December 29, 1999
Teacher helps transform town
By Carol South
Herald contributing writer
Art teacher Deborah Kaskinen Crandell has witnessed transformation in her hometown.
A native of Kaleva, the Garfield Township resident still commutes an hour one-way every day to teach art at Brethren High School in the Kaleva, Norman, Dickson school district. There, she and two other art teachers, Cynthia Asiala and Amanda Bultema, teach a service learning class at the high school and middle school level, which takes their students into Kaleva to rebuild the town.
This fall, the Points of Light Foundation honored the teachers with the Presidential Service Award for their work. Crandell and Asiala traveled to Washington, D.C. in October to receive the award and met the President of the United States. Elementary school teacher Chris Makinen, who initiated a summer Walkabout program four years ago that generated the idea for the service learning class, was also honored by the foundation.
"This project has given a sense of identity to the town and students in this spread out district," said Crandell. "We had this general idea of trying to rebuild the town and took it to the superintendent, who was real supportive, as were town officials. It is kind of an unusual formula to have, but it works."
During the past three years since the class began, her students have rebuilt an outdoor cabin theater, log by log, and renovated an old, abandoned building into a Welcome Center. They also restored the Train Depot, built an art gallery and renovated a park, which had been just a parking lot. Students have also been constructing a walking trail as a joint project with students from the Manistee Intermediate School District.
The idea began when the school needed another class in the curriculum. Asiala thought a service learning class would be a great idea for the district, but Crandell was initially skeptical until the idea of restoring the town took shape. Both natives of the area, they had watched the once-vital community founded in 1900 by Finnish immigrants fall into disrepair.
The first year, which began the during the school's second semester due to an initial shortage of funding, students conducted a community survey in Kaleva to determine what residents wanted to see done. They then determined goals for the project and took an oral history of the town from a number of the founding settlers.
"The first class did all the groundwork," Crandell said. "We have since traveled to University of Michigan to talk about our class and last spring went to the Governor's Mansion because the class received the Governor's Service Award."
For the students who participate, they receive school credit and a huge lesson in life and community. They have learned to plan, budget, manage resources, and work together as a team toward a distant goal. Technical skills they have learned include construction, welding, sculpting and carpentry.
"We are able to reinforce academic curriculum with this project, including reading, writing and the visual arts," said Crandell. "Students have worked with more than 1,500 community volunteers, who have been both helping and mentoring them in specific skills."
Taking the service learning class has become a cachet to the junior and senior students, the only grades eligible for it. They can repeat the class once for a total of two semesters and most choose to do so. They work hard to show that not all teenagers are out to cause trouble and that some want to contribute to the community, Crandell said. An annual newspaper the students publish and send to the community summarizing work on the project gives them a chance to learn other skills, including writing, editing and publishing.
"Many students do not even live in Kaleva but they come in to work," Crandell said. "They really feel a sense of identity with this project."