On Nov. 9, the pride of the Pueblo marching band
placed in the Top 25 in the State; that’s two consecutive years for this
ranking!
State championships this year took place at Buckeye
Union High School in Buckeye, Ariz. Last year, our marching Warriors placed 21st
out of 22, while this year students pushed hard and made it happen again; this
time, however, they placed 23rd out of 30.
“This year we scored eight points higher than last
year,” said Mr. Jesus Jacquez, Pueblo’s band director and teacher. “It [placing
23rd] may not seem like it, but it’s a way better rating [than last
year’s placing].”
The score improvement shown by those eight points in
just one year is a big step towards the success and rebuilding of our school’s
music and band programs, according to Jacquez.
Our band placed higher than 25th in sub-categories
including general effect music/visual, music individual/ensemble, and visual
individual/ensemble, even surpassing Sahuaro High School, whose band has
historically ranked higher in previous competitions.
Jacquez said, “Beating Sahuaro in the sub-categories
felt pretty good. I didn’t think we would beat them in some of the categories.”
The band program at Pueblo has grown tremendously over
the past few years thanks to the commitment from Jacquez and his students.
Senior Polet Licudine, a drum major, said, “The band
has really improved because everybody knows what they are doing this year. Last
year, students didn’t have this inspiration and organization. Mr. Jacquez has
really made us a better program.”
Another senior, Luciana Velarde, the band’s trumpet
soloist, said, “The band program has grown immensely, and within a few months
of this school year and gained more recognition. Mr. Jacquez believes very
deeply in us.”
Pueblo High School’s 21st Century Community Learning Center, also known as CCLC, has been a five-year program helping students excel in their school work and to catch up with their credits. However, the program had its budget cut from $140,000 to $100,000 this year and next year. This is year five, and Pueblo has to reapply next year for another five-year cycle to fund the program with $100,000.
Ms. Mary
Wallace, the coordinator of the program, said, “It’s [the budget cuts are] very
difficult, and all of it comes out of instruction, but Pueblo got lucky this
year because we got an enhancement grant to put in a maker space.”
The
enhancement grant will cover the budget cut, boosting the program’s budget back
up to $140,000.
Wallace
said, “The students would not have seen as many classes offered, and we
wouldn’t have as many tutors. Last year we had 22 employees, and we spent every
dime of our budget on those 22 employees.”
She added
that losing that money from a student’s perspective would prompt a decrease in
grades and G.P.A rates among the students in the program since less activities
would be offered.
The
program has had a great impact on students.
Senior
Desiree Martin is currently making up her freshman credits for English and
Algebra 1.
“During my
freshman year, I struggled a lot,” Martin said. “The CCLC program is helping me
to graduate in the spring. I can’t believe that this program may not exist in
the future. Even if there are budget cuts, it’s going to affect a lot of our
students at Pueblo. CCLC is the perfect opportunity to catch up with credits-
especially for us seniors.”
Michael
Rodriguez, a senior who is also in the CCLC program, said, “I’m so relieved that I have the extra
time and help I didn’t have in class. This program has allowed me to take my
time and understand the content.”
Wallace
wants students to know that they can still enroll in the CCLC program. The program
does not have a cap regarding the number of students enrolled.
“Grades 9
and 10 are our primary
focus,” Wallace said, “We do not have a limit, we have a goal, and we need to
have 120 students who attend at least 30 days or more.”
Wallace
wants to ensure that the program will continue successfully after she decides
to retire.
She said, “It’s important
for me to teach another person how to apply for the grant and take over as the
new CCLC coordinator so that the program can carry on.”
Records are meant to be broken, and that’s exactly what five amazing seniors accomplished on Wednesday, Nov. 13. Seniors Aaron Kuzdal, Janice Salazar, Leonard Parra, Joel Bustamante and Reannah Rodriguez cycled for a city record of 17 hours, a record previously held by a Desert View student several years ago.
A sixth senior, Danielle Rojas, attempted to break the record, but she only rode for 12 hours, which is still considered to be quite a physical accomplishment!
According to Kuzdal, Bicycle Club sponsor Mr. Ernesto Somoza announced to the club the city record and challenged any of his cyclist team members to break it.
“Sometimes you wake up one morning and want to break records,” he said. “Once Mr. Somoza told us about this challenge, it was like, ‘Heck, yeah!’”
Kuzdal
and Parra decided to commit to the record-breaking challenge just two days
before the event; the other four members committed just the day before!
At 6 a.m., in Somoza’s classroom, the six cyclists began their challenge.
“The only break students received was five minutes per hour to drink water, go to the bathroom and eat a quick snack,” Somoza said.
After two or three hours, all of the bicyclists admitted that they were beginning to experience excruciating physical pain.
