The Importance of Culture Fest

2017 Culture Fest was well attended on February 10

By Chloe Johnson

To commence ACE week, students participated in an annual event created by senior, Fatima Boumahchad. If you didn’t know, ACE week stands for “Accepting Cultures for Everyone.” Two years ago, as a sophomore, Fatima was inspired by her past experiences as a New Yorker where there was a variety of cultures represented. When she came to Dayton Regional STEM School (DRSS), she wanted to learn more about the cultures within STEM to share it with others. Fatima stated, “I started it mainly to educate my peers on different cultures that there are. I also thought it would be a pretty cool event to have!” This year, many different cultures were represented including: French, Native American, Indian, Moroccan, Brazilian, Saint Augustine, Philippian, Bolivian, Indonesian, Spanish, Japanese, German, Australian, Italian, Russian, Cuban, Puerto Rican, Thai and so many more. 

Students had the opportunity to share and learn more about each culture that was represented and get food from various parts of the world.

This event was about sharing culture with each other. Fatima stated, “It has grown each year! My sophomore year there was only about ten different groups and cultures represented. And last year there was about thirty groups. This year was our biggest and best, with a huge variety of culture and even more people participating than before!” When I asked students about if they enjoyed the event, an overwhelming theme was shared; it was tons of fun, and it was great meeting new people. ACE week is all about accepting one another and getting to learn more about people who you may not know much about. When I asked several students about the importance of sharing cultures, I received many different types of answers. Junior, Shivani Selvam, who represented India, stated, “This event helps people to not mistake culture for something else. Specifically, henna is something that is representative of Indian culture, and it did not originate from boho fashion. This event is about disrupting ignorance.” 

Pooja does a henna tattoo for a fellow student

Furthermore, when I asked students about the importance of diversity in society, senior, Cameron Martin, who represented Romania, stated “We all don’t want to get boring. Through our differences, we are unique. Our uniqueness makes us who we are.” In addition, senior, Brianna Moen, who represented Native American culture, answered this question by stating, “Let’s you know you are not alone. No one is the same.” Another question I posed to some students who were sharing their cultures was if it was possible to create your own culture. Srvanthi Vanga, a junior, who represented India, stated, “You can travel to different countries to learn more about them to make your own.”  Also, Amanda Desorcy, a junior, who represented Hawaiian, stated, “Yes, countries can do it, so can you.” 

Event organizer, Fatima Boumahchad (far left) stands with her fellow classmates as they represent Morocco

This event was a beautiful display of cultures that represent the school’s diversity. Fatima believes this event will continue on. Specifically, she stated, “Definitely! It’s such a fun event and the students and staff enjoy it every year. I’d love to see it continue on as a tradition.” Culture fest was a success, and this event will hopefully stay around for a while even after the creator graduates.

National Honor Society Inducts New Members for 2017

2017 Inductees to the DRSS Chapter of National Honor Society

By Shivani Selvam

With more than four events taking place each year, National Honor Society (NHS) began 2017 with a great kick off to the year. On January 19^th, students who were recently inducted into NHS attended a ceremony to be formally inducted. 

The ceremony took place at the Dayton Regional STEM School. Students celebrated the ceremony with their family and friends, and by signing a book committing them to following the mission and rules of NHS. Towards the end of the ceremony they received a certificate commemorating their acceptance.

National Honor Society is a national organization whose students commit to helping out their local community. NHS members are very involved in their school and community. Students inducted into NHS have demonstrated exemplary skills in the categories of scholarship, leadership, service, and character. Juniors and seniors with a cumulative GPA of 3.50 or higher are eligible to apply.

Mrs. Camden, the NHS advisor, remarked upon the stipulations for membership, explaining, “Members of NHS demonstrate exemplary skills in scholarship, character, service, and leadership.  These students continuously uphold these characteristics and serve as leaders in school and in the community.  Members meet at a minimum once a month – more often when they have specific projects that they are working on.”   

Membership in NHS is both an honor and a commitment. It is this commitment that has helped shape the Honor Society’s reputation for excellence, making it a valued asset among administrators, faculty members, students, parents, and communities.

The following students were inducted at the ceremony:

Amin Ashraf, Jessica Blankenship, Gloria Campos, Stephanie Cooper, Lauren Dalton, Chloe Johnson, Katie Jones, Adam Mitchell, Zayneb Moumkine, Bendic Pacia, Adya Panchal, Brianna Perkins, Christian Peters, Anjali Phadke, Maya Quale, Zeke Reichert, Kathleen Saine, Rachel Sax, Pooja Shirahatti, Rachael Stowe, Nicole Sword, Devin Wade, and Connor Weaver.

This is an exciting time for NHS members as they embark on new initiatives designed to further support students in their quest to uphold the values that earned them their selection. These initiatives will allow student members the opportunity to engage in activities that extend far beyond their local communities. Students will be proud to identify themselves as a member of the National Honor Society.

CyberPatriot Teams Head to Regional Competition After Taking State!

Kettering, OH, 2/3/17 - The students of the Dayton Regional STEM School's CyberPatriot teams just pulled off a pretty amazing feat by taking first place in their state competition! Perhaps more impressively, the students placed first at the platinum level, the highest level of competition. The first place team consists of Quan Nguyen, Daniel Ayala, Marc Ayala, Connor Weaver, Ryan Lapchynski, and Ryan Erno.

Cyber Patriots advisor Mr. Slone stands with our 1st place team, consisting of Connor Weaver, Ryan Lapchynski, Ryan Erno, Marc Ayala, Quan Nguyen, and Daniel Ayala.

CyberPatriots is a national Cybersecurity competition sponsored by the Air Force Association where students compete to find system vulnerabilities. Thanks to the students' amazing performance, the students now get to move onto regional competition, where they will have a shot at getting into the CyberPatriot National Competition. According to Mr. Slone, this competition is very hard to get into, but our students have a great chance at doing just that.

"The qualification for earning at seat at the national competition is to score within the top 13 of 4,404 teams nationally. To put this request in perspective, one of our teams ranked 37th nationally during the last state round competition. That same team earned first place in Ohio and our other team on track for nationals earned third place in Ohio," he explained.

The students are indebted to their head coach, Dr. Kowal, who works with them. Connor Weaver, one of the students on the first place team, praised Dr. Kowal's coaching technique, explaining that "Dr. Kowal teaches us about the images we're practicing in order to challenge us and prepare us for competition. He makes complex things, like setting up a network, sound like an everyday simple task." Dr. Kowal has also been able to bring in mentors from the Air Force Institute of Technology (AFIT), who have helped mentor the students as they prepare for competition.

DRSS has two other teams who will advance to regional competition tomorrow, including the DRSS team that placed third at the platinum level, as well as the school's first all-female team, which placed fourth in the silver tier, but earned a wild-card spot that allowed them to advance to regionals.

Sam Furtaw, Stephanie Tullis, Aidan Schubert, Adam Mitchell, and Austin Davis placed third out of all the teams who competed in the state level competition.

The schools first all-female team placed fourth at the silver tier of competition. The team consists of Danielle Lindsey, Carissa Ritter, Cara Stedman, and Kellyn Brokenhagen.

The school's middle school team also performed well in competition, earning the second place spot in the state! They will advance on to semi-finals tomorrow.

The middle school team placed second overall and moves on to semi-finals next. From left to right: Xander Tipton, Pushar Shirahatti, Peter Cooper, Jackson Kauflin, Caleb Gindelberger, and Vraj Shah.

The school is grateful to the Dayton-Wright Chapter of the Armed Forces Communications and Electronics Association (AFCEA) for providing a generous grant to DRSS, a portion of which is allocated to support the activities and competitions for DRSS's CyberPatriot teams. AFCEA's financial contribution means that the teams can focus on improving their skills and continue to explore the cybersecurity and computer science paths.

Congratulations to all our CyberPatriots teams on their amazing performance, and good luck to them in their regional competition tomorrow!

Learning Chemistry by the Grid Method

Students use the grid method to learn about bonding.

By: Rachael Stowe

STEM is known for its non-traditional learning environment, and this year’s juniors are getting a taste of that as they go through and complete a unit of learning using the grid method. The grid method consists of a “grid” created by the teacher and corresponding assignments to go with each part of the grid. The grid for Chemistry is specifically designed in order for students to learn and understand bonding.

The bonding grid begins with Level 1, which focuses on Lewis Dot structures and different bonds types. Level 1 has five different sections, each consisting of notes and/or a quiz. Once the student has achieved at least an 80% on the individual section they are then free to go onto the next section of the grid.

Once mastery has been achieved for a level of the grid (meaning that the student passes the final assessment or task on the level), they are free to move onto the next level of the grid. For level 2 of the bonding grid, students focus on the difference in electronegativity and how that effects bond type. Students also learn about the Lewis Dot structure of polyatomic ions. This builds on what they learned in the last level.

Level 3 of the grid has students focus on molecular geometry and molecular/bond polarity. This level consists of tasks completed using online simulations, followed by a quiz to test learning. Level 4 has students creating and executing a lab, figuring out what properties determine bond type and determining the bond type of multiple different substances, including an unknown substance.

A full lab report, including procedures, results, clean-up and a conclusion is required to finish Level 4. The final level is Level 5 and requires students to write a four-paragraph essay on one of a couple topics including bonding in polymers, snowflake formation or the folding of proteins in biochemistry.

Chemistry isn’t the only class where the grid method is being used. For sophomores, multiple grids have been used in Biology, over subjects like DNA replication. They even completed a grid in Language Arts about research, in preparation for the cancer video/letter project.

Students have mixed opinions about the grid method, but the reception to the method is mostly positive. “I think the grid method is a great way to learn, especially for upper classmen”, one student told me. “I feel like being self-responsible and learning how to manage our time properly is a great way to prepare for college. And the assignments themselves are very interesting.”

It remains to be seen how many teachers try and adopt the grid method, but for now, it’s just a reminder of how progressive and innovative STEM can really be.

