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Teacher in Need Phones Home Geneva Kids Help Peers in Louisiana

Posted on: Monday, 19 December 2005, 21:00 CST

By Rupa Shenoy Daily Herald Staff Writer

In the weeks after Hurricane Katrina hit New Orleans, thousands of evacuees flooded a nearby Baton Rouge school district, where Laura Klatter - only a year into her first job out of college - was teaching fourth grade.

They needed help, so she called home.

Now, Klatter, a 2000 Geneva High School graduate, is serving as a link through which clothes and toys are being sent from Geneva students to children in Baton Rouge, who -four months after New Orleans' destruction - still are much in need.

After receiving her teaching degree from Louisiana State University, Klatter decided to teach at Cedarcrest-Southmoor Elementary School in East Baton Rouge, where she had interned.

When Katrina and Rita inundated Klatter's school district with nearly 6,000 children, she made a frantic call to her mother, Helen Klatter, secretary to Geneva schools Assistant Superintendent for Business Rebecca Allard, and said the new students were in need of the most basic items.

"Laura told me they didn't have books or enough copy paper so that they could copy books," Helen Klatter said. "Some didn't have shoes. They wore flip flops."

Helen Klatter, in turn, talked to Harrison Street School fifth- grade teacher Cheri Powell, who called Cedarcrest Principal Nancy Hammatt and arranged for donations.

"This is a good way to teach kids that its not on the news anymore but these people still have needs," Powell said. "It's a life lesson that builds emotional intelligence."

Harrison children gathered new and "gently used" shoes, socks, underwear, and other clothes, packed them in bags, and sent them to Baton Rouge students.

School staff washed unclaimed lost-and-found items and sent them off. Teachers and families in need received gift cards, Powell said.

"We're just trying to think of a lot of different ways to help," she said. "Whatever we can think of to do to let them know we're thinking of them."

Classes are creating videos and writing letters to Cedarcrest students, who are writing back, Powell said.

Meanwhile, in Geneva High School, the student leadership team, a group of about 70, organized its own efforts to help Klatter's school.

By soliciting area stores, appearing on school television programs and putting a donation box in each homeroom, the group got the word out, gathering dolls, trucks, toy cars, Play-Doh, drawing pencils and other children's playthings to send to Baton Rouge.

"I think we all realize how much this is going to make a difference," said Jackie Santacaterina, a senior leading the drive.

Hammatt told Geneva High School Principal Greg Fantozzi that students attend her school in shifts.

"I don't think we have a grasp of the mass of humanity that they are trying to deal with that are homeless," he said.

Having Laura Klatter involved gives that "mass of humanity" a face, name and place - and a sense of security that Geneva children's efforts are being directed to the right people, Powell and Helen Klatter said.

Source: Daily Herald; Arlington Heights, Ill.

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