A Washington County tourist attraction is at the center of a yearlong project for the Washington Middle School Extended Learning Program (ELP).

Middle school ELP teacher Connie Svenby, art teacher Erin Almelien, and choir teacher Cailee Wenger presented their barn quilt project at the recent Washington School Board meeting. The project began with a student bus trip to see over 90 barn quilts that hang on a variety of farms, homes, and buildings around the county. By the end of the tour Svenby said the students were cheering on the quilts, and now each of the approximate 70 students have chosen one of the quilts to build a 12-by-12 inch wooden replica. They will create online content that can be scanned with a QR code with their own narration about the quilt with even some quilt-related background music chosen with the help of Wenger.

Svenby explained that they will also help update the Washington Chamber of Commerce’s county barn quilt map with locations not currently listed, and do a miniature installation of the map’s four loop routes. She is in talks with the City of Washington to pick a weekend in 2022 where they can host a mini tour event, “We would take those four loops and we would go to the UP (United Presbyterian) Home and say we would like to set up a trail through the UP, go to Halcyon [House], maybe around the square, and maybe at the Kewash [Nature Trail], four different loops. And then you could go to each of those, walk it as a family and then scan the code and you would have access to all that augmented reality and everything the kids did.”

Almelien mentioned this mini tour could be a great opportunity for those who can’t make the drive to all the existing quilts, especially those elderly. School Board Member Mindi Rees complimented the staff’s excitement for the project, but she asked how it would still challenge ELP students in the areas such as math and reading. Svenby and the other teachers shared that the students have already been using math and geometry to sketch the quilt designs, and will learn communication skills when making the online content, “Yes, we do the math and the reading and English, but a lot of times we miss those artistic kids also. And we have so many artistic kids in ELP. I get the parent that says that, ‘Well my kid is so artistic, how do I help them with that?’ So we’re trying to do everything in this project to make it so that we’re kind of encompassing all of it.”

The teachers hope the kids can incorporate interviews with the barn quilt owners into their presentations. Svenby, Almelien, and Wenger sported their own quilt t-shirts at the meeting, which some students have wanted to purchase themselves, showing the excitement for this county tradition.