Students host senior-citizen pen pals for dinner

“Everybody has a need, and that need is to be needed.”

That was part of the message brought by the Rev. Damon Lynch III, pastor of New Prospect Baptist Church in Over-the-Rhine, at the annual dinner for The Gifts We Share, a FamiliesFORWARD program now in its 16th year.

The Gifts We Share brings together children and senior citizens who write letters back and forth and exchange small gifts during the school year. Students develop writing and storytelling skills, in addition to building social skills. The program, which takes place in Bond Hill Academy, Carson School, Evanston Academy and Hays-Porter School, helps seniors connect to the schools and promotes community bonding.

Lynch held a glass half-filled with water and said the bottom part—the water—represented the gifts that people have to offer, while the empty part represented problems in the community. “There is not a human being on the planet who is not gifted,” he said, adding that people need to focus on the water, or the gifts that people have to offer, and encourage them to use those gifts. By focusing on the emptiness, people will feel rejected and become victims of their circumstances, he said.

About 170 students, senior citizens and program supporters turned out Nov. 1 for the formal dinner, which was sponsored by The Westin Cincinnati hotel, downtown. The dinner is an opportunity for the students to put into practice the etiquette that they learned as part of after-school classes.

Alicia Tidwell, diversity/inclusion and employee resource group manager for Luxottica Retail, emceed the event. The Withrow University High School Choir provided musical entertainment, along with Charles Perdue, who played a flute solo. A number of FamiliesFORWARD students performed musical dance selections. Many of the senior-citizen partners joined the students for the final dance.

Deborah Mariner Allsop, executive director/CEO of FamiliesFORWARD, a nonprofit United Way agency partner founded in 1875, presented the second annual Eula O’Neal Gifts We Share Award to Missy Hatt, an educator for 40 years who is volunteering daily to set up a library at Bond Hill Academy after raising $50,000 for the project. The award was named for O’Neal, who for more than 50 years volunteered her time at Cincinnati Public Schools, the Urban League, recreation centers, child-care centers, Head Start, the YMCA and other places to help youths. O’Neal died in September 2011.

FamiliesFORWARD provides comprehensive social services to students and their families in five Cincinnati Public schools. It helps children develop good homework habits, social skills, conflict-resolution and anger-management abilities, healthy attitudes and healthy eating practices. The agency also provides parents with workshops to help them be better mothers and fathers. For additional information, go to familiesforward.net.