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Students Prepare for Upcoming Voting Season

Jarrod Ragsdale Staff writer

With election season just around the corner, everyone is anxious about what’s happening. Currently, all the talk is focused on the two very aggressive and opposing candidates in the polls and what’s to come which leaves many new voters like our current seniors very confused on how to actually register to vote and why voting is such a big deal.

“A lot of people don’t think their votes count because of the Electoral College,” senior Brandon Johnson said.

This makes sense, as many like him ask themselves why we should think voting matters if we don’t see our vote directly correlating to the polls. However, if everyone has this mentality, then the Electoral College will have no idea what the populace really wants. With so many of our current seniors about to enter the political scene as fresh voters with fresh ideas, it’s important to review how to register for voting. All you have to do is follow the steps listed at right:

Many seniors are either not interested in voting or don’t know how to, yet we expect them to. There are some faults to be accounted for this.

“[Students are] not interested in voting because…we don’t show them any application or significance in their lives,” AP English teacher Mr. Stephens said.

Stephens said that students don’t have the same care or interest in voting as adults do because they haven’t yet had to deal with adult responsibilities.

“We just say ‘get out there and vote’ like we have this expectation that they’ll suddenly care about things they’ve never had to care about because it’s never affected them,” Stephens said.

Students have a similar feeling towards this.

“Kids in society don’t give it much thought. And now with schools, we don’t really talk about it that much, so if you’re not exposed to it, you’re not going to want to do it,” senior Jawed Bensalah said.

Half a semester in the tail end of your high school career isn’t enough to get young adults interested in something that has hardly concerned them until then, so we need to either remedy that or stop expecting young men and women to give two hoots about voting.

Even if you were not sure how to vote, you would do well to inform yourself on both candidates and vote on whose policies you agree with most.

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Band competes with show “the living sea”

ANGELA RAGSDALE Staff writer

Picture the ocean and all of its beauty: the waves gently pushing and pulling the sand, beautiful blue fish swimming in and out of coral. Now take a closer look deeper into the darkness, see the horrors that lie beneath, the damage that a perfect storm can cause on the waterfront, the devastation the water brings while still maintaining its beauty. The 2016-2017 Panther Band wishes to take you on a journey beneath the water and to witness the beauty of ‘the Living Sea.’

 As the UIL Region change is putting our football team against tougher competition, the same is for band. The band has advanced to the State Marching Contest for the past four years and has established a reputation as a big fish in a small pond as the reigning UIL Area G Champion, but this year the band goes up against possibly the toughest competition in the state in order to qualify for the chance to make it to state.

 “Overall the higher standards of the investments have pushed everyone to work harder and stay up to par with the expectations of this show,” senior color guard captain Taylor Ritchie said.

 The band has many new additions to not only the director staff with a new band director, Jamie Ramos and a new color guard director, Darryl Pemberton, but also in the people who wrote this year’s show. The band has employed some of the most well known people in the marching world to work with the band and as a result the band’s work ethic has changed to make the show what the creators have imagined it to be.

 “The change in mentality of the band is already evident in our rehearsals that our membership is pushing themselves and holding themselves to a higher standard because we all have a common goal to make it to state this year,” senior head drum major Rebekah Altenburger said.

 The band knows the challenges that face them and that only hard work and determination can get them to where they want to be. The directors know this and it is also why they can be heard yelling at morning rehearsals trying and to get the band to realize their potential, that they can go into this new area and compete with the best in the state, that they deserve to be amongst them.

 “Scores don’t matter I just want the satisfaction knowing that we did the best we could,” junior tuba section leader Austin Parry said.

 For any UIL activity making it to state is a great honor. The whole goal is to be able to stand with the best in the state, to be the best in the state, and with the hard work that goes into it, to not reach that dream can be devastating. But ultimately the band has no control over whether or not they make it to state, its up to the judges, the one thing they do have control over is making sure that they do the best possible job so that they can be proud of what was accomplished.
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Student uploads comic voice overs, gains following

Gallery

LAUREN DECENA Production Editor & NICOLAS CORTES Staff Writer

Out of the many YouTubers that are active the site, the small YouTuber by the name of “frisk the-human-hybrid” happened to make her appearance. Her real name is Cora Cutkomp and she’s a senior here on campus who makes dubbed videos over popular comics. When she first started her YouTube channel Cutkomp said, “I just had so many favorite YouTubers that I watch that, [well] it looks so easy I just had to do it.” While she has had this YouTube channel for a few months she is still relatively new to YouTube and just hit 801 subscribers.

  Not only does she have 801 subscribers but one of her videos has 122k views which is extremely high considering how many views on average she gets per video. However, her videos differ from time to time.

  “Really, you don’t want it too long, I’ve done a 20 minute video plus I’ve seen others with hour long videos people don’t watch the whole thing. It needs to be a specific length because of the attention span for a lot of viewers. Some people have shorter attention spans than others,” Cutkomp said.

  So, Cutkomp bases her videos off what her audience is as well as her own opinion so she can appeal to the masses when making them.

She has also yet to have a very specific uploading schedule for her viewers, but has tried to set almost guidelines for when uploads.

  “I don’t really have one [an update schedule], I need to figure out one. I’m kind of thinking maybe two or three videos on the weekend,” Cutkomp said.

  And while these uploads are clumped together she has to do them with her phone instead of her computer, ranging from video game uploads to the voice overs she usually does.

  “I record using my phone. I go to a website called Roblox, and I play games, but I can record my screen. The players can chat with each other,” Cutkomp said.

  So she uploads a variety of content as opposed to just a complete focus on one subject.

