NOVEMBER 2008 (vol. 15, no. 2) est. 1893 • K-12 college prep
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N e w s l e t t e r
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Orchestra Preps for New York Competition in April
Harker Speaker Series Opens..2 Olympian’s Beijing Experience..3 “Freeze Frame” Ramps Up...4-5 Family Picnic!......................6-7 Library Encourages Readers.10 JSA Brings in Voters.............12 Hidden Talents: Gary Hinrich..12 Students Create DVD for Tamagawa Buddies...............19
found out about the National Orchestra Cup and decided that competing in a newly renovated space like Alice Tully Hall would be a great opportunity.”
ACE Club Builds School.........21 Dance Troupes Rarin’ To Go...23 Musicians Travel to USC.......25 US Assembly Entrances All...27 Inserts in this issue: Nov. Home & School Connection, Save the Date Flier
Save the date! Oct. 30, 31 & Nov. 1, 2008 US Conservatory Production Blackford Theater 7:30 p.m. $25 reserved; $10 adults, seniors & students E-mail tickets@harker.org to purchase tickets
The US Orchestra is going to New York! The group, led by director Chris Florio, will travel in April to compete in the National Orchestra Cup at Alice Tully Hall in Lincoln Center. The hall just completed a $100 million renovation and is considered one of the top performance halls in the country. “I have wanted to take the orchestra to New York for a couple of years,” said Florio. “Through research, I
Although the orchestra traveled to Eastern Europe in 2005 with a score of students, and to Paris in 2006 with almost twice that number, “this will be the first orchestra competition for Harker,” said Florio. “We will be taking 68 students to
One of those 68 students will be violinist Sonya Huang, Gr. 11. She started playing at Harker eight years ago. “I started off learning under Toni Woodruff, a Bucknall strings coach at Harker,” said Huang. “About a year later, I switched to an outside private teacher, and I’m currently studying under Li Lin, a teacher at the San Francisco Conservatory.” Huang has been in first the MS, then the US orchestras since Gr. 4. She made the Eastern European tour, seeing Prague, Vienna and Budapest with the US Orchestra while she was still in Gr. 7 and went on the Paris tour in Gr. 9. “I’m looking forward to attending its third-ever tour,” said Huang. “We attend the CMEA (California Continued on page 11
Dogs Get Human Volunteers from Harker Harker students have been helping out one of their favorite charities, Humane Society Silicon Valley (HSSV), and two groups received thank you notes from the organizers. A group of Harker students organized by senior Anthony Chen volunteered at Bark in the Park in late September. Participants were Alyssa Boyle, Noel Duan, Winny Huang, Nathaniel Kwok, Richard Ly, Dominic Shamblen, Brian Soetikno, all Gr. 12; Noriko Ishisoko, Gr. 11; and Jennifer Nguyen, Gr. 10. Beth Shafran-Mukai, the 2008 volunteer chair for the event, said, “Anthony and the Harker crew were great volunteers, spending many hours greeting visitors at the registration areas, assisting in the stage area, refilling dog water trays, and assuring that our park remained clean and safe for all the people and pets who came out to enjoy Bark in the Continued on page 11
Kerry Enzensperger
events
The group had to apply and pass a review before being green-lighted for the competition, said Florio. “There are several schools entered this year that I am familiar with, and their programs are going to be very challenging to compete against,” he noted.
perform. We have had chamber groups participate in competitions in the past but those were with only a handful of students.”