WSO brings Holiday Tour to Steinbach

The Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra brough their Holiday Tour to Steinbach on Dec. 3 at Crossview Church.

Area students nab MHSAA honours

For three consecutive weeks, the Manitoba High School Athletic Association’s athlete of the week has gone to a volleyball player from the region.

Green Valley’s Jasmine Barkman and Gabrielle-Roy’s Jacob Boisjoli followed up Morris School’s Nicolas Leflar in receiving the award.

Barkman is the only grade 12 player on the Grunthal-based Green Valley’s varsity volleyball team and helped them to an appearance at the provincial championships.

“Jasmine has been a fearless leader all season long, on and off the court,” the MHSAA release reads, noting she also serves on the school’s student council and maintains a 98% average in her classes.

Lighting up a bright future in health care

Christmas lights and fireworks lit up the grounds of Bethesda hospital and the faces of families gathered for Bethesda Foundation’s Gifts of Light tree lighting.

Hundreds gathered around the healing garden Dec. 1 to see Cari Penner with her family flip the switch that turned on thousands of lights sponsored by donations from the community. Those donations helped build the major expansion now going up at the regional hospital.

Penner is the wife of the late Darrel Penner, a driving force with the foundation who served as vice chair and chair of the board for 27 years. Cari reflected on the many years the Gift of Light has shone in Steinbach, and the significance of light.

“You could say light is a sign of hope; hope that morning will come, rescue will come, darkness will end – a true sign of the Christmas season,” Penner told the crowd.

MCC hands out $40,500 to local community groups

MCC Thrift Store has handed out $40,500 to nine community groups in Steinbach who it feels provide vital services to the community.

“Often the question is what do we do here locally for our own people? Is all this money going out of the country? Our aim is to do what we can here locally in the same kinds of ways that we do in other countries around the world,” said MCC Thrift Store general manager Dave Thiessen.

Sales from the thrift store are used to help organizations in 45 countries around the world and in Steinbach. This year, Thiessen said donations were up from the previous year.

One of the organizations being helped by MCC is enVision Community Living, an organization that helps individuals with intellectual disabilities live normal productive lives.

COLUMN: Tales from the Gravel Ridge – Voices remembered

The gravel ridge of my childhood has a very old history, and change has permeated its existence since time immemorial. To those who lived on the Rosengard gravel ridge during my childhood and youth, it seemed like a very solid landmark that simply belonged where it was located. And furthermore, I do not recall anyone in my hearing at the time questioning how the ridge came into existence. Nevertheless, the advantages of living on the gravel ridge were many. The fact that the Rosengard School was located on this ancient landmark, that being the gravel shoreline of long-ago Lake Agassiz, was advantageous in numerous ways, including the fact that our playground was never muddy. Spring run-off was not a concern, and neither was the aftermath of a heavy downpour.

The gravel ridge without a doubt had been traversed by many people, even reaching back well before recorded history. Those who were our neighbours when I was growing up in that vicinity, and in some instances, their ancestors as well, all found it an ideal location for setting up their homes and farms. In addition to being perfectly suited for establishing their homes and helping to nurture and develop their family units, the gravel ridge was a reliable roadway as well.

The individuals and family units who have made the gravel ridge and its surrounding lands their home, or possibly the means of providing a livelihood in one way or another are, of course, countless. Many whose names appear on no written birth certificates, or, for that matter, school attendance records, have nevertheless found the ridge amenable to being a willing participant in the activities and adventures of those who were drawn to its inviting environment.

Our own stories are, in some instances known only to us, inasmuch as we personally have experienced our individual lives. Nevertheless, we have also shared our lives with others, be it within our individual families, our friends and neighbours, or fellow students and teachers at the Rosengard School. We have shared, either through lived encounters or through conversations with others, many of life’s experiences, be they ordinary, if there is such a category, or possibly those that were profoundly life altering.

Rosenort claim AA boys varsity volleyball banner

The Rosenort Redhawks rode a hot serving hand to nab the AA boys varsity volleyball provincial championship in hostile territory Nov. 30.

The Redhawks matched up against the host and fellow Zone 4 school Morris/St Jean Mavericks in the final and managed to overcome the crowd for a three-set (25-16, 22-25, 15-3) victory.

Their wins in the first and third sets were powered by AJ Peters, whose booming serves to start each set gave Rosenort nearly insurmountable leads in both sets. Peters was named a tournament all-star.

Mavericks Nicolas Leflar and Tanner Manning were named tournament all-stars as well, with Redhawk Tristan Manning nabbing tournament most valuable player honours.

Hanover School Division lays off 93 EAs due to funding mishap

The Hanover School Division is laying off almost a third of its EAs after an application for funding was sent to the wrong government office.

The division had been told in the summer by the regional office that its funding under Jordan’s Principle had been approved. Then the school division was informed in October that the funding applications had to be resubmitted. This led to a funding shortfall with the division laying off 93 educational assistants.

“Renewal applications for Jordan’s Principle funding were sent to the regional office for Indigenous Services Canada, which was the correct processing location…However, sometime in late summer early fall, responsibility for administering the funding shifted to the federal office of Indigenous Services Canada. This change was introduced without our knowledge. Upon submitting an invoice for expenses paid out in this school year, we were informed on Oct. 31 that the bill would not be paid and that we would need to resubmit our applications to the federal ISC office for review,” said superintendent Joe Thiessen.

“The reality is we’re greatly disappointed that we had to move in this direction…We had committed to over $1 million in EA salaries up until (the) time of layoff(s) and we really were left with no choice without secured funding.”

NDP government introduces motion to support local journalism

The NDP government has introduced a motion that would see a committee established to support local journalism in the province.

The measure was introduced during the throne speech last month and this week government leader Nahanni Fontaine introduced a motion to establish an all-party committee to explore “the future of local journalism, including rural and cultural media such as French, Filipino, Punjabi, and Chinese language publications with the mandate to consider matters of public support for journalism, and report its conclusion to the Assembly within 30 days of the start of Fall Sitting 2025.”

“It’s never too early to look at supporting the free press here in Manitoba and whether it be paper, radio, online media. We just want to see if there’s a way to support papers across Manitoba (in the) different ways we share information with Manitobans and in communities as well,” said MLA for St. Boniface Robert Loiselle.

The opposition said it will support the bill with the following amendments covering all ethnicities and non-official languages so long as they don’t promote hate speech or “undermine the Manitoba values of inclusivity and respect for all races, religions, and backgrounds.”

SPORTS FLASHBACK 1981: Super League Trophy is back in Steinbach

It was no surprise that Carman’s Bill North and St Jean’s Jim Dewart were battling it out in the final draw of the 1981 Thompson Brooms Super League season in Winkler, Saturday. The surprise was that they were deciding third and fourth place. while a sheet over, Wilf Peters and Don Brown were settling the league’s championship.

Don Brown and his Citizen State Bank rink, from Cavalier, North Dakota, added an international flavor to this season’s Super League playoffs, but after reaching the final he ran out of shots and Wilf Peters and his East-Man Feeds foursome chalked up a 12-3 victory in six ends, to bring the Super League trophy back to Steinbach.

Peters set the tone in the final, when he drew for four in the first end. In the second, Brown needed a head-on hit to count one and cut Peters out of three. The third end was another disaster for Brown, and Peters built his lead to 8-1.

Peters and his rink of Hans Epp, Norm Krysko and Danny Lipinski made the playoffs by virtue of a four-way tie for the final three playoff spots and defeated Abe Friesen’s Steinbach rink in a special playoff Friday.