hats off to our grads

Bradford High School Seniors

2 - The Bradford (Pa.) Era, Hats Off To Our Grads, Wednesday, June 3, 2015

Harsen named keynote speaker for Bradford High graduation

Bradford Area High School administrators have announced the lineup of student speakers for commencement exercises slated for 7 p.m. June 4 at the school auditorium.

Delivering the class welcome speech will be Brianna Pattison.

She is on the National Honor Society and National Technical Honor Society, in addition to being a Skills USA Career and Technical student. Pattison, who is a certified nurse assistant, is also involved with Peer Helpers and Studio B Dance Academy. She is a four-year member of soccer and serves as captain and is a four-year member of Student Council and president of the organization this academic year.

Pattison participates on the Go Green Committee and the Bullying Prevention Committee, volunteers with the McKean County SPCA and the Special Olympics and takes part in the Tuna trails and Main Street

clean-ups and Read Across America.She has also received the

president’s physical fitness award, the math excellence award and science excellence award. During her high school career, Pattison has been named a scholar athlete.

Her parents are Tammy and Jerry Pattison of Bradford.

After high school graduation, she plans on studying in the nursing/midwifery program at Penn State-Behrend.

Also at the graduation ceremony, Sarah Eaton will deliver the class address.

Eaton is also a four-year member of Key Club and club editor; a four-year member of cross country and captain her junior and senior year; a three-year member of the swim team; and a two-year member of the track team. She is on the National Honor Society.

During her high school career, she was named Miss Bradford Area

High School.In addition, she has been an

altar server at St. Bernard Roman Catholic Church for eight years and a lifeguard and swimming instructor at the Barcroft Pool in Bradford.

She is the daughter of Kim Thurston and Chris Eaton of Bradford.

Eaton plans on attending the University of North Carolina, Greensboro.

Delivering the farewell address will be Alexis Thurston.

She has been involved with the Bradford Area High School Marching Owls for four years and is a member of the school’s Drama Club and is the vice president. She has also been part of high school musicals and is on the National Honor Society.

In 2014, she was named Bradford High homecoming queen.

Thurston is a waitress at John William’s European Pastry Shop.

She is the daughter of Nate Thurston and Andrea Prince of Bradford.

Thurston plans on attending the University of Pittsburgh main campus, majoring in global business management.

The top career and technical student, Samantha Johnson, will also be recognized at commencement.

Johnson has been involved with the National Technical Honor Society and Relay for Life. She is the vice president of the Family, Career and Community Leaders of America.

She is employed by the YMCA Prime Time Childcare.

Her parents are Stacey and David Johnson of Bradford.

Johnson’s plans include studying pre-nursing at the University of Pittsburgh at Bradford.

Class speakers announced for Bradford High graduation

Bradford Area High School alumna Emily Harsen has been named the keynote speaker for commencement exercises slated for 7 p.m. June 4 in the school auditorium.

Harsen graduated from Bradford High in 2005 with Honors, where she participated in the Marching Owls, Madrigal Singers, in district and regional band and choir. She attended Gettysburg College and graduated with honors, earning a bachelor of arts degree in sociology, concentrating in criminal deviancy and received a minor in British literature in 2009.

She authored and presented her

honors thesis in May 2009, titled “The Work Identity of Police Officers.” In 2006, Harsen had the opportunity to travel to Singapore and work on a project called The Social Construction of Chineseness in Singapore as an AsiaNetwork Student-Fellow.

In 2009, Harsen moved to Atlanta, Ga., to attend John Marshall Law School, where she served as the Justice for Phi Alpha Delta- The Hollowell Chapter. During law school, she interned with the McKean County district attorney’s office, Cobb County DA’s office and the District Attorney’s Office for the Paulding

Judicial Circuit. Harsen graduated in May of

2012 and was admitted to practice law in Georgia in October of 2012. Approximately six hours after receiving the news that she passed the Georgia Bar, she accepted an offer extended by the district attorney for the Paulding Judicial Circuit as an assistant district attorney.

In 2013, she was promoted to run the Domestic Violence and Sexual Assault Division as the Senior Assistant District Attorney, prosecuting all felony and misdemeanor domestic violence and sexual assault crimes. Under her

leadership, the division has grown with a prosecutor, victim-witness advocate, investigator and paralegal. The division works together to prosecute more than 450 cases annually.

