Students at Frank Porter Graham Elementary School took advantage of an extra hour of daylight Monday by attending the school’s Readathon night. The Readathon has been an annual event at FPG for 12 years, but this was the first time a family night was included in the two-week fundraiser.

This year’s Readathon theme was “Reading Adventures in Your Backyard,” and, fittingly, the school media center became an outdoor adventure-land filled with tents, canoes, kayaks and even an indoor campfire. The sound of crickets filled the air and the walls were decorated with scenes of mountains.

“What better way to infuse the library than to transform it?” said school librarian Kathryn Cole. “Kids who do not like to read are begging to come down so they can read in the tents and canoes.”

Certainly the media center was a popular place Monday night. In every corner, students paired up with parents or friends to read books by flashlight or lantern. Second-grader Leah Hurwitz climbed into the stern of a canoe while her mother took the bow.

“I like to read over there,” Leah said, pointing toward a cluster of tents and canoes on the far side of the media center. “But I usually don’t get to because I’m slow at picking books.”

Family night also included storytelling by local children’s authors Amy Odom and Rosemarie Gulla, show-and-tell with rehabilitated wild animals by the Piedmont Wildlife Center and a bake sale. Parents were offered ideas on how to support reading at home through BookFlix, an online reading program available to FPG students. The Chapel Hill Public Library also was on hand to sign families up for library cards.

Second-grader Rachel Grau attended family night with her mother and sister. “So far I’ve read about four hours,” she said of Readathon. “My favorite part of tonight was getting to see the animals in the science area.”

Readathon is consistently the school’s most successful fundraiser, raising approximately $10,000 last year. The funds were used to support a variety of school programs including upgrades to the science lab and media center and money for fieldtrips and purchasing classroom supplies. To participate, students set individual goals of the number of minutes they plan to read and ask parents, friends and neighbors to support them with monetary donations.

The student body as a whole is trying to read a grand total of 500,000 minutes. If the students reach the half-million mark, Cole and the school’s science teacher, Liz Stabenow, have agreed to participate in the FPG Challenge: Cole will hold a snake and Stabenow will touch a tarantula while hundreds of excited – and well-read – students look on.

Students will model their own work as well as trends from local stores. Donations for victims of recent earthquakes will be accepted at the event.

Since 2002, at least one state officer in NCTSA has been a student in the Chapel Hill-Carrboro city schools. Paladugu attends Chapel Hill High.

CHCCS TSA coordinator Redmond Grigg said, “Manoj is an outstanding student and fierce competitor. He brings an original brand of leadership and sincere enthusiasm to the TSA team.”

The event is a benefit concert to raise money for Rock Against Cancer and brings the healing power of music to children with cancer. Admission is $5 for students and $7 for adults.

This year’s focus is Universal Human Rights. As a timely real-world connection, several fundraisers will contribute to disaster relief in Haiti. On Friday, McDougle will host a faculty follies event to benefit “Hearts for Haiti.” To encourage students to be active participants in local and global issues, fundraising efforts will continue through next week.

During Learning Without Borders Week, activities focused on human rights will be incorporated in every class. In preparation, students in Webmasters and Graphic Arts created posters to illustrate the 30 rights of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR), such as the right to free speech and to education. Core classes will investigate how human rights issues have been viewed historically and in literature and how technology can impact rights.

On Friday, students will participate in a gallery walk through the school to view art, math displays, human rights figures and posters and live presentations about famous human rights activists presented by drama students.

Parents and community members are invited to visit and learn more about the UDHR by touring the Human Rights Gallery on Friday, March 26.

MON 3/22 — Chicken Nuggets w/Wheat Roll; Taco Salad w/Salsa, Cheese, Lettuce & Tomato; Spanish Rice; Sweet Yellow Corn; Apple Halves

TUE 3/23 — Mozzarella Cheese Sticks; w/Marinara Dipping Sauce; “Fun on the Run”; Brown Rice Pilaf; Asian Mixed Vegetables; Chilled Apricot

WED 3/24 — Cheese Pizza; Pepperoni Pizza; Tuna Salad w/Lettuce, Tomato & Crackers; Carrot & Celery Sticks; Steamed Broccoli; Fresh Banana

THU 3/25 — Ham & Cheese Sub on a Wheat Bun; Chicken Tetrazzini w/Wheat Roll; “Fun on the Run”; Cinnamon Mashed; Sweet Potatoes w/Apples; Seasoned Lima Beans; Chilled Pears

During the time that Alethia Wheatle taught at McDougle Elementary, she learned a great deal about literacy. Wheatle, who was a Visiting International Faculty (VIF) teacher, taught at McDougle for three years before returning to her home country of Jamaica. 

Upon her return, Wheatle contacted McDougle and commented on how much she learned about teaching reading and comprehension skills while working in Chapel Hill.

“I want to bring back this knowledge to my teachers and my school,” she said.

