WE Play to Learn!

The new playground has been under construction all summer. Our students spent the three weeks of the year watching as a team of installers brought our Big Toy playground to life. They watched as the ground was prepared, the foundations were dug and laid, the towers were erected, the slides put in place, and the mulch was blown in. Our fifth graders even calculated the volume of recycled wood fibers it would take to fill the space.

It's been a long time coming, but our new Big Toy playground will be ready for play on Monday, September 20.

It was with the generous support of many, many donors and believers that Wilkesboro Elementary School was able to fund this momentous event. Thank you to the children who asked parents, family, friends, neighbors, and businesses to help bring our special play space to life. We couldn't have done it without your hard work and determination!

We would like to share a special thank you to the Stone Family Foundation. Your seed gift with 2019 Wishing Well grant helped us dream big. Our playground team did its research, our students chose the equipment, and through your generous matching support, we are able to make this wish a reality.

We also are indebted to many other generous grants and gifts including those by the groups listed below.

Stone Family Foundation
The Health Foundation, Inc.
Kulynych Family Foundation II, Inc. (in honor of Mr. Thomas Edgar (Ed) Story, III and Mr. T.E. Story
Leonard G. Herring Family Foundation
The Spears Family
WindowWorld

In addition, we are thankful to families who provided funding for specific parts of our playground.

Climb in memory of Hunter Brown.
Slide in honor of Kilby Quinn Handy.
Spin in honor of Lucy and Sophia McBride.
Swing in loving memory of Reese Huskey.

We'd also like to recognize many donations were made in honor and memory of special people in our students' lives. We have these noted on signage at the playground, but you can see those names here as well. Thank you to our families for recognizing these beloved people.

Great things are accomplished by many smaller things brought together, and we appreciate and share our gratitude to everyone who contributed to this project. We've compiled a list of our generous donors and send grateful and heartfelt appreciation to you all. We've tried to be as inclusive as possible with this list, and if we've omitted your donation, please let us know at [email protected] and we will update the list.

We'd also like to thank Chris Yang and his team for Carolina Parks and Play for helping bring this dream to life. We have been working with them since March 2020 to design and construct this playground.

We will kick of this playground with a bang! All students will enjoy the playground beginning Monday, September 10. We look forward to hosting a community playground dedication in October where our donors, families, and community members can come together in the name of PLAY!

Thank you for your role in bringing this dream to life! Thank you for supporting children and encouraging a safe place that will help them learn and grow. Thank you for believing in public education and for supporting our public school. We are enormously grateful to you.

Now, it is time for us to PLAY!

A HUGE thank you to all who have donated! to Wilkesboro Elementary! Thanks to your generous donation to our WE Play to Learn! campaign, we've raised 15% toward our goal! Our fundraising efforts are going strong, but you can still help by sharing this page and letting others know about our need and ways to help. Thank you for supporting our school and for believing in the power of PLAY! Stay tuned!

WE are excited that we've raised $2,000 toward building our new playground! Thanks to the early support of family, friends, and kind people, we are off to a great start in our first five days. Please continue to spread the word about the power of PLAY - thank you so much for continuing to support us and SHARE our mission TO PLAY TO LEARN!