In addition to having one of its teams earn 9th place at the recent Battle of the Books, Vinton-Shellsburg also received a unique tribute, a letter of thanks and praise from the waitress who served them after the contest.
ELP teacher Jeff Mangold accompanied the students to the event in Cedar Falls on April 6 at the Cedar Falls Conference Center.
The team of girls from the 7th and 8th grade finished in ninth place. Team members were: Patience Kies, Tess Lillibridge, Caroline Erickson, Ellery Johnson, Cameron Dawson-Fink, Lizzie Noe - This team placed 9th and was made up of 7th and 8th graders. The 6th grade boys team also competed in the event. Those students are: Hugh Mangold, Aleric Weber, Carter Lamont, Max and Wyatt Janssen and Emmett Colsch.
Mr. Mangold explains the contest: "Each team read a total of 30 books together over a two month period, then competed against a total of 49 teams in Cedar Falls."
Click HERE to see a list of those 30 books.
After the contest the team members at at the Olive Garden, which Mr. Mangold calls the traditional VSMS Battle of the Books (BOB) eating place.
A few days later, the district received a letter from one of the waitresses there, praising the students for their manners.
"We received a letter from our waitress at the Olive Garden about how well-behaved our students were," says Mr. Mangold. "I was surprised by the letter but not the students' behavior. They are a great group of very respectful yet fun loving students. All I had to say was, 'Please use your manners and remember we are representing our school.' I was very proud of how they conducted themselves. We also talked about sales tax and tipping since they aren't usually used to paying at restaurants."
See the waitress's comments from her letter below:
My name is Laura and I work at the Waterloo Olive Garden. Today a group of kids and a teacher from Vinton Shellsburg came in after competing in the Battle of the Books at UNI. I had the pleasure of serving them and I wanted to let you know how well behaved the kids were!!
Unfortunately, when a group of tweens/teenagers walk through our doors it sometimes means we have to deal with kids who can be loud and disrespectful of others. Your students were the complete opposite! They were polite, kind, and just a pleasure to wait on. You have absolutely no idea how much that means to that me and my fellow servers!
I wanted you to know so you can recognize these kids and their instructor. You have a group of wonderful kids and if the rest of your students and faculty are similar to the group I met today, you should be very proud.
Thank you for your time and keep up the good work! I hope to see more of your students and faculty at the Olive Garden!!
Laura Stasko
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