Awards and Achievements

Weatherly High School recently inducted 2 students into their German National Honor Society.
Pictured are, from L to R, Thomas McLaughlin, WASD Superintendent, Matthew Caccese, Alicia Panzarella, and Heidi Holinowsky, HS German Teacher.

eCYBERMISSION is a web-based Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) competition for students in sixth through nine grades, sponsored by the U.S. Army.  Teams are challenged to solve a problem in their community by using either the scientific method or an engineering design. This year’s team members, Alexander Hamm, Samantha Hartz, Tea Heister and Brett Kelly entered the “Food, Health and Fitness” Category and tackled the problem of health and fitness for our students.  The team used the engineering design to test wood to use in making a portable sidewalk to our schools. This would help make a morning walk to school safer and promote walking to school.

The students worked diligently to complete the lengthy mission folder, required in this competition.  They gathered resources to back their ideas and designed and built a prototype of the side walk they thought would be the best design. Each team member will receive a check for $500 from the eCybermission program. State Rep. Doyle Heffley (R-Carbon) presented each team member a certificate for this accomplishment. The team would like to give special thanks to Mrs. Rodgers for use of her room during the experimental phase of the mission.

To learn more about the eCybermission program, visit www.ecybermission .com.  “eCYBERMISSION is designed to share the importance of STEM education with the leaders of tomorrow and encourage them to understand the real-life applications of these subjects”.

In the picture, L - R:  Brett Kelly, Samantha Hartz, Tea Heister, Alexander Hamm

Chris Hunt, a senior at Weatherly Area High School is one of nine students in the state of Pennsylvania to be a qualifier for the most prestigious high school math contest in the United States.  There are only 500 students selected throughout the Unites States to compete for the honor of representing the United States in the International Math Olympiad.

After taking the American Mathematics Competition (AMC), Chris was invited to take the American Invitational Mathematics Exam (AIME) and with his combined score from the AMC and AIME, he qualified for the USAMO.  The USAMO exam will last for 9 hours over a two day period.  The exam contains only six questions, three on the first day and three on the second day.  If Chris does well in the USAMO, he will be chosen to be on the United States of America Math team in the International Math Olympiad to be held in Mar del Plata, Argentina.

The AMC, AIME, and USAMO are all contests sponsored by the Mathematical Association of America (MAA).  The MAA “is dedicated to the goal of strengthening the mathematical capabilities of our nation’s youth.”  One way they reach this goal is to “identify, recognize and reward excellence in mathematics through a series of national contests.” For more information about the MAA, go to their website at: http://www.maa.org/.

Chris has been an outstanding math student and won two first places in individual math contests held at Bucknell University and Marywood University during this school year. Chris placed third of all twelfth graders at the 2012 Lehigh University High School Math Contest, and earned a place on the Lehigh Valley American Regions Math League team.  The Weatherly Math team, with Chris as a member, has won first place in math contests at Bloomsburg University, Muhlenberg College, and at Bucknell’s Gold Math Exam.

Picture, L to R:  Thomas McLaughlin (Weatherly's Superintendent), Chris Hunt, and Stuart Tripler (Weatherly High School Principal)

The Engineering Team from Weatherly Area School District is again first in the state of Pennsylvania for Division One in the TEAMS(formerly JETS) competition!  The TEAMS competition, held at Bucknell University, is conducted in a written competition format, with teams of four to eight students to face off during two ninety-minute parts:

• Part 1: Teams try to answer eighty multiple-choice questions, requiring participants to apply math and science knowledge to unique situations.
• Part 2: In a short essay format, students must answer eight questions, and expand their ideas as they explain their answers for engineering solutions.

“The one-day competitions take place at over 100 locations between February 13 and March 12, 2012 through a partnership with high school educators, universities, corporations, and professional organizations.  Involving more than 10,000 students, schools and groups compete just one day during the four-week period vying for competition day, state, and national rankings and awards.”  This year’s theme focused on the engineering involved in healthcare and medicine.

