Category: News

Senior Ben Neal was privileged to visit Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) under the Minority Introduction to Engineering and Science (MITES) pre-college summer program for six weeks and returned with two awards under his belt. Students and staff familiar with Neal know that he is a talented computer programmer, evident through his self-published app, Fall Freely, available on the App Store, Google Play Store, and Windows App Store. With a strong interest in the computer sciences, he applied to the MITES program with his eyes set on MIT as his dream school.App Store. With a strong interest in the computer sciences, he applied to the MITES program with his eyes set on MIT as his dream school. Similar to that of a real college application process, students interested in the MITES program apply online with qualifying GPA, SAT scores, and teacher recommendations, while MIT admissions officers review and accept the strongest of applications―accepting less than one hundred students with a devastating acceptance rate of roughly 4%. Aside from the flight cost, all expenses were cared for by the university. Under the pre-college summer program, Neal and other students attended five courses: Physics, Calculus, Life Science (Chemistry/Biology), Humanities, and a project-based elective, which Neal chose as Digital Design. Students took diagnostic tests as a prerequisite in order to be evaluated and placed in a class that is deemed worthy of a challenge for each student. To help the students get accustomed to the college life, each course has one professor and two teacher assistants from reputable backgrounds including students of Harvard and Stanford. Despite the rigor of the program, students still had time to interact with their peers in Cambridge and nearby Boston during the weekends. Most of the bonding stemmed from late-night homework sessions. “I did not sleep before 2AM and Sundays were the only days where I was allowed over 6 hours of sleep… I was faced with challenging material, extensive problem sets (homework), and competition that I had never seen before,” said Neal. All that hard work paid off when he was acknowledged as the Best Student of Digital Design and was awarded the Leon and Edna Trilling Award for the best overall academic performance. “After attending MITES, I feel I am prepared for any challenge that comes my way,” said Neal. “Whether it was ordering pizza at 1AM while finishing problem sets with my classmates, viewing the bright city of Boston from the roof of MIT or playing in and winning a football tournament on the 4th of July, MITES certainly had its share of fun times.”

The METS academy will be having an assembly for all ninth and tenth graders. It will be in the library on September 28th, over the course of the entire day. Charles Acosta, the METS counselor, will be there as well as Mrs. Erica Sands, the METS club teacher. METS teachers and students will be attending the assembly to hear what the academy is about. “The only thing worse than kids giving up on school is when we give up on them,” said Acosta. Acosta will be explaining the expectations of student behavior and of the tutoring that will be offered. It is important for the teachers and students to attend so that they understand their academy better, but most importantly so that they can be proud about the academy they are in by hearing all about METS’ great opportunities. For all the students and teachers in the METS club the first club meeting will be in the library on October 13.

This past summer, seniors Keyanna Daniels, Mia Grayson, and Salvador Leon participated in the LA-HIP program, an eight-week biomedical research internship at Children’s Hospital, Los Angeles. The program was created to expose students to the medical field by placing them in a laboratory setting. In order to gain admission, students had to turn in an application and participate in an interview. Fourteen students were then picked from a competitive field of applicants. “I think I was really positive in my interview. They saw how positive and upbeat I was, and in my résumé, they saw a confident and ambitious girl who won’t stop until she gets what she wants,” said Daniels. After gaining admission into the program, the three students were matched with medical professionals based upon their initial interests. They took a two-week introductory course designed to prepare them for laboratory work. Afterwards, participants conducted research with their mentors over a five-week period. Grayson chose to work with brain tumors, testing several inhibitor cells for their effect on the cancerous growth. She discovered that certain drugs changed the morphology, or physical composition, of the tumors, thereby indicating a slower rate of growth. “My grandmother died of a brain tumor, so I feel I have a personal connection to that. So, when they asked me what I wanted to research, brain tumors were a significant thing,” said Grayson. Leon had an interest in HIV and the micro biome, which is the collection of bacteria found in a human body. He sought to find the best way to extract DNA from these bacterial cells. “I wanted to see if the micro biome could be passed down from mother to child. When you have HIV, your micro biome is altered, which means that you may have more or less of certain bacteria species,” said Leon. An interest in neonatal research prompted Daniels to explore the invasive effects of E. coli K1 on neonatal meningitis. She used the protein OmpA in order to reveal the bacteria’s effects on babies. The three students concluded their internships by giving presentations on their chosen topics at a science symposium. Ultimately, they felt that the program helped solidify their future pursuits in the medical field. “It showed me that I don’t want to work in a lab. I do want to go into medicine, however, I want to go into the clinical side instead of the laboratory side,” said Grayson. Overall, the experience was quite positive for the trio, considering that most had hitherto little to no experience with laboratory and work and medicine. “It was really cool to see most of the things up close, since one thing they try to do is give students experience in the area. It wouldn’t be uncommon for me to see what my other friends were doing that were unrelated to mine. It was really interesting,” said Leon.

