4 Misc.

The Bear November 3, 2022

Student government designs homecoming

SCaleb Pedersen
Staff Writer
Student government got a great start on
the planning of the 2022-2023 school year by meet-
ing up in the summer.
Sophomore student government
member Layla Samuelson said, “We discussed what
groups we wanted for homecoming.”
Homecoming is always the biggest and
hardest event to plan for at the beginning of the
year. It took a lot of work and coordination between
the student government members. Although this
year’s outcome was successful, there were some
struggles.
Junior Student Government President
Olivia Naber said, “For the Pep Rally, we've had to
coordinate with several different groups like the
Marching Band, Cheerleaders, Homecoming Court,
and Football, which has been interesting. Figuring
out a definite schedule for all of them has been
pretty tough.”
Senior Student Government Secretary
Anna Waterman said, “The hardest part was trying
to plan all the activities around the pep rally and
powder buff because those were separate commit-
tees.”
“This was the first time in over three
years that we DJed the dance ourselves. If we do
that again, we have a few snafus we need to work
out,” said Abby Noelck, student government ad-
viser.
Although the planning process didn’t
change much, the student government decided to
tweak the way they planned homecoming this year.
Naber explained, “Last year, we had
four committees. We had the Spirit Week commit-
tee, Friday Afternoon Activities committee, Powder
Puff and Buff committee, and the Dance committee.
This year, we did all of those as well as a Pep Rally
committee so we could focus on our Pep Rally and
Friday Afternoon Activities separately. When we
had them combined last year, it seemed very rushed
and like we didn't have enough time to focus on
both.”
Waterman pointed out, “This is our sec-
ond year of doing committees to plan homecoming.
In the past all of student government would plan
each part together and not split up.”
Sophomore student government class
president, Josh Kroemer said, “It is easy to plan.
Everyone splits up into their own committees.”
This year’s change in planning has lifted
stress and made planning smooth sailing. Student Government. First Row: Freshman Class President Lincoln Naber, Senior Class President Evan
Each member took on an extra role to Striegel, Social Media Chair Alex Poppen, Secretary Anna Waterman, President Olivia Naber, Treas-
make homecoming the best it could be. urer Rediet Boelk, Sophomore Class President Josh Kroemer, uClass President Nina Torkelson, Ad-
“I also emcee’d for the dance,” said Wa-
terman. viser Abby Noelk, Second Row: Maddie Reed, Claire Jarrett, Kennedy Simpson, Miley Shields,
Naber helped out by making “a couple Peyton Braddock, Madelynn Falco, Jordan Waters, Nora Ziehr, Maryam Martin, Emmersen
of the posters around the school as well as writing Thomas, Saylee Gingerich, Caitlyn Harrison, Ava Finley, Madelyn Stout, Tess Hammar, Third Row:
the Monday and Friday trivia questions.” Kalvin Clemens, Alyssa Pierce, Will Bridges, Addi Schultes, Lexi Skay, Ashlynne Nash, Whitney
“Overall, we are happy with the re-
sponse we got and how participatory and enthusi- Spratt, Kaylee Kettler, Karley Staker, Layla Samuelson, Lynzi Dykstra, Dawn Johnson, Alyse Klink-
astic students were!” Said Noelck. kammer, Hanna Schiele. Photo by Brooklyn Nash.

