Local climber makes the grade at North American championships

Greg Padovani Jr. of Arlington Heights took seventh place in the 2008 North American Continental Climbing Championships, among 18- and 19-year-olds, held recently in Montreal. Padovani, a freshman at Marquette University in Milwaukee, is a 2008 graduate of Hersey High School and a 2004 graduate of St. James Catholic School. He began rock climbing at age 10 with Indian Guides at the Lattof YMCA in Des Plaines.

• Christopher Scarpulla of Elk Grove Village and Daniel Shaw of Schaumburg have been selected for the 2008-2009 edition of the Millikin Men, a 25-voice choir made up of first-year Millikin University students, who sing a variety of repertoire. Scarpulla is a music education, vocal major and a graduate of Elk Grove High School. Shaw is also a music education, vocal major.

• Laura Chiuve was honored Dec. 16 with the Des Plaines Park District's "Dedicated to Excellence" award for the fourth quarter of 2008. Chiuve is the Des Plaines School of Dance coordinator, the founder and artistic director of Artistry in Motion and AiM2 Dance Companies and an instructor at the school. Chiuve was nominated for "her positive attitude and enthusiasm about her craft, her willingness to put her students and the program first and her professional experiences."

• The Rev. Kathie Bender Schwich has been appointed vice president of mission and spiritual care at Advocate Lutheran General Hospital and Advocate Lutheran General Children's Hospital, in Park Ridge. She succeeds the Rev. Lee Joesten, who is stepping down after nearly 36 years as chaplain at Advocate Lutheran General Hospital. Josten will continue to be involved on a part-time basis in the hospital's disclosure and clinical ethics programs. Bender Schwich was ordained in the Lutheran Church in America in 1986.

• Elk Grove Village violinist Natsuki Kumagai, a member of The Academy program of the Music Institute of Chicago, will perform Saint-Saens' Violin Concerto No. 3 in B Minor, Op. 61, with the Skokie Valley Symphony Orchestra at 3 p.m. Sunday, Jan. 18, at the North Shore Center for the Performing Arts, 9501 Skokie Blvd., in Skokie. Kumagai, currently concertmistress of the Music Institute of Chicago Academy orchestra, also is concert mistress of the District 211 High School Honors Orchestra.

• Sarah Tesch of Schaumburg, a junior biochemistry major at Valparaiso University, presented her summer research project, "Harnessing Microbes for Containing Uranium and Plutonium Contaminants in Groundwater," at a chemistry department seminar Dec. 12. Tesch's research was part of the university's involvement in a U.S. Department of Energy project studying microbes that could help prevent the spread of radioactive contamination from more than 100 sites across the U.S. where nuclear weapons have been tested or build since after World War II. Tesch is the daughter of Mark and Danette Tesch.