Open letter to my classmates

Dear classmates, fellow bus-riders and hall-dwellers,

I know that Spring Break has only just ended, but I would really appreciate it if you would be so good as to stop talking about the past week.

You might find this hard to believe, but the folks around you don't want to hear about how painful every step you take is thanks to that stellar hide-tanning sunburn you fostered in Florida or Mexico. Some of us don't want to watch you carefully inspect your arms and legs in the middle of lectures, and certainly don't want to sit next to you as you peel off strips of your skin and carelessly flick them onto the floor of the bus.

Personally, when you recount your drunken exploits with that guy that Keeli went tailgating with, but Tameka was talking to for a minute——you know, the one with that bleached emo haircut you saw that time at the tanning salon——and how you couldn't remember his name the next morning 'cause you were so "wasted", all I think of is how trashy that sounds.

I don't want to know about how many hot girls you slept with last week, how many beers you drank, or how wild the parties you went to were. I don't want to hear about how sick it was, or how sick you got, and I certainly don't want to hear about the "nasty rash thing on her expletive so dirty I refuse to type it" and how your friend can't pronounce gonorrhea correctly.

Please save these conversations for dorm rooms, facebook posts and text messages. Those of us who don't enjoy getting hammered, buck naked, crazy wild or horizontal with strangers would really prefer to quietly wallow in the misery that the post-Spring Break return to school brings out in all of us.

Thank you,

Jennifer

P.S.—— You should really get that rash checked. Seriously.

Locals put in their time for Million Minute Read

Photo courtesy of Shona Foster, JLA


By Jennifer L. Johnson - news@onlineathens.com
Published Monday, March 15, 2010

The kids weren't as curious about what Morgan Carden was doing in their prekindergarten classroom as they were about the story she was going to tell.

"They were 4 and 5 years old, and mostly they just wanted to hear me read," Carden said.

Junior League members across the state are going into prekindergarten classrooms to try to read 1 million minutes by April to celebrate Georgia enrolling its millionth child in lottery-funded pre-K programs.

The local women started logging minutes at the beginning of the year and contributed to the state Junior League groups reaching their Million Minute Read program goal.

"I think that it was an attainable goal, with all 12 Junior Leagues (in Georgia) going for it," said Shona Foster, president of the Junior League of Athens and a media specialist at Whitehead Road Elementary School.

Foster helped arrange some of the readings by talking to librarian friends and working with pre-K teachers to schedule volunteer readers.

The U.S. Department of Education recommends that parents read to their children at least 20 minutes a day, but some parents might not have that kind of time, according to Foster. She's hoping the volunteer readers can help fill in for busy parents.

"We're going to keep reading because it's so important," Foster said.

The group is focusing specifically on youngsters in Athens-Clarke, where more than 700 children are enrolled in pre-K.

About 90 percent of brain development takes place before age 5, and being read to frequently prepares the child for kindergarten, according to Brigham Young University's School of Education.

"I think that reading to children is one of the most important things that allow their brains to develop," said Carden, a former teacher and the director of Champions for Children childhood development center in Athens. "To me, reading to kids in the community was just one other way to support that."

Carden read Dr. Seuss books to students at Howard Stroud Elementary and Winterville Elementary schools before the late author's birthday March 2.

The kids talked after the stories about rhyming words, which tied into teachers' lesson plans.

The readers also demonstrated other valuable lessons.

Barrow Elementary pre-K teacher Kelly Hocking had been talking to her students about helping other people, so when Junior League member Jo Boling came into the classroom to read, she told the kids about how her group volunteers its time.

"It really made a connection to them about what we'd been talking about," Hocking said. "The kids get excited when anybody steps into our room, but it's that much more important when they can say, 'Wow, this visitor has come to read to us.' It makes the kids want to be readers."

Studies show children who are read to learn to read earlier than those who are not, according to the National Literacy Trust.

