Harker middle school speech and debate team members competed at three tournaments in three states – California, Georgia and Texas – in April and early May.
In April, at the National Debate Coaches Association National Championship in Atlanta, 166 entries from 102 schools across 26 states competed. Harker had two middle school entrants and a few upper school entrants.
Also in April, 10 middle and upper school Harker students competed at the St. Marks Novice Round Up in Dallas. A dozen schools were represented. Results are below.
Novice Policy
1st – Deven Shah and Andy Lee, grades 8 and 9, respectively, went undefeated with a perfect 19-0 ballot count.
Novice Policy Speaker Awards
1st – Andy Lee
2nd – Deven Shah
6th – Ansh Sheth, grade 6
On May 7, approximately 40 Harker middle schools students competed against each other in two distinct intramural debate events in preparation for the Middle School Tournament of Champions Nationals, and earned the following awards:
Lincoln-Douglas
1st – Rahul Santhanam, grade 7
2nd – Brian Chen, grade 7
Public Forum
1st – Sriram Bhimaraju and Arjun Gurjar, both grade 6 (3-0)
2nd – Adam Sayed and Sathvik Chundru, both grade 6 (3-0)
Public Forum Speaker Awards
1st – Sascha Pakravan, grade 8
2nd – Carol Wininger, grade 7
3rd – Ansh Sheth, grade 6
4th – Ayan Nath, grade 8
5th – Deeya Viradia, grade 7
In early May, Harker speech and debate team members attended the middle school TOC at the University of Kentucky, in Lexington.
At the event, 232 of the best middle school speech and debate students from 35 schools competed. Overall, Harker had great success across all events. Harker won the First Place Sweepstakes Team Award for best middle school speech and debate team in the country.
Harker students won the following awards, competing against some of the best middle school teams in the country:
Policy
1st – Deven Shah and Mir Bahri, grade 7, undefeated, 20-0 ballot count
5th – Saanvi Arora, grade 8, and Sarah Mohammed, grade 7
Policy Speaker Awards
2nd – Deven Shah
18th – Mir Bahri
Lincoln-Douglas
2nd – Anshul Reddy, grade 8
3rd – Alexander Lan, grade 7
5th – Akhilesh Chegu, grade 8
5th – Arnav Dani, grade 8
9th – Brian Chen, grade 7
Lincoln-Douglas Speaker Awards
1st – Akhilesh Chegu, grade 8
3rd – Krish Maniar, grade 7
4th – Anshul Reddy, grade 8
Public Forum
1st – Sascha Pakravan and Ayan Nath
2nd – Krishna Mysoor, grade 7, and Ansh Sheth
5th – Arnav Jain and Rohan Rashingkar, both grade 8
17th – Michelle Jin and Lexi Nishimura, both grade 7
Ranjita Raghavan ’08 had a fascinating break from her studies: After three years of medical school, she took a year off to work as a medical producer for “The Dr. Oz Show” in season nine.
“I was able to bring my knowledge of medicine to the world of writing and producing,” Raghavan said. “It was a rewarding job, because I learned firsthand how to produce a daily talk show, made tougher when you embed medical content in it.
“My job entailed working with the segment producers to write show scripts that convey complex medical concepts to the audience in an accurate and compelling way. This included the development of demonstrations and animations, along with their talking points that helped visualize these concepts. We also orchestrated lab testing and experiments and would brief Dr. Oz and medical experts on all show days about show content. I am heading back to USC to finish off my medical degree in a few weeks, but was lucky enough to cap off the experience by witnessing our show’s Emmy win for Best Informative Talk Show.”
Raghavan noted the medical producers are on the show now and then, and she gets to be the “expert” on the last segment of the show, airing on May 21, so be sure to tune in to see her on the show!
Over the weekend, four Harker teams won awards in the 2018 Tech Challenge Showcase, held at the Tech Museum in San Jose. At the event, teams of grade 4-12 students demonstrated the devices they had constructed for this year’s contest. More than 600 teams comprising 2,000 students entered the competition, which challenged them to design and build a device that could successfully fall 10 feet into a drop zone, then deliver a payload to a target situated on a ramp, without the aid of batteries or electricity.
Grade 4 students Sofia Shah, Minal Jalil, MacEnzie Blue, Tiffany Zhu, Tanvi Sivakumar, Arushi Sahasi and honorary team member Rocky (Jalil’s dog) formed team “SMMARTT,” which received an outstanding overall award in the grades 4-5 category.
Sixth graders Nathan T. Liu, Adrian Liu and Aniketh Tummala, known as the “Huskies,” won the award for top tech challenge story, which explained the origins of the device they built. The “FlyteZON” team, made up of Neel Handa, Om Tandon and Zachary Blue, all grade 6, won an award for being outstanding overall.
