Would today’s students be better off if we provided and encouraged more hands-on training program options?
Annie Holmquist | January 19, 2016
In Forbes today, columnist Erik Sherman addresses a common mistake that politicians and the public make about education. All too often, writes Sherman, “we move from ‘education is good’ to ‘education will fix income inequality’ or otherwise charge the economy.”
Because the public has believed such taglines, the push to send every student to college to get a degree has seen a dramatic increase in recent years. And as the push to college has increased, so has student debt. In fact, as a recent Gallup poll noted, 35% of students who graduated in the last 10 years have racked up more than $25,000 in debt.
JANUARY 15, 2016 LAST UPDATED: FRIDAY, JANUARY 15, 2016, 12:31 AM
BY GREG TARTAGLIA
SPORTS EDITOR |
THE RIDGEWOOD NEWS
Ridgewood High School gets much better odds playing the numbers 1-13-16 on the ice than in Powerball.
Those digits represent the date of the Maroons’ latest Bergen County hockey tournament victory, a 5-1 decision over Paramus/Lyndhurst/Hackensack Wednesday at the Ice Vault in Wayne.
The date of Ridgewood’s last prior county win? Jan. 16, 2013 (1-16-13) over Mahwah in the opening round. The team dropped its 2014 opener to Tenafly and did not qualify in 2015 following a slow start to the season.
This year’s first-round triumph gives the No. 8-seed Maroons a quarterfinal match-up with No. 2 St. Joseph tonight at the Ice Vault. RHS defeated the Green Knights to reach the 2012 semifinals, its furthest advancement in the tourney’s five-season history.
Senior Cooper Telesco led the offense against No. 9 Paramus/Lyndhurst/Hackensack (7-4-1) with two goals and one assist. He was one of four different Maroons to light the lamp in the third period, along with Ryan Carius, Liam Seston and Justin Klatsky.
Klatsky, Matt Cafarella, J.P. Kelly and Tim Anzano added an assist apiece, and goalie David Woodford made 26 saves as RHS moved to 9-3-1.
The win was welcomed after the Maroons sustained their first loss of the calendar year last Saturday, 6-2 against Big North Patriot foe River Dell/Westwood.
Ridgewood began 2016 by topping Clifton, 10-3 on Jan. 2, and RD/Westwood, 8-2 on Jan. 3. After splitting the season series with the latter, the team was 5-1 in the division, good for first place over the Golden Hawks (3-1-1).
Ridgewood NJ, Nineteen members of the RHS Math Team competed in the thirtieth Joseph W. Andrushkiw Mathematics Competition at Seton Hall University. The team placed fourth out of 23 schools and one RHS senior placed fourth overall out of more than 200 students.
Who announces regulations on one of the top selling products of the year just before Christmas— the Obama Administration, of course! Donald Scarinci, PolitickerNJ Read more
DECEMBER 30, 2015 LAST UPDATED: WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 30, 2015, 9:59 AM
BY BY DIANA OLIVEIRA
STAFF WRITER |
THE RIDGEWOOD NEWS
Working behind the scenes at a broadcast of a presidential primary debate can be chaotic. Anything can go wrong at any moment, and the technical crew is expected to think on its feet and try to salvage potential disasters.
The role is an embodiment of stress. But 20-year-old Ashling Stanek was unaffected by the pressure of being a runner for ABC’s Martha Raddatz and George Stephanopoulos at last Saturday’s Democratic debate. In fact, backstage was where the Saint Anselm College junior felt most comfortable.
“I’m least stressed when there’s lots to do, and when I’m busy and moving and figuring everything out,” said Stanek.
A 2013 Ridgewood High School graduate, Stanek is currently a member of the Kevin Harrington Student Ambassador program at the college’s New Hampshire Institute of Politics (NHIOP) in Manchester, N.H. Her position at NHIOP – the center features presentations by renowned speakers, authors and scholars almost daily – has helped her become involved with networks like WMUR, ABC, MSNBC, ESPN and CSPAN. She met the majority of the 2016 presidential candidates, some of them multiple times. She was, therefore, more than qualified to be selected to take part in ABC’s weekend-long coverage of the Democratic primary debate on campus.
Growing up, Stanek regularly sat with her father and discussed what was in the news, specifically the goings-on in Washington, D.C. So, she was understandably thrilled when she learned she’d be putting her longtime knowledge of politics to good use and witnessing political action in person as a member of the production’s crew.
“I’m really interested into going into media production,” said Stanek. “I was really excited to finally get the opportunity to work with all the technology.”