  Along with everything she has done she has not started doing this entirely (voices for characters) until after she saw her favorite youtubers.

  She had done it earlier in life as well, “I’ve actually, done a lot of stuff for voicing, like for class. Whenever we’d read a book with the whole class I’ll do the voices for the characters. I’ve always done that,” Cutkomp said.

  So while she may have been inspired by her favorite YouTubers such as Markiplier, jacksepticeye, Pewdiepie, Popularmmos, Gaming with Jen, Supershadic50, and twilight, regardless she had done it before.

  Nevertheless, frisk the-human-hybrid is one of the many YouTubers that uploads video on a weekly basis for her audience.

Entertainment

Three Musketeers arrives on stage October 6

Theatre is presenting “The Three Musketeers”, October 6-8, directed by Roberta Moglia. The auditorium doors will open at 6:30 p.m. Tickets will be $6 presale and $10 at the door.  

In the play a young Frenchman named D’Artagnan played by Matthew Whyte and his sister Sabine played by Annalisa Salazar wish to become a part of the Famed Musketeers. However they come during troubling times due to the rivalry between King Louis XIII and the evil Cardinal Richelieu.

As the first play of the school year, many of the theatre students are looking forward to “The Three Musketeers”. For some, like senior Annalisa Salazar, this is a way to make a name for them. Salazar will be playing the role of Sabine, who is the younger sister of D’Artagnan.

   “This year is my senior year and I wanted to do something special for it so I was happy that I got the role of Sabine,” Salazar said.

There are many aspects to becoming the characters. Memorizing the script is a main part of becoming a character, although many of the actors picked characters that fit their personalities.

   “I memorize and practice my monologue in order to become my character, Cardinal Richelieu,” junior Walker Dalton said.                       

The actors must truly immerse themselves in their roles through endless rehearsals so that the production goes off without a hitch.

“You get a feel of who you most want to be when first reading the script,” junior Nick Guerra said.

     Due to the fact that the production calls for many fight scenes the actors have to practice fight choreography to ensure that all the movements they make with their props won’t injure anyone.

“We practice the fight choreography to make sure that the scenes go smoothly and there are no mishaps,” junior Imogene Daily said.

However important the actors are, without Technical Theatre, the people who build the sets and help run the show, there would be no production. They take care of everything from props and scene changes to making sure the lighting correct.

“So far we’ve spent money on many of our tools and the lumber needed for building the sets,” junior Alexis Luna said.

The techies, a.k.a. Technical Theatre students, make sure that everything is in the right place. They are the ones who control the lights, music and sets of the production.

“They take notes on what microphones need to be turned on, what lights need to be on at certain times,” Daily said.

Student actors are honing their craft and techies are crafting the set and lighting to make sure this play will be a success.

News

Students express joy, disappointment toward Olympics

Sarena Gonzales

Staff Writer 

This summer everyone’s attention was on the 2016 Rio Olympics. It’s the time of the year when people put aside politics and athletes are cheered on to bring back the gold.

  Aside from all the achievements the USA made, there are some athletes who gave America a bad reputation in the veiwers’ eyes. If you hadn’t already heard, swimming athlete Ryan Lochte lied about a robber in Rio approaching him and teammates with a gun at night. In regards to his actions most of his sponsors like Speedo And Ralph Lauren have dropped him as a client. 

  “I think everybody deserves a second chance, I think his lesson needs to be learned that what he does affects more than just himself,” the water polo and art teacher Coach Hadin said.

  Though some people think he deserves a second chance, some say he needs to change to get back where he was.

  “I would try to change him into a better person and show him why he did what he did was wrong ” student athlete Grace Bradford said.

  On a more positive note, Michael Phelps was definitely in the spotlight this Olympics. He is the most decorated Olympian of all time with 28 medals. He did choose to retire this year on a good note.

  “It’s good to end on a high note not on a low note,” student athlete Joseph Camacho said.

  Another athlete that was in the spotlight was Simone Biles. Some may refer to her as the Michael Phelps of gymnastics.

  “She is like the MIchael Phelps of gymnastics because she was just so great in everything that she did,” Bradford said.

  Simone was a big contributor to the U.S. gymnastics team, but if she weren’t on the team, would the U.S team have done as well without her?

“I don’t think it would have changed the outcome,” Camacho said.

  In the end the U.S dominated the Olympics with 121 medals total, the most medals out of all the countries.   

  “It makes me feel really proud and happy to be apart of this country,” Bradford said.

  The Olympics brings not only pride to countries around the world but honor. The feeling of knowing your country is the best at the sport you’re in is incredible an experience one can only imagine.

  “Historically we’ve made our way up, and it’s emotional seeing that we’re the best on the world,” Camacho said.

  Despite all the negativity for the Olympics being hosted in Rio some students think Rio did a good job.

  “It looked really pretty and the stadiums were good,” Bradford said.

  No matter where the games are being held there are always those who are skeptical about the location.   “ Every country has its issues hosting such a big venue, I think they did well with what they had,” Camacho said.

  Another unsettling event in the Olympics involved Russian athletes that tested positive for drug use and were still allowed to complete, such as Russian swimmer Yulia Efimova.

  “It’s very difficult, because if there were some athletes that didn’t do anything wrong but there’s always going to be a cloud of did they do it the fair way,” Hadin said.

  Those that do cheat will have to live with the guilt of not earning what they got the fair way.

  “I’d feel cheated out in my spot, I’d be a little bit angry about competing against those that are cheating,” Bradford said.

  America bringing home the most medals out of all the countries left us feeling proud to call America our home and proud to be an American.