SOROPTIMIST INTERNATIONAL of KERMAN
COMMUNITY SERVICE PROJECTS

In 1996, the Soroptimist International of Kerman developed with the Kerman-Floyd Elementary School a mentoring program. Kerman has a high percentage of hispanic students in the elementary school. A need was seen for these fourth, fifth, and sixth grade students to have a person away from the immediate family to take an interest in them. One of our long-time Soroptimist members, Anita Anderson, has many years experience in the field of education and Anita made contact with the principal at the elementary school, who also happened to be a friend of hers. Anita submitted a proposal to the principal and together the plan was created. The Principal would provide a list of students to be in the “Soroptimist Friends” Program.

Soroptimists participating in the Program were assigned a “Friend” in the fourth, fifth, or sixth grade. This Friend is the Soroptimist’s Friend all school year. The Soroptimist member takes a personal interest in this student by remembering them on birthdays and holidays with small gifts and cards. In addition, on the third Thursday of the month, the Soroptimist Friends, as a group, have a pizza lunch with their student. This is paid for by each Soroptimist contributing $5.00 to buy both lunches. During lunch, the Soroptimist asks the student about their school activities and shares information. After lunch, the program chairperson has educational games for everyone to play together. These include word games, puzzles, pantomimes, math calculations, reading out loud, and memory games. The students enjoy playing because there is always a reward of some kind (cookies, a bag of candy, pictures taken that day, etc.). We also make arrangements to visit the school for the child’s birthday, just to let them know they are special.

The school has been very supportive of this program and feels that they see a positive change in the students behavior in the classroom. Each school year, the Soroptimist may be assigned a new friend or some have the same friend until they graduate to middle school.