Student/School News
Tall Oaks in the News!
|
CONGRATULATIONS to sixth grade student, James Donnelly who won 1st place in the Daughters of the American Revolution American History Essay Contest, not only at the local Cooches' Bridge Chapter level, but also at the Delaware state level. He was awarded a certificate, medal, and cash award on March 20th at the Wilmington Country Club and was honored again in Dover on May 8th. James' essay chronicled the completion of the Transcontinential Railroad through the eyes of an Irish immigrant.
CONGRATULATIONS to fifth grade student, Kana Turley who won 1st place in the American Mothers 2010 National 5th
Grade Essay Contest, “What My Mother Means to Me”.
Kana wrote:
"My mother is the lighthouse in the sea of my life. Lovingly, she does two things that really touch me deep down. Every day she works for my needs, and she teaches me. My mother takes care of me daily. When I fall ill, she makes sure the treatment required is presented to me. She helps me grow in strength and wisdom. My mother is my top teacher. When I fall victim to bad ideas, she disciplines me out of love. When I waver from the right path, she corrects me and sets me straight. Often, she reminds me to follow the deeds that the Holy One requires of me. Working for my needs and teaching me is how my mother directs my safe passage through life. She is a bright light before my feet, and I love her.
Congratulations to 10th graders Phillip Chaffee and Lydia Stinson - On April 24, students from the Tall Oaks
Speech and Debate Team competed in a Delaware Speech League Tournament at
Conrad Schools of Science in Newport, DE. The competition also included
students from Conrad, Cab Calloway School of the Arts, and Sanford School. Congratulations to 10th graders Phillip Chaffee and Lydia Stinson; Phillip won 2nd place in
Extemporaneous Speech and 3rd place in the Social Studies Trivia Competition, while Lydia won 3rd
place in Memorized Poetry and Honorable Mention in the Social Studies Trivia Competition.
Congratulations to TOCS Senior, Jessalyn Foggy, for placing third in the annual ISI Founding Fathers National High School essay contest. ISI, along with the Circe Institute, the James Madison Institute, and the Association of Classical and Christian Schools, sponsored the annual Founding Fathers high school contest. Students were asked to consider the life and character of Nathanael Greene and to discuss why his legacy as a military strategist, leader, and patriot should be remembered by contemporary Americans.
Tall Oaks is Moving to New Location
It is with great excitement and with
thanksgiving to our sovereign Lord that the
Board of Tall Oaks Classical School announced
an agreement with the First Baptist
Church of Delaware to begin the 2010-2011
school year in their building, which is the
former site of New Castle Christian Academy.
For the past six years, Tall Oaks’
five-year plan has always included looking
for a more suitable building and location.
After outgrowing our location in Hockessin,
Delaware, the school relocated in 2006 to
the campus of Faith City Family Church
across from the Christiana Mall in Newark.
As a result of steadily increasing enrollment,
the TOCS Board charged the Administration
to begin searching for a larger or more permanent
location to accommodate the growing
student body and the expanding school
offerings.
The Lord has continued to bless
Tall Oaks in fulfilling many of the goals and
objectives of our five-year plan. In the area
of academics, some of the major accomplishments
over the past several years have been
the hiring of Mrs. Dory Zinkand as a full-time
principal, the reworking of the entire curriculum,
a yearly science fair for tenth through
twelfth grades, summer class offerings for
incoming students, and better coordination of
test scheduling.
In other areas, we have greatly improved
parent/school communications
through RenWeb, our web-based school
management software system; developed a
service project program for our seniors; catalogued
and started up our library; established
a homework monitoring system; and hired an
athletic director, Mrs. Louise Shaw, who has
improved our sports program and afterschool
offerings.
During the past ten months, some of
our larger goals have been achieved by
God’s grace. In April 2009 we were granted
our initial two-year accreditation by the Association
of Classical Christian Schools. Only
seventeen of the two hundred thirty ACCS
member schools are presently accredited. As
a result, our teacher certification program
was approved and implemented, we applied
for and received a $20,000 science grant,
and we hired Mr. Harold Naylor as our Director
of Stewardship in order to improve our
community outreach and increase charitable
donations to our school.
We are still seeking to accomplish
many goals, but we are rejoicing today that
we will be able to expand our program now
that God has graciously provided this new
building for Tall Oaks Classical School.
Following is a list of Tall Oaks seniors who have received college acceptance letters and scholarship offers. We are excited about the number of students who have been accepted so early in the year. Congratulations!
- Jesse Biron - Le Tourneau University in Longview, TX (with scholarship offer)
- Danny Favuzza - Drexel and Kings (with scholarship offers from both), University of Delaware
- Jessalyn Foggy - Gordon College (with scholarship offer), Wheaton
- Jeffrey Loux - Houghton (where he is being interviewed for a full scholarship), University of Delaware (Honors Program - International Relations)
- Katie Palmer - University of Delaware (Honors Program - Nursing)
- Katelyn Stover - Cedarville in Dayton, OH
- Emily Voshell - Philadelphia University (P.A.), University of the Sciences in Philadelphia, PA
- Chad Wilkinson - University of Delaware (Honors Program - Engineering)
Congratulations to... Jesse Biron, Jessalyn Foggy and Danny Favuzza who have all placed in the Veterans of Foreign Wars Voice of Democracy essay contest at the post level and have advanced to the state level! (This year’s theme was: Does America Still Have Heroes ?)
