The Downers Grove Roadrunners Soccer Club donated $12,500 to Downers Grove Grade School District 58 to enhance the District’s Developmental Learning Program, or DLP, classrooms. The Roadrunners co-hosted the Grove Express 5K race in downtown Downers Grove last November, and this donation comes from their portion of the Grove Express proceeds.
“Thank you, Roadrunners Soccer Club, for your continued generosity and support of District 58. This donation will absolutely enhance our DLP students’ learning environments,” said Superintendent Dr. Kevin Russell. “I also thank our Downers Grove community for making last November’s Grove Express 5K so successful. This donation would not have been possible if it wasn’t for your participation in this fantastic community event!”
The DLP is a highly individualized special education program designed to meet the intensive needs of students with known or suspected intellectual disabilities. Students in the DLP participate in direct instruction of daily living skills, which include pre-vocational skills, self-care and hygiene practice, among other areas. This donation will specifically fund improvements to the program’s daily living skills instruction. The donation will fund DLP appliance updates, improved organizational systems and more privacy options. Many of the daily living tools that current DLP students practice using, such as the washing machine and dryer, are more than 20 years old and in poor condition.
“Thank you, Roadrunners, for this incredible donation! Your generosity serves as a great example of how our community recognizes and values inclusion,” said Assistant Superintendent for Special Services Jessica Stewart. “I am proud to work in a community that responds to the needs of all of its members, including individuals with special needs.”
The Roadrunners Soccer Club is also providing $12,500 in donations to District 99 to enhance its special education programs.
“We are all very excited to support both District 58 and District 99 in their special education programs. Both districts do such a fantastic job in this regard, and we wanted to use the funds from the Grove Express 5K to support and improve upon those programs in each school district,” said Don Renner, treasurer of the Downers Grove Roadrunners Club and the president of the Grove Express 5K.
The Roadrunners gave District 58 discretion on how to best use the funds within its special education programs.
“We selected the DLP as it is a program that supports students across our community, and this amount of funding allowed us to address a need that we otherwise would not have been able to accomplish,” Stewart added.
In addition to this $12,500 donation, the Roadrunners organization annually supports District 58 through school supply donations in August, holiday gift donations in December, and other donations throughout the year.
“I’ve had the pleasure of partnering with the Roadrunners on a variety of projects for the past several years,” said Community Relations Coordinator Megan Hewitt. “The Roadrunners organization is truly one-of-a-kind with their generosity and support of our District 58 schools. I am so grateful for their continuous partnership!”