Taking Part in the World of Service: Senior Year Passion Projects

Senior year at Calvin Christian High School concludes with the famous (or infamous) senior projects, and along with that, passion projects. For these projects, seniors undertake to help the community in ways they are passionate about, such as organizing fundraisers, volunteering, or setting up events.

For example, Mollie Kelderman organized a 5k for Shema, an organization dedicated to providing jobs for survivors of trafficking. Her goal was to raise $10k, and she has already exceeded this.

However, this is just one example of the variety of projects that this year’s seniors are doing. Brad Mateer, Connor Bartz, and Drew Dykstra organized a basketball camp for children in grades 3-5.

Connor says, “We all have a passion for the game of basketball and for youth.”

Some Passion Projects are based on the seniors’ experiential learning projects, such as Ava Krueger’s project on homelessness.

“We’re getting supplies for Stepping Stone Emergency Housing,” says Ava. “Since the shelter already provides the resident’s basic needs we wanted to collect items that would improve their quality of life.”

Calvin Christian High School has required senior projects for a long time now; it is a fundamental part of the student's path to becoming active agents of good in the world.

"It’s important to apply our passions into the world of service,” says Connor Bartz. “It’ll help show that it is not about me, but about others.”

by: Nicole Krueger, Writer.

Student Highlights 8.0

Caleb Walden

Birthdate:

July 3, 2002

Biggest fear:

Living forever

Favorite quote:

“That's bad.”

What’s on your bucket list:

To play with a quantum computer.

If you had a time machine where would you go:

Before I ate my lunch.

Describe yourself in five words:

I like turtles, a lot.

If you could vacation in one country where would it be:

Dubai.

If a genie appeared and offered you one wish (besides more wishes) what would you wish for:

More genies.

Ilya Yunchyk

Birthdate:

July 30, 2001

Biggest fear:

Heights.

Favorite quote:

“Lit.” — Ilya Yunchyk

What’s on your bucket list:

Skydiving.

If you had a time machine where would you go:

To the future.

If you could vacation in one country where would it be:

Australia.

If a genie appeared and offered you one wish (besides more wishes) what would you wish for:

More genies.

Why Advisory Trips?

Photo: Mr Tien's advisory traveled to the Minnesota North Shore.

Advisory trips have come to pass successfully once again. These trips allow advisory groups to to get to know each other better and learn new things. Advisory groups meet at the beginning and end of the school day, and act like a conventional home room.

Every other year, the advisories goes on a trip together for one week. The location of the trip needs to be within a ten hour drive of school, which leads to the exploration of various locations around the area. This year, advisories went to Chicago, St. Louis, Duluth, South Dakota, and Milwaukee, leaving on April 24 and returning on April 28.

Why do advisories go on trips?

A significant goal of advisory groups is to build a close community, and develop friendships between students in different grades. Shared experiences over the course of a week can help develop these friendships.

The trips also have an educational goal. Each one is meant to answer a driving question, and works towards that goal with the places they go and activities they participate in. Upon the conclusion of these trips, advisories make presentations to show the rest of the school what they have learned.  

CCHS Principal Wendell Schaap said that the trips help develop community, and “give you the space to develop relationships.” They allow students to get to know each other in different ways, and that they combine the learning community of school with personal community, and that can work to strengthen friendships and groups.

Educationally, Mr. Schaap says the trips allow students an “experience where we can learn about the history of a city, and learn how to value it.” The trips give students the chance to learn and experience things that they would not be able to learn about or experience in a typical school class.

It teaches students to be interested in history, and to learn how to value it in ways that they would not be able to without experiencing it. Learning to appreciate the history of a place can cause students to think differently about any new place that they go.

It will be exciting to see how the Arkansas Canoe Trip and the Washington D.C. Trip go next year. They also give students unique opportunities, and contributes to their understanding of creation or government. They also both offer students the opportunity to get to know each other better. Hopefully these trips will go smoothly and enjoyably next year.

By: Rick Derfus, Editor

CCHS Girls Basketball Team Awarded All Conference Titles

After going through a huge change in their roster, the CCHS girls basketball team performed remarkably this year.  Leah Martin(grade 11), was awarded All-Defense and Player of the Year in the conference.  Martin(11), Arien Fritts(10), and Annika Dykstra (9) were awarded first place in All Conference. Additionally, Head Coach Paul Spencer was awarded Coach of the Year.

The team consisted of 2 brand new players, Emma Natedal and Salina Yu. Most of the players were on the team last year as 8th graders, and were asked to play due to making their short roster qualifiable. In fact, five players, which is more than half the team of 12, were freshman.

In addition to that change, Paul Spencer was hired as a new coach this year to lead the girls to victory in their conference. Mr. Spencer coached the ninth grade team at Fridley High School before he was referred to coach at Calvin by a family attending here.

