McAdam Elementary School’s playground has hosted countless childhood thrills and spills throughout the decades.
But after years of use, some of its equipment needed a refresh. Its 40-year-old monkey bar set was due for replacement, as were “a couple of teeter-totters that parents of students used when they went to school here,” said McAdam Elementary School Principal Scott Cousins.
Purchasing and installing an elementary school playground is no inexpensive task. So, Cousins leaned on one resource he knew to be quite reliable for assistance: the McAdam village community.
And thanks to both the fundraising campaign sparked by his initiative, and the generosity of McAdam-area people and organizations, he was able to purchase new equipment for the school playground.
Installation began last week.
“McAdam’s is the kind of community where they just need someone to take the lead on something, and they’ll follow you,” said Cousins. “Within one year, we raised $231,000.”
To be exact, the school raised $231,104.80 during its 10-month fundraising campaign, which ended this past August. Half of the funds came from a provincial Regional Development Corporation Community Development Fund grant, while generous local individuals and organizations provided the remainder.
Half of those remaining funds came from Fredericton’s J.T. Clark Family Foundation. The philanthropic organization’s goal “is basically trying to improve the lives of people living in and around Fredericton and southwestern New Brunswick,” said J.T. Clark Family Foundation Director Cynthia Clark.
The Foundation gave Cousins a fundraising window between May and August. Having a limited donation window “keeps things real and serves as a call to action to those who might be a little hesitant or slow to donate to get the job done, Clark said. “We go after 100 per cent success.”
Out with the old…
Items Removed: 40-year-old monkey bar set (oldest structure), a spiral slide, medium-sized play structure, another set of monkey bars, a four-swing swing set, several teeter-totters.
…In with the new
Items Installed: Climbing Spinner, Creative Space, Play Structure, Psychomotor Course, Stump Stepping Stone, Freestanding RR Crossing, Etna Trapp, Rubber Seats, 8′ 2-Bay Arched Swing, Nin-ka Walls, 20′ Track Ride with Ride platform, angled overhead cable net, Climbing walls tower, Balance Crossing, Parallel bars.
That limited donation window worked.
“We were hoping to reach our goal of $30,000 by August, but we hit it in July,” Cousins said. “So, they asked how much more we could raise by August, and we said $5,000. They said, ‘ok, we’ll match that too.’”
Clark said of her organization’s matching donation, “They met the entire $35,000, so now they have $70,000 to put towards the development of the new playground.”
“We like to make a difference.”
Among other local entities whose contributions made a difference were the Village of McAdam ($20,000), The Lion’s Club ($20,001), Fundy Community Foundation ($4,000), and the Fredericton Community Foundation ($2,500).
“Once the word got out that this was happening, everybody was all over it,” said McAdam Village Councillor and retired McAdam High School teacher Jody Robinson.
Local citizens had ample opportunities to donate to the fundraising drive, thanks to Cousins’ persistence, said Robinson.
“He’s a go-getter and a hands-on guy,” Robinson said of Cousins. “So, when I went to the next Council meeting after Scott got the [principal] position, we basically said we want to put 100% support behind him whatever he wants to do.”
Said Cousins, “I felt like I was a salesman. We did an online auction that we thought was going to be kind of small, but it turned out to be really big. And we raised like $7,500 bucks.” Additionally, “Our home school committee was great with finding connections. They got a bunch of stuff donated from Fredericton and surrounding areas.”
Cousins also raised funds via 50/50 draws, chase-the-ace games, barbeques, candy sales, and bottle recycling.
“There was a grandfather of a kid at the school who went door to door collecting bottles, and he ended up raising like, four or five grand on bottles alone,” he said. “It kind of brought the community together.”
Donor List: Fundy Community Foundation, Home & School Fundraising, Online Playground Donations, Encorp Recycling Program, Village Donation, Fredericton Community Foundation, J.T. Clark Family Foundation, The Rockland Mud Runners ATC Club, The McAdam Save Easy.
Fundraising Activities: JavaMoose Fundraiser, Silent Auction, Chase The Ace, The Gun Dealer – Yeti Draw, Firemen’s BBQ, Canada Day 50/50, Lion’s Club Fundraising Promise, Cooke’s Aquaculture, Cash Donations from auction, E-Transfer Donations, Recycling, In-Kind Site Prep
Repurposing old equipment
Installation of the new playground equipment is expected to be completed by mid-late October. However, not all the old equipment is being discarded.
“We’re taking the old equipment out and we’re going to repurpose it for a couple of other playgrounds in the village,” said Robinson. “We’ll have to do some pretty serious refurbishing probably, from sandblasting on the metal to replacing some wooden decking.”
The village is eyeing Scott Park, the McAdam Campground, and O’Keefe Field as sites for the refurbished old equipment, he said.
As for the new playground equipment, “it’s an elementary school playground, but it’s also a community playground. We only have 1300 people who live here, so it’s more than just for the elementary school.”
“Anything that happens in the community is a community event and I’m just amazed and proud about how much everybody in the community supports anything that happens here,” Robinson said.
A blast from the past: Installation of the old playground, 1984
