It’s here! No, I’m not talking about spring, I’m referring to the end of school. One one hand, it’s hard to believe the year is over, but in some ways it seems like a very long journey. I’m sure it depends on your point of view and your spot in the very large group that keeps the school running.
I know the children are ready for summer. But I also know that a school like this is a bit different than a public school. Children will actually miss their teachers! That’s not something I ever had to deal with! Not sure that’s good or bad. Believe it or not, one of my teachers is still very active in the community and I see him at least once a year. When you have been out of school almost 50 years and some of your teachers are still around, it makes you realize how young they were when you were in their class.
Projects are still going on at the school, both big and small. If you have driven by lately, you can see the evidence outside. The whole north field has been leveled out, and even a bit of landscaping has been done on the southwest side. Not only did we need to get drainage in that area, but we are preparing to install a baseball field at the far north end, and get the parking area seeded and back in shape. Any big summer fundraisers may have to be held elsewhere until that area can be driven over without damage.
Inside, work continues on smaller projects. The lower restrooms are progressing nicely, and plans are underway to get working on the resource room for more use next year. We are dealing with the lack of storage space that was designed into the building when it was originally built. I have wondered if it was lack of funds, or just lack of foresight that led them to plan a large public school building with so little space. We do have a couple ideas about carving out a bit of storage space here and there eventually. Some storage space downstairs isn’t available right now, but will be later.
I didn’t hear much about what the school did for the eclipse, if anything. Some of our family went to the Muncie area to see it. The traffic jams that were on everyone’s mind didn’t seem to happen, although we did hit one mile and a half backup at a 4 way stop out in the country. It was interesting that it was only about 50 miles from here, not where the eclipse was, and was several hours later. Only took about 7-8 minutes to get through, and then there was no more traffic at all.
I hadn’t been that excited about seeing it where it would be total, but now I understand why some people travel the world to see them. Total is completely different from 99%. It actually got so dark I couldn’t see people next to me, but the horizon was lit all the way around. Looking right at the sun without glasses and seeing solar flares with your own eyes is something that doesn’t happen often. If I had the resources, I might become a world traveler to see them myself!
The biggest school event that I was involved in lately was the donut fundraiser. Thanks so much to everyone who helped make this a success! We sold at least 423 dozen. With our small school, that’s a lot of hustling by the children, thanks to all the parents who helped them! We also sold coffee roasted by Winston Martin, and that was also a big hit. He was thinking he might have to roast 75 bags, but he ended up doing 165.
We weren’t really sure how it was going to go. We learned a lot about the logistics of doing a project like this, and next time it will go even smoother. As we started to find out how the sales were going, we were trying to imagine how big a pile of donuts we would be getting dumped on us. Krispy Kreme delivered them Thursday afternoon, and we got started right away. We were glad for the help from the older students in unloading and carrying them into the lower kitchen area. I don’t think it took more than 10 minutes to unload the truck. It took three of us about two hours to do all the sorting and creating the assortments. We only missed being done by the end of school by about 20 minutes, but it worked out well for the parents to pick them up Friday morning.
As you can see by the pictures, we pretty much filled the kitchen. It was almost sad to see all of our work carried out and disappearing in just a few minutes! Hope everyone enjoyed your coffee and donuts. I’m still working on mine.
With the end of the school year fast approaching, even though it seems like things are slowing down, there is one part that needs to get into high gear. That is the ordering of more curriculum materials for next year. Although we don’t have to order a lot of the textbooks that can be used year after year, the student materials, tests, and work sheets need to be ordered before the end of June to get good discounts from the various companies. We are only several weeks away, so meetings need to happen, counting what we have left, and the biggest puzzle, figuring out how much extra to buy for new students. For some later enrolling students, we can order closer to the opening of school, but then we also face the risk of the suppliers running out. Some of them only print so many pieces, and when it is gone, you are out of luck.
If you know anyone who is thinking of sending their children to UCCS next year, it would be a great help to encourage them to make their decision as soon as they can so we can plan for them. Of course, we will take children any time, but it just makes it much easier if we have more time to plan.
If you want to help with a financial donation to help with curriculum costs, finishing the new roof, or any of our construction projects, you can go on our website, www.uccs.school, there is a Donate button there, or you can contact us for more information. If you would like to make a totally anonymous donation, there is a button on our website to go through the Anabaptist Financial group. You can direct them to send your donation to us, and your identity remains private. Thanks in advance for your support!
