Dear Maxwell Supporter,

The end of another school year is upon us. The year was very different and challenging. I applaud our students, teachers, and staff as they handled the pandemic like true champions. The school year quickly passed, but it has afforded us the time to celebrate, recognize, reflect and turn the light out on a fantastic school year. I would like to take this opportunity to say thank you to our students and staff for a job well done. Our stakeholders have put forth a great effort this year. We had great success with our student organizations: FCCLA, HOSA, and SkillsUSA. In addition, our Work Ready advisement program provided students the opportunity to experience real-life activities that prepare them for college, work, and life. Our counselors also hosted a successful virtual College and Career Fair. We feature the student of the year for each Maxwell program, as well as our National Technical Honor Society students. We also feature award winning Electronics students. We are able to highlight our Healthcare Science program’s new state of the art 3-D computer table, a great learning tool for our students. Please take a few moments to read about a student who received an aviation scholarship and our new program offering next year: Animation and Digital Media. Be sure to learn about GCPS summer school opportunities for students. We look forward to hosting middle school summer camp, a wonderful opportunity for us to showcase our programs to potential future students. I wish nothing but success for our students and hope everyone has a relaxing and restful summer. As always, please know our doors are open to you and thank you for your support. Go Navigators!

Dr. Jeff Hall

Principal

Maxwell High School of Technology

SkillsUSA Georgia held its annual State Leadership and Skills Conference virtually this past March. Maxwell High School of Technology had 28 students competing at the State

Championships. Maxwell contestants brought home six gold medals, ten silver medals, and three bronze medals. The State Championships allow students to showcase the leadership and skills training they have obtained during the school year. First Place State winners advance to the National Championships, which will be held virtually in June. Congratulations to Maxwell’s medalists and good luck to the 1st Place winners competing at the National Championships!

Maxwell is offering an Animation and Digital Media program combined with AP Computer Science for fall of the 2021-22 school year. This class will cultivate a unique combination of technical and creative skills prepping students for both design oriented and software development pathways. Students will work on traditional skills for animators such as drawing and design and how they relate to working with digital media tools like Adobe Photoshop, Illustrator, and Animate. In addition, students will make 2D animation for the web using Dreamweaver and other tools. HTML5 programming skills are utilized to make the animation interactive with CSS and JavaScript. Students will experiment with 3D modeling concepts with Blender, an open source 3D modeling and animation tool. This includes creating characters, environments, lighting in the 3D world, applying textures, and making things move. Students will also study Object Oriented Programming and modern software development skills and concepts with Java and Eclipse as a code editor. The Animation and Digital Media program will culminate with students producing a portfolio of work and having the opportunity to take the AP Computer Science test at the end of spring semester. The pathway will be a good on-ramp for several area college programs that have multiple tracks in related career areas.

This year, the architecture students competed in the American Institute of Architects High School Design Competition (AIA HSDC) to design a community center on a site in Atlanta off of the Beltline. Thanks to Kenji Tillman and Mike Clifford of BCA Architects, Stephen Fleming of RJT+R, Mike Rossi of Hill Foley Rossi and Associates, and Ryan Crooks of Georgia State Interior Design for serving on review boards for the projects. Out of 13 students, eight students placed or won honorable mention! Asbel Acevedo, Mike Henriquez, and David Quintero earned first place in the group category; followed by Katliyn Davis, Mia Roxbury, and Sierra Merrick earning third place; and Jordan Beason and Jose Salazar Reyna earning an honorable mention (pictured above).

During second semester, 24 architecture students qualified to take the Autodesk Certified User Exam in Revit Architecture, and 100% of the students passed.

For the 2021-2022 school year, three architecture students, Maria Salazar, Amani White, and Katliyn Davis, will work in Work Based Learning (WBL) positions at architecture firms at Lindsay, Pope, Brayfield and Associates in Lawrenceville, and Hill Foley Rossi in Duluth. Former architecture students and current WBL students, Precious Ceballos and Sophia Nguyen, were hired to keep their positions this summer at their respective firms. Congratulations to Maxwell's hard working and successful architecture students!

Work Ready went virtual this year! The Maxwell counselors wanted to make sure all students received employability skills training, which included a college and career fair. The theme for Work Ready this year was “You Are Essential.” Maxwell students are highly skilled students who will enter the workforce with essential skills. In order to make sure students are ready for employment after graduation, the Maxwell counselors organized a college and career fair. Because of COVID/CDC guidelines, we were not able to have the Career and College Fair in person; instead, we had a virtual fair this year. This college fair took place on May 10, and the career fair was on May 17. The following colleges attended on May 10: Georgia College, Georgia Gwinnett College, Georgia State University, Gwinnett Technical College, Kennesaw State University, Middle Georgia State College, and the University of Georgia. At the career fair, the following employers attended: Carroll Daniel Construction, Independent Electrical Contractors (IEC), Keune Academy by Salon 124, Latin American Association, Metro Power, Ryerson, Studio 23 Hair Design, Victura Professionals (hiring firm employment agency), and Year Up Apprenticeship. We had a celebrity guest speaker who also attended this virtual session on Zoom. Our guest celebrity speaker was Kayleen McCabe, TV Host and Trades Advocate, who energized Maxwell students by reminding them that they have what it takes and are very qualified to make it in the working world.

Owen Christian, a student in Mr. Womack’s Electronics class, was recently hired as a Junior Lab Technician at Genesis Connected Solutions, a technical manufacturing company. He submitted his resume and cover letter to the company after Mr. Womack announced in class that they were interested in selecting a student to work for them. His job duties include soldering wires, testing equipment, and building circuit boards. Owen stated, “this was really a dream job for a 17-year-old high school student. I have been working there for about three months now, and I have been offered a full-time position, along with a raise, once I graduate. None of this would be possible without Maxwell High School and my teacher, Mr. Womack. I would like to thank him for helping me reach my goals.” Congratulations, Owen!

For high school students needing to retake a class they previously failed, GCPS is offering this option to students at no cost to address COVID-related learning gaps and to provide students with an additional opportunity to earn credit for courses failed this year.

For students attending a high school summer learning program:

• A student should take no more than two summer classes: two face-to-face classes, two online classes, or a combination.
• For students taking a course for the first time, the cost per course is $250 for GCPS students and $275 for non-GCPS students. All fees are due at the time of registration.

Credit Recovery is another option for earning credit for qualifying students who previously took a course and were unsuccessful. To enroll in Credit Recovery, students must meet GCPS qualifications and have approval from their school counselor. Credit Recovery is available through local schools, face-to-face summer classes, and Gwinnett Online Campus. There is no cost to participate in Credit Recovery.