For Service Learning this year a group of about thirty students volunteered their community service hours to give a helping hand to Bee Tree Park.

Over time, honeysuckle plants have invaded areas of the park, threatening native missouri wildlife. Honeysuckle is not a native plant to Missouri and Bee Tree park had an influx of it in certain areas. Students were given the opportunity to hack away at trees and help mend the wildlife back to the state it was meant to be in. Talk about having a green thumb.

“I like it,” Kimmy Komrska said, “it feels nice to be in nature, helping nature. It’s nice to help out.”

For first year teacher Mrs. Oesh, removing honeysuckle is more than just second nature to her. Oesh used to sell and install plants and is currently teaching Biology and Meteorology here at Oakville. Oesh was the one that informed our staff about the harms of honeysuckle, it outcompetes Missouri’s wildflowers.

Oesh describes the student’s hard work;

“They cleaned out the first area so quickly. they’re losing fire. They’re used to sitting in desks all day, they’re not used to being out working, but they’re doing good and having fun.”

Students were scheduled to work in Bee Tree for roughly three hours. By the time they were finished, their hard work seemed to paid off. Mr. Kuchno describes the experience as “refreshing to see students get out and work hard to help their community. The guy that worked at the park was absolutely blown away. He said words cannot describe how valuable our work today is.”

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