I have always believed that if we engage children in service early, it’s a gift that will stay with them for a lifetime.

I was so proud to stand beside each volunteer at the Watts Labor Community Action Committee Center and build a playground for kids in the community.  There were mothers and families from the Center and the community, AmeriCorps volunteers and so many people who rolled up their sleeves to build this playground – all because they, too, wanted a safe place for children to play.  (Photo: Maria Shriver, right, and Paul Chavez, left, son of the late Cesar E. Chavez, join volunteers in building a community placespace at the Watts Labor Community Action Committee Center).

I attended my first U Play! in the fall of 2006 and have been trying to get a build done in San Jose ever since then.  In the meantime, I've attended U Plays in Chicago and New Orleans, which was where I discovered that a build would be happening in SJ in less than seven weeks!  What a surprise!  We, in turn, surprised KaBOOM! staff by telling them that the build would be in the neighborhood where Cesar Chavez lived and that family was still in the area.  I'm looking forward to my fourth build with KaBOOM! and am bringing along volunteers from around the city so we can get our feet wet on this project while still working on our own.  I can't tell you HOW EXCITED I am!

-Randi Kinman, volunteer

Community is the one word that sums up what KaBOOM! has meant to Leonard Flynn Elementary School, which is getting a playground March 31.  This project has excited the school community far beyond building a playground – the students are thrilled about the new play structure, the greening committee is anxious to help with the garden and landscaping, the teachers are happy to get some other projects done such as the long awaited four-square courts painted – but most of all parents, students, teachers and staff are humbled by the outpouring of good will and assistance from the surrounding community in the form of volunteers, tools and food donations, monetary donations, offers to tutor later as well as just excitement about this project.

Parents and students have also found new skills from working on the project – learning to solicit donations, using the values of Cesar Chavez to interpret the morals of stories, organizing friends to make large amounts of food to feed volunteers – all while making new connections with people in our community (thanks Youth Service California!) and strengthening existing relationships, people working side by side, no longer strangers, to achieve our goals.

-Beth Thew, Leonard Flynn Elementary School

By Jen DeMelo, KaBOOM! project manager

The phrase "sí se puede" keeps coming to mind when I think of the upcoming program honoring universal rights leader Cesar E. Chavez. This phrase, which means “yes, it can be done,” motivated many who worked alongside Chavez for equality and continues to drive people today in many ways. This phrase is also very powerful to me, as it has guided me through my involvement in the 10 community playgrounds and skateparks that are being built to celebrate the legacy of Chavez.  

As a project manager who has worked for KaBOOM! for almost two years, I have experienced a range of 28 projects in 20 states, but I had never led a program of this magnitude.  The concept originated with Maria Shriver.  She wanted to create 10 places for children to be children, places of play from San Diego to Sacramento that would celebrate and honor the legacy of Chavez while educating children and adults about his important work.   

Observations of “normal” 

I was in Austin, TX, last week for a conference called South by Southwest (SXSW). You might have heard of it. It’s a large event that is much more famous for music and the indie film festival than for anything else, but there was also a big interactive technology conference. 

No. I wasn’t singing or hobnobbing with Hollywood types. I was there being a web geek. 

It was a great conference and, as I get my head back around being in Washington again, I’ll post some things I learned over the next few days. 

First, I’d like to start with an observation. 

Friday, February 9:

12:32 p.m. - It's lunch time folks! Our morning sessions are over and we are now filing down the Hall of Play for gumbo and sandwiches. And with this great food comes two great announcements:

1) We will be posting the presentation from Dr. John Kretzmann, speaker for the Asset-Based Community Development workshop, on the website next week. Stay tuned for more information.

2) For the next 30 days, every person who registers with a completed member profile (including a description and pic) AND completes a project website will receive a free copy of Dr. Kretzmann's book Building Communities from the Inside Out.

Last week, I got an e-mail from someone who works with a neighborhood association that is getting rid of their shared playspace. The people in this community decided that since most of their houses had play equipment in their back yards, the shared playspace wasn't necessary.  

The impulse in contacting KaBOOM! was really very nice. He wanted to offer their play equipment to some other community that, perhaps, couldn't afford their own. The question, however, bothered me.

Just how important is a shared playspace?

The New York Times has been abuzz this month with articles and with letters to the editor about a “radical new playground design” proposed for a park in New York City.  The proposed design replaces monkey bars and swings with foam blocks, ropes and pulleys, and “play workers”, an envisioned cadre of paid, yellow-clad grown-ups whose job is to direct wee ones in the form and etiquette of proper play.