Page 16 - Reedley Exponent 2-22-18 E-edition

The Reedley Exponent B8 Thursday, February 22, 2018 RHS FCCLA
Photo Contributed
Four members of the Reedley High School chapter of Family, Career and Community Leaders of America earned honors at the Feb. 3 Region Eight Competitive Recognition Event. They are pictured here with Lisa Bueno (center), RHS teacher and FCCLA chapter adviser. The students are (from left) Luis Santos, Nancy Sainz, Liliahna Bedolla and Zuheidi Del Rio.
RHS MUSIC
Continued from page B1
So Dewhirst tried the flute, “and that was the mag- ical moment.” Her teacher was local legendary teacher Burl Walter Jr., who for 35 years was Reedley High’s band director and music de- partment chairman until his retirement at the end of the 1999-2000 academic year. He passed away in December 2016.
Dewhirst attended KCUSD schools, such as then-Grant Junior High and RHS. She earned her bache- lor of arts degree in flute per- formance from Fresno State. She has taught in other com- munities, while her husband, Erik Dewhirst, was serving in the U.S. Marines.
Erik left the military in 2013. The couple, who have four children, eventu- ally moved back to Reedley, where Erik also has family.
Dewhirst returned to RHS for a second time in 2016 to be a band director. Erik now teaches music in the Clovis Unified School District.
Awbrey, 32, started play- ing trumpet in sixth grade at Great Western Elementary School and changed to bari- tone at Navelencia Middle School. When he got to RHS, he wanted to play percussion. “I like them. I like to rock and roll,” he said.
In fact, he took private drum lessons from Dobbins.
But Awbrey was told he couldn’t switch instruments because he had never played drums in school, “so I was sad,” he said as Dewhirst and McGraw smiled and laughed. Awbrey said he had to enroll to learn the instrument, and Walter – who was a percus- sionist – taught him.
He earned his bachelor of arts degree in music educa- tion at Fresno State. Before Reedley High, he taught mu- sic in the Kingsburg Elemen- tary Charter School District.
McGraw, 42, is from Southern California. He started in music in the fifth grade, learning the flute. By the eighth grade, he started studying the oboe on his own.
By the time he entered La Puente High School, he played flute. But, by 10th grade, “I just went crazy and learned all the wind instru- ments,” he said, with a smile.
He attended Citrus Col- lege and earned a bachelor’s degree from California State University, Long Beach in music in performance and education. His past music work experience includes be- ing a band director at Bloom- ington High School in the Colton Joint Unified School District.
McGraw said music “anchored” him through his school years. He not only per- formed but became familiar with other aspects of the pro- gram, such as management and fundraising and meet- ing the program’s booster parents. “I connected with the community because they were supporting the school,” he said. “It was connecting and socializing and everyone working toward a similar goal.”
And, McGraw said, “for me, talking to people, I’m more reserved, shy. With music, I start opening up and communicating in a different way.”
Dewhirst said music was just what she did growing up: “I have worked other jobs, but this is really the only thing that my heart is in it.”
Even when it gets hard, it doesn’t shake her commit- ment. “You know how much it means to the students, and you feel like you’re making an impact,” Dewhirst said.
And, she said, “I really push the whole ‘You are a part of this band. This is something that you’re doing, and it’s important.’”
Awbrey quipped that in high school he wanted to be a rock star. But teaching music was a calling, too.
“I enjoy it, and I enjoy the sense of community, es- pecially this gig, being at Reedley,” he said. “That’s all I remember from high school is the band and having a lot of fun doing it. Now, I get to come back to high school and have fun with it again.”
McGraw said he had worked different jobs be- fore pursing a music teach-
ing career. Teaching, he said, is challenging and it pushes him: “I want to push back and be constructive with it.”
McGraw is a true trans- plant, with no previous ties to Reedley. He said it’s a bit slower pace compared to the intensity of life in Los Ange- les, where it’s every band di- rector for himself or herself. His first year in Reedley, he said, has been a time of set- tling in and getting to know the students and the commu- nity.
Dewhirst and Awbrey ac- tually had worked together before at RHS. In 2004, Aw- brey was the drum tech while attending Fresno State. Both are well versed in the tra- dition of the Reedley High School music program and its Pirate marching band – and the responsibility of main- taining that tradition and car- rying it forward.
