Dave Winter, adviser
Dave Winter has been advising publications since well before his current students were born. In the spring of 1993, while a floating first-year teacher at Wheeler High School in Marietta, Ga., he was asked this question: “Would you like a classroom?” After answering affirmatively without hesitation, he was told he was the new yearbook adviser. Three schools and more than three decades later, Winter is still at it. He has been at McCallum, advising newspaper and yearbook and teaching photojournalism, since 2015. For the better half of his 56 years, he has been married to his better half. He tries to avoid embarrassing his two amazing children on his social media account but occasionally fails.
![HONORING AN ICON: Senior Analise Bady strikes a pose with her fellow company members after they concluded their dances in the first Black History Month assembly on Feb. 10. The assembly included performances from the Knight Steppers, Paityn Jones and Laelani Croan as well as a panel of HBCU graduates talking about their experience at either Grambling or Jackson State.
The dance students danced to a Beyonce song. Bady said the choice of music was appropriate because Beyonce is an influential Black artist, and her music therefore empowered their dance.
“To me, she is a powerful symbol of Black culture and excellence,” Bady said. “Many of her songs focus on empowerment and pride in being who you are.”
The dance, called “Flames,” was choreographed by senior dance major Zoe Maxwell. Bady said that the dance was performed by a different group of dancers than last year's performance, but there were some returning dancers.
This was Bady’s first year in performing for Black History Month. She said she was happy to perform at the assembly because it felt like she was honoring Black History Month in a meaningful way.
“I believe us dancing to [Beyonce’s] music was a way of celebrating,” she said.
Caption by Priya Thoppil.](https://macshieldonline.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/03/dance-bhm--1200x676.jpg)
![SHARED DISAPPOINTMENT: Senior Mark Sanchez and head coach Thomas Gammerdinger walk across the House Park field following the loss against Anderson. Sanchez, who has known Gammerdinger for five years, said the coach treats Sanchez like his own son.
“I used to come up and lift weights with the varsity team and go to Speed and Strength, so me and Coach G are pretty close,” Sanchez said. “He not only cares about football but also my life outside of football. He’s a great leader for us, and he just pushes me to be better.”
Gammerdinger said he cares a lot about his players, and that made the loss feel more personal.
“I felt like, as a coach, I wish I could have done more to have helped them,” Gammerdinger said. “For me, the disappointment really wasn’t losing the game. It was more about seeing my players not have success, kids that I care about and had worked really hard for a goal, and we came up short.”
Having known Sanchez for longer than he has been a member of the team, Gammerdinger said he shared the disappointed moment with Sanchez.
“I coached his older brother, and Mark’s been coming around,” Gammerdinger said. “It was funny, my first game as head coach at McCallum was against Anderson, I guess seven years ago, and Mark was a ball boy on the sideline. We were laughing because we were looking back at that 2018 game, and you could see Mark there.”
With this being Sanchez’s senior season, Taco Shack was the opener to his final year on the team.
“I’m excited for it, but I’m also sad that it’s coming to an end, and I won’t be able to play with the people I played with over the last four years,” Sanchez said.
Also looking toward the future of this season, Gammerdinger said he thinks the team is only going to get better.
“We talk a lot about the process of improvement and what all goes into, ‘How do you actually get better at something?’” Gammerdinger said. “And unfortunately, one of those elements for that process is failure. It’s really hard to get better at something without failure.”
After failure, Gammerdinger said, the coaches go back to the drawing board to reevaluate and make tweaks to their play.
“And that’s what we’ve done,” Gammerdinger said. “So I’m still very confident about this season. I don’t think that game [against Anderson] shook my confidence at all.”
Gammerdinger said his confidence in his players remains unshaken as well.
“All of them are just great people,” Gammerdinger said. “I feel really close to this group of kids, and I have really high expectations and goals for them. And you know, I just want to see them go out there and do it.”
Caption by Camilla Vandergrift.](https://macshieldonline.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/09/G-and-Mark-5-870x1200.jpg)
![DANCING QUEEN ONLY 15: The Mccallum quinceañera took place Saturday May 18 in the cafeteria. Students who danced at the quinceañera practiced for weeks during lunch and after school with the help of Señora A to perfect this special moment. “I signed up for fun and for the dress originally, but I actually made a lot of friends, and it helped me want to come back to practice,” said Elizabeth Peables, a freshman quinceñeara. “It’s been stressful, but it always works. We stayed very late yesterday [the day before the event], but today it feels like everything came together.”
Caption by Nellie Eschberger with reporting by Beatrix Lozach.
LA REINA DE BAILE, SOLAMENTE TIENE 15 AÑOS DE EDAD: La Quinceñera de McCallum fue el 18 de Mayo en la cafetería. Estudiantes que bailaron en la quinceañera practicaron por semanas durante el almuerzo y después de la escuela con la ayuda de la Sra. A para perfeccionar este momento especial.
“Originalmente me inscribí para divertirme, y por el vestido, pero actualmente hice muchos amigos y me ayudó a querer regresar a la práctica.” Dijo la estudiante de primer año Elizabeth Peables. “Ha sido muy estresante, pero siempre funciona.” “Nos quedamos muy tarde ayer el día antes del evento pero hoy se siente que todo está cayendo en forma.”
Leyenda por Nellie Eschberger con reportaje de Beatrix Lozach. Traducción por Maverick Palacios.](https://macshieldonline.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/06/53732328578_3ee2526f55_o_53769409497_o-1200x675.jpg)
![MAXWELL’S MASTERPIECE: Members of Zoe Maxwell’s choreographed dance for the spring student directed show 'Perennial' form a group pose.
For both the choreographers and directors the performance was an opportunity to show off their unique style of dance and bring together the dancers, the theme, and music to create a dance that resembled them.
For junior Zoe Maxwell the performance was unique because while it was her third year performing in the show, it was her first time getting the chance to choreograph a dance and have a more hands-on role with the show.
“It was my last show with all of my senior friends and it was the first student directed show that I got to contribute to choreographically [which was special],” Maxwell said. “My favorite part of the experience was getting to showcase my creativity and seeing that come to life.”
Maxwell said her song choice inspired her choreography.
“Since I heard the song 'MOVE' by Beyonce I knew I wanted to choreograph it,” Maxwell said. “The tricky part was matching it to the themes of the dance show, but luckily the song mentions fire so I connected it to the element theme of the show,”
The role as choreographer proved to be a learning experience for Maxwell because the process of creating a dance differed from just performing in one.
“The biggest challenge was managing the rehearsal time we were given and planning accordingly so that our dances would be finished in time for the show,” Maxwell said. “I took some inspiration from videos and choreography online, but other than that I just kind of improved to the song until I found moves I liked.”](https://macshieldonline.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/53719496826_a8b6b35cb8_o-1200x678.jpg)
