High Tide Feb, 7, 2014

Redondo Beach, CA // Redondo Union High School Feb. 7, 2014 // Vol. XCIV // Edition 9

sharks

TIDE

blood

HIGH

dogs

p. 8 Is working in groups really that beneficial?

disorder needles

dark

clowns

fire

depth ocean heights vegetables elevators spiders insects fish germs p. 15

Senior Courtney Melendrez volunteers often for cats.

p. 16 What gives coach Reggie Morris his magic touch?

Got fear?

PHOTO ILLUSTRATION BY JUSTIN LEE AND JOSEPH BIESHCKE

Photos of the Week Battle of the Bands

Sadie Hawkins

Bud’s Memorial

Tuning up. 1. Senior Garret Lash performs on the first day of the Battle of the Bands competition, singing and playing piano. 2. Bombin’ Blonde played for the audience in front of the Student Union on Tuesday.

1.

PHOTOS BY JUSTIN LEE AND MATT MARDESICH

2.

The roaring 20’s. Girls asked the guys out to Sadie Hawkins last Saturday, where a Gatsby-themed small gym awaited dancers and partiers alike.

PHOTO BY TYLER EISENHART

PHOTOS BY JUSTIN LEE

In loving memory. Students and administration spoke in honor of the late Gaylord “Bud” Irwin at a memorial service that brought many to tears.

Science bowl leaves lasting impression on team members

by Caitlyn Catubig

The Science Bowl team lost three out of five rounds in the morning session while competing at the JPL Regional Science Bowl on February 1st, making them unable to continue on into afternoon rounds.

“We did well, the competition is extremely difficult,” team coach and physics teacher Matthew Keye said. “We won some matches, we lost some matches, but we played pretty well against one of the best teams at the competition.”

The team “held back” well-known competitors such as Arcadia, who are renowned for holding the title of Regional Champions multiple times and being one of the top groups in the nation.

“We held them to a smaller amount of points than we normally do, which was an accomplishment,” Keye said. “Of course they beat us because they’re just amazing at how fast they can answer questions.”

By the end of the competition, the team was only four points, or one question, away from making it into the afternoon rounds.

“This year we really needed some more biology knowledge. We were really good at chemistry, good at physics and we were good at math,” Keye said. “We need more time to develop a team over multiple years to really get into the top and make it into the afternoon rounds.”

In past years, the RUHS Science Bowl teams had never made it to the competitions’ afternoon rounds which inspired a goal for the team.

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NEWS

“It’s a big goal; it just shows you’re in the top eight out of twenty-four teams, and it’s something that we haven’t done in a long time,” Keye said. “Each year we get closer and closer. Some years we’re off by just one question. Right at the last second, you either get it right or you get it wrong and that determines your fate. This year, we were pretty close again.”

The team believes that their teamwork is one factor that led to their successful performance at the competition.

“You rely heavily on teamwork. Every person on the team needs to be up on their game and every person is necessary,” senior Matthew O’Connell said. “Without a person, you lose a huge part of your team and can’t perform at the same level.”

Their teamwork was reflected in how they competed.

“In comparison with the other teams, I believe we had the best cooperation skills.

Each of us had an individual skill set in one of the various sciences,” O’Connell said.

“We would delegate questions to each other and when a bonus question would come up, we would immediately turn to each other and start working out the problems, usually coming up with the right answer.”

This was echoed by the team’s captain, senior Cedric Hyon.

“We counteracted each other very well because a lot of us had certain weaknesses, like some of us hadn’t finished our AP physics course, or some of us haven’t taken

chemistry. Then, there were random facts of Earth, space, and astronomy that some of us knew every now and then,” Hyon says. “We were able to balance each other out with the knowledge we had.”

Overall, the team found competing in the Science Bowl to be a fun, well-spent experience.

“It was nice to be there with my team and spend time with them,” senior Vera Gold said. “We met students from other schools with the same interests as us and we

made connections with them. The knowledge we’ve accumulated over the years from science and math really paid off and we got to see that when we were answering questions.”

Keye added his thoughts to the team’s experience.

“It was a great team. They were really motivated and they had a great time,” Keye said. “Its really about the celebration of science and thinking about all of it’s different aspects in a fun way.”

PHOTO COURESY OF VERA GOLD

For Science!

From left to right, Matthew O’ Connell, Sarah Antilla, Vera Gold, And Cedric Hyon. The science bowl was hosted at the JPL Laboratory run

by NASA. The students were able to see a lecture by Bill Nye the Science guy and other professors about different Mars Rovers. “There were a lot of different models with descriptions that helped me learn a lot more about space exploration,” Hyon said.

AcaDec awaits weekend result

by Shaniya Markalanda

PHOTOS BY CEDRIC HYON

New suede shoes.

New band director Viscarra shows off his skills both playing the trombone and conducting for class.

Raymundo Viscarra joins staff as band director interview by Cedric Hyon

Q: Why did you specifically pick Redondo?

A: I wanted to work with the students

at this school because the band program has a lot of potential and can do many great things. I’ve been teaching for 8 years now, and I’ve seen Redondo perform before.

There’s years where they’re really good and other years where I have ideas of what the group could be. There’s some years they do well, and other years where they need a certain direction.

noying because the producers in the call audition said that “this year we’re not looking for the next pop singer, we’re looking for the next real voice.” The reason I didn’t make it through was because they asked me to sing the Star Spangled Banner, and it’s such a hard song to sing. I knew the melody, but I blanked out on the words just then and there, so that was my shot at that and I didn’t make it in.

Q: How would you describe your teaching style? What created this great program?

A: I just make sure that the students trust me. I connect with the students a lot so they’re able to trust me with knowing that I can take them to a certain level. There’s a mutual respect between us. I’m able to joke and relate to kids and I’ve always had that connection with kids where they want to be in my class and hang out and play music or even just talk.

Q: What do you expect for the rest of the year?

A: Through the years, I want to get to Q: Tell me a little bit about Q: How have the staff been at know the rest of the students and plan for your past and past jobs. the following year. And I want to plan for Redondo?

A: I went to a school in Michigan. Be- field season and start thinking about band A: Everyone here from top to bottom fore that I went to El Camino College. After I returned from Michigan, I graduated from Ohio State. My first job was at Fairfax High School. When I got there, I started a music program from scratch, both band and orchestra. My band won Division 1 City Championship, so the students became competitive. The nature was great to have, since it set the stage for the years to come and to repeat the next accomplishment. We won 2 more championships, and the orchestra was really good. They had excellent and superior ratings and even unanimous superior ratings.

Q: What’s something that I wouldn’t expect from you?

A: I was on American Idol and I took

camp and what to play next season. They’re a highly competitive group, and just need something to stand out.

Q: How many instruments do you play?

A: Pretty much all of them. I can do

has been great and really helpful. I haven’t met all of the teachers, but when I meet someone new, they say, “Hey you’re the new band guy.” They call me the band guy until they learn my name.

Q: Where do you commute flute, clarinet, saxophone, french horn, from?

A: I commute from West Hollywood. tuba, trumpet. The double reed instruments are really hard. Everything in percussion; the best thing I can play are the mallet instruments like marimba. I also teach private piano lessons outside of schools. I can also do violin, cello, bass and viola. Guitar is weird for me on my wrist when twisting it and it was too painful.

Traffic is usually not an issue but it was difficult waking up so early and I almost fell asleep on the way home.

Q: Anything else you’d like to add?

A: I hope the students are getting accli-

mated to me and being open to me being

Q: What do you like about Re- their teacher. I feel bad that I have to come voice lessons in college to get a better sound dondo? towards the last part of the seniors’ years. I on my trombone, I never really thought A: The fact that you can see the beach hope they can respect the fact that I’m trying of singing, but my teachers were serious. I made it all the way with the main audition with the executive producers. However, they were looking for a pop style and I had more of an opera-musical type of style. It was an-

anywhere you drive makes me really happy and relaxed. It’s a really relaxing feeling to be able to see the ocean.

to make the last few months in their band program much better. The fact that so many seniors are still in band shows how much of a foundation Mr. Aguero left for us.

After countless hours of studying, RUHS’s Academic Decathlon teams await the results from the regional competition.

“Students are tested on ten subjects— speech, interview, essay, art, literature, science, music, economics, math and social science,” said Sam Arrow, a member of the Senior team.

Two teams from Redondo Union competed this year—the senior team and the junior team.

“The junior team scores don’t really count, it’s kind of like a practice team. For the senior team, if we did well enough on the regional competitions, then we’ll go on to the state competition,” Arrow said.

“Each team is divided into three groups -varsity, scholastic, and honors- based on GPA unweighted. So the order is varsity with the lowest GPA, then scholastic, then honors,” Arrow said. “Having three different GPA levels in each team allows the competition to be open to all, regardless of grades.”

In addition to the competition being open to anyone grade-wise, Arrow believes it is for people of all personalities.

“I feel like AcaDec attracts a lot of different people for a lot of different reasons.

You don’t need to be hardworking to be on it,” Arrow said. “I’d say maybe it’s for people that have a lot of free time that are looking for something different.”

Bella Hsu, another team member, believes the team was more prepared this year.

“The team this year is much stronger and much more focused than we were last year,” Hsu said. “Even though we tied for 1st at Super Quiz, I know that it does not guarantee taking first in the region. Regardless, I couldn’t be prouder of my team.”

Although Arrow agrees that the team was more prepared, some portions were still difficult and others were easier.

“Art was the easiest. This is sort of a general consensus. It wasn’t very complicated, it was all very straightforward,” Arrow said.

Through Acadec, Arrow feels he has learned to work hard.

“In a lot of classes, you can find shortcuts, but there are no shortcuts in AcaDec. You have to sit down and you have to power through all of it,” Arrow said.

