Building Playgrounds, Engaging Communities: Creating Safe and Happy Places for Children

5. Community Stone Soup: Breaking the Myth of “Broken” Schools

88 5 Community Stone Soup Breaking the Myth of “Broken” Schools “How do you define community?” I was once asked this question in a job interview. I gave a straightforward answer—something along the lines of being united in mutual respect and working together for the common good—but I’ve thought about the definition of community for a long time and there are a lot of answers to that question . A community can be defined as a group of people who share particular traits (geographical, religious, political, occupational, and so on), a number of groups united around a cause, or all the beings that inhabit a particular environment. While one can pretty easily provide a basic definition of community , my experiences involving community are far more complicated. The concept of community is at the core of the playground designs produced through the LSU Community Playground Project. Capturing the essence of what makes each school community special, a process I call finding the “soul of the community,” is of paramount importance. In my travels through the playgrounds of my community’s public schools, I’ve learned that every school community is different, and that the soul of each specific community is like a snowflake, unique and distinctive. To be successful in designing a playground that will reflect the unique community it will serve, I encourage my students to figure out the soul of While the spirit of neighborliness was important on the frontier because neighbors were so few, it is even more important now because our neighbors are so many. —Lady Bird Johnson Community Stone Soup: Breaking the Myth of “Broken” Schools / 89 the community and to let that soul be the driving force of their collaborative designs. It is perhaps the most difficult concept that my students struggle with. They’ll typically come right out and ask just about every constituent in the process what they think the soul of the community is, getting some wonderful answers in response. It is difficult to explain to students what it’s like when you finally “get” the soul of the community, because when you do, there is no longer any need to ask. The community has stopped being “them” and has become “us.” Communities, like schools and like playgrounds, are living, breathing things; you understand the soul of the community when you are part of the living, breathing thing that is the community. I tell my students that understanding the soul of the community is like hearing your favorite song on the radio. It is the spine-tingling feeling of excitement you get as you hear the initial chord, the bass beat, the lyrics, the refrain, and then that favorite part of your favorite song, the nuanced subtle thing, where you know you’ve seen and felt through to the heart of the song, its soul. Once my students see through to the soul of the community, that unique ball of people and place and emotions and accomplishments and roots and wings and aspirations, they can begin to translate it into a playground design through activities, art, landscaping, equipment, music, and so on. The soul of the community is why no playground design we’ve ever completed is the same. It is also the reason that designing playgrounds is never boring. I begin every playground design collaboration knowing that the soul of the community is there, but also realizing that I don’t know it yet. I love to spend time immersed in a school community, listening with my ears and my heart, watching with my eyes and my mind. Inevitably, I come to an understanding of the soul of the community sort of in the way that a painter creates a painting, first with broad strokes, then by filling in detail, and finally through fine tuning. When a painter finishes a masterpiece, that painting vibrates; it puts out energy to those who feel it, an energy that is 90 / Building Playgrounds, Engaging Communities exciting and calming and uplifting, all at the same time. I feel like I know the soul of the community when I can literally feel it vibrate around me and through me. I get the same calm, happy feeling while in this community that I get when I look at a George Rodrigue or Bill Hemmerling painting. To use my community soul sister Deborah Normand’s words, “It’s like manna.” The soul of the...