The Tall Oaks Speech and Debate Team participated in the first annual Delaware Speech League Tournament that was held at Cab Calloway School of the Arts on Saturday, January 9, 2010. Lydia Stinson took first place in Dramatic Monologue with Script, with Megan Palmer and Jessie Mitchell receiving Honorable Mentions. Joshua Yoon placed fourth in Math Trivia – no calculator (Algebra I through Calculus) and Phillip Chaffee received Honorable Mention in 
Extemporaneous Speech Competition. On Saturday, January 23, the Team traveled to Rock-bridge Academy in Millersville, Maryland, to de-bate the resolution: "Resolved: The United States government should establish a timetable for withdrawal of troops from Afghanistan." Twenty teams from four schools were involved: Tall Oaks, Rockbridge, Summit
Christian Academy (Yorktown, VA) and Oak Hill Classical Christian School (Reston, VA).
At the junior-varsity level, the team of Megan Palmer and Lydia Stinson won all three of their de-bates, finishing in first place out of six teams! At the varsity level, the team of Jeff Loux and Phillip Chaffee won two out of three of their debates, beating teams from Rockbridge and Oak Hill. Our other teams, which competed at the novice level, included Courtney Lang and Andrew Lanouette, Joshua Brunson and Nate Foggy, and Jessie Mitchell and Mary Ellen Stover.
Congratulations to all of the students who participated and special thanks to parents Mrs. Michelle Lang and Mr. Alan Loux for serving as judges and Mr. Jay Foggy for helping to provide transportation and supporting the team!
Congratulations to Senior Greg Baumann (Class of 2009) who won second place in the Delaware Abraham Lincoln Bicentennial Essay Scholarship (see press release below). He was also recently awarded a $1,000 scholarship from Cumberland Farms.
Delaware Dept. of Education Press Release
Lincoln Bicentennial Essay Scholarships Announced
Release Date: Jan 22, 2009 8:00 AM
(Dover, DE) – The Delaware Abraham Lincoln Bicentennial Commission and the State of Delaware, in collaboration with The Lincoln Club of Delaware, have announced the three winners of the Delaware Abraham Lincoln Bicentennial Essay Scholarship.
Alan Stuart Markham, from Caravel Academy, won the first-place scholarship of $10,000. The second-place $7,500 scholarship went to Greg Baumann from Tall Oaks Classical School; Ella Frances Wagner, from Sanford School, took the third-place scholarship of $5,000.
High school seniors across Delaware competed for the Delaware Abraham Lincoln Bicentennial Essay Scholarship by submitting an essay on the topic, “1860 Candidate Lincoln’s Middle Path on Slavery: Too Little or Just Right?” The deadline for this contest, which was administered by the Delaware Higher Education Commission, was December 5, 2008.
The winners will be honored at the Delaware Abraham Lincoln Bicentennial Dinner on February 10, 2009, at the Chase Riverfront Center in Wilmington. The Dinner will also feature a dialogue with Harold Holzer and the Hon. Frank J. Williams on “The Legacy of Abraham Lincoln in the 21st Century.” Additional information on the Dinner is available at http://www.lincoln200.delaware.gov/ .
The Honorable Henry duPont Ridgely, who chairs the Delaware Abraham Lincoln Bicentennial Commission, said “We are very pleased to honor these three high school seniors for their writing achievements. Abraham Lincoln provided the national leadership that saved our Union and ended slavery in America. The bicentennial of his birth this year provides a unique opportunity for students to not only study the leadership qualities of our nation’s greatest President but also to exercise the critical thinking skills essential to their own success as 21st Century citizens of the United States.”
The Delaware Abraham Lincoln Bicentennial Commission was established by an Act of the 143rd General Assembly, House Bill No. 491, which was sponsored by former House Majority Leader Rep. Wayne A. Smith (R-Brandywine Hundred-North) and Senator Nancy Cook (D-Kenton) and signed into law by Governor Ruth Ann Minner. To learn about other Lincoln Bicentennial activities in Delaware, visit http://www.lincoln200.delaware.gov/. The national Lincoln Bicentennial website is at www.lincolnbicentennial.gov/
________________________________________Delaware's Department of Education is committed to promoting the highest quality education for every Delaware student by providing visionary leadership and superior service.
Welcome Back, Juniors & Seniors!
April 2009
The juniors and seniors have safely arrived back home from our wonderful trip to Merida, Mexico. We are quite tan, full of stories to tell, and, I promise, swine flu- free! None of us really had any idea of what to expect from this much-anticipated trip. But I think that I speak for everyone when I say that our ten days in Mexico were better then anyone imagined they would be.
Whether we were painting for hours in the hot sun, splattering orange paint, slipping and sliding while washing floors or climbing roofs (which may sound to some like a drag), we had a blast serving the Church of the Rock. It was great to come together and help that church, though they gave us so much more than we gave them. It was awesome to get to know the wonderful people there, who not only made us delicious meals, but opened their homes to us and drove us to all the amazing sights of the area. An overall favorite of the trip was swimming in mysterious and beautiful cenotes. (Look them up online; they are indescribable.) We also spent relaxing time at the beach, complete with clear blue water. We ate lots of delicious, authentic, (and sometimes scary) foods. We also got to experience the Mayan ruins of Chichen-Itza (Not Chicken Pizza!) and Uxmal. These are only a few of our many adventures from our undeniably incredible trip!
A special thanks goes out to Mr. and Mrs. Voshell and Mr. and Mrs. Davison for the awesome job they did chaperoning our trip!