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Contact: Liz Carroll
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E-mail: carroll@gcc.mass.edu

Media contact: Liz Carroll
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Release date: April 25, 2005

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Conversation partners builed bridges between cultures

"Language barriers don't mean personal barriers,” says Kit Carpenter, GCC Department Chairman of ESOL (English for Speakers of Other Languages). "Language barriers are fairly easy to get across if someone wants to build a bridge to someone in another culture.”

That's what Carpenter's "conversation partners” have been doing for 15 years. Since 1990, four to eight volunteers per semester have been meeting once a week with newly-arrived immigrants to share conversation and offer some guidance about resources in the community. "I don't have a long training program because it's not a tutoring situation,” says Carpenter. "This is just for conversation.

"Conversation is crucially important,” explains Carpenter, "to create an opportunity to make a real relationship that can help support the student. The relationship also offers a chance for students to talk about things that are meaningful to them, and to use their new language to do that.”

Irmarie Jones and her husband, "Brud,” of Greenfield were among the program's first conversation partners. What they learned over the years has helped shape the role of conversation partner.

"It's sort of everything: being a friend, being a teacher,” says Irmarie. "What I try to do is help them speak better. In many cases, they say the words but you can't understand them because they pronounce them so differently from the way you would. When they're reading along and you correct them, and the next time they get to that same word and they'll say it right, there's such satisfaction because you know that you've corrected the pronunciation. I think that's probably what I do as much as anything, is just get their pronunciation right.”

That and a whole lot more, according to Carpenter. "There was one time that Irmarie helped find a piano for someone whose child was musically gifted,” says Carpenter. "She helped another student find furniture for her apartment, and get it there! Irmarie shares information about scholarships that are available to international students. Because she's so active in the community, she's been a tremendous resource for students.”

When Irmarie celebrated her 80th birthday last year in a very public party advertised in the Recorder, which publishes her popular, twice-a-week column titled "Just Plain Neighbors,” many of those friends showed up to help her celebrate. One was a young woman from Uzbeckistan. "I had had her for a couple of years,” recalls Irmarie. "She came here at 19 all by herself, and she showed up at my party. I hadn't seen her for two or three years and I asked, ‘Where are you now?' She's in Westfield, where she's studying criminal justice at Westfield State College. As soon as she becomes a citizen, she wants to become a police officer. She's taking Spanish so that she can speak two languages and help out in court. When I first met her, she wasn't speaking English very well at all. I think I had her for two years, but she caught on very quickly. She got jobs, she got an apartment. She's an amazing young woman.”

One of Irmarie's treasured mementoes is a handkerchief with a crocheted edge and her name embroidered on it, a handmade gift of a Cambodian woman Irmarie conversed with for two semesters. "I still have it. It means a lot to me.”

Last year at this time, Irmarie suffered a stroke, but that hasn't stopped her. "I feel that there should be people there acting as conversation partners,” says Irmarie. "You help them somehow get used to being American.”

This spring, Irmarie and Brud were honored for their volunteer service as conversation partners. "They treat students as individuals,” says Carpenter. "They've been tireless and enthusiastic advocates for international students at GCC since they became part of the program.”

"I'm not sure that the English was the most important thing,” mused Irmarie recently. "I think in some cases it was just being a friend.”

To learn more about being a conversation partner, you can call Kit Carpenter at (413) 775-1226.