Leesburg Today, April 16, 2015

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Robot

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R Full-Day Kindergarten R Small class sizes R Integrated STEAM focus (Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts, Math) R Individual Student Learning Plans for every child R Project-Based Learning R Arts integration R Portfolio assessments R In-house daily gifted lessons

We invite you to rethink school! Please join us for one of our upcoming information sessions to learn more about enrolling your child in 2015 to reserve a slot in this free public charter.

Our website: www.hillsborocharter.org Email questions to hillsborocharter@gmail.com The

Cla ssifi e d

A full day private school for grades 6 to 12 O pinio n

Concert of the Season Saturday @ 7:30 pm The Community Church 19790 Ashburn Road, Ashburn, VA 20147

Brought to you in part by One Loudoun

Featured soloist Julia Martin Frazier harpist Liszt / Hungarian Rhapsody No.2 Castelnuovo-Tedesco / Concertino for Harp & Chamber Orchestra Dvorak / Symphony No.8 in G Major

Buy two tickets, get two free Adults ($25), Seniors 65+ ($20) Students 13-18 ($10) Children 12 and under Free Tickets $5 more at the door

Come take a look

“Call me directly, or join us at our next information session. I’d love to answer your questions about our unique approach to advanced learning. No hard sell, just a conversation about your most important investment.” Susan Talbott, Executive Director, Direct 571-758-5855 info@loudoungifted.org, www.loudoungifted.org

Our next information session is on April 26th at 2:00 pm at the Rust Library in Leesburg!

ww w. lee s burgt oda y. com • Thur sda y, A pri l 16 , 2 0 15

Charlotte Klaar, a certified educational planner and founder of Klaar College Consulting, has been retained by the Loudoun School for the Gifted in Ashburn to lead its College Counseling program. In her role, Klaar provides college planning guidance on areas such as selecting courses and extracurricular activities, refining a student’s choice of majors, making successful college visits, and creating a selected list of colleges that are uniquely suited to the student. n

Masterworks

L if e s t yle s

Monday 4/6/15 - 7:30 PM: Ashburn Library, 43316 Hay Rd., Ashburn, VA 20147 Wednesday 4/8/15 - 7:30 PM: Sterling Library, 120 Enterprise St., Sterling, VA 20164 Monday 4/20/15 - 7:30 PM: Purcellville Library, 220 E. Main St., Purcellville, VA 20132 Tuesday 4/21/15 - 7:30 PM: Lovettsville Library, 12 North Light St., Lovettsville, VA 20180 Tuesday 4/28/15 - 7:30 PM: Rust Library, 380 Old Waterford Rd., NW, Leesburg, VA 20176

SCHOOL FOR THE GIFTED HIRES COLLEGE CONSULTANT

presents

Visit loudounsymphony.org

Hillsboro Charter Academy will offer:

Sports

projects this summer. The students’ proposals are four of 35 that received $3,000 Harrison Undergraduate Research Awards. The students from Loudoun and their projects are: Angela Liu, 20, of Leesburg, a thirdyear biomedical engineering major, and Anne Archer, 21, of Leesburg, a thirdyear biology major, who are researching bacterial interactions within the lung microbiome and their implications in public health and infectious diseases; Bansi Patel, 20, of Ashburn, a thirdyear biology and global public health double-major, who is researching whether wild-type versus knockout dendritic cells of a particular receptor will cause a difference in T-cell response and thereby induce tolerance without compromising immune function; Mardeen Karim, 20, of Sterling, a

We’re building an experiential, project-based school that provides individualized learning plans to meet each child’s educational needs. Our students will be encouraged to use higher-order thinking skills by being continually challenged.

Bu s in e s s

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third-year neuroscience major, who is researching the mechanisms of how axons degenerate and how this relates to neurodegenerative diseases; and Caroline Kerr, 19, of Ashburn, a second-year chemistry major, who is researching the synthesis of boron-based nanoparticles used for oxygen sensing and optical imaging in cells.

Hillsboro Charter Academy will be a free K-5 public charter school, open to Loudoun residents in the fall of 2016.

LT

EDUCATION Educa t io n

Notebook

Hillsboro Charter Academy Parent Information Nights

L o udo un Ne ws

Foundation, a nonprofit that helps raise money to supplement school funding, returned to her desk April 7 to see a yellow Post-it note from Wayde Byard, the school district’s public information officer. “It said, ‘Come see me ASAP,’” Meyer said. Byard explained what had happened to the team’s robot: A school district van, which was carrying the ’bot and the team’s laptops, was stolen from the parking lot of a hotel in Knoxville, TN, just hours after the team had won second place in the Smoky Mountains Regional FIRST Robotics Competition and a spot at the world robotics contest. Now, the team had two weeks to raise $15,000. “Yikes,” Meyer said. “I was nervous—I know Loudoun County is a great community, but that’s a lot of money to raise in such a short amount of time. Well, I shouldn’t have been nervous.” John Wood, CEO of Telos Corp., one of the team’s sponsors, called Loudoun County Chamber of Commerce President and CEO Tony Howard, who emailed area businesses. “All I did was send an email,” Howard said, “and I had people getting back to me right away to say, ‘How do I help and where do I send the help?’” Money trickled in over the next 36 hours. By the morning of April 8, the foundation had received $900; by the next morning the figure had grown to more than $6,000; and by noon April 9, $8,000 had been donated, including $5,000 from Orbital ATK for the competition entry fee. “I was excited, but I thought, we still have a lot of money to go,” Meyer said. “And then I get a phone call.”

A representative from BAE Systems was on the line to offer the final $7,000. “So by two o’clock we had raised the $15,000, and it was done in less than two days,” Meyer said during the press conference. “And why was it done? Because this community cares. They step up when it’s time to step up.” Lisa Hillary-Tee, vice president of communications for BAE Systems Platforms and Services, said she and her colleagues were touched when they heard RoboLoCo’s story and wanted to help. “When we found that we could invest in future engineers or chemists or whatever it is you want to do, it was very exciting for us.” The company sponsors other robotics teams but does not regularly support a team in Loudoun, something Hillary-Tee said BAE Systems is interested in pursuing. Orbital ATK has supported the RoboLoCo team, both financially and by identifying employees to be team mentors, for about a year. “I knew this team was going places the first year they competed in DC Regionals and they got the FIRST Inspiration Award,” Orbital ATK’s Vice President of Engineering Sally Richardson said. “And they are inspiring. We’ve seen that over the last week.” With the needed funds in hand, the team’s focus turned toward building and programming the robot in time to ship it Tuesday. “We should be ready by then,” Mary Zell Galen, the team’s president and a senior at C.S. Monroe Technology Center, said before correcting herself. “No, we will be ready.” As the team scrambled to meet that deadline, word came from Knoxville on Tuesday that the originial robot, the school van and the team’s trophies had been recovered by authorities. n

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