#b#Stump Wins Poetry Contest#/b#
Jamie Stump of West Windsor took a first place award in the Collingswood Book Festival poetry contest. A fifth grade student at Millstone River School, she is 10 years old.
She was in the West Windsor Arts Council’s multi-arts camp this summer and learned about the competition from her poetry instructor, Anna Evans. Stump was invited to read her entry at the children’s tent on the day of the festival. Her poem, “Secrets,” follows:
The little bird whispers soft secrets in my ear I swear never to tell
The honeybee tells me sweet stories they taste like liquid in my mouth
The butterfly lectures me about her flights and I listen intensely
The flowers show me dances they learned from the wind I laugh until my side hurts
The leaves blow through my hair fixing stray strands
They all tell me adventures of their lives and I swallow them down
#b#Hsia Selected for Master Class#/b#
Tiffaney Hsia was selected to perform in a master class led by Joseph Silverstein, a violinist and faculty member at Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia. Hsia, 14, is a freshman at High School South and concertmaster of the school’s orchestra String Ensemble. The event takes place at Caldwell College on Sunday, October 28, at 3 p.m.
Hsia is one of the three winners selected from an audition sponsored by the National League of Performing Arts. Currently studying violin with Cheng-Chih Kevin Tsai, Hsia has received awards at ASTA/NJ Solo Strings Competition, the NMTA Composer Commission Competition, the concerto and string scholarship competitions at Westminster Conservatory, the Kennett Symphony Concerto Competition, Young Classical Virtuosos of Tomorrow Competition, American Fine Arts Festival, and Golden Strings of America. She has performed at Carnegie Hall’s Weill Concert Hall and the Kimmel Center for the Performing Arts in Philadelphia.
Visit www.nationalleagueofperformingarts.org.
#b#WW-P to Ghana#/b#
Lorell Levy, a learning disabilities teacher-consultant with the WW-P school district, will travel to Ghana to train parents, educators, and public health officials about early identification, therapeutic interventions, and supportive strategies for the treatment of children with autism. The goal of the mission is the establishment of the Haven International Center for Special Education, an autism and developmental disabilities treatment and training center in Ghana.
Levy, a resident of Lawrenceville, is a former special education teacher, and a part-time instructor with the graduate School of Education at Rutgers University, New Brunswick campus.
She is traveling with Genevieve Kumapley, PharmD and Barbie Zimmerman-Bier, MD. Each has a son with autism and each is also devoted to helping families cope with the challenges of raising an autistic child. Levy is the mother of a 24-year-old son with autism.
#b#Weird New Jersey#/b#
Joe Ryan, a former West Windsor resident, entered five photos in the “Weird NJ” cover contest for the magazine, “Weird NJ: Your Travel Guide to New Jersey’s Local Legends and Best Kept Secrets.”
Two of his images were taken in West Windsor. The Grover’s Mill water tower was shot in 1992 and the Veterans Memorial in 2010. Though his submissions were not chosen for the front cover, the image of the Veterans Memorial was selected as a runner up and published in “Weird NJ #39.” The photo of the water tower is in this issue with the “War of the Worlds” story.
#b#South Invited to United Nations Day Celebration#/b#
High School South’s Model UN group was invited by the United Nations Association of the United States of America’s Northern NJ Chapter to attend a celebration of United Nations Day 2012 in the Senate Chamber of the historic NJ State House in Trenton. The students will be recognized and honored for winning citations at regional and national Model UN conferences. Delegates will have the chance to hear remarks by several ambassadors.
“I expect this will be a highly educational experience for our team members, who debate these pressing issues in MUN every day, especially given the high relevance of the Middle East, Africa, and Afghanistan to U.S. foreign relations,” says Arnav Sood, the press secretary for the South group, who will attend the event. Prashant Sharma, president of SouthMUN, will be participating in the reading of the UN Charter before the gathered assembly.
The attending officers also include Vedant Sachdeva, vice-president; Suchira Sharma, vice-president; Abhimanyu Muchhal, secretary; and seniors Laurence Hochman, Sophia Liu, Ayush Gupta, Derrick Wang, Aaron Wen, and Jenni Kim. Accompanying the delegates will be the South Model UN advisors Brad Borsuk and Erin Schomburg.
The students were also invited to attend a formal luncheon with some of these dignitaries including Representative Rush Holt and Senator Linda Greenstein where delegates can discuss with the speakers on a more relaxed and informal note. This is the 67th anniversary of the United Nations. This year’s event is dedicated to the theme of “Working Toward a Peaceful and Prosperous World.”
