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This year’s honorees will include Kendra Borque, a 1993 graduate of Cardinal Cushing School. (Cardinal Cushing Centers) |
A day of special recognition
Springtime 2010, a major fund-raiser for an institution that has taught and cared for people with intellectual disabilities for more than 60 years, celebrates the achievements of the organization’s students and offers thanks to its business and individual supporters.
“It’s a very meaningful evening,’’ said Jo Ann Simons, the president and CEO of Cardinal Cushing Centers, which offers educational services at campuses in Hanover and Braintree.
In its 46th year, the Springtime event has raised money for the nonprofit center’s services from the local as well as national businesses, spokeswoman Jane Spitz said.
The Cardinal Cushing School Student Choir will perform at the evening gala on June 24, and student artwork will be featured. Before the gala gets underway, a new ballfield and track dedication ceremony will be held on the special-needs school’s Hanover campus at 5:30 p.m. The gala begins with a reception at 6 p.m., followed by the formal program and dinner at 7 p.m.
This year’s Personal Achievement Award will go to Kendra Bourque, a 1993 graduate of Cardinal Cushing School, who now lives and works in the community while receiving home and work support from Cardinal Cushing Centers Adult Services.
Borque, 37, works at Stop & Shop, volunteers at the YMCA child-care center in Hanover three times a week, and takes part in charity walks for causes such as diabetes, cancer, and arthritis research as well as the Special Olympics. She lives with four other adults in a group home in Hanover, with staff support provided by Cushing. All together, Cushing provides adult residence services for more than 30 people with intellectual disabilities in eight group homes.
“She’s a really wonderful person,’’ Spitz said of Borque. “She does charity work not because she’s supposed to but because she really cares about people.’’ Her “positive attitude, enthusiasm, [and] energy’’ are admired by others.
Home after a food-shopping expedition last Friday, Borque said she likes taking care of children at the Y center, doing things “like coloring, reading to them, and building blocks.’’
She also works out at the Y. “I swim, I work out, I do yoga, the dance class. I change it around,’’ she said.
Living with roommates “works out good.’’ She helps with taking care of the house, cooking — Mexican tacos are a favorite — “vacuuming, and making everything neat,’’ Borque said. The house’s staff members are a combination of family and friends, she says.
At Stop & Shop, she works cleaning aisles and looks forward to learning to bag groceries. She previously worked at Jordan’s Furniture for 13 years.
Like workers everywhere, she looks forward to weekends. She and her roommates might go bowling or out for dinner.
“But if it’s nice — beach,’’ Borque said.
Cushing staff point out that she and other adult service recipients recently took a course in “self-advocacy’’ to polish skills for activities such as speaking out against budget cuts at the State House. Borque’s group home also takes trips together, last year going to Ellis Island in New York City.
The other honorees at Springtime 2010 are longtime supporter Procter & Gamble Co.; James P. McDonough, a member of Cushing’s board of overseers; and the Will and Arline Cloney family, who have also provided longstanding support.
Hanover resident McDonough began the center’s annual St. Patrick’s Day Dinner and Auction, originally sponsored by the Abington Savings Bank, when he was the bank’s president. The event funds a trip to
The Cloney family donated the funds to construct the new track on the Hanover campus. The late Will Cloney was the director of the Boston Marathon and instrumental in transforming it from an amateur race to a world-class event.
A longstanding supporter of Cardinal Cushing Centers through golf tournaments and past Springtime galas, Procter & Gamble recently awarded the school a $50,000 grant to expand its Community Access Recreation and Vacation Program for children with intellectual disabilities up to age 13 and extend its reach beyond the center into the broader community.
Robert Knox can be reached at rc.knox2@gmail.com. 
© Copyright 2010 Globe Newspaper Company.
