Words: Sarah Paz

On Wednesday, May 6th, State Superintendent of School Karen Salmon announced that all Maryland school facilities will be closed for the remainder of the school year.

In an online letter, Superintendent Michael Martirano announced that the Howard County Public School System will subsequently be closed.

Though the end of the virtual school year is yet to be decided, the last day of school for seniors will remain May 20.

Phase 3 of the HCPSS Continuity of Learning program will continue until the end of the school year. Though all its school facilities are closed, HCPSS will continue to work remotely, and will persevere in developing better distance learning models with the input of teachers. 

Howard County is also developing plans for “Recovery of Learning” for the reopening of schools in the fall. It is currently waiting for the guidance of the Maryland State Department of Education guidelines for these plans as well as plans about summer school programs. 

Food distribution centers will remain open until the end of the school year. 

Martirano encourages everyone to remain safe and patient while waiting for further announcements. 

For more information regarding school closings, please click here.

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Words: Sarah Paz

On Saturday, December 7, Centennial’s two jazz bands opened for the US Jazz Ambassadors in Centennial’s packed auditorium.

At 2:45pm, the first jazz band played “Backburner” and an arrangement of “Rudolph the Red-Nose Reindeer.” Junior Susie Park, a soloist, said that “all of our hard work paid off…  I think it went pretty well.”

At 7:00pm, the second jazz band played “Hark the Herald Angels Sing” and an arrangement of “Jingle Bells.”

In their annual concert series Sound the Bells, the Jazz Ambassadors serenaded the audience with jazzy holiday tunes. The audience, including the Centennial jazz band members, enjoyed the music. 

“Their playing was very impressive… [and] inspiring [to me],” Carter Matties said. 

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Words: Sarah Paz

The Howard County Public School System (HCPSS) is instituting a new color code notification system for school closings. Designed to standardize how the school alerts parents, students, and teachers on emergency and scheduled closings, the system uses five colors to indicate whether HCPSS schools and administrative offices are operational. 

While green represents normal operations, red represents a total shutdown of schools and offices. Orange indicates only the closing of the schools, while administrative offices remain open with liberal leave for employees who can’t report in. Blue indicates schools open two hours late, and yellow means that schools dismiss early. The notification posted will always state the code color and the corresponding message, eliminating memorization of the codes. 

The new color system was put into place on December 1. The emergency notification sources remain the same with the exception of the discontinuation of notifications on HCPSS cable TV. HCPSS will post all status updates concerning whether its schools and offices are operative on a new website, where the new color code system will be used. The new website is https://status.hcpss.org/.

“The site updates every day so any stakeholder can easily see if there has been a change in that day’s operating status,” remarked Emily Bahhar, HCPSS Coordinator of Multimedia Communications. 

The new color code system and website are intended to simplify communication of the operational status of HCPSS schools and administrative offices. Bahhar stated that “an analysis of the last five years of emergency notifications found 19 variations of operating statuses. The new system standardizes HCPSS operational status to five possibilities, helping to ensure staff, students, and families understand what a possible closure might entail.” 

Although the purpose of the color coding notification system is intended to clarify all operational statuses, some teachers, parents, and students believe that the development of it was unnecessary for informing the HCPSS community. 

Chad Hollwedel, Centennial physics teacher and a parent to a child who attends an HCPSS school, believes “that the new system does nothing to help… [him] understand beyond the words of the old system.” He believes that “the old system was sufficient.” 

While many students were unaware of the changes being made by Howard County, there are students who believe that the new color-coding system answers an unimportant problem in the communication of HCPSS.

Grace Chan, a Centennial junior, believes that “the color-code system is unnecessary for students.”

Despite these sentiments, the system is beneficial for employees at the HCPSS administrative offices. Holly Pascuillo, a Centennial English teacher, stated that even though “it is superfluous for me [as a teacher] because I receive text alerts, I believe the new coding system is necessary for members in the central office, for whom the situation is more unclear.” 

The previous system often sent obscure messages to administrative workers, so the new system aims to improve communication within the school system. 

Bahhar clarified, “in prior years, messaging to staff included only information for employees with union bargaining agreements and [created] a great deal of confusion for the remaining staff. The new system includes all employee groups, providing consistency and a clear direction for all staff. The language also was edited to be more clear and concise, and adheres to the negotiated bargaining agreements, where relevant.”

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Words: Sarah Paz

Centennial’s Science Olympiad team, affectionately called SciOly by its team members, traveled to the Science Olympiad National Tournament in Ithaca, winning 29th place.

Sophomore B-team member Shreya Vallimanalan said that the team placed 1st in the Environmental Chemistry Event at Cornell University.

“We also came in 12th in Chemistry Lab, 14th in Fermi Questions, 14th in Hovercraft, 16th in Astronomy, and 18th in Helicopters, ” she said. “We definitely view these achievements [as] successes. Every year, we strive to improve, so we will continue to work hard to prepare for next year’s competitions.”

Their success story began nine months ago in September. Even though the club allows anybody to participate, tryouts were held to be part of higher teams like the A-team who represented Centennial at the National Science Olympiad.

Just like any serious sports team, SciOly showed their dedication by practicing every week. At 2:15pm every Thursday, the team would hold weekly meetings beginning with announcements about the next competition. To practice and collaborate on projects, the team would break into the pairs they compete in at tournaments.

SciOly’s consistent determination won them first at the Maryland Science Olympiad which allowed them to qualify for the national tournament.

To celebrate the SciOly’s success at Nationals and a successful year together, the team gathered for a picnic on June 6.

The Science Olympiad team attributes some of their great successes throughout the season to Centennial biology teacher and team sponsor, Jason Piluk.

“Mr. Piluk, our coach, has greatly helped and supported our team… the Science Olympiad Club would not run as smoothly as it does with his guidance. He provides us with a lot of support and encourages our passions for STEM,” Vallimanalan said.

Regarding his role as the team’s sponsor, Piluk stated, “I pretty much make sure the club exists, is registered with the state and national program, provide a workspace for the team, confirm team rosters, facilitate travel to and from various competitions… and cheer them on.”

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