Ridgewood NJ, The RHS Robotics’ team competed in the FIRST Technology Challenge at Englewood as part of the FIRST Robotics league. The RHS team came in first place in their competition in conjunction with their alliance team. Aside from building a robot meant to complete a set of tasks in the fastest time, the RHS team was also honored for their professionalism and sense of community by receiving the Connect Award. The group had to submit an engineering notebook along with goals for sustaining the program and recruiting new students to the fields of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics. They also had to engage with the engineering community at large.
Neuroscientist: U.S. High Schools Are Too Boring for Students
Lillie M. Thomas | December 29, 2015
Temple University neuroscientist Laurence Steinberg’s research has shown him that adolescent brains are primed for learning.
The problem is, he claims, that most U.S. high schools are not challenging students enough during their adolescent years.
As WQED in Pittsburgh reports, Steinberg has spent his career studying the adolescent brain’s development, and has discovered that it has an “incredible plasticity” and “is exquisitely sensitive to experience.” We tend to think of small children’s brains as sponges for information, but Steinberg basically says the same thing is true of adolescents.
However, Steinberg feels that “American high schools are by and large not taking advantage of this opportunity”:
“Our high school students are among the worst in the developed world… It’s because our high schools are so boring… When we are not challenging our kids in high school, not only are we hindering their academic development, but we also aren’t taking advantage of the plastic prefrontal cortex.”
The article also points out that, unfortunately, American high schools tend to confuse “challenging work” with “amount of work”:
DECEMBER 28, 2015, 5:38 PM LAST UPDATED: TUESDAY, DECEMBER 29, 2015, 6:44 AM
BY GREGORY SCHUTTA
STAFF WRITER |
THE RECORD
Years of debate. Months of meetings. Weeks of hand-wringing.
And in the end, athletes, coaches and officials of New Jersey high school sports find themselves right back where they started.
In a momentous announcement Monday, state Commissioner of Education David Hespe reversed controversial votes this month by state athletics’ governing body to separate public and non-public schools in football and on the road to the state wrestling tournament.
Related: Landmark vote splits N.J. H.S. football along public/non-public lines
The decision forces the New Jersey State Interscholastic Athletic Association and school officials to yet again seek a lasting solution to the longest-running issue plaguing high school sports in the state: the competitive imbalance between public and non-public school teams.
“I’m disappointed,” said River Dell Athletic Director Denis Nelson, a strong proponent of the separation proposal in football. “The strategic and competitive advantage non-public schools have is going to continue. I don’t think it’s fair. I don’t think it’s right. But it is in existence.”
“We’re back to where we were,” said Bergen Catholic Athletic Director Jack McGovern. “I don’t know that that’s a great place. But now we know the parameters we have to work with, and we will continue to try to make it better.”
If any RHS alumni are looking for some last minute gifts, we still have t-shirts, hats, umbrellas and blankets for sale. Please check out the items atRHSalumniassociation.org …scroll down on the main landing page to see the items. Thanks.
Ridgewood NJ, The Ridgewood High School Alumni Association is currently accepting nominations for this year’s Distinguished Alumni event. The event will take place on Thursday, March 10th, 2016. The deadline for nominations is January 23rd, 2016.
Please submit all nominations via the website (RHSalumniassociation.org) under the Contact Us section. Please make sure to include the full name of the graduate, year of graduation and a brief write up detailing the person’s distinguished achievements. Any questions or inquiries can be sent directly to [email protected].
DECEMBER 18, 2015 LAST UPDATED: FRIDAY, DECEMBER 18, 2015, 12:31 AM
BY GREG TARTAGLIA
SPORTS EDITOR |
THE RIDGEWOOD NEWS
The Bergen County Coaches Association (BCCA) and Bergen County Women Coaches Association (BCWCA) held their fall sports awards banquets at the Fiesta in Wood-Ridge earlier this week.
Numerous Ridgewood High School athletes and coaches were honored for being named to an All-County first team or with other special awards.
Here is a look at the Maroons who were recognized:
Tuesday: BCWCA dinner
Ridgewood was named as the Large Schools Team of the Year for girls cross-country after winning the Bergen County Group B and Bergen Meet of Champions (BMOC) titles, both at Darlington Park. The Maroons honored for being on the All-Bergen first team were junior Olympia Martin and senior Sam Halvorsen, who finished 2-3 at the BMOC and 1-2 at the North 1, Group 4 sectional.
In addition, the State Group 4 race winner Martin was tabbed as one of 10 finalists for The Record Fall Athlete of the Season award, which went to Northern Valley/Old Tappan volleyball player Natalie Alechko.
Three Ridgewood girls were recognized for being chosen to the All-County gymnastics first team: junior Mika Tamura and freshmen Katherine Muccio and Victoria Purritano, all of whom scored over 36 all-around this season.
