Category: Education

Local HOSA Students Promoting Breast Cancer Awareness

Health Occupations Students of America, aka HOSA-Future Health Professionals, is a global student-led organization that actively promotes career opportunities in the health industry, and four New Tampa-area residents who all attend Strawberry Crest High in Dover and participate in the school’s International Baccalaureate (IB) Programme have created “Project Pink” to raise awareness about breast cancer.

Strawberry Crest sophomores Elizabeth Chettipally, Aditi Nair, Anika Prasad, and Netra Vijay (photo) will participate in HOSA’s Community Awareness competition by focusing on breast cancer, which affects more than 250,000 women (killing about 42,000) each year in the U.S. alone.

“Our team first felt the urge to raise awareness for breast cancer when we saw how fiercely one of our team member’s family (members) fought against breast cancer,” Anika wrote in the Crest Critique. “Being females and students, we saw the lack of education and awareness of breast cancer in our community and decided to make a change.”

To begin their quest to raise community awareness of breast cancer, the four friends spoke to Archana Nair, RN, an advisor in the Breast Clinic at the Moffitt Cancer Center, and Shilpa Sachdev, MD, an internal medicine specialist in Wauchula, FL. They also met with Shreya Shivan, a student at the USF Health Morsani College of Medicine.

“Through these discussions, our team realized that the subject of breast cancer is extremely personal, and a strong support system is needed by women survivors to reclaim feminine identity,” Anika wrote.

In October — also known as Breast Cancer Awareness Month — the quartet began their efforts by staging a “Pink Out” (getting students at their school to wear pink, including the cheerleaders at the Strawberry Crest football game that night). They also participated in the Cory Lake Isles Unity Walk in November.

“I feel like that even though a lot of people know about breast cancer, when it comes to the facts, to the details, we’re all lacking,” Netra says. “There’s also a lot of stigmatization about breast cancer because, when you talk about someone’s breasts, it’s a very taboo topic in our society, so I feel like it’s something people need to know about before the diagnosis.”

Anika adds, “We also want people to know that just because you’re diagnosed, it doesn’t mean it’s the end. We just want to spread hope to them.”

The group also will participate in Dr. Helene Robinson’s “Hugs from Heaven for Sister Warriors” breast cancer awareness podcast. Dr. Robinson is a faculty member at USF’s Sarasota-Manatee campus.

In addition, the friends recently hosted a HOPE Kit packing party (photo left), in partnership with the National Breast Cancer Foundation — with donated items, such as makeup, wrist bands, notebooks, travel mugs and other “goodies” — that will be mailed to women who are struggling with breast cancer across the country.

Their school reposted the announcements the girls made on their Instagram about the packing party and also has allowed them to set up tables in the school’s library and talk with other students after school assemblies. They also were permitted to broadcast the “Pink Out” at the end-of-the-day announcements for a week before that event. The school’s Student Government Assn. and PTSA also helped spread the word about the girls’ efforts.

And, while there are more than 100 HOSA students at Strawberry Crest, the four friends are the only ones participating in the Breast Cancer Awareness campaign. They all will travel to Orlando April 13-16 to participate in the State of Florida Leadership Conference for HOSA, where they will make a presentation about their project.

For more info, visit “Project Pink” on Instagram, “CrestProjectPink/Videos” on YouTube or schshosa.wixsite.com/projectpink.

PHSC’s Timothy Beard To Retire

After 17 years at Pasco-Hernando State College (PHSC), which includes leading the Porter Campus at Wiregrass Ranch, president Timothy L. Beard, Ph.D., will retire effective January 31, 2024, the school announced on Mar. 1.

By the time he retires, Beard will have served nearly nine years as the state college’s president and CEO. Prior to that, he served more than eight years as PHSC’s Vice President of Student Affairs and Enrollment Management.

The school announced that it is conducting a nationwide search for Beard’s successor. Myers McRae Executive Search and Consulting firm will lead the search for PHSC’s fifth president, teaming up with a presidential search committee comprised of community stakeholders and PHSC faculty, staff and students.

