Archer’s first ARCHERVISION awards were held in the dining hall during meetings and mentorship time Tuesday, May 9. The awards were presented on Zoom, which was projected on screens to mentorship groups. In the submitted videos, students lip-synced to or sang an original or preexisting song in the language they study.

Sixteen judges and 298 student, faculty and staff members voted on 14 music videos in the middle school division. The Chinese 1B class’s video won first place and was called “对面的女孩看过来,” which means “the girl in front of me look over here.” The second place winner was a music video titled “Bruxelles Je T’aime” by French 1B, which means “Brussels I love you.” The fan favorite was “Ser o Estar,” which translates to “to be or to be” by Spanish 1B.

The first place winner for original song in upper school was by Chinese 3 called “我们爱,” which means “We Love.” The second place winner for original song was “女孩的力量,” which means “Girl Power” by Advanced Study: Chinese Language and Culture. For the lip sync category, first place was “Tout Oublier,” which means “to forget everything” by French senior seminar, the second place and fan favorite was “男子汉,” which means “I’ll make a man out of you” by Chinese 4 and third place was “Music Sessions #53” by Spanish 2 Accelerated. 

The World Language Department found inspiration for ARCHERVISION from the Eurovision Song Contest, a global television music competition. Chinese teacher Pei-Ying Gosselin was part of the planning and ceremony.

“We always wanted the students to be able to use a language they learn in a classroom and apply [it] to the more daily life activities, and we like to see that the students are inspired [and] encouraged to use the language in music videos,” Gosselin said. “The main purpose is that we want the language to be used outside of the classroom.”

Once the World Language department received the results, Gosselin said they prepared the prizes and certificates. In honor of the first year of ARCHERVISION, Spanish teacher Talia Geffen and Gosselin created customized stickers of the ARCHERVISION graphic illustration.

Ashley Chan (’27) is part of the Chinese 1B class and said the most challenging part of creating the video was deciding what the class wanted to do in each scene to make their actions meaningful.

“This year, we just focused on editing, and we’ve prefilled a couple clips,” Chan said. “But, it’s been really fun and nice.”

Maya Bell (’27) is also part of the Chinese 1B class and watched the awards take place in the dining hall. Bell said she and her classmates got up in front of the middle school division when they received the award.

“Everyone was clapping, and we were all just really excited,” Bell said. “It was a very fun experience for our entire class.”

Gosselin hopes the ceremony can inspire younger students to expand their knowledge of the language they are studying.

“We organized the ceremony so that students feel proud of their work,” Gosselin said. “And we hope that our ceremony can inspire some younger students who maybe didn’t have a lot of experience.”