Because the competition is important to the Academic Decathlon class, students work outside of class.

“Primarily, most of the work we do is outside of class. In class, we spend a lot of time organizing and planning, so our studying is outside of class,” Arrow said. “For the weeks leading up to the competition, we stayed until like 5:30 after school studying.”

Arrow feels Acadec was worth his time.

“I’ve made some of my closest friends through AcaDec. It’s been a constant thing in my life, it’s always on my mind and I look forward to it.” Arrow said.

NEWS . 3

ELI’S

CORNER

“Admitting unqualified students into schools based on athletic ability is wrong.”

Dreams of stadiums packed to the brim with screaming fans. Aspirations of a professional career and a multi-million dollar contract. Irresistible offers of scholarships, benefits and ultimately admission to some of the biggest names in the country. It’s no mystery why high school athletics are taken so seriously when you look at some of the doors they open for student athletes. Student athletes deserve to be rewarded for their commitment and their skill. There is no question about that. However, this system, while seemingly beneficial for student athletes of all kinds, has a disturbing side effect in the form of academic exceptions given out by prestigious schools to under-qualified students with a “special talent.”

Student athletes with grades and test scores that are significantly lower than the averages of a school like Berkeley or Michigan find themselves admitted on the basis of their “special talents” on the court, field, pitch, or ice. With so many thousands of students attending these popular, prestigious schools, what’s the harm in letting in a few under-qualified athletes who are headed to careers in the NBA, NFL and other professional sports leagues?

1.7% of college football players ever play professionally. That also goes for 1.3% of college hockey players, 1.2% of college basketball players, 1% of college soccer players, and the list goes on and on, with only one sport exceeding 2% (Business Insider). For the other 98% of college athletes, they will graduate and be pushed into the real world with the expectations of supporting themselves and finding a career. This isn’t so easy for those who found themselves completely overwhelmed by the academic environments of UCLA, Wisconsin, Washington and the rest. 44% of football players from Berkeley graduate with a degree.

60% of basketball players at UCLA get a diploma (SFgate.com). These athletes get lured away from schools where they have a chance to legitimately succeed academically in order to win games and bring in revenue for big name programs like those mentioned above.

It’s easy to point the finger at the people responsible but solutions aren’t as obvious. But overall, college is about preparing people for the future and providing them with the skills necessary to succeed in the real world. Depriving students of that for the sake of packing college stadiums and generating revenue is wrong and goes against everything higher education is supposed to stand for.

4 . OPINION

ILLUSTRATION BY JOSEPH BIESCHKE

EDITORIAL:

The shift to the new Common Core standards means a shift in curriculum for teachers. But will this also mean a shift to more flexible curriculum? Or will these new standards turn us all into robots?

It’s the school’s job to ensure that we get the best education and that we reach our full potential. In the past, this has meant getting students on more or less an equal plane, with standardized tests and STAR scores are used to measure everyone against a certain standard.

But is this truly what is needed to prepare us for college and the world beyond it?

RUHS is working on a large educational shift: from STAR based teaching to Common Core based teaching, which focus on math, science and English based skills.

The new standards are also more streamlined and ideal when paired with the new Chromebooks and other technological devices that schools across the SOuth Bay will be recieving shortly.

According to Principal Dr. Nicole Wesley, this means that teachers are going to teach not just so that we get the best score possible on a given test, but so that we learn all the skills necessary to be applied to our lives in anything, be it tests, jobs, or everyday problems.

“As a country, we are falling behind other countries in terms of achievements,” Wesley said. “Going to Common Core is more about shifts in instructional practice, and in my opinion it lends itself to more freedom or liberty in teaching so that students can be more successful.”

Now, this is not to say that having standards to match are a bad thing. Without

these standards of education, who’s to say that one teacher would have to teach the exact same thing as another? Without these benchmarks students’ learning would be all over the place and there would be no way to gauge who needs improvement and who doesn’t. But it all depends on the individual teacher’s style of teaching and interests in what should be taught.

“For equality’s sake, I think it’s great that we have standards. In terms of teachers having more liberty, how they implement the standards and teach students is completely up to them,” Wesley said.

And yet, this is where the strength of our education has its roots. Having a standard to teach by is great, but alone it is not enough. Combine this standard with a teacher who knows just how to get the information across in the best way possible and that’s how students learn exactly what they need to be successful.

Common Core standards will require a higher level of analytical teaching and learning. It’s not as easy to figure out how to apply the themes in Lincoln’s “Emancipation Proclamation” to “Washington’s Crossing the Delaware” as it is to review a powerpoint of information, only to regurgitate the information later.

Therefore, this switch will require teachers to have even more freedom and creativity in their teaching styles then they have now. To learn more difficult concepts, stu-

dents are likely to have a more difficult time learning if teachers just give them a black and white, facts-filled presentation of information. More abstract and fun lessons are more likely to make applicable ideas concrete.

And that, in the end, is what Common Core is all about. Teaching students skills they’ll need to apply to life so that they can find a problem and figure out how to use what they’ve learned to figure it out, despite the difficulty it may present.

Whether or not you agree to having more difficult standards of learning, it’s an inevitability in the world to come across issues that will be hard to solve. The standards that will be implemented will give students the tools to find solutions.

Therefore, although it will require that our teachers rework their ideas of what should and should not be taught to students, teaching to Common Core standards will allow teachers to be more liberal with their teaching and will give students more of a chance to be successful in the future.

By the numbers

Editorial Staff Vote

For

Against

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Letters to the Editor If you have an opinion about one of the articles, emails can be sent to the editor at hightideonline@gmail.com.

We reserve the right to edit them for content, grammar, and space constraints. Letters must be signed and are not guaranteed to be printed.

HIGH TIDE

STAFF

Editors in Chief: Cedric Hyon; Allegra

Peelor Managing Editor: Alejandro Quevedo News Editor: Jason Rochlin Opinion Editor: Chance King Health Editor: Kayla Nicholls

Features Editors: Kira Bowen; Yas-

meen El-Hasan; Stella Gianoukakis; Shawn Mallen; Grace Zoerner Sports Editors: Ted Cavus; Micah Ezzes Photo Editors: Tyler Eisenhart; Justin Lee Copy Editors Deborah Chang; Lauren Diethelm; Angela Kim; Romy Moreno; Illustrators: Joseph Bieschke; Angela Kim; Luma Wegman Online Editors: Vivian Lam; Kayla Maanum Staff Writers: Lauryn Alejo; Joseph Blakely; Jennie Bao; Caitlyn Catubig; Jason Clebowicz; Caitlin Cochran; Shaw Coneybeare; Lauren Diethelm; Jason Fong; Vaidehi Gandhi; Nina Gomez; Kelly Harraka; Caterina Hyneman; Eli Jarmel; Roxanne Labat; Stephanie Lai; Sophie Maguy; Shaniya Markalanda; Marie Ona; Chris Paludi; Phoebe Reneau; Jené Price; Amanda Ross; Chandler Ross; Sophia Ruffo; Reema Saad; Amanda Shaw; Laura Smith; John Webb; Luma Wegman; Cody Williams The High Tide dedicates itself to producing a high-quality publication that both informs and entertains the entire student body.

This is a wholly student managed, designed, and written newspaper that focuses on school and community events.

The High Tide is published by the journalism class at Redondo Union High School, One Sea Hawk Way, Redondo Beach, CA 90277.

Signed commentaries and editorial cartoons represent the opinions of the staff writer or cartoonist and in no way reflect the opinions of the other members of the High Tide staff.

TAG-TEAM ELI JARMEL

ONE PROBLEM, TWO WRITERS EXAMINING EVERY ANGLE TO FIND THE RIGHT SOLUTION

CODY WILLIAMS

PHOTOS BY JUSTIN LEE

PROBLEM: Should the grading system be subjective or objective?

For many, an English essay means 40 excruciating minutes of trying to guess exactly what the teacher wants to see on paper. Although it may seem impossible, the truth is that there is a system and established set of standards for what defines an ‘A’ paper. English teachers don’t just hurl a random number out for an essay. 12th grade AP English Literature teacher Tim Ammentorp explained the process of grading an essay.

“Grading the essay, first of all, requires that you know exactly what the prompt asks,” Ammentorp said. “Then you have to have an idea of what appropriate answers to that question are, because there can be multiple answers.”

Recognizing the significance of the prompt is vital to understanding how English teachers grade essays. Just like any math or science test, essays pose a central question that needs to be answered.

Ammentorp believes that all English teachers accept answers that differ from their personal interpretation as long as the answer is an appropriate response to the prompt.

“Ideally, all [English teachers]

could look at a work or an essay that may not answer the question exactly the way we would but still see the value and the quality of it,” Ammentorp said.

The entire English department gathers before each school year to discuss and clearly define what requirements an essay needs to fulfill to earn each number on the 9 point scale. Ammentorp discussed this meeting and how it helps establish an objective system for grading papers.

“The English teachers have gotten together on several occasions to sit down with a group of essays and to try and [define what is] an ‘A’ essay and what is a ‘B’ essay,” Ammentorp said.

While a ‘7’ essay in AP English Language might be a ‘5’ in an AP English Literature class, the variation between two teachers of Language or two teachers of Literature is nearly nonexistent. Is there some subjectivity in grading essays? Of course, but there is also some subjectivity in the grading of math and science tests as well. The bottom line is that no teacher can determine your grade solely on opinion and that there is a well-defined method to the often-criticized grading of English essays.

A test is taken. The score is recorded. A final grade is earned.

Although an objective approach to grading may seem cold and somewhat robotic, its overall simplicity and consistency are why it is so commonly used.

