Parent Lends Time, Ear for Student

For three years, Ron Jackson, a volunteer mentor at El Camino Real High School, has enjoyed a weekly lunch date with 17-year-old Darrell Fields.

Over pizza or burgers, the two talk about sports, dating and Darrell’s dreams of attending culinary school. And of course, grades.

The quick weekly lunch leaves little time for math or English lit tutoring but no matter. The program is more about the mentors showing up and the students sticking it out.

“Some kids don’t think that adults follow through on their commitments,” said Jackson, 53, who has three children, including a 17-year-old daughter who will graduate from the Woodland Hills campus this year.

Jackson prides himself on being a good listener. He said 17 years as a grocery store clerk at Albertsons has taught him that.

“I don’t try to be a therapist or a social worker,” he said. “I just try to be a friend.”

Currently, 58 students are assigned to mentors. Incoming ninth-graders with a grade point average below 2.0 and poor test scores are selected for the voluntary program. The goal is for the mentor and student to stick together four years until graduation. Older students whose grades have dropped or attendance has slipped may also participate.

Many of the mentors are parents, teachers and school staff members. Others are professionals from firms such as the Boeing Co. plant in Canoga Park. One is a college student, another a geologist and another a retired woman credited with getting three male students--whom she has met with weekly for four years--to graduation.

“If they wouldn’t have had [her], they wouldn’t have made it,” said Fern Somoza, an advisor in the program.

El Camino started its mentoring program in 1995. Mentors are screened and references checked. Mentor training workshops and special off-campus field trips and luncheons to celebrate student achievements are funded by grants and through private donations.

Jackson said he looks forward to his Wednesday lunches with Darrell. He knows little of Darrell’s home life, only that he lives with his mother and that his parents split up when he was 8.

Jackson said he likes to keep their conversations simple. During a recent lunch, Jackson advised Darrell about the stock market. And the two talked about Darrell’s grades. Jackson is concerned that after improving last year, Darrell’s grades have fallen again. Jackson said he wonders if the slip was caused by Darrell’s long commute. He travels some 35 miles each way from his home in Huntington Park. He often rises at 5 a.m. to make the bus on time and does not get home until 12 hours later.

Darrell also works as a cashier on the weekends at a discount department store in Torrance. His pay helps support his mother and provides some pocket change.

“I give advice if asked for it,” Jackson said. “As a mentor, I try to tell him to turn his lemons into lemonade.”

Jackson, who lives in Winnetka, sometimes helps Darrell with homework. Occasionally, he will drop Darrell some ideas on good study habits. Once in a while, he will give Darrell a book as a gift, such as Stephen Covey’s “7 Habits of Highly Effective People.”

“I think in time, what Darrell will remember most is that a stranger took an interest in [him],” Jackson said.

*

Personal Best is a weekly profile of an ordinary person who does extraordinary things. Please send suggestions on prospective candidates to Personal Best, Los Angeles Times, 20000 Prairie St., Chatsworth 91311. Or fax them to (818) 772-3338. Or e-mail them to valley.news@latimes.com.