Student Directory
Reilly Martin, a ninth-grader at First Baptist Christian School, 221 E. New Castle St., was a 2020 Carson Scholarship winner and now a 2021 Carson Recognized Scholar.
She is the daughter of Joel and Desiree Hills of Bruin.
Current Carson Scholars are defined as students in grades 5-12 who have previously been awarded a Carson Scholarship. Carson Scholar Recognition is an elite honor that affirms the prestigious status of Carson Scholars in their pursuit of academic and career goals. These students are rewarded based on their previous scholarship, a GPA of 3.75 or higher and their community service.
Mars Area Middle School eighth-grader Carson Mahan received an award for his successful completion of Catalyst Connection's virtual “What's So Cool About Manufacturing,” Exploring the Marvels of Manufacturing Project.The project, open to grades seven through 12, asked students to play a mobile game, Cube Cut; create a custom level; write a short essay; and to watch several videos.Mahan was randomly selected from among 123 students who completed the project to received a $75 Amazon gift card.
Mars Area Middle School seventh-grader Bryce Zatchey competed in the Academic Games League of America Presidents academic competition Feb. 17.Presidents, a question- and-response game, develops students' understanding of the personalities, historical contexts, political decisions, and other events surrounding presidents of the United States.The annual competition is open to students in grade 4 through 12 at Butler, Lawrence and Mercer county schools.
Claire Reynolds, a Seneca Valley High School senior, was recently announced as a Gold Key winner in the 2021 Scholastic Art and Writing Awards Pittsburgh Arts Region Competition.Claire won for her piece titled “Calm through Chaos.”Her work will go on to be judged at the national level.Seneca Valley Silver Key recipients include seniors Connor Campbell, Tess Enders, Jocelyn McNany and Emilee Neuman.Also, several students from Seneca Valley received Honorable Mentions for their entries including seniors Isabella Bardelli, Kierstin Beahm, Gabriella Donatucci (two Honorable Mentions), Lacey Eisengart, Faith Milcic, Tia Myers (three Honorable Mentions), Chase Nething, Mackenna O'Mara, Anna Sikora (two Honorable Mentions) and Brian Whitney. Junior Julia Lingenfelter received two Honorable Mentions, and sophomore Arden Kiely received one Honorable Mention.
Mars Robotics Association's FIRST LEGO League Team earned a Perseverance Award at the 2021 Pittsburgh Virtual FLL Competition, held Feb. 18.The award is given to the team that improvises and overcomes a difficult situation, while achieving their goal with a positive attitude. Team members are sixth-graders Aiden Gloystein, Sophia Gourash and Alex Hutchens and fifth-grader Preston Musser.The students built a robot with a LEGO EV3 base, adding different attachments to accomplish FLL tasks to score points. Team members also learned Python programming language to better control their robot.As part of the competition, the students researched the problem of how to get society to exercise more and presented their solution to the judges.Students in Mars Area High School's French classes are joining in an annual “Manie Musicale de Mars” music bracket competition.The competition, a play on “March Madness,” encourages students to listen to contemporary French music; participate in supplemental activities; vote for their favorite songs; and connect with the larger French-speaking community.Students from across the nation and in more than 10 countries are expected to participate.Voting continues through March. Winners will be announced in April and at the end of the competition. Prizes will be awarded.When Seneca Valley Senior High School AP Chemistry Teacher Kelly Weston was a junior in high school, she won an essay contest.Weston's win not only inspired her career, but came full circle recently when the same essay contest recognized two of her current students.Seneca Valley juniors Sydney Thompson and Nicholas Nedzesky were both awarded an Honorable Mention in the Society for Analytical Chemists of Pittsburgh (SACP) High School Essay Contest.Thirteen students were awarded prizes, including Sydney and Nicholas. Their recognition also included a $100 prize.Each year, SACP hosts an essay contest that requires students to respond to a science-related prompt dealing with a current event.Schools in the Greater Pittsburgh area — which includes 39 Pennsylvania counties, 10 Ohio counties and 25 West Virginia counties — were permitted to submit no more than two student essays in the competition.Weston selected Sydney and Nicholas' essays after they chose to write to the contest prompt as part of their first quarterly assessment in AP Chemistry.The prompt was, “Why does the United States have a higher coronavirus fatality rate than other countries?” It needed to be answered in 2,500 characters or less and include a list of resources.“The really cool thing is that I also won an award in this contest when I was a junior in high school as well,” Weston said. “My prompt dates me: It was about if the United States should fund research on the human genome project. SACP also paid for my summer internship to Carnegie Science Center while I was in college. It is because of organizations like SACP that I became a chemistry teacher.”Mars Area High School's Class of 2020 has donated about $3,270 to benefit MHY Family Services.As the 2020 senior prom was canceled, those students who represented last school year's senior class on Class Council were surveyed to determine how to spend the monies that would have been used for the event. The students agreed that the funds should be donated to MHY Family Services.MHY Family Services plans to use the funds to offset the costs of renovating its gymnasium.
