From music to athletics to the alphabet soup of clubs–DECA, HOSA, FCCLA–PHS is full of passionate students with a wide range of skills. The Viking Varieties talent show, held March 22, exemplifies this. The talent show is a perennial feature at PHS, leadership teacher Jamie Mooring confirms.
“[The talent show] was put on my plate when I took over the leadership job,” Mooring, who has held the position for 15 years, said. “It has always been student-run. They have to do the script-writing themselves, they have to find the emcee–they have to schedule everything.”
This year’s edition was being organized by three juniors: Megan Ditty, Grace Marvin and Courtney Huber. They describe the experience as [busy] but worthwhile.
“We have had to go over a lot of scheduling with the main office and the auditorium,” Huber said. “A lot of advertising has gone into it as well.”
In addition to arranging the space, the team of three was responsible for holding auditions, feeding and rewarding the contestants, writing programs and scripts and finding a panel of judges.
“[Planning] has been stressful this past two weeks,” Marvin said.
But the team is proud of their achievement. Though Winter Wishes has since become the Leadership program’s biggest project, Viking Varieties is still one of the most important events on the calendar, according to Mooring. And the juniors believe it represents the Leadership program well.
“[With] leadership, I feel like there is a stereotype that it is all the popular kids,” Ditty said. “But I think the talent show is great because anyone can join it. We wanted anyone to come. Of the people who did come out, some are very confident that they are going to do well and some are more timid. I am glad there has been a broad spectrum to work with.”

Though Viking Varieties has, for the most part, remained the same over the years, each show brings something slightly different.
“The change comes from the talent base that is at the school,” Mooring said. “It is really fun because it showcases talent around the school, talents we did not even know kids were participating in. A number of years [ago] punk rock was really big and we [were] literally having battle of the bands. We do athletics here, we do higher academics, we definitely do music here. But there are kids who do individual things that are so cool and [Viking Varieties] is a great opportunity for them to be able to showcase it.”