Team “Flopper Waffles” – grade 7 students Brian Chen, Andrew Fu, Jacob Huang and Nicholas Wei – received an award for outstanding device performance.
It is officially the Week of the Young Child, and Harker Preschool celebrated Tasty Tuesday by teaching about eating healthy and promoting physical fitness. On Tuesday afternoon, the students enjoyed activities and games, including Tug of War, bubble play, big blue blocks, parachute play and many races. Wednesday, students had the best of times with the simplest of toys: cardboard tubes and boxes! It’s great to be a young child at Harker Preschool!
Preschool students continue to revel in Week of the Young Child! On Thursday, the young ones had and art extravaganza that included sidewalk chalk drawing, finger painting, painting with brushes and spray bottles, and more.
The next day, Friday, grade 8 students from Harker’s Middle School Ecology Club came by for an Eco Buddies day. Among other activities, the students sang together, designed wind-powered helicopters, planted and germinated seeds, butyl bird feeders and learned about composting. The weather was beautiful and everyone had a great time!
Week of the Young Child is an annual celebration hosted by the National Association for the Education of Young Children to celebrate early learning, young children, teachers and families.
Last week, grade 4 students made their annual trek to Coloma, gaining insight into the lives of Gold Rush-era miners as they “made cornbread, did some old-fashioned laundry, made shelters and bartered at the general store,” reported Kristin Giammona, elementary division head. Naturally, the students also learned how to pan for gold, and some even managed to turn up gold flakes. Students finished the bulk of their first day activities in time to find cover from the rain and enjoy a brief hoedown and campfire chat. Coloma’s abundance of wonderful scenery was a real treat for the students, who hiked the Monroe Ridge and learned about the history of the area and how mining affected its environment and native population.
Four Harker upper school students and one middle school student have advanced to the third round of the USA Math Olympiad and Junior Math Olympiad, respectively. Sophomores Cynthia Chen, Rohan Cherukuri and Jeffrey Kwan, senior Swapnil Garg and eighth grader Rishab Parthasarathy were among the top 500 students from the roughly 75,000 who took the American Math Contest in February to qualify for the third round. The nine-hour test is taken over the course of two days. Top scorers will have the chance to represent the United States at the International Mathematical Olympiad, set to take place this summer in Romania.
In late March, two dozen grade 7 and 8 students visited Greece for a weeklong journey, visiting the sites of many pivotal historical events and experiencing its complex culture firsthand. Students detailed their daily activities on their blog of the trip.
Major events during the first two days included a stop at the massive Corinth Canal and exploring the seaside town of Nafplio, as well as seeing the Theatre of Epidaurus and learning of its importance in the formation of theater arts. Students also visited a Mycenaean tomb and an acropolis.
At Crete, the largest of the Greek Islands, students viewed ancient frescoes and artifacts at the Heraklion Archaeological Museum and toured the storied palace of Knossos, believed to be the inspiration for the myth of the labyrinth and its prisoner, the Minotaur. Other stops included the Arkadi Monastery, which dates back to the fifth century and today still operates as an Eastern Orthodox monastery.
In Athens, students visited the site of the Battle of Marathon, as well as other famous landmarks including the Agora, the Acropolis and the Parthenon, learning history and purpose of each of the ancient structures.
Naturally, the students also made the most of every opportunity to shop and sample the country’s tremendous variety of foods!
Harker’s varsity speech and debate team is heading into the end-of-season championships phase! The team has qualified an impressive 18 students (see photo!) to represent us at state and various national championships. The coaches are especially proud that the school will be represented in all of our main events: policy debate, Lincoln-Douglas debate, speech, congress and public forum debate.
This weekend, students will attend the first of the national championships, hosted by the National Debate Coaches Association in Atlanta. Next weekend, team members will attend the state championship in Mountain House, near Tracy. The weekend after, they will travel to the Tournament of Champions in Lexington, Ky. The team concludes its season with the National Speech & Debate Association Championship in Fort Lauderdale, Fla., in June. Watch for updates!
Qualifiers are:
Alan Hughes, grade 12
Megan Huynh, grade 12
Serena Lu, grade 12
Jacob Ohana, grade 12
Alycia Cary, grade 11
Nikhil Dharmaraj, grade 11
Haris Hosseini, grade 11
Jason Huang, grade 11
Anusha Kuppahally, grade 11
Cindy Wang, grade 11
Clarissa Wang, grade 11
Avi Gulati, grade 10
Maddie Huynh, grade 10
Sachin Shah, grade 10
Nikki Solanki, grade 10
Jason Lin, grade 9
Andy Lee, grade 9
Andrew Sun, grade 9
Huge congrats to all! Best of luck in the coming events!
