October Highlights from the Wolfpack!
FFA VISITS LOCAL FIELD
It is already known that several activities related to organizations such as FFA and FBLA have been cancelled due to the global pandemic we are going through, and other ones will continue af-ter or in January, if things go as planned.
Among the FFA activities that have been cancelled is Range Judging, which consists of identifying prairie plants. Sophomores are commonly the students that participate in this. Before they can compete with other schools, they must go to a field to apply what they have learned from their instructor. This year due to COVID-19, it will not be possible for the sophomores to participate in an actual Range Judging contest. However, the sophomores did get to go to a local farmer’s field to do some classroom judging. Thank you, Dennis Wieser, for helping out. Submitted by Itzel Gonzalez, FFA Member
Every year the freshmen FFA members learn the Creed. The first person to memorize the entire Creed earns an FFA jacket. This year’s winner was Kale Morris. Congratulations!
FBLA VIRTUAL CALENDER SALES
Over the years the FBLA Chapter has gone out to businesses and promoted FBLA as well as sold ads for the community birthday calendar. The students have shown leadership, communication, and teamwork skills. This year, due to Covid-19, sales had to be handled differently as students could not leave the building for a trip.
This did not stop the Idalia FBLA Chapter from developing their leadership skills. In fact, this opened a new avenue for some of them. They had to perfect their telephone skills and call their past supporters from St. Francis, Wray, Burlington, and Idalia. They also had to write e-mails for the businesses as well as create and send invoices. This was a great way to expand the student’s skills because they would have to learn how to deal with different personalities through a phone call or email! Priscilla Cordova, Camren Morris, Kylie Wingfield, Brandy Henrickson, Vanessa Venturi, Porscha Jacobs, Itzel Gonzales, Cloey Jones, and Raquel Lieurance were the students making the calls! Thank you, communities for helping us develop these telephone/email skills! Submitted by Priscilla Cordova, FBLA Member
FBLA STOCK MARKET CHALLENGE
An FBLAs competitive event that students are participating in is the Stock Market Challenge. This event requires students to manage a successful investment portfolio of stocks, bonds, and mutual funds, using a hypothetical $100,000. They track their investments over the course of 12 weeks, receiving valuable opportunities to practice core math, English Language Arts, and research skills as well as fundamental business, economics, and social studies content in a real-world scenario.
Idalia FBLA’s team consists of Marek Cody, Eduardo Estrada, and Tyler Hall. The team has purchased stocks in Tesla Nvidia as well as a couple of hotels, airlines, and random bands. This is the first time our FBLA has had a Stock Market Team. We are excited to see how far this team will go. Submitted by Porscha Jacobs, Idalia FBLA Member
GROWING UP WITH KATIE
October is the awareness for Spina Bifida month, On October 5, students spread the word to wear blue for Katie McGinnis. We got together with the students who wore blue and gathered for a picture with Katie. Katie has lived with spina bifida her entire life. Spinal bifida is a birth defect that causes the spinal cord to develop improperly or close too soon. I’ve grown up with Katie and watched her thrive at everything she does. She’s one of the strongest people I know. Katie is always finding her own ways to do the things we don’t think about. She has her own activities outside of school to stay active and included. I’ve always seen Katie as anything but “normal.” And this isn’t because of her condition. She’s always been a friendly and spunky girl. She isn’t like what you normally see in other people our age. Ever since the first day of preschool, I knew she would be so much fun. Katie has never let her condition stop her from doing something she loves. She will always be someone you will remember simply because of her intriguing personality. She continues to shine and I don’t see her slowing down anytime soon. Submitted by Kylie Wingfield, InDesign Student
HOMECOMING WEEK STILL GOES ON!
Although we’re stuck in Covid, our school is still showing school spirit. Every year the Student Council along with sponsor, Sherri Ramseier, come up with different themes and activities for every day of Homecoming Week. Throughout the week, we’ve kept the school spirit high and participated in different wardrobe themes and lunch time activities each day.
On Monday, to keep the tradition going each student was told to come to school wearing a jersey, a hat, and bring suckers to classes. Our lunch time activity was Whose Phone Is It? On Tuesday, the theme was Online-School Fashion Day. Almost everyone wore their pajamas! The lunch time activity was the Balloon Relay. Wednesday’s theme was Tie Dye-Neon/Disney Day. The lunch time activity was the annual ice cream social. Eve-ry student and staff member got a cup of ice cream and all kinds of top-pings. Thursday’s theme was Red Carpet/Hobo Day. At lunch, we played Army vs. Navy. Lastly, on Friday we kept the tradition from years in the past and dressed up with wolf pride!
