Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: FRIDAY, April 12, 1991 TAG: 9104120208
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: B1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: NEAL THOMPSON EDUCATION WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
When teens don't get those hugs from parents or from a caring teacher, they get them from one another.
"Kids need affirmations every day," Chuck Jackson told a few hundred educators and social workers Thursday. Hugs are a simple form of affirmation, but people are afraid to hug.
To make his point, Jackson dragged an embarrassed Melva Belcher onto a podium in the Tanglewood Holiday Inn ballroom. He hugged the Bedford County instructional specialist and said, "I love you."
"He made his point," Belcher said afterward.
Jackson is a counselor and former principal from Tulsa, Okla. He used a fast-paced hour of screaming, singing, poetry and a tear-jerking story or two to kick off an intense, daylong conference Thursday on mentoring.
The conference collected people from schools, churches, civic groups, businesses and social service groups to show how mentoring relationships may be the best way to save the many children branded as "at risk."
"At risk" means students who are in danger of dropping out, getting pregnant or doing drugs. The number of those students in Roanoke and its surrounding counties has been rising for years. Most agree it's becoming more than the schools can handle alone.
The solution may rest in the hands of volunteers from groups like churches and businesses who can spend time with children, Jackson said.
Kids need encouragement like the kind they got when they took their first steps and spoke their first words. In many cases, parents' squeals of joy and praise for a baby's "Da-da" are all but gone by the fifth grade, Jackson said. And schools don't pick up the slack.
"The school model, my friends, is not encouraging. It's discouraging," he said.
Today's school administrators have "myopic tunnel vision" and are interested only in improving test scores. "This is destructive," Jackson said. "We compare kids to perfect instead of to who they were yesterday. And another thing we do is compare kids to kids."
Jackson's opening speech, which left him breathless and sweating in his overalls, began a day of workshops on an emotional and motivating note, some attendees said.
Peter Lewis, director of Roanoke's alternative education programs for troubled youths, said, "I've gotten a lot of energy today and a lot of ideas I can use in my program. I'm thrilled."
Workshops showed how mentoring programs in the Roanoke area are working: career mentoring, students mentoring other students, literacy training and business mentoring. Lewis said they showed him that some programs are working and businesses and individuals can help make a difference.
The Junior League of Roanoke Valley sponsored the conference. Conference chairwoman Lissy Runyon, community relations supervisor for Roanoke schools, said turnout was much more than anticipated. Extra chairs had to be set in the ballroom and workshops were standing-room-only.
In Cheri Hartman's workshop, folks got a taste of something that works: the Teen Outreach Program at Patrick Henry High School, which Hartman heads.
The program uses volunteers to train teens to be volunteers themselves. Teens work in nursing homes, read to elementary schoolchildren and do construction work for the elderly. "We've tried to give each one of them a chance to express their special talent," Hartman said.
To help the students understand the elderly a little better, Hartman conducts exercises like having them wear popcorn in their shoes or open candy wrappers with their fingers taped together.
The 20 students who participated this year - all considered at risk - get free class rings. "It's more important than ever that these kids feel appreciated," Hartman said.
by CNB