By Blake Sebring,
Big Brothers Big Sisters of NEI
At age 11, Courtney Scoles had to learn life’s hardest lesson, and now her goal is to help kids in similar situations.
Courtney’s mother Jennifer Schenkel-Scoles passed away in 2013 after battling breast and brain cancer. There were lines of people at the funeral home to pay their respects to the woman who worked in the finance office at Glenbrook Dodge. Of course, her daughter Courtney and her three siblings were crushed, but she remembers her mom telling her that life is like stairsteps. There were always going to be those you tripped and fell on, but you always have to climb back up to get where you are going somehow.
Soon after, Courtney received a mentor through Big Brothers Big Sisters and she started attending Erin’s House For Grieving Children.
“I found that helping kids on those sort of paths is what I want to do,” she said. “I don’t know how to put it other than there is more to life than just losing people. That’s what I want to help kids understand. There’s a lot more than just the bad things that go on in life, and there is good that can come out of those bad things.”
So, Courtney became a volunteer at Erin’s House, working with a group of 6- to 9-year-old kids for three years before committing to study psychology, cognitive neuroscience and counseling at the University of Saint Francis where she’s an 18-year-old freshman. When the pandemic presented challenges for many BBBS clients, she joined Jaren Harmon, Miranda Jackson and Jorie Rodenbeck in forming Learning Pods, a program that helps children continue their schoolwork at the agency. Courtney serves breakfast and lunch, helps with assignments and makes sure students attend their Zoom classes.
“I’ve always had a goal that I wanted to work with kids (at BBBS),” she said. “Now, coming here and working hands-on with them, something clicked, and I know absolutely this is what I’m supposed to be doing. For me, coming here wasn’t about making money, it was about the impact I was making on people, and that’s always been the goal. I saw the impact my mom made on people and all she did was sit in an office. If I can do what she did to one person in my lifetime, that would be all right.”
Mom would certainly be proud of her start.
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