Jonesboro, AR – JonesboroRightNow.com – A group of Jonesboro students is working together to make sure medical attention can be quickly provided during recess.

While school playgrounds are hubs of fun and activity, a scraped knee or sudden injury can quickly highlight the long walk across campus to the nurse’s office.

At International Studies Magnet School (ISMS), the playground is at least a five-minute walk from the nurse’s station.

“So anytime we have a kid that is injured, usually they’re walking by my room crying, and they’re limping, you know, and they’re still not even halfway there yet,” EAST facilitator Carman Owens said.

Students in the ISMS EAST program recognized this issue and decided to come up with a solution: The Emergency Medical Playground Box Project. The initiative aims to install secure, weather-resistant boxes stocked with essential first-aid supplies directly on the playgrounds, strategically placed in areas where the most injuries occur.

“At the start of the year of EAST, we mostly come up with, like, brainstorming ideas on how we can help the community,” student Holt Jones said. Fellow student Cambree Grissom noted that walking a long distance to the nurse can “take time off of recess and make it less fun”.

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Inside the boxes, the students plan to pack a variety of first-aid essentials.

“We were thinking some band aids… a lot of instant cold packs… wipes too to clean wounds, and we have tweezers, adhesive tape, gloves, an emergency blanket,” Clark Hastings, another student, said.

The project initially faced a hurdle when students pitched a wooden box to the school administration, who raised concerns about rotting and upkeep. Realizing the boxes needed to be constructed from metal to last, Owens initially felt they had hit a dead end.

“We’ve never done anything out of metal,” Owens said. “I don’t know how to weld. I don’t know anybody who knows how to weld”.

She then remembered the Northeast Arkansas Career & Technical Center (NEACTC) and reached out to assistant director Garrett Barnes, who connected the EAST team with welding and fabrication instructor Henry Laxton. When evaluating the blueprints, Laxton’s team had to consider durability and weight.

“What we came up with is that aluminum is the best alloy for this project,” Laxton said. “Once you weld it, it’s basically maintenance-free, leak-free. It won’t ever rust. They’ll never have to replace them”.

Working out these logistical details meant visiting the high schoolers in the NEACTC welding shop. Student Avian Carlton said the experience was overwhelming due to there being a lot of high schoolers. However, she noted that “it did look very amazing, because there were so many amazing tools.”

Grissom added that the students quickly learned “there’s a lot of different kinds of metal and different ways to make the box,” and they had to “consider so many different things”.

Owens enjoyed watching the younger students navigate the process with the older teens.

“He [Laxton] was just throwing a lot at them to think about, and the kids were just responding and then kind of looking at each other,” Owens said regarding Laxton’s questions on roof pitch and paint. “It was very collaborative, but it was also like a problem-solving session”.

Laxton noted his students also enjoyed playing the role of manufacturing experts.

“The kids would say, ‘Okay, what do you think as an expert?'” Laxton recalled. “And the kids would giggle and laugh and they seem to get along really well working together”.

Before finalizing the designs, EAST students met with duty teachers, the school nurse, and principals. The consensus was that the boxes must be locked, requiring future training for playground staff. The school nurse plans to restock supplies on a monthly basis, storing the medical items in plastic containers inside to protect them from the heat of the aluminum.

Production on the boxes officially began on Thursday morning. Owens said with the group graduating this year, they want to see it before they leave.

For the sixth graders, the project represents a permanent legacy.

“Knowing that all your hard work pays off. A permanent like mark of y’all just in the playground forever helping out people,” Hastings said.

Laxton shared a similar sentiment. “They’ll be there until the students that are doing this [have] kids, kids, and even kids after that,” Laxton said.

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