Mountain Views News          Saturday, October 27, 2012

8

EDUCATION & YOUTH

 Mountain Views News Saturday, October 27, 2012 


SCHOOL DIRECTORY

ALVERNO 
HIGH SCHOOL 
CELEBRATES 
FOUNDER’S DAY 

Students celebrate Alverno’s 
founding with Mass and 
special workshops

Sierra Madre, CA – Alverno High School 
students recently celebrated the founding 
of Alverno High School on the feast day of 
their founding order. Originally founded 
by the Sisters of St. Francis in 1960, 
Alverno celebrated Founder’s Day with 
a liturgy and workshops focused on the 
school year theme of “Mind, Body, Spirit.” 

Students started off the morning with an 
assembly featuring performance poet, 
Azure Antoinette of STUDIO: alchemy, 
who spoke about the impact of social 
media on our world. During the assembly 
Azure asked students to recount what the 
top trending social media topics were in 
the early months of 2012. She then helped 
the students to understand the connection 
between their social media posts and the 
prominence of stories in the media. 

Following the assembly, students returned 
to their classrooms where they discussed 
St. Clare and the firsts in their lives. In 
November, Alverno will be working with 
She’s the First to help fund girls’ education 
in the developing world through several 
cupcake sales. Tying in that relationship, 
students discussed how they were the first 
in their families to compete in the Junior 
Olympics, first to attend an all-girls school, 
and how some will be the first to attend 
college. 

Keeping the school year theme of “Mind, 
Body, Spirit” in mind, students were then 
given the opportunity to attend various 
workshops on campus. Workshops themes 
included the importance of laughter, packing 
a healthy lunch, tai chi, yoga, hobbies and 
toys, and so much more. Alverno students 
were fortunate to enjoy four workshops 
with special guest presenters. 

Josie Loren, of ABC Family’s Make It or 
Break It, conducted a workshop called 
“Spreading Kindness with Letters” where 
she introduced students to her non-profit, 
Rainy Day Notes. The concept behind Rainy 
Day Notes is to write notes of kindness that 
are then distributed to people all around 
New York City. 

The workshop Think Like A Champion was 
run by teen life coach, Jessica Berger. As 
a certified Teen Wisdom life coach, Jess 
works with teen girls and young women 
to navigate through the trials, tribulations, 
and transitions of adolescence and early 
adulthood. During the workshop, Jess 
helped Alverno students to create an action 
plan to help them bridge the gap between 
where the girls are today and where they 
want to be in the future. 

Azure Antoinette and Alverno English 
teacher, Carla Tomaso, oversaw a workshop 
called The Power of Writing that allowed the 
girls to learn the importance of writing and 
the impact it can have. Going along with the 
theme of “She’s the First,” the students were 
given a writing prompt that asked them to 
consider what they wanted others to know 
about them and how that impacts who they 
are as individuals. 

The final guest speaker was Gabrielle 
Thomas of My Beauty. Gabrielle spoke to the 
girls about the importance of inner beauty 
and the special qualities that make up each 
girl but also talked about the importance 
of women’s health and taking care of our 
bodies. The girls had the opportunity to 
make a homemade body scrub and discuss 
what they felt made them beautiful and 
unique. 

The day ended with a liturgy that celebrated 
the legacy of Alverno’s Franciscan and 
Immaculate Heart roots. Individual girls 
shared their experience as “firsts” in their 
lives and talked about how Alverno has 
helped them to have even more firsts than 
they ever dreamed of. 

“Alverno is fortunate to have such strong 
values in our school history,” said Ann 
Gillick, Head of School. “Each year on 
Founder’s Day we not only celebrate these 
roots, but also look forward to the future 
and the gifts that each of our students bring 
to our campus community. This year we 
paid special tribute to St. Clare and asked 
our students, ‘What were you the first to do?’ 
Many of them shared tremendous stories 
and accomplishments that demonstrate the 
many ways Alverno empowers each young 
woman to be exactly the person she wants 
to be.” 

About Alverno High School

Alverno High School is a Catholic, private, college 
preparatory school for young women dedicated to 
preparing them to function in a society as informed, 
knowledgeable persons, who have the requisite skills to 
make and implement mature decisions about complex 
problems. For more information about Alverno High 
School, please call 626-355-3463 or visit www.alverno-
hs.org. 

