March 24 Weekly Update
Dear NCHS Family,
Jim Zambarano recognized as Outstanding Technology & Engineering Educator
Outstanding Technology and Engineering educators and students were honored by the International Technology and Engineering Educators Association (ITEEA) at its 79th Annual Conference held March 16-18 in Dallas, Texas. Forty classroom educators and 25 programs at the elementary, middle, and high school levels received ITEEA’s Teacher Excellence Award and Program Excellence Award, the most prestigious awards given in recognition of Technology and Engineering Education Teachers and Programs.
ITEEA President, Dr. Edward Reeve, shared, “It is always an honor and pleasure for ITEEA to recognize those professionals, including teachers and students, who go the ‘extra mile’ in their commitment to excellence in the profession and in their teaching and learning environments. As President of ITEEA, I am always proud to interact and be associated with these individuals.
Congratulations to Jim Zambarano!
Odyssey of the Mind
At the Connecticut Odyssey of the Mind State Tournament this past Saturday, three teams from NCHS competed along with 14 other teams from New Canaan and over 150 teams from around the state.
In the “Catch Us If You Can” vehicle category, the team of DJ Morse, Jason Campe, Dana Lurie, Brian Sandor, Brad Newton, and Aidan O’Halloran took First Place.
In the “It’s Time, OMER” classics category, the team of Julia Weitz, Mikaylah Vindas, Andrew Weitz, Isaac Chow, Luca Triant, and Lauren Meyers also took First Place.
In the “Catch Us If You Can” vehicle category, the team of DJ Morse, Jason Campe, Dana Lurie, Brian Sandor, Brad Newton, and Aidan O’Halloran took First Place.
In the “It’s Time, OMER” classics category, the team of Julia Weitz, Mikaylah Vindas, Andrew Weitz, Isaac Chow, Luca Triant, and Lauren Meyers also took First Place.
In the “To Be Continued: A Superhero Cliffhanger” performance category, the team of Andrew Morse, Allie Orphanos, Alexis Axon, Skye Curren, Dan Tierney, Peter Mason, and Will Dantini received Third Place medals.
The First Place teams will continue on to compete at Odyssey of the Mind World Finals to be held in May at Michigan State University. Congratulations to all the participants and their coaches!
The First Place teams will continue on to compete at Odyssey of the Mind World Finals to be held in May at Michigan State University. Congratulations to all the participants and their coaches!
Hack-a-Thon from Mr. Rothman:
A junior, Thomas Freiberg, approached me a while ago with an idea: can we have a ‘hack-a-thon’ at the school? As an administrator, I bristled at the word ‘hack’ and my first impulse was to kindly discourage him. Thomas explained what such an event entailed and we decided to give it a try. Over the course of several months, we put the event together – arranging spaces in the building, ordering kits and reaching out to presenters from various technology fields – and began to see who’d be interested.
Yesterday morning, fourteen NCHS students worked in teams on coding or robotics projects that they presented at the end of the day. Some were in the AP Computer Science Principles class, some were members of the VEX Robotics Club, some are just computer hobbyists.
As an old social studies teacher, I have no idea what they’re saying to each other or about which they’re making inside jokes. What I do recognize is creativity, collaborative problem-solving and mutual respect for the skills and insights each team member brings to the project. When they reach a point where they could say they’re finished, one makes a suggestion on how their project could be even better. I’ve gotten questions like, “Can I go get a [certain tool I don’t know]?” and “Can we add sensors so that they robots can [do something I don’t honestly understand]?” I had CTE Chair and technology educator, Jim Zambarano, on speed-dial all morning. Other staff members and students filtered in and out all day, seeing what their peers were doing; witnessing what can be done with an idea.
NCHS Career Night:
Career Night was a wonderful event. Over 600 students turned out to listen to talented professionals in the field. The professionals were engaging and interesting, but I think I was most impressed with the quality of questions that our students asked the speakers. We truly have an amazing student body. A special thank you for putting on this amazing event. I know that it was especially difficult this year after the first evening was snowed out.
Coffee House Event
“Coffee House” an upcoming event sponsored by NCHS club, Charity Link, where a lot of talented NCHS students perform music, poetry, and films, and if parents are interested, please join them! It will be held on March 29 at 7 pm in the Wagner Room.
