Singapore American School May 20, 2011 www.saseye.com Vol. 30 No. 6 the eye Alcohol Survey Truly Anonymous Says Dr. Devens See story online at www.saseye.com Turn page to see SAS’s reaction to one laptop under every arm Where in the Wordle are they going? Senior’s college list on pg 8 Research doesn’t support admin decision on uniforms. Read on pg 15 To premiere during the June 2 graduation ceremony, the senior video was shot throughout two days. Seniors dressed up during their free periods to create a music video to Kanye West’s “Power.” Photo by Sam Conrad Senior Power Junior Dominique Pratt uses her Macbook Pro in her History of China class while teacher Kristin O’Connor lectures. Photo by Anbita Siregar Seniors decked out in red for the senior video titled “Power.” Photo by Sam Conrad A student in the library is out of dress code. He wore a sweatshirt around school to conceal his crime. Photo by Leo De Velez Dr. Jeff Devens shows Eye Online reporter Freshman Greyson Harness the results from the anonymous survey sent out to all high school students. Photo by Tan Kabra www.saseye.com • 40 Woodlands St. 41, Singapore 738547 • www.sas.edu.sg/hs • (65) 6363 3404 • MICA (P) 091/05/2011
Transcript
Singapore American School May 20, 2011www.saseye.com Vol. 30 No. 6the eye Alcohol Survey Truly Anonymous Says Dr. Devens
See story online at www.saseye.com
Turn page to see SAS’s reaction to one laptop under every arm Where in the Wordle are they going? Senior’s
college list on pg 8Research doesn’t support admin decision on uniforms. Read on pg 15
To premiere during the June 2 graduation ceremony, the senior video was shot throughout two days. Seniors dressed up during their free periods to create a music video to Kanye West’s “Power.” Photo by Sam Conrad
Senior Power
Junior Dominique Pratt uses her Macbook Pro in her History of China class while teacher Kristin O’Connor lectures. Photo by Anbita Siregar Seniors decked out in red for the senior video titled “Power.” Photo by Sam Conrad
A student in the library is out of dress code. He wore a sweatshirt around school to conceal his crime. Photo by Leo De Velez
Dr. Jeff Devens shows Eye Online reporter Freshman Greyson Harness the results from the anonymous survey sent out to all high school students. Photo by Tan Kabra
By Becky KreutterAt the beginning of the 2010-2011 school year, the
high school inaugurated its one-to-one laptop program. According to the Student Handbook, students in grades nine to 12 are required to “own a laptop as a necessary tool for our academic program” (page 42).
“We want students to have access anytime, any-where to information and to learning that is going on around the world,” high school Principal Dr. Timothy Stuart said.
Access to more research, though not all credible
Dr. Stuart said that when he was in school, research meant combing through books in a library and compil-ing note cards, tasks which didn’t give him as much breadth as students have today.
“You have access to thousands and thousands of papers and research that’s been written on that particu-lar topic, so it’s not just three books,” Dr. Stuart said. “That’s power.”
While having such a range of information gives students more options in their research, they must learn to separate the good resources from the bad - a skill not as necessary when students pulled research from published books.
Students have not been the only beneficiaries of the depth of resources on the Internet. Teachers have been able to in-corporate information from the web into their courses.
Science Department Chair Dennis Steigerwald said that having laptops in class has differentiated his teaching and made it more student-centered. Steigerwald said he is able to use not only traditional lectures in class, but also videos, visuals and interactive content from the web.
Steigerwald is not the only teacher to see an increase in variety thanks to laptops. One teacher who responded to The Eye’s One-to-One survey commented that com-puters gave teachers the opportunity to get instant feed-back from students as well as students to get feedback from each other. The teacher mentioned blogs, Wikis, social bookmarking, and YouTube as just some of the programs available to students before adding, “I think technology can give a learner control over what they learn and I love it!”
But have learning and teaching really changed?
Not all students have felt the effects of differenti-ated learning. Junior Dominique Pratt, who moved from a paperless school in Bombay, said there is noth-ing she does with her laptop in class that she couldn’t do without one. Pratt uses her laptop mainly to take notes during class which she said has helped her stay more organized.
“You can always take notes on a piece of paper,” Pratt added.
Senior Barbara Hoffer does just that. “For most classes, laptops are optional, but I just
prefer to use paper and pen to take my notes. It’s just easier,” Hoffer said.
Some teachers agree that not much has changed with the addition of laptops.
“A lap top is just a tool, no more and no less. I don’t think it has changed my teaching or how I do things in any way,” one teacher respondent to The Eye survey
said.Another teacher felt that the time and effort spent
researching ways to use laptops in class was not justifi-able if the research will not improve the class.
“Finding something requiring the use of a laptop takes considerable time and research and is not always a better way to teach many of the topics I need to teach in my field.”
Deputy Principal Lauren Mehrbach said the ad-ministration realizes that the laptop is simply a tool for learning.
“We never expected that every class would be using computers every day. That’s not our goal and that’s not realistic,” Mehrbach said. “That would almost be det-rimental, trying to force teachers to use something like that when it’s not an appropriate tool.”
A variety of brands leads to a variety of problems
One of the early challenges of the program was the mixed platform, mixed brand program SAS uses. This means that students not only work off of two platforms, Windows and Mac, but also own a variety of brands that use Windows.
While the mixed platform model was chosen to allow students to use the type of computer they felt more comfortable with, teachers encoun-tered problems with getting projects to run smoothly, particularly if teach-ers themselves weren’t used to the new technology. Many teachers had to scrap projects because of techno-logical glitches.
“Because it is the first year, teach-ers have different levels of proficiency when it comes to computer use... And that’s okay,” Dr. Stuart said.
One teacher who responded to the survey said, “Good teachers are going to teach well, bad teachers are going to teach badly, in spite of the technology.”
Teachers will have to adapt to teaching with com-puters, though Steigerwald said that the administration acknowledges different teaching styles and encourages the use of technology without mandating it.
In the past all teachers had to use Lenovo laptops which they may or may not have been familiar with. For next year, teachers were allowed to switch to Macs if they preferred. As a result, about 70 percent of teachers next year will use Macs in class.
HS Technology Coordinator, Jay Atwood, said that while the computer itself doesn’t change teaching, the more comfortable teachers are with their tools, the more they can innovate. If teachers know how to make a pod-cast or blog, they can incorporate that into their teach-ing.
Training teachers in technology
For teachers who don’t know how to make a pod-cast or blog, training is available. Training for teachers so far has been teacher-motivated, not top down from the administration.
Atwood, said that teachers who wanted to learn how to incorporate technology into the classroom had three options this year.
Teachers looking to broaden their skill set could at-tend once-a-month, after-school sessions or they could attend shorter sessions during the day. But Atwood said the majority of training that the IT office does is, what he labels “just-in-time training.”
Teachers who wanted to do a specific project with
technology came to the IT office with the project when they needed it. Atwood said the office has helped teach-ers use Skype, iMovie, QuestionPress and other appli-cations in their classrooms.
Temptations in Facebook, YouTube, Skype, more
Perhaps the biggest change teachers will have to make will be in classroom management, in particular making sure students don’t become too distracted by Internet focus-zappers like Skype and Facebook.
Atwood, who also has a background as a psycholo-gy teacher, said, “Students have this false idea that they can multitask and pay attention to what’s happening on Facebook as well as what’s going on in class, and it just doesn’t work.”
While Pratt agrees that students need to have self-control in class to stay off Facebook, she said she be-lieves some blame for heavy Facebook work falls on teachers. Pratt said teachers could better control Face-book by walking around in the back of the class and enforcing the screens-down approach.
Steigerwald found another way to see if students were using Facebook in class.
“Watch their eyes,” Steigerwald said. “They have not only a different expression, but also they are look-ing at a different place on the screen if they’re typing and writing.”
While he admits that he finds kids on Facebook all the time, Steigerwald said that in the biology program the laptop is integral to the assignments which keeps kids on task.
Yet Eye survey results show students are more dis-tracted by Facebook than teachers think. According to the Eye survey whose results are shown in SAS in Numbers, most teachers thought only a small minority of students used Facebook during class. However, the survey showed that almost two-thirds of students used Facebook during class.
Looking to the future
Atwood said the responsibility to focus in class rests with the students. Atwood said teachers cannot be ex-pected to police students’ screens so students must learn to manage their own time wisely.
“Facebook is still going to be there when you are done with class,” Atwood said.
Multi-platform program problems are bound to arise on a campus as large as SAS, but Atwood said he expects things to improve over the next few years as the program is perfected.
“We’re all kind of guinea pigs right now,” Atwood said. “We can’t expect things to change overnight.”
One teacher wrote, “To label the program as a fail-ure or success at this point would be short sighted. We need to be patient and grow with this amazing oppor-tunity.”
Mehrbach agreed with this view.“This year was more about letting teachers try it
out, see what works, what succeeds and what fails,” she said.
Dr. Stuart shares Mehrbach’s and Atwood’s long-term views and said that, as the program is perfected, both teaching and learning will change for the better.
“It is our absolute responsibility to equip our stu-dents to be successful and competitive in the 21st cen-tury and using technology is part of that,” Dr. Stuart said. “We’ve got to stop calling it the ‘one-to-one initi-ative’...Technology is here to stay, it is not going away.”
One year in: One-to-OneAfter one year with laptops, feelings about the program are mixed
Dr. Timothy Stuart”“It is our absolute
responsibility to equip our students
to be successful and competitive in the 21st century and
using technology is part of that.
“If you’re asking me if technology
has helped improve my
relationship with students, I would
say no. The personal touch is
missing.”
1:1
“We are a school; we are not an
internet cafe.”
“I think technology can
give a learner control over what
they learn and I love it!”
In an Eye survey about one-to-one’s first year, teachers were given a chance to make
comments about the change. All comments
were anonymous. These are a few.
“With wireless connections we are able to work in the class and
other locations on campus. This is
a lot better than working out of å computer lab.”
