Latest news with #MayoHighSchool
Yahoo
27-05-2025
- General
- Yahoo
Memorial Day celebration reflects on remembrance amid shared loss
May 26—ROCHESTER — Kay Swenson has told her family's story countless times since her son, Cpl. Curtis Swenson, was killed in Afghanistan , but each telling for the Gold Star mother remains fresh. "I've worn that badge for 15 years," she said of the Gold Star family status to families of U.S. military members who've died while serving. "At times, it feels like 15 seconds." On Monday, she shared her family's story again as part of Rochester's Memorial Day observance at the Soldiers Field Veterans Memorial. It was Swenson's third time giving the main address at the annual event, but friends and strangers who paused briefly after the ceremony to reach out to her made it evident the emotions shared among them are fresh. "She always gets me," program master of ceremonies Darlene Krebs said. Curtis Swenson was killed in Afghanistan on April 2, 2010, having joined the military shortly after his 2007 graduation from Mayo High School. Enlisting was a family tradition shared by his mother and father, as well as cousins and others. "Because of my family's history of service, I thought that was the thing you do," Kay Swenson said of her own Army service. When the son she described as a "smart, quick-witted, strong-heated, yet soft-hearted, little boy" served in Iraq from 2008 to 2009 and later left for Afghanistan in 2009, she said she better understood that individual service is not truly service of one person. "When a soldier serves their country, a family serves their country," she said. "We go through much of the same mental strain as our loved one." As someone born into a Gold Star family due to the death of her mother's first husband, Sgt Francis Berger on Nov. 14, 1952, Swenson said she knew of sacrifice but didn't understand the full impact on the family until her mother opened up following Curtis' death. "It was something she never talked about," she said of Berger's death in a non-combat plane crash in Korea. Even after Kay Swenson's sister died from cancer while serving, giving the family another Gold Star, she said the full impact didn't strike her. But Curtis Swenson death as the result of an improvised explosive device in Afghanistan during a combat support operation as part of Operation Enduring Freedom changed everything. She said her family opted to publicly mourn, searching for meaning in Curtis' death and letting others in to share their loss and personal stories. The search led to a memorial fund and educational scholarships , but Swenson said it's also helped others share and consider the enduring lessons of pain and sacrifice. "That's why we strive to turn our pain into purpose," she said. Swenson said sharing the experiences helps deal with the pain, even as the sadness remains indefinitely "It makes me incredibly sad, not knowing what might have been," she said, reflecting on her son's goals and plans for the future. "Letting go of our future is almost as difficult as letting go of him." With that, she urged the crowd that filled the seats and poured out of the memorial during Monday's program to remember those honored on Memorial Day, as well as those left behind as battle survivors and loved ones. Amid the variety of traditions carried out Monday, she said the key is remembering the sacrifices of those lost. "We owe a lifetime of gratitude," she said. "We speak their names so their sacrifice is not forgotten."
Yahoo
14-05-2025
- Yahoo
Mayo grad, remote wilderness doctor, works on new season of 'Survivor'
May 13—MAMANUCA ISLANDS, Fiji — Sarah Spelsberg didn't take a direct route to practicing emergency medicine in remote areas. It's fitting because she spends much of her time now in places where there isn't a direct route from anywhere. However, being in some of the world's most remote places as part of a team on standby to provide medical aid is where she feels at home. Spelsberg is the director of USA Field Operations for World Extreme Medicine, a faculty member and podcast host for World Extreme Medicine. Currently, Spelsberg is in Fiji as part of the medical team on hand for filming of the 49th season of the television show "Survivor." She arrived in Fiji in early April and is a member of a team of doctors and paramedics on the production. One piece of her training for that role was learning how to find the South Pole using the stars in the southern hemisphere. "There's something really special about practicing medicine in remote places," said Spelsberg, a Rochester native and Mayo High School graduate. "I think places like this play to my strengths." As for the injuries and ailments she's treating, that has to remain a secret. "They're typical of what you'd expect under vigorous activity in a tropical environment," she said. Are there any specifics related to exciting developments viewers will see? "Very much so," she said. "I think people are going to want to watch this season." Season 49 will film into the summer and air on CBS in Fall 2025. Wilderness emergency medicine takes improvisation. It means making do with the tools you have at your disposal and repurposing gear while often navigating tough terrain and extreme weather conditions. Spelsberg wouldn't have it any other