Alverno High School

200 N. Michillinda Sierra Madre, Ca. 91024

(626) 355-3463 Head of School: Ann M. Gillick 

E-mail address: agillick@alverno-hs.org

Arcadia High School

180 Campus Drive Arcadia, CA 91007

Phone: (626) 821-8370, Principal: David L. Vannasdall

Arroyo Pacific Academy

41 W. Santa Clara St. Arcadia, Ca, 

(626) 294-0661 Principal: Phil Clarke

E-mail address: pclarke@arroyopacific.org

Barnhart School

240 W. Colorado Blvd Arcadia, Ca. 91007

(626) 446-5588 Head of School: Joanne Testa Cross

Kindergarten - 8th grade

website: www.barnhartschool.com 

Bethany Christian School

93 N. Baldwin Ave. Sierra Madre, Ca. 91024

(626) 355-3527 Principal: James Lugenbuehl

E-mail address: jml@bcslions.org

Foothill Oaks Academy

822 Bradbourne Ave., Duarte, CA 91010

(626) 301-9809 

info@foothilloaksacademy.org 

preschool@foothilloaksacademy.org

The Gooden School

192 N. Baldwin Ave. Sierra Madre, Ca. 91024

(626) 355-2410 Head of School: Patty Patano

website: www.goodenschool.org

High Point Academy

1720 Kinneloa Canyon Road

Pasadena, Ca. 91107 626-798-8989

website: www.highpointacademy.org

LaSalle High School

3880 E. Sierra Madre Blvd. Pasadena, Ca. 

(626) 351-8951 

website: www.lasallehs.org

Monrovia High School

325 East Huntington Drive, Monrovia, CA 91016 

(626) 471-2000, 

Email: schools@monrovia.k12.ca.us

Norma Coombs Alternative School

2600 Paloma St. Pasadena, Ca. 91107

(626) 798-0759 Principal: Dr. Vanessa Watkins 

E-mail address: watkins12@pusd.us

Odyssey Charter School

725 W. Altadena Dr. Altadena, Ca. 91001

(626) 229-0993 Head of School: Lauren O’Neill

website: www.odysseycharterschool.org

Pasadena High School

2925 E. Sierra Madre Blvd. Pasadena, Ca. 

(626) 798-8901 Principal: Dr. Derick Evans

website: www.pasadenahigh.org

Pasadena Unified School District

351 S. Hudson Ave. Pasadena, Ca. 91109

(626) 795-6981 website: www.pusd@pusd.us

St. Rita Catholic School

322 N. Baldwin Ave. Sierra Madre, Ca. 91024

(626) 355-9028 website: www.st-rita.org

Sierra Madre Elementary School

141 W. Highland Ave, Sierra Madre, Ca. 91024

(626) 355-1428 Principal: Gayle Bluemel

E-mail address:gbluemel220@pusd.us

Sierra Madre Middle School 

160 N. Canon Sierra Madre, Ca. 91024

(626) 836-2947 Principal: Gayle Bluemel

Contact person: Garrett Newsom, Asst. Principal

E-mail address: gbluemel220@pusd.us

Walden School

74 S San Gabriel Blvd

Pasadena, CA 91107 (626) 792-6166 

www.waldenschool.net

Weizmann Day School

1434 N. Altadena Dr. Pasadena, Ca. 91107

(626) 797-0204

Lisa Feldman: Head of School

Wilson Middle School

300 S. Madre St. Pasadena, Ca. 91107

(626) 449-7390 Principal: Ruth Esseln

E-mail address: resseln@pusd.us

Pasadena Unified School District

351 S. Hudson Ave., Pasadena, Ca. 91109

(626) 795-6981 Website: www.pusd@pusd.us

Ciara Madigan, Alexxa Vasquez, Alexis Winstanley, Cameron Martinez, Leslie 
Jovel, Arianna Nava, and Isabella Dominguez

CONGRATULATIONS TO PASADENA HIGH SCHOOL ALUMNI TORI TRIPOLI

Tori Tripoli, Pasadena High 
School Class of 2011, graduated 
on September 20, 2012, from the 
United States Navy Air Rescue 
School in Pensacola, Florida. 

She is only the 50th woman in 
the history of the United States 
Navy to graduate as an Air Rescue 
Swimmer and during her 
training she set a new swim record. 
Go Tori!

While at Pasadena High School, 
Tori was a valued member of 
the Girls Water Polo and Swim 
Teams earning CIF Water Polo 
1st Team honors as well as being 
a CIF swimmer.

The motto of the Aviation Rescue 
Swimmer (AIRR) community is 
"So Others May Live". Aviation 
Rescue Swimmers are experts 
in emergency response - doing 
whatever it takes to complete rescue 
missions and save lives.

Congratulations Tori - we 
are so very proud of your 
accomplishments!!!!


THE REEL DEAL: by Ben Show

Movie Reviews Especially for Teens & ‘Tweens

ALEX CROSS

Pasadena High School Alumni Tori Tripoli graduates from the US Navy Air Rescue School

 With a very 
derivative plot, yet 
a great cast, Alex 
Cross is a flop. The 
good acting does 
not balance out 
the badly paced, 
dawdling plot, 
which takes time 
out from the story 
to try and fill the 
holes with badly 
written emotional 
scenes.

 Alex Cross (Tyler 
Perry) is on top of 
his police job and 
is debating over whether or not to take an F.B.I promotion when a serial killer, Picasso 
(Matthew Fox) kills his first target: an extremely rich aristocrat. Now, Alex has to unravel the 
tightly wound mystery of who Picasso is, why he is doing this, and more importantly, who 
he is working for.

 While the idea is interesting enough, it feels like any other police/serial killer movie 
I’ve seen. However, Tyler Perry’s performance as Alex Cross is this movie’s saving grace; he 
actually kept me from walking out of the theater. Matthew Fox was perfect for the part of 
the insane, moral-less serial killer. Both he and Tyler Perry made this terrible movie worth 
seeing. 

WARNING: This movie has extreme violence and little kids should not see this. This 
should be rated R.


YOUNG ARTISTS NATHAN AND TIMOTHY LE HONORED


Betty J. Ford, Scholarship Chair with Nathan Le, Cellist and his brother Timothy Le, violinist 
proudly display honors bestowed on them by Assemblyman Anthony Portantino.

Photo courtesy Phil Madden Studio

Well known young musicians, 
Timothy and Nathan Le were 
presented in concert by the 
George R. Garner branch of the 
National Association of Negro 
Musicians, Inc. (NANM). The 
brothers performed a duet that 
brough the audience to their 
feet with a rousing applause that 
lasted almost a full minute.

 The brothers have performed 
in Vienna, Russia and Carnegie 
Hall and have won numerous 
competitions. They both currently 
play with several youth 
orchestras.

 The event, which was held at 
the Altadena Library, also included 
bestowing Nathan and 
Timothy proclamations from 
the State Assembly and a stipend 
from NANM.

 For more information about 
NANM, contact Betty H. Ford 
at 626-806-6802.