On October 23rd, the Canandaigua community came together to support Courtney Wagner, a Canandaigua Academy student, in her battle with cancer…
If you would like to learn more about how you can support Courtney and her family, visit Courtney’s Caring Bridge website at
Members of the CA Reading Society met last week for an organizational meeting to discuss ways to get together and talk about books this spring. The small but enthusiastic group came up with some great ideas to get the most out of the great collection at CA Library. Among several decisions that were made:
Purpose of the Group — A book group can essentially be one of two types; one in which everyone reads the same book and discusses it (like Oprah’s) or one in which everyone reads something different and shares it with everyone else. We liked the idea of the latter — sharing books with the group on a regular basis, letting individual group members choose whatever they would like to read.
We can also use the social networking app LibraryThing to share information about books. CA Library has been uploading the collection to LibraryThing for a few years now (check it out here), and although there aren’t any reviews under the calibrary1 account yet, this would be another place that group members could share insights about the books they read.
A Name — Mr. Bateman indicated he liked the idea of the group being known as a society, like the Dead Poet’s Society or the MIT Literary Society; the term lends an air of sophistication to the group (despite having Mr. Bateman as a member). We decided on the CA Reading Society until somebody comes up with something better.
Stuff To Read — Obviously, CA Library has a great collection to choose from, but Mr. Bateman also shared the opportunity to read Advance Reading Copies, books that are sent out before they go on sale to give reviewers a chance to read them. The library gets about a dozen or so every month, and since they can’t go in the collection, this sounds like a great way to get them used.
Membership — This was our first meeting, so attendance was understandably light. We discussed ways to increase our numbers, including sending personal invites to known readers at the Academy (Mr. Bateman will take care of this). We also hoped that once the group has a more definitive meeting schedule, we’ll be able to get more committed members, which leads us to…
A More Definitive Meeting Schedule — With weekly seeming too much and monthly seeming too little, a bi-weekly meeting seemed the way to go. Thursdays after school (at 2:30) are workable, so we’ll see how that works out every other week.
Food and Beverages — It was decided that food and drinks would make these meetings a lot better (duh!); Mr. Bateman will take care of the catering…
The CA Reading Society is likely the least exclusive club on the planet; all you have to do is show up!
Jack Haley, Messenger-Post
This has been another great season for CA athletes in several different winter sports. Here is a sample of some of the headlines Braves teams have earned recently:
Canandaigua’s Jackie Corbett had 23 points including five three-pointers as Canandaigua beat Irondequoit 60-51 in the Class AA sectional semifinal. (By Mike Bailey, Messenger-Post)
Canandaigua Academy junior Meghan McCormick has qualified for the New York state championships in the 3000-meter run. (By Dan Enright, Messenger-Post)
The Canandaigua boys basketball defeated Brockport 71-52 to advance to the quarterfinals. (compiled from staff reports, Messenger-Post)
Senior co-captain Jackie Corbett had a career-high 34 points — third-most in school history — and dropped a career-high six 3-pointers, second-most in school history, to lead the Braves to a 67-61 win over Churchville-Chili in the first-round of the Class AA sectionals. (By Dan Enright, Messenger-Post)
When KG Norris left the Section 5 girls alpine skiing sectional meet, she thought her season was over. Later that night she got word from Braves head coach Wade Sarkis that it wasn’t time to put away her poles yet — she had one more high school race left. (By Bryan Sullivan, Messenger-Post)
After the Blue Devils opened up with an early 1-0 lead, Victor and CA slugged it out on defense until a D.J. Goldstein goal tied things up mid-way through the third period. Then, with the final seconds ticking off the clock, Goldstein got his second goal of the night, firing the puck into the net as the final whistle blew. Final score: 2-1 Braves. (By Ron Wilson, Messenger-Post)
Congratulations to all the teams and all the athletes who work so hard to be the best at what they do on the court, track, ice and slopes!
BTW, are you wondering how I compiled all these headlines from hundreds of news stories? Google Custom News! If you have a Google account, give it a try — just go to Google News, click Add A Section, then Create A Custom Section.
Here’s one I created for Canandaigua News.