Over a two-week period in late July and early August, 16 middle school students traveled to Costa Rica for the annual summer Spanish immersion trip. After arriving in the Costa Rican capital city of San José, the students visited Nuevo Milenio, a private school, where they enjoyed dance performances and student poetry recitals. Over the next several days, they learned how to make local cuisine in Grecia, volunteered at a school located in the neighborhood of La Carpio (made up primarily of poor Nicaraguan refugees), gazed at the country’s native flora and fauna, went ziplining over the lush forestry and participated in a day-long scavenger hunt through downtown Grecia. The memorable journey was capped off with a hearty dinner at a local eatery, where the travelers were entertained by local musicians and costumed dancers, known as máscaradas.
Over a two-week period in late July and early August, 16 middle school students traveled to Costa Rica for the annual summer Spanish immersion trip. After arriving in the Costa Rican capital city of San José, the students visited Nuevo Milenio, a private school, where they enjoyed dance performances and student poetry recitals. Over the next several days, they learned how to make local cuisine in Grecia, volunteered at a school located in the neighborhood of La Carpio (made up primarily of poor Nicaraguan refugees), gazed at the country’s native flora and fauna, went ziplining over the lush forestry and participated in a day-long scavenger hunt through downtown Grecia. The memorable journey was capped off with a hearty dinner at a local eatery, where the travelers were entertained by local musicians and costumed dancers, known as máscaradas.
Harker 2017 graduates Steven Cao, Divya Rajasekharan, Sandip Nirmel, Angela Kim, Andrew Rule, Kai-Siang Ang, David Zhu, Anuva Mittal, Amrita Singh and Albert Xu were named 2017 National Merit Scholarship Winners. Cao, Rajasekharan, Nirmel, Kim, Rule, Ang and Zhu were awarded National Merit $2,500 Scholarships, a one-time prize that can be put toward their studies at any accredited U.S. college or university. Mittal, Singh and Xu received college-sponsored Merit Scholarships, which provide an annual amount of between $500 and $2,000 for up to four years.
More than 30 middle school students posted medal-winning scores in this year’s National Myth Exam, which took place during the spring semester. The annual exam, taken by all middle school Latin students, includes questions on Greek and Roman myths.
Silver medals, awarded to students who scored between 95 and 99 percent, were awarded to rising seventh graders Hita Thota, Jeremy Ko, Alan Jiang, Jasmine Li, Andrew Fu and Andrew Pluzhnikov; rising eighth graders Nicole Tian, Anoushka Khatri, Arnav Jain, Brandon Park, Jacqueline Hu, Angela Jia, Aaron Lo and Alex Zhang; and rising ninth graders Betsy Tian, Angela Cai and Akshay Manglik.
Bronze medal winners, who scored between 90 and 94 percent, were rising seventh graders Atri Banerjee, Anthony Tong, Linette Hoffman, Nicholas Wei and Isaac Yang; rising eighth graders Ishaan Parate, Aaron Tran, Prakrit Jain, Thresia Vazhaeparambil, Ysabel Chen and Akhilesh Chegu; and rising ninth graders Sidra Xu, Jason Lin, Anna Vazhaeparambil, Shalini Rohra and Maria Vazhaeparambil.
These students were presented with their medals and certificates in May at the California Junior Classical League’s state convention.
Harker Preschool students have experienced some wonderful music and movement activities this summer. Mara Beckerman, music and movement specialist, turned her space into the ocean for an Under the Sea week in mid-July. Each morning, upon arrival, students removed shoes and socks to get ready to become waves and fish.
“We usually start with the song ‘Hello My Friends’ by Pam Donkin,” said Beckerman. “It’s a chance to welcome each child by name in song and for the child to stand up and do some short movement.”
The students took an imaginary trip to an aquarium, pretending to get on a bus and ride to the aquarium. Once at the “aquarium,” the class sang a delightful song by Tom Paxton that includes the lyrics, “At the ‘quarium, the ‘quarium, all the fishes make the googlie eyes and stare-ium …”
During one activity, students were transformed into clams and tried to move themselves with one leg , like a clam. They also transformed into swordfish and octopi.
In the musical portion, “The children had the opportunity to bang on pots and pans, always fun, but this time the props were in water,” so students could discover the difference in underwater sounds, explained Beckerman.
Beckerman also introduced the children to a unique instrument called a Tibetan water bowl, used in Tibetan temples. “You fill the bowl with water and gently rub your hands on the two handles,” she said. “The friction of your hands (assuming you’ve washed them with soap and water and removed oils from your hand) will cause the handles to make a low sound. That sound creates vibrations that affect the water. The water begins to move creating lines and when the vibrations are just right the water starts to spurt upwards like a fountain, or what I call ‘water fireworks!’” Students are thus able to see the ripples— or “see” sound.
Students also were introduced to a unique drum called an ocean drum that sounds like the ocean and each child made a small ocean drum to take home, Beckerman said. The trip may have been fantasy, but the learning and fun were all real. It was a great week for these young learners!
At the World Chess Federation’s 28th Panamerican Youth Championship, held June 30 to July 7 in Costa Rica, student Omya Vidyarthi, a rising grade 2 student, took first place among girls under age 8. Vidyarthi was one of four gold medalists to represent the United States at the competition, and her win helped make the U.S. the highest-placing country. She also received the title of Woman Candidate Master, which is awarded to female players who have at one point achieved a rating of 2,000, and she placed first in her age group for blitz chess, a variation of speed chess.
Both the upper and middle school speech and debate teams did incredibly well recently at one of the three major national speech and debate tournaments. The National Speech & Debate Association Tournament was held in Birmingham, Ala., June 18-23. Thousands of students compete at the massive event.
