Warriors Territory Heats Up

Selfie Stick! 

It's a hot winter, at least in terms of activities and exciting happenings 

on campus here at YVHS!

Academic Luncheon

Warriors were treated to an early release from 6th period and a free lunch celebrating some academic successes! Over 200 students were invited to partake of this fun event, provided through Allyn Monzon and our amazing After School Program, in collaboration with Renaissance Leadership. Students honored met one of the following criteria:

• Honor Roll for Spring Semester 2014 (3.5 and up) 
• Principal's List for Spring 2014 (4.0 and up) 
• GPA improvement of .5 or better from Fall '14 to Spring '14
• GPA improvement of 1.0 or more from Fall '14 to Spring '14

These students were also honored at the Fall WOW assembly and were given rewards cards that they were encouraged to use in each of their classes, for things including extra credit, a homework pass, early release for lunch, and more. 

Congrats Warriors! We are proud of you! And Keep up the great work! 

ASB Hosts Leadership Development Day with over 200 Middle Schoolers

Middle School Leadership students made the trek to their award winning *6 years running of Excellent California Leadership Program Awards* high school counterpart, to participate in a great day of activity, challenge, and a positive motivating message to bring back to their schools. 

Warriors Treated to Mike Smith Live! 

Students were treated during CAHSEE week to a motivational speaker by the name of Mike Smith, a young midwestern grad who is the CEO for two non-profit companies with partnerships with Red Bull, Jostens, and Tilly's, including a philanthropic movement called Skate for Change, where young skateboarders get together with backpacks full of supplies, water, and food and distribute them to the local homeless.

Mike came to YV to bring a message- What will be your legacy? 

Alums back to Dance

Dance 3 has been treated to some amazing guest teachers- their older counterparts! Several dancing grads have come back to treat the dancers to master classes, bringing back what they have learned since leaving a Warrior, and letting the kids know what about the YV experience helped them in their dance pursuits. Guest teachers have included Steve Sese ('08 grad) who is graduating from SF State in May and has been dancing with several crews; Amec Lujan and Jesus Lizarraga ('14 grads) who currently dance and compete with Chapkis, and more. #AlwaysaWarrior

Amec and Jesus back on stage with Cooper for Warmups

New Voice at Basketball Games

We have a new emcee at our basketball games, though you wouldn't know it from his seasoned attitude and easy manner in pumping up the crowd! Sophomore Jacob Samuels stepped into the role when his dad was slated to announce the games- he expressed his interest in the role and he has been awesome for the game atmosphere! Look for more great things in the future from this young Warrior!

Former YV Resource Officer Earns Officer of the Year nod! 

Former Warrior SRO Michael Jaime received the prestigious City Police Officer of the Year Award for 2014. Officer Jaime is now working on the homeless unit and continues to come to YV to help when he can. Congratulations!!! #Alwaysawarrior #Youcan'tleave

Back in the Saddle!

Winter Madness

(In a good way) 

First off, to our followers, we apologize for the lapse in coverage- YVHS has been doing some outstanding things this winter, but one of them has not been the Internet. So we are hoping to catch up and stay up after this week! 

Now, in Warrior Territory, we celebrated the holidays in a ton of different ways. The halls were adorned with cheer and the skies were clear, scarves are out, boots strapped on, and winter is upon us. Here are some of the things happening in the winter months at YVHS. 

Winter Spirit Week

Our ASB Spirit Commisioners Michael Mendoza and Josiah Cisler put together a fun week for winter spirit week- with students encouraged to bust out their craziest socks, winter hats, holiday colors and of course, the sweaters you only wear once a year. 

Eren Tugcu and ASB Teacher Corissa Stobing sporting the holiday sweaters

Warrior Jam
ASB put on our annual Warrior Jam event, where students come out to meet this year's basketball teams, our own version of Midnight Madness. Prizes are given, a three point and free throw contest, and of course the ever-popular Staff/Student basketball game. This year's game was light on the ladies of the Warrior Staff, and for this reason we believe, the staff lost to the students for the first time in this blogger's recollection. Next year, Warrior fans. The comeback will be huge. 

Kimmel Sadat (12th) and Mark Tran, our AD go head to head in a free throw contest.
Tran dominated. Of course. Unbiased opinion obviously. 

Carols by Candlelight

Our 27th Annual Carols by Candlelight was a huge hit thanks to the hard work of the wonderful performing artists! Concert Choir, Madrigals, Guitar, and Dance 3 all performed holiday hits and standards, and the audience was treated to homemade cookies as well! This is a tradition and a favorite, and many arts alums came out to show their support and love for the staff involved - Mr. Carter our vocal music director, at the helm of this wonderful tradition for the last two decades and counting, and his counterpart Ms. Kelly Cooper, running the dance program side of things. What a great event, and thank you to all for attending! 

