Falls Church School News & Notes

Seventh Graders Host Business Day

Students in Jeff Buck and Kieran Shakeshaft’s seventh grade civics classes hosted Business Day last week. The students developed a product, designed marketing materials, and used their sales skills to sell their wares to other seventh and fifth graders visiting the school. Judges from the community came to assess and give special awards to deserving businesses. From this experience, they learned how to be risk takers and reflect by creating a business plan, while learning how to market it to fifth graders and reflecting on the experience.

OSE Student as Global Ambassador

Oak Street fifth grade student

Abby Ashbrook, was selected as the Global Down Syndrome Foundation Ambassador for 2023, it was announced at their gala in DC this week. Abby was joined at the gala by her family and by six distinguished members of FCCPS: Norma Sorto, Yoki Jeffers, Shelly Skomra, Rachel Skomra, Brittany Chavara and Alex Raines. The organization pursues medical research for Down syndrome and other diseases with NIH and lobbies Congress for research into health improvements for those with Down Syndrome.

MHS New Club MHSTV A Success

One of Meridian’s newest clubs, MHSTV, is focused on reporting what’s going on at Meridian in the past few months through monthly news broadcasts. These episodes, created entirely by students, feature inside looks at Meridian events, reviews of Falls Church restaurants, interviews with teachers and students at Meridian and more. Catch their latest episode and the rest of their videos on the MHSTV YouTube channel.

10th Grader Ranked 3rd in National Association

Meridian sophomore Preston Lieu is ranked third in the National Debate and Speech Association at the local level for Meridian. This makes Preston eligible for the Academic AllAmerican Award after his first semester in his junior year. The Academic All-American award recognizes students who have earned the degree of Superior Distinction (750 points); completed at least five semesters of high school; demonstrated outstanding character and leadership; and earned a GPA of 3.7 on a 4.0 scale (or its equiva lent).

Congratulations, Virginia Class 3 State Champions

Boys Soccer capped an 18-31 season with a thrilling shoot out victory over Charlottesville to claim the Virginia Class 3 State Championship. The run to the title saw the Mustangs score 26 playoff goals while con ceding zero across six playoff games. Senior captains Charlie Russell and Oliver Frandano led the back line in front of senior goalkeeper Inigo Diz, whose two saves in the shutout brought the state trophy back to Falls Church. Felix Green, Alex Gardner, Fernando Herbas and Charlie Russell scored in the shootout. The team gave the lunch pail to Nathan Greiner for winning a state title in his first year as head coach. The Mustangs featured eight all-Region first-team players, including two-time Region 3B Player of the Year Alex Gardner. The Class 3 all-State teams will be announced this week.

FCCPS Celebrates Retirees

Good wishes resonated as FCCPS celebrated the five employees retiring this month. Congratulations to Jan Garrett, Blanca Avila, Ingrid Schoenburg, Janet McEvoy Price and Ken DiCesare.

Operation EarthWatch Recognized by Council

Falls Church City Council recognized students from Mt. Daniel and Oak Street for their commitment to the earth this school year. Two OSE fifth graders were honored as lifers in the program — participating for six years from Kindergarten through fifth grade: Noah Hardi and Connell Henderson. Operation EarthWatch is a free environmental action program for elementary-aged residents o f the City of Falls Church and all students attending Mount Daniel Elementary School, Oak Street Elementary School and Saint James Catholic School. The program, a partnership of the Education Task Group of the Environmental Sustainability Council (ESC) and the Village Preservation and Improvement Society (VPIS), is celebrating its 30th anniversary this year.

OSE Word Masters Team Earned Highest Honors

A team representing Oak Street Elementary School recently earned Highest Honors in the 2022-2023 WordMasters Challenge™—a national vocabulary competition involving nearly 125,000 students annually. The third-grade team scored an impressive 186 points out of a possible 200 in the last three meets this year, placing sixth in the nation.

The third graders also ranked eighth nationally in the overall competition, scoring 501 points out of 600.

Competing in the tough Gold Division of the WordMasters Challenge™, third graders Lizzy Henneberg and Victoria Seitz each earned a perfect score of 20 in the recent meet. Nationally, only 41 third graders achieved this result. Other Oak Street Elementary School students who achieved outstanding results in the last meet of the year include Kylie Fine, Nico Groth, Nikhil Kapadia, Kabir Sharma, Heath Halvaksz and Clara Teply.

Fifth grader Clara Teply also earned Individual Highest Honors in the overall competition with a cumulative score of 58 out of 60 points. The highest Honors are reserved for students among their division’s top 10-15 students.