Members of Harker’s Junior State of America organization spent the afternoon of Oct. 11 getting out the vote at the Valley Fair mall in anticipation for the Nov. 4 general elections. The JSA registered a total of 42 new voters in about four hours.
The idea to hold the drive in a more public place was introduced at last year’s drive, also held at Valley Fair. “The main problem is that there aren’t enough students who meet the age requirement at a single time,” said JSA member Mahum Jamal, Gr. 12. “So we decided to expand our focus by holding the drive in a fairly public community.”
In addition to voter drives, the JSA also holds weekly meetings and miniconventions, where students have debates, discuss politics, feature guest speakers and hold an occasional workshop. On Nov. 4, the JSA held a “Pizza and Politics” event, where students enjoyed pizza while watching coverage of the general election. During commercial breaks, students discussed the ongoing events. This year, the JSA also plans to stage screenings of politically-oriented films and hold discussions afterward.
JSA stayed busy during the summer as well, holding a fundraising car wash and sending members to attend the Democratic and Republican conventions (see HN Oct. issue). For the 2007-08 school year, the Harker JSA was named Chapter of the Year for the Northern California region. Jamal said that although politics affect everyone in some way, high school students remain uninterested in the political process. “JSA attempts to bring politics to high school students in ways that students can relate to and enjoy,” she said. “We try and find a more comprehensive way for students to understand [the] U.S. today.” Jamal said she chose to get involved with the JSA because she wanted to bring information on governmental matters “to a generation soon to make the decisions of the world. As a cliché goes, we are the future leaders of America.”
Over the summer, the World Awareness Committee (WAC), which recently became Global Empowerment and Outreach (GEO), donated a grand total of $7,400 to the Aid to Children Without Parents (ACWP) charity. The money will be put toward a new school for disadvantaged children in Cambodia.
Neha Sabharwal, Gr. 12, who served as WAC co-vice president last year, said the organization chose to donate to ACWP “not only because it was like the ‘underdog’ group but also because its mission and aims are so fundamentally concrete. This program is all about making lasting, tangible solutions.”
“We were really moved by the ACWP cause,” said Niti Shah, Gr. 11, who was WAC co-vice president last year, and currently serves as vice president of GEO. The organization sprang into action after watching an NBC news special on child sex trafficking. “Many of us didn’t know that it was going on and scarring the lives of girls by the thousands.”
The ACWP purchased the future school’s property, formerly the location of a brothel. When finished, it will provide a basic education to children residing in nearby villages. “[The ACWP was] extremely grateful for the donation,” said Shah.
To raise the money, WAC held a number of events, such as visits by ACWP representatives, a benefit concert, a dance and a student auction. Throughout the year, WAC also sold buttons, T-shirts and CDs containing music made by Harker students. WAC managed to raise about $6,000 on their own, and the amount was bumped to $7,400 after a number of anonymous donations.
GEO will hold its first fundraising and education week Nov. 10-14. The theme for the week will be the hunger and extreme poverty, which is first on the list of the United Nations’ Millennium Development Goals. GEO will also begin fundraising for Free the Children, an organization based on youth empowerment and providing alternative sources of income for individuals worldwide.
The upper school Orchestra is going to New York! The group, led by director Chris Florio, will travel in April to compete in the National Orchestra Cup at Alice Tully Hall in Lincoln Center. The hall just completed a $100 million renovation and is considered one of the top performance halls in the country.
“I have wanted to take the orchestra to New York for a couple of years,” said Florio. “Through research, I found out about the National Orchestra Cup and decided that competing in a newly renovated space like Alice Tully Hall would be a great opportunity.”
The group had to apply and pass a review before being green-lighted for the competition, said Florio. “There are several schools entered this year that I am familiar with, and their programs are going to be very challenging to compete against,” he noted.
Although the orchestra traveled to Eastern Europe in 2005 with a score of students, and to Paris in 2006 with almost twice that number, “this will be the first orchestra competition for Harker,” said Florio. “We will be taking 68 students to perform. We have had chamber groups participate in competitions in the past but those were with only a handful of students.”