Salazar said, “My legs, back and butt hurt horribly, and the pain was even worse after we had our five-minute break to go to the restroom and stretch.”
Another cyclist, Rodriguez, said, “Not only were we in great pain, we were being watched like zoo animals! Student Council came in to visit us, and a lot of them just stared at us like we were freaks.”
Parra echoed Rodriguez; he said, “It was difficult [cycling in the classroom] with other students because it was like we were on stage being observed.”
Unfortunately, Rojas couldn’t bare the pain any longer.
“We must all suffer from one or two pains: the pain of discipline or the pain of regret,” she said.
To help ease the indescribable pain from hours of cycling, students said that they sang—including “Bohemian Rhapsody”, Christmas songs and John Legend tunes to keep their mind off of their agonizing body parts.
This record-breaking event was hardly ignored by local media. Channel 4 (KVOA) and Channel 13 (KOLD) were on campus, and they covered the story for television; also, reporters from The Arizona Daily Star were present.
“Having a few local media channels here boosted morale,” Somoza said. “This [media coverage] really helped students complete their goal knowing that their school and entire community was behind them one hundred percent.”
The five cyclists completed their 17-hour event, breaking the old record by an hour.
“Way down inside of me, I really believed that we would be up for this challenge,” Bustamante said.
“I’m proud to have been part of this record-breaking experience, but I really wish—and I think we all wish—that we could have sat on a bigger, softer seat,” Kuzdal said.
Every new school year at Pueblo High School, many freshmen seem to struggle
to transition to high school—from being “kings/queens of the hill” in middle
school to feeling insignificant as ninth graders in a new environment.
Even though we’re close to the end of the first semester, several freshmen
admitted that they were challenged by their first few days at Pueblo back in
August—including getting lost finding their classes or being confused about
which lunch to take. Now, at the near-end of the first semester, most freshmen
have found a routine and admit to enjoying their new school. Truly, they have
found their ways…
Kortez Rodriguez, one of the more than nearly 500 freshmen this year at
Pueblo, said, “This first quarter wasn’t as confusing as it could have been for
me because a lot of upperclassmen helped guide me. Not all upperclassmen hate
freshmen!”
Transitioning from a middle school to a high school can be a big milestone for
many freshmen.
Freshman Eve Woods feels proud of herself to have earned a perfect GPA for
first quarter, but she admits that she had her share of personal challenges.
“It was difficult to put myself out there,” Woods said. “But, in the end, I
found that being involved in volleyball really helped me to meet new people.”
Woods suggest that all freshmen should become involved with an activity
because it will help them to establish new friends and to help them feel that
they are part of a community.
Another freshman, Issac Palomo, said that making new friends has been his
biggest struggle.
“I came to Pueblo from Pueblo Gardens, and only friend from that school came
with me here,” Palomo said.
“I plan to get involved with sports,” Palomo added, “and this will hopefully
help me to make more friends at Pueblo.”
Pueblo counselor Ms. Marian Finley said that freshmen have many
opportunities to transition smoothly into high school.
“Freshman Experience is a great program for incoming freshman, and this past
summer, we had a record number of participants,” Finley said. “Each student
gained high school exposure and one-half credit to start off their freshman
year.”
Pueblo’s Engineer Robert Fuentes checks the status of AC Unit.
As Pueblo marches well into the second quarter, and November is upon us, the weather is at last cooling off. It seems that for many, summer lasted longer than usual this year. Unfortunately, for many students and teachers, it felt like “summer” insidethe classroom as well for much of the first quarter.
During summer break, the
air conditioning systems are shut down to save money. However, when several
teachers returned to this new school year, they discovered that their
classrooms were hot; and they stayed hot sometimes for weeks well into late
September.
Marketing teacher Dr.
Maria Bicknell, located in the Tech Building, is one of those teachers sweltering
in extremely uncomfortable conditions.
“I tried to be positive in
this hot classroom, but it was hard to manage at times,” Bicknell said. “There
were some days I felt sick when I left Pueblo at the end of the day—like I was
going to throw up.”
Bicknell’s neighbor and
another Tech Building teacher, English and journalism teacher for the past 28
years at Pueblo, Mr. Rana Medhi, said, “Our administrators and district
engineers need to ensure that we teachers and our students are comfortable on
the first day of school. There’s no excuse for hot classrooms year after year.
Students cannot learn in 92-degree classrooms, and old teachers can’t tolerate
the heat anymore.” He paused and added, “It seems to me that we educators
should feel confident about returning to a new school year with everything
working and having comfortable teaching environments.”