Around that time, the school was cleaning out book resource rooms and disposing of old reading assessment kits. Instead of throwing away the items, the school decided to put them to good use: They boxed them up and sent them to Wheatle’s third-grade class in Jamaica. 

Several McDougle classes have been writing in pen pal exchanges to students at Wheatle’s school, and the two schools plan to conduct a Skype call when the shipment of over 300 books arrives. 

This kind of connection between schools highlights one of the main goals of the VIF program, which is the largest cultural exchange program for teachers in the United States.

Jack Watson, an art teacher at Chapel Hill High School, had an idea. Take the events of Haiti and turn them into inspiration for a class art project. Then take that art project and turn it into a fundraiser for the earthquake-ravaged country.

At least $800 has been raised for the American Red Cross relief effort through the “Art for Haiti” exhibit at Open Eye Café. The showcased paintings, drawings and sculptures are done by high school artists from Watson’s class, as well as Elaine Walton’s art class from East Chapel Hill High School. These students wanted to be part of the relief effort, but initially felt they had no way to contribute.

“Kids feel like they want to help and contribute something, but that they don’t have a lot that they can offer,” Watson said. “This gave them an opportunity to give something of themselves.”

Watson said that he is always trying to help his students become more socially engaged and address social issues. This project seemed to be a way to accomplish this.

The earthquake, Watson said, “seemed like something we couldn’t ignore. There were some students who were very deeply moved by it and who felt powerless in the wake of what was happening.”

At the start of the new school semester, he and Walton came up with a presentation to show their students. The same presentation was shown at each of the schools. The students then had two weeks to complete artwork for the exhibit.

Watson showed his class a CBS video of the aftermath in Haiti, depicting the week after the earthquake occurred. He said it was graphic, but honest, and that some kids were visibly moved by what they saw. A slideshow created by Walton was also shown, displaying contemporary artworks created in response to what happened after Hurricane Katrina.

“We looked at the response after Hurricane Katrina and asked them to do a responsive artwork based on Haiti,” said Walton. “We gave them a presentation. They had no rubric. They had free reign. It was completely different than what they would do in class.”

In preparation for the “Art for Haiti” exhibit, which ran from Feb. 13-27, Watson had numerous discussions with his students about art, social issues and media.

“We talked about the function of art to confront issues like this and to confront what people feel about it,” said Watson. “We agreed that we would put aside our typical curriculum for a few weeks to address this.”

He said that he took his class to the library, where they made three lists. Each student made one list of things they knew about Haiti and another of things they felt about Haiti. The class then worked together to form a list of what they still wanted to learn.

“What’s going to happen when all the camera crews leave, how are they going to rebuild, these kinds of questions,” said Watson.

The questions became the framework for the artwork produced for the exhibit. Students investigated answers to the questions through their art pieces. How they decided to execute their investigations was left completely up to them.

Both Watson and Walton said their students were enthused about getting involved and exhibiting at Open Eye Café. Walton said her students were excited that their work sold to people other than their parents, and she found it exciting to see the students’ work outside of a school setting.

Some pieces used acrylic paint; others used mixed media including plastic water bottles and newspaper. Titles such as, “No Words,” by India Lassiter or “Preliminary Toll, 111,000 buried” by Meg Duffy were succinct but meaningful. One painting asked, “Why?” and another said, “Hope.”

Watson said that there has been a positive response from the community, and community members appreciate that they are doing something productive. He said that sometimes it is easy for people to fall into “charity fatigue.”

“If you continually ask people for money, eventually, they start to turn off to it,” he said. “But this didn’t go about it in that way. I told my students not to focus on making ‘saleable’ works, but for them to explore what they know, feel and still don’t know.”

“Jack basically said, ‘Hey, we want to do this project and we need a place to do it,’” said Scott Conary, the owner of Open Eye Café. “I thought it was great, because we would try to do a number of Haiti relief things and keep them going.”

Conary said that after a disaster there is often a “surge” of donations upfront, but then things die down. He said giving people a way to donate focuses it more, and that having events and exhibits allows charity to be an interesting exchange.

“People definitely want to help,” he said. “We want to make sure things keep happening.”

Latisha Catchatoorian is a UNC student writing for the Carrboro Commons, a bi-weekly online lab newspaper for Jock Lauterer’s Community Journalism class at the School of Journalism and Mass Communication.

The competition is coordinated locally through Fourth District U.S. Representative David Price’s office. High school visual-art students in the counties of Orange, Durham and Wake are eligible to apply. If you are a current high school visual-art student in Orange County and would like to participate, contact your high school art teacher or the Orange County Arts Commission for an application form and guidelines. The deadline to apply is Friday, April 9 at 5 p.m.

Visit the Orange County Arts Commission’s web site at artsorange.org for more information and to download the application and guidelines or call 245-2335.

The Carrboro Elementary School community prepared the most food samples from a variety of cultures and countries for the event. The Taste of Carrboro also featured a silent auction and craft sale.

Cookbooks containing recipes from the event will be available for sale at the Carrboro Elementary School Fair.