April was a great month for Harker’s middle school Latin students, who performed exceptionally well in the National Latin Exam, and also scored dozens of awards at the State Latin Convention.
In the National Latin Exam, Alayna Richmond and Austin Tuan, both grade 6, had perfect papers in the Introduction to Latin category. John Nicolas Jerney, grade 7, and sixth graders Kshithija Mulam, Anthony Luo, Aditya Dhar, Arjun Subramaniam, Venkat Sankar, Brandon Chow, Peter Wu, James He and Alexander Lam all received awards for outstanding achievement in the same category. Achievement awards for Introduction to Latin went to Ashley Zhong, grade 7, and grade 6 students Albert Xu, Brendan Tobin, Karthik Sundaram, Jackson Su and Manan Shah.
In the Latin I category, grade 8 students Billy Bloomquist, Richard Gu, Ryan Pachauri and Vivek Sriram received gold/summa cum laude awards, along with seventh graders Rishabh Chandra, Grace Guan, Sadhika Malladi, Kaushik Sankar, Elisabeth Siegel, Gurutam Thockchom, Robbie Underwood and Alison Wang. Silver/maxima cum laude awards were won by Celine Liang, Noko Stearns and Arjun Narayan, all grade 7. Michael Moncton, Kevin Chen and Malvika Khanna, all grade 7, won magna cum laude awards.
Aadyot Bhatnagar, Simran Singh, Sahana Rangarajan, Madhu Nori, Tiara Bhatacharya and Rasika Raghavan, all grade 8, won gold/summa cum laude in Latin II, where Sophia Shatas, Maya Nandukumar and Jackelyn Shen took home silver/maxima cum laude awards. The remaining of Harker’s 50 award recipients in the contest were magna cum laude winners Zabin Bashar, Allison Kerkhoff and Sahiti Avula, all grade 8, and fellow eighth grader Christopher Hildum, who won cum laude.
In early April, nearly 30 middle school students were in attendance at the State Latin Convention, held at Miramonte High School in Orinda, Calif. A total of 10 grade 6 students won awards in the MS1 category. Sean Costello took second in Latin sight reading. Aditya Dhar came in first in derivatives, mythology and Latin oratory and also won the individual academic sweepstakes at the MS1 level. Alexander Lam took second in derivatives, while Eric Pei earned an honorable mention in grammar. In dramatic interpretation, Venkat Sankar won first place for interpretation of a boy, and Amrita Singh won first for interpretation (girls division) while also taking third in grammar and Latin sight reading. Karthik Sundaram won first in strings performance, and Austin Tuan took second place in grammar.
At the MS2 level, Billy Bloomquist, grade 8, placed second in Latin sight reading and third in reading comprehension. Classmate Richard Gu took second place in reading comprehension and third place in mythology. Eighth grader Vivek Sriram placed first in no less than three events: derivatives, reading comprehension and Latin sight reading. Rishabh Chandra, grade 7, won first place in grammar and tied for third in reading comprehension with Bloomquist and Kaushik Sankar. Seventh grader Sadhika Malladi won first place in reading comprehension, tying with Sriram. Taking first in both pentathlon and essay was Elisabeth Siegel, grade 7, whose classmate, Allison Wang, took second in mythology and pentathlon, and third in Latin sight reading. The middle school quiz bowl team of Chandra, Sankar, Siegel and Wang took first place at the state level.
A total of four grade 8 students performed well in multiple events, including Anni Ankola, who placed third in the costume category (dressed as Charon) and earned an honorable mention in reading comprehension. Zabin Bashar won first in impromptu art and honorable mentions in both mythology and reading comprehension. Aadyot Bhatnagar came in first in reading comprehension and vocabulary and placed second in strings. Maya Nandakumar won first place in mythology and dramatic interpretation (girl) while placing second in vocal music. In addition to their awards in other categories, Bhatnagar and Nandakumar tied for first place in the individual academic sweepstakes at the MS3 level. The quiz bowl team of Bashar, Bhatnagar, Nandakumar and Rasika Raghavan took first place.
Harker’s middle school delegation at the convention won first place for spirit, aided by seventh grader Kevin Ke’s first-place-winning T-shirt design, and the first-place banner by grade 7’s Shannon Hong and Natalie Simonian, and grade 8’s Sophia Shatas and Allison Kiang. Harker’s chariot race team finished second, and the scrapbook created by Nandakumar took third place.