Hospice News
 West Orange, NJ -- In 2003, at 70-years-old, West Orange Resident Gloria Watkins embarked on a 27-month journey with the Peace Corps to the Village of Nobody in Limpopo Province, South Africa. There, the substitute teacher was an educational resource person to schools and residents in the Village and Ga Mathiba. It was the death of her husband, James, in 2001 that prompted her to fulfill one of her life-long dream of becoming a Peace Corps Volunteer.
“I remembered President Carter’s mother joined the Peach Corps when she was 70,” said Mrs. Watkins. “I always thought, if she could do it, I could do it.”
Today, now 78, Mrs. Watkins continues to fill her days by giving them to others. She is currently a volunteer at the New Jersey Performing Arts Center in Newark, NJ, is a tutor with the West Orange African Heritage Organization and, since 2008, has donated more than 650 hours to Barnabas Health Hospice and Palliative Care Center (BHHPCC), an affiliate of Barnabas Health located in West Orange.
Her work with the BHHPCC includes visiting patients who reside in nursing homes and those who are living at home. Mrs. Watkins also devotes Monday evenings to knitting lap blankets and shawls for patients receiving hospice and palliative care services. “Many times I just lend an ear or sit and talk with people who don’t have many visitors,” she explains about her time volunteering for hospice.
Mrs. Watkins has always been inspired to volunteer. The New Jersey native recalls volunteering weekends at Camp Walkills in Bear Mountain, New York, working with underprivileged children from Harlem, when she was only 18 years old. After moving to California in 1958, she volunteered as a docent at both the Oakland Museum and President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s Yacht. In addition, while working full-time as an Academic Advisor at the University of California, she was a tutor at several Oakland Elementary Schools and was assisting young women with children in a literacy program.
When she retired in her 50’s, Mrs. Watkins returned to school and earned a bachelor’s of arts degree in history from Holy Names University in Oakland, California. In 2006, after serving in the Peace Corps, Ms. Watkins returned to New Jersey.
When asked what has motivated her to continue to give so unselfishly for nearly seven decades, Mrs. Watkins, the recipient of the 2008 Franklin H. Williams Award given to returned African American Peace Corps volunteers for outstanding community service, replies, “I’m just not the type of person who can sit down and watch television. I like spending time with people and I’m always ready to lend a hand.”
For information about becoming a volunteer with Barnabas Health Hospice and Palliative Care Center, please contact Spiro Ballas at sballas@barnabashealth.com or 973-322-4866.
For more information about the Barnabas Health Hospice and Palliative Care Center, please visit www.barnabashealthhospice.org.
Date: August 16, 2011
Contact:
Public Relations: ltortorello@barnabashealth.org
973-322-4924
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