Castner’s, Lecher’s efforts will bring a new flagpole

Sidney Middle School National Junior Honor Society President Will Castner, in a combined effort with Sidney Middle School Student Council President Annalise Lecher, has done all the research needed for installing a new flagpole in front of the middle school.

They have started donation efforts and have a plan to make the new flagpole become a reality.

According to middle school students and staff the current flagpole “has chipped paint, leans to the street and is unable to be displayed at half-mast.”

“The National Junior Honor Society puts up the flags every morning and Mrs. Glassburn, our National Junior Honor Society sponsor, had the idea in December that a good service project would be to maybe raise money for a new flagpole,” said Castner. “From there I went down to ConServ Flag and saw about the amount that it would be and found out that we could do this.”

According to Castner’s findings repairing the current flagpole so that is can be displayed at half-mast would cost approximately $500 plus the cost of renting equipment to install the repair.

“But that doesn’t solve the problem of chipped paint and the leaning of the flagpole,” said the students.

The price of a new flagpole to be installed is $2,330. A new 30-foot internal pulley system would cost $1,580 (with no maintenance), and other costs would include approximately $150 in shipping charges, a $1,400 installation fee and a $400 electrician fee, said Castner.

“The original installation fee was going to be $1,400, and it was going to be $1,200 for labor and $200 for the cement and materials,” said Castner. “Wamsley Construction said that they would donate the labor for us.”

With Wamsley’s donation the students would only have to pay the $200 for cement work.

ConServ Flag won the bid for installing the new flagpole and they agreed to donate new flags to the school, said the students.

Castner and Lecher have also received final approval from the school board for the fundraising efforts in their proposal, and the two hope that the project will end up costing only a total of $2,400.

Lecher said that the student council combined forces with the honor society chapter to gain more support for the project and to get more students involved.

“Will came to me and asked if we wanted to do this as a combined effort so that we would have more kids involved in the project and more helping hands toward it too,” she said.

There are currently approximately 24 students working hard to get the project set into motion, the students said.

“When the idea came up I thought it was a very noble project to do and if there is something that benefits our school and the community this is it,” said the junior honor society president. “If you go and look at the flagpole, there are a lot of things wrong with it. Every morning we have to go out there and sometimes it could take 20 minutes in the cold to figure out the wiring in it and pull it up. So we just thought it would benefit the school.”

“This would help the appeal in the front of the school because the one we have now is leaning and it has chipped paint. With an internal pulley we wouldn’t have to worry about the strings flying everywhere and flapping in the wind,” said Lecher.

Sidney Middle School Principal Brandon Ross said that he also heard students say that a new flagpole would help them match better with the adjacent high school building and its flagpole.

“I think the kids really are rallying around trying to make it look nicer out front. I know they always see the high school and compare the two flagpoles. So I think appearance and school pride is the issue that it would help with,” said the principal.

Ross said that the school building was originally built in 1955 and there is no indication to say that the flagpole has ever been replaced.

“I’m not sure if they have ever replaced the flagpole -- it could be original,” he said.

Lecher said that the students would like to have the funds needed for the new flagpole by May 1, but their ultimate goal is to have them at least by the end of this school year.

“We would like to have it installed for the 2013-2014 school year, so we want to have it installed sometime during the summer,” said Lecher.

Castner said that the flagpole would take two days to install.

One fundraising event that the students are already planning is a school dance for sixth grade students and middle school students on March 22.

“It’s for all those students so that we have more attendance and we’ve agreed that all the costs for putting it on will be covered,” said Lecher. “Mr. Ross has agreed to donate the DJ costs so that all the funds will go toward our fundraising.”

“We’ve also gotten several private donations,” said Castner. “We got one from a former school employee and some more are coming in slowly.”

Both students said that they have been hearing good things from classmates and community members about their project efforts.

“I think to a lot of students it might not mean as much because they aren’t involved with dealing with the flag, but a lot of students I would say are excited for the new flagpole and we’ve heard a lot of good things from the community,” said Castner.

“I think a lot of people are excited to make a difference. Especially with this class knowing that they were the ones to do it,” said Lecher.

“This class has done more than a lot of the classes in the 10 years I’ve been here as far as getting excited to do something for the school. A lot of times kids do a fundraiser but it never really benefits our community,” said Ross. “I think it’s cool. It’s patriotic and it shows pride in our country and in our school.”

“The American flag symbolizes all the values of American kids. So I think it’s neat that they took onto it and Will and Annalise have done all the work. They’ve done all the research and they’ve had meetings with people downtown and have been asking for private donations,” he said. “They’ve worked hard, harder than most kids would I think.”

The students also plan on creating a sort of mini-donor plaque in front of the flagpole for any contributors to project efforts.

“We’d like to put a plague up for people who do a private donation at the bottom of the flagpole so if they would like to be recognized they can be on there,” said Lecher.

To help contribute to the cause donors can call Sidney Middle School at 308-254-5853 or email [email protected].