About

Hello fellow SAINTS!! As I write this article, preparations are underway for this year’s Alumni Banquet. I can’t help but reflect back over the last four years that I have served as President of the Alumni Association. My goals when I became President were: to strengthen the bond between the Alumni Association and the high school, to get younger alumni involved, and to better inform alumni and the community of our events/activities. While admittedly I can say we have work still to do, I do feel we have made a lot of progress towards these goals. We meet monthly at the school and this May, the annual Alumni Banquet will be held at St. Michaels High School for the third year in a row. The Banquet continues to grow and we are thankful to be able to have it at the high school. In addition, we continue to give scholarships to deserving seniors at Graduation, and assist the high school financially with small projects. Each year we sponsor multiple events geared at primarily younger alumni. The alumni soccer game, the alumni field hockey game, and the alumni basketball game are all well attended events. In addition, we continue to try our best to keep up-todate with people’s contact information, while utilizing social media such as Facebook.

The Executive Board of the Alumni Association has been hard at work and we are gearing up for A LOT of new things. With the support of Josh Poore (Class of 2003) and Omni Solutions Agency LLC, we are putting together a webpage for the Alumni Association. This website will have information about upcoming activities, contact information for the various graduating classes, pictures, and more. We hope to have this up and running so we can show it off at the Alumni Banquet. In addition, Josh is working with us to send out planned giving information. The money we give to graduating seniors in scholarships and the money we donate to projects at the high school come specifically from fundraisers that the Executive Board run each year. We would really like to have alumni support through financial giving, planned gifts, and other financial means if possible. Ideally, we would like to have the financial means to give many more scholarships to deserving graduates, plus help the high school for years and years to come. We also continue to collect group graduation pictures so that they can be framed in the hall outside of the auditorium at the high school. We hope to have these pictures hung this spring. A few years ago, we attempted an Alumni Tennis Tournament, but the weather did not cooperate. With the tennis courts now redone at the school, we would like to again try to hold this tournament. More information will be coming out on Facebook about this event. Finally, we are planning a huge community-wide party this summer to watch Harold Baines Hall of Fame Induction Ceremony. We will have more information on our Facebook page very soon about this event. In late 2019 or early 2020, we will also have a banquet to personally recognize Harold for being the humble hero that we all know.

As you can see, we have a lot that we are working on. We are proud to serve as the Executive Board representing all graduates of St. Michaels High School. We enjoy carrying on the business of the Alumni Association that was started back in 1900. There may not be a more accurate slogan than the one we use – Once a Saint, ALWAYS a Saint! On behalf of the Alumni Board, I hope you will support us in the many activities that we are tackling this year. Let’s keep that Saints Spirit alive.

~JR Burkhardt
Class of ‘95