Communications

Columbia High School (CHS) Students Awarded with Academic Honors from College Board National Recognition Programs

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Fifteen Columbia High School students have earned academic honors from the College Board National Recognition Programs. These National Recognition Programs grant underrepresented students with academic honors that can be included on college and scholarship applications and connect students with universities across the country, helping them meaningfully connect to colleges and stand out during the admissions process. Colleges and scholarship programs identify students awarded National African American, Hispanic, Indigenous and/or Rural/Small Town Recognition through College Board’s Student Search Service.  Fifteen CHS seniors received special recognition, among them:

National African American Recognition Award:

  1. Alexis Halm-Owoo, National African American Recognition Award
  2. Connor McBride, National African American Recognition Award
  3. Cyrus Merriweather, National African American Recognition Award
  4. Hudson Tyler, National African American Recognition Award
  5. Jeslyn Ero, National African American Recognition Award
  6. Makayla Ojentis, National African American Recognition Award
  7. Nicholas Franklin, National African American Recognition Award
  8. Okherra Prosper, National African American Recognition Award
  9. Sophia Franklin, National African American Recognition Award
  10. Tristan Bernard, National African American Recognition Award
  11. Valentina Ravix, National African American Recognition Award
  12. Zachary Taylor, National African American Recognition Award

National Hispanic Recognition Award:

  1. Arturo Gigante, National Hispanic Recognition Award
  2. Sadie Munoz, National Hispanic Recognition Award
  3. Zoila Mills, National Hispanic Recognition Award

“We’re thrilled that our students have earned this recognition. We are very proud of them for their achievements in their classrooms and on College Board assessments,” said CHS Principal, Frank Sanchez. “These programs help students from underrepresented backgrounds stand out to colleges during admissions.”

Students who may be eligible have a GPA of 3.5 or higher and have excelled on the PSAT/NMSQT or PSAT 10, or earned a score of 3 or higher on two or more AP Exams; and are African American or Black, Hispanic American or Latinx, Indigenous, and/or attend school in a rural area or small town.

Eligible students will be invited to apply during their sophomore or junior year and will be awarded at the beginning of the next school year. Students will receive their awards in time to include them on their college and scholarship applications.

“We want to honor the hard work of these students through the College Board National Recognition Programs. This program creates a way for colleges and scholarship programs to connect directly with underrepresented students who they are hoping to reach,” said Tarlin Ray, College Board senior vice president of BigFuture. “We hope the award winners and their families celebrate this prestigious honor and it helps them plan for their big future.”

 

Columbia High School Senior, Holden U. Reeves Named a 2023 National Merit Scholarship Semifinalist and Twenty-One CHS Seniors Named as Commended Students

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The South Orange and Maplewood School District is pleased to announce the National Merit Scholarship Corporation (NMSC) has announced the names of approximately 16,000 semifinalists in the annual National Merit Scholarship Program.   Among the academically talented high school seniors named is one senior from Columbia High School, Holden U. Reeves.  Reeves was named as Semifinalists for the 2023 National Merit® Scholarship Program and will have an opportunity to continue to the National Merit Scholarship competition. 

Some 16,000 of those high performers were recently designated semifinalists on a state representational basis for the 68th National Merit Scholarship Program. The semi-finalists will compete for more than 7,250 National Merit Scholarships worth nearly $28 million that will be announced in spring 2023. All winners will be selected from this group of finalists. CHS also had twenty-one seniors named as commended students in the 2023 National Merit Scholarship program, these students were recognized for their exceptional academic promise.

As a  Semifinalist, Reeves will have an opportunity to continue in the Merit Scholarship® competition and advance to Finalist standing by meeting some additional requirements.  Of the 16,000 semi-finalist, it is expected that 15,000 will move to the finalist round and their designation will be announced in February.  According to the National Merit Scholarship Corporation approximately half of the finalists will win a National Merit Scholarship, earning the Merit Scholar title.

