Truckers Provide Lessons From Afar

Two truckers driving loads of new cars to dozens of U.S. cities last fall welcomed the opportunity to be teachers, and to see the sights--Old Faithful, the Alamo and Plymouth Rock--in a new way.

Drivers Joe Barboa and Rivers Livous, of Auto Transport Co. in Gardena, learned the historical significance of the landmarks and reported back to a group of fifth-graders at Serrania Avenue Elementary School about what they saw.

“They go to museums and pick up postcards to send to the children,” said Kim Foster, vice president of ATC, when the truckers met students Wednesday at the school. “It gives them something to focus on. And, for the children, it gives some context to San Antonio and the Alamo.”

As part of an alliance with the trucking company and three schoolteachers, the drivers volunteered to send postcards from each stop on their journeys, giving the students a real-life lesson in U.S. history and geography en route.

Back home, the children read the cards aloud and tracked their truckers’ trips state-by-state on a bulletin board map. This was the second of what the school and the company hope will be an annual assignment, said teacher Meredith Nelsen-Smith.

“It shows the kids that not all success stories in life are college educated,” Foster said of a benefit of the program that wasn’t anticipated when it began. “You can have a good job, with lots of responsibility and success in a blue-collar environment.”

That was a lesson one boy said he learned from the project. Before he began reading about the truckers’ trips, and before he met them for the first time Wednesday when they visited the school, he underestimated the skill it took to drive a truck.

“I assumed too much, and I learned a lot about them when we started getting the postcards,” said Ben Ishizuka, 10. “They were talking about the different cultures they met and the responsibility they have.”

The truck drivers said their research was a lesson for them as well.

“You’re always learning,” Barboa said.