News

Over the weekend, West Albany music students competed in the Oregon Music Education Association State Chamber Ensemble and Oregon Student Activities Association State Solo Contests at Pacific University in Forest Grove.

The following students earned awards for their performances:

Chamber Ensembles

Women’s Large Ensemble – 4th Place

Gemma Williams, Jessy Birruete, Anna Soot, Rhianna Miller, Elizabeth Lake, Mackenzie Duda, Sylvia Harrington

Men’s Large Ensemble – 3rd Place

Sam Rossback, Charlie DeRose, Cole Stenger, Tanner Wind, Will Radtke

Percussion Ensemble – 2nd Place

Curtis Allen, Jessica Bradley, Jasiah Brown, LJ Carmichael, Chase Clure, Cameron Crites, Elizabeth Frenzel, Kyle Jensen, Emily Lyon, Zachary Manning, Alexander Miller, Ryan Nelson, Benjamin Norman, Lauren Rose, Paul Sprague, Tanner Wind

Woodwind Trio – 1st Place

Ryan Nelson, Brandon Dodd, Zoe Ames

Soloists

Paul Sprague – 2nd Place – Euphonium
Colton Byers – 3rd Place – Trumpet
Amanda Givens – 5th Place – Oboe
Ryan Nelson – 6th Place Bassoon

At the April 23 School Board meeting, Waverly Principal Anne Griffith, preschool teacher Katy Allaback and preschool assistant Carlos Sanchez shared information about the Waverly Child Development Center.

Now in it’s second year, the preschool serves about 35 students within the Waverly attendance boundaries. The preschool started with grant funding with a goal of giving young children an boost for school readiness.

According to Allaback, “The program provides a level playing field and expands opportunities for students success.”

Watch the video for more information about this successful program. 

Proposed Budget 2018-2019

Work will start soon on bond-funded projects around the district. Come to a community meeting in May to learn about the plans.

May 2: West Albany High School
May 23: South Albany High School

Both meetings will start at 7 p.m.

Congratulations to Team SWARM, the high school robotics team from South Albany and West Albany high schools. During its first international Lego Robotics competition, the team won second place in a division finals competition.

The team earned the right to compete at the World Championship events by earning high scores at competitions at the regional and state levels earlier in the year.

Read the story in the Democrat-Herald.

SWARM team leader Robin Hobbensiefken shared the team experience in an email to supporters:

From Wednesday through Saturday last week, SWARM competed in Houston Texas in the FRC World Championships. 404 FRC teams traveled to Worlds and were split into 6 divisions. We were placed in arguably the most difficult division, Hopper.

We had some amazing games and performed very well. In the end we ranked 17th out of the 68 teams in our division. During alliance selection, we were picked to be on the number 3 alliance comprised of BumbleB from Israel, the Ratchet Rockers from Missouri and Walton Robotics from Georgia. Our alliance won the quarter final matches 2 – 1 and won 2-0 in the semi finals.

In the finals for Hopper field, our alliance played against the number 1 alliance of the Cheesy Poofs, Robowranglers, Spartabots and Ha-Dream Team. The Cheesy Poofs went undefeated all season this year. They have an absolutely amazing robot. They were able to beat our alliance 2 – 0 in the finals. After winning our division, the moved on and proceeded to win every match in the round robin play for Einstein finals qualification matches and went on to win the World Championships 2 – 0 in the finals.

We assembled a playlist with all of our matches from the World Championships.

From all of the students and mentors from SWARM, we want to thank you once more for helping out our team! We had an amazing season and a lot of fun. We really appreciate all that you have done for us!

Robin Hobbensiefken, Team 957 SWARM Lead Mentor