Social Studies teacher Jason Adkison uses a projector to lecture his class while stuents take notes on laptops. Other interactive technology used in SAS include Blackboard and Powerschool. Photo by Leo De Velez
Students work on their laptops for a collaborative project in Social Studies teacher Jason Adkison’s class.Photo by Leo De Velez There’s an ongoing debate between SAS students on which is
better: Mac or PC. Photo by Leo De Velez
2 May 20, 2011the eye
Brief
s
By Becky KreutterAll IASAS athletes will converge on Woodlands in
October for the 30th anniversary of IASAS, the Interscho-lastic Association of Southeast Asian Schools. SAS will host soccer, volleyball and cross-country teams from all six IASAS schools.
Activities and Athletics Director Mimi Molchan said she asked to host this event three years ago after seeing the success of the 25th anniversary celebration of IASAS at SAS. She began planning the event in November of last year when she began getting schedules together and thinking of T-shirt designs.
While Molchan generally has little trouble securing enough housing for an IASAS event, housing 396 athletes requires both this year’s third-season athletes and first-season athletes next year to pitch in.
To ensure the event runs smoothly, Molchan said she expects all freshmen, JV and varsity teams in first-season sports to house athletes from other schools.
“If you are going to do activities out of our office, hous-ing is a responsibility that goes with the privilege of partici-pating in the programs,” Molchan said.
The freshmen and JV players will also help to run the event as part of the Athletic Council.
In addition to first-season IASAS, SAS will also host Cultural Debate and Forensics in March and IASAS softball in April.
All sports here first season 2011
By Bram XuTwo weeks ago, Morning Show hosts announced the
posting of QR codes around campus as part of a school-wide scavenger hunt. Quick response, or QR codes, are a new type of barcode that can be read by QR readers which can be downloaded as an app on a smartphone. The reader translates the image to an action, such as sending an SMS, opening a hyperlink or a message.
The scavenger hunt was set up by a group of stu-dents in Diana Pratt’s Emerging Computer Technologies class. Not all of the QR codes are with the scavenger hunt though. For example, the ones outside the bathroom door open up surveys to rate that bathroom.
Pratt and her class thought QR codes could be used check the daily schedule, to get the homework, or to get the citation of a book by scanning a code printed inside the book.
QR codes, the new bar code
By Gretchen ConnickAs tradition requires, Islander adviser Tate Sonnack
and the yearbook staff stayed silent on the Islander theme until the books were delivered. He offered only a hint last week.
“Your journey through high school has its twists and turns,” Sonnack said.
Pressed to reveal the cover design, he added, “You’re asking all these questions I can’t tell you.You’ll have to wait to find out.”
Students have taken delivery of almost 1300 of the square-formatted books, an Islander first, with cutout three-by-three letters spelling the theme, “Labyrinth,” on the cover.
It is not surprising that Sonnack feels so strongly about extending the suspense for as long as possible. This is Sonnack’s fifth Islander. He was sophomore editor for the 2001 Islander, co editor-in-chief his junior and senior years; this is his second and last year adviser. Sonnack finishes a two-year internship in June (see profile, pages )
Islander 2011 takes new shape
3the eyeMay 20, 2011
By Viraj BindraAt approximately 10:40 in the morning on May 2, 2011, the
Internet exploded with tweets, facebook statuses, and news up-dates all containing one name: Osama Bin Laden.
The death of the Al Qaeda leader came as a result of Unit-ed States’ military action authorized by President Obama, who subsequently made an announcement of the operation once he was satisfied that the body had been identified with certainty.
As groups of Americans began loud cheering in the streets at places such as the White House and Ground Zero, students in our school all reacted in different ways.
Some were perfectly ambivalent.“I didn’t care” junior Ishan Krishan said. “It
didn’t impact my life in any way”Others were positively exuberant.“It was awesome” sophomore Alex Berenger
said, “A lot of people had been waiting a long time for this day, and so they were all really happy to see the end of the leader of such a terrifying terrorist group.”
This cathartic experience was prominent through-out social media forums at the time. Facebook sta-tuses included “10 years later, 2977 souls finally avenged” and “People outside the White House are cheering ‘USA! USA!’ haha.” Others simply an-nouncing Osama’s death were met by witty, relieved comments such as “Thank goodness, now I can fly again.”
This fervor, however, soon died down.“Initially, I was really happy” said sophomore
Rohan Bharvani. “But when I saw people celebrating
and cheering, that felt wrong. It’s hypocritical for those people to celebrate death, even the death of someone like Osama.”
David Sirota, left-wing opinion columnist for Salon.com ar-ticulated this view in an online article criticizing the American response to Bin Laden’s death.
“This is bin Laden’s lamentable victory” Sirota said. “He has changed America’s psyche from one that saw violence as a regrettable-if-sometimes-necessary act into one that finds orgas-mic euphoria in news of bloodshed. In other words, he’s helped drag us down into his sick nihilism by making us like too many
other bellicose societies in history -- the ones that ag-gressively cheer on killing, as long as it is the Bad Guy that is being killed.”
Overall, students seem to be adopting a more long-term outlook on recent events.
“I don’t really feel safer in general” senior Gainya St. Clair said. “Unprovoked violence will still keep happening, especially now that Osama’s supporters will be angry. Politically, I think this might end up helping Obama in his campaign, but only because of shortsighted swing votes.”
This question of the effect Bin Laden’s death might have on Obama’s re-election has become a hot topic in the American media, and some students seem to think that the incident will entice the public to vote Obama.
“Yes, I think people will be more inclined to vote for Obama now,” Bharvani said. “But wrongfully so. One incident shouldn’t define a presidency.”
Others thought that the President’s actions did not merit credit.
“Obama had nothing to do with it” Krishan said. “The United States has been trying to get Bin Laden for ten years now. Obama did nothing on his own, and I don’t think that he’ll be re-elected just because of this.”
Berenger said when questioned about the impact of Osama’s death, “Let’s just wait and see.”
People gather in Times Square may 2, 2011 shortly after the announcement from the President Obama announced that Al-Qaida mastermind Osama bin Laden was dead and the United States has his body. Bin Laden was killed in a mansion close to Islamabad. Photo by TIMOTHY A. CLARY/AFP/Getty Images)
Pakistani protestors shout slogans against the US President Barack Obama for eroding Pakistan’s sovereignty with its operation to eliminate Osama bin Laden, during a protest in Multan on May 6, 2011. Hundreds of Pakistanis took to the streets on May 6, cheering Osama bin Laden and shout-ing ‘death to America’ to condemn a unilateral US raid on their soil that killed the Al-Qaeda chief. Photo by S S MIRZA/AFP/Getty Images)
Students’ reactions vary in wake of Al Qaeda leader’s deathSome confessed indifference, others relief or caution. Reactions to cheering crowds disturb some.
4 May 20, 2011the eye
Forget Big Brother, Facebook is watching
An Eye Staff Editorial
Our parents had it easy. When they drank underage - and parents, don’t try to deny that you didn’t make our same mis-takes - there were no blurry Facebook pictures to remind them just how much they drank. With no videos narrated in slurred voices and no images of compromising situations, the proof of their deeds disappeared as quickly as the hangovers.
But our misdeeds last forever. One drink too many and the whole Facebook community knows. It only takes one Black-berry instant upload to change a reputation. Who among us hasn’t engaged in some harmless Facebook stalking? We love to see what other people are up to, and let’s admit it, judge them for the choices they’ve made.
But why should we care about a few blurry pictures? With the News Feed’s continuous updates, the pictures will soon be buried deep in the Facebook picture wilderness. Nobody looks past the first few pages of pictures anyway. Right?
Maybe nobody today looks past the first few pictures. But the bad choices we get away with today could come back to hurt us in the future. The Internet lasts forever. We may laugh off our nights in the morning, but we could be staring at that incriminating picture years down the road, way after we’ve for-gotten we even looked like that.
The incidences of Internet dirt hurting careers rises each year. And it isn’t just politicians and Miss America who need to be concerned. Inappropriate pictures, videos, comments and statuses are diligently filed away wherever Facebook goes when we aren’t looking at it. A skilled investigator, or an ama-teur stalker can pull up that information in minutes.
Once, allegations from the past pitted one person’s word against another’s. No more.
But even if we want to take that evidence down, we can’t. Only the person who posted it has the right to remove it which leads to the question of blame. Our generation is no crazier than the last; the difference is the proof of our wild times stays online forever. So perhaps we shouldn’t blame kids for being kids, but should blame the photographer for the evidence.
In a world of a billion cameras, a billion eyes ready to cap-ture each moment of our lives, the bad ones are bound to make it to the Internet. Anyone who tries to sidestep every photo will find themselves in an exhausting game of hopscotch for eter-nity.
No, the problem can’t be solved by expecting every adoles-cent to act their age, underage, and it can’t be solved by avoid-ing every amateur paparazzi. However, it can be lessened with a collective agreement to share photos, laugh at the good mo-ments, cringe at the bad, and then take the photos off the web.
Editor-in-chief: Sophia Cheng, Managing editors-in-chief: Phil Anderson, Gretchen Connick, Anbita Siregar, Op/ed editor: Becky Kreutter, A&E edi-tor: Olivia Ngyuen, Sports editor: Hannah L’Heureux, Layout editor: Jen-nie Park, Photo editor: Leonel De Velez, Reporters: Phil Anderson, Viraj Bindra, Sophia Cheng, Gretchen Connick, Leonel De Velez, Erica Huston, Rachel Jackson, Becky Kreutter, Hannah L’Heureux, Emily Nelson, Olivia Ngyuen, Ash Oberoi, Jennie Park, Anbita Siregar, Tyler Stuart, Megan Talon, Michael Too, Adviser: Mark Clemens; Synergy Chief: Viraj Bindra
The Eye is the student newspaper of the Singapore American School. All opinions within these pages are those of their respective writers and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of the Singapore American School, its board of governors, PTA, faculty or administration. Comments and suggestions can be sent to the Eye via the email address, [email protected]. At the author’s request, names can be withheld form publication. Letters will be printed as completely as possible. The Eye reserves the right to edit letters for reasons of taste and space.
the eyeSingapore American School40 Woodlands Street 41Republic of Singapore 738547Phone: (65) 6363-3404Fax: (65) [email protected]
All-American
PacemakerGold Award
International First Place
Jennie Park
When I was in kin-dergarten, f i r e m e n visited my
school. They showed us pictures of the cool pole they got to slide down day and night, and they shared stories of courage. One word came to mind: awesome. In kindergarten, I resolved to be a fire-man. When I was in second grade, I wanted to be a vet on the basis that puppies were adorable and I didn’t want them to die.
