Community

EQ
JDDI
g&lion

Berkley High School students
begin ongoing relationships with
Jewish Apartments and Services residents.

Clockwise from top: Melissa Gomoll, 17 enjoys time
with Prentis resident Lee Waldbott.

Erica Akers, 17, learns about stamps from Esther
Frances Friedman of Prentis.

Prentis resident Belle Bratt shares a laugh with
Heather Lehmann, 17.

SHELLI LIEBMAN DORFMAN
Staff Writer

Ilir

e closed the generation gap," says Melissa
Gomoll, 17, after completing a course
that brought Berkley High School teens
together with area seniors from Jewish
Apartments and Services. "We saw that they aren't
always so dependent, and we showed them we aren't all
bad and we don't all have purple hair."
Gomoll and 24 classmates were part of a pilot pro-
gram, Generations In Action, initiated by social studies
teacher Sheryl Young.
"We didn't have anything that was human services
work, allowing the kids to see what it's like to work in
human-related fields," Young says.
So she started one that involves 10 weeks of person-
al connection between area seniors and social studies
students. "This is not a class taken to just get out of
going to school for an hour and a half."
She opened the course only to those who had
already taken a class in psychology, sociology or child
development, so they would come into it with a back-
ground in human relationships.
Damon Bradley, marketing and development direc-
tor of JAS, embraced the new program.
"The intergenerational component of this pilot pro-
ject is an added bonus," Bradley says. "A younger gen-
eration is learning about what it's like to be an older
adult today and gaining life experience from the
knowledge the older adults share. Senior citizens are
leaning about teen concerns and issues faced today."
Meeting two to three times a week, throughout the

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2000

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semester, the groups worked in teams of two or three.
Six students spent the semester with seniors at the Oak
Park Community Center and 19 with residents of
Anna and Meyer Prentis or Harriett and Ben Teitel
Jewish Apartments, both in Oak Park. A scrapbook
chronicled the experience.
Paired with Prentis resident Lee Waldbott, Gomoll
says, "The scrapbook was for him, to remember his
life, with his pictures, but he dedicated a page to me,
with my picture, to remember me."
The two shared many hours of conversation. "He's
such an interesting guy," says Gomoll. "He told me
stories about his life and showed me pictures and a let-
ter his great-grandfather wrote. He is a really, really
active person. He actually drives some of his friends
who don't drive."
Waldbott gained insight into another generation
through Gomoll. "A lot of kids are stuck on them-
selves," he says. "But she is a sweetheart and she uses
her brains. I'd be willing to have her as my grand-
daughter."
Benefiting from time spent in the program,

Waldbott found the entire group of students to be
impressive. "There was a good relationship between the
seniors and the kids. There was a very, very lively feel-
ing between the youngsters and the adults," he says.
Before meeting with residents, the students did
background reading in areas including hearing and
sight impairments, Alzheimer's disease and the different
needs of the elderly woman versus the elderly man.
At the end of each session, students made journal
entries of what they learned and felt about the day's
meeting.
Since the new class is just a half-year course, another
group of students will get the opportunity to partici-
pate next semester. Beginning in January, Berkley will
offer two classes, once again including seniors from
Prentis, Teitel and the Oak Park Community Center,
where Rhoda Horner, senior citizen coordinator is
awaiting the Jan. 22 program kickoff
"We plan to do this every semester," Homer says.
"This is has been real positive for us. It is the first time
we had a regular on-site structured program with high
school students here. We saw such growth and enlight-
enment and a liveliness it gave the seniors."
Bradley is optimistic of continued JAS involvement
in the program, and is making attempts at locating
potential grant-funding to replicate it in other school
districts, as well.
Next semester, the students will plan and lead spe-
cial classes, like chair-exercises, art and social action
classes. "For example, for the exercise class, they will
have to look up what exercises are applicable to the age
group involved," Young says.
Gomoll plans to keep in touch with Waldbott, and
adds, "If I could do it again next semester, I would."
For Waldbott, that opportunity is available and he
says, "God-willing, I'll be back." El

