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Youth Corps Takes Care Of Business

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By D'ANN LAWRENCE WHITE

The Tampa Tribune

Published: August 27, 2008

PALM RIVER - Calling their summer productive might be a bit of an understatement, agreed members of the 2008 class of the Palm River Youth Corps.

Not only did they start a business, they learned a hip-hop dance routine and performed it for an audience, wrote and acted in a series of skits and learned to play a musical instrument.

"It was a pretty busy summer," said class member Jimmie Wright Jr. "But it was a privilege to be a part of this group and participate in something to benefit my community. I'd do it all again in a heartbeat."

The third annual Palm River Youth Corps for young people age 12 and older was organized by the Greater Palm River POINT Community Development Corp., a nonprofit group whose mission is improve the urban community's roads, economic development, education and the quality of life, health and well-being of children and families.

Working with youth, POINT executive director Liz Gutierrez said, is an integral part of that mission.

"This program is about how we can engage, inform and educate our youth about their neighborhood and how they can make a difference," she told families, sponsors and other guests at a graduation ceremony for the 19 corps members Aug. 6 at Dowdell Middle Magnet School.
Palm River POINT Youth Director Natalie Clamp said the agency could not manage an eight-week program of this kind without community partners. She said the program had two invaluable partners: Stageworks Theater, a professional children's theater troupe, and Junior Achievement, a national nonprofit group dedicated to teaching youngsters business skills.

The corps members demonstrated some of what they had learned at their graduation, including a hip-hop dance routine choreographed by Stageworks' Elizabeth Edelson.
Alvon Griffin, also a Stageworks staff member, taught them they can make music anywhere, at any time, with anything. The students presented a synchronized bucket-drumming concert using commercial plastic paint buckets.

In a more challenging project, Griffin and Stageworks staff members Dawn Truax and Josh Groff asked the students to confront challenging personal and social issues they have faced. The students wrote and acted in skits about gang violence, proper behavior when being pulled over by law enforcement and how to respond when people judge them without knowing them.

"This was our first time working with the Palm River Youth Corps, and it was such a great partnership," Truax said. "We teach conflict resolution, anger management and civil rights to youth, so this was right up our alley."

The audience wasn't able to see the eight weeks' worth of work the 19 corps members did, with the help of Junior Achievement curriculum, starting their own sno-cone business, called SO ICY.

"They applied for jobs, had a marketing and finance department, executed a business plan and sold their product, earning money for a field trip to Wet n' Wild," Clamp said.

Tiara Watson, 12, said she's ready to return next year.

"I definitely would like to do it again," she said, adding that she liked the dancing best.

Shaniqua Isom, 14, echoed the sentiment.

"Yeah, doing the hip-hop was a lot of fun," she said.

"It was all fun," agreed Sierra Williams, 14. "Making new friends, being able to run our own business - I want to do it again."

Gutierrez gave all the credit for the program's success to the sponsors and community partners.

"Average people can do miraculous things when they believe," she said.
Palm River Youth Corps Class of 2008 graduates are Akia Mondezie, Alex Turner, Amanda Feroz, Ashley Williams, Benjamin Burke, Brandicia Taylor, Bode'sha Speed, Carlos Martinez, Daniel Stokes, DeAundre Green, Daquan Adams, Felix Diaz, Gerardo Sanchez, Jimmie Wright Jr., Jose Pereira, Shaniqua Isom, Sierra Williams, Tiara Watson and Velvet Nealy.

Reporter D'Ann Lawrence White can be reached at (813) 657-4524 or dlwhite@tampatrib.com.

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