Sasha Luhur

Students Excited for Winter Carnival

March 1, 2025 by Sasha Luhur

Winter Carnival is approaching once again, and the four teams—Big Slide, Wolfjaw, Gothics, and Skylight—are preparing for a full day of intense competition. Winter Carnival is a highly-anticipated day off from classes, giving students a chance to have fun throughout the day and take an academic breather. The carnival features a variety of events, ranging from geography bees and the talent show to dodgeball and tug-of-war. The teams divide themselves between events about two weeks before the actual day, and different groups will represent their peak throughout the day on Tuesday, March 4^th.

The Head’s Council directs the teams, drafting equally from each grade to create a mix of students from each sport and grade and helping them bond to achieve victory in the carnival. There are many opportunities to gain points this year, including the Northwood Winter Carnival classics: snow football, dodgeball, broomball, dog-sled racing, baking, tug-of-war, talent show, and obstacle course. The Perfection game is making its debut in the Winter Carnival this year, while the snow sculpture competition is being re-introduced.

New students have heard about Winter Carnival and are curious what the day will offer. First-year sophomore Penelope “Penny” St-Pierre ’27 says, “I’m excited because everyone will spend some time together and build our team chemistry. The competition will be high, and that’s how we make memories. Winter Carnival is the perfect day for everyone to talk to people they don’t know that well.” She’s most excited about the broomball competition.

We are yet to see what this year’s Winter Carnival has in store!

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Slide show of scenes from past Winter Carnivals

Filed Under: Northwood Life, Top Story

Humans of Northwood: Gracie Hurlbut ‘25

February 10, 2025 by Sasha Luhur

“My first year at Northwood, I was in 10th grade and my roommate had a guitar. None of my family has ever been musical, so it was kind of a joke I would make; I would take this guitar, go around the halls, and be like, ‘Hey, tell me a song and how to play it’, and they’d give me a song and I would just play. I didn’t even know what chords were then; I would strum the guitar, and everyone would laugh at it. A few months later, the guitar was there when I went to lie down on my floor, and I ended up hitting my head on the guitar and splitting my eyebrow open pretty well. So, after that, I decided, ‘You know what? Let’s try and learn guitar.’ Ever since then, I’ve been learning guitar on my own, using YouTube and whoever can help teach me. That Christmas, I also got my own guitar and kept going with it.

“I’m from Massena, NY. My dad played hockey growing up and in college, so obviously, he wanted me and my brothers to keep playing. I have four brothers, and we all play hockey. My uncle Mike Hurlbut went here a while ago. The hockey team I was on before was falling apart, and the good coach was leaving, so my parents took it upon themselves and started my application. I didn’t know anything about it. My mom asked me in the Dunkin drive-through, ‘How would you feel about going to a prep school?’ It was a dream of mine growing up, but I never thought it would come true. It was the only school I applied to, so I’m thankful I got in because it’s been a dream come true.

“I’m committed to Castleton and excited because Castleton is in Vermont, and I’ve always loved Vermont growing up. The town reminds me of Lake Placid, and it’s the only hockey team in the area there. My dad went to one of their games a couple of weeks ago, and it was packed, just like a D1 game would be. So, I’m excited about getting to meet new people. When I was talking to the coach there, he was like, ‘I really like you,’ because many players don’t come from prep schools, making the transition so much easier. It’s basically being at college already when you’re in high school, and it just makes the transition a lot easier.

“Coming to Northwood, I learned a lot about responsibility. Things like homework: I can sleep whenever I want, but I still have to get my homework done and keep myself responsible—getting up in the morning, going to a lift or workout, and then staying up late at night doing homework. I’ve also learned a lot about respect and the little things about it, like pushing your chairs in when you’re done using them. I had never thought about that before, but now I’m looking around, like, ‘I got to push some chairs in. ‘ It’s just a different culture.

“One other thing I’d say is people might think, ‘ Oh, I can’t do this’. I never thought I’d be able to play an instrument, but now I’m playing guitar at the school concerts, so my advice is don’t put anything down until you try it.”

As told to Sasha Luhur ’27. Photo by Mr. Michael Aldridge.

