RPS Update

When I was appointed as RPS Superintendent of Schools five years ago, I had one child in elementary school, one in middle school, and one in high school. Tomorrow, my second daughter, Isabela, will graduate from high school. She will continue her athletic and academic career at Drexel University in Philadelphia. Gabriela (my oldest) is coming home this evening from her second year of college and will head abroad shortly thereafter, and my son André will soon be a junior. I say all of this to remind the parents of our youngest children to capture and savor every moment– you can’t get the time back, and it all happens so fast. Tears.

I hope to see our RHS seniors around town for early prom pictures this evening. I have loved getting to know this senior class—they are an incredible group and very special. Yesterday, I reminded our high school senior leaders at the Government Against Drunk Driving (GRADD) ceremony that while we trust them and their peers to make good decisions, we recognize that they may make mistakes, and we are here for them, now and always.

At the May 27th BOE meeting, Dr. Hannaway and Ms. Gillette presented a proposal that further enhances our student wellness approaches at RHS. We are fortunate to have resources across our schools, and most certainly a devoted faculty and staff, PK-12. The team aims to further engage student voice and peer-to-peer support to promote healthy daily habits. The plan includes inviting families into the conversation–as we know, with everything that happens here at school, we are only successful if we have your support. Thank you in advance for working alongside us.

Warmly,

Susie

Susie Da Silva, Ed.D

“What lies behind you and what lies in front of you pales in comparison to what lies inside of you.”

—R.W. Emerson

It was a week of firsts for the Ridgefield Tiger Talk podcast! We welcomed our first-ever RPS Communications intern, RHS senior Murphy Everdell. She discusses her internship, which is covering her fellow senior interns—in the office, in the schools, or on the farm. In the second part of the show, Murphy takes her turn as our first student co-host, interviewing her school counselor, Lori Bran, about the first intern service trip to Panama. Interns packed a lifetime into a five-day trip. Thanks for listening!

See more photos in our special Senior Internship section below!

RHS Boys Lacrosse upset New Canaan last night to win the FCIAC Championship for the first time since 2009. A gritty team effort—phenomenal goaltending, lights-out defense, face-off domination, beautiful passing, and clutch scoring—put the Tigers on top, with the final score of 12 to 7. Congratulations, Tigers!

REGISTRATION REMINDER: If you have a child entering kindergarten next year, are moving to a different RPS school, or have a graduating senior planning to participate in the elementary school graduation walks, please register so that we can plan accordingly. Remember to check your school calendar for art shows, concerts, field days, and other end-of-the-year events!

RHS Theater is offering a Cabaret this Saturday and Sunday. Tickets at the door.

Elementary principals recently sent a letter to RHS seniors and their parents about the Graduation Walks—a tradition when seniors put on their caps and gowns and march along the halls of their elementary schools. Grad walks are an opportunity for each school to celebrate its students in its own way and for graduates to thank their teachers. Please read the full letter here to learn about registration, parking, and other security protocols. Tell your friends!

Dates, times, and schools below

Editor's Note: Last week's RPS Update had an incomplete list of our building Teachers of the Year. Please see the full list below! Thank you to the parents who brought this mistake to our attention.

Barlow Mountain Elementary—Patricia Cerniglia

Branchville Elementary—Betsy Anderson

Farmingville Elementary—Amanda Cody

Ridgebury Elementary—Karen Van Vliet

Scotland Elementary—Danielle Donovan

Veterans Park Elementary—Jeffrey Lovelace (selected RPS Teacher of the Year!)

East Ridge Middle School—Daniela Silvestri

Scotts Ridge Middle School—Christie Judge

Ridgefield High School—Julie Henderson

Camp Common App offers rising seniors the opportunity to get a head start on their college application process during a free morning workshop. The options are Friday, August 1 OR Thursday, August 7th from 10am - 1pm. Students can register here!

Please help RPS go green by checking your students' e-Backpack weekly for important information. Organizations that meet the RPS policy may submit their request for inclusion to cmelagrano@ridgefieldps.net.

On Wednesday, faculty and families celebrated Junior Book Award recipients. Please see photos of Book Award recipients with family and staff below, and all the recipients and prizes here.

On Wednesday night, Ridgefield High School seniors Caroline Baker, heading to Tufts University next year, and Julia Knispel, off to Northwestern University, were recognized at a Fairfield County Scholar Leader Banquet in New Canaan.

Shown in the photo with RHS Assistant Principal Christine Hopkinson.

May's RHS Student of the Month is Peter Karloutsos! He is also the FCIAC Exemplary Student-Athlete and a valued intern at East Ridge Middle School. Read more about Peter in this Hamlet Hub article and in the internship column below. Congratulations, Peter!

