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To say that she talks a mile a minute is an understatement. Ivy Lee’s words leap from her mouth in her enthusiasm for her pet project.
"Well, first, this is the creation of our frustration," she says in the space normally occupied by two syllables. "We want to better the community, and we have to do it this way because we don’t have money. And we want to give teen-agers a better name. And very, very important, we want to have a lot of fun."
The "this" Ivy refers to is Helpcats, a two-year-old service organization the
Lake Highlands High School sophomore founded with four friends.
Helpcats emerged from what Ivy calls a "volatile mix" of boredom, wariness of adults’ distrust of teen-agers, and a need for an organization responsive to the special interests of teens.
"Every teenager is looking for something like this," she says. Teens want
to perform community service but on their own terms.
Helpcats reflects the teen culture of its 20 members: young, enthusiastic,
and creative. The group freewheels its way through community projects without losing its sense of fun.
"They’re some of my favorite volunteers," says J.D. Stumpf, assistant
volunteer coordinator for the Dallas Zoo, where the Helpcats work with the Rainforest Puppet Theater. "They’ve come up a lot. They’re real enthusiastic, and they never seem to get bored."
It is loosely organized — the group has no service requirements or regular meetings and its two officers, a president and a vice president, serve indefinite terms. Helpcats chooses one service project a season by consensus. In addition to operating puppets at the zoo, the group has fingerprinted children at a homeowner’s association party, raised money for the AIDS Life Walk, and written and performed a Dick Tracy spoof for nursing home residents. Their greatest current problem is transportation; none holds a driver’s license, so the group depends on parental carpools to ferry them to their engagements.
Throughout their contact with the community, Helpcats insist that they are
average teens doing what all teens would like to do. Stumpf expresses amusement at this insistence. "They come at you like they’re regular teens," he says. "But you start to realize they’re not.
It adds to their charm.
"I have to remind myself that these are junior high and high school
students," he says. “They like ‘deep’ discussions about the future
and always seem much older than they are.”
Helpcats participate in numerous other activities, ranging from drama
and dance to a math honor society. And some members of the organization enjoy weekend pizza parties to debate such topics as evolution and creationism.
Despite their sense of self-direction, some adults worry that the group’s
youthful enthusiasm overwhelms its intentions. A sympathetic adult could help the teens channel their energies, says Kathy Ogle, president of the
homeowner’s association where the Helpcats conducted the fingerprinting drive. That in turn would enable the group to have a greater impact on the community.
For their part, the Helpcats have their own dreams: Ivy, for one, hopes the
group will be around for her great-grandchildren. Teens will always need an
organization just for them, she says. The world needs to see that teens can
be teens — and still earn respect.
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