Tuesday, February 21, 2017

Jared Conant honored as MDA State Ambassador


On Friday, February 10th, Jared Conant's classmates had the privilege of joining an award ceremony to honor him for his work as the Maine State Ambassador for the Muscular Dystrophy Association.
 
Jared Conant and Casey Bunker
Casey Bunker, from the Portland Fire Department, presented Jared with his own fire fighter boot on behalf of the International Association of Fire Fighters. The boot represents their gratitude to Jared for his hours of charity work and assistance with their "Fill the Boot" campaign. Casey's speech outlined Jared's impressive efforts and singular dedication to this work.
 
Ashley King, the Executive Director of the Maine Muscular Dystrophy Association, was unable to attend the presentation. Mike Hagerty read Ashley's speech to Jared and his seventh grade peers. Jared's classmates learned about his tireless efforts and perseverance to raise money and bring awareness to this cause, and celebrated his unwavering commitment to his role as the MDA Maine State Ambassador. 
 
Mike Hagerty, Jared Conant and Casey Bunker
It was a privilege to have Jared's dad, Barry Conant, in attendance at this presentation. Jared and Barry will continue their important work together. We were honored to participate in this special recognition of Jared and his work on behalf of the MDA. 
 
Here's more information about what Jared has been up to:





 

Monday, February 20, 2017

Freya Lutz-Mountain's painting chosen for Youth Art Month

Freya Lutz-Mountain's "West Coast Cliff

HMS Art teacher, Mike Hickey, shared this exciting news about an upcoming art show:

Freya Lutz Mountain's piece,"West Coast Cliff", was chosen for display at the Youth Art Month show, sponsored by The Maine Art Education Association and the Portland Museum of Art. Congratulations to Freya!

You can see this special exhibition by student artists at the Portland Museum of Art from March 1st through April 2nd. The opening reception will take place on Saturday, March 11, from 4:00 to 7:30pm. Presentation of Certificates of Participation will take place during this reception. 

Oliva Bailey is published in KidSpirit

Congratulations to Olivia Bailey on her most recent piece published by KidSpirit, a magazine that reaches around the world!

Olivia Bailey
Dear Olivia,


Congratulations! Your Media review Red and Blue: A Review of The Martian is now live on KidSpirit as part of our winter issue on Mysteries of the Universe.  We encourage you to share the link with your family, friends, and wider community. We've also promoted it on social media - please check out our Facebook and Twitter pages and like/share/retweet the posts if you'd like to!


Thank you so much for all your work on this wonderful piece. We look forward to publishing more of your work soon!

Best wishes,
Jessie

Jessie Post
Managing Editor
KidSpirit Magazine & KidSpirit Online


Monday, February 13, 2017

2017 Scholastic Writing Awards

We want to recognize and thank all of our students who submitted pieces to Scholastic this year. We appreciate your writing and your decision to share it in this way!

We're thrilled to announce the following Scholastic Writing Awards. Gold Key recipients are submitted to the national pool. There will be an awards ceremony to honor these students in March-more information about that soon.
Top Row: Callie Meehan, Evan Lucca, Parker Harnett, Anushka Canfield, Patrick Bergen
Bottom Row: Amelia Watt, Connor Wolf, Soleil Fournier, Avi Singh
Congratulations to these students on this outstanding achievement, which requires time, dedication and perseverance. Thanks to Ms. Agell, Mrs. Smith, Mrs. Kilpatrick, Mr. Martin, Mr. Shardlow and Mr. Warshaw for their support of these students.

Gold Key:
Patrick Bergen, Memoir
Anushka Canfield, Short Story
Evan Lucca, Poetry

Silver Key:
Parker Harnett, Poetry
Evan Lucca, Memoir
Amelia Watt: Memoir, also Critical Essay
(Lulu Rasor/poetry/now in high school!)

Honorable Mention:
Soleil Fournier, Memoir
Callie Meehan, Novel Writing (our only 7th grader)
Avi Singh: Critical Essay
Conor Wolff: Memoir


5/6 Math Team Update

Sebastien Martinez
Thanks to Barbara Ellis for sharing the latest news from our 5/6 Math Team:
On Thursday, February second, the following 5th and 6th grade students represented HMS at the second annual Southern Maine Elementary Math League meet in Portland. Sebastien Martinez placed fifth overall for his grade level and received a ribbon. Congratulations to these students for proudly representing our school!

Sixth Grade Team
Harper Fremont-Smith
Liam Hickey
Stuart Baybutt
Truman Peters
William Best
Joshua Leinwand
 

Sixth Grade Alternate Team 
John Raymond
Logan Beaupre 
Grace Shi
Emily Densmore 

Nate Hagedorn J
ohnny Cody
 

Fifth Grade Team  
Norah Mills
Milo Sanokklis 
Addy Letz 
Sebastien Martinez 
Anna Dickinson

Second and Sixth Grade Students' Winter Reading Festival


Thanks to Merry Stuhr for sharing this special update from the HMS Library:
 
On January 25th, YES 2nd graders walked to HMS to join the 6th grade class for their first-ever Winter Reading Festival! Students were paired together to read books, make snowman bookmarks and fold origami penguins. Good books and good buddies-it doesn't get better than that! Based on the smiles on all of the faces, the event was a literary hit! 
 

A special thanks to the second and 6th grade teams and the parent volunteers who stepped forward to help during the time the two grades spent together.  

Saturday, February 4, 2017

District II Honors Choral Festival


 
2017 District II Honors Choral Participants
 Thirty 7th and 8th grade choral students were selected, through individual auditions in October, to participate in the 2017 District II Honors Middle School Chorus.

