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In Oklahoma, as prom season comes to an end, Isabella Aiukli finds herself in the teen vogue shining spotlight. Isabella didn't expect to be front and center of the U.S magazine that targeted teen girls called Vouge, but it did give her a wonderful opportunity to show her history and culture in her own unique and beautiful way. "I felt really good. It felt really good to represent my culture in my fashion," said Cornell. Bella explains that she chose the color red because it brings awareness to the Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women movement. It holds great importance. Though some girls choose glitz and glamour for their prom dress, Bella's dress holds great importance to her and the Choctaw tribe to whom she belongs to. Bella is also a Choctaw model and she has worked with lots of native Choctaw designers such as Jolonzo Goldtooth, Red Berrywoman, Lokata Sage. and the creator of Bella's dress, Della Bighair-Stump. "I didn't"t expect it to get this big. I didn't expect it to be on Teen Vogue or make it to the independent," said Bighair-Stump. She has also done work with non-native designers. You can find the Choctaw teen featured in a mural on the side of a building near Northwest 37th Street and Western Avenue. But that's not Bellas only accomplishment, she has influenced many teens around the world and now they are taking her state of mind into consideration and are wearing dresses that have a significance to them and their culture. Not one but many girls are making their prom dresses from their culture, like this incredibly beautiful African- American dress. With her date sporting the same colors, these are a perfect pair. Even though this is incredibly artistic not everyone has received this concept with open arms, it has caused some controversy. A senior high schooler in Utah is being called ¨closet racist¨ after she posted a picture of her and her friends on their big night, just because she wore a Chinese inspired dress. The girl's name is Keziah Daum she is 18 and her post that was captioned ¨prom¨ has gotten re-tweeted over 5,900 times and a lot of them were negative. As an example, one comment said ¨This isn’t ok. I wouldn’t wear traditional Korean, Japanese or any other traditional dress and I’m Asian. I wouldn’t wear traditional Irish or Swedish or Greek dress either. There’s a lot of history behind these clothes. Sad¨ and also "She is wearing a traditional dress that is reserved for special occasions and by her, a non-Chinese woman, thinking she is entitled to our culture, she is profiting (does not necessarily mean $$) from it. That is cultural appropriation. Cultural appropriation is racism." Even though the teen has gotten many comments like that, she has also gotten some beautiful tweets such as "Glad you wore the dress! You look fantastic!!! Being Asian I am not ostracized wearing green shamrock on March 17 or looked down upon waving the only flag I know- Old Glory- on July 4. #embraceDiversity (btw, love the shoes too 😊) — heli (@HeliSkiier) May 1, 2018 There where others too for example, "Hey! I'm Chinese and I live in China, I just want to say you look stunning in that dress, and pay no attention to those who say you shouldn't wear it because of some kind of "cultural appropriation", a lot of Chinese wear jeans and I didn't see anyone make a fuss about it!" — Willmore F (@Reaperxma) May 1, 2018 Story by Estrella Moreno-Maldonado
 Is dance really a sport? This question has been debated numerous times. I am a dancer myself, and I believe that dance is a sport, but also an art because for the dancer for it is both extremely physically and mentally demanding. I think that dance is also an art because you are using your body to tell a story without words.
