The Student News Site of Palo Alto High School

The Paly Voice

The Student News Site of Palo Alto High School

The Paly Voice

The Student News Site of Palo Alto High School

The Paly Voice

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Staff Blog

We invite you to read and respond to The Paly Voice’s ongoing staff blog, where we talk informally about the Voice, campus life, and other things on our minds. Enjoy — and click on the feedback link on the bottom if you want to participate by adding your own comment.

Webby Award (Mar. 9, 2005)

On May 3, 2005, the entire Voice staff rushed to our 6th period class to congratulate each other on our Webby Awards achievement in the "student" category. Not only did we win the People’s Voice award, but in an unexpected surprise we were one of only 13 sites to also win the Webby award, which is given by the judges to what they deem the best-run site. Voice would like to thank all the relatives, parents, peers, and teachers for their support. Without your encouragement and vote, our success would not have been possible. Being recognized with a Webby award is a tremendous honor, and Voice hopes that the award will increase the number of hits to our site and motivate the class to constantly make new improvements to the site.

After a year of being on the Voice staff I can’t help but feel relief that we received the Webby. The entire class deserved this prestigious award after all the hard work we have put in as a staff. In addition to reporting, staff members are responsible for uploading the work of Paly’s Advanced, Broadcast and Magazine Journalism publications to the site, which contributes greatly to the diversity of our content.

The people who are most responsible for the site’s success, however,
would have to be Voice’s seven fabulous editors; without their
after-school efforts and continuous encouragement we would not be as successful a site.

Thank you again to all our supporters; we appreciate your votes!

–Jessie Ebert

Emergency Plan (May 5, 2005)

The emergency drill on Tuesday, April 19th, was a pleasant break from class. Although there was some confusion at the beginning due to missing teachers, things settled down quickly. Students were son spread out on the track and on the field, simply chatting with their friends and soaking up the sun. Every so often, you would see a few students doing homework. Most didn’t seem worried about the procedure or how it was going, which was an indicator that things went well.

However, after talking to various students, I discovered that a few voices were concerned with how it went. Here are the supposed problems:

With the recent bomb threat, was it really wise to return to the field again?

In my opinion, we should have specific plans written up for other possible scenarios. Not just one all encompassing plan. Think about this. For example, if the school had been set on fire, would it make sense to duck and cover? Even though it’s true that we live in an area more prone to earthquakes than other disasters No one can guarantee that the emergency coming up next will be an earthquake.

Another issue has to do with the fact that many students who have preps often don’t know what’s going on.

For example, there could have been a fire at the school, while students are at home. Then, when teachers take role on the field, the student will be assumed missing. Not only that, but if a student comes to harm off campus, the faculty has no way to know. In this case, I would think that students would know when there was a disaster, but in the case that they
don’t, the school should establish some sort of system where the students can also gather at Town and Country, and other nearby places. From there, teachers should use cell phones to try to contact students and find out whether or not students are at any outside
"gathering sites".

Also, maybe the school could adapt some kind of color-coded flag system. Brown for earthquakes, red for fire, etc. That way, people walking by, will know there’s a disaster, and will gather at the appropriate place.

One last thing: in Voice, many of the upperclassmen were questioning the purpose of roping off a section of the parking lot, so as to make space for the fire engines and other emergency vehicles. Since that area isn’t usually roped off, a few people asked where fire
engines would park in the case of a real emergency. Suggestions included parking on the grass or mowing down cars.

–Weiqi Hu

Help, My Leg is Broken!

On Tuesday, April 19th, I had the privilege of playing a victim in the city-wide disaster drill. To be quite honest, it was a very odd experience. I had no idea what would happen to me or what to expect.

Two weeks ago my math teacher announced she needed a student to play the role of a victim in the upcoming drill. When she randomly asked me if I wanted to do it, I said “sure,” as our school drills are usually twenty minutes long and consist of the entire school taking a speedy trip to the field and back. For a week and a half, the thought never crossed my mind about what I might have to do while being ‘injured?’ A few days before the drill I got sent a tiny note telling me that I would have a broken leg. I confused as I wasn’t sure how I was supposed to act. Was I really supposed to pretend like I broke my leg? Should I lie on the ground, hold my leg and cry? I didn’t want to be a party pooper, but then again, I didn’t want to make anyone’s job any harder than it already was.

Tuesday morning rolled around and as I arrived in my second period class and my adorable and animated teacher shouted, “Katie! Today’s the day!” Immediately, all the confused thoughts came back to my mind. I was quickly distracted as I wanted to see what I got on my trig midterm. At 9:25 the bell rang and I heard the loud speaker telling everyone to duck and cover. Confusion and panic swept through my math class. After a good sixty seconds of ducking and covering, everyone rose from the floor like they were coated in molasses and somberly moved to the door. I don’t think anyone was exactly thrilled about a forty-five minute time period of waiting on the fields doing nothing productive.

As everyone was leaving, I wondered if I was just supposed to chill in the classroom by myself. I’m not sure why, but my math teacher let Cullen Hollyn-Taub stay with me. Cullen was helping pass the time when all of a sudden, we heard a door fly open and an-out-of breath Ms. Antink seemed to be relieved that she found the ‘injured person.’ After getting the stubborn the walkie-talkie set working, Ms. Antink was super-speedy to announce on the radio that there was a student down in room 706.

Within three minutes, two students entered the room, on a mission. I have to admit, I was not really paying attention when they entered the room and I was somewhat in a daze, so I didn’t exactly catch everything they said to me. They asked me what was wrong and if I was okay. I was surprised by how professional the students were, as I had expected someone to come in and say “Oh, we’ve found the person, now let’s go." They made sure I knew what day it was and my name and the basic facts (just as if it was a real emergency). At this time I was sitting in a desk with my math homework out. I guess I should have taken the drill more seriously because after this, my leg was wrapped up with splints and bandages. It was definitely an awkward experience especially when your leg is perfectly fine, but I guess this kind of thing doesn’t happen every day. After I got bandaged, I really hoped I’d get to ride on one of the golf carts I always see around campus, but no such luck. However, I did get to feel like a V.I.P. and ride in a wheel chair out to the quad. After this point my job of being injured was over because I got to sit in the grass by the yellow section (I still am unclear about why I was in the yellow section, but that’s okay).

For the next twenty minutes, I got a first-hand view of everything that was going on with the administration. Many were scrambling to find papers or make sure each building got searched. I felt like on the grass, I was in a completely different universe than the teachers on the concrete. After watching all the other victims be recovered and placed into green, yellow, and red categories, the drill was basically over.

While it was quite painless and effortless on my behalf, however, this is when I realized the amount of work it takes on the parts of others in this simulation. Everyone I encountered was calm and knew exactly what to do. Granted this was a drill, that does mean stress levels were not high. I think our school administration has a great plan for rescuing students and I think the student medical teams that rescue victims from classrooms were also well prepared. They definitely deserve kudos and pats on the backs for making the seemingly normal disaster drill run quite smoothly.

–Katie Tseng

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