Sergio Sáinz-Maza

INsergio-sainzTERVIEW WITH SERGIO SAINZ-MAZA

1.- How did you prepare for the race?

-Going running. -Good nutrition, I had a balance diet. -Tranning morning and afternoon, some days I was going to the gym.

What did you think when you finished it?

-I was satisfied and I was happy because there was a lot of waves, it caused that I vomited proximally at kilometer six, because I hadn´t taken the “Biodramine” which are pills to avoid dizziness, so it was difficult for me to finish but I finished first in my category.

  1. Are you happy with your results?

-Yes, because although my results in swimming pool aren´t very good, in open waters in Sanabria within the 6.5 km reace I was fifth in my category, in which only people from Sabadell won, Galaico: which is a city of Galicia with very good people. And in this proof my results were good and the mark was so good too.

  1. Would you repeat the heat again?

-Yes, but I would like to make another longer or harder race, for example in the North or some of 15 km, because I prepared so well that I could have made another even longer race.

Fire rages at Seseña tyre dump

The small town of Seseña, which is in the north of Toledo on the boundary with the region of Madrid, constitutes one of Spain’s biggest environmental headaches.

The tyre dump has been a source of controversseseña0y since it was first created in 2002, and, what is more, this dump was declared illegal in 2003 because the company that ran it failed to meet legal requirements.

The last thirteenth of may, a huge fire occurred in the largest tyre cemetery of Castilla-La Mancha, where the regional government has activated alert status level 1 on account of the huge pall of smoke rising from the dump and almost 9,000 people had to leave the town.

The cause of the blaze is not known, but the dump is located only 400 metres from a large residential development. It is estimated that the 5 million old tyres weigh as much as 90,000 tons, and the cloud of smoke emanating from the site is so thick that the authorities in Madrid and Castilla-La Mancha are advising both residents to keep their windows closed.

The level of emissions released in the fire could be as high as the equivalent of pollutants typically produced for the whole of Spain in one year, and to prevent illnesses, Seseña’s population had to wear protective masks outdoors.

This great fire will be very difficult to extinguish, since the water will not be sufficient. It can put out the flame, but not the internal temperature of the tyres and embers. Some experts said that the only effective way of attacking the huge fire is by small zones.

Marta Sandoval Rico  1ºA

 

 

 

Congratulations!

March 21st, Saturday evening, In Plaza de España in Torrijos took place the Villa of Torrijos awards gala organized by the town.

By surprise we were notified that our classmate Jesús Baltasar and our class 1ºBACH A had been awarded with the solidarity price in that gala.

Why were we awarded? Maybe you are asking… Well here it is the story:

All started with Mario, a classmate of us that suffers from a degenerative illness that keeps him on a wheelchair and what is more, there is not an elevator on our high school. A student called Jesus, seeing Mario’s situation decided to start up an initiative that could help Mario to get to the upper floors in the high school without taking any risk.

Then he wrote an article in a social platform called Change.org explaining what was happening in Mario’s everyday life and we collect up more than a thousand signatures in favor of installing an elevator.

This piece of news reached the ears of the town hall and they decided to support us.

Some weeks later, some friends of Mario’s started writing a letter to the minister to let her know about the terrible situation and incredibly she answered us back expressing  her full agreement in that initiative.

The construction of the elevator took more or less a month and it started in April. When it was finished the TV came to our high school to interview Jesus, Mario and his mother about their feelings and experiences.

And so we were awarded for this, for our dedication, for the way that we express to the world that Mario is one of us no matter what his situation is, to prove that teenagers also have feelings and are worried for everyone else’s situation, for trying to make our partners life a little bit easier. This is a very clear example that make us see that if you fight for your dreams with effort and dedication sooner or later they will become true.

DSC04761
Mario, his parents and Jesús

 

 

By Alba Frías López, 1ºBACH A

London 16′

If you want to see our trip’s photos, just click in the «London 2016» button in the top of the page!

Hello, we are a group of students from 1º Bachillerato and we want everybody to know about our amazing experience in London. Here, we are going to tell you how we spend these amazing 5 days in the UK. We began with the idea of the trip in September and surprisingly in November our teacher, Luis found a travel offer and this is how it began to become real.

