Students, seniors make fast friends in after school program
A dozen women were at North Aurora's Goodwin Elementary School the day before Halloween dressed in their finest Halloween-themed sweatshirts and sweaters, prepared to help with homework, read stories and carve pumpkins.
The senior citizen volunteers were there as part of Goodwin's 11-year-old SS Friendship program, which matches the adults with a first-grader for the special weekly after school program.
Goodwin media center director Linda Slaker helped start the program after being awarded an urban education grant.
"We got the money to get the program going and after the three-year grant period ended we've been getting support from the PTA for the school buses, the West Aurora Foundation for snacks and supplies. The North Aurora Lions have supported the program also," Slaker said.
Teachers nominate first-graders at the start of the school year who they think would benefit from the extra homework and reading attention provided by the volunteers, Slaker said.
Accepted students report to the media center right after school on Tuesday afternoons and are first treated with a snack before meeting with their senior citizen volunteer.
The pairs then follow a checklist of math homework and then they take turns reading books to each other.
Norma Christenson has been a volunteer for the past 10 years. This year she is working with Aurora 6-year-old Lizbeth Sanchez.
"She's been doing real well at reading," Christenson said. "As the year goes by there'll be a basket of books for her to read to me." At the start of the year the seniors read most of the books to the first-graders.
Marnie Pritchard of North Aurora is a charter member of the program.
"I live a block and a half away from the school and they sent a letter out asking for volunteers," she remembered. "A long, long, long time ago I taught nursery school at Mooseheart and I thought this was something that I should do."
And she's been coming once a week during the school year ever since.
This year Pritchard is matched with 6-year-old Kylie Taglia.
Xavier Webb of Aurora enjoys his time with Jan DeBroux, who said that she moved to the east side of North Aurora 42 years ago on Halloween.
"My children went to Schneider School but my grandchildren went to Goodwin," said DeBroux, who has been involved in the SS Friendship program for nine years. She has continued to volunteer at the school even though her grandkids are now at Herget Middle School and West Aurora High.
After Xavier finished his math homework, reading and playing with a puzzle, he and DeBroux started in on designing and cutting a jack-o'-lantern for Xavier to bring home.
"I've been wanting to do a pumpkin ever since I was little," he said.
The SS Friendship teams have parties planned for Christmas and Valentine's Day. Also, the children end the year with a party where they receive a lot of books, pencils, crayons and markers to use all summer at home to work on their skills.
The senior citizens are also on hand to help celebrate birthdays as the kids turn 7.
Hector Rosa turned 7 on Halloween. His SS Friendship partner is June Kreminski, who has volunteered for the past eight years.
She gave Hector a noisy, digital audio player race car for the occasion. "His mother will be thrilled with the present," Kreminski predicted.
As the pairs finished their jack-o'-lanterns, Slaker and her partner Kay Martinson ushered the children over to a Halloween bulletin board to take a picture of the first-graders and their creations.
The children will get a set of photos from SS Friendship at the end of the school year.
Slaker said that the kids brag about the program and can't wait until the weekly Tuesday meetings.
"I've had some third-graders come to me and want to be in it again," Slaker said. "It's a very neat program. I really love it."