According to debate.org, 77% of voters think dance is a sport and 23% think it is not. people who think dance is not a sport have very weak reasoning such as: “there is no physical movement”. This is not true because if you have ever seen a dance performance you can see that the dancers are moving a lot. Also, part of being a dancer to make it look easy so if anything it makes it harder. Another reason that they use to explain why dance is not a sport, is because dance is a game of memory. This is not true because you do have to remember the steps, but also execute them well. One more reason they use is you don’t work together as a team; this is not true because you all have to make sure you are on the same counts so no one is late or early, and you all have to know the steps and rely on each other during lifts. The reasons I also believe dance is an art is because you are telling a story with your body without words. Also when the audience is watching a performance they view it as art, not a sport. Another reason is that when you are dancing you are wearing costumes and makeup to seem more like your character. Many dancers believe that dance is just an art because it is so much more than a sport. I think that while in dance you are telling a story without words, you are also working your body to its limits. Even if you believe that dance is just an art, dancers are still athletes. They are athletes because it takes just as much physical skill to dance as it does to play a sport. While dancers appear to make everything they are doing effortless, that is only the illusion they are creating and so it appears to be an art, but it is actually much more than that. If you still think dance is not a sport I hope you now realize that it is just and physically demanding as a sport. I still believe dance is a sport and a art. In conclusion, these are the reasons why dance is not only an art but also a sport. Story by Maddy Peeples Sources: https://www.theodysseyonline.com/dance-is-not-sport Annie Leibovitz was born in 1949 in Waterbury, Connecticut and as a kid went to an Art Institute to study painting. Later, she moved to Japan with her mother the summer after sophomore year, and started to discover that she found an interest in photography. Then when she moved to San Francisco. That fall, she started talking night classes to keep up in photography. Then at around the time of 1970, Leibovitz approached Jann Wenner, founding editor of Rolling Stone, which he’d recently launched and was operating out of San Francisco. Impressed with her portfolio, Wenner gave Leibovitz her first assignment: shoot John Lennon. Leibovitz’s black-and-white portrait of the shaggy-looking Beatle graced the cover of the January 21, 1971 issue. Two years later she was named Rolling Stone chief photographer. When the magazine began printing in color in 1974, Leibovitz followed suit. “In school, I wasn’t taught anything about lighting, and I was only taught black-and-white,” she told ARTnews in 1992. “So I had to learn color myself.” Among her subjects from that period are Bob Dylan, Bob Marley, and Patti Smith. Leibovitz also served as the official photographer for the Rolling Stones’ 1975 world tour. While on the road with the band, she produced her iconic black-and-white portraits of Keith Richards and Mick Jagger, shirtless and gritty. In the year 2000 Annie Leibovitz was the first in a group of Americans to be named a Library of Congress Living Legend. And she eventually ended up going to the white house to take pictures of Barack Obama and his family. Quotes "A thing that you see in my pictures is that I was not afraid to fall in love with these people." "Nature is so powerful, so strong. Capturing its essence is not easy - your work becomes a dance with light and the weather. It takes you to a place within yourself. When I say I want to photograph someone, what it really means is that I'd like to know them." Born: October 2, 1949, Waterbury, CT Children: Sarah Cameron Leibovitz, Susan Leibovitz, Samuelle Leibovitz Awards: Honorary Clio Award, Glamour Award for The Visionary Education: Northwood High School, San Francisco Art Institute Story by Stella Ballard
Photos by Annie Liebovitz from ArtNet and Pinterest  1. Born with a silver spoon in their mouth
This phrase typically means that someone was born in a wealthy family. No one really knows where it first originated but it was first seen in the U.S. Congress in, 1801. The content said, “It was a common proverb that few lawyers were born with silver spoons in their mouth.” Another scenario it may have came from was, in the middle ages, people used to carry around spoons to show their spot on the social ladder. The common people carried around wooden spoons, while the rich people carried silver spoons. 2. A penny for your thoughts We have all probably heard the term, a penny for your thoughts. It is a fun way to ask someone how they are feeling or what they are doing. Well, it first originated in 1535 when a writer, Sir Thomas More, used it in writing his new piece called Treatise Upon The Last Thynges. The phrase is pretty self-explanatory, you offering someone money to hear their thoughts or opinion. 