News from the Leadership Elective

Greetings MRA community,

Over the past couple of months, I’ve had the pleasure of working with the Senior Leadership Team, a group of committed students in grades 6-8 who want to make our school a better place.  The first few weeks we focused on what it means to be a leader and team building between our own group.  After those initial get-to-know-you-moments though, we morphed into quite the team and accomplished a lot this term.  These students wanted you to know what we do and why it’s important:

Assemblies

“Leadership is a great opportunity to get more involved in school activities.  Assemblies are something the leadership gets to participate in.  We get to make important announcements for things like Buddy time, Jog-a-thon, Dances, fundraisers and performances. 

Every once in a while, we get to have a special speaker come in and teach a lesson.  Recently we had a speaker (NED) come in and talk about accomplishing your goals.  Hopefully we get to do things like award ceremonies and lead songs to students at MRA.  Something we enjoyed about assemblies is getting to make announcements and lead songs.” – Madelyn and Stephanie

Remembrance Day

“Our school (MRA) celebrated 9/11 Remembrance Day with an assembly.  MRA Leadership talked about why they are proud to be an American.  We also made an American flag out of our handprints with the colors red, white, ad blue.  We wrote down why we are proud to be an American on the hands.  At the beginning of the assembly, we taught the Pledge of Allegiance to the younger students who it was new to.

9/11 is important because it was the day that we, as Americans, were brought together through tragedy.  Our responsibility as a Senior Leadership team was teaching the Pledge of Allegiance, leading the assembly, and helping put up the American flag that we made with our school’s hand prints.” – Kayla and Kim

Composting Project

“We learned about compost in the beginning of the year in leadership.  This led to teaching the other students of Molalla River Academy composting lessons.  It was a great experience being able to teach the younger students.  We learned more through teaching and also really felt like a leader of our school.  On Roots of Responsibility day we made compost lids.  Then the next step was to get a compost bucket, make posters to explain what is and isn’t compost to hang up in the cafeteria, and reminding students about composting.  Everyday a pair of leadership kids dump the compost. We rotate the pairs every week.

This is important because we don’t have to buy our own soil.  Also, instead of wasting our garden debris that we weren’t using, we reuse it through our compost.  In this process we learned to be a leader by teaching the classes and making the compost happen.” – Cassidy and Mattie

Roots of Responsibility Day

“This year was MRA’s first Roots of Responsibility Day.  It was a very busy day, full with lots of fun activities and a big bonfire with the whole school at the end of the day. 

In the morning, the 8th grade went to the Molalla Community Garden and did service work, while the rest of the school worked around the campus.  There were separate stations for the K1s, elementary, and the 6th and 7th graders.  At one station we made apple cider.  We had to wash the apples, slice the apples, and put them into a cider press.  At another station we got to plant trees behind the 4/5 classrooms.  .  We also got to dig the fire pit and place rocks around it.  The K-3s got to go through “Wonder” stations, wondering about the world around them.  Two of their many stations were to pop popcorn and roast pumpkin seeds.

While the whole school was around the fire pit we got to sing silly songs and listen to classes preform.  Afterwards, we got to drink the apple cider and eat the pumpkin seeds and popcorn.  The whole school got a lot accomplished and the campus looks great!” – Lexi and Lydia

MRA Buddy Time

“Here at MRA, our Senior Leadership team is in charge of planning many things.  One example is buddy time.  Buddy time is where the 4-8s have little buddies (K-3s) where we participate in fun activities such as “I have a friend,” “Charades,”  ect.  It’s a great way to get our MRA community to bond together creating a warm, inviting place.  It’s really fun, and it’s a great idea!  So many people are missing out!  Come join us next year!” – Cameron and Parker

Leadership in the Future

“We hope that in the future we will have several fundraisers and a better learning system!  We appreciate all the school has done in the garden.  Do you remember Roots of Responsibility day?  That made a big impression.  Our primary reason for leadership is to make leaders out of people so they can make a change in the world.” -  Grace


As you can see – we've been busy.  Look forward to more exciting, innovative, and community minded ideas and activities from the Senior Leadership Team.