SLA Media

SLAMedia is a publication of the news for the Science Leadership Academy community. Writers come from the student body in 10th, 11th, and 12th grades. We work in unison to create a functioning paper with biweekly postings on a variety of events.

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Macbooks Go Chrome?

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By Jesus Jimenez

Staff Writer

 

MacBooks– The beating heart of an SLA student’s workload.  Without them, it seems almost impossible to complete the sort of assignments given at SLA.

The Chromebooks are a series of laptops developed by Google (and built by Samsung and Acer) that are designed to fully integrate cloud-based technology in a simple and efficient manner.

However, the computers come at a price. Each year, SLA struggles to find the necessary money — around $180,000 per year — to fund the freshman laptops.

This past year, the cost went up slightly when Apple discontinued their regular MacBook series, and SLA had to spend a bit more on MacBook Pros.

Searching for alternatives to the growing cost of the MacBook, both Principal Chris Lehmann and Tech Coordinator Marcie Hull were introduced to the Chromebook by their friends at Google.

Chromebooks are the new thing, with getting inside info from Google employees, Mr. Lehmann saw the potential for Chromebooks at SLA. They provide a whole new definition to productivity by giving you direct access to your google account directly from your desktop.

Addressing one of the major concerns,“The biggest thing they have going for them is the cost.” Chromebooks cost, on average, $199, compared to $1199 for a MacBook pro.

He added to the list of pros: “They are fully built off the Google app system and are designed to be a school computer.”

Ms. Hull has her own thoughts about how the Chromebooks would impact education at SLA. She described the Chromebooks as a “jump start” to what could possibly be a new learning experience for the entire school.

Ms. Hull explained one of the cons for the Chromebooks, saying “There are no executable files, you can and can’t do things”. Meaning, that there aren’t any .app or .exe files found in computers with operating systems such as Macs or PCs.

Loading a new operating system onto the Chromebooks that isn’t based on their default Linux-based one would be one of the learning experiences that Ms. Hull would expect. Finding alternatives to software such as iMovie would be another obstacle if the school were to order them.

Even if software were to be found, the Chromebooks still don’t have the same computing power as a Macbook. While this statement is supported by both Mr. Lehmann and Ms. Hull, the fact that Google’s Chromebooks have the potential to be an excellent tool in the classroom still remains.

The integrated Google Apps (Google drive, Gmail, etc.) system would be very beneficial to the students at SLA. In the past few years, the school has been experimenting with cloud-based technology as a part of our learning.

Enhancing the technology in room 300 would be an investment made from the money saved by purchasing the inexpensive alternative. They would make up for the lack of power and software of the Chromebooks by adding more iMacs with more power and faster speeds.

Regardless of what the decision will be, Ms. Hull said “…with any tool we choose, there is always a lot of work to make a 1:1 laptop program be functional and educational. The true goal is to have the tool disappear and the learning to be what [the students] see”.

Locker Talk : What do you remember about your SLA acceptance interview?

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Junior Taylor Thomas, "I remember Mr.Lehmann was interviewing me and I was super scared because I was this little thing about to go into high school."
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Junior Joe Tartaglia "I enjoyed [being interviewed] very much, it was pretty chill."
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Sophomore Amy Chen "I was interviewed by Ms.Dunda and Jeff Kessler and I was so nervous I kept stuttering. Although, after a while I knew it was going well."
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Junior Octavius Collins " Mr.Lehman was interviewing me so I was a little more scared than I would have been if it were someone else. Except I knew since him being the principal, that it was a better opportunity."
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Freshmen Jamie Turner (left) "I was interviewed by Mr. Latimer and I was kind of nervous, but I knew I was doing fine." Freshmen Jesse Shooter (right) "I was deffinatly nervous, but I felt welcomed."
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Click the “caption” button to see what they said!

Photos by Isabela Supovitz-Aznar and interviews by Jamie Murphy.

Column: The Perils of Going to a Small School

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By Jenn Wright

Staff Writer

If you’ve ever wanted to avoid a certain someone in the halls of SLA–whether it’s someone you just broke up with, or a friend turned enemy–good luck. Having only 500 students around makes that almost impossible. SLA loves appreciating the small community we have- but not all that glitters is gold.

