By: Amanda Ostrowski / Staff Writer

     Puerto Rico recently had a towering hurricane wash over them. This hurricane has left Puerto Rico with hardly anything.

    Hurricane Maria, with winds up to 155 mph crashed into Puerto Rico. This knocked out all the electricity and power to the island.

    The residents are running low on the food and fuel. Families are having a hard time sending their loved ones food and water because it’s so expensive.

    “Let me begin by saying our hearts and prayers go out to the people of Puerto Rico and the US Virgin Islands, who are suffering in the wake yet of another catastrophic hurricane,” President Donald Trump said.

    Trump wants to be there for Puerto Rico every step of the way. He wants to help in any way he can because there are many Americans that live or are visiting Puerto Rico.

    Since most of the power is still out Puerto Rico passed a curfew that says no one can be out from 7 p.m- 5 a.m. About 60 people we already arrested for breaking the curfew.

    The police are still missing around 10% of their employees, and also they are working in way less buildings then they should be. They are also having trouble because many people have been shoplifting and stealing stuff they need like food and water. Around 36 people have already been arrested for committing those kinds of crimes.

    Puerto Rico is doing the best that they can, but the people there can not do everything themselves especially because they are on an island. Other people need to step in and help Puerto Rico.

By: Chelsea Kirk / Staff Writer

During the 2017 fall semester natural disasters have demolished and taken a toll over the North-Western hemisphere. These powerful catastrophes have left thousands of people without homes, power and everyday resources.

    Hurricane Harvey was the first colossal storm to submerge the Gulf of Mexico and the surrounding states at the end of August. Harvey was classified as a Category 4 storm, just prior to slamming into Houston. Many coastline cities were left devastated after Harvey passed, leaving several feet of rain behind. Luckily, many organizations including the American Red Cross and Salvation Army, have been helping distribute supplies and providing aid to those who have been impacted.

    Soon after Hurricane Harvey, Hurricane Irma crashed into the Caribbean islands and Florida in early September. Irma had a tremendous amount of strength, which measured up to be a Category 5. Many civilians were left without power, which resulted in a loss in communication with family. Irma weakened extremely slowly, still a Category 3 by the time the eye of the storm hit central Florida.

    On September 19, a 7.1 magnitude quake left Mexico City and surrounding areas in ruins. More than 200 fatalities were confirmed by this deadly earthquake and many more injured. This quake was not even the worst of it. A few days prior, an 8.1 magnitude quake hit Mexico, which is the strongest earthquake in approximately a century to have hit the country. Civilians as far as Guatemala and Mexico City felt this quake, even though the epicenter was in the Pacific Ocean, 75 miles away from the coast.

    These natural disasters are showing no signs of stopping, while Hurricane Maria stirs in the Atlantic, also reaching a Category 5.

     Hundreds of lives and homes were lost due to these relentless events. Individuals from around the globe have been donating and providing help to all of the civilians affected. The relief efforts give the survivors hope that someday, they will return to their normal lives and forget about these past tragedies.

Around Valentine’s Day every year, the school offers many different activities for students to participate in.

Student Council has an activity which is ‘Send a Soda’ where students can buy a soda for each other and Student Council will deliver it to them on Valentine’s Day.

Senior Hayden Baer in Student Council explains that many students participate in this activity every year.

“Send A Soda was Coke Grams so I think it has been here for a while at least before I was here and it changed to Send A Soda two years ago,” Baer said.

  Baer explains how the money from this activity goes to a charity of their choice each year.

“10% of everything we make goes to a charity we selected, this year we chose Camp Quality and then the rest we keep and use for events for the school,” Baer said.

Each year they make around 75 to a 100 dollars.

The main purpose is mainly for fun and to make some extra money for Student Council events that they hold later on in the school year.

“It is just a fun thing to do during Valentine’s Day because some other programs do stuff like carnations but cokes are more humorous and a fun thing to do I think,” Baer said.

Along with Send A Soda, there is a carnation sale. Very similar to Send A Soda, students can buy carnations for other students which will also be delivered to them on Valentine’s Day.

Teacher Trina Poole and the group of students attending Washington D.C. are in charge of selling and delivering the Carnations.

The money that is raised is used for the trip that all seniors can attend in the spring.

“We do it to raise money for our annual trip to D.C. in April, we do it because the trip is expensive and it helps offset the cost for kids to go,” Poole said.

Poole and Oregon Corners Florist created the carnation sale

    “We started selling Carnations six years ago when Adam Carlyon passed away. His family,who owns Oregon Corners Florist, thought it would be a good idea to start selling carnations for Valentine’s Day so we have been doing it ever since,” Poole said.

Poole explains how much money is usually made from selling the carnations every year.

“We usually raise about 150 to 200 dollars a year and that is split amongst the students who help out with selling the Carnations,” Poole said.

    Along with the sodas and carnations, Happy also started a new activity this year. The students in Happy decided to send out valentines to a list of students.

The teachers who run the organization pick out a list of students who they believed would appreciate receiving a valentine from Happy.

Teacher Lisa Heilmeier explains how the idea came to be this year.

“The kids in happy came up with the idea but we just decided we wanted to do something for Valentine’s Day along with the sodas and carnations but since we are not an official club we cannot sell anything or raise money so whatever we did had to be free,” Heilmeier said.

The idea branched off from their annual Halloween event, passing out candy to students.

“This is the first time we have done valentines but for the past three years we have done the Halloween candy so we decided to make a play off of that and do the valentines this year as well. The students just donated the valentines and the candy and then we just came up with a list of students that we thought it would brighten their day if they got a valentine,” Heilmeier said.

Overall the school gives many ideas for students to brighten someone’s day and make their Valentine’s day happy and enjoyable.