Bloomington High School South, The Gothic, 2009, Page 14

Description:	teachersSix teachersshare their interestsproving that they do in fact haveives outside of the walls ofBloomington South.campusRamonGarcia-TamaranImagine, Mr. Ramon Garcia winningseven tides for archery and having thechance to qualify for the Olympics.Then instead, giving up that once-in- a-lifetime chance to leave for the LondonRoyal Academy of Music to study andcompose music. Mr. Garcia was a naturally gifted archer, and won many competitions including the 1992 Barcelonagames, where he won the gold. In addition, Mr. Garcia also won the nationalchampionship in Spain, where he competed with 300 other archers and still,thanks to six months of hard training,came out with a victory. However, hisarchery days were over when he officially quit only a few years later topursue his true love—playing the piano.For 13 years Mr. Garcia was a concertpianist. Over those years, he produceda piano CD which was available bothin the United States and Spain. —MAD-ELYN NAHASRhondaWelchPlaying the timeless sounds of Motown, classical rock, and country, Ms.Rhonda Welch jammed out with thepeople who she said have good musical chemistry and connection together.Ms. Welch was a member of the bandJustin Case. Also in the group washer brother and fellow South teacher,Mr. David Welch, and good friendsJerry Minger and Don Campbell. Thegroup met in 1987, as part of two different musical groups. Then later they decided to start a band together in 1988.The band could be found rocking outat places like The Porthole and ThePlayers Pub. Their shows were knownto have a fairly wide variety of attendees. One student, a dedicated fan ofthe band, was junior Victoria Babcock. She was a long-time friend ofMs. Welch and said, Rhonda is greatin the band and has an amazing voice.Ms. Welch loved playing with the bandand said they just always make the experience so fun. -MADELYN NAHASMary BethHannah-HansenStudents in Ms. Mary Beth Hannah-Hansens classes knew she was an expert on the classical world. She oftensurprised and delighted her WorldStudies students with recitations fromclassical works like the Illiad. Her expertise and interest in classical timestook on an athletic edge in 2007 whenher passion propelled her to run theOriginal Course from Marathon toAthens, Greece. Along this course therunners passed the Marathon Tomb(the site of the battle of Marathon) andcircle around the Marathon War Memorial. This was Ms. Hannah-Hansenssixth marathon; her first was in February 1986, two years to the date after shehad started running. And like the messenger that ran the course to Athensto announce the defeat of the Persianarmy, Ms. Hannah-Hansen could teachher class something else about classical culture — endurance. -MEG MCGILLIVRAYAbbyGrayRather than heading straight homeafter a day of teaching hundreds ofaspiring Spanish speakers, Ms. AbbyGray put on her workout gear andheaded to Souths dance studio. Whenthe idea arose for the school to havesome kind of fitness program for thestaff, Ms. Gray was the first to be askedto teach a step aerobics class. Havingexperience in teaching step aerobicsat Indiana University while in college,she was eager to accept. Accordingto Ms. Gray the class is primarily allwomen because the men are afraid.She said Mr. Mark Fletcher wouldonly go if other men were present.Only a handful of students witnessedthis fairly private event, including thepoms squad, theater members, andher daughter, Zoe, of course. Overallthe visitors seemed to think that it waspretty funny, watching their teachers, according to Ms. Gray. SeniorAnissa McKibben commented onher reaction of the class saying, It wasweird seeing the teachers not teaching. —MADELYN NAHAS14 \| ACADEMICS \| teachers off campus
Source:	http://cdm17129.contentdm.oclc.org/cdm/ref/collection/hs-bloomsouth/id/8036
Collection:	Bloomington High School South

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