NEWS & EVENTS

This week Upper School students took their annual pause from regular classes on Wednesday and Thursday to dive into exploratory programming and interactive design-based activities.

During Spirit Week, we kicked off our annual Middle School Bizzaardvark Locker Art competition!

Last week the fifth graders returned from their annual class trip to Orcas Island with much to be proud about.

The Boys' Choir practices weekly, and recently they had the opportunity to witness the progress of the Chapel's organ expansion project, led by Frederick Beal, the organist at St. John's. When parts of the organ case were removed, the boys were able to see the mechanical link between the keys and the valves under the pipes.

Tired and happy sixth, seventh, and eighth graders returned from their annual September school trips last week, having spent in Lincoln City, at Mount St. Helens, and in Turner, Oregon, respectively. All were treated to amazing weather, lots of fun activities, and learning new skills, from pitching tents and identifying animal tracks to practicing meditation.

Spirit Week kicked off this week as a lead up to our annual Homecoming Pep Rally, happening Friday morning. After getting rallied and spirited with the entire Aardvark community (including Aardy), all students will participate in afternoon fun and games.

Last Friday Lower School students, faculty, and staff worked to complete as many laps around the OES track as possible in the course of a school day during the annual Walk for Fun. Volunteers supported students on the OES track throughout the day, with tasks like marking the students' lap cards, offering words of encouragement, and in some cases, joining students for a lap or two around the track. We had about 340 students and 40 parent volunteers who walked or ran around the track.

Please join us for the inaugural Parent U event on Wednesday, October 10 from 7-8.30 p.m. in the Lower School Library. The focus of the evening will be Sleep and Nutrition. Learn more about our amazing presenters we found within our very own community!

Join current OES families, alumni, employees, and Aardy (of course!) on Friday, October 5 to cheer on the Girls' and Boys' Varsity Soccer teams and JV & Varsity Volleyball teams as they take on Catlin Gabel.

We are proud to announce that four Aardvarks have become National Merit Semifinalists this year in the 2018 National Merit Scholarship Program.

OES is excited to welcome award-winning author and illustrator Yuji Morales to our campus! On October 1, Morales will share her colorful and dreamy world with our Lower School students during Chapel. Her picture-book memoir, Dreamers, or Soñadores, captures the story of her 1994 immigration from Mexico to San Francisco with her two-month-old son.

The Visual, Performing, & Musical Arts Department is proud to announce their fall show: Haroun and the Sea of Stories by Salman Rushdie. This magical fable is about a boy named Haroun, whose famous storyteller father suddenly loses his ability to tell stories.

Parent University is a new experimental program OES is launching this year to give parents the opportunity to learn about and discuss issues that are central to raising healthy children. Learnings will be organized around a central theme, and this year's theme is the "Healthy Mind Platter," which is a concept developed by pediatric and adult health expert Dr. Dan Siegel.

Highly acclaimed Young Adult fiction author Andrew Smith will be visiting several of the B block English classes on Wednesday, September 26 as part of his book tour organized by Powell's Books. His new book, Rabbit & Robot, tells the story of Cager Messer, a boy who's stranded on the Tennessee (his father's lunar-cruise utopia) with insane robots. Andrew will be signing copies of the book for our students and talking about the craft of writing.