Students are bracing for the oncoming stress of midterms
By Ben Chester
Stress is a very unique feeling. It comes when people are overwhelmed with work and have a limited amount of time to get it completed. The weeks that lead up to midterms at East Greenwich High School are especially stressful because there is schoolwork to be completed in addition to heavy studying for the upcoming midterms. On top of that, some students participate in extracurricular activities that require their complete attention and time in addition to school. Different activities lead to a lack of free time for a student which is coincidentally the root of stress. If there is no leeway for students to get all of this work done in a short amount of time, pressure builds up.
However, there are simple solutions to manage stress. “To an extent, school is stressful during this time of year but it’s all about time management,” said Junior Brandon Eckles. Eckles is a star on the East Greenwich High School Basketball Team and is in the midst of the season during midterm week. With practice or games six days a week, time management is his key to stress-free success. “If you don’t use time management to your advantage in high school, then you won’t have good results,” he comments.
Additionally, Matt Wegrzyn, sophomore at East Greenwich High School and another member of the basketball team, claims school stresses him out a lot during this time of year. “I’m a member of the basketball team, Best Buddies, and I’m in class council, and it seems like the work load for everything including school increases which makes life quite stressful. Balancing schoolwork and midterms on top of all of this is nearly impossible but I get it done,” he notes.
Of course everyone has a different workload during midterm week, and it’s all about how you take control of it, and not letting it take control of you. If students let stress overwhelm them, then they won’t get much work done. However, a little bit of stress can actually be a good thing. In fact, small amounts of stress keep students on the edge with a little urgency to help get work done.
A New Year, or Just a New Day?
By: Duncan Englehart
For some, the New Year is just another day, another year, and the end of a vacation. However there are those who take advantage of this new year to start something new for themselves, and Clayton Gupta, Senior at East Greenwich High School, is one of those few. And while the others who choose to perhaps just go to the gym more often or eat healthier, Gupta desires more. “Everything” is what he wants to change he says, “a fresh start. I want to be better to my friends, and my family,” a bold resolution.
His list goes on, and he reveals that he’s concerned with his schoolwork; Gupta would very much like to start a new initiative and get school work done early and done well. “It’ll be hard,” he says as he has grown infamous from his lack of drive in his schoolwork. This is especially so because Gupta is getting anxious to leave the town in which he lives, and his drive to earn money conflicts with his ability to complete his schoolwork. However, the job market is hard and Gupta has been unable to find work despite numerous attempts. “Times are tough, I just said it,” as he adds a chuckle. Gupta says he wants to get away, but not a town or two. “States” he says is the distance he wants to leave between him and his hometown, “perhaps even countries.” Most would say Gupta’s resolutions are extreme and unrealistic. But to him, they are goals for the year, not merely the first few weeks. He intends to check off his list by the end of the year. He plans to work hard to so that he can both earn the money necessary to leave, while simultaneously proving to his father he is ready for the next step in his life. Gupta understands the challenges he will face, and notes, “this isn’t going to be easy...but it’s something that I just really want to do.”
However, not all students take New Year’s resolutions quite as seriously as Gupta. In fact, Luke LeGraw, freshmen at Providence College, believes something completely different. To him, “the New Year is just another day, it’s really nothing to get excited about.” His view is that if you need to change yourself, you shouldn’t have to wait until the New Year, that it should be done immediately. LeGraw admits that he has never made a new year’s resolution and never intends to do so; He believes it is a waste of time and energy. He says that people often give up on the gym or a diet several weeks after the start of the New Year. Also, you will never deal with disappointment from not reaching your goal. Yet, “It’s like a necessary evil though, because at least it can occupy people for a little.”
Prom: 2013
By Maddie Eustis
Prom seems to be all the buzz anybody who’s anybody is talking about second semester. Who's going with who, who’s wearing what dress. This excitement didn’t skip over East Greenwich High School (EGHS), and many anticipated questions are circulating about EGHS Prom 2013.
The location of Prom this year was an initial problem, as members of the committee decided between the Botanical Gardens and a Newport Mansion. Yet, the committee took a complete turn and decided on the Crowne Plaza in Warwick.
In fact, the graduating Seniors of last year planned a Winter Ball supposed to be held at the Crowne Plaza. However, the ball fell through and the was indebted to the Crowne Plaza, which worked in the current Juniors favor.
Meredith Reilly, an EGHS Junior and class Historian had all the details regarding Prom 2013.
Reilly, believes that, “while not everyone saw eye to eye” she smiled , “now it looks like smooth sailing.” Reilly has “high expectations” for prom 2013, “it will be amazing... I know the hard work we’ve put into it will be paid off.”
