The grades of students involved in a sport or activity continue to be higher than the grades of students who do not participate in an activity. In her annual program update, Activities & Athletic Director Dr. Kristina Martin shared yearly GPA averages for the 2023-24 school year:
Athletics: 3.42
Band/Choir/Orchestra: 3.5
Drama: 3.695
Scholar Bowl: 4.31
No Sport or Activity: 2.86
1,051 students at Ray-Pec High School were involved in one or more sports or activities last year, including the newly added esports program and Girls Flag Football who was one of 32 teams to compete for a national championship, representing the Kansas City Chiefs. An additional, 1,416 students participated in an activity at the middle school level.
See the entire presentation here: raypec.org/page/2024-2025-board-meetings
The middle school Coding and 3D Printing camp wrapped up today with their showcase event! Check out some of their cool creations! 🤯
The Peculiar Chamber of Commerce held their monthly coffee event at the new PAC this morning! Local business leaders and community members got a sneak peek of the PAC and were treated to a short performance by our middle school orchestra! ☕🎻
Ray-Pec East Middle School's Choir Director, Shea Twenter, was named Missouri Choral Directors Association's Outstanding West Central Director for 2024! Congratulations! 👏👏👏
Today was the last day of RP Camp Innovation for middle school students! They got to show off their stop motion videos and BattleBot creations in a showcase event this afternoon! 🎥🤖
Elementary level RP Camp Innovation wrapped up this morning with their showcase event! What a fun way to stay engaged over the summer! 🎉
Our very own Ruth Johnson's term as Missouri School Boards' Association President has come to a close. As always, Ruth made the Ray-Pec School District proud with her strong leadership and commitment to serving others. 🖤💛
Congratulations to the Ray-Pec High School students who attended the American Legion Missouri Boys State and the American Legion Auxiliary Missouri Girls State at Lindenwood University! The program is designed to educate and train Missouri's young leaders in functional citizenship, leadership, and government. Nearly 1,000 student leaders build an entire state government in a single week.
Pictured left to right: Kendyll Gethers, Makayla Coleman, Sophie Dick, Carter Younger, Elijah Cook, Eyan Karr and Mason Rew.
Last week, summer school students participated in the presentation of their project showcase! Students worked the past 4 weeks on a collaborative project using the design thinking process to explore an essential question related to the content area they enrolled in. Students created trifold presentations to showcase their learning and shared their ideas with the community and some of our middle school students. Finally, our students presented individually to community evaluators to share how the project work they completed helped them to develop 6 traits that all Raymore-Peculiar High School students should master before graduation.
Once a Panther, Always a Panther!
Calling all alumni! Scan to code or click the link below to stay informed about what's going on in the district and about future alumni events!
https://forms.gle/aJa3znuxHT3Q6GQM9
Ray-Pec finished the National Speech and Debate tournament as a Top-20 school in speech IN THE COUNTRY! 🎉
Audrey Shepard - 5th Place, Storytelling
Tre Hill & Noah Tuttle - 10th Place, Duo Interpretation
Devin Fisher & Sav Jordan - 14th Place, Duo Interpretation
Amari Russell - 30th Place, Program Oral Interpretation
Ellie McRill & Jaxon Fines - Top 60, Due Interpretation
Natalie Kies, Top 60, Original Oratory
Ian Haneberg, Top 60, Humorous Interpretation
Wyatt Rust - Top 120, Storytelling
Catie Howlett’s High School Functional Skills class has been learning about volcanoes and how the eruption of Mount Vesuvius destroyed the city of Pompeii. This week they made their own volcanoes out of clay and got to the watch them erupt!
A group of 12 Ray-Pec students, two teachers, and one parent recently returned from a 15-day trip to Europe. They visited many locations, including London, Paris, Bordeaux, Biarritz, San Sebastian, Pamplona, Barcelona, and Madrid.
Students participating included: Alex Gawron, Audrey Gibson, Isaac Kruse, Elly Dillon, Addison Showalter, Logan Balentine, Amanda Balentine, Kyle Newcomer, Maryn Clausing, Lily Winchel, Taryn Bower, Eliana Ramos, and Miles Lee. Two high school foreign language teachers were on the tour: Coralie Price and Heidi Lanksbury. Pilar Arizaga was the tour guide.
Teacher Coralie Price said, “We visited museums, recreated paintings and sculptures, ate amazing food, strolled reverently through churches, saw the countryside and city life, toured palaces, swam in the Atlantic Ocean, got our feet wet in the Mediterranean Sea, successfully navigated the subway, explored gardens, climbed dunes and hills, rode bikes and carts, enjoyed a flamenco show, saw so many iconic places and things, shopped til we dropped, got ALL our steps in, saw dogs and cats and birds and sheep and horses, witnessed protests and parades, celebrated a birthday, travelled in busses and trains and planes, and had the best time!”
They are already planning a trip for 2025. If you have a student who is interested or know someone who might be share this with them: https://www.eftours.com/2691035US
Congratulations to Sam Larkins on being a 1st team All-District selection and Grace Vest for being named first team All-District, first team All-Region, and first team All-State! ⚽️
Nearly 60 Mini Panthers participated in the Ray-Pec Summer Wrestling Camp on June 7-8! This past Friday and Saturday, elementary-age students from all over the district spent nearly 8 hours getting a hands-on introduction to the sport with fun drills, movements, games, and live wrestling! 15 wrestlers and coaches from East Middle School, the Ninth Grade Center, and the High School volunteered to work with the Mini Panthers, ages 5-10, and helped make this camp a huge success. All camp participants received a t-shirt, prizes, and snacks from camp sponsors: Defense Soap, Smile Doctors, and Ray-Pec East Middle School Wrestling.
2024 graduate Emma Lintecum is the most recent recipient of the St. John Henry Newman Scholarship! The prestigious scholarship is awarded to five incoming Newman University students and includes a full tuition package renewable for four years.
Check out the full story here: https://news.newmanu.edu/emma-lintecum/
✂️ You may have seen the construction, but today the Peculiar Charitable Foundation, in collaboration with the City of Peculiar and the Ray-Pec School District, has opened new pickleball courts to the public! Thank you to everyone who has worked so hard to turn this idea into a reality! 🎉
Some photo updates from our middle school students in Summer School!
The Blast Off into Baking class is making Cosmic Brownies, they're doing book study in ELA, studying color theory in Art Foundations, and learning about scientific notation in math!
Congratulations to Grant Hornbeck! Last night Grant was awarded with a $500 scholarship from the Home Builders Association of Greater Kansas City buy new tools for his chosen trade of being an electrician. Grant says he is enjoying working full time with Murphy Electric and looks forward to developing his skills to have his own business someday.
Grant's parents want to say thank you Mr. Lewis and Mr. Ketchum at the LEAD Center for pushing their son to be his very best! 🖤🐾💛
Our high school students involved in ELA, art, science, history, and personal finance started working with their subject matter experts this morning to solve problems/answer questions associated with their course’s content. They will work on these projects through the duration of summer school and students will have their final showcase on Thursday, June 27!
