School news of the week: Blue Ribbon schools named, new outdoor classroom, homecoming spirit

Amazing things happen in our schools every day — if you know where to look! Do you know some school news others would love? Let us know at [email protected].

Congrats to our Sioux Falls-area National Blue Ribbon school winners for 2022: Holy Spirit Elementary and Sonia Sotomayor Elementary.

They were among 297 schools across the country as a National Blue Ribbon School for 2022.

This distinguished recognition is based on the school’s overall academic performance. The other schools honored in South Dakota are Ethan Elementary School in Ethan, S.D. and Timber Lake Elementary School in Timber Lake, S.D.

The PTA at Fred Assam Elementary helped fund this welcome new addition — an outdoor classroom, offering a new environment for student learning. Anderson Landscaping completed the project.

As part of homecoming events at Sioux Falls Lutheran, older students read to younger ones.

Members of the Washington High School Homecoming court visited elementary students, including at John Harris Elementary where they offered insight and advice about working hard in school, visited classrooms and joined some students on the playground.

These are some awfully cute farmers at Rosa Parks Elementary — dressed that way in honor of Washington High School’s Homecoming theme day.

And these two got into the theme “Dress like a college student.”

And finally, as part of President’s Week celebrations, Sioux Falls high schools participated in Hunger Before the Bowl, a food drive competition to benefit Feeding South Dakota, created Scheels. Throughout the week, each school was to collect dry goods, and the school with the most food collected at the end of the week would receive the winning title during the halftime of their game and receive a $5,000 donation from Scheels.  Jefferson was named the winning school with a total of 1,553 pounds of food donated. Roosevelt followed in second place with 946 pounds, Washington in third with 704 pounds, and Lincoln donated 695 pounds.