Here at RUHS, there are two main systems of grading. A subjective system which utilizes the judgement of the grader in evaluation, typically found in english classes, and objective grading in which a single question has a single correct answer.

Mathematics teacher Tim Baumgartner has used an objective approach to grading for much of his 26 year career and appreciates the simplicity of the system.

“It’s nice to look at a student’s answer and know that it’s either right or wrong,” Baumgartner said. “Because most of the time there is only one answer.”

The consistency and reliability of this system makes grading straightforward and nearly eliminates ambiguity and grade disputes which something both students and teachers can appreciate.

“On the occasion of a dispute I am able to look at a student’s work and determine if I should give them any credit or not,” Baumgartner said. “But most of

the time the grading is correct.”

Unlike subjective grading commonly found in an English class, objective grading allows students to pinpoint areas that need improvement and concentrate on strengthening those certain areas.

“Grading this way eliminates grey areas,” Baumgartner said.

“That’s what I really appreciate about it.”

But could objective methods be applied in classes such as english that require deep thought and analysis? If objectivity was used to grade essays instead of being at the complete mercy of the evaluator would essays become uniform in structure?

English teacher Aimiee Gauvreau finds rubrics effective in bringing objectivity into grading assignments such as speeches and essays.

“Rubrics are as formulaic as it gets in English,” Gauvreau said.

Although rubrics give students a clear understanding of an assignment’s requirements, they lack essential impressionability made through human observation.

“At the end of the day you can’t align students’ work with preconceived words,” Gauvreau said, “I want to grade students, not words.”

VERDICT: Objective grading is an integral part of any grading system Overall, the grading system at Redondo is efficient in measuring student performance. Both objectivity and subjectivity are present in all classes and each serve a specific and necessary purpose.

No single teacher can decide a grade based on opinion or mood and there is an established and reliable system for grading assignments in all types of classes.

The point of standards and

standardized testing is to make sure that students are well-rounded and that schools are providing equal amount of education to all students.

Although it may seem like an unfair system at times, it serves a very specific and necessary purpose.

Teachers and administrators know that every student is different, but if every student was graded subjectively, teachers would be

responsible for giving special attention to hundreds of kids.

This would simply not work.

And at a school as large as RUHS, a system like this could be disastrous to the quality of teaching as a whole.

The goal for teachers should be to offer special treatment to students when they struggle with areas of the standards. It is idealistic to think that any type of grading system could be tailored specifi-

cally for each and every student.

A teacher’s job is not to be a tutor, but a guide to students’ learning and education. In the end, a student’s grade reflects the effort and understanding they achieve in the class, not whether the teacher likes them or not.

Without objectivity, grading would be almost impossible. In short: standards and objective grading are here to stay, for better or for worse.

OPINION . 5

Tattoo talk Compiled by Vaidehi Gandhi and Caterina Hyneman

English Teacher Angie Yi Q: Why did you get your tattoo? Q: Why is your tattoo in elfish?

Does having it reassure you?

A: I especially wanted [my tattoo] in elfish A: I originally got it because this was a period because Lord of the Rings was the love of in my life when there were a lot of changes every year. I thought I had found the job of my dreams, but just because of budget cuts I had been laid off every single year that I’d gotten a job, and it hurt really badly because I hadthought that I had it made. I realized that as hard as I may work and as much as I think I deserve a good job, at the end of the day, life happens. Sometimes life throws you things and you have to learn how to deal with them. It was a heartbreaking lesson, but from that I realized that there is always hope and that we need to learn how to face all these adversities and grow from them. I think this is one important thing to know about life: nothing is ever guaranteed, and it doesn’t matter if you’re a good person or that you come from a good family. What matters is how you’re able to face adversity.

Q: What does it feel like to get a tattoo?

A: It feels like somebody got a toothpick

and rubbed it against you skin for 30 minutes straight. It was irritable having to just feel it constantly, for 30 minutes, but it definitely wasn’t as painful.

Q: What does your tattoo say?

A: My tattoo in elfish means there is always PHOTOS BY TYLER EISENHART

hope.

my life since middle school and the font is just beautiful. I didn’t want it to be in English. I wanted it to be mysterious and something that meant something to just me.

Q: Why did you get the tattoo on your wrist?

A: I wanted it on my arm, so when it faces me, I could see it. Having it around my wrist just makes it feel like a bracelet. It was just a subconscious choice that I made.

Q: What do you say to people who ask about your tattoo?

A: If it’s an acquaintance [that I’m talking

to] I just say that it’s my favorite quote from Lord of the Rings. I think Gandalf says it.

Just the epicness--even the audience might know that they are going to succeed but the characters don’t. If he believes that, and since he is someone of power, then everyone else would believe too just because he does.

Q: Would you get another one?

A: Because tattoos are so permanent, it

would have to be something I would have to think deeply about. I don’t want to just get any random tattoo. It’s what it symbolizes that makes it worth it, and I don’t want to get something that doesn’t really have some deep meaning. It won’t be for awhile.

Spanish Teacher Amanda Duran

Q: What are your tattoos of?

Q: How does having them make Q: Why did you get your tattoos?

A: The first tattoo looks like the Loch Ness you feel?

A: What can I say? I’m a rebel with a cause. monster hanging out in a compass. One A: It makes me think that I really should ¡Sí se puede! on my ankle is a shell that I got when my have thought about the first three.

Q: What does it feel like to get a grandma died; she was the person I loved most in the world. Her name meant “Shell.” Q: Is there any symbolism in the tattoo?

The other one is a symbol that my grandma tattoos?

A: It feels like someone is burning your skin used to draw with me. It was a puzzle that A: I thought I was super cool and I was all with a lighter, for like an hour.

I could never figure out; she never taught me the solution. The best one is a Mexican calavera that I drew.

about the ocean and the sun.

Q: Would you get another one?

Q: Where are they located?

A: Yes, but this time I am really, really goA: Foot, ankle, shoulder, back; all the stan- ing to make sure that I absolutely love it. No dard places for my generation.

cartoon characters for me.

Q: Was the tattoo worth the pain? Q: What advice do you have for A: I guess, but I made sure the place was those who are thinking of getting legitimate and sterile. a tattoo?

Q: When did you get your tat- A: Think before you ink and make sure it is toos? okay with your parents and that it is someA: I was 19. I still hid it from my mom for thing you won’t be embarrassed to explain

6.

a year. I told my grandma though.

HEALTH

in 10 years!

Pass Out

Illustrations by Joseph Bieschke Lulu Wegman

Health Risks Compiled by Lauren Diethelm

Allergic reactions

Granulomas and keloids

Tattoo dyes — especially red, green, yellow and blue dyes — can cause allergic skin reactions, such as an itchy rash at the tattoo site. This can occur even years after you get the tattoo.

Sometimes bumps called granulomas form around tattoo ink. Tattooing can also lead to keloids — raised areas caused by an overgrowth of scar tissue.

Skin infection A skin infection — which might cause redness, swelling, pain and a pus-like drainage — is possible after tattooing.

Bloodborne illness If the equipment used to create your tattoo is contaminated with infected blood, you can contract various bloodborne diseases — including tetanus, hepatitis B and hepatitis C. Illustrations by Lulu Wegman

HEALTH

.

7

Different Learning Styles compiled by Chris Paludi illustrations by Joseph Bieschke

There are three main types of learning styles: auditory, visual and kinesthetic. Though there are three main styles, most people prefer one.

Auditory learners

PHOTO BY CHANDLER ROSS

We’re all in this together. Junior Dylan Moore participates in a group discussion in Sra. Gonzalez’s Spanish class.

Prefer listening to lessons as opposed to reading through them.

Study habits: Reading study material aloud while listening to music.

Visual learners Learn best by looking at graphics, watching a demonstration, or reading. Study habits: Looking at charts and graphs.

Kinesthetic learners

Digest information best through a participatory learning environment. Study habits: Sitting still while studying may be difficult, but writing things down makes it easier to understand.

Information from http://www.learningrx.com/ types-of-learning-styles-faq.htm

8

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FEATURES

Dillard and Yi discuss the benefits of group work

by Roxanne Labat

Some students think that group work is a waste of time and that only one student will do all the work. However, like many of their colleagues, teachers Linda Dillard and Angie Yi think otherwise.

“Group work is most advantageous when students are trying to solve a difficult problem,” chemistry teacher Linda Dillard said.

“Labs can be pretty challenging; if you try to do it by yourself, you might just give up. If you’re trying to solve a problem in a group, you might be able to exchange ideas with others.”

Being assigned to a group can be academically advantageous to students.

“Sometimes, explaining the material to people allows you to learn it. Other times, having people explain it to you helps,” Dillard said.

Working with others in class can prepare students for real-world situations off campus.

“Many things in life, like a future job, require that you work collaboratively,” Dillard said. “It’s important to learn those skills.”

According to Dillard, group work requires “individual accountability.”

“I always tell my students that if they just go through the mechanics without fully understanding the material, they’ll have a tough time when they need to perform individually,” Dillard explained.

Working in a group is known for encouraging some students to allow their group members to do most of the work.

“The critical thing is that you have to work at it and not copy off of others,” Dillard said. “Answers can certainly sound a lot alike because students work towards the same goal, but when they do their individu-

al assessments, you can tell who understood it.”

While many of Dillard’s past students have felt comfortable working with others on an assignment, some have favored working alone.

Over the years, most students preferred to be in a group. But I’ve had a few who didn’t want to,” Dillard said. “I’m not opposed to individual work, but there must be some aspect where you have to be working with other people to learn in life.”

“One of the main issues with group work is the students’ work compatibility.

“I change the groups every unit. Some students don’t want to work in their group because it wasn’t a good group for them. By changing the groups a lot, students can find someone to work with,” Dillard said.

English teacher Angie Yi agrees that group work is beneficial to students.

