The school’s allies include: 1. Workplaces:
- PTS "Transbud" – constant, almost daily assistance.
- BFFiA "Polfa" – locksmith and mechanical repairs.
- The Anhydrite Mine in Niwnice – supplies us with chalk and plaster for children’s projects, as well as fertilizer for the school garden.
- "Bolesławiec" Ceramics – cups, jugs and flowerpots
- Jakubowski’s "Dana" Decorative Ceramics – milk jugs, cups and ceramic kitchenware worth PLN 7 million.
- Police Headquarters – helped bring a cooker and gas cylinder, as well as all the kitchen equipment.
- Bolesławiec Forestry District – supplies firewood.
- JCMB – made it possible to purchase a typewriter, carpets and fibreboard. They provide occasional support:
1. Institutions: the Municipal Office, GZEAS, GOK, BOK, the Educational and Psychological Clinic, Sanepid, and the Cooperative Bank (in May 1993, it donated PLN 10 million to the school to purchase a colour television and VCR).
2. Local councillors, village heads and the "Jeleń" Hunting Club are currently laying paving blocks in a checkerboard pattern by the community centre.
3. The priest of the local parish and the residents of the villages of Bożejowice, Rakowice and Otok (they systematically respond to the school’s needs). We reciprocate by organising community events for the parents and the school’s allies, such as Nativity plays, Grandparents’ Day and Mother’s Day. The children then thank everyone by presenting gifts they made themselves—to the allies of the “health-promoting” school.
There is still never enough learning. In September 1993, I took part in workshops for teams implementing the above-mentioned programme at WOM in Jelenia Góra. We met in person Associate Professor B. Wojnarowska, MD, PhD, DSc, and her team from Warsaw, who spent three days showing us where to begin, how to implement and evaluate health-promoting activities at school, and how to gain allies for the school.
There, the associate professor also told us that the path to success was the “small steps” method. Encouraged and full of ideas, I returned to school, entering the second year of health promotion at our school.
I do not know whether what we accomplished during the first year of health promotion at our school was a lot, but I know for certain that it was that “first step” because:
1. In terms of psychological comfort—we read the list of pupils by their first names, and address one another by first name as well; pasted into the register are the “rules for communicating with pupils” and sets of mid-lesson exercises; there is a “lucky number” student who is not questioned, and no homework is assigned for the weekend. The student council (supervised by J. Hołodniak, MSc Eng.) works using the “class presentations” method. In November, Class VIII presents itself; on Thursdays we listen to music by rock bands, and on Tuesdays to “hits from an old record”.
For three weeks, a school-wide general-knowledge competition will be held, and the children relieved stress by writing on the board “write whatever you want”—what they think about us, themselves and the school. We are planning a photographic exhibition entitled “This Is Where We Live”.
2. A healthy environment—we are enriching the plant life on the rock garden and taking care of the green areas around the school. We have now submitted an order to the Municipal Office for interesting specimens of trees and shrubs, so that a “mini botanical garden” can be created around the school, with a collection of protected coniferous trees and shrubs, surrounded by a small arboretum (deciduous forest) containing rare shrubs with decorative leaves, flowers and fruit.
For years, we have collected acorns for the “Jeleń” Hunting Club and built feeders and feeding racks for partridges. The hunters organise a winter sleigh ride for us, combined with feeding wild animals and identifying tracks; at the end, we eat “hunter’s bigos” at the forester’s lodge in Otok.
On 4 November 1993, we went on our first ecological trip to the Izerski slope in the Karkonosze Mountains. We visited a meteorological station and a station for researching air and water, and saw the ecological disaster in the Karkonosze with our own eyes, where “trees die standing”.
3. Care for our own health and that of others
- Activities such as addressing health-promotion topics every day in all forms, maintaining regular cooperation with a doctor and the school nurse from ZOS Kraszowice, and improving the school’s sanitary and hygienic conditions constitute care for a “safe environment”; the planned major renovation of the school during the holidays will also improve the premises.
As part of AIDS prevention, we took part in the municipal and district “AIDS Knowledge” competition—our pupil received an honourable mention and chose a calculator as her prize. The School Health Promotion Team operates at the school:
1. M. Tomczyk, MSc – coordinator and school principal.
2. D. Sikorska, MSc, and St. Wajda from the School Council,
3. nurse K. Kruszelnicka – ZOS Kraszowice,
4. chairwoman of the SK PCK, Student Council and SK LPO,
5. Maria Dąbrowa – parents’ representative,
Psychologist Ewa Mąjchrowska, MSc, from the Educational and Psychological Clinic provides us with ongoing assistance in working with difficult and gifted pupils and pupils with official assessments; during the so-called “open” days at the school (November and March), she advises parents.
In May 1993, the school librarian held a recitation competition in which pupils recited poems on health-promotion and ecological topics. It was a truly interesting competition.
In September 1993, I gained a new ally—the Scout troop, which is preparing a “Family Tournament” for 20 November 1993. With the money donated by the tournament participants (classes from “O” to VIII will sell “the products of little hands” and “bricks”), we will buy the computer, camera and duplicator we dream of.
I trust that, with such a GROUP, we will achieve much in our pursuit of the “healthy school” model. It is work for many years, and the satisfaction will be seeing children attend such a school willingly, smiling and happy, because “such will the Republic be as the upbringing of its youth” – J. Zamojski
In today’s difficult times, people say that education is declining, but one need not wait for “manna from heaven”; one can simply WANT—and to want is to BE ABLE.