St. Mark’s Donates Playground

Construction is underway on the Winn Science Center as crews begin clearing the ground for the new building. This includes a new open courtyard that will connect the Science Center with the Green Library, a space that has been home to the Lower School playground. While the School decided to relocate the playground to an open area nestled within the L-shaped Lower School building, the 20 year-old equipment wouldn’t fit in this space. 

 

Thanks to a generous $210,000 gift from the St. Mark’s Parents’ Association, a specially-designed playground is being constructed over the summer and will be ready when Lower Schoolers return to the campus in August. 

 

But the old playground equipment will find new life with some very special children. When the Be An Angel children’s charity learned about St. Mark’s old playground equipment, they offered to extract and transport the equipment to the Dominican Republic, where they partner with several schools for special needs children. In early June, crews carefully dismantled and packaged up the equipment for the trip across the Gulf of Mexico.

 

“Our mission coordinator in the Dominican Republic was extremely excited about the possibility of another playground project and has several potential sites she’s now evaluating to find one that would present the greatest utilization,” said Ross Massey, Program Director at Be An Angel Fund, Inc. “Our efforts in the Dominican Republic are still expanding and the gifting of the playground from St. Marks will certainly be a blessing to both us and the disadvantaged children who will benefit from it.”