Job Corps students make Buddy Benches for Medina parks
Provided photos: Carpentry students at Iroquois Job Corps are, from left in front, Jayvon Bryan Rolfe, Camrie Porter-Dye and Mark Bebe. In the background with hard hats are Tristan Peters and Jordanny Reynoso Castillo. Others in back are Leroy Phillip, carpentry instructor; Peter Bartula, Medina Rotary president; John Thomas, Job Corps operations director; and Dennis Essom, Center director. Absent is carpentry instructor Robert Trautwein.
MEDINA – The Iroquois Job Corps Center is teaming with the Medina Rotary Club in a project adding Buddy Benches to village parks.
Job Corps students are building four of the benches, with the cost of the materials covered by the Rotary Club. John Thomas, operations director at the Job Corps, is a member of the local service group.
Rotary also is paying for the materials for Adirondack chairs that students will build, with the chairs then sold to community members in a fundraiser for Rotary. Seven of the chairs are complete. The Rotary is finalizing the cost for the chairs.
“The chairs and benches are beautiful and very well constructed,” said Peter Bartula, Medina Rotary president. “It works out great for everybody. They learn a skill and the community benefits with new benches for the parks.”
(Left) Iroquois Job Corps’ carpentry student Jeremiah Caldwell works on one of the buddy benches which will be placed in four local Medina parks as a way to spread goodwill. (Right) Students in the carpentry program at Iroquois Job Corps Center work on Adirondack chairs, which the Medina Rotary Club will sell to raise money for the community.
