Meadow Lakes Elementary students earn medals

JEREMIAH BARTZ/ Frontiersman sports editor

WASILLA - A group of Meadow Lakes Elementary students had the opportunity to take part in a unique set of athletic events earlier in the semester.

The Meadow Lakes students were among 600 athletes who competed in the 2006 Junior Native Olympic State Championships at the Wells Fargo Sports Center on the University of Alaska Anchorage campus.

A pair of students from Meadow Lakes earned medals at the championships, and seven placed in the top eight.

First-grader Brianna Thronsen earned a gold medal in the stick pull, and second-grader Sierra Plumb received a silver in the same event.

Second-grader Jade King finished fourth in the seal hop, and fifth-grader Ariana Hansen was fourth in the scissors broad jump.

A pair of fourth-graders finished eighth. Damien McMahon was eighth in both the two-foot high kick and leg wrestling, while Vicky Baybado was eighth in leg wrestling.

Hank Foster, a physical education teacher at Meadow Lakes, taught in the Anchorage School District for 14 years before moving to the Valley. Each year in Anchorage, Foster said, he included events from the Native Youth Olympics in his curriculum and would take a group of students to the annual games. Now Foster hopes he has started a tradition at Meadow Lakes. Foster plans to continue to include these games in his curriculum, and give his students the opportunity to experience something different in elementary physical education.