The middle school girls robotics team, 1072A – made up of seventh graders MacEnzie Blue, Janam Chahal, Minal Jalil and Kimi Yashar – has qualified for the for VEX Robotics World Championship in May. “They have been practicing and competing under my supervision at the STG campus all year as COVID restrictions have permitted,” said Martin Baynes, middle school computer science teacher. “The girls have worked hard and produced a very successful robot.” The team’s place at the world championship was cemented by receiving the Design Award at the Northern California Middle School State Championships. As with all VEX Robotics events this season, the world championships will be held remotely.
In late March, upper school English teacher Jennifer Siraganian was named the next Poet Laureate of Los Gatos. Over her three-year term, her duties will include planning an annual poetry program at the local library, engaging with a local school to promote poetry education and surveying poetry for a collection that will be submitted to the local library archives at the end of her term.
“I am thrilled, flattered and honored to be selected,” Siraganian said. “I’ve been an educator, poet and literary organizer for almost two decades, so when I saw the opening for Los Gatos Poet Laureate, I knew it was made for me.”
The application process included submitting a selection of her work and a letter of interest as well as reference letters. Upon being named a finalist, she interviewed with the mayor of Los Gatos and members of the city’s Library Board and Arts and Culture Commission. She was voted unanimously to be the city’s Poet Laureate. She was formally inaugurated on April 6 during the Los Gatos Town Council meeting.
DoorDash co-founder Andy Fang today gifted $10 million to The Harker School to establish The Alumni Scholarship Endowment Fund. Fang is a 2010 graduate of the private K-12 school, located in the heart of Silicon Valley.
The fund will create a permanent legacy at The Harker School to provide need-based financial aid to students who qualify for admission, but otherwise could not afford tuition and fees. It will support Harker’s commitment to diversity at the school.
“A great education is one of the best ways to even the playing field for underprivileged kids,” Fang said. “I hope this endowment can help families from underserved communities achieve the American dream.”
Harker’s Head of School, Brian Yager, expressed pride in Fang’s efforts to improve access to education at Harker. “Andy is doing something of profound impact for the school, and his vision, forethought and overwhelming generosity will have a significant effect on Harker and the community for generations to come.”
Board of Trustee Chair and ’79 alumnus, Albert Zecher, Jr. added, “Andy’s commitment to creating this historic endowment for scholarships at Harker is inspiring. As a young alumnus, his philanthropy is especially laudable.”
Fang cited his experience at Harker as a motivating force. “With my philanthropy, I was looking to focus first on an institution that I knew could help the community, based on my personal experiences,” he said. “I’m thankful for the education I received at Harker, and I want to provide a way for more students to get access to Harker’s world-class education.”
Kim Lobe, Harker’s Director of Advancement, added, “Increasing our endowment is an important goal of our strategic plan. We couldn’t be more grateful that Andy has established this new Alumni Scholarship Endowment fund to inspire others to join him in giving to this very worthy cause.”
Fang co-founded DoorDash in 2013 with Stanford University classmates Evan Moore, Stanley Tang and Tony Xu. The company went public in December 2020.
Harker students Krish Maniar, grade 10, and Kabir Ramzan, grade 9, together with Saratoga High sophomore Shafin Haque, received the grand prize and several other awards at the HackDefy 2.0 hack-a-thon, held the weekend of March 27. Within 24 hours, the team developed a technology called EyesAIght that analyzes retinal images using artificial intelligence to help ophthalmologists determine the stage of diabetic retinopathy, a condition that can cause vision loss and blindness in diabetics. One in 10 Americans are currently diagnosed with diabetes, and 84 percent of patients are unaware of their condition because no objective assessment tool exists to automate detection, the team explains in its project overview.
EyesAIght also estimates the likelihood that diabetic retinopathy can cause blindness, thereby allowing physicians to determine appropriate treatment options. EyesAIght also produces a convenient summary report for review by physicians by utilizing natural language processing technology, .
In addition to winning the grand prize among 162 participants, comprising both high school and university teams at HackDefy, the team also received the Best High School Hack award. The trio also received awards at other hack-a-thons, including Best Healthcare Project at Merge 2021 and Best Medical Hack at Hack-2-Connect 3.0. For their efforts the team received over $650 in cash prizes and over $5,000 worth of non-cash prizes.
