Six Red Level Elementary School students showed leadership last month by challenging their peers and making an outdoor classroom possible.

Fifth graders Bryson Pate, Caylee Douglas, Jenna Foshee, Savannah Whitfield, Jentry Lee and Audrey Fowler formulated a plan to hold a coin war with the rest of the school for the month of February.

The group of fifth graders would collect cans with change from classrooms every Thursday and Friday. The class that raised the most money won the right to have a pizza party in the outdoor classroom once it’s built. Ms. Sara Robinson’s second grade class raised the most money. Overall, the school raised more than $1,000.

“My vision was for them to be able to go outside and sit under the awning, and have class and explore nature at the same time,” RLES special education teacher Jenny Henderson said. “A lot of teachers take students outside, but they have nowhere to sit and nowhere or instruct. I thought it would be a great idea to have this on campus, and then decorate it and keep it up.”

Through a 21st Century Grant, RLES purchased the materials needed to build the classroom, but needed funds to provide labor.

That’s where Pate, Douglas, Foshee, Whitfield, Lee and Fowler came into the picture.

They asked RLES principal Chris Thomasson if they could hold the coin war at school.

“We talked to Mr. Thomasson and he said he needed some money to build the outdoor classroom,” Foshee said.

Henderson said the school is still holding fundraisers to help finish its outdoor classrooms, but the idea for the coin war came from the students.

“They initiated the coin war and got it started, and did all of the work,” Henderson said. “They did the posters, cans for the classsrooms and did the fliers.”

Henderson said it was a collaborative effort.

The group of six students started planning this effort about a few weeks before the fundraising began, and extended it through this week to decide a second-place winner.

“If we had some money left, we could buy school equipment,” Douglas said

Henderson said the students wanted to make sure others know what’s going on at the elementary school and how the students are helping make it a good learning environment.

The outdoor classroom, which will be a nature house, will be built on the corner of the school where the big tree is located. Limbs will be cut to make room for the new addition, which will be housed in the tree’s shade.