December has been a great month for Harker math students, who’ve been performing very well in annual math competitions.
Last week, Harker took first place nationwide in Interstellar’s Math Madness finals at the high school level. Middle school mathematicians also performed very well, with their team placing in the top 10 nationally. The competition, which comprised more 25,000 middle and high school contestants, was conducted through the Interstellar Web application, which allows teachers to create teams of students representing their schools and compete against other schools either by inviting them to compete or by entering events organized by Interstellar. Students had been competing since the September opening rounds, which separated schools into various divisions. Harker ended up in the Division I bracket at both the middle and upper school levels, with the upper school defeating University High School of Irvine to take first place. The middle school narrowly lost to Raymond J. Grey Junior High in Acton, Mass., who went on to win first place.
During the first week of December, National Assessment and Testing announced that Harker placed second in two national math contests. Upper school math teacher Anuradha Aiyer acted as coach for the two contests, each of which contained 100 problems that had to be solved in a half-hour. The Fall Startup contest had students solving problems on their own, while the Team Scramble allowed students to work as a group to solve tougher problems. The division in which each student competed corresponded to their grade level.
Harker’s placing was highlighted by several standout individual efforts. Grade 9 students Katherine Tian and Rose Guan placed 11th and 17th, respectively, in the ninth grade division. Sophomore Swapnil Garg took first place in the 10th grade division, where Rajiv Movva placed sixth and Joanna Lin placed eighth. David Zhu took 25th place in the 11th grade division. Finally, Richard Yi earned first place in the 12th grade division, in which Allison Wang took fourth place and Lawrence Li finished 23rd.
This morning, the Siemens Foundation announced the winners of this year’s Siemens Competition via live stream, and teammates David Zhu and Evani Radiya-Dixit were named $20,000 scholarship winners! Congratulations!
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This past weekend at the California Institute of Technology, juniors Evani Radiya-Dixit and David Zhu were named the winning team at the regional finals of this year’s Siemens Competition. Their project, titled “Automated Classification of Benign and Malignant Proliferative Breast Cancer Lesions,” earned them a shared $6,000 scholarship and a trip to the National Finals in Washington, D.C., which will take place Dec. 4-8.
Radiya-Dixit and Zhu received high praise from judges at the competition, including Alexandre Cunhe, director of CalTech’s Center for Advanced Methods in Biological Image Analysis, who said, “In this ‘big data’ era, with a larger data set, David and Evani’s approach has the potential of being very applicable to help distinguish a breast cancer tumor as benign or malignant. This could lead radiologists to be able to better diagnose biopsy images.”
The two students were later mentioned in a San Jose Mercury News story about the competition, in which five South Bay high school students are finalists.
Congratulations to these hard-working students, and good luck in the nation’s capital!
On Dec. 2, the Harker Red Cross Club held its annual blood drive at the upper school gym, inviting students, faculty and staff to donate blood to the American Red Cross. Harker Aquila has the full story.
In late October, Harker’s chapter of the Junior Classical League headed to Stanford University for the Ludi Octobres event.
Numerous upper school competitors placed high. Bobby Bloomquist, grade 9, took first place in Grammar III, in which Mathew Mammen, grade 9, won an honorable mention. In Mythology III, Praveen Batra, grade 10, took first place, with Allison Wang, grade 12, and Sara Min, grade 9, taking second and third, respectively. Kaushik Shivakumar, grade 9, finished third in Grammar III, and Alexander Young, grade 9, tied for first in History and received an honorable mention in Mythology III. Batra also won second place in Advanced Reading Comprehension, in which Arnav Tandon, grade 11, Andrew Semenza, grade 10, and Allison Wang, grade 12, tied for third. Alexander Lam finished second in Advanced Vocabulary, while Edgar Lin, grade 10, tied for first place in Derivatives and took third place in History. Semenza had another tie for second place in Derivatives and received an Honorable Mention in Advanced Grammar. Wang took second place in Mythology and tied for second place in Vocabulary.
