.png){kind=logo}
2015 Derek Park Fund Grant Award Winners Announced
St. Andrew’s Episcopal School’s Head of School Robert Kosasky announced the winners of the Derek Park Fund Grant for Creative Innovation on Monday morning. The Fund was created in memory of former student, Derek Park, who died tragically on November 26, 2011. Four awards were handed out in total, two to students and two to faculty.
Gracie Ashworth ’16, Ben Wang ’17, Kim O’Shaughnessy and Ritchie Porter each earned individual grants that speak to Derek’s love of the arts and science.
Derek Park was a student at St. Andrew’s from sixth grade through the end of the first trimester of his ninth-grade year. At the time of his death, the Derek Park Fund was created to provide grants to students and faculty seeking creative innovation and personal development. Derek was a member of the Jazz Band (clarinet) and loved being out in nature playing, fishing, riding a bike or hiking. He was an imaginative and creative person who experimented freely with the physics in our world.
Ashworth will use her grant to take a nature photography workshop and put together an exhibition that shows the beauty of the world, something Derek connected with.
Wang will use his grant to build a 3D scale model of St. Andrew’s future Student Center. The sophomore has taken summer architecture courses at University of Illinois and Syracuse University and his model will help build excitement about the proposed Student Center.
O’Shaughnessy, who teaches Middle School science, will use her grant to purchase 4 Lego NXT intelligent bricks, the computer portion of Lego robots, for use in the middle school. This would allow students to learn programming and code writing at the entry level and progress with their skills to more complex problem solving.
Porter, who teaches performing arts on the Postoak Campus, will use his grant to develop an original play, one that explores themes of the purpose of art and performance.
St. Andrew’s Episcopal School is a private, coeducational college preparatory day school for students in preschool (Age 2) through grade 12, located in Potomac, Maryland.