In middle school, after watching “Almost Famous” for the first time, I wanted to be William Miller, a young writer for The Rolling Stone. I wanted to meet famous musicians and share good music with the world.
I thought about these past ambi-tions about a month ago, when I was deciding what I wanted to major in. I chuckled to myself. Obviously I could never be a fireman, I mean, it is fireman not firewoman - that is mere-
ly the patriarchal society we live in. A vet? I would be the butt of all jokes. “Jennie can’t even be a real people doctor.”
Ah, but surely journalism would be a suitable career. Oh wait-- no one reads anymore.
This negativity crept into my mind almost instantly. But I realized, this wasn’t negativity at all, rather, something society has taught me to think.
This mindset is what caused me to consider a major other than litera-ture, despite literature being my first love. I began to look into business and economics because, in my mind, these presented themselves to me as practical majors with promise for my future.
But I was never a second grader who dreamt of sitting in a cubicle doing the bidding of some faceless corporation. Yet still, I weigh them as options for my future because I’m scared. In fact, we’re all scared.
We fear inadequacy, not making
money, and most of all, failure. But no one wants an “okay” life. We want adjectives like “robust” and “titillat-ing” and “marvelous.”
But instead, we settle for some-thing “safe” rather than something that makes us happy. When I was younger, I never thought of pursuing a career that was “safe.” My career ambitions were based solely on how much I liked them. But one would say, “You were naive then, you didn’t know any better.” But sometimes, I wish I had never lost my naiveté. It is in this way, that youngsters are in-finitely wiser than us. They lack the fear that society will later instill in them - a fear of failure.
So graduating class, hold fast to third-grade dreams. It may seem idealistic, but if there is any time to take risks, it’s now, because we have ample room to make them. All of us have the capacity to dream but I know that all of us also have the capacity to make those dreams a reality.
Third grade dreams may have been best career adviceFear of failure sends us in safe directions
Sophia Cheng
In an age of easy uploads, pictures posted today might hurt us in tomorrow’s job market
Editor’s Note
If you are reading this, that means the Eye team has actually managed to finish the sixth and final issue for the 2010-2011 school year.
Now that it has come to an end, I can’t help but wonder if all the effort we’ve put into the paper was worth it. Putting together a 16-page paper is not an easy task. Every story you read has been subjected to countless drafts. Editors spend weekends laying out till the only creatures left in the Media Lab are roaches and geckos.
Have we achieved our goals?
Newspapers, on a professional level, should be diligent and unbi-ased. Their ultimate goal should be to inform readers with what they need to know, not always what they want to know. These are the characteristics that separate newspapers from tab-loid magazines, that separate news-papers from the Internet blogs. What ultimately separates great journalism from the mediocre is substance – the ability to inform, enlighten, persuade, entertain and to some degree, influ-ence readers at the same time.
The Eye is no Huffington Post or New York Times. We do not publish
daily, or monthly even. We do not have the power to influence world events or political decisions. We do not have a professional staff of sever-al hundred. But as I flip through other high school newspapers, I realized we are better at what we do than many of the high school press.
We have stories covering most aspects of high school, or so we try. We touch on sensitive subjects such as anorexia. Our reporters have inter-viewed not just fellow students and teachers, but also best-selling authors and executives. We go on excursions around Singapore for first hand infor-mation – whether it’s checking out a particular restaurant or evaluating public transportation.
Most importantly, the Eye has proven itself an influential member of the SAS community. It has become a forum where students can voice their opinion and actually be heard.
Articles influence policy
Take our staff editorial in the first issue as an example. The piece examined, closely, some of our foul restrooms – “For a top-tier institu-tion, SAS has some bottom-rung re-strooms. The point is, the toilets seem plagued with problems, yet nothing is being done.”
The result? Facilities reacted im-mediately and effectively. Restrooms are now scrubbed down every fort-night instead of every month, ventila-tion fans were repaired, standards and methods of cleaning bathrooms were reviewed and twenty-seven air fresh-eners were put to work to get rid of the smell. In short, cleaner and better bathrooms.
In issue three, our staff editorial touched on the issue of unheeded stu-dent voices in SAS – “For some rea-son the administration seems hesitant to ask students their opinions about upcoming changes.” The result? A series of forums led by Dr. Stuart for students to voice their opinion on is-sues such as drug policy and breatha-lyzers. More than 15 percent of the high school population attended.
Room for improvement
We must learn how to be keen
observers. We must learn how to take on controversy responsibly. We must learn how to really report the truth – even if it means offending teachers or administrators.
We have been working towards that this year. In issue four, we wrote an editorial about interim spon-sors’ behaviors: “Reports of spon-sors drinking and smoking in front of kids or choosing to ignore the ac-tions of students who did so, surfaced this year.” Although we didn’t name names, the article enraged many teachers – some expressing their an-ger at our adviser, Mr. Clemens. Were we wrong for publishing the article?
The goal of the article was to of-fer a perspective while reporting the truth. The piece was well researched and everything was based on first hand information and investigation. We report student misbehaviors, and we should report teacher misbehav-iors that endanger students as well – in the most respectful way possible. Our goal is to be fair and unbiased, not one-sided.
Growing as a writer and reporter
While finishing up my final issue, I reflected upon my two years as a student writer and reporter – fourteen issues, countless late-night sessions and too many McDeliveries.
What have I really learned? What has working with Clemens and the staff taught me?
Plenty. As journalists we must aim to preserve what the printed press values the most – thorough, thought-ful journalism. We must learn how to research and dig, separate rumor from truth, learn how to follow through un-til the story is told in its entirety. It’s a shame that the printed press is a dying industry.
I have learnt the power of infor-mation and how easy it is to manipu-late the crowd.
I have learnt the power of the press to influence, impress and in-form.
Thank you Clemens, for every-thing you’ve taught me. Goodbye Eye, and thanks for an amazing two years.
Senior and Eye reporter Viraj Bindra has aspired to attend Stanford University for the past two years. Stanford University, located in Palo Alto, California, was Bindra’s top choice university, hands-down. But recently a dilemma rose during his decision making; he was consider-ing another university. But this time, it wasn’t because he was particu-larly interested in the university, but instead, the university –Tufts – was particularly interested in him.
Bindra may have been pursuing Stanford for the past two years, but ever since he applied to Tufts, they have been pursuing him – via detailed emails and even friendly “tweets” on Twitter. Stuck between the two col-leges, Bindra had to make a tough decision: choose the college he loves, or choose the college that loves him.
Most colleges require a final decision from admitted students by May 1. Leading up to this date, many seniors have an experience similar to Bindra’s. For Bindra, it was the battle of Stanford’s prestigious reputation ver-sus Tufts’ persistent reach-ing out to him, showing interest in him.
“On one hand, there’s a school I’ve been trying for two years to get to,” Bindra said. “On the other hand, there’s a school who makes me feel accepted and embraced.”
Another graduating student, Alex Wong, wasn’t stuck between two
Choosing may come down to a choice between the school that tops student lists or the school, or schools, that entice students with offers of scholarships, special programs or honors.
schools, but between a school and enlisting in Singapore’s National Ser-vice.
Wong has a six month gap be-tween the time he graduates to the time he is required to report to Na-tional Service. His dilemma was whether it was better to wait in Sin-gapore until NS began or to attend the college offering him a scholarship - Fordham University.
“I’m afraid that if I do not at-tend and then reapply later after NS, I might not get the same scholarship, or it might be less, or might not be of-fered at all,” Wong said.
Wong has considered all the pos-sible scenarios.
“Even if I did online classes be-fore I attend [Fordham], and before NS, I’d have to reapply as a transfer student which, in that case, I might
lose my scholarship,” Wong said.Wong chose to wait on Fordham. Beth Kramer, a junior and sen-
ior counselor, said she works with at least two students every year who are offered scholarships larger than they expected. These students are often influenced by these scholarships even though the colleges weren’t necessar-
ily their first choice.“Choosing a college is a business
decision, as well as a personal like or dislike decision,” Kramer said said she tells students.
“There is so much hype about the college decision process; people think there is a perfect college for them. Just as you are investing money, or making an important purchase, peo-ple compare value. They want to see what they are getting for their money. It’s important to look at the [decision process] not only as an emotional thing, but as a business choice for the whole family.”
A major factor for students and their families, Kramer said, is the family’s financial situation.
“For some families, paying $10,000 less is a big factor.”
Sometimes the fact that the stu-
dent has received a scholarship to a school will persuade them to enroll.
“For other families, [the] pride of getting a large scholarship is also a factor,” Kramer said.
If they aren’t giving out “tuition discounts” – the behind-the-scenes term for scholarships – or consistently keeping in contact with students, col-
leges have many other ways to pro-vide incentives to attend their college. As the commitment deposit deadline date nears, many colleges review where their desired prospective stu-dents are from.They then have current students from their same towns, if not same high schools, contact them.
Some universities hold “admit-ted student events.” Although these are more popular in the U.S., larger private schools like Northeastern, University of Southern California, or Boston University will host these events around Asia. At these events, admitted students have the opportu-nity to socialize with current students and faculty, and learn more about the school.
“[These colleges] invite admitted students to generate excitement for the college,” Kramer said.
Do these attempts to reach out to prospective students prove futile?
“Based on school rank-ings, [Tufts] was my safety school,” Bindra said, “but I [personally] ranked it number two because of the amount of support I feel like I got out of
their interaction with me.”For other students, it is not the is-
sue of feeling embraced but the issue of money. Shoko Oda was the receiv-er of the largest scholarship given to a student at SAS – a fully paid tuition to attend the University of Southern California.
The scholarship she received, ti-
tled the Trustee Scholarship, includes full tuition, and any study abroad ex-penses, excluding room and board.
“Tuition is about $42,000 a year, and the Financial Aid people said it’s constantly increasing. If it increases, [USC] will cover that, too” Oda said.
Oda was accepted into three other colleges; however, George Washing-ton University was the only college that also gave her a scholarship worth an annual $15,000.
