As the 2014-15 school year closes, we are proud to report that the Lyceum has had another strong year. Below is an outline with some commentary about our activities and accomplishments.
• Mock Trial for students in grades 9-12.This year we had over 150 students participating from seven local high schools. Carmel High won a narrow victory over Pacific Grove and went on to win 6th place in the State Finals, the best performance yet by a Monterey County team at State.
• Monterey County Spelling Bee for 4th and 5th Grade students. The event was held at San Benancio Middle School on Feb 21st with 56 finalists from all over the County. Twenty eight schools are participated. David Whitrock, of KAZU, was our word caller. Linus Santos, of Sacred Heart, took first place; Kassandra Lopez, of New Republic, won second place and Stella Foster, of Captain Cooper School was the third place winner.
• History Day for students in grades 5 through 12. The event was held, on March 7 and 8 at Los Arboles Middle School. Over 150 students doing historical research through posters, displays, academic papers and creating websites or performances participated. The theme was Leadership and Legacy. Since then, the Los Arboles performance team went on to win the State Finals for their play, From Tiny Bungalows to Enchanted Castles: Julia Morgan a Leader for Women in the Workplace and a Legacy of Amazing Architecture. They will complete in the National Finals in June.
• Model United Nations for middle and high school aged children. The middle school event was held at Monterey Institute of International Studies on May 2nd. The Syrian refugee and North African terrorist issues were focus points. The keynote speaker was noted UN specialist Edward J. Laurance of MIIS. The high school event was held on October 4th on the topic of Space Security. The guest speaker was Clay Moltz from Naval Postgraduate School,
• Our Expanding Your Horizons event, held at Hartnell College on Nov. 22, was a huge success with about 300 middle and high school girls in attendance to encourage careers in sciences. There were sixteen break our sessions taught by forty local practicing scientists. Our keynote address was by Anne Gibbon of the Stanford Design School. Fifteen organizations presented a Career Fair for the girls.
- Art/Natural Science: Sharon Nelson has volunteered to be the Arts Coordinator for the Lyceum and has been making an effort to align arts classes with a natural science focus. Botanical Drawing and Painting, Pocket Sketching. Nature Journaling, Drawing and Painting the Seaside, Creating a Herbarium, are just some of those offerings. Among the artist/educators teaching those classes are Nina Antze, Claudia Stevens, Marie Gilmore, Pat Lightfoot, and Erin Hunter. We are pleased to announce that they will also be on board in the coming year.
- Cyber Adventurers a summer STEM program for middle school girls will be offered at Hartnell’s Alisal Tech Center and at Monterey Peninsula College this summer. MPC: Jul 11 and 18. Hartnell July 20-25. Thanks to the Community Foundation for funding this program.
- Communities for Sustainable Monterey County is interested in collaborating with the Lyceum next year in connection with our Square Foot Gardening program and offering classes having to do with different types of gardening, water catchment, and pollination.
- The Lyceum conducted two six-week programs in Digital Story Telling for senior citizens at the Carmel Foundation. See these at www.lyceum.org/digital-storytelling/
- Hidden Careers Program: Under the direction and coordination of Lyceum board member, Elaine Herrmann, we have launched a series of panel presentations for children enrolled in local high schools. This spring we held a Careers in Hospitality event at Alisal High. Next year our focus will return to medical careers.
- Our iLead+Design Summer Camp was held for the second year at MIIS Digital Learning Center. Teachers Sean Raymond (Academic Dean at York School) Bob Cole (of MIIS) and Tritia Moneypenny focused on producing solutions for three community partners: Animal Friends Rescue Shop, Monterey Bay Aquarium and Save Our Shores. Four excellent You Tube videos of this can be seen at www.lyceum.org/ileaddesign. iL+D 3.0 will be held June 15-26 this year.
- Monterey County Young Journalists (MOCOYOJO) was offered by syndicated columnist, Peter Funt, for the fourth year. Twelve students visited The Herald, KSBW, KAZU and KNRY to get hands on experience in the field of journalism. They applied these skills by covering the Mock Trail last year.
- Lyceum Enrichment Academic Programs (LEAP) These are our day-to-day after school and weekend classes in arts, humanities, and sciences. Please visit our website www.lyceum.org to see the arts, language and culture, sciences and nature studies classes we offered.
- Space Adventures Grade 5-7. Our fourth year of this event involved over 25 students from throughout the County. NASA astronaut, Dan Bursch, was a special guest. Tours of Chabot Science Center and the Monterey Institute of Research in Astronomy (MIRA) were features. The event was coordinated by Bud Cook, a retired MPUSD GATE Teacher. The camp will run July 13-17 this summer.
- Square Foot Gardening Classes have been taught at the Lyceum in Monterey , Laurel Wood School and Mission Park in Salinas and DLAMP at Fort Ord by Mary Helen Van Veen and Lynda Kamrath.