Kemp drives students to off-site opportunities.
Photo credit: Joan Gaylord

When it comes to helping kids, Darien resident Frank Kemp doesn’t let town lines restrict his generosity. Though Kemp started as a volunteer with Darien’s Person-to-Person, a community service organization, administrators at Norwalk’s Briggs High School now say they couldn’t run some of their programs without him.

Kemp coordinates teams of drivers willing to transport Briggs students to off-site opportunities including workshops at the Center for Contemporary Printmaking in Norwalk and Silvermine Guild Art Center in New Canaan. It may seem like a small task, but if it were not for the rides that Kemp arranges and the ones he drives himself, it would be impossible for the students to benefit from these community resources.

“There is no budget for transportation,” said Nan Lenore, the art teacher at Briggs, Norwalk’s alternative high school. “We couldn’t do this without him.” Briggs relies upon community organizations to enrich the students’ academic programs, she said. They regularly visit the Bruce Museum in Greenwich and have even traveled to Manhattan for exhibitions at the Metropolitan and Guggenheim museums. Lenore arranges the visits and then Kemp makes sure there are volunteers ready to transport the students.

“It is tremendously rewarding to volunteer,” said Kemp. One of his favorite experiences was when he and others drove students to the Aldrich Museum in Ridgefield. Because volunteers provided the rides, a core group of students was able to return to the museum repeatedly and train as docents. When it was time for the whole school to visit, the student-docents provided tours for their classmates. “It blows me away to see what these kids can do,” he said.

Person-to-Person also provides scholarships for area students and Kemp says he is especially pleased that Briggs students are among the recipients. The grants are based upon economic need and are good for all four years of undergraduate work, Kemp said. “Most of the kids go to Norwalk Community College,” he said. “We want to help keep them in college.”