More than a dozen former employees say understaffing at Brynn Marr Hospital contributes to what they describe as a dangerous place for patients and employees. Hospital officials say allegations of violence, sexual assaults, overmedication and lack of mental health therapy are unfounded.

Former employees say short-staffed NC psych hospital rife with violence, abuse

Brynn Marr Hospital

It's that time of year when your child will be taking end-of-grade tests or EOGs. What are EOGs and how can you help them be better prepared?

End-of-grade tests: Everything you need to know about these annual exams

Student testing 

All assets associated with the tag: JoJo Siwa

JoJo Siwa Coverage

Go Ask Mom kid reporter Quinn (who is also the daughter of contributor Sloane Heffernan) caught up with the group for an interview before their Raeigh show! 

Our interview with JoJo Siwa's new pop group XOMG Pop

Go Ask Mom kid reporter Quinn (who is also the daughter of contributor Sloane Heffernan) caught up with the group for an interview before their Raleigh show. 

Hey guys, it's gonna be full out. What's up everybody? It's your girl, tiny T here. Hey, it's kaya, hola, it's Bella everyone, it's leah here, hi, I'm Brooklyn and I am Dallas and we are excellent. Hi, I'm Quinn with WRL, I'm here with X. OMG Pop. Welcome to Raleigh Girl. Thank you. Um how do you guys like Raleigh? It's been amazing so far. All the sides are so beautiful and nice and it's been an amazing experience so far. I love all of the cool trees everywhere we were driving down the road. It's so cool to see all of the scenery. It's so pretty. Yeah, it's definitely different from where we've been, it's been very cold everywhere. We actually just came from where we're at, we're at pennsylvania, which was really cold and right here, it's really nice and it's beautiful, perfect weather. The weather is so nice. How does it feel to be our age and to be pop stars? It feels so good because like there's a lot of people that wanted to be an eccentric pop and like since were so young and we're doing this and for pop stars, it's just so amazing. And it just feels so good to be honest. I just feel like this is just an amazing opportunity for all of us, especially all our age differences and it's just so crazy that we get to be an X. M D pump because like you said, a lot of people on this show, but they didn't make it. And also it's like, sorry, the average person doesn't get to do this as often and it's just such a great opportunity and it's so exciting. Yeah, I agree. And there's only like seven of us in the whole world that get to do this. Like we're living out our dreams right now, so that it's such an amazing feeling that we get to go on stage and make so many people happy when and we're doing it with jojo and we've all been to jojo concerts before. This were a little and we've always wanted to do something of jojo and this crazy that and jess and Jojo actually picked us seven to be in there, pop star group. And it's crazy how she could have picked anybody. There's like 1000 kids who auditioned and it's us seven. Like we started out with 11 kids. And it's crazy how she narrowed it down and like we're a group now, like we're excellent family. Okay, how do you guys go to school and stuff? Alright, so we are all home out. Sorry. Okay, Okay. So I actually started public, like I've been homeschooled for the past five years and I started public school this year, but I went back to home schooling, so I could be with all of my friends and examine you pop and we do school, like any free time that we get on the road when we're doing drives on tour and sometimes it's definitely good that we do home school so that we can do all these fun things together and practice are singing and dancing and performing. I'm so sometimes like on the weekends we can do our school. Um, and so like any free break, like leah said we have to do our school. So if it's like road trips and just anywhere we have free time. But I'm actually the fun fact, I'm actually the only one in this group and that's not homeschooled. Um, I go to school, but you know, like I obviously can't, so they like post the homework on google classroom and I do it all. It's basically like homeschooling, accept the homework assignments are on google. A fun fact about me. I've been homeschooled since kindergarten. So this isn't really new to me, but it is really fun doing, but eventually I'm probably gonna have to get home school. Yeah, it's really hard. And how does it feel? Do you guys ever get nervous performing in front of all those people? To be honest. We've already done this like a bunch of times and we just always have to give a pep talk to each other. We always say our prayers together and I feel like when we go in the crowd, we just see the whole like the audience and they have some like posters, they have armored and it's just, it's just so great. I'm so grateful. We're like the crowd like gets us like pumped up and just ready we just cleared the stress out of our minds and just be ourselves and be confident and just do what we love to do and if we're being honest, I think it was like the first