Call to Aktion for Disabled Adults

Betty Knauf had community on her mind.

The result of her ruminations is the launching of the Aktion Club, which will hold an informational meeting at 7 p.m. Friday at Clover Park High School in room 108. The club, which is sponsored by the Kiwanis Club of Clover Park, is open to disabled adults ages 18 and older who have an interest in serving their community.

Knauf, a special-education teacher at Clover Park, said that the impetus for the club was borne of her short stint advising the school’s Key Club last year. That experience wasn’t the right fit, she said, but soon after, she came across Aktion Club’s national website.

“It gave me an idea to keep involved with the kids once they leave my (life-skills) program,” she said. “I don’t have to say goodbye; they can come back and I can be involved with them and they can be involved with the community.”

On Friday, prospective members and their guardians will learn about the service projects that they may be able to do, as well as the fun activities and offices for which they would be eligible to run.

Knauf said that the big project they are looking into is through Sleeping Child Around the World, an international organization that provides bed kits to children in Third World countries. A donation of $37 provides a child with a mattress or mat, bedding, pajamas, school supplies and some food. The club will receive a photograph of each needy child it supports.

The Aktion Club also may adopt a street in Lakewood, or may make make wreaths and Christmas cards during the holidays, or even inspirational cards throughout the year—“it’s totally up to the club to come up with ideas.”

Club members will also seek input from the mayor, police chief, fire chief and parks department about what they would like to have done in terms of civic projects.

“They’ll find out what the community wants to have done, take a role and do it themselves,” she said. “That will be a great thing.”

Knauf said that joining Aktion Club gives disabled adults an opportunity to be contributing members of the community, as well as a leadership role.

“It’s not just a club for them,” she said. “They can do things in the community that other people do. It’s an area they have never had an opportunity to shine in.”

Knauf said that the club needs 15 members for a charter, and that Aktion Club’s national guidelines recommend no more than 35 or 40 members. Even so, she said, if the turnout is higher, “I can’t turn them away.”

“There has been a lot of potential interest,” she said, “and I am really excited about that.”

There are other Aktion Clubs in Washington, the nearest in Issaquah, and Knauf plans to attend the district convention in Anacortes in May.

Advising the club also gives Knauf a final chance to work with Clover Park senior James Mamerto, who has been a teaching assistant in her classes. Helping develop the Aktion Club is his senior project.

“Once I told him about, he immediately said he wanted to do this with me,” she said of Mamerto, the winner of an Act 6 Award that gives him a full scholarship to Pacific Lutheran University. “He’s very gung-ho."

“I can’t say enough good things about James," she added, "and I can’t wait to continue working with him.”