Schools: Creating music videos like pros
Long Island students have never seen a bus like this one.
A group of high schoolers at Eastern Suffolk BOCES' Edward J. Milliken Technical Center in Oakdale and H.B. Ward Career and Technical Center in Riverhead learned the ins and outs of audio and video recording last month during a visit from the John Lennon Educational Tour Bus, a nonprofit mobile production studio that provides songwriting and multimedia workshops to students.
Three onboard music engineers -- along with Alex Skolnick, guitarist of the heavy metal band Testament -- assisted the teens with writing, performing and completing a broadcast-quality music video.
"Students are gaining insight into real-world applications of what they're learning in class," said Mark Deedy, an audio production teacher at Milliken. "They're also benefiting from the experience of working as a team with students from our communication cluster as they produce a large-scale project."
In Oakdale, senior Ashleen Jones, a singer and guitarist, recorded her original song titled "Stupid Boy" and made a music video with the help of Skolnick and four classmates -- all in one day. The video features Jones singing at various spots on the Milliken campus with the tour bus in the background.
All projects created on board the bus are available for viewing on the nonprofit's MySpace, Facebook and YouTube pages.
"This is such an incredible opportunity," said Jones, a senior at Connetquot High School in Bohemia who is studying audio production at Milliken. "I couldn't believe I was really working with Alex."
Emi Pellegrino, a junior at Sachem High School East in Farmingville, added: "Someday, I'm going to have my own tour bus with my photo on the side."
Lindenhurst Middle and High school students raised more than $3,400 last month as part of a walkathon and blood drive held at the middle school to benefit the Christina Renna Foundation, a Lindenhurst-based nonprofit that supports children's cancer research.
Renna was a Lindenhurst High School student who died in 2007 of rhabdomyosarcoma, a soft-tissue cancer. Her father is a former president of the district's board of education.
Library in soldier's name
Pulaski Street Elementary School held a ribbon-cutting ceremony last month to rename the school's library in honor of Garfield Langhorn, a 1967 graduate of Riverhead High School and Congressional Medal of Honor winner as an Army private first class killed in action in the Vietnam War. The school unveiled a bronze plaque with details on Langhorn's life, along with two framed photographs of him.
Langhorn died during a rescue mission when he threw himself on a live grenade to save his fellow soldiers. He was posthumously awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor.
New appointments
Michael Radday is the superintendent of Westhampton Beach School District, replacing Lynn Schwartz, who retired.
Radday was previously the assistant superintendent for personnel and instruction and a middle school principal in the district, and before that he worked as an assistant principal at the middle and high school levels of Mount Sinai School District. He also taught history and physical education in the New York City public school system.
In other news, Lisa Sliver is now principal of Westhampton Beach Elementary School replacing Ron Masera, who is now superintendent of Remsenburg-Speonk Union Free School District. She was previously principal at an elementary school in Port St. Lucie, Fla.
ISLANDWIDE
Tech grant program
Long Island schools eager to advance education in the classroom with technology have the opportunity to apply for up to $100,000 in grants from Jericho-based telecommunications provider Optimum Lightpath.
Applications, available on the company's website, are being accepted through Monday and are open to public and private elementary and secondary schools.
Grants will be awarded based on criteria that includes how a school would use the funds to create new initiatives, improve the overall education experience, and promote "distance learning," which means using technology to teach students with information sources not physically in the classroom.
Winners will be announced next month at Optimum Lightpath's Long Island Education Technology Conference, where Nassau County Executive Edward Mangano will present checks. Optimum Lightpath is a division of Cablevision, which owns Newsday.
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