Since 1985, students at Wheeling Park High School have worked in partnership with employees at Wheeling's nationally-renowned Oglebay Park to create dozens of dynamic lighted displays. Displays constructed by students for the park's Winter Festival of Lights including the Candy Cane Wreath, The Twelve Days of Christmas and Willard the Snowman help to attract more than one million visitors to Wheeling each Holiday Season. The displays span more than 300 acres over a six-mile drive through the scenic resort.
Students learn how to apply what they learn from textbooks and in class to a real-world project.
According to Randy Worls, chief executive officer of the Oglebay Foundation, the project began in 1985 as an effort to entice more visitors to visit Oglebay during its off season. He recognized the opportunity for students to be involved in a wonderful service-learning project. We base these figures on actual retail sales tax figures, not some convoluted multiplication formula. Believe it or not, one local ice cream store now sells more ice cream in December than it does in August because of this project. George Krelis, principal at Wheeling Park High School, said that the project has made a significant difference in students' lives a difference that can't always be measured in dollars and cents.