Junior Leaguers may continue to read in classrooms as a long-term community service project, according to Foster. The group also is working to provide age-appropriate books for each child in pre-K classes in Athens - roughly 750 books. So far, the group has reached about 25 percent of its goal.

The league posted a book wish list on its Web site, www.juniorleagueofathens.org, and collects book donations at its headquarters at the Taylor-Grady House on Prince Avenue. The group also is taking monetary donations online, which will help pay for books from weRead.com for students in Clarke County schools.

Simple products for simple tasks

When my beloved little mp3 player finally died this weekend, I took to the internet to search for the best prices on comparable devices...only to discover that there really aren't any machines quite so simple anymore.

When did every single product venture into the all-in-one market?

I want a simple little device that plays songs with a one-line readout of the tune blaring through my ear buds, not some high-tech, video-playing, internet-surfing, four-star-rated system with eight to fourteen buttons, a camera function, global positioning system software, a microwave, language-translator that allows me to do my banking in Croatia and Laos all in a bright-pink skin with wrap-around, ignore-the-world headphones that scream, "I'm so cool and aloof, there's no way you can approach me on the bus and ask me to move my book bag so you could possibly sit down."

And can I forgo all of that stuff that'll cost me more than half my rent this month? Nope—not really.

In this high-speed, on-the-go culture, products with only one function seem to be forced out of the market at major retailers, and have been replaced by the consolidation gadget. Printers no longer run off a home-work assignment; they scan, fax and, in some cases, hop on the internet for quick, targeted printing. Cell phones no longer just make calls; they conference, photograph, play music, watch television, play games, surf the web, morph into keyboards, tune guitars, translates documents, projects movie trailers onto a wall, and run hundreds of available programs or applications ("apps" is a terrible word, by the way. Shall I just start calling them "progs" just to mess with people and see how many correct me?), all designed to make your life easier.

I understand this concept——maximizing the utility of certain objects or products is a good marketing/business move. It's nifty having a camera that also takes brief video clips. It's convenient to be able to find your way out of the boonies when you're lost. But don't do this all-in-one dance with every product.

I want a home phone that rings and dials. I want a stapler that just links two pieces of paper together. I want a can-opener that only opens cans. And I want an mp3 player that just plays music.

Senior center plan may help land grant

The Historic Winterville School Building

By Jennifer L. Johnson - news@onlineathens.com
Originally Published in the Athens Banner-Herald on Monday, March 01, 2010

WINTERVILLE - City leaders continue to make plans to renovate the historic Winterville school building for a senior center and have agreed to apply for a $500,000 block grant that could pay for part of the restoration.

Applying for the Community Development Block Grant from the state Department of Community Affairs requires the city to get building inspections, conceptual designs and a tentative floor plan. That work will cost $8,500, but much of the work would have to be done anyway, according to Bob White, chairman of the school restoration committee.

The city acquired the school building and an opera-style auditorium last year from the Clarke County School District.

The restoration committee has been working to find a use for the school building and money to restore it.

Athens Community Council on Aging officials continue to talk with restoration committee members about becoming a long-term tenant in one section of the school building.

"The (Council on Aging) is essential as a partner to the validity of the grant," said Jo Mercer, who sits on the restoration committee. "They're a viable, established community eager to work with us to bring these programs and services to Winterville."

Council on Aging leaders are ready to start selecting existing programs that would work well in Winterville, according to Mercer.

Although the restoration committee and Council on Aging leaders haven't figured out which programs Wintervillians would like at the satellite location, the grant application doesn't require that information.

The senior center won't take up all of the two-story, 9,000-square-foot building, and the grant money only will go toward restoring the sections that house senior programs. If the city receives the grant, restoration of those parts of the building could be completed in as little as two years, according to Mercer.

Finishing the entire building could cost the city up to $1 million based on estimates by city engineer George Chandler, also a committee member.

The grant recipients won't be determined until October, according to Charlie Armentrout, the civil engineer who is assisting Winterville in the application.

"It will be a lot of additional work to pull this thing together," Armentrout said.