two or like first show that we were kind of nervous because you know, it was our first time performing with the one and only jojo. See what like the fourth and the fifth time we kind of got used to it, like you have a natural nerves every time we're always just a tad bit nervous but we had each other out, we have pre show rituals and we just get it, get out there on stage and the crowd is like screaming our first shows with 10,000 people which was absolutely crazy and we definitely feed off of the crowd. Um how like how did you guys feel when you found out you girls were the ones who got to perform with jojo ze? I mean it was honestly crazy like we had no idea and it just gave us all in shock and we were just like, wait what? Like it's every single one of us is dream to do perform for her obviously, but it is, it does take work. It takes hard work but it is really fun. Yeah. And then when we were like um like going to judges concerts, like we all went to joe's us concert before, like we started being an ex OMG pop and like I have like all of us have been wanting to go on that stage and do a concert for so long and now we are finally doing it and living our dreams and I know some people don't get to live their dreams this early and it's just we are super duper grateful for it. And when you guys did, how did you find out about the auditions? It was well, I'll say my story. Okay, so how I found that was actually, I was at a competition that day. I was performing my solo and my dance teacher actually told me, wait, there's an audition, do you want to maybe go, it's in California and I think he'll probably make it. So I went and I made it two x 25 I'm so grateful. So how I found out about the audition was actually from my dance teacher Justin and I think Miss Jess like sent him a DM just like sending the application to people and he sent it to my mom and we were like, we're just gonna submit, you never know what it's another opportunity. And we actually got a call back from the producers and we went through the whole process and now we're here with the whole group. I was actually in the car Donald and then my manager were on, he was like, he was like, hey, come to the studio, I gotta tell you something. So he already well he just found out, but he wanted to like have cameras rolling to get my reaction. So I went to the studio and he had a big poster that said jojo and jess auditions and I was like, oh my God, and it's crazy. Like we just said, we went through this whole um dance pop revolution process and now we're here about to perform with jojo Siwa on a couple of hours. Have you guys formed a really strong bond together? We're all like family and like, jojo is like our big sister and this is like our second mom and it's just so cool that we have this big of a connection because we are all family and we just all connect. Most pop groups are like, one has to be better than another, but like we can be at like 12 o'clock and we'll all go to like, let's say like I assume and start practicing the dandy. And it would just be so fun how like we would laugh and google together and it's crazy how we work together because some people can't work as like strongly connected and we even do vocal warm together, we rehearse all together whenever we get something new and sometimes we drive in the car together, we share the same room together together and so we have became a family, just like, hey girls, you want to go get ice cream after you finished a show and you guys went out there and rocked it. What do you guys do after to celebrate? Okay. Okay. For well me, I go out and get whatever I want. Like I'll get ice cream, I'll get donuts, okay, whatever I want, it'll just be so fun because I'll be hanging out with my friends and we just have like a party well after we perform well after we perform. We always have to play jojo songs celebrate and we start jumping celebrates actually after. This is really funny. But after the show, after we watch the show finish it, we go back to our hotel and we always have to watch a scary movie with, if you don't know me. I absolutely love horror movies. They're like my favorite thing, horror movies and candy. And I always make everybody watch a horror movie with this might sound really, really basic and normal, but all I do is just take a shower and go to bed and get into bed. Yeah, Well I really enjoyed talking to you guys. It sounds like you guys have a really strong bond and you guys are very talented and I enjoyed speaking with you today. Thank you

JoJo Siwa's new group XOMG Pop answers our questions

Want to go see JoJo Siwa at PNC Arena? We have four tickets to give away!



Enter to win tickets to see JoJo Siwa

JoJo-Siwa-Sweepstakes

The 16-year-old dancer, singer and viral YouTuber who got her start on the Lifetime show "Dance Moms" will perform at the PNC Arena on May 19. Tickets go on sale at noon, Nov. 22.

JoJo Siwa Coverage

Our interview with JoJo Siwa's new pop group XOMG Pop

JoJo Siwa's new group XOMG Pop answers our questions

Enter to win tickets to see JoJo Siwa

Teen YouTuber, Nickelodeon star JoJo Siwa is bringing her D.R.E.A.M. tour to Raleigh