CARL AZUZ, HOST, CNN STUDENT NEWS: It is Friday, TGIF. It is awesome. I`m Carl Azuz. Thank you for wrapping up your week with CNN Student News. And congratulations to Stillwater High School in Stillwater, Oklahoma, who got our social media trivia question right this week. Now it`s on to today`s headlines.
First up, this is the first day when everyone can buy stock in Facebook -- if you`re willing to pay for it. The social networking site was scheduled to make its IPO this morning. It stands for initial public offering, and it means that Facebook stock is now being traded on Wall Street. The company has been building up to this for months.
Executives have been meeting with potential investors, figuring out what the price should be for each share of the Facebook stock. That price was finalized late yesterday. During this IPO, each share was originally priced at $38. Some investors, mostly financial institutions, made orders in advance. Everyone else had to wait until after the stock market opened this morning.
With that share price of $38, Facebook is expected to raise $16 billion with its initial public offering. That would be the biggest IPO ever for a tech company and it`ll be the third biggest IPO in U.S. history.
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AZUZ (voice-over): Well, the business world is also keeping a close eye on what`s happening right now in Greece. The country held parliamentary elections earlier this month, but the political parties who won seats couldn`t find a way to come together in a coalition. So Greece will hold new elections in June.
Does the business world care about this for a reason? Yes. Greece has a major debt crisis, and it`s had to get bailouts from other European countries. The concern is if Greece doesn`t have a working government in place soon, it could miss making payments on its debt, and that could have serious consequences for Greece.
And since what happens in one country can impact the economy of others, this kind of crisis could have rippled effects around the globe.
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UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Today`s first Shoutout goes out to Ms. Lannan and the first graduating class of Wylie East High School in Wylie, Texas. What country operates the Soyuz spacecraft? Here we go. Is it China, Russia, France or India? You`ve got three seconds, go.
The Soyuz is a Russian spacecraft, and there`s always one part at the International Space Station. That`s your answer and that`s your Shoutout.
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AZUZ (voice-over): In fact, the first crew that ever went to the International Space Station got there inside a Soyuz rocket. So did the most recent arrivals. This spacecraft took off on Tuesday, carrying on U.S. astronaut and two Russian cosmonauts. Even though the Soyuz is a Russian vehicle, it launches from a space pad in the nearby country of Kazakhstan. The ship arrived at the space station yesterday.
One of the men on board said the docking went very smoothly. The three new crew members are scheduled to be on the ISS for four months, four months in space. They`re joining three other men who have been living on the space station since April.
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AZUZ: The U.S. military is no stranger to technology. It`s got night vision goggles. You`ve heard of unmanned drone aircraft we reported on our show. Now there`s a new kind of robot that lets troops see through walls and around corners. Ashleigh Banfield reports on how this machine works and how its makers hope it can help save lives.
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ASHLEIGH BANFIELD, CNN HOST (voice-over): You can toss it over a wall or even drop it from a three-story building. Known as the Throwbot, this device is helping soldiers and Marines detect insurgents and IEDs in Afghanistan.
JEREMY BLADE, RECONROBOTICS: It`s retreating deeper in.
It`s essentially a 1.2-pound throwable reconnaissance device that soldiers, Marines, SWAT teams, bomb teams use for situational awareness. So you can take it, throw it into a room and you get a live video feed of what`s going on.
BANFIELD (voice-over): You steer the robot by remote control, and you see what it sees.
BLADE: The recon`s got XT. It can be deployed in less than five seconds. It`s simple. Pull the pin, flip the switch, you`re ready to go.
BANFIELD (voice-over): Infrared sensors let you see in the dark and it`s small enough to fit in a backpack or a pocket.
BLADE: The thing that makes this robot unique is its size. Back in 2007 when this first came out a lot of the bigger systems were 30 pounds, 50 pounds, a lot to carry for soldiers.
BANFIELD (voice-over): The U.S. military is using over 2,000 systems and more than 400 police SWAT teams are using this robot.
BLADE: Something like this can save lives. If this goes in first and it does get shot at, you`re not coming out or one of your buddies isn`t coming out shot. You can get eyes inside before you go in.
