friends of
FAIRBURY
Stories of life in Jefferson County
The Fairbury Journal-News
Wednesday, January 25, 2017
Page 5B
TELLING
TALES
Jefferson County
Story by
GORDON HOPKINS
fairburyjournalnews.com
TEAM
PLAYERS
In 1991, Nebraska
legend Tom Osborne
and his wife, Nancy,
founded TeamMates,
a mentoring program
intended to provide
school age children
an individual, oneon-one relationship
with an adult mentor. While classroom
education is important, many feel it is
not the be-all and
end-all of a child's
educational development. Dr. Osborne
said when he created
the program, “Our
young people face
different challenges
today that affect
them personally. If
we are going to make
a difference, we have
to get involved with
them as one-to-one
mentors.”
One of the more
ardent supporters of
TeamMates is Greg
Cromer. Cromer,
M.S.P.T., is a physical therapist working here in Fairbury.
When Cromer signed
up to be a mentor,
he was paired with
a fifth grader named
Alfred Davis.
“When TeamMates
came, I was actually on the board
when it started,”
Cromer explained.
“So I knew it was a
great project for the
kids. We saw good
results in how kids
responded as far as
improving grades,
attendance to school,
decreased dropout
rates and those kind
of things. So I was
really interested
in doing that and I
knew Alfred a little
bit because he was
in my son's grade.
So I went ahead and
said I would be more
that happy to mentor
Alfred.”
Mentors generally spend an hour
a week with a student. According to
Cromer, “During
that one hour you
can do anything you
want. We talk about
school, we talk about
life in general. It's
not a tutoring program or anything
like that but if they
have questions or
we have suggestions
about school or life…
it is just another
person to sound off
with.”
TeamMates—Last Wednesday when Tom Osborne was at the Fairbury Jr/Sr High School talking on the importance of mentoring, Greg Cromer got to have a little
one-on-one with TeamMates program founder Tom Osborne.
TEAMMATES
PROGRAM
Greg Cromer: A TeamMates Mentor
“Alfred and I, we
have a lot of the
same interests. He
likes sports and I
like sports, so we'd
spend a lot of our
time playing basketball or football and
we'd go outside and
walk on the track,
kick field goals and
we'd even, once in a
while, do some baking.”
“He graduated from
the high school last
year but he's in the
LIFE (Living Independently through
Functional Education) program with
the high school.”
Although mentoring officially ends
when the student
graduated, Cromer
discovered that, as
is often the case, the
relationship continues, “Not officially
through the program
but we still keep in
touch, which is nice.
He's looking for a
job that will be adequate for him that
he's excited about
and he's looking at a
couple of things. So
we discuss that and,
of course, we always
discuss Husker football and those kind
of things.”
Motivation can
sometimes be an issue with some kids,
and the mentoring
program can help.
Although as Cromer
relates, motivation
was never really an
issue for Alfred. “He's
pretty impressive. He
doesn't drive and his
parents have a hard
time getting around,
so he's always been
active. One of the
things that I believed
in and Alfred believed in was being
active, so he's always been involved
either in football or
basketball or both
in junior high and
high school. Now he
played up until the
point where he didn't
think he could be
competitive anymore
and then he became
the student manager. So he's been
the student manager
for the football team
the last two or three
years and he helps
the basketball team
as well. And this
year he's helping
with wrestling. He
stays involved that
way.”
“His parents weren't
able to get him to
and from practices
and games, so a lot
of times Alfred would
do something a lot
of kids wouldn't. He
walked.” Cromer noted that Alfred walked
Photo by Tim Linscott/fairburyjournalnews.com
TeamMates—Alfred Davis and Greg Cromer were matched when Alfred was in fifth grade and
still keep in touch.
“When Teammates came,
I was actually on the
board when it started,” he
explained. “So I knew it
was a great project for the
kids. We saw good results
in how kids responded as
far as improving grades,
attendance to school,
decreased dropout rates
and those kind of things.
So I was really interested
in doing that and I knew
Alfred a little bit because
he was in my son’s grade.
So I went ahead and said I
would be more that happy
to mentor Alfred.”
Greg Cromer
regardless of how
difficult the weather
might be. Which, in
Nebraska, was often
very difficult indeed.
“It was snowing, you
know it's cold, he's
walking early in the
morning. He's pretty
impressive that way.”
Being a mentor has
been good for Cromer
and Davis.
Cromer said, “It's
been a positive influence on me and,
hopefully, on Alfred
as well.”
Unfortunately, not
all kids are as lucky.
There is currently
a shortage of mentors in Nebraska
and TeamMates is
actively searching for
adults to fill these
important roles.
“There are a lot of
students that would
like to be with a
mentor but there's
just not as many
mentors out there
as we need,” Cromer
said.
As always, a major
roadblock is time. “It
doesn't seem like an
hour a week is tough
but, for me, being a
physical therapist,
it's hard to try and
fit that in. It always
is hectic to try and
fit that in but every
time I go see him he
always brightens up
my day, so it was a
great experience. I
learned things from
him as well.”
“Luckily, I'm my
own boss, so I was
able to schedule
•Ask a physical therapist about a safer way
to manage pain.
•Physical therapy will help you avoid
surgery and keep you moving forward.
402/491-3660
www.npta.org
“Your Community. Your Paper. Your FJN”
that hour a week off.
What we run into
now with TeamMates
is sometimes employers don't want to
let their employees
take an hour off, so
I know that is one
of our big emphases
now is to try and
meet with the employers.”
“Many kids are
currently on a waiting list for mentors.
The longer they are
on that list, the less
likely it is they will
ever find one. Once
they hit junior year,
that doesn't leave
enough time in the
eyes of some for a
profitable mentoring
relationship, so mentors are more likely
to be paired with
younger students.”
Cromer commented.
If you are interested
in becoming a mentor for TeamMates
and helping a young
person's future, you
can sign up by visiting teammates.org/
or calling 402-3908326.