Scout leads Mundelein bridge project

Students at Fremont Middle School in Mundelein will have more outdoor options this year, thanks to one of their own.

Over the summer, Boy Scout Patrick Wilkosz built a bridge behind the school at 28871 N. Fremont Center Road in Mundelein. The bridge, which was Wilkosz's Eagle Scout service project, will allow students access to a quarter-mile cross country path for meets, snowshoeing in the winter and science explorations in the pine forest.

The bridge spans a marshy area that had been difficult to cross. Now, students and staff can easily reach the woodlands that back up to the golf course at the Ivanhoe club.

Wilkosz, 13, of Wauconda, said he got the idea for the project after talking to the school's groundskeeper.

"I was talking to Mike Moon (groundskeeper at Fremont Middle School) and the original plan was to just put woods chips here, so I decided to build this bridge as my project."

Wilkosz constructed the bridge in about a week's time last month. An eighth-grader at the school, Wilkosz is a member of Boy Scout Troop 198.

The district foot the bill for the $1,246 bridge, which is 72 feet long, 6 feet wide and 1 foot off the ground.

Fremont District 79 already has an outdoor learning environment on its west campus behind the elementary and intermediate schools. The Lake County Forest Preserve District owns 40 acres of woodlands and prairie that the teachers take advantage of for science and physical education units.

Wilkosz's bridge will allow the middle school teachers to enjoy the same type of learning environment on the east side of the campus.

Fremont District 79 is a kindergarten-through-eighth-grade district serving 2,147 students living in Mundelein, Wauconda, Hawthorn Woods, Grayslake, Ivanhoe, Round Lake, Round Lake Park, Long Grove and Libertyville.