LRSD Spotlight

Morgan Johnson, a 3rd grade student at M.L. King Elementary, is one of only eight Boy Scouts who will present the Boy Scouts of America's Annual Report to the Nation in March.

Morgan will stand before the Speaker of the House and give this year's Report to the Nation with his fellow delegates, representing millions of scouts all across the country.

The five-day trip to Washington, D.C., will include visiting the White House, the U.S. Supreme Court, the CIA, Arlington Cemetery, the NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, the Pentagon and Marine Corps Base Quantico. A visit with President Barack Obama is planned but not yet finalized.

The trip coincides with the 100th anniversary of the founding of the Scouting movement, which bills itself as one of the nation’s largest and most prominent value-based youth development organizations. Its latest membership rolls boast more than 1.6 million youth members and more than 1 million adult volunteers in its Cub Scouts, Boy Scouts, Varsity Scouts and Venturing programs.
 
“It’s an unbelievable opportunity because of the historic anniversary [of Scouting] and also with the chance to meet a historic president,” said Glen Johnson, who also is his son’s cubmaster, or pack leader. “It’s almost a surreal thought that out of the millions of Scouts in this country and all the Scouts in the council that my son has been chosen to do this.”

Morgan's favorite subject at school is math, he likes to play golf and he liked using a slingshot and shooting BB guns at day camp. He has said he wants to attain the rank of Eagle, the highest in Scouting, and play golf professionally.

Cub Scouts has been good for Morgan, his father said. “Scouting stands for and reinforces the things we are teaching at the house,” the elder Johnson said. “The days Morgan wears his uniform to school, you can see the pride in him.”

Six LRSD students are prize winners in the 2009-2010 "Lessons from the Past...Visions of the Future" Art and Writing Contest.

The Testimony to Tolerance Initiative and the Racial and Cultural Diversity Commission Of Little Rock will award prizes for 1st place ($400), 2nd place ($250) and 3rd place ($100) winners in both the middle school and high school categories.

Middle School Winners:
1st place: Faith Roberts; Mann Magnet Middle School; essay titled “Strength Through Diversity.”

2nd place: Destiny Duguid; Mann Magnet Middle School; essay titled “The Testimony to Tolerance.”

3rd place: Anna Wahls; Mann Magnet Middle School; essay titled “Tolerance in My Daily Life.”
 

High School Winners
1st place: Lucy Richardson; Central High School; essay titled “United We Stand, Divided We Fall.”

2nd place: Patrick S. Phelan; Central High School; essay titled “My Testimony to Tolerance."

3rd place: Brandon Word; J.A. Fair Magnet High School; artwork titled “Tolerating Diversity.”

The Testimony to Tolerance Initiative is a program of the Central Arkansas Library System that serves Little Rock and the surrounding communities in Central Arkansas. The program was established in 2007 in partnership with the USC Shoah Foundation Institute for Visual History and Education with funding from the Winthrop Rockefeller Foundation, L’Oreal USA, Inc., and the Jewish Federation of Arkansas.

Debate students from Little Rock Central High School attended the Harvard University National Debate and Student Congress Tournament in Boston February 12 through 15.

The team of Michael Anda and Lindsey Garland won the Junior Varsity title. They were seeded second out of the 86 teams coming out of the preliminary rounds.

Michael Anda won 3rd Place Debate Speaker out of 172 debaters.

Sarah Parker won 6th Place Debate Speaker, also out of 172 debaters.

The team of Sarah Parker and Pouya Parsian were Double Quarterfinalists in the tournament.

Siteng Ma, a senior, advanced to the Semifinal round in Student Congress and was the elected Presiding Officer for the first session. He also was one of six delegates nominated by the judges to participate in the Super Congress out of 24 students.

Central's debate coach is Kathy Holladay, and Melinda Beith served as a judge.

The winners of the North Little Rock Benevolent and Protective Order of the Elks #1004 “Hoop Shoot” competition, a national free-throwing competition sponsored by the Elks lodge which attracts more than 3 million youngsters, advanced to the State competition held in Hot Springs last weekend. The six winners in age categories 8-9; 10-11; and 12-13 (boy and girl divisions) were: Kennedi Stephens, Jerrice Stout, Amber Hawkison, Pierce Risinger, Rachael Moser and Martrellis Thomas.         

Amber Hawkison, a 10-year-old student at Williams Magnet Elementary, won 1st place in the state competition for 10-to-11-year-old girls and will be representing Arkansas in the regional competition in Paris, Tennessee, on March 13. This is the second year in a row that the NLR #1004 has sent a first-place winner go to the regional competition.

The competition, organized through the LRSD Office of Coordinated School Health in partnership and sponsored by the North Little Rock Benevolent and Protective Order of the Elks #1004, invited and sought out participation from all area public schools, many charter and private schools as well as the Boys’ and Girls’ Clubs and YMCAs. Even though the local competition was cancelled due to weather complications on January 31, there were 503 participants as a result of the following schools holding competitions within their physical education classes: Williams Magnet Elementary, Franklin Elementary, Stephens Elementary, Baseline Elementary and North Little Rock Catholic Academy. The program will begin in September next year and hopefully more groups will be able to participate.

Pictured, from left: Rachael Moser (North Little Rock Catholic Academy), Amber Hawkison, Kennedi Stephens, Jerrice Stout and Pierce Risinger (all from Williams Magnet) and Martrellis Thomas (Franklin Elementary).

Results from the statewide JETS competition recently were announced. LRSD had two high schools emerge as winners in their divisions!

JETS (Junior Engineering Technical Society) is one of the nation's leading non-profit educational organizations dedicated to promoting engineering and technology careers to America's youth.

Division Winners:
Division 5 – J.A. Fair High School, Team B
Division 9 – Little Rock Central High School

State Awards (out of a possible 80 points):
First Place – Little Rock Central High School, with 68 points

National rankings will be posted on the JETS website in April. Central ranked 10th in the nation last year.

From coordinating exciting student competitions to providing top academic resources and career exploration materials, JETS is helping students make informed decisions about their futures and developing a new generation of engineers. Each year JETS programs touch more than 40,000 students and 10,000 educators from 6,000 high schools across the country. JETS participants are a diverse group — more than 50 percent are from groups that are traditionally underrepresented in engineering and technology fields, including one-third who are female.