35th WES JUMP ROPE FOR HEART
35th WES JUMP ROPE FOR HEART
Valentine’s Day Jump Rope Extravaganza at WES
On Wednesday, February 14, our grades 4-6 students celebrated our 35th annual Jump Rope for Heart Day. Our school and community continue to support our jump rope dayand we were able to raise over $13,124.00 to the Heart and Stroke Foundation and took our total to over $450,000. What an incredible total! Thank you, Wainwright and grandparents, aunts and uncles, neighbors and students who pledged dollars and our students completed those pledges by jumping their hearts out.
The day started early as we organized and prepped the gym for a day of jumping,
fellowship and fun. Huge salute to Mrs. Munn, Mrs. Chaulk, Mrs. Koroluk, Mrs. Lingley
and Mrs. Rhodes for assisting with the preparation. The Grade 4s started the jumping off
at 10:30 and performed some individual skipping techniques until 11:00 and then the long
ropes and double ropes took over. Students could be seen laughing, tripping, falling,
singing and dancing to loud music. . A few prizes were handed out while the students
jumped to encourage them to keep going and fulfill their pledge promise to jump.
Grade 6s jumped in their last jump rope at 12:30 and had a blast jumping with their
friends in their final Jump Rope for Heart event.
Grade 5s finished off the jumping at 1:45 and in their hour of pledge jumping they had a
fun time – long rope skipping and developing connections with friends. They were
joined by former WES staff as well as a cheering section from the stage.
RCMP Constable Mitch Gardipee was the hero once again (his hamstrings won’t think so
the next day) of the day as he came out and jumped for all three sessions and was the
leader of the Conga Line around the gym for the skippers. We are extremely grateful that
Constable Gardipee joined us for the day. He brought a great skipping talent but his
energy and enthusiasm were felt throughout the gym all day. Thank you, Constable!
Extra skipping incentive prizes were supplied by the Phys. Ed. Department and students
were pumped to get a prize whether it was a skipping rope, WES water bottle (courtesy
of WEPA) or other prizes supplied by the Heart and Stroke Foundation. Extra prizes were
also handed out to the fabulous skippers.
WES bounty prizes were handed out in the gym for all the students. It was sure nice to
have everyone back in the gym excited for the prize giveaways.
This was a special day as we celebrate 35 years of jumping. We were able to bring back
a number of former staff: veteran principals, teachers and instructional assistants joined
us in the gym. These former staff members spanned the years of jump rope and we were
fortunate that many of them could join us on this special day. What a blast rekindling old
friendships and sharing laughs and memories along the way. Thank you to Lynn Pullen
for taking out her rolodex or phone contacts and touching base with many of our former
colleagues. It truly was a win-win for all involved.
Huge WES salute to the following partial sponsors Canadian Tire Wainwright,
Wainwright Bowling Center and Armstrong’s Clothing and Sports. Full sponsors of items
were Sportfactor Inc. (Edmonton – Craig Neufeld) Huxley Hockey Conditioning(Adam
Huxley) , Wainwright Golf Club(PGA professional Josh Copeland), Gracie’s Hair
Design(Della Lischka), Big Buck Golf(Sean Mills and Garrett Fraser), Mrs. Boxell WES
Library and Mr. Mitchell Phys. Ed. Department.
Thank you to our secretarial staff (Mrs. Boychuk and Mrs, Wells), WES administration
for their continued support of this worthwhile program in our school. Thank you to Mrs.
Munn and Mrs. Chaulk for their continued leadership in assisting me with this project.
All in all a great day and super energy release for our students. Our students jumped their
hearts out and not one complaint could be heard as we wrapped up our 35th Annual Jump
Rope for Heart.
See you in the gym
Mr. Mitchell
Aka “Gritty”
Go Flyers Go!
