{"id":52294,"date":"2014-06-02T07:06:26","date_gmt":"2014-06-02T12:06:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/?p=52294"},"modified":"2014-06-03T02:47:10","modified_gmt":"2014-06-03T07:47:10","slug":"class-of-2014-graduates-at-van-wert-high-school","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/2014\/06\/02\/class-of-2014-graduates-at-van-wert-high-school\/","title":{"rendered":"Class of 2014 graduates Sunday at VWHS"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><b>DAVE MOSIER\/<\/b><i>independent editor<\/i><\/p>\n<p>It was just a coincidence, but a total of 143 seniors were listed as graduating Sunday during Van Wert High School\u2019s 143rd annual commencement exercise held in the VWHS gymnasium.<\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_52295\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-52295\" style=\"width: 330px\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/06\/VWHS-graduation-6-1-14-Coleman-Priest.jpg\"><img fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" class=\" wp-image-52295 \" style=\"border: 1px solid black;\" alt=\"Graduating senior Tyler Priest receives his diploma and a friendly comment from Van Wert City Board of Education  member R.J. Coleman during Van Wert High School's commencement exercise held Sunday in the VWHS gym (more photos in Tuesday's edition). (Dave Mosier\/Van Wert independent)\" src=\"https:\/\/www.thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/06\/VWHS-graduation-6-1-14-Coleman-Priest.jpg\" width=\"330\" height=\"263\" \/><\/a><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-52295\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Graduating senior Tyler Priest receives his diploma and a friendly comment from Van Wert City Board of Education member R.J. Coleman during Van Wert High School&#8217;s commencement exercise held Sunday in the VWHS gym (more photos later this week). (Dave Mosier\/Van Wert independent)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>The seniors processed into a gym packed with friends and relatives to the strains of Edward Elgar\u2019s \u201cPomp and Circumstance\u201d played by the VWHS band under the direction of Robert Sloan.<\/p>\n<p>After the playing of \u201cThe Star-Spangled Banner\u201d by the band, \u00a0seniors, teachers, parents and friends then listened to the VWHS choir, directed by Julia Reichert and accompanied by Marilyn Alessandrini, sing two numbers, \u201cFor Good\u201d by Schwartz, and John Ness Beck\u2019s \u201cBenediction\u201d \u2013 the singing of which is a VWHS tradition that goes back more than 40 years.<\/p>\n<p>Class speakers for this year\u2019s senior class were Clarissa Gamble, Kendal Humrickhouse and Holly Lawson, who provided some humor, as well as serious introspection and inspiration for the future.<\/p>\n<p>A record number of graduates of distinction were introduced by VWHS Principal Bill Clifton, and then honored by Superintendent Ken Amstutz and Board of Education President Mike Morrow.<\/p>\n<p>The 16 graduates of distinction are in the top 10 percent of their class, earned a grade point average of at least 3.85 (six graduates this year had a 4.0 average) and successfully completed at least three of the six Advanced Placement courses offered at VWHS.<\/p>\n<p><!--more-->This year\u2019s graduates of distinction are as follows: Jacob Braun, son of Matt and Tina Braun; Amanda Clay, daughter of Scott and Sherri Clay; Andrew Dingle, son of James and Diane Dingle; Taylor Doidge, daughter of Brad and Kim Doidge; Sydney Dull, daughter of Mike and Brenda Dull; Eric Easley, son of Jeff and Michelle Easley; Kaitlynn Hall, daughter of Nick and Val Steyer; Hannah Hulbert, daughter of Matt and Tina Hulbert; Holly Lawson, daughter of Bill and Lisa Lawson; Lauren Mathew, daughter of Carey Mathew and Patricia Mathew; McKenna Merkle, daughter of Kevin and Brenda Merkle; Lexi Myers, daughter of Jim Myers and Linda Myers; Audrey Nicolai, daughter of Brad and Denise Nicolai; Daniel Patterson, son of Randy and LeAnn Patterson; Korbin Sanderson, son of David Sanderson and Amanda Kinkle; and Allison Smith, daughter of Franklin and Brenda Smith.<\/p>\n<p>Amstutz then provided a few remarks for this year\u2019s class of graduating seniors, followed by brief remarks from Morrow.