| Best Buddies provides lasting friendships
By Pat Healy When Julia Lockhart is wheeled into the Common Ground on the Dana Hall campus, her eyes dart from one person to another until they click on a person she recognizes as a friend, tenth-grader Steffany Nichols. The two hug hello and laugh with delight upon seeing each other. Steffany is one of 19 members in the new Best Buddies program at Dana Hall, which serves as a social outlet for members of the special needs community at Needham’s Charles River Arc. Once a week each Dana Hall student involved with the program will either e-mail or talk on the phone to her buddy, and once a month the two groups get together for an activity. Today’s activity is making ginger bread houses. Working with a $1,000 grant from the United Way, The Dana Hall chapter of Best Buddies has already held such events as a dance, a barbecue and a movie night. The buddies range in age from 12 to 21. Nichols participated in the planning process for the Buddies program last year, and says she has been pleased to see the results. “A lot of people didn’t know what to expect at first because this was the first time they had been in a group like Best Buddies,” she says. “But I think it’s going really well. Different friendships take a little more time to develop but they end up being really strong friendships.” Buddies Chapter President Maxine Kantor agrees. “Even though Rose and I just met this year our friendship is really thriving,” she says. Rose Inglis, a twelve-year old buddy from Brighton nods enthusiastically as she carefully places a chocolate shingle on the roof of her gingerbread house. Rose’s mother, Anne Marie Inglis, is also enthusiastic about the Buddies program. “It really seems to be working just the way that it’s supposed to,” she says. “She’s more excited about it than I expected her to be. She’s usually a little hesitant about doing anything new, but she’s eager about it and loves getting the invitations addressed to her in the mail, and when Maxine calls she really likes talking to her.” Donna Corrigan, director of boarding life at Dana Hall, and an advisor to Best Buddies, says the program is also a benefit to the parents. “For the parents, when the kids get dropped off here, this is an opportunity for them to have some sort of a relief and do something else, where they know their kids are having fun and doing some sort of an activity,” she says. “That wasn’t the main goal, but we did notice that the parents are really happy with the program because where they entertain and interact with their kids day and night, this program is an opportunity for the kids to interact with other kids and join in and do activities like any normal kid.” David Osborn of Wellesley, says his son Ryan functions better socially because of the Best Buddies program. “He works like a Xerox machine, and he copies actions, so when he sees something and likes it, he looks for it again and replays it,” he says. “So he is what he is, to an extent, because of doing things like this. Instead of being scared of everybody and shying away he’s very comfortable and outgoing with people.” Osborn says he and his family moved to Wellesley from Sydney, Australia because of the better programs available to Ryan in this area, such as Charles River Arc. Peter Sabino of Wellesley says the food is his favorite part of Best Buddies. He places a red licorice chimney on his ginger bread house and then reconsiders. “She’s super,” he says pointing shyly to his buddy, tenth grader Katherine Adams. Kunal Sharma also agrees that his buddy is his favorite part of the program. “She’s really cool,” he says about tenth grader Jennifer Faro. Courtney Caruso, also a sophomore, says the friendships she has made so far from Best Buddies have been its biggest reward. “You get to know a lot of kids who you wouldn’t get to know otherwise,” she says, “and it’s such a different way of life that it’s really good for us to see, because we interact with these kids and we grow to love them.” Kim Carey, a house director in one of the Dana Hall dorms, and an advisor to Best Buddies, says that the program has been a tremendous success this year, and she is planning for an even better year in 2003. “This year it has taken some time to get started, but now that we’ve gotten to know theses families and kids, next year will be a lot easier because we will already have those relationships formed.”Back |
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