![The Wayland Police Department have issued a warning on the rise of scammers during the holiday season. “Hang up [the phone]. if you get a text and you do not know who it's from, just delete it. Don't click on any links, nothing,” Wayland police chief Edward Burman said. “Every single one of them is a scam.”](https://waylandstudentpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/12/img_0954_720-e1734676255647.jpg)
![WHS’s Connect Program ran its annual holiday gift drive to fulfill the wishlist of children enrolled in the Dorchester based non-profit daycare organization, the Yawkey Center. This drive brought the town together and impacted both the students in Connect, as well as the greater Wayland community. “You could see how helpful the town was and how our community came together and wanted to help out a community that wasn't our own [and] kids who were less fortunate than we were,” senior and Connect Program member Jordynn Lee said.](https://waylandstudentpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/12/screenshot_2024-12-20_at_12.21.24___pm_720-e1734734228474.png)
![The Boy Scouts will be selling trees on Fridays from 4 p.m. to 7 p.m., Saturdays 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. and Sundays noon to 6 p.m. until they sell out.
“This event is one of the things that [the Boy Scouts] get to have a direct impact on the community,” freshman Alex Macleod said.](https://waylandstudentpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/12/Screenshot-2024-12-11-at-8.38.38 AM.png)
WHS seniors collaborate to create an AP computer science course
Credit: Creative Commons
With COVID-19 cancelling the AP computer science class for Wayland High School, many students are left wondering what to do. Luckily, seniors Sashwat Das, Walker Whitehouse, and Daniel Cai, decided to take thing into their own hands and teach their own class.
Following the cancellation of many computer science courses at WHS for the 2020 to 2021 school year, various students expressed their disappointment, having hoped to take one of these courses as an elective. Luckily, seniors Sashwat Das, Walker Whitehouse and Daniel Cai decided to take on this responsibility and run their own Advanced Placement computer science class.
The three students plan on teaching two sessions per week with one being on Wednesdays (a little over an hour), and the second one being towards the end of the week for clarifying questions and presenting project ideas. Not only does the team have a schedule planned out, but they have the experience working with computer science which they hope will enrich the program.
“Over the summer, a couple kids in Acton-Boxborough decided to open up a non-profit computer science school,” Das said. “I was roped into this and helped design homeworks, curriculum and taught the classes…we generally taught the same material [as what would be taught in this class] and the school had over a thousand students.”
The three leaders have a specific plan in mind: follow the Advanced Placement Computer Science A exam curriculum suggested by College Board and utilize a tool called “CSAwesome” – an online interactive textbook for students to learn Javascript.
“We obviously can’t be compared to the great Mr. Hopps when it comes to teaching the class, but we are here to aid self-guided learning,” Das said. “Having a mentor or someone who can answer your questions on a subject you are trying to learn on your own is extremely important and helpful to accelerate your learning and increase the quality. We have an open [Slack channel] to answer any questions and help anyone who needs it.”
There might be a few differences between a real classroom and this program, but the three seniors want to make the two as similar as possible. The course will attempt to follow a curriculum, but most of it will be self-studying with some guidance relating to the overview of each topic. The rest of time will be spent on practicing the material.
“I really like [computer science], and I think taking the [computer science] class at the high school brought on that inspiration, so I want to share that with others,” Das said. “Coding is also a really important skill nowadays. It permeates through every part of our life, so it is important to get a basic understanding of the subject.”
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Brasen Chi, Class of 2022, is a third year reporter and the Arts and Entertainment editor for WSPN. In school, he tends to zone out and be a little forgetful...