New Mitchell High School nearing completion
MITCHELL, S.D. (KELO) — A few years ago, a large project began on the land across from the then-Mitchell High School.
'School officials at the time saw that the need for the building, fixes and things like that, size and space was all, reason enough to explore the option. I think the administration that was in place previously had been planning for a new building for a period of time. So, it got to a point where, okay, now it's time to to pull the trigger,' said Justin Siemsen, principal of Mitchell High School.
Local artists set up shop at Washington Pavilion
The new building is nearing completion, with some exterior projects being finished up. Siemsen says the school will be ready next month.
'Most of our classrooms are moved over with all the teachers' materials and desks and things like that. So, we will be continuing that moving process throughout the next few weeks. And so, we're hoping that, middle of July, we'll have things situated where they need to be and ready to hit the ground running this fall,' said Siemsen.
Although the new Mitchell High School is only across the street from the old school, it will allow students easier access to the football field and Career and Technical Academy.
'We had kids that were across the street of our main school, and then they would come over here for all of our Career Technical stuff. And so that eliminates the need for for movement and during the wintertime and things like that, that'll take that problem off the table,' said Siemsen.
Once the building is finished, the school plans to welcome the community in for a tour.
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Washington Post
11 hours ago
- Washington Post
15 sets of twins are graduating from one New York high school
HEMPSTEAD, N.Y. — A high school in the suburbs of New York City will be seeing double on graduation day this weekend: Among the nearly 500 students in its graduating class, 30 are twins. It's a tight knit group. Some of the students at Long Island's Plainview-Old Bethpage John F. Kennedy High School have known each other since kindergarten, their parents meeting through a local twins club. Some even still plan family vacations together. These days, some of the twins are on a group text chain, which has helped them cope with their newfound notoriety as graduation day approaches. 'Honestly when we're together, the room is electric,' said Sydney Monka, as she attended graduation rehearsal with the other twins earlier this week. 'We're all very comfortable around each other and we all have these shared experiences so we're all bouncing off each other. It's really cool.' Save for the shared last names, though, the pairs may be hard to spot as they walk the stage Sunday at their high school graduation, held at Hofstra University in Hempstead. The students are all fraternal twins — meaning born from different eggs and sperm — so none of them are identical. Many of the twins are different genders. That doesn't make the bonds any less tight, says Bari Cohen, who is attending Indiana University in the fall. 'Especially for boy-girl twins, a lot of people think it's just, like, siblings, but it's more than that, because we go through the same things at the same time,' she said of her brother, Braydon Cohen, who is headed to the University of Pittsburgh. Most, when prodded, give a playful shrug at the curious phenomenon in the high school, which is located in an affluent, largely white district about 35 miles (56 kilometers) east of Manhattan. 'I guess there's just something in the water,' said Emily Brake, who is attending the University of Georgia, echoing a common refrain among the twins. 'We're all just very lucky. I think it's just a coincidence,' added her sister, Amanda Brake, who will be attending Ohio State University. Others acknowledge there's more than Mother Nature at work. Arianna Cammareri said her parents had been trying for years to have kids and in vitro fertilization was their last option. Back then, it was more common than it is now for IVF babies to be twins or triplets. There also may be a genetic component at play. 'There's a few twins in our family, like I have cousins that are twins, so I guess that raised the chances of having twins,' added the incoming freshman at Stony Brook University, also on Long Island. Large cohorts of twins are not unusual at Plainview-Old Bethpage. The high school had back-to-back graduating classes with 10 sets of multiples in 2014 and 2015, and next year's incoming freshmen class has nine sets of twins, according to school officials. Among the other schools around the country with big sets of graduating twins are Clovis North High School in Fresno, California, with 14 pairs, and Eleanor Roosevelt High School in Greenbelt, Maryland, with 10 pairs. Last year, a middle school in suburban Boston had 23 sets of twins in its graduating class, though that's still far shy of the record for most multiples in the same academic class. New Trier High School in Winnetka, Illinois, had a whopping 44 twin pairs and a set of triplets in 2017, according to Guinness World Records. Most of the twins at Plainview-Old Bethpage are heading off to different colleges. An exception is Aiden and Chloe Manzo, who will both attend the University of Florida, where they'll live in the same dormitory on campus and both study business, though with different majors. 