Category: General News

Flag Football Enrichment By Cory Dupree

Academy Prep Center of Tampa offers enrichment classes to all their students. Enrichments are after academic classes that are either learning or athletic based. The enrichments we have are Spanish club, Advanced Art, Dancing, Chess, Choir, Sewing and Crafts and Digital newspaper. All of these enrichments are cool but the one that I’m interested in most is the Flag Football enrichment.

You may ask what a Flag football enrichment is, well a flag football enrichment is an enrichment that is basically just flag football that has some of the best football players in 6th, 7th, and 8th grade. I have chosen to interview some of my friends in the enrichment which are Taylor Gardener, J’london Bivens, and Caiden Pope. I got to ask them how they feel about flag football and a lot more questions. 

                                           J’london’s Interview

Cory: Have you played flag football before or outside of Academy Prep?

J’london: Yes.

Cory: Cool!

Cory: What positions do you like to play?

J’london: Wide Receiver, Defensive back, and Safety. 

Cory: Good choices!

Cory: Do you have fun?

J’london: Yes.

Cory: I’m glad you have fun.

Cory:  Who is a good player on your team?

J’london: Zion and Moses are good.

Cory: Who do you work best with?

J’london: Zion.

Cory: What does flag football mean to you?

J’london: I guess it means to me a sport that I can do and play just to get away from home.

                                                  Caiden’s Interview

Cory: Have you played flag football before or outside of Academy Prep?

Caiden: Yes.

Cory: What positions do you like to play?

Caiden: Receiver

Cory: Do you have fun?

Caiden: Yes.

Cory: Who is a good player on your team?

Caiden: Henry.

Cory: Who do you work best with?

Caiden: Henry.

Cory: What does flag football mean to you?

Caiden:  To me it means a sport that I can be competitive at.

                                    Taylor’s Interview

Cory: Have you played flag football before or outside of Academy Prep?

Taylor: No.

Cory: What positions do you like to play?

Taylor: Center and corner.

Cory: Do you have fun?

Taylor: Yes.

Cory: Who is a good player on your team?

Taylor: Aryanna Gregory.

Cory: Who do you work best with?

Taylor: A’niya Hutchingson.

Cory: What does flag football mean to you?

Taylor: It means a sport where you can move yourself. The reason I play flag football is because I like throwing and catching footballs.

The Untold Secret of October! By Hezekiah Davis

We all know October as the creepy month, the month of Halloween, or the weirdest month of them all but have you heard of the untold secret of October. It turns out October is Pizza Month! I bet you love pizza. Well, there’s not only a day of pizza, February 9, but there’s a whole month for it. I’m here to tell you the secrets of October, the good pizza, the creepy pizza, and even the bad pizza! While reading this I hope others begin to realize the importance of Pizza Month and how much it’s overlooked. 

The Horror of Pizza Month

There are some cons to celebrating Pizza Month. You might think pizza month will be the best month and there will be no complications to this, well, that’s where you’re wrong! Pizza companies such as Dominos or Pizza Hut are practically competing on selling pizza. They are planning to have self driving cars, drones, and even robots to sell pizza. They’re trying to get access to order from Alexa Echo Dot or to even text to order. This may be convenient, but it’s kinda a problem to rely on electronics for everything. Especially the little stuff such as delivering, racing and other stuff! You can make pizza spooky, but there’s a difference between spooky and dangerous. Celebrating Pizza Month means that there might be pizza delivery related accidents. As technology advances, so will the competition of selling pizza.

The Magnificence of Pizza Month

Don’t get me wrong, there’s benefits to October as Pizza Month. Even though Pizza Month is overlooked, there are lots of benefits to it, despite the negatives to it. With Pizza Month places like Pizza Hut, and Cici’s, they’re willing to give discounts or even good deals. For example, California Pizza Kitchen gives out big discounts and are planning to try and give out 10,000 free pizzas for FREE. If you’re in California and you love pizza, go to Grubhub.com and claim your free pie. No taxes or driving fees will be charged. That’s not all! There’s much more benefits to October as Pizza Month and it shouldn’t be overlooked any more. It’s just as good of a holiday as Halloween. When you’re getting free pizza, that can be donated to the homeless or the hungry. With the discounts, these pies can be more affordable for the less fortunate. This may seem like nothing now, but later on this can be a buffet of different types of pizza for people who are starving, people who will eat anything they can find to survive. When Pizza Month is recognized, the hungry can be fed and people can get free meals. 

Pizza Month is Amazing!


