Category: Student Life

By Taylor Skelly-

From nerds to NBA all-stars, the public’s perception of eye glasses is changing, again.

Whether it’s casual wear or black tie attire, eye glasses are becoming more and more prevalent amongst celebrities and average citizens.

Local merchants are noticing the trend and reaping the benefits.

I’d say there’s been at least a 20 percent increase in overall consumption, but as far as teenagers and people in their early twenties, probably a 35 percent increase in consumption in the past year said Michelle Barton, who is the General Manager at the local Park City Mall LensCrafters store.

However, this trend has been seen before and now it’s back, here at Penn Manor, too.

“They’re called attitude glasses,” said Penn Manor history teacher Rich Brenton, who knows a thing or two about history. “Kids were wearing them when I was in college, which was in the 80s.”

Since the 80s, many people have gradually moved away from eye glasses, deciding instead to wear contact lenses, because of their convenience, and glasses’ increasingly nerdy reputation. But over the past year, glasses are making a comeback.

“I feel like people are always aware of what they look like, so they want to try something new, maybe even try to look more intelligent,” said Penn Manor junior Jena Lacock.

Surprisingly, this fad is just as popular, if not more, in men compared to women. In last weekend’s NBA all-star game, six of the ten starters have been observed regularly wearing “attitude glasses” as they enter and exit their respective basketball arenas  through out the 2011-2012 season. Last year’s NBA all-star game proved to be a different story. Only two out of the ten starters were seen sporting glasses as a part of their normal pre and post game attire.

This recent surge of celebrity eye-wear has caused much of the general population to jump on the bandwagon, but why are celebrities opting to rock  a pair of their favorite frames  instead of their tried and true contacts in the first place?

“Glasses lend themselves to individuality more so than contacts, glasses are no longer just an optical need,” said Barton

Adam Sahd, also a junior at Penn Manor, has a different approach.

“Personally, I started wearing my glasses more because I didn’t feel like putting my contacts in in the mornings, but it has gradually become the popular thing to do, so I just keep wearing them,” said Sahd, who can regularly be seen wearing a pair of prescription Ray Ban eye glasses.

Regardless of the reason, eyeglasses have made yet another appearance in not only the general public but the public eye as well. Will this trend last or fade away fast? Whether you’re one of the celebrities setting the trend, or one of the many simply following in their footsteps, one question remains, when will you re-frame yourself?

 

By Ryan Flexman and Jordan Rineer-

Men around the world are finding a new way to prove their manhood, and so are the boys at Penn Manor.

Who would think that choking on cinnamon or vomiting milk would prove anything to anybody? But what started out as two kids having fun has changed into a small international phenomenon that’s catching on at Penn Manor.

“The real reason I did [the cinnamon challenge] was to impress the girls,” said Kyle Musser, Penn Manor junior who tried the challenge and videoed himself.

The cinnamon challenge is the new phase that teenagers are obsessing over. They start with a tablespoon of pure cinnamon. They then have 60 long seconds to swallow it all without taking a drink. Most of the time, this process results in vomiting and choking from the dry cinnamon. Side affects include uncontrolled coughing, burning, nausea, breathlessness, and the overwhelming feeling of failure.

“A mushroom cloud of cinnamon came out of my mouth,” said Musser.

The internet sensation went viral as soon as the first video of someone taking the challenge was posted in 2007.  Since then, more than 5,000 videos were posted all over the internet of people attempting the cinnamon challenge, the majority of them being men, or boys, or boys trying to prove they are men, through cinnamon.

Like many dares, this one can be dangerous.

Doctors are persuading teenagers to avoid the challenge because they could possibly burn the tissue in their nose and throat. Also, if the cinnamon is inhaled, there’s a high chance of severe chest pain.

Schools around the nation have sent home advisories to show the possible consequences of the cinnamon challenge.

Pottstown Middle School in Pennsylvania has banned boots because kids were sneaking cinnamon into the school to try the challenge during school hours. All open top boots are banned there, the students may wear them to school but not in school.

“I haven’t encountered anybody in the past several days who feels like this cinnamon challenge is anything other than ridiculous and potentially dangerous,” said John Armato, Pottstown’s School District spokesperson.

Carmen Ana Rodriguez, principal of Clinton Avenue School, witnessed students doing the cinnamon challenge and turned her head on the incident, according to a recent news report on CBS news. She is now on administrative leave and her future with the school is questionable.

“Teenagers like to try fun and daring things, sometimes they don’t pay attention to the potential risks as much as they should,” said Musser.

