A Student Of Her Community

A USC Davis School student turns her final exam into a real-life grant
By Jonathan Riggs

Barbara Thomas

A grant-writing final exam for Ed Schneider's GERO 589 class earned Seattle-based, online master's student Barbara Thomas more than an A-she received real-life funding.

"Barbara has been in two of my classes and is always one of the top students. I was extremely happy to hear her grant would be funded," Ed Schneider said. "She exemplifies the spirit of our program: students who dedicate themselves to making the world a better place for today's and tomorrow's seniors."

Thomas, a home-delivered meals assessor for Senior Services of Snohomish County's nutrition department, wrote a grant requesting funding to maintain the agency's Meals on Wheels program, which serves 1,100 older adults with 158,500 home-delivered meals. Impressed with her proposal, The Medtronic Foundation accepted.

"It is a very rewarding experience," Thomas said. "Especially because I get to work with the clients every day who are going to benefit from the funding."

A 2009 graduate of the University of Washington, Thomas became interested in gerontology when she volunteered as a long-term care ombudsman, earning her certification and eventually working in 15 local adult family homes.

"It really opened my eyes to some of the regulatory problems in the long-term care industry and to the challenges that older adults face when they are no longer able to live independently," she said. "I knew after my first visit that this was the field that I wanted to go into."

Enrolling in the USC Davis School's online master's degree program allowed her to continue her career in Washington while opening up countless amazing educational opportunities.

"Sharing the virtual classroom with international students from places like Singapore and Iraq has been my favorite part of distance learning because it adds the perspective of global aging to each class," she said. "It's also a privilege to be working with such well regarded professors who have tremendous knowledge about the field of gerontology."

A published poet, Thomas lives in Everett, WA with her 15-year-old son Nicholas, her partner, Cate, and two dogs, Hugo and Vita. Her gerontological interests include long-term care, advocacy, LGBT issues, education and autobiography/life review. Academically, Thomas continues to turn classroom assignments into real-life success stories: a video she created for Aaron Hagedorn's Gerotechnology 506 class is now featured on The Birren Center for Autobiography & Life Review's website main page.

Thomas also recently became a master trainer for the Stanford Chronic Disease Self-Management program and will facilitate her first class in June. Next month, she will graduate from USC and is already excitedly planning a Southern California itinerary that includes professional activities, including thanking Dr. Schneider, but leaves a little room for a few more lighthearted adventures as she prepares for the next chapter of her career.

"I'm going to Disneyland!" she said with a laugh.