Head O’ Meadow Volunteers

Learn About Junior Achievement

By Eliza Hallabeck

For Fran Wong the orientation held at Head O’ Meadow on Wednesday, October 5, for parent volunteers taking part in Junior Achievement this year was her last at the school, but Ms Wong said this week she plans to continue her efforts with the nonprofit organization that brings real world experiences into the classroom, with her as her children advance to Reed Intermediate School.

“To see an elementary school child understand the concepts of business is a really amazing thing,” said Ms Wong this week, “and hopefully we are producing more business-minded people.”

Ms Wong began volunteering with the program when her youngest child was in kindergarten. During the orientation, overseen by Junior Achievement’s Kate Rossi, Ms Wong offered advice for new volunteers to help them through the process.

Ms Rossi told the gathered volunteers what they can expect when in the classroom. The different lessons, Ms Rossi explained, were created to target the age group with which parents will be working. Each parent volunteer received a booklet with course curriculum, teaching strategies, and more.

The packets, Ms Rossi said, are “made for people who aren’t teachers, so it is really straight forward.”

Each volunteer is responsible for providing the equivalent of visiting a classroom once a week for five weeks, but the overall time spent on the course can be decided on by the classroom teacher, according to the orientation presentation.

Ms Wong said if parents incorporate the use of SmartBoard technology into their presentations, like she did last year for a fourth grade class, students respond positively.

As the coordinator for Junior Achievement at Head O’ Meadow, Ms Wong said she will be looking for someone to replace her next year when both her children will be attending Reed.

This year, Ms Wong said she had more volunteers than were needed to oversee Junior Achievement in each of the classrooms at the elementary school, she also has two fathers volunteering this year for the first time.

Junior Achievement, Ms Wong said, teaches students about entrepreneurship and brings examples from the business world into the classroom.

While plans to bring Junior Achievement to Reed have not been finalized, Ms Wong said any parents interested in volunteering with the program at Reed next year can contact her at Fran.Wong@cbmoves.com or at 203-470-2990 for more information.

“I’d be happy to get people interested,” said Ms Wong.

The program, Ms Wong said, teaches students how the “outside world runs,” and bringing those examples to children at an early age helps them to remember everything they are taught.