North Addington Education Centre celebrated its undergraduates
at awards night last week. Students are acknowledged for their hard work with academic points along with other honour certificates and proficiency awards. Abby Tryon, Kendra Wilson, Emma Benn, Danielle Drysdale, Brooke Hawley and Jared Salmond received pen sets or gold watches for high academic point achievement.

Grades five and six students at Land O' Lakes Public School in Mountain Grove were thrilled to be able present a cheque for $200 to a representative from the Kingston branch of the Canadian Cancer Society on October 10. The students in Mr. Harding's class held a two-day bake sale on October 2 and 3 and said they got a “great turn out with the line-up for buyers winding through the school all the way to the pod”. Liz Bonser, volunteer engagement coordinator with the KFL&A branch of the Canadian Cancer Society, was presented with the cheque in the school library. She said she was pleased with the students' efforts and she spoke to them following the presentation. “It's not so much the amount of money but just the fact that the students care so much and made such an amazing effort to contribute.” The students sold cream puffs, cupcakes, cheesecake, cookies, pastries and other homemade goodies and were thrilled to be able to present their efforts in person to Bonser.

The fundraiser was the brainchild of Hazuki and Keeley, with Charlotte given credit for starting the tradition of a bake sale fundraiser. Some of the students said that their inspiration to help out the CCS came from learning about famed Canadian cancer research fundraiser Terry Fox.

Limestone District School Board officials were being optimistic in July when they targeted a November opening for the new Granite Ridge Education Centre (GREC) in Sharbot Lake.

That would have required the building to be substantially complete by the end of September to allow six weeks to finish up and co-ordinate moving students into the new building.

As late September came and went it became clear that the building was taking longer to complete than had been hoped, and last week the board sent a letter home to parents informing them that the new target for move in is the first day of classes in January, 2014.

And even that target is now being called a hope rather than a firm move-in date.

In the newsletter that was released last week, the question on all parents’ and students’ minds of when GREC would be ready for students was answered with the following statement:

“We hope to have students and staff begin classes in the new building on January 6, 2014. We are still on track to get into the building in November but contractors and facilities services staff will need a few extra weeks for finishing touches, and to completely clean and equip the building before moving in furniture, equipment and resources, and eventually students and staff. We plan to complete the installation of these items in phases throughout early to mid-December. We then hope to have students and staff tour the new building before the December break.”

Initially, the plan had been to move the students in in stages, with the primary students remaining at their temporary quarters at the former Sharbot Lake Public School site until the existing Sharbot Lake High School is demolished and the necessary landscaping can be done in order to create outdoor recreation areas for the exclusive use of primary-aged students.

That plan has now been scrapped. If all goes according to the latest plan, all 400 students will move in to the completed Granite Ridge on January 6, but the existing Sharbot Lake High School will still be in place.

While the board has acknowledged that “not all elementary play areas can be finished until the demolition is complete … we have revised our plans so that elementary students will have access to the field/wooded area at the east of the school as well as the gym during inclement weather.”

The board now expects the demolition will take place sometime in the spring of 2014.

In a letter to parents, Granite Ridge Principal Heather Highet said the delayed opening came about because some phases of construction took longer than expected.”

The newsletter added a bit more detail, saying “A province-wide roofers' strike in early spring delayed our progress. Approvals for the new septic system also took longer than anticipated."

A poster taped to the front door of Harrowsmith Public School greeted author Kenneth Oppel with the words, “We love you Ken Oppel and your books!” As part of the Kingston Writers Festival, the famed Canadian children's author spoke to students at HPS about his books, what inspires them and how he goes about creating them. He spoke extensively about the first book in his trilogy titled Silverwing, which was written in 1997 and is still the best seller of the 28 books he has penned to date.

The book’s plot centers around a Canadian silver-haired insectivore bat named Shade, and the adventures he experiences with Marina, an eastern red bat who was booted out of her colony after being banded. The two experience many adventures as they try to reunite Shade with his mother and colony. The popularity of the trilogy eventually led to an animated TV series but Oppel explained that he had tried to make his bat characters as real as possible; he did not want them to seem like just cartoon creations. He pointed out some amazing bat facts, like the fact that there are1000 different species; how bats use echo location to find food; how some consume 1000 bugs in a single night and how they catch insects with their tails, then flip them into their wings, and from wing to mouth. He spoke of how he used real life locations as the backdrops in the trilogy, thus investing the books with real place facts and real life landmarks.

He spoke of his second trilogy of adventure stories called Airborn, set in an imaginary past about 100 years ago, which resembles earth prior to the First World War except that in the stories airplanes had not been invented. Instead people travel and live on huge air ships, which Oppel said were inspired by both the airships of the 1930s like the Hindenburg and huge cruise liners like the Titanic.

