Last month, 26 Harker students qualified for a chance to compete in the United States of America Mathematical Olympiad and Junior Mathematical Olympiad. As a result, the students were invited to take the American Invitational Mathematics Examination (AIME), which was administered on March 3. Results are still to come. The AIME, which contains 15 questions and lasts three hours, is administered to students who score well on the American Mathematics Competition (AMC) exam. Their combined scores on the two tests determine their eligibility to compete in the Olympiads.
Congratulations to the following students for making it this far:
Lawrence Li, Evan Lohn, Jonathan Ma, Anika Mohindra, Allison Wang and Richard Yi, all grade 12; Kai Ang, Steven Cao, Misha Ivkov, Justin Jia, Winnie Li, Manan Shah, Peter Wu and David Zhu, all grade 11; Swapnil Garg, Linus Li, Jimmy Lin, Joanna Lin, Rajiv Movva and Neelesh Ramachandran, all grade 10; Rose Guan, Jason Huang, Satvik Narasimhan, Katherine Tian, Cindy Wang and Michael Wang, all grade 9.
All-League teams were recently announced and, once again, Harker was well represented in the West Bay Athletic League.
Boys Soccer: Oisin Coveney, grade 12, first team; Omar Hamade, grade 12, second team; Rohit Shah, grade 10, and Jared Anderson, grade 9, honorable mentions
Girls Soccer: Lyndsey Mitchell, grade 11, first team; Anuva Mittal, grade 11, second team; Layla Walker, grade 12, and Maile Chung, grade 11, honorable mentions
Boys Basketball: Elijah Edgehill, grade 12, first team; Rohan Desikan, grade 12, honorable mention
Girls Basketball Skyline Division: Jordan Thompson, grade 11, first team; Joelle Anderson, grade 11, second team; Selin Sayiner and Satchi Thockchom, both grade 10, honorable mentions
El Camino League Wrestling: Davis Howard, grade 11, Anthony Contreras, grade 10, and Danny Reidenbach, grade 11, All-League
Results from the first round of the North American Computational Linguistics Olympiad (NACLO) recently arrived, and the following 10 students qualified to advance to the invitational round: Lawrence Li, grade 12; Misha Ivkov, Andrew Rule, Kai-Siang Ang and David Zhu, all grade 11; Swapnil Garg, Rajiv Movva, Michael Kwan and Joanna Lin, all grade 10; and Rose Guan, grade 9.
The students will participate in the next stage of the competition on March 10.
Since its founding in 2006, NACLO has tested high school students on a variety of linguistics puzzles. The top-scoring students then represent the United States at the International Linguistics Olympiad, to be held this summer in Mysore, India.
Last week, the Harker golf team traveled to Antioch to compete in the Gambetta Tournament, the longest running high school golf tournament in Northern California. The Eagles finished fourth – Harker’s best-ever finish at this tournament – behind Bay Area powerhouses Campolindo, San Ramon and De La Salle. Leading the way for the Eagles was Avi Khemani, grade 11, who finished in fourth place with a 2-under-par 70, the best-ever individual performance for a Harker golfer at this tournament. The highlight of Khemani’s day was a consecutive birdie, eagle, birdie on the back nine, to card a tournament low 31. Scout McNealy, grade 9, continuing the family linksmen tradition, shot a 1-over-par 73, finishing in a tie for ninth place. The Eagles travel to Corral de Tierra Country Club today to face Palma High School.
Boys Tennis
The boys tennis team started its season with a 6-1 league win over King’s Academy last Tuesday. The Eagles then headed south over the weekend to compete in the California Tennis Classic in Fresno. After two consecutive years of strong finishes, the Eagles were selected as the only tournament team to move up two divisions, which matched them up with some of the best teams in the state. The Eagles went 1-2 on the weekend, with their sole win coming in dramatic fashion. Harker upset defending Central Coast Champion Clovis West High School in the closest tennis match in both tournament and Harker history; it required three tie-breaking criteria and, ultimately, the winner of the No. 1 singles match to decide to winner. In the clinching match, Ronak Baldua, grade 12, overcame three match points before coming from behind to win 12-10 in a third set tiebreaker. Other strong performers included David Wen, grade 10, as well as the doubles team of Randy Zhao, grade 10, and Anjay Saklecha, grade 9. The Eagles travel to Pinewood on Tuesday to continue league action.