On Tuesday, RHS Theater hit the red carpet for the Halo Awards, the CT high school equivalent of the Tonys. This dedicated team of actors, crew, and faculty directors won the awards for best team, best spirit, and best dressed, according to RPS Update's estimation. They took home two Haloes. Peter and the Starcatcher won the big prize for best contemporary play, and junior Casey Fisher (in photo) won best comic actor in a male role. Bravo! Bravo! See the 17 Halo nominations and more on the RHS Theatre website. Cabaret tomorrow and Sunday!

Each year, the state organization for world language teachers (COLT) organizes a virtual poetry contest in which students memorize and perform a poem in the language they are learning or speak at home. This year, the competition drew almost 400 students in 18 languages. RHS sent eleven students and came home with four place winners. Participants: Jenna Rolewicz (French II), Tora Hulber (Italian I), Hunter Lebun-Luo (Mandarin I), Aaron Goncalves (Mandarin II), Sadie Huang-Kashansky (Mandarin III), Lucas Cai (Mandarin Heritage), Sofia Mongardi (Spanish V)

Congratulations to:

Alina Mitev; Spanish III—1st place

Samuel Turok, French IV–2nd place

Abigail Bakle, Italian II—3rd place

Maggie Melita, Latin II—3rd place

Last Thursday, RHS hosted its annual Science Research Symposium—an opportunity for science research students to share their projects and for RHS to celebrate these students' original research. Science Research is a college-level, multi-year, intensive program. Students prepared this website for the event, which details the ten student presenters, their research, and the event schedule.

The keynote speaker was Dr. Daniel Baluha, an Associate Professor of Chemistry at Western Connecticut State University. He discussed the path he took to get into research and briefly touched on his current research in wood smoke. His message about how students still learn and how research is still valuable, even if the results weren't exactly what the researcher had hoped, really resonated with our students. A number of them said they felt better about their own research after listening to him speak.

Some of the completed research that was presented last Thursday included:

• The Effect of Chronic Versus Need-Based Stimulant Use on Sensitivity to Natural Reward in Drosophila Melanogaster
• The Effects of Different Breathing Techniques During Swim Workouts on Short-Term Memory in Adolescent Athletes by using Word Recall tests
• Optimizing Extraction of Chitin from Crustacean Shells
• How Nutritive Versus Non-nutritive Sweeteners Affect Sleep Quantity in Drosophila Melanogaster
• The Effect of Positive Thinking and Mindset Technique on High School Athletes

On Wednesday, Scotts Ridge Middle School celebrated "Get Outside and Play for Children's Mental Health Day." Health teacher Kelly Zurzola and PE teachers Carrie Torpey, Gillian Kane, and Devin Sullivan combined their classes on the turf field for the day. Stations included football, soccer, volleyball, frisbee, wiffle ball, spike ball, and bubbles. Students chose any activity or combination of activities they wanted. As you can see from the photos, students had a great day!

On Tuesday night, the RHS Orchestra, conducted by Michael McNamara, opened the CHIRP (Concert Happenings in Ridgefield's Parks) Concert series. Students and some special guests gave Ballard Park a night to remember with iconic hits from Frank Sinatra, Aretha Franklin, Billy Joel, and more. Listen to their rendition of "Purple Rain," sung by senior Kevin DiMiceli with back-up by Elizabeth Campbell, Hazel Connally, Leigh Kovalsky, and Michelle Scheffel. Thank you to our Ridgefield Music Parents for underwriting the show and for all you do to support music education in our schools. See the CHIRP schedule for free concerts on Tuesdays and Thursdays.

Elementary art shows provide the opportunity to celebrate students' creativity, learning, and craftsmanship in the visual arts. Hats off to our student artists and our outstanding elementary art teachers—Alison Anderson, Rachael Penney, Megan Kounnas, Jennifer Zeyer, and substitute Jennifer Simon—for all you do. While each school's art show is a little different, all are beautiful!

League and State playoffs continue. See the RHS Athletics website for more information and schedules. Let's go, Tigers!!! Here is a link to the RHS Athletics newsletter sent last Friday.

Seniors Owen Dulecki and Peter Karloutsos are the RHS Spring FCIAC Exemplary Athletes. Read more about these student-athletes contributions below. Congratulations!

Owen achieved a 3.9 unweighted GPA and has consistently been a member of the High Honor Roll, mainly taking AP and honors classes. She is a member of the RHS National Honor Society. Owen has played on the girls’ varsity tennis team for all four years, and she has served as co-captain for the Tigers in both her junior and senior seasons. Last spring, Owen and her doubles partner, Ava Treat, teamed up to have a very successful season, earning 2024 All-FCIAC Girls Tennis Second Team Doubles recognition. Outside of athletics, she is the president of the RHS Interact Club and vice president of the Molly Ann Tango Memorial Foundation. Owen is also a nationally certified EMT, and she works at Sammy and Nat on the weekends. She will be attending Syracuse University as a Biology major on a pre-med track.

