oct. 2010, volume 20, issue 2

news sports diversions opinion feature

Writing Center to Open 2nd Quarter (pg. 2)

Students Procrastinate Due to Addictive Powers of Facebookby: Mackenzie Carson

With the movie The Social Network in theaters, Facebook is receiving more recognition than ever before. But can it be just as harmful as it is entertaining? Facebook has become a black hole that sucks in the users after they sign up. “Homework that would normally take five minutes takes an hour or more with Facebook near me,” Sebastian Echeverri (11) said. “I get distracted by the news feed and chats.”

As technology advances, teens be-come evermore dependent on it. The appeal of turning on the television or answering a text during homework be-comes inevitable as the entertainment factor increases. Facebook is a silent predator which seems fairly harmless; however, many don’t even realize that they’re being continously pulled in.

“I only find it really distracting when I’m doing homework on the computer because it’s right in front of me and it wastes a lot of time,” Jessica Woolson (12) said. “I’ve considered deactivat-ing it a couple times but I don’t care enough.”

52 percent of Centreville students polled said they spend one to two hours on Facebook a day, and 35 per-cent said they spend three to five hours a day. In those three hours the student wastes in front of their computer they

could watch an entire film, six epi-sodes of Spongebob Squarepants, play more than one complete game of foot-ball, or shockingly enough, finish their homework.

Some students have even resorted to deleting or “deactivating” their Face-book page just to get rid of the temp-tation. “Without Facebook, I can do homework in a fraction of the time that it would normally take me,” Johnny

Germanis (12) said, who deactivated his Facebook. “With Facebook, I can end up spending three hours writing a paragraph. Without it, that paragraph would take me a solid 30 seconds.”

So what pulls students into Face-book? “I like to see what people are doing through their statuses, pictures, and I guess, creep for lack of a better word,” Nicole Zarou (11) said. “Every-one creeps a little bit on everyone else.”

Right now Facebook has over 500 mil-lion active users, 50 percent of which log on at least once a day. More than 60 million status updates are posted each day, and five billion pieces of con-tent are shared each week. There are also more than 100 million users using Facebook through their mobile phones, all according to Facebook’s statistics.

So while Facebook can be entertain-ing, don’t let it become an addiction.

Spirit Rises with foot-ball wins (pg. 10 )

Learn About Model Judiciary (pg. 4)

Interview with Mr. Campbell (pg. 9)

Homecoming Festivities! (pg. 7)

upcoming events!

1. Centreville High Schools Facebook page, which pumps up spirit for games and informs users of re-cent events. 2. The amount of hours Centreville students spend on Facebook each day. (Photos: Mackenzie Carson)

1 2

•Oct. 29 – Centreville at West-field Football Game•Nov. 1 and 2 – Teacher Work-days•Nov. 4 – Cross Country Region-al Meet at Burke Lake•Nov. 5 – Centreville at Robin-son Football Game•Nov. 10 – Writing Center Opens•Nov. 10 – Transcript Request forms due for Dec. 1 deadline for college admissions•Nov. 11 – Touching Bases, Ear-ly Closing•Nov. 15 – Winter Sports Tryouts begin•Nov. 18 – Theatre Centreville presents Plaza Suite show•Nov. 24 – Students released two hours early for Thanksgiving

Photos/ Lila Mastriano, Bailey Munson, Shane Kehl

Dimitris Zayas 1993-2010

news Oct. 29, 20102Teacher Spotlight: Mrs. Jean Cole-Kleitz

By Brynna HeflinAs November rolls around, most

faculty members are concerned with entering their grades and are looking forward to the holiday breaks which are quickly arriving. However, Mrs. Cole-Kleitz, AP Environmental Science and Geo-systems teacher and cross country coach, will be looking forward to the race of her life: the Ford Iron-man in Arizona on November 21st.

The Ironman triathlon consists of a 2.4 mile swim, 112 mile bike, and a 26.2 mile run. This intensive race is 140.6 miles total and must be covered in 17 hours or less.

Cole’s first triathlon was a sprint in Phoenix, AZ – consisting of a 400 meter swim, 12 mile bike, and a 5k run. “I remember training only six weeks and thinking how easy it was going to be,” she said. “So six weeks before the event I learned very quickly that I didn’t even know how to swim – literally. The swim was a straight line and I swam

in a zigzag pattern the entire time. I hit a wall at mile 8 on the bike and my run was horrid, I think I ran like a 10 minute pace. I swore I would never do that again.”

Cole hated the sport the first time she tried it, but now it has “become a lifestyle” for her. By the morning of November 21st, Cole will have completed 24 weeks of intensive training. She trains all three dis-ciplines four times a week, com-pleting 2 workouts a day, 6 days a week. Two weeks before race day, her training will taper off. For now, Cole is swimming 14,000 meters, biking between 260 and 300 miles, and running between 40 and 45 miles a week. “My number one concern with everything is that I stay healthy,” Cole said. “Work-ing out is not going to do anything for me if I’m not eating and resting

properly.”The first time Cole went to an

Ironman was to support a friend, and she was inspired by everyone who was racing. “I’ve seen people collapse, cry, be completely dazed, and be in another mindset,” she said. “So much is invested in train-ing and preparing for an Ironman, much more than I thought before I started training for this.”

How does she handle teaching, training and coaching? “I take one day at a time,” she said. “The great thing is that I love teaching, coach-ing, and training – so I never feel

like I have this huge burden hanging over my head with any of them.”

Organization also keeps her fo-cused. She writes down everything, from what she eats day to day to what time she goes to bed each night.

“Basically, when I’m at school, teaching is my priority, when I’m at practice, coaching is my priority, and when I’m training, training is my priority.”

“I can’t wait for the announcer to shout out “JEAN COLE – YOU ARE AN IRONMAN,” Cole said. “I get goose bumps and tear up ev-ery time I think about it.”

Cole-Kleitz finishes as second female finisher in a half triathlon in North Carolina in mid- October (Photo: Jean Cole- Kleitz)

Centreville Opens New Writing Centerby daniela medina

Tutors of the writing center role-play tutoring situations in prepo-ration for the opening next quarter. (Photo: Mackenzie Carson)

Are you having trouble writing? Do you find yourself struggling over how to write a thesis statement or where to put in a comma? Con-sider these dark days over: Starting second quarter, Centreville will be opening a Writing Center to help student through the challenges that come with writing.

The Wildcat Writing Center will

be available to students in every grade during all four lunches on B-Days. “I think students may not like the idea of having to give up their lunch to go do work, but once they realize all the help they will be getting, they will want to come back to the Writing Center for every lunch,” Sasha Rocke (12) said, one of the tutors of the Writing Center. Whether a student needs help with an English essay or with a science

lab report, the Writing Center’s tutors are here to help. The Writ-ing Center understands the impor-tance of nutrition and thus, allows students to bring their lunch to the tutoring sessions. Furthermore, the Writing Center offers Pizza-Fridays to students who visit the Writing Center during their lunch periods.

By working side-by-side with students, the tutors of the Writing Center aim to produce more con-fident writers for the long run, ac-cording to Allison Grace, director of the Writing Center. The goal of a tutoring session is not to produce a perfect paper, but to teach students key revision strategies that will help them in the future.

Though the tutors would like to improve students’ writing as a whole, a 25 minute session is not long enough to cover every aspect of a paper; however, the Writing Center encourages students to re-turn if they would like to further improve their paper. When students visit the Writing Center, they are

given an opportunity to request a specific tutor; every tutor in the Writing Center specializes in differ-ent areas.

Since the tutors of the Writing Center are students themselves, they understand the responsibilities that come with high school writing assignments. The Writing Center accepts any form of writing and the tutors, who have been professional-ly trained by George Mason’s Writ-ing Center, possess the right kind of knowledge to help students through any stage of their writing process.

The Writing Center will be lo-cated in room 220 and students are encouraged to drop by any time to fill in a tutor-request form or fill out a tutoring-session survey. “I think the Writing Center will be a great resource to have because it allows students to go to their peers for help,” counselor Kelly Devlin commented, as she explained how students who can’t stay after school should take advantage of the Writ-ing Center during lunch time.