Filed Under: Northwood Life, People

Japan LEAP Ready for Adventure

February 7, 2025 by Sasha Luhur

Photo: Northwood Adventure Sports/Instagram

The Japan Leap crew recently set out on their adventure, ready to go after some last group preparations. These preparations included a dinner to encourage group bonding, prepared by Northwood’s head chef, Adam Fischer. Jingxi Zhao ’27 said, “Chef Adam, who is coming on the trip with us, made our sushi dinner. He has an old friend in Japan whom he learned the sushi stuff from.” Chef Adam did a great job and the LEAP team enjoyed his meal. Bobby O’Connor, one of the teachers leading the LEAP, said, “I especially enjoyed the California roll! It was obvious that he devoted a lot of time to preparing this meal and it turned out to be a huge success.”

Over delicious food, the Japan LEAP members got some education on Japanese culture and etiquette. “It was great having Mr. and Mrs. Garvey there—the insight and education they shared regarding ethics within the country was incredibly valuable,” said Mr. O’Connor. They are excited and ready for their journey in Japan. Jingxi says, “About the food, I want to try the midnight 7/11s!” Bobby is excited for the skiing: “I look forward to bonding with this group and having the opportunity to share turns on the slopes. Skiing brings me so much joy and I love sharing that passion with others. I love travelling to new places and learning about the country and people. For me, it’s about absorbing all that I can within the time we get to be there.” Best of luck to this crew!

Filed Under: Northwood Life

Haran Places First at Titus Snowboard Rail Jam

February 5, 2025 by Sasha Luhur

Over the weekend of January 11^th-12^th, Northwood had great representation at a snowboarding rail jam at Titus. Brynn Haran ’28 shared a bit about her experience competing over the weekend.

Brynn Haran at a recent rail jam. Photo provided.

“The people there are all very nice—everybody helps each other and supports each other, even though everybody’s still competing against each other,” said Haran. “We still help each other out if anyone needs help with something, and it’s just a good community overall.” Haran placed 1st for both her rail jams at Titus.

Brynn spoke a bit about how snowboarding competitions work. “Some competitions have two events over two days, or there can be doubleheaders, which are like back-to-back competitions on the same day,” explained Haran. “It can be the same thing or different events. Last week’s competition was a doubleheader rail jam. You sign in, you get to go up and practice, and there’s usually a few boxes and rails. After, there’s this thing called riders meeting, and it just talks about basic information for the event. Depending on how big the groups are, they split us into heats of age groups and abilities. They go by start list order, and whenever you get up there and strap in, you just drop one at a time so that they can score you. For doubleheaders, there’s usually a break for lunch, another short practice, and then we just restart. That’s what happened at the last competition,” Haran added.

We hope to hear more about snowboarding results as the season progresses.

Filed Under: People, Sports

Students Enjoy Winter in Lake Placid

February 4, 2025 by Sasha Luhur

As the weather gets even colder in the second semester, students have been enjoying the various winter activities that have become available. Lake Placid and its surrounding area have many unique opportunities for fun, and Northwood students have been capitalizing on these resources.

Skiing and riding at Whiteface Mountain. Photo provided.

Students each have their favorite parts about winter so far. Natalie Gaeckle, ‘25, says, “Walking across the lake is really fun because I’ve never been able to walk across any lake, at home or anywhere. So, I think it’s cool that this lake actually freezes over, and we can go on it.” Jingxi Zhao ‘27 loves the snow at Whiteface this year. “I enjoy snowboarding with all my friends,” Zhao said.” It’s great that we have such good conditions this year to explore different trails earlier. Lookout Mountain is one of my favorites now. Also, I know it’s pretty cold, but I still like to go into town with my friends,” she added.

Sasha Luhur ‘27 has “had a lot of fun skating on the Oval, although it does get really cold. I learned the hard way to bring hand warmers with my mittens.”

Some winter activities haven’t been checked off students’ bucket lists yet. “I want to go down to the ski jumping area and watch competitions,” Gaeckle said.

Jingxi Zhao wants to “try the toboggan chute with my friends this year, and I also want to try the dog sleds. I saw them last year and thought they were really cool.”

It helps that it’s much colder lately in town, and the lake is frozen solid because Sasha wants “to skate on the lake because I didn’t get to skate on it last year. It would be cool if it froze deep enough, and I could do jumps on lake ice because I’ve always wanted to do that.” Hopefully, the winter weather will keep giving us opportunities to try new things and make lasting memories.

