Eau Claire parents hope to bring back school field trips
07/13/09 - 10:00 PM News Report on WQOW News Channel 18 - Eau Claire
Eau Claire (WQOW) - Funding for Eau Claire school district field trips have been cut from the budget. In order to bring them back, a group of parents is hoping to raise $70,000 though a community-wide fundraiser.
The group is a combination of parents and members of various PTA's and PTO's. They are joining forces to make sure that all of the district's students will be able to go on field trips, no matter what school they go to.
Many parents chose to get involved after going to school board meetings and seeing how much the district had to cut. The group felt that some individual PTA's or PTO's would be able to fund their schools field trips on their own, but other schools would be left out.
The campaign will kick off August 15th and continue through September 15th. If they raise at least $70,000, the group says it should be able to fund all the field trips that kids went on last year.
The group's Chair Diane Willer says, "Field trips are life long learning experiences for these kids, they learn about the community and we would just hate to see them lose that."
Lesley Sauls, a parent, says, "It's the memory everyone takes with them, you know, it's the only time my daughters get to go on a school bus, it's a chance for a lot of kids to see things they've never seen before"
The group hopes to be able to hand a check for at least $70,000 to the district by October 1st.
The money will go into what is called the District 21 fund, which is through the school district, but is tax deductible.
If they don't meet their goal, they will have to pick and choose which field trips to fund. Again, the fundraising campaign will begin August 15th.
