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Tiger Tracks mUfsd's monthly e-news

December, 2019

It wouldn't be the holidays without concert season in Mamaroneck Schools...Smiles and beautiful music to warm our hearts. A special thank you to parents and community members who came to support MHS and Hommocks singers in their annual NYC performance at the Met Life building.

District Highlights

  • MUFSD Students Gr K-12 Participate in "Hour of Code"
  • 'Portrait Project' to Connect Design Students with Community
  • Learn More About Collaborative Design at MHS
  • Have You Seen MHS's Impressions? Winter Issue Due Out Soon
  • Food Rescue Program Provides Donations to Neighbors in Need
  • Elementary Schools' Green Tigers Making a Difference
  • Middle School Girls/Boys Empowerment Groups Learn Leadership Skills
  • Padres Unidos Going Strong
  • Debate Team Reaches New Heights in 4th Year
  • MHS Student Selected as 2020 Coca-Cola Scholar Semifinalist
  • Winter Sports are Heating Up; Fall Athletics Wrap-Up Report Presented
  • Alumni Spotlight: 2009 Grad Named to "Forbes 30 Under 30" List

Students Celebrate Worldwide "Hour of Code" with Week Full of Activities

All students K-12 participated in the worldwide "Hour of Code" event that takes place annually during Computer Science Education Week (December 10-17th). This event seeks to spark student interest in tech-related fields and make computer programming more accessible for all. In partnership with the Larchmont-Mamaroneck STEM Alliance, special events throughout the district contributed to a fun-filled atmosphere of learning and collaboration. MHS computer science students visited elementary classrooms to share their passion for coding and guide students through hour-long challenges. Additionally, a host of other community events took place throughout the week, including a Digital Arts Experience Bus visit to all four elementary schools. Hommocks students celebrated the occasion with coding in all math classes, culminating in a schoolwide raffle with prizes for the lucky ticket-holders. At MHS, it was ‘Hour of Code: Excel Edition,’ with students taking on a spreadsheet-based challenge that introduced them to programming formulas and automated budgeting.

Students in grades K-12 used their problem solving & coding skills as they participated in "Hour of Code", a worldwide event that was part of Computer Science Education Week Dec. 10-17.

The 'Portrait Project': MSF Student Photography Grant Connects Design Program to Broader Community

A student grant funded by the Mamaroneck Schools Foundation will provide family portraits at no cost to financially disadvantaged members within our school district.

"During my freshman year at MHS, I had started to think about how I could bring together the community and my passion for photography through a project that would benefit others. The Design Program at MHS teaches within its curriculum the concept of human-centered campaigns and provided me with a great foundation to develop an idea for my grant proposal." - Anna Robarts, MHS sophomore

Anna says she created the human-centered design initiative of the "Portrait Project" in design class freshman year. The prospect of applying for a student grant came into focus when she had the opportunity to participate in a service-oriented program Service Through the Lens in Ollantaytambo, Peru. In addition to a work project where she helped build a reading room for a local school, she traveled across the region, meeting other students, families, and children while creating connections through photography. She was inspired by these connections and the joy it brought to the people she met, many of whom had never had a portrait taken of them or their families. It was at that point she decided she wanted to help families right here in her own community. Anna looks forward to bringing the "Portrait Project" to life this winter.

MHS sophomore Anna Robarts was inspired to begin the "Portrait Project" for Mamaroneck after participating in a service-oriented program,  Service Through the Lens, last summer in Peru. (Above: One of the families Anna photographed while visiting beautiful Ollantaytambo, Peru)

Learn More About MHS Collaborative Design

Watch this video produced by MHS Info students Mateo Cruz & Gent Malushaga to learn more about the Collaborative Design program at Mamaroneck High School and the recent "Shark Tank" project.

Winter Issue of Student Photography and Design Magazine Coming Soon

If you're not familiar with Mamaroneck High School's innovative student photography and design magazine, you will want to take a look. Keep an eye out for the Winter 2020 issue of Impressions, which will delve into the themes of what it means to visualize the space around us. A "Behind the Scenes" special will showcase the design thinking process and use the MHS Garden Project as a noteworthy example.

"We would like to introduce our readers to the finer aspects of our living environment through portraits, landscapes, city life, and human creative freedom. We hope to give our reader an awareness of the outside world and how it influences each and every one of us." - Impressions student president Ines Chammaa
The 2020 Winter edition of Impressions is due out in February.

