Typically by January 15 studies have shown that most people forget about their resolutions and live their lives just as they did before the new year. My question is: did you have a resolution? If so, are you still sticking with it?
I polled 40 students from Mount Olive High School, and 26 did not have a resolution. However, out of the 14 that did, eight of them have kept their resolutions. The other five have already given up. Overall this poll has shown that many high school students do not participate in creating a New Year’s resolution.
Personally, I have created a resolution for myself. I believe a new year is a time to start fresh and it is a great starting point for improvement. While this is true, you do not need to start improving just when a new year begins. You can start any day you like; it is just important that you are making yourself the best that you can be.
Earl Pluhm, a 1951 graduate of Mt. Olive High School, recently passed away and left money to several different organizations.
One of the organizations he donated to was the Mt. Olive High
School. He left $135,411.15 to the high school. To honor Mr. Pluhm for this outstanding donation, the school board voted unanimously to rename the band room the Earl Pluhm Band Room.
The Mt. Olive School Board is still deciding on how this money will be best used in our high school. Mt. Olive High School truly appreciates this donation. Stay tuned next month for more information concerning this generous gift, as well as pictures of the dedication.
Matt Mueller, a 2012 MOHS graduate, high jumped 6’9” his junior year of high school. He is currently a junior studying sports management and marketing at Central Michigan University and is attending on a track scholarship. On January 16, CMU hosted their first indoor meet of the season: the Jack Skoog Open .
Mueller’s goal was to high jump 7’ and he succeeded breaking his personal record. However, the school’s record for high jump is 7’3”, which Mueller has now set as his new goal. As a student athlete he is very busy each day. Mueller says, “All of my classes start in the morning at eight or nine, and then I have practice. Along with lifting and required study hours...you’re busy about nine to ten hours a day.”
He also says that as a student athlete, it would be very hard to manage a job on top of academics and athletics. Mueller plans to finish his undergraduate at CMU where he is majoring in Sports
Management and minoring in Marketing. His advice for seniors considering sports in college are as follows, “As a senior in high school, I would say if you like the sport and are offered a scholarship, take the scholarship.”
Congratulations Matt and good luck on the rest of your track season.
The journalism class at Mt.
Olive High School is working to publish their school newspaper,
The Cats’ Connection , as an insert to The Mt. Olive Herald.
This is a wonderful learning experience for the students who will be doing everything from selling advertisements to support their section, to writing the articles, taking the pictures and doing the layout. Without the support of local businesses and individuals this experience wouldn’t be possible.
With that in mind we are asking you to purchase an advertisement. Prices of ads range from eight dollars to forty dollars. Ads may be purchased for one month or for several months.
We appreciate all that the community does to support our school, and we would like to thank you in advance for any contribution you are able to make to help us print our newspaper.
Your check should be made out to The Mt. Olive Herald and you may either give your advertisement to a student or e-mail it directly to The Mt.
Olive Herald.
I interviewed Mr. Ryan about the Mt. Olive Wrestling invitational and the season so far. His favorite moment of this year’s wrestling team was, “Maxx winning three tournaments; Shon wrestling the number one ranked kid multiple times and having close scores and
Lee winning the Mt. Olive Tournament.”
Coach Ryan’s goal this year is, “seven to eight wrestlers making it to the sectional tournament and scoring high in the regional.” The team’s record is currently six and nine. Coach Ryan has 18 kids wrestling this year. He said, “Caden Monke and Johnny Darrah have become much better wrestlers with better technique even though they had previous experience with the Mt. Olive kids club.
The next upcoming tournaments are Litchfield January 30-31,
Regional February 7, followed by Sectional and State the next two weekends.
With Valentine’s Day comes the arrival of yet another dance.
The dance is being hosted by the school on Saturday, February
14 from 7-10 PM. There are several preparations for the dance.
There will be a DJ, along with the decorating, which is being done by the PTA. The dance is sponsored by the junior class, and there is a $2 admission fee.
Students who are bringing a guest who is not a Mt.Olive High
School student, must submit a Date Request Form to the high school office for approval. Dates must be in at least ninth grade and may not be above the age of 20. Date Request Forms must be turned in to the high school office by February 10.

By Amy Grandidier
The infamous Marty McFly, accompanied by Doc Brown, traveled forward to the year 2015 in the 1989 movie Back to the
Future II . Of course, the movie had to adjust from the year 1989 to the year 2015. There were some prediction flops and some predictions that actually came true. In the flops category, we have hover boards, jackets that dry themselves, wearing our clothes inside out, flying cars, a re-hydrator for pizza, Princess Diana being alive and now
Queen Diana (she died in 1997), an invention that turns garbage into energy, and the Cubs winning the World Series (we all know how bad of a prediction that was).
