Inclusive Grounds \u2014 The Arc Tampa Bay Caf\u00e9<\/a>\u00a0opened in December and is home to a living classroom. The caf\u00e9 is an extension of The Arc Tampa Bay Culinary Institute, where students are spending their spring break at a career camp. The program gives participants hands-on job training they can take into the workforce.<\/p>\n\u201cWhat we found, one of the biggest barriers is not just the skills training, but it’s actually the opportunity that comes after that related to employment. So, Inclusive Grounds is a place where people \u2014 after they learn the skills \u2014 they can actually try them out and practice them,\u201d said Beth Tasis, executive director of The Arc Tampa Bay Foundation.<\/p>\n
McKinley Brown is one of about 20 camp participants where on Tuesday, they prepared tacos.<\/p>\n
\u201cI like cooking and I also like hanging out with friends,\u201d said Brown.<\/p>\n
Derek Fullerton is a part-time employee at the caf\u00e9. He was hired as a cook.\u00a0Fullerton was one of the first to graduate from the culinary institute and hopes the students find inspiration in the kitchen.<\/p>\n
\u201cI want them to be motivated,\u201d he said. \u201cI want them not to be afraid of cooking.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Arc Tampa Bay\u00a0also aims for that motivation and hopes participants leave with empowerment beyond culinary skills.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe hope that they take the soft skills with them, the confidence, the communication skills, the teamwork,\u201d said Tasis. \u201cUnderstanding things like following directions or meeting timelines or deadlines.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
Part-time employees are also found in the front of the caf\u00e9, where staff members learn about customer service, how to use a cash register and they get to connect with the community.<\/p>\n
From the caf\u00e9 to the kitchen, it\u2019s a space where Arc aims to transform training into opportunity.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"CLEARWATER, Fla. \u2014\u00a0A new caf\u00e9 in Clearwater provides career training and job opportunities for people with intellectual and…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":199488,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[4996,2031,274,558,113,2200,960,1187,115,596,135,137,136,278,2032,835],"class_list":["post-199487","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tampa","tag-app-education","tag-app-local-business","tag-app-top-stories","tag-business","tag-education","tag-instagram-bn9","tag-jobs","tag-melissa-eichman","tag-news","tag-pinellas-county","tag-tampa","tag-tampa-headlines","tag-tampa-news","tag-top-stories","tag-trending-topics","tag-vod"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/199487","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=199487"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/199487\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/199488"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=199487"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=199487"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=199487"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}