ELMS 8th Grader Goes Hollywood!

ELMS's very own Alyssa Shouse just returned from Hollywood after meeting with songwriter/producer Greg Critchley. Critchley heard Alyssa sing on her MySpace page and offered to have Alyssa and her mom come to Hollywood to do a "mic" test.

Greg Critchley, a Los Angeles-based writer/producer has collaborated with such prominent songwriters as Bridget Benenate, Matthew Gerrard and Robbie Nevil. Most recently, Critchley can be heard playing the drums and perscussions on the High School Musical 2 soundtrack.

According to Alyssa, the meeting went well and she had a great time in LA! Way to go Alyssa! Who knows...American Idol? Recording Contract? Radio Play? I think she can do it all!

For more information about Alyssa's amazing talents, please see the links below.

Click here to read the entire article by Susan Lavin

Shouse Wins Howard County Teen Idol: Click here to read the entire article

Maryland Terps (Men and Women!) Are in the Dance!

Congratulations to both the men and women's basketball teams for making
the NCAA tournament this year.

GO TERPS!

Cook-off A Huge Team Success!

IF YOU WANT TO
RUN FAST: RUN ALONE.
IF YOU WANT TO
RUN FAR: RUN TOGETHER.
African proverb

This proverb is one of my favorites. As a middle school educator, it reminds me of the importance of creating powerful teams within a school in order to help students and staff. In order to do this, we sponsor all kinds of activities to reinforce this concept. At our last schoolwide professional work day, LeeAnn Sanna helped to organize our first annual staff one-pot cook-off. Teams of staff members were formed to compete in the following culinary competition:

The Rules:

• As a team, create a one pot meal (soup, stew, chili). It must be a one pot meal that can cook or simmer during the entire morning meeting (approximately 3 hours).
• Each team will have 45 minutes of preparation prior to the staff meeting starting at 8:30. During preparation time all of the ingredients must go into the pots or crockpots. At 8:30, all pots/crockpost must be plugged-in and cooking in the Family and Consumers Sciences classroom.
• Each team, must have the recipe by your "pot".

• Each "pot" will be Judged on:

1. Creativity
2. Taste
3. Texture
4. Degree of easiness it is to prepare and cook

• The "pots" will be judged by guests judges not on our staff.

The competition was fierce! Great food was created, but only one team could win. Eva Soboleski and her band of chefs ended up being judge best this year. While we did declare a winner, I don't believe there were any losers. The team work, friendly competition and wonderful pots of stew that were prepared and consumed will create lasting memories and bonds!

The ELMS staff ROCKS and cooks well, too! Thanks LeeAnn for doing such a great job creating this new tradition for our school!