By: Alpine, Mountain Empire Chamber of Commerce
For The Alpine Sun
“What Makes A Good Friend?”
Fifty Mountain Empire Unified School District elementary and middle school students who won the district’s 3rd Annual Essay Contest were recognized on June 6 for their carefully crafted definitions of best friends from their point of view.
By: Alpine, Mountain Empire Chamber of Commerce
For The Alpine Sun
“What Makes A Good Friend?”
Fifty Mountain Empire Unified School District elementary and middle school students who won the district’s 3rd Annual Essay Contest were recognized on June 6 for their carefully crafted definitions of best friends from their point of view.
Good friends are caring, supportive, loyal, truthful, kind, respectful, funny, helpful, trustworthy, unselfish, empathetic, sharing, understanding, forgiving, “drama free” and they appreciate you, stand by you, don’t pick on you or steal from you, children wrote.
“My best friend in first grade (dose) not care if I smell like dead fish” wrote first grader Evelyn Vickers of Clover Flat Elementary School “He will still be my friend.”
And although making friends is common and easy for most people, wrote eighth-grader Nury Ulloa of Jacumba Middle School, “making the right friends can be rare.”
“This year’s essays were really amazing,” said Descanso Elementary School Principal Donna Burton, event coordinator. “Everybody should be very proud. The competition was very difficult.”
Presented by the school district and the Alpine Mountain Empire Chamber of Commerce in the Mountain Empire High School Auditorium in Campo, the evening awards ceremony began with a pasta dinner by sponsor Sycuan Casino for everyone who attended.
The school district and the Chamber sponsored the essay contest, the festive tables and atmosphere, and bound books of the essays and bags full of goodies for each child.
Jacumba Shell, San Diego Gas & Electric, Thing Well Drilling and the Alpine Creek Town Center/Barons Market also sponsored the event.
U.S. Congressmen Duncan Hunter and Juan Vargas; San Diego County Supervisor Dianne Jacob; State Senator Joel Anderson and State Assemblyman Randy Voepel provided individual legislative certificates of recognition for each essay writer.
“I feel honored to be here with all my fellow classmates and everyone else in the district,” said sixth-grade winner Ryan Ayus of Pine Valley Middle School.
Parents were sometimes surprised at the significant academic recognition for their children, but they appreciated it and the work of the district’s faculty and staff.
“The teachers are phenomenal,” said John Oney, father of second-grade winner David Oney of Clover Flat Elementary School. “They go above and beyond Common Core. They have new ideas, new technology, creativity.”
Presenting a Certificate of Recognition to District Superintendent Kathy Granger for district achievement and the event, Chamber President/CEO Mary Rynearson noted that schools are what bring communities together.
Students from transitional kindergarten through eighth grade participated in the contest.
The winners were from: Campo Elementary
—- Camden Shumate, Seth Vargas, Victoria Egan, Quinn Schuchhardt, Miranda Haisch, Roman Zarate, Logan Haney, Aleah Zarate, Aleena Cruz, Fernanda Zatarain, Oscar Plasencia, Daniel Delgado, Gabriel Dierkop, Angel De Los Reyes, Armya Boyd, Rose Johnson and Patricia Jenkins.
Descanso Elementary —–
Cammi Dibelka, Nicholas Santos, Kevin Macres, Sage Heckeroth, Brooke Kloack, Michael Noble, Abbey Laskey and Darrious Baker.
Clover Flat —-
Damian Polen, Evelyn Vickers, David Oney, Tristen Deak, Adrian Hydorn and Aria Neil.
