Victory at the Accotink Cardboard Boat Regatta!

Trevor, Paul & Wade (and Dr. Cox in the background)

On a glorious sunny Sunday at Lake Accotink, Dr. Cox's Honors Physics class, in their intrepid craft "Fingerbox" dominated the competition and emerged victorious in the Annual Cardboard Boat Regatta. The team of Wade Carter, Trevor Ferguson, and Paul Whittington won not only the schools, civic groups and scouts category, but also the survivors’ race made up of all boats that were still seaworthy after the individual races. The GWCS team worked on the boat for a month and a half, including every day during the last two weeks before the race. "Getting the shape of the boat together was the hardest part," says Wade. "We were kind of doubting ourselves because it was a rush at the end to finish the boat and we didn't know how it would perform, so it felt good to win." This Saturday marked the 12th time the Honors Physics class has participated in the Cardboard Boat Regatta, and the 5th win of the category. This is the first time GWCS students have won both the category and the survivor’s race. Now next year's class will have some big, cardboard shoes to fill.

A Starry Night ~ GWCS Prom 2015

Prom: 3.5 hours spent and 52,000 calories burned

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Most schools call it the Senior Prom. Some schools call it Junior/Senior Prom. At GWCS it is called Promenade: Freshmen and Sophomores welcome! Let’s be honest, we need participation from all four grades to hold any event. But our underclassmen are better than yours. Because we treat all of our kids like fully invested members of the community, they don’t come across as interlopers and dorks at a social function. They hold their own!

The food was sublime! Hors de oeuvres included beef tenderloin crostini, teriyaki chicken skewers and Swedish meatballs, along with veggies and dip, deviled eggs, assorted cheeses and two desserts! There was plenty to eat and everything was delicious (tiny cheesecake squares were the most popular!).

Then the dancing started! Our DJ, the talented Mr. Muntu, rocked the house! The lights were spectacular and the dancefloor was crowded for the entire evening. There were just enough breaks for cold drinks to keep the prom-goers alive!

The place remained packed until the overhead lights came on and scared them away. Taking their free gifts and beautiful gift mugs (stiffed with chocolate), they parted in a euphoria that can only be attained when spirits run high on dancing, and Pepsi, and horseradish sauce.

Thanks again to the SGA, Mr.Goldie,  Ms. Mauney, Ms. Sinichko, and Jodie K. for making this awesome event so awesome. See you next year!

GWCS COYOTE ROBOTICS A YEAR IN REVIEW

Coyote Robotics, Inc. recently completed a very successful 2014-2015 season of participation in the FIRST Tech Challenge program. Over the course of the season, 19 students participated in one or more activities. Three of these were not GWCS students and 9 of them had previously had no experience with robotics. Two past participants now in college returned again to help coach and mentor our teams. Many moms and dads contributed a lot to drive, supervise, mentor, design T-shirts, feed and cheer on our teams. One or both of our teams participated in five official FTC Qualifying or State Championship tournaments, with Team 3749 League of Incompetent Gentlemen taking a Winning Alliance trophy in the Northern Virginia Qualifier and

Team 965 Bionic Renegades winning the Control Award trophy in the Eastern Virginia Qualifier. Together the two teams also took 3rd place in the Off-Season “Battle In The Burg”.

We participated in four other events, including workshops, scrimmages and demonstrations and even hosted our 3rd annual Coyote Robotics scrimmage, bringing about 40 guests to GWCS giving our school and program increased visibility. Educationally, 14 students earned at least one quarter credit for Robotics with 11.75 total credits earned.

In an exciting surprise, we were selected by the Virginia FTC Program Director to be one of three teams representing Virginia at the FTC Asia Pacific Invitational Tournament in Sydney, Australia this coming July. We currently expect to have three students, two coaches and a few family members participating as Team 3749 League of Incompetent Gentlemen.

The FTC 2015-2016 Season has officially begun though we will not learn what the game will be until the first Saturday in September. However, one significant change this year for FTC is the move away from the Lego NXT platform to a new Android-based platform. This will change and improve communication between the Drivers and the Robots, frequently as source of frustration. It will also necessitate a move from RobotC to Java for the programming language. Fortunately, the language structures are very similar and Java should be easier to learn (and more useful) than was RobotC. I’m also happy to announce that Robert Carlisle, Kelley’s dad, has offered to help mentor this year. He will serve as head coach of one of our two teams this coming year.

Gary Lindner
Coyote Robotics Teacher

Astrophyisics Field Trip to NRAO

Discovering the Hidden Universe

Holden & Joe operating the telescope & chart recorder.       

