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Senior Gabrielle Currid posing with FCCLA Culinary's inflatable dinosaur at 2025-2026 Club Rush. Courtesy of Alexia Alonso.

Senior Gabrielle ‘Gabby’ Currid was the Vice President of FCCLA Culinary and a member of VASE. She died Dec. 23, 2025. In her honor, her family started a scholarship fund for FCCLA Culinary members wishing to pursue college. As of Jan. 16, they have raised $8,780 out of the goal of $10,000. On Jan. 17, her family is hosting a Celebration of Life at On the Patio from 2 p.m. – 5 p.m. The dress code is casual.

“They started a GoFundMe as a scholarship for FCCLA,” FCCLA Culinary adviser Samatha Baker said. “They wanted to share a part of Gabby and Gabby’s goals, because Gabby wanted to leave school and she wanted to be a therapist. [Her dad] didn’t want flowers. He didn’t want help with services. He just wanted it to go into a scholarship.”

At the ceremony, FCCLA Culinary will bake Gabby’s sophomore year competition cupcakes: Butterbeer cupcakes.

“They look good so far,” Baker said. “Gabby’s watching me right now. She’s watching me to make sure these come out. I know because we struggled. I remember watching her make her cupcakes over and over and over. She always did such a good job. So hopefully these are going to come out beautiful for her.”

President of FCCLA Culinary and senior Alexia Alonso, first met Gabby freshman year.

“I met her properly at Sting Fling [sophomore year],” Alonso said. “ I say stuff, and I don’t mean it, but sometimes [people] will take it literally. I told Gabby, like, ‘You should buy me some cotton candy, because there’s a booth of cotton candy right next to us.’ So, we’re outside in the blazing heat painting kids’ faces. She bought it for me, and that was the first time we interacted.”

Baker first met Gabby in her freshman year through FCCLA events. In her junior year, Gabby made the tiramisu cupcakes that advanced her to state for the Texas Cupcake Presentation event.

“She did really good,” Baker said. “She was super excited, and they tasted amazing. She got so much better [than] when she first started, and then she didn’t give up. She was like, ‘No, I’m gonna make cupcakes, and I’m gonna do it again.’ And this year she said, ‘I’m gonna do cupcakes again, and I’m gonna win this year.’”

Gabby planned on baking banana pudding cupcakes.

“She only made them once, but they were really good,” Baker said. “When she was making her cupcakes, she sent me a video on Thrill Share. She’s showing me her cupcakes, and she goes, ‘Ahhhhh!!!’ and she’s eating the whipped cream from the can. She’s just the goofiest person. Like, that’s what she was. That’s exactly how she was. I don’t know how to explain her, because Gabby was just Gabby,”

Baker wasn’t alone in appreciating Gabby’s goofiness. Baryn Shepherd, Gabby’s art teacher and VASE adviser, said she stole Gabby from Art 1 and put her into Art 2 after seeing her work.

“Her laugh was infectious,” Shepherd said. “Her sense of humor is absolutely amazing. She’d make us all laugh. We all loved her quirky little smile. It was infectious.”

Alonso agreed with the sentiment.

“She was just someone who I couldn’t feel down around,” Alonso said. “When I was sad or anything, she was like, ‘Don’t do that.’ My sister tells me this joke, and it’s basically [Gabby]: ‘Don’t be sad because sad spelled backward is ‘das’ and ‘das’ not good.’”

Gabby also gave Baker a lot of her art.

“She would draw stuff, and I hung it up, and she was just like a kid with her mom,” Baker said. “She’d be like, ‘You put up my work—oh my gosh, thank you!’ It made her so happy, because it was like putting something on the fridge.”

Over winter break, as Baker was cleaning out her classroom, she found a letter Gabby had brought her.

“I remember when she gave me that she was just saying thank you for loving her and accepting her for how she is, and being like a mom [to her],” Baker said. “She was always so sweet. I think she wanted to be around me because she always felt that she was safe and she was loved. And when she spends so much time at school, you know she’s away from home, this was like her second home.”

Baker said Gabby used to give her something every day. For example, she would often give Baker beef jerky, so now every time she eats it, she is reminded of Gabby.

“We know she’s watching us,” Baker said. “She has a funny way of showing it. Every little while, Gabby just pops up into my head. Or, something happens, and I’m like, ‘Oh my gosh, that’s Gabby.’ I’m not even lying, it’s like I can feel her watching us.”

If Gabby is watching, Baker said, she thinks Gabby would have loved the scholarship.

“She would have been so excited,” Baker said. “I’ll tell you why: because, Gabby, when her [t-shirt design] got picked [for the FCCLA shirt this year], would tell everybody, ‘That’s the shirt I made. I designed that shirt.’ She was so proud of it. And to me, I feel like that’s exactly what she would be doing. She [would say], ‘See, there’s a scholarship in my name.’”