form of butterfly garden

Graduating classes at a school usually leave their marks on the school as they exit it for the “real world”. They engrave their memories in the halls and (sometimes) their names on the walls. Underclassmen, in their turn, must usually wait to engrave their own marks on the school when it’s their senior year.

That’s not the case with the Richard Winn Class of 2012. This group of eighth graders have acted to leave their own mark on the school for years to come, and they did it by honoring those who have gone before them.

Class student government officers Emily Locklair, Alex Maass, Rebekah Phillips and advisors Martha Ladd and Michelle Brown explained.

What they have done is created a butterfly garden, an oasis amid all the chaos that’s normal in a school. The garden is located in one of the small courtyards outside of the building on the

“We created the butterfly garden in memory of all the students, faculty and friends that have passed at RWA,” said Emily Locklair.

“We read the book, The Red Kayak, by Priscilla Cummings, and were inspired by a passage in the book where the main character’s mother plants a butterfly garden in memory of her deceased infant daughter,” she said.

The concepts in the book made the students do a lot of soul-searching, said class advisor Martha Ladd, and the students decided planting a butterfly garden was a good way to memorialize their own losses in the RWA family.

“We started researching about gardens and butterflies and what sort of plants attract them,” said Emily.

“Then we decided how were we going to pay for it,” added Rebekah Phillips.

“We decided on a Talent Show. We hadn’t had a talent show since Mrs. Tant (one of the teachers the school lost, who is memorialized by the butterfly garden-she was also a student government sponsor) had passed, so we decided to do one,” she said.

The Talent Show was a Student Government fundraiser, Martha Ladd explained. The members of the Class of 2012 worked the Talent Show. All 23 members of that class have contributed something to the project.

The class got advice from Clemson Extension Agent Mark Talbert and a representative from Monticello Gardens and Nursery talked to them about butterflies and the plants that attract them.

Wanting to make this a whole-school project, the Class bought books on butterflies for the library, so the younger grades could study about them as well.

Then, armed with recommendations as to what sort of plants to plant, the class held a workday, along with members of the Winnsboro Garden Club, and created the garden.

Teacher Michelle Brown served as Martha Ladd’s right hand and helped with the talent show.

Emily Locklair said it’s the Class of 2012’s dream that, “when the butterflies come to the garden, it will be like the people we have lost coming back, and we will remember them through that,” she said.

“We have had a lot of recent deaths here in our RWA family,” said Martha Ladd, “when you go back to the the year Mrs. Tant died, it was the also the year Ry Foster died, and Lisa Stevenson was killed that december, and we’ve had David Coleman (Lou Ann Coleman was one of our teachers here) and seems like, we’ve had one right after another, Ally Douglass last year, and the most recent was Charlie Beach, one of the founding fathers of the school, he passed away this school year. We just wanted to do something to remember them, and to beautify the school,” said Martha Ladd.

“The kids eat lunch here and hang out here, and now they'll have a little more respect for this space,” said Michelle Brown.

The garden will have a small, circulating waterfall as well as the plants to attract the butterflies and a guardian angel statue. It also has a solar-powered fountain. A plaque will memorialize the garden in honor of all those who have gone before.

Class of 2012 officers are JulieAnne Bennett, president, Alex Maass, vice president, Emily Locklair, treasurer, Rebekah Phillips, student government representative, Colie Rowe, student government representative and McNair Coleman, secretary.

Martha Ladd said she is impressed with her eighth graders.

“I think this is awesome. I am very proud of them, for their work ethic and dedication to the project. They’re a good group of kids.”

Michelle Brown added, “everyone has really put a lot into this project, and you can’t always get this kind of effort out of kids this age. But this means a lot to them.”