3. A watched pot never boils We all those moments, when you stare at your pot of water, waiting for it to boil. Somehow, it takes forever if you just stare at it. Apparently, this scenario was so meaningful to some people that made a phrase out of it. A watched pot never boils. This phrase means, time seems much longer when you are expecting something to happen. The first recorded use of this word was by Benjamin Franklin. He was given the task of writing a research project on “animal magnetism.” In the article he included the phrases a watched pot never boils. 4. Break a leg You have probably all have heard the expression, break a leg, but what does it really mean; it’s a little odd to wish someone a injury. The expression actually comes from theater. They used superstition to have a good performance. If you wished someone something, they believed it would it reverse and give that person bad luck and they perform poorly. So, on the other hand, they would wish them negative things so it would be the opposite of what they wanted, good luck. 5. A taste of your own medicine This expression typically is used to represent revenge. If someone plays a nasty trick on you. You can simply trick them back with their own little prank. This is can be called a taste of your own medicine. According to Ginger, This idiom was a thing due to, an Aesop’s fable where a doctor hands out fake medicine saying it can cure anything, although he knows it can’t. When he finally gets sick, the people give him his so called medicine and since it isn’t real, he dies and gets a taste of his own medicine. 6. Cat got your tongue Awkward silence can be fixed you simply saying, “Cat got your tongue?” It is usually used when someone is unusually quiet. People still occasionally say it today but in the 1970’s and 1980’s it was frequently used. It wasn’t an old saying. “Cat got your tongue” was actually first written by children and by adults much later. 7. Spill the beans Is a phrase worth using when someone is holding a secret from you. Some people think it came from Ancient Greece, when the voting system depending on beans. White beans meant positive votes, while black beans meant negative votes. If the beans were spilled, than the secret of who won the election was out. Others think that it was first a thing much later in the 15th century. Spill had started to mean let out and wasn’t just used to refer to an object. But why beans? Well, nobody knows for sure, because there are many other sayings like, ‘spill your guts’ or ‘spill the soup’ so beans were pretty random. 8. Hold your horses I’m sure that your mom has told you countless times to hold your horses, meaning to be patient or to hang on a second. The originality of the phrase was ‘hold your horses’ which is a slang for saying horse. It was used in the 1800’s, in America, for the same meaning and I think that it was just one of those things where it just evolved out of thin air. 9. Bought the farm This term isn’t used often but it makes sense because people don’t like to talk a lot about dying either. These two go together because bought the farm means to die. The meaning comes from the scenario when a pilot accidently crashes into some crops and dies. He pays for the trashed land with his life. 10. Head over heels You can use this expression in a couple of ways. You can either be hurt and in an uncomfortable position or in love. It originally meant upside and the started to go down the path of love. If someone was in so much love than they were helpless and felt like they were in that uncomfortable upside down position. This phrases also resembles someone’s excitement through cartwheels or any other position where you heels are over your head. Story by Liv Suydam Sources: -https://owlcation.com/humanities/10-Strange-Idioms phrases 1,4,9,10 -https://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/phrases-and-sayings-list.html phrases 2,3,6,7,8 -http://www.gingersoftware.com/content/phrases/a-taste-of-your-own-medicine/#.WqluNWinG00 phrase 5  January - Garnet
Garnet is the stone of physical love and spirit. Garnet is known to ward off negative energies and give you psychic protection. Garnet is a stone which gives you love and devotion, as well as courage. Lastly, Garnet can activate peoples survival instinct and can also keep a person safe during travel. ` February - Amethyst Amethyst is a stone of logic and peacefulness. Amethyst is a meditative and calming stone, Amethyst can help you promote peacefulness in your body, soul, and mind. Amethyst also can have the power to boost your intellectual and cerebral thought. This stone also can have the power to make you apply your intellect into different situations. Along with these powers, Amethyst can promote sobriety and listen to others concerns. Lastly, Amethyst helps you build the skill to analyze others emotions. March - Aquamarine Aquamarine is the water stone and helps us reconnect to our roots, water. Aquamarine is said to have many of uses in relation to water. Aquamarine is said to purify water, alleviate seasickness, give safe passages to sailors, and bring