Invesigative Report: Tuition

 $29,125

By Gwen Schultz

It’s the full tuition for a boarding student at National Sports Academy.

It may seem like the school is charging a lot for tuition, but here are the facts.

The overall budget of the school is $2.5 million, and it seems as though every penny is squeezed in order to make the school function.

The biggest expense is payroll, which includes the salaries for administrators, teachers, staff, and coaches. I couldn’t get an actual number for the payroll, but I do know that it gets very expensive when factoring in benefits, social security, and government taxes.

The second biggest expense for NSA is financial aid, and when considering financial aid, there are two things that one must keep in mind.

Educating tomorrow’s Olympians is expensive

1. There are few full-pay students. One of the great things about NSA is the amount of financial aid that it awards: 30% of the overall budget goes to financial aid. Some of the full tuition goes to helping fund this financial aid, and the average award given is 25-35%.

2. Tuition is about 82% of the overall budget. What we pay in tuition does not even come close to paying for all of the things that the school has to do for the students.

There are the expenses of the athletic programs (which athletic fees do not fully cover), the leases on the vehicles, insurance on the building and the student-athletes, department budgets, the dining room, and finally repairs and maintenance.

The school does, however, have other major sources of income. Fundraising, which is overseen by Angela Price, the Director of Development, is biggest source of income after gross tuition.

She works with trustees and alumni to raise money for the school, and has raised $300,000 in the last year.

Steve Preston, Chief Financial Officer of NSA, mentioned that getting participation from alumni is the most important way to make sure the school will have sufficient funding. After graduating NSA, alumni are depended on to give back to their school.

NSA also has investments that earn money, a small amount of government funding, summer revenue (a big one), as well as revenue from selling school apparel.

In terms of an endowment, Preston said, “we don’t really have one.” He added that, “if we had a big endowment, we might be able to have a nicer building and the ability to offer even more scholarships.”

The school is, however, looking to make economical improvements around the building.

The addition to the dining room was a great expense, but in terms of energy conservation it looks like it will be well worth the price. Preston said that he looks forward to comparing energy bills from this year and past years to see how much money was saved.

Occasionally there will be those students who hold grudges about the quality of food in the kitchen or the lack of space around school, but if you think about it, we really have everything we need to be comfortable in this school.

And, in the end, most prep schools that are comparable to the academic and athletic standards of NSA have tuitions bordering on $40,000.

Preston mentioned that hidden expenses, such as attorney fees when the school must pursue money from those student-athletes who leave with balances still due, are what the school really cannot afford to deal with.

So, is the school struggling to keep up with all the adventures and mishaps of the National Sports Academy? The answer: a little bit.

It probably didn’t help that, during my time talking to CFO Steve Preston, Mergs (a ski coach) popped in the door to inform Steve that one of the mirrors on his car was just knocked off by one of the smiley buses.

Steve just looked at me, shrugged, and said, “things like that.”

Students arriving as Freshman and leaving as Seniors

by John Wilkins

Some of us, our freshman year at NSA find ourselves wondering if I will be here from now until I graduate.  Unfortunately after doing some research I discovered that the amount of students lasting from there freshman year to there senior year at NSA has been decreasing. 

            In the Freshman Class of 2003-2004, their were 15 student athletes  that started their freshman year, and seven of those 15 stayed for their four years and are now Alumni of NSA.  Jena Jacobs, Laura Klinger, Dave Loftus, Pete Freire, Chis Lamb, Michelle Zimmerman, and Jonathon Norton were the seven that stayed.

            The Freshman Class of 2004-2005 only had nine student athletes, and 3 of those 9 stayed the four years.  These three were Zach Liebowitz(ski racer), Trey Sanderson(ski racer), And Jake Smith Finch(ski racer) better know as “Pee-wee”.

            In 2005-2006 the Freshman class held 13 student athletes yet only five of them stayed.  Erin Kotz (snowboarder), Brechin Muller(ski racer), David Simon(ski racer), Coleman Lieb(Ski Racer), and Steph DeMars(Girls Hockey) were the five.

            There are only two students from the freshman class of 2006-2007 and they both started as 8^th graders their first year in 2005-2006.  Matty Saehrig and John Wilkins have been goin to NSA for the past five years.  Matty, a ski racer, and John a Freeride snowboarder will be graduating this spring being the only two from our freshman class to also graduate.

