Report card

It’s a night to make dreams come true. Saturday at the Waterfront

Hilton in Huntington Beach, DreamCatchers Auxiliary of the Assistance

League of Huntington Beach will hold it annual fund-raising dinner at 6

p.m.

The night will include a silent auction, raffles and door prizes with

the funds raised going directly to meet local community needs.

DreamCatchers is a nonprofit organization dedicated to serving the

community. Some of their projects include, Operation School Bell, which

provides school clothes, backpacks and other needed items to

disadvantaged children; Operation Self-Esteem, which supplies personal

care items to the homeless and mentally challenged, and the Therapeutic

Riding Scholarship, which assists needy disabled children with physical

therapy.

DreamCatchers’ resources to meet these commitments consist of

donations from the community and the work of several volunteers. To

purchase a ticket for the fund-raising dinner, become involved in their

projects or to send a donation, call 962-2558.

Potential merit scholars

Ocean View High School announced Tuesday that six of its graduating

seniors have qualified as semifinalists in the National Merit Scholarship

awards competition.

Naoshin Haque, Edwin Kim, Iris Ma, Katherine Nguyen, Salman Rehmat and

James Szeto now have the opportunity to compete for nearly 7,600 merit

scholarship awards, said Nancy Steiner, the school’s community resources

coordinator.

After taking the the Preliminary Scholastic Assessment Test/ National

Merit Scholarship Qualifying Test, which screens more than a million

entrants each year, the six students wrote essays about their interests,

plans and goals, major activities in which they are involved, awards

earned and volunteer work and contributions they have made to the school

and community.

Winners of the Merit Program awards are chosen on the basis of their

abilities, skills and accomplishments and will earn the title of merit

scholar.

The National Merit Scholarship Program is an annual academic

competition for recognition and college undergraduate scholarships. The

program’s objectives are to identify and honor exceptionally able U.S.

high school students, encourage them to pursue rigorous college studies

and provide a system of professional services for organizations that wish

to sponsor scholarships.

Register for the the American College Testing Assessment

College-bound high school students who want to take the American

College Testing Assessment have two chances to register before the Dec. 8

test date.

The postmark registration deadline is Friday. There is also a late

registration postmark deadline on Nov. 15, which requires an additional

fee for late registration. The test fee is $24.

Test scores are accepted by virtually all colleges in the nation,

including all Ivy League schools. A student’s scores are considered by

colleges for admissions. To learn more about the test, including

registration forms and test locations, students can contact their high

school counselor or go to the ACT Web site, o7 https://www.act.org.f7

The site offers useful tips, sample tests and the opportunity to order

test prep materials.

Plenty of pennies

The final tally is still uncertain, but the Huntington Beach Pennies

for Prevention campaign has been deemed a success.

Representatives from elementary and middle schools throughout

Huntington Beach stopped by Bank of America at the Five Points Shopping

Center on Friday to drop off pennies they had collected. The drive raised

nearly $10,000, said Huntington Beach Police Sgt. Janet Perez.

The campaign is co-sponsored by the Police Department and Promoting

Resources in Drug Education. It supports Substance Abuse Prevention

Education in Huntington, which includes the Drug Abuse Resistance

Education Program, Every 15 Minutes, Red Ribbon Week, the Huntington

Beach Youth Summit and community forums.

“We are very happy with the money that was raised,” Perez said. “We

were a little concerned with the amount we would be able to raise, seeing

as how everyone has been contributing in some way to relief efforts in

New York, but we were pleasantly surprised with the total.”

Each school that participated will receive $1 for every pound of

pennies it raised, with the money going toward programs for drug

prevention and education at the school.