Building BOOM!
Operation Playground, a project of KaBOOM!, aims to give Gulf Coast kids their own space
By Maria Montoya, The Times-Picayune
Bare. Empty. Boring.
That's how some of the fifth-graders of Medard H. Nelson UNO Charter School described the playground on their St. Bernard Avenue campus. Not that many of the students got to spend much time playing there pre-Katrina. They had a mere two days at the school before it was submerged in floodwater.
Earlier this summer, Nelson's principal, Ava Lee, got word that her school was chosen to be the site of an Operation Playground building project. A two-year initiative of the national nonprofit KaBOOM! to build 100 playgrounds in communities affected by hurricanes Katrina and Rita, Operation Playground is committed to bringing play back to the Gulf Coast. |