The group of men is volunteering their time to help with new school projects and improving attendance with cookouts.
By ELISABETH DYER
Published June 18, 2004
[Times photo: Skip O’Rourke]
Bryan Thomas, 41, joins his 16-month-old son Nicholas at the Growing Together playgroup in South Tampa. “It’s a woman’s world,” says Thomas, who is often the only stay-at-home dad at the playgroup.
Ray Alzamora, 42, jokes with his children, Sarah, 4, center, and Jessica, 8, while eating dinner at McDonald’s. Alzamora is the founder of Tampa Dads, a support group for stay-at-home fathers.
Ray Alzamora listens as daughter Jessica asks a question while doing her homework in the family’s kitchen. Alzamora says his decision to step back from his career as a computer specialist to be the kids’ full-time caregiver “makes the most sense for us now.”
PALMA CEIA - As noon nears on a school day last month, tummies grumble at Roosevelt Elementary School on Ferdinand Avenue. Over the chatter of a couple of classes of students, second-grader Patrick Collins belts out a made-up mantra: "Can I get a hot dog?"
A group of dads have set up to grill lunch in the school's courtyard. They line up students and pass out plates of franks, chips and juice pouches, as they have every month for the past four years.
Patrick, skinny and blond, can barely contain his glee at avoiding cafeteria fare.
"When they don't have hot mush, they give us cold mush," he says.
Patrick takes a plate with a hot dog and chips from another child's dad, who wears a business suit. He wolfs the dog down cheerfully.
Volunteering at school was once a call heeded just by moms. But more and more South Tampa dads are getting in on the mix.
Four years ago, a Dads' Club formed at Roosevelt. Their first project: to increase student attendance rates to the district's 96 percent goal.
For four years, they've succeeded.
Hot dog lunches reward the class from each grade level with the highest monthly attendance. That's a treat for kids like Patrick and a proud moment for those whose dads volunteer.
Now at Roosevelt, more than 60 dads, grandfathers and other men dish out food, read in classrooms, landscape the grounds and raise money for school projects.
Club President John LaRocca remembers his own childhood, when dads were uncommon in classrooms. They made rare appearances only for school plays or sporting events.
"What's more important than your child's education?" LaRocca says.
When his daughter Claire, an only child, started school four years ago, he went to school too.
"I knew that whatever she did, wherever she went, I was going to be active in her schooling."
Claire, who starts fourth grade in August, likes having a doting dad at school.
Colleen Vaverek, the school's principal, agrees. When she came to Roosevelt last summer she knew it was a good school, but having dads in classrooms makes a difference, she says. Many of her students don't have fathers in their lives, the principal says. And like most elementaries, Roosevelt has very few male teachers. These dads serve as role models.
"It's nice to be able to write a check, but being involved - you can't measure what that does for children," she says.
Dads at nearby Ballast Point Elementary want to get in on the action. In May, more than 90 men met to plan their own Dads' Club.
"They were lined up out the door," said Mary Cunningham, Ballast Point principal.
She envisions pairing men with children who need extra help for one-on-one reading time.
LaRocca attended the meeting, to tell Ballast Point dads what the Roosevelt club has accomplished.
Over the past school year, the Roosevelt fathers helped raise $50,000 for a covered play area. Next year, Allie and Celeste's dad, Tony Schettino, will be president of the group. He plans to continue construction fundraising.
The men collected enough castoffs for a yard sale complete with a pancake breakfast on a recent Saturday.
Bill Wadsworth, father to Alex and James, brought his band, Coconut Migration, to play at the event. He played drums.
"The great thing about the Dads' Club is it encourages and allows us to be there at school during the school day," Wadsworth said.
Alex, headed into second grade, likes seeing his dad around school. Next year his brother James starts kindergarten there.
"I'm lucky because sometimes other kids' moms and dads don't work in the library or they don't get to see them," Alex says.
Kids call Wadsworth "Alex's dad" or sometimes, "Mr. Wadsworth."
