But St. Pius X School in Southgate has such a spot with a name that’s almost impossible to say without smiling.
David Neubecker, left, a second grader at St. Pius X School in Southgate, and his brother, Patrick, who will be a fifth grader, try out the school’s new “Buddy Bench,” built with recycled bottle caps. In addition to helping students learn about recycling, the bench also gives lonely students a place to go to find a friend during recess. Dan Meloy | The Michigan Catholic This school year, St. Pius X’s playground will feature a “Buddy Bench,” a place to grab a seat and make a new friend.
The idea of a Buddy Bench came from the schools “Green Team,” a group of students and teachers dedicated to finding sustainable projects the school can take up to promote environmentalism.
“The Green Team came up with the idea to get a bench made out of recycled material,” said Linda Cavanaugh, a middle school science teacher at St. Pius X. “Then there was another idea to have a ‘Buddy Bench,’ a bench for anyone with nobody to play with. There they can take a seat, so the other kids know they can go over and include them in any game they’re playing.”
The schools’ first Buddy Bench was installed in June between the school’s soccer field and Playscape, a prime spot for students looking for a friend to play with during recess. Two more Buddy Benches will be picked up and installed this August.
In the fall of 2016, the school sought out Green Tree Plastics, an Evansville, Ind.-based company that has a program called the “ABC Promise Partnership,” in which students can collect and donate plastic bottle caps and lids and in return receive a park bench.
This led to a parish-wide drive to collect as many plastic bottle caps as possible.
“In order to get a four-foot bench made, we had to collect around 200 pounds of bottle caps,” Cavanaugh said. “I can tell you it took many boxes and bottle caps. The kids set up the recycling and organizing process, separating the plastic bottle caps and making sure they fit the standards for what can be donated.” In a parish bulletin, the students put out a call for a variety of plastic caps, from medicine bottle caps, to milk jug caps, toothpaste caps and hairspray caps. Blue recycling containers were placed outside the church, parish and school offices, as the community rallied to recycle as much as possible.
“We started in the fall of 2016 and continued through the end of June,” Cavanaugh said. “After we gathered enough for one bench, we had enough to get two more benches this August, so we’ll have three in total.”
The benches are placed throughout the St. Pius X campus, including next to the soccer field and Playscape. It cost $130 for a four-foot bench, but the school payed an extra $50 to paint it green, the school’s colors.
In addition to having the benches to cheer up a student in need of a friend, Cavanaugh said the project is a great way to show how students can make a difference.
“For the kids, I think the biggest lesson they learned in this is how much they can make a difference,” Cavanaugh said. “They always hear they can make a difference, but sometimes that’s hard to see. But with this project they learned about organizing and collecting, sorting the different lids. It really inspired them to do much more and get an idea for what they can do this year to make a difference.” With the school year beginning, students are returning with a sense of optimism at what they can accomplish. And while there might be times when they’re feeling down or seem to be caught up in assignments or a bad test score, they’ll have a place to take a seat, relax and realize they can accomplish great things.
And maybe they’ll find a buddy who will help them do it.