One of those 68 students will be violinist Sonya Huang, Gr. 11. She started playing at Harker eight years ago. “I started off learning under Toni Woodruff, a Bucknall strings coach at Harker,” said Huang. “About a year later, I switched to an outside private teacher, and I’m currently studying under Li Lin, a teacher at the San Francisco Conservatory.”
Huang has been in first the middle school, then the upper school orchestras since Gr. 4. She made the Eastern European tour, seeing Prague, Vienna and Budapest with the upper school Orchestra while she was still in Gr. 7 and went on the Paris tour in Gr. 9.
“I’m looking forward to attending its third-ever tour,” said Huang. “We attend the CMEA (California Music Educators’ Association) orchestra competition every year, but that is a relatively small-scale competition. I’ve never par ticipated in a large orchestra competition before, and I think that this will be a great experience for all Harker orchestra members. It’s really such an honor that Harker has been chosen to participate in the National Orchestra Cup this year.”
Huang noted it won’t be all work. “We’ve scheduled many fun activities to do in New York, ranging from watching a performance by the New York Philharmonic, to touring New York landmarks, to shopping on Fifth Avenue,” she said. Then there is the event. “It’s going to be really thrilling to play in that famous venue, as many famous orchestras and musicians have played on that very stage. I’m especially looking forward to the competition because it’s a great chance to showcase our orchestra’s talent and hard work from the entire year.
“We’ll be playing some Copland, as well as a piece I originally recommended to Mr. Florio, Smetana’s “Ma Vlast.” To me, the latter is an especially beautiful work, and I love everything about the piece, from the flowing melody in the first violin sections to the dance-like motifs later on in the piece. So performing “Ma Vlast” on stage will definitely be one of the highlights of the competition for me! Of course, it would be great to win a trophy, but regardless of whether we win any awards, I believe that we’ll all gain extremely valuable performance experience, and of course, cherished tour memories,” Huang added.
It’s early days, and the group hasn’t felt the pinch of time yet. “There hasn’t been that much added pressure,” said Huang. “Sure, we’ve had our fair share of bad rehearsals, but we’ve also had many, many successful rehearsals as well. Mr. Florio hasn’t star ted tearing out his hair yet at our intonation, so I’d say we’re on the right track!”
The orchestra will have 25 minutes to perform and Florio selected Bedrich Smetena’s “The Moldau” from “Ma Vlast” and Aaron Copland’s “Saturday Night Waltz” and “Hoe Down” from “Rodeo” for their program, and “the toughest par t is definitely in the preparation of all the pieces,” said Huang. “When working on orchestral masterworks such as the Smetana, it’s difficult, with so many members of the orchestra, to convey the single unified idea that the conductor wants. Everyone has a slightly different interpretation of the piece at first, but we try our best to match up to the conductor’s interpretation of the music. And of course, sight-reading and learning the notes is difficult when we first receive the music, but eventually, with lots of hard practice, we’ll have the pieces down.”
Florio is intent on challenging his students. “I believe that Harker students work best when they have a competitive drive (so) I am anxious to see how far we can push ourselves, and how we stack up against other groups around the country.” Watch for updates on this adventure!
Students got an early look at Nichols Hall’s multimedia room in September. When finished, the room will be used to film video presentations and record live audio.
The room currently features a large green screen that can be used to display images behind subjects being filmed. It also contains two high-definition cameras for filming at multiple angles.
Fred Triefenbach, US assistant director of instructional technology, said a wooden floor would eventually be added so that dance students can use the room to film routines. A high-end computer containing the video editing software Final Cut Pro and the industry-standard recording suite ProTools is also on its way. Drapes will be added to absorb sound and cut down on reverberation, and equipment such as high-quality microphones, boom stands and an audio board have already arrived. The room will also be fitted with a new lighting array to reduce heat production. Triefenbach is currently researching different lighting solutions to determine what will best suit the room’s needs. A window has been installed between the multimedia room and the adjacent classroom, which will serve as a control room when recording equipment arrives and is properly configured.
