There will be a new face on the Davis Field sidelines this fall, as Loren Powers was recently named Harker’s new head football coach as well as the new strength, conditioning and mobility coach.
A California native, Powers was part of a state champion St. Bonaventure High School team before playing at California Lutheran University. His football career has included a coaching position at Archbishop Riordan High School in San Francisco, scouting for the Cleveland Browns, recruiting for Stanford University and youth development with the San Francisco 49ers.
“I am excited to work with our young leaders,” stated Powers. “Harker is known for developing lifelong learners and well-rounded citizens, and that is something I am proud to be a part of.” Powers already began working with some of Harker’s student athletes at spring practices in May.
As the new coach, Powers stated his “short-term goals for the program are to increase participation, improve our athletic skills, offer new experiences and to change the narrative of football.” He understands the risk of injury is a possibility in football, but wants to promote what can be gained through the sport. “From experience, I know football can be played safely at a high level, but what I got out of football is priceless,” expressed Powers. “I learned the value of character, grit and integrity. I developed skills such as leadership, goal setting and goal attainment, time management, discipline and most importantly how to compete!”
In addition to helping build the Harker football program, Powers looks to build the overall health and wellness of the Harker community. “In order to work at your highest mental capacity, you need to be at your peak performance,” Powers explained. “Regular exercise is a part of many successful people’s routine because they see the value in improving overall strength, stress relief and improved self-esteem.”
“Loren is a high-energy guy that brings a lot of experience and passion,” said Dan Molin, upper school athletic director. “The kids will pick up on that as he will continue to provide a great football experience for our athletes.”
The Eagles open the 2019 season at Elsie Allen High School in Santa Rosa on Aug. 23, with the first home game on Sept. 6 versus Washington High San Francisco.
Please welcome Coach Powers to the Harker family. Go Eagles!
Team Harker crushed it at the National Speech & Debate Tournament, where Haris Hosseini ’19, and Avi Gulati, a rising senior, nailed first and second places in original oratory. This event, billed as the largest academic competition in the world, is the culminating event of the speech and debate season. And there’s more good news: Alycia Cary ’19 made it to the semifinals for oratory; Andrew Sun, a rising junior, was 15th in congressional debate; and Jason Huang ‘19 made it to the semifinals of congressional debate.
“When these results are added to earlier results at the National Debate Coaches Association National Championship (sophomore Akshay Manglik’s top-three-in-the-nation finish in Lincoln-Douglas debate and Anusha Kuppahally, grade 12 and Maddie Huynh, grade 11, finishing fifth in policy debate), we have had quite the season!” noted Jennifer Achten, speech and debate chair.
Check out the feature article on this year’s speech and debate team in the spring/summer 2019 issue of Harker Magazine or right here, reprinted in Harker News!
In April, the student-run nonprofit organization Nanoseed held a special benefit concert at the Rothschild Performing Arts Center. The concert featured performances by pianist Nina Zhou and trumpeter Dylan Girard of the San Francisco Symphony, and Anna Maria Mendieta, a harpist with the Sacramento Philharmonic. The concert also featured performances by Harker students Kai-Ming Ang, Charlotte Blanc, Jessica Jiang, Hanoom Lee, Anna Miner and Jeffrey Yang, all rising seniors; rising junior Audrey Liu; and rising sophomores Spencer Cha, Karolyn Cheng and Angeline Kiang.
The concert raised approximately $8,000 to help reduce poverty in rural China. Several members of Nanoseed are currently wrapping up a trip to Ningxia, an autonomous region of China, where they are providing local students and entrepreneurs with loans and grants.
This article originally appeared in the summer 2019 issue of Harker Magazine.
In 2018, the boys varsity volleyball team came within inches of winning CCS and the NorCal championship, but ended up with second place finishes in both matches. The 2019 team returned its core players, and added some talented newcomers, which resulted in one of the best seasons of any team in Harker’s athletic history. The Eagles brought home the first team CCS championship in school history, played in the program’s second consecutive NorCal championship and finished the season as the No. 4 ranked team in the nation. Through the many highs and the seasonending low (a five-set loss to Monta Vista in the NorCal Division 1 finals), the 2019 boys varsity volleyball team proved it was a team for the ages.
