SENTINELC E N T R E V I L L E H I G H S C H O O L

august 29, 2012, volume 22, issue 1

summer special issue

Most recently an assistant principal at Edison High School, Martin Grimm started work as the new principal for Centreville High School in July. As the new principal, Grimm’s main goal is to help the students do well in a changing environment. Grimm wants to improve the learning atmosphere for students and teachers, and help students choose a path for their futures. “From the freshman to the senior year, just as a person you change so much, and you really go from this kind of awkward middle schooler to someone who is ready to go out into the work world or go to college,” Grimm said.

Instead of re-creating the school right off the bat, Grimm has decided to watch the school for the first couple of months and see what works and what needs to improve. “Unless you are living in the school and you really see how things are going day to day, it is hard for me to say what is and isn’t working,” said Grimm. However, he will be paying special attention to the effectiveness of CATS time and how students are using it.

To build on the successes of Centreville High School, Grimm has recently hired a Dean of Students. The Dean of Students’ main job is to follow up and support the attendance referrals and work with teachers on their collaborative teams. “When students are in class and on time, they are very successful academically,” said Grimm.

Grimm has lived in several states and has had a great variety of teaching experiences, from kindergarten to high school. Though Grimm was born in Pomona, California, he moved often as a child and lived in Oregon, Washington, Alaska, Georgia, and Colorado. He played basketball in high school and college and first began working with students as a head basketball coach, Director of Athletics, and Dean of Students at Oxford College. He later worked with elementary school kids at El Dorado and Remington elementary schools as a PE teacher, and also worked at a middle school. Later, Grimm earned his Master of Education in Curriculum and Instruction at Regis University and obtained his principal license at George Mason University.

When he’s not at school, Grimm enjoys playing with his son and daughter, Zachary and Clare, ages six and seven. “They are my hobby and my sport,” Grimm said. He is also a huge Redskins and Red Sox fan.

So far, Grimm has met with administrators and department chairs during the summer before teachers and students return. Grimm would like to get to know all the teachers and form a close relationship with the students.He encourages students to drop by and introduce themselves. “This may sound corny and everybody says this, but I always like working with students,” Grimm said. “For me, that’s the fun part.”

By: Soo Lim

Welcome To The Family

This summer, Shaw Industries Inc. began installing two brand-new turf fields to serve as flat, consistent, and durable play surfaces for Wildcat athletes. The stadium and practice fields will benefit many of the sports

The Dirt on the New Field: Tough Turf Stands Up to WildcatsBy: Michael Bollman

Principal Martin Grimm (right) shakes hands with President Barack Obama (left) as Senior Summer Thrasher (center) is grateful to accompany Grimm in the athletic hallway as the selected SGA senior class board member.

Grimm signs a form in his office from one of the piles of paperwork waiting to be completed before the school year begins.

Obama (center) gladly accepts Centreville’s basketball jersey given by Grimm (right) and Thrasher (left).

teams. They will have multi-sport versatility because football, field hockey, and soccer lines will be inlaid in the fields. Athletes, coaches, and parents will be able to have dependable, early-notice schedules because of the sturdy new fields.

In the past, the Office of Student Activities kept the stadium field vacant to prevent damage to the grass before major events. Therefore, many athletic teams scrambled to find practice space, leading to scheduling conflicts and tensions between

sports team coaches. However, the new turf fields are practically invincible and will be able to stand up to constant abuse from regular practices, a feat a grass field cannot match regardless of the care it receives. Because turf fields do not get muddy, practices and games will be allowed to continue as planned, almost regardless of the weather or usage of the fields.

Director of Student Activities Jimmy Sanabria drove the turf project from idea to reality. Sanabria made many of the decisions about the field’s design. He specified that a large, Carolina blue power cat be placed prominently in the center of the field. The end zones will be unfilled to prevent confusion for athletes participating in sports other than football while giving the Centreville turf a unique look compared to other fields in Fairfax County.

