Thomas Porton believes that his most important teaching takes place outside the classroom and in the community. An English/drama teacher at James Monroe High School in the Bronx, New York, since 1970, Porton takes his students out of their impoverished neighborhoods and into the New York City metropolitan area both to learn and to teach.

Porton created the "Monroe Eagle Players," a community theater company that performs for audiences ranging from senior citizens, to day care youngsters, to the homeless. Porton's innovative AIDS education project, includes student-written pamphlets about HIV prevention and transmission, "friendship grams" of support to those afflicted with AIDS and HIV, baskets of love to AIDS patients at local hospitals, and the AIDS VAN, Porton's personal mini-van transformed into a mobile HIV/AIDS information center. Teen educators then perform street corner outreach throughout New York City.

Porton taught English at Jane Addams High School in the Bronx from 1969-1970. He currently teaches at the Monroe Academy for Visual Arts and Design in the Bronx. He earned bachelor's and master's degrees from New York University.