GBS Loses Beloved Mathematics Teacher and Coach - Mr. Jeffrey L. Aaron

Glenbrook South High School honored and celebrated the life of Jeffrey L. Aaron on Wednesday, March 19, 2008 in the Norman E. Watson Auditorium at 4:00 p.m.

In addition, the Jeffrey L. Aaron Memorial Scholarship Fund has been set up to honor Jeff's memory. All contributions should be sent to Glenbrook South High School.

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Jeff Aaron unexpectedly passed away on March 17, 2008 at his home. Jeff was an outstanding mathematics teacher, and devoted coach who positively influenced those around him, especially at Glenbrook South High School where he served for 31 years.

Jeff was a wonderfully warm and caring person, well loved by his peers and by his students. Always generous with his time, Jeff held review sessions on weekends and holidays before major exams for his students often at local coffee houses. He contributed to the school over the years as a coach, activities sponsor, member of the Student Assistance Core Team, representative on the Teacher’s Advisory Forum and was a staple at our basketball games as an announcer.

A student shared that "Mr. Aaron gained the respect that he did because of his work not only in the classroom, but in the hearts of each and every one of his students."

A parent shared her reflections, “Jeff ~ such a kind, selfless person who definitely put everyone before himself, loved his job as a teacher, enjoyed and respected all his students, and again, a very rare and remarkable person & excellent role model for us all.”

Glenbrook South High School will always treasure Jeff’s legacy of care and involvement. We were fortunate to have him in our lives. He will be sorely missed.

GBS Junior Earns Caring Hearts Award

Glenbrook South junior Katelyn Jo Hofstetter recently received a Caring Hearts Outstanding Volunteer Award as the outstanding youth volunteer in the Northwest Chicago suburbs. This award is conferred by the Volunteer Center of Northwest Suburban Chicago, which represents over 200 volunteer organizations in matching resources with people in need.

Katelyn was nominated for this award by the Glenbrook South Interact Club, which is a group of over 200 juniors and seniors who provide financial and volunteer assistance to a wide variety of community organizations.

During the fall of 2007 Katelyn participated in numerous events including a community paint-a-thon, clean-up of the Lake Michigan shoreline, and babysitting for physically and mentally challenged children.

Through her generous commitment of time, and her positive, joyful attitude, Katelyn has distinguished herself as an outstanding volunteer. Katelyn has had a positive impact on the lives of those who she has served and also on the lives of her fellow students.

Congratulations, Katelyn!

Katelyn's accomplishment was noted in the March 19th Daily Herald newspaper.

GBS Debate Earns State Championship

Congratulations to our debate team and Ms. Tara Tate for winning the State Championship Saturday, March 15, 2008. For the third time in four years, Glenbrook South is the IHSA State Policy Debate Champions. They won in a dominating style by closing out the final round. Seniors Grant Peretz and Winston Luo and sophomores Will Thibeau and Richard Day reached the state championship final round by defeating Walter Payton H.S. and Glenbrook North H.S. in the semifinal round after blowing through the rest of the competition and elimination round bracket. Grant and Winston did not lose a ballot the entire tournament. This feat followed their JV State Championship last weekend.

GBS earned HALF of the All-State team...five of the ten All-State Debate team were GBS debaters.

GBS was the only school to have multiple teams in the elite eight...we had THREE. Juniors Colin Quinn and Alec Zimmer finished fifth.

Thibeau and Day are SOPHOMORES...there has not been a sophomore team in recent history that has been crowned state champions. Thibeau and Day are also the only team in Illinois' recent history to win all three state titles at the varying age levels. They were state champions last year in the freshmen division and won the Junior Varsity and Varsity state titles this year.

Two GBS Students Named to All-State Group Interpretation Cast

Congratulations to sophomore Joe Lewis and freshman Mimi Dybczak who were named to the IHSA All-State Group Interpretation Cast. Congratulations also to the entire team for earning 9th place overall with the GBS production of Radio Days, directed by John Knight.

Jack Cooley Earns All-State Honors

Congratulations to junior Jack Cooley for earning a place on several boys' basketball All-State teams. He was recognized as second team All-State by the Chicago Tribune, Chicago Sun-Times, and the Associated Press. Jack had a great season for the Titans and will be playing for Notre Dame after he completes his senior year next year.

Congratulations again to Jack Cooley and to the basketball program who devoted themselves to the team and helped him earn this distinction.

GBS State Champion and Coach on ABC with Diane Sawyer April 9, 2008

The 2008 Glenbrook South state champion in speech, Nate Beasley, and speech team head coach Scott McDermott, were interviewed March 11 by ABC for a Diane Sawyer special scheduled to be aired April 9. The special will focus on Randy Pausch whose speech, “The Last Lecture,” has become a motivational blockbuster through YouTube, a guest spot on Oprah and other publicity. Based on the speech and Randy Pausch’s story, Pausch and Wall Street Journal Jeff Zaslow, collaborated on a book entitled The Last Lecture, due in print April 8. The timing of the program is to coincide with the release of the book.