On Friday, October 23, the football boys participated in the Homecoming football game against the Eads Eagles. Although they did not come away with a win, it was a hard fought game. The Homecoming royalty consisted of Vanessa Venturi, Rebecca Sbrozi, and Macy Richards for queen candidates and Tyson Richards was the only king candidate. Tyson and Vanessa were crowned king and queen at halftime. It was a very exciting week! Submitted by Rylan Brigham, InDesign Student
IDALIA OR ITALY??
Once again here’s the “exchange student’s point of view”! This time I’d like to talk about the many differences there are between Idalia, which is the only example of American High School I’ve experienced, and schools in Italy. I can tell you that they are very different from each other, starting from the homecoming week we had!
So far the other exchange student and I are loving this school, it’s cool how we can create beautiful relationships at school, also because the school is not so big, we have the opportunity to get to know every student! In our Ital-ian schools that’s not possible, schools are so big there that, of course, you have your little group of friends, but nobody at school really cares about the others. For this reason, this is an aspect of this school that we’re appreciating a lot.
Furthermore, we can feel another atmosphere between students and teachers—it is more relaxed and friendly! You also have a lot of activities that help students feel united with each other and that gives the school another mood—a positive and happy one—such as the Olympic Games or the Homecoming Week we had! I know that for many students going to school is an obligation, and I can tell you that most of the time it’s the same for me in Italy! Well, most of the time I feel stressed and anxious when I go to school there because of the tense atmosphere that exists. Otherwise here I’m happy to go to school because it’s not scary or stressful; in Idalia we can express ourselves in our best way without worries!
Another big difference is that in Italy we don’t have any after-school activity (sometimes we have after-school course, but most of the time they’re boring and nobody wants to participate), but also lunch time or sports! We usually have two 15-minutes breaks in which we can walk around the school but we can’t go outside, and then at 2 p.m. we go home. After school someone can play a sport, but only individually and not in school. So as you can see, your school is cooler than ours! In Idalia we’re happy to have lunch all together and play sports everyday after school!
Rebecca and I can’t be more excited to be here, and we must thank our families, the school and all the stu-dents for that. So remember that even when you don’t want to go to school, you will always have a good rea-son to go, because it’s the place where we spend most of our time and we have wonderful people waiting for us that make our lives a bit lighter and shiner! Submitted by Vanessa Venturi, Exchange Student
WHAT IS TWO WEEKS OF REMOTE LEARNING LIKE?
You know some students may like remote learning more than others, but you never know until you get to experience it, and I got to experience it. This is my perspective. Everyone has their opinions with remote schooling, and there are pros and cons to everything.
Life is different while doing remote learning. Sitting in front of a computer for around seven hours a day for mandatory classes along with hours of homework after class is draining for many. As the county cases rise rapidly, many are preparing to go to remote. This isn't the life that parents wanted to raise their kids in but unfortunately, we all must adjust to the new life.
From a student’s point of view, I would like to share a few things that I have learned with remote school. In-school learning is easiest for me as I am a very visual and hands-on student. With having been quarantined for the last two weeks and having to login remotely to “be in class”, I found it more difficult to learn; classes aren’t the same. During those two weeks my mind started to lose focus. Personally, I can´t stay on track mainly because of how long I’ve been sitting in front of a computer. Last spring the school changed the schedule to help us get through the remote learning process and that way seemed to help us focus better.
COVID gets brought up in many conversations now. Some days this is the talk of the school. I have heard many students agree with my statements. Idalia, as we are in a hard spot with this virus, let’s stay “Wolfpack Strong”. Submitted by Tara Hubbard, Past Quarantine Student
WOLF WARRIOR OLYMPICS
On October 2 of the 2020 school year, the Idalia high school and middle school came together and participated in the first annual Wolf Warrior Olympics. The seven teams were captained by one of the seven seniors. There was a total of 12 obstacles and whoever had the fastest time were the winners.
When asked how the afternoon went, many of the Idalia students said they had a blast and cannot wait until next year. They also said that because this school year has a restricted amount of activities, they really enjoyed hanging out with friends, doing something out of the normal day-to-day routine, and having a good time! A little physical activity, a friendly challenge, and lots of new friendships made for a productive afternoon. Submitted by Camren Morris, StuCo Member
