Schuman Wins Mac N' Cheese Contest
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- Written by Joanne Wallenstein
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On Sunday, March 3 Ira Schuman won best “Overall” in a Mac N" Cheese Bake Off sponsored by Angel Food East a not-for-profit organization in Kingston, New York.
This was the first time Schuman entered the contest and he took the award in a field of 30 other contestants including professional chefs and restaurants.
Ira was working from a recipe created by his wife, Assemblymember Amy Paulin, which he modified slightly. It was the first time he entered.
Paulin says, “Ira loves to cook and it occasionally comes out good.”
Pictured at top are Ira Schuman (left) with the woman who won the contest the prior three years and two of Ira's buddies.
Student Artist's Work on Exhibit at the Katonah Museum of Art
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- Written by Wendy MacMillan
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Olivia GaoScarsdale High School artists continue to shine! Just on the heels of being celebrated as “Artists of the Month” by Friends of Music & the Arts, senior artists Ben Dallal and Olivia Gao were chosen to showcase their work in the Young Artists Program and Exhibition at the Katonah Museum of Art. In addition to Dallal and Gao, seven other outstanding, senior artists were invited to showcase their pieces, including Naia Beckwith, Angela Chiang, Rachel Coplan, Ella Hayes, Riley Meltz, Maya Regenstreif and Randee Smith.
According to the museum website, “The Young Artists program and exhibition has been an annual tradition at the Katonah Museum of Art for 41 years. With the goal of providing hands-on, learning experiences to aspiring artists, this unique initiative offers meaningful student participation in the exhibition planning process from beginning to end. Under the guidance of museum professionals, students take on the roles of artist, graphic designer, curator, exhibition designer, and installer as they work collaboratively with the KMA’s staff to mount this impressive exhibition.
Young Artists 2024 reflects the depth and diversity of expression among these emerging artists. On view are 365 artworks by high school seniors from forty-three schools across Fairfield, Putnam, Rockland, and Westchester counties. The exhibition is a tribute to the talents of the young artists, the dedication of their teachers, and the support of their families. Young Artists illustrates the KMA’s steadfast commitment to providing dynamic museum education opportunities to our communities and fostering the next generation of creative thinkers and artists.”
Angela Chiang
The show, (featuring drawings, paintings, photography, and so much more), is nothing short of amazing. As you walk through the art-filled rooms, it's hard to believe that the works were created by teenagers and not seasoned professionals.
In addition to supporting our very own talented, young artists, a trip to the picturesque Village of Katonah, with its quaint stores, highly-rated restaurants and cafes, is a perfect way to spend a wintery afternoon. The gallery is open Tuesday through Saturday from 10 to 5 and on Sundays from 12 to 5, so make it an adventure and be sure to check the Young Artists Exhibition before it ends on March 3rd!
For more information visit here.
Naia Beckwith
Ella Hayes
Maya Regenstreif
Randee Smith
Come to Beeee a Contestant Or to Cheer the Spellers On…
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The Friends of Scarsdale Library invites you to join them on Friday, March 1, at 7:30pm (snow date, Friday, March 8) at SHS Auditorium for a fabulous, fun community event to benefit Scarsdale Library.
Scarsdale’s greatest (or bravest) spellers will battle it out on stage while onlookers spell along at their seats–where it’s somehow much easier. We are limited to just 15 teams of three adults each to compete in multiple rounds, or in bee-speak, swarms. There will also be a separate set of swarms for high schoolers.
All proceeds will benefit the Scarsdale Public Library and enable the SPL (which, come to think of it, could be pronounced “spell”) to continue to offer the unique programs and speakers we all enjoy throughout the year.
Josh Milstein, a 2006 SHS alumnus will emcee the bee, and Mayor Justin Arest, Library Director Beth Bermel, and NYS Assemblywoman Amy Paulin will serve as judges.
Please get your team together and sign up here: Spelling Bee 2024
Registration for adult teams is $180 and for teen teams it’s $75. All participants get Bee t-shirts and water bottles.There also will be prizes galore, and, of course, Queen Bee bragging rights for the winners.
We don’t want to drone on, so we’ll end it here. Looking forward to seeing you there!
Student Artists of the Month
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Persona by Olivia Gao for 3D Art (Mid Nov - Dec)Scarsdale High School art students take center stage as they are honored by Friends of Music & the Arts and recognized as “Student Artists of the Month”. Friends of Music & the Arts, a nonprofit parent booster group that supports visual and performing arts in Scarsdale schools, has so far selected three talented seniors whose work has been featured in the showcases at the Brewster entrance of the high school. The honorees and their work are displayed here.
The FMA SHS art committee explains, “To become “Student Artist of the Month”, the Senior must first be nominated by their teacher from AT 2D and/or 3D Art. The entire art department then meets to review the students’ work and agrees upon a nomination. They look at students who are considering art in some form as a major in college or art school.
Stretch by Ben Dallal for both 2D and 3D Art (Mid Jan - Feb)
Parents are welcome to come see the showcases around the school and to visit the art gallery which exhibits works from all areas of the curriculum, Freshman through AT, throughout the year. The next student art gallery show will open February 14.
