Granger high school
Tri-Color Times An open forum for student opinion and expression
TRICOLORTIMES.COM
November 2016 LIX-III
Surprise assembly features Utah Jazz, dunk team, and Bear By Gabriela Thompson IN THE hallways and classrooms of Granger High School, ideas were stirring about the surprise assembly that would be taking place on Friday, September 30. The teachers told the students when it was, but not what it was about, for they themselves had no idea. “I heard that it was going to be a motivational assembly, like someone was going to come and talk to us,” Damion Robertson (11) said. However, Granger students received an even better surprise than a motivational speaker. As the students walked into the gymnasium, what greeted them was the Utah’s own Jazz Dunk team. The dunk team began jumping on little trampolines, while attempting intricate moves to dunk on Granger High School’s hoops. When the spirit started to wane,
the Jazz’s own mascot “Bear” pumped Granger students up by spraying silly string and starting chants. Some students thought the surprise was simply the dunk team performing, but the day wasn’t done with surprises for Granger High School. After the dunk team’s mind blowing performance, the actual Jazz team walked onto the court surprising all of the student body. “It was really awesome. It was cool to see that an NBA team would come to our school and play a scrimmage. Just coming to Granger was enough,” Cole Olsen (12) said. With the wan of welcoming cries from Granger Lancers, students were asked to stand if they were or used to be a Junior Jazz player. As a handful of students stood, and two were selected to be honorary Junior Jazz coaches. These two kids were Ian Alexan-
der (10) and Kate Tanner (12), who received some Jazz gear and a seat on the bench with the players. Soon after, the Jazz team conducted the highly anticipated scrimmage, dividing up into a blue team and white team. The game was divided into four quarters, each eight minutes long. With the players sweating up the court, news anchors and photographers were recording students’ reactions. Some students, including Olsen, Mitch Lindsey (12), and Peyton Lindsey (10) were interviewed by KUTV. At half-time, Granger students began the wave to boost both theirs and the team’s spirit. During the halftime, Jazz items such as china dolls and t-shirts were given out to students in the crowd. As the halftime period ended, players began getting hyped up to continue their scrim-
mage. At the end of the game, the blue team defeated the white team with a close score of 42-38. Although the Jazz’s visit was coming to a close, the team had one more surprise for Granger High. The team and a selective group of students stood in the middle of the gymnasium holding a basketball signed by all the Jazz and a $1,000 check. Gratitude and shock filled the over-packed gymnasium. “My reaction was like ‘Wow these people are at my school’....it makes me think that this doesn’t happen often, like it’s a once in a lifetime opportunity... the money and the game,” Morgan Varney (11) said. Another student felt the same way. “It was nice of the Jazz to care for the community. This experience will be memorable, some of my friends are jealous,” Lindsey said.
As the Jazz departed, the media was welcoming to the players when interviewing them. When asked about coming to Granger, Dante Exum said, “They said keep it a secret all week and that’s what we did. I never been to a high school out here, it was a cool experience. It fit my vision of an American high school.” In the midst of the secret keeping, Dr. Dunn was the head of it. “They called me three weeks ago asking to play here. About a couple weeks ago they came and checked out the gym and we coordinated it to make it happen. I was amazed it was kept such a secret…it was a temptation to tell, but I wanted it to be special for the students,” he said. At the end of the day, Granger High felt connected and honored to have a once-in-a-lifetime experience thanks to the NBA and Utah Jazz.
Students, staff, reporters, and athletes filled the gym for a surprise assembly that included the Jazz Bear, the dunk team, and a blue vs. white Utah Jazz scrimmage -- and a $1000 check for Granger!
Students look to recruiters for inspiration about college selection By Ramon Martinez III COLLEGE day ended on September 27; however, for seniors thinking of their future careers, it was just the beginning. It was a wake-up call that told students that after high school there is still more school that could help them go into getting better jobs. This would also lead up to colleges that will help them with their career goals. College presenters were not the only ones giving out info for students’ futures because there were also counselors giving out information on other colleges that couldn’t attend college day. College is still the word around
school, and it is not going to fade throughout the school year. In fact, it’s not even the Granger High staff, it is the students who are going to the counselors and asking them for information that will help them go to the right college. “There was a positive increase of students who wanted information,” Ms. Takashima said. The information was mainly on scholarships or what colleges had the program that the interested students wanted. Saying that having college day improves how many students go to college is highly possible, but it is those who know who want to go college and apply
are the ones to go to college earlier and raise those statistics. Some students took it as an understanding that this might be important to their future, and they took it that way, students such as Anthony Rivas (12). He spoke about how college day influenced him in the present and the future. “It pushed me to do better and reach my potential and make it rise, Rivas said. He also learned that college is an important factor for getting a higher rating on landing a job than rather applying without college experience. Rivas also included his info on thoughts of a college he would
be willing to commit more to and he shared that he did not commit more than he now to Granger High School. Many students are falling into the senioritis stage early so they go to imaginary land to forget that they can’t go on to college without getting a high school diploma. More with thoughts on college day, it was a bummer that students couldn’t go to other college lectures rather than just the three colleges they picked -- there were so many options that this could have been for juniors, too. That thought does not sound as bad, but anything below is unnecessary to other grades to be
involved in college day “Juniors should be involved to this event to give them a head start to know what is coming and pick a different college from last year,” Rivas said. Some colleges were picked to do this on the same day with seniors so the juniors should do it a different day and maybe in smaller groups, because it wouldn’t hurt if they could not go to a college that year they can go the lecture next year when they are seniors and less groups means less noise and disruption to the presenters of the college. Granger High will make difficult decisions this fall.
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