 | | Mr. and Miss St. Andrew's | |  Seniors Barry Lee and Bud Sheppard have been selected by their peers as Mr. and Miss St. Andrew’s 2012.
Barry, the daughter of Bob and Scottye Lee of Madison, is an Alpha Omega who has been on high honor roll throughout her high school career. She is President of the Senior Class, and is on the National Honor Society. Barry is co-president of the St. Andrew’s chapter of the Fellowship of Christian Athletes, competes on the Saints swimming and fast-pitch softball teams, and is the manager of the varsity basketball team. She is a member of the Italian Club, the Baking Club, the Latin Club, and the Stewpot Club. Barry has participated in a medical mission trip to Honduras, as well as completed extensive volunteer hours for Teen Trendsetters, and the Blair E. Batson Children’s Hospital. Barry spends her summers tutoring, babysitting, and serving the school as a Kindercamp counselor.
Bud, the son of Patricia Sheppard of Jackson, is an Alpha Omega who has been on honor roll throughout high school. A natural on stage, Bud has enjoyed major roles in St. Andrew’s productions of The Crucible, Once Upon the Natchez Trace, Sweeney Todd, You Can’t Take It With You, South Pacific, Our Town, and The Drowsy Chaperone. Bud has volunteered his time and services for HeARTS Against AIDS, CelticFest Mississippi, and Olsvaldo’s Clinc. Bud has worked in sandwich shops throughout the metro area, as a car salesman for the Wilson Auto Group, and trains gamers in the intracacies of Halo 3, as he was the state’s top player from eighth through tenth grade.
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| | Saints Win MC Math and Science Competition | |  On February 2, the twelve students listed below went to Clinton to compete with over 50 schools in the Mississippi College Science and Mathematics Tournament. The competition consisted of two components. First, each student took two tests in the morning selecting from either biology, chemistry, physics, math or computer science. Each school’s cumulative scores were then used to determine to overall school winner in each division. In the afternoon, schools competed in a science and math quiz bowl competition. After a qualifying opening round, the final six teams met to compete for overall quiz bowl winner.
This year, St. Andrew’s finished 1st in the overall school competition for Division I schools, and also won the Quiz Bowl competition. Out of the 24 individual tests taken, 12 placed either 1st, 2nd or 3rd in their subject areas.
The students attending were Jessica Lee, Blake Luehlfing, Matthew Mosley, Vineet Aggarwal, Aritra Biswas, Ria Goel, Bennett Barr, Peryn Reeves-Darby, Mike Steere, Erik Raucher, Anna Hudson and Kelli Coleman.
The Quiz Bowl team was composed of Jessica Lee, Vineet Aggarwal, Aritra Biswas, and Erik Raucher.
Go Saints!
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| | Saints Celebrate the Year of the Dragon | |  Over the last two weeks, members of the St. Andrew’s community have celebrated in multiple venues the Chinese New Year and the arrival of the “Year of the Dragon,” which is considered the luckiest year in the Chinese zodiac.
First, students and faculty participated in the annual celebration sponsored by the Mississippi Chinese Association, which was held at the Christ United Methodist Church in Jackson and drew hundreds of people from across Mississippi. Three Upper School students performed in the gala -- Katie May, Susannah Burrell, and Lee Schmidt – all of whom are studying Mandarin at St. Andrew’s, which has the largest Chinese program in the state of Mississippi. Also performing were St. Andrew’s Mandarin instructors Grace Pei and Yun-Chu Chen, both of whom also helped organize the event.
On that same Saturday a faculty delegation attended the annual celebration sponsored by the Japan-America Society of Mississippi, which was held at the Mississippi Craft Center and drew a large crowd as well, including the Consul General from Japan, the Honorable Hiroshi Sato, and Mississippi Senator Hillman Frazier. Part of the St. Andrew’s delegation included College Counselor Mimi Bradley (who oversaw for years the school’s long-standing Japanese exchange program) and Associate Head of School Kevin Lewis, both of whom will be traveling to Japan in March to celebrate the fortieth anniversary of the school’s exchange program with Momoyama Gakuin, our partner school in Osaka. Also participating and presiding was John Henry Jackson (Class of 1995), who spent a year in Japan as the St. Andrew’s student on this exchange and who now represents the Mississippi Development Authority in Asia.
