At the NCASA annual meeting held on Saturday, May 16, Atkins HS and several Atkins personnel received honors. For an amazing tenth year in a row, Atkins is the recipient of the statewide recipient of the NCASA Joe Childers Scholastic Cup award, which is given to the "top school in North Carolina" for its performance in Scholastic competitions throughout the year.
"I'm really proud of our school, since some of our nearest competitors are schools twice or three times our size," said Scholastic Director Scott Plaster, who accepted the Cup award on the school's behalf. The school amassed nearly 500 points for competitions hosted by NCASA such as the Quiz Bowl, Twelve, A Cappella, and Dance Ensemble, but also for "partner" competitions such as Science Olympiad and Chess. Atkins has teams for 15 of the 18 competitions that contribute toward the Cup. These competitions range the gamut, including knowledge based competitions in various subject areas, several STEM competitions, and also several in the fine arts categories.
The namesake of the Cup, Joe Childers, was also inducted into the NCASA Hall of Fame. Joe Childers is the former principal of Atkins who passed away unexpectedly five years ago. It was his vision in building the environment at Atkins where Scholastics thrive, and are recognized equally right alongside Athletics, Fine Arts, and JROTC. His legacy is carried on at Atkins in its Letterman Celebration, which recently honored over 50 competing teams at the school, and inducted four new members into the Letterman HOF.
In addition, two Atkins staff members were included in the annual meeting. Scott Plaster was elected again as Vice President of NCASA and Sylvia Wright was voted in as a board member. Plaster has been on the board of directors for NCASA for the past 14 years, and has been VP many of those years. Wright was also elected as Secretary of the organization.
Plaster delivered the President's message at the meeting, in which he emphasized that the NCASA group is at a critical juncture with it being the first year with its new Executive Director, Ryan Kluk, who replaces the founder and retiring director of NCASA, Leon Pfeiffer.
