CELEBRATIONS
Girl Scouts learn about the COVID-19 vaccine
The members of Greenwich Girl Scout Troop #50432 made a donation of Girl Scout cookies to the health care workers at the COVID-19 vaccination site at Brunswick School operated by Yale New Haven Health System’s Greenwich Hospital.
Then, the Girl Scouts in the troop held a Zoom conversation with Amy, a nurse and longtime Girl Scout leader, to learn more about the coronavirus vaccine.
Brunswick teacher selected for National History Day spring webinar
Steven Mandes, a teacher at Brunswick School in Greenwich, is one of 120 teachers selected for a National History Day spring professional development program.
The course focuses on using online Library of Congress resources to develop and support historical arguments and is a feature of NHD’s membership in the Library of Congress Teaching with Primary Sources Consortium.
The teachers chosen for this honor represent NHD’s 58 affiliates across the country and around the world, and the National History Day program in Connecticut selected Mandes.
“NHD is incredibly fortunate to be able to offer this opportunity for teachers, especially now as teachers and students continue to address challenges of non-traditional learning settings required by the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic,” said National History Day Executive Director Cathy Gorn.
For several months, Mandes works with his peers around the country and National History Day staff to build knowledge for teaching with online Library of Congress resources. Upon completion of the series, he will have demonstrated the ability to share with his students key strategies for researching, supporting, and presenting historical arguments bolstered by these primary sources.
NHD is a nonprofit organization that seeks to improve the teaching and learning of history. The National History Day Contest was established in 1974 and currently engages more than half a million students every year in conducting original research on historical topics of interest. Students present their research as a documentary, exhibit, paper, performance, or website. Projects compete first at the local and affiliate levels, where the top entries are invited to the National Contest at the University of Maryland at College Park. For more information, visit nhd.org.
Connecticut History Day is one of 58 affiliate programs of National History Day, which annually engages over 4,000 middle- and high-school students in historical research, interpretation, and creative expression through project-based learning. For information, visit the program’s website at histordayct.org.
GHS Model UN Team wins awards at WAMUNC
Greenwich High School’s Model United Nations Team recently won Outstanding Large Delegation at the Washington Area Model UN Conference. In addition to their team recognition, a total of 10 students from GHS were honored with individual acknowledgements for their performances.
“WAMUNC was an amazing conclusion to our year of college conferences. We had more students win Best Delegate than at any other conference in my time as the team’s adviser; we were also recognized as an Outstanding Large Delegation for the first time,” GHS Teacher and Model UN Advisor Ian Tiedemann said.
“When I look at our performance, though, what strikes me is that we feature a team of students who have been part of our club since they were in middle school,” he said. “To me, our performance at WAMUNC represents our deep roots in the community, but also our commitment to learning throughout the pandemic. Combined, nothing could make me happier.”
“After doing Model UN for four years, WAMUNC XXIII was the last college conference of my high school career. I joined MUN as a freshman because I wanted to learn more about global politics and get better at public speaking; while both of those goals were accomplished, it’s really the other members of GHS’s Model UN community that have made my four years as part of the club so special, and that’s why it was so bittersweet to participate in my last conference,” GHS MUN President Skyler McDonnell said.
“As a club leader, I’m so proud of how well everyone in the club has adapted to doing things online this year, from virtual conferences to playing online pictionary on Saturday night instead of the typical board games and delegate dance,” he said. “Doing Model UN virtually this year was a big adjustment for everyone, and the club members’ willingness to continue participating and improving makes me feel so lucky to be part of the MUN community.”
WAMUNC is a four-day exercise in diplomacy, international affairs, and global knowledge and is sponsored by The George Washington University.
Individual Best awards went to:
➼ Aarya Dhru, Committee: Commission of the Status of Women, Role: Israel
➼ Amrutha Nandakumar, Committee: Human Rights Council, Role: Denmark
➼ Ben Shi, Committee: The Transition of Arrakis/Dune, Role: Stilgar, Fremen
➼ Kade Tibberts, Committee: The Social, Humanitarian, and Cultural Committee; Role: Myanmar
➼ Josh Winston, Committee: Kiel Mutiny; Role: Friedrich Schönbeck
Individual Honorable awards went to:
➼ Skyler McDonnell, Committee: Ad hoc, Role: Delegate 1
➼ Ziyi Yan, Committee: Global Health in Communism, Role: Teija Lyngstad, Prime Minister of Denmark
Individual Outstanding award went to:
➼ Ambika Grover, Committee: Committee on the Peaceful Uses of Outer Space, Role: Israel
➼ Veda Swaminathan, Committee: Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean States, Role: Mexico
Individual Verbal award went to:
➼ Bryn McConnell, Committee: The Social, Humanitarian, and Cultural Committee, Role: Israel