By Iris Santana –

Gender Identity Disorder. It is a formal diagnosis used by psychologists and physicians to describe a person(s) who experience significant gender dysphoria. Dysphoria is a discontent with the biological sex and/or gender with which someone is born.

There are many cases where people, male or female as young as five are ‘trapped’ inside the opposite genders’ body.

Five year old Zach Avery refused to live his life as a boy at the age of three.

“He just turned round to me one day when he was three and said, “Mummy, I’m a girl.” I assumed he was just going through a phase and just left it at that. Zach’s mother, Theresa Avery recalled about the day her son ‘came out’.

It’s sad to think that a lot of people have this problem, dealing with the fact that they are something they’re ‘not’, especially if that person is your little boy.

He gets so frustrated to the point where he even tried to cut his genitals off.

But this is not a big surprise to most. People. Parents do this to their own kids, hiding their child’s identity so they are able to decide themselves what they want to be as if it’s a career choice.

A pigtail-purple tutu wearing ‘Zachy’ is much happier now that he is able to be who he wants to be.

There was another case in 2011, where Toronto parents planned on raising their baby Storm genderless.

The parents, Kathy Witterick and David Stocker claim it’s a “tribute to freedom and choice.”

“That’s wrong, it’s torture and people that do that to their kids should be in jail,” Bianca Cruz commented about the Toronto parents.

“Their child is going to be so confused and with a lot of mental and emotional issues to deal with.” Cruz added.

The couple also has two other boys, five and two, which they encourage to dress and play less ‘boyishly’.

That’s exactly what they do. Jazz, 5, loves to paint his nails and wears pink while his younger brother Kio, 2, gets mistaken for a girl.

People have their own views about gender and sexuality.

“Everyone’s entitled to do what makes them happy,”  Dimitrius Dennison said.

Whereas other don’t agree with it.

“It’s just wrong. You think it’s  a female and when they turn around it’s a dude.” John Diaz said about cross dressers.

More and more parents nowadays are becoming tolerant towards their child being gay, lesbian and/or even cross-dressing.

“I think my mom would support me, but my dad would just look at it as a phase,” says Sierra Bland, a student at Penn Manor.

Other parents on the other hand are not.

“My dad would slap me, then kick me out,” says Robert Cruz, a senior at Penn Manor.

There are many students walking the halls of Penn Manor, innocently holding hands with the same sex. Maybe their friends, or maybe they’re more than friends.

 

By Brandon Bowers –

Colleges are now going to have a software called turn-it-in that will run an application essay to see if it’s plagiarized.

Scary to think that just to apply to a college, they can see if you took someone’s essay they wrote or took it off an online site, they can even see if you took it out of a trash folder and copied it in to be lazy.

Pennsylvania schools, including Penn State, are using the software for incoming applicants.

Vicky Nace Penn Manor senior going to Ohio University next year to play field hockey said “I did my application online and the essay was not mandatory but was advised. I did not write one.”

Diane Bounds the school librarian had a view on the software.

She said, “It is definately a good idea for this. An application is the college’s first interview with the student. If they want honest students that’s what they have to do for a good first impression.”

Previously,  colleges may have read an essay and thought it was the best thing since Shakespeare but when the student was accepted and started school, that student may not have done so well because their essay was actually someone’s work and that great writing…

Well it never showed it’s pretty face again.

“Students don’t understand copywriting other students’ work for an essay or any other paper is not plagiarizing but it still is,” Bounds said.

Now that colleges will run this program, students will have to be careful and make sure they write their own essays to apply to a college they
really like.

Penn Manor junior Erica Williams said, “I think it’s a good idea so the students can show real ability and not someone elses.”

If colleges did not start this program many of students may plagiarize their essays just to get into a school because they may think it is the hardest and most time consuming part. The students may make it easy and copy and paste someone’s essay to make the application easy and get by with someone’s work and not their own.

College is a higher education that students go to get a better understanding in the field they may want to study. So if they plagiarized an essay the colleges may catch you and not accept a cheater in their school.

Penn Manor senior Will Welsh said, “It is better that they do use it so they can’t copy and past everything, if they copy and paste everything they wouldn’t learn anything therefore college would be pointless.”

Colleges are using the software because they believe students who are going to college need to buckle down and get ready for college and not take other people’s work to pass them through.

By Jay Jackson –

The Food and Drug Administration just came out with nine new pictures on packaging to illustrate some of the terrible affects of cigarette smoking.

These new packs could have pictures on them such as a diseased lung, a person that needs oxygen because of heart disease, a picture of a mouth was a result of smoking, and a picture of a baby meaning that smoke can cause a lot of harm to little kids especially. That is just one of the few pictures that may be on the new packaging.