Reilly continued, “since its a short ride everyone will save on limos [and] it will be cheaper since they [the limo companies] are paid by the hour. Prom is so much money anyway.”
While planning prom can be stressful, it surely is a night that every attendee will not forget.
Hell Week
The EGHS auditorium, home of Drama Club.
By Leticia Luz
Once a year a fire burns in the eyes of EGHS drama students. This fire is not set by the passion of opening night, no. This fire is kindled about a week before the show. This week is best known as Hell Week: the week where Drama Club participants come to school at 7:30 a.m. and leave at 10:00p.m. On top of this, it is the week of midterms and early senior project presentations. Drama Senior Koby Gartner says, “I’m ripping my hair out just thinking about it.”
Hell Week officially starts on January 22. On this day, you will see drama students dreading the upcoming days, but underclassmen and first time actors only have rumors to go off of. First time drama student Brandon Dao exclaimed, “hell week is like looking in your cabinet for that last cookie and not finding it. You feel sad and angry.”
On Thursday the 24th midterms start. Sweatpant clad students will shuffle through the glass doors, take the first two exams, rush home to study and hopefully eat. Then they’ll have to rush back for hours and hours of grueling rehearsal. They will go home study, sleep and repeat until opening night.
Will this stress kids out to the max? Will the pressure of trying to complete both tasks flawlessly be too overwhelming? Who thought of all these events falling in the same week? Is it to show the students what it means to have a work ethic? Whatever the reason Drama students have already began to take shelter.
All Drama students, from Freshmen to Seniors, have a common goal: to prioritize. Clearly school comes first for most students and they would not be able to be in drama if their grades were not up to par. In fact, some Seniors who have early senior project presentations have already asked teachers if they could take certain exams during their gym final or other elective final. Seniors are being hit the hardest, but through four years of experience, have luckily learned to juggle all of their activities the best.
Even though the fire is being provoked more and more by the addition of common tasks and project deadlines, most drama students appear to be trying to remain calm. The Juniors explained their weekend goal was to complete as much work as possible, because, for the following days they would be in rehearsal.
Overall, the students appear to be calm for right now but are still dreading the upcoming weeks. It will be a new challenge for the Seniors this year because they have never experienced Hell Week on the same week as midterms. However, the show must go on, and students at EGHS, including these Seniors, will learn to prioritize and time-manage to get the job done.
College Acceptances
by Duncan Englehart
Jack Payette
Caitlyn Mason
The biggest step we have yet to take in our young lives: college. It gives us hope for a better future, leaves us excited for the next four years, but it can also cause a great deal of stress and anguish. What happens if we don’t get our first choice? Well if that is your mindset, you won’t be getting any sympathy from Senior Jack Payette, one of the select few high school seniors to be accepted into an elite University. It was this December that Payette learned of his acceptance into Stanford University, one of this country’s most prestigious higher learning universities.
Payette remembers the day he finally received his letter of acceptance. It was a freezing day in December, and Payette was coming home to a rather ecstatic mother. “I had really hoped I got in, because I worked my butt off,” Payette said with a laugh, “my favorite was telling Mrs. Schnacky though and giving her a hug.” Schnacky, Payette’s AP chemistry teacher was elated, Payette said. He also notes that Schnacky always considered him to be a good student in that class, which surprises nobody. Shiv Patel, a junior at East Greenwich High School who has shared classes with Payette, said that Payette didn’t hide his achievements, “he was talking in math class about how he was mad that gym drags down his GPA so much, and I was just sitting there like...” Patel said, adding a shocked face at the end.
However, another name might pop up in the East Greenwich High School community when college is mentioned, and that name is Senior Caitlyn Mason. Simply by her demeanor it is easy to assume she is of incredible intelligence. In addition, you will see her associate herself with other very knowledgeable people, such as former Salutatorian Ben Pallant, and Eagle Scout Brian Ross, whom all row crew together. Mason was accepted into the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in December, the premier of technology institutes in America.
However, Mason is quite modest when it comes to grades and hardly said much at all when asked about her academics. Emphasizing that she just tries hard and had a goal she wanted to achieve, and did as much. Whereas Payette has plastered Stanford across his Facebook page, Mason has never been one for advertising, causing her acceptance to be less mainstream, only being spread by her peers and not herself.
However, it doesn’t matter who you ask, both of these remarkable students worked their hardest to get into these prestigious Universities. Although they didn’t have to deal with the stress and disappointment of not getting into their dream school, such an achievement certainly does not come without their fair share of stress during their high school career.