The Bear Facts
February 19, 2022


Good morning! I’m Meredith Tigges!

I’m Ava Eisenbarth!

And I’m Marguerite Fakler! This is the “Bear Facts”, your weekly radio update from Bishop Garrigan High School.

For the past several years Garrigan students have been part of DECA, a nationwide organization with the goal of “preparing emerging leaders for the future”. Tomorrow fifteen Golden Bears will be headed down to Des Moines for the DECA State Career Development Conference. They’ll meet with and compete against students from all over Iowa who are interested in business-oriented careers.

As part of state DECA, students take exams in a wide variety of fields, including entrepreneurship, finance, marketing, business administration, hospitality, business management, and core skills. They also work to prepare presentations in their fields of interest. Violet Bode, Lillee Deike, Brendan Plathe, and Ella Schaaf will be representing Garrigan on the Entrepreneurship team.

There’s also a Sports and Entertainment Marketing Team, which features Mya Kemna, Sam Plathe, and Ben Greteman. Isabel Casey will compete in Accounting Applications, Riley Rosenmeyer is entered in Human Resource Management, and Zach Warren is in Restaurant and Food Service Management.

Avery Lichter and Ava Hough make up the Travel and Tourism Team, Brooke Ludwig is in Hotel and Lodging Management, Sam Greteman will compete in Business Management and Administration, and Molly Peterson is in Apparel and Accessories Marketing. Good luck at state to everyone involved in DECA.

Garrigan’s Viva Voce jazz choir is competing again today. They’re up in Spirit Lake for the “Shake the Lake” jazz festival. The jazz choir includes Ava Eisenbarth, Ella Muller, Hollis Bode, Marguerite Fakler, Xander Darling, Isabel Casey, and Meredith Tigges; as well as Audi Crooks, Maggie Vaske, Nate Bronk, Drew Casey, Eva Snyder, Savannah Waechter, Violet Bode, Benjy Trainer, Brendan Plathe, Logan Nemmers, Sam Plathe, and percussionist Riley Rosenmeyer. Good luck, Viva Voce!

The jazz choir will also be performing next Friday at the annual Garrigan pops concert. Both solo and group acts have been rehearsing all through the winter, and both the vocal and instrumental performances should be good. The pops concert will be next Friday, starting at 7pm in Friedmann Auditorium.

There’s also more quiz bowl action this coming week. Today both high school and junior high quiz bowlers are down competing in the Iowa Quiz Bowl League Winter Classic at Centennial High School in Ankeny. Then next Thursday the team will take part in the online Knowledge Master spring contest. Best wishes to the quiz bowl team!

Gala 2022 is just around the corner. The event will be back in person this year, and it should be bigger and better than ever. Yesterday we had a special out-of-uniform day to raise money to buy some of the Chest of Chance gifts for Gala. Sponsors are needed for other gifts. You can find some of them on a special Amazon wish list that is linked from Garrigan’s Facebook page.

The theme for Gala 2022 is “Masterpiece Ball”, and the decorations will be themed around artwork. As always the big evening includes an elegant dinner, live and silent auctions, and numerous special raffles. Gala will be Saturday, April 2nd. We’ll tell you more as the big night approaches.

This past week the Top of Iowa Conference announced their all-conference basketball teams. Golden Bear point guard Molly Joyce was named the conference player of the year, while her teammate Audi Crooks was also first team all-conference, Abbie Capesius earned second team honors, and Meredith Tigges was an honorable mention. The Bears breezed past West Bend—Mallard in their opening round of playoffs earlier this week. Congratulations, girls!

This week’s Senior Spotlight shines on Isabel Casey. Here to tell you about her is Riley Rosenmeyer.

We’ve mentioned Isabel Casey’s name twice already on today’s show. She’s part of the jazz choir, and she’s also competing at state DECA. Over the years Isabel has also been active in speech, drama, and musicals. She also competes in the throwing events in track. Her DECA skills should come in handy when she takes business classes in college. We wish Isabel all the best in the future.

Thanks, Riley. On our Golden Bear calendar, today there’s jazz choir in Spirit Lake, and the quiz bowl team is competing down in Ankeny. Then tomorrow and Monday there’s state DECA in Des Moines.

We’ll have a school mass next Tuesday. Then Wednesday there’s no school because of teacher inservice. The girls basketball regional final will be next Wednesday night.

Thursday the quiz bowl team will compete in the spring Knowledge Master. Next Friday night is the pops concert, and then next Saturday individual speech students will compete in the district contest in Newell.

That’s this week’s “Bear Facts”. Thanks for tuning in, and be sure to join us again next week to hear more news from Bishop Garrigan High School.