BCHS students to perform at event
Briarcrest Christian High School’s fall show, “Baskerville,” has been selected to perform at this year’s Tennessee Thespian Conference held at Middle Tennessee State University on Jan. 12. It is one of just two shows chosen for this prestigious honor.
The cast and crew will perform for theatre students from all over Tennessee. ThesCon is an annual conference where theater students attend workshops on acting, singing, playwriting, combat, dance, yoga, costumes, tech, makeup, clowning, juggling, trapeze, magic and student leadership. In addition, seniors can audition for scholarships, and juniors and seniors can audition for acceptance to various colleges.
BCS Basketball Homecoming Court announced
Briarcrest has announced the members of the 2017-18 Basketball Homecoming Court:
- 12th grade: Mckenna Hulette, Savanna Owens, Chandler Schelp and Ally Willoughby
- 11th grade: Camille Moffat, Mary Katherine Mormon and Julia Perrusquia
- 10th grade: Phoebe Sivils and Kallen Miller
- Ninth grade: Mia Robinson
BCS students exhibit art in West TN center
Each year, The West Tennessee Art Center holds a regional exhibition. Out of twenty-five pieces of student art submitted this year, eight Briarcrest art works were selected to show.
The following students were selected to show in the West Tennessee Regional Student Art Exhibition:
- Karson Mount, photography, “Stuffed Childhood”
- Zack Ranson, painting, “Trout”
- Grace Turner, painting, “Remy”
- Brianna Pope, mixed media, “Connected”
- Elizabeth Towers, computer graphics, “Blocked Artery”
- Second place for ninth grade, Julia Abel, painting, “Layers”
- Best of Sculpture, Maddie Wilmore, paint palette dress, “Cocktail Dress”
Briarcrest Regional Art Contest & Exhibition is held at the Sparks Chapel Gallery. The show includes almost 300 pieces of art from the Mid-South, both private & public schools, as well as private studios. Teachers choose two pieces of student art out of thousands of pieces created throughout the year.
This year, the following students showed and won awards at BRACE from Briarcrest High School:
- Julia Abel, “Loud Series of Groans,” oil painting, ninth grade honorable mention
- Ellie Stewart, “Bunnies in Still Life,” drawing
- Sammy Wipper, “Blue,” drawing
- Jonah Rinehart, “Waspish,” Adobe Illustrator drawing, 10th grade honorable mention
- Grace Turner, “Remy,” acrylic painting, 11th grade fourth place
- John Eshun, “Lurk,” oil painting
- Zack Ranson, “Crappie,” watercolor painting, 12th grade honorable mention
- Brianna Pope, “Peer,” acrylic painting
Brace winners in other grades included:
- Best of Show for Grades K-2: Emerie Celli
- Kindergarten: Fera Weisberger, first place; and Jude Hensley, second place
- First grade: Jaxson Mullett and Grace Petree, both honorable mention
- Second grade: Brayden Byrd, first place
- Third grade: Charlie Spann, second place; Molly McGee, third place
- Fifth grade: Sarah Brim, honorable mention
- Sixth grade: Campbell Slankard, first place
- Eighth grade: Lily Hydrick, honorable mention
Johns Hopkins University winners announced
Briarcrest has announced that 41 eighth-grade students qualified to participate in the Johns Hopkins Center for Talented Youth Program. Qualified students must be ranked in the 95th percentile on a section of a national or state achievement test.
These students will be invited to take the ACT or SAT Assessments during the 2017-2018 school year. Based on their performances, the students will have the opportunity to participate in a multitude of academic offerings sponsored by Johns Hopkins University in the summer of 2018.
Among those chosen are Tyler Bryan of Arlington; Olivia Cheng and Taylor Kearbey, both of Lakeland; and Gabrielle Pence of Bartlett.
Duke TIP 7th Grade Talent Search students named
Fifty-two seventh-grade Briarcrest students qualified to participate in the Duke TIP 7th Grade Talent Search. Qualified students must be ranked in the 95th percentile on a subtest of a national or state achievement test. These students will be invited to take the ACT or SAT Assessments during the 2017-2018 school year. Based on their performances, the students will have the opportunity to participate in a multitude of academic offerings sponsored by Duke University in the summer of 2018.
Among those chosen are Lily Cantrell and William Carlson, both of Bartlett; Tate Farris, Riley Norman and Elisha Wong, all of Arlington; and Kiera Bowers and Abigail Kirby, both of Lakeland.
10 attend Mu Alpha Theta state event
Ten students from the Briarcrest Mu Alpha Theta Math Team attended the State Convention and Competition in Oak Ridge, Tenn., Nov. 3-4. More than 300 accelerated math students representing 16 schools across the state attended the competition. Briarcrest was the only private school to participate.
Briarcrest students took home five of the Top 5 Awards. Winners in the Alpha division were Jaret Bennet, placing fifth in the Mental Math competition and third in the Gemini competition with partner Dawson Maynard, who also placed third in the Speed Math competition. Nikki Gray placed second in the Theta division for Relay.
The competition included individual, team and interschool competitions throughout the two-day period. Students participating in the convention competitions were as follows:
•Mu Division (Calculus and Advanced Topics): Nicolas Beine, Lilac Ding, Elizabeth Towers and Katie Wolfe
•Alpha Division (Pre-calculus): Jaret Bennett, Dawson Maynard, Bryan Miao and Bruce Lim
•Theta Division (Algebra 2 and below): Brendan Granger and Nikki Gray
Before the competition, the students visited the National Museum of Science and Energy and were able to enjoy a private tour of the Oak Ridge National Laboratory.