Cole-Kleitz gives examples of problems on the board for her AP Environmental Science class. (Photo: Mackenzie Carson)

“I get goose bumps and tear up every time I think about it.”

news 3Oct. 29, 2010

Student Travels Abroad for World ChampionshipBy Allison Ewing

Most students wouldn’t know that Marco Jiminez (11) is a member of the USA Junior Kickboxing Team. Jiminez, along with the 27 other members of the USA kickboxing team, participated in the VIII WAKO World Junior Champi-onships in Belgrade, Serbia.

The tournament took place from Sept. 19-26, with approximately 1,159 competitors from 60 different coun-tries. “My favorite part of the trip was meeting the new people from all over the world,” Jiminez said.

Jiminez trained at his coach’s house five times a week in the summer to pre-pare for the tournament. He first joined the junior kickboxing team when he was in 8th grade by competing a g a i n s t other boys and girls n a t i o n -wide in Rhode Is-land. Jimi-nez is a first degree black belt and has trained at World Class, Black Belt Academy, and his coach Neil Ehrlich’s new school, Fighting Fitness.

In January, 2010, he fought in the World Cup Martial Arts Association National Finals and finished first in point and continuous fighting. Jiminez also helps instruct some of the young-er children’s classes. “I’ve helped my little brother Sebastian train a lot,” said Jiminez. “He’s finally getting his black belt this weekend.”

WAKO is the World Association of Kickboxing and is the biggest sports

martial arts in the world. WAKO holds a junior world championship every two years. In 2008, Jiminez and the rest of the USA team travelled to Naples, Italy to compete. The participants were divided into three categories based on their age. The first group, which consisted of ages 10-12, could only compete in point sparring. A fighter can earn a point by a correct punch or kick, but a referee has to stop the fight so three judges can verify if the point counts. Ages 13-15 can also participate in point fighting, as well as continuous fighting.

In continuous fighting, a match isn’t stopped every time someone scores a point. The match ends after three

rounds, and is a full con-tact fight. A full contact fight follows the Ameri-can rules of kickbox-ing, and any kick above the belt can

count for a point. All fights are fought in a ring with a referee and knockouts are permitted.

The third group consisted of ages 16-18 and participants can choose kick-boxing, point, continuous, or full con-tact fighting. Jiminez competed in this group and fought in point and con-tinuous fighting. “I plan on compet-ing one last time internationally in two years and make the USA team again,” said Jiminez, “Hopefully I’ll bring back the gold next time.”

For additional information about the tournament, visit www.wakoweb.

Marco Jiminez (11) in his kickboxing gear for the USA Junior Kick-boxing Team. (Photo: Neil Ehrlich)

Anna McKittrick: National Merit Semi-Finalist

by brynna heflinAnna McKittrick (12) is Centreville’s

lone National Merit Semi-Finalist. The National Merit Semi-Finalist

award is based on PSAT scores taken during ju-nior year in high s c h o o l . A l o n g with the a w a r d , m a n y scho lar -ship op-portuni-ties are offered to v a r i o u s co l l eg es and uni-versities across the U n i t e d States.

E a c h -state is allocated a percentage of semi-finalists, based on the percentage of graduating seniors, in comparison to the national rate. This past year, stu-dents who scored at or above a 218 were National Merit Semi-Finalists in Virginia. This score can be roughly converted to a 2180 on all three sec-tions of the SAT reasoning test, in-cluding the mathematics, reading, and writing sections.

Some students prepare for the PSAT in hopes of becoming a semi-finalist, thus being eligible for the many schol-arships that come with the award. However, McKittrick did not specially prepare for the test.

“My preparation for the PSAT was only what I’d done in classes at school,” she stated. Many classes take practice PSATs in order to prepare students, especially in Fairfax County. “I knew about the National Merit Scholarship

program, and re-m e m b e r thinking as I went into the test that qua l i fy -ing for a schol-a r s h i p would be great. But I can’t say I ex-pected it, because I t h o u g h t that my j u n i o r

year PSAT was the most difficult one I’d taken,” McKittrick added.