way. Duct tape and safety pins are two of her favorite and versatile tools. Spelsberg will be in Fiji until July when she returns to the University of North Carolina Southeastern, where she's a resident in emergency medicine. Spelsberg's emergency medicine career began in Telluride, Colorado, where she trained with the ambulance crew of the San Miguel County Search and Rescue team. Spelsberg initially went to Colorado to ski and play music. She was hiking when she came across the team in the middle of a rescue and offered to help. She jumped at an opportunity to train with the team for meager pay while a musician residency program in Telluride paid her bills. Spelsberg then decided to go to physician assistant school. However, after school, she began to miss emergency wilderness medicine. The immediacy of helping people was appealing compared to fighting insurance companies. She recalled arguing with insurers about whether a recent amputee needed a prosthetic to return to work (they did, she said). Another company denied her request for a lidocaine patch and insisted on prescribing OxyContin for a patient in their 90s. "It was just over and over hitting roadblocks to get people care," she said. "I don't want to have to ask some businessman's permission to help my patients." Spelsberg began applying to remote U.S. health care outposts. She got a call from Dutch Harbor, Alaska. For four years, Spelsberg responded to injured people in need around the Aleutian Islands via helicopters, fixed-wing planes and cargo planes — however she could get to the patient. Spelsberg said she knew that planes going down in icy conditions was something rescuers risked every time they went up to help someone. Knowing someone needs help would push those thoughts aside, she said. Even training poses risks. The first time Spelsberg rappelled from a helicopter in flight, she was terrified, she said. However, the training happened over water. "I figured the worst-case scenario is I take the fall and end up in the water and I'm a good swimmer," she said. It wasn't training or a rescue mission that got Spelsberg to nearly needing rescue herself. While living in Colorado, Spelsberg decided to take a mountain pass over a mountain to turn a three-hour drive into about an hour. A snowstorm hit and at the summit of the mountain on a narrow road, her car lost forward momentum and started sliding backward. She thought of her parents, her friends and of her colleagues with San Miguel County SAR. "I thought, 'Oh my god, I'm going to scar so many people,'" she said. "There was no one around, no cabins, no buildings — nothing." The car stopped sliding and she was able to maneuver it on the narrow road to make a final run at the incline over the mountain. These days Spelsberg is less likely to do risky things alone. "I do things like mountain climbing, scuba diving, those things in groups," she said. While working in Alaska, Spelsberg decided to attend medical school remotely from Alaska. From 2020 through 2023, she attended online classes that started at 3 a.m. her time. "I wanted a degree that would let me be able to work anywhere in the world," Spelsberg said, adding more certification would help her better be able to help patients but would also open doors for more opportunities to work around the world. One opportunity had Spelsberg making house calls to a scientist living on the bottom of the ocean off the Florida coast. Spelsberg was the lead medical team member on Project NEPTUNE 100. That project's goal, among others, was to study the physiological and psychological effects of prolonged compression on the human body as Dr. Joseph Dituri lived for 100 days in a sea-bottom lodge. As a result, Spelsberg is now also working on certification for use of hyperbaric chambers in medicine. Spelsberg said she doesn't have a specific position in mind in which she'll use her training and certifications, but they're all keys to potential opportunities. "I do like to make my decisions as opportunities come," she said. "It drives my parents nuts." Being part of the on-site team for Survivor is a high-profile longshot of wilderness medicine opportunities. Spelsberg was approached to be part of the team. World Extreme Medicine is often approached by production companies making shows or shooting films in remote locations. Spelsberg's leading role in the field and with WEM garnered her the offer she was glad to accept. "I have earned my stripes so to speak," she said. She said the medical team and the entire production staff have been great to work with. "The people who run this, they have this can-do attitude," Spelsberg said. "They're the kind of people I want to surround myself with." That kind of adaptability likely suits Spelsberg to wilderness emergency medicine. "In emergency medicine, it's a strength to be absolutely flexible," she said. It also helps to have a partner who's flexible as well. When not studying or rescuing people from remote environments, Spelsberg currently lives in Jacksonville, Florida, and works at Mayo Clinic there. She still plays music but medicine pays the bills now. Her partner, Alton Robey mostly patiently waits for her while she's in remote settings or studying. It's not all bad, she said. He plans to join her in Fiji next week to surf and fish there.
