Based in Marshall, the local AmeriCorps Seniors Foster Grandparent Program seeks volunteers to work with special needs students in Sedalia.
Martin Tichenor, the program director for the Foster Grandparent Program, said it serves Pettis County along with Johnson, Lafayette, Ray, and Saline counties. It has seven volunteers in the Sedalia area at the MVCAA Hubbard Park Head Start, Pettis County R-XII (Dresden), and St. Paul Lutheran Elementary. Tichenor said they are in the process of building the program in the Sedalia area.
The Foster Grandparent Program pairs senior volunteers beginning at age 55 with special needs children, who then work with the students and teachers in a classroom setting. Often, volunteers read to the children or help them with their lessons.
Tichenor added that before COVID, the program had 15 volunteers in Sedalia. Many of them helped out in the Sedalia School District 200. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the volunteer numbers have dropped, and the Sedalia School District no longer uses Foster Grandparent volunteers. Once based in Higginsville, the local program has been in service for 50 years. One can volunteer at age 55, and Tichenor said one woman volunteered from age 70 to 107.
"I consider 2018 as when we really got started in Pettis County," Tichenor noted. "We had volunteers at Parkview, Heber Hunt, Washington, and Skyline (elementary schools).
"We also had volunteers at Parkview Christian Daycare," he continued. "And we started in the Head Starts; that's where we really got started. The center coordinator, Ruby Marin, at Hubbard Park, she is really a great supporter of our program. She just loves our volunteers."
Deborah Steele, 73, from Hubbard Head Start, and Carol Handy, from St. Paul Lutheran School, said being a Foster Grandparent is gratifying.
"It has been a great experience being with those children, giving them love and attention that some of them need," Steele said. "It's gratifying teaching them their numbers and their colors and their alphabet. It's been a gratifying experience for them to call me grandma and come up and hug me."
Steele added she's been in the program for two years, and it makes her happy to know the children also help her.
"For the most part, they make my day," she noted.
Handy has been with the program since 2019 and said it's a "joy" to help children read and socialize. She works with pre-k students and first, second, third, and fourth graders.
"What the children do for me is they read to me," she explained. "I don't read to them. So, the more practice they get, the better.
"I've had some very shy children that's come out of their shell," she continued. "We try to make it a fun time."
Handy added she's been out this past month with pneumonia but is anxious to begin the new year back in class as a Foster Grandparent.
"It's a very rewarding situation," she said of fostering. "They just keep me going — on both sides of the fence, we're waiting to get started back with school."
Tichenor said when one asks to be a volunteer, they undergo an approval process and a background check.
"The first thing we do is get their basic information," noted Tichenor, who worked for the Missouri Department of Corrections for 15 years. "We have a one-page application."
He also runs their name through Case.net, and a fingerprint and background check is run through the Pettis County Sheriff's Office.
"At the same time, we run them through NSOBW, the National Sex Offender public website," he explained. "We check that out, and I also check the Missouri Highway Patrol sex offender website."
If the person is approved, they undergo a rigorous three-day orientation before receiving their assignment.
"We go through basic things about volunteering," he explained. "We do a full day on childhood development — how children develop from stage to stage. What to look for and how to help them with their developmental markers."
A full day of communication skills is also taught so volunteers can better communicate with the children and the teaching staff.
"We try to place the volunteer in a station that would be what they would like," Tichenor said. "If they want to work with younger children, we try to put them in a primary school or maybe a Head Start.
"The majority of our volunteers want to work with early elementary, first, second, and third grade," he added. "We have a few that like to work with the older kids, middle school (and) we've had volunteers at the high school level."
He noted that one of the program's mandates is that the volunteers be assigned to work one-on-one with the children. Foster grandparents usually help children with reading.
"We work very closely with the teachers in the classroom," Tichenor said. "And what we found is the majority of our volunteers end up reading with children.
"Because reading is fundamental," he continued. "There's a ton of research out there that shows if a child is not reading at grade level by grade level three, they struggle the rest of their school career."
He added the program's theme is "All About Kids" and noted the motto is, "Foster Grandparents nurture our future's promise."
"Because those kids are our future," he said. "And I think our Foster Grandparents have a greater awareness of that, working with the children one-on-one, than most people do.
"They see that development," he continued. "They see what those kids need on a day-to-day basis. They become so intertwined with the station, with the teacher they work with, I refer to them as unpaid staff."
Those interested in volunteering in Sedalia with AmeriCorps Seniors Foster Grandparent Program, 261 W. Washington St. in Marshall, may call 660-886-7421.
Faith Bemiss-McKinney can be reached at 660-530-0289.
