Kennedy Playground Needs Your Help

By Lisa E. Crowley
BrocktonPost
BROCKTON—The Kennedy Elementary School in Brockton needs you to buy coffee, ice tea and slushy-type drinks at the Belmont Street Cumberland Farms!
Cumberland Farms on Route 123, or 1205 Belmont St., near Owen O’Leary’s, Starbuck’s, Bertucci’s and the new Panera, will donate every 20 cents from every coffee, ice tea and “Chill Zone” drink it sells during the next month toward a new playground at the Kennedy Elementary School.
“We really need a new playground,” said Jenna Giannoros, one of the parents on the playground committee who helped initiate the fundraising drive.
Parents and school officials are looking to raise about $50,000.
Cumberland Farms--whose Chief Executive Officer Joe Petrowski is a Brockton native who attended Thursday’s kick off party—has pledged to donate at least $1,000 from the beverage drive.
The kick off party also highlighted the Cumberland Farms' reopening of its renovated store, featuring the "Chill Zone," coffee bar and beverage stations.
Lisa Sheehan, another parent on the committee, said the graffiti-covered, more than 25-year-old jungle gym and broken swings now at the school’s playground are not safe for use, and are in dire need of updates.
“As a parent, I would never let my son on it,” Sheehan said.
Sheehan said the Cumberland Farms drive is a big help, and hopes are the total might get to $3,000, although the guaranteed $1,000 is a step in the right direction.
“It’s a $1,000 we didn’t have before,” Sheehan said.
Fundraising efforts began last summer with a golf tournament organized by James Rober, a Kennedy School parent and cable television committee member.
He said the golf tournament was a huge success—collecting more than $5,000 toward the playground.
Rober said the cable station is involved with Kennedy’s efforts to win a complete playground through a contest hosted by Miracle Playground.
The contest is in the second phase, or public vote phase, where people from all over the country are heading to the contest’s Facebook page and voting for their school's entry.
Kennedy was in first place for votes as of Thursday.
Anyone reading this is asked to vote everyday until Monday, Nov. 21 at the contest page.
Here’s the link: http://www.facebook.com/miracle.recreation.equipment.companyThe top 10 schools with the most votes go on to the next round, which is judging and includes a 3 to 10 minute video that illustrates the need for the new playground.
Rober said Noube Rateau, a producer for Brockton Community Access, will be helping out with the video that is already in production and expected to be completed this weekend—in plenty of time for the next phase.
Judging ends Dec. 1 and a winner is to be announced the same day.
Cumberland Farms CEO Joe Petrowski said he was excited to be in Brockton and is happy to help the Kennedy gets its playground.
“It’s great to be doing something for the schools,” Petrowski said.
At 57, Petrowski said it was education and hard work that helped him rise from a life steps away from poverty to the head of Cumberland Farms, a company that boasts $10 billion in revenues each year.
“Knowledge is the antidote to fear,” Petrowski said, as parents and school officials shook his hand and thanked him for helping with the fund drive. (Pictured at top with Kennedy Principal Brian Rogan)
Petrowski attended the Winthrop School and St. Edwards School, both which are now closed. He earned a scholarship to Boston College High School and then Harvard University where he earned a degree in government and economics.
Now living in Wellesley with his wife, also a Brockton High grad, Petrowski said after his father died of Hodgkins disease when he was 8, he and his mother Ann were left to fend for themselves, a situation many youngsters and their moms face everyday in this city.
“My mom was a single mom,” Petrowski said. “She worked hard to give me everything she could,” he said.
Petrowski said he never dreamed of being a CEO, his only dream was to make enough money to support himself, something that took many, many years and much help to attain.
“I had so many mentors who helped me,” Petrowski said, including Dr. Sarkasian who wrote Petrowski a letter of recommendation that helped get him accepted into Harvard.
He told any kids who might read his words that he worked hard for everything he has achieved, and started on the ground floor working for $2.20 an hour performing oil changes.
“If you really work hard, find those mentors around you and let them help you, you will get anywhere you want to go,” Petrowski said.
“Education and hard work,” he said.