TOLEDO, Ohio — The Boys & Girls Club expanded their shared spaces partnership with Toledo Public Schools by adding a club for teens inside Rogers High School.
Not only is it the first Boys & Girls Club in a Toledo high school, it is also the first teens only Boys & Girls Club in the area. The director says the club is open to all Rogers High School students.
"As of right now, Rogers as a whole are considered chartered members. There are close to 800 students here at Rogers, so they are all welcome here at the club."
The students say they expect this will be a great place for teens to get creative.
"It provides us a safe place to be at and it provides us some free time from home. As well as being able to catch up on a little bit of work and just have us some fun," said Dameon Austin – a tenth grade Rogers High School Club Teen Center student.
The Teen Club Center at Rogers is the Boys & Girls Clubs' way of expanding to teens while also being innovative.
"We are opening the very first teen only Boys & Girls Clubs in northwest Ohio and the very first one in Ohio, and one of the first few in the country," said Jim Ravas, President and CEO of Boys & Girls Clubs of Toledo.
Although this is the first all-teen Boys & Girls Club of Toledo, it is not the first shared space partnership with TPS.
In January, the clubs expanded into elementary schools starting with McTigue Elementary School. The students have formed clubs within the club that best reflect their own personal interest including an Art Club and an Apple Technology Club.
The students say they have traveled to the Apple store as a group and they are looking forward to seeing how much more they can do.
"It makes me feel nice because I love learning about technology. We all went to the Apple store in the mall and we are learning about garage band procreate, and some other editing technology and we will also be learning some coding," said Miracle-Divine Robinson, a sixth grade student at McTigue Elementary School.
The Rogers and McTigue Boys & Girls Clubs are now enrolling students to attend between the hours of 3 p.m. and 6:45 p.m.