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Father and son raise thousands for Richmond school, urge other parents to get involved

Posted at 8:07 AM, Sep 18, 2019
and last updated 2019-09-18 08:07:32-04

RICHMOND, Va. -- It's easy to see what draws people into Brewers Waffles in Richmond's Manchester neighborhood. It’s the delicious smell. The hard part is choosing a waffle.

"You have several options," owner Ajay Brewer said. “The Carver is probably the most popular right now.  Named after Carver, the school, the man."

In fact, all the waffles are named after Richmond schools.

"We wanted the names of our waffles to be representative of people who were inclusive, who brought about change," Brewer said.

Change was needed to help Richmond schools thrive, Brewer added. A change in the way the school are supported. He said parents need to take more pride in their communities and their children's schools.

"Blackwell is adjacent to us," Brewer said. "The school that's in that neighborhood is beautiful, it's a great set of teachers, great kids, but it's poorly, poorly supported by the community."

While his son Parker loves eating his dad's waffles, he also loves his school, Blackwell. That's why he and his dad started a GoFundMe called “Parker's 50-mile Bike Ride".

Together they rode the Capital Trail from Jamestown to Blackwell in Richmond and raised more than $4,000.

Ajay Brewer and his son Parker

"Parker, for his 5th birthday, raised more than 10 times the amount of money that was given to the school last year for their PTA," Brewer said.

They plan to repeat the feat next year. Between now and then, they'll try and bring awareness to the needs in all Richmond schools... one waffle at a time.

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