By Cathy Spaulding
Sixth-grader Kayla Royse said she didn’t have a decent playground set for all the years she spent at Irving Elementary School.
“I just walk around and be bored during recess,” she said. “I didn’t think I could ever get to see a playground set that was fun.”
When Kayla and other Irving students come back to school this August, they’ll have a new set — yellow and Rougher green, complete with humpy slides, towers and spiral ladders.
Irving school administrators and Parent Teacher Organization members said hard work and good fortune helped them raise the thousands of dollars to buy and put up the playground set.
Irving, however, faced an extra challenge because of its high poverty rate, Irving principal Dr. Pam Bradley said. In 2007, 87 percent of Irving students were on free or reduced lunch. Tony Goetz Elementary, where Bradley used to be principal, had a 60 percent of its students on free or reduced lunch. The district average was 75 percent on free and reduced lunch; the state average, 56 percent.
The school also had no parent teacher group at the start of the school year, Bradley said. She said a group of women got together to set one up again. They included Delana Scoggins, president; Tedra Willis, vice president; Charity Royse, secretary and Laura Wiseman, treasurer.
The group’s first challenge was to improve the school’s playground. The school, 1100 N. J St., had no basketball goals and concrete where kids played soccer. Bradley said the only pieces kids could play on were monkey bars, which were too big for smaller kids.
The school used to have a wooden playground set, but that had been disassembled because kids kept getting splinters.
“I heard they had been talking about getting a new set for nine years,” said Bradley, who just finished her first year at Irving. “This time, we didn’t just talk.”
The school started with a goal of raising $53,000.
However, the PTO had no money, Charity Royse said. “We had some fundraisers that had worked for other people, we tried a garage sale. Hopefully, it will be better planned this year.”
Royse said one reason Irving had problems raising money was that the PTO did not have a 501(c)(3) tax number, designating it as a non-profit organization and qualifying it for tax-exempt donations.
“We found it was going to take us up to $1,700 to get it,” she said. “We hope to get the status by July.”
Wiseman said the school held 19 fundraisers through the year.
Area organizations started to help. Masonic Lodge 430 co-hosted a spaghetti supper. The Modern Woodmen of America sponsored a bean dinner. Both organizations matched the money raised, Bradley said.
Royse said that, with the original goal still beyond reach, Irving found a smaller playground set at less than half the cost of the first set.
Another breakthrough came in December, with the closing of Memorial Christian Church, 4200 W. Okmulgee Ave. Proceeds from the sale were divided among the church’s 16 remaining members, on the condition they pass their money to a non-profit organization. Member Rose Hammer donated her share — $10,000 — to the school.
“When you put great people together, great things happen,” Bradley said. “Other people read about our efforts. People who had formerly attended Irving read about us and offered to help.”
So did others: Barry Love of Love Bottling; Lillian Jayne, the Realtor; and Budo Perry in Fort Gibson stepped in and made generous donations.
Overall, the school and community raised $26,000 for the set, Bradley said.
Bradley said the district paid for installing the playground and preparing the ground.
By the end of the year, Irving got some new playground toys, including new balls and hoops.
Construction on the new playground set began the last couple days of the school year in May.
Bradley said the successful fundraising shows how schools and the community can work together.
“It does take a village to raise a child,” she said.
Royse said she drove by Irving’s new playground set recently, “and it was a wonderful feeling.”
“It’s wonderful that we accomplished it, that we completed it,” she said. “It shows that the school and the community can get together and get it done. The proof is right there.”
She said her sixth-grade daughter was afraid she wouldn’t get new playground equipment before she left Irving. Not any longer.
“This year’s going to be a lot different,” Kayla said.
Reach Cathy Spaulding at 918-684-2928 or Click Here to Send Email