The entire cost of design, materials, and installation was $1,257,000, a staggering number that made getting approval for the field a difficult proposition. However, students, parents,

businesses, and organizations in the community came forward to support the project. The Southwestern Youth Association and the CVHS Booster Club each donated $300,000 to the cause. Centerville students and parents themselves raised $125,000 through the Christmas Tree Drive, a fundraiser selling custom-engraved bricks in a to-be-built stadium wall, bake sales, car washes, and other methods. Grants from the Fairfax County Department of Neighborhood and Family Services and the Carney Foundation netted another $125,000. Other area businesses showed their support with generous donations that covered the rest of the cost.

Through the hard work of the Office of Student Activities and the support of students, parents, and community organizations and businesses, Centreville’s sports program will be able to use the new turf field in the stadium during the first home football game. The practice field turf should be finished during the first quarter.

This diagram presents the nine layers that make up the two new, durable turf fields.

Courtesy of the Obama Campaign

Courtesy of the Obama CampaignMichael Bollman

Source: Shaw Industries Inc.

News2 August 29, 2012

Layout Editors: Erin Shin,

Stephanie Wiggins

Staff Writers:Katie Blumer,

Michael Bollman, Soo Lim, Brenda Nguonly, Erin Shin,

Stephanie Wiggins

Adviser: Chris Kervina

Questions?CVHSnews@gmail.com

Editors-in-Chief:Soo Lim

Michael Bollman

Business &Advertising Manager:

Michael Bollman

Section Editors: Brenda Nguonly (News)

Stephanie Wiggins (Feature)Erin Shin (Op-Ed)

Katie Blumer (Sports)

2012-2013 STAFFThe Sentinel, a student written and

edited publication of Centreville High School, serves the CVHS community. We accept all advertising relevant to the students, parents, and CVHS staff. We reserve the right to decline any advertis-ing deemed in violation of the Students Rights and Responsibilities or inappro-priate for a school setting. All comments or complaints should be addressed to the editorial staff.

Prospective advertisers should con-tact the Business and Advertising Man-ager at cvhsnews@gmail.com for rates and deadlines.

The objective of The Sentinel’s Staff is to provide a student forum where information is provided and voices can be heard. Our mission is to provide the student body of Centreville High School an honest and accurate paper produced by the students, for the students.

Our editorials represent the opinions of The Sentinel’s editors and always promote the opportu-nity for critique and response. Our opinion pieces reflect the view of the writer and the writer only, and

are not printed to offend. This is a publication that maintains high standards and proper ethical con-duct, per the guidelines of profess-sional and scholastic journalism or-ganizations.

All letters to the editor must be typed and signed. They can be dropped off at room 116 or in the main office in Mrs. Kervina’s mailbox. We reserve the right to edit the re-sponses for length, grammatical cor-rectness, and spelling.

Advertising PolicyEditorial Policy

On the scorching hot morn-ing of July 14, nearly 2200 people filled the sidewalks and streets in front of Centreville High School. They waited for what Peter Lizza, a 2010 Centreville alumnus, called “The biggest in the history of the town.” The people were talking, of course, about the arrival of cur-rent President and 2012 presiden-tial candidate Barack Obama. The Obama campaign planned the speech as part of a two-day cam-paign trip through Virginia.

Potential voters from all sides of the discussion were present, shouting their stances through loudspeakers and cupped hands, trying hard to sway the opinions of the people hoarsely shouting back at them. The sun beat down on the scene, filling the air with the pervasive smell of melting as-phalt. Centreville was an image of barely constrained chaos, friends and neighbors clashing in a politi-cal civil contest.

The approximately 2100 peo-ple lucky enough to get tickets to the event queued up in front of the school’s main entrance for hours prior to the opening of the doors, in lines trailing all the way out of the bus loop and down the street. Obama campaign volun-teers offered water to the waiting crowds to help beat the heat. Con-trolling the crowds was difficult. Director Student Activities Jimmy Sanabria said, “It was more chaot-ic than a Centreville vs. Westfield football game.”

Every person was given a full body search and walked through a row of metal detectors erected in the atrium. Secret servicemen were in every shadow as guests

Obama Gives Centreville Vote of ConfidenceBy: Michael Bollman

2012 Presidential candidate Barack Obama speaks in front of his slogan, “FORWARD” placed in front of the bleachers at Centreville High School’s gymnasium.

