For over ten years, the Boys & Girls Clubs of Broward County’ Leo Goodwin Foundation Teen Center at the Levine/Slaughter Club has given teens a place to call their own. Before the Foundation donated the funds to complete the Center, teens were out numbered. Of the nearly 300 kids that use the facility, only about 40 percent of them are over the age of 14.
As the children in our community become teens, they really need a space of their own. The Teen Center has a large game room where students can play pool, ping-pong, foosball and air hockey; a computer room where they can catch up on homework; and a big screen TV for relaxing after school.
It also has a full kitchen and space for a recording studio, which organizers hope will help some teens gain viable skills that they can use in future jobs.
This was a new direction that the Boys & Girls Clubs and they plan to build more Teen Centers in the years to come that will focus on different careers and vocations that don’t require a college education.
The idea is that even though the Boys & Girls Clubs encourage teens to attend college, not every child is college material nor has the means to do so. The goal of the Leo Goodwin Foundation Teen Center is to help guide the at-risk youth of Broward County and help them understand that there are many career opportunities for them to consider. For more information, please visit www.bgcbc.org.