The ship is called Aurora and the hero is a 15-year-old cabin boy (Matt Cruse) who essentially lives in the sky. The stories are about his adventures with his friend, a ship passenger Kate de Vries. Together they explore desert islands, mysterious ghost airships carrying treasures and discover new species of animals.

One of Oppel’s more recent works is a book titled “Half Brother”, which was inspired by two experiments done on chimpanzees in the 1970s. Half Brother is about Ben Tomlin, a 13-year-old boy whose scientist parents adopt a nine-day-old chimpanzee named Zan. They bring Zan home as an experiment and undertake to teach him sign language while trying to raise him as a human child. Oppel explained that Ben is expected to be big brother to this baby chimp. The story is about their relationship, how Zan changes Ben's entire family and what happens when this very strange experiment starts to go "terribly, terribly wrong.”

Oppel said that he wrote two of his most recent works, “This Dark Endeavor” and “Such Wicked Intent” as prequels to one of his own most beloved novels, Mary Shelly’s “Frankenstein”. The books tell of a teenage Victor Frankenstein, his weird, dangerous and appalling escapades and his sick twin brother Conrad. There are towers, dungeons and secret passages and of course the adventures as Victor tries to find the elixir of life.

HPS Principal Valerie Arsenault was thrilled to have Oppel visit. “It's great for the students here to have a chance to meet, listen to and ask questions of the author behind the books that they adore and have been reading for years.” Oppel's visit generated a lot of excitement and numerous questions from his young audience, who were captivated by his presentation. Oppel himself said that a personal visit from an author gives young readers “a chance to meet the person who thinks about these subjects and creates these stories. I believe it will further their interest in writing and reading and it also helps to generate interest in my work.”

Following his presentation students lined up with books, which Oppel graciously signed.

Over 250 young runners tested their mettle at the annual Timber Wolf Run at Land O'Lakes Public School in Mountain Grove on October 1. The event, which was founded by retired LOLPS French teacher Brian Robertson, was taken over by LOLPS grade one teacher Jen Meulenaar three years ago.

The run attracts students from grades 1 through 8 at other schools, including North Addington Education Centre, Clarendon Central, Granite Ridge and for their first year as participants, Prince Charles Public School. The students are invited to walk or run the race, which takes place through the woods around the school and the length of the race varies from 1-2.5km. The run is a fun event and gives the students in the northern schools a chance to get together outside for a bit of exercise and fun. The top three winners in each category received medals and ribbons were handed out to the fourth and fifth place finishers. The grade 7/8 top male and female finishers each received a trophy.

LOLPS principal Emily Yanch said her school looks forward to hosting the event every year. “It's a great opportunity to get all of our northern schools together, have a fun and healthy competition, and it's a great way to get outside and enjoy the beautiful fall weather.”

The septic system for the Granite Ridge Education Centre, currently under construction in Sharbot Lake, has been the subject of consultation between the Limestone District School Board and the Ontario Ministry of the Environment for a year.

Because the school is located within 300 metres of the west basin of Shabot Lake, which has been identified as a Trout Sensitive Lake by the province, an environmental compliance approval from the ministry was needed before the septic system could be constructed.

On August 23, that approval was granted.

Sarah Dick, Senior Environmental Officer at the Kingston MoE office, said in an email: “On August 23, 2013, the Environmental Compliance Approval for the Granite Ridge Education Centre was issued. 
The approval permits the establishment of sewage works for the collection, transmission, treatment and subsurface disposal of domestic sewage, with a rated capacity of 17,000 litres per day. The new system is equipped with phosphorus treatment, which is a significant improvement to the previous system.”

The septic system will need to be constructed and approved before the new school will be able to receive an occupancy permit from the Central Frontenac building department.

The Limestone Board is aiming to have the building ready for students in early November.

Janice Peters, the long time office manager at Hinchinbrooke Public School, couldn't let the final day of classes in the school's history pass without some sort of gesture. The school did have an official closing on June 15, but this was the final day, the final time the buses would come into the parking lot and gather up all the children and take them away for the summer.

Janice had an idea. Helium balloons, (biodegradable helium balloons in fact) one for each child, to be released just before they boarded the buses.

This children and staff gathered in front of the school. Most of them held on to their balloons until the proper moment, and they let go. The balloons floated up into the sky as everyone watched, and then drifted away. There were some hugs; some tears were wiped away. The children got on the buses, and the buses drove off, leaving a quiet, empty building in their wake.

