By DAVID CRUZ

At an unassuming building on Gates Place, movie magic is born. So are skills needed to be an upstanding citizen and a creative thinker. 

Such has been the case for the Community Organized with a Vision of Excellence (COVE), an after school media arts program for teens created by the Knox-Gate Neighborhood Association (KGNA). The after school program is now celebrating 25 years in the community and offers programming such as martial arts, health and beauty, and literacy classes.

Behind The COVE’s push is the need to spark responsibility and self respect. The creative element at The COVE certainly draws a roster of burgeoning artists. During a 24-week session held twice a year, high school students ages 14 to 18 gather Mondays through Thursdays and Saturdays and choose a project to produce during the session.

The educational undertones are subtle, yet certainly tangible, and Aisha Norris, The COVE’s program director since 2009, knows it. In this past session, students chose to write, produce, direct, act, and edit a movie. The writing component has been raised some, after Norris, through help from The Robert Bowne Foundation, decided to up the writing portion following New York State’s adoption of the demanding Common Core standards. “We’re integrating that into the curriculum now,” said Norris, adding the intent there is to “raise their reading levels and writing levels through writing scripts, proposals, and treatments.” The hope is to fuse an educational requirement with something fun.

One of its most recent finished products was “Only If,” a neo-noir film that tells the fabled story of a young man whose good intentions lead him to trouble. The film debuted last month to great fanfare.

Modest Beginnings
Longtime neighbor Lyn Pyle, serving as the executive director of KGNA, recalled the days when there was a need to lure kids away from the trappings of drug influences happening along several known corners in her neighborhood. “You can’t just say no. You gotta provide something positive that’s more fun, more exciting than hanging out with your friends and getting high,” said Pyle, remembering the days when drugs were pervasive in the area. She sought refuge for adolescents at 3418 Gates Place, a building owned by the Johnson family–Winston, Patrick and Petra.

To this day Pyle has remained thankful for the Johnsons in finding The COVE rent-free space in the building, securing the building’s storage unit to set up the center. “These pipes here were covered with asbestos,” recalled Pyle. Thankfully Mosholu Preservation Corporation, the neighborhood nonprofit, stepped in to secure funding. Teens helped rehab the concrete and paint the rock wall. The end result was several dozen kids attending the program and leaving with a more open mind.

Norris certainly has seen this firsthand–she’s a product of an after school program in Manhattan, where she eventually taught video production. “Having that experience of seeing personally how it changed my life and having that support system of people who care about you no matter how old you get, and knowing you have a safe space when you’re ready to come back to the positive side of life, helped me to continue this work,” she said.

Future Ahead
These days a block party-style festival is in the works to celebrate the center’s milestone with Pyle reaching out to several students from the early years. Changes abounded for the past few years for KGCA and The COVE, and Pyle admits there have been some challenging years behind them. “During the Bloomberg years it was very hard for small programs to exist,” said Pyle, adding that small programs such as The COVE are just as important as larger ones.

The celebration will take place in mid-summer. Those interested in learning more about the program can log on to www.covebx.org.