Waldorf Students Win Awards At Annual Sprachfest

Garden City, NY Tuesday, April 15, 2008 - On Saturday, March 15, over 450 students studying German in grades 7 through 12 from 16 schools throughout Long Island attended the 18th annual "Sprachfest" language festival, sponsored by the Long Island chapter of the American Association of Teachers of German at the Garden City High School. A perennial event, Sprachfest is a language festival that fosters the learning and sharing of German language skills and cultural events. Among the competitions that took place were musical and theatrical performances, poetry recitations, spelling and vocabulary bees and the challenging culture bowl.

Waldorf students from the 8th, 9th, 10th, and 11th grades participated under the guidance of Peter Goble and Juliane Schneider. The following results of several competitions reflect the enthusiasm and hard work of our students:

8th grade:

- Spencer Diamond, 1st place, Individual poetry recitation

- Marianne Rose Weber, 1st place, Spelling Bee Level I

9th grade:

- Yeonju Ham, 1st place, Vocabulary Bee Level II

- Michael Escribano, 1st place, Number Bee Level I

- Sean Proctor, 1st place, Geography Bee Level II

- Brendan Fogarty, 1st place, Geography Bee Level II

10th grade:

- Mary Catelli, 3rd place, Spelling Bee Level II

11th grade:

- Peter Olynciw, 2nd place, Spelling Bee Level III

- James Sievert, 2nd place, Vocabulary Bee Level III

- Brian Lindsay, 2nd place, Scrabble Team

- Joseph Yuan, 2nd place, Scrabble Team

- Abigail McGlone, 2nd place, Scrabble Team

- Meagan Gallagher, 3rd place, Vocabulary Level III and Number Bee Level III

"The event gives students of German the opportunity to share their knowledge and to meet other students learning German," said Waldorf's German teacher Juliane Schneider. "Our congratulations to all the participants!"

Besides these academic competitions, this Sprachfest was filled with cultural events such as folk dancing, skits, German soccer, baked goods, a display of gingerbread houses created by students, visual artwork and music, complimented by raffles and voting for next year's Sprachfest T-Shirt designed by a student.

The Waldorf School of Garden City is a coeducational day school with classes from nursery through twelfth grade, and is accredited by the New York State Association of Independent Schools and the Association of Waldorf Schools of North America. Based on the insights of Rudolf Steiner, Waldorf schools are the largest independent school system outside of parochial schools, and can be found on every continent in the world. The Waldorf School of Garden City has continued in this esteemed tradition, offering a curriculum that balances arts, science, and humanities and awakens independence, curiosity and a life-long desire to learn. For more information, contact the Office of Admissions at (516) 742-3434, ext. 129 or proctorc@waldorfgarden.org.