FMA will continue to celebrate different Artists of the Month throughout the school year and looks forward to spotlighting even more SHS artists at a spring gallery showing, most likely on April 16th.
Pears by Stella Canora for both 2D and 3D Art (Mid Oct - Nov)
The Gamification—of Everything
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- Written by Sameer Ahuja
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Seen Squid Game?
It’s a wildly popular South Korean survival drama series that’s become a global sensation on Netflix. The plot revolves around people who are deeply in debt and struggling financially. Exploiting their economic straits, a shadowy organization invites them to participate in a survival competition as a way out.
Superficially, the contest involves a series of six traditional kids' games. These games seem innocent at first glance—belying something sinister. There’s a deadly twist: losing a game will result in the player's death.
The ultimate prize for the last survivor? A massive cash reward.
Just as the Hunger Games reveal just how far some will go to survive,
This K-drama serves as a cautionary tale on the dangers of reducing complex human experiences and struggles to mere games. Can Squid Game show us the negative aspects of over-gamification in today’s society? And how can the continual pressure to compete—even in safer, more banal contests—transform individuals and their value systems?
To put it in simpler terms, if our incentives in life revolve around scarcity and a zero-sum mentality, how can we ever retain our principles?
In today’s fast-paced world, where the average attention span is not much better than a goldfish’s, businesses are adopting an intriguing strategy to keep consumers and employees engaged: gamification. This approach, which injects game-like elements into non-game environments, is revolutionizing everything from language learning apps to the food industry and beyond.
Of course, markets don’t follow trends unless there’s a payoff involved—its own kind of game. So why does gamification work so well? Psychology.
At its core, gamification taps into basic human desires for reward, achievement, and status. By incorporating challenges, points, leaderboards, rewards, risks, and the possibility of loss into everyday activities, innovative businesses can motivate and engage audiences more effectively.
Writer and entrepreneur Nir Eyal captures this phenomenon with what he calls the “Hook Model.” The Hook Model is a cycle comprised of four parts: trigger, action, reward, and investment. According to Eyal, this method is vital to creating desired habitual behaviors—or gamifying our brains.
One of the most well-known examples of such gamification is Duolingo. A popular language learning app, it exemplifies gamification in education. Turning language proficiency into a series of challenges with rewards for progress keeps learners both engaged and motivated.
The result? Users spend more time on the app, learning more effectively. It’s yet to be seen if people en masse will go so far as to master a second language via Duolingo, but it’s clear that the app has impacted the market.
Similarly, other educational platforms like CodeAcademy harness gamification to enhance student engagement and learning retention.
Beyond consumer apps, gamification is making workplace inroads. Companies are leveraging game mechanics to increase employee productivity. From sales competitions to gamified training modules, this approach transforms how employees work, incentivizing tasks in novel ways.
For more evidence, look no further than the everyday apps we use, such as Slack. While Slack is not a game per se, its design and functionality incorporate elements characteristic of gamification, enhancing user engagement and interaction. Slack provides instant feedback through notifications, which can be gratifying for users. The immediate response to messages or actions (like someone reacting to your message) mimics the instant feedback loops often found in games, which can be psychologically rewarding. These feedback loops are useful, especially for remote managers tasked with retaining engagement during the work-from-home revolution.
While gamification offers benefits, it's not without its challenges. Critics argue it can lead to addictive behaviors, often overshadowing the intrinsic value of activities. Even eLearning leaders who extol gamification as a net-positive, grok the potential risks for increased addiction. Companies must, therefore, design gamified systems responsibly, ensuring that they encourage healthy behaviors, not exploit users' psychological vulnerabilities.
Like anything else, gamification is best in moderation.
But the essential key? Consent. A study from Harvard Business School concluded gamification is only successful when participants are willing and eager to play. According to the authors, “We highlight the role of consent (Burawoy, 1979) as a psychological response to mandatory fun, which moderates these relationships and, in a field experiment, find that games, when consented to, increase positive affect at work, but, when consent is lacking, decrease positive affect.”
So where do we draw the line? Should everything be gamified? Or like with AI, should we develop a “Dos and Don’ts” list? Similar to how our data is now appropriated by so many advertisers—eliciting societal concern— should we also be more cautious about how gamification commodifies our attention?
After all, there is a risk that gamification, particularly when tied to essential aspects of life, such as finance, health, or education, can be used to manipulate people for the benefit of those in power, rather than for the participants' benefit.
From making learning more effective to turning routine tasks into exciting challenges, gamification has the potential to enrich our daily lives. In fact, we’re only at the beginning, because as technology advances, the potential for gamification grows. Augmented Reality (AR), AI, and machine learning may soon offer even more personalized and immersive gamified experiences.
Still, as we move forward, it’s best we relegate gamification to responsible realms and away from our most crucial institutions. Otherwise, we risk the reality portrayed in Squid Game where we’re willing to eschew our principles for rewarding feedback loops—even ones threatening dark outcomes.
Author Sameer Ahuja is a tech executive and Scarsdale Village Trustee Ahuja who writes a newsletter, Consume at Once, that discusses how technology is transforming how we create and consume movies, videos, TV, games, sports, and social media.
