The 10th annual Stellar Waitstaff Luncheon was, as usual, a great success! Even though the Harker Family & Alumni Picnic was unfortunately cancelled, Harker parents rallied with the silent auction offerings, and sixth grader Kyle Johnson’s parents won him the prize of being served lunch by Harker’s top administrators.
Johnson invited friends and classmates Kuga Pence, Kieran Figueroa, Jackson Lara, Sebastian Dionne and Dominic Ortiz to join his birthday celebration on Tuesday. With Jennifer Gargano, assistant head of school, and Brian Yager, head of school, as waitstaff, the service was stellar. The pair dished out root beer floats, Greek salads, fruit cups, make-your-own tacos and hamburgers. The students rounded out the feast with make-your-own ice cream sundaes and chocolate-covered strawberries.
On Monday, Dave Hart’s middle school music students were visited by Brad Hogarth, band and orchestra director at San Francisco State University. A friend of Hart’s since their time at the Eastman School of Music, Hogarth worked with the students on a section of Ralph Vaughan Williams’ “English Folk Song Suite,” advising them on technique and how to sound more enthusiastic while performing. One of his methods was to ask the students for words that came to mind while playing various sections of the piece, which helped them bond with the music and deliver more sincere, heartfelt performances.
“The main thing that I was trying to get them to do today was give them permission to use all the energy that they naturally have at this age and put it into their instruments,” Hogarth said.
This past winter was amazing, with many league and tournament championships – and a whole lot of fun! We started off in early winter with boys basketball and girls soccer and finished in late winter with girls basketball and boys soccer.
Please see the accomplishments of all of our lower and middle school winter sports teams below:
EARLY WINTER
VA (Grades 7-8) Boys Basketball – The Varsity A team, coached by Ed LeGrand Sawyer, finished in fifth place in the WBAL with a record of 1-5 and went 4-5 overall. Team awards went to Matthew Chen, grade 7 (MVP), Alex Zhang, grade 8 (Eagle) and Ayan Nath, grade 8 (Coaches).
VB (Grades 7-8) Boys Basketball – The Varsity B team, coached by Richard Amarillas, finished in first place (Tri-League Champs) in the WBAL with a 6-1 record and went 6-2 overall. Team awards went to Sasvath Ramachandran, grade 8 (MVP), Zeke Weng, grade 7 (Eagle) and Kaden Kapadia, grade 8 (Coaches).
VB2 (Grades 7-8) Boys Basketball – The Varsity B2 team, coached by Jon Cvitanich, finished in sixth place in the WBAL with a 2-5 record. Team awards went to Akhilesh Chegu, grade 8 (MVP), Michael Pflaging, grade 7 (Eagle) and Saurav Tewari, grade 8 (Coaches).
JVA (Grade 6) Boys Basketball – The Junior Varsity A team, coached by Mike Delfino, finished in fifth place in the WBAL with a 2-4 record and an overall record of 3-5. Team awards went to Om Tandon (MVP), Zachary Blue (Eagle) and Toju Maku (Coaches).
JVB6 (Grade 6) Boys Basketball – The Junior Varsity B6 team, coached by Matt Arensberg, finished in first place in the WBAL with a 6-1 record. Team awards went to Jack Shen and Kyle Leung (MVP), Jordan Labio (Eagle) and Ariav Misra (Coaches).
MS Intramural Boys Basketball – Team awards went to Zain Vakath, grade 7 (MVP), Ramit Goyal, grade 6 (Eagle) and Christopher Tonev, grade 7 (Coaches). The team was coached by Raul Rios and Adam Albers.
JVB1 (Grade 5) Boys Basketball – The Junior Varsity B1 team, coached by Kristian Tiopo, finished undefeated in first place in the WBAL with a 7-0 record and took first place in the WBAL tournament finishing with a 10-0 record overall. Team awards went to Gary Jin (MVP), Drew Diffenderfer (Eagle) and Advay Monga (Coaches).
JVB2 (Grade 5) Boys Basketball – The Junior Varsity B2 team, coached by Tim Hopkins, finished in eighth place in the WBAL with a 2-4-1 record. Team awards went to Rahul Yalla (MVP), Edward Hunter (Eagle) and Max Zhai (Coaches).
