See-Saw-a-Thon Rocks Donations for Magnet School Playground

See-Saw-a-Thon Rocks Donations 
for Magnet School Playground

By Mike Lauterborn

(for Fairfield Citizen News)

12/1/11

Fairfield, CT --  They came, they see-sawed and conquered any doubts that Sacred Heart University students would do their part to help raise funds for a new playground project in Bridgeport.

Hosted in the school’s University Commons room by the ten Greek fraternities and sororities at SHU’s 5151 Park Avenue campus, the 24-hour See-Saw-a-thon kicked off at 6p.m. Wednesday night and concludes at 6p.m. Thursday evening. A series of activities, which the school’s Student Events Team helped coordinate, was planned around the clock, including such fun as four full-sized wooden see-saws, a life-sized Operation game, basketball shootout, Rollerball game and moonbounce featuring Twister board game patterns imprinted on it. All was set up for the purpose of raising funds toward the $70,000 needed to build a new playground at the Six-to-Six Interactive Magnet School in Bridgeport. As of 8a.m. Thursday morning, over $7,800 had been collected.

“The theme of the event is ‘Greek Life Goes Back to Give Back’”, explained Meg Campbell, president of the Panhellenic Council, the governing body for SHU’s sororities. “So we’ve featured classic childhood games, as well as a raffle for gift items contributed by local businesses.”

Campbell, who is also a Phi Sigma Sigma sorority sister, added, “We all have our individual philanthropies for which we raise money, but we wanted to come together to make a bigger impact in the Bridgeport community.”

The playground need was obvious according to Dan Miller, a Delta Tau Delta fraternity brother and philanthropy chairman. “We went to visit the school and found that the playground was splintering and graffiti covered, and nothing worked.”

Funds were primarily driven through the efforts of the 585 members of the Greek Life community at SHU, who were each asked to raise at least $15. Additional funds were being captured through raffle ticket sales and a portion of proceeds from t-shirt purchases.

Contributions to the effort can be made by visiting www.sacredheart.edu/seesaw.cfm or sending cash or a check made out to Sacred Heart University to SHU, Office of Student Life, Attn: Greek Life Goes Back to Give Back, 5151 Park Ave., Fairfield, CT 06825.