“After I got [USC’s] scholarship, it was between USC and Wellseley College, but USC came in a better package because I also got accepted into the Honors General Education,” Oda said.
USC’s Honors General Education is a program in which only 200 en-tering Freshmen, after applying, are chosen to be in. This benefits of this program are smaller classes and bet-ter professors.
Another factor that swayed Oda towards USC is their highly skilled marching band, which recently ap-peared in the popular television se-ries, Glee.
“I’m planning to be in the march-ing band there,” Oda said.
Oda has finally decided to attend USC.
“I guess if they’re giving you a scholarship, if you got into their hon-ors program, and they have some-thing you really want to do, then go for it. They’re literally paying you to go there,” Oda said.
“On one hand, there’s a school I’ve been trying two years to get to; on the other hand, there’s a school I feel accepted and embraced.“-Viraj Bindra, senior
Empty nest takes toll on parentsSeniors move on and leave parents behind. Feelings of loneliness hard to avoid
By Olivia NguyenWhen Josh Abueva graduated from SAS last
year, Redge Abueva put on a smile for her son. Ac-cepted into Notre Dame University, Abueva was excited to live in a dorm, possibly join a frater-nity and meet new people; however, little did Abueva know, his family would miss him immensely.
Although she said she was proud of Josh for the choices he has made, once he left for college Redge Abueva immediately missed her son’s smelly shirts on the floor, the impromptu wrestling matches with his siblings, and the noisy video games he used to play for hours. She also missed being able to talk about his day, and hugging him whenever she felt like.
Anxiety, sleep deprivation, de-pression and excessive crying are all symptoms of ENS, or empty nest syndrome. It is a feeling of depression experienced by parents after their chil-
dren have grown and left home. Often parents can be swamped with feelings of loneliness after their child has departed, and can’t cope with the loss.
“I had always thought I would be ready for Edward (‘10) to leave home to go to college, but the reality was quite different,” Julie O’Connell, mother of two said. “It was strange not knowing what he was doing each day, meeting his new friends and really finding out how he was
adjusting to his new environment.” O’Connell said. Dineen Chapman, mother of three, prepares
herself for her eldest child Taylor (‘11) leaving at the end of this year. “I think the silence will be deafening,” Chapman comment-ed.
Although empty nest syndrome can change parent’s lives, with
time and acceptance, empty nest syndrome can pass, and parents can move forward.
“I knew it was where he should be, and this move was all part of him growing up to be an independent, happy
and successful young man.” Julie O’Connell said.
Also in order to be a part of this s t a g e in their child’s life, Redge Abueva
believes no matter what distance, communication is key for maintaining a strong relationship- “He’s just a bbm away!”
EMPTY NEST SYNDROME: Serious cases of empty nest syndrome can affect a parent’s ability to function in his or her’s daily routine. ENS affects mother more commonly than fathers.
Priyanka Dewan, a 1999 graduate (and former Eye deputy edi-tor is the daughter of former English teacher Dr. Roopa Dewan.
By Gretchen ConnickAs of June 2nd, I will be an SAS
graduate, heading off for college. My friends and teachers know where I’m going and what I’ll be doing, but, when I move out of the house, there is one old friend who will have no clue.
His name is Louie and he is my six-year-old pug. In the midst of making the transition from senior to alumni, it is not difficult to forget about a very important demographic: our furry friends.
Senior Rodrigo Zorrilla is not looking forward to the looming sepa-ration with his Rhodesian Ridgeback, Shaka Zulu.
“My parents know I’ll be back, and I can still talk to them over Sky-pe, but no one is going to take my dog out for runs and no one is going to play with my dog when I’m gone,” Zorrilla said.
Similarly, Senior Torrey Cullen
does not want to leave his bottle cap chewing dog, Rosie. Although he is not upset about no longer having to take her out every morning, Cullen will miss certain aspects of their re-lationship.
“I’ll miss having her at the foot of my bed,” he said.
Pets hold more place in a house-hold than just being a playmate when the time feels right. They are friends and part of the family.
“When I was little I moved a lot, but my dog was always there and now this will be the first time moving with-out my dog,” senior Nick Starr said.
Unlike humans, pets do not under-stand what is going on or why their friend is leaving.
“I probably won’t say goodbye because he won’t understand, but he’ll probably be confused when I don’t come to bed,” Starr said.
Many seniors find the communi-cation barrier between themselves
A peticularly painful good-byeSeniors share their thoughts on leaving behind more than just family
and their pets difficult, but pets do not hold grudges and they love owners unconditionally.
“I guess the way you get along with a little pet is different from the way you get along with your family,” Zorrilla said.
Starr said that having his dog around is relaxing, so that aspect makes leaving sad.
“Whenever I come home, he is waiting at the door for me, and when I leave he sits at the door. I know he doesn’t, but it’s almost as if he sits at the door all day because when I come back he’s right where I left him,” Starr said.
When you leave, what would you like to say to your pet?
“I would say that I’ll see him soon and not to worry, it will all be chill,” Zorrilla said.
“I guess I would say that I love him,” Starr said.
Louie, senior Gretchen Connick’s pet pug, hangs out with her while she fin-ishes her homework, perhaps hoping for a late night snack - of homework. Photo by Gretchen Connick
By Viraj BindraA globetrotter from an early age and an
alumni of Singapore American School, Priya Dewan was recently named in Billboard’s Power Players: 30 Under 30 list, which honored thirty of the most influential young people in the music and record label industry.
The 1999 graduate acknowledges the role that her background played in shaping her ca-reer. Growing up in Philippines and the Sin-gapore before the prominence of the Internet meant that she was not exposed to a lot of mod-ern music until col-lege. In contrast with most people entering the industry, who were generally mu-sic aficionados from a very young age, she had a unique per-spective.
“I think that was kind of advanta-geous, because for me everything was fresh and brand new and I had no precon-ceived notions about what the industry was or what mu-sic should be like,” Dewan said. “So I found a lot of people would get jaded very quickly, and I got to keep my naivety a bit longer”
Dewan said that her mother, former English teacher Dr. Roopa Dewan, also had an impact on her future career choice. While at SAS, Dr. Dewan began Peace Concert, a large-scale musical concert that until recently were sponsored by Peace Initiative each year.
Dewan left Singapore for Boston Univer-sity, where she worked at WTBU, the college’s local radio station. She later became the live music director for the station, which helped her infiltrate what she described as Boston’s “dense, great music scene.” In her senior year she then
interned at Fenway Recordings, and finally joined Warp Records in 2005 where she oper-ates now as the U.S. label manager.
Dewan was selected by Billboard for its annual list of influential figures in the record label industry, and is thankful to the American Association of Independent Music for nominat-ing her. She has been an active member of the AAIM, and describes the experience as a chance to contribute to a field she is passionate about.
Dewan was recently in Singapore for the Laneway performance of !!!, a band signed to
Warp Records. She was impressed with the lo-cal crowds and sees both the Australian and Asian markets as developing independent mu-sic scenes.
In the next three to five years, Dewan hopes to start her own company, ideally in music man-agement. Next time we see her, it might be on the cover of Rolling Stone magazine.
Billboard names alumna to top 30 Under 30 in industry
By Megan TalonIt all started when Deputy Principal Lauren
Mehrbach asked English teacher Andrew Hal-lam to present a Teachers Teaching Teachers session on finance. Hallam finished the session with the observation that an Ivy league college
graduate knew about as much about investing as the average high school sophomore. Hallam says that is when he decided to write the sim-plest finance book possible.
“Since we are not taught how to manage our finances in school, we go into the real world
‘naked in a blizzard,’” Hallam said.He had written articles on fi-
nance before, one for “Money Sense,” another for “Readers Di-gest.” These earned him a finalist spot for two Canadian National Publishing Awards.
Hallam has penty of advice for young, first-time investors: First of all, save money. Second of all don’t borrow money to buy things that lower in value.
“Don’t borrow money to buy a car, borrow money to buy a house. A house increases value over time, a car loses money over time and you will pay a high interest rate for it.”
“The Millionaire Teacher” will be hitting the stores in August in Singapore a month later in Aus-tralia, then on to the U.K. and U.S. around October or November.
“Teaching investment and how to save money is about as hard as grade eighth math, not even. In all likelihood these are the things that can change peoples lives. Its totally simple and its not taught in schools. Its insane that its not taught in school.” Hallam said.
Hallam to take year off from classroom
to promote book
In the Eye’s April issue, the story “Face-book a real drag” made two incongruous state-ments. The first claims that Facebook-using students are “maxing out” Internet connections everyday, and the second maintains that “the school’s Internet traffic rarely exceeds 30 per-cent of... capacity.”
In fact, students are accessing Facebook from 1-3pm everyday, but are only reaching the limit allowed for Facebook access on the school’s network, and not the entire network’s bandwidth.
Also, in the last issue “A modest prom-posal” was left uncredited. The writer of that story was Alex Wong of the Eye On-line.
In the Cultural Convention spread in the last issue one of the photos incorrectly spelled senior Becka Ruan’s name. Our apolo-gies to Becka Ruan.
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where in the wordle are they going?
9the eyeMay 20, 2011
Chemistry teacher, reserve horn player finishing 30th yearBy Ash Oberoi
In his youth, Chemistry teacher Michael Cox thought his future would involve fire trucks and red helmets, but a two year stint with the Peace Corps led him to work with glassware and goggles. Cox wanted to be a fireman when he was younger, but those dreams were replaced with new ones—the ambition to educate classes of screaming teens.
Cox said this dream was so-lidified back in the Sixties in the space of the two years during which he taught in the Peace Corps.
“[When I was a kid] I had no desires to be a teacher. That was something that really cata-lyzed in those two years in the Peace Corps. Those were my first two years away from fam-ily, my first two years outside of the U.S,” he said.
Cox started teaching at SAS in July of 1981. For thirty years he has been teaching
what he calls the “privileged” students at SAS. He recalls these students as “challenging and a very gratifying stu-dent body.”
I think there’s a lot of brilliance here,” he said. Cox said he takes pride in those over-the-top students
who provoke higher levels of discussion and heighten the level of creativity in his classroom.
