Tolman coming in for a landing.

LaVerkin Elementary students waited with anticipation, and they looked straight up in hopes of catching a glimpse of Mr. Tolman as he jumped out of a Cessna airplane on Wednesday. The Principal has been rallying the children to collect pennies for the cube in the hall towards the leveled reading library this year. It has been filled twice, accumulating $5,000. Mr. Tolman says he just wanted to do something exciting that would get the kids to want to participate in such an event. With a head cold, harsh weather and a rainy day the day before, it looked as if his plane jump would once again be rescheduled. But it was smooth sailing all the way down as the Principal and Rick with Skydive Zion used the tandem procedure to make their jump. The instructor stated at an assembly earlier in the day that they would be falling from 2 miles up, around 11,500 feet. They would do a 120 mph freefall for 45 seconds and then when reaching 5,000 feet, pull the ripcord. This entire wild ride will last 3 to 5 minutes. There was particular excitement when the parachute did a complete loop-de-loop!

The last 1,000 feet is spent getting lined up and ready for landing. Mr. Tolman was ready. With a worried look on his face, and knees up to his chin, they slid on their rears to a complete stop. Rick said he could hear the children applauding and shouting from “way up there.” When asked what he thought of his adventure, Mr. Tolman stated “At first, when I jumped, my stomach fell and I thought WOOOAHH, but then it was kinda fun!” The children thought Mr. Tolman was very brave to jump out of a plane, and a few said that they were proud of him to do something that exciting for their school. There were banners from each class cheering him on, and Farmer’s Market came and supported our school by donating ice cream to all the children.

The money from the penny cubes will be used for books this year to help the reading library. These books are based on levels that will be more in tune with each individual child’s reading level. The school hopes to be able to buy enough books to cover the reading program.

So send your pennies to school. It doesn’t take much if we all work together to make a big difference in our children’s education. Besides, I wonder what Mr. Tolman might do NEXT???