Making things better for Middle Schoolers
Published on September 7th, 2005
For years now, parents of children at the Stoneham Middle School have been making some familiar complaints about the aging building — and the concerning level of cuts that have considerably lessened the learning experience at such a crucial experience.
With August 31 and the first day of school upon us, things had gotten a little desperate for the Middle School grounds.
It’s gotten to the point that new Middle School Principal Christine McMenimen was out several weeks before school pulling weeds and putting in some manual labor — attempting to offset the dearth of janitorial help following this year’s cuts.
Enter Christine Oneschuk and the Class of 1982 Beautification fund — who heard the cries of many Middle School parents and have put their considerable attention to the Central Street building.
"In the Fall of 2004, I received a phone call from Cindy Collins from the Middle School PTO asking me if I wanted to get involved in the parent’s extreme makeover project," said Oneschuk, referring to the grassroots project organized by parents to clean up both exterior and interior of the Middle School building. "We chatted and I told her we usually pick something noticeable that residents are going to be able to see and want to contribute to. We figured that something like the courtyard might not be much of a big seller, so we chose to the outside and the front of the school."
The Class of 1982 Beautification Fund Inc. is made up of five classmates from Stoneham High School (Noreen Nicholson, Elena (Reis) Doucette, John Skiftimas, Robin (Lusardi) Boivin, and Oneschuk — who banded together to help make Stoneham a little bit more beautiful.
"We also have some people that aren’t classmates and are in the background, but are absolutely helping us on these projects," said Oneschuk, referring to among others, Paul Doucette.
Many in town will remember them for their work with the Holiday Tree on the Town Common last year, and the committee hopes to build on that success with this year’s endeavor.
"We found a landscape architect who was married to one of our former classmates. His name is Ron Headrick out of North Andover," said Oneschuk. "I gave it to my brother Frank Capone, who owns Capone Landscaping in Wakefield, for a plant list and Class of 1983 graduates Phyllis Warren drew up a three-dimensional sketch."
"We’ve decided that we want to plant trees and shrubs and we want to put in a circular bench around the flagpole as well as some other benches," added Oneschuk, who attended the Middle School when it was actually still Stoneham High School in the late 1970’s and early 1980’s. "We want to put in a really nice trash barrel and we’d also like to paint the exterior of the cafeteria. It looks pretty terrible right now."
The Committee did some cost evaluations to place a price tag on the cost of beautifying the Middle School grounds and came up with a rough figure of about $15,000 — a target that starts with efforts to raise money at Town Day. Oneschuk and friends will be there with temporary Spartan head tattoos, and will also begin to canvas their fellow classmates with a request for donations.
The undertaking will be a bit more ambitious than the holiday tree — as the bill could amount to nearly double that of the Holiday Tree fund.
"We’re going to target classmates, the residents and especially parents and businesses as well," said Oneschuk. "We also had a very successful raffle last year at Town Day, and we’re hoping for it again this year. One of our classmates gave up two very good Red Sox tickets for the Yankees/Red Sox game on October 2, and we plan on raffling them off at Town Day."
"If we didn’t have the parents and the employees at the Middle School behind us, I might view this as more a challenge," added Oneschuk. "But they are so excited to help raise money, and they have been in asking the Vice-Principal what they need to do — so I know they have a lot of momentum going."
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