Middle School Latinists Win Prizes, Have Fun at State Convention

Nearly 30 middle school students attended the State Latin Convention at Miramonte High School in Orinda in early April. The group enjoyed a variety of activities ranging from workshops (the Roman soldier re-enactors were a particular favorite) to a banquet, and, naturally, participated in the competition, with many winning prizes. Harker placed second overall in the middle school category.

Awards at the MS1 level (all grade 6): Sean Costello, second in Latin sight reading; Aditya Dhar, first in derivatives, first in mythology, first in Latin oratory; Alexander Lam, second in derivatives; Eric Pei, honorable mention in grammar; Venkat Sankar, first in dramatic interpretation (boy); Amrita Singh, first in dramatic interpretation (girl), third in grammar, third in Latin sight reading; Jackson Su, honorable mention in mythology; Arjun Subramaniam, first in tennis, second in dramatic interpretation (boy); Karthik Sundaram, first in strings; Austin Tuan, second in grammar. In addition, Dhar won the individual academic sweepstakes in MS1.

Awards at the MS2 level (all grade 7, unless otherwise indicated): Billy Bloomquist , grade 8, second in Latin sight reading, third in reading comprehension; Rishabh Chandra, first in grammar, third in reading comprehension; Richard Gu, grade 8, second in reading comprehension, third in mythology; Sadhika Malladi, first in reading comprehension; Kaushik Sankar, third in reading comprehension; Elisabeth Siegel, first in pentathlon, first in essay; Vivek Sriram, grade 8, first in derivatives, first in reading comprehension, first in Latin sight reading; Allison Wang, second in mythology, second in pentathlon, third in Latin sight reading. The certamen (quiz bowl) team of Chandra, Sankar, Siegel and Wang placed first in the state.

Awards at the MS3 level (all grade 8): Anni Ankola, third in costume (he dressed as Charon), honorable mention in vocabulary; Zabin Bashar, first in impromptu art, honorable mention in mythology, honorable mention in reading comprehension; Aadyot Bhatnagar, first in reading comprehension, first in vocabulary, second in strings; Maya Nandakumar, first in mythology, first in dramatic interpretation (girl), second in vocal music; Bhatnagar and Nandakumar tied for first in the individual academic sweepstakes at the MS3 level. Also, the certamen team of Bashar, Bhatnagar, Nandakumar and Rasika Raghavan, grade 8, (in preliminary rounds) placed first.

Other participants were Chris Finsterbusch, Brendan Tobin, Albert Xu, all grade 6, and Ryan Fernandes and John Nicolas Jerney, both grade 7. In conjunction with the upper school, the delegation was awarded first place for spirit. The T-shirt designed by Kevin Ke, grade 7, placed first, as did the banner created by Shannon Hong and Natalie Simonian, both grade 7, and Sophia Shatas and Allison Kiang, both grade 8. The chariot team came in second in their race. The scrapbook created by Nandakumar placed third.

May 18, 2011Tags: Featured Story