Category Archives: Lake Travis

LEEF may stay, Viper Nation may become a booster

By LYNETTE HAALAND, Four Points News

The Leander ISD board of trustees will be discussing a new way to handle the district’s goal of having one education foundation at next week’s board meeting. On April 4, the trustees will discuss and possibly take action on allowing the Viper National Education Foundation to become an academic booster club while Leander ISD Educational Excellence remains the district’s only education foundation.

“LISD administration supports the recommendation that will be presented to the board April 4,” stated Corey Ryan, LISD chief communications officer.

Leander ISD has been in the process of trying to create only one education foundation for the entire district instead of having two at the present time with the request for more to be created.

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RM 620 motorcycle fatality near Mansfield

A Round Rock man died at the scene of a motorcycle accident on March 26 on RM 620 northbound, just south of Quinlan Park Road near Mansfield Dam.

Around 1:30 a.m., Eduardo Ernesto Benedetto, 44, was driving a 2011 Yamaha and traveling southbound on RM 620 at an unsafe speed in a curve, according to the report by Texas Department of Public Safety.   Continue reading →

2019 Austin Regional Spelling Bee


The West Austin Chamber of Commerce hosted the 2019 Austin Regional Spelling Bee with 50 Austin area spellers on March 14 in Four Points.  

The 1st and 2nd place winners were the same as 2018 with Pranathi Jammula from Austin ISD’s Kealing MS coming in as the champion, and Pranav Nandakumar from Magellan International School as the runner-up. Eshan Bharadwaj from Cedar Park MS came in 3rd place.

There were four local students in the competition this year.

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VHS wind ensemble wows crowd at TMEA

By KRISTEN HILL, Contributor , MEGAN MESSER, Vandegrift Voice

Before a standing-room-only audience of over 2,500 music educators, the Vandegrift wind ensemble performed their TMEA 6A Honor Band concert on Feb. 15 at the Lila Cockrell Theatre in San Antonio as part of the Texas Music Educators Association annual convention.

The highlight of the Honor Band program was “Symphony No. 4” by David Maslanka, a 27 minute piece that the students worked on for months in preparation.  This preparation included a special clinic with University of Texas Professor and Conductor Jerry Junkin. This is a collegiate level work of music that is difficult for most high school bands to master.

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Three Viper seniors awarded perfect scores on the ACT

L-R Vandegrift seniors Jonathan Kaaua, Zachary Weiss and Bo Yang Deng all received a perfect score of 36 on their ACT exam after taking it for the first time. MIGUEL BLANCO

By MIGUEL BLANCO, Vandegrift Voice

The pressure of a standardized test is palpable as silence overtakes a room of concentrated students rapidly analyzing questions and writing answers. Although high school students are accustomed to the anxiety and weariness surrounding standardized tests, there is arguably no way to fully prepare for a test as crucial to a student’s future as the SAT and ACT.

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