The National Radio Astronomy Observatory in Green Bank, West Virginia is in the National Radio Quiet Zone, an area where radio interference is minimized to allow astronomers to detect low energy electromagnetic waves from astrophysical phenomena.   Green Bank is home to the largest fully steerable telescope in the world, the 100 meter diameter Green Bank Telescope.  The GBT is used by astronomers all over the world.   It is especially well-suited for studying pulsars, stellar remnants that offer unique opportunities for us to improve our understanding of Einstein’s theory of General Relativity.  The observatory is about a four hour drive from GWCS.

Contour Map

Students from Dr. Cox’s Astrophysics class visited Green Bank to tour the observatory and to use the 40 foot diameter teaching telescope.  They scanned a part of the sky that includes a star forming region (The Great Nebula in Orion) and a supernova remnant (the Crab Nebula).  Data was recorded on a strip chart.  After several hours of data reduction, they produced a contour map (shown here).  In the southern part of the map you can see the radio emission from the star forming region.  In the northern part of the map you can see the emission from the pulsar in the supernova remnant along with a background of emission from hydrogen clouds our Milky Way.  They were assisted in their observations by Dr. Cox’s husband, Dr. Schulman, who spent three years as a postdoctoral fellow at NRAO.

Thanks to parent Melissa Dana for driving and hanging out with us all weekend at the NRAO in Greenbank, West Virginia

Thanks to parent Melissa Dana for driving and hanging out with us all weekend at the NRAO in Greenbank, West Virginia

X-STEM

THE GWCS X-STEM CLUB GETS OFF TO A GREAT START!

2014-2015 GWCS STEM Club (missing from photo: Kelley, Ronan & Zach)

In February GWCS established an X-STEM club to more formally harness the talents and abilities of our amazing students. The X-STEM Club is open and available to all. Upcoming events and activities include:

  • Build A Drone Essay Contest: Deadline Tuesday, March 17th
     
  • Field Trip: Children’s Science Center Vision Statement: Thursday, April 9th at 9:30
     
  • Museum without Walls Service Opportunities: Weekly. Contact Mrs. Saile for more information.
     
  •  USA Science and Engineering Festival: Wednesday, April 29th

The following students were selected by our staff to represent GWCS at the USA Science and Engineering Fest.  Congratulations! 

 
  • Ben
  • Danny
  • Emily S.
  • Holden
  • Josh B.
  • Kelley
  • Paul
  • Preston
  • Ronan
  • Ryan B.
  • Trevor
  • Wade
  • Zach

PAC AUCTION EXCEEDS GOAL OF $15K!

GOING, GOING, GONE!

The 2015 PAC Online Auction lasted for two weeks and ended on February 25th at 10:00 pm with a Big Bang!  We broke our record of $12,400 and raised $15,523 this year making this our third year of record breaking fundraising! A huge thank you to our volunteer auction committee for all of their hard work: Deiadre Rauch, Chair, Jeanine Ferguson, Mary Beth Cole, Linda Campbell and Christina Carlisle.  Many more thanks go out to all of the local retailers (including our wonderful neighbors at King's Park Shopping Center), as well as all of the GWCS parents and friends who donated items, solicited donations and placed bids.  It takes a village to run an auction, and GWCS has the best village ever!  

There were many "Buy A Spot" items such as A Belgian Dinner, English Tea Party, Bunko Night, Dinner & Theater with Mr. Goldie and a Craft Beer and Bites night that will keep our community celebrating together for fun, friendship and laughter over the coming months.  

100% of the funds raised in the 2015 PAC Auction will be put towards our Outside the Box experiential learning program(OBX), class trips, and technology. Last year we were able to seriously elevate our OBX program and students were able to participate in a real DNA gel electrophoresis lab, team-building at GMU’s The Edge program, an actual mission at the Spy Museum and much more. Class trips included camping, Gettysburg, and the Senior Essay Writing Retreat. Technology upgrades included new projectors and speakers. This year we look forward to being able to provide high-quality experiential learning opportunities, expanded class trips, and a complete migration to The Cloud providing better stability and consistency in our computer services.

Thank you GWCS PAC (Parents Acting Collaboratively) for making all of this possible!

Sampling of some of the 150+ items sold at this year's auction...


RUN YOUR HEART OUT!

GWCS STUDENTS, PARENTS AND STAFF RAN, JOGGED, WALKED & TALKED THEIR HEARTS OUT AT ANNUAL 5K

On Sunday, February 8, 2015, GWCS families met at Fairfax Corner to participate in the Potomac River Running sponsored "Run Your Heart Out 5K" for the third year in a row.   The race was clearly celebrating Valentine's Day.  Everyone was dressed in red  and love was in the air.  GWCS participated in this 5K to raise awareness in our community for POTS (Postural Orthostatic Tachycardia Syndrome), a condition two of our students live with each day.   Special thanks to the 30+ GWCS community members who came out for the 5K and especially to Mr. Connelly for organizing this event for GWCS each year.  