<\/p>\n<p>Members of the Board of Education, which includes Morrow, Ben Cowan, R.J. Coleman, Debbie Compton and Scott Mull, then presented diplomas to the seniors, followed by the playing of the VWHS \u201cAlma Mater\u201d and the traditional tossing of mortarboards by graduating seniors.<\/p>\n<p>The Class of 2014 then recessed to the band\u2019s playing of \u201cSlow March from Scipio\u201d by George F. Handel.<\/p>\n<p><b>DAVE MOSIER\/<\/b><i>independent editor<\/i><\/p>\n<p>It was just a coincidence, but a total of 143 seniors graduated Sunday during Van Wert High School\u2019s 143rd annual commencement exercise held in the VWHS gymnasium.<\/p>\n<p>The seniors processed into the gym to the strains of Edward Elgar\u2019s \u201cPomp and Circumstance\u201d played by the VWHS band, under the direction of Robert Sloan.<\/p>\n<p>After the playing of \u201cThe Star-Spangled Banner\u201d by the band, the seniors, teachers, parents and friends then listened to the VWHS choir, directed by Julia Reichert and accompanied by Marilyn Alessandrini, sing two numbers, \u201cFor Good\u201d by Schwartz, and John Ness Beck\u2019s \u201cBenediction\u201d \u2013 the singing of which is a VWHS tradition that goes back more than 40 years.<\/p>\n<p>Class speakers for this year\u2019s senior class were Clarissa Gamble, Kendal Humrickhouse and Holly Lawson, who provided some humor, as well as serious introspection and inspiration for the future.<\/p>\n<p>A record number of graduates of distinction were then introduced by VWHS Principal Bill Clifton, and then honored by Superintendent Ken Amstutz and Board of Education President Mike Morrow.<\/p>\n<p>The 16 graduates of distinction are in the top 10 percent of their class, earned a grade point average of at least 3.85 (six graduates this year had a 4.0 average) and successfully completed at least three of the six Advanced Placement courses offered at VWHS.<\/p>\n<p>This year\u2019s graduates of distinction are as follows: Jacob Braun, son of Matt and Tina Braun; Amanda Clay, daughter of Scott and Sherri Clay; Andrew Dingle, son of James and Diane Dingle; Taylor Doidge, daughter of Brad and Kim Doidge; Sydney Dull, daughter of Mike and Brenda Dull; Eric Easley, son of Jeff and Michelle Easley; Kaitlynn Hall, daughter of Nick and Val Steyer; Hannah Hulbert, daughter of Matt and Tina Hulbert; Holly Lawson, daughter of Bill and Lisa Lawson; Lauren Mathew, daughter of Carey Mathew and Patricia Mathew; McKenna Merkle, daughter of Kevin and Brenda Merkle; Lexi Myers, daughter of Jim Myers and Linda Myers; Audrey Nicolai, daughter of Brad and Denise Nicolai; Daniel Patterson, son of Randy and LeAnn Patterson; Korbin Sanderson, son of David Sanderson and Amanda Kinkle; and Allison Smith, daughter of Franklin and Brenda Smith.<\/p>\n<p>Amstutz then provided a few remarks for this year\u2019s class of graduating seniors, followed by brief remarks from Morrow.<\/p>\n<p>Members of the Board of Education, which includes Morrow, Ben Cowan, R.J. Coleman, Debbie Compton and Scott Mull, then presented diplomas to the seniors, followed by the playing of the VWHS \u201cAlma Mater\u201d and the traditional tossing of mortarboards by graduating seniors.<\/p>\n<p>The Class of 2014 then recessed to the band\u2019s playing of \u201cSlow March from Scipio\u201d by George F. Handel.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>DAVE MOSIER\/independent editor It was just a coincidence, but a total of 143 seniors were listed as graduating Sunday during Van Wert High School\u2019s 143rd annual commencement exercise held in the VWHS gymnasium. The seniors processed into a gym packed with friends and relatives to the strains of Edward Elgar\u2019s \u201cPomp and Circumstance\u201d played by [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-52294","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-04-19 18:02:13","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/52294","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=52294"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/52294\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=52294"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=52294"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=52294"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}