From September 19 to 20, seniors Megan Guttieri and Miriam Melendez participated in the Chezy Championships in Fresno, reaching the semifinals and winning the overall Programming Award. They competed as part of the Friarbots team, Servite High School’s robotics team. This is because Long Beach Poly’s FIRST robotics team could not compete due to last-minute complications. This did not deter Guttieri and Melendez, however; they still powered on through and found alternative ways to participate in robotics competitions. Chezy Champs has teams from all over the nation test their robots in a series of challenges. 35 different teams competed for the top prize, participating in events like Recycle Rush, where two alliances of three robots are pitted against each other. Other games involve shooting basketballs, climbing a seven-foot pyramid, and stacking totes. In order to win, teams must be strategic, have structurally sound robots, and communicate well. It is evident that the Friarbots possess all three qualities, for they emerged as semifinalists and winner of the Programming Award. “Chezy Champs is an inspiring experience because it provides students the opportunity to experience new things, fix old problems, and have a friendly environment,” said Thena Guttieri. For the past two years, the Friarbots have made it to the world championships in St. Louis. This year they were they were the Regional Winners at the Arizona West Regional and Quarterfinalists in the Curie division.

An online petition has emerged with the start of heat waves to get air-conditioning in every LBUSD classroom. The petition, started by concerned parents on change.org, has received over 9,000 votes in two weeks. The online petition reads: “It is imperative that LBUSD update our buildings and put air conditioning in all of our classrooms. Temperatures have been consistently been rising, and hot weather is lasting well into autumn, in Southern California. Our children can’t be expected to concentrated in conditions like this.” With the start of autumn heat waves, the Long Beach Unified School District has continued to implement the use of minimum days to combat the heat. The minimum days were a feature started last school year While the minimum days are a short-term solution to the excessive heat in classrooms, it does not address the root of the problem: the lack of air-conditioning in every classroom in the school. Newly built schools in LBUSD, such as McBride High School, McBride Academy, and Roosevelt Elementary school feature full air-conditioning in all classrooms. A bond measure is a possible long-term solution to getting air-conditioning in all classrooms. This was the path of action taken by Bellflower Unified School District in 2012. A $79 million bond was approved by BUSD voters that improved overall structural issues with the district, which included updates to air-conditioning. Long Beach Unified is a significantly larger school system, and the full air-conditioning update could cost $700 million, according to LBUSD spokesperson Chris Eftychiou. Until the air-conditioning solution is solved, minimum days will continue to be implemented on a case-by-case basis.

Theodore Roosevelt Elementary School reopened after a two-year rebuild of the entire campus on September 2nd. During the rebuild, staff and students relocated to Butler Middle School. The rebuild was paid for by Measure K bonds. Measure K was a ballot initiative, approved in November 2008, which will allocate $1.2 billion for the building, renovation, and general improvement of schools in LBUSD. Roosevelt Elementary was originally opened in 1935, and, in homage, photos of murals, along with an original door, are displayed in the library. “We used Measure K to build one of Long Beach’s oldest schools. Roosevelt now has a community health center on campus, it is energy efficient, and has the latest technology. As it is a historic neighborhood, we’ve taken great care with the treasures from the 1930’s. I hope everyone will agree that it was well worth waiting for,” said Felton Williams, the President of the Long Beach Board of Education. Other highlights of the rebuild include two computer labs (one Mac-based and on PC-based), a playground built over a ground-level parking garage, and a multipurpose room, complete with a stage and an audio/visual alcove. “I’m thankful to those who have been a part of this project. I’m excited to see the kids’ faces when they walk through the gate and see the school. It’s like opening a Christmas present,” said Clarissa Tolentino, Roosevelt’s principal. Roosevelt Elementary grew from 64,000 square feet to nearly 100,000. The school serves 1,100 students, kindergarten through fifth grade. Measure K is also paying for Poly’s own renovated auditorium, as well as improvements for Wilson High and major renovation for Jordan High.

