The Student Newspaper of Mars High School

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March 2015 Volume 87 Issue 7 Send us your suggestions

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Mars High presents: Shrek the Musical Cast, crew perform popular musical for Mars community

Student entrepreneurs use teamwork to present business idea By John Conley

Two students from Mars and one student from Central Catholic linked up together to compete in the Startup Weekend Education in Pitts-burgh held on February 20-22 which consisted of 38 groups of contestants that presented their business ideas to the crowd. “Startup Weekend was truly a life-changing experience and we hope to keep working to-gether,” said junior Logan Reck. Startup Weekend is a global movement of entrepreneurs who learn the basics of found-ing and launching successful startup ventures. Startup Weekend travels all around the United States to teach people about entrepreneur-ship. Mars students Cole Bradley and Logan Reck, and Central Catholic stu-dent Robert Mitchell joined up together to try and start a business that is education related. They made a one minute pitch and talked about their business which was about job shadowing and how it

ment with Farquaad that if he fetch-es him a queen then he will allow

On both Friday, March 20, and Saturday, March 21, students at Mars High performed the annual musical production with this year’s presenta-tion of “Shrek.” The ac-tors and actresses, along with the stage crew, have been work-ing since January to put togeth-er the show. The production depicts the popular DreamWorks movie in which Shrek, an ogre, played by senior, Carl Stokes, and his swamp are invaded with a crowd of fairy tale creatures who were banished from the kingdom by Lord Farquaad, played by senior, Nick Pec-ora. Shrek and his new friend, Don-key, played by jun-ior, Hunter Baselj, make an agree-

the fairytale creatures back into the kingdom. Although the queen, Fio-

na, played by junior, Allison Wright, may share a secret similar to the

green ogre. The fun-filled show may seem different from the past performances like Footloose and Grease. “It’s very contemporary compared to our shows in previous years,” said director Mrs. Fassinger. Although to put on such an “intensive” per-formance means a lot of work from the producers, cast, stage crew, and the ensemble Fassinger added. In the two weeks prior to the show, students put in over 40 hours of re-hearsals, until every last note and line were “perfected.” “Putting the show all together means not only the characters, but also special effects, props, and costumes,” said Fassinger. “Getting all this done became even tougher with school closings, sicknesses, and other student commitments,” she added. Although after two sold out performances, Fas-singer said “it was a great and memorable show.”

could help students in the future. The team of Bradley, Reck, and Mitchell made a pitch about job

shadowing at surrounding companies and asked students over Twitter to give their advice on the idea.

Several students responded saying how job shadowing could make a huge impact on what people do in

life. The team of three was voted first out of many contest-ants. They then had just 54 hours to make another pitch. They also had help from a team of develop-ers that helped them cre-ate a website, start a Twitter

account and promote their busi-ness.

The most unique aspect about this experience was that the three stu-dents were the youngest to compete at the event and were going up against college professors and PhDs. “It was definitely a hard task going up against more experienced people, but we knew we could do it, and it showed,” said Bradley.

PAGE 2 What’s new in technology? Prom Asks

PAGE 3 March Madness Spring Sports Preview

WHAT’s InsIde

(From left) Logan Reck, Cole Bradley, and Robert Mitchell present their pitch in front of a crowd. Photo from Twitter

Main characters, Shrek (Carl Stokes), Fiona (Alli Wright), Donkey (Hunter Baselj), and Lord Farquaad (Nick Peco-ra) from the cast of Shrek. Photo from Richard Rude

Features/Entertainment Planet Press Volume 87 Issue 7 2

‘PROMposals’ How students asked their dates to prom...