Editor’s Note: Harker’s speech and debate team ended on the highest of notes, with students taking first and second at the National Speech & Debate Tournament in mid-June. Check out these additional updates to the speech and debate year!: Nationals, middle school speech and debate results
This article originally appeared in the summer 2019 issue of Harker Magazine.
Roshni Bhatnagar ’11 doesn’t recall why she was drawn to speech and debate during her sophomore year at Harker, beyond noticing that other students seemed to be having a lot of fun on the team. “I just know that I enjoyed it immensely once I joined,” she said. She competed in Lincoln-Douglas debate, a one-on-one format that emphasizes logic, ethics and philosophy. Competitions offered a reward for the weeks of hard work conducting research and writing arguments. “Debate was a phenomenal opportunity to be exposed to different ideas, to learn how to compete and to have fun traveling to new places,” Bhatnagar said.
She also noted that Harker’s team and coaches were encouraging and supportive. “Whether I won or lost, it was always OK, because we were encouraged to see each debate as a step in the road and a learning opportunity.”
Bhatnagar had been out of high school for several years before truly appreciating what she learned as a student debater at Harker. “I developed strong critical-thinking and problem-solving skills, as well as the mental agility to think quickly and to recognize patterns,” said Bhatnagar, who will be an internal medicine resident at UCLA this fall. “Thinking strategically and analytically at such a young age was key to my development as an excellent communicator and listener, skills which serve me well in my work with patients now.”
Top Notch Hundreds of current Harker students are gaining the skills Bhatnagar spoke of – persuasion, organization of thoughts and ideas, intensive research and information literacy, poise and presentation – while finding success on the national speech and debate stage. The students are guided by the expertise of Harker’s speech and debate teachers Jenny Achten, Greg Achten and Scott Odekirk at the upper school, and Shania Hunt and JJ Kim at the middle school, who are in turn aided by numerous coaches (several of whom are Harker alumni).
Launched in 1998 when the upper school was founded, the speech and debate program has grown into one of Harker’s most popular student activities, with 115 upper schoolers and 175 middle schoolers involved this year. It is one of the best programs in the nation, consistently sending students to national competitions and winning both individual and team national titles.
As both an academic subject and an extracurricular activity at Harker, speech and debate emphasizes the connection between high-intensity learning inside the classroom and intellectual competition outside of class. “Our academic curriculum is largely about teaching kids to think critically about modern sociocultural controversies,” Odekirk said. “We translate that learning into the applied format of extracurricular competition, which adds so much to students’ intellectual and personal growth.”
Upper school students are required to take a course in the speech and debate department – at the introductory, intermediate or competitive level – in order to compete on the team, while middle schoolers can take speech and debate courses as electives. Upper schoolers mainly prepare and practice for tournaments during class time, while middle schoolers meet three times a week after school.
“Harker’s program is unique because of the dedication of a highly qualified faculty that is solely focused on teaching and coaching speech and debate,” said Jenny Achten, speech and debate department chair for grades 6-12. “We also receive incredible programmatic resources and support.”
Harker is a member of the National Speech & Debate Association, which chooses topics for student debaters, sponsors tournaments, and offers conferences and resources for teachers and coaches. Harker students compete in four categories of debate, including Lincoln-Douglas, congressional, public forum and policy (see page 41 sidebar for descriptions). Students choose from a variety of speech categories, depending on their personal interest, including original oratory, dramatic interpretation, impromptu, extemporaneous and humorous interpretation. Speeches are either memorized in advance of a competition or prepared quickly (in 20 or 30 minutes) during the tournament. Harker students compete at 35 to 50 tournaments a year, though no one student attends all of them.
“We believe students should have the freedom to select the number of tournaments and events of their choosing, depending on interest and time and how well they can balance other commitments,” Jenny Achten said.
The competitive season runs the entire academic year, and this year, students have competed at tournaments in Chicago, Miami, Los Angeles, Phoenix, New Haven, Conn., and Jacksonville, Fla., as well as at local and regional tournaments throughout California (see page 39 sidebar for highlights). Eleven Harker students qualified for the postseason Tournament of Champions, held in late April at the University of Kentucky, and five students will compete at the National Speech & Debate Tournament in Dallas in mid-June.
