May 15, 2002 – A Family Fun Day has been planned at Market Square East on Saturday as a fundraiser for the V.I. Resource Center for the Disabled.
The center is asking businesses to support the event by making donations. For each $100 donated, an employer will get five tickets to the Fun Day which can in turn be given to employees so they can spend Saturday with their children at the event.
The Fun Day will get under way at 9 a.m. with music by the 28-member Housing Authority Youth Steel Orchestra. A highlight will be the special showing at 11 a.m. in one of the Market Square East theaters of "Return to Never Land," a Walt Disney film based on the characters from "Peter Pan."
Before the film showing, school children have been invited to compete in a sidewalk art contest in front of the cinema complex. Special chalks will be provided, and the entries will remain on the sidewalk until rain later washes them away. Prizes will be awarded in four divisions — primary (grades 1-3), intermediate (grades 4-6), junior (grades 7-9) and high school (grades 10-12). The winners will receive multimedia arts and crafts kits valued at more than $100 each.
There also will be a focus on career options. Representatives of businesses and educational institutions are invited to talk about and distribute materials on various career fields. A firetruck, an ambulance, a police car and the center's handicapped-access van will be parked on site for children to explore.
Several levels of sponsorship are being promoted. All donations, whether in cash or in kind, go toward the qualifying level of $500 to become a "Special 2002 Sponsor." The center's goal is to obtain sufficient financial support to ensure that "no child is turned away."
Betty Barber, a Resource Center staff member, notes that the organization's understanding of "disabled" is not just those persons who are physically disabled. All children from low-income and at-risk families are "disabled" in the sense of needing assistance which the center hopes to provide, she said.
The Resource Center, which has presences on all three islands, has grants for "School to Work," for job sharing with local employers, and for getting dropouts back into school. Computers plays a large part in its programing — for example, teaching clients keyboard proficiency, how to prepare resumes and how to conduct themselves in interviews.
Although Saturday's fundraiser is on St. Thomas, disabled and at-risk children on all islands are served.
For further information, call Ricardo Richards Elementary School at 778-0612 for St. Croix, Julius Sprauve Elementary School at 776-6336 for St. John, or the Resource Center offices at 777-2253 for St. Thomas. Or send an e-mail to VIRCD@islands.vi.
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