Some predictions are already true or will come true this year.
Nike is currently designing shoes that lace themselves with the press of a button that will be available for purchase later in the year. Other correct predictions were 3D movies, making multiple sequels to movies, a large flat screen television hanging on a wall, a Miami-based baseball team, hands-free video games, and video conferencing.
The predictions that were wrong for the year 2015 may not be wrong for years later on! Someday we may see pizza re-hydrators and flying cars buzzing around. As mentioned before, Nike is already working on the shoes that lace themselves, who knows what else is being invented?
By Nathan Spaller
Collin Schuricht has been a resident of Mt. Olive for seven years. In all of those years he said that he has been most influenced by sports. In fact, his favorite memory from high school so far is making it to playoffs in football during his freshman and sophomore years. His favorite thing about Mt. Olive is that it is a small town.
He plans on going to the University of Illinois to study history.
When asked what he could change in his life Collin responded, “I would choose not to procrastinate.” If he could make one change in the world it would be to end world hunger.
Lastly, Collin said that his biggest lesson from high school is to avoid drama. Good luck, Collin!
The Mt. Olive High School cheerleading squad has done very well this year! They started off rough in their first few competi- tions but then improved greatly. They performed their best at the
Bloomington Cheer Tournament. The team also took home first place at the O’Fallon Spirit Fest.
Junior cheerleader, Maria Clarke, said, “We as a team have improved more and more with every competition.” Maria has been a cheerleader for six years. Maria stated that she also hoped to cheer her senior year. The squad’s last performance was said to be the best one of their season. They also have a good chance of qualifying for state this year.
Senior cheerleader, Alyssa Labonte, stated, “I am very impressed with the way that we have performed this year in our competi- tions.” Alyssa has been a cheerleader for four years at MOHS. She is hoping to be accepted into the cheer program for the Missouri
Tigers next year.
Greetings community! I am
Bobby Krug, the editor-in- chief for The Cats’ Connection.
I am well known around the community for my sport tributes and running Weekly Wildcat
News.
Being a host for Weekly
Wildcat News has helped me out a lot in the journalism field and specifically with being an editor.
In my free time, I enjoy making
YouTube videos, learning new computer programs, and spending time with family and friends. I am very excited to help make The Cats’ Connection an enjoyable read this semester!
The 2015 MOHS track team has a new assistant coach named Josh Heltsley. This is Mr. Heltsley’s first year coaching track, and he says, “I look forward to meeting all the members of the boys and girls track teams and helping them achieve their goals.”
Mr. Heltsley ran track at
Gillespie High School, and walked onto the Mizzou Track team his freshman year.
Also, Mr. Heltsley qualified for state in the 300 M hurdles his senior year of high school after having a major knee surgery the year before. He also won the 300
M hurdles two years in a row and placed first in the 110 High
Hurdles at the Capital Classic.
Coach Heltsley says, “I want to be a track coach for MOHS so I can help athletes reach their goals, push them to limits that they didn’t know they could reach, and teach them that dedication and hard work pays off in the end. A lot of life lessons can be learned in sports such as honor, discipline, work ethic, sportsmanship, and teamwork.”
Welcome to MOHS, Coach
Heltsley.
The Mt. Olive Boys’ Basketball team has had a rough start this season, but over the last few games they have improved greatly.
The next game is against Tri City high school and it will be played at Mt. Olive High school on January 27.
Senior Jeremy DeVries said, “I expected to do better than we are right now.” He has been playing basketball since he was in fifth grade. Jeremy has been on the high school team for all four years, but only got to play for three due to a broken leg.
When asked if the team has improved, he said, “Yes, there is a huge difference from the first game to the last game.” Jeremy’s goal this season is to win at least one game. His most memorable moment of this year was when his teammate Nate Bennett shot and made a three pointer when they were down by 30 points with a minute left.
Seth Bruhn, a junior basketball player at Mt. Olive High School also answered some questions. He said, “The team has definitely improved this year, and they continue to improve with every game.”
Seth also said, “We need to communicate and play better as a team.” Seth stated he needs to improve his ball handling and vision of the court. He has been playing basketball since the fifth grade.
Hopefully the boys’ basketball team’s improvement pays off soon! Keep working hard boys.
Baseball season is right around the corner, and Coach Scoggins is working on preparing the team for this year’s season. The first official practice starts Monday, March 2, and coach has already been working with some athletes who don’t play winter sports. A total of 28 players have signed up so far, eleven freshmen, eight sophomores, three juniors, and six seniors.
