Arnav Dugar

Daunting stacks of thick envelopes stuffed with college admission papers and teacher recommendations flood the desks of counselors at this time of year. With more than 200 seniors applying to private schools and each student applying to about 10 or 15 schools that require three recommendations for each school, the amount of paperwork can easily get out of hand.

Taking 14 classes every year seems impractical, even for the most ambitious students at Saratoga High, yet this is what senior Michael Gaus is familiar with. Gaus, whose family moved to Saratoga from the suburbs of Munich, Germany, at the start of his sophomore year, has spent the majority of his school years learning under the German education system.

Track athletes started the season off with a bang, securing a victory against Fremont on March 10 and against Homestead in the varsity boys and girls division on March 31, as well as multiple personal records.

Track athletes started the season off with a bang, securing a victory against Fremont on March 10 and against Homestead in the varsity boys and girls division on March 31, as well as multiple personal records.

Track athletes started the season off with a bang, securing a victory against Fremont on March 10 and against Homestead in the varsity boys and girls division on March 31, as well as multiple personal records. “Our first three meets went pretty well; we had a lot of people [achieve persona l records]. Usually no one PRs at the first meet, so it’s going pretty well,” junior Eren Veziroglu said.

The bell rings, and students pour out of the classrooms, heading for their next class. In the hallway, they pass by several rooms that are vaguely recognizable, but which they have no knowledge about.

Instead of listening to a lecture or typing code into computers as they usually do in class, on Oct. 18 the AP Computer Science students gathered around the front of the room, interacting with five “LANdroids” milling about their feet.

Redwood Middle School students get a head start on many high school classes. For every academically rigorous high school, there must also be an equally rigorous feeder school. Such is the case in the Saratoga school district. The school boasts one of the highest API (Academic Performance Index) scores in the state: 933 out of 1000. Given that this standard of excellence is established at the lower levels, it's no wonder that Saratoga's feeder schools also boast abnormally high test scores.

Oil is being used all around us, from the cars we drive, to the power plants. For the appliances that have become ingrained into our daily routine. We all know the environmental downside to the consumption of oil, yet we just can't seem to stop using it. The reason for its ubiquity is simple: it is the cheapest form of energy available. Cheap, at least for Joe Six-Pack, but there lies a hidden cost, waiting to erupt, just as it did with the Deepwater Horizon oil drilling rig in the Gulf of Mexico.

Five Saratoga students took the United States of America Mathematics Olympiad test, of which two have qualified for a chance to represent the United States internationally. Three juniors and two sophomores spent April 27-28 answering six proofs in a nine-hour mathematics exam, the United States of America Mathematics Olympiad, or USAMO for short. The USAMO exam is based only on pre-calculus concepts but is different from the ordinary tests that math teachers assign in that it not only requires a significantly deeper understanding of the material but also problem-solving and logical thinking skills.

It has instilled fear in our minds, bringing images of pain or widespread destruction. From childhood, we are taught not to play with it. We are taught that fire is dangerous. But over the past four years, sophomore Nick Turpin has learned something very different: that fire can be tamed.

The track team started its season with a meet on March 4, the Falcon Invitational, but the athletes did not compete against another school. Instead, they went against themselves. "The mock meet is practice to get us ready for the regular meets this season," said the head coach Archie Ljepava, who is coaching long and triple jump. "It also lets us evaluate athletes in a competitive manner." In the boys' division, senior Trevor Teerlink is the team's top sprinter being coached by Michael Xiatry.

Imagine being a child in many parts of Haiti today. You leave the orphanage to look one more time for your parents. What once used to be the street you lived on is now an expanse of rubble. As you climb onto one mound, you realize the place you called home is gone. Your parents are nowhere to be found. Perhaps they are looking for you, or perhaps their remains are just below your feet. With over half of Haiti's population under age 21, you are just one of the countless youth searching for life as it was before the Feb. 12 earthquake.

As many students were busy concentrating on bubbling the first few answers for their finals week of Jan. 11, Kirk Davis' physics classes gathered outside to drop eggs from the roof of the science wing.

