Basketball
By Darren and Ayven
For this month’s article, Ayven and I have decided to write about our MHS basketball boys, and to start things off we want to give a huge congratulations to our district champions going to the playoffs!
I think we can all agree that we are proud of this year’s basketball boys. This year you guys did so well taking Marfa to the playoffs and landing us district champs after a strong season that culminated in a win against Sierra Blanca on February 16. The Horns clenched bi-district Champs on Tuesday, February 20, and played for area champs on February 23, ultimately falling to Robert Lee High School after an initially close game. No matter what, though, it was a great season, with the boys going the furthest they had in 12 years, so heck yeah, go Horns!!
We asked some of the players some questions and here is what the junior Derick Campos had to say when we asked, “How do you feel about y’all’s win against Sierra Blanca?” He said, “It felt good because they talked a lot of trash, and they needed to be humbled!” “How does it feel to be district champs after 12 years without a title?” “It’s crazy! I don’t know how that stuff works, it’s weird!” “How do you think this season went?” “It was a ‘W’ season!”
We asked freshman Ayden Alvarez about his season, and he said, “It feels good especially with my first time in this program. It feels good … I wish I got more playing time, but for right now I’m chilling on the bench.”
About the recent win against Sierra Blanca, Ayden said, “I feel good about it, someone needed to humble them. I didn’t get a lot of play time but I still scored, but I hope we can make it to the playoffs.”
Senior Marco Ruiz said that the win against Sierra Blanca was awesome, saying, “I feel really good about it, especially because they were talking smack!” He concluded the interview with an optimistic look into the future, saying, “I think we can make it deep into playoffs!”
Finally, we interviewed the OG Coach Luna, who said the win on Friday against SB “felt good, and it was the win that got us to be district champs! That hasn’t happened in 12 years!”
Looking forward, Coach Luna said, “I feel like we put in a lot of work, a lot of hours, and I wanna see how much these boys can make a run in the playoffs!”
So, even though the basketball season is over, we have a lot to be proud of with the boys advancing into the playoffs this year, and being bi-district champions!
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Valentine’s Day at Marfa ISD
By Dariela and Giselle
Valentine’s is a fun and enjoyable holiday for some people. People enjoy the warm, heartfelt feeling of getting asked to be someone’s valentine. But some people also dislike seeing people in love on Valentine’s Day when they themselves don’t have anyone to spend the day with.
Valentine’s Day can be enjoyable or disliked, depending on the person. Some MISD students are able to spend the day with their valentines while others have to sit in the corner and watch.
Zoey Salgado, a freshman at MISD, recently got asked to be junior Austin Milligian’s valentine. Zoey was blindsided by Austin’s appearance at her house. We asked Zoey what her initial reaction was. “I was gasping, and I was surprised. I did not expect it at all. I thought the poster was super cute and cool. It had my favorite, SPIDERMAN! He was really thoughtful and he made me handmade flowers with pipe cleaners. And so, you know I had to say yes.” Zoey explained that she didn’t know what they were going to do the day or weekend of Valentine’s Day.
Samantha, a senior at MISD, explained that on Valentine’s Day her and Luis tried to give out popcorn and teddy bears. However, their romantic efforts drastically failed, and they only dropped a gift off to Maryfer. Afterwards, Samantha, Luis, and Loretta went out to eat at the Waterstop.
Mrs. Marginot had a very memorable Valentine’s Day. We asked what she and her husband did for the special day, and she explained, “We had an at-home dinner, Billy [her husband] made baked chicken.” We then asked how he had asked her to be his valentine, and she said, “I brought him some flowers from Marfa Blooms, I took some flowers.”
She then went on to tell us that they have been married for 30 years and had been dating for eight years before that. We were interested in how they met, so we asked. She said that he lived in the same house as her crew coach’s house in college, and they had met there. He also DJed at a party one time. Mrs. Marginot is happy to be her husband’s valentine!
Asael Zubia, a freshman at MISD, had asked Itzel Urrutia to be his valentine. He asked her out in a generous way. He had gifted her a basket with flowers to ask her. On that day they cruised around town as well as exchanged gifts. They built flower Legos together and just spent the evening hanging out with one another. We asked him if they had fun, he said “Yeah, I had a good time hanging out with her, she’s an enjoyable person to be around especially when we are both having fun, which I always have fun with her.” In El Paso on the art field trip, Asael bought Itzel a charm for her James Avery bracelet and chocolates. Itzel bought him an Ariat jacket and made him a basket with different snacks and goodies.