Middle school competitors were no less impressive. In the MS-1 division, Lucy Ge, grade 6, took third place in Grammar I, while classmate Aaron Lo earned third place in History. Brandon Park, grade 6, was awarded second place in Mythology and an honorable mention in Derivatives. Grade 7 had a strong appearance in the MS-2 division, as Arohee Bhoja had first place wins in Vocabulary and Greeting Cards, and took second place in Grammar II and third in Reading Comprehension II. Angela Cai took first in Mythology and tied for second in Daily Life with classmate Jason Lin. Akshay Manglik took second place in three categories: Derivatives, History and Mythology. Annamma Vazhaeparambil won first place in History and second place in Greeting Cards, while Mariamma Vazhaeparambil had honorable mentions in Derivatives and Mythology. The MS-3 division, in which Harker’s grade 8 students participated, saw Ashley Duraiswamy take first place in Reading Comp II and tie for third in Grammar II, while Jeffrey Fung took first in History, second in Grammar II and third in Derivatives. Allison Jia had a first place win in Vocabulary and received an honorable mention in Derivatives, in which Kyle Li took first place in addition to taking first place in Mythology and second History. In Reading Comprehension II, Kalyan Narayanan took second place in addition to tying for third in Grammar II. Jin Tuan had second place finishes in Derivatives and Vocabulary, and George Wehner, grade 7, took first in Grammar II. Finally, Jasmine Wiese, grade 8, was awarded an honorable mention in Derivatives.
Harker’s journalism department recently received 10 Gold Circle Awards from the Columbia Scholastic Press Association, which also named the Winged Post a finalist for the Crown Award, the winners of which will be announced in March.
Gold Circle winners were: Elisabeth Siegel, grade 12, third place in Newspaper News Features; Shay Lari-Hosain, grade 12, third place in Newspaper Art/Illustration: Portfolio of Work, first place in Newspaper Typography: Overall Look, second place in Newspaper Typography: Look of One Page and second place in Digital Media Personal Opinion; Kacey Fang ’15, second place in Newspaper Informational Graphics and Newspaper Photo Layout: Full Page; Kathryn Duan, grade 11, and Alex Jang ’15, third place in Digital Media Humor; Jessica Chang ’15 and Priscilla Pan ’15, first and third place in Digital Media Video Feature Package.
Certificates of Merit went to juniors Ria Gandhi and Alex Youn in Newspaper Sports Features; Shay Lari-Hosain, Kshithija Mulam, grade 11, and Meilan Steimle, grade 11, in Newspaper Photo Story; Shay Lari-Hosain in Newspaper Photo Illustration; and Kacey Fang in Newspaper Informational Graphics. Go Journalism Eagles!
Both of Harker’s Quiz Bowl teams had strong showings this past weekend at California Cup #2, a quiz bowl tournament held at UC Berkeley. The upper school team – made up of Nikhil Manglik, grade 11, Swapnil Garg, grade 10, Edgar Lin, grade 10, Derek Yen, grade 10, Andy Semenza grade 10, and Sukrit Ganesh, grade 9 – were 7-2 on the day and finished third out of 20 teams. Just as impressive, the middle school team – Kyle Li, Arun Sundaresan, Jin Tuan, Simar Bajaj, Jeffrey Fung and Catherine Zhao, all grade 8 – entered the tournament in the junior varsity category and ended up placing a solid fifth out of 31 teams. Team coach Jonathan Brusco said the tournament was initially meant to be a learning experience, making their performance, which included victories over Saratoga, Monta Vista, Valley Christian and Menlo, all the more impressive.
A Harker alum and student received nice mentions in Nuntius Californiensis, the official newsletter of the California Junior Classical League, regarding results at the 62nd National Junior Classical League Convention, held at Trinity University in Texas: Maya Nandakumar ’15 received the Jessie Chambers NJCL Scholarship, and Elisabeth Siegel, grade 12, was part of a multi-school advanced competitive Certamen team that took third place. Congrats to both women! Read on: http://cajcl.org/uploads/fall2015nuntius.pdf
Football is now 7-1 overall, 3-0 in league play after a 55-8 victory over St. Vincent de Paul Friday on Davis Field. This sets up a Harker first – a football game to determine the league champion. This Friday the boys host a strong Stellar Prep team, which is currently 6-1 overall, 2-0 in league. If Harker wins, we’ll be league champions! School spirit has been outstanding this year, and we hope the support continues Friday night. Kickoff is at 7 p.m. A film crew from Cal-Hi Sports will be covering the game. Friday is also Senior Night for football and cheerleading. Seniors will be honored before the game around 6:45 p.m.
