An LSU biological engineering professor started a community playground project 17 years ago that has since built 30 playgrounds through student designs and volunteer construction. The most recent project at Bernard Terrace Elementary took 3 years to complete due to fundraising efforts and involved over 120 volunteers. The professor works with students, schools, and community members to design playgrounds that reflect each community's uniqueness. Playgrounds provide important educational and social benefits to communities beyond just recreation.

1. IN THE KNOW
WHO KNEW?
MARYBETH LIMA never imagined an
annual assignment for her freshman-
level biological engineering class at
LSU would turn into a community-
wide effort, but 17 years later, 30
playgrounds have been constructed
as a result of the LSU Community
Playground Project.
More than 120 volunteers came
out for the most recent playground
build at Bernard Terrace Elementary
School in March. This particular
project took three years, with most
of the time spent gathering funding.
Each project begins with
collaboration between Lima’s
students and the school’s faculty,
parents and, most importantly, the
children—the true experts at play,
according to Lima, who serves as
the Cliff & Nancy Spanier Alumni
Professor in Biological & Agricultural
Engineering.
The students must find out what
makes each school community
unique and translate that into
a design. From there, Lima’s
students apply engineering and
problem-solving methods to design
and create a blueprint for the
playground.
Construction of the playground
is done entirely by volunteers
including both current and former
students of Lima as well as alumni
and a number of local community
groups and organizations.
“We really have a big list of people
who support us and who will come
to every single build,” Lima says. “It’s
just amazing to see.”
Playgrounds number 31 and 32 are
already in the works. Lima pursues
project after project, but there are
still a great deal of schools that need
help. Within a week of completion of
the project’s first playground back in
1998, Lima received a call from the
principal of another Baton Rouge
school soliciting the help of the LSU
Community Playground Project.
Lima says attention to playground
access and safety is not only a
community need, but actually a
national issue.
Demetric Alexander, principal at
Bernard Terrace, points out that
recess and physical activity are
things often put on the back burner
in this day and age, yet they are so
critical. “It sounds so simple, but
they still need time just to exert
some of that energy.” Alexander
explains that playgrounds also teach
things like social skills: “It’s so much
more than just playing.”
Although the goal of the
Community Playground Project is
to upgrade all playgrounds in East
Baton Rouge Parish, the effect of
the program is more profound than
simply providing a needed product.
“There’s something more that
happens, I think, educationally
and socially, when people all work
together to make something
happen,” Lima says. “[The project]
just keeps giving back to all of the
people who are involved for as long
as the playground lives.”
A playful purpose
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IT’S AN EVENING under the stars at the LSU AgCenter Botanic
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inRegister.com•April2015