Twilight is the New Black!

Is Twilight a New Sensation or a New Fad?

By Robert Garcia

Twilight has become a franchise and is now being marketed everywhere, when it comes to teeth actually drinking blood. Twilight has become more and more of a popular trend among most of the girls in schools and out of school. You do see some boys into the whole concept of 'Whom do you choose - Team Edward or Team Jacob?', but the majority is girls. Because of this new popular trend people have been getting fake teeth at Hot Topic, getting real teeth like vampires, and buying Twilight-themed items. Twilight is a growing trend that is sweeping the nation fast and quick. And the premier of the movie has only helped the marketing of Twilight-themed items. Not saying this is a bad thing it’s just we don’t want them to start drinking blood anytime soon because then things get really creepy. But just like fanny-packs Twilight- related items will some come to a close, unless they make twilight themed fanny-packs then we might all lose there.

Feeding America

New Club Aims for Charity
by Omar Arce

Thanksgiving weekend just passed. This meant that many of rejoiced in eating and shopping. Thanksgiving is probably the only holiday when gluttony and spending a gross amount of money are celebrated. It must have been fun for those of us where able to fulfill these traditions. But what about those who could not afford a meal on Thanksgiving, or go shopping on black Friday? One in eight Americans do not have access to essential food. To stop this unbelievable but true trend in the country, many organizations run programs to provide food to people in need. Feeding America is the nation's leading domestic hunger-relief charity. Most noticeable are their ads in NBC's The Biggest Loser and in the back of candy wrappers such as Snickers. Although it may seem like a program alien to San Diego, Feeding America has a branch at Southwest High. The branch was recently founded by Araceli Diaz. Raiders' Digest had the opportunity to talk to Diaz. Here is the interview:

RD: Why did you decide to start this program at SOH?
AD: I decided to begin this club at school which is already a world known international program, because I realized that hunger isn't just in the eyes of of other children or their families that are in other countries. Hunger is affecting greatly American families that are in desperate need of a simple decent meal. I want to, along with the other members and those who want to donate, to at least attempt to decrease the amount of hungry American families in the United States.

RD: How did u start it ? Where did u hear from it?
AD: I started this club like any other at school, with the mandatory paper work and with a few interested people in becoming part of it. I originally heard of this program by watching television on the show called,The Biggest Loser. Ironic though, how the show is meant for overweight people to lose weight and how the program encourages viewers to contribute with donations to feed America....

RD: Is the main goal of this club to raise money?
AD: The main goal of this club is to provide a basic decent meal to all those hungry American families that are undergoing harsh difficult times. Especially now with the rough economy. By a simple donation of one dollar, just one dollar will guarantee a family with nine pounds of food.

RD: What has the club accomplished so far?
AD: So far, the club will be collecting donations from each class (those want to be a part of this program) once a month and so on, until the end of the school year. This will continue until the end of the school year and all of the donations will be sent to the feeding America organization. Pretty soon there will be a bake sale, so we're expecting it to be a success. Every teacher has had fliers about feeding America put in their box.

RD: Any info for people interested?
AD: Anyone that is still interested can still join. It's open for anyone, freshmen, sophomores, juniors, and seniors. All you have to do is show up for the club meetings in room 310 every Wednesday during lunch.

RD: Who or what was your inspiration to start the program?
AD: I've always wanted to help anyone in need, anywhere from lending them a hand or helping them cross the street. But just one week ago while I was going out with my family I saw the real eyes of a hungry young child. There was a little boy and his mother begging for money just to get by through the day. I couldn't just keep on walking and ignore the poor child and his mother and not care about them. The money I had with me which I intended to spend on myself, I ended up giving it to them. I said,"here you probably need it more than I do." To me the amount of money i had was meaningless, but to them it was heaven.

RD: Any plans for the future of the program?
AD: I would like to take this program to the next level. but i want to focus right now in the present, one step at a time. i can't worry about the future if i don't even know what will happen in the next five minutes. this year will be the trial year where we will see how well we did.
Perhaps the next time you have spare change and think about putting it in a piggy bank, you will donated to Feeding America. After all, cents are the difference between a full stomach and an empty stomach.

Black Friday

Shopping spree becomes pandemonium

by Bob Chan

Black Friday is the Friday following Thanksgiving Day in the United States and Black Friday is not an official holiday, but many employees have the day off as part of the Thanksgiving holiday with the exceptions of those employed in retail, health care, and banking. Many retailers open extremely early, with most of the retailers typically opening at 5AM or even earlier. Black Friday is usually the busiest retail shopping day of the year because of the great deals and prices that they offer

Since they have great deals such as a 40" Full HD LCD TV for only $449.00 or FIFA Soccer 10 for $34.99 with the game usually priced at $60 people are rampant and have their primal instincts kick in with a perfect example being 34-year-old Jdimytai Damour, a Long Island Walmart employee, was trampled to death after frenzied shoppers smashed through the store's front doors. According to police officers who arrived to perform CPR on the dying man were also stepped on and injured, as was a pregnant woman.

Curfews

Be Home By?
By Elma Gonzalez

The 10:00pm curfew has always been a nuisance for any high school student –the best parties and movies always start at 10:00pm; so why can’t they be out at that time? Well, because it is the city's way of protecting its youth.

In the 1990's curfews became a popular way to combat juvenile delinquency. But, have they helped? According to studies, curfews have had a small, positive effect on the reduction of crime among adolescents. But, what about those who are simply out for a party or movie? According to statistics, there is a higher chance of being caught in a car accident at night than during the day. Therefore, for them, it is not an issue of decreasing crime, but tragedies. Curfews have been a good way to battle both phenomena.

