AFTER-SCHOOL CENTERS

Our after-school centers provide a friendly and supportive environment for supervised group study and individual tutoring. Centers are staffed by experienced well-trained tutors with degrees in their fields.

The Problem

When students struggle in a class they have limited options. We encourage them to see their teacher for additional help, but this teacher may have numerous students all needing attention in a limited number of preparation hours. Resources may not exist in the home even to provide a quiet study environment, let alone additional help.

A student lacking remedial skills is at a special disadvantage. Teaching staff may have time to support the current curriculum but not to backfill learning gaps that are deep and longstanding. Grades can suffer across a student’s schedule when basic math and literacy skills need development. High school graduation can be threatened if those grades suffer sufficiently, or if missing skills show up on the High School Exit Exam.

The Solution

Aspire Education Project after-school centers can be staffed with AEP Educators or with a combination of AEP Educators and AEP-trained college students. Using trained volunteers can be extremely cost effective and with proper training in content areas and pedagogy, college students can become extremely effective educators. AEP has practice selecting and preparing these educators to succeed.

A group of four or five tutors can provide excellent personalized attention to between twenty and thirty young students. College students and recent grads have two advantages over other educators: the relatively small age difference between educator and student creates a rapport that can be much more effective for communication and alliance building than in relationships with older educators, and college students stand as role models demonstrating both the desirability and accessibility of post-secondary education

A program typically runs two hours a day for four days a week. Attendance is on a drop-in basis, but recording participation and tracking each student improves both the raw attendance and the effectiveness of the program. Students respond to the attention and develop a relationship with these educators that is distinct from that with even the best teachers: where teachers provide knowledge and encouragement, they must also enforce accountability and grade performance. The supplemental educators Aspire provides can serve purely as allies to the students, supporting them through their academic challenges and even through outside difficulties that can impair educational progress.

While allowing attendance to be voluntary can increase the success this program will have for those who participate, through self-selecting by students who care enough about their schooling to take advantage of the extra support, efforts to reach out to students who don’t initially partake of the after-school tutoring will widen our impact. Here, relationships with the teaching staff are crucial. Teachers know which students are most in need of intervention, and are in a place to make this recommendation to students and their parents. Aspire’s supervisors stay abreast of weekly curriculum to improve the effectiveness of the after-school support, and can accept specific assignments from teachers who might wish to direct us to review some topic with students from their classes.

It is important that the program be seen as both connected with the school, and distinct from it. The program’s connection with the overall educational task of the school persuades students and the community to respect the academic quality of the after-school support project. AEP ’s distinction from the school encourages these same groups to be more willing to admit deficiencies and seek out their remedy.