Upper Arlington's state title count is up to 114 and growing! With 32 varsity sports and 1,000 student athletes, it is no surprise that the number continues to climb. This winter, our Golden Bear student athletes added to the school's impressive record.

For a sixth consecutive year, our Women's Swimming and Diving Team brought home the state title, and the Men's Swimming and Diving Team had a very strong showing, finishing third in the state. Kelly Harper King, UA '95 coaches the divers for both the teams. The combined state title count for these two programs is now at 43! The swimming powerhouse created years ago is alive and well in our waters!

For the first time in 63 years, the Men's Basketball Team completed an undefeated regular season. Prior to this year's undefeated team, the 1947 Golden Bears were the last to accomplish this very difficult task. Under the leadership of Tim Casey, UA ' 81, the Ohio Capital Conference Coach of the Year, the 2010 team boasted three First Team All Conference players, one Second Team player, one Honorable Mention player, one All Conference Scholar Athlete, and the Player of the Year. Like the 1947 team, the only loss for this year's team was in the state tournament. Way to go, Golden Bears!

The Women's Basketball Team was equally competitive, with only one loss in the regular season! The team also boasts one First Team All Conference Player, two Second Team players, one Special Mention player, one All Conference Scholar Athlete, the Player of the Year and the Coach of the Year as well. Congratulations to both of these teams on terrific seasons!

Visit UAGoldenBears.com for information about all 32 UAHS Varsity sports.

Visit UAGoldenBears.com and click on the "Spring Sports" menu button for a drop down list of links to team pages where you will find schedules, photos, scores, and more. If you are in town, consider stopping by for a game and support your Golden Bears!

If you are, we have great news! The UA City Schools offer a Golden Bear Activity Card for Upper Arlington Senior Citizens. All residents of UA who are age 60 or above are eligible to receive this card free of charge. The card provides free admission to all regular season athletic events, music programs, and activities sponsored by the Upper Arlington School District. This card does not include post-season competition. Cards are available at the school principals' offices, the superintendent's office, and the UA Senior Center. Proof of age and UA residency is required when you request your Golden Bear Activity Card.

Please note: You do not have to be a UAHS alum in order to receive this card, but you MUST be a resident of Upper Arlington. Please tell your neighbors and friends to take advantage of this great benefit, and enjoy the many wonderful events you can attend here in UA free of charge!

With our alums scattered all over the world, we know that there are many of you who still have parents living back home in UA. Did you know that the City of Upper Arlington has fantastic resources for our older adult residents? The Upper Arlington Commission on Aging, housed in the UA Senior Center, is a not-for-profit organization that recognizes the needs of our UA residents who are age 60 and up. For more than 25 years, the Commission on Aging has worked to enhance the quality of life for seniors in Upper Arlington.

For a complete list of services available to our seniors, please visit the Older Adult Services page of the City of Upper Arlington Web site, or call 614-538-5326.

Thanks so much to those of you who sent in nominations for the UAHS Educators Hall of Fame. The 2010 honorees will be selected from the following nominees:

The Educators Hall of Fame was established in 2005 by Principal Kip Greenhill and the UAHS faculty to honor retired teachers and adminsitrators for their lasting influence on their students and fellow educators.

Now is your opportunity to visit our Bearalums.com Messageboard and leave a comment of support for one or more of the nominees. Please sign in with your real name and graduation year and relate a favorite memory of that educator and indicate why you believe that he or she should be honored in the Hall of Fame.

The Selection Committee will review your comments, select the honorees later this spring, and recognize the inductees in a ceremony next fall. Please leave your comments by May 15.

Many of our former elementary, junior high or middle school, and high school teachers have sent in their email addresses and short bios for the Bearalums.com so that they can stay in touch with their students. By asking to be listed on Bearalums.com's Faculty Email page, these educators are inviting us to email them and reconnect. Please visit this page and send one of your teachers a message. It's sure to make his or her day ... and won't it be fun to receive a reply after all these years?

Did you graduate in a year ending with a "0" or a "5"? If so, you will be having a reunion this summer! Reunion chairs have been busy with party plans, and you can see the details on your Class Reunion page. Check our Reunions 2010 page for all details about the 2010 UAHS class reunions and to see if your class has a Web site or a Facebook page set up for your reunion.