prosperity to fishing. Aquamarine can encourage relaxation and help with public speaking. April- Diamond Diamond is the stone of relationships and longevity in them. This stone is said to bring abundance, balance, and charity. Diamond amplifies one's emotions, even if they are negative. Diamond also combats stress and brings courage and self-confidence to the user. Diamond can improve your thoughts and help you counteract jealousy. May- Emerald Emerald is the stone of love, romance, wisdom, and harmony. Emerald enhances emotions, faith, and clairvoyance. This stone has the ability to stimulate your mental capacity and memory. It also heals emotional heartbreak and can help you be more considerate and generous towards the people around you. June- Alexandrite Alexandrite is a stone which encourages imagination and boosts confidence. This stone gives you hope and encouragement when thinking about goals. It helps you to see both sides of an issue and it makes you calm down and relax. This stone helps you to understand and accept change and it helps you assess your own emotions. July- Ruby Ruby is the stone of life and death. It helps you get out of funks and helps you to become more energetic. It helps if you have self-doubt or if you have excessive modesty. It helps you get back up if someone has hurt your feelings or if you are feeling bad about yourself. This stone helps you regain connection with the world if you feel as though you don't have a purpose. August- Peridot Peridot is the stone of positivity. It emits positive energy and helps you become more optimistic. If you are down peridot gives you a better outlook on the world around you. Peridot helps you foresee positive outcomes and it helps you pursue them. It also protects you from fears and nightmares. September- Sapphire Sapphire is a stone which preserves your honor, truth, and integrity. It invites abundance and prosperity into your life, while also helping you with dealing with sad memories, or sad emotions. This stone also helps you while finding solutions to problems. Lastly, Sapphire forces the truth out of you, whether it be for good or for worse. October- Tourmaline Tourmaline is a calming stone. Tourmaline dispels the negativity surrounding you, and relieves you from stress. It lets you know when to stop if you have done too much of something. Tourmaline makes you more aware of your surroundings and helps you be more patient and stable. It also brings your deep, hidden feelings to the forefront so that you can handle them better. November- Citrine Citrine is another stone which makes you more positive and optimistic. Citrine helps you get over fears if they have taken over your life or if they are controlling you. Citrine makes you feel more cheery and gives you peace in your life. In your career life, citrine can bring success and abundance in your career. December- Tanzanite Tanzanite is a stone which guides you in the right direction while making decisions. It gets rid of lethargy and the feeling of defeat. Tanzanite can help you stop caring about others opinions if you are self-conscious of yourself. Lastly, tanzanite encourages creativity and individuality. Story by Will Euler Source 1 Source 2 Source 3  Gaming consoles have come a long way, and have been through many changes. We've had the Atari and the classic Nintendo all the way up to the PS4, but have you heard of the 3DO, or the Vectrex? Well, now you have.
The first ever console The first ever console created is called the “Brown Box”. A german engineer named Ralph Baer and his co-workers designed the first ever video game that works on a television in 1967. The first game on it was what Baer called the “chase game”. They built a tube that connected to the TV, which allowed the players to control their own different blocks. It was called the Chase Game, and it was like a game of tag. They later added in another 11 games and a fake gun, and it was known as the Brown Box technology. From then on, it was all uphill. The earliest successful consoles Baer’s technology was launched in 1972 by Magnavox and was called the odyssey video-game console. However, it was not as successful as Magnavox hoped. But, it was the start of a new generation. Nolan Bushnell and his company, Atari, created the first electronic arcade game called PONG in 1975. The game was so popular, the coin box would get jammed because of all the quarters that went into it. At the time, average arcade machines were making about 10 dollars a day, but PONG was making 40 dollars a day. Nolan Bushnell knew they just started a revolution. Atari later paired up with sears and released a home version of PONG. After that, along came the Japanese brand, Nintendo. The Rise of Nintendo Nintendo started selling consoles in the mid 80s with the Nintendo Entertainment System (NES). It is an 8-bit video-game console that was released in North America in 1985. Later, in 1989, the Nintendo Gameboy was released as the first ever handheld game console. Nintendo has several other versions of the Gameboy including the Gameboy pocket and the Gameboy color. The first 3-Dimensional consoles The first 3D console ever made is the Playstation. This console was launched in 1995 by Sony. It was the start of the more modern consoles. It was a success. 