If cleaning isn't your thing, consider enjoying an action-packed day of math.

Middle school students from throughout the South Sound will compete in the annual Washington State Middle School Math Olympiad on Saturday, May 2.

Truman Middle School, 5801 N. 35th St., will host the competition, the same as it has since 2003. The Washington State Math Council (WSMC) sponsors the competition for math lovers in fifth through eighth grades.

Teams compete in six test components. There's a long-session problem and five short-session problems in number sense, probability and statistics, measurement, geometric sense and algebraic sense, according to a Tacoma School District news release.

More than 75 teams are expected at Truman, making it the largest math olympiad competition in the state this year.

For more information, check out www.wsmc.net/olympiad.

Here's a few more details about an event that I briefed in the paper version of The News Tribune earlier this week:

Organizers are hoping 1,500 volunteers young and old will show up to tidy up Tacoma’s Eastside this Saturday (May 2).

Already, 1,200 students, families and other community members have signed up to clean around schools and along safe walking routes to schools from 9 a.m. to noon in the 2009 Eastside Clean Sweep project, according to a Tacoma School District news release.

Four St. Vincent DePaul trucks will be stationed throughout the Eastside community to collect used furniture and other salvageable donations. After the clean-up, Clean Sweep participants can enjoy a free barbeque, family activities and entertainment at a community celebration and awards ceremony 12:30 to 2 p.m. at Stewart Middle School, 5010 Pacific Ave.

Schools participating in the clean-up include: Boze, Blix, Fawcett, Lister, Lyon, McKinley, Roosevelt and Sheridan elementary schools; Gault, McIlvaigh and Stewart middle schools and Lincoln High School.

A high school student from the Division 34 Kiwanis and Key Club has collected nearly 2,000 children books that will be distributed at the event.

The Clean Sweep planning committee includes the Tacoma Public Schools, First Creek Neighbors, Tacoma Police Department, Tacoma Housing Authority, City of Tacoma, Boys and Girls Club, Kids at Hope, Safe Streets and the Puyallup Tribe.

The clean-up is supported with a $5,000 grant from the Eastside Neighborhood Advisory Council (ENACT) and another $5,000 from the Puyallup Tribe. For more information or to volunteer, contact Kate Frazier at 253-571-1347.

Debby Abe, The News Tribune

The Orting School District’s spring lahar drill, which typically takes place the first week of May, will be delayed this year.

Orting City Manager Mark Bethune said that although the drill was originally scheduled for Tuesday, it probably will take place a couple of weeks from now instead.

City and school district officials had difficulty coordinating this year's spring drill in part because they're still figuring out whether they have the ability to activate the city’s five lahar sirens themselves, Bethune said.

During many past drills, the state or the county has activated the sirens.

The city will run its own silent test of the warning system on Monday to see if it works, Bethune said. The customary live drill involving students evacuating the Orting Valley on foot will most likely occur sometime later this month. Another will occur as usual in fall.

Officials will give citizens advance notice of when the spring drill is to be rescheduled, Bethune said.

About 1,500 students from various Bethel School District campuses staged walkouts to protest teachers losing their jobs today.

To show their support, they all wore black. One principal called it “Black Friday.”

The school district, facing up to a $12 million shortfall in its $160 million annual budget this year, issued layoff notices to 220 educators early this week. Those numbers are something of a worst-case scenario, however, and it's unlikely so many will actually be out of a job next fall.

Talk and text messages about a protest began to flood through the student body during the week.

The gist of the messages: walkout Friday, wear black.

Shortly before 8 a.m., today, waves of students at Bethel High, Graham-Kapowsin High, Bethel Junior High, Spanaway Lake High and Frontier Middle School walked out of their classrooms, according to the district.

Devin Hannold, a sophomore at Graham-Kapowsin High, was one of them. He said students like their teachers and realize how important they are to be successful.

“It’s easier to get passing grades when you have teachers you like," he said.

The 16-year-old said about 400 students at his school gathered in the Graham-Kapowsin parking lot and began to walk around the school building. They made their way to the football field and walked around the track before marching the school grounds again.

By the time the first lunch bell rang around 10:30 a.m., some teachers came from inside the building and warned that the protesters wouldn’t be able to eat lunch, he said. Some kids then went inside.

Around noon, between 30 and 40 students remained. They were warned that if the protest didn’t stop, they could receive suspensions, Hannold said.

There were still a few people walking to support the teachers by 1 p.m., he said.

At Bethel High, about 500 students walked out.

Principal Wanda Riley said the students left class about 7:45 a.m. and peacefully marched to Art Crate Field, some carrying signs with messages like “Save our teachers.”

Bethel School Board member Joy Cook then came and spoke to the students for about an hour. After that, most students returned to class about 9 a.m.

About 60 students remained protesting outside the school into the afternoon. None who participated are being punished, Riley said.

“They’re still peaceful,” she said. “They’re supporting one another. They just love their teachers.”

Riley added that she didn’t know of any Bethel High teachers who participated in the walkout, though some were present for supervision purposes. Those teachers also wore black.

“We called it ‘Black Friday,’” Riley said. “I don’t know who coordinated it.”

The school district reports that between 400 and 500 students at Bethel Junior High, 50 students at Spanaway Lake High School and about 30 students at Frontier Junior High staged similar walkouts.

“Basically the students all wore black today and they wanted to support their teachers by walking out for a little bit,” district spokeswoman Krista Carlson said.

Carlson said no schools are taking disciplinary actions against the students.

“Our students are entitled to their opinions,” Carlson said.

She added that school officials were expecting the walkouts.

“We knew there were rumblings that this might be happening today," Carlson said. "We were not unaware.”
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News Tribune reporters Brent Champaco and Melissa Santos contributed to this story.

A long, ascending ramp that could be seen throughout the Orting Valley is among the latest proposals for a pedestrian bridge to take Orting school children out of the path of a lahar.

An engineering firm is completing initial design work for the proposed Bridge For Kids, which would guide students from four Orting schools across the Carbon River and to higher ground.

The Bridge For Kids group has been working for almost 10 years to secure funding and complete studies for the evacuation route, which they say is necessary to get students and other Orting residents off the valley floor in the event of a volcanic mudflow from Mt. Rainier. Bridge for Kids volunteers say too many cars would flood the roadways for citizens to safely evacuate in the 40 minutes it would take the debris to reach the city.

Volunteers working on the project presented a few rough design options to the Orting City Council Wednesday night.

“At this point, we’re going through the engineering process of just saying, ‘What are the options?’” said Chris Fowler, president of the Bridge for Kids group.

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Just got off the phone with Lakewood City Manager Andrew Neiditz, who said he learned of the possible swine flu at Lakes High about 5 a.m. this morning.

He said he's confident the Tacoma-Pierce County Health District is taking the right steps, which started with the closure of Lakes High.

So far, the news isn't affecting city business. "At this point, we're not closing any operations," Neiditz said.

I asked whether there was a concern of other students possibly with swine flu and whose symptoms weren't detected going out into the community on what's turned into a day off.

Neiditz said he hopes parents would take the initiative and keep kids who show signs of the flu home.

"The concern I have is containment," he said. "That's the concern of every parent and every resident in Lakewood."