New Castle students show drive with Project Ignition

Staff report

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Two groups of students from New Castle Junior/Senior High School participated last month in the National Service-Learning Conference in Atlanta, Ga. Donna Campbell and Angela McConnell, Project Ignition team advisers, accompanied juniors Alesia Pickney, Nicole Long, Victoria Stone, Christopher Hare, Nicholas Totin and Jeffrey Fandozzi to the conference.

New Castle’s Project Ignition Team honored advisers Campbell and McConnell at the State Farm Awards Ceremony at the Georgia Aquarium earlier this month by presenting them with a plaque.

The team has advanced to the Tier 3 level of competition and will mentor other schools getting started in creating teen-driver-safety programs nationwide.

New Castle’s Project Ignition team, created in 2007, has received national recognition for its teen-driver-safety campaign. In 2009, they were named Best of the Best in the nation and received a $10,000 check to continue their efforts.

In October, they received another $2,500 and were named a Tier 2 Leader School.

Students involved in this year’s campaign set up a booth in Ignition Land, were engaged in several workshops and responsible for flash-mob activities, filming and interviewing conference participants and assisting with gift giveaways.

Fran Joseph and Kathleen Daytner, service-learning coordinator and co-coordinator, respectively, accompanied eight additional senior students to the conference.

Those students included Ronald Wratny, Grant Farah, Elise Moyer, Kristen Koscinski, Michelle Lloyd, Nicole Natale, Alysa DeLillo and Kayla Fields. All of these students are in Joseph’s service-learning program at New Castle and attended various workshops to bring back ideas for future use.

Joseph and Daytner have been attending the National Service-Learning Conference for seven years.

High School Principal J.R. Respress also made the trip.