Most Tufts students spent the last days of their spring break sleeping, detoxifying or scrambling to do schoolwork they'd put off, but not senior Elizabeth Bauer. Instead, Bauer's break found her at the 2007 Idealist Campus Conference in Chicago, where she received the conference's annual "Practical Dreamer" Award.
This award is third in a string of honors that Bauer has recently received for her work with Jumpstart, a national program that employs Tufts students with work-study benefits at Medford and Somerville preschools. Each student in the program spends time one-on-one with a preschooler from a low-income family throughout the academic year, working to improve the student's literacy.
Bauer's work with Jumpstart has impassioned her throughout her four years at Tufts, inspiring her to demonstrate the "creativity, and innovation in imagining a better world" that the Practical Dreamer award seeks to honor, according to the Idealist Conference's Web site.
When she talks about her work with Jumpstart, Bauer is effervescent, bubbling with enthusiasm.
"I do this work," she said, "because it's an amazing way to change the world."
Bauer, an international relations and English double-major known to most people as Beth, began her work with Jumpstart freshman year as a member of the Jumpstart Corps, spending 15 to 25 hours a week working one-on-one with two different 3-year-olds.
She remembers these children fondly, and said that her time spent with them so excited her about the program that she decided to work as Volunteer Coordinator the summer after her sophomore year.
This position found her working with four different Jumpstart preschools in the Boston area, allowing her "a more global approach" to her work with children, she said.
It was in this job that Bauer discovered a serious issue: one of the preschools she was in charge of contained lead paint, a poisonous material that has been banned from modern construction.
"Every day when the children entered their preschool, they were being exposed to lead paint," Bauer said.
Bauer sprang into action.
"I contacted ridiculous numbers of businesses trying to get people to come help us," she said. Eventually, she found an expert who explained the health and legal ramifications of the paint to the church affiliated with the preschool, which had previously refused to fund a project to remove the paint.
"Eventually, we were able to secure the $60,000 needed to remove the paint," Bauer said. "Now, when the children walk into the preschool, their health isn't really being diminished."
During her time with Jumpstart, Bauer also worked to create a family resource guide detailing many free and low-priced activities for families in Boston, and organized a successful clothing drive with the local organization Cradles to Crowns. She has interned with Jumpstart's national office, reviewing ideas for curriculum development and currently works as a team leader, heading up a group of seven Jumpstart Corps members.
Bauer said her dedication to the Jumpstart program stems from her love of children and her passion for helping them.
"It's incredible," she said. "I don't know how to explain the feeling it is to walk in to the preschool and children start running up the ramp to you."
All of the children of Jumpstart come from low-income families, a fact that inspires Bauer to work even harder for them.
"If there's anything that I as an individual can do to pull them up, it's absolutely what I need to be getting up and doing everyday," she said.
In addition to the Practical Dreamer award, Bauer's dedication to Jumpstart has earned her recognition as one of 10 national finalists for the American Eagle Spirit of Service award, which honors Jumpstart members for serious commitment to the program.
She was also nominated to be one of 10 Jumpstart members to spend a week raising awareness about the organization's mission with members of Congress in Washington, D.C.
As Bauer wraps up her years at Tufts, she said she's as dedicated to her work as ever. She is currently working to help fix a local preschool that has been prone to floods, helping preschool staff members to temporarily relocate students as she figures out how to best fix the problem.
"I want to make sure that in the next couple of months I am the best resource I can be for the preschool," said Bauer.
Looking to the future, Bauer hopes to turn this passion into a long-term career, either with Jumpstart or perhaps by approaching children's issues at the level of state legislation. Her inspiration, however, will continue to be each individual child that she helps.
"It's the pictures of the children on the wall," she said. "It's having them write me stories."