This year’s Alumni Day of Giving campaign is set to take place on April 8. This is a one-day effort that will take place online in partnership with GiveCampus.
Once again, this year’s goal is based on participation. We are aiming for 250 alumni donors, and no gift is too small or too big! In addition of the use of #loveharker to help spread the word, the beloved slogan “Put Your Eagles Up!”, used traditionally during school meeting athletic announcements, has been added to this year’s campaign in the spirit of our alumni community helping to lift up all future Eagles and showing their love for their first alma mater.
A link to make a gift will be emailed to all alumni beforehand and will be posted on all of our social media beginning April 7. This notification also will include ways to share the news about a donor’s gift as well as help with spreading the word to fellow alumni. All donors will be encouraged to post their donation status on social media using the hashtag #loveharker.
We are excited to announce that both Venmo and PayPal have been added to the platform to make it even easier to give.
The alumni office will have its virtual zoom room open from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. for alumni and friends to stop by and check in to help celebrate the big day’s milestones!
Those interested in becoming advocates for this campaign should contact Kristina Alaniz, director of alumni relations, at kristinaa@harker.org.
From Feb. 22-25, 139 students from The Harker School DECA Chapter attended the 2021 State Career Development Conference (SCDC). This conference was held virtually due to COVID-19, and students competed by submitting recordings of their events. To simulate the in-person conference feel, SCDC also featured Career Prep Academy Workshops and a Harker DECA chapter social. Overall, Harker performed admirably, with 59 overall finalists and 28 top four written event and top five role-play winners.
“SCDC was the culmination of Harker DECA’s efforts this past year, and I am extremely proud of how far our students have come,” said senior Anvitha Tummala, Harker DECA co-CEO. “Everyone has demonstrated such commendable adaptability with a virtual DECA experience, and due to a competitively successful SCDC, I’m excited to see our chapter compete at ICDC next month!”
The conference started off with the opening ceremony, which our chapter watched through a livestream on Zoom. Students were motivated to find their purpose by keynote speaker Quinn Tempest, a successful entrepreneur who has dedicated herself to helping people reach their life goals. Tempest said, “never stop asking yourself big important questions” and “purpose is the ‘why’ that drives what you do.”
“She discussed her personal motivators and what led her to be a successful entrepreneur, inspiring me to search for my own purpose in the work I do,” said Clarice Wang, grade 11, Harker DECA VP of operations. Since this competition was held online, submissions worked similarly to SVCDC, and members were given two days to record their written presentations and roleplays, put the documents in a Google Drive folder, and turn in the link to the DECA submissions portal.
“Though I’d much rather be presenting in person, it isn’t all bad! I liked that we could re-record if we made a small mistake, and the conference went very smoothly,” said Shreeya Merchia, grade 9.
SCDC activities continued with a Harker DECA Chapter social which took place on March 5. The Harker DECA Officer team prepared a variety of fun and engaging breakout-room activities such as baking cookies, playing Among Us, watching “Wandavision,” participating in sports trivia and more. Members were allowed to hop between as many of the bonding activities as they liked, the most popular being “Wandavision.”
“Although this is our second time competing in an online format, the Harker DECA chapter has been preparing for a virtual competition the entire year through Zoom study sessions. Students submitted videos of their presentations and PDFs of their business plans that were judged asynchronously,” said senior Bryan Zhang, Harker DECA VP of competitions. “Despite not being able to have live competition, we were still able to simulate business case studies and develop ourselves professionally. The virtual format also demanded higher levels of creativity and teamwork to stay ahead of the curve of other teams, which I am sure will benefit all competitors in the long term.”
The competition concluded with an awards ceremony hosted by California DECA on Thursday, March 11. Members joined a livestream as the California DECA officer team recognized advisors and announced ICDC (International Career Development Conference) qualifiers. To simulate stage recognition at an in-person conference, winners were spotlighted when their names were announced. Along with our chapter members’ achievements, Harker DECA was recognized for achieving Gold Level Certification for the Chapter Awards Program, as well as Thrive Level for the Chapter Campaigns and Membership Campaign.