Softball
Last week, the girls softball team traveled to Palo Alto High School and defeated the Vikings 10-5. Tong Wu, grade 12, led the Eagles with two hits and three RBIs. The Eagles will make up their contest with Menlo Atherton as their Friday match up was cancelled due to rain. Harker will host St. Francis Watsonville this Friday at Blackford.
Baseball
The boys baseball team picked up an 11-2 win over North Valley Baptist last week as Miles DeWitt, grade 12, had three hits and three RBIs to lead the way for the Eagles. However, Harker was defeated 6-2 by Crystal Springs Uplands in their league opener. Akhil Arun, grade 10, drove in two runs in the loss. The Eagles host San Mateo on Tuesday and travel to Jefferson High on Thursday.
Track and Field
The track and field team was rained out this past weekend, midway through the Willow Glen Invitational. Before the event was shut down, Alycia Cary, grade 9, ran the seventh-fastest 800m, Elijah Edgehill, grade 12, ran the seventh-fastest 100m dash of the day and Anthony Contreras, grade 10, ran the 10th-fastest time. This Saturday, the Eagles will compete at the Kings Track Classic.
Boys Volleyball
The boys varsity volleyball team went 1-1 last week, losing to Oak Grove in five games. Andrew Gu, grade 11, led the Eagles with 14 kills. Later in the week, the Eagles traveled to Monterey High and came up with a three game win. Chris Gong, grade 9, led the way with 12 kills. The Eagles host Lynbrook on Tuesday at 6:15 p.m. at Blackford and host Amador Valley on Friday at 6:45 p.m. at Bucknall.
Girls Lacrosse
The girls lacrosse team dropped three matchups last week, falling to Sacred Heart Cathedral and Gunn, before losing a tough 11-9 overtime loss to York. The Eagles will host Castilleja on Tuesday at 4:30 p.m. and Newark on Friday at 5 p.m.
Swim
Even the rain and wind couldn’t stop the Harker swim team from competing this past weekend at the Monta Vista High School meet. Cedric Nowatzyk, grade 9, Ihita Mandal, grade 9, Karen Tu, grade 12, Anika Jain, grade 11, Philip Krause, grade 12, Alex Yu, grade 9, and Kevin Tzeng, grade 10, all swam personal bests at the event. Congratulations to Vivian Wang, grade 10, and Michael Auld, grade 11, who each had CCS qualifying times in their events. The Eagles are back in the pool on March 19 for the Small School Invitational at Sacred heart Prep.
Students in the AP studio art program had their works showcased at this year’s AP Studio Art Exhibition on Feb. 23. A throng of visitors took in a wide variety of paintings, sculptures, drawings and prints in many different styles and media.
One of the featured artists, Kaylan Huang, grade 12, used ink and colored pencil to create small-scale drawings of cities such as Tokyo, San Francisco and Amsterdam. Fellow senior Ankur Karwal used clever graphic design to examine the symbolism of famous brand names such as Louis Vuitton, Apple and Nike.
All of the works from the exhibition are currently on display in the Nichols Hall atrium. This year’s showcased artists are Alice Wu, grade 12; Amar Jain, grade 12; Grace Park, grade 11; Jenny Bourke, grade 12; Joyce Li, grade 11; Kaylan Huang, grade 12; Madison Tomihiro, grade 12; Marti Sutton, grade 11; Doreene Kang, grade 12; Kevin Ke, grade 12; Kristen Ko, grade 12; Sarah Tien, grade 11; Shreya Sunkara, grade 12; Alexa Gross, grade 11; Ankur Karwal, grade 12; Caroline Skrobak, grade 12; Edward Sheu, grade 12; Johnathon Keller, grade 12; Kavya Ramakrishnan, grade 12; Kevina Xiao, grade 12; Natasha Mayor, grade 12; Surya Solanki, grade 12; Arben Gutierrrez-Bujari, grade 11; Chandler Nelson, grade 12; and Layla Walker, grade 12.
Thirteen Harker seniors were named U.S. Presidential Scholar candidates for 2016. Each year, about 4,000 graduating seniors nationwide are selected, based on their SAT and ACT scores. As many as 161 graduating seniors are then named Presidential Scholars. Students must be invited to apply for the program.