Four upper school students qualified to attend the tournament, and each had impressive results. Aditya Dhar ’17 took home top honors in congressional debate with the senate leadership bowl and a second-place-finish overall. The leadership bowl award is voted on by the debaters, and congressional debate coach Marjorie Hazeltine noted that the whole team was thrilled for Dhar, especially because he has been an incredible team leader and role model throughout his time at the upper school.
Jenny Achten, Harker’s speech and debate department chair, noted Dhar “was seen as a great competitor and also a fair and encouraging presence in the community. It really speaks to how highly he was held as a role model in the Congressional Debate community and within our team.”
Nikhil Dharmaraj, rising junior, made it to the quarterfinals of original oratory with his speech on the importance of quality over quantity. Dharmaraj also made it to the top 20 in impromptu speaking. Avi Gulati, rising sophomore, was close to making it to elimination rounds in oratory and also placed in the top third in impromptu. Rounding out the upper school contingent was Jason Huang, rising junior, who earned a winning record in the relatively new event of world schools debate.
The middle school team also did extremely well in its division, with 157 middle schools from 33 states represented. Harker won the School of Excellence Debate Award, given to the school with the strongest overall record in the debate events across the entire field. Coach Chris Thiele was honored to accept the award on behalf of the whole team.
The duo of Andy Lee and Jason Lin, both rising freshmen, won first place in policy debate on a 5-0 decision, as they successfully argued that the United States ought to increase its diplomatic engagement with the People’s Republic of China, particularly in the area of joint space exploration. Deven Shah, rising eighth grader, and Akshay Manglik, rising freshman, made it to the semifinals of policy debate. In Lincoln-Douglas debate, Rishi Jain, rising eighth grader, was in the semifinals and Akhilesh Chegu, also a rising eighth grader, was in the octofinals.
Harker’s grade 7 public forum teams also had impressive finishes, debating humanitarian assistance and antiterrorism efforts in East Africa. Anshul Reddy and Ayan Nath were semifinalists, Alina Yuan and Amiee Wang made it to octofinals, and Arnav Jain and Harsh Deep, along with Yejin Song and Alysa Su, were double octofinalists. All are rising eighth graders.
Arusha Patil, rising freshman, was a semifinalist in both original oratory and storytelling. Rhea Nanavati, rising fresman, was a quarterfinalist in dramatic interpretation of literature.
The coaches are very proud of all of the students’ accomplishments and send a special thanks to Class of 2017 graduates Sana Aladin, Molly Wancewicz and Anika Jain for joining the coaching staff for this exciting event.
Harker students had great success at the national TEAMS (Tests of Engineering Aptitude, Mathematics, and Science) finals in Orlando, Fla., in late June, where they won the grades 9-10 division first-place trophy in problem-solving, and placed in the top 10 for both prepared presentation and best in nation. The team finished fourth overall nationally. The team members, who took second in the state finals, are all rising sophomores: Jackie Yang (team captain), Eileen Li, Sachin Shah, Emily Liu, Allison Jia, Cynthia Chen and Vani Mohindra. Kyle Li did not travel to Orlando, but was part of the team that took second in the state.
“Once again the top qualifying team from Harker has represented the school with honor,” said the team’s coach, Tony Silk, upper school mathematics department chair. “The students worked very hard and had a wonderful experience. I can only imagine how they’ll do in their second year! A special thanks to Harker parent Roxana Yang, who traveled with the students to Orlando, helping to make the trip, and the students’ success, possible.”
The theme for 2017, “Engineering the Environment,” included scenarios on energy efficiency, open-source geothermal heat pumps and wastewater treatment. The TEAMS competition helps to develop “STEM-capable” students in an engaging way by showing them how math and science, with an engineering focus, are used to make tangible differences in the world.
During the spring semester, lower school English teacher Heather Russell got 32 lower school girls involved with the national Girls on the Run program. “I’m a runner and I thought this would be a great thing for girls, [because] many of them don’t think of themselves as runners,” Russell said. “But it’s really a lot more than that, because it’s an incredible curriculum that focuses on self-esteem and positive self-talk and self-image.”
The girls trained together for a 5K run in late May, in which they participated with 5,000 other runners. Each meeting started with a brief classroom activity based on the week’s theme, such as bullying, gossip and qualities that make good friends. Students also learned about healthy life habits and nutrition. The runners then did warm-up exercises and went on practice runs, which integrated various activities, including a scavenger hunt that had students locate scraps of paper that provided tips on how to be a good friend, such as learning how to say something positive about someone else. Parents of Girls on the Run participants were sent summaries of the topics so that they could continue the discussion at home.
“I thought this would be a great way to meet new people, make great friends and grow emotionally,” said Trisha Iyer, grade 5. “It’s a great way to talk about all these topics that everyone has trouble with but never really wants to share.”
Russell noted that even with increased efforts to encourage young girls to enter careers they are interested in, they still often feel insecure, something she hopes to improve with Girls on the Run. “What is exciting for me is just to see them discover the beautiful qualities of themselves,” she said.
In April, rising sophomores Catherine Zhao, Ronit Gagneja, Jeffrey Yang and Michelle Kwan took second place at the Cupertino Hackathon, held at the city’s Quinlan Community Center. During the event, they created an app that helps students organize bike rides, carpools and meetups. Their work was presented to the Cupertino City Council, with the top five teams receiving awards from Cupertino mayor Savita Vaidhyanathan.
About 20 teams competed at the Cupertino Hackathon, during which they spent 13 hours creating projects intended to improve public safety and promote community togetherness. The event also offered many learning opportunities, including workshops on women’s contributions to computer science and leveraging software used by several large tech companies.