            The number off freshman that stay their entire four years of high school have been dropping every year.  Is there a reason for this?

Investigative: Local Newspapers

No News Is Bad News

By Kathryn Dawson 

Lake Placid overflows with copies of the Adirondack Daily Enterprise but is it really an adequate replacement for a larger newspaper?

            “A hometown newspaper feels the pulse of a community,” The Lake Placid News wrote in their article “Being a hometown paper is special.” It listed the benefits of a local paper, including that “A great personal scrapbook is composed of photos and newspaper clippings,” which a larger newspaper will not provide.  

The Adirondack Daily Enterprise

            That’s assuming the articles are worth scrapbooking. The Press Republican’s article “NSA skiers win at Eastern Regional Junior Finals”(sic) contained Associated Press style mistakes that would make even my lenient editor cringe, not to mention grammatical errors, and was published with a picture of a racer unrelated to the story. Similarly, the Adirondack Daily Enterprise published a minutiae-ridden article, “Woodward goes 4 for 4” and mislabeled a poorly chosen photo of Hannah Feinberg as Katelyn Madden. Aylin Woodward was also upset at being misquoted. None of those articles managed to use correct capitalization.

While The Wall Street Journal will not print a photo of your baby’s science fair prize, the absence of a local paper does not imply a shortage of all local news. People living in larger cities settle for celebrating their personal news through local television. Like local papers, television fills dead air with segments about the Scholar-Athlete of the Week and high school sports, which can be recorded for your compulsive record keeping.

            A local newspaper provides information on community events, meeting times, and achievements. It has a strong readership base and improves its town’s organization and solidarity. Although it is vital to a community, equally vital is a larger paper that spans regional, national and international news.

Large newspapers have exponentially better resources than local papers, so they can provide more thorough articles covering a broader range of information. They have a more job applicants to choose from, so they can choose more talented and experienced writers, and they can afford to employ more fact-checkers and reporters. Their prestige attracts good applicants, freelance writers and interns, and expands their range of sources.

            Lake Placid has commendably accessible local news; the Adirondack Daily Enterprise can be found in most stores along with the free publication Adirondack Sports and Fitness. However, the only store carrying the New York Times, USA Today, or Washington Post was Newman’s News. The next best option was The Bookstore Plus, which had a copy of the Economist amongst its various interest magazines. An employee there directed me to Starbucks, where I could peruse a worn and misfolded copy of The New York Times.

            “We used to have a whole shelf of [larger newspapers]” said an employee at Newman’s News. Then they changed to the distributor Today’s News, presumably (since the old distributor is still in business) because that “whole shelf” lacked readership and sales. That leaves Lake Placid with one tiny rack of large newspapers at one store. The employee gave me detailed numbers on their sales of The New York Times: between “a lot” and “a few,”depending on the season.

In an age of electronic news, the dearth of large newspapers in Lake Placid is acceptable as long as residents are proactive about collecting news and resist becoming isolated, apathetic or ignorant. 

The Real Laws for Longboaring in Lake Placid

            Lake Placid- Long boarders and skate boarders have had a constant struggle with the local police. A struggle between the kids’ desire to shred around town and  the local police’s responsibility to keep people safe.  Kids have been yelled at, threatened with tickets and even arrest for riding on sidewalks, in the roads or at night.

            Some police officers will yell at a rider for something that the next officer won’t, creating confusion of what is and isn’t allowed.  Since it’s the long boarders’ responsibility to abide by the laws, it’s important to know what they are. The laws centered on skateboarding vary from state to state and town to town.

            Kids constantly get yelled at and in trouble for riding on the sidewalks of Main Street. During the summer on any given day, you can walk by an officer yelling at local kids. This is silly since our town has a well-stated law displayed on signs that are littered around town which say, “No bikes, skates or skateboards” These signs are found on the sidewalks of Main Street between the town hall and where Saranac Ave. intersects Mirror lake drive.  Skaters caught on the sidewalk could be charged with fines between $10.00-$250.00 as well as being charged with disorderly conduct.

