Helping Students Through Community Networking
June 04, 2009
If community involvement sounds forced, rigid, or too formal, take a cue from Philadelphia, Pa. English teacher Zac Chase.
Chase, 27, could pen a book on effortless involvement. The sociable 9th grade English teacher discovered early in his career how to engage himself in his community in a way that stretched beyond the boundaries of mere volunteerism.
Faced with having to reach at-risk teens as a language arts teacher at Phoenix Academy, a dropout-prevention program in Sarasota, Fla., Chase built a bridge between his classroom and the community.
He networked, exchanged e-mails, joined Florida Studio Theatre's improv comedy troupe, and began writing a column on education for Sarasota's daily newspaper. He joined the Freedom Writers Foundation, a nonprofit organization that decreases high school dropout rates through journaling. (The organization inspired the 2007 Hillary Swank film, "Freedom Writers.")
Feeding his students need for Internet fodder he started a blog called "Mr. Chase's Room." His posts, whether sad, funny or sentimental, proved a healthier alternative to MySpace.
"I started looking at my social life as a catchall," says Chase. "I kept my eyes and ears open for natural connections. Every time I met a friend, or a friend of a friend, I would ask myself: how might this add to the classroom?"
He started a one-on-one mentoring program, pairing students who were struggling with writing assignments with friends he had made in the newspaper industry.
On an espresso-fueled paper-grading night, he conceived a youth screenwriting program after learning his favorite barista, Debra Hussong, was also a screenwriter. Offering to help Chase's students write their own short films, Hussong persuaded the owner of the coffee shop into hosting student readings inside the café.
He founded an after-school improv comedy club using the skills he learned at Florida Studio Theater to pass on the art of quick wit and to boost students' self esteem. Melding the two loves paid off tremendously. Chase saw an improvement in classroom participation, and Sarasota improv fans loved the shows.
"It's easy for teachers to feel a constant sense of burnout," says Chase. "There's this familiar school-home-school-home cycle. Teachers become invisible. If you don't do that one extra thing to become involved in the community, you'll get lost in the shuffle."
No longer employed at Phoenix Academy, his volunteer work with the Freedom Writers nabbed him a job last fall in Philadelphia teaching English at the Science Leadership Academy (SLA), a progressive inner-city high school developed in partnership with The Franklin Institute.
In a city 30 times the size of Sarasota, where Chase knows little to no one, he has had to start what he calls, "informal networking" all over again.
Using the resources he garnered from the Freedom Writers Foundation, Chase began his first semester at SLA by introducing students to Freedom Writer founder, Erin Gruwell's diary. The students, many of whom met for the first time in Chase's classroom, identified with Gruwell's message of diversity and acceptance.
"The book gave them a safe place to talk," says Chase.
Through relentless work, he's made new contacts in Philly"getting involved in improv comedy again, pairing up students with mentors at newspapers, museums, and colleges.
"If you look at my time in Sarasota," says Chase, "I was never involved in groups. I was associated with people who knew the right people and that's the mindset I moved to Philadelphia with."
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