Community support continues to be a crucial factor in making Wando a school of excellence. Our PTSO Big Bash was a great success both as a fund-raiser and a fun community event. The profit was more than $28,000. With the budget cuts we face, this financial support is truly needed and greatly appreciated. The Big Bash Coordinators, Lauren Raycroft and Tammy Howe, deserve special recognition and thanks for their hard work and leadership.

Our School Improvement Council (SIC) sponsored a job fair on March 12 for our students who are seeking jobs or summer employment. The event is designed to give our students the experience of applying for jobs, completing applications and interviewing with employers. Our School Improvement Council members, teachers, counselors, parent volunteers and local businesses all work together to make this job fair a success. Each year some Wando students get jobs based on contacts from the job fair. This year’s event was organized by Sue Hensch, a member of our SIC who is a Wando parent and a local realtor.  She did an outstanding job and managed even in tough economic times to get great support from local businesses. Participating businesses included BiLo, Carolina Park Children’s Center, Chick-fil-A, Charleston Electrical Contractors Asso-ciation, Charleston Fire Department, Charleston Heating and Air, Charles-ton County Parks and Recreation, Dunes West Golf Club, Food Lion, Harris Teeter, McDonalds, Old  South Carriage, Sonic, Town of Mount Pleasant, U.S. Coast Guard, and Wild Dunes Resort.

Wando’s All Sports Booster Club’s 21st annual Oyster Roast/ Silent Auction will be held at 7:30 p.m., March 21  at Gold Bug Island. Oysters, fish stew, hot dogs, and soft drinks will be served. There will be door prizes, raffles, a silent auction and great fellowship. Tickets are available from the Wando Athletic Department at $25 per person. The event is for those who are 21 years old or more. Call 881-8245 for more information.  Our All-Sports Booster Club supports all the Wando athletic teams and provides critical funding so that we can be competitive with other top athletic programs in S.C.

In addition to great community support, we are blessed with outstanding students. During the first weekend in March, I had the pleasure of attending the Southern Interscholas-tic Press Association (SIPA) annual convention in Columbia and seeing Wando students in action.  At this meeting, more than 450 student journalists and their faculty sponsors attended workshops and learned from experts in this field. Student groups from as far away as Texas, Virginia, and Florida attended. Wando’s student journalists represented their high school and this community with great distinction.

The staff of our student newspaper, the Tribal Tri-bune, works under the direction of our talented teacher, Tammy Watkins, and consistently produces a newspaper of incredible quality and depth. This year our editor-in-chief is Francie Anderson. The most recent edition is 32 pages long, full of great pictures and well-written stories. Our Tribal Tribune staff of 55 students are bright, curious, creative and talented teens who do not hesitate to take on challenging topics or do the research to get it right. Our student newspaper staff members are enrolled in one of our two periods of newspaper production which meet every day. Their work as editors, writers, designers and photographers, and their ability to take the work of such a large group of teens and organize it into a cohesive quality newspaper is really amazing. As a principal I do not review in advance or censor the content of this newspaper. Under the guidance of their faculty sponsor, these students are learning valuable lessons about responsible exercise of freedom of expression. The Tribal Tribune can be read online at tribaltribune.com or accessed via the wandohigh.com Web site.

At the SIPA conference, The Tribal Tribune won the Scroggins Award, which goes to the best student newspaper in the Southeast. This award is named for Dean Scroggins who was the dean of the USC School of Journalism and was instrumental in the development and organization of SIPA.  The Tribal Tribune also won best newspaper in the state of South Carolina for the ninth year in a row.

Wando students Mer-edith Burwell, Erin Skin-ner, Sallie Snyder and Stacy Verner won best overall in the Writing/Editing /Design contest. Four-member teams from different schools compete. They take notes, take pictures, write a full-length feature story and design a “center spread (two page spread)” based on Friday evening’s guest speaker. It’s a very competitive and intense program.

Wando students Geoffrey Marsi won second place and Nick Shuler won third place in review writing. This was a three-hour contest during which the students had to write a review on site. Only two students per school can participate, so to place both of them was pretty remarkable.

In addition, Wando had over 25 individual winners in individual contests, ranging column writing to photography.

Community and parental support, outstanding students, and talented teachers and staff are the recipe for success for any great high school.

As your principal, I appreciate every day the blessings of Wando!