Forget bake sales! School booster club selling alpaca manure.

The music booster club at Central Community Unit School District 301 in St. Charles isn’t bothering with bake sales and car washes this year. Instead, it’s selling bags of something promoters call “paca poo.”

Minus the cute name, the product is alpaca manure.

Booster club secretary Gudrun Dorgan says it is a great garden fertilizer, and it comes in little pellets that are easy to work into the ground.

Parents, students and teachers will be scooping and selling droppings on Saturday at Inspiration Farm Alpacas. A 30-pound bag will cost $10.

Farm owner Jeff Koehl has been raising alpacas for four years and usually sells manure for profit. He says alpacas digest their food more efficiently than most farm animals, so their waste doesn’t smell too bad and doesn’t require lengthy composting.

Read more: School booster club selling alpaca manure.

Heroic PE teacher pushes mother and children from path of car

A physical-education teacher at A.K. Suter Elementary School in Pensacola is being called a hero after he was struck by a car this morning near the school while he protected children.

Patrick Judd was transported to Baptist Hospital. Colleen Kirsch, spokeswoman for the hospital, said Judd was in good condition this morning.

Deputy Superintendent Norm Ross said witnesses saw Judd push a mother and her two children out of the path of an oncoming car.

By doing so, Judd took the brunt of the hit and suffered a leg injury.

District officials applauded Judd’s selfless actions Friday.

Laura Richards, 37, dropped off 6-year-old Abigail for school this morning and was crossing the street while talking with Judd.

She had 2-year old Laura Sophia sitting on her hip and 4-year-old Isabella holding her hand as she walked.

“He jumped back to take the full impact,” Richards said of Judd. “I don’t really know what happened. It happened so quickly but when it was all said and done we were safe on the side of the road and my daughters’ flip flops were still on the pavement.”

Richards said she know Judd because she sees him every morning and afternoon doing crossing guard duty. The last day of school before Christmas break, Richards said, Judd wears a Santa Claus costume while guiding traffic.

“We’re so grateful,” she said. “We pray for him and that he’ll be alright. If if he hadn’t been there it would have been us. My two little girls are so tiny.”

“The incident this morning was certainly an act of heroism,” Ross said. “It doesn’t surprise me at all. He’s been a longtime employee and has demonstrated throughout his career his dedication to students and the school.”

Superintendent Malcolm Thomas said he was proud of Judd’s service to the schools.

“This is just another example of the dedication of our employees in this district,” Thomas said.

In 1999 Judd won the Elementary School Physical Education Teacher of the Year Award from the county.

Read more and see the family he saved: ‘An act of heroism’

Students use “Wall of Shame” to fight discrimination [Video]

I love the idea these students had and the story that came from it.

When it comes to negative stereotype students at the University of Memphis have a visual reminder this week. Monday, members of the Students Activities Council put up a wall in the student plaza to expose the discrimination that still exists.

The wall made of cinder blocks is covered with dozens of words of hate still used to stereotype different races, groups and individuals.

“I think it will really open people’s eyes to what people really think. A lot of things are just kept inside,” said Sean Fernandez.

Students spent weeks filling in these cinder blocksand say the words comes from real life experiences.

They say labels like generic, pretty boy or drama queen may not seem offensive, but if used over over in a negative way they can hurt . “What is kind of bothersome might be not be bothersome to you, but we still have the same feeling when something bothers us,” said Jenn Armstrong, President of the Student Activities Council.

The wall has only been up a day, but is already having an impact on students even employees on campus.

“I”ve never seen anything like it,” said Shamika Wright.

The wall will be torn down with ropes and chains and students are hoping along with they’ll tear down discrimination on campus.

“I just really want people to start talking,” said Armstrong.

Read more, watch this story and see the wall: Students Use Wall Of Shame To Fight Discrimination

Young at heart: Elderly librarian says kids keep her alive [Video]

Here is a library worker who is older than many of the books on the shelves but she says her elementary students keep her young at heart.

