What's going on at the Tampa Housing Authority Community Center?

THA Students proudly displaying their Keith Haring drawings :)

So, as I previously mentioned, I also do a second "job" at the Tampa Housing Authority (THA) community center, Oaks at Riverview. Not too far from the Community Stepping Stones location. The center is for the children and youth of the community there, a community of very underprivileged families. In fact, in order to live there, you have to be of extreme low income. THA not only caters to these families, but they also place their communities in areas where slums exist... so, this kind of gives you an idea of the type of people in these locations. They are strict though... they have rules and they also do not allow anyone who is a criminal or felon to live there. Good. I guess they should be, considering these are really nice homes that are being given to these people.

I don't think many of my co-workers at CSS understand the amount of hard work and dedication it takes to work at THA and to be the ONLY art teacher there. Only my AmeriCorp leader (who used to work there as the art teacher) truly understands the hard work and dedication the position there requires. She has made sure to let me know on numerous occasions how well she knows I am doing, which I truly appreciate because it has helped to keep going. The "coaches" at the center have also told me on various occasions that they appreciate my work too, which was also really uplifting to hear. But anyway, this is all besides the point.

Teaching there is difficult. I don't mean that in a bad way though. One of the main reasons I have such a hard time teaching there is because I am a first time teacher. Actually, teaching there is the first time I have taught class sizes that large before. I teach a range between K-12 (I have written before on a previous post about the differences each have so i won't go there). They give me about 2-4 groups a day, depending on how many they get, and about 20-22 in each class. Phew! That's a lot for one person to handle! And as a beginner who has never taught a class this large or has never had any true formal training to prepare me for this.... it was quite overwhelming. It still is. :/ Despite that, the experience is more valuable than gold... well, if you're going to be a teacher it is. Although I am the teacher, the children there have taught me a lot as well.

All in all, I have thoroughly enjoyed my experience at this location. I learned more than I could have ever imagined. It was as if a wonderful opportunity was just thrown onto my lap without me even foreseeing it. I learned a lot about the way community centers function and the way they handle and organize kids. I learned a lot about classroom management and lesson preparedness. And I learned about what works and what doesn't. Just SO much. It's not like I haven't learned anything at CSS, I have. It's just that I never got the classroom experience that THA has given me. CSS is more like a mentorship program, and I think I like it that way, because I get experience in both. I just hope more than anything that the staff at both locations have seen my hard work and has appreciated it as much as I appreciated being there :)