The Sycamore Girls track team set four new school records en route to a runner-up performance at the Indianapolis Independent School League. The boys finished 6th out of 10 teams.
Among the teams setting new school records included the 4×100 relay team of Alissa Pearson, Jordan Smith, Peyton Duiser and Julia Hoffman, and the 4×400 relay team of Pearson, Smith, Audrey Sims and Emma Love. Pearson also set a new school record in the 400, while Peter Steinbart broke the record in the boys 2400 meter run.
On a warm and sunny afternoon, many on the Sycamore team ran in multiple races (including heat races to determine the finals) , and five girls who competed in four running events. The hard work of the season paid off, as many of those in multiple races were the same ones who set records.
Orchard won both the boys and girls titles.
Sycamore 8th Grade student Chad Qian won the Raytheon National MATHCOUNTS Championship in Orlando, FL. He was crowned champ in competition that ended Friday, May 11.
Chad captured the title by first earning a spot in the top 12 and then going head-to-head in a bracketed competition to grab the championship. “He becomes the first-ever overall National MATHCOUNTS champion at the school and only the second overall winner from Indiana.
Chris Mihelic, 1995 Sycamore grad, won the written round in 1995 and finished as the national runner-up.
The 2012 finals were webcast live on ESPN3.
The program exists in all 50 states plus U.S. territories and the Department of Defense and State Department schools and is supported by the National Society of Professional Engineers at the state and local levels. Public, private, religious and home schools alike are eligible to participate, as long as students are in the sixth, seventh and/or eighth grade.
Currently in its 29th year, MATHCOUNTS is one of the country’s largest and most successful education partnerships. President Barack Obama and former Presidents George W. Bush, William J. Clinton, George H.W. Bush and Ronald W. Reagan have all recognized MATHCOUNTS in White House ceremonies. The MATHCOUNTS program has also received two White House citations as an outstanding private sector initiative.
Consisting of creative problems that promote critical-thinking and problem-solving skills, the MATHCOUNTS competitions have written and oral rounds, as well as individual and team components.
The Symphonic Band has had an eventful spring, with March and April festivals and contests. They traveled to St. Louis in April, where they participated in the Music in the Parks festival. This performance earned them another superior rating, first place in the Middle School small school division, and the Jr. High/Middle School overall award for the top performance from all bands of this age category.
The students participated in the ISSMA (Indiana State School Music Association) Organizational Contest in March where they, along with our Fifth Grade Concert Band, earned a Superior rating. In addition, this past week we are notified that the Symphonic Band was one of only 20 middle school bands statewide honored with a “With Distinction” commendation for earning near perfect marks from the adjudicators. With well over 300 bands participating in the festivals, this means that we fell in the top 6% statewide.
Band students are now busily preparing for our final concert of the year which will be held on Tuesday, May 22 at 7:00 p.m. at North Central High School.
“I hope that you will join us for this exciting performance,” Band Director Candi Grandlund says. “Congratulate the students when you see them in the halls. Mr. Clutinger and I are very proud of their fine work this year.
The Indiana Council of Teachers of Mathematics held their annual state math competition across the state Saturday . Thirty-five Sycamore Middle School students competed at Butler University with nearly 400 students from across the Indianapolis area, competing in 5 divisions. Sycamore students Alex Gu (Algebra 1), Christina Duffield (Algebra 2) and Chad Qian (Comprehensive) were name “Site Winners” for their respective contests. The state results won’t be tabulated until this week. The Butler site also recognized the top 3 in each division and then any student that scored a 75% or higher on the test was named a “Scholar”. The following Sycamore students received recognition:
Pre-Algebra Scholars
Arunabh Sinha (3rd place)
Johnathon Moore
Algebra 1 Scholars
Alex Gu (1st Place)
Jack Paganelli
Abhinav Ramkumar
Algebra 2 Scholars
Christina Duffield (1st Place)
Amanda Li (T-2nd Place)
Amy Zhou (T-3rd Place)
Vikas Maturi (T-3rd Place)
Comprehensive
Chad Qian (1st Place – perfect score!)
All Sycamore Students represented our school very well!
The Sycamore 7/8 Knowledge Master Team finished 1st out of 28 schools in Indiana in the the spring competition, and is the National Champion in the Small School Division. They earned a score of 1716 out of 2000 possible points. Sycamore was 8th out of 565 schools internationally including Hong Kong, Korea, and Dubai.
