Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, January 8, 1995 TAG: 9501070019
SECTION: HORIZON PAGE: G-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: DONNA ALVIS-BANKS STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: RINER LENGTH: Long
Josh has one younger sister named Tara. Bill has one younger sister named Sara.
They're in Mrs. Roberts' fifth-grade class at Riner Elementary School in rural Montgomery County. They live about a mile from each other and within walking distance of their school.
But Josh Altizer and Bill Fudge are worlds apart.
Until this past September, Bill's world was 2,500 miles away. He was born in the Southern California city of Whittier, a 20-minute drive from downtown Los Angeles.
Crime. Drugs. Gangs. Riots. Earthquakes.
They weren't just words to Bill. They were realities.
"In California, it's not very good there," Bill said recently as he worked at a terminal in the computer lab at Riner Elementary School. They didn't have computers in his old school.
"The kids here don't bully you, either," he said. "At least here, they don't carry guns. There they had drugs and guns."
Before he moved to Riner with his family in September, Bill attended Bell Gardens Christian School, a private parochial school near Whittier.
"The public schools were 10 times as bad," Bill said.
His mother, Debbie Demshki, agreed.
"The schools in general out there were very lacking in the desire to really want to educate kids," Demshki said. "Their main concern was monetary needs."
"A lot of the children [in the Los Angeles area] don't speak English," noted Demshki, whose ancestry is Mexican, Spanish and Italian. "The language barrier is a problem. There's also a big problem with the gangs."
Children started identifying with gangs in the elementary grades, Demshki said. Their gang affiliation was symbolized by the color of the bandanas they wore.
"I didn't want Bill walking to school," Demshki said. "The public school kids would beat up the private school kids because the private school kids wore uniforms."
Bill said he and his classmates tried to hide their uniforms underneath their jackets.
"I wore a jacket even when it was 100 degrees outside," he said.
Finally, Demshki and her husband, Bob, began to talk about getting out of California.
"With all the worries with your kids in school and worries about the economy, we were anxious to move."
"So Bob started interviewing," Demshki said. "He first went to Chicago. Then he went to Virginia. When he came back, he said, 'It's beautiful. I don't know how to explain it to you. The only thing I can say is it's green.'"
Demshki's husband, a senior design engineer, took a job with Hubbell Lighting and the family moved to the New River Valley. Demshki, a mail carrier with the U.S. Postal Service, went to work at the Christiansburg Post Office.
She enrolled her 2-year-old daughter in a local day-care center and Bill entered Riner Elementary School. He became one of two new students in his class, one of 48 who've moved to this school over the past four years.
"I have been ecstatic about the schools here," Demshki said.
Recently her hot water heater went out and she had to cancel a parent/teacher conference to wait for the repairman. So two of Bill's teachers, Cheryl Roberts and Carol Wellington, made a housecall to discuss Bill's progress and difficulties adjusting to his new school.
"They actually care about the outcome of their students," she said. "In California, you won't find that kind of dedication."
Bill said there are some drawbacks with the switch to Riner Elementary.
"I have a lot more homework," he admitted, "but the teachers help you a lot more."
"I've got some catching up to do from the other schools," he added.
Just down the road from Bill's home in a new, modern subdivision in Riner is the rolling farmland that's been in the Altizer family for generations. Josh Altizer lives in a brick ranch near his grandfather's white farmhouse.
Horses graze in a nearby pasture. A Kenworth truck tractor is parked in the driveway, "Altizer Trucking Inc." lettered neatly across the cab.
Like his father, Josh wants to be a truck driver.
"It's in his blood," said his mother, Phama Altizer. "He can drive and he can hook up the trailers just as good as the other truckers. He started driving when he was 5, sittin' on his daddy's lap."
"He was driving by himself when he was 6," added his father, Freddie Altizer.
Josh's mother doesn't allow her son to test his driving skills on public roads, but she says he spends much of his time driving tractors, trucks and cars around the farm. He also accompanies his father on runs around the Southeast.
"He's been to Maryland, Pennsylvania, West Virginia, Ohio, New Jersey, North Carolina, Tennessee, Indiana, Maryland and Kentucky," his father said.
Josh has never missed a day of school for a trucking trip, though.
"Mama won't let me," he says with a sheepish grin.
The Altizers are proud that Josh and his sister attend Riner Elementary School, but they're concerned about how quickly the school and the rural community are changing. Since the late 1980s, developers have created six major large-lot subdivisions in the Riner and Childress areas south of Interstate 81 between Christiansburg and Radford.
"Riner has built up," Phama Altizer said. "The schools are filling up beyond capacity. The teachers have more to do. The classes are larger. I like the smaller groups."
"It disheartens me to see the farmland disappearing so fast," she added. "People are looking to move out, away from town....I'd kind of like to see [Riner] stay the way it is."
Josh sides with his mother.
"I like Riner," he said. "You don't have a lot of city noise. It's peaceful."
Unlike many children of his generation, Josh isn't interested in computer games, videos or professional sports.
He wears cowboy boots. He listens to country music. His most prized possessions are the trophies he's won at antique tractor pulls.
"I like to play and help my dad with the trucks," he said.
"A lot of children don't have a farm and the opportunities Josh has," nodded his mother. "He's an outdoor boy. He's a country boy."
by CNB