Students from Spring Hill Middle School were treated to a recent trip to the Time Warner Cable Arena in Charlotte to see the Charlotte Bobcats take on the Memphis Grizzlies in a preseason game.

Middle schools all across the state were invited to bring students to the arena for this game. Sixty seven students from Spring Hill Middle that are participating in a new program to improve reading skills entitled, “Step Up”, were invited to attend this event.

Spring Hill students earned their way to the game by staying focused, attentive, and hard working during their “Step Up” classes. Students boarded buses at 6:15 and headed to Charlotte for the 10:30 a.m. game.

After arriving at the arena, Dan Hersey, P.E. teacher at Spring Hill was approached by a Bobcats’ representative to ask if our students could participate in the half time show.

After the first quarter, our students went “backstage” for instructions on how to play “Simon Says.”

Students went onto the court at half time and played the game, boys against the girls. The last student remaining from each group then played against the mascots from all of the professional teams in Charlotte. Winning students were Shykeim Oliver and Jataveya Anderson.

Students were provided a Bobcats drawstring bag, workbook and pen along with a free lunch while at the game. Unfortunately, the Bobcats lost in the final second of the game to the Memphis Grizzlies.

“With the loss of funding from the state for after school tutoring this year, the leadership team met this summer to decide how we could still help our students improve their reading skills even with the loss of our after school programs," Spring Hill principal, Beth Ammons said. "We decided to provide time during the school day to work with students on specific reading strategies. Each day, students attend Step Up classes conducted by all of our core academic teachers. We felt that it was important to reward our students for working hard to improve. That’s what the Bobcats trip was all about. Around here, hard work pays off!! I would also like to say that we had a lot of compliments on how well behaved our students were at the game. That made me really proud. We are looking forward to providing our students with another similar opportunity in December."