News

During April, National Poetry Month, our WLHS library is offering many ways for students to explore the use of language to inspire, beautify, and celebrate. Students can make poetry from magnets, book spines, and blackout sheets. The library is offering a poem reading challenge. Students can check out and read a book of poetry or a book-in-verse and be entered to win a gift card. Click here to see some of the books in verse on hand in the Wisco library.

2023-24 was the inaugural year for the WLHS rock climbing club under the direction of Ms. Rachel Rosenberg, Mr. Tim Meister, and Mrs. Bekah & Mr. Mical Schaffer. The club had a total of 26 climbers. In its first year, Wisco took eleven rock climbers to State to compete in both top rope and bouldering at the Downtown Adventure Rock. Four climbers made it to the final five in their divisions including Oliver Saugstad ('27), Caden Schaffer ('27), Mina Schaffer ('27), and Talia Meister ('26).

In only its second year of competition, the WLHS Future Business Leaders of America (FBLA) sent 13 qualified students to State competition in Green Bay, Wis. on April 8-9. Students had opportunities to grow through workshops, networking sessions, and college exploration. They also competed in a variety of events, from coding and computer programming, to marketing, accounting, investments, and more. Top performers qualify for the National Conference in Orlando.

Congratulations to the following students who are now national qualifiers:

On March 22, after a snowy start to the day, Viking Steel was still able to hold its spring concert. WLHS is one of only a few high schools in Wisconsin that offers steel pan, and one of the few co-curriculars at WLHS with 60+ members. Enjoy some more facts about Viking Steel:

WLHS hosted ten students and one adult chaperone from Ecuador for a two-week spring camp. Some of the many activities they experienced have included a tour of the city of Milwaukee, an Admirals hockey game, Easter party with our dorm students, Wisconsin dairy farm experience, Milwaukee Art and Public Museums, Sky Zone trampoline park, Great Wolf Lodge waterpark, and much more.

Spanish teachers Mrs. Cheryl Belott ('98) and Mrs. Kaitlin Hernández spent three days in Minneapolis last weekend at the Central States Conference on the Teaching of Foreign Languages. They attended workshops and presentations with passionate language teachers from all over the midwest and beyond, and they returned excited to share new ideas with our language students at Wisco.

Fifteen schools and 82 high school students put their culinary and management skills to the test in the ProStart Invitational at Madison College on March 14. Wisco sent four students to compete as a team in the culinary competition. They prepared a three course meal and were judged by foodservice industry professionals and college educators on teamwork, presentation, cooking procedures, knife skills, and sanitation. Click here to see the delicious menus prepared by talented students.

For nearly 40 years, March has been designated as Music In Our Schools Month®. Music has a positive impact in the lives of our students and lasts a lifetime. This month alone WLHS has many opportunities to showcase the musical talents of our students including: the spring musical The Little Mermaid, the spring band concert (pictured), the sacred choral concert, and Viking Steel spring concert. Our thanks to the hardworking teachers in our fine arts music department!

Can the #2 Forest Elephant outlast the #15 Honey Bee? Who will survive and advance in the #8 vs #9 matchup between the Himalayan Monal and the Nicobar Pigeon? Mr. Tim McEachern's ('99) Biology classes are joining students from around the world in the 2024 March Mammal Madness Tournament (MMM). Since 2013, MMM asks the question “Who Would Win?” when two animals encounter each other in an absurdly complex and wonderfully nerdy way . . . a simulated tournament within a structured game universe! Fill out your own bracket here to play along.

Wisco seniors learned important lessons about finances at the Reality Store on March 12. After receiving an assigned life situation (marital status, children, debt, etc.), along with a "paycheck" based on the job they were assigned and hope to have as an adult, students stopped at various stations to create a budget. Along the way, students "run into" real life expenses such as car repairs, medical bills, vet expenses or child care. Thank you to all our volunteers who helped to make this event valuable for our students!

Students in Mr. Sam Wallace's World Geography classes had a chance to learn from Milwaukee Alderwoman Larresa Taylor about food deserts. Food deserts are areas where people have limited access to a variety of healthful foods. This may be due to having a limited income or living far away from sources of healthful and affordable food. Grace Raymond ('24) said of the presentation, "It really put things into perspective how food deserts are a local problem. Alderwoman Taylor represents Milwaukee District 9, and has been instrumental in building new grocery stores as well as redeveloping the old Northridge Mall area to bring in better businesses."

Students in Mrs. Bauer's Modern World History classes were tasked with discovering a topic that interested them during World War I and creating a poster to describe their topic. Some topics chosen included Rags the Dog, The Unknown British Soldier, Henry Johnson, Aileen Cole Stewart as well as some better known characters like U.S. President Woodrow Wilson, British Prime Minister Winston Churchill, Soviet Union Leader Vladimir Lenin or Russian mystic Grigori Rasputin. With our library as a resource, these historians uncovered the value of untold stories.