“Tournaments don’t have age requirements so if a younger student – say a seventh grader – is advanced enough, they can compete at the varsity level, rather than junior varsity or novice,” said Hunt. “They may be in a little over their heads at first, but they learn fast.” It’s fairly common for upper school debaters to attend middle school practices to mentor and coach the younger students. Ariav Misra, grade 7, welcomed support from Harker’s upper school students after struggling at a varsity tournament in congressional debate. Harker’s older debaters help Misra with prepping bills and resolutions and give advice on how to compete effectively. “I love the sense of community on the team,” Misra said.
Jason Lin, grade 10, agreed. “The team has created a truly unique, wholesome dynamic where the advanced debaters don’t hesitate to help novices with whatever they need,” said Lin, who participates in congressional debate. “Older students are even enthusiastic about helping underclassmen with things not related to speech and debate, like math homework.”
The program has had such an impact on students that recent alumni often return from college to serve as assistant coaches. This year, Anika Jain ’17 and Ayush Midha ’15 have assisted the team as time allows.
Jain, who just finished her second year studying economics and social policy analysis at Rice University, recalled her days of being inspired by older debaters. “They were so skilled in argumentation and in spreading, which is a fast-talking technique used in policy debate, and that motivated me to improve my skills,” she said, noting that she hopes her assistance with current Harker debaters provides similar motivation. “It’s great to advise students on aspects of debate that confused me as a middle schooler.” Midha debated for Harvard University while earning a degree in human developmental and regenerative biology. He plans to attend medical school after spending a year in research at Boston’s Joslin Diabetes Center. As a high school student, he competed in policy debate and attended summer debate amps, intensively researching a topic and practicing debate with 30 other students. “Debate offers an interesting duality of a hypercompetitive activity that turns into a form of deep collaboration,” he said.
Midha also mentored middle schoolers while at Harker, and this year he watched two of his former mentees (now in grades 11 and 12) reach the quarterfinals of a national championship tournament. “That was the proudest moment of my involvement in Harker debate,” he said.
Alexandru Iftimie ’03 recalls lugging around several 20-gallon tubs of documents at debate competitions in the days before digital files were readily available. “We had to be prepared for every possible argument,” he said. “Those tubs contained piles of highlighted research at our fingertips.” Iftimie debated for the University of Southern California – coaching Harker students during the summer – and earned a J.D. from Yale University. He recently left the U.S. Department of Justice to return to the Bay Area as an attorney for a private-sector law firm.
“I still use the critical-thinking, publics peaking and advocacy skills I learned from debate,” Iftimie said. “Those skills have been tremendous assets to me as a lawyer.”
Student Driven Harker’ speech and debate program wouldn’t be as successful as it is without the students who commit to learning debate techniques and skills while conducting hours and hours of research.
“Speech and debate are academic competitions that allow our very bright students to apply their knowledge and test their wits against their peers, all while getting immediate feedback,” said Greg Achten.
Students join the program for a variety of reasons, from a desire to learn more about current events to wanting to lessen public speaking anxiety to their parents suggesting it.
Oftentimes, they’re hooked by the first taste of competition. Krish Mysoor, grade 7, tried speech and debate at his mother’s insistence and attended seven tournaments before he broke into the quarterfinals. “Taking all of those losses early on taught me that I was in it for the experience and the love of this brain sport more than I was into just winning,” he said. He has since seen more success, making it to a bid round for the Tournament of Champions this year.
Harker’s teaching and coaching staff works to de-emphasize a “winner take all” attitude in speech and debate. “We talk a lot about realistic expectations,” Greg Achten said. “We talk about goals not associated with wins or losses, such as achieving a better understanding of an argument or improving in a particular debate technique.”
Competing in speech and debate provides tangible rewards for students beyond wins and losses, noted Haris Hosseini, grade 12, who recently earned third place in original oratory at the Tournament of Champions.
“I’ve become a better speaker, writer and friend,” Hosseini said. “My capacity for empathy has deepened by listening to those wildly different in background and circumstance than me.”
