| (no subject) |
[Jul. 1st, 2009|08:33 am] |
Los Angeles alumni are getting together on July 7th. Details here. If you're in the area, please join us! |
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| More Stuy people in the news |
[Jun. 30th, 2009|03:26 pm] |
Actually, both of these are from the last few months rather than the last week or anything, but still.
You may remember a case last year where a SUNY-Binghampton basketball player assaulted another student at a bar, and then managed to flee the U.S. The incident received a good amount of coverage in the local and NYC papers, as well as the Times, and last month, on ESPN. It was not mentioned initially, but Bryan Steinhauer, the student who was assaulted - and spent several months in a coma - is a Stuy graduate, I think '04.
---
On a completely separate note, those who were at Stuy in the late 1990's remember or were vaguely aware of Micah Lasher, '99, who had published a book on magic tricks while 14, and was a Spectator editor-in-chief, but clearly set his sights on the world of politics/policy. As of the beginning of this year, he is the executive director of public affairs (i.e., responsible for lobbying with Albany and Washington), for the NYC Department of Education. |
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| Reality TV! (sigh) |
[Jun. 23rd, 2009|05:45 pm] |
Okay, maybe I'm out of the reality TV loop here, but apparently there's a new show called NYC Prep debuting tonight at 10 on Bravo.
From the Bravo page:
NYC Prep chronicles the lives of a group of privileged teenagers who are key players in Manhattan's elite high school scene. Students who travel in packs – whether it's on sophisticated vacations or to a townhouse for an exclusive midnight party, their lives intertwine as they network, shop, party, study, date and write college applications. Everyone's beautiful and everyone's connected.
So I guess it's like Gossip Girl, but uh, not?
But anyway, one of the girls on the show is from Stuy:
 Taylor is a 15-year-old sophomore who bounces between her public school entourage and the fast-paced, wealthy Upper East Siders whose parties she has no qualms crashing. As it is for most New York City kids, the academic bar is set extraordinarily high for Taylor. Her magnet public school is an intense academic pressure cooker, yet she finds time to be an active member of her school's gymnastics and roller hockey teams.
The NYT review mentions:
Taylor, 15, who goes to the highly selective Stuyvesant, a public high school, worries that wealthier students from places like Nightingale-Bamford and Dwight could look down on her. To improve her status, she decides to throw a party at a chic Japanese restaurant downtown.
No comment from the administration yet, but Nightingale-Bamford, one of the other schools, is less than thrilled with having a student on the show. |
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| any recent grads remember a mr. asch? |
[Jun. 13th, 2009|02:14 pm] |
interesting. but was the salary bit really necessary?
Stuyvesant Librarian Is Accused of Sexual Abuse
By JAVIER C. HERNANDEZ
Published: June 11, 2009
A Stuyvesant High School librarian has been arrested and charged with harassment and sexual abuse after he was accused of inappropriately touching four male students, city investigators said Thursday.
A report by the special commissioner of investigation, Richard J. Condon, said that the librarian, R. Christopher Asch, 56, who was also an adviser to the school’s quiz bowl team, gave massages to several boys while on duty in the school’s library.
The boys objected to Mr. Asch’s advances, but he continued to touch them, the report said. At one point, he grabbed a student’s leg and massaged it, and in another case, he ran his fingers through one boy’s hair while the student was studying, the report said.
Mr. Asch was expected to be arraigned Thursday afternoon and charged with one count of endangering the welfare of a child, two counts of third-degree sexual abuse and two counts of second-degree harassment.
Mr. Asch’s lawyer, Donald Vogelman, said Mr. Asch intended to plead not guilty. “Mr. Asch denies any improper behavior involving students,” Mr. Vogelman said.
Mr. Asch was reassigned to a teacher detention center after investigators issued the report substantiating the charges in May 2008. The Department of Education is moving to fire him.