Students Put On Their "Thinking Caps"

A "thinking cap"

By: Rachael Stowe

Students in Anatomy and Physiology are creating brain thinking caps, or small brain models to wear on their head, in order to help them learn the different sections of the brain. 

This is a continuation of their nervous system unit. So far, the students have learned about the three main functions of the nervous system (sensory, integration, and motor), the different sections of the nervous system, neurons and their parts, and the action potential (or the way that signals travel throughout the brain and nervous system). Now, the students are moving onto the brain itself and the parts of the brain.

The brain thinking caps are colored and labeled with important sections of the brain, like the four lobes of the brain (frontal, temporal, occipital and parietal), the speech and language area, the visual area, the working memory and judgment areas, and the auditory area. These areas are crucial to brain function and are essential to know when learning the brain. 

The frontal lobe is located at the front of the brain and contains control centers for important functions like motor function, memory, judgment, problem-solving, language comprehension, and speech. The temporal lobe is located on the side of the brain and controls smell, speech/language and hearing. The occipital lobe is located on the back of the brain and controls sight and association. The parietal lobe is located on the center top of the brain and controls senses, speech/language, and taste. 

These four major lobes of the brain control essentially every basic and complicated function and movement of the human body. Because of this, learning and understanding these lobes is essential to a full comprehension of the nervous system as a whole. Once these four lobes are memorized and understood, students can start to identify the connections between the brain/nervous system and other human body systems that have already been learned, like the muscular system.

Having these brain thinking caps as a resource and a way to learn the brain is proving to be very helpful to the students. One student said that “Participating in projects like these really helps give me a visual of what I’m learning, which improves my learning overall.” Another spoke about how “hands-on learning helps to further develop their understanding of topics, especially in Anatomy, because of the complex parts and processes that are required to be fully learned and understood. These projects help me determine the connections between all parts and systems of the body and that helps me to see the human body system as a working machine of sorts, and not just as a variety of different parts each controlling their own thing.” 

Projects like these brain thinking caps are just another way that STEM infuses hands-on opportunities into everyday learning.

Key Club Raises Money for Shoes for the Shoeless

By Maya Quale 

DRSS Key Club continues to benefit the community by experimenting with a new project. Key Club is a student run club that focuses on fundraising at school or in the community to help local and national charities. Projects Key Club has done this year include pep rally, winter dance, and change wars. 

Now, they are partnering with World’s Finest Chocolate to help raise money for a local charity: Shoes for the Shoeless. Shoes for the Shoeless is a non-profit organization that began in Dayton, started by Kris Horlacher, which donates shoes, socks, and underwear for students ages 5-18. It began giving shoes to children in need back in 2010, winning the Pepsi Refresh award. 

Each box of chocolate generates $60, half of which goes to Key Club, the other half to Shoes for the Shoeless. Key Club hopes to generate over $3000 in sales. Key Club Treasurer, Pooja Shirahatti, says, “I think the chocolate sales is a great idea to raise money because everyone loves chocolate. I am most excited about raising enough money to donate at least 300 shoes to people who don’t have access to shoes their own size or access to shoes at all.” Students who sell more than four boxes can be awarded a cash prize by selling more than their fellow students. 

Five different types of chocolate are on sale: dark, milk, wafer crisp, caramel, and almond chocolate. Students will be selling before and after school. 11th grade student, Anjali Phadke, stated, “I had a dollar and instead of buying a frosty, I bought a chocolate bar. They’re that good.” 

With a large variety, everyone will be able to enjoy and even better, the money will help a local Dayton charity that needs our help. The project dovetails nicely with Key Club’s Flower-grams project, which are also now on sale. During Valentine’s Day, students can send their friends a nice message, along with a chocolate bar. 

One of the great things about this project is that it branches out to the community. This is an amazing opportunity for both Key Club and Shoe’s for the Shoeless because everyone in the DRSS community can give back, while also receiving a delicious reward.

Parents' Night Out Fundraiser Helps Students Travel to Bosnia-Herzegovina

Gloria, Austin, Victoria, and Bri are working hard to raise funds to head to Bosnia-Herzegovina for an exciting international internship opportunity!

By Katie Jones
 
The Dayton Regional STEM School (DRSS) is hosting a fundraiser for the four students (and one alumna) chosen to go on the Bosnia and Herzegovina internship. This group consists of Gloria Campos (junior), Austin Davis (junior), Brianna Perkins (junior), Victoria Cockrell (sophomore), and Bethany Wilson (alumna). It takes quite a bit of money to send each student to Bosnia and Herzegovina, so DRSS is helping them by allowing them to put on a Parents’ Night Out!

Parents’ Night Out is a chance for parents of DRSS students to go out and know that their kids are in good hands. It takes place on February 10^th, and goes from 6:00 - 9:00PM. Tickets are $10 and are on sale now, both before and after school. They can also be bought at the door, although the price increases to $15.

While there, students can participate in a variety of activities. These include movies for all DRSS students, no matter what their age, as well as board games and video games. In addition to movies and games, food will also be provided. Subway is donating two 6 foot long subs, and Taco Bell will be providing cinnamon twists. Other snacks and drinks will also be available.

Sure to be a fun event, so don't miss it!