The Rune archive · Sacred Heart Academy student newspaper, Louisville, 2012 to 2018
Sacred Heart Academy Dances Their Hearts Out
The ValkyrieBeat Club's second dance marathon at Sacred Heart Academy raised $14,843.03, beating its $10,000 goal, for the pediatric cancer clinic at the University of Louisville.
About The Rune
About this archiveThe Rune was written by students at Sacred Heart Academy, a Catholic girls' high school in Louisville, Kentucky. This independent archive restores 203 of its articles from 2012 to 2018, from state titles and service drives to new teacher spotlights and reviews.
The Rune was the student newspaper of Sacred Heart Academy, a Catholic girls' high school in Louisville sponsored by the Ursuline Sisters. In its own words it was a Sacred Heart Academy supported and funded publication whose purpose was to enlighten, educate, and entertain. Student reporters, section editors and a social media director filed stories between classes, practices and rehearsals, and most pieces carry one or two bylines. The staff also produced videos for the Alumni Awards banquet and posted game updates on Twitter. The paper covered the Academy first, but it also looked outward to the city, from the Pegasus Parade to the backside of Churchill Downs.
Sports take up a large share of the archive, and the results were often big: the swim and dive team's sixth consecutive state title in 2018, the volleyball team's 2016 state championship, golf's eleventh state title in 2017, and a Louisville Invitational Tournament win for basketball under Coach Donna Moir. Service stories follow the Appalachian gift drive to Kermit, West Virginia, the ValkyrieBEAT dance marathon for pediatric cancer research, and mission trips to Belize and Nicaragua with Hand in Hand Ministries. The falls of 2016 and 2017 each brought a run of new teacher spotlights. In between sit theatre previews, a ranking of Louisville haunted houses, a review of Bossypants, a column on feminism, PSAT study tips, and reports on the Dalai Lama's 2013 youth talk and the 2018 national school walk-out.
The archive is organized by section (news, features, sports, student life and opinion) and by school year, from 2012-13 through 2017-18. Articles appear with their original headlines, dates and bylines, so the names of the student writers stand exactly as they were published. Some posts were omitted or trimmed to protect the privacy of students who were minors at the time, and the About page explains what was removed and why. Nothing here is affiliated with Sacred Heart Academy or the original staff, and the archive takes no submissions, corrections or new articles.
From the archive
Behind the Scenes of Churchill Downs
Two Rune reporters describe the Churchill Downs backside, where fans stand on the track, bring coolers, and watch horses walk from stables to the paddock.
SHA Participates in National School Walk-Out
Sacred Heart students joined the optional March 14 national walk-out and observed 17 minutes of silence for victims of the Stoneman Douglas school shooting.
Pippin Takes Center Stage at St. Xavier Theatre
Nine Sacred Heart students appear in St. Xavier Players' production of Pippin, which opens March 17 and runs through March 24.
Louisville Flood
Heavy February rain sent the Ohio River into downtown Louisville, damaging homes, businesses and farms, with Mayor Greg Fischer confirming losses above two million dollars.
Aquavalks Gain Sixth Consecutive State Title
The Sacred Heart swim and dive team scored 520.5 points to win its sixth straight state title, the 29th state championship in program history.
Valkyries Take LIT Title
Sacred Heart beat defending state champion Mercer County 83-48 in the Louisville Invitational Tournament final, and Kia Sivils won the defensive player award.
News
All 93 storiesBehind the Scenes of Churchill Downs
Two Rune reporters describe the Churchill Downs backside, where fans stand on the track, bring coolers, and watch horses walk from stables to the paddock.
SHA Participates in National School Walk-Out
Sacred Heart students joined the optional March 14 national walk-out and observed 17 minutes of silence for victims of the Stoneman Douglas school shooting.
Louisville Flood
Heavy February rain sent the Ohio River into downtown Louisville, damaging homes, businesses and farms, with Mayor Greg Fischer confirming losses above two million dollars.
Dancing the Night Away at Father Daughter Dance
Sacred Heart held its annual Father Daughter Dance at Mellwood Arts Center, where seniors again wore their prom dresses and danced on stage with the DJ.
Features
All 72 storiesPippin Takes Center Stage at St. Xavier Theatre
Nine Sacred Heart students appear in St. Xavier Players' production of Pippin, which opens March 17 and runs through March 24.
Alumna of the Year Offers Advice to Upperclassmen
Alumna of the Year Alice Biedenbender Fisher, class of 1985, gave Sacred Heart juniors and seniors five tips for the future during a February 2 visit.
Alumni Awards Banquet Recap
Sacred Heart Academy honored alumnae, teachers, and coaches at the Feb. 1 banquet with five awards, naming Alice Fisher '85 Alumna of the Year.
