Berney VIP

For nearly a decade volunteer Sharon Carter has been arriving at Berney Elementary each day to support teachers and students. Sharon, who grew up in Yakima and moved to Walla Walla in the 1980s, was recently honored by Volunteer in Person Coordinator Beth Swanson for logging 100 hours of volunteer service for this school year alone.

It’s normal to see Sharon at Berney one to three hours a day doing what she can to help out. She began volunteering at Berney when her granddaughter, who is now a freshman at Walla Walla High School, started school at Berney.

Sharon developed an efficient and easy to use system for teachers to submit tasks to support classroom learning like cutting paper, organizing materials and stocking supplies. Each grade level has a colored, plastic bin with folders for teachers to organize their requests. Sharon utilizes the staff workroom to complete all the jobs noted in the bins before returning them back to the classrooms for the teachers. She can tell right away when there is a job to be done by seeing the colorful flag she screwed into the side of the bin is raised. Sharon says she loves supporting the teachers who, in her words, “can use a hand.”

If you are interested in becoming a volunteer, visit the school district website and click on the VIP logo. Thanks so much to Sharon Carter for supporting the district’s Vision 2030 Strategic Plan through her unwavering partnership with the Berney Elementary community.