Longfellow Middle School in Falls Church, Virginia was the winning team with a score of 1814.
Members of the Knowledge Master team included: Joe Lybik, Vikas Maturi, Ash Mahenthiran, Julia Hoffman, Amy Zhou, Chad Qian, Sydney Roach, Chloe Nusbaum, Aryaman Gupta, Christina Duffield, Jack Rodman, Amanda Li, Brendan Murphy, Nico Biagioni, Andy Metzman, Joey Mervis, Karen Lu, Tommy Williams, Ben Snyder, Sarah George, Jay Natarajan, Jonathan Schwartz, and Gayatri Balasubramanian.
Congratulations to all participants on an excellent competition. Special thanks to Erika Roach for providing team snacks for the practices and competition. The team is coached by middle school history teacher Tony Young.
Here’s an article on her from the Indianapolis alt-weekly NUVO:
“Taylor-Ruth Baldwin’s work, collected under the title Hanging Rock Comics, immediately struck a nerve, and her blog soared in popularity, topping 30,000 regular followers within a few months of its launch. This led to a profile of the 17-year-old in Wired magazine, which in turn triggered a dizzying blitz of offers from book publishers and TV and film studios.”
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Sycamore Alum and current Washington University (MO) freshman relief pitcher Max Zhang leads the Bears baseball pitching staff with with a miniscule 0.42 earned run average, giving up just one run over his first 21 innings of work this spring. Quite a feat for a player who once was hit by a batted ball that struck him so hard and at the wrong moment that it stopped his heart.
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Eileen Prince’s new book, Art Is Every Day: Activities for the Home, Park, Museum and City, is due out in June. It is scheduled to be featured in the June issue of Scholastic Parent and Child, along with a brief interview. The Sycamore Art Instructor says the the book is “aimed as much at parents and grandparents as it is to teachers, so it might be of interest to our parents”.
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ABOUT THE BOOK: Art isn’t just what you find in a museum, a sculpture park, or a one-period-a-week elementary school curriculum—art is every day. Author and educator Eileen S. Prince offers projects for parents, grandparents, teachers, and others who want to bring meaningful, rich, and fun art experiences into children’s lives. This handy resource contains more than 75 ideas to do at home, in the park, in the city, or at the museum. Go on a photographic scavenger hunt around town looking for forms and shapes. Write an autobiography based on a museum portrait only using clues found in the painting. Or make a sandcastles on a trip to the beach.
Each project is easy to do and requires only free or inexpensive materials.
What’s more, the projects and activities in Art Is Every Day will help children of any age (and adults) improve their basic understanding of art or reinforce concepts they may have already learned. The book stresses art vocabulary, which in turn promotes observation and discovery. It’s the perfect resource for parents whose children’s school has cut its art program, grandparents looking for some fun activities to share with their grandchildren, or art teachers who would like fresh ideas for meaningful field trips or homework assignments to support their curriculum.
Below you will find a link to the most recent Brain Game that aired over Spring Break on WTHR, featuring a number of Sycamore School alums competing for their high school teams.
Click on Week 26: Park Tudor, North Central.
Enjoy and please share with others.
The 5/6 Knowledge Master Open team competed in their final contest of the year on Wednesday, March 21. In a match with participants from Hong Kong, Singapore, the United Arab Emirates, and all fifty states, Sycamore’s team earned first place in the state of Indiana and tenth place overall, 39 points behind first place. The team struggled with a bumpy start to the contest, but recovered well in the last quarter of the competition with great teamwork skills.
Representing the Sycamore Middle School on the 5/6 KMO team were: David Bishop, Max Bott, Elise Granlund, Alex Gu, Agrayan Gupta, Nicole Hay, Brendan Hurley, Alex Johnson, Jay Maturi, Alex McGrath, Gordon McNulty, Isaac Meng, Maya Mishra, Jonathan Moore, Max Mukhin, Courtney Nusbaum, Jack Paganelli, Alex Pirkle, Adhitya Ramkumar, Grant Sajdak, Arunabh Sinha, Alex Smith, Donovan Snulligan, Indrajit Sokkhar, Cory Steele, Rachael Tan, and Clay Wright.
Congratulations to all team members for a great season!
The Sycamore Girls track team set four new school records en route to a runner-up performance at the Indianapolis Independent School League. The boys finished 6th out of 10 teams.