JVC (Grade 4) Boys Basketball – The Junior Varsity C team, coached by Karriem Stinson, finished undefeated in first place in the WBAL with a 7-0 record. Team awards went to Brennan Williams (MVP), and Topaz Lee and Rishaan Thoppay (Eagle).
LS Intramural Boys Basketball – Team awards went to Vedant Yadav, grade 5, and Jackson Powell, grade 4 (MVP), Keshav Kotamraju, grade 5, and Sriram Batchu, grade 4 (Eagle), and Anderson Chung, grade 5, and Veeraz Thakkar, grade 4 (Coaches). The team was coached by Tobias Wade.
VA (Grades 7-8) Girls Soccer – The Varsity A team, coached by Brighid Wood, Sara Pawloski and Hannah Grannis, grade 9, finished in eighth place in the WBAL with a record of 1-4-2. Team awards went to Kalyn Su, grade 8 (MVP), Alexandra Wong, grade 7 (Eagle) and Ashley Barth, grade 8 (Coaches).
JVA (Grade 6) Girls Soccer – The Junior Varsity A team, coached by Brittney Moseley and Vanessa Rios, finished in sixth place in the WBAL with a record of 0-5-1. Team awards went to Kate Grannis (MVP), Anya Chauhan (Eagle), and Margaret Cartee and Claire Luo (Coaches).
JVB (Grades 4-5) Girls Soccer – The Junior Varsity B team, coached by Justin Sullivan, finished in second place in the WBAL with a record of 3-1-2. Team awards went to Claire Anderson (MVP), MacEnzie Blue, grade 4 (Eagle) and Kylie Anderson (Coaches).
LATE WINTER
VA (Grades 7-8) Girls Basketball – The Varsity A team, coached by Richard Amarillas, finished undefeated in first place in the WBAL with a 7-0 record and an overall record of 7-1. Team awards went to Maya Hernandez, grade 7, and Haley Hernandez, grade 7 (co-MVPs), Gigi Chan, grade 8 (Eagle), and Ashley Barth, grade 8, and Priya Rohra, grade 8 (Coaches).
VB (Grades 7-8) Girls Basketball – The Varsity B team, coached by Tim Hopkins and Brittney Moseley, finished undefeated in first place in the WBAL with a 7-0 record and took first place in the WBAL tournament finishing 9-0 overall. Team awards went to Athena Wu, grade 7 (MVP), Angela Jia, grade 8 (Eagle) and Avery Olson, grade 7 (Coaches).
JVA (Grade 6) Girls Basketball – The Junior Varsity A team, coached by Jon Cvitanich and Vanessa Rios, finished in fourth place in the WBAL with a 5-3 record and went 5-5 overall. Team awards went to Anjali Yella (MVP), Kate Grannis (Eagle) and Margaret Cartee (Coaches).
MS Intramural girls basketball – Team awards went to Alice Tao, grade 6 (MVP), Serena Janny, grade 6 (Eagle) and Brindha Chandran, grade 6 (Coaches). The team was coached by Raul Rios and Adam Albers.
JVB (Grade 5) Girls Basketball – The Junior Varsity B1 team, coached by Karriem Stinson, finished undefeated in first place in the WBAL with a 7-0 record and took 1st place in the WBAL tournament finishing 10-0 overall. Team awards went to Isabella Lo (MVP), Claire Anderson (Eagle) and Kylie Anderson (Coaches).
JVC (Grade 4) Girls Basketball – The Junior Varsity C team, coached by Kristian Tiopo and Belle Carley, finished undefeated in first place in the WBAL with a 6-0 record. Team awards went to Minal Jalil (MVP), Elie Ahluwalia (Eagle) and Tanvi Sivakumar (Coaches).
LS Intramural Girls Basketball – Team awards went to Menaka Aron, grade 5, and Arushi Sahasi, grade 4 (Co-MVP) and Hannah Streeper, grade 5 (Coaches). The team was coached by Tobias Wade.
