Alla Denisenko, youth outreach coordinator

ALLA DENISENKO

For young Russian-speaking immigrants in the Boston area, Alla Denisenko's door was always open. In particular, her office at Brookline High School was a gathering place for high school students hoping to keep their culture alive, adjust to life in America, and navigate complex parent-teenager relationships.

"She did more than social workers do - she was like another mother to us," said Yana Fedorova, student president of the Brookline High Russian Club. "She gave us advice, and whenever we made mistakes, she didn't say that we made mistakes - she made us see it as if we could get out of our problem."

The Russia native, who was a pillar of the local Russian-speaking and Jewish communities, died Feb. 15 at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center from complications of cancer. She was 56 and lived in Brighton.

In working with teenagers, she tried to get inside their minds to understand how best to offer help. She was hired by Jewish Family and Children's Services in Waltham to work as a youth-outreach coordinator based at Brookline High, helping hold families together, often during times of family crises.

"She worked very closely with families as a unit - not only with teens," said Ena Feinberg, director of services for new Americans at Jewish Family and Children's Services. "She was a very open, very warm person with perfect understanding of teen psychology."

Her office on the third floor of Brookline High was filled with knickknacks brought by her students from Russia and photographs of students at their graduation ceremonies. The Russian Federation flag was affixed to an office window.

While part of her job involved serving as a translator for parents, she also was in the thick of the after-school Russian-speaking community scene, helping to organize dances and other activities for students born in former Soviet countries, many of whom were Jewish.

Colleagues said Mrs. Denisenko wrote college recommendations for students and, like a favorite aunt, would counsel them on dealing with a slew of problems.

"They immigrated during a very difficult period of their lives, and it was very necessary to learn what is white, what is black - they really had lost their orientation," said Marina Akhmetova, a former Russian language teacher at Brookline High.

Friends said there was a youthfulness to Mrs. Denisenko that made her fit in with the teenagers who befriended her. Many students were not shy about seeking help for complicated problems that they could not discuss with their parents, relatives and former students said.

"Anyone who had a problem would always hang out in her office," Fedorova said. "She was in contact with all of us, and she tried to form that bond between us - and with the school."

Born in the Siberian city of Omsk, she moved to Ryazan, where she met her husband, Sergey. She attended a Moscow university, earning the equivalent of a master's in English language studies. She taught English at a middle school in Moscow whose name translates to "school of self-determination." Many of her former students remained in touch with her over the years, staying with her in Boston when they would visit the United States.

"She had a special connection with her former students - she took great care of them," her husband said.

The family moved to the United States in 1992, and she started out teaching English as a second language at Roxbury Community College.

"She talked with everybody from any social strata, any age," her husband said. "She was really, truly interested in people."

As large waves of immigrants from Russian-speaking countries moved to the United States, Boston became one of the more popular destinations; many settled in Brighton, Brookline, and Newton.

Mrs. Denisenko's role evolved out of a growing sense that more energy needed to be spent on helping the younger Russian-speaking population with a wide array of adjustment issues.

"Everyone had her phone number, and called her at all times of the day and night," Akhmetova said

She was diagnosed with cancer in December, and Fedorova and others said her absence from the hallways of Brookline High was felt immediately. "Her personality made her special - she was a very special person," Feinberg said.

In addition to her husband, Mrs. Denisenko leaves a son, Michael of Brighton; her mother, Elvira Kolesova of Brighton; and a half-sister, Natalya Gomelskaya of Waltham.

Services have been held.