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“President Obama visits Lee High School and awards teacher ‘Hipster of the Year’” reads the headline on the first page of “The Traveler,” Lee High School’s student newspaper.
Also on page one is a story about Principal Jonathon Trinh paying cash to students for good grades. In fact, the first six pages of the monthly publication are filled with hilarious stories that reflect the cleverness of the staff reporters in producing an April Fools’ Day issue.
Other parodies include “HISD announces 4 months of break” and “State and standardized testing cancelled forever,” even as many students are in the middle of taking the English STAAR test.
Various faculty members were spoofed as well, including a story about a geometry teacher’s video receiving one million hits on YouTube and another winning the lottery and quitting her job to travel the world. Another story reported that Principal Trinh had been called back into the Marines to fight ISIS, along with all ROTC students 18 years of age.
On page 6, the Traveler staff fessed up to the prank and pointed out that pages 7 through 12 are full of true newspaper stories such as Algebra teacher Oscar Arturo Urrutia being awarded Teacher of the Year and how to prepare for STAAR testing.
On page 9, news reporter Bryan Eriza reported on the origins of April Fools’ day, although he was not able to find anything definitive regarding why it exists. He did find references to it dating back to the early 16th century, but the tradition remains a mystery.