Romeo and Juliet: Got a minute?

For those who do not enjoy clas­si­cal Eng­lish drama, plays by the Bard of Avon and his late 16th and early 17th cen­tury con­tem­po­raries like Fran­cis Bacon and Christo­pher Mar­lowe, an evening’s pro­duc­tion of William Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet might seem to drag on for hours and hours … and hours … and hours.

That was not a prob­lem for Big Wal­nut High School stu­dents in Mary Jane Carr’s Eng­lish Class. They decided to dis­card the fluff and get down to the meat and bones of the Bard’s clas­sic love story about an ill-fated cou­ple that turns tragic, all because the Montague’s and Capulet’s could not bury the hatch­ets of past animosities.

Graduation is near; Scholarship time is here

Spring is here. The weather is get­ting warmer (we hope); flow­ers will soon bloom; trees will bud and blos­som … and Big Wal­nut High School seniors will be going online, scram­bling for last-minute schol­ar­ship funds to help pay for next year’s trip to college.

What many of them may not know, is that there’s a source of schol­ar­ship funds they can apply for by sim­ply stop­ping at the high school guid­ance office; and those funds are the result of the gen­er­ous efforts of mem­bers of their own community.

Any Big Wal­nut senior or Big Wal­nut grad­u­ate cur­rently enrolled in a col­lege or uni­ver­sity is eli­gi­ble to apply for one of the many schol­ar­ships admin­is­tered by the Big Wal­nut Edu­ca­tion Foundation.

BW Drama’s Godspell opens, performances tonight and Friday

Select mem­bers of the Big Wal­nut High School Drama Club are pro­duc­ing an unprece­dented third show of the school year, a 40th revival of Stephen Schwarz’s Godspell.

God­spell com­poser Stephen Schwarz has a strong and well-known list of Broad­way, Dis­ney and movie hits such as Pip­pin, Disney’s Enchanted, Poc­a­hon­tas, Hunch­back of Notre Dame, Prince of Egypt and the cur­rent Broad­way hit Wicked.

Big Wal­nut Drama Club’s pro­duc­tion of God­spell opened last evening (Wednes­day, March 20), and will con­tinue with shows tonight and tomor­row evening, with all shows start­ing at 7:30 p.m.

Faulkner says more to come in March, April
 at NorthStar Studios

There’s noth­ing like win­ning and Amy Faulkner and her all-star cheer teams at North­Star Stu­dios have been hav­ing a great win­ning sea­son. Faulkner said her teams have com­pleted a month of four dif­fer­ent com­pe­ti­tions where they placed First nine times, plus other indi­vid­ual First Place awards, and have received two High Point awards, and a Spirit Award.
 In addi­tion, the North­Star Junior Level 2 Team took Grand Cham­pion, plac­ing First out of 43 teams at the recent Ohio State Uni­ver­sity 2013 Cheer­lead­ing & Dance Team Competition.

“The U.S. Finals stand­ings for the month of Jan­u­ary have been released and our Junior Team was ranked num­ber 22 in the nation among all Level 2 teams,” Faulkner said. “This is a huge accom­plish­ment and some­thing to be very proud of. This team of 22 ath­letes has come together through hard work, ded­i­ca­tion and deter­mi­na­tion to be a top-notch, win­ning team.”

Godspell BW Drama’s third production of year

Mem­bers of the Big Wal­nut High School Drama Club typ­i­cally pro­duce only two shows each year, one stage play and one musi­cal. This year, how­ever, the drama club is pro­duc­ing an unprece­dented third show of the school year, a 40th revival of Stephen Schwarz’s Godspell.

God­spell com­poser Stephen Schwarz has a strong and well-known list of Broad­way, Dis­ney and movie hits such as Pip­pin, Disney’s Enchanted, Poc­a­hon­tas, Hunch­back of Notre Dame, Prince of Egypt and the cur­rent Broad­way hit Wicked.

Big Wal­nut Drama Club’s pro­duc­tion of God­spell opens Wednes­day, March 20, and will con­tinue with shows on March 21 and March 22, with all shows start­ing at 7:30 p.m.

Two BW students throw bowls for a cause

Two Big Wal­nut High School stu­dents who are in Leah Peck’s art classes and enjoy ceram­ics are throw­ing bowls for a cause. No, they’re not throw­ing bowls against a wall and break­ing them; they’re throw­ing bowls on a ceram­i­cist potter’s wheel, then donat­ing the bowls to Delaware Habi­tat for Humanity’s 11th Annual Soups for Shel­ter Dinner.

Of course the two stu­dents, junior Blake Stenger and senior Katie Flynn, have to fire the bowls, apply glaze, then re-fire them, before Peck deliv­ers them to Habi­tat for Humanity.

Stefaniak holds book signing at Big Walnut High School library

There was a book sign­ing in the Big Wal­nut High School Media Cen­ter last week, but the author didn’t have to be flown in from New York, LA or some other dis­tant and exotic loca­tion; she had to be excused from class.

The author is 16-year-old Big Wal­nut junior Sarah Ste­fa­niak, who wrote My Sup­plier, a 358-page novel set in 2038 about a soci­ety that raises per­sonal organ donors for elite citizens.

Author Nelson-Schmidt encourages students to follow their dreams

Children’s book author and illus­tra­tor Michelle Nelson-Schmidt vis­ited Hylen Soud­ers Ele­men­tary School and Gen­eral Rose­crans Ele­men­tary on Thurs­day, Feb­ru­ary 21, and she brought not just her books and art works, she brought along a mes­sage for stu­dents — find out who they are, what they love to do, then fol­low their dreams.

Nelson-Schmidt, who has three children’s books under the Usborne & Kane Miller Pub­lish­ing imprint and another one in the prover­bial pipeline, spoke with stu­dents about her lat­est book, Jonathan James and the What If Mon­ster. She explained that it’s the “What if’s”, the wor­ries about what might hap­pen, that most often pre­vents peo­ple from fol­low­ing their dreams.