Keep your fingers crossed! More than half way through winter and no snow days yet! As much "fun" as they may be at the time, snow days can disrupt schedules long after the flakes, drifts, and icy roads are a memory. Let's hope the groundhog was wrong and that spring is just around the corner.
As many of you know, I spent my entire professional career in the Audubon School District. Even without a point of comparison (other than conversations with colleagues in other districts) I have always considered Audubon special and myself lucky to serve in such a great community that truly respects and supports the mission of the schools. Is this Utopia? Most certainly not. Like most close knit families, we have our moments when we grouse at one another in disagreement. Yet, just let an "outsider" say a disparaging word about the Green and Gold!
Now, as a University Supervisor of Student Teachers for Rowan University, I am having the opportunity to visit schools all over South Jersey. As wonderful (and new) as many of them may be, I can tell you that Audubon still outshines them all. I have yet to encounter a more dedicated staff, more respectful students, or a cleaner facility than we have in the Audubon. Please enjoy this newsletter, which celebrates the individuals and organizations, activities, and accomplishments that make the Audubon Schools so special.
- Suzanne McKenna
Haviland Hornets Weather the Winter
Look who’s drive-ing! According to HAS Principal Dr. Carleene Slowik, if there is one word that describes Haviland Avenue School during the first semester it’s GIVING. HAS children held the following collections:
- South Jersey Food Bank Collection
- Winter Coat Collection
- The Giving Tree which collected hats, scarves, gloves and mittens
- The Pajama Project
In the second half of the school year we will have even more opportunities for our children to participate in giving to others.
Haviland Teachers receive much deserved recognition. Three HAS teachers have been named recipients of Audubon Education Foundation grants. Ms. Michele Castagna has been awarded the funds to purchase two iPads for use in her classroom. Mrs. JoAnne McCarty will use her award to purchase Lego sets for learning about simple machines. Ms. S. Dib will continue to fund the popular Traveling Art Shows featuring the work of Salvador Dali and Claude Monet for January and March.
And if that’s not enough…The Audubon Alumni Association funded the following projects: Wedgits (manipulative building blocks that can be used in a number of ways and encourage both creative and cooperative work) for Mrs. Christine Brady; and a Priority Box Project which spreads Art and Peace one box at a time for Ms. Dib.
The accolades continue! ACME Markets selected Mrs. Rosemary Lang, Grade Two, as the Teacher of the Month for November. Mrs. Lang received a $25.00 ACME Gift Card, flowers, and ACME shopping tote and a certificate. Congratulations to our teachers and to our children who will be the beneficiaries of these gifts.
The RTI (Response to Intervention) Block offers support at HAS.Under the direction of Ms. Jane Byrne and her RTI Committee, students can receive intense, small group remediation in specific identified literacy and math skills four days a week for thirty-five minutes. Eleven “interventionist” teachers deliver these services, including three who are from Mansion Avenue School, during the first period of the day. Additionally, six Grade One and Two teachers provide enrichment instruction in areas such as Science, Math, Reading, Writing, Art, Technology, and Social Studies to those students who are not in need of remediation. The students will cycle through the enrichment classes during the year. Interventionist teachers are giving ongoing assessments and collecting data on student progress. We look forward to analyzing the data at the end of the year to determine the success of this new RTI Block. This has been a positive, cross grade experience for students and teachers who are taking the opportunity to get to know each other better for the common purpose of improving learning for all students.
Back to The TopMansion Avenue Mountain Lions Roar through Winter
Sixth Grade Parent Book Club kicks off! Twenty-five parents showed an interest in participating in the Book Club program which ran the entire month of January. Through the program the parents have gotten a close up view of how we instruct our students during the Language Arts block. Not only that, they have been able to share in reading and discussing the novel The Misfits with their child.
Pennies for the Playground is a school wide project that began in January. Unfortunately, the MAS playground sign was damaged in mid-December by vandals who tore off part of the sign. This is the second time this has happened. The students are raising money through a change drive to replace the sign. Our school goal is to collect $750.00. Emily Grim, a student in Mrs. Susan Jenkinson's class, designed a coin collection container that looks like the crayons that held up the original sign. VERY COOL!
Pajama Project helps others. We are asking the students to bring in a new pair of pajamas for kids that are less fortunate than we are. All three schools in the district are participating in the program.
We’re coming down the backstretch! Believe it or not, we are half way through the school year! Report cards were issued on January 27. Also, our Sixth Graders had their Sixth Grade Social which was held on the same night in the MAS All Purpose Room.
Open Mike at the Tree House for our Third Graders was held the first Monday in February. We had a very low turnout at our last event. Principal Mr. Ted Clarke hopes the students come and share some of the writing they have been working on this year. The program runs from 5:00 to 6:00 PM.
Back to The Top
Sports Spectacular Night promises to be fun! Another event that you should write on your calendar is our annual Sports Spectacular Night. It will be held in the AHS Gymnasium on February 24. Look for more information coming soon.
