Foster Grandparent Program to end locally after almost 50 years
Like everyone else, 59-year-old Marlene Ward is getting older.
But ever since she joined the Thames Valley Council for Community Action's Foster Grandparent Program six years ago, she said, it hasn't really felt that way.
"I feel like it's making me younger," said Ward, who's been stationed in the Early Learning Center at Bishop School in Norwich for five of her six years. "Because the kids are young, it puts life into me."
Naturally, when Ward learned in April that the 50-year-old program would be calling it quits locally at the end of June, she was disappointed.
"I was upset — really upset," she said. "I still am. I love these kids."
Initiated in 1965 under President Lyndon B. Johnson, the federally funded Foster Grandparent Program has seen thousands of qualifying volunteers develop relationships with youths in day cares, Head Start programs and elementary schools across the country.
It's a win-win-win set-up. The low-income seniors are able to add meaning to their free time while receiving a small stipend. The children benefit from one-on-one time they may not get without two people in the classroom. The teachers have an extra set of hands to help out.
But over the years, the requirements corresponding with the grant have continually increased, according to Jennifer Johnson, director of senior volunteer services for TVCCA.
For one, she said, the grant asks TVCCA to maintain 77 participants in the program.
According to Megan Brown, TVCCA's senior director of marketing and development, the high point of volunteers in recent years was around 60. Right now, it's down to about 27.
"We're seeing more and more people in this group going back to work," Brown said, explaining that, to qualify, a senior must be making $14,850 or less a year.
As a result, she said, the $2.65-per-hour stipend offered by the grant often doesn't cut it for seniors who otherwise may be interested in participating.
In addition to that, Brown explained, the federal government now wants those running the program to put resources into developing measures and documenting the impact the foster grandparents have on the kids they work with.
When the time came around to renew the grant, TVCCA decided it was no longer feasible.
"It's an incredibly sad time for me personally," Johnson said. "I'm very sorry that it has to go. It was a program that in its heyday was a very excellent program. It just reached the end of its lifetime in this region."
Standing in the Bishop School playground, Ward, surrounded by kids showing her their newly blown bubbles and telling her stories, stressed that she and the others are involved in much more than "story time and playtime."
Each school year, she explained, she stays with the children five days a week, 7 1/2 hours a day. She helps them learn the alphabet, how to write their names and which shapes are called what while paying extra attention to the four kids who are deemed to need the most help.
"We don't just sit back on our haunches," agreed 72-year-old Cynthia Chaput, who also is a foster grandparent at the early learning center. "They learn a lot from us."
She called the ending of the decades-long program a "travesty."
"As seniors, most of us live on a fixed income," Chaput said. "Like me: I just live on Social Security. That little bit of money from the stipend helps more than people realize."
Ward said she's worried about how she'll spend her time once the program ends, but above all will miss her interaction with the kids.
"I love these kids, and these kids every day tell me they love me," she said. "If I'm out a day, they say, 'Grandma, where were you? What happened?'"
A resident of the Hamilton Park apartments, she said she's brought children from the center to Hamilton Park over the years to do crafts and interact with her neighbors.
"These guys where I live keep saying, 'When are you gonna bring the kids back?'" Ward said. "I don't know now if I'm going to be able to bring the kids back."
Chaput echoed Ward's sentiments.
"I've had one kid, more than one kid, say they wish I was their real grandma," Chaput said. "They get used to you. They care about you and you care about them. They become like an extension of your family."
"I'm going to miss them," she said.
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