            On the state level there are more laws that are not so well known.  Skaters must abide by nearly the same traffic laws motorized vehicles are responsible for. This may come as a surprise to some but it is a law, so wait for the green light when going through an intersection!

            Night is the best time for long boarding in town. There are much fewer cars and it is quieter, so we are able to hear when a car is coming. This makes our chances of getting hit far less. There are also fewer people walking, running or using other recreational devices so the danger of injuring someone else or ourselves is far less. Night is usually much cooler so it is far more enjoyable hiking hills and pushing around.  Although it is much safer to long board at night, the police often threaten us with tickets saying it is against the law to skate at night, with no explanation. New York State law states that no person shall skate or glide on a skateboard between sunset and sunrise unless he or she is wearing reflective, light or bright colored material or clothing that is visible.

            Riding through town, there are cars and people all over the place.   At most times it is pretty hectic and once in a while you will see kids grabbing on to the backs of cars or pushing off them to propel themselves forward.  Although this seems smart to some kids, New York State legislatures disagree. It’s against New York law to hold on the back of any motorized vehicle.

            Skaters and long boarders often ride next to each other when going from one place to another. Whether riding like this is legal or not is often discussed among skaters. New York legislatures have too. It is legal for two skaters to ride next to each other on the road unless a vehicle is passing them.

             Although skating is a controversial activity in Lake Placid and one officer may yell at you for one thing that the next will not. Understanding the laws will prevent some future ticketing and arrest for this fast and fun activity.

Investigation

Eating at NSA

By: Frédérick Hallé

Kids here at NSA complain a lot about food no matter what’s on the menu.  I decided to make a research and talk to Steve Preston as well as the cooks to know more about the organization of the school on food and maybe make students realize that it won’t be everyday of their life that they are going to eat mom’s food.

One of the great meal serve in a typical cafeteria.

I am writing this because I am tired of hearing students complaining. I agree that it’s not like my mom’s food but we are eating better foods then typical cafeteria ones, where they serve you scoop of juicy potatoes with beans and some kind of meet with sauce that you almost throw up just by looking at it.

Giving some numbers and explain how things are budgeted, I hope that the people at NSA will realized how hard it is to manage all of that and make everyone happy.

NSA spends 100 thousand dollars on food for a year and that includes summer programs.

Money obviously comes from student’s tuition but there is not a specific amount from every student. The money comes from different group budget. By example, when there’s a recruit coming in to visit and eat at school, the money will come from the development budget. If there is a special event like alumni dinner, the money comes from the development department, which is usually made of donation. There is also the boy’s hockey team budget, girl’s hockey and ski teams. Usually a certain department that need something will transfer money to the school so as it doesn’t come from the 100 thousand.

The budget is divided this way: $8 for breakfast, $12 for lunch and $20 for dinner for a student per day. This way the school makes approximately 1500 meals per months and that does not include weekends. Out of this, an average of 75 meals are completely wasted because students get help from the garbage cans or sometimes there is too much left overs.

Budgeting 1500 meals is not as easy as it looks like.

The school is part of the New York states child program that required including 5 food groups for every meal. If it’s done well, the States give a little bit of money to the school.

Some kids are allergic to lactate; peanut butter, wheat and some others are vegetarians, which complicates the cook’s tasks.

Also the budget does not allowed the school to by certain kind of food every week like steak or fish because it is too expensive. The school does it when they can have a little discount but other than that it is hard to by something else than chicken.

Regardless that there is chicken almost every night, it is not always the same sauce or same kind of chicken and it usually doesn’t have the same sides. Salad is also always available.

When students are really unsatisfied, knowing that some don’t spend any money and some others can spend, as much as $15, the average per week of money spends on food somewhere in town is $5.

The cooks plan the meals every two weeks to make two weekly meals schedule. They try to varied it a little bit but with all the restriction it’s is hard and stressful to satisfy everyone. Image how frustrating it can get when 80 people walk by you saying just two little words on how the meal wasn’t good.

An option for students to make the food better is to contribute. By example, at this time of the year, students can volunteer in town to help making maple syrup. If a decent amount of student help, the school could get a good prize for real maple syrup for next year because as of now the one at school is way cheaper but not really healthy.

"Spending Problem"

-Posted by Carmen Aguirre

A typical phrase heard coming from the students here at NSA is, “gosh I am so broke”.  Ever wonder why it seems like that?

