Calgary woman follows family footsteps on playground project: ‘History repeating itself’

Mary Catherine Noseworthy’s connection with Calgary’s St. Peter Elementary School goes back most of her lifetime, and she’s now working hard to make life at the school better for a whole new generation of students.

Noseworthy attended St. Peter during her elementary years. Now, her two sons Ethan and Zach are students there.

She’s leading a drive to get a new playground built at the school, something she remembers her parents being involved in during the 1990s.

“I was in Grade 5,” Noseworthy said. “The whole community came together. It was so exciting!”

After 24 years in use, that playground was deemed unsafe and was removed last year.

Noseworthy and the other parents at St. Peter have been working since then to replace it.

“It’s history repeating itself,” she said. “I went here, my parents did it for me. My kids go here and I’m going to work so very hard to make sure that they have a place to play.”

The project got a big boost with a strong showing in a national competition to get funding for recreation facilities.

Out of more than 800 applicants from across Canada, the St. Peter playground is one of four finalists in the Kraft Heinz Project Play contest.

Three of those finalists will receive $25,000, with the winner getting $250,000.

Whichever group gets the most support in online voting takes the grand prize.

“So we need people to vote, vote, vote!” Noseworthy said. “Share it, tweet it, Facebook it. Just get out there and vote.”

The voting continues until 10 p.m. MDT on Friday, Oct. 19 online.