In public hearings about the building, Winterville residents said they wanted to use the buildings for senior programs. Other popular ideas included a health center, a space for Winterville's overloaded library and the relocation of city hall.

Programs for other age groups may benefit from the restoration.

"Our grant just has to focus on senior citizens to qualify," Mercer said. "The Athens Community Council on Aging has many programs that they could bring to Winterville."

The grant application requires a conceptual floor plan, not a detailed design, according to Armentrout. The Council on Aging still will have the flexibility to change programs.

"I don't think that anything that we would be doing would be cast in stone," said architectural consultant David Matheny. "It's fluid and flexible enough that we're going to be able to react to the citizens' feelings about this facility."

A public forum for citizens to provide input about the partnership and discuss which Council on Aging programs and services would work best in Winterville will be held at 7 tonight in the Winterville Depot.

House provides sanctuary for missionaries

Bogart-based ministry celebrating 10 years
House provides sanctuary for missionaries

By Jennifer L. Johnson - news@onlineathens.com

Originally Published in the Athens Banner-Herald on Monday, March 01, 2010

Missionaries spend their lives sharing the message of God with other people, but sometimes, they might need a little ministering themselves.

"I tell everybody about God's love, but deep down, I had thought that all of that was not for me," said Marlene Huyler, a missionary who operates a Christian school in her native Bahamas. "I had started to question how much God loved me because of all the bad things that had happened to me."

That was before she came to unwind at a special place for missionaries in Bogart.

"Being here with these selfless people gave me evidence that God had not forgotten about me," she said.

That special place - Missionary Care Ministry, which celebrated its 10th anniversary Saturday with a banquet - provides a free place for missionaries to rest and relax after serving abroad. Over the years, the ministry has opened the doors of its seven-bedroom home on Snows Mill Road to 1,752 guests from 68 countries.

"We feel that this is still one of Athens' best-kept secrets," said Celia Stockamp, chairwoman of the board that manages Missionary Care Ministry. "God's had the doors to this place open (for) 10 years, and it is truly a time to celebrate God's faithfulness to this ministry."

Laura Keil, who founded the nondenominational Christian home here a decade ago, had been a missionary to Africa and stayed at a similar house in Europe before she returned home to the rush of friends and family.

Memories of her stay prompted her to search for similar places in the United States for missionaries working in foreign countries. When she discovered that there weren't any, she approached friends of the family Bill and Sudie Hanger, a couple now in their 90s, to help her fund the project. The Hangers gave the house and its 10-acre property to the organization in 1999, and after extensive renovations, the house had its first guests in 2000, Stockamp said.

"It is a much-needed haven of rest for missionaries," she said. "And it fulfills a desperate need for rest and relaxation."

Because of factors like burn-out and feeling discouraged, some 21,000 people a month leave their ministry work, according to Huyler. The guesthouse - or sometimes just knowing that it's there - has helped some missionaries remain in their assignments, she said.

"(Missionaries) do want to be with their friends and family when they come home, but sometimes you need a day off," Huyler said. "Having a place to stop and heal emotionally gives you hope."

Huyler learned about the Bogart home seven years ago, though she didn't get there for another four years.

She's stayed at the house on three occasions, each time in the same room, giving her a warm familiarity with the place.

Missionaries can spend three to four years out of the country, working in missions that often are under-staffed and leave them little personal time away from work, Huyler said. The ministry house can give them a sense of place - a home away from home if they don't have one in the United States.

For some families, the best part about coming to Missionary Care Ministry is having their own bed, a backyard full of grass and a stream to play in.

"As soon as the kids come, they run right out to the swings," Huyler said.

Everything in the seven-bedroom home - from the pictures on the wall to the children's toys in the closet - was donated.

Twenty-year-old Kati Braswell donates her time at the office in the house. The University of Georgia student learned about the ministry from a church group.

"I'm here because this is what I've always wanted to do," Braswell said. "These people need a place to rest, and I had no idea it existed until now."

Learn more about the ministry at www.missionarycareministry.org.