Jr. Sr. High School – Page 17 – Fairbury Public Schools

Copacabana showcases variety of local talent

by Brynn Novotny – Original article X-Ray

The annual Copacabana oversaw a gathering of local talent in the Burkley Fine Arts Center on Saturday, March 16. The evening featured performances from FHS’s music department, soloists and individually-formed groups along with the display of works from art students.

Potential acts auditioned prior to the event for a place in the show. Some individuals earned several spots for the evening. More preparation time was seen as a necessity for them. Dakota Gladson ’19 believes the time put in was crucial to a successful concert.

copax3 — Sara Huss ’20 performs a piano piece for the public dinner prior to the Copacabana concert. The meal, along with the main event, featured several musical acts including an appearance by FHS’s Ukulele Club and the playing of a classic Czech polka song by various Band students. Photo by: B. Novotny

“Copa was not only a blast but it was such a privilege to work with the rest of the performers and MCs,” Gladson said. “I personally think that this was our smoothest and best Copa at least since I’ve been in high school. The alumni are missed and greatly praised, but I feel that we either did as good or better than years before!”

copax1 — Brylee Yantz ’21 plays the saxophone alongside other members of the jazz band. Yantz also participated in two piano solos, a vocal and ukulele duet with Hailie Nicholson ’21 and pieces performed by the general high school band. Photo by: B. Novotny

Some performances featured a more personal undertone. Michaela Buchli ’19 and her mother, Karie Buchli, joined together to sing Whitney Houston’s “The Greatest Love of All” with former director Karen Grefe Reynolds utilized as a piano accompanist. Karie performed this piece in 1986 as a solo act for the very first Copacabana.

“When I talked to [Karie] about doing a piece for Copa, she brought up this idea of singing as a duet,” Michaela said. “It felt amazing to perform with my mom. She was so excited to be able to relive the moment and I was excited just to be a part of it.”

Other unique moments arose from the event. What resonated with performers and attendees varies from individual to individual. For Gladson, the unveiling of an original work [“Dream With Me”] that included audience participation and publicly asking Jasmine Snyder ’21 to the upcoming Prom stood out.

copax2 — Jason Hughes ’20 and Lauren Patton ’20 carry out a skit between acts to keep the crowd entertained. Other emcees included seniors Toriann Likens, Joy Ondrak, Dakota Gladson, and Mikasa Lierman. Photo by: B. Novotny

“One part of the night suck out to me the most, and that was when the entire audience stood up and sang with me,” Gladson said. “It took my breath away and made me so honored that I was in the presence of such a great audience. The ‘promposal’ was a big deal to me so I wanted it to be perfect. I no-joke practiced in the mirror so that I wouldn’t freeze up.”

Fairbury will host the District Music Contest April 11-12.

Boys Track Team Gives Back to Flood Victims

by Taylor Gustafson

Imagine what it would be like to lose your home or your livestock and crops. Well this is the reality for many Nebraskans at this time. People throughout the state have had to evacuate their homes and leave everything behind. Flooding has left people without homes and also without water. Water in flood areas have been contaminated leaving them undrinkable and many people without water. The boys track team decided to do something to help those people in need and hold a water drive in Fairbury.

“I thought of how I couldn’t enter Beatrice from where I normally do due to the flooding, so then I thought about contaminated pipes, and how water could be pretty nasty at other towns. Then I made a flyer and I asked my parents and if they could get this out for publicity and if I could store it somewhere in the schools,” Freshman Zane Grizzle said.

So far the track team has had great success with the Water drive. There have been multiple business that have donated cases of water to the flood victims. There has also been a delivery made to Peru State College on Wednesday morning. 350 cases of water have been donated so far.

The boys track team is also challenging other track teams across the state to help by starting their own water drive for the flood victims. If you are interested in donating water to the water drive, you can drop off cases of water at Central, Jefferson, and the High School.

KWBE News Story

Original Article FHS X-Ray: https://fhsxray.com/2019/03/21/boys-track-team-gives-back-to-flood-victims/

SohCahToa – Using Trig to Solve Right Triangles

Geometry students study right triangle properties as they prepare for the ACT. After mastering Pythagorean Theorem and its converse, students worked with special right triangles (45-45-90 and 30-60-90) before learning a valuable trigonometry concept. Right triangles exist everywhere! Math skills allow us to apply our knowledge to life outside the classroom and beyond the ACT.

