My name is Tammy Schaub and I'm the Special Needs Coordinator at Wesley Church.
The A-Team is a special needs ministry where we have students from all age groups to come
and spend some time together.
Here at Wesley Church several years ago we had a youth praise band which is a phenomenal
band but the band members and the instrumentalists slowly aged out and they grew older and they
moved on and I was stuck with a core group of individuals that loved to sing.
Maybe they couldn't always hold perfect pitch but they loved to sing.
So we continued to get together and we did do a lot of music, we did music in church,
we did it with canned music, we did it with videos and that kind of started to dwindle
and so I started to ask the students what is it that you're looking for, what do you
want with this group and they said we just like getting together.
So we took that as a key that that's what we were going to do.
We were just going to get together, we would have a meal, we would do a devotion, we would
play games or do activities, have crafts and of course we would continue to have some of
our music and so that's how the A-Team started.
Alright so introduce yourself.
My name is Mark Ross, I'm 21 years old.
My name is Brandon, I'm 17 years old.
My name is Isabel and I'm nine years old.
Uh, Joseph, uh, 25.
Hi, I'm Kimberly Koss.
My name is Olivia Martin and I'm 11 years old.
My name is Lucas and I'm 12 years old.
My name is Bella and I'm 10 years old.
Okay, my name is Ebbe Wigan.
My last name is Wigan, I'm 29 years old.
My name is Rocky, I'm 18 years old.
My name is Curtis.
And how old are you?
I don't know.
You don't know how old you are?
56.
56?
Yep.
Okay.
Alright, uh, what is the best thing about being in the A-Team?
Sing.
You like singing?
Like your Elvis impression?
Yes!
Do I get to do music?
I love the songs.
The songs?
Play.
Play?
And play music.
Um, uh, spending quality time with others?
Um, I like to be with my friends and do the crafts.
Do you have a friend relationship?
Uh, hang out with Mark.
Hang out with Mark?
Does Mark your best friend?
Yep, so is Tim.
So is Tim.
Uh, my friends.
Your friends?
Yep.
Who are some of your friends here?
Tim.
Tammy.
I like everyone because they all have their special own way of dealing with things.
How has being an A-Team made a difference for you in your life?
It taught me that I'm good no matter what other people say.
It made me feel great.
Tammy helped me a lot.
How does she help you a lot?
What makes me behave?
She makes you behave.
Seeing everybody out and seeing their smiling faces and hopefully I can get to see them
more.
Watching the students connect and watching the families connect has been super rewarding
and watching all of that flourish.
One of the difficulties that I have as being the coordinator of the A-Team is when one
of our students comes down with being very sick or is in the hospital because when these
kids get sick they get really sick sometimes and it just breaks my heart because it's almost
as if they are my kids and so watching them in pain, watching them be sick or have troubles
like that can be really hard.
So the A-Team came up with its own name.
Years ago I was told that we needed to come up with some kind of a name for our group
because each group in the church had their own names.
The Sunday school classes, the different age groups, the older classes, the adults, etc.
And so I said to our group, what should we be called?
And they came up with probably a dozen answers and we all wrote them all on the whiteboard
and so then we took a vote.
And the vote turned out to be A-Team which was the one that I thought I liked the least
because when I think of A-Team I think of Mr. T and I think of that show that was on
when I was growing up.
So I said to the kids, why did we pick the A-Team?
What about the A-Team?
The kids very quickly raised their hands and they said, well Ms. Tammy, it's because we
are awesome and so that's how it stuck.
We are now the A-Team, awesome team.
The A-Team has really changed the way that I look at things in my whole entire life.
I look at all the things that we take for granted on a daily basis.
Simple things like getting up out of bed can be a challenge for some of these students.
Things like jumping in the car and running to get something to eat or something at the
grocery store.
If you're a mom of a student that is affected by disability, it's a big deal to pack them
in the car, do it just the right time of day, get them out of the car, get them in the store,
make sure there's no meltdowns.
It's just amazing what these parents go through and it has given me a totally different idea
of what is and isn't important in life.
The A-Team is open to anyone that is affected by disability.
They do not have to be affiliated with the church.
For Sundays, we have a Sunday school class so that our families can go up and have some
worship time if they'd like and our kids can be downstairs having a regular Sunday school
class.
We also meet on Thursday nights a couple times a month and then we also do parent respite
nights so that the parents can drop the student off and they can go have a date night or just
go home and relax or go to the grocery store and often times these have a theme for us.
So whether it's pajama party or stuffed animal theme or camping or sometimes we just do field
trips.
So we'll load the kids up in the van and we'll take them someplace fun in the community
and we get to spend some fun time together.
So check out our Facebook page at A-Team at Wesley Church and help us spread the word.