“The introduction of these warnings is expected to have a significant public health impact by decreasing the number of smokers, resulting in lives saved, increased life expectancy and lower medical costs,” the FDA stated on their web site.

“The introduction of these warnings is expected to have a significant public health impact by decreasing the number of smokers, resulting in lives saved, increased life expectancy and lower medical costs,” according to the FDA’s website.

Some Penn Manor students have other plans however.

“It isn’t going to affect me,” said an anonymous junior who says he smokes a half of a pack a day. “I want to live my life to the fullest and if that happens when I am smoking so be it.”

This is the first time that the small warning labels would change in 25 years. These pictures may never make it to the cigarette packs however. The FDA and the cigarette companies are in a lawsuit to see if the FDA can make them change the packs to such extremes.

“We want to make a difference and help people who are smoking stop smoking and discourage people who haven’t taken up the habit yet,” FDA commissioner Dr. Margaret Hamburg told ABC News.

“One of the problems in our society is that we don’t have an illness idea about nicotine addiction,” said Dr. Mary O’Sullivan, director of the smoking cessation program at St. Luke’s-Roosevelt in New York. ” But that’s the story, suffering.”

The goal of these new packages are used to play on the emotions of the smoker or it could be just to scare them straight.

“The point of putting these pictures is the shock value and research tells us shock value on its own rarely works,” said Timothy Edgar, associate professor and graduate program director of health communication at Emerson College in Boston.

“I think people are still going to have a hard time saying, ‘Yes, that’s me on that label,'” he said. “There’s a physical addiction involved in this as well. It’s not an absolute choice for many who smoke.”

“Oh my god, if I saw those disgusting pictures on my pack of Marlboro Lights, I think I would throw up,” said a senior girl who was asked not to be named.

There are roughly 450,000 deaths caused by smoking each year and the FDA thinks that these pictures will deter people from smoking the deadly cigarette.

 

These pictures may scare some people however this doesn’t mean they will end up quitting.

“No way I will stop smoking,” said one senior.  “I am addicted and I know it. I’ll stop when I am dead.”

Now we will just have to just wait and see if these disturbing photos will be printed on every packet of cigarettes.

By Maggie Dubbs –

Who knew you would ever find your soul mate from a piece of paper.

With Valentine’s Day right around the corner, students at Penn Manor were anxious to receive the Matchmaker forms they filled out in mid- January.

At a cost of $2 each, Matchmaker forms would in turn tell the students who could be their best possible match-up among students in their grade and other grades as well.

Student Council, a club at Penn Manor, decided to put these together as a fundraiser.

“There was about 250 turned in this year,” said Jillian Heckman, a class officer for the juniors. “It’s definitely less than we’ve had in the past years.”

Megan Schlegelmilch is on student council and is in charge of Match Makers this year.

“It was a longer, more complicated process this year with homeroom not being where the student’s primarily filled them out in years past,” said Schlegelmilch.

This year students were asked to fill them out in their first block classes, so many of them weren’t turned in, Schlegelmilch reasoned.

“Last year there was like, four boxes to pick the Matchmakers out of, but this year there was only one,” said Schlegelmilch.

The results were based off  a personal survey and preferences that students filled out. Certain questions such as hair color preference and height were included in the questionnaire.

Junior Robbie Conover said he just does it for fun, not necessarily to find his match.

Erica Williams and Kenzie Caterbone, both juniors, said they were each others’ number sixth most compatible friend.

“It’s weird because my actual good friends are lower on my friend’s list, and people I’ve never heard of are up higher than my good friends,” said Caterbone.

Williams also found this interesting because her and Caterbone are close friends.

Billjo Atkins, high school gym teacher, is in charge of student council.

The money raised from this fundraiser was around $120, said Atkins who said it will be used to benefit general student activities.

Student council says they look forward to next year as this fundraiser not only benefits them, but is also enjoyable for the students.

“It might not have been a lot, but any money we bring in is always beneficiary,” said Aktins.

By Joey Jackson and David Mohimani –

Rock the Vote, Vote or Die, and Choose or Lose have all been initiatives to try and get young people, specifically ages 18-29, to go vote, and, apparently it has been effective.

According to CIRCLE, (The Center for Information & Research on Civic Learning and Engagement) an estimated 23 million young Americans under the age of 30 voted in the 2008 presidential election, an increase of 3.4 million compared to the 2004 election. CIRCLE estimates that youth voter turnout rose to between 52 and 53 percent, an increase of

four to five percentage points over CIRCLE’s estimate based on the 2004 exit polls. The 2004 election was a strong one for youth turnout, reversing a long history of decline.