Madison Huynh, grade 11, joined the debate program in sixth grade because she wanted to have intellectual discussions on topics beyond what she was learning in class. “I love debate’s basis in curiosity, research and strategy,” said Huynh, who finished fifth in the nation in policy debate at the National Debate Coaches Association National Tournament in April.
“From learning how to work on a team to developing strong critical thinking skills, being a part of speech and debate is truly a unique experience,” Huynh said. “It offers education and real-world skills in the most fun, intellectually spirited way possible.”
A banner year for speech and debate
In 2018-19, Harker students participated in dozens of speech and debate
tournaments across the country. After achieving great results during the
fall and winter, students continued to shine on the national speech and
debate stage this spring. Here are a few highlights of their successes:
Western Junior Varsity and Novice National Championship
(held at San Francisco State University, March 9-10)
Harker set a tournament history record by having the top six finishers
in JV Lincoln-Douglas debate – Deven Shah, Akhilesh Chegu, Karoun
Kaushik, Arnav Dani, all grade 9, and Krish Mysoor and Ansh Sheth,
both grade 7 – close out two quarterfinals and all of the semifinals,
making them co-champions. Shah also was the top speaker in the
Fourteen Harker students earned perfect scores on AP tests taken in the spring.
In economics, Ashwin Rammohan, grade 12, got perfect scores – no wrong answers – on both the macro- and microeconomics AP tests, one of only four students in the world to earn perfect scores on more than one AP exam! Enya Lu, grade 12, got a perfect score on the AP Macroeconomics test, making her one of only 31 worldwide to do so. Rithvik Panchapakesan, grade 12, was one of only 26 students worldwide who aced the AP Microeconomics test.
In computer science, there were 193 perfect scores worldwide and nearly 6 percent of them were from 11 Harker students. Arya Maheshwari, Michelle Si, Daniel Wang, Russell Yang and Bowen Yin, all grade 10; and David Feng, Finn Frankis, Alyssa Huang, Rashmi Iyer, Chaitanya Ravuri and Bryan Wang, all grade 11, all had perfect scores.
Only six schools worldwide had four or more students with perfect scores.
Harker students have turned in numerous perfect scores over the years. Search “perfect score” to find related articles in Harker News.
It was an impressive spring season for Harker athletics and it showed as many individuals were rewarded with all-league honors.
Softball
Cameron Zell and Taylor Lam, both grade 12, earned first team honors, with Anika Rajamani, grade 12, and Molly Mobley, grade 10, making the second team and Natasha Yen, grade 10, getting an honorable mention.
Baseball
Zach Hoffman, grade 12, Max Lee, grade 11, and Andrew Chavez, Levi Sutton and Nicholas Coulter, all grade 10, were each named to the first team, and Luke Wancewicz, grade 10, and Mark Hu, grade 9, made the second team.
Boys Tennis
The boys tennis team made it to the second round of CCS, led by first-teamers Ramanand Vegesna, Mihir Sharma and Richard Hu, all grade 11. Joshua Zhou, grade 11, and Shika Tseitlin, grade 9, made the second team, with Jack Hansen, grade 11, getting an honorable mention.
Boys Golf
Boys golf earned its sixth consecutive league championship (sharing it with Menlo this year) and finished sixth in CCS. Ashwin Rammohan, grade 12, Jaimin Bhagat, grade 11, and Aditya Tadimeti and Bryan Zhang, both grade 10, were all named to the first team, with Bradley Lu, grade 12, and Gabriel Yang and Bowen Yin, both grade 10, making the second team.
Lacrosse
The league champion lacrosse team featured Midfielder of the Year Elise Mayer, grade 12, along with first-teamers Heidi Zhang, grade 12, Nellie Tonev, grade 11, and Lisa Barooah and Anna Vazhaeparambil, both grade 10. Julia Amick, grade 12, and Piper White, grade 11, earned second team honors, with Zoe Sanders, grade 10, and Sarah Leafstrand, grade 9, receiving honorable mentions.
Track and Field
Alexa Lowe, grade 9, was the league champ in the triple jump and was named to the first team. Ayush Vyas, grade 12, and Gio Rofa, grade 11, each earned second team honors, with Anton Novikov, grade 10, Natasha Matta, grade 9, earning honorable mentions.
