Lowe’s Heroes provide free upgrades to local high school

BRADFORD, Tenn. — Employees of local Lowe’s stores are volunteering their time to serve the community.

Each year the Lowe’s Heroes program chooses a nonprofit organization or public school and provides upgrades, free of charge. This time around one West Tennessee high school is getting a new lease on life.

Lowe’s volunteers work Friday afternoon to transform a classroom at Bradford High School.

“I won, and so now they demo’d all three kitchens and now they’re putting them back together,” family and consumer science teacher Stephanie Pate said.

School officials say the kitchen area is more than 30 years old.

“I am just beyond excited,” Pate said. “I can’t wait for it to be done.”

Students will not only have a completely transformed facility, but the Bradford Special School District is also providing brand new appliances. Former Bradford High School student Johnathan Powell applied for the Lowe’s Heroes grant on behalf of Pate.

“He told me he was going to do it and then he called me at school the day he found out that we were accepted,” Pate said.

Pate said she couldn’t contain her excitement when she heard the news.

“Went out in the hallway and he was on the phone,” Pate said. “He said ‘I just wanted to tell you that you got it,” and I was just — I had no words. I just screamed and jumped. I just didn’t have anything to say but thank you.”

For more than a week, volunteers from the Lowe’s in Milan and both locations in Jackson collaborated to finish the service project, something Pate says will be beneficial for the students.

“Working in a newly designed kitchen just getting some life skills that they’ll be able to take to college and then on into their families as well,” Pate said.

The Lowe’s Heroes program began more than 10 years ago with the mission of changing lives one community at a time.

Volunteers will continue the project through the weekend and expect renovations to be completed by the end of next week.