Los Banos High School

How to begin to describe Los Banos High School MESA? The only thing that seems to suit it best would be, action packed. Beside from the academic endeavors, our MESA program fosters the growth of engineering minds and the creativity of design. Our success is apparent in our members, since we have 1 qualifying team, composed of Alyssa Zorra, Noemi Diaz, Jessica Alday, and Jocelyne Trejo, for the Windmill Energy Challenge, which placed 2^nd in the preliminary competition and is ready to go to regionals. Furthermore, we have Diego Aguero, Elijah Bueno, Andrea Pineda, Steve Georgiou, and Tony Ramirez who have also advanced to regionals due to the Team Math Quest for categories A & C.  
Currently we are a work in progress, maintaining ourselves busy in preparation for MESA Day Prelims. Our students have given the janitors some work with gliders in the roof, since they have practicing with prototypes. Likewise, creating a commotion inside our adviser’s room thanks to our bridge testing.

Beyond our MESA events and preparations, we are implementing a focus in career goals for those who are ready to graduate as well as the younger generations by doing college enrichment worksheets. The pioneers of MESA in Los Banos, Martha Santoyo, and Diego Aguero, continue to be exemplary role models to others by volunteering to help their peers as well as students in the Junior High. 

Thanks to our members and students’ hard work and dedication, we are being awarded with a field trip to Great America alongside of Los Banos High School Physics class for Physics Day. We all are eager to join  the fun and exciting day just as well as anticipate winning at MESA Day!

Pacheco High School

In our second year of being open, Pacheco High School has been doing a great job. Our MESA students are having fun, and doing a great job on their projects and math skills. We have been offering a tutoring program for MESA sudents who want compete in the math competitions  and to those who are new to the program and would like some help on thier projects.

We have done our Annual Drive-Thru Chicken Dinner, as well as other fundraisers, like raffling off an ipod. We have been attending all the Saturday Academies and been giving it our best! We have been preparing for MESA day prelims and keeping busy, but having fun at the same time.  And, we already have several students who qualified for regionals in Solo Math!

We have visited the Tech Museum, Moss Landing, and participated in the Catalina Island Marine Institute. We are planning on taking several trips in the next few months, to Monterey, Merced and to Great America. We are making the best of the program and look forward to a great rest of the year as well as next year.

Mendota Junior High

During these last few months, Mendota Mesa has participated in several interactive activities. Some of these activities include drafting, mini- competitions, and preliminary competitions.

In the months of August through November we have been practicing how to draft. It has taught us how to be precise and accurate. It has also taught us how to use professional drafting tools.

During the month of December we have been participating in windmill. This mini-competition gives us a small taste of what MESA is about.

We have also talked about various preliminary competitions. Everyone has selected their MESA Day activities.

In conclusion, Mendota MESA has been productive so far. We are planning to increase our participation.

Bullard High School MESA

Since the beginning of the year, our club has grown to about 30 members.  So far, we have participated in our school's club day, where we had a table showcasing the VEX robot. 
We have also attended two Saturday Acadamies at Fresno State.  At the Saturday Academies the VEX robotics team competes in various challenges and other members do fun workshops to get ready for our MESA projects.  During some lunch periods, students come in to work on thier MESA projects or work on the Robot. While we are thier we talk about how to improve and perfect our MESA Projects.

Mendota MESA Working Together

The MESA club in Mendota high school has expanded its student body, over the past few years. We have been gathering ideas for fundraising. It’s complicated to have everybody agree with each other, but somehow we cooperate and accomplish things. I can say it is a working process, but we are working on it. We are planning to make a bake sale here at school but we are not sure because we first have to get approval. If that does not work then we are just going to stick with a candy sale.

We also talk about the MESA day projects. We make sure everyone knows what they are supposed to do and how they are supposed to do it. We give them the project rules, so that they know we are not going to trick them on doing things wrong just because there are other people in the club doing the same activity. There are examples and pictures that we have to show them so that they can get an idea on how to do the project, especially if it is their first time on the project. It might take more practice but it is all worth the excitement.

All we expect from the Mesa members is for them to have fun and enjoy what they are doing. We would want for all members to come back next year. That is why we try to make everything really fun. Now we are having positive comments because so far they are having fun and we like to hear that. So that is what we have been up to these past few days in Mesa.

Los Banos Junior High School Leadership Class of 2012

Back Row Left – to –Right:  Itzel Quintero, Kellen Haug, Gurlynn Gill, Erik Hernandez, Sammy Perez
Front Row Left – To – Right: Elizabeth Guzman, Julisa Ornales, Nayeli Gonzalez, Jimmy Georgiou

President: Elizabeth Guzman
Los Banos Junior High School is going to make this year incredible for our MESA program. Our school has been doing great on fundraisers. We sell brownies and cookies during school hours, and boy, do those get sold out fast. Brownies and cookies are not the only things that get sold in our school. We also sell ice cream after school when the days are hot, and you cannot stand the heat, so students come and buy ice cream. One of our advisors, Mr. Wilson, sells sodas and water when he has tutoring after school. When those soda cans, and water bottles are empty we recycle them to get money. We also have other teachers that help us recycle. Teachers have their own recycling box and when they are full, students are sent to their classes to pick them up.