Columbia High School Principal, Frank Sanchez, shared, “We are so proud that in addition to Reeves, we had a total of 21 National Merit Commended Scholars, representing another incredible senior class.  This accomplishment demonstrates years of hard work and dedication by these students and by the mentoring of our CHS faculty and our colleagues across the district.” The CHS commended seniors are:

  1. Burton M. Alexander
  2. Isaac W. Arnold Berkov
  3. Daniel A. Butkus
  4. Brandon S. Doubek
  5. Garrett S. Dyson
  6. Isaac S. Fleischer
  7. Sophia E. Franklin
  8. Owen R. Friedman
  9. Olivia R. Gibbons
  10. Maya S. Glynn
  11. Robert M. Goldman
  12. Benjamin E. Hanselman
  13. Jordan R. Klein
  14. Jaden J. Lee
  15. Cyrus I. Merriweather
  16. Malachy L. Meyer
  17. Claudia A. Nesin
  18. Samuel E. Svitavsky
  19. Walker J. Szczecina
  20. Hudson A. Tyler
  21. Ian R. Wissel

High School juniors entered the 2023 National Merit Scholarship program by taking the 2021 Preliminary SAT/National Merit Scholarship Qualifying Test (PSAT/NMSQT®)  which served as an initial screen of program entrants.  The nationwide pool of semifinalists, representing less than 1% of U.S. high school seniors, includes the highest-scoring entrants in each state. 

Superintendent’s Access & Equity Initiative Updates

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SOMSD Access & Equity Initiatives Updates:

We as a District are moving forward with our continued commitment to Access and Equity. This includes the ongoing work of Dr. Gilbert, Assistant Superintendent of Access and Equity. He and I recently met with NJSCI via Rutgers University. You may recall that last year we were one of just a few dozen School Districts in the State that piloted their School Climate and Culture Survey Platform. Columbia, SOMS and MMS participated in this pilot where all 3 major school-based stakeholder groups (Students, Staff and Parents) were encouraged to participate. The results of these initial pilot surveys are on our website under our Access and Equity tab.

Our Principals and Assistant Principals have spent much of their summer developing action plans to utilize the data in those survey results to continue our work on this important topic. We are thrilled to share that we are moving forward with the updated survey platform again for this school year. You will be hearing more about this from your Principals. We are also very excited to announce that, as part of our commitment to Social and Emotional Wellness, we will be engaging with Challenge Day to support Columbia, MMS and SOMS students again this year. The Principals of our Secondary Schools and I met with our Challenge Day representatives to plan the implementation of the experiences that our students will be engaged in this year. If you are interested in learning more about Challenge Day please visit challengeday.org to see the groundbreaking work that this group is doing around the country. As part of our District Goal regarding Social Emotional Learning and our commitment to Access and Equity, Ms. Ann Bodnar our Assistant Superintendent for Curriculum & Instruction and Dr. Gilbert are partnering to bring our SEED Seminars back for this school year.  If you are not familiar with the National Seed Project, SEED’s origin story began right here in South Orange & Maplewood! Emily Style, a long-time South Orange resident was part of the launch of the project as she worked with Dr. Peggy Mcintosh … the very first SEED seminar was held at Seton Hall University followed by the first parent SEED group, which was held in Maplewood.

SEED seminars are designed to grow educators by providing courageous spaces for sharing and engaging in powerful conversations that will allow us to better serve our students, learn how to have difficult conversations, and expand our experiences in order to be better colleagues. Participation in the seminars is completely VOLUNTARY. Although SEED seminars are open to ANY and ALL faculty staff, we are capping participation in these seminars to 25.We are also happy to have Columbia High School MAC Director and Counselor, Marcia Hicks as our SEED seminar facilitator this year. Our partnership with Equal Opportunity Schools is entering year two at Columbia. We are extremely pleased to share that so far this partnership has resulted in a year over year increase in our enrollment* in AP Courses. 

We are continuing to monitor and review this data. But this initial snapshot is very promising and reflects the efforts of our CHS Leadership Team, Guidance Department, Teachers, Students, Families and our Curriculum and Instruction Department. We will share a full review of this data and the upcoming C&I Committee Meeting.

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