TAMPA, Fla. — As many of us are gearing up for a weekend of Halloween fun, a group of students is taking meaningful life lessons and representing them through some gory and spooky looks.
It's all a part of a middle school program led by a social worker at IDEA Public Schools.
In one of the classrooms poured in a group of 8th-grade girls — each one with their own story of trauma or insecurity.
Now, many of the students in the class can share their stories with a new-found sense of confidence and support from their peers.
"I have always said, you know, girls support girls," Sheylyann Rodriguez said.
This school program focuses on trauma, resiliency and how to cope in healthy ways.
"I didn't know I needed it until the year ended and it was just summer and I was kind of just like, wow, I improved a lot," Mikayla Timmons said.
Timmons shared a recent story of how gunshots were fired into her grandmother's house while she was staying the night there. In fear of being targeted, her aunt drove them away from the house, nearly wrecking the car on the highway.
She carried that with her and also shared how middle school has been tough, leaving her feeling antisocial and wanting to hide from others.
In seventh grade, she kept wearing her COVID-19 mask. Not to prevent germs but to hide.
"I used to wear this mask to cover my face. Because not just because of COVID. But because I didn't like my face at all. And I hated it," she said.
Now, she smiled through an interview with confidence she didn't have a year ago. Throughout the class, she chatted with her friends, who lifted her up and helped her through any challenges she faced.
"The topics we talk about are self-harm," explained Destiny Sanders, the school social worker. "We talked about physical abuse, we talked about sexual abuse, we talked about different things that can be considered trauma for different young ladies"
Sanders leads the class. Not only is she helping these young girls through serious life moments, but she also teaches them that they are more than their past.
"These scars are fake but the scars that they have, like I said, they don't define them," Sanders said as she painted a fake bloody wound on one of her students. "They are they are something that happened to them, but it doesn't make them who they are."
Sanders isn't just a social worker. She has serious skills in special effects makeup, even winning some awards for her work.
It's spooky season, so Sanders is wrapping up her sessions on trauma by letting the (fake) wounds ooze out.
"This group, like really helps with confidence and like just like being yourself, and like not caring about what other people think about," Rodriguez said.
Sanders does these workshops yearly, with a different middle school grade each time. She says the topics she focuses on vary depending on her students' needs.
Malique Rankin is a general assignment reporter with 10 Tampa Bay. You can email her story ideas at mrankin@10tampabay.com and follow her Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram pages.