MadMen give it to us Country Style

Winter One Act Plays

The Drama Club (and class!) once again produced some outstanding one act plays for our English classes to enjoy, and our evening audience on Wednesday the 17th as well! Directed by Ms.Cooper and Ms. Hopper were two short comedies - Office Rumors and Detective Story. The third play was longer, called the Fourth Wall, and directed by Rachel Gephart, our resident stage manager! The Spiegatorium was packed to the brim, reminding us thespians that our next YVHS project REALLY needs to be a theater. What do you think Warriors? Can we get that going? 

Wall to wall audiences for Winter One Acts. Time to expand.

Audiences were delighted and the actors did a wonderful job of pulling these together! 

The One Act Cast. Plus Special Emcee Guest Leah Cooper (5) 

Hall Decorating 

Our Annual Club Hall Decorating contest brought out some great new themes this year, and clubs worked hard to deck the halls of YV and put us all in the holiday spirit! The winning hall received a pizza party, and this year's winning hall was Nightmare Before Christmas, by our brand new Breaking Down the Walls club and the Art Club! (obviously artists--- the decorations were amazing!) 

Senior Breakfast

Our incredibly busy (and state recognized) ASB put together yet another event this week, our annual Senior Breakfast. Seniors were treated to a fresh cooked meal by the senior teachers, playing board games while waiting, in pajamas, and sipping orange juice. They were then serenaded by the same teachers with some interesting carols. Some surprises all around, including Principal Stephen Brady's impressive baritone! What a great time for the class and a great send off tp Winter Break! 

Just Dance Battles

Senior Breakfast highlights

Mid-Month Madness is Back

Staff went back to some sweet traditions from the Principal Sheila Walker days, and that included MidMonth madness staff bonding! Nice for the Warriors to see each other outside of the copy room and be reminded of our human-ness. Yay for staff bonding! 

Raising for Relief Club

Run by Co-Presidents (Seniors) Ariana Whitmarsh and Kayla Samuels, the Raising for Relief Club put in their charity efforts this Winter with a successful canned food drive, and by getting together and cooking for the Winter Nights shelter! What a way for our Warriors to spend their holiday break! #WarriorProud

Spotlight On- ART- with our own amazing NATHAN VASARHELY

If you ever have a chance to walk down the 600 wing, you may be treated to some of the outstanding projects that Mr. Vasarhely has his class focusing on. We wanted to take a moment to talk to Mr. V about what the classes were working on with these outstanding tile renderings of John Wayne.

"In my Art Design, Art II, and Advanced Art classes, we were focusing on high contrast imagery. As a source of inspiration we first looked at a street art documentary, "Exit Through The Gift Shop." This doc focused on the stencil art of Sherpard Fairey (OBEY) and Banksy. As an introductory project we collaborated on these John Wayne posters as a class. Collaboration is an important aspect we were working on this first quarter. First, I made screenshots of several images that I then copied and pasted into Photoshop. I then changed the image size and adjusted the threshold to transform the images into high contrast black and white. After I made a grid of the image with one inch squares. Each student was then responsible for three little squares, that they transcribed onto larger 8 in. squares using a quadrant system. After creating a contour drawing, they started collaging down the black and white areas using magazines. I call each grid a mini abstract piece of artwork. What we do at the end is piece each square together as a puzzle. (This is done with a number/letter combination set forth at the beginning of the process.) ---- The grid system is taken from the portraits created by artist Chuck Close. Since much of the imagery from many modern street artists is taken directly from popular culture, we mimicked that with each classic John Wayne character.

Rooster Cogburn - "Tue Grit"
Captain Nathan Brittles - "She Wore A Yellow Ribbon" ----- "Actually where I got my first name; My dad is a big JW fan"
Ethan Edwards - "The Searchers"
Tom Doniphon - "The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance"

Clearly not John Wayne, but a similar process was used in creating Frankenstein with a different medium

What is this wet stuff?

Winter Season at YVHS 

As the Warriors gear up for a busy week of holiday activities, we bust out the galoshes and umbrellas and hunker down in the corners of the buildings to try to stay dry. A lot has happened in Warrior territory so let us recap some highlights--

Performing Arts takes Broadway... In SF

Performing arts students took a day to the city to dance and watch one of the greatest Fosse musicals, Chicago. 

They started the morning on Bart getting off at 16th and Mission to walk to the renowned ODC dance center, taking an energetic class called Fusion Rhythms from teacher Dantè. He took the dancers through aerobic routines in a variety of styles from Afro Hatian to Salsa and the students sweat for a good hour and a half, garnering a lot of attention and compliments from class regulars who noticed the "intruders" immediately. 