Valkyries Recover from Widespread Illness
Sacred Heart Academy closed on January 8, 2018 so staff could clean classrooms, lockers and the cafeteria after a widespread illness linked to norovirus symptoms.
Sports
All 22 storiesAquavalks Gain Sixth Consecutive State Title
The Sacred Heart swim and dive team scored 520.5 points to win its sixth straight state title, the 29th state championship in program history.
Valkyries Take LIT Title
Sacred Heart beat defending state champion Mercer County 83-48 in the Louisville Invitational Tournament final, and Kia Sivils won the defensive player award.
SHA Dominates Trinity Valkyrie Invitational
Sacred Heart cross country won the JV race and finished 23rd of 40 varsity teams at the Trinity Valkyrie Invitational at E.P. Tom Sawyer Park.
Lacrosse Secures Fifth Straight Braveheart Title
Sacred Heart lacrosse defeated Eastern 9-6 on Horton Field for a fifth straight Braveheart Championship, with the ninth goal coming with five seconds left.
Student Life
All 13 storiesFrosh Experience
Sacred Heart freshmen came together through the Rose Ceremony and Matriculation Mass, the Frosh Blast sleepover and a team-based Freshman Field Day.
Travels to Thailand
Fifteen Sacred Heart students and three teachers spent spring break caring for elephants in Thailand and touring Chiang Mai.
Oaks Fashion
The Rune lists three online shops and two Louisville boutiques for students hunting a dress for Oaks and Derby days.
Global Ambassadors from SHA
Sixty-one Sacred Heart students attended the 2017 Kentucky United Nations Assembly at the Galt House and earned a Delegation of Excellence Award.
Opinion
All 3 storiesThe Best Haunted Hangouts in Louisville
A Sacred Heart reporter reviews Baxter Avenue Morgue, Field of Screams, Devil's Attic and Haunted Hotel, naming Haunted Hotel the pick.
The Women of ISIS
In an opinion column, Rune editor Eliza Walsh argues that the treatment of women under ISIS should be a headline issue that relates to women's rights worldwide.
Bossypants-A Hot Summer Read
A Rune reviewer gives Tina Fey's memoir Bossypants 4.5 out of 5 stars, calling it funny, engaging, and a good summer read.
Reading Room
All piecesWhat a School Newspaper Teaches About Writing
Student reporters learn to put the point first, let sources speak, and cut what does not earn its place. Six articles from the archive show how, and how the same habits carry into essays.
Student Athletes and the College Essay
Signing ceremonies and state titles make headlines, not essays. Here is how to find the moment, the role and the honest sentence inside a season, drawing on the Rune's sports pages.
From Service Trip to Application Essay
The sentence every service essay reaches for is the one to cut. The Rune's coverage of mission trips, gift drives and a dance marathon shows what to keep instead.
Team Trips and College Visits
Tournaments in Las Vegas and Ohio, an art trip to New York, spring break in Belize and Thailand, and the campus visits seniors arrange themselves. What the archive shows about budgets, schedules and paperwork.
Winter and Spring Break Abroad
The Rune's winter break lists stay in Kentucky; its spring break stories go to Thailand, Belize and Nicaragua. What a student brings home from either depends on noticing, and on a notebook.
Questions
What was The Rune?
The Rune was the student newspaper of Sacred Heart Academy, a Catholic girls' high school in Louisville, Kentucky, sponsored by the Ursuline Sisters. Its original About page described it as a Sacred Heart Academy supported and funded publication with the purpose to enlighten, educate, and entertain.
Who runs this archive, and is it connected to the school?
No. This is an independent reading archive. It is not run by Sacred Heart Academy, Sacred Heart Schools, the Ursuline Sisters or anyone who worked on The Rune. It takes no submissions and cannot forward messages to the school or to former staff members. Questions about the school itself should go to the school.
Which years and how many articles are included?
The archive holds 203 articles restored from Wayback Machine captures of therunenews.org, published between the fall of 2012 and the spring of 2018. The 2016-17 and 2017-18 school years are the fullest. Earlier years survive in smaller numbers, and no articles from the 2015-16 school year were recovered.
Why are some articles missing or shortened?
Articles were left out when they centered on individual students who were minors: senior wills, student profiles and memorials, posts with personal or health details, weekly event listicles and video-only posts. In some surviving articles, family, health and contact details were removed. The goal is to keep the paper readable without exposing private information about former students.
Are the bylines and dates original?
Yes. Headlines, publication dates and bylines appear as they were published, including staff titles such as Staff Reporter, Sports Editor or Editor-in-Chief where the original post carried them. Some posts, mostly from the earlier years, had no byline in the captured page, and those are shown without one rather than guessed.