Staff
Some Fort High students are heading off to France next March—and they’re hoping for some community support with a bottle drive fundraiser this Saturday (Sept. 26).
“Come out and help support the kids, it’s for a really good cause,” encouraged Jessica Anderson, one of the teachers organizing the trip that will see 25 Grade 11 and 12 students in French Immersion and Core French visit France.
“We’re just doing as much fundraising as we can to help them with their trip,” she added, noting the cost is $3,000 for each student to go.
“We’ve already done a garage sale a couple weeks ago and now we’re doing a bottle drive, and we’re just asking that people donate their extra drink bottles to help out with that,” Anderson said.
Empty bottles can be dropped off Saturday from 10 a.m.-3 p.m. at the property next door to The Beer Store, which Webb’s has allowed the students to use, Anderson explained.
For those who want to help out but can’t drop off the bottles themselves on that date, students also will be doing pick-ups around town, which can be arranged by phoning Anderson at 274-5896.
The trip itself is an opportunity for students to experience the French culture and language, she remarked.
“It’s just to kind of give them a bigger spectrum of how important another language is,” Anderson said of the importance of trips like this one, which give students the chance to experience the world outside of Fort Frances.
Some of the sights the students will see include the Eiffel Tower, the Louvre, the palace at Versailles built by King Louis XIV.
They’ll also visit the coastal beach town of Saint-Malo and Normandy, including the D-Day beaches and Caen Memorial.
“We get to go to all of the original churches and all of those things, so [there’s] a lot of history that kids can try to wrap their minds around, to see how old things actually are compared to here in Canada,” Anderson said.
More fundraisers in the works, she added, with the students planning to hold another garage sale Oct. 17 at the high school starting at 8 a.m.
They also are hoping to stage a “Mom’s Pantry” fundraiser and hold some raffles within the school.
