Samantha Nuñez has been a part of the Transitional Learning Center at Hart High School for about four years.
The program has helped her navigate life after high school. It’s taught her how to find jobs, manage a budget and learn other skills needed for “how life works out in the world,” she said.
One of the biggest lessons for Nuñez was learning how to take public transit, which was something she felt nervous about when navigating her travels.
“I was scared of where to go,” she said, but to learn “the aide will always come with me. They meet me where I have to go. I had to take two buses to get home. The aide will meet me at the transit center then she showed me which bus I have to take.”
“After that, I got used to taking the bus,” Nuñez said.
But on Thursday, Nuñez traded her walking shoes for some gloves and was on tea duty, taking orders as they came in and then pouring hot water into a cup with a label that read “The Lucky Cup.”
The letters TLC, usually associated with the Hart High Transitional Learning Center, were reintroduced during a soft launch of Hart’s newest student-run coffee house on the block.
But ingredients weren’t just coffee beans and milk, but also resilience, effort and dedication.
Nuñez and a number of other students could be seen ushering back and forth at The Lucky Cup’s kitchen taking orders, toasting bagels, and making hot cups of coffee or, a recent popular drink, matcha for Hart High School staff and personnel who paid a visit to see the students at work in the on-campus kitchen.
TLC is a program that “is geared towards having the students learn vocational skills, but also life-based skills. We want them to be as independent as possible. That is our goal for each individual student,” said Mikael Ohlsen, a special education teacher at Hart and department chair of the TLC.
As students become part of the program, he’s seen them grow “more confident, more brilliant and more willing to try new things,” he said. The TLC program has partnerships with local nonprofits and businesses that give students opportunities to put the skills they’ve learned into practice, and the grand opening of The Lucky Cup was another step in that effort.
But the students didn’t just buy a ton of ingredients to make a cup of joe. They had to learn how to run a kitchen and even had to take a food handler certification test. Study sessions would average about an hour daily, for a few weeks before test day, and it wasn’t something the students looked forward to, but were dedicated to succeed, Ohlsen said. They didn’t all pass the first time, but eventually they all did, he added.
The items needed to run the coffee business, including the kitchen space where the students made the orders, and the test itself were funded by the state Department of Rehabilitation through the William S. Hart Union High School District’s Career Visions program.
“When students reach that adult transition age, they need purpose and they need direction. And so, this coffee business served two purposes. It gave them a feeling, sense of community but more than that, social interaction in a business-type setting so they’re ready to go into the community,” said Kevin Sarkissian, supervisor of Career Visions for the district. “It supports campus connectivity and community involvement,” he added.
As students traveled from one bungalow to another to greet guests and deliver orders, Hart High Principal Jason d’ Autremont took a moment to take in the sight of the students professionally handling themselves with everyone present.
“It’s really fantastic for us to be able to provide something that can only enhance their future and their marketability for jobs,” he said, adding that it allows the TLC students to work on their customer service and personal skills.
“I used to teach special education here, so it’s a very soft spot in my heart for students that do have extra struggles, whether it be specific learning disabilities or physical limitations,” d’ Autremont said, adding that it can be difficult for them to have a sense of independence when they rely on others so something like the coffee business can be “powerful for their spirit, and for their wellbeing,” he said.
District Superintendent Michael Vierra also paid a visit to the early-morning soft launch and during a followup he said he enjoyed witnessing the students and “how professional and serious they took the work,” he said. “They really wanted to do a good job and were excited about serving others.”
Those involved said the experience was a reminder of what students in programs like TLC are capable of when given the opportunity and support.
“Push them. People don’t realize that they’re capable of doing a lot more than we think, and they just need exposure and support,” Ohlsen said. “Don’t hold them back — support them and don’t hold them back.”
