Harker Conservatory candidates and other performing arts students had an intense weekend in late October, first attending a college workshop in the afternoon and later a workshop held by a pair of casting professionals on Friday and then putting the new information to use at a Broadway casting call held on Harker’s Blackford campus on Sunday.
Lisa Schwebke ’04 was the catalyst for bringing the events to Harker. As a Harker Conservatory certificate graduate, Schwebke knows Harker has a robust performing arts program and the space to host a professional casting call, so she put her former employer in touch with department chair Laura Lang-Ree about hosting the casting call.
Lang-Ree cleared the way for hosting the Sunday event, and brought Schwebke in to host a Friday afternoon discussion in Nichols Hall with students in Cantilena, an upper school choral group, and the Advanced Scene Study, Choreography and Study of Dance classes.
Friday Afternoon
Schwebke, perched on the edge of the stage, spoke about the satisfaction she has gotten from her job after realizing she didn’t have to be on stage to be in show business, and how she actually likes the casting side better than performing. Schwebke, who lives in New York and attended New York University’s Steinhardt School, interned and apprenticed at Bernard Telsey Casting, but then went on to work as a talent agent with the Gersh Agency.
She noted the training she received while getting her Conservatory certificate has helped her virtually every day of her career. “The discipline and foundation in the arts I learned [at Harker] comes into play every single day of my life,” she said. “I don’t think I would have gotten that training anywhere else.”
Harker’s combination of academics and performing arts training have stood Schwebke in good stead, also. “What I do now involves math, which I never, ever thought I would do as a professional, and, in college, I stuck with [non-performing arts classes] because of Harker – they taught me how to balance academics and performing.”
In her current job as an assistant talent agent, Schwebke represents those seeking roles on stage, “figuring out where our various actors fit, whether it is film or TV or theater, then, consulting with those hiring to fill their needs,” she said. Her best advice for current Conservatory candidates is to “be open to all the possibilities. I really didn’t understand that there were options other than to be an actor, and I’m having so much more fun doing what I am doing now than I ever did when I was acting. I loved [acting], but to help other actors and to use different parts of my brain that I maybe wasn’t using on that track is such a treat.” Her immediate plans are to stay put at the talent agency, but “I’ll see what comes up. I’m not saying no, anymore!”
Friday evening, Schwebke and Telsey casting director Rachel Hoffman teamed up for a Conservatory-sponsored workshop, “How Broadway Casting is Done.” They discussed the difference between a talent agent and a casting director, gave tips to the students about following different courses in colleges, and answered the students’ various questions about “the biz.” Twenty-five Conservatory candidates attended the workshop.
“It was great,” said Lang-Ree of the audition workshop. “It was a unique look at the business of casting; not only could my students gain information about casting and understand it in a whole different way, but they got to show their stuff as well. I had a couple students prepare their work to show it to Rachel for feedback. That was very informative not only for the students who were brave enough to do that but for the students watching. You learn so much by observation in the arts,” she said.
Sunday
Then, on the big day, Sunday, 30 Conservatory candidates in two shifts helped manage the flow of tiny hopefuls to and from the audition rooms, as Hoffman and two of her New York colleagues finished up a yearlong search for the next cast of “Annie,” being revived on Broadway next year.
Gathering in the Blackford campus’ outdoor eating area, the morning shift of 15 interns were instructed on how to help those auditioning to fill out the proper releases, where the prospective Annies and orphans would go first, and where to take them when they moved to the second round or were through for the day.
Those trying out for parts began arriving at 8:30 a.m., and many seemed used the routine of signing up, settling at the picnic tables and sitting quietly until called.
“The amphitheater is the holding room,” said Alice Tsui, grade 11 and a theater certificate candidate. Once called in, hopefuls, “go in one by one and sing to them. It is very exciting,” she added.
Interns first led those auditioning in groups of eight to the initial try-out room, helping build energy and confidence by having them skip or weave between the poles along the walkway. While waiting outside the auditioning rooms, interns read parts to cue those auditioning, high-fived those exiting and gave advice on speaking with emphasis. Since those auditioning were all children ages 7-10, each was escorted back to her parent by an intern when she left the room after trying out.
“I thought it would be a really good experience,” said Tsui, “especially because it was a real Broadway audition. I thought it would be a great chance to see what goes on beyond the walls of high school and it has been fascinating.”
“Auditions went great,” said Hoffman. “We had a lot of talented girls. It has been fun to see this community. There are a few girls I am excited about that I think will at least go into the mix to be called back later this year in New York.”