At NSA students spend an average amount of 4 dollars a trip when traveling to the local gas station called Stewards.  Students go there an average of 3-4 times a week that ranges from 12-16 dollars a week meaning 48-64 dollars a month. That is to say that the average student in their 9 months attending NSA spends 432-576 dollars at just that one gas station. 

Other money suckers to consider are favorite restaurants downtown.  Ever gone to simply?  The pub? How about subway or even price chopper?  These favorite food spots also suck good amounts of money from our students.  Even though they may only visit them once or twice a month, the restaurants cost 10-15 dollars a visit for just a meal and maybe a drink not including a tip for dinning out.

Is this spending a problem here at NSA? In this case it really depends on personal views, “I don’t think it is a problem,” said English teacher Peter Fish. “As long as the people who spend the money are happy with how they spend it!”

Others think that anything more than 5-8 dollars a week solely at that one place is a problem, “I think students should not be spending that kind of money,” said NSA post graduate Celeste Brown. “It could go toward such better causes like donating to the Tsunami relief or even saving for the future like collecting interest in a bank.”

The pull can be either way on whether spending that much on recreational dinning and munchy runs is a bad thing.  From my own personal perspective it is ridiculous to spend that kind of money in the duration of the school year on candy, fancy food and ice cream when it could, as Brown said earlier, be spent on way better causes. 

Not only does this habit of uncontrollable spending hurt your nutrition (junk food from Stew’s) it also teaches poor money managing skills.  Good money managing Skills are crucial to learn as young adolescents growing up heading into college because there are no parents to watch over how and when you spent your money where ever.

What can NSA do to change these problems?  When it comes to money management its tough because there is not a lot NSA itself can do, they can’t take all our money and hang on to it because its our money and also a lot of people have debit and credit cards.  They can’t restrict the times we visit places because then they take away the little freedom students have.

 The only real way to suppress this so called “spending problem” among our students is for students themselves to take action of their own lives and just become more responsible with their money. 

Maybe there are some students who are okay with spending that sort of money but the majority of them don’t realize the amount they spend and hopefully once they do they want to take action to changing their habits and their friend’s habits.  Helping one at a time change the ways of our community here at NSA.

The Big Distraction: Facebook

By Brittany Moorehead

Credit to google images.

There appears to be a big distraction at National Sports Academy in Lake Placid, New York. The source of this distraction involves students using the internet during the academic day.

The number of students using the internet or so called “surfing” the web is growing at an alarming rate. Each of the 15 students that I interviewed admitted to using the internet for non-school related purposes. All of these students were on the internet from a range of thirty minutes all the way to four hours.

Some of the classes at NSA require the use of a computer such as Journalism and Apex based courses which could be the reason for such high rates of “surfing.” Rather than doing the work they are suppose to be doing, students may wander to sites such as Facebook. Facebook is the most visited site among the NSA student body.

“I think kids spend about an hour a day on average “surfing” the web,” said Luke Hudak.

He also went on to add, “It’s not as big of an issue for Juniors and Seniors/PGs because they should know when they should be doing work and recognize that if they don’t finish an assignment in class, then they will have to finish it later. On the other hand, I believe that it’s important to keep a close eye on the younger students.”

On average there are about six or seven individuals on Facebook on any given period throughout the academic day, which is pretty high considering there are 80 something students in the NSA community. It’s hard to say whether these kids are truly distracted though because they might have that period off.

 Based on the students that I interviewed, most tend to be on Facebook anywhere from 20 minutes to an hour during night time study hall. The students that spend more time on this site tend to have lower grades than those who spend minimal time on the site.

It’s difficult to prevent students from getting distracted because they have to be somewhat accountable. If their grades begin to slip, they should realize that they need to spend more time on their academics and less time getting distracted.

There is a few ways that teachers can help prevent students from becoming distracted. One way is by not allowing them access to their computer when one is not needed. Also, teachers can look over the students’ shoulders every once in a while to ensure that they are hard at work.