Kayla Vasquez and Jaden Nunez were each other’s valentines this year. We asked what they did to celebrate, Kayla said, “I went home to get ready because we had a dinner reservation at the Waterstop, so then he came to pick me up, and we exchanged our baskets. He got me a card and my favorite chips, candies, and snacks. And I got him a necklace, stuffed animal, and all his favorite goodies. Then we went to eat. And I was super cold, so I went to the car for my jacket and he said he would stay and pay, and when I came back he surprised me with dessert. Yeah, it was a good Valentine’s Day.” They were able to have an enjoyable time together!
Overall, Valentine’s Day was a good day for a lot of Marfa couples. Couples were able to celebrate and give each other gifts. Valentine’s Day is a special day for some and an ordinary day for others.
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New counseling program at MISD begins
By Zoey and Belen
Recently Marfa students in first period have been having the school counselor Mr. Natividad reach out to the students in Marfa ISD to talk about their future and the future of Marfa itself. The sessions are on Monday for freshmen and last about 25 mins or so. The first session featured an exercise where the students have a journal and were asked to write their goals for themselves in 10 years and then in 20 years, and for students to think about and write about where they see themselves in that amount of time.
The next session was about what we need to focus on for ourselves and how we can stop procrastinating and get stuff done to reach closer to our goals that we’d written about in the first session.
As a student attending Marfa ISD, these sessions with our counselor Mr. Natividad are actually helpful and get you thinking about the future and what you need to focus on and what is not really necessary at the moment.
We immediately thought about interviewing Mr. Natividad. After searching all over the high school and even the elementary school, we finally found him when he came back from his lunch break.
“How did you come up with the idea for these sessions?” we asked him.
“Well I didn’t really come up with the idea, it’s a thing I always did at every school I worked with. Our previous counselor had started it before I got here, so I just continued what she started, and I used what she had done and combined it with what I have done at other schools before.”
“How do you think it’s affecting the student body?” we asked.
“Well, I don’t know, it’s positive even if I don’t see it right away. If I don’t see results right away, I think at least someone in the classroom needs to hear that lesson. You see it a lot more in the elementary, you know, they respond immediately, high school students tend to think about the information I give them more. So, I see immediate results in the elementary school students, but I know it will make a difference in the junior and high school students eventually.”
We followed up by asking, “Did you have these types of sessions while you were in high school?”
“No actually, when I was in high school we didn’t have anything like this, I never had any type of character education classes in school or any of that stuff, I guess it’s a new thing because ever since I’ve been teaching it’s been a thing. Unfortunately, though, I never had any of that in high school, but I think it would’ve been really helpful for us.”
The last question we asked him was “Do you think the importance of character education affects us more since we’re such a small community?”
“Well, I like the fact that I can go to every classroom, that’s a good thing. Since it’s such a small community I can go to every class, so to me that is a positive thing, so I think it’s more effective since I can meet with all the students.”
Next up we interviewed Mrs. Donaldson, a teacher who loves science and is Ms. Powers’ best friend. We asked her, “How do you feel about the counseling sessions during your first period class?”
She replied, “Well I wish it wasn’t during a tested subject because I only have four days with y’all, and now only three days. We are behind and this test is required for your graduation and is a measurement of how well I do as a teacher. I do wish it would’ve been during a different time period. I do like the value of it and the message that he’s giving y’all.”
This time she flipped the script and asked us a question: “Do y’all like it?”
We nodded in reply and said, “Yeah, it’s interesting.”
Mrs. Donaldson concluded by saying that he does a good job on how he presents the material. I think that everyone can agree that these counseling sessions are going to be for the better. We asked some students, and they all agreed that so far it is beneficial for the students of MISD.
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Who is MISD’s biggest rival?
By Samantha
In sports and in life, a little competition can make things interesting and, hopefully, increases everyone’s performances.
Lots of people would consider Marfa’s biggest rival to be Fort Davis. Maybe once upon a time I’d have agreed, but recently I don’t think they are anymore. This rivalry with Fort Davis has fallen over the years, or, more accurately, ebbs and swells depending on when our teams are more evenly matched. Recently, they haven’t been as good, and Marfa has dominated. Two years ago, that was not the case, but that’s a lifetime in high school.
Luis Solis agrees with me, saying, “It definitely used to be Fort Davis, but then they lost all their seniors, and we started winning. Competitively, I’d say our biggest rival now would have to be Van Horn. Although Sierra Blanca has to be the most heated games we’ve been playing from football to basketball and many more.”
