TUHS Springs into a New Season
Barry Heimillier posing in front of the angel wings for Spring Fling.
The week before Spring Break the TUHS campus was ‘The Happiest Place on Earth’ with a Disney-themed Spring Fling. For dress up days, students were encouraged to wear pajamas on Monday, beachwear on Tuesday, crazy hair for Wednesday, and anything Disney on Thursday.
Wednesday for Hump Day, Pump Day two of Taft High’s clubs were busy at work to raise money for their programs. Rain didn’t stop the Garden Club from selling strawberries in the TUHS quad. The club sold over 200 berries and made the same amount in profits. All the strawberries were freshly grown in the Taft High garden with the chocolate bought from our local grocery store. Although it was pouring rain, Mrs. Popejoy and Mrs. Schoneweis refused to let that get in the way of their selling of these homegrown treats to the Taft High students and faculty members. FFA raised money by selling muffins and Krispy Kreme donuts individually or by the box.
Art teacher, Sophie Rasmussen decided to bring something new to the TUHS campus in honor of Spring Fling Week. Art club students were to either get in groups or go solo in creating wings for Colette Miller’s Global Angel Wing Project. This was to, “…remind humanity that we are the angels of this earth.” says Miller. With that, Mrs. Rasmussen determined that it was, “A good concept that will bring a positive message to Taft High.” Four pairs of wings were created by students and could be found by the library, science building, main building, and auditorium annex building.
Again, art students made the campus a brighter place with their annual chalk art. Beginning art and cartoon students were paired in groups of no more than three and were assigned to create an image pulled from the Internet on a 2’ by 3’ space in the quad while advanced students were in groups of 4 and were given a 4’ by 6’ space and were expected to be finished within the day. Weather put pressure on the students as they did not want their hard work going to waste, but Mrs. Rasmussen encouraged the students to remember that this style of art is meant to be temporary. Chalk art was first introduced to Taft High when Rasmussen first started teaching on the campus. She was encouraged by principal at the time, Dr. Mark Richardson, to see something fun like that at the school. Rasmussen likes doing this as it has, “…been a good contributor to the chalk art festival in October.”
Semi-annually, the ASB contributes to the Spring Fling festivities with a 3-on-3 basketball tournament. This year, they were able to continue the tradition. Weather was not cooperative and some teams decided not to compete after signing up, but that did not stop them. The teams that did play had a great time and the music made for a fun atmosphere for “March Madness.” According to Jacob Gonzales, “Usually the teachers win, but they choked this year when one of their star players went down.”
