Cst Prep

Cst prep is a class that gets you ready for the Cst tests. Cst prep is during first period, sixth period, and after school. It provides help for areas in math and science, and are taught by teachers that care for students, teachers like Mr. Flaxenburg and Mr. Dam. Some students are chosen to have Cst prep, some just sign in for it. The extra help is available to both seventh and eighth graders.
-Erika D.

Mesa Winners

Nightingale students took on Southern California in the MESA competition in March 26, 2011. MESA (math and science engineering) is an afterschool program where students train for competitive events of intellect. Students have been training since the early beginning of the school year. MESA students have competed for medals and other awards. They were coached by our own Mr. Meyerhof.
There were many categories in MESA. In the math categories, there are self exams for geometry, algebra, and pre-algebra. In the science engineering categories, there are mouse traps, gliders, bridges, windmills, and the egg drop. Nightingale students walked out of the MESA building with over 30 medals. They will have a beach trip later this year.
As a school, we are very proud to have these students represent Nightingale Middle School in such high-class. We hope for next year that MESA will succeed the older members and follow similar results.
-Jonathan Quach

Charter School

We have gotten news that there’s going to be a charter school in Nightingale! If you don’t know what a charter school is, they are primary schools that can receive public or private funds. They are not allowed to pay tuition. Charter schools don’t have the rules that regular schools have. When too many students are on the waiting list, they use a lottery method. Some people don’t think they’re a good idea. Look at our video to find out more.
-Dalia

Waste School Lunches

There have been reports of uneaten food in the trashcans at Nightingale Middle School. It costs the school lots of money to provide every student food. Many students take their food for granted because they think the lunches are free, but it isn’t. Every year students waste about thousands of dollars in food by throwing it away. We shouldn’t waste our food even though you don’t eat it. There is a reason for that green basket on the trashcans. It requires no work to save the food. Save the food instead of disposing it. All you need to do is put the food into the green basket. It cost about $3.00 or $3.50 for each lunch. The leftover lunches is thrown into the trash. They can’t even save them. Don’t just get your food and throw it away without even taking a bite of it. The school works hard to provide us our food so we should be thankful we have food to eat.
-Victor R.

April Fools Day

April fools day is when friends and families have a chance to prank each other. Also people get to make any type of joke whether it is good or bad. Here at Nightingale the school is being closed during April Fools Day. Usually the school has been open but this year it is not going to be open.
-Jennifer

Easter

Easter is where Adults hide eggs for kids and the kids go hunt for the eggs, the eggs may contain candy or money inside them. Easter Is April 24th 2011 This year. Every year Easter changes It’s dates about 20 days forward. The Easter bunny is the symbol for Easter. Easter, the principal festival of the Christian church year, celebrates the Resurrection of Jesus Christ on the third day after his Crucifixion. When Christians wanted other Christians to accept Christianity they used Easter to celebrate their Christianity. To solve this problem the emperor Constantine called the Council of Nicaea in 325. The question of the date of Easter was one of its main concerns. The council decided that Easter should fall on Sunday following the first full moon after the vernal equinox. But fixing up the date of the Equinox was still a problem. The Alexandrians, noted for their rich knowledge in astronomy calculations were given the task. And March 21 was made out to be the perfect date for spring equinox.
-Angie S.

Teacher Layoffs

Have you heard of teacher layoffs? Well on March 15 they’re going to tell the teachers who are going to be laid off. There are about 2,300 teachers laid off in L.A. . The teachers wanted to go on strikes. Some teachers are sad about getting laid off their job. Also students like their teacher that they have but there getting laid off. It is unfair to the teacher that worked at a school for a long time. There also would be fewer students because there are fewer teachers. One of our questions are why should teachers get laid off? There was one statement that the government said, "The last one that was hired should get laid off."
-Kevin C.

