S'More Community News - NPHS

Our administration is having so much fun getting to know our students and staff. This year has been a big change for everyone, and we are still learning so much, but we can all agree our students are awesome. We enjoy seeing each of them growing and learning every day. I hope you are following us on Facebook under North Platte High School to catch all of the happenings with our school and the activities our students are participating in. We also have a LiveFeed on our website where you can catch a lot of important information regarding events at school. We would like to make sure we can reach you, so please make sure to communicate any updated phone numbers or addresses as they change throughout the year.

Thank you for your support and care as we work within our community to educate our students!

Jami

College and Career Readiness events are underway at NPHS. Juniors and Seniors will be attending a College Fair on September 28th from 9:30 am - 10:30 am. In October and November we will be taking visits to various college campuses and career fairs. October 5th is a trip to MPCC, Oct. 12 students will learn about health care professions from UNMC in Kearney, Oct. 26th students will get hands on experience of different careers available in our surrounding areas in Kearney, November 11th students interested in the medical field will get to see what Central Community College in Grand Island has to offer, and on Nov. 9th students will get to explore the campus at UNK. If your junior/senior student is interested in attending one of these visits, please have them sign up in the Counseling Office. More events to come in the spring.

Click here to see more resources from the library!

My name is Brooks Greene, and have worked in the district for 9 years. I teach freshman civics/economics and really enjoy the job! My class has been busy so far this semester learning about citizenship and the formation of our great country’s government. Right now my students are completing a ‘Bill of Rights’ poster project that has them take a deep dive into what rights and protections come with this important set of amendments.

Next in class we will be learning about the three branches of the U.S. government, the history and current political parties in our country, voting and elections, and finally finish up our civics learning with civil, criminal, and juvenile law. Then we will shift to economics where we will be learning some basic concepts such as supply and demand and GDP. We will also take a look at how our countries economy operates within our own borders as well as internationally. Then we will finish the semester by doing a personal finance project because today’s youth can never learn enough about that topic before tackling life out in the real world.

My name is Bobbi Dehr and I am the new Geometry teacher at NPHS. I recently moved

back to North Platte from Portland, Oregon. I taught in the North Platte school district at

the middle school level for many years.

10th Grade Geometry is off and running! We are currently working on equations of

parallel and perpendicular lines. Students will spend a good amount of time building a

supportive learning community, learning how to keep themselves organized with getting

work turned in, and learning that "effort is everything."

Health Sciences Mr. Drake

We are currently starting off the year learning the how and why a patient’s vitals are so important. Our first step was taking Blood Pressures. The students worked on checking for pulses, finding a Brachial pulse, and then acquiring an accurate reading with a manual Blood Pressure cuff.

Vocabulary of the medical field is also on our agenda. Students are currently working on Subjective, Objective, and Plan portions of the medical process. This also is a great opportunity for them to apply the medical terminology they have learned as well as discover new words.

The classes are off to a great start and we are looking forward to build on what we have learned!

From the science department:

The biology teachers have come to the end of the lessons about bacterial resistance to antibiotics. Over the past five weeks students discussed how bacteria grow and how antibiotics work. They swabbed the school looking for the wide variety of bacteria present all around us every day and then added antibiotics to their bacterial cultures to see if they could become resistant. Using computer simulations and mathematical models, students were able to explain how a single resistant bacteria could become the most common bacteria in the infection.

This week we are transitioning to a unit studying Juncos, a small bird found both here in North Platte and on the campus of University of California San Diego. Our students are discussing the physical and behavioral changes the birds underwent as they adapted to living in a human environment.

Greetings from English 11! My name is Hannah Seifer, and I teach both Advanced English and General English 11. This is my third year teaching in North Platte Public Schools, and I previously taught at a large high school in the Metro East area of St. Louis, Missouri. I am a proud University of Illinois graduate (Go Illini! Sorry, Huskers fans!) and hold a Masters degree in Curriculum and Instruction with emphasis on secondary English Language Arts. I also hold a Bachelor's degree in Social Work from Cedarville University, a small school located in Southwest Ohio. Both fields of social work and education inform my teaching practices, and I count it as a privilege to work with my students during an extremely formative time in their lives.

English 11 focuses solely on American literature, and students read a variety of diverse American authors throughout the course. In my current classes, we just finished our unit on Lorraine Hansberry’s critically acclaimed play, A Raisin in the Sun. A guiding question for our class is what is the role of the American Dream both in the literature we read and in society today? Students have had excellent discussions and assignments in class about what the American Dream looked like in 1959 when Hansberry’s play was written, as well as what it looks like today in 2022. I strive to encourage my students to view literature as not simply words on a page, but as meaningful and applicable to their lives today. The idea of the American Dream permeates all of our units of study, our next being Native American literature, and we will continue to discuss what literature tells us about what it means to be American and what it means to be human.

