Hello, my name is Penny. I am in 6th grade and I am 10 years old and live in The Bronx in Indian Village. I am with the Girl Scouts of Greater New York organization working on my Bronze Award. I am trying to open the local school park at PS/MS 108. The kids and their families of the Indian Village community would be very thankful since as of now, it is only open to the people that go to that school during the school day. 

It would be better to play in the park instead of playing in front of the school steps, like me and some of my friends do. We also end up playing on the sidewalk near the gates and sometimes our balls roll into the street, we end up near the street and then we could get hurt and get hit by a car.  We also get into people's way when they come out of the school. 

Recent research shows that the benefits of opening the playground to the community are that the kids and adults interact with people in the community, that's important because kids learn social skills and parents make new friendships and hang out too. 

Play helps kids to learn how to resolve conflict, practice patience and have empathy.  Then they will know how to be good neighbors who don’t fight with each other. People in the neighborhood will be more healthy and active if we could use the park to ride their bikes or jog or walk and do exercises together. 

 The community paid for the school playground with their taxes and the money is just going to waste since its closed after school and on weekends. Every kid should have a park that is a 10 minute walk from home, PS 108's school park would be that park for us kids in the neighborhood but since it's not open we have to walk further to get to a park.

It is a brand new playground but still only the people who go to school there can use it so it is very unfair. So, it would be awesome if it was opened.