At Wellesley High, you can’t have too many robotics clubs

January 9, 2021 by Bob Brown Leave a Comment

When Wellesley High School junior Rachel White gave us a heads up about a robotics club she launched this past spring with fellow student Ethan Chen, I was surprised that the school didn’t already have one. White quickly clarified for me that indeed the school already had a robotics club that participates in Botball competition—but the new club focuses on FIRST (For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology) Robotics Competition.

“An [FIRST Robotics Competition (FRC)] robot presented us with a really exciting opportunity to design, build, and code a 125-pound robot,” says White, who has compiled an impressive range of robotics knowledge via classes at Wellesley High and Wellesley Middle School, participation in the Botball club, and five years of robotics summer camp.

The FIRST club, which started with six students in May, now has 27 members. So the appetite for more opportunities in this field are apparent.

“We were inspired to create an accessible and equitable team to increase the diversity of students in STEM activities, and open it to all no matter their background or experience with robotics,” says White, who notes that only 10%-20% of the students in her engineering and computer science classes/clubs are girls. The Wellesley Robotics Team (WRT) is 50% girls.

White and other students are urging Wellesley High’s administration to add a robotics course that goes beyond the Botball and Lego Mindstorm topics included in existing courses. Who knows, maybe that will inspire even more robotics and STEM clubs in the future at the school.

Building the robot

The Wellesley Robotics Team has been designing, building, and coding a prototype robot since October that White says “we have fun driving around!”

While you can choose to take part in many tasks in the FRC game, Wellesley’s team has focused on one: shooting a 7-inch ball into an 8-foot-high goal. The competition will take place virtually in January and February.

The Wellesley club has been meeting on Zoom for the past seven months, White says, to learn about the robot control board, electrical wiring, Java programming, CAD (Computer Aided Design), mechanical design, tool safety, and material use.

Building the robot in person has been more challenging, though they’ve been fortunate to have access to a team member’s garage, which has been outfitted as a shop.

“We meet in person several days a week so that no more than six people at a time are in our build space due to our COVID protocols,” White says. “With only six people in at a time, it can be hard to make progress, but we are persevering and pushing forward with our work.”

Club cofounders White and Chen also have plenty of other activities to keep them occupied. White’s a student representative to the School Committee and a WHS Student Congress member, while Chen is a swim team captain, co-leader of the New Student Ambassadors, and a member of the Keynote singers.

Among the club’s mentors is Brian Kelly, who teaches robotics at Wellesley Middle School, but parents also help out a lot, as do mentors from FRC teams around the state. The Wellesley Robotics Team is always looking for mentors to help with coding, CAD, and mechanical design/build tasks.

Kelly says it’s been a pleasure to mentor the club members given that most were in one or more of his classes during their time at the middle school. “It is a hard working, focused, and enthusiastic group who has taken on quite a challenge, not the least of which is organizing a workspace and schedule to maintain as safe an environment as possible during this pandemic,” he says.

“They are getting tremendous support from parents and I have been impressed by the forward thinking on the part of both students and parents, in the sense that they are very much focused, not only on their particular challenges for this team, this season, but also on the teams that will likely follow,” Kelly says.

The club members and parents are “building a foundation for students and the parents who will also find themselves inspired and engaged by the challenges of building a robot that actually does what one wants it to do. It ain’t easy…,” he says.

FIRST robotics teams are sponsor funded, and Wellesley’s team (Team Ultraviolet #8765) thanks MathWorks, Eliassen Group, NASA, FIRST, and Lowe’s for their support. Anyone interested in sponsoring or learning more about the nonprofit can email [email protected] or check out its website.

Wellesley Scholarship Foundation now accepting applications

January 9, 2021 by Bob Brown Leave a Comment

The Wellesley Scholarship Foundation is now accepting applications for scholarship funding for the 2021-2022 academic year. The application deadline is March 1, 2021.

In order to be eligible to apply, the Foundation requires that applicants are a graduating senior or past graduate of Wellesley High School, or a resident of the Town of Wellesley. It only considers applications from students who intend to pursue either an undergraduate degree or a post-high school technical certification program. The Foundation does not award graduate school scholarships.

Need-Based Scholarships: Wellesley Scholarship Foundation awards numerous financial awards to qualified candidates to assist with their unmet financial need. In 2020, WSF awarded $316,000 in need-based awards.

Merit Scholarships: The Foundation awards privately endowed merit scholarships to two high school seniors each year who are Wellesley residents in recognition of their outstanding scholastic achievement and citizenship.

