History and Challenges of Dogwood School Shared with Lions

Tamara Ballou, Interim Principal, and William Vardeman, Dogwood Elem. School came to the Lions Club meeting Wednesday night, 2,20 and discussed the history and challenges and accomplishments of the school where we have staged our Mulch sales for many years.  Dogwood Elementary is majority low-income, majority Hispanic and other second languages.  

Among it's challenges, Dogwood also was devastated by a fire in November of 2000. (See Article in the Washington Times.)  After a struggle to rebuild the school it still faced a perilous battle to re-invent itself.  It was rated as a failing school under “no child left behind” leading to many efforts to overcome this.  They have since been able to achieve significant successes, no longer seen as failing, with small classes (12:1 student-Teacher ratio) and challenging curriculum.  The road ahead is difficult.

While decisions still need to be made, the generosity the school has shown for so many years in sharing their parking lot as a staging area for our annual Mulch Sale Fundraiser and re-arranging week-end events to be able to help us out, we will be thinking as a club about ways to support them.  As a club who prides ourselves on Service, we can put our collective heads together and see if we can provide this well-deserved community school some assistance.