Good morning! I'm Cassie Recker!
And I'm Jesse Bode! Welcome to a special edition of the "Bear Facts", the weekly radio show from Bishop Garrigan High School
Gala 2004 is here. For months the development staff has been making plans, and this past week we've been putting the final touches on "A Heavenly Celebration", the fifteenth annual Catholic Schools Gala. Each year Gala raises around $200,000 to help support Garrigan and Seton, which makes it by far the largest fundraiser our school system has.
For many Gala-goers, the highlight of the evening is the dinner. This evening's menu begins with hors d'oeuvres-including smoked salmon pastries, Greek pizzerettas, and Asian chicken salad on endive tips. The meal itself starts with tomato bisque, followed up by spinach salad with bacon vinaigrette. The main course features herb-crusted tenderloin of beef with raspberry port sauce. A mélange of sautéed vegetables and potatoes au gratin will be on the side. Guests will enjoy cheese and garlic pillow rolls, and they'll top everything off with "a walk in the clouds" for dessert.
While they're stuffing their faces, Gala guests will bid on nearly ninety live auction items, plus hundred of silent auction gifts. Some of this year's more unique items include an old church pew from St. Cecelia's, a Brad Nelson bobblehead doll, and lots of angel-related gifts reflecting this year's "heavenly" theme.
In addition to the auctions, there are many other opportunities to get nice things and part with your money at Gala. There's raffles where you can win a car or a big-screen TV, the "Chest of Chance", "First Chance", "Half Chance", and "Last Chance" games, and a recreation raffle. About forty student workers will be helping out at this year's Gala, and literally hundreds of adults have been working for one full year to make sure everything is just right for tonight's big event.
Last weekend Garrigan's quiz bowl team brought home two trophies from the Boone Invitational tournament-the fourth and fifth pieces of hardware the team has won this year. Grioups from Garrigan took both first and fourth place in the tournament's green division. Jacob Richter, Renee Taphorn, Brianne Donahe, Samantha Kirsch, and Seth Rogers edged out North Kossuth in double overtime to capture the championship trophy. At the end of regulation, the game was tied 70 - 70. After the standard five-question overtime, it was still tied, 80 - 80. The game went into sudden death, and Jacob Richter was the hero of the day for identifying that Drake University was named after Iowa's oldest governor.
A team of Garrigan sophomores has a less than stellar record in the preliminary rounds, but they came back in play-offs to take the fourth place trophy. That team included Alison Brandenburg, Jeff Lappe, Spenser Rahm, Jacob Hellman, and Andrew Missal. Garrigan's other entry included seniors John Kohlhaas, Matt Courtney, Amber Golwitzer, Scott Stence, and Jesse Bode. They qualified for play-offs in the red division, but ended up losing to Ames High School. The quiz bowl team's next event will be next week, when those players going to nationals will put their brains together to answer 200 questions in the Golden Bear trivia challenge. They're looking for people to sponsor them based on how many questions they can answer correctly.
Last Thursday a large group of Garrigan seniors went up to Minneapolis. The seniors were part of the school's Christian Leadership in Action Group, and they were doing just what that name says-putting their Christianity into action. The seniors spent the day working at Mary's Place, a mission that helps homeless and unemployed people in the Twin Cities area. Garrigan students served the noon meal and helped out with odd jobs around the place.
Everyone at Garrigan will be exploring their faith on Holy Thursday next week, when we have our annual retreat. We're starting this year's retreat with a field trip to the Algona Theatre, where we'll see a special screening of The Passion of Christ. Afterwards we'll return to school, where we'll be discussing the film and Christ's impact on our lives. Each year we have some sort of special school retreat right before the Easter season.
Our Senior Spotlight this week shines on Ashley Berte. Ashley comes to Garrigan from the LuVerne area. She's a very busy person, who is the yearbook editor, a HOSA member, and a successful golfer. Ashley also keeps busy with 4-H, and away from school you might see her working at K-Mart. Ashley plans to go into a health-related career in the future, and we wish her all the best.
Because of the Easter break, we've got two weeks of events on our Golden Bear calendar. Tonight is Gala, 2004. Mass for the workers is at 4pm, and the guests will start arriving around 5:30.
Tomorrow is Palm Sunday. Then on Monday Eric Cassmann, Amber Golwitzer, and Amanda Golwitzer will be performing at the All-State Speech Festival in Cedar Falls.
Tuesday there's girls track at Clear Lake. Then on Wednesday several art students will go to Hampton for the North Central Conference Art Show.
Thursday we'll see The Passion of Christ for retreat, and then we have a long weekend with no activities over Easter break.
Classes start up again on Tuesday, April 13. That night there's boys golf at Webster City, girls golf at Humboldt, and girls track at Algona High. Then on Thursday the 15th the boys track team runs at Lake Mills.
Friday the 16th the boys track team runs at Estherville, while the girls are at Clarion. Then on Saturday the 17th there's the state math contest in Iowa City, and several musicians will be competing at state solo and ensemble music contest.
That's the "Bear Facts" for another week. We'll be off next week for the Easter break, but be sure to join us again two weeks from today for more news from Bishop Garrigan High School.
