Madison team places in Nat’l Science Bowl

Five REACH students from Madison Park School recently returned from representing Arizona at the National Middle School Science Bowl in Denver.

The National Middle School Science Bowl is an academic competition where students participate in a fast-paced question and answer contest on math and science topics. Additionally, there is a model hydrogen fuel car challenge where students design, build, and race model cars.

The Madison team competed against 36 other teams from across the nation and took 13th Place. In the academic competition, Madison’s team played nine straight matches and earned a spot in the top-16 team double elimination for which they received recognition. The students also were awarded with $50 iTunes gift cards.

Madison Park was selected to advance to the National Science Bowl after competing in the State Regional Tournament. Team members include Stefan Boccieri, Baran Balkan, Jordan Bruner, Timothy Millea, and Kyle Chapman. The team is coach is Chris Sheehan.

Glendale Union High School District

Gonzalez receives Wells Fargo award

Eleven Valley students—including Joshua Gonzalez of Sunnyslope High School—are among 732 children of Wells Fargo team members who will share $1.05 million in college scholarships for the 2008-09 school year.

The scholarships are awarded through three Wells Fargo programs: Team Members’ Dependent Children Scholarship Program, The Mary Jo and Dick Kovacevich Scholarship Program and the Murray Scholarship Program. Each student also will receive a CD-ROM of Wells Fargo’s Hands on Banking® (www.handsonbanking.com) program, which teaches students about the basics of personal money management.

Scholarships are offered to dependent children of Wells Fargo team members who are enrolled or planning to enroll full-time in an undergraduate course of study at an accredited two- or four-year college, university or vocational technical school. Gonzalez is the son of Patricia Gonzalez, a fraud specialist for Wells Fargo.

“It’s a privilege to support the continuing education of the children of our team members who contribute to the success of our company every day,” said Pam Conboy, regional president of Wells Fargo Arizona Regional Banking. “We’re extremely proud of all the Wells Fargo scholarship winners and the commitment they have made to their educational future.”

Wells Fargo scholarship recipients are selected on the basis of academic record, demonstration of leadership and participation in school and community activities. Awards, honors, work experience and the student’s statement of goals and aspirations are also considered during the selection process.

Phoenix Union High School District

North teacher, student spend summer at ASU

While many of their peers were off enjoying summer holiday, 58 talented and dedicated Valley high school students and teachers engaged in solving real-world problems alongside Biodesign Institute scientists as part of Arizona’s largest high school bioscience internship program at Arizona State University.

Among them were North High student Sandra Pogarcic and her science teacher, Fe Dumapias.

In all, 24 high schools in 14 districts with existing or emerging biotechnology programs were each invited to send a teacher to participate in the internship program. The teachers, in turn, helped select students for the paid six-week internship.

“By including teachers for the first time in our internship program, we are helping them introduce more students to potential bioscience careers than ever before, with a potential impact on more than 4,000 Arizona high school students in the coming academic year,” said Richard Fisher, Biodesign Institute director of Educational Outreach. “The timing couldn’t have been better. As more Arizona high schools develop biotechnology programs, teachers can use their Biodesign experience to bolster their expertise and curriculum development.”

Each student/teacher team worked on a research project tackling a pressing societal problem, ranging from decontamination of groundwater to building nanostructures for diagnostics or working on cures for infectious diseases and cancer. Each student/teacher pair also was mentored by a Biodesign researcher who supervised their day-to-day progress.

The daily exposure to the large research teams and world-class facilities of the institute gave the interns an in-depth introduction to the career of a research scientist.

New super receives national recognition

Incoming Phoenix Union superintendent Kent P. Scribner has been nationally recognized as a recipient of the Excellence in Educational Leadership Award for 2008, designed to honor practicing school administrators who have made significant contributions to the improvement of administrator preparation.

Scribner contributes to the professional preparation of school leaders in multiple ways. His Isaac Elementary School District has partnered with the Education Leadership program at the Mary Lou Fulton College of Education at Arizona State University on pre-service and professional development grants for the preparation of school leaders.

This past year, he taught courses in the Division of Educational Leadership and Policy Studies on the superintendency and supervised interns from the D.E.L.T.A. program, a professional Ed.D. degree serving practicing teacher leaders and school administrators.

The Excellence in Educational Leadership Award is co-sponsored by ASU and the University Council for Educational Administration (UCEA), an organization of member universities in the United States, China, and the United Kingdom, devoted to improving the professional preparation of educational leaders.

Washington Elementary School District

WESD contracts for school resource officers

School resource officer (SRO) and probation officer support in the Washington Elementary School District will be provided primarily through SRO Professionals, LLC during the 2008-09 school year. The district has had SROs on school campuses since 1994.

