Dynamic Dads are the Highlight of Jenks Elementary Schools
By DAVID JONES
Contributing Editor
TAKING RESPONSIBILITY: Barry Bramlett reads to his daughter Brooke and several other students at Jenks Southeast Elementary School a book about being responsible. Bramlett and his daughter, who is in a second grade class taught by Cathie Searcy and Ferris Anderson, were taking part in a Dynamic Dads session in which fathers are encouraged to join their children in the classroom once a month.
DAVID JONES for GTR Newspapers
In October they discussed courtesy.
Throughout Jenks Southeast Elementary School, a couple of hundred “Dads” swarmed into the classrooms. Not all of them were dads; they were a smattering of grandparents, uncles, older cousins, stepfathers and who knows what else, but they were all there for one reason: to share a school experience with a child.
“The idea,” says Jenks Southeast Principal Dr. Marilyn Livingston, “has been incredibly beneficial. When it comes to extra activities surrounding the classroom, such as PTA, most of the people who come are the moms. With our Dynamic Dads program, we have 40 percent of the school’s families represented.”
The idea sprang from a program at Jenks East, then spread to other elementary and middle schools. Each school tailors the once-a-month get-togethers for their own needs. Jenks Southeast, for example, is emphasizing character traits such as courtesy, honesty, respect and so forth.
“We blend it,” says Dynamic Dads co-chair Debe Johnson, “with whatever the teacher is working on.”
Hence on an early October morning fathers and children were discussing how certain situations should be handled with the utmost courtesy.
The program usually takes a little more than an hour of a busy father’s day on the last Friday of the month. The program starts with a guest speaker (in October it was University of Tulsa head basketball coach Doug Wojcik) who talks on the importance of being a good role model for the kids. Then it’s off to the classrooms where the dads participate in whatever the teacher has planned.
“We’re pushing male influence,” says Dr. Livingston, “because in education we don’t have as much of that as we’d like. Out of 55 certified teachers at Jenks Southeast only two are male. When you have a parent come to school to work with a child you send a message to that child that THIS IS IMPORTANT.”
Dr. Livingston says that the children really look forward to the monthly meetings.
“There is a pride element that starts about the Wednesday before the meeting,” she says, with children anticipating the arrival of their dads.
“I don’t think parents realize what power they have. The kids are proud of their parents and they want to show them off. I sometimes think parents don’t know this. This is important to these kids.”
Once or twice a year the parents and their children devote a couple of hours on a Saturday to improve the school grounds.
“We are nationally certified by the National Wildlife Federation as a habitat,” says Dr. Livingston. “We have possums, raccoons, rabbits, butterflies and even a couple of skunks.”
Even more important, the fathers are working on a project with their youngsters and the youngsters are working with their Dynamic Dads.
Updated 11-28-2007
Back to Top
