The Justice

Similar cooperation between intergenerational volunteers at Brandeis would be far from innovative: University of California, Berkeley holds off-campus meetings with the elderly as part of their curriculum. Students learn communication and oral skills from experience, while the elderly stimulate their hungry minds. Many participant testimonies confirm the success of activities varying from lectures to student-led yoga classes. Essentially, campuses such as Berkeley's give students access to a growing population that will be our clients, coworkers, and eventually peers.

The global public's average age increases exponentially due to the stubborn postponement of death through improved medication, geriatrics and research in gerontology. Our administration does little to encourage the study of the demographic changes caused by our aging parents and the baby boomers. We typically engage in age-segregated activities and goals, but many methods exist for our community to reap the benefits of a widespread and natural relationship with senior citizens. Judging from the Generations Symposium, undergraduates and elderly people hold common misconceptions about each other that cause natural disdain and avoidance. Liberated from the barriers of embedded ageism, we could discover that perseverance and ambition rather than senescence and decline are the hallmarks of the Boston area's aged population.

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