Five Riverway Learning Community Win state wide charter school essay!

On Wednesday, May 4th 2011, Five talented students from Riverway Learning Community will be given the honor of reading their essays on the steps of the State Capital building. This ceremony is part of a week-long celebration of National Charter Schools Week. The Charter School Essay Contest is an annual event. This year there were over 2000 essays entered into the contest in three different categories. The topic this year was “Describe Your Best Day at School”.  The winners in the age categories are Zane Al-Saeed, Morgan Sultze, Emily Spaag, and Brooke Powell. The special award over all was won by Kayton McKern.  Congratulations to all the winners!

Secondary Maple Syrup Project

       A group of Secondary students have been working on a Maple Syrup Project. We have tapped trees at the local park as well as a farm a couple of miles away from the school. We started collecting sap in the beginning of March.
       When tapping the trees we had a drill to drill the wholes in the trees. We then inserted the taps into the trees. After that we put the clear plastic tubes onto the end of the taps and the tubes into the buckets. Next year we will be using new taps in order to have a tighter fit in the whole so we won't lose sap that way.
       In order for the trees to produce sap the weather needs to drop below freezing at night and raise to above freezing during the day. This is because when the weather gets warm the water is pulled up through the trees roots to it's leaves and when the temperature drops the tree quickly pushes the sap down to the roots of the tree so that it doesn't freeze in it's branches. When the sap goes up and down like this it comes out of our taps and into our buckets.
        We have collected roughly 100 gallons of sap. This does not mean that we will have 100 gallons of syrup though. It takes about 40 gallons of sap to make just one gallon of syrup. Soon we will be starting the evaporation process. This is where we boil the sap in a special evaporation pan, over a campfire for a few days, adding sap little by little as we go along. Eventually the water boils out leaving behind the sugary substance called Maple Syrup!
        We will be selling our finished Maple Syrup as a fundraiser for our class once it is finished. If you are interested in purchasing some Maple Syrup from our classroom please contact Jamie Harper.

written by: Madison and Haley

Photos to come soon!

(Secondary 7-12) Bake Sale For Breast Cancer

A few students from Riverway's Secondary Class put together a date and time for a bake sale at Wal-Mart. Each student involved in this project as well as Riverway families and teachers made many different baked goods including different types of cookies, brownies, and bars. A lot of the baked goods even showed the pink spirit! We had a great outcome from this fundraiser. As a group, we raised $241.50. All the money will be going to Susan G. Komen for the cure. Also we will be making key necklaces. Some will be painted and others will have colored rhinestones on them.
written by: Brooke Powell

By Emma Krause

Several Secondary 9^th-12^th Riverway Learning Community students participated in a scarecrow contest for Lark Toys. The goal is to make a creative scarecrow. Chelsee, Kevin, and I (Jamie Harper helped us too), decided to make an owl scarecrow. We wanted it to be unique and superb.

We decided to use wood and sticks to make part of the body. We used a hula-hoop for the owl’s head and large record disks for its eyes, and used white sheets to put over the body so you wouldn’t see any sticks or wood peeking out. We painted the owl black and brown for the body and the beak. We used yellow and black paint for the eyes and the tail.

We had so much fun making the scarecrow that we recommend it for others to do next year. It will be a great experience for you. If we win first place, we win a $100 certificate to Lark Toys.

Ronald McDonald House fundraiser

By Brooke Powell
Edited by Madison Berg

      Hello, my name is Brooke Powell. Just recently I came up with a project to raise money for the Ronald McDonald House. A few students also joined into my project, their names are Madison, Michaela, Taylor and Jani Rae. Our fundraising activities were the “10 days of giving for RMH,” a book and bear drive, a pop tab collection and a bake sale. We did this project because we know that the Ronald McDonald House is a great place and they could definitely use the help. 

    Some of you are probably wondering what the Ronald McDonald House is…Well it’s basically a “home away from home” for both children and their families. But this isn’t just a home for anyone it’s for the families with children that have ongoing medical treatment at Mayo Clinic. There are children who have doctor’s appointments 2-3 times a week, if not more. If their parents are driving over an hour to Rochester every other day, the money they would be spending on gas would be ridiculous, right? Well, that’s were the Ronald McDonald House comes in handy.

            The Ronald McDonald House provides much more than a home for families. They also provide games, toys, movies nights, crafts, activities, and much more. Sounds like a fun place, right?

            There are 42 guest bedrooms in the Ronald McDonald House. There isn’t really a cost to stay there. Although, they do ask for a 10 dollar night donation per family, if possible, but it's not required.

            Most of the staff at the Ronald McDonald House are volunteers. They help with cleaning, greeting guests, answering phone calls and much more. They also provide a shoulder to cry on after a hard day at the hospital.

            Since you’ve learned about the Ronald McDonald House, you probably want to know more about our fundraiser. We did many different things to benefit the Ronald McDonald House. Recently we just had a bake sale at Wal-Mart. We sold baked goods and homemade crafts. Our bake sale was a great success, we made 235 dollars for the RMH. We also were able to collect roughly 50 pounds of pop tabs, 70 pounds of food, 35 pounds of cleaning supplies and household items, and some toys, movies, and art supplies for the Ronald McDonald House!

           On Tuesday October 19^th we traveled to the Ronald McDonald House in Rochester Minnesota to deliver the donations. The staff at the Ronald McDonald were extremely grateful for what we donated and surprised by how much we had accomplished. We also got a tour of the first floor and learned lots about the Ronald McDonald House. Overall this was a great project and for a great cause. We are happy we were able to help!

                                Here are some pictures of our trip to the Ronald McDonald House!

                                                                 Packing up the food

                                                           Signing the donation forms

                                                         On the tour: The game room

                                                   On the tour: The art room

                                                The giant map. People who stay in the RMH put
                                          a pin in to show where they are from. People have come
                                          from all over the world to stay there.          

                                                 We got our picture with Ronald McDonald!