I wanted to thank some of the peeps who have helped out so far with the St. Cecilia’s Gym donation post I did last week.
Props to Brooklyn Based for including us in their Tip Sheet last week:
A stiff, $20-an-hour fee has made Greenpoint’s St. Cecilia’s gym too expensive for neighborhood kids, like the On Point Cyclones (pictured). To help fund their practices or brainstorm ways to fundraise, Greenpointers lists the ways.
Big ups to Brooklyn Paper for adding us to The Stoop:
Greenpoint: Our favorite neighborhood blogger is trying to raise cash for youth basketball players who can’t afford to pay $20 an hour to practice in the gym of the soon-to-close St. Cecilia’s School. Donations can be made at www.greenpointers.blogspot.com.
And gracias to The Diamond Bar for including us in their email blast:
Neighborhood Kids Need Help
St. Cecilia’s School on Monitor Street has closed. Kids in the neighborhood still use the gym which now costs $20 an hour. This is a really tough situation as many of these kids are from low income families. Check out Justine Carroll’s blog post and click at the bottom to donate $20 if you can. We just kicked in $50 and will definitely keep them in mind for a future fundraiser.
http://greenpointers.blogspot.com/2008/06/fundraising-help-needed-in-point.html
And most of all so far I’d like to publicly thank the trio of folks who have so far sent in PayPal donations that will help these kids get a few more hours of practice in.
Valerie Hope
Josh Lieberman
Stephen Chesler
But keep in mind the kids still need donations. An email from Rick this week shows that they need them even more than ever:
We won one game in Connecticut this weekend but we lost two. Honestly, we did not have 2 of our top players because they could not afford the trip so thy stayed home. This is what we were afraid was going to start happening…
See my previous post about how you can help here.
And I also received an email from reader Dotty today with an insight about how longtime parishioners feel about the closing of St. Cecilia’s school. Gotta love this feisty dame!
My husband, aunts, uncles, grandparents, cousins, children, grandchildren and myself all went to Saint Cecilia ‘s. We are long time parishoners.
This is a damn shame about Saint Cecilia’s. I went over to see it for the last time today Tuesday June 17 08. I was shocked to see every thing packed up in see thru plastic bags lying on the floor waiting to be placed in trucks waiting outside to be taken to God knows where.
I brought a program into the school as a volunteer in 1974 which I did until May 12, 2008. I always had children in my after school class. We did arts and crafts from 2:15 until 3:30. It was a success until the very last day. I received no pay for this, my payment was seeing the smiles I put on every childs face when they said “I made it all by myself Mom, and it’s for you!”.
But in todays world there are no volunteers. They want to be paid with big names placed on office doors and no degrees. That what it comes down to. The ones who gave their all to the school and church were forgotten about. I seen many seniors leave and we all worked our ass off, but we had fun and loved what we did.
If you sit in the quiet halls of Saint Cecilia’s you would swear that we left our laughter within the walls of a great school that once was. We lost a lot, but the memories and the tears we shed will live forever in our hearts. GOD BLESS OUR SCHOOL.