Diego Jurado, after thinking about it, said, “I would say Sierra Blanca is Marfa’s biggest rival. They’re the most heated games and the players don’t like us. Like, I have personal experience with Frijol, aka Beans. One time I was blocking him, and he said some foul things to me and I pushed him and they gave me a flag for a personal foul but it was his fault, he started it.”
In this reporter’s opinion, the most fun games to go to are against Van Horn and Sierra Blanca. The rivalry games are the best games. All the fighting and yelling makes them 10 times better. For example, going to a Del City game is not as fun as attending one of these other games.
I think what makes Van Horn games so good is that we are equally matched, basically, talent-wise. But, additionally, Van Horn is the other school that I can say is easily as respectful as our players are on the court, track, field, etc. They’re very disciplined, and it also makes a huge difference that they’re all our friends. Sierra Blanca are also our friends but they, for some reason, always are trying to fight on the court. The two rivalries have very different feels, like Van Horn’s is a healthy competition with some mutual respect, and SB’s rivalry is a little more down and dirty. You can feel the difference as an audience member and a player watching this.
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Science fair
By Isaiah and Messiah
At the science fair that took place three weeks ago, 13 students placed first and second place and will be moving on to compete for state in College Station, Texas.
We first asked Mrs. Donaldson, who is a science teacher and science fair sponsor, about her opinions on this year’s competition. She said, “My thoughts on going to the science fair this year! This is the largest group of kids I’ve ever taken. It was definitely a challenge trying to put everything together, on time. And we compete against different schools, like homeschool and private schools, etc. They have a lot more resources than we do over here. We have a science lab which is a hit or miss, but luckily Mrs. Gomez will order anything we need or want. But we compete against those homeschool kids who have a lot more resources, and they have parents who are doctors, or parents who have access to laboratory equipment which we just don’t have! So their parents teach them, they have that one-on-one time with them, they spend all this time on their science fair projects, and y’all have all these other classes to do and extra-curriculars like powerlifting and basketball so, yeah, it’s all about the experience.”
The next thing we proceeded to ask was what she thought of the majority of her kids placing pretty high and being able to move onto state. “I thought for sure that we would get that golden ticket to ISIP, but I’m so proud, and we are going to do well when we make it to College Station where we will be competing against hundreds of people in the categories.”
The next person we asked was JoAngel Davila. The first thing we asked him was how was his experience competing at science fair against other people. He said, “Maybe other than competing against one group in my category, it wasn’t really that bad, it was quite nerve-racking just to think that you could say something wrong to the judge when they are asking questions. Another bad thing was I was stuttering like a LOT.” Next we asked JoAngel what place he got in his category. He responded, “I got second place.” Then, we asked, “What is your favorite memory of the trip?” He said, “I liked taking pictures of Darren and going to Cinergy.” The last thing we asked him was his thoughts on making it to state are, and he said, “Honestly I feel like it’s going to be a lot more stressful since it’s going to take a whole lot longer to get judged now that there’s more categories and people there to go against.”
The next person we decided to interview about the science fair was Piper Donaldson. The first question we started off with was, “How was the competition?” She responded back with, “I was only the person in my category, but there was an off chance that I wouldn’t make it to state. But, the fact is that they gave me the gold medal for first place and let me move onto state, which was pretty neat.¨ Then we decided to ask, “What is your favorite memory of the trip?” Piper said, “Cinergy! And I won that Hello Kitty cup and also got my big FAT Garfield from Best Buy.¨
Next we decided to interview Diego Jurado. The first thing we asked him was what his thoughts on going to compete at the science fair was. He said, “At first I didn’t really want to and was kind of hesitant, but I’m glad that I did since I got first place! It was a cool experience.” The next thing we asked him was what his favorite part out of the whole trip was. “Probably the bowling cause I smoked everybody that was in our lane so that was pretty fun.” The last thing we asked him was how he feels now that he has advanced onto state and has to compete against others again. “I just can’t wait to go and say that I went to state to compete at the science fair.”
On March 22-24 the students who advanced will be heading to College Station Texas and competing for a spot at ISIP in Los Angeles, California.
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What’s going on in art class
By Flavio and Itzel
Ms. Powers’ art class is teaming up with the Chinati Foundation for the spring art class, which so far, is actually a computer class! All art classes were given the task of making a project using Photoshop. We are able to do a lot of things for this project. The Chinati Education team brought in six new computers with Adobe Photoshop and showed us colleges from art history and work by Cindy Sherman.