Hoffman said the company seeks one or two girls to actually play Annie, plus understudies, “and children grow, so over time, may grow out of the role,” said Hoffman, so Telsey takes note of those who may grow into the role, too.
Though show business is supposed to be a tough business to survive in, “I don’t think my job is hard!” said Hoffman. “I’m lucky that I love my job. I was one of these girls when I was little. It is fun to see their enthusiasm and to encourage their love of performing and singing; I think it is really hard to foster that and support people.”
Having the casting call at Harker has been a win-win all around, said Hoffman. “Harker has been a beautiful facility. Coming from New York, we’re usually in smaller rooms and it has been fun to be in larger spaces. And this is the first audition we have done where the waiting room is outside, with picnic tables.
“The interns have been fantastic. I think they’ve had fun and they have been great. I love that high school kids are the interns because little girls that age always look up to older girls, so they have been fantastic about being encouraging; a big part of this is to encourage self-esteem in these girls. The interns have been fantastic at that throughout the day!” said Hoffman, who also had high praise for Lang-Ree. “She was really supportive of this event and in being a host for it,” Hoffman said.
Lang-Ree was on cloud nine with all the outside expertise flowing to Conservatory candidates. “It has been an incredible opportunity to have that kind of one-on-one contact with live theater on Broadway,” she said. “It has allowed students to see the business from a very personal point of view.”
Between the Friday afternoon session, the Friday evening session and Sunday’s casting call effort, “Interns have had an opportunity to see the business from multiple sides and that is something that is really important to the Conservatory teachers,” Lang-Ree said. “While we all understand that passion and joy of performing and we all still perform ourselves, there is something about knowing that there is more to being in the arts than being the one shining star on Broadway, that there is this whole world open to them to remain in the arts their entire lives in directing, casting, stage management or even being that star on Broadway.”
Harker may get lucky a second time, this event went so well, said Lang-Ree. “This whole process was so successful from our end, and hopefully from Telsey’s. We all got along so well they may return in February for a workshop and we hope to piggy back on that. This is a home run for us and a home run for them, so we would do it again in a heartbeat.”
In late October, Lucy Cheng, grade 12, and Paulomi Bhattacharya, grade 11, were named regional finalists in this year’s Siemens competition. In addition, Harker also produced a total of six regional semifinalists: Michelle Deng, Alex Hsu, Revanth Kosaraju, Chaitanya Malladi, Ramya Rangan and Lucy Xu, all grade 12.
A total of 2,436 students from across the country participated in this year’s competition, submitting 1,541 original research projects and setting a new record. Regional finals begin this week, and the winners of the regional events will be invited to compete at the Siemens National Finals, held Dec. 3-5 at George Washington University in Washington, D.C.
The Siemens Competition, administered every year by the College Board, is one of the leading competitions for high school students performing original research in science, technology in mathematics. Students, both as individual participants and as team members, compete for college scholarships ranging from $1,000 (for regional finalists) to $100,000 (for the top-placing individual or team).
Harker’s annual open house events started with the upper school this past Sunday; Harker Live! a middle school open house, is Tuesday, Nov. 8 at 9:30, while Sun., Nov 13 the lower school will host Harker Live! open houses for Kindergarten at 10 a.m. and grades 1-5 at 1 p.m.
Prospective families will visit classrooms and attend mini-lessons conducted by Harker teachers, to sample the Harker student experience.
These open houses will feature teacher presentations on Harker’s academics, character-building and broad program offerings. Teachers will host special presentations on each of these core principles, complete with video footage of teachers in the classroom. Attendees will also be able to visit classrooms and talk to teachers from each department.
On Sun., Dec. 4, at 11 a.m., the middle school open house will provide visitors with the opportunity to visit classrooms and sit in on mini-lessons with Harker teachers. As with the upper school open house, teachers from the various academic departments and other programs will be available to answer questions and provide pamphlets and other literature to attendees.
Update: After trailing most of the first round game of the Santa Clara Valley Athletic League Championship tournament Tuesday night against Fremont, our girls water polo team came on strong in the fourth quarter to secure a 13-10 victory. Anna Levine, grade 10, scored five goals and Keri Clifford, grade 11, three. The girls now face No. 1 seed Santa Clara in the semifinals Thurs., Nov. 3, 7:30 at our own Singh Aquatic Center. Come cheer on our Eagles!
Nov. 1, 2011
The Harker School’s girls water polo team hosts the Santa Clara Valley Athletic League Championships for the first time next week, with high hopes of a win themselves.
In mid-October, they won three of their five games at the prestigious Western States Varsity Girls Water Polo Tournament in Modesto, defeating Beyer, Ukiah and Newman. Following that, they suffered a loss at Lynbrook, but came back at Cupertino High with a 15-4 victory, followed by a tough 8-5 loss to Saratoga High.