Investigators have also substantiated a separate complaint that Mr. Asch took seven students on an unauthorized trip to Harvard to participate in a quiz bowl competition, according to Mr. Condon’s report. Stuyvesant officials did not approve the trip, and the parents of one student objected to sending their child, the report said.
The students said in the report that the inappropriate contact occurred from September 2004 through February 2008, when Mr. Asch grabbed the leg of a boy, the report said. The four boys decided to report Mr. Asch to school officials after that episode.
Mr. Asch was also the faculty adviser to the Republican club and several other student groups, and was the coach of the cricket team, according to the student newspaper, The Spectator.
Mr. Asch started working in city schools in 1989 and has spent most of his career as a high school librarian. He came to Stuyvesant in 2002, according to the Department of Education, and his annual salary is $86,590. |
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| I thought he looked familar... |
[Apr. 25th, 2009|02:48 am] |
I'm kind of embarrassed to admit this, but it took four episodes of Better Off Ted for me to realize that Lem (one of the scientists) is played by my old classmate Malcolm Barrett (Class of '98).
He gets to be in a show created by the guy who created Andy Richter Controls the Universe and be in scenes with Portia de Rossi. Excellent! |
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| The International Master of Stuyvesant |
[Mar. 29th, 2009|10:00 pm] |
The New York Times, March 28, 2009:
New York Teenager Stakes His Place Among the Elite
It takes skill and dedication to become a grandmaster, but how much? Is it necessary to live and breathe chess?
[...]
Then there is Robert Hess, 17. He is an international master, the level below grandmaster, and is a junior at Stuyvesant High School in Manhattan. Last year, at the Foxwoods Open in Connecticut, he earned the first of three norms necessary to become a grandmaster.
Then he went back to school.
Since then, he has competed sporadically, at least by the standards of an elite player, balancing grandmaster dreams with the requirements of an academically rigorous high school. He is taking seven courses, including Advanced Placement classes in history and French.
10 years out of school, and yet there are still kids who can make me feel bad for being an underachiever. :p |
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| [SHSAA] Annual General Meeting of the Stuyvesant High School Alumni Association |
[Mar. 18th, 2009|02:52 pm] |
Re-post from the original e-mail. Bold was inserted for emphasis on important details.
Dear Fellow Alum,
Please join us this Sunday, March 22, 2009 at the Annual General Meeting of the Stuyvesant High School Alumni Association from 11:30 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. It will be held at Stuyvesant High School, 345 Chambers Street, New York, NY 10282 in the Murray Kahn Theater.
It is a day for catching up with old classmates, meeting other Stuyvesant Alumni, checking out the School facilities and learning more about your school's Alumni Association.
AGENDA
11:30 am to 12:30 pm Brunch
12:30 pm to 1:30 pm General Meeting-includes election of Directors to the Board, update by President, Bob Sherwood '68 on the activities and growth of the association and the organization's financial statement prepared by Dan Zica '93, Treasurer.
We are pleased to include a State of the School Address by Jennifer Suri, Stuyvesant High School Assistant Principal of Social Studies. Prior to starting work at Stuyvesant Ms. Suri taught at Marymount School, Sheepshead Bay High School and Bronx High School of Science. During her 13 years of teaching she has taught Advanced Placement European History and Advanced Placement Psychology.
As an added bonus we will be treated to a PowerPoint presentation by Stuyvesant Senior Valentina Zarya on her Intel Research project-Trauma of Socialism: Voting Behavior of Russian-Jewish Immigrants in New York City.
1:30 pm to 2:30 pm Refreshments, Building Tours, demonstrations by the award-winning Stuyvesant Robotics Team
Special Note: the Stuyvesant School Store will be open all day for the purchase of school merchandise. (T-shirts, sweats, mugs, etc.)
All Stuyvesant Alumni are invited and asked to attend. Simply come to the school this Sunday, no fee required although donations are welcomed and SHSAA members are asked to pay their dues to keep them current.
