"Seniors and students form new friendships"

Reposted here with the permission of The Davis Enterprise - http://www.davisenterprise.com/home-page/featured-stories/seniors-and-students-form-new-friendships/

Olden Paris reads a book with Montgomery Elementary fourth-graders Julia Bonnel, left, and Layla Fitch during the students’ visit last week to the University Retirement Community. Sue Cockrell/Enterprise photo

The children had already begun singing when Bryant Wright wheeled into the room.

They were fourth-graders from Montgomery Elementary School, visiting University Retirement Community in West Davis, and singing the 1905 Thomas Allen song, "Fifteen Miles on the Erie Canal."

There were already about a dozen URC residents in the room, smiling at the students, some singing along, when Wright entered in his wheelchair.

The faces of two little girls immediately lit up upon seeing Wright arrive. He gave them a quick little wave, and when the song ended, and after a poem had been recited, Juju Miyamoto and Crystal Kerner hurried over to give Wright a hug.

"Hello, Juju. Hello, Crystal," he said with obvious pleasure. "How are you?"

Around his neck he wore the strand of beads and bells the two girls had given him in December.

"When they made it for me," Wright said, "I told them, ‘I'm going to wear it until you come back … and I'm never going to throw it away.' "

He was true to his word.

The girls immediately got to work on their next gift for Wright — a foam valentine picture frame. They chatted with Wright as they worked.

"What have you been up to?" Juju asked Wright.

He told them what he'd been doing, complimented their work on the picture frame, and told them he would take it upstairs to show his wife, Jane, who he reminded them was a teacher for 30 years.

Then he told them he would hang the picture frame in the entry to his apartment at URC, where he already had their photos hanging, so he could always see their smiling faces when he came and went.

"I didn't know our photos are there," said a beaming Juju.

This connection, between two young girls and a man 70 years their senior — whom they'd never even met just months ago — was exactly what Montgomery teacher Cheri Burau had hoped would grow out of the senior buddies program she started this year.

Burau's sister is a teacher in Twin Rivers, and she had been telling Burau about the senior buddies program her class was doing. Burau contacted several retirement homes in Davis and URC responded immediately: They would love to pair up some residents with Montgomery students.

Together, Burau and fellow Montgomery teacher Alicia Herrera began preparing their fourth-graders for the first visit to URC last fall. Their senior buddies would be URC residents who spend a lot of time in the health care unit. Many are in wheelchairs, some hard of hearing.

"We talked about that a lot," Burau said. "What it means to be in a wheelchair, to not be able to see well or hear well. Many of (our students) had never been around people that age."

They also talked about what it's like to be elderly in this day and age — about the loneliness and disconnection many older Americans face, and how these fourth-graders could make a difference.

"The kids were really nervous about it the first time we went to visit," Burau said. "But that (nervousness) lasted maybe five minutes."

Any trepidation on the part of the children quickly turned into fondness.

"They're becoming very attached to their buddies," Burau said of her students.

"And the joy you see on the seniors' faces when we walk in is really meaningful," she added.

Said Alika Castillo, URC's administrator of health services: "I walk in the room and I see the smiles on residents' faces … and that's all I need to know.

"Having meaningful interaction, especially with children … we all crave that," he added. "And that's what's happening here."

For some of these residents who don't have family nearby, it's the only chance they have to spend time with children. And many said they cherish it.

"I love this," said resident Mary Macdonald as her buddies, Kaela Roemhild and Matthew Wilson Negrete, read aloud to her.

Across the room, students Graciela Leter and Nichole Shannon Craig were chatting with Charlotte Cassidy as they made her a picture frame. She talked to them about her daughter, and Nichole told Cassidy about her grandfather.

"They are just great," Cassidy said of her young friends.

The visit came to a close after about an hour. The children sang another song — this time, "I Think You're Wonderful" — and then said their goodbyes.

Juju and Crystal hugged Wright once more.

"When are you coming back?" he asked them.

"In a month and half," they replied.

"OK then," said Wright. "I will see you in a month and a half."