LASA Students Shine During the 2025-2026 Reflections Program, Going National!

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LASA Students Shine During the 2025-2026 Reflections Program!
Texas PTA proudly celebrates the incredible creativity of students across the state! This year, more than 870 student entries advanced for state-level judging, showcasing remarkable talent, imagination, and artistic expression inspired by this year’s theme. We are thrilled to recognize over 600 student artists with state-level awards. Five LASA Students have been recognized by the LASA PTSA, the Austin Council PTA, the Texas PTA this year with one student making it to the National PTA Competition (results will be announced the first of May, 2026).

These incredible student artists are:
Ananth Pakanati for Literature
Grant Ratcliffgardy for Music Composition
Piper Meley for Photography
Sadie Sarrat for Dance Choreography
Zixuan (Camille) Mei for Visual Arts

Camille has achieved the “Overall Award of Excellence,” which elevates her to the National PTA Reflections competition level. Congratulations, Camille!!!!!!!

LASA PTSA Scholarship Application

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LASA PTSA is offering a $1,000 scholarship this year. Application and rubric can be found here:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1Zroc984DV4XrI4dKknWyidxVv8-Zqc4L/view?usp=sharing

Applications are due March 31st. For questions, please email Heather Roell vpmembership@lasaptsa.org.

If you are NOT a Senior Parent and would like to sit on the Scholarship Committee, please email vpmembership@lasaptsa.org. We need a few more people.

LASA PTSA Loves our Student Members!

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That’s right, we love our student members! Every year, LASA PTSA runs a contest to see which class will have the highest student membership. The race is on! Here’s the student membership count as of January 31st:

  • Class of 2028 – 59 members
  • Class of 2029 – 56 members
  • Class of 2027 – 47 members
  • Class of 2026 – 41 members

It’s a close race! Spread the word and have your classmates join PTSA. Every membership counts. While you’re at it, have your parents join too!

https://www.lasaptsa.org

Lunch & Learn This Friday: Be an Informed Voter

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Friday, January 23 from 12:05-12:55pm in the library. Pizza will be provided on a first-come, first-served basis to enjoy during an informative lunch talk open to the entire LASA community, including parents! This PTSA Advocacy program is an excellent primer for future voters and a helpful refresher for registered voters, offering insight into how civic participation shapes our communities. Please join us – register today!

LASA PTSA Earns Even More Membership Awards!

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The LASA PTSA has been busy earning membership awards! Thanks to everyone who has joined and donated so far this year!

October – We earned the Snappy Increase Award by submitting more than 100% of last year’s membership total!

December – We earned the Golden Apple Award by recruiting 100% school faculty as members (thanks donors!).

We also reached the Good Standing metric.

It’s not to late to join. In fact, you can help us earn the next award, by joining today. In January, we need 10 new members to earn the Welcome Back Membership Award. All are welcome to join and our JotForm is working again!

https://www.lasaptsa.org/

Reflections Austin Council PTA (ACPTA) Reflections Competition Winners

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Congratulations to these LASA Students who have now advanced to the Texas State PTA level of the National PTA Reflections Competition.

After participating in the LASA round (LASA PTSA), then advancing to and competing in the Austin Council PTA (ACPTA) Reflections Competition using the theme “I Belong”, several LASA Students have now been advanced to the state-level competition for the entire state of Texas.

Here are the amazing artists who have been advanced to TXPTA Reflections 25-26:

(Camille) Mei Zixuan – Visual Arts
Piper Meley – Photography
Ananth Pakanati – Literature
Grant Ratcliffgardy – Music Composition
Sadie Sarrat – Dance Choreography

We wish these talented individuals the best of luck in this next round of the National PTA Reflections Competition! Results will be posted March 15th.

Announcing the Reflections 2025-2026 Advancing Artists

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Congratulations to the artists who participated in the 2025-2026 National PTA Reflections. We had a wonderful Artist Recognition Celebration for everyone who entered last week and it was a great time! We would like to announce the Artists that are moving from the LASA level to the ACPTA (Austin Council PTA) Level.

With a theme of “I Belong!” For The Categories of:

  • Literature: Ananth Pakanati and Ariana Rodrigue
  • Photography: Piper Meley, Liam Harris and Ananth Pakanati
  • Visual Arts: Camille Mei, Tiernan O’Keefe and Zaara Zaidi
  • Music Composition: Chloe Billhardt and Grant Ratcliffgardy
  • Dance Choreography: Amelia Ratcliffgardy and Sadie Sarrat

We were pleased to have increased the number of artists and entries this year and hope that even more will participate in the LASA PTSA Reflections program next year. The Reflections theme for 2026-2027 is “What My Culture Means to Me”.

Congrats Again, LASA Reflections

2025 Reflections Recognition (Update) & Reception Date

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Congratulations to the artists that participated in the LASA PTSA Reflections 2025-2026 art competition (“I Belong!”).

We will have a reception for all of our participants Thursday, Dec 11 at the beginning of lunch.

Please recognize our amazing artists who contributed to Reflections this year.

  • Advika Raghav (somehow left out last week)
  • Akwaeno Udosen
  • Alex Catterson
  • Amelia Ratcliffgardy
  • Ananth Pakanati
  • Ariana Rodriguez
  • Chloe Billhardt
  • Elise Foster
  • Gargi Pandey
  • Gordon Streber
  • Grant Ratcliffgardy
  • Knox Meley
  • Liam Harris
  • Maeve Mohundro
  • Paxton Tidrick
  • Piper Meley
  • Ryan Wu
  • Sadie Sarrat
  • Sahana Vijay
  • Stella Thomaz
  • Tiernan O’Keefe
  • Zaara Zaidi
  • Zixuan (Camille) Mei

Judging has been completed and we will be announcing the artists that move forward to the Austin Council PTA (ACPTA) level at the Reflections Recognition Celebration this Thursday, December 11th during lunch.

Great Job!

LASA Reflections

Congratulations to our Reflections Artists of 2025

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We are pleased to congratulate the artists that participated in the PTA Reflections 2025-2026 themed “I Belong!” art competition. The judging should be completed soon to find out who moves on to ACPTA reflections. We hope to have a reception for all of our participants very soon. We would like to recognize these esteemed artists who contributed to Reflections this year:

  • Akwaeno Udosen
  • Alex Catterson
  • Amelia Ratcliffgardy
  • Ananth Pakanati
  • Ariana Rodriguez
  • Chloe Billhardt
  • Elise Foster
  • Gargi Pandey
  • Gordon Streber
  • Grant Ratcliffgardy
  • Knox Meley
  • Liam Harris
  • Maeve Mohundro
  • Paxton Tidrick
  • Piper Meley
  • Ryan Wu
  • Sadie Sarrat
  • Sahana Vijay
  • Stella Thomaz
  • Tiernan O’Keefe
  • Zaara Zaidi
  • Zixuan (Camille) Mei

We will be announcing the artists that move forward to the Austin Council PTA (ACPTA) level next week and will be planning a Reflections Recognition Celebration during lunch soon as well.

Great Job! LASA Reflections