Student Submissions

How to Communicate like a Pro

Communication is a vital part of our daily lives. From talking to your best friend about video games, to giving a presentation to the general public, or to flipping off a driver that cut you off on the interstate. All of these are forms of communication. We communicate in so many different ways, and you probably don’t even know it. But we can start out with the most common form. Verbal communication.

Verbal Communication

Verbal communication is when we speak to each other using our mouths to express ideas or beliefs. Like me talking with my buddy at lunch about how repulsive the food is. Or me calling up my boss to ask for my pay check, that's a form of verbal communication. But it can be seen on a bigger scale, like the president addressing the nation, or a motivational speaker telling the audience all the heartwarming things they pay to hear. Verbal communication is one of the most important forms of communication though, as it’s the most clear and common. Verbal communication has the smallest amount of miscommunication, the easiest to spread an idea and get a  point across. But also we see religion get spread with verbal communication with pastors in churches. Especially mega churches. But the church also uses the help of written communication, as the Bible is a perfect example of written communication. But we have to talk about the opposite of verbal communication first. 

Nonverbal Communication

Now take everything you know about verbal communication, and do the opposite. Nonverbal communication is when you use your body language, eye gaze, artifacts, basically anything except your mouth to communicate. The perfect demonstrator of nonverbal communication is Art the Clown from the “Terrifier” franchise. Art is a murderous mime that refuses to talk but gets every emotion across with his facial expressions and body language. You can infer that he is gonna kill someone when he gives his smirk showing all teeth, has his eyes slightly squinted with his head tilted, waves his finger to you, and goes to pick up an axe while being dressed as a blood stained clown. You really don’t trust that at all. But if a lumberjack with a big bushy beard, wearing his flannel and jeans, causally walking and whistling goes to pick up an axe, you might not be as nervous. Or the popular girl in school can say a lot by looking you up and down then giving a crooked smile that says she thinks your outfit is disgusting and it belongs in the trash. But her mouth doesn’t say that, her body language does though. But nonverbal communication can help someone seem more friendly by having a more laid back posture while wearing casual clothes while someone who wants to be intimidating might have strong posture, wear a suit with a tie, and might never crack a smile during the conversation. All of this goes to show you can really say a lot by saying nothing at all. Sometimes you don’t have to even be present in a conversation, but you can still communicate your ideas. 

Written Communication

Written communication is truly one of the most time resistant ways to communicate. Over time, what someone says to you verbally or non-verbally can mutate to something that is not what actually happened. So maybe my buddy wore a red shirt today, but my brain doesn’t quite remember such small details, so I thought he wore a blue shirt. Then I go tell people he wore a blue shirt, well now I’m just innocently lying to everyone. Everyone’s brain does this. But written communication is a form that can’t be misinterpreted in that sense because written 

communication is when an idea or belief is conveyed through being documented. So for example, books, texting, this essay, mail, you get the idea. A popular form of written communication is the Bible, as it’s the most widely known form of written communication around the world. But even silly stories, like the Goosebumps series, is a form of written communication. But we need written communication because it doesn’t just tell stories to one person, or to a nation. But it’s communicating what is going on in the world, to future generations. Thanks to written communication, we have a sense of history, without written documents from the past, we have zero knowledge of anything prior to the internet. So written communication is more than just reading an email of how you are getting laid off, it is the most important form of communication in terms of understanding the past, to help shape a better future. But only if there was a form of communication that could overcome the language barrier. Oh wait, there is one.

Visual Communication

Now to me, I view this form of communication as the greatest partner in crime when it comes to expressing a point of view or sharing an idea. While yes it can be seen on its own, as a piece of artwork or a beautiful landscape photo, it’s hard to get a certain idea or emotion across as the piece can be interrupted in many different ways. But with the use of charts and graphs, you can verbally communicate your points in more depth, while the chart or graph is telling the numerical information and statistics. For example, let’s say we are in a business meeting talking about cell phone sales. The presenter pulls up a chart that says people in Beverly Hills have a tendency to buy more cell phones than people over in Rochester. Now while the graph says that, the presenter can go on to explain that people in Beverly Hills probably buy more cell phones because the majority of the people there have more money than the majority of the people in Rochester. So visual communication can help you be way more efficient in communicating two 

things at once. It also comes in handy if you are using a billboard for an ad-campaign, you can pair an image of a family having a wonderful time at a petting zoo along with a little bit of written communication and saying that the petting zoo is going to guarantee you a ton of fun, and that's no bull crap! We see visual communication all over pairing with verbal communication and written communication to help communicate quickly and effectively.

