Fall 2022

The Conversation

Caton

Fall 2022

The PS249 Student Newspaper

The Faces of Newspaper Club

By Newspaper Staff

This year newspaper club was excited to begin the year in November. Students in grades 3, 4 and 5 applied to join our staff. When asked what made them want to join 4th grader Sara Nureldin said she was excited to share her writing with the school.

5th Graders Research Social Issues

"We don't usually get to write about what we want to write about in school. I like being able to choose what I want to write about." The club meets twice a week on Wednesdays and Thursdays for an hour after school. The club is led by Ms. Vanessa and Ms. Williams this year. Both of them say you don't need to be a great writer to join. "If you're a great writer and want to be part of the club, that's amazing. But if you just want to have a chance to be creative and learn new things, this is a fun opportunity."

By Newspaper Staff

This fall 5th graders jumped into researching social issues. These are problems that affect many people in our society. Students began this work in November by brainstorming what topics or issues that they cared about and wanted to know more about. (Continued on page 2)

Social Issues

(continued from front page)
At first there were a lot of ideas about what to focus on. Then each class was surveyed about their topics and the teachers were able to find issues that all the classes was interested in learning more on.
Racism from police and in education was a very popular topic. Another topic was climate change and the environment, students who are worried about what's going on with the planet chose that topic. Mental health issues were an unsurprising choice because of what everyone has gone through in the pandemic.
Some wanted to learn more about what is happening with transgender children in some states, so they focused on that issue. Immigration and school safety were issues that concerned some students because they are problems that they think about or deal with daily.
This is what a few 5th graders learned about their topics.

Is School Safe Anymore?
By Chloe Cepeda, 5th Grade

School safety is a problem going now in the United States. One of the biggest issues is people shooting up schools. Young kids and adults are getting killed and even more are getting injured. The deadliest school shooting was Sandy Hook Elementary, where 20 first graders and 6 teachers were killed in 2012. The next deadliest was Robb Elementary School in Uvalde Texas where 19 fourth graders and their two teachers were killed in 2022. In 2018 at Parkland High School 21 people were killed. This is very tragic for parents and others in the community but we can do something about it.

Congresswoman Suzanne Boncamici wants to pass laws about how only people 18 and older can buy guns. They also want to up the prices for guns so young people would most likely to not buy the guns. There are young kid activists who are fighting for better protection. Schools are also doing more safety like lock down drills and training kids and teachers on safety. This problem can be fixed if we fight for change.

Mental Health is Important
By Diara Dollar, 5th Grade

Important terms of mental health are abuse and suicide. The problem is kids are dealing with a lot of problems. They feel depressed and stressed.

You can solve this at home, and also through counseling. Anybody at home can read a book to help with their mental health. Or this may be shocking (we all love this) you can use fidgets. Its calms your mind and helps you settle down.

Do you know that your mental health can be dangerous its very serious ?

Racism and Police Brutality
By Safiatou Diallo, 5th Grade

Why do police shootings happen?
Police shooting happen when police officers shoot unarmed black teenagers and adults. Sadly they will not be charged for this crime. In the article of “Ferguson Police and court treated Black unfairly” it says black were searched without legal reason also they ignored people rights. In another article of “Latinos shooting” it says a deputy sheriff shot a 28 year old brother. This connects to who is the target of the police shooting. Police officers continue to shoot unarmed men without cause. People protest to stop the racist acts from happening, they want the police officers to go to court and pay for their crime.

Who are the target of police shooting?
The police target Black and Latino people. In the article “Ferguson police and court treated black unfairly” it says a police officer pointed a gun to a black man's head because his car windows were too dark. This shows police targets are black people unfairly. In the article it also says Black people felt under attack. It connects to justice for police shooting. Police have a target on certain people because of their skin such as Blacks and Latinos.

Immigration
By Gianni Russell, 5th Grade

Have you seen the border between the United States of America and Mexico ? At least a picture ? Well that border is to keep immigrants from Mexico coming to The United States of America illegally. Every year millions of immigrants from Mexico and Central America try to come to America for a better life but they get caught by the Border Patrol.

Do you even know what immigrant actually is ?
Immigration is when someone from a different country comes to the United States of America. There are all sorts of immigrants. For Example there are Temporary Immigrants, Undocumented Immigrants, and a Lawful Permanent Resident (LPR) according to MigrationPolicy.org

Immigration
By Gianni Russell, 5th Grade

Continued from previous page
Sometimes people come illegally, meaning without permission. Even though they come to the country illegally they still give the country some benefits. They help the country greatly socially and economically. Illegal immigration is a problem the US needs to face.

Why do they come?
Immigrants come to the United States of America mainly when there are natural disasters in their home country or civil unrest, which is problems that the government of their country can't control. Immigrants who come to the United States of America while breaking the law are coming because it's better to come to a place where your life isn't in danger every day.

About 2 million immigrants work in jobs growing, harvesting, processing, and selling food in the United States of America serving an essential role in feeding America according to MigrationPolicy.org. They also make the United States of America more money seeing that in 2019 they made the United States of America $1.6 trillion according to MigrationPolicy.org This shows that immigrants can be a positive influence in our country.

Ways people can help immigrants
By Amelia Bowen, 5th Grade

People who want immigration to change make different organizations and protests. Some examples are “the best charities for helping undocumented immigrants" they are United We Dream and Movimeinto Coseha. These organizations are platforms for immigrants empowerment and immigrants in general.

Organizations are willing to help undocumented immigrants. Another detail according to www.nilc.org it states “immigrants advocates and community members marched in D.C. to demand that congress includes a pathway to citizenship in the budget.” This tells me that people are protesting to get immigrants to the point of citizenship and help those in need.

Katherine and Apollo 11

Katherine Johnson is an African American women and loved numbers and math. She loved it so much that she even growing up she would count everything! She would count the steps, the doors, and the dishes but the only thing she didn't count was the stars. She thought only a fool would count the stars.

Because Katherine loved math she got to skip 3 whole grades past her brother. He wasn't to happy about that.

By Salmana Diallo, Grade 4

Katherine Johnson lived from Aug 26, 1918 to Feb 24, 2020 in White Sulphur Springs, West Virginia

By the age 10 Katherine was ready for high school but back then american was legally segregated by race. her town high school didn't accept any black students. Katherine burned all she wanted to do was to keep learning than any else ''Count on me'' Katherine's dad said to her
The next day Katherine's dad earned enough money to move to a town with a black high school nearby