COFFEE BREAK
Saturday, March 28, 2015
PARENTS TALK BACK
Sending
12-year-olds
completely
off the grid
7
he most enriching, eye-opening
learning experience happened nowhere
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For 45 years, the Parkway School District
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It’s a four-day experience;
it used to be a week-long
program, until budget cuts
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“We talk about
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said Ron Ramspott,
coordinator for Healthy
Youth Programs for
Aisha
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Sultan
Parents talk back
about disconnecting with
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My daughter’s class
recently took the trek into the wilderness (a
very tame wilderness, as all the cabins have
air conditioning and electricity) for lessons
on water ecology, wildlife and soil quality,
along with outdoor activities like horseback
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ban on any digital devices for the entire
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“We weren’t sure we were going to make
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One of her friends packed grid paper in
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they don’t have a tech device nearby for four
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cohort who won’t remember a time before
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only four years older than them, has been
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Removing them from their hyper-
connected, screen-saturated environments
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“If you wanted to know how to do
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It’s not surprising how often questions
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a student wondered what the most common
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time or set an alarm without resorting to
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information and solve problems, they had to
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“We couldn’t contact our friends on the
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to document the experience through the
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Eventually, the impulse to constantly
document lessened, and the moment took on
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“I coped because I had 12 of my friends
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proved less of a distraction at night, which is
when most school children retreat into their
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“I got closer to people I wouldn’t have
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Even if the students didn’t think about
that overtly, at some level, the experience
reinforced the importance of human
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But it wasn’t just the children who
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without any way to check in on them runs
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Becky Lopanec’s daughter, Julia, also
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missed her daughter’s phone as much Julia
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“I spent the week sending her random text
messages knowing that her phone was off
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of texts during the next four days: “How’s
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My own phone was a reminder of how
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rereading our old text conversations while
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My daughter had a sentimental reunion
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She cradled her phone in her hand like a
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Ŷ
Aisha Sultan is a St. Louis-based
journalist who studies parenting in the
digital age while trying to keep up with her
tech-savvy children. Find her on Twitter: @
AishaS.
East Oregonian
Page 9C
Summer camp goes wild:
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By SUE MANNING
Associated Press
/26$1*(/(6 ² &KLOGUHQ
who love to dance, act or play
sports have summer camps spe-
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parents don’t realize that kids who
are passionate about pets can have
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6 to 17 will attend day camps this
summer at hundreds of animal
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urge to nurture animals starts
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becoming key parts of families
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of programs that offer budding
veterinarians and other young
animal lovers a way to help dogs
and cats and learn the responsi-
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fastest growing programs at the
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executive director of the Humane
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tion from parents often is: “What
are they going to do, clean the
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getting free volunteers in to scrub
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children to animals and show
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ers learn to feed, exercise, wash,
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In some camps, older youths can
watch a surgery, help with minor
stitches and monitor an animal
patient to test out careers in the
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Ohio, is building a national da-
tabase of camps on crayonsand-
AP Photo/Chris Carlson
In this March 16 photo, Mikayla McCarthy, 15, left, and Ashley Carter, 14, look at a red-tailed
boa constrictor during the Arizona Animal Welfare League & SPCA spring kids camp in Phoe-
nix. Thousands of youngsters from 6 to 17 will attend similar summer camps this year at
hundreds of animal shelters across the country.