“I was really surprised to find out that I was the only semi-finalist from Centreville this year, since Centreville is a big school with a lot of really driv-en students,” McKittrick said. “But the qualification is only based on that one test, so I guess I must have had a good day!”

Centreville has had multiple re-cipients of the award during previous years, and hopefully will have many recipients in the future as well. For this year, Anna McKittrick is the only re-cipient – accompanied by some of the brightest in the nation.

“Hopefully I’ll bring back the gold next

time.”Marco Jiminez

Anna McKittrick (12) was the sole National Merit semi-finalist from Centreville. (Photo: Brynna Heflin)

Because there are still roughly 100 students who haven’t had their se-nior portraits taken, there will be one final senior portrait shoot at Cen-treville on Nov. 10 in the lecture hall. If your student hasn’t had their picture taken yet or if you would like retakes, please call Lifetouch at 800-445-1189 to set up an appointment. If you have other questions re-garding this, please email Melissa Rife at Melissa.rife1@fcps.edu.

Senior Portraits Nov 10

Noosh and Polly’s Surprise Corner Sur-

Model Judiciary Competes at Virginia Supreme Court

Ever want to go ghost hunting? There are many places in Virginia that are believed to be the residents of ghosts.

Ever heard of the haunted theater

of Wakefield High School, or a gazebo at George Mason campus in Fairfax be-ing haunted by a man who drowned?

Wakefield High School’s theater is said to be haunted. Apparentlystrange things will only occur if you are sitting in the balcony seats, and only when you’re there by yourself, you may hear the sounds of a piano being played.

It has also been rumored that a young man, who may have been a member of the theater crew, died dur-ing a performance by falling off the stage in the early 1960s. His ghost has been seen walking back and forth on the catwalk over the stage.

A decade later, a young man drowned one evening near a George Mason gazebo in Fairfax. His body is rumored to have been found sitting in the gazebo by two young girls. Ever since then, it is said that he beckons young women to come sit next to him.

According to University Police Ser-geant Judy Meade and Lt. Willie Mor-ton, no one has drowned in the George Mason Lake.

These are just two of the haunted

A Haunting In VirginiaBy Pallavi Saini

Halloween is fast approaching, and if you are a Clifton resident and you have not yet heard of the “Bunny Man Bridge” legend, you are about to be ed-ucated on one of the scariest ongoing legends that has taken place in your very own backyard.

The tale of the Bunny Man goes as far back as the 1930s. It originally be-gan in 1931, after many murders were committed around the Old Clifton li-brary.

It was later reported by Fairfax of-ficials that the small bridge along Brad-dock Road was where two other blood-curdling events took place.

In 1970, when a man and his fian-cé were driving home from a football game, they decided to park their car in a field on Guinea Road to talk.

Moments later, they heard the smashing of the passenger window of their car, and a man in a bunny suit holding an axe threatened to kill them if they did not leave the area. Luckily, the two escaped before anything hap-pened.

Another incident occurred that same year when a security guard ap-proached a man standing on the porch of an unfinished home. The guard said the man was in a bunny suit holding an axe, and began chopping at the porch post with it. During the same time, a few days before Halloween,

locals reported sights of hundreds of cleanly skinned, half-eaten carcasses of rabbits hanging from the trees in the surrounding areas.

To this day, legend has it that on Halloween, right before midnight, a bunny approaches the bridge, and at the stroke of midnight, his soul, which appears in a dim light, walks the tracks above the bridge.

Moments later, his soul stops right above the bridge and disappears, only to reappear underneath the bridge. From then on, it’s his soul which il-luminates the whole area, so brightly that you can’t even see it.

“I can’t say I don’t believe the sto-ries of the Bunny Man Bridge because most of those events were reported in-cidents. As for his ghost showing up each Halloween to haunt people, that sounds like a joke,” said Zaira Din (11).