As you know, during the past several months, we have been working diligently to increase our UAAA membership. With reunion season well underway, we are conducting a REUNION CLASS CHALLENGE to all classes who are having a reunion in July, 2010. Here's how your class can win a $500 CASH PRIZE to be used for your reunion party! On June 15, 2010, we will tabulate each class' TOTAL MEMBERSHIP PERCENTAGE, and the class who has the highest percentage of members at any level will win a $500 CASH PRIZE for their reunion parties! By using total percentage as the criteria, we keep the competition fair, since some classes are quite small and others are huge. This is a great time to become a member of UAAA and help increase your own class' membership percentage.

To become a member of UAAA, just go to the Membership page and join online with Paypal or print out the membership form and mail it to us with your check by June 15.

Please visit Bearalums.com to see the announcement of the winner of the REUNION CLASS CHALLENGE on June 17, 2010.

Whether or not you have a reunion this summer, please plan to join everyone UNDER THE TENT at the 2010 UAAA BLOCK PARTY. This year, as always the Block Party will take place right after the UA parade behind Barrington Elementary School. And again, John Kost, Class of 1974, of ReMax Premier Choice Real Estate, will be sponsoring this fun event for us. John has generously underwritten the entire Black Party for TEN CONSECUTIVE YEARS, making him the single largest contributor to the UA Alumni Assocation. We thank John for his continuing dedication to UAAA! See our photo galleries from Block Parties since 2001. You may be pictured Under the Tent!

For those of you interested in UAHS music concerts, here is a calendar of upcoming band, orchestra, and vocal music concerts:

Jok and Bol are two Lost Boys of Sudan who are recent graduates of The Ohio State University. These remarkable young men told their life story to an assembly of UAHS freshmen from House D and inspired a semester-long service learning project. Walking 1,500 miles to escape civil war in southern Sudan, Jok, Bol, and thousands of other boys fled their village, leaving behind their families and overcoming dehydration, starvation, military attacks, wild animals, and illness. They spent fourteen years in refugee camps and were two of the lucky few to make their way to America. Their goal is to begin rebuilding southern Sudan by raising funds to build a health clinic in their home village.

The Upper Arlington Education Foundation is a proud sponsor of this effort to assist in raising funds and awareness for the Lost Boys of Sudan, and YOU CAN HELP, TOO!

Please join us at the 5 K Walk-A-Thon to help the Lost Boys of Sudan!

As graduates of Upper Arlington High School, we share a bond that lasts a lifetime, and it is with sad hearts that we announce the passing of the following UAHS alumni. To their families and friends we extend our sincere condolences.

Thanks so much to all of you who pay dues to the UAAA. These dues are critical to the support of our organization. Many alums think that funding for the Alumni Association comes from the school district. WRONG! We are completely self-sustaining and need these dues in order to maintain our database of nearly 30,000 graduates and to pay the costs of running our Web site, Bearalums.com. We are proud that we do not require a login and password for our Web site and we do not restrict it to dues-paying members. However, over the past few years, we have seen our number of dues-paying members decline. We need YOU! Our tax-deductible dues are modest, so it is our goal to increase membership, and we hope that we can count on you. Membership in UAAA is available at four levels:

Some people are online a great deal and prefer to pay with Paypal; others prefer printing the membership form and mailing us a check. We appreciate your dues, and we want to make it easy for you, so please select your preferred method of payment.:

Because we respect our alums' privacy, we list names and email addresses on Bearalums.com ONLY when they are personally submitted by the alum. When we started Bearalums.com in 2000, we had approximately 320 email addresses in our database; we currently have more than 12,000 alums' email addresses listed on Bearalums.com!

If you are not listed on your class page but wish to be, please send in your information. If you notice that one of your classmates isn't listed, please contact that person and ask them to visit Bearalums.com and personally submit his or her information. And if you see someone's name on the Lost list at the bottom of each class page, and you know his or her location, please let us know, or contact that classmate and ask him or her to contact UAAA.

Our goal is to maintain the most complete and accurate database that we possibly can. We are asking for your help! And thank you to those of you who have helped us through your membership dues; your financial help allows us to provide the ongoing hosting and maintenance fees of our Web site.  

We hope that you will make sure that we have your current postal mailing address, phone number, and email address. Below are the email addresses to use to send this information to the correct person at UAAA: