We've Got The County Covered
We've Got The County Covered
Dog Treat Makers, Emma Haas, Oliver Standiford, Kalled Jaha, Ashlyn Jensen, Hannah Schoen, Hope Huckabee, and Grace Buck enjoyed the mixing and the cutting out of the dog treats they made and will donate to PAWS Pet Rescue Shelter in Chinook for the sixth graders' Community Service Day.
Walking the streets of Chinook, Carson Nissen, Julius SeRoy, Hendrix Doney, Nic Johnson, and Addison Olsen were on litter detail on Community Service Day, May 14
The MBI student leadership team (SLT) at Meadowlark Elementary School (MES) conducted a Community Service Day where all the sixth graders set out to visit five sites in Chinook to volunteer on May 14.
According to SLT member, Brianna Boettcher, the group adopted the idea after attending Inclusive Youth Days 2018 on December 2-3 at the Billings Convention Center. Sponsored by the Montana Office of Public Instruction and Special Olympics Montana, Inclusive Youth Days featured Service Projects on Monday morning. Inspired by the experience of visiting various sites in Billings to perform acts of service, the SLT-which is basically a student council at MES-wanted to try something similar in their home town.
After the Billings conference, the group brainstormed possible volunteerism sites in Chinook. Then, Mrs. Jordan Heilig, the school's counsellor, and Mr. Jonathan Martin, the school's principal and SLT adviser, called those sites and arranged in January for a member of the SLT to visit and to determine whether the site would be a good fit for their Community Service Day project. Once they had a list of viable prospects, they developed a survey and asked their sixth grade classmates to choose their top three.
"We talked about a community service project for months," Boettcher said, "and we wanted to do what worked best for the school while still volunteering in the community. Maybe next year, even the fifth grade can help out."
Based on ballot results, the SLT then organized the students into groups of five to seven. These groups departed from the school around 8:50 on Tuesday morning. The site benefactors were Little Critters Day Care, Funshine Preschool, Sweet Memorial Nursing Home, PAWS Pet Rescue Shelter, the City of Chinook, and the Chinook Food Pantry.
Each of the groups had a site leader. SLT member Hannah Schoen reported that her group was supposed to go to the Pets Are Worth Saving (PAWS) shelter to clean pens and to interact with the dogs, but given that no one with the PAWS organization was available to give them access to the facility, Melanie Qualls instead supervised Schoen's student group in the school's lunchroom, where they made dog treats. After mixing pureed pumpkin, peanut butter, whole wheat flour, and eggs, the group rolled out the dough, cut it into star shapes, and arranged them on a cookie sheet for baking. Several members of the group thought they might sample the treats themselves!
SLT members Mekayla Brown and Brianna Boettcher led the student group at the Food Pantry where they performed some spring cleaning in coordination with Food Pantry volunteer Wilma Melville. Under the supervision of Heilig, the group swept, mopped, washed windows, and stocked shelves.
Town clean-up was performed by a wandering group of four boys under the leadership of SLT member Addison Olsen. That team picked up litter on the block between Indiana and New York Streets.
Two child care facilities in Chinook also benefited from the youth volunteers. Student manager at the Little Critters Daycare site, Jeni Mord reported that her team affixed vinyl stickers of trees and animals in the baby room. Across town at Funshine, SLT member Gracie Skoyen and her team conducted various arts and crafts activities. Rilee Molyneaux, Sami Malsam, and Madi Gruszie managed a station on building rocket ships using cardboard toilet paper rolls and construction paper; Skoyen led a group in making stained glass kites, and at Alexus Seymour's station, ladybug books were on the agenda. The girls also engaged in math building skills like matching, organizing, and sequencing with the preschoolers.
Finally, the Sweet Nursing Home team, directed by Dentin DePriest, began their entertainment of the residents with a spontaneous performance of the Chicken Dance. "I had no idea we were going to do that, but the response was positive and put the residents in a good mood," DePriest reported.
After that opening act, they convened in the chapel where card games, magic tricks, and playing checkers ensued.
About the morning's events, DePriest said, "Seeing everyone helping out all over the community was a good thing."
School Principal, Mr. Martin agreed: "This is a really great student group, and I am happy to see them taking a lead in the school with projects like this. This really was primarily a student led project."
The MBI is a positive behavior support program that develops the attitudes, skills and systems necessary to ensure that each student leaves public education and enters the community with social and academic competence.
