June 16, 2005: Headlines: COS - Liberia: Sedona Red Rock News: After graduating from college, Genevieve Stokes planned to go into law, but first volunteered for the recently-established Peace Corps. She spent three years in Liberia, in west Africa. After learning the Grebo language and receiving medical training, Stokes taught in the mornings and ran a health clinic from her home during the afternoons.
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June 16, 2005: Headlines: COS - Liberia: Sedona Red Rock News: After graduating from college, Genevieve Stokes planned to go into law, but first volunteered for the recently-established Peace Corps. She spent three years in Liberia, in west Africa. After learning the Grebo language and receiving medical training, Stokes taught in the mornings and ran a health clinic from her home during the afternoons.
After graduating from college, Genevieve Stokes planned to go into law, but first volunteered for the recently-established Peace Corps. She spent three years in Liberia, in west Africa. After learning the Grebo language and receiving medical training, Stokes taught in the mornings and ran a health clinic from her home during the afternoons.
After graduating from college, Genevieve Stokes planned to go into law, but first volunteered for the recently-established Peace Corps. She spent three years in Liberia, in west Africa. After learning the Grebo language and receiving medical training, Stokes taught in the mornings and ran a health clinic from her home during the afternoons.
Viewing the spectacle, then living in it
By Joe Scully
Sedona Red Rock News
Sedona, Ariz.
June 16, 2005
Having taught geology for a while, and understanding rock formations, Genevieve Stokes was curious to see just what Sedona looked like.
Upon viewing the spectacle before her after driving down Oak Creek Canyon, she said "this is where I want to live."
Stokes, 62, made it happen. After retiring in 2001 as a teacher of elementary school sciences in a school for gifted students in Las Vegas, she moved into the home in the Village of Oak Creek that she had purchased 10 years earlier.
She has long been concerned for the welfare of others and says she began to learn the need for tolerance while in college.
In her junior year at San Jose State College, Stokes attended a semester with the University of the Seven Seas.
Visiting 32 countries in four months circumnavigating the globe, she learned about world politics, religion and history from a variety of perspectives.
Stokes said she realized what a responsibility it is to play fairly in the world, to respect the customs and religions of others and to learn the true meaning of tolerance.
"We don't realize the problem the world is in," she said. "We need an ongoing effort to learn and respect and appreciate different points of view."
And Stokes did something about it. After graduating from college, she planned to go into law, but first volunteered for the recently-established Peace Corps.
She spent three years in Liberia, in west Africa. After learning the Grebo language and receiving medical training, Stokes taught in the mornings and ran a health clinic from her home during the afternoons.
She learned to diagnose medical conditions, and was provided with training and medication to dispense.
CARE, the international humanitarian organization, provided electricity to her home for a refrigerator that was to be used to store medicines.
Among the conditions Stokes was trained to treat were malaria, tuberculosis, snake bites and various stomach ailments that arose from unclean water and poor sanitary conditions.
Before the Peace Corps arrived, there had been little concern for sterile conditions around childbirth, she said.
Ambilical cords were cut with whatever sharp implement was available, often resulting in infection and death to mother and infant.
Stokes said she realized what a responsibility it is to play fairly in the world, to respect the customs and religions of others and to learn the true meaning of tolerance.
With the help of CARE, training and sterile equipment were provided, which helped avert many early deaths.
After her three-year tour in Liberia, Stokes re-thought her future. Instead of attending law school, she earned a master's degree in education from the University of Kentucky, in Louisville, and entered the education field.
While teaching science, she also ran an educational touring company, providing opportunities for Nevada students and teachers to visit science-oriented venues. Stokes would plan with other teachers to instruct for several weeks on a topic and then arrange extended field trips to San Diego, Death Valley, Catalina and other destinations, to reinforce the learning.
Locally, Stokes has worked in case management for the Guidance Clinic in Cottonwood and has worked with Catholic Social Services. She is a member of the Verde Valley Caregivers, assisting neighbors with trips for shopping and medical appointments.
Stokes lives with her 93-year-old mother, Pauline, and Zues, a 150-pound "retired hotel watch dog." She will soon begin construction of a new home with a wonderful view that she says she thanks God for ever day.
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Story Source: Sedona Red Rock News
This story has been posted in the following forums: : Headlines; COS - Liberia
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