Obama shakes hands with crowd in the gym as he walks to the podium to give his speech.

Obama supporter holds up a sign about Obama Care in front of Centreville High School.

entered a hardly-recognizable gymnasium, filled as it was with staging, press cameras, and rich red, white, and blue bunting. An eight foot tall banner, nearly the width of the bleachers, stood as a backdrop exclaiming Obama’s campaign slogan, “FORWARD.”

A thunderous roar of applause greeted Obama as he made his way to the speaking podium while shaking hands and greet-ing dozens of his supporters. He spoke of meeting Centreville’s principal, Martin Grimm: “I met Mr. Grimm, I said how long have you been the principal, he said, “five days.” I said, ‘I’m sure you’re going to do a great job.’”

Obama spoke first about how much we as Americans have to be proud of. The young, bright stu-dents of the nation will usher in an era of intellectual and monetary wealth that will help our nation’s economy. Our capable youths are one of the reasons America is “the envy of the world,” Obama said. “I want us to have the best school systems in the world.” Obama be-lieves that children adept in the basic skills of Science, Technolo-gy, Electronics, and Mathematics, or STEM, will lead the country to attain greatness once again.

The crowd went into a frenzy of clapping and whaling as the president spoke of strong patrio-tism and of support for fellow citizens. Obama promised health care support as well. “If you don’t have health care, I’m going to help you get it,” Obama said.” He went on to speak of the many poli-cies, starting with his plan to fix the economy “from the bottom up, not the top down like my op-ponent Mr. Romney would have America do.”

Refreshments are served as people wait in a line streching to the end of the student parking lot to attend Obama’s campaign speech at Centreville High School.

Nick D

ell’Om

oKatie Blum

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Katie Blumer

Katie Blumer

News 3August 29, 2012

From Centreville’s earliest days in 1988 to Centreville’s latest the-atre production of “Radium Girls,” the auditorium lights have time and again proven their resilience. Up until April, the lights in the Roy A. “Skip” Maiden Theater have given us long years of, well, light. Finally, the lights took their last breaths just before a “Radium Girls” showing, forcing the tech theatre staff to reprogram. The control board was good to Cent-reville, never creating major issues, which was fortunate, considering the original light company had long gone out of business. Once the tech theatre staff realized the lights weren’t working like they used to, they tried to add a new

By: Brenda nguonly

Light It Up lamp in the lighting instrument. But it still wasn’t bright enough.

Over the summer, our beloved auditorium saw a total remodel, from ceiling to floor and booth to backstage. Ninety-four cir-cuit channels, which operate like light switches, were swapped for a whopping one-hundred and ninety two circuits, more than double the original amount. The ETC arranged the new lights on both sides of the stage, allowing lights to shine from all angles and eliminating the need for extension cords. Robotic lighting will give the booth complete power over the lighting system. And it’s easy to use! Booth control boards are now operated by iPads and iPhones, plus new backstage touch pad con-

As students come back to Centreville High School to pick up new schedules, they might find that not only does the new school year come with new class-es, teachers, and a new principal, but also a new building known as the Quad. It was added over the summer, so students may see math classes held in Quad 1, 2, 3, or 4. Mr. Person, Mr. Neff, Mr. Noga, and Mr. Mossholder will be teaching in the new class-rooms, which are located behind hallway D and the cafeteria. “We needed the extra room space, so adding the quad was our best chance to do so,” Chesapeake Sub School Principal Rob Ewing said. But with its benefit of providing more classrooms, the Quad in the middle of the staff parking lot may pose problems for staff and students alike.

The Quad may cause traffic problems since cars won’t be able to pass through the road by the staff parking lot because of safety issues with students walking out-side to the quad during the day. Most of the staff will now have to park in the front of the school, an already chaotic place in the mornings. Getting to school on time may be a challenge for stu-dents who are dropped off, espe-cially when they need to wake up five minutes earlier than last year to beat the traffic.

