As softball players retire to the benches after a grueling batting practice, new head coach John Reina entertains the exhausted girls by cracking jokes. Reina’s amicable personality is something he shares with other new coaches Brian Germain, Harry Wilkes and Dorothy Brown.

According to JV softball player Lindsay Charters, sophomore, Reina “has a different coaching style.”

“Coach Reina is more involved,” Charters said, adding that he regularly attends JV practices in addition to coaching varsity.

Wilkes, the new boys varsity soccer assistant coach, expressed similar sentiments.
Continue Reading

As softball players retire to the benches after a grueling batting practice, new head coach John Reina entertains the exhausted girls by cracking jokes. Reina’s amicable personality is something he shares with other new coaches Brian Germain, Harry Wilkes and Dorothy Brown.

According to JV softball player Lindsay Charters, sophomore, Reina “has a different coaching style.”

“Coach Reina is more involved,” Charters said, adding that he regularly attends JV practices in addition to coaching varsity.

Wilkes, the new boys varsity soccer assistant coach, expressed similar sentiments.

Continue Reading

I was dubious when I walked into the theater that was showing John Carter. I feared that Disney would render the original story unrecognizable. My fears, however, were unfounded.

Continue Reading

The spring season is ushering in a newfound attitude of player responsibility and a strong sense of teamwork for the boys varsity soccer team.

“The players are taking much more initiative,” senior goalie Jason Warren, senior, said. “After practice or a game people post on our Facebook group what needs to be worked on.”

Warren added that “there is a lot more closeness among the team [and] people talk more outside of practice.”

Captain Filip Gouglev, senior, attributes the new attitude to a difference in determination among the returning players.

Continue Reading

Four competitors won first place in their respective categories at the regional science fair last weekend.

First place winners Annie Bryan and Emily Casey, sophomores, said they had started their project to address the deficit of pure water in Africa. The team searched for a way to transport desalinated water to African villages far from the coast lines. Bryan and Casey built an apparatus to distill water containing the same salt density as the Atlantic Ocean. Bryan said they “purified the water by 97.7 percent.”

Continue Reading

Directing instructions to the driver of the tractor trailer pulling cement and bricks near the back entrance of the school, Dilip Sheth navigated through the rubble and demolition with an air of familiarity.

Sheth, whose job is to oversee the construction and assure FCPS that the process is going within the allotted time and budget, said that this familiarity was hard-earned.

Continue Reading

While the hallways are filled with people complaining of lack of sleep, tests and in-class essays, these concerns are rarely addressed by the administration or teachers unless you enter your counselor’s office. Stress Free Day is an exception and an excellent idea. However, if the administration is serious about what Stress Free Day represents, it needs to make some serious changes.

Continue Reading

In response to concerns over theft of student ID numbers to pay for lunches, the cafeteria administration has installed new picture verification technology in each lunch line. Under the new system, if a student is caught using someone else’s ID number, he or she will be formally charged with theft.

The new technology uses touch-screens, which have every student’s school picture uploaded. When a student ID number is put in, a picture of the corresponding person will come up on the screen.

Continue Reading

The Envirothon team competed in the District Envirothon competition today. This two-part challenge tested students’ environmental skills and knowledge. The group competed against eight other schools and teams.

The first part of the competition took a traditional question-and-answer approach, centering on four main categories: wildlife, streams, soil and forestry.

According to team sponsor Barbara Brown, certain members were chosen to specialize in one of the categories in order to answer more obscure questions.

Continue Reading

DECA earned the title of Blue Chip Chapter at their state competition on the weekend of March 7. The award is the highest honor a chapter can earn in Virginia.

“This [award] is something we’ve been working towards for a while,” DECA advisor Jen Hendrickson said.

The team also broke the Marshall record for most first-place wins, with six participants topping their respective categories.

Forty-one participants qualified for the international competition, requiring a top seven or eight placement in their respective categories.

Continue Reading