Rowers Help Build Playground

11/15/2011 10:07:00 AM

The Central Oklahoma rowing team traveled to Oklahoma City last weekend to help build a community playground, working with 200 other volunteers to finish the project.

Constructed near SE 6th Street and Lincoln Blvd. in the Oklahoma City Boathouse District, the playground is directly adjacent to the future permanent home of Broncho Rowing, The CHK Central Boathouse that is in the final stages of fundraising. Currently the Bronchos row out of the Chesapeake Boathouse just a few hundred meters away.

The playground was a project of KaBOOM!, Oklahoma City Boathouse Foundation and Blue Cross Blue Shield of Oklahoma. KaBOOM! is a national non-profit organization dedicated to saving play and for 15 years has been ensuring there is a great place to play within walking distance of every child.

The Bronchos helped construct the playground, spent time with underprivileged children and contributed to their community.

"The Kaboom project was a great way for the UCO women's rowing team to make a difference in our community,” said sophomore rower Kelsey Philhower. “This project was about helping build a playground that would be enjoyed by many kids in Oklahoma City to keep them out of trouble.

“Our team worked really hard mixing cement, shoveling mulch and putting pieces of playground obstacles together. We had a lot of fun with the 200 volunteers and it was a great success. It will be really awesome to row by the playground during practice and know that we helped make that happen."

“It was great to see our team give back to our community,” head coach Andrew Derrick said. “We have a very special group of young women here and it's very nice for the community to get to interact with them, especially while working together on such a great project.

“Obviously this is a very special location for UCO Rowing. We all look forward to the future when the team comes to practice every day and walks past the children's structure they all helped to create.”

The UCO Rowing team is now in their indoor practice season and will return to the competition in the spring for their championship season.

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