Getting to the Quad on time may also be difficult, particularly for students whose previous class is on the 3rd floor. For example, the Sentinel staff determined it takes an average of 3 minutes and 20 seconds for a student to get from the science hallway on the 3rd floor to the quad, maybe less if the student has long strides. Add a few more minutes of wad-ing through the sea of students by the main stairs, bumping into a few friends along the way, and making a trip to the locker and many students will not make it before the tardy bell. The back staircase of hallways C and D will save some time by avoiding crowds on the main stairs. But a trip to the locker or bathroom may not be a good idea. Make sure all materials are at hand for a Quad class so there is no struggle with opening a jammed locker, which will certainly require you to sprint to class.

On the brighter side, the Quad is brand new, guaranteed to have new desks, chairs, and windows in each classroom, something students can be excited about, right? A bit of fresh air during the school day won’t hurt either.

By: Erin Shin

Parking Lot

Traffic Flow Impacted;

Students Must

Plan Routes

trols. Best part about getting new gadgets is the thousands of effects they provide, from focusing light beams onto the audience to being able to dim the lights one by one.

The project was finished with a

New Quad Brings Needed Class Space, Some Challenges

Quad location placed by M

ichael Bollman

Katie Blumer

The new Quad building sits on part of the back parking lot, near the ramp to the baseball field. Each of the four classrooms is larger than the single trailer classrooms in trailers 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5, which have been compared to bowling alleys or airplanes.

This map of the first floor of CVHS shows the location of the new Quad, near the Cafeteria and the end of D Hallway. Student will use doors 6 or 7 to get to class.

new sound system, which will al-low musicals to be operated from backstage. “We now have the best system in the county,” said tech theatre teacher, Mike Hudson. The new system could last anoth-er twenty years, or more, he said.

Michael Bollman

This new touch screen allows operators to control the house lights without changing light settings on the main control board.

Sports4 August 29, 2012

Wildcat Cheer led by seniors Courtney Thurston and Danielle Farrell have a lot to be cheering about this year. The team has a new head coach, Megan Howard, who they truly respect. With a new turf field for the football team and a fan section looking to make some noise, the cheerleaders will have plenty of energy to use.

Since August 8, the squad has practiced cheers, stunts, and tum-bling passes almost every day to prepare for the season’s football games and cheer competitions. The girls took some team bond-

On August 14, the varsity field hockey team won its first scrim-mage 5-1 against Osborne High School. With this win, the Cent-reville squad seems confident of a good start to their season. “In our scrimmage we played really well as a team and the game allowed us to figure out our player’s strengths and weaknesses and capitalize on them,” said Junior Kasey Martino.

Senior captains Gabby Dagata, Lindsey Egbers, and Shannon O’Donnell have led by example, pushing their teammates through long, tough pre-season practices. The team participated in jogging, full field sprints, abs, and push-up work. Their preparation for the season will be tested at an August 24-25 tournament at Lee High School. The team plays its first game of the season at Hayfield High on August 28 at 7:30 p.m. and its first home game against Thomas Jefferson on August 29 at 4 p.m.

After last year’s awesome run to the state finals, the Centreville Wildcat varsity football team has been working hard to make themselves competitors again this year.

The team won its first scrimmage against the An-nandale High School Atoms with an unofficial score of 55-14 on August 17. The scrimmage revealed a few stand out players to watch this season. Two running backs, Sophomore Xavier Nickens-Yzer and Junior Christian Martey combined for a total of four touch-downs, while Junior quarterback Scott Walter not only threw the ball very well, but was outstanding in the open field. The team’s two-a-day practices August 6-22 were “very exhausting but worth the effort,” said Junior Ryan Vierregger.

On August 23, the Wildcats took on the C.D. Hyl-ton High School Bulldogs. The Bulldogs ran the ball well, challenging the Wildcats’ defense. A late third-quarter touchback by the Bulldogs gave the Cats the momentum they needed to fight back and win the scrimmage with an unofficial score of 23-21.