“From kicking off the conference with a motivational message about purpose, our competitors no doubt found their purpose while competing at SCDC. I’m incredibly proud of the officer team for helping run this conference smoothly, and I am looking forward to making more conference memories at ICDC!” said chapter advisor Juston Glass. “Congratulations to all of our ICDC qualifiers. Go Harker Eagles!”
Members qualifying for ICDC are as follows:
1st Place
• Shreeya Merchia, grade 9; Principles of Marketing
• Vienna Parnell, grade 11; Hotel and Lodging Management Series
• Vedant Kenkare, grade 11; Marketing Communications Series
• Bodhi Saha, grade 11, Kaden Kapadia, grade 11; Sports Entertainment Marketing Team Decision Making
Plan
• Ananya Bammi, grade 10, Saavi Kumar, grade 10; Finance Operations Research
• Miki Mitarai, grade 9, Medha Yarlagadda, grade 9, Meishin Yen, grade 9; Hospitality and Tourism Operations
Research
• Margaret Cartee, grade 9; Principles of Business Management and Administration
• Bryan Zhang, grade 12; Sports and Entertainment Marketing Series
• Emily Zhou, grade 11, Emily Tan, grade 11; Entrepreneurship Team Decision Making
• Aditya Singhvi, grade 12, Andrew Sun, grade 12; Hospitality Services Team Decision Making
• Annmaria Antony, grade 10, Grace Hoang, grade 10; Marketing Management Team Decision Making
3rd Place
• Emily Tan, grade 11, Emily Zhou, grade 11; Business Services Operations Research
• Leisha Devisetti, grade 10; Sports and Entertainment Marketing Operations Research
• Cynthia Wang, grade 9; Principles of Marketing
• Rohan Varma, grade 12; Automotive Services Marketing Series
4th Place
• Max Xing, grade 9, Carey Chang, grade 9, Kevin Zhang, grade 9; Hospitality and Tourism Operations Research
• Ananya Bammi, grade 10, Saavi Kumar, grade 10; Financial Services Team Decision Making
• April Sun, grade 11; Restaurant and Food Services Management
• April Sun, grade 11; Hospitality and Tourism Professional Selling
• Camilla Lindh, grade 11; Quick Serve Restaurant Management Series
5th Place
• Simren Kochhar, grade 11; Entrepreneurship Individual Series
• Sara Wan, grade 10; Human Resources Management Series
• Sujith Pakala, grade 11; Quick Serve Restaurant Management
• Victoria Han, grade 11, Catherine He, grade 11; Travel and Tourism Team Decision Making
• Elvis Han, grade 11, Melody Luo, grade 11; Marketing Management Team Decision Making
Raji Swaminathan, middle school science teacher, recently published the third book in her series about the elements, titled “The Halogens – Oh, So Reactive!” As with the previous two books, this book follows Atom and her dog, Electron, as they travel to visit the elements via a magic periodic table. The book is currently available to purchase through Amazon and will be available to download for free on April 5-6. The second book in the series will be available for free March 25-28 and April 5-6. Swaminathan’s other two books, “Hydrogen and the Alkali Metals” and “My Basketball Game – A Lesson about Accuracy and Precision,” are available as free downloads through Apple Books.
On March 13, students and faculty from Bay Area schools attended the Student Diversity Leadership Gathering, hosted by Harker and led by Rodney Glasgow, head of school at Sandy Spring Friends School in, Sandy Spring, Md. A well-regarded speaker and facilitator in the areas of diversity and social justice, Glasgow delivered a keynote at the start of the event, detailing the ways in which his identity as a Black man changes both how the world sees him and how he sees and acts in the world.
He spoke on how the mask he wears as a precaution during the pandemic has hidden what he feels is his best feature, his smile, which he said puts others at ease. When wearing his mask, he said, “No one can really tell who I am. I’m suddenly every Black man at once. They can’t see that I’m a head of school. They can’t see that I’m an Ivy League graduate. They can’t see that I’m smiling. They can’t see that I’m kind. They can only see that I’m Black.”
