Education

Spring Hill Elementary Promotes Reading

To promote reading over Spring Break, the reading teachers at Spring Hill Elementary School encouraged students to "Get Caught Reading" in a unique location and have their picture taken.

April 17 Well-being Festival Prevents Extinction of a People

GMU professor brings health to Maijuna indigenous people, whose population has dwindled to 400.

The Mason Center for Social Entrepreneurship and the Center for Consciousness and Transformation have partnered with Mason ethnobiologist Dr. Mike Gilmore and Mason students to bring clean drinking water as well as proper sanitation and hygiene to the Maijuna communities, an indigenous people in the Peruvian Amazon whose population has been reduced to the low number of 400 individuals. The Maijuna are dying due to dysentery and waterborne diseases contracted from contaminated drinking water.

Chantilly Robotics Team 612 Honored

Chantilly Robotics Team 612 was presented with the 2013 Judges Award at the DC FIRST Robotics Competition, held at the Walter E. Washington Convention Center on March 29-30. Each year FIRST challenges students, working with adult mentors, to design a robot to play an original game, and to design and build it in exactly six weeks. This year at the DC FIRST (For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology) Regional Competition, robots built by 59 teams faced off in a game called “Ultimate Ascent.”

School Notes CV 4/10/2013

Email announcements to centreview@connectionnewspapers.com. Deadline is Thursday at noon. Photos are welcome. Carolina Sosa, a sophomore at Westfield High School, was among 50 girls from 23 states and Puerto Rico to participate in the ANNpower Vital Voices Leadership program.

Mulch Sale Supports After-Grad Party

Mulch Sale Supports After-Grad Party The Centreville High School community rallied around its seniors and bought thousands and thousands of bags during the annual mulch sale March 15-16. The result: 13,500 bags of mulch sold and delivered in two days.

Parents Sound Off on School Issues

McLean Citizens Association hosts education discussion at McLean High School.

Parents from around the McLean and Langley High School pyramids gathered at McLean High Monday, April 8, to participate in an education forum hosted by the McLean Citizens Association.

Langley Theatre Explores Dickens

“The Life and Times of Nicholas Nickleby” debuts April 18.

When the plans were announced for Langley High School’s spring play, many of the cast and crew weren’t familiar with the title. While “The Life and Adventures of Nicholas Nickleby” isn’t at the top of the list of the most popular Charles Dickens works, after doing their research, the cast found plenty to get excited about.

Robotics Team Brings Home Hardware

After Washington, D.C. regionals, Herndon High School Robotics team competes in St. Louis.

The Herndon High School Robotics team gained several accolades at the FIRST (For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology) regional robotics competition, punching their ticket for the world championships in St. Louis, Mo., this month.

History, Up Close and Personal

West Springfield High School students interview veterans at World War II Memorial.

The heat is palpable and the buzz of tourists is mesmerizing but Courtney Simmons is focused on Carmel Whetzel’s account of his World War II experience. Whetzel is a veteran and Simmons, a current freshman at George Mason University and a West Springfield High School graduate, is interviewing him as part of “Capturing the Voices of World War II: A Student Interview Project.”

Robinson Students Commit to 26 Acts of Kindness

The number 26 is in honor of the 20 students and six staffers killed during the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting.

Even if only 10 percent of Robinson Secondary School’s almost four thousand students accept the Student Government Association (SGA)’s 26 Acts of Kindness Challenge during the month of April, that would still mean 10,400 random acts of kindness and courtesy added to the world. Not a bad achievement.

Burke Rotary, Library Foundation Partner to Provide Community Scholarships

Fairfax Library Foundation will be able to provide more scholarships to the community this year—thanks to the Rotary Club of Burke. The Burke Rotary, an affiliate of Rotary International since 1984, has contributed a $3,000 gift to fund additional undergraduate scholarships for the foundation’s scholarship program in 2013.

School’s 8th Graders Debate Gun Control

Touched by the shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Connecticut, the 8th grade at Christ Episcopal School studied gun violence in America and around the world. The early discussions centered around the question of whether there should be a federal law restricting gun ownership.

Schools

School Notes

Email announcements to almanac@connectionnewspapers.com. Deadline is Thursday at noon. Photos are welcome. Joy Suslov has been named to the dean’s list at Rider University. Joy is a music education major in the Westminster Choir College.

Artists at Work At Oakton Elementary

Public art project caps two-year renovation of school.

The kinetic sculpture—16-feet-tall, with bright blue and green swirling arrows—looks like a classic Alexander Calder mobile on exhibit at the National Gallery of Art.

Alexandria City Public Schools Administration Costs $3.6 million a Year

Administrators pull down competitive salaries for Northern Virginia.

In the classic Depression era tune "Nice Work if You Can Get It," Ira Gershwin describes "a man who only lives for making money" as one who "lives a life that isn't necessarily sunny." Here in Alexandria, the sun is not always shining on the Alexandria Public Schools central administration headquarters on Beauregard Street. But it is raining cash.

The Connection