Teen of the Week: Karen Meidenbauer

Her name is Karen Meidenbauer, but everyone, even her parents, call her Kari.

By either name, Kari, 18, is a teen-on-the-go. The 2009 Archbishop Spalding High School graduate packed so many activities and experiences into her high school years, it's easy to wonder if she ever slept.

Yet, she does have fun. With her boyfriend Justin Leo, an Arundel High graduate, she attended the senior proms for both Spalding and Arundel high schools.

Maintaining a high grade point average and membership in the National Honor Society, the Millersville resident served in the Student Government Association throughout all four years at Spalding and was SGA president her senior year. Kari also participated in four sports: cross country, track, equestrian and swimming. She lettered in cross country and track and was team captain for the cross country and equestrian teams.

She especially loved cross country. "The team was a good group of girls. It's not a drama sport," said Kari. "It's something you hate while you're doing it, but you love it after it's over. Yay! Endorphins!"

When a stress fracture sidelined her from running, Kari switched to shot put during track season - only to discover she was "a foot shorter and 150 pounds lighter than my competitors."

In her sophomore year, Kari was the SGA's secretary on its executive council. Working with three male seniors, she was "the token girl," she joked. "I learned a lot from them," Kari recalled.

As the service coordinator her junior year, she led a canned food drive in the fall for Harvest for the Hungry that was so successful; the cans her schoolmates gathered filled six cars and one van. The following spring, under her direction, Spalding students created, filled and wrapped 500 Easter baskets for the children of migrant workers on the Eastern Shore.One project she actively promoted through her high school years was the countywide Adopt-A-Family Program. "When I was five or six in Girl Scouts, our troop was involved in Adopt-A-Family. I've done it every year since," said Kari.

She explained St. Bernadette's Catholic Church in Severn, near the Spalding campus, receives an annual request from the county's Social Services Department to aid about 250 families during the Christmas season. "Spalding takes about 55 of those families. It's our biggest service project of the year."

As service chair for the National Honor Society, she organized the drive so each homeroom would be responsible for one family. They gathered all the items needed to brighten one needy family's holiday season, including a Christmas day meal. "I established procedures for Adopt-A-Family, so successive service chairs can follow my rubric. It's on a flash drive so they don't have to reinvent the wheel," Kari noted.

A final gift to her alma mater, she set up a leadership seminar program that's slated to kick off next year with 50 to 60 teens attending for free. Eventually, she hopes organizers will invite more and more schools each year until the seminar encompasses student leaders countywide.

Spalding recognized her work with both the Principal's Citizenship Award and the Principal's Leadership Award. The Optimist Club presented her with the $1,000 Kenneth Allor Scholarship for her volunteerism.

Noting she graduated with over 100 outreach service hours, Spalding's Assistant Principal Lew Van Wambeke stated: "Kari is that rare person that combines patience with drive, maturity with energy and intelligence with work ethic. She is highly respected for her service to others, her willingness to always listen to others and her genuine good nature."

Spalding's Principal Kathleen A. Mahar added: "As president of the Student Government Association, Kari faced her share of challenges. She confronted them with grace, poise, and a steely determination. Kari's work ethic is phenomenal and will serve her well not just in college but in life."

A project that had a profound impact on Kari was the church mission trip she took with Catholic youth to Guaymas, Mexico. There she learned "how severely impoverished people truly live and allowed me to not only learn about the culture, but also help them while I was there." Back home, she continued to raise support for the people she'd met.

"I learned that no matter where you are, what language you speak, or what your ethnicity is, a smile conveys the same message to everyone."

Kari is active in her parish church, Our Lady of the Fields in Millersville. "She's worked here for a couple years as the parish receptionist on Sunday mornings. She's warm and welcoming to people when they come to the office," said its pastor, the Rev. Gene Nickol.

He noted she is also the greeter for the 6 p.m. youth service. "She is something! A tremendous help and always willing to be of help. She is above average in that way." She was also a Eucharistic minister and a peer minister with the church's youth group.

Kari works about 24 hours a week with the Greater Annapolis Veterinary Hospital as a veterinary assistant. She is heading to Virginia Tech later this month as a biological sciences major, in hopes of eventually becoming a veterinarian.

"After I receive my bachelor of science, the veterinarian school for Maryland and Virginia is there at Virginia Tech," she said. Plus her father, both brothers and an aunt, Barbara Shanks, attended VT.

Her dad, Richard Meidenbauer, is an electrical engineer and member of the senior professional staff at Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory. Patricia Meidenbauer, her mom, is a nursing school professor at Catonsville Community College. Brother Ken, 25, works as a mechanical engineer at the Patuxent Research Naval Center; and brother Dan, 24, is an Ensign in the Navy and a nuclear reactor engineer.

With Kari about to leave the nest, her father admitted: "We will miss her desperately."

Anyone may nominate a Teen of the Week. If you have a nomination, send it by e-mail to Wendi Winters at Teen@quantumstep.com.