40 upper school community life
Catalina Mathletes Display Problem-Solving Muscles The 47th annual Mathletics Competition took place on May 2 at Seaside High School. Mathletics encourages excellence in math and recognizes the achievements of individual students and the schools they represent. Seventeen Santa Catalina students in grades 9 through 12 participated in the contest and took home 13 individual awards and four team awards. First-place winners received $100, and second-place winners received $75. Each year, the top graduating senior taking the advanced calculus exam receives the $1,000 Richard Morgantini Scholarship. This year, our own Lauren Redfern ’15 won this honor on top of her third-place finish in AP Calculus BC. AP Calculus BC Lauren Redfern ’15, third place; Anna Burks ’15 AP Calculus AB—First-Place Team Brenda Melano ’15, first place; Jee Hee Lee ’15, honorable mention; Ellie Stork ’15, honorable mention Math Analysis—Third-Place Team Sein Lee ’18, honorable mention; Jane Shim ’17, honorable mention; Emily Szasz ’16, honorable mention Algebra II—Third-Place Team Lulu Fang ’18, third place; Jessica Cheng ’18, honorable mention; Ariana Fadel ’18
Math II—Second-Place Team Coco Wang ’18, third place; Emma Kogler-Franklyn ’18, honorable mention; Fila Oen ’18, honorable mention Math I Sarah Ning ’18; Saige Madden ’18; Madeleine Oh ’18 Sein Lee ’18 (pictured) was also awarded Santa Catalina’s 2015 Robert Balles California Math League (CML) Award, which includes a $750 prize. To be considered for a Balles Award, a student must compete in all six CML contests during the academic year (14 students met this criterion for 2014–2015) and must earn an average of four out of six correct answers for the academic year. Lee was close to earning a perfect score on three contests, each of which requires a creative mix of intuition, acquired mathematical knowledge, logic, and common sense to generate answers to six challenging problems in just 30 minutes. Congratulations to all of our talented mathematicians!
Twelve Seniors Honored for Excellence in History The National History Society established a program in 2009 to honor outstanding history students in secondary schools. To become a National History Scholar, a student must maintain a minimum academic achievement and receive the history faculty’s recommendation. The Santa Catalina History Department honors the following seniors as 2015 National History Scholars: Maddie Bennett, Julia Clark, Leslie Gobel, Xiadani Juarez Diaz, Katherine Kamel, Christine Marella, Brenda Melano, Giovanna Mitchell, Lauren Redfern, Ellie Stork, Sharmaine Sun, Rio Turrini-Smith.