Category: School Happenings

As summer approaches, all students can think about are shedding their winter coats and replacing them with bathing suits. School will soon be out and classes forgotten, so why are some thinking about hitting the books during the warm summer months?

Penn Manor High School offers several chances for students to explore career opportunities all summer – June through August.

Colleges from Penn State and Harrisburg University to Lancaster County Career & Technology Center, offer several programs to get students more interested in their future jobs.

All of the programs join in to create what is called a summer of STEM. STEM stands for Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math.

Matthew Glick, a senior at Penn Manor, attended a Lego Robotics camp and found it beneficial.

“I don’t know about [leading me to] a future career, but it was helpful when it came to learning about engineering,” said Glick.

However, Corey Delmonto, another Penn Manor senior, disagrees.

“I went just for fun, but I didn’t find it helpful,” said Delmonto. “I definitely didn’t put it on my college applications.”

Careers in robotics, biology and health programs are offered through almost twenty individual programs.

Most of the activities vary from day camps to three week-long programs. Each camp has a certain fee and the prices rise the longer the camps go.

“Yeah it was expensive,” said Glick. “It was $200 for two weeks.”

While Penn Manor does not offer scholarships, some of the summer programs provide financial aid themselves.

“I can point you in the right direction and put you in contact with the right people,” said Brandy Basile, a counselor at the high school.

If you’re looking to go abroad and study in another place for the summer, the People to People Program offers time away in other countries to immerse yourself in the culture of other places. Places such as Europe and Asia offer sports, education and leadership programs where the students take general education classes or participate internationally on sports teams.

Students will also go sightseeing to places like the world-famous Louvre Museum and The Great Wall of China.

“We can put you in touch with other students who have taken this opportunity and they can tell you more about it,” said Basile.

Interested? Stop in the counseling office for more information.

By Emily Brody

The masters of physics from Penn Manor were at it again last week.

Wednesday, April 21, 43 students from five area high schools attended the 18^th annual Physics Olympics. This was Penn Manor’s first year, so they didn’t know exactly what to expect.

The students from the various schools were then split up into ten different teams so individual schools would not be competing against each other.

“The competition helped build teamwork with people we never met before,” said senior Jordan Franssen.

The competition consisted of five high-concentration events.

The events were:

Pinwheel of Fortune – Create a air powered cardboard pinwheel to lift the most mass in the least amount of time.

Jump – jump off a chair onto a force plate with the minimum force.

Bernoulli Relay – use a hair dryer to guide a ping pong ball along a path.

Weight of a metal block – use spring scales and knowledge of vectors to determine the weight of a suspended metal block.

Volume of an irregular object- determine the volume of an object using only a ruler.

“There’s a lot of dexterity involved,” said junior Lars Anderson.

From the teams that were part of the competition, only two Penn Manor students finished in the top three.

Jordan Franssen’s team took first place, and Ivan Puskovic’s team finished third.

Overall it was a good first experience for the Penn Manor students, who look forward to next year’s event.

By Paul Slaugh

The Pennsylvania State Board of Education is “weighing” the benefits of eliminating unhealthy foods from school vending machines, cafeterias and fundraisers to combat childhood obesity.

As the board holds hearings on the subject, students are already expressing their displeasure.

“I buy French fries almost everyday, they can’t take them away,” senior Krista Conlin said.

Don’t fuss about losing fries just yet, Penn Manor’s cafeteria already switched to zero trans fat oil about four years ago when they got a whiff of the direction government was going in its efforts to slim kids down.

Penn Manor cafeteria employee Sherlyn Wolf said, “Our food that requires oil has zero trans fat, due to the switch the school made about four years ago for health reasons.  The margarine blend we used to make desserts like pies, cakes and cookies have one gram of trans fat.”

They may have to cut a little more with the new regulations.

“Food items containing vegetable shortening, margarine or any kind of partially-hydrogenated vegetable oil unless the label required on the food, pursuant to applicable federal and state law, lists the trans fat content as less than 0.5 grams per serving,” the regulations state.

