The Idaho Lottery made a special Classroom Wishlist visit to Syringa Middle School in Caldwell in January. The school’s instructional coach, Kristy Rudan, asked for “wish items” for each teacher in the school.
“Imagine having over 40 wounds on your body, but no gauze, nothing to pack it with to stop the bleeding. You have no idea which wound to treat, which one is more serious,” began Rudan using a medic’s triage metaphor to describe the situation her teachers face at Syringa. “There is so much need everywhere you look, and they all bleed together. What do you do? Where do you begin to treat the wounds? Welcome to my classroom!”
As a lead support staff for the school, Rudan’s “class” of “students” are the 40 teachers who instruct over 700 middle schoolers every day. She sees the need of every teacher and, for the Christmas season’s Wishlist requests, made a plea to the Idaho Lottery.
“My request is to make a single wish come true for each teacher in my “class”; each teacher that I support, and mentor, is in need of something for their classrooms. In some ways, it’s almost like playing Santa Claus–leaving one gift for each of our incredible educators to use to continue inspiring others,” she said.
The Lottery agreed and delivered something for everyone including flexible seating stools, a white board, an entire classroom set of headphones, a printer, and a 3-D printer, along with many other boxes of supplies and classroom needs.
“The request was large enough we needed a utility cargo van to deliver all the packages,” said David Workman, Idaho Lottery spokesman. “The Lottery was created to benefit public schools and improve education. This Classroom Wishlist was so unique. We were thrilled with the opportunity to make it come true.”
The total request delivered to Syringa Middle School had a value of more than $7,700.