Students at Springville Junior High School who participate in the Honors English class will read many different pieces of literature throughout the school year. The book they are currently reading called Elantris.

“In class, students researched Elantris, along with other titles, and then gave speeches on behalf of it as well as other books. When we finally voted, Elantris was one of the books selected,” said Mrs. Mary Rice, the Honor’s English teacher at SJHS. All the books that the students are going to read this year were selected by a democratic vote by the students at the beginning of the year. Research was done on these books beforehand so the students knew what to expect from the books.

Mrs. Josie Hales teaches the Computers in Business class, which is a place where students learn how to manage a business using computers. As part of the class, students are creating their own websites.

The students in Computers in Business have been making and managing their own fictional amusement parks. They get to decide what logo, slogan, name, and everything else they want to include about their park. As part of the assignment, students get to make a website advertizing their amusement park. The students began making the websites November 15th. 

Students in photography were recently assigned a new project called Surrealism. This type art was created in Europe 1930’s and was first done in paint. According to Mr. Mitch Cudney, art and photography teacher at Springville Junior High, these photos can turn out to be crazy, zany, and fun when they are finished.

At Springville Junior High, there is something called Quest Time. Quest Time is right after third period where students can go to a room of their choice. Each room has an activity such as the movie, karaoke, board games, writing lab, etc. You are only allowed to go to these fun activities if you have an A, B, or C.       

Guess who’s new this year at Springville Junior High? Mrs. Kelli Lauret had her first walk through the halls of SJHS at the start of the year.  This is Mrs. Lauret’s first year teaching. As a ninth-grade student she took peer tutoring and thought it was a blast. From that point on Mrs. Lauret knew becoming a teacher was exactly what she wanted to be when she grew up.

“Music has greatly changed my life. I want to give students that same opportunity,” said Ms. Neilson, a student teacher from Brigham Young University. She and many other student teachers at BYU have been teaching in Dr. Sam Tsugawa’s orchestra classes at Springville Junior High.  During first period orchestra class on Tuesday and Thursday, a large group of student teachers and their instructor, Dr. Andrew Dabczynski, come into class tolearn how to teach music classes.  Ms. Neilson is the primary student teacher for Dr. Tsugawa, and helps out in all of his junior high and high school classes.

Seventh graders at Springville Junior High School recently participated in the ice cream shop business activity in CTE (Career Technology Education). The students got to serve ice cream at their “creamery,” called Castle Creamery, themed after our school’s mascot, the knights. The creamery took place on Wednesday, November tenth in Mrs. Linda Woodfield’s seventh-grade CTE class.

According to Mrs. Linda Woodfield, CTE teacher, the purpose of the activity was to teach the kids how to set up a business and the four P’s of marketing: product, place, price, and promotion. According to Landon Simkins, a seventh grader that took part in the creamery, they had the activity to learn how to cook.

Every student at Springville Junior High School in Mr. Greg Shields’s history class knows that they have to think a lot to pass. Likewise, Mr. Shields's Quest Time activity this year is Mind Trap, which, according to Hazel Dore, “Makes you think and is fun and challenging.”

Every once in a while in Mr. Shields’s history class, the students will take a little break from history and play a game. “The students seemed to enjoy this, so I thought it would be a good idea to do it for a Quest Time Enrichment activity,” said Mr. Shields.

There is a new school psychologist at Springville Junior High School. Mr. Nick Baird, the new school psychologist, is from Olympia, Washington. He is the youngest of four brothers and is married and has one daughter.  According to Mr. Baird, he wanted to become a psychologist because he likes counseling and working with adolescents. His favorite part of his job is working with kids and seeing them progress.

Some of the things that Mr. Baird does as a psychologist are: assessing students with learning disabilities, counseling students, creating interventions for students, and working on prevention programs. Mr. Baird’s office is located across from Mr. Mikesell’s room.

So welcome to SJHS Mr. Baird!

What is FFA? The largest youth leadership organization, that’s what! For the first time, Agricultural Science is being offered at Springville Junior High. Agriculture is the production, processing, marketing, and use of foods, and fibers and byproducts from plant crops and animals. Mrs. Monica Giffing teaches Agricultural Science, or FFA, at the junior high and at Springville High School. She has been teaching FFA for five years at the high school, but this is the first year she is teaching FFA at SJHS.