Fifth Grade Field Trip to Crystal Springs By Antez Crossman and Cory Dupree

The fifth grade Class at Academy Prep went to Crystal Springs on September 7th 2019.

Crystal Springs is a 530-acre sanctuary devoted to environmental education and dedicated to the preservation of Florida’s natural environment, Crystal Springs Preserve features a wealth of wilderness experiences for visitors. 

Within the property is Crystal Springs, there is a spring system, discharging 30 million gallons of water per day. Everyone in Tampa gets their water from the Spring. The spring water is very clean but goes through many different cleaning processes until it gets to our homes.

My name is Cory Dupree and I am in 5th grade. I was fortunate enough to be able to GeoCache with my friends during this field trip. Geocaching is hunting for and finding a hidden object by using a GPS and plugging in coordinates using longitude and latitude. I also got to swim in the very cold spring. There I saw grasshoppers, birds, tadpoles, and different kinds of lizards.

In the spring I saw lots of rocks, bugs and a huge hole in the ground where the water comes from. After we finished our activities we got to eat pizza, brownies, and soda.

My name is Antez Crossman and I am in 5th grade. My experience at Crystal springs was wild. I saw a turkey and a flat fish. That was fun! Coach Byrnes and Ms. Wyluda swam with us in the springs.

The bus ride was fun because we listened to music and I talked about Yu-Gi-Oh with my friend David and Ms.Wyluda knew what Yu-Gi-Oh was. That was the best part, it was nice to talk about Yu-Gi-Oh. There is something called an aquifer that makes bubbles. The water was freezing cold and I was scared at first to swim to in spring because I had never done that before. I was also a little scared of the animals and fish that might have been swimming underneath me. I got to swim with a very nice lady. She helped me overcome my fear. The lady that help me overcome my fear of swimming was very kind for doing that.

Overall this trip was a lot of fun and I got to make awesome memories. If you get to go on this trip you should bring a bodysuit because the water is cold!

Guidance By Nevaeh Hargrove

Ms. Malone is the guidance counselor at Academy Prep Center of Tampa. She is one of the most helpful people to many students and helps people cope with problems using a variety of methods. Neveah Hargrove, an editor for the digital newspaper, interviewed students on campus about their experience with Ms. Malone and recorded their responses. She asked students to name their favorite method that Ms. Malone used to help them cope with their emotions. Neveah also asked what Ms. Malone would do to help them feel better and calm down. All the students interviewed had very good answers to the questions that were being asked.

London Ponder is one of the students that has benefitted from speaking to Ms. Malone. London struggled to deal with rudeness from her other classmates and she states “Ms.Malone tells me don’t listen to the hate and be my own person because the hate should not hold you down it should make you wanna do better.” London said her story should inspire others, “to do as Ms.Malone says because it will make you feel better and give you the confidence that you need.” Also, this shows that Ms.Malone really cares about the student body and is willing to help them with any problem that may come their way. Jalicia Jackson is another student who was interviewed. She says that Ms. Malone gives her good ways to take her mind off things and cope with emotions.

Ms. Malone’s methods have given the students guidance on how to cope with their problems and it shows that the students really appreciate Ms. Malone for all the work that she has done.

Neveah stated, “I appreciate Ms. Malone because even though I don’t go to her a lot she can still help me in many ways without begin in her office, it can be by the court just giving me inspiration words of wisdom or in the lunchroom telling me to staying out of silent lunch and keep doing what I do.”

Welcome to Academy Prep! By Isaiah Booquet

The Academy Prep students are getting started with the 2019 school year. I am in my first year at Academy Prep and one of my favorite things about going to school here is our enrichment program. We have many enrichments like Flag Football for girls and boys, Digital Newspaper, Band, Cooking and so much more! Some of the students are really happy when they get to pick their enrichment. I am glad I got to be in Digital Newspaper because writing about things I enjoy is great!  

I am in three different enrichments, they are Digital Newspaper, Organic Gardening, and Friday Fun Chess. And so far, I have already learned lessons about chess and increased my gardening knowledge. In Chess, I learned that the more you play and get better you will learn to make good decisions in life. Also in Organic Gardening I’m learning how to plant fruits and flowers. In these enrichments, I’m learning how to work hard to achieve different goals. In Digital Newspaper, I’m learning the skills of a professional journalist and how to make interesting stories. I’m glad I go to this school because at my old schools I would’ve never got enrichments or life lessons. Also I’m really excited of what I’m going to learn this year in my enrichments. In conclusion, this year is turning out great already and im really excited and ready for what it will bring!