During Beard’s presidency, PHSC constructed the $18-million Instructional Performing Arts Center (IPAC), located on Old Pasco Rd. in front of Cypress Creek middle and high school. The facility opened in 2021, and provides instruction in music, dance, theater and multi-media design.

“Serving as PHSC’s president has been the crowning achievement of my career,” Beard said in a release. “The College has made exceptional progress, thanks to the guidance of our trustees and the dedication of our administrators, faculty and staff. I remain in awe of the transformative power of education.”

Beard also has been at the helm for a number of other major projects, like adding a $5 million Burn Center and Fire Academy training center at PHSC’s East Campus in Dade City, which will also be home to a future STEM Student Success and Community Engagement Center with a projected $25-million budget.

Dr. Beard earned his Bachelor’s degree from Florida A&M (FAMU) in 1984, and received his Master’s and Ph.D. degrees from Florida State University. He worked on the staff, faculty and in the administrations at FAMU, FSU and the University of South Alabama in Mobile before accepting the vice president’s position at PHSC.

He succeeded former PHSC presidents Katherine M. Johnson, Ed.D., in 2015. Johnson was preceded by the late Robert W. Judson, Jr, Ed.D., and Milton O. Jones, Ph.D., the college’s founding president.

PHSC, which has six locations in Pasco and Hernando counties serving nearly 10,000 students annually, saw its operating budget increase by nearly 40 percent under Beard, and the PHSC Foundation’s assets increased by more than 60 percent. Beard personally raised several hundred thousand dollars to establish and fund scholarships.

PHSC’s nine-member District Board of Trustees is hoping to find and introduce Beard’s replacement in September.

Information on PHSC’s Presidential Search, including details about the application and nomination process, can be found at MyersMcrae.com or PHSC.edu/about/leadership/presidential-search.

pasco-hernando state college phsc Timothy Beard Wesley Chapel

New Tampa’s 2022-23 Teachers Of The Year

The 2023 Excellence in Education Awards, hosted by the Hillsborough Education Foundation in partnership with Hillsborough County Public Schools, recently recognized outstanding educators at the county’s public schools, including 11 in New Tampa.

Each school nominated one candidate for the each of the three county-wide awards — Teacher of the Year, Ida S. Baker Diversity Educator of the Year and Instructional Support Employee of the Year.

While none of the District winners were from New Tampa’s schools, it is an honor to be nominated for the many deserving teachers and support staff at all of our local schools.

Congratulations to the New Tampa nominees for Teacher of the Year (pictured on this page), and the Ida S. Baker Diversity Educators and Instructional Support Employees (not pictured).

Megan Boghosian Language Arts Liberty Middle School

New Tampa Teacher of the Year

Local Author Lois Lewandowski Hopes To Inspire Others

*Local author Lois Lewandowski poses with most of her “vanity published” books, including* The Ghost on Swann. (Photos by Charmaine George)

I recently read a novel by someone I’ve known indirectly for more than 20 years — Hunter’s Green resident Lois Lewandowski.

To be fair, despite knowing Lois’ husband (and local financial advisor) Chuck Lewandowski for that amount of time, I had only met her a handful of times and I honestly had no idea that the one-time IT rep for a Silicon Valley company who later worked in the jewelry department of Nordstrom’s was a published author.

So, when Lois (who writes her books as “L.A. Lewandowski”) contacted me by email about buying an ad for her most recent “vanity published” (she hates the term “self-published;” more on this below) novel — The Ghost on Swann — I told her that I would read the book first and be honest with her about whether or not I thought it would be worth buying ads to try to sell copies of it.

Well, quite truthfully, I was blown away by The Ghost. Each chapter of the book is told in first person by one of the four major characters — the ghost herself, Bertha “Posh” Swann, Posh’s friend Victor, Victor’s niece Tyrene and even a mannequin named Maude. The format, albeit a little confusing at first, does make you want to find out what happens next. Posh, who “haunts” the business now owned by her living friend Victor, was murdered in the same building many years earlier.

If you recognize the spelling of “Swann,” it’s because Posh’s family is supposedly the reason Swann Ave. in Tampa’s renowned Hyde Park Village neighborhood (where the entire story is set) was given that name.

