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Emme Tomimbang: Making Her Mark |
| The veteran television broadcaster talks frankly about her personal life and amazing career. |
Back to School |
| Serving as teachers’ aides in the classroom,
senior volunteers are making a big difference in the lives of Hawaii’s children. |
FEATURE:
Back to School
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Susan Kondo is on a mission. Since she was hired as the state Department of Education’s Volunteer Coordinator a year ago, she has been working tirelessly to bring new life to the volunteer program in the public schools.
Much of her time has been spent making key contacts at the schools and in communities statewide. She works closely with FELLOWS (an acronym for Fellowship Education and Lifelong Learning Opportunities with Seniors) and the Retired and Senior Volunteer Program (RSVP), both of which support the schools, teachers and children while enhancing the lives of Hawaii’s seniors .
Most
schools have a Parenting Community Networking Coordinator (PCNC),
a paid part-time employee who serves as the liaison between the school
and parents and who coordinates volunteers’ time at the school.
“The PCNCs help establish the relationships that are necessary
to make the volunteer program work,” says Kondo. “Unfortunately,
not all the PCNCs are familiar with FELLOWS and RSVP. One of my goals
is to connect the PCNCs with those groups to build community partnerships,
which, in turn, will build the volunteer program.”
During the 2004-2005 school year, 140 RSVP volunteers served more than 17,000 hours at 40 of Oahu’s 167 public schools (FELLOWS did not have current statistics available). Kondo hopes those numbers will increase in the coming months.
She recognizes seniors are valuable resources for the schools, but there are challenges. “People want to help at schools that their grandchildren attend, but the long distance they would have to travel doesn’t make that feasible,” she notes. “Also, some seniors are trying to make ends meet, and because they have part-time or full-time jobs, they don’t have the time or energy to participate. Others are raising their grandchildren and when they have free time, they want to enjoy their hobbies.”
But
Kondo believes an ample pool of potential volunteers exists. Increasing
public awareness is key; as word gets out, she hopes there will be
enough interest to spur the growth of the schools’ volunteer
programs. “We want to inform everyone about what wonderful free
resources FELLOWS and RSVP are. Every school can benefit from volunteer
help, and FELLOWS and RSVP can provide that.”
Kondo notes how the public schools frequently get criticized for not
providing children with a quality education, but not enough people
in the community are doing anything to improve the situation. “We
all know there’s a problem, but why aren’t more people
willing to fix it?” she laments. “We need to help the
teachers, we need to help the principals and we need to help the kids.”
Education, she asserts, is much more than just reading, writing and ’rithmatic. “Teachers are being asked to shape children’s values, assume a parental role,” she says. “If that’s the case, why can’t we as a community come out and say, ‘C’mon let’s work together on this!’”
Willis Barnhouse and Fukuyo Iwamoto are two seniors who have answered the call.
Willis Barnhouse
“Volunteering at Waialae School has restored my sense of self-worth.
“I feel I’m giving something back to the community and
making a difference in children’s lives.”
Looking dapper in a bright aloha shirt and slacks, Willis Barnhouse is easy to spot at Waialae Elementary Public Charter School, where FELLOWS began as a pilot project in 1997. The 74-year-old retired pharmacist has volunteered there for the past five years and “loves every minute of it.”
Barnhouse grew up on a farm near Olympia, Washington. He attended the University of Washington in Seattle, where he earned a degree in pharmacy. After completing two years of service as a communications officer with the Air Force, he settled in Seattle and embarked on a successful career as a pharmacist. Marriage followed, then the births of a daughter and a son.
In 1976, Barnhouse and his family moved to Hawaii, drawn by its aloha spirit, multiethnic culture and tropical beauty. He worked for Stewart’s Pharmacy in Waikiki and Niu Valley the first four years, then was hired by IPC Pharmacy as a consultant. During the 21 years he was with IPC, he traveled throughout the islands, even making trips to Kalaupapa on Molokai, the isolated settlement for those stricken with Hansen’s disease.
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A Hawaii Kai resident, Barnhouse retired in 2001. After a couple of months at home, however, he admits, “I was getting pretty antsy. I knew I had to do something with all the free time I had.”
Reading the newspaper one morning, he came across an article about FELLOWS. He says, chuckling, “There was a picture of a guy (the late Ed Krentzman) surrounded by little kids, and the story said that he belonged to a volunteer group called FELLOWS. I thought it was a men’s organization. Wrong! I turned out to be one of the few men in FELLOWS, but that’s okay.”
In October 2001, after taking his usual month-long annual vacation, Barnhouse started volunteering at Waialae School. Since then, he has spent every Tuesday morning there during the school year, assisting Mrs. Denise Kealoha. The first year, she taught a kindergarten class; in 2002, she was assigned to the second grade.
Barnhouse often tutors students who are having difficulty with math and reading. “One day,” he recalls, “I was showing a boy how to carry numbers in subtraction. We went through it over and over, then all of a sudden a lightbulb went off in his head and he got it! I think I felt happier about that than he did!”
