EV Students Learn From ‘Real-Life Work’

Last week about 70 East Valley High School students sat down and went through the school district’s orientation, just like any new employees.

These students are in the education outreach program. They spend part of every school day working in East Valley’s grade schools, middle schools or with the special education classes at the high schools.

They learned the importance of confidentiality and school laws, background checks for the Washington State Patrol, as well as information on blood-borne pathogens and first aid.

“This is a real-life work experience,” said school to work director Paulette Fink. “When we (adults) come to work at East Valley, we have to go through orientation, and they do, too.”

To a certain extent, these student helpers don’t know what they’ll face each day.

On his first day, Ray Ruiz found himself helping on the playground recently at Trentwood Elementary School.

“I thought it would be fun and I might want a teaching career,” said Ruiz, a junior. He began coaching an impromptu football game of fourth-graders and, within minutes, the group grew from six, to nine, to 10 boys. Ruiz directed play after play, as the children happily ran and ran and ran.

Jeremy Daw, a senior, spent part of his Tuesday morning with tools and a table that needed assembling in Trentwood’s library. Daw is starting his third semester in the program; he’s the student with the most experience.

And he doesn’t mind putting time on chores like this, because he knows his time in the Trentwood library will give him exposure to students from all over the school.

After having seen the Trentwood kids last year and this year, “I’m watching them grow up. There’s been a big difference in a lot of them and that’s meant a lot to me to be able to watch that,” Daw said. He’s headed for a career in teaching or business, he said.

Last week’s training sessions contained a mix of old and new information for him. “But I can see where a lot of it would be very beneficial to myself and to students who are new.”

For example, learning CPR will be helpful to Daw when he helps on the playground, he said.

And as simple a suggestion as not making themselves at home in the teachers’ lounge until they’d learned their “place” in the schools’ hierarchy seemed valuable to Daw, too. After all, he’s been through his own learning process, getting to know the Trentwood teachers.

“Now I know them all, and I think they’re all OK with me.”

Homeschool Fair winners

The recent Homeschoolers Learning Fair awarded trophies for outstanding achievement to Gabriel Ingersoll, Geoffrey Hyatt and Ida Cohrs.

Ingersoll, 6, and his brother and sister entered a project on hatching eggs. Hyatt, 9, entered a short story about his own life. Cohrs, 15, entered a geography project on her planned trip of Washington state.

The fair, held in Valleyford last month, attracted 29 participants with 189 projects. Other winners included Robbie Gray, 6, in penmanship; Michele Dillon, 11, in poetry and earth science; Christin Kemmer, 8, with a book report; James and Kevin Triplett, ages 8 and 10, with a math project; Jennifer Dillon, 13, in photography; Rebecca Meredith, 7, craft project; and Geoffrey Hyatt, 9, chemistry.

‘Caustic’ wins crown

Greenacres Junior High ninth grader Brooke Sprank won the 25th annual Valley spelling bee, with the word “caustic.”

Sprank won a $50 savings bond and trophy.

Chanelle Hill, Mountain View Middle School, was runner up.

Spelling bee organizer Bill Bussard of Bowdish Junior High said the evening ended up in a “shoot-out” by these two exceptional spellers, going back and forth for at least 10 minutes before Sprank’s eventual triumph.

Other competitors were Adam Lincoln, Bowdish, who missed “indubitable”; Katie Skogen, St. Mary’s School, “incontrovertible”; Justin Petrilli, Spokane Christian Academy, “initialization”; Josh Brown, North Pines Junior High, “onomatopoeia”; Sam Lux, Gethsemane Lutheran School, “dulciloquent”; Jenessa Busby, Centennial Middle School, “centrifugal”; Roxanne McPeck, Evergreen Jr. High, “demarcation”; Kim Jones, Horizon Junior High, “coerce”; Matt Johnston, East Valley Middle School, “brontosaurus”; and Lani Shadduck, St. John Vianney, “abscess.”

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