Transportation, tutoring among biggest needs

With some experience now under their belts, Peachtree City officials are wanting to improve the fledgling after-school program the city hosts for Booth middle school students.

But Art Sivertsen, the program supervisor, contends more help is needed from the school system, which rebuffed a transportation request to help drop off students from Booth and Rising Starr middle schools. As a result, the program served only students from Booth who could walk to the Glenloch recreation facility where the Teen Activities at Glenloch program operated.

At a workshop with the City Council Tuesday evening, Sivertsen said he tried to convince school officials to allow students to take a school bus that goes right past the Glenloch center, but he was told the system didn’t have the resources.

Councilwoman Judi-ann Rutherford said she was willing to try and help solve the transportation issue by re-approaching school officials.

The program started small with a maximum limit of 18 participants but city officials hope to grow it in the future. Part of that future hinges on finding a better site, as there is a need for a larger indoor recreation “gym” type space than Glenloch offers, officials said.

City Manager Bernie McMullen said the ultimate goal would be to have the program running in the future at the multi-purpose community center that will be built at First Baptist Church.

In June, the City Council approved spending $3,500 in seed money to get the program started with recreational equipment.

Participants pay $50 a month or $20 for one set day of the week over a month’s time. The program is offered every day of the week but Thursday because of a conflict with another program at Glenloch.

The program also has to work to find homework tutors, as initial plans to have high school students perform that task weren’t fruitful, said Randy Gaddo, director of the city’s leisure services. Booth Principal Ted Lombard, who attended the meeting, said he could help explore the possibility of hosting the tutoring sessions at a Booth classroom under the supervision of a teacher, which would help alleviate concerns about a lack of tutors the program has experienced. Other areas for activity at Booth, however, are not available because they are constantly full with school programs such as athletics and the like, Lombard noted.

When they picked up their children, some of the parents’ first questions were if their child got their homework done, Gaddo noted. Another possible solution for the tutoring issue would be to use volunteers from a service group such as the local Kiwanis Club, officials suggested.

Sivertsen said he was caught by surprise at the number of TAG participants who needed some type of social service intervention because of various reasons such as parents getting a divorce, a parent losing their job or other problems. One of the students had just been adopted from Burma and spoke very little English, he noted.

Sivertsen said most of the program’s participants were sixth graders, and some of the older eighth graders would often help him out by cleaning up, “which was nice.”

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