*My name is Shannon Hudson and I Coach the Colorguard, This is my 22nd year with NPHS!

*Colorguard is an Auxiliary group that works and performs alongside the Varsity band and as a separate unit. We are a team of 9th-12th grade students who perform choreographed dances and routines with various equipment to enhance and interpret the music of the marching band and that of our own choosing. We have had practice basically every morning since the end of May and then also during 3rd period each day since school started where we work both independently and with the Varsity Band on our Field show. We just participated in the Kearney Marching Festival and Parade on Sept.17th where we received a Superior and 2nd Place overall for the Parade! We are looking forward to continuing that streak and improving as we move on to our next 3 Marching Competitions next month in Grand Island, Lincoln, and again in Kearney for State Marching. The team still has a lot of hard work ahead of them but they are ready to face the challenges and show what it means to be a NPHS Bulldog!!

The following is just a little more info on the team if you need...

*My favorite part of Colorguard is the creativity and precision that comes along with the creation of the routines. It's always been my favorite way to relax....as for the group and what keeps me here as long as I have been is getting to see each new group and each individual member find their own niche and grow more confident and self assured! Colorguard is a very hard and time consuming activity but to see it change a student, open them up, and give them something to have pride in as well as in themselves....well that's worth all the world to me!

*I have 12 members this year 4 Seniors (4 yr members) 4 Juniors, 1 Sophomore, 3 Freshman.

Captains/Band Leadership/Squad Leaders- Senior Stazia Weir and Junior Evelyn Kittle

Band Leadership/Squad Leader- Junior Justina Viter

*We are striving to reach a group goal of all Superiors at our Parades and Competitions (1Down 4 more to go!) Otherwise each member is always trying to better themselves and grow their skill level. I am so proud of the work they have already accomplished so far this year, and I can't wait to see what they bring to the rest of the season and year!

The Bulldog Girls Golf Team has their final week of the regular season coming up.

The team will travel to Kearney for a dual with the Bearcats on Monday Sept. 26, then head to the panhandle for the Scottsbluff/Gering Invite at Monument Shadows Golf Course on Sept. 29-30.

We are excited to be hosting the A-4 District Meet at Lake Maloney Golf Course on Tuesday Oct 4! The team has been working hard this season & we are aiming for another trip to the State Tournament in Norfolk.

Go Dawgs!

NPHS THEATRE DEPARTMENT PRESENTS BLUE STOCKINGS

North Platte High School Theatre Department will present Blue Stockings by Jessica Swale on October 7th and 8th at 7:00 pm in the NPHS Performing Arts Center.

The North Platte High School theatre department is currently working on Jessica Swale’s Blue Stockings for their fall production. Director Brittany McDaniel states that the show has been a growing experience for herself and the cast. This production explores the fight for women's right to education at the turn of the century in Great Britain. Throughout the process, McDaniel and her cast and crew of 39 have had conversations about women's right to education throughout history, the treatment of the female body in health care, and how both these issues have impacted our society today.

From a theatrical standpoint, the students have gotten the chance to experience period costuming with corsets, skirts, and suits as well as how they physically moved and sat during that time period. Students have also worked on learning their lines with a British accent and are incorporating fight choreography during the climax of the show. Senior Joseph Roeder said, “This show has been an amazing process! I've loved expanding my talents with trying new fight choreography and doing the entire show in an accent.”

This is McDaniel’s second show as play production director with NPHS and it is a complete 180 from the show the department produced last spring. “Trap was all storyline based. We wanted something that would bring everyone together, give everyone a chance to be on stage, and surprise the audience a bit. Blue Stockings is a totally different feel. While the story is important as it is based on real historical events, the true heart of the show lies within the characters and their struggles and successes.” McDaniel said. The historical events McDaniel is referring to includes the 1896-1897 school year where women at Cambridge University fought for the right to be able to graduate. This fight ended in a mob of angry men causing a riot while the university senate was voting on the issue. “I play Elizabeth Welsh, one of the characters in the show that actually existed in real life. It’s been super interesting to get to learn about the history behind the story we are telling and how people reacted to the vote.” said senior, Breanna Lundgreen.

Admission for the show is $5 at the door and doors open at 6:30 p.m.