After providing a brief summary of his plans for the room, Triefenbach had US music teacher Susan Nace direct her ensembles Cantilena and Camerata in renditions of “The Star-Spangled Banner” and Pierre Passereau’s “Il est bel et bon” to test out the acoustics.
Over the summer, the World Awareness Committee (WAC), which recently became Global Empowerment and Outreach (GEO), donated a grand total of $7,400 to the Aid to Children Without Parents (ACWP) charity. The money will be put toward a new school for disadvantaged children in Cambodia.
Neha Sabharwal, Gr. 12, who served as WAC co-vice president last year, said the organization chose to donate to ACWP “not only because it was like the ‘underdog’ group but also because its mission and aims are so fundamentally concrete. This program is all about making lasting, tangible solutions.”
“We were really moved by the ACWP cause,” said Niti Shah, Gr. 11, who was WAC co-vice president last year, and currently serves as vice president of GEO. The organization sprang into action after watching an NBC news special on child sex trafficking. “Many of us didn’t know that it was going on and scarring the lives of girls by the thousands.”
The ACWP purchased the future school’s property, formerly the location of a brothel. When finished, it will provide a basic education to children residing in nearby villages. “[The ACWP was] extremely grateful for the donation,” said Shah.
To raise the money, WAC held a number of events, such as visits by ACWP representatives, a benefit concert, a dance and a student auction. Throughout the year, WAC also sold buttons, T-shirts and CDs containing music made by Harker students. WAC managed to raise about $6,000 on their own, and the amount was bumped to $7,400 after a number of anonymous donations.
GEO will hold its first fundraising and education week Nov. 10-14. The theme for the week will be the hunger and extreme poverty, which is first on the list of the United Nations’ Millennium Development Goals. GEO will also begin fundraising for Free the Children, an organization based on youth empowerment and providing alternative sources of income for individuals worldwide.
The Siemens Competition in Math, Science and Technology has announced its 2008-09 semifinalists, and Harker has a total of six, one of only two schools on the West Coast to have that many, and the only one in Northern California. Congratulations to Rahul Ahuja, Dominique Dabija, Elena Madan, Vikram Nathan, Nikhil Raghuram and Andrew Stanek, all Gr. 12.
Harker had the highest percentage of semifinalists from among all the schools in California, with twice the number per class size as the second and third schools.
The Siemens Competition in Math, Science and Technology is designed to recognize talent early on and foster individual growth through science research. It is administered by The College Board and funded by the Siemens Foundation.
Student projects are judged on creativity, field knowledge, comprehensiveness, interpretation, literature review (source citation), scientific importance, future work (follow-up or applications), clarity of expression and presentation. About 300 projects nationwide were chosen as semifinalists. After that, up to thirty students and thirty teams are chosen to compete at six regional competitions. Harker began submitting projects to this competition in 2005-06, and had one semifinalist that inaugural year. In both 2006-07 and 2007-08, Harker fielded four semifinalists.
This school year marks the occasion of the 10th year since Harker opened the Bucknall campus and launched the new Upper School.
There will be a variety of activities and features throughout the year to celebrate, and to marvel at just how far we’ve come in 10 short years. Harker’s “Toast to 10 Years” celebration inspired teachers Diann Chung and Cindy Proctor to host a Gr. 1 activity on the 10th day of school, all based on the number 10.
Activities included the Flying Gumdrops, a Bean Bag Toss, a Ring Toss, the challenge of finding 10 things wrong on a page, and a variety of math games based on the number 10. “The Gumdrop Fling was fun when it touched the ceiling!” noted student Dominique P.
Other groups counted out 10 Goldfish (and ate ‘em!), while nearby, students jumped rope, counting up and down by tens. Each activity had its adherents. Matthew H. “liked counting 10 Goldfish and then eating them,” while Alexandra J. said she “liked the jump rope and counting by tens.