So those are some of the bigger ways to communicate. Now obviously we could go into more detail about each and find other ways to communicate but if you know these 4 big ones, I promise you can get your points across as clearly, efficiently, and effectively as possible.

Texas Station Hit by Severe Storm Damage

Blake Wagner

On Sunday June 8, 2025, a series of severe storms hit Texas and Oklahoma, some of which were tornadic. At 11PM, one of these storms hit north of Abilene, Texas, hitting the studios of KTXS, the ABC affiliate in Abilene. This caused the tower KTXS used for their over the air signal to collapse on impact, windows broke, the roof had parts torn off. 

Meteorologist Caiden Dinkins was at the station at the time, and said the experience was unimaginable. From an article on the KTXS website, she recalls "Quite literally, our studio roof was ripped off its hinges, if you will," she said. "Our studio roof just blew off right above me and our Chief Meteorologist, Mark Rowlett, as we were trying to take cover from kind of an unexpected situation." She was also outside during the storm, and luckily has not been injured. She later stated "You don’t ever expect to experience something like that, the power went out in the studio and the whole entire station and we were walking back into the studio. You just feel this, almost, suction kind of taking you with these winds as this roof is pulling off. My ears popped, I felt like I was gravitating towards that area that was opening and me and Mark just, all we could do was take cover and hope for the best."

Copycat

Malekih Harkey

I walked into the hallway just getting done with my least favorite class, math. I then saw her, the girl that would eventually ruin the next few weeks of my life. There stood Bethany Hawks talking to my best friend Micheal Stewart. I didn’t think too much about it until I walked up to her and my eyes opened wide, there dangling in her bright blonde hair was the same pink hair extension in my hair. I talked to her a few times in the past when I was walking in the hallway but we never had a full on conversation before. What made me even more confused is she was talking to Micheal. I mean I have never seen them talk so much before. 

When she finally walked away I asked Micheal, “What was that all about?” 

He replied, “It was nothing she just was telling me about herself and what she likes.” 

I quickly threw another question at him about Bethany, “What did she tell you she liked?” 

“She said her favorite color was green, her favorite sport was soccer, and she said her favorite food was spaghetti with meatballs and hot dogs cut up in it,” he said. 

After we finished talking I just walked away and headed to my bus, strangely enough Bethany was on my bus and was in my seat.

 I asked her, “Hey Bethany, could you scoot over so I can sit down please?”

She answered quickly after, “Sure.” 

When I sat down she leaned over and said, “By the way Micheal is mine.”

I was a little confused when she said that because I didn’t think I was competition if she liked him, I am just friends with him. Before I could say anything the bus stopped in front of my house, I got out and just stood there for a few seconds confused with what she just said to me. That night while I was laying down I just thought about what she said and why she was wearing the same hair extension as me and why she was riding the same bus as me. 

The next morning finally rolled around and when I got up and stood outside for my bus. I got on my bus and like I thought she didn’t ride my bus. When I got to school I saw Bethany but Something seemed different about her, her hair was dyed from blonde to the same shade of brown my hair was. I didn’t think about all the similarities we had until about P.E, that day we were playing soccer, my favorite sport. When the teacher told us to partner up I was walking to the girl I always partnered up with but before I could make it to her Bethany jumped in front of me to partner up with my partner. That afternoon on the bus she was riding my bus again, I asked the bus driver if he could drop me off last so that I could see where Bethany lived and actually have time to look at her house aand what it looked like.  The bus finally stopped after what felt like forever because she was the last one dropped off that time. When I saw her house something about it looked very familiar, I took out my phone to see what I thought was true. I looked at the picture of me in front of my house, I then realized that her house was my house. It didn’t make a lot of sense. I mean the street name was the same as even the tree in my yard was the same as hers. I was a little shocked at what I just saw. That night when I was laying in my bed I thought to myself that if me and her had everything in common it was like she was living a copy of my life. 

In terror I looked up into my closet when a strike of lightning lit my room just enough for me to see a dark figure that looked like a person in my room with me. I just sat there trembling with fear. Then out walked Bethany but it didn’t look like Bethany, instead she looked like me. The only thing that gave it away was because of her voice. I was shocked to see her, it was like she wanted to be me, and then it clicked in my mind that SHE WAS ME! 

This Quiet Space

Libbey Menard 

In the quiet corners of my mind, shadows softly tread,

Loneliness, a silent partner, whispers of the unsaid.

The world outside moves on, vibrant and aglow,

While inside, a tempest stirs, a private, silent woe.