“The safety of our staff, students and community is always of primary importance to us in the WESD,” explained Lyn Bailey, Ed. D., assistant superintendent for Administrative Services. “The presence of SROs at our schools supports us in this mission.”

The SROs contracted through SRO Professionals will be sworn off-duty certified regular or reserve Phoenix police officers who would perform the same job functions as the SROs who are funded via the School Safety Grant through the Arizona Department of Education (ADE).

On July 10, the WESD Governing Board voted to approve a one-year School Resource Officer and School Safety Program Services Agreement with SRO Professionals, to provide SROs at 10 schools that would not be covered in the preliminary 2008-09 School Safety Program Grant awarded to the district through the ADE. Of the 12 schools covered in the grant request, the ADE awarded grants to only Desert Foothills Junior High School and Desert View Elementary School. In 2007-08, WESD had been awarded a School Safety Grant that funded eight of the 12 officers who were assigned to WESD schools.

WESD’s experience was not unusual. According to recent reports, of 367 schools that submitted 2008-09 School Safety Grant applications, only 212 have received preliminary awards; 99 of the 155 schools that have been denied grants for 2008-09 were awarded School Safety Grants during the previous school year. The majority of funding for the SROs will come from civic center funds that are generated through the collection of facility usage fees.

School Resource Officers provide invaluable services at the schools to which they are assigned. Studies have shown that the presence of an SRO on campus promotes truancy reduction and crime prevention. SROs help to protect students and staff from drug, gang and youth violence.

“Without School Resource Officers on some of the district’s most challenging campuses, the safety and welfare of students, staff, and community members is a significant concern,” Bailey said. “We’re excited about the possibilities that working with SRO Professionals will provide.”

The SRO Professionals LLC relationship will be monitored throughout the year to determine whether or not it will be continued beyond the one-year pilot.

The Washington Elementary School District is the state of Arizona's largest elementary school district serving more than 24,500 students in north central Phoenix and east Glendale.

Private/Charter Schools

Chess, bowling at AmeriSchools

AmeriSchools Academy, 1333 W. Camelback Road, will now offer chess and bowling to middle school students on Wednesdays. Chess will be taught by a certified chess instructor and there is the possibility for some of the students to participate in the state competitions. This program change will give teachers time to participate in collaborative planning activities.

For more information, call 602-532-0100 or visit www.amerischools.org/camelback.html.

Winsor honored by women’s sports assoc.

Sister Lynn Winsor, BVM, CMAA, vice principal for Activities and athletic director of Xavier College Preparatory, was honored by the Phoenix Women’s Sports Association with the 2008 PWSA Advocacy Award for her dedication to creating equality for and advancing young women in sports.

Proudly returning from the National Middle School Science Bowl are Madison Park team members, from left: Kyle Chapman, Chris Sheehan (coach), Tim Millea, Jordan Bruner, Stefan Boccieri, Baran Balkan (submitted photo).

Winsor received the award at the Fifth Annual PWSA Celebration of Girls’ and Women’s Sports Awards Dinner, the only celebration of its kind in Arizona to honor elite women athletes and coaches from all generations.

A graduate of Xavier, Winsor joined the staff in 1974 as a softball, basketball and golf coach, and has been the school’s Athletic Director since 1977. She has remained the golf coach, and the Xavier Golf Team holds a 24-year record as Arizona’s High School Girls’ High School State 5A Golf Champions, a national record.

In 2006, Winsor received the National Interscholastic Athletic Administrators Association Award of Merit, considered the most prestigious award given by the NIAAA. She was named Girls’ High School Golf Coach of the Century by the Arizona Interscholastic Association (AIA) in 2001, inducted into the Arizona Golf Hall of Fame and the ASU College of Public Programs Hall of Fame in 2000, and was named the Nike Athletic Director of the Year and National Golf Coach of the Year in 1999. The Women’s Sports Foundation named her National Coach of the Year in 1989 and 1994.

Winsor currently serves on the AIA Girls’ Equity in Sports Committee and is Chair of the AIA Tony Komadina Committee, which visits Arizona high schools, evaluates their girls’ sports programs, and recognizes those high schools that excel. She is only the second female elected to presidency of NIAAA (1994) and has spoken at seven NIAAA conferences and four National Catholic Education Association conventions, as well as over 20 State Athletic Administrators conferences, on topics of gender equity, Title IX and opportunities for girls in sports.

The Phoenix Women's Sports Association is a nonprofit organization formed to help girls and women find their power through sports. PWSA reaches out to all girls and women, particularly those from underserved communities, to give them opportunities to reach their greatest potential by building confidence and self-esteem through participation in sports and fitness activities.