By DAVID VITRANO
News Editor

LAPLACE—Shelia Louper is retired, but you’d never guess it by looking at her schedule.

Her day starts at 5 a.m. when she begins her daily exercise regimen.

“When you reach 60, you gotta keep moving,” she said, repeating an obviously often uttered mantra.

She has no problem keeping moving, though. Her mornings are spent readying her grandchildren for school, a routine that begins at 5:45.

The bulk of her days are spent doing various volunteer projects such as working at the gift shop at River Parishes Hospital as part of the Retired and Senior Volunteer Program and helping juvenile drug offenders at the St. John One-Stop Center.

She is also extremely active in the church, serving as an Extraordinary Minister of Holy Communion and recently organizing a Christian workshop at Our Lady of Grace Church in Reserve.

“You gotta keep God in your hand,” she proclaimed.

Additionally, she spends time entertaining seniors at the St. John Council on Aging.

Then, at 4 p.m., she makes it home in time to get her grandkids off the bus and help them with their homework.

All before it’s time to retire, for the night that is, at 6 p.m.

Oh yeah, and she spends 12 hours a week helping inmates at the St. John Parish Correctional Facility.

This is the “job” to which she is obviously most devoted, her face lighting up when she speaks about her experiences with the inmates.

It may seem like an unlikely career choice for a mild-mannered, retired educator, but Louper insists she did not choose this path. “It’s God who directed me.”

Now in her second year of helping the prisoners earn their GEDs, she has seen 16 men, whose ages have ranged from 19 to 54, graduate from the program.

Many of them, she says, stick around after completing the program to help other students or to study the law books lining the walls, too.

The prisoners must first apply for the program, and once approved they take a series of tests to determine their level and their weaknesses.

They then complete work in the necessary areas, and when they are ready, they take the state-sanctioned GED test.

But Louper’s program does so much more than improve these men’s minds. Through her teaching, Louper is able to change the inmates’ lives.

They gain a sense of accomplishment by achieving goals. They also learn to look at the world in a different way, reflecting on the circumstances that led to their incarceration and on the freedoms they are missing out on as a result of their actions.

One of the recent essays she had her students write was called “If you could make one positive change in your daily life, what would that change be?”

Their answers ranges from “changing the way I think” to “changing the way I judge people” to “stop focusing on negative things” to “being thankful for what I have been given.”

Judging from the heartfelt emotions pouring forth from these papers, the changes in these men goes way beyond the academic.

From Louper, these men learn accountability and gain a second chance at life.

She currently has 12 men under her tutelage and clearly can’t wait to help more.

Before taking on her present vocation, Louper spent 34 years as a teacher and administrator with the St. John school system, two years with the archdiocese and two years in Orleans Parish before “retiring.” And she shows no sign of slowing down.

“I love it. As long as they’re willing to learn, I’m willing to teach them.”