Link Crew students from SOSS prepare for their Haunted House project that runs from 6-8 p.m. on October 31. (Photo by Keith Lacey)
It promises to be a very scary and fun Halloween night in Oliver with the return of the “Haunted House” project spearheaded by a group of 26 leadership students at Southern Okanagan Secondary School.
Students from the Link Crew leadership program convinced teacher Alison Podmorow to bring back the Haunted House after a hiatus as a means of providing quality family fun.
“Because of the fire at the school, we hadn’t hosted a Haunted House in a couple of years and thought it would be great to bring it back this year,” said Link Crew student Devon Nemeth, who along with good friend Colton Thomsen, have been selected team leaders for the Haunted House.
For the past two weeks, all 26 students in the Link Crew program have been spending much of their time in the band room turning it from a wide open space into an enclosed and claustrophobic haunted house.
On Halloween night the students will be dressed in their wildest, ghoulish outfits to scare and entertain people.
Podmorow said the Haunted House project was a big success at SOSS for six years, but had to be abandoned when the school was gutted due to a huge fire in 2011.
Because of its success, Podmorow arranged to have the Haunted House continue at the Oliver pool for two years.
“We’ve been on a bit of a hiatus the past couple of years because we just moved into the new school and there wasn’t really any place to set up a haunted house,” she said. “The kids in my class were the ones who spearheaded this and wanted to bring it back. They’ve done all the hard work.”
Music teacher Lisa Ante deserves a shout of appreciation for agreeing to turn over the music room for more than three weeks and teach her music theory classes in another classroom at the school.
On Oct. 31, students from Osoyoos Elementary School and Tuc-el-Nuit School, as well as Grade 8 students from SOSS, will be invited to “take a sneak peek” at the haunted house during school hours.
Starting at 6 p.m., members of the community will be able to receive some chills and thrills by taking the 10 to 15-minute tour.
“We are going to be accepting donations because it cost quite a bit of money to put on this production,” she said.
Her leadership students have been a pleasure to work with on this project and she’s proud that so many people from the community will be able to enjoy a happy Halloween because of their hard work.
“Community service is a big part of what this leadership class is all about,” Podmorow said. “Each of our students must complete 20 hours of community service and they are all eligible to count the four hours from Halloween night towards those community hours,” she said. “A big part of what we do in this class is about giving back to your community.”
Thomsen said he and Nemeth have had a great time working on this project.
“We’ve tried to give the kids jobs that they will enjoy and allow them to work beside their best friends,” said Thomsen. “You tend to get more work done when you’re working with friends … we’ve had a blast working on this.”
By Keith Lacey
