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Heroes of the Week

While health care workers take care of coronavirus patients, these Maryland student volunteers are watching the kids

Baltimore Sun
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Eni Owoeye, 20, volunteers through Maryland Covidsitters to babysit two girls whose parents are both healthcare workers. Maryland Covidsitters is a non-profit that provides overworked healthcare workers with babysitting and tutoring helps.

Eni Owoeye, 20, volunteers through Maryland Covidsitters to babysit two girls whose parents are both healthcare workers. Maryland Covidsitters is a non-profit that provides overworked healthcare workers with babysitting and tutoring helps. (Kenneth K. Lam)

Three times a week, Eni Owoeye leaves her West Baltimore home at 7 a.m. and drives to Locust Point for a babysitting job. Her compensation for the eight-hour stretch? The gratitude of the parents — both health care providers whose lives are stretched thin by the pandemic.

“They say ‘thanks’ a lot, though they don’t have to,” said Owoeye, 20, a volunteer for MD COVIDsitters, a nonprofit network offering child care and other household services (grocery shopping, pet-sitting) to hospital workers in Maryland, Washington, D.C., and northern Virginia.

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Many of the group’s 236 volunteers are medical students who want to give back during the crisis. Owoeye, an environmental studies major at New York University, signed up for another reason.

“My mom is a COVID-19 nurse at [University of Maryland Medical Center],” she said. “I remember what it felt like, when I was younger, when she had to work and it was just me and my siblings at home. Now I’m entertaining these kids and taking away that anxiety.”

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For two weeks, Owoeye has cared for the family’s two daughters, 12 and 9, while their parents work, free of family concerns.

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“I’ve done mentorship programs in the past, empowering young women and strengthening their self-image,” Owoeye said. “On the flip side, I’m Black and the children are white, and it’s enriching to have that personal communication — especially in this divisive climate where races don’t interact on a regular basis.”

Begun in March, the MD COVIDsitters program — one of 20 such branches worldwide — has provided services to 75 health care workers, including some in Baltimore City and Anne Arundel, Baltimore, Howard and Harford counties. Volunteers are male and female, age 17 and up and are matched with clients near their homes, said Ankita Gautam, co-founder of the group. A fourth-year medical student at Ross University, Gautam had her hospital internship delayed by the outbreak.

Haley Suh, of Ellicott City, a rising junior majoring in neuroscience at the University of Maryland, College Park, is Hero of the Week. Suh is a volunteer with MD COVIDsitters, where student volunteers help essential workers with household needs including tutoring, babysitting and grocery shopping. July 22, 2020.

Haley Suh, of Ellicott City, a rising junior majoring in neuroscience at the University of Maryland, College Park, is Hero of the Week. Suh is a volunteer with MD COVIDsitters, where student volunteers help essential workers with household needs including tutoring, babysitting and grocery shopping. July 22, 2020. (Kim Hairston/Baltimore Sun )

“We wanted to help those on the front lines any way we could,” said Gautam, of Upper Marlboro. “By doing acts of kindness, volunteers can network and show health care providers what kind of workers they’ll be in the future.”

Two weeks ago, volunteer Haley Suh got the call: an orthopedic surgeon in her Ellicott City community needed help to care for her 6-year-old son.

“He and I read books, took a walk and played soccer,” said Suh, 20, a junior neuroscience major at the University of Maryland. Afterward, the doctor offered to let Suh shadow her at UMMC and, perhaps, to help in her research lab there.

“It’s cool to see all of this unfold,” Gautam said. “One doctor said that during a pandemic, health care providers must choose between family and work. If they choose family, then patients die. COVIDsitters, she said, was ‘the antidote’ to that situation.”

Know a hero?

We want to hear about the essential workers and everyday people who are keeping the Baltimore area safe, fed and cared for. Submit your heroes at baltimoresun.com/heroes.

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