MAY 2002 (VOL. 8, NO. 12)
M O N T H L Y
N E W S L E T T E R
HARKER
F R O M
T H E
H A R K E R
S C H O O L
headlines
Harker Team Wins Tech Challenge and Grand Prize Four Harker US teams competed in this year’s Tech Challenge 2002, sponsored by the Tech Museum and held recently at the San Jose Civic Auditorium. The challenge was to move a simulated torch from one platform to another platform located 11 feet away. Team “APOL” won the high school award for Best Team Spirit, and Team “Pyrrhic Victory” earned the Grand Prize in the high school division! Team APOL: Aaron Kleinsteiber, Peter Combs, Ozan Demirlioglu and Leann Duong.
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Saratoga - MS Future Problem Solving teams heading to state finals ........ 8
Saratoga - US Latin students sweep California JCL Convention ................. 11
important dates Due to the volume of important dates in May and early June, please refer to your division calendars for date information. We also remind you that the key dates for next year are currently posted on the Parent Home Page!
Team Phyrrhic Victory: Adrik McIlroy, Greg Perkins, Alex Segal, Pia Pal, Alan Malek and Mason Liang. Rand Harrington, Harker’s US physics dept. chair, has been involved with this event for the past three years and shared some funny anecdotes and interesting facts about this annual event: The APOL team have been competing for at least three years. They won the Middle School division two years ago when they were 8th graders and the High School division last year as freshmen, also being honored with a plaque from the Santa Clara Board of Supervisors. The APOL team was “dethroned” from their first place title this year by the Pyrrhic team, though they still won the award for Most Spirited Team. We had two different teams of sophomores competing this year, and one team almost won the most spectacular failure award when their propeller driven device, suspended by a cable between the platforms, cut through one of the supporting strings. At that point, two members
Diane Reese
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est. 1893 • K-12 college prep
of the team fell off the platform into the crowd—quite a spectacular event (a QT movie is posted on the web site for all to see). We also had a team of juniors this year who didn’t make it to the final competition due to mechanical failures (their motors burned up 1 hour before this year’s competition!) The Pyrrhic team did a phenomenal job—their design was totally unique and no other team came close to their design. After they finished the competition, they set up their device and gave demonstrations throughout the rest of the evening, much to the delight of the crowd. One of the team members, Adrik McIlroy, was even interviewed on TV by a news team from Channel 14. All the Harker teams are very
supportive of each other. Although there is some secrecy building up to the day of the event, everyone cheers the other teams on during the competition. The teams that win plan ahead and work hard to test their device before the day of the competition, and the winning entries are usually “clever and simple.” The parents of the team members should also be recognized for their support transporting team members and devices (Team Pyrrhic had to rent a U-Haul to move their device!), donating materials and allowing students to take over several garages. —Rand Harrington You can view movie clips on Harrington’s web site and see the project in action…as well as the enthusiastic response of the audience. Go to http:// users.harker.org/hs/randalh/ techchallenge/ and enjoy the show! Big congratulations to all of our teams for competing in this challenging event—we honor your hard work and ingenuity! At press time, the winning Harker team was invited to a special dinner at the Fairmont Hotel in San Jose honoring Tech Museum donors.
Editor’s Note: The month of May is full of “passages” of all sorts as our children rise to their next challenge. It’s also a time when thoughts turn to summer vacation. We wish you joy—and patience!— as we bring to a close another busy year at Harker! The next newsletter will be mailed in mid-June so we can include photos and news of all the exciting end-of-the-year activities, including the K-6 Dance Production, the Gr. 6 Promotion Ceremony, the Gr. 8 Graduation and the historic occasion of the first graduation in our new Upper School! —Pam Dickinson, Director of Communications Remember to check the Parent Home Page for detailed calendars, updates and additional news between editions of the Harker News!