Yet, in this solitude, where melancholy lies,

A gentle hope might flicker, beneath the heavy skies.

For though today I wander through a thicket, dense and deep,

I hold a quiet promise, a light I'm meant to keep.

In every lonely moment, a chance to find anew,

The strength that lies within, a courage to pursue.

So, I'll embrace the stillness, learn from its harsh decree,

For even in the darkness, there's beauty yet to see. 

Crusin' for Coffee

Brock Fleishman

Sometimes school is a drag. Actually, school is a drag most of the time. However, the school has a solution. We now have a coffee cart! Now whether you need a pick-me-up in the morning or just something to carry you through the day, the coffee cart is there to back you up. With the selection of coffee, cappuccino, and hot cocoa, the coffee cart is there to help you get through your day. With a friendly staff there to serve you, there is no reason not to check it out!

And if you are concerned about pricing, don’t be! Hot cocoa and coffee are just a buck, while a cappuccino is 2 dollars. Plus, all the money from the coffee carts will go to a field trip for the staff who are involved. So in reality, you can get a coffee, while they can get a field trip. Win, Win!

Unfortunately, the cart is only around on Wednesdays for now, but this is scheduled to change for next year, increasing to 2-3 days a week for next year. Some changes are rolling out already, with iced coffee added to this week’s menu, and more surprises down the road.

So what are you waiting for? Head down to the Baker Wing, grab yourself your warm cup of joe, and help our school community have more opportunities going forward!

TLMHS Prom Setup

Zoey Abbott

The students working on setting up the prom have stated how excited they are to see the finished product of their work. However, there are some complaints about how stressful getting everything done on time is. There have been two different groups working on prom setup, which include a small group of students making the decorations and another group slightly larger working on the carnival tent. Both groups are proud of themselves and each other for all the work they have completed. Other students going to the prom have also claimed to be amazed by the work being done and that they can't wait for prom night.

TLMHS Science Fair

Rachel Sorensen

The first ever Tupper Lake High School Science Fair was held on February 13th and hosted by The Wild Center. There were four science classes that participated: Mrs. Kendall’s Environmental, Mrs. Connell’s Astronomy, and Ms. Brockway’s Chemistry and Physics students. Excited and ready to take on a challenge, students paired up, researched, created, and executed the task at hand. 

Each group put together a poster board with their weeks worth of research and trials of experiments. Students stood next to their work with smiles on their faces ready for parents, friends, community members, and teachers to admire and learn from their experiences. Some students could not attend the event in person due to other extracurriculars; however, this did not stop them from getting to interact with their audience. Groups recorded videos and made slideshows to further explain their projects and the potential questions that might follow. 

The smell of hot glue, paint, and construction paper filled The Wild Center with childhood nostalgia. Being that this was the first high school science fair it was really fun to see each group spin the classic projects like, the catapult, volcano, and greenhouse effect data. There were so many more original ideas that everyone could learn from. For example, Cohen Gerstenberger and Jonah Kendall took a passion that they had, running track, and figured out how to apply it to science. After all, science is all around us. The boys figured out the best “Stride For Success” when doing long jumps. Liza Crouse tested “Tupper Lake Water Quality” and spent weeks going around town and getting photos and samples of the water. Because our students are passionate about sports, it was a popular topic. There were multiple sports projects including how a hockey stick bends, how a volleyball spins, and how temperature affects a golf ball. 

From volcanoes, to Tupper Lake water, all the way to outer space, the science fair was a hit and with more advertising we hope that it becomes an annual event. A special thanks is necessary to our teachers for giving us the resources and encouragement to make the event happen, as well as to The Wild Center for giving us a gorgeous and science filled environment to make our projects thrive.

The Effects of Artificial Intelligence on the Creative Industry 

Alison Richer

Imagine studying for years to pursue a job that you are passionate about. Now imagine the feeling of not being able to pursue that job because Artificial Intelligence can do it faster and cheaper. This is how people in the creative industry are feeling right now because it's being used more and more to replace them. Artificial Intelligence or AI uses code to mimic human intelligence. AI has the power to mimic human art and language because of machine learning. Machine learning is when a developer uses data such as images or text to train the AI to understand how it's supposed to look. It is then able to splice this given information into new pictures and sentences. The problem is that artists are being pushed aside because AI can create things in an instant without the cost of hiring a person. Some believe that AI is helping creative jobs, but in reality AI is negatively affecting people in the creative industry because AI is stealing the work of artists, people might start being replaced by AI, and the power of AI is being overestimated.

