The Martin Luther King Center’s summer program known as the Tarkington Work Crew is gearing up again this summer.
The program aims to keep the youth busy and teach them real-life skills, including financial literacy.
The Tarkington Work Crew is a 10-week program that pays its participants to work on diverse projects throughout the summer. According to the MLK Center’s website, the program is named after the Tarkington Park neighborhood adjacent to the MLK Center.
The program is a brainchild of the director of the MLK Center Allison Luthe alongside Richard Donnell “Coach Nell” Hamilton.
Hamilton was fatally shot during a road rage incident in January. This will mark the first year since the program’s inception in 2018 that Hamilton will not be a part of the work crew.
Participants in the program are between the ages of 14-18 and are selected based on their level of demand. This means that the program only employs as many participants as needed for summer projects in the community. This figure can flux anytime.
The program provides the youth with an opportunity to learn job skills and earn money while keeping them busy during the summer months.
The program is split into two phases. The first phase focuses on job readiness training, including resume building, interview skills and workplace etiquette.
The second phase involves hands-on work experience, including landscaping, painting and other community service projects.
The Tarkington Work Crew program has been successful in helping at-risk youth in the community. According to the program’s website, 100% of the program’s participants avoided arrest and more than 97% of them avoided arrest during the following school year.
All participants reported an increase in neighborhood pride.
Tarkington Work Crew members reported increased levels of confidence and a sense of pride in their employment. The program also helps to improve the Tarkington Park neighborhood by providing much needed community service projects.
Teens participating in the work crew must live within roughly one mile of Tarkington Park. Mostly, this means teens living in the Meridian Kessler, Butler Tarkington, Crown Hill and Mapleton-Fall Creek neighborhoods are eligible to join the work crew.
The MLK Center is committed to helping at-risk youth in the Indianapolis community. The Work Crew program is just one of the many programs the center offers to help youth develop real-life skills and reach their full potential.
Contact multi-media staff writer Noral Parham III at (317)-762-7846 or via e-mail at noralp@indyrecorder.com. Follow him on Twitter @NoralParham.