Finally, over the past weekend, St. Andrew’s students and faculty held their own celebration on the South Campus with members of the Central Mississippi Chinese Cultural School, a local civic organization that meets regularly at the Lower School and, with the help of St. Andrew’s Mandarin students and faculty, provides instruction in Chinese language and culture for dozens of children from the Jackson area, who come from a wide range of schools and pre-school programs.
For more information about these Chinese programs and Japanese exchange, please contact Dr. Chris Harth, Director of Global Studies and World Languages.
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| | 2nd Graders Beautify Campus | | St. Andrew's Episcopal School 2nd graders in Mrs. Carla Kelly's class planted 300 tulip and daffodil bulbs on the patio outside of their classroom window. Pictured are (back, from left) Victor Sutton, Beck Koestler, Hasan Yousuf, Owen Newburger, Mrs. Carla Kelly, Aidan Welch, Rhodes Pharr, Joshua Harvel, Cameron Hill; and (front, from left) Hannah Grace Kerr, Avery Stallings, Wilkie Gonwa, Sancenia Johnson, Jane Arnold, Lillian Sistrunk, Ferriday Rose Green, and Lily Parsons. Rhodes Pharr’s grandmother, Mary Ann Petro, has helped Rhodes’ class plant bulbs every year since pre-K3.
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| | Stock Players Get Advice | | Last week, Randy Boyles and Paul McNeill of Merrill-Lynch stopped by Darin Maier's economics class to discuss strategies and ideas for the Stock Market Game, which is being played by several groups on both campuses this spring. Economics teacher and Associate Head of Middle School Darin Maier is overseeing four teams from his class, while Lower School Spanish teacher Omar Rachid is working with groups of students on both the North and South Campuses. The Stock Market Game is offered through the Mississippi Council on Economic Education and provides students with an imaginery $100,000 to invest over the course of ten weeks. The winning team from Mississippi will have the opportunity to travel to New York City for recognition.
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| | Lower Schools Make More International Ties | | At the Lower School last Tuesday afternoon Mrs. Luke’s and Mrs. Liston’s 4th grade classes had an opportunity to visit with a 4th grade class at an Episcopal school in San Pedro Sula, Honduras, via Skype. The children enjoyed asking each other questions and learned a lot from this exchange. The school is called El Buen Pastor and it's an Episcopal school in Honduras that has a bilingual focus. We have agreed to alternate our conversation between English and Spanish in order for both of our students to benefit from cultural and linguistic enrichment. The Skype video conference can be seen at the Lower School’s World Languages Blog called “ From Mississippi to China” where previous Skype calls can be found as well as updates on what we’re doing in World Languages at the Lower School. | | | |
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| | Rosetta Stone Renewal | | St. Andrew's is pleased to again be able to offer students and faculty annual subscriptions to Rosetta Stone, an interactive web-based program providing instruction in more than 30 languages. For more information about renewing your subscription or purchasing a new one, please contact Dr. Chris Harth, Director of Global Studies and World Languages. | | | |
| | Travel Thursday Focusing on Infectious Disease | | As part of a new collaborative, experiential learning program with the University of Mississippi Medical Center (UMMC), St. Andrew's Episcopal School has launched a Science Literacy Lecture Series, which is open to interested parents and alumni, as well as to students and faculty from other schools.
This Thursday, February 16, we are pleased to welcome Dr. Ed Swiatlo from UMMC, where he serves as Professor of Medicine and Microbiology. An infectious disease specialist at UMMC with both a Ph.D. and M.D. from the University of Chicago, Dr. Swiatlo will give a presentation on "Around the World without Leaving Mississippi: The Far-flung Travels of Infectious Diseases." Targeted primarily for high school students studying AP Biology, AP Chemistry, Biomedical Research, or other advanced science courses, this presentation will focus on some of the most important infections that affect persons living in both the United States and around the world. This includes how these diseases are transmitted, how they are diagnosed, and what we can do to treat, or even prevent them. Dr. Swiatlo also will discuss the education and training required to specialize in infectious disease and the great variety of career opportunities that are open to people with special training in infectious diseases of humans.
In addition to the opportunity to learn from Dr. Swiatlo, participating students from different area schools will have the opportunity to meet each other and to spend time together, both over a lunch preceding the presentation and during the less formal discussion session following it. At the heart of this program is an interest in building connections among neighbors and helping students develop communicative and cross-cultural competencies, which will serve them and our community well in the future.
