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Commandant's Corner

The Commandant’s corner is a bi-weekly message board presented by Commandant Anthony Pullella. Read our latest blog below, check out one of our archived messages, or sign up to receive future messages.

Teacher/Staff Appreciation Week!

Good morning Seahawk Nation, This week is Teacher/Staff Appreciation Week!  Please take a moment to thank a teacher or a staff member!  I know this entire faculty goes above, and beyond for the cadets at DMA, we support one another and work tirelessly to provide a safe, clean, educational, military-orientated, athletic, and FUN high school experience for our cadets.  All too often, we read and hear about the decline of student performance or kids do not care and in some rare instances, this may be true, but I believe the majority of young people are leaning forward and excelling. I suppose I can only speak for DMA, but when you hear and see our cadets’ desire to serve our country, their academic accomplishments, their athletic achievements, and their volunteerism in the community, we/you/they must be doing something right!   Therefore, this week, we celebrate our educators and faculty who give their best to our cadets to ensure they have a solid foundation for the next chapter of their lives.  Please join me in thanking and acknowledging the work, or more appropriately, the calling, our Staff has chosen as a profession. We would not be the school we are today without you all!  BRAVO ZULU Staff and Faculty! Here is what is happening at DMA:
  • DMA’s 2023 Academic Awards Ceremony will take place next week on Monday, May 15th on the DMA Drill Deck at 6:30 pm. This year the Academic Awards Ceremony will celebrate cadets earning the following awards: the “Highest Course Achievement” award, which is given to the cadet who earned the highest overall average in a course; the “Cadet Breakthrough” award, given out by academic departments to the cadet(s) who really stood out for their positive influence and effort in that content area; the “Shining Seahawk of the Year” award, a program that recognizes cadets who attain high academic achievement and take pride in DMA and in themselves; recognition of cadet finalist(s) in the “College Board PSAT/NMSQT” national scholarship program; and the “Presidential Award for Outstanding Academic Excellence,” a national award given out to select graduating seniors, which recognizes academic success in the classroom. Cadets who have earned a 2023 Academic Award were sent their invitation to the awards ceremony on Saturday, May 6th through their DMA student email account. The ceremony will begin promptly at 6:30 pm on the DMA Drill Deck (McDonald Hall) on Monday, May 15th and cadet award recipients are asked to arrive no later than 6:15 pm to check in, ensuring their name will be read during the award ceremony. Award recipients need to RSVP for the ceremony by this Thursday, May 11th by sending an email to jenny.aunet@dma.k12.de.us if they are planning to attend to celebrate their academic achievement.  We look forward to seeing cadet award recipients and their families at the ceremony!
  • A message from the PTA: Teacher/Staff Appreciation Week is this week, May 8th through the 12th. A huge thank you to DMA’s entire staff for all you do on a daily basis for our cadets. Enjoy the week! Also, please join us for our final PTA meeting of the school year on Thursday, May 18th at 6:30 pm. We will be planning the end of year events and having our election for Board positions for the next school year. More information can be found at dmapta.net, or please feel free to reach out to any current board member directly with questions. Ideally, we would like to have all names of those interested by Monday, May 15th. Thanks in advance!
  • Tomorrow morning (0845) we will be holding our last morning parade of the year. The uniform of the day will be service dress (Thursday attire). We will be recognizing our direct enlistees, Academy appointments and holding our Change of Command ceremony.  We have Senator Nicole Poore joining and possibly Senator Coons.  In return, our cadets will be permitted to dress down Wednesday.  We will send out additional details on the attire through the Band app.
  • Inside look at a math lesson from Ms. Fabian: Sine/Cosine Spaghetti curves. In this hands-on lesson, the students learned that the angles from the unit circle actually form a wave that has many applications in life – sound waves, electrical currents, and musical tones. They use spaghetti to measure the angle heights on the unit since they are not whole numbers, then glue the spaghetti to a poster to form a wave. Then the students can make a picture using their spaghetti wave. Creativity was encouraged, and the results were amazing!
  • Sports Report:
    • The Boys Track & Field team repeated as Conference Champions! Congratulations!
    • The Baseball team defeated Newark Charter 3-0 and Hogdson Vo-Tech 7-5. With a win over Newark Charter, the team secured the conference titled. Great job team!
    • The Golf team defeated Red Lion 233-178.
    • The Boys Lacrosse team lost to Wilmington Friends 0-13 and defeated Newark Charter 4-2.
    • The Girls Lacrosse team lost to Sanford 2-17 and Newark Charter 5-13.
    • The Girls Soccer team defeated St. Elizabeth 8-0 an lost to Archmere 3-1.
    • The Softball team lost to Caravel Academy 5-6 and defeated Newark Charter 10-0.
    • The Girls Tennis team defeated William Penn 4-1 and Glasgow 4-1.
    • The Boys Volleyball team defeated Conrad 3-1 and Kennett High School 3-2.
  • SBC:
    • The Sports Booster Club will meet this Thursday at 6:30 PM in the dome in room FH5. New Board elections will occur at the meeting.
    • Save The Date: The Athletic Award Ceremony will take place Monday, May 30th in the dome at 6:30 PM.
    • The Fall Meet The Coaches will occur Monday June 5th in the dome at 6:30 PM.
We hope you have a great week and please if you have the chance and want to acknowledge or recognize any Staff member (teacher or faculty) at DMA, please do so.  I always enjoy sharing kind words with them, or you can send it to them directly. Either way, the acknowledgment means a lot. Kindly,
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