Pascack Valley Community Life from Westwood, New Jersey • A24

Pascack Valley Community Life SCHOOLS JANUARY 26, 2012 PAGE 24 PHOTO COURTESY OF LISA RUGGIERI The CyberHawks Robotic Team of Holdrum Middle School, River Vale, won the Champions Award at the New Jersey FIRST Lego League Championship in Flanders last month. The team's performance qualified them to be invited to the World Championship FIRST Leqo League Festival in St. Louis, in April. LEGO LEAGUE ROBOTICS CyberHawks qualify for World Championships League, the presentation requires team members to explore an actual problem that today's scientists and engineers are trying to solve and then develop an innovative solution to the problem and share their findings. This year's "Food Factor" theme had the teams exploring food safety from possible points of contamination: during processing and transportation to unsanitary preparation and storage and then find ways to prevent or combat these contaminants.

They also scored well on the Core Values judging, the fundamental elements that Information contained in this article was provided by Lisa Ruggieri. RIVER VALE The CyberHawks, a Holdrum Middle School FIRST Lego League (FLL) robotic team recently competed in the New Jersey Championships in Flanders. They qualified for the state tournament after wining the Over-all Champions Award at the Bergen Qualifying Tournament in November. At the state tournament, the team won the Champions Award. The winning team is chosen by the judges of three categories of competition: Robot Design; Research Presentation; and Core Values, as well as the results of the Robot Performance portion of the competition.

The CyberHawks earned a perfect score on Robot Design, wherein teams build and program an autonomous robot using LEGO MINDSTORM technology to score points in 2.5 minute matches on playing field themed to this year's Challenge, "Food Factor." The team had a near-perfect score on their Research Presentation, losing one point. According to FIRST Lego TOWNSHIP OF WASHINGTON Matthew Zlotkin FORDHAM UNIVERSITY Matthew Zlotkin is honors graduate TOWNSHIP OF WASHINGTON Matthew Zlotkin recently graduated magna cum laude from Fordham University Business School where he earned an accountingfinance degree. He is a member of Phi Kappa Phi National Honor Society; Fordham's Business School's Boyle Honor Society; Beta Gama Sigma, the national business honor society, and Phi Alpha Phi, the accounting and finance national honor society. He is currently employed with KPMG and is working toward his Certified Public Account certification. A 2007 graduate of Westwood Regional High School, he is the son of Marie and Marc Zlotkin, also of the township.

HILLSDALE Relay for Life kick-off meeting is at PV on Feb. 1 On Wednesday, Feb. 1, Relay for Life of Pascack Valley will hold a kick-off celebration of the American Cancer Society's May 20-21 event to raise awareness and funding to fight cancer. The meeting will be held at Pascack Valley High School, 200 Piermont at 7:30 p.m. For more information or to indicate attendance, call 201-457-3418, ext.

2225 or email pascack.valley.relaycancer.org. To join the Cancer Prevention Study attend the meeting or visit cancer.orgcps3. distinguish FLL from other programs of its kinds. Participants learn that friendly competition and mutual gain are not separate goals, and that helping one another is the foundation of teamwork. Overall, the Cyberhawks placed third out of 48 teams in Robot Performance.

As a result of their showing at the state tournament, the team qualified to be invited to the World Championship FLL Festival in St. Louis, in April FLL teams from around the world meet for two days of friendly of competition. ARING PHOTO COURTESY OF DONNA DEJOIE Courtney Dejoie honored by Oticon MaDVANC BY KATHRYN BURGER Staff Writer A fourth-grader at Brookside School in Township of Washington who has overcome the challenges she faced when diagnosed with a hearing deficit was recently nominated for an award by her doctor who was inspired by her story. Last May, an article about how 9-year-old Courtney Dejoie, who overcame the challenges she faced when, as a first-grader, it was found that she had a hearing deficit, was published in Community Life. After extensive testing, she was fitted with hearing aids in the summer before she began second grade.

Her mother, Donna, said, at first, she was "very resistant" about wearing them. But that summer she met three children -triplets who would soon become her best friends. Two of them are hearing impaired. Her mom said that meeting them made all the difference. By the time the school year started she wasn't self-conscious about her hearing aids.

But she faced another challenge, this one academic. She struggled with her school work because it had been difficult for her to keep up before she got her hearing aids. She got the academic support she needed by switching to Brookside School, where the triplets went to school, and goes to classes with her hearing impaired friends. Her second grade teacher at Washington School invited her to come and speak to her current students about what it's like to be hearing impaired. And she wrote a book about how she met her best friends.

Her story inspired her audiolo-SEE DEJOIE, PAGE 28 Courtney DeJoie was honored for helping to change people's perception of people with hearing loss. She is pictured here with Nancy Palmere of Oticon, and Tom Higgins, of Advanced Hearing Services, Ramsey, who presented the certificate..