Ridgewood NJ , Two Ridgewood High School Coaches make Coach of the Year in Bergen Record Poll.
Karen Mendez is Coach of the Year
Karen Mendez was named High School Girls Gymnastics Coach of the Year by The Record. This is the second straight season Mendez is The Record Gymnastics Coach of the Year. In eight seasons leading her alma mater, Mendez is 65-14.
Medha Kirtane is Coach of the Year
Medha Kirtane was named The Record’s High School Girls Tennis Coach of the Year. The Maroons have won three consecutive state sectional championships, including this year’s North 1, Group 4 crown. Medha starred for Coach Debbie Paul before graduating RHS in 1996.
(Reuters Health) – Rule-breaking may be just as irresistible to teenagers today as it was in their parents’ day, but a new study of secret social media hashtags like #selfharmmm suggests that new technology is helping kids share dangerous behaviors more easily than ever before.
When it comes to what’s known as non-suicidal self-injury – cutting, burning and scratching done with damage rather than death in mind – teens can be quite crafty at deploying hashtags that mask their activities, evade content safeguards and advisory warnings, and make it much harder for parents to monitor their virtual lives.
“The online communities that develop around these hashtags can draw in adolescents and provide them a strong sense of belonging and support that is centered on these unhealthy behaviors,” said lead study author Dr. Megan Moreno, a specialist in adolescent medicine at the University of Washington and Seattle Children’s Research Institute.
“This can make recovery from these behaviors more challenging,” Moreno added by email.
Moreno and colleagues used the search term #selfharmmm to identify public posts on the social media platform Instagram, a photo-sharing service popular with teens, that related to destructive habits like cutting and burning.
Then, they used the search results to identify a list of ambiguous hashtags such as #blithe, #MySecretFamily and #SecretSociety123 that were tied to the same dangerous behaviors.
Other hashtags related to mental health conditions through use of common names, such as #Deb for depression, #Annie for anxiety, and #Olive for obsessive-compulsive disorder.
The number of search results for self-harm hashtags was high and grew over time.
The broad term #cat, which refers to cutting, had more than 44 million search results in 2014 and more than 56 million in 2015, the study team reports in the Journal of Adolescent Health.
Over that same period, use of #selfharmmm also grew, generating 1.7 million search results in 2014 and more than 2.4 million in 2015. In its various permutations, #SecretSociety123 grew by approximately 500,000 search results.
Ridgewood NJ , Nine RHS student musicians were selected to participate in the 2016 All Bergen County High School Band that will perform on January 17 at Paramus High School. Selected RHS students with media permission granted are Stephanie Pizza, Kari Wong, Halina Maas, Helen Cho, Joshua Yang, Jonathan Negron, Teddy Trent and Darius Karoon.
By Jim Lambert NJ Advance Media for NJ.com
on December 14, 2015 7:15 AM
Mike Glynn, one of the state’s most successful track and field and cross-country coaches, will be inducted into the New York Armory Coaches Hall of Fame later this month, the New York Armory announced.
Glynn, along with the coaches listed below, will be inducted into the Armory Coaches Hall of Fame during the AT&T Hall of Fame Invitational on December 19.
Glynn, who began his coaching career at Paramus Catholic (1966-79), where he built a powerhouse in boys cross country and track and field, retired from coaching at Ridgewood last spring after leading the Maroons program from 1985-2000 and from 2003-2014.
During his time at Ridgewood, Glynn’s teams have won six Bergen Group titles and five NNJIL titles. His Ridgewood squads have won 12 straight Group 4 sectional titles since 2012.
Glynn, a retired guidance counselor, produced five indoor state individual champions and 22 outdoor individual group champions. His track and field teams earned five Bergen County team titles, shared a sixth, and won 33 Bergen Group Championships.
Lt. Governor Kim Guadagno today visited Ridgewood High School to launch a “Rock Your Socks” competition to benefit the Covenant House, an organization that provides food, shelter, and other services to homeless, runaway and trafficked youth between the ages of 18 and 21. Socks are often overlooked during donation drives, so Lt. Governor Guadagno asked three area high schools to engage in a friendly contest to raise awareness for the charity and get involved in their community.
“Part of being a good citizen means participating in your community or your country as a whole to make it a better place,” said Lt. Governor Guadagno. “Volunteer at a food bank, at a library, at a soup kitchen. You’d be amazed how good it feels to give back to the community and you have no idea just how much people appreciate the help.”
The “Rock Your Socks” initiative is part of the Christie Administration’s annual “Season of Service” program. The goal of “Rock Your Socks” is to collect as many pairs of new socks as possible for the Covenant House. Students are encouraged to use social media to take pictures of interesting or unique socks to spread awareness of the campaign and challenge others to join.
