Simon Johnson and Rebecca Mirvish of Culver City High School, recently named among the country’s 16,000 National Merit Scholarship semifinalists, credit the one-of-a-kind education they have received in the arts for helping them achieve what less than 1 percent of high school seniors have.

“CCHS has a great arts program, which is extremely special,” said Mirvish.

She has been a part of the school’s Academy of Visual and Performing Arts since her freshman year.

“It is productive, it allows me to be with friends and have opportunities for real-life hands-on experience,” she said. “This is a great outlet for students like myself who are not good at sports.”

Heavily involved in theatre as a Tech major, Rebecca focuses on doing technical theatre rather than acting and performing. She is currently stage managing the play “Almost, Maine,” and she serves as secretary of Drama Council.

Rebecca plans to go to college as a math major and has been involved in a wide array of activities at Culver High.

She has been Associated Student Body Ambassador of the Arts, Math Chiron, she is founder of the “Friends for Now” Club and a member of both Mock Trial and the Student on Unbiased Politics (SOUP) Club.

Off campus, Rebecca is involved with Temple Akiba’s youth group.
Like Rebecca, Simon Johnson has been involved in AVPA since he arrived at Culver High.

He both performs and works on the technical side of productions, where he has served on the lighting crew and master electrician. He has earned a number of awards from California Educators of the Theater Arts.

Simon currently serves as the AVPA Company Manager. His task: Making sure everything runs smoothly in theatre company while doing all the behind the scenes work that makes a theatre company run smoothly.

The former Spelling Bee champion of the School District has also spent four years as part of the school’s Improv team and serves as this year’s co-captain.
“CCHS has been incredibly helpful both in academics and having great teachers,” Simon said. “The Arts program is huge. These programs have been transformative for me and for my identity.

“Doing Improv since middle school transformed me from being a shy introvert to a confident extrovert – the person who I am today.”

Simon is involved in in Model Legislature and Court, an extension of Youth and Government at the Culver Palms Family YMCA, and is a Math Chiron and Academic Mentor this year.

He hopes to pursue a college career as a mechanical engineering and/or computer science major. Simon has taken and scored 5s on numerous Advanced Placement classes.

“Our school has provided a lot of advantages that I wouldn’t have otherwise,” Simon said. “The quality of education and life at CCHS is greater than anything you can pay for at a private school.”

Rebecca and Simon hope to be among the 15,000 students to advance to the finalist level in February. Half of those students will earn National Merit Scholarships next spring.

Mr. Maleman may be contacted at gmaleman@aol.com