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RECREATION DEPARTMENT
On your Mark, Get REC, Go! That’s right! Newmarket Recreation keeps going and going! We now invite you, our town residents, to read what their recreation department has accomplished in their community in the year 2007. By going the extra Smile we are committed, as you will read below, to REC Your Day…
Our Latest and Greatest and much anticipated addition will certainly REC Your Day
We’re very happy to announce that in December the recreation department finally acquired a 14-passenger handicap accessible bus/van cut-away. The van also features an easy to move around center aisle and large tinted windows perfect for scenic trips. This much requested van will be used for a variety of Newmarket Recreation sponsored activities and field trips.
REC every Newmarket Residents Day in our Seasonal Special Events Way
The following will be our brief annual RECap of the “Traditional and Favorite” special events we hold every year! It was a Special Moment in Time theme for our annual Daddy Daughter Date Night where approximately 300 little girls and their fathers danced the night away treasuring each moment together. Our annual Easter Egg hunt was a bit easier this year due to the lasting snow on the grass. The colorful eggs lit the snow up like a rainbow as 400 children scattered to find over 2,007 eggs that were hidden! The weather did, however, cooperate for our Annual Fishing Derby, which is always held the day before Father’s Day. Again we partnered with the town’s Conservation Committee, and stocked over 750 rainbow trout and brook trout in Herb Richmond’s Pond. Kids of all ages arrived as early as 6:30 in the morning just waiting to lure a few fish out of the pond. Things certainly heated up for our 8 weeks of Summer Camp, which we will go into greater detail further down in this report. In the fall, we held our two favorite Halloween themed events. First came the annual Spooky Sleepover where over 50 kids spent the night in our Haunted Community Center. Next came our Happy Halloween Haunt & Costume Parade whereover 200 little goblins in various costumes participated. After an exciting 2007 World Series, we decided we wanted to stay in the sprit of sports and appropriately themed our annual Mother and Son Dance Thursday Nights under the Lights! The 2007 Season of Giving started again with the Annual Giving Tree during the Town Tree Lighting Ceremony. Finishing up the year, we would like to thank Santa Claus again for taking time out of his busy December schedule to visit at our Annual Winter Wonderland Christmas Party.
REC Newmarket Kids with a 2007’s Amazing Race to Discover Earth Fire People Ice
Our 8 week Summer Camp was themed an Amazing Race around the world. In fact, as we traveled to different continents each week, campers had a chance to play various games and learn a bit about their environment along the way. For example, kids learned how the sun is bleaching the Great Barrier Reef in Australia, so we played a game where counselors dressed in white and campers got to “un-bleach” them by throwing colorful sponges of paint at them. The game was a bit messy, but campers thoroughly enjoyed the global warming lesson! We also took on a huge recycling project and collected over 2000 cans/plastic bottles and created an EARTH mosaic using the very same cans/bottles that were brought in. We wanted to show the campers how much space just 2 weeks of this type of waste can make. Parents continue to give us positive feedback on our summer camp program telling us their kids just love all the creative special events, field trips, and sports & game activities and, of course, the awesome staff. Our continued success with inclusion in camp keeps our friendship facilitators very busy. A friendship facilitator helps bridge social gaps between children to make sure that all children are supported in camp to give them the best experience that they possibly can have. Due to the increasing popularity of our summer program, our registration numbers topped off at a total of 400 campers from preschool age children on up to 9th grade. This number includes our Little “Rec”tile Preschool Summer Camp for ages 3-5, our regular 1st Rec from the Sun Adventure Camp for 1st - 6th grade, and our increasingly popular TEEN T.U.R.F. Camp geared for 7th- 9th graders. Registration for any of our summer camp programs start on March 1st for Newmarket residents.
REC our Residents Year with new and innovative Seasonal Recreation Programming
Lacrosse is becoming the fastest growing sport of the new millennium and Newmarket Recreation is doing whatever we can to make sure we’re on the ball with this sport. Due to the previous year’s success, Newmarket Recreation brought back Hershey’s Track & Field again last year and ended up recruiting over 20 kids to participate in the 2007 summer games. Hershey Track & Field Games is an exciting track and field event to promote active lifestyles, sportsmanship as well as provide an opportunity for kids to be the best that they can be. Even our 5 & 6-year old T-ball program grew in 2007. Even if you haven’t stopped by on a Wednesday night, its quite a sight to see watching 8 teams comprised of this age group play ball! Our newest programming additions last year would be our Peek-A-Book program geared to toddlers & preschool age children, our Beginning Ballroom Dancing for adults and our partnership with the Exeter Hospital Mobile Health Care Services. If you haven’t heard, on the 3rd Monday of each month, Exeter Hospital Mobile Health Care Services medical van will be on-site from 1pm - 3pm to offer a variety of FREE health screens to anyone who wishes to have a screening done (i.e. cholesterol, ABI, blood sugar) and/or whatever screenings they may be focusing on that month. Do you have a medical question you would like to ask the visiting doctor? According to the staff at Community Healthreach, no reason is too small to stop by. In addition to that, each month the HealthReach Community Education Department also sponsors a Monthly Health Awareness campaign and provides free give-away literature.