Tennis
Girls tennis had three solid victories last week: Presentation 7-0, Crystal Springs 7-0 and an important league victory over Sacred Heart Prep 5-2. The girls are now 12-2 overall as they host Castilleja and state powerhouse Menlo Thursday at the Santa Clara Tennis Center. Thursday is also Senior Day for Izzy Gross, who will be recognized just before the 4 p.m. start time.
Cross Country
The cross country team competed in its final tune-up before the league championships on Nov 6. The runners concentrated on running fast last miles on the 3-mile Crystal Springs course. Top marks were turned in by freshman Anika Rajamani, and seniors Alex Dellar, Connor O’Neill and Jack Rothschild.
Golf
Girls golf defeated Mercy-Burlingame Monday on Senior Day, at which seniors Ashley Zhong and Daphne Liang each sank long 20-foot putts on their final hole. The girls ended the regular season at 6-4 as they wait to see if they’ve qualified for CCS. They compete in the league championships today at Poplar Creek Golf Course.
Water Polo
The girls water polo team lost a close game to powerhouse Santa Clara Thursday night in triple overtime. The team fought hard through four quarters and ended up tied 10-10. After two overtime periods, the score was tied 11-11. The girls went into a golden goal period, during which they played tough defense and had some opportunities to score. Santa Clara scored after almost 2 minutes, winning the game in sudden death. Your Eagles were led by seniors Yasemin Narin with three goals and Helena Dworak with 18 saves in the cage!
Boys water polo beat Lynbrook 10-4 last week with senior Edward Sheu scoring five goals and junior Raymond Xu two. The team then hosted Santa Clara for Senior Night, beating them 15-4 with Sheu scoring six goals, and junior Arnav Tandon and freshman Bobby Bloomquist each chipping in two. Sheu currently has 108 goals, a Harker record for the total number of goals in one season.
Both teams travel to Fremont tomorrow in preparation for the league tournament next week.
Volleyball
Your 14th ranked girls volleyball team lost a tough battle against No. 10 ranked Menlo last week, suffering its first league loss at the hands of the Knights. With a record of 15-8 overall, 6-1 in league play, the team dropped into a first place league tie with Menlo.
The girls freshman volleyball team improved to 7-4 with wins over Priory and Saratoga last week. They’ll complete their fine season at Mercy-SF today.
Football is 6-1 overall after the team’s 63-0 win at Turlock Christian on Friday night. Check out the game stats at http://www.maxpreps.com/games/football-fall-15/harker-vs-turlock-christian/10-16-2015-bVpdBRqUtkCdD_BtMPNJDA.htm. The squad will host a tough St. Vincent de Paul team at home this Friday on Teacher/Faculty Appreciation Night. The game starts at 7 p.m. (come early for the recognition ceremony at 6:45 p.m.). This is also an important league game, so come out and support the team!
Cross Country
Junior Niki Iyer again cruised to a league cross country victory last Thursday at Baylands Park as the young girls team placed a very respectable third overall. Senior Alex Dellar ran her season’s best, while seniors Lev Sepetov, Jack Rothschild and Connor O’Neill led the varsity boys team, with Sepetov earning top Harker boys honors. The team races tomorrow in its final competition before the league championships.
Golf
The girls golf team defeated Notre Dame last week and lost a close one to Sacred Heart. The team faced Mercy yesterday and will play Castilleja tomorrow afternoon at Palo Alto Hills Country Club.
Tennis
Menlo had to really work to beat our girls tennis team last week. Though we lost 6-1, with freshman Pamela Duke defeating Menlo’s No. 1 player, all matches were very competitive. The girls then defeated Pinewood 7-0 Thursday to improve to 8-2 overall.
Volleyball
Girls volleyball improved to 14-7 (5-0 in league) after its victory at Mercy-Burlingame. Join us for a big game against Menlo this Thursday night at 5:45 p.m. at Blackford!
Water Polo
Water polo’s Senior Day is Thursday! The boys will play at about 4:15 p.m. and the girls will play at about 6:30 p.m.
Toward the end of the last school year, middle school performing arts teacher Monica Colletti’s grade 7-8 students worked with the SAAS Marina School in Moscow to create video projects in which they performed one-minute monologues. The students were asked to interview someone they knew about their family life growing up. Using the information gleaned from the interview, each student then recorded a one-minute video monologue, mimicking the interviewee as accurately as possible. Videos from both schools were later edited to make one longer video that was submitted to a local school video competition.