Outside the walls of his classroom, Cox said he en-joyed playing the french horn in music performances and travelling with the music department on Cultural Conven-tion trips.
“Working with kids in the chemistry class and then sitting with them in the band or orchestra or travelling with them on music trips, you see a whole different perspective,” Cox said.
Cox is moving back home to North-western Ohio to take care of his parents, who are in their 90’s and living alone. He said leaving Singapore was not an easy decision to make since he’s made close friends here and feels he’s leaving behind countless opportunities that Singapore has to offer, such as going to the Esplanade and listening to a world-class orchestra or just wandering around the back streets of Little India or China Town.
“We’ve had some wonderful years here. We’ve had 30 great years of expe-riences and activities outside the school context mostly. And it’s now time for a dif-ferent phase, and so we’ll have new mem-ories [to make],” Cox said.
Couple head north to IASAS Neighbor, ISKLBy Viraj Bindra
On the list of things he will miss, Dr. Dale Smith includes his large classroom. The extra space was something he used often, keeping miniature train sets and motorized planes on dis-play for students. He used its large interiors to test fly remote controled planes, an ornithopter, helicopter and blimps.
Dr. Smith, who first came to SAS in 2001, has taught classes such as AP Psychology, Western Civilizations, History of India, Modern European History, and Psychology, and Foundations of Knowledge.
Dr. Smith said he is excited about the move he and spouse Tracy Meyer will make to International School, Kuala Lumpur next year.
“I think it will be interesting for both me and my wife to teach at a smaller school” Dr. Smith said. “It might provide us an opportunity to get to know students and faculty on a more personal basis.”
In addition to a new school, Dr. Smith will be teaching a new class: anthropology. He has been taking an online refresher class this past year to ensure that he will be prepared to educate eager young anthropologically-motivated minds.
“It’ll be exciting and challenging, because it’s something I’ve never taught before” Dr. Smith said. “I’m revisiting anthropology now in preparation and it’s humbling to learn something you’ve never taught before.”
Dr. Smith will also be involved in the introduction of IB Psy-chology to ISKL.
“They had a math teacher pilot it this year,” Dr. Smith said. “But they wanted someone who could kind of take over take over full-time teaching IB higher level and standard level psychology. It’ll be a pretty busy first year.”
He lists coaching track as something else to miss next year..“I’ve really enjoyed the sport, because you get to know people
outside of class.”But Dr. Smith is ready for the change.“I’ve liked it here, and so in that sense I’m leaving the things
I know and I’m comfortable with,” he said. “On the other hand, there’s a new challenge, and that’s always exciting. I don’t think anyone got into teaching because they wanted an easy life - they wanted some kind of challenge. I want to experience that side of Asia; it’ll be different but it’ll be fun.”
Meyer taught theater classes in middle and high schools
By Phil AndersonFor an actor, nothing can compare to those seconds right before
the curtains open. The adrenaline, the thrill, the mortifying fear that something will go wrong.
Actors live for that moment, and for theater and Tragedy and Comedy teacher Tracy Meyer, that is her favorite part of teaching.
“The feeling just before a show opens, is a real high for the di-rector as much as it is for cast members,” Meyer said. “Highlights involve me sitting in the drama theater or auditorium and being excited for about what I know the audience is going to see.”
Meyer first began her career teaching at SAS in the middle school in July 2001 as an 8th grade RLA/social studies teacher. In her second year of teaching, she was teaching half RLA, half theater for the middle school and it was so popular in sign-ups for the following year that she turned to theater full time.
There was no formal theater course before Meyer arrived, and so she was given the opportunity to write a new course for middle school theater.
“It had never been done as a full time course, and so I had all the freedom in the world to determine the direction the course would take,” Meyer said.
Meyer said that she played with her students and at the end felt great about how she had divided the material to suit each grade.
After high school theater teacher Patricia Kuester left three years ago, Meyer become the new theater and Tragedy and Com-edy teacher.
“The scripts are entirely different in the high school,” Meyer said. “I’ve been able to get really in depth with topics and choice of material.”
Next year, Meyer will be teaching 7th grade humanities and coaching the girls JV tennis team.
“The hardest thing about leaving SAS, without question, is knowing that I’m saying good bye to the students who are day by day closer to what I consider to be my colleagues,” Meyer said.
Former student turned teacher leaves for land down underBy Anbita Siregar
As a senior editor-in-chief of the 2003 Islander, teacher-intern Tate Sonnack created a last-minute cover page before sending the yearbook off to print.
“We’d hit the print deadline, and Clemens was gone for his son’s graduation. Nobody else saw [the mistake], nobody else checked it,” Sonnack said.
The staff reviewed the books before distributing them, and former The Eye staff member Robert Oandasan found that Sonnack had misspelled Singapore as “Sinagapore.”
“Clemens came to me, and told me I’d misspelled some-thing on the cover page, and I said ‘I know, I spelled Singa-pore wrong.’ Then he told me about my other mistake.”
Sonnack had spelled Ameri-can as “Amei-can” as well.
After spend-ing a cumula-tive of 15 years at SAS, the California-and-Singapore-native is moving down under, looking to be a freelance cinematographer in Australia.
“The States is kind of not the best place to be right now and Hollywood’s al-ways going to be there,” the two-year year-book adviser and beginning film-making teacher said in an interview with The Eye Online.
Transitioning from student to teacher in less than 10 years helped Sonnack deal with his students.
“I sat in these seats not all that long ago, so I know the types of things that students try to pull.”
The worst excuse he was given from a student for not turning in homework was from senior Michael too.
“[He] said he was on his period.”After working in the film industry and possibly attending
graduate school, Sonnack said he wouldn’t mind returning to SAS someday..
Bags packed, they’re ready to go
IS PAISLEY AN ELEMENT? Cox’s ties are keys to his daily lesson plans. If a tie is decorated in flowers a quiz or test is on the menu for that day. Students often run by his room first thing in the morning to check. Photo by Liz Quick
Cox’ 1982 Islander picture in his first year. He started at the King’s Road campus.
photo by Tan Kabra
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10May 20, 2011the eye
By Ash OberoiIn the year before he moved to Singapore, computer teacher Paul Welsh
spent a gap year in a small town in a rural, mountainous area of British Colum-bia. A world traveler, Welsh taught at schools in Vancouver, Venezuela, Japan and next year will settle in Tunis, Tunisia, where the Arab Uprising began in December of 2010.
Change is a constant and since Welsh has been at the Singapore American School for almost 12 years now, he felt that it was time to move on to new prospects.
Welsh reminisced about his second interim trip to Mount Kinabalu, during which 19 of his 20 students were able to fight altitude sickness, walk in the dark at 4 a.m., scale a flat rock face and make it to the peak of the mountain.
Along with interim, Welsh mulled over the distractions students face due to the one-on-one policy.
“Good classroom management is still good classroom management. No matter what the distraction is. In the days of chalk easels, a piece of paper and pen would’ve been a distraction. There will always be distractions,” Welsh said. “There will always be things that will divert attention away from the task-at-hand. And so it’s up to the teacher to be a good class manager and it’s also up to the student to believe that classroom-time has value.”
Welsh said he will miss the eclectic society that Singapore has to offer. He calls it “the mix.” He’ll miss the elation of being able to go to a Western res-taurant for dinner and then wake up the next morning, ride his bicycle to Little India, as the locals are just beginning to set up the market place.
“We’ve been here a long time and I think our take on it was to either stay [in Singapore] forever or to make a change and it just became time to [make that change],” Welsh said.
Mehrbach to assume her first principal’s job at Tunis high school
By Gretchen ConnickDeputy Principal Lauren Mehrbach is headed to the American Cooperative
School of Tunis (ACST) with her husband and two sons. Mehrbach will take over as the middle and high school principal in her new school of about 700 students leaving behind her high school of over 1100 along with her colleague, Deputy Principal Doug Neihart. Over the past four years of working together, Neihart said that they have gotten to know each other very well and enjoy each other’s company in the office.
“I enjoyed finishing her lunches she brought from home if she couldn’t fin-ish her food. That was always a nice treat every now and then,” Neihart said.
Every day they share ideas and work at being consistent in how they handle situations.
“We pretty much work like a hand in glove. We each have out own respon-sibilities that we are the point person for, but we also help each other out when needed. We’re often like a tag team,” Neihart said.
Mehrbach brought a fresh female perspective to the administration, which is something that will change when she leaves.
Neihart is not the only one who will miss Mehrbach’s presence. Many students had positive remarks about Mehrbach ranging from her stylish wrap dresses and nice hair to her interest in students.
“She always approaches you and asks how you’re doing. She’s very in-volved,” junior Isabella Shaulis said.
“The American Cooperative School of Tunis is very fortunate to get not only Mrs.Mehrbach but also her husband Paul because they are just such out-standing individuals and outstanding educators and I wish their whole family the best as they go and I know that they are going to be very successful at their next school and they are going to be very appreciated,” Neihart said.
Departing teachers recount good times, things they’ll miss and what they are looking forward to
By Gretchen Connick Physics teacher Eddie Bywater is
the only one of six Bywater children who did not graduate from SAS. His youngest sister, Michelle, graduates this year. Bywater says that as much as he loves SAS, it is time to move on to something else. He and his family are headed for Qatar at the end of the semester.
“I felt the prompting that it was time to go, so we said we’re going to go,” Bywater said. “We like it here; it just felt like it’s what we’re supposed to do.”
While teaching at SAS, Bywater began a family. He said that learning how to balance his home life with his work life has been a challenge and can be stressful, but that his job is worth the stress.
“You always want to do your best for your students,” he said. “I love my job, I love what I’m doing. If there’s no stress then what’s the point? If it’s too easy, why do it?” he said.
Despite loving his work, Bywa-ter puts a great deal of importance in spending time at home.
“At the end of the day nobody on their death bed said ‘Oh I wish I had spent more time working.’ You know, they always want more time with their family, so I’m trying to do that,” Bywater said.
Family is a special part of Bywa-ter’s life, which is what makes sharing
SAS with his sister, senior Michelle Bywater, special even though she never took his classes.