Band, cheerleaders donate $5.5K to St. Jude
The Briarcrest Band and cheerleaders teamed up this fall to raise support for St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital. Each year, the Marching Band hosts one of the largest and most prominent marching band competitions in the Mid-South. This year, the Briarcrest Marching Band Invitational donated all of the attending band’s registration fees to St. Jude.
In addition, the cheerleaders and band joined forces by hosting a Jeans/College T-Shirt Day to raise additional money for St. Jude. The youths presented their donation of $5,502.94 to Brittany Clark, a representative from St. Jude.
Mighty Sound of the South wins competition
The Mighty Saints emerged from the Bandmasters competition victorious earlier this school year. Not only did the band receive First Place in Class-A, they also received the award for Outstanding Music and Outstanding General Effect. In addition, the Color Guard received First Place for Class-A.
It also was a historical day for Briarcrest’s band. Not since the 1980s has the Briarcrest Band won First Place in any class or division at the Bandmasters competition. Bandmasters is, essentially, the Super Bowl of marching band competitions. It is hosted by the University of Memphis and is held at the Liberty Bowl. It is also one of the largest and most competitive contests in the Mid-South. Only the very best bands win at this event. This is, singlehandedly, the most successful competitive season that the band has had in decades.
See a video of the performance at https://youtu.be/KeXd2ml0pU8.
Choral students get top honors in All-Southwest
Briarcrest had the most students of any private school make the All-Southwest Honor Choir. Students chosen included:
- Morgen Story, S1, 23rd Chair
- Katherine Benoit, S2, 11th Chair
- Sarah Barlow, S2, 16th Chair
- Evan Montgomery, S2, 34th Chair
- Kallen Miller, A1, 22th Chair
- Avery Veteto, A2, 12th Chair
- Jessa Ripley, A2, 29th Chair
- Benjamin Cheng, T2, 3rd Chair
- Taylor Elliott, 5th Chair
- Josiah Parker, 15th Chair
Another 20 Briarcrest students in grades 7-9 made the All-Southwest Junior High School Honor Choir. They included Colby Amos, Anna Baccus, Oscar Chen, Olivia Cheng, Skylier Clark, Brenda Donlevy, Lauren Green, Marvin Holt, Nadia Holt, Marie Hutton, Zara Jadol, Jonathon Jordan, Abigail Kirby, Ethan Maness, Leah Paige, Page Richards, West Sepko, Kristin Stewart, Josh Tarver and Tyler Ybarra. They joined the upperclassmen who already made the Senior High School Choir for rehearsals and performances November 16-18 at Bellevue.
2 BCS students make All-West Orchestra
Briarcrest senior Nic Beine won first chair clarinet in the All-West Orchestra, and new BCS student Bruce Lim is the first violinist to make All-West. He made 11th chair first violin.
Fourth-grader wins second place in regional chess competition
Srichu Kosanam recently brought home honors in the 2017 National Chess Day Chess competition conducted by Shelby County Chess Organization. He won second place in the under 500 category.
Briarcrest wins Tri-State Chess Tournament
Briarcrest Chess Team won first place at the Tri-State Scholastic Chess Tournament, where they competed against teams that included Campus School and Lakeland. The BCS team (in order of board position) is Seth Williams, Ryan Erdman, Abby Erdman and Brogan Ratliff.
5 BCS seniors named National Merit Semifinalists
Officials from the National Merit Scholarship Corporation (NMSC) have announced the names of five Briarcrest seniors named as National Merit Semifinalists for the 2017-2018 school year. Four have been attending Briarcrest since preschool/elementary school, and the fifth Semifinalist joined in middle school.
They are Annie Barber, Rachel Collins, Lilac Ding, Matthew Stuart and Barrett Tillman. They were chosen from a pool of approximately 16,000 Semifinalists in the 63rd annual National Merit Scholarship Program.
To be considered for a Merit Scholarship award, Semifinalists must fulfill several requirements to advance to the Finalist level of the competition. About 90 percent of the Semifinalists are expected to attain Finalist standing, and about half of the Finalists will win a National Merit Scholarship, earning the Merit “Scholars” title.
BCS also had four senior students named as National Merit Commended Scholars. They are Emily Irigoyen, Isaac Stancil, Megan Underwood and Jacob Wade.
8th-grader wins third in Art Festival
Briarcrest eighth-grader Nadia Holt won third place in the 5th-8th grade division of the Young Artist’s Contest for the Cooper Young Festival. There were 350 total entries. This year’s theme was “Cooper Young Celebrates Local Music and Art.”
Sophomore named to Olympic Program Pool
Sophomore Lady Saints soccer player Skylar Garner of Arlington was recently named to the Region III Olympic Development Program Pool. She is one of 40 soccer players in her age group (and one of two from Tennessee) chosen from hundreds of players in the southern region from Texas to North Carolina based upon her performance at the Region III camp at the University of Montevello in Alabama.
She is the daughter of Chris and Lisa Garner of Arlington.
BCS senior named National Hispanic Scholar
Officials from the College Board’s National Hispanic Recognition Program (NHRP) have announced that Briarcrest Senior Emily Irigoyen has been named as a National Hispanic Scholar for the 2017-2018 school year. Emily was chosen as one of only 5,000 scholars from a pool of approximately 250,000 Hispanic/Latino test takers.
To be considered, students must maintain a minimum 3.5 GPA through their junior year and score in the top 2.5 percent on the October ACT.
The NHRP is a high academic honor used by colleges to identify academically exceptional Hispanic/Latino students.
