All posts by teamcomm
Student Update October 31, 2013
Happy Halloween from The Island School! It’s a little late but we’re ready to celebrate. On Thursday, we had some time to plan costumes with our Community Outreach buddies. Tonight the whole school is going to the Levy Preserve in Governor’s Harbor. On out Down Island Trip, we visited this natural plant haven and learned about many medicinal plants. However, we have more exciting plans from this evening. We are dressing up and attending a haunted house will all of the Deep Creek Middle School kids as well as some of the local kids.
After all that fun, I’m sure we will be tired. Good thing we have a sleep in tomorrow! I know everyone here is excited to wake up late and have a relaxing morning. I’ll probably go on the free dive tomorrow morning. Since learning to free dive, I have improved greatly. At first, I could only go down maybe 15 feet and everyone else was going through tunnels down at 50. It was a little discouraging at first, but with some tips from Maxey and my fellow students I began to get much better. Although I still can’t hold my breath too well, I’ve started to make it down to about 35 feet most dives. This is the case for many other budding divers, but we are all really improving and having fun and get up early to show it.
Tomorrow there will also be other activities. A few weeks ago we went to Deep Creek to play basketball one afternoon and my five on five team won! It was really fun and even though I only scored one basket I’d love to do it again. On the opposite end, last week there was a softball game versus some local kids and we got destroyed 28-4. Even so, it was really exciting and a great way to spend a Sunday. Who knows what I’ll do tomorrow? I might bike out into the inner loop and spend the day really exploring.
Island School-Inspired Halloween Costume!
Shout out to Noelle Anderson (S’13) for her incredibly creative Halloween costume. She’s a conch shell! Thanks for sharing, Noelle! Did you wear an Island School-inspired Halloween costume this year? Send us your photos to alumni@islandschool.org
Student Update November 1, 2013
Hey here from The Island School! My name is Kiley Knott and I’ll be writing the blog this week. I have just completed my academic week. We had a very packed schedule throughout this as well as a new class: Humanities. This is a combination of Histories and Literature. Both classes have been discussing tourism so they were joined temporarily and team-taught. As for other subjects, we did a lot of work on our Human Ecology Projects and Research Results Assignment. We had long field blocks for each so that we could go out and do some hands-on activities. My research group took this opportunity to go out to our distant site and drop cameras that record video of sharks. Although each day was very busy, we also had a fun.
On Saturday, we went to The Ride For Hope. This is a bike ride in Governor’s Harbor about an hour or so north of The Cape. This ride raises awareness about cancer and is a very popular event every year. We went and cheered on Island School Faculty as well as members of CEI. Everyone got particularly excited when Maxey rode by on his “Iron Horse” and the day was full of entertainment.
Another big part of our week came on Wednesday. After a long morning exercise, K1 and K2 had been eagerly anticipating the return of K3. All throughout the evening people were reunited and there shouts of delight. Once everyone was showered and ready, all 48 of us headed down to a bonfire on Boy’s Dorm Beach. Everyone sat and talked around the warmth and I got to talk to people I hadn’t seen in almost 3 weeks. This event really brought us back together after weeks of separation. We’d had many bonfires before so it seemed a fitting way to recognize the completeness of the students once more. This late Wednesday night was really a pick-me-up for everyone and a great idea by our Caciques.
This week had a a lot of ups and downs for each person. Some students transitioning back into classes, some wishing they would end already, but we are all happy to have a full dorm and be able to count off at circle.
Admissions Reception in NYC Next Week!
DCMS New England Boarding School Tour
Each year, qualified students from Deep Creek Middle School visit New England Boarding schools in the hopes of earning a scholarship to continue their study abroad. This year, Zachary Carey and Demetria Humes toured at sixteen schools in five different states (The Hill, Taft, Deerfield, Pennington, Perkiomen, Cheshire, Cushing, Miss Halls, Wesminster, Northfield Mount Hermon, North Yarmouth Academy, Lawrence Academy, Kents Hill, George, Berkshire, Wilbraham and Monson, and Winchendon)! Zachary and Demetria will join over 30 other alumni who have earned over $3.25 million dollars in scholarships from partner schools.
For more information on this trip and DCMS’s relationship with US boarding schools, email Joanna Paul at joannapaul@dcmsbahamas.org.
Don’t Forget to RSVP to the 15 Year Celebration!
2013 October Road Trip Wrap-Up
What a whirlwind week it has been! On Tuesday morning, we left Burlington, VT and headed to Middlebury, VT. We met with prospective students at Middlebury Union High School in the morning where some of our recent alumni (Emily Robinson, F’12; Katie Holmes, F’12) had recruited a bunch of prospective Island School students. That evening, the Robinson family hosted an admissions reception at their beautiful, cozy home just outside of Middlebury in Weybridge, VT. We were happy to meet incoming Island School student and her family, Faith Isham, as well as catch up with some alumni!
