The Community Hero Spotlight award identifies and supports people making a positive impact in their communities. Three Spotlight heroes with the most votes will receive money to donate to a charity of their choice.
The Chicago Crusader is presenting Simeon High School instructors Nikisha Henderson and Shavone Walton as nominees for the Community Hero Spotlight. The Crusader urges you to vote for our nominees.
The voting is open now until December 20. Scan the QR code below or visit https//www.community-hero.com/ to vote.
While most parents are optimistic about their child’s ability to learn and acquire skills to navigate through life after high school or college, there are many who fear the thought of their child being able to assume the responsibilities of young adulthood because of developmental challenges.
Welcome to Room 172, housed in a corner of Simeon Career Academy High School, where for the past five years two instructors have showered students with blessings that go way beyond traditional classroom instruction.
Simulating home life, Room 172 includes a tiny kitchen tucked discreetly in a corner of the classroom, called Sweet Café, where students learn not only how to cook meals but acquire cooking safety skills as well.
The program, which includes students from freshman to senior year, has been the best kept secret for the past five years. That’s when the program’s architects, Nikisha Henderson, program creator/instructor, and her instructor, Shavone Walton, created Life Skills for Diverse Learners. The pair has a combined 30 plus years of Special Education experience.
Henderson and Walton were inspired by their mentor Dr. Leslie Diaz-Perez to develop a Life Skills after-school program for Diverse Learners. What they created helps students with disabilities from economically disadvantaged communities to develop essential independent living, personal/social, and vocational skills that foster independent functioning in society.
With the creation of the program, Henderson and Walton wrapped their arms around students who might have been overlooked and turned them into believers of themselves and explorers of the world.
During a visit to the classroom, students were anxious to answer questions about cooking and kitchen safety procedures such as when and how to use fire safety equipment, like the fire extinguisher.
Students acquire safety as well as basic culinary skills, like how to cook chicken, and make homemade pizzas, pastries, macaroni and cheese, greens and other popular dishes. In addition to practical skills, they teach the power of meditation, the ease of online workouts, and life skills like how to shop for groceries.
The instructors also take the young people on field trips, as they did last summer when they took students to a show. Another trip taught them how to shop for groceries at different stores, including Target, to expand their horizons.
Henderson and Walton teach vocational preparation, help students secure employment and teach manners, including how to respect adults.
On one side of Room 172 is a picture with the Target logo; this area houses the location of the classroom’s “store.”
“This is a functioning Target, the kids operate it. They all have IDs, name tags. We provide the food for them. There is a reward-based program. They are able to buy from the store” Henderson said. She added one student is named Employee of the Month each month.
The Target program is curriculum-based. The students work in the school and have to be on time to be paid. They can purchase goods with real money provided by the instructors. It is a school-work incentive.
“The Target store is a job simulation,” Henderson said. “We have stock people, cashiers and Employee of the Month.” That honor, she said, is bestowed on a student who has shown model behavior in the classroom.
Students are able to purchase items from the Target store based on class participation and good behavior.
“Each student receives about a $1 a day from the classroom cashier,” explained Henderson. “They can choose to purchase items every afternoon or let the money build up to purchase items at the end of the week.”
Henderson said before they had a Target store program, they had a student café where they served coffee, tea and hot chocolate. The instructors provide the money for this program.
One of their star students is Artez Haywood, 17, a junior, who worked last summer while enrolled in their summer program at Greencorps Chicago, making bikes for the community with One Summer Chicago.
Henderson and Walton believe no child should be left behind, especially those with disabilities, and they have help from Monique Gaston, lead site coordinator for the Greater Auburn Gresham Development Center (GAGDC), which sponsors the program. Her organization partners with five schools, including Simeon. “We provide resources, and meals before or after school,” said Gaston, who also oversees their budget.
Their goals are clear—teach students independent living skills, along with personal, social and vocational skills.
“The objective for this program is to foster independent functioning in our diverse learner population so that they can become contributing members of society,” Henderson explained.
And then there is the “Giving Closet,” located directly in back of Room 172 where students can get free clothes, personal hygiene products, shoes, socks and other items they perhaps can’t afford.
According to the program creator many of the youth are being raised by “secondary parents, meaning their grandparents,” Henderson explained. “A lot of times, we take on a second parent role. That is why our classroom is set up like a living room or a kitchen, giving them a feel of home.”
Their program, which includes all grades and students up to 22 years of age, teaches survival skills, which helps them cook meals, and take care of grandparents or other relatives where they live.
But showering their students with the necessities of life comes with a price; that is, mostly straight out of the pockets of Henderson and Walton.
Henderson and Walton say they have observed a renewed sense of pride, self-worth and self-esteem in the students. “You know how you feel when you get a new designer handbag or a new car, well that’s how these students feel about the things we give them,” said the pair.
The Life Skills for Diverse Learners program needs sponsors and donations to continue serving special needs students while nurturing their self-worth and building their self-esteem.