Harsen continues to hone her legal expertise by attending conferences specializing in domestic violence and sexual assault and cherishes the opportunity to work within her community to spread awareness.

She received the Rising Star Award in 2014 and is a member of the Paulding County Domestic Violence Task Force.

Alexis ThurstonSarah EatonBrianna Pattison Samantha Johnson

The Bradford (Pa.) Era, Hats Off To Our Grads, Wednesday, June 3, 2015 - 3

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Politics, passion and wrestling? Thompson engages Bradford high students

By RUTH BOGDANEra [email protected]

“I want to encourage you to be lifelong learners.”

U.S. Rep. Glenn “GT” Thompson, R-Pa., offered these words Tuesday when students at Bradford Area High School received a rare treat — the chance to talk directly with a national legislator.

Thompson came to Bradford Tuesday morning to talk with senior government students about his career and to answer questions from the budding constituents, according to Tim Baumbach, 12th grade history teacher.

Baumbach explained the congressman was coming to talk about his role in government. Thompson visited a few years ago for the same purpose, he said.

Ken Coffman, dean of students, offered a brief biography of Thompson to the students before the talk began.

According to Coffman, Thompson is a resident of Howard Township, Centre County, and began his first of four terms representing the Fifth District of Pennsylvania on Nov. 4, 2008.

Thompson summarized his life into “three simple words”: Purpose, principals and passion. He talked to the students about how the words describe the way he lives.

For him, he found his life purpose of “making a difference in other people’s lives” when he was 11 and went to Boy Scouts with the foster child his parents adopted.

He said tasks such as his continued involvement with the Boy Scouts, his long-time nursing home career and his volunteer firefighter work bring him closer to that goal.

Regarding principles, Thompson told students he asks himself about four things before making decisions: His duty to God, his duty to his country, his duty to others and his duty to himself.

He offered some important advice about passion as well. The congressman told the students to do what they were passionate about and advised them not to take skeptics to heart. “Don’t let folks discourage you,” he said.

When the floor was opened to student questions, the youths offered an array of topics they had concerns and questions about.

He was asked about such things as his take on natural gas drilling and

hydrofracturing, whether he offered aid during the large water break this past winter in Bradford, what he knows about the cost to residents recently connected to the Bradford Sanitary Authority’s sewer system, the hardest bill he’s had to vote on, the most surprising thing he’s learned, whether he goes through security in Washington, D.C., and how much weight he can bench.

Incidentally, Thompson said now he can “bench a fork and a spoon at the same time,” but added he was recently inducted into the National Wrestling Hall of Fame. He was a high school wrestler.

U.S. Rep. Glenn Thompson, R-Pa., takes a few minutes to listen to concerns from Kyle Petitt, a senior at Bradford Area High School, before talking to the senior class at an assembly Tuesday morning. Kyle said the Congressman scheduled to meet with him after he tried to e-mail Thompson about concerns he had of Section 309 of the Intelligence Authorization Act, which talks about the acquisition of electronic communications.


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Community leaders: Bradford High students to attend national FCCLA convention in Washington

By KATE DAY SAGER�Era [email protected]

When Sapphire Wallin and Andrea Lipps attend the Family Career Community Leaders of America (FCCLA) National Convention this summer, they’ll brainstorm with other teenagers from across the country on how to bolster the clubs’ presence in their communities.�

One challenge the two Bradford Area High School juniors are currently facing is to�raise enough money to cover the costs of attending the July 5-9 event in Washington.�

In addition to raising $700 each, the youngsters have to raise additional funds to pay for a chaperone to attend. The state club will help by providing $300 for each girl to participate in the convention.

Wallin and Lipps are in Kimberly Preston’s Family and Consumer Science classes and were elected to FCCLA state offices earlier this year. Wallin was elected state secretary and Lipps was elected state vice president of programs.

Preston teaches classes on childcare and culinary arts, with students participating in FCCLA as a service organization.�

“Attending National Convention will help the girls in their leadership training,” Preston said. “The convention offers specific training sessions for state officers.”�

Preston said she had attended the Pennsylvania State Officers Orientation and Training session with the students this year and was impressed with the leadership training provided at the state level.