Filed Under: Northwood Life, Sports, Top Story

Intro to Arts Exposes Students to Visual Art

November 12, 2024 by Sasha Luhur

For Northwood’s 9^th and 10^th graders, Intro to Arts is a required class covering visual arts and music over two semesters. 9^th grade is currently in the visual arts semester of the course, while the 10^th graders are split between art and music for the first semester.

Ingrid Van Slyke, who teaches all of Northwood’s visual art classes, discussed why the Intro to Arts class was formed last year. “Intro to Arts started because we found that many of the students who needed an art credit were seniors/PGs or juniors, and they had such full schedules that it made it difficult for them to get into an art class. They enjoyed art, but it was very hard to schedule them. We figured that if we get students an art class early, they don’t have to be stressing about the art credits they needed by the time they’re ready to graduate.”

The art class has evolved since its start last year due to the increased number of 9^th and 10^th graders this year. “The classes are much bigger this year, which is tricky to work with, but we try to give everyone the chance to explore and be exposed to different forms of art that they might like.” Currently, the 10^th grade class has covered painting and printmaking, with drawing slated for the next unit.

Filed Under: Northwood Life, Top Story

9th and 10th Field Trip to the Wild Center [Slide Show]

November 5, 2024 by Sasha Luhur

While most 11^th and 12^th/PG students had a standardized testing day on Thursday, October 24^th, Northwood’s 9^th and 10^th graders took the day off for a field trip to the Wild Center Museum.

Starting the day at 9:00 a.m., four buses took both grades 40 minutes to Tupper Lake. After a brief introduction featuring Luna the screech owl, we split into four groups to explore the museum. There were indoor and outdoor activities about different aspects of nature, including a climate change bingo activity.

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Filed Under: Northwood Life

Behind the Results: How the Survey of Candidate Preferences was Conducted

November 2, 2024 by Sasha Luhur

Image: WHYY

The Mirror recently partnered with Northwood’s AP Statistics class to create a study on the school’s demographics and their preference for a US presidential candidate. A copy of the study results can be downloaded here. The class, which split their responsibilities into different student pairs, managed all aspects of the study, from gathering data to calculating and organizing it into graphics and numbers for the Mirror to use.

AP Statistics teacher Mr. Bob Emery (Photo: Michael Aldridge)

Mr. Bob Emery, who teaches the AP Statistics class, spoke about the class’s process in conducting the survey. “The timing was kind of rushed with the election coming, but I think the class did a pretty good job, especially with the non-response bias. The biggest challenge in conducting it was finding a sample size that would work.” Mr. Emery explained the class’s decision to go with a 25% sample size, saying, “Running tests on samples depends on the independence of one data point from the next. The more you sample, the less independent the data becomes. So, the rule of thumb for running tests is generally not to sample more than 10% of the population, but in our case, 10% would have been around 19 students and a few staff. That’s way too small to have any conclusions, so we used 25%, knowing there’d be some non-response. It’s settled out around 20%, which is big enough to make some conclusions, but small enough to have the conclusions be legitimate.”

Once the data was collected, the class was divided into pairs. Each pair was tasked to come up with “some sort of comparative visual” for their respective sections: comparing political preference to sports cohorts, gender, or grade/faculty. Mr. Emery then took the data that his students compiled and tested it to see how likely it was that the correlations found were due to chance or an actual correlation. He said, “All tests result in a p-value, and interpreting the p-value correctly is crucial.” A p-value represents the likelihood that a correlation is by chance alone; thus, the lower the p-value, the more certain a correlation is. A p-value less than 0.05 is considered statistically significant because there is a 5% possibility of the event being only by chance; in other words, a 95% certainty that the event was not by chance.

Mr. Emery also spoke about the class’s choice to conduct a study, not a poll: “We randomly selected the people who would be a part of it instead of conducting a poll where we ask people to respond. If we did a poll, we would have a larger data set but also significantly more biased and less reliable numbers. So, we chose as a class to stick with the study process, which is to randomly select people and then hound them a little bit, so we don’t have too much non-response bias. That’s why we’re allowed to run those tests and make those conclusions.”