“She’s just too good for me. She skipped all my math classes, she took the AP classes before I started teaching AP physics, she skipped JV basketball and went straight to varsity, so I never got to have her in a class or anything, but it has been a lot of fun,” he said.
Bywater says that he will always remember the people he has worked with and taught.
“I enjoy the students in my class and when they get excited about something or when somebody that I wrote a rec for comes in all excited that they got accepted to their school, that’s excit-ing,” he said.
Bywater will teach IB math at The American School of Doha. Five years ago when he began at SAS he taught math, but was able to move on to physics. Bywater has the same hope for Qatar.
“I enjoy the application of physics more. As long as I am teaching I am pretty much happy. I guess one of my most memorable things is when my students come back from the week-end and they say they saw something
that we talked about in class and that’s what physics is about,” he said.
Bywater has left his mark on SAS by starting an Ultimate Frisbee team that has grown to over 30 students this past year. Apart from his team, Bywater and his family will leave friends and relatives in Singapore, but he said he feels that it is time to leave and they look forward to what is ahead.
“We do really like SAS, we like Singapore and if it were left up to us, we would probably stay here, but knowing that the Lord wants us somewhere else is kind of the trump card,” he said.
Arab Awakening draws attention of world, Welsh and deputy Mehrbach
Bywater, sister, last of family with SAS roots
By Emily Nelson It has been 10 years since Aus-
tralian Karl Wischki walked into his first math classroom at SAS. Wis-chki says it feels “shorter than that.” But Wis-chki will join his wife and son in Brisbane in June.
Wischki said SAS was a home away from home and that he had many cherished memories from things that happened in his class and on Interim trips.
He recalled being abandoned on
a Malaysian island by students on the Interim trip, Langkawi Sailing Ad-venture. Wischki said he was loung-ing on a beautiful white beach waiting
for the boat to take him back home, when he realized he was alone.. He then caught a glimpse of two boats carrying 20 students, sailing away.
“It wasn’t until I squinted my eyes and looked harder that I saw it was the two boats that were on the Interim, and I wasn’t on either of them,” Wischki said.
Wischki said the story had a happy ending as a boat turned around and picked him up. He said that the boat’s skipper, a Captain
Blake, “christened a postage stamp-sized island Wischki Island to com-memorate the event.
While Wischki said he is look-ing forward to spending quality time with his wife and son when he returns to Brisbane, Australia, he said he will miss Singaporean food, walking around in Little India, and the uniquely Singaporean “lah” and other Singlish phrases.
Six hundred kids and 10 years later, Wischki said he has left a good impression on his students, that life is good and caring for your students is important.
Through math classes such as Algebra II and Functions, Statis-tics and Trigonometry, Wischki said that caring for students is the most important step for a good student-teacher relationship.
“I think he really cares about his students and he wants them to suc-ceed” junior Katy Thieneman said. “I also think that he is really dedi-cated to teaching and really likes to help his students learn and will do anything so they can learn the mate-rial 100 percent.”
To Wischki, caring for students and teaching in fun ways is the best way for kids to learn the ma-terial. Wischki said that humor is important and helps get the message across.
“Mr. Wischki is one of my fa-vorite teachers because he teaches math in a humorous, relaxed way and loves to help with anything,” junior Megan O’Neal said.
Junior Kelly Murphey added, “He is a great teacher who always knows how to motivate us, such as with funny videos at the end of les-sons.”
Wischki to stretch, try something new on return home to Brisbane
See video interviews with these teachers at www.saseye.com
photo by Tan Kabra
photo by Tan Kabraphoto by Leo Del Velez 11the eyeMay 20, 2011
By Viraj BindraA nine-year veteran of Singapore
American School, math teacher An-drew Donahue, who just moved up to the high school after teaching for eight years in the middle school, will be moving in August to teach in the American Cooperative School of Tu-nisia.
He and his wife, nurse Shelly Do-nahue, see the transition as an oppor-tunity “to experience North Africa, the Middle East and have a different adventure as a family.”
Donahue sees many potential op-portunities in the new location.
“I’m looking forward to traveling in Africa and traveling in Europe,” Donahue said. “It’s an hour flight from Rome, it’s an hour and a half from Barcelona, and a few hours from the Middle East.”
There is also a historic component
to his interest in Tunisia. Donahue says that he is intrigued by ancient European and African influence in the area.
“I’ve never lived in any place re-ally historic,” Donahue said. “Sin-gapore has got some great things to offer, but I think Tunisia might be a bit more exciting historically and cul-turally.”
At the same time, Donahue ac-knowledges that he will miss certain aspects of SAS, namely the connec-tions he made with individual people here.
“I’ll miss the students, I’ll miss the teachers, I mean, I’ll miss the people here, definitely,” Donahue said. “[I will miss] the people that I’ve worked with here, how much I’ve grown as an educator and a professional here with my colleagues.”
By Phil AndersonMath teacher Joe Lingle, will be
moving to Bangladesh after 14 years of teaching at SAS. He first began teaching in 1987 in Southern Califor-nia, where he taught for three years before moving to northern Califor-nia. He taught in northern California for seven years, and then moved to Singapore to teach math in SAS.
He taught in the middle school for six years before moving to the high school, where he taught mathematics for the last eight years.
“It’s been an incredible profes-sional growth, in all seriousness,” Lingle said. “I don’t think I had a bad day at teaching, in my classroom, with my students. I’ve had bad days in SAS, but never in my classroom, with my students.”
Lingle will be moving to the In-ternational School in Dhaka, where
he will continue to teach high school mathematics. Lingle’s wife, Joanie, will teach Joanie Lingle will teach pre-kindergarten and their twin sons, Ben and Sam will start third grade.
“I’m excited for a new adven-ture,” Lingle said. “I’ve been here for 14 years, and I’ve never had a job, previous to this, for more than five years.
The International School in Dhaka is a small school and Lin-gle is looking forward to “an environment where everyone knows each other a little bet-ter.”
Lingle says he will miss the stu-dents and teachers the most, but that he will keep in contact with his friends, like Mr. Tomlinson and Mr. Zitur, though Facebook and Skype.
“Even though we won’t be able to just walk across the hall and visit with each other like we’ve been able to, we’ll still be able to be friends.”
Fourteen-year math veteran looking for change, adventure
ON TASK. Math teacher Jo Lingle subjects senior Julia MacMeekin’s desktop to the sort of scrutiny required in a one-to-one world. Photo by Leo Del Velez
Donohue to join Merbach, Welsh in Tunisian school
By Greyson Harness and Felicity DunbarMajor summer improvements are hardly a rar-
ity in SAS, but this year there will be a big a** im-provement with the middle school cafeteria among other things.
In the middle school cafeteria, the ceiling is being lowered and air conditioning removed. Re-placing this will be an installation of fans by the company Big Ass.
“Part of it is the flow to get students served more quickly and more efficiently,” Middle School Principal Brian Combs said. “Part of it is being more environmental, being more green.”
The middle school will also undergo renova-tions and updates to the 6th and 7th grade sci-ence classrooms, and the digital and computing rooms will be piloting new movable furniture so as to better suit the one-to-one learning environment.
In the high school, most improvements are being done to the PE facilities. On the track, the light posts will be upgraded, as the current posts are getting dim. On either side of the field, a net will be placed so that when playing games on the grass inside the track, the ball will not go onto the track. On the boundary on the opposing side of the bleachers, netting will be added to prevent the ball from sliding down the slope.
There will be “a total refurbishing for the swim-ming pool,” as Projects Manager Francis Ang de-scribed it. The pool will be re-tiled and there will be new diving boards.
In all the gyms, middle school, high school and auxiliary, the court lines are being redrawn to cur-rent standards, as the current lines in use are out of date.
In the dance rooms, the floors are being re-varnished.
“If you look at the dance floor, it’s all wear and tear. I think the dancers have a problem trying to slide with the surface,” Ang explained.
The Drama Theatre’s lighting system is be-ing completely renewed, with every light bulb re-moved and replaced with a new one.
“Last summer we replaced the dimmer, this summer everything from dimmers out is new,” said Paul Koebnick. Also, the theatre will receive a new stage lighting desk, and the theatre floors will be sanded down.
In the high school Library, echoes are a nuis-sance for students trying to study and so meas-ures will be taken to reduce the echoes produced.
“We have acoustic wall panels. We are going to hang some panels and alter the fan patterns. There’s the culprit of the acoustics,” Ang said.
Summer renovations will improve PE facilities, middle school caf, library, theater
Big A** changes, renovations over summer to improve school
See video interviews with these teachers and more news about SAS at www.saseye.com
Courtesy of Facilities and Planning.
12May 20, 2011the eye
By Rachel JacksonPrincipal Dr. Timothy Stuart start-
ed looking for replacements for 14 departing teachers in early October. He began by asking teachers whether or not they were returning the follow-ing school year. By the beginning of December he knew who was leaving and who was staying.
Once he knew which p o s i t i o n s he needed to fill, Dr. Stuart start-ed looking through on-line applica-tions. While many teach-ers choose to apply on-line because of the ease of doing it, this is not the only way to find teachers.
The fair season begins with the attendance in Bangkok and Sydney. Followed by fairs in London, Boston, Iowa, and San Francisco. This year SAS administrators attended hiring fairs in Bangkok and San Francisco.
At hiring fairs Dr. Stuart is accom-panied by Superintendent Dr. Brent Mutsch. Sometimes they use Skype to include other faculty and staff in interviews with prospective teachers. For instance if they are interviewing a teacher applying for a math position, they might ask the math department chairman to interview the candidate.
Hiring fairs attended by hundreds looking for overseas jobs
“The first day of the fair all the schools are in one big room, like a big ballroom and we all have tables,” Dr. Stuart said. “About six hundred teachers come into this room, this massive room, and there are about a hundred and something schools.”
Prospective teachers approach a school’s table and ask for an inter-
view for posi-tions that are posted as open. Dr. Stuart looks at their re-sumes and, if impressed with the candidate’s qualifications, schedules an in-terview.
The first round of inter-views are about 30 minutes. After these in-terviews are
done, the administrators decide which teachers they want to talk to again, and the second round of interviews begin. The second interview can run up to an hour-and-a-half.