“A lot of the time, students get too nervous or anxious when the focus is just on them individually in front of the teacher and the entire class,” Yi said. “To help facilitate discussion, we like to have students talk to one another first and get a bit more comfortable. It’s good to hear your thoughts being said out loud so that you can find what you want to say to the other students.”

Working in a group can also encourage students to make realizations without a teacher’s help, allowing students to make sense of what they are learning.

“There is a dialogue in class that shouldn’t only be between the teacher and students. It should be among the students themselves,” Yi said.

Like Dillard, Yi sees group work as preparation for life after high school graduation.

“It helps prepare students for college,” Yi said. “In my smaller classes, 50 percent of my students’ grades was based on participation. I want to encourage students to know that what they have to say is valuable and, even if it’s wrong, that’s okay. The point is that they’re thinking, making progress and taking risks. To help students be comfortable in facing these risks is to help them work with each other.”

Yi believes that working with others and striving for the same goal is a preview for the future.

“The reality is that we have to work with people our entire lives,” Yi said. “Whatever your job is, you have to know how to effectively communicate. When you go to work, you’re going to be put into groups and you are going to have to do presentations that way. In general, if you are in a leadership position, you have to learn to work with people. That’s why group work is a really important factor in the high school classroom.”

Yi knows that effort can be a priority for some group members, but an issue for others.

“I understand that there are times when someone isn’t pulling his or her leg in the group work or someone’s just being lame and not saying anything meaningful, but that’s life,” Yi said. “It really is a reflection of what we’re going to face when we head out into the real world.”

Yi claims that by working with others, students will have an entirely different experience than if they were working alone.

“No man is an island,” Yi said. “And just by being people, we have the responsibility to work with each other.”

Should new material be taught before a test? complied by Lauren Dielthem

Interference theory states that interference occurs when the learning of something new causes the forgetting of older material on the basis of competition between the two. The stored memory is intact, but the brain may be unable to be retrieve it due to the competition created by newly acquired or previously learned information.

University of South Florida conducted a study where students were told to remember 25 different names of people and were asked to write down those names every 15 minutes over a five hour period (for a total of 20 tests). The students were instructed to either watch television or read a book during the intervals between the tests. They noticed that as time passed, the students mixed up the learnt names with the newly learned information from the TV and the book.

Proactive: Past memories inhibit an individual’s full potential to retain new memories (example: difficulty in remembering a friend’s new phone number after having previously learned the old number).

Retroactive: When newly learned information interferes with and impedes the recall of previously learned information (example: when someone gets a new phone number it replaces the memory of the old number).

Information from http://www.scholarcommons.usf.edu

FEATURES

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9

by Stephanie Lai

Fears come in all shapes and sizes, and for senior Keegan Linnett they just happen to look like the insides of large vegetables.

“They look extremely vile and unearthly, and their weird parts make me think they’ll trap me in them,” Linnett said.

According to Linnett, pumpkins are especially “bad.”

“The insides of pumpkins are just very wild and uncomfortable because of the sheer concentration and disorder of them,” Linnet said. “It’s really sad around Halloween because I can’t carve pumpkins.”

Linnett thinks he has been repressing a “traumatic childhood encounter with a large vegetable.”

“I’ve been told that when I was really young, I saw brain matter on the sidewalk from a crime scene,” Linnett said.

He believes this is the cause of his fear.

“It’s a really traumatizing thing for a kid to see in real life. I don’t think anyone should witness something like that.” Linnett said. “I think pumpkins bring back that shock and fear from when I was younger.”

Though Linnett is afraid of the inside of large vegetables, he is a vegetarian for health and ethical reasons.

“For the most part, vegetables aren’t very noticeable when there’s lots of other stuff in a dish” Linnett said.

PHOTO BY JUSTIN LEE ILLUSTRATION BY ANGELA KIM

Dozens of colorful fish swarm beneath the surface of the clear turquoise water. As Fong spots them out of the corner of her eye, panic shoots through her body. She is paralyzed with fear. Her legs have seemed to turn to lead. There is nothing she can do to stop the tropical fish from nibbling at her skin from head to toe. Suddenly, she wakes up in a cold sweat. It was all a dream.

“Fish freak me out. I don’t want them to touch me, and I feel like they are going to come up to me. I just don’t want them to be near me,” junior Kaela Fong said.

Although Fong is afraid of swimming in water that contains fish, her fear does not apply to swimming in general.

“I really like swimming, and I love swimming in the ocean. I just have to make sure that I don’t see any fish. As long as I don’t see them, then I’m okay,” Fong said.

In fact, her love of swimming and hatred of fish have come into conflict with one another.

“When I was in Hawaii one day at the beach, I saw a fish and I basically ran out of the water,” Fong said.

Since many activities in Hawaii

WHAT DO YOU FEAR?

involve swimming with fish, Fong’s fear affected her enjoyment of the vacation.

“I felt really disappointed because when you think of Hawaii you think of going to the beach and going snorkeling in really pretty clear water. I didn’t really get to take part in that because of my fear,” Fong said.

She missed out on creating memories with her family due to the limitations on the activities she could comfortably participate in.

“I didn’t get to stay in the water very long when I went snorkeling with my dad and brother. I just got to see the pictures afterwards. It made me miss out on time I could’ve spent hanging out with them and bonding with them,” Fong said.

Fong hopes to eventually put an end to the negative influence her fear has had upon her life.

“I really would like to overcome my fear because I really want to go snorkeling more and things like that when I go to Hawaii,” Fong said. “Last time I went I couldn’t go snorkeling because I was so afraid of going in the water with the fish. So I would like to be able to snorkel more.”

Elevated fear. Junior Cammy Gonzalez is afraid of being inside elevators because she does not like how cramped it feels when there are a lot of people in such a small space. She often feels sick to her stomach after riding in elevators.

Claustrophobic Cammy

by Joseph Blakely

by Nina Gomez

10 . FEATURES

from her family’s history of mental health and her own past.

“My family has a history of anxiety but not OCD and my counselor told me that it’s common for kids with OCD to come from dysfunctional families. My parents got divorced when I was really little and it kind of made me feel out of place; I felt pretty lost and out of control, so it’s like a control issue.” Elwood said. “I felt like I needed to be in control of something and that I had to do things in a certain way in order to make the fear go away, like I would do strange things to make my anxiety subside. It made me feel better but only temporarily.”

Her mysophobia and OCD subsided when she started middle school; the counseling and medication has helped her lead a normal and more secure life.

“Sometimes I’ll be a little uncomfortable around dirty things, but it’s definitely not how it was before and I can say with confidence that my fear is pretty much completely gone because it was a really extreme case and now I feel normal and happy,” Elwood said.

“

A meaningless life. We’re all going to die eventually and I don’t want to have wasted my life while I had it.

– SAMANTHA KARNES, 11

PHOTO BY JUSTIN LEE

Senior Kimberly Elwood’s severe childhood OCD and mysophobia prevented her from undertaking certain tasks but has since recovered with the help of counseling and medication Elwood’s fear alienated her from her friends in the normal activities she refused to take part in because of the fear of becoming “contaminated.”

“Sometimes I would be afraid to go to my friends’ houses because I had a fear of getting sick at their house without my parents around and it was really stressful,” Elwood said. “It was hard to watch all my friends be able to do things like touching their food, going out and playing on the playground.

They looked like they were having fun and I was so afraid to do all that.”

Elwood’s parents took the initiative during her last years of elementary school and got her in counseling and subsequently on medication for her OCD. “I went to counseling for my OCD when I was about 9 and my dad did the best he could to reassure me that everything was going to be okay because sometimes I would freak myself out to the point of actual panic attacks,” Elwood said.

Counseling encouraged Elwood to find out where exactly her fear had come from, which she later found out had originated

compiled by Lauren Diethelm photos by Ted Cavus

Everybody has a fear– whether it is the fear of spiders (arachnophobia) or the fear of clowns (coulrophobia). Some students, however, suffer from unique fears that sometimes interfere with their everyday lives.

Elwood used to have severe OCD As a child she would wash her hands until they were sore and would refuse to eat food that either she or others had touched-- just to get away from the germs that constantly trapped her. Senior Kimberly Elwood’s childhood Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD) and mysophobia, or fear of germs, restricted her from having a normal life when she was younger.

“When I was little I was terrified of germs and it’s kind of a silly fear to have and some people would probably laugh about it but it really did control my life,” Elwood said.

“I felt like everything was contaminated and everything had germs on it or they were on me and I’d freak out.”

In attempts to relieve herself from the fear, Elwood would take precautions that she deemed necessary to get away from the germs she thought were always there.

“I’d wash my hands until they were raw because I was so uncomfortable all the time.

I wouldn’t eat parts of food that my fingers touched because I was so scared,” Elwood said. “It was hard because a lot of people didn’t understand how stressed out I was.”

What is your greatest fear?

N BY ILLUSTRATIO

HKE

JOSEPH BIESC

While the only scary experience some may have in an elevator is in the Tower of Terror at California Adventures theme park, junior Cammy Gonzalez has a fear of elevators which prevents her from using them at all.

Gonzalez’s fear stems from another fear-– claustrophobia. However, she only experiences claustrophobia inside elevators.

“I’m afraid of elevators because they are very small and the idea of a lot of people crammed into a small place makes me feel claustrophobic,” Gonzalez said. “I get this feeling that something bad is going to happen.”

Gonzalez, with no other options, rode an elevator 107 stories up to the restaurant Top of the World in Las Vegas with her family.

“The elevator went extremely fast and there was a [security] woman in the elevator because apparently some people pass out,” Gonzalez said. “There were only a limited amount of people allowed on it and I just clutched onto my mom and closed my eyes.