Peter has achieved a 4.1 weighted GPA and maintained High Honors while taking AP and honors-level courses. He has played on the varsity baseball team for the past three years and was named captain in both his junior and senior seasons. Peter received All-FCIAC Honorable Mention recognition in his sophomore and junior seasons. Peter is also very involved in the RHS choir, where he has performed at many prestigious venues, including Carnegie Hall. See his May Musician of the Month write-up above. Peter has accepted an appointment to the United States Coast Guard Academy, where he will continue his academic journey and compete as a member of the baseball team.

So many internships--not enough time to cover them all! Listen to the Ridgefield Tiger Talk podcast and read below to see where we followed our interns this week. Follow RPS Instagram for daily stories.

We visited Farmingville interns and former FES students Megan Gallagher and Nick Costello on the highly anticipated day of Hula Palooza, where students of all grades were excused from class and invited to the gym and cafeteria, which had been transformed into a sort of fairground full of activities, from face-painting to bean-bag toss.

This internship visit was especially personal, as I reunited with some of my FES teachers. They remembered me fondly as this goofy, outgoing kid with glasses and a bob. But, once they recognized my changed appearance, I was immediately met with hugs and proud faces. As I lap the building, I'm overwhelmed by the nostalgic smell of crayons and the familiar street signs that mark the hallways, which have somehow shrunk. What hasn't quite changed is the warmth I feel here. I might tower over her as I embrace my beloved first-grade teacher, Ms. Carroll, but I still remember the joy and comfort I felt in her class. As we look through the yearbook together, I laugh at my younger self, but I also appreciate her and recognize we're not so different. I'm still the same extroverted kid, I still love to write, I still need glasses (though they've now been substituted with contacts), and I still have a deep fondness for my Farmingville family. I know I'll always have a place here.

ERMS has recently onboarded two senior interns to support essential classes—PE and Art. Peter Karloutsos has channeled a love of sports and competition into his role as the school's Gym intern, where he enjoys interacting with the kids and occasionally jumping in on the fun (but only when the losing team needs a little boost, he adds). Intern Niall Tantary is utilizing his creative talents and expertise to assist art teacher Hillary Lewis and help kids learn how to use new digital art programs on the school iPads.

Tucked behind the A.C.T. Theatre is Ridgefield's lesser-known gem: BassamFellows Furniture & Design House. The building isn't just any high-end furniture store — it holds significant historical value. It was renowned architect Philip Johnson's first commercial building (built in 1952) and has since been restored with most of the original materials kept intact. Even on a cloudy day, light streams in, highlighting BassamFellows' mid-century Modern-inspired furniture. Senior intern River Trotter, who plans to study product design at Drexel University, has been helping out at BassamFellows, taking inventory, quality checking, managing the price and sourcebooks, and helping organize showcase events and photoshoots to advertise the products. River has also gained a better understanding of the design process itself, with the opportunity to speak with the company's Italian designer over Zoom and learn how he utilizes computer-aided design technology to bring ideas to life.

Seniors Walker Fiore, Brandon Gmelin, James Holloway, Chris Keating, Jack Kirchner, and Jack Schoenherr are currently interning at Athletic IQ above the ice rink, where they help create advertising content, market programs, test equipment, and clean. Downstairs, interns Tillie Van Alstyne, Talia Bender, and Summer Tamarro are assisting TJ Cline in managing inventory for the store.

Interns from the Town of Ridgefield and Veterans Park Elementary participated in the annual Memorial Day Celebration last Friday. They listened to patriotic songs and an inspiring keynote speech by Captain James Zegarelli, a VPES parent and a veteran of the United States Marine Corps. Senior town intern Sophie Zezula spoke eloquently to memorialize fallen heroes. The VPES fifth-grade student council did a great job leading the Town ceremony.

This was a busy week for RHS interns Andrew Pearl, William Carter, Mazie Pelusio, and William Trotman at Kohler Ronan Consulting Engineers. They have been actively working alongside staff on two significant projects at The Metropolitan Museum of Art, The Tang Wing for Modern and Contemporary Art, and the South Side Central Chilled Water Plant. Earlier in the week, the interns reviewed construction drawings, researched building codes, performed spatial analysis for mechanical, electrical, plumbing and fire protection systems, and collaborated on Microsoft Teams with the firm's colleagues at Beyer Blinder Belle Architects and Planners and Thornton Tomasetti Structural Engineers. On Wednesday, they accompanied Christopher Vahlsing, Jay Kurtz, and James Hurley in surveying existing conditions on site to develop solutions for modifying and routing systems throughout the landmarked historic building.

As they say, a photo is worth a thousand words, and these photos from the first senior internship trip are adorable. Please listen to the Tiger Talk podcast to hear more about the service trip to Panama.

We would love to hear from you! Families and staff can submit stories, comments, or corrections to RPS Communications. Please follow us on Social Media with links below.