By the second round of interviews administrators have conducted refer-ence checks and have talked to the teacher’s previous schools. At this point they can decide to offer or de-cline a position, or they can move the candidate to a waiting list of potential candidates.
Dr. Stuart said he dislikes hiring fairs because of how competitive they can get. He said that it can be difficult to get the best teachers because the re-ally good teachers “will walk out of a job fair with five, six job offers.” It
can also be difficult because there are so many other options available to the prospective teachers.
“I know that he or she has already received a job offer for Paris or Rome, or Tanzania and Prague, so now I am competing, and they might say well Prague in the winter would be nice, so they may make a decision to go to Prague instead of SAS because they have never been to Europe, lets say,” Dr. Stuart said.
Direct applications Dr. Stuart’s favorite way to find new teachers
Although hiring fairs play a big role in finding new teachers, it is not always the best way. For the past four years, three years at JIS and one here at SAS, Dr. Stuart has not hired any teachers at a hiring fair, and prefers to hire teachers who apply directly to the school.
Dr. Stuart likes to hire teach-ers with online applications because those teachers have demonstrated a direct interest in the school. He also knows that if he does not act quickly then the teacher may go to the hiring fair and find another offer.
New SAS teachers include nurse, drama teacher, new deputy
There are 14 new teachers com-ing next year. Two teachers who have already been working at SAS will be taking on new positions.
Cathy Casey who is currently a substitute at SAS, will be the mid-dle high school nurse. Adam Miller is working in the primary and interme-diate school PE department and will be moving up to work as a PE/Health teacher in the high school. Christina
Advento has been living in Singapore with two years with her family and will be teaching social studies.
The new drama teacher, Tom Schulz has been teaching theater at Jakarta International School for the past 18 years. He has directed profes-sionally in New York and San Fran-cisco and will be moving with his wife and two young children.
TEC teacher Martin Wiliams will be joining the SAS faculty with his wife Ellie Lee, who will be teaching math. Williams and Lee have been working at the American Internation-al School of Guangzhou for the past 10 years.
Cherie De Zwart was previously working in China and is returning to Singapore after two years. De Zwart taught at UWCSEA in Singapore teaching math, and will continue to teach Math as SAS.
Craig Saylar will also be joining the Math Department. He is mov-ing from Saudi Arabia with his wife Tracy who will be working in the pri-mary and intermediate schools. He is currently teaching geomerty and Rock Band at Saudi Aramco Schools in Dhahran.
Science teacher Zach Evans will
be moving from New Mexico where he taught at the Rehoboth Christian School. He will be moving with his wife and two kids. He has worked at schools in Hong Kong and S. Korea.
Three teachers will be coming from the U.S. Darlene Poluan is mov-ing from the Sequoia High School in Redwood City, California and will be teaching math. English teacher Jackie Osborn was a student teacher at SAS and will now be returning af-ter being a substitute teacher in Iowa. John Gaskell will be teaching Science and is moving from Aurora, Colora-do where he taught at Hinkley High School.
Darin Fahrney will be the new deputy principal. He is currently the building principal at Greenfield High School new Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Fahrney taught AP Biology, physiol-ogy and ecology before he became an administrator. He will be moving to Singapore with his wife Sara and two daughters Sydney and McKenzie.
Yearbook adviser Tate Sonnack who was at SAS on a two-year in-ternship will be replaced by Virginia Sheridan who has substituted in class-es at SAS.
certainly not for an annoyed senior girl who has seen students choose gaming over friends.
“I know people who would rather stay home and play video games than go out with friends,” senior Jackie Wait said. “They play all the time.”
Excessive gaming meets criteria for addictive behavior
Many pathological gamers exhibit the same behaviors and experience
By Madeline MitchellViolent images flash across the
computer and television screens of students as they spend hours a day playing video games. Parents and psychologists alike are discovering more and more of the harmful side-effects of gaming.
“Violence is everywhere,” said junior Cassidy Dimond, referring to the shooting and bloodshed seen in movies and video games. “Even in Singapore you come across it every-
In race to find the best, administrators search near and far for new teachers
Violent video games linked to aggression in young people
Teachers looking for international jobs check for openings and sign up for interviews at the January International School Services fair in Bangkok. Photo courtesy of Laura Light, ISS
”““About six hundred
teachers come into this room, this massive
room, and there are about a hundred and something schools.”
Dr. Timothy Stuart
the same effects as those experienc-ing true chemical addictions.
“If you look at the criteria for ad-dictive behaviors, whether it’s sub-stance use or chemical use, many of those same patterns are found with kids who have what we would con-sider an Internet addiction or a gam-ing addiction,” psychologist Dr. Jeff Devens said.
Debate and concern over the effect of media violence on young people continues to gain global prominence.
“If you think about the exposure that we have to certain media sources, whether it’s advertising, whether it’s movies, whether it’s particular shows with explicit sexual or violent content over time the more of that we’re ex-posed to, the more the tendency is for us to become desensitized by it,” Dr. Devens said.
Multiple studies are in effect to determine if psychologically stable young people can develop aggressive tendencies by participating in violent video games.
“What researchers have found is that those children who are exposed to more violent content tend to en-gage in more violent sorts of behav-ior,” said Dr. Devens.
Many kinds of violent games place the gamer in a relatively real-istic virtual world where violence is necessary to succeed.
“When they see all the fighting they think it’s cool, and they’re so used to the video game world that they confuse what’s real and what’s not,” junior Sam Wills said.
Juniors Will Pazos and Shane Soetaniman said they play several hours of violent video games a week.
“I don’t think violent videogames cause aggression unless you get too into them, if you are way too intense with it, like 20 hours a day,” said Soetaniman.
An article in the January Health-Day reported the results of a longitu-dinal study on pathological gaming.
“The average time spent playing video games was around 20.5 to 22.5 hours a week,” author Serena Gordan said. “Once addicted to video games, children were more likely to become depressed, anxious, or have other so-cial phobias. And, when they stopped gaming, the depression lifted.”
Gaming may inhibit development of social skills
Students who know pathological gamers often notice the social differ-ences in behavior and in the way they carry themselves.
“The gaming makes them anti-social which could probably lead to depression,” said Wait.
Gamers begin to neglect almost every other aspect of their lives when they become addicted to the games.
“There is a closing off of social relationships due to the exclusive thoughts, wishes, desires of wanting to be engaged in that activity,” Dr. Devens said.
Although controversial, the gen-eral consensus of psychologists is that over-exposure to violence in commonly played games can lead to some level of aggressive behavior in pathological gamers.
“My plea to parents and my plea to kids is to approach life as best we can thinking about a balance,” said Dr. Devens. “What you put in your body mentally, physically, spiritu-ally, it eventually works its way out in some way, shape or form.”
HARMLESS FUN? New research reveals potential harm in violent video games including increased agression, addictive behaviors.
13the eyeMay 20, 2011
Verbatim Seniors voice theirfears of college life
Photos by Phil Anderson
I’m really afraid of not finding a roommate before college starts and then getting one that I don’t get along with at all!
-Megan Trgovich”
“
After signing up for my school’s email I got five e-mails from LAPD and Campus Security reporting crimes on campus. I haven’t checked it in a while but I’m pretty sure there are tons more.
-Shoko Oda
“
”
Its not the silly things like if I’m going to find friends. I just don’t know if I’ll enjoy the lifestyle like living in a dorm, going to class, the partying, etcetera. I don’t know if I’ll like that.
-Alyssa Rhodes
“
”
I’m afraid of what kind of game I’ll have to adapt to in order to reel the girls in.
-Billy Zimmerman
“”
“Communal bathrooms.COMMUNAL BATHROOMS!? Are you kidding me?!
-Brittney Dimond”
“I’m really afraid of the cold. I never lived in a place so cold and I’m worried my toes might fall off because of frostbite.
-Anna Rhinehart”
“What if I chose the wrong school? What if it doesn’t have the right programs for me?
-Isaac Virshup”
[For National Service] I’m afraid of having to bunk with seven other dudes in a room without air-con.
-Ian Wu”“
“I’m worried that my school won’t have the same variety of students as SAS does. -Rodrigo Zorilla”
Freshmen fifteen! But my sister told me that if you go to the gym you meet hot guys, so that’s some positive reinforcement.
-Seira Wade”“
14May 20, 2011the eye
Starting over: new freshmen share anxieties Seniors leaving high school for college and Alphas moving up to high school find some common ground
By Tyler Stuart Two classes will take the largest step of their educational
careers over the summer: seniors and Alphas.Seniors face the most daunting transition of the two. Leaving
their school, family and friends in one move. But, for 14-year-olds, the move into high school is an intimidating transition as well.
Middle school is essentially a three-year preparation for high school. Students are trained to read, write and think at a higher level. In the year preceding the transition, high school and mid-dle school counselors work together to ensure the smooth inte-gration of the Alpha’s into a new system.
Alphas will move from middle school where they are ten-derly nurtured by teachers, and give little thought to life after SAS. They will move into high school where there is little hand-holding and where they are expected to begin plotting the path they will follow into adulthood.
Seniors, meanwhile, are stepping off on that path as they enter universities with their barely comprehensible schedules, and they do so without the support of parents.
“I will miss the easiness of living with my family,” senior Victoria Stanley said.
The entrance into high school should not be too overwhelm-ing. Sure, there will be more work at possibly a fast-er pace, but they have been well prepared.
“I am exited about the vari-ety of classes but scared about the heavy homework load,” Alpha Megan Spitzer said.
Counselor Sue Nesbitt asked her freshmen to compare the homework load between high and middle school.
They said the homework load wasn’t really anything more than middle school,” Nesbitt said.
Most Alphas are intimidated by the thought of being the youngest students in a new school. Nesbitt said many Alphas asked to be placed in the same classes with friends.
“You can remain friends even though proximity has been r e m o v e d , ” Nesbitt said. “This is a product of being older. You expand your friend-ships in high school.”
But, she said new freshmen “tend to form tighter cliques” to cope with the adjustment.
While both, Alphas and seniors, are apprehensive about change, that does not mean they are not looking forward to the challenges. Seniors will not necessarily miss high school. There
is a lot to look forward to in college and there are possible nega-tive aspects of high school seniors leave behind as well.
