Karen McHale provides opportunity to M-S student to see D.C., Johnson to take over

By FRED KRONER
fred@mahometnews.com

Five years ago, Mahomet’s Karen McHale decided it was important for children to see in person some historic sights they had read about in history books or had watched on videos.

“I talked to a friend who was leading a trip to Washington, D.C. at the school district that she worked at,” McHale said. “At that time, I had a son (Jack) who was in eighth-grade and I thought it would be a wonderful opportunity for him to travel to Washington, D.C. and see many of the things that the kids have learned.

“I truly feel that it is so important to see our Nation’s Capitol and thought I could help provide that for some of the kids in Mahomet.”

Though she doesn’t teach at the junior high, McHale volunteered as a parent-chaperone for interested M-S students who had just finished eighth grade to take the trip, which is not a school-sponsored event.

McHale saw this as a multi-year commitment on her part.

“I truly enjoy traveling and I have loved getting to know Washington D.C.,” McHale said. “I have four kids and I planned to continue to lead the trip until this year when our youngest son (Alex) graduated from eighth-grade could travel as well.”

The most recent trip, which took place in June, included a special attraction. Arlington National Cemetery has always been a stop on the tour, but this year, M-S student Ava Eckley had the opportunity to look for a significant grave marker.

“I got to see my great-grandpa’s gravesite,” Eckley said.

Joseph Louis Ready (her paternal great-grandfather) was a Brigadier General in the U.S. Army in WWII. He was buried at Arlington in 1955.

“It was really important to me and I’m happy to have that memory,” Eckley said. “Not all of the members of my family have had the chance to do this.

“I was looking forward to the opportunity to find the grave.”

While Eckley had a specific highlight, other M-S students considered the whole trip to be memorable.

“I saw a lot more than I thought I could in three or four days,” Clayton Seal said. “There was not a bit I didn’t enjoy. I think everyone enjoyed about every single part.”

At one point, Eckley took out a $5-bill she had and held it in the air as she looked at the statue of Abraham Lincoln in the Lincoln Memorial.

“It was breathtaking to see this huge statue (approximately 19 feet in height) of one of our leaders and think the face can be put on a bill,” Eckley said. “It was definitely cool to be able to get out of the small town (of Mahomet).”

Seal had the same impression.

“When I see things in movies or pictures, I don’t realize how big it actually is,” Seal said.

For the group, it was a whirlwind chartered bus adventure, covering parts of five days.

While there was structure and a daily plan in place, the chaperones did not overschedule.

“I think Mrs. McHale and Mrs. (Amy) Johnson did a great job of letting us have our own time and letting us enjoy ourselves,” Eckley said. “I would recommend it to everyone.

“It’s an experience you may not get again. Everywhere you looked, there was something in our history. I had a lot more fun than I was expecting.”

Carter Johnson was another of the 52 M-S students on the D.C. trip. He had an idea of what to expect.

“My mom (Amy) has been to D.C. and I kind of knew a little about it,” Carter Johnson said, “but hearing about it and experiencing it are two different things.”

The students were under the supervision of three chaperones. For Eckley, that part of the experience was memorable.

“To go on a trip without your parents, and to be with your friends was very exciting,” Eckley said, “having a true experience with my friends and not just a family trip.”

For Carter Johnson, however, one of those chaperones was a parent, but he said that wasn’t a problem for his mom to be a part of the trip.

“It was a good experience,” Carter Johnson said. “She could help explain a little more about some things, and I still felt independent.”

More than a dozen other schools were touring the city during the same days M-S was in town.

“I met people in parts of the U.S. I didn’t know existed,” Alex McHale said.

The trip, he said, “exceeded my expectations.”

Alex McHale added: “It was awesome to see all the things I’d seen on TV and think, ‘I’m there.’

“It was fun to think, ‘This is what the history teachers were talking about.’ “

During her five years as M-S’ lead trip coordinator, Karen McHale made tweaks to the scheduling.

Working in conjunction with Worldstrides, an educational travel company, she said, “We developed the itinerary and schedule for the five-day adventure.  Each year I would add and delete things based on the kids’ reaction and what I felt was the best places and things to do and see within the D.C. area.”

The basic sights are unchanged annually, but in the last couple years, several additions made their way on the to-do list.

“We stopped on our way out, in Shanksville, Pa., at the Flight 93 Memorial. We went to the zoo to see the pandas and took a riverboat dinner cruise on the Potomac River,” Karen McHale said.

Among the other must-see sights were the memorials: Lincoln, Martin Luther King, WWII, Vietnam and Korean, the Holocaust museum, African American Museum (which opened two years ago), Ford’s Theatre, Pentagon Memorial, Arlington National Cemetery and Mount Vernon.

“We would stop at the White House and went into the Capitol and had a tour led by an Illinois Congressman,” Karen McHale said. “Congressman Rodney Davis gave us a VIP tour.

