PROVO, UT (Good Things Utah) – After coming back from a holiday break to find their school with extensive flood damage, Treeside Charter School is looking for help to get back onto its feet. Iva Faulkner and Nadine Sundblom are teachers at the small school, and they joined us to talk more about their story.

Nadine came in to work on New Year’s Day to prepare for students to return to class. It was a Sunday, so she was the only one at the school. Upon her arrival, she immediately noticed water covering all the floors on the way to her basement classroom. After calling the school’s directors, she searched for the source of the flooding. Looking for a burst pipe or another issue in the plumbing, Nadine had no luck finding where all the water was coming from. As they later found out, the water was seeping in from the foundation walls due to the snow and rain. Teacher’s supplies, curriculum material, classroom flooring, and furniture were all ruined.

The water did $400,000 in damage to the property, and insurance can only cover $50,000. For a Title I school like Treeside, this news is devastating. The community needs the school to stay open and continue in-person classes. Teachers had to be flexible and make sacrifices to push through, making things as normal as possible in their conditions. This means they have been combining their classes into whatever rooms are available whether that be the cafeteria, the gym, or the small classrooms that survived the flooding.

Iva, Nadine, and the other staff, students, and parents from the school are reaching out to the public for help. A GoFundMe has been organized to raise money and bring a sense of normalcy back to their school days. If you want to help, search “Treeside” on the GoFundMe website or click here to be taken to the webpage. You can also find out more about the Treeside and what they do on their school website or Facebook page.