A week ago several SOH students were arrested for staying out past curfew. Most of these students however, were not out engaging in illegal activities,or even 'partying'; they were walking out of the movie theater after watching Twilight’s sequel: New Moon. "As we waited for my dad to come pick us up, we got hungry; so we decided to walk to Carl's Jr. That's where the cops arrested us," recalls a student.

Why would students choose to neglect the curfew? According to a survey administered to Mr. Thompson’s AP Econ class, 58% of the students know there is a curfew at 10:00pm, about 30% of the students know one exists but are unaware at what time it comes into effect, and approximately 13% did not know there was one at all. For those students who do not know there is a curfew, it is just a matter of informing them. But what can be done for those who simply choose to ignore it?

When asked, many of the students who were arrested said their parents had given them permission to be out at that hour. So, perhaps it is not a question of what can be done to the students, but to the parents. The Junior State of America club at school has decided to hold a discussion about this issue this Tuesday. They will have a guest speaker to answer any questions you may have, so show up and let your opinion be heard.

The AP Then and Now

AP classes provide open access

by Martin Zazueta

Now most of the students at Southwest High school may not remember how someone was to get enrolled in an AP class in past years; in fact only the class of 2010 should have a first hand memory of how it used to be. Nowadays one can just sign up for just about any AP class they want (probably the most obvious exception being AP Calculus) and depending if there's room (or in some cases it doesn't matter) and they can enroll in the class. The way it used to be was that a student had to sign an AP contract that required both a parent signature and two teacher recommendations, the contract would state that you were aware of the rigor that comes from AP and that it was considered a college level course and were expected to conduct as such. It also used to be that to get out of AP would also require several parent meetings with both the counselor and the teacher, student with counselor conferences, and the process at the very least would take about two weeks. Now it's just a word with your counselor and you can get out almost at will.

AP may no longer have the same prestige it had before, with so many students filling up the AP classes (except for Science and Math), many of whom are not prepared for it or are just simply do not understand the dynamics of it. by not taking it seriously, it has created a form of lagging that may be impeding the growth of students.

This growing concept of letting more students into AP is colloquially known as "Open Access" or "Open Enrollment" which has the noble purpose of allowing students to grow and expand themselves academically, by letting those who want to take the extra mile to try it, and not just leave those for the ones who are already prepared for it. This idea embodies the core purpose of education of getting someone to make progress. But the reality is that a lot of students do not really grasp the idea that AP is supposed to be for students who are willing and wanting to take the extra mile: an example of this is that several AP students continuously lag in participation with little regard to try to progress despite how much a teacher tries to get them to do otherwise. Also there have been occasions when a teacher has said that "you wont get crossword puzzles in college, you should be doing essays" a student replied "well this isn't a college class". Despite the problems with Open Access, all the aspects are too much to deal with in a single article. More on this next week.

Chargers vs. Chiefs

Bolts Have Six Game Streak

by Bob Chan

The Chargers have won six in a row since starting 2-3 including that loss to then 5-0 Broncos but look how the tides have turned with the chargers surging back to first place in the AFC west. The Chief’s were horrible in this game where the chargers defense had forced four turnovers. Tomlinson began the day 12th on the all-time list with 12,218 yards. He passed Marcus Allen and Edgerrin James for 10^th place with him eyeing Marcus Allen and Marshall Faulk. Tomlinson had 39 yards on 13 carries, giving him 12,257 for his career. Rivers was 21 of 28 for 317 yards, with no interceptions, for a rating of 135.6.

Cornerback Quentin Jammer had an interception and forced a fumble, and Brandon Siler and rookie Larry English also recovered fumbles. The most spectacular play was Oliver's. Matt Cassel dropped back and cocked his arm to throw late in the second quarter and the ball slipped out of his hand. Oliver grabbed it in the air, bobbled it, gained control, turned and ran 40 yards into the end zone to give the Bolts a 28-7 lead.

The Chief’s fourth turnover came early in the third quarter when a shotgun snap went over Cassel's head on third-and-1 from the Chiefs 31 and was recovered by English at the 10. Tomlinson scored on a 3-yard run two plays later to make it 35-7. Gates had seven catches for 118 yards. Chris Chambers, who people thought could be the X-factor didn’t live up to expectations was released by the Chargers a month ago and quickly signed by KC, caught a 7-yard touchdown pass to tie the game at 7 in the second quarter. Backup QBs Billy Volek of San Diego and Brodie Croyle of KC came in late in the game. Next up for the Chargers are the 1-10 Browns and for the Chief's, well they have the 7-4 Broncos.

New Moon Review

Expected Hit Disappointing?

by Robert Garcia

New Moon opened on Friday at midnight. The midnight showing earned a total of $26.3 Million dollars on the first showing of the film. But overall New Moon had earned more on the first showing of The Dark Knight, Unlike the The Dark Knight, New Moon is for die hard fans who want to watch Bella (Kristine Stewart) cry and mope around for 2 hours and only to scream while Jacob Black (Taylor Lautner) is in the movie 90% of the time with his shirt off. Now if you’re a die hard fan for Twilight Saga you will have already have seen this movie most likely and had given it a A++, but if you’re someone is somewhat of a fan because of the cute boys running around the movie playing vampire and werewolf then you most likely will give this a B. If you’re just someone who goes out and sees any big movie or is forced out with friends then most likely a C-. Don’t get me wrong as someone who saw the movie and can appreciate good acting Taylor Lautner (Jacob Black) did that, while Kristine Stewart (Bella) and Edward (Robert Pattinson) failed to bring their characters to life and give you that personal connection that some actors have on making you feel sad when the character feels sad and happy when they’re happy. Personally I found Bella and Edwards acting hollow and had no real emotion when they had to give that audience the grief of missing your loved one.

Overall, the movie in my opinion gets a C- on rating while others may differ. I found the movie Twilight to be a lot more enjoyable than New Moon.