As a public school employee and private citizen, I work and volunteer to build enriched communities, advocate for community connections and to prepare for the future.

For a reasonably long period of time, I have been a third grade teacher at Lake Wilderness Elementary School.  Our student population exceeds 1,000. We may be the largest elementary school in the state of Washington. Each year in the classroom we build a community, engage in learning with cutting edge Tahoma curriculum and use our habits of mind and thinking skills to foster problem solving and critical thinking.

Over the last decade, especially, I have noticed a fraying of the physical building around us and the systems that support the building known as Lake Wilderness Elementary School. I am aware that those who went to school here at Lake Wilderness Elementary eons ago remember fondly the beautiful building they were proud to attend.

Well, over the last 50 years things have changed. How so you might ask? Despite the Herculean efforts of maintenance, the building and its systems are worn out. I preface the following information with this disclaimer. These are no-fault pieces of information. Please do not blame or point a finger at those individuals and departments that labor so mightily to “make it work” in this old building.

The following are a few examples of how teachers “make it work.”

One day about a month ago, I walked into my classroom on Read Across America/ Dr. Suess Day. The temperature was 62 degrees Fahrenheit and there was a “pocking” sound coming through on the intercom every sixteen seconds. The boiler was down for part of the day and the room was pretty warm by lunchtime. The “pocking” sound continued unabated for three days. During that time, students were taking the Winter Mini-Math Core Assessment and the District Writing Sample. How good would your concentration be with a “pock” sound every 16 seconds?

Across the hall in a colleague’s room, netbooks are stored for three classrooms. These were purchased with the technology levy money. (Thank you!) These netbooks need to be plugged in overnight. The outlets, along the parking lot wall, shoot sparks whenever they are plugged in.

I asked Rosemary Lathrop, second grade teacher, if she had had any experiences with the physical plant of the building. She responded, “Oh, you mean the smell of urine from the restroom across the hall where the smell has permeated the floor and the wall? Another staff member described the odor as, “a horrendous stench.” Or, Mrs. Lathrop continued, did I mean the one stall that latches in the girls bathroom, or the cold water in the restrooms, or is it the mold growing in the ceiling?

Erin Osborn, third grade teacher, has a heater that runs the room into the nineties every day. Each day she removes the cover from a portion of the heater and manually turns the heater off until the wall of heat in the room cools down. None of the windows at LWES open anywhere, and there is no air conditioning. The heater has been repaired and sometimes overhauled with new parts. The repairs and replacements are to no avail. The heat keeps pouring in. Keeping all the rooms at a just right temperature is a constant task some are too hot and some are too cold most days. The system is old and it is hard to get an even temperature throughout the building.

Melissa Morelock’s fourth grade classroom developed a water feature this year. Her ceiling was running water into the classroom. There is mold in the ceiling and the cabinet near the sink is ‘gross’ with a musty smell.

Lake Wilderness has many portables, some are old and some are simply beyond ancient. Right now they house district programs like ECAP (early childhood and parenting), preschool and speech. Three out of the six fourth grades are in portables, both music programs, and two of the first grade classrooms. They do not have running water.

Kelli Minitti first grade teacher at Lake Wilderness writes:

“As I enter my portable each day; I face walking in the rain, a creaking ramp, the smell and the mold.

I was locked inside my portable a few months ago. I went into panic mode because I couldn’t get the door to open from the inside. I was almost jumping at the door to pound on the bar, but nothing was happening. I decided to use the special key that locks and unlocks the bar. I had to jimmy the bar for a while and the door finally unlocked. Thank goodness there were no students with me, and that there was no emergency.

“My students also complain of wiggly desks. I can do nothing about this because the floor is warped in my portable. I find pattern blocks to place underneath the leg to balance the table. This works for a while but eventually the block gets kicked and the wiggly desk problem continues.

“I have a waterfall cascading off the side of the portable roof when it is raining, literally, a waterfall.

There are only two sets of outlets. This limits what I can do with technology and possibly creates a fire hazard. In addition, two sets of outlets limit how the room can be arranged for optimal teaching. “Therefore, I have a large cord running across the floor which we all trip over constantly.  As a result, I researched online and found a cord protector long enough so I can use the technology. My first grade students work under these conditions.”

After reading this, I wonder if we all realize this is all day everyday. How would you do in this situation?

Some floors have newer carpets because the roof blew off in a wind storm some years back. Teachers were moved and taught in teams in library A and on stage B, and in classrooms not their own. The carpet in other rooms is 50 years old and has been vomited on at the rate of one episode per year. Of course, the carpet is cleaned up at the time and then cleaned thoroughly once a year. In your home, would it be time yet to put down new carpets?

The building is settling and the linoleum floors have long rivulets of cracks running along where the wings join each other. Portable three is sinking. In an A portable, for two months at the end of one year and two months into another year there was no drinking fountain in the room because the parts had to come from the Midwest.

It was mentioned that ants live in the floor and walls of several classrooms in building A.

The floor in the boys bathroom third grade wing, erupted overnight one year with a ridge of tile in the middle of the floor about four inches high, cause unknown. The bathroom was closed for four months until new flooring was installed. So, the consequence was that between sixty and seventy boys had to use a bathroom in another wing of building B for four months.

From my point of view, the plumbing is precarious. Will the staff bathroom toilet flush one more time? The water from the faucets doesn’t taste right. Most students won’t drink the water because it tastes funny due to the rusty pipes. Sometimes the water comes out brownish and other times it is cloudy.

In the boys’ bathroom, one of the urinals was shooting up a geyser of water. The urinals run constantly unless the handle is pushed up. Is the hot water in the bathrooms hot enough to wash hands properly? There is one cold drinking fountain that perpetually leaks onto the linoleum floor. Not to mention the wet slick surface walked on or near by hundreds of children each day as they go out to recess, lunch, and specialists. Some days recently, they also had to be careful of the buckets placed to catch the water leaking from the ceiling.

The staff room in B has no real hot water, unless it is run for five minutes. I have never been able to stand there long enough for the water to get hot. But I hear it does. The electrical outlets blow when too many appliances are plugged in like during lunch as staff needs to heat up their lunches. So, we unplug things like the refrigerator.

Overall, staff handles the physical building issues with as much grace and humor as possible.  However, we do recognize the building and its systems are exhausted. We all “make it work.” Our primary focus is the students and providing a fair and equitable educational opportunity despite the limitations of the building. The building is becoming a burden rather than a showcase for student learning.

We ask for your yes vote to support the bond. I would appreciate it if you could find it in your heart and mind to vote yes for the bond. And why vote yes?

Tahoma schools are outstanding! Many of us know this because we have searched online for the best educational offerings for our children and found Tahoma School District. Many of us have specifically moved to Maple Valley so our children could have the educational opportunity offered through our curriculum. The Tahoma School District’s mission is to have “Quality Learning in Every Classroom for Every Child.” How education is housed is important for our children. How the community supports education is our responsibility. The building is the physical plant that is the setting for learning. This is the evidence that demonstrates that the community values education for our children – your children.

Schools enrich community because; they connect community through education, provide community access to the building, and house events that build strong community bonds.

Providing schools insures community stability, economic vitality, and prepares us for the future. By supporting the bond, we advocate for education. We make a commitment to providing a fair opportunity for children to succeed.

Value our children. Vote yes for the bond.

Pat Pepper

Third grade teacher

Lake Wilderness Elementary School