Olds Municipal Library employees, along with seniors and high school students are getting ready for another edition of the library's award-winning Cyber Seniors program this fall.
The program, a partnership between the library, Olds Institute through Olds Connected Communities and Olds High School is now in its third year. The library imported it from the U.S., where it began in 2009.
It helps seniors to become more familiar with today's technology with the help of high school students.
The Albertan met with some of those seniors and students recently.
Earlier this spring, the library won a 2017 Minister's Award for Excellence in Public Library Service for the Cyber Seniors program.
Abby-Jean Gertridge is one of the high school students who coaches seniors in the program.
"I like volunteering for things," she says. "I moved here just two years ago and I didn't really know what to do because I'm not huge into sports.
"One of my counsellors, Tane (Skotheim) had come up to me with the idea of, ëhey, there's this program running at the library and we thought you might like to help out with it. It's on Tuesdays after school. Just show up and they'll show you what to do.'"
She loves it so much she wants to do both sessions again this fall and winter.
"It's an excuse to talk about technology, which I don't normally get to do, and I like teaching people and helping people, so it's a fun chance," she says.
During the latest instalment of the program, Gertridge coached Dorothy Christensen.
Christensen's daughter signed her up.
"I said, ëhow much is that going to cost me?' She said, ënothing, it's free for seniors.' I was thrilled. So the 10 weeks just went by. The two hours every week has been great," Christensen says.
Christensen wanted to learn about cloud computing.
"I knew how to email and how to do that, but I just learned so much more," she says, adding she now knows how to place things in clouds and how to retrieve items from there.
She also learned how to obtain books from the library online.
Ashley Nichol is another seniors' coach.
She was especially impressed with how much Harold Gordanier, 87, learned as a result of the program.
"He wasn't very experienced at the beginning," Nichol says. "He was only learning on an iPad, so he didn't have very much experience at all."
Nichol says Gordanier knew how to search for things online and how to use email, but he wanted to know more about how to keep up with people on Facebook.
"Almost every day, he had new questions to ask, because he'd take his iPad home and do what we learned the last time, and then he'd have new questions and then come back," Nichol says. "At the end of the session, there wasn't really much else that he really had (to learn)."
Nichol enjoyed helping Gordanier out.
"It was one-on-one so it was really fun to meet somebody like Harold especially, because he was really into the community and all about volunteering and everything, too," she says. "It was nice meeting another person in the community where we kind of had similarities and we just got to know each other really well.
"It was really nice just helping too. It was fun being able to just come and ñ I learned a lot too; like I'm not very techy too, so I got to learn lots too in the program and it was nice helping (others)."
Gordanier enjoyed the experience too.
"She updated different things and got me organized (helped me set up passwords)," Gordanier says. "I had a whole lot of things I was having some problems with ñ all the pictures. We got them into files. She showed me how to do it.
"For us, it's like a whole different language; you don't know what a lot of these things mean."
Gordanier says the experience was good for both him and Nichol.
"You get this gal at 17 and (laughs) and me who's 87, well, we've got some different stories to understand each other's language and lifestyle and stuff," he says.
"We had our 65th high school reunion a couple of years ago and so there were a bunch of pictures from that. She was kind of impressed that people would have a high school reunion from 65 years ago."
Don Dwyer, a volunteer in the program, says he served as a kind of go-between for students and seniors.
"I'm basically a senior. I'm a young senior, but I'm a senior, and I know the frustrations that I've had," Dwyer says.
"I've become reasonably computer-literate, but I see the frustration on people who aren't ñ people that I'm familiar with. That's why I volunteered for this.
"I know there are a lot of people out there who are just apprehensive of computers; know it's important, know it's a significant thing in the future of all of our lives, but it can be very intimidating.
"If something simple goes wrong, you've just got to kind of stop and put your hand up for help.
"So it was just trying to make seniors feel comfortable and go out and talk to them."
"It's an excuse to talk about technology, which I don't normally get to do, and I like teaching people and helping people, so it's a fun chance." ABBY-JEAN GERTRIDGESTUDENT
