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When Olivia Rodrigo arrived at the Grammy Awards earlier this month, the 19-year-old singer-songwriter attracted attention for her decision to bring an American Sign Language (ASL) interpreter with her. The interpreter stood next to Rodrigo as she was interviewed on the red carpet, converting Rodrigo’s spoken words into signs. Rodrigo won praise for improving accessibility at the Grammys. 

Rodrigo is winning a lot of praise these days. At the Grammys, she won three of the coveted music prizes, thanks to her mega-hit single, “Drivers License,” and her album, Sour. 

Rodrigo’s music career took off last year, after “Drivers License” was released in January 2021. The song, which is about heartbreak, was streamed more than one billion times, propelling Rodrigo to pop-star status. Rodrigo’s Grammy Awards—for Best New Artist, Best Pop Solo Performance, and Best Pop Vocal album—could help set her on the superstar path forged by her idol, Taylor Swift.

Rodrigo isn’t totally new to fame. She had the lead role in the movie An American Girl: Grace Stirs Up Success, when she was 10 years old. She has since starred in two TV series, Bizaardvark and High School Musical: The Musical: The Series. Her roles on both shows required considerable musical talent—no problem for the gifted Rodrigo.

During the time she was acting, Rodrigo was also writing songs. When she shared one of them on Instagram, the producers of High School Musical asked her to write a ballad for the show. The success of the resulting song, “All I Want,” got Rodrigo a record deal. “Drivers License” and Sour would soon follow.

Rodrigo will spend a good part of the spring and summer on tour. She’s super busy and says fame can be a lot, but talking to a therapist helps her handle life in the spotlight. 

“I’m so happy,” Rodrigo told Clash Music in 2021. “I’m doing everything that I’ve always wanted to be doing.”

It’s official: Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson will serve as a justice on the Supreme Court, the highest court in the United States. The U.S. Senate confirmed Jackson on April 7 by a vote of 53-47. Jackson will be the first Black woman ever to serve on the Supreme Court.

The nine Supreme Court justices have some of the most powerful jobs in the United States. Together, the justices hear about 80 cases every year. They consider whether laws are constitutional, meaning they decide if laws are fair based on what the U.S. Constitution says. Justices have the power to overturn, or reverse, decisions made by lower courts. 

The justices don’t always agree on the cases they hear. In fact, they have very different ideologies, or opinions about issues. They make decisions by taking a vote. 

How do you become a Supreme Court justice? Potential justices are nominated by the president before the Senate votes on whether they should get the job. Nominees are usually chosen based on their experience as a lawyer and a judge. Presidents usually select nominees who have legal opinions similar to their own.

Jackson has had a long career in the law. She grew up in Florida, where both of her parents were teachers before her father became a lawyer and her mother became a school principal. Jackson attended Harvard University and Harvard Law School. After graduation, she worked as a law clerk for Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer, assisting him with research and other work that justices do before reaching decisions. Jackson also worked as a lawyer and then a judge. In 2021, Jackson became a judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit, the second most powerful court in the nation.

Like all Supreme Court justices, Jackson will have her job for life, unless she decides to retire. Her legal decisions and opinions will have an important influence on many aspects of life in the United States.

Humans make up new slang words all the time. And, it turns out, orangutans do something similar, though they don’t use words. 

Orangutans can’t talk, but they do use sounds to communicate. Scientists in the United Kingdom have found that orangutans often come up with new sounds. Like human slang words, these sounds often catch on and are used by other orangutans in the community.

In a study led by Dr. Adriano Lameira of the University of Warwick, scientists spent five years recording “kiss-squeaks” emitted by orangutans in various communities. Kiss-squeaks are sounds that orangutans make to try to scare away predators. Scientists once thought kiss-squeaks were hardwired, meaning they never change. But the recordings showed that new kiss-squeaks are invented over time. The recordings also showed that after hearing a new kiss-squeak, other orangutans sometimes begin to use it. 