REC our Senior Citizens Day, with the Sunrise Sunset Newmarket Senior Activity Center
Newmarket Recreation is happy to finally announce the opening of Phase 1 of our Sunrise Sunset Activity Center for our active 55+ population. Get Up Get Active Be Alive at 55! The center is located at 2 Terrace Drive - the old ambulance building. We would like to thank the Newmarket Housing Authority for funding the majority of the Phase 1 project. Sunrise Sunset Phase 1 included: a state-of-the-art kitchen, which will house the Rockingham County Meals on Wheels program; a 400 sq. ft. community room which will be used for a variety of programs such as crafts, cards, congregate & small social networking events; a small multi-use private office which will be used for foot clinics, tax help, etc.; and a newly paved one-way easy in & out parking. It is our wish to begin general activity programming in the facility in February of 2008. Phase 2 of the Sunrise Sunset Center will include a 1500 sq. ft. multi-use function space and is projected to start construction in July of 2008. Again, we hope to expand senior programming all together after Phase 2 of the center opens. Our last bit of goods news is we again applied for a New Hampshire GraniteCare Senior Wellness Grant, which if granted, will help pay for a 6 month Tai Chi wellness program for our senior population in 2008.
REC the Pre-Teens and Teens of Newmarket in the Club Chameleon Way
We are happy to announce that at the end of 2007 we had over 215 registered in the Club Chameleon program, that’s 40 teens up from last year. As you may remember, we reported last year that the Newmarket Recreation’s Club Chameleon was designated as one of 20 Teens Outside! pilot sites by the National Recreation and Parks Association and the Outdoor Industry Foundation. By participating in the Teens Outside! program in 2007, our Club Chameleon teens participated in advanced kayaking and rock climbing, in addition to the Great American Back Yard Camp Out, various community service projects, learned how to fly fish and went white water river rafting as part of another national campaign, entitled TakeMeFishing. The rock-climbing kids also mentored down their rock climbing skills to local area 4th graders. After completing this year long Teens Outside! adventure, our Club Chameleon teens wanted to celebrate their achievements and share them with younger kids to let them know how great Club Chameleon is and how it has changed their lives and why they love the outside world around them. It was decided that we would organize a “tie-in” assembly between the Newmarket Elementary School’s celebration of Red Ribbon Week and Newmarket Recreation’s Club Chameleon program. We believe Newmarket’s Club Chameleon offers the perfect alternate activities for your kids to get involved in rather than getting involved in drugs! For example, Chameleon teens don’t get tied up with drugs... they get tied into carabineers and go rock climbing! The Chameleon Connection Mentoring Program with the athletes of the University of New Hampshire also grew by leaps and bounds. By the end of the 2007-year Club Chameleon connected 45 teens with positive role models from the Life Skills program at U.N.H. Also in November of 2007 the program received a $5000 grant from the NH Charitable Trust Foundation. The grant will be used for various Chameleon Connection activities, as well as one-on-one mentoring activities. If you would like more information on Club Chameleon and/or would like to donate/contribute in some way to this worthwhile cause, please call the Rec. Dept. or log onto www.clubchameleon.org.
Our Supporters REC Newmarket Recreation’s Day!
Newmarket Recreation is very proud to re-introduce our Friends of Newmarket Recreation. This group of volunteers is committed to joining together in pursuit of community unity and supporting a diverse range of recreation opportunities for all members of our community. They engage in volunteer efforts and fundraising on behalf of this mission in support of the Newmarket Recreation Department. They are excited about supporting a number of ongoing initiatives such as Club Chameleon, the new Sunrise Sunset Senior Center, and various inclusive recreational activities. If you would like to help contribute, please call 659-8581. Another organization we would also like to acknowledge and thank is the N.C.E.P. for their continued support. N.C.E.P. is a non-profit organization and stands for Newmarket Community Education. Partnership. We encourage you to check them out @ www.ncepconnectioninaction.org
REC the Tax Payers Day by making 2007 Revenue
With the expansion in programming and the increased attendance numbers in our very popular summer camp program, we were especially excited to announce that we brought in over $214,000 in revenue for the Town of Newmarket in the 2006/2007 fiscal year! This revenue helps to keep stable your recreation tax spending dollars and stills allows growth.
We’re here to REC your Day in “EVERY” way by inviting each and every resident of Newmarket to participate and enjoy themselves in Newmarket Recreation activities! In exchange we will continue to create an inclusive recreational culture so that all members of our community, regardless of differences or background can participate in a recreational outlet that they enjoy throughout the year.
Jim Hilton Aimee Gigandet Anneliese Fisher Sarah Gibbons
Director Asst. Director Operations Manager Front Desk
2008 NEWMARKET RECREATION SPECIAL EVENTS SCHEDULE
Each year we do several brochure mailings everyone listed on our mailing list. These brochures give a detailed description and scheduling of all the programs we offer. If you are not on our mailing list, we encourage you to come down to the Recreation Department, located in the Community Center on 1 Terrace Drive, and register to receive our next mailing. While you’re there, be sure to pick up the Winter/Spring 2008 activity brochure. In the meantime, please refer to the brief outline below of our 2008 annual special events and programming seasonal sign-ups:
JANUARY Winter Enrichment Classes begin (pick up brochure)
FEBRUARY Daddy Daughter Date Night on 2/7
MARCH Spring enrichment classes begin (pick up brochure) Easter Egg Hunt 3/22
Registration for our Summer Camp 3/1, T.R.L. Fifth Grade Dance on 3/21
MAY Community Garden begins, Hershey Track and Field practice begins
JUNE Summer enrichment classes begin (pick up flyers)
Annual Fishing Derby on 6/14, First Rec from the Sun Summer Adventure Day Camp and our Little “Rec”tiles (8 wks) starts 6/25
AUGUEST AUGUST Drive-In Movie 8/11, End of Camp 8/15, Nellie Soccer Camp 8/4-8
SEPTEMBER: Fall enrichment classes begin (pick up brochure)
Little “Rec”tiles Preschool Playgroup school term begins
OCTOBER: Annual Halloween Haunt on 10/25
NOVEMBER: Mother & Son Dance 11/6, Flag Football Super Bowl Party on TBA
DECEMBER: Annual Giving Tree on 12/6, Annual Christmas Party on 12/13
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