Organizers hope a reunion Saturday of former students and teachers of Tacoma’s McCarver Elementary School will get them closer to the $3.5 million fund-raising goal for the Zina Linnik Project.
They also hope the event prompts alumni to become more involved in the Hilltop school and engaged in the project, a student-led effort to improve two city parks.
“A lot of people still remember what McCarver did for them,” said Debbie Bingham, an alumna and organizer of event.
“This project is making McCarver for these kids what it was for us.”
Students at McCarver have helped raise more than $3 million for improvements in honor of Zina, the 12-year-old Tacoma girl who was kidnapped July 4, 2007, from her Hilltop neighborhood and killed.
“They’ve done a ton of work,” Drew Ebersole, executive director of the Greater Metro Parks Foundation, said of the students. “We need everyone to jump on board right now.”
Zina’s death motivated fellow classmates at McCarver to dream big in her memory.
“It’s turning a tragedy into a triumph in the community,” Ebersole said.
The students came up with improvements to McCarver Park, next to the elementary school, and to Wright Park, in the Stadium District.
Fifth-graders brainstormed ideas for the changes, worked with students from the University of Washington’s landscape and urban design program to transform the ideas into plans, traveled to Olympia to meet with legislators and the governor and talked with Tacoma city and parks officials.
Under the designs, a “sprayground” water play area is being added to Wright Park and community gardens, a school garden, reading circle and amphitheater to McCarver Park. A memorial to Zina also will be part of the changes at McCarver Park.
Construction began in June and is to be completed this fall, Ebersole said.
A campaign was launched in August 2008 to raise $3.5 million for the effort.
Ebersole initially thought the money could be raised in three to five years. It has occurred much faster because of the students’ dedication. They wrote letters, made videos, designed T-shirts and spoke publicly about the project, generating donations from individuals, foundations, corporations and government entities.
The parks foundation was “pleasantly surprised with the response the children generated,” Ebersole said. “They’ve exceeded (expectations).”
Bingham said Saturday’s reunion is open to McCarver alumni from as recent as last year to decades ago. The public also is invited.
Ideally, she’d like to see an alumni-teacher association created to keep former students interested and involved in activities at the school.
“A lot of alumni who went there are still connected,” Bingham said.
Stacey Mulick: 253-597-8268 stacey.mulick@ thenewstribune.com blog.thenewstribune.com/crime
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