Cree Myles is a professional reader, social media influencer, and inaugural editor and curator of a black literature podcast through Penguin Random House. Ms. Myles spoke to students in Mrs. Shakirah Cousin's African American studies class. She broke down ways to reach reading goals, emphasized the importance of reading, and gave pointers on how the class can successfully complete an upcoming assignment on podcasts for their book reviews.

Cool Beans, a barbershop quartet with the Sweet Adelines International organization, stopped by to deliver a singing Valentine to the Freshman Choir. These ladies are also members of the Crosstown Harmony Chorus, a local regional chapter of Sweet Adelines. Member Rochelle Hackmann ('86) (pictured right) is a WLHS graduate and a member at St. Jacobi Lutheran Church in Greenfield. We thank the ladies for their performance and for inspiring the Freshman Choir with their four-part barbershop harmonies!

On Ash Wednesday, February 14, Campus Pastor Phil Huebner ('99) led a special chapel service that brought a focus to the beginning of the Lenten season. The theme of our campus worship this Lent is The Places of the Passion. Each Wednesday we will contemplate a different location where Jesus stopped along his path to redeem us: Gethsemane, The High Priest’s Palace, Pilate’s Court, The Way of Sorrows, and Golgotha.

Scott Cousins II ('24) signed his letter of intent with the Biola University Division 2 Track & Field program. Scott has had a successful track & field career here at WLHS, and plans to continue throwing at Biola University, in La Mirada, Cal. Scott intends to pursue a major in Cinema and Media Arts with the goal to become a director.

On February 2, English Department Coordinator, Amy Goede ('94), attended a free online symposium offered by the University of Southern California entitled "The Role of Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Large Language Models in the Writing Class." From sessions on the flaws and possibilities caused by the coding used to create AI generators to harnessing the power of Chat GPT in a writing class, this symposium provided a wealth of information and ideas on how to train our students to use this fast-growing technology in an ethical and productive way.

As part of a unit on fibers and fabrics, students in Fashion Tech Two experimented with the properties of cotton — absorbency and color-fastness — by tie dying t-shirts in class. Most of the students did traditional tie dye patterns, but Rhiannon Gantner ('24) tried the ice cube method of putting dry dye on ice cubes placed on top of her shirt. Once the ice melts, the colors blend into the shirt. Who says you can't have fun while learning!

Congratulations to English teacher Mrs. Stacy Bitter who received her doctorate from Alverno College with a degree in K-12 Leadership. Dr. Bitter defended her dissertation called "Young Adolescents' Perceptions of Reading Interventions" in December 2023. Motivated to better serve her students, Dr. Bitter completed her study in two and half years, no summers off, alongside her full time job at WLHS.

WLHS is excited to have another alumni, Miss Claire Leverence ('19), join our staff. She is serving in our English department teaching composition classes. Ms. Leverence is a recent graduate of Wisconsin Lutheran College and earned a degree in Secondary Education Broadfield Language Arts (English and Communication). Miss Leverence is a member at Grace Lutheran Church, Milwaukee. In her free time, Miss Leverence likes to run, read, crochet, thrift, write, and enjoy outdoor activities.

In recent years, WLHS has developed a partnership with our WELS mission on the Caribbean island of Antigua. God has blessed St. John’s Ev. Lutheran Church and School there with significant growth: 350 students attend their school and worship services on Sunday are at capacity. Each fall, WLHS holds a school-wide drive to collect resources for St. John's. Typically, five students and Pastor Huebner deliver the donation which this year was five computers, two projectors and 220 new Bibles.

All Algebra 1 students must go through testing called Measure of Academic Progress (MAP). MAP assessments are a computer adaptive achievement test which means that the computer adjusts the difficulty of the questions so that each student takes a unique test. The difficulty of each question is based on how well a student has answered previous questions. In the end, students receive a MAP RIT score which is norm-referenced to other students and represents a point on a continuous scale of learning.

New to our co-curricular clubs for the 2023-24 school year is Ski & Snowboard Club. This club offers our students a great way to get outside, meet new friends, learn a new sport or hone your skills, and enjoy the beautiful Wisconsin winters. Wisco's Ski & Snowboard Club has partnered with Little Switzerland in Slinger, Wis., to offer special pricing for lift tickets and rentals. In December, the club had its first event. More than 30 students attended!

The WLHS Dinner Auction will be held on Saturday, April 13, 2024. To join in the fun and receive information before the event, participants can participate and invite others to the private WLHS Auction Facebook group page here. For information about sponsorships and donating items, visit the auction web site here.

At WLHS, students have the opportunity to participate in a wide variety of co-curricular activities and clubs geared to many different interests. This year, WLHS offers Rock Climbing Club for the first time. Through partnership with Adventure Rock, students explore and learn a new sport and even compete. In December, Wisco students competed with more than 300 students from around Wisconsin. Congratulations to Annalise Kuehn ('26) for placing first in Division 2 and Willamina Schaffer ('27) for placing second in Division 4.