As usual, the presentation will run from 12:40 to 1:20 and will be held in the Lecture Hall in the McRae Science Center on our North Campus (370 Old Agency Road in Ridgeland). Please contact Science Chair Sandra Hindsman or Dr. Chris Harth for more information.
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| | Saints Sports Round-Up | | The nascent St. Andrew’s archery team competed in a scrimmage against Ridgeland High School over the weekend. 8 Saints archers competed, 5 Middle Schoolers and 3 Upper Schoolers, against an all-upper Ridgeland team. Scott Kennedy had the highest individual score of252 (out of a possible 300), and Millie Morris had the 2nd highest individual score of 215. The first official match of the archery season is March 2, again against Ridgeland, at the Jackson Archery Center at 4:30.
The Saints varsity basketball teams each lost in the opening games of the division tournament, ending both the girls and boys seasons. The boys lost to McLaurin, the girls to Raleigh.
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| | Lower Schoolers Reach Out To Ronald McDonald House | | The Ronald McDonald house is a home where the families of critically ill children can temporarily reside in a comfortable and caring environment. Providing items for the Ronald McDonald House was the most recent Lower School Service Project. St. Andrew’s Lower School chose seven items from the Ronald McDonald House’s wish list, and each grade had an assignment. The school was able to donate a large quantity of plastic forks, large paper cups, cereal, snack foods, paper plates and bowls, laundry detergent, and postage stamps. The gifts were blessed at Big Chapel on Friday, February 10.
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| | Saints Debate Coach Honored | | Congratulations to Coach Darin Maier of St. Andrew's Forensics for being named the 2012 National Federation of High Schools Speech, Debate and Theatre Association Section III award recipient representing Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Tennessee.
The NFHS Speech, Debate and Theatre Association (NFHS SDTA) is a professional organization specifically for directors and coaches of high school speech, debate and theatre programs, and Darin’s award is a public recognition of his coaching excellence and personal dedication to St. Andrew’s debaters and the St. Andrew’s forensics program.
We are all very proud of the fine job Darin has done over the years at St. Andrew's!
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| | K Valentine Sing | | LOVE IS THE MAGIC WORD! As a wonderful collaboration across the curriculum for this time of year, the Kindergarten classes presented poems and songs in celebration of Valentine’s Day. Guests were welcomed by a rhythmic rendition of saying “Hello!” in Swahili, Spanish, Hawaiian, English, French and Japanese. Sharing rhymes and songs by individual classes and as a group, about making, exchanging and even eating valentines, this bunch loves singing about love! Dazzling hats with glittered hearts topped off each student, and the program culminated with all of the classes singing and signing “What A Wonderful World” and “You & Me, St. Andrew’s School, We Are Family.”
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| | Rolling Tigers Take Middle School | | Last Thursday, the Rolling Tigers Wheelchair Basketball team paid a visit to the St. Andrew's campus to play ball against a number of members of our Middle School faculty and student body. Motivational speaker and former Jackson State football player Antonio Wright brought his message of "Tough Times Don't Last Long, Tough People Do" to the Middle School. Wright, the founder of Metro Area Community Empowerment and the author of the book From a Label to a Brand, looks to help those with spinal cord Injury maximize their emotional, mental, physical, and spiritual potential, and serves as a mentor to those with such injuries. Spotting the Middle School to 25 points a half, the Rolling Tigers still managed to squeak out a 53-52 victory.
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| | Snapping Turtle Educates 7th Graders | |  The 7th grade science classes had a special visitor from the Mississippi Museum of Natural Science last Thursday: an alligator snapping turtle. The alligator snapping turtle is one of the largest freshwater turtles in the world and is common to the southeastern United States. Found at the bottom of a muddy rivers, creeks, ponds or bayous, they can grow to be over 200 pounds and live over 100 years. But don’t expect them to come up for air so you can see them; they are known to hold their breath for up to an hour. Although this species has been around for millions of years, this once abundant turtle is in decline as a result of over hunting and loss of habitat.
The students got a close look at this intriguing organism. The snappers are a master of disguise with amazing camouflage. Even the inside of their mouths are camouflaged. They have no teeth, but are armed with powerful jaws and sharp, bony beaks. They capture prey in their powerful beaks with an interesting technique. They sit motionless at the bottom of the bayou with their mouths open. Inside the mouth is a tongue that looks like a worm. Snappers wiggle their tongues to attract fish. Looking for a tasty treat, fish swim into the turtle’s mouth and become a meal! What a marvelous adaptation for a slow moving organism to catch swift prey!
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