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Washington School seventh graders put seasonal cheer on walls, on glass for holiday

KEARNY – When five savvy seventh graders came to the art teacher at Washington Elementary School, Mrs. Jillian Pulcine, with the urge to decorate the entire school for the holidays, she was, quite frankly, shocked. After getting the word out to the rest of the class, the budding project would include eight more eager students wanting to get into the act. What was compelling about the endeavor was that it would be extracurricular and done on the student own time before classes began – they all came to Pulcine’s classroom 8:10 to 8:40 a.m. two to three times a week to put the various decorations together and to brainstorm on new ideas as well as the traditional.

The baker’s dozen has covered many areas around the school with a variety of holiday decorations and gave the school’s perimeter windows some dashing up. They worked on 72 windows on Woodland Avenue; 60 windows on the school’s main entry; and approximately 50 interior classroom windows for teachers – almost 200 windows when they were finished with that end of the project.

The artsy adolescents will even provide the sparkle for the auditorium as well as its tree in order to give the school’s Dec. 23 Christmas concert its decorative due.

“It’s just amazing that they are so enthusiastic and did not die down,” Pulcine said. She is in her first year at the school and also teaches at Schuyler Elementary School on Schuyler Avenue. Previously she was a high school teacher in Lakewood but has come up through the Kearny School system and is happy to be on home turf.

“The high school students are always under peer pressure but at this grade the students are open to anything. They have no preconceived notions and are not self conscious,” she said. “They’re willing to try anything.”

The starter students are Bianca Torales, Karina Santos, Valeria Siquenza, Noemi Campos and Giovanna Silva.

“I felt we could make the school prettier with the decorations for the holidays,” Campos said. “When we first asked about it I didn’t think so many students would come to help out.”

Most of the children chimed in about being happy to make the school look good and take an active part in it.

“Everybody was talking about – it was really fun to do,” Carolina Souza said. “We got to meet new people that we never talked to before.

The rest of the go-getters included Grace Rojas, Stephanie Solano, Kinga Niedzielski, Tiara Pineda, Sebastian Cabrejas, Carolina Souza, Raquel Vizcaino, Mariana Lopez and Trinidad Cordero.

“It was very cool to help out. Hanging up the snowflakes was good,” Cordero said. “I made them!”

Pulcine replaced John Giardina when he retired after 46 years at Washington School. He was her art teacher when she was at Lincoln School in 1995.

“He was the one who got me into art,” Pulcine said. “It’s an honor to have his position now.”

Second grade Michelle Brinkmeyer, who came up through the Kearny system with Pulcine, has taken on the duty to laminate all the beautiful holiday objet d’art. The 3D snowflakes that have three pages of how-to instructions used to be created by the PTA but no more. The experimental troupers have used everything from glitter, glitter spray, put lights on yarn and many other cool 2D decorations like penguins and snow globes.

The decorations are aimed at holiday winter themes so as to not exclude other religions. Plus, they can then be used through throughout the season.

Principal Mrs. Mary Costello congratulates Pulcine in motivating the seventh graders.

“These things used to be done in class and now they are happy to use their freetime. Some of them even took them home,” Costello said. “It’s nice to see them be so consistent.”

As a reward the principal will have a special breakfast for the students nextweek, which she will make herself at the school – pancakes and all the accouterments.