So though the pendulum has swung this season, the girls have the strength and potential to pull off some tough wins in the championships. The girls are now 13-11 overall, 6-6 in league play and are seeded fourth. They will play the fifth-seeded Fremont at 7:30 on Nov. 1, so come out and cheer them on! Games are from 4:30-8 p.m. at the upper school’s Singh Aquatic Center on Nov. 1, 3 and 4. Ticket prices are $6 for adults and non-ASB card holders, and $3 for children 6-12, seniors and students with ASB cards.
“It should be a good tournament,” said coach Allie Lamb. “I think the top six teams are all very close and anyone could win any given day. We have had some ups and downs throughout the season, but I believe we could win the tournament if we are able to pull everything together and apply what we have been working on this throughout this season. It’s going to be a fun week of water polo and I really hope we get a lot of Harker supporters out on the deck to pump up our team!”
Congratulations to The Harker School robotics team, who won two awards at the Western Region Robotics Forum’s (WRRF) CalGames competition, held at Archbishop Mitty High School in late October.
The team was awarded the BAE Systems Design Award for their “Ebox” modular electronic control hardware. “The Ebox is a single unit that contains all of the electronics needed to run the robot and a standardized set of connectors to interface with external motors and sensors,” said team member Jay Reddy, grade 12. “That way, we always have multiple functioning robots in the lab. We simply plug the Ebox into whichever robot we want to run.”
Additionally, team mentor Eric Nelson, upper school physics teacher, received the WRRF Mentor of the Year award for his longtime dedication to the team. The winner of this award is determined by student essays and interviews conducted on his or her behalf. “The team is very excited since Dr. Nelson is a great mentor and we are glad to see him get the credit he deserves,” Reddy said.
Update Nov 12, 2011 This update courtesy of Ray Fowler. The above photos are from 2010–an updated slideshow will be posted on Monday–watch for the tweet! –ed.
The Harker Eagles (3-7) defeated the visiting Cupertino Pioneers (2-8) last night by a score of 35-28 in a contest between two teams each battling for its first SCVAL El Camino league victory.
The first half ended in a 14-14 tie, but Harker outlasted Cupertino in an exciting second half which saw momentum shift to both sides before the final buzzer sounded. Harker highlights included a near perfect performance by junior QB Spenser Quash. Quash connected on 12 of 15 pass attempts for 175 yards and two touchdowns.
Junior WR Robert Deng caught both touchdown passes. Quash also rushed for three touchdowns. However, the top rusher of the night was junior RB Ryan Mui with 115 tough yards on 15 carries. Defensive standouts were junior DE Josh Bollar and junior LB Michael Chen.
Both Bollar nd Chen recovered Cupertino fumbles while harassing Pioneer running backs throughout the game. In the secondary, senior DB Avinash Patel broke up several deep passes intended for Cupertino receivers.
Nov 1, 2011
The Harker School’s Homecoming game is fast approaching, but the fun will begin on Mon., Nov. 7, when spirit week kicks off at the upper school campus. Each grade will have their own dress-up day, and on Fri., Nov. 11, the entire upper school student body will be wearing their class colors and heading to Davis Field on the Saratoga campus for the annual homecoming rally to get amped for the afternoon and evening football games against Cupertino High School.
The action will start at 4 p.m. on Friday with the JV game, with the varsity game scheduled for 7 p.m. Carley’s Cafe will serve hot dogs, veggie chili and clam chowder, while other tables will have tri-tip, pulled pork and barbeque veggie cutlet for hungry Eagles fans. Attendees can also look forward to games, a bounce house and other attractions, making Homecoming an event for all ages. Get the latest news from our Homecoming page!
The tailgate section will be teaming with activity beginning at 5:45 p.m. as each campus has its own section. Harker alumni can grab some barbeque at a special alumni booth, and the returning Eagle Buddies tailgate spot will be twice as large (and fun!) as last year’s.
This event is free to attend, and is a wonderful opportunity to connect with the entire Harker community, so come on out and support your Eagles! Parking for this event is limited and only available on a first-come, first-served basis. Parking is available at, and shuttle service will run from, the Blackford campus at 3800 Blackford Ave. in San Jose. Shuttles start at 4 p.m. and will run continuously between Blackford and Saratoga, ending 45 minutes after the end of the varsity game.
