Every Wednesday after school, a cadre of teachers from Rose Kidd Elementary in Sterling Heights, Michigan, treks to a mobile-home park to help some of the neediest students with their schoolwork. “It’s teaching at its purest,” says Helena Foust, who founded the seven-month-old volunteer program involving a handful of her colleagues. The group meets in the park’s clubhouse, where kids do their homework, review lessons, and play brain games. “It makes doing homework fun for them,” says Tina McGuffin, whose 9-year-old son, Jordan, concurs, adding, “My grades have improved. So I know it’s helping.” The idea is also catching on, as other schools in the Utica Community Schools district have started similar programs. And the timing, according to Rose Kidd’s principal, couldn’t be better. “Especially with all of the higher standards of achievement everyone is being asked to meet,” says Christopher Hammill, “some kids need an extra push.”
A version of this news article first appeared in the Web Watch blog.