Due to the use of others' work in the development of AI, artists are having their jobs threatened. For example, picture generating AI uses images found on the internet to create their images. One of these AI’s is called Lensa, it can create portraits from any picture the user submits. Josh O’kane writes in his article about the ethical concerns of AI that, ”...Lensa was built on a service called Stable Diffusion that was trained on 2.3 billion images from publicly available websites…such data sets can include photos taken by professional photographers and illustrations by professional artists – people who painstakingly work for years on their craft and often copyright their creations.” AI is being trained on pictures from the internet without the knowledge of their original creators. Companies are using others' art without their permission. More importantly these companies aren't paying the people who made the art they used. This hurts the artist financially because businesses are now using AI because it's cheaper and the original artist is getting nothing for their work. Furthermore, AI is only using human created images and writings, it isn't creating anything for itself. For example, “Having an original idea, expression or epiphany — having an experience that no one taught you to have — is a deeply human act and also impossible for AI…it is using preexisting building blocks drawn from its data set. This means that profoundly new, paradigm-shifting artistic choices…are nearly impossible for an AI to invent. Instead, for AI to create anything like these artistic expressions, it must observe human creativity first” (White). The only reason that AI can do what it does is because of human creativity, whenever it generates a picture there is no passion going into the product. It's merely arranging data from the art created by humans without understanding anything that it is making. The problem is that people don't care and continue to use AI to get the pictures they want and artists aren't getting any credit. Because of this, “Actors, writers and the rest of us film and television professionals might be some of the first (but not the last) to have [their] jobs threatened by so-called artificial intelligence - technology that ingests enormous amounts of ‘training data,’ crunches the numbers and spits out new combinations of the data, following the patterns it was trained on” (Gordon-Levitt). Because of AI’s ease of use and low cost, people are using it more and artists might start to lose their jobs to AI. AI that only exists because artists existed to create the art it needed to be trained on. In short, using other artists' work to train AI is negatively affecting the creative industry because artists' work is being stolen without compensation and even though AI can never truly create art people would rather use it then hiring an artist.

Additionally, businesses are becoming compelled to use AI in place of people to cut costs and push out work faster. For example, studios are starting to scan actors and create digital copies for large group scenes, this is becoming a problem for people wanting to get into acting. Pranshu Verma writes about the use of digital clones in acting, he states, “Joseph Looper a 26-year-old from Phoenix who works as a background actor in Hollywood films and aspires to leading roles, said replacing extras with digital clones would ruin a common entry-point into the business. ‘If you do a background role once and some studio owns your likeness - then they don't really need you anymore,’ he said. ‘Then you're out of a job...and how exactly is someone supposed to work their way to a speaking role if they don't have any on camera experience.’” For now, the actors being replaced by the digital clones are mostly extras. By using these clones in place of actual actors it will be a challenge for these actors to work their way up to larger roles and it will be harder for people to become noticed for their talents because the directors are not giving them a chance. Furthermore, song writers might start to face trouble when AI starts to generate its own music. O’kane states that in his conversations with a music educator and composer Max Alper that, “...as music-streaming services such as Spotify collect evergrowing pools of data about their users, Mr. Alper has warned of a moment when such services generate songs that wouldn’t require human composers or musicians – diverting any potential revenue back to the services themselves.” If AI reached a point where it can generate believable music then companies wouldn't even bother hiring musicians. This is hurting creators who have spent years learning to compose music and now it could now be done at the click of a button. Additionally, Ai is also coming after writers because of new chatbots that can easily create a paragraph. One of these new chatbots is named ChatGPT and it has become increasingly popular. Jemina Lewis writes in an article about how AI could be taking jobs that, “ChatGPT excels at the kind of bland, textureless copy we have come to expect all around us. It is fluent in the language of council websites, of banks and corporations, funeral homes, rental agencies and NHS leaflets. Such institutions may well be tempted to cut costs by using a robot instead of a copywriter.” Because AI is easier and more cost effective to use, big companies have been tempted to cut writers in place of AI. Those writers work hard to perfect their writing style and know AI can replicate it in an instant making all the work meaningless. To sum it up, businesses would rather use AI instead of hiring workers. This would put many creators out of the job and force them to give up on their work.

