Ten Catholic school teachers came to the head of the class on May 18, receiving 2023 Golden Apple Awards from The Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Washington.
The 15th annual award presentation was made during a dinner at the Marriott Hotel in Hyattsville, Maryland.
The Golden Apple Award, giving annually to 10 Catholic school teachers in the Archdiocese of Washington for teaching excellence and dedication to Catholic education, is sponsored by the Donahue Family Foundation. The 10 teachers each received a golden apple, a monetary award of $5,000 and a certificate of achievement.
Jack and Rhodora Donahue, founders of the Pittsburgh-based foundation, sent their 13 children to Catholic schools. Eager to express their deep appreciation to Catholic school teachers for providing a quality academic and faith-filled education for their children, the Donahues through their foundation have established this award in five dioceses around the country.
Here are the 10 Golden Apple Award winning teachers for 2023 from Catholic schools in the archdiocese:
- Christina Buzzeo, a pre-kindergarten teacher at St. Mary’s School in Bryantown, Maryland
- Katie Cain, middle school math teacher at St. Jude Regional Catholic School in Rockville, Maryland
- Amy Clayton, a fifth grade teacher at St. Jerome Academy in Hyattsville, Maryland
- Carol Corgan, a religion teacher at Gonzaga College High School in Washington, D.C.
- Lauren Harper, a fifth grade teacher at Our Lady of Victory School in Washington, D.C.
- Lurana Hogan, a middle school language arts teacher at Holy Cross School in Garrett Park, Maryland
- Cheryl Kimm, a kindergarten teacher at St. Peter’s School in Waldorf, Maryland
- Dominican Sister Mary Olivia Shirley, a fourth grade teacher at St. Anthony Catholic School, Washington, D.C.
- Catherine Williams, a first grade teacher at St. Raphael School in Rockville, Maryland
- Jean Zwald, a pre-kindergarten teacher at St. Peter School on Capitol Hill, Washington, D.C.
The teachers learned of the awards during surprise announcements at their Catholic schools earlier this spring. At the dinner, guests saw a video showing the surprise announcements and featuring interviews with the teachers that was produced by Geoff Ros, the Director of Multimedia Production, and Ron Bethke, the Multimedia Production Specialist, of the archdiocese’s Secretariat for Communications.
A photo gallery of the surprise announcements for the 10 Golden Apple Award winning Catholic school teachers for 2023 was posted on the Catholic Standard website, with photos by Mihoko Owada, the digital media and photography manager for the archdiocese’s Catholic Standard and Spanish-language El Pregonero newspapers and website.
The 2023 Golden Apple Awards presentation took on a special poignancy, because it was the first time since 2019 that the gathering was held in-person, due to limitations posed by the COVID-19 pandemic and its aftermath.
At the beginning of the dinner, the Golden Apple Award winning Catholic school teachers from 2020, 2021 and 2022 stood and were applauded, and later, the 2023 winners came to the stage and were presented with Golden Apple Awards by Washington Cardinal Wilton Gregory.
In the Golden Apple Awards video, the cardinal in introductory remarks noted, “We are blessed to have some of the best teachers around in our Archdiocese of Washington schools.”
At the conclusion of the video, he noted, “On behalf of our archdiocese’s Catholic Schools Office and our students and their families, we say thank you to the Golden Apple teachers for their incredible devotion to educating our children and for helping them to better know Christ each day.”
After presenting the 2023 Golden Apple Awards to the 10 teachers at the dinner, Cardinal Gregory noted that it was his first time attending the gathering, because he became archbishop of Washington after the 2019 ceremony, and the COVID-19 pandemic prevented the ceremonies from taking place during the next three years.
Reflecting on the impact of the pandemic on Catholic education in the archdiocese, the cardinal said, “When we entered that unknown, uncharted waters we were afraid of what it might do to our schools and our students.”
Then Cardinal Gregory noted, “We grew during the pandemic. We grew, not just because we had excellent online services and we brought our students back to in-person learning in a more rapid rate. We grew because of you. We grew because our teachers were dedicated to the art and ministry of teaching and shaping our kids, so thank you, thank you to all of you.”
Before offering a final prayer at the dinner, the cardinal expressed thanks to all the teachers at the dinner, and also to all of the Catholic school teachers, administrators, pastors, parents and supporters throughout the archdiocese. “We have excellent schools… (and) we could not be a Catholic school system without them,” he said.
The dinner had opened with a welcome from Kelly Branaman, the Secretary for Catholic Schools and Superintendent of Schools for The Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Washington, who praised the outstanding achievements of the 2023 Golden Apple Award winning teachers, and the generous support of the Donahue Family Foundation for the awards.
The emcee for the dinner, Paula Gwynn Grant, the archdiocese’s Secretary for Communications, noted that she graduated from St. Jude School in Rockville and the Academy of the Holy Cross in Kensington. “As a graduate of our Catholic schools, I just want to say ‘thank you,’” she said.
Speaking on behalf of the Golden Apple Award recipients, Dominican Sister Mary Olivia Shirley spoke about her experiences as a fourth grade teacher at St. Anthony Catholic School in Washington.
“It is of utmost importance for my students to realize they are seen, known and loved each day. Being a part of a classroom where the guiding principle of respect is lived through our words and actions helps the students to witness to me each day the goodness of God,” she said. “On behalf of all the Golden Apple recipients, thank you for this great honor.”
