Adult education classes are often bounced between locations. Some will now be housed, at least for a while, in the old Oldsmar Elementary.
By THERESA BLACKWELL, Times Staff Writer
Published July 22, 2005
OLDSMAR - In the 13 years that Betty Burgan has helped prepare North Pinellas adults for the General Educational Development exam, the county has moved her class so many times she's losing track.
"I think I was at Countryside twice ... yeah, twice," she said one day this month as she prepared her classroom for sessions that start Aug. 1.
Now the GED program and a program in English as a second language are moving to the former Oldsmar Elementary School at the corner of Chestnut Street and St. Petersburg Drive.
Through the years, adult education in North Pinellas has served the community in whatever space the school district could find, however temporary.
Since Burgan began teaching adult education classes in Pinellas, she has taught at the old Oldsmar Elementary (three times), Countryside High School (twice), the old East Lake Community Library, a Salvation Army facility and the old Safety Harbor Neighborhood Family Center.
Until the latest move, she was at Florida Metropolitan University on Enterprise Road, a location where an open parking spot could provoke a feeding frenzy.
FMU wanted its space back and asked the program to leave, so now the GED classes that were held there will return, like homing pigeons, to the old Oldsmar Elementary. Classes in English as a second language held at Westminster Apartments last year also are moving to the school.
Other North Pinellas adult education classes, like those held in Tarpon Springs, will remain at their current locations this school year.
Suzanne Wester, administrator of Palm Harbor Community School, is basically the principal of adult education from Sunset Point Road northward in Pinellas County. She smiled as she said that school administrators have to be flexible in adult education.
"It's like being in a military family," she said. "You have to move every two years."
Combined, enrollment in the two programs ranges from 40 to 50 students. Wester said she expects that enrollment will grow at the former Oldsmar Elementary School and that the classes will stay there for a while. She also expects to get additional space when a county records center housed in the school is relocated. "We know there is a need," Wester said. "People come across the border from Hillsborough. And there's a big contingent of immigrants working in the industrial parks in Oldsmar."
The program's students run the gamut from older adults who need to have a high school diploma to advance in their jobs to younger adults who dropped out of high school, immigrants who were illiterate in their native country and others who were professionals in their native country but need to learn English to continue in their careers.
One Thursday this month, Wester, Burgan and Joy Brown, an English as a second language teacher in Tarpon Springs, were moving tables into place in the classrooms and getting things ready for classes. They went on an expedition with head plant operator Jim Ruckdeschel, who oversees the school's maintenance, to look at furniture in a storage area.
They found something there for Burgan, a convenience she's never had before.
"This is going to be so nice," she said.
Finally, she'll have her own desk.
TO LEARN MORE
Starting Aug. 1, GED and English as a second language classes will meet from 8 a.m. to noon, Monday through Thursday, at 400 Chestnut St., Oldsmar. A night session of GED classes will meet from 5 to 8 p.m. Mondays and Wednesdays. After 2 p.m., Monday through Thursday, call (727) 669-1140.
