Grades are really important, especially when you are planning for college. Middle school grades don’t matter as much, but they can prepare you for the years to come. In my first semester of high school, I had a 4.34 Grade Point Average. I felt really proud. My hard work was paying off, and I built great relationships with my teachers. As I think back to sixth grade, I had a B+ in language arts, and it stressed me out because it was just the beginning of middle school. I knew I could do better. I learned very quickly that my grades mattered, and I was determined to work harder. If you have a grade you are not happy with, it will take extra effort to raise your grade. Grades are important, because they will prepare you for your future. There are many types of students at school. Some work hard on homework and tests, and they typically get good grades. Others slack off on homework and studying. Those people usually get bad grades, and they are not fulfilling their potential. Many people think grades don’t matter. They do matter! Colleges look at your grades, and your grades reflect the effort they believe you displayed in high school. If you don’t work hard in the classroom, which results in low grades, then most colleges will not accept you. Grades show where you are in your academic level and how much work you put into school. School work always comes before sports, and I have made academics a priority. Participating in activities will, however, help improve your time management skills. You will be more likely to work efficiently while studying when you are in a time crunch.  You must be willing to sacrifice other things for school. That may mean you will need to stay up later than you'd prefer to get your homework done. Also, you may not have time to spend with your friends outside of class until the weekend. I stay up late every night to make sure I get all of my homework done, so I am prepared for my upcoming tests. If you work hard enough, you can even be recognized by teachers and other students. I won the Jack Wahlig Award for my involvement in activities, success in academics, and leadership in the classroom. It is very humbling to get recognized for the hard work I put in to school. You should make it a goal to improve your grades with hard work. Grades help determine your future, including potential scholarships you may receive and what college you will attend. You have to be confident that you will get the grade you want. If you have great grades, it could help set you up for being more successful later in life. You must prepare yourself now for the future. I believe we need to raise expectations for ourselves and set goals for high achievement. If people are on the wrong path during high school, they may never change their habits in the future. You can’t have bad grades your whole life and expect to get hired for the best paying job available. I encourage all people to strive for good grades to increase their chances for success later in life. You can never give up. You must raise your confidence level to prove to yourself that you can do anything.

Have you ever wanted to know more about the Dowling Catholic Basketball program? Would you like an inside view on how the tryout process works? If you make the cut, what does the season look like? Many think the coaches are rough. Others don't know what to expect. Any questions you may have about the experience can be answered right here. Tryouts for the freshman team last four nights in November. You will meet Coach O’Hare and Coach Hetherton. Typically, more than thirty students try out for Freshman Basketball. There are two teams you have a chance at making, the A team and the B team. During tryouts, you go through many drills, and you scrimmage for at least twenty minutes each day. The coaches evaluate your skills, work ethic, attitude, and involvement. There are also open gym sessions, prior to tryouts, where you scrimmage the whole time. The scrimmages are open to all age levels of basketball players. There are about eight open gyms scheduled during the summer, and that is the time to improve your skills. After tryouts, the coaches select twenty-four freshman to play on the A and B teams. The coaches then take the remaining players into the locker room after tryouts. They inform them that they didn’t make the team, but encourage them to keep working hard to improve their skills and to consider trying out next year. There are practices almost everyday from the beginning of December to the middle of February. Practices are usually at 6:00 PM, but sometimes they can be held at 6:00 AM. The coaches decide the teams after the first few practices. These teams are not permanent as players can move between teams during the season. Everyone has to be ready to practice fifteen minutes before the start time. If you are late, you have to run a last gasp for every minute you are late. A last gasp is four down and backs with dribbling patterns. During practice, you work on your skills in drills and scrimmage usually at the end of practice. With Coach O‘Hare, you do a lot of conditioning during practice. Some players can get sick, because they are so exhausted. You have to be in shape to be able to play for Coach O’Hare. He will run you hard. For both the A and B teams, there are games at least once a week. Most of the games are on weekdays with the exception of possibly playing on Saturday. Playing basketball at Dowling is a huge time commitment. You have to find time to do homework and focus on your faith. To play basketball at Dowling, you must also be a team player. You have to be more about “we” than about “me.” The A team went 21-0, and the B team went 15-3 last season. At the end of the season, there is a team banquet. You get to celebrate a great season! Coach O’Hare expects a lot out of you and can be intimidating, but if you do everything he wants from you, he will love you! You have to work harder than you have ever worked before, and you have to be a team player. Through Freshman Basketball, you can also build many lasting relationships with others. It was a great experience for me, and one I will always cherish and remember.