District's Food Rescue Program Assists Neighbors in Need & is "Share" Component of Love Your Food Grant

Since September, the Mamaroneck School District has been collecting excess food from its school cafeterias’ hot lunches -- as well as from uneaten items that students wish to donate from their lunches -- for neighboring after-school programs, soup kitchens and food pantries in need. This food recovery program is directly aligned with the Love Your Food three-year grant initiative that the District is proud to be a part of, along with the Town of Mamaroneck and Villages of Larchmont and Mamaroneck, to inspire our community to reduce wasted food and share the excess with those in need.

Elementary Schools Create Their Own Reusable "Green Bags" in Support of Town's Plastic Bag Ban

Students at several of our elementary schools have created and distributed their own reusable "green bags" in support of the Town of Mamaroneck's single-use plastic bag ban, which took effect Dec. 1. The MAS Green Tigers, shown below, made reusable bags from donated t-shirts. This is just another example of the multitude of sustainability initiatives underway in Mamaroneck Schools.

Timed to coincide with the Town of Mamaroneck's ban on single-use plastic bags, the MAS Green Tigers group -- which has grown to about 70 participating students -- created and distributed reusable bags made from donated t-shirts.

Boys and Girls Empowerment Groups at Middle School Focus on Leadership Development, Team Building Skills

Our "Males Moving Forward" and “Girls Empowerment” lunch leadership groups, launched this year at Hommocks Middle School and run by our new Director of Student Life April Francis, are off to a great start. The purpose of these programs is to help young men and women develop leadership and positive team building skills so that they can serve as mentors to others. Guest speakers from the community share stories of resilience and help students set goals. Students also participate in small service learning projects and social networking, with emphasis placed on making good decisions, being positive, and serving as role models for others.

The Hommocks "Males Moving Forward" and "Girls Empowerment" groups have been meeting at lunchtime and working on leadership skills such as decision-making, positivity, and resilience.

Padres Unidos Going Strong

Padres Unidos is a group of Hispanic parents who support other Hispanic parents in the pursuit of their children’s academic success within the District. This year, they have held regular meetings in which the bilingual social workers talk about relevant topics, such as “How to Navigate the Parent Portal”, “An Introduction to the NYS Education System”, and “How to Help our Kids in our Schools”. This week they held their traditional annual holiday fiesta, which was a huge success.

The mariachi was a highlight at the annual Padres Unidos holiday fiesta.

Debate Team Reaches New Heights in 4th Year

MHS Debate began just four years ago, but has already established itself as a vibrant program on par with other longstanding high school debate programs on the map for years. In addition to serving as host for the recent well-attended debate tournament, MHS Debate participated this season in several local, regional, and national circuit tournaments. In early fall, MHS debaters competed at a national circuit tournament in Washington, DC against schools from seven different states, with three teams reaching elimination rounds. (MHS was the only school to qualify more than two for the elimination rounds.) Also in the Fall, we had eight MHS teams competing and faring well at Yale University's regional tournament and one of our teams finishing First Place in the local Byram Hills High School tournament, beating a Bronx Science team in the final round. Exciting to think of what 2020 will bring.

MHS Student Liana Haigis Selected as 2020 Coca-Cola Scholar Semifinalist

Mamaroneck High School senior Liana Haigis has been named a semifinalist in the Coca-Cola Scholars Program. She was selected among 1,928 semifinalists chosen from more than 93,000 applicants across the country based on her academic excellence, community involvement/leadership and extensive work in independent medical research.

Winter Sports are Heating Up: Come Out & Support

Director of Athletics Bari Suman delivered the fall sports wrap-up report to the Board of Education and community at the Dec. 3 Board of Education meeting. Check out the extensive List of Fall '19 "Scholar-Athletes"

Alumni Spotlight: MHS '09 Alumnus Yuni Sameshima Named to "Forbes 30 Under 30"

Mamaroneck High School 2009 grad Yuni Sameshima, co-founder and CEO of a grocery technology start-up company, was named a "Forbes 30 Under 30" for his success in building his company Chicory, which has facilitated more than $25 million in online grocery orders this year and generated $6 million in revenue.

"MHS's amazing community and faculty was such an integral part of cultivating my drive to become an entrepreneur. From learning in the classroom, to collaborating with the tennis team, to my stint as Cowboy Bob in Footloose, it was invaluable to learn to network and build a strong base of friends and advisors since my high school years. Go Tigers!"- Yuni Sameshima