Category: News

Two members of the Arkansas School for Mathematics, Sciences and the Arts Class of 2023 will be spending the summer before going off to college learning Russian in Latvia.

Madison Arenaz and Rose Brown will spend six weeks living and learning in Riga, Latvia, as part of the National Security Language Initiative for Youth (NSLI-Y) program for Russian. The program seeks to improve participants’ Russian in reading, writing, speaking and listening. Participants develop their skills through language instruction, cultural presentations and activities, and host family stays. Students will spend approximately 20 hours per week in language classes studying Russian. The program is sponsored by the U.S. Department of State.

Teams from the Arkansas School for Mathematics, Sciences and the Arts swept the divisions of the Spring 2023 Stock Market Game sponsored by Economics Arkansas. One team also won the yearlong division.

The team of Christian Lu and Walker Daniels won the Region 2 spring high school competition while the team of Jaden Williams and Aarohi Sonputri took the After School division. Lu and Daniels also won the state yearlong division with a portfolio of $214,415.67.

Eight Arkansas School for Mathematics, Sciences and the Arts students received awards at the Arkansas Foreign Language Teacher Association State Competition.

The AFLTA State Competition features several categories that allow students to demonstrate their language competence. The competition categories include poetry recitation, extemporaneous speaking, extemporaneous reading, vocabulary, and several others.

Hometown/Sending School

North Little Rock/ North Little Rock High School

 

College and Area(s) of Study

Bachelor’s degree from the University of Arkansas and a master’s  degree at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, both in mathematics

 

Current profession and company. Tell us what you do. 

I currently teach mathematics at the North Carolina School of Science and Mathematics at Morganton, a residential STEM school similar to ASMSA. My time at ASMSA has helped me relate to the unique experience of these residential programs.

 

What made you choose ASMSA?

The opportunity to enter an academically rigorous community with like-minded peers made ASMSA extremely appealing. While I met many phenomenal people at my homeschool, ASMSA offered a comprehensive community that I had craved throughout my high school experience.

 

What are your fondest memories of the school?

While I loved the academic rigor, my favorite experience at ASMSA was playing Ultimate Frisbee. I take immense pride in the fact that our team came in 1st in Ultimate both my junior and senior years. Ultimate symbolizes the best part of the ASMSA experience, which were the dorm hangouts outside of the classroom. Looking back, those evening visits were some of my favorite memories from high school.

 

What do you feel was the most important thing that you learned?

The role of community in education. As a student, I was fixated on “being the best,” where academics was a way to demonstrate ego over my colleagues. However, at ASMSA, I met a whole swathe of people who knew things I didn’t! I think learning how to learn from my peers, as well as communicating with my instructors, taught me how to view education as a collaborative process.  These lessons proved invaluable in my undergraduate/graduate career as well as in my teaching.

 

Share a favorite quote and/or your favorite book. 

“Standing on the fringes of life... offers a unique perspective. But there comes a time to see what it looks like from the dance floor.” — from Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky

 

What do you feel are the most important tools for an educator to have in today’s classroom?

Communication is essential in today’s classroom. Of course, educators must be strong in their communication of content, but with modern students it is ever more important to communicate clear expectations and feedback.

I also feel building interactive lessons is essential for the modern classroom. External factors such as COVID and technology use have shortened the modern student’s ability to withstand traditional lectures. I feel that part of our responsibility as instructors is to build active classrooms where students can spend more time engaging with material instead of passively receiving information.

A team from the Arkansas School for Mathematics, Sciences and the Arts placed second in the 2023 All-State Coding Competition.

Seventeen teams from high schools across the state participated in the competition held April 29 at the University of Arkansas — Pulaski Technical College in North Little Rock. The contest features teams solving problems that test contestants’ computer science knowledge. A team from Conway High School won first place while a team from Rogers High School took third.

Four teams from the Arkansas School for Mathematics, Sciences and the Arts took the top four spots in the state 2023 TEAMS competition.

TEAMS, which stands for Tests of Engineering Aptitude, Mathematics, and Science, is an annual science, technology, engineering and mathematics competition that challenges middle school and high school teams to work collaboratively to solve real-world challenges by applying their math and science knowledge in practical, creative ways.

Two Arkansas School for Mathematics, Sciences and the Arts students were awarded The Gates Scholarship for the Spring 2023 cycle.

Trenton Noel of Little Rock and Jaden Williams of Fort Smith, both members of the Class of 2023, were award the scholarship which is sponsored by The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. The Gates Scholarship is a highly selective, last-dollar scholarship for outstanding minority high school seniors from low-income households.

Bethany Catron, a member of the Arkansas School for Mathematics, Sciences and the Arts Class of 2023, was selected as a Horatio Alger State Scholarship recipient.

As a State Scholar, Catron received a $10,000 scholarship from the Horatio Alger Association of Distinguished Americans, Inc. The program specifically assists high school students who have faced and overcome great obstacles in their young lives, according to the organization’s website. The scholarships are funded by Horatio Alger Members who have overcome similar challenges and are awarded to eligible students in all 50 states and the District of Columbia.

Three Arkansas School for Mathematics, Sciences and the Arts students earned recognition at the 2023 Regeneron International Science and Engineering Fair.

The team of Amanda Navarro and Charis Xiong won a Third Grand Award in the Plant Sciences category for their project “Development of a Novel AI Soybean Root-Knot Nematode Stress Assessment Model in Soybean Plants (Both Field and Home-Grown).”

Shreyam Tripathi won a Fourth grand Award in the Translational Medical Science category for his project “Investigating the Role of Rev1 in Maintaining Accurate DNA Replication Past G4 Containing Regions in the Leading and Lagging Strands.”

Editor's note: This story has been updated to include results from the national competition. The original story begins with the fourth paragraph.

A team from the Arkansas School for Mathematics, Sciences and the Arts placed third in the 2023 National Personal Finance Challenge.

ASMSA seniors Beatrice Nknuga of Sherwood and Ai’Yanna Tombs of North Little Rock teamed with junior Daniel Nkunga of Sherwood represented ASMSA at the national competition held June 5 at the Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland in Cleveland, Ohio. The contest was sponsored by the Council for Economic Education.

Thirty-three teams competed for the title. Each team had two hours to review a detailed fictitious family case study and develop a presentation and then present to the assembled judges. The teams were divided into four groups with one team advancing to the final round.