JBER school partnerships star at awards luncheon

Published May 3, 2012
By Airman 1st Class Ty-Rico Lea
JBER Public Affairs

JOINT BASE ELMENDORF-RICHARDSON, Alaska -- The Star Awards luncheon is hosted by the Anchorage School Business Partnerships program annually to acknowledge the partnerships with the various agencies in the Anchorage community.

"The goal of the program is to improve citizenship and the educational experience of students through exposure to positive role models, active parental involvement, tutoring of academic studies, unit sponsoring and mentorship," said Air Force Master Sgt. Scott Thibodeau, 3rd Maintenance Squadron shop coordinator.

"Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson's School Partnership Program with the Anchorage school district was nominated the best in the district," Thibodeau said. "There are a lot of other programs and companies that have partnerships with the school district and ours was nominated as the most outstanding."

Schools such as Begich Middle School and Mount Spurr Elementary School were visited by Thibodeau and members of the 3rd MXS where they helped the children of Begich conduct a plane building project and assisted with Mount Spurr's mentoring sessions.
Volunteers from the 3rd MXS donated 50 hours per month to the school partnership program.

"I feel that this is a very good program and a great opportunity to help the children and relieve the thought of their parents being deployed," said Sgt. Brett Workman, 1st Battalion (Airborne), 501st Infantry Regiment.

Workman is the noncommissioned officer-in-charge of the Eagle River High School and Eagle River Elementary School partnerships.

"When we go to the Eagle River Elementary School, we do physical fitness testing with them and we can track their health, well-being and level of fitness as it improves," Workman said. "When I go to Eagle River High School, I take eight volunteers and we referee their Wild and Crazy Kids Olympics event. We go there every Friday during our spare time just to do physical training with the high school's JROTC program."

"Some units in the Army or squadrons in the Air Force each have a school that they are partnered with," Workman said.

"In the end, I just like giving back to the community as they are very supportive of our presence here," Workman said.

Bobby Jefts has been the principal at Gruening Middle School in Eagle River for five years.

"People in the community want to support education and want to be involved in what's going on in the public school systems and I think this event proves that," Jefts said.

Gruening Middle School has received a Department of Defense grant known as Project Connect, which provides the school with financial support for outdoor education.

"Members of the 509th Infantry Regiment have come out to Gruening Middle School as a part of the partnership to assist in activities such as registration at the beginning of the school year. They'll come in and have lunch with the children, attend field trips - they've even come out to the student conferences," Jefts said, "A lot of our children who attend Gruening come from military families. About 60 percent of our students have parents in the military."

Further into the luncheon event, Carol Comeau, Anchorage School District superintendent, was awarded the Commander's Public Service Award and the Outstanding Civilian Service Medal.

"I've just been so fortunate to watch the program grow," Comeau said.
In 2002, as superintendent, she signed a military child education coalition agreement to implement support practices designed to ease the transition of military students and families who frequently change duty stations.

"On behalf of the Anchorage School District and the Anchorage community, we want to recognize and honor our military partners and to thank them for their service to our youth," Comeau said.