It is 2055 and Joe, a freshman at Dowling, is bullied everyday. Joe is bullied by a senior named Justin. Justin is always trying to pick fights with Joe. He teases Joe frequently. Justin is a like a fly buzzing in your ear. He is persistent in his works to bully others. Joe is always fearful, and he doesn’t feel safe in the humongous and intimidating school environment. If only he could be saved by someone. One day, Justin started to approach Joe, who let out a deathly scream. Justin dashed off to ensure he wouldn’t get into trouble. A male teacher came out of his classroom, mad that someone had interrupted his class. The man’s name was Mr. Wilkerson. He was about seventy years old. Mr. Wilkerson had Joe in his religion class, so he recognized him. Mr. Wilkerson has Joe fill him in on the events that had just taken place. He gives Joe a mission, and the task is related very closely to his situation. Joe will have to fly in the past to another high school dealing with bullying issues. Through this experience, Mr. Wilkerson is hoping to teach Joe how to deal with bullying along with protecting himself. Joe arrives at Scary High School after a long and dizzy time machine ride. As Joe enters the school with a name that doesn’t seem promising, he meets a kid that is an exact replica of himself. His name is Eoj. Eoj is also bullied frequently, just like Joe, so the two boys make a plan to stop bullying everywhere in the world. The plan ends in epic failure. Their problems intensify when they walk into the gymnasium for weight lifting. A ginormous, hideous, and scary beast comes out from the corner. Joe and Eoj run in terror. They want to get out of Scary High School, but they're not quick enough. The monster approaches them and looks familiar to Joe. The monster’s name is Oractoid, the same monster that was found in all of Joe’s comic books. Oractoid holds a huge, sharp ax in his hand. The ax just breathes death when you see it. He swings the ax with great velocity at Eoj. The tip of the blade comes in contact with Eoj’s head. It is too late to rescue him. He is dead. Joe panics and sprints out of the school. He finds a shady grocery store, but he buys only string and legos. Joe ties the string on opposite ends of the wall, and he places the legos behind the string. Because of his height, Oractoid doesn't see the string. He trips and falls onto the legos. He fell clumsily like a lazy walrus. Joe starts laughing, but then he travels through a dark portal. He is confused. Where is he going? He lands back at Dowling. When Joe sees Justin at school again, Justin runs away from him. Justin no longer has power over Joe. Mr. Wilkerson talked Justin into being nice. Change can be good sometimes, and in this case, it is. Mr. Wilkerson is ecstatic that he saved Joe. Joe now sees a new perspective on life. There will be some who are unfriendly in your life. There will be challenges down the road, but you have to stay strong and face those challenges head on. Mentors are key to leading you in the right direction. They will always be there to help.

