The Perrydale School District invested in a new and bigger playground designed to allow children with mobility or sensory issues to play freely with their peers on structures that are fun for everyone. (Photo by Jake Arnold, OSBA)
Trina Comerford first saw children laughing and playing on the Perrydale School District’s new inclusive playground in November. She had to pull over to cry and then go back just to watch the kids.
The play area is the fulfilment of her son’s dream, Comerford said.
“We were always looking for playgrounds where he could play with his siblings,” she said.
Tyler Hawes, Comerford’s son, was born with cerebral palsy and used a wheelchair. The new playground, the only one in the unincorporated community northwest of Salem, is designed to be a community gathering place where all children can have fun.
The playground’s realization required school board vision and district leadership collaboration. It is a joyful symbol of the district’s long journey to offer an education environment that better serves the needs of all its community’s children.
On a recent day, children scrambled over the various slides, swings and climbing equipment. A half-dozen spun on a merry-go-round set at ground level for easy access. Others pushed the limits of a tire swing with a webbed center where anyone can lie or sit. Some children sat in the seesaw’s seats while others stood on the center pivot.
District leaders intentionally designed the playground so most areas can be accessed by ramp, whether for a child using a wheelchair or a grandparent who wants to follow along.
Grace Clark, a fourth grader who is blind, lists a half-dozen spots on the playground that are her “favorite.” She says there are more things she can play with than on the old playground and she can play with her friends.
That really is the point, according to Christy Ford, the elementary and middle school principal. The old playground had a concrete area and a pea gravel area. Sometimes children would be left on the concrete while their classmates were on the toys in the gravel.
The district decided it needed to do better for all its students with special needs, children like Hawes.
Hawes was born in 1997, the same year Comerford moved to Perrydale. Comerford, who wasn’t elected to the school board until 2013, started advocating for more special education services before Hawes even started school. Like many small schools decades ago, Perrydale wasn’t prepared to support students with special needs.
Comerford said her son would cry when his school bus dropped his siblings off at Perrydale and then took him on to Dallas.
Things really began to change when the district hired retired teacher Mary Reid in 2010 to be a part-time special education director. As the district focused more on serving all students, the number of students on individual education programs grew from 14 to around 40. The district enrolls a little more than 300 students.
In 2017, the district decided it needed a full-time director as well as a special education teacher. Now six instructional assistants focus on students who require learning plans.
In eighth grade, Hawes was able to transition to partial days at Perrydale.
“It’s just been phenomenal to watch it become what it is today,” Comerford said. “No longer do our students have to go to other schools to have their needs met.”
Perrydale recently used a bond to make its facilities more accessible and add a special education resource room. There wasn’t money left over to improve the playground, though.
According to Comerford, the board had some tough conversations about how to update its playground. Members discussed whether all-inclusive play structures were the best use of resources.
The board decided on a conservative budget approach, setting aside a part of the half-million-dollar cost for three years before moving ahead.
Amber Burns, the school board chair, is particularly proud of the way the board found grants and community sponsors to help pay for it. Burns was another driving force, and her husband and son along with community members and staff helped assemble the structures to save money.
The GT Wave, many Perrydale students’ favorite structure, has all sorts of webbing to climb through but also a fabric ramp to the center for children with mobility challenges or who are just less daring. (Photo by Jake Arnold, OSBA)
Erin Henery, the special programs director, said the playground lets all students be part of the community and to have a “life experience” interacting while playing.
“Peers learn from each other more than they do from us,” she said.
First grader Brielle Carmona, who begs to visit the playground even when it’s raining, chose it for her birthday party despite her mother offering other children-friendly venues.
Her grandmother Michelle Carmona also loves the space.
“It’s like Disneyland,” she said.
Carmona, whose five children attended Perrydale, said she is impressed with the district leadership’s ability to create a wondrous inclusive play area.
“I think every playground should be like that,” she said. “Perrydale made it happen.”
Superintendent Dan Dugan started at Perrydale as a student teacher in 1996, and he has seen the changes in approach. The playground is another extension of the district’s efforts to provide opportunities.
“It’s about all our students and making it a place that is fantastic,” Dugan said.
Dugan said Hawes and his family helped inspire the district to become more diverse and better meet all its students’ special needs, including his own son.
Hawes graduated from Perrydale in 2016. He died in 2019.
The new playground will be dedicated to Hawes, with a placard bearing his name.
– Jake Arnold, OSBA
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