Randy Wolfgang, Penn Manor’s Food Services Coordinator, is aware of the changes being proposed by the state.  If the proposal passes, Pennsylvania will be one of eight states that are changing the nutrition and physical endurance guidelines of school students.

“As the rules change, the food manufacturers will change to produce lower fat in foods,” said Wolfgang. “The regulations wouldn’t necessarily replace (all) cafeteria foods; it will just reduce the size proportions.  For example, the big cookies would be down-sized.”
Many Penn Manor students are not happy with the new proposed regulations.

But news of a down-sized cookie is not any more popular than the idea of cutting back on lemonades or deep-fried food.

“A lot of students spend more money on cookies and fries than anything else sold at our cafeteria lunches,” said junior, Vennessa Nougeras. “What’s the point of a “big cookie” if it’s not even big?”

The new requirements will require that beverages have 67 or less calories per eight ounces, will replace all milk with skim milk or one percent milk, prohibit energy drinks as well as food with 35% or higher calories from sugar.

Not only does the state Board of Education want to eliminate high fat food, but they also aim to require at least 30 minutes of physical activity from every student, every day.  As for elementary students, if this regulation passes, they will be required to have 150 minutes of physical activity each week.

Now that’s an idea that makes physical education teachers very happy.

“I don’t think the chance of passing the food regulations is very high.  But it would be nice; kids would lose body fat within a month,” said Aron Basile, phys-ed teacher.  “Having 30 minutes of physical activity would be like a high school recess.”

“I am all for 30 minutes of physical activity.  It’s absolutely a great idea, schedule adjustments would have to be made, but we would make it fit,” said Britney Clugston, another phys-ed teacher.  “It would probably alleviate tensions between students.  Exercise increases your endorphins release, which internally makes you happy.”

“I agree with adding physical activity to schedules, although it involves more work with course scheduling.  But I don’t know about the food changes only because we have a good variety of food in our cafeteria.  It isn’t all healthy food, or all junk,” said Penn Manor school counselor, Marjean Long.

The board has held hearings on the regulations in April and plans to vote on the changes during the first week in May.

To see a cartoon for this article click here

By Kayla Pagan

You know it’s a successful high school event when the students are cheering each other on, and the elderly couples have left before the end of the final act.

Entertainment Penn Manor, the annual talent show presented by the student council, had another outstanding show on Saturday, April 24.

“It was really great to have the opportunity to perform in front of my peers. I really enjoyed the experience,” said sophomore Kelly Lenahan, who played piano while junior Jill Wiley sang.

People from all over the community came out to watch the acts, with some acts even earning standing ovations from members of the crowd.

“I thought the acts were good, but I wish there was more diversity of talent instead of people mainly singing. There should have been more dancing acts and other talents like the talent shows previous years,” said junior Livie Stoltzfus.

“It was really good and exciting to see all the amazing talent,” said Sabrina Kurtz, “My favorite was the band that sang ‘Under The Bridge’ by ‘Red Hot Chili Peppers’.”

Acts Included:

Becca Eckman, Tim Deubler, Jesse Griffith, Tosh Chambers: Singing/Guitar/Drums/Bass

Sierra Woodworth: Singing

Ian Bricker and Emily Biechler: Singing/Piano

Corina Connelly: Singing

Alicia Ygarza and  Marcos Rivera: Singing/Dancing

Kim and Greg Gydush: Singing/Guitar

Mandy Li: Piano

Shea Kurtz and Bri Potts: Singing/Guitar

Greg Gydush, Pat Navin, Shane Burkhardt, Spencer Barnett: Singing/Drums/Guitar/Bass

Dessie Jackon and Clayton Secrest: Dancing

Jill Wiley and Kelly Lenahan: Singing/Piano

Hunter Paulson, Henry Stewart, Tyler Funk, Gabe Eshleman, Dessie Jackson: Singing/Guitar/Drums/Tambourine/ Violin

Henry Stewart and Tyler Funk:  Keyboard/Drums

Manhunt: Tim Deubler, Sid Kreitzer, Jesse Griffith, Tosh Chambers, Weston Chambers and Alicia Ygarza: Singing/Guitar/Drums/Bass/Keyboards

Emcees for the night: Ariela Contreras with Venessa Nogueras, Marcos Rivera and Xiomara Contreras

For more pictures from ETPM visit the Image Gallery

By Lindsey Ostrum and Mike Nitroy

The PSSAs (Pennsylvania System of School Assessment)  are off to an amazing start at Penn Manor with good attendance and only one health issue, according to Penn Manor assistant principal Krista Cox.

