Hello. My name is Danielle Hildebrand. My husband, T.J. and I teach at Sierra Avenue Elementary in Thermalito, California. Thermalito is a small rural and agricultural community west of the neighboring city of Oroville in unincorporated Butte County. Between the both of us, we have been teaching for 28 years. I teach fourth grade and T.J. teaches second grade. Sierra Avenue is a Title I school, which means many of our students come from a lower socioeconomic background.

Many of our students have experienced several hardships in their early childhood education. Butte County has one of the highest adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) rates in the state. (If you are interested to learn more about ACEs I urge you to visit http://helpcentral.org/buttethrives.)

Just imagine being a kindergartener or even a 6th grader only to be immediately evacuated from school because the Oroville Dam was in a critical stage of failure. February 2017 brought forth many challenges to come. Not only did the evacuation prevent our students from attending school, many had to evacuate their home and were displaced during this critical time in their early education. Notwithstanding the inherent ACEs factors unrelated to a natural disaster this was a regional issue with no immediate fix.

The administration and teaching staff were able to begin remote schooling. Not all of our students had access to the internet nor did they have computers to even participate in distance learning. Ultimately the district was able to provide Chromebooks and Hotspots, but as we all have come to find out, distance learning has been a challenge. Little did we know how important distance learning would become. No, I am not referring to Covid but the catastrophic Camp Fire in Paradise in November 2018. Again, many of our students and staff lived in Paradise and lost their homes. Due to this disaster, Sierra Avenue as did many of the region's schools, received students from Paradise which immediately impacted our student population. Kids not only had to deal with the loss of homes but immediately had to integrate to unfamiliar territory.

And just when we think we are getting back to a sense of normalcy, March 2020 arrives. Covid 19 created hardship for all of us, but especially our students who were probably thinking “what’s next.” Lower income students have experienced the greatest learning loss due to partial or remote learning attributed to the lack of resources and a stable home environment.

As a result, both T.J. and I have implemented a buddy program with our students. This informal program serves as a mentoring of the younger students. My 4th grade students mentor his 2nd grade students. This in itself has helped develop important skills such as leadership and teamwork. We also had planned many extracurricular activities for our students such as educational field trips, attending professional baseball games, pumpkins carving, and Easter egg hunts. With distance learning and ever changing Covid protocols, our students have missed out on these highly anticipated activities.

We start our school year on Tuesday (August 16th). We know our students anticipate returning to school to be with friends, classroom projects, field trips, classroom libraries, and prizes used to incentivize them to work hard. Many of T.J.’s students are now my students. We are a small school wherein students not only rely on school for attaining their early childhood education, but also for their participation in the Universal Meals Program for breakfast and lunch.

Our plan is to raise money to enhance our students' learning through hands-on experiences, field trips, and classroom activities, and prizes. These experiences really help students learn to develop a sense of pride in their school and help build self-esteem and be rewarded for their hard work throughout the school year. We really care about our student body and our Sierra Avenue staff works extremely hard to provide a high level of academics in a very challenging environment. So for those of you who can help T.J. and I raise money, it will be greatly appreciated by all. It will help us fund these activities that we would otherwise not be able to implement.