We know the Y can do amazing things in the community…and sometimes the community makes the magic. That’s what happened at the YMCA Detroit Innovation Academy, a Y-run charter school for students in kindergarten through 5th grade. Hundreds of volunteers from Mercedes-Benz Financial Services joined members of the school community and Y staff to build a playground for the school on a gorgeous fall day last month.
Even more amazing, the colorful, expansive playground was a parking lot at the beginning of the day. It was built with the help of Kaboom!, a nonprofit which partners with community groups to make playgrounds happen in a day’s time.
Once a site for a new playground is chosen and funds are raised, Kaboom works with kids to create a design for their new play space, and they work from their wish list in the final plans.
“It’s not just about the project, it’s the process,” says Josh Carlson of Kaboom! “People who would have never met each other come together to do these things.”
Kaboom! brought the volunteers from Mercedes-Benz Financial Services, which encourages its employees to serve the community. Hundreds of them painted hopscotch and four-square outlines on the pavement, spread woodchips, erected play structures, built benches, and affixed squares to the wall that had been painted by each child at the school to create a beautiful mural.
The school opened this fall in a former KMart, which means they have plenty of space but not a suitable playground until Kaboom! and Mercedes-Benz Financial Services helped make it happen. Principal Lawrence Hood says the new playground will help his students engage their brains for learning while keeping their bodies active. Even more, it will become a gathering spot for the community. “The biggest impact is on the community, to be able to beautify it and have a place where people can not look towards blight, but look toward the bright spots.”
Amazingly, $15,500 for the playground was raised in just 30 days from 150 Y donors.Thanks to their generosity and that of Kaboom! and the Mercedes-Benz volunteers, what once was a dreary stretch of asphalt will be a place to play and make memories for students at the school today and for generations to come.
