Columbia High School Help Haiti

Alumna Megan Coffee and current students aid those in Haiti.

The following article appeared in the March, 2012, volume 100, issue 3 edition of The Columbian, the student newspaper of Columbia High School By Samantha Cohen, senior - Editor-In-Chief Photo courtesy of Dr. Megan Coffee Page designer: Madeleine Scafidi, junior In January 2010, an earthquake struck Haiti causing devastation across the entire country. Countless school buildings collapsed to piles of rubble, causing education to become far less accessible to Haitian students. It was not until Columbia High School alumna, Dr. Megan Coffee, introduced the student body to 21-year-old Jimmy that the situation in Haiti became real to CHS. In May 2011, CHS’s student council donated the money Jimmy needed to finish school. “Now I will be an …

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Maplewood Community Garden Breaks Ground on New Turf

Patch behind First Aid Squad is added. The MCG is also looking to add a garden at Montrose School in South Orange but needs volunteers to help.

Building on the success of last year, the Maplewood Community Garden — which had its start in more than two dozen plots behind Town Hall last year — has expanded to a new site behind the Maplewood Volunteer First Aid Squad building on Boyden Avenue. There are 21 new plots with 25 families taking part in the garden's newest patch. The plots were built over the course of a two weekends starting on April 30. The work crews were made up of the gardeners receiving plots at the new site, as well as members from the original Town Hall site. Their job was to build the raised beds and fill them with soil. Home Depot in Vauxhall donated the wood for the boxes and Maplewood Pizza, Auturo's and Village Trattoria donated the pizza to feed the crew. …

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A Clean Green River Runs Through It

Volunteers clean up the east branch of the Rahway River for a belated Earth Day celebration.

Maplewood is clean and green and so is the east branch of the Rahway River that runs through Memorial Park, thanks to the Environmental Advisor Committee and about 40 volunteers — most of them children — who came out on a glorious day to pick up trash in the river. “We're doing this to keep the Rahway River clean,” said Sheila Baker Gujral, a member of the Environmental Advisor Committee. “We didn't do all of the Earth Day activities (two weeks ago) because of the school break. So we're doing this one now.” The Rahway, which runs through South Orange, Maplewood and Millburn, will become part of a bikeway/walkway between the three towns, according to Baker Gujral. Kids of all ages came out to pick up trash in and along the banks of the …

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mark slade

11:07 pm on Tuesday, May 3, 2011

Yea. Thank you all!   more ›

Cohens Have Left their Mark on Community Summer Program

Rich and Treasure Cohen have been involved with the Adult School's community summer program since the '80s, first as teachers and then as coordinators.

While Rich Cohen's May and June are consumed with hiring staffers, and doing scheduling and logistics for the Adult School's community summer program, the process always seems to justify itself by the first day of camp, and he compares it to the feeling of having a baby. "By the time we get to the first day, it feels good, it works," said Cohen, 65, a former Columbia High School biology teacher, who retired from the district in 2002 after 23 years and now works at Liberty Science Center as a science educator. "You feel you're doing something that makes Maplewood and South Orange a good place to be." Cohen and his wife, Treasure, are 32-year residents of Maplewood and were already involved with the community summer program in 1987, when he …

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Saving Backyard Wildlife

The South Mountain Wildlife Rehabilitation Center helps injured and orphaned animals.

Sonya Kaloyanides leads a double life, a little like Bruce Wayne. She isn’t a masked superhero, but she does have a bat cave, of sorts, tucked away in her Maplewood home. Kaloyanides is a licensed wildlife rehabilitator and part of’ her home is the headquarters of the South Mountain Wildlife Rehabilitation Center (SMWRC), of which she is the founder and director. When she isn’t at her job in Manhattan, Kaloyanides cares for orphaned and injured animals (including a bat with a broken wing currently in residence) so that they may be safely returned to their habitat. Most of the care takes place inside Kaloyanides’ charming house on a quiet street where she lives with her husband and four cats. SMWRC’s indoor facility consists of an average-…

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