Good News June 15, 2016

Christian Jones Named Gatorade Washington Baseball Player of the Year

Tonight, we’re starting out our Good News Announcements by recognizing Christian Jones of Federal Way High School.
Christian has been selected as the 2015-16 Gatorade Washington Baseball Player of the Year. He is the first Federal Way High School student-scholar to be selected for a Gatorade player of the year award in any sports category.

The award recognizes not only outstanding athletic excellence, but also high standards of academic achievement and exemplary character demonstrated on and off the field. This, Gatorade notes, distinguishes Christian as Washington’s best high school baseball player, and makes him a finalist for the prestigious Gatorade National Baseball Player of the Year.

The 6-foot-2, 195-pound senior outfielder and first baseman batted .446 with six home runs, 27 runs scored, and 23 runs batted in this past season, leading the Eagles to the first round of the Class 4A regional tournament. Christian was a 2015 Under Armour All-American, and both the Seattle Times and the News Tribune selected him as their Baseball Player of the Year for 2016.

Christian is a leader in the classroom, too, and has maintained a 3.76 grade point average. He also has volunteered locally as a peer mentor and as a youth baseball coach. Christian has signed a National Letter of Intent to play baseball on scholarship at the University of Washington this fall.

Congratulations and best wishes in all your future plans, Christian. We’re very proud of you!

FWHS and TBHS Pacific Islander Clubs Excel in Samoan Arts High School Competition

Both the Federal Way High School and Todd Beamer High School Pacific Islander Clubs participated in the second annual Samoan Arts High School Competition at Mt. Rainier High School on Saturday, May 14.

The competition is treated as a sport and participating student-scholars are required to have a certain GPA to participate. This helps motivate the scholars to strive for academic excellence and holds them accountable. Participating schools from around the South Puget Sound region work together throughout the year to form bonds and even though they are in competition, organizers say, they are winning as a community by uniting as one and spreading the love.

Video of both clubs’ performances are available on YouTube and were shared on our district Facebook page late in May – we encourage everyone to go take a look, they are quite wonderful.

At the Samoan Arts competition, the Federal Way High Pacific Islander Club took home four first-place awards:

• Highest Grade Point Average 
• Best Mauluulu or group dance 
• Best Siva Tama (or Faataupati) or Boys’ Dance, and
• Best Siva Teine, or Girls’ Dance

The Federal Way High’s Pacific Islander Club members are:

• Tiarra Ah Dar 
• Mikayla Arsenian 
• Aaryn Ashe
• Leapagtele Atanoa 
• Jahvone Borders 
• Darius Bourne 
• Aiyana Dawson
• Shanique Dickens
• Timothy Faoa
• Shyna Fong 
• Wesley Fonoti 
• Edward Huakau 
• Pauline Huakau 
• Evangelina Ili 
• Penina Keni 
• Kaleigha Lang 
• Meshach Lautalo 
• Tupu Lologo
• Victor Lologo
• Tamaaulelei Maalona 
• Litia Makaafi 
• Foalima Misa 
• L'lonaica Mulitauapele 
• Karina Neri 
• Caitlin Nysta 
• C.C. O'Brien 
• Naarah Olive 
• Andrea Palomin 
• Rosie Pini 
• Gloria Pua 
• Sydney Saniao 
• Mariah Stewart
• Liai Ta'ala 
• Josiah Talai 
• Kasandra Tauai 
• Elijah Tuiletufuga 
• Mercy Tuiletufuga 
• Deija Tupua 
• Draven Tupua 
• Alphonzo Tuputala
• Wilma Viena
• Raymond Westerlund
• Vicenta Wyatt
• Milana Hector

Advisors to the Federal Way High School Pacific Islander Club are Mane Tuia’ana, Pam Ashe, Ray Meleisea Tuputala and Upu Moni Tuputala.

The Todd Beamer High School Pacific Islander Club received awards for two dances at the Samoan Arts Competition: the best Taupou and the best Ulufale or Entrance Dance. Todd Beamer took second overall in the competition, and even did the honors of singing the National Anthem -- beautifully.