The Gift of Giving

Holiday Gifts for those in need...

The GWCS community embraced the Holiday spirit this year by giving to those less fortunate. We sponsored families that would otherwise have no holiday gifts, and purchased clothes, games, and toys tailored to individual wish lists. Moreover, we contributed new and gently used items to a “Holiday Store” so that these needy children could experience the gift of giving as well.

Delivering the items to the Holiday Store was especially inspiring, as one young man was so excited to lay away items he wanted to “purchase” for members of his shelter.

How wonderful is it to not only be generous, but to allow others to be so as well.

Coyotes, you make a difference!

IT'S THE... HERITAGE FEAST!

The Heritage Feast is a GWCS tradition that began in 2010 when a student asked Ms. Warden if the GWCS family could have a Thanksgiving dinner together at school.  Ms. Warden, who always says yes to a good pot-luck dinner, endorsed the idea and a tradition was born. 

In the beginning, families contributed their favorite traditional thanksgiving dish.  A few years ago, to celebrate the diversity of our school community, we spiced it up by asking families to send in food that represented their heritage and changed the name to Heritage Feast.  Ms. Warden also created a catchy Heritage Feast jingle that is echoed around school the month of November.

This year's GWCS Heritage Feast took place on Tuesday, November 25th.  The buffet table was loaded with scrumptious home-made food from around the world and the cafe was comfortably crowded with current students, parents, siblings, staff, and a record breaking number of alumni!  We were all one big happy family with plates loaded, bellies full, and an abundance of gratitude expressed.

DRILLS FOR DISASTER

GWCS VICTIM ACTORS FOR CERT

Last spring GWCS was introduced to CERT, the Fairfax County Community Emergency Response Team. We participated as victim actors in a large-scale disaster scenario that allowed CERT members to practice all phases of disaster response. Coyotes were hooked, and the photos and video that circulated after the event had everyone wanting to participate at the next event.

On a frigid morning, November 15, 2014, GWCS students, staff, families, and alumni showed up in record numbers to participate in another large-scale disaster drill. The location was the abandoned Lorton Juvenile Prison. The situation was dire. A massive tornado had torn through northern Virginia leaving a path of absolute destruction. Professional special effect makeup for the victim actors and the decrepit outbuildings strewn with debris and broken glass set a powerful stage for the four-hour rescue mission.

After a complete safety briefing, we took our places armed with instructions on how to perform a realistic portrayal of our injuries, which ranged from compound fractures, to severe lacerations, to traumatic head injuries. This powerful training exercise provided a valuable experience for CERT members, and many lessons were learned.

The GWCS actors were so convincing that we were personally asked to perform again the following week (November 24, 2014) at a similar drill at the Fire Training Academy in Fairfax. Again, Coyotes showed up in force and evinced our value of service for this incredibly important and worthwhile event.

At GWCS our world is our classroom and we celebrate the opportunity to provide service to our community

THE YIN & YANG OF PLANTING & PULLING

Community Service Event  with Earth Sangha

GWCS Community Service Events are one of my favorite ways to come together as a school.  There's something invigorating about working outside in the fresh air along side students and parents as we tug, pull and plant to improve our greater community.  On Sunday, November 2, 2014, we had a wonderful time despite the wind and cold at the Earth Sangha planting event at Rutherford Park in Fairfax, VA!  Along with Chris and Linda Bright (Earth Sangha Founders) and many other area community members, we finished the planting of native shrubberies in record time and then focused our efforts on removing pernicious Porcelain Berry from the flood plain. (We did more un-planting than planting!) Everyone worked tirelessly and we had a great time. I was especially impressed by all of the parents who participated!  ~ Ms. Warden

“We abuse land because we regard it as a commodity belonging to us. When we see land as a community to which we belong, we may begin to use it with love and respect. ”
— Aldo Leopold, A Sand County Almanac - 1949

Junior Trip to Gettysburg

Every year Mr. Goldie takes GWCS juniors to Gettysburg, PA for an overnight trip to take in the history.  Highlights include the Visitors Center Museum, the restored Cyclorama Painting & film, watching the really, really, really, really, really, really long Gettysburg movie, touring the battlefields, walking the Gettysburg National Military Park, and remembering those who gave all in Gettysburg at the Soldiers' National Cemetery. 

 

"The Battle of Gettysburg was a turning point in the Civil War, the Union victory that ended General Robert E. Lee's second and most ambitious invasion of the North. Often referred to as the "High Water Mark of the Rebellion", Gettysburg was the Civil War's bloodiest battle and was also the inspiration for President Abraham Lincoln's immortal 'Gettysburg Address'."  -National Park Service