Superintendent: Appreciate Your Teachers, School's Almost Out, Blown Away by Debate Team

Submitted by Joseph Sawyer, superintendent of schools

You likely saw the various requests from principals asking that you and your children please consider sending an e-mail or card to teachers and school nurses in honor of this week’s Teacher Appreciation Day (Today) & Week and School Nurse Appreciation Day that occurred on May 8. Such gestures are valued a great deal by our educators, and given that many are working under particularly difficult conditions with too many classes that have too many students, messages of thanks and appreciation are more important than ever. We are fortunate that Shrewsbury has such high performing and dedicated teachers, and they deserve our gratitude and praise. Please take a few minutes to express your appreciation for their efforts to improve your children’s lives.

It is hard to believe we only have seven weeks of school left (the last day will be Thursday, June 20). While this is an intense time of year given all that we are trying to accomplish to ensure a strong finish, while also preparing for next school year, it is also a gratifying time when we get to witness the growth and success of our students.  This past weekend, I was incredibly impressed by the quality of student artwork in our Elementary and Middle School Art Festival, which was held at the Senior Center on Maple Ave.  The art is displayed there through this Thursday, May 9 – stop by and check it out if you can. 

I also was blown away by the various performances by the SHS Speech and Debate Team, who held an exhibition on Saturday night.  From classic pro/con debate, to poetry and narrative interpretive readings, to original oratory, these students demonstrated unbelievable talent, preparation, and poise.  Congratulations to Karyn Polito, who received the Speech and Debate’s second annual Community Voice Award, and thanks to Coach Marc Rischitelli, his assistants, and the POISE parent group for putting on such an impressive event.  We will be honoring four speech and debate state champions tomorrow (Wednesday) evening at 7pm at our School Committee meeting: Sean Lambert (Gr. 12), Nathaniel Mahowald (Gr. 10), Nithya Pathalam (Gr. 10), and Jeremy Lambert (Gr. 9).

We also honor the top ten ranked students in this year’s senior class at SHS. As always, these students’ accomplishments are incredibly impressive – our community should be very proud of these fine young people.  Please read the brief profiles below to get a sense of what our highest performing students accomplished during their high school career – and remember that there are many, many more whose overall accomplishments are equally impressive but whose grade point averages were just slightly lower. 

Shrewsbury High School Class of 2013 Senior Scholars

(in alphabetical order, with college each plans to attend)

Abheek Ghosh  (Emory University)

Vivian Si-Min He  (California Institute of Technology)

Sara Waleed Khedr  (Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute)           

YiMing Li  (University of Michigan)

Stephen Mitchell Munzer  (Brown University)

Adam Jacob Proch  (Cornell University)

Sarah Jeanne Russell (Wellesley College)

Nicholas David Silverio  (University of Pennsylvania)

Avneet Kaur Soin  (Tufts University)

Jennifer Lynn Tylock  (Massachusetts Institute of Technology)