Westchester 1977 Classmate, John Sheely, Chef & Owner of MOCKINGBIRD BISTRO hosts our first WAA social of 2008. Get ready to be impressed, classmates! John has created an amazing, upscale restaurant "inside the loop". http://www.mockingbirdbistro.com/index.html
ON SATURDAY, APRIL 26 3:30 PM - 6:30 PM, and for our Westchester classmates & guests only, MOCKINGBIRD BISTRO will provide heavy hors d'oeuvres, reduced priced cocktails, and complimentary valet parking. As a courtesy to John for his generosity, kindly provide your RSVP to wildcats_1977@yahoo.com BY April 25 (include your name, your guest's name, and year you graduated). Mockingbird Bistro is business casual attire.
Please keep in mind that our social concludes at 6:30 PM so that John's staff can prepare for dinner guests. If you have interest to continue with dinner, kindly make your reservation with the restaurant directly ~ 713.533.0200. Keep in mind that this venue is intimate and securing a reservation in advance is recommended.
WAA has provided you a social and business networking opportunity. John Sheely has provided the venue, food, reduced priced drinks, and valet parking! It's up to you to make it a success! News of WAA and our socials will come only by word of mouth and email due to the expense of postage. Will you kindly help us by passing this message on and by telling your friends you'll meet them at Mockingbird Bistro! If you received this news thru another classmate and not from us directly, it's likely that we do not have a current email address for you. To update your email address, please write to: Westchester@Wranglerettes.com
Our socials are designed to provide more frequent opportunities for WHS classmates to network and build our own social and business communities, and corporately, to offer financial and volunteer support to Westchester Academy of International Studies. The school counts on our financial support, and we count on yours. Go to http://westchesterwildcats.blogspot.com/ to learn more!
If you own or have access to a restaurant, venue, Houston-area property (for bonfires, BBQs, etc.) that would make a great "party place" for this awesome cause, we would love to hear from you! We would love to shake it up and enjoy socials across the Houston area! Secondly, we will help to promote businesses near the campus. We have enjoyed successful events at Clay's Restaurant, which is owned by Damian Seaback, WHS '77 and also by Grisby Grill, owned by Judy Foster Coker, WHS '74. At our homecoming in November at Clay's, we had OVER 100 in attendance! We'd love to help promote your business while, at the same time, build our WAA network. The homecoming will remain our primary function, while the mixers will be "additional" opportunities throughout the year.
Please contact wildcats_1977@yahoo.com if you have interest in hosting a future social! Mark your calendar for 26 April 2008 ~ 3:30 PM - 6:30 PM Mockingbird Bistro. We'll see you there!
Lauri (White) Ramsey Events Coordinator WAA & '77 Class Rep
Tuesday, March 25, 2008
Thursday, March 13, 2008
WAA Officer and Board Meeting Minutes 10-MAR-2008
Those members present were:
Officers: Ralph Devine – President, Jamie Onstot Tharpe - Vice President
Nancy Adams Adamo - Secretary, Pamela Mudd Conlan - Treasurer
Board Members: Deal Moore, Carolyn Madden, Jeff Martin, Lauri White Ramsey, Fran Rolon, and David West
The meeting was called to order at 6:30 by Vice President Jamie Tharpe.
Agenda Items:
Treasury Report - Pamela
So far we have $6281.26 for the 2008 scholarship fund. At the meeting, Deal Moore’s company, NDT, donated $500.00 to the scholarship fund. Also, David West contributed $300.00 to the fund. Thank you to all that have contributed so far. We are still in need of more funds to be able to accommodate the seventeen applicants. Please keep clicking the advertisements on the www.westchesterwildcats.blogspot.com blog site to generate more money. The Google AdSense revenue in February was $204.54. Please see the attached report following the minutes for more information.
Each committee chairperson reported on their committee’s activities. The following reports were heard.
Events/Activities – Lauri
There is a social get together planned for Sat. Apr. 26 3:30-6:30 at Mockingbird Bistro. This will be an opportunity for social or business networking for Westchester Alums. There will be free hors d’ovrs, valet parking and discount prices on drinks. The owner, John Sheely ’77 and his brother Steven Sheely ’78 are providing this endeavor. Please see the material posted on www.westchesterwildcats.blogspot.com for more details regarding this great event. We are asking everyone to RSVP by April 11.
Our June meeting will take place on the weekend of the 7 &8 at the Galveston bay home of Lisa Hoyt Bays.
Scholarship Committee – David
David reported that he and Pamela attended the Spring Branch ISD Celebration of Sharing Community Appreciation Breakfast that recognized donors to the Spring Branch Education Foundation. David also addressed the scholarship funding. We are in the process of interviewing and selecting the winners of the scholarships. The Board will read the applications and decide on the top six candidates.
