Dixon High School Gets Spruced Up

“Let’s get this one done first,” yelled one voice as a group of students carried a garbage pail full of mulch towards the office at Dixon High School.

All around the campus on Saturday morning similar orders could be heard and students responded accordingly.

“Right now were having our Second Annual Campus Beautification Day,” said Principal Ivan Chaidez. “This is sponsored by our Public Service Academy and our student body, our Leadership Club. So they’re here as part of a service to the school. So we have a few parents out here, a few teachers, students. Seniors also get community service hours for graduation.”

He added the students will come on Monday and see the flowers and see what has been done to the campus

“The environment that students are in, it really reflects on their attitude as well,” he said.

Many students who attended the four-hour cleanup dressed in T-shirts and shorts. They could be seen in hallways washing windows, sweeping, digging in mulch, pushing wheelbarrows, picking up garbage and scraping gum off the sidewalk and other areas.

For Senior Jeff Beukelman, 17, and Ricky Saechao, 15, a freshman, volunteering their time was worthwhile.

“I thought it was a nice idea to come here and help out the campus,” Beukelman said. “We are shoveling up this mulch and they roll it away and out, where it needs to go.”

Beukelman added doing the work makes him feel good in that when he does return to school on Monday, he can be proud of what he’s done.

Katie Walsh, 28, a teacher with the Public Service Academy spent her Saturday morning raking mulch into place in the various planter areas on campus.

“The Public Service Academy is geared toward students who are interested in service the community and helping out their community so they do extra stuff like this,” she said. “It is to work and help out and beautify our school. We’ve done a lot of projects for the larger community but it’s nice to take some time and focus on our school and make it look really beautiful.”

She added when students help out it's fun and it’s those kids that can pass on to others the value of taking pride in something they‘ve done.

Up and down hallways students kept themselves busy but at the same time - although they were concentrating on the task at hand - they acted like students. Many chatted as they used towels  and soapy water to clean windows. Some even had music playing as they worked.

For 16-year-old Junior Payton Dodge, scraping gum from cement was a lesson in cleanliness.

“It’s gross,” she said. “There’s gum everywhere. There are trash cans everywhere and people can’t throw their gum away. It’s gross."

Dodge added although the work was “gross” she did felt like she was helping out the school  a lot.

For the majority of the students and other volunteers who participated, the feeling of accomplishment was great. As they sat over a lunch of barbecued hot dogs, chips and sodas provided by the Early Academic Program at UC Davis, many commented that they could not wait for Monday to arrive so that other students could see what they had done.