NAP- Neighborhood Alliance of Pawtucket

The fountain is going to be restored at Blackstone Blvd  + Hope St park- Lippitt Park

The article in the projo with the help of our Summit Association Neighbors and Jesse Polhemus and some Champlin funds etc...

Bob Kerr: A man from Senegal offers a life lesson

01:00 AM EST on Sunday, January 10, 2010

Mouhamadou Sylla, a senior at Tolman High School, has inspired his classmates with his courage in the face of death.

The Providence Journal / John Freidah

Sitting next to a 6-foot-4 package of courage, gratitude and humility can change the way a guy thinks about the school he’s in.

“He doesn’t slack off,” says sophomore Helder Lopes. “I might be sitting there daydreaming, but he’s always in his notebook.”

“He shows that he’s tough, too,” says senior Devon Clay-Smith. “He had the chance to stay home, but he came to school. He chose to come. I respect that 100 percent.”

They talk that way of Mouhamadou Sylla at Tolman High School. They talk of how his presence has enriched them, how his quiet insistence on being in the classroom has made this a better and more meaningful year at the old high school in the middle of Pawtucket.

This year, they have learned things they couldn’t have learned before the arrival of the man from Senegal.

Now, they prepare for a special graduation ceremony this week to honor their friend.

“We want it to be about the Tolman community,” said Maureen Toth, the director of guidance who, along with her family, has become close to Mouhamadou.

The seniors will gather on Wednesday, as seniors do for graduations. But only Mouhamadou will wear the cap and gown. It is his day, his time to claim something precious.

“Education is everything,” he said when we talked at the school Wednesday morning. “That’s what my mother always told me.”

He will be 21 on Jan. 27. He is a quiet and private man who is not sure his story deserves telling. Even students at Tolman didn’t know it. They knew there was a tall person among them who walked with a cane, studied hard and talked little. They didn’t know the details. They didn’t know that there were lessons to be learned from his incredible journey.

So Toth and other members of the faculty decided to tell them. Students gathered in the gym on a day in mid-October and learned of the cancer that was diagnosed in Senegal and treated in Rhode Island. They learned that this person they like so much was facing some very long odds.

“Some kids didn’t even know he had a prosthesis,” said Toth.

She told the students they have a hero among them. And as the story came out — as they learned of the surgeries and of waking up in a strange place with part of a leg removed — the students of Tolman began to applaud.

And because of the terrible uncertainty cancer creates, there will be this special graduation on Wednesday. Mouhamadou’s mother was due to arrive from Senegal on Saturday so she could see her son walk across that stage.

“They are good people,” said Mouhamadou of his friends at Tolman. “I feel comfortable here.”

It was more than three years ago that the pain in his right leg was diagnosed as cancer. And with the diagnosis came word that the best treatment for the cancer wasn’t available in Senegal. It was available in the United States.

His father, brother and sisters were already in Pawtucket. He flew to New York, then went straight to Rhode Island Hospital. He remembers being examined, being moved through scanners. Then, just hours removed from the place he had known his entire life, he was in an operating room in a place he knew little about and in the care of doctors and nurses who spoke a different language.

“I woke up and saw my leg wasn’t there,” he said. “It was very tough.”

He did what he had to do. And he talks in an almost matter-of-fact way about how he’s dealt with life-changing surgery and pursued an education and learned English and kept himself from surrendering to the kind of emotional pileup that would leave many people in a heap of self-pity.

His cancer is something he feels no need to tell people about. But it has not gone away. It came back in his leg and a second surgery took the rest of his right leg up to the hip.

Then, a few weeks ago, a CAT scan revealed lung cancer.

“Knowing this, he still came to school, worked on his assignments, studied for tests,” said Kelley Healey, his English teacher. “To be honest, I didn’t even know until he told me that he was sorry that he wouldn’t be in class the next day because he would be having surgery to try to remove the cancer from his lung. He even e-mailed me in the morning before the surgery to ask for his missed work and to tell his classmates hello.”

He deals with what’s right here right now. His Muslim faith helps. He prays mostly at home with his family. And the people at Tolman High School have come up big. They have done the small things. They help as much as Mouhamadou allows.

Toth’s husband, John, a track coach, took him to a Celtics game, where a serious upgrade put them at courtside and a cheerleader came over to say hello. Mouhamadou played basketball and soccer in Senegal.

John Toth also provided science instruction when homeschooling was necessary.

It’s going to be an emotional week at Tolman. The school chorus is getting ready for a graduation in January.

Then, on Thursday, Mouhamadou goes back into the hospital for more lung surgery because cancer has come back yet again.

He looks past it. He says he might like to be a banker some day. He’s very good at math. And the man who made his prosthetic leg has offered him a job with his company.

He is grateful, he says, grateful for the opportunity to come to the United States and be cared for by some of the best people in the world. Sometimes, when he goes to Hasbro Children’s Hospital for follow-up care, he has seen children just 4 or 5 years old with cancer. He will be 21 this month, so he feels fortunate.

And he is grateful for Tolman, where he has been able to be a high school kid and make friends and, on Wednesday, walk across the stage and receive a special diploma.

Maureen Toth says Mouhamadou Sylla has brought a community together.

Students at Tolman say they appreciate life more because of him.

bkerr@projo.com

The New England Paralyzed Veterans of America (NEPVA) and the Joining Hands club of Boston University , will host a Wheelchair Basketball Clinic at Sargent Gym at the Student Activity Center 1 University Road Boston MA on Sunday February 7^th, 2010, from 11a.m. to 3:30p.m. See attached flyer for more info.

NEPVA is recruiting players, volunteers and sponsors who want to be a part of this exciting adaptive form of basketball. Wheelchair basketball can be played by individuals with disabilities such as spinal cord injury, amputation, multiple sclerosis and polio.

Anyone interested in participating in the wheelchair basketball clinic, should contact us asap to register for the clinic. We want to reach as many people as possible and to promote wheelchair basketball so please pass this info along to anyone you think would be interested.

If you have any questions about wheelchair basketball clinic, please feel free to email any of the following contacts:

Thomas Dodd

Assistant Sports Director

New England Paralyzed Veterans of America

508-660-1181

Katie Faris

Joining Hands Program Manager

Boston University Community Service Center

617-353-47104710**

joinhand@bu.edu
**Call line in case of inclement weather

Karen J. Hutchinson, PT, DPT, PhD

Clinical Associate Professor

Boston University

Sargent College, Rm 541

635 Commonwealth Ave

Boston, MA 02215

617-353-7502

kahutch@bu.edu

Ps Any assistance in promoting the wheelchair basketball clinic would be greatly appreciated!

http://www.ribsfest.org/ Storytelling week from 17-24th