It felt like my stomach jumped into my throat, my ears were popping and it almost felt like I was being crushed. I thought I was going to die.”

The fear also includes the physical appearance and operations of the elevator.

“The idea that on the inside it looks like a plain box with buttons, but on the outside

the mechanics of it is dark, and everything is made out of some kind of metal and it looks like the cord could snap at any given moment really scares me,” Gonzalez said.

Gonzalez’s fear of elevators is enhanced by her “bad” motion sickness; she feels sick every time she uses an elevator.

“I feel dizzy and I already know I’m going to be in for a painful headache,” she said.

Gonzalez tries to avoid elevators whenever possible.

“I try to take the stairs as much as possible unless it looks sketchy,” Gonzalez said.

“I’ve been afraid of elevators for as long as I could remember.”

Junior Josh Alther, Gonzalez’s boyfriend, has experienced her fear personally.

“When I was on crutches, I would have to take the elevator to get to English class, and she wouldn’t go with me-- she would take the stairs instead,” Alther said.

Whenever Gonzalez gets into an elevator she has to focus and get her nervous energy under control.

“I just stand in the corner with my face to the wall and close eyes and just take deep breaths,” she said. “Once I start to think about beyond my surroundings, like what goes on behind the walls of the elevator as I’m zooming up or plunging down, I feel like I’m going to suffocate or be trapped in there forever.”

“

Sleep paralysis. You’re completely immobilized and you’re having auditory and visual hallucinations and that’s scary in itself but then you have this paranoia and sense of helplessness too.

– MICHAEL HESSELTINE, 12

“

“

by Amanda Shaw

AROUND REDONDO

“

Senior Keegan Linnett is afraid of the insides of large vegetables

Fong’s fishy fear

“

Veggie tales

Girls. They’re scary and they intimidate me.

– LOGAN GLAVE, 9

FEATURES . 11

1.

PHOTOS 1 AND 3 BY JUSTIN LEE

Persevere. 1. Gehman plays beach volleyball.

“It’s a great feeling to win, a feeling of pride and accomplishment. It’s what we work hard for. We don’t train just for the sake of training, we train to win,” Gehman said. 2. Gehman and his late father eat lunch together. 3. “I feel a little bit of relief and freedom when I play volleyball. It connects me with my father. I believe that he is watching and that he is celebrating with me,” Gehman said.

Set on the past

2.

PHOTO COURTESY OF LOGAN GEHMAN

Sophomore Logan Gehman translates the pain from his father’s death into passion for volleyball

by Vaidehi Gandhi

3.

12 . FEATURES

He concentrates on the play in front of him, looking out for signals from the servers. He hears nothing besides the occasional instruction from his coach, and as he plays, he thinks of his “buddy.” He thinks of his number one supporter, the one who came to all of his volleyball games, the one who is no longer with him. Sophomore Logan Gehman finds that his passion for volleyball allows him to connect with his late father.

Gehman has been playing volleyball ever since he was a child. At the age of 14, he lost his father in a tree-cutting accident when the tree fell the wrong way.

His love for volleyball was influenced by his father, and finds that the sport connects them. After his father’s death, Gehman became motivated to make his father proud.

“I can still feel his presence in a way and it reminds me of him. He gives me motivation to work harder in volleyball and to make myself better. Since he passed, I have to push myself because I want to show him that I did succeed,” Gehman said.

According to Gehman, he wishes to prove that no matter what happens in life, one can bounce back stronger because “everything happens for a reason.”

“I want to prove that all the hard work will pay off one day. I want to make my dad proud by inspiring others to continue their journey and to not give up,” Gehman said.

Gehman feels that his father is still supporting him wherever he goes.

“I think when he saw us playing volleyball it reminded him of when he used to play, so naturally he wanted to see us succeed,” Gehman said. “Just playing the sport

and giving our best made him proud.”

Gehman finds that his “mental game” has improved since his father’s death, which helps him whenever he plays volleyball.

“You have to have confidence, which I struggled with after my dad passed because I felt that I was so focused on other things,” Gehman said. “Now I feel like I’m locked into the game better and that I can play my best any time I want to.”

Gehman finds motivation not only through his late father, but his previous experiences with unsuccessful teams.

“I always knew that I didn’t want to be on the losing team. I wanted to keep pushing to get onto a winning team and not let anything keep me from doing the best that I could to get there,” Gehman said.

He has learned from his past experiences and finds that it helps him.

“Learning to lose has helped me know how to win. Never think that you’re going to get beat. Even if you’re not the best player, you can be the best teammate,” Gehman said.

Gehman’s passion for volleyball helped him overcome the pain of losing his father, and served to be “something normal” amidst all the “chaos.”

“After he passed, I wasn’t really focused on volleyball. When I got back to volleyball, everything felt normal and continuously playing helped me get back into the swing of things,” Gehman said.

The family moved from Pa. to Calif. in August of last year for a fresh start.

“It was really difficult to adjust here because I had no idea what I would do with-

out him, but it still feels like he’s here helping me get through things,” Gehman said.

Despite the difficulties Gehman faced moving and adjusting to the the environment, he finds that the move helped him. “[Moving here] helped me deal with my father’s death because I got away from everything that held me back,” Gehman said.

Gehman finds that he learns a lot from his family, and that they are his biggest supporters.

“My family definitely supports me and tries to keep me going,” Gehman said.

“They’re constantly teaching me new things, helping me, and learning from me, with me, and for me.”

Gehman’s older sister, Chynna Gehman, has seen her brother channel the pain of losing their father into improving himself.

“It was tougher for him because he was there to see the accident happen, but he’s been able to take that pain and find inspiration and drive. He’s very focused and determined,” Chynna said. “It’s the drive to make all the dreams he told dad about come true.”

Chynna is proud of her brother and how he has grown.

“He’s used all the pain that we’ve been through in a positive way. He has overcome a lot,” Chynna said.

Gehman found that the most effective way of dealing with the loss of his father was through faith.

“I could only have faith that good things would come out of this tragedy,” Gehman said. “I thought that there is so much more of my life yet to live--I wasn’t going to let it affect what I wanted to accomplish in life.”

Springsteen is his rock

Math teacher Tim Baumgartner is a Bruce Springsteen enthusiast

by Reema Saad

Even after 42 concerts, math teacher Tim Baumgartner still cannot get enough of Bruce Springsteen.

According to Baumgartner, Springsteen is his idol. He keeps going back to watch him perform in concert ever since he first saw him in 1980.

“He puts on an amazing show. It becomes emotional in lots of different ways.

There’s celebration and just rock ‘n’ roll,” Baumgartner said.

According to Baumgartner, he feels the same rush that he felt the first time, even after so many concerts. In fact, He took his two daughters to a Springsteen concert to show them why he always goes back to to watch him perform.

“Last year I took my daughters to see him in concert and as we were leaving, I said to them, ‘Now do you see why I keep coming back over and over?’ and they said, ‘Oh my God, yes, yes,’” Baumgartner said.

According to Baumgartner, one particularly emotional concert was in 2002 about Springsteen’s 9/11 album “The Rising.”

“That was the first time I found myself crying at a concert,” Baumgartner said.

Baumgartner started crying when Springsteen performed his song “Into the Fire,” which is about firemen who climbed the World Trade Center to rescue victims of the terrorist attack. The lyrics that triggered his tears were in this refrain: “May your strength give us strength, may your faith bring us faith, may your hope bring us hope, may your love bring us love.”

Baumgartner says that he feels a connection with Springsteen these lyrics because of their shared religion and beliefs.

“Since Bruce was raised Catholic, and I am Catholic, I immediately recognized the emphasis on faith, hope and love we both

were raised with,” Baumgartner said.

Baumgartner says he feels no shame in his faith.

“When I was a kid, I didn’t like to sing at church, but at some point, after singing my lungs out at a Springsteen concert, I thought I owed it to God to sing for Him, too. Whether the people around me are happy to hear me or not is beside the point,” Baumgartner said.

Baumgartner appreciates the message Springsteen sends to fans and audiences.

“I think Bruce Springsteen carries that tradition of writing lyrics that show concern for the conditions of people going through lots of difficulties in life. His songs resonate with me in many different ways. They celebrate the happiness of life and sadness of loss and the struggle of people trying to make it through the hard times,” he said.

According to Baumgartner, Springsteen’s songs helped Baumgartner realize the hardships that people go through.

“Growing up in the 60s and 70s, there were a lot of songs that had socially-conscious lyrics and they would make commentary about what was going on in the country and around the world. I think those had an effect on me and made me be aware of what’s going on, not wrapped up in my own little world,” Baumgartner said.

Furthermore, according to Baumgartner, Springsteen helped him realize how easy it is to help others.

“Springsteen encouraged people to make donations to the Los Angeles Food Bank.

People would bring cans to the concerts and throw money at him,” Baumgartner said.

Other concerts that Baumgartner has been to have not had the same affect on his emotions.

“I’ve been to other concerts where they

played for 45 minutes and they might have had a couple good hits and it was fun to hear that, but the rest of the concert wasn’t all that impressive,” he said.

Baumgartner thinks Springsteen is able to express emotions because of the effort he puts in.

“He gets all those different emotions in during the show because he’s willing to play a long time. It’s fantastic, he’ll play for two and a half to three and a half hours,” Baumgartner said.

Math teacher Bill Dargen, a close friend of Baumgartner’s, also commented on the kind of performances Springsteen puts on.

“He’s known for having a high energy, high quality show. He’s a motive on stage. If you love the music, then you’re likely to have a connection,” Dargen said.

Baumgartner believes today’s artists can be bad role models and do not live up to his expectations in music.

“The other day I was walking in my neighb o r -

hood and a guy pulled up at the stoplight.

