speakout Crier / Nov. 8, 2013
3
BEARD BEAUTY
Raising awareness for prostate cancer, students, teachers do not shave for Nov.; guess who’s who A. Demetri Georgalas, senior B. Tanner Seput, senior C. Brian King, senior D. Mr. Kevin Clyne, English teacher E. Luis Dominguez, senior F. Yiorgo Karnezis, sophomore
1. editorial
BLOCKED OPPORTUNITIES
words that may prove important, do more harm to students than they do good. When attempting to conduct research, either for an assignment or a paper, a student remains constricted. This poses as a disadvantage to students, especially in the cases when they write research papers of which the subject matter differs from the norm. Students also struggle with the blocks on important key words. If a student searched “Munster Girls’ Cross Country record,” it shows an error message. Searching the word “girl” does not necessarily show malicious intentions. The school should lift the ban on “New URLs” and evaluate the current key words blocked; most do not prove particularly vulgar or harmful to the student body. The school needs to remove the roadblocks it placed in front of many necessary websites in order to provide students with the opportunity to enter websites that prove helpful.
In light of recent tragedies, many people can recall what they did or where they were when the news broke. Maybe one first heard of the shooting in his second hour, not knowing its severity. Or maybe he did not find out until seeing all of the tweets on Twitter. However, not many can remember when they heard about the Nevada shooting. They cannot remember the countless shootings occurring in Chicago on a daily basis. Shootings and homicide of various degrees occur almost on a daily basis,. As of last Friday, Chicago has had 1,883 shooting victims in 2013, accord-
ing to the Chicago Tribune. The frequency of violence, particularly gun violence, continues to rise, and the increased occurrences strengthen society’s indifference towards them. Unless one holds personal ties to the victim or the violent act involves a lot of victims, people do not pay any attention to it. Shootings stand less and less recognized by society because society has grown used to them. Studies conducted by the Pew Research Center show that shootings do not possess a large effect on the opinions on gun control in the communities the shootings took place in. Often times, those who supported gun control before shootings still supported gun control after, and
Crier Crier, Munster High School’s official student newspaper, may be reached at 8808 Columbia Ave, Munster, IN 46321, phone 219-836-3200, Ext. 3443; Fax: 219-836-3202. Published by the Honors Newspaper Advanced Writing and Editing classes, and extra-curricular involvement. •The newspaper serves as a public forum and two-way communication for the school and community.•Crier is a source of information, entertainment, advertising and opinion for the student body, faculty, administration and community •Published material will stress objective reporting except on the editorial page where opinion writing will be featured. All published material will stress accuracy, truthfulness, integrity, honesty, responsibility, objectivity, fairness and independence.
vice versa. America proves an unusually violent country, statistically, America has almost double the assault rate per 100,000 people than other countries in the Organization of Economic Cooperation and Development, according to the Washington Post. However, the question still exists: Why does it take a death toll of 27 to make society care? Why can society not take interest in the shootings with death tolls of only one or two? Do individual lives not matter? Just because only one person died does not make it okay. Many innocent lives are taken day in and day out, therefore society should show sympathy and support for those affected.
Opinions expressed in the newspaper do not necessarily reflect those of the School Town of Munster, faculty or administration. Letters to the Editor are welcomed, but should be limited to 250 words. All letters must be signed and should be given directly to any staff member or delivered to the Pub, N155, one week prior to publication. Letters must not contain personal attacks against an individual. Editors reserve the right to edit for length, clarity, and grammatical errors. Crier will accept letters from anyone, provided that the content pertains to school or school issues. Subscriptions cost $4 per semester or $6.50 per school year. Mailed subscriptions cost $18 per year. Ad rates and policies are available to anyone upon request. Crier is published 13 times a school year. The Staff Editor-in-Chief Cassie Eberle Managing Editor Jordan Cockrum
3.
4.
5.
Recognizing gun violence victims Jordan Cockrum Managing Editor
2.
6.
For the after photos of No Shave November, check back on Nov. 22 Answers: 1. F. 2. C. 3. D. 4. E. 5. B. 6. A.
Driving along a country road, a girl finds herself closer and closer to her destination. When she finally advances towards the final destination, she finds a roadblock between it and herself. As much as she tried to bypass the roadblock, it continued to obstruct her path. Like the roadblock obstructs the girl’s path, some of the restrictions the school places on acOUR TAKE cessible websites obstruct a student’s path in their studThe new filtering ies. The school needs to loossystem blocks too many necessary en its grip on the websites acwebsites that cessible from the laptops. students use Blocking popular social media outlets such as Twitter and Facebook prove necessary. Without the block, students would end up distracted and it would deviate from the school’s mission. However, the “New URL” block, which prohibits access to any website or web page that has not been accessed and blocks on some key
Associate Editor Victoria Avina Lifestyles Editor Meena Kandallu Sports Editor William Hatczel News Editors Vrusha Patel, Max Baker Infocus Editor Nikki Mammano Social Media Director Lauren Rouse Head Photographer Gabrielle Dore Photographers Christopher Anguiano, Alex Baker, Ali Bauer, Natalia Bilek, Cesar Camacho, Chelsea Eickleberry, Casey Gouwens, Gage Knor, Lauren Koultourides, Pam Muangmingsuk, Alisa Muñoz Cartoonist Ryan Myers Adviser Sarah-Anne Lanman