The Philadelphia Center

Experience

Q&A: Laila Rabah

Laila Rabah attended TPC during the Spring 2009 semester. She is going to be a senior at Earlham College and fulfilled requirements for her human development and social relations major through her internship at the HMS School for Children with Cerebral Palsy. Hanna, her older brother, attended TPC in 2001.

The Philadelphia Center: So, your brother did this program, how much of an influence was that on you to come here?
Laila Rabah: I think he wanted me to come and experience something new.

TPC: What’s your experience been?
LR: It’s been wonderful. The people are wonderful, the classes are great. The Center is cozy. Everything is great.

TPC: Tell me a little bit about your internship, where are your working?
LR: I’m working at HMS School for children with cerebral palsy. It’s a residential facility that children ages four to 21. They offer different services like occupational therapy, recreational therapy, speech therapy, dance movement therapy, art therapy, and physical therapy.

TPC: What are you primarily doing?
LR: I’m primary working with a classroom of six students. All of them are non-verbal, all of them are in wheelchairs. Just basically trying to help them to understand basic concepts. Because I was floating around to different classrooms I got to experience different therapies and students of different ages.

TPC: What drew you to this field?

LR: I have a passion to help people. My major is human development and social relations and I wanted something different, something that’s not offered, something that not a lot of people have experience with back home. My aunt used to run a facility for children with autism and she was encouraging me to try a class in special education. We don’t have any classes at Earlham but since I was coming here to Philadelphia it was a perfect opportunity for me to try out and see if I like it or not. And I do.

TPC: What were some of the challenges for you and how did you overcome them?
LR: The most challenging is just to find a connection. Working to know the actual person and how much they understand. Looking at their different personalities. Patience is big.

TPC: What do you think you got out of interviewing and the interview process?
LR: How hard it is to find a job! I knew that for sure I was going to find an internship because of The Philadelphia Center. In real life, there isn’t a Philadelphia Center!

TPC: Do you feel like you made good connections in the field in Philadelphia?
LR: Yes, I would love to believe so. I will try to keep in touch as much as I can. My goal is to come back here.

TPC: If your younger sibling decided to come to Philadelphia, what would you say?
LR: Yes! I learned a lot about myself and with the help of Mark I learned much more.

TPC: Do you feel like the classes here are different than the classes at Earlham?
Yes. In Mark’s class we went to several locations, different sites, different media, books, reading. Mark really wants us to really understand. There’s a different vibe. Assignments were different, we use our actual experience as the foundation as the material for the paper.

TPC: What about Philadelphia did you enjoy?
LR: The independence. There’s many opportunities if you want to be on your own and do your own thing.

TPC: What am I missing?
LR: I’m taking abnormal psychology. A wonderful class. I really enjoyed it. At first I was like, “oh my god, there’s only three people in class. That’s going to be hard, I have to talk now!” But it turned out it was completely opposite, I wanted to participate because everything was so interesting.