An estimated 650 people arrived at the middle school campus on March 23 for the 2018 Cancer Walk. The annual event raises awareness of cancer and money for Camp Okizu, which organizes outings for children living with cancer. The event was started in 2007 by former Harker computer science teacher Michael Schmidt, whose mother died of cancer in 2006. Money was raised by selling baked goods, hot chocolate, T-shirts and other items at stations set up at various points around the walking area, which was adorned with flags that had written tributes to loved ones who died from cancer as well as survivors and those currently fighting it. In the days leading up to the event, several classroom doors were decorated to promote the event and encourage participants. Donations for the fundraiser totaled more than $6,300. To date, the Cancer Walk has raised more than $100,000 since its first year in 2007.
This past winter was amazing, with many league and tournament championships – and a whole lot of fun! We started off in early winter with boys basketball and girls soccer and finished in late winter with girls basketball and boys soccer.
Please see the accomplishments of all of our lower and middle school winter sports teams below:
EARLY WINTER
VA (Grades 7-8) Boys Basketball – The Varsity A team, coached by Ed LeGrand Sawyer, finished in fifth place in the WBAL with a record of 1-5 and went 4-5 overall. Team awards went to Matthew Chen, grade 7 (MVP), Alex Zhang, grade 8 (Eagle) and Ayan Nath, grade 8 (Coaches).
VB (Grades 7-8) Boys Basketball – The Varsity B team, coached by Richard Amarillas, finished in first place (Tri-League Champs) in the WBAL with a 6-1 record and went 6-2 overall. Team awards went to Sasvath Ramachandran, grade 8 (MVP), Zeke Weng, grade 7 (Eagle) and Kaden Kapadia, grade 8 (Coaches).
VB2 (Grades 7-8) Boys Basketball – The Varsity B2 team, coached by Jon Cvitanich, finished in sixth place in the WBAL with a 2-5 record. Team awards went to Akhilesh Chegu, grade 8 (MVP), Michael Pflaging, grade 7 (Eagle) and Saurav Tewari, grade 8 (Coaches).
JVA (Grade 6) Boys Basketball – The Junior Varsity A team, coached by Mike Delfino, finished in fifth place in the WBAL with a 2-4 record and an overall record of 3-5. Team awards went to Om Tandon (MVP), Zachary Blue (Eagle) and Toju Maku (Coaches).
JVB6 (Grade 6) Boys Basketball – The Junior Varsity B6 team, coached by Matt Arensberg, finished in first place in the WBAL with a 6-1 record. Team awards went to Jack Shen and Kyle Leung (MVP), Jordan Labio (Eagle) and Ariav Misra (Coaches).
MS Intramural Boys Basketball – Team awards went to Zain Vakath, grade 7 (MVP), Ramit Goyal, grade 6 (Eagle) and Christopher Tonev, grade 7 (Coaches). The team was coached by Raul Rios and Adam Albers.
JVB1 (Grade 5) Boys Basketball – The Junior Varsity B1 team, coached by Kristian Tiopo, finished undefeated in first place in the WBAL with a 7-0 record and took first place in the WBAL tournament finishing with a 10-0 record overall. Team awards went to Gary Jin (MVP), Drew Diffenderfer (Eagle) and Advay Monga (Coaches).
JVB2 (Grade 5) Boys Basketball – The Junior Varsity B2 team, coached by Tim Hopkins, finished in eighth place in the WBAL with a 2-4-1 record. Team awards went to Rahul Yalla (MVP), Edward Hunter (Eagle) and Max Zhai (Coaches).
JVC (Grade 4) Boys Basketball – The Junior Varsity C team, coached by Karriem Stinson, finished undefeated in first place in the WBAL with a 7-0 record. Team awards went to Brennan Williams (MVP), and Topaz Lee and Rishaan Thoppay (Eagle).
LS Intramural Boys Basketball – Team awards went to Vedant Yadav, grade 5, and Jackson Powell, grade 4 (MVP), Keshav Kotamraju, grade 5, and Sriram Batchu, grade 4 (Eagle), and Anderson Chung, grade 5, and Veeraz Thakkar, grade 4 (Coaches). The team was coached by Tobias Wade.
VA (Grades 7-8) Girls Soccer – The Varsity A team, coached by Brighid Wood, Sara Pawloski and Hannah Grannis, grade 9, finished in eighth place in the WBAL with a record of 1-4-2. Team awards went to Kalyn Su, grade 8 (MVP), Alexandra Wong, grade 7 (Eagle) and Ashley Barth, grade 8 (Coaches).