VA (Grade 8) Boys Soccer – The Varsity A team, coached by Brighid Wood, Adyant Kanakamedala and Deven Parikh, finished in second place in the WBAL with a record of 3-1-1, and an overall record of 6-1-1. Team awards went to Ishaan Mantripragada (MVP), Raj Patel (Eagle) and Sasvath Ramachandran (Coaches).
VB (Grade 7) Boys Soccer – The Varsity B team, coached by Brighid Wood, Adyant Kanakamedala, grade 12, and Deven Parikh, grade 9, finished in second place in the WBAL with a league record of 4-2-1. Team awards went to Ben Tian and Michael Pflaging (co-MVPs), Pranav Mullappalli (Eagle) and Rupert Chen (Coaches).
JVA (Grade 6) Boys Soccer – The Junior Varsity A team, coached by Colleen Campbell, finished in third place in the WBAL with a record of 2-4 and an overall record of 2-5. Team awards went to Alexander Guo (MVP), Ryan Barth (Eagle) and Ramit Goyal (Coaches).
JVB (Grade 5) Boys Soccer – The Junior Varsity B team, coached by Matt Arensberg, finished in second place in the WBAL with a record of 3-2-1. Team awards went to Alec Zhang (MVP), Advay Monga (Eagle), and Veer Sahasi and Vyom Vidyarthi (Coaches).
LS Intramural Boys Soccer – Team awards went to Ryder Hewitt, grade 4 (MVP), Cyrus Ghane, grade 4 (Eagle) and Kaan Kurtoglu, grade 4 (Coaches). The team was coached by Walid Fahmy.
Earlier this week, several Harker students were named national medalists in the 2018 Scholastic Art & Writing Awards. Jacqueline He, grade 12, earned a gold medal for “Mollusk Threnody,” her entry in the poetry category. Junior Annabelle Perng was awarded a silver medal for her flash fiction piece, “Name Tag,” and Katherine Zhang, also grade 11, received a silver medal in the journalism category for her article, titled “Trump’s Proposed Budget Cuts Throw the Future of Research into Question.”
At the middle school level, eighth grader Michelle Liu was awarded two gold medals for her submissions in the drawing and illustration category, “The Feast of Harvest” and “Leisure Time.”
As national medalists, these students are invited to attend the national events this summer in New York City. Gold medalists are invited to the national ceremony at Carnegie Hall.
Congratulations to these students for receiving this remarkable recognition!
Members of Harker’s middle school speech and debate team competed at four tournaments in February in California and Nevada. As always, our students primarily compete against high school students.
At the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, from Feb. 3-5, 90 schools across 17 states representing 313 entries competed in debate events. Five Harker middle school students competed. In novice Lincoln-Douglas speaker awards, Arjun Krishna, grade 6, came in ninth.
At Stanford University from Feb. 10-12, 270 schools across 27 states representing 2,262 entries competed in speech and debate events. Twenty-five Harker students competed. In junior varsity impromptu speaking, Arely Sun and Madeleine Hansen, both grade 8, were quarterfinalists and finished 20th and 26th, respectively. In JV public forum, Vienna Parnell and Alivia Li, both grade 8, were triple-octofinalists, finishing 33rd; in varsity Lincoln-Douglas, Anshul Reddy and Akhilesh Chegu, both grade 8, were triple-octofinalists, also finishing 33rd.
In Harker’s fourth intramural contest of the year, in early February, about 50 Harker students competed in four distinct events. In speech (memorized interpretive events) Hansen was first and Zubin Khera, grade 7, was second. In public forum, Carol Wininger and Deeya Viradia, both grade 7, took first. Public forum speaker awardees were Krishna Mysoor, grade 6, first place; Ansh Sheth, grade 6, second; Karan Kathuria, grade 6, third; Muzzi Khan, grade 7, fourth; and Stephen Xia, grade 7, fifth. In Lincoln-Douglas, Rahul Mulpuri, grade 7, earned first place.
Sixth graders had their own events. In the intro category, Om Tandon came in first, Angelina Zhu placed second, Bryan Xiao was third and Ramit Goyal was fourth. In intro speaker awards, Goyal was first, Tandon was second and Zhu was third.