That day; the countdown started!!!!

The previous day of our trip was Monday, but it wasn’t an awful one, of course, it was, maybe THE BEST one. At 2 a.m. of Tuesday we had to be in the bus station to take the bus to the airport. We were all really excited and, although it was too early we were as if it was 5 p.m. The trip from Torrijos to Madrid wasn’t a relaxing one because we couldn`t stop talking and having fun, we were too excited to sleep!!! When we arrived to the airport; everything took place as it was supposed to, we took the plane and, finally, at half past eight on Tuesday we arrived to Gatwick airport, in London. When we caught our suitcases, a bus took us to the hotel. Once we arrived there, we left them in our rooms and we went to visit the British museum, which was quite near the hotel. There, we had the opportunity of seeing the “Piedra Rosetta”. It is a really important discovery since it was the base to read papyrus. In this museum, there are wonderful statues and sculptures. Greek zone in the museum is incredible, you go into the room and the first thing you see is the famous Parthenon. In the upper floor, you can find an exposition about mummies and sarcophagus of different eras and places. It was a wonderful visit, we would repeat it thousands of times!

Nevertheless, the day had just started. When we went out from the museum, the teachers decided to take us to see Trafalgar Square. All of us were impressed, and obviously thousands of photos per second were taken.  But that was not all; we also visited Piccadilly Circus, one of the most famous places of London. The square is known mainly because the illuminated posters, as well as the “Eros Fountain”. In addition, there are thousands of shops, restaurants, theatres and pubs. It is, actually, the most living part of London. We had some free time, which we spent in shopping and eating. It had been an exhausting day and we had to be prepared for next day; Tower Bridge and Natural History museum were coming!

Next day, on Wednesday morning we went to the Natural History museum, which was, maybe, the most interesting one we have ever seen. It was different from other museums; in this one, apart from dinosaur area, which was the most amazing one, there were many sections where you could interact with the museum by games and videos. Later, we had lunch in a kebab and, after having lunch, we went to visit one of the most emblematic monuments of London: the Tower Bridge. We were all amazed by the shape of the bridge and we took there many photos!! After taking thousands of photos, we had some free time and we could observe wonderful London sights.

Near the tower bridge, there was a man singing Justin Bieber’s famous songs and we kept there listening to him. When he finished singing, we took a photo with him. We were really excited!!

 

It was Thursday morning and we were absolutely ready to take the train that would carry to us to Oxford. This city, full of a magic, is the place of resident of the most prestigious universities of the world.

First, we visited the “Christ Church”. It is both; a college of the university and the Cathedral of Oxford. This college is probably the largest of the university and many distinguished people have studied there. Moreover, here is where the famous “Harry Potter” film was recorded. We were all amazed by the large dining room as well as the courtyard where the “Quidditch” matches were celebrated in the film.

After these two incredible days, the greatest one arrived: we did a complete visit of London; the London Eye, Westminster Abbey, Big Ben, red phone boxes, Buckingham Palace, changing of the Royal Guard….

It was an exhausting day, but nothing could be better.

First, we visited the Westminster Abbey. It was a real surprise since everybody thought it could be boring, but not all. Lot of visitors attempt here everybody and this trip was our turn. Poets, kings, soldiers and heroes; almost the complete history of British. In the abbey there were  was a lot of tombs from different people, especially of royal family and distinguished celebrities.

After the Abbey we went to visit the Big Ben, as well as the London Eye. We really enjoyed our free time: British lunches, selfies and laughs. Then, we went to Buckingham Palace. In addition, we walked through St. James Park which was large and alive but full of doves and ducks. After a pleasant walk we finally arrived at the Buckingham Palace. In fact, we saw some royal guards. They were may be sick and tired of listening us and our photos, but they resisted incredibly well.

When we were in our way to the hotel, after such an amazing day, we  went through Oxford street, a great “shopping street” in where you could fine the shop you want, we were all so tired to go shopping, so we didn`t stop in the shops.

And, after these amazing days, our trip was coming to its end. On Saturday morning, our last day in London, we went to Covent garden again to do the lasts shops , we have lunch there, in Covent Garden, and, finally, in the afternoon, we went to catch the bus to Gatwick airport  and … It was time to say goodbye to London .

