On April 21, Great Mills High School held its 15th annual Hornet Culture Day at the school. This event is sponsored by the GMHS Parent Teacher Student Association.

This tradition gathered more than 230 students, parents, faculty and alumni who cleaned the entire school grounds. The volunteers planted trees and flowers, mulched, weeded, and removed old trees and branches. One of the corporate sponsors, Kohl’s department store, also sent employees from its local store to volunteer at Hornet Culture Day.

This event provided spring maintenance to beautify the school grounds and brought the school and community together in a positive and productive environment.

On behalf of the entire school, I would like to thank all of the Hornet Culture Day volunteers and would especially like to thank the following people and organizations who sponsored the event:

Applebees Restaurant, BJ’s Wholesale Club, Blazer’s Custom Construction, Chick-fil-A, Cornerstone Presbyterian Church, Dyson Building Center, Educational Systems Federal Credit Union, Endless Summer Tanning Salon, Great Mills Trading Post, Kim Butner, Shoppers Food Warehouse, Tidewater Dental, Town Creek Garden Club, Wendy’s Restaurant, Nancy Montano and Tim O’Connor, Jackie Snell, Mary Lusk, Trisha Post, Catherine Holden, Deb Bowen, and our fantastic principal, Jake Heibel.

GMHS parent Brandie Sparr (a master gardener) provides year-round gardening efforts and immense planning to coordinate Hornet Culture Day annually. We could not have successfully held this event without her dedication to our school and support to our students.

A very special thank you goes to Kohl’s department store for its generous sponsorship of this event. Without that support, this event would not have been possible. Kohl’s also sent five employees: Annette Buoncongiglio, Cindy Giebel, Stephen McLoughlin, Katie Parr and Gregory Holtz. They spent their Saturday working around the front area of the school near the marquee sign.

And finally, thank you to the fantastic students of Great Mills High School who came out and worked immensely well together. You make your parents, teachers and community proud with this project.

If you are a business or GMHS alumni and would like to support this event now or in future years, there is still an opportunity for you to sponsor a specific project of replacing the wooden benches outside our school with new ones made of recycled material. If you are interested in sponsoring a bench, please contact me to arrange donations at andrea.dyson414@gmail.com or 301- 904-6866.

Andrea Dyson, Great Mills

The writer was chairwoman of Hornet Culture Day.