Courtney Fairchild

How To Calculate Your GPA

December 4, 2018 by Courtney Fairchild

With the first trimester ending, students are all excited for (or dreading) their grades. With this comes the question of GPAs. The GPA is an important tool to determine how well a student is doing academically. Many students, however, have no idea what a GPA is or how it is calculated.

“GPA” is an acronym for “Grade Point Average,” a tool to measure your average grade throughout all classes. The method Northwood uses is very simple, and it’s easy for students to find on their own. It takes the total points from the letter grades and averages them to find what is essentially the average grade. The letter/point correspondence works as seen below: [Read more…]

Filed Under: Northwood Life, Top Story

Ski Racer Higgins-Lopez Wins Fifth National Ski Cross Title

May 3, 2018 by Courtney Fairchild

Audrey Higgins-Lopez ‘21 came to Northwood an accomplished alpine ski racer and earned top-ten finishes at numerous alpine races for Northwood/NYSEF at the U16 age group this season. She ended her first season a national champion in ski cross, an entirely different discipline. On April 10th, Higgins-Lopez competed in USASA’s 14-15 Freeski National Championship, racing against the top young women in her age group. It’s her fifth national title in the sport. [Read more…]

Filed Under: Sports

Blood Drive Sees Record Donations

March 26, 2018 by Courtney Fairchild

Last Tuesday was Northwood’s annual blood drive for the American Red Cross. The Fitness Center was transformed into a donation center, where students and faculty could choose to donate their blood to help save lives. With the help of event organizer Mr. Andy Donatello, the Northwood community was able to give back to our community and potentially help save lives. [Read more…]

Filed Under: Northwood Life, Real World

Five Alumni Competing in PyeongChang Winter Games

February 9, 2018 by Courtney Fairchild

Five Northwood School alumni will compete in the XXIII Winter Olympic Games in PyeongChang, South Korea. Two athletes, Andrew Weibrecht ’03 and Tony Granato ’83, are participating in their third Olympic Games, while Kevin Drury ’06, Mike Testwuide ’05, and Will Rhoads ’13 are first-time Olympians.

[Read more…]

Filed Under: Northwood Life, People, Sports, Top Story

How to Be Sustainable While Keeping Warm in Subzero Temps

January 22, 2018 by Courtney Fairchild

As the winter season reaches its peak and temperatures drop below zero, the results of climate change become ever more prevalent. With extreme heat comes extreme cold, both of which often cause people to waste energy, worsening the crisis. This year, several temperature records in America, both high and low, have been broken, causing families to huddle in their homes with the thermostat turned up. Despite the extreme temperatures, there are several methods to stay warm while the world freezes around you. [Read more…]

Filed Under: Real World

Holiday Cheer at Northwood

December 14, 2017 by Courtney Fairchild

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Northwood takes the holidays very seriously: we deck the halls and hold a celebratory formal dinner that culminates with Christmas carols and Santa sharing presents with faculty children. During the weeks leading up to the event, we decorated the living room with poinsettias, fairy lights, menorahs, and a Christmas tree, finished off with mistletoe over the entrance. Students baked and decorated cookies for the formal. The band and vocal classes worked tirelessly on their performances. Everyone was fully immersed in the holiday spirit when the time came for the winter formal. [Read more…]

Filed Under: Northwood Life, Top Story

Composting at Northwood: It’s Not Just Rotten Food

December 6, 2017 by Courtney Fairchild

Northwood’s campus, though small, is embedded into the nature that surrounds it. We have three expansive fields, trees and grass surrounding the buildings, and an Adirondack pavilion. In order to tend to this greenery, we rely mainly on fertilizers bought from outside sources, which are quite expensive. There is a way to become self-sustainable so that the school does not have to spend money on fertilizer while reducing waste produced by our community: composting.

Students collect food waste from the kitchen in plastic buckets and bring it to the compost bin. Photo: provided.