Then it was off to the Curran theater where John Stapleton (of Seinfeld fame) played the enigmatic Billy Flynn. Great day had by all, and the Health Academy juniors joined in for the show too!

The Health Academy took their own trip to the theater that day as well- #WarriorProud

 NCS CROSS COUNTRY

Our runners were treated to a wet final as they ran the NCS race in the rain. Junior Jorge Bernabe Velazquez finished 27th overall in this high capacity race and the Warriors represented well with 5 males and one female runner qualifying. Congrats to our outstanding runners! 

WOW ASSEMBLY celebrates achievement 

The annual fall wow assembly did not disappoint, and students were honored for GPA improvement, Honor Roll, Principal's list, and more. The Assembly also featured our Golden Warrior announcement, with 16 seniors reviewing the honor. 

Finally, our many talented students were featured with Nelson Flores, Rosemary Cruz, and Dance 3 ending with the staff dancers working their stuff to TI. 

Warrior Family loses a legend

Mr. Art Atkinson, who taught at Ygnacio for 35 years, passed away over the thanksgiving break. Mr. Atkinson had retired in 1986, and was living in Oregon. He is survived by his daughter Deirdre who followed in the legend's footsteps and is a teacher as well. Mr. Atkinson was known to the students as the 'Big Mamoo', and is remembered fondly for pushing the envelope and his dedication. He would greet students at the door and instruct them not to disturb the 'Wa', when they came in, teaching them to focus their energy in a positive way in the classroom and leave the drama behind. He was a huge Bob Dylan fan and would deconstruct lyrics with the students, recognizing the poetry in great songs. 

We will miss you Mr. Atkinson, and thank you for all you gave to all of our Warriors. 

Mr Atkinson and his Daughter Deirdre

A YVHS school newspaper from 1969

Save the Daylight!

WARRIOR NEWS 

In Collaboration with Aidee Hernandez (Senior), Rafael Maciel (Senior) and Crystal Roblejo (freshman) 

Warriors have a LOT going on, so it is a great thing we manipulated the clocks to eek out some extra daylight! Let's look at what's been happening in Warrior Territory...

College Fair
For the second year in a row, a district college fair descended upon our campus, inviting students in the MDUSD and presenters from colleges around the country to meet together and discuss what they could do for each other. The fair was incredibly organized, spear-headed by our own PTSA President, Ilana Samuels, and students came to get an idea of what schools were out there and how they can get their feet in the door.

Combined Choirs Concert
For the second year in history, the choirs of MDUSD came together musically at Ygnacio Valley for a wonderful combined choir concert. Each group sang pieces prepared at their school sites, and they had the opportunity to sing together for a couple of numbers as well. What a wonderful event! And thank you to all of the vocal music directors for bringing the kids together in song! See a video HERE...

Guitar Concert OGMS
YV guitar players, led by Geoff Carter, collaborated with their younger counterparts at Oak Grove Middle for a guitar concert that was a wonderful success! Congrats to all of the strummers and thank you to Mr Carter for all of the hard work pulling this together! 

Puente Field Trip
Our Puente program, in its 3rd year, took their students on a whirlwind tour of Southern California colleges for a wonderful field trip organized by program leaders Kara Yu and Socorro Lomas. Students traveled by charter bus and averaged about 4 college visits a day, favorites being UCLA and USC of course. The program goal is to graduate college bound students, ones who would be the first in their families to go on to higher education - and this trip was certainly inspiring to our kids! Thank you Ms. Yu, Ms. Hopper and Ms. Lomas! 

Special Olympics
For the 5th year at YVHS, the regional Special Olympics came to our campus, where students (including some Warriors) competed in soccer. Over 80 YV students served as volunteers for the event, coordinated by interim VP Mike Ing. Many classes brought their students out to watch, and it was a wonderful day on campus for all! Be on the lookout for the spring dates for the Special Olympics track and field event as well! 

Senior Night Football and Cheer
Regular football season wrapped up with a game versus Clayton Valley Charter at home, and we took some time to honor our senior football players and cheerleaders for their last home game. 12 seniors on football and 7 on cheer were escorted by their parents, families, teachers and loved ones to wish them luck for the years ahead and to say thank you for all you've done for the school- we are proud to have you Warriors! 

 

NAPA Band Review
Our marching band also celebrated their seniors in their last March of the year at the Napa Band Review. While the Golden Warriors did not place, they had a wonderful showing at this prestigious event and we look forward to them marching on the French Quarter this winter!

Watch part of their performance HERE

Halloween

Halloween was festive and fun for the Warriors with what felt like the largest costume participation we have had in years! Some great creative costumes came out for the occasion and a good time had by all..