BURLINGTON

by Madison Hawley

  BHS’s English department is bursting with exciting news. Beloved Teacher Holly Weston has had her first child, dubbing him Lincoln. As she spends her maternity leave with her new son, she brings back another beloved English instructor: Devra Parker!

   The anticipation for baby Lincoln has been high. Before her leave, Mrs. Weston had made “Lincoln Loot” as a part of her Honors Senior English class lessons. Many of her students miss her but are excited for her and her family.

   When news first broke of Mrs. Weston having a baby, the question of who could substitute teach for her quickly arose. Who was more qualified than the teacher that Mrs. Weston student taught under? So, Mrs. Parker was beckoned back to the school for her final opportunity to teach the pupils she missed.

   The arrangement made perfect sense. Mrs. Parker, having retired at the end of last school year, previously taught junior and senior English classes.

Dual credit college course requires the high school instructor to have a master’s degree. With the needed degree, Mrs. Parker is the perfect fit. 

   “I came back because Holly needed me, and I had the opportunity to be with my students again,” Mrs. Parker explains. She admits that she “kinda took [the classroom] over. While we all miss Mrs. Weston, it is nice to see Mrs. Parker again.

    Mrs. Weston plans to return the week after Spring break. While she is gone, we wish her the best time with her family. In the meantime, Mrs. Parker is a welcomed face.

by Sarah Gifford

   What is a thespian? A thespian is a person that acts or is an actor. The word originates from ancient Greece. Thespians stand for theatre and drama.

   The Burlington High Schools Thespians went on a trip on the 5th, 6th, and 7th of January. They traveled to Wichita. The bus ride felt short. When they got there, they were excited for what was to come.

   After looking around, they got settled in and spent the night in a hotel. The next day was full of competing. After the busy day, they went to a trampoline park Witicha Sports Forum. Then, they had to leave and come back to Burlington. They were only able to stay one day and do the activities, due to sports.

   The thespians trip is a statewide annual competition made up of many different workshops. These workshops consist of; professors, collage students, high school teachers and other

people that offer a wide variety of theatre skills for the high school students. One bonus is, if a person does good enough in state, then they have a chance to go to Nationals.

   Overall there were ten submissions for thespians that went. Amongst the ten people, they performed very well. Zalie Allen got the Best. Mallory Over, Mallory Gilmore, Eli Erven, Corinne Bolyn, Michelle Philips, and Jaycee Belcher all did Excellent. Then Kylie Price, Harleigh Baker, and Chloe Gosney, got the award of Good.

  Once all that was done, the thespians were glad to be home. The students learned a variety of things. Freshman, Jaycee Belcher learned,” Don’t call Michael at 12am, and take the plastic bag off.” Those are great tips for next year, and they cannot wait to do it again.

by Allie Harris

  Coming back from Christmas Break is a bit difficult for teachers and students alike. Some jump right into the next unit for lack of time to stall, while others take a more lax approach in settling into the new semester. Chris Varvel’s American History class does a bit of both.

   The WWI unit in this class is quite the challenge. After all, this war was the result of years of backdoor alliances springing into action that created most of the problems that we still see on a global scale. Obviously, stressing that information to a group of teenagers is difficult. As such, he began with a competition.

   Every student had a spreadsheet of 60

different African countries to conquer, and a packet of maps and point systems. Within their teams, they assigned a number of points to every country based on the following factors: size, topography, agriculture, rivers, coastline, strategy, mining, and population. They then ranked every country by what they believed to be the highest point value to the lowest.

   After everyone had their rankings, they took turns “conquering” countries, the true value of each of their picks were written on the board until there are no more left. The team that conquered the best of the lot then received extra credit on their WWI test.

   “You’ll notice, just playing for points, how

competitive it gets,” Varvel states. His main goal for this project was illustrating what imperialism is, but also how quickly years of pent up frustration leads to the largest war to happen. Not only that, but it gives the students a chance to analyze geography, resources, population, and really decide what makes a country valuable.

   It took 20 years for the global powers of the time to take over all of Africa. This project condensed that time into just four days. It forced students to work together and get into the minds of the rich leaders that caused the war in the first place. Also, it was just a quick, competitive way to begin 2023.