Glasgow recalled instances in which he found himself centering his identity, such as when he was interviewing for a job and received half-hearted greetings or was grilled with questions in private to verify that he had graduated from Harvard. “This is an identity moment,” he said. This is not actually a Harvard moment. I’m sitting in a Black moment. I’m sitting in a poor moment. I’m sitting in a you’re-too-close moment. I’m sitting in a is-that-a-mask-you’re-wearing moment.”
In one powerful moment, Glasgow told the story of a Black parent who was detained while waiting with his daughter for the bus to arrive outside the school. After seeing the officer pass by once in his vehicle, he told his daughter to be ready, because he sensed the officer would return. “Could you imagine living a life where the police slowly creep by you and you don’t think, ‘thank goodness they’re going on to solve a crime, thank goodness they’re going on to keep the neighborhood safe,’ you’re thinking, ‘let’s just get ready because I think they’re coming back?’” Glasgow said.
Although the situation was resolved, the parent was upset that none of the other parents present during the encounter checked on him or his daughter. “When we unmask identity, all that’s really sitting there in the center is this deep, deep humanity,” Glasgow continued. “It’s this sense of, they didn’t treat me like a person; they didn’t take care of my daughter like she was human. She had to get on the bus and wonder, do they still see me as the person they saw yesterday?”
Following the keynote, adults and student attendees were put into groups to discuss identity and conduct group activities around their feelings on their own identities and how they affect their perceptions of the world. The attendees later met as a group to talk about what they had learned and what elements of the attitudes displayed during the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol that they saw in their school communities.
Tiffany Liou ‘08, now a reporter with the ABC-affiliated WFAA in Dallas, posted a video yesterday in which she speaks about the yearlong wave of violence against Asian Americans, including yesterday’s attacks in Atlanta that left eight people dead, including six women of Asian descent.
“I am angry, I am sad and I’m scared,” Liou says in the video. “I’m scared because I don’t want my family to become the next target.” She also shares personal experiences, such as a recent encounter at Target where the cashier would not speak to her or take her money: “I felt like she was disgusted by me because of my race. I felt like she was disgusted by my husband, who is Asian as well.”
Affirming her commitment to stand up for Asian communities, Liou also implores people to speak out and get active. “I need you to stand with us too,” she says. “Rhetoric matters. Speak up when you see hate, use your platforms to denounce racism, and reach out to your leaders and your elected officials to pass anti-hate legislation.”
Earlier this month, a group of Harker seniors published a website that tracks the rate of COVID-19 vaccination in the United States and the country’s progress toward herd immunity. Created with the feedback of Harker science teachers and epidemiology professors from Stanford University, the website provides a way for the public to monitor the progress of vaccinations in every state, including the percentage of people who’ve received their first and second vaccine doses and the percentage of each state’s doses used.
“In December, as stay-at-home learning dragged on, I found myself wistfully checking the news for updates on vaccines,” said senior Jason Lin, one of the students involved with creating the website. “I was looking for an easy-to-use platform that displays national and state vaccinations and progress to herd immunity. But to our surprise, I couldn’t find any. So I reached out to a few friends, and we got started.”
Lin was joined by a few fellow seniors for the project. “Bowen Yin built the website with his incredible coding finesse; Sara Yen verified data and reached out to professors for input with her journalism skills. Later, we added Claire Luo, who is working on publicizing the site, and Helen Li, who is helping us upscale and add more resources to the site,” said Lin. “We’re hoping that in the future, we might even help people find where to get vaccinated.”
Data for the website was sourced from organizations including the CDC, and experts knowledgeable in public health were consulted to ensure accuracy. Professors from Stanford offered their insight on how to display the progress toward herd immunity as well as how to factor in natural immunity. Biology teacher Mike Pistacchi and math teacher Bune Bloomquist were consulted to resolves issues pertaining to data.
The creators aimed to make the user experience simple and represent the data as accurately as possible. “The fundamental purpose of this site is to allow anyone to keep tabs on the vaccination situation,” said Lin. “We’re now in a stage where we’ve built something we’re proud of, and we want to let as many people as possible know it exists as an accessible resource.”