What's Happening at the High School?
AHS National Honor Society members drive the winter away! Members of the Audubon Chapter of the National Honor Society are always living up to our motto of pride and excellence. Since the beginning of the year, members have undertaken several service projects. The first very successful project involved the collection of supplies for our troops overseas. Over ten bags of nonperishable food items, toiletries and other miscellaneous items were collected through the generous donations of students and staff.
The annual Blood Drive, which took place on the Saturday after Thanksgiving, was also very productive. It is a very difficult day for people to come out and donate, but our members recruited over forty individuals who donated a total of twenty-five pints. (FYI: 25 pints =75 lives saved!)
Canned goods were collected before the Winter Choral and Band concerts. Thanks to Mr. Duane Trowbridge and Mr. Lee DeLoach for spreading the word!
Last but not least, old athletic shoes are being collected until the end of January. These shoes will be recycled into playgrounds, athletic tracks and basketball courts. The shoes must not be muddy or very torn. We are still accepting donations, so when you clean out your closets, don’t throw those old sneakers away!
AHS Cheerleaders continue to shine! The Audubon High School Cheerleading program is among the best in the Colonial Conference. Constantly striving to entertain, the girls push themselves to work as a synchronized team in a multitude of categories: cheer, dance, tumble, stunt, and jump. Judges at competitions award points based on difficulty and execution of competition routines. AHS is always a contender to be in the top of the heap. Most sports require a specific number of players: baseball starts nine; basketball plays five; soccer eleven. Competitive Cheer is divided into size divisions to better ensure a fair playing field. Small squads consist of twelve or fewer cheerleaders; Medium, thirteen to sixteen; Large, seventeen to twenty; Mega Varsity, twenty-one to twenty-eight; and Super Varsity, twenty-nine to thirty-six. Cherokee High School reflects the fairness of these divisions. CHS enrolls around 2,600 students grades 9-12, and is in the Mega Varsity division while Audubon High School enrolls around 600 students grades 9-12, and is in the Medium Varsity division. Just as the high school sport conferences “group” schools according to enrollment, so do divisions in cheerleading.
The first competition of the season was held at Paul VI High School on Saturday, January 14. Both teams earned a Second Place trophy! Our JV squad beat Triton and Maple Shade while Varsity defeated Holy Cross, Maple Shade, and Camden Catholic. On Sunday, January 15, we competed at the “New Year’s Cheer Challenge” at Highland High School. JV beat a talented Pennsbury team to capture First Place while Varsity annihilated Camden Catholic and Clearview High School by twenty-five points to earn First Place! Coaches Kristen Tegan and Alycia Colucci are extremely proud of the AHS Cheerleaders’ performances, and are looking forward to future performances including one at the Palestra. Come out and support the AHS cheerleaders as they host a competitions in the Gym. Admission is $7, and proceeds go towards covering the cost of a competition at Rider University in March. Go Wave!
Renaissance Motivates All to Achieve. The Audubon Junior/Senior High School Renaissance Program is an incredible tool that rewards students for their achievements. Renaissance is not just a program, though. It is a process that encourages academic excellence, improvement and citizenship. Its primary goals are to increase student performance and teacher enthusiasm, and raise the level of community participation in schools. Throughout the year a multitude of students are recognized through our Student of the Month program, monthly Student Spotlight recognitions, quarterly Gold, Green, and White certificates and rewards. In addition, there are acknowledgements for daily good deeds. The Audubon Renaissance Program has provided an effective venue to showcase the many students who are doing a great job academically, behaviorally and socially at AHS. Chic-fil-A has provided the Audubon Renaissance Program with hundreds of free chicken sandwich coupons to foster and recognize the “Pride and Excellence” within our school. Audubon Renaissance uses motivational concepts to reward and recognize the individuals who make school a better and more positive place.
Junior High Musicians play with pride and excellence! Congratulations to Karenann Libby (Grade Eight, French Horn) and Jessica Pineiro (Grade Eight, Bass Clarinet) for being selected to the All-South Jersey Junior High Band. Both students were selected after a rigorous audition at Southern Regional Middle School. They will represent the Green Wave at the South Jersey Junior High Band Concert at Rowan University on Sunday, March 4, 2012.
AHS Seniors help others. Physical Education teacher, Mrs. Kay Azar, would like to recognize five students who have volunteered their time to help instruct the Adaptive Physical Education class at Audubon High School. Seniors Megan Anstotz, Haley Carbone, John Gugel, Brianna Roach, and Steve Welch have made a huge impact on the class and have developed such wonderful relationships with the students. This has been a win-win for both the students in the class and the senior aides as they have had a wonderful opportunity to learn from each other.
