Vocalists impress Michael Bublé during Masterclass

Sophomores Isa Calvo and Zoe McLaughlin traveled to Segerstrom Center for the Arts on Nov. 30 to participate in a masterclass taught by Michael Bublé. 

After weeks of auditioning, they were chosen along with four other students from Orange County.

Originally Calvo was confirmed as a participant to sing, while McLaughlin was chosen as an alternative. However upon arrival, McLaughlin learned that Bublé wanted the alternates to also sing.

“In soundcheck, we didn’t know if [Zoe] was gonna be performing or not,” Calvo said. “They had all six of us soundcheck and they were like, we’ll see.” 

Each student sang one song in front of the Bublé and he gave students feedback, such as making sure they projected their voice or enunciated their vowels. However, when it came to critiquing the FUHS singers, Bublé had nothing to say. 

“[Bublé] called me ‘a god,’” McLaughlin said. “He was, like, ‘Whoever you believe in, bless your throat. Kiss your throat. You’re literally this beautiful singer.’ I died.” 

Calvo also received wonderful compliments, surprising her. 

“[Bublé] was like, ‘You need to give me notes on how I sing because you’re better than I’ll ever be,’” Calvo said. “I was, like, ‘oh my god.’”

The masterclass took place only hours before opening night of the Fall Dance Concert, where both students were scheduled to participate. In order to be show ready, Calvo and McLaughlin turned the backseat of their car into a dressing room.

“We changed in the car,” McLaughlin said. “I’m like taking out all my fancy earrings and we sprinted to the Auditorium and got there within 30 minutes.”

Calvo added: “I did a couple jumping jacks and a squat and called it my warm up.” 

McLaughlin said, “Us being in [the masterclass] probably opened up a lot of opportunities for the school.”

Final Exams This Week

ASB hosts winter spirit week

Choir students celebrate holidays with community

Assistant principal challenges students to be grateful

Today, students received their final gratitude challenge notification through Aeries. Assistant principal Dan Ma embraced the national campaign to encourage students to pause for a minute and just reflect.

“I think it’s just one of those things where we’re in that season of thankfulness,” Ma said. “Sometimes we just go, go, go, go. And I think it’s also important to find that balance where we pause and appreciate what we have.”

Each weekday, on the @fullertonunionhs Instagram, there is a post encouraging people in our community to post under the tag #FUHSgratitude. Some of the challenges included sharing songs and reaching out to thank a friend.

Ma says he plans to continue to use Aeries to promote school activities.

Instrumental Music Winter Concert

Speech and debate members participate in tournament

Senior Mackenzie Mauldin and junior Joshua Lee are on the path to the Tournament of Champions in Lexington, Kentucky after winning their double-final round. Fullerton’s speech and debate team competed at the Glenbrooks Speech and Debate Tournament in Glenview, Illinois. The Tribe was one of 223 schools that were in attendance over Thanksgiving break.

FUHS was successful in two events: Humorous Interpretation (HI), where students perform a comedic script to highlight a problem, and Public Forum (PF), a debate event where students argue about a prepared topic.

In HI, sophomore Jane Kwak placed 14th of 55 competitors. In PF, teammates junior Joshua Lee and senior Mackenzie Mauldin made it to the double-final elimination round, placing them as one of the top 32 teams out of an initial 124. This secured them a bid to the Tournament of Champions in Kentucky.

Model UN President wins best delegate

Senior Audrey Bae won Best Delegate as a representative of the Central African Republic within the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) division at Bruin MUN, hosted by UCLA on Nov. 12 and 13. Bruin MUN is an international competition with a total of 3,000 students attending. Some students came all the way from Europe and Asia just to compete.

“They felt that I displayed the most diplomacy and leadership within my respective group of people that I was working with to foster solutions for [environmental conservation],” Bae said, “As well as being able to establish myself as a key player to these topics that were being discussed.”

Preparations consisted of researching and coming up with solutions for the topics given. The actual conference required competitors to debate for 7-8 hours for two days, with most of the speeches being improvised on the spot.

As the club’s founder, Bae thought that the club had come a long way from where it began. She initially tried to make it something of a cultural club because she wasn’t certain many students would want to commit to Model UN. Since then, they’ve had four official conferences and a total of around 30-40 students who have competed.

“It’s still shocking to me,” she said, “I think it’s pretty impressive considering we are a club and we don’t have time to practice after school.”

The FUHS Model UN Club is currently preparing for two upcoming conferences next semester.

Junior high students visit FUHS

Staff members Alicia Bennett, Elie Chung, Dante Diaz, Katherine Martinez, Mackenzie Mauldin, Helen Sanders, and Eadyn Ochoa contributed to this report.