We may never know the exact truth behind these stories; however, it is still one of the most interesting legends in American folklore.

Teenagers occasionally visit the Bunny Man Bridge in large groups on Halloween, although most decide to leave right before midnight hits.

It has been suggested that the public not visit on Halloween this year, since the police department will close off the area around Bunny Man Bridge, in order to discourage curious onlookers and pranksters.

Local Myth Attracts StudentsTo Clifton’s Bunny Man Bridge

By Nashmin Behrouzi

Many people know that model judi-ciary is a club that focuses on govern-ment. What most don’t know is that it is more of a team; the members become well-educated about the U.S. Govern-ment system, and they even get the op-portunity to compete in Richmond in front of Supreme Court judges.

Mrs. Ruffing, an AP Government and Law in Action teacher, started Model Judiciary in 2006, the same time she started the Law in Action class. “I love everything that has to do with the law,” Said Ruffing. “I really enjoy working with the students and our at-

torney mentor, Kyle Bartol, to help pre-pare for the trials.”

The class is associated with the club, but students do not have to be enrolled in the class to be on the team. Students on the team play the roles of attorneys or witnesses in a mock trial. As they hold trials, they learn about the differ-ent parts of the court system such as opening statements and closing argu-ments, as well as cross-examination techniques.

Sarah Karlik (12) joined the team four years ago as a freshman, and has been a member ever since. “Model Ju-diciary is really a great experience,” she said. “I am able to meet many different people that I wouldn’t normally talk to

in school just because we didn’t have any-thing in common, but now we do through this club.” As a fresh-man, Sarah started as a witness, but since her sophomore year, she has been an attor-ney in their case.

The teams com-pete at all different levels of the court. They start out at a tri-al level, which Cen-treville has always

By Kristy McKain

Samantha Zazzero (9) is involved in the Clifton Haunted Trail.(Photo: Pallavi Saini)

Diversions4 Oct. 29, 2010

The 2009-10 model judiciary team. (Photo: Catherine Ruffing)

Title Genre Release Date-Due Date -Comedy -11/5

-For Colored Girls -Drama -11/5

-Megamind -Animation -11/5

-Unstoppable -Action -11/12

-Harry Potter and the -Action/Adventure -11/19 Deathly Hallows: Part 1

-The Last Three Days -Drama/Horror -11/19

-Tangled -Family -11/24

been successful at, and later, move up to the appellate round in the Fairfax Courthouse. If successful there, (which they have been every year), they move to the Virginia Supreme Court in Rich-mond. The attorneys argue their cases before real Virginia Supreme Court justices. “It was always a little bit scary to present my case in front of real judg-es and another team,” said Karlik. “But I believe it is all worth it in the end.”

Centreville’s Model Judiciary team

is the only Northern Virginia School to progress to the Virginia Supreme Court Round for the past four years, and they have attracted so much popu-larity that two teams have been formed to represent Centreville.

“Our team motto has always been, ‘the juice is worth the squeeze,’” Karlik said. “And at the end of the trial, we al-ways end up becoming successful and moving forward to the next round.”

places in Northern Virginia. If you want to go ghost hunting this Hallow-een, do your research and go find a haunted place. Maybe if you are lucky, you might discover something really eerie and cool.

If you want to get scared this Hal-loween without leaving the comfort of your community, check out the Clifton Haunted Trail on October 30, 2010.

Many months of hard work has been put into this event by many people.

“I’m looking forward to getting chained up to a tree and acting crazy with my sister. We’re trying to make this year scarier,” Samantha Zazzero (9) said.

Zazzero is just one of the many indi-viduals who are participating in mak-ing this Halloween fun for all in the Centreville/Clifton area.

Movies Coming Out in November

Feature 5Oct. 29, 2010

Seniors Slip by Juniors 16-14 in PowderpuffAfter missing a year due to

rain, the annual Seniors (2011) vs. Juniors (2012) Powderpuff game was held on Wednesday, October 20, 2010. Both teams came out pumped, especially the seniors, given last year’s cancellation. After four 15 min-ute and very tense quarters, the seniors emerged victorious over the juniors.