Filed Under: Northwood Life, Real World, Top Story

Recovery Room a Welcome Addition

October 29, 2024 by Sasha Luhur

Northwood students take their athletics very seriously, which includes the crucial aspect of recovery. Luckily for us, there has been a new addition to our athletic training resources this year: the recovery room. An extension of the existing training room, the new recovery room has become a popular spot for students to hang out and boost their recovery.

Boys’ Varsity players use the Normatecs in the recovery room during their free time. Photo by Mr. Donatello.

Andrew “Donny” Donatello, Northwood’s athletic trainer, has seen highly increased traffic in his spaces since the introduction of the recovery room. He says, “I’ll have anywhere from 10 kids to 20 kids a day. I’ve had a day where I had 42 kids use the Normatecs. 42 in one day.” He spoke about the training area’s evolution over the last few years; the training and recovery rooms are in the original training area before COVID, during which the training office was remodeled as a quarantine space. The training rooms moved to a temporary location, and when Donny realized that the old training rooms were now vacant post-COVID, he asked to have his office moved back to its original location. With that move came the addition of the recovery room, and there is extensive equipment that many students use there. Donny says, “One of the most popular [recovery equipment] is the Normatec. Another way to recover is with foam rollers. Massage—we have multiple different types of massage guns. We do manual therapy here, as well as all other traditional therapy and therapeutic stuff.”

While recovering, students also build a small community in the recovery room with Donny’s facilitation. He says, “I think that it’s really providing a safe place for kids to come and hang out; one thing I do when kids come in is I always introduce them to the other kids if they don’t already know each other. They also get benefits from learning why to recover, how to recover, what the benefits of recovery are, and what works for them. They’re learning about themselves as well.”

Filed Under: Northwood Life, Sports

Humans of Northwood: Minh Tue “Jenny” Tran ‘25

October 15, 2024 by Sasha Luhur

“If I had to describe myself in three words, they would probably be ‘bubbly,’ ‘reliable,’ and an ‘ambivert.’

“Coming to Northwood, I think I became more open-minded and adventurous. Back home, I didn’t want to do anything except shopping and going to cafes, but here, I started hiking, and I tried rock climbing. Now I’m super open-minded about trying everything for the first time and seeing how it goes. And skiing too—I tried skiing when I got here and grew to love it so much. I’m super excited for ski season. I’m also more active now; I love going to the gym. Here, surrounded by athletes and coaches, I ended up going to the gym and lifting, and I really enjoy it since it helps with my mental health.

“Dance here is really fun. I always liked dancing, but I never took a serious course in it. When I joined the dance program here, I felt like I had a team, and I made friends, and, of course, I loved dancing as well. I got to experience the more serious side of it, which was really fun. Performing was scary, but then it eventually created more confidence for me. I started doing ballet, which is super technical and hard, so I’m still learning and improving, but I noticed that over my three years here I’ve been getting better at the techniques of ballet.

“My favorite time at Northwood so far was last year, my junior year. I love the springtime, because in the winter I get really gloomy because of the weather, but in the spring, the sun gets out and I’m always just very happy to be outside. My friend group last year, which had Ashley [Guevara ’24], Sophia Miller [‘24], and Avery [Novia ‘24] in it, was tight throughout the year. During spring, they got ready to graduate, and I was really upset but happy for them at the same time. We created so many good memories together, and it was just really fun being with them. We were going outside 24/7, going to town, skating on the oval, things like that. I love the town of Lake Placid. I think I made a lot of good memories there too, and in this room, which was Ashley’s room last year. We spent a lot of time here just hanging out together until 2 am.

“I’m an only child, but I live with my grandparents, so I’d say the family’s five, because we all live together: my parents, my grandparents, and I. Back home, in Ho Chi Minh City [Vietnam], I have long-term friendships; I’ve known all my friends since middle school, so I think I’ve been friends with them for about seven years. We have tight friendships, and we kind of grew up together.

“Coming here and making new friends was overwhelming because I used to be shy and making friends was hard. Also, because I have such tight friendships already, I wasn’t used to making new friends back home and stuck to the same friends every year. At Northwood, it’s totally different. Every year, people leave, and people come, and I learned how to be more social and be more open about making friends and just having fun with people you meet.”

As told to Sasha Luhur ’27. Photo by Mr. Michael Aldridge.