Chocolate Fundraiser

The Music Department is holding a See’s Candies sale. The chocolate fundraiser started on March 2, 2011 when Ms. Elliot and Ms. Jones are performing at Disneyland and Knott’s Berry Farm. They also decided to start a fundraiser to earn money for their instruments. The students will be performing in front of the whole crowd. The teachers need a lot of orders to go to the amusement parks and to buy new instruments. The prices of the See’s Candies are a little expensive, but it’s worth it. The highest price is $18.50 for one Truffles box. The lowest price is $6.50 for a Fluffy Chick Box, Bordeaux Egg, Milk Chocolate Butter Egg, or a Peanut Better Egg. All sales go to the Music Department. Remember to buy chocolates and help out!
- Manting H.

Oscar/Grammy

The Grammys is an event where music artists are nominated for awards like “Song of the year”or “Best New artist”or “Artist of the year”. It is the biggest event in music ,every musician looks forward to winning a Grammy award. The Oscars are similar to the Grammys, but it involves awards like “Best Picture” “Actor in a leading role” And ”Art direction and makeup.” Many actors try their best to win an Oscar. The actors who get in to better movies are most likely to get an Oscar. The Oscars will be on February 27,2011.Don’t miss them.

Family Science Night

Family Science Night was on March 3, 2011. All of the teachers in the Science department were in charge of this fun event held at our school, conducting fun experiments with students and their families. Science Night gives students and their parents the opportunity to meet the wonderful science teachers here at Nightingale and get to experience some of the material they might be working with this year or next year. Some of the things offered this year were making oobleck, dissecting frogs, launching rockets made out of soda bottles, and making a boat out of aluminum foil and trying to make it sturdy enough to hold a lot of pennies without it sinking. Altogether, this was a very joyful experience. We hope to see you at next year’s Family Science Night.
-By Sarah R.

Spring Forward

Health

In the beginning of second semester 7th graders take health instead of science. LAUSD says that we have to take half a year of science and half a year of health. In health we are going to learn about the use of drugs. We are also going to learn about sexuality, how to take care of your body, and what to eat to stay healthy. Taking health is very important because if we don’t take it then we won’t know what to do with our body. Health shows us what is positive and what is negative. We are only going to learn a small part of health so that in high school we learn more about it.
Jennifer R.

March Madness

The world of collegiate of basketball season is fast approaching and March madness is right around the corner. Like so many other people, the anticipation March madness intensities during this time because we want to see who is going to put all their emotions out there for the world to see, the upset, and the unmet expectations.
-Yessenia D.

The LA Marathon

Hello people, it is almost for the La Marathon race! This race will be held at March 20, 2011 at Sunday. The people will be training for the race. The athletes need to train 3 days between Monday and Thursday and the athletes will start out with a 10 minutes warm up jog. The La Marathon will have a lot of runners and the winners will be awarded suck as trophies, certificate and medals. The La Marathon will get more exercise for people. The La Marathon race will start from Dodger Stadium and end at Santa Monica Pier. Also the La Marathon is 26 miles. The La Marathon runners will have to pay 143 dollars to join the Marathon. They also have training services for the people who wants to train before the Marathon. There will be water stations on every mile for the runners. After the race there will be food for the runners after the runners made it to the finish line. There are medical supports at the start, finished line and along the course.
-Kevin C.

Value Added Assessment

What is the Value Added Assessment? We had a few questions about it, like what is it? Why does teachers need to be evaluated? What happens when they get evaluated? We asked Mr. Knapp and some teachers on their opinions about teachers becoming evaluated. Some teachers think it isn’t fair because not all students put 100% effort into testing. Other teachers think its fair because everyone gets evaluated at least one time. It shows how much the teachers are teaching the students. If they don’t teach the students everything, then students will do badly on test. It is depended on how much the teachers teach. But, other times, the students don’t put all effort into testing. They think ‘Oh, it’s just a test. It’s not even part of the grade.’ But it’s part of the CST grade. If kids don’t pass, then is it fair for teachers to get evaluated? Even if the teachers teach what had to be taught. What do you think?
- Kin L.