Mission club reaches out for Earth Day

ST. IGNATIUS — A new Mission High School club — Students Serving Community — only started this year, but in only a few short months, the group has made a mark on the town of St. Ignatius. From organizing food drives to spreading holiday cheer with caroling around town, about 15 dedicated members have paved the way for service in their community.

The group’s latest endeavor? An Earth Day celebration at Good Old Days Park, complete with information booths, tree planting, folksy music, games and arts and crafts. They even rustled up some much-needed sunshine and warm weather to make the day all the more enjoyable for everyone involved.

“This was one of our big projects that we put on to get our name out there in the community,” club founder, senior Austin Durglo, said. “It took a lot of calling people and organizing, but it was worth it because it was a pretty good turnout.”

Durglo and his hardworking team brought together other local service groups, businesses and environmentally conscious members of the community and student body alike. The CSKT Tribal Forestry Department donated boxes of lodgepole pine saplings for attendees to take home and plant. Lake County Solid Waste came by with information and helped the students organize a recycling drop-off for people in the community who would normally have to drive their recycling items to the transfer station.

“We’ll hopefully be doing some more projects this year,” Durglo said, mentioning the possibility of doing a volunteer project with the animal shelter. “We’d definitely like to see people to look to the club next year to see what’s going on and how it’s grown.”