Big Spring High School
Newville, Pennsylvania
Teacher: Mrs. D. Whitmoyer

                                                                            Karin Lin-Greenberg

Looking to the Future With Help From the Past

By Brooke Donovan
Grade 12
Age:  17

 

There are many ways in which we can use our "role of personal responsibility in improving the quality of life in our communities today."  One of the ways that we can make a better community is through improving the relationships between teenagers and the elderly.  Why is it that many teenagers and younger children are afraid to associate themselves with the older generation of people?  Maybe it is because they feel that they have nothing in common, and to some maybe they don't, but what many kids don't realize is how much they can learn from the senior citizens.

There is so much that senior citizens can do to help shape the younger generations for the future.  If the youth would just take the time to listen they would see how much they could learn from the elderly.  They could tell the youth about mistakes they have made in the past and help the youth to not make the same kind of mistakes in their future.  They can also share their experiences that they went through like the wars, and the depression.  The younger generation has never really known what war was like and this would help to show the younger generation what kind of things their grandparents faced as youth and how lucky they are to not have had to experience the same situations.  The youth today could learn so much about the past if they only took time to sit down with them and listen.  They would find that they could not only take away a piece of information from the past, but they would probably enjoy listening to them.

One way that these two generations could be brought together is through the schools.  The elderly could be brought into the schools as tutors and mentors.  If they would be brought into the classes the students could learn so much more about past events.  They could learn from what the elderly saw instead of reading it out of some book.  Students would probably enjoy that too, because most kids do not like to read out of textbooks.  Also if students need help with schoolwork, the elderly could help because they have already been there or they were once educators themselves.  Kids would probably respond very well to the senior citizens and from this they would not only get help in their subject but also they would learn respect and make a friend.

The senior citizens would also make good mediators.  Many people have found that when a child is having behavioral problems they do not tend to respond well to their peers, parents, or teachers.  They do however respect the older generation.  They do not want to disappoint them for some reason so they share with them what their problems are.  If this happened then hopefully there would be less fights and hatred from the youth at school and in the communities.  This would be a good idea because this would give the two generations more time to share and become closer.

Another way to bring the two generations together would be for the youth to go visit the elderly in the nursing homes.  They get very lonely and sometimes they don't have family members to come in to look after them.  It would make them so happy to have someone just come in and sit with them for a little while.  This might also take away from the time the kids spend with drugs and alcohol.  They could just share some of their interest and maybe they would find that they had some that were in common.

The opportunities that are out there for the youth to follow and to make a difference are endless.  Helping and interacting with the elderly is just one way that they can help change the future of our community.  They could help to set a path for the next generation to follow and hopefully when today's youth are the elderly then they will have youth that will come to them for guidance or just to have fun.  Both generations would learn so much and help to make each other a stronger person.  It would help cut back on the bad things of the communities.  People would look at them and say  "Wow, what a difference they have made."  This might not sound like a great idea to most teens but if they would just give it and if the schools would give it a chance then they might find that having the elderly involved with today's youth might help shape them for a brighter tomorrow.

Answers To Questions Re: Required Reading

Q1:  How does society invest in marriage in the USA and in Manus?  In the USA people see marriage as second hand.  The rate of married couples decreases every year.  Now people are looking more at cohabitation.  Some people see just living together without getting married as a "Marriage in heart and spirit” and something that does not need to be done through the government.  In Manus they literally invest in marriages.  Just as they would invest in businesses, they do the same with marriages.  Some of these people are seen driving around looking for "investments".  Marriages are very important to them.

  Q2:  Interview 10 married people.  No names.  State the length and number of each one's marriage and a line or two of advice from each on how to maintain a long, happy relationship.

1.  Married for 22 years.  Accept that you and the person you married will not stay the same from the day you married them.

2.  Married for 22 years.  You need to learn how to gain respect for the person you married and they have to have respect for you in return.

3.  Married for 18 years.  You need to begin marriage with the right person.

4.  Married for 55 years.  He goes his way and I go mine and when we talk things never get boring.

5.  Married for 55 years.  We respect each other’s individuality.

6.  Married for 10 years.  You need to stay active in each other’s lives.  Go out and do activities together.

7.  Married for 36 years.   The best way to communicate is to listen.    

8.  Married for 36 years.  You need to sit down with your spouse at least once a day and share with them something that is happening in your life.

9.  Married for 28 years.  Tell them that you love them.

10.  Married for 24 years.  Make sure that there is some alone time in each day.

  Q3:  According to Richard Eckersley, what should our collective goal be?  To see if we are on track to a better future economically, socially, and environmentally according to our long held beliefs or do we need to restructure the way we think about our world and how to live in it together successfully.

  Q4:  Write a worthy goal for your local community.  A community goal would be to take care of each other no matter what happened.

  Q5:  Comment on the excerpts from "Tomorrow's Child."  I think that it is wrong that children will have to look to dolls to find love.  If they grow up being raised by a doll, imagine how they might raise their children or what they might grow up to become.  Children need to know what real love is.  With the other excerpt I believe that we need to see a variety of ethical backgrounds.  I believe if the children will grow up around it there will be fewer problems and our society will grow closer.

  Q6:  How does the fact that the USA is a democracy make lawyers particularly helpful, according to Kathleen Sullivan?  How does our diversity, wealth and size make lawyers particularly helpful?  Lawyers help, like other intermediaries-between individuals and the state-protect us from the danger of tyranny of the majority.  They create a form of public responsibility and accountability that would not happen in an untrammeled democracy.  We are heterogeneous.  That heterogeneity brings more conflict and less agreement about social customs: this is where law steps in to help mediate across diversity of custom or what Madison might call faction.  People who worry about clean air and clean water, people who worry about healthcare and the longevity of human life often are people who have to think about what law can do to solve those problems.  Lawyers help to achieve economics of scale.  They help you save money or repeat transactions by helping you set up processes, procedures and rules that enable the same kind of transaction among a lot of people who don't know each other.

  Q7:  Ms. Sullivan claims bad practices are changed either by regulations or punitive damages.  Which do you prefer and why?  Can you think of an alternative?  I believe that there are bad things about both of them.  There should be some kind of change, but for now I think it will be okay to leave things the way they are because it is not that bad.

  Q8:  Briefly describe three ways society would benefit from the coming retirement of baby boomers, according to the required reading.  The first way that society can benefit from the coming retirement is that they will start the 'gray businesses'.  These businesses will offer services for the people of this generation.  With their experience and business contacts it will make these workers competitive.The second benefit we can receive from them is that with in these jobs they will offer on site "elder care" so that they can hold on to there talented employees who might not be able to work because they would have to take care of their parents.  The third benefit is for the teenagers.  The elderly who will be at home could provide opportunities for teenage entrepreneurs.  The teenagers could learn responsibility this way by running errands and doing things that the elderly would ask them to.  These changes could bring a lot of advancement to the future of our society.

  Q9:  Evaluate the likelihood of President Clinton's anti-poverty program making a real impact.  Give at least three reasons to back up your conclusions.  The likelihood that this will make an impact is very slim.  There is a lot of poverty in this world and I believe it would be hard to reach everybody.  Also the companies that are giving these people jobs are finding that they are not very well educated and can not do the work they hoped they could.  This is also causing people to take their business else where because of these employees.

  Q10:  Name three things Truett Cathy and Tom Lewis have in common.  Both of them are working to do things for children and to help them.  Another thing they have in common is that they are both religious and that is something that is very important to them.  And the last thing they have in common is that they both opened up their house to families and children.  They took care of them and helped them with their needs.

Back