His speakers were on really loud on some rap song, dropping f-bombs and sounded so angry. I know anger is a legitimate human emotion that we need to learn how to deal with and not really celebrate it,” Baumgartner said.

Baumgartner believes Springsteen is an ideal role model for others in the way he shows a need to help others.

“He along with many other people I listen to make me want to do what’s right for people and not make short cuts.

He writes lyrics that are socially conscious and wanting to push an agenda that is going to make the world better for everyone, not just a few people,” Baumgartner said.

PHOTOS BY CEDRIC HYON

Ticket master. Baumgartner fans out the Springsteen tickets that he has kept from the many concerts that he has attended.

FEATURES

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13

Double Dash Michelle Ho bonds with her older sister through their love of old Nintendo games

by Stephanie Lai

Wii. Ho began her love of video games with the Nintendo 64.

PHOTO BY JUSTIN LEE

The new Xbox One and Playstation Four aren’t the only gaming consoles taking the spotlights of gamer’s lives right now, some are oldies like the Nintendo 64.

Beginning with the Nintendo 64, a video game console released in 1996, freshman Michelle Ho has created a “very strong” bond with her older sister, Jennifer Ho, through playing old video games together.

“I feel connected to my sister because she was always sitting next to me when I would walk through the different lands or fighting the big boss in the games,” Ho said. “It makes me appreciate the time I spend sitting down with her for a couple of hours and just being able to relax and concentrate on nothing but her and the game.”

Through playing together, Ho has been able to get to know her sister better and form a deeper connection.

“I learned from bonding with my sister that, because we are sisters and share the same interests, we just naturally work well together. I have complete trust in my sister.

Since she is my closest friend, I really put all my trust into her. When we play video games together, we build up our trust and faith in each other so that we’ll know what to do and when to do it,” Ho said.

Ho has also been “positively” influenced by her older sister from being able to connect with her.

“My sister has influenced me by mak-

ing me a more patient and flexible person.

Bonding with my sister [has] made me more ready to have her back when she needs me.

By working with her during games, she has both verbally and nonverbally taught me to focus on the situations and be ready for anything,” Ho said.

Ho remembers a time when she was first beginning to form a connection with her sister around the age of six or seven.

“My sister and I were at our grandmother’s house and we were having a blast with her original Nintendo NES. I remember we spent as much time as we could stuck to the screen, and our grandmother would watch us having fun,” Ho said.

During this time, Ho became “really interested” in video games and also became closer to her sister.

“After we had been playing for a little bit and we got to a new level [in a game], we didn’t even have to say ‘I’m going right, you go left.’ We just did, and there were no other directions or comments needed. We had gotten to the point where we automatically knew what we needed to do and how to do it,” Ho said.

Jennifer also “appreciates” being able to bond with Ho through playing the games.

“I’m really happy that this is an activity that we could do together to spend more time together,” Jennifer said. “Playing video games together created lots of memorable moments with each other and would also create lots of topics for us to talk about after playing the game.”

According to Ho, playing together has helped them work as a team.

“At first it was a little rocky because we were figuring out who does what, when and how, but now, we can use minimal words and just know what the other person is going to do and how we can back them up,” Ho said. “Our strengths are watching out for each other and knowing when to carry out an action and when to just patiently wait and let the enemy come to us. Our weakness is that we have a hard time taking a break from the game and doing whatever chores that need to be done around the house.”

Like Ho, Jennifer believes that games that rely heavily on teamwork have strengthened their bond the most.

“The games we played heavily relied on teamwork, and the more we played the more we learned how to work together and what our strengths and weaknesses are,” Jennifer said. “I can aim better when it’s a shooting game and I can also drive better if there’s a driving part. I have trouble during puzzle parts, and sometimes I don’t know which way to go. She’s good at the puzzles and figuring out where to go. She’s okay at shooting but she can’t drive. We kind of balance each other out.”

Walsh makes rugby All-American team

by Lauryn Alejo

After moving from England two years ago, senior Alex Walsh has made the USA All-American rugby team.

“I was kind of confident in making the team because I’ve been playing rugby for 12 years. Here in the United States, there’s not that many people that have been playing that long, so I kind of felt that I had an advantage, but the level of talent that was on the national team was still really high,” Walsh said.

Since making the USA All-American rugby team in mid January, Walsh had already had a “great” experience at his first tournament in Las Vegas.

While in Vegas, he was able to meet the USA men’s national team and practice with them.

“Meeting the national team was a really good experience. It made my team think that in a couple of years that’s where we could be if we continued what we do,” Walsh said.

Once Walsh made the team, he realized it would be difficult.

“Making the team was a big opportunity. At the start, it was hard because it was a lot different from what I’d usually been doing,” Walsh said.

14 . FEATURES

Walsh has to keep up with fitness and nutrition and adjust to his schedule of being on three rugby teams.

“It was kind of hard to manage everything at the same time, but after a while it got easier. It was pretty stressful because everything was piled up at once,” Walsh said.

Since Walsh has such a “busy” schedule, he is not able to go out as much which can be “disappointing”.

“Some nights I don’t want to stay home, but I know I have a big game the next day, so in a way it kind of sucks, but sometimes it’s nice to have a break from going out,” Walsh said.

While going through the process of making the team, there were times when Walsh doubted himself.

“There were points when I thought about giving up, but I remembered all the effort I have put in. If I gave up all that time would have been wasted,” he said.

Although being on the national team was “stressful” at first, Walsh is “proud” of himself.

“I felt like all my hard work payed off. Putting all the effort and all the time in was just worth it,” he said.

Walsh’s family is excited that he made the team, especially his mom, Sally Whitty.

“Our family couldn’t believe he made the team. It was so exciting.

We were so proud of him and we were so pleased with him because he did so much hard work to get there. We told all our rela tives back in England,” Sally said.

Initially, Walsh didn’t have aspirations for the national team.

“Moving over from England to the United States, I didn’t really think about wanting to make the USA team, I just wanted to play rugby. Back in England, I played for the county team, so I wanted to get to the England team,” he said.

His mother is a “big supporter” and is “very proud” of Walsh.

“He is a British boy who is playing for a USA national team. The guys on that team are from all over the world, but for Alex to get picked to play on the team is a huge, huge honor for him,” Sally said.

Across the pond. Walsh moved to America from England when he was younger.

PHOTO COURTESY OF ALEX WALSH

Outlet Courtney Melendrez dealt with bullying by volunteering at an animal shelter as an outlet for her feelings.

by Jennie Bao

A start to a great year. That is all senior Courtney Melendrez wanted, but she didn’t get one when she attended North Torrance her sophomore and junior year. After being bullied countless times through rumors and lies, Melendrez has found an “outlet” by volunteering at an animal shelter to help cats in need.

After moving to a new school, Melendrez found herself being bullied constantly for dating a boy that wasn’t exactly “sugars and cream.”

“He sort of had a reputation because of a friend he was associated with. So people didn’t really like me because they didn’t like him and I guess it was kind of like guilty by association,” Melendrez said.

Melendrez found herself being attacked on a regular basis with rumors that were started from her peers.

“People would come up to me and call me worthless or a whore even though I nev-

er did anything to them,” Melendrez said.

“When I walked into the cafeteria people would look at me and laugh to themselves.”

Melendrez found herself spending a lot of time at home with nothing to do. At fifteen, Melendrez started to volunteer at an animal shelter called Peter Zippi Fund for Animals in Hermosa Beach.

“It’s really nice to get away for a while.

Not to just get away from my problems, but kind of to just enjoy something else,” Melendrez said.

Melendrez claims that the comfort from the cats helped her through her tough times.

“Some of the cats have had really sad stories of being abandoned and found on the streets, and others have been adopted and returned which I think is terrible. Even with that they are still sweet and I think it’s wonderful how they can get through their past. They can keep on going through their life after abuse which encourages me to get through tough times,” Melendrez said.

Although Melendrez is highly allergic to cats, she continues to volunteer.

“Every three weeks I get an allergy shot at my doctors office and it’s not very painful, but it’s sometimes bothersome because there are risks at first. My doctor told me my arm could go numb, and I could have harder breathing because of my asthma but I still wanted to do it,” Melendrez said.

Her mother, Patty Melendrez, is happy to see Melendrez happy.

“Courtney and I have always been really close. For a mother, it’s really sad to see your

PHOTO BY CEDRIC HYON

daughter get bullied, and I just couldn’t believe it,” Patty said.

According to Melendrez, her mother helped her get through the tough times.

“I could always talk to her about anything, and she was always supportive,” Melendrez said. “She accepts me for who I am.”

Melendrez is still volunteering for cats every Saturday. After moving to RUHS, Melendrez is now much happier.

“I hope people see me as a really kind,

Living a sheltered life. Melendrez spends time with one of the “many” cats she takes care of at the animal shelter.

caring person who is able to give up a part of herself in order to help another,” Melendrez said. “I do care about what people have to say about me, but if its negative and it’s wrong then it doesn’t really affect me anymore.”

FEATURES

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15

PHOTOS 1, 2 AND 3 BY MATTHEW YONEMURA; PHOTO 4 BY TED CAVUS

Big mamma’s here. After struggling with drugs and alcohol throughout middle school, Maimot found her passion in basketball, and kicked her old habits in the team’s friendly environment.

Strength and power through joy athlete of the issue: Tati Maimot

by Cedric Hyon

On the court, she’s “big mamma.” “The Tatinator.” “Brick House.” “T-Strong.” “BigT.” Senior Tati Maimot uses her strength to become an asset to the girls basketball team.

“I think my best attribute would probably be boxing out and getting rebounds.

I’m not the quickest, but I feel I have a lot of strength over other players in the South Bay,” Maimot said.

Outside the court, one of her strengths is her positive attitude for other team members.

