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Thompson Education Foundation awarded $3,500 Windows on the World (WOW) travel grants to two Turner Middle School teachers to enrich the lessons they offer their students. Justin Muir, 7th grade social studies teacher, will travel to Italy and Amy Pasch, 6th grade math and social studies teacher, will travel to the Canadian Atlantic provinces. They will travel over summer break. The WOW grants are sponsored by The Hiatt Family Fund of the Community Foundation of Northern Colorado and Greg and Tracy Roller.

The Bank of Colorado is donating $30,000 to Thompson School District’s Career & Technical Education (CTE) programs over the next three years in addition to providing volunteer hours in the classroom. The partnership will benefit a variety of CTE programs and activities in the district.

Three Turner Middle School robotics teams qualified at the state championship to compete in the Vex Robotics world championship in Louisville, Kentucky. Teams Elite Machines and Gamma Ray placed second and third, respectively, in the teamwork driving category, and Kryptonite won the overall excellence award. Overall excellence is the top prize awarded to only one of the 40 middle school teams for the team that excelled in all categories, including engineering documentation, unique but effective robot design, interviewing skills, competitive performance and a Science Technology Engineering and Math research project.

The following Thompson teams qualified at the NoCo Canyon Regional Destination Imagination (DI) Tournament to advance to the DI State Tournament: Elementary School Division – Monroe Elementary School’s Legend Builders; Namaqua & Ponderosa Elementary Schools’ Hilarious Golden Robot Chickens; Cottonwood Plains, Laurene Edmondson & Centennial Elementary Schools’ Batteries Not Included; Garfield Elementary School’s Brain Stormers; and Ivy Stockwell Elementary School’s Berthoud Beats. Middle School Division – High Plains School’s Gummy Maze Runners; Lucile Erwin Middle School’s D.O.G.B.O.T.’s; Lucile Erwin Middle School’s Spicy Pickles; Walt Clark Middle School’s The Explorettes; and High Plains School’s Colored Gummy Bears. Destination Imagination prepares Colorado’s kids to be the innovators of the future by combining the arts, sciences, and technology with creativity, teamwork, and problem solving.

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Thompson Education Foundation awarded Thompson School District staff with the following 2018 Educator of the Year Awards: TSD Staff Member of the Year – Diana Ritschard, Gifted and Talented Teacher, Big Thompson Elementary School; TSD Staff Member of the Year – Raechelle Salas, Intensive Learning Center Teacher, Cottonwood Plains Elementary School; Elementary Teacher of the Year – Nita Starr, 4th Grade Teacher, Ivy Stockwell Elementary School; Secondary Teacher of the Year – Carin Barrett, Social Studies Teacher, Berthoud High School; Principal of the Year – Jason Germain, Ferguson High School; and Thompson Education Foundation Educator of the Year – Sabrina Opila, 5th Grade Teacher, Monroe Elementary School.

Four Thompson schools received a total of six awards from the Colorado Department of Education for academic achievement and growth. Big Thompson Elementary School and Coyote Ridge Elementary School each received two honors—the governor’s distinguished improvement award and the John Irwin award. Berthoud Elementary School and Ivy Stockwell Elementary School each received the John Irwin award. John Irwin awards go to schools that demonstrate excellent academic achievement and, on the state frameworks, exceed expectations for more than three years. Distinguished improvement awards go to schools that show excellent student growth, again exceeding expectations in this category for more than three years.

Students from Bill Reed Middle School, Lucile Erwin Middle School, New Vision Charter School, Turner Middle School and Walt Clark Middle School participated in the Chapter Math Counts competition at the University of Northern Colorado. Kyle Nordick from Lucile Erwin, Lauren Lessman from Walt Clark and Ashley Campbell from Bill Reed are moving on to the state competition.

A Berthoud High School robotics team won the top state award at the Vex Robotics Colorado State Championship, earning them the opportunity to compete against teams from around the world at the Vex Robotics World Championship in Louisville, Kentucky. The team, called Critical Mass, won the overall excellence award as well as a skills award over 15 other high school teams at Kent Denver High School. Critical Mass is made up of senior Paul Miller, junior Matthew Rottinghaus, sophomores Andrew Rottinghaus, Lily Burtis and Julian Kaiser, and freshmen Ellie Sundheim and Emily Franks.

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Many Thompson students received awards at the Longs Peak Regional Science Fair in Greeley. Two types of awards were given out: Special Awards, which are donated by organizations to recognize projects that meet specific criteria determined by the organizations, and Category Awards, which are 1st, 2nd and 3rd places in each of 12 categories. The following Thompson students were chosen to represent the Longs Peak Region at the State Science Fair: Walt Clark Middle School students Kelly Clingan, Chance Hill, Chloe Rojas and Dylan Sellers; and Turner Middle School students Zachary Isley, Ellie Mead, Kaleigh Schanker and Nathan Woo.

Mountain View High School senior Dominic Sandoval was named Loveland Youth of the Year by the Boys & Girls Clubs of Larimer County. New Vision Charter School eighth grader Kailee Verdeyen and Thompson Valley High School freshman Addison Clause were honored as Junior Youths of the Year.