Drama State
A group of the high school drama students went to drama state at Vincennes University for the weekend of January 22. The students could perform a skit and there were even things for the stage crew to do. For the crew, there was a series of challenges for them to complete like folding a large backdrop, quickly and quietly performing a scene change, and properly hang and operate a light and cables.
“Drama state is everything it is lived up to be. It’s an amazing experience I hope every theater kid gets to go at some point. We saw astounding plays, met amazing people and went to well put together workshops to shape you as an actor. Crew wasn't left out either; they had the opportunity to participate in tech challenges. The whole experience was definitely worth it,” said junior Evan Queen.
If students wanted to perform a skit or song, they got to pick their group or do it solo and some student even won awards. Senior Josh Zoran won the “excellence” award, junior Trevor Sheffield won the “superior” award, and senior Daniel Walker won the “distinguished senior” award.
Blood Drive
On January 25, the high school held a blood drive throughout the day in the main gym. The school does one every year. Only students 16 and over were aloud to donate.
They had to sign up for the event in advance. The drive is run by student council every year and this year NHS were even offered hours to help out with running the event. A large number of students were pleased to sign up to donate blood and the outcome was a large success. They even passed their goal of raising 70 pints of blood. Student council plans on continuing this event in future years.
Student Shout Out
Senior Marissa Perez is ranked number two in her class and gets very involved in multiple school activities. She is in soccer, swimming, and track and she is also the captain of the swimming and track.
Not only is she a captain, but she is also the president of National Honors Society and co-president of FCCLA. She also takes part in many other clubs like student council, international club, and math bowl. She also volunteers outside of school and is a tutor. Noticing all of Perez’s amazing achievements, she got accepted a full tuition scholarship to Rose-Hulman.
Teacher Shout Out
Sheila Vaclavik made the decision to retire from teaching after teaching at Griffith High School for 32 years. Vaclavik graduated Valpo University with a major in English and a minor in Spanish. She spent her first year of teaching at Rensselaer, then she transferred to GHS for a part time job to teach Spanish.
She was then moved to a permanent spot as an English teacher and has been teaching English at GHS ever since. She mainly taught sophomore honors English, but her favorite class to teach was English 11 (American literature) because she enjoyed showing her students the chronological development of literature.
“I advise students to push themselves to the limit. Don’t just read for the surface value. Push yourself to re-read and re-read again to really understand the message that the writer is trying to share. I am going to miss teaching at GHS and just the community at large,” said Vaclavik.
After her retirement, she is now off to Pennsylvania to pursue her dream career of becoming a youth minister.