Students and staff at River HomeLink now have two brand-new filtered water bottle filling stations, thanks to a couple of enterprising seventh graders who recognized an issue and took action. During their sixth grade year, Chloe Schultz and Charis Ahrendt noticed the only drinking fountain in the entire building was near the main office.
“I always ran out of water in my water bottle really quickly,” Schultz said, adding that few people wanted to drink the water out of the sinks in the building.
The pair decided to write a letter and pass it around the school, highlighting the need for more clean drinking water sources. After collecting around 80 signatures, they handed the petition to the school’s principal, Matt Kesler.
“I’ll be honest with you guys, I set that letter down thinking, ‘I have no idea how to accomplish this,’” Kesler admitted, tearing up. But a few weeks later, he received a call from the school’s Parent-Teacher Organization.
“They said, ‘Hey, we have some funds. What can we do to help benefit the school?’” Kesler recalled. He recommended looking into whether it would be enough to fulfill the school’s wish for more clean drinking water.
“We priced it and we were like, ‘We can’t afford to do this,’” said former PTO President Melissa Wellborn. “Everywhere you looked, it was insane.”
But Kesler and the PTO decided to approach Battle Ground Public Schools Maintenance Supervisor John Parker about the plan. “They donated their time and labor, so that’s really how all of this was made possible,” said Wellborn.
“I use them all the time,” Schultz said of the filling stations. “I love it when I see other people using them and talking about it. It just makes me really, really happy.”
At the brief ceremony, Kesler had Chloe and Charis install a small plaque above each of the two filling stations. The plaques read “Donated by RHL PTO, 2023-24.”
“This all started with the seed you planted,” Kesler said to the group gathered for the event. “This is a beautiful moment where a lot of things have come together to make something happen that is actually super, super special.”
