PTO uses Lowe's Home Improvement and Garden Assocates to help Van Derveer School

PTO Funds Fence to Block View of Graveyard:
by Martin C. Bricketto: Staff Writer
July 12, 2009

SOMERVILLE — The Somerville PreK-8 Parent Teacher Organization has undertaken a project to create a natural fence of landscaping between Van Derveer Elementary School and Immaculate Conception Cemetery on Route 28.
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PTO Vice President Jodi Smith said children as young as kindergarten-age were playing on a playground that had a direct view of a cemetery, and most kindergarten classrooms had a view of the cemetery as well.

"We just wanted the children, while they're outside and while they're in their classroom, to be able to focus on being kids — running around playing tag, going down the slide, playing on the monkey bars — and to not have to see what's going on in the cemetery," Smith said. "Sometimes we'd be out there and the cemetery workers would be setting up for a burial."

The PTO was able to get a $5,500 grant from Lowe's, the home improvement store chain, to help with the project. Somerville-based Garden Associates Landscape Architecture Inc. designed the landscaping at no cost.

"We needed something that was low maintenance, since it's volunteers who are going to be handling the maintenance of the plants," Smith said. "They really took care to pick out specific plants that are indigenous to the area so they would require very little maintenance."

The landscaping is along a roughly 300-foot section of fence on the left side of the building when facing it from the street. The landscaping also offers the playground some coverage from Route 28, Smith added.

The project's total cost was $10,000, which the PTO covered through its other fundraising efforts, according to Smith. It was completed in April.

Van Derveer Principal Susan C. Haynes said having a border between the school and the cemetery enhances the playground area.

"We kind of have a very close feeling here at Van Derveer, and I think having that natural border on the outside of the building reinforces what we have on the inside of the building," Haynes said.

Van Derveer school serves nearly 800 students in prekindergarten to fifth grade.