Medhi added that he was
fortunate that he had to teach elsewhere for just two weeks; some teachers
weren’t so lucky…
Mr. Valentino Martin,
Pueblo’s auto shop teacher—and his students—suffered in the heat since from the
beginning of the school year. He and his classroom had to be relocated to the
Special Projects Room, which was very inconvenient for his curriculum, although
students still learned about auto shop safety and other issues until students
were finally able to return to T-9 when the air conditioning was repaired.
Then, on Aug. 23, the
A/C stopped working again, and Martin and his students were relocated again.
Another Tech Building
teacher, photography teacher Ms. Emma Tarazon-Oetting, also had to be relocated
to other locations while air conditioning unit was repaired.
Other non-Tech Building
classrooms were also excessively hot during the first quarter across campus,
and several teachers had to be relocated until the air conditioning was
repaired.
Assistant Principal
David Montaño said that before students and teachers returned for the new
school, all of the air conditioning units were working, but a major
thunderstorm just before school started disrupted several of the A/C units.
“Based on the age of
some of these A/C units, repairs are bound to be needed,” Montaño said.
However, summer did end
at last, which alleviated teachers and students in classrooms that still had
inadequate air conditioning.
Many other environments suffered
as well. Even though the weight room may boast air, the room is cooled only by
a swamp cooler and big fans.
Just the opposite
occurred in many classrooms as fall began in late September—classrooms
experiencing frigid temperatures.
Junior Sarahi Perez said, “There are some days when the AVID classroom was downright Arctic, and so was [science teacher] Ms. Amaro’s classroom. The AVID classroom is either freezing or hot—it’s never normal in there. It seems that it’s never a healthy environment in which to learn.”
Another student,
sophomore Dezarae Valenzuela, said that the Student Council room [Mr. Obregon’s
classroom] is very cold. I’d rather it be cold than hot, but sometimes you need
a thick blanket to stay warm.”
Junior Angel Leeth said
that in her math class, taught by Ms. Rhesa Olsen, she sometimes has to borrow
her teacher’s blankets, which she keeps in her classroom.
“It’s very difficult to
concentrate in her frigid classroom,” Leeth said. “It’s so cold, I fall
asleep.”
The AC system in the
main building is controlled and set by TUSD at 76 degrees, but the question
remains: Why were the temperatures in some classrooms and the library 59
degrees or colder?
Pueblo has just one
engineer, Mr. Robert Fuentes, a 1997 Pueblo graduate, who has been employed for
the past 14 years; however, for the past 10 years, he has been the only engineer
on site.
He explained that the
new equipment to maintain Pueblo’s cooling and heating systems are working with
an old 1980’s pneumatic system. In other words, two different systems are
trying to work together, often unsuccessfully.
Story from 1995 Pueblo Yearbook on AC Issues
“I like what I do,”
Fuentes said, “but it’s frustrating maintaining an entire school by myself most
of the time.” He added, “I have to do what I have to do to make classrooms feel
comfortable for our students and teachers.”
He paused and added, “This
school needs to prioritize repairs on its cooling system.”
It’s not every day that a Pueblo High School student is celebrated in a play/film, but that’s exactly what Bill does—recounting the accomplishments and tragedies in the young 25-year-old life of Mr. Bill De La Rosa, a Class of 2012 graduate.
After a run as a play in local theaters, Bill
has been made into a feature film and will premiere at the Fox Theater on
Tuesday, Jan. 14, 2020.
“The whole thing [my life being turned into a movie]
is very humbling, and I originally had no idea that my life was being
celebrated publicly,” De La Rosa said.
He added that the film touches on his successes and
traumas in life before and since graduating from Pueblo almost eight years ago
as his class’ valedictorian—including his numerous scholarships totaling more
than $500,000. De La Rosa attended Bowdoin College in Brunswick, Maine, and
Oxford University in England, earning two master’s degrees in criminal justice
and immigration studies.
“I wish I could say I was finished with school, but
I’m not,” De La Rosa said. He plans to pursue a law degree “back East” next
summer, either at Yale University in New Haven, Conn. or Harvard University in
Cambridge, Mass.
De La Rosa also shared his tragedies in his young
life, including the deportation of his mother to Mexico in 2009 when he was a
sophomore at Pueblo. Two years later in 2011, his father suffered a stroke, and
De La Rosa was able to see his mother on a “temporary humanitarian parole”
status. He saw her again in the summer of 2018 when his father suffered a fatal
stroke.
“If all goes well, my mother will back in the United
States next June [2020],” De La Rosa said, hoping that immigration lawyers will
expedite the process.
For now, De La Rosa said he is staying in Tucson and
spending time with his family, including his brother Bobby (a freshman at
Pueblo) and his sister Naomi, who is currently a University of Arizona student.
As for the film, Bill, De La Rosa said, “I’m
still very humbled that I have inspired a movie about my life.” He paused and
added, “I want everybody to know that if I can do it, they can do it.”
