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Featured reviews on Jeff Tweedy's new album, the Detroit Opera House's "Aladdin" and season six of "Arrow."
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GROSSE POINTE NORTH HIGH SCHOOL
UPCOMING
EVENTS
MIDTERM EXAMS Tuesday, Jan. 15 - Friday, Jan 18
SINCE 1968
NORTHPOINTENOW.ORG
Water bills skyrocket, sparking concern for financially unstable families
years, rising on average 1.7 percent in 2017 and 1.7 percent in 2018, according to the Detroit Free Press. However small the numbers may seem, Schock thinks that even a small increase can affect an impoverished family’s ability to live comfortably. “When you look at the line of poverty in the United States, it is around under $30,000 (for a family) and even a couple percent increase in any bill can affect whether a family can afford to eat on any given night,” Schock said. Social Studies teacher Barry Mulso said he agrees that changes in bills can dramatically affect how families under the poverty line live. However, Mulso thinks that water bills have not increased enough to severely impact these families. “I don’t really think that we have seen any egregious rate hikes to water… but any increase in any cost doesn’t do families any good, especially families that are in financial hardship,” Mulso said. “And, of course, water being one of those absolute essentials, it is especially important that families have affordable access to it.” The main explanation for increasing water rates is the vast infrastructure that DWSD must maintain along with the low amount of people feeding off of the infrastructure built for millions more, according to the Grosse Pointe News. Sophomore Hannah Ladach attributes the rising costs not only to overextended infrastructure, but also to outdated models. “I think that the water rates are probably going up because of how old everything is around here,” Ladach said. “The pipes are probably not efficient and need to be replaced.” The water bills continue to rise and without any apparent solution by the DWSD to lower costs, the price of water will most likely continue to increase. Mulso said that there is little that can be done for citizens to advocate lowering water prices unless Whitmer decides to create a commission that monitors changes in water prices. “The major reasons for increases of water bills is the increasing cost of delivering and dealing with the waste of water,” Mulso said. “...The only thing that is going to lower water prices is to decrease cost (for the supplier) or increase competition.”
END OF SECOND QUARTER Friday, Jan. 18 for all students NO SCHOOL Monday, Jan. 21 for all students
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By Michael Hartt & Ray Jason PAGE EDITOR & INTERN Sophomore Amelia Schock acknowledges the effect rising water costs are having in Grosse Pointe, which she believes, are creating hardships for families that are struggling financially. She said the issue of increasing water costs has recently become more prevalent in the community. “I’ve definitely heard about increasing (water) bills more now than ever,” Schock said. “I just really hope that the situation is solved
WEDNESDAY, JAN. 9, 2019
with the new governor being inaugurated soon.” Although Governor Gretchen Whitmer does not currently have any firm or direct inf luence over the Detroit Water and Sewerage Department, Schock later said that she hopes Whitmer will be able to set up a commission regulating the price of water. That would be similar to the Michigan Public Service Commission, which regulates the price of electric power and natural gas services. Schock’s observations of water bills climbing do have statistical weight. Water rates have been increasing steadily in recent
Local Starbucks offer special needs classes employment training, opportunities
FACTS HAS
THAT." PAGE 3
"THEY’RE
EQUATING
FUR WITH "GET AND GLAMOUR
INFORMED LUXURY AND MAKE AND ALL YOUR VOICE THAT. IT JUST HEARD. WE SEEMS LIKE, CANNOT IF YOU ARE AFFORDIT, AGAINST TO LOSE JUST DON’T
THEM."
USE IT AT ALL" PAGE 7 PAGE 4
By Emily Widgren PAGE EDITOR For the past couple of years, the special needs classes have been raising money by selling coffee during first hour every Friday. For chemistry teacher Steven Kosmas, buying their coffee has become a part of his routine. “It makes me feel great and gives me an opportunity to show gratitude to others. I really enjoy the coffee and I enjoy buying others a cup of coffee,” Kosmas said. “I try to buy coffee every week and have been supporting “Coffee for Camp” from the initial start up until now.” Like Kosmas, many students and staff have become regular attendees at the coffee cart. For the last two years, the students have been fundraising for a trip to Camp Fowler, but this year, the students have decided to help raise funds for Kids Need Opportunities to Socialize, a student program that helps improve the specials needs students’ social skills. KNOTS also provides aid for different fundraisers, such as the coffee carts and the Peer-to-Peer program. Both KNOTS and Peer-to-Peer are involved in helping the coffee cart f lourish. According to speech pathologist Sarah Hunter, Coffee Club is very beneficial for the participants’ future, because they learn skills important to transition from high school to the future, such as money skills and problem solving. “Coffee Club offers the benefits of beginning to work on vocational skills with an emphasis on the social interactions during delivery time, while students are in an environment where they can be strongly supported by staff or KNOTS student leaders. The level of support can be faded as they
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become more independent in the skills they have learned,” Hunter said. “Students can take the skills the have learned or practiced during Coffee Club and use them in their Career Decisions class during lessons the other four days of the week. This real experience can be used during resume writing in class to generate a list of their skill sets and used as a workbased experience." This year, the program caught the eye of Starbucks, who have a program to help integrate students with special needs into the company. Starbucks, over a long period of time, has created more ways to help people with intellectual disabilities into their cooperation and have earned many awards for doing such. On Dec. 11 and Dec. 14, Starbucks’ store managers came to Special Education teacher Sheila Doss’ Career Decisions class to share more about a potential future of their coffee program with Starbucks. The managers also observed the coffee cart operation. During the first session, one of the Starbucks’ managers taught students about employment and interviewing, giving them a chance to ask questions about the company and their potential employment there. In the next session, another manager came and observed the coffee sales. This lead to lessons about the Starbucks operation, such as orders being generated on labels, the drinks being made to order and how the drink is served with a smile, drawing parallels to the coffee carts as well as explaining how these are important to their operation. This experience has offered special need students an opportunity to learn more about
VOLUME 51 | ISSUE 7
“
News Life
I learn to wash dishes, make the coffee and I get to talk to lots of new people... I might like to work in a coffee shop some day.
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NOT, WILL NOT AND CAN NOT DO
Jacob Dall JUNIOR
SYEDA RIZVI
their interests. Junior Jacob Dall, a student who regularly participates in selling the coffee, loves being able to serve students and faculty. Dall feels that selling coffee through this program will help him in the future. “I learn to wash dishes, make the coffee and I get to talk to lots of new people when we deliver their coffee,” Dall said. “I might like to work in a coffee shop some day.”
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By Hannah Zalewski & Kylie Duke