Be well and stay healthy NCHS!
Bill Egan
Upcoming Events:
3/24 Post Prom Fashion Show tonite, Auditorium 7- 9 pm
3/24 Through Our Eyes Art Exhibition through 4/1, Carriage Barn Arts Center
3/27 Board of Ed Meeting, Wagner Room 7:00 pm
4/4 Parent Networking Grade 10, Wagner Room 9:30 am
Pictures from around NCHS:
Department News:
English Department News:
It’s benchmark season in the English Department! For the past two weeks, the 9th and 10th grade teams have administered the growth measurement of our department reading benchmark (an earlier benchmark was administered the in the fall). On Tuesday the 9th grade team scored the assessments, and the 10th grade team will be reviewing the results in the coming weeks.
In club news, last week the Human Rights Advocates hosted a documentary showing of "30 Days a Muslim" to bring awareness to the issue of Islamophobia. The documentary was followed by a Q & A with New Canaanite and representative of the UN Committee of New Canaan, Shekaiba Wakili-Bennett.
The club also went to the Human Rights Institute for High School Student Leaders at Iona College, NY last Thursday. They engaged in student-led breakout sessions on global human rights issues, and heard from guest speakers like Judith Altman, a holocaust survivor.
(bottom photo).
CTE Department News:
Journalism - Students are laying out pages for the March edition of the Courant newspaper. In the meantime, you can read recent stories on their website, nchscourant.com. Recent stories include: Filmmaker Jackson Oehmler, Career Night coverage and a March Madness Sweet 16 preview.
Journalism - Students are laying out pages for the March edition of the Courant newspaper. In the meantime, you can read recent stories on their website, nchscourant.com. Recent stories include: Filmmaker Jackson Oehmler, Career Night coverage and a March Madness Sweet 16 preview.
Advanced TV - NCTV has been busy producing two live, multi-cam productions over the past couple weeks. First, they recorded the NCHS winter musical, The Will Rogers Follies and tonight NCTV will live-stream the Senior Fashion Show (use this live link at 7pm). Additionally, NCTV also aired their regular live, weekly news show, The Morning Announcements. Watch today's here.
Recently, TV and Music Tech students took an amazing field trip to see a live taping of the Harry Connick Jr. show in NYC. Afterwards, students were treated to a behind-the-scenes tour of the set and studios from Harry himself!
Graphics - Students are working on the Notepad project. After creating initial sketches, students are finishing up a detailed rough layouts before designing it on the computer.
Intro to TV Broadcasting - After learning about different camera angles and movements, students watched the hit TV show Lost to see how professionals use them. Students then shot their own around campus for the Countdown project, which they are currently editing in Final Cut Pro.
Mrs. Sapienza's Child Development classes are again teaching their lessons in the NCHS Preschool. The lessons included a day about transportation and we celebrated St.Patrick's Day with a mysterious visit of some leprechauns.
Mrs. Sapienza's Baking & Pastry Art classes are preparing low fat cakes including Angel Food and Pumpkin or Chocolate roll cakes. They are learning about eggs as leaveners and different mixing methods when preparing cakes.
This week in Ms. Zilly's Foods & Nutrition class the students are learning all about the incredible edible egg. Students competed to see who could cook the best over-easy, poached and hard boiled eggs. In the end, win or lose; everyone got to make a delicious bacon, egg and cheese breakfast sandwich!
VPA News:
Our Through Our Eyes art exhibition Opening Reception was held on Friday, March 17th. The show will continue to be on exhibit until April 1st.
Math Department News:
Students in M4 Algebra 2 have designed their own survey questions in small groups and decided how they will survey a stratified sample of 100 members of the NCHS community. Once they have collected the data then they will calculate measures of central tendencies, measures of dispersion, the margin of error, identify outliers, in order to draw conclusions.
Some the of the draft survey questions are:
- How much sleep do you get on an average school night?
- How many days do you eat breakfast in a school week?
- How many servings of soda do you have in a day?
- On average, how many hours do you spend on homework a night?
If anyone stops to ask you a survey question please help them out!
Students in AP Calculus AB are graphing slope fields by hand and then using Desmos to create slope fields digitally.
Library update:
