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Congratulations to Christine Dunne and Marcia Napolitano, who were recently named this year’s Oak Tree Award Teachers of the Year.

Award winners Christine Dunne (L) and Marcia Napolitano

The Oak Tree Award promotes community recognition and respect for teaching as a profession by selecting a representative Oak Tree Award winners Christine Dunne (L) and exemplary educator at the elementary and secondary levels in Webster Schools. A nominee must be characterized as an exemplary teacher, be currently teaching in a full-time position in the Webster Central School District, have a minimum of five years’ teaching experience in Webster, and plan to continue to teach in the following school year in/or retire from the Webster Central School District.

Other nominees this year included Lynda Courage, Erin Lantzer, Kathy Scerra, William Schoff, Pam Smith, Kristin Chatfield, Diane DiGravio, Julie McGuigan and Deb Ostertag. Winners were chosen by a selection committee comprised of representatives from the Webster Teachers Association and Webster Parent Teachers Student Association.

Marcia Napolitano is the Oak Tree Award recipient for the elementary level.  Colleague Ann Merkey nominated the Plank Road North Elementary School fourth grade teacher.

Christine Dunne, who teaches foreign language at Willink Middle School and Webster Thomas High School, is the recipient for the secondary level. She was nominated by her former student, Beth Gillis, and by her colleague, Kathleen Lehman.

As Oak Tree Award honorees, Napolitano and Dunn were presented with their plaques at the Board of Education meeting on May 3. These plaques will hang in their buildings (Dunne’s will be at Willink) as a proud display for their colleagues and visitors to the schools.  They also each received a hand-lathed, wood pen and a $500 award.

Last weekend, many of our Webster Schroeder music students traveled to Walt Disney World in Orlando to participate in the annual Festival Disney.  Several performance groups were represented, including the Webster Show Choir, comprised of students from both Thomas and Schroeder high schools.

Yesterday I received a press release from Show Choir Director Laura D’Angelo letting me know that along with a few sunburns, lots of souvenirs and tons of great memories, these kids also brought back some pretty impressive bling.

Festival Disney allows high school performing groups from around the country to perform for a panel of three eminent college professors, who provide constructive feedback in the form of a brief clinic. At the event last Saturday, 45 choirs were adjudicated in various aspects of performance and given final numeric scores reflecting overall level of preparation and competence.

Of the 15 “Specialty Choirs” represented, Webster achieved the highest ratings of “Gold” and “Best In Class” with an average rating of 97. This was not only the highest score in the Specialty Choirs class, but the highest overall score among all 45 choirs of all classes. The adjudicators also made special mention of the show choir’s pit band, unique among the 15 choirs in their class.

Proud directors: Kim Eckler and Laura D’Angelo

Webster Show Choir is an auditioned extra-curricular group which meets for one two hour rehearsal per week for eight months of the year.  The students from Show Choir who attended this festival were:  Brianna Adams; Stephen Adams; Hayley Alexander; Dan Bennett; Abby Blackmon; Hannah Boddery; Jon Christiano; Tom Curran; Kayleigh DeBrine; Jordan Diggory; Emma Germano; Tim Hight; Gabby Jerzak; Carson Klasner; Selene Klasner; Diana Lohrman; Alec Nevin; Dan Parry; Justin Smith; Allison Snavely; Hadley Strelau; Evan Sundquist; Paul Urriola; and Julian Wicks.

The pit band included: Nick Mastrolonardo and John Killigrew, Trumpet; Frank Regelski, Tenor Sax; Zak Smith, Bass; and Kevin Killigrew, Drums.

Congratulations to all the performers, and Show Choir directors Laura D’Angelo and Kim Eckler for this terrific accomplishment. You made Webster proud again.

Today I offer a follow-up on a blog I wrote a few days ago.

If you happened to click through to the gallery of photos I posted as part of my blog on Community Arts Day on Saturday,  you saw this one:

I was so impressed with this piece, my caption simply said, “This. Is. Awesome.”

Since that blog, I’ve gotten quite a few comments about that photo, and it has racked up several “likes.”   Turns out, the student who painted that piece, is a Thomas High School Advanced Placement art student, so found out a little more about it, and about the artist himself, from Webster Thomas art teacher Todd Stahl.

The artist is Austin Frank, and he is so good at what he does that he’s been offered the Presidential Scholarship from the prestigious Cleveland Institute of Art, where he’ll be studying Industrial Design this fall.  The award is offered to only a few incoming freshmen every year, and will cover his entire tuition for all four years.

But, proud art papa that he is, Todd didn’t want to talk only about Austin. He pointed out that several of his students have received impressive scholarships. Like Beth Peterson, who “received a major scholarship from almost every major art college in the country east of Chicago — every school she applied to.”

Other outstanding students from the program include Dennis Moore and Jessie Schnall. Todd gave me the actual figures, and so far these four students alone have pulled in a total of $863,000 in art school scholarships so far.

Webster Schroeder also has its share of top-notch art students.  Schroeder AP art teacher Bill Stephens told me that his students Tristan Cannan, Briana Jewell, Michaela Jewell, Danielle Capizzi and Katie Papas have also scored some big bucks. Check out some of their artwork below.

email me at missyblog@gmail.com

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