Eric Heflin and Quentin Tooley say that they have been preparing in the off season by lifting weights and going up to Litchfield to hit at the batting cages.
Coach Scoggins states, “I plan on preparing the team by building arm strength and conditioning. Early in the season we are going to make sure our fundamentals are solid. As the season goes by we will learn more of what we need to work on as a team.”
The staff and students at MOHS eagerly await the start of the season. Good luck Wildcats.

Every year, we say goodbye to amazing students. However, life does not end once high school is over. A 2014 graduate, Paige
Mick, left with high hopes. She enrolled at Blackburn College in
Carlinville, Illinois. At first, she enjoyed Blackburn, but living on campus wasn’t working out for her.
This year, however, she transferred to Lincoln Land Community
College in Litchfield, Illinois, and is working on her Associate's
Degree in Psychology. She plans to become a social worker in the future.
She enjoys Lincoln Land's mathematics teacher. She also enjoys
Lincoln Land more than Blackburn because it's less stressful and she can stay at home without worrying about a roommate.
Paige is also happily engaged. Life does not end after high school; sometimes it gets better.
Good luck in the future, Paige.
The Mt. Olive Lady Wildcats took third place last Saturday at the 97th annual Macoupin County Tournament. Their path to third included wins over Staunton(52-24), North Mac(75-27), and a loss to the eventual champion, Carlinville(37-42). Mt. Olive beat Gillespie 50-37 in the third place game. The Lady Cats gave
Carlinville their toughest game of the Tournament.
Jill Niehaus was one of six girls named to the 2015 Macoupin
County All-Tournament Team. This is her second selection as she was named to the 2014 All-Tournament team even though she was only a freshman that year.
As always, life never fails to bring about a new student within our school. This time its Marissa May from Lawrenceville, Illinois.
Marissa likes video games, from Assassin’s Creed to Halo to
Call of Duty and she also likes crafts and football.
The class she likes here the most is mythology, simply because it’s interesting and she enjoys learning about it.
Her plan for after school is to attend veterinary college; in ten years, she wants to own an animal rescues shelter.
Welcome to Mt. Olive High School Marissa!
This is the last semester of my senior year and I am currently enrolled in journalism class where we produce the school newspaper.
I am the Editor of the Sports section of the school newspaper.
I really enjoy being an Editor and looking over what my fellow classmates have to talk about and helping them with their articles.
I will be graduating on May 16 and my plans are to go to college and become an EMT. I am extremely glad to be a part of this journalism crew and I am looking forward to everything I am going to learn from this class and my fellow classmates.
The girls’ basketball team is having a good season. Breanna Rooney, a girls’ basketball player, had always been a post player, but she loves that this year she was able to be a guard. Rooney loves that she is able to shoot three-point shots now; she says they are super fun.
Breanna says, “ I wish I had some other upperclassmen on the team. It’s just me.” Sadly she won’t be back to play next year; she will be graduating. Rooney doesn’t think her left hand dribbling is the best and says if she had another season that would definitely be the one thing she would want to improve on.
Another girls’ basketball player, Zoe Murphy, would like to improve her defense and post play. She plans to play next year and would like to change how the team plays in the Litchfield Thanksgiving
Tournament.
When naming Ms. Murphys’ highest moment of the season, she says, “ Getting third place in the
Lebanon Christmas Tournament.” Although I suspect her new high point would be earning Third place in the Macoupin County Tournament.
Over all these girls have worked hard all season. Keep up the good work ,girls! Go Lady Wildcats!
This year’s spring play is in the works! Lisa Haenel is the director of this year’s play. Mrs. Haenel has chosen a musical comedy this year. It is titled, Adventures of a Comic Book Artist .
The play is written by Pat Lydersen with music by Wendy Woolf and it is produced by Pioneer
Drama Service, Inc. The musical will have fifteen major roles in addition to many small parts.
The musical’s dress rehearsal will be on March 5 with the actual performance being on March 6.
Mrs. Haenel has directed many of the previous plays. When asked what her favorite play has been so far she replied, “I’ve enjoyed so many it’s difficult to say, but this year we are attempting a musical which is exciting!” Her favorite part of making the plays is “watching the students pull it all together.
They make me so proud.”
Alison Knowles, a senior at MOHS, will be performing in this year’s play. Ali has two plays under her belt and is really excited about doing a musical this year. But although she is excited, she knows all too well that being on stage can be scary too. Ali states, “I think everyone gets a little nervous. Being the center of attention can be extremely nerve-wracking as well as the fact that your cast members are depending on you. You really just have to block out the audience and just focus on yourself and what you have practiced to do in order to wipe out nervousness!”