“I feel like I’m a really outspoken person and I’m not afraid to embarrass myself to make people comfortable. I love putting people before me and making them happy.

On my team, I hate seeing someone feeling down and crying, and I want to be that spirit to keep things uplifting,” Maimot said.

“On the court, I can be a source of intensity because when we go against our opponents I think of my team as my sisters and that it’s time for me to go in and kill.”

Coach Marcelo Enriquez agrees.

“Being a captain, she’s the liaison between the staff and the members. If there are small fires that need to be put out, I put that responsibility on the captain, and if there is an issue, she’s able to help squash those problems,” Enriquez said.

In her first few years, Maimot had to

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struggle with her temper.

“When I first started learning how to play, I had a really bad temper. I just remember my teammates would have to tell me to calm down and I even got kicked out of one game for pushing a girl on the court,” Maimot said.

Enriquez believes that she has matured and grown, however.

“Emotionally, she’s come a long way. Two years ago, she had issues being committed and invested in the program. but now she is. She was very temperamental a few years ago and would fly off the handle, but she’s channeled that and turned into a powerful force on the floor,” Enriquez said.

Basketball also saved Maimot when she was growing up.

“Basketball saved me from the streets.

Growing up, I went through a lot and made bad decisions. Because it’s a year-long thing and consistent, it keeps me busy,” Maimot said. “My parents divorced when I was 3. I am the oldest of 7, so I always felt the need to be independent and take care of other people. When my dad moved to Vegas, that was when I started making bad decisions.

I was hanging out with the wrong crowd, doing drugs, drinking, smoking weed, all in middle school. When I came to high school, I was introduced to basketball and the fami-

ly-like environment kept me around.”

When she started basketball, this environment is what kept her from going.

“Because I’m from Inglewood, I thought it would be really difficult here because it was so different,” Maimot said. “When I first came here, Marcello and my JV coach made me feel really comfortable. The girls made me feel comfortable. I didn’t have to try and fit in. Every year it builds and I become closer and closer to the team.”

Maimot’s game mode on the court comes in after coming off the bench.

“I like coming off the bench. My game mode is to come in and make a difference.

I think ‘what can I do to help my team?’”

Maimot said. “When I’m having a good game that usually turns into me coming in and getting a big rebound and a big lay up. Since I’m not fast, I need to use my strength.”

Enriquez has noticed her strength and presence on the field.

“Because of her size, she just has a presence about her on the court and with her work ethic, she starts to wear on her defenders because of her strength. Maybe the first and second quarter they can guard, but during the third it starts to wear on them,” Enriquez said. “She’s worked really hard to put herself in that position by making herself a

better condition. Last year she wasn’t, but this year she’s in much better cardiovascular condition so she can stay on the floor for us.”

Maimot understands the difficulty of being on the bench.

“I just really like to recognize the people that don’t get a lot of playing time: the people on the bench. It’s really hard to be on the bench and to not be able to do anything,” Maimot said. “For anyone who is sitting on the bench: never give up. At the end of the day you’re the unsung heroes. If it weren’t for them, we wouldn’t be the team we are because in the end, they’re the ones who keep us up.”

Maimot wants to keep her intensity up for the game today.

“Losing to our archrivals on Tuesday was a really bitter loss. It was a game we should’ve, could’ve and would’ve won, but everything happens for a reason,” Maimot said. “It was a blessing to lose that game because if we didn’t, we wouldn’t be so hungry and want to kill West all over again.”

Maimot is going to give everything for the team.

“Tomorrow I’m going to give all I’ve got,” Maimot said. “I just want to go all out because I know if do my part, it’s going to help the team and help everyone.”

The man behind it all

Boys basketball coach Reggie Morris has been voted the best high school basketball coach in California and is now in the running for the national award.

by Jené Price

He makes you run, run, and run and it’s hard– well that’s what the boys think. The boys say he makes them better people; he’s supportive and helps on and off the court. But Coach Morris isn’t just the number one coach according to the boys basketball team– he’s also been named the best basketball coach in California by USA Today.

“To be named ‘Best High School Basketball Coach in California,’ is a definite honor. However, I don’t allow those things to alter how I feel about myself as a coach,” Morris said. “I am very thankful for all of those who support me to the end. The contest shows me that I am truly blessed for the people that believe in me.”

According to captain Terrell Carter, Morris is a hard-nosed coach and a disciplinarian.

“He makes you want to work hard in practice just by giving everything a reason. He helps me think not only about basketball but about my future such as college,” Carter said.

Morris believes not only in making his players work hard in basketball but also in life. He tries to teach them valuable life lessons and help them grow into better men.

“My priorities as a coach are first and foremost to help aid the boys to become young men by teaching them responsibility, accountability, and work ethic,” Morris said. “Many times being on a team is a student’s first job. Young men must learn how to work with others and perform tasks at a high level.”

According to Carter, there is no such thing as “getting away with stuff” or “getting let off easy” with Morris. He makes sure his players are performing in the classroom as well as on the court.

He makes sure players attend every class, get good grades and are role models on campus. The team feels highly about Morris, especially former West player Carter.

“At West, I wasn’t as responsible. I didn’t go to class all of the time and I just didn’t care,” Carter said. “We have study hall every day and Morris checks grades on a weekly basis and makes us run for every D and F people have.”

According to Carter, Morris is the best coach he’s ever had.

“He makes us realize it’s not always about basketball. It’s about becoming men. He’s very constructive and helps us deal with situations outside of basketball. He’s opened my eyes to a lot of things,” Carter said.

According to Morris, a lot of his coaching strategies have come from his dad Reggie Morris Sr., who coached high school and college and also his high school coach from Westchester, Ed Azaam.

They are both defense oriented and believe a team will only be as good as its defense, according to Morris. Being around his dad has inspired him to start coaching.

“I wanted to become a coach because my dad is a coach and I have been around basketball my entire life. Also, it gave me a way to stay connected to the game that has done so much for my life such as allowing me to get a free education, travel to various places, and create several lifelong relationships that are invaluable,” Morris said.

Morris believes his supporting staff has a lot to do with his success as a coach. He says that he would not be as successful as he has been in his coaching career if he was on his own.

“Having a great supporting staff, not working alone,w is the secret to success. No one person is capable of reaching people successfully,” Morris said. “A successful coaching staff is able to show how several different people can work together passionately and carry out a dream together.”

PHOTOS BY MATT MARDESICH AND MATTHEW YONEMURA

King of the court. In his first year as coach at Redondo, Morris led the boys basketball team to a CIF Div. 2 State Championship. He and the team hope to continue their newfound success going into this year’s CIF tournament.

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Boys basketball bounces back

22 points, 15 rebounds, five blocks, and two steals.

“You always want to be locked in against your rivals,” Carter said. “Because we are local the crowd knows a lot about us, so we just had to keep focused and play through the comments.”

Junior Cameron High was the second leading scorer with 13 points.

“Cameron is our ‘glue guy,’” Morris said.

“He does a lot of different things well, rather than one thing exceptionally well. When he plays with energy we become a much better team.”

“

Coming off Saturday’s loss, we had to make a statement. I know I took it personally, I know Ian took it personally, we all took it personally.

– TERRELL CARTER, 12

by Caitlin Cochran

After a tough loss on Saturday against Centennial, the boys bounced back to beat Mira Costa 64-40 on Tuesday night.

According to senior Terrell Carter, the loss on Saturday really affected the team and him, so they needed to come out strong to beat Costa.

“Coming off Saturday’s loss, we had to make a statement,” Carter said. “I know I took it personally, I know Ian took it personally, we all took it personally.”

This was senior Ian Fox’s second game since his injury, and he finished with six points. According to coach Reggie Morris, he was essential to the win.

“Ian played a very good game, set the tone defensively, and did a great job in getting others involved in the game,” Morris said.

Carter was the player of the game with

PHOTOS BY MATT MARDESSICH

Head in the game. Senior and starter Terrel Carter reaches for a shot during the game.

“

Boys basketball comes back to defeat rivals Mira Costa in an exciting rival game after recent defeat

According to High, the rivalry between the two teams was his motivation in the game.

“I just had a chip on my shoulder,” High said. “Costa has been talking bad about us since we beat them the first time, so I just wanted to go and play my heart out.”

The team received both a technical and an intentional foul, but according to Morris it was good for the team.

“During a rivalry game things always get a little heated. This is a good experience for playing in the playoffs,” Morris said. “It is imperative that no matter how hostile things get, we maintain our focus.”

The team will play Torrance on Friday, and even though they already beat them once, Morris believes they have some things to work on.

“Against West we hope to continue to get better at all the little things teams need to do to become a championship level team,” Morris said. “Small details like setting up a team mate, recovering loose balls and boxing out goes a long way.”

Both surf teams shred their competition in El Segundo The boys and girls surf teams both dominated in the competition and are confident for the upcoming competition

by Caterina Hyneman

The surf team won their heats against El Segundo during Wednesday’s competition at Hermosa Beach.

“As a team we did pretty well. We had a lot of standout performances. We got first, second and third in a lot of the heats which is really exciting, because that means that we’re working hard and getting stuff done,” junior Paige Sullivan said.

The team swept the competition winning everything in both girls’ heats. Girls’ longboard was won by Kelly Harraka with Paige Sullivan in second and Emma Waldinger in third.

First in shortboard was Hali Honea, followed by Emma Waldinger and Alix

18 . SPORTS

Woolner.

In boys shortboard, Kyle Beatty, Kenny Okuda, Jack Langdon and Luke Meyers all won first place in their heats.

Keianu Diers also took first in bodyboarding in a “well contested, four man-heat.”

Overall, the team feels ready going into the next competition.

“I would say that we feel pretty confident.