Officers: Ralph Devine – President, Jamie Onstot Tharpe - Vice President
Nancy Adams Adamo - Secretary, Pamela Mudd Conlan - Treasurer
Board Members: Deal Moore, Carolyn Madden, Jeff Martin, Lauri White Ramsey, Fran Rolon, and David West
The meeting was called to order at 6:30 by Vice President Jamie Tharpe.
Agenda Items:
Treasury Report - Pamela
So far we have $6281.26 for the 2008 scholarship fund. At the meeting, Deal Moore’s company, NDT, donated $500.00 to the scholarship fund. Also, David West contributed $300.00 to the fund. Thank you to all that have contributed so far. We are still in need of more funds to be able to accommodate the seventeen applicants. Please keep clicking the advertisements on the www.westchesterwildcats.blogspot.com blog site to generate more money. The Google AdSense revenue in February was $204.54. Please see the attached report following the minutes for more information.
Each committee chairperson reported on their committee’s activities. The following reports were heard.
Events/Activities – Lauri
There is a social get together planned for Sat. Apr. 26 3:30-6:30 at Mockingbird Bistro. This will be an opportunity for social or business networking for Westchester Alums. There will be free hors d’ovrs, valet parking and discount prices on drinks. The owner, John Sheely ’77 and his brother Steven Sheely ’78 are providing this endeavor. Please see the material posted on www.westchesterwildcats.blogspot.com for more details regarding this great event. We are asking everyone to RSVP by April 11.
Our June meeting will take place on the weekend of the 7 &8 at the Galveston bay home of Lisa Hoyt Bays.
Scholarship Committee – David
David reported that he and Pamela attended the Spring Branch ISD Celebration of Sharing Community Appreciation Breakfast that recognized donors to the Spring Branch Education Foundation. David also addressed the scholarship funding. We are in the process of interviewing and selecting the winners of the scholarships. The Board will read the applications and decide on the top six candidates.
Communication – Carolyn
Carolyn reported that she e-mailed a press release in several neighborhood newspapers on line about the scholarship funding and donations. She is still trying to talk to the person in charge of the newspaper section to have in printed. She also received some information about the Memorial Buzz magazine in order to be able to provide information about the scholarships and possibly interview and provide pictures of previous scholarship winners.
Membership – Fran
Fran and Jeff are continuing to work on an e-mail to send out to all the Westchester members asking for information about rejoining. They are looking into a file with Houston people and a way to protect privacy issues. They want people to know about joining and what the money goes toward.
Class Leader Liaison – Deal
Deal is working on the class leader list and is looking into recruiting more class leaders. He received feedback from several who are no longer interested in this task. We still need more alums from the 80’s.
New Items
Jamie brought up the fact that our All Class Reunion will continue to fall on the Stratford/Memorial football game due to the fact that Stratford won their appeal and are in the 5A conference along with all the other Spring Branch schools.
Pamela brought up the fact that she is working on a “Frequently Asked Questions” about the WAA and what it is and what it does. Some people still don’t know that Westchester is an operating school.
Ralph brought up that we have someone (his daughter) that will work on an interim on the Westchester Wildcats web site to say it is “under construction” and be directed and changed to the blogsite.
Sam Dejohn, who is a Government, Economics, US History teacher at Westchester Academy, came to ask the Board to help with his funding for new equipment in the weight room. He said the equipment is old and not properly functional. He and his weight lifting students and sponsoring and Lift a Thon. If anyone is interested in helping please call the school and get information or e-mail him at the Westchester or Spring Branch website.
Jeff motioned to adjourn the meeting. Carolyn seconded the motion. The meeting was adjourned at 7:30.
Treasury Report for March 10, 2008 Board meeting
Current assets of February 29, 2008,
Cash in checking account $5,519
CD for Student Scholarship fund (restricted) 5,776
CD – Wranglerettes (restricted) 3,095
CD – Class of 1976 (restricted) 1,482
The Google AdSense revenue deposited in February was $204.54.
As of February 29, 2008, there are 10 polo shirts remaining. Over 2006 and 2007 we collected $1540 in donations for the polo shirts. Our costs were $1429. We now have a profit of $111 from polo shirt donations.
For the two months ended February 29, 2008, we collected $210 in memberships. Expenses for 2008 included $74 office exp & $17 website exp.
Membership receipts received for the first two months of 2008 include One Lifetime member (Jack Schubert) and 8 individual memberships.
Scholarship donations from January 1 through February 29th, include:
Google AdSense $204.76
Jack Schubert 200.00
Doug Kelting 50.00
Virginia Tippen 25.00
Total for 2008 $479.76
The scholarship fund started the year with $5,801.50 in funds. The additional amounts collected bring the funds available for scholarships to $6,281.26.
Wednesday, March 12, 2008
The New Westchester......
