Now that the most recent graduates are heading to college, teachers are handing out their syllabuses and students are again waking up for first period, the new school year is beginning. But before diving head first into the new school year, The Feather staff would like to celebrate the 2012-’13 school year along with all its achievements.

Though last year’s staff would be considered newbies, we strove to serve our community by providing more news than the year before. The staff focused on producing quality work in their 890 articles, 171 videos, numerous podcasts and plenty of photo slideshows. But The Feather also expanded their reach by connecting with views through social media like Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.

After evaluating the happenings of the 2012-’13 school year, The Feather chose to split up this article into the categories of academics, sports, extracurriculars and graduation.

ACADEMICS

This past school year our academic programs were improved due to the multiple changes that took place in the learning environment. As one of the minor changes, the school was able to purchase all new chairs for every classroom. In a more drastic change, both the science lab and computer labs were completely remodeled. With the help of donations from Christianna Enterprises, Viking Enterprises and the Dyer Family Foundation, FC was able to improve both labs with new equipment and bigger, safer workspaces.

Alongside those major improvements, the teachers were also able to begin using more advanced technology in their classrooms to aid in their lesson plans. Teachers were given iPads and AppleTV so they could incorporate videos and easier overhead projections.

On campus, the California Scholarship Federation (CSF) was one of the biggest clubs in school. This year, the club was able to send a team of three to the regional conference to compete in the Quiz Bowl. Seniors McKay Mohun, Ashley Erickson and junior Suzy Carroll competed against multiple teams, only to return home as two-time Quiz Bowl champions. The same conference also featured senior Maddie Yee as a Seymour Memorial Award finalist, where she received a $2,000 scholarship.

This past year, FC offered three different Advanced Placement (AP) classes: English Language and Composition, Calculus and US History. These students study their intended subject all year long hoping to pass the AP tests proctored in May. This year campus students took 51 AP tests. In AP English 79.31 percent of the students got a three or higher on their test, passing the test. 58.33 percent of students passed the AP US History test, and 80 percent passed the AP Calculus test. All three of these percentages outranked the California results as well as the national and global results.

SPORTS

This year, the Eagles’ football team did not play in the West Sequoia League (WSL), but rather played independently which allowed the team to travel throughout California for their games. Though their season was not the most successful, senior Brandon McCormick was invited to play in the 2013 City/County All-star Football game.

This year, the girls soccer team advanced to the playoffs for the second year in a row under head coach Tony Martinez. After winning in the first round of playoffs, the girls moved on to the second round, but were unable to advance any further.

One of the newest additions to this year’s athletic programs was involving homeschool students from Tower Christian School to create opportunities for larger teams. Through this program, Tower Christian’s students have joined in football and both boys and girls soccer.

During spring sports, the golf team was able to bring in their sixth WSL title, despite fielding a team of underclassmen.

Track also saw improvements this year with a big-sized team. Freshman Brittany Bender had a successful season, advancing to the WSL Valley Championships for her 400 meter sprint.

COMMUNITY INVOLVEMENT

The student body gathered in the Ground Zero quad at 7 a.m. to participate in the national See You at the Pole (SYATP), Sept. 26. SYATP is a national event that has grown to over two million participants who gather at local schools to pray for their cities, states and country.

For the fourth year in a row, the FC community participated in the Max Hinton Blood Drive, Sept. 25. The Central California Blood Center (CCBC) blood mobile was on campus and students, faculty and parents were all welcome to partake in the event.

Campus groups like Student Leadership and The Feather staff also continued in the tradition of Kid’s Day, March 5. This year, the event raised more money than ever before in the 26-year history, totaling $490,000. The campus students contributed $1,800.57 towards the cause, where all profits go towards helping Children’s Hospital, Central California.

EXTRACURRICULAR

Because the Extracurricular category spans so many areas in the students’ lives, it has been broken up into subcategories to provide more details.

Organizations

This year’s clubs continued with their success. Long standing clubs like CSF and Spanish Club has huge numbers this year, while new clubs like the 5 Minute Mile club just got its grounding.

CSF has one of its more successful years. The students were able to partake in multiple service projects, including buying supplies through World Vision. The club also was able to send students to the regional conference like mentioned above. In partnership with Spanish Club, CSF was able to host the anual Cinco de Mayo event, providing the usual enchilada lunch and mariachi music.

