Welcome back, Beavers! In today’s society, teenagers are expressing themselves through fashion more than ever. With outgoing trends and fabrics, us teens use pieces of clothing to show off our very own style and personality; however, the price tags are continuously rising.

In high school, sporting events and club involvement take up a lot of our time. With the little free time that we have outside of our classes and hobbies, many of us have a part-time job. Considering that the minimum wage in Ohio is $8.15, the few hours that we are able to work do not reward us with the money it takes to be a stylish teen ― or so we thought.

Most students here at Beaver Local travel approximately forty-five minutes to get to the nearest shopping center. In this town, there are many stores that students may not consider when thinking of places to shop. I decided to write this post to inform students about the places where they can get the most amazing fashion trends while staying within a budget that doesn’t break the bank.

First, my personal favorite, is TJ Maxx. This store has a wide variety of clothing, purses, shoes, and homegoods, with many name-brand items marked down to unbelievable prices! Some of the best deals that I have found at TJ Maxx are: Michael Kors tennis shoes (originally $110.00, purchased for $50.00), a Kate Spade purse (originally $315.00, purchased for $130.00), a Calvin Klein bookbag (originally $211.00, purchased on clearance for $32.00), and high-quality blouses for as low as $5.00.

Second, another great store is Marshalls, affiliated with TJ Maxx. Although I have yet to shop here myself, I know of many people who have found jaw-dropping deals here, similar to TJ Maxx.

Showing teens that they can get the most trendy fashion for a fraction of the original cost can hopefully give them the opportunity to save up their money while still buying affordable clothes to express themselves as they desire. I believe that every young adult should be able to feel confident about themselves, and saving money while keeping up with popular fashion is a good way to do that.

Happy New Year Beavers! Now that Christmas is over and we’re getting closer to 2018, we’re all thinking about starting our new year off with a bang. To give you an idea about where the New Year’s tradition came from, and some statistics and numbers about the celebration itself, I decided to write a post.

First, we’ll learn about where the holiday originated from. Ringing in the new year goes way back to 4,000 years ago when the Babylonians celebrated it at the first full moon after the spring equinox. The ancient Egyptian year began with the annual flooding of the Nile. Julius Caesar made January first the official first day of the year in 46 B.C., but England and many American colonies didn’t do so until the year 1752.

Second, different countries celebrate the new year in many different ways. For example, the signature foods that people eat on this day have a very wide range of variety. In Italy, Germany, Ireland and the Southern United States, the main dish is legumes and leafy greens, meaning financial fortune. In Cuba, Austria, Hungary and Portugal, the food they eat is pork, meaning progress in the days or months to come. In the Netherlands, Mexico and Greece, the food is ring-shaped pastries symbolizing that the year has come full circle. And lastly, in Japan, the citizens eat long noodles in hopes of long lives.

As well as foods, different places also have different events to celebrate the beginning of a new year. For example, originating in 1890, the Rose Parade in Pasadena, California features floats made with 18 million flowers. At the Mummers Parade in Philadelphia, 10,000 people march through the city and perform in costumes. London, England brings in the new year with fireworks over the Thames. In 2012, the Olympic Games extra-large display consisted of 12,000 individual fireworks. In Australia, over one million people go to Sydney Harbor’s 40 mile shoreline to watch a firework show.

Here in America, a million people go to New York City to watch the ball drop, and close to 1 BILLION people watch the event on television. The famous ball is twelve feet in diameter 2,688 crystals, 32,000 LED lights, and weighs 11, 875 pounds. At midnight, 2,000 pounds of confetti fall on the crowd in Times Square. 44% of American adults plan to kiss sometime when the clock strikes midnight, 61% say a prayer on New Year’s Eve, and 22% fall asleep before midnight arrives.

The most common new year’s resolutions that Americans make are to: lose weight, get organized, spend less money, save more money, stay healthy, and quit smoking.

To all the Beavers here at our school, I hope the new year brings you many blessings that have yet to occur in your life, and I hope you all have a wonderful and safe holiday season. HAPPY NEW YEAR!

In today’s society, text messaging and social media are more popular than ever. In high school students specifically, the effects of these technology devices could be weighing heavy on our minds.

Texting is the most convenient way of communicating, but is it the best for the growing and learning brains of teenagers? Texting among teens has increased from an average of 50 texts a day in 2009 to an average of 60-100 texts a day in 2011. In today’s world, about 75% of teens communicate using text messages. This rise in texting has mostly occurred in teens aging from 14 to 17. Even still, older teenage girls remain the most enthusiastic about their texting. About 63% of teenagers claim to be exchanging text messages every day to communicate with people in their lives, more than phone calling (39% do it every day), face-to-face communication (35% do it every day), and social media messaging (29% do it every day).

While text messaging is obviously consuming most of the average teenager’s time, how is it affecting their school work? In a Rutgers study published in the Journal of Child Neurology, nighttime messaging is linked to the sleep, health, and academic performance of teenagers. Students who turned their devices off or messaged for less than 30 minutes after they have turned the lights out for the night performed significantly better in school than those who messaged for more than 30 minutes after lights out. Students who texted longer in the dark also slept fewer hours and were, therefore, more tired during their day than those who quit messaging when they settled down for bed. Even though females reported more frequent texting and more daytime sleepiness overall, they also had better academic performance than males in this study. This study concluded with a suggestion that educators recognize the sleep needs of teenagers and students, and to make these dreadful sleep habits an educative tool in their curriculum.

