On April 30 the Renaissance club put together the “Evening with the Stars” event for special seniors. This event is held to honor seniors who have been a part of Renaissance for at least seven semesters. Each student also invites a teacher that is special to them and who they think deserves to be honored. 

One of the seniors who attended this event was Emily Johannes. Not only was Johannes invited to attend this event, but so was her family and close friends. During the event the attendees all had dinner, accompanied by the school’s three music groups: band, choir, and orchestra. After the dinner and music was over, they began to honor the students for their accomplishments. Along with that every student also received the Principal’s Award, a certificate given to students who have excelled both academically and behaviorally in school. After all that they had enough space for the music and a place for the recognized seniors to stand on top of that. Luckily Mrs.Kohr and her renaissance club did an amazing job, they received compliments from parents and teachers on how smoothly it ran and how fun it was. students were honored they were asked to honor the teachers they invited. Each student wrote a message and read it aloud to the teacher and after that they gave that teacher a flower, symbolizing their thanks to them. According to Johannes the event was both set up, and moved incredibly smoothly.

“It was a lot of fun. The evening was really well set up and it was really well managed and I think it was a great night where students got to show their appreciation for their teachers and to also be appreciated as well.” Johannes said.

Speaking of teachers, one of the “VIP’s” that were invited by the students was Amanda Davis. She attended the event at the request of Quinn Orrick. According to Mrs.Davis, this is one of her favorite nights each year, she loves to see all these students being recognized and recognizing their teachers. She also noticed that the event ran incredibly smoothly, especially since this was the first year since COVID it was held in a banquet hall. Mrs.Davis is also the orchestra teacher, so she was especially proud that her students performed so well for the recognized seniors.

“This this was our first year having it at a banquet hall in a while, I think since COVID, and the transition to a new place was perfect and it was just a really nice setting.” Davis said.

Moving away from the people who were being honored, let’s look at the person who helped set up the whole event, Melissa Kohr. She is the head of the Renaissance club and is the person responsible for setting up the Evening with Stars. This year was especially difficult for her since it was the first time in almost five years that they were doing it in a banquet hall. They had to make sure the space had enough room for everyone and their families.

“It was really good. Just bringing it back to being off campus made it a bigger deal than I guess maybe it has felt like it’s been these past couple years,” Kohr said.