CHSAANow

Category: Activities

  • Adviser University accepting applications

    Adviser University, a one-day training conference for student leadership advisers, is now accepting registrations.

    The conference, set for April 20, is $75 if registered before March 13. After March 13, registration is $85.

    Use this form to register.

  • Photos: Fall Student Leadership Conference at Golden HS

    GOLDEN — Photos from the 2014 Fall Student Leadership Conference, held at Golden High School.

  • 2014 CHSAA music adjudicator conference call

    CHSAA staff held a conference call with music adjudicators on Wednesday. A full replay of that call is below.

    The agenda for the call:

    Download: PDF
    https://old.chsaanow.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/08/2014_Music_Adjudicator_Conference_Call_Agenda-_Website.pdf

  • CHSAA and Mullen speech legend Frank Sferra passes away

    Frank Sferra.
    Frank Sferra.

    For 57 years, Frank Sferra was a speech coach at Mullen High School. But the breadth of his impact in speech activities reached throughout Colorado and the nation.

    Sferra, 77, had long been recognized as the preeminent speech coach in the country by educators and speech/debate professionals. He passed away Wednesday morning after a long illness.

    “Frank was a passionate man who gave his life to his students. His impact on the Colorado speech community is immeasurable,” CHSAA commissioner Paul Angelico said. “He is speech to Colorado’s high schools. We will miss him as a teacher and coach, but even more as a man of integrity and character, and as a friend.”

    Sferra served 10 years as president of the National Forensics League (NFL) and spent nearly every year since 1966 on the NFL Executive Council. In Colorado, he served 20 years on CHSAA’s Speech Advisory Committee, including 18 as chair.

    He is a member of the National Forensics League Hall of Fame, the CHSAA Hall of Fame (1991) and the National Federation of State High School Associations’ Hall of Fame (2003).

    In fact, Sferra was the first speech individual inducted into the National High School Hall of Fame.

    Just this past June, Sferra was presented with the inaugural NFHS Section 6 Heart of the Arts Award for his work in speech activities.

    He will be remembered as the person who started the Colorado state speech tournament. His Mullen students enjoyed great success at the state and national level. In 2012, Sferra became a 7 Diamond coach in the NFL, one of very few to reach that level.

    Frank Sferra's Heart of the Arts trophy.
    Frank Sferra’s Heart of the Arts trophy.

    Sferra was a graduate of Regis Jesuit High School and Regis Univeristy. He held a Master’s Degree in Communication from the University of Colorado. A Denver native, he was a teacher at Regis Jesuit, St. Joseph, Bishop Machebeuf and Mullen high schools for 57 years.

    In an email, Mullen President and CEO Carl Unrein wrote:

    We recognize Frank’s passing will impact our Mullen community on many levels. Frank was such an integral part of Mullen’s history and our Lasallian Mission. Frank was a long-time educator at Mullen High School and his tenure spanned seven decades. Notably, his accomplishments included a nationally prominent Speech and Debate program. However, Frank impacted the entire Mullen community with unmatched dedication to our students and an unrivaled commitment to excellence and integrity. His legacy will endure for many years to come, particularly to Frank’s friends in the Speech and Debate community and the Colorado High School Activities Association.

    Services are pending and will be updated when known.

  • Casey: Once again, the Student Leadership Camp proves its value

    CHSAA Student Leadership Camp
    This year’s attendees to CHSAA’s Student Leadership Camp. (Troy Rivera) More photos »

    FORT COLLINS — This week was a great reminder that this Association is about more than just athletics.

    Monday brought the return of the annual CHSAA Student Leadership Camp to CSU. It was something I was exposed to for the first time last summer, and it was slightly overwhelming then — hundreds of eager, high-energy students just waiting to be involved. In anything.

    These kids are, quite literally, the best-of-the-best when it comes to leadership in Colorado’s high schools.

    CHSAA student leadership
    (Troy Rivera) More photos »

    Last summer, the thought crossed my mind that this Leadership Camp was the best thing CHSAA does. This year’s trip only reinforced that notion.

    Think about CHSAA’s stated mission — in large part, to “provide an environment that enhances personal development through sporting behavior, character education, teamwork, leadership, and citizenship.”

    The annual camp — this summer actually marked the 50th anniversary — ticks all those boxes. Students attend keynote speeches, they have breakout sessions on a variety of topics, they absorb seemingly everything they can about leadership in four jam-packed days. And then they take it all back to their schools and disseminate it to their respective student bodies.