With the election coming in November and the primary season in full swing, some Penn Manor seniors plan on exercising their right to vote, while others do not.

“I don’t like politics because it’s boring. Nothing ever changes, they (politicians) just tell you what you wanna hear,” senior Mitch Domin explained.

Even more scary is the fact that teens who are voting don’t follow the campaigns, which asks the question, what foundations do they base their vote on?

“I get my opinions straight from my daddy,” senior Michael Andrusisin answered.

So what does daddy say?

“I wish America would strengthen the future of our nation rather than hindering it,” Andrusisin stated. “Both of my parents are teachers, so education is a big deal to me.”

“[It] doesn’t matter who the president is, the same things will happen,” senior Michael Andrusisin added. “And I think Obama is a cool dude.”

Further yet, some people claim allegiance to a particular side yet not all young voters fully understand what that particular party represents.

“I’m definitely more liberal, I think people should be able to do what they want,” said senior Alex Lombardo.

“I want less government control,” added Lombardo.

Other students expressed disinterest in the process or what it takes to understand the issues and the candidates.

“…maybe it’s their civic duty not to vote because they don’t know anything,” ABC reporter John Stossel stated in an interview conducted by ABC that can be found here.

“Teenagers don’t understand the profound effect a new president can have. “[Teenagers] don’t seem to care unless the laws directly apply to them,” said senior Brandon Schuman.

Another worrisome fact is that some high school seniors are not interested in entire topics like health care or foreign policy.

“What’s that?” senior Bob Warfel said in response to a question regarding foreign policy. “I care a lot more about stuff like education because the cost of college is so high.”

Even with so much confusion about the issues, nearly every Penn Manor senior we talked to said they did indeed plan on voting.

It appears that Penn Manor will be well represented in the voting booth the only question that remains will they be voting  just to vote or will they knowingly and responsibly decide who they think the best leader for our country will be.

Aaron Sellers contributed to this story.

If you’re 18 and you aren’t yet a registered voter, CLICK HERE to register.

Date of PA’s GOP primary: April 24, 2012

Date of Presidential Election: November 6, 2012

By Breiana Herr –

For a teen deep in trouble, it can be hard to turn your life around.

Allante Floyd, a Penn Manor senior, is working to turn around his reputation and his life.

Floyd, originally from North Philadelphia’s William Tennent High School, is happy to be working toward his goals at Penn Manor.

“There is nothing wrong with William Tennent High School, it’s a great learning environment but it’s boring in my opinion,” Floyd said.

Floyd’s parents passed away nine years ago, leaving his grandmother to raise him and his brother Rakim Herman.

“I was torn, lost every care and became rebellious,” Floyd said. “My turning point took place when I was incarcerated.”

Floyd said he was arrested multiple times on serious charges and went to several schools as he continued to be expelled for bad behavior.

Even then Floyd said he wasn’t ready to make the changes he needed.

It took one final run-in with the law before he realized he should be headed in a different direction.

“I wasn’t that scared, I felt like it was a part of becoming a man and I prepared myself mentally the best I could,” recalled Floyd.  “Being in a jail cell is very boring, it allows you to think, read and become crafty.”

Floyd said he noticed the people who were locked up didn’t seem to have a care in the world except getting out and doing more of the same activities that got them there in the first place.

Floyd decided being in jail wasn’t somewhere he wanted to be.  He knew it wasn’t too late to make a positive change in his life.

“I now understand the importance of education, and now I value its power,” said Floyd.

Recently Floyd got his own apartment in Millersville with his brother, Rakim, where they intend to start their new life while his brother attends Millersville University.

Floyd said his brother has a big influence on him because he takes education very seriously and enjoys helping people.  He is the only person that Floyd looks up to.

“He has my best interest at heart, so I trust him,” Floyd said.

They decided to grow up and take on the responsibilities of paying rent, buying food and clothing as well as other necessities.  Floyd has to keep his apartment clean and his brother works at the admission’s office on campus.

“Coming to Penn Manor, my mindset was putting my education first,” said Floyd. “I wasn’t worried about fitting in or making friends.  I just want to graduate and further my education at a four-year university.”

The number one school Floyd would like to attend is Millersville, where he wants to major in business management or accounting. If Floyd doesn’t get accepted in Millersville he would like to attend Penn State, West Chester University or Shippensburg.

Floyd said he wants to stay out of trouble and keep his life on the right path, so he can be successful out of college and get a good job to make money and start a family of his own.

The most important thing he has learned through all his experiences, said Floyd, is that the future holds many possibilities for him. He said he bleieves in the value of hard work and appreciates the opportunities that the future holds for him.