Lego League kicks off a new year

Keaton Norfleet ence team, and a beginner team. There are twelve gram: Robotics, Tech Challenge, and Lego League,
Staff Writer participants in total. The two teams are “56187 Tur- all have their own theme; The theme for Lego
tle Power” and “56188 Screaming Goats.” Students League is “SUPERPOWERED.” Students will get
On Saturday, August 20, 2022, the then constructed the LEGO missions that would be to explore where energy comes from, how it’s dis-
FIRST Lego League team kicked off the new sea- placed on the game table. tributed, and how it’s used, and work to innovate
son in Matt Cain’s room. Students watched the The game is “ENERGIZE,” which is a for a better future in energy.
2022-2023 FIRST ENERGIZE season announce- game about energy and how to discover new ways There are two parts to Lego League. The
ment and learned about their game. After this, Cain to minimize its impact on our planet. first part is the game. Students will need to design,
split the students into two teams, a mixed experi- The three branches of the FIRST Pro- build, and code a robot using a LEGO MIND-
STORM EV3 brick, and other MINDSTORM ac-
cessories, such as motors and sensors, and of
course, LEGOS. This robot will have to perform
tasks such as pulling, pushing, and grabbing objects
on the field.
The field is a game mat that is laid on a
4’x8’ table. It is a top-down view of a landscape.
The missions are placed in specific places on the
field that are marked with an X. The missions are
connected to the field using double-sided tape or
command strips. This makes sure that the missions
do not move when the robot pushes or pulls moving
pieces that are a part of the mission task.
Students can not create a robot that is
over twelve inches tall, and it must be small enough
to fit inside a designated robot station on the game
field. While during a match, students can not touch
the robot, unless it is in the robot station. If the robot
is touched outside of the station or interrupted dur-
ing the match, a referee will remove one of six pre-
cision tokens from the field. Precision tokens are
small, red LEGO cylinder bricks that are located on
the corner of the game field. Each token is worth
ten points.
The second part of the competition is
the innovation project. Students are tasked with
finding a problem with current technology involv-
ing energy, such as the burning of fossil fuels, and
must research, plan, and present a possible solution
to the problem. Cain explained,
“For this, they brainstorm to come up
with a relevant problem to this year's theme and an
innovative solution to that problem.”
They can create a document, presenta-
tion, or poster, and can even build a model of their
Middle schoolers Max Tucker, Evan Pederson, James Haack, and Hunter Hammer work together solution. Students are encouraged to collaborate
to brainstorm what their robot will do. Photo by Keaton Norfleet. with peers, be creative, and have fun with the proj-
ect. Students will present their projects to the
judges, who will award points for creativity and
core values.
Discovery, Innovation, Impact, Inclu-
sion, Teamwork, and Fun are the six core values
that FIRST uses to express the philosophies of Gra-
cious Professionalism, which is a way of doing
things that encourages high-quality work, empha-
sizes the value of others, and respects individuals
and the community. Lego League and all other
branches in the FIRST program, use the core values
to model the behavior of their students for a better
work atmosphere.
“Our students are doing exceptional this
year. Our teams are far ahead of schedule in their
robot game and they have some really awesome In-
novation Project ideas to choose from,” Cain com-
mented.
While the Lego League members have
to do the work themselves, they have the help of
Matt Cain, the Lego League sponsor of seven years.
They can ask questions about the rules, the game,
and overall efficiency, while also getting help with
robot design and mission choosing.
Students also get the help of returning
members who act as mentors. Mentors provide the
same assistance, however, it makes productivity
greater, as it is not just Cain helping with students.
For this Lego League season, sophomores Keaton
Norfleet, Kayla Garret, and 7th grader Eli Garret
are acting mentors.
The team goal is to compete on De-
cember 10, 2022, at the Quad Cities Qualifier.
“Registration is not guaranteed place-
ment, and it will not open until mid October,” Cain
clarified.
While the team does hope to compete in
person, in recent years, FIRST has held a digital
competition on Zoom, a video call software. Teams
would record their robot performance within the
time limit, and would submit the videos to the
judges.
Students would still present their innovation proj-
ects. They would stand in front of a camera, and
communicate with the judges. Points, awards, and
placements would be shown at the end.
The Lego League members are excited
and ready to take on the rest of the 2022-23 season
and all of its challenges.

The Bear looks back on 30 years

Will Tidrick
Staff Writer
Issue: Issue 1, October 13, 1993
Page: 1
Story Title: The Flood of ‘93
• Summary: During the summer of 1993, a massive
rainstorm struck eastern Iowa causing large-scale
damage to Coralville and Iowa City. Many streets
in downtown Coralville got flooded and many
homes damaged. The repairs for the damages done
were estimated in the millions. In West Branch,
Wapsi Creek was flooded causing a few roads to be
entirely shut down. West Branch Elementary
School’s boiler room was also damaged and had to
be fixed. Many farm families were hit hard finan-
cially as well as tons of acres of crop had been de-
stroyed due to the heavy rainfall.
Issue : Issue 1 Section B, November 10th, 1993
Page: 1
Story Title: Huffing- When household items
become lethal drugs
• Summary: In the beginning of the 1993 school
year at West Branch High School, a large issue had
come to light and caused a lot of distress. Two stu-
dents were under arrest for public intoxication due
to huffing chemicals. This sparked a lot of attention
and KCRG made an entire news story about the sit-
uation in West Branch. Students as well as teachers
felt that KCRG had pinned West Branch as the epi-
center of the issue and had taken a bad angle of the
whole story. Many students were upset as the inci-
dent was put on all West Branch Highschool stu-
dents and it was ruining the school's reputation.
According to Dewey’s Jack and Jill, there had been
a massive increase in demand for Glade Air Fresh-
ener in that past year, with most of the buyers being
unusual customers. In 1993, according to the Na-
tional Institute of Drug Abuse, about 17 percent of
teens in the United States had tried getting high by
inhaling household products.
Issue : Issue 1 Section B, November 10th, 1993
Page: 2
Story Title: We are saving for a rainy day. Is it
here?
• Summary: Massive Budget cuts were demanded
from education. Students and teachers were out-
raged as the previous year they also had another
round of budget cuts. In 1993, the state wanted
$15,000 to be cut from the district budget. The
budget cuts looked to cut a lot of school program
funding even more and it meant that a lot of student
and teacher supplies and activities were going to be
cut. The Bear Newspaper Staff decided to hold a
poll to hear suggestions students had on how to sur-
vive the budget crisis. The top 10 answers were:
1. Who cares? We don’t get paid to come here
2. Rent out football journeys
3. Sell movie rights to the huffing story
4. Extortion
5. Donate Faculty Organs
6. Advocate home schooling
7. Burn the school for insurance money
8. Don’t run the air conditioner during January
9. Don’t waste paper on report cards
10. Recycle toilet paper

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