Pratt students helping classmate, family recover from house fire
At Pratt Elementary, a service project involving students has a personal touch. Students in first- through sixth-grades are helping a classmate and her family who lost a home in a May 21 fire.
“They’ve lost everything,” said Jodi Walter, volunteer coordinator at the school who leads a school community service club with 28 members. “They walked out of there with just their pajamas.”
“We did a food drive, and we did get them some groceries. We got some clothes to them. They’re staying at a friend’s house.”
The club also wants to help the family find furniture and other home furnishings.
Walter said two older children in the family went to Pratt in addition to the younger girl who is currently at the school. Volunteers want to raise enough money for a deposit on another home and payment of first month’s rent, she added.
Children from the school spent last weekend making posters and jars with labels for donations. The club also contacted area businesses.
Although the family has received some agency help, Walter said, the club members want to assist the single mom and her children. “Fliers are going out with kids and jars will be in the classroom.”
For more information, contact Walter at the school at 354-3841.
Carwashes to help student with cancer
A series of carwashes, including one scheduled today, is planned to benefit a Mountain View Middle School student who has cancer. MVMS sixth-grade teacher Patty Markofski and her class are doing the project for Brandon Bothmer, a sixth-grader.
Markofski and her students have spent most Saturdays since April 17 at the Petco on Sullivan and Sprague washing cars for donations. The students will be at the site from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m., weather permitting, each Saturday through June 12. One significant donation from Myrna McElwain boosted the fund-raiser, Markofski said.
The students have a goal of raising $10,000 for the Bothmer family to help pay for medical costs. In Markofski’s classroom, she posts a “BOTH-O-METER” to keep track of money earned to date. The students have raised about $4,700 so far.
Haiku winners
Drew Berger of Pioneer School won a first-place award in the first- through third-grade category in a Haiku poetry contest at the Spokane Valley Barnes & Noble bookstore.
Allison Tran, a Pioneer school kindergartner, took a second-place award for her Haiku, a Japanese style of poetry. Deserey Lopez of Broadway Elementary won a third-place award in the early grades’ category.
For fourth- to sixth-grade, Pioneer’s Yunus Tezcan won a first-place award. Stephany McClain, of University Elementary took second place and Mackenzie Rizzuto of St. John Vianney won third place.
In another recent contest, a Pioneer School team took home a third-place trophy from the Math is Cool Masters competition in Seattle. Team members Tezcan, Joel Wasserman, Anthony Goodwin and Wil Jaeger went to the May 15 event.
Seventh-grader taking college course
North Pines Middle School seventh-grade student, Ryan Crigger, will go to an intense college course this summer based on his high score on a SAT test. He took the test through the Johns Hopkins University Center for Talented Youth.
Crigger decided to attend a session on medical sciences: pharmacology and toxicology at Arizona State University.