Fewer students equals less empty space, which means many more hangout spots to avoid on a daily basis in order to steer clear of that certain someone. Sometimes, it seems like the universe is purposely putting you in the path the one person you’d rather avoid.

This isn’t the only drawback, though.

While students at SLA often have the initiative to start clubs and activities of their own, some clubs never get off the ground because of lack of support. With a small staff, finding a sponsor can be hard, but even more so is getting participation from students.

If a club averages at most, say, 8 members and 3 of them are busy during your meeting time, the change is noticeable. During a benchmark season with deadlines creeping closer, a lunchtime club doesn’t stand a chance.

As a co-leader of SLA Community Involvement Club (CIC), organized by Senior Sam Lovett-Perkins, we feel the impact of this. Being apart of the committee to plan this and other clubs, the best incentive to attract members to meetings is food.

In other ways, the small size of the school benefits students. This year’s C Band Calculus class with Math Teacher Brad Latimer only has 12 students–a rare opportunity for a lot of personalized attention. Rigor of the coursework aside, a small school population makes the odds for having small classes much higher.

On the flip side, fewer students means a smaller variety of courses offered, because our teachers can only teach so many a day. I am often envious of courses like Psychology or Cooking offered at high schools much larger than ours.

The staff, Principal Lehmann and all of us sacrifice many traditional things to participate in a school community like ours. We will never have a homecoming game or might not ever have a gym, but I like that I can name everyone in my grade.

Even so, eye contact would seldom have to be avoided if there was a mass of even one hundred more students to hide behind.

The Suits, Cars, and Plans behind “Skyfall”

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By Jacob Lotkowski
Staff Writer

 

The 23rd installment of the James Bond franchise, Skyfall, opened in the US on November 9th with earnings in the 200 millions. According to Yahoo Movies, Skyfall “…shattered the record for the biggest Bond movie opening ever with nearly $88 million for the weekend.”

The film stars Daniel Craig as James Bond and Javier Bardem as his flamboyant antagonist, Raoul Silva. Craig works with Judi Drench–who plays M, his commanding officer, and Naomie Harris–as a field agent that works closely with Bond.

In case you haven’t seen it yet, the official plot summary, provided by Sony, is as follows: “Bond’s loyalty to M is tested as her past comes back to haunt her. As MI6 comes under attack, 007 must track down and destroy the threat, no matter how personal the cost.”

Since the movie is based on personal conflicts with a villain, rather than an international crisis, you feel much more connected to the characters’ stake in the film and that they remain unharmed. It is an interesting dynamic that make some think this is the best Bond movie to date.

The film’s director Sam Mendes felt that critics doubted what he could bring to the franchise, as he told Dave Calhoun of Timeout.com. Mendes started the direction of the film “With…one small element…and abandoned everything else.” He then went on to say that he didn’t want to read about others opinions of what a Bond film should be, because it would affect his personal opinions towards the film he was put in charge to direct.

Mendes wanted his Bond movie to be one done with special effects, not visual effects. This meant he relied very little on computer animation to create the explosions and action sequences. This is one of the reasons the budget of the film was one of the costliest in franchise history. In addition, the production crew went through a handful of Audis and Land Rovers Defenders shooting the opening scene.

Another thing that this film was praised for was the costume design–done by Jany Temime.

During her first meeting with Craig, she said “Daniel told me what he wanted: a slim fit suit tailored very near the body… Daniel wanted a suit you could forget—a suit that wasn’t on top of his body, butmoving with his body.” In regards to the character Silva, Temime wanted to “…give him a costume that will help him create that villain. In a way, he has to be as powerful as Bond.”

Temime was drawn to a Prada shirt that she designed Silva’s costume around, “I was addicted to the Prada shirt, because it had just the right level of lightness and expensiveness. I’m not going to call it “bad taste”—the graphic of that shirt is beautiful—but it’s not Bond; a gentleman wouldn’t wear that. I did the entire costume around that shirt.”

With the help of Sam Mendes, Daniel Craig was able to earn the recognition of movie critics forever, as a worthwhile 007. Skyfall has proven itself to be a must-see for any Bond or espionage fan. Skyfall is rumored to be released on DVD/BluRay March 13, 2013–and is available for pre-order on Amazon.com for $19.99, and $27.99 for Bluray.