Our MESA school is very dedicated to this program. We make sure we complete everything on time. We have meetings once or twice a week usually on Wednesdays at break. We share ideas on fundraising, upcoming events, and future plans for our program, especially on how to improve our MESA program. Every two weeks we send out newsletters to students and parents informing them on current events, upcoming events, and important dates to attend. As you can see, we are making good progress and we are focused on making our MESA program better.

Secretary: Sammy Perez
We have done some pretty cool things in MESA this year such as, the MESA Orientation Night, and learned about the OnlineU. We have also worked on some fun enrichment activities such as the Glider, Paper Bridge, and Windmill. We will soon work on the Paper Car.


Treasurer: Jimmy Georgiou
In our Junior High, we are doing a lot of things, besides just MESA, like the 1st Priority club, which is held during both lunches. The club is about Christianity and to follow the rules God gave us.  I’m in the club myself and I think it is really fun.  Also, we’re having some band marches coming up in Santa Cruz, Merced, and many more places, so don’t miss out on our tiger pride!  We have also had a campus clean up competition just recently and 1st lunch won.  The prize was an early release from their class before 1st lunch.  Although, they said it was the last campus clean up competition, I think they will change their minds and make another campus clean up competition. Lastly, we are having our regular free after school tutoring, so don’t miss out!

We are also doing a lot of things in MESA as well. Such as fieldtrips that are coming up, like the Student Leadership Retreat that on September 24th, the 1st Saturday Academy on October 22, and the deadline to sign up for that is, October 3rd, if all the spaces are still open by then. 

Photographer: Nayeli Gonzalez
Los Banos Junior High School’s MESA has been doing great! We started the year strong with fundraisers, preparing for the Solo Math Competition, 600 Club and the MESA Club! The Leadership Team sells ice cream, cookies, and brownies during and afterschool. Our fundraisers are to fund scholarships for the Catalina Island Trips, and College Road Trip.
We are preparing for the Solo Math Competition and doing the 600 Club. The preparation for the Solo Math Competition is every Friday from 3:10 to 4:30. The MESA program at LBJHS has volunteer tutors to help us prepare! This year we began to do the 600 Club where the students prepare for the CST’s every Friday, during the same time as the preparation for the Solo Math Competition.

We have about 20 students in the MESA Club. They have meetings on Mondays during break and Friday’s afterschool in Mrs. Salcido’s classroom. I have been helping Mrs. Salcido with the meetings and to recruit new students! In Mrs. Salcido classroom we do enrichments and compete. I hope LBJHS does awesome this year!

3rd Period Representative: Shyanne Vargas
This week at LBJHS we are working on keeping our school clean. MESA is also working on recycling to save the environment and to also raise money for our MESA program. In each MESA teacher's class there is a bin for recycling.  Last time that we recycled everything that we had collected we made $35.68. The Leadership class that is run by Mrs. Smith collects the bottles every so often and turns them in to Mr. Wilson.

RJJH MESA Accomplishments!

This year RJJH MESA has already got a lot of things accomplished! One of our biggest achievements has been MESA buddies. MESA buddies is when each seventh grader gets to request an 8th grade MESA buddy. They then exchange numbers and then do activities together. It’s a really good way to get to know MESA and be involved with other students straight from the beginning. It’s also just a way to make the incoming students feel more comfortable in the class and get used to the adjustments of junior high. The leadership team came up with this idea while brainstorming at our leadership retreat to Kings Canyon National Park. Our leadership group spent three days and two nights participating in leadership activities, challenges, hikes, reflections, and brainstorming great ideas for the new year in MESA.  It was a great way to get to know each other and form a bond. We did a lot of activities to get to know each other including walking with a blindfold while the partner had to lead the person with the blindfold. That took trust! We now can trust each other with anything. We all feel like a closer team that can face the challenges our new school year brings.

RJJH MESA held a parent meeting after Back to School Night, informing parents on what will be happening during this year and gearing up for our main fundraiser of the year, the back to school dance. The dance theme was "RJJH Hollywood Premiere Night," and included a red carpet entrance and paparazzi. Students danced for two hours straight while viewing photos of themselves on the big screen. Although the final numbers haven't come in yet, early estimates show our dance raised over $1,000 for our MESA group.

This year in MESA class, we have we have been doing mini mysteries, hands on activities, working very hard to get the dance ready, learning MESA basic with the OnlineU, and taking notes on aeronautics from our guest speaker, Mr. Bouck. Our leadership team has been holding leadership meetings every Friday at lunch. We also just got word that RJJH won the $300 enrollment incentive award! This is an example of how hard our leadership team is working to make this year a success. This year will continue to be a great one for Rafer...GO MESA!!!

Leadership Team

 Team Work

Trust Walk