The Wayland Metco Brick Program was officially unveiled last Thursday at the High School in a “groundbreaking” ceremony attended by students, parents, teachers and town officials.

The program was initially created last winter as a means of local fund-raising to supplement support provided by the state.

According to Megan Lucier, Metco coordinator for Happy Hollow School and a member of the Wayland Metco Steering Committee, “The state funding only goes to a certain level. So, in order to have a robust program – to enable Metco students, for example, to take part in after-school sports and music activities, or for us to be able to provide tutoring when necessary – we really need more support.

“The brick program seemed like a way to do this without cannibalizing our other fund-raising and outreach activities, such as the annual appeal letter, the Florence Adler Walk/Run in the spring, and the Martin Luther King Jr. dinner each year.”

Bricks with personalized messages, purchased for $75 each, have been placed in prominent locations, around walkways and in gardens, at all five Wayland schools.

Messages run the gamut – be it from parents to their children (”Steph’s parents are proud of her”), from businesses (”Weston Orthodontics supports Wayland Metco”), or dedicated to teachers and administrators (”R Teachers R GR8″).

“All of the principals have had a brick inscribed in their honor,” Lucier said.

Each brick can contain a message of up to three lines, 16 characters per line.

The landscaping work necessary for the brick project has all been donated by Twin Pines Landscaping of Hopkinton, whose founder, Chris Hopkins, is a 1990 graduate of Wayland High School.

Metco (which stands for The Metropolitan Council for Educational Opportunity) recently celebrated its 40th anniversary of service to families in the Boston and Springfield areas. It is now the largest voluntary school desegregation program in the nation.

Wayland joined the Metco program two years after its establishment, starting with nine students in the freshman and sophomore classes of the high school. Today, 130 youngsters from Boston attend all levels of the schools here in town.

According to Wayland Metco Director Mabel Reid-Wallace, “The brick initiative is a wonderful opportunity to leave a legacy in the Wayland Public Schools. Anyone can buy a brick, and we encourage everyone to do so.”

And, Lucier added, “We’ll continue to sell bricks, so long as it seems like it’s a viable effort.”

Anyone interested in purchasing a brick with a personalized message should call Rena Santillo at the Metco office at 508-358-3755.