“I look forward to meeting new people that like what I like and not having to take all the crappy courses for four years that I do not want to take,” senior Sophia van Tilburg said.
Alphas, on the other hand, are looking forward to the vari-ety of options the high school course catalog offers, but nerv-ous about the mixing of grade levels in some classes, a first for them.
“I’m scared about being hurt by people that are older than me,” Alpha Samuel Speciale said.
In three months time seniors and Alphas will go from the top of their school, to becoming freshmen. While they share similar anxieties about their transitions, they will probably agree that change is good.
“I think the similarities are that they are all excited and they are ready to move on,” Nesbitt said.
When high school admin re-moved the decades-old free
dress privilege from final exams they cited three reasons (Eye Online, Dec. 3).
“Last year as we were doing the calendar, somebody asked, ‘Why does the high school have free dress [during exams] when we all agree it’s going to be on the second and fourth Wednesday of the month?’” Deputy Principal Lauren Mehrbach said.
Mehrbach said this was not the only reason though. She said that most research confirms that students perform best on tests when taking those tests in the environment most similar to that where the material was learned. She said that wearing uni-forms during finals benefits students’ performance by duplicating their reg-ular, SAS learning environment.
“When it comes time for your se-mester exam, we want you to be in that frame of mind,” Deputy Principal Doug Neihart added.
Mehrbach said an additional mo-tive in removing the free dress privi-lege was to reduce the number of dis-tractions during final exams.
New research finds no educational value in school uniforms
In online searches of news and education-related sites, EyeOnline was unable to find any scientific evi-dence to affirm either the assertion that uniforms had a positive effect on test-taking, or that sameness of en-vironment reinforced recall. In fact, research seems to say the opposite. A September New York Times article “Forget What You Know About Good Study Habits,” by journalist Benedict Carey refers to a longitudinal study about school uniform policies from the National Association of Elemen-
tary School Principals that c o n c l u d e d , “It is exceed-ingly clear that school uni-forms are not significantly i m p l i c a t e d in the suc-cess or failure of elemen-tary, middle or high school students. Re-search has shown that school uni-forms neither directly nor indirectly af-fect academ-ics by creat-ing a positive school climate or a positive approach to learning.”
The data gathered in the study failed to find evidence that indicated any remarkable effect uniforms had on academic achievement, which in-cludes performance on exams.
The same study undermined oth-er claims about the good effects of school uniforms as well.
“What is clear from the research is that school uniforms, as a policy and strategy, do not play a role in producing more parental involve-ment, increased preparedness, posi-tive approaches toward learning, pro-school attitudes, a heightened feeling of school unity and safety or positive school climates.”
Research new and old asserts variety of settings the key to good test performance
In the same article, Carey says that cognitive scientists have long known that a student’s study habits are what matter most in learning. He refers to a 1978 study that contradicts the advice that students find a specific place for studying.
This study found that students who studied a list of 40 vocabulary words in two different settings did far better on a test than those who studied the same list twice in the same room.
Administrators’ assertions that sameness in student dress - taking a final in the uniform you attended class in - equates with success finds no support in these findings.
In fact, researchers have discov-ered from recent experiments that certain study methods show promis-ing signs of effectiveness.
“Researchers have debunked old notions about learning and now sug-gest varying topics and study set-
tings,” said UCLA psychologist Dr. Robert A. Bjork, a senior author of the experiment. “What we think is happening here is that, when the out-side context is varied, the information is enriched, and this slows down for-getting.”
Studies have shown that the stu-dent will find connections between what he or she is studying and the details of that student’s environment.
“The brain makes subtle associa-tions between what it is studying and the background sensations it has at the time, regardless of whether those per-ceptions are conscious,” wrote Carey, summarizing the study’s results.
SAS psychologist cautions against embracing research too early
However, high school psycholo-gist Dr. Jeff Devens says that because it is helpful to reinforce routine that students may need to have some fa-
miliarity with their testing environ-ment.
“Repetition,” he said, “produces predictability and predictability pro-duces stability. Does this translate into clothing? I don’t know. But if the test is taken in an unfamiliar envi-ronment there will probably be some heightened anxiety.”
This research is all still relatively new and general and the learning and study methods of students will vary based on the individual. Because of this it is important that educators do what they can to consider all the scientific evidence before supporting claims regarding educational meth-ods.
“It is important to substantiate opinions with evidence,” Dr. Devens said, “and to back up claims with em-pirical data. This will help us to look at and eliminate additional variables.”
MOVING UP. Eigth-grader Abby Sardjono makes a reading log for her Reading Language Arts (RLA) class. English classes in high school are equivalent to RLA classes in the middle school, but this is one of many changes rising freshmen will face. Photo by Suein Oh
PACKING UP. Seniors picked up their folders containing their school files during their last weeks of school, along with their chords from several different honor societies. Picture by Phil Anderson
“I look forward to meeting new people that like what I like and not having to take all the crappy courses for four years that I do not want to take.“ -Senior Sophia van Tilburg
Claims about effect of uniforms
on student performance in testing not supported by new research
By Madeline Mitchell, EyeOnlineAdditional reporting by Frances Young
15the eyeMay 20, 2011
By Erica HustonAfter eight years at SAS, seven
as a 7th grade social studies teacher and three as co-director in the Ath-letics and Activities Department, Mike Molly says he’s ready to retire to spend more time with his children and grandchildren. And, Molly has a hobby he wants to get back to - bee-keeping.
“I thought I might raise bees. Bees are a little bit like middle-schoolers,” Molly said. “It might help to make the transition easier.”
Molly’s departure prompted a search for a replacement and the win-ning candidate for his job happened to have an office down the hall. P.E. teacher Kim Criens will take over for Molly next term.
“It’s nice to know that somebody coming to take over is extremely ex-cited about it and qualified to do it and has great ideas,” Molly said.
Criens said that his duties will identical to the ones that Molly
By Hannah L’HeureuxDue to Bangkok’s Spring Break holiday and SAS’
prom, the 3rd season IASAS had an unusual schedule this year. SAS participants left Sunday April 17 to start their tournaments the next day. Participants missed school forn Monday through Thursday while Friday was a public holi-day.
The SAS girls’ badminton team had won silver last year and was pushing hard to get first. Only two IASAS players graduated last year, but the team lost in a close match against TAS in the finals, finishing again with silver.
The boy’s badminton competition has always been tough for SAS. Last year they managed to take fifth place. Unfortunately for them, only two players of their team were returning this year. The team was very young and less experienced than last year’s team. Their final result was sixth place.
“Even though we didn’t perform as well as the other teams, I feel like we’ve played our best and had a good time,” senior Clement Ng said.
Both the Boys and Girls softball teams had high expec-tations to live up to as they had dominated IASAS softball in previous years.
The girls had only four returning players this year and had a relatively young team. They started off the tourna-ment strong, winning their first three games against Ja-karta International School (JIS), the International school of Bangkok (ISB) and the International School of Kuala Lumpur (ISKL).
“Coming into the tournament, we knew that it wasn’t going to be an easy win. We started from scratch this year – our team consisted of all underclassmen with the ex-ception of four seniors. The end results weren’t ideal, but we did have two big wins against JIS and Bangkok that proved SAS was a major contender in the tournament,” said Co-Captain Kelsey LaBranche.
Unfortunately, the girls couldn’t keep the momentum up, and lost their next two games against the International School of Manila (ISM) and the Taipei American School (TAS). The girls lost again in the consolation match against TAS in a close game of 10-11.
“Our team was young and inexperienced, but we all did our best,” team Co- Captain, Michelle Bywater said. “I think we could have gotten gold if we were more con-sistent, but I was proud of the way the girls bonded and
helped each other on the field”The boys on the other hand had a strong returning team
with a few new and experienced players. It seemed like it would be an easy tournament for them after easily beating all 6 Iasas teams in the round robin.
“We performed really well,” 2nd year IASAS player, Robert Barber said.
Unfortunately nerves got the best of the Eagles when they were put up against their SEAYBST (South East Asia Youth Baseball and Softball Tournament) rivals, Manila. Just a few months before, many of the Eagles Boys par-ticipated in the tournament. They had a disappointing loss to ISM in the final game where there were men on base, 2 outs and they were down by one run. It seemed like déjà vu when once again the SAS team was placed up against ISM in the final in the exact same position. They lost 7-6.
“We didn’t hit as well as we did the rest of the tourney; probably because of nerves,” senior Peter Zampa said.
In Bangkok, the boy’s and girl’s Track Team fought hard to continue their gold streak. For two years in a row the girls have gotten gold while the boys have managed to get it 13 years in a row. It seems as though the other teams stepped it up this year, narrowing the gap between SAS and the other schools.
In the past SAS easily blew the other schools away, but the competition became more intense. Sprinters that would usually win races didn’t even score. The Eagles were a younger team this year and unfortunately the boys were not able to pull through with gold and got second place by half a point.
On the bright side the girls won the tournament for the 3rd year in a row along with breaking two records. Junior Isabella Shaulis broke the schools triple jump going 10.46 meters, while junior Emma Graddy broke the IASAS shot put throw with 10.75 meters.
“It couldn’t have been a more perfect moment - the entire team was there cheering me on, as well as coaches even from other teams. My dad was jumping up and down and i couldn’t have been happier sharing that moment with everyone,” Graddy said.
shared with his wife and co-director Mimi Molchan.
“Ms. Molchan will be respon-sible for volleyball, cross country, touch, rugby, swimming and track and field, and I’ll have the other sports,” Criens said. “We’ll do the cultural events, MUN, together.”
Criens is moving from a teaching job to a non-teaching job which he said will be a bit of a change for him. Criens said he loves to work with kids and that he likes to watch them take a step outside of their normal routine.
“I think what I’ll miss about teaching is that you can take stu-dents out of their comfort zone and give them a positive experience,” Criens said. “In extra- curricular activities and athletics, students are always in their comfort zone. Teach-ing gets kids who maybe don’t have experience to succeed in something they’ve never done before.”
CONCENTRATION. Freshman Chris Schindele steps up to bat during an IASAS softball game against International School of Bangkok in Jakarta, Indonesia. Lady Eagles took fourth, ending their gold streak. Photo by Gregory Hand