Of course, in any time of our lives, we will return to London, but it will never be the same. This kind of travels are UNFORGETTABLES and unrepeteables.

 

Arduino and our High School

The students of 4th course of Technology have been playing around with Robotics using the Arduino board. First of all what is Arduino? Arduino is an open-source computer hardware and software company that provides several boards (as in the figure1), with different features. The key aspect of the boards is that they have digital and analog pines that we can use as inputs or outputs for reading and writing sensors, motors, LEDs . Arduino provides also an integrated development environment (IDE) for programming in a computer language. With the creativity of the students, the Arduino board, some sensors (like infrared and ultrasonic), some toy-motors and some electronics stuff you can create robots and automatic toys. Our projects have been 3 robots: A line follower, a robot that follows a black line, Laserbot a robot which starts moving when it receives the light of a laser and a robot that avoids obstacles using 2 sensors: an ultrasonic sensor for detecting objects and a nose with whiskers (made with the joystick of a videoconsole) (figures 2,3,4)

The Technology Department encourages the students of 3º course with enthusiasm in computers and technology to choose the subject of technology for 4º course because they would enjoy working with Arduino.

PICTURES OF OUR STUDENTS’ PROJECTS

Ex-Covarrubians shine at university

CONGRATULATIONS TO OUR ALUMNI

We’d like to congratulate our students because of their success in their studies at uni. We feel so proud for teaching and having them with us at school and have helped to their education and training.  CONGRATULATIONS!!!

Miguel Adánez García-Villaraco       Mejor Expediente Académico de su Promoción  de Ingeniería Técnica Industrial de la Universidad de Castilla-La Mancha.

Noemí Puyol Ruiz       Beca de Excelencia Académica en el Área de Ingeniería de las TIC de la Universidad Politécnica de Madrid
Ángel Gómez-Hidalgo Pérez     Premio al Rendimiento Académico Excelente en Primer Curso de Ingeniería Aeronáutica de la Universidad Politécnica de Madrid

A poet’s blink

Everybody knows that there are gifted people for everything, ok, but what not all know is that a pack of them flock together in 4º B-C bilingual this year and every now and then they give us some bits of their talent.

Today our friend Paula R. Bolonio shares with us a part of her lyric sense with a couple of poems in English language. Hope you like them
DARLING
Why do you look so sad, my darling?
Doesn’t the light shine where you are?
I’ll bring you light
And make things alright
Doesn’t the girl listen to you anymore?
I’ll bring you tissues to wipe your eyes
I’ll comfort you and ask why
Why do you hurt yourself, my darling?
Does nobody believe in you anymore?
I’ll bring band aids to put on your wounds
And I’ll give you love like I always did
Why did you leave me, my darling?
Did her lies become too much?
I give you love and tell her to stop

But I guess It’s not enough


BRIGHTER

Laying her makes me think
Of everything that we could be
If I was brighter
And you were too
Maybe I could have a better future with you
But I’m your trophy wife
While you go out and party all night
I make you look good even If you’re not
I make people believe your temper isn’t that hot
For you I do everything
I cover up my bruises
So, no one notice a thing
But, I really wish we could worked
Because of you, right now,
I’m in hospital to die


Science Fiction. Our young writers’ tales

Hey there!
Where’s the limit? What’s the next challenge? Time, Space, Intelligence…?
After reading a passage of H.G. Wells’ «War of the worlds» in class, I made a proposal: «Why don’t you make some teams to write a short four-or-six-hand sci-fi tale?» That was the challenge and they accepted! When I say «they» I refer to my class of 4ºESO B-C bilingual (the loudest class ever but the one you can’t help loving).
They had one week to squeeze their brains, loose their imagination, work effectively in teams and to give birth a short tale… and so they did!
I had promised them to have a winner but I can’t! you can take my word for this; so I have decided to ask them for permission to upload the tales to our magazine and let the readers decide.
I have uploaded the three first stories but I will upload them all as the students send them to me.
Hope you can enjoy the tales as much as I did.  Just click the page «THE TALES» above to ckeck it out and please, We will open a poll gadget next Dec.19th for the readers to vote; we hope that all the writers will have handed their masterpieces in by then.