WA High School Walkathon Helps Stack Library Shelves
RSSBy Lauren Barack -- School Library Journal, 05/08/2009
Students in Washington are hoping to stack the shelves at Liberty High School one step at a time at their 2nd annual walkathon. Their goal? To raise $5,000 and add more international titles to their school library.
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Last year's walkathon raised $3,500 for a new international section in the school library. |
“This is going to be a tremendous help,” says Braillard, who helps teach research skills to 1,250 ninth through twelfth graders and oversees the library, which is used throughout the day—even during breaks. “I’m known for having no tolerance for food, drinks or games,” she says. “And I still manage to have 60-70 students in here at lunch every day.”
Fresh off their success with last year’s walkathon—which raised $3,500 for a new international section for the media center—the school’s National Honor Society set the goal for this year’s event higher, enough to beef up resources at the Renton, WA,. campus, as well as help the FR. Agnel Multipurpose School and Junior College in Mumbai, India, which Liberty partnered with this year.
“The students wanted an activity that would have a positive impact,” says Dana Greenberg, a students and activities coordinator at Liberty High School. “And this was a way to give them a voice and to make a difference.”
One hundred students walked around the school’s 400-meter track for pledges last year. This time organizers hope to attract at least 150 on May 22 to walk or take part in a water balloon fight, an eating contest, or even a book sale, from titles donated by the student body. “It’s a great way to be part of the school’s community,” says Ashley Turnidge, the 11th grade president of the National Honor Society, who helped planned the event.
Books bought from last year’s walkathon include English translations of new fiction from countries such as India and China, along with popular fiction in foreign languages. “It’s incredible to see students faces when they stumble across Harry Potter (Scholastic, 1998) in Russian or Twilight (Little, Brown, 2006) in Spanish,” says Braillard. “They’re so excited.”
This year, approximately 40 percent of pledges will be spent on a gift for Liberty’s sister school in Mumbai. Students at the high school have produced a “Day In The Life” DVD, which they sent to their counterparts in India, while world studies students have engaged in a global question and answer exchange with the students on the other side of the globe.
It all feeds into the students’ pursuit of international studies—and the hope that they could broaden the research tools available to them in their own school.
“We always had World Book encyclopedias, but they never really get you into the culture,” says Turnidge. “It made sense to us to have extra resources. Plus our librarian was so excited.”