'We're going to see each other a lot,' Chloe said wryly. 'Deep down, my mom knew it would be easier if we went to the same school,' she added. 'You know, like moving in, graduation, going to sports games.' Some were apprehensive about living far from their longtime partner in crime. Emma and Kayla Leibowitz will be attending Binghamton and Syracuse University, respectively. The fifth generation twins say they're already making plans for frequent visits even though the upstate New York schools are some 80 miles (130 kilometers) apart. 'I think it's gonna be really weird because we really do everything together. She's my best friend. I really can't do anything without her,' said Emma. 'We're sleeping over every weekend. I'm coming for football games — like all of it,' said Kayla. Others were looking forward to getting some breathing room. Sydney and Kayla Jasser said they're both studying fashion design — but at different colleges. Sydney is attending the University of Delaware while Kayla will be attending Indiana University. 'We could have went to the same college, but we just wanted to be able to be independent since we've been with each other forever,' Kayla said. 'It's good to get out there and have our own experiences.' ___ Follow Philip Marcelo on X at .
Associated Press
11 hours ago
- Associated Press
15 sets of twins are graduating from one New York high school
HEMPSTEAD, N.Y. (AP) — A high school in the suburbs of New York City will be seeing double on graduation day this weekend: Among the nearly 500 students in its graduating class, 30 are twins. It's a tight knit group. Some of the students at Long Island's Plainview-Old Bethpage John F. Kennedy High School have known each other since kindergarten, their parents meeting through a local twins club. Some even still plan family vacations together. These days, some of the twins are on a group text chain, which has helped them cope with their newfound notoriety as graduation day approaches. 'Honestly when we're together, the room is electric,' said Sydney Monka, as she attended graduation rehearsal with the other twins earlier this week. 'We're all very comfortable around each other and we all have these shared experiences so we're all bouncing off each other. It's really cool.' They're twins but not identical Save for the shared last names, though, the pairs may be hard to spot as they walk the stage Sunday at their high school graduation, held at Hofstra University in Hempstead. The students are all fraternal twins — meaning born from different eggs and sperm — so none of them are identical. Many of the twins are different genders. That doesn't make the bonds any less tight, says Bari Cohen, who is attending Indiana University in the fall. 'Especially for boy-girl twins, a lot of people think it's just, like, siblings, but it's more than that, because we go through the same things at the same time,' she said of her brother, Braydon Cohen, who is headed to the University of Pittsburgh. Most, when prodded, give a playful shrug at the curious phenomenon in the high school, which is located in an affluent, largely white district about 35 miles (56 kilometers) east of Manhattan. 'I guess there's just something in the water,' said Emily Brake, who is attending the University of Georgia, echoing a common refrain among the twins. 'We're all just very lucky. I think it's just a coincidence,' added her sister, Amanda Brake, who will be attending Ohio State University. Others acknowledge there's more than Mother Nature at work. Arianna Cammareri said her parents had been trying for years to have kids and in vitro fertilization was their last option. Back then, it was more common than it is now for IVF babies to be twins or triplets. There also may be a genetic component at play. 