Queens Students Unveil Renovated Basketball Court at Playground Ninety

A group of Queens high school students cut the ribbon Friday on a newly renovated basketball court at Playground Ninety in Jackson Heights, celebrating the completion of a student-led effort that turned a run-down neighborhood court into a colorful public space for students, families and neighbors.

The project was led by students from Voyages Preparatory High School, a public transfer school in Queens, through an elective class offered in partnership with Hire Cause, a project-based career education program. Hire Cause gives high school students hands-on experience building professional skills by leading projects that address real needs in their communities. The students identified the court — a place where many of them gather after school to play basketball — as a public space they wanted to improve.

Over the course of the school year, the students organized three bake sales, a carnival and a basketball tournament, raising $2,100 toward the project. They later submitted a video to Every Court Has a Story, a global competition in which participants pitch their vision for why their court deserves a renovation grant.

Their submission was selected from more than 50 entries, making it the first student-led submission to win the competition and earning them a $50,000 renovation grant.

“This project shows that the way some people look at transfer school students is wrong,” said William Nevels, a Voyages Prep senior. “People might make assumptions about who we are, but when you really get to know students at schools like Voyages, you see people who are driven, hardworking, and capable of doing something meaningful. This court is proof that students like us can create something real for our community.”

The nonprofit Project Backboard renovated the court in partnership with NYC Parks, with students helping paint the court in the days leading up to the unveiling. The renovation included repairing and resurfacing the court, drawing the court design and applying colorful acrylic coating designed for sports surfaces.

The finished court features a large-scale mural design created with student input in collaboration with artists Traci Molloy and Claude Viaud Peralta. The design includes colorful flowers meant to represent the diversity of Jackson Heights, wavy blue lines symbolizing New York City’s rivers and interconnected communities, and a day-and-night theme across the court.

“For a lot of us, basketball is therapy. It brings people together, helps people find peace, and gives students a place to stay focused,” said Kamrin Jones, a Voyages Prep senior. “We put our voice into our video for ‘Every Court Has a Story,’ and people heard us. To know that our voices could lead to a real change in a place our community uses, means so much to us.”

The ribbon-cutting brought together students, educators, families, artists and community partners. State Assembly Member Jessica González-Rojas and City Council Member Shekar Krishnan also attended.

Voyages Prep serves students who have fallen behind in credits or need a different pathway to complete high school. Educators said the court project gave students a chance to practice leadership, collaboration, communication, project management and civic engagement while creating something tangible for the school and neighborhood community.

“What made this project so powerful was that students saw their ideas move from the classroom into the real world,” said Yael Glick, teacher of the Hire Cause class at Voyages Prep. “They were not just learning about service or career skills in theory. They were organizing events, telling their story, working with partners, contributing to the design, and seeing the impact of their work in a public space that people will use every day.”

“At Hire Cause, we believe young people build confidence, purpose and career-ready skills when they have the chance to work on real challenges that matter to them,” said David Dvorkin, Founder and CEO of Hire Cause. “These students chose a cause bigger than themselves, and once they tapped into that, nothing was stopping them. They organized, raised money, built partnerships, and helped bring a lasting community improvement to life.”

For some students, the court’s transformation was also deeply personal.

“I’m from this neighborhood, so this is personal for me,” said Joseth Laiz, a Voyages Prep senior. “One day when I have kids, I want to be able to come back here and tell them, ‘I helped do this.’ It feels special to know that something we worked on will be here for the people of this community for many years to come.”

Project Backboard, which renovates public basketball courts with site-specific art, has worked on more than a dozen courts in New York City, including another Queens court at Murray Playground in Long Island City.

The Playground Ninety renovation was made possible with support from Every Court Has a Story, Project Backboard and JDS Sports #playwithpurpose.

“This project showed us what we can accomplish when we work as a team,” said Sophia Nunez, a Voyages Prep senior. “We started with an idea to improve a court that mattered to students and the community, and we just kept going. It taught us to invest in our community and to believe that our ideas can make a difference.”