Another example of the negative effects of AI is that due to AI’s popularity, people are overestimating its capabilities. For example, AI has messed up on simple questions that would be easy for a human to answer. Matthew Cantor argues in his article about how people are using AI that, “It’s important to remember that while ChatGPT can seem incredibly smart, it is also incredibly stupid, as this index of some of its many failures proves. It has struggled to count the number of N’s in ‘banana’, failed to correctly answer its own riddle and agreed that 1+0.9 makes 1.8. Far more dangerously, it makes up ‘facts’ – such as a sexual harassment scandal that didn’t happen, starring a real professor”. Because AI is struggling to calculate simple math problems, it could be problematic when companies start using it. If companies aren't fact checking what the AI is generating, they may be using bad data. But by using people, they would be less likely to have bad data, so they wouldn't have to waste resources to fix it. Additionally, ”Engineers might be able, for example, to easily write a program that can make extremely complicated calculations extremely fast but struggle to train a program that can consistently and accurately recognize photographs of dogs” (“Artificial Intelligence (AI)”). AI programs can struggle to do simple tasks that would be easy for a human. The problem is that companies don't care and would rather use an AI because it's cheaper, even though the risks are greater. AI faces many technical struggles but it also faces creative struggles. AI doesn't experience the world as we do so it can create something truly original, for example “At present, AI can do many things — it can make beautiful visuals, compelling essays and interesting poetry. But it cannot participate in the fleshy, awkward, complex and unique human condition. And because it cannot experience, it cannot create something truly new and meaningful. That solidly remains the domain of us humans” (White). AI is built upon the creativity of humans, it is unable to create anything from its own emotions and experiences so in some ways it can never recreate human creativity. People are the ones with true creativity, they can create something new and exciting. AI is only copying what humans have already made, it can't create anything truly new and original. In summary, AI can do many things but people are overestimating what it can do. 

While some believe that AI is negatively affecting creators, others believe that AI is positively affecting people in the creative industry. For example, “For years, Hollywood's biggest productions have relied on artificial intelligence along with sophisticated graphic design software for cinematic effect - it de-ages movie stars, creates realistic cartoon heroes and allows directors to tweak performances without reshooting. Body scanning technology, in particular, has been a boon for productions flush out big crowds. ‘Game of Thrones’ and the Lord of the Rings franchise used AI to create imposing 10,000 strong armies” (Verma). Since movie producers can more easily create large groups and de-age actors, production can go faster and can help cut the costs of filming on a set for multiple days. Because of the technology to tweak scenes without reshoots, production doesn't have to waste more money renting out the acting space. Even though the use of digital doubles helps the producers create movies faster and makes working simpler, it hurts low level actors wanting to get into the business because they aren't getting any on screen experience. Verma argues that, “...if studios were to use these digital clones for background scenes throughout a movie, the result would eliminate a huge amount of work for low-level actors, said actress and director Justine Bateman…’ Everything they proposed that related to AI is to eliminate paying for talent. It's all bound up and inspired by greed,’ she added. ‘It does not solve a problem that currently exists in entertainment. It is only solving the problem of profit margins.’” Companies want to cut costs any way they can, but by doing so it's hurting people who want to become actors because they aren't getting the experience of being on a set. Even though AI seems to be helping the creative industry, it's only hurting it.

The creative industry is hurting because AI has become so popular. Artists' work is being taken by AI developers and so their jobs are being threatened because AI is cheaper and faster. Writers are losing to AI that can produce paragraphs faster than they could, background actors aren't able to gain experience because of digital doubles, and musicians could be in danger of being replaced by AI that can generate music specifically for the tastes of the user. The reason this is happening is because people are overestimating the capabilities of AI. AI has been shown to have trouble recognizing certain objects, it has shown to be bad at math,  it makes up facts because it uses the internet for its information, and people don't understand that AI gets all of its knowledge from the creativity of humans so it can never create something that hasn't been done before. AI is becoming more and more advanced and without safeguards in place people could easily lose their jobs to AI. AI is such a powerful tool we have, it has so much potential to do great things. But it could also be used to replace people in the workforce because of greedy corporations wanting to cut costs. Because of this, we should educate ourselves on how AI functions and what it could do to make our lives better without replacing workers. By doing this we can make a better future for ourselves.

Works Cited

Pinkie Promise 

JQ

you told me you loved me, “do you promise?”

“of course”

and yet you seem so resentful, miles away though we’re inches apart.

you said you didn’t care, but the way you said,

“ok” 

tells me that you do. and there’s this burning, painful feeling in my stomach,

and in my chest,

and in my heart and all it’s arteries,

because that 

“ok” 

almost seems to break your promise.

you told me you loved me, but when i finally said it back, when i finally opened my heart's doors to you, you looked at me and said,

“ok”

simply with your gaze.

and i knew our promise meant nothing and i wonder if you know how much that gaze can break hearts and close doors.

My Favorite Necklace -

Zoe Abbott