Twelve Maricopa High School students earned national honors on the 2019 Level 2 National German Exam (NGE).
Senior Skylar Nelson and sophomore Abigail Poland earned gold medals, scoring in the top 10 percent nationally. Senior Cobe Nadelen and sophomores Geric Kramarczyk and Regan Elsberry earned silver medals, and seniors Drake Cole and Lucas Dial earned bronze medals. Senior Destinee Chavis, junior Grace Njue, and sophomores Elizabeth Barba, Omar Perez, and Nathaly Zavala earned honorable mentions.
“This year’s NGE was more difficult than last year’s, as evidenced by the significantly lower national average score on this year’s exam. Yet, we still had twelve national placers to last year’s eleven in spite of that,” said McKay Jones, German teacher at MHS. “The big news is that we had two national finalists this year, and one of them won a study trip!”
Abigail Poland was awarded an all‐expense‐paid summer study trip to Germany. Abigail was selected as a national winner after scoring in the 97th percentile nationally on the NGE. As a gold medalist, she was eligible to apply for the trip, which included essays in German and English. Students from each state were selected from these applications to be interviewed in German, and candidates were then selected from the interview process to be sent to the national committee of the American Association of Teachers of German (AATG). Abigail was one of forty‐four outstanding German students selected from across the US to receive the award.
The study trip includes round‐trip air transportation to Germany from New York, a homestay in a host family, a two-week international seminar, and excursions to places of cultural and historical significance. The study trip, now in its 60th year, is made possible through a grant from the Federal Republic of Germany.
Another student at MHS, Skylar Nelson, was also a national finalist.
