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Summer gigs

No, they don't live in their classrooms when school's out. Come summertime, teachers keep busy with as many different projects as there are teachers.

By Times staff writers
Published June 24, 2005

Ada Roland, Beach Park School

When summer breaks, Ada Roland leaves her classroom of 3- to 6-year-olds to help tourists from Brazil, Japan and England find the perfect souvenir at Busch Gardens' Label Stable.

She sells T-shirts, baseball caps, key chains and beer steins promoting American-brewed beers.

She steers guests to attractions and translates for Spanish and Italian speakers.

"Some ask you what kind of shows you recommend, what kind of rides," said Roland, 49. "Other people just want to get to a certain place or (find out) how to get a stroller."

A day in the park is no match for her time in the classroom with prekindergarten and kindergarten students.

"They're completely different," she says of the two jobs. "But you know what? I like to take a break from the children during the summer. That's why I don't work the summer camp at the school. I want to come back refreshed."

Born in Mexico City, Roland has taught 11 years at Beach Park School. She helps her students become independent. They learn to tie their shoes, polish silver and sew on a button. They pour rice and water from pitchers and learn the continents. She introduces them to addition, multiplication and squaring.

The students keep her coming back year after year.

"You get attached to them after three, four years," said Roland, who lives in Forest Hills. "They become your children.

"You see them grow. By the time they're 6, they're helping the younger ones along. They become the little adults. They can read, they can write, they can do multiplication."

But once school gets out, she searches for extra income.

"I don't get paid over the summer so I have to find something to do," she said.

For the past three years, Roland has found that something at Busch Gardens.

"It's a fun job," she says. "I like the people, I know the products."

- ELISABETH DYER

Five years ago, Mason's husband suggested that she try writing a novel of her own. Mason, a math, economics and photography teacher at Tampa Preparatory School, had finally met a problem she couldn't easily solve.

"It seems simple," she said. "But it's not. I've had to learn how to write. I did not come into it with the ability to write well."

During the school year, Mason, 56, writes at least three hours a day. But when school is out, she spends as much as six hours a day sculpting her characters, writing and rewriting her stories. Her specialty is romantic suspense.

It took Mason a year to finish her first novel. Now, she's on her seventh, a tale about a serial killer who pledges to kill drunken drivers to avenge the death of his girlfriend, who was hit by an intoxicated motorist. The book starts when a woman is murdered execution-style on Bayshore Boulevard. The love part comes much later.

Mason, a member of the Tampa Area Romance Writers Group, lives in Ballast Point and sets all of her works in Tampa. So far, she has not published any of her novels or made any money from her side career. But she is pitching several books to publishing houses and dreams of one day seeing her name emblazoned across the spine of a novel.

When she isn't writing, Mason works on lesson plans and tests for the coming school year.

"There's no time for goofing around," she said. "Once school starts, that's my vacation time because all my work is done."

- SHERRI DAY

Gwendolyn Henderson, Jefferson High School

As head of the business and marketing department at Jefferson High School, Gwendolyn Henderson spends 10 months of the year devoted to her students. She never misses a school football game and always stays to the end.

But during the summer, Henderson spends her time investing in real estate. She uses her days to scout properties, scour contracts and screen prospective tenants.

"I'm just getting into the game that is going to allow me to do some things financially that I wouldn't be able to do as a classroom teacher," said Henderson, 40, who lives with her teenage daughter and niece in a Tampa Heights Victorian house. "I've always been interested in real estate and last summer I just said, "I'm going to do it."'

Henderson is no Bob Vila , so she concentrates on turn-key properties or houses that are in move-in condition. Her first investment was a home in Ybor Heights. She rented it out to a single mother who needed a second chance.

That deal gave her the confidence to purchase other properties. She also owns a home in Forest Hills and is building three houses in a new Plant City subdivision.

Earlier this month, she closed on an apartment building near Florida A&M University, her alma mater. In addition to providing extra income, that property will eventually serve as home to her daughter and niece when they enroll in college.

Henderson beams when speaking of her investments,but has no plans to give up teaching.

"It's exciting to close on a house, but it's not my career objective," she said. "It's a sidebar to what I do."

- SHERRI DAY

During the summer, middle schoolers from Christ the King Catholic School often find their language arts teacher arranging lighting displays or rugs at Pottery Barn in Old Hyde Park Village.

Sometimes, they stop in just to see her.

Victoria Thaxton, 35, has worked at the store for the past five summers.

It's a shift from her work during the school year when she helps students with their reading and preps them for the SATs.

"It gets you around different people," she said. "People who want different things from you."

And with 7-month-old triplets at home, the extra money helps.

While Thaxton juggles teaching, studying for her master's degree and working at Pottery Barn, her husband, Drew, looks after their five children, including the babies, Charlie, J.C. and Zoe.

"He sings and dances and reads the Constitution to them," said Thaxton, who lives in Palma Ceia West.

Faced with tripled day-care costs, they knew one parent would have to stay at home.

"We rock paper scissored it and I won," said Thaxton with a laugh. Then she quickly corrected herself. "No, I lost."

She misses time with the triplets but doesn't mind the busy schedule. This summer, she'll teach a two-week creative writing class for fifth-graders. And her master's thesis, due in August, is the final step toward her degree in education leadership at Argosy University's Tampa campus.

It's the degree that usually leads to a principal post. But not for Thaxton.

"I don't have any desire to be a principal," she says. "I love the classroom."

- ELISABETH DYER

Karen Stonis, Chiaramonte Elementary School Early in her career, Karen Stonis whiled away her summers. To combat boredom, she tried retail. Then, she got her real estate license.

But her heart wasn't in it.

That changed this summer when Stonis, an art teacher at Chiaramonte Elementary School, decided to do what she does best - share art with students who are willing to learn.

This month, she opened ArtFunKids, a summer art camp for children in the Bayshore Square shopping center on Gandy Boulevard.

"It's a lot of prepping," said Stonis, 34. "I spend a lot of time here besides the time during class. But I love it. It's my thing."

On a recent afternoon, Stonis taught 13 students how to paint florals while Lullaby of Birdland played softly in the background. ("It's nice for painting," Stonis said.) That day, her campers would also work with clay and learn new vocabulary words pertaining to art.

The students were eager to begin each new task. But they saved their greatest appreciation for the announcement of the afternoon snack: ice cream.

When Stonis was a child, she grew up with an art room in her home instead of a computer. Her newest venture, which she plans to operate on a limited basis once school resumes, is a tribute to her mother, a former artist for a greeting card company who recently died from complications relating to Parkinson's disease.

Stonis, who lives in Bayshore Beautiful, feels fortunate that her summer job brings her closer to her mother and makes her happy.

"You know what they say, "Do what you love, and it won't feel like work,"' she said. "It's true."

- SHERRI DAY

[Last modified June 23, 2005, 01:01:07]