What’s new in technology? Patience Yobp

Some of the biggest smartphone, laptop, and tablet producers on the market today are Apple, Windows, and Samsung who are constantly coming out with new products and gadgets. Apple is one of the most interna-tionally recognized technology pro-ducers. Apple held its most recent Apple Event on March 9, 2015. This allowed Apple customers to see what is coming next and primarily focused on unveiling of the Apple Watch. Apple`s new products include the IPhone 6 and 6 plus, the Mac, and the Apple Watch. IPhone is the top selling smartphone in the world with a customer satisfaction rating of 9 per-cent. The new MacBook weighs two pounds and is 13.1 millimeters thick, has a reinvented keyboard and track-pad. There are no fans in the new MacBook as well and only has one port that support five uses including USB, HDMI, Power, VGA, and Dis-playPort. The Apple Watch is the newest addition to Apple`s lineup. The Apple Watch is the IPhone on you wrist. It not only displays the time, but can also send and receive text messag-es, phone calls, and other notifica-tions. The watch tracks daily move-ment and alerts the user to daily and weekly activity. Apple Watch also features Siri, the interactive personal assistant. The watch will have three different collections: stainless steel, anodized aluminum, and 18-karat gold. There are two different size op-tions: 38 and 42 millimeters. Preorder begins on April 10, 2015 and prices start at $350. Microsoft devices such as the Lu-mia 640, the Lumia 640 XL, and the Surface Pro 3. The Lumia 640 will be available as of April 28. The Lumia 640 has a five inch screen, eight megapixel camera, eight gigabits of mass memory, and 30 gigabits of free cloud storage. The Lumia 640 XL has a 5.7 inch screen, 13 mega-pixel camera, and the same amount of memory as the Lumia 640. Both phones contain about 10 hours of battery while continuously browsing the Internet and are operating on Windows. The Lumia 640 should cost about $150 and the Lumia XL slightly higher at around $200. The Surface Pro 3 is a tablet with a Windows operating system that can replace a laptop. The tablet has a 12 inch screen, nine hours of battery while web browsing, three USB ports, and a five megapixel camera. The Surface Pro 3 starts at $799. The laptop can change with the flip of the keyboard into a tablet making this laptop more versatile than others in the same industry. Samsung also makes a phone watch called the Gear S. The Gear S has a curved 2 inch screen, one to two days of battery, and four gigabits of memory. The watch focuses on communication, with 3G, Wi-fi, and Bluetooth, as well as fitness, and no-tifications.

Prom is just around the corner and seniors have been thinking about who they want to

take to prom. Tickets are on sale now and “promposals” are happening daily. Teenag-

ers today come up with the most elaborate ways to ask their dates to prom. Whether it’s

on a poster board with flowers or in front of the entire school, “promposals” are always a

great beginning memory for prom. Below are some of the extravagant ways seniors at

Mars have asked their dates.

Senior, Tom Hannon, asked senior, Brandie Bacco, with a goldfish and a sign.

Photo from Twitter

Senior, Hope Berneburg, asked un-derclassman, Ryan Gillinardo, with a sign and basketball.

Photo from Twitter

Senior, Luke Rouda, asked under-classman, Kaitlyn McKenzie, on a pizza box with flowers.

Photo taken by Kendall Angeletti

Samsung’s new Gear S watch. Photo by Google images

Senior, Hunter Mincer, asked senior, Angelina Prato, with a box of donuts.

Photo from Instagram

Senior, Madison Ainsworth, asked Mars High graduate, Lucas Santos, with a box of Chik-fil-a nuggets.

Photo from Instagram

Senior, Josh Schultheis, asked senior, Cassie Berteotti, by taking a tire off of her car and only putting back on if she said yes to prom.

Photo from Instagram

Senior, Mitch Wesley, asked senior, Carly Reimer, by decorating her car, getting her a stuffed animal, and waiting for her with a sign.

Photo from Instagram

Reporters– Kendall Angeletti, Patience Yobp, John Conley,

Justin Golden

The Planet Press is a student-to-student newspaper

published on a monthly basis.

All editorials are strictly the

opinions of their authors and in no way reflect the position of this

newspaper.

Adviser: Mrs. Hock

THE PLANET PRESS

Planet Press Volume 87 Issue 7 Sports 3

As winter comes to a close, spring sports teams begin their preparation for the upcoming season. Every team, including the baseball, soft-ball, tennis, track, and lacrosse are looking to exceed last year’s efforts.

Boys Lacrosse In the 2014 season, the boy’s la-crosse team managed a 10-6 record in just its third season in the pro-gram. The boys finished second in their section, but lost in the first round of the WPIAL playoffs. The team played their first game this season on March 23 against Moon and lost 9-10. “We are all looking forward to the rest of the season, this team has a lot of potential,” said sophomore, Ben Lewis.