Composting is a process by which organic waste such as food, leaves, or lawn clippings, decomposes in a controlled environment to produce compost, a soil-like material that is full of nutrients. For the waste to properly break down, it must be kept moist and aerated regularly to keep decomposition aerobic so the food does not simply rot in anaerobic fashion. It can be then used in gardens as a form of fertilizer to improve the quality of plants grown there. The most commonly used method has three stages, and three piles – one where the food goes in, one where it is mid – decomposition, and one for the end stages when it becomes usable. The decomposition takes anywhere from three months to a year, depending on conditions such as temperature and moisture. [Read more…]

Filed Under: Northwood Life, Real World, Top Story

Humans of Northwood: Ms. Aerie Treska

December 1, 2017 by Courtney Fairchild

Ms. Treska with her son, Calder. (Photo: provided)

I teach Literary Themes. I am also the Eleventh Grade Dean and the co-advisor for CARE. This is my first year at Northwood. My dad [Mike Treska ‘64] fell in love with this school, this town, and especially the people, and I was lucky enough to grow up in Lake Placid. Before Northwood, I taught for four years at St. Paul’s School for Boys, then spent fourteen years at Roland Park Country School. I loved it there, but I was eager to work in a place where my boys [Owen, 14, Baxter, 12, and Calder, 7] could also benefit from the educational community into which I was pouring my time, heart, and soul. I returned to the Adirondacks with them every summer, and when we weren’t there, I felt so homesick for the mountains. Mr. Pierce and I had a long talk, then we e-mailed our friend, Jill Walker, to see if there might be any openings at Northwood. We were eager to rejoin this close-knit community that our children could also be a part of, and so we did. My colleagues are wonderful; they are creative and passionate about working and living in these mountains. I love teaching and interacting with students, but although I have learned to cultivate an extroverted personality, I am a hard-core introvert. By Friday night, I am sort of talked-out. I just really need time and space and silence so that I can tune in to my rich and restorative inner life. One thing about me that may surprise people is that I really like rap and hip hop (as long as it’s not racist or misogynistic), especially MIA, Eminem, the Beastie Boys, and old-school stuff like Grandmaster Flash, De La Soul, A Tribe Called Quest, and Run DMC. Really good rappers do amazing stuff with language; their use of cadence, internal rhyme, and double (even triple) entendre is virtuosic.

As told to Courtney Fairchild ’20

Filed Under: Northwood Life, People

Plattsburgh-Bound Seniors Hope to Continue Dynasty

November 14, 2017 by Courtney Fairchild

Three senior hockey players have announced their plans to attend SUNY Plattsburgh and play for the most dominant team in Division III hockey. The Cardinals have won a total of six NCAA Division III women’s ice hockey championships, seven ECAC Women’s West Championship titles, and have won at least 20 games in each of the past fifteen seasons. It’s one of the most impressive dynasties in the history of college hockey.

According to the blog D3 Recruiting Hub, at the Division III level, “committing” is an informal and non-binding statement by the student-athlete that she intends to apply and, if admitted, matriculate at the college and participate in intercollegiate athletics. Committing does not guarantee admission to the college nor does it guarantee playing time.

Ashley Davis, Hanna Rose, and Sierra Benjamin have chosen SUNY Plattsburgh, the hockey power and small state school an hour from Lake Placid on Lake Champlain. The Mirror staff writer Courtney Fairchild ’20 sat down with the trio to ask them a few questions about being committed to a college, and what it’s like to do so with some close friends at their side. [Read more…]

Filed Under: Northwood Life, People, Sports, Top Story

An Investigation Into Recycling Culture at Northwood

November 6, 2017 by Courtney Fairchild

One of Northwood’s most attractive features is the beautiful land that surrounds it. We lay in the Adirondack Park just off the shores of Mirror Lake and Lake Placid, surrounded by luscious forests of evergreen and deciduous trees. It’s no surprise people flock from all places to hike the gorgeous mountains and swim in the lakes, as they are truly a gem of the natural world. The experience students receive from Northwood’s Adirondack setting demands that we should be a standout leader in sustainability, so one would expect us to emphasize preservation of the beautiful environment we reside in. [Read more…]