The Todd Beamer Pacific Islander Club is primarily made up of Todd Beamer students, but it also includes a few students from Decatur, and Illahee and Sequoyah Middle Schools.

Its members are:

• Dannis Thompson 
• Cjataya Carruthers 
• Quianna Aquino 
• Jalen Williams
• Andrina Tanielu 
• Angel Mann
• Annemarie Pritchard
• Atina Elia
• Caleb Crichton
• Daniel Tanielu 
• Divine Paepule 
• Dorothea Maiava 
• Faamaoni Solaita 
• Gerard Gordon
• Gizel Pene, a Sequoyah student
• Heavenly Tuputala 
• Jacob Mareko 
• Jeremiah Faapepele 
• Jerusalem Sane 
• Jireh Tuigamala 
• Josh Crichton 
• Juju Sane 
• Keenan Thompson, who attends Decatur
• Kolani Pua’auli who also attends Decatur
• Lincoln Liulama-Mitchell
• Loto Sane
• Lovelle Tellumo 
• Nana Lemaveve 
• Nautica Maile
• Neiryah Aifili 
• Renee Tiumalu 
• Ruben (R.J.) Talamoa 
• Samuel Pritchard
• Sia Uila 
• Susana Dominguez
• Taufoai Solaita 
• Tayana Faausu 
• Yyvone Ned

Todd Beamer High School’s Pacific Islander Club advisors are: Darren McKay, and parents Nifo and Ailinii Sane.

We’re very proud of our Pacific Islander student-scholars and community.

Federal Way High School 4A Boys State Track Champs Honored

Next up, we want to honor our state 4A track champions this evening.

Representing Decatur High School, senior Parris Watson brought home the 4-A Girls Discus title. Parris won the state meet with a throw of 128 feet, nine inches – a foot and a half more than the nearest competitor. Coach Sam Hunt says of Parris, "We’ve known for seven years that she’s a phenomenal athlete," noting that they’ve watched her develop her skills from Saghalie Middle School all the way up through high school. Parris plans to attend Eastern Washington University and participate in the track program there.

From Federal Way High School, we have the 10 members of the boys’ track team who made it to state and jointly brought home the state championship. In addition, the first five of the ten we are about to call up are seniors who have been part of three Federal Way High School state champion track teams in the past four years. They are:

• Mason Sallee 
• Alex Taylor
• Jason Palmer
• Marcus Tate
• D'Jimon Jones 
• Sam Strok 
• Sergio Rojas Luna
• K.J. Ridders
• Eric Jones, and
• Trey Davis

This is the second year in a row that Mason took home a triple jump state championship, and this year he also took the state title in the long jump. Mason also broke Federal Way High's school record on his final long jump as a high school athlete.

As we always like to point out, these athletes are scholars, as well: Several of students in this group are moving on to college on athletic scholarships, and their career goals include psychology, firefighting, police work and engineering.

With the team this evening are coaches Chris Williams, Quinn Gillis, Dirk Vanderhulst, Karrie Marton, Lynde Clarke, C.J. Green, Erik Grotzke, Kyler Randall, Beckett Cordes, Mike Minahan and Nelson Hamre.

Coach Williams notes that the boys track team typically has around 100 members. They qualify for state initially by meeting a certain qualifying standard in their event. Eventually those athletes are narrowed down to the best 16 in each event out of all 4-A schools in the state. Simply getting to state is a big accomplishment; taking the title is indeed notable.

We want to extend hearty congratulations to all of our state track champions.

Nautilus 4/5 Highly Capable Class Participates in State Civics Program

Each year, Debi Koch’s fourth and fifth grade highly capable class at Nautilus K-8 participates each year in We the People: Project Citizen. This is a curricular program that promotes competent and responsible participation with government at all levels.

The program helps participants learn how to identify and influence a public policy while developing democratic values and political efficacy. A Project Citizen proposal has four parts: a Problem, Alternatives, Proposed Policy, and Action Plan.

Last fall, Nautilus K-8 offered a sampling of coding lessons during library time. The opportunity simultaneously made scholars excited for more coding opportunities and aware of the overall lack of them. This year, Debi’s class decided to tackle this problem for the Project Citizen project. The student-scholars devoted a lot of time to researching the importance of teaching coding in schools, especially at the elementary level.

