FEATURES, page 9
SPRING FASHION, page 11
Interview with San Jose Mayor
Trending styles for spring
TECH, page 17
Stem cells used to slow aging in mice
Winged Post Friday, March 2, 2012
the
THE HARKER UPPER SCHOOL STUDENT NEWSPAPER, VOL. 13, NO.6
500 SARATOGA AVE. SAN JOSE, CA 95129
AP Studio Art holds exhibition meena chetty & allison sun
TALONWP managing editor & editor
ART SHOW, page 3
On March 1, the school was successful in bidding on the 4525 Union Avenue property, which will become the third campus. According to an email announcement made by Head of School Chris Nikoloff, details of the purchase will not be finalized until the summer. Nikoloff said that acquiring this campus is a major milestone for the school. “Over the long haul, eventually unwinding from the lease of Blackford and moving onto three campuses is a lot more secure,” he said. He plans to keep the community updated as decisions are settled
Journalists recognized
ALLISON SUN AND VASUDHA RENGARAJAN - WINGED POST
During lunch on Wednesday, February 29, AP Studio Art students showcased their pieces at the Art Exhibition Reception in Nichols Hall, which featured artwork of various mediums that ranged from sculptures to photography. AP Studio Art is offered in 3D, taught by Jaap Bongers, and 2D, taught by Pilar Aguero-Esparza. The students were reviewed prior to being accepted into the classes to ensure that they had sufficient artistic aptitude for the course. Bongers had taught many of his AP students previously in the Study of Visual Arts class. His appreciation for teaching art comes from watching his students develop over the course of their art career. He hopes that the art show will “jumpstart [students’] understanding of art,” especially for people who do not normally have the opportunity to read art magazines or visit museums frequently. “A lot of people don’t get to [visit art exhibits], but to see an exhibition of art in school, for some of them, is more serious exposure to art,” Bongers said. Each of the student artists chose a theme that recurred throughout their works and wrote a statement that explained their inspiration for the exhibition.
Successful new campus bid
STUDIO ART Students and faculty visit the AP Studio Art exhibition in Nichols Atrium during long lunch on Wednesday, February 29. Featured student works were created in media ranging from photography to sculpture to drawing and expressed unique themes chosen by the artists themselves.
STEM week combines science and charity darian edvalson & allison sun TALONWP editors
This week, WiSTEM and 14 other clubs hosted Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics Week (STEM) to raise funds for charitable causes, spark interest in those topics, and increase awareness of global problems. “The main goal is to get participation for the activities and [for] people to enjoy the science activities that we’re putting on,” WiSTEM president Ramya Rangan (12) said. STEM Week featured activities held by a specific club each day during lunch. Similar to participating in spirit competitions, classes were able to earn points from the activities. The class with the most points will be able to support the charitable organization of its choice. The senior and junior classes would support organizations centered on medical science: Operation Smile, which focuses on cleft palate surgery, and Limbs for Love, an organization that sponsors
prosthetic patients, respectively. The sophomore class would support education for African girls through Camfed, whereas the freshman class would support the HIV/AIDS Alliance. WiSTEM kicked off the week by posting trivia questions each day on the daily bulletin and distributing science-related crossword puzzles on Monday. Class competitions continued the following day with Robotics Club’s Robot Mario Kart Race, which was not completed due to the robots running out of battery. On Wednesday, students browsed various science booths, the most popular being the liquid nitrogen-frozen flowers and bananas, at the WiSTEM fair, while enjoying cookies and ice cream provided in the gym. “It [was] great,” Richard Min (10) said. “I really enjoyed the experiments because they were really interesting, but I wish there was more.” Interscholastic Gaming League hosted the Gaming Extravaganza on Thursday, and the Chemistry Magic Show led by Chemistry Club during today’s lunch will conclude this week’s activities.
Aside from encouraging students to participate in the activities, the secondary goal of the week was to raise funds for the cause chosen by the class that earned the most points. Hoping to raise approximately $1,500, WiSTEM sold baked goods, wristbands, sweatshirts, and T-shirts throughout the week. For many students, STEM Week allowed them to pursue their interests outside of the classroom. “Harker is known for students who win national-level math competitions and do university-style science research, but I think this week is important to remind us that those aren’t the real goals of pursuing science. Instead, we [do those things because] we’re simply curious and motivated [...],” WiSTEM member Zareen Choudhury (10) said. “STEM Week will [...] bring together our community based on this passion we share.” After this week, WiSTEM will continue to fundraise for these causes throughout the year, with tentative events including a possible faculty luncheon and a fundraiser at BJ’s Restaurant and Brewhouse.
