Pupils urged to record stories of elderly

A new project for pupils doing transition year in second-level schools has been introduced by the Friends of the Elderly group to bring teenagers and older people together.

The "Life and Times Biography" project involves students working in pairs to interview an older person and write their biography.

The students will get a certificate of merit from Friends of the Elderly while the project will help to alleviate loneliness and isolation among older people, according to the organisation.

A bound copy of the biography will be presented to the older person to be kept in the family and a copy will also be kept in the school library and used for researching local history.

Dermot Kirwan, development manager with Friends of the Elderly, said the organisation had created the project because it was receiving an increasing number of calls for friendship visits from elderly people who were "desperately lonely" despite the fact that family members lived nearby.

"In spite of our increased mobility and communications technology, loneliness and isolation is becoming a very real problem for the elderly who live alone," Mr Kirwan said.

"There are now 121,826 elderly people living alone in Ireland. When the elderly are active and mobile they can keep up their own social network.

"But if they become house-bound due to a fall or illness, or the death of a spouse, then they rely on family, neighbours and friends to call," he said.

Mr Kirwan said that isolation of the elderly was once the result of emigration, but it was now the result of prosperity because people were too busy to remember older people.

"There is a new social class developing - the elderly who live alone, and they are being forgotten about."

He said the project would help second-level students to develop a connection with the past as this link was becoming increasingly fragile.

"Teachers are telling us that some of their students can't remember the last time they had a conversation with an elderly person," he said.

"We would like all families to have a written record of the "Life and Times" of their grandparents that can be passed down as a family treasure," he said.

Copies of the "Life and Times" format are available to transition year teachers from Friends of the Elderly. Tel: 01 8731855 or  www.friendsoftheelderly.ie