Spanish Club was also able to put in many hours of service, making Easter baskets for children in Honduras, sending money to missionaries in Columbia and many other small projects. On top of that, the club brought in speakers to teach its members about different cultures.

As a new club, the 5 Minute Mile Club, founded by physical education teacher Michael Ogden, encourages students to strive their best to run the mile in 5:59 or less. Over this past year multiple students were able to reach this goal and receive their t-shirt to prove their membership.

Other clubs like Sister to Sister and Brother to Brother continued again this year. These two clubs helped upperclassmen to mentor junior high students on a biweekly basis.

This year, a group of students was also able to start the Science Club. This group of students met each Tuesday to experiment with various projects in the science lab alongside science teacher Dan Harris.

Student Leadership had a successful year with their joint teachers Robert Foshee and Kim Bimat. The class was able to host a week of Homecoming events, including the infamous King Dance. They also put on the campus’s formal event Night of the Stars (NOTS) under the theme of Lights, Camera, Action! Then, in the Spring the class also put together a casual Sadie Hawkins event, featuring line dancing and carnival games.

Performing arts

This year the FC Music Department, under direction of Michael Ogdon, hosted multiple performances, highlighted by their Christmas show Round the Table Carol Sing at the end of the first semester. In the second semester, the choirs performed at the Heritage Festival this year, earning the highest remarks.

As a first, FC was also able to hold their very own music festival called Fresno Favorites. This local competition allowed students to sing in a mass choir with local schools and choirs in Fresno’s surrounding area.

Though they had a small cast, the drama department was able to put on three different plays. In the winter, they performed both Christmas With Little Women and The Christmas Dress. And again in the spring, they performed a larger show called Meet Me in St. Louis under the direction of Susan Ainley.

Visual arts

In the visual arts subcategory, The Feather would like to feature the students who work in the video productions and arts classes. Taught by Michael Ogden, video productions teaches students to work with video equipment and computers in order to produce short films and videos. This year, a few members in the class worked to enter a video into the annual Slick Rock Festival.

The multiple art classes, instructed by Sharon Scharf, has a lot of fun producing some fun, interesting and beautiful works of art this year, like many others, her students competed in The Big Fresno Fair’s chalk-drawing competition. They also competed in the Valley’s postcard competition and other national competitions, bringing many awards to Scharf’s students.

Publications

This year, The Feather staff had its most successful year yet. The staff published every school day of the 2012-’13 school year, aiming to win various competitions throughout the year.

The Feather was named, for the third year in a row, an All-American newspaper by the National Scholastic Press Association (NSPA). The ranking is only given to about 15 percent of student newspapers across the country. The Feather received four out of five marks of distinction, gaining a total score of 3,720 points.

Later, the Columbia Scholastic Press Association (CSPA) announced that The Feather is a Digital Crown Finalist, meaning the online paper could receive their third Gold Digital Crown in the spring. The CSPA also awarded the staff with three All-Columbian Honors, the equivalent of the NSPA’s All-American award. When a few members of the staff traveled to New York in March, they learned that they had, in fact, won a Gold Crown from the CSPA, earning the highest award Columbia awards.

In the spring, after traveling to New York, a majority of the staff traveled to San Francisco to attend the NSPA West Coast Conference. Where there, Editor-in-Chief Tynin Fries, Senior Editor Maddie Yee, Features Editor Viviana Hinojosa and Media Anchor Cally Fries were able to teach classes to their fellow publication students across the nation.

At the same conference, The Feather was awarded with an Online Pacemaker award, the highest honor awarded, from the NSPA. In addition, the staff competed in an in-house competition where they were announced the Best of Show winners.

GRADUATION

The school year ended with the 32nd Commencement of Graduation to honor the class of 2013 in their many achievements, May 23. The keynote speaker, Brad Bell, addressed the class as a whole, and student speakers Co-Valedictorians Maddie Yee, Ashley Erickson and Salutatorian Jessica Healy also addressed their peers.

The Feather also selected senior Brandon McCormick as The Feather’s Student of the Year. McCormick was selected because of his heavy involvement in academics, clubs, service projects and sports.

This author can be reached via Twitter: @TyninFries. Follow The Feather via Twitter: @thefeather.

For more information on the 2012-’13 school year, navigate the sections at the top of the page. Also, suscribe to the RSS feed, follow The Feather on Twitter and “Like” The Feather on Facebook to stay informed for this next year.