On Wednesday morning it was back in the car and hitting the road! The team split up when we reached Hanover, NH. Cam and Taylor set up a table for interested students at Hanover High School, thanks to Elizabeth Keene in guidance, while Sharon drove to Kimball Union Academy in Meriden, NH. At Hanover, we were thankful for our alumni Sam Hastings (F’12) and Abby Smith (Su’13) for sharing their experiences at The Island School with their interested peers. Many friends of current student, Elsa Davis (F’13) also stopped by our table to find out more about The Island School.While in Hanover, we had the opportunity to check in all of our IS alumni at Dartmouth over lunch.
Meanwhile, at KUA, Sharon had a great visit all organized by recent Teacher Conference alumni Eric Russman and Erin Mellow. She also got to meet Tristan Wakeman who will be coming down to IS in Spring 2014, and caught up with Spring 2006 alumna and KUA teacher, Brit Hastings. From Hanover, we had a good 3-hour drive up to Portland, ME where we would stay for the remainder of our trip.
On Thursday morning, we had an appointment at Freeport High School where we met with a number of interested students. A special thanks to Dana Clark in guidance who supports our program and is welcoming us back on 11/12 for her Semester Abroad/Gap/Summer opportunities fair! The rest of the day was filled with visiting IS alumni at colleges in Maine. We had lunch with our Bowdoin alumni in Brunswick and dinner with our Bates alumni in Lewiston.
By the time Friday morning came around, Continue reading
We Care Solar
Island School parent alumna, Gigi Goldman (Danny Goldman, S’13) is connected with Laura Satchel who has been nominated as one of CNN’s Heros of the Year 2013. She is doing some amazing work in an effort to lower maternal mortality in state hospitals in Africa. During her time there in 2008, she witnessed deplorable conditions in state facilities including sporadic electricity that impaired maternity and surgical care. Without a reliable source of electricity, nighttime deliveries were attended in near darkness, cesarean sections were cancelled or conducted by flashlight, and critically ill patients waited hours or days for life-saving procedures.
Laura told her husband, Hal Aronson, a solar energy educator, about the rough conditions of the hospitals and her desire to make it better. Hal created a suitcase-sized portable solar panel that can be used as an operating room light or a source of electricity to charge headlamps and walkie-talkies while they await the larger solar installation. If you would like to vote for Laura Satchel as the 2013 CNN Hero of the Year, vote here!
The organization creating and distributing these portable, life-saving suitcases is called We Care Solar. They have received so many requests from people wanting to contribute to the cause so they have created a way for individuals to get involved. The cost of one of the Solar Suitcases is $1000. When you send in the $1000, We Care Solar mails you the parts included in a kit, you assemble the suitcase, and then send it directly to a hospital in need.
The Lawrenceville School Island School Club is in the process of raising $500 to go towards purchasing a Solar Suitcase. If they raise that money, The Island School will match them the remaining $500 so the club can get a kit to assemble together. Be sure to check back to the blog for updates on fundraising and Solar Suitcase assembly! If you are interested in this challenge or getting more information about We Care Solar, email alumni@islandschool.org.
Flats Research Project Update
The Flats group has begun running our shuttlebox trials to determine how climate change will affect Bonefish, Yellowfin Mojarra, Schoolmaster Snapper, and Checkered Puffer Fish. For our experiment, we have a shuttlebox, which consists of two circular tanks that are connected by a short swim-through area. For our experiment we are heating one of these tanks and waiting until the fish ‘shuttles’ to the other side. We have run a number of trials on both the Snapper and Mojarra. In some of these trials, we place a Lemon Shark in the unheated tank to play the role of a predator. Unfortunately we haven’t had any excitement; there have been no fish fatalities.
We do other things besides just shuttlebox trials. One day we cleaned the tanks with the Early Learning Center. Andrew and Charlie worked with the kids to clean the Bonefish and Mojarra tanks. The little kids were either really excited or a little bit scared to clean the tanks. Some of them jumped right in the bonefish tank but a few hesitated. In the end, the kids had a good time and the tanks got a good scrubbing, a success on all fronts.
We’ve spent lots of time in the wet lab recently but the other day we went out fly-fishing. This was only half of the research crew; Dale, Andrew, Krissy, and Hayeon, because the rest were on kayak rotations. Dale was the only one of us who had any previous angling experience but Aaron gave the rest of us a quick crash course on fly-fishing. We learned how to cast and single haul. Unfortunately, we didn’t catch anything on this trip. Better luck next time!