Other than these few ways, I believe that students have to be aware of what they are doing. They need to have the ability to avoid going on other sites when they are typing an essay or are using educational resources online. The internet is a great resource to use because it’s fast and easy but we have to be careful with some of the sites that can cause distractions.

curfew changes

A study conducted in Stanford showed that athletes that had 9-10 hours of sleep performed better than athletes with 8 hours of sleep. At NSA the curfew was changed from 11:00 to 10:00. The change was made because the faculty felt that students needed more time to rest and recover. Just how effective is it? we asked returning students and new students about the curfew. A teacher said that 25% of students went to bed around 10:00 when we asked the students it was closer to 5%. All of the students asked, said that if the curfew were later they would go to bed at the same time. Athletic and academic performance, as stated by the students, has not gotten any better from last year. Most kids say that they go to bed around 11:00 and 1:00 am. After check in most kids go on facebook, watch tv, skype, and listen to music. Even after going to bed later then the curfew most kids say that they feel rested during the day. Some of the returning students went to bed earlier last year compared to this year. Having the curfew later, in my opinion, would be better because you would not have to rush to get through your nightly routine. You are tired at the same time so you should still be able to be out and talking to people in your floor. This allows you to find out information about the next day. Less people would get in trouble for being up late when really they are up the same time as they were last year. The problem with having an earlier curfew is that people are not tired at 10:00 and when students are home they do not have a bed time and they fall asleep earlier then they do here. Here we feel an added pressure to be ready for bed at a certain time so it creates more stress that keeps us awake longer. Most people that skype, skype with people of the opposite sex. If we could be downstairs until 10:00 then we would probably still go to bed around the same time because we would not stay up and skype with them.   The curfew change in most students opinion was not effective. Students go to bed later or the same time they did last year. The curfew being later gave students more time to get ready for bed which allowed them to take time in their nightly routines, therefore making it easier to relax and sleep better. 

Mold in Mountain House

Mold in Mountain House by Zach Stein

Zach Stein is currently investigating the mold discovered in Mountain House.  It has come to the schools attention that Students thought it was black mold, which would make it a lot worse and would need to be treated immediately.  NSA is trying to discover what type of mold is in Mountain House. Luke Hudak said “We are unsure as of now”.   Zach Stein did some research and discovered mold is a type of fungus that grows on plants and fibers and is most often associated with damp, musty locations such as bathrooms, basements, and attics.  Mold travels through the air as tiny spores which like to make their home in wet areas, where they will breed.  If mold is spotted, it’s best to nip it in the bud immediately lest it spread to other areas.  This is a good indication of a moisture problem. 

                As a fellow Mountain House member Zach wanted to find out to see if this Mold is a health threat.  So he took the interview with Hudak and asked more into depth questions, and brought up his and the fellow students concerns.  “The mold is most likely not a health threat, but molds are allergic and could spread.  As of now the Mold is not, but if it’s left unattended it could possibly turn into one” Hudak said.  He immediately responded asking what is NSA going to do about it and what stage is the Mold.  Hudak responded with “they are going to gut the bathroom and repair soffits, put a new fan in, and new walls with better materials, and a stage four due to the fact that the mold is mostly contained into the bathroom, but could get worse”.  As a member of Mountain House he wanted to know how long this bathroom and mold situation would take.  Hudak said “it probably will be done at the end of spring break”.  Personally Zach and other students think they should start fixing this situation as soon as possible before it gets worse and spreads throughout the house.  “Also it is a real pain with 12 guys in the house and two bathrooms.  Someone is always in the bathroom” said Zach Stein.  He continued to ask Hudak questions and wondered what the structural problems were.  He said “there are no ventilation, and no windows.  The suffix doesn’t allow air to circulate trapping the moisture.  Also the dry wall is not moisture resistant causing mold to respond to the moisture.”  I was still curios about this Mold in the house, and have never seen anything like it.  Zach wanted to know ways to prevent this problem. “If there were better building material built, moisture resistant dry walls, ventilation, and consistent cleaning, we would most likely not have this problem.”

                In a conclusion the students  of NSA  found out that mold is a fungus that grows in damp moisture areas.  Mountain house definitely has mold but NSA is unsure of what type it is, and won’t be able to fix the problem until after spring break, which is a month away.  This Mold situation could have been prevented with better building material installed in the bathroom, and consistent cleaning.  As of right now the mold is not a health threat but if left untreated it can spread throughout the house, so the mold should be taken care of as soon as possible.