Kids News - Articles for Grades 11-12

In mid-January, Cape Town officials announced that the world-class South African city of four million residents would run out of water on April 12. The date, nicknamed “Day Zero,” has since been postponed multiple times, thanks to the intense conservation efforts by locals, a sharp reduction in agricultural water usage, and a 10 billion-liter donation from the private reservoirs of the Groenland Farmers Association. The city now has enough water to sustain the current level of usage until July 9, giving residents hope that the rainy season, which begins in June, will be more normal than has been the case lately....

Though animals are continually evolving to adapt to their environment, it is hard to observe the process real time in the wild. Now, some international scientists have stumbled upon a unique group of West African dwarf crocodiles that may be in the midst of mutating into a new species....

February 14, 2018, began like any other school day for the over 3,000 kids that attend Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida. Classmates exchanged Valentine’s Day cards and carnations, grumbled through the mandatory fire evacuation drill, and eagerly waited for the last bell to ring at 2:40 pm. Little did they know that at 2:19 pm, their school would become the scene of one of the deadliest mass shootings in modern US history — one that would claim the lives of 14 students and three educators....

On February 13, 17-year-old Chloe Kim made history at the 2018 Winter Olympic Games in PyeongChang, when she became the youngest woman to medal in the halfpipe. What made the win even more special for the first-generation Korean American snowboarder was the presence of her 75-year-old grandmother who resides in Seoul and had never seen her compete live....

A 14-year-old with a vocabulary comprising four or five rudimentary words may not sound impressive. However, it sure is when the speaker happens to be an orca, or killer, whale! The amazing discovery along with the recording of the vocalization was unveiled in a January 31 study published in the journal Proceedings of the Royal Society B....

The joyous and colorful 2018 Chinese New Year celebrations will commence on Friday, February 16. Also known as Lunar New Year, or Spring Festival, the fifteen-day event, which will end with the Lantern Festival on March 2, is the longest and most anticipated of all of China’s festivals. Associated with customs meant to ensure auspicious beginnings, it is also observed in Malaysia, Singapore, Taiwan, and Vietnam....

If you were among the millions of people that watched NBC’s replay of the opening ceremony of the 2018 Winter Olympics in PyeongChang, South Korea on Friday, February 9, you might have seen an airborne snowboarder, a bird flapping its wings, and the iconic Olympic Rings, light up the skies. While they may have appeared to be digital fireworks, the mesmerizing show was the result of thousands of tiny drones preprogrammed to follow complicated flight paths to form the shape-shifting images....

The American alligator (Alligator mississippiensis) is known to be a crafty and fierce predator that devours anything it can snare. However, given that the reptile lacks salt glands, scientists had always believed that its diet was restricted to the fish and crustaceans that dwell in its freshwater habitat. Now, a new study suggests that the opportunistic beasts also gobble down saltwater inhabitants like crabs, sea turtles, stingrays, and even sharks....

While we often hear of humans losing their jobs, a robot being fired for incompetence is almost unheard of. However, that is exactly what a Scottish grocery store was forced to do after its newly-employed humanoid robot proved woefully inept at performing the assigned tasks....