Saying good-bye to the staff!

I can't believe our trip is almost over! It went so quickly!

Today we had our last staff "meeting" with our friends at Hopson Middle School. We had a pizza party to celebrate the end of the year and the small successes everyone had with students throughout the year.

It was really wonderful to be a part of the this meeting and hear the teachers talk about all of the great accomplishments their students had made this year and the excitement for next year.  It was our chance to say goodbye and thank you to a wonderful staff. All but one of them is returning for the next school year, which is amazing considering the turn-around rate for teachers here in Alaska. I'm excited for the next year as they get to accomplish so much more after one year of working together.

They really are a wonderful group of people. Today we all got to see an awards assembly for the 6th and 7th grade students. They sat patiently through two hours of awards for the students given by the staff for multitudes of reasons. Each teacher presented at least one award to one student in each class they have. It was really fun to see them honoring students that had done well, persevered, changed their attitudes, or were extremely helpful in the classroom. There is so much good work going on in this school and the students reap the benefits (and the awards today) from all the hard work this staff puts in for the students.

We got small gifts from our teachers and it made all of us excited to be involved in a school community of our own.

Only two more nights in Barrow, then it's back to MN!