The installation of the new turf field has put some stress on the football team. Because the practice field isn’t finished, the team has been practicing at Brad-dock Park. Both scrimmages were played at other schools, too. But, with the new turf field in the sta-dium almost finished, Head Coach Chris Haddock and Wildcats look forward to their first regular sea-

The always competitive Cen-treville volleyball team, stepped out for their first scrimmage Au-gust 23 at home against South Lakes High School. Though the score for this game was not avail-able at press time, the team’s try-outs and two-a-day practices had already put the girls through some heavy-duty strengthening and conditioning drills to prepare for the games ahead. Sophomore Lo-gan Ross said “We workout with medicine balls, hand weights, and resistance bands for our upper body and we do sprints, lunges, and block jumps for our lower body. We also perform a thirty minute ab workout each practice.”

The Lady Wildcats first home game of the season against Stuart High School will be on September 6 at 7 p.m.

Beginning practices on August 6, the Centreville Cross Country (XC) team had a few setbacks in early season training. The new turf installation affected the XC team. The runners warmed up at Braddock Park where they had to estimate the distance of the track, which is far from exact. Also, the runners have no clean space in order to stretch and do pylometrics. As a pre-competition warm up, the team ran a two-mile time trial at Burke Lake Park on August 10. The Wild-cats have an upcoming scrimmage Saturday, August 25 at Robinson. The girls will run at 8 a.m. and the boys at 8:30 a.m.

Most people don’t realize the XC team has to pay an entrance fee for every competition, so they have to raise money to run. A recent car wash at the Colon-nade helped them raise almost $1200, which will al-low them to compete in many events this season. The team’s first official meet will be at Bull Run Regional Park at 4 p.m. on August 30.

The Boys and Girls of Fall: Centreville Starts a New Season of Sports

FootballBy: Katie Blumer

Coach Haddock addresses the Wildcats after a close scrimmage against Hylton High School.

Field Hockey

Cheer

GolfVolleyball

Cross CountryBy: Katie Blumer

By: Katie Blumer

By: Katie Blumer

By: Katie Blumer

By: Katie BlumerThe team has been busy in the month of August,

competing in many tournaments with great finishes. The squad finished third overall on August 9 at the Twin Lakes Atomic Invitational. On Tuesday, August 14, the golf team finished 8th at the Charger Chal-lenge at Pleasant Valley Golf Club. The next day, the team competed at Laurel Hill Golf Club where Fresh-man Yoo Jin Kim shot even and finished second overall. The CVHS Golf team also competed in the Bryan Gunter Memorial Tournament on August 16-17 where they fell just 8 strokes short of a three-peat championship.

The team played a grueling week of back-to-back events August 20-23. Both girls and boys teams played at the VSGA Invitational August 20-22, the girls played at Twin Lakes August 21 for the Northern Region Girls’ Kickoff, and both teams participated in the August 23 Concorde District Kick Off.

The Wildcats compete today at 3:30 p.m. verse sHerndon and starting at 5:50 p.m. is the girls’ scrim-mage against Osborne Park, both at Westfields Golf Club.

Come out and see your very own Wildcats take

Sophomore Kelcie Greenfelder lines up to take a shot on junior goalie Ashley Winkeler, while Ashley’s sister and teammate, Junior Amber Winkeler, looks on.

This graph represents the number of athletes participating in each fall sport. Three hundred ninety-eight CVHS students will participate in freshmen, junior varsity, and varsity sports.

ing time at the National Cheer Association (NCA) Stunt Camp at Hylton High School in Wood-bridge on August 20-22. Thurston called it “a stunting boot camp” where the squad focused on learn-ing challenging new stunts. For 8 hours each day, the cheerleaders learned from NCA instructors who teach cheer squads at high schools across the east coast. The new skills will become part of the Wildcat Cheer’s routines for foot-ball season and Concorde District competition in October.

Katie Blumer

Michael BollmanSenior Esther Yoo (left), Senior Danielle Farrell (right), and Junior Rachel Luke (back) lift senior Courtney Thurston, co-captain of the varsity cheer squad, during practice. Coach Megan Howard is pushing the team hard towards victories in competitions very close to the beginning of the school year.

Katie Blumer

Source: Office of Student Activities