Principals confirmed that one girl taking the test got a nosebleed during the first day of the PSSA testing but she just went into the hall and stopped the bleeding. She even went back in and finished the section.

Other health issues that are associated with the PSSA, according to officials,  is that if a test is defaced with blood or something else, the school just needs to get the same numbered test from the state and the student finishes it.

The PSSAs sometimes bring a lot of stress because teachers and administrators always talk about how important the tests are to the school.

Juniors take the PSSAs but the state has approved a new form of testing – The Keystone Exam which students would have to pass in order to progress to the next grade and graduate.

The junior class finished the two long sections of the PSSA on Monday and Tuesday.

There are seven more days of PSSA testing left this month.

By Sam Valentin and Taylor Groff

The Penn Manor quiz bowl team was facing tough competition Thursday night in the quarter finals of the year-end championship tournament, and without their captain.

Grant Elledge, the team’s strongest player, was incapacitated, recovering from a broken femur from a car accident when Penn Manor went up against the team from Cedar Cliff.

Although Cedar Cliff, who had lost before during the regular season of competition and returned thanks to the wild card system, was also handicapped having lost a player for unknown reasons.

But Penn Manor rose to the challenge overtaking Cedar Cliff 410-380, thanks to an early dominance by the Comet’s Lars Andersen and a late-game answer streak from Brendan Stoeckl, along with the efforts of Christine Sharp and Henry Stewart.

“He [Elledge] was out, but the rest of the team did a great job of making up for it,” said Sallie Bookman, Penn Manor Gifted Program supervisor.

The team now advances to the semi-finals round of the tournament, Penn Manor is already one of the final four out of 38 other schools which participate.

Penn Manor’s latest victory will be aired May 8 on WGAL’s show “Brain Busters.” Meanwhile, Penn Manor will be facing Cedar Cliff again, who returns in the wild card slot for a second round.

By Kennedy Phillips

All of the courses that Scott Hertzog teaches at Penn Manor are involved in the new, modern, and, dare we say it, fun book report called “Fireside Book Chats.”

An innovative teacher at Penn Manor, Hertzog is now one of 700 entries that are hoping for one of ten first place prizes for innovative teachers through the Public Broadcasting Service.

The chats are really podcasts that are recorded in front of the class, “They still have to do work, like writing an annotated bibliography,” said Hertzog. “It’s an interview setup that students alike agree is less threatening.”

Hertzog describes the students as having anxiety about their thoughts on a book going worldwide.

Originally called Room 312, Fireside Book Chats started as a quick five-minute lesson recap that students could use if they hadn’t made it to school that day.  But since no one was using it, Hertzog decided he could evolve it into something more interactive.

Clearly the Fireside Book Chats have had an impact worldwide. Hertzog says one of his proudest moments was when their site; www.firesidebookchat.com hit 55,000 downloads. Not only is it a hit online with people all over the world, but even the authors of the books have written in.

Taking one look at the site, you can see why Hertzog would be motivated to compete in the innovative teacher’s award. Book reviews ranging from Nickled and Dimed to A Great Derangement can be read on this  growing site.

The thirteenth year English teacher at Penn Manor said he likes how the whole concept has developed.

Hertzog said, “It has evolved from just a simple list of questions to using MLA citation and writing an annotated bibliography.”

Ninth through twelfth graders participate in Fireside Book Chats, but, “I slowly increase the intensity as courses are taught,” as far as length of books and the depth of annotated bibliographies, Hertzog explained.

Hertzog is currently ranked among the top five teachers nations wide. Winners will be announced on April 5.

By Dana Poetzl