Local Charter Schools Raise Marathon Money

By Cherice Chen

As hungry-looking marathon runners streamed past on Sunday, gospel music boomed from nearby Emmanuel Baptist Church, spectators cheered at the sidelines and six parents from Community Roots Charter School in Fort Greene manned a table laden with plates of cookies, cupcakes and brownies, while their children circulated with plates of treats for sale at the corner of Underwood Park.

“I have sold a full plate,” said Olivia, a third-grader at Community Roots, as she reloaded her plate with more chocolate chip cookies.

For parents from three charter schools in Brooklyn, the New York City Marathon on Sunday was not just a sporting event. With tens of thousands of runners and spectators on the streets, the marathon provided an essential opportunity to raise money for their children’s schools. Parents from the Community Roots peddled homemade baked goods to raise money for the overnight field trips for their third- to eighth-graders.

This is the third year the parents organized a bake sale during the marathon, said Susan Miller Smith, a volunteer parent and the mother of Olivia, the third-grade cookie-seller. The fundraising has helped reduce the cost of students’ field trips significantly, from about $300 per person to $75, she said.

“We try to keep the cost as low as possible so that everybody who goes to the school can afford the trips,” she said.

The out-of-town trips are built into the charter school’s curriculum and are unmatched learning experiences, said Lisa Franklin, another parent.

“When they went to the [Washington, D.C.], it was tied to the government,” she said. “When they went to Boston, they saw different historical sites.”

Parents from The Co-op School, a preschool and elementary school also in Fort Greene, sold cookies, coffee and apple cider six blocks east of the Community Roots’ spot on a residential sidewalk on Lafayette Avenue. A line of customers surrounded the table.

Rachel White, head of The Co-op School’s fundraising committee, said this is the second time the school held a bake sale at the marathon. The money they raised from the bake sale, among other fundraising activities such as the flea market, helps fund scholarships for those who cannot afford tuition.

At another popular cheering spot on Lafayette Avenue near Classon Avenue was another bake sale organized by parents from the Brooklyn Urban Garden Charter School, a middle school that opened in Park Slope only this August. There, only two parents tended a small stand selling chocolate cakes, juice boxes and wristbands.

“This is our first year,” said Desi Parasol, the co-president of the school’s Family Staff Organization, which is equivalent to a PTA. “We started from zero.”

The money they raised will fund the new school’s after-school programs and a rooftop garden where students will learn gardening skills and the importance of sustainability, Parasol said.

Back to the scene at Underwood Park, the baked goods were marked down big after four o’clock when the parents were about to pack up.

“Oh, that one will be free for you,” a father in a black fleece jacket said with a wink as a 3-year-old child picked up a “Monsters Inc.” themed Mike Wazowski cupcake.