Girls Lacrosse The girl’s lacrosse team achieved a 14-5 record last year and finished second in their section. They ended their season with a loss to Shaler in the WPIAL playoffs . On March 24, the team had a rematch against Shaler in their first game and lost 11-15. “It was a rough start to the sea-son, but it can also be used to help fix our mistakes as we look ahead to our upcoming matches,” said junior,

Sara Weiss.

Boys Baseball The boy’s baseball team traveled to Myrtle Beach on March 18 to par-ticipate in The Ripken Experience for the second straight year. Alt-hough the games palyed in the Car-

olinas account for nothing more than a preseason warm-up, the var-sity and junior varsity squads man-aged to win three of their four

games. Last year, the varsity team lost in its first round of the WPIAL playoffs. “It’s perfect get-away vaca-tion that gets us prepared for the season at the same time,” said junior, Josh Gaunt.

Coed Track and Field Last season the boy’s track team achieved first in their section, and the whole team earned a trip to the WPIAL’s. Mars graduate, Sonny Zanga-

ro set a school record in the high jump and won second place in states. After multiple scrimmag-es, the track team traveled to Knoch for their first meet on March 31. “We have great team this year and I’m excited to see what we can do with it,” said junior, Nate Mrdjenovich.

Girls Softball In the 2014 sea-son, the girl’s soft-ball team finished 12-5 and was defeated in the WPIAL

champion-ship. The team won their first game 17-0 this season against North Catholic on March 23.

The craze that is March

Madness By John Conley

Outdoor sports ‘spring’ into action By Justin Golden

A person can only dream of having a perfect NCAA March madness bracket. The odds will never be in your favor and the chances of some-one getting a perfect bracket are 1 in 9.2 quintillion. Yeah, that’s right 9.2 quintillion. Someone would have a better chance of hitting four holes-in-one in a single round of golf and it would be easier to win Mega Millions twice in a row, only buying one lottery ticket both times. ESPN.com has been running a contest for the tournament since 1998, and in the past three years, every bracket entry had lost at least one team by the end of the first round of 32 games. In 2010, a student at Davidson College submitted a bracket that beat 99.9 percent of the ESPN con-testants. To put his bracket into per-spective, 5,169 other contestants had a better bracket than him, none of which were even close to perfect. This year, there is a lot of contro-versy over who is going to win the tournament, but if anyone was to pick a winner, it’s probably going to be Kentucky. They finished the reg-ular season 31-0 and carry a lot of momentum into the tournament, but some teams that are a lower seed always find a way to get an upset win and ruin pretty much everyone’s bracket. There are ways though that can improve chances of getting a perfect bracket. For example, a No.16 seed has never beaten a No.1 seed ever and you can also look at teams who play good on the road because all tournament games are played away at neutral sites. Also, look for teams who have had long win streaks, be-cause to win they need at least six or seven victories to be crowned cham-pion. So do you think you have what it takes to get a perfect bracket?

The team traveled to Florida on March 25 to play three games. While the team was down south, they stopped at Florida’s Univer-sal theme park. “Florida was a great time, but I think our team is ready to focus on the season we have ahead of us,” said junior, Nikki Schlegel.

Boys Tennis Last year, the tennis team would make it all the way to the state semi-finals. Starting this season, the tennis team ad-vanced to AAA. So far, the team, coached by teachers, Mr. Knauff and Mr. Lewandowski,

has won three of their four games. “Mr. Knauff will lead us to victory,” said junior, Alex Gruber.

Nick Cimini, junior, carries the ball up field to try and score.

Photo from Triblive

Kelly O’ Connell, junior, beats a defender to advance up the field.

Photo from Google

Ty Reginelli, senior, gets a fist bump from the coach after he safely reaches first base.

Photo from Triblive

Shannon McChesney, senior, looks to make a big impact on the track this season.

Photo from Twitter

Maggie Ol-shenske, freshman, hits the ball deep into the out-field.

Photo from Instagram

Tim Hunt, senior, hits the ball across the net for a point.

Photo from Triblive

Senior, Ori Rinaman, sprints in his relay.

Photo from Julie Chapman Luce Facebook