Fourth-grade

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BY MAYA DAWSON SPECIAL TO COLORADO COMMUNITY MEDIA

As wild re season draws uncomfortably near, 15 new experts on mitigation presented their ndings to community members at the Evergreen Fire/Rescue Administration Building.

e catch? e presenters were fourth graders from King-Murphy Elementary School.

e class partnered with Evergreen Fire/Rescue over the past semester to learn about re mitigation in a series of classes and lectures that culminated with the students performing re-mitigation work on their school grounds and presenting what they learned to an audience of parents.

“ is process was all about engaging and empowering these fourth graders to make a di erence in their community,” said Einar Jensen, EFR’s risk reduction coordinator. “To learn from me, but also to teach me their perspective and what matters to them.”

Teacher Mary Gordon hoped the students felt empowered to make a di erence.

“Not just in their school, but in their community, and also that they are developing a love of public speaking and learning by producing their own videos,” Gordon said.

Jensen previously taught a re mitigation course to high schoolers, but in converting his lessons for a fourth-grade audience, both teacher and students were pushed to make something as complex as wild re science accessible to all.

“ ey were really high-level lessons for the kids to do, and the kids just ate it up,” Gordon said. “ ey loved every minute of it.” eir work is creating real-world change in the community. e week after Alice completed a re-risk assessment on her home for a homework assignment, her family took action to reduce re risks on their property.

After a series of lessons from Jensen, students independently produced slideshows, posters or videos about what they learned. For fourth-grade partners Jackie Munro and Alice Ardern, creating and presenting their slideshow together was the best part of the semester.

“I knew what I had to read and what Jackie had to read, and I was cheering myself on in my head,” Alice said. eir presentation covered everything from how to receive wild re alerts on your phone to how to train your pets to evacuate.

“She’s remembering things she learned and asking questions,” Heidi Ardern, Alice’s mother, said. “When we are out and about and she sees a lot of pine needles somewhere, she’ll say, ‘ ey should rake those pine needles up because that’s a re risk,’ or, ‘Daddy should get our gutters cleaned because that’s a re risk.’”

Other parents spoke on how the project encouraged their students to take initiative and build public-speaking skills in a hands-on environment. On April 25, the students put their learning into practice, raking and bagging an eighth of an acre of pine needles, twice what Jensen expected them to accomplish.

“I’ve never raked up pine needles before,” Alice said. “It was pretty bad weather when we did it, but everyone felt proud after we nished raking.” is semester was Jensen’s pilot class of what he hopes will become a larger partnership between the re department and area schools.

“It was perfect,” he said. “Now we know that we can roll it out to other schools, so hopefully, it’ll be bigger and better next time.”

She joked that she would do well in the race because of communication and a deep understanding of umper, though she meant it when she exclaimed, “ is is the best day of my life.”

Cousins Jason Mounts of Denver and Dewane Mosher of Alamosa participated together, Mounts with burro Bluebell and Mosher with Bunny. is was Mounts’ rst foray into burro racing, and he just wanted to cross the nish line unscathed. is was Mosher’s fourth time in the Georgetown race. He said he used to run road races, and then he tried a race with a burro, and the road races became passé.

“ ese are more entertaining,” he said.

Burro fans

Leslie Russell of Salem, Massachusetts, used the Georgetown packburro race as a way to gain more understanding of the book: “Running with Sherman: How a rescue donkey inspired a rag-tag gang of runners to enter the craziest race in America.”

Both Russell and her daughter Erin Gilroy, who lives in Denver, are new to watching pack-burro races.

“I’m trying to ful ll a dream,” Russell said. “I am so excited. You have no idea.”

She said she was doing reconnaissance as she considers trying burro racing herself – maybe next year.

Tonya and Paul Pappert of Westminster attended to cheer on their daughter, Brooke Tolmacho , who was running with Esther the burro.

Rotary fundraiser e smiles and chuckles were noticeable as people learned about the Rotary club’s Call to Doo-ty fundraiser, a unique twist for the pack-burro race.

Five years ago, according to Rotary President Robert Smith, the club came up with the fundraiser, and he said club members have learned over the years that burros relieve themselves while they’re moving, which is why the squares are located near the starting line.

With apologies to those who might be a bit squeamish, Smith said the club wants to make sure the winner truly is the winner, so club members survey the squares after burros run by, and if there isn’t a clear square winner, they don gloves and grab paper plates to scoop up and weigh the excrement.

“We weigh it to one-one hundredth of an ounce,” he said, “to gure out where the most poop is.” is year, the club added a pooppitching cornhole game with participants throwing bags that look like poop, and winners getting gift certi cates to area businesses.

Tonya Pappert laughed uproariously when she saw the Rotary club’s Call to Doo-ty fundraiser, with Paul adding, “Where else can you gamble on poop?” the killing of Christian Glass. The murder of Christian Glass becomes even more tragic when one realizes that one of the deputies who was involved in the Darrin Patterson case, Kyle Gould, had been promoted by the Clear Creek

County sheriff’s office and was actively supervising and directing the fatal events the night of Christian’s death via body camera. Gould is now on trial for homicide. Andrew Buen, the deputy who physically shot and killed Christian Glass, also had a violent history. He was the subject of an excessive force lawsuit at the time of Christian’s death, due to an assault on a handcuffed inmate.

The death of Christian Glass is a tragedy, and the $19 million civil settlement that resulted is unprecedented not only due to the monetary damages but also because it forces Rick Albers and Clear Creek County to finally implement the recommendations made by the D.A. after Darrin Patterson’s death. It also mandates additional levels of training for Clear Creek County law enforcement officers and all police academy graduates. If it takes a lawsuit to force Rick Albers to implement change, and he is unaccountable for the actions of his deputies, I personally question why he is still leading the Clear Creek County Sheriff’s Department when the department under his leadership has so clearly “failed to meet expectations.”