Mr. Spencer’s coaching, along with the girls’ strong attitude to play to the best of their abilities, led them to a final record of 11-5-0(11 wins, 5 loses, and 0 ties) At about midway through in the season, the girls were undefeated, with a winning streak of nine, losing to Brooklyn Center in a close game of six points.

Overall the girls went throughout the season with only good things to say. Emma Natedal, CCHS senior, said, “The highlight of the season was being undefeated in the bracket and getting bumped up with the big teams.” Many can agree with Emma’s statement; with a great record and many awards, the girls basketball season finished strong.   

By: John Erickson, Editor.

China Joins the Space Race

The Chinese astronauts Jing Haipeng (L) and Chen Dong at the send-off ceremony of a space mission in Jiuquan, China.

The race to get off planet earth and into the unknown mystery of space is not a new concept. The United States and Russia competed to be first for decades. Now the underdog, China, is breaking the bank to take gold in the space race.

Within the next decade, China is planning on completing a moon landing as well as exploring Mars. They have recently unveiled the design of their space probe and rover scheduled to depart for Mars in 2020. The United States is the only country to successfully land a rover on the red planet, however several other countries and organizations have made successful attempts to orbit Mars. China is the fifth country  to orbit the planet after the U.S, Russia/USSR, Europe, and India.

China's current plan is to launch its first Mars probe in 2020. The probe will bring back samples from Mars, explore the Jupiter system, conduct research into scientific questions like the origin and evolution of the solar system, and look for the answer to the question everyone keeps asking, “Is there life out there?”

China had a late start in the race to space. The Chinese space program was founded in 1956 and has since been disrupted by Mao’s cultural revolution. Their first satellite did not leave the earth's surface until 1970, just after the United States had the first man walk on the moon. In the decades following, China has spent billions of dollars on research and training. Since the early 2000s, China has, among other things, landed a rover on the moon and they plan on continuing their progress.

China's reason behind wanting to reach Mars is to demonstrate that their long march into the leading ranks in space exploration is finally complete. By finally achieving the goal of reaching Mars, they would show that they are joining the space race for real.  

By: Emma Natedal, Writer.

NASA Discovers New Solar System with Earth-size Planets

On February 22, 2017, well-known space exploration program NASA announced its discovery of a new solar system with seven new exoplanets (planets outside our solar system). The solar system, named the TRAPPIST-1 system after the Belgian telescope that discovered it, was actually discovered in late May of 2016, but was not fully researched until this year.

Only three of the seven exoplanets had been found. They all have potential for some form of water on the surface, but three exoplanets (TRAPPIST-1e, f and g) have the highest chance to sustain life forms.

The system lies in the constellation Aquarius and is not perceivable by the naked eye, despite being “only” 40 light-years from Earth. This is not exactly a couple minutes away; the closest star in proximity to us besides the Sun is about 4.35 light years, a significant change.

The reason we cannot see the system is because TRAPPIST-1, the star in the center of the system, is an ultracool (under 4,400 Fahrenheit, as compared to our Sun at 9,941 Fahrenheit) dwarf star and is slightly larger than Jupiter. This type of star is common in the Milky Way, but this is the first time planets have been discovered orbiting one.

Julien de Wit, from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in the U.S., spoke about the subject of sending satellites to learn more about the exoplanets, saying that, "Thanks to several giant telescopes currently under construction, including ESO’s E-ELT and the NASA/ESA/CSA James Webb Space Telescope due to launch for 2018, we will soon be able to study the atmospheric composition of these planets and to explore them first for water, then for traces of biological activity. That's a giant step in the search for life in the Universe.”

By: Kaatje Bruin, Writer.

Student Highlights 7.0

Hannah Stuewer

Birthdate:

July 16th, 2002

Biggest fear:

Snakes

Favorite quote:

"I want to be the chubby kid swimming in the pool." -andrénonymous

What’s on your bucket list:

Ride my horse through a drive-through

What’s your favorite TV show:

The Office

If you had a time machine where would you go:

I would want to be alive during the time of Alexander the Great so I could meet his horse Bucephalus.

Describe yourself in five words:

Horse and other animals crazy

If you could vacation in one country where would it be:

Ireland

If a genie appeared and offered you one wish (besides more wishes) what would you wish for:

Unlimited amount of any breed (imported or not) horses whose needs for the rest of their life were already paid for.

Kaleb Swensen

Birthdate: 9/27/01

Biggest fear: Heights

Favorite quote: "There may be people that have more talent than you, but there's no excuse for anyone to work harder than you." -Derek Jeter

What’s on your bucket list: Travel, Go fishing in lots of places

What’s your favorite TV show: 24

If you had a time machine where would you go: 1800's

Describe yourself in five words: Athlete, Competitive, Futuristic, Swaggy, Fun

If you could vacation in one country where would it be: New Zealand

If a genie appeared and offered you one wish (besides more wishes) what would you wish for:  Catch big fishies.