<DWest@eprod.com> wrote:
Bart,
The WAA Board met last night and it looks like we may be able to fund 6-7 scholarships this year with the support of all the alumni that rose to the challenge. I was roped into the board by Pam Mudd ‘73 who somehow found me and my soft heart. She invited me to the first graduation at Westchester which was several years ago. They only graduated something like 60 seniors and the enrollment is being kept small so I think the max graduation will be around 150 within a few years.
The easiest way to describe Westchester now is as a magnet school, but they don’t call it one. They intentionally keep enrollment small, I believe a total of 1000-1200 students for grades 6-12 and it is one of only 12 schools in Houston with an International Baccalaureate (IB) program and the only one in SBISD. Kinda like Awty International School but without the major bucks and big head requirement (and my parents were friends of K and Jack Awty). As an International Studies school, they drive the students to develop international skills, develop a second language, and the curriculum includes many accelerated courses also. The school naturally draws students that have moved to the SBISD area from other countries so it has become a melting pot so to speak. Not all students enter the IB program but it appears that the IB program pushes all Westchester students to excel.
I’ve met some of these students and they have all been more mature than I was when I was there. They have to apply to enter this school and that brings in a higher standard that is easily visible when talking with them. And the kids that we have applying for scholarships have all done extensive community and school service, way beyond what I did. These kids come from all over the Spring Branch district so many do not have the same parental backing that we enjoyed. That is one of the hard things to get out to the alumni. These aren’t rich brats, not that we were, but you remember that there were many students with silver and gold spoons in their mouths. Lots of these kids are from the other side of the tracks trying to make a better life for themselves by putting in the hard work and taking the risk of not going to school with their neighborhood buds. After Westchester effectively died, I am pumped that it has arisen again and with this caliber of student. As these new graduates start coming back to the area after college, we hope they join the alumni association and grow it. As it is, the new Westchester Academy for International Studies (WAIS) alumni association has rolled into the Westchester Alumni Association (WAA) so we are all one.
The WAA is a really new group, only 2-3 years old. We are trying to get in touch with alumni and start doing more functions. We already hold a homecoming outing which is the Stratford/Memorial game since WAIS can not support a football team with their student population. Let me know if you want me to and I can get your email into the organization so you will get emails of events in the future. And feel free to let other alumni know about us. Thanks again for the contribution. I’ll let you know who ends up getting scholarships and where they are headed off to for college.
David T. West
Enterprise Products/EPCO, Inc.
Bart,
The WAA Board met last night and it looks like we may be able to fund 6-7 scholarships this year with the support of all the alumni that rose to the challenge. I was roped into the board by Pam Mudd ‘73 who somehow found me and my soft heart. She invited me to the first graduation at Westchester which was several years ago. They only graduated something like 60 seniors and the enrollment is being kept small so I think the max graduation will be around 150 within a few years.
The easiest way to describe Westchester now is as a magnet school, but they don’t call it one. They intentionally keep enrollment small, I believe a total of 1000-1200 students for grades 6-12 and it is one of only 12 schools in Houston with an International Baccalaureate (IB) program and the only one in SBISD. Kinda like Awty International School but without the major bucks and big head requirement (and my parents were friends of K and Jack Awty). As an International Studies school, they drive the students to develop international skills, develop a second language, and the curriculum includes many accelerated courses also. The school naturally draws students that have moved to the SBISD area from other countries so it has become a melting pot so to speak. Not all students enter the IB program but it appears that the IB program pushes all Westchester students to excel.
I’ve met some of these students and they have all been more mature than I was when I was there. They have to apply to enter this school and that brings in a higher standard that is easily visible when talking with them. And the kids that we have applying for scholarships have all done extensive community and school service, way beyond what I did. These kids come from all over the Spring Branch district so many do not have the same parental backing that we enjoyed. That is one of the hard things to get out to the alumni. These aren’t rich brats, not that we were, but you remember that there were many students with silver and gold spoons in their mouths. Lots of these kids are from the other side of the tracks trying to make a better life for themselves by putting in the hard work and taking the risk of not going to school with their neighborhood buds. After Westchester effectively died, I am pumped that it has arisen again and with this caliber of student. As these new graduates start coming back to the area after college, we hope they join the alumni association and grow it. As it is, the new Westchester Academy for International Studies (WAIS) alumni association has rolled into the Westchester Alumni Association (WAA) so we are all one.
The WAA is a really new group, only 2-3 years old. We are trying to get in touch with alumni and start doing more functions. We already hold a homecoming outing which is the Stratford/Memorial game since WAIS can not support a football team with their student population. Let me know if you want me to and I can get your email into the organization so you will get emails of events in the future. And feel free to let other alumni know about us. Thanks again for the contribution. I’ll let you know who ends up getting scholarships and where they are headed off to for college.
David T. West
Enterprise Products/EPCO, Inc.
Sunday, March 2, 2008
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