Artie Rogers had a dream.

For the last 10 years the secretary at Lincoln Park Elementary School has wanted to get a reader board. When she drove up to the school on Monday she saw that her dream had come true.

"Dreams do come true," the 59-year-old Rogers said. " I drove up and thought, ‘That looks like my name’ and of course I had to cry and tell everybody that I know (about it)."

Last year, the school's parent group, the Lincoln Leaders, wanted to know what they could do for Lincoln Park. Toni Lix, the school’s parental involvement facilitator, told them that Rogers wanted a reader board put up before her time at the school was up. That became the Lincoln Leaders mission. In just one year through fundraisers like a rummage sale and numerous bake sales, they raised the $3,000-plus to buy the sign.

It was Rogers’ plan to have money donated for the sign after she died if the school did not already have one.

"She would do anything for anybody," Lix said of Rogers. "She doesn't have a mean hair on her head."

Rogers’ love for Lincoln Park runs deep. As a student there from 1957 through 1959, she was in the first class of students to attend the school and found a love for it early. Her best friend’s mother was the secretary and let her help with small tasks. It was then that she decided she wanted to become Lincoln Park’s secretary. She began working at the school 26 years ago first as a third-grade aide for half a year, then as a clinical aide for nine years and finally as the school secretary.

She has also seen all three of her children walk through the halls of the school and considers herself the students’ grandmother.

"The kids will tell you that I love them," Rogers said. "I am too old and senile to be their mother so now I am the grandmother."

Rogers wanted the school to have a way to communicate with the parents of the school in a way that would save trees.

The sign, which was installed on Saturday, will give parents information about upcoming events. Information on the board will be in both English and Spanish because the school’s population is split evenly between the two languages.

"We need to communicate for our parents in their language though some people may not say it's okay," Lix said.

Now that the board is up Rogers and her colleagues have another dream.

"Our next dream is that (the board) will stay vandalism free," Lix said.