The seniors displayed tremen-dous enthusiasm during the game. “I was ecstatic. All the se-niors were pumped and ready to win. The juniors were vicious though,” said Cara Donovan (12).

The seniors were the first to score, on a touchdown pass from Mackenzie Carson to Ka-tie O’Donnell, quickly taking the lead 6-0. Taylor Avery’s ex-tra kick was good, making it 8-0. (Extra kicks are worth 2 points in Powderpuff rules). The ju-niors toughened up their de-fense, preventing any more se-nior touchdowns for the rest of the first half.

In the beginning of the 2nd quarter, the juniors came back with a touchdown of their own

on a pass to Gisela DeConti, making it 8-6. Kelsey Ciarrocca kicked the extra point but unfor-tunately, it was just shy of the posts, so the score remained 8 -6. Even with the missed extra points, the juniors’ offense was lights out as they quickly scored again, making it 12-6 juniors. This time the extra kick was good, making it 14-8 juniors.

Unwilling to let the juniors win, the seniors fought back with another touchdown that tied the game. Taylor Avery kicked her second extra kick of the night, making it 16-14 se-niors. This would make Avery the MVP of the game.

The juniors played hard the rest of the game, but were un-able to overcome the seniors, and the final score was 16-14 seniors. “The girls played hard and aggressive. We are proud of them; they really showed their skills. Unfortunately the score-board was not in our favor at the end of the game,” said junior coaches Shay Claypoole and Jed Williams. The seniors were elat-ed during their after-game cel-ebration as they all huddled to-gether and cheered on the field.

Overall, Powderpuff was a fun

experience for the girls. “It was enjoyable but stressful,” said Emmie Dohse (11), “since the seniors always win and it was hard going into the game know-ing that.”

Each team held practices be-fore the game so they were ready for their opponent. “We had strenuous practices, long

hours in the weight room, team building exercises, film studies, and chalk talks,” said Coaches Claypoole and Williams. The se-niors had their own way of pre-paring. “We had war paint, jer-seys, intense practices, and we blasted music on the way to the game,” said Erin Maynard and Cara Donovan.

By Courtney Burke

Isabel Chang (12) slips past the junior defense. (Photo: Ashley Potts)

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Centreville Sentinel Gets 2nd PlaceCentreville’s very own school

paper, the Sentinel, won sec-ond place in the Virginia High School League Competition For its outstanding achievement in quality publications service to its school and community.

Sentinel advisor Kathleen Will-mann accepted the award for last year’s newsmagazine pub-lication at the VHSL’s Publica-tions Championships held in Chantilly October 4th. Each of the schools in the running were evaluated by the Publications Evaluation Services of the Vir-ginia High School League. Not

only do they vote on the win-ners, they also offer feedback which helps schools improve their papers. “The corrections they made actually helped me to see what I had been doing wrong,” Cara Donovan(12) said.

This year the Sentinel has made many changes. It’s gone from a newsmagazine to a full-fledged newspaper. A few more color pages have been added as well as many more pictures. “The newspaper is a lot more enjoy-able to read, it has so many pic-tures and cool quotes from stu-dents,” Isabela Medina(10) said. The opinions section has added blurbs, and students seem to en-

joy them; in fact, lots of students have approached the news staff wanting to be featured in the next upcoming blurb.

In addition, instead of five is-sues a year, the Sentinel is push-ing for nine. “We’re determined to get all nine issues published this year,” Editor in-chief Bryn-na Heflin(12) said. “With issues

coming out more often, we will be able to get news around fast-er.”

This year’s Sentinel news staff is working very hard in order to accomplish this goal. The staff of 2010-2011 is determined to win first place in next year’s Virginia High School League Publica-tions Championships.

By Salwa Touzani

The Sentinel Staff with their award. These 13 members of the current 2010-2011 staff were also staff writers last year when the Sentinel won 2nd place in the Virginia High School League Compe-tition for newsmagazines. The newspaper advisor, Kathleen Will-mann, is not pictured. (Photo: Kathleen Willmann)