Yahoo
08-05-2025
- Science
- Yahoo
Mayo High School team ties for fifth place in national current-events competition
May 7—ROCHESTER — A team of four students from Mayo High School recently tied for fifth place in a national competition focused on current events and world knowledge, called Academic WorldQuest. Three of the students — Evita Hansen, Hannah Tupper and Emma Lange — spoke about the experience during a Rochester School Board meeting on Tuesday, May 6. The fourth student on the team, Adelyn Crum, wasn't present. "If anything, I think we're just so proud of how we did," Hansen said. Mayo is the only high school in Rochester that hosts an Academic WorldQuest team. This is the third time a team from Mayo has advanced to the national level. The team secured its national standing after taking first-place at a state-level competition of Academic WorldQuest, hosted by the organization Global Minnesota. Although only the one team of four went to nationals, there were multiple other Mayo teams that competed at state. Two of the other teams from the school finished fourth and eighth in the state competition. A representative for The World Affairs Councils of America, which hosts the Academic WorldQuest, said there were a total of 33 teams competing at the national competition.
Yahoo
11-03-2025
- Science
- Yahoo
Rochester students qualify for Regeneron International Science and Engineering Fair
Mar. 10—ROCHESTER — Two Rochester high school students have won a trip to participate in the Regeneron International Science and Engineering Fair in Columbus, Ohio. The students qualified during The Rochester Regional STEM Fair, which was held Friday, Feb. 28, at Rochester Community and Technical College. They include: * Mayo High School sophomore Rathan Duggirala, whose project is "Optimization of Drying Time for Biological Paint with Cellulose Nanocrystals and Chitosan Additives: A Comparative Study with Commercial Paints — Year 4." * Century High School junior Ana Milosevic, whose project is "Development of an Immunofluorescent Test (IFT) for Detecting Measles Virus (MV) Proteins and Virus-Expressed Transgenes in Clinical Specimens from Patients Treated with Oncolytic Measles Virus Strains." The first alternate is Century High School senior Dean Wang whose project is "Uncovering the Effect of Shared Gene Modules in Co-occurrence of Autoimmune Diseases using the Latent Dirichlet Allocation The second alternate is Mayo High School junior Srinidhi Babu, whose project is "Investigating the Role of p19 Arf-A Senescent Regulator Shaping Stromal Regulation in Lung Tumorigenesis." A number of students have also qualified to take part in the 2025 Minnesota State Science and Engineering Fair, which will be held March 28.
Yahoo
03-03-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Student group rallies hundreds in support of immigrants
Mar. 2—ROCHESTER — With U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement taking immigrants into custody in Rochester and the Trump administration promising the largest deportation effort in U.S. history, more than 200 people rallied in support of immigrants in downtown Rochester Sunday afternoon, March 2, 2025. Members of the group, the student-led Rochester Community Initiative, decried deportation of immigrants, splitting of families and the fear recent immigration actions are causing among the Rochester immigrant community. "RCI refuses to sit back as people are erased from the communities they helped build," said Anousha Mozammel, a board member and organizer with RCI. The student-led Rochester Community Initiative organized the event, attended mostly by students. It started with a rally outside the city-county Government Center followed by a march. The group walked from the Government Center to Broadway, to Second Street Southwest to Mayo Civic Center. The group made multiple circles along the route, carrying signs and chanting slogans, amid honks from passing cars. Speakers at the rally included student organizers, student immigrants and teachers from Rochester Public Schools. Christina Freund, a Mayo High School Spanish teacher, gave a bilingual speech and urged students to speak out in support of immigrants in the community and schools. "This event is necessary because the people in danger don't feel safe using their voices," Freund said. "Right now, we need that allyship." Mayo High School 10th grader Annika Cmeil said that's why she attended the rally. "I wanted to be here to be a voice for people who aren't able to speak up," she said while carrying a sign that read, "No human is illegal." Ava Tiede, an immigrant and Rochester Community and Technical College student, attended the rally after learning about it and decided to show her support for other members of the immigrant community. "What America is doing is not okay," she said. "You don't separate families." Mozamme said that the rally was in response to recent news of enforcement action by ICE officials in Rochester and a chance to show the community where young people stand amid polarization in policy. Mozammel said she hasn't seen that polarization as prevalent in school as elsewhere, but nevertheless fear is growing among students from immigrant families and their friends. "The feeling of fear that permeated the community has filtered into the schools, unfortunately," she said. Maeva Djossou, a Mayo High School student whose family immigrated from Morocco in 2010, spoke at the rally and read a poem she had written. She expressed hurt for her fellow immigrant students. She said she has lost much of her native language skill, but still is treated by people in the community as an outsider. "Despite losing my mother's tongue, there will always be those who remind me I'm an immigrant," she said. Following the march, Mozammel asked the people attending to continue to help the immigrant community speak up. "Our work isn't done," she said.