    The camp is the epitome of the Association’s overriding goal: to create better students and citizens. It is something special, and offers a unique view at our state’s future.

    A major part of this is the kids who attend. Like I said, they are the type who want to learn, who want to be involved. They make great pupils for Rashaan Davis, Harry Waterman, Troy Rivera and the dozens of other staff members who put the camp together.

    When the four days are up, and the camp concludes, the staff has to drag the students out of their dorms. Because with so many like-minded individuals in one place, the camp forms a kind of lasting bond among its attendees.

    Just ask them:

  • Photos: Student Leadership Camp comes to a close

    FORT COLLINS — The 50th annual Student Leadership Camp came to a close on Thursday.

    Below are photos from Wednesday and Thursday at the four-day camp, which was held on the campus of Colorado State University this week.

  • Photos: Student Leadership Camp rolls on in Day 2

    FORT COLLINS — The Student Leadership Camp continued with its second at at Colorado State University on Tuesday.

  • Photos: Student Leadership Camp kicks off at CSU

    FORT COLLINS — This year’s CHSAA Student Leadership Camp kicked off on the campus of Colorado State University on Monday.

    This year marks the 50th anniversary for the camp, which runs through Thursday. Students from around the state attend to learn how to be better leaders in their schools, and exchange ideas.

  • Photos: Captain to Captain Leader to Leader Summit

    BOULDER — CHSAA and the University of Colorado’s Leadership Development Program held the Captain to Captain Leader to Leader Summit on Tuesday.

  • Niwot choir, set to perform at Vocal Gala, had Broadway experience

    Music
    (CHSAANow.com)

    The Niwot High School Choir had an opportunity thousands dream of hope to realize as adults.

    Niwot’s choir took part in a one-night-only concert version of the musical The Titanic on Broadway in February. The concert, held at Avery Fisher Hall in New York City, returned to the stage seventeen years after Maury Yeston and Peter Stone’s Tony-award winning musical debuted. Students from Niwot were invited to participate in the celebration of the musical after being selected by Manhattan Concert Productions upon submission of an audio recording of their music.

    “They invite students from across the country,” Kim Watkins, Niwot’s Vocal Music Director, said of the event. “The chorus was comprised of a little over 200 students from across the country at various (high) schools. We had 26 students from Niwot participate and I opened it up to anyone in an auditioned choir. They could choose to pick the trip or not, and if they were in a non-auditioned choir they had to audition for me for the opportunity to attend. Then we prepared them in advance.

    “The Broadway stars and the guy that conducted them on Broadway and a lot of the original Broadway cast came out and played the leading roles,” Watkins added. “The kids got to participate in the chorus, got to have a lot of rehearsal time with the principle characters and watched them in action. There was a cast party and they got to talk to them and take photos and ask questions. It was a really cool experience.”

    Joe Castinado, a junior at Niwot, won the coveted role of the Bell Boy. He was the only person in a named role that had never been on Broadway before.

    “It was such an incredible opportunity,” Watkins said of her students’ participation in the musical. “These high school students essentially got to be on Broadway for a night. They had the opportunity to assemble with this Tony award winning cast and to perform under a conductor who has this huge reputation and has conducted all these major Broadway shows.

    “It was just such an amazing experience for the students to be exposed to the conductor and to all of the Broadway stars. I came away from it thinking it was one of the most incredible things I’ve been a part of and I think a lot of the students would say that it was the best experience of their life.”

    The Niwot choir is one of 12 outstanding high school groups selected to attend the CHSAA Vocal Music Gala, a special concert held on Friday, May 2.

    Niwot will be performing songs unrelated to The Titanic. Watkins said there are lots of legalities involved when it comes to performing musicals at the Gala and, for CHSAA Festivals, classical music is encouraged.

    “We’re going to perform our festival literature,” Watkins said of Friday’s concert. “We’re singing four pieces and they have nothing do with Titanic. We will be performing the literature we sang for the judges at the CHSAA Large Group Northern that just happened a couple of weeks ago.”

    The Gala will showcase choirs from the following high schools: Lutheran, Castle View, Air Academy, Montezuma-Cortez, Palmer Ridge, Mitchell, D’Evelyn, Harrison, Loveland, Discovery Canyon, Niwot and Lewis-Palmer.

    The concert will be held at the Newman Center for the Performing Arts at the University of Denver. Tickets are $10 for adults and $7 for students and senior citizens. Seating at the Newman Center is limited, so it is highly encouraged to buy tickets in advance (303-871-7720) or show up early at the ticket box office.