Here at Beaver Local, I believe that technology is a very useful tool for everyday life during the school day; however, we should take the time to teach students about the effects their texting actions can have on their bodies and their need for a well-rested brain.

Hello again, fellow bloggers and Beavers! As the holidays are quickly approaching, people are thinking about recipes and cooking food more than they normally do. Here at Beaver Local, we have a class, taught by Mrs. Julie Agnew, called Foods and Nutrition. In this class, we work in groups of three to five to achieve the goal of a wonderfully made dish.

Each time we cook, we complete an organizational sheet in order to help the mixing, cooking, and dish washing tasks to get done in an efficient and timely manner. This sheet designates each group member to a specific role in the kitchen. We assign a head chef, an assistant chef, a supply manager, and two helpers who wash the dishes. Also, we write down what equipment and ingredients we’ll be needing, and we assign each task to a certain group member.

While we learn nutritional facts about the foods we consume daily and safety precautions, Mrs. Agnew also makes the class very fun and enjoyable. Personally, I never had an interest in cooking or baking before taking this class. Mac N’ Cheese in a box was just about the only thing I could make in the past! Now, I have recipes to follow and skills to use in the kitchen at home, as well as in class.

Group work is very important for learning and growing high school students. It teaches us social skills, leadership skills, and a great deal of patience. We work with our friends, and meet new people, too. Even though the food and equipment are taken very seriously, we still laugh a lot every day!

During the times of Thanksgiving and Christmas, many families cook a great amount of food. With the knowledge and recipes I’ve learned in this class, I am now able to assist my mother and grandmother as they cook food for our entire family. Hopefully, I can add some of the new recipes I’ve learned to the menu!

Examples of the different food we have made so far this year in Foods and Nutrition are: no-bake cookies, pancakes, muffins, biscuits, banana nut bread, doughnuts (with supervision), pizza, cinnamon rolls, soft pretzels, Italian bubble bread, and chocolate chip cookies. YUM!

Hello again, Beavers! In today’s post, I’ll be sharing some information with you about the Wildlife Conservation class.

Wildlife Conservation is a class that students can take in the high school here at Beaver Local. We study and touch on many subjects such as how to conserve our wildlife and the local animals we have in this area. As well as studying in the classroom, we also do many things around the outside of the school. Behind the new baseball and softball fields, there is a small and shallow pond. This is where we do most of our outdoor studies and observations.

So far this school year, we’ve studied whitetail deer, black bear, and coyotes in the classroom. Recently, we began to read a book called Half-Earth, Our Planet’s Fight For Life by Edward O. Wilson. This book talks about the biodiversity on our planet and the things we need to do in order to keep animals and plants thriving. In addition, every Monday we watch Wild America videos with Marty Stouffer. We call these “Marty Monday’s.” Usually, each video we watch is related to the topic we are studying at the time.

Outside, we’ve accomplished many things. When the school year began, we focused our attention on our milkweed garden for monarch butterflies located inside the fence surrounding the pond. We began by pulling the weeds that grew inside the garden and weed whacking along the bricks on the perimeter. We then painted the bricks tan, placed new soil inside the garden, and planted the milkweed seeds. Hopefully, the milkweed will begin to grow next spring, and we will have a nice home for monarch’s.

Even though the pond was created for the water running off of the school’s parking lot, we still want to keep the water as clean as possible to make a nice home for many species to live. Our class purchased an algae rake to keep the algae off the top of the water. We take turns as classmates, putting on waders and marching into the shallow water. Two students wear waders in the pond, while one other student stands along the shore to pull the algae out of the water.

Furthermore, around the pond are many homes that we have made for animals. For example, we have a bat house, a mallard duck house, and a home for solitary bees. We as students have worked on those projects, as well as our teacher Mrs. Berger.

This class is not only to teach growing, young adults about the wildlife in our area, but also to teach about the need to conserve as much wildlife as possible. We hope our efforts are making a difference, and we hope that you’ll consider trying some of these tactics in order to keep our town and community full of life!

Hello Beavers! Today I would like to inform you about a college credit opportunity we have here at Beaver Local.

College Writing 1 is a class taught at Beaver Local High School that can earn you a college credit. These are called College Credit Plus (CCP) programs. The course is taught by Mrs. Dayna Hendricks, who also teaches AP Language and Composition, College Readiness English 12, Intervention, and Yearbook. Mrs. Hendricks was approved as part time faculty by Youngstown State University academic departments to teach this college class. CCP instructors are required to have the same qualifications as YSU faculty on campus. This class is available to students because Beaver Local teamed with YSU to allow Mrs. Hendricks to teach this course. The course is a dual enrollment program administered by the Metro Credit Education Outreach Office at YSU. The CCP class is monitored to insure that the class rigor meets University standards.

In college writing, we touch on many subjects that will work to our benefit when we graduate high school and move on to college. For example, we write ten pages each period of nine weeks. That’s a total of twenty pages, or four five page essays when we finish the course. So far, we have written a literacy narrative essay, a 500 word essay for college applications, a textual analysis essay, and we are now working on a compare and contrast essay.

As well as perfecting our writing skills, we also study the “soapstone” method. The soapstone method stands for speaker, occasion, audience, purpose, subject, and tone. Studying this method is greatly beneficial while writing long essays.

Personally, I found that taking this class gave me a real wake-up-call to what college will be like. Before taking this course, I had no idea how to write an essay, let alone a five-page essay. I found that this class incredibly increased my writing ability, and I would encourage any student at a lower grade level to take advantage of this wonderful opportunity.