The Willow Glen Resident

Photograph by Skye Dunlap

Point and Click: Roger Fong (left) teaches R.L. Knowles how to set up a spreadsheet during a SeniorNet Learning Center tutorial at the Willows Senior Center. SeniorNet offers courses in word-processing and database programs, as well as Internet service providers, for IBM compatibles.

Seniors boot up in computer classes at the Willows center

Volunteers teach their peers basic skills at SeniorNet Learning Center

By John Pancharian

Whoever said you can't teach an old dog new tricks didn't own a computer.

Hundreds of Willow Glen seniors are leaping into the information age--and understanding what their grandchildren talk about--thanks to volunteers at Willows Senior Center.

The volunteers work through a national nonprofit called SeniorNet, an organization dedicated to teaching technology to older adults and helping them enrich the online community with their wisdom. Through the SeniorNet Learning Center located at Willows, a small staff of volunteer teachers--themselves seniors--run consistently packed classes in basic computing, the Internet and popular software.

"The problem now is volunteers; we really could use more," SeniorNet education coordinator Phil Carnahan said. "If we had more, we could expand our program."

Carnahan said the cliché describing technophobic seniors hiding from the modern age was quickly trampled underfoot by crowds of elders rushing to take computer classes at Willows. Carnahan said Willows offers five eight-week class sessions every year, each accommodating about 230 students, and still there is a waiting list. "We and another learning center in Boynton Beach, Fla., are the largest in the country," Carnahan said.

The program he coordinates offers classes in basic computing, navigating the Internet, word-processing, spreadsheets, databases and other popular software such as Windows 95 and Quicken. Carnahan said he believes the classes are so popular partly because of the laid-back, seniors-teaching-seniors approach.

"Our environment is peer teaching peer," he said. "If someone is going a little slower, they get a coach to help."

Willow Glen resident Forrest Funk teaches spreadsheet classes and coaches others. He learned to use computers back in the digital stone age--1983--and said he loves watching his students discover the practical and the social side to computers.

"It's fun for me to see someone's eyes light up when they learn something, and say, 'Wow, I didn't realize a computer could do that,' " Funk said.

"We ask them at the beginning of class, why are you here?" Funk said. "Many say their grandchildren are on computers, and they want to keep up and talk to them. People just really enjoy it."

Though talking to grandkids might spark their interest, many seniors find as much satisfaction in chatting with each other online.

"That was fun," student Nancy Little said. "I went into a talk room and had the chance to chat with people all across the U.S.

"Try it, by all means," she added. "It's easy; they go at your pace."

SeniorNet began in 1986 as a research project by Mary Furlong. She hoped to determine whether older adults could use computers and benefit by them. She ended up so convinced of both points that she founded SeniorNet.

The service now has about 140 learning centers in the U.S. and dozens more overseas. There is a SeniorNet Web site--administered mostly by seniors--a site on America Online, and numerous chat rooms and bulletin boards "on every topic of any conceivable interest to older adults," said Laura Fay, SeniorNet's assistant director of development. "And some of the chat rooms are not the polite little tea parties one might expect."

Find SeniorNet online at www.seniornet.org. On AOL go to keyword SeniorNet.

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