Summer of opportunity

Scholarships send 20 Mort Elementary fifth-graders to two weeks of summer camp, split between the MOSI and a YMCA "Sports Camp.'' The program gives children a look outside their own neighborhoods and a chance to enrich their lives.

By MELANIE AVE

© St. Petersburg Times, published July 23, 2000

NEW TAMPA -- Camp isn't that big a deal when you live in a $250,000 house and your mother isn't struggling to put groceries on the table.

But when you don't, and your mom does, summer camp can be an unexpected opportunity.

And while 11-year-old Dawn Pacy's camp tales seem nothing more than simple summer fun to her -- two weeks of football, craft-making and movies -- her mother, her principal and her teacher see the experience as much, much more.

"She probably doesn't even realize the benefits," said Jane Pacy, sitting on her couch in the two-bedroom apartment where she lives alone with Dawn, her youngest child. "She's seeing different people, learning different cultures."

The single mother, who does not work because of a disability, knows how children can be tempted by crime and drugs when organized play is nowhere to be found. She's seen it in her own neighborhood near the University of South Florida, an area given the derisive nickname Suitcase City for its cheap apartments and transient population.

That's why she was so pleased when Dawn's guidance counselor at Mort Elementary School called to tell her about an opportunity.

Her daughter with the waist-length curly hair and soprano singing voice was going to summer camp -- for free.

"I was so excited," Jane Pacy said.

The New Tampa Rotary Club offered free tuition to 20 fifth-graders for weeklong summer camps at the New Tampa Family YMCA and the Museum of Science and Industry. The awards would pay for the camps as well as meals and bus rides. The value: about $375 each.

The counselor explained how Dawn was chosen from dozens of other children for her grades, leadership and behavior.

"It's an honor," Jane Pacy said. "I told her, "They must really think a lot of you.' "

Chosen

To her teachers and principal, Dawn Pacy is a quiet girl with a promising future.

"I think Dawn is a student who really tries to do her best," said Mort Principal Darlene Choe. "She tries to be a good citizen in school and be helpful to the teachers."

Teacher Cora Lee Fannon remembers how Dawn was three years ago when she first entered her language arts classroom.

The round-face, soft-spoken girl was afraid to ask questions aloud. And sometimes, she was even too timid to make friends.

"In the beginning she was real reticent to write," Fannon said. "Now she just loves to do it."

Now that she's ready to enter sixth grade at Buchanan Middle School, Dawn has become more outgoing, which Fannon said has been helped by the involvement of the girl's mother.

"Her mom was always there," she said. "In the city schools, that's not always the situation."

At Mort, a school populated by children from low-income families, Fannon sees firsthand how a lack of opportunity, transportation and money can stand like roadblocks to life experiences.

She recalls talking about well-known places and events to her students and watching their unknowing faces stare back at her.

Many haven't been exposed to much outside of their everyday school and home lives.

"For most of the parents . . . finances are something they are concerned about," Fannon said. "They can't spend the money on things that a lot of us have taken for granted."

Like summer camp.

Camp

Each morning for two weeks, Dawn's aunt dropped her at the University Area Community Park, where a bus picked her and the other Mort students up for camp.

Her first week was spent learning about ancient Egyptian culture at MOSI.

She ate Egyptian cuisine -- dried fruit -- and cookies that tasted "too buttery." She made a mummy out of tinfoil and plaster, an urn out of a ginger ale bottle and a pharaoh's mask out of cardboard. She watched a movie at the museum's 10,500-square-foot IMAX dome screen and felt as though she was being swept up in a waterfall.

"It was kind of fun," Dawn said.

The second week was "Sports Camp" at the YMCA, held at the Tampa Palms Elementary School.

About 50 students -- mostly from north Tampa schools like Hunter's Green and Clark elementaries -- lined up at the door and headed outside to play football. Many wore matching outfits from the Gap and Limited.

The day earlier, three USF football players had shown the camp-goers how to throw a pass and catch a ball.

"You go like this," Dawn demonstrated, putting her thumbs together and cupping her fingers. "You don't touch your chest because the ball could bounce off."

She stood in line waiting her turn for YMCA program director Jeff Leonard to throw her a pass.

"Yesterday was the hardest," she told her camp friends. "You could tell those guys really know how to play football."

Her turn. Front of the line. Leonard yelled, "Hut!"

Dawn ran about 6 feet, turned around and caught the ball.

"All right," Leonard said. "Good job."

After a quick game of flag football, the children waited in the school's cafeteria to go swimming.

She and friend Donna Small, also from Mort, sat cross-legged, played patty-cake and sang softly:

Mama's having a baby

Daddy's going crazy

If it's a girl, I'll give it a curl

If it's a boy, I'll give it a toy

At the swimming pool, the new camp-goers like Dawn took a quick test to make sure they knew how to swim.

Dawn, nervous about jumping feet-first in the 31/2 feet of water and hurting her ankles, did a belly flop and swam a few yards over to the side.

"Did you see how I went in?" she asked the others at the pool's edge. "I just jumped like this," she said, showing her less-than-perfect jump and giggling about it.

"Did I pass?" Dawn asked.

Finally, an authoritative answer.

"Okay, everybody in," the lifeguard yelled.

Sporting a sunburn on her face from swimming without sunscreen, Dawn described her camp experience as "pretty nice and stuff."

At the end of two weeks, she had learned the rules of football and putt-putt golf, watched a Tampa Yankees baseball game and made new friends from around the city.

"If she had a camp like this all the time," Jane Pacy said, "she'd move right in."

Pacy said she is so thankful for programs that give children like Dawn a look outside their own neighborhoods and a chance to lead to more enriched lives. Her only hope is that her daughter realizes that too as she grows older.

"There's so many opportunities out there," she said, "you just have to grab on."

Melanie Ave can be reached at (813) 226-3473 or melanie@sptimes.com.

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