SohCahToa is an acronym used to solve not only for sides of a right triangle, but also for angles. Mrs. Petersen’s geometry students calculated the height of objects around Fairbury High School while using not only their calculator, but also a tape measure and clinometer. The height of the classroom is 13′ 4″. The height of the entryway to the building is 20′ and the flag pole is 35′.

A popular question that Mrs. Petersen hears and answers frequently is “When am I ever going to use this?!” As you may have experienced, story problems are challenging in a math class. Labs are like a real live story problem! Students enjoyed using a new tool, called a clinometer, to measure angles. The frustration was not with calculations, but with the tape measure! But hey! There’s an app for that.
Marching our way up Bloom’s Taxonomy Pyramid for education, the next thing students get to do is create their own story problem using Adobe Spark.
Here is an example and this is another example.

Fairbury Farm to School

Fairbury has been fortunate to have several donations of pork and beef throughout the last two years. The DeBoer families donated two beef to kick off our Farm to School Program in the spring of 2018. Since that time, we have had more beef and pork donated by several generous families. We have also had many monetary donations. Monetary donations are used to help defray the cost of processing the beef and pork. In addition to pork and beef, in the fall we have had donations of fresh garden produce.

The Farm to School Program is great for our school. It gives our students pride in where there food is produced. They get fresh from the farm foods. The cafeteria staff does a great job in serving the foods in creative and tasty dishes. Some of the beef dishes served have been, fresh 100% ¼ lb. hamburgers, roast beef, beef and noodles and beef enchiladas. The variety of pork dishes include: Pork Tetrazinni, Pulled Pork Sandwich, Southwest BBQ Pork Pizza, Roast Pork Loin and Pork Tacos. Fresh salsa was prepared with some of the locally produced and donated tomatoes and peppers. Fresh cucumbers, peppers and tomatoes have enhanced flavor and color of the fruit/vegetable bars. Nothing is better than a home-grown tomato. Yum…

Donations are accepted throughout the school year. Please contact Mr. Grizzle at the district office (402-729-6104) for more information on donating beef or pork. For donations of fresh produce, please call Jane Rhine at the high school cafeteria, (402-300-3094)

A big thank you goes out to everyone for all generous donations. Our students really appreciate all the fresh local food.

New Members Selected for NHS

National Honor Society has selected new members based on the criteria of scholarship, leadership, character, and service. These new members include Bret Cole, Brylee Yantz, Brynn Novotny, Chance Amundson, Devin Wanamaker, Ellie Ohlde, Jillian Caroon, Josh Robertson, Kacy Starck, Keely Schramm, Lindsey Korthals, Maggie Layton, Page Nippert, Rielee Achtemeier, and Taylor Gustafson. They will participate in a formal induction ceremony on Thursday, March 21 at 7:00 p.m. in the BFAC.

FFA Entertains Students and Staff With Ag Olympics

by Brynn Novotny
Photos by Nichole Harris and Hannah Knigge

The annual Ag Olympics were held in the high school gymnasium on Thursday, February 21. The entire student body and all staff attended a series of games and activities based around a central theme of farming and agriculture.

The convocation was led by FHS’s own FFA. Members Kennedy DeBoer ’20 and Taylor Runge ’20 acted as student leaders for the event. Their work during the Ag Olympics was only part of what had to be done to achieve success.

“It was a very stressful day because we had the teacher breakfast and Ag Olympics together,” DeBoer said. “Mr. [Thomas] Dux and I met a ton over the past week just trying to plan what we were going to all do. We had to get people to let us borrow all the materials we used, I had to boil 7 dozen eggs, we had to line up the sheep, and then put the tarp [down] and get the gym set up.”

Teacher representatives and students from every grade competed against one another in the various games and activities. This interactive aspect remains a favorite for many students.

“I had lots of fun doing something I’ve never done before,” Beckett Chappell ’23 said. “They picked great teams. That made it even better!”

Teams of FFA members worked to set up every event during small intermission periods. Each individual was assigned a task in order to function as a cohesive group and prevent long waiting periods. Runge was personally pleased at the organization’s output.