'There's a few twins in our family, like I have cousins that are twins, so I guess that raised the chances of having twins,' added the incoming freshman at Stony Brook University, also on Long Island. Other schools with large sets of twins Large cohorts of twins are not unusual at Plainview-Old Bethpage. The high school had back-to-back graduating classes with 10 sets of multiples in 2014 and 2015, and next year's incoming freshmen class has nine sets of twins, according to school officials. Among the other schools around the country with big sets of graduating twins are Clovis North High School in Fresno, California, with 14 pairs, and Eleanor Roosevelt High School in Greenbelt, Maryland, with 10 pairs. Last year, a middle school in suburban Boston had 23 sets of twins in its graduating class, though that's still far shy of the record for most multiples in the same academic class. New Trier High School in Winnetka, Illinois, had a whopping 44 twin pairs and a set of triplets in 2017, according to Guinness World Records. After graduation Most of the twins at Plainview-Old Bethpage are heading off to different colleges. 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Others were looking forward to getting some breathing room. Sydney and Kayla Jasser said they're both studying fashion design — but at different colleges. Sydney is attending the University of Delaware while Kayla will be attending Indiana University. 'We could have went to the same college, but we just wanted to be able to be independent since we've been with each other forever,' Kayla said. 'It's good to get out there and have our own experiences.' ___ Follow Philip Marcelo on X at
Yahoo
a day ago
- Yahoo
People Are Sharing The "Creepiest" Family Traditions They've Witnessed Or Experienced, And Some Of These Are Mind-Boggling
Every family has their own special traditions and certain ways of doing things, but from an outsider's perspective, some of those traditions may appear a Recently, Redditor u/BothManufacturer4793 asked those in the Reddit community to share the "creepiest" family traditions they've witnessed or experienced, and my jaw is on the floor: 1."I have neighbors who want 13 kids because of something about Jesus and his 13 disciples. They're on their twelfth one now. They never interact with any neighbors, either. It's freaky." —GT_Numble 2."I did a group project in high school and got paired with the 'weird,' quiet kid. He told me we'd have to meet at his house to work on the project because his mom expected him to be home 30 minutes after school every day, and he couldn't leave the house until he left for school the next day. I thought that was weird in itself, but his house wasn't too far from mine, so we arranged a time, and I biked over. I got there around five minutes early, and his mom invited me in and told me that he was in the shower and should be out soon. I sat on the couch and waited. A couple of minutes later, a door opened, and my group partner walked out in a bathrobe, followed by his sister, who was also in a bathrobe." "He went off to his room and got changed so we could work on the project, but I was really creeped out. He was 15 or 16 at the time, and his sister was one grade younger. I understand siblings bathing together as kids, but I feel like that should stop when they hit double digits." —Bringerofthenachos 3."There was a lady at my church who was still breastfeeding her six-year-old. What's even worse is that she had just started to wean off the nine-year-old as well. She'd told my mom once that there 'wasn't any milk anymore' and that it was just a comfort for her kids. The nine-year-old, even then, had MAJOR Norman Bates vibes. I still shiver when I think about him sometimes." —BackgroundSecond9366 4."My ex's family loved scaring each other. Even at the dinner table, someone would randomly scream or slam their fists down, and everyone would laugh. It only felt a little weird until the oldest sister had a baby, and they would try to scare the baby, too. The baby would literally lose his breath, and they'd all die laughing while he cried. I couldn't even pretend to laugh; I just watched in horror." —peachesncobbler 5."My friend's family shared bath towels, toothbrushes, and more. They weren't even poor, just stingy." —SirKellerkind 6."When someone in the family turns 21 (sons, daughters, cousins, etc.), the adults would take them to the strip club together. And when one daughter said she wasn't interested, they were all baffled, like it was so weird she didn't want her father or uncle or whoever to take her to the strip club." —Top_Manufacturer2729 7."I grew up with a large, dysfunctional family with many strange rituals. There was one 'branch' of the family I despised eating dinner with. It was an absolute patriarchal house. The father was a retired cop, and the house ran his way. At dinnertime, everyone had to be dressed up. For me, that meant a dress shirt and slacks, but for women, they had to be made up to a higher degree. We all had to sit at the table ON TIME, and only the retired cop was allowed to talk. You were only allowed to answer his questions. The food was crap, too, but the worst part is that you couldn't go to the bathroom, get a drink, or do anything unless the he allowed it. I remember that people would ask to be excused, and he'd say no." "After a few times, I