Ali says it takes her about a month to prepare for a play, but she says the hard work is well worth it because while she has fun, she also learns a great deal too. Ali says that while being in a play, “you learn teamwork, timing, effort, and that practice makes perfect.”
Elizabeth Spickerman, another senior actor, has been in 13 total plays. She is really excited about the play this year because they are doing a musical. Elizabeth learns many life lessons from participating in plays including “how to work with others and see other perspectives.”
Being on stage is exciting and nerve wracking. Elizabeth states, “I become extremely nervous, but
I just remind myself that I love being up there and once I’m up there I’m fine.”
Overall Elizabeth loves acting. She states, “I just think that acting is the best way to express yourself.
I hope that we can see more of this (acting) in our school.”
Stay tuned for more information about casting in next month’s edition of The Cats Connection .

Dark Souls is one of the most sensational games of the last generation that ring true to the saying that some games are timeless.
Dark Souls has many improvements and new mechanics over its predecessor, Demon's Souls, which is also one of the most sensational games of the generation before last. The addition of the statistic called poise which makes the character’s armor resist staggering when hit. Dark Souls is renowned for its difficulty and steep learning curve as well as its lack of blatant handholding of waypoints or maps that most games use. Dark souls lacks a few finer details like accurate establishment of the players’ goals as it relies on a few characters to tell the player what he should do but many players make the mistake of attacking them and making them hostile which means they then lack the advice the character would give. The learning curve in Dark Souls is about a five inch long tutorial and then an immediate and rapid incline in difficulty once leaving it. This learning curve, or lack thereof, has caused many players much grief and has left the game to mostly self abusive masochists and those who refuse to quit and rail endlessly against a single enemy they can’t beat.
Dark Souls has a very in depth but also very vague storyline that is relatively clear cut in places but murky and obscure all throughout.
This much can be said without a doubt or personal interpretation; the story begins with the land obscured by grey fog with only the great arch trees and the everlasting dragons but then came fire and with fire came disparity, heat and cold, life and death, and from the dark they came and found the souls of lords within the flames.
The first flame burned bright, yet what triggered it is unknown, but the soul starved hollows crawled out of the dark to sit beside the flame. Four of them found great souls in the flame: Nito the first of the dead, Gwyn the lord of sunlight, the witch of Izalith, and the furtive Pygmy. Three found light and flame in their souls, the
Pygmy found only dark.
The lords then challenged the dragons; Gwyn’s bolts of sunlight split their scales of immortality. Nito spread death and disease on their then vulnerable flesh. Then the witch weaved great firestorms destroying their nests, the arch trees, and burned what remained, and Seath the scaleless dragon betrayed his brethren to gain the crystal of immortality from them. Thus the dragons were no more and the age of fire began, but it would quickly sputter and begin to fade with the flame, but the lords resisted.
Nito bound the newly born humans with death but faded himself.
The witch of Izalith tried to recreate the first flame with her own lord soul but it went wrong and she was twisted into a bed of chaos that was the mother of all demons. Finally Gwyn gathered all his strength and knight and went to the kiln of the first flame and linked the flame with his own soul and humanity burning the land around to ash and leaving his knights as charred suits of armor that haunt the land killing any other around them.
The player character then takes the spotlight as you find yourself an undead locked away to await the end of the world in a asylum guarded by demons. The player character leaves the asylum after slaying the demons and travels to Lordran where he or she is told to find and ring the bells of awakening. After ringing the bells the player character journeys back to the area after the asylum, firelink shrine, and meets with Frampt the primordial serpent who advises the player character to travel to Anor Londo the city of the gods now abandoned by all but one god and reclaim the lord vessel.
The player character receives the lord vessel from the princess
Gwynevere, daughter of Lord Gwyn, who is only an illusion created by Gwyndolin her brother the dark moon god, and travels back to
Frampt and learns he has to satiate the lord vessel with great souls from powerful beings who he then names, Nito, The witch now bed of chaos, the four kings of New Londo who received part of
Gwyn’s own souls, and Seath the scaleless.
After feeding the souls to the lord vessel the player character travels into the kiln of the first flame and fights Lord Gwyn himself.
Upon killing him a choice is placed in front of you, sacrifice yourself to fuel the flame or leave and embrace the dark as the lord of men.
But neither is the right choice as Frampt manipulates you for the god’s benefit and Kaith, another primordial serpent who encourages the dark, is openly manipulating his dark wraiths and you, as he confessed it to the player character early on, but the choice is yours and the repercussions are everyone’s problem.