Looking forward to seeing you Sunday. |
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| ava hecht (stuy '09) died on thursday. |
[Jan. 10th, 2009|03:42 am] |
there are too many of these kinds of posts here. rest in peace.
Daily News: Queens teen found dead in her home
A Stuyvesant High School senior was found dead by her mother in their Queens home on Thursday, police said.
Ava Hecht, 17, was found facedown on the floor of her bedroom by her mother, Karen Gang, in the afternoon, according to a police report.
Gang, who called 911, told police that her daughter had recently been treated for laryngitis.
Hecht was rushed by ambulance from her Bayside home to Flushing Hospital, where according to police, she was pronounced dead.
"All we know is that she was sick over the weekend," said Department of Education spokeswoman Marge Feinberg. "The school is trying to find out as much as possible."
A message posted on the school's Web site on Friday read, "Ava was an active and beloved member of the Stuyvesant community and we will all feel her loss deeply."
At a morning assembly yesterday, Stuyvesant Principal Stanley Teitel announced that Hecht had passed away, leaving some students in tears.
A message from the school's Parent Association posted to a LISTSERV for parents assured them that the principal was doing everything necessary and asked them not to speculate about the cause of death.
A funeral is expected to be held Sunday. The results of an autopsy by the city medical examiner, scheduled for Friday, were not immediately available. |
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| (no subject) |
[Dec. 22nd, 2008|05:57 pm] |
Hello Friends,
If you haven't already, please support your local nyc high school organizers in their survey on bias-based harassment in public schools. Please forward to your peers and any youth you may know:
http://www.sikhcoalition.org/youthsurvey.asp
There's actually some Stuy kids working on and with this effort!
Peace + Happy Holidays
Nafisa |
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| High... Heights... Holder... Hmm. |
[Dec. 1st, 2008|05:41 pm] |
The New York Times has more about [Attorney General nominee] Eric Holder's time at Stuyvesant:
His high score on a grueling city test earned him a seat at Stuyvesant High School, where the prom was sometimes canceled because of a lack of interest and students had a penchant for reciting class rankings (Mr. Holder graduated 363rd in a class of 721 boys).
[...]
At Stuyvesant, whose students were primarily white and Jewish, Mr. Holder said his first year was one of the most difficult periods of his life, as he adjusted to a hefty workload and an hour-and-a-half commute. When the stress of taking biology and chemistry at the same time grew overwhelming, he turned to his mother for advice. She told him to stick it out, he said.
[...]
At Stuyvesant, Eric joined the Afro-American Society and became co-captain of the basketball team, the Peglegs, helping to lead his peers to 2 wins and 12 losses. “When you’re on a team that doesn’t win very much, you can either get angry at teammates or bond,” said Paul Grayson, a former Pegleg who is now a Manhattan accountant. “He bonded.”
Mr. Holder’s years at Stuyvesant progressed as opposition to the Vietnam War escalated, but though he opposed the war, he did not actively protest it. |
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| Reunion! |
[Dec. 1st, 2008|11:56 am] |
So who went to the Class of '98 reunion on Saturday? Did you enjoy yourself? Did you at least think it was better than the 5 Year Reunion (if you went)?
I enjoyed myself. Even though it was a bit pricey, the venue was nice and the food was good. However, we had the same problem with the open bar being too close to the door so there was massive crowding in the front (and it blocked off the bathrooms). They ended the open bar at around 10pm, and then the restaurant started kicking people out at 11pm because they had another event to set up for... except because of a massively slow coat check line, the inside wasn't clear until almost midnight, and everyone lingered outside for even longer.
I was the dork who brought a yearbook with me... I was the only dork who brought a yearbook, so many were grateful (especially as they used it to look up old pictures of people). A suggestion for future reunions would be to print out yearbook pictures of everyone and stick 'em on their name tags. Also, to not run out of name tags.
