Saint Stephen’s Episcopal School Makes History with Big Win at State Latin Forum

Saint Stephen’s Episcopal School (SSES) Students are celebrating this week after the Junior Division Latin team, thirteen 7th graders and two 8th Graders, made school history.  For the first time ever, a Saint Stephen’s Latin team won first place at the Florida Junior Classical League (FJCL) Forum in the Academics Competition. The team of fifteen also placed 3rd in the overall competition and the Novice (Level 1) Certamen team came in 5th place. 

The 25 member Senior Division Latin team also broke a school record, placing 3rd in the State Academics Competition and 5th place in the overall competition. Additionally, the Intermediate and Advanced Certamen teams both made it to the finals.  The Advanced team of Joe Class, Ethan Leuchter, Ashley Peterson and Gera Versfeld placed 3rd and the Intermediate team of Jack Berry, Emma Jones, MaryAnn Placheril

and Alex Siegal won the competition, running away with it in the last five questions.

Forty-one middle and upper school students from SSES in Bradenton, Florida, attended the 65th State Latin Forum of the Florida Junior Classical League (FJCL), held from April 3 to April 5, 2014 in Orlando. Also notable at the event, Zach Bessette was elected Vice President of FJCL.  That is the fourth Saint Stephen's student to be elected to office in the last three years.

            “At Saint Stephen’s Episcopal School, we are pleased to offer our students the opportunity to study Latin along with the rest of our rigorous academic courses,” said Dr. Janet Pullen, Saint Stephen’s Episcopal School’s Head of School. “Our students who competed in the Latin Forum have made us extremely proud.”

In the past five years, Florida has produced three of the national champions at this event, and there are three levels of Certamen teams; novice, intermediate and advanced.

Saint Stephen’s Episcopal School is a private, independent, co-educational, college preparatory school in Bradenton, FL. Saint Stephen’s delivers world-class education, excellent extracurricular experiences and exciting programs like AP course work, the iPad initiative, a band/strings program, a global education program, K-12 daily foreign language program and our Marine Science Initiative, to name a few.

Saint Stephen's sits on a gated, 35-acre campus, which includes a state of the art athletic center that hosts the school’s athletic events including cheerleading, football, track and field, lacrosse, baseball, softball and tennis. At every level, from PK3 through grade 12, students are nurtured in small classes and encouraged and supported in their academic pursuits. Students benefit from programs and educational models that have proven successful by Saint Stephen’s students who are excelling today in colleges and universities around the country. Saint Stephen's is proud of its rich academic offerings that go hand-in-hand with a strong college counseling program, a wide variety of competitive sports teams, a creative fine arts program, and many service learning opportunities. For more information about our school, please visit www.saintstephens.org.