8th Grade Swimmer Jack Murray Takes Home 2 Awards at State Competition

This past weekend, the Symphony Band played at MSBOA Band and Orchestra Festival and got straight 1 (superior) ratings from all 3 judges in performance, and a 2 (excellent) rating in sight-reading. That means a strong 1 rating overall.

Ferndale Director of Bands Elon Jamison reported, "The auditorium chairperson was blown away...Lots of directors have said things about the consequences of COVID about their performances today, but he said that it didn't sound like Covid had impacted us at all." Mr. Jamison praised the students for their hardwork since September that earned this high score. "I am SO proud of them. They've shown up every day and gotten better. I would say they've probably exhibited at least a year and a half of growth, in only 6+ months."

In addition, Wind Ensemble performed today (March 17th) at the Great Lakes Concert Band Festival at Easter Michigan University. This event is a non-rated, non-competitive festival affiliated with Bands of America, the national concert and marching band organization. It featured twelve high school bands from around the state (as far as as Manistee and Traverse City), as well as a performance by the EMU Wind Symphony.

Wind Ensemble performed a challenging 25-minute program, and did a phenomenal job. Performing groups were assigned a clinician after each performance, and Ferndale was fortunate to work with Dr. Stephen G. Peterson—recently retired Director of Bands at University of Illinois. While he gave them plenty to work on, he also had high praise for their musicianship and achievement. "When he was told that Ferndale HS has a student enrollment of less than 700, he was floored with what they played and how they played it! He assumed we were a large suburban school of 1500 students or more," Mr. Jamison said.

We are all so proud of our Golden Eagles and cannot wait to hear their beautiful sounds once again. The next performance of Symphony Band and Wind Ensemble will be on Wednesday, May 3, at 7:30 pm in the FHS Auditorium.

Congratulations to the FUEL 5th graders for competing in our fifth annual 5th Grade Spelling Bee this past week!

 Our winner this year was Finnegan Downing from Mrs. Lepp's homeroom!  Finn will compete at the Oakland County Regional Championship on Saturday, March 3rd at Oakland University along with students from across the county in grades 5-8!

Great job to all of our 5th grade competitors, including Aiden Bander, Leonard Graves, Zachary Rood, Desmond Koehler, and runner-up Apollo Newman!! We are so proud of all of you!

Middle school student also competed in a Spelling Bee this week, and the winners are:

Winner—Jan Hartzer  (8th grade)
Runner up—Koncel Platt (6th grade)

Excellent performances were given by all competitors.

Mr. Peace brought his unique style of energy, fun and emotional impact to student assemblies this week at Ferndale Middle School and Ferndale High School. Thanks to Mr. Peace for sharing your message of healing and hope with our students.

Tuesday night, Ferndale Schools 5th-12th grade orchestra students took the stage with electrical violinist Mark Wood, Emmy-award winning composer and founding member of the Trans Siberian Orchestra. The crowd went wild for their contemporary music performance. as you can see in this video shared by parent Tanya Kempf on facebook.

Purdue University is offering a FREE Kids STEM Degree. Students click to watch 10 videos (3-5 minutes) for each level and complete a quiz (Google Form) at the end of each video where they will earn a code. Collect 10 codes and be eligible to earn a ‘degree’ from Purdue Science. This program can be completed individually by students, or together as a class. Topics include Phases of the moon, barcodes, gene therapy, soil erosion, and more!