The Harker School has been recognized as one of the top 100 schools in the nation for speech and debate activities, according to the National Forensics League. Of the more than 3,000 qualified schools, Harker ranks 19th. That number is based on “student participation and achievement in speech and debate activities,” said the NFL. Carol Green, the communications studies department chair for grades 6-12, said, “This is a huge honor and shows the strength of Harker whose overall 9-12 population is much smaller than many of the top schools.”
Butch Keller, upper school head, presented an award to the department that was accepted by Jonathan Peele, the director of congressional debate and individual events, and Greg Achten, the upper school debate teacher.
Almost 200 high school students visited Nichols Hall on Oct. 22 for the first ever, independently organized TEDx Harker School event, put together by grade 11 students Neeraj Baid and Neel Bhoopalam. Headlined by keynote speaker Guy Kawasaki, the event featured five top entrepreneurs, each offering unique perspectives and advice to the young audience.
As chief evangelist at Apple in the ’80s, Kawasaki helped bring developers to Apple’s Macintosh platform. During his introduction, he asked how many members of the audience used Macs. Upon seeing the vast majority of the attendees raise their hands, he grinned and remarked, “I love to see that.”
With Steve Jobs still in headlines due to his recent passing, Kawasaki’s presentation focused on key lessons he learned from the late celebrity businessman and inventor. “I’m one of the few people who survived working for him twice,” he joked.
The first such lesson was, “Experts are clueless.” “If there’s anything that Apple has proven,” he said, “it’s that experts are often wrong.” He encouraged the audience to “learn to ignore experts.
“This may be contrary to what you’ve been taught, but experts usually define things within established limits, and I think you should break those limits,” he said.
He followed up with several prophetic quotes from influential business leaders that in retrospect seemed downright foolish, including one by Thomas Watson of Western Union, who in 1876 famously said, “This telephone has too many shortcomings to be seriously considered as a means of communication. The device is inherently of no value to us.”
Other lessons he learned from Jobs included the value of design, realizing that customers often don’t know what they need, and the concept that changing one’s mind is a sign of intelligence.
The conference was kicked off by Kevin Surace, CEO of Serious Energy, who observed that the United States is “no longer number one in much of anything,” a far cry from when the U.S. “took over” the industrial revolution in the 1850s. Rising carbon dioxide levels present an opportunity for America to once again be a leading innovator, he said, “and the opportunity is to correct it.”
After identifying the various ways in which the world uses energy, Surace said there a number of things American businesses can now reinvent. “Whether it’s motors or pumps or washing machines or lighting or the way we operate buildings or all the supply side dynamics, we get to reinvent today, and this, in fact, is what America has always done best,” he said.
Although there is competition, particularly from China, America is good at what Surace called disruptive innovation, using none other than Steve Jobs as a shining example. Under his leadership, products such as the iPod, iPhone and iPad “completely disrupted an industry, like no industry has ever been disrupted before,” he said.
However, being disruptively innovative means “we have to be absolutely empowered to take the risks,” and come up with ideas that are unconventional and possibly looked down upon.
Karl Mehta, founder and CEO of PlaySpan, a micropayment company acquired by Visa in March, talked about what he called the “building blocks of entrepreneurship,” covering key principles that helped him in his business ventures. “Wealth creation is not just about money,” he said, but also about giving back to the people who enabled them to become entrepreneurs in the first place. “We want to keep in mind that we stay grounded, that it’s not about money but about creating the wealth so that we can help society. We can give it back to the community,” he said.
Mehta is passionate about using technology and entrepreneurship as “two big tools” to help the people at the “bottom of the pyramid,” who are living on less than $10 a day. He is currently a board member of Simpa Networks, which seeks to make energy available to people in poor and remote areas by allowing them to purchase credits for clean energy with an affordable “pay-as-you-go” model.
When founding a company, Mehta said, one of the most important steps is “to hire people who are smarter than you.” Forming an effective team means being able to find people who are strong in areas where others are not. “Seldom you’ll find individuals who are well-rounded, but generally only teams are well-rounded,” he said.
Following Mehta was Sramana Mitra, who has built three companies since 1994, two of which she has successfully sold. Instead of a presentation, she opted to “have a conversation” with the audience, recapping her journey as an entrepreneur and talking about some of the opportunities that await future generations. “By 2020, there are going to be five billion people on the Internet … So the potential for value creation, the potential for entrepreneurship, the potential for wealth creation ahead of your generation is immense,” she said.
She also talked about her “1 Million by 1 Million” initiative, which aims to help one million entrepreneurs reach $1 million in revenue by 2020, which would create a worldwide GDP of $1 trillion and create 10 million jobs. “We have entrepreneurs from all over the world, at all different stages of their lives and careers doing one million by one million right now,” she said. Those who wish to take part in the initiative can gain access to lectures, case studies and coaching via the website http://1m1m.sramanamitra.com.