“I would say it was a success overall,” Runge said. “We were able to keep things moving in an efficient manner and hardly had any time between games.”

Parent Climate Survey

In an effort to continuously improve your student’s education, Fairbury Public Schools are conducting Parent Climate Surveys. We value your opinion and ask that you take the time to complete this survey. Please click on a link below to take the survey.

Please be assured that your responses to this survey will be anonymous. Your honest opinion is appreciated. Thank you for your time and attention to this matter.

Central Parents:
https://nde.qualtrics.com/SE/?SID=SV_9t0PdmkTw2tVPXn&Level=elementary&SchoolID=48-0008-003

Jefferson Parents:
https://nde.qualtrics.com/SE/?SID=SV_9t0PdmkTw2tVPXn&Level=elementary&SchoolID=48-0008-008

7^th and 8^th Grade Parents:
https://nde.qualtrics.com/SE/?SID=SV_9t0PdmkTw2tVPXn&Level=elementary&SchoolID=48-0008-001

9-12^th Grade Parents:
https://nde.qualtrics.com/SE/?SID=SV_9t0PdmkTw2tVPXn&Level=high&SchoolID=48-0008-001

Fairbury FFA Competes at District 5 Leadership Development Events

by Kennedy DeBoer

On January 16th, the Fairbury FFA had 23 members attend and compete at the District 5 Leadership Development Event (LDE) in York at the Holthus Center. The members included Michaela Buchli, Taylor Runge, Sara Huss, Delaney Miller, Colton Starck, Jared Engelman, Harlie Blas, Taylor Gustafson, Christina Hickey, Sarah Engelman, Riley Wood, Brooklen Bear, Toby Julin-McCleary, Makena Lantz, Malayne DeBoer, Jordan Hauschel, Jason Marschman, Alexis Mau, Ava Kroll, Autumn Branson, Jillian Caroon, Kennedy DeBoer, and Kaylee Sipek.

This year Fairbury had Two Senior Parliamentary Procedure teams that both received a blue ribbon. Senior Parliamentary Procedure Team #1 was made up of the Fairbury FFA Officers including Michaela Buchli, Taylor Runge, Sara Huss, Delaney Miller, Colton Starck, and Jared Engelman. The Senior Parliamentary Procedure Team #2 was made up of Harlie Blas, Taylor Gustafson, Christina Hickey, Sarah Engelman, Riley Wood, and Brooklen Bear. In Junior Public Speaking, Sophomore Harlie Blas received a blue ribbon. In Senior Public Speaking, senior Michaela Buchli received second purple and is qualified for the Nebraska FFA State Convention in April! Senior, Autumn Branson received a Blue ribbon in her event Natural Resources. Junior Sara Huss received a purple in Employment Skills and was only a few points off from qualifying to state! Junior Jillian Caroon received a blue ribbon in the Employment Skills Contest. The Conduct of Chapter Meetings team consisting of Toby Julin-McCleary, Makena Lantz, Malayne DeBoer, Jordan Hauschel, Jason Marschman, Alexis Mau, and Ava Kroll (who are all 7th graders) received a blue ribbon. Jordan Hauschel also competed in the Discovery Speaking Contest and received a red ribbon. There was a lot of young talent that competed for the Fairbury FFA Chapter this year and the future is looking very bright for all of these FFA members. It was a GREAT day to be a Jeff

Anatomy and Physiology Searches for Evidence in Mock Crime Scene

by Nichole Harris (Originally Published on the FHSX-Ray).

On Monday January 7, Mrs. Kari Fisher’s Anatomy and Physiology class participated in a mock crime scene experiment. Students in the class used what they had learned about forensics and fingerprinting to dust for fingerprints and identify the “criminal” in the class.

“I liked how she had people in the class act as the “criminals” so we knew it was someone among us and we had to figure out who it was,” RJ Suey ’19 said.

Participating in the mock crime scene helped students to fully understand what they’d been taught and gave them an outlet to apply what that hey learned in real life.

“I enjoyed the crime scene lab because it took what we learned about fingerprints and applied it to real life,” Senior Isaac Robertson said. “I think by trying to catch a “criminal,” it made it more fun and exciting for us while also learning how finding fingerprints work.”