For a book devoid of sex and violence (even the description of Posh’s murder was somewhat pedestrian), The Ghost on Swann is a true page-turner. I told Lois that, as I read it, I wondered if maybe Posh’s murder was more of a mystery than the reader is led to believe, but as it turns out, The Ghost is not a murder mystery. Instead, it’s simply a well-crafted story rooted in the fashion industry (as Lois herself has been) that likely will appeal more to women than to men but I wouldn’t discourage anyone from giving it the once-over.

“I’m very proud of The Ghost,” Lois says. “It took three rewrites to get it to where it is now.”

Lois On ‘Vanity’ Publishing

Speaking of rewrites, as I mentioned earlier, Lois isn’t a fan of the term “self-published,” because it indicates to many people that the books are likely less “professional” than those published by one of the remaining major publishing houses.

However, after reading The Ghost, it’s obvious that Lois’ work is not only professional, she takes a lot of pride in things like her editor (Stacy Juba), the design of the covers of her books, the spelling, grammar and punctuation of her stories and other things that many “self-published” authors don’t seem to sweat as she does.

“I prefer to call it ‘vanity publishing,’” she says. “Just because Viking, Penguin and other traditional publishers haven’t published my books, I care that if you read them, you won’t be able to distinguish it from a traditionally published book.”

She admits, however, that some self-publishers who don’t think they have to pay the same attention to detail, give the vanity publishing business a bad name. Many also don’t think you can make “real” money as a vanity publisher.

“But that just isn’t true,” Lois says. “I’m in a lot of online independent publishing groups and the word is that it takes as many as 15 books to really start making money. The Ghost on Swann is only my sixth book, but my brain is very active and I have at least three more that are close to being ready, so I feel like I’m on my way.”

On the other hand, Lois says that even though sites like Amazon do provide numbers of copies sold to authors, “I don’t really worry about sales. I write because I have stories in my head and I do regularly receive money for my book sales, too.”

Lois says it wasn’t always her dream to be a writer — “I wanted to be a lawyer, really…but it is my dream now.” She points to one vanity publisher who has written 35 or more books, putting out two a year, and has enough of a following that it is now his full-time job. “Amazon has an algorithm (for book sales) and you have to feed the algorithm, so I have to get another book out by October of this year to do that.”

She also says that a lot of people she meets tell her that they really want to write a book and she always encourages them to do so.“Stephen King calls it ‘BIC,” or ‘Butt in Chair,’ which is the only way to get it done.”

In addition, Lois wrote for a blog called “Indies Unlimited” and found out, “that a lot of self-published writers are too cheap to register their work with the Library of Congress to protect it. But, if you really think you have a story people would be interested in reading, why wouldn’t you want to protect it?”

She adds, “Writers’ ideas are not copyright-able, but the words themselves are. If you protect your work, and someone publishes something that’s really close to your words, you can go after them legally.”

Lois says she even has gone so far as to teach “Authors 101” courses at public libraries, where she teaches people who want to write how to get started. “After the Tampa Bay Times did an article on me several years ago, I had 25 or 30 people at my course at the Riverview library,” she says. “The information I gave out then is all old now because of the internet, but I found out that a lot of people definitely have stories they want to tell in a book. That’s why, when I did my Authors 101 course, I felt so good about encouraging other authors to become vanity publishers.”

She also notes that it’s harder than ever to get one of the big publishing houses to publish your book, as you have write query letters to literary agents because, “you can’t even submit a manuscript to the folks at Random House.”

But, Lois says, “If you want to be a writer, your goal should be to publish, not to make money. “I don’t keep track of my sales because my goal is to be proud of my work. If people love my books, the money will come.”

Before releasing The Ghost on Swann in 2022, Lois’ first book was Born to Die, The Montauk Murders (2011). That was followed by A Gourmet Demise, Murder in South Tampa (2014), which Lois says briefly hit #1 on Amazon for a while and may be her career best-seller. Between those murder mysteries was Gentleman Vampire: The Undead Have Style (2012). She also has published Bacon Aporkalypse, which is a collection of recipes paired with short stories in 2014. And, Lois says the ebook Thirty Days of Work from Home Style (2020), was how she navigated the pandemic. She says her next book, which she plans to have out by the end of this year, will be the sequel to Gentleman Vampire.

