Lander sweeps it's own Nordic Invite, Basketball takes both games!

Post date: Feb 16, 2020 8:8:15 PM

The Lander Nordic Ski team hosted the Lander Invitational this week with the help of nearly a hundred volunteers from the community.  The event originally scheduled for a two-day event at Beaver Creek on South Pass, was changed at the last minute to the golf course on Friday and Beaver Creek on Saturday as the hurricane force gusts on South Pass subsided over Friday evening.  Connor Mays led all skiers on Fridays Golf Course skate ski in the boys action while teammates Otus Beason (7th), Kameron Brough (8th), and Hadley Lobatos (10th) rounded out the top 10 boy skiers.  Sophomore KayKay Sandall led the girls with a pack of teammates close behind with Maria Anderson, Marlee Jones, and Ursula Anderson finishing second, third, and fifth respectively and Bri Rich (9th) rounding out the top 10 for the girls.  On Saturday the winds stopped, the sun came out and we were able to host a great meet at an incredible Beaver Creek venue where Connor Mays again led the boys pack in the classic event with teammates Kameron Brough (5th), Otus Beason (7th) Payson Wirick (8th), and Camron Kitchen (9th) cleaned up the top 10 spots.  On the girls side, KayKay Sandall won the top spot, followed by Maria Anderson (2nd), Ursula Anderson (5th), Marlee Jones (8th) all with top ten finishes.  The skiers will have the week off as they prepare for their state championship event in Cody on February 28-29.  

The Boys and Girls basketball teams both earned victories at Pinedale on Friday night and here against Big Piney on Saturday.  They will host their final home game of the season this Friday against Powell with girls varsity tipping at 6 and boys at 7:30.  Please help us cheer on the Tigers as we will also honor our seniors.   

Good luck to our Boys Swim team who finished their regular season on Thursday with a last chance meet and will take their team to the State Championships in Laramie where competition begins Thursday at 2pm and continues through Friday.  The boys are in search of their 24th consecutive state championship after returning from conference last week where they won 12/12 events!  Good luck to our swimmers and divers!  

Good luck to our wrestling team who went 1-1 last week in duals against Rawlins and RIveteron.  The team will now head to Mountain View for their regional tournament on Friday and Saturday after taking their first weekend off since Christmas!  They will then head to the Casper Event Center on February 28-29 for their State Tournament.   

Congratulations to our Speech and Debate team with Mark Susanka taking 1st in Big Question and 3rd in Impromptu, while Megan Haratyk took 1st in Informative and 4th in Impromptu, and Katrina Winn took 5th in Poetry.  They will head to Evanston this weekend to compete and will return to Fremont County for a meet in Riverton the following weekend.  

I had the opportunity to attend the LIfetime Sports class ski/board day last Monday at Pinedale's White Pine Ski Area with 41 students from our Lifetime Sports classes.  We had a great variety of students from freshmen to seniors, and novice to experts who took to the mountain.  I was most impressed by some of our students who had never tried the sport and despite that took a growth mindset to the hill and were able to be successful after just a few hours of lessons and lots of falls and near falls.  Their attitudes were inspiring and encouraging and I am so proud of them for stepping out of their comfort zone and trying something new.  The entire day was a great opportunity to connect with our great students at a different level and reminded me how truly I am to be able to work with 550 incredible students on a daily basis.  A special thanks to Lifetime Sports teacher, Mike Watson, who organized the trip for the third consecutive year with more and more students seizing the opportunity to participate in this great activity. 

 Last week I took part in three different data analysis meetings for three different courses here at LVHS.  These meetings happen after our students take a common formative assessment (CFA) and allows our teachers time to reflect on their own data, compare and analyze their results to their peers results, and then make the changes needed to the assessment and/or the instruction to ensure better outcomes in the future.  Teachers also then create a plan for immediate intervention (for students who are not yet proficient) and for enrichment (for those students who already are scoring 4 level).  These meetings are a result of our change to the PLC process and are the most vital meetings our teachers take part in to ensure that when we say every student, we are truly able to mean it. I applaud our teachers and departments for the sacrifices they have made to make these meetings a reality and for the professionalism that they approach them with to yield better results for all students.   

LVHS proudly recognized THREE National Merit Finalists last week as that became official from the National Merit Scholarship Corporation.  Mia Cox, Alexa Mazur, and Ryan Brinda were all recognized as National Merit Finalists, placing them in the top 1% of all students in the nation based on their performance on the SAT test. Finalists earn automatic entry into the Lander Valley High School Academic Hall of Fame and we are ecstatic to have three winners this year.  Congratulations to Mia, Alexa, and Ryan and their families on an incredible achievement that recognizes the top academic performers in the United States!  

LVHS was again awarded for the incredible work of our students and staff with the College Board AP Computer Science Female Diversity Award.  Out of 20,000 institutions that offer AP courses LVHS is one of only 639 to be recognized for achieving this important result in AP Computer Science Principles. This is the second year that LVHS has offered AP Computer Science Principles to our students and in each year more than half the students are female.  More importantly of the girls who took the AP Computer Science test last spring 85% of them earned a 3 or better on the exam.   I would like to especially thank Mr. Aaron Robson who has graciously taken on this class to his already full load of math classes and has created a very successful program that was long overdue at LVHS.  Of course I also applaud our former and current female students of this class who have taken advantage of this great course.  

You may have already received notice by the district, however just a reminder that due to the snow day on February 3rd, we will have school on Friday, March 13th to makeup for that day.   That Friday was originally a comp day for staff for Parent Teacher Conferences, those will still happen as planned on Tuesday, March 10th (4-7pm) and Wednesday, March 11th (3:30-7) Reminder that there is NO SCHOOL tomorrow, Monday, February 17th in observance of President's Day, however teachers and staff will be at work continuing to refine our services to students.