Social & Community

Bringing Older Adults and Young People Together for Learning, Mentoring, and Inspiration

When we think of our childhood, many of us are lucky enough to recall at least one older adult — perhaps a grandparent, teacher, or family friend — who inspired and gently prodded us to work harder in school and aim higher in reaching worthwhile goals. Now, a new generation of school children is getting the chance to learn from the unique wisdom and life experience of older adults through an innovative program spearheaded by the UAB Center for Aging and the UAB School of Education.

The program — called JCARP (Joint Collaborative Action Research Program) — provides opportunities for older adults and urban school children to interact regularly in structured projects designed to enhance the students’ academic achievement and foster well being among the senior adults. “Overall, the program helps the students appreciate what older people have to contribute and allows them to spend time with an older adult in a way they may never have before,” says Angela Curtis, PhD, UAB assistant professor of medicine and associate director of the UAB Geriatric Education Center. “The older adults, many of whom haven’t been in the workforce in years, find it rewarding to know they can still contribute to the education and personal growth of young people.”

Established in 2005, the program awards two grants per year totaling $10,000 to urban schools proposing specific, innovative projects involving students from preschool to 12th grade and older adults from the community. “Every grant proposal is required to equally represent students and older adults while including outcome measures, or objectives, that focus on both groups,” explains Dr. Curtis. “We’ve received a number of strong proposals since the program began. All of the grant recipients have been successful in developing projects that involve both groups in creative ways.”

Project GRACE (Grandparents Reading and Comprehending Enthusiastically) is an example of a literacy-focused JCARP program that paired older adults with their K-5 grandchildren who were students at Glen Iris Elementary School in Birmingham. The program’s primary objective was to improve the students’ reading comprehension skills, but GRACE also accomplished an important secondary purpose. “The program empowered grandparents raising their own grandchildren by teaching them strategies for helping the children become better learners,” explains Dr. Voltz. “The senior adults benefited from having a structured opportunity to focus on their grandchildren’s success.”

Another innovative JCARP program, called AIM (Adult Identity Mentoring), was designed to encourage children at South Hampton Elementary School to explore their life ambitions and begin developing plans to achieve their goals. As part of the program, 20 senior adults mentored 275 fourth- and fifth-graders, guiding them in a variety of hands-on activities such as mock job interviews, resume writing, creating business cards, and researching various careers. “The older adults helped to spark a desire and focus within the children to acquire the academic skills they need to succeed in their future careers,” observes Dr. Voltz. “The program also gave the older adults an opportunity to share their knowledge and wisdom gained from many years of life experience.”

Dr. Curtis says that in addition to the benefits gained by students and older adults, JCARP has provided an important opportunity for faculty members from the UAB Center for Aging and the School of Education. “Working together on this project has led us to collaborate on other projects as well. We’ve found that our work supports each other in ways we may not have realized previously,” she adds. “We’ve learned a great deal about one another’s research interests and projects, which opens new windows of opportunity for ways we can work together in the future to further the interests of students and older adults within our community and the nation,” observes Dr. Voltz.