If this sounds familiar, it may be because this is a lot like the way humans add new words to their languages.

Scientists already know that human language is shaped by social surroundings. In other words, we begin to use new words after seeing or hearing them from friends, social media, TV, and other sources. The study provides evidence that orangutan communication is somewhat similar. Dr. Lameira told The Guardian he believes that some orangutans will invent new sounds to “show off their coolness and how [much of a] rebel they are.”

Two college students have created a website designed to assist Ukrainian refugees. The website, called Ukraine Take Shelter, helps people who are fleeing the war in Ukraine to find a place to stay in cities around the world.

Ukraine Take Shelter was created by Harvard University students Avi Schiffman, 19, and Marco Burstein, 18. Since Russia invaded Ukraine on February 24, millions of Ukrainians have left their home country, and many have no place to go. There are, however, a lot of people around the world who want to open their homes to Ukrainians. Schiffman, a talented web designer, realized that there was a need for a simple online resource linking refugees with people willing to host them. He and Burstein built the website in just three days.

Ukraine Take Shelter, which can be viewed in several languages, is designed to be easy to use. The user simply types in the city where they need shelter to get listings for houses, apartments, and rooms that are available. Thousands of potential hosts have posted listings on the site. 

Why did Schiffman decide to help? He said he saw a need for a website and, having built sites before, he thought, “Why not me?”

On March 31, 1989, a UFO was spotted in the sky over London, England. The flying saucer attracted hundreds of witnesses who may have wondered if extraterrestrials were about to land on Earth. But this was no alien invasion. It was the ultimate April Fools’ joke.

The man behind the prank was Richard Branson, the founder of the Virgin Group. Branson’s company is involved with entertainment, fitness, and flight—but business isn’t Branson’s only interest. He’s all about April Fools’ Day, which falls every year on April 1.

For his legendary 1989 stunt, Branson didn’t build a flying saucer from scratch. Instead, he made a hot air balloon look like a flying saucer by covering it in silver casing and adding lights that could flash on and off. The dressed-up balloon took flight early in the morning, just as the sun was rising and the first commuters were heading to work. At least some of the people who saw the eerie “UFO” hovering over them took it pretty seriously. The police later said they lost count of the number of calls they received.

The police pursued the mysterious “spacecraft” and finally caught up with it just after it landed. But, as Branson later remembered, the drama didn’t end there. When the door of the flying saucer opened, Branson recalled, fog wafted out and an alien emerged. (Of course, it was a human wearing an alien costume.) Since the next day would be April Fools’, the police soon realized what was going on.

Branson’s company, Virgin Group, has since gotten involved in space exploration. Maybe Branson will actually be an alien someday—exploring a planet far from Earth.

For more than 100 years, a ship called the Endurance was hidden under the icy waters near Antarctica. Now, the ship has been found. And it looks a lot like it did a century ago.

The Endurance was part of an expedition led by British explorer Ernest Shackleton. In August 1914, Shackleton and his crew set out to make the first land crossing of Antarctica. But trying to reach the frozen continent would almost prove to be deadly. In December, the Endurance became trapped in the ice-covered Weddell Sea. The ship drifted for 10 months before it got crushed by pack ice. For five more months, the crew camped on ice floes before escaping in lifeboats to a nearby island. By then, the Endurance had sunk into the sea.

On March 5, 2022, a team of researchers located the Endurance nearly 10,000 feet (3,008 meters) under water. It wasn’t easy. The team had to use a ship that’s designed to break through the ice that covers the Weddell Sea. They sent remote submarines under the water to search for the ship. It took more than two weeks to find the Endurance. No sunlight reaches the seafloor, making the environment extremely cold and dark.

But the cold water proved to be a very good thing. It kept the Endurance in remarkably good shape. Scientists say wood-eating worms often eat away at shipwrecks. But these worms can’t survive at the bottom of the freezing Weddell Sea. So the Endurance still looks a lot like it did during Shackleton’s lifetime.

Viewing photos of the ship is almost like going back in time.