Several classmates photoshopped themselves with their celebrity crushes, some photoshopped themselves with food, some added muscles to their own pictures, and many more things! We will be working on this for the next month, although other elements will be added like screen printing onto posters and tote bags. Hopefully, like last year, there will be a commercial component so that we can sell our work and use the proceeds to do something really fun like going to Cinergy in Odessa or going to El Paso.
Chianti people have been really helping us and are doing a great job teaching us how to use Photoshop, a skill that can be useful in the future!
We interviewed Belen Soto, who is not in art class, but is in journalism and has been learning Photoshop from her friends who are in art. Our first question was if she likes Photoshop. “Yes, I enjoy it very much. It is a fun activity to do.” I asked her what she was doing on Photoshop. “I have done many things. The most recent thing is Zoey climbing a rainbow trying to get a pot of gold with the words ‘Got this feelin’ in my body.’ I mostly did it for fun, but I think it came out really funny and a way to describe Zoey.”
Zoey Salgado, another student who is not in art class but is doing Photoshopping, has recently become a little obsessed with it. When I asked her about what she was working on right now, she replied by showing me a photo of Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson and several people from Marfa ISD climbing on him. It was very … interesting to see.
As for me (Flavio), I have been working on a project that basically has cats on the moon. There are a lot of cats, a variety from the internet, and then I added Samantha and Mochi (my cat). However many you’re imagining is an understatement of how many I added. I’m planning on adding more people and more cats.
Madison and I (Itzel Urrutia) are currently working on a project where basketball player for the Philadelphia 76ers Kelly Oubre Jr. is carrying both of us in his hands and is lifting us up on both because he is very strong! And we’ve got a big celebrity crush on him.
The Marfa students are really enjoying this project –– during Ms. Powers’ second period conference you can find a lot of freshmen using all the new computers to manipulate imagery into weird and wonderful creations, or at least weird ones. The 45 minutes of fifth period aren’t enough for them! Many are hoping for positive results from their Photoshopping projects, and are using them to make cards and posters for fellow students. Chinati’s people also seem to be happy about our projects and seem to have positive feedback and are helping us every step of the way!
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Celeb crushes
By Dariela and Maddie
Everyone has at least one celebrity crush and others may have multiple. We all have dreamt of living a perfect life with our celebrity crushes. Although we know that our dreams will possibly never come true. But it’s fun to see our crushes online and fall in love.
The teacher at MISD that has the biggest obsession with a celebrity is Ms. Powers. Ms. Powers’ obsession with Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson is always growing. We asked her what’s so special about him for Ms. Powers to be in love. “Um … I like The Rock because, A. He has big muscles, B. He’s bald, C. He has a sense of humor. I read an interview, and I thought that he’s a good guy. He is smart, funny, has muscles, and he’s bald. Which is definitely my type.” To really show her love, Ms. Powers has multiple “The Rock” belongings. She owns “The Rock Pillow,” which she stole from Marfa Public Radio station. However, Ms. Powers disagrees and says that it was gifted to her. But we all saw her steal it. She now sits on a pillow with The Rock’s face everyday. She also has about three cutouts of The Rock’s face throughout her classroom. She also has a cutout from a magazine of The Rock that a student collaged in a way where she is piggy back riding on him. Last, but not least, she has a large painting of her and The Rock’s portrait together that she made as an example a few years ago.
Michael B. Jordan is by far the most popular celebrity crush at Marfa High School. Janayah Villa, a junior at MISD, said things about Michael B. Jordan that are unprintable for the Marfa Shorthorn Newsletter. Janayah said she especially likes him because he’s “her type.” Zoey Salagdo, a freshman at MISD, explained, “His teeth are so pearly white and … [the rest is unprintable].” Itzel Urrutia, a freshman at MISD, said, “His abs are so juicy and plump … and he’s always so shiny, bro.” Madison Cash, a freshman at MISD said that she, too, has a crush on him. Belen Soto, a freshman at MISD added that, “He looks so good in his Creed movies.” Samantha Martinez, a senior at MISD, has a different opinion, though, and she said, “Michael B. Jordan is overrated and Quavo and Offset are cuter than him.” It is concluded that most people find Michael B. Jordan attractive, but he may be considered overrated.
