Centennial committee prepares for year-long commemorations
November 4, 2024
By Sydney Patterson, Staff Writer
Every anniversary deserves a good celebration.
Xavier’s centennial planning committee has been collaborating for the last few months with the goal of planning and organizing Xavier’s centennial year celebrations. This includes mapping out the events the committee wants to see take place.
“In January, we will have a launch event to celebrate our centennial year. In May, we are going to have our Centennial Gala,” said Dr. Marguerite Giguette, Xavier’s provost and senior vice president of Academic Affairs, who described these main events as “anchor events.”
Other key centennial events will include a remembrance of Saint Katherine Drexel and the Sisters of the Blessed Sacrament. During the Fall semester in 2025 the committee will plan a mass at Saint Louis Cathedral for Founder’s Day, archival exhibits that showcase former nuns, football teams, and past homecoming celebrations, and an artistic gallery will include alumni exhibits as well as one dedicated to Hurricane Katrina.
The planning committee is organizing events on campus, but they are also expanding beyond New Orleans. Xavier will be highlighting the centennial at a Mardi Gras celebration in Washington, D.C. In New Orleans, decorative banners will be placed around and near campus. In D.C., the planning committee has not made concrete plans yet; however, they want to highlight that Xavier is celebrating its centennial in a way that makes the university more visible to D.C. and surrounding areas.
“In January, there is this big event in D.C called D.C. Mardi Gras where the goal is really to tell the rest of the country about Xavier,” said Curtis Wright, Xavier’s vice president of Student Affairs. “Lots of legislators and anyone in New Orleans will go out to Mardi Gras where all the legislators are and try to lobby Congress for resources,” Wright explained.
When speaking about the beginning stages of planning, Giguette wanted to input across Xavier’s stakeholders. “We wanted to make sure alumni and students were represented.”
“[We wanted to] make sure that student voices are heard and that the events are ones that students can find themselves in,” Wright said.
Giguette shared that she hopes that the events will focus on “who we are and who we are going to be.” The events will aim to reach new and graduating students alike.
Dr. Michelle Boissiere, head of the Biology Department, and a Xavier alumna, said she hopes that “everyone who participates in the events has an increased pride about their affiliation with Xavier.” Vice president Wright hopes eventgoers “have a recommitment to the pride and [understand] why the institution is so important.”
To Giguette, it is a time for us to remember our history and this is what makes the centennial special. It is Giguette’s hope that current students can “recognize how our mission has been the same since the beginning.”
Boissiere also emphasized Xavier’s longevity. “There have been several HBCUs that have hit hard times and struggle to keep their enrollment up,” she said. Xavier should take pride in staying strong, she added.
