11/18/09 Redmond

By Doug Johnson

At the beginning of the school year, the Redmond School District adopted a four day school week, leaving a need for alternative activies for students on their day off. That's when Choice Fridays began, a partnership of Redmond Area Parks and Rec., the city council, local Boys and Girls Clubs and others, all providing students with something to do, and a place to go. Right now there's thirty different programs. Elias Ulvi runs the RUSH Soccer program, which has about forty to sixty students each week.

"It's a great learning experience, you know you learn how to interact, you learn how to problem solve, the healthy factor of getting out there and running," Ulvi says.

Nine weeks after Choice Fridays began, about five hundred students have started to participate. But that's only seven percent of the roughly seventy one hundred students in the district without class on Friday. Now the program is trying to find ways it can grow, focusing more on what students want.

"What they're interested in, how they can get credits out of them, either for college graduation or clubs, as well as any input they can provide in their future," says Jamie Christman, spokesperson for Choice Fridays.

Only about four of the programs don't charge. The rest range from about five to twenty five dollars each Friday.

"We want to make sure it's inclusive, for as many students as we can, some can afford it, some can not, so to do that that means there needs to be scholarships," Christman says.

Bill Dahl runs Global Nomads, which pairs international students with others who go on hikes and take pictures. It sees thirty to forty students each week.

"And our group has been growing in numbers every two weeks," Dahl says.

Dahl believes word of mouth and starting a facebook page is the way to attract more students. Others hope to follow his lead.

"Hopefully by word of mouth, with the kids that are involved already, letting their friends know about the program," Ulvi says.