“I can only imagine that the national convention will compliment the state training,” Preston added.�

Wallin said she, too, is pleased with her appointment because of the leadership experience she will receive through her state post. She said her responsibilities as state secretary included the presentation of two speeches at the state conference held in Lake Harmony in March. As public speaking is her “grind,” Wallin had no qualms with speaking in front of the entire conference. Lipps also had to speak at a smaller meeting.�

Wallin said it is highly recommended that they attend the national conference in Washington, as it will help the local programs at Bradford High.�

“They want us to network with the other state officers to bounce ideas off each other and make our organization in Pennsylvania better,” Wallin

explained. “I’m so excited.”�Lipps said the Bradford High FCCLA group

hopes to invite the culinary art students into the club next year, which would be a new addition. As vice president of outreach, Lipps will work on creating state outreach programs each chapter can conduct.�

“Two years ago the (outreach) program was ‘No Kid Hungry’ and our chapter did it with the goal to raise a mile of food to donate to the local food banks,” Lipps recalled.�

She said this year’s outreach project encouraged families to eat together at the dinner table, which was successful on the local level.

The two girls said they expect to be busy organizing and conducting a sub sale in early May to raise some of the funds needed.�

“We are sincerely crossing our fingers” for a successful fundraiser, Wallin said. “If we raise enough money, we’d be able to go to Washington, D.C., the night before and watch the Fourth of July fireworks.”

The girls said donations for their project can be mailed to Bradford Area High School, 81 Interstate Parkway, Bradford, PA16701 c/o Kim Preston. Checks can be written to BAHS FCCLA Club.�


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Among the bestBAHS ranked by U.S. News & World Report

By ALEX DAVISEra [email protected]

Once again, the Bradford Area High School has been recognized as one of the best schools across Pennsylvania and the nation.

For the third consecutive year, U.S. News & World Report ranked the high school as a silver medalist, this year placing it 63 of 216 high schools ranked in the commonwealth. Across the United States, the high school is listed as 2,184 among thousands of other public high schools ranked.

“We all need some good news and proof that our hard work is paying off,” high school principal David Ray said in an email sent to faculty and staff.

The U.S. News & World Report developed the annual listing by reviewing several aspects of high schools, including test scores, college readiness, student/teacher ratio and

total enrollment, all information based on the 2012-13 school year.

Breaking down the 2015 Best High Schools report, 85 percent of students at Bradford Area High School were proficient in literature and 76 percent were proficient in mathematics. The scores are based on state exit exams and internationally available exams on college-level class work.

In addition, the high school has scored 22.9 percent in college readiness, factored on the number of students taking the Advanced Placement exam and percentages of students who are successful on at least one of those tests.

The findings also revealed that on the AP exams, 35 percent of the students participated, and 57 percent passed the tests.

In an interview with The Era, Ray praised the high school’s college-in-high-school courses and advanced-level placement class. The high school has a smattering of classes not found in schools locally,

he said.The school also has a career and

technical school, which Ray says results in better academic achievements.

The high school isn’t without its struggles, though, one of them which includes catering to economically disadvantaged students, Ray said. A total of 33 percent of the high school students are considered economically disadvantaged, according to the U.S. News & World Report.

A total of 30 percent of the economically disadvantaged students take part in the free lunch program and 3 percent in the reduced-price lunch program, according to the report.

“They (economically disadvantaged students) continue to be our focus,” Ray said.

The information used by the U.S. News & World Report lists an enrollment of about 755 students, and there were one teacher to every 13 students.

“The U.S. News & World Report

listing lets us see how we’re doing,” he said.

With the results, Ray expressed appreciation to high school teachers and staff, along with those at the other school buildings who prepared the students.

“Parents and the community deserves a share of our continued recognition as one of the best schools in Pennsylvania and the United States,” Ray said.

Making the U.S. News and World Report listing isn’t the only ranking received by the Bradford Area High School. In 2014, the school was named one of the top 500 high schools in the nation by Newsweek magazine.

“A high school diploma is essential for career and financial success,” said Brian Kelly, editor and chief content officer of U.S. News & World Report. “The Best High Schools rankings are a useful tool for families trying to discern how well schools are serving their students in preparation for college and careers.”


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Alma-Mater‘Mid the hills of Pennsylvania

Stands a school we love;Our devotion is as steadfast

As the stars above.

Chorus: Bradford High colors, Red and BlackMay they float for aye.

We’ll remember Alma MaterThroughout life’s long day.

Through we leave our Alma MaterLife’s great work to find.

Memories of friendship loyalLinger in our minds.

hats off to our grads

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