Santa Fe: A semester in review
January 23, 2023
August
The school year started with many great events. Color wars left many covered in colored powder, and Wolf Wars raised a lot of money for our football team.
These events were followed by a softball victory over South Moore, which was the first victory over South Moore in Santa Fe history.
“I loved how all the girls came together to pull the absolute blowout of a victory,” junior fan Ada Goldman said.
Our football team started their losing streak by losing to Jenks in the season opener.
The month also had lots of concerns about overpopulation. Santa Fe has a much bigger population than in previous years but has not had appropriate size accommodations.
“My biggest class is AP government with 30 plus students,” junior Ivy Bennan said. “I can’t concentrate because there are many kids behind me that talk.”
This difficulty in learning combined with a lack of space or resources was very unfortunate.
“I feel like it’s a disservice to a lot of those students that they can’t be in, but there’s just physically no space,” Mr. Beiri said.
Our football team started their losing streak by losing to Jenks in the season opener.
Samuel Campbell added to his Random Randy comic series with Random Randy #14.
September
This September was the kick-off for the fall sports season. Which included the football team taking several losses, one of the biggest losses following the Beat North Assembly taking place between the Bulldogs and the Wolves, and several others following suit.
Santa Fe also hosted a Senior Night Celebration as a final wave-off for the senior volleyball players on the team, following a victory for all of Santa Fe’s Volleyball teams concluding the night in a large celebration.
However, fall sports weren’t the only autumnal thing occurring at this time. Autumn fashion also began to take off during this time along with the remembrance of suicide prevention month and 9/11.
October
October began with the Edmond Santa Fe Softball team putting up a tough fight during the Softball Regionals hosted by Memorial. The Santa Fe Softball team beat Midwest City 11-1 and North 11-5 but unfortunately lost to Memorial 3-13 during the finals.
Another Heard on Hurd festival celebration was held on Oct 13. People celebrated in downtown Edmond with live music performances and a wide variety of food from food trucks and local restaurants.
Special Olympics Oklahoma (SOOK) ran another exciting Special Olympics event at AMF bowling lanes despite the many other events they host all year. A 3-game bowling tournament allowed players to show off their bowling skills to those who volunteered for the event.
Taylor Swift released her much anticipated 10th studio album, “Midnights”, and upon release, it received high praise from many Santa Fe students.
The Edmond Santa Fe STOMP team, the Edmond Santa Fe Show Choir, and a handful of individual Santa Fe students put on a spectacular performance during the annual “Wonderland” talent show. The talent show included many musical performances that thoroughly entertained the students of Santa Fe.
The Edmond Santa Fe Marching Band placed sixth at the Oklahoma Band Masters Association (OBA) state marching competition, continuing one of the best years in the history of the Edmond Santa Fe Marching Band.
“What the Edmond Santa Fe band did this year was truly historic for not just their school but also all of Edmond,” said Edmond Memorial High School’s head band director Jeff Jahnke.
October concluded with a Halloween Costume Contest. Alongside the contest, a new Wolves in The Wild was released, featuring some of the more interesting costumes around Santa Fe.
November
November is Native American Heritage Month and holds a large amount of importance in Oklahoma as it is home to 39 different tribes, and
Nov. 25 was Native American Heritage Day.
”Being a part of the culture, teaching and learning from many different people is my favorite part about being Native American,” History teacher Ms. Mason said.
The students also celebrated Veterans Day by decorating the main hallway of the school with patriotic colors and nameplates that honor the servitude of our country’s veterans.
“Seeing other veterans in murals like the one Santa Fe is making gives a reminder of the much greater sacrifice others have given so that we collectively can have so many rights and privileges,” said Cody Birsner, a U.S. Navy Machinist veteran.
Many multicultural clubs had meetings during November. The French and Chinese clubs both held game nights at different points in the month. The Black Student Union (BSU) and Spanish club came together to hold a Friendsgiving potluck where students brought festive dishes, played games, and got to know each other better.
Archery started competing in tournaments. They started off slow, but they have improved at every tournament and are hoping to compete in Group 1 at state.
Santa Fe’s varsity football team picked up their first and only win in the last game of the season on the road against the Yukon Millers.
“Our kids have played hard all year, and they’ve gotten better every week, but things just haven’t gone their way the whole season. They played their tales off, and we put it all together tonight,” said head football coach Kyle White.
Santa Fe’s band this year is the best it has ever been. During November, they placed third at the Owasso invitational, won the Mustang Invitational for the second year in a row and recorded the highest score in the history of the school at the Oklahoma Band Masters Association (OBA) State Marching Championship.
During November, art created by artificial intelligence began to reach the mainstream as drawings created by DALLE began to go viral on social media platforms like Twitter and Tik Tok. The question of whether this art is beneficial is still up in the air.
December
To kick off the month of December we spoke out about the importance of this month to many Indigenous people and their cultures.
Random Randy, a comic strip that comes out each week about a guy named Randy and his silly adventures, number 28 and 29 were published.
With the cold front coming in this month a lot of teachers and staff started cracking down on IDs.
“What we’ve learned this summer and over the last three to five years is that student IDs and faculty IDs are the number one deterrent for strangers in the building,” Mrs. Hanson, assistant principal, said.
This has been one of Santa Fe’s Biggest struggles even going into the new year.
On a happier note, well happy for some, Elephants Graveyard; a horrible tale of the poor life of an innocent elephant. Well, that’s my bias, I hope you saw it yourself. The actors were phenomenal and brought to life the story of hanging a misunderstood elephant that never even came on stage.
Winter sports were supported and cheered on at the winter sports assembly which had lots of fun activities and was just overall great because you could get out of class. Though the winter sports assembly went well, our boy’s basketball team would fall a little short in their first game.
This month took a slippery turn whenever a pipe burst in the F-hall boy’s bathroom. The bathroom has since been repaired, but it was funny having Ms. Bray and Russel Johnson yell at students to turn around and take another path to class as the hallway got cleaned from the sewage.
Great people like Adalise Goldman and Teacher Randy Blackwood were featured this month on things like Hanukkah and Teacher of the Year.
Special Education got festive with Buddy the Elf where teacher, Bill Arbuckle, dressed up as an elf and entertained the students. Everyone involved expressed it was a great time.
Student Council (STUCO) continued their journey to raise money for Not Your Average Joe with things like a movie night where they displayed Home Alone and some Royalty groups sold Hot Chocolate and hosting a Holiday Carnival where royalty groups and different clubs and classes could have booths selling stuff and engaging in fun activities.
We ended the month, and the year, with a holiday special of Random Randy.