Model United Nations
High School North and South last month competed with more than 54 high schools and 1,000 delegates at the Model United Nationals Conference held in November at Princeton University. High School North was named best delegation large school, another first for the school. The team also received first place in best delegate, second place for outstanding delegate, third place in honorable mention, and fourth place in verbal commendation. North wins included:
Outstanding Delegate: Quinn Maingi, Felix Xiao, Tom Klimek, Amy Xu, and Brian Yuan.
Honorable Mention: Frank Long, Rebecca Brodsky, Jackie Litwin, Angela Sheng, Neha Kulkarni, Greg Solak, and Carolyn Lipka.
Verbal Commendation: Mohit Hajarnis, Nikhil Shenoy, Rachel Lipka, Daphne Ye, Brian Hui, Sarah Yue, and Lwam Stefanos.
Delegates: Anne Corbett, Faizon Khan, Zahid Sayed, and Chris Tian.
“After weeks of hard work and preparation that began over the summer, our school was awarded the Outstanding Delegation award at both Rutgers and Princeton conferences out of hundreds of participating schools, and over 1,000 participating delegates,” says Vyshakh Kodoth, secretary, High School South Model United Nations Club. “The school takes great pride in our successes at these conferences, as we have created a formidable reputation for our school and the West Windsor-Plainsboro area as a community with driven and hardworking intellectuals.”
High School South awards include:
Rutgers Model United Nations Conference: Outstanding Delegation Award in the Medium Delegation size category. Individual award winners were Ronak Gandhi, Vyshakh Kodoth, Aakash Bhatia, Rahul Lakhwani Rahul Sabinenni, Varsha Sundararaman, Nikhil Gavai, and Karan Gupta.
Princeton Model United Nations Conference: Outstanding Delegation Award in the Small Delegation size category. Individual award winners were Sabrina Arias, Sharang Phadke, Rahul Sabinenni, Omeed Alerasool, Eric Tang, Jordan Reece, Mark Kogan, Pranav Rao, Niharika Ray, Mihir Sheth, Amanda Immidisetti, Dylan Ogden, and Michael Liu.
South Model UN will compete at the University of Pennsylvania and Georgetown University in January and February. “These conferences tend to be our most competitive conferences of the year, and we have experienced great success at these conferences in the past,” says Kodoth. South club advisors are Brad Borsuk and Erin Schomburg.
Musical Notes
Kevin Kong, a seventh grade student at Community Middle School, received second place in the 11 to 14 year-old group in New Jersey in the Music Teacher’s National Association piano competition held on November 14. Earlier this year he took awards in the junior group of the Steinway & Sons Piano Competition. He studies piano with Chiu-Ling Lin.
Kong, who also studies violin with Dezheng Ping at Westminster Conservatory, won the Westminster Conservatory String Scholarship Competition for 2009. For more information visit https://kevinkong.moonfruit.com
Saved a Village
James Schultz, 9, of West Windsor donated $250 to adopt a village in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. He earned the money by doing chores and saving gift money he received for his birthday last May.
He presented his gift to Dr. Daniel Shungu, executive director of the United Front Against Riverblindness, headquartered in Lawrenceville. Through his donation, UFAR will distribute a full year’s treatment to fight riverblindness to a village in DRC. Riverblindness, prevalent in DRC and in other parts of Africa, slowly destroys eyesight in those with the parasitic disease.
Schultz is the son of the Reverends Matt and Elizabeth Schultz, who serve as youth pastors at Nassau Presbyterian Church in Princeton. His father has been in the news lately after winning $100,000 on “Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?”
New Patent
Chandrakant R. Yande of West Windsor was granted U.S. Patent No. 7614813 for Multiple Unit Combination Grout Dispenser for the tile industries by the U. S. Patent and Trademark Office in Washington, DC. Last year Yande received U.S. Patent No. 7344510 for Dental Hygiene Pulsatory Slit Apparatus for general dental health.
Arbitrator Named
Timothy J. Brown, above, of West Windsor has been elected to membership in the National Academy of Arbitrators by the board of governors of the academy.
The organization includes U.S. and Canadian arbitrators of labor management and employment disputes. Brown’s practice includes mediation and neutral fact investigations for government and private industry.
Project Freedom
Jason Cohen, a graduate of West Windsor-Plainsboro High School, Class of 1994, received Project Freedom’s Stephen Wensley Award. Cohen, inducted into the National Honor Society during his high school days, was one of the first wheelchair-bound students at High School South.
Cohen received his bachelor of arts degree in communications with a minor in religious studies from St. Andrews Presbyterian College in Laurinburg, North Carolina. A volunteer at Project Freedom in Robbinsville prior to his senior year in college, he was able to secure both an apartment and a part-time job there after graduation. Cohen is currently pursuing a masters degree in Christian Counseling.
The award recognizes Cohen’s support and continued service to Project Freedom and his community. Since he began living there in 1999, Cohen has taught a computer course for residents, maintained much of the Project Freedom website, as well as mined databases for grant funds. Cohen attends the Hamilton Square Baptist Church and maintains its website. Cohen, also involved in the New Jersey Coalition for Inclusive Ministries, is focused on getting houses of worship to become accessible for the disabled population. Cohen has completed other programs related to the disabled in New Jersey including Partners in Policymaking.
His mother, Florence Cohen of West Windsor, earned a top CARES grant award of $5,000 for Project Freedom. A retiree of Prudential Financial, the award was to aid accessible housing and support services for low-income, physically disabled individuals, and their families. (The News, November 20).
Community
Volunteers
Mark Merkovitz and Emily Josephson, both of West Windsor, have spearheaded the United Jewish Federation of Princeton Mercer Bucks’ annual Super Sunday.
On Sunday, December 6, volunteers from Mercer and Bucks counties will join together to make phone calls, raise funds, and donate time to support people in need. They will be wrapping gifts for a Chanukah program that provides donated gifts for children in need. There are training sessions, outreach activities, and even a special session for teens to learn about philanthropy and participate in raising funds.
The event will be held at Bank of America, 410 Scotch Road, Pennington, from 9 a.m. to noon, and from 1 to 4:30 p.m. Call 609-219-0555 for information or a schedule.
Engagement
Dr. Laura Ottavia Frangella and Jeffrey Harwood Beam are planning an August wedding.
The bride is the daughter of Ottavio and Marianne Frangella of South Huntington, New York. A graduate of Lehigh University, Class of 2004; and the University of Buffalo Dental School, Class of 2008, she practices dentistry in Commack, New York.
The prospective bridegroom is the son of William and Eileen Beam of Cranbury. A graduate of West Windsor-Plainsboro High School, Class of 2000, and Lehigh University, Class of 2004, he received a master’s degree in biomedical science from the University of Medicine & Dentistry of New Jersey in 2007. He is a territory sales manager with Middlebrook Pharmaceuticals.
Births
The University Medical Center at Princeton has announced the following births:
Sons were born to Plainsboro residents Usha Rani Pamidi and Siva Kumar Veluru, November 13; Grace Kamagana Penn and Darrell Andre Penn, November 21; and Lavanya Katkuri and Prasanna Rachakatla, November 22;
Daughters were born to Plainsboro residents Eileen and John Wang, November 13; Rasheedah McDaniel and Hassan Wilson, November 19; and Junhong Mao and Guofeng Xu, November 24.
Daughters were born to West Windsor residents Colleen and Emmett Henry, November 23; and Anne and Christopher Maloney, November 24.