A professor at Carnegie Mellon, Randy Pausch gave the August 2007 speech in “The Last Lecture Series,” an annual tradition at the university in which a professor delivers a speech as though it were the last lecture he would ever give. In Pausch’s case, he delivered the speech one month after learning that efforts to cure his pancreatic cancer had failed and the doctors projected he had 3-6 months of good health left. Although he gave the speech in front of 400 friends and relatives, he wrote and gave the speech for his three young children. The speech reflects Pausch’s beliefs on living life and has become wildly popular as a motivational guide.


Nate Beasley won the State Championship in oratorical declamation based on an edited version of Pausch’s now famous speech. Coach Scott McDermott had learned of the speech on the Internet and selected Beasley to base his speech on “The Last Lecture.” Beasley had to take a 90-minute speech and distill it down to eight minutes of the messages that Beasley found most important to him. Beasley got it down to ten minutes and Coach McDermott helped trim it to 8 minutes, the maximum time in state competition. The impact of the speech has become a phenomenon and apparently will be the theme of the Diane Sawyer special. Beasley’s state championship and how it affected Beasley is an example of the impactfulness of the speech on young people. In addition, another speech student, Billy Sterrett from Naperville Central High School, was also interviewed for the special.

GBS Debate - JV State Champs

Sophomores Richard Day and Will Thibeau were crowned the ISTA Illinois Junior Varsity State Champions in Policy Debate this past weekend in Belleville, IL. Day and Thibeau were undefeated throughout the entire tournament and defeated New Trier in the final debate. Day and Thibeau were also the top two speakers of the tournament.

Two GBS Debate teams tied for fifth place as well - juniors Stacy Kapustina and sophomores Phil Sailer, Jaret Kanarek, and Jack McLeod were quarterfinalists. Kapustina and sophomore John Zhao were also in the top ten speakers.

GBS also placed third in the state in Novice Policy Debate, the division for first-year debaters.

Freshmen Philip Han and Jonathan Choi placed third in the state in the first-year division and were also in the top ten speakers.

Freshmen Kathy Nalepka and Sam Kim took fifth place in the division.

Good luck to the GBS Debate Team as the State Championship series wraps up this weekend. The Varsity team competes for the IHSA State title in Springfield, IL.

GBS Students Recognized as Debate Academic All-Americans

Three Glenbrook South Debate seniors have been recognized by the National Forensic League as Academic All-Americans. Seniors Winston Luo, David Han, and Rosie Yang are in the top 1% of the debaters in the nation that are recognized for this honor. Students must demonstrate excellence in debate, grades, and test scores. The students will be honored by our national organization in May.

Congratulations to our Debate program and students.

GBS Teachers and Students Participate in High Energy Physics Initiatives

Jeff Rylander, Instructional Supervisor for Science at GBS, had the privilege of traveling to Sendai, Japan, from February 27-March 3. He represented Glenbrook South High School and Fermilab, and traveled with a Quarknet staff member from Fermilab and another teacher from California and presented a two-day workshop to Japanese teachers on "Using Cosmic Ray Detectors in the High School Classroom." These teachers will be using detectors to collect cosmic ray data and learning to upload this data to the e-lab site where it can be analyzed and shared with other high school groups from around the world. Currently, there are approximately 500 of these cosmic ray detectors in high schools. GBS and GBN both have detectors that are currently up and running. This workshop was held in conjunction with a conference for particle physicists from several countries who will be discussing the future of particle physics over the next two decades.

Read Fermilab's Press Release.

In addition, in mid-March GBS will be taking approximately 10 students to Argonne National Labs for a one-day, interactive video-conference on the future of particle physics as CERN (the Conseil Européen pour la Recherche Nucléaire, or European Council for Nuclear Research) comes online in April of 2008. Our students will participate with students at 14 other laboratories from around the country learning from and being able to ask questions of physicists about the goals and hopes of this new accelerator in Europe. Also, some of our students have applied to serve as one of four student teams who will be selected as student journalists and travel to Switzerland for the opening ceremonies of CERN's new particle accelerator. They will find out next week if they have been selected.

GBS Speech Team Members Qualify for Nationals

Congratulations to our speech team which completed another successful season this weekend at the Northern Illinois National Qualifying Tournament. The following students qualified to the national tournament in June:

• Laura Manning - 1st Place Dramatic Interpretation- She earned 10 out of 11 perfect ranks on the day. Laura, becomes GBS's first 4 time National Qualifier in speech. Additionally, Laura received the Northern Illinois District Participant of the Year- a first time award given out to the student who has contributed the most in speech, school and beyond. Most remarkably, Laura finished first with a different piece than she had finished 2nd with at the IHSA state tournament two weeks earlier.
• Nate Beasley - 2nd Place Dramatic Interpretation- 9 of 12 perfect ranks in the day.
• Lea Hirsch - 1st Place in Original Oratory.
• Pat Lawrie - 2nd Place in Humorous Interpretation.

Three of these exceptional students are first time qualifiers, while Laura will represent GBS at the National Tournament for the 4th time.

Congratulations to our entire speech team and coaches for their season and good luck at nationals.