By Roland Allen, Director of College Counseling
More than 400 students and parents from the Class of 2013 joined St. Margaret’s college counseling department last Sunday to receive tips and insights into the college application process. The Fifth Annual Coastline Case Studies program concluded with a college fair that allowed students and their parents to speak informally with college admissions representatives from 85 universities and colleges around the country. The event was held in cooperation with Sage Hill School and Tarbut v’Torah. In addition, 10 students from the Tiger Woods Learning …

By Karen Poffenberger, Upper School Visual Arts Teacher
In early April, 27 St. Margaret’s students from studio art classes in the Upper School embarked upon a creative process to design imagery that would adorn various styles of Vans footwear. After registering for the Vans Custom Culture art program competition, Vans sent St. Margaret’s four pairs of shoes – one high top, two lace ups and one pair of slip ons. Each shoe was to represent one of four themes: action sports, music, art or local flavor. The shoes were to have …

By Joe Ingalls, Upper School Chemistry and Physics Teacher and JETS Team Advisor
St. Margaret’s had a group of students rise early on the morning of Saturday, March 3 to travel to the University of Southern California. For the first time in seven years, 14 St. Margaret’s students attended the TEAMS Competition, formally known as JETS (Junior Engineering Technical Society). This allowed the school to have an A and B Team.
TEAMS (Tests of Engineering Aptitude, Mathematics and Science) is a nationwide annual high school competition that challenges students to work collaboratively as …

By Rocky Parker, Upper School History Teacher and MUN Advisor
This past weekend the Model United Nations took a short trip to New York City to attend the 13th Annual Seton Hall University Model UN Conference. Led by the club’s Secretary General Raffi Saposhnik and Secretariat, the club performed superbly at the two-day conference.
Unlike most California conferences, Seton Hall was organized into Advance, Intermediate and Novice Committees with St. Margaret’s Episcopal School choosing to participate only in the first two. The Tartans did a wonderful job and earned four individual …

By Ashley Eichenauer, Grade 11
On April 14, members of the St. Margaret’s Episcopal School and San Juan Capistrano community gathered together to support The Ecology Center in its Earth Day celebration. The Ecology Center is a relatively new operation founded by Evan Marks, an Orange County native and environmental activist. The center aims to educate the San Juan Capistrano community, and the communities surrounding it, about incorporating sustainability into everyday life. The Earth Day celebration is the annual realization of everything that The Ecology Center values and strives for.
Members of …

Artwork from nine St. Margaret’s students will be on display at the upcoming Huntington Beach Art Center Photography and Multi-Media Show. Artwork from two of the nine students will also be displayed in the Junior Art Exhibit this summer at The Festival of Arts of Laguna Beach.
Students entered their work in Imagination Celebration, an annual county-wide art festival celebrating creativity for all children and their families. The art festival is sponsored by Arts Orange County and the Orange County Department of Education. Student artwork was juried by artists and educators.
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By Dr. Scott Nelson, Upper School History Teacher
Introduced by senior Monika Laird, former U.S. Ambassador to Sierra Leone Thomas Hull gave a highly informative and engaging lecture last Thursday to Upper School students about the background of African conflict. This context is needed, he explained, to fully grasp why so many African countries face internal divisions, tribal strife, and, in many cases, civil war.
Ambassador Hull spent 22 years in Africa as a diplomat and Peace Corps teacher. He served as Ambassador to Sierra Leone and was Africa director at the …

By Najet Fazai, Grade 12
Dirty Rotten Scoundrels all began back in January at auditions. Sitting nervously among my peers, Mr. Wheeler, our director, gave us an overview of his concept for the show as I awaited the start of my last high school audition. Throughout the week, several Upper School students earnestly shared their talent with Mr. Wheeler, Vocal Director Mrs. Miles, Assistant Vocal Director Mrs. Porrazzo, and Choreographer Mrs. Mehling. Palpable excitement radiated through campus as the student body buzzed about each possible casting result. As Saturday dawned, I …

By Michele Silverman, Production Manager for the Arts
Students in Lower, Middle and Upper School gathered in Pasternack Field House last Friday for an instrumental music concert by the eight-member Hutchins Consort.
The Hutchins Consort played on eight scaled violins of a violin octet designed and built by Dr. Carleen Hutchins. With instruments ranging from the tiny treble violin, tuned one octave above the standard violin, to the gigantic large bass violin, tuned one octave lower than a cello, the Hutchins Consort produced an astonishing pallet of sounds.
Click here for photo gallery.
The …

By Maggie Griffiths, Assistant Director of Breakthrough San Juan Capistrano
After an extensive selection process, 19 high-performing high school and college students have been chosen as Breakthrough San Juan Capistrano’s teacher interns for summer 2012.
Now entering its seventh summer, Breakthrough San Juan Capistrano provides an academically intense summer program for highly-motivated, underserved students from San Juan Capistrano. The program’s mission also seeks to inspire the next generation of teachers through its “students teaching students” model: All of the teachers in BTSJC’s summer program are high-performing high school and college students from …