Riverton Elementary

Our MISSION

Our mission is to design and build what we will call the “Classroom on the Flint.” This will essentially be a STEM lab full of unique and beneficial learning opportunities for all of our students. An environmental engineer sketched out our ideas, and we have secured a contractor to build the classroom/observatory overlooking the Flint River. We also plan to create a platform and stairs which will lead students down to the water so that they can take water samples, study the living organisms, and even fish to determine what exactly lives in this large body of water on our campus.

Currently, the Flint River provides excellent fishing for spotted bass, largemouth bass, the occasional smallmouth bass, rock bass, bluegill, longear sunfish, channel catfish and bullheads. Also, bald eagles and their nests have been spotted in the trees surrounding the Flint River behind RES; therefore, the Green Team decided to install stationary binoculars throughout the outdoor classroom for students to be able to observe bald eagles in their natural habitats, which for some students will be a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.

In addition, we will assemble a weather station, water collection area, a vegetable garden, and a fishing club. We will have so many opportunities for students to learn about the wildlife in and surrounding the Flint River.

Once the construction is complete, the “Classroom on the Flint” will be utilized by the RES students on a daily basis. The learning as a result of this project is endless for our students, who are currently in grades Pre-Kindergarten through Third Grade. Our students will be able to explore things that most students in public schools do not have access to. In addition to the STEM lab overlooking the Flint River, we will also build a large raised-bed community garden on the outskirts of the classroom, which our students will manage and sustain using compost from our school cafeteria, as they learn all about horticulture and gardening. Moreover, we will have a water mill that will feed electricity to the outdoor classroom for our students on cloudy days or for the community to enjoy in the evening time as they utilize our walking track. Lastly, our contractor recommended paving a parking lot for community members to park, and he also recommended clearing a walking trail in the woods with railing as a path to the outdoor classroom.

We will have ecology, biology, and aquatics field trips on our very campus. In fact, we plan to share this opportunity with the other five schools surrounding us within Madison County, should their teachers and students want to explore the Flint and its surroundings. It will belong to the MCSS, so any school is welcome to utilize it for STEM learning. We plan to spotlight this learning project and its benefits as we apply for Green Ribbon Schools status in December of the 2019-2020 school year.

The Green Team, made up of two kindergarten teachers, two first grade teachers, one third grade teacher, our interventionist, our bookkeeper, and the administration, has been meeting bimonthly since the beginning of October planning the construction and implementation of this instructional asset to STEM learning.

Our community just celebrated RES’s 100th year, and what better way to honor our school and the legacy of all the students who have walked these halls than to construct this outdoor classroom for our community and our students. At our 100 year celebration, there were families who had four and five generations that had attended our school. We want to showcase this special STEM project by inviting all of our former students to join us for a ribbon cutting ceremony and involve our entire community in educating our students and preparing them for success in the future.