CWA junior Bryan Gula and alum Iean Drew ’10 are inviting the whole Charles Wright community to attend a spotlight production of their new musical Falling Back on Monday, May 23, at 8pm in the Donn Laughlin Theater. The spotlight show with selected readings and songs is the culmination of three years of effort. Gula hopes to see the entire production staged before he graduates from high school and is the first opportunity for others to see what he and Drew have been working on for so long. Read the rest of this entry »

Charles Wright’s Upper School vocalists triumphed at last weekend’s regional Solo and Ensemble contest. Despite being one of the smallest schools at the contest, CWA won top honors in three categories and qualifying six performers for the state competition in April. The instrumental musicians held their contest earlier, click here for that story. Read the rest of this entry »

Charles Wright Academy middle school students have been carving wooden duck decoys for more than 25 years and caring for Chambers Creek for the past nine years, a service project that earned them the county’s Youth Group of the Year award last year. This year the seventh graders in Bob Gordon’s art class have blended these two great Charles Wright traditions. They built and installed houses in the canyon near campus for a unique breed of duck experts are hoping to attract to the creek.

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Winterim, a long-standing tradition at CWA, is a five-day experiential program that allows Upper School students and faculty to explore themes and classes beyond the school’s academic curriculum. The program offers opportunities to develop a variety of interests, understand cultural differences, build intellectual flexibility, and provide social and personal confidence. The themes of art, community service, outdoor education, culture, and new skills are explored through a wide variety of offerings. Or, as one student put it, Winterim is “midwinter break, minus the break but plus awesomeness.” Read the rest of this entry »

Munyo Frey-Edwards was a sophomore in high school when her older brother enrolled at Reed College. She got sick that year – really sick – and spent much the year in a hospital in downtown Portland, just a fifteen-minute car ride from Reed’s 116-acre campus on the southeast side of the city. “I wound up spending a lot of time talking with my brother,” she recalls, “and without consciously realizing it, I fell in love with the school. As I began my own college search, I realized Reed had become my base point for evaluating every other school I considered.” Read the rest of this entry »

Charles Wright sent 17 Upper School students to participate in last weekend’s Mountain Region Instrumental Solo and Ensemble contest.  CWA fielded three ensembles and nine solos performances.  All earned either a Superior or Excellent rating, the two highest scores. The 11-member CWA String Orchestra is moving on to the state contest in April in the large string ensemble category. Junior cellist Sarah Yamamoto advanced to state as a soloist and will also compete with freshman Hanna Um in the small string ensemble category for duets. Junior violinist Jay Um is a first alternate soloist. Senior Josh Naon is the first alternate saxophone soloist. Junior Natalie Tjota is the first alternate oboe soloist.

The next opportunity to hear these talented Tarriers perform will be at CWA’s instrumental chamber music concert on Tuesday, March 8, at 7:30pm in the Language and Performing Arts Center.

Commentators often say that the greatest ballerinas do what would be physically impossible for most people so gracefully that it looks effortless. Perhaps her teachers and parents know just how much work it has actually required, but to the untrained eye, Parker Reynolds appears to have handled both her high school years and the college application process so gracefully as to make both appear absolutely effortless. Read the rest of this entry »

The Woodrow Wilson Foundation announced this week that Charles Wright Academy alum Aukeem Ballard ’07, a senior communications major at Lewis and Clark College, has been selected for a prestigious national fellowship in teaching. Ballard is one of 25 fellows selected for the second cohort of the Woodrow Wilson-Rockefeller Brothers Fund (WW-RBF) Fellowships for Aspiring Teachers of Color. The Foundation seeks to recruit, prepare and retain effective teachers for the students and schools who need them most. Read the rest of this entry »

Pat Dale puts 120% of what he’s got into every challenge he faces and since arriving at Charles Wright his freshman year, he’s taken on his share of challenges in academics, athletics, arts and leadership. Accepted early decision to Carleton College and given an opportunity to play football for the Knights, just like his older brother, all that effort has just begun to pay off. Dale shows no sign of letting up any time soon. Read the rest of this entry »

The day after Christmas, Brendan Rome went shopping and he bought himself the biggest warmest North Face coat he could find. He’s going to need it, because next year he’ll be attending Macalester College in Saint Paul, Minnesota, where the average temperatures in January are a low of 6°F and a high of 23°F. Surprisingly enough, it wasn’t the weather that attracted Rome to Macalester. Read the rest of this entry »