Senior class president and graduating senior Senan Ebrahim was named as one of two California Presidential Scholars , joining the ranks of other scholars – one man and one woman from each state, the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico, along with at-large, out-of-the-country and Arts scholars- selected for the honor. Ebrahim earned a perfect SAT score, was Bausch & Lomb Top Science Scholar, a semifinalist in the Intel and Siemens competitions, and won top marks on nine AP exams. His interests range from swimming and cross-country to theater, speech and debate, and he serves as a tutor, camp counselor, hospital volunteer and disaster relief fundraiser. All Presidential Scholars are invited to attend a ceremony in their honor in Washington, D.C., in June. Ebrahim chose his Harker history teacher, Ramsay Westgate to accompany him as his most inspiring and challenging teacher.
The Harker Environmental and Animal Rights Team (HEART) was awarded a Certificate of Special Congressional Recognition May 18 as winners of Rep. Mike Honda’s Go Green Contest.
The competition, sponsored by Honda’s Student Advisory Council and engaged area high schools, prompted students to reduce their school’s carbon footprint. At Harker, this was “the PSI effort”: a team of students checked and corrected the tire pressure of about 50 vehicles on the Harker campuses. HEART estimates the effort offset 3,232.83 kg of carbon entering the atmosphere – equivalent to having planted 147 trees. Representative Honda called the initiative “truly groundbreaking and innovative.”
The Harker art department hosted its inaugural Juried Art Exhibition in the Shah Hall Gallery on Apr. 30. Over 100 student artists featured 244 original creations in six competitive categories: drawing; painting; sculpture; ceramics; digital photography and graphic design; and printmaking, collage and mixed media.
“We had double the amount of classes this year,” said teacher Pilar Agüera-Esparza, who reflected on the expansion of the Study of Visual Art class to freshmen and sophomores this year. The growth, she added, resulted in “more variety in the types of projects created.”
When asked about the benefits such an event brings to Harker, Agüera-Esparza quoted Stanford professor and artist Elliot Eisner: “Not everything has a practical utility, but maybe it’s experientially valuable. Learning through the arts promotes the idea that there is more than one solution to a problem, or more than one answer to a question.”
Harker students and faculty experienced the exhibits while munching pizza and cake and enjoying a performance by the US Jazz Band, with vocalist Frankie Nagle, Gr. 9, and conducted by Chris Florio. Artist, educator and retired member of the Harker faculty, Don Maxwell, served as judge. Best of Show award went to freshman Susan Tu and sophomores Jeanette Chin and Jackie Ho for their mixed media creation “Plank Mask.” Ho, who displayed nine works, also won the award for Most Exhibited Artist. Categorical awards included:
Drawing – First Place: “Light Study: Chairs and Stools,” charcoal and pastel by Jackie Ho, Gr. 10. Drawing – Honorable Mention: “Paper Light Study,” charcoal by Winny Huang, Gr. 11.
Painting – First Place: “Commotion,” acrylic on canvas by Eugenia Sorotokin, Gr. 12. Painting – Honorable Mention: “Grass,” oil on canvas by Heidi Wang, Gr. 12.
Sculpture – First Place: “Untitled,” alabaster stone by Jami Woolsey, Gr. 12. Sculpture – Honorable Mention: “Untitled,” alabaster stone by Kyle Drummer, Gr. 10.
Photo/Digital – First place: “Cliffs,” digital illustration by Melissa Chen, Gr. 12. Photo/Digital – Honorable Mention: “Self-Portrait,” digital illustration by Katrina Kao, Gr. 10.
Ceramics – First Place: “Yellow/Orange Vessel,” ceramics by Julian Stahl, Gr. 11. Ceramics – Honorable Mention: “Ochre & White Vessel,” ceramics by Lauren Moser, Gr. 11.
Printmaking/Collage/Mixed Media – First Place: “I love love,” collage by Tiffany Lai, Gr. 12. Printmaking/Collage/Mixed Media – Honorable Mention: “Inspired by Social Realism,” by Niti Shahi, Gr. 10.