This year’s candidates from Harker are Akshay Battu, Anthony Luo, Evan Lohn, Elina Sendonaris, Jonathan Ma, Karen Tu, Michael Zhao, Janet Lee, Vineet Kosaraju, Anika Mohindra, Natalie Simonian, Allison Wang and Richard Yi.
Scholars are chosen in April based on various criteria, including academic and artistic achievement, leadership and community involvement. They are invited to travel to Washington, D.C., in June for a National Recognition Program that will include a variety of activities. There, they also will be presented with a Presidential Scholars Medallion at a ceremony sponsored by the White House.
Also in February, a group of Harker seventh graders — Sidra Xu, Betsy Tian, Arya Maheshwari, Jason Lin, Alexander Kumar, Nicky Kriplani, Paul Kratter and Jonathan Chao — competed in a middle school TEAMS competition and scored highest in the country in all divisions. A total of 98 teams entered the competition, which consists of four topics, two essays and a design challenge. The students will head to Nashville this summer for the national stage of the TEAMS competition.
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This past weekend, two teams of Harker students earned first place finishes at the TEAMS (Test of Engineering Aptitude in Math and Science) competition. The event, held at San Jose State University, consisted of a two-part exam that lasted about three hours. Upper school math teacher Anthony Silk said Harker faced “tougher competition” this year, but still managed to earn first place in both the grade 9-10 and grade 11-12 divisions.
The first place team in the grade 9-10 division consisted of sophomores Jerry Chen, Amy Jin, Michael Kwan, Jimmy Lin, Sahana Srinivasan, Justin Xie, Shaya Zarkesh and Randy Zhao. The first place grade 11-12 team was made up of juniors Steven Cao, Neymika Jain, Evani Radiya-Dixit, Venkat Sankar, Manan Shah, Arjun Subramaniam, Peter Wu and David Zhu.
New to the competition this year was a design challenge that had students building the highest tower possible using just 20 sheets of 8.5” x 11” paper. Zhu, who captained the first place grade 11-12 team, called the challenge “a great way for us to develop on-the-spot problem solving and designing skills that typically cannot be trained with written problems.
The Harker baseball team opened its season with an impressive 16-3 win over Livermore Valley Charter Prep. Dominic Cea, grade 10, started his season off hot with a two hit, four RBI day to lead the way for the Eagles. On Tuesday, North Valley Baptist will visit the diamond at Blackford for a 3:30 p.m. game.
Softball
Elevens were wild last week for the Harker softball team as it defeated both Overfelt High and Mercy San Francisco 11-0. In the win over Overfelt, Marti Sutton, grade 11, went 2-2 with four RBIs, while Marita Del Alto, grade 12, gave up only two hits and zero runs in five innings pitched. Later in the week, Kristin LeBlanc, grade 10, had the Mercy batters begging for mercy as she tossed five innings of no-hit ball, striking out seven. Grace Park, grade 11, provided the thunder as she hit the first Harker home run of the year. The Eagles travel to Palo Alto High on Tuesday to face off with the Vikings.
Boys Volleyball
The boys volleyball team kicks off its season on Tuesday as its travels to Oak Grove High for a 6:15 p.m. non-league matchup.
Boys Golf
Monday marks the start of the boys golf season as the team travels to the Lone Tree Golf Course in Antioch to compete in the Joe Gambetta Invitational Tournament. Next Monday, Harker will travel to Brentwood to compete in the Falcon Invitational at the Deer Ridge Golf Club.
Girls Lacrosse
The girls lacrosse team opened its season with a 14-3 loss to West Catholic powerhouse Archbishop Mitty. This week, the Eagles will host three games on Davis Field: Tuesday vs. Sacred Heart Cathedral at 4:30 p.m., Wednesday vs. Gunn High at 4:30 p.m. and Friday vs. York School at 5 p.m.
Boys Tennis
The boys tennis team jumps right into league action as it hosts King’s Academy in its season opener on Tuesday. On Thursday, the Eagles will travel to Crystal Springs Uplands for another league match. And this weekend, the team travels to Fresno for the California Tennis Classic.
Track and Field
The Harker track and field team opens its season this Saturday at the Willow Glen Invitational.