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UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Today`s Shoutout Extra Credit goes out to Ms. Duff`s advisory class at Hickory Creek Middle School in Frankfort, Illinois. Checkers, Grits and Miss Beazley have all lived at what famous address? Was it 10 Downing Street, 4 Privet Drive, 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue or 221-B Baker Street? Another three second on the clock, go.
Those presidential pets all lived at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, the White House. That`s your answer, and that`s your Shoutout Extra Credit.
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AZUZ: There`s a long legacy of presidential pooches like the three we just mentioned. But the human occupants of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue haven`t always limited themselves to dogs. We`re talking about lions, tigers and bears, oh, my, also horses, elephants and -- hippos? Can you imagine bringing a pet hippo into the White House?
Can you imagine bringing one anywhere? We`re going to let Tom Foreman handle the history of presidential pets.
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TOM FOREMAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Ever since George Washington, presidents have been judged by the dogs they run with.
GARRETT GRAFF, EDITOR IN CHIEF, "WASHINGTONIAN": Presidents and their pets have a long and storied history.
FOREMAN (voice-over): Garrett Graff is editor in chief of "Washingtonian" magazine.
GRAFF: Most of us don`t get the intricacies of Middle East oil politics and the rise and fall of the GDP. But we can get if you connect with a dog.
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FOREMAN (voice-over): Presidents have kept company with critters of all types. Theodore Roosevelt turned the White House into a zoo with parrots, horses, ponies, bears, a zebra, snakes and, inexplicably, a one- legged chicken.
GRAFF: John Quincy Adams actually used to love surprising guests in the White House with an alligator he kept in a bathtub.
FOREMAN (voice-over): William Taft had a cow. Woodrow Wilson pioneered the PR potential of sheep, using them to trim the White House lawn during World War I and apparently calling someone about it.
Calvin Coolidge, like Roosevelt, had it all, lion cubs, a goose, a bobcat, a raccoon and a pygmy hippo named Billy.
GRAFF: Both Teddy Roosevelt and Calvin Coolidge gave large parts of their menagerie to the National Zoo here in Washington. Even today, many, if not most of the pygmy hippos in zoos in the United States are descendants of that original Calvin Coolidge hippo.
FOREMAN (voice-over): But dogs have always been the most likely pick for first pet, for better or worse. For example, there was a story going around that during a tour of the Aleutian Islands, Franklin Roosevelt left his Scottish terrier, Fala, behind, and sent the Navy back to rescue him.
Almost every president has had at least one dog and maybe -- just maybe -- there is a reason beyond politics.
GRAFF: The presidency is a very lonely undertaking. I think there are very many moments in the White House where what you really want to do is take your pet for a walk.
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AZUZ (voice-over): One school, 25 valedictorians? That`s the subject of my latest article at CNN "Schools of Thought" blog. Vanguard High School in Ocala, Florida, offers students college level courses and a lot of people take them. So more than 20 students there are expected to have GPAs of 5.0.
Since the school ranks its student based on GPA and not numerical grades, it`s possible there will be 25 Vanguard seniors with 5.0s. They`d be at the top of their class. It`s crazy. How does the school decide who speaks at graduation? You can`t have 25 speakers, even if they are all valedictorians. Nobody has ever complained that a graduation ceremony was too short.
And you can find the answer to that at the "Schools of Thought" blog. It`s all things education and it`s relevant to anyone who`s ever been a student, which is all of us. The address: CNN.com/schoolsofthought.
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AZUZ: Finally, today, a college graduate who stands out in the crowd.
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GAC FILIPAJ, COLUMBIA GRADUATE: Sometimes I think maybe I do not fit in there because of my age.. But then I say, well, why not?
AZUZ (voice-over): Gac Filipaj may be a little older than his classmates, but the 52-year-old`s Ivy League diploma is just as real. He`s a custodian at Columbia University in New York. When he`s not working on campus, he`s been taking classes, and after 12 years, he has earned his bachelor`s degree and graduated with honors.
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AZUZ: You may say 12 years is a long time, but Mr. Filipaj spent seven years learning English before he started his coursework. So really, it`s just a matter of degrees. It`s time for the weekend to commence. We hope you have a great one, whatever the pomp and circumstances may be. For CNN Student News, I`m Carl Azuz.
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