Michael Grauwde off to Aruba to swim for Suriname

Michael Grauwde ,AlphaMax Academy Senior and member of the GAC 2014 class is taking part in the 29thCARIFTASwimming championships in Aruba from the 22 to the 26^th April. 

Michael is expected to take part in the backstroke events in the 15-17 year division. Mrs. Joan Grauwde, Michael’s mother and senior teacher at AlphaMax Academy is accompanying the team as a Surinamese swimming official. The meet will feature swimming, synchronized swimming and open water swimming.

Michael Grauwde Suriname Swimmer

The venue for the swimming and synchronized swimming will be the PISCINA OLIMPICO (Roly Bisslik”) in Savaneta_

The meet is the approved qualifier in swimming the Second Youth Olympic games and CAC 2014. The Youth Olympic Games will be held in Nanking ,China from August 16- 28 this year. The 22nd Central American and Caribbean Games will be held from Nov.14-30 in Vera Cruz,Mexico.

 The open water venue is the Mangel Halto Beach. There will be heats and finals from Tuesday to Friday in the Olympic Pool. On Saturday the open water event will be held before the closing ceremony.

Twenty-two swimming federations have been invited to participate. (Antigua & Barbuda, Aruba. Bahamas. Barbados. Bermuda, Cayman Islands, Curacao, Dominica, French Guyana, Guyana, Jamaica, Martinique, St. Lucia, St. Kitts, Nevis, Anguilla, St Vincent & the Grenadines, Suriname, Trinidad & Tobago, Turks & Caicos Islands. British Virgin Islands, US Virgin Islands).

The Competition will be conducted in accordance with FINA Rules 2013-2017 in force at the start of the competition.

 Swimming Competitors will compete in the following age groups: Female & Male 11-12, 13-14 15-17. Synchronized Swimming Competitors will compete in Female 12 & Under, 13-15 and 16-18. Open Water Swimming will be for  Males and Females aged 13-14 and 15 to 17.

 Last year at the CARIFTA Games held in Jamaica ,Suriname  50m record holder Renzo Tjon A Joe won the 50m Gold medal in a time  of 23.44. Suriname came 8^th in the final ranking with 350.50 points. Guadeloupe topped with 742.  

Final CARIFTA points rankings: for the top ten teams were:

1. Guadeloupe – 742
2. Trinidad and Tobago – 698
3. Aruba – 659
4. Jamaica – 584
5. Bahamas – 507
6. Barbados – 485
7. Martinique – 353
8. Suriname – 350.50
9. Netherlands Antilles – 151
10. Cayman Islands – 107

GAC Assignment filmed by new AlphaMax Communication unit

The Global Assessment Certificate (GAC) 2014 Class did their second  assignment for the GAC 006 class — Business, Science and Social Science 1: Communication  Skills, on the 11th November.

GAC 2014 Class

Michael Grauwde and Vivian Zheng

This  assessment event was a group role play.

The aim of  the assessment event was for the group to negotiate and come to a consensus at the end of ten minutes.  The group consisted of 5 members, and every member had to agree on what was decided:  They were to imagine that they were about to be frozen and would not be brought back to life until the year 3000 A.D.  They had to rank 10 items about society that they believed would change the most.  Each person had to justify their top five rankings and try to persuade others why they chose this ranking.  At the end, the group had to reach an agreement on a ranking.

Jason Hoppie (GAC Valedictorian, Class of 2013) and Kirk Clarke

The assessment event was video-graphed by the AlphaMax Academy's Communication unit.  The unit is currently engaged in several projects that will be aired in December.  The communication unit is new in the AlphaMax Academy and is currently taught by Mr. Kirk Clarke, a Caribbean Media trainer with many years of experience in Trinidad & Tobago, Guyana, other Caribbean countries, and north America.

Written by Vivian Zheng

THE IELTS EXAM

On Saturday 26^th November, 2011, the IELTS exam was conducted for the first time in Paramaribo, Suriname at the AlphaMax Academy. The International English Language Testing System known as the IELTS exam consists of four sections. The four sections are: Listening, Reading, Writing and Speaking. The Listening section is 30 minutes long, the reading 60 minutes, writing 60 minutes and the last part speaking is 15-20 minutes long.

The IELTS exam was taken by eight AlphaMax Students: six from the GAC program and two from the GED program.  The students took classes on Monday and Wednesday evening taught by Mrs Sylvana Dankerlui to help them prepare  for the IELTS exam. On November 26, Mr Russell Hammond, an Englishmen from the IELTS agency came and conducted the exam.

I have taken the TOEFL exam before and it is different from the IELTS exam. The difference is that in IELTS you have a speaking section however in TOEFL you have a grammar section. The structure of the IELTS exam is different from the TOEFL exam. In the IELTS you have two writing tasks however in the TOEFL there is only one writing task. However, for the rest is was about the same.

Written by: Gabriel Grauwde (GAC Class 2012)