We’re all working really hard in training so that we will be prepared for next time,” Sullivan said. “Our coaches are amazing and they’re really encouraging, and they teach us how to work the competition as best as possible.”

PHOTOS BY JUSTIN LEE

Surf’s Up. Freshman Emma Waldinger catches a few waves for practice before the big meet

Girls water polo loses to PV The girls water polo team took the lead PV in the first half but they failed to score additional points and keep up their defense against PV’s aggressive play

by Christopher Paludi

PHOTOS BY JUSTIN LEE

Keep on treading. Junior Madison East passes the ball and in hopes to keep up offense

Girls water polo lost to Palos Verdes for the second time this season on Wednesday, 16-5.

Despite leading 5-4 at halftime, the team lost its lead in a third quarter tie before losing in the fourth.

“They came into the second half very aggressively; I knew they were mad that it was such a close game. I think we got a little discouraged,” freshman Maddie McCaw said.

Senior and ‘two meter man’ Bridgette Schneider echoed McCaw. The two com-

bined to score all five of the team’s goals, with Schneider scoring two and McCaw putting in three.

“We came out strongly in the first half and outplayed PV, but at halftime they regrouped and ran a really hard press that limited a lot of our drives and plays, which were what had allowed us to score goals in the first half,” Schneider said.

McCaw said that the team drew together and will move on.

“We definitely should have stayed calm

and focused on our defense, but we fell apart and ended up losing,” McCaw said.

“We were all pretty frustrated with ourselves, but after we all talked, we realized we played a pretty good game and we worked together as a team, so that made us feel better. Overall, I think it was one of the best games we’ve played together. We definitely still have stuff to work on, and I feel like if we work really hard we can keep playing well in these games.”

Although the team was disappointed by the loss, they must look forward to the last two games of the season, which determine their berth in the CIF playoffs.

“It was a disappointing loss but it also showed us that we can play with the tougher teams in our league and we will take this mindset with us into our game against Costa,” Schneider said. “Beating them would give us a guaranteed position in CIF.” McCaw agreed that the team is putting an emphasis on next week’s game at home against Costa.

“I think going into the last two games, we can use this game to remind us that we can play with these tough teams — we just can’t lose focus and get down on ourselves.

Costa is going to be a big game for us, so we have to keep practicing what we need to this week and we’ll beat them next Wednesday,” McCaw said. “Not only would that put us in better ranks for CIF but also I think we’d all be pretty stoked to beat Costa in our home pool.”

Wrestling loses match to West

by Romy Moreno

In Tuesdays match against West Torrance High School the wrestlers did not win but still believe that they did well.

“We usually don’t do too well against West,” junior Gerald Nellum said. “But this year was probably the best because we put up a better fight.”

The wrestlers believe that the reason they lost was because they did not stick to the original plan.

“We didn’t stick to our shot defense and that’s how West got most of their points,” Nellum said. “If we could have tightened that up we would have done better.”

They also think that some emotions played a factor in how the match went.

“I think if some of our guys wouldn’t have been so intimidated and just worked their moves like we drill in practice everyday, we would have had a lot better chance,” senior Kevin James said.

With Bay League finals coming up, the team plans on preparing the same way they have all season long.

“We plan on lots of drilling and conditioning to make sure we stay focused and finish strong so we can get far in CIF,” Nellum said.

The wrestlers also have some other strategies to help them in Bay League Finals.

“I’ll review the matches I lost and correct whatever I’m not doing right,” Nellum said.

“I’ll figure out what’s working for me so I can use it to my advantage on the mat and go as far as I possibly can in CIF.”

Girls soccer team is ready to take on Mira Costa tomorrow The girls are confident that they can beat rivals Mira Costa because of what they learned from their previous losses

by Romy Moreno

With a loss against West High School early in the season, the girls are ready to redeem themselves in tomorrow’s game.

“The last time we played West was near the start of our season,” sophomore Makayla Hughes said. “And now our team chemistry has improved as a result of practicing, playing games against tough opponents and team bonding, so we are hoping to win.”

There are a few different reasons why the girls believes they have not been as successful as they feel they could have been in their season so far.

“We have been struggling this season due to our number of injured players,” sophomore Katie Stein said. “We also have not had the right amount of intensity and desire to want to win, along with not finishing, connecting passes and transition from offense to defense.”

However, the team is confident that they

will be able to come out of tomorrow’s game victoriously.

“We definitely have more experience now than when we started the season off,” Hughes said. “Many of the starters had never played varsity before this year, and now they have the experience to win the game.”

Bravo had similar thoughts.

“With all the experience we have gained from this season so far I think if we play as a unit and work on our finishing and passes we will have a great chance,” sophomore Brittany Bravo said.

Senior Shelby Barnes believes that tomorrow’s game will be a challenge but hopes for the best.

“We are going to be the underdogs going into the game since West is number one in bay league,” Barnes said. “But we are going to leave it all on the field and expect to get a result.”

The girls plan on using what they

learned from Tuesday’s game against Mira Costa High School and other past games to beat West High.

“The game against Costa was a tough loss, but it taught us to never give up. The game was very fast paced, so we will have to keep that intensity up,” Stein said.

“Even though we have been losing, we have been playing hard and leaving everything on the field,” Barnes said.

“So we continue to do that.”

According to the girls they will be trying to play their absolute best in tomorrows game for many different reasons.

“We need to do our best and get the result tomorrow, or we will be completely out and have no chance of moving on to CIF,” Barnes said.

Bravo has similar feeling about tomorrow’s game.

“We all plan to do our best so that

we will have a chance to proceed to CIF,” Bravo said.

“But we also really want to win for the seniors because the season is coming to a close and they definitely deserve to get this win.”

PHOTOS BY JUSTIN LEE

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Girls Basketball plans to rebound against West for title

by Sophie Maguy

After a 40-35 loss against Mira Costa, the girls basketball team’s fate as to whether they are the champions of Bay League depends on if they can take out their frustrations abouttheir loss in their upcoming game against West.

“The game on Friday can either make or break us. We can either learn from this and have it motivate us, or we can fold and have a game like we did tonight on Friday, but I feel that we will be hungry for the win against West,” senior Tati Maimot said.

Maimot thought the team was too unfocused on Tuesday.

“I think we were unfocused and we picked up the game too late,” Senior Tati Maimot said.

Senior Natalie Sisto agrees that this was not RUHS’s best performance.

“We definitely did not play our best. We had multiple shot attempts inside of the key that were not falling.

Our focus wasn’t where it needed to be with the Bay League title up for grabs,” Sisto said.

Although they had a rough game, RUHS did have some strengthswhich included their defense and their movement on the court.

“We were good at attacking the gaps and getting open inside the key.

We were just having a difficult time finishing our shots,” Sisto said.

RUHS’s difficult game on Tuesday has inspired them to improve their play for the upcoming game on Friday, Feb. 7, against West Torrance.

“We need to work on rebounding and finishing our shots around the rim with pressure,” Sisto said.

Maimot believes that there are broader aspects they can improve.

“We can improve on getting and staying focused, staying on the same team, staying hungry and playing with full intensity,” Maimot said.

Sisto hopes that their loss against Mira Costa will fuel their energy to win today.

“I’m expecting that we will take our frustration from this game out on West. To win Bay League, we need to win on Friday. I think we’ll come out really intense knowing that the title is on the line. We just need to have good practices these next two days,” Sisto said.

Sisto wanted to let her team know that “championships is on the line.”

“We have to win to become cochampions with West. We will take our frustrations out on West and have better focus when doing our shots,” Sisto said. “Go in and play with confidence. When we played against Costa, we looked good but we were really rushed so we really couldn’t finish our shots.”

PHOTOS BY MATT MARDESICH

Climbing back up. Left: Junior Nao Shitoa catches the ball during the Mira Costa game. Right: Sophomore Micaela Enriquez in a triple threat position. Center: Junior Meghan Peneueta about to free throw.

Boys soccer to come back

by Sophie Maguy

PHOTO BY PETER TRAN

Conniving thief. Senior Takehiro Yamaya steals the ball from a Mira Costa player in the first Mira Costa game.

20 . SPORTS

The boys soccer team tied with Mira Costa 0-0 on Tuesday. The team has worked on their offense for the game against West today.

“If our offense could start scoring more it would be more helpful but our defense just needs to stay the same and we will be fine for the rest of the season,” sophomore Trenton Klatte said.

Senior Michael O’Neil believes that the team just needs to play like they normally to win.

“I think we just need to start playing our game. When we do, we are untouchable,” O’Neil said.

He hopes that the team will learn from this game when they play teams that present a large challenge.

“I think this game will show us what we need to do to compete against harder teams,” O’Neil said.

The team has certain goals that they want to accomplish to help them win Bay League, including beating West.

“Some of our goals are to beat the teams who are competing for the Bay League title like West and Palos Verdes,” O’Neil said.

“Friday is a must win now in order for us

to be in the running to become Bay League Champions. We will come out ready to play and hope for the best,” Klatte said.

Learning from past experiences, Sophomore Trenton Klatte thought that the night against Mira Costa went solid.

“We had a solid night. Our defense played extremely well. Our offense did well but they need to start finishing opportunities if we want to be Bay League Champions,” Klatte said.

O’Neil agrees that their defense performed well against Mira Costa.

“We defended well and we played the ball nicely to create one-on-one opportunities,” O’Neil said.

Although the defense was doing very well, O’Neil believes that the team still could have beat Mira Costa.

“We did not perform up to par. We could of played a lot better and should of came out there with a win,” O’Neil said.

O’Neil wants to tell his team that they “are all great players and know what to do to play well.”

“We know we can win if we can just play the ball on the ground,” O’Neil said. “If we keep the ball, we’re bound to get a shot.”