At the University of California, Berkeley, from Feb. 17-19, 180 schools across 17 states representing 2,193 entries competed in speech and debate events. This is the most competitive tournament Harker attends during the year, based on entry numbers and skill level. About 90 Harker middle school students competed. In varsity expository speaking Michelle Jin, grade 7, was a quarterfinalist, finishing 24th. In varsity impromptu speaking, Jin was a quarterfinalist, finishing 21st. In JV Lincoln-Douglas speaker awards, Alex Lan, grade 7, came in 17th.
In JV public forum, Carol Wininger and Deeya Viradia earned 36th; Vienna Parnell and Ysabel Chen, both grade 8, were 41st; and Chloe Lee and Kaitlyn Wang, both grade 6, were 45th. All three teams had 4-2 records. In JV public forum speaker awards, Dhruv Saoji, grade 8, was seventh and Aaditya Gulati, grade 8, was 21st. In varsity Lincoln-Douglas, Anshul Reddy, grade 8, was a triple-octofinalist, finishing 33rd.
Math enthusiasts from 13 schools visited the Harker middle school campus on March 4 for the 16th annual Diana Nichols Math Invitational, in which about 300 students competed, according to math teacher Vandana Kadam.
In the grade 6 individual competition, Harker students claimed all of the top five spots, with Aniketh Tummala placing first, Ethan Liu coming in second, Heidi Lu earning third, Emma Gao placing fourth and Angelina Hu placing fifth. Harker also did well in grade 7 individual, where Stephen Xia took second and Rohan Bhowmik placed fifth. David Dai placed first in the grade 8 individual event to give Harker another top placement.
A total of 50 teams competed in the team event, which was also highly competitive. Harker’s “6R” team of Maria Chrysafis, Varun Fuloria, Emma Gao, Angelina Hu, Ethan Liu, Aniketh Tummala and Michelle Wei took second in the sixth grade category, in which the “6S” team of Ramit Goyal, Chloe Lee, Heidi Lu, Claire Luo, Julie Shi, Cynthia Wang and Ella Yee placed third. In the grade 7 team event, Tiffany Chang, Amruta Dharmapurikar, Alex Lan, Krish Maniar, Ashley Ruan, Grant Sims and Stephen Xia took second place. David Dai, Alice Feng, Angela Jia, Sasvath Ramachandran, Rohan Thakur, Clarice Wang and Emily Zhou earned second place in the grade 8 team event.
The yearly estimation contest challenged students to guess the total number of Harker Math Invitational participants from 2002 to 2017. Thornton Junior High School’s Larry Zhi won the contest with an estimate of 4,040, just shy of the actual number of 4,045! The next closest guess was made by Harker student Angela Jia, grade 8, who estimated 4022.
Middle school scientists were very successful in the 2018 Toshiba/National Science Teachers Association ExploraVision contest, in which teams of students created and submitted scientific research projects.
Two Harker middle school teams won regional recognition in the grades 7-9 division. Eighth graders Rishab Parthasarathy, Rohan Thakur, Michael Tran and William Zhao were regional winners for their project, “A Novel Method to Treat Diabetes Using Specially Designed Nanobots.” In addition, “Gene Editing Just Got Way CRISPR!” a project by eighth graders Akhilesh Chegu, Alex Liou and Deven Shah, was awarded an honorable mention.
Over the next month, regional winners will prepare a website and prototype for the next stage of the competition. Teams with successful entries will be invited to an awards ceremony in Washington, D.C., in early June. Good luck!
Two teams of Harker students performed admirably at this past weekend’s Middle School Science Bowl regional competition. The first team, consisting of eighth graders David Dai, Harsh Deep, Shounak Ghosh, Rishab Parthasarathy and William Zhao, went undefeated throughout the competition and emerged as the winner, earning a trip to Washington, D.C., for the national finals. Team two, made up of seventh graders Rohan Bhowmik and Brian Chen, and eighth graders Mark Hu, Kailash Ranganathan and Aditya Tagore, advanced to the double elimination round after going 5-0 in the round robin portion of the event.
Both teams were coached by upper school students Leon Lu, Kaushik Shivakumar and Alexander Young, all grade 11; and sophomores Emily Liu and Kyle Li, all of whom participated in the Science Bowl as middle school students. With this victory and the upper school team’s previous regional win, Harker will send two teams to the Science Bowl national finals for the first time in Harker history!
