Friday, February 05, 1999
Two churches make goodwill partners
Educational exchange holds lessons for east- and west-side Presbyterians
BY JULIE IRWIN
The Cincinnati Enquirer
Sometimes things work the way they're supposed to.
Sometimes someone with a great idea comes across someone with a willingness to help. Sometimes someone like Rosa Sierra, a native of Mexico, meets someone like Te'Airea Powell, a fifth-grader from East Westwood, who last year fell in love with the Spanish language and longs to speak it the way Rosa does.
Sometimes people of good will give the Rosas and Te'Aireas and a couple dozen others a place to meet and a reason to keep meeting. And everyone — students, teachers and the people behind the scenes — comes away feeling like they've won.
Knox Presbyterian Church and Third Presbyterian Church are separated by more than just a few miles. Knox Presbyterian, which occupies a valuable piece of real estate just off Hyde Park Square, is home to a prosperous, educated membership. Third Presbyterian sits off a frayed intersection of East Westwood, a church that over the years had dwindled from 800 members to eight and has been burglarized 20 times in recent years. About 80 people now attend Sunday services at the church.
But nearly a year ago, the two churches forged a relationship that continues each Wednesday evening in the basement of Third with 30 or so students from the East Westwood neighborhood and about 20 tutors from Knox. What began as a well-intentioned but sometimes haphazard effort has matured into a cataloged library, a computer lab and an increasingly organized tutoring program.
“This community has been a very troublesome community. We want to give these kids positive, good things to keep them out of gangs and drug problems,” says Third's pastor, the Rev. Santana Krishnan.
And for Knox? “We're making missionaries out of them,” the pastor says. “It works both ways.”
The story of Knox and Third's relationship began before either church was involved. Reggie Roberts and Rodney Christian, natives of East Westwood, came back to their old neighborhood to organize sports programs at Roll Hill Elementary School so area kids would have something to do. When the school closed to become Project Succeed, the pair went looking for new digs and asked the Rev. Mr. Krishnan to help.
Soon they set up shop in Third's basement and established the East Westwood Youth Council. On the council's advice, the room became a recreation center with table games, a candy store, a VCR with video games and other activities. Dozens of kids started coming by, and the center threatened to become too successful for its own good.
“There were times when we started when there were hundreds of kids coming in and I was alone and there wasn't a lot of teaching going on,” Mr. Christian, a meter reader with Cincinnati Water Works, says. “I'd been teaching a lot of manners, respect and values, but I didn't have time to do that much academic teaching.”
Around the same time, members of Knox had been talking about a change in the focus of their mission work. For years, they had donated generously to all sorts of causes, national and international. Many spoke of an urge to become involved in more hands-on work.
“We believe in local mission as well as international,” the Rev. Christena Alcorn, Knox associate pastor, says. “Your own back yard is probably more important, because you can see the results.”
Knox members were aware of the work going on at Third through Presbyterian newsletters and other media. With teachers, librarians, computer experts and business executives in their ranks, they wanted to lend their expertise, but they were worried their offer might smack of the white saviors rushing to rescue a largely African-American group.
“We went in with Rodney and Santana and said, we're honkies from the east side, is this going to work?” the Rev. Ms. Alcorn says. “We didn't know if we'd be the right mix for them.”
Assured that their help was wanted, the Knox group began in April with six or so tutors and grew to 22, as the students' ranks increased from 10 to as many as 35. There were obstacles: The youngsters range from kindergartners to high-school students, with vastly different needs, and only a few tutors had a background in teaching.
But the effort picked up steam. Knox members collected books for a library, and one volunteer arranged them according to the Dewey decimal system. Others wired the computer area where 16 donated computers now line three long tables.
One student with reading and attention-deficit problems received free testing and evaluation from a Knox member who is an administrator at the Springer School. Another friend of Knox members, a speech therapist, came to class to work with several students. Summer trips to Kings Island, a Reds game and a canoeing trip brought the adults and the youths closer.
And when organizers learned of Te'Airea Powell's talent in Spanish, one of them asked Rosa Sierra to come to class. Ms. Sierra, a lab manager at Children's Hospital Medical Center, is not a member of Knox, but after coming once to Third she was hooked on helping Te'Airea.
“When she (Te'Airea) was reading she was doing it very well, almost without an (American) accent,” says Ms. Sierra, a Clifton resident. “That is great, and we were going through books that were not so simple, very complicated.”
On a recent Wednesday night, Te'Airea showed off the embroidered change purse Ms. Sierra brought back for her from a holiday trip to Mexico. She also explained why she likes learning Spanish.
“It's better than speaking one language,” the 10-year-old Heinhold Elementary student says. “When I go places and I see a Hispanic person, I can say, "Hola, que pasa?'”
Robert Moore is another Third success story. A 13-year-old eighth-grader at Dater Junior High, Robert has been coming to the center for four years.
“My mother is excited because it changed me a lot and made me a lot more respectful. She likes that I help the little kids,” Robert says. “Since (the Knox members) came, we've been able to go on lots of summer trips, and they started the tutoring programs. Since they started coming, lots more kids have started coming.”
Robert greets visitors to Third's basement with a handshake and a smile, wanting to know if he can help in any way. He comes by three times a week and wants to be an architect when he grows up. And one more thing.
“I want to be a leader here,” he says. “And when I get older I can come back and help with the tutoring program.”
Just the way they're supposed to.
TO HELP
Third Presbyterian Church and the East Westwood Youth Council are looking for tutors, especially tutors with computer experience.
Contacts: Rodney Christian, 542-6830, or Joan Wilkinson, 793-4911.
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