Valentine Elementary students were able to check out the school’s new Stepping Stones site with their families during an informal viewing ceremony before Monday evening’s Ice Cream Social to see the 125 unique hand-decorated works of art.
The stepping stones were recently installed by San Marino Unified School District’s maintenance staff, near the Valentine Elementary Library & Kindergarten Playground.
Students decorated the stepping stones this past spring by making handprints, special designs and inscriptions in the cement, and placing glass stones on them.
The opportunity was made available for families to purchase the stones for children to decorate at a fundraiser in conjunction with the 2015 Fall Fair. The project raised $12,300 for the school.
“We wanted to do something special and help out with the event,” Stepping Stones co- chair Alice Song said. “We tried to do something different that has never been done before and we came up with the idea.”
“It’s great for the kids to be able to come back year after year to see their artwork,” Stepping Stones co-chair Michiko Lee said.
“Your kids can measure their handprints,” 2015 Valentine Fall Fair co-chair Dennis Fong added.
Brent Bilvado, who also was co-chair of the 2015 Valentine Fall Fair, said the credit for the project should go to Caroline Fong, Lee and Song.
“They were the ones who came up with the concept,” he said. “They implemented it. They got us out there mixing concrete on the spring days. And they were here over the summer to make sure the installation got completed.”
Stepping Stones coordinators also expressed appreciation to 2015-16 Valentine PTA President Alison Moller, Principal Colleen Shields and Jim Fahey, the SMUSD’s director of Maintenance & Operations for their help with the project.
In addition to being a school beautification project, the new Stepping Stones site is meant to help with the drought. Previously, there was grass in the area. The stepping stones are surrounded by smooth pebbles.
Metal benches will be installed along the edges of the Stepping Stones site at a later date.