Saw a few familiar faces, and turnout was pretty good, but it's a bummer when people don't show up. I know a few people who don't go to reunions because "no one I know will be there" or "there's no one I want to see." Well then, they're missing the point. Reunions are for seeing the people you didn't give a crap about until you recognize them across the room and suddenly you remember sitting next to them in Government or hitting them across the shins with a hockey stick in gym class (or maybe that's just me).
So don't get mad when everyone thinks you've joined the Merchant Marine and changed your name to "Boris." I had to tell them something...
( And now, selected pictures! ) |
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| Ten Years |
[Nov. 21st, 2008|06:23 pm] |
I guess I'm going to my 10 Year Reunion (Class of '98). Are you?
Today's the last day to register at the price of $85 (!). From here on tickets will be $100 (!!!). The '98 reunion is a week from tomorrow. |
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| Guess it's that time again |
[Nov. 7th, 2008|10:16 pm] |
NYT article, telling us nothing we don't already know: Racial Imbalance Persists at Elite Public Schools
"The disparities were the worst at Stuyvesant, where 2 percent of blacks, 3 percent of Hispanics, 24 percent of whites and 72 percent of Asians [who took the exam] were accepted."
Other interesting numbers that pop up are that at this point, Stuy is "more than two thirds Asian", and that even after sitting through the Specialized High Schools Institute (for those who don't know, summer tutoring and then additional help, with the goal of increasing under-represented student populations in the specialized high school), Hispanic and black students are far less likely to actually *take* the test.
The paper by Joshua Feinman (Stuy '80) the article cites is 'High Stakes, but Low Validity? A Case Study of Standardized Tests and Admissions into New York City Specialized High Schools' - available here. He finds significant issues with the test as an instrument, in particular, because it fails to predict how well an admitted student will actually do in a specialized high school.
While I definitely respect his analysis, I find the underlying assumption somewhat off-base: I've always thought the test is supposed to be first and foremost a reward for how good you were up to eighth grade and a way to get out of your zoned school, and that it really was the test that *let* Stuy allow people to get away with just doing whatever they felt like it. Sort of a, 'you all are clearly smart liek whoa, so if this kid will obviously get into Harvard, this one is going to make a billion working for a software company, this one is totally fine with SUNY Binghampton, and this other one is a pothead but knows more about existentialism than most of everyone else, who are we to get on their case...' |
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| Paul Levitz |
[Oct. 21st, 2008|08:17 pm] |
Paul Levitz '73, President of DC Comics, name-dropped Stuy in his latest post at Blog@Newsarama:
My only affectation is a leaning towards wearing ties of our characters, or similar such visual theme pieces (e.g., a NYC subway map tie for events for my old high school, Stuyvesant, to which nearly all of us commuted by train).
Hrm. |
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| NYT review of "Frontrunners" |
[Oct. 16th, 2008|01:17 pm] |
Running for Office, With Class
By STEPHEN HOLDEN
Published: October 15, 2008
If the teenage candidates running for president of the student union at Stuyvesant High School in New York City are bellwethers signaling a change in the tone of American political discourse decades hence, the mudslinging of today’s presidential campaign may someday be a thing of the past. Hints of gentler times ahead run through Caroline Suh’s mild-mannered documentary “Frontrunners,” which follows four slates of fresh-faced contenders in a recent school election.
[...]
To its credit, “Frontrunners” doesn’t strive to generate more suspense than the situation merits, which isn’t much. Nor do the petty, trumped-up school causes that George embraces seem to matter to the students who appear contented with the status quo. The passions that are running high in this year’s national presidential campaign are nowhere to be felt at Stuyvesant, where the most pressing problem facing seniors is being accepted into an Ivy League college.
The movie would have been much richer had it explored the candidates’ family backgrounds, but interviews with the front-runners’ parents are too cursory to provide much insight. Instead the film wastes precious time showing the candidates smiling and handing out fliers in school hallways.