It took hours of hard work, perseverance and dedication to reach this goal! We congratulate these students on this achievement and their outstanding work at the festival.

Our thanks to Mrs. Grover for the time, mentorship, guidance (and wonderful photos!) she provided for these students as they prepared for this event. 

Relaxing!

DII Honors Choral Participants:

7th Sopranos
Fiona Brown
Hillary Connor
Maddie Emrich-Shanks 

Maren Found
Lexi Inger
Tori Kendeigh
Caroline Meehan 

Maya Panozzo
Elena Schlax


7th Altos
Marin Cowell
Ella Doxsee
Olivia May
Delaney McDonough 

Emily Mickool

7th Baritones
Jasper Chappell
Jared Conant
Isaac Grondin
Krisztian Kovacs
Tyler Lucca
Nicolas Mogul-Campbell 

Galen Skinner
Milo Wiebus

8th Soprano
Eleanor Zimmerman

8th Altos
Izabel Cox-Faxon 
Lydia Dustin 
Abigail Hill
Calin McGonagle


8th Baritones
Miles Hagedorn 
Max Kemplar 
Evan Lucca

HMS/Clipper Pride!

7th/8th Grade Math Team Update


Jay Harrington, 7th/8th Math Team Advisor Extraordinaire, shared this exciting update about the HMS team's recent event:

On Thursday, 2.2, the 7th & 8th Grade Math Teams went to the Holiday Inn by the Bay to compete in the Southern Maine Math League's second meet of the year.

The 7th Grade team, featuring Elena Miller, Georgia Herr, Emily Mickool, Ty Lucca, Milo Wiebus, and Galen Skinner could not match their first place finish from the first meet. They still had a solid showing, finishing 12th overall.

The 8th Grade team, featuring only Evan Lucca (8th grade students, please join us!), was not competitive in the team rankings. However, Evan did very well, scoring in 2nd place individually! 

Evan Lucca
As you can see in this photo, the seventh graders were a little jealous of Evan's hardware : )
 
Emily Mickool, Galen Skinner, Milo Wiebus, Evan Lucca, Ty Lucca, Georgia Herr, and Elena Miller

We thank these students for their efforts; we're looking forward to our next meet on Pi Day!

The Library Hosts a Magical Harry Potter Night


 
Harry Potter Night Begins....
The HMS Library hosted a special evening event on February 2nd,  International Harry Potter Book Night!

Students hoping to attend had to complete THREE Triwizard Tournament Tasks and submit them to the Goblet of Fire in the HMS Library. The Goblet then determined who would be allowed to enter this magical experience! 

The Goblet ignored the high number of parents and staff vying for a spot and determined that all of the students who completed the Triwizard Tournament were welcome!

Thank you to Merry Stuhr, Tracy Weinrich, and Nancy Castonia  for creating this most unique,  wonder-filled, and awe inspiring event!


Students are eagerly awaiting next year's celebration!

2017 HMS Spelling Bee

 
2017 HMS Spelling Bee Participants
We want to recognize and thank all of the students who participated in the 2017 Spelling Bee for their outstanding efforts! They worked hard and supported each other through this challenging event!

Congratulations to Sarah Dressel and Stefan Bell, HMS Spelling Bee champions and to Laney McDonough, who earned the alternate spot.
 
Sarah and Stefan distinguished themselves at the County Spelling Bee! Sarah made it through six challenging rounds and Stefan ended the bee in second place out of 25 spellers, a close match against the 2016 County Bee champion.
Mrs. Kilpatrick, Sarah Dressel, Stefan Bell, and Mrs. Smith  






Well done Sarah and Stefan!
 
Our thanks to Mrs. Kilpatrick for planning and implementing all aspects of the Bee and accompanying Sarah and Stefan to the County Bee and to Mrs. Smith for her expert facilitation of the Bee.

HMS Spelling Bee Participants:

Stefan Bell-8th Grade

Ella Brown-5th Grade

Sarah Dressel-6th Grade

Cooper Israel-6th Grade

Jack Janczuk-5th Grade

Laney McDonough-7th Grade

Jack McGrath-8th Grade

Zoe Siegel-8th Grade

HMS 2017 Geography Bee


 
HMS 2017 Geo Bee Participants 
 We want to thank the 2017 HMS Geo Bee participants for their hard work during this year's bee. We admire and respect their calm approach under pressure, their support of each other, and the knowledge and skill they demonstrated in their responses to the extremely challenging Geo Bee questions.

Congratulations and best wishes to:

-Evan Lucca-this year's winner of the school Geo Bee-this is the second year in a row that Evan has held the top spot!

-Sutter Auger-who earned second place-Sutter will serve as alternate.

-Jared Conant-who earned third place.

We're inspired by your efforts!
Ms. Agell, Evan Lucca and Sutter Augur
Evan has completed the National Geo Bee online Qualifying Test. This test will be scored and ranked with the scores of other students from Maine who have taken the test. We'll keep you posted on Evan's progress with this phase of the competition.

Our thanks to Ms. Rice for her work planning and implementing all aspects of the Geo Bee, and to Ms. Agell for her expert facilitation of the Bee!

HMS 2017 Geo Bee Participants

8th Grade
Anna Pires
Ashley Allen
Evan Lucca
Evan Van Lonkhuyzen 

Cameron Todd
Jack Vigue

7th Grade
Steven Densmore 
Jared Conant
Olivia Bradford
Maddie Emrich-Shanks 

Oscar O'Donnell
Sutter Auger