Vote!!! SJP Style

by Tyquia

As a minor, I do not have the privilege of voting along, with inmates. We discussed the meaning of social justice, which is a group of interacting people who fight for fair and equal rights. My classmates and I each chose a social justice topic. My topic was inmate rights. To get our opinion across, we used printmaking.Printmaking is the carving into linoleum or wood, to send a message. It is important for all citizens to have equivalent rights, including inmates. I will continue to send my message to all.

Tyquia is an eighth grade student at Stuart- Hobson M.S. She loves to expand her knowledge. She plans to one day make a mark in history.



by Luke

If you didn't already know anything about social justice, it is communities coming together to achieve equal rights. We did this project to learn more about social justice, printmaking, and it's just that time because of the presidential election. Printmaking is carving into linoleum. This is important because kids need to learn this to teach us how to vote. I learned the importance of voting and social justice.

Luke is a student from Stuart Hobson Middle School. He loves to practice hockey, soccer, and to learn German. In his spare time he likes to hang out with his friends.


by Nia

For the social justice printing assignment, I had to complete a worksheet on social justice; I also had to create or get a picture that represent the importance of voting. When we were done with the picture we drew it over on a linoleum and carved it. Then we printed it when you print your drawings, go over it with ink on a paint brush. W e did this project to acknowledge the imporrtance of voting and to actually get the chance to say what we feel and be heard in some kind of way. I learned that if you vote you will be heard but if "if you don't vote then you can't complain."

Nia is 13 yers old. She is isn't old enough to vote but she still wants to be heard.


By Xavier

Social justice is where people try to agree on something which a lot of people agree on. That may seem boring, but add printmaking and it gets interesting. When printmaking you carve out a picture that relates to your idea then pat ink on it and press ink on to something. We carve out pictures related to voting and printed them out.

Xavier liked this project a lot and enjoys basketball. He is an 8th grade student.

Columbus Monument

by Nia

The Columbus Statue at Union Station is a statue of Columbus (the man himself). This statue was made in honor of him because he brought new things to mankind.... But I think that Columbus deserves the statue but not the actual holiday. He took land that wasn't his and tried to turn Native Americans into slaves. He also started slavery of African in the Americas. Do you think he deserves this day (Columbus Day)? Before the visit to the statue we learned a lot of interesting facts like where he traveled to, how long it took, when he was born and more. At the visit to the statue, we completed a worksheet and discussed our impression of the statue and the man.

Nia is a seventh sister of eight children (all GIRLS). Nia had a brother but he died before she was born, but she knows that he is watching over her.



by Katie

Columbus is and was an influential explorer, who went out of his comfort zone to explore the unknown. We have been studying Columbus and our school is two or three blocks from a memorial for him. Our classes decided to visit his memorial. This memorial portrays Columbus in a very positive light although Columbus did some horrendous things. However, before we visited his memorial, we learned some basic facts about Columbus and prepared to take notes on what the memorial tell us about Columbus' life.

I thought this lesson as rather important to our studies because Columbus is the true father of our country, and an important figure in the age of exploration.

Katie is a lover of her beautiful, new edition, black Yamaha guitar. California girl through and through, except for her random obsession for the past eight years with the Boston Red Sox! Life revolves around music, Ugly Betty, and The Office.




by Gary

About a week ago the whole 8th grade went up to Union Station to see the Christopher Columbus statue. We've been talking a lot about Christopher Columbus in class. Some of the things we talked about was how he was so called the founder of what would become the United States and he does really deserve his own holiday. We had to write a one paragraph summary of why he does or does not deserve a holiday. I said he doesn't deserve a holiday because he didn't really discover America, he was just the only one to adventure out into the open because many people feared that the Earth was flat. I thought this lesson was a good experience and hope to do it again.

Gary is an 8th grade student at Stuart-Hobson Middle School. He loves playing sports and activities outdoors. he also loves playing online and his xbox 360.

By Niiya

While you were out...
We learned about Christopher Colombus. The reason being is because Colombus Day is coming up and we were having a debate about if he deserves a day all to himself. I don't think he does because he's not a real hero. I loved the lesson because I learned something new. I'm also glad Ms. Trenkle read those chapters about Christopher Colombus because I don't know the real stories. I always thought he did something great for this country, but the truth is he really didn't. He used the Native Americans, then enslaved them and African Americans. He also made promises that he did not keep. That day that is dedicated to him should be dedicated to other people that actually did or tried to do something for our nation.

My name is Niiya, I'm the big 1.3. My month is April, my year is easy: 1995. Aries is the only sign... Oh, let me tell you this, I love to speak my mind.

