Garden City Community College - Broncbuster Yearbook (Garden City, KS)

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A special gift-Chris Heiman wat- ches as his child Alfred Rincones opens his present. Togetherness-College students and their I Care kids enjoy entertainment during the Christmas party. AcademicsfProject I Care 87

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Project: I Care offers students TQ EET Sz BEFRIE Project: I Care offered students from sociology classes an opportunity to meet and befriend young persons from the community. The pro- gram was initiated over 16 years ago by Sociology In- structor joyce Boone. The children chosen were those who were identified to Boone as ones who would benefit from personal, direc- tive interaction with a college student. Approximately 75 students per semester participated in the program. The students who volunteered for the project were given on-the-job training in understanding the pro- blems of younger children, ages four to 14, and in relating to those children and their problems. Children in the community who need this type of help are selected and referred to the program by the social and rehabilitation service, the schools, and personal calls from concerned parents,', Boone said. Many of the children have been in trouble with the law, are from minority families or from one-parent families or dual-career families, Boone said. I sometimes get calls from children asking if they can join Project: I Care. Some have friends in the program and they would like to have someone care about them too 86 Project I Care!Academics -just like their friends have, Boone said. The project required each volunteer student to spend at least one hour a week with their child. The students then turned in a weekly progress report to Boone who checked the reports and then sent them to qualified counselors. A case study was required for the student at the end of the semester, recommending whether the child should be on the program the next semester. Students had the respon- sibility of introducing the children to community ac- tivities and showing them some of the simple things that most people take for granted. Many of the activities were supported by the community, including discount movie, bowling, and skating tickets. Free tickets to all college ac- tivities such as football, basketball, drama and musical events were provided for the children and the students. In the past 16 years, over 2400 students have par- ticipated in the program. Some of my students were actually 'I Care Kids, themselves, Boone said. One such student was Freshman Shelly Goodwin. She began participating in Project: I Care when she was in grade school. Unlike many of the other kids, I wasn't a kid from a poverty family. I just wanted someone to be my friend and spend time with me, Good- win said. From an I Care Kid's point of view, the fact that someone cared about me was the most important thing. It really helped me get over the rough spots of growing up, Good- win said. When I became an I Care student myself, the neat thing was that I had the opportunity to see the program from both sides of the fence, Goodwin said. 'llm kind of sorry the class is over for me. I'd like to take another I Care Kid-just for fun,', Goodwin said. Companionship-Two Project: I Care participants share a special mo- ment at the annual Christmas party.

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Day and evening VARIETY GF PRGJ ECTS We have students making everything from nightstands to entertainment centers, Building Construction Coor- dinator Curt Tarrant said. You name it, everything you can make out of wood, we've made it. He was refer- ring to the various projects constructed in his day and evening woodworking classes. He taught two night classes and two day classes. The day classes were called Machine Woodworking while evening classes were called Beginning Woodworking. Adults in the community enrolled mainly in night classes. They were interested not in the credit hours but the projects themselves. Some dedicated adults have enrolled in as many as sixteen semesters of the course. Enrollment also increased when the new facilities in the john Collins Vocational Building were finished. We're pretty proud of our enrollment, Tarrant said. He explained that there were 51 people enrolled in the five classes, which included a wood finishing class. The classes were considered full with ten per class period. The department added a new full-time instructor, Gary Barker. This was Barker's first college teaching job, he formerly taught high school industrial education at Lin- colnville. The change was for the bet- ter, according to Barker. They're here because they want to be, not because they have to be. They're more eager to learn and a lot more pleasant to work with, he said. Most of the beginning students started with simple projects and moved on to more difficult ones as their skills progressed. I made a dresser in high school and this gives me an op- portunity to build the mat- ching mirror frame, said night student Ron Kreutzer. As far as the classes combin- ed they build all kinds of stuff, from real simple to com- plex projects, Barker said. Students in both beginning and machine woodworking drew their own unique plans. By building their own fur- niture pieces, Tarrant estimated that students spent only about one fifth of what they would have paid for the same item in a furniture store. The department purchased several different kinds of Squaring up stock-Ron Kreutzer runs a piece of walnut over thejointer. It was later used as the side of a mir- ror frame. 88 Wood ProductionlAcademics wood and supplies. The students kept a material bill and paid for the project when they were finished. They pick- ed their project as well as the supplies. We don't dictate to a stu- dent what they should build, Tarrant said. We want them to build something they have a need for and could use at home.