Olivia Newcomb and Michael Guzman, both Hood River Valley High School seniors, have been selected as the latest Elks Students of the Month. They were honored at the weekly meeting and presented checks for $100 each in recognition of their high achievements at school and their outstanding work in the community. They, along with the other monthly winners, will be honored at a year-end banquet, to be held at the Elks Lodge on June 5.
Included among Olivia’s many talents is her ability to sing and perform on stage. She has been acting since her freshman year and has performed in “Legally Blonde,” “Reach for It,” “Into the Woods,” and most recently, as Rizzo is “Grease.” She has also performed in “Hamlet,” “Does My Head Look Big in This,” “The Mad Woman of Chaillot,” and is currently playing Kate in “The Taming of the Shrew.” She has been taking voice lessons for six years and is the only female in a small acapella ensemble, performing both traditional choral music and recent pop. She has also studied modern and jazz dancing.
Olivia is a member of the National Honor Society and the United Nations Club, where they debate worldly problems as individual countries. As a junior, she served as class vice president, where she planned events such as prom. She is also a four year member of the varsity tennis team and plays both singles and doubles.
This past month, Olivia went to Tanzania, Africa, to help implement the Full Circle Learning program at the Your Sisters orphanage, and also at the Dinka School. Along with an experienced trainer named Maureen Mungai, she helped implement the program into the community. It will be introduced to nine more African countries in the near future. She has spent a week volunteering at a care farm called Sanctuary One, a home for injured and abandoned farm animals. This is a place where they can be rehabilitated and hopefully adopted into a new home.
Olivia has also spent time volunteering at the Blanchet House, a facility in Portland serving meals to the homeless. She worked as a waitress and food prepper, and learned about the homeless population. She has also worked with the Riverside youth group, where she spent a week at the White Swan Indian Reservation in Yakima, Wash. While there, she worked on a variety of different projects, including ripping up carpet in a homeless shelter, cleaning the local school, serving dinner to the homeless and working with children in an educational summer camp.
Olivia is the daughter of Gretchen and Doug Newcomb and has a younger brother, Phineas, a freshman at HRVHS. After high school, Olivia will accept a position as ambassador with Full Circle Learning and travel to India, China and Africa to help implement the program. Following that, she will attend a university studying in a field that will be applicable to a non-governmental agency, such as the Peace Corps, which is where she would ultimately like to work. She has narrowed her college choices to Northeastern, Smith College, Princeton, Yale and Seattle University. She wants to spend her life traveling, volunteering, learning and making music. When she has time she enjoys reading, watching Netflix and petting her cat.
Michael likes to help, be involved and learn by being pro-active. He is a member of the Health Media Club, which serves to reduce and prevent the use of drugs by students in the community through advertising campaigns in the media. This year, he is the MECHA Club president, which is dedicated to celebrating the Spanish community through outreach and advocating the culture, history and education of Latinos. He is also a member of the Robotics Club, where they develop robots for competition and, with a group of other students, is developing a prosthetic hand for a member of the community. He is involved in video production, developing skills in photography, video and audio production.
He has worked as a project engineer intern for Insitsu, where he prepared test equipment and traveled to test sites to support the Skyhook Recovery System. He organized, managed and shared test data with teams using Excel and Sharepoint. He also utilized a program called Solid Works to provide reference for an un-modeled machine component. He has worked at the Hood River County migrant summer school as a science teacher assistant, where he helped the teacher with kindergarten through eighth grade students. He helped develop techniques to keep students engaged and organized field trips. Michael is a member of the Model United Nations, where students develop an understanding about diplomacy and international relations.
Other volunteer work includes the National Honor Society, where he volunteers for community projects and helps prepare school activities. He is also inovled with Leaders of Tomorrow, meeting with local business owners to develop leadership skills and plan for the future of the community. He spends time at WAAAM as a volunteer, helping with new displays or odd jobs.
Michael is the son of Maria and Serafin Guzman, and he has an older sister, Elizabeth. Following high school, he would like to attend MIT, Cal Tech, Yale, or Stanford University and major in engineering. He would like to become an aerospace engineer and hopefully work for NASA or Boeing following college. In his spare time, he enjoys photography and listening to music.
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