Smartphones, Bluetooth devices, scanners and state-of-the-art laptops can make keeping track of information and staying in touch easier than ever. But not everyone is tech savvy; older adults who didn’t grow up in the digital age often find it overwhelming.
There’s a teenager for that.
Through the end of April, a program at the North Cobb Regional Library in Kennesaw pairs seniors from the Kennesaw Mountain High School magnet STEM track with older adults who need help. The adults sign up for 30-minute sessions from 1 to 3 p.m. on Mondays and Wednesdays, and six student interns work through whatever problems they’re having.
Since launching last month, appointments have filled up quickly, keeping students busy showing adults how to transfer contacts from one phone to another, how various computer programs work and how printers and scanners operate. Most of the problems have been pretty generic, said KMHS senior Jeremiah Cadet.
“A lot of questions are what do I do with all these notifications, how do I to transfer information from one device to another and what is the cloud,” said Cadet. “One woman asked how to hook up the Bluetooth in her car, and another intern, Chloe Black, and I went out and did that.”
The one-on-one advice sessions are only part of the high school-library partnership. The STEM program requires students to put their knowledge into practice and involves a comprehensive research project. Since mid-January, Cadet and his peers have been at the library four afternoons a week to work on their individual projects.
“One of the things that attracted me to the library was the chance to learn more about information science; that’s what I want to study in college,” said Cadet. “So I’m looking at data and doing a literature review to see whether or not income affects who comes to the library and if there’s a way to address that.”
At the end of the internship program, the students will present their projects to library officials. Senior Library Assistant Vidhya Jagannathan is looking forward to the results.
“Part of the program is having students identify topics that benefit their hosts,” she said. “So in addition to helping our patrons, they’re also doing research with surveys, census data and studies. One project is about teen attendance at library programs and what we can do to improve it. Another looks at the correlation between poverty and library fines. And all the info is centered on North Cobb so it will benefit the library.”
The public senior-to-senior sessions have proved enormously popular, and library leaders plan on expanding the program. And so far, the teens haven’t encountered a problem they can’t solve.
“Generally, they’re pretty basic questions,” said Cadet. “A few times we’ve had to look stuff up, especially if one of us isn’t familiar with a specific device. One guy came in with a printer problem that got really in depth. We tried as much as we could to help him, and I guess we did – at least, he hasn’t come back.”
Information about the Senior to Senior program is online at cobbcat.org. Appointments can be made by calling 770-801-5320.
Details about the Kennesaw Mountain STEM magnet are online at cobbk12.org/kennesawmountain.
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Each week we look at programs, projects and successful endeavors at area schools, from pre-K to grad school. To suggest a story, contact H.M. Cauley at hm_cauley@yahoo.com or 770-744-3042.
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