In the 12 years since it was founded, Google Inc. has grown from a garage-based search engine into an internationally recognized cloud-computing giant, yet the company is contemplating a bold step in the opposite direction, abandoning its business in China because of a China-based cyber attack on its intellectual property and continued frustration over government censorship. Google's decision may seem rash and illogical, but it is a calculated move. The company's ostensibly philanthropic attempt to bring free speech to China seems to be shrouding an ulterior mercantile motive.

Steve Chang partakes in nearly every activity one would expect of a 17-year-old with the exception of one—high school. No, Chang is not a high school dropout, nor is he an early graduate. While many of his former classmates roam the halls of Saratoga High as seniors, Chang takes classes at West Valley Community College as part of their Middle College program. This branch of schooling deviates from the typical path students follow to higher education but offers several attractive benefits.

The international community is in concord over one statement regarding climate change: it is a problem that needs to be addressed. However, not much else is known about the issue.

The current Iranian regime has consistently shown its intent to develop nuclear weapons. Iran has already shown sufficient progress on the three pieces of technology to create an effective nuclear weapon: uranium enriched to weapons grade, a missile capable of reaching Israel and parts of Western Europe and a warhead that will fit on the missile.

The tournament on Nov. 14-15 at Milpitas High School was the first major debate tournament this year with around half of the students on the SHS team attending, debuting the the season for most of the team. A few have attended other tournaments earlier this year. The team performed well, but with room for improvement, according to the head speech and debate coach, Erick Rector.

What do you eat for dinner when meat is off the menu? In most American households, dishes like roasted chicken and beef patty hamburgers are served daily, but not in my house. In our family, being a vegetarian is natural, and we have our own fancy dishes... wait, but don’t all vegetarians just eat salad all day long? OK, let’s back up. Believe it or not, there are actually more dietary options available to vegetarians than just salad.

Like many other seniors, Rishabh Jethanandani has only one thing on his mind these days—what school will be the best fit for him. One school he’s considering is Columbia University. To find out more about the school’s general environment and academics, he attended a talk given by a Columbia admissions officer on Oct 1, taking advantage of one of the school’s most informative resources: the College and Career Center (CCC), located near the main office in room X01. The CCC is making renewed efforts this year to publicize its resources and help students take advantage of them.

President Obama’s speech on education raises grave concern about the direction in which this country is headed. If the president, of all people, has to try to convince students of the necessity education plays in life, this country has little hope for success. Obama addressed students on Sept. 8 concerning the need for education, giving examples from his life and students persevered despite hardships, but he said nothing earth shattering. Conservatives worried he might engage in "liberal brainwashing," but he merely stuck to a non-political, pro-education script.

As the December Copenhagen climate change conference draws near, expectations of change are gaining impetus. However, since countries are looking out for their own economies before the environment, the meeting may fail to change the environment. To curb greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, the Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) adopted the Kyoto pact in 1997 under the auspices of the United Nations. This year the meeting aims to reach a new agreement to overcome the shortcomings of the original pact.

As planned, the six new classes offered this year are AP Computer Science A, AP Environmental Science, Japanese 3 Honors and three new Media Arts Program (MAP) classes: advanced digital animation, filmmaking and multimedia Journalism. The students, teachers and staff involved are excited about the new class offerings and are expecting this to be a rewarding experience for everyone involved. “The new classes have been a very welcome addition on campus,” said assistant principal Brian Safine. “We have students who are pursuing their passions in [these classes].”

Can you imagine life without cell-phones or the Internet? With the turn of the 21st century, new means of communication have revolutionized the way we interact with each other, from employees web-conferencing across the globe to the complex social networks developed over applications like Facebook. Just like these tools have completely transformed our ability to communicate, online classes have the potential to harness the same technology and transform education.

My mom and grandmother flank me; my sister is half sitting, half lying down on top of us. We sit squeezed into two back seats of a car half the size of a normal sedan breathing the same sweltering, humid, stuffy pollution blowing through the open windows. The driver and my grandfather in front have the same leg space as we do: none. The car swerves around a buffalo being milked, hits a pothole, stopping in the middle of the intersection barely missing a horse carriage, pedestrians, and cycle rickshaws crossing in front of us. Everyone bounces up an inch, bumps into the roof, and lands back into the dog pile. The deafening cacophony of honks around us only grows louder. No one is wearing seatbelts, but everything we are doing is legal. Well… welcome to India.