Search “Books by L.A. Lewandowski” on Amazon.com. Almost all of Lois’ titles are available in paperback and for Kindle.

Book Hunters Green Lois Lewandowski New Tampa The Ghost On Swann

AIMING FOR THE TOP

*Parth Madabhushi gives 100 percent to everything he does, as evidenced by his acomplishments in dance, music and sport.****(Photos: Courtesy of Madabhushi family)***

Wesley Chapel teenager Parth Madabhushi doesn’t do anything half way.

When he took up karate, he put in all his effort and made it onto a national team that competed in other countries.

When he took up dance, he spent hours and hours practicing his craft and became the third generation in his family to learn the classical Indian dance Bharatanatyam.

And, when he took up music, he mastered the mridangam (the ancient classical drum of South India), recently completing his solo percussion recital, or arangetram, with renowned Indian musician Padma Shri A. Kanyakumari.

Whereas the majority of people may take a few years of karate or a few lessons in dance or compete in a couple of sports leagues, Parth has always set out to conquer everything he tries.

“I’m proud of myself for the accomplishment,” Parth says. “I don’t really get the appeal of doing something and stopping, unless it was just a hobby or something. Accomplishing all three things was important to me. My parents preached that if you’re not going to do something 100 percent, don’t do it.”

The most recent accomplishment on Parth impressice roster was completing his mridangam arangetram last year.

An arangetram (which means “ascending the stage”) ceremony is a rite of passage that is most similar to a recital or graduation, and is deeply rooted in Indian culture. The mridangam, the instrument Parth plays, is the.

All classical dancers and musicians participate in an arangetram at the end of their training with a guru, and it signifies their ascension from disciple to performer and even to teacher.

For his arangetram, Prahlad Madabhushi, Parth’s father, managed to arrange for his son to accompany violinist Padma Shri A. Kanyakumari, a recipient of the Padma Shri Award from the government of India for her devotion to the arts. Prahlad says it is rare that such a prominent artist would agree to play at an arangetram.

*The Madabhushi family (l.-r.) dad Prahlad, Parth, sister Nitya and mother Sabrina.*

“We had been in communication for 2-3 years, before Covid,” he said. “And, her calendar is packed. However, she sent us a message that she had a weekend open, and we were shocked. It was jaw dropping. But, we can see why she agreed. Parth is very very unique, and artists want to enrich upcoming brilliant kids.”

On October 29, 2022, Parth took the stage at USF and accompanied Padma Shri A. Kanyakumari in a three-hour performance that included a 10-minute solo. She changed pace often, playing at such a dizzying speed at times

it was hard to imagine Parth keeping up on his mridangam. However, he did.

“The speed she played at was crazy,” Parth said. “I enjoyed it, trying to see how fast I can play. She was challenging me, and now I know I can play that fast.”

Prahlad, who joined his son on stage, called it an impressive performance.

“It was exhilarating to see my son not only play well, but hang in there,” he said, “because it is very difficult when she plays the violin, because it’s not just at one speed, but 4-5 speeds. And she’s not like, “This is a newcomer, let me take it easy.’ Very, very seasoned musicians find it difficult to hang in with her, but Parth did.”

Completing the arangetram was just another step for Parth, who has already piled up a list of impressive accomplishments.

His father says that Parth represented Team USA at the World Karate Federation championships four times, winning four championships, and also has recently gained the title of Sensei in the martial arts form of Shitu-Ryu.

At his first arangetram in 2008 for dance — his mother Sabrina and grandmother Geetha Raaj are dance teachers — he became the first boy in Florida to complete a recital in the classical Indian dance Bharatanatyam.

Prahlad says that combination of accomplishments is “one-in-a-billion.”

So, what’s next for Parth? He’s not sure. A Carrollwood Day School graduate, he is currently a second-year Business student at the University of South Florida, and has taken an interesting in video editing. While school is a priority, and time-consuming as well, he has wondered what his next challenge might be.

“In my brain, I want to do something else,” he says. “I will figure it out. In my opinion, having something to accomplish, that’s what makes life fun.”

Parth Madabhushi