Wheatley, Northport teams are mock trial champs
A team from The Wheatley School in Old Westbury, in the East Williston school district, won first place in the Nassau County Mock Trial Championship. Credit: East Williston School District
Teams from The Wheatley School in Old Westbury and Northport High School are this year's mock trial champions for Nassau and Suffolk counties, respectively.
Wheatley's team placed first last month in Nassau County's regional championships at the state Supreme Court in Mineola, defeating a team from Locust Valley High School in the final round.
Northport's team placed first last month in Suffolk County's regional championships at the Suffolk County District Courthouse in Central Islip, defeating a team from Bay Shore High School.
The two county champions advance to the state championships in Albany on May 19-21.
"It was a very emotional win," Northport senior Emma Canfora said. "Our hours and hours of hard work paid off."
Participating teams acted as the defense or prosecution to demonstrate their knowledge of law and courtroom procedures in a trial case that involved issues important to young people. Judging was handled by local attorneys and judges, with scoring based on criteria including preparation, performance and professionalism.
The Nassau and Suffolk county bar associations coordinated the tournaments for Nassau and Suffolk counties, respectively. The state tournament is sponsored by the New York State Bar Association.
Students at Elmont Memorial High School showed off their artwork during the school's first-ever Art Symposium. The recent event's keynote speaker was Grammy winner and Rock & Roll Hall of Fame inductee Darryl "DMC" McDaniels, who rose to fame with hip-hop pioneers Run-DMC. Credit: Elmont School District
JERICHO
WAC Science Fair
Jericho High School had seven first-place projects in various categories — the most of any school on Long Island — in this year's WAC Lighting Foundation Invitational Science Fair presented by the Research Association, a nonprofit consortium of lead research teachers from 13 local participating schools.
Jericho's first-place students were Nicole Huang, Jennifer Lin, Jake Moreh, Riya Patel, Janice Rateshwar, Sanjana Shanmugavel, Nuzhat Tarafder and Angela Zhu.
Seven teams from Plainedge High School and one team from Bethpage High School recently processed a mock crime scene as part of a third annual CSI Competition held at Plainedge's Brian Moore Athletic Center. Credit: Plainedge School District
Nassau County's other first-place winners and their high schools were: Olivia Liu, Great Neck North; Shourav Saha, Great Neck South; Carrie Hsu, Herricks; Mir Zayid Alam, Taylor Fox and Aaron Zhang, Manhasset; Jasmine Berger and Makenzie Komack, Roslyn; David Gold, Isaac Goldstein, Vernon McDermott, Jeannie Ren and Aidan Spizz, Paul D. Schreiber (Port Washington); and Manav Bansal, Wheatley.
The fair was held last month at The Wheatley School in Old Westbury.
OLD BROOKVILLE
Rocketry Challenge
Two teams from The Green Vale School are among 100 nationwide selected for the national finals of the 2019 Team America Rocketry Challenge, which this year is themed around the upcoming 50th anniversary of the Apollo 11 moon landing.
The contest asked students to design, build and fly rockets that can safely carry three raw eggs in a capsule to an altitude of 856 feet and return them intact to the ground within 43 to 46 seconds. Nearly 5,000 students nationwide competed.
The Green Vale School teams are the only ones chosen from Long Island. Finalists will vie for more than $100,000 at the national finals in northern Virginia on May 18.
The contest is sponsored by the Aerospace Industries Association and the National Association of Rocketry.
ISLANDWIDE
Spark! Challenge
A team from John F. Kennedy High School in Bellmore placed first and won $4,000 in a poster contest that was part of Northwell Health's 5th Annual Spark! Challenge.
More than 1,000 students from 47 school districts participated in the program, in which students visit Northwell Health facilities to learn about health-care careers and vie in poster and oral competitions based on what they observed.
Second place went to a team from MacArthur High School in Levittown and third place to a team from Valley Stream Central High School.
Other winners included teams from Baldwin High School and Division Avenue High School in Levittown, which won the Facebook Favorite Poster and Poster Rookie Award, respectively.
In addition, teams from Amityville, Baldwin, Glen Cove and Patchogue-Medford high schools, as well as Holy Trinity Diocesan High School in Hicksville, won Presentation Awards.
Michael R. Ebert is an education researcher and has worked for Newsday in various capacities since 2003. He was part of an 11-person team named as 2008 Pulitzer Prize finalists for investigative coverage of the LIRR's platform safety issues.
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