Carbon School District Press Release
Lighthouse High School has been a beacon of activity this year, particularly when it comes to service projects for the community.
The school’s student body has been divided into four teams this year, with four adults on each team as mentors. These teams have to do with their tiered behavior program. One team is the Goats (Greatest Of All Time), another is Team D (representing students’ names). There are others, but the names keep changing as the teams evolve. Each month, one team is responsible for a school activity (to plan and execute it) and one team is responsible for a service project.
“For instance, in September, Team D was responsible for homecoming week,” said Karen Bedont, the principal of the school. “The students planned our activities and built a float for the homecoming parade representing our school. It was an amazing float with a shark coming right at you. One of our students designed and drew that shark.”
The service project in September was to help with fire mitigation along the walking trail behind the Creekview Shopping Center.
“Mr. Benson took his team down there and helped the fire department cut noxious weeks and brush,” she said. “Then later, the city came over with a chipper and ground it all up.”
As far as Bedont is concerned, citizenship of the students is very important and the community service projects are part of that. And not all of them are planned; they just come about because of needs in the area. Just before the big rains hit the area in October, the fear in the community based on the forecast was that some powerful storms would move through and dump a lot of water all at once on the area. In the past, those kinds of storms have culminated in a great deal of flooding in the county.
The Public Works Department of Price City called for help filling sandbags at its dome facility in south Price due to those concerns. The Lighthouse heeded the call and student group after student group went out to the facility to help. Four teams were supposed to go for two hours each. One group, however, called Bedont after only an hour and a half and said they were done. Despite the fact that these were the most athletic and big young men in the school, she thought they must have just been not up to the task and went out to get them. When she arrived, she found that the work they had done was exemplary.
“These are my strong boys and they called and they said they were done,” she said. “I went over there to get them and said to them ‘Seriously, you guys? You didn’t even make it two hours?’ Then, they told me they filled 14 pallets (yes, pallets) of sandbags. I looked around and it was amazing what they had done in such a short time.”
The next day, the city thought they might need more bags, so the students went out again as well. Altogether, between 30 and 40 students participated in the project.
“The thing is, these kids knew it was going to be hard work,” she said. “But when I made the announcement that help was needed, there were so many that wanted to help that I had to turn some of them away.”
Students who participated were honored at the Price City Council meeting on Oct. 24 for their hard work on the projects. Since then, other projects for Heirloom Inn residents and school services have taken place. This month, the service activity will be a Foster Parent Night Out. The students will be tending the kids so that their foster parents can go Christmas shopping in secret or just have a few hours free during this busy season.
“We are also very proud to have one of our students serving on the Price Youth City Council.” Bedont said. “TJ Linville is representing Lighthouse High School well. He was also a recipient of the Suited for Good award from Utah Woolen Mills. His service to the community is being noticed.”
We look forward to see what other service projects the students at Lighthouse High School complete this year.
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- ETV News Photo by Traci Bishop