Boys Volleyball
Boys volleyball brought home the first team CCS championship in school history and took second place in NorCal for the second year in a row. Jarrett Anderson, grade 12, was named league Senior of the Year, and Billy Fan, grade 10, earned league Sophomore of the Year. Charlie Molin, grade 12, and Jeffrey Kwan, grade 11, were named to the first team, with Chris Gong, grade 12, earning second team recognition.
Swim
The boys swim team took third in CCS and fourth in state with Ethan Hu, grade 11, being named WBAL league MVP after setting numerous league, CCS and state records. Alex Yu, grade 12, and Jason Kwok, Matthew Chung and Rhys Edwards, all grade 10, were also recognized with first team honors for their top league and CCS finishes. Representing the girls swim team, Nikela Hulton, grade 9, was named to the second team.
Upper School Athletics Awards Ceremony
Harker’s annual upper school Athletics Awards Ceremony was held earlier this week, honoring our amazing student athletes. Awards were given in the following categories:
Super Eagle Award
Given to athletes who have participated in three sports during one school year:
Alycia Cary, Cameron Zell, Lilia Gonzales, Lily Wancewicz and Trevor Thompson, all grade 12; Gio Rofa, grade 11; and Andrew Chen, Ashley Barth, Brooklyn Cicero, Jack Hayashi and Marcus Anderson, all grade 9
Eagle Award
The Eagle Award is the only accolade voted on by the student athletes of that sport. It is given to the athlete who displays enthusiasm at all times, supports the team and individuals, hustles in every task, is a positive role model and displays a selfless, giving approach to the program:
Cameron Zell, grade 12, cheer; Ryan Adolf, grade 12, male cross country; Lilia Gonzales, grade 12, female cross country; Mitchell Granados, grade 12, football; Katelyn Vo, grade 11, girls golf; Gina Partridge, grade 11, girls tennis, Katrina Liou, grade 12, girls volleyball: Bobby Bloomquist, grade 12, boys water polo; Claudia Opris, grade 12, girls water polo; Gio Rofa, grade 11, boys basketball; Maria Vazhaeparambil, grade 10, girls basketball; Jared Anderson, grade 12, boys soccer; Ria Gupta, grade 12, girls soccer; Sophia Gottfried, grade 10, wrestling; Zach Hoffman, grade 12, baseball; Ashwin Rammohan, grade 12, boys golf; Zoe Sanders, grade 10, lacrosse; Taylor Lam, grade 12, softball; Cassandra Ruedy, grade 11, swimming; Jack Hansen, grade 11, boys tennis; Mitchell Granados, grade 12, male track and field; Alycia Cary, grade 12 female track and field; and Liam Bakar, grade 11, boys volleyball
Iron Eagle Award
The athlete receiving this award demonstrates the highest level of commitment to his/her school, teammates and their sport throughout the entire season, which includes off-season, pre-season and in-season:
Anika Tiwari, grade 11, and Rohan Varma, grade 10
Drew Goldstein Award
Given to athletes who participated in three sports in each of his/her four years at Harker:
Lilia Gonzales and Lily Wancewicz, both grade 12
Athletic Commitment Award
This award is given to seniors who played four years of at least one sport, showing commitment, positive leadership, good sportsmanship and a strong work ethic:
Trevor Thompson, Gene Wang, Richard Wang, Lilia Gonzales, Ria Gupta, Rithi Jayam, Alexandra Lu, Sahana Narayan, Krish Kapadia, Edwin Su, Prameela Kottapalli, Lily Wancewicz, Alex Rule, Henry Wong, Ryan Adolf, Alycia Cary, Mitchell Granados, Carl Gross, Surya Gudapati, Andy Koonmen, Noah Lincke, Kai Franz, Kobe Howard, Anthony Meissner, Marcus Tymous, Michael Wang, Aneesha Kumar, Mahi Gurram, Josh Broweleit, Andrew Chang, Leon Lu, Donna Boucher, Allison Cartee, Srija Gadiraju, Karen Krause, Katrina Liou, Linda Luo, Devanshi Mehta, Claire Newman, Kelly Shen, Taylor Vaughan, Stephanie Xiao and Claudia Opris
League Achievement Award
Given to seniors who played four years of at least one sport, achieving first team all-league honors and showing commitment, positive leadership, good sportsmanship and a strong work ethic:
Anika Rajamani, Chris Gong, Charlie Molin, Abigail Wisdom, Julia Amick, Akhila Ramgiri, Heidi Zhang, Samantha Yanovsky, Bobby Bloomquist, Jacob Kim, Cameron Zell, Zach Hoffman, Ashwin Rammohan and Taylor Lam
Director’s Award
This award is given to seniors who played four years of at least one sport, showing commitment, positive leadership, good sportsmanship and a strong work ethic and was either recognized at a state or section level or achieved league MVP honors:
Matthew Hajjar, Jared Anderson, Jarrett Anderson, Ayush Vyas, Elise Mayer, Alex Yu
Harker upper school students performed well in a pair of recent math contests. Yesterday, junior Jeffrey Kwan received an honorable mention from the Mathematical Association of America for being one of the top scorers in the 2019 USA Mathematical Olympiad (USAMO), among 300,000 participants.
