Water is good for planet Earth.
So a little precipitation – OK, quite a bit of precipitation – did nothing to dampen spirits and enthusiasm Tuesday at Vernon’s Ellison Elementary School.
It was there that Kim Ondrik’s Grade 6/7 “Ozone” class hosted a community-wide Earth Day Festival for three-and-a-half hours in a steady downpour.
“Rain is good for the Earth,” said Isaac Coombs, one of Ondrik’s students and co-director of the festival with classmate Corbin Kelley.
“The Earth needs a lot of water.”
The class hosted community groups such as the City of Vernon and Regional District of North Okanagan, as well as their peers.
“We have students here from Okanagan Landing Elementary, J.W. Inglis in Lumby and Beairsto,” said Kelley. “We have a lot of different stations that all of the kids can go to.”
Stations included things such as kids receiving free trees to plant, making dreamcatchers in a First Nations’ tepee, water trivia, a watershed model of Greater Vernon, face painting and free munchies such as fruit and vegetable.
Ondrik was doling out scoops of popcorn.
“It is an amazing opportunity to watch kids leading kids, as well as everyone’s awareness of the criticality of the natural world,” said Ondrik.
