Successful project sees students living in retirement homes

JOHANNA, 92, beams at the 20-year-old stepping into her room – not a visiting grandson, but rather a housemate at her retirement home.

Town planning student Jurrien is one of six who have chosen to live in the yellowbrick home in Deventer in the eastern Netherlands as part of a unique project that benefits everyone.

The university students pay no rent and, in exchange, spend at least 30 hours a month with some of the 160 residents doing the things professional staff cannot always do -- such as just hanging out.

“They go for a chat, they play games, go with them to the shopping mall and do shopping for those who can’t,” activity coordinator Arjen Meihuizen said.

Gea Sijpkes, head of the Humanitas retirement home, said: “It’s important not to isolate the elderly from the outside world. When you’re 96 years old with a knee problem, well, the knee isn’t going to get any better, the doctors can’t do much,” Sijpkes said.

“But what we can do is create an environment where you forget about the painful knee.”

While retirement homes in many European countries lack enough rooms for an age- ing population, budget cuts by the Dutch government have made it increasingly difficult to get a subsidised place, leaving some with more rooms than they can fill with elderly people.

The idea has resonated in a country where many people do volunteer work, and other retirement homes are coming up with their own variations on the theme.

In some schemes, the elderly rent out a room in their own house or flat.

In others, housing projects are built specifically to house the young with the elderly. – AFP