Coach Pippen is in love with Ryan Reynolds and Bradley Cooper. Pippen said that they were both his celebrity crushes. We asked why they are his celebrity crushes, and he said, “They are hot.” But realistically his real celebrity crush is Elizabeth Olsen and Scarlett Johanson. Pippen is an indecisive man and really loves his Marvel actors.
Mrs. Donaldson is very similar to Coach Pippen. Both share a love for hot superheroes. Mrs. Donaldson has eyes for Henry Cavill (Superman). Zoey Salgado is also a fan of hot superheroes. Zoey finds Tom Holland and Andrew Garfield to be pretty dang cute. Both played Spiderman during different eras. Marvel actors and superheroes are very popular celebrity crushes throughout MISD.
Jeremy Allen White has recently been rediscovered by Giselle Torres, ever since that Calvin Klein photoshoot. She believes he’s super hot and he’s a baddie. She has seen him on Netflix on the show “Shameless.” She added that she thinks he’s a pretty good actor and that makes him even hotter.
Luis Solis’ celebrity crush is Jennifer Lopez. “She’s so beautiful and glowy, she just glows and shines,” he said, in awe. Jennifer is indeed very glowy and shiny. Even at the ripe old age of 54 she still looks so youthful and mystical. Jennifer is a queen and is multi-talented as an actress as well as a musician.
Celebrity crushes are widely spread throughout MISD. Everyone has different types and preferences. We all like to have a crush even though we have never even met the people we have crushes on. But it’s so fun to watch movies, listen to music, watch sports, and see commercials and just fangirl and fall in love through the screen.
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Softball
By Janayah
Spring is here which means it’s time for softball! The first game of the year was a tournament in Pecos on Thursday, February 15.
“We only practiced once for like an hour before the game,” said freshman Dariela Muñoz. The first game we played was against Lake View and we won 15-2. The next game we played was against Pecos and we lost.
I interviewed freshman Zoey Salgado to see how she’s feeling about softball season. I asked what she thinks this softball year will be like. She replied, “I think the tournaments will be fun, but the games will be boring.” I then asked what she likes to do during practice and she said, “I like hitting and warming up.” I then asked what’s her least favorite thing in softball? She said, “The temperature! It’s been hot recently.” I agree with Zoey, it’s been really hot and the sun is always in my face and I can’t see, especially when we are in the outfield.
Next, I interviewed sophomore Kayla Vasquez. I asked her how she thinks this year’s softball season will be? She said, “I think we need a practice where everyone is there and we are having a good time so we enjoy it.” I then asked her favorite thing about softball. She said, “My favorite thing in softball is having fun in the dugout and having a pop fly in the air because you have all the intensity on you to catch it and when you do catch it everyone gets pumped.” I then asked Kayla if there’s anything she doesn’t like about softball, and she said, “Throwing with you (Jan), because you get mad at me and you call me out in front of everyone, but it’s okay because you are my friend.” This reporter acknowledges getting mad at Kayla sometimes because she throws to the ground sometimes.
I interviewed freshman Giselle Torres. I asked her how she thinks softball will go, and she said, “This year’s gonna be ok. I think, umm, we have some pretty good players this year on the team. I know we lost, but I know we can work hard this year and do good.”
Giselle walked away after that exchange, so I asked freshman Madison Cash what her favorite and least favorite thing is in softball, and she said, “I like catching and hitting, but I do not like fielding because it’s lowkey hard, and I don’t like grounders because they be jumping at me and stuff.”
I asked freshman Daniela Fernandez what’s her favorite thing about softball, and she said, “Batting is okay, but after what happened I’m scared.” I then asked if she could tell me what happened and she said, “Bro, I got hit by the softball in the eye.” Anyone who has seen Dani recently knows that this is true. I asked how, and she said, “It hit me right in the eye, we were throwing, and it hit me, and my glasses broke.” I asked how badly it hurt, and she said, “It didnt hurt till the day after –– it looked like I got jumped … I couldn’t eat or smile or laugh because of how badly it hurt, because of how bad it was bruised.” I asked if she went to the doctors and she said, “Yes, they said I was fine, but my cheekbone is swollen and it won’t go down, and it also popped a blood vessel in my eye.” I asked her if she will still be able to practice softball, and she said, “Uh I don’t even know, I hope so.”
I then asked her how she thinks softball will go this year, and she said, “Good, I hope … The girls played really well, so yeah this year for softball will be good.”
I agreed. This reporter thinks we are doing good so far, but we for sure do need to keep practicing and we will be really good!