“I like that aspect of it. I try to honor that tradition,” Awbrey said, adding “I love the kick steps.”
“I do, too. I’ve alway loved that,” Dewhirst said.
The program also is dis- tinguished by how music is taught in KCUSD. Each band director teaches music at a middle school or campus that has grades up to eighth grade. They say that is an unusual setup in school dis- tricts.
“We see them from when we taught them how to first hold the trombone to when they graduate from high school,” Dewhirst said. “So that family sense is really through most of their educa- tional career.”
Research has shown that music education, with its dis- cipline and creativity, can bolster early development in youngsters to excel in aca- demic areas.
“We have some very, very talented kids,” Dewhirst said. “I think our role as edu- cators is to motivate them to work harder, to practice. Our biggest challenge is getting them to really take advan- tage of the talent they have. They’re great, great kids.”
And, she said, music is a joy: “A lot of it just boils down to music is fun. It’s fun.”
Contributed
The Reedley High School chapter of Family, Career, and Community Leaders of America recently attended the Region Eight Competitive Recognition Event.
The event, held Feb. 3 at Orange Cove High School, served as a qualifier for state competition. This year’s FC- CLA State Leadership Confer- ence will be held April 28-May 1 in Fresno.
At the Feb. 3 event, FC-
CLA members were judged on their portfolio, display board, oral presentation, and a ques- tion-and-answer session.
RHS freshman Liliahna Bedolla earned first place in Illustrated Talk. Her topic was “The Dangers of Teen’s Drink- ing and Driving.”
Zuheidi Del Rio, another RHS freshman, placed first in Nutrition and Wellness.
Sophomore Nancy Sainz earned first place in Life Event Planning.
And, freshman Luis San-
tos placed second in Illustrat- ed Talk, with his topic “Family and Relationship Violence.”
Lisa Bueno, Reedley High teacher and FCCLA chapter adviser, will take the students to the State Leadership Con- ference. She said the students are looking forward to the conference and competing in its events.
They hope they can qual- ify for the “Inspired by FC- CLA!” National Conference June 28-July 2 in Atlanta, Ga.
St. La Salle and missions
RIGHT: Fourth- grade student Priscilla Torres
made this model of Mission San Antonio de Padua. It was the third mission of the 21 founded missions and is in Monterey County.
FSU receives $1 million math grant
Fourth-graders at St. La Salle Catholic School each year study the California missions.
LEFT: James Lara is pictured with his model of Mission San Carlos Bor- romeo de Rio Carmelo, the second of the 21 missions founded. It's also known as Mission Carmel, in Carmel-by- the-Sea.
Another photo is on B1.
Photos by Felicia Cousart Matlosz / The Exponent
File Photo / The Exponent
A tradition for the Reedley High school marching band directors is to play holiday songs downtown and at other locations before the Kings Canyon Unified School District campuses go on their winter break in December. Pictured here (from left) are Daniel Paulsen, Jason Awbrey, Sam Gipson, Lisa De- whirst and Michael McGraw. Erik Dewhirst, Lisa's husband, also played with the group.
Contributed
Fresno State’s Depart- ment of Mathematics has been awarded $1 million by the National Science Founda- tion for scholarships to math majors from low-income backgrounds who show aca- demic promise.
The department’s pro- grams include Fresno State’s Mentoring Math Scholars for Success, which “includes rig- orous investigation of what learning strategies work
best” for these students, ac- cording to a news release.
Fresno State officials say that program will help other universities nationwide to increase the pool of “math- ematics talent.”
The mentoring math scholars program is de- signed “to build a strong pre-research environment. The program is an “intense,” 18-credit pathway focused on science, technology, en- gineering and math (STEM) courses. The curriculum will
include problem-solving chal- lenges designed to stimulate students’ interest in math research. Students also will be mentored by faculty and high-achieving peers.
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LEFT: Abraham Garcia shows his model of Mission San Francisco de Asís, which also is known as Mission Dolores. It was the sixth mission built and is in San Francisco. According to the California Mis- sions Resource Center, the mis- sion survived the devastating 1906 earthquake and fire that struck the city and is
the oldest intact building in San Francisco.
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