Arlene Greene turns 82 this summer and she credits the kids at Wengert Elementary for her new lease on life. “When I first came here to Nevada I was sitting around, doing reading, watching T.V. and I was slowly dying and my daughter said, mom, ‘you are going to die like this. You’ve got to volunteer.'”

Greene now volunteers five days a week. Wengert’s principal, Suhaila Mustafa, says, “She is very sweet, very kind to them.’ Mustafa says Greene resembles grandma and provides a family atmosphere.   

Greene is no push over, though, and the kids know it. A book overdue is a book overdue. And she is a stickler when it comes to saying “please and thank you.”

Greene says, “I would encourage everybody who doesn’t know what to do with themselves, who have nothing, their children have married or gone away, jump into a school. Volunteer and work with the kids. It’s like living all over again.”

Read more and watch this story: Cool at School: Young at Heart

Photo: Flickr user apdk

Town pulls together to prepare for flooding [Video]

Having grown up in an area, in Louisiana, that is at the mercy of Mother Nature, this story reminds me of how good it feels when a community comes together.  

 As the swelling Red River lapped within 30 feet of his back door, Carlis Kramer’s property resembled nothing so much as a bustling construction site.In a well-ordered ballet, four people loaded sandbags, four others hauled them to the house and another person stacked them into a dike.

This is how Fargo responds to the threat of record flooding: Hundreds of people from all walks of life have joined forces to shield the community from the rising river, racing to fill 2 million sandbags.

The effort has drawn football players, soldiers, high school students, even a Microsoft engineer — all fearful of enduring another disaster like the devastating floods of 1997.

“A friend of mine brought his neighbor’s kids, and friends of family bring boyfriends and girlfriends,” Kramer said.

The 1997 floods forced tens of thousands of people to flee homes in North Dakota, Minnesota and southern Canada in one of the costliest and largest flood evacuations in U.S. history before Hurricane Katrina. The disaster killed 11 people in the Dakotas and Minnesota and caused an estimated $4.1 billion in damage.

In Fargo, Noah Addy was among dozens of volunteers who gathered around huge sand piles at the Fargodome indoor football stadium to shovel sand into bags.

While most workers needed two hands to drag the bags onto piles, the muscular Addy tossed them like they were pillows.

A native of Ghana, he moved to Fargo about eight years ago for college. Now an engineer for Microsoft, he did not hesitate when the company offered its Fargo employees time off to help.

“I didn’t experience the 1997 flood, but everybody told me how bad it was, so I feel that helping is the right thing to do,” Addy said.

Not far away, near a home in south Fargo, Phil Hansen handled sandbags as easily as Addy.

Hansen grew up in North Dakota, then went on to play pro football for the Buffalo Bills. In his playing days, Hansen teamed with Bruce Smith to form one of the NFL’s best pass-rushing duos.

On Tuesday, Hansen’s mouth was bloody from the work.

“I bit my tongue, and I haven’t stopped bleeding for two hours,” said Hansen, who now lives in nearby Detroit Lakes, Minn. “It feels good to help, though.”

Read more and watch this story: In Race Against River, Fargo Pulls Together

Cops and cards: Program changes how youth view police [Video]

This is a good idea that more police departments should look into.

Some Baltimore City Police officers hung up their handcuffs Thursday and honed their game-playing skills.

A city police officer could be seen teaching card shuffling skills to a student at Guilford Elementary Thursday, while others helped with homework.

For the last three weeks on Thursdays, the officers have taken their lunch at the school. It’s part of the Big Brother, Big Sister program.

Students who seem to have formed a perception of officers from television find they are really not much different than other adults.

“It was fun for her to know I go home and cook dinner, go over homework with the kids, and she was like, ‘Really? I never knew a police officer did that,'” said Detective Sharon Talley.

But the stories about special assignments when big stars come to town are interesting.

“I think it’s kind of cool ’cause she’s been with superstars like people in Hollywood,” said Skyligah Hite.

