FRIDAYEXTRA !
The Daily Astorian
Friday, May 22, 2015
Weekend Edition
KATIE WILSON — EO Media Group
Two Ocean Park Elementary students and a chaperone investigate a circle of trees at Camp Kiwanilong in Warrenton April 28. At a session on wilderness survival an OMSI outdoor
school instructor told the fifth-grade students to figure out ways to build shelters using only materials found in the woods around them.
OMSI SURVIVAL CAMP
Students bound for new
Ilwaco Elementary bond
By KATIE WILSON
EO Media Group
O
CEAN PARK, Wash. — There was a terrible plane crash
and now they are alone in the wild.
Children walked in tight groups of two or three down a
winding dirt path. As they walked, they discussed their pre-
dicament. One girl asked a smaller boy, “Why are you scared
of bears?”
He thought about the question as
they passed by a marsh and entered
the woods. Mosquitoes hummed
around their legs and arms. Finally,
with some bewilderment, he replied,
“I don’t know.”
They kept walking, now ducking
under overhanging branches that
formed a green tunnel. If the chil-
dren had been adult-sized and not
paying attention to what was in front
of them, these branches would have
clocked them under the chin.
In a clearing, they formed a circle
and discussed what they would need
to survive. How long could they go
without food and water?
³)LIWHHQ KRXUV´ RQH ¿IWKJUDGHU
promptly proclaimed. A boy next to
him shook his head. “Three weeks,”
he said.
“Hmmm,” said Hannah Scholes,
an outdoor school instructor for the
Oregon Museum of Science and
Industry, who set them to building
shelters.
In the last week of April, two
Ocean Park (Wash.) Elementary
teachers, several chaperones and 27
¿IWKJUDGHUVVWD\HGIRUVHYHUDOGD\V
at Camp Kiwanilong in Warrenton.
They were at the camp for an
outdoor school program focusing
on coastal ecology offered through
OMSI. They were there to learn, but
also to have fun and work on cooper-
ation and team building because big
changes are coming their way.
Changes
In September, these fifth-grad-
ers will be sixth-graders and will
attend a new elementary school the
Ocean Beach School District has
decided to form inside the Ilwaco
Middle School building. This ele-
mentary — tentatively called Ilwa-
co Elementary — will serve all of
the district’s fifth- and sixth-grade
classes. It is hoped the new school
will alleviate overcrowding issues
at Long Beach Elementary as well
as address what ended up being a
troubled transition for sixth-grad-
ers entering the middle school last
September.
KATIE WILSON —EO Media Group
See CAMP, Page 4C
An Ocean Park Elementary fifth-grade student slices through a squid’s mantel during a dissection work-
shop at an outdoor school led by OMSI at Camp Kiwanilong in Warrenton April 29.
A storia ’s O nly Va pe Shop & Lou nge
~ Beginning to Advanced Vaping Devices & Supplies
~ Quality E-Liquids & Sample Bar
~ Comfortable & Friendly Social Lounge
~ Friendly & Knowledgeable Staff
~ Committed to Helping Tobacco Cessation or Reduction
Lik e & Sha re U s a t-
w w w.fa ceb ook .com /Colu m b iaVa pes
1268 Commercial Street, Astoria
503-741-3008
OPEN EVERYDAY AT 10 AM • PET FRIENDLY
D ed ica ted Solely to Va pers
& T he Va ping Com m u nity