Virtual High School is coming to AHS beginning in 2012-2013. AHS will increase elective offerings to students in grades 9-12 through the Virtual High School program. (See www.govhs.org for course information.) There are fifteen seats available each semester next year. Opportunities exist for students to take AP classes as well as interesting electives in all disciplines. Students will be working with counselors this spring to request the VHS experience and to choose classes they may wish to take.
Junior High Peer to Peer students visit HAS. On Friday, January 20, Eighth Graders involved in the Peer-to-Peer program visited HAS along with their advisors, Mr John Skrabonja and Mrs Wendy VanFossen. Students organized activities and presentations that centered around good decision making, especially when facing difficult situations. This offered a wonderful opportunity for older students to mentor younger students as they discussed issues of interest to both age groups.
Yearbook receives national recognition. Earlier this month Yearbook Advisor, Mr. John Skrabonja, was contacted by Mr. Terry McGovern, our Jostens representative. Terry recently returned from a Winter Sales Premier Seminar in Anaheim, California. During opening remarks by Jostens CEO Tim Larson, yearbook layouts from high schools around the nation were featured that reflected the theme of Larson’s comments: “Yearbooks that students want ..., and love.” According to Terry these layouts, enlarged to five feet by seven feet, were displayed around the room as a type of “Ring of Honor.” Mr. Skrabonja is honored to report that a layout from the 2012 edition of the Le Souvenir was among those featured! Considering the number of schools nationwide for which Jostens publishes yearbooks, this is more than pretty cool! Even more amazing is the fact that an eleven person staff of students produced a yearbook that has received national recognition! Way to go!
Calling all Fashion Bugs! Are you looking for the latest fashion trends for spring? The annual Audubon Education Foundation Fashion Show Luncheon will be held on March 4, 2012 at Tavistock Country Club. Doors will open at 12:30. This wonderful event, which features students and staff members in fashions by Love on A Hanger, Donne Fashions, and Formal Expressions, benefits the Audubon Education Foundation and Project Graduation. The AEF awards grants to staff members (they've been mentioned in past Points of Pride news articles). The Foundation also raises money to support the technology needs in the Audubon School District. Project Graduation raises money to host an all night substance-free celebration for seniors on the night of graduation. The Fashion Show includes a delicious lunch, time to relax with friends, and a chance to support AEF and Project Graduation. If you are interested in tickets, please contact Kim Gigantino at kapten22@aol.com or Cheryl Hauske at (856)-546-6101.
Athletes' Corner
Athletic Director Mr. Anthony Carbone has issued the following report on the Green Wave winter sports program:
The Swim Team (Audubon/Collingswood) will most likely finish 4-6 this season, taking 2nd in the Ocean Division. The boys took fifth overall at the SJISA Coaches' Invitational, the highest finish in school history. Katie Gillespie set a meet record in the 100 Butterfly, while Andy Schuehler (Collingswood) set a meet record in the 100 Breaststroke.
The Audubon Girls Basketball Team has a record of 12-6. The girls had won five straight games after beating Gateway. Tyler Frankowski is leading the team in scoring (13 points pergame) and rebounding (15 rebounds per game). Maddie Lord is averaging eight assists per game and three steals. Other players earning significant minutes are Emily Howard, Valerie Pineiro, Hunter Urban, and freshmen Erica Lord and Allie Borden. In a game against cross-town rival Haddon Heights, freshmen Allie Borden hit a three point shot at the buzzer in overtime to seal the win. Tyler Frankowski also came up huge in that game scoring thirty-one points and grabbing nineteen rebounds.
The Boys’ Basketball Team is working hard and improving every day. As of the writing of this newsletter, the team just celebrated the first back-to-back wins. The team is being led by Seniors Trevor Tassi, DeSean Mundell and Joshua McShane. Rounding out the starting five are Juniors Adin Borden and James Schroth. Others playing significant minutes are Tyler Mecca, Austin Tassi, and Eric Schorr.
The Audubon Girls Winter Track Team earned the Silver Medal at the NJSIAA Group One Relay Championships in the 4x800 meter race. The team of Megan Anstotz, Alison Guldin, Julia Pugliese, and Kelly Vogt ran a time of 10:01.64, breaking the school record (indoor and outdoor) for the event. The time also met the US Milesplit standard for national ranking.
The Audubon Wrestling Team is having another competitive season in spite of the fact that it is a rebuilding year at all levels, All of the wrestlers are training hard and improving every day. As of the writing of this newsletter, the team is preparing for the end of the season tournaments. Thanks to the Audubon Community for continuing to support this program.
AHS Senior Athletes accept offers to play. Signing to play sports at Division I schools are Andrew Schorr who will be playing Baseball at East Carolina, and Megan Anstotz who will be playing Field Hockey at the University of Louisville. We wish Andrew and Megan much success as they continue to play at the college level.
That’s all for now! Look for the Early Spring edition of Points of Pride prior to spring break. The deadline for the next issue is April 30.
Forward items to me at smckenna@audubonschools.org.