By EMMA BARTLETT

Thanks to Adian Paplauskas, 14, St. Mary’s School now has an outdoor classroom.

“I wanted to do something that would benefit the school I’ve been going to since Pre-K,” said Paplauskas, who created the outdoor classroom for his Eagle Scout project.

Paplauskas is an 8th grader at St. Mary’s School and will attend Cranston High School West next year. He became a cub scout in third grade and said his dad had been a Boy Scout. Once Paplauskas moved through the ranks, he wanted to become an Eagle Scout.

Paplauskas said his favorite part of scouting is the campouts – mentioning that the past weekend he went on a camping trip in Plymouth, Massachusetts. His troop will also go to Camp Yawgoog in the summer.

While Eagle Scout is the highest rank a scout can achieve, Paplauskas said individuals can get Eagle palms which are merit badges. While he has completed his Eagle project as of April 23, Paplauskas must finish paperwork for his project and go before the board of review for the Narragansett Council. By the fall, he hopes to be an Eagle Scout.

For this project, Paplauskas approached Principal Lisa Lepore about his idea. She said when he asked her about it, she thought it would be a great opportunity.

On April 23, Paplauskas had 13 helpers who assisted him in putting together the outdoor classroom. It took five hours to clean up the area, put down mulch and put in the tables. Paplauskas had help from fellow scouts including Ryan Chase who also attends St. Mary’s School.

The outdoor classroom includes picnic tables, a white board and has an inviting sign welcoming individuals to the space. Paplauskas’s grandfather – who owns BORI (Balloons Over Rhode Island) Graphix – created the dry erase board and outdoor classroom sign for the school.

Lepore said she created a sign up list so teachers can put when they would like to use the outdoor classroom. She said once the weather turns, she expects all the classes (which range between 10 and 25 students) will want to go outside and use the space. Lepore mentioned during the pandemic students were outside most of the time and would sit on the school yard’s grass or concrete.

After the outdoor classroom was completed, St. Mary’s School had a small presentation and showed students the new area. The space will be kept as an outdoor classroom and cannot be used at recess.

Paplauskas said the benefits of having an outdoor classroom is that being outside is good for your health and provides a different atmosphere from the indoor classroom.

As for his favorite part of the project, Paplauskas said seeing the result put things in perspective from where the project started.

St. Mary’s School teaches students from grades Pre-K to eighth grade. The outdoor classroom has been around for a few weeks and Paplauskas said his class has already been able to use it.