Wanted: Boomers to engage with children

Gladstone Center looking for adults to mentor children

By Ellen Spitaleri

The Clackamas Review, Feb 15, 2012

Kassy Babeckos / the Clackamas Review

Volunteer Colleen Stutz reads to students in Kassy Babeckos all - day Kindergarten class at the Gladstone Center for Children and Families. Pictured are: from left to right, Othello Mulligan, Mylah Ramirez, Oscar Dzib and Chloe Black.

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Susan Trone is hoping a bumper crop of baby boomers will show up to volunteer at the Gladstone Center for Children and Families, where she is the volunteer coordinator.

Trone was hired in September at the center, and one of her duties is to “build a volunteer program from the ground up,” she said.

Helping to facilitate that goal is the Babies and Boomers grant of more than $25,000 that the center was awarded by the Oregon Community Foundation, an organization that does “amazing work helping better people’s lives,” Trone said.

The purpose of the grant is to “engage baby boomers in volunteer activities to promote school readiness in young children.”

Although the center welcomes volunteers of all ages, the grant is aimed at those born between 1948 and 1964, Trone said.

She also noted that because the center is part of the Gladstone School District, the school district will do all the background checks and take care of the paperwork, at no cost to volunteers.

Volunteer duties

The Gladstone Center for Children and Families, located across the street from Gladstone High School in the old Danielson’s Thriftway store, provides education services to children from birth through kindergarten, through Head Start, Healthy Start, Clackamas County ESD and seven other agencies.

Three kindergarten classes, one all day and two half day, serve 124 students at the site.

The site opened in January 2009, and “there is no other center like this in Oregon; all these agencies have come together to support kids and families,” Trone said.

She is hoping to get baby boomers to come to the center to share their life-experience skills from years of working and living, and there are many ways for the boomers to engage with children.

She emphasized that she is open to ideas, and noted that volunteers can be one-on-one mentors, reading buddies, classroom assistants and playgroup facilitators, among other things.

“The kindergarten teachers need people who will come in and work with small groups in reading, math, art, cooking, gardening, drama, music and cultural awareness. People can also share parenting skills and go on welcome baby visits with Healthy Start,” she added.

And, Trone noted, there is plenty of science to show “that the way children interact with adults is crucial in laying the foundation in early childhood for future learning, behavior and success in school.”

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