Currently, I know of only one place where I can find free crackers, bright blue T-shirts, and a never ending stream of people requesting piggy-back rides. This place is Los Penn Elementary School. When I’m not drowning in homework, I seem to be spending much of my time volunteering at Los Penn’s Homework Club, an after-school program for children. I had gone there during my junior year solely to complete my mandatory hours for Key Club and NHS. However, my involvement this year began when my good friend, Roy, expressed interest in going back. His reason was simple. Roy “liked little kids”, as he put it. I heartily agreed to the prospect. Hoping to involve a greater number of students in the project, we introduced the Los Penn Homework Club to Rancho Bernardo High’s Key Club as a year-long project. While Key Club attendance is not always optimal, Roy and I are there three days a week playing games and helping kids with their homework.

What originally began as something to do involving being outside of my house became something completely different. As we spent more time at Los Penn, a few facts concerning the program and the school were brought to my attention. The first was that the housing surrounding the school is government housing. This came to be a great surprise to me. A mere three-minute drive down the street from the affluent school populated by spoiled suburban teens was a community that was, for lack of a better term, poor. Another interesting piece of information that I learned reinforced the previous realization. The Homework Club was a completely free program designed to assist parents who could otherwise not afford after-school care for their children. The existence of a community of struggling families so close to the well-off community nearby (Rancho Bernardo) provokes thoughts about similar situations. The new awareness was depressing, if nothing else. However, as clichéd as the following statement may sound, the knowledge that the children and school which I assisted were actually in need made me want to not only continue my involvement in the tutoring program, but to increase it. The work I did now had greater meaning. As with many “community service” events our club provides, I assumed that the Los Penn project involved a program which high school students could put on their college application without actually accomplishing anything (various events such as putting registration packets together for our school come to mind). The chance of doing work that would actually benefit the community and especially people who are not as fortunate as my fellow Key Clubbers and I is, to say the least, rare. Thus, I increased my involvement with a new fervor.

I cannot claim, however, that the hours I spend every week there are due purely to my philanthropic (<- exaggeration indeed)tendencies. One could argue that my attendance is controlled by the presence of free juice and people that actually like me. While this is an exaggeration, the friendships I have formed as a result of my time at Los Penn are surely as important to me as the community service aspect. The majority of the children know my name, and I talk to a few on a regular basis. The fact that I can joke around with Louis about her taste, or lack of taste, in music and play on the swings with Sam brings me joy. Utimately, their shouts of glee at the prospects of getting pushed on the swings and games of tag mirror my own. Simple pleasures for simple minds, I suppose. But what I love most about getting to spend time with the elementary schoolers is their kindness and naiveté. Being around people who are friendly and truly considerate is a far cry from the high school experience. In the end, the innocence and honesty of the children is refreshing. Even those that are obnoxious and rebellious are preferable to high schoolers, as they have no false pretenses. The children remind me to exhibit these admirable qualities as well. For, as a tutor, I am expected to be a role model. As luck would have it, being nice and patient is not as hard as one would believe. (actually it can be difficult at times. respect all teachers for being able to put up w/our crap w/o killing us)

Ultimately, Los Penn is an escape: an escape from the stress of homework, the incessant need to finish college applications, and, most importantly, the craziness that is my daily life. My great hope is that the college experience will become some comparable form of joy and freedom.