This year, Weatherly's Engineering team consisted of five members:  Matthew Caccese(Senior), Sarah Dolinsky(Senior), Michael Embick(Junior), Christopher Hunt(Senior) and Lucas Rinker(Senior).  To find out more about TEAMS or to view 2012 State Rankings, go to:

http://teams.tsaweb.org/teams/about/

On the site, click on “2012 State Rankings” in the left navigation column, then click on Pennsylvania. Weatherly’s team competed in the 11^th/12^th grade category, Division One.

First Picture, L to R:  Matthew Caccese, Chris Hunt, Sarah Dolinsky, Michael Embick and Lucas Rinker

Marywood University hosted a high school math competition on  March 25th, and Weatherly's Chris Hunt received the top score and a monetary prize in the Level II competition.  In one hour, Chris answered 39 out of 40 questions correctly.  

In the picture, L to R:  Front row - Chris Hunt, Michael Embick, Lucas Rinker.  In the back row:  Alicia Panzarella and Sarah Peiser

Weatherly Area High School recently inducted 6 new members into their Spanish National Honor Society.

Pictured are, L to R, Thomas McLaughlin-Superintendent, Nicole Bachart, Karlee Ursta, Lucas Rinker, Chris Hunt, Tiana Genetti, Crystal Hoffman, and Judy Lagana, Weatherly High School Spanish Teacher.

Erin Hollingsworth, Senior at Weatherly Area High School, along with Rachel Heister, a 2011 graduate of Weatherly, now attending Philadelphia University, won a poster contest for Earth Day, 2011, sponsored by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. Although the contest ended last spring, last week Erin and Rachel received a satchel filled with items relating to the mission of the EPA, which is to protect human health and the environment. Included in the satchel were two books, a packet of seeds, a poster, a certificate, school supplies and a magnifying glass with a chart to identify insects and small water creatures.

Erin and Rachel were both selected as two of the four winners in grades 9 – 12 by Region 3:  The Mid-Atlantic States Region, which represents the states of Delaware, Maryland, Pennsylvania, Virginia, West Virginia and the District of Columbia. Erin and Rachel’s poster, as well as winning posters in other grade levels, are now online at the EPA Region Three’s website at this address:  http://www.epa.gov/region3/earthday/2011_poster_contest.html

On March 14^th,  the Weatherly team competed against 28 other schools at Bucknell University. One hundred and sixty students competed by taking a two-hour exam consisting of 36 math questions. Weatherly’s team correctly answered more questions than any other team at the competition. Weatherly will receive a plaque for the school in their honor. One team member, Christopher Hunt, correctly answered an astounding 33 out of 36 questions, giving him top honors in the individual competition. Chris will be receiving book prizes for his award.

In the front:  Alicia Panzarella and Sarah Dolinsky.  Back row:  Lucas Rinker, Christopher Hunt and Michael Embick

Three students represented Weatherly in the Muhlenberg Math Competition.  Michael Embick, Junior, Chris Hunt, Senior, and Lucas Rinker, Senior, competed against eight other high schools in Muhlenberg College’s 34^th Annual High School Mathematics Contest on February 25^th. Fifty percent of the team’s score is based on rapid, 30-second responses to short-answer questions. The remaining fifty percent of the team’s score is based on the team’s written responses to longer, more open-ended problems. As first place winners, each of the team members received a check for $100 and the school was given a book for the high school library.

The twenty top math students at Weatherly Area High School participated in the American Mathematics Competition sponsored by the Mathematical Association of America. The competition is divided up by grade level. Winning in the AMC 10 for ninth and tenth graders were Dominique Adamczyk, first place, and Stephanie Jamgochian and Cassidy Piskorick, tied for second place. In the AMC 12 f or eleventh and twelfth graders, Chris Hunt won top score, followed by Michael Embick in second place and Lucas Rinker in third place. Chris Hunt scored high enough to receive an invitation to the next level of competition, the American Invitational Mathematics Examination to be held on March 15, 2012.

Chris Hunt, a senior at Weatherly Area High School, has been named a National Merit Scholarship Finalist.  As a finalist, Chris will be in the final round of competition for three types of scholarships awarded to finalists: state representative $2500 scholarships; corporate-sponsored scholarships; and college-sponsored scholarships.  At Weatherly, Chris is involved in Student Forum, Science Olympiad, the Academic team,  and the Math and Engineering team.  He has scored a perfect 800 in Math on the SAT I, and a perfect 800 in Physics in the SAT II.  His top choices for furthering his education next year are Brown University, Vassar College, Williams College and Connecticut College.