I grimace whenever I look back on the past three years. These years have not given me the washboard abs and six-foot-height I wished for. Alas, the only things I’ve gained are twenty pounds and an insatiable addiction to coffee. Yet, my biggest frustration is not my physical mediocrity; rather, it was my lack of useful knowledge coming in. No one told me what it felt like to be a grain of sand at the beach in a school of over four thousand students, feeling microscopic is, at times, inevitable. Such was the fate I believed I was consigned to for the next four years. Or so I thought. High school isn’t all fun and games, but it isn’t a complete bore, either. Looking back, I can say that I’ve grown past my awkward freshman self.As I sit in this coffeehouse waiting for the ground to swallow me whole, I am overcome with a sense of responsibility to you, incoming freshmen, in hopes of making these next four years the best they can be. This duty to help has resulted in a hastily-written freshman survival guide from one of Poly’s most lackluster students. Though I wanted to release this in Sunday’s edition of the Times, the High Life will have to do. To all freshmen, make sure to print this out and post in on your walls. Treat it with the same reverence as the Bible. This collection of tips will single-handedly turn your life around. You can thank me later. For starters, you must learn that Poly’s seagulls are unavoidable. They have accuracy better than Olympic archers. Walk with caution, my friends. Secondly, spend a coup1e of hours on Urban Dictionary. You don’t know how embarrassing it is to not know the difference between “thought” and “thot”. Once you learn the art of communication, try talking to people. For the most part, Poly students are very friendly—not everyone is a cold-blooded cynic like me. Graduation is in four years, start eating healthy. You will most likely donate several organs in order to fund your college education, so the better their condition, the less debt you’ll accrue. A kidney might pay for a textbook or two. As you prepare to become a semi-functioning adult, learn to control your social media usage. Not everyone needs to know what Becky ate for breakfast. The whole world is your oyster and your eyes are plastered to a screen. Look up at the falling ceiling tiles once in a while — counting the dots are a great way to pass the time in class. What is the most valuable advice I can give to you? My biggest tip is to do something worthwhile. Engage in various things, actually. You’re going to spend four years with people as lost as you. Hang out with them. Go attend Poly’s many activities. Join a club. Better yet, join the High Life and hang out with me, Poly’s go-to source for bad humor. As you spend the next four years in these halls, I hope you heed my advice. It will help make these years a bit more bearable. Best of luck, fellow Jackrabbits.

On Saturday, March 14, Poly students participated in the annual History Day competition at Azusa Pacific University. This year’s theme was “Leadership and Legacy in History”. History Day is an annual event where hundreds of students from high schools all over Los Angeles County are able to demonstrate interest and research in specific periods of time in history. By studying a person, place or event and presenting their ideas in a variety of creative means, students are able to share their knowledge in a friendly, yet competitive environment. This year, Mara Koval and Asa Mazor-Freedman were successful in the process of judging and will advance to state. They will once again present their documentary, with the chance to make additional minor edits prior to the competition. As partners in the competition, Koval and Mazor-Freedman represented Poly with a documentary, titled “God Incarnate”. The video was intended to highlight the contributions of former Ethiopian President Haile Selassie. Selassie became the face of resistance for Ethiopia during the 1930s with the nation in the midst of invasion and instability. “We saw so many great documentaries and learned so much,” said Koval. “We were shocked to be advancing to state, and plan on editing our video.” Six groups, some of which were individual projects, represented Poly. The process of preparing for the competition often includes several months of gathering research and making a presentation. Some groups even started preparing over the summer. “It’s great to see the initiative and creativity that goes into these projects,” said Mr. Gillogly, Poly’s team sponsor. “I’m so impressed every year by the projects that are showcased”. Poly will compete in the state competition taking place on May 8 and May 9.