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MILLIKAN HIGH SCHOOL 2800 Snowden Avenue Long Beach, California (562) 425-7441 http://www3.lbusd.k12.ca.us:81/millikan/ |
Hello Millikan Community,
On Thursday, May 24th, the Long Beach Unified School District honored 90 students with the “Most Inspiring Student” Award. The presentation took place at the Long Beach Hilton where Don Keller and I were there to support Millikan’s recipient, Tehja Oyama—a senior who has given many hours of community service to help at-risk children in our area. Tehja has overcome many personal challenges in her living situation over the years.
Congratulations to the Millikan JROTC program under the leadership of Sergeant Sarmiento and Sergeant Hebert. In the 2003-2004 school year, our JROTC program was un-rated due to an evaluation team that refused to inspect the program. To be perfectly honest, our program was not ready for inspection and in danger of being disbanded. With the arrival of our new JROTC staff in the 2004-2005 school year, the Millikan High School JROTC program has been rebuilding. This year our cadets received the highest honor available, Honor Unit with Distinction a Gold Star Unit. There are currently 181 cadets in the program with more parental involvement than I have ever seen in the past. The Homecoming Queen, Briana Perez, and Mr. RAM, Matthew Hodges, are both cadets. Briana has accepted an appointment to the United States Military Academy at West Point. I am very proud of the hard work and accomplishments that our JROTC program has accomplished over the last four years and I will be proud to attend their banquet this Friday evening.
This year our Virtual Enterprise participated in an online Stock Market Game. This game replaces the very popular Press Telegram newspaper Stock Market Game. The Millikan students have become more and more accustomed to using technology so an online Stock Market Game was a natural transition. The students started with a virtual cash account of $100,000 and they strive to create the best-performing portfolio. Over several weeks, the Millikan students worked together in investment teams. They practiced leadership, organization, negotiation, and cooperation as they competed for the top spot with other students throughout the western regional of the Stock Market Game. Millikan’s investment teams captured the 2nd and 3rd place in the high school division of the Western Regional On-line stock competitions! An awards ceremony is planned to honor the 1st – 3rd ranked student investment teams at Boomer’s in Fountain Valley in early June.
Millikan’s RAMSET won 2nd place in the annual SOLAR CUP 2007 at Lake Skinner. Solar cup has completed its seventh year. High Schools from Southern California build a fifteen foot boat that looks like a canoe. A driver from each school competes in two types of races. The 200 meter Sprint race was completed in 30 seconds. The Endurance race lasts 90 minutes. The goal is to go the farthest possible distance. In only its second year of participation, Millikan produced a very fast boat. We had a pair of electrical motors with a chain gear system, excellent batteries, prop and steering system.
This year 9th grader Ashley Smith was able to break the school varsity record for the women’s high jump. On her way to breaking the record, she set the highest women’s high jump in the state for this year. She went on to become Moore League Champion, and then she destroyed the competition to become the Women’s CIF Division I Champion. She is still the state leader in women’s high jump and will be competing again tonight at Cerritos College in the CIF Masters Meet. If she does well there she will move on to the State Meet in Sacramento. The coaches firmly expect her to become the state champion this year if she avoids injury. What a list of accomplishments for this Freshman!
As we get closer to the end of the school year, it is time to share the Millikan Final Schedule. Our Seniors will start their finals on Tuesday June 5th and all the other students will start with their finals on Friday June 8th. This year is rapidly coming to a close and summer looms ever larger.
Since summer is right around the corner, I wanted to share the Millikan Summer School information. Summer School will start on June 25th and end on July 27th. Please take a look at the above hyperlink and you will be able to determine the summer school pre-registration date for your student. Summer School spots are assigned on a first come first serve basis and they fill up quickly every school year.
I am finishing my fifth school year as co-principal of Millikan High School and I have attended hundreds of events over the years in my role as co-principal. On Monday, I attended one of the saddest events that I have ever attended. One of Millikan’ graduates Staff Sergeant Joshua Whitaker was killed fighting in Afghanistan with the Green Berets. This is the third such funeral that I have attended for one of Millkan’s graduates and they never get any easier. This Monday is Memorial Day and we all need to be thankful for the men and women of our Armed Services. I will be thinking of Joshua and his infectious smile.
Best wishes,
Jeff
Jeffrey M. Cornejo, Ed.D.
Robert A. Millikan High School
2800 Snowden Ave.
Long Beach, CA 90815
(562) 425-7441 x4103
http://www3.lbusd.k12.ca.us:81/millikan
“It doesn’t take a hero to order men into battle. It takes a hero to be one of those men who goes into battle.” Norman Schwarzkopf