During the question and answer session, Mitra said that one way to help solve problems stemming from the current economic crisis is to “empower a lot more entrepreneurs … with the skills and knowledge of how to be successful entrepreneurs,” and she is seeking to create a “Capitalism 2.0, a distributed, democratic capitalism. We need to democratize capitalism the same way Steve Jobs democratized personal computing, the same that Henry Ford democratized the automobile.”
One of the more popular speakers of the day was Rahim Fazal, who sold his first company during his senior year of high school. He was spurred into entrepreneurship, funnily enough, after being fired from McDonald’s for working “too slow.” “I might be the only entrepreneur who’s ever been fired from McDonald’s,” he joked. He went on to start an online business with his friend, which resulted in him cutting several classes and taking far too many bathroom breaks.
The pair made local headlines after selling the business for more than $1 million. Feeling confident, he stridently ignored his parents’ advice to go to college and started another business. “I thought I was on the top of the world,” he said. “That business ended up falling flat on its face, and lost almost all of this money that I made.” He then decided to listen to his parents and acquired an MBA.
Fazal’s current business is Involver, a social marketing company that helps companies leverage social networks to reach customers. Involver’s clients include Nike, Facebook and the National Football League. One of the lessons he learned in his journey so far was that having a good relationship with his parents was more important than he originally thought, mentioning his “incredibly successful” sister, who “had an awesome relationship with my parents, and that was I think one of the things I regret that I didn’t have.”
He also recommended that entrepreneurs build a group of people around them who can answer questions and solve problems for them that are outside their expertise, such as lawyers and accountants. Another point close to Fazal’s heart was getting a life. “If you’re not having a good time, if you’re not out there doing the things that regular kids do, then you’re going to completely regret it,” he said. “Make sure you’re actually doing stuff that’s fun, and that matters.”
Storyteller Jim Cogan returned to The Harker School campus once more in mid-October, regaling K-5 students with stories centered around this year’s lower school theme of kindness. Cogan performed first for K-3, and for grades 4-5 shortly thereafter. As always, the students loved listening to Cogan, who has a unique, warm and animated style of storytelling.
From the moment you wake up in the morning until you drift off to sleep at night, you’ll face about 26 adversities, ranging from petty annoyances to major setbacks, according to Dr. Paul Stoltz, president and CEO of Peak Learning Inc., who recently visited The Harker School as part of the Common Ground Speaker Series. Witty and engaging, Stoltz captivated the audience gathered at Nichols Hall with examples of resilience to adversities in his personal life.
A decade ago, Stoltz coined the term “Adversity Quotient,” or AQ, to describe the science of human resilience. To have a successful AQ is to perform optimally in the face of adversity. A person with low AQ, on the other hand, would be the first to burn out. Adversity, Stoltz said, “both destroys and elevates, strangles and sparks life.” Some people with high AQ can actually cause more adversity than they harness. Stoltz believes many are afraid of failures because their parents have been so lovingly protective and have done their best in removing every fathomable adversity.
Stoltz went on to identify the three types of AQ people: climbers, quitters and campers. High AQ climbers seek challenge, low AQ quitters flee from it and moderate AQ campers, which Stoltz said make up about 80 percent of the work force, are content and happy, stuck in the status quo.
Going hand-in-hand with AQ is Response Ability. This term for the response when adversity strikes is the key to building and developing resilience. When employers worldwide were asked which they would prefer, a person with great talent but low resilience, or a person with exceptional resilience but low talent, almost 90 percent picked resilience. This is because they believe “highly resilient people will find a way to figure out how to learn to do what they have to do whereas those lacking resilience will join the throngs of great talent gone to waste,” Stoltz explained.
For those of us who are concerned with our response when faced with adversity, it is comforting to know that people can improve their resilience and, in turn, improve their performance.
Stoltz said that if we think of any person we consider great, that person has overcome adversity along the way – we can’t unleash the greatness in ourselves without adversity. We are all “hardwired” to react differently to adversity, but unlike IQ, it’s possible to improve AQ.
Stoltz then talked about the importance of developing what he calls the 3G mindset, which is broken into, “global, good and grit.” Global he defines as an openness and connectivity to the greater world; good, as may be expected, refers to integrity and kindness; and grit relates to toughness and tenacity.
“You can’t necessarily control what happens but if you can master how you respond to what happens, you can craft your destiny. So if adversity is harnessed with superior resilience, it could be the fuel cell of your success,” said Stoltz.