Then, on May 12, twenty-two scholars from Debi’s classroom went to Olympia, and proposed a policy of having coding available to students at every level in school.

Debi says, "Most adults don't understand how a public policy can be changed. My students do. They researched problems and critiqued problems to identify ones that affect the public, and chose a policy they felt passionate about and wanted to change."

We’re very pleased to welcome Debi and her students here this evening. They are:

• Dasha Biryukova
• Colin Bjornson
• Zarella Contreras
• Audrey John
• Samantha Kahn
• Anastasiya Kelley
• Oliver Lie
• Blake Litton
• Mateo Llewellyn
• Hana Mai 
• Cody McKanna
• Steven Ross
• Uriel Sanchez 
• Olivia Ulima 
• Seth Colombelli-Silva
• McKenna Hulse
• Caleb Hyun
• Reika Iwase
• Kathryn Koltenbah 
• Julian Mallory
• Zeth McAnalloy
• Amelie Pulido-Ayala
• Emma Raschkow
• Emma Ross
• Alan Tran
• Myla Warden 
• Ashlynn Lettice

We are thrilled to celebrate these civically-minded young people. Each of you are taking a part in making your community and school even better.

FWPA Team Tops in K-8 Chess Tournament

The Nautilus Parent Teacher Student Association, led by parent Don Hyun, hosted a chess tournament on May 10 for Federal Way student-scholars in grades kindergarten through eight.

Eighteen scholars from five different schools joined the action, representing Public Academy, Nautilus K-8, Twin Lakes Elementary, Lakota Middle School and Green Gables Elementary. For many of the scholars, this was their first opportunity to participate in a chess tournament.

Each student-scholar played four games in a Swiss-style tournament, with each game lasting up to 30 minutes. They received one point for a win and one-half point for a tie. The top 2 scores from each school was used to determine the school ranking.

The Federal Way Public Academy team of Piers Hanson and Brett McGlone combined for six wins to get the top school prize.
Second place was a tie between the Twin Lakes team, consisting of brothers Aiden and Ryan Evans -- and the Nautilus K-8 team, which consisted of Yacine Bennour and Esther Johnson.

In individual competition, first place again went to Federal Way Public Academy eighth-grader Piers Hanson, while Yacine Bennour of Nautilus took second place and Aidan Evans from Twin Lakes took third place.

We’re glad to see our young scholars taking an interest in chess. Keep it up!

Illahee Saturday Math Program Participants Recognized

This evening we are recognizing nine Illahee scholars who participate in the "Saturday Math" program at Illahee Middle School to improve their math skills. The program is under the direction of Principal Jerry Warren and Rebecca Nilsen, a district interventionist.

Each Saturday morning these scholars gave up their time to participate in community building activities, math lessons, career oriented field trips and robotics. Currently they are at meeting or excelling on their grade level standards in math and two are earning high school credit in algebra.

Illahee’s 6th grade math scholars are:

• Malik Agbo 
• Malichai Hunter
• Ethan Sides, and
• Ahmad Zaiyyad

In addition, Diamond Johnson is a 7th grade scholar, and there are four 8th grade scholars who are finishing their third year in the program:

• Brycen Dillworth
• Shamaun Guiden
• Kenneth Westbrook, and
• Gerrell Washington

We are also recognizing Cedric Dennard, a 9th grader at Todd Beamer High School. Cedric started with Illahee as a 7th grade math scholar and is now a tutor and mentor to our middle school students. He is on track to graduate with high school credit in Algebra.

Additionally we are recognizing Marcus Tate, who is a senior at Federal Way High School and also serves as a tutor mentor to our middle school scholars. Marcus is excelling in AP calculus math.

Finally this program would not be successful without these Illahee teaching and support staff: Teachers include Derek Donahue, Caty Sathoff, and Kimberly Edwards. Support staff include Jacqueline Scott and Shawnte Garrett, as well as assistant principal, Angela Williamson.

Thanks to these staff members who make the Saturday Math program at Illahee Middle School a great experience and to these student-scholars for their hard work and effort to improving their math skills!