Stuart-Hobson History Reports

By Liz

The Stuart-Hobson history report was a report on Stuart-Hobson's history, obviously. We did a paragraph every day on a different part of Stuart's history...the building's traits, Stuart, Hobson, and lots of other parts of our school's history. Although the paragraph-a-night routine got kind of annoying, I learned ALOT of really interesting stuff from the report. Even though there are so many jokes you can make with some of my new-found-knowledge (our school is on the site of a former brewery!), I never will tell anyone from another school. They'll just laugh and even though that's kind of the point of a joke, I don't want people to have a bad opinion of my school. Because despite it's many faults, I've never wanted to go anywhere else!

This report was really interesting because (I know it sounds corny), I learned so much new stuff about my favorite school.

Liz is an 8th grader from Stuart-Hobson who loves Ugly Betty, and perfume, and has a HUGE dislike for spiders!



By Ben

The 8th grade's first major assignment was the Stuart-Hobson Building Report. This assignment gave us a chance to go back into history and learn about what our school really used to be like. How there wasn't always a school building where we are right now or how our school used to be two different schools. In order to get the research for this project we used primary and secondary sources and read through them to answer the questions we were given. We then made paragraphs from these questions and then combined them all. In the end we formed our Stuart-Hobson Building Report which holds the history of my school.

I thought this was a good assignment to have. I was able to learn about the history of my school while getting a grade for it. This assignment was not just busy work because I got something out of it. I feel that it was easy too because all you had to do was answer the questions given and put them into paragraph form to do a good report.

Ben is an 8th grader at Stuart-Hobson Middle School who loves to play sports. He tries to do his best at everything he does and will continue to do that. He says his family and friends are awesome and "Let's Go Angels!"



By Rachel

The Stuart-Hobson Middle School history report was about what the school went through over the years. The information in the report was about how the school got its name, what the building was made out of, when the school became desegregated and when Stuart Junior High and Hobson Middle Schools became combined. I think Ms. Trenkle gave us this report because we go to this school, we should at least know some of its history. The 8th grade class got the research from primary sources Ms. Trenkle had. The process of writing was .... we received questions and some papers (primary sources) that had information to answer the questions. So, we had to find the answers in the papers, then write a paragraph about it. We had to do this process everything for almost two weeks.

I thought the report on the history of Stuart-Hobson Middle School was good. I enjoyed learnign about it, but not writing a paragraph every night.

Rachel likes to learn history about things that involve her. She enjoyed learning about Stuart-Hobson Middle School. She's 13 years old and in Ms. Jenkins' homeroom.




By Stephen

In history class for several days, the class of '09 did research on the history of Stuart-Hobson. To do this, our teacher Ms. Trenkle gave us primary and secondary sources for research tools. The process of us writing the report was to gather all our rough drafts and combine them into one big report. We were also given a rubric on how to type it. We also made a timeline for the dates of SHMS creation.

Stephen is an 8th grader at Stuart-Hobson Middle. He likes his two cats and has been to New Jersey once.



By Alexandria

Stuart-Hobson has been a mystery to many people (mostly students). If I were to guess at least one thing about the history of Stuart-Hobson it would probably be that its old. I guess you could say I knew nothing about the school. Heck, I thought the school wa a mini mall!

During this assignment I opened hidden doors that made me proud to say SHMS is my school and some that didn't. We were given information and like a reporter wrote about them. We couldn't even skip a sentence or we might miss vital information. There was something new but not always surprising lurking in every corner. Knock-knock. Who's there? The things you thought you would never find out.

This assignment may seem very exciting but it was also very grueling. It was interesting and challenging. If I had the choice I probably would never do it again.

Alexandria is a 13 year old, experienced writer. She's played many sports including dancing and cheerleading. She also knows sign language because her parents are deaf. She moved to DC from PA in the summer of 2007 and she loves it here. "D.C. is an exciting place that I'm happy to be a part of but I'll always be an Eagles fan."



By Katie

From the first day of school Ms. Trenkle told us we would be studying our school. Although we may be the seniors of our school, we were just as ignorant about our school's history as the 5th graders, and I believe the 8th grade team knew this. So Mrs. Trenkle took it onto herself to educate us about our school. Everyday we had towering piles of DCPS history files on our already crowded table. Together my group sifted through past news articles, biographies, pictures and books to find the answer to all of our question sheets.

Though these assignments kept crowding up my small desk each night, adding one more proect to the infinite list of all the others, it was overall, well worth it. It was a personal gain of satisfaction that I can now explain to my cousin that my school is named after men equivalent in their own way to the man of his name, John Adams. Knowledge is key, the key is knowledge and to open that door of knowledge even the slightest details make all the difference in the world.

Katie is a hyperacive, awesome person with strong ideas and a need for mint chocochip ice cream now and then. She does ballet (which is not a kiddy sport, but is one of the only sports requiring all the muscles in the body), plays the guitar and reads. She has an obsession with Ugly Betty, The Office and smiley faces.