Dark souls while having many issues is still a great game in player versus player online or the story itself. Dark Souls remains one of the most difficult games to master, but it is also one of the most addicting games to pick up and is a definite seven out of ten stars.
By Jacob Taylor
It’s spring and with that comes the Pep Club Magazine Drive.
This fundraiser consists of selling magazines and Valentine’s Day gifts.
The student body attended an assembly to explain how the program would work. Twenty- five percent of the money earned from the fundraiser will go to the school’s Pep Club. The other seventy-five percent will be given to a designated club of the participant’s choice.
The sale ended Monday,
January 26. Stay tuned next month for more information on the top sellers.
Abagail Walls is the new student teacher coming from
Southern Illinois University
Edwardsville. She has been placed in Mrs. Halpin’s English
II classes and in Mrs. Haenel’s
English III classes as well as journalism.
Mrs. Walls attended Athens
Senior High School in Athens,
Illinois and was inspired to teach because of some extraordinary teachers there. She wanted to be a social worker and a counselor in high school and when she was younger she wanted to be a traveling veterinarian.
Mrs. Walls has been attending college for five years. At SIUE she was a member of “One Mic
Poetry,” an organization that held poetry slams, where she served as secretary for two years. She also started a Bible study called
“FLY: Fully Loving Yourself” for freshmen women.
Mrs. Walls is majoring in
English Education and minoring in Speech. Her favorite subject to teach is literature. She is also married and has an eight month old daughter named Moralie. She and her husband are expecting a second child this June.
In her free time she likes to read and when teaching literature she not only gets to read, but also gets to discuss and explore the text with other brilliant minds.
To student s c considering pursuing a career in education,
Mrs. Walls states, “Only pursue it if your heart is in it! It’s a very rewarding career, but it takes a lot of heart, patience, and drive. You get out of it what you put in it!”
Welcome to our school Mrs.
Walls!
I interviewed a couple of the wrestlers and questioned them on how their season has been going. Tim Hancock said, “I’m doing good, but I could always improve.” His record is 9-9. He said, “I need to work on escaping from the bottom position and need to work on getting myself in better shape.”
Tim has been wrestling for two years. He said, “Lee Welch and
Shon Calvert have inspired me to wrestle. I also enjoy beating on people without getting in trouble. Coach Harvill has helped me out by teaching me different throws and Shon and Lee have helped me on my shots and getting way from the bottom.”
Caden Monke said, “I’m improving.” His record is 15-12. He said, “The top position is what I need to work on.” He has been wrestling for four years. The people urging him to wrestle are the ones who inspired him the most. Caden stated, “All my teammates help me out and they try to give me the best advice they can.”
Johnny Darrah says, “I’ve been doing well this year. I need to work on keeping the bottom guy broke down and pinning him.”
Johnny has been wrestling for four years. He states, “I really enjoy the sport. Coach Bessemer teaches me new things and how to do the moves correctly and Lee Welch helps me by being a good practice partner.”
As we move throughout the years, it seems as if we have a new test for excellence appearing every other year. This time, the PARCC
Exam takes the spotlight as all students from grades 3-8 as well as Algebra II and English III students prepare for a new exam this spring. PARCC stands for Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers.
PARCC is comprised of , “a group of states working together to develop a set of assessments that measure whether students are on track to be successful in college and their careers.”
The 2014-15 year is the first year for the PARCC, and it’s mak- ing a debut in at least 12 states. Exact dates for when the PARCC will be taken at Mount Olive High School are still in the works, but they will be announced soon. Good luck to our fellow classmates who will be preparing for and taking these new tests very soon.
By: Emily Hosick
What is water witching? It’s using a rod or similar device to locate underground water, minerals, or other hidden substances.
Water witching is also known as dowsing. There has been a debate for many years over whether water witching actually works.
Although shop teacher Mr. Winsel has never tried water witching he has used witching wires to locate underground pipes.
Mr. Winsel stated “I have had pretty good results getting close enough to using more modern electronic devices to zero exactly.”
He hopes he can try this experiment on a day it’s not too cold out.
Down! Set! Hike! Super Bowl XLIX is being played on Sunday,
February 1. The two teams competing are very solid teams, the New
England Patriots and the Seattle Seahawks. The Patriots have won more Super Bowls than the Seahawks 3-1.
I took a poll at Mt. Olive High school to see who they think will win the Super Bowl. The results were very close. Forty students think the Seahawks will win and thirty-nine think the Patriots will win.
Stay tuned to the game to see who is right!