The Tenderloin After-School Program Reopens its Doors

Dated 11.17.2021

The Tenderloin After-School Program (TASP) is once again open for kids and teens to drop in five days a week! 

Participants are already enjoying themed enrichment activities, nutritious snacks, homework help, and Academic Teen Nights. In addition to new Covid protocols, TASP programming has adapted to prioritize participants’ social, physical, and mental health. 

Some new activities you’re helping TNDC to invest in include exercises that utilize technology, outdoor education, and restorative practices to build resiliency and coping skills.

TASP continues to prioritize celebrating and exploring different cultures. For Día de los Muertos, participants created their own altar to honor deceased loved ones. For Latinx Heritage Month, participants were able to partake in themed activities, including designing their own alebrijes, Mexican folk art, and learning how to make pupusas, a delicious flatbread from El Salvador, and alfajores, a sweet treat made across South and Central America.

Hands-on activities like cooking are opportunities for kids to practice gathering and measuring ingredients. It also makes cooking more approachable and fun! Rebbeca Barajas, Food & Nutrition Supervisor, noted how kids are always excited to crack an egg and are encouraged to keep trying (no matter how many eggshells get stuck).

With the return of in-person school and TASP, new and returning participants are feeling some consistency after a long disruption. Many faced exceptional barriers—like a lack of stable internet for remote learning and limited places to safely play outside—due to systemic racism and existing inequities that the pandemic amplified.

It’s important that we continue to advocate for each other, and create spaces like TASP that offer valuable resources so that all kids can become life-long learners and succeed in ways that are meaningful to them.