By WESLIE STRATTON
Moapa Valley Progress
Mack Lyon Middle School students celebrated the first week back to classes with a pool party on Thursday. Complete with snow cones and diving board competitions, the party offered a great time to all who attended.
Student council advisor and sixth grade teacher Kim Bunker said that the student council hosts the event that has been taking place annually for many years.
“It’s just swimming, contests and snow cones,” she said.
Bunker said that the local Parks and Rec plays a generous role in allowing the use of snow cone equipment as well as the Overton Pool, which is on the Mack Lyon campus.
“It’s just a welcome back to school,” she said.
Student body president Aubrey Aikele said that the event was planned weeks ago at a leadership retreat. The retreat had allowed she and her fellow student council members to focus on their upcoming first week of school, Aikele said.
“It was fun but tiring,” she said of the first week back from summer break.
Aikele said that she looks forward to sports this coming school year and. In addition, a haunted house planned by the student council for October is sure to be her favorite event of the year, she said.
Aikele said that waking up early is the worst thing about going back to school. But she enjoys being able to see “everyone” again, she said.
In contrast, seventh grader Sierra Holzer said that she can’t think of a downside to going back to school.
“Because I like school,” she said. “There’s not really anything I don’t like about it.”
Holzer’s friend and sixth grader Laurana Bush said that her favorite part about the first week of school was playing chess in the library and attending the back to school party.
When asked what the best part of the first week of school was for him, sixth grader Weston Munss answered emphatically, “The food!” He said that he especially enjoyed the orange chicken and the spicy chicken sandwich at the school’s cafeteria.
“Classes are better too,” he added.