Hinchinbrooke Public School opened in 1966. It served the population of Hinchinbrooke township, and later, Central Frontenac, for 47 years. There is a committee working on a plan to keep the building in public use as a recreational centre.

The heat and humidity were getting to the audience at the springtime Sydenham High School graduation last week (Thursday, June 27)

With over 200 graduates, and dozens of special awards to hand out, the audience had to struggle to maintain their enthusiasm at times.

Not so when Tyler MacComish took the stage to receive awards from the Kingston Community Credit Union and the Sydenham High School Staff Association, when the audience erupted in sustained applause, the loudest cheer for any of the deserving award winners all evening.

Because he has been a student in the School to Community Class, Tyler is now 20 and has been at the school longer than almost all of the graduating class, and his impact has been felt by the entire Sydenham High School community.

One of his teachers, Karl Hammer, met Tyler in September of 2006.

“Tyler began as a very quiet and shy young man, but slowly began to show his true personality over the course of the year. Tyler is one of the most well-mannered and positive people I have ever met.”

Over the past 7 years Tyler has been a manager for soccer, football, basketball, volleyball... he also played junior boys basketball, football and dressed and took the final snaps in the annual Bubba Bowl game in SR football this year. He has twice won manager of the year, and won a special award at this year's athletic banquet for his commitment and service to the athletic program at the school.

He has done co-op programs in the school and at the local Foodland store, where he has become an integral member of the Foodland family.

At SHS he has been the student council representative from the school to community classroom.

“Tyler is Mr. Sydenham,” said Karl Hammer. "He is known by all and highly respected for the joy he brings to people's lives. He is here with me helping me get my classroom ready for next year. Although he has moved on as a student and will leave my program... he will now become one of my close friends.”

There was standing room only at the cafetorium at Sharbot Lake High School on June 26, where friends and family gathered to celebrate the achievements of the last official graduating class from SLHS. The school is slated to be demolished once the new Granite Ridge Education Centre is completed and that fact made for an especially lively, emotional and very energetic ceremony that saw numerous graduates receive multiple awards, trophies scholarships and bursaries.

The commencement program included addresses by Principal Heather Highet, Vice-principal David Russell, senior management director with the Limestone District School Board, Brenda Hunter, and School Trustee Ann Goodfellow, as well as live musical entertainment courtesy of the SLHS band. Meaghan Kirby introduced the valedictorian of 2013, Cadence Cumpson, whom she described as spirited, kind, genuine, determined, bubbly - in a nutshell - a fireball.

Cadence took on a leadership role in many areas of the school while simultaneously working hard and succeeding academically. She was active in athletics, music, student council and many other special school events. In her address Cadence proved those descriptors to be true and made a very humorous, moving and impassioned speech about the school she entered four years ago as a grade nine newbie and how the staff and students there all helped to shape and inform her. She spoke about many memorable events and her easy speaking nature and fine sense of humour made the final valedictory address a memorable one.

Congratulations to all of the graduates, who will long be remembered as the last to graduate from Sharbot Lake High School.

In a special school closing ceremony at Sharbot Lake Public School put on by current staff and students on June 20, former students and staff had a chance to bid farewell to the school that holds many cherished memories for them.

The current school was built in 1930 and replaced the former one-room school house, which had been erected in 1887 further down the hill from the present site. The public school is slated to close in the upcoming school year when students and staff will be moved to Granite Ridge Education Centre, the new school currently under construction in Sharbot Lake.

The closing ceremony included addresses by Trustee Anne Goodfellow, current and former school council representatives Sarah Sauve and Cheryl Allen, SLPS grade 5/6 teacher Stephanie Leeder and former staff member Pam Woods. Each spoke of what the school has meant to them over the years and remembered SLPS as a small rural school with a big family feel. Each class at the school made a special presentation that included numerous songs and readings and Mrs. Harding wrapped up the presentations with a slide show commemorating the history of the school in photos from both its former and recent days.

School Principal David Allison saved for the end a special presentation- the opening of a school time capsule that was left at the school and meant to be opened in 2020. The capsule included many artifacts from 1999, the year that it was created.

Following the ceremony guests were invited to peruse a number of old and treasured school artifacts that were set up in a special “memory room” and visitors had a chance to leaf through and marvel at the fascinating collection of old notebooks and other school memorabilia kept by former teachers from as far back as the early 1900's.

While many were sad that the small school will be closing its doors for good in the upcoming school year, many expressed their confidence that the move to the new school in Sharbot Lake will make for an exciting change for both staff and students. The special ceremony represented the final chapter at SLPS, the small rural school perched high on a hill overlooking Sharbot Lake, which will long be fondly remembered by the hundreds of students and staff who passed through its doors in its 126-year history.