Of course this helps the kids, but the police officers say it also helps the department by breaking down stereotypes and letting children know police officers are ordinary people.

“And some of them open up and talk, so you get a chance to interact with them. It’s just a great opportunity, person-to-person versus cop-to-kid,” said Deputy Commissioner Debbie Owens.

Read more and watch that story: Program Changes Perception Of Police Among Youths

Teachers ditching class chairs for stability balls [Video]

This is a very interesting story that makes a lot of sense really. One of our reporters and a guy in sales use the balls at their desks as well.

Talk about a teacher’s dream: No more slouching, no more wiggly little boys and no more snoozing at desks.

All teachers have to do is ditch the classroom chair. A growing number are replacing them with exercise stability balls more associated with pilates classes than schoolroom lectures as an innovative way to improve student posture and attention.

 

The kids in Tiffany Miller’s class sound like little pilates teachers when they talk about their new chairs, dropping phrases like “strengthen your core” and “engage your center.”

“They’re awesome,” gushed 10-year-old James Howell, a fourth grader at Bauder Elementary School whose class switched to purple stability balls in January. “They help you focus, they help you keep your structure. And sometimes you get to bounce on them, get the wiggles out.”

“The whole theory with the brain is that when your body’s engaged, your brain’s engaged,” Miller said. “I call it actively sitting. They’re maybe moving their legs a little, wiggling some. But their upper body, they’re focused on writing, on the teacher. It really works.”

Read more and watch this story: Teachers Ditching Class Chairs For Stability Balls

Battle of the bots: Teens shoot for the moon [Video]

Some bright young inventors will be at the Memorial Coliseum this weekend to show off their creations. 

Check out America’s newest generation of inventors!

Some of the teens, in the past, have ended up working for NASA.

Watch this story about these inventive teenagers: It’s the battle of the bots at the Memorial Coliseum… and it’s free!

One school, eight sets of twins [Video]

Do you ever wonder what it would be like to have a twin? We get those answers and more from not one, not two, but eight sets of twins at St. Francis school.

“Huh? No I’m not a twin she’s my clone.,” the Laa sisters say. They are members the most exclusive club at school. From two years old to seventeen, enrolled here are 8 sets of twins.

The twins say their classmates all react the same way. “They are shocked because we look nothing alike,” the Damaschi brothers say.

All 8 sets are fraternal and not identical twins. “They don’t think that were twins usually when we tell them,” Taylor Damaschi says, “why am I bigger than him, I’m still younger.”

Conner and Taylor have some obvious differences but some of the twins look a lot alike. “I can’t tell them apart but they are fraternal,” Sister Joan of Arc Souza said.

She says a school discount for siblings could be the reason for the twin invasion here. “We always want to wear the same things so we’ll fight over clothes sometimes a lot most of the time,” Emma and Claire Laa said.

Read more and watch that story: One school, eight sets of twins

Exchange program breaks down stereotypes [Video]

Skaneateles and Fowler High School students are learning they have a lot in common.  Friday, students took part in an exchange program organized by Interfaith Works, which helps break down stereotypes by bringing students together. 

“Well, actually, before I came to fowler — I’m embarrassed to admit this — I was really scared,” says Skaneateles senior Madison Eckles.

Chris Gilkes, a senior at Fowler, says “I always thought Skaneateles — not to be mean — was going to be racist, which it’s really not.”

Skaneateles’s Josh Tracy is shadowing Fowler’s Gilkes; the pair met earlier this year during the schools’ first exchange.

“We’re definitely going to keep in contact, cause he’s getting recruited for basketball,” says Tracy.

“I just wanted to show that we’re not bad people. We’re the same. We just live in a different location,” says Gilkes.

In the fall, students compiled a list of assumptions they had about each other. Every so often they’ll revisit the list and see if the stereotypes still ring true.

Read more and watch that story: Exchange program breaks down stereotypes