Bay District Schools’ “Welcome Back Bash” Energizes 3,500+ Educators

PANAMA CITY, FL – On July 31st, the Bay District Schools (BDS) “Welcome Back Bash” at First Baptist Church, for all 3,500+ employees, was, as always, an exciting occasion, giving BDS employees a chance to come together and get energized for the 2025-2026 school year. 

This year's theme was, "We're Bringing Our 'A' Game," with featured performances by local high school bands, cheerleaders, and JROTC, in addition to inspirational father and son guest speakers from Apple.

One special surprise for teachers was 4 drawings for wagons, due to a generous donation by Kiwanis Club of Panama City, whose members were present to hand out the prizes at the event.  Each wagon was filled with items that teachers value, including a lockable “cell phone jail” for phones that students bring to school this year (since they must now be locked away until they leave school at the end of the day). A special surprise was in store for Stefanie Gall, Kiwanis Club President and also a previous teacher and BDS Superintendent, when the recipient of the wagon that she was giving out was Kim Trzaska, a former 4th grade student of hers who has been teaching for 38 years herself!

The highlight of the day was a 90-second pop-o-shot competition between Josh Laatsch (Director of Athletics and Extracurriculars for BDS and a former guard for the UWF basketball team) and Jabbar Manning (Oscar Patterson Academy Physical Education Coach) who won the game 24 to 6.  Coach Manning gets to take the pop-o-shot game back to the school gym for even more fun and games for the students. To further explain what happened, Referee Winston Chester came out before the game started and insisted that having a high school “student” compete against a college “student” gave the college student an unfair advantage.  To even the playing field, the college “student” had to try to make baskets while blindfolded. He did a pretty good job, considering. 

Watch for yourself.