JVA (Grade 6) Girls Soccer – The Junior Varsity A team, coached by Brittney Moseley and Vanessa Rios, finished in sixth place in the WBAL with a record of 0-5-1. Team awards went to Kate Grannis (MVP), Anya Chauhan (Eagle), and Margaret Cartee and Claire Luo (Coaches).
JVB (Grades 4-5) Girls Soccer – The Junior Varsity B team, coached by Justin Sullivan, finished in second place in the WBAL with a record of 3-1-2. Team awards went to Claire Anderson (MVP), MacEnzie Blue, grade 4 (Eagle) and Kylie Anderson (Coaches).
LATE WINTER
VA (Grades 7-8) Girls Basketball – The Varsity A team, coached by Richard Amarillas, finished undefeated in first place in the WBAL with a 7-0 record and an overall record of 7-1. Team awards went to Maya Hernandez, grade 7, and Haley Hernandez, grade 7 (co-MVPs), Gigi Chan, grade 8 (Eagle), and Ashley Barth, grade 8, and Priya Rohra, grade 8 (Coaches).
VB (Grades 7-8) Girls Basketball – The Varsity B team, coached by Tim Hopkins and Brittney Moseley, finished undefeated in first place in the WBAL with a 7-0 record and took first place in the WBAL tournament finishing 9-0 overall. Team awards went to Athena Wu, grade 7 (MVP), Angela Jia, grade 8 (Eagle) and Avery Olson, grade 7 (Coaches).
JVA (Grade 6) Girls Basketball – The Junior Varsity A team, coached by Jon Cvitanich and Vanessa Rios, finished in fourth place in the WBAL with a 5-3 record and went 5-5 overall. Team awards went to Anjali Yella (MVP), Kate Grannis (Eagle) and Margaret Cartee (Coaches).
MS Intramural girls basketball – Team awards went to Alice Tao, grade 6 (MVP), Serena Janny, grade 6 (Eagle) and Brindha Chandran, grade 6 (Coaches). The team was coached by Raul Rios and Adam Albers.
JVB (Grade 5) Girls Basketball – The Junior Varsity B1 team, coached by Karriem Stinson, finished undefeated in first place in the WBAL with a 7-0 record and took 1st place in the WBAL tournament finishing 10-0 overall. Team awards went to Isabella Lo (MVP), Claire Anderson (Eagle) and Kylie Anderson (Coaches).
JVC (Grade 4) Girls Basketball – The Junior Varsity C team, coached by Kristian Tiopo and Belle Carley, finished undefeated in first place in the WBAL with a 6-0 record. Team awards went to Minal Jalil (MVP), Elie Ahluwalia (Eagle) and Tanvi Sivakumar (Coaches).
LS Intramural Girls Basketball – Team awards went to Menaka Aron, grade 5, and Arushi Sahasi, grade 4 (Co-MVP) and Hannah Streeper, grade 5 (Coaches). The team was coached by Tobias Wade.
VA (Grade 8) Boys Soccer – The Varsity A team, coached by Brighid Wood, Adyant Kanakamedala and Deven Parikh, finished in second place in the WBAL with a record of 3-1-1, and an overall record of 6-1-1. Team awards went to Ishaan Mantripragada (MVP), Raj Patel (Eagle) and Sasvath Ramachandran (Coaches).
VB (Grade 7) Boys Soccer – The Varsity B team, coached by Brighid Wood, Adyant Kanakamedala, grade 12, and Deven Parikh, grade 9, finished in second place in the WBAL with a league record of 4-2-1. Team awards went to Ben Tian and Michael Pflaging (co-MVPs), Pranav Mullappalli (Eagle) and Rupert Chen (Coaches).
JVA (Grade 6) Boys Soccer – The Junior Varsity A team, coached by Colleen Campbell, finished in third place in the WBAL with a record of 2-4 and an overall record of 2-5. Team awards went to Alexander Guo (MVP), Ryan Barth (Eagle) and Ramit Goyal (Coaches).
JVB (Grade 5) Boys Soccer – The Junior Varsity B team, coached by Matt Arensberg, finished in second place in the WBAL with a record of 3-2-1. Team awards went to Alec Zhang (MVP), Advay Monga (Eagle), and Veer Sahasi and Vyom Vidyarthi (Coaches).
LS Intramural Boys Soccer – Team awards went to Ryder Hewitt, grade 4 (MVP), Cyrus Ghane, grade 4 (Eagle) and Kaan Kurtoglu, grade 4 (Coaches). The team was coached by Walid Fahmy.