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over 250 shelters with camp of-
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“Many parents don’t know it’s
an option for their animal-loving
kids, and some of the shelters
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sandrino, 23 and 26, respectively,
went to camp in Phoenix over a
decade ago when the programs
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her veterinary technician license
and returns to the shelter each
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year of veterinary school in Scot-
land, and her sister awaits the day
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“I thought I wanted to be a vet,
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“One day, we got to go in where
they were doing spay and neuter
surgeries, and I instantly realized
that was not something I could
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She enjoys taking tempera-
tures, measuring heart rates or
giving shots, so she became a vet
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“Since I was able to walk, I
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can cheer you up if you are hav-
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gecko and a bearded dragon at
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get to meet exotic animals at
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5-foot iguana, is the most popu-
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In Florida, the Humane Soci-
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its camp three years ago to give
children ages 7 to 12 a chance
to bond with animals, play an-
imal-themed games, make an-
imal-themed crafts and hear
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When camps start, about half
the kids have pets at home, said
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over, about two-thirds of the par-
ticipants own animals, because
their families have adopted furry
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OUT OF THE VAULT
WWII bomber crashes kill 14 near Pendleton, Boise
D
uring World War II,
Pendleton was a training
site for bomber crews
supporting the war effort in the
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killed 14 men and injured two
more on March 16, 1942, when
B-17 Flying Fortress bombers
went down between Pendleton
and Boise, Idaho, during separate
routine night training exercises
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second crash happened just 10
days later, but all 10 crewmen
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One of the B-17s crashed
three miles southwest of
Gowen Field, near Boise, at
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in the crash, and two men were
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Hosford III,
of Butler,
Pennsylvania,
the pilot of the
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25-year-old
Hosford had
been married
Renee
Struthers just a month
Out of the vault before in the
Pendleton
base’s chapel
to Helen Pruitt of Pendleton, and
celebrated his birthday the day
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20 miles south of Pendleton in
the Blue Mountains, and salvage
crews struggled through the snow
to recover the wreckage and the
bodies of the 10 crew members,
who all perished instantly in the
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over a mile-wide area after the
plane hit one ridge and then
caromed across the canyon to the
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crashed shortly after takeoff on
March 26, landing a half mile
from the home of Jack Shafer,
who owned a ranch six miles
northeast of Pendleton, near
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of the plane traveling at about
5,000 feet with smoke trailing
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later the 10-man crew bailed
out and parachuted safely to the
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a left spiral and crashed to earth
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to Shafer, strewing wreckage
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privates from an infantry division
stationed at Walla Walla, who
were en route to Walla Walla
from Pendleton when the crash
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scene and stood guard duty until
the crash crews could arrive from
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On a lighter note, one of the
sergeants involved in the March
26 crash complained, “With all
that territory to land in, I had to
light on a barbed wire fence and
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Ŷ
Renee Struthers is the
Community Records Editor for
the East Oregonian. See the
complete collection of Out of
the Vault columns at eovault.
blogspot.com
ODDS & ENDS
Driver gets ticket
for driving with the
‘Most Interesting
Man’ in carpool lane
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Washington State Patrol trooper
says it’s by far the best carpool
scam he’s seen, but it didn’t
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when they do, they prefer ‘dos’
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on Monday afternoon spotted
a driver and a rather unusual
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stopped the car, he discovered
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cutout of the actor who portrays
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driver was told not to use him
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cutout, the State Patrol tweeted:
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Police track suspect
through Snapchat
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wanted by police for several
weeks made a couple of
woman apparently did not know
that the item she picked up and
transported Monday was an
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believe the woman knew the
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She told authorities that she
found the item while cleaning
her property in Sandia, about
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Employees at the recycling
center recognized the mortar
round, cleared out the place and
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AP Photo/Washington State Patrol, Trooper Tony Brock
This Monday photo shows a cardboard cutout of the “The
Most Interesting Man In The World,” otherwise known as ac-
tor Jonathan Goldsmith, of Dos Equis beer TV commercial
fame, strapped to the passenter seat of a driver who tried to
use the image to qualify to drive the carpool lane on Inter-
state 5 near Fife, Wash.
critical mistakes that led to his
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media messages pinpointing his
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Police tell the Morning
Sentinel that on Sunday night
they received tips from people
who said Wallace had posted on
Snapchat that he had returned to
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While they were searching
with permission of the resident,
they were tipped off that Wallace
had posted a new Snapchat
message saying police were in
the house looking for him and he
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Woman drops off
old mortar round at
Texas recycling site
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some items she found on her
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what turned out to be a piece of
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a bomb squad was dispatched
and the mortar round was safely
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Police say the 62-year-old
Jury convicts man
of attacking woman
with his cane
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convicted of attacking a woman
with his cane because his
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convicted 57-year-old James
Shettles of aggravated assault on
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Witnesses said Shettles
confronted the woman in June
2013, angrily accusing her son
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blow her head off if he didn’t get
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Shettles swung his cane at
her, but the woman was able to
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went into his home and retrieved
what looked like a handgun and
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Police later determined that it
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