Pleasantdale School is moving forward with its plan to have a new outdoor classroom area for its students.
Two Grade 8 students, Amanda March and Savannah Krupka, were joined by response to intervention staff member Angela Smeltzer to make a presentation to Estevan city council on Monday night.
They offered their vision for the project to council, explained why they are proceeding, and shared its benefits.
“Our purpose of why we are doing this is to help natural habitat, and to make a proper shelterbelt for our school,” said Savannah.
Smeltzer noted the project would be a five-year implementation period, and in addition to the shelter belt, there would be such elements as wildland trees, an interpretive trail and possibly a picnic and garden area.
The school would need to remove old, dead trees, Amanda said, and then they would need to replace the soil. The current Grade 8s would plant the new trees and in the following years, other classes would take care of them.
Some advantages they see for a shelterbelt are reduce the wind, control blowing snow, protect buildings, decrease energy consumption, capture atmospheric carbon, provide habitat for wildlife, beautify land and increase property value.
“If we start in April, then by the time June rolls around, the trees should be planted and starting to grow,” said Amanda.
The main tree they want to use for this project is a scots pine, Savannah said.
“We have picked this tree because it can live for many years, and can grow up to 35 metres tall, with a width of one metre,” Savannah said. “It is very good at surviving in very cold and very warm climates.”
They have also looked at lilacs and green ash.
“We wanted to have the first row to be lilacs, the second row to be scots pine and the third row to be green ash,” said Savannah.
“We can see that in the future, this would be a beautiful green space,” added Amanda.
Smeltzer pointed out the class is going to do some soil sampling to make sure the soil is at the correct acidity.
The students recognize they need to consider animal and plant monitoring in the area. They have done some research on how to keep the area free of invasive species.
All grades at Pleasantdale are excited for the project.
They have talked to Rod March, who is the city’s parks and facilities manager, as well as the South East Cornerstone Public School Division, and they are on board with the project.
Members of city council praised their initiative before approving the project.
Mayor Roy Ludwig applauded the trio for their efforts. He said the presentation was well thought-out, and the girls clearly did their homework.
Smeltzer noted that part of the project is on school property and part of it is city property, so working together with the city would be the best possible scenario.
Councillor Greg Hoffort said that he is really excited to see the outdoor classroom proceed. He noted that prior to the 2016 Saskatchewan Summer Games, a few people were in the area, trying to clean up the appearance so that it would look good for the Games.
“We really didn’t know anything about future use,” said Hoffort. “We just hoped that someone might come along with an initiative at some point to do something with that land. I think this is a great idea and credit to you guys and your teacher for coming up with it, and doing something to improve the area and the community and the environment all at the same time.”
While the Grade 8s are taking the lead, and getting in on it at the start, Smeltzer pointed out the Grade 7 class wants to create a garden in the area that she described as an Indigenous garden.
“We’re trying to get the whole school yard to become part of the classroom,” said Smeltzer.
Councillor Lyle Yanish recalled that when he was a student at St. Mary’s School, he helped plant trees at the north edge of the school yard. When people drive by it now, they can see the trees are still there, and it looks great.
“It is one of the things that the girls said when they were planting – and they wrote all of this, and they’ve done several presentations – and one of them said we’re going to come back and we’re going to see these trees, and we’re going to know we did this,” said Smeltzer.
Councillor Shelly Veroba recommended that the school take lots of pictures, so that in 20 years, students can look back and see the growth of the project, while Councillor Trevor Knibbs, whose kids attended the school, applauded Pleasantdale for their efforts.
