SCOTTSDALE, AZ — Sequoya Elementary School has been a fixture near 64th Street and Cactus since 1988. It's the kind of school where parents who once walked the hallways now drop their own kids off at the front door.
This week, a new generation of those kids stepped up in front of our ABC15 cameras to become the newest class of Kidcasters.
Nearly 30 fourth-graders took a turn at the microphone. Some talked about temperatures. Some talked about tornadoes. All of them shouted out the athletes they look up to most, from Simone Biles and Katie Ledecky to Michael Jordan and Lionel Messi. And of course, the hometown heroes got plenty of love too: Phoenix Suns guard Devin Booker and Arizona Diamondbacks catcher Gabriel Moreno.
But on this day, the spotlight wasn't on the court or the field. It was right here in Mr. Tak's classroom.
Armen Takoushian, known to his students simply as Mr. Tak, teaches fourth-grade science and social studies at Sequoya. He's worn just about every hat on the campus over the years, from pre-K to aftercare, and now full-time in the fourth-grade classroom.
He says his students were primed and ready when ABC15 reached out about a visit. They had already been studying weather this year as part of their science curriculum.
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"A lot of gasps," Mr. Tak said, recalling the moment he told his class who was coming. "I think there was one kid who asked, 'Is he a celebrity?' To which I replied, 'Oh yeah. Local legend, Jorge Torres.'"
For Mr. Tak, the value of a day like this goes far beyond a fun assembly.
"Seeing the science that they're learning in action in real time puts that idea in their head that this is something that doesn't just start and end in the classroom," he said. "This is something I can take with me for the rest of my life."
And the best part of his job, he says, often happens long before any student ever picks up a Kidcaster microphone.
"You can literally see the neurons firing in some of their faces, and when they're so eager and so enthusiastic to participate, that's what means the world to me as a teacher."
A school built in 1988, still lighting up young minds in 2026 — and the minds of those who teach them, too.
