Student Spotlight: Madeline Epstein

Fourteen-year-old Madeline Epstein is full of promise. The eighth-grader at Booker Middle School starts her day at 5:40 a.m. most mornings and goes until about 8 p.m. with all of her extracurricular activities. She is a dancer, singer and model student.

Madeline made it to the county history and science fair. Her science-fair project tied into her love for the arts. She hypothesized that learning with music would not be as productive as learning without music. Her hypothesis was correct, but she discovered classical music was the best music choice to when learning something. Her history-fair project was on Joan of Arc.

“I knew I wanted to do a history project on her when I found out she jumped off a 66-foot building and survived,” Madeline says.

Madeline began singing at the same time she learned how to speak; she’s also been dancing ever since she could walk.

“When I am dancing jazz, I feel sassy; when I am dancing ballet, I feel free and graceful; and when I dance composition, I can make up my own dances so I can express myself,” says Madeline.

She is in the magnet Visual and Performing Arts program at Booker Middle School and dances with Dance- The Next Generation. Last summer, she attended an intensive dance camp with the Sarasota Ballet and next year she will be in the ACE program, at Sarasota High School.

Last week, Madeline and her friends, Bailey Lovesky, Halle Nobles and Patty McGuire, auditioned to sing the national anthem at the opening of the Orioles versus Phillies baseball game Sunday, March 3, at Ed Smith Stadium. The students will represent Booker at the sold-out game.

Madeline hopes to one day be a mathematician or heart surgeon.

“Being a heart surgeon means you save people’s lives,” Madeline says. “If you are good at math you are usually good at everything.” — Yaryna Klimchak