In early May, our robotics team won both the Gold and Silver awards for combat robots in the National Robotics Challenge (view photos)! The “ant weight” (robots weighing under 1 lb.) championship team consisted of Alex Nanda and Jim Phieffer while the runners-up consisted of Saagar Arya, Alexandra Butnariu and Raaghav Malik. “The entire team worked on both robots,” according to faculty advisor Tom DeVore, “but they had different types of strategies going into the competition. The winning entry by Jim and Alex was a wedge robot that could flip and pin other robots. The one entered by Saagar, Raaghav and Alexandra was a spinner robot that had a high-speed spinning blade to damage the other robots. It was exciting to have both our teams advance all the way to the finals to face each other.”

Columbus Academy senior Lucas Huang recently competed in a rigorous 48-hour online cybersecurity competition sponsored by the National Cyber Scholarship Foundation (NCSF). Against over 5,000 other high school students in challenges such as solving computer security problems and capturing and defending computer systems, Lucas was the only student from Ohio and one of just 30 nationwide to earn the top distinction of Scholar with Honors that comes with a $3,000 college scholarship (learn more)!

Congratulations to a pair of Columbus Academy sophomores who have earned impressive honors! Grace Luo (left) recently received a Certificate of Excellence for her outstanding achievement as a top-scorer on the Mathematical Association of America’s AMC (American Mathematics Competitions) 10 A exam (learn more). Imani Munene (right), meanwhile, has been selected as a Carleton Liberal Arts Experience Scholar. She will join 42 other rising high school juniors in CLAE’s summer program that introduces the strengths of a liberal arts education through an array of courses in science, art, technology and social sciences. Imani will also receive a free trip to visit Carleton’s campus during her senior year and an automatic loan reduction of $10,000 as part of a financial aid package if she is eventually admitted to the Minnesota college.

Congrats to upper-schoolers Chris Shen (1st place), Sean Jackson (2nd place) and Evan Schenck-Chang (22nd place) who recently teamed up to win the 2021 Ohio High School State Chess Championship! The trio was tops among the three-team high school championship round with 10.5 points over Hawken School, which accumulated 8.5 points, and Solon, which had 8 team points (view results).

After only seeing each other on screens all school year, our seniors finally had the chance to spend some in-person time with their kindergarten buddies (view photos) before they departed campus to work on their Senior Projects. It was the perfect opportunity for each kindergartner to present their buddies with a graduation gift: personalized keychains with their buddies' actual signatures laser cut into them by makerspace gurus Todd Martin and Luke Howard. The keychains were packaged up with graduation cap tags created by Academy parent and alumna Sarah Milks Bethel '98. For more community life news, click on the following links:

This year's Cabaret was extra special as it was the first in-person musical performance of the school year. The socially distanced concert took place in the Senior Quad as parents of the upper-schoolers who sang enjoyed the outdoor presentation on a spring evening (view photos). We thank choir director Amy Brooks who made the whole event possible, along with music assistant Jennifer Kristoff who played the piano throughout, Scott Dillon who managed the sound system, as well as the seniors who decorated the Quad. For more arts and music news, click on the following links:

In last weekend’s OHSAA boys tennis tournament, Columbus Academy seniors Jack Madison and Arie Tuckerman (top photo) matched their 2019 result with a state runner-up finish in Division II doubles. After defeating squads from Lima Central Catholic (6-2 6-0), Cincinnati Country Day (4-6 6-2 6-2) and Lexington (6-1 6-0), they battled tough in the final but lost 3-6, 6-2, 6-4 to brothers Josh & Chika Nwaozuzu from Pepper Pike Orange, the school that also defeated our team in Sunday's OTCA state semifinals. But our Vikings bounced back by beating Lexington 3-1 to claim third place. Meanwhile, at the regional track & field meet, Luke Nester and Regan Cornelius (bottom photo) both qualified for next weekend’s state meet. Luke won the 1600 and placed third in the 3200 while Regan finished third in the 3200 in a school-record time of 11:25.88 (view more results). Also, check out the links below for more sports news:

At the beginning of National Nurses Week, Head of School Melissa Soderberg and her leadership team surprised school nurses Beckie Hoagland and Janet Fireman with special costumes to recognize them as superheroes who have helped our community manage a pandemic (view photo and post). We cannot thank this amazing and friendly duo enough for all of their extra efforts over the past 14 months! Click on the following links for more news about Academy's outstanding educators: