It’s reunion, festival time in Clinton!

Reuniting with former classmates is an ingredient for automatic fun, so the chair of this year’s All-School Reunion planning committee, Katie Miskel, is confident the weekend will go well. But unless a new generation of alumni gets involved, the 1993 graduate said she’s not as confident about the next reunion five years from now. 
“We just haven’t had any volunteers, and I’m pretty concerned about what’s going to happen in five years. I won’t be able to chair that one because I’ll have a senior in high school who is also an athlete. So, she’ll be very busy, which means I’ll be very busy. 
“I might be able to help, but we’re definitely going to be putting a call out for a new chair next time.”
Miskel, who is married to 1995 CHS graduate Michael Miskel, has two children. Her daughter, Mia, will graduate in 2023. Her son Caulan, who will be a sophomore this fall, will join the ranks of Clinton alumni in 2021. 
She “inherited” the position of planning committee chair from Randy Meacham following the last All-School reunion.
“Shortly after our last reunion Randy asked if I’d be willing to help with the next one, and of course I said I would. But about two years later he handed me keys and told me, ‘Here you go,’” she laughed. 
“But the crew of people who’ve been coming to the planning meetings this year have done it in the past, and they’re done. They don’t want to run it anymore, and I understand.”
She guessed the average age of people at the meetings to be between 60 and 65. 
“Most people who’ve come to the meetings are there to get information for planning their individual classes, but not to help with the reunion as a whole. I’ve had people complain to me that there aren’t any committees, but it’s not because I haven’t tried. 
“We tried for four months to form committees and I got one volunteer. That was Sherry Lou Gastineau. She’s been in charge of registration and she managed to recruit a few people to help her.”
But other people have shared their experience, she said, which has been invaluable. 
“There’s been a handful of people who’ve given their expertise, which has been a huge help. One of them is Sandy Cornell, who has come to every meeting. She’s participated and given us advice, and she didn’t even go to school here!”
As of Wednesday this week just under 600 people had already pre-registered for the reunion, and of those Miskel estimated around 80 percent of them graduated before 1968. 
“Historically, the reunions have been something that’s pretty great for our community. And especially for the classes from the 1940s, 50s and 60s, it’s a really big deal. We have a lot of people from those classes coming back. 
“But we have a lot of alumni who live here in town from my generation, who I’d really like to see step up and get more involved. People are busy, and I understand. I have teenagers who are involved in everything with very hectic schedules, but I’m worried about five years from now.” 
The lack of volunteers forced Miskel to get creative about this year’s silent auction. The auction was held at the Frisco Center during registration, to raise money for the Alumni Scholarship Fund. Instead of soliciting donations from the business committee, such as professional services and gift baskets, original artwork from some of Clinton’s student artists is being featured. 
“What we’ve always done is ask the business community to donate items, but most of that needs to be done during business hours. Since I work myself I knew I wouldn’t be able to do that, so I tried to find someone to help. 
“When I couldn’t find anyone, I talked to Joy Badillo at the high school. We have a phenomenal art program and I thought it would be really beneficial for our students. They wanted to do it, and it took a lot less legwork to get it accomplished.”
Miskel isn’t ruling out chairing the reunion committee again 10 years from now, but unless more people get involved at the next one she’s not sure what will happen. 
“We’ve got to get a younger group of people involved, and if they don’t I’m not sure it will happen in five years,” she said.
But even with the responsibility on her shoulders of making sure everyone else has a good time, she was still looking forward to attending her own class party. 
“We’ll get there this weekend and I’m sure there will be a lot of details that weren’t thought of, and we’ll deal with it when we get there. But we’ve got the basics covered. There’s going to be lots of free food and a fantastic band.”