GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. — Sacred Heart Academy in Grand Rapids is off for Spring Break this week, and when classes resume Monday, 42 students will have a quick turnaround as they travel to the path of totality thanks to an anonymous donation.
As we inch closer to the eclipse, you might be like Sean Nolan trying to remember when you last saw one yourself.
“I’m trying to remember with high school or middle school because I don’t remember exactly the grade, I just remember the experience of, like, it looks like twilight, but it’s two in the afternoon,” Nolan said.
He mentioned that was just partial eclipse — one he only partially remembers.
However, as the Headmaster at Sacred Heard Academy, he wanted to give his students an experience they would never forget.
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“I mean, this is part of our educational philosophy — when you have that experience for yourself. You don’t lose that because now it’s yours. You’ve had it. It’s not just an idea — it’s reality,” Headmaster Nolan said.
According to Nolan, the school has been trying to put together a plan since October, but wasn't sure how it was going to get 27 high schoolers and 15 eighth graders to Indianapolis. Then, a couple months ago, Sacred Heart Academy received an anonymous donation.
"It's one family," Nolan explained. "They're a wonderful family. We're really grateful for them."
"This doesn't happen often," he added. "We're not doing this next year. I don't know where the next solar eclipse will happen, right? But, we're not doing this again for quite a long time. So, they saw this opportunity is in front of us, and we either take it or it's gone. So, they did a really wonderful thing for us in giving this to us.”
Nolan said it was easy to determine which students would be able to go. Essentially, the way he put it, no one is getting left out.
Nolan said half the high schoolers were already planning to be in Alabama on a mission trip, so the remaining 27 will now have something of their own to look forward to.
As for the eighth graders at the school, they don't go on mission trips. Aside from the handful who declined the opportunity, everyone else (15 students) will take advantage of this opportunity.
The plan is to load up buses in front of the school at 7:30 Monday morning and head to the Indianapolis Motor Speedway before eventually coming back later that night.
That's more than four hours of one-way driving (8+ hours for the round trip) for fewer than four minutes of a total eclipse.
Nolan said every second will be worth it.
“To be able to see astronomy happening in front of you and not just read it in a book, or see what’s it like when it gets dark? We’ll go do it, go see it, go experience it for yourself,” Headmaster Nolan added.
For those 7th grade and below, the school has a different plan in place.
In a press release sent out Wednesday morning, Nolan said, "back at home in Grand Rapids, the remaining students and staff will line up outside in the school’s greenspace to watch the peak of the eclipse at approximately 3:11pm (approximately 93 or 94% at peak here in Grand Rapids). The part-time Classical Enrichment Course (CEC) students in grades 1-4, who usually only attended classes on campus on Tuesdays and Thursdays, will be making a special trip to school to join their counterparts in the full-time program for the afternoon 'viewing party.'"
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