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| [SHSAA] Movie Premiere of "Frontrunners" and Fall Bar Night |
[Oct. 3rd, 2008|03:30 pm] |
Sacrificing my inbox to SHSAA mailings so you don't have to.
The Stuyvesant Alumni Association is pleased to invite you to:
Movie Premiere of "Frontrunners" and Fall Bar Night
Please join us for one of two showings of the New York premiere of "Frontrunners" on Wednesday, October 15th, a documentary about the competitive 2006 Stuyvesant High School Student Union Presidential Elections. Its release is timely as it parallels our nation's turbulent election period. We will be coupling this event with Fall Bar Night, complete with great discounted specials, at Steak Frites.
Date: Wednesday, October 15th, 2008
Location: Film Forum
209 West Houston Street (between 6th and 7th Aves.)
New York, NY 10014
Movie time choices: 6:15PM or 8:15PM,
Cost: $20 per person
What's included: Movie admission, Private Q&A / Meet the Director, Caroline Suh and Producer, Erika Frankel.
How to get your tickets: Go to www.shsaa.org and purchase your tickets on-line.
Please join us for a drink at Steak Frites. It's cash bar but with great food and drink specials.
Steak Frites
225 Varick St.
New York, NY 10014
212-463-7101
Time: 5:30PM - 10:30PM
Drink Specials:
Red/white wines $5/glass
Beer (Stella, Bud Light, American Ale) $3
Call liquor (house brands) $6
Other specials:
Stella, Burger and Fries $9.95
Stella and 6 Oysters on the half shell $7.95
Directions from Film Forum to Steak Frites: Exit the Film Forum and go left (west) to Varick Street (less than a block). Make a right onto Varick and go north (against traffic). Steak Frites is one block north on the west side of the street.
*We encourage you to buy your tickets early as there is limited seating available and we expect the event to sell out.
For questions please contact Paul Kim,'94 at Paul_Kim@ml.com or cell at 917-747-3945.
FRONTRUNNERS is a smart and funny political documentary that follows the
student council presidential campaign at one of the country's most
prestigious public high schools: Stuyvesant High School in New York City.
An entertaining and symbolic campaign film, put forth in classic verité style, we follow four charming and idiosyncratic candidates as they navigate an electoral process that is said to be one of the most competitive at the high school level. These teenaged candidates face the same issues as candidates of any age, such as picking the 'right' running mate, shaking as many hands as possible, preparing for televised debates, impressing the pundits and journalistic community, addressing sensitive race-related issues, and mobilizing an apathetic voter base.
A microcosm of the U.S. Presidential elections, Caroline Suh's film shows politicking and pluralities through the lens of the adolescent experience.
"It's the hardest race I ever fought."
-Dick Morris, Stuyvesant class of '64
Campaign manager of Bill Clinton's successful 1996 Presidential re-election.
LINKS:
Website: www.frontrunnersthefilm.com
Trailer on YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nweYQrJJElY
Facebook Group: FRONTRUNNERS |
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| NYT on Frontrunners |
[Oct. 3rd, 2008|01:06 pm] |
Today's New York Times Metro section covers Frontrunners:
The day after the big debate, the editor of an influential newspaper shared his conclusions with his staff. He acknowledged the broad appeal of the female candidate, who had confidence and charm to spare, but concluded that for someone with so little experience to have that much responsibility, “It’s not enough.”
The candidates had been waiting to hear which of them would be endorsed by the editorial board of The Spectator, the Stuyvesant High School newspaper. They all had a lot riding on that endorsement, which could sway the 2006 race for president of the Stuyvesant Student Union. Now the subject of a documentary film, “Frontrunners,” which opens at the Film Forum on Oct. 15, that campaign at Stuyvesant, the famously competitive New York public high school, turned out to foreshadow, in ways uncanny and comic, many of the issues now playing themselves out on various political stages.
Read the rest here. |
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