Swim
The varsity swim team faced off in a three-team meet against Crystal Springs Uplands and King’s Academy last week. Michael Auld, grade 11, Vivian Wang, grade 10, Angela Huang, grade 12, and Grace Guan, grade 12, all qualified for CCS in their events. Angela Li and Ihita Mandal, both grade 9, won their respective varsity races in the 100 back and 200 free. The Eagles travel to Monta Vista on Friday.
Winter Wrap Up
Girls Basketball
The girls basketball season came to end last Tuesday as Terra Nova defeated the Eagles 52-44 in the first round of the CCS Division 4 playoffs. Jordon Thompson, grade 11, scored 29 points, but it wasn’t enough as the Harker lineup was shorthanded because of injuries and illnesses. The Eagles finished the season with an impressive 16-9 record and look to stay strong next year as the team graduates only two seniors, Aishu Murari and Aathira Menon. Great job this year, ladies!
Boys Basketball
The boys varsity basketball team traveled to San Lorenzo Valley High School last Thursday to open up the CCS Division 4 playoffs. The Eagles got 22 points from Roy Yuan, grade 9, but SLV was too much for Harker as it moved on to the next round with the 67-47 victory. It was the final high school game for seniors Elijah Edgehill, Dhanush Madabusi, Rohan Desikan, Amar Jain, Prithvi Gudapati, Jonathan Yiu, Evan Lohn and Raghav Jain. Congrats on a great year, Eagles!
Rajiv Movva, grade 10, was recently named one of 100 students nationwide to win the Emperor Science Award, presented by PBS LearningMedia, Stand Up To Cancer and the Entertainment Industry Foundation. Movva was one of 100 among nearly 1,200 grade 10 and 11 students who submitted essays for the contest. As a winner, he will receive a $1,500 stipend, a Google Chromebook and the opportunity to participate in an eight- to 12-week cancer research project with a mentoring scientist. Congratulations!
This was the first year of the Emperor Science Award program, which is aimed toward students with an interest in pursuing a career in scientific research. Its goal is to find qualified sophomores and juniors who will be chosen to work with university-level research mentors.
Jordan Thompson, grade 11, led the Eagles with 22 points in the regular season finale against first place Mercy San Francisco, but it wasn’t enough as Harker was defeated 52-43. However, the Eagles finished with an impressive 16-8 record and were given the No. 10 seed in the CCS Division 4 playoffs. That gives Harker’s team home court advantage as it hosts Terra Nova on Tuesday at 7 p.m. Come out to support our Eagles as they make a run at a CCS title!
Boys Basketball
Last week the boys varsity basketball team picked up a huge 71-29 win over Crystal Springs Uplands behind a 21-point, five-rebound, five-assist night from Rohan Desikan, grade 12. Later in the week, the Eagles faced off with Menlo to close out the regular season, but the Knights spoiled Senior Night by defeating Harker 55-42. Elijah Edgehill, grade 12, led the way with 13 points. The Eagles finished the season with a 12-12 record and were rewarded with the No. 11 seed in the CCS Division 4 brackets. The team travels to San Lorenzo Valley this Thursday at 7 p.m. to begin its postseason journey.
Boys Soccer
The varsity boys soccer team wrapped up its season last week as it split its two games. The Eagles fell to King’s Academy 3-1 on Senior Day, but finished the season on a winning note, taking down Priory 2-1 with goals from Kedar Gupta, grade 11, and Jared Anderson, grade 9. Harker ended with a respectable 7-9-1 record. Great job this year!
Wrestling
Although the Harker wrestling team was represented by only two wrestlers in the CCS tournament, it had a very strong showing. Anthony Contreras, grade 10, went 1-2 in the tournament, but with two more years of high school wrestling ahead, the sky is the limit for Contreras. Davis Howard, grade 11, represented Harker very well in the 285-pound division. Howard went 3-2, with all of his wins coming by fall, and his final loss coming at the hands of the eventual third place finisher. Congratulations on a great year to Anthony, Davis and the entire Harker wrestling team!
MS Wrestling
Dezi Johnson, grade 6, once again showed that he is one of the best young wrestlers in the nation as he finished fifth at the 2016 Liberty Nationals. The tournament was held this past weekend in St. Joseph, Mo., and showcased some of the best wrestling talent in the country. Again, congrats Dezi!