NORTHRIDGE : Course Leads Seniors Into Computer Age

They played solitaire on the computer, but it wasn’t just fun and games.

For the seniors who filled one of Cal State Northridge’s classrooms Friday, it was serious business as they learned to drag, click and double-click computer “mice” on their way to mastering new technology.

It was the latest session in the senior computers course sponsored by a local senior citizens enrichment group and designed to help older residents shed their fears of modernity.

“A lot of people our age have a huge fear of computers,” said Jerry Eisen, 69, who, as a retired industrial hygiene engineer, helped establish the class to satisfy his own curiosity about the latest computer hardware.

Along with 70-year-old Morris Cutler, founder of the Study, Activity, Growth and Enrichment (SAGE) Society, Eisen teaches the six-week course for two hours every Friday during winter and summer breaks at CSUN.

Demand for the class is so great that some of the seniors in the current class had been on a waiting list since last July. Eisen said the course’s popularity shows the willingness of older residents to stay abreast of the times.

“Our generation grew up on mechanical typewriters,” he said. “When this course is over, (students) will know how to produce and enhance documents, as well as explore other aspects of computing.”

The class was set up three years ago by SAGE as an outgrowth of its efforts to interest seniors in exploring politics, history, art and literature. To thank CSUN for sponsoring the group, the course’s $20 enrollment fee goes toward establishing scholarships at the university for computer science and gerontology.

Class member Howard Zuckerman of Beverly Hills said he enrolled in the course so he could continue a scaled-down version of his tax-preparation service on the family PC.

“I’d like to find out what our computer can do,” said Zuckerman.

Eleanor Hirsch of North Hollywood, meanwhile, is taking the class to enhance her revived attempts at free-lance journalism. Hirsch said she is determined not to be left behind in the computer revolution.

“I want to get updated so that I can buy a computer made in the 20th Century,” she said. “Then I can start to worry about 21st-Century technology.”