2008 Annual Report.indd - Moon Area School District

April Peng and Dan Murray placed third in presidentscategory competition in the 2008 Academic Games Leaguesof America National Tournament’s junior division in April.High School DECA members competed at theInternational DECA Conference in Atlanta onApril 25 - 30. Jeff Snaman, Joshua Payton,Jason Clary, Marco Bartoletta and DarrenBurns qualifi ed for the conference by fi nishingfi rst and second in the Retail MerchandisingServices, Tourism Management Team andBuying & Merchandising Management Teamstate DECA competition at Hershey in February.Pennsylvania Governor’s School of Excellenceselected Ling-Ling Lee to attend the program’sHealth Care School at the University ofPittsburgh in summer 2008. Lee was chosen onthe academic merits of her application. She wasone of 3,736 applicants who competed for 788positions in eight different schools.Jim Palamara, Vash Patel, Abe Stuckey,Aman Saleh and Nikole Warn designed anddeveloped a radio-controlled and autonomous,hybrid robot for First Tech Challenge RobotCompetition. Held at Weatherly Area SchoolDistrict, the competition drew teams from asfar away as Singapore. The robotics teamrepresents a partnership between MAHSand Robert Morris University’s EngineeringDepartment. Students are mentored by RMUEngineering Department Associate ProfessorArif Sirinterlikci.MAMS student Allison Murphy was chosento represent the entire district in the DowntownVibrancy Project at Point Park University heldon June 23 - 27. She helped determine a planto create a healthier downtown Pittsburghduring the fi ve-day program after meeting withlocal leaders.Madeline Scanlon was Moon Area’s fi rstNational History Days state-level participantat Millersville University in May. She qualifi edby placing in National History Day Pittsburghcompetition with her project “Confl ict andCompromise at the Constitutional Convention.”MAHS students Sophia Bender, SiddarthGovindarajan and David Defucciaparticipated in the National VocabularyChampionships qualifi er held at KeystoneOaks High School in January. Qualifi ersscored top marks on an exam taken by morethan 300 MAHS students.MAMS students Chad Trice and VidishaSharma placed in the Top 20 out of 150students at MATHCOUNTS RegionalCompetition at Robert Morris University.ACHIEVEMENTSFaculty RecognitionJoe Martonik, middle school science teacher, was named a 2008 Teacher of Excellence Award fi nalist.The award recognizes and honors outstanding teachers and is distributed by the Teacher ExcellenceCenter, which represents 19,687 teachers in 83 southwestern Pennsylvania school districts.Nancy Burgunder, middle school keyboarding and computer science teacher, attended the Governor’sInstitute on Financial Education at Elizabethtown College in July to learn how to include ageappropriatefi nancial concepts into lesson plans. She is preparing for a story-time session that teachesthe ideals of saving money at the Moon Township Public Library.Warren Kooi, high school chemistry teacher and Oracle Academy instructor, was chosen as GlobalLead Adjunct for the Oracle Academy PL/SQL programming course. He provides support for academyinstructors around the world. Mr. Kooi also taught at the Oracle Academy Institute, helped judge the2008 Academy International Data Modeling competition and developed a global support forum.Moon Area9Community Report