FOSTERING INTERGENERATIONAL CONNECTIONS AT YOUR COMMUNITY
dren. They encourage the children: ‘Here, try your peas.’ Those are some of the neat- est little moments.” Those neat little moments don’t just hap-
pen on their own. For executive directors and other senior living community leaders, it takes careful planning and a bit of fore- thought to pull off a successful intergenera- tional program.
Rules of the road Senior living rule of thumb: Safety first, of course. For Ryan Stephenitch at American House, that means pairing the right seniors with the right events, and then vetting both the venue and participants with care. “It is the independent residents who typi-
The Watermark at Rosewood Gardens resident Emil Cigliuti collaborates with Livermore High School students as they develop inventions for the recent "Seniors Helping Seniors” science fair and presentation.
people who were in command of their lives for so long and now they have less control of their surroundings. This gives them control again,” Goodyear said.
Remote, and up close At American House Cedarlake in Plainfield, Ill., executive director Ryan Stephenitch has found that even when younger and older peo- ple can’t be in the same room together, there still are ways to create a meaningful intergen- erational bond. His residents put together care package for less-fortunate kids at holiday time, and just making up those bundles and boxes seems to have a positive impact. “The seniors like to nurture, so for some
residents who don’t have a lot of family in the area, this gives them someone to hold on to, to take care of,” he said. “For those residents in particular, this can be their only interaction on an intergenerational level, and so they do look forward to that.” Senior Lifestyle Corp. also has been look- ing to connect residents with kids in need: The company is collaborating with nonprof- it Together We Rise to make care packages for youth in foster care. “Our residents will be decorating and
stuffing ‘suitcases,’ which are duffel bags full of things a foster [child] wouldn’t necessary get when they are pulled out of a crisis sit-
20 SENIOR LIVING EXECUTIVE JULY/AUGUST 2018
uation—a stuffed animal, coloring books,” said vice president of resident experience Hollie Kemp. “We feel it’s an opportunity for residents to give back to local youth. For the foster youth it’s a way of
telling them
that someone in the community cares about them, that they do matter.” It’s hardly the conventional intergenera-
tion program, but that’s just the point. “We want to push the boundaries a little bit. You see a lot of sameness in senior housing, and a lot of it is really good, but I think it’s also important that we are always trying new things,” Kemp said. Certainly, that holds true at Ebenezer. At
the Ebenezer Ridges community in Burns- ville, Minn., seniors regularly come down to the childcare center to read to the kids. Generations take part in music, arts, and craft projects together, and they share their holiday celebrations. Moreover, co-location means that there is a deep, ongoing experi- ence of togetherness. “We have direct access to the residents’
areas. We sit on their furniture and we share meal times together,” Schumann said. “Our kids will bring in their regular lunches and they will sit down in memory care to have lunch. It’s funny because the residents al- ways eat better when the kids are there. They want to be role models to the chil-
cally are going out, but if it is an assisted living resident, then we want to make sure they can go without needing any significant nursing care. We look at how long the trip is, what the conditions will be, if they will have to tackle stairs. We gather all that informa- tion ahead of time,” he said. Success relies on the personal touch, hav-
ing a team of caregivers who keep a close read on individual residents’ interests and abilities. “We have a good handle on our residents and their activities, so we think about who our most social residents are, who would benefit the most. We know that some are frankly turned off by the idea [of socializing with kids], and so we try to ap- proach those who we know would be most drawn,” Stephenitch said. Once they’ve identified residents who
are ready and willing, activity directors and other key leaders can take additional steps to ensure a positive experience. When Goodyear’s residents were getting
ready to meet their high schoolers, “we or- ganized it to make sure that we had at least one good communicator in each group of residents,” she said. “Then we made sure that in each group, the staff member had a strong personal connection to at least one person in that group.” In order to have the best chance of suc-
cess, Goodyear brought in a wide range of leaders from across the community: The director of dining services, the human re- sources director, the maintenance director, and others. “We knew that if we got the leadership involved, they would then get their staff involved,” she said. That push for staff involvement can be a critical component driving the success of an
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