My spring break trip with my family was a great way to take a step back from all the chaos in our everyday lives. We traveled by plane to Captiva, Florida on March 15, 2019. Flights out of Des Moines to Florida were really expensive, so we decided to fly out of the Minneapolis-Saint Paul International Airport instead. We had a four hour drive to Minneapolis, Minnesota before the flight. Our car was jam-packed with suitcases, backpacks, a cooler, snacks, and other belongings. I felt so squished! There was very little legroom. My legs started to tremble, and they were shaking from pain. The drive felt so long. I couldn't wait to stretch my legs. About one hour outside of Minneapolis, we ran into a large unexpected traffic delay. All traffic had to move over to the left lane, and the lineup stretched several miles long. People were getting antsy. Some decided to drive quickly up the right lane, cutting off other drivers. The car in front of us didn’t want any cars to cut in front of her. She swerved from the left lane to the right lane, once almost driving a car off the side of the road. In the moment, my family was dying laughing. We could hear the lady yelling at the other cars. She made inappropriate hand gestures to at least four cars. My family started becoming a little nervous that her road rage might cause an accident. Finally, we reached the end of the delay. As it turned out, there was a huge amount of snow melting onto the highway. Our drive was delayed for twenty-five minutes. When we arrived at the airport, we dashed across the terminal. We thought we were going to be late. Luckily, our flight was delayed. We arrived in Fort Myers, Florida after a 3 hour flight. The wheels screeched to a halt, and we got out and picked up our rental car. On our drive to Captiva, we drove over two massive bridges. The scenery was amazing. We saw the ocean, the palm trees swaying in the air, and the seagulls dive bombing the water for their food. We drove a little over an hour, and we made it to the South Seas Resort after twenty minutes of twisty roads. On Saturday and Sunday, the weather was great. The temperature was about 76 degrees, and it was very sunny. Although the temperature was cooler, the sun made it feel really warm. I didn't get sunburned, but my brother got very burnt. His skin was wrinkled, and it was shedding. I went for a run everyday, so I could log my miles for track. The humidity was awful for running though! I would come back after a four mile run, and I would be drenched in sweat. When I run with my track team in Iowa, we usually sweat way less than I did for that week in Florida. The weather during the next four days was rainy, cool, and windy. It was pretty annoying to have it rain a lot. We already had to deal with a bad winter in Iowa, and we got a taste of bad weather in Florida as well. We had to find things to do without going outside. My family really loves filling out March Madness brackets. My siblings changed their picks after the games happened, so they didn't fully understand the concept. When the weather didn’t cooperate, my family would stay inside and watch one of the games. We went shelling on the beach, and we swam in the pools located on the resort for the majority of the time. The sand was damp, compact, and cool to walk in, and the massive waves crashed, flying onto the beach. While shelling, we found many conch shells varying in size, big and small, and color, purple and tan. On Thursday, March 21, we went on a cruise to Cayo Costa State Park. Cayo Costa was described as, “the best shelling place in Florida.” The island could only be reached by boat, and the sail there was very windy. The boat traveled at 26 miles per hour, and it was bouncing up and down crushing the water below. The gusting wind felt like a tornado was hitting me. I was scared and dizzy from the ride. After looking for over an hour and walking many miles, my mom found a sand dollar. My family was ecstatic. We had found many fragmented sand dollars, but this sand dollar wasn’t broken at all. It was perfect. There were a little over eight families on the tour, and we were the only family to find a sand dollar. It was my first time seeing a sand dollar in real life. We definitely don’t have sand dollars in Iowa! We put all of our shells into one black and yellow striped bag. I had checked to make sure that the sand dollar was intact multiple times. When we were on the boat, I looked in the bag again, but I couldn’t find the sand dollar. I started to panic, taking all the shells out to try and find it. Pulling out pieces of a sand dollar from the bag, I realized it was broken. Although we were very sad to no longer have that perfect sand dollar, we still had a fun time at the “secret” beach. During the trip, I had time for a lot of reading. I read The Serpent King by Jeff Zentner, which I really recommend to all. I also completed many word searches. I loved the time I spent with my family. We don’t usually get to spend much time together, because we have a very busy schedule. I needed the time off to relax. When we got back home at 1:30 AM on Saturday, March 23, I was so tired. I tried sleeping in the car, but we kept hitting bumps, and I couldn’t get comfortable. Our family vacation was really awesome, but it felt good to be home. It was time for me to get back to reality!