lost my patience and asked my mom why we even went there. It was like the curse had been lifted; she didn't like eating over there either, so we stopped. I haven't talked to anyone in that branch of the family since 2010 (a funeral). I don't miss them; I hated going over to that fucking house." —Complete_Entry 8."I knew a kid who wasn't allowed to say 'fart' or 'poop' at home because they were 'dirty' words. Unsurprisingly, he was the kid who spoke like a sailor when we were at school." —smr312 9."My friend's husband's family was surreally cheap, to an almost abusive degree. Despite being upper-middle class, the parents made their children buy their own movie tickets when they went to the movies. And if a child spent their allowance and couldn't afford the ticket, they were left at home. Each child was also only allowed one birthday party growing up. As in, they had to pick a year to have a party, and that was the only party they were given." —MobbSleep 10."Kiss on the lips. I get that it's totally normal for some families to greet each other like that, but the idea of kissing any of my family members is revolting to me." —Meridas_Angel 11."I was seeing a girl once whose family had a church room in their house, with pews and all. I never got to see the room besides a glance. From my understanding, her family would change beliefs every decade or so — going from extremely liberal to extremely conservative, etc. I grew up in an old-school Catholic family, but the girl's family did some really weird prayers that even I'd never heard of. All of the boys in their community were sent away to a private Catholic school in Canada, and they homeschooled the girls. To me, their lives felt like a cult. I haven't seen her or her family again, and it feels like I dodged a bullet." —Sicilianguy1 12."My friend's family puts cutlery in the freezer before using it to eat." —Tall_Somewhere_1280 13."My brother dated a woman whose father wouldn't allow anyone who wasn't a relative to attend any family events — no exceptions. They dated for four years, and my brother wasn't invited to any holiday, birthday, BBQ, or anything else that took place at their home. My brother and his girlfriend then got engaged, but that still wasn't good enough. Her father said my brother wasn't part of the family until marriage." —sweetsquashy 14."I knew a family who sent their sons to the brothel to get laid when they turned 18. Everyone acted like it was perfectly normal." —Wolves_all 15."I went over to a friend's house and ate dinner. After, each family member took their plates and put them on the floor for the dog to lick off them, which was pretty gross. Then, after the dog licked the plates clean, they just put them back in the cupboard. I still wonder what diseases I may have gotten from that meal." —DramaticErraticism 16."I knew one family that would not tolerate any form of anger, shouting, swearing, or being upset. It explained a lot why the person I hung out with was so deeply frustrated. As soon as something happened, they'd just start crying in silence." —GreenLurch 17."The girl I went to college with around 10 years ago invited our housemates and me to sleep over at her family home for a birthday party she was having in her hometown. When we got there, I was honestly baffled. Her, her mom, dad, and her brother just wandered around naked in the evenings and mornings. Like, once they've all gone up to bed, they'd strip commando for the night, but if they needed to mooch around the house, they wouldn't put a single sliver of clothing on. When I went to the bathroom during the night, I had the trauma of seeing her mother in her birthday suit. When we were downstairs watching a film, her dad just casually passed by the sofa with his little 'Jimmy' on full display to fill up his water, yet no one seemed to think it was weird." "The final straw, however, was when the girl I knew was using the toilet in the morning after her shower — also naked — and opened the bathroom door mid-wee to talk to her naked father, who was asking her a question in the hallway. I felt like I'd entered an alternate naked universe." —Terrible_Music_7439 "When I was growing up, we had some family friends who'd visit us. When 'bath time' came around, they'd draw a bath and share the same bathwater. It'd be the dad first, then mom, then the older brother, and then the youngest daughter. My parents told them empathetically, 'Please just take showers, or at least draw separate baths. Just don't leave the bathwater in the tub for an extended period of time.'" —ChevalierMal_Fet Um...I honestly have no words. What's the creepiest or most bizarre tradition you've seen a family do and normalize? Let us know in the comments, or you can anonymously share your story using the form below! Note: Some submissions have been edited for length and/or clarity.
