Brethren Elementary School students celebrate the end of the school year

BRETHREN — The last day of school every year is always one of the most fun for the students.

At Brethren Elementary School the end of the school year is an opportunity to celebrate a year of hard work with prizes and activities. It is a way of sending the students off into the summer break feeling good about having completed another successful year of school.

Teacher Jennifer Cordes said the last day celebration has been a tradition at Brethren Elementary for the past seven years. The concept behind it is to reward the students for good behavior and doing good things for others.

"We have done it for the last seven years under our MTSS (Multi Tiered Systems of Support)," she said. "We started a reward drawing in the mid-year and another one the end of the year."

Principal Jakob Veith said almost all the prizes they give out are donated and said students have to earn their way into the drawing.

"We have great community support and there are a lot of organizations, businesses, teachers, para professionals and community members that donate prizes and they continue to support us," he said. "The kids have to earn the Bobcat Paws by doing positive things at the school and they are recognized by the teachers, aides, custodians, bus drivers, lunch people and everybody else. If they are doing good things they get the chance to earn paws and then they can win prizes."

Cordes said they also hold a weekly drawing of smaller incentives to keep the interest up throughout the year.

"We keep the Bobcat Paws and then they all go into the big drawing for the winter one and the end of year one," she said. "We want to thank everyone who donated gifts because there were a lot who donated this year."

Students then had the opportunity to take part in a field day competition to cap off the day. They participated in a tug-of-war competition, long jump, 50-yard dashes, balloon toss, bounce houses and much more. It put a perfect cap on the 2015-16 school year for the elementary students at Brethren Schools.