For more information and to apply, please visit: https://www.wellesleyscholarshipfoundation.org

Note that applicants for WSF need-based awards should use the Wellesley Scholarship Foundation Common Application, and applicants for merit-based awards should use the Wellesley Scholarship Foundation Merit Application. Students may apply for both the need-based and competitive merit awards.

Rise in COVID-19 cases forces Wellesley High back to all-remote

January 8, 2021 by Bob Brown 2 Comments

Wellesley High School Wellesley Public School and town health officials feared that the return from the holiday break could result in a rise in COVID-19 cases. Speculation was swirling among parents that a return to full-remote could be in the offing even as they urged the Health and School Department to renew efforts to update COVID-19 dashboard metrics and bring students back to full in-person learning.

Unfortunately, fears that a spike in cases would happen has been realized, and WPS is failing two of its three COVID-19 dashboard metrics, a trigger to reevaluate the educational model in use. Wellesley High School will return to all-remote education on Jan. 11, with a planned return to hybrid schooling on Jan. 19. This means that the winter athletic season has also been put on hold (no practices, games or competitions until Jan. 19 at the earliest).

The School Department briefed the School Committee shortly before Christmas on the successes of its viral testing program, and the funding status of it. One key marketing point by those touting it is that the program has allowed the school system to close down schools in a targeted way, as it is now doing with the high school.

Here’s what Wellesley Public Schools Supt. David Lussier and Health Department Director Lenny Izzo shared in a Friday night memo:

Dear Members of the Wellesley Public Schools Community,

We write to provide you with an update on Covid-19 in WPS this week. We saw positive cases at multiple schools, including single cases at Bates and Upham, two cases at Sprague, and five cases at WMS. All but two of these cases are students. None of these cases involved in-school transmission of the virus.

Our most challenging situation is at Wellesley High School where we documented 10 positive cases this week. All but one of these cases are students. Two of these cases may have emerged through in-classroom transmission, although we cannot confirm that with full certainty. (We will be conducting a more thorough review next week.) The aggregated number of close contacts and other absences has resulted in a significant number of students and staff who cannot attend school in person. We are particularly concerned that we do not have enough staff to safely open the school next week.

After a careful review of all of these facts, the School Department and Health Department have jointly determined that Wellesley High School will transition to full remote learning on Monday, January 11th, with a planned return to hybrid learning on Tuesday, January 19th. All WHS winter sports will be on hold during this time and may also resume on January 19th.

It is absolutely critical that our entire school community work together and adhere to the safety protocols of wearing masks, social distancing, frequent hand-washing, and avoiding large group gatherings. It is particularly important that we support our students in doing this anytime they are outside of their homes.

We recognize that this is disappointing news given all of our safety efforts, but we also believe strongly that this response is both appropriate and targeted based on the information we have collected. All other WPS schools will continue to follow their regular hybrid schedules next week.

Thank you for your ongoing efforts to keep our entire community safe.

Dr. David Lussier

Superintendent of Schools

Leonard Izzo

Director, Wellesley Health Department

Thank you Swellesley Report supporters & on to Year Sweet 16

Who has the cutest pet in Wellesley?

January 7, 2021 by admin Leave a Comment

Wellesley pets Who has the cutest pet in Wellesley?

The Rotary Club of Wellesley is holding a virtual pet photo & video contest! All you need to enter the club’s contest, is fill out an entry form and submit a $25 entry fee on the website WellesleysGotPets.com. The window for submissions closes on January 8^th and voting will be opened to the public from January 10^th to January 24^thto decide the winner in each category! The BEST IN SHOW winner will be decided on by three judges: Honorary Chair Sue Webb of Wellesley Animal Control, Dr. Anthony Cosimini of The Cat Hospital, and Dr. Liz Hartman of The Wellesley Animal Hospital.

Proceeds from Wellesley’s Got Pets will got to benefit The MassBay Meal Scholarships provides eligible students with the funds to access food they might not have otherwise be able to afford. Typically, the school provides the meals to students on campus but as students are now having to study remotely due to COVID-19, MassBay has partnered with Imperfect Foods to deliver groceries directly to students’ homes. Imperfect Foods has expanded its service area in a commitment to ensure all eligible students are able to access food deliveries. Recipients of the MassBay Meals Scholarship receive funds through their Imperfect Foods account to choose the produce, meat, and pantry supplies that work best for them. The students will receive weekly $50 credit to their account, for a total of $600, covering the 12 week semester.

Many MassBay students have been significantly impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic, either by job loss or reduction in hourly-wage positions, remote education responsibilities with their own children, or learning new online technology to complete their studies. The MassBay Meal Scholarship Program can help ease student’s financial burdens, while providing access to nutritious food to help students focus on their studies and reach their academic goals.

WellelseysGotPets.com

Wellesley remembers Tony Lumley, Sr., as “such a present parent”

January 4, 2021 by Bob Brown 1 Comment

In reviewing five years of texts with her friend Anthony “Tony” Lumley, Sr., Wellesley’s Betsy Komjathy says it was all about him being “proactive, supportive and in good humor” about his kids, as well as their schoolmates. “He was such a present parent,” Komjathy says.

Wellesley and beyond are now mourning Lumley, a Boston resident who passed away from coronavirus on Dec. 22 at the age of 56.

A fundraiser has been launched to support the family during this most difficult time. All funds raised will be used to help support the Lumley children with unforeseen medical and living expenses, as well as college tuition.

Lumley is survived by his four children, who like himself, all took part in the METCO educational program for Boston residents, as well as two grandchildren and his fiancee Gwen Johnson. His oldest son, Eric, graduated from Wayland High School; Nykia and Anthony, Jr., graduated from Wellesley High, and Samone will graduate from Wellesley High in the spring. Lumley’s aunt, Carla Lumley, works for the Wellesley METCO program.

According to the fundraiser, organized by Lumley’s mother Beverley and Wellesley High’s Diane Zinck, “To say ‘Mr. Tony’ was a loyal family man is an understatement. As a loving single father, his entire world centered around loving, providing for and taking care of his beloved children and grandchildren. Lumley was a father who seemed to have the power to be in three places at once. He supported all of his children at all times, attending every single cheerleading event, football game, basketball game, and educational ceremony.”

Lumley’s mother told us that “My son Anthony had a huge presence in the Wellesley school system and the community. He and his children were quite well known.”

According to Anthony Lumley, Sr.’s formal obituary, the Annual Caribbean Festival was among his yearly highlights, when he opened his home and shared a BBQ “that gave us all an opportunity to gather at the end of the summer and enjoy each other’s company.”

Komjathy, a Friends of Wellesley METCO board member, says when she recalls Lumley she thinks of the pride he had in his kids.

“He went to all of their activities that he possibly could, and if he wasn’t at something, it was because he was at another kid’s event,’ she says, fondly recalling sitting near him and family members at sports events. Lumley epitomized being part of the two-way community that the METCO program hopes to foster, she says, as he felt part of both the Boston and Wellesley communities.

Services for Anthony Lumley, Sr., take place on Jan. 11 in Mattapan at Davis Funeral Home.

lumley family — Lumley family photo from Gofundme page

Shocking stats spurred Wellesley High student to launch breast cancer awareness club

December 29, 2020 by Bob Brown Leave a Comment

Wellesley High School senior Sarah Howland says the fact that the cause of more than 70% of breast cancer cases is unexplained was among the reasons she decided to start a club called Protect Our Breasts.

“That was really shocking and concerning to hear, especially because I had never heard anything like that before,” says Howland, who came across the numbers while taking part in a Harvard Medical School summer program. “Education surrounding breast cancer, and the types of things people can do to avoid it, are quite nonexistent unless you go searching for it. I can’t recall much education about breast cancer in sex-ed class or any science classes, so I wanted to start this club to spread more awareness and help educate as many as I can.”

The WHS Protect Our Breasts club, which now has 15 members, is a chapter of the original club started at Umass Amherst.

The club’s purpose is to raise awareness of the non-genetic causes of breast cancer, and the students recently started a fundraiser by selling stickers, which you can order via an online form or by scanning QR code if you come across any of the club’s flyers.

The club has also reached out to local businesses to see if they’d be interested in carrying the stickers in their stores. If interested in participating, please send email to [email protected]

All net proceeds will be donated to The Ellie Fund, a Needham-based non-profit that provides assistance to breast cancer patients residing in or receiving treatment in Massachusetts.

Running the club in the hybrid learning environment has been “surprisingly easier than I thought it would be,” Howland says. Meeting via Zoom instead of booking a physical room has simplified things, not to mention that students don’t need to worry about travel arrangements. The club generally meets once a month, and hopes to have some sort of socially distanced year-end celebration.

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A holiday treat from Wellesley public school musicians

December 24, 2020 by Bob Brown Leave a Comment

The Wellesley High School Performing Arts Department assembled a Virtual Holiday Concert to share with the community.

The Wellesley High Concert Band, Two O’Clock Jazz Band, Keynote Singers, Rice Street Singers, and Wind Ensemble, as well as Wellesley Middle School 8th grade band, perform.

Each one of these pieces represents hours of work.

“We applaud our students for continuing to find a way to keep music active in their lives during this time and for putting in the effort to make this special performance for the Wellesley community,” writes WHS Band Director Steve Scott.