Tomorrow is the first day of the Intergenerational Tutoring class. As the instigator of this class, I am worried, nervous, doing my usual St Anxious Dance tonight.
The Principal of Amelia Earhart Continuation School is coming to talk about the North Hollywood at-risk high school students. His name is John Berns, and he is just plain kind. Kind, smart, good with kids, immensely likable. I met the other teachers at his school, which is small, and marvelled at how down-to-earth, honest, and unafraid they were. I could feel that they liked the idea of the older adults bonding with "the kids." They had lots of cool reasons. They told stories about, for example, the introverted kid who visited a nursing home and made many friends there, thus overcoming his shyness. Another teacher said that hanging out with older people gave him a perspective on what happens to you in life, and how to take care of yourself better.
Valley Village Senior Apts is an interesting place to teach. Lots of former entertainment industry pros live there. There are also different languages and cultures. Armenians and Russians. We had a little communication problem and the flyers are going up late. I phoned students I thought might be fascinated with Principal Berns, and might build up their confidence to tutor-mentor.
I am a little scared though, and I spent more than I thought I would on buying stuff for their lunch. $30 bucks.
Will anyone show up tomorrow at 10am? Will we be able to pull of intergenerational tutoring and mentoring?
It feels lonely out here. We don't even know if the Older Adults Program will survive the budget cuts. Many in the LAUSD seem to be on a bummer.
Well, I am a happy survivor so far. And as Spiderman said, "With power comes great responsibility."
Here's to tomorrow. Hope they like the bologna sandwiches. Hope the other bits of bologna go down well, too.
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