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Being around young children for three hours every week has, Barnhouse believes, made him a better grandfather (he and Shirley, his wife of almost 50 years, have a 13-year-old granddaughter and a 10-year-old grandson). Among other things, he says he has become more patient, relaxed and communicative.
“Children,” Barnhouse says, “accept people unconditionally. Even after the kids I’ve gotten to know in Mrs. Kealoha’s classes have moved on to other grade levels, they’ll say hi when they see me and run up and give me a hug. That’ll melt your heart for sure.”
All the time he was working, Barnhouse notes, his identity was closely tied to his job. “That changed when I retired,” he says. “I no longer felt I was accomplishing anything important. Volunteering at Waialae School has restored my sense of self-worth. I feel I’m giving something back to the community and making a difference in children’s lives. Plus, I’m having so much fun it’s hard to say who’s getting more out of it—me or them!”
Fukuyo Iwamoto
“I appreciate their companionship, I enjoy the mental stimulation—and
the
children definitely keep me young!”
You would never guess Fukuyo Iwamoto is 84 years young. This energetic mother of three children and grandmother of an eight-year-old granddaughter and five-year-old grandson exudes the joie de vivre of someone much younger.
When her husband passed away over four years ago, Iwamoto made major
adjustments in her life. First, she supervised the renovation of her
55-year-old Alewa Heights home with new paint, plumbing, electrical
wiring, and flooring for the kitchen and bathrooms. Then she revamped
herself.
It was 2003. “I live near two schools, and I enjoyed hearing
the voices and laughter of the children,” Iwamoto recalls. “Then
summer came and it got really quiet. I missed the sounds of the children.
Right at that time I happened to see a newspaper story seeking FELLOWS
volunteers and decided to respond.”
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After attending an orientation meeting the following week, Iwamoto was placed at Pauoa Elementary School. She now goes there once a week, usually on Monday mornings.
The first year, she helped in the library and worked with Mrs. Cheryl Oshiro and her kindergarten class. The next two years, she assisted Mrs. Faye Miyamasu with her first grade classes. Miyamasu retired in the spring, so when the current school term began, Iwamoto was placed with Mrs. Catie Uyeda and her first-grade class.
Iwamoto, who retired from a 40-year career as a registered nurse in 1982, says she “knew nothing about teaching when I first started at Pauoa School; I didn’t have the slightest idea about it. But I told the teachers I would be willing to do anything and everything that they needed me to do.”
This has included tutoring immigrant children from homes where English is spoken as the second language. “One year there was a boy in Mrs. Miyamasu’s first-grade class who didn’t know what a lemon was,” Iwamoto recalls. “He also didn’t know the word ‘trash.’ When I told him it meant rubbish, then he understood.”
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She has found being in the classroom requires her to be as alert as she was when she was caring for patients at Kuakini Medical Center and Straub Clinic & Hospital. “Children look up to teachers and expect them to be much more knowledgeable than they are,” she says. “Whenever I make a mistake, they point it out to me. They say, ‘But you told me such-and-such, and that’s not true.’ I tell them, ‘I’m sorry, I’m not a perfect person and I don’t know everything.’ I explain that adults are human, too, and we do make mistakes. It’s not something to be ashamed about; even grown-ups learn from their mistakes.”
| Interested in volunteering at Hawaii’s public schools? The first step is to call the Retired and Senior Volunteer Program (RSVP) at 536-6543 and/or FELLOWS (Fellowship Education and Lifelong Learning Opportunities with Seniors) at 220-8686. The Letter from the Editor on page 4 of this issue shares more information about RSVP. FELLOWS is a program sponsored by the Hawaii Intergenerational Network (HIN) whose mission is “to improve the lives of people of all ages by promoting and supporting intergenerational connections through advocacy, education and empowerment.” Launched at Waialae Elementary Public Charter School nearly 10 years ago, FELLOWS places volunteers aged 50 and older in the public schools to assist teachers with tutoring, storytelling, arts and crafts, and special events that promote the academic and social growth of the children. The goal of the program is to help develop well-rounded students and provide seniors with opportunities to serve their communities and learn about and mentor the younger generation. After going through a screening process, training from RSVP or HIN, and an orientation session that familiarizes them with the school’s campus and policies, FELLOWS spend at least two hours per week assisting teachers with classroom activities, field trips and other needs. You can learn more about the program by perusing the Web site www.hingeneration.org. |
Iwamoto also notes the tremendous effect technology has had on the education process in general. “Today there are computers in just about every home and classroom,” she notes. “Kids start using them as soon as they can walk. Technology has made the world move at a much faster pace than when I was growing up and raising my children. Students and teachers nowadays have to learn much faster to keep up.”
So, Iwamoto adds with a laugh, has she. “Being a teacher is not an easy job,” she says, insisting she has received more benefits from volunteering at Pauoa School than the teachers and children whose lives she has touched. “I get so much satisfaction from being with them. I appreciate their companionship, I enjoy the mental stimulation—and the children definitely keep me young!”