In April, Harker placed ninth in National Assessment & Testing’s Four-By-Four competition due to the high scores posted by a team of sophomores comprising Arya Maheshwari, Luisa Pan, Sidra Xu and Nicholas Yi. The contest has teams of four solve a series of problems over 10 rounds, each lasting three minutes.
Shahzeb Lakhani and Alivia Li, both grade 9, are Harker’s latest winners of the H&R Block Budget Challenge! The students each earned $20,000 by coming in second out of thousands of entries worldwide.
Students who participated in the challenge were given a virtual job, complete with a 401(k), credit card bills and student loans. They then had to successfully manage their paychecks for 10 weeks. Li and Lakhani were two of just 10 competitors nationwide to receive the $20,000 scholarship.
Harker has had winners in this contest for four years running. Last year, Luisa Pan, now grade 10, won. Roma Gandhi, grade 11, won in 2017, and Rithvik Panchapakesan, grade 12, won in 2016. Each semester, five awards are given out nationwide.
“I believe that the hardest part of managing my budget was definitely understanding all of the concepts,” said Lakhani. ”Since I planned out the entire challenge within the first month, I had to learn quickly what functions did what. I was able to understand these a lot better thanks to some help from last year’s winner, Luisa Pan.”
He did run into some speed bumps, and managing them made the project challenging. “I found that planning ahead and making adjustments when things went sideways was one of the most important keys to success,” Lakhani said. “Being organized and creating tools such as the machine learning application I applied to predict risk was equally important, because the tools allowed me to make more informed decisions.”
Lakhani gained a practical life lesson, too. “I learned that staying on top of things and checking in often aided in paying bills on time,” he said. “Even when you think all hope is lost and you have no chance of winning as I did, if you keep working hard, things might turn around for you.”
Li noted, “The hardest part of the challenge for me was mainly learning the basics of personal finance in general and how to plan and pay for living expenses. Once I got the hang of using the interface and knew what to check and where to do so, everything quickly became second nature.
“The most important thing I learned through this experience was definitely how to plan out future finances. Getting a good handle on keeping a spreadsheet and staying organized is undoubtedly the most valuable and practical skill I have acquired through the H&R Budget Challenge,” she finished.
At yesterday’s school meeting, Zachary Wong ’19 was presented with The Forgotten International’s 2019 Compassion Award for his work bringing water to impoverished regions of Nepal via the nonprofit organization Water In Nepal, which Wong founded and runs with other California high school students.
Founded in 2007, The Forgotten International works to alleviate extreme poverty around the world, especially for women and children, by supporting community organizations it believes will have the most impact.
Wong traveled to Kathmandu, Nepal, in December of last year to help construct a sedimentation tank for the village of Patlyachaap. The sedimentation tank filters out sludge that builds up in water sourced from a pond near the village and is expected to last up to 100 years.
After being presented with the award, Wong thanked his parents and teachers and reminded the students to “remain kind, remain compassionate, remain grounded.”