TALONWP.com, the online publication of the journalism program, was one of 18 high school finalists for the Columbia Scholastic Press Association (CSPA) Gold Crown Award, and one of 31 finalists for the 2012 National Scholastic Press Association (NSPA) Online Pacemaker Contest. “I was honored to be in the company of all those other established and high-quality online publications,” online editor in chief Jackie Jin (12) said. “We were doing a lot of new stuff with the program this year, and I’m really glad that everyone’s work was recognized.” According to official press releases, the CSPA will award Gold and Silver Crowns on March 18, and the NSPA will announce winners of the Pacemaker on April 14.
DECA conference results
From February 23 to 26, around 40 members of HBC competed in the DECA state conference in Irvine. 29 students placed in their events, and nine qualifed for Internationals. Qualifiers from this conference, all juniors, were Kevin Lin and Michaela Kastelman, who both placed first; Emily Wang, who placed third; Preeya Mehta and Patricia Huang, who placed third as a team; Rachel Yanovsky and Tiphaine Delepine, who placed fourth as a team; and Aneesh Chona and Reyhan Kader, who also placed fourth as a team. In order to qualify, students had to place in the top three or four in their respective events. They will next compete in the DECA International Career Development Conference from April 28 to May 1 in Salt Lake City, Utah.
Mittelstet: A lifetime of grace, love, and literature
SPECIAL TO THE WINGED POST
editor in chief & asst. editor in chief
MITTELSTET During a vacation in the mountains many years ago, Sharron Mittelstet poses with her husband and daughter. A memorial service will be held for her on Saturday, March 10.
On February 2, 2012, longtime English teacher Sharron Mittelstet passed away at home from Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease, a neurodegenerative disorder. She was 67. Mittelstet first joined the faculty in the 1992-1993 school year as a Middle School English instructor; in 1998, the second year of the Upper School, she began teaching high school English. Loving the links between literature and the silver screen, she authored and taught the Literature into Film senior elective. Her friends, family, students, and colleagues remember her as a gracious, witty, and gentle lady who loved her students and the act of teaching. Throughout her time at this school, she was always incredibly conscientious. According to her
husband, John, she would spend “way more time than [he] could imagine” critiquing each student’s essay and often stayed up until 2 a.m. working. She put the same kind of dedication into recommendation letters and midterm comments; every year, many students would solicit her for letters, and she would spend hours upon hours writing them. “She wouldn’t take a ‘one size fits all’ approach because she really loved [her students],” her husband said. Her care for her students was evident to friends as well. Her friend Dresden Erickson said, “Once September started, we’d only see her at Thanksgiving again, because of the amount of time she put into teaching and dedicating it to her students.” She did not entirely lack downtime, though. She adored
magical realist Latin-American literature—Gabriel García Márquez’s Love in the Time of Cholera and Isabel Allende’s Eva Luna were among
“
She was the person I confided in. For me, she was the heart of the school.
“
priyanka mody & michelle deng
Dr. Erin Redfern, English teacher
her favorite novels. She went to the movies nearly every Friday. She enjoyed gardening. And she went on Burger King runs with Assistant to Head of School Linda Brearley. “We’d take off during long
lunches on Wednesdays and talk about life and eat hamburgers, and she’d always say, ‘Ah! The perfect food,’” Brearley said. Once, when Mittelstet was in the earlier stages of her illness, Brearley brought her a hamburger, and “she said still the same thing: ‘Ah! The perfect food.’” All in all, Mittelstet was an inspiration. For English teacher Dr. Erin Redfern, Mittelstet was “the heart of the school.” She said, “[Mittelstet’s] dedication to teaching and her involvement with her students and her enjoyment of teaching some of the texts like The Scarlet Letter or some of the really gory, violent films she liked so much—that was what defined, for me, how to be a good teacher. She was my teaching mentor, and now it just feels like this big vacancy where the heart should be.”
REMEMBERING, page 8