Weatherly Middle School students participated for the first time in the "Odyssey of the Mind" competition, a creative problem solving program for students of all ages. Students group into teams and select a problem, decide on  a unique solution, then present their unique solution in a competition. The Weatherly students chose "You Make the Call" as their problem to solve at Mt. Pocono West on March 3rd.  The students needed to create a structure between 9 and 15 grams that will hold the most weight as possible.  In an eight minute period, while the weights are being placed on the structure, the students demonstrate or perform a mathematical function with a device they have created.  There is also a "spontaneous" competition which involves the team solving verbal, hands-on or verbal with hands-on problems. Although Weatherly did not place, we would like mention that in between our competitions, we watched Lehighton High School's performance, and it was fantastic!

L to R:  Drew Solonoski, Dana Weiss, Olivia Sipler, Olivia Winheld and Cyrick Thomas

History Day Participants

It is not the winning, but the learning that is emphasized by the organizers of History Day, an event in which over half a million students participate  each year. Students choose a topic in history that is centered around the theme of the year, research the topic, finding both primary and secondary sources, if possible,  then create one of the following:  a documentary; a website; an exhibit; a play; or write a paper.

This year only two students at Weatherly took on the challenge of History Day's 2012 theme, "Revolution, Reaction, Reform in History". Allysa Miller and Krista Lutzick created a documentary about the Weatherly Train Works.  The judges were impressed with the project's pictures, editing and interviews with Jack Koehler, Weatherly historian and Tom Connors, mayor of Weatherly. For more information about History Day, check their website:  http://www.nhd.org/

L to R:  Alyssa Miller and Krista Lutzick

Congratulations to Laura Palmer who qualified for the Pennsylvania All-State Band Festival which will be held in Lancaster, Pennsylvania on April 19-21, 2012.  Laura will perform with the All-State Ensemble on Saturday, April 21, and will have the opportunity to re-audition for the All-Eastern Ensemble to be held in 2013.  Most recently, Laura has performed in the Region 5 Band Festival at Chambersburg, the District 10 Orchestra Festival at Parkland, the District 10 Band Festival at Nazareth, and sat first chair flute for the Carbon County Band Festival at Pleasant Valley.  Laura performs regularly at Heritage Hill, Weatherly, PA and with the Hazleton Philharmonic.  She is a private flute student of Mrs. Judy Schmaldienst.

Jessica Adamczyk and Jared Nyer represented Weatherly on February 11th at the Brain Bee at the University of Scranton.  Both students did well in the written exam, and advanced to the open question round.  The Bee is sponsored by the Neuroscience Program at the University of Scranton and the Scranton Neuroscience Society.

Devon Bizarre, a junior at Weatherly Area High School, was awarded 3rd place in the 2012 Pin Contest at the Pennsylvania Educational Technology Expo and Conference.  the conference was held in Hershey, PA on February 13th - 15th.  Devon was one of six finalists throughout the state of Pennsylvania.  For the 3rd place prize, she was awarded a $125 gift card and trophy.  She is a students in Mr. James Pino's graphic design class.

To the side are the students pictured with perfect attendance for the first half of the 2011-2012 school year.

Front Row: (L to R)Kayla Harrisson, Brittany Isom, Tea Heister, Jasmine Rivera, Jenna Bartel

Back Row:( L to R) Kirstin Ursta, Cheyanne Wallish, Sarah Peiser, Mike Marirko, Josh Reiner, Samantha Hartz,Kelly Parker, Jennifer Weiss

To the side are the students pictured with perfect attendance for the first half of the 2011-2012 school year.

Front Row: (L to R) Lucas Rinker, Jackie Watkins, Laura Palmer, Maura Kelly, Katherine Ray, Joseph Hancharick

Back Row:( L to R) Jack Walters, Michael Embick, Matthew Caccese, Michael Baade, Brian Benedict, Seph Smith