“For three years we have had the pleasure of being escorted around the capitol by interns of the Congressman and have gotten to go out onto the speaker’s balcony for a breathtaking view of the National Mall.”  

For Amy Johnson, the chance to travel as a chaperone in June served as a trial run for the next two years. She has agreed to help coordinate M-S’ 2020 and 2021 D.C. trips.

“I felt fortunate to have the opportunity,” Amy Johnson said. “It was good for me to take notes and to observe.”

One key to the trip is the almost constant movement from one location to another. There isn’t time to get bored.

“It’s really an overview,” Amy Johnson said. “You do as much as possible without stopping.

“I wish we could have done the Air and Space Museum, but we ran out of time.”

The three days spent in Washington were filled to capacity.

“We begin sight-seeing and go non-stop Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday, typically beginning the day with breakfast and on the bus around 7 a.m., not getting back to the hotel until 10 p.m. or after,” Karen McHale said.

Not everything goes according to the plan.

“Flexibility is the key to this trip,” Karen McHale said. “There is so much traffic and construction that we just never know when we will get to someplace.

“Oftentimes because of security reasons things are closed, like the White House, and we have to come back at a later time or day.”

Schools are assigned a tour guide, who helps with the daily logistics.

“I rely on the course leader, who is our travel guide, to help us stay on schedule,” Karen McHale said. “For three years I have had the same course leader, Ron Page.

“Ron is provided to us by Worldstrides, but because I know he is so wonderful, I have requested him to be our leader for the past three years.  We pick him up each morning and he takes us all over the city and area.

“He is so knowledgeable and teaches the kids so much in such a fun and personal way.  He becomes one of the highlights of the trip as well.”

Amy Johnson was impressed by the young M-S teen-agers’ ability to recognize the times to be serious and mindful of their surroundings.

One time was when the group visited the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum.”

“The eighth-graders were silent,” Amy Johnson said. “They put their silliness aside and owned the heaviness of the place.”

Karen McHale considered the Holocaust Museum an essential stop.

“I felt this was important as the students have studied this at great length in school,” she said.

Four M-S students also had the opportunity to participate in a wreath-laying ceremony at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier – Arlington National Cemetery.

They were:  Carter Johnson, Jamisen Jones, Alex McHale and Chloe Pruitt.

“It was crazy to think, ‘I’m doing this and a bunch of other schools are watching me,’ “ Alex McHale said.

“To see Carter have the opportunity was real emotional,” Amy Johnson added.

Schools, or groups, can request an appointment to participate in the wreath-laying ceremony.

Karen McHale initiated the request process months before the trip.

“I had worked with Worldstrides to get that appointment,” she said. “I was thrilled when we got a spot. Four kids got to be a part of the ceremony.

“I was so proud of them and how they represented Mahomet. It was really an overwhelming experience.”

Before she started overseeing the student trips, the Nation’s Capitol was a family destination for Karen McHale as a child.

“I went to Washington, D.C. with my family in 1976,” she said. “I would have been 11 years old. It was important for my parents to take my sister and I to Washington, D.C.

“We liked to travel and with it being the bicentennial year, my parents knew there would be a lot to see and learn.”

Karen McHale was able to get her entire family involved in the trips at one time or another.

Her son Jack went on the first trip she sponsored.

A year later, his older siblings (Nick and Catherine) went as chaperones while they were in college.

This year, not only did Alex attend, but Karen McHale’s husband Brendan was also another of the chaperones.

A reading specialist at Middletown Prairie working with kindergarten, first- and second-graders, Karen McHale has enjoyed her half-decade of chaperoning trips to D.C.

“I simply love to travel, love history and am an educator, so I put it all together to make this trip work,” she said.

The 2019 trip was meaningful beyond it being her final one.

“This trip was also especially fun because several of the student travelers had been in my first-grade class seven years ago,” Karen McHale said. “They hold a special place in my heart.

“I am thankful that the trip will continue and that many others may get the chance to experience traveling to Washington, D.C.”

The only “thank-you” she has needed came from watching the reaction of the students.

“They have so much fun,” Karen McHale said. “They sing and dance and laugh. They take tons of pictures and share this memory with their friends.

“I love that I have been a part of helping them makes some wonderful memories and learn something along the way.”

All M-S eighth-graders were invited to participate on the trip, but registration was on a first-come, first-served basis. After the bus was full, then all others were added to a waiting list to be included only if someone canceled. 

The approximate cost per traveler was $1,000.

The return trip is an overnight one, the bus leaving Washington, D.C., at 8 p.m. and arriving back in Mahomet around 8 a.m. the next morning, on a Friday.

For Alex McHale, Carter Johnson and Clayton Seal, their travels weren’t over.

“The boys had a baseball tournament (that weekend) in Michigan City, Ind.,” Amy Johnson said.