WHS varsity football athletes serve as mentors for third-grade players

By Jolene Bailey

Within the Windham school community, students are offered opportunities to interact with not only their classmates in the grade they attend, but with every grade.

Members of Windham High School's Varsity Football Team
served as mentors for students in the Windham Primary 
School's third grade class of Savannah Lemieux this
fall. The football players stressed the importance of
academics for student-athletes.
PHOTO BY JOLENE BAILEY

“I had an idea early in the school year to connect the high school football players with my third-grade football players. I had been asking around about the best way to do this” said Savannah Lemieux, a Windham Primary School teacher.

Lorraine Glowczack’s name was shared with Lemieux a few weeks later. Glowczak is the Director of Community Connections for Windham schools. She is also the coordinator for the WHS capstone project and extended learning opportunities available to high schoolers. She then connected a handful of high school football players who were interested in helping Lemieux.

The mentorship of varsity athletes with Windham Primary School students reinforced the lesson that being a student takes priority before athletics.

“This mentorship connects to the habits of work rubric. Prior to meeting the high schoolers, my students came up with questions for them,” Lemieux said. “My students wanted to learn about how important it was to keep good grades, take school seriously, and finish their work. The high schoolers stressed the importance of being a student before an athlete and discussed what it meant to be a student athlete.”

High school athletes practice the importance of time and stress management balancing out school life, athletic life, and their own personal life. Those are all critical and crucial skills important for growing minds to learn.

“I think for both the older and younger students they both walked away feeling like it was a great experience,” Lemieux said. “There was lots of laughter and connections made because of their shared interest in football.”

The high school students said that people look to them to be role models on and off the field. They said setting an example for your peers and touching upon picking each other up and supporting others when you fall down are crucial for young kids to learn.

“I have used this experience as a reminder when they don’t want to do work in class, and it has been a great motivator for them. I hope they were able to take away the feeling of pride in how hard they have worked to be where they are today,” said Lemieux.

The older students took the time to explain the importance of school in a student perspective rather than a teacher’s way that had come across more effectively to some students at a level that they understood.

“My students haven’t stopped talking about how fun it was and how cool they thought the older students were,” Lemieux said. “After seeing how successful it was this time, I will be looking to find other ways to make these connections.”

She said that connections throughout the community can go a long way in one’s individual life and having positive role models builds personal growth. <