler Funk

As the weather gets colder and the excitement rises for Christmas break, many Penn Manor families start their annual holiday traditions.

“Christmas makes me feel super happy,” said freshman Kacie Dumas. “Our family tradition is to go over to my uncle’s house to party.”

“Christmas makes me feel like I’m floatin’ on a cloud,” said Mickayla Baldwin , whose  family has a very unique tradition. Her family plays a game called Polyanna.

“Each family member gets three numbered cards and we put them in a hat. Then somebody picks a card and if you had the number that’s on the card you get to pick a gift  from the big pile of presents.”

This is a very popular holiday tradition in the United States.

Caitlin Whirt, a senior at Penn Manor shares her family tradition of putting pictures in front of their decorated Christmas tree. Also, Caitlin said that her family always gets together for the holidays at her house.

Here at Penn Manor High School, Christmas is just one of the many holidays celebrated among the student body. Hannakuh, a Jewish holiday is celebrated as well.

“Basically, our family lights the Menorah candles before dinner, eat dinner, and then we get presents,” freshman Nate Rosenburg said. “Oh, and we always have a family Hanukkah party.”

Along with gift and family dinners, holiday songs are another very popular tradition when the holidays are approaching.

Christmas music originated in England where traveling musicians would visit towns and sing Christmas songs for the holidays. In today’s society, we still go door to door and sing carols for all to hear.

“My favorite Christmas song has to be “Carol of the Bell,'” said Cassie Kreider a Christmas loving Penn Manor freshman.

Mickayla Baldwin another freshman says that her favorite song is “Oh Come All Ye Faithful,” an old Christmas carol written by John Francis Wade that first appeared 1751.

Brian Geer, a junior at Penn Manor tells us that his favorite Christmas Carol is “Silent Night.”  The song has been translated into more languages then any other Christmas song.

Courtney Whirt, a freshman says that her favorite Christmas carol is “Rudolph the Red-nosed Reindeer.”

Whether it’s listening to Christmas music, or getting presents at family reunions, most families have their own special holiday traditions.

By Olivia Bailey and Toby Holsinger

Instead of sitting at home after school watching TV with their parents still at work, students can participate in an academic enrichment program at Pequea Elementary School.

This enrichment program in the Penn Manor School District is a fun and, most importantly, a safe place for students from third to sixth grade to be with their friends after school until their parents get off work. They can go learn things they enjoy.

“The Pequea PTO was looking for someone to teach foreign language,” said Daliah Ferko. “I am from Germany and speak this language fluently. I wanted to give the children an opportunity to explore a foreign language before  they get to middle school.”

This year they will be offering Spanish, French, German, art, creative writing and poetry, quilting and sign language. Each class runs for usually eight weeks long. The students go once a week for an hour at a time. Each time they do, they try and offer more subjects than the last time.

“I truly believe that at a young age they (the students) can learn these different languages so much easier,” said Ferko. “I wish we could offer foreign languages in elementary school.”

“I would love to offer more classes. Maybe in Chinese, dancing or even theater,” said Ferko

So far 72 students are enrolled and the program will run until December 14.

This enrichment program is supported and funded by the PTO and Ferko has been the chairman for the “Beyond the Bell” since the Spring of 2009. Many others, like high school students and parents, volunteer their time to help this program run smoothly.

“We would not be able to do this without the help of our wonderful volunteers,” said Ferko.

“I am working with Mrs. Sallie Bookman at the high school. She usually gets in contact with some students who would love to teach the younger kids, and at the same time they can fulfill their community (service) hours,” said Ferko.

This gives them the opportunity to learn and have fun with different academics.

By Liz Lawrence

It’s the time of the evergreen trees.  The time of decorations and song.  The time of giving.

The Student Council of Penn Manor High School has joined with Penn Manor’s Twilight students to help contribute to families in need this holiday season.

In these difficult financial times there are plenty of families with children in the district who may be low on funds for the holidays. Student Council members and Twilight students intend to make the season a little brighter for many families.

Just a few weeks ago, a Christmas tree was put into the library and the Twilight students decorated the tree by putting on lights and tags.  Specific needs and sizes for each member of a family is written on the tag.  Contributors can pull the tags off the tree and buy the gift written on the specific tag.

This is the third year that Student Council has helped the families all over the district and each year has been successful. The club works with a school social worker who keeps the list of families who need gifts.

Students, faculty, families and friends are all being encouraged to participate this year.

Social studies teachers, Maria Vita and Rich Brenton, who are also student council advisers, have decided to award each participant with one hour of community service or in a senior’s case, they will offer an extra hour of volunteer service if a student takes a tag and buys a gift.

The Young Humanitarian Club also has helped out by donating $500 of their club’s money to the effort.

By Sarah Gordon