By Ellina Chulpaeff
Joshua Schwartz â11 was named KABCâs “Cool Kid of the Week” for his volunteer program, Intergenerational Internet. The senior citizens at ONEgeneration Senior Enrichment Center in Van Nuys nominated him for the award.
Schwartz has been teaching senior citizens to use the internet for four years and believes all generations should be able to use it.
“I teach the seniors because I believe that the computer is extremely beneficial to seniors; it can make them feel tremendously less lonely,” he said.
Schwartz teaches senior citizens the most basic skills, with the ultimate goal being mastery of sending and receiving e-mails. If senior citizens are able to understand how to use the internet, he sometimes teaches them programs like Microsoft Word.
One of Schwartz favorite things about interacting with the seniors is hearing their stories.
“I learn a great deal from the seniors themselves; they have already lived through so many things in life. They often tell me stories of things in the past. I teach them, but they also teach me,” he said.
Schwartz, who believes that people do not devote enough attention to seniors, wants to recruit more students. He is working on bringing his project to Harvard-Westlake.