5 years later, in 2000, The PS2 (Playstation 2) was released as the first 128-bit system. You could also put games from the Playstation 1 on it. A year after the PS2 came out, Microsoft released a console called the Xbox. Because of the use of PC technology in the build, the console allowed for greater performance. Xbox later came out with the Xbox 360 and the Xbox 1, and the Xbox 1 S. The Modern Consoles The PS4, Xbox 1 S and the Nintendo switch, the consoles that everyone are playing on right now. The PS4 is the newest available Playstation right now, with a storage size of 500GB. The game Spider-Man just got released on it, and Playstation is selling a Spider-Man bundle. Xbox, on the other hand, is making their money by selling the 1 S. Not a lot of money, though. The Xbox used to be the supreme gaming console, but ever since Sony released the PS4, they have been getting loads of money, selling a PS4 at a max of $400. Then, there is the Nintendo switch. It has many cool features. You can hook it up to your TV to play it at home, or take out the controller to play on it like a tablet. The controller also can cut down into 2 mini controllers, so you can play split-screen with your friends. You can also stick the two mini controllers onto the tablet, and that gives you the handheld mode of it. Future Gaming Consoles Sony is planning on releasing a PS5 one day, and coming out with a brand new controller design too. Microsoft also is one day going to come out with an Xbox 2 (Xbox 1 X). Maybe other brands could make a console in the future, like Verizon or google. Or Nintendo could make another hit. We’ll just have to wait and see. Story by Rowyn Esslinger  If you haven’t heard of Fortnite, you’ve been living under a rock for the past couple of months! There are an estimated 125 million people who play Fortnite. And of those 125 million, the average player plays 6-10 hours a week! This article is all about the growth and popularity of Fortnite and how Epic Games, the company that produces Fortnite, makes all of their money.
Fortnite has two major versions. “Battle Royale”, one of the versions of Fortnite, is free to play. There’s not much of a storyline in “Battle Royale”. Basically, you and 99 other people battle it out in the alternate universe until there is only one man left. “Battle Royale” was released on July 25, 2017. Initially, Fortnite was only available for Microsoft Windows, macOS, PlayStation 4, and Xbox One. Today, Fortnite is also available for Mobile devices and Nintendo Switch. According to Metro, from July 2017 to January 2018, 2 million people have started playing Fortnite. Soon after, in February 2018, there were 3.4 million people playing Fortnite! As you can see, its popularity is growing every day. Fortnite “Save The World” is another version of Fortnite. In this version, 98% of the world turns into zombies and 2% of the world are people. Aside from storyline, the biggest difference between “Battle Royale” and “Save the World” is the price. While “Battle Royale” is free, the cheapest version of Save The World costs $40, says Tom’s Guide. Battle Royale is more popular than Save The World mainly because Battle Royale is free to play. Also, “Battle Royale” is probably more popular because it can be played on mobile devices and Nintendo Switch, but Save The World cannot. So, how does Epic Games make all of their money? Epic Games makes all of their money mainly by in-game purchases, such as different outfits (or skins) and dance moves. A battle pass can be purchased for $10 and comes with a lot of items that can be unlocked depending on how many challenges you complete and how much you play. Fortnite has also just had a new “Support a Creator” event where when you buy V-Bucks, Fortnite “money”, to support the content creator of your choice. A financial education company Lend EDU took a survey of 1,000 Fortnite players and found that 68.8% of players have spent at least some money on Fortnite. The average spending by a player on Fortnite is at least $84.67 or more. Recode says that mobile purchases alone total up to $1.8 million a day! Epic Games makes tons of money. But some of that money goes to a good cause! Epic Game’s founder, Tim Sweeney, spends a lot of his money protecting forests in North Carolina! In fact, according to Money Magazine, he owns and protects 35,000 acres of land in Western North Carolina. Also, Epic Games' main headquarters is in Cary, NC! Tim Sweeney is not only an environmentalist, he’s a car enthusiast too. He owns a Ferarri, a Porsche, a Lamborghini, and a Corvette. Don’t feel bad if you’ve spent a lot of money on Fortnite, just know that at least some the money you are spending is going towards protecting forests! Story by Tate Lloyd Image link: Image  Have you ever wondered why Google is the search engine you use? Or why Google overcame yahoo and other search engines? You may wonder are there any other search engines? There are a lot of factors of why Google is the most popular, but there are a few main factors.
In the beginning of the search engine war, when search engines were being made, Lycos and Alta Vista where the first search engines. They are now severely outdated and look sketchy. But then in 1997 some students at Stanford found google and found it was better than AltaVista and Lycos, according to lowendmac.com. Why, you may ask? Well, Google was much more organized and had less random clutter. Then in 2003, Google and Yahoo were at the peak of their war to be the best search engine. Obviously, there was winner because we use google, so obviously they won. There are a lot of factors why Google won, but a major one was each engines filing system. First of all, filing systems are the things that allow the company to add new stuff and keep it organized. Google made their own, while Yahoo used a thing called Netapp. Netapp was good at first but it caused some inefficiencies, and NetApp was taking a big chunk of revenue, so google was making more money. And so Google won the search engine war. According to lorriballen.com, Google keeps improving and it is the best search engine for small businesses because they are always improving. Google's whole business is built on being the best search engine. I was researching some other search engines, and I found a lot on Bing, which is Microsoft's search engine. To be honest Google and Bing petty much look the same except for a few different little touches and details. Fo one, when you go one bing you get a really cool image like one day I had a picture of the monarch butterflies migrating. Also, one perk about Bing is the video search. So at Google if you search up a video you get 3 videos on bing you can get up to 9 videos. In conclusion, Google won the search engine and war and is still the top on the search engines, and probably will be until Microsoft figures out how to make Bing better than Google. I use bing and google for different things for a lot of different reasons. Story by Garrison Hunt Do you like to draw? Well if you do, this is the month and activity for you. This month is INKTOBER. What is INKTOBER, you may be asking. INKTOBER is a challenge to draw every day of October with the words that mr.Jake parker or agent 44 gives you. Why and who? Mr.jake parker or also known as agent 44 started INKTOBER in 2009; he is a comics short-story creator, animator, illustrator, and concept artist. On the INKTOBER ,website it explains he created INKTOBER as a way to challenge himself and improve his ink skills. What was the outcome? What was the outcome of INKTOBER? Well the outcome of INKTOBER was positive, it is a very popular annual celebration. In its first year over 100,000 inked images were tagged on twitter by participating artists. Why should you try it? You should definitely try it because it is a very good opportunity for a better understanding inking and different inking techniques ,and its just plain fun and artistic. I highly recommend it. Here is the list of words for this year:  Story by Estrella Moreno-Maldonado
 You may have heard of Dippin’ Dots, the sweet ice cream pellets that many people now enjoy. Originally, they were not actually invented by an ice cream company or even someone in the food industry. The sweet treat, believe it or not, was invented by the microbiologist Curt Jones, who was working on a project in 1987 for a biotech company in Kentucky. His job at the time was to figure out more efficient forms of feed for farm animals. Jones eventually came upon the idea that freezing already existing cow feed at 350 degrees below zero would form little cow feed pellets. It may seem off, but cow feed was what led Jones to his discovery. Jones happened to be an avid ice cream lover. When he finished his farm animal feeding project, he took his idea of turning farm animal feed into pellets and applied it to ice cream. When Jones flash froze the ice cream he ended up with tiny pellets just like he did in cow feed. Thus the sweet pellets we now know as Dippin Dots were born.
Jones was born and raised on a farm near Grand Chain, Illinois. Even as a kid, Jones was a bit of a businessman. At a young age, Jones had begun a small business by fixing radios, tending to other peoples' barns, and sometimes even broom making with his grandpa’s tools and equipment. After graduating high school, Jones went to college at Shawnee community college and received a BA and a MA in microbiology. After Jones established the company, he realized that the treat could not be sold in grocery stores due to the fact that they would melt in the freezers because they were not cold enough to house the frozen treat. So, Jones decided to sell the treat at fairs and other events like baseball games so the Dippin Dots could still be sold to the public. In 2002 the company started selling both the ice cream and their merchandise online. In 2002 the company was also said to be the fastest growing franchise and was voted number one for new franchise company. These accomplishments may seem small compared to the idea of ice cream pellets, but for the company these were huge! So whether or not you think this sweet treat is the ice cream of the future or not, you have to admit their past is pretty interesting. Story by Stella Coffey Sources: history.com and CNN |