Last week, the boys basketball team began its postseason with a 60-54 win over Terra Nova, with Brando Pakel, grade 12, and Jack Connors, grade 10, each scoring 12 points. The Eagles then upset the No. 5 seed Pacific Grove 58-45 behind 16 points from Connors and another 14 points from Marcus Tymous, grade 11. However, the season came to an end as the boys fell to Carmel 54-69 in the quarterfinals. The Eagles end the season with a 13-14 record.
Boys Soccer
After an historic season for the boys soccer team, the Eagles were ranked No. 2 heading into the Division 2 playoffs. However, Santa Cruz High upset the boys with a stunning 2-1 last-minute win. The boys soccer team ends the year with an impressive 14-2-3 record.
Girls Basketball
The girls basketball team fell to Pacific Grove 35-54 in the first round of the CCS playoffs, ending its season with a 9-12 record.
SPRING
Baseball
The baseball team opened the year with a 17-1 win over visiting San Jose High, followed by a 7-2 win over Trinity Christian. In the matchup with San Jose, Dominic Cea, grade 12, had three hits and two RBIs, with Matthew Kennedy, grade 12, driving in three runs, and freshmen Levi Sutton, Ellis Goldman and Luke Wancewicz each driving in two runs in their first high school game. Kennedy had three RBIs and Cea had three hits to lead the way again in the win over Trinity Christian. This week, the Eagles travel to Menlo on Tuesday, host Pinewood on Thursday and travel to Lincoln SF on Saturday.
Swim
The swim team opened its season last week against Monterey. The 200 medley relay team of Ethan Hu, grade 10, Matthew Chung, grade 9, Jason Kwok, grade 9, and Alex Yu, grade 11, won the event and made the first CCS cut of the season. Also, Chung swam the 200 freestyle in nearly record-breaking time. The swimmers will compete again on March 10 at the Small School Invitational at Sacred Heart Prep. On Saturday, the team competed at the Spring Kickoff at Palo Alto High, which saw many swimmers achieve CCS cut times. Vivian Wang, grade 12, 50 free (first place) and 100 free (first place); Hu, 100 fly (first place) and 100 back (second place); Chung, 200 IM (second place) and 100 breast (third place); Kwok, 100 breast (first place); and the varsity girls 400 free relay team of Taylor Kohlmann, grade 12, Betsy Tian, grade 9, Alyssa Huang, grade 10, and Wang.
Softball
The softball team gets things rolling on Wednesday as it travels to Palo Alto, followed by a trip to Crystal Springs Uplands on Friday.
Boys Golf
The boys golf team kicks off its season at the Cowboy Classic in Livermore this Wednesday.
Boys Volleyball
The boys volleyball team officially opens its season this Wednesday as players travel to Cupertino High. On Friday, the boys travel to Saratoga, followed by the Wilcox Tournament over the weekend.
Boys Tennis
The boys tennis team opens up its season with a busy week. The Eagles host Sacred Heart Prep on Tuesday, before traveling to Aragon on Wednesday and Nueva on Thursday.
Track and Field
The track and field team will get the season off and running at the Willow Glen Invitational this Saturday.
Lacrosse
The girls lacrosse team opens up the 2018 season on March 6 by hosting Salinas High at 4 p.m.
At the NorCal FIRST Lego League Silicon Valley Championship in late January, a team made up of Harker sixth graders Jordan Labio, Dustin Miao and Kabir Ramzan – known as Alpha Wolves – took first place among the 35 teams at the event. The team’s robot performed exceptionally throughout the competition, scoring the highest two runs (one with 285 points and another with 265) and being the only robot to score more than 200 points on all four of its runs. Competition was fierce, as each team at the tournament had qualified by finishing in the top three at other local events. This win puts Harker’s team in the running to compete against other regional champions from across the world.
The Alpha Wolves’ next event is the Northern California FLL Innovations Expo in March, which the team was invited to attend after presenting a group research project at a previous event in November. Their project was one of 50 selected from 500 entries.