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Lowell Milken Center for Unsung Heroes (2021) Print
2021 AARP Community Challenge Grantee
Project Category
Public places
└ Park enhancements
└ Park enhancements
Fort Scott's Lowell Milken Center for Unsung Heroes mission is to share stories of lesser-known great Americans through project-based learning. The Center created a downtown park next to its museum facilities. The new space features six narrative boards, which commemorate the contributions of individual heroes. Students in grades four through twelve researched and chose the subjects, who include scientists who discovered dinosaur bones and measured the extent of the universe, as well as a Navajo code breaker, a pioneer of modern education and others. Project organizers say the story rails will allow visitors to learn about historical figures outside the nearby museum's operating hours.
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See More Projects Like This One
Asheville, NC
AARP Community Challenge Grant Year: 2019
Project Category: Park enhancements
Description: After Buncombe County Recreation Services installed new instruments in Charles D. Owen Park -- including lily pad cymbals, a tenor tree, tuned drums and flower gongs -- park attendance increased nearly 20 percent in one year. The instruments, created by the Freenotes Harmony Park company, don't include sharps or flats and are designed to be played using arm and hand muscles rather than fingers. That way, people of all musical abilities can play them without training. More than 400 people also participated in three workshops focused on designing artistic tiles for the new space with themes of compassion, peace and diversity. The creation of the Real Possibilities musical garden sparked new projects, including the park's first TRACK Trail (self-guided, family-friendly outdoor adventures with prizes), enhanced sports courts and bird nest boxes that allow researchers to study tree swallows.
Union City, GA
AARP Community Challenge Grant Year: 2023
Project Category: Park enhancements
Description: This project will turn an unused wooded lot into a centrally-located, easily-accessible dog park with accessible gates, benches and a gazebo to provide a gathering spot for older neighborhood residents.
Waycross, GA
AARP Community Challenge Grant Year: 2024
Project Category: Park enhancements
Description: To provide shade and create a comfortable gathering space, this project will add a covered gazebo and benches to a park, which is located near housing for older adults.
Nearby AARP Community Challenge Projects
Savonburg, KS
AARP Community Challenge Grant Year: 2021
Project Category: Park enhancements
Description: City leaders hoped to give Savonburg residents a park suitable for people of all ages. The City, in partnership with a local service club, added a quarter-mile walking trail, ADA-compliant picnic tables and benches to the park. Built next to a new children's playground, the additions allow intergenerational